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Politics • Tech • Race • Slog AM/PM • 2020

Slog PM: The House Says Trump Sent Racist Not Racist Racist Not Racist Racist Not Racist Racist Not Racist Racist Tweets

by Chase Burns • Tuesday at 5:55 pm

The vote is: Racist tweets.
The vote is: Racist tweets. PHOTO BY ARI PERILSTEIN/GETTY IMAGES FOR COMEDY CENTRAL

Before we get into the major House drama today involving Trump's tweets: Let's talk about Brier, Washington. I know, it's been a while since we've talked about Brier, but look, something big happened there. SOMEONE bought a lotto ticket at Brier Grocery for the July 3 Lotto jackpot and that ticket could be worth $12.2 million. Was it you? Double-check. No one has claimed the prize. The numbers are 05-12-13-27-34-49, reports the Seattle Times. Okay, now let's jump into this hellhole.

The House Republicans, minus four, are on the record as supporting Trump's racist tweets: But House Democrats passed a resolution to condemn Trump's attack on "the Squad." Here's that resolution.

Let's back up: It's been a long day in the House. Time for a re-cap.

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Arts

See the Survivor of the South Park Attacks Perform Live, 10 Years Later

by Christopher Frizzelle • Tuesday at 5:40 pm

Jennifer Hopper, known to Stranger readers as the bravest woman in Seattle, performing with the Angel Band Project.
Jennifer Hopper, known to Stranger readers as the bravest woman in Seattle, performing with the Angel Band Project. Courtesy of Angel Band Project

This Friday is the 10th anniversary of the horrific crimes described in Eli Sanders's essay "The Bravest Woman in Seattle," a story about sexual violence and murder that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2012. Jennifer Hopper, the brave woman at the center of Eli's essay, whom I have had the honor to meet and who is easily the most amazing person I've ever shaken hands with, later decided to make her name known in an essay she wrote called "I Would Like You to Know My Name."

Not only is Hopper an amazing person, she is an amazing singer. A few months after the attacks, she and some friends came together to create the Angel Band Project, which makes music to raise money for survivors of sexual violence. "What we learned from that process is that music can give us comfort when not much else can," said Rachel Ebeling, cofounder of the project.

The Angel Band Project is performing again this Friday at the Neptune. In an interview with Q13—embedded below—Hopper talked about what she went through 10 years ago, but she also said, about Friday's concert, "I promise you it's going to be fun."

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Visual Art

Currently Hanging: As in Also: An Alternative Too at Traver Gallery

by Jasmyne Keimig • Tuesday at 5:00 pm

LACEMAKER LAMP | 31985 by Jen Elek
"LACEMAKER LAMP | 31985" by Jen Elek Jasmyne Keimig
There are many creative ways to light a space. I used to put a flashlight behind my right ear so I could covertly read under the covers as a child. It always got too warm under there. Or in college I'd throw a colored scarf over my floor lamp to create an ambiance before getting concerned I'd start a fire. And then there are contraptions like Jen Elek's "LACEMAKER LAMP | 31985," which is on view at Traver Gallery's show As in Also: An Alternative Too.

Elek's lamp uses real candles and employs lens and glasses of water to throw light around the room. One of the glasses is shaped like a pair of lungs. The metal rods that suspend the lenses, the glasses, and the candles are wedged into what looks like a tree trunk. Wax from the candle drips down the sides. The lenses magnify the light from the candles, which throw the shadows every which way. I'd really like to see this thing in the complete dark.

As in Also: An Alternative Too is guest curated by Brooklyn artist, writer, and curator John Drury and serves as a followup to The Other Glass: An Alternative History, a show he put on in New York City earlier this year. As in Also brings together 12 artists who push the boundaries (and expectations) of what glass as a medium can do. Though group shows can sometimes feel a little uneven, this exhibition is cohesive, a unit. What I'm saying is that it's fun.

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Science

Is Physics Dead?

by Charles Mudede • Tuesday at 4:15 pm

Lots of nothing going on here...
Lots of nothing going on here... xenotar/gettyimages.com

I have argued elsewhere that the peak moment for physics was actually the mid-'70s. Here we had the taming of the particle zoo into one of the most impressive achievements of human intelligence, the Standard Model. The action in science after the 1970s shifted to biology, which, for many years, had been stuck to principles borrowed from physics, the chief of which is the search for simplicity at the heart of the profusio (the constant buzz) of breathing, heart-beating, biting things. Biology is now in the process of abandoning this search for the simple in the middle and embracing the irreducible complexity of living organisms. The future for this field is opening. But the one for physics is becoming more and more constrained.

