MUSIC
OD on indie
Thankfully, a major Canadian touring act has once again mistaken Whitehorse for an actual city.
Winnipeg-based the Weakerthans and Guelph’s the Constantines—two giants of Canadian indie—have joined forces for a cross-Canada tour, dubbed the Rolling Tundra Review.
May 4 at the Yukon Arts Centre.
Don’t have tickets? Both bands will be dropping in to Coasters on Tuesday, May 5th.
Tickets for Coasters available only at the door, so line up now.
FILM
Rusty metal
For the blink of an eye during the mid-1980s, Canadian heavy metal “demigods” Anvil rose to international prominence and influence. Just as quickly, they were gone.
Anvil! The Story of Anvil tells of the band’s Spinal Tap-esque fall from grace, and their attempts to recapture the limelight.
All winter, amateur Yukon filmmakers have been embroiled in the Yukon Film Society’s intensive Mise En Scene training program. Before Anvil!, catch two of the program’s 10-minute productions.
Thursday at 8 p.m. at the Old Fire Hall.
Can’t live without it
A privatized world water cartel threatens to derail the whole fabric of human survival, warn water campaigners.
FLOW (for love of water) tells their story, as well as those of the institutions that are providing practical solutions to the global water crisis.
Tuesday, at 6:30 p.m. at the Whitehorse Public Library. Screening organized by the Whitehorse chapter of the Council for Canadians.
BUSINESS
Score some logo-ed coffee mugs
All weekend, the best and brightest of Yukon businesses—and aspiring businesses—will gather at the Canada Games Centre for the age-old human custom of the trade show.
Free pens and rub-on tattoos are expected.
Costco’s got a booth. An omen?
Friday from 2 to 9 p.m. Saturday from 10 to 6. Sunday from 11 to 4. At the Canada Games Centre.
COMEDY
Fourth walls need not apply
Right before it closes its doors for the summer, the Guild Hall is ushering out its season with yet another foray into the disturbing realm of unscripted comedy.
Presumably through clerical error, most of the time it actually ends up being funny. And if it isn’t, the bar will be wide open.
Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Guild Hall.
VARIETY
Honest to goodness
Roused from their late-winter slumber, the Longest Night Ensemble has rebanded to spend some time with the kids.
This weekend, catch their co-production with local youth arts heavyweights Northern Lights School of Dance, the MAD program and some local hip hop tinkerers.
The production is structured as a variety show, allowing a flexible lineup while feeding the goldfish-like attention spans of modern audiences.
Friday and Saturday beginning at 8 p.m. at the Wood Street Centre.
ARTS UNDERGROUND
Skeletons under the floorboards
The Casa Loma isn’t the Yukon’s only source for fossilized dinosaurs.
Almost from the first time Yukoners first started yanking gold out of the ground, they were turning up a potpourri of fossilized dinosaurs and mammals.
Until July 31, Arts Underground will host an exhibit of maps, photographs, books, newspapers and “ephemera” re-examining the long, dirty-fingernailed history of Yukon paleontology.
Opening reception is Friday at 5 p.m. at Arts Underground.
Go to seed
After taking a look at the tarnished relics of eons past, check out some seed-themed art.
SEED, by Marlene Collins, features smoke-fired clay sculptures, crafted into shapes reminiscent of seed pods.
Rebirth? Regeneration? Subversive garden politics? Only the eye of the beholder can tell for sure.
Runs until May 29 at Arts Underground.
LOCAL MUSIC
Strings attached
It’s always nice to hear a string orchestra outside of a Paul McCartney solo album.
On Sunday, the iron baton of Fumi Torigai will return, leading the Whitehorse string ensemble through a dynamite catalogue of Bach, Gershwin, and yes, Vivaldi.
Flutist Lisa Turner will solo.
Sunday at Christ Church Cathedral. Concert starts at 3 p.m.
Nuts to instruments
When the Whitehorse Community Choir takes the Yukon Arts Centre stage this weekend, the old standards of Handel, Mozart and Verdi will naturally find their way onto the program.
But choir members will also let their proverbial hair down to perform classics of rock opera such as Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody and selections from the Who’s Tommy.
Stay away from the brown acid.
Friday and Saturday at the Yukon Arts Centre. Concert starts at 8 p.m.
FUNDRAISERS
Spicy altruism
Indian cuisine was good enough to lure 14th-century Spanish explorers off the edge of the planet, and it’s definitely good enough to raise money for the Victoria Faulkner Women’s Centre.
On Saturday, watch as the cuisines of six other continents are slowly put to shame amid a parade of shrimp curry, spicy greenbeans, butter chicken and authentic chai tea.
Saturday, 6 p.m. at the Whitehorse United Church. Tickets are $45. Call 667-2693 for more information.
HOLIDAYS AND COMMEMORATIONS
King harvest may surely come
In 1886, workers gathered at Haymarket Square in Chicago to protest for an eight-hour workday—rather than the era’s customary 12- to 14-hour days.
Somebody set off a bomb, and the resultant gunfire killed eight police officers and an unknown number of civilians.
The event galvanized eight-hour-day movements around the world, who chose May 1, May Day, as the Haymarket Incident’s annual memorial. The Soviet Union used it as an excuse to drive tanks around the streets of Moscow.
Regardless, May Day is still a potent international focal point for workers’ rights, which are still sorely lacking in much of the non-Western world.
“We must stand shoulder and hold leaders accountable for the conditions of our working brothers and sisters, wherever they are,” states Yukon Federation of Labour president Alex Furlong in a May Day release.
Keep it unfettered
Sunday, May 3rd is World Press Freedom Day.
The Earth revolves around the Sun. Richard Nixon was a crook. Joe McCarthy was a hack. And we can print pictures of the prophet Mohammed whenever we want—unless someone threatens us with a firebomb.
Don a sombrero, marry Isis
Mexico is one of the only countries left in the world that still celebrates the time they beat the French army.
Vietnam, Britain, Russia, Germany, Spain, Italy, Haiti, and Algeria—for their part—have all just accepted victories over the French as a routine historical footnote.
On the Fifth of May, 1862, Mexican soldiers, outnumbered two to one by French soldiers, nevertheless scored a victory outside the Mexican city of Puebla. Of course, the victory was only a slight delay for the French, who took over the entire country only a few months later.
Regardless, ever since, the Fifth of May (Cinco de Mayo) has come to be known, worldwide, as a time to celebrate all things Mexican.
On Tuesday, forget the drug violence, forget the swine flu, forget all of Canada’s unmerited deportations of Mexican refugee claimants—let’s go get some tacos.
Contact Tristin Hopper at
tristinh@yukon-news.com
