Dig Boston July 8th 2015

EATS

BANYAN BAR & REFUGE

NEWS

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S.W.A.T. STICKER SHOCK EXCLUSIVE DOCUMENTS REVEAL COSTLY POLICE TACTICS

THE SOUTH END’S FIRST ASIAN GASTROPUB

FEATURE

WU-TANG &

BOSTON HIP HOP

SUPERHERO

CZARFACE

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VOL 17 + ISSUE 27

JULY 8, 2015 - JULY 15, 2015

EDITOR Dan McCarthy NEWS, FEATURES + MEDIA FARM EDITOR Chris Faraone ASSOCIATE MUSIC EDITOR Nina Corcoran ASSOCIATE FILM EDITOR Jake Mulligan CONTRIBUTORS Nate Boroyan, Martín Caballero, Paige Chaplin, Mitchell Dewar Christopher Ehlers, Bill Hayduke, Emily Hopkins, Micaela Kimball, Cady Vishniac, Dave Wedge INTERNS Oliver Bok, Emily Tiberio

DESIGN CREATIVE DIRECTOR Tak Toyoshima DESIGNER Brittany Grabowski INTERNS Amy Bouchard, Stephanie Buonopane, Kelsey Cole COMICS Tim Chamberlain Pat Falco Patt Kelley Tak Toyoshima

ADVERTISING ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Nate Andrews Jesse Weiss FOR ADVERTISING INFORMATION sales@digpublishing.com

BUSINESS PUBLISHER Jeff Lawrence ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Marc Shepard OPERATIONS MANAGER John Loftus ADVISOR Joseph B. Darby III DigBoston, 242 East Berkeley St. 5th Floor Boston, MA 02118 Fax 617.849.5990 Phone 617.426.8942 digboston.com

ON THE COVER Esoteric, 7L, and Inspectah Deck hang out on our cover this week. Read all about their latest creation: CZARFACE on page 10.

Photo by Bill X.

©2015 DIGBOSTON IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY DIG PUBLISHING LLC. NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION CAN BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT WRITTEN CONSENT. DIG PUBLISHING LLC CANNOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR ANY TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS. ONE COPY OF DIGBOSTON IS AVAILABLE FREE TO MASSACHUSETTS RESIDENTS AND VISITORS EACH WEEK. ANYONE REMOVING PAPERS IN BULK WILL BE PROSECUTED ON THEFT CHARGES TO THE FULLEST EXTENT OF THE LAW.

DEAR READER Now that everyone is settled after a rousing holiday weekend, with hangovers (mostly) gone, loud music having been played loudly, and a healthy amount of beer and meat consumed through it all, it’s time to get back to business.

In your case this involves perusing the current issue of DigBoston, which is chock full of fantastic content that thankfully has nothing to do with Jared from the Subway commercials being investigated for child porn (mentioned here due to it saturating my newsfeed at the time of this writing).

Instead, you’ll find reasons to head to Chelsea for some Sunday outdoor theater (Arts, page 26), an overview of the fantastic new Amy Winehouse documentary (Music, page 20), and a rundown of the special retrospective of the films of everyone’s favorite nerd overlord and Simon Pegg booster, Edgar Wright (Film, page 24).

And yet, through the fog of America’s birthday, we also got our hands on exclusive embargoed documents (News, page 4). They detail extreme police tactics in the Commonwealth, including the goods on extreme security forces being deployed for the Dalai Lama’s visit to Medford. As it turns out, the North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council (NEMLEC) deploys dozens of SWAT officers from across the region to serve warrants on any prospective targets, apparently under the philosophy that overkill is underrated. Thankfully, a suit filed against the organization by the ACLU resulted in the disclosure of over 900 pages.

You know, just your average light summer reading at the beach on the Fourth of July.

Enjoy.

DAN MCCARTHY - EDITOR, DIGBOSTON

DIGTIONARY

OLYMPOCALYPSE

noun ō-lĭm′pˈpäkəˌlips 1. The giant disaster of Boston 2024 finally coming to fruition.

2. A version of the Games involving God and Satan competing for humanity’s soul.

OH, CRUEL WORLD Dear Chicken, Why can’t you cross to the other side of the road without pushing the “walk” button? I assume that no one told you that it doesn’t really work, that it’s a placebo that was placed there to entertain dummies, or that when it does work, it’s typically misused by morons like yourself. I was sitting in my car, stopped at the light, and we made eye contact; still; you had to push the bastard, leaving me stuck there for at least another 30 seconds as you walked along carelessly. I heard those buttons electrocute people sometimes, but I guess not soon enough.

ILLUSTRATION BY AMY BOUCHARD

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NEWS US

SWAT STICKER NEWS TO US

Exclusive docs reveal 34-man deployment to Dalai Lama visit plus other costly and extreme police tactics in Mass

BY CHRIS FARAONE @FARA1 Last June, Washington Post ace Radley Balko wrote a bombshell about SWAT activity in Massachusetts that shook advocates for government transparency to their skeptical cores. The shocker: Roughly 70 percent of the Commonwealth’s 351 police departments belongs to one of several Law Enforcement Councils. Financially speaking, LECs are technically nonprofit corporations; but as Balko quoted from a damning 2014 report by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), though such outfits “are funded by local and federal taxpayer money, are composed exclusively of public police officers and sheriffs, and carry out traditional law enforcement functions through specialized units such as SWAT teams,” they “do not maintain and make public comprehensive and comprehensible documents pertaining to their operations.”

Accountability watchdogs found the news troubling on countless fronts. The LECs are yet another layer in a robust security apparatus, as state police agencies and more than two dozen municipalities across Mass are 4

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already equipped for SWAT ops. More worrisome, though, is that despite feasting on millions in subsidies since 9/11, and in one case being made to pay a settlement to the feds for “not properly account[ing] for several hundred thousand dollars of grant funds” in their School Threat Assessment and Response System program, LECs have benefitted from the cloak of privacy enjoyed by corporations, and as such have been reluctant to share records with reporters and the public.

Bothered by what it deemed “the weakness of Massachusetts public records law and the culture of secrecy that has infected local police departments and Law Enforcement Councils,” last June ACLU attorneys filed suit against the North Eastern Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council (NEMLEC), which the plaintiffs describe as “a group of 61 police and sheriff departments in Middlesex and Essex counties” that “uses armored vehicles, automatic weapons and combat gear to carry out military-style operations, including forced entries into homes to serve search warrants.” After a year of

deliberation in Suffolk County Superior Court, last month NEMLEC settled with the ACLU, agreeing to disclose more than 900 pages of documents including everything from deployment reports to financial records. DigBoston was among a few select reporting outlets given early access to the fruits of the lawsuit, and found the information therein to be boggling; the Bay State norm is apparently to deploy dozens of SWAT officers from across the region to serve warrants on any prospective perps who are believed to have firearms. Such force may seem appropriate in certain dangerous circumstances; in the vast majority of cases, however, overkill appears to be an underlying theme …

-In October 2012, NEMLEC dispatched 28 members from 10 different city and town departments—their alliance spans from Groton and the New Hampshire border to the north, to Newton and Waltham on the southern side, and to Gloucester and Newburyport up SWAT STICKER continued on pg. 6

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SWAT STICKER continued from pg. 4 the coast—to confront a “barricaded subject armed with a knife” who had a “history of mental health issues.”

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-In January 2013, NEMLEC was activated to assist with a “no knock day time search warrant … for narcotics (heroin).”

Since the target had a “very extensive criminal history” and a “confidential informant” allegedly reported a handgun in the apartment, Lowell police were given three teams with a total of 30 troops, the “platoon” packing everything from battering rams and long arms to attack dogs and tasers.

Together with the medics and crisis negotiators in tow, the posse totaled nearly 40 people.

-Responding to a suicidal subject in Gloucester who was armed with a knife back in September 2013, Gloucester police were complemented by 23 members of NEMLEC SWAT, four crisis negotiators, two K-9 officers, and nine incident management specialists—plus two additional SWAT associates from the Middlesex Sheriff’s Office for good measure.

-In September 2013, NEMLEC called an astonishing 110 bodies from SWAT and their affiliated Regional Response Team (RRT) to Dunstable after reports rung out of a “missing 57 year old male who had a history of depression and suicidal thoughts.” After approximately three hours of searching, during which NEMLEC “deployed ATVs, mountain bikes and personnel on foot to conduct line and grid searches,” local police found the man in question deceased on an abandoned property with self-inflicted gunshot wounds.

dignitary protection and crowd control issues with the visit of the Dalai Lama,” the council dispatched 34 personnel to the Elks Lodge near the Kurukulla Center. While four members comprising an “immediate action team” sat in a “grey van” for the rest of the day, the “remaining members of the SWAT team were assigned to crowd control, if needed.” As anyone familiar with the Lama’s repertoire may have predicted, special units were not ultimately required to quell the horde, and after eight hours on the clock, the team was dismissed.

Whether the Lama requested a goon squad and an armored tank on wheels is unknown. What’s more important is that the information from these documents would have been unknown as well had lawyers from the ACLU not taken on NEMLEC, which has been masquerading behind corporation status since 1974.

