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Small Business Awards 2013: sexy shots to Chinatown suppers. Plus, artMRKT versus ArtPadSF, the future of garbage, surf tunes, and more. Articles Online | Digital Edition

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Scholarship fund for poor college reject

04.01.13 - 2:49 pm | Tim Redmond |

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The Bay Guardian Family Foundation has announced a special scholarship fundraising program to help Suzy Lee Weiss attend the college of her dreams.

Weiss, who slacked off four four years in High School watching The Real Housewives, revealed her plight in the Wall Street Journal, announcing that the elite schools of the US lied to her.Read more »

Pope announces evolution

04.01.13 - 1:25 pm | Steven T. Jones |

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Reflecting the growing political acceptance of same-sex marriage around the world, Pope Francis has unexpectedly announced that God's position on the issue is “evolving.”

Speaking to reporters in the Vatican following Easter services, the recently installed Pope acknowledged his own personal history of expressing opposition to same-sex marriage as Archbishop of Buenos Aires Jorge Mario Bergoglio.Read more »

Wiener to star in porn flick

04.01.13 - 12:13 pm | Tim Redmond |

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Supervisor Scott Wiener has signed a contract to star in a new porn film satirizing the city’s ban on nudity.

Variety reports that Wiener accepted a deal “in the mid three figures” to play the fictitious Supervisor Scott Cox in “Cover Up,” a film by the legendary Naked Sword productions.

Wiener replaces porn star Dale Cooper, who has left the film “to pursue other interests.”

The film, shot on location in the Castro, would violate the ban on public nudity that Wiener sponsored – but since the producers obatined permits, Wiener said, wieners are permitted.Read more »

Archbishop announces nuptials

04.01.13 - 11:53 am | Tim Redmond |

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San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone announced today that he would wed his longtime lover, Lupe, a tennis pro at the Bay Club.

“It will be a simple ceremony, as befits two humble servants in the eyes of our Lord,” George Wesolek, spokesman for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, told us. Read more »

He will rise again: Hunky Jesus contest rescheduled

04.01.13 - 10:11 am | Caitlin Donohue |

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Soggy hordes of Dolores Park revelers were caught, mid-day-drunk, when unseemly amounts of rain stopped the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence's famed Hunky Jesus contest in its tracks yesterday. No one likes a wet deviled egg.

But don't worry heathens, you'll still get a chance to blaspheme -- the Sisters have announced that the event will be resurrected in April. Read more »

Lyft to take on Muni routes

04.01.13 - 8:56 am | Tim Redmond |

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In an announcement that could transform transportation policy in San Francisco, the startup company Lyft is prepared to take over some of the most crowded and dysfunctional Muni routes in San Francisco.Read more »

Live Shots: Flume at the Rickshaw Stop

03.29.13 - 3:19 pm | Ryan Prendiville |

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Houses play Popscene night at the Rickshaw Stop. Photo by Ryan Prendiville.

Houses at the Rickshaw Stop. Photo by Ryan Prendiville.

The crowd at the Rickshaw Stop. Photo by Ryan Prendiville.

Flume at the Rickshaw Stop. Photo by Ryan Prendiville.

Flume, from afar. Photo by Ryan Prendiville.

Every time I've been to Popscene in the last few years, and I mean every time, I see the same guy. Deep 30s, clean cut, and so meticulously well-dressed that it's conspicuous. Particularly conspicuous when he's gravitating around a pair of black lingerie wearing girls dancing like they can't drink. But I guess that mix is fairly typical of Thursdays at the Rickshaw Stop, for the weekly event that always brings in a new crowd by being an 18+ dance party, while maintaining a certain following with the promise of seeing an emerging music act that "could be the next big thing."

Or, as the case was with Australian electronic producer Flume on Thursday night, the next Porter Robinson. As in "OMG, can you believe he's only 20?" and the additional hype that goes with it. The crowd was sold out and eager to hear him DJ, many in the audience probably choosing the show over more established popular EDM acts playing that night like Major Lazer at the Independent or the Skrillex/Diplo (he's everywhere) event going on for the video game convention. Read more »

Foreign imports and American heroics: new movies!

