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Preventing the next ghost shiP

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Women's march saves our soul

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DePression goes 3-D

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14 A father’s ordeal to reclaim his child reveals a family court system that places kids back in the hands of alleged abusers

BY ALASTAIR BLAND Sacramento’S newS & entertainment weekly

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Volume 28, iSSue 41

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thurSday, January 26, 2017

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newSreView.com

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EditoR’S NotE

JaNuaRy 26, 2017 | Vol. 28, iSSuE 41

22 28 Our Mission: To publish great newspapers that are successful and enduring. To create a quality work environment that encourages employees to grow professionally while respecting personal welfare. To have a positive impact on our communities and make them better places to live. Editor Rachel Leibrock Associate Editor Raheem F. Hosseini Arts & Culture Editor Rebecca Huval Assistant Editor Anthony Siino Editorial Services Coordinator Karlos Rene Ayala Staff Reporter Scott Thomas Anderson Contributors Daniel Barnes, Ngaio Bealum, Janelle Bitker, Alastair Bland, Rob Brezsny, Aaron Carnes, Jim Carnes, Willie Clark, Deena Drewis, Joey Garcia, Cosmo Garvin, Lovelle Harris, Jeff Hudson, Dave Kempa, Jim Lane, Kel Munger, Kate Paloy, Patti Roberts, Ann Martin Rolke, Shoka, Bev Sykes

32 Design Manager Lindsay Trop Art Directors Brian Breneman, Margaret Larkin Production Coordinator Skyler Smith Designer Kyle Shine Marketing/Publications Design Manager Serene Lusano Marketing/Publications Designer Sarah Hansel Contributing Photographers Lisa Baetz, Darin Bradford, Kevin Cortopassi, Evan Duran, Lucas Fitzgerald, Jon Hermison, Shoka, Lauran Fayne Worthy Director of Sales and Advertising Corey Gerhard Sales Coordinator Joanna Graves Senior Advertising Consultants Rosemarie Messina, Olla Swanson, Joy Webber, Kelsi White Advertising Consultants Matt Kjar, Paul McGuinness, Wendy Russell, Manushi Weerasinghe Lead Director of First Impressions & Sales Assistant David Lindsay Director of First Impressions Hannah Williams Distribution Director Greg Erwin Distribution Services Assistant Larry Schubert Distribution Drivers Mansour Aghdam, Kimberly Bordenkircher, Daniel Bowen, Heather Brinkley,

55 Allen Brown, Mike Cleary, Jack Clifford, Lydia Comer, Rob Dunnica, Chris Fong, Ron Forsberg, Joanna Gonzalez-Brown, Lori Lovell, Greg Meyers, Aswad Morland, Sam Niver, Gilbert Quilatan, Lloyd Rongley, Lolu Sholotan, Jonathan Taea N&R Publications Editor Michelle Carl N&R Publications Associate Editor Kate Gonzales N&R Publications Writers Anne Stokes Senior N&R Publications Consultant Dave Nettles N&R Publications Consultant Julie Sherry Marketing & Publications Consultant Dan Howells, Nik Bonovich, Steve Caruso President/CEO Jeff vonKaenel Director of Nuts & Bolts Deborah Redmond Executive Coordinator Carlyn Asuncion Director of People & Culture David Stogner Project Coordinator Natasha vonKaenel Director of Dollars & Sense Nicole Jackson Payroll/AP Wizard Miranda Dargitz Accounts Receivable Specialist Analie Foland Sweetdeals Specialist/HR Coordinator Courtney DeShields Nuts & Bolts Ninja Christina Wukmir Developer John Bisignano, Jonathan Schultz System Support Specialist Kalin Jenkins

05 07 08 13 14 18 21 22 28 30 32 40 47 55

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1124 Del Paso Boulevard, Sacramento, CA 95815 Phone (916) 498-1234 Fax (916) 498-7910 Website www.newsreview.com Got a News Tip? sactonewstips@newsreview.com Calendar Events www.newsreview.com/calendar Want to Advertise? Fax (916) 498-7910 or snradinfo@newsreview.com Classifieds (916) 498-1234, ext. 5 or classifieds@newsreview.com Job Opportunities jobs@newsreview.com Want to Subscribe to SN&R? sactosubs@newsreview.com Editorial Policies: opinions expressed in SN&R are those of the authors and not of chico community Publishing, inc. contact the editor for permissions to reprint articles, cartoons or other portions of the paper. SN&R is not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts or review materials. email letters to snrletters@newsreview.com. all letters received become the property of the publisher. We reserve the right to print letters in condensed form and to edit them for libel. Advertising Policies: all advertising is subject to the newspaper’s Standards of acceptance. The advertiser and not the newspaper assumes the responsibility for the truthful content of their advertising message. SN&R is printed at bay area News Group on recycled newsprint. circulation of SN&R is verified by the circulation Verification council. SN&R is a member of Sacramento Metro chamber of commerce, cNPa, aaN and aWN.

Propaganda 101 It’s been less than a week since  Trump took office and already his  administration is proving it will  be a grave threat to free speech,  journalism and truth. On Saturday, Trump visited the  Central Intelligence Agency. Not  surprisingly, it didn’t go exactly as  planned with Trump using his platform  to decry the media for truthfully  reporting his rift with the agency. A beef with the CIA? Totally made up  by the media, Trump said. He also took umbrage with the  media’s truthful reporting on his  inauguration.  Low attendance numbers? Totally  made up by the media, Trump said. On Saturday, White House Press  Secretary Sean Spicer doubled  down on that particular lie in a  press briefing, claiming Trump’s  inauguration had seen massive  crowds. And on Sunday, Kellyanne  Conway, senior counsel to Trump,  went for broke as she faced off  against Meet the Press host Chuck  Todd. Spicer’s account of the inauguration wasn’t a lie, she said, it  was “alternative facts.” Actually, no, it was propaganda and  watching Spicer dish it out so blithely  was frightening. Some have argued we should stop  arguing about crowd numbers or CIA  beefs, but I say don’t ever let up. It  may be exhausting to whack-a-mole  every single time Trump or his team  blatantly lies, but each lie must be  dissected, exposed and shot down. The second we let up on fighting  against such obvious falsehoods— ones that can so easily be proven  wrong—that’s the second we make it  easier to accept the bigger distortions, fabrications and fictions. Don’t let it happen.

—Rachel leibRock r a c h e ll@ ne wsr e v ie w.c o m

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |  3

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Yes, I always text. I use it for social media, Marco Polo with my friends. Marco Polo is video texting. We talk to each other and see each other. It is more personable that way. I use it a lot for my Bible and when I’m in church. That way I don’t have to carry around my Bible.

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I was just thinking that I should limit my screen time. Well, what I am trying to do is to use [it] only for essential, pertinent things. I look at myself as middle-of-the-road phone dependency but it still [is] too much for me. I have a LinkedIn, it is the only social media I have.

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Show up Re “Reject and resist” by Sasha Abramsky (SN&R Feature Story, January 19): Get off your ass! Get off the couch! The turnout Saturday at the Women’s March in Sacramento was huge. It was heartwarming to see thousands of enthusiastic women and men walking and expressing their feelings about the recent inauguration and their resolve to fight for their rights and the future of our country. Women brought their kids; the elderly and disabled turned out in impressive numbers. But for every person in attendance, there were many more who took a pass and followed on Facebook or other social media platforms. To those people, I say clicking “like” on Facebook isn’t enough. Patriotism and activism don’t happen from the couch! There will be many more opportunities. Sometimes it’s all about showing up. You just have to be there. Maggie WilliaMs s acr am e nt o

Act up

I grew up protesting the Vietnam War; it worked. I grew up boycotting businesses, products, people, events and ideologies I did not agree with for moral, political and global

Re “Reject and resist Donald Trump” by Sasha Abramsky (SN&R Feature Story, January 19):

reasons, and I can tell you that it works. Don’t talk about it; get out in the streets and scream about it. And boycott in every possible way you can. Blacklist this regime from existence! Debi Earl Sacramento

The wrong move Re “The Sacramento Ballet searches for a new director with a fresh vision” (SN&R Page Burner, January 12): As one of Ron Cunningham and Carinne Binda’s first ballerinas at the Sacramento Ballet, I was deeply saddened and fiercely outraged at hearing the news of their impending dismissal by the board of directors. Over the past three decades, Ron and Carinne took a regional ballet troupe and turned it into an internationally recognized, world-class company with stellar dancers,

cutting-edge choreography, and a diverse repertory unheard of for a company of their size and budget. The board has clearly made a mistake in letting Ron and Carinne go. It is time for the board to do their job by marketing, fundraising and supporting the performances, and most importantly, showing Ron and Carinne the utmost respect they have earned. Nina Baratova-Amato via email

On Our “reSiST” DOnAlD Trump cOver: Not only sad but how sick  and twisted a local reputable  newspaper will go for ratings, talk  about selling out your integrity of  honesty....

RobeRt Cooley v ia Fa c e b o o k

@SacNewsReview

One thing that really stuck out in  this publication is how much of it  is filled with ads for strip clubs,  Asian massage businesses, and  pornography. Yet, they proclaim  that Trump hates women?!? Totally laughable

Toke up Re “Reject and resist” by Sasha Abramsky (SN&R Feature Story, January 19): Your paper doesn’t need to give the president advice. You’ll just have to smoke pot for the next four to eight years. That should get you mentally prepared for the next election. Curt Fry via email

Facebook.com/ SacNewsReview

@SacNewsReview

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online Buzz contributions are not edited for grammar, spelling or clarity.

Some guy pointed at a stack of   @SacNewsReview and said he  wants to burn it. Me: You don’t like  the paper? Him: Donald Trump’s  face is on it.

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City building inspectors listed this property at 3900 Second street as one of numerous vacant buildings that caught on fire in the last three years. Photo BY MARGAREt LARKIN

Squatter’s dilemma Hoping to prevent the next Ghost Ship tragedy, Sacramento officials  police vacant buildings as homeless residents seek refuge by Scott thomaS anderSon

An extended version of this story is available at www.newsreview .com/sacramento. Raheem F. hosseini contributed to this report.

Curtains of rain billow through downtown Sacramento on a Wednesday afternoon. Two women and two little girls huddle inside the vestibule of the Capitol Event Center, shivering in mismatched clothes inches from the downpour. On I Street, men wrapped in blankets shelter under the art deco overhang of a liquor store that barely protects them from the sweeping showers. Six bodies are sprawled across the face of City Hall, most tucked so deep into their sleeping bags they can’t see a massive pool of water creeping ever closer.

8   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

In four hours, one man sleeping here will be dead. When storm conditions are this inescapable, people experiencing homelessness face the dilemma of getting wet at night with no way to dry off until businesses open again. The threat of hypothermia can compel many to seek sanctuary in old vacant buildings or longabandoned houses. But local officials worry this trend also creates potential for deadly misfortune—and they point to the ways an old, unmonitored warehouse that doubled as

sc o tta @ ne wsr e v ie w.c o m

an illegal living space in Oakland erupted into flames during a secret concert last month. More than 30 people perished in the now-infamous Ghost Ship fire, that city’s deadliest. Ghost Ship has also become a terrible shorthand for what can happen when vacant, sometimes dilapidated buildings fly under the radar of code enforcers and fire authorities. But where’s the line between showing compassion to those so-called squatters with no other place to go and turning a blind eye to threats of run-down buildings—and has Sacramento found it?

“In the cases where we clear people out, it’s really for their own protection,” said Program Analyst Kelli Trapani, who works with the city’s code enforcement division. “We don’t want to have a major tragedy—we don’t want to have our own Ghost Ship.” While the Bay Area continues to reel from the December 2 death toll, the potential danger posed by vacant dwellings isn’t lost on Sacramento city fire inspectors, who recently probed two blazes in large, local buildings that are older than the Ghost Ship. The first happened in March 2015, when the historic Biltmore Hotel on J and 10th streets burst into flames. The bones of the Biltmore date back to the 1880s. For a time during the 1990s, the Biltmore shared similarities with the Ghost Ship in that 41 low-income residents called it home. The hotel’s owners eventually had every tenant in its singleoccupancy dwelling evicted in 2000 over development dreams that never came true. The hotel’s been officially vacant ever since.

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STakeD ouT The same was the case for the 81,000-square-foot Crystal Ice plant on R and 16th streets—older than Ghost Ship by a decade and empty since the late ’90s. The ice plant was engulfed in flames in November 2015. Fire inspectors still haven’t determined what caused the Biltmore or Crystal Ice plant to ignite, and may never solve those mysteries. “The problem in those situations is that oftentimes our inspectors can’t work backwards because fires that size cause structural collapse, burying most of the evidence,” said Sacramento Fire Department spokesman Chris Harvey. “In the case of the ice plant, the building had a low basement and the walls and beams fell into it. … With the Biltmore, there wasn’t structural collapse, but the fire burned so hot that the evidence was totally consumed.” Given that the ice plant and Biltmore long predate modern building codes, there are myriad possibilities involving their destruction; though one cause that hasn’t been ruled out is illegal squatting. “Every year we do see a number of fires in vacant buildings,” Harvey said, adding that witnesses noticed people trespassing into both the Biltmore and ice plant in the days leading up to their fires. Multiple city officials told SN&R that people taking refuge in vacant buildings is especially common during the winter. Principal Building Inspector John Leno has seen the pitfalls that come from people desperately trying to get warm. From a fire safety perspective, the situation is often a nightmare waiting to happen. “We find a lot of people living in structures without electricity huddled around all these candles,” Leno said. “In the larger buildings, sometimes they’ll have actual fires going. In houses without heat, it’s not uncommon for them to bring stoves inside. … When it comes to our cases, our concern is the same whether it’s tenants or squatters—that they’re going to be locked inside and can’t escape when something happens.” That’s reportedly the main factor that caused 36 people to die in the Ghost Ship fire. According to a lawsuit filed by family members of two victims, managers of the Ghost Ship rented “makeshift rooms and alcoves” to 24 people as living spaces, while simultaneously offering the venue to party promoters for music and dance events, despite its lacking smoke detectors, working fire sprinklers, exterior fire escapes and proper exit routes. The cause of the fire is still undetermined.

In Sacramento, city building inspectors generally only examine dangerous buildings when complaints come in from the public. Information obtained by SN&R through a public records request reveals that, in the last three years, city building inspectors checked on 4,275 different properties, mainly based on neighborhood tips and concerns. But in 13 of those cases, the investigations were triggered by actual fires that broke out in a structure, seven of which happened in buildings that were supposed to be vacant.

days after Warren’s comments, a man died sleeping in front of City Hall during a battering storm. While Mayor Darrell Steinberg called last week’s opening of a second weather refuge at the Stanford Settlement Neighborhood Center a response to “unacceptable social conditions,” the West El Camino Avenue sanctuary might as well have been a world away for a young homeless woman who has been on a nonstop exodus with other members of the Southeast Asian community since county authorities raided The conditions that drive their massive south county desperate people into encampment in July. vacant structures Currently posted continue to be up behind a highway debated at City Hall. sound wall on a The city of sliver of sodden Sacramento’s ground that dips emergency warmsteeply toward ing center only roaring Highway holds 40 people at a 99, “May” and her Kelli Trapani time; and while city neighbors are more program analyst, and county leaders than 10 miles away by City of Sacramento recently managed to car from the new weather open another on Garden refuge. (SN&R agreed Highway, that facility only to withhold her name due to holds another 25 people. Coupled concerns over privacy and law enforcewith other programs, like Sacramento ment reprisal.) Steps Forward’s winter sanctuary for On the worst night of the storms, May homeless adults at 30 rotating churches, told SN&R she wrapped herself in three the best scenario on a life-threatening night sleeping bags and crowded into a single in the region is that 160 to 260 shelter blue-tarp tent with five other people and spots will be available. two dogs to weather the deluge. Officially, it’s believed there are at The day before, she said, a sheriff’s least 2,600 people living on Sacramento deputy discovered their tents and told them County’s streets on any given night, but they would need to leave the area. When nearly all local homeless experts believe one of her neighbors, who doesn’t speak the actual number to be much higher. English, didn’t respond to the warning, “I think the city, county and our local she says the deputy kicked over a pot of organizations have been clicking well noodles the man was cooking. together to work on this,” said First Step “It was messed up,” May said. Communities Executive Director Stephen Without delving into the outdoor campWatters, who is trying to lobby political ing debate, local firefighters and building support for transitional supportive housinspectors stress that allowing people to ing communities, “but we could still use congregate in perilous structures could five times the amount of spots during the have equally devastating consequences. winter. There’s a ways to go, because it’s a On September 26, 2015, a man squatting big problem.” inside a historic building in Jackson, an North Sacramento Councilman Allen hour east of Sacramento, lost control of a Warren recently acknowledged that existsmall, illegal stove and was burned to death ing resources aren’t enough. On January in a raging fire. 10, he asked the city manager’s office to On December 28, 2015, a man and explore options for lifting the so-called woman seeking shelter from the cold in a anti-camping ordinance. He found no boarded-up house in Oakland were killed support from the mayor or other council by an inferno, one possibly sparked by their members at that meeting. portable propane heater. Neighbors told In arguing his position, Warren cited ABC7 News that they had seen much larger statistics from the coroner that 705 groups of people taking refuge in the abanhomeless people died in Sacramento doned fourplex on winter nights. Ω County between 2002 and 2015. Seven

“We don’t want to have our own Ghost Ship.”