Sure, physics is still making some discoveries and performing important experiments, such as the recent teleporting of "an electron to a low-orbiting satellite 300 miles away." But this still does not eliminate the fact of the general trend downward from the peak in the mid-1970s. Teleporting a particle to space may look impressive, but quantum entanglement is old hat. It is still, as weird as it all sounds, in the realm of the knowable. But something like dark matter, which is believed to account for over 80 percent of all matter in the universe (25 percent of "total energy density"), may not be. It is possible that this stuff is not at all stuff as we can even understand it. But physicists insist that it is. DM can be explained with the reality represented by the splendid Standard Model. What can we do but believe them? There is one theoretical physicist, however—Sabine Hossenfelder—who thinks this is all hogwash.

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Sponsored

For Pride This Year, Uncle Ike’s Gave Entre Hermanos a Big Lift

Do you ever sit up at night, or in the morning, afternoon, early evening, and all other times, dwelling on how absolutely fucked our immigration system is and how powerless most of us are to do anything about it? Haha same! But while none of us can personally abolish ICE, there are things we can do right here in Seattle to improve the lives of immigrants and asylum seekers. Specifically the LGBTQ+ ones served by Entre Hermanos.

Here’s how.

Music

Sound System in the PNW: Bass Coast Puts the British in British Columbia

by Gregory Scruggs • Tuesday at 3:45 pm

Among the Victorian trees at Bass Coast
Among the Victorian trees at Bass Coast Yiting Lim

Tourists looking for a taste of the royal life without making a pilgrimage all the way to Buckingham Palace often turn to charming Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, where afternoon high tea at the Fairmont Empress and a tour of the imposing parliament buildings offer a PNW refraction of merry old England—just as gray and rainy, but nearly 5,000 miles away.

But those tired tropes of Britishness belie the living connection between the UK and this far-flung New World corner of its postcolonial empire, one that comes in megawatt form at the annual Bass Coast festival in Merritt, BC, which should be an annual destination for Seattle-area electronic music aficionados.

Now a full decade past the publication of Tribal Revival, the seminal coffee table book on West Coast festival culture, we’re so far past peak festival money grabbing that any event surviving nearly into the 2020s must have some kind of organic cultural juice behind it. Such is most definitely the case with Bass Coast, which, this past weekend, capped its 11th year of a distinctively British Columbian interpretation of global sound system culture.

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Music • CHBP

Capitol Hill Block Party 2019 Must-See: Still Woozy

by Leilani Polk • Tuesday at 3:02 pm

Sven Gamsky, keepin it casual as Still Woozy
Sven Gamsky, keepin' it casual as Still Woozy Courtesy Paradigm Agency

The Oakland artist otherwise known as Sven Gamsky doesn’t have a huge amount of recorded material under his Still Woozy alias—the fresh 2019 Lately EP and several stand-alone singles—but what’s available is bright, breezy, languid anti-pop crafted in his garage with a combination of electronics (synths, drum pads) and organic instrumentation (guitar, bass, piano).

Gamsky has a hushed cooing vocal that can reach falsetto notes while maintaining its lovely sighing quality in songs like the swishing and skidding bossa-nova-influenced “Ipanema” (featuring Omar Apollo and Elujay), the sumptuous amorousness of “Habit,” or the easy, bouncy of Montreal–evocative “Lava.” This is sigh-of-pleasure music, the sort you hear that is immediately satisfying, like a sweet caress to the ears, and that prompts a knee-jerk out-loud exhalation of 'Ahhhh' along with a feeling of relief that it exists at all.

Still Woozy performs at Capitol Hill Block Party 2019 on Saturday, 9:45–10:30 pm, on the Vera Stage. Choice media below.

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Things To Do

93 Stranger (Than Usual) Things To Do in Seattle This Week: July 16-21, 2019

by Stranger Things To Do Staff • Tuesday at 2:00 pm

Wear your best maroon-and-gold scarf and dance to the protagonist pop-punk of Harry and the Potters on Friday.
Wear your best maroon and gold scarf and dance to the protagonist pop-punk of Harry and the Potters on Friday. Courtesy of the artists

Our arts critics have already recommended 50 great things to do this week and our music critics have picked the 37 best music shows, but there are still tons more events happening. To prevent some of the quirkier and more extraordinary ones from slipping through the cracks, we've compiled them here—from Venardos Circus to Apollo 11 anniversary events like the Museum of Flight's Lunar Block Party, and from the Christmas in July 5K and 10K to the Game of Thones-themed BrodieNation Music Festival. For even more options this week, check out our complete Things To Do calendar.

