Andrew Keating & Scott Fife

(ART) KEATING shows paintings of buildings and other manmade structures isolated on barren plains: an empty swimming pool, a radio tower, a drive-in movie theater. His muted palette and detail-free images make the paintings read like elegies for an imagined American past. SCOTT FIFE shows virtuosic constructions in cardboard: '50s haute couture dresses and primate heads. We're not sure what he's aiming at, but the effect is creepy. -- ERIC FREDERICKSEN

Esther Claypool Gallery, 617 Western Ave, 264-1586, Thurs Sept 2 through Oct 2.

Fandra Chang

(MORE ART) L.A. artist CHANG's multi-panel paintings mix actual painted passages with abstract photographs mounted on Plexiglas or aluminum. The hand-wrought mixes with the mechanically reproduced, blurring the distinctions between each. -- EF

James Harris Gallery, 309A Third Ave S, 903-6226, Thurs Sept 2 through Oct 2. Opening reception Thurs Sept 2, 6-8 pm.

Blundershoot

(LIVE MUSIC) The event of Bumbershoot plays havoc with local clubs, since artists playing the festival are forbidden from playing locally within a particular time frame. Rather than write the whole weekend off, the CROCODILE and the SHOWBOX have banded together to bring you BLUNDERSHOOT. Unlike its older sibling, it's guaranteed to be drum circle- and stroller-free AND all proceeds go to worthy causes like Northwest AIDS and Planned Parenthood. In addition to non-Bumbershoot artists, like former L7 bassist JENNIFER FINCH'S glam-pop outfit OtherStarPeople or the ubiquitous HARVEY DANGER, you might want to read between the lines or just take a risk, because you just never know who might REALLY be on the bill. -- BARBARA MITCHELL

Crocodile & Showbox, Sept 3-5, $8 joint cover (21 and over).

Nintendo Game Bus

(VIDEO GAMES) Are you a video game genius like Jeff Bridges in Tron? If so, head down to WESTLAKE CENTER and hop on the bus -- the Nintendo game bus, that is. In a brilliant marketing move, the evil Blockbuster Video and Nintendo corporations are giving you a chance to play some of Nintendo's new games. All you have to do is show up, and you can play games like "Ken Griffey Jr's Slugfest" and "Star Wars: Episode I: Racer" on one of the bus' twelve Nintendo 64 game systems. And it's free! -- BRADLEY STEINBACHER

Westlake Mall, Downtown Seattle, 10 am-6 pm, free.

Rakugo: Japanese Comic Storytelling

(THEATER) Since the 16th century, Japanese storytellers have had audiences pissing their pants with RAKUGO, the comedic storytelling style in which a single narrator kneeling in a KIMONO, with only a fan and a towel as props, acts out elaborate, multi-character stories. Here's a rare opportunity to hear Rakugo performed in English. Featured in the program are stories about careless optometrists, DRUNKEN KNOW-IT-ALLS, and rotten tofu. -- DAVID SCHMADER

Stimson Auditorium, Seattle Asian Art Museum, Volunteer Park, 654-3121, 7:30 pm, $9/$6

Julie Cascioppo

(MUSIC) Along with the Space Needle, the Fastbacks, and that CRAZY RUSSIAN GUY who runs up and down Broadway screaming, lounge chanteuse JULIE CASCIOPPO is one of Seattle's most enduring entertainment fixtures. Movin' on up from her traditional home at the Pink Door, Julie brings The Julie Cascioppo Experience (featuring Ben fleck on piano) to the swanky Pacific Place eatery STARS for an evening of Porter, Berlin, Gershwin, and, we are told, much, much more. -- DS

Stars Restaurant in Pacific Place, 600 Pine St, top floor, 7-11 pm.

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers

(LIVE MUSIC) The reason for loving Tom Petty was best summed up by an 11-year-old seated near me during one of Petty's concerts a few years back. Thinking her a little young to be enjoying the show so much, I asked her what she liked about Tom. "You ever see My So-Called Life?" she asked, referring to the short-lived but much repeated television tribute to teen angst. When I said I had, she continued, "Tom Petty is just like Jordan Catalano." And she was right, despite the 30 year age difference between the two men. -- KATHLEEN WILSON

Gorge Amphitheatre, 628-0888, Sat & Sun at 7 pm, prices vary.

