August 1999 August 4 August 11 August 18 August 25 back to Archives home Volume 25, issue 42, August 25, 1999 NEWS Lead Story Closing for Christ. Down By the Riverside:Can Portland's young Christian soldiers help Luis Palau's march to the top of the evangelical world? Lead Story Sidebar Jesus Wept: While the bands of Portland Festival '99 genuinely pursue a joyful noise, their uninspired reworkings of mainstream pop can wring tears from heaven. Politics Yikes, Election 2000 is almost here. Politics Movin' To Montana: The folks at Project Vote Smart were able to pin down thousands of slippery pols, but they couldn't get around Oregon's restrictive land-use laws. Business Call Waiting: WW's story on Sequent Computer rattles the company's stock and has phones ringing as investors wait for the IBM deal to close. Letters "Could it be that the union leaders feared the scandal would weaken their position at the negotiating table and decided to take the moral high ground and rat on their fellow officers for the sake of public-relations damage control? " NewsBuzz David and Goliath | Hard on Microsoft | Taking Stock | Bananas Republic | Schwing! | Party Favors | Corrections Scoreboard This week's winner and losers: schools' superintendent Ben Canada already is getting high marks; "Fiancée-gate" tarnished Clackamas County Commissioner Bill Kennemer's reputation. Rogue of the Week Don't get us wrong. We've got nothing against Old Glory. It just shouldn't be used to cover up roguish grandstanding. LIFE FEATURE Guys, Dolls and Their Wheels Q & A Diana Schutz Shop Tea For One CULTURE FEATURE Turning Tricks: At 18, B.J. Campbell was a promising in-line skater preparing for his first appearance in the X Games, the premier competition for the sport. Now 20, he says this weekend's B3 games in Beaverton may be his last professional event due to extreme burnout. Dinner Palace of Love Suey Chow's personals column Music Music Column Daydream Nation Preview Jazz David Slays Smooth Goliath! Jazz festivals across the country have lost their artistic edge. Newport's scrappy Jazz on the Water looks to turn the tide in favor of the real deal. Preview Overtures of Madness : Call them crazy, but the Swingin' Utters are willing to risk their hard-earned street cred for the right to write serious music. The result: punk songs with enough lyricism to command respect in any genre. Recorded Music Reviews of new releases from GZA/genius and Los Lobos Screen Review Unamused: In The Muse, Albert Brooks plays a screenwriter who's lost his edge. It's easy to see where he got his inspiration for this one. Review Shallow: The tedious urban melodrama In Too Deep is just not deep enough. Dish Restaurant Review Half-and-Half: When two of the principals at a couple of Portland's best restaurants opened their own place, foodies salivated at the thought of these superpowers uniting. Unfortunately, Castagna is uneven. Performance Review Pluck of the Irish: Cracked skulls. Fainting girls. Tight pants. Dropped skirts. Dancing for liquor. The spry lords and ladies of Riverdance take it all in step. Play Review Take Me to the River: The Gorge is one of the best places in the world to windsurf--if you can figure out how. Volume 25, issue 42, August 18, 1999 NEWS Lead Story Breaking Ranks: Guess who blew the whistle on the Portland Police Bureau overtime scandal? Politics Critical Condition: Multnomah County's ambulance contractor got a one-year reprieve last week. The county officials who oversee the ambulance program got an old-fashioned tongue-lashing. Business Return to Sender: On paper, Sequent Computer Systems made a huge sale earlier this year to a Maryland company. In reality, the computers never left Oregon, and the buyer says he has no memory of the deal. Now federal securities regulators are looking into the mysterious order. Crime and Justice Making a Correction: Multnomah County's parole and probation office thought it knew the whole story about a former Linn County sheriff's deputy it hired. Now it isn't so sure. Letters "Marijuana use still involves criminal risks even for legitimate users of medical marijuana. " NewsBuzz Freeze Frame | The Slow Burn | Rules of the Rope | Seizing The High Ground | Corrections Scoreboard This week's winner and losers: protesters win a legal battle; OHSU loses its kidney-transplant monopoly. Rogue of the Week Two recent court decisions on the East Coast highlight the poor judgment exercised by this week's rogue. LIFE FEATURE Vitamin Shopping 101 Q & A Marcii Hovanic Shop Mouthing Off CULTURE FEATURE Legend in His Own Mind: Johnny Legend kicked it with Andy Kaufman, learned life lessons from "Classy" Freddie Blassie and directed the one and only Johnny Wadd. After trolling the murky backwaters of American culture for decades, the rockabilly madman unleashes his most psychotic show ever on Portland. Dinner Palace of Love Suey Chow's personals column Music Music Column Daydream Nation NXNW Drum Roll, Please! The madness is upon us: The North by Northwest Music Fest will occupy Portland like a barbarian horde, Sept. 30 to Oct. 2. Here's who wants a piece of the action. Opinion Epitaph for Destruction? Epitaph Records is both friend and foe. It's an evil slut in bed with the capitalist system. But it's also the most generous pimp on the block. Can one label take the sting out of punk? Recorded Music Reviews of new releases from Santana, Ministry and God Hates Computers Screen Review Jagged Little Pill: Scream scribe Kevin Williamson goes for more melodrama than horror in Teaching Mrs. Tingle, an odd experiment in irony that becomes ironic itself. Words BiblioFile Reviews of three new books. Volume 25, issue 41, August 11, 1999 NEWS Lead Story The Shot Heard 'Round The World Wide Web: Portland's David Olson takes on AT&T in the global war for control of the Internet. Politics A Question of Conscience: David Wu will need all the votes he can get next year. So why did he buck his own party--and some powerful interests in his district? Environment The Eagle Soars: Environmentalists have been pushing for years to halt logging in the Clackamas River watershed. Now, they're getting help from Washington. Crime and Justice Social Worker Shakedown: Church secretary Blanchette Villavicencio thought an Old Town cop might need her help. Instead, he hauled her into the police station. 