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September 2008
Your A-List: Best Singer-Songwriter
For years and years, after Stevie Ray Vaughan’s passing and before indie rock and the ubiquity of hipsters, Bob Schneider was more or less synonymous with the Austin music scene. And after all that time he’s still going strong and is the winner, with 27 percent of the vote, of the Your A-List poll for Best Singer-Songwriter.
Although, in a testament to our pop culture, some may have come to know Schneider as the boyfriend of Sandra Bullock for a time, the musician has had a strong career in various bands, starting with funk outfit Joe Rockhead, and moving on to the Ugly Americans, The Scabs (with whom he arguably got his first serious recognition), and eventually striking out on his own as a solo artist who also performed under the moniker Loneyland. Throughout his career, the guitar playing Schneider has mixed elements of funk, rock and, increasingly, the darkly romantic ethos of traditional singer-songwriter material to establish his familiar hybrid sound.
Schneider is still a regular fixture on the Austin scene, playing solo shows at the Saxon Pub, Antone’s and Threadgill’s regularly, and still pops up with members of the Scabs from time to time. His ubiquitous and long-standing presence on the Austin music scene is a testament to his endurance as a performer and the devoted fan base he has cultivated in his adopted hometown of Austin.
Others receiving votes
- Joe Ely, 17 percent
- Patty Griffin, 15 percent
- Eliza Gilkyson, 15 percent
- Bruce Robison, 10 percent
- Ray Wylie Hubbard, 5 percent
- Patrice Pike, 5 percent
- Slaid Cleaves, 3 percent
- Wendy Colonna, 2 percent
- Bill Callahan, 1 percent
Write-ins: Doyle Bramhall, Adam Carroll, Matt Powell, Nathan Singleton, Wynn Taylor, Rick Trevino, Jimmy Vaughan, Mark Viator, Carolyn Wonderland, Josh Zee
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Jean-Claude Van Damme: Last action hero
Once the laughing stock of the movie world, Jean-Claude Van Damme, who made a living kicking ass and speaking broken English in late-eighties and early-nineties action films, seemed to disappear from the public consciousness. Until now.
He returns to screens at this year’s Fantastic Fest in ‘JCVD,’ a film in which he plays a washed-up 47 year-old action hero struggling through action scenes and enduring even more abuse in a custody battle for his child. Sound familiar?
The movie begins with the chiseled but aging Van Damme struggling to make his one through an over-the-top action scene — in which he dismantles seemingly an entire army of ‘bad guys’ — that is filmed in one long-running shot. The director is a young Asian seemingly full of ennui and antipathy toward Hollywood. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. But such is life when you have legal bills to pay.
The film follows Van Damme in a series of flashbacks from his family court battle in L.A. to an outlandish scenario in which he finds himself as a hostage in a post office in his home town in Belgium. In both the filmmaking and the storytelling the violent comedy shows serious influences of Guy Ritchie, Simon Pegg, the Coen brothers and Quentin Tarantino. It is an absurd, highly stylized shaggy dog story but also touching in its portrayal of a man who has become a prisoner of his own fame and a forgotten punch line in Hollywood, forced to sell out his body and his creative vision in order to work. Where reality begins and ends is hard to tell in this film, but it does a good job of reveling the human side of the thoughtful karate master in an entertaining and meta screenplay.
Apparently it humanized and highlighted Van Damme, who displayed some pretty decent dramatic acting chops in the film, to the point that since the film first screened at a festival earlier this year, he has started to receive more acting work, and is currently working on a project in which he is starring and directing. Only in America. Or Belgium. Or whatever.
‘JCVD’ screens tonight at Alamo South as part of the Fantastic Fest.
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Your A-List: Best Radio Morning Show
In the battle for radio morning show supremacy, it was a two-horse race in the Your A-List poll, with winners the ‘Dudley & Bob Morning Show’ beating out reigning champ Bobby Bones and his crew.
The ‘Dudley & Bob Morning Show’ on KLBJ-FM took home 52 percent of the vote, thanks to a devoted fan base that tunes in each morning to hear Austin’s take on comedy shock jocks. Call it a Howard Stern starter kit.
The dynamic of the show generally has Dale Dudley, the native Texan who has been on Austin’s air for 20 years, playing the absurd self-deprecating wise-cracker with Bob Fonseca, his radio partner of 16 years, acting as his straight man, or as much a straight man as you can expect to find on FM morning radio, a format designed to wake people up with some laughter and head shaking. The addition funnyman and Austin High grad Charlie Hodge in recent years has also been a welcome addition to the show’s format.
