Telling Stories Feb. 20 and 21!

Telling Stories, a super-fun collection of FREE live music and essay readings, returns 7 p.m. Friday, Feb 20 in Boulder and Saturday, Feb. 21 in Denver. This month's installment is "Finding Our Religion," an exploration of spirituality through a collection of creative musical and written art.

Word on the street is that there will be essays about bathroom graffiti, the Midwest and the ghost of Cab Calloway. There will also be a host of electric guitars, marimbas, cellos, zarbs and clarinets.
Telling Stories features young classical musicians and writers, but the group aims to "leave the stuffy concert hall behind." Full disclosure: I'm a contributing writer for the event, and this event is far from stuffy. I followed a gorgeous and unconventional flute piece at the last event, I managed to drop the F-Bomb on stage as I read my essay.

If you're in the Boulder area, check out Telling Stories Friday at Old Main on the CU campus. For the Denver crowd, check out Telling Stories at 910 Art Gallery, 910 Santa Fe. Both events are FREE and start at 7 p.m.

For more information, visit tellingstoriesmusic.org.

Rock out with (Jew)elry

Image via jewishrosaries.com

I always get a little too excited when I get another free issue of Nylon in my mailbox. (Thanks free trial offers!)It's all so silly: the neon fashion trends! The ugly but somehow irresistible shoes! The long-haired guys with jeans so tight they look like grungy ballet dancers!

I was especially excited when I saw a small feature on Carlen Altman's Jewish Rosaries that seem to be slung around everyone's necks these days (the guys from MGMT, English model Agyness Deyn, musician Adam Green, are just a few of the usual hipster suspects). And the likes of Elle, InTouch and Heeb have all found a place in their pages for the jewels.

Some priests in the Catholic church have said they're disappointed to see traditional rosaries used as a fashion statement, but the trend made popular by Madonna seems to be going as strong as ever. Now that there's a Jewish equivalent, even I want one-- and I'm not even Jewish. They remind me of the super-pretty beads my grandma had (and the sky-blue one I kept tangled in my sock drawer with my rarely-used prayerbook.)

I can see the Catholic church's caution against using the beads as a date-night accessory. When you think about it, the fashion angle can detract from rosary beads' spiritual and practical use the same way decorating with prayer flags in Boulder detracts from their actual sacred purpose. But the let's-play-dress-up side of me wonders why rosaries have to be so darn gorgeous if they have to stay zipped in a carrying case or Sunday-best pocket.
Check out Altman's spazzy, tongue-in-cheek Web site here for the full scope of her awesome rosary madness.

Hey mommy, is Islam the light?

Remember all those horror movies with the talking dolls whose only mission was to kill humanity in gruesome and fucked-up ways? Needless to say, I've never been one for talking toys. In fact, as a child, I preferred to come up with my own voices for my baby dolls. That's why I never had this odd problem: several parents who bought the "Little Mommy Cuddle n' Coo" doll say the baby declares the phrase "Islam is the light!" in a garbled, creepy voice.
Some parents have complained about the same problem with the Baby Pals game for Nintendo DS.
So what really happened? Was it simply a cheap recording malfunction that cobbled together the word "mama" too many times? Or is some toymaker really, really dead-set on converting the world's young population with a single electronic phrase?
Neither Nintendo nor Mattel take responsibility for the error. Nintendo backed away from the issue by saying the game is manufactured by a third party, and Mattel said the compressed audio files can sometimes get corrupted. Sounds like a conspiracy to me!
I personally can't see how someone happened to get access to change the audio on these toys to add a religious message, but if you really want to hear it for yourself, check out the news story here.
And if that DID happen? Hey, if you know the guy who manipulated the audio, send him my way so I can indoctrinate children with a healthy fear of zombies.

Ask a Muslim!

Image from the Houston Chronicle
I like having "a guy." You know-- friends and acquaintances I call up when I need a special job done. I've "got a guy" (or gal) for when I need to translate something into Spanish, get a free meal, jump my car, figure what's wrong with my computer or get into the bar when I've forgotten my ID.
Yeah, I like having people.

On my "I've got a guy" wishlist is a guy who can answer my dumb questions about religious tenets without making fun of me for those four years I spent studying in the Religious Studies department at CU. Luckily, for questions about the world's second-largest religion, I can call 1-877-WHY-ISLAM.

With lots of post-9-11 misinformation still connecting Muslims with terrorism, Ask A Muslim seems like a pretty simple way to clear up basic questions about mosques and Mohammad and tackle larger issues such as what the Koran says about jihad.

According to a recent Houston Chronicle article, the call center fields 1,000 queries a month. You can also go online to www.whyislam.org, where people can e-mail questions, get in on discussion forums, get free copies of the Quran or find a nearby mosque.
“The idea was to help answer the questions that people have about Islam,” Islamic Circle of North America board member Hanif Harris was quoted in the article. “This way, they’ll get the answers directly from Muslims.”

