Park life is the best thing this side of the city (Richy Rich represent)



The Matthew Palladino show is major good, the use of shadow frames really made the art pop. I really like that gang theme. The rest is just as good, and very weird

I saw some red pins out there so congrats. Too bad you couldn't take the mural home







More Photos
- John Casey at the Palladino opening
- Matthew Palladino tag on Flickr


Park Life‎
220 Clement St
San Francisco, CA 94118
(415) 386-7275
parklifestore.com
Google Maps (Clement at 3rd)


Bonus (eats)
- B Star
- Burma Superstar
- Genki
- Schubert's

Best movie status (five stars baby!)


Photo from Y! Movies

IMDB (8.1/10): Po the Panda is the laziest animals in all of the Valley of Peace, but unwittingly becomes the chosen one when enemies threaten their way of life.

This is the first full feature directorial debut for the pair of directors, same for the writers Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger

This movie received good reviews so it was pretty safe to watch. I do love a good animated movie. Jack Black really shone here, so were Dustin Hoffman who plays Shifu (though I didn't know it was him, I had no idea Jackie Chan was in the movie either). That whole "the 5" thing and all the kung fu mystique were really "awesome" as Black would say. Animation and character designs were top notch, though some of the fighting scenes were a bit too fast. The major fight scenes (especially the one on the bridge) are pretty mind blowing, and I think most would appreciate Po's training. Also big love to the flashbacks, baby animals are so cudly

FYI Shifu is a red panda, which I had no idea existed


One of the best movies (period) this year, it goes in my top 5 animated flicks. Pandas rule!!

The CJM opened last week, a project 10 years in the making. The site was formerly the Jessie Street Power Substation dating from 1907. It's nice to see the plywood removed although the main structure had been visible from Yerba Buena Lane for a while


I took the above photo in September 2007, this cubic structure is supposed to be modeled after the Hebrew letter "yud"

I think there was a free day for the museum opening and I shouldave gone cuz it was hardly worth the Thursday late admission ($5 after 5pm). The museum is tiny, and I think they wasted the 'yud' gallery for some weird audio experiment. The one redeeming exhibit was William Steig (he created Shrek!) though it belonged to the Cartoon Art Museum

Here's a Steig postcard I picked up from the store which at $1 is a rip off, you know it


The most impressive thing for me was probably the building by Daniel Libeskind who's pretty famous for these things being also responsible for the two other Jewish museums in Berlin and Copenhagen. I first admired his work when I saw stunning photos on the expansion for the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) in Toronto

The CJM design may come off as cold and bare but I actually like those attributes. The sharp angles are also refreshing



The open garden outside is cool though it's a lot of open (unused) space


Check out the aerial photo by Bruce Damonte


Flickr has more photos of the CJM


The Contemporary Jewish Museum
736 Mission St
San Francisco, CA 94103
www.thecjm.org
Google Maps (Mission at 3rd)

Bonus
Not the museum cafe as much as Beard Papa's right there on Mission St

Many thx to Tristen for the tix

Datarock opened and I knew nothing of them beyond the track suits. I didn't expect too much actually and it was a lot worse than that. I'm not sure if it's the mics but the singer(s) were horrible, it was like metal screaming. The whole hopping energy looked fun though but this is not a band I ever wanna see again

DJ Aaron who spinned before and after was probably the highlight, especially those Justice tracks. It also helped that I got beer and nachos. It's outrageous that they don't serve fries there, especially if they have burgers on the menu. Btw you should def drink ups at the Boom Boom Room before, very chill

I didn't quite enjoy Ladytron having been thoroughly exhausted by the first act. They had a not so bad light show but the performance wasn't too exciting. I was hoping they would play "Destroy Everything You Touch" early but instead they played a lot from the the new album Velocifero

Check out the show poster

Some photos (more)

Michelle took me to see M83 for my bday (thx). Their set started really late around 10:30pm

I was only vaguely familiar with them but I knew it would be very ambient electronic ish, with minimal singing. The show hit all my expectations with extra unintelligible singing that didn't take much away. That encore was bomb (the drummer is fire)

Interesting note from jforsythe

I was pretty intrigued by the Lexan, light up control box that was on stage [...] it seemed like Anthony would actually be real-time modifying some digital output, but at other times I think he was just faking us out by pretending to be generating real-time effects that were actually pre-recorded.

Highlights

Gone (opener?)
On A White Lake, Near A Green Mountain (opener?)
Graveyard Girl
Kim & Jessie
Skin Of The Night
We Own The Sky
Car Chase Terror (maybe)
Teen Angst
Run Into Flowers (maybe)
Don't Save Us From The Flames
Couleurs (encore)

Some pics (more photos)

Of course I didn't run Bay To Breakers this year.. I showed up a bit late to take some pics (9:30am)





Some day I will run it again, with some kind of team!