In addition to their schtick, the show also does its part for the local scene by highlighting local musicians. Additionally, the show features interview segments with touring comedians, which seem to be a hit with the listenership.
Others receiving votes
- ‘Bobby Bones Show,’ 96.7 KISS-FM, 38 percent
- ‘J.B. and Sandy Morning Show,’ Mix 94.7, 5 percent
- ‘KASE Morning Crew,’ KASE, 2 percent
- ‘The Morning X,’ 101X, 1 percent
- ‘Morning Edition,’ KUT, < 1 percent
- KMFA Classical 89.5, < 1 percent
- *‘Orange Juice and Biscuits,’ KTSW (write-in), < 1 percent
- ‘The Talk of Austin,’ KVET, < 1 percent
- ‘KGSR in the Morning,’ KGSR, < 1 percent
- ‘Austin’s Morning News,’ NewsRadio 590, < 1 percent
- ‘Kidd Kraddick in the Morning,’ Jammin’ 105.9, < 1 percent
- ‘D-Train in the Morning,’ Hot 93.3, < 1 percent
- ‘Majic in the Morning with Kim and Alex,’ Majic 95.5, < 1 percent
- ‘Big Boy’s Neighborhood,’ Beat 104.9, < 1 percent
- ‘Family Friendly Mornings,’ The River 102.3, < 1 percent
- BOB-FM, < 1 percent
- ‘The Wake-Up Call,’ KVET, < 1 percent
- ‘El Piolin,’ La Que Buena, < 1 percent
- ‘El Chulo y La Bola,’ La Ley, < 1 percent
- ‘The Wake-Up Call’ with Nelson Linder, Kenneth Thompson and Richard J. Smith, KAZI, < 1 percent
- ‘The Lounge Show,’ KOOP, < 1 percent
- ‘The Morning Rush’ with Erin Hogan and Mike Rosenthal, 1530 ESPN Austin
* Kudos to morning show ‘Orange Juice and Biscuits,’ which was able to garner enough write-in votes to land the Texas State University-based show in the top 10, ahead of several Austin stations owned by corporate giants.
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Take a pass on new Coen brothers’ film
It was with a mixture of excitement and low expectations that I entered the screening for ‘Burn After Reading,’ the new Coen brothers’ film. It turns out that the latter of my two motivations would be rewarded.
The film starts with a satellite image that slowly descends on CIA headquarters until we are thrust into the halls of power. As we come to learn through the film, those halls hold about as much cognitive power as a disorderly junior high, with lying, backstabbing and buck-passing at every turn. Though the film’s early sequences may seem to suggest that movie will be about the misuse of power and the oxymoron inherent in ‘Central Intelligence,’ and the buffoonery therein, it quickly spirals into a shaggy dog tale centering on people who can’t find satisfaction in their fractured personal lives.
Although it bares some similarity to the Coens’ ‘Fargo’ and ‘The Big Lebowski,’ the film is neither as dark as the former or as funny as the latter. John Malkovich and Tilda Swinton give wonderful performances that are deserving of better material, but the other performances fall flat. Brad Pitt’s quirkiness is not as trite as Tom Cruise’s profanity-laden character in ‘Tropic Thunder,’ but it comes close. The always charming George Clooney’s character waffles between unbridled neuroticism and shotgun-splayed Don Juanism that is disjointed at best, and even the usually wonderful Francis McDormand struggles to endear on any level. In fact, none of the characters are lovable or even likeable, much less entertaining, making the absurd plotline somewhat tedious.
Considering the brothers entered this endeavor fresh off of ‘No Country for Old Men,’ I guess this piece of fluff, despite some seriously dark scenes, can be excused for falling short of both the ‘dark’ and ‘comedic’ elements of a ‘dark comedy.’ Save this one for the Netflix list or a rainy matinee.
Read the Statesman film critic Chris Garcia’s review here.
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Beer bonanza at Hyde Park Market
After a few steps into the new market, it becomes clear that things are not what they seem from the outside. Sure, the store has the simple conveniences you would expect — chips, soda, water, candy, etc. — but there is also a deli case featuring Boar’s Head products, a refrigerated case of Green Cart sandwiches, an aisle of hardware necessities, a cooler soon to be filled with organic produce, a plethora of exotic tobacco products, and beer. Man, is there beer.
