BRAD ALLEN: TRAIN FOR ST. PATRICK'S DAY >>>

99 Bottles in Federal Way hosts a stout tasting tomorrow. Throw back six styles of stouts â€" Belgian, Milk/Sweet, Oatmeal, Dry Irish Stout (Guinness), American and Russian Imperial â€" for $5 from 5:30 to 7 p.m.

MICHAEL SWAN: EVERGREEN RIOT UPDATE >>>

The Associated Press reports that 24-year-old Kaylen Williams, accused of sparking a riot during a Dead Prez concert at Evergreen State College Feb. 14, has pleaded not guilty to a misdemeanor assault charge.

LINK: The Weekly Volcano interviewed Williams.

LINK: Seattle Times.

STEPH DEROSA: PCTURE YOURSELF IN A CHAIR AT MY TABLE >>>

As you probably already know, your daily activities and thoughts are small stepping-stones in the creation of your dreams. My thoughts the last couple of days were: I had a deadline, I needed to churn out a Dinner with DeRosa, Pappi Swarner was going to spank me if I didn’t get it done, I felt so exhausted, yet all I wanted to do was cut my head off because it hurt so bad.

I’m pretty sure that my feverish mental state, along with some really cool drugs, led me to have the following medically-induced radical dream about my next Dinner with DeRosa:

They were having a party. I could hear them hooting and hollering with the loud music those young kids like to play. Everyone was laughing and carrying on. What a great time they were having, but where was I? Why wasn’t I invited? And where the hell was this party? I headed down the hallway, ears up, detecting the whereabouts of said party action. It was in the cabinet, behind the wooden door, and staring me right in the face: my loot of over-the-counter and under-the-counter medicine was having Dinner with DeRosa keg party without me.

Tums was there. He was part of the nerds, geeks and dweebs circle. He sat in the corner staring at all the other pretty medicines, but lacked the self-confidence to ask any of them out. As a matter of fact, I’m sure the lack of self-confidence was justified if you think about it. Tums are pretty useless. Does anyone even take Tums anymore? If you really want to fix some acid indigestion or heartburn, don’t you run for a Zantac or Pepcid nowadays? The only benefit Tums has now is that they have Calcium. Tums is the kind of guy, though, that you’ll run into 20 years from now and he’ll be smokin’ hot. And all the girls will be thinking they should’ve paid more attention to him while they had the chance.

Doing keg stands front and center was Alka-Seltzer. I’m thinking he’s part of the jock crowd. He automatically has a posse with him wherever he goes. Inside the box there are 36 other packages of fizzy tabs to always make him feel like he’s part of a group. So this guy is never alone, and always ready for a good time.

Imodium anti-diarrhea medication has emo kid written all over it. Imagine if diarrhea had a face, wouldn’t it have a sad, “I want to cut myself” kind of expression on it? Imodium was at the party, but it was tucked away into the corner hating itself and crying along with my sterile syringes. (Don’t judge me. I have them for allergy shots, OK?)

Listening to Broken Oars and living out the punk scene were all my tubes of ointments, balms and creams. Each tube expressed individuality in how it helped cure what ails me, yet they were all made up of basically the same composition. Much like a modern-day typical punk scene, correct?

Pepto-Bismol was the pretty pink girl that everybody loves. Yes, the life of the party. On the outside she beckons you with the “I can make you feel better” dress she likes to wear. But on the inside she’s a dirty little whore. You know she’ll get rid of the nausea, but the taste of sickness itself is the small price you have to pay to get the prize. Is there anyone out there that doesn’t gag a little as that pink shit slides down your throat? You swallow it anyway, don’t you? She’s evil, yet oh-so good for you.

So where was my lethal prescription in this party of the drug sectors, you ask. It was there, all right. It was leading the circle of stoners onto another journey of high imagination and twisted memories. Pretty much like I’m doing to you right now. I dare you to ever think of your medicine in the same light again.

Mangiamo!

BRAD ALLEN: THROWDOWN IN THE SOUND >>>

Steph DeRosa drilled it into your heads that the men were to strap on the skates and do it derby style March 8 at the Tacoma Soccer Center. 

It went down.  And it was dirty.

Photographer extraordinaire Philip Peterson got up close and personal for the Weekly Volcano. 

Enjoy.

Since our Derby Dame Steph DeRosa was down and out with the flu, read up on the Throwdown action on All About Derby.

