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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 22, 2000)
Arts The following is a brief list of events this weekend. For more information, call the venue. CONCERTS: Duffy’s Tavern, 14120 St 474-3543 Sunday: Michyksaseal and Tlirtie Moon Kimball Recital Hall, 11th&R streets 472-4747 Sunday: Karen Becker, cello, and Theresa Bogard, piano Knickerbockers Bar & Grill 901 OSt 476-6865 Friday: Kate Venable and RemyZero Saturday: Eddie Mac Lied Center for Performing Arts, 301N. 12th St. 472-4747 Friday: Preservation Hall Jazz Band PlaMor Ballroom, 6600WestOSt. 475- 4030 Sunday: Sandy Creek Royal Grove Nite Club, 340 West Comhusker Highway 474- 2332 Friday: Eighth Wave and Noise Wave Saturday: Blacklight Sunshine 7th Street Loft, 504 S. Seventh St. 477-8311 Saturday: Third Chair Chamber Players The Zoo Bar, 136 N. 14th St. 435-8754 All weekend: Lucky Peterson THEATER: Lincoln Community Playhouse, 2500S. 56th St 489-7529 All weekend: “As You Like It" Star City Dinner Theatre, 803 Q St. 477-8277 All weekend: "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” Mary Riepma Ross Film Theater, 12"1 and R streets 472-5353 All weekend: TYixie GALLERIES: Burkholder Project, 719 P St. 477-3305 All weekend: Ann Burkholder, Alan Smith, Nancy Childs Doc’s, 140 N. Eighth St. 476- 3232 All weekend: Nick Pella Haydon Art Gallery, 335 N. Eighth St.475-5421 All weekend: Lynn Soloway Noyes Art Gallery, 119 S. Ninth St. 475- 1061 All weekend: Kathryn Undershill 1. The Olivia Tremor Control “Presents: Singles and Beyond" Capping off the Bill Doss/Kindercore takeover. 2. Du$ter "Contemporary Movement" This is slo-core. 3. A Sunshine Fix "The Future History of..,* The other recent Bill Doss release, this is his solo-time-filler before the next Olivia Tremor Control album. 4. The Helio Sequence "Com Piex" Noisy madchesteresque beat-driven guitar rock...with an appropriate cover of the Beatles'"Tomorrow Never Knows." 5. Man„ or Astro Man?"A Spectrum of Infinite Scale* Love that sci-fi surf-rock. 6. Trans Am "Red line" Full album of new material...full of vocals. (Surprise.) 7.8(ack Heart Procession "Three" Former Three Mile Pilot members' winter music. 8. The Glands "The Glands" Summery guitar pop...but it's cold now. ^Microphones "It Was Hot We Stayed in the Water" Another album of Brian Wilson meets your vacuum cleaner. 10. Experimental Aircraft “Experimental Aircraft" Signed from an unsolicited demo, this is My Bloody Valentine if Kevin Shields were a woman. Courtesy Photo Drop by Christopher Romer Courtesy Photo Artist Francois Yordamian works on his "The Young & the Restless: recipe & ingredients" in the Bemis Center studio. Using 40 television sets, he displays 82 gestures portrayed by soap opera actors. Courtesy Photo Charmers by Christopher Romer Bemis gives 'starving artists' temporary home BY MELANIE MENSCH “Go to your room!” artists are told at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, and they gladly do so for three months. But the three-month stay is better than any grounding a parent could give. The Bemis Center, 724 S. 12^ St. in Omaha, offers seven studios for artists to concentrate on and create their art, elimi nating excuses for “starving artists.” The Bemis is featuring the work of two former studio artists in its 2000 fall exhibits. The opening reception for its two new shows last from 7-10 p.m. Saturday. Abstract, wooden sculptures fill Gallery I in “Floaters and Charmers” by New York artist Christopher Romer. Romer, raised by American parents in London, could be called an Old World artist in the New World. Romer found the states’ land of trees inspired him. Using the ample resources of pine, cypresses, firs and oaks, Romer expresses poetry and exposes the raw nature of wood. in uaiiery 11, guests can watcn tne dis section of popular American soap operas on 40 TV sets by artist Francois Yordamian. Using “The Young and the Restless," Yordamian breaks down the American obsession of daily TV drama into 82 ges tures depicted by the show’s characters. Each of the 40 TV sets has a video mon tage of one gesture, such as touching one’s face, kissing, making love, opening or clos ing a door, and just doing