For years, Central Market, Whole Foods and Whip In (and, more recently, newcomer Spec’s), have been the preferred destination for beer lovers whose discriminating tastes have led them to a life of American micro-brews and delicious imports. With the new Hyde Park Market, the balance of beer power in Central Austin may soon be shifting.
Owner Navid (Tony) Hoomanrad decided that he wanted to deviate from the norm of neighborhood convenience stores by offering a one-stop shop for fresh grocery products generally found in larger markets, along with an amazing array of beer. After a few early orders, the affable proprietor upped the ante and ordered every single beer offered by his eight distributors. The result is a dizzying array of bombers (singles), six packs and cases that is virtually unrivaled in Austin. At last count, Hyde Park Market offers 525 different types of beer. For perspective, Central Market carries roughly 360 beers, Whole Foods 425 and Spec’s 550, while Whip In professes to having a smaller (though equally impressive in terms of quality) selection due to space.
If there is a beer you have had in this town (or towns in Europe), chances are Tony has it. With singles from Ayinger, Maredsous, Afflinger, St. Bernard’s, Urthel and Ommegang, to name a few, a trip down one aisle in Hyde Park Market is enough to make a beer connoisseur’s head spin and mouth water. And, the pièce de résistance, the $40 Deus Brut de Flandres Cuveé Prestige 2006.
If Belgium, Holland, Germany, et al., don’t offer your cup of, um, beer, then the six-pack aisles should please your micro-brew loving heart. There you will find selections from Atlantic Brewing Co. of Bar Harbor, Maine; Boulevard Brewing of Kansas City; Avery Brewing of Boulder, Colo.; and every local Texas brewery, naturally.
While Tony says he quit drinking beer four years ago, and who can blame him, it’s hard to work 85 hours a week if you’re hungover, he takes great pleasure in serving the refined palates of Austin.
“It’s fun,” Tony said about providing the insane assortment of beer. “You have customers calling in for certain beers, and I figure we might as well get them. I like seeing the looks on people’s faces and seeing them content knowing that they can come here and get what they want.”
Tony opened his market in the space formerly occupied by Sunrise Super Stop in May of this year after spending close to two years running the Diamond Shamrock on Barton Springs Road. Although his business may be new to the neighborhood, Tony, whom frequent shoppers call by name, spent his earliest years living in the apartments across the street from his current business. In 1977, his parents moved from Iran to Austin, where his father, Ali Hoomanrad, attended college with dreams of becoming a doctor. Although he was accepted to several medical schools, Hoomanrad’s dreams took a back seat to the political realities of the day, as the 1979 revolution in Iran disrupted his ability to receive monetary support from his family in Iran.
After graduating from Anderson High School, Tony operated multiple convenience stores in the Houston area before returning to Austin. He understands there is something of a risk in putting so much money into a somewhat unorthodox business plan, and despite the fact that he paid close to $30,000 for the largest of his beer coolers, Tony says he is certain he will make his money back in time, and plans no further expansion of his enterprise. And, about those gas pumps outside, Tony has been offering gas at cost, and at times taking a loss, to get folks into his shop. The long lines at the pumps, at which you can’t pay without going inside, seem to be proving his logic as prescient.
Hyde Park Market
4429 Duval St.
Austin, TX 78751
[map]
Photo of Tony Hoomanrad by Mark Deutrom
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Your A-List: Best Gay Bar
Some places in Austin are simply the standard-bearers in their respective industries. BookPeople for books; Amy’s Ice Cream for, um, ice cream; Waterloo Records for music. The same can be said of Oilcan Harry’s, with 60 percent of the vote, winner of the Your A-List poll for Best Gay Bar.
There may be a gay bar or two that has been around longer than the Warehouse District stalwart, but none draws the crowds or the number of mentions as does Oilcan’s. As a testimony to its popularity, I would venture to guess that any visitor inquiring about local gay bars would first be directed to the bar on 4th Street, a distinction any establishment of any stripe would be proud.
The bar is generally home to a mid-to-upscale crowd who enjoy the bar as much as a place to hangout with friends as any kind of pick-up locale. On weekend nights, which now include Thursdays in case you didn’t know, the bar gets bumping with a dance crowd the likes of which you would be likely to find at any other dance club in town, gay or straight.
