The drunken junket is a wonderful thing. It's the sort of perk that makes up for the lousy pay in this typing business, at least for a few days. But times have changed since the halcyon hedonism of yore, when Hunter S. Thompson - the most celebrated master of the fine art of spending a jetting off to some faraway locale and imbibing and debauching on someone else's dime - was staggering drink- and drug-addled around the Mint 400, weaving his half-remembered adventures into fabulist prose. Nowadays, when a martini at lunch is looked at askance, there's a palpable button-down mentality that frowns on overindulgence. I prefer zippers.
So when I received word today that Sip wine bar and restaurant in Gig Harbor now offers a full bar service, I made my way upstairs to the publishers looking for an expense account - you know, to "really uncover the truth behind the added booze."
Their answer was automatic: Does Shane MacGowan need a liver transplant?
Until my research is finished, which could take weeks, I submit the press release announcing Sip's new boozy existence after the jump.
The band Going Shopping joins Humble Cub tonight at Fulcrum Gallery for an ambient music extravaganza. Read Editor Matt Driscoll's take on the show here.
I found this Going Shopping video on YouTube to get you in the mood.
[Fulcrum Gallery Art Space, with Humble Cub, Thursday, March 11, 8-10 p.m., all ages, $5, 1308 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Tacoma, 253.250.0520]
1. Tacoma poet Tammy Robacker reads from her book The Vicissitudes at 8 p.m. inside Vinum Coffee & Wine Lounge. There will be an open mic following her reading. Readers, poets, and spoken word artists are encouraged to come share poetry that addresses topics of Women, Women's History, Women's Issues, Women's Roles, or challenges that face women.
2. Speaking of poetry, the Puget Sound Poetry Connection and Tacoma Arts Commission bring in poet Allen Braden for the Distinguished Writers Series at 7 p.m. inside King's Books. An open mic follows Braden's performance.
3. Banff Mountain Film Festival selections that explore environmental, adventure or adventure-related themes - including BASE-jumping, snowboarding and mountain climbing - will screen at 7:30 p.m. at the Capitol Theater.
4. Brooklyn Pool, James & The Giant Bitch, Santee, and The Moo play a 9 p.m. show at Bob's Java Jive.
5. The Missionary Position and Where Sails Meet Rails perform a free show inside Doyle's Public House at 9 p.m.
Saint Patrick was not Irish. He was born in Britain when it was under Roman rule. The myth that he drove the snakes out of Ireland is actually a symbolic euphemism for the inquisition that eliminated Paganism from the Emerald Isle. And March 17 marks Saint Patrick's death, not his birth. So once a year we poison rivers and pollute livers in honor of a carpet-bagging, xenophobic fraud.
Erin Go Braugh!
That said, with St. Patrick's Day approaching, I begin to salivate for old-fashioned Irish dishes like boxty, barm-brack, champ, coddle, and colcannon. Most of all, I yearn on the 17th of March for corned beef and cabbage - which, as it turns out, might not be very Irish at all.
INDIE ROCK: In Olympia, a show featuring Calvin Johnson's Hive Dwellers, old-schoolers Pet Products, Al Larsen, The Human Skab, Mary Win, Redbird Fever, Wimps, Big Idea and Brazillian "superstar" Lulina will aim to raise money for the Haiti Emergency Relief Fund. 6 p.m. to 2 a.m., all ages, $8, Eagles Hall, 805 Fourth Ave., Olympia.
POP ROCK: Red Jacket Mine is an assembly of pop craftsmen, a group that creates radio-ready pop rock so friendly and easygoing that it's easy to pass it by without second thought. With Sirens Sister, 9 p.m., The New Frontier Lounge, 301 E. 25th St., Tacoma, 253.572.4020
OK, there's something that's been on my mind for a few weeks now, and although I'm not entirely sure The Prefunk is the best place to address it, I'm going to do it anyway.
Surely this revelation will come as no shock to all the Andersons, Smiths, Joneses and Buttafuocos out there - but it really sucks when some douchebag goes out and seriously shits on the credibility of your last name.
Case in point, Mark Driscoll, he of Seattle's Mars Hill Church.
Check out that video and tell me you're not impressed.
Recently, Driscoll made headlines by calling Avatar the "most demonic, satanic film I've ever seen."
That's funny, of course - and Avatar (from what I understand) is basically two hours and 42 minutes of bright blue alien fecal matter thrown onto a giant Megaplex screen - but motherfucker! Not only does Mark Driscoll make people associate my last name with a zany, Jesus-high religo-freak that seriously believes the devil himself has a hand in major Hollywood motion pictures - but his first name starts with M! Just like mine!
This, after all the fine work I've done for the M. Driscolls of the world!
(Refer to Feb. 5's The Prefunk, where I recommended drinking antifreeze for the buzz.)
Anyway, this Mark Driscoll character has really chapped my hide - and surely the hides of other M. Driscolls out there. I'd like to take a moment, before offering my usual, questionable recommendations for you and your liver this weekend, to point out a few differences between Mark Driscoll and myself.
Mark Driscoll: Went to Highline High School in Burien and was student body president and editor of the school newspaper.
Matt Driscoll: Smoked weed at lunch in high school.
Mark Driscoll: Believes the Bible tells us that woman should submit to the leadership of their husbands.
Matt Driscoll: Does whatever his wife tells him to do, and smoked weed at lunch in high school.
Mark Driscoll: Has characterized himself as a "Charismatic Calvinist."
Matt Driscoll: Likes it when Calvin pees on stuff.
Mark Driscoll: Was quoted in Relevant magazine as saying, "In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up."
