Week of March 6, 2008, Issue #646
COVER
Steve Earle
There’s a long, hard road out there, and Steve Earle has walked a big stretch of it. He’s a man who has been dedicated to his craft—songwriting—learning from masters like Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark and working in Nashville as a staff writer until he finally got his own shot and recorded his debut, Guitar Town. The record was the beginning of a career that was very nearly derailed by a drug addiction that led to a short stint in jail. But, while there are plenty of artists who hit the bottom and never recover, Earle rebounded, entering into a new period of creativity after his release and recovery. read more...
FRONT
Hard work and heartache: election day at the David Eggen campaign
Kelly Bitford’s eyes shine as she tells me about David Eggen and his work in Edmonton Calder. “We’re very lucky that we have such a candidate,” she says. “He works very hard.” read more...
Let’s be honest: we lost - SCOTT HARRIS / scott@vueweekly.com
A war in South America? Not likely, rhetoric aside - GWYNNE DYER / gwynne@vueweekly.com
Health care must move beyond damage control - CONNIE HOWARD / health@vueweekly.com
Oil Communication - DAVE YOUNG and TB PLAYER / inthebox@vueweekly.com
Thar be pirates sailing on a wave of Tory Blue - DARREN ZENKO / infinitelives@vueweekly.com
Doin’ it Siderite: queer allies clam up to make some noise - TED KERR / ted@vueweekly.com
Renegotiate NAFTA? That sounds like a good idea - MAUDE BARLOW / canadians.org
DISH
How to Cook Your Life
It isn’t hard to understand how someone could fall under the sway of Edward Brown, the main subject of Doris Dörrie’s documentary How to Cook Your Life. A languid, dreamy man quick—probably a bit too quick, actually—to chuckle and radiating inner calm, his demeanour and tack fall somewhere between an exceedingly benevolent grandfather and a favourite elementary school teacher, the kind of individual so eminently peaceable he probably dislikes walking on grass. His affability evidently charmed Dörrie: for better or for worse, her film is little more than a paean to the man, a wide-eyed but narrow-minded endorsement of everything he is and teaches/preaches. read more...
An IPA for oil-sodden Alberta - JASON FOSTER / greathead@vueweekly.com
Brown rice makes for a healthy and tasty pancakes - JAN HOSTYN / jan@vueweekly.com
Zucchero proves to be a delicous avventura
CHRISTOPHER THRALL / christopher@vueweekly.com
SNOW ZONE
Rockin’ the mountains with machines and dogsled teams
‘You brought boots, right?” Curtis Pawliuk asked uncertainly. I glanced at my ankle-high, brushed leather footwear. My shoes were ideal for navigating icy Edmonton parking lots. However, the amused look from the 28-year-old General Manager of the Valemount Area Recreation Development Association (VARDA—valemount.org/varda/) told me what he thought of them for alpine sledding. read more...
The World Cup report - HART GOLBECK / hart@vueweekly.com
Vernon’s Silver Star will have you feeling like a kid in a candy shop
Silver Star - RON YAMAUCHI / rony@vueweekly.com
EDUCATION
Teaching Overseas
Immediately following four years of university, few people are psyched for the prospect of getting a real career, settling into a mortgage and paying off those sizeable student loans. It’s pretty easy to understand the desire for adventure: the spirit of adventure is encouraged in institutions of higher learning, and unfettered from the routine of classes many people want to, to quote a friend of mine, “do something crazy and exciting.” read more...