While other gay bars have come and gone, or slowly seen patronage taper off, over the past two decades, Oilcan’s seems to be as strong as ever.
Oil Can Harry’s
211 W. 4th St. [map]
Others receiving votes
- Charlie’s: 13 percent
- Rain: 11 percent
- Chain Drive: 9 percent
- Rainbow Cattle Company: 3 percent
- Cockpit: 2 percent
- ‘Bout Time: 2 percent
Write-in: The Rusty Spur
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A cosmopolitan city does an Olive Garden make
Someone once showed me a post on some city-specific search site that has reviews of restaurants, etc. On a post about the massive Cannoli Joe’s in South Austin, a poster wrote after gorging himself at the Italian joint that, “The Olive Garden is dead to me!”
I spit fettucini out of my nose when I read that one. It may have been the greatest line of unintentional comedy delivered via the interdigitubes in all of computerized history. Until this.
This story has been bouncing around the ‘Net today, and, in the words of Gawker, it may be the “most Onion-like real news story of all time.” Apparently, December of 2006 was a slow news month (shocking) in Sioux City, Iowa. In this story, Sioux City Journal staff reporter John Quinlan trumpets the arrival of the town’s first Olive Garden, apparently a hallmark for fine dining and refined palates in Siouxland.
Here are the first few grafs, with the rest linked here. I really can’t make any jokes that this story doesn’t make on its own.
A martini is not a martini without an olive.That, at least, is the thinking of a true connoisseur.
And to Siouxland residents, many of whom consider themselves connoisseurs of fine food, a city is not a city without an Olive Garden. So as of Monday, Sioux City becomes a real city.
What for years has been a local obsession — the OG’s manicotti formaggio, chicken vino bianco and zuppa toscana driving Siouxlanders to Omaha and Sioux Falls — has become a reality.
Olive Garden officially opens its newest restaurant at 4 p.m. Monday at 4930 Sergeant Road in Lakeport Commons.
The OG yearning was best expressed by an anxious woman in a big white car who stopped this reporter as he was leaving the new restaurant last week. She rolled down her window and asked if it was open, then looked heartbroken when told that it wasn’t, that the parking lot was simply filled with the vehicles of Olive Garden staff members in training. “I’ve been watching it and marking my calendar until Dec. 11,” she said, her brief hopes for an early Italian dinner quashed.
FANTASTICO!
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Actor revisits ‘A Bronx Tale’
Twenty years ago, struggling actor Chazz Palminteri made his way home after being fired from a job as a doorman at a club in Los Angeles for refusing entry to legendary Hollywood agent Swifty Lazar. Sitting on his bed at home, his eye caught a card his father had given him as a child: “The saddest thing in life is wasted talent.”
His father’s simple profundity motivated the native New Yorker, who had grown frustrated bouncing around playing small parts on serial television, to take the fate of his career into his own hands. He headed to the store, grabbed a legal pad and returned home to the solitary endeavor of writing.
“I remembered when I was 9, I saw a man kill a man right in front of me, and I didn’t rat on him,” Palminteri said last week during a break from rehearsal at the Long Center. “And I told my father, ‘I did a good thing, right, daddy?’ And he said, ‘You did a good thing for a bad man, son.’ My father always said, ‘Don’t admire those guys; I’m the tough guy because I get up and work for a living.’ I thought that dynamic between the father and (wise guy) Sonny and the boy in the middle would make a good story, and I started writing ‘A Bronx Tale.’ ”
The murder and its resulting moral dilemma served as the jumping-off point for a work of art that explored the complexities of a young man whose coming of age is confused by the push and pull of his relationships with two separate worlds.
“The main theme going in was that it wasn’t black versus white; it was kind of like gray and gray. The boy took the best of Sonny and his dad and became a man,” Palminteri said. “Of course, Sonny, as bad as he was, wasn’t all that bad. The father, as good as he was, wasn’t all that good. He (the boy) took the best of both people … I didn’t know I was writing all that. I just wanted to tell a great story, a story from my heart, from my soul.”
The play, which premiered in 1989 in Los Angeles, immediately garnered the unknown actor serious attention from Hollywood, with the script becoming one of the hottest commodities in town. But neither stardom nor riches would come immediately, as the broke Palminteri steadfastly refused offers of more than $1 million to sell the film rights unless he was allowed to write and star in the movie.