More
- Rest of my photos of Bay To Breakers 2008
- Upcoming: Bay To Breakers 2008 event detail
- Post for Bay To Breakers 2007
- Mark you calendar for Bay To Breakers 2009: May 17, 2009

Forgot to post this up but Iron Man rocks, you better watch it


Photo from Y! Movies

Showtimes at AMC Van Ness (can't believe Century doesn't have it)
10:05 10:45am 1:00 1:45 4:00 4:45 7:00 7:45 9:50 10:30pm

IMDB (8.3/10): When wealthy industrialist Tony Stark is forced to build an armored suit after a life-threatening incident, he ultimately decides to use its technology to fight against evil.

Movie had a lot of buzz, the good kind from friends (and Roeper). Hey they can't mess all of em up. Kudos to casting on Downey Jr (and Bridges.. going bald is so evil; and Paltrow, really). Tony Starks is damn cool

Instant classic that puts this easily in the top 3 super-hero movies (in good company with Spider-Man 2 and The Incredibles)


Fun stuff
- Favreau cast himself as Starks' driver/bodyguard.. bodyguard really? I ain't sure he has the size for it. He does look big though
- reference to War Machine (when Howard's character looks at the other suit left at the compound towards the end)
- you definitely do not need to stay at the end of the neverending credits to see the extra footage they are showing (for comics geeks only)

5/14/07

South from the UK has a bit of a cult following in SF. People really embraced the band and especially older songs (that I've never heard). All I knew of South was "Better Things" and the album You Are Here that Tristen sent me (also thx for the tix, they hooked up the vip bracelets though the place was the emptiest I've ever seen it)

A marathon of 3 openers started things off around 8, I give some props to solo acoustic man Johnny Lloyd Rollins, and maybe a little less to Ki: Theory (if you must, check out "Holiday Heart" on his MySpace) The Silver State was ultra depressing music that drove us out the venue to walk down the Divisadero 600 block (cool hippest: Mojo Bicycle Cafe)

South rocked a lot more than I thought they would. Good stuff really. Super impressed by their rendition of "You Are One" live (it was cool to hear "Better Things" live, I've been rocking that on the iPhone for weeks). This is actually the end of their US tour so I hope everyone who caught them had a great time

Set list highlights (out of order)

Tell Me
Better Things
Opened Up
Motiveless
The Pain
Wasted
Opened Up
Soul Receivers
Up Close and Personal (maybe)
You Are One

Fun: the band rocked out a crazy instrumental piece for their encore. They then said goodbye and left the main(ish) singer by himself, he looked puzzled and wanted to perform more. He played a nice little acoustic number called "Flesh and Bone". Sweet

Bonus: the Independent played "Untitled" by Interpol in between sets. Sheya!

Snapped some photos, see more

The A.J. Fosik show at White Walls is sick


Flyer (large)

Fosik's art is really impressive: there's this great psychedelic quality to the wood sculptures, and the bears, and the 3d!! The opening was last week but it's here all of May. Check out of one of the best shows of the year so far

Some pics



Kelsey Brookes is also showing but I found his stuff a bit too "fairy tale"


Oh yeah check out the stuff by Curve at the Shooting Gallery next door


I went to the White Walls SP ONE show last month but I haven't posted the pictures yet (lots of cool paper cut out work there too haha)


White Walls
837 Larkin St
San Francisco, CA 94109
(415) 931-1500
whitewallssf.com

More
Rest of my photos
White Walls photos
artbusiness.com photos
A.J. Fosik in Swindle
A.J. Fosik's MySpace (myspace.com/aaaajaaaay)

I'll be honest, seeing Kate Nash in May wasn't quite as exciting as the possibility of seeing her in January (Popscene). Also, going to this show by myself was super questionable (see audience below) but Kate Nash provided a ton of energy (thx Tristen for the hookup)

Audience: a lot of girls, especially prepubescent (jk but not really). I hope I saw what looked like a dad buy sodas for his kids and their friends

Highlights: not so much when the girl is on the piano (especially the first 3 tracks were very very disorderly). I thought the two songs following on the guitar were really strong, my favorite being "Nicest Song". Sound in general was very good. Gotta give props to her band and the guy standing most right. He switched around with the bass, guitar, keyboards and rocked out the drums too. I would say if you go to a Kate Nash show, you might want to stay on the left side since that's where she plays with her own guitar when she's not on the piano

Non factor: the weird opening act The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players from NY slideshowplayers.com (MySpace). They are some kinda modern era troubadours or something

Set list highlights (out of order, basically the entire first album + more ish; she played for over an hour with a 3-song encore)

- Foundations
- Mouthwash
- Dickhead
- Birds
- We Get On (maybe)
- Pumpkin Soup
- Skeleton Song
- Nicest Song
- Merry Happy

