_i a -a. w w I Uf c K- . ....................... .............. ...... ................. . ............................. . ...... ............... ... ........... ... ........... ... .......... 1.1.'.*.*.".'., .................. ......... . ...... .......... .... .. .. . ... Too rye ay Dexy's Midnight Runners St. Andrews Hall 431 E. Congress, Detroit Tuesday, February 15 By Larry Dean SOUL. YOU CAN philosophize about it, debate about its existence - read Nietzsche by the bedside and go to sleep curiouser. Or you can pray for its redemption down on scabbed knees, hands aclasp, envisioninga shirt marked SOUL being scrubbed on a "washboard by hands that haven't ever heard of Madge or Palmolive orv... And then there's the other soul - best described by these names: James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Sly Stone, Stevie Wonder. They got it, they got it good. But are by no means alone in their gotness. Kevin Rowland is white. In that respect, he resembled the washed shirt from paragraph no. one above. I don't know if he reads Nietzsche. Kevin Rowland is the lead vocalist for Dexy's Midnight Runners. They have Roots reggae The Core Rick's American Cafe Wednesday, February 16 By Tom McDonald DON'T SAY THAT Pittsburgh hasn't given us any entertaining groups. They've given us the Steelers and the Pirates. Now, they bring us The Core, a tight five-piece reggae band which will ganga into Rick's Wed- nesday night for an exciting evening of powerful sound. The Core embody the American reggae sound by flavoring the traditional Jamaican rhythm with bits of R and B, jazz, and rock. The band plays almost all original material, save for a few Bob Marley tunes like "Exodus" and "Jammin", which may just be an honorary gesture to the deceased master. The Core's stage presence coupled with their ability to excite their crowd into frenzied dance, has 'made them very popular with collegiates in the Tri-State area of Pen- nsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. Recognizing their potential in Ann Ar- bor, The Core will bring their "rockin reggae" to Rick's, where other reggae bands have recently been well- received. two albums out in the U.S., the latest of which, Too-Rye-Ay, was just recently released here after a year's release in Europe. Their first, Searching for the Young Soul Rebels, was a big hit in England, but failed to make any waves here. Of course, it was wonderful. What Dexy's specialize in is Soul, with an ever-present capital "S". Their music is spunky and sincere and yes, sometimes even political. Now that isn't exactly the newest thing to be hap- pening in these days of "greatest con- cerns" groups sprouting up left and right, but it is a nice and sincere touch. Too-Rye-Ay is a marvelous follow-up to Searching. .. , with its own pleasant alterations and movees ahead from the sound of the first LP. They've come a long way from the switching-through- the-radio-stations intro of "Burn It Down" (A/K/A "Dance Stance") to "Come On Eileen," which is quite possibly the most orgasmic song of the last year, if not for its verve, then for daring to include a banjo! There have only really been two other acceptable uses of the banjo in modern music to date - one being the Who's "Squeeze Box," and the otehr being a Natalie Cole song, the title of which is unknown to me - hey, I heard it one mysterious night on Don Kirschner's Rock Concert, how can I be held totally accountable? (For further reference, see Gabriel, Peter: "Excuse Me"). Rowland's point with the intro to "Burn It Down" was undoubtedly that he didn't feel Dexy's fit into any of the categories ofrmusiche switched past, like Deep Purple, the Specials, the Sex Pistols ... so, he shut the radio off. Simple as 1-2-3: Dexy's Midnight Run- ners are not to be clumped together with anyone else. Trouble is always a-brewin' in Dexy- ville, however. Right after Sear- ching ... came out, the group split in half, with the basic rock band outfittees (guitar, bass, drums) remaining with Rowland, and the horn section bopping off and becoming the Bureau, a group with a similar sound to Dexy's, yet still individualized enough to distinctify their identity. To my knowledge, they only released one single before heading off to endless Englebert Humperdinck sessions (consider this a true "loss-of- Soul"). As Soupy Sales always used to say, "the proof is in the pudding," and here the pudding happens to be Too-Rye-Ay. Obviously, Rowland and Co. made it through the split, bouncing back onto their collective-feet with assurance: as I said before, this is a wonderful album. Buy it for your mom; tape it for your dad to listen to at the office on your brother's Walkmans; play it for Spot and Kitty, who'll be waggin' their tails to "Let's Make This Precioius" and will never eat Purina products again. Even the lowliest of beasts cannot come away unchanged by Dexy's. Which brings us in a not-so-quite-but- adequate way back around to the question of the Soul. Too-Rye-Ay has got the horns, but lots more strings. OK, so Englebert uses lots of strings, but these are not wimpy ... However, their use was incentive enough for the Inew horn section to walk off and leave Papa "em: n interview Performance Network 408 W. Washington 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday, February 11-12 2 p.m. Sunday, February 13 By Jeffrey W. Manning THIS WEEKEND, Ernest Heming- way will conduct interviews at the Performance Network. No, of course not the real one, he's dead. But his character lives on in Hem: An Inter- view, a one-man play conceived and performed by Robert Beaupre. Though the show was scheduled only for this. weekend, there is a slight possibility it will reopen next weekend, the 17-20, since the Young People's Theatre production of The Best-Laid Plans has been canceled. Hem is a hypothetical interview with Ernest Hemingway presented in one act. The play is structured in four sec- tions, each corresponding to one of Hemingway's passions: war, women, writing, and the sea. Beaupre commen- ted on the purpose of the play: "Most importantly, I wanted to present an overall view of Hemingway as a person as seen through his works, but at the same time show how his personal life paralleled the content of these works." Besides the emphasis on the four passions .of