Joelogon/Flickr

Mike Doughty answers questions from the question jar.

Mike Doughty will be at the Swedish American Hall on Tuesday, but don't expect any Soul Coughing. He's in town to promote his new memoir The Book of Drugs. If the book about some rough years is consistent with Doughty's demeanor, we're not expecting any apologies -- or self-congratulation.

"I think I came into it wanting to tell an addiction story without any bad-assery. I think most addicts aren't like, you know, bloody-fisted, thrown-in-and-out-of-jail, bad-asses. My story is kind of like, I'm Buster Keaton as a dope fiend," Doughty last week told our sister publication, Denver Westword.

Doughty's drug-addled years in Soul Coughing are behind him. He's not so inclined to play the old classics, but he'll thank you for asking. The show does feature his solo work, though. And his "question jar" engages the audience (and inspired a 2012 live release). See a bit of that hysteria in the video clip below.

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Photo by Christopher Macsurak, Wikipedia

​Last week, singer Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields created a gossip-blog blip when an interview with LA Weekly revealed his belief that the popularity of Brit vocalist Adele is rooted in a racist fan base. Merritt expressed his general wariness of people who "get excited about British people who sound like American black people."

Rich Juzwiak (of the beloved FourFour and now writing for Gawker) dissected the weaknesses in Merritt's brief argument, acknowledging a history of white artists co-opting black music yet making a distinction between that practice and white women who have been singing soulfully since Whitney Houston changed the pop standard with her gospel-trained voice.

While I agree with Juzwiak on some level, I can see where Merritt is coming from, which is odd because it borders on impossible to flesh out a two-sentence theory that uses this as a rationale: "Basically she sounds like Anita Baker. And people are not, you know, wild and crazy about Anita Baker."

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​Johann Sebastian Bach was born 327 years ago this week. While not considered a great composer during his lifetime, Bach created more than 1,100 works, three of which were pressed onto golden records and sent into space aboard the Voyager spacecrafts as a representation of humanity's virtue. It is a sweet reward for a talent that was underpaid, undervalued, and frankly obstructed by the church, which often employed the composer. During Bach's 27-year tenure as cantor in Leipzig, he worked assiduously, creating an original cantata for every Sunday and every feast day of the year. Still, it is his secular works that spring to mind as masterpieces, which makes Noontime Concerts the perfect setting to celebrate Bach's 327th Birthday on Tuesday.

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Eva Soltes

Lou Harrison

​When we first heard Terry Riley's "In C," our minds left us -- all those instruments, in all those minutes, all galloping after that C. We'd always known classical was inventive; we'd just never heard inventiveness so hypnotic, so direct, so rock 'n' roll. Riley became our classical point man to what we should be paying attention to. Today, we find we should be paying attention to Eva Soltes' film Lou Harrison: A World of Music, in part because Riley himself, at Tuesday's benefit screening, takes a seat behind the Castro Theatre's "mighty Wurlitzer" for a musical prelude to the film.

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Pop-culture emcee Adam WarRock

​​Adam WarRock, dubbed the Internet's foremost comic book rapper, rolled through Berkeley's 924 Gilman on Sunday to promote his second full-length album You Dare Call That Thing Human?!?, which released the week prior. Co-headlining with indie nerd rockers Kirby Krackle and local openers who sang acoustic ditties about Pokemon and life post-zombie apocalypse, WarRock's set was surprisingly intimate for a hip hop performance -- due to Gilman's sparse surroundings and a Sunday evening show which started in broad daylight -- yet undeniably spirited. More >>

Three years ago, while working on a commissioned video installation, director Jacob Krupnick put out an open call for amateur dancers. Inspired by the range of styles exhibited in not-so-amateur dancer Anne Marsen's improvised routine -- which included Bollywood, breakdance, hip-hop, ballet, freestyle, and rave -- he set out to make a feature film for her to star in. The perfect soundtrack revealed itself in popular mash-up DJ Girl Talk's 2010 album All Day.

After a Kickstarter campaign that raised nearly $25,000, Girl Walk // All Day is touring the country's theaters and film festivals, including opening night of SXSW. The film plays at two S.F. venues -- Public Works and the Roxie Theater -- as well as Oakland's Vessel Gallery in the next week.

Girl Walk // All Day follows three characters (the girl, the creep, and the gentleman, played by Marsen, John Doyle, and Dai Omiya, respectively) as they dance their way through New York City. Along the way they experience the inhospitable nature as well as the embrace of certain public spaces, eliciting rudeness and appreciation from strangers, and discover the uplifting power of dance. They tap atop Wall Street's Charging Bull. They get kicked out of Yankee Stadium. They enlist a group of women off the street to perform Beyonce's "Single Ladies." In doin so, the dancers reveal the scope of landscapes, personalities, and human responses in NYC. We caught up with director Jacob Krupnick in New York to find out more.

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Guy Webster

Circus Finelli

​Our city is a political circus. Joshua Norton declared himself emperor of the United States during the Gold Rush. Punk rocker Jello Biafra and comedian Will Durst ran for mayor. District Attorney Terence Hallinan was nicknamed "K.O." because he liked fistfights. Mayor Frank Jordan broadcast himself showering with two radio DJs. There's a lesser-known face in this storied group who ran for mayor last year. His name is Blinky Winky, and we have it on good authority he's now aiming for the White House. Mr. Winky also belongs to another circus -- Circus Finelli, whose members appear Wednesday with the Black Hats at El Rio.

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​As you strive to improve yourself in the new year, in addition to crap like running on the treadmill, not eating in bed, only wearing sweatpants at home and sometimes to the grocery store, and doing laundry more than once a month, make at least one resolution you'll actually want to keep.

Today's suggestion: Become a karaoke superstar. Never mind your friends who are learning how to cook vegan meals or make blown glass art to sell on Etsy. Instead focus on mastering these five easy steps to singing other people's songs in places where beer is sold in 24-ounce "schooners," and the food, the bathroom, and most of the other patrons are all a little bit sketchy.

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Fishbone

​Chris Metzler fits in perfectly in the eclectic documentary circles of his adopted S.F. home, even if he hasn't shed his L.A. roots. Everyday Sunshine: The Story of Fishbone, the high-energy follow-up to Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea (co-directed with Jeff Springer), tracks the stormy history and vibrant legacy of the African-American punk-fusion pioneers who met in high school 25 years ago. Everyday Sunshine rode the festival circuit from early 2010 (including stops at S.F. Docfest and the Mill Valley Film Festival) through the summer of 2011 before launching its theatrical run in the fall.

The doc returns today (Friday, Jan. 6) for a week at the Roxie Theater, with band members Angelo Moore and Norwood Fisher performing before the first-night screenings and the filmmakers on hand Friday and Saturdsay. We caught up with Metzler, who essentially has toured nonstop since early October.

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losangeles.broadwaytoday.com

Lynda Carter in her latter-day profession.

​Lynda Carter spent much of the 1970s playing the iconic superhero Wonder Woman on television, and it has defined her whole career. She led two series, The New Original Wonder Woman from 1975-77 and The New Adventures of Wonder Woman from 1977-79, setting the bar for the character so high that the scramble to produce a competent cinematic version is still under way.

Carter has made dozens of brief appearances on TV in the years since, and she fronted two more programs (1984's Partners in Crime and Hawkeye in 1994-95). But it appears her true passion is to sing, which she'll do at the Rrazz Room in March.

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