Kade Crockford, director of the ACLU of Mass Technology for Liberty program, says, “Ultimately the decision about how to spend public dollars should rest with the public itself. That’s why transparency in policing especially is so critical, and why the release of these documents—only after a lawsuit—is so important.”

Crockford continues: “Do people in the towns that pay NEMLEC officers think this was a good use of the police department’s time? We cannot begin asking these kinds of questions about government expenditures and actions unless we actually know what’s going on. It shouldn’t have taken a lawsuit to get these records, but because our public records law is so weak, it did. In a funny way, the story of NEMLEC’s 34-person SWAT army guarding the Dalai Lama is also a story about why we need to reform Massachusetts public records law.”

The ACLU documents also include price indexes for NEMLEC’s heavy artillery and gadgets, including tens of thousands of dollars for mobile radio and camcorder equipment, a $141,000 “Armored Response Vehicle,” and more than $150,000 for facemasks. Additionally, the trove packs interesting tidbits like the council’s useof-force policy for “conducted energy weapons,” which states first and foremost that the “Taser is an additional police tool and is not intended to replace verbal problem solving skills, self-defense techniques, or firearms.”

Of the seemingly innumerable frivolous deployments and expenses, one NEMLEC action in October 2012 stands out as the most absurd. Documents show that “to assist Medford PD with security,

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BLUNT TRUTH

ANOTHER SCIENTOLOGIST LIES Jackass rocker claims he spent a $1,000 a week on pot

BY MIKE CANN @MIKECANNBOSTON There’s an article on Vulture titled “I Used to Spend $1,000 a Week on Pot Because I Thought Smoking Made My Music Better. I Was Wrong.” It’s by Cedric Bixler-Zavala, frontman for The Mars Volta and At the Drive-In, and if it registered on your bullshit-o-meter, then you may be even more on-point than you already realized.

Specifically, Bixler-Zavala bizarrely confesses, “I was a total monster. I was spending $1,000 a week on weed.” He then blames marijuana for preventing him from interacting with people, as if all strands have the same effect. And then he goes in as a scientist, stating “the stuff people are smoking is not necessarily even naturally grown from the ground, anyway; it’s basically been altered to fuck you up and fuck you up royally. I don’t even know how some people are functional after smoking this stuff.”

As for Bixler-Zavala’s newfound weed abstinence: he says, “I don’t want all my art and all my life to be defined by weed. I

want to be known as someone who grew up a little.”

Did he find Jesus? Nope. What the publication and author leave out, of course, is that it appears Bixler-Zavala is a member of the Church of Scientology, a religion with a reputation for brainwashing and fleecing its followers. Scientology is no friend to marijuana reform; as the religion’s maniacal founder, science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard once wrote, “The single most destructive element present in our current culture … is drugs.”

The lies are endless. A Scientology offshoot, Foundation for a Drug-Free World, claims that cannabis causes birth defects, while pot use is forbidden in Scientology. If Bixler-Zavala really spent $1,000 a month on weed, then the remaining question is simple: How much is he now spending on Scientology? Vulture should have asked, because his new drug probably costs way more than four grand a month.

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GUEST MEDIA FARM

JEFF TALK

The fabulist miracle of Rev. Brown’s TED sermon

BY JAMARHL CRAWFORD @JAMARHLAKAUNO Any preacher worth his salt can deliver a sermon that evokes a rollercoaster of emotions. It’s an old practice, the “preacher embellishment,” which is often achieved through anecdotal stories, with the preacher as the hero and central figure who overcomes obstacles. The moral: If you work as hard and pray as hard as he does, then you too can have such inspiring victories.

But the problem with a lot of these stories, routinely told from the pulpit, is that they are rehashed folktales crammed with untruths. One might call them “dramatizations,” but it’s more than that. Especially in the case of Boston area reverend Jeffrey Brown, whose recent TED Talk, now with more than half-a-million views as of this writing, merged times, places, and characters into a History Channel version of the so-called Boston Miracle.

For those of us who lived through those times, it has always seemed like the Boston Miracle is really a collective romanticized fantasy devised by a select group of folks who are eager to take credit. Back then I lived off of Humboldt Avenue, exactly where I live now. From the ‘80s to today, these preachers have claimed to hit the streets so hard, but I have yet to see them in person. What block are you from? Have you seen preachers who engage young people in the afternoon?

How about at night? Late night? I’m not claiming no such case exists; I’m just saying that even Bigfoot and UFOs have YouTube videos. But on to the reverend’s TED Talk …

Let’s start with the church that Brown pastored for more than 20 years, from 1988 to 2009. Union Baptist is located at 874 Main Street in Cambridge, close to the Newtowne Court housing projects to which the reverend refers in his talk. In reality, it’s all nestled near the killing fields of MIT, a far cry from developments like Orchard Park, Heath Street, Franklin Field, and Franklin Hill across the river in Boston. Brown speaks about Cambridge in infamous tones, and conflates happenings there with Crack Era violence elsewhere; for example, whereas Boston had 116 murders in 1990 alone, there were 94 homicides in Cambridge between 1980 and 2013.

Of all the dramatizations, one part of the story especially got under my skin. At one point in his tale, Brown references the murder of Jesse “Jesse-Jess” McKie, who happened to be a friend of mine. Jesse was killed in January of 1990, and back then I felt as though I could have somehow stopped the tragedy if I had been there, since I also knew two of the guys from Boston who were later convicted of killing him. (At the time, it was common for Roxbury kids, myself included, to go to Cambridge and rob easy “vics,” or victims.) On this occasion,

though Jesse-Jess was involved in hip-hop and was known as a “cool white boy,” these Boston guys wanted his leather jacket.

He refused to give it up, was stabbed, and died.

In his TED Talk, Rev. Brown implies that Jesse’s dying steps were made towards his church—a final attempt to get help in the midst of the jungle. I don’t know the truth. Like the reverend, I wasn’t there. But I do think that his making Union Baptist out to be the central figure in the story is disrespectful to the lives ruined that evening—not only my “cool white boy” friend Jesse-Jess, but also my friends on the other side of the knife, one of whom wound up with a lengthy prison sentence, and the other of whom is doing life.

At the end of the day, it’s a classic hustle to get paid off of something that happened 25 years ago. In that sense, you can consider Brown’s TED appearance as part embellishment, and part funding request. Lucky for him, the clicks and views are adding up, probably along with his speaking fees, as viewers believe every word Brown is saying. For those who may have missed the message, the reverend sent an email to his followers: After watching my TED Talk (and thank you so much for your responses!), so many of you have asked the question, “what can I do to help?” ...

If you live in any of the cities committed to the Season of Peace, you can volunteer … I also ask that you support RECAP financially. It is my life’s work and purpose. Over 25 years of seeing the impossible become possible has convinced me that it is time to press forward. Please join me and be part of the change that is to come. God is with us …

Jamarhl Crawford is a community activist and the publisher of the Blackstonian. A version of this column appeared on blackstonian.com.

FREE RADICAL

BOSTON 2024 PR GAMES

BY EMILY HOPKINS @GENDERPIZZA When something’s not working, it’s a good idea to switch up.

That was likely the thinking behind Boston 2024’s community outreach meeting at English High School in Jamaica Plain last week, since over the previous six months, the group’s format has been familiar and frustrating: Olympic organizers wasted the first hour or so reviewing bid plans and touting the potential legacy of a Summer Games, while the accomplished athletes in attendance tried their best to force compliance through nostalgia.

Last week was different. Spokespeople for Boston 2024, whose so-called “2.0” bid was recently unveiled to the public and the United States Olympic Committee, began with a presentation of their updated plans. After that, attendees were asked to split into breakout groups. Some people joined the micro chats, which were parsed by topic, but a lot of community members—some who were for, and others who spoke out against the Games—remained in the auditorium.

And that’s when things got ugly …

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First, people in the crowd began shouting at the speakers.

After that, they shouted at each other, effectively disrupting the presentation. Before long, it became clear that the event organizers were unwilling to turn any meaningful authority over to members of the public. To make matters worse, John FitzGerald, who serves as Mayor Marty Walsh’s liaison to Boston 2024, cried for “common decency,” and claimed he was there to defend the community’s interest—that despite internal emails, recently made public through records requests, showing the extent to which he’s pushed the Olympics agenda.

If Walsh is committed to having public opinion fairly represented at such meetings, he should boot FitzGerald and find a less biased player. Extra points if that person doesn’t work at the Boston Redevelopment Authority. Unfortunately, these productions have merely imitated neighborhood involvement, and the mayor has proven time and again that he has little interest in considering constituent opinion. This lack of a sincere openness is driving a stake through Boston’s communities, pitting neighbors against one another, as some clamor for a piece of the pie, filling with premature pride at the sound of Olympic theme music, and others reject the pie altogether. A Hub Games may be nine years away, but the impact of Boston 2024 is already being felt.

