A rts Tuesday, September 23, 2014 -- 7
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom A rts Tuesday, September 23.2014-7
DETROIT ARTS COLUMN
Write A House
gives house to
Brooklyn poet
M ATA DOR
"I believe in symmetry."
Perfume Genius
sh ines 'TooBrgt
etroit's creative
scene has been
booming over the
last few years from music to the
literary arts, but it doesn't get
much more
creative than
giving away
a house to a
Brooklyn-
based poet,
which is
preciselyj
what Write PAIGE
A House PFLEGER
has done.
The offbeat
group bought a house off the
auction block for $1,000 back
in 2012 and renovated it to
give it away to a writer of any
kind. Casey Rocheteau beat out
hundreds of writers for her new
Hamtramack abode.
Write A House threw a
coming-out party for Rocheteau
last Friday to welcome her
into Detroit's literary scene.
Hamtramck's Public Pool set
the scene for the evening: the
galleryspace was adorned
with a myriad of different vinyl.
albums and Pink FlaminGO's
tin food truck offered curbside
locally grown, organic food.
Some of the most prominent
writing figures from the
city milled about the gallery,
including Write A House's
co-presidents Toby Barlow and
Sarah Cox of Curbed Detroit,
as well as Stephen Henderson,
a Pulitzer-Prize-winning Free
Press Journalist who is also
a mem
Board
"W
you de
city,")
"We'n
you to
know,
friend
Roc
her ne
is requ
as her
at leas
otheri
on her
hopes
her co
reside
"Ia
to be i
of Wri
told th
stunne
happe
everyo
and be
Roc
to
ci
Hen
for a Q
abouti
famou
and, of
interes
"I l
iber of the University's like, 'You're going to live there?'
of Student Publications. Ithink with DetroitI'm just
e're very honored that really, really fascinatedby the
cided to come to our fair arts scene," she said."This is an
Barlow said to Rocheteau. incredibly vibrant community.
e very excited to introduce Everyone was like,'you're
all the people that we gonna die' butI don't believe it,
and you'll make your own I don't believe it.Everyone does
s I'm sure." eventually."
:heteau will move into Coming straight from
w home on Nov. land Brooklyn, Rocheteau was
sired to use the house immediately surprisedby the
primary residence for cultural differences between
t two years. Her only something as simple as taking a
requirement is to work walk on the streets of her old city,
'writing. Write A House and her new one.
that she'll engage with "I took a walk today and Iran
mmunity and Detroit into eight people thatI didn't
nts at large. know that all just said, 'hi.' Iwas
m so absolutely thrilled like,'What's up Midwest!' It was
n Detroit, to bea part weird, living in Brooklyn I'm
te A House," Rocheteau also very accustomed to street
e crowd. "ObviouslyI'm harassment, and the one dude
ed that any of this is even who tried to holler at me, literally
ning. I just want to thank said to me, 'Heylittle mama.
ne for being here tonight, You like 'Star Trek'?' It was the
ingso welcoming." weirdest cat-callof mylife."
She hopesto make Detroit a
main feature of her upcoming
:heteauho writing, and the city's rich and
hee uhopes complicated history have inspired
rite on the her to try to combat the negative
writ onthenarratives that mainstream media
's ' ioften uses to describe the city.
s J' "I'm interested in digging
into the neighborhood and
actually seeing for myself what
sderson joined Rocheteau this is and what this really is,"
& A session, asking her she said. "Not just what this is
her favorite work, her quasi- portrayed as."
s cat, Omar Fromthewire
f course, why she is Pfleger is exploring
sted in Detroit. Hamtramck. To join her, e-mail
ve places where people are pspfleg@umich.edu.
Mike Hadreas feeds
off of his enemies
on latest album
ByBRIAN BURLAGE
Daily Arts Writer
Mike Hadreas has spent the
last two years of his life exorcis-
ing his demons. An epic state-
ment he made
in July makes A
this fact very
clear: "Some- Too Bright
times I see
faces of blank Perfume
fear when I Genius
walk by ... if
these fucking Matador
people want
to give me some power - if
they see me as some sea witch
with penis tentacles that are
always prodding and poking
and seeking to convert the mug-
gles - well, here she comes."
