twi-ny recommended events

VICTOIRE

Victoire will celebrate release of their debut CD at Joe’s Pub on October 2

Joe’s Pub
425 Lafayette St. between East Fourth St. & Astor Pl.
Saturday, October 2, $14, 7:30
212-967-7555
www.myspace.com/victoiremusic
www.joespub.com

Atmosphere is everything when it comes to Victoire, and what an atmosphere they create. Led by Brooklyn-based keyboardist and composer Missy Mazzoli, Victoire is a five-piece all-woman avant-garde chamber ensemble that tests the limit of classical music by incorporating elements from a myriad of genres, along with haunting vocal samples and pure noise. Mazzoli, violinist Olivia de Prato, clarinetist Eileen Mack, keyboardist Lorna Krier, and double bassist Eleonore Oppenheim have followed up their 2009 EP, A DOOR INTO THE DARK, with their debut full-length, CATHEDRAL CITY (New Amsterdam, September 2010), a stunning collection of eight forays into the unknown. Throwing in a hint of jazzy percussion in the title track, some German Expressionism with Irish tinges in “A Song for Mick Kelly” (featuring the National’s Bryce Dessner on guitar and soprano Mellissa Hughes on vocals paying tribute to the American peace activist) and more than a touch of Coldplay-esque piano in “A Door into the Dark,” Victoire glides along on a cloud of mystery. Things turn rather melancholy on “I am coming for my things,” while “India Whiskey” ends the record in an exciting blur of experimentalism. CATHEDRAL CITY is like a journey through the dark, daring world of the Brothers Quay. Victoire will be celebrating the release of the new record with a launch party at Joe’s Pub on October 2, promising that there will be “special secret guests.” The band will also be playing at the Brooklyn gallery Smack Mellon on November 4 at 7:00. (In addition, “Missy Mazzoli and Sarah Snider: A Night of Chamber Music” will take place October 5 at Galapagos in Brooklyn, featuring the New York premiere of Mazzoli’s “Death Valley Junction,” performed by the MIVOS Quartet.)

VOLLMOND (FULL MOON)

Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch returns to BAM without their fearless leader (photo by Jan Szito)

Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch
BAM Howard Gilman Opera House
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
September 29 – October 9, $25 – $85
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
www.pina-bausch.de

Back in 1984, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch performed at BAM for the first time, presenting DAS FRÜHLINGSOPFER and LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS, and over the years the insanely entertaining German troupe has returned with such memorable evening-length pieces as DANZÓN, MASURCA FOGO, NEFÉS, and last year’s BAMBOO BLUES. And for Bausch, evening-length really means evening-length, as many of her productions run between two and a half and three hours, and they rarely if ever lag. Instead they’re filled with offbeat humor, playful dialogue, unusual props, wild stage designs, and, of course, creative movement. Bausch died in June 2009 at the age of sixty-eight, so this will mark Tanztheater Wuppertal’s first BAM appearance without their endlessly innovative and always elegant director and choreographer. VOLLMOND (FULL MOON) will run at the Howard Gilman Opera House from September 29 through October 9, but tickets are already scarce, so act quickly, whether you’re a fan of contemporary dance or not, because you’ll find lots to love regardless. Bausch’s twelfth show at BAM features set design by Peter Pabst, costumes by Marion Cito, and musical collaboration by Matthias Burkert and Andreas Eisenschneider, with an eclectic score that includes songs by Magyar Posse, Cat Power, Amon Tobin, René Aubry, Alexander Balanescu, Tom Waits, Siegfried Ganhör and to rococo rot, Jun Miyake and Sublime, and others. There will also be a lot of water.

