The Stranger

Local metal/hardcore stars Himsa are playing their last show ever tonight. Someone's probably gonna get hurt. Their live performances are already screaming, boiling messes with nutso dudes going apeshit over shredding guitar and Johnny Pettibone's demonic vocals. The band's farewell performance is sure to be the craziest scene in Himsa history, so brutal some megafan is even flying in from Italy to see it! And to think you only have to walk down the street to get there. (El Corazón, 109 Eastlake Ave E, 381-3094. 9:30 pm, $10 adv/$12 DOS, all ages.) by Megan Seling

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Seattle's annual celebration of all things pot—from hemp sandals to octo-carb bongs—returns to Myrtle Edwards Park this Saturday and Sunday with live music, featured speakers (Rick Steves both days!), stoned strolling, and, if tradition holds, wonderfully laissez-faire law enforcement. Go, wander, inhale. And should it get too hot or rainy, the newly minted stoner classic The Pineapple Express is playing at the not-too-distant Pacific Place cinema. (Myrtle Edwards Park, 3130 Alaskan Way W, www.hempfest.org. 10 am–8 pm, free.) by David Schmader

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If you're expecting a movie as raging and ferocious as his aptly titled Head-On, you might be disappointed. But German-Turkish filmmaker Fatih Akin's new movie—scheduled to play at the Varsity for just a week—is another kind of devastating. The braided narrative is about the disruptive urgency of sexual desire, the ties of kinship, and the faint tactlessness of requesting forgiveness. And I don't care if she never makes another film that reaches American shores: Nurgül Yesilçay is a goddamn movie star. (See movie times, www.thestranger.com, for details.) by Annie Wagner

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Wittenborn's Pharmakon begins: "I was born because a man came to kill my father." It's a novel about a doctor in the burgeoning field of mood-altering pharmaceuticals. You'll want to read it because it recalls the best of John Irving, but you'll want to go to the reading to hear Wittenborn tell Pharmakon's secret story: The book is semiautobiographical. Wittenborn's father was an innovator in the field that would eventually create Prozac, and he was marked for death by a crazy student. (Elliott Bay Book Company, 101 S Main St, 624-6600. 7:30 pm, free.) by Paul Constant

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Sweden is freaked out. By what exactly, it's hard to say. But a show of three Swedish artists at Howard House explores threat: the threat of filthy little pygmies and sadistic lower-class families ruining the neighborhood (Nathalie Djurberg's In Our Own Neighbourhood), the threat of burka-style wraps covering entire couples (Annika von Hausswolff's The 21st Century Transitional Object), and the dueling threats of boredom and escape (Johanna Billing's Look Out!). It's live-action video, animation, and photography. (Howard House, 604 Second Ave, 256-6399. 10:30 am–5 pm, free.) by Jen Graves

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