The Self, Absorbed

(ART) This group show looks at contemporary self-portraiture, much of it involving new technologies. A pair of endurance-test VIDEO pieces should be highlights: in one, HAPPY TO BE HERE, Charles Goldman holds a fixed smile for an hour; in the other, Mexico City artist Minerva Cuevas films herself politely drinking herself into unconsciousness. -- EF

Bellevue Art Museum, Bellevue Square, through Nov 7.

Madeline DeFrees

(READINGS) Poet MADELINE DEFREES was one of the very first prominent poets who also happened to be local and to be female that I ever had the pleasure of hearing read (in a tiny auditorium in Spokane, while the pot-smoking male presence in my life grunted gratuitously next to me -- but that's another story). I remember thinking, "Wow, she's really good." Here it is 10 years later, and I'm still thinking, "Wow, she's really good," a thought a lot of other people have also had. At this event some of these people pay TRIBUTE to DeFrees, and she reads her newest work. -- TRACI VOGEL

Richard Hugo House, 1634 11th Ave, 322-7030, 6 pm, free.

Midway Swap Meet

(SHOPPING) Since thrift store culture is quickly dying out, where are you going to find those awesome deals on records, clothes, and possibly STOLEN STEREO EQUIPMENT? Give the MIDWAY SWAP MEET a try! Operating every Saturday and Sunday from 8:00 am to 4:00 pm, this former drive-in movie theater has rows and rows of tiny yard sales featuring scads of new and used (sometimes very used) goodies at bargain basement prices. Last week I purchased six huge boxes filled with 45s (the records, not the guns) for the low, low price of 25 smackeroos! Try the Midway; it's LIVIN' LARGE and on the cheap! -- WM. STEVEN HUMPHREY

Midway Swap & Shop, 24050 Pacific Hwy S (corner of 240th and Pacific Hwy S, five miles south of SeaTac), 8-4 pm, $1 admission.

A-maze-ing Corn Fest '99

(FESTIVALS) The first in a season prolific with CORN MAZES, this 40-acre beauty will allow you to re-enact classic '60s horror movies or other lighthearted associations while munching on FREE ROASTED CORN (noon- 2 pm), listening to live hoedown cornbelt music, or wheezing in the aftermath of the antique tractor-drawn HAYRIDES. Shucks, what could be funner? -- TV

One mile North of Conway, East of I-5 in Skagit County, through Sept 26, 10 am-9 pm, kingcorn@gateway.net.

Fame: The Musical

(THEATER) You were going to be famous, maybe? You were going to learn how to fly? Well here's your chance -- FAME: THE MUSICAL is in town. You remember the TV series: sexy people throwing their leotard-clad bodies around the dramatic halls of high school. I moved the furniture and danced my little ass off every episode. I was sneaky, so my mother wouldn't catch me, but I had a dream! To live forever! -- JEFF DEROCHE

The Paramount Theatre, 911 Pine St, 682-1414, runs Tues-Sun through Sept 19, $23-$50.

Salsa & Latin Dance

(CLUB NIGHT) La noche aleja el prado, gris azul en lo negro. De pronto fulge un punto verde muy amarillo aligerado. Por tan rápida huida que apenas es ya vida cuando se desvanece, se enluta hacia un presunto casi aniquilamiento. Desde la SOMBRA mia yo presiento la hermosura -- que es luz -- de aquel instante breve, feliz, mortal: relámpago de amante. ("Luciérnaga" by JORGE GUILL:N.) -- TV

Vito's, 927 Ninth Ave, 682-2695, salsa lessons start at 10 pm, free.

Robert Yoder

(ART) After working on a modest scale (both size and pricewise) for years, Robert Yoder is starting to get ambitious. His $75,000 public art commission for the new football stadium is set for dedication in late September/early October, and his SOLO SHOW this month at Howard House will feature some large-scale constructions. Yoder cuts up and reassembles road signs, stripping them of their original meanings but retaining the sense that they are trying to communicate something: Recognizable letters and numbers are recombined to create illegible symbols of not-yet-invented languages. -- EF

Howard House, 2017 Second Ave, 256-6399, through Sept 26.

This is a Play

(THEATER) Why spend your lunch hour eating GREASY FOOD you don't want and mulling over the failures of your life when you could be watching THEATER? Today, as part of the Noon Hour Lunch Box Theater series, Seattle's THEATER SIMPLE presents This is a Play, Daniel MacIvor's parodic assessment of the actor's mindset. The show is 40 minutes, admission is pay-what-you-will (they suggest 5 bucks), and no, lunch will not be served, so bring your own. -- DS

Market Theater, 1428 Post Alley in the Pike Street Market, 12:10 pm.