Faced with a new and unpredictable administration, Sacramento County’s political leaders kept to tradition last week, signing off on a list of legislative priorities they want state and federal lawmakers to consider this year. The items reflect official policy stances the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors would take if related legislation is proposed at the state or federal government levels, and call for expanding health care and homeless services while reining in environmental review requirements for large suburban developments. At the state level, county officials are hoping to take advantage of a law that helped expedite construction of the golden 1 center in the city of Sacramento. Authored by mayor Darrell Steinberg before he left the state Senate, the law grants California Environmental Review Act exemptions to transit-served infill projects, which refers to “building within unused and underutilized lands within existing development patterns,” according to the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research website. But the law only applies to incorporated cities, not counties. At the behest of their planning department, supervisors hope to change that. Sacramento County Planning Director Leighann Moffitt said the adopted statement has been a long time coming, and better reflects the reality of local development in 2017. “The state law is set up under the presumption that cities are really more the urban areas and counties are rural,” Moffitt told SN&R. “The state CEQA exemptions don’t recognize the circumstance for an unincorporated area that can really be very city-like in nature.” As part of this year’s attempt to anticipate new legislation, supervisors also articulated their support for expanding health and housing services for vulnerable populations. These all face uncertain futures under the new administration of President Donald Trump, who is making progress on his promise to dismantle the affordable care act and has suggested capping the federal government’s contribution to Medicaid, which could potentially leave millions of eligible people uninsured. (Matt Kramer)

hammer anD jaIL From the jailhouse to building a house—that’s the goal of a partnership now entering its fourth year between the Sacramento County Probation Department and Northern California Construction Training Inc. Since its December 2013 inception, the nine-month program has trained probationers in various construction trades and placed them in apprenticeship-training programs that are the first step to becoming unionized labor. The program also helps probationers obtain high-school equivalency diplomas through the Sacramento County Office of Education. The collaboration was pitched as a way to reintegrate probationers age 17 and up into the workforce post-incarceration. According to Assistant Chief Deputy Probation Officer Dave Semon, the program has been largely successful, securing 85 job placements for probation clients, and 44 high school equivalency diplomas since it began just over three years ago. In 2016, 41 of the 152 probationers enrolled in the program found work, and 15 obtained their GEDs. Ninety-six earned certification in welding, forklift operation and other construction trades. While job placement hovered around 27 percent last year, Semon said some trainees find work before graduating each June. “I think [the program’s strength is] the ability to provide an opportunity for these clients to learn a trade, earn gainful employment, and not have potential employers pass judgment on them just based on their history,” Semon said. (M.K.)

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Backpage blackout Sex workers and advocates fear the worst for  marginalized women since site’s partial shutdown by Dave Kempa

A classified ad website finally caved to government filled the void with their site, which maintained its own adult ad section. SN&R partners with pressure this month by taking down its adult Backpage on its website advertising section. services section, leaving sex workers feeling That fight may be over for Lacey, Larkin and attacked by U.S. officials and advocates concerned Ferrer, whom the state has dragged back in court. for marginalized women’s safety. One month after losing her case and weeks before Backpage.com shuttered the adult pages on leaving office to join the U.S. Senate, former January 9, the evening before the site’s founders Attorney General Kamala Harris leveled the three and current owners were scheduled to testify men with 40 felony allegations each related to before the U.S. Senate’s Subcommittee on criminal money laundering and pimping. They Investigations in response to allegations that they were scheduled for arraignment on January 24, were to blame for acts of prostitution and sex after print deadline. trafficking resulting from ads on the site. They But the sex industry always seems to find a refused to answer questions at the following day’s way. Many sex workers have already moved their hearing, citing their Fifth Amendment rights. ads to the dating portion of Backpage, and sites Sacramento advocates warn the website’s like Ava.fm, a Tinder-like matching forum for censoring will force many marginalized women escorts and clients, are reporting a surge in out onto street corners, where they are much sign-ups. more likely to fall victim to traffickThough happy about ing, rape, robbery and arrest. Backpage’s internal troubles, “It’s ineffective if the Andrea Powell, founder and intention is to give help to “All they’ve really executive director of FAIR people who are trafficked or Girls, a Washington D.C.exploited,” said Kimberlee done is made it harder based group that provides Cline, co-founder of the to find those people and aid to human trafficking Sacramento chapter of Sex give them help.” victims, dismissed the Workers Outreach Project, company’s disabling of its a nonprofit dedicated to Kimberlee Cline adult section as “a publicprotecting the rights of co-founder, Sex Workers Outreach ity stunt.” those in the sex trade. “All Project—Sacramento In a release, Powell wrote they’ve really done is made that the company could have it harder to find those people done more to root out exploiters and give them help.” and cooperate with law enforceSex workers and Backpage ment while also protecting consensual executives have allies in First sex workers who rely on the service for their Amendment advocates such as the Electronic survival. Frontier Foundation, who have argued success“Backpage’s business practices did not strike fully in court that online companies should not be that balance,” Powell contended. legally responsible for third-party ads, and that Law enforcement and lawmakers have yet to websites being sued for user-generated content show an interest in striking such a balance. would have a chilling effect on speech. Sex work advocates such as SWOP A Sacramento Superior Court judge recently Sacramento urge U.S. lawmakers to approach sex agreed, last month tossing out criminal pimping work and human trafficking separately, and with and conspiracy charges brought by the California an added sense of empathy for those involved. Attorney General’s Office against Backpage’s “They have completely excluded the voices of chief executives. the people who are most affected,” Cline said. “It But government pressure persists, and it is feels more like an attack on us than an effort to that very pressure that shut down the adult ads protect the victims.” Ω section on Craigslist in 2010. Backpage founders Carl Ferrer, the company’s CEO, and Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin, former owners of the altweekly newspaper chain Village Voice Media,

Economic group drops author who  criticized all-male panel r aheem h@ n e w s re v i e w . c o m

An extended version of this story is available at www.newsreview.com/sacramento.

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The Sacramento Business Review scrubbed from its website the name, image and biography of a female author after she criticized the group for using an all-male panel to present an economic forecast she and four other women co-wrote. Oracle Corp. organizational development consultant Jessica Kriegel no longer appears on SBR’s author’s webpage, even though she was one of 17 contributors to a 48-page report on emerging economic trends in the Sacramento region, which was presented January 17 inside Sacramento State’s University Union Ballroom. Kriegel has written or co-written the forecast’s section on human resources the past two years. In the last forecast, the data she collected revealed Sacramento businesses were disproportionately run by men. Kriegel highlighted these disparities before last year’s main presentation, when she was invited to give a 4-minute preamble. Given the attention her mini-talk garnered, Kriegel didn’t expect to find herself in the role of gender police 12 months later. But when the lead panelists were announced, it was the usual male suspects—and zero women. Eight days before the Sac State event, Kriegel cited her concerns in an email to SBR director and chief economist Sanjay Varshney and two board members. Kriegel says Varshney responded that the forecast wasn’t meant to be a social experiment. “Which, in my mind, is such a silly perspective,” she said. The report “is massive,” she noted, and the presenters get to pick which elements to highlight—or not. By inviting a woman to speak, she said the SBR would have allowed a minority perspective to help shape an important conversation. “You could have expanded the perspective,” Kriegel said. Kriegel articulated that view in an op-ed that appeared in the January 13 “Soapbox” section of the Sacramento Bee. Writing that “a lack of diversity in speakers limits the quality of the message being delivered,” Kriegel continued: “All-male panels suggest that women’s perspectives aren’t important, and they reinforce the perception that women don’t have the skills or expertise.” That message got a cool reception. Kriegel soon realized her email address had been dropped from SBR’s distribution list. She wasn’t sent a parking pass to the forecast event as in previous years. And, while her name and bio remains in the actual report (PDFs are harder to alter, apparently), it’s been removed from SBR’s website. Reached by phone, Varshney declined to comment on the decision to erase Kriegel from SBR’s website. “As of now, I would assume I’m fired,” Kriegel said when asked about her status. And the SBR is now a little less diverse. Ω

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Donald Trump has to go by jeff vonkaenel

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12   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

After listening to the orange-haired leader of the free world give his incendiary inaugural speech, and after marching in the cold and rain with tens of thousands of peaceful demonstrators in the Portland’s Women’s March on Saturday, I have hope. I am starting to believe that Donald Trump can make America great again. He has already shown a remarkable ability to bring people together. Millions of Americans from many diverse backgrounds have united around their shared opposition to his policies. As his plans unfold, they will soon be joined by millions more. Already the Affordable Care Act, or as it is more commonly known, Obamacare, is gaining in popularity. Obamacare may not look good compared to the imaginary unicorn, a Republican health care plan with no individual mandate that allows drug companies and insurance companies to make massive profits, which is affordable for all, but doesn’t actually exist. But Obamacare will look wonderful next to real-life Trumpcare. What will be soon revealed is that the real-life Republican health care plan is primarily designed to ensure that the Republican Party continues to receive massive political donations from the pharmaceutical industry and the insurance companies. It has little to do with delivering affordable health care. But now the Republicans will have to take responsibility for a real health care system. And they will certainly screw it up. Millions of Americans will be hurt. Many will die because of lack of access to health care. But there will be a silver lining. Trumpcare will build support for a rational single-payer health care system. In his inaugural speech, Trump said, “This American carnage stops,” and he actually talked about giving the power back to the people. It was hard to believe I was hearing a Republican

je ffv @ ne wsr e v ie w.c o m

president use socialist phrasing throughout his speech. While the political rhetoric may sound good to the unemployed factory worker or the person struggling to support his or her family on minimum wage, he or she will soon learn that the Revolutionary Cabinet is filled with former executives from Exxon, Goldman Sachs and Carl’s Jr. Most people I know are not asking for a big tax cut for the rich, reduced worker protections and inflation that will continue to erode the minimum wage. The blue collar workers who voted for Trump will soon learn they have been betrayed. Once they realize this, many of them will be willing to join the evergrowing coalition that wants to return the power to the people: Those who want a government that will reverse the flow of national wealth to the 1 percent; those who want affordable health care; who want the government to protect senior citizens; and who believe in science and want to preserve the environment. They will be willing to join a coalition that includes people of all races, all religions and all sexual orientations, and recognizes and appreciates America’s immigrant population. Trump will bring Americans together. But the question will be: What will be the party of the people? Robert Reich, the former labor secretary under Bill Clinton, called for the Democratic Party to stop being just a fundraising tool and to start being the party of the movement. Trump will bring us together by showing us that we need to unite for the common good. Our priorities? First, we need to stop him. And then we will build a better America. Ω

Jeff vonKaenel is the president, CEO and majority owner of the News & Review.

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Donald Trump-supporter Richard  Spencer, who wants America to be a  white “ethnostate,” got punched in  the face by an unidentified anti-fascist protester on Inauguration Day.   Spencer is a member of the  alt-right or, in other words, a  rebranded Nazi. It’s not good to  sucker punch people, but violence  has defeated nazis in the past.

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The largest protest in American history (yeah, read  that again) drew an estimated 20,000 participants  through downtown Sacramento in a massive show  of support for women, immigrants, people of color,  basic human rights and decency on Saturday. Fifty  years from now, the events of January 21, 2017, will  be codified in history textbooks. But whether the Women’s march launches the next civil rights’ era or  sputters like Occupy is up to us. Fired up?

Aware of the public health crisis in Michigan,  where government ineptitude allowed  the children of Flint to drink and bathe in  toxic waste, California Gov. Jerry Brown  streamlined the process for testing lead in drinking water at the state’s approximately  9,000 K-12 public schools. America has taken  a dark turn, but at least California’s children  probably won’t be drinking poison as   they learn.

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In one of his last acts in office, former  President Barack Obama last week commuted the sentence for whistleblower chelsea manning.  Manning had leaked classified documents that  revealed unseemly military and diplomatic  action, yet resulted in no American deaths.  Manning, a transgender woman, has served  seven years of her 35-year sentence in a male  prison, often spending long periods in solitary  confinement. She should be released in May.  Glad she’s out soon.

proposed tax on processed, high-fat and sugary snack foods has the potential to raise $1 billion in revenue  for the state. In a release, Garcia reasoned that  “necessities like tampons” get taxed while chocolate  bars skate free. Fair point. But the Bell Gardens  rep will have to convince two-thirds of voters  that schools, roads and health care are better  than cheaper junk food. The instant gratification  constituency rarely takes the long view.

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01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   13

‘The judge TOOk my sOn away’

by AlAstAir blAnd

A father’s ordeal to reclaim his child reveals a family court system that places kids back in the hands of alleged abusers

T

he toddler could barely walk, but already he was lost. In 1992, his mother, a woman named Josie Cohen, reported to Sacramento area authorities that she suspected her estranged husband was sexually abusing the 2-year-old. According to investigative records documenting the case, obtained by SN&R, the boy told a Child Protective Services investigator in 1993 that his father regularly sodomized him. A medical exam proved inconclusive. But in April 1994, the case was heard in Sacramento County’s family court, where multiple witnesses testified that the child had described being abused or raped. His attorney even relayed a CPS social worker’s conclusion that the father was masturbating “and ejaculating in front of” the toddler. But Judge Peter McBrien—still with the court today—was convinced the boy had been coached by his mother to concoct the allegations and handed him over to his father for primary custody. The reports of abuse continued. In July 1995, the child called the police himself, asking for protection from his dad. According to a report by the responding police officer, obtained by SN&R, the boy graphically described being sodomized. The 5-year-old told the same story to a CPS social worker and even drew an image of his father raping him before a camera on a tripod. In the crude drawing, the dad’s face is smiling while the child cries. The boy spent some time in foster care but was eventually court-ordered back to his dad. His mother died of cancer in 1998, and his story was orphaned to obscurity. Connie Valentine founded the California Protective Parents Association in Sacramento in 1999 in direct response to the case. Almost 20 years later, she’s still trying to reform what she says is a corrupt branch of the court system that destroys lives. Valentine is far from the only detractor. According to interviews with attorneys, former judges, past litigants and others who have worked in or analyzed family courts across California, judges disproportionately award custody to parents accused of abuse, due to a variety of factors—particularly institutional sexism that dismisses the concerns of female litigants and conflicting financial interests of attorneys and judges.

14   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

These factors and more have eroded the family court system into a grotesque caricature that favors litigants with the money to hire private attorneys while penalizing the mothers who say their children are being mistreated, says Barbara Kauffman, a family law attorney based in Mount Shasta. “[Parents] are thrust into this court situation where they are expected to prosecute a person who has been abusing them and, if they fail to prove they’ve been abused, they are accused of making a false allegation of abuse,” Kauffman explained. There’s research to back this up. If a parent claims in court that their spouse or partner has been abusive, their odds of losing custody skyrocket, according to a nationwide analysis from California State University, San Bernardino. In a written statement to SN&R, Supervising Family Law Judge Jim Mize, a magistrate of many years’ experience in the Sacramento Superior Court, dismissed as “absurd” the idea that judges knowingly funnel children into abusive homes. Still, activists are adamant that the system effectively gambles with children’s lives—and they want a system overhaul. An East Bay group called Court Reform LLC is lobbying for several procedural changes that could benefit family court litigants unable to afford attorneys. And the Socioeconomic Justice Institute, a newly founded organization based in the Silicon Valley, is preparing to launch a class-action lawsuit against California court administrators and several judges, including Mize and McBrien. “An entire branch of government is operating in the dark, like the Catholic Church,” said Kathleen Russell, executive director of the Center for Judicial Excellence, a Marin County organization that aims to protect litigants’ basic courtroom rights. “This has become an unregulated cottage industry that is completely unaccountable to anyone.”

One family’s sTruggle DeWayne Robinson wants his little brother back. The two used to live together in Elk Grove. They were born to different fathers. “But he’s my brother,” said Robinson, 21, an information technology student at Los Medanos Community College in Pittsburg. But Robinson’s brother, who is 7, has been taken away from his biological family by Sacramento County’s family court system and placed in the custody of an unrelated man named Timothy Dwyer, with whom the boy’s mother, Gloria Bauzon, had a short relationship several years ago. According to court records, the child was initially handed over to Dwyer after he submitted a standard court form two years ago called a “petition to establish parental relationship.” Dwyer claimed in the petition that he was the boy’s father—which genetic testing had already shown wasn’t the case. Dwyer also claimed that Bauzon was coming up short on parental duties, such as helping her son with homework and taking him to school, and that Robinson, then 19, was physically bullying the kindergartener—what Robinson told SN&R was simple brotherly tussling.

A restraining order issued in Sacramento Superior Court in October 2016 prevents Israel Brown from seeing his biological son at all. “I said to [his mother] the other day, ‘We’re going to lose him.’”

PHOTO BY GEORGE BAKER JR.