Minnesota T.C. Terrors warming up before the match.
Falling pla yers in a match between the T.C. Terrors and the Diamond City Death Kings.
Pileup about to happen between the T.C. Terrors and the Diamond City Death Kings.
T. C. Terrors player sliding into the crowd.
Scorekeepers Slim Finnegan (left) and Paula Bunion (right) sliding back to their stations.
Puget Sound Outcast player takes a spill vs. Dallas Deception.
Puget Sound Outcasts vs Minnesota's T. C. Terrors.
Injured Dallas Deception player before medical attention arrives.
Quadzilla of the Puget Sound Outcast showing off between games.
Pennyslvania Diamond City Death Kings vs Puget Sound Outcasts.
One of the orginizers, Nancy Hardagain of the Tacoma Dockyard Dames

FILM
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
Miss Pettigrew is not having a good day. For that matter, she hasn’t had a good day, week or month for as long as she can remember. Recently fired from a job as governess, another in a long line of failures, she is facing the stern proprietor of an employment agency where she has a reputation as “the governess of last resort.”

This is the sad plight of the frumpy, frizzy-haired eccentric at the center of Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, an entirely charming film based on a 1938 novel by Winifred Watson, an author known for writing about women who flout convention. As the story unfolds, it will fill you with smiles, thanks to the smart, witty writing and great performances all around â€" especially Frances McDormand, who’s in fine form in the title role. â€" Mary Houlihan
[The Grand Cinema: 4:30, 6:40, 8:45; Regal Martin Village 16: 11:05 a.m., 1:35, 4, 6:55, 9:20]

COWPUNK
Joe Buck
Joe Buck comes to Tacoma from Nashville, something that will be blatantly obvious once he rips into his first number at the Kitchen tonight. Don’t be fooled by the fire red Mohawk or one-man-band antics, Joe Buck is everything country could be.

Everything it could be if you added heavy doses of booze, explosives, punk, and hillbilly rage, that is. Joe Buck first emerged as a guitarist for the Legendary Shack Shakers and gained further momentum as Hank III’s sparkplug companion and standup bass player. As a one man entity Joe Buck is a sight to be seen and heard. â€" Matt Driscoll
[Hell’s Kitchen, Joe Buck, James Hunnicutt & The Revolvers, Brent Amaker & The Rodeo, The Lo-Devilers, 8 p.m., no cover, 3829 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253.759.6003]

LINK: Acoustic Open Mike at Station 56 and more in local clubs.
LINK: Hanging in local galleries and museums.
LINK: Let’s eat Italian today.

BRAD ALLEN: SAMPLE MICROBREWS IN GROCERY STORES >>>

Washington lawmakers have approved a pilot program that will allow beer and wine tasting in 30 grocery stores statewide to give them an advantage over the national beer giants.

Beer and wine tasting bill SB 5751 now moves on to Gov. Gregoire.

LINK: Seattle P-I
LINK: History of SB 5751

BOBBLE TIKI: BREAKFAST WITH BOBBLE TIKI >>>

THE DAILY WORD
Galumph \guh-LUHM(P)F\, intransitive verb:
To move in a clumsy manner or with a heavy tread.

USAGE EXAMPLE: After five or six cocktails, and five or six bacon cheeseburgers, all David Hasselhoff could do was galumph back to his German hotel room.

MORNING NEWS

SEATTLE:  Shauna’s future?

TACOMA: Bounty hunter bill

OLYMPIA: Human remains

POLITICS: Spitzer to resign?

THINGS TO DO TODAY
JOE BUCK: Yourself
MOVIE TIMES: Look here
MUSIC LISTINGS: Here’s what’s happening

STEPH DEROSA: TOILET TALES >>>

My cousin, who is also one of my favorite people in the entire world, recently gave birth to the most beautiful baby boy I’ve ever seen. His name is Gianni DeRosa, and I find myself making up excuses to see him, hold him and kiss him on a daily basis. In order to keep my cousin from slapping a restraining order on me, I’ve settled for weekly lunches with my new little baby. Uh, I mean her new little baby.

Last week cousin Angie suggested lunch at Duke’s Chowder House. Seeing as how we’d both never tried it, and it was destined to be a beautiful day on the waterfront, I happily obliged.

The service was fantastic, the atmosphere was comforting, and seeing Gianni again made everything perfect. I had the grilled salmon with blueberries and goat cheese, which was very yummy, but eventually I had to head to the potty to relieve my bladder.

I passed the long line of retirees and blue-hairs waiting for a table, feeling lucky we had snagged a spot when we did. Entering the bathroom I felt as though as cool as it was with the dark colors and black accents, it didn’t quite stick with the theme of being all “Duke’s” like the rest of the restaurant was. It was still the perfect place for me to pee, don’t get me wrong. I even waded through the pack of AARP members to get to a stall without breaking a single person’s hip.