Found something you like and don't want to forget about it later? Click "Save Event" on any of the linked events below to add it to your own private list.

    TUESDAY

    GEEK

  1. Trivia Tuesday: Schitt's Creek
    Have you recently binge-watched Schitt's Creek, the CBS comedy series about a wealthy family who is forced to live in a town they bought as a joke when they suddenly lose their fortune? Same, it's delightful. Earn prizes for your knowledge at this themed trivia night.

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News • Politics

Washington Republicans Refuse to Call Trump's Tweet Racist

by Rich Smith • Tuesday at 1:40 pm

A group of people unwilling to call out obvious racism.
A group of people unwilling to call out obvious racism. U.S. House of Representatives

On Sunday the President told four Congresswomen of color to "go back" to the countries "from which they came." Just in case you need the racism spelled out for you: in this tweet, Trump is assuming that these women are not "originally" Americans because they are brown and black. He is therefore conflating the white race with American citizenship, echoing the central tenet of white nationalism.

This is of course nothing new from a President who called Mexicans "rapists," who said a judge couldn't rule impartially due to his Mexican heritage, who condemned people "on both sides" in Charlottesville, and whose list of racist acts and comments go back many years. But what is new is Democrats deciding to vote on a resolution today calling on Congress to condemn Trump's racist comments.

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Music

My New Favorite Singer, Rhyme-Slinger, Songwriter, and Producer Yeek Is from Naples, Florida, of All Beautiful but Godforsaken Places

by Leilani Polk • Tuesday at 1:24 pm

Eek, Yeek!
Eek, Yeek! Courtesy of Orienteer

I was surprised to learn that my new favorite artist hails from Naples, a boring Southwest Florida backwater with nice beaches, a crap ton of super-rich fucks, and not much else. But it’s shitty little Florida towns like these that spawn intriguing talents like Yeek, a singer, rhyme-slinger, songwriter, and producer now based in Los Angeles who churns out sounds that are hard to pin down, a mix of hip-hop and beat tape production qualities, avant R&B grooves, and pop-savvy indie rock-ness. Yeek sing-songs rhymes and croons over top in a low, fatigued, lightly husky tone that's casually soothing and often mesmerizing.

His latest release, IDK WHERE, is a six-track EP that ranges from bouncy, beat-and-guitar-riff-fueled opener “Cleaner Air,” to the chugging bass drive of "Too Fast," to the soulful, slow-burning, pitch-shifted, beat-skidding closer, “Fatigued.” It's one of those albums that feels like it's over entirely too soon. He has two more LPs and another EP's worth of material, too. It's all real good shit that should be on your radar.

And if you do, indeed, dig it, Yeek lands at the Columbia Theater for an all-ages show tonight, with warm-up from Dotha. Some media below.

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Savage Love

One Night In a Cock Cage Left Him With a Deflated Flesh Balloon Between His Legs

by Dan Savage • Tuesday at 1:00 pm

SAVAGE-Letter-of-the-Day-STAMP-2019.jpg
I found an old column of yours that mentioned male chastity cages and the potential risk of causing erectile dysfunction (ED) by wearing one. And, I have to say I think wearing one overnight five years ago broke my penis. I asked my urologist about ED and he only gave me a sample of Viagra (which didn’t work) and never mentioned any other possible treatments. Is it too late to diagnose and repair my penis so I can achieve an erection again?

Feeling Frustrated

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Things To Do

17 Ways to Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing in Seattle

by Stranger Things To Do Staff • Tuesday at 12:52 pm

Dont miss the Smithsonians touring exhibit Destination Moon: The Apollo 11 Mission, on view in its only West Coast appearance at the Museum of Flight, where you can see images like this one of astronaut Buzz Aldrin walking on the surface of the moon, plus artifacts like the Apollo 11 command module.
Don't miss the Smithsonian's touring exhibit Destination Moon: The Apollo 11 Mission, on view in its only West Coast appearance at the Museum of Flight, where you can see images like this one of astronaut Buzz Aldrin walking on the surface of the moon, plus artifacts like the Apollo 11 command module. Photo courtesy of NASA

Saturday, July 20 will mark 50 years since Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to land on the moon. If you want to geek out over the epoch-making accomplishment and marvel at the power of space science, there’s plenty in store, from the Museum of Flight's three-day Lunar Block Party to a screening of the 1989 documentary For All Mankind to a moon-watching party with the Seattle Astronomical Society. Find them all below and on our Apollo Anniversary calendar.