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7L, DECK, AND ESO HASH OUT THE NEXT CZARFACE OVER HASH AND EGGS AT THE ROSEBUD IN DAVIS SQUARE

EVERY HERO NEEDS A HUSTLE FEATURE

With Wu-Tang ace Inspectah Deck back with 7L and Esoteric, ‘Czarface 2’ is huge for Boston —but it’s even bigger news for music, culture, and the future of life in this galaxy Imagine if one of the Beatles, in their debut recording stint outside of the band, had linked with two beloved underground legends from Boston for the first-ever collaboration beyond the mothership. That’s essentially the case here, at least in hip-hop terms, with Czarface, the supreme Boston-meets-New York trio of 7L, Esoteric, and Inspectah Deck of Wu-Tang Clan. For anyone who has been waiting for the Hub to have its next remarkable rap moment, your time has come, but only after more than 15 years of backbreaking groundwork.

The saga started back in 1998, when 7L and Esoteric, then a young and eager rap duo emerging from their college years at Salem State, reached out to Deck, who was already a certifiable rhyme icon, through a friend in the record business. This wasn’t the typical routine of aspiring young rappers batting out of their league to which the game has become so accustomed. There was some favoritism involved, but 7L and Eso, boom bap 10

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junkies to the core, went to the edge of the earth—or at least Brooklyn—to assemble the Deck-assisted “Speaking Real Words,” which simultaneously helped them to arrive and inspired jealousy among their budding hardcore rap peers.

“It pissed a lot of kids off,” Esoteric told me in an interview a few years ago. “[They] were scratching their heads asking, ‘How the fuck did they put this together?’”

With the second coming of Czarface, haters and appreciators alike are again wondering how 7L and Esoteric pulled the damn thing off. How did one of Hub rap’s most enduring subterranean outfits, now seven albums deep with more side and tangential projects than Rap Genius can tally, manage to reboot their careers yet again, and this time with the help of an MC who, one algorithmic study shows (mathematically confirming what Wu fans already knew), has the tightest flow in the entire game? There’s no easy answer to those

questions; but as the breadth and magnitude of its return effort, Every Hero Needs A Villain, begins to register, it is increasingly clear that Czarface soars on the strength of a collective vision as opposed to individual aptitudes.

“Last time there was a little bit of nerves involved, because you don’t know what you’re getting into,” says Deck, who’s in a camouflage hoodie and Timberlands.

He’s in Somerville today, but an “RIP ODB” patch on his Wu-Wear bomber confirms his native allegiance. The Clan stalwart continues: “Untested waters, and coming from the hardest group in hip-hop to doing stuff with different themes—and even the fact that they weren’t black, you get looked at like, ‘Why are you doing that over there?’ But you know what—I’m not afraid to try my hand.”

Esoteric reflects on the Czarface incubation period, highlighting occasional awkward moments. “There was EVERY HERO continued on pg. 12

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EVERY HERO continued from pg. 10 music made before the Czarface thing, but just a tiny bit, our history of doing a couple of records together,” he says. “7L wanted to just do something as a white label, and to put it out there, and that’s it. That’s his whole life, driving to New York for records, and it meant a lot to have these records that are on a white label and you can’t track them down. But we kind of felt like it wasn’t the right atmosphere for that, so I started thinking of ways to put the group together.”

After they finally convinced Deck to venture further outside of his comfort zone, the next step was to establish some common identity. “Deck came up with a dope name—Bomb Techs,” Eso says. 7L nods in agreement. Eso adds: “We were sitting on that for a while.” Deck stabs: “Bomb Techs was dope, but it was kind of cliche at the time.”

With a rarer-than-rare opportunity to tap the infinitely creative depths that fuel one of the genre’s premier poets, 7L and Eso raised the bar for their brainstorm. “We needed a figurehead, something people could see,” Eso says. “When I finally thought of Czarface, I waited like two weeks before I even presented it to [Deck] because I didn’t know how he was going to like it.

I thought he might say it was too similar to ‘Ghostface,’ but no one has said anything about that—ever. I just think about things too much. Then we came up with the character, and we took it from there.”

Now roughly four years into their crusade as Czarface, sitting together for lunch, it seems like they’re old chums.

Certainly Deck has an extra-special rapport with his Wu brothers, all of whom he grew up with and continues to tour alongside today; but for dudes who have for the most part collaborated from afar, Eso, Deck, and 7L are as comfortable as batters in a dugout as they joke and finish one another’s lines.

“There’s only one album I compare any of the Czarface stuff to,” Deck says.

Esoteric interrupts: “This oughtta be good.”

Deck continues, “A Prince Among Thieves by Prince Paul.”

Surprised, 7L and Eso nod in approval.

Deck goes on: “It didn’t really get a lot of notoriety, because it was so different from what was going on at the time, but if [Prince Paul] put that album out now it would be a gem … It’s like, if everybody’s walking down the street with white Pumas, and then somebody comes down the street with some lime green whatever on, you notice that instantly, like ‘What’s that?’ Just by having those on, you separate yourself and you stand out. With the people with the white shoes, I don’t know who’s who, but the lime green dude, I see him over there before he even gets over here.”

As it turned out, they all needed some fresh green kicks. Says 7L, “We needed a vacation—in a good way.

After we did the record 1212 … I sent [Deck] a text [about potentially doing a whole project], and from that point on I was excited to do something that didn’t fit into the mold

“When I finally thought of Czarface, I waited like two weeks before I even presented it to [Deck] because I didn’t know how he was going to like it. I thought he might say it was too similar to ‘Ghostface,’ but no one has said anything about that--ever. I just think about things too much.

Then we came up with the character, and we took it from there.”

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CZARFACE SPOTTED WALKING THE STREETS AND KEEPING US SAFE of being underground rap. Our early stuff had a certain sound—stabs, and very dark, and this is something different.”

“They actually helped me snap out of that Wu-Tang one-track line phase I was on,” Deck adds. “Before WuTang, I rhymed on all kinds of things. I would rhyme on P.M. Dawn if you played that, but when we came to doing Wu-Tang Clan, it was this serious and focused streeteducated group, and everything we said was about selfawareness and education, even in the negative. So to be now like, ‘Oh yeah, I’m having fun,’ it’s like I get to say the shit that I can’t say with Wu-Tang.”

A lot of that expressed liberation emerges from behind the mask and armor of Czarface, a rather odd kind of rocket-equipped superhero whose powers include the ability to disintegrate bullies while keeping their vintage Polo garments intact. Deck compares the experience to entering the Danger Room training camp in X-Men, since with his Boston crew he can so openly deploy his arsenal.

“He can just go in there and go berserk,” Eso says. “The thing about the album is there’s no real concept, and that’s kind of the concept.”

“Czarface is the face of a czar,” Deck says. “It’s not like some real, real, real superhero though; it’s more like an anti-hero. It depends who’s rapping. We were supposed to be this villain, but when the artwork came, it was a perfect fit to everything else too. There’s even wrestling references, and the cover and everything fit the lyrics and the production. It was right there in front of me, I could see it. This is all retro. It’s a flashback.”

7L jumps in: “Czarface is just a regular guy.” They begin to laugh like teenagers; Deck and Esoteric explain further, “He’s Irish … and Greek … and Black”—the combined punch of their ethnic and racial identities.

“That’s a shock to the world right there,” Deck says.

To complement the melting pot and throwback comic concept, Czarface merchandising is unparalleled— limited CD editions feature a hardcover graphic novella illustrated by acclaimed multifaceted artist Lamour Supreme. On his end, Esoteric wrote the story, sketched ideas for panels, physically cut and pasted them into sequence, and even tapped other designers to create the fake ads that are a staple of such Marvel-esque spreads.

“Sometimes you need a little more than the music,” says Eso, “and this presentation brings in casual fans along with the hardcore fans.”

On the music side, Deck learned from RZA, the eternal ringleader and chief producer of Wu-Tang, that the beatmaker should be left alone. If you’re working with somebody in the first place, says Deck, then you have to trust them. To that end, 7L sent over instrumental after skeletal instrumental, allowing Deck to hang his vocals on the bones before the team in Boston added bells and whistles. Unlike with initial Czarface sessions two years ago, in which Esoteric didn’t want to show his hand, this

time 7L included Eso verses on a lot of tracks up front.

In turn, Deck says his job on this go-around was less to “come like, ‘I’m Inspectah Deck’ and try to beast it, and more for the mixture.”

Deck relishes the newfangled process: “We jump in, we overlap each other, we go four-for-four, eight-foreight. I just feel like hip-hop is missing that now—the friendly camaraderie. As much as it’s like competition, it’s competition to make everything mesh … [With Wu-Tang], you’re dealing with nine personalities, so it’s always sixon-two, or four dudes aren’t there to make a judgement.

With [7L] just coming in like, ‘Deck, I got these new beats,’ the shit is dope.”

On that foundation, a czar’s palace was built. Now intrigued by the eclectic if not utterly bizarre ideas that his Boston connection is renowned for pushing forward, for this latest outing, Deck not only used his clout to lure both Method Man and GZA in for memorable appearances, but ushered those and other guests including MF Doom and Large Professor through the Czarface chamber rather than the other way around.

“Knowing what [7L and Esoteric] stand for allowed me to say, ‘You know what, I’m just going to keep it hiphop, keep it beats and rhymes,” Deck says. “I’m used to rhyming with guys like Ghostface and Method Man, but for this one I didn’t talk about murders in the projects …

I’ve never been a real punchline dude, but I know how to do it. Pull out some punchlines, some metaphors, some aggression, mix it up.”

