Artvoice Goes to China

by Jamie Moses

On the day we returned from China there was a front-page story in the New York Times that provided a remarkable finish to our 23,172-mile journey into Asia. The Times article was about Russia and the headline read “With Lenin’s Ideas Dead, Russia Weighs What to do With Body.” Lenin, the leader of the 1917 Bolshevik revolution and the founder of the Soviet Union, lies in a glass box in his Red Square mausoleum adjacent to the Kremlin. He’s been on public display there for the past eighty years, “occasionally sprouting fungi.” Under a lawn behind Lenin’s mausoleum lie the bodies of many other Communist Party luminaries, including Josef Stalin, Brezhnev, Chernenko and Feliks Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Soviet secret police.

The Buffalo News recently published an article offering the readers an in depth look at the front runners in the race for mayor of the City of Buffalo. As a life-long City of Buffalo resident I was anxious to read it. After I read the article I was dismayed to find it did little to show us the political record of either candidate.

Hysteria or Health Issue?

by Peter Koch

If there’s anything the media loves, it’s a story about the end of the world. The “bird flu” that has killed dozens in Asia is spurring widespread worry about its potential migration across the Atlantic. Memories of the “killer bees” blunder and the North American SARS epidemic, (which killed little more than Toronto’s tourist industry), are grounds to declare the avian influenza nonsense. However, we’re overdue for a pandemic, and a new awareness of the 1918 Spanish Flu virus, which killed between 25-50 million people, raises legitimate concerns that this bird flu could be a disease ready to take off. Should we fall into a pandemic of panic, should the media be inoculating Americans with an unhealthy dosage of fear, or should we just give the over-hyped bird ballyhoo a bogus diagnosis?

"Don't Make Me Stop This Car"

by Jim Corbran

How many of you out there ever heard your father or mother utter those words as you made a ruckus in the back seat of the family car? Yeah, so did I. And if you’re near my age, you were probably in the back of a seatbelt-less, relatively large American sedan—probably a Ford, Chevy or Plymouth. That’s just the way it was back then.

Back to Basics

by Mark Norris

Popular consensus would seem to find that books, along with newspapers and magazines for that matter, are a dying medium. True, the Web and ever-evolving computer technology have revolutionized the way people obtain their news, stories and folklore (just as Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press did nearly six centuries ago). Yet, disturbingly, many people seem to feel that as time goes by, and an increasing number of the population does the bulk of its reading on the computer screen, that books will simply stop being published. It may seem far-off or fantastical—and a little “Big Brother”-ish to boot—to think of a world without books, but look how quickly compact discs completely replaced vinyl records a few decades ago.

Bret Easton Ellis

by Tom Waters

Author Bret Easton Ellis is synonymous with postmodern fiction. During his second year of college at Bennington College, Ellis’ Less Than Zero (Simon & Schuster, 1985) was published and he was branded the voice of a generation. At the same time, writer Donna Tartt (The Secret History, The Little Friend) transferred to Bennington, where she become friends with Ellis. Until this interview, much speculation has been made of their relationship, as neither party has ever disclosed their dynamic. Rules Of Attraction (Simon & Schuster, 1987), his sophomore effort about a group of promiscuous and party-inclined college students, was regarded as too autobiographical. American Psycho (Vintage, 1991) was a dark, violent satire about a stockbroker turned serial killer whose graphic, sterile descriptions of slaughtered women and homeless people caused an uproar that is still being felt in popular fiction. After its release by Alfred Knopf, the National Organization for Women rallied to boycott the book bolstered by the protests and writings from feminists Tara Baxter, Tammy Bruce, and eventually, Gloria Steinem.

by Javier

Playwright August Wilson (pictured above) died on October 2 at the age of 60. Wilson chronicled the African-American experience in the 20th century in a series of ten plays that covered each decade, earning Pulitzer Prizes for Fences (set in the 1950s) and Two Trains Running (set in the 1960s). His play, Gem of the Ocean (set in the 1900s), opened on Broadway last year, starring Ruben Santiago-Hudson from Lackawanna. The final installment of the cycle, Radio Golf (set in the 1990’s) is scheduled for the 2006-07 Broadway season. To honor his achievements, the Virginia Theater on Broadway will be renamed the August Wilson Theater and the new marquee will be unveiled on October 17. The renaming was announced in September, weeks after the playwright revealed that he had been diagnosed with liver cancer.

Fresh-Faced Sophisticate: La Scala

by Arthur Page

You will know your dining companions are real Western New York restaurant aficionados if they comment that there is something very familiar about La Scala Ristorante, which opened recently on Transit Road in East Amherst.

by Robert Franz

This season the BPO celebrates the 250th anniversary of the birth of Mozart…any excuse for a party! Between drinks at our “Amadeus on the Rocks” concerts I wanted to share with you a bit about his music. Who am I? I’m the new Resident Conductor of the BPO, and I am thrilled to be in Buffalo.

A Truly Independent Independent

by George Sax

Thirty-nine years ago, the late, great Pauline Kael observed that James Blue was among a young generation of “gifted, intelligent men outside the industry… who are attempting to make inexpensive feature films as honestly and independently as they can.”

Dharma Lab

by Bill Mahoney

Why you should know who they are: Dharma Lab became something of a sensation in Buffalo’s electronic music scene when the duo formed locally three years ago. Elevating the practice of a traditional DJ to an art form, the duo add invigorating live and improvised sound to the experience. The Oracle (Christian Kuczkowski, pictured left) pounds out energetic tracks as the duo’s turntabilist and the Puppet Master (Chris Battaglia, pictured right) astounds with maniacal skill on keyboard. Sometimes he acts the part of a pseudo-DJ himself, performing familiar piano snippets by artists as diverse as Faith No More and Beethoven. It’s not surprising that Dharma Lab stands as one of the city’s most successful electronic music exports, regularly headlining popular festivals and events throughout Southern Ontario.

by Jennifer Behrens

We should have seen it coming, really.

by Rob Brezsny

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Columnist L.M. Boyd told the story of Mark Gubin, a photographer whose business was located near Milwaukee’s airport. A lover of pranks, Gubin decorated his roof with a giant sign that read “Welcome to Cleveland.” Countless passengers arriving in Milwaukee by plane were amused and confused by the greeting. I suspect that a similar event will occur in your life this week, Libra. As you arrive at your new destination, you’ll get signals that lead you to believe you’re not where you thought you were. Ignore the misdirection.

by Chuck Shepherd

■ In September, nine-year veteran weathercaster Scott Stevens of KPVI-TV in Pocatello, Idaho, resigned to pursue his obsession of proving that the massiveness of Hurricane Katrina must have been caused by a Russian-made electromagnetic generator employed by the Japanese Yakuza in retaliation for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The “patterns and odd geometric shapes” in the sky are “unmistakable” evidence, according to his Web site, that “our weather has been stolen from us.” Station manager Bill Fouch said that Stevens was great at forecasting local conditions and that he was sorry to lose him.