ICNA says the Web site and hotline are meant is to spread information to non-Muslims and promote multi-faith dialogue without converting anyone, but not everyone is happy with the idea. On just the Houston Chronicle's Web site alone were plenty of idiotic tirades about how the tuuurrrrists are just trying to indoctrinate innocent callers with their violent ways and "take over our country."
Gee, guess I'll have to call the number and ask a Muslim if that's true!
So much for interfaith dialogue.

Silly, snarky church signs

Thanks to Seth for alerting me to this fun blog Crummy Church Signs, where I can indulge in some laughable church signs across the country!

Church signs are such a haiku-like phenomenon. With little space to spare and the occasional shortage of necessary letters (3’s instead of E’s, upside-down W’s standing in for M’s), saintly messages are transformed into an awkward art that’s really just a by-product of enforced brevity.

As a kid, the church where my brother’s Boy Scout troop met usually had some great messages on their signs, like “God has a job for you—inquire within.”
What I love about the signs (other than the cutesy sayings) is the way they reflect the community and culture around them. A sign will reference technology (“Need to reboot? Remember, God saves!”) consumerism (“Walmart isn’t the only savings place”) or flash-in-the-pan slang (“Jesus is the rizzle for the sizzle.”) The perfect formula for a hilarious church sign? A combination of vaguely threatening language coupled with awkwardly misspelled words: "God hates whoremongers."

When driving my brother to Boy Scouts, I never paid much attention to the cheesy words that greeted me as I pulled into the parking lot where his friends fiddled with their pocket knives and played football before meetings. Now, I can’t help wanting to start my own collection of double-entendre-laden, snarky and silly phrases that are designed to reach out to people in a contemporary way. If only the sermons were so consistently witty…

If you're a church sign lover like me, you can also get your fix with coffee table books chock-full of church sign photos such as Donald Seitz’s “The Great American Book of Church Signs” or Steve Paulson’s “Church Signs Across America.” Buy local—ask your neighborhood bookstore for details!

Diner-lovers, drunk Pentecostals and one big plastic Jesus

Now that the holidays are over and I’m just about out of energy to party, I’m making a list of movies to watch as I snuggle on my new couch and listen to the annoying Chinook winds blow outside my window. There’s a few embarrassing favorites (Pretty in Pink, more Pretty in Pink) but also a long list of documentaries and dramas I can’t wait to get my cold little hands on.

One gorgeous documentary I can’t stop talking about is Searching For the Wrong-Eyed Jesus, an absorbing road trip film that follows alt-country singer Jim White through the American South. White drives through small towns, bayous and forests with a life-sized plastic Jesus in his trunk. He ruminates about what it means to live in an environment where the ideas of eternal damnation and faith are constant companions-- and constant inspiration for writers and musicians. Along the way, he meets drunk Pentecostals, enthusiastic preachers, diner-loving locals and at a handful of folks who claim their brother’s cousin’s best friend was dragged into hell.

Interviews with locals and scattered shots of church scenes offer context for the film, but what cast a spell on me was the built-in soundtrack sung on the edge of lakes, in the middle of roads and in the back of greasy spoon diners. I’m a blossoming alt-country fan, so it was an awesome treat to see performances by the Handsome Family, banjo player Lee Sexton and guitarist Johnny Dowd. These musicians show up at the corners of the story and slowly turn the lonely landscape into organic concert halls for their impromptu performances. In my favorite scene, David Eugene Edwards of 16 Horsepower sits alone in the forest, singing the haunting traditional hymn “Wayfaring Stranger” on his banjo. As he sings, a kid pushes his bike toward him, stops to listen for a minute, then pushes his bike away.

The simplicity of each shot and the unhurried, thoughtful tone of Searching For the Wrong-Eyed Jesus convinced me that there is creative and spiritual inspiration at every turn--even when inspiration comes from dirty truck stop bathrooms and cramped, hot barber shops. White’s view of the South may be crusty, imperfect and full of contradiction, but that’s what he loves so much about it. His outlook reminds me that the crusty, imperfect corners of my own landscape are just as valuable and just as packed with inspiration.

Modern breakups + ancient Indian epics = awesome-looking

I’m marking my calendar for two screenings of “Sita Sings the Blues,” a color-saturated, gorgeously animated film by Nina Paley.
U.S.- born Paley melds the storyline of the Indian epic Ramayana with her own autobiographical account of getting dumped by her husband via e-mail after he moves to India for work. It’s set to the music of 1920’s jazz artist Annette Hanshaw, adding an even more contemporary touch.
I don’t know much else about the film yet, but I do know the Ramayana packs in some serious action, adventure and soap-opera style betrayal, loss and greed. (I’ve only read parts of it because it’s made up of seven books—anyone know of an abridged version I can get my hands on?)

“Sita Sings the Blues” has gotten international accolades from film competitions in Holland, Melbourne, Taipei and Warsaw. Check out the trailer and official Web site here, then catch the flