Get your fuzzy warbles rick's "A Clockwork Orange" is pure dystopian brilliance. Listening to the "William Tell Overture" will never be the same. At the Michigan Theater, 7 p.m. ARA"kym aft TS TUESDAY MARCH 7, 2000 5 michigandaily.com /arts 'Best Thing' isn't Madonna By Leslie Boxer Daily Arts Writer "The Next Best Thing" is the latest woman-with-a-homosexual best friend challenge to the more conservative view of relationships and family. This time we follow the trials and tribula- tions of Abbie (Madonna), a yoga instructor who is "too complicated" for straight men, and Robert (Rupert Everett), a gardener, who is tired of his homosexual lifestyle. The story starts out light-hearted describing Abbie and Robert's friend- ship, Abbie's breakup from the bimbo- seeking Kevin (Michael Vartan), and a Courtesy of Kerrytown Concert House Trumpeter Cuong Vu, quartet leader Chris Speed, bassist Skull Sverrisson and drummer Jim Black make up yeah NO. Post-modem j boasts flawl essdrummer comical scene TheNxt Best Thing Grade: D At Briarwood, Quality 16 & Showcase R,%*. ,4 in which Robert, dressed flamboy- antly, pretends to be Kevin's effem- inate lover in order to get Abbie's keys back. All of this is part of the exaggerated buildup to a fate- ful Fourth of July when Robert and By John Uhl Daily Music Editor What did you do over spring break? I saw the best drummer in the world. Twice. I Amid the cross-state shuffle *ween my residences, I had the for- V& to catch performances by tenor saxophonist/clarinetist Chris Speed's yeah NO quartet in Grand Rapids and at Ann Arbor's Kerrytown Concert House (don't worry, I'll come back to that drummer). By most accounts, yeah NO is an adventurous post-modern ensemble from New York's downtown jazz scene that incorporates traditional elements of jazz with rock, funk thms, classical composing meth- ods and, most emphatically empha- sized by the press, Eastern European folk melodies; sort of a John Coltrane meets James Brown meets Ivo Papasov and His yeahNo Bulgarian Kerrytown Wedding Band. oncert House But in that Mar. 4, 2000 description I've already manipu- lated two words that are often used somewhat flippantly: Tradition and folk. In the music world, folk usually refers to a class of people's native music; the unso- p isticated, that is not guided by for- training or rules, music of the general population. Tradition, then, is the means by which these people maintain a cultural continuity, through music in this instance, to help shape the present day. My description of yeah NO becomes anomalous when the nature of jazz music is questioned: Couldn't, in a certain sense, jazz be sidered an American folk music? its inception jazz was certainly considered to be an unsophisticated example of common class kitsch, placed in the same "not proper" cat- egory as other supposed folk music. Classical composer Aaron Copeland, who was singled out for his transfor- mation of a Shaker folk tune into "Appalachian Spring," one of the 20th Century's most distinguished American compositions, was corre- ndingly noted for including the iuence ofjazz into his milieu. And jazz, steadily mutating through approximately a century's worth of generational inheritance, has estab- lished itself as a tradition. Thus, as jazz and folk and tradi- tion all become relatively synony- mous, my description fades into redundancy, reading something like Chris Speed's quartet plays 4erican folk music that also notably includes Eastern European folk music. Isn't the real point sim- ply that he plays music (embellishing a little, that he artfully encompasses a global variety of influences into this music)? Courtesy of Paramount Pictures Rupert Everett and Madonna play friends-with-benefits in "The Next Best Thing." NO into an exploration of the exotic. I bring this up mostly because, in the day of hip-hop music, which derives its spunk from assimilating sampled musical bits with freeflow- ing lyrical innovation, and Internet websites that teller last minute air- line tickets, the most vital musics are those that intelligently balance the hybrid tightrope between styles that have already been established and can appeal to the continuously grow- ing global marketplace. When I spoke to yeah NO's drum- mer (just another minute till I talk about how great he is) Jim Black between sets on Thursday, he spoke eagerly of attracting a more disparate audience, recalling a recent sold-out gig at the club Tonic in New York. "Where did these people come from?" he remembered wondering about the unusually youthful crowd that was likely drawn bythe club's atmosphere and reputation. Of course I don't mean to suggest that musicians should promptly set sail for Paraguay or the Kamchatka Peninsula in the name of broadening artistic or economic horizons. In fact that would cause the music to become just what I feared earlier, a quest for the eccentric. The music still has to be genuine and, in Speed's case, it is. One piece had the freeform 1960s lilt of Charles Lloyd's "Forest Flower Suite" while simultaneously possess- ing the melodicism of the best early nineties alternative pop music - powered