BELLE & SEBASTIAN

Belle & Sebastian will headline an outdoor show along the Williamsburg Waterfront on September 30

Williamsburg Waterfront
North Eighth St. & Kent Ave. at the East River
Thursday, September 30, $37.50, 5:30
www.myspace.com/thebandbelleandsebastian
www.openspacealliancenb.org

Belle and Sebastian, those kings of twee pop led by Stuart Murdoch and Stevie Jackson, are attempting to return to relevancy with a new album, BELLE & SEBASTIAN WRITE ABOUT LOVE (Matador, October 12), and a slew of tour dates, including a show September 30 at the Williamsburg Waterfront. The band’s recent setlists have leaned heavily on tracks from their 1996 breakout masterpiece, IF YOU’RE FEELING SINISTER, which features such songs as “Like Dylan in the Movies,” “The Stars of Track and Field,” and “Me and the Major,” along with their 2003 self-proclaimed comeback album, DEAR CATASTROPHE WAITRESS, which was produced by former Buggles and Yes singer Trevor Horn. On the new disc, their first album since 2006’s THE LIFE PURSUIT, they make such pronouncements as “I Want the World to Stop,” “I Didn’t See It Coming,” “I Can See Your Future,” and “I’m Not Living in the Real World,” with special appearances by Norah Jones and Carey Mulligan. (Is that a return to relevancy? We’ll have to be convinced.) For the Brooklyn show, they’ll be joined by fellow Glaswegians Teenage Fanclub, who are touring behind their first record in five years.

TWI-NY TICKET GIVEAWAY: VAMPS

Hot Japanese band Vamps are coming to New York City, and twi-ny has a pair of free tickets to give away

Roseland Ballroom
239 West 52nd St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Saturday, October 9, $35 ($47.20 including all fees), 8:00
212-777-6800
www.roselandballroom.com
www.myspace.com/vampsofficial

Singer and guitarist Hyde of l’Arc~en~Ciel and guitarist K.A.Z. of Oblivion Dust had been collaborating for several years, but when they finally decided to get together and form their own band, the goth-metal outfit Vamps, it sent shockwaves through the Japanese music industry. Huge pop stars in their home country, Vamps will be making a brief U.S. tour in October, playing shows in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, highlighting their latest record, BEAST (Avex Trax, July 2010), which features such heavy tunage as “Devil Side,” “Angel Trip,” “Euphoria,” ”Revolution,” and “Rumble.” Strongly influenced by such 1980s American groups as Mötley Crüe and Cheap Trick, they’ll also dip into their 2009 eponymously tilted debut record, which includes such metal madness as “Love Addict” (“Hey! Keep on rolling baby I want to explode / Oh yes, need you darling with the growling exhaust note”), “Vampire Depression,” “Redrum,” and the instant classic “Sex Blood Rock n’ Roll.”

Vamps will be at Roseland on October 9, with tickets going for $47.20 apiece (including all fees), but twi-ny has one pair to give away for free, courtesy of our good friends at New York-Tokyo. To enter, send your name and daytime phone number to contest@twi-ny.com no later than Sunday, October 3, at 12 noon. All entrants must be at least twenty-one years of age, and employees of Roseland, New York-Tokyo, and This Week in New York are not eligible. One winner will be selected at random. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to see one of Japan’s hottest exports!

OPENHOUSENEWYORK 2010

The annual openhousenewyork weekend offers free tours of unexpected and unusual places in the city, including the Atlantic Ave. subway tunnel (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Multiple venues in all five boroughs
Saturday, October 9, and Sunday, October 10
Admission: free (advance reservations required for some sites)
OHNY Weekend Passport: $150 ($200 includes two tickets to launch party)
212-991-OHNY
www.ohny.org

