Newvid
Continued from Page 9
the soundtrack is first-class as well.
Violence, subject matter and lan
guage make “Above The Rim” a
movie not to rent for the kids, but it’s
well worth seeing.
PICK OF THE WEEK — A
movie focusing on competition in a
pool hall, between two men and within
aman’s soul, “The Hustler” isan all
time classic.
Paul Newman stars as “Fast Eddie”
Felson, a young, dynamite pool player
who has come to Ames, Iowa, to chal
lenge the legendary Minnesota Fats
(Jackie Gleason) to see who really is
the best.
Felson loses, but he begins on a
long and painful journey that will
bring him back as someone completely
different.
All the performances are top-notch,
and the pool-playing skills exhibited
by Newman and Gleason are out
standing.
0
Stylish slapstick!
SCAPiNO
October 6-8 A 11-15
TICKETS ON SALE NOW!
CALL 472.2073
THEATRE ARTS & DANCE
BOX OFFICE: TEMPLE BUILDING, 12TH4R STREETS
UNIVERSITY Of NEBRASKA-LINCOLN
“Red Hot and Country”
Various Artists
Mercury Records
Rating: B
Another death, another baby is
bom, another big-budget AIDS
benefit album is produced. This
disease-destroying compact disc,
“Red Hot and Country,” features
supertwang artists like Johnny
Cash, Billy Ray Cyrus and Mary
Chapin Carpenter. Yee-hah!
Dolly Parton’s cover of George
Jones’s “You Gotta Be My Baby”
is the only song worth getting ex
cited about on this album. What
fun! Whatta gal! Cuteness may be
the highest virtue after all.
Conversely, Brooks and Dunn’s
cover of “Folsom Prison Blues” is
a filthy desecration of a Cash clas
sic, capable of stinking up this en
tire album with its blasphemous
stench. Hearing these two honky
tonk moronsgiddily declare “I shot
a man inRenojustto watch him die
— And when I hear that lonesome
whistle, I hang my head and cry!”
like they just won a rhinestone
blow-up doll in a rodeo contest is
enough to make one nauseous. Sor
row and regret make for a bad Nash
ville two-step, apparently.
The four-man band of Wilco,
with Syd Straw in the wings, pro
vides the best hope for the future of
country music on this album. Their
cover of “The T.B. Is Whipping
Me,” is both fully modem and au
thentic country at heart, detailing
the sad death of country star Jimmie
Rodgers. It could almost make you
cry or something.
Most of the songs on this al bum
are strictly “ehh.” Johnny Cash’s
“Forever Young” is a real
dissapointment—badly produced
". 11111 1111,11 """ '■ ",u I
f
by Randy Scruggs, with lousy in
strumentation and an unimpressive
guitar solo that never ends.
Sammy Kershaw’s “Fire and
Rain” sours and molds the memory
of a James Taylor classic. Nanci
Griffith sings “If These Old Walls
Could Speak” in the little-girl
whispy of an Appalachian Smurf.
Willie Nelson and Carl Perkins
do fun, revamped versions of their
own songs.
“Red Hot and Country” presents
a few country artists to enjoy and a
lot of citified cheeseballs to avoid.
_ —Patrick Hambrecht
——
“Hot Trip to Heaven”
Love and Rockets
American Recordings
Grade: C
In 1989, Love and Rockets
scored its first and only hit with “So
Alive.” After listening to the
group’s new compact disc, “Hot
Trip to Heaven,” it is likely that the
group will still be a one-hit won
der.
None of the songs on “Trip” are
as catchy as L&R ’s older material.
Most ofthe songs on the disc sound
like a new-age meditation on bad
acid. Each of the 10 songs incorpo
rates heavy use of key boards, mys
tic chanting and spacy lyrics. What
is missing from this release is the
tightness the band used to have.
Take the first track, “Body and
Soul.” Clocking in at just under 15
minutes, the track nearly drowns
itself in heavy techno production.
The rest of “Trip” fares a little
better. The addition of Natacha
Atlas for vocals fits perfectly with
lead singer Daniel Ash’s. Songs
like “Eclipse” and “Be the Revolu
tion” mark new directions for the
band.
The band recorded most of the
tracks on the disc within a period of
eight days. Maybe that’s why most
of the disc sounds like such a mess.
The band called this period of re
cording a “titanic burst of inspira
tion,” according to a press release.
What the band needs to do now is
take that inspiration and shape it
into a truly fluid and hypnotic lis
tening experience.
“Trip” isonly forthe most dedi
cated Love and Rockets fan. The
band is already set for another re
lease in early 1995. Let’s hope Love
and Rockets doesn’t “Trip” again.
— Sean McCarthy
Universal Mother”
Sinead O’Connor
Chrysalis/EMI Records
Grade: B
On Sinead O’Connor’s fourth
album, “Universal Mother,” she
packs all her anger and political
frustrations into a lofty 14-song
eulogy for lost childhood, and a
prayer for a safer, more sensitive
world.
Her efforts for universal moth
erhood among women, and her need
to express the importance of pro
tecting children from our ‘cruel’
world, turned this album into a
lullaby that could put anyone at
ease, or at least pull on their
heartstrings a little.
Most of the songs are
minimalistic in instrumentation and
simple in their melodies — songs
like “My Darling Child,” the a
cappella “Tiny Grief Song,” and
“Scorn Not His Simplicity,” are
strong enough to support the grav
ity ofthealbum’sdramatic themes,
and provide an effective equilib
rium throughout.
“Red Football” begins eerily
with piano and calm vocals only to
col lapse into a wild roar of electric
guitar, drums and bass. While
O’Connor wails a ferocious string
of mocking revenge, she winds up
sounding hilarious, in an enjoy
ably evil way.