Citing the involvement of a minor, the sheriff’s department declined to discuss the case or even acknowledge whether it had received such a report. Dwyer spoke briefly by phone with SN&R. He declined to offer any comment. His attorney, Timothy Zeff, did not return emails from SN&R. If anything, Bauzon’s allegations of abuse have worked against her. Bauzon’s visitation time of nine days a month with her son was reduced to four supervised hours and two phone calls per week in October, largely because of the pedophile claims, according to Coil’s report. In her report, Coil—who repeatedly misspelled the child’s name—noted that Bauzon had requested that her son be allowed to sleep in his own bed while at Dwyer’s home. Coil, who interviewed the child and the opposing litigants, ultimately recommended to the court Bauzon’s current custody arrangement. Coil couldn’t be reached for comment prior to print deadline. Several days later, Mize admonished Bauzon at a court hearing for using the word “pedophile” in front of her son. “Do you have any sense of how sad you’re making your child by having such a negative attitude?” Mize said. That day, he ordered Coil’s custody recommendation. According to Brown, none of the child’s relatives have seen or spoken to him since. “The judge took my son away from everyone related to him,” Brown told SN&R.

If a parent claims in court that their spouse or partner has been abusive, their odds of losing custody skyrocket. A pAttern of rulings It’s hardly the first time the Sacramento court has left a family in shambles. There was the Cohen case, which received little media attention. Valentine closely followed it, however, and says the child is now a stable, if emotionally troubled, adult who lives off of his maternal inheritance in Sacramento. More recently, in two separate cases, Judge Sharon Lueras allegedly ignored evidence that she was granting child custody to dangerous parents, rulings that preceded the hatchet murder of a 9-year-old boy by his father and the poisoning death of an infant girl by her mother. Similar events occur nationwide. Russell has analyzed 530 cases since 2008 in which children were murdered by their parents. Her findings, posted on her organization’s website, revealed that 58 children were killed after being court-ordered into the custody of the parent reported to

“‘the judge took my son AwAy’” continued on page 16

Still, Dwyer’s handwritten form, submitted in February 2015, proved convincing enough for the court. That October, Judge Tami Bogert granted Dwyer primary custody in an unusual ruling that established an unrelated man as the father of his ex-girlfriend’s child. Fifteen months later, the boy’s biological family has lost contact with him, according to Israel Brown, the child’s biological father. Brown only learned in 2015 that he had a son and has been struggling for more than a year to help Bauzon retrieve him. Bauzon, who retains custody of a 13-year-old daughter—Brown is her father—contested the court’s judgment in an interview. “All I do is work and take care of my kids, every day, and they take my kid away from me?” said Bauzon, who was born in the Philippines. “Why? Because I don’t speak the language so good, because I don’t have a lawyer?” She might have answered her own question. While Dwyer has an attorney, Bauzon does not. James Brosnahan, a family law attorney in San Francisco, says fighting to maintain custody of one’s child without legal representation is a very difficult task. “When you don’t have a lawyer in a custody fight, usually you lose,” Brosnahan told SN&R. “It’s a very serious problem. It’s a blot on the justice system in California.” It also may be illegal. Brosnahan has argued in court that taking people’s children while they are unrepresented by attorneys—something that happens routinely—is a violation of their constitutional rights. While California’s Family Code section 2030 states that “the court shall ensure that each party has access to legal representation,” sources disagree as to whether this language requires or merely allows family court judges to level the playing field between litigants. Kauffman, the Mount Shasta attorney, says judges routinely skirt around this legal clause via a sort of Catch-22. She explains there is a considerable mess of paperwork that a litigant must fill out to demonstrate financial hardship and the inability to pay for their own attorney. But the process of accurately filling out the paperwork, Kauffman says, is complex enough that one essentially needs an attorney to guide them through it. According to a 2004 estimate by the Judicial Council of California, at least one party in more than 70 percent of divorce cases is without an attorney. By the time of judgment, 80 percent are self-represented—apparently unable or unwilling to continue paying fees. By comparison, nobody goes to trial without a lawyer in the criminal justice system unless they choose to. “If you’re accused of a misdemeanor and you can’t afford an attorney, you have a right to a public defender,” said Joseph Sweeney, Court Reform LLC’s founder. “But you don’t have those same rights in a family law case even though you risk losing something arguably even more valuable—your children.” Bauzon’s case also resembles other custody disputes in the way that the system has responded to accusations of child abuse. According to a report filed October 20, 2016, by a Sacramento County family court custody counselor named Priscilla Coil, Bauzon and Brown have repeatedly called Dwyer a “pedophile.” Brown told SN&R he even filed a report with the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Department on December 8, 2015, alleging Dwyer may have been abusing his son.

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   15

“‘The judge Took my son away’” continued from page 15

be abusive or threatening, even when a nonthreatening parent was also fighting for custody. This pattern showcases what Russell calls “judicial child trafficking.” “The court system is systematically trafficking children who are abused by a parent away from their safe parent who is trying to protect them and into contact with the parent they say is harming them,” Russell said. “It happens almost every time like clockwork. If you raise an allegation of abuse, the system starts turning against you, even if you have legitimate medical evidence that the kid has been raped or beaten, or there is testimony from the emergency room doctors saying they see evidence of abuse.” Linda Barnard, a licensed marriage therapist in Sacramento who regularly testifies in court as a domestic violence expert witness, describes the same recurring outcomes in cases where a woman reports abuse. “The more frantic the mother becomes, the more they think she’s crazy, and pretty soon the abusive parent ends up with the kid,” she said. “Many times people are actually afraid now to disclose abuse because they’re afraid they’ll lose their kids.” A 2015 analysis by a professor at CSU San Bernardino showed how frequently this seems to occur. Geraldine Stahly reviewed 163 California custody disputes. In 82 percent, mothers initially had primary custody. Even though 88 percent of the mothers reported being abused by their exes, only 12 percent of the time did the mothers end up with primary custody. “Allegations of physical and sexual child abuse arose in nearly all cases,” the report stated. “In 75% of cases, children positively identified fathers as perpetrators.” Stahly’s report noted that “98% of the fathers were represented by an attorney while the mother had no attorney.” The Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence, a Baltimore welfare advocacy group, has collected similar data and has estimated that more than 58,000 children across America are courtordered into abusive environments every year. Money, Russell says, ultimately has much to do with these rulings. “They’ve figured out if you put the child with the abuser, they’ll make a lot more money, because the parents who go in trying to protect their children often end up losing their livelihood,” Russell said. In other words, keeping families mired in toxic custody disputes is a cottage industry. For example, Ulf Carlsson—whose saga SN&R has closely covered—estimates he has spent a million dollars in legal fees trying to carry out a divorce in the Sacramento court. According to the 2014 family court corruption documentary Divorce Corp, divorce and custody cases wring $50 billion a year from litigants in the United States. Attorneys, custody evaluators and mediators, custody supervisors and psychologists rake in most of this money. “These [litigants] get bled dry,” Barnard said. In theory, judges would stamp out systemic corruption that turned family court squabbles into money-making schemes—but they don’t, at least not always, according to DeAnn Salcido, a former family court judge in San Diego County.

16   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

In fact, Salcido says judges may actually cash in on the system by becoming private custody mediators after they retire, a service for which they can pocket $500 an hour. Since lawyers are the ones who recommend these mediators, it behooves a judge to curry favor with established family law attorneys during their time on the bench, Salcido explains. On the other hand, “judges who piss attorneys off won’t be recommended,” explained Salcido, now a family law attorney herself. This system, she says, fosters cronyism between judges and attorneys and leads to biased rulings in the family courts. Moreover, Salcido says, the mediation service itself is a scam. She says mediators often fail to fact-check what one parent tells them, leading to badly flawed custody recommendaEmily Gallup, a former Nevada County family court mediator, says she was pressured to tions—which, she notes, make speedy custody recommendations that judges follow most of the judges heavily rely on. time. “They’re basically delegating their decisionPHOTO BY KEVIN CORTOPASSI making to the mediator,” she said. But one source after another insisted it does happen, That’s how Emily Gallup says it worked in the Nevada and with regularity. County family court, too, where she served as a court“It’s dumbfounding,” Salcido said. “Only in family employed mediator for several years until 2010. Her job court can a child who has claimed to be abused by a involved interviewing parents and their children and person be then forced to be in that person’s company.” making a custody recommendation for the judge, who Nancy Lemon, a lecturer at UC Berkeley’s School she says ordered her recommendations roughly nine of Law and the legal director at the Family Violence out of 10 times. The big problem, Gallup says, is she Appellate Project, said “a general history of sexism was pressured by her superiors to complete one such where women aren’t believed as much as men are” has report per hour—a task she says was “absolutely not” created the environment in which abusive men often possible to do fairly. gain primary custody of their children against a woman’s Gallup says her employers encouraged her “to be protective efforts. skeptical of domestic violence allegations” while discourOf course, some parents lie and falsely tell the court aging her from reviewing parents’ criminal records and that someone else is abusing them or their child, but even the case files. research has shown this to be rare. For example, a 2003 “They basically told me to make my best guess,” Canadian study found that of all child abuse allegations she said. researched, only 4 percent were intentionally fabricated. Mize firmly contests allegations of systemic corrupThis figure was higher—about 14 percent—in cases tion. He says there are too many employees within the where custody was in dispute. A 1987 study in the Journal Sacramento Superior Court system, and too many family of Interpersonal Violence found a similarly small rate of law attorneys who represent local cases, for conflicting false abuse allegations. friendships and cronyism to routinely develop. Salcido eventually resigned from the judicial bench And Mize adamantly denies the system trades kids of San Diego County in 2010, frustrated with a system for cash. she feels is overtly misogynist and “favors the politically “[T]o imply that a competent and honest judge, connected over public safety.” hearing clear evidence of sexual abuse, would then, That same year, Gallup was fired for questioning what without secure protection to the child, award unsupervised she felt was a negligent system. She won a wrongful visitation to an alleged perpetrator is absurd,” Mize wrote.

to follow up later with more information. Almost eight months later, Brown is still waiting. So are thousands of others. In fact, while the CJP receives more than 1,000 complaints every year, almost none result in public discipline, according to the commission’s annual reports. From 1990 through 2015, the commission received 29,969 complaints. Just 106 times, though, were judges publicly disciplined. The activist camp claims this indicates a system failure. “Judges don’t follow the laws, but then the CJP doesn’t do anything about it,” said Stephen James, the co-director of the Socioeconomic Justice Institute and an investigative reporter with years of experience studying California’s family courts. Sweeney, at Court Linda Barnard, a licensed marriage therapist in Sacramento who testifies as a domestic Reform LLC, was keen violence expert, says mothers who allege on learning more about child abuse are often dismissed as “crazy.” the complaints—who filed them and why. He submitted a public records request with PHOTO BY KEVIN CORTOPASSI the commission last February to access this information, termination suit against the Nevada Superior Court that and the agency promptly refused to hand it over. awarded her $313,000 in compensation, but the ruling was Shortly thereafter, the state auditor, answering to overturned on a technicality. Gallup now runs a private public outcry, similarly demanded access to the CJP’s marriage and family therapy practice in Grass Valley, records. In its 56-year history, the commission has never but she remains troubled by what she saw as a mediator. been audited—and the secretive 11-member unit, which “It upsets me,” she said, “to know that children are filed a lawsuit on October 20, 2015, to block the audit, paying the price for poor work being done in the court.” is trying to keep it that way. The CJP’s director did not return multiple calls from SN&R seeking comment. But Mike Belote, a lobbyist for the California Judges Association, says grievances against the courts usually Like so many unhappy court litigants, Brown turned to do not justify action. He explains that many, if not most, higher officials for help. complaints filed with the commission address what In June, he filed a complaint with the Commission on are technically legal errors, not examples of judicial Judicial Performance accusing Bogert of racism (Brown misconduct. is black) and pre-established bias in her ruling to bar him “And we have a court of appeal for legal error cases,” from joining Bauzon’s fight. He claims she disregarded he said. the results of the genetic tests showing Brown was the That’s sort of true. Litigants can appeal a court boy’s father. ruling—but generally only if there is a transcript of the “She talked to me like I was a thief in there trying to proceedings. However, most counties have eliminated steal someone’s kid, instead of the other way around,” family court reporters to save money. Stahly, at CSU said Brown, who has had no attorney throughout the San Bernardino, found that more than half of family ordeal. court hearings she analyzed “were held without a court Bogert was unable to comment because the case is reporter present, thus precluding an appeal.” Litigants still pending, according to Kim Pedersen, a spokeswoman may opt to have a reporter present, but in Sacramento for the Sacramento Superior Court. they must pay $478 a day for the service. One of Court Several weeks later, the commission sent a brief Reform LLC’s primary goals is to require family courts acknowledgment of Brown’s complaint and the promise

An Absent wAtchdog

to produce transcripts of courtroom proceedings at no cost to litigants. Eugene Hyman, a retired judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court, says the elimination of court reporters “could allow a judge to cut corners.” Salcido, in San Diego County, says the absence of court reporters has created “a due process nightmare” from which “the integrity of the whole system is lost.” Still, Belote insists it’s not judicial fouls that usually prompt outrage from litigants but, rather, the very nature of the family court. “We are talking about the most sensitive issues in our court system—custody of one’s children,” Belote said. “In virtually every case, someone is going to be unhappy.” The tide may be turning slowly in favor of families, parents and children. The state auditor has the Commission on Judicial Performance in the hot seat. Court Reform LLC’s Sweeney is even applying to serve as one of the CJP’s six public members.

“The court system is systematically trafficking children who are abused by a parent away from their safe parent.” Kathleen Russell executive director, Center for Judicial Excellence

James, at the Socioeconomic Justice Institute, is working closely with Carlsson and Susan Ferris—who went four years without seeing her daughter due to a series of Sacramento court actions that James insists were illegal—on the class action lawsuit against the state, which he expects to have filed within six months. On January 3, the Ninth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that CPS workers who place a child in an abusive home can be held accountable, whereas previously they have been protected by immunity. James, a former SN&R contributor, says the decision, made in Pasadena, sets a groundbreaking precedent that could start the unraveling of immunity protections for employees of the family courts, where judges and attorneys, without transcripts to track their behavior, rarely face legal consequences for their actions. “The pressure is going to start coming from the top down to the county level,” James said. “The family courts are going to start getting the message that they need to follow the law, stop with the cronyism and giving favorable rulings to their favorite attorneys, and stop the bias against the people who can’t afford attorneys.” Ω Rachel Leibrock contributed to this report.

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Str u g g l e S, cr e a tivity & conne c tio n

A rt i s t D i A n A D i c h t w i s t s w i r e i n to t h e s h A p e o f h e r pA i n .

A new art exhibit explores links between art and mental illness B y E n id Sp it z

Photo BY LISA BAEtZ

D

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on’t be afraid, but shit’s about to get deep. This month, Sacramento artists are digging into a tough, often taboo topic: mental disorder. As part of a new, ambitious exhibit, dozens of pieces at two venues will spotlight mental illness in the hopes of increasing awareness about artists’ needs for treatments, health benefits and creative outlets. Diana Dich knows the subject well. The Sacramento artist, who says she’s struggled with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, uses art as a way to turn pain into into something positive. “Sometimes I feel like if my insides could be on the outside, things might be easier,” says Dich, who has teal hair and a knack for twisting wire into intricate, three-dimensional sculptures. Dich is one of hundreds of artists who submitted to Patterns of Disorder, a multivenue, multidisciplinary evening of art that will take over Midtown’s Menagerie Gallery and the Red Museum for the night on Saturday, January 28. The event was put together by Sacramento’s Retrograde Collective, a nonprofit that hosts salons, forges partnerships and, ultimately, aims to bring medical and retirement benefits to artists. The evening will include cocktails, stand-up comedy and music by Electric Baby Jesus. In addition to the art, performances, readings and a live art-making booth will keep guests entertained.

Also on display? Debilitating anxiety, PTSD, mania, depression and maybe even an eating disorder or two. Cheers. It’s not your average gallery show, says Retrograde’s co-creator Arielle Robbins. “It’s a progressive evening of art,” she says. The point of the event, she adds, is to stop the stigma surrounding mental disorder, especially where artists are concerned. “You have to speak to the commonalities that all of us possess,” she says. The evening will start as a straightforward viewing of the exhibit at Menagerie and then progress to a panel discussion and Q&A booth with mental health experts from Stop Stigma Sacramento at the Red Museum. “The art is like the first step,” Robbins says. “Are you ready?” Don’t be scared off by the psychological probing, though. And if you’re the anxious type, unnerved by crowds and the thought of mingling, that’s OK, too. “You don’t have to talk, you can just look,” says Menagerie’s curator Sarah Hawkins. Hawkins gets it. For years, she says, anxiety stopped her from submitting her work to local shows, even though she’s been coaching peers and curating a gallery. Like Dich, art is her safe space. “There’s that stigma that we have from our moms and their moms that we don’t talk about things that aren’t happy,” Hawkins says.

