Mission Mission

Well here’s what I get for never reading the comments (it’s like the #2 rule of blogging) — rock ‘n’ roll legend Mike Watt commented on a post of mine back in 2013 and I didn’t know about it til this week.

On the occasion of Thee Oh Sees’ 3-night residency at the Chapel this week (which concludes tonight), I was looking through some old coverage and came upon “Here’s an algorithm up your asshole,” our report from the time they opened for Iggy and the Stooges at a tech conference in a park in San Jose.

(Went back through the photo archives and found this shot, by our own Jess Kelso, of Watt making the low flow, back there behind Iggy.)

Here’s what Watt had to say:

people,

petey on bass for the oh sees was truly a righteous man but taking nothing from the man w/a beat in his hand for the stooges. glad to work the at a park where besides all the silicone whatever this article already talks about but where a nightmare like the last cali lynching ever was…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooke_Hart

on bass, watt

Know your history, people!

To wit:

And nowadays we just take it for granted.

[via Alamo Drafthouse San Francisco on Facebook]

That’s my official review. Last night was awesome. Try to go tonight if you can. Or get tickets for their August dates at GAMH when they go on sale tomorrow.

[Photo by Cosmic Amanda]

I mean, if you want.

Just remember, there’s more to San Francisco than just Pop’s Bar and St. Francis Fountain and Dolores Park.

(Just another friendly reminder, like that post Those times when you realize you still love this place.)

And I’m seeing the new Oh Sees tonight!

In our lengthy, pictorial profile from back when they first opened (more than 3 years ago, wow!) we reported that Cervecería de MateVeza, the little corner brewery at 18th and Church, had a big fridge full of all kinds of interesting to-go beers.

Not no more.

Instead — we’re happy to report — they’ll can any of their house drafts, on the spot, just for you. One customer, one can. It’s a localized, immediate transaction that feels refreshing in an era where everything from ordering delivery to signing up for no verification casinos or streaming services happens via automated, faceless digital queues. Here, you just walk up and get your drink.

It’s high-quality beer, and 32 ounces of it, so it’s pricier than a can of Foster’s. But Foster’s tastes like shit.

(Also, the 32-ounce thing comes in handy when you’re sitting up on the hill and it tips over and spills — you may lose several ounces of beer, but you’ve still got like 27 ounces of beer.)

From a certain news source:

Palestinian Man Marvels At How Much Childhood Refugee Camp Has Changed

AL-SHATI, GAZA STRIP—Saying he hardly recognized some of the makeshift buildings and piles of rubble he played in as a child, Gaza native Ramzy Abu-Dhubah told reporters Tuesday he was struck by how much the refugee camp he grew up in has changed over the years.

As he walked through his “old stomping grounds” in Al-Shati, a 0.3-square-mile camp currently home to 87,000 displaced Palestinians, the 36-year-old remarked how the whole area seemed more bustling and crowded to him now than it did when he was a boy.

“So many of the spots where I used to hang out are gone, and they’ve all been replaced by new homes—I guess this place has really been growing,” Abu-Dhubah said as he pointed out a demolished concrete structure filled with improvised mud-brick shelters that had not been there when he left Gaza in 1999. “This used to be an empty lot where I’d play soccer, but there’s got to be a few dozen families that have moved in here now. They put in one of those big ration-distribution centers, too. My buddy Ibrahim was telling me that’s where pretty much everyone goes to eat these days.”

Read on for lots more.

[Photo by Google Maps]

I’m sitting on the hill in the park just now when a guy comes barreling down the walkway behind me yelling about how mad he is and how nobody better turn around and look at him or else he’ll get violent. 

A couple of high schoolers get in his face and call his bluff and they both end up socking him. (And then they grab their shit and disperse quickly.)

The guy continues down the hill toward the intersection of 18th and Church, and he somehow ends up with a picket sign. (It was not Frank Chu.)

He’s letting out these shrieks of pain or dread, and once in the intersection, he hurls the picket sign at an oncoming car, and then continues on to the sidewalk where he shrieks again, throws a female pedestrian to the ground, and then runs off up Church Street.

Update: The picket sign was one of these…

Trenches and rubble — it’s like a warzone.

Should be done any day now.

Meanwhile:

It’s like 90 degrees out here, where is everybody?

Yep, that’s right, the Tenderloin Museum!  And things are starting off with a bang this Thursday!

The Tenderloin Museum kicks off its evening programming on Opening Night, July 16th at 6:30pm with transgender activists Tamara Ching, Veronika Fimbres, and filmmakers Susan Stryker & Victor Silverman. Moderated by Randy Shaw, the panel takes us back to the days of the Tenderloin’s 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria riot when transgender women and queers were harassed by police and businesses alike.

In those days, the Tenderloin was the geographic center of the city’s emerging gay and lesbian civil rights movement. It was in the Tenderloin where the movement’s more confrontational spirit was demonstrated, and brought success. Stryker, Ching and Fimbres will describe the decades of struggle following the Compton’s riot, as that legendary act of resistance—three years before Stonewall–was only the beginning.

Check it all out here.

And that’s not all!  Stop by the following week for the first showing in 50 years of Drugs in the Tenderloin!

A stark and often harrowing look into the life of the street denizens of the notorious San Francisco district which was a haven for junkies, prostitutes, and pushers during the Sixties… it takes a real gutter-level look at its subject, the grainy night photography capturing beehive-haired hookers and turtle-necked dope dealers plying their trade against a smoky backdrop of seedy neon, while meth users pontificate about their high, and a youth worker takes a couple of shocked city officials on a walking tour of the area, pointing out such lurid landmarks as Market Street, known in the area as the “Meat Rack” thanks to the male hustlers who ply their trade there.”Join us for some incredible footage of the Tenderloin’s past.