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BEST
WAY TO WIN A FREE PITCHER OF BEER
Around 9 pm every Tuesday, the normally rowdy hipster bar
Beulahland (118 NE 28th Ave., 235-2794) grows suddenly serious,
as an emcee fires off 20 questions as eclectic as the literature
lying around the pub--MAD magazines and scruffy paperbacks.
Trivia night questions range from naming the territory
India and Pakistan are warring over to identifying the secret
society to which Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble belonged.
Teams and individual players scrawl their answers on sheets
of loose-leaf paper then determine the winners, grammar-school
style: Teams switch papers and correct each other's work,
bestowing X's and curlicued C's. The victors are treated
to a pitcher of beer (their choice) on the house. If you're
not too confident about your trivia skills, be sure to choose
your team's name well--there's also a prize awarded for
best moniker (a recent reward was a baggie of brightly colored
rubber frogs and a large toy rat).
BEST
WAY TO COMBAT THE
TRENCH COAT MAFIA
OK, we got turned away at the door. Still, the
KUFO Stop the Hate Concert on May 15 was pretty cool--and
it wasn't intended for us, anyway. The local radio station
teamed up with rock gods (yeah, it's a stretch, but we'll
give them the benefit of the doubt) the Red Hot Chili Peppers,
for a show exclusively reserved for high-school students.
This was no prom but rather an attempt to take a stand against
the alienation and angst that apparently led to the high-school
massacre in Littleton, Colo. Hot on the heels of that appalling
tragedy, the Chilis threw together a brief tour to try to
spread a message of peace, love and understanding to high
schoolers. In Portland, KUFO picked 500 kids for the free
private blowout by sorting through anti-violence essays
submitted to the station's Web site. Critics could have
pegged the show as an opportunistic attempt by the Chili
Peppers to connect with music fans who were in grade school
the last time they had a hit. But the excited chatter of
the kids hanging around outside the Roseland Theater that
night left little doubt that Flea and the boys had made
a positive splash.
BEST
RETRO RECALL
Remember life as a kid in the '80s? Back then,
video games weren't all violent fight scenes and turbo action.
You won the right to enter your initials by helping a frog
cross a busy highway unscathed, gobbling up ghosts or firing
at alien invaders. Thanks to Portland's newest arcade, Ground
Kontrol (610 SW 12th Ave., 796-9364), the salad days
are back. Owners Kneel Cohn and Betty Farrier collected
more than 30 '80s pinball and video games--Tetris, Star
Trek, Dig Dug, Space Invaders and Centipede among them--and
corralled them in a revamped downtown space. Besides 25-cent
games galore, the store buys and sells new and used CDs,
Atari units and cartridges. Visit the window nook, where
a couch, Atari unit and TV setup assuage your joystick jones.
GK is open 11 am-10 pm Monday-Thursday, 11 am-midnight Friday-Saturday
and noon to 10 pm Sunday.
BEST
ILLEGAL CONCERT VENUE
Though the recent string of corpses unearthed
in Forest Park set the spines of Portlanders a-shivering,
local act Hexenhammer has suddenly found the park more alluring
than ever. Undeterred by potential police interference,
the acoustic black-metal band--whose name is Swedish for
"witches' hammer"--celebrated the summer solstice with a
covert gig at the appropriately nicknamed Witches' Castle,
the stone fort in Lower Macleay Park. A loyal crowd of about
four dozen took in the shrouded trio's brief set then split
before the fuzz caught on to the buzz.
BEST
BAR FOR WALLFLOWERS
Some of us have that Latin rhythm trapped deep
within our souls--and it can't escape. We love the saucy,
syncopated measures from beyond the Rio Grande, but our
limbs are strictly anglophonic. In other words, we couldn't
dance our way out of a pair of Ricky Martin's hip-hugging
trousers if our crazy lives depended on it. For us, dancing
remains a spectator sport--and we're grateful for La
Rumba Restaurant (228 NW Davis St., 279-1588). The bar
is hard to miss, with its strobing red, white and blue lights
and the meaty beats pulsing out the door. Grab a Corona
at the bar, squeeze in the lime and dig the action as oldsters,
slick-haired, young suaveniks on the make and goofy girls
out for a good time rock the dance floor.
BEST
TOUCH OF VEGAS CLASS
The 3-D popcorn, monorail journey and Batcave-like
quality of Regal Cinemas' promotional trailer serves as
an impressive introduction to the feature presentation.
But the gold lamé curtain at CineMagic (2021
SE Hawthorne Blvd., 231-7919) puts on an even better pre-movie
show. After the opening advertisements roll, the close curtain
is set aglow by the movie's studio logo. It doesn't do much
besides look pretty, but some say that the outrageously
Vegas drape is even more remarkable than the theater's nearly
year-long run of The Secret of Roan Inish back in
1997.
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Willamette Week | originally
published July 21, 1999
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