St. Patrick's Day can't be green enough, to our collective mind. So how perfect is it that Wednesday, March 17 -- St. Paddy's Day itself -- is also a day to swill down a few Detroit Green Drinks. As in the local chapter of the national environmental movement.
This month's theme is reuse and renewal. What some see as obstacles, Detroiters treat as untapped resources. They have taken forgotten places and used them as opportunities to grow the economy in a variety of green ways. Community cleanups by Southwest Solutions that have made parks safe for children to play in; the Greening of Detroit has beautified the city with tree plantings for the past 20 years; the Architectural Salvage Warehouse makes reclaimed materials readily available for building and reconstruction; and the Green Garage is a physical place and concept aimed at developing sustainable ideas and skills that people will be able to apply to the city.
Fitting into this theme is the choice of this month's location, the renovated Third Street Bar, where 90 percent of the building's materials are reclaimed, reused or recycled. The walls are lined with shipping crates, the bathroom walls are made from a steel barn roof. The tables, ceiling and bar top are all reclaimed ash and maple woods.
Go drink green Wednesday, March 17, 5:30 - 8 p.m. Third Street Bar, 4626 Third St. in Detroit's Midtown. Drink specials include Michigan beers for $3. As usual, bring your business cards. It's free, but donations are always welcome. For more info send them an
email.
Red Door Studio and Gallery is holding its first exhibition in a series of themed showings featuring art from local Detroit area artists. The inspiration for this show comes from the curator, Stephen Boyle, aka Fuzzytek, who earlier this month decided to round up a group of photographers to shoot a truck filled with babies. Baby dolls, that is.
The staff at Theatre Bizzare acquired enough baby dolls at an estate sale to fill the bed of a pickup truck. Within three minutes of reading the unique zany opportunity Fuzzytek began searching for models and committing time and a location for the shoot. Three models came for the initial shoot. More came later and, voila, an exhibition was planned.
It opens with a party this Friday, March 19, 5-10 p.m. and closes Friday, April 30, when another party is planned.
Red Door
Studio and Gallery is at 7500 Oakland St., Detroit. (in a neighborhood west of the Russell Industrial Center and east of New Center).
The future is anything you want it to be in Detroit. Take the experience of a genre-bending music project with the intriguing name Moon Pool & Dead Moon. If there is a flaw in the local music game, it's the separation of styles and scenes based on preconceived notions or social habit, nothing more. Everything can work here: soul, jazz, funk, rock, disco; anything electronics or rock music based. This two-person group aims to start changing the game plan, mixing it up, cross pollinating, blurring the lines, erasing the distinctions.
In late January, Moon Pool & Dead Moon issued a limited cassette only release called
Overspace that found its way onto traveling merch tables and into the ears of a few key people across the indie nation. Now, the duo's debut five-track LP is set for a summer release on Plasma Tapes.
Come see how it's done, live, Friday, March 19, 9 p.m. at the Park Bar, 2040 Park Avenue, downtown Detroit.
Fans of rhythm and blues, the deep, dirty authentic kind, we mean, gather round to say thanks
Crofoot for choosing R&B legendary septuagenarian Andre Williams for the Pontiac-based club's first show in Detroit.
The man they call "Mr. Rhythm" wrote "Shake A Tail Feather" -- you may have heard of it -- and has performed cult classics like "Bacon Fat" (covered by the Cramps) and "Jail Bait," about you know what. He's worked for Motown, Chess, and Fortune. He wrote or produced for Ike Turner, Parliament/Funkadelic, Edwin Starr and Stevie Wonder.
In the late 1990s, he recorded with members of Detroit's Demolition Doll Rods and the Dirtbombs. Since then he has recorded with the Sadies, Jon Spencer, Two-Star Tabernacle (which included a young cabinet maker name of Jack White) and many others. He was the subject of a documentary,
Agile, Mobile, Hostile that premiered at the 2008 South By Southwest Film Festival.
The show is at the Park Bar, 2040 Park Avenue, Detroit. Earlier in the day, Williams reads from his collection of short fiction,
Sweets, at
Book Beat, 26010 Greenfield Road, Oak Park.
A producer of exquisite house music on his own Deep Transportation and S Y N T H labels, a renowned remixer of dub techno (Deepchord, Juan Atkins, Vladislav Delay, Pole, Loco Dice, LoSoul and
Pacou) Mike Huckaby is one of Detroit's best and busies exports of late. He's an inspiration to local and European DJs, represents production/performance software/hardware companies as a touring spokesperson and has taught and tutored younger musicians at Detroit's Youthville. What a guy.
Atlast! an offshoot promotions group affiliated with Family Funktion, brings Huckaby to Alvin's this Saturday, along with Ghostly's Mike Servito -- originally from Troy but now based in Brooklyn, but we don't hold that against him -- and the comely Jennifer Xerri (pictured). It's called Depth Perception and it's at Alvin's, 5756 Cass Avenue, in Detroit's Midtown. Saturday, March 20, 10 p.m.-2 a.m. For 21 and over. $5.
It's time, brothers and sisters, to be part of the solution. It's time to get together to banish the red dwarf, an evil spirit that has plagued the city of Detroit since its incorporation in 1701. La Marche du Nain Rouge is a Detroit tradition that dates back to shortly after the city's founding by the French over 300 years ago. Held on the Sunday closest to the Vernal Equinox, it is parade and street theater similar to Mardi Gras and other Carnival celebrations.
La Marche drives Le Nain Rouge (the Red Dwarf) out of Detroit, preventing its evil spirit from plaguing the people of the city for the rest of the year. By forcing Le Nain Rouge from the city (and into the spirit plane), Le Nain is banished, transforming Detroiters' fears and doubts into the hopes of new life and the coming spring season. The music played during La Marche has evolved and infused many
traditions from the people of Detroit. Most recently the music and
spirit of the band is akin to that of a jazz funeral march, featuring
drums and horns. Right on, let's go. We're ready.
La Marche du Nain Rouge begins inland and follows a north to south route, tracing the historic French ribbon farms toward the river. Although early versions of the La Marche drove Le Nain into the river, Cass Park was chosen as a new location in the 19th Century, and a bonfire was favored as a way to banish Le Nain (since water is ineffective).
At the bonfire Le Nain is transformed into a paper Mache effigy – after ducking behind a curtain – and is ceremonially flung into the fire, representing the end of Le Nain's hold on Detroit. Participants are also encouraged to make their own Petits Nains to throw into the fire as well, representing the cleansing of regret, fear and ill will from the soul, and a moment of catharsis, purification, rebirth and renewal.
Dress strangely, ready to do battle with the supernatural. Sunday,
March 21, 3-9 p.m. March begins at Third Street Bar, Detroit's Midtown.