nothing. Yordamian, who first came to the Bemis in 1997, discovered a kind of secret “recipe” of gestures needed to produce nine months * of soap opera. Kelly Goodall, a Bemis spokeswoman, said through donations and grants, the Bemis had supported artists’ residencies at the center for the past 20 years. “The residency program lets artists live and work on their art for three months,” she said. “There’s a bath, bedroom, kitchen area, everything they need. It gives them the time and space to concentrate and focus on what they need to do in their art.” The nonprofit center gives a monthly stipend of up to $1,000 to artists for sup plies and groceries during their stay. The center selects artists twice a year, in September and April, by application. Artists submit at least 10 slides of work Floaters and Charmers by Christopher Romer The Young and the Restless: Recipe and Ingredients by Francois JVbrdamian ”C Where: Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, 724 S. 12th Omaha -(When: Opening reception 7-10 p.m. Saturday; runs until Nov. 6 -( Hours: Wed.-Sat. 11-5 p.m. -(Cost: Free from the past two years, along with a resume and references. When selected artists live at the Bemis, they must donate one piece to the center at the end of their stays. Goodall said artists can apply for repeat stays at the Bemis. Romer, who first came to the Bemis in 1995 and again in 1998, said he planned to re-apply for residency at the center. “I seem to find myself here again and again,” he said. “I don’t often get to see many of my artworks in one place at one time, so it’s very exciting.” Working at the Bemis allowed him to focus on his artwork rather than being dis tracted by other things like a job. "I had plenty to keep me busy. I was very productive,” he said. Romer also said he appreciated the Omaha atmosphere. “I'm very fond of it. I love the quality of the Midwest. People here are forever trying to apologize for it.” Acclaimed jazz band marches into Lied BY BRIAN CHRISTOPHERSON There’s a land far, far away, where jazz music fills the air with every step you take. Dare to visit this land, you will most likely be lured in like Ulysses was to the call of the Sirens. And while there, if you have the knack for differentiating the top musicians from the street players, your step will pick up to a sixteenth note-like quickness, and the music will lead you to a historic setting known as Preservation Hall. In 1961, a couple by the name of Allen and Sandra Jaffee took over the hall, filled it with jazz and has since developed it into an icon to musicians and jazz fans. In the jazz-crazed New Orleans, within the maddening French Quarter, Preservation Hall has seen its share of famous names grace its stage. It’s also home of the acclaimed Preservation Hall Jazz Band, which boasts alumni such as Jelly Roll Martin and the puffy cheeked, trumpet-blowing Louis Armstrong. Tonight, the modern-day Preservation Hall Jazz Band will open the Lied Center for Performing Arts’ new season at 7:30 p.m. . "They’re a famed group that brings great jazz to Lincoln, and people will really enjoy hearing it,’’ said Charles Bethea, executive director of the Lied Center. The group tours religiously for about four months each year, and it was time for the band to include Lincoln on its tour list, Bethea said. “It’s been a long time since they’ve been here. They’re over due for a visit,” he said. Fans can expect to hear all the Dixieland, as New Orleans Jazz is often referred to, hits that have been a staple of the musical pulse of this country since the early 1900s. Classic songs that will be played include “Bill Bailey,” "I Ain’t Got Nobody," “Shake it and Break It” and “Just a Closer Walk With Thee.” And yes, the band is known for rounding out its performance with the American favorite, “When the Saints Come Marching In.” Preservation Hall kicks off what Bethea expects to be a spec tacular, talent-filled season of variety at the Lied Center. “We’re providing a wide range "Preservation Hall 1 Jazz Band^ —( Where: Lied Center _12th&0 -( When: Tonight @ 7:30 -(Cost: $ 16, $20, $24, Half price for ' students of artists across the board” Bethea said. “We look to bring artists in here that appeal to