JUNE 16

Rocket Launch Day
The Apollo 11 crew couldn't have landed on the moon without a really powerful rocket (the Saturn V), so in honor of the 50th anniversary of the historic occasion, this event invites you to build and set off your own miniature spacecraft.
Pacific Science Center, Seattle Center

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A Democratic Climate Change Summit Is Falling Apart Because a Gay Guy Criticized a Gay Guy

by Katie Herzog • Tuesday at 12:13 pm

The mary at the heart of this weekends drama
The mary at the heart of this weekend's drama. JUSTIN SULLIVAN/Getty Images

Sponsors have dropped out of a planned presidential candidate forum on climate change because a homosexual wrote something offensive about a homosexual politician on the Internet.

Let's back up. Over the weekend, the New Republic (TNR) published an article by a Gen X critic known for writing hatchet jobs, Dale Peck, entitled "My Mayor Pete Problem." It was, to put it mildly, rude as fuck. Peck, a gay man, started out with a 1,000-plus word anecdote about rejecting some guy in a gay bar in the '90s. It moved from there into a scathing criticism of both presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg's politics and his life choices. The gist is that Peck thinks of himself as a radical (he, unlike Pete, never cared about gay marriage) and he thinks of Buttigieg as an assimilationist and neoliberal (whatever that means). Throughout the piece, Peck refers to Mayor Pete as "Mary Pete," a play on "Uncle Tom," and that is not even the most problematic part. In perhaps the most offensive section, Peck wrote (emphasis mine):

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Music • Inbox Jukebox

Inbox Jukebox Track of the Day: The Debauched Folk Farce "I’ve Got Drugs (Out of the Mist)" by Legendary Musical Comedians the Frogs

by Dave Segal • Tuesday at 12:08 pm

The 30th-anniversary vinyl reissue drops Aug. 16.
The 30th-anniversary vinyl reissue drops Aug. 16. The End of All Music

The Frogs, "I’ve Got Drugs (Out of the Mist)" (The End of All Music)

The Frogs' It's Only Right and Natural is an original artifact from the American underground. Initially released in 1989 on Homestead Records, the album unleashed the homosexual id in the bluntest manner to a ramshackle, spindly folk-rock backing. The shamelessly lascivious lyrics were so disarming because they hit you in such a stripped-down context, in a musical form typically associated with earnest, leftist sentiments, heterosexual sentimentality, and love-one-another-right now universality—not the sleaziest aspects of queer culture.

Adding further layers of strangeness: The Frogs weren't from San Francisco or New York, but from muthafucking Milwaukee—and they were straight. Brothers Dennis and Jimmy Flemion had no self-censorship instincts; they simply thrust their faux sexual urges and fantasies in your shocked mug, accompanied by florid acoustic guitars and arch, perfectly enunciated troubadour vocals... that would sometimes lurch into dirty-old-man-on-the-verge-of-orgasm stutters.

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News • Film/TV

It's Emmy Nominations Day, Baby!

by Jasmyne Keimig • Tuesday at 11:25 am

Youre looking at TWO Emmy nominated actors....interesting.
You're looking at TWO Emmy-nominated actors... interesting. COURTESY OF HBO/HELEN SLOANE
Today, nominees for the 71st Annual Emmy Awards were announced. It seems, like, really early (the ceremony is on Sept. 22), but what else do we have to do?

HBO leads the pack, snagging 137 nominations, mostly because nearly every actor in its crowning drama Game of Thrones got a shout out. The show received in total 32 nominations, the most for any show in a single year in the history of the Primetime Emmys. Although, in my professional opinion, the last season sucked, the nostalgia and need to formally recognize the ending of a cultural phenomenon is bigger than me. Just don't give an award to Jon Snow, please!

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Weed

Los Angeles Gets a Cannabis Cafe, While We Are Stuck Hot-Boxing in Our Subarus

by Josh Jardine • Tuesday at 10:59 am

Justin Sullivan / Getty
Justin Sullivan / Getty

Something that should have been a claim to fame for Washington State is now the subject of bragging rights for California—and, like a doughnut made by a livid baker, I am filled with both jelly and anger. Next month will see the debut of Lowell Farms: A Cannabis Cafe, a space in West Hollywood that will offer guests the opportunity to purchase and consume cannabis in a well-appointed restaurant/bar setting.

Washington and our tourists would obviously despise the idea of having such a thing in our fine state, which has to be the reason we've consistently shot down any legislative effort put forward to allow any social consumption spaces. But, you know, good for West Hollywood, I guess. The people behind this are the cofounders of well-known cannabis brand Lowell Herb Co., whose pre-rolls, Lowell Smokes, are carried at hundreds of California dispensaries.

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