• Hart Plaza
• Belle Isle
• Ford Motor Company’s official rooftop party. Yeah. Real proletariat there, Lee. $350 a pop. Yes, proceeds do go to the The Michigan Thanksgiving Parade Foundation.
• TV (WDIV-4)

There. I just saved ya the trip. No thanks necessary. For those of you still asleep, it's tonight. Act accordingly.

Happy (early) Canada Day to our brothers and sisters across the river.

Free your mind and your ass will follow…
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Possibly following in the traditions of Christmas decorations in November and summer Black Friday sales, some municipalities have been celebrating American Independence Day weeks in advance. Much of a super-genius as I am, I never really understood what's the rush. In any case, the linked article from our pals over at BridgeMichigan lists the pyrotechnic spectacles planned and already passed here in the Great State of Talktothehand-and-Belial.

Just to—ehmmm—present the other side of the coin for those who appreciated a pretty explosion, here's Planet Detroit's "Michigan fireworks add to air quality problems".

Screw humans: maybe it is time to consider a different way to celebrate the Fourth of July: from the Humane Society: "Fireworks: An explosion of fear for animals"

Oh, and a premature Happy Canada Day to our friends to the North…uh, and South! You know…the ones with better beer and better health care…

What We Want Now
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You can listen to any of the near-infinite versions of this song…but none match the beauty and power of this version, lead vocal by the great Tony Williams. Close your eyes…

Swoon-City BONUS:

• The Platters - Only You, And You Alone

• The Platters - The Great Pretender

Perfection is just a way to escape from having nothing to say. -- Dieter Meier
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What the feez, "Blood"? This isn't ~~grating~~ avant-garde or free jazz in the least! It sounds like Mssr Ulmer is channeling Jimi who's channeling T-Bone through Otis Rush!

Then again, like Grant Green used to say, It's all blues anyhow.

Back-From-The-Alternate-Universe BONUS:

• James "Blood" Ulmer - A Thing for Joe

That's more like it…

A lot of people don't realize what's really going on. They view life as a bunch of unconnected incidents and things. They don't realize that there's this, like, lattice of coincidence that lays on top of everything.
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Detroit-born musical child prodigy Frank Isaac Robinson was known professionally as "Sugar Chile" Robinson—you can roll your eyes; it was a "different time". Robinson played with such luminaries as Lionel Hampton, Count Basie and Billie Holiday until in 1952 he said "stop." More on this wunderkind over at !detroit as today he is appearing live for a special performance at the Detroit Film Theatre's weekend screening of the 1943 classic musical, Stormy Weather.]

Compare-And-Contrast BONUS:

• Live, 2007, at the Royal Oak Music Theatre, Royal Oak, MI

If you can't see the crazy person on the bus, it's you.
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Coprolalia BONUS:

• From 2022's Few Good Things - One Way or Every N**** With A Budget

• 2024 - Saba and No ID, featuring Madison McFerrin, Ogi, and Jordan Ward - head.rap

It takes a nation of millions to make a hip hop recording.

Workers of The World...Relax!
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Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed legislation on Wednesday — which also was Juneteenth — to celebrate the contributions of Black athletes in the Negro National League. The Detroit Stars was one of the original eight teams represented at the birth of the league in 1920.

May 2 will be known as “Negro Leagues Day” in Michigan, the day in 1920 that its first game was played.

Rep. Helena Scott (D-Detroit) who sponsored the legislation to recognize the league, told a legislative committee in May 2023 that the league and its athletes stood up against racism and pursued greatness. “Without the influence of these exceptional players and the Negro League, Major League Baseball wouldn’t be what it is today, and America wouldn’t be the country that it is today,” Scott said during a state House Governmental Operations Committee hearing last year.

