Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (June 6, 2003)
jUflfl 6.2ÛÛ3 ' MUSIC PEACE Queer as music CHURCH Ju st In time for Pride Month, two heavy hitters hit Portland • We are an open Christian church that welcomes people of all races, genders, sexual orientations, abilities, ethnicities and ages. ou r in n o v a Û U /ib U b n u fhen you’re talking about Buzzcocks, it’s reflexive to mention The Sex Pistols and The Clash in the same breath. All were well regarded and relatively popular groups from the first (c. 1976) English wave of punk— that stripped-down, sped- up pop that set a new standard of fast, loud, catchy, succinct and smart. In hindsight, though, it’s fitting that Buzzcocks’ W! • We follow Jesus’ teachings by continuing our 300-year Brethren history of peace and service work. • We invite those who are drawn to a people of joy and action, of reflection and hope, to visit our congregation. • We believe the Bible has preserved and supports different perspectives of Christian faith. D Buzzcocks, June 11, Berbati's Pan BRETHREN Justice • R e c o n c i li a t i o n • S im p lic it y • W e l c o m i n g Tracy Chapman, June 8, Keller Auditorium on’t underestimate Tracy Chapm an. As much a social activist as she is a singer/songwriter, the five albums she’s released since her groundbreaking 1988 dehut haven’t amounted to much— if you’re a bean counter. But if you count the hairs rising on the hack of your neck, C hapm an has produced her share of emotional “hits” (e.g., “All T hat You Have Is Your Soul," “Crossroads”). The exception? “Give Me O ne Reason” from 1995’s New Beginning. T he song was a stylistic anomaly for Chapm an; that the bluesy har tune took the album gold and reintroduced the understated folk rock goddess to her audi ence was a hit of a fluke. But C hapm an’s ride has been topsy-turvy from the start. Remember the album cover of her first record? T he light brown background, the tight ly cropped dreadlocks, eyes cast downward. “Fast C ar” got a lot of attention (and airplay). For a mostly white audience eight years deep in the bleak Reagan-Bush era, C hapm an repre sented the G reat Underdog. A young, soft-spoken black woman discov ered in the coffeehouses of Boston, she drew us in with her vulnerability, her quiet wisdom. And we whispered, do you chink she’s queer? W ith her music, she’s been bold enough to take a creative road some would consider commer cial suicide. But when it comes to her private life, Tracy C hapm an stays silent. Released amid the needle-poking grunge craze, the second album, Crossroads, went greatly underappreciated as sales limped in comparison to her stunning dehut. By 1992, the critical and commercial apathy toward her third album, Mat ters of the Heart, made the songwriter seem irrele vant. Folk was dead (again). The big buzz quiet ed. And that probably suited Chapman just fine. She might have disappointed record execu tives and alienated critics, hut the singer did not km' sight of that other measure of success: personal integrity. She kept on, writing songs about the interior of relationships, the inequal ities of political and economic systems, the sub tleties of being human. Maybe the only issue she’s never addressed head-on is the one we’ll always wonder about. Word on the street is C hapm an’s a knock out live. Tickets for her June 8 show at Keller Auditorium are $31.50-$45 from Tickets West. And he sure to arrive early to hear the opening act, eastmountainsouth, a soothing, melodic Americana duo touring on their dehut record. — Con Taratoot OF THE 12727 SE M a r k e t St. P o rtla n d , O regon w w w .p e a c e c o b .o r g K e r b y L a u d e r d a le , p a s t o r A ll EMI, A ngel legacy, while lower-profile, also feels more dignified and less nostalgic. Those other prominent punkers might have seemed more defiant, and they were inarguahly liberating and seminal in their own ways, hut Buzzcocks.. .they were another sweeter, richer, maybe more important story. They subverted their way, song by song, to the heart of post-sexual-revolution romance, love and sex— topics virtually anathema to their peers— from a casually but actively bisex ual POV. (Lead singer/guitarist Pete Shelley and singer/bassist Steve Diggle were lovers for a while in the hand’s early days.) Their work was of its moment yet singularly timeless; even today, no teen-ager or closet romantic from anywhere on the gender/orienta- tion spectrum can hear those breakneck guitar melodies or Shelley’s voice frustratedly squeaking lines like “If passion is a fashion, then emotion is a curse” without feeling a pang of identification. Their gender-neutral, fatalistic, funny, tender sen sibilities were the missing link between the sex rebels of the early ’70s (David Bowie, Iggy Pop, New York Dolls) and The Smiths, who borrowed their fluid sexual tone and tease realist/romantic dichotomy almost directly from Shelley and Co. After a fallow ’80s, Shelley and Diggle reformed the group with a new rhythm section, mounting a successful revival during the past decade. Though Shelley’s voice has lost a little of the androgynous, petulant charm of yore, and the production values of their ’90s releases lack the magic of the earlier ones, the new material still demonstrates an unmatched, unique brand of worldly-wise, heartache-prone acuity. Buzzcocks play Berbati’s on June 11 to pro mote the just-released Buzzcocks (the first eponymous title in their catalog), and new songs like “Jerk” and “Stars” won’t seem at all out of place alongside the classics. (I’m crossing my fingers for “Ever Fall en in LoveT’ and “Promises.”) Tickets are a cheap $13.50 from TicketsWest. Anyone who’s pined and tri umphed in the less repressed hut still volatile minefield of modem love— and that probably includes all of us at one time or another— should be there to experience the perfect soundtrack for it. — Christopher M cQuam |T1 and W o r s h ip : 11:00 A M P h o n e : 5 0 3 -2 5 4 -6 3 8 0 V irgin C lassics T itles O n S ale ! Vivaldi - Four Seasons Fabio Biondi/Europa Galante $13.49 CO Sarah Brightman • Harem New Release Arriving on 6/10 $14.99 CO or $9.49 Cassette Bizet - Carmen Alagna/Gheorghiu/Hampson, etc. 3 CO Set • $40.47 Mozart - Violin Concerto #3/Symphony *41, Itzhak Periman/Berlin lln Philharmonic $13.49 CO T h o u s a n d s oi T itles O n S ali : F r o m : EMI CLASSICS k % ' Maria Callas Forever $13.49 CO w - 3% Grieg/Schumann - Piano Concertos Sviatoslav Richter/Lovro von Matacic $9.99 CO mm nw tw iv fa s t* # a Schubert * Quartet #13 “Rosam unds", etc. •elcea String Quartet $13.4« CO The Very Best of Montserrat Cabell« 2 CO B e t-$13.49 V isit E ither C lassical M illennium L ocation and S ign U p to W in a F ramed M aria C allas P oster . N o P urchase N ecessary to P articipate , D eadline to E nter —J une 30 th ♦ < )N S \ l l Till« >1 (.il «Il NI ôOlll ♦