500 Words Power To The People: HB 2753 will give us just that. Letters " I am in no mood to cut Dolin any slack now that he has been hoisted by his own petard. " NewsBuzz New Cadillac | Satan's Place | Hack Attack | Where Have All The Felon's Gone? | Happy Feet| Corrections | The Changing Nature of Police Work Scoreboard This week's winner and losers: Gerding/Edlen Development wins in the Pearl District; Al Gore loses. Rogue of the Week Pubgoers along Southeast Hawthorne Avenue are miffed about recent changes in the aesthetics of their beer-drinking experience. LIFE FEATURE Something Special In The Air: Does airline food leave you as stuffed and leaden as an overpacked carry-on? A barf bag isn't the only remedy. Q & A Lillian Faderman Shop Racqueteering CULTURE FEATURE Screen Saver: Film critics-turned-filmmakers Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut kicked off the French New Wave cinema craze and birthed a lo-fi film revolution. See why Truffaut is still a critic's darling during a retrospective this month. Dinner Palace of Love Suey Chow's personals column Music Music Column Daydream Nation Scene Report Too Much Blackness? Obituary Remembering Leroy: The passing of walking-bass legend Leroy Vinnegar leaves a yawning gap in Portland's jazz scene. The drummer who helped Vinnegar keep the music's spirit alive discusses the man and reflects on the future. Recorded Music Reviews of new releases from Habib Koité, Echo and the Bunnymen, and Corrina Repp. Screen Review Family Size: The splendid animated adapation of Ted Hughes' novel The Iron Giant is a family movie that doesn't forget the grown-ups. Review The High Low Finger: A great parody of Hollywood, Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy's Bowfinger manages to be a work of both high- and low-brow hilarity. Dish Review For the People, By the People: On Saturdays and Wednesdays, head down to the Park Blocks for a real sense of food community and the best damn cherries on the planet. Mash beer column Visual Art Review A Good Look Around: However you look at it, this year's Oregon Biennial will leave you feeling anything but indifferent. Play Profile Ultimately Fabulous: The Frisbee has come a long way since its days as a pie tin. Portland's top female team competes in the World Ultimate Club Championship in Scotland this week. Volume 25, issue 40, August 4, 1999 NEWS Lead Story The Incredible Shrinking Doctor: The collapse of HealthFirst heralds the decline of Portland physicians. Politics Got Backbone? The mayor wants to turn a toxic old shipyard into a new city neighborhood filled with riverfront housing, shops and parks. So why isn't everyone applauding? Education Reed has a Dream: Portland's most exclusive liberal-arts college cracks open its doors. Crime and Justice Letting Loose of Moose: Days before leaving his home of 24 years, Portland's top cop lets down his guard to talk about friends, racism and the media. Letters "Why is it taboo for a private citizen to sell a gun at a gun show? The location of the transaction has no bearing on the fact that it is illegal for a convicted felon to possess a gun. " NewsBuzz King-56 Case Heads To Jury | Battling High Medical Costs | Wrong Numbers | Condom Nation | Amazing Grace Scoreboard This week's winner and losers: the Oregon Ballet Theater wins; Blitz-Weinhard beer drinkers lose. Rogue of the Week This week's award goes to Knoll Pharmaceutical Co. of Mount Olive, N.J., for bullying scientific researchers and costing consumers--including an unknown number of Oregonians--an estimated $356 million per year. LIFE FEATURE Waxing My Girl Q & A Mike Pippi Shop The Fashion Supadupahighway CULTURE FEATURE New Wave Hookers: Film critics-turned-filmmakers Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut kicked off the French New Wave cinema craze and birthed a lo-fi film revolution. See why Truffaut is still a critic's darling during a retrospective this month. Dinner Palace of Love Suey Chow's personals column Music Music Column Daydream Nation Preview Cravedog Records hosts a full-tilt feast just 20 minutes from town but a freakin' world away. CD Reviews Cuba Libre: Their baseball team is on the skids, Havana is falling apart and the Beard's getting old. But three classy Cuban albums and the film Buena Vista Social Club prime the island for a musical takeover of the U.S.A. Recorded Music Reviews of new releases from the Steve Lacy Trio, The State Flowers, and various punks. Screen Review Dethroned: The weak remake of Norman Jewison's 1968 The Thomas Crown Affair only emphasizes how truly great the original was. Dish Dish Turning Japanese: Olive Stick uses a Mediterranean approach to impaling and frying quasi-Japanese food. Sound weird? It is. Words BiblioFile Reviews of two new books. Visual Art Review Highway Sublime: As the American landscape changes, so does landscape painting. A show at Elizabeth Leach takes in the view at the end of the century.