Esoteric jokes: “Are you saying I’m not a Ghostface, or a Method Man?” Kidding aside, Deck returns, “I’ll have you know, bro, you had me step my game up big time.”

In the pyramidal scheme of hip-hop, they aren’t peers.

The inspiration and appreciation, however, is mutual.

“He gives us the confidence to stay on that rough and rugged format that Czarface is,” Esoteric says of Deck.

“The first album and this album are the albums that we always wanted to make. The two of us have put out a shitload of 7L & Esoteric albums, but we haven’t been as excited about a project as we have been about Czarface.

Having [Deck] involved is obviously a big help, but I feel like we just got that confidence, and with each new album it goes up.”

Eso brings it home: “This whole phase of my life has been like a second childhood for me. To be able to make the records that you’re most proud of, and with your best friend and with one of the people who you’ve always looked up to, as someone who grew up just always wanting to make hip-hop, you couldn’t ask for more. It’s all on this album. It’s not sentimental. I’m doing it.”

See Czarface perform at the Middle East in Cambridge on Saturday July 25

NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

13

DEPT. COMMERCE SHOP

SOCKED

New Boston-based sock startup wants you to live and wear socks

BY DIG STAFF @DIGSTAFF

ASIAN REFUGE

Goodbye Hamersley’s Bistro. Hello Banyan Bar + Refuge.

BY DAN MCCARTHY @ACUTALPROOF Last August, word circled round the culinary campfire in town that the long-standing bastion of South End dining Hamersley’s Bistro would be closing after 27 years in business. And for a time, there was a great crying out of sadness, a fare-thee-well, and then … silence.

But now that the coveted restaurant space next door to the Boston Center for the Arts (and its prized 50-seat outdoor brick patio) has been claimed by Rebecca Roth Gullo and the Gallows Group (who also own Blackbird Doughnuts down the street, as well as the Gallows), the ambient din of a bustling eatery is about to return. The team has enlisted Phillip Tang, the beloved chef and owner of the permanently closed sliver of a Chinese noodle restaurant East by Northeast in Cambridge, to help usher in a new era of Asian gastropub glory to a now-legendary corner of the South End’s dining scene. For Tang, the new roomy enclave will present new challenges and an exciting environment for him and his staff, as well as diners.

“For a project of this size and the volume we’re going to do, it’s all about food quality,” he says. “East

by Northeast was easy to manage, as every plate came through me and the number of dishes were not that varied. But I’m most excited about moving away from the shackles of trying to put everything into … modern Chinese noodles. That was a major focus, and it’s fine, but this is just a free for all. We can do whatever we want. The freedom of space here is great.”

And that space is largely unrecognizable from its former incarnation. The interior has been essentially gutted and reworked from top to bottom, with a blown-

out and expanded bar space (making it an inevitable go-to for the after-work and residential crowds of the South End and Back Bay), a lot of reptile-green leather booths, natural-edge woodwork, and ornate timber installations assembled by hand on-site. The kitchen is still exposed, but now houses a chef’s counter that’s part raw bar and part two-seater private counter space for a front-row vantage point to see all the fun happening behind the line.

Tang says the history behind the space and having the chance to bring an Asian gastropub with Chinese, Southeast, and Southern Asian influences to the neighborhood is exciting, but it’s the ability to change up food formats and manage a larger volume that is driving him here. The food will vary from the raw bar and small bites to grilled items you’d traditionally find with dim sum (think: charred broccoli rabe in smoked oyster sauce and crispy garlic, pork wontons in spicy sesame sauce).

There will also be larger format shared-plate offerings like Korean BBQ and platters of Asian style fried chicken (“Food that’s good to share with a communal feel,” says Tang), and a Southeast Asian-influenced sausage platter.

Still, while Tang is ready to man a much bigger kitchen, he acknowledges that in order to win fans and keep people coming back, it’s going to come down to execution.

“There’s a lot of moving parts here and that’s the difficulty of large restaurants,” he says. “Here consistency [will be] key. What’s the point of putting new dishes out every week if we don’t nail them? So as we get our footing and comfortable in the space, then we [will] really play around and get more interesting.”

>> BANYAN BAR + REFUGE. SLATED TO OPEN MID-JULY. 533 TREMONT ST., BOSTON. 617-425-0200.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT FACEBOOK.COM/BANYANBOSTON 14

07.8.15 - 07.15.15

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>> NEON BANDITS. FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT NEONBANDITS.COM

BANYAN PHOTOS BY DAN MCCARTHY (ROOM) AND COURTESY BANYAN (FOOD)

EATS

Siblings are sometimes known to possess special communicative powers with one another, the kind that only strike the shared subconscious of two minds connected by blood and family.

And sometimes those powers are used to think about socks.

At least, that’s what the brother and sister team behind the Boston-based sock start-up Neon Bandits say about the moment three years ago when the two of them decided to ditch their careers in retail consulting and sports apparel marketing and morph into glowing sock merchants.

“My sister Sammy [and I] were both traveling independently when we came home from a trip [and] we said to each other that we [had] an idea for a business,” says co-founder Dan Cohen. “At the same time we both said ‘let’s make socks.’” [Ed note: He swears this is a true story.]

And after research into the space (and a desire to target millennials) and three years of preparation, they launched in early June.

Cohen says he and his team set out to blend the worlds of athletic socks (“[they] can be loud, but are designed for athletic performance”), dress socks (“[they] can have funky patterns, but aren’t designed to be worn with shorts”), into a straight all-purpose lifestyle sock that mixes fashion with function.

“We’ve designed Neon Bandits to be worn as you live,” says Cohen.

That can mean a lot of things to a lot of different people, of course. Maybe to you that means skateboarding. Maybe that means showing off your pasty white legs at a backyard mixer on a hot summer day. Or maybe that means wearing some brightly colored socks while doing both of those at the same time.

At any rate, fans are drawn to Neon Bandit’s sports mesh-arch socks with reinforced heels, as they’re already being carried at places like Laced Boston, Boneyard Surf Shop in Martha’s Vineyard, and local e-commerce emporium of footwear needs, A Man Among Socks.

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NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

15

OLDE MAGOUNʼS SALOON PRESENTS:

BACON PALOOZA

HONEST PINT

LOUD IDLE

A Q+A with Idle Hands founder Chris Tkach

BY DAN MCCARTHY @ACUTALPROOF

WEDNESDAYʼS • JULY 1ST-29TH 5-11PM ARANCINI

Crispy Risotto Croquette / Pancetta / fontina Cheese / Amatraciana Sauce

HOG WILD RANGOON

Black Pepper Bacon / Charred Jalapenos / Cream Cheese / Plum Sauce

FIG-ALICIOUS

Bacon Wrapped Figs / Goat Cheese / Balsamic Vinegar Drizzle

BACON POUTINE

Waffle Fries / Cheese Curds /

Bacon Onion Gravy / Soft Fried Egg

CHICKEN & BISCUITS

Fried Chicken / Buttermilk Biscuits / Country Bacon Gravy

BACON BOA

Pan Fried Asian Bun / Slab Bacon / Kimichi / Korean BBQ Sauce

BACON WRAPPED PORK TENDERLOIN

Roasted peach & Shallot Gastrique

BACON BOMB MAC & CHEESE Apple wood Smoked Bacon / chicharones / Jalapeño Bacon / Pancetta

WARM BACON AND BREAD PUDDING

Salted Caramel Sauce / Bourbon Pecan Ice Cream

@MAGOUNSSALOON OLDEMAGOUNSSALOON

518 Medford St. Somerville

magounssaloon.com|617 - 7 76 - 2 6 0 0 16

07.8.15 - 07.15.15

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When news came down the pike last week that Idle Hands Brewing, one of the first “nano” breweries to open in greater Boston, was closing its Everett brewing facility as part of a planned roadway construction project tied to the beleaguered Wynn casino being erected there, accusations of an affront against the little guy could be heard across the Hub. But the fact of the matter is Tkach was well aware this was in the works for over a year (he says they’re eyeballing a new spot that could happen in late summer). As the Wynn project progressed, he realized it would impact his building, but he was fine with that. “We [were] going to need to leave [that] place soon anyways,” he says.

When did you start poking around for a potential new facility once you were aware that the clock was ticking for Everett?

We started in earnest last summer, looking at spots in and around Boston, trying to find a location that would work for us and for what we want to do with Idle Hands. I must’ve looked at 30, 40 places stretching from Salem all the way to Dorchester, and I just couldn’t really locate anything that I felt was what would be conducive to what we [want] to build.

The viable real estate for independent locally owned businesses is an ongoing problem that doesn’t seem close to being fixed.

[It’s] just the sheer fact of what’s happening with property in and around the Boston area, warehouses and stuff like that—they’re all getting either torn down or redeveloped and turned into condos, lofts, mixed use properties, things that just aren’t conducive to manufacturing. So all of these small manufacturing companies such as ourselves are getting pushed further and further outside of the Boston area because you can’t find affordable lands to do this anymore.

Let’s talk a little nitty-gritty on the beer now. You’re out of the location at this point, right?

We stopped brewing five or six weeks ago; we have no more beer to sell. It’s a difficult situation that we’re in right now. We were asked to vacate by the end of June; we are unable to do that because we don’t have any place to go to yet.