I began to wonder if these senior citizens remembered a lot of their lives. If they did, what moments stuck out to them? Did the bad memories eventually fade away? Was it hard to remember prom? Your first kiss? At what point do you start forgetting stuff that happened to you?

Before you get all bent out of shape and call me a total heartless bitch for picking on the older folk, let me let you in on a secret: I’m scared I have a memory problem.

I was watching a show about a group of people at their 20th high school reunion the other night. They were letting people enter the area one by one, making a grand entrance. These people hadn’t seen each other in 20 years, some of them never even hung out with each other in high school, yet they all remembered who each person was as they walked in. “Hey! Look! There’s Robbie Smith!” they would shout. If I were there, I would’ve been saying, “Who the fuck is that walking in right now?”

I tried to close my eyes and grasp a mental picture of the first couple of names I could cluster up in my head from high school. Not only could I not remember their faces, but also I could think of only a handful of names. Quickly I tried to test myself again. I tried to think of five teachers from high school. I could remember two. And it was the two I had for drill team, so I had them for all four years. That was kinda cheating for my brain. This sucked. College? Don’t remember a single professor. I remember my roommate I had one year; that was it. Shit. I’m stupid, aren’t I?

Why do some memories stay with me, and others take a permanent vacation? I rushed back to my table to confide my newfound memory loss to my cousin. She laughed in my face and burped little Gianni as she reminded me of something very important: music is my key to opening up memories. She wasn’t shocked I hadn’t remembered that I told her that a long time ago. It’s true: certain songs open the doors to my thoughts, others justify my feelings, and some give me closure to my worries. But all of them hold some sort of treadmill that will jog a memory at any given time.

She then comforted me in the fact that I will always remember the important things. She asked me a few questions about Annalese being a baby, and certain milestones she passed. I remembered them all. It seems as though after meeting my husband, nothing before that mattered. And especially after having my daughter, no other memory was ever as important.

I feel confident that I’m not alone in this thought process. I know a few of you who will agree with me on the music part of the memory process and a lot of you who will agree on the “new person” in your life memory process. Whichever one it is, all I have to say is:

Screw all of you that said I forgot things ’cause I was old. My cousin will beat you up. Assholes.

MATT DRISCOLL: FOREVER ADOLESCENT>>>

This week, in anticipation of www.myspace.com/hobolibido ">Hobo Libido’s sure to be rockin’ CD release show at Hell’s Kitchen, on Saturday, March 15, I interviewed Hobo Libido frontman Brandon Ballentine. His band will unleash Hornier than a Box Full of Hobos to the masses at Hell’s Kitchen, and the band’s irreverent, sexually perverse, booze fueled classic rock should go over quite nicely.

While I cherry-picked from the interview for Rock Rhetoric this week, here’s a look at everything Ballentine had to say.

(Pictures courtesy of Krystal Kerr Photography)

Weekly Volcano: You're releasing the debut Hobo Libido record. How long in the making is it? What can fans of Hobo Libido expect from it? Did it turn out how you'd hoped?
Ballentine:  Well, the recording/mixing process took us about 3 months.  Some of these songs go back 9 years, though.  “We're Not Leavin' 'Til We're Heavin'” for example, was the first song I ever wrote.  I think I was 15.  But some of the songs on the record, like “Love Cow” are only a couple of months old.  It's surprisingly cohesive.  I guess we just never grew up! 

WV:  What is the record called and how many songs are on it? Are you pleased with the recording quality?
Ballentine: The record is called Hornier than a Box Full of Hobos, the first line from our theme song, “Hobo Libido.”   We put 11 songs on the album, plus if you dig around a little you might just find some bonus stuff. 

We are very pleased with the production quality, actually.  That was a big concern - undertaking a full length album (having it recorded, pressed, and distributed) entirely independently, but our good friend, Dustin Baccetti, just happens to be a gifted engineer.  He always went the extra mile to make sure the end product was as good as it could possibly be and we think it really shows.  And he did it all for us on a shoe-string budget!  You can find him at www.myspace.com/myassstudios.      

WV: You're doing two CD release shows - one north, one south. Do you have a following in both places? Why do you think Tacoma receives you guys so well?
Ballentine: Yeah, we've definitely got a following in Seattle and Tacoma and we wanted to make a point of catering to both audiences but, in Tacoma more than anywhere else so far, people just seem to get what we're doing and it's great.  We put in a lot of long hours and hard work and don't always get much recognition in return, as is true of most musicians.  So when someone comes up to us after a show and says, "Thanks, your show made my week", that's what makes it all worthwhile.  That's why we love Tacoma so much, because we always know it's not going in one ear and out the other. 

