THURSDAY OCT 25


Marjorie Kelly

(READING) On October 17, The Seattle Times reported that Boeing was to cut production in half, and would lay off thousands. On October 18, The Seattle Times reported that Boeing had made a seven percent profit. Tonight, Marjorie Kelly explains why such contradictions are possible in our late age of capitalism. "Shareholder primacy," she points out, is the source of the problem. Corporations serve the interests of those who buy and trade stock, and not those who work in the corporation. This would be fine if the shareholders' capital represented an actual investment in the company, but it doesn't. Marjorie Kelly's new book, The Divine Right of Capital, explains in lucid language the reason for this economic paradox. Here's a small sample of her excellent work: "When we say that the corporation did well, we mean that its shareholders did well. The company's local community might be devastated by plant closings. Employees might be shouldering a crushing workload. Still we will say, 'The corporation did well.'" See Bio: Readings on page 95 for more of her insight. CHARLES MUDEDE

Third Place Books, 17171 Bothell Way NE, 366-3333, 5:30 pm, free.


FRIDAY OCT 26


Stereolab

(Live Music) Every modern rock and pop aficionado's droning, Marxist wet dream is back, with a new album called Sound-Dust and an unwavering penchant for '60s pop, art rock, bossa nova, movie soundtracks, slurpy, hypnotic rhythms, Kraut rock, and disaffected female vocals. Stereolab is regarded as one of the most important bands of the '90s because Tim Gane (its prolific leader) is a master of innovation and experimentation, and simultaneously a mad perfectionist. Every Stereolab song is neat, off-kilter, and recorded in some noteworthy manner and, consequently, every critic in the world wants to hump this band. So whether or not you think Stereolab is just a little bit boring live is irrelevant. Get your ass to the show, buy a T-shirt, and suck it all up like the frothy capitalist you are. JEFF DeROCHE

Showbox, 1426 First Ave, 628-3151, $15.


Preston School of Industry and the Shins

(MUSIC) Pavement has aged well to some, not so well to others--and it's the former group who will no doubt find much to love in Preston School of Industry (the Preston School was the juvenile detention located 40 miles outside Pavement's hometown of Stockton, CA). Led by Pavement founder Scott Kannberg, a.k.a. Spiral Stairs, Preston School of Industry's debut CD, All This Sounds Gas, features the '90s alternarock sensibilities that Pavement employed, probably because a good third of the album was written concurrently with Pavement's last disc, Terror Twilight. Though they got nearly as much hype, the Shins have not worn themselves out à la the Thrones; Oh, Inverted World is an album that's too fucking good to get sick of. Live, the band is so sweet you just want to squeeze them. Truly, the real deal. KATHLEEN WILSON

Graceland, 109 Eastlake Ave E, 381-3094, 9:30 pm, $10. The Shins will also play at Sonic Boom Records in Ballard, 2209 NW Market St, 297-BOOM, 5 pm, free.


The Race of the Ark Tattoo

(THEATER) "I want to expand theatrical space to include the real world of the audience: your glove compartment, your closet, your underwear drawer," wrote playwright W. David Hancock in a recent manifesto. Over the next year or so, Seattle will get a big dose of this unconventional, Obie award-winning playwright: First down the chute is The Race of the Ark Tattoo at A Contemporary Theatre, a "play and flea market" in which a man named P. Foster is selling the belongings of his deceased father. As the audience selects different objects, Foster (played by Matthew Maher, who won an Obie award for his performance) tells stories attached to them, and his relationship with his father slowly emerges from the anecdotes. Next year, the Empty Space will produce Hancock's The Convention of Cartography, and after that New City Theatre will produce a new play by the playwright, which--along with Ark Tattoo and Cartography--will form a trilogy. Start collecting them now. BRET FETZER

A Contemporary Theatre, 700 Union St, 292-7676, Wed, Thurs, Sun at 7:30, Fri-Sat at 8, some matinees at 2 (call for details), $16.50 ($10 under 25). Through Nov 11.


SATURDAY OCT 27


Representative Democracy?

(POLITICS) There are a lot of reasons why our current system of citywide council positions (as opposed to positions representing neighborhood districts) is a screwy formula. For one, citizens have no clear advocate in city hall, so the Seattle City Council can pretty much ignore you and concerns specific to your neighborhood. For example, it took the city council six years to install public toilets in Pioneer Square. If that neighborhood had its own representative, as in "a representative democracy"--you know, the way the rest of the country operates--those toilets would have been there six years ago. Come hear a panel discussion on districting elections, hosted by San Francisco's City Council President Tom Ammiano. S.F. recently returned to its districting system after a 20-year failed experiment with a Seattle-style at-large council. The event, sponsored by Seattle City Council Member Nick Licata, will include panelist Jay Sauceda, who is pushing a districting initiative. JOSH FEIT

Lafayette Elementary School, 2645 California Ave SW, 10 am. For more information call Nick Licata at 684-8803.