I have no place to move anything, and so we’re trying to buy ourselves some additional time in this space by doing some legal maneuvering to hopefully get the lease signed on the space that we want to have, so that we only have to move stuff into one spot versus moving it into storage and have to move it again. But we closed down the kitchen, and last weekend was our last weekend of operations in terms of the retail side of the business, and now we’re basically [trying] to keep beer in the market.

You’re still going to produce in small batches through Night Shift Brewing though, right?

We’re not brewing any of our normal lineup beers over at Night Shift. We made a conscious decision not to do that because I don’t want flavor variations that are going to result. So everything we’re doing over there is new ... more seasonally oriented styles of beer that we know is going to move fast and it’s all going be draft only. I believe Night Shift is planning on serving some of it in their taproom as well.

It seems like the current landscape makes it impossible for anybody other than a large scale chain or a bank to afford the skyrocketing rents for manufacturers and retail storefronts. It’s systemic.

You’re right, it absolutely is, and you start dumbing down the community-feel of things by just putting up [those] types of institutions. And the money doesn’t necessarily go back to the local community in those scenarios, which I think is a big issue. I’m not sure everybody realizes that. In the end the millions and millions of dollars that that property is generating is not going back to somebody that’s sitting in Everett. [It’s] going some place else.

CRAFT

BEER ISSUE July 15th

digboston arts + entertainment | news | lifestyle NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

17

ARTS ENTERTAINMENT

D E R SO

CEN

STRIP DOWN FOR A GREAT CAUSE. AND THEN GO DO THE WORLD NAKED BIKE RIDE BOSTON.

18

WED 7.8

WED 7.8

FRI 7.10

SAT 7.11

SAT 7.11

SAT 7.11

Three Stooges and Classic Bugs Bunny Screening

FroYo and Indian Pizza in Central Square

Ward #6 Show Closing Party

World Naked Bike Ride Boston

HackCycle Exhibit Closing

Janeane Garafolo

If there was ever a time to take advantage of the free outdoor movie screenings that befall the Hub throughout the year, it’s summer. Mainly because that’s the only season worth doing it in Boston.

Who cares, though? Grab your favorite flask and a few friends and catch some Three Stooges slapstick shorts on Wednesday (with a bonus of classic Bugs Bunny cartoons). Caveat: All Curly impressions will be subject to ridicule.

Remember the old Indian Spices spot in Central Square? Don’t answer that, because it doesn’t matter. Not in a mean and dismissive way, but because over the holiday weekend the place decided to morph into the weird hybrid of a self-serve froyo spot and a house of freshmade Naan pizzas, because if there’s one thing that’s been missing from your life, it’s a place to get Indian pizza and froyo. Don’t ask questions. Just eat.

The last time you picked up an anthology of short stories by Anton Chekhov, you probably thumbed through a few of them and said, “Huh … not bad.” And speaking of Chekhov, you should hit the last night of the Ward #6 group art show curated by Chuck McNally and inspired by a short Chekhov story from 1892. We’re not entirely sure what that means, but art party + Russian literature + PBR (that’ll be there too) sounds good to us.

Maybe you’ve always wanted to strip off your clothes and ride a bike through the city for a couple hours. Maybe you like watching people do that instead of being naked yourself. Or maybe you agree with the World Naked Bike Ride’s message of confronting the dangers urban cyclists and pedestrians face in a world dominated by oil dependence and automobiles. Either way: World Naked Bike Ride, people. Don’t forget to wax.

Around you orbits all manner of technology on a daily basis. Just sitting there. And if you head to the Nave Gallery on Saturday, you can see how the HackCycle community art exhibit celebrated recycled digital goods of the 21st century by turning them into statement pieces, sculptures, visual displays, and more. In short, if the transformation of hardware into art is your thing, this is too. And it’s your last chance before it closes.

With news that Netflix is resurrecting everyone’s favorite modern-day camp movie, Wet Hot American Summer, you can catch up with star of the original and ’90s comedy presence Janeane Garofalo as she performs a set at the Paradise on Saturday.

Think of it as a reason to remember when she was as important to Gen X-ers as Emma Stone is to whatever today’s ironically detached youth are called now.

SCATV. 22 Vinal Ave., Somerville. 7:30pm/ all ages/FREE. For more information, visit scatvsomerville.org/news/ scatv-presents-cinemasomerville-movie-series

Frozen Yogi. Now open. 80 River St., Cambridge.

Sweetree Ink. 281A Mt. Auburn St., Watertown.

7-11pm/21+/FREE. For more information, visit sweetreeink.com

Starts at North Point Park. 6 Museum Way, Cambridge. 9pm/18+/FREE. For more information, visit facebook.com/wnbrboston

Nave Gallery. 155 Powder House Blvd., Somerville.

1-5pm/all ages/FREE. For more information, visit navegallery.org

Paradise Rock Club. 967 Comm Ave., Boston.

8pm/18+/$34. For more information, visit crossroadspresents.com/ paradise-rock-club

07.8.15 - 07.15.15

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NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

19

MUSIC

MUSIC

COME BACK, AMY

BEST FEST

Music returns to the porches of JP

The gut-wrenching truth behind new Winehouse documentary

BY NINA CORCORAN @NINA_CORCORAN

BY NINA CORCORAN @NINA_CORCORAN

Forget about 7/11 slushies. The best freebie on July 11th this year is the return of JP Porchfest.

Inspired by the Somerville Porchfest, Marie Ghitman and Mindy Fried organized an allvolunteer event to celebrate the area’s creative talent and diversity and intentionally kept it noncommercial. It’s not a competition. It’s a second serving of arts, culture, and community bonding, all for free.

From noon to 6 PM, a slew of local acts like bubblegum pop family band Zanois, ’90s New Orleans brass group Boycott, and immaculate 18-year-old Eastie MC Nikochet will give it their all. Remember to look beyond the rustic wooden porches. Stoops, driveways, and lawns all count, too.

“We wanted to include anyone who wants to be a part of it, even if they don’t own a house or their landlord won’t let them use the porch,” explains Ghitman. “Mixing up different types of people on different porches will encourage people to go to different parts of the neighborhood they may not have been to. Now places like Hyde Square and Egleston Square will get that involvement.”

Bikes Not Bombs are leading bike tours, Hyde Square Task Force’s youth leaders are creating banners, and pedicabs are giving free rides to those unable to walk. The top priority is increasing involvement from the community’s various organizations. “That was our big goal this year,” she says, “and it’s really coming together.”

JP Porchfest may only be in its second year, but Ghitman and Fried are already expanding it to include dance, theater, poetry, storytelling, and circus arts stages.

“Last year a couple politicians came and spoke, but this year we’re asking them to perform,” Ghitman laughs. City councilors Ayanna Pressley, Matt O’Malley, and Tito Jackson are committed to singing; an unnamed politician will play the triangle; and state representative Jeffrey Sánchez has yet to confirm whether or not he’s singing.

Together, we can get a Modern Lovers song out of them.

Amy Winehouse wasn’t an attention-craving junkie. She was a vibrant soul waiting to be saved by those she loved.

The unabridged depth and astute clarity Asif Kapadia delivers in Amy, his new documentary on the iconic singersongwriter, elevates it beyond the glories of critical praise and into the field of longevity known as reflection. Be ready to cry.

Before the beehive hair and permanent inebriation came a jazz-driven girl guided completely by music. For most, this is the first time they’ve seen Winehouse as more than a laconic drunk on the cover of US Weekly, and frankly, these 128 minutes are too short. Amy packs more interviews with associates than it does archival footage with the star herself, but those friends, peers, and family members reshape the idea of Winehouse as a coloring book available for onlookers to shade in ways the media reaffirmed were correct.

She wasn’t emptying cups and stumbling down the sidewalk in hopes of making headlines. She was depressed. When looking for help from fiancé Reg Traviss and her father, Mitch Winehouse, she was pulled away from rehab and directly given more heroin and cocaine by Traviss. When someone’s luxuries ride on your talent, help won’t come if it means cutting access to easy milking.

It’s almost humorous that Winehouse only had two albums. The Grammy-adorned Back to Black from 2006 was a follow-up to the perfect combination of R&B and jazz on Frank, her 2003 debut LP. That’s it. A voice that huge never got the chance to sing notes other than those. Five years of live albums and useless milking of past material up until her death in 2011 let that soul grow thirsty, frail, and weak.

No matter which performance of hers remains closest to your heart—the studio-perfected bass of “You Know I’m No Good” or the mascara-smeared flair of her Glastonbury set—Amy will reset your appreciation of her work and, more importantly, of her as a person. You will re-listen to Back to Black in awe. You will revisit every acoustic session, every TV appearance, every full concert. In observing Amy Winehouse’s death from a new vantage point, you will scramble to bring her back to life. This much is certain. But tragic as it is, the glamor of her addiction will likely outshine her voice for many, failing to resolve the gendered martyrdom we can’t seem to rise above and ultimately pushing the young woman she was—immensely talented and wholly unaware of it—out of our minds. Amy reminds us we can’t let that happen.

>> JP PORCH FEST. SAT 7.11. JAMAICA PLAIN. 12-6PM/ALL AGES/FREE. FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT JPPORCHFEST.ORG.