Matt Driscoll: Once got the shit kicked out of him by Jesus - just wanted to play hacky sack.
Mark Driscoll: Was featured on an ABC debate with Deepak Chopra called "Does Satan Exist?"
Matt Driscoll: Once pretended his name was Deepak Chopra... while smoking weed in high school.
This week's Prefunk:
ZOOK, THE REVENGERS, THE FUCKING EAGLES at DOYLE'S
Saturday, March 13
One of the best bills of the weekend, and also a Prefunk in itself - for St. Paddy's Day. The show Saturday night at Doyle's is the first of many leading up to the most "blacked out on Jameson" day of the year. You can't go wrong with that.
PREFUNK: This is a tricky one, since - technically - you'll be Prefunking for St. Paddy's Day just by attending - making the act of Prefunking for tonight's event the Prefunk for a Prefunk.
Got it?
Anyway, take it easy since the show is sure to be spectacular and you've only got one liver - and St. Paddy's Day is still four days off. Have a bowl of Lucky Charms before heading out and call it good.
TACOMA CULT MOVIE CLUB: HOSTAGES at ACME GRUB CAGE
Sunday, March 14
If you have yet to venture inside the Acme Grub Cage, you're really missing out. If you have yet to check out the Tacoma Cult Movie Club, the same can be said.
Currently focusing on hostage flicks (presumably, films including hostage situations), this week's installment (as always) will start Sunday at 7 p.m. - and is totally free. Come out, have a few beers - and watch cult movies with a group of people just as dorky/and or lonely as you.
PREFUNK: Why not get Sunday evening off to a good start with a little self-grooming? I know, usually when you watch your favorite cult films you're all alone, in your sweats, with a ring of Orville Redenbacher fake butter around your wrist from digging straight into the bag. While this very approach would surely be welcomed at the Acme Grub Cage, why not clean up your act - if only for one night. Slip into your "nice" sweats and hit the town.
As you may have clued into by this point, every Friday the Weekly Volcano posts Owen Taylor's "El Vacio Moral" column - a weekly legislative update from Olympia. It's become a regular, bizarre feature - and we really like it. Personally, seeing what Owen's addled mind comes up with every Friday is often the highlight of my week (I'm a sad, sad man).
Unfortunately, though - as we should have anticpated from the beginning - the threat of a special session in Olympia has sent Owen into a downward spiral of intoxication and strange entertainment choices. He emailed me this morning to promise his usual El Vacio Moral column will be ready to go Monday morning - promising a "Epicc wrap-up million miles from Graceleand coup de tat stilo..." Whatever that means.
Anyway, look for your usually scheduled El Vacio Moral Monday morning on weeklyvolcano.com. Until then, here's an excerpt from Taylor's crytpic email to tide you over.
"I am absolutely drained, giddy, melancholy as hell (or he'll, whatever the iPhone will have you believe), and before I drag you or any of our pristine readership down into this pit electroshock-treatment qualifying madness, I am demanding a special session on my own sanity! Monday! I'm high watching Akira! Don't bring them into this!!!"
The year is 1984 and the song is Hall and Oates' "Out of Touch." Bobble Tiki can't say for sure where you were, dear reader, but the average thirtysomething was in the backseat while her mom rocked out to the synth-fueled rock 'n' soul masterpiece up front in the driver's seat. By the time they made that hit, the Philly natives had become the biggest-selling duo in the history of recorded music.
Seriously. If you're in for a good dose of nostalgia and want to remember why they sold so many records in the first place, consider this the summer of Hall and Oates. Daryl and John are touring behind the title "Do What You Want, Be What You Are Tour 2010," which will bring them to the Puyallup Fair Wednesday, Sept. 22 for a little "Rich Girl," "One on One" (anyone for a little adult edu-cay-shun?), "Maneater," "I Can't Go for That (No Can Do)" and on and on. Listening to their collection you can't help but be impressed. Hall and Oates' "She's Gone" is a little slice of pop/R&B 1970s perfection, with flawless harmonies, uncomplicated and Hemingwayesque lyrics, a lovely hint of strings and a classic ABA structure that, with a simple key change, brings the song to a burning, soulful climax.
Aw. If nothing else, the songs will bring you back to a time when white musicians emulated black soul legends. Uh, wait. Guess some things never change.
The concert, part of the Columbia Bank's Puyallup Fair Concert Series will start selling tickets on Saturday, March 20 at 10 a.m. at Ticketmaster. Ticket prices are $65 for the Golden Circle, $40, $30, $25, and include Fair gate admission, and seats are reserved.
1. The Mob Ride presents "The Great Leprechaun Hunt" - its fourth bicycle booze cruz - pushing off from The Acme Grub Cage at 7:30 p.m. If the past three rides have been any indication you can expect 30-plus riders on a wide variety of bike models visiting four pubs/bars with a traveling distance of 1.5 miles between drinks.
2. The non-profit Tacoma Art Place invites the community in for free art classes from 10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. During their Community Free Day you may learn about pottery wheels, photography, sewing, making ripped paper collage paintings and much more. A list of the free art classes can be found here.
3. MOVE! #16 features dancers from Seattle's Spectrum Dance Company, MLKBallet company, Tacoma City Ballet members, and guests Josephine's Echopraxia and the Maureen White Dance Company at 2 and 7 p.m. inside the SOTA Theater. Local musicians Goldfinch, Olivia de la Cruz and Travis Barker and the Black Sails will perform live to several pieces for MLKBallet.
4. Jazzbones presents "A Night With DJ Donald Glaude" with DJs dAb and Haaps beginning at 9 p.m.
5. The Revengers and The Fucking Eagles perform at 9 p.m. inside Doyle's Public House.
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