Be vigilant; guard your mind against negative thoughts. -- Gautama Buddha
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From our friends over at BridgeMichigan, Sneha Dhandapani writes about the spreading idea in the Michigan legislature of a statewide ban on cellphones in school. Some state representatives and school districts don't think that's such a good idea…

While there is currently no bill in the Legislature to implement a statewide ban in Michigan, some individual schools and districts are experimenting with the policy, hoping to improve academics and curb rising levels of anxiety and depression tied to social media.

A study by Central Michigan University surveyed more than 600 students between seventh and 12th grade and found learning increased with a decrease in smartphone use, including at school and during homework. A separate study found that students who did not have cell phones in a classroom had higher levels of course comprehension, lower levels of anxiety and higher levels of mindfulness than those with cell phones.

Whether you're a parent or not, aren't higher comprehension, lower anxiety and higher mindfulness qualities we want in our students?

State Rep. Matt Koleszar, D-Plymouth, a former teacher, said he “would be uncomfortable with a state mandate on (cell phone bans in classrooms) as no two communities are the same.” Koleszar emphasized support for local control and allowing teachers to make their own decisions regarding cell phone use policy.

[Rep. Brad Paquette, R-Niles,] called a potential statewide ban “one of the worst ideas that we could come up with as legislators.” He emphasized that allowing schools and districts to make their own decisions regarding cell phone policy is important because “this is a cultural learning issue where kids are gonna have to learn how to deal with these distractors at some point in their life.”

Ironically enough, Rep Paquette, one of your own proposed exactly this idea in 2022…

In Michigan, then-state Rep. Gary Eisen, R-St. Clair Township, sponsored a 2022 bill that would have required districts to prohibit cell phone use during the school day. The proposal died in committee, however.

One of the weakest excuses I've heard against any cellphone ban is from parents, saying "what if I need to contact my child in case of an emergency?!" Is calling the school not an option?

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right? -- Charles Schulz
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4'33" BONUS:

• From There's A Riot Goin' On - There's A Riot Goin' On

• From There's A Riot Goin' On - Thank You For Talking To Me Africa

A lot of people don't realize what's really going on. They view life as a bunch of unconnected incidents and things. They don't realize that there's this, like, lattice of coincidence that lays on top of everything.
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🥵

Maybe you wanna see something light while getting out of the oppressive, heavy, humid Detroit summer? Something escapist for your escaping the heat. A romantic comedy with a happy ending for everybody…well, for almost everybody. Are you in luck!

Friday evening, 8:00pm, at the historic (and air-conditioned!) Redford Theatre (at fashionable 17360 Lahser Road, just north of Grand River Ave.) is the 1987 romantic comedy, Moonstruck!

Directed by the late, great Norman Jewison (Fiddler On The Roof, In The Heat Of The Night), see 80s post-op Cher riding the top of her wave as a movie star and pre-op Nicolas Cage at the beginning of his…

Cher is perfect as the widowed woman, convinced she is cursed by bad luck, who agrees to remarry, only to fall for her fiance’s opera-loving baker brother (Nicolas Cage). This still fresh romantic comedy from Norman Jewison (who passed earlier this year) is a love letter to Italian culture and New York City.

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Godzilla Saturday! 🏢🦖🔥

You want light? Some frivolous entertainment? How 'bout a man in a rubber monster costume terrorizing both a scale model of Tokyo and another actor in a blobby, shapeless rubber costume? No CGI here, no shin nothing except maybe getting kicked!

On Saturday, the historic Redford is showing not one but two masterworks from Japan's Toho Co.…oh, no!…it's a Godzilla Double-Header!

At the 2:00pm matinée is 1971's *Godzilla Vs The Smog Monster!

Perhaps the trippiest film in the original Godzilla series, in which the big guy battles a creature born of out-of-control pollution. Rare to see in any form, we screen the dubbed version that ran in US theaters in the early 1970s.

Then later at 8:00pm is the original, the one that started it all, Ishiro Hondo's 1954 Godzilla!

70th anniversary screening! Celebrate the birth of everyone’s favorite atomic dinosaur, stomping Tokyo on the big screen and in glorious black and white. We present the film’s recent restoration in Japanese with English subtitles.

