Hearsay: Wednesday, May 18, 2005
A D V E R T I S E M E N T
A D V E R T I S E M E N T
Local Round-Up

Ghost World, which came out in 2000, is a mediocre movie, based on a mediocre underground comic book, but it’s worthy of some praise for two reasons: First, the film takes a moment to scathingly satirize blues-rock, by introducing us to a nameless character whose idea of “authentic” blues is a band of mop-topped miscreants with loud guitars called Blues Hammer; second, and more significantly, Ghost World steps back briefly to scorch college-age students who think they’re just too cool for school. I’m talking specifically about the scene in the coffee shop in which some frat daddies walk by a table occupied by the film’s protagonists (Thora Birch and Scarlett Johansson), and one of the deliberately disheveled ruffians says to the others, loud enough for the girls to overhear, “Are you guys up for some reggae tonight?” What is it about pampered young white adults and African-American music? You probably would have parsed similar thoughts this past Friday at the Moon, where a predominantly blue-eyed (except for the black key’b player) Red Hot Chili Pepper-ish funk outfit performed to house packed with youngsters and the occasional codger (i.e., me). The band was good but would not have been as good in any other setting, with any other age musicians. (Apparently, young white males eventually get old enough to realize they shouldn’t be sponging off black musos’ inherent coolness.) I guess the mix of college students’ rebellious attitudes with rebellious music simply makes some sort of weird psycho-artistic sense. HearSay cannot tell a lie: There was a time, eons ago, during the balmy months, when skipping class to party on a buddy’s boat was almost always accompanied by the music of an artist who my white friends and I had just discovered — some dude named Bob Marley. Who knew that by our truancy we were unwittingly helping fashion a cruel joke of which we would eventually become the butts? ...
On the surface, the thought of a male TCU grad performing country-esque singer-songwriter material in the posh confines of the Ridglea & Vine Wine Room gives HearSay the willies. In reality, however, Fort Worthian Stephen Pointer was pretty damn impressive this past weekend there, spinning what could have been a nightmare into a close approximation of down-home Fort Worth wholesomeness, a vibe utterly devoid of pretension and full of genuine grooviness, much like the Wine Room itself. Pointer’s sound gets a lot of its muscle from his perfect fretwork, a combo of precisely picked, complex figures and larger, heftier, open-chord bombs. He’s about to release a full-length, sixes and sevens, and his next gig is Friday, at private party at the Colonial Golf Tournament. Pointer’s excellent, but we don’t know if even he can redeem Fort Worth’s annual celebration of all things vapid and vanilla. Visit www.stephenpointer.net for more info. ... Amber Fraiser, wife of Mitch Randal, 6th Street Grill sound engineer, is pregnant and also being treated for acute leukemia. The grill is holding a benefit for her Sunday. For more information, contact 6th Street owner Michael Tramel at 817-338-9300.
Contact HearSay at hearsay@fwweekly.com.

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