The "muggles" that Hadreas
referred to are all the people
who, for reasons of their own,
propagate the gay panic in our
culture. They are the same
people who cast incendiary
gazes upon Hadreas wherever
he walks, who cannot come to
terms with his fierce noncon-
formity, and yet they are the
same people who give him his
sense of power.
Hadreas feeds off the confu-
sion of his enemies. He takes
their insults and disgust and
he transforms them into a
kind of self-sustaining vitality.
His first two albums, Learn-
ing and Put Your Back N 2 It,
perfectly display his cycling
vigor, his pent-up anger that
fuels the creativity of his spirit.
The albums consist of taut and
powerful songwriting, dis-
tinguished by an in-your-face
aggression that pop music has
contorted into folly in recent
years. Mike Hadreas is bent on
fixing that problem.
And so he has crafted an
album that strikes not with
the swing of its fist but with
the turning of its back. Too
Bright brings to a careful head
all the beauty and devastation
of Hadreas's personal battles.
He's decided that the surest
way to cleanse himself of past
trauma is to sing into.the faces
of his persecutors with such
sincerity, such directness of
heart, that silence becomes the
only appropriate response. So it
is: Too Bright ends in peaceful
silence.
A string of insecurities fol-
low Hadreas throughout the
album - his mother demand-
ing grandchildren despite her
knowledge of his sexual ori-
entation and boyfriend, indus-
try executives pushing him
to sacrifice his unique style
for the price of a mainstream
breakthrough, friends and col-
laborators harping on him for
more material. As a young kid,
Hadreas was diagnosed with
Crohn's disease, an affliction
of the gastrointestinal tract
that inflames and debilitates
organs. He was often sick and
pale, and his weight fluctu-
ated dramatically. Chief of all
his insecurities are those that
involve this issue - his body.
"If I could just be a lump, or
a mist of smoke with eyes, I
probably would be that - just
an energy, moving around," he
said in an interview with Pitch-
fork. Too Bright is grounded in
this same wish. His keen desire
to transcend the limits of his
body grows and develops into
pure-form frustration, which
he harnesses and reinvents
with masterful artistry.
Hadreas enlisted the help
of Portishead's instrumental
guru Adrian Utley, as well as
engineer Ali Chant and PJ Har-
vey's drummer John Parish, to
furnish his vision of ethereal
darkness. The group inhabits
a world of zigzagging synths,
saw-like guitars, electric pia-
nos that carve pleasing tones
into rock, smattering drum-
beats and reverberating vocals.
It's a world full of heartbreak
and rejection, and Hadreas
is finished with it. Too Bright
describes the journey of his
escape.
"Queen" emerges with splen-
did certitude, like the tip of
someone's finger landing some-
where on a spinning globe;
this is the "pop" aesthetic that
Hadreas has been aching to
achieve, and here he achieves
it in spades. Instead of masking
his self-consciousness, he heads
straight for its jugular. "Don't
you know your queen?" he asks
three separate times, each time
describing the broken-down,
tremulous nature of his body. It
doesn't matter if we recognize
it or not, he decides finally: "No
family is safe / When I sashay."
The terrible beauty of "Queen,"
and indeed the whole of Too
Bright, lies with Hadreas's
audacity to confront not only
the negative voices of his outer
world, but the negative voices
inside himself as well.
The arrangements here proj-
ect the power of several pop
icons onto more modern tastes
and styles. "Fool" - an entire
three act story in and of itself -
channels the catchy, hooky maj-
esty of Prince, only it's slowed
down a bit so we can bask in its
warmth. "My Body" mirrors
some of the darker minimalist
work of Bowie. Hadreas's voice
floats along softly just above a
whisper, that is, until devious
distortion kicks in and starts
to supply the right amount of
intensity. "Longpig" sounds
like it leapt out of an '80s exper-
imental pop anthology - glitzy,
repetitive, tuneful - picking up
the electro-rock fusion right
where Phil Collins left it.
