Category: Arts

Agent Ribbons on KXLU

Agent Ribbons is ready for a primetime bout
Agent Ribbons is ready for a primetime bout
Sacramento’s Agent Ribbons are taking a step today in opening the doors to wider exposure, more fans and (fingers crossed) a more successful career in the music biz. At 6pm they will appear on Demolisten, KXLU’s showcase of underground artists. Agent Ribbons performs Victorian Punk and Baroque Pop, with songs that are simultaneously haunting and whimsical, rocking and longing, beautiful and disturbing. This year, they expanded from a duo to a trio, which has added several beautiful new elements to their live shows, and have been busy touring the world and recording a concept album called Chateau Crone.

KXLU, the FM station of Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, is known worldwide as one of the gold standards of college radio. Their diverse programming and dedication to cutting edge music has resulted in thousands of bands over the years lining up at their doors, clamoring for access to the playlist. Demolisten, which has aired weekly since 1984, is one of the primary gatekeepers of the KXLU airwaves. DJs Fred and Octavius have the difficult job of performing triage on the music of the day and deciding which acts need immediate attention.

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Spring Awakening: Theater Review

Prepare to be moved! Spring Awakening, which opened at the Community Center Theater on Wednesday and runs through November 15, brings rare vitality to the Sacramento stage. The play offers originality from set, cast, music, and story alike. Make no advanced presumptions. Whatever you imagine the play to be like, you’ll probably be surprised.

The story takes place in Germany in the 1800s, yet you could easily be watching a modern drama. The themes are utterly timeless: teenage rebellion against strict parents and stern teachers; new love; curiosity about the body; heartache and hope.

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Sacramento Comedy Spot Grand Re-Opening This Weekend

sacramentocomd16dMoving from its humble digs on Broadway, the Sacramento Comedy Spot — the city’s premier destination for improv, sketch, and stand-up comedy – opens Friday at its new location in the Marrs Building on 20th and J in the heart of midtown. The Spot has been putting on some of Sacramento’s best improvised and sketch comedy shows for almost a decade. If you like shows like Saturday Night Live, and Who’s Line is it Anyway?, this is the comedy club for you. Friday’s shows feature the Anti-Cooperation League, Sacramento’s longest running long-form improv group, at 9pm and Throwdown, a competitive improv and stand-up battle, at 10:30pm. Tickets are only $8 per show and are nearly sold out. Shows run Saturday and Sunday as well starting at 8pm.

Check the Sacramento Comedy Spot’s website for information on show times, tickets, and a schedule of classes where you can learn how perform improv, write sketches, and put together a stand-up act worthy of the club circuit. www.saccomedyspot.com

“Spring Awakening” Contest winner

And we have a winner: Kassie Rivera, a local actress, correctly answered our trivia question, which was:

What musical was performed in Sacramento by a local theater company with the musical numbers done in reverse order, and then after only one performance had all subsequent shows cancelled by order of the composer?

The answer: Merrily We Roll Along, by the inimitable Stephen Sondheim. The script for this play unfolds backwards, so this appears to have been an attempt to turn it back to regular. Kassie will be seeing “Spring Awakening” in recognition of her local theater trivia pwnage. Congratulations Kassie!

That was fun, you’ll definitely be seeing more contests here in the future.

No Impact Man: Film Review

NoImpactManCould you live one year without electricity, toilet paper, toothpaste, or your car? One New York City man embarked on this seemingly impossible journey with his family. The results were filmed for the documentary No Impact Man, which opened at the Crest Theater yesterday. The film compliments the best-selling book by the same name.

Colin Beavan is a history writer with an environmental worldview. When he realizes that his lifestyle doesn’t live up to his own expectations, and that his writing falls short of fully expressing his passions, he embarks on the potentially crazy adventure of becoming No Impact Man: diminishing his environmental footprint. His wife, at first begrudgingly, must join him for the wild ride along with their toddler daughter.

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Art Vault Auction

One of the pieces available at the KVIE Art Vault Auction: The Ocean's Rhythm by Suzanne Bell
One of the pieces available at the KVIE Art Vault Auction: The Ocean's Rhythm by Suzanne Bell

FREE!