In “Famine,” O’Connor rants
about the problems of the Irish
people, past and present, and the
fate of Ireland as a whole.
But the other 12 songs are re
markable in their sensitivities.
O’Connor’s voice starts soft and
gentle and usually ends up soaring
at full-throttle.
“In This Heart,” and ‘Tiny Grief
Song,” are voice-only gems, and
are so simple and yet intricately
crafted lyrically, that they become
more powerful than any of the
album’s other instrument-laden
songs.
With a brooding spirit, and pas
sionate honesty, “Universal
Mother” becomes a series of ex
plicit short stories and puts
O’Connor back on the scene as a
rock-n’-roller, political activist, and
disturbed spirit, finding a voice in
short, solemn songs.
— Steven Sparling
There are no smal
victories in the fight
against heart dsease.
American Heart
Association
O 1992. American Heart Association
Exhibit
Continued from Page 9
resemble a marble surface bearing
Latin phrases. The effect is philo
sophical and lighthearted at the same
time.
Hansen does not have this subtlety,
in her work. %
Her photography gi ves li fe to dear!
images. Dead birds seem to be a run
ning theme with Hansen. On an un
titled work, she took a variety of dead
birds, maybe sparrows, and posed
them like fruit in a bowl.
On another, she shot a close-up of
a dead bird with every aspect of its
withered body in detail.
These grotesque yet interesting
images give newmeaning tothe phrase
“still life.” It almost seems like an
attempt at a parody.
“Encoded Trees” is void of dead
birds, but it does depict barren trees
and fields. The painting’s border is a
pattern of alternating faces, one face
blocked out and the other in negative
print. Scribbled words break up the
nine tree images and make the photo
graph talk.
Her work is a nihilistic view of
death and nature. It questions the ex
istence of a hopeful future.
“History of Biosphere” isa“menu”
? of how the Earth should be and what
people should do to make it work.
“Mix forests, deserts, swamps,
prairies and plains. Ideal for living,"
the photo reads.
Both exhibits are evidence of two
artists who are not afraid to question
their art and mold it to fit their objec
tives.
Connell and Hansen have strong
educational backgrounds and experi
ence in their respective fields.
Connell receivedher Master of Fine
Arts degree in painting from the Uni
versity of Michigan and her Bachelor
of Fine Arts degree from the Univer
sity of Colorado.
Hansen has never left the educa
tion circuit. She’s an assistant profes
sor of art at the College of Wooster in
Wooster, Ohio. She served as chair
woman and treasurer of the Midwest
Society for Photographic Education.
She also is the editor of “Artful
Dodger” in Wooster.
The gallery, in Room 102 of
Richards Hall, is open Monday
through Thursday from 9 a.m. to 5
p.m. Admission is free.
LITTI CP
Book and Lyrics by
HOWARD ASHMAN
Music by
ALAN MENKEN
A super-hilarious musical about a plant in a skid-row florist shop
that sings, dances and eats people. FUNNY, FUNNY STUFF!
Tonight $4 • Tomorrow $8
(General admission, cash ticket* only No phone orders Available at the Playhouse Box Office.)
Curtain alSflOpm.
1994 Governor s Arts Award Recipient
imean-con playhouse
with support from the 2500 S. 56th St. • Lincoln
Nebraska Arts Council. Phone: 489-7529
*HSK
“Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas”
Tom Robbins
Bantam Books
Grade: B
You’re browsing through the
bookstore. Ahhh ... the new Tom
Robbins book, “Hal f Asleep in Frog
Pajamas.” You smile. You finger
its ecru dust jacket. You move on.
If the last paragraph annoyed
you, don't read Robbins’ latest
work. The book is written in sec
ond-person tense. Hence, you, the
reader, are treated as the main char
acter, Gwen Mati.
This wouldn't be so bad ifGwen
were a likable sort, but the money
hungry stockbroker is downright
annoying throughout most of the
book.
Gwen’s story opens on Good
Friday Eve in Seattle. The stock
market hastaken an especially dra
matic nose dive, and Gwen, a me
diocre broker at best, is desperate.
Enter Larry Diamond, former
financial genius, long-winded ec
centric, rectal cancer victim and
likable weirdo.
Larry takes a liking to Gwen.
And Gwen — prim, proper and
more than a little uptight — is dis
gusted with Larry.
But their paths keep crossing.
Gwen tries to put her financial lire
together before the market opens
again on Monday, but strange things
keep happening.
She’s assaulted by a band of
rich kids. Her boring but rich
Lutheran boyfriend needs her help
searching for his born-again pet
monkey. And her psychic neigh
bor Q-Jo Huffington disappears.
And of course there’s Larry.
Robbins seems to choose a charac
ter in each book to use as a mouth
piece for hisown strange ram blings.
I arry is that mouthpiece.
This time, Robbins is going on
(and on and on) about aliens from
the Sirius system, the superiority of
amphibians to reptiles and the wis
dom of the Bozo tribe in Africa.
The book is interesting. Robbins
has a flair for the bizarre, and his
books — “Still Life With Wood
pecker” and “Even Cowgirls Get
the Blues,” for example — always
have a myriad of strange charac
ters.
Kal WNkM/DN
But this time, Robbins tries to
do and say too much. The story
follows a breakneck pace so that
Gwen can finish her adventure by
Monday. But Monday comes and
the book ends before Robbins ties
up loose ends.
True-blue Robbins fans wiII read
the book anyway just to savor his
way with words. The author wields
a metaphor like nobody’s business,
and to say that his language is col
orful is a criminal understatement.
Even when Robbins is confus
ing, he’s delicious.
— Rainbow Rowell