>> AMY. RATED R. OPENS EVERYWHERE FRI 7.10.

MUSIC EVENTS THU 7.9

ROWDY ROCK MEATBODIES + KAL MARKS + ZIP-TIE HANDCUFFS + MIDRIFFS

[Middle East Upstairs, 480 Mass Ave., Cambridge.

8pm/18+/$10. mideastclub. com]

20

07.8.15 - 07.15.15

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THU 7.9

LUCID LOCAL JAMS INFINITY GIRL + GUILLERMO SEXO + LUBEC + HAVANIA WHAAL

[Great Scott, 1222 Comm Ave., Allston. 9pm/18+/ $10. greatscottboston.com]

DIGBOSTON.COM

FRI 7.10

EMO WITH A SMILE SAY ANYTHING + MODERN BASEBALL + CYMBALS EAT GUITARS + HARD GIRLS [House of Blues, 15 Lansdowne St., Boston, 6:30pm/all ages/$20-35. houseofblues.com]

FRI 7.10

SWEET, SWEET CANADIAN FOLK MARTHA WAINWRIGHT + ZS [Institute of Contemporary Art, 100 Northern Ave., Boston, 6:30pm/all ages/$25. icaboston.org]

TUE 7.14

WED 7.15

[Brighton Music Hall, 158 Brighton Ave., Allston. 7pm/all ages/$20. crossroadspresents.com]

MARGARET GLASPY + BRITTANY HAAS [Passim, 47 Palmer St., Cambridge. 8pm/all ages/$16. passim.org]

MEME RAP RIFF RAFF

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THURS 7/9 - LEEDZ PRESENTS:

STYLES P

SUNDAYS

MONDAYS

DOUBLE TAP

MAKKA MONDAY

Weekly Gaming Night: The same guys who bring you Game Night every week at Good Life bar are now also running a special Sunday night.

GROOVECHILD

PETER PRINCE & THE TRAMA UNIT LONG TIME

SAT 7/11 - LEEDZ PRESENTS:

THE 2015 HIP HOP FEST FT. SLAINE & MORE

THURS 7/16 - CRUSH PRESENTS:

LAZERDISK ABSRDST

SAT 7/18 - LEEDZ PRESENTS:

DJ YELLA OF NWA WED 7/8

KABAKA PYRAMID

IBA MAHR & THE BEEBLE ROCKERS THURS 7/9

MEATBODIES KAL MARKS

ZIP-TIE HANDCUFFS, MIDRIFFS FRI 7/10 6:30PM - BOWERY PRESENTS:

SOAK, COVEY SAT 7/11

STICKY FINGERS (AUS) DUBBEST SUN 7/12

LET’S WAIT, MY BODY, ANDA VOLLEY MON 7/13 - BOWERY PRESENTS:

THE WOODY SKY

DAVID MIRABELLA (OF THE RATIONALES) TUES 7/14 - ILLEGALLY BLIND PRESENTS:

HEATERS

14+yrs every Monday night, Bringing Roots, Reggae & Dancehall Tunes 21+, 10PM - 1AM

21+, NO COVER,

6PM - 11:30PM

OF THE LOX FRI 7/10

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TUESDAYS

WEDNESDAYS

THIRSTY TUESDAYS

GEEKS WHO DRINK

Live Resident Band The Night Foxes, Playing everything Old, New & Everything Inbetween 21+, NO COVER, 10PM - 1AM Live Stand Up Comedy from 8:30PM - 10PM with no cover!

Free Trivia Pub Quiz from 7:30PM - 9:30PM

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15+ Years of Resident Drum & Bass Bringing some of the worlds ELJJHVW 'Q% '-·V to Cambridge 19+, 10PM - 2AM

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THE BEST ENTERTAINMENT IN CAMBRIDGE 7 DAYS A WEEK! 1/2 PRICED APPS DAILY 5 - 7PM RUGBY WORLD CUP SHOWN LIVE, STARTING ON SEPTEMBER 17TH WATCH EVERY SOCCER GAME!

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...GHOST SCORPION WAKES, FUTURE SPA CHECK OUT ALL PHOENIX LANDING NIGHTLY EVENTS AT:

WWW.PHOENIXLANDINGBAR.COM NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

21

FILM

ZOOM-ZOOM

Spend this weekend with the films of Edgar Wright

BY JAKE MULLIGAN @_JAKEMULLIGAN

7/10 Mr. Airplane Man 7/11 The FUʼs with The Ungraded & more Tickets on sale now!

7/16 Elvis Depressedly SOLD OUT 7/17 Superficial Future The U Project 7/18 Spraynard/Dogs on Acid Locavore Tacos Done Right Every Monday Night!

5-10PM in the Lounge The ONCE Lounge is Coming!

Countdown to our new Lounge Bar & Menu 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10...

Cuisine en Locale Presents: GITANA by Bread & Salt Hospitality June 25th - July 19th Thurs - Sat Lunch & Dinner Sunday Brunch

When Ramona Flowers washes her hands, it’s done with the visual equivalent of a drumroll: There’s a first-person shot of her fingers turning the knobs, then an overhead shot of her rinsing off, then an extreme close-up of her turning the fountain off. These insert shots aren’t providing necessary information—the film is Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, by the way—this is just how characters in Edgar Wright’s films exist. They can’t walk into a room without the camera crashzooming into the door first.

The Brattle Theatre will be playing Wright’s movies this weekend, along with films he’s named as influences. Remnants of disreputable subgenres drive the narratives: zombies in Shaun of the Dead (Sun 7.12, 2:15 and 9:30 PM), slashers in Hot Fuzz (Sun 7.12, 4:30 PM), aliens in The World’s End (Sun 7.12, 7 PM), and video game bosses in Scott Pilgrim (Fri 7.10, 7 PM). But beneath the varying brands of bloodletting, the movies are all telling the same story: the struggle of stagnant slacker men (and, in Fuzz, an overachiever) to maintain identity and relationships in a world that seems gamed against them. They’re cinematic anxiety attacks.

One could certainly put together a grand unified theory of what that recurrence represents. But the beauty of these films isn’t always what they say—it’s how they sing. Wright’s dialogue (co-written by Simon Pegg, with the exception of Pilgrim, which adapted a graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley) bounces between his characters like a pinball, rhyming and repeating with the sort of cadence that ruled the screwball comedies of the ’30s and ’40s. The opening sequence of Shaun is a barroom quarrel where the characters interrupt each other—”Ed!” “Liz!” “Shaun!”—with the quickening flow of a tidal wave.

This is a filmmaker who can do more with names than most others can do with sentences.

In World’s End, Gary King—Pegg’s man-boy drunkard—is arguing about nonsense with his friends over pints, trying desperately to ignore the extraterrestrials singling them out. “I don’t even know what a pronoun is … I don’t get it.” “You just used one,” Nick Frost’s Andrew Knightley—a particularly exasperated member of the bunch—points out. “Did I?” “It is a pronoun.” “What is?” “It.” “Is it?” That last response has Knightley crushing his glass in outsized fury, but the reaction is believable enough. It’s Ben Hecht-level banter: sharp enough to shred skin.

ZOOM-ZOOM continued on pg. 24

FILM EVENTS WED 7.8

ELLIOT GOULD IN ROBERT ALTMAN’S

MAJOR DUNDEE

[Harvard Film Archive.

24 Quincy St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge. 7pm/R/$7-9. http://hcl.harvard.edu/hfa]

SAM PECKINPAH’S

[Somerville Theatre.

55 Davis Sq., Somerville.

8pm/NR/$10. somervilletheatreonline. com/somerville-theatre] FRI 7.10

TAKE NOTE, HANNIBAL FANS

THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

[Coolidge Corner.

290 Harvard St., Brookline.

Midnight/R/$11.25. Also plays Sat 7.11. coolidge.org]

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CALIFORNIA SPLIT

SAT 7.11

BOSTON FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL PRESENTS THE YOUNG GIRLS OF ROCHEFORT

[Museum of Fine Arts.

465 Huntington Ave., Boston. 1pm/G/$9-11. mfa. org]

FEATURING THE RAMONES

ROCK ’N’ ROLL HIGH SCHOOL

[Somerville Theatre.

55 Davis Sq., Somerville.

Midnight/PG/$10. somervilletheatreonline. com/somerville-theatre] MON 7.13

INGRID BERGMAN IN GEORGE CUKOR’S

GASLIGHT

[Brattle Theatre. 40 Brattle St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge.

7pm/NR/$9-11. Also plays Tue 7.14 @ 4:45pm and 9:30pm. brattlefilm.org]

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ZOOM-ZOOM continued from pg. 22 And Wright has an eye to match his ear. Shaun has a symmetrical structure that turns every single shot of the movie into a laugh: A nondescript trip to the convenience store (shot in one long take) is replicated exactly later on, with Pegg’s bumbling non-hero failing to notice the blood and gore that has enveloped his neighborhood. (These films aren’t uncritical of the aforementioned slacker ethos.) And other shots are doubled in kind—the early sequences in a Wright film are trails of gunpowder, leading like breadcrumbs to the punchlines later on. Film critic Dave Kehr once wrote that “no director ever matched Preston Sturges’ way of blending low slapstick and literate dialogue comedy.” That was true until Edgar Wright came along. He knows how to blend those two elements, and he adds a third: visual literacy—comedy born of the film form itself.