Here are a few pics (more photos)

On Sunday, Kira's friends took us to check out the KFOG (104.5) annual fireworks show at the Embarcadero. Too bad about the fog. Next year I need to bring a hat and a coat and a blanket (bonus on the Zune radio feature)


Two more pics

Playlist (credits and video)

"William Tell Overture"
"I Fought the Law" - The Clash
"1234 " - Feist
"Time Has Come Today" - Chambers Brothers
"Ruby Ruby Ruby" - Kaiser Chiefs
"Tiny Bubbles" - Don Ho
"Hot for Teacher" - Van Halen
"Let It Be" - Timothy T. Mitchum / Carol Woods (Across the Universe Soundtrack)
"Rehab" - Amy Winehouse
"1812 Overture"
"Free Bird" - Lynyrd Skynyrd

Not sure if it was Beethoven or Lang Lang (it could really go either way) but last night was not all that enjoyable. The highlight was the solo encore, "Spring Dance" which I may have heard before

I think Kira liked it



Program (James Gaffigan conducted)

Beethoven
Egmont Overture

Beethoven
Piano Concerto No. 1

Beethoven
Piano Concerto No. 4

Some pics

While N.E.R.D. and Rihanna did their best to lower the hype (they sucked; skippin Lupe was probably wise), Kanye absolutely "smashed" my actual secret expectations for a fantastic show. Loved the energy and the visuals (did he nab the video guy from Daft Punk?)



Speaking of video, Kanye must have splurged on his own video equipment, it looked like some hd shit. I've never seen video screens with such good image quality (this only applies to him, of course)

Favorite moments
- Good Morning (cool opener)
- Glory
- Flashing Lights
- Jesus Walks
- Gold Digger
- I Wonder
- Hey Mama
- Stronger (though I was mad tireds and ready to leave by then, he closed with "Touch The Sky")

In retrospect, the only song missing for me was "Big Brother" but maybe that didn't fit Kanye's hip-hop opera. Ya it was probably kinda weird but the dedication and the work put into his performance, kid did not just show up. Picture him on stage, all by himself with giant a video backdrop behind him, the band/orchestra was sunk below in front of him, like a freaking opera

Absolutely worth it and by that I mean $75 (floor) + a million dollars in fees. I'd roll in a a leisurely 10pm to skip all the lame openers. Catch the tour on its way back, June 6 2008

Here are some rather whack pics, more



PS: Morg. was there, nosebleed seats and he said he actually liked Rihanna (she wins lamest gig costume, evs) but also Lupe who he thought was a white guy. Sirius Radio FTW

Adored the movie


Photo from Y! Movies

$10.50 at AMC Van Ness
11:40am 2:20 5:00 7:40 10:10pm


Bonus
The trailer for Pineapple Express, set to M.I.A.'s Paper Planes. Let me say that again, the trailer ruled, not sure bout the actual movie :-)

IMDB (8.3/10): Devastated Peter takes a Hawaii vacation in order to deal with recent break-up with his TV star girlfriend, Sarah. Little does he know Sarah's traveling to the same resort as her ex ... and she's bringing along her new boyfriend.

This movie had a few things against it, a super annoying city-covering marketing campaign and a mini-backlash from the Apatow (Superbad) laugh factory (exhibit a and b: Walk Hard', Drillbit Taylor). However it got very good reviews on (Ebert and) Roeper so that gave me hope. Who likes hype though?

Fortunately for me, a subdued and conservative enthusiasm did not take away from the movie, even if they do give a lot of it away in a trailer (the magicians behind the two-minute reel really need to do something new and different for comedies)

I know a lot of guys thought the Peter (Jason Segel) character was super pussy but I found him very sympathetic. Veronica Mars (Kristen Bell), not that hot. Something about her eyes. Mila Kunis on the other hand had a meteroic makeover since That 70's Show. The cutey. Period (proof)

The flick sports of a host of colorful secondary characters. The Aldous Snow character while pompous to the max was not actually that loathable. His British accent worked. There are fun small roles with some local flavor (Hawaiians + Samoans, and also that kid from South Central), major weedhead Paul Rudd, Snow superfan Jonah Hill (Superbad) and a very good Bill Hader as Peter's brother-in-law support

The movie is also a fun homage to Hawaii, couples who over do it there and all those cliches. Reclaimed for all of manhood and mankind by Segel who also wrote this movie, major bigness props. I think he hit a few things with perfect notes: that scene where he goes "tell me you're sorry" or something, and what follows; the picture from the bathroom at the very end and that ridiculously genius dracula operatic number, you must see this tour de force (he crazyo)


Yes, as Roeper hinted at the possiblity, this could very well be better than Superbad and Knocked Up. Word