MARKET YOUR ART See NIGHT&DAY

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GRANOLA GOURMAND See EAT ME

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TO LOVE A PIZZA SANS CHEESE See THE V WORD

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Diana Dich

B e n ja m i n m a rt i n s PHOTO COURTESTY OF BENJAMIN MARTINS

Such avoidance can lead to social stereotyping, she adds, which makes lobbying for artists’ health care an even tougher challenge. “I want people to look around the room and realize that these are everyday people,” Hawkins says. “These are nurses, professors, students and baristas. Even in my family now, it’s something that no one talks about. The other side of the family still says, ‘You’re eccentric. You’re an artist.’” So what does depression look like in 3-D? In Dich’s sculpture, it’s manifested into wire that’s twisted into the shape of a young girl with a slice out of her neck, arms splayed open and her organs spilling out of her torso. For papercraft artist Irena Azovky, mental disorder looks like 9-by-9 inch squares of meticulously cut pop culture photos interwoven into eye-crossing collages. A naked body, a vintage Nikon camera and what looks like a pile of kittens are connected, basket-weave style, into one square. On the other end of the artistic spectrum, Benjamin Martins uses one color and blank white paper to create haunting watercolors. Imagine the twins from The Shining painted in blood-red watercolor, floating on a blank canvas and staring you in the face. Martins’ watercolor technique is loose, meaning that his figures don’t have eyes so much as sockets, and their limbs look a little bloated, like a corpse that’s been floating in the river too long.

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SINGING HIS MISTAKES See MUSIC

I r e n a a z ovs k y PHOTO COURTESY OF DIANA DICH

PHOTO COURTESY OF IRENA AzOvSKY

“ You have to speak to the commonalities that all of us possess.” arielle Robbins co-curator, Retrograde Collective “It’s crazy intimate,” Hawkins says. For artists like Dich, who says she used her sculptures to heal after an abusive relationship, and Martins, who’s been grappling with the impact of coming out as transgender, this interactive show is a chance to explain their art. As for those who attend, the organizers and artists hope it makes for an interesting, even therapeutic evening. You could just show up, avoid eye contact by perusing art and clutch a wine glass to keep your hands busy all night. You wouldn’t be the only one. But maybe, for the well-being of artists who are a working part of our community, you open up a little. With Patterns of Disorder, Retrograde offers casual browsers and serious collectors an opportunity to learn about the people behind the art, and their struggles.

It goes beyond the usual Second Saturday experience, Hawkins says. “I feel like the community uses Second Saturday as a way to go have fun and get free wine,” she says. “But when you buy art, you want to know the background of the artist and their work. Second Saturday is like speed dating. This is the real date, where people lean in.” One objective is to inspire public dialogue, which can breed understanding. Organizers also hope the exhibit helps better connect artists with resources. “One of our goals for Retrograde is to offer artists some sort of benefits over time,” Robbins says. It will take more than an art show, of course, to make that happen, she adds. It will take a push for city leaders, investors and patrons to commit to support not just

the arts, but also the artists themselves, in a meaningful way. “[With more city funding], you could have a venue that’s all up to code. You could have stipends for affordable housing, health benefits and retirement,” Robbins says. This show is just the first step in that journey, Hawkins adds. “Art is not a priority budget-wise,” she says. “But it should be.” Ω

Catch Patterns of Disorder, 5 p.m. Saturday, January 28, at the Menagerie Gallery inside Outlet Coworking, 2110 K Street and 7 p.m. at the Red Museum, 212 15th Street. Learn more at www.facebook.com/events/607851052758527.

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FoR THE wEEk oF JANUARY 26

hat we’ll all be reeling from the how  and why and are you sure? of this  election for a long time is a given, and  while it might be tempting to crawl  into your metaphorical (or hey, maybe it’s literal; we’re not judging) pillow fort right about  now, community engagement is more important  than ever, and aligning yourself with disenfranchised segments of the population is a sure way  forward. But if getting out there with your clipboard and megaphone aren’t your speed, there  are plenty of ways to get engaged this week via  more creative methods with the following: On Saturday, January 28, at the Crocker  Art Museum (216 O Street), Block by Block, an  arts engagement initiative, is asking community members to come with ideas on how art  and culture can be used to impact community  needs in south Sacramento (a.k.a. District 8)  at the Community Art Summit Public Discussion.  Attendance is free, but registration is required,  and the session will run from 8 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.;  visit www.crockerart.org/event/1297/2017-01-28  for more information.  Later that day at the Colonial Theatre (3522  Stockton Boulevard), the folks behind the  Sacramento Horror Film Festival are hosting

Lastly, take a cue from Bassem Youssef (pictured), who will be speaking at the Mondavi  Center at UC Davis (501 Alumni Lane in Davis)  on Wednesday, February 1, at 8 p.m. with his  program The Joke is Mightier Than the Sword.  Youssef was a surgeon in Egypt up until the  Egyptian Revolution of 2011; in its wake, he created a satirical YouTube show that eventually  became a television show—al Bernameg (The  Show)—that was eventually canceled over  lawsuits, threats and governmental pressure.  Known as “the Jon Stewart of Egypt,” Youssef  will be speaking to his experience in reaching  out to the people in the wake of a massive cultural shift—something we should hope to see  plenty of in the years to come. Tickets start at  $17.50; find out more at www.mondaviarts.org/ event/2016-17/bassem-youssef.

—deena drewiS

Professional Bull Riders: Built Ford Tough Series Friday, January 27, through Sunday, January 29 Get ready for a whole lotta bull. The Professional Bull  Riders come to town this weekend to scuff up the  Golden 1 Center as 35 of the world’s best riders go  up against the “rankest, most fearsome  CULTURE bulls.” This is PBR’s first time at Golden  1—so grid-dwellers should cut the bull and check ’em  out. $41.30-$350; 7:45 p.m. at Golden 1 Center,   500 David J Stern Walk; www.pbr.com.

—dave Kempa

How to Prepare a Marketing Plan Saturday, January 28 As an artist, how the eff are you supposed to pay  the bills? Marketing generally isn’t the first thing  an artist thinks of, but getting your work out there  matters if you ever expect to make that money.  Michele Alexander lays it out  ENTREPRENEURSHIP in this first workshop of the  YoloArts 2017 Professional Development Series. $35;  10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Hyatt Place UC Davis, 173 Old Davis  Road; https://yoloarts.org.

—deena drewiS

Louder Than wolves: Taking a Stand Against Rape Culture, which will take the shape of dance per-

Herbs for Strengthening and Rejuvenation

formances, spoken word and poetry, aerial arts,  live music and screenings of the short films Quiet  Culture and Girls Don’t Cry Wolf. A minimum  donation of $10 is requested, and all proceeds  will benefit local women’s shelter WEAVE. Visit  www.facebook.com/sacramentohorrorfilmfestival to find out more.

Saturday, January 28 Soil Born Farms will be hosting a special three-hour  class focusing on herbs, led by teacher and herbalist  Candis Cantin. Learn how to stay healthy  HEALTH with both plants and herbs during the  harsh winter months. Try a few samples and even  walk away with some new recipes. $25; noon at Soil  Born Farms American River Ranch, 2140 Chase Drive  in Rancho Cordova; http://soilborn.org.

—eddie JorgenSen

Bowl Makers Day Saturday, January 27 For the seventh year, Stellar Studios is hosting  a benefit for the River City Food Bank’s “Empty  Bowls” event. You can make a glass bowl to  ART be donated to the fundraiser. Choose from a  square or round bowl, and even upgrade to two to  make a second for yourself. Stellar Studios will supply the glass, kiln and studio space. RSVP is required.  $25-$50; 12:30 p.m., 2 p.m. or 3 p.m. at Stellar Studio,  202 23rd Street; http://stellar-studios.com.

—Lory giL

In the Groove: The Art and Science of Vinyl Records thurSday, February 2 How many vinyl fans actually understand what  makes records’ sound quality unique? Local vinyl   aficionado (and owner-operator of S.S.  MUSIC Records) Scott Soriano will explain why this  technology never dies. $5; 7 p.m. at Verge Center for  the Arts, 625 S Street; www.vergeart.com. PHOTO COURTESY OF CHATHAM HOUSE

—aaron CarneS

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   21

IllustratIons by MarGarEt larKIn

Hippie breakfast GourMet Granola, ikeDa’s california country Market If you take frequent trips to Lake Tahoe, you’re probably familiar with Ikeda’s, the delightful market and restaurant known for its burgers and pies. But Ikeda’s makes a lot of other delicious treats, too, like candied nuts, dried fruit, pasta sauces and granola. There are a few granola flavors, but I dig the gourmet granola ($12.99 per pound), with nuts, coconut and the holy trinity of brown sugar, maple syrup and butter. Each oat feels lovingly toasted, with plenty of crunch and sweetness that pairs ideally with plain yogurt. It’s a hippie breakfast you actually want to eat. 13500 Lincoln Way in Auburn, www.ikedas.com.

—Janelle Bitker

Social brew Deep steep coffee co.

IllustratIon by MarK stIVErs

Cake trumps hate By John Flynn

Cake stand: Justice tastes particularly sweet at Freeport Bakery this week. On January 17, co-owner Marlene Goetzeler cut a check for $1,725 to the Sierra Forever Families’ LGBTQ Foster Youth Collaborative. She raised the money by selling “More Cake, Less Hate” T-shirts ($24) and donating $5 from every sale to the program which seeks to place these marginalized youth in permanent homes. The charitable donation is the latest episode in a saga that started when Goetzeler posted a picture of a cake with a Ken doll in a dress on Facebook. Unexpectedly, she drew death threats from noxious zealots. But the hate was soon drowned by 22

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online support coming from as far away as Austria and Taiwan as the cake post became a forum for debate over transgender issues. Goetzeler embraced her unintended statement. Custom Ken Cakes are now a staple of her bakery. (Recent requests including “punk rock Ken” and “Rachel Maddow Ken.”) The giving will continue as the T-shirts are still on sale. “As a business, there’s a responsibility to take a stand, even though it’s really scary,” she said. After her latest Ken Cake post, a commenter intrigued Goetzeler when he wrote, “not everybody who disagrees, hates.” She resisted the urge

01.26.17

to combatively engage, saying she respected the man’s opinion, but felt she needed to take “a stand.” The commenter replied, “A cake stand?” Goetzeler laughed. “At first, I couldn’t handle the drama,” she said. “But now, I write something back. I’m trying to engage people and not make it hostile. Because it can be turned into a positive thing.” Seasonal beer: At Tapa the World, Lucky Joe English IPA has been the beer of the month for over a year. Tapa’s new “beer guy,” Danny Levis, grew tired of the monotony. So he resurrected the gimmick. Starting this week, the Order of the Rabbit from West Sacramento’s Jackrabbit Brewing Co. takes over as the new beer of the month. The Belgian Dubbel comes in a 22-ounce bottle ($12) and has notes of malt, caramel and “holiday fruit.” “It’s perfect for how cold it is this time of year,” Levis said. As the months change, so will the beers, but Levis plans to keep things seasonal and regional. Ω

Sure, you drink coffee to wake up, but why else? It’s social. That’s why Bryan Martinez started Deep Steep Coffee Co. in 2015, and now has a roasting facility in Land Park. Martinez says, “We’re having fun doing this,” and you might even taste hints of the music they listen to as they roast. The coffee beans ($14.99 for 12 ounces) are only at Taylor’s Market and brewed into the SuperHero Coffees at Wholehearted Juice Co., but look for a carbonated cold brew with hops at bars soon. http://facebook.com/deepsteepcoffee.

—ann Martin rolke

Call me thin-skinned Delicata squash Winter squash usually has a hard skin, but little delicatas are a soft-skinned variety. No need to peel; just seed and slice these oblong veggies for pretty scallopshaped rings. Then roast them for salads or side dishes, or bake them with grain fillings. They’re sometimes called “sweet potato squash” for their creamy flavor, which pairs well with goat cheese and roasted nuts. They make an impressive display when cut into 4-inch lengths and roasted. Stand the pieces on end and fill with rice, dried fruit and caramelized onions.

—ann Martin rolke

Brews, food and art The reviews from last year’s Art of Beer Invitational were all glowing: cool   venue, chill vibes and lines that don’t kill you. The sixth annual edition returns  to the McClellan Conference Center (5411 Luce Avenue in McClellan) on Friday,  January 27. In addition to unlimited pours from  30 breweries, you’ll also be treated to unlimited  food pairings from local farm-to-fork restaurants. Meet the brewmasters behind  your favorite brews and also get a little  window into the heart of your favorite  breweries, which will build lounges, bars,  galleries and other installations to showcase their vision just for Art of Beer. All  the while, bid on beer-themed art pieces  created by Sacramento artists—proceeds from the silent auction benefit Sol  Collective. General admission tickets cost $50;  VIP tickets cost $70 and include early entry as  well as special pours from certain breweries. More at  http://artofbeerinvitational.com.

—Janelle Bitker

Vegan pizza revolution By Shoka America loves pizza—and pizza  joints are finally loving Americans  who are vegan. While herbivores  could custom order a veg-topped  pie from most places, the relatively  new PizzaRev chain in East Sacramento (at 5801 Folsom Boulevard,  Suite 110) crushes it like red pepper  by clearly marking its menu with  V’s for “vegan”—and it has Daiya  vegan mozzarella and vegan sausage.  Zpizza, another chain in Roseville  (3984 Douglas Boulevard)—with  more stores “coming soon” to East

Sac, Elk Grove and Fair Oaks—also  marks its menu with vegan options,  including Daiya and Beyond Meat.  And where a Zpizza once occupied  2700 East Bidwell Street, Suite  500, in Folsom now stands locally  owned Sacramento Pizza Co., which  also offers Daiya—and “character  dining,” for those who want a slice  with Ariel, Elsa or Batman. The bottom line: Vegans are hungry and  have money, curiosity and friends  to dine with them. Smart business  move, guys.

All in the neighborhood By Ann MArTin rolKe

Taylor’s Kitchen

Recently, a thick-cut pork loin chop ($29) came with pickled red cabbage and caraway, to balance the rich meat. Uniquely yeasted pretzel spaetzle added salty crunch, while sides included 2924 Freeport Boulevard, (916) 443-5154 grilled, thick-cut mushrooms, fried Brussels www.taylorskitchen.com sprouts and mandarin orange supremes. Dinner for one: $40-$50 I often find red meat disappointing, but Good for: high-quality meat dishes with inventive sides Taylor’s enormous rib-eye ($36) was not. While Notable dishes: burger, pork chop with pretzel spaetzle, it was slightly too salty for my taste, the perfectly housemade pasta grilled exterior yielded to tender, juicy meat. It paired satisfyingly with a red wine reduction, broccolini, white beans and sliced mushrooms. Chefs now create vegetarian food that’s just as intriguing as meat-laden meals, and Taylor’s is Taylor’s Market, on the border between Land no exception. Indian-spiced carrot-coconut cakes Park and Curtis Park, remains one of the few full($18) with a rice base were beautifully presented service neighborhood grocers still in Sacramento. with julienned Easter egg radish on top and Adjacent to the market, Taylor’s Kitchen, a fine complements of rich aioli, smoked mushrooms and dining restaurant, raises the business to a rare deep red blood orange segments. category. On the other hand, we may have missed includWhere else in Sacramento can you eat local ing their Richards Ranch burger ($14) on our Best Of high-end meats and produce, then go next door list. It’s deceptively simple, but that just highlights and buy those same ingredients? The recent trend the meat quality. On a housemade milk bun with for chefs to sell branded condiments comes cheddar, aioli and arugula, we also enjoyed full-circle at Taylor’s. it with the swoon-worthy caramelized Despite the small size of Taylor’s onion and fennel on the side. Kitchen, it benefits from the The recent Including that condiment and esteemed butcher services at the the cherry tomato relish, it ranks trend for chefs market, making the meat dishes in my top five for local burgers. some of the best in town. In to sell branded With the shoestring fries, it addition, chef Casey Shideler, condiments comes seemed a bit salt-heavy, but on its who took over the kitchen last own, hits all the marks. full-circle at June, excels at combining a wide Another unique strength at variety of produce on each plate. Taylor’s. Taylor’s Kitchen is the presence of Her sunchoke salad ($9) married manager Keith Fergel. An alumnus of roasted chunks of sunchoke with bitter fine dining locales The French Laundry frisee, tart pomegranate arils, buttery (Napa) and the Fifth Floor (San Francisco), toasted almonds and a cilantro vinaigrette. Fergel has developed a top-notch staff. He’s also a The plate was not only colorful, but texturally trained sommelier, offering a well-edited wine list appealing. that complements the changing menu. A sweet potato salad ($8) was similarly multiDesserts, from pastry chef Amanda Silverstein, faceted, with thin slices of roasted sweet potato, are not as outstanding as the savory courses. A crispy pancetta, arugula, goat cheese, black lentils warm chocolate rice pudding ($8) came with and a coddled egg. It seems like a lot of ingrediattractive crimson poached pears, but didn’t stand ents, but they worked harmoniously. out. Her hazelnut crunch cake ($10.50), while There is usually a cheese plate ($15) or charvisually impressive, lacked excitement, aside from cuterie board ($19) on offer, presenting selections the nicely creamy espresso ice cream on the side. from the ambitious cheese counter at the market. The strength of Taylor’s Kitchen lies in its Get the housemade chicken liver mousse, which is intimate atmosphere with elevated but accessible ethereally light and spiked with sherry. It balances dishes. You’re likely to be pleasantly surprised perfectly alongside the pickled red onion and by a flavor element, yet not overwhelmed by the cauliflower. noise and size of many newer restaurants. It’s a Chef Shideler also seems particularly skilled lovely neighborhood eatery, of which we have far with accompaniments, adding several sides—each too few. Ω well-executed—with the entrees.