Eventually, Palminteri’s stubbornness paid off when Robert De Niro, after seeing the play in New York, offered to make “A Bronx Tale” his directorial debut, with Palminteri writing the script and playing the role of Sonny.
Two decades later and with dozens of acting roles to his credit, the Academy Award-nominated Palminteri, older and wiser, returned to the work that brought him fame. He opened a national run of “A Bronx Tale” on Wednesday at Austin’s Long Center following a revival on Broadway.
In the time since he wrote the play, Palminteri has gone from wandering bachelor to married father of two. With that maturity comes a shift in his relationship to this personal story and a deeper understanding of the role a father plays in guiding his son.
“My father used to say, ‘Don’t look at those guys (wise guys) because they only end up in two places, dead or in jail.’ And he was right. As I got older, they ended up dead or in jail. So sooner or later you have to pay the band. If you wanna dance, you have to pay the band. I always say that you have to do the right thing. And that’s what my dad always preached. … And look what it says in ‘A Bronx Tale’: ‘The choices you make will shape your life forever.’”
As it turns out, the bold choices Palminteri made in both striking out on his own and refusing to give in to Hollywood’s expectations have brought him fame and success, and eventually returned him to where it all began: one man and his vision on a stage, opening his heart to the world, just telling “another Bronx tale.”
‘A Bronx Tale’
The national tour of the successful Broadway revival of the show opens in Austin. 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday. Dell Hall, Long Center, 701 W. Riverside Drive. $40-$80. 474-5664. www.thelongcenter.org.
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Your A-List: Best Park
Home to weekend picnickers, soccer fanatics, kite-fliers, festival-goers, and at one point or another anyone else in Austin not found under said umbrella, Zilker Park is winner of the Your A-List poll for Best Park.
The 351-acre natural retreat set along the Colorado River offers some of the best views of the downtown skyline, but feels miles and miles away from the crowded and noisy streets of the city’s center. Ask any local or visitor to the city what their favorite things are about Austin, and you Zilker Park is all but guaranteed to be near the top of that list.
From the City of Austin’s Web site:
In 1918, A.J. Zilker deeded the 35 acres surrounding Barton Springs to the City of Austin. In 1932, Zilker agreed to give the military school established during the First World War an additional 330 acres, joining the 35 acres on the north side of the original tract if the city would buy the acreage from the school for $200,000. This action was approved in a bond election and despite the economic depression of the 1930’s, the land was developed into Zilker Park.
Others receiving votes
- Barton Creek Greenbelt, 14 percent
- Auditorium Shores, 6 percent
- Bastrop State Park, 5 percent
- Hippie Hollow, 5 percent
- Pace Bend Park, 5 percent
- Bull Creek Park, 3 percent
- Umlauf Sculpture Garden, 3 percent
- Waterloo Park, 2 percent
- Republic Square, < 1 percent
Write-ins: McKinney Falls State Park, Rollingwood Park
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Your A-List: Best Country Singer/Group
Roger Wallace went up against some of the biggest names in the country scene in Austin, from Asleep At the Wheel to Dale Watson and Kevin Fowler, but as the polls closed, he rode off into the sunset with 37 percent of the vote and the title of winner of the Your A-List poll for Best Country Singer/Group.
While this native of Tennessee may not be as well known as some of his competition, Wallace definitely has the work ethic to stay competitive on the local scene, constantly playing gigs at holes-in-the-wall all over town, from Ginny’s Little Longhorn to, well, the Hole in the Wall. Not only is the honky tonker just a picker and a singer, he also pens most of his own tunes, with co-writing credits on 12 of the 13 songs on his last album, “It’s About Time.” It looks like it may be just about time that the energetic performer with a voice that bangs off the back of the room starts getting a little more notoriety for his roots country style, and maybe one day find his name treated with the reverence of that given to some of his more famous competitors/vanquished Internet foes.
Others receiving votes
- Jon Emery, 20 percent
- Asleep at the Wheel, 12 percent
- Dale Watson, 11 percent
- Kevin Fowler, 8 percent
- Derailers, 4 percent
- Kelly Willis, 3 percent
- Mother Truckers, 2 percent
- Jesse Dayton, 1 percent
- Sunny Sweeney, < 1 percent
Write-ins: Alvin Crow, Billy Dee, Heybale!, Kyle Park Band, Pauline Reese and High Country, Jim Stringer, Dale Watson
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