Now that I have your attention… KVIE Public Television is holding a rare, free event tomorrow (Wednesday) night from 5:30 to 8:30PM. They’re opening their art vault for a one-time public auction. Did I mention? It’s FREE.

The auction offers an opportunity to purchase some amazing artworks at affordable prices. You’ll find pieces ranging from just over $100 from artists including Steve Aldridge to price points over $1,800 from artists like Julio Reyes. And in KVIE’s classy style, they promise a wine and cheese reception.

You can preview a sampling of the art and buy select pieces online in advance. Just visit their website. You will also need to RSVP in advance–space is limited. Same website.

Go Bold this Second Saturday

Raw and vibrant, "The Hunger" reflects the passion in the paintings by Santiago Proano.
Raw and vibrant, "The Hunger" reflects the passion in the paintings by Santiago Proano.

Sometimes you have to exit the beaten path to find brilliant artists. This Second Saturday, I recommend heading to a most unlikely spot to view the works of a bold and commanding Sacramento artist: Santiago Proano at the Marco Fuoco Gallery on 6764 Folsom Blvd. at 7PM.

The gallery is part of an interior design business, which is the perfect locale for an artist whose paintings pop straight off the wall, leaving colorful, intense emotions that will complete any vibrant home design. Proano’s art is not the kind to be tucked into the corner of a room. It’s the sort of art that sets the tone, calls you in, and tugs at your mind.

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SF Mime Troupe in town this weekend

Michael Gene Sullivan performs a song from Too Big to Fail
Michael Gene Sullivan performs a song from Too Big to Fail
The fantastically awesome San Francisco Mime Troupe will have their annual free Sacramento area performances this weekend. For those who are unfamiliar, these are not the creepy non-speaking Marcel Marceau-type mimes with the white painted faces, trapped in a box, walking against the wind, pulling the invisible rope… you know, the ones you want to whack with an olive loaf. No, these are revolutionary mimes that perform physical comedy and feats of agility, talk and sing, and educate their audiences about complicated political realities that affect us all.

This year, which is the 50th anniversary of the SFMT, they have written a wacky comedy about the economic crisis. Titled Too Big To Fail, the show concerns a goat herder and his struggles to build his small business enough to support his family, make his village proud and keep a home for his favorite goat named Bamusa. As he becomes a goat kingpin, he encounters bankers, lenders, mortgage brokers, Wall Street tycoons and ponzi-scheming scalawags. The story is presented in the style of the West African Griots, who have an famed oral storytelling tradition and are known for their talented traveling bards.
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All About Walken

The Cast of All About Walken
The Cast of All About Walken
The longest running comedy show in LA is coming to Sacramento for only one night. All About Walken, which plays at the Guild Theater this Saturday, features seven Christopher Walken impersonators, including St. Francis alumnus Amy Kelly. The show is not traditional theater, but an interactive experience that tells the life story of Walken through audience participation, crazy hair, music, improvisation, multimedia and, of course, dancing. Tickets are $20 at www.brownpapertickets.com, call (888) 227-2285 for info.

All About Walken: Conceived and directed by Patrick O’Sullivan. Starring O’Sullivan, Kelly, Kyle Cadman, Kenzo Lee, Dionysio Basco, Joe Dallo, & Aryiel Hartman.

This just in in in: Chk Chk Chk Friday at Townhouse

!!!
Creative Commons License photo credit: benjaminlansky

I have just learned via mt. st. mtn. that Sacto expatriates Chk Chk Chk will be playing at Beatnik Studios The Townhouse this Friday at 9:30 9:00 P.M., as part of a North American tour that started on the East Coast. They will be playing in the Bay Area, LA and Arizona and of course the Austin City Limits festival next weekend.

The lineup for Friday’s show also contains Sacramento’s Mayyors, whom I have not heard, but they got a pretty decent writeup by the Austin Chronicle when they played SXSW earlier this year. Sounds like the place to be Friday night if you like art pop and/or art punk and are currently not experiencing any hearing loss.

UPDATED INFO:
!!! (Chk, Chk, Chk), MAYYORS
The Townhouse: 1517 21st Street
9:00 PM, $5, 21+