The eighth annual openhousenewyork weekend takes place October 9-10, and they have just announced this year’s lineup of opendialogues, sustainablenewyork tours and talks, site-specific architecturemoves dance and music performances, OHNY Kids! workshops, and other special activities. Although everything is free, some programs require advance reservations, which go live at 9:00 this morning, so don’t waste any time, because they fill up fast. Among the participating locations, many of which are not usually open to the public (at least not for free), are 1 World Trade Center, the African Burial Ground, the Apollo Theater, the Atlantic Ave. Tunnel, the AVAC System on Roosevelt Island, the Chrysler Building, the Woolworth Building, the Gatehouse, Governors Island, the Grand Lodge of Masons, the Jacob Riis Park Bathhouse, the Lighthouse Tender LILAC, an MTA Substation, the Rocking the Boat shipbuilding shop, Tom Otterness’s Brooklyn studio, the DreamYard Project, the Red Hook Sludge Boat, Sixpoint Craft Ales, and the Digester Egg Experience at the Newtown Creek Visitor Center in addition to architecture and design studios, churches and temples, libraries, university centers, cultural institutes, memorials, historic residences, cemeteries, and museums across the five boroughs. Be sure to read the details about each venue, since not all of them are open both days, and keep checking the online schedule because there are regular updates and changes as well as web exclusives. We’ve seen some pretty amazing things over the course of openhousenewyork’s first seven years, gaining access to places we never thought we would, so we highly recommend taking advantage of this terrific opportunity to get an inside look at some of the city’s hidden treasures.

SHIFTING THE GAZE: GALLERY TALKS

Deborah Kass, “Double Red Yentl, Split, from My Elvis,” screen print and acrylic on canvas, 1993



PAINTING AND FEMINISM
Jewish Museum
1109 Fifth Ave. at 92nd St.
Select days at 1:00 from October 4 through November 8
Free with museum admission of $12
212-423-3337
www.thejewishmuseum.org

The Jewish Museum will be hosting a series of exciting talks and discussions in conjunction with its latest exhibit, “Shifting the Gaze: Painting and Feminism,” which runs through January 30. The series begins October 4 with Joyce Kozloff, whose “Naming II (or Who’s Jewish?)” is in the exhibition, followed by Judy Chicago (“Sky Flesh”) on October 5, Mira Schor (“Silence”) on October 11, a tour with curator Daniel Belasco on October 18, Deborah Kass (“Double Red Yentl, Split”) on October 25, Robert Kushner (“Blue Flounce”) on November 1, and Elisabeth Subrin (“Shulie: Film and Stills by Elisabeth Subrin”) on November 8, with all talks free with museum admission. In addition, the Jewish Museum will be presenting a three-part lecture series by CUNY art history professor Dr. Nanette Salomon, “Shifting Crossroads: Feminism, Art, Modernity, and Difference,” at 11:30 am on October 4 (“The Prequel: Women Painters in Early Modern Europe”), October 11 (“Impressionism and the Moment of Modernism: Women, Jews, and Other ‘Others’”), and October 18 (“Women Painters and the Jewish Museum 2010”); each lecture is $20, or you can get a series ticket for all three for $45.

muMs & AURORA

New York City natives muMs & Aurora will be teaming up for a special show at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe on September 30

Nuyorican Poets Cafe
236 East Third St. between Aves. B & C
Thursday, September 30, $10, 7:00
www.nuyorican.org
www.mumsandaurora.tumblr.com

We were thrilled to bump into muMs da Schemer the other day, the poet, playwright, director, and actor perhaps most well known as Poet on the HBO prison drama OZ. Born Craig Grant in the Bronx, he has also appeared in such television series as COLD CASE, DEF POETRY JAM, THE GOOD HEART, LAW & ORDER, BOSTON LEGAL, and CHAPPELLE’S SHOW, where he famously portrayed Lysol in the “Mad Real World” sketch. He immediately pulled out a flyer trumpeting his latest gig, teaming up with New York City singer-songwriter, actress, and violinist Aurora Barnes for a series of shows at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. “I’m going back to where I started,” he said. “It’s a real pleasure.” Backed by a band, muMs & Aurora are “folk music’s answer to hip-hop,” performing such songs as “Sleep, Baby, Sleep,” “Fifty Times / Ploylessness,” “Survivor,” and “Bring on the Fire,” alternating between Aurora’s sweet melodies and muMs’s spoken word poetry. They also do a mash-up of muMs’s “Truth” with Kings of Leon’s “Use Somebody” and Stephen Sondheim’s “Move On” from SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE, so you never really know where they’re going to take you next. The duo, who previously collaborated on muMs’s play PARADOX OF THE URBAN CLICHÉ for the LAByrinth Theater Company, will be at the Nuyorican on September 30 at 7:00.