HHHH

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   23

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Meet Cookie and other dogs that will soon be up for adoption during the Jan. 26 Bike Dog Brewing Yappy Hour.

GoinG To The DoGs

craft happenings

Sacramento breweries, clubs turn to canines for inspiration b y K at e G o n z a l e s

the friendships that begin in sacramento’s beer scene are half the fun of going out for drinks, and these days you may make a fourlegged pal along the way. more breweries are welcoming dogs onto their patios and into their doors in sacramento. discovering a “yappy hour” — yes, a social hour for dogs and their owners — has become less of a novelty, with spots like university of Beer and Oak park Brewing Company hosting these events. some breweries have fully embraced this trend, even incorporating dogs into their branding. sage smith is co-owner of Bike dog Brewing Co., a West sacramento brewery that recently celebrated three years in the business. When he and others were brainstorming ideas for brewery names, they simply considered their common interests. “We’re all dog lovers, bike lovers and beer lovers,” he says. “From there, the logo was kind of a piece of cake: … We’re going to make a dog a bike and a bike a dog.” the name and image have resonated with customers, and the brewery welcomes wellbehaved dogs all year. On Jan. 26, the brewery will be packed with canine companions during the Bike dog Brewing Yappy Hour, which will benefit the sacramento spCa. From 6 to 8

“ We love dogs ... and we’re happy to use beer as a platform to give back and bring people together.”

• Bike Dog Yappy Hour, 6-8 p.m. Bike Dog Brewing Co., 2534 Industrial Blvd. #110, West Sacramento

saT urday, Ja n. 28

Sage Smith Co-owner of Bike Dog Brewing Co.

p.m., guests and dogs are invited to “gather, sniff and support,” while enjoying beer, a raffle, food trucks and dogs up for adoption. Bike dog will donate $1 from every pint sold to the sacramento spCa. “We love dogs, obviously, and we’re happy to use beer as a platform to give back and bring people together,” smith says. across the river, Kyle and angie Blaikie are gearing up for the return of the sloppy moose running Club, named after their Boston terrier, mousse. the Blaikies organized the first run back in 2013, which started at new Helvetia Brewing Company on Broadway. “it was my wife and i, a couple friends and a couple neighbors,” Kyle Blaikie says. “We ran a few miles, drank a few beers.” as more runners joined, it was time to name the group. inspiration hit while they drank beers at new Helvetia after the run and

Th ursday, Ja n. 26

they named it after mousse, who is known to drool when she’s nervous. they opted to spell “moose” like the animal (to make the name less confusing) and the running club was officially born. they continued to meet thursdays just before 6:30 p.m. for a 3-mile run followed by beers, and the club has continued to grow. “in 2016 we were having about 100 people [come out] every thursday,” Kyle Blaikie says. the club’s namesake has become so popular that mousse gets waves and attention from strangers when the Blaikies walk him around town. the sloppy moose running Club will start up again thursday, Feb. 16, at 6:30 p.m., but Blaikie recommends people arrive early. runners who participate in five or more group runs will receive a sloppy moose running Club t-shirt, and of course, dogs are welcome.

• Bacon Fest Breakfast and Nick & Guido Bottle Release, 10 a.m.-noon Bike Dog Brewing Co., 2534 Industrial Blvd. #110, West Sacramento

sun day, F e b. 5 • Second Annual Prairie Bowl, 11 a.m. Capitol Beer and Tap Room, 2222 Fair Oaks Blvd., Sacramento

saT urday, F e b. 11 • Hanger 24 Takeover!, 11 a.m. Capitol Beer and Tap Room, 2222 Fair Oaks Blvd., Sacramento

We d n e sday s • Trivia Night, 6:30 p.m. Final Gravity, 9205 Sierra College Blvd., Roseville

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   25

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The feminine complex Difficult WoMen Roxane Gay (An Untamed State: A Novel and Bad  Feminist: Essays) knows a thing or two about   difficult women, which makes her new collection of  short stories very aptly titled. In Difficult Women  (Grove Press, $25), we get the scoop from the perspective of women who may not be easygoing—and  they’re certainly not “ladies” in any sense of the  word. Instead, we have a professor of materials  engineering who finds herself not only the  Book sole woman on faculty, but the sole AfricanAmerican; she finds an unapologetic place for  herself on her own terms. Then, there’s the opening  tale of survival and love, “I Will Follow You,” in which  two sisters, abducted and raped as children, find  their way forward together. The dangers for these  women are real, but they are about as far from  cowering as it is possible to get.

—Kel Munger

Ripe for picking aMerican PicKers Whether you’re a fan of the popular History Channel  series American Pickers, an old-things enthusiast or  just a basic hoarder, this just might be your chance  at 15 minutes of fame. Producers for  AnTiques the show will be filming episodes of  the show in California this spring and have put out  a scouting call for “sizeable, unique collections.”  However you define that (rooms filled with kitschy  ’50s ceramic cats; the rusted-out shells of old  cars; weirdly inscrutable metal things) is up to you.  The show, hosted by Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz, is  known for its deep dives into junky attics, dusty  barns and endless stacks of towering boxes, some of  which yield bona fide treasures and some of which  just turn up interesting oddities and richly detailed  stories. Think your collection fits one or more of  those criteria? Make your pitch via email or phone  at americanpickers@cineflix.com or call 1-855-OLDRUST. www.history.com/shows/american-pickers.

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Hasan MinHaj’s HoMecoMing King In the current entertainment   landscape, a successful Netflix   special can make a stand-up  comic’s career explode.  For Hasan Minhaj, that fateful  recording date should take place  January 27, at the Mondavi Center.  After touring his solo theater show  Homecoming King for more than  a year, he’s finally ready for his  close-up. It’s a fitting  Comedy setting, too: Minhaj is a  Davis native and UC Davis alumnus.  The show is based on Minhaj’s  life growing up in Davis and the  first-generation Indian-American  experience. He goes into racism,  bullying, interracial relationships  and the elusive American dream.  All together, it’s the story of what  he calls the “new brown America.”  His style comes across as smart,  thoughtful and charming while  also being completely unafraid to  explore sensitive issues. That should come as no surprise  if you’re familiar with Minhaj’s  work on Comedy Central’s The Daily  Show. In 2014, he became the last  correspondent to be chosen by Jon  Stewart—a big endorsement for  both his comedic chops and smarts.  Previously, Minhaj hosted the MTV  comedy panel show Failosophy and  appeared on television shows State  of Georgia, Arrested Development  and Getting On.  Minhaj’s performance at  Mondavi is unusual in that it’s open  seating, so get there early.   10 p.m. Friday, January 27; $35  general admission. Mondavi Center,  1 Shields Avenue in Davis;   http://mondaviarts.org.

—janelle BitKer

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“Why am i surrounded by these religious clones?”

The Christians

4

2 p.m. and 7 p.m. thursday, 7 p.m. friday, 8 p.m. saturday, 1 p.m. sunday, 7 p.m. tuesday and Wednesday; $26-$38. B street theatre, 2711 B street; (916) 443-5300; www.bstreettheatre.org. through february 11.

From the moment Kurt Johnson enters the theater, hair slicked back, Bible in hand, and begins shaking hands with audience members, it’s evident that this is his play. He owns the role of Pastor Paul, a preacher at the top of his game but one about to face a major crisis of conscience, in Lucas Hnath’s The Christians. Hnath’s play, a hit of the 2014 Humana Festival, is structured like a church service, complete with choir and sermon. It is so realistically staged— set designer Samantha Reno puts the pulpit in front of a magnificent stained glass window backdrop—that some may feel, at play’s end, that they’ve just been sermonized. This can make some uncomfortable. Indeed, the play intends to cause discomfort with its examination of theology today, of the clash between traditional Christianity and contemporary faith shaped by individual experience. Over the past 10 years, Pastor Paul has built his ministry from a modest storefront to a major edifice. The growth was often financially taxing, but on the day he can announce that all the church’s debts are paid, the reverend delivers a sermon that will challenge his congregants (Tara Sissom as Jenny, particularly), his church hierarchy (the great Greg Alexander as Jay and Darian Dauchan as associate pastor Joshua), his wife (Margaret Laurena Kemp) and himself. The outcome is both unforeseen and to be expected. Ω

Photo courtesy of B street theatre

4 The Shape of Things  Adam is a nerd. A student making his way through the university, he works two jobs, one of which is as a guard in a campus art museum. Evelyn is an amoral, free-spirited student working on a “performance art piece” and obsessed with “truth” in all life experiences. The two meet when Adam notices she has approached a cordoned-off statue with a can of spray paint and asks her to leave. He is attracted to her joie de vivre but he is diffident and has difficulty talking to her. She encourages him and eventually he invites her to coffee. This is the simple opening of Neil LaBute’s play The Shape of Things, now at the Lab A Theater in Wright Hall at UC Davis. The relationship between Adam and Evelyn grows and eventually includes Adam’s old roommate Philip and his fiancée Jenny. Sparks fly between Philip and Evelyn as they trade barbs and insults and clearly can’t stand each other, while mild-mannered Jenny and Adam look on helplessly. In this intense work, directed by Gregory Holmes, these four examine the meaning of friendship, sex, betrayal and what constitutes “art.” Melissa Cunha and Taylor Church give strong performances as Evelyn and Adam. Emile Rappaport is suitably obnoxious as Philip while Kelly Tappan is a bit too demure as Jenny—it was sometimes difficult to hear her. —Bev SykeS

the shape of things; 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.,thursday-saturday, 2 p.m., 4 p.m., 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. tuesday; $10-$15. Lab a theater, Wright hall, uc Davis; http://arts.ucdavis.edu/seasonal-event/ shape-things. through January 28.

4

42nd Street

3

I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change

This Broadway musical  made its debut in 1996  using songs to tell story  arcs of typical couples’  relationships from dating to  widowhood—well, “typical”

1 FOUL

as defined by this rather  dated show. Though the  show boasts an ace team  that includes local cabaret  king Jerry Lee as director,  a very talented musical  acting-singing foursome  and two skillful musicians,  it just can’t overcome this  20-year-old show’s stale  songs and rather confined  view of love. Still, some  of the songs are clever,  capturing the aches, pains,  comedy and rewards of  old-school courtship. Lee  does the best he can with  the material. Th 6:30pm; F

8pm; Sa 2pm and 8pm; Su 2pm and 7pm Sa 8pm; Su 2pm. W 6:30pm; $15-$38. Through 2/12. Sacramento Theatre  Company, 1419 H Street;  (916) 443-6722; www  .sactheatre.org. P.R.

4

The Night Alive

This production by  playwright Conor  McPherson is the strangely  sweet and savage story

of Tommy (Scott Divine),  a Dublin street hustler  who tries to find his way  through each day with  his simple-minded-yetdeeply-philosophical pal  Doc (Bert Andersson), and  his reluctant landlord uncle  (Don Hayden). Upending  Tommy’s already-inupheaval universe is Aimee  (Amber Lucito), a scrappy  prostitute whom Tommy  rescues from her violent  boyfriend (Ryan Snyder). The storyline has some  frustrating ambiguities, and  in this production the overthe-top physical violence  feels gratuitous—a little  toning down would make  the moments even more evil  and menacing. Th, F, Sa, Su 8pm; $12-$22. Through 2/11.  Big Idea Theatre, 1616 Del  Paso Boulevard; (916) 9603036; www.bigideatheatre  .org. P.R.

Short reviews by Bev Sykes and Patti Roberts.

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4

FAIR

GOOD

WELL-DONE

5 SUBLIME– DON’T MISS

PhOTO cOURTESy OF B STREET ThEATRE

A woman of influence A narrow escape from Nazi Germany after her parents’  death, then stints as a sniper in Jerusalem, a psychologist in  Paris and a sex therapist in New York. By the time Ruth Westheimer achieved radio and television stardom in the 1980s  she’d already lived a lifetime. Westheimer’s matronly manner  and Euro-Jewish accent (dispensing disarmingly frank sex  advice) quickly caught the public’s fancy. Becoming Dr. Ruth  is a compact, efficient one-woman show that radiates a  resourceful determination to survive, thrive and enjoy life. 8  p.m Thursday, January 26, and Friday, January 27; 9 p.m. Saturday, January 28; 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, January 30; 2 p.m. and  6:30 p.m. Wednesday, January 31. $26-$38. B Street Theatre,  2711 B Street; (916) 443-5300; https://bstreettheatre.org.

—Jeff Hudson

ON STANDS FEBRUARY 16 TH

Gritting her teeth through a nasty sex question.

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This latest from  the Davis Musical  Theatre tells the familiar  story of a small town girl  with stars in her eyes.  Here, the heroine becomes  an overnight sensation in  a major Broadway musical—only to break her leg.  Strong performances by  all, including a cast of 30  tap dancing choristers,  make this an exceptional  program. F Sa 8pm; Su 2pm. $16-$18. Through 1/29. Jean  Henderson Performing Arts  Center, 607 Pena Drive in  Davis; (530) 756-3682; www  .dmtc.org. B.S.

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All that glitters

Gold “all i’m saying is that it’s my turn to wear the hat.”

3

In Gold, Matthew McConaughey looks like hell. After a brief prologue set in 1981, where he’s more or less at his handsome best, the movie shifts to 1988, and he has really let himself go. In his Oscar-winning role in Dallas Buyers Club, McConaughey was gaunt and ravaged; here his acting pendulum swings wildly the other way. As white-collar gold prospector Kenny Wells, McConaughey is balding, beer-gutted just short of morbid obesity and sporting the ugliest teeth west of the British Isles. In that 1981 prologue, we see Kenny being passed the baton of their mining company by his father (Craig T. Nelson in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo). Then it’s seven years later and Kenny has run the company into the ground. He’s lost his house and moved in with girlfriend Kay (Bryce Dallas Howard) while he and a clutch of loyal co-workers try to keep the business alive by working phones in the bar where Kay waitresses, seeking vainly to reach bankers and getting stiff-armed by financiers who once hobnobbed with Kenny’s daddy. Then, fired by a boozy vision imparted to him in a dream, Kenny hocks the last of his and Kay’s jewelry and jets off to Indonesia in search of celebrity geologist Michael Acosta (Édgar Ramírez), who once discovered a rich deposit of copper there and has a widely derided theory about untapped millions in gold somewhere deep in the Indonesian jungle. Kenny doesn’t scorn Acosta’s theory, though; his vision tells him it’s true, and he sees it as his last chance to redeem the heritage he squandered from his dad and legendary prospector grandfather.

by Jim Lane

When discoveries in the jungle make it look as if Kenny and Acosta might be sitting on billions, the worm turns. Doors open like magic. People who once slammed the receiver on Kenny are eagerly calling him. Kenny has already braved a tiger in Indonesia, and nearly died of malaria, but all that was as nothing compared to the wolves of Wall Street who are jockeying to outmaneuver him now. Gold is written by Patrick Massett and John Zinman with more plot twists than are good for it, and directed by Stephen Gaghan with splashy bravura designed to make the twists work. It’s practically a one-man show, and McConaughey chews production designer Maria Djurkovic’s scenery with gusto; his Kenny is a vulgar, unstoppable blowhard, at once annoying and amusing, somehow inspiring devotion in men and women who are probably better people than he is, and envy in bankers and investment gurus who are almost certainly smarter. The Kenny-Acosta bromance is the spine of the movie, but a more interesting thread is the Kenny-Kay story, and Bryce Dallas Howard makes a deeper impression than anyone, for all Ramírez’s inscrutability and McConaughey’s bluster. Somewhere in there is a hell of a movie, but Massett, Zinman and Gaghan didn’t bother to make it. Ω

Gold is written with more plot twists than are good for it.

1 2 3 4 5 Poor

30   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

Fair

Good

Very Good

excellent

fiLm CLiPS

3

20th Century Women

In 1979 Santa Barbara, a middleaged divorcée (Annette Bening), her  adolescent son (Lucas Jade Zumann), their  two boarders (Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup)  and the boy’s platonic girlfriend (Elle Fanning)  interact haphazardly, bouncing off each  other as they alternately tiptoe and stumble  toward the people they will eventually become.  Writer-director Mike Mills creates a world that  feels at once distinctly individual and broadly  typical, and it’s the same for his characters:  We recognize these quirky-ordinary people,  even though we’ve never met anybody exactly  like them. Their lives are punctuated by events,  though little really “happens” in the movie as  a whole; it has the rhythm of life without the  forced buildup of melodrama. The result is, like  the characters, a little aimless but extremely  likeable. J.L.