In Hot Fuzz, Pegg and Frost play pseudo-fascist police officers in the mold of other cinematic supercops (see also: Dirty Harry, Point Break, and yes, Supercop), which means lots of catchphrases. And whenever they holler, “Punch that shit,” Wright hits us with the same shot sequence: a series of zooms into the clutch, the pedal, and the wheel. The result of all the rampramp-ramping up—the dialogue and the compositions crashing into one another until they form one monstrously overcranked whole—is like seeing an elaborate row of dominoes come tumbling down.

It’s the kind of harmonic effect you only get in the most relentlessly stylized of genre cinema, like some of the films screening this weekend: the feature-length chase scene Run Lola Run (Fri 7.10, 5 and 9:30 PM) or the John Woo-directed shoot-’em-up masterpiece Hard Boiled (Sat 7.11, 7 PM ). The joke of Hot Fuzz is that Wooinfluenced firefights are happening in a British village the size of a postage stamp, looking as though a high school had staged Bad Boys II as their class play. But the feverish momentum of these movies is as crash-bang-pow overwhelming as anything in the more expansive films that gave Wright his inspiration. The drumrolls collect, one on top of the other, until the resulting racket starts to sound like a symphony. >> WRIGHT ON! EDGAR WRIGHT AND HIS INFLUENCES. BRATTLE THEATRE. 40 BRATTLE ST., CAMBRIDGE. FRI 7.10—SUN. 7.12. FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT BRATTLEFILM.ORG

FILM

ON MAGIC MIKE XXL

BY JAKE MULLIGAN @_JAKEMULLIGAN

Unless you’re fascinated by the subject of pubic grooming, the repartee coursing through Magic Mike XXL won’t excite you. But you’re not here for the boyfriend experience—you want another kind of excitement. Tatum and company leave for “one last ride,” with bookings for their strip-revue set all up the coast. That’s how you experience the movie, too: You don’t watch it, you ride it.

The first Mike harbored sociopolitical concerns beneath its tearaway jeans (it was Shampoo for the iPhone set.) This one’s pure exploitation, like the lascivious cheerleader movies of the 1970s. In that tradition, it sends knockouts out on a narrative as thin as their T-shirts—one designed to get them to locations where they’re loath to wear clothes.

No cheer designed for football games works at a frat party. By that principle, the manner of male stripping varies by location: A drag bar allows for loose-limbed slides, while a Southern mansion affords a chance to hone table manners. But it’s the house of Rome (Jada Pinkett Smith)—catering exclusively to black female patrons—that elevates the flippant fun into something hotter.

Rome’s boys posit stripping as a confluence of sex and art: They’re audience-pleasers. When you see the quietly impressionistic way cinematographer Steven Soderbergh shoots those dances— screaming women lining the back of the frame, dollar bills falling from outstretched arms like leaves from an autumn tree, and soft overhead lights melting the onlooking bodies together, all while men grind underneath—you’ll confuse those two words yourself. Then you’ll want to ride again. >> MAGIC MIKE XXL. RATED R. NOW PLAYING EVERYWHERE. 24

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FILM SHORTS BY JAKE MULLIGAN @_JAKEMULLIGAN CARTEL LAND Documentaries like this one

by Matthew Heineman aim to batter us into disbelief: We’re in Michoacàn, where victims recall unspeakable acts of cartel violence and government employees speak openly about their side jobs cooking narcotics. Heineman’s interest in the visceral—in firefights—precludes larger insights about that trade. But in following the struggle between local Autodefensas and the cartels they oppose, he finds a fitting symbol for the bloodshed. The leaders on the ground level shift incessantly, death demanding that each role constantly be in flux—everyone’s a piece on a chessboard, with unseen money-men making the moves.

ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL

INSIDE OUT It’s a head trip: The new Pixar movie takes place inside a teenage girl’s psyche, where characters like Joy (Amy Poehler) and Anger (Lewis Black) dictate her actions. The stakes are low—her family moves, and some non-humans get lost, just like Toy Story—and the resulting drama is inevitably inert. But who cares?

The beauty is in the details, like in the way the emotions’ bodies are rounded off into amorphous blobs of energy rather than structured by hard lines. Dramatizing chemical imbalances is admirable, but doing it with such aesthetic vigor? That’s beautiful.

REBELS OF THE NEON GOD The first film by Tsai Ming-Liang, from 1992, reveals a director with an eye that sees far beyond most: Each shot is built of great depth, from the urban detritus that populates the foreground to the buzzing lights lining the walls in back. Tsai follows Hsiao-keng and Ah-Tse down diverging paths; the latter cycles through girlfriends and criminal acts, while the former—bored and envious—observes from afar. Each struggles for satisfaction and a salary, in between stops at the skating rinks and arcades of Taipei—the physical spectre of the title’s deity.

JURASSIC WORLD If you didn’t know that ’90s nostalgia has hit critical mass, then see the new Jurassic Park film—judging by the box office receipts, you probably have already. Every single sequence in the Chris Pratt-led sequel is centered around callbacks to Steven Spielberg’s original film. Have you been waiting 20 years for another look at the dino that blinded that film’s secondary villain? You’re in luck! Then the film has the nerve to make jokes about the overbranding of stadiums and theme parks. This whole film’s a branded advertisement—reinforcing our reverence for a film we already saw 20 years ago.

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Max is almost mute. Car chases fill the entire running time. Backstories are illustrated using only the scars and wounds on character’s bodies.

Fury Road speaks to us visually—it’d work entirely without sound. There’s only one verbal motif: “Who killed the world?” shouted by the film’s six heroines toward the patriarchal figures who scorched their planet.

Scoff at the inclusion of progressive politics in a film this unashamedly violent, but everything eventually clicks together. We see a world in need of tearing down. Fury Road finds great cinematic beauty doing exactly that.

Earl is a racist’s caricature of an African-American teen—he never goes to class, and considers women solely on the basis of “dem titties.”

The “Me” is Greg, a white highschooler suffering from Max Fischer syndrome. (He’s charming and creative, but also self-centered, and needs to get laid.) And the dying girl is just that—an ill classmate who exists only to teach Greg about what matters in life, Fault in Our Stars-style. This is the nadir of years of post-Rushmore bildungsromans about sad-but-quirky boys who flourish thanks to the help of otherwise-disposable side characters.

Just the worst.

TED 2 The humor and energy of the first one was strangely specific to the region, but only one note in Ted 2 feels Boston-authentic: Mark Wahlberg plays a divorced Irish guy who drinks too much so he can avoid his feelings. The rest is standard-issue Seth MacFarlane—absurd scenarios (a talking bear suing for human rights) interrupted by random pop references (a study session becomes a shot-for-shot recreation of a Breakfast Club montage). The story concludes with a scene at New York Comic Con, a fitting location: These characters aren’t townies, they’re brands.

THE WOLFPACK Documentarian Crystal Moselle saw five brothers with modelish good looks walking the street, dressed like the cast of Reservoir Dogs. She followed them to their home to find that they rarely left it: Their father raised them as shut-ins, letting them spend their time obsessing about and reenacting movies instead of socializing. Moselle gives them this film; their recreations and visual art command entire passages. The resulting profile is often shapeless, but the story itself—drawing together mass-level commerce and street-level cultishness—is irresistably beguiling.

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THEATER

PARK IT

Spend a Sunday in the park with Lorca

BY CHRISTOPHER EHLERS @_CHRISEHLERS

Thursday JULY 9 8:00 PM

SHOCK TOP

AFTER PARTIES DJs: Radio BDC Genres: Top 40 & Alternative No Cover | 21+

Friday July 24 7PM

STEELEYE SPAN feat

MADDY PRIOR Folk Rock

SHAKE

DJs: Bok Bok, Jam City, Fens + Brek.One upstairs Genres: Downstairs - House, Garage, Future Bass, Techno?

Upstairs - Hip Hop and Party Jams $10 Before 11PM, $15 After

Social Media Bundle: Wednesday August 5 7PM

STAN RIDGWAY Wall of Voodoo

17 Holland St., Davis Sq. Somerville (617) 776-2004 Directly on T Red Line at Davis

Saturday JULY 11 9:30 PM

SUMMER

FRENZY

DJs: Evaredy and Real P Genres: Hip Hop, Trap, Reggae and Party Jams $10

Thursday, July 9th 8PM

BOOKER T. JONES & DJ JOHN FUNKE Soul/Rock n Roll Friday, July 10th 7:30PM

EMISUNSHINE 10 year old Virtuoso Gospel & Americana Saturday, July 11th 10PM

GUNPOWDER GELATINE & VAN RALIN’ Tuesday JULY 14 6:00 PM

GAME NIGHT

No Cover | 18+ until 10 PM Downstairs

Tribute Tuesday July 14th 7PM

THE REZILLOS RECORD RELEASE PARTY PETTY MORALS & CASSANOVAS IN HEAT Scottish Rock & New Wave Wednesday, July 15th 8PM

SEHRANG BOSTON PREMIERE World Thursday, July 16th 7PM

TEN FOOT POLECATS TSUNAMI OF SOUND SPRAINED ANKLES Rock Friday, July 17th 7PM

SHELLY KING + SWINGING STEAKS Country/Folk/Blues/Rock Friday, July 17th 10PM

VINAL BACKGROUND ORCS Funk/Soul/Rock - FREE Saturday, July 18th 7:30PM

THE BAND THAT TIME FORGOT Classic Rock Saturday, July 18th 10PM

AQUANUTZ & BIKINI WHALE Rock

17 Holland St., Davis Sq. Somerville (617) 776-2004 Directly on T Red Line at Davis 26

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For the 12th year running, the Apollinaire Theatre Company will present a free bilingual outdoor immersive production in English and Spanish, this year choosing Federico García Lorca’s classic 1932 play Blood Wedding. But this will be the company’s first summer performing in Chelsea’s new PORT Park, taking advantage of the resplendent harbor views and amphitheater located inside of what was once a large oil storage tank.