I am partial to this one-sheet though I haven't seen it too much



PS I almost forgot, male nudity is definitely NOT cool

I previously wrote about pizza, that was more the gourmet sit down kind. Deja Vu is my favorite spot for pizza by the slice: thin exquisite crustness

The wait can be ungodly but it's all made fresh to order, you can go next door to an art thing or Needles And Pens, a cool zine/artsy place

Each slice is a big one cut in two long mini slices (about right for one person). Eat there, with a knife and fork on a nice place (to go can be quite messy because of slice size)

El Negatron
I've ordered a whole one for takeout but something happens with the box, the heat steams is up and it loses crispiness, becoming very regular (a good one for that is Pauline's). Wings are pretty average. The full name does beg to try their pasta but I've never seen anyone order that (maybe to go)

Bonus
Bi-Rite Creamery for ice cream dessert?


Deja Vu Pizza & Pasta
3227 16th St
San Francisco, CA 94103
(415) 255-1600
Google Maps (16th at Guerrero)

Hours
Sun - Thu 11am - 11:30pm
Fri - Sat 11am - 12:30am


Caution
A word about Serrano's, which is very much affiliated to Deja Vu. You'd think it's the same thing, just on 21st St but the slice you get is bigger and the crust a bit thicker. Could be a fluke but the 16th St location is a bit quieter

Serrano's



Deja Vu

Fulfilled a "life long" dream of seeing Chris Rock yesterday, even if I had to shlept to Oakland. It wasn't too bad actually, the Paramount is by Bart, $5.80 roundtrip.. if you don't lose your ticket :-)



This is Chris' 4th major tour show: No Apology, following Never Scared (2005), Bigger & Blacker (1999) and Roll With The New (1997)

I remember he was slightly off his edge between Never Scared and Bigger & Blacker, translated in real life by finding fame (money) and getting married/having kids. I still loved Never Scared though but he really pushed the envelope last night. Dropping knowledge left and right. Quite impressive. Sure there were up and downs but in general he was quite excellent. The politics was very topical, he's still hating on Hillary which is fun and spoke the truth about Obama's biggest roadblock: his black wife

Yeah he said it. In Oakland too

I liked the relationship stuff and of course the race bits. The one about who lives in his tony neighborhood of Alpine NJ: gold. There was one minor slip where he misspoke a line about Rev. Wright on the news recently for being an "angry old black man". Chris Rock dead panned "is there any other kind? his whole 3rd grade class was lynched after all"

Don't worry Chris, it ain't no thang. And that was just the first of four nights at the Paramount

Tip: the ticket says 7:30pm but the show started late with opener Mario Joyner of Seinfeld fame (Kramer's black friend and more). I think Chris performed from around 8:45 to 10pm


Chris Rock @ Paramount
"No Apology"
April 3 - 6, 2008

Paramount Theatre‎
2025 Broadway
Oakland, CA 94612
(510) 465-6400

Google Maps (Broadway at 20th)
paramounttheatre.com
chrisrock.com


I had decent seats which is to say I could see Chris without binoculars, almost. That's what $55 (plus I don't wanna say how much f-ing fees) get you. Tickets are $45.50, $55.50 and $75.50

This is the view at the end of the show


A much better pic from EOS Boy

"shot this from the back of the theatre. 400mm lens with a 1.4x tele-extender!", hot

Chris Rock 2008 Tour Dates

04/03/08 Paramount Theatre Oakland, CA
04/04/08 Paramount Theatre Oakland, CA
04/05/08 Paramount Theatre Oakland, CA
04/06/08 Paramount Theatre Oakland, CA

04/09/08 River Rock Show Theatre Richmond, BC
04/09/08 River Rock Show Theatre Richmond, BC

04/10/08 Paramount Theatre Seattle, WA
04/11/08 Paramount Theatre Seattle, WA

04/12/08 Silver Legacy Casino Reno, NV
04/12/08 Silver Legacy Casino Reno, NV

04/18/08 Dar Constitution Hall Washington, DC
04/19/08 Dar Constitution Hall Washington, DC
04/20/08 Dar Constitution Hall Washington, DC
04/21/08 Dar Constitution Hall Washington, DC

04/23/08 Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk Universal City, CA
04/24/08 Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk Universal City, CA
04/25/08 Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk Universal City, CA
04/26/08 Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk Universal City, CA

04/30/08 WaMu Theater At Madison Square GardenNew York, NY
05/01/08 WaMu Theater At Madison Square GardenNew York, NY
05/02/08 WaMu Theater At Madison Square GardenNew York, NY
05/03/08 WaMu Theater At Madison Square GardenNew York, NY
05/04/08 WaMu Theater At Madison Square GardenNew York, NY

05/16/08 Borgata Atlantic City, NJ
05/17/08 Borgata Atlantic City, NJ

Get tickets

The Paramount is a pretty cool spot btw, very art deco. Classy venue


Here's one from wikped

More info