Mission Mission

Reader and artiste Donald Tetto says:

I’m involved in a big group art show of tiny works in a tiny space, The Good Shop at 22nd and Folsom…

Almost all the artists are from the Mission, and I’ll be selling a chapbook of my poems about the Mission at the opening. Great Valentine’s Day gift?! But other artists will be showing small photos, sketches, collages, and so on that are really fantastic.

Details at the facebook event page, and in the flyer:

True to V-day form, Donald adds:

Once you linked to one of my tweets: http://missionmission.wordpress.com/2009/06/17/biker-down/ which was pretty helpful as a cute girl later said to me, “Hey, I saw your tweet on Mission Mission!”

He left out the part where she said, “God that site sucks now, when’s Allan coming back?”

(snapped at Ms. Teriosa’s on 24th and Shotwell)

Okay, you guys, take a deep breath. Noise Pop and Mission Mission are about to give you free tickets to the concert of the decade: !!!, Sugar & Gold and My First Earthquake at Mezzanine on Saturday, February 27, 2010.

Jerry Fuchs is one of my top three or five favorite drummers of all time, so when !!! got him I was pumped. Now that he’s dead, part of me wants to wonder whether the band’ll ever be as good without him, and the other part of me says, “Fuck off, self! !!! rules!” And I’m pretty sure I’m right. I can’t wait to see how much they still rule.

Sugar & Gold is a great band too. They make me want to dance just as much as !!!, plus they’re quite a bit less screamy, and thus all the more pleasant. Also, they’re from SF, not Sacramento, and maybe largely for that reason they’re a lot more physically attractive. And they have a new album coming out later this spring.

My First Earthquake has the advantage here of being led by our pal Rebecca Bortman, a force of rock ‘n’ roll nature if ever there was one. Pretty soon, you’ll have to pay Live Nation $35 plus service charges and parking fees to see Becky and MFE headline the Warfield or whatever, so best enter this here contest and see them for free at an intimate venue while you still can.

The only way this bill could be any better is if Scissor Sisters showed up last minute to play their as-yet unreleased new album in its entirety.

TO ENTER: Okay, if you submit a good Jerry story (or remembrance or whatever) you’ll probably win. Otherwise, good stories about any of the above bands will probably do you good. Winners will be decided based on merit or something by Mission Mission staff. Contest ends this Thursday at 6pm.

!!! photo by abzflickr; S&G photo by Rachel Weinstein; MFE photo by spencercrooks.

Tonight is your opportunity to a) support the arts and b) get yourself out of that Valentine’s day hole you’ve dug.

The Poetry Store is featured at Secession gallery’s show opening tonight, enhancing already awesome photos by Armand of Mission Loc@l and Julie of i live here: SF.

Armand + Silvi

Julie + Silvi

Freshly crafted poems in bottles go a long way, guys:

Secession, on Mission between 29th and 30th (across from Safeway). The opening runs from 6:30-9:30.

Void has the scoop:

Thought you might enjoy. It wasn’t there yesterday. 22nd & Mission.

An impressive feat of acrobatics, courage, tenacity, and vision.

Norma Miller speaking at Savannah Jazz Club 2/10/10

This is pretty rad. 90-year-old Norma Miller (aka “the Queen of Swing”) is a pioneer and creator of the Lindy Hop, by far the most popular form of swing dance today. She was featured in movies such as 1941′s “Hellzapoppin” (proving that “hella” was used, in a more primitive form, 70 years ago), and also worked with a lot of the big names back in the day. You know, like Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Fletcher Henderson… no big deal.

She used to hang at the Savoy in Harlem during it’s prime, the site of some of the first integrated music/dance events in American history.

Last night local dance promoter Chris Lee showed her around the mission, starting at Amnesia, where traditional jazz outfit Gaucho plays every week, then to Savannah Jazz Club on Mission and 25th, where she did a guest lecture.

My buddy Nathan A. had the scoop:

When they introduced her, she bounced up on the stage with more spring in her step than a woman less than half her age. I couldn’t get over how sharp she was – how animated. She had mind like a steel trap! She had us all on the edge of our seats while recalling the “good old days”. She told us how moved she was to see all these young people carrying on the the original American dance form – and a tradition she helped establish. She was hilarious, crude, and sentimental. She worked with Red Fox, Richard Pryor, and Bill Cosby doing a bit of comedy after her legs started to give out eventually.

Check out this clip of her with Frankie Manning (RIP) tearing it up… WILD!

The Mission’s unofficial entertainment critic, 40 Going on 28′s TK, brings us this most excellent review of Wicked, now playing at the Orpheum:

More interesting to me is the fact that “Wicked” is clearly a Mission vs. Marina allegory. Now, if you’re not familiar, the plot essentially concerns the backstory of the witches in “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.” On the one hand, we have Elphaba, our Mission girl, who will grow up (to be labeled by the patriarchy) as the Wicked Witch of the West. She has body art (i.e., she’s green) and doesn’t get along with her parents. At school, she develops an interest in animal rights and doesn’t hang out much with the cool crowd. This should remind you of someone you know by this point.

I will now magically turn Tecate tallboys into Midori sours!!

Glinda is pretty much the prototypical Marina girl. She’s blonde and rich and not that smart. She makes fun of Elphaba and doesn’t think anything of her right up until the time she suddenly discovers that the stuff Elphaba likes (in the musical, magic; in the real world, LCD Soundsystem and ecstasy) is actually really cool.

Read more mindblowing interpretation at 40 Going on 28.

Following up on Seals baseball history, the awesome LookBackMaps points us to this Bancroft Library image of Rec Park in 1923.  Here we enter the time machine to look north on Valencia from 15th.

Click image for a higher resolution shot over at Burrito Justice.

Reader NoCalAl says “As for Rec Park, I used to go to the gym across the street, and was met with skepticism whenever I mentioned Valencia Gardens used to be a ball park. The Hotel Royan at 15th and Valencia used to house ballplayers, unlike the current denizens.”

Elizabeth Gilhooley (American, 1981-), Immovable Iconography, 2010, trash receptacle, washtub, bicycles, GAP bag, 4.5′ x 6′ x 5′, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.

24th and Harrison, WHY?

(via Eric Fischer)

24th and Florida, WHY?

(via SF Weekly)