03.29.13 - 1:25 pm | Cheryl Eddy and Guardian Staff Writers |

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Hollywood unfurls the latest adaptation of Stephenie Meyer's ever-popular YA fiction (the mercifully vampire-less The Host), as well as Tyler Perry's Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor, the multi-hyphenate mogul's 5628th film. (One statement in the previous sentence is false.)

Plus: check out Dennis Harvey's dual review of a pair of refreshingly low-key foreign imports, The Silence (from Germany) and Starbuck (from Canada, set in Quebec). There's also an American-set movie from singular French director Quentin Dupieux, Wrong, opening at the Roxie; check out my review here.

More reviews, including a surprisingly positive take on toys-gone-wild sequel GI Joe: Retaliation, after the jump. Read more »

Calvin Trillin: One issue that seems to be getting bipartisan support in the Senate

03.29.13 - 11:56 am |

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When Cruz begins a crude bombard,

He speaks with reckless disregard.

So even those who share his views

Tend not to want to schmooze with Cruz.

Calvin Trillin: Deadline Poet: The Nation4/8/2013

Calvin Trillin US Senator Cruz

Foxygen works its uncanny magic at Brick and Mortar Music Hall

03.29.13 - 11:52 am | Laura Kerry |

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I experienced a strange phenomenon in the few days leading up to Tuesday’s sold out concert at Brick and Mortar Music Hall. The first in a series of strange events occurred in a coffee shop. I overheard one barista say to another, “Put on that Foxygen song.”

“Who?” she asked.

“It’s like ‘oxygen’ but with an ‘F.’”

The next day, one of my favorite websites listed Foxygen’s “Shuggie” as the “Song of the Day,” and later that evening, a friend mentioned the band in a conversation that had very little to do with music. Read more »

Privacy and electronic tolls on the Golden Gate Bridge

03.29.13 - 11:35 am | Rebecca Bowe |

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Now that human toll collectors have vanished from the Golden Gate Bridge, motorists can expect their license plate numbers to be recorded for fare collection. Yet one aspect of this shift to receive little ink in recent media reports is the privacy implications of the new electronic system.Read more »

Golden Gate Bridge

Bow down to the robo-proletariat!

03.29.13 - 10:05 am | Robert Avila |

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Radically refashioning a host of reactionary fashions, La Pocha Nostra Live Art Laboratory puts all borders up for grabs. The international performance art troupe returns to San Francisco Sat/30 for the US premiere of La Pocha Nostra’s latest creation, Corpo Insurrecto 3.0: The Robo-Proletariat.

A performance project by Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Roberto Sifuentes, and Erica Mott (with LPN associates Brittany Chavez, Rico Martin, Marcos Nájera, Esther Baker Tarpaga, and Allison Wyper), Corpo Insurrecto 3.0: The Robo-Proletariat asks the time-old question: What might you discover at the intersection of “an aging deviant shaman, a Neo-Aztec priest making romantic religious tableaux with a goat, a flamenco drag king, and an Oil Spill Madonna”?

Read more »

Performance art

Can't stop fashion: Style, as always, at Oakland's First Friday

03.28.13 - 5:09 pm | Jessica Wolfrom and Cortney Clift |

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Oakland First Friday. Guardian photos by Cortney Clift and Jessica Wolfrom

We're stoked on next week's Oakland First Fridays, where the style is weird, wild, and exactly what you would expect to see any time Bay Area folks, art, and mingling collide. In March, despite the previous month’s tragedy, looks were lively as ever. Attendees and vendors alike seemed to have all received the same memo: throw on some sort of headwear and layer up in as many different patterns as possible.

