THURSDAY 6/29


RoStarr

(ART) Graphic design gets harder and harder. It's no longer enough to simply have impeccable visual sense; artists have to reach further along both ends of the art/business continuum into topics as obtuse as identity and brand recognition. RoStarr is actually artist and graphic designer Romon Yang's brand name, and his work ranges from art direction for magazines such as Spin and Interview to large glossy paintings incorporating Rorschach blot-like shapes into vibrant, nearly alive patterns. Yang's paintings are on view at Houston, along with a series of lightboxes created by the New York group Colab. The pairing of RoStarr's work with an of-the-moment advertising technique results in something altogether new, a fusion of aesthetic and function that makes the argument about art and advertising just that much stickier. EMILY HALL

Houston, 907 E Pike St, 860-7820, Tues-Sat noon-7 pm. Through July 13.


FRIDAY 6/30


Lava Lamps

(LIVE HALLUCINATIONS) Blob goes up... blob comes down. The ectoplasmic brainchild of some brilliant hippie hearkens back to those days of psychedelia and experimentation, back around the time when a group of English art school students formed a band, called themselves Pink Floyd, and became the alpha testers for the music industry's latest sound effects gizmos. Gone are the days when Floyd's music morphed like a bottle of mystery goop heated by an appliance light bulb--but Roger Waters remains, his distinct voice still by turns thoughtful and eccentric. He'll be at the Gorge, minus his old school chums, so if your retro-cool lava lamp doesn't heat up fast enough for you, this one-time aspiring artist should have an audio/visual experience prepared that will do well in the natural amphitheater. KRIS ADAMS

Gorge Amphitheatre, 628-0888, 8 pm, $32.25-$55.40.


Juggling Festival 2000

When I was about 12 years old, I tried to teach myself how to juggle. Impatient as I am, I didn't start slowly and work up to handling four or five objects at a time--I went full force, baby! And today, I still can't juggle. Fortunately, the Seattle International Juggling Festival 2000 is my chance to stop feeling like a pathetic failure and master the fine art of throwing things in the air. Seattle Center will be host to 100 of the best damn jugglers in the Northwest and Canada, with the highlight of the weekend being a juggling show in the Flag Pavilion at 8 pm on Saturday. And in case anybody should become jealous of the jugglers' talents, there will also be free workshops offered all weekend for the benefit of uncoordinated fools like me. MEGAN SELING

Center House and Flag Pavilion, Fri June 30, 6-10 pm; Sat-Sun July 1-2, 10 am-6 pm, free.


Liquid Girls

(OPERA) Seattle Experimental Opera returns with a new collaboration between composer Christian Asplund, librettist Lara Candland, and choreographer Juliet Waller. Doesn't sound like there's much of a story--something to do with a woman wandering the shore of Lake Washington and musing about landscape, friendship, and the destruction of a strange building she'd longed to turn into a pie shop--but Candland's language is said to be mesmerizing, and the music features gargled high C's, electric guitar and bass, and water percussion instruments of drummer Greg Campbell's own devising. Any attempt to reinvigorate such a powerful art form as opera is worth investigating. BRET FETZER

Nippon Kan Theater, 628 S Washington, 888-424-2525, at 8 and 10 pm; Sat July 1 at 2, 8, and 10 pm. $15, $10 students/seniors.


SATURDAY 7/1


Bobo Returns

(EXHIBIT) Seattle saw one of its darkest hours when Bobo the gorilla, star of the Woodland Park Zoo, died in 1968. Captured as a two-week-old infant in Africa, Bobo was then purchased in 1951 and raised like a human child by the Lowman family of Anacortes. After Bobo (surprise!) matured into a 520-pound adult gorilla, he was moved to the zoo. Bobo's sad life turned even more bizarre when his remains were taxidermied and donated to the Museum of History and Industry, where, besides the eerie restored primate himself, Bobo's baby clothes, toys, and related newspaper stories are now on display. MELODY MOSS

Museum of History and Industry, 2700 24th Ave E, 324-1126, daily 10 am-5 pm. Adults, $5.50; seniors (55+) and children 6-12, $3; children 2-5, $1.


