The Michigan Daily michigandaily.com I Thursday, September 20, 2007
The Daily Arts
guide to the best
upcoming events
- it's everywhere
you should be this
week and why.
AT THE MICH
"Refusing to be Ene-
mies," about a Jewish
and Arab women's dis-
cussion groups comes
to The Michigan The-
ater Monday through
Wednesday. The film
shows at 7:15 p.m.
each night. Tickets are
$6.75 for students.
AT THE MIC
The School of Art and
Design hosts Ellen
Lupton, a curator of
contemporary design
at the Cooper-Hewitt
National Design Muse-
um in NYC, in a free
and public lecture at
The Michigan Theater
today at 5 p.m. Expect
the theater to be
packed, as these lec-
tures usually are, with
some of your most-
driven peers.
COVER
f you'll forgive the comparison, cover art is sort of like
wine: It only gets better with age, and you have to
be a drunk or nerdy enthusiast to really appreciate it.
As we here at Daily Arts are nerdy enthusiasts (and
drunks), adjusting our oversized, plastic-frame glasses
while enjoying the occasional alcoholic beverage, talk-
ing about album cover art is right up our alley. Be it
the considerable merits of The Beatles [White Album] or the
completely preposterous, Spinal Tap-did-it-first Black Album
by Metallica, album art is totally engrossing and occasionally
more important than the music itself. I'll bet you can remem-
ber little else about Andrew W.K. than his bludgeoned face on
the cover of I Get Wet.
Ahead is a short list of some of our favorite album covers.
From the surrealist Late For the Sky by Jackson Brown to the
photographic aspirations of The Talking Heads' More Songs
About Buildings and Food, each cover says something about
the album typically undisclosed without it. Put on your reading
glasses, pull out that box of wine and get nerdy.
STORI
PACKAGING
Alice Cooper
Schools Out
Warner Bros.1972 f
School's Out is a
perfect example of
the record's nope-
riority over the
CD when it romeo
toart and packaging. The album looks like
a school desk replete with carved graffiti
on the outside and a slingshot, unfinished
homework and trash beneath its lid. On the
back, two cardboard legs unfold and make
the album stand. Did I mention the record
inside was originally wrapped in a pair of
girls' paper panties?
CAITLIN 00OWAN
ART
Pixies
Doolittle
4A0/Elektra 1989
The Pixies let
photographer
Simon Larbales-
tier read the lyrics
to Doolittle before the album's cover shoot,
which led to inspired cover art to match the
ES
album. The haloed monkey and numbers on
the front reference the themes of "Monkey
Gone to Heaven," and the album's equally-
artful liner notes referenceparticular lyr-
ics and themes from other songs, like a set
of teeth to depict the lyric "It shakes my
teeth" from "IBleed."
IAITLIN 00OWAN
THE
PHARCYDE
Bizarre Ride lthe
Pharryde
Delicious Vinyl
1992
Whensallkthe
West Coast knew
about hip hop was chronic, gangbang-
lug and G-Funk, The Pharcyde offered an
alternative. The cover to Bizarre RideIIthe
Pharcyde is as animated and extraordinary
as thetalbum, depicting the four tM atthe
height of a long, looping rollercoaster, about
to enter the garish, gnashing mouth of a
tunnel. Similar to the artwork, the album
is a flash of comedic stunts, brilliant tracks
and upbeat rhyming to a style never before
heard in California. The beautifully crafted
See ALBUM ART, Page 4B
AT THE COMEDY
SHOWCASE
Don't be fooled by his
stony demeanor. The
Ann Arbor Comedy
Showcase reports that
Auggie Smith, who
debuts this weekend,
is "energetic" and
"hysterical." Friday and
Saturday at 8 p.m. and
10:30 p.m. - tickets
are $12 and $14.
- Chris Gaerig
How TV
changed
for me
By BEN MEGARGEL
DailyArts Writer
On a balmy day this past
July I stood on the 52nd floor
of the Rockefeller building
with the premature illusion
that I'd "made it." Just being
on the same level that NBC
CEO Jeff Zucker receives
full maid service gave me the
extraordinary feeling that I'd
reached a corporate zenith
after a three-month stint as g
See NBC, Page 4B
MoCAD's way with words
By KIMBERLY CHOU
Associate Arts Editor
The Museum of Contem-
porary Art Detroit's new
exhibition, "Words Fail
Me," explores the relation-
ship between
visual art and Words
language. As a
non-collecting Fail Me
institute with
curators that Through
cycle by show, Jan.20
MoCAD brings At MoCAD
to its space
expansivetalent
and organizers to match.And
the new show, the museum's
fourth, maintains the ambi-
tiously high bar.
Curated by Matthew
Higgs, director of the
esteemed New York gallery
White Columns, the exhibit
loosed itself upon Detroit
with a special reception last
Saturday night. Music acts
Little Claw, Pink Reason and
Michael Yonkers performed.
But most befitting the exhibit
was a reading by poet John
Giorno, .joyously exercising
his still-spry septuagenar-
ian voice and body in a dis-
play that proved the power
of words as art. Performance
art.
"People traditionally think
that poetry is something you
read sitting in a chair," said
Giorno, founder of the Gior-
no Poetry Systems collective
and its Dial-A-Poem experi-
ment (although the most eas-
ily recognized as subject of
Andy Warhol's "Sleep"). "But
there are other avenues. You
can make itan art form."
For the crowd gathered in
-the MoCAD's central room
Saturday, Giorno alternately
barreled and tiptoed his way
through half a dozen pieces.
He read excerpts from "The
DeathofWilliamBurroughs,"
See MOCAD, Page 4B
AT THE MIC
It's still debated
whether "anti-folk"
is a real category but
Ani diFranco.will
be here. Tickets are
still on sale (32.50 -
$37.50) for her 8 p.m.
Sunday concert at The
Michigan Theater.
'