by the rhythm of Skuli Sverrisson's guitar-mimicking six- string electric bass strums, the tune (thankfully; charmingly) never relented its naive fury, Cuong Vu's trumpet aiming its climax until it slowly ran out of gas and puttered away. One time Sverrisson's bass bubbled into a snapping stew of elec- tronic overtones that the whole ensemble followed into a cavorting reminiscence of the early eighties downtown noise scene; another, the group sounded like Miles Davis playing a Turkish dirge on the moon. And then (here it comes...) there was Jim Black. I'll take the Pepsi challenge that some of his snare and high-hat beats were repeated fast enough to put the most rapid and precise drum machine to shame. But Black wasn't phenomenal for pre- senting the most flawless or virtuosic performance I've ever seen, though it may have been close. Or one that dazzled by enveloping the entire scope of the percussion instrumen- talist's history. Black was a wonder because he absolutely dominated the ensemble. At times it was even diffi- cult to hear Speed's clarinet or Vu's trumpet over Black as it sounded like he was violently banging on a set of trashcans. But I didn't care. It was musical, artistic, elegant trashcan banging. Listen to yeah NO's latest recording "Deviantics" and realize that the group seems hushed because the recording levels on Black's kit were probably turned down. I've done it twice, and can assure that in person is the way to see this band. Abbie get drunk ' and have sex. Throughout the beginning of the film, Abbie is feeling depressed because she believes Kevin was her last chance for love, marriage and a family. She whines to Robert about getting older and wanting a child - not a hus- band - a child. It's as if she is already thinking about the possibility of Robert as the father to her child. The audience, at this point, should be questioning whether or not Abbie has recently attended a seminar given by Frank T.J. Mackey. Abbie is seemingly begging to turn herself into a sperm receptacle (she even creates the tragedy of her breakup to surround the situation). Once Abbie tells Robert she is preg- nant and they decide to keep the baby and live together as a family, the film jumps ahead six years to find Madonna with a new haircut and Sam (Malcolm Stumpf), Abbie and Robert's son, beginning to ask questions about his family. Just as he's doing so, we are introduced to Ben (Benjamin Bratt), the suave banker who falls in love with Abbie and causes problems for the family. This is the point where the film begins to realize its own shortcomings as a carbon copy of other movies and TV shows with similar themes. In order to distinguish itself, "The Next Best Thing" convolutes the plot with twists and turns that add absurdity to the story. This is a really bad idea. The additions, which center on a custody battle for Sam, are contrived and make the film too serious. What director John Schlesinger is trying to accomplish in this part of the film by raising questions about the def- inition of family and legal rights afforded to homosexuals is interesting and may be a good topic on its own. It is, however, thrown in a hodge-podge manner into a Madonna movie that cannot support serious subjects. Also disappointing is the fact that Madonna proves once again to be a ter- rible actress. She not only cannot deliv- er her lines without sounding phony, but she has also adopted an on-again- off-again faux British accent that sounds ridiculous, especially next to Rupert Everett's real English accent. What is so surprising about Madonna's poor acting is that the role seems like an exaggeration of her own life - she and Rupert Everett really are good friends, she is a single mother out of wedlock and she does yoga. These are not demanding characteristics to por- tray, particularly if they are describing your own life. Rupert Everett, who is usually charming and witty, is also not at his best. He has done a sloppy remake of his "My Best Friend's Wedding" role as the gay best friend. What's so upsetting is that Everett is a good actor and yet much of his dialogue is spent telling Madonna that she is beautiful. This woman is a talented musician, hugely famous and largely successful - does she really need to be told how pretty she is multiple times as an ego boost? If anyone should be praised about their looks it is the slew of gorgeous men in this movie. What is worrisome is that the film is suggesting that hav- ing a baby with your best friend because you feel as if you are getting too old and options are running out may truly be the next best thing. At what point do women have to start worrying? Should I start looking now? .**.. .. _ ~1 T 'I " . ' .7 ] wj I- - LSA STUDENTS & MAY 2000 GRADS Seeking a REWARDING SUMMER JOB? Be a Summer Academic Peer Advisor! Info at LSA Advising Center, 1255 Angell or Attend an Information Session at 4:30 p.m., Wednesday, March 8, 3410 Mason Hall 0 . ..., N t - . k .,. aao nr r+ 1r .< .......... «.-k..e .. .. .. ., ... ..,... ,. p...q....~ o A ! AT -- T, r , r . ; 1 I UNVERSIIT ACTIVI|IES CENTER A-K K _._ t - .' 1 f EATUPIN G: AU ._ i w! m