everyone.” SI Dave Matthews disappoints ■ The last tour stop in Kansas was more like a party, not a concert. The sound produced? Like that of the band's CDs. BY GEORGE GREEN The Dave Matthews Band played at a massive party Wednesday night. The event was so big that it had to be held at Sandstone Amphitheater, in Bonner Springs, Kan. It was expensive, too. Tickets were at least $35. Fortunately, none of the party essentials were overlooked. The cele bration included a perpetual flow of booze, a touch of pot smoke in the air, an abundance of thirsty young men and women and excellent back ground tunes. However, I was disappointed. Don’t get me wrong; the party wasn't bad. But I mistakenly thought I was going to a concert instead of a social gathering. At a concert, people enjoy live musical performances. At a party, drunks sing along to EVERY song that gets played, friends talk loudly to each other, guys flirt with girls, and bored bystanders fire up the cell phone to look busy. When all of the above happen at a concert, the concert stinks. To be honest, though, I don’t know if I would have liked the show even if the crowd weren’t rude, obnoxious and immature. Dave played well, but his sound was identical to the one produced on his CDs. When I go to a concert, particu larly a “jam band” concert, I expect to hear some musical improvisation or at least some different songs. If I wanted to hear the musician’s songs performed exactly as they are on the album, I would have saved $30 and listened to the disc at home. Dave did add some jams on “All Along theWatchtower,” “Warehouse” and “Tripping Billies.” But the jams sounded completely premeditated - not impromptu or interesting. Furthermore, during the jams the band members took turns play ing their instruments instead of cre i ating a synergy of sound by including all the various instruments simulta neously. The result was choppy and some times dull jam sessions. Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, the opening band, accompanied Dave on “Crash” and “Ants Marching.” Fleck, a phenomenal banjo play er, and Victor Wooten, arguably the world’s best bassist, sustained a few great jams alone and with Dave that the audience failed to notice. When Dave was not singing, most of the concert-goers ignored the show because they could not sing along. Finally, I expected more from Dave because the show was the last one of his summer tour. I thought he would leave the con cert circuit with a show so loud, com plex and new that it would be talked about until he hit the road again in December. Instead, he played like a bored puppet, tired of being shackled to the same songs and jams that his lis teners cannot get enough of. Punk pioneer on tour after battle with illness Mike Watt may be frail and a little weak right now, but one has to look no further than the theme of his 2000 tour to know he has an important message: Enough with the piss bag! Watt battled with the flu for most of this year and even had surgery to correct a bladder infection that resulted . from the flu. Now, trying to return to full strength, Watt and his Pair of Pliers are back out on the road, and a stop at Omaha’s Ranch Bowl on Sunday will give local Watt fans a glimpse at the legendary bass player. Watt helped pioneer punjk music in the ’80s with his band The Minutemen. In 1985, Minutemen guitarist D. Boon died in a van accident - an event that would shape some ofWatt’s later musical efforts. Differences led to the breakup of his next band, fIREHOSE, in 1994, and Watt went in his own direction. What resulted was the release, “Ball-Hog or TUgboat?” Watt covered a myriad of musical styles - from punk to country - and had the help of 48 guest musicians includ ing The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea. In 1997, Watt returned to a three-man project with “Contemplating the Engine Room." On "Contemplating,” Watt turned to his life to construct a rock opera. Watt used a day in the lives of sailors to describe such events as Boon’s death and a strained relationship with his father. Watt dedicated his 1998 tour to Boon and played songs almost exclusively from “Contemplating.” But on his current tour, Watt has left the set list wide open.