By CHARLES ANDREWS
YOUR FRIENDLY WEEKLY REMINDER
Four City Council members –
DAN HALL, JESSE ZWICK, NATALYA ZERNITSKAYA, CAROLINE TOROSIS –
Voted to throw away the best chance we had to not only save the Santa Monica Civic, but restore it to performance status. One of the most storied concert venues in the world. Don’t forget those names
But DAN HALL is working hard with Goldenvoice, in exclusive negotiations, to bring his version of much-needed culture to Santa Monica: an EDM concert on the beach for 35,000. Next week, I will tell you the many reasons why this is a really bad idea.
GUNS ARE AS AMERICAN AS APPLE PIE
DON MCLEAN, Sat 2/7, Saban Theatre, Beverly Hills – So you just love his sweet tenor voice, and OMG, just to hear “American Pie” and “Vincent” – they’re signposts of your life. Well, times change, we learn things that alter our innocence, and somewhere along the line, McLean became the NRA red hat guy who was all set to play the big NRA/guns convention in Texas last year, until the very last minute, when he cancelled “out of respect for the victims of the Uvalde shooting” just a few miles away. Yahoo News, which is very suspect, played it that way, but I was paying attention at the time, and I know he didn’t cancel until the outcry became more than he wanted to risk. Respect for the victims? Then he would have pulled out the very next day, but he didn’t. I say it was a calculated career move. And what was he doing playing a big NRA convention in the first place? Guess he figured that’s his audience. Uvalde was not the first gun massacre, just the latest. I almost never recommend AGAINST an artist or performance, but folks, we have to start voting with our wallets. McLean thinks we all forgot, or we’ll buy the rewritten history.
Bye bye unAmerican guy.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED:
LIBRARY GIRL – Susan, forgive me! But I just hit my deadline. I don’t even know the prompt for this month’s show, but it doesn’t matter. I do know that in 10 years, I’ve never seen a bad one, so go. Spoken word and music, in these trying times bound to be inspirational. Sun 7 p.m., Ruskin Group Theatre, SM Airport, $20.
HOT CLUB OF LOS ANGELES – The HCOLA don’t claim to play note for note Django but they are the spot on purveyers of his spirit, and though I would love to time travel back to The Hot Club of Paris (I would also go looking for Josephine Baker), listening to this virtuoso ensemble is so close it doesn’t matter much, and no travel needed except just over the SM border to Sepulveda Boulevard. Their website shows them booked every Sunday evening through… 2027, but why wait? In this uncertain world, anything could happen. Sundays 9 p.m., Cinema Bar, Culver City, always no cover.
RECOMMENDED:
PACIFIC OPERA PROJECT, “ABDUCTION FROM THE SERAGLIO” Mozart meets Star Trek, this lil ol’ opera company that started in Santa Monica is really good, and I highly recommend their productions, but just ran out of time to tell you much more than that. Go, if there are still tickets. Fri, Sat 7:30 p.m., Sun 3 p.m., Thorne Hall, Occidental College, LA, $15-100.
“HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU” – They’re back for a new season, just in time! To make us all laugh at the headlines rather than sticking our heads in the oven or moving to Antarctica over the evil results of Stephen Miller’s latest Donald-whisperings/ Roy Wood Jr., ex-“The Daily Show” and brilliantly funny MC of the 2023 Washington Correspondents’ Dinner, is the ringmaster of this kind-of game show based on the news, but it’s much more important to be funny than correct. They don’t even pretend to keep score. Aided hilariously by team captains Michael Ian Black and Amber Ruffin, each with some celebrity teammate, usually struggling to keep up. Based on the immensely popular UK version, but, come on, except for Monty Python, Ricky Gervais, and Jimmy Carr, Yanks are much funnier. Sat 9 p.m., CNN.
