The Hold Steady: Separation Sunday

by Donny Kutzbach

This Brooklyn-based band, centered around vocalist/guitarist Minneapolis transplant Craig Finn, took a path of resistance to create a truly unique and challenging record that results in a decisively engrossing and engaging listen. The Hold Steady’s sophomore release would be a memorable album in 2005 simply for the back to basics wall of classic rock-savvy guitar licks and crashing drums but those things alone wouldn’t be enough to take it over the top.

Sung to the tune of Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire"

by Ken Ilgunas

Michael Jackson, Holloway, Peterson, Skyway; GM, Delphi, Poverty, Pataki; Rosa Parks, Richard Pryor, Pope John Paul, Sabres on fire; house purging, government merging, China’s growing, lake snow blowing; it’s Brown’s town, Spikes is down, Losman was a letdown; White House lies, Rehnquist dies, Israel’s out of Gaza; Saddam on trial, Schwarzenegger, Baghdad getting hostile; hockey strike, Alito, Peace Bridge, casino; global warming, Katrina storming, tsunami in the Indian; terrorist, torturer, there goes Masiello; London bombings, King Kong, Condoleeza was wrong; bird flu, Parker Bowles, poor turnout at the polls; Superintendent Williams, Schwarzenegger, city slums; Sith revenge in Star Wars, Iraqi death toll soars; outsourcing, church closing, Guantanamo, what a year in Buffalo…

The Big Read

pictured right: Brandishing a copy of the once-banned book Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Assemblyman Sam Hoyt helps Just Buffalo Literary Center Artistic Director Michael Kelleher announce that Buffalo has been chosen as one of 10 pilot cities for the “Big Read,” a national literacy program by The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and Arts Midwest kicking off in May 2006. Fahrenheit 451 is one of four books, including The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald; Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, chosen to help encourage adults and kids to read. Just Buffalo received a $25,000 grant to participate in the pilot program. Watch for a month-long list of programming from Just Buffalo to be released in February.

by Javier

Happy Festivus! In the sitcom “Seinfeld,” Frank Constanza, played by the great Jerry Stiller (pictured above) invented this non-denominational holiday in response to the commercialization of Christmas. Festivus is traditionally celebrated on December 23rd. Now starring in the hit sitcom, “King of Queens,” Stiller was last on Broadway in 1997 in a production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters that also featured Calista Flockhart. A graduate of Syracuse University, Stiller spent a couple of seasons at the Erie Playhouse early in his career.

Artists' Nature

by Cynnie Gaasch

Artists often make their art around who they are—not necessarily flat out self-portraiture in the look in a mirror and paint a likeness of yourself kind of a thing—more of a “everything I do and make is about me” approach to the world. This could sound self-indulgent, or even uninteresting, and there are times when it is exactly that. In truth though, this is an artist’s nature, their job, to take their experience of the world and put it out there for us to see, to notice what is really going on. Currently, there are three solo exhibits in Buffalo that offer fine examples of artists providing real observation of the world through the description, or total immersion, in their own obsessions. Robert Holland’s installation, “All Aboard” is at Gallery 164, Nathan Naetzker’s “One by One” paintings are at Insite Gallery, and Beverley Semmes’ prints and installation “Hole/Pot/Dot” at Nina Freudenheim Gallery.

Deep Dish Delights

by Arthur Page

One of the things I miss most about no longer living on W. Ferry Street near Elmwood Avenue is being a short drive from Marco’s at 1085 Niagara St.

Chris Malachowski

by Ken Ilgunas

Why you should know who he is: By day, he’s your average real estate representative. By night, Chris Malachowski trades the suit and tie in for a guitar and microphone, transforming into frontman for the local punk rock band the Wolf Tickets. If you don’t recognize him from the group, he’s locally identified for spinning punk and reggae records as a DJ over the past 15 years. For now, though, he has put his spin-ster career on hold to focus on his band, The Wolf Tickets. The group is heavily influenced by The Clash—Malachowski’s favorite boyhood band. In commemoration of the life of The Clash’s lead singer and guiding force, Joe Strummer, Malachowski has created “Death or Glory: A Tribute to Joe Strummer and The Clash.” This annual concert features multiple local bands all performing Clash songs with proceeds benefitting The Joe Strummer Foundation for New Music (strummerville.com), a national organization dedicated to helping young and struggling musicians. The Strummer tribute takes place this Friday (Dec. 23) at 10pm at the Mohawk Place.

by Rob Brezsny

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Happy Holy Daze, Capricorn! I’ve been meditating on the perfect holiday gifts for you. What items might inspire you to take maximum advantage of the cosmic currents in 2006? And the answer is: anything that makes you laugh harder, deeper, faster, and more often. For me that would be something like DVDs by comedians Margaret Cho, Chris Rock, Dave Chappelle and Sarah Silverman, but you might need different stimuli. The point is, you’ve got to significantly raise your Laugh Quotient in the coming months. The astrological omens say it’s the only strategy that’s guaranteed to make you an expert problem-solver, increase your intelligence and keep you in peak health.

by Chuck Shepherd

■ British store owners seeking to drive away obnoxious, congregating teenagers have turned to security consultant Howard Stapleton’s recent invention, similar to a dog whistle, that emits a high-frequency sound audible to most teens but few older people. “The Mosquito” (it’s “small and annoying,” Stapleton told a New York Times reporter, who vouched that she couldn’t hear it, either) emits what one merchant called a pulsating chirp, not painful but surely irritating. A professor of neurophysiology verified that the ability to hear high frequency dissipates with age but that some people in their 20s and 30s could probably still hear it.