3

A Monster Calls

This awkward combination of CGI  fantasy spectacle and indie therapy  drama was adapted by Patrick Ness from his  own award-winning young adult novel, and directed by J.A. Bayona, who previously merged  special effects and tragedy in The Impossible.  Ferocious young actor Lewis MacDougall plays  Conor, a boy filled with terror and rage at the  impending death of his terminally ill mother  (Felicity Jones), plagued with nightmares and  unable to deal with bullies at school and an  imperious grandmother (Sigourney Weaver)  at home. One night, an ancient yew tree near  the house comes to life, taking a monstrous  humanoid form and informing Conor that he  will visit him several times in the coming weeks  to deliver healing parables relevant to his life.  Ancient trees, am I right? You just never know.  Liam Neeson provides the voice of the monster,  because otherwise the fabric of the universe  would rip to shreds. D.B.

5

Elle

Paul Verhoeven is a masterful satirist  because he’s also kind of a terrible  satirist. Elle is a borderline schizophrenic satire,  and instead of hectoring and finger-wagging  from a safe distance, Verhoeven identifies with  the damned and demented. That discomforting  point-of-view was enough to sully Verhoeven’s  reputation among pearl-clutching establishment  critics during his heyday, but subsequent waves  of young and outsider critics helped restore the  faith. The only fear was that his acclaim might  not overlap with his relevance, but lo and behold,  Elle is the most Verhoeven-y thing you could  want: perverse, funny, disturbing and insane. It’s  the work of a master operating at the height of  his powers, a devastating and insidiously dense  piece, with a stunner of a lead performance  from Isabelle Huppert as a woman who forms a  strange relationship with her rapist. Huppert is  practically incapable of falseness, the perfect  star for a film obsessed with ugly truths. D.B.

3

BY DANIEL BARNES & JIM LANE

Hidden Figures

If Quentin Tarantino really only has two  movies left, I pray that at least one of  them stars Janelle Monáe. In Theodore Melfi’s  moldy but watchable Hidden Figures, the music  star and fledgling actress Monáe (she also  played a memorable role in Moonlight) comes  off like a cross between Tarantino muses  Pam Grier and Uma Thurman, all sizzling attitude and soul fire in a part that feels barely  conceived. Monáe, Taraji P. Henson and Octavia  Spencer play NASA employees who each face  their own racially charged work conflicts, all in  the shadow of a space race in which Henson’s  math genius Katherine Johnson plays a crucial  role. The three leads are all good, especially  when they’re onscreen together (which is  unfortunately not that often), but the film is  nobly maple-glazed, timid and perfunctory at  every turn. Kevin Costner adds another slowly  melting authoritarian to his stable of Stoic  American Men. D.B.

From Batman to Responsible-For-Making-Millions-Fatman.

4

The Founder

Writer Robert Siegel and director John Lee Hancock trace the career of  Ray Kroc (Michael Keaton) as he expands McDonald’s from a successful little San Bernardino drive-in to the most lucrative food-service business  on Earth, while screwing the original McDonald brothers (Nick Offerman, John  Carroll Lynch) out of millions in royalties. It’s a wickedly clever study of inspiration, enthusiasm and perseverance morphing into avarice and ruthlessness— Macbeth among the deep-fryers, except that nobody actually gets murdered,  and Macbeth and his Lady (Linda Cardellini as Joan Smith Kroc) assuage their  consciences by donating billions to charity. Performances are sharp and keenly  observed. (Note, for example, Patrick Stewart as Joan’s first husband, seeing  his wife and Ray Kroc fall in love right under his nose.) J.L.

2

Live by Night

A Boston petty thief (Ben Affleck, who  also directed and adapted Dennis Lehane’s novel) rises in the Mob during  Prohibition, winding up rum-running from Cuba  through Florida. It’s all fedoras, blasting guns,  flashy 1920s suits and dialogue hissed through  gritted teeth in the kind of whispers that only  self-serious movie actors and people in libraries ever use. Maybe pearly gems like “We all  find ourselves in lives we didn’t expect” looked  profound on Lehane’s pages, but they sound  gaseous and campy when spoken aloud, and all  the teeth-gritting and whispering of a decent  cast (Sienna Miller, Elle Fanning, Zoe Saldana,  Chris Cooper, etc.) can’t put them over. Every  one of the movie’s 128 minutes reverberates  with phoniness—like Affleck’s character telling  us in 1941 that there isn’t going to be any war.  J.L.

4

Patriots Day

Another masculine tragedy from  director and co-writer Peter Berg, who  recreates the Boston Marathon bombing and  subsequent manhunt with the same visceral  accuracy that he brought to his recreation of  the BP oil rig explosion in last year’s Deepwater  Horizon. His Deepwater Horizon star Mark  Wahlberg also headlines here as Tommy Saunders, a fictional composite Boston cop who  tracks the bombers from ground zero to their  eventual captures or deaths. Patriots Day  forms a triple feature with Deepwater Horizon  and Michael Bay’s 13 Hours—they’re all ethically dubious enterprises, yet the filmmaking  is undeniably powerful and the moral lines are  hazier than you would think. Even if Patriots  Day is the bronze medalist of that trio, with  Wahlberg’s borderline self-parodic performance making for a mediocre centerpiece, it’s  still a gripping portrayal of an hour-by-hour  response to terror, with strong supporting  players and an effective score by Trent Reznor  and Atticus Ross. D.B.

4

Silence

Two 17th century Jesuit missionaries (Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver)  are smuggled into Japan to minister to local  Catholics, who must worship in secret, and to  learn the fate of a predecessor (Liam Neeson),  who is said to have renounced the faith in the  face of official persecution. Director Martin  Scorsese and writer Jay Cocks realize a longheld ambition to adapt Shūsaku Endū’s novel

of faith tested in the fire. They may have been  foolhardy in a business uncomfortable with  religion in movies (unless demonic possession  comes with it), or this may just be a movie  ahead of its time. Anyhow, it’s a stately, loving,  sincerely acted and exquisitely photographed  (by Rodrigo Prieto) experience. It probably  won’t make a dime, but Scorsese has nothing  to apologize for—not to the ghost of Endū, and  not to us. J.L.

2

Sleepless

2

Split

A crooked Las Vegas cop (Jamie Foxx)  runs afoul of a drug-dealing casino  owner (Dermot Mulroney), who grabs the cop’s  teenage son (Octavius J. Johnson) and holds  him hostage till the 25 kilos the cop stole are  returned—but an Internal Affairs detective  (Michelle Monaghan) intercepts the drugs  and the cop has to play for time. This grimly  mindless shoot-’em-up is based on a 2011  French picture that was in turn inspired by  American movies from The French Connection  to Die Hard and Taken—in other words, this  one is derivative two times over. If such twiceand-thrice-removed movies are your cup  of hemlock, you’ll find no surprises to rattle  your expectations. Foxx stalks and snarls for  his paycheck, Gabrielle Union is wasted as his  estranged wife, and Switzerland’s Baran bo  Odar directs with heavy fists. J.L.

Three teenage girls (Anya Taylor-Joy,  Haley Lu Richardson, Jessica Sula) are  held captive by a maniac with multiple personalities (James McAvoy) and an ability to make  physical and chemical changes in his body—in  other words, a shape-shifter. Writer-director  M. Night Shyamalan is at it again, roaring off on  one of his harebrained deliriums. He provides  McAvoy with a juicy opportunity for wild-eyed  hamming, all but demanding an Oscar nomination, but it’s empty bombast, couched in seething dialogue that sounds like the Unabomber’s  manifesto shredded and pasted back together  at random. With nothing remotely human  menacing the girls, the horrors visited upon  them become just so much nasty sadism. And  it’s Shyamalan himself, not McAvoy’s supposed  character(s), who inflicts it. A deeply unpleasant movie. J.L.

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   31

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Out of habit How Damien Verrett lobbies for  personal and musical change

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Other times, Verrett lays it out flat, as in the music video for “Simple How I Feel,” released this December. As he and his lady fail to connect, he sings, “Why’s it gotta be so fucking complicated?” It’s hilarious because it feels so true—we’ve all been there—and it proves that lyrics or music don’t always have to be so fucking complicated, either. Verrett didn’t always know that. He taught himself guitar off the internet, covering Metallica and Sum 41. Then, all this hype is making Damien verrett’s neck itch. he played in a local math rock band, The Speed of Sound in Seawater, when he idealized complexity. “I was very much in a band that was, like, a On a recent night, local one-man-band Damien musician’s band,” he says. “But now [technicality] Verrett was hanging out with musicians after a seems a lot less important.” show. He reached for a bowl of tortilla chips at the Released by record label Anti-, So Much Light’s same time as an Oakland folk artist. She backed off upcoming album—still untitled and set to drop and let him go first. Nothing out of the ordinary or sometime this year—Verrett combines his technical worth remembering. And yet. skills with visceral directness. His airy pop trills She noted how women are usually the ones to trace back to Justin Timberlake’s stylings, and back down. And Verrett acknowledged that in his his bold lyrics echo his biggest influence, Joanna case, it’s habitualized dominance. Newsom. “It’s such a silly, tiny example, but it’s fun to “Writing a song that’s going to immediately notice those things,” he says. “It’s not you making connect with somebody who knows noththose decisions. It’s just habit.” ing about music, I think it’s honestly In his electronic pop and R&B projmore useful … than to be able to ect So Much Light, Verrett calls this “I want to be impress somebody,” he says. unconscious space “Little Lobby,” But in live shows, he’ll like what Drake the name of a track on his 2015 EP throw in a “noodling, masturIdiot Soul. is to Toronto, to batory” guitar solo because “You have to take a big step Sacramento.” audiences don’t expect it. Plus, back to become aware of these it’s just fun. things that have just become Damien Verrett “People do like to see that normalized,” he says. singer-songwriter stuff,” he says. With pulsing synths and a crystalDespite his rising star, Verrett line voice, Verrett finds clarity. On Idiot wants to keep building a local following Soul, he sparsely layers electronic clicks, in Sacramento. bells, boings and wind rushes. The confessional “I’m seeing all these cool things happening in tracks sound like they echo off the walls of a church, town and I desperately want to be involved in, like, but Verrett doesn’t treat any subject as sacred everything. I guess I want to be like what Drake is to beyond ridicule. He makes fun of his own faux pas, Toronto, to Sacramento,” he says, unable to contain like complimenting his girlfriend on her looks when his laughter at the grandiose vision—and that it she’s upset about something important. Wobbly jazz piano, circa 1980, or video game-esque sound effects might just happen. “That would be really cool.” Ω hint that Verrett doesn’t take himself too seriously. “I … try to express what I’ve been learning without judgment toward myself, and I try to do it See So Much Light at 10 p.m., Saturday, January 28, at Red Museum, through devices like self-deprecation or satirizing 212 15th Street. Suggested donation is $10. More at http://somuchlight.net. feelings that I have,” he says. PHOTO BY aNDREW PaYNTER

• DARTS (THOUSANDS)

32   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

rebeccah@newsreview.com

1315 21st St • Sacramento 916.441.7100

SALE

MAGIC DARTS & BILLIARDS

by Rebecca Huval

Beats of hope a Prince—yes, that Prince was once a customer—sadly closed last week. Records (1618 Broadway) shuttered after the owner, Kevin Hartman, balked at a $500 rent hike. Lovers of soul, R&B, hip-hop, punk and vinyl, no matter the genre, are mourning its loss. “This is as sad as when Tower closed,” wrote Wesley Peden on its Facebook page. To that, the owner offered a glint of hope: He’s still passively looking for a new, “significantly smaller” space. For now, Hartman plans to keep the good records and sell some of them on eBay (www.ebay.com/ usr/k-street_records), he wrote to SN&R. “The store was taking up too much of my time and energy,” he wrote. “I feel that it’s good to at least have a break at this point.” He’s not the only one enjoying the time off. The store’s mascot, the snowy white cat Joey (named after Joey Ramone), has curled up into early

retirement. “I think he’s much happier at home,” Hartman wrote. “He doesn’t have people messing with him.” If Hartman does decide to move the store, it wouldn’t be the first time. Records opened in the 1970s on K Street and relocated to 1618 Broadway in the 2000s. Throughout nearly a half-century, the musical mecca wove into local lore. Acerbic cartoonist R. Crumb designed the logo that emblazons its iconic storefront. A photo of Records’ aisles, packed floor to eye level with sleeves, graced the cover of DJ Shadow’s seminal 1996 hip-hop album Entroducing. The 13 tracks layer samples of funk and blues standards, comedy bits and horror flicks, most of the sounds gathered from Records’ shelves. A palimpsest of the store’s history, Entroducing might become an ode to a long-lost record store. But let’s hope not. —rebecca Huval

ON STANDS FEBRUARY 16 TH

—Taylor Desmangles

Radio silence: The record store fit for

SN&R’S SACR A MENTO AREA DINING GUIDE

Rhythmic rebellion: On the night of President Donald Trump’s inauguration ball, another, more attendanceworthy concert took place. DJ Abilities hosted a show at Sol Collective to send out positive vibes during a weekend of mixed emotions. Featured performers—including Hobo Johnson, SpaceWalker and the Philharmonik, among others— contributed to the movement with powerful words about our future. While our nation’s outlook seems distressing, these artists’ careers are booming. Last week, Hobo Johnson signed with Los Angelesbased Control Music Group. More quietly, but no less powerfully, Sacramento rapper and producer the Philharmonik has hit the music scene with full force. Since releasing his EP Good People, the Philharmonik has been busy with collaborations, creating beat compilations and sharpening his sound. At the show last Friday, the Philharmonik dropped hidden gems of sound onto the crowd with refreshingly organic tones. He spit words that resonated with the audience and reflected what many of us were thinking: We’re young people in the world trying to grow, but because we’re faced with negative forces keeping us down, we’re deciding if we should make peace or riot. His lyrics represented a deep dichotomy between wanting to change the world with love vs. rebellion—an urban, musical form of the yin and yang. One of his songs hit home: “Stay Woke.” As the low tones of bass steadily crept before the hook, he said, “Stay woke … don’t believe the shit that you’ve been told.” Throughout the show, the Philharmonik played a few covers from artists like J. Cole and Kanye West, and debuted some new material from an upcoming project. He uplifted the crowd and promoted the importance of growing through your mistakes. On February 17, the Philharmonik will perform live at Ruhstaller Taproom (630 K Street) at 10 p.m. He’ll make beats on the spot in a showcase that promises to be an amazing display of raw creation.

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27 FRI

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28 SAT

Lucinda Williams

The Toasters

Mark Eitzel

Raffi

Crest theatre, 7:30 p.m., $35-$55

Blue lamp, 8 p.m., $12

It’s really not hyperbole to say that Lucinda  Williams might be the coolest ever. A voice  made to hurt. Those poignant turns of  phrase (no wonder, considering Flannery  O’Connor was a friend of her poet father’s).  That I-don’t-give-a-care style achieved  only by someone who really doesn’t give a  care. She’s presently on tour with Chuck  Prophet in support of  AMERICANA last year’s  The Ghosts of  Highway 20, a road-weary, rambling ode to  Williams’ 35-year career spent traversing  the country. She’s a master storyteller  perhaps at the peak of her powers; this  show is not to be missed. 1013 K Street,  http://lucindawilliams.com.

olD ironsiDes, 9 p.m., $15

How do you place New York band the  Toasters on the ska continuum? The group  formed in the early ’80s, around the time of  the British 2 Tone bands (bandleader  SkA Bucket is an English transplant himself). The band was one of the leaders in the  ’90s when American ska bands were blowing  up mainstream radio. Bucket’s label, Moon  Records, signed a lot of ’90s ska bands, and  the Toasters kept chugging along with the  same fervor in the 2000s when ska supposedly died. Basically, the Toasters transcend  era distinctions. The sound is upbeat with  lyrics that range from political to geton-the-floor-and-dance. 1400 Alhambra  Boulevard, www.thetoasters.band.

—Deena Drewis

—aaron Carnes

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34   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

916.771.6505

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Crest theatre, 1 anD 4 p.m., $27.50-$65

Mark Eitzel’s first solo album in three years  harkens back to all that was good about his  former band—cult favorite American Music  Club. The songs in Hey Mr. Ferryman are  full of rich melodies that showcase Eitzel’s  warm, emotive vocals and  INdIE RoCk compelling (if a bit acerbic)  lyrics. A smart addition to this album is  the masterful guitar skills and production  know-how of ex-Suede member Bernard  Butler. It’s a musical match that elevates  each song to its best outcome, making Hey  Mr. Ferryman Eitzel’s most enjoyable album  to date. 1901 10th Street,   www.facebook.com/markeitzel.

—amy Bee

Platinum-selling children’s singer-songwriter  Raffi has entertained and educated young  audiences for more than 40 years with his  silly and catchy tunes about beluga whales  and ditties that shine a light on how everything grows in this world. With 30 albums  recorded, Raffi is known for his children’s  music, but also for the folk music released  on his own record label, Troubadour.  FoLk His third album,  Adult Entertainment,  was only released on wax, so for all the ’80s  kids who grew up singing his tunes in the  classroom, check out his folkier side and hunt  down those rare LPs. 1013 K Street,   www.raffinews.com.

