Yoda's House is an experiment. "It's very much about the process of the whole thing and writing as you go," member Hannah Frasier said. The group will perform Saturday at q-Staff theatre. Joe Annabi is the only member who has been in every show. He sings, plays accordion, musical saw, cello, violin and harmonica.
You can see the entire universe at a planetarium's dome theater in Old Town. The planetarium at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science hosts a number of daily programs. Technician and show presenter Jason Zermeno said his favorite program is "Enchanted Skies.
Switches Lay Down the Law 3/5 Available Now Indie pop is starting to become a bit of misnomer. There's nothing particularly independent about it these days. Switches is no exception, and it's hard to see anything in its music that sets it apart from run-of-the-mill pop rock.
Songwriting is an arbitrary process for Brian Jonkman. "What I used to do was go out, and in random-ass parts of my day, something would happen," he said. "It would be like these kind of epiphanies. I'd get, like, this line. I'd get, like, this phrase. So, I'm more into lyrics in a lot of ways.
UNM is hosting the Collegiate National Poetry Slam for the first time. Twenty-four college slam teams will compete individually and in groups for a gold medal between today and Saturday. This year's UNM slam team includes Damien Flores, Aaron Cuffee, Lee Francis and Jessica Lopez.
The Blue Dragon Coffeehouse has reopened. Beth and Brian Rosen bought the coffee shop, which closed in July, and have had it up and running since March 1. Longtime Dragon patron Holly Buehler is glad that one of her favorite hangouts is back. "I used to go to open-mic nights to enjoy tasty beverages and musical entertainment," she said.
"Turning Point: Fall of Liberty" should have been an excellent game. It has a great premise - an alternate reality where the Allies lost World War II and Germany is invading the United States in the mid-fifties. The player controls a resistance fighter whose fight starts the very moment New York City is invaded, and later helps to blow up the occupied White House.
For playwright Leonard Madrid, there's nothing like watching his story come to life. "Last year, one of my plays was produced at UNM, and eight months later, it was produced at Eastern (New Mexico University) with a completely different cast, completely different set," he said.
"Snake Oil for the Lovelorn" is not a play. "It's more like kind of a world," artistic director and actor Richard van Schouwen said. "And the experience is kind of like visiting a foreign town." The performance is presented by q-Staff Theater. Van Schouwen, co-founder of the company, said the performance is physical theater - an evolving performance of multiple live art forms such as poetry, music, acting and dance with no script or characters.
Indie-rock band Minmae began as Sean Brooks' solo project, but it has evolved into something bigger. Brooks started the band in 1998. Since then, Minmae has seen members come and go. But Brooks said it now seems pretty sound. "We've had a revolving cast of members over the last 10 years," he said.
Rosalinda Rojas trains people to join the circus and make it a career. "I come from the era where, if you're not born in the circus, it's really hard to break in," Rojas said. She founded the Albuquerque School for Circus Arts, at 1001 Yale Blvd. S.E., in 1999 to train her daughter, Gabi, who is in the UNM Dance Department.
There's a bona fide vaudevillian freak show coming to town. Co-creator Samantha X said there hasn't been a show like this in 45 years. "I was using pictures of freaks to teach anatomy and physiology," she said. "Then I met (accordionist) Dylan, and he asked me if I wanted to put together a show to highlight freak-show history.
Verb Collective is an anti-gallery. "Where the hell else can you have holistic healing art?" said Verb member Andrew Kiff. "Aha. See? There you go. We win. Ding! Verb scores again." Kiff said most art galleries are dull. "Someone says, 'Come to the art gallery.
It wouldn't be fair to say director George Romero has lost his touch - "Diary of the Dead" is an acceptable zombie movie. It's just not a Romero zombie movie. The problem is, by using the shaky-cam method of filming, he allowed the soul to be sucked out of the movie.
The first piece in Christine Chin's exhibit is powered by a fuel tank of liquefied worms. The exhibit, "Alternative Alternative Energy," has five pieces that represent their own micro energy economy because they power themselves, Chin said. The exhibit will be up through April 4 in the Jonson Gallery.
In "Laughing Wild," two lonely souls find love - in the tuna fish aisle. The play's two characters, referred to only as Man (played by Blake Catherwood) and Woman (Heather Yeo), reflect on their high-anxiety urban lives in monologues and bizarre, coinciding dream sequences.
Artists explored emotional and physical shelter in the exhibit "Giving Shelter," a sister to the Cradle Project. The Cradle Project aims to get 1,000 artists to each make a cradle to raise funds for orphans in Africa. Proceeds from 516 Arts' "Giving Shelter," at 516 Central Ave.
Casual games might turn out to be the downfall of mankind. There are few things in the world more addictive - though heroin and "World of Warcraft" come to mind. Sunday night I bought a copy of "Lumines" for the PC. I'm writing this on Tuesday afternoon, and I've managed to log 15 hours of play time on the game.
Zoltan Szekely learned guitar from a Hungarian trapeze artist. "Before that, I played the violin, and I was a miserable failure at violin," he said. "After I got instructions from the circus trapeze artist, I began to see the way." His band, the Zoltan Orkestar, is made up of accordion, guitar, bass, percussion and occasionally violin.
For the past six months, the Fertile Crescent has been on the injured list. "We couldn't play for four whole months because our drummer overextended his wrists from playing too much," vocalist Bryce Hample said. The Fertile Crescent will perform at Winning Coffee Co.
Solutions by The State News