The Breeders

(MUSIC) Fans have been waiting since the release of 1993's excellent Last Splash, and still there is no third album. The new release, originally slated for this fall, is now being promised for early 2002 (apparently it hasn't even been recorded--nice work, ladies!). But there is new material to be heard, and since it's likely been at least five years since you've actually had a Breeders record in rotation, even the old stuff should sound good as new again. And that's an exciting prospect indeed. JEFF DeROCHE

Crocodile Cafe, 2200 Second Ave, 441-5611, $15.


SUNDAY OCT 28


Treat Me Good

(ART) This is your last chance to see that art ROCKS. Treat Me Good celebrates one of the great icons of the '80s: The 5'0," 95-pound powerhouse known as Pat Benatar. She was chosen as the subject for this show over some of her more hardcore contemporaries (Joan Jett, Debbie Harry) because of the way her aesthetic was manufactured--the tough rocker who was also vulnerable and approachable and ultimately safe. Seeing the tough cookie's image reproduced in multiple (in mirrors, on homemade T-shirts, in paint on canvas), you start to ask where the persona ends and the person begins. Maybe you've never thought about Pat this way, but standing on Linda Peschong's Benatar-shaped shag rug collage, it dawns on you that culture devours the artists as well as the consumers. With work by John Seal, Shawn Wolfe, Ryan Berg, Jo Claxton, and more. EMILY HALL

SOIL Artist Cooperative, 1412 12th Ave, 264-8061. Through Oct 31.


MONDAY OCT 29


All Things to All People

(VAUDEVILLE) Odds are that you're too young to have seen a real vaudeville show. Furthermore, you are mystified by the concept--all you know is that it involved people in blackface tap-dancing on pianos. Well, vaudeville is dead, and the closest you're going to get to it is All Things to All People, a monthly old-school-style variety show hosted by the many-splendored Sean Nelson. The next incarnation's lineup boasts Jon Auer, Chris von Sneidern, Sgt. Rigby and his Amazing Silhouettes (performing an 18-minute version of Wagner's Ring cycle with shadow puppets, I'm told), and "a slew of special guests." Last time I went, that slew included City Council Candidate Grant Cogswell telling a story about the time he drank his own urine. I can't promise you blackface, but I wouldn't rule it out either. MEG VAN HUYGEN

The Green Room at the Showbox, 1426 First Ave, 628-3151, 8 pm, $5.


TUESDAY OCT 30


Edward Albee

(PLAYWRIGHT LECTURE) Edward Albee made the mistake of launching his career with one of the most galvanizing plays in American drama, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Everything he did after--even Pulitzer Prize-winners like A Delicate Balance and Seascape--couldn't quite emerge from the shadow of that brilliant, bilious first full-length play. After a period in which his plays debuted more often in Europe than the U.S., Albee's standing in New York was revived by Three Tall Women, which opened to rave reviews in 1994, three years after it opened in Vienna--no doubt much to Albee's surprise, as he once sardonically commented, "The only time I'll get good reviews is if I kill myself." That's only the tip of Albee's acerbic tongue; his interviews and speeches are sprinkled with caustic comments, both keenly observant and cuttingly funny. BRET FETZER

Benaroya Hall, Third Ave between Union and University, 621-2230, 7:30 pm, $18 main floor, $15 balcony, $7.50 students/under 25.


Plato's Cave and the Light Inside

(ARTIST LECTURE) Since 1972, artist James Turrell has been creating a work of art in and around the Roden Crater, a natural volcano in Northern Arizona's Painted Desert. When it's finished--probably in 2003--a series of tunnels and openings will highlight the viewer's changing relationship to the sky and, ultimately, to time. Turrell, one of the key figures in the California Light and Space movement in the 1960s, examines these qualities in terms of environments both natural and built, but the aims are more spiritual; on his website, www.rodencrater.org, he is quoted as saying, "I am making spaces which will engage celestial events." We are sooooooo lucky to have Turrell at the Henry as an artist-in-residence, it's not even funny. He'll be scoping out the territory for a piece for the gallery's permanent collection and giving this lecture--a rare opportunity to meet one of the major forces in contemporary art. EMILY HALL

Kane Hall on University of Washington campus, Room 130, 7 pm, $15 general, $10 Henry Art Gallery members, $5 students. For information call 543-2280.


WEDNESDAY OCT 31


Nosferatu with C Average

(MUSIC, FILM) Most times you see an old silent classic accompanied by a live score, the music is provided by an orchestra, or some eclectic semi-orchestral combo that plays unorthodox variations on classical forms. All that heady shit goes out the Frank Gehry-designed window for this event, which features Olympia's chaotic, evil, dungeon-master metal band C Average laying down what is sure to be a devastatingly hard soundtrack to F. W. Murnau's everlasting expressionist creepfest Nosferatu. You couldn't really ask for a better pairing, unless perhaps the EMP were going to show Army of Darkness. Still, Nosferatu will do just fine. SEAN NELSON

JBL Theater at EMP, Seattle Center, 770-2700, 7 and 9 pm, $5 members, $7 public.