Edmonton organization lays down deep global roots in rural Alberta - SCOTT HARRIS / scott@vueweekly.com
Stretch your love for yoga into a flexible career teaching others - CAROLYN NIKODYM / carolyn@vueweekly.com
Bruce Peel goes digital - MEGAN BERTAGNOLLI / megan@vueweekly.com
Education choices let children hablan espaÑol and sprechen Sie Deutsches - KRISTINA DE GUZMAN / kristina@vueweekly.com
New kind of all-nighter means trouble for university watering holes - CHLOÉ FEDIO / chloe@vueweekly.com
‘Life drawing’ is more about technique than titillation - JAY SMITH / jay@vueweekly.com
MacEwan writing programs: for those who want to write gooder - JAN HOSTYN / jan@vueweekly.com
You have clearance, Clarence. Roger, Roger. What’s your vector, Victor? - JAN HOSTYN / jan@vueweekly.com
After two decades, Harcourt House still makes the art grow fonder - CHRISTOPHER THRALL / christopher@vueweekly.com
Metro course explores the equation ‘comedy = tragedy + time’ - CAROLYN NIKODYM / carolyn@vueweekly.com
No need for a suit and tie at NAIT’s online school of business - JOEL SEMCHUK / joel@vueweekly.com
ARTS
Business As Usual
The last time Edmontonians saw one of Lynn Richardson’s kinetic landscapes, it was safely contained in a table-sized piece at Latitude 53, spoofing a cynical wilderness that lives in the imagination of marketers by merging it with features of actual backcountry. The noble buffalo is the luckless emissary for Manitoba Hydro, used in campaigns to recall pristine countryside, but in reality driven near extinction years ago and only found on farms and in ads. Richardson compressed the real with the wishful: cranking a handle on her plexi-encased piece set a herd of rough-hewn buffalo stampeding across rolling greenery, threatening tangles of electricity towers—the genuine beasts of Manitoba wilderness. read more...
Citadel Play Personalizes Massacre - DAVID BERRY / david@vueweekly.com
Spenrath’s motormouthed Trillionaires - PAUL BLINOV / blinov@vueweekly.com
Humanity proves Heavens’ saving grace - DAVID BERRY / david@vueweekly.com
Expanse Movement Arts Festival
Borostik’s Movement Arts festival will Expanse your mind - SHERRY DAWN KNETTLE / sherry@vueweekly.com
Should Easton stay or should he go? - AMY FUNG / amy@vueweekly.com
FILM
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
Set in Bucharest in 1989, Romanian writer/director Cristian Mungiu’s Palme d’Or-winning 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days concerns the arduous process through which Gabita (Laura Vasiliu), a young university student, procures an illegal abortion. Much of the legwork, however, is undertaken by Gabita’s devoted friend Otilia (the remarkable Anamaria Marinca). She’s the one who secures a hotel room, who negotiates with the imposing back alley abortionist Mr Bebe (Vlad Ivanov), all while attempting to placate her moody boyfriend. read more...
Open this Golden Door - JOSEF BRAUN / dvdetective@vueweekly.com
Clap if you believe in fairies: DINX is about happy endings - MARY CHRISTA O'KEEFE / marychrista@vueweekly.com
The Bank Job, David Cronenberg Retrospective, The Best of Ottawa 2007 -
MUSIC
Allison Moorer
On Mockingbird, Allison Moorer eschews her own songwriting—for the most part anyway: the title track came from her pen—in favour of a collection of cover songs, all of them written or co-written by female songwriters like Moorer’s sister, Shelby Lynne, Canadian folkie Joni Mitchell and Chan Marshall, also known as Cat Power. read more...
Prevue - KRISTINA DE GUZMAN / kristina@vueweekly.com
Justice Reigns: the French take Germany - ROLAND PEMBERTON / roland@vueweekly.com
Harp player has got the grade 7 blues - GEN HANDLEY / gen@vueweekly.com
The globetrotting Dust Poets’ aural identity blows with the wind - MARY CHRISTA O'KEEFE / marychrista@vueweekly.com
Spring is Here—for Laura Crema, anyway - ALYSSA NOEL / alyssa@vueweekly.com
Prevue - BRYAN BIRTLES / bryan@vueweekly.com
Justin Townes Earle, Steve Aoki, Born Ruffians, Cadence Weapon, Yes Nice -
Report fails to explain why CDs keep selling - STEVEN SANDOR / steven@vueweekly.com
WHITEY and TB PLAYER / quickspins@vueweekly.com
This Sparrow is taking flight on his own - CAROLYN NIKODYM / carolyn@vueweekly.com