—steph roDriguez

THAT I-DoN’T-gIvE-A-cARE STyLE AcHIEvED oNLy By SoMEoNE WHo REALLy DoESN’T gIvE A cARE.

28 SAT

29 S UN

01 W ED

02 T HU

Sergio Mendes & Brasil 2017

The Lique

Juicy J

Amarok

Harris Center for tHe arts, 7:30 p.m., $29-$64 For those who’ve yet to indulge in Brazilian  music fare, any record in Sergio Mendes’  vast catalog is a good place to  BRAZILIAN start. The 75-year-old composer, producer and bandleader shows no  signs of slowing down and still plays semiregularly in the Bay Area. His 2014 album  Magic is his latest—a Grammy-nominated  record that features songwriting and  collaborative efforts with such disparate  artists as John Legend, Milton Nascimento,  Carlinhos Brown and more. Whether you’re  a newbie or a world music aficionado,  Mendes’ music and crossover influence  cannot be denied. 10 College Parkway in  Folsom, www.sergiomendesmusic.com.

—eddie Jorgensen

distriCt 30, 7 p.m., $6

aCe of spades, 7 p.m. $25-$42

If you saw the Lique the last time it blew  through town, you were probably amazed  by former Sacramento rapper Rasar and  his crew’s blend of smooth, smart hip-hop,  funk and jazz. And you might have been  frustrated that the group only  HIp-Hop had an opening slot—then  again, you were also about to be blown  away by Rituals of Mine. Anyway, after four  months, the Las Vegas-based band finally  returns—and it won’t have to worry about  the clock. As the evening’s lone act—along  with some promised special guests—concertgoers will be treated to a whopping  two-hour show. 1022 K Street,   www.facebook.com/theliqueband.

starlite lounge, 8 p.m., $7-$10

It took the world almost two decades to  universally laud rapper-producer Juicy J.  The Memphis-bred polymath was recognized for an Academy Award and collaborating with Justin Timberlake before rap  radio was ready to give him regular rotation. He scored big hits in his former group  Three 6 Mafia with “Stay Fly” and “Sippin  on Some Syrup,” yet still wasn’t  HIp-Hop considered a proven hitmaker  on the level of producers like Timbaland or  Lil Jon; it took “Bandz a Make Her Dance”  in 2012. Since “Bandz,” it’s been yearly victory laps of tours for Juicy J. 1417 R Street,  http://thejuicyj.com.

—Blake gillespie

Doom metal outfit Amarok hails from Chico,  though far be they from a kegger frat band  that plays covers. Amarok’s bleak brand  of sludge has earned the band a small following of devoted, underground fans. And  while their particular flavor  DooM METAL of harsh, depressing metal  may not be for everyone, this band is worth  checking out if your own misery loves a  little company. Pick up their split release  with Hell in 2014, which features one track  clocking in at nearly 21 minutes dubbed  “V-Red Oak Wisdom.” Battle Hag will play  support, and a couple of TBA locals will be  joining the lineup as well. 1517 21st Street,  https://amarok.bandcamp.com.

—Janelle Bitker

—eddie Jorgensen

2708 J Street Sacramento, CA 916.441.4693 www.harlows.com

LIVE MUSIC Jan 27

THE INSIDE STORY

Jan 28

DANTE ZAPATA

Feb 03

THE BONGO FURYS

Feb 04

HEATHER MAE

Feb 10

ZUHG WITH BROKEN & MENDED

Feb 17

TODD MORGAN

Feb 25

LILLIE LEMON

COMING SOON

1/26 7:00PM $15ADV

MAC SABBATH

2/1 5:30PM $25ADV

HENRY KAPONO

SPACEWALKER

1/27-28 9:00PM $18ADV

TAINTED LOVE

Mar 10 ZACH WATERS BAND Apr 01

MATHEW FRANTZ

apr 14

JACOB WESTFALL

May 20

THE ZAPATA BROTHERS

May 26

FLYIN’ COWBOY

33 BEERS ON DRAFT

MONDAY PINT NIGHT 5-8 PM, TRIVIA @ 6:30 PM TACO TUESDAY $1.25 TACOS NOON - CLOSE WEDNESDAY OPEN MIC – SIGN-UPS @ 7:30 PM 101 MAIN STREET, ROSEVILLE 916-774-0505 · LUNCH/DINNER 7 DAYS A WEEK FRI & SAT 9:30PM - CLOSE 21+

/BAR101ROSEVILLE

2/2 AND 2/3

CODY JINKS (SOLD OUT)

2/4 9PM $15

HIP SERVICE

1/29 7PM $30ADV

HEART OF THE CITY CONCERT

2/6 6:30PM $20ADV

UGLY GOD

(BIG MIKE HART’S 30TH BIRTHDAY BASH) FEAT. KENNY LATTIMORE

(ALL AGES)

1/31 6PM $15ADV

THE MERMAID GANG TOUR WITH FELLY GYYPS, ADAM NYSTROM (ALL AGES)

2/7 5:30PM $32.5ADV

DAVID LINDLEY & PETER CASE

02/08 Ro James 02/10 Skyler’s Pool 02/10 Saved by the 90’s 02/11 Paul Barrere and Fred Tackett 02/11 The Brothers Comatose 02/14 Khalid 02/15 The Revevalist 02/16 Infamous Stringdusters 02/17 Kill the Precedent 02/18 Greg Golden Band 02/19 ALO 02/20 The Brains & The Delta Bombers 02/22 Yonas 02/23 Zepparella 02/24 Will Kimbrough & Brigitte Demeyer 02/25 Pink Floyd Experience 02/28 Rich the Kid 03/01 Chicano Batman 03/02 Don Carlos 03/03 Ian Ethan Case

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   35

thURSdaY 1/26 BADLANDS

2003 K St., (916) 448-8790

List your event! post your free online listing (up to 15 months early), and our editors will consider your submission for the printed calendar as well. print listings are also free, but subject to space limitations. online, you can include a full description of your event, a photo, and a link to your website. Go to www.newsreview.com/calendar and start posting events. Deadline for print listings is 10 days prior to the issue in which you wish the listing to appear.

Hey local bands! Want to be a hot show? Mail photos to: calendar editor, Sn&R 1124 del Paso blvd., Sacramento, ca 95815 or email it to sactocalendar@newsreview.com. be sure to include date, time, location and cost of upcoming shows.

#turnup Thursday, 9pm, no cover

BAr 101

101 Main St., RoSeville; (916) 774-0505

BLue LAmp

1400 alhaMbRa, (916) 455-3400

KUZZO FLY; 9pm, call for cover

fRidaY 1/27

SatURdaY 1/28

SUndaY 1/29

MondaY-WedneSdaY 1/30-2/1

Fabulous & gay, 9pm, call for cover

Spectacular Saturdays, 9pm, call for cover

Tea dance & beer bust, 4pm-8pm, no cover; Industry Sundays, 8pm, no cover

Big Mondays happy hour all night, M; Karaoke, Tu; Trapicana W

THE INSIDE STORY, call for time and cover

DANTE ZAPATA, call for time and cover

THE TOASTERS, THE INCITERS, SACTO STORYTELLERS, 8pm, $12

LEMURIA, MIKEY ERG, LITTLE TENTS; 8pm, $10

Trivia, 6:30pm M; Open mic, 7:30pm W, no cover Reggae night with Solseed, 9pm, no cover

The BoArDwALk

9426 gReenbacK ln., oRangebale (916) 988-9247

ceNTer for The ArTS

BLACK VIOLIN, 7:30pm, $47-$52

314 Main St., gRaSS valleY; (530) 274-8384

cooper’S ALe workS

235 coMMeRcial St., nevada citY; (530) 265-0116

Karaoke, call for time and cover

ACCORDING TO BAZOOKA, SAM CHASE, call for time, $8

couNTry cLuB SALooN

ELECTRIC HEAD, GHOST TOWN REBELLION; call for time, $10 THE MENACE, 9pm, call for cover

2007 taYloR Rd., looMiS; (916) 652-4007

DISTrIcT 30

1016 K St., (916) 737-5770

DJ OASIS, THOMAS YOUNG; call for time and cover

MATT CALI, MEZ; call for time and cover

fAceS

Everything happens dancing and karaoke, 9pm, call for cover

Absolute Fridays dance party, 9pm, $5-$10

Party Time with Sequin Saturdays drag show, 9:30pm, $5-$12

foX & GooSe

ACCORDING TO BAZOOKA, 8pm, no cover

DUKE CHEVALIER, SUNMONKS; 9pm, $5

MR. P CHILL, DJ MIKE COLOSSAL; 9pm, $5

2000 K St., (916) 448-7798 1001 R St., (916) 443-8825

GoLDfIeLD TrADING poST 1023 fRont St., (916) 321-9480

5681 lonetRee blvd., RocKlin; (916) 626-6366 2708 j St., (916) 441-4693

MAC SABBATH, 7pm, $15-$17

The hIDeAwAy BAr & GrILL hIGhwATer

1910 q St., (916) 706-2465

hell yes?

DEMUN JONES, 7:30pm, $10

ESSEX, 9pm, $5

TAKE OUT, 9pm, $7

TAINTED LOVE, 9pm, $18-$20

TAINTED LOVE, 9pm, $18-$20

NO SMALL CHILDREN, MOB RULE; 8pm,$5

2565 fRanKlin blvd., (916) 455-1331

On the low, 10pm, no cover; Punk/rock ’n’ No chill, no cover, 10pm roll, 10pm, no cover

Jazz jam with Reggie Graham, 5pm, no cover

Open jazz jam and spoken word, call for time and cover

HEART OF THE CITY, 7pm, $30-$35

FELLY, GYYPS; 6:30pm Tu, $15; HENRY KAPONO. 7pm W, $25-$20

Open jam with Leo Bootes & Co, 4pm, no cover Heavy, 10pm M, no cover; Tussle, 10pm Tu, no cover; Good stuff, 10pm W, no cover

Eric & Juan, 10pm, no cover

hell no?

Is hell paIn and torment forever? or lIfe extInguIshIng? or restoratIve?

FRee leCTURes: Jan 28th 10-11:45 a.m. “Why I am still a Christian” Is It Rational?...or not? 2-5 p.m. “Why Does God Allow evil?” Does evil Disprove God’s existence? 7-10 p.m. “Three Christian Views on hell” Does hell Contradict God’s love? Questions and Challenges Welcome By Steve Gregg, Author and Radio Talk Show Host KFIA 710 AM Sierra 2 Center - 24th Street Theater – 2791 24th Street, Sacramento 95818

sacramento’s favorite country nightclub WeDnesDays

KNCI hot College CouNtry, 18 & over $2/$3/$4 drINK speCIals 9-11

thursDays

INdustry NIght, $3 wells & Beers tIl mIdNIght. KaraoKe CoNtest up froNt, daNCINg IN the BaCK

friDays

free daNCe lessoNs at 7pm. CouNtry IN BaCK, .50 Beer speCIal & $2 JaCK from 8-9pm

join the

team! For more inFormation and to aPPly, go to wtww.newsreview.Com/jobs.

• on-Call distribution driver • marketing & PubliCations Consultant • editor

SN&R is an Equal Opportunity Employer that actively seeks diversity in the workplace. 36   |   SN&R   |   01.26.17

EDM & karaoke, 9pm M, no cover; Latin night, 9pm Tu, no cover open mic, 7:30pm M, no cover; Pub quiz, 7pm Tu, no cover;

Poker tournament, 6:30pm, call for cover Old school r&b and hip-hop, 9pm, $10

hALfTIme BAr & GrILL hArLow’S

Sunday Mass, 2pm, no cover

ADELITAS WAY, 7pm, $12

1603 j St., (916) 476-5076

GrAcIANo’S SpeAkeASy

ARMED FOR APOCALYPSE, BLOOD CABANA; call for time Tu, $10

saturDays

CouNtry IN BaCK, KaraoKe up froNt $4 JamesoN 9-10pm

sunDay funDay

18 & over CouNtry College NIght KaraoKe wed-suN free daNCe lessoNs NIghtly amazINg food & speCIals voted Best daNCe CluB IN saC By KCra faNs CaterINg & BaNquets avaIlaBle

pBr after partIes frI JaN 27th whIsKey maIdeN sat. JaN 28th CrIpple CreeK suN JaN 29th the Corduroys

1320 Del paso blvD in olD north sac

Stoneyinn.com

916.402.2407

thursDaY 1/26 luna’s cafe & juice bar 1414 16th st., (916) 441-3931

frIDaY 1/27

saturDaY 1/28

THE FLAT EARTH ASSHOLE, NOR CAL WATERS; 7pm, no cover

DAVID HOUSTON & STRING THEORY, GUEST; 8pm, $6

sunDaY 1/29

monDaY-WeDnesDaY 1/30-2/1 Comedy, 8pm W, no cover

Club Seance, 9:30, call for cover

Salsa Wednesday, 7:30pm W, $5

midtown barfly

NASTYNASTY, MOLDAVIBE; 9PM, call for cover

naked lounge downtown 1111 h st., (916) 443-1927

DANIEL ANTHONY, CASEY GROAT, SAM SHARP; 8:30pm, $5

SO MUCH LIGHT, DEEP POOLS, ALFONSO THE BEACON & THE VAMP, DINO PORTELA; 8:30pm, $5 DIMARE; 8:30pm, $5

old ironsides

We are your friends dance club, 9pm, $5

MARK EITZEL, HOWE GRIB; 9pm, $15

OGRES, THE COLLYER BROS; 9pm, $7

Karaoke, 9pm Tu, no cover

Open mic stand-up comedy and karaoke, 8pm, no cover

Resonance: modern love edition, 9pm, $6

Karaoke, 9pm, no cover

Karaoke, 9pm Tu; Dart & movie night, 7pm W, no cover

Mac Sabbath

8 TRACK MASSACRE, 10pm, $10

DANNY CLICK, 10pm, $10

DENNIS JONES, 3pm, $10

Live band karaoke, 8pm M, call for cover

7pm Thursday, $15-$17 Harlow’s Metal

BASTARDS OF YOUNG, 5pm, call for cover Sunday night dance party, 9pm, no cover

YOUNG JESUS, 8pm Tu, $6; MDL, TOM HANX, 8pm W, call for cover

1119 21st st., (916) 549-2779

1901 10th st., (916) 442-3504

on the y

670 fulton ave., (916) 487-3731

powerhouse pub

614 sutter st., folsom; (916) 355-8586

the press club

2030 P st., (916) 444-7914

DUSTIN LOVELIS, K SKELTON, THE RIPPERS, PREGNANT; 8pm, call for cover

shady lady saloon

HOT CITY, 9pm, no cover

HUMBLE WOLF, 9pm, no cover

ENOECA, 9pm, no cover

starlite lounge

THE KENNEDY VEIL, FLUB; 8pm, call for cover

ARMED FOR APOCLYPSE, RUNESPOOR; 8pm, call for cover

WHITE KNUCKLE RIOT, KOREAN FIRE DRILL; 8pm, call for cover

stoney’s rockin rodeo

Country dancing & live band karaoke, 9pm, no cover

Country dancing & live band karaoke, 8pm, $5-$7

Country dancing & live band karaoke, 8pm, $5

Country dancing & live band karaoke, 9pm, call for cover

Country dancing & live band karaoke, 8pm, $5-$7

torch club

X-TRIO, 5pm, no cover; SAM CHASE, 9pm, $6

PAILER & FRATIS, 5:30pm, no cover; BACON FEST, 9pm, $8

GOLDEN CADILLACS, 5:30pm, no cover; BLACK MARKET THREE, 9pm, $8

Blues jam, 4pm, no cover; Front the band, 8pm, no cover

MASSIVE DUO, 8pm Tu, NO COVER; BOCA DE RIO, 9pm Tu, $5

1409 r st., (916) 231-9121

1517 21st st., (916) 704-0711 1320 Del Paso BlvD., (916) 927-6023 904 15th st., (916) 443-2797

PETER PETTY, 9pm, no cover

All ages, all the time ace of spades

TRIBAL SEEDS, RAGING FYAH; 7pm, $22-$25

1417 r st., (916) 448-3300

cafe colonial

JUICY J, BELLY; 7pm W, $25-$42 FEA, KRISTEEN YOUNG, DESTROY BOYS; 8pm, $10

3520 stockton BlvD., (916) 736-3520

Young Jesus 8pm Saturday, $6 Press Club Rock

the colony

3512 stockton BlvD., (916) 718-7055

shine

DEER PARK AVE, 8pm, $7

1400 e st., (916) 551-1400

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arena softball: $10 gift certificate for $2

our 2nd chance Boutique: $10 gift certificate for $4

Baguette’s deli: $15 gift certificate for $4.80

Pita Kitchen Plus: $15 gift certificate for $6

cafe colonial: $10 gift certificate for $2.80

smokeless smoking: $20 gift certificate for $8

classy hippie tea co.: $25 gift certificate for $10

squeeze Burger (Power inn rd): $20 gift certificate for $8

club fantasy: $20 gift certificate for $4

sweet dozen doughnuts & coffee: $5 gift certificate for $1.60

drewski’s hot rod Kitchen: $15 gift certificate for $6

that guy eyewear: $50 gift certificate for $12

el Jardin mexican restaurant: $15 gift certificate for $5.40 snrsweetdeals.newsreview.com

01.26.17    |   SN&R   |   37

Print ads start at $6/wk. www.newsreview.com or (916) 498-1234 ext. 5 Phone hours: M-F 9am-5pm. All ads post online same day. Deadlines for print: Line ad deadline: Monday 4pm Adult line ad deadline: Monday 4pm Display ad deadline: Friday 2pm

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*Nominal fee for adult entertainment. All advertising is subject to the newspaper’s Standards of Acceptance. Further, the News & Review specifically reserves the right to edit, decline or properly classify any ad. Errors will be rectified by re-publication upon notification. The N&R is not responsible for error after the first publication. The N&R assumes no financial liability for errors or omission of copy. In any event, liability shall not exceed the cost of the space occupied by such an error or omission. The advertiser and not the newspaper assumes full responsibility for the truthful content of their advertising message.