But much of Too Bright's
sublime pathos is delivered
through its slower tracks,
where Hadreas unfurls him-
self in the space of airy glass
corridors, vanishing and reap-
pearing with mirage-like qual-
ity. For about a minute during
"I'm a Mother" we can hardly
understand what he's singing,
as though his words evaporate
before they leave his mouth.
But that doesn't diminish their
importance; rather, he" proves
with "No Good" that quiet
inward reflection can be just
as valuable a tool as outward
swagger, and as the track's fuse
burns away he purposefully
loses himself behind a swath of
lush piano. It's popcraft of the
highest order.
In the closing minute of the
album, Hadreas utters from
his heart what he knows to
be true: that his talent, his
determination, pride, self-
reliance and inner beauty
render all opposition futile. He
is strong. His cause is stronger.
He will continue to thrive and
inspire outcast groups with
or without our permission;
Too Bright is simply his latest
testimony. "I don't need your
love / I don't need your love /
I don't need you to understand
/ I need you to listen," he sings.
And as the song and the album
fade to a graceful close, we
come to the sudden realization
that by listening to Hadreas's
words, we have become a very
real and dangerous part of his
enterprise.
FILM REVIEW
Kline carries 'Old Lady'
By KARSTEN SMOLINSKI
Daily Arts Writer
Both charming and utterly
predictable, "My Old Lady" fol-
lows a failed, friendless writer as
he attempts to
clear his debts B-
by selling a
Parisian apart- My Old
ment inher-
ited from his Lady
father. Adapted The Michigan
from first-time
director Israel Theater
Horovitz's play BBCFilms
of the same
name, the film
follows an all-too-familiar pat-
tern of unraveling secrets and
dramatic confrontations. How-
ever, the excellent cast manages
just enough charisma to prevent
a complete tragedy.
In "My Old Lady," the shad-
ows of the past hang over the
main characters like a thick,
black fog. After 57 years, three
divorces and three unpublished
novels, Mathias Gold (Kevin
Kline, "Last Vegas") arrives in
Paris hoping that the sale of his
deceased father's apartment
will give him the fourth chance
he desperately needs. Unfortu-
nately for Mathias, he discov-
ers the 90-year-old Mathilde
Girard (Maggie Smith, "The
Best Exotic Marigold Hotel")
and her unmarried daughter
Chloe (Kristin Scott Thomas,
"The English Patient") living
there as part of a deal made
with his father under a strange
French property law.
While the deal itself is
poorly explained, the conflict
is clear: Mathias wants to sell
to a hotel owner who plans to
tear down the apartment com-
plex, while Mathilde and Chloei
wish to continue living in the
home that has been their fam-
ily's for generations. This spurs
Mathias's investigation of the
mysterious circumstances of
the arrangement, eventually
leading to the uncovering of
enough dirty family secrets
to fill three Greek tragedies.
Extramarital love affairs, alco-
"Can I carry you now?"
WHAT IN
T THE WORLD
COULD YOU
POSSIBLY BE
WAITING FOR?
@MICHIGANDAILY
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, attempted suicides and Despite the film's unremark-
all get dragged into the able visual style, the city of
f the present, and all in Paris serves as a pleasant set-
stratingly unsurprising ting for "My Old Lady." In one
n. scene, the gruesome gargoyles
along the river Seine glare
down at Mathias as he drinks
A British himself into a stupor, yet the
venerable architecture and
kee tragedy. alluring sense of tranquility
serve only as a backdrop for the
characters' dilemmas.
"My Old Lady" delves into
e's performance car- perhaps the greatest human
e film. While his char- obsession: the power of love
depressive complaining to cause both great happiness
t annoying, his roguish and immense pain. Mathias
ality endears him to the observes, "Anytime someone
ce. He may be a broke follows their heart, someone
at with daddy issues, else has their heart broken." It is
s talent for squeezing this dual nature of love that con-
from rich businessmen cerns the characters, and though
is intrusive inquiries love brings agony to them all, it
iewers on his side. Smith also serves ultimately and rather
'eet for her character as predictably as the source of their
widow with no interest contentment. While the plot's
tlety, though she lacks crises feel somewhat cliche, it is
te of, say, her dowager the gentle humor and charmthat
ss from TV's "Downton "My Old Lady" treats them with
" that truly engage the viewer.
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