TOLEDO DIAMOND – Who’s been showing up even longer than the Hot Club, with a very different but also virtuosic show? His decades-long Sunday night residency at Santa Monica’s Harvelle’s, the oldest blues bar in LA (almost a century!), is the stuff of myth. Toledo choreographs a truly unique show, a blend of ‘50s hipster jazz and his dancing dames and a most modern smokin’ hot band that gets better all the time. Toledo is perhaps the longest-running proof that Santa Monica is a City of the Arts. Sun 9 p.m., Harvelle’s, Santa Monica, $13.
COMING ATTRACTIONS (also recommended): PACIFIC OPERA PROJECT, “ABDUCTION FROM THE SERAGLIO,” Thorne Hall, Occidental College, LA, 2/6-8; “HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU,” CNN Sat 9 p.m., 2/7, 14; TOLEDO DIAMOND, Harvelle’s Santa Monica, 2/8, 15; HOT CLUB OF LOS ANGELES, Cinema Bar, 2/9, 16; JIM KWESKIN & FRIENDS, McCabe’s, 2/7; LIBRARY GIRL, Ruskin Theatre, 2/8; DUDAMEL, BEETHOVEN, LORENZ, SCHUMANN, Disney Hall, 2/12-15; ALBERT LEE, McCabe’s, 2/13; “HONOUR,” Ruskin Group Theatre, 2/14,15, 19-22, 26-28, 3/1, 5-8, 12-15, 19-22; ANNE HILLERMAN’S “DARK WINDS,” Season 4, AMC/+, 2/15; LA CAFE PLAYS, Ruskin Group Theatre, 2/15; PRSERVATION HALL JAZZ BAND, The Soraya, 2/18;
DOWN THE ROAD (also recommended): TOLEDO DIAMOND, Harvelle’s Santa Monica, 2/8, 15, 22, 29; “HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU,” CNN Sat 9 p.m., 2/7, 14, 21, 28; HOT CLUB OF LOS ANGELES, Cinema Bar, 2/9, 16, 23, 30; WARREN HAYNES Solo, Blue Note LA, 2/17, 18; DAMN WELL PLEASE ORGAN TRIO, Harvelle’s, 2/17; KAUKONEN The Final Tour, McCabe’s, 2/20, 21, 22; GUSTAVO, BEETHOVEN “MISSA SOLEMNIS,” Disney Hall, 2/20-22;
BEETHOVEN, ORTIZ, DUDAMEL, Disney Hall, 2/26-3/1; LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO, BroadStage, 2/27; BRANDI CARLILE, Kia Forum, 2/27; GLASS “AKHNATEN,” LA OPERA, 2/28, 3/8, 11, 14, 19, 22; BILL FRISELL TRIO, Blue Note LA, 3/4, 5; DUDAMEL, “Dante,” BEETHOVEN 6, Disney Hall, 3/5, 6, 8; SANTA CECILIA, Fonda, 3/6; CHARLIE HUNTER TRIO, Blue Note LA, 3/9; THE BAD PLUS POTTER TABORN, Blue Note LA, 3/10, 11; MADELEINE PEYROUX, Blue Note LA, 3/17, 18; “VERTIGO” in concert, Disney Hall, 3/21; ST. PAUL & THE BROKEN BONES, Kia Forum, 4/3; SAMARA JOY, Blue Note LA, 4/15, 16; VERDI “FALSTAFF,” LA OPERA, 4/18, 26, 30, 5/2, 6, 10; TAKE 6, Blue Note LA, 4/30-5/3; STANLEY CLARKE’S SANTA MONICA INTERNATIONAL JAZZ FESTIVAL, BroadStage, 5/1-9; MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO, Blue Note LA, 5/4, 5; LA SANTA CECILIA, Fonda Theatre, 5/7; MOZART “THE MAGIC FLUTE,” LA OPERA, 5/30, 6/6, 11, 14, 17, 21.
Charles Andrews has listened to a lot of music of all kinds, including more than 3,500 live shows. He has lived in Santa Monica for 40 years and wouldn’t live anywhere else in the world. Really. Send love and/or hate mail to: therealmrmusic@gmail.com.