Read more »

Airbnb's tax and tenant law violations headed for hearings

03.28.13 - 4:24 pm | Steven T. Jones |

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As Airbnb continues to avoid making any public comment on the $1.8 million annual Transient Occupancy Tax obligation to the city that it appears to be dodging, with the complicity of the Mayor's Office, Board of Supervisors President David Chiu is getting closer to introducing legislation to regulate so-called “shared housing” and holding public hearings on the issues it raises.Read more »

The right wing and same-sex marriage

03.28.13 - 1:55 pm | Tim Redmond |

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I had lunch with my old friend Johnny Angel Wendell, a musician, actor, and radio personality in LA, who was up here on vacation (and to hype his new vinyl, "My Lesbian Friend,") and we got to talking about the Supreme Court and same-sex marraige, and Johnny and I have agreed for years that this debate is essentially over. When 80 percent of people under 30 think same-sex marriage is fine, then it's really only a matter of time before it's legal and encouraged in every single state.Read more »

Hot List

 Appleseed Cast - Chris Crisci’s 14-year old band has produced eight albums, dabbled in about as many different genres, and has a revolving-door lineup that would exhaust any frontperson. But Crisci shows no signs of tiring. In fact, the lyrics for the band’s most recent album, this year’s Illumination Ritual, were written over the course of three nights, between the hours of midnight and 4am. Though the band’s career has arced from its oldschool emo beginnings, the vespertine Illumination Ritual gets back to its moody roots. With a fresh lineup and a nostalgic new sound, the Appleseed Cast’s tender instrumentals and Crisci’s earnest vocals have never sounded so good.  8:30pm, $14. Bottom of the Hill, 1233 17th St., SF. (415) 626-4455, www.bottomofthehill.com

Information Technology Talk -It is often assumed that the advancement of technology will solve all of humankind’s problems, but is this really the case? One of today’s most respected cyber-philosophers Evgeny Morozov doesn’t think so. Join him tonight as he discusses what might happen if we continue on our path away from the natural imperfections of human life and toward a mechanically reliant age.  7-8pm, $15. World Affairs Council, 312 Sutter, SF, www.worldaffairs.org

 Big Boi - Any lingering notions of Big Boi as the “conventional” half of legendary Atlanta hip-hop duo Outkast should be dispelled by his two solo albums, including his most recent effort Viscious Lies and Dangerous Rumors released last November. Aided by cameos from Phantogram and Little Dragon in “Viscious”, Big Boi dives into rock guitars, female vocalists, and electronic bass to present a fearless, kaleidoscopic vision of rap. 8:30pm, $35. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. (415) 625-8880, www.mezzaninesf.com

 ArtPad - Here’s an idea for a surrealist film: enter one hotel room and find metal hands that respond to their viewers, enter another and find a strange light sculpture, then cut to a performance of synchronized swimming team in a pool in the courtyard. This is no film plot, but a description of ArtPad, the arts fair that will take over the entire Phoenix Hotel for three days. With galleries from the Bay Area filling every room with experimental exhibitions while food, drink, and performances contribute to the festive vibe, the event promises to be surreally epic. Through May 19, $25-$40. Phoenix Hotel, 601 Eddy, SF. www.artpadsf.com

 Fun Times with Friends -So you’ve been to a stand-up show before. But have you been to a stand-up show with free cake? Fun Time with Friends (FTWF) aptly summarizes the event as something like “a comedy show crashing a party, or a party crashing a comedy show.” As this is the premiere FTWF event, its hilarious founders will take to the stage. These include: Ron Chapman, Aly Jones, Scott Simpson, and Brandon Stokes.  8pm, $10. Lost Weekend Video, 1034 Valencia, SF. www.lostweekendvideo.com

Dale Eadnhardt Jr. Jr. - On its albums, the Detroit duo of Daniel Zott and Joshua Epstein alternate between aw-shucks folksiness and the party-hearty synth-and-rock of MGMT and Phoenix. While firmly rooted in the here and now, DEJJ has shown respect to its musical inspirations with covers of classics by Madonna and the Beach Boys. The duo paid homage to Gil-Scott Heron with a shimmering, upbeat take on his funk classic “We Almost Lost Detroit,” resplendent with a video showcasing authentic locals and establishments from the Motor City.  9pm, $16. Independent, 628 Divisadero, SF. (415) 771-1421, www.theindependentsf.com

 The Whole Enchihuahua - Be warned: your cuteness tolerance is going to be tested this afternoon. The third annual Whole Enchihuahua, a canine filled afternoon organized to bring awareness to the large percentage of Chihuahuas in shelters, will consist of a doggie fashion show, adoptable animals, free dental checks for your pup, and food trucks (serving up people food, although we all know what darlihg four-legged friend is going to get your scraps). Noon-3pm, free. Dolores Park, SF. www.sfspca.org

