‘Arts’ Archives
Sinners
from the series Movie Corner... 5/5 Stars Comedy/Dark Comedy By HOWARD MCQUITTER II Howard McQuitter II All throughout, a profound maestro of blues with a quick glimpse of future Black music, rings strong from beginning to end. At the opening scene of director Ryan Coogler’s brilliant film (if not an outright masterwork) a young man, Sammie, drives up to a plain looking church, gets out and enters the place where the pastor, his father), is giving a Sunday sermon. When he approaches the pulpit where his father greets him, the camera zeros in on a snapped-off guitar neck in his right hand. Sammie’s face is bloodied and slashed as if he’s been in a brawl. That scene alone embodies a series of metaphors and allegories that will stare audiences in the face. His father requests Sammie to drop the guitar because “If you keep dancing with the Devil, one day he will follow you home.” Warner Bros. Pictures In a small town near Clarksdale, Mississippi, in 1932, at [...]
CHROMAKOPIA Is A Gorgeous, Wowing Album That Encapsulates the Time We Live In
By ARABELLA FRACISCO Part III of III Part II Part I Arabella Fracisco’s original review first appeared in the November 2024 issue of The Southerner, a student-written and student-produced newspaper at South High School in Minneapolis. The Southerner can be found online at www.shsoutherner.net. Editor’s Note: The last 2 months the alley featured the first 10 tracks of Arabella’s thoughtful and inviting review of CHROMAKOPIA. This month we conclude with the final four tracks. Thought I Was Dead is the eleventh track on the album and is about Okonma embracing his provocative persona, bringing up past controversies and expectations addressing them in his own playful yet rebellious way. “Everything I said I do, I did. Talk my shit? I sure damn will. You ain’t like that shit? I’ll do it again.” The track also features ScHoolboy Q and Santigold, their verses elevating the song. The twelfth track on the album, Like Him, featuring Lola Young, beautifully [...]
LOST AND FOUNDRY
By DAVE MOORE I picked up a brick from the edge of the demolition,carried it home and set it on my porch,one small piece of that hated Smith Foundry. Forty years of smelling its burnt iron reek,closing windows in summer, eyes smarting,hearing my sensitive partner coughing::::Talked to pollution agency ginks,went to meetings, marched in protest,the whole neighborhood wheezing with asthma.Finally resigned to accepting the horrible stench,either live with the bitter fumes or move.And then:::: and then::::after decades of violations,initialed regulators finally heard us.Smith Foundry shut down. With barely any notice::::heavy scoops began to batter the walls,pouring water on noise and concrete as it crumpled.Now its tall stack lies smokelessly sideways::::Spring air carries the last remnants of dust. So I picked up the brick and brought it home,As if I had torn it out with my own hands.The air, of course the air is still dirtyfrom combustion engines whizzing past the site,but [...]