SUNDAY 7/2


Ian Brown

(LIVE MUSIC) From Strangeways, here he comes. Following a notorious stint in prison (for assaulting an air hostess, a charge he still vehemently denies), the Stone Roses frontman is back on the solo track. One could argue that his time in an 8' x 12' cell--and the brutal beatdown he's received in the U.K. press the last few years--has made him a more thoughtful, introspective guy. But he's still the Monkey King, and when he keens "I could astound you if I wanted/I wouldn't even have to try" above guitar swells and cascading sitar on the opening track of his modestly titled new album, Golden Greats, dammit, you believe him. There is no asking to be adored anymore; he's simply telling you how easy it is. Recent appearances have been wildly unpredictable and Brown's behavior has been reportedly erratic, but one thing tonight's show should not be is dull. LEAH GREENBLATT

Crocodile, 2200 Second Ave, 441-5611, 8 pm, $12.


Hi-Top

(DJ) "Breakbeat Evolution" is their catch phrase, and Hi-Top is indeed quite an educational journey through the rare groove/hiphop/jungle continuum. But please don't just stand around taking notes; put down that pencil, Chester, and bust out the cardboard (Adidas track suit optional)--this is still a boogie-down production, not a head-nodder, and the emphasis really is on the hiphop side. Not that you should expect any extended jump-up remixes of "The Thong Song" from DJs KO (you know him from IQU), Supafriend, and special guests; instead, album tracks and old favorites from the kind of artists who have other stuff to talk about besides ladies' panty options are a lot more likely. LEAH GREENBLATT

I-Spy, 1921 Fifth Ave, 374-9492, 10 pm, $5.


MONDAY 7/3


Ride the Bus

(PUBLIC TRANSPORT) All week long I'd been begging my friends with cars to drive me down to Costco so I could pick up some stuff from their print shop; all week long my friends with cars had been begging off because their stupid cars weren't working, or some other lame excuse. Finally, I called the Metro info line and found out what bus went down that way. I caught it downtown; it took me right to Costco in 15 minutes. I quickly got my stuff; in less than 10 minutes, I caught another bus to downtown and was back where I started. The entire trip: Just over 45 minutes. It usually takes at least a half hour by car, and on the bus I could read a newspaper some fellow rider thoughtfully abandoned. The monorail will be a lovely thing if it ever arrives, but in the meantime, our bus system is pretty darn good. BRET FETZER

Buses go just about everywhere, or pretty darn close.


Monitor Trio, Bill Horist

(LIVE MUSIC) Tonight marks the end of the 15th Annual Seattle Improvised Music Festival. The endgame will be played by Monitor Trio, flown into our humble town from Holland, where free jazz is treated as a respectable art form and not as some pesky disease. On sax will be Amsterdam-based Michael Moore, while Cor Fuhler on piano and cellist Tristan Honsinger round out the trio. All three are accomplished and well-respected musicians who combine humor with virtuosity, infecting you with a viral condition for which there is no cure. KREG HASEGAWA

On the Boards, 100 W Roy, 217-9888, 8 pm, $8.


TUESDAY 7/4


Kirikou and the Sorceress

(FILM) Some say psychedelia is dead--they've obviously never seen this film, which was adapted from some West African folk tales and is just plain weird. Kirikou, the eponymous baby, is a fucking head case: He speaks with a weird, twitty, completely annoying accent; he meets a strange animal that shoots stinky pellets out of its ass; and he dances with insane-looking squirrels with huge opal eyes. He dresses up like a bird and walks through a rock that looks like a... well, like what a woman has between her legs. He gets a blowjob near the end, too. Plus, all the women in the film are topless. Oh yeah, and there are some really goddamn bizarre fetishes (little sculptures) with knives and red eyes that spit fire.... Just take a lot of acid and go see it, and it will blow your mind (as will most things, but that's not the point). JAMIE HOOK

Varsity, 4329 University Way NE, 632-3131, Fri June 30-Thurs July 6 at 5:10 and 7 pm, with additional screenings Sat-Tues at 1:30 and 3:20 pm, $7.


WEDNESDAY 7/5


30 Frames A Second

(FILM) Video has changed the way we remember things. My little cousin can "remember" trips he took at one-and-a-half years of age, because he has grown up watching the videos of them. It is destined to be much the same with the WTO protests of last November. We will "remember" details of events we were only partially aware of, because they were so obsessively recorded, digested, and thrust back at us. Rustin Thompson's new documentary, 30 Frames a Second: The WTO in Seattle, is a fine work of memory, delicately crafted and suitably humble. Thompson is not concerned with politics so much as he is intrigued by the process of experiencing, then recalling, the events of the protests. And while the documentary will certainly strike some as shallow, it is indeed one of the more aesthetically resonant diaries of the protests you're likely to see. JAMIE HOOK

Seattle Asian Art Museum Auditorium, Volunteer Park, 7 & 9 pm; $4, children under 12, free.