WV:  Where would you like to take this record? What's your goal with it?
Ballentine: We mainly just want to have something tangible to give our loyal fans and, hopefully, something that will win over the people who previously didn't get us or just hadn't heard of us.  Our ultimate goal, though, is to take it on the road and let it pay for gas and cheeseburgers!  

WV: What exactly is a hobo's libido like? How does that fit your band?
Ballentine: Hobos are so horny they fuck hobos, and, if given the opportunity, I can't say any one of us wouldn't fuck a hobo! Pretty much everything rock and roll is inspired by sex or drugs or some combination of the two. Whether it's a serious song written about something I've experienced that's hurt me or brought me joy or just a joke about a love doll we saw in a porn shop that was shaped like a cow, we've taken that theme, injected it with amphetamines, greased it up with expensive lube, and run with it.

WV: Do you have anything special planned for the show at Hell's Kitchen? How have your experiences at the Kitchen been in the past?
Ballentine: Show-goers will witness an unnatural act.  That is all I'm at liberty to divulge.  One time we took a guitar with a dildo suction-cupped to it to the cow love doll I mentioned earlier.  "Love Cow" was inspired, specifically, by that particular cow so we thought it was only fair to give the cow some stage time. That was a Hell's Kitchen exclusive. Hell's Kitchen is far and away, our favorite place to play.

WV: What's in the future for you guys? Now that the record is complete, what's next? How will you spend '08?
Ballentine: We want to get on a label that will put us on tour.  Basically, we want to tour the shit out of this album and get our name out there.  If that doesn't happen by this summer, we'll continue doing the local club rounds, trying our best to put on a memorable show.  A long-time goal of mine has been to open for GWAR. I'm not ruling that out either.    

WV: If Hobo Libido had an official alcoholic beverage, what would it be?
Ballentine: Our own invention: The Gaping Asshole!  It consists of equal parts Sex on the Beach, Pornstar, Slippery Nipple, and Scotch Whiskey.  Served by the pail and guaranteed to give her "the gape"!  Seriously though, we drink enough Pabst to quench the thirst of a small army.  Wouldn't mind landing an endorsement deal with them. 

WV: Your rock is pretty straight forward. With all the artsy stuff that's popular these days, is that intentional? What kind of people do you hope to appeal to?
Ballentine: We just make the music we want to hear.  We grew up, primarily, on metal, punk rock, and 60's-70's era rock.  Those are just the sounds we like and I guess they show through a little in the songwriting.  At the same time, I generally write all the songs so, being a very blunt person, I don't think the music could help but be straight forward.  Who do we hope to appeal to?  Anybody and everybody who likes good old-fashioned, straight-up rock and roll.  Anybody who liked/likes Little Nicky, Tenacious D & the Pick of Destiny, American Pie, Metalocalypse, Family Guy, Tom Green, Sifl & Olly, & Mr. Show.  People who get that you can have something legitimate to say even though you also like to crack the occasional 'AC Slatering' joke.  What's 'AC Slatering', you ask? Look it up, it'll change the way you crap forever!
 

ART
A Couple of Ways of Doing Something: Photographs by Chuck Close, Poems by Bob Holman
Chuck Close is something of a one-trick pony, but he does that one trick magnificently. He does portraits of his friends in an almost endless variety of media and techniques, usually close-ups with sharp focus on the center of the face and fading along the edges. This internationally famous artist who grew up near Tacoma and went to school at the University of Washington first became famous in the 1960s for his stark, in-your-face photographic realism â€" images of faces seen so close and in such gigantic scale that every pimple, scar and wrinkle was seen in almost microscopic detail.

Now showing at Tacoma Art Museum is a collaborative project two years in the making between Close and the poet Bob Holman â€" visual and word portraits of themselves and their friends. â€" Alec Clayton

[Tacoma Art Museum, Tuesday-Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Third Thursdays 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., Sunday noon-5 p.m. through June 15, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma]

DJ
A Jazz Primer
If your head is spinning because you can’t decide what to do with so much going on, just know that you’re not alone. I’ve got the added pressure of a houseguest, my 21-year-old niece, to make matters even more indecisive. What am I supposed to do with someone who hates large crowds of people and is only interested in jazz?

DJ Alspinski.

The man has, as the kids say, skills. Alspinski spins jazz â€" old and new â€" at the Monsoon Room every Wednesday. Alspinski, in his own way, is helping to shape how the turntable can be utilized as an instrument in a jazz-oriented context. â€" Suzy Stump

[Monsoon Room, 9 p.m., no cover, 1022 S. J St., Tacoma, 253.722.5075]   

LINK: Stanley & Seafort’s jazz and more in the clubs.
LINK: Catch a flick today.
LINK: Let’s eat in a bistro today.