Hemingway, the play also involves his relationship with Ezra Pound, who was one of his greatest in- fluences. One of the most difficult aspects of this play will be whether Beaupre can accurately portray Hemingway. Everyone who has read his writings has some sort of preconceived idea of what Hemingway's personality is. Beaupre prepared for the writing of the text by reading all of Hemingway's works, his letters, and journals, as well as half a dozen biographies on the man. The most difficult aspect of writing the play was capturing Hemingway's style of speech, especially his use of ad- jectives and sentence structure. "It demanded more from me as an actor," said Beaupre,'"because of the style in which it was written, and the tran- sitions that take place in the script." Beaupre is a 1979 graduate of the fine arts department of the University of Detroit. In 1977, he co-founded the Black Sheep Theatre in Manchester, where he worked in a number of shows. Just recently, he moved back to his home town of Ann Arbor and appeared in the Performance Network's produc- tion of Endgame last fall. He and the Performance Network are co- producing this show, which has already been performed nearly 25 times in the past three years at various colleges and high schools in the midwest. Kevin Rowland: Soul Kev and crew in the lurch. Swell, just swell. There is some incantation of Dexy's Midnight Runners coming to Detroit. That's what this is all about: see them. "Come On Eileen" was a monster hit in England, riding the top of the charts for months - it deserves all the attention it got. It's a great song. This is a great group. Kevin Rowland cares to the point of going out of his way to avoid categories; Dexy's does it with aplomb - earnest aplomb - there ain't much of that around anymore. And somewhere, a young man with dreams of guitar-glory signs on the dot- ted line for a certain Mr. Beelzebub ... Hem: Stand-up performance Beaupre did write the script alone, however. "I was fascinated by the idea of writing a one-man show," he said. "But once I began reading him (Hemingway) I found he was an in- credible author, much greater than I had ever known, mainly due to the con- tent. I realized that this was ideal materia nobody The p Saturda afternoo Tickets formanc Theatre Prince of Tyre Pericles Professional Theater Program Power Center 8 p.m. Tuesday, February 15 By Chris Lauer T IS NOT often that one finds a decent production of a Shakespeare play. Everyone does Shakespeare, even the 12th grade drama class. To really experience Shakespeare, one has to seek out the productions done right - in a style consistent with the greatness of the author. Theatre doesn't get any bet- ter than a well done Shakespeare play; to suggest otherwise is blasphemous. Last year Twelfth Night was in the not-to-miss category, and this year John Houseman's Acting Company is back with Pericles, not as well known as Romeo and Juliet, but who cares - it's still Shakespeare. The one night only performance will be at the Power Center on Feb. 15 at 8 p.m. The Acting Company, which is the of- ficial touring arm of the Kennedy Cen- ter, was formed by Houseman and other Julliard School colleagues as a way of keeping the school's most out- standing graduates together. Since its inception in 1972 the company has been dedicated to the development of young actors and boasts of many past The Core: Gang of four Unlike their Jamaican counterparts, The Core does not have a strong political message to convey. Said drummer Ken Crisafio in a telephone interview from the Steel Ctiy, "We don't want to get into the realm of being a heavy political band with some big message to communicate, like to save the world." He added, "However, we do put out a positive message. We definitely are a positive band with something to say. We want people to feel good." The philosophy of the band thus seems to be the let's-play-reggae- and-have-a-good-time approach, rather than the let-our-music-be-the-vehicle- to-convey-our-spiritual-beliefs attitude. While The Core is not heavily into the Rastafarian cultural traditions, they certainly don't ignore them. "We draw on Rastafarian beliefs as well as Christian beliefs in our music," says Crisafio. The band does not want to restrict themselves to one image, but would like to encompass a number of different philosophies to capture their own reggae-style sound. They combine the versatilitynof their own musical backgrounds into the framework of the Jamaican reggae tradition to produce a potent and fresh approach to the genre. Drummer Crisafio and bassist Brooks provide a solid rhythmic foun- dation for the rest of the band to expand on. Their driving, upbeat rhythms quickly turn their listeners in- to dancers. With an excellent voice and all the stage moves to go with it, lead singer Tony Miles is the focal point of the band. His wild stage activity alwlays keeps the attention of the audience. Miles is a dynamic performer with alluring charisma and the ability to siphon many different sounds out of his voice. He pools together a wide variety of influences ranging from the Otis Redding sound to a sensual Marley-ish tone. Miles goes beyond his influences to a vocal style all his own, giving him the potential to surface as one of the dominant figures on the American reggae scene. Expect an unshackled evening of rockin reggae from the quintet from Pittsburgh. This aggressive band will be out to make a killing. Pericles: Light show memebers now thriving in show business on their own. The company does both classical and modern plays and has performed a repertory of 45 to date. Pericles, the title character, is a gallant and likeable guy. Like a peaceful pasture animal, all he wants out of life is a shady place to relax, but he cannot even seem to approach this modest ideal. He looks for a niche of peaceful existence but is prodded and pushed, tossed and turned by forces beyond his control. Which welcome we'll accept; feast here awhile, Until stars that frown lend us a smile. It is the way Pericles gets kicked around that is so impressive - he loses with style. No one with such patience could lose in the end - and Pericles doesn't. Peric play. T powerfu uncoop the Ba does no devices fine ea tualism bor's c - how impecc 12 Weekend/February 11, 1983 5