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My ex-wife permitted our 12-year-old daughter to open Instagram and Twitter accounts against my explicit instructions. I don’t see any need for a “tween” to be on social media. I’m concerned because of the proliferation of predators on the internet. My ex-wife is like Pavlov’s dog—she has every notification set on her phone and allows herself to be interrupted every few minutes. My daughter says my ex can’t have a conversation without constantly checking her phone. Advice, please.

the relationship was his two daughters. They contacted me recently to say they missed me and think their dad is crazy for breaking up with me. (Apparently he’s already seeing someone new.) I miss them, too. Do you think I should contact him about continuing a relationship with his two girls, ages 9 and 12?

No. A breakup that spun you so dizzy with despair that you could barely rise from bed isn’t out of your bloodstream—yet. A man you nearly married but who is already seeing someone new isn’t out of your Teach your daughter how to safely heart—yet. Be patient. In six months to two participate in the online world. Telling years, the residue of this relationship will be a tween that social media is off-limits cleansed from your system. If you reach makes going online secretly more out to your ex too soon, you might enticing—don’t you remember try to win him back or demand being young? Kids want to reasons why he fell out of be where their friends are love. These acts might Don’t punish and want to do what their even seem logical to you, your daughter friends do. During adolesbut they’re not. Seeking cence, kids start to peel for your ex-wife’s answers from your ex away from adults. The beyond what has been short attention process may be painful for offered (he said he’s no span. parents, but it’s essential to longer in love) will renew an adolescent’s development. your suffering. So trust that Your job is to become your relationship with the girls someone your daughter wants to is strong enough to withstand a brief stick with, while remaining an adult, not intermission. In the interim, see a relationtrying to be her best friend. Begin here: ship coach to discover what fissures, if any, Ditch your authoritarian stance. Fear and you denied in order to believe all was well control are not attractive. Authoritative while dating this man. Ω parenting is your goal: set reasonable demands; establish consistent and fair discipline; listen to your child’s opinions; MeDITATIon of THe Week encourage her independence; explain the “In order to enter the path of reasons behind your expectations and rules. forgiveness, we have to lose Educate your daughter so that, in your our feelings of both superiority absence, she makes beneficial choices out and inferiority. Each of us has of self-confidence, not fear of you. You hurt another, each of us has want her to respect you so that she can talk been hurt,” wrote Jean Vanier. with you about difficulties, not fear you so Where in your body do you trap that she avoids telling you any harsh truths your shame? about her life. One last thing, don’t punish your daughJoey facilitates a Medicine Wheel ter for your ex-wife’s short attention span on January 28 and 29. Learn and lack of self-discipline. Your daughter is more and register at www. thebrickhouseartgallery.com. an individual. Treat her accordingly. Don’t assume that because your ex is obsessed with social media that your daughter will Write, email or leave a message for be, too. My boyfriend of four years broke up with me. He said that he was no longer in love. I was so shocked that I could barely get out of bed for a month. I’m on my feet again and realize the best thing about

Joey at the News & Review. Give your name, telephone number (for verification purposes only) and question—all correspondence will be kept strictly confidential.

Write Joey, 1124 Del Paso Boulevard, Sacramento, CA 95815; call (916) 498-1234, ext. 1360; or email askjoey@newsreview.com.

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Pot pests Knowing that you were a judge at The Emerald Cup, I thought you might find this interesting: A story from The Press Democrat in Santa Rosa says multiple winners from the cup were disqualified for pesticide use. Can you comment on the use of pesticides in the current industry and whether the new pot law offers any new protections against pesticides? —Michael Yeah, it’s a drag. The Emerald Cup is supposed to be for organically grown cannabis products and it’s a shame that some people try to sneak in samples that aren’t up to snuff. Fortunately, there really weren’t that many. According to the article, only about 5 percent of the flower entries (40 out of 735) tested positive for nonorganic pesticides. We definitely did our best to remove not just the pesticide-laden cannabis, but also the “black ash” samples. When you burn cannabis, say, in a joint, the ash should be a nice gray color. Super-dark or black ash indicates cannabis that hasn’t been properly flushed and probably contains an unacceptable amount of the chemicals and nutrients used to create giant, monster plants. Keeping pesticide use to a minimum is especially important when making concentrates. As the name implies, concentrating the chemicals in cannabis, like when someone makes hash or wax or shatter, will also concentrate the pesticides and chemicals that are on or in the plant matter. But, like the story says, the offenders were caught and removed, proving once again that stoners may take extra time, but they usually get it right. No one wants to smoke pesticide-laden weed, Stoners which is why most clubs these days go out of may take extra their way to ensure that the products on the shelves have been tested for pesticides, mold, time, but they fungi and all sorts of things. Many clubs will usually get it either post the test results online or have the right. results available for you to see while you shop. If you are unsure, talk to your budtender. We have come a long way from worrying about the government spraying outdoor grows with Paraquat, but we still need to make sure that we are only putting the finest cannabis (and cannabis concentrates) into our lungs. Happy smoking! I’m pretty much new to pens and cartridges. I enjoy them for many reasons, and I want to ensure I’m getting the very best quality for my money. Can you recommend a dispensary that has a wide variety and the best quality vape cartridges and pens? I like flavored vapes. My favorite so far is pineapple. —M.C. I try not to recommend specific dispensaries too often because I don’t want to hurt people’s feelings, so I will just talk about flavored vapes. As someone that really likes the taste of weed, I am surprised at the popularity of all these flavored vape pens. I like the pens made by Dark Heart called Alchemy (www. darkheartalchemy.com). They have great flavors and good effects. I have never seen a pineapple flavored pen. Try Weedmaps or Leafly if you want to learn more about dispensaries. They usually know where the good stuff is. Ω Ngaio Bealum is a Sacramento comedian, activist and marijuana expert. Email him questions at ask420@newsreview.com.

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FRee will aStRology

by Scott thomaS anderSon

by rob brezSny

FOR THE WEEk OF JANUARy 26, 2017 ARIES (March 21-April 19): Westward Ho! is the

name of a village in southwestern England. Its name is impressive because of the exclamation point. But it’s not as dramatic as that of the only town on earth with two exclamation points: Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha!, which is in Quebec. I invite you Aries folks to be equally daring. According to my reading of the astrological omens, you have a cosmic mandate and poetic license to cram extra !!!!s into all your writing and speaking, and even add them to the spelling of your name! Why? Because this should be one of the most exciting and ebullient phases of your astrological cycle— a time to risk showing just how enthusiastic and energetic you are!!!!!

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): The New York Film

Critics Circle named Casey Affleck the Best Actor of the year for his role in the film Manchester by the Sea. In his acceptance speech at the award ceremony, Affleck gave a dramatic reading of quotes by David Edelstein, a prominent critic who has criticized his work. “Mumbly and mulish,” was one of Edelstein’s jabs about Affleck. “Doesn’t have a lot of variety,” was another. A third: “Whenever I see Affleck’s name in a movie’s credits, you can expect a standard, genre B picture—slowed down and tarted up.” I suspect that in the coming weeks, Taurus, you may get a vindication comparable to Affleck’s. I suggest you have wicked fun with it, as he did.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): The roulette wheels

at casinos in Monaco have 37 pockets. Eighteen are black, 18 are red, and one is green. On any particular spin, the ball has just less than half a chance of landing in a red or black pocket. But there was one night back in August of 1913, at the Casino de Monte-Carlo, when probability seemed inoperative. The little white ball kept landing on the black over and over again. Gamblers responded by increasingly placing heavy bets on red numbers. They assumed the weird luck would soon change. But it didn’t until the 27th spin. (The odds of that happening were 136,823,184 to 1.) What does this have to do with you? I suspect you’re in a comparable situation—the equivalent of about 20 spins into an improbable streak. My advice: Don’t bet on the red yet.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Born to a religious

mother on July 8, 1839, John D. Rockefeller amassed a fortune in the oil industry. Even in comparison to modern billionaires like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, he’s the richest American who ever lived. “God gave me the money,” he said on numerous occasions. Now I’m going to borrow the spirit of Rockefeller’s motto for your use, Cancerian. Why? Because it’s likely you will be the recipient of blessings that prompt you to wonder if the Divine Wow is involved. One of these may indeed be financial in nature. (P.S. Such boons are even more likely to transpire if you’re anchored in your sweet, dark wisdom and your holy, playful creativity.)

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): What influence do you need most in your life right now? Are you suffering because you lack a particular kind of help or teaching? Would you benefit from having a certain connection that you have not yet figured out how to make? Is there a person or event that could heal you if you had a better understanding about how you need to be healed? The coming weeks will be a favorable time to get useful answers to these questions—and then take action based on what you discover.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): The next two weeks

will be a favorable time to kiss the feet of helpful allies, but not to kiss the butts of clever manipulators. I also advise you to perform acts of generosity for those who will use your gifts intelligently, but not for those who will waste your blessings or treat you like a doormat. Here’s my third point: Consider returning to an old fork in the road where you made a wrong turn, and then making the correct turn this time. But if you do, be motivated by bright hope for a different future rather than by sludgy remorse for your error.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In the beginning was

the wild cabbage. Our ancestors found that it had great potential as food, and proceeded to domesticate it. Over the centuries, they used selective breeding to develop many further variations on the original. Kale and kohlrabi were the

first to appear. By the 15th century, cauliflower had been created. Broccoli came along a hundred years later, followed by Brussels sprouts. Today there are at least 20 cultivars whose lineage can be traced back to the wild cabbage. In my astrological opinion, you Libras are in a wild cabbage phase of your long-term cycle. In the coming months you can and should do seminal work that will ultimately generate an abundance of useful derivatives.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): In 1733, workers

finished building the New Cathedral in Salamanca, Spain. But if you go there today, you will see two seemingly modern elements on one facade: carvings of a helmeted astronaut and of a gargoyle licking an ice cream cone. These two characters were added by craftsmen who did renovations on the cathedral in 1992. I offer this vignette as metaphor for your life, Scorpio. It’s a favorable time to upgrade and refine an old structure in your life. And if you do take advantage of this opening, I suggest you add modern touches.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): I suspect

that in the coming weeks, you will be afforded opportunities to bend the rules in ways that could make life simpler, more pleasurable, and more successful—or all of the above. To help you deal with the issue of whether these deviations would have integrity, I offer you these questions: Would bending the rules serve a higher good, not just your selfish desires? Is there an approach to bending the rules that may ultimately produce more compassionate results than not bending the rules? Could you actually get away with bending the rules, both in the sense of escaping punishment and also in the sense of being loyal to your own conscience?

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): I don’t

necessarily guarantee that you will acquire paranormal powers in the coming weeks. I’m not saying that you will be able to foretell the future or eavesdrop on conversations from a half-mile away or transform water into whiskey-flavored coffee. But I do suspect that you will at least tap further into a unique personal ability that has been mostly just potential up until now. Or you may finally start using a resource that has been available for a long time. For best results, open your imagination to the possibility that you possess dormant magic.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): A London-based

think tank does an annual study to determine which of the world’s countries offers the most freedom. The Legatum Institute measures indicators like civil liberties, social tolerance, and the power to choose one’s destiny. The current champion is Luxembourg. Canada is in second place. France is 22nd, the United States is 26th, and Italy 27th. Since I’m hoping you will markedly enhance your own personal freedom in the coming months, you might want to consider moving to Luxembourg. If that’s not an option, what else could you do? The time is ripe to hatch your liberation plans.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): I love to see

dumpsters that have been decorated by graffiti artists. Right now there’s one by the side of a busy road that I often drive down. Its drab gray exterior has been transformed into a splash of cartoon images and scripts. Amidst signatures that look like “Riot Goof” and “Breakfast Toys” and “Sky Blooms,” I can discern a ninja rhinoceros and a gold-crowned jaguar and an army of flying monkeys using squirt guns to douse a forest fire. I suspect it’s a perfect time for you to be inspired by this spectacle, Pisces. What dumpster-like situation could you beautify?

You can call Rob Brezsny for your Expanded Weekly Horoscope: (900) 950-7700. $1.99 per minute. Must be 18+. Touchtone phone required. Customer service (612) 373-9785. And don’t forget to check out Rob’s website at www.realastrology.com.

New mayor, same Mac Worthy Around City Hall, Mac Worthy is the  master of hard-edged proclamations and poetic accusations. In  four years he’s branded himself as  a sly-tongued scold, swinging verbal  haymakers at elected officials every  chance he gets. He came to Sacramento from South Carolina in   December 1960—a hard-working  man who owned a janitorial business and became a study in civic  pride. Now, the retired 75-year-old  attends city council meetings unfailingly. And he’s always ready to keep  it real with an old-school dressing  down. Worthy usually nags council  members with a blunt force moxie  that seems like a near-sermon.  When city leaders discussed the  Railyards Project last month,  Worthy assured them that “the  low-income housing was dropped  in it like a mickie in a drink.” When  it was time for the city to renew the  Oak Park Business District, Worthy  announced the council got its community support via “buying through  the pimps on a Sunday morning, the  church.” Three years ago, Worthy  was famously ejected from a meeting on his own birthday for saying  the n-word six times in a matter of  seconds. But Worthy hasn’t stopped  taking the podium. Far from it. As  Mayor Darrell Steinberg ushers in  a new era for Sacramento, SN&R  caught up with Worthy to get his latest views, as well as some previews  of the barbs he’s sharpening.

So what’s your take on the new mayor? He can’t move the city. He’s gonna run the same game that Jerry Brown ran when he went to Oakland, and fiddled around with everybody’s money and switched, and went to being governor. Darrell can’t move it.

Last week, Steinberg kind of rebuked you for calling politicians the scum of the earth. How did you feel about that? I don’t feel bad. (Laughs.) See, the thing about it is, America’s politics is the scum of the earth. That’s why my man [Donald Trump] got elected president. Drain that swamp.

What should be the council’s top priorities? They are not creating jobs. They’re liars. …

PHOTO BY EVAN DURAN

to buy bonds.” Who buys those bonds? Other countries. … [The Trump cabinet picks] are considered terrorists because we don’t know who is here. Because it’s where you don’t even know if you’ve got the right guy, cause there’s nothing in those countries to identify them. A guy could comes across the line here four times and you can’t identify him? Or how many different names he made? You couldn’t. Check the (inaudible). I’ve told all y’all we sold our grandmother’s dirty underwear to the illegals.

People told [Councilman Allen] Warren to come to me. They told [Councilman] Rick [Jennings] to come to me, and talk about what this city needs for black people. How did we get three black people [on city council] and a mayor up here? Somebody sold out. They cannot put anything on the table for economics. We need economics. Property. You’re gonna buy the ghetto up, and not even give the folks a job?

Who’s your favorite city council member? I ain’t got no favorite. Well, um, there’s the old white guy over here on the side.

Will the meetings be different under the new mayor?

Schenirer?

It’s not going to be different because you’re in debt. He’s gonna come in and give a Sunday school class, which we’re about to attend, (laughs) but that’s how it’s gonna be. This is a rubber stamp.

No, the guy from the River District. … He sits beside [Councilman Steve] Hansen.

Jeff Harris? Yeah, Harris is the man. But they will not listen. They will not listen to him.

What neighborhood do you live in now?

Where do you stand on police accountability? You cannot have that type of oversight on no police department in America. Sit beside the police. Sit down with them. Talk to them. And you will find out you gather intelligence—how they think. I cuss them out to their face, and I laugh and talk. … We’ve got to be communicating. But this is how [Councilman Larry Carr] thinks. Is he outside the law? Or is he in the shadow of the law?

What irritates you about Sacramento government now?

Oak Park. … I’ve seen people show up in a limousine with a white super dome on their forehead—Anthony Bruno was my tailor— they look like something on a damn bum. … All the education black people got now and we still can’t come up with an economic idea. What did you study? We need to quit bitching about who’s prejudiced. I’m a prejudiced son of bitch, if I’m on a walk. To a bum. I don’t want a bum around me. (Laughs.) I ain’t got no extra money. Ω

Bonds and grants. They tell people, “You don’t have to be a professional investor

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