And if you’ve been looking for a reason to pay a visit to Chelsea, it is doubtful that a more attractive one will present itself this year. PORT Park—gorgeous, serene, and right on the water—is a short journey across the Tobin. Easily accessible by public transportation (it’s a quick 10-minute ride on the 111 bus from Haymarket) or an inexpensive Uber, Chelsea’s proximity to Boston only underscores its diamond-in-the-rough reputation. And no, it’s not as dangerous as the news reports out of there would have you believe.

Lorca is best known for (aside from Blood Wedding), Yerma, and The House of Bernarda Alba, and is arguably one of Spain’s greatest poets and playwrights. He inspired a generation of artists from Spain and Latin America with his visionary disregard for theatrical conventions and his bold explorations of class, sexuality, and the role of women—all taboo subjects in his time, to be sure.

Lorca reportedly wrote Blood Wedding after reading a newspaper article about a young bride in Andalusia who abandoned her husband on their wedding day to escape with her childhood sweetheart. It is an inventive, enduring, and tragic work about unfulfilled love, deception, fate, and the cycle of life. And for the first time, Apollinaire is joining forces with another area theater company: Escena Latina Teatro, who will be performing its own unique Spanish-language version of the play on Friday nights with an entirely different cast in an entirely separate production; it’s a rare treat to have two opportunities to see such an important play in such an exciting setting. (The Escena Latina Teatro production will also be produced in Mozart Park later this month.)

Apollinaire’s English-language production, directed by Danielle Fauteux Jacques, has a cast of 17 Boston-area professional actors and musicians, with original music by David Reiffel. The staging is also environmental, in that the audience will follow the actors to multiple locations within the park.

Outdoor theater is one of the great pleasures of the summer months, and the fact that there is so precious little of it in the Boston area is a tragedy. And being free, this is a no-brainer, must-see event this summer. Audiences are encouraged to bring some blankets or lawn chairs and pack a picnic; Apollinaire is also working on getting some food trucks lined up for the performances. With incredible harbor views as a backdrop, now is the perfect time to rediscover Chelsea and take in some award-winning theater in one of Boston’s newest parks. >> BLOOD WEDDING. JULY 8-23. PORT PARK, 99 MARGINAL ST., CHELSEA. FREE. FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT APOLLINAIRETHEATRE.COM

PHOTO BY DANIELLE FAUTEUX JACQUES

Friday JULY 10 10:00 PM

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ARTS

PANEL WORK

New Lawn on D installation kicks off with a public art discussion on Thursday

BY RENAN FONTES @OHHIRENAN

AMANDA PARER’S INTRUDE There’s a brain trust of the arts gathering for discussion as a unique way to engage the public with some of the local artists, architects, and general funmasters behind the growing public art landscape in Boston. And everyone is invited.

Play in Public Art will gather together on Thursday night in South Boston at Lawn on D, with panelists that include interdisciplinary artist Ian Deleón; educator and exhibiting ArtLab artist Chris Frost; educator and exhibiting ArtLab artist Kelly Goff; educator and Shepley Bulfinch architect Mary Hale; exhibiting ArtLab artist Robert Lobe; exhibiting ArtLab artist Amanda Parer; and artist, Arts Program Manager at Boston Children’s Museum, and Time, Body, Space, Objects curator Alice Vogler.

Kate Gilbert, D Street ArtLab curator and director for Now and There (one of the event’s sponsors), says the discussion will highlight the importance of play in the public arts, and that the session itself will be uncharacteristically held outside, right in the middle of a brand-new display of public art.

The panel itself will be held among artist and fellow panelist Amanda Parer’s work, Intrude, which kicks off a four-day exhibit at Lawn on D. Involved: five twostory-high rabbits—the same that were created for the 2014 Vivid Festival of Light in Australia, and have since made their way to England, Belgium, France, Scotland, and Italy. Each will light up and watch over the night as the panel gets down to business and proceeds through the discussion.

Chris Wangro (impresario, artistic director of the Lawn on D, and panel moderator) adds that along with taking place outside, what differentiates Play in the Public Arts from other panels is its brevity: “We’ve created an overall topic, which is sort of playfulness in public art, and we’ve divided it into three sub-segments … spectacle, site, and architecture … each one about 10 minutes long,” he says. “We consider ourselves [to be] trying to make a difference in the public art scene in Boston. We want to make sure we’re contributing to the overall dialogue, [and] bring people who are doing work elsewhere and cross-pollinate the discussion. Public art is finding a great audience and great popularity by being playful.” Featured artist and panelist Robert Lobe seconds the notion, and frames the discussion as a “celebration of the arts, relating to having fun with the arts.”

Which isn’t to say that because there happens to be an international art installation and a bunch of insiders discussing the the importance of widely available public art there will be any reason to not have fun.

“We’re doing it in the middle of a lawn surrounded by giant white rabbits,” says Wangro. “It’s a different way of dealing with public art. If I could moderate this thing wearing a bunny suit, I would. Being fun doesn’t diminish the importance of public art.” >> PLAY IN THE PUBLIC ART. THU 7.9. LAWN ON D. 420 D ST., BOSTON. 6PM/ALL AGES/FREE. LAWNOND.COM. 28

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“We want to make sure we’re contributing to the overall dialogue, [and] bring people who are doing work elsewhere and cross-pollinate the discussion.”

Cycles 128 107 Brimbal Avenue Beverly, MA 01915

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NOTHING MATTRESS

BY BRIAN CONNOLLY @NOTHINGMATTRESS

THE STRANGERER

BY PAT FALCO ILLFALCO.COM

WHAT'S FOR BREAKFAST

BY PATT KELLEY WHATS4BREAKFAST.COM

OUR VALUED CUSTOMERS

BY TIM CHAMBERLAIN OURVC.NET

SAVAGE LOVE

DISUNION

BY DAN SAVAGE @FAKEDANSAVAGE In a former life, I was a staunch Republican and voted for antigay ballot initiatives. Then, after a bad divorce 18 years ago, I moved to another state and fell in with an artistic crowd. Over the years, I became close friends with people with vastly different life experiences, and I’ve developed an entirely new attitude toward gay rights. My dilemma: When SCOTUS handed down their ruling making marriage a right for all, I congratulated all my non-straight friends on Facebook. One of those friends posted a note thanking me for “always being in [their] corner.” My asshole brother then commented that not only had I not “always” been supportive, in my previous life I campaigned against gay rights. Several nonstraight friends jumped to my defense, stating that it couldn’t be true. I am ashamed of the person I was and have worked hard to be a better person. Is there any point in apologizing?

Don’t Have A Clever Acronym Anthony Kennedy, the Supreme Court justice who wrote the majority decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized samesex marriage in all 50 states, also wrote the majority opinions in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), which declared laws against sodomy to be unconstitutional, and Windsor v. United States (2013), which overturned the Defense of Marriage Act. Kennedy will obviously go down in history as a hero to the gay-rights movement—but his record isn’t perfect.

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Richard Frank Adamsa US citizen, legally married Anthony Corbett Sullivan, an Australian citizen, in 1975 in Boulder, Colorado. The men had been issued a marriage license by a county clerk who couldn’t find anything in state law that prevented two men from marrying. Sullivan and Adams applied for a spousal visa for Adams. Here’s the response the couple got— the entire response—on official US Citizenship and Immigration Services letterhead: “You have failed to establish that a bona fide marital relationship can exist between two faggots.”

The couple sued, and Kennedy, then a circuit court judge, heard their case—and he ruled against the “two faggots.”

Sullivan and Adams had to leave the country to be together.

Exactly 18 years passed between 1985, when Kennedy signed off on the deportation of Adams, and 2003, when Kennedy wrote his first major gay-rights decision.

In Obergefell, Kennedy wrote that “new insights and societal understandings” changed the way many Americans—including a majority of Americans on the Supreme Court—see gay people.

The same goes for you: New insights and understandings have changed how you think, feel, and vote about gay people. And that’s exactly what the queer-rights movement has been asking of straight people all along: to think, feel, and vote differently— and you have done all three. You can and perhaps should apologize to your gay friends for the antigay attitudes you once held—and for antigay votes you once cast—but they should immediately thank you for being the person you are now.

You can be ashamed of the person you once were but proud of the person you are now—unlike Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia, four men who are as shameful now as they ever were.

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