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Tickets for all the shows are the usual $7 and $5 for seniors and kids. Stay cool "old school", fool! Go to the movies!

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right? -- Charles Schulz
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Slice-And-Dice BONUS:

• From Romantique 96 - Good

• From Readymade Recordings - No. 5

• From Sister Freedom Tapes - Airplane '96

• From Bossa Nova 2001 - 我が名はグルーヴィー (Groovy Is My Name)

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right? -- Charles Schulz
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The Detroit Film Theatre at the world-reknown (and air-conditioned!) Detroit Institute of Arts celebrates cinematically the Juneteenth weekend with not one but three blockbusters of African Americana!

Tomorrow at 7:00pm, one showing only, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson's 2021 award-winning documentary, Summer of Soul!

In his acclaimed debut as a filmmaker, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson fashioned a joyful and transporting documentary — part music film, part historical record — created around an epic event that celebrated Black history, culture, and fashion. Over the course of six weeks in the summer of 1969, The Harlem Cultural Festival was filmed in Mount Morris Park (now Marcus Garvey Park) in New York.

Incredibly, most of the footage was largely forgotten–but no more. Summer of Soul shines a light on the importance of history to our spiritual well-being, and stands as a testament to the healing power of music during times of injustice, past and present. Including concert performances by Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, Sly & the Family Stone, Gladys Knight & the Pips, Mahalia Jackson, B.B. King, The 5th Dimension and many more. Academy Award® Winner, Best Documentary Feature; Grand Jury Prize, Sundance Film Festival. (118 min.)

Try to stay seated.

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Stormy Weather

On Saturday, at sweltering 3:00pm and muggy 7:00pm, the final days of the Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898--1971 exhibition close with the 1943 classic, star-studded musical, Stormy Weather!

One of two musical entertainments featuring all-Black casts released by major Hollywood studios in 1943, Stormy Weather has a traditional movie romance plot — but what really matters in this incredible film is the cast and musical numbers.

The great Lena Horne, whose performance of the title song is one for the ages, is only one of the brilliant talents on screen; there's also Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Cab Calloway, Fats Waller, Katherine Dunham and her dance company, Dooley Wilson (Casablanca’s piano player), and the astonishing Nicholas Brothers, Fayard and Harold, performing what may still be the greatest dance number in movie history [emphasis mine -- r^2^ ] (their tap shoes are on display in Regeneration: Black Cinema 1898 – 1971, at the DIA through June 23). (78 min.)

"Different Times": from the Wikipedia entry…

Although Stormy Weather and other musicals of the 1940s opened new roles for African Americans in Hollywood, breaking through old stereotypes and far surpassing limited roles previously available in race films produced for all-black audiences, it still perpetuates stereotypes. Notably, the musical numbers in the movie contain elements of minstrelsy. The performance of a cakewalk, for example, features flower headdresses reminiscent of the Little Black Sambo figures used in historical misrepresentations of Black American males.

…just so you know.

Performing live at 7:00pm screening is the DFT's special guest, Detroit's musical child prodigy, Frank "Sugar Chile" Robinson!

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Moonlight

Finally, at the Sunday 2:00pm matinée, director Barry Jenkins' 2016 Academy Award winning film, Moonlight, starring Ashton Sanders, Trevante Rhodes and Mahershala Ali. Moving. Touching. Difficult. Gripping. Yeah, it's all those adjectives and more. Jenkins' adaption of Tarell Alvin McCraney's play follows the life of Chiron from childhood to adulthood, his relationship with father-figure crack dealer Juan and his addicted mother Paula and how he just tries to navigate through the situations he finds himself in, inside and out. If you've never seen this powerful film, I'll say no more other than it's not what you'd call a "popcorn movie". You may need to bring Kleenex along.

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Tickets for all showings are $10, $8.50 for seniors, students and DIA members and available online (plus $1.50 inconvience fee).

Stay cool "old school", fool! Go to the movies!

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right? -- Charles Schulz
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