Disappears - A 16-minute song has to do a lot of work to keep its listeners invested, but the Disappears’ “Kone”, off of the band’s April EP, is compelling because it doesn't seem to make too much of an effort. An experiment in Kraut and psych-rock, the song harkens back to the very beginnings of proto-punk; though it involves less muddy intensity, it recalls those stretches in some Velvet Underground songs that don’t feel the need to arrive anywhere, but simply relish the ride. And isn’t that the aim of any good concert? It certainly will be at tonight's.
 With LENZ and the Tambo Rays, 10pm, $12. Bottom of the Hill, 2183 Mission, SF. www.bottomofthehill.com

 Gothic Tropic - For a band that has released so little music -- only the 2011 EP Awesome Problems -- Gothic Tropic has developed a sense of itself. Part of it is frontperson Cecilia Della Peruti’s tendency to perform shoeless so as not to restrict her dance moves. Another aspect arises in her nickname for the trio, “the Sacred Three.” The primary feature though, is the band's sound. As its name suggests, Gothic Tropics plays sunny and exotic psych-pop tinted with some grit and darkness, and it plays it well. See the band in all of it’s fully-formed glory. 9pm, $10. Brick and Mortar, 1710 Mission, SF. (415) 800-8782, www.brickandmortarmusic.com

Amgen Tour of California 2013 -Whether you are a cycle-to-work or cycle-across-the-country kind of biker, the Amgen Tour of California is sure to stir up some motivation within your little cycle-loving skull. Competitors will be biking down from Santa Rose to cross the finish line of the 750-mile California coast race. Where’s the best place to watch? We advise snagging a spot on the Golden Gate Bridge, which will be closed to cars during the event.
 8:15am-noon, free. Marina Green, Marina and Fillmore, SF. www.amgentourofcalifornia.com

Eve Ensler - KPFA Radio, Code Pink, and Pegasus Books present “Eve Ensler: In the Body of the World”, hosted by Erica Bridgeman. Internationally renowned playwright, author and activist Eve Ensler is the founder of V-Day, the global movement to end violence against women and girls. Ensler will discuss her memoir, In the Body of the World, which takes readers through her personal history of sexual abuse, her travels to the Congo, her diagnosis with cervical cancer, and her reflections on the resilience of humanity.  7:30pm, $35 advance/$38 at the door. First Congregational Church, 2501 Harrison, Oakl.www.brownpapertickets.com

Daughter - London-based trio Daughter brings its wistful soul-searching sensibility to the stage for free at Amoeba Records today. Daughter's debut album If You Leave showcases the group's signature ethereal sound and songwriting skills, which at first listen sounds contemplative, but a second go-round will lend your ears haunting lyrics but full of melodic soul.  6pm, free. Amoeba Records, 1855 Haight, SF. (415) 831-1200, www.amoeba.com

Feast of Words - Scarf down some literature amongst friends and food at this monthly literary feast. Tonight’s special guest will be Andrew Lam, author of Birds of Paradise Lost. Grab a plate of homemade goodies, take part in writing exercises led by Lam, and share your on-the-spot writing for a chance to be entered in a drawing for edibles, books, and other great excuses to pick up the pen.  6:30pm, $5 with potluck dish or $12 at the door. SOMArts Cultural Center 934 Brannan, SF, feastofwords.eventbrite.com

”Eating Nose-to-Tail: The Whole Animal Movement” - Unsatisfied with the growing gaps along the whole food production chain, farmers, butchers and chefs have banded together under the whole animal movement, which emphasizes using every part of a beastie for preparation and consumption. At this talk, four of the Bay Area’s meat authorities slice into how the movement stresses conservation and connects local producers, preparers and eaters. After the talk, Dave the Butcher gives a whole animal butchery lesson while diners delve into delectables at the Ferry Building, with proceeds going to the Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture.  With Chris Corsentino, Ryan Farr, John Fink, and Tia Harrison. 6:30pm program $12-$20; 8pm butchering demo, $80-$100. Commonwealth Club, 95 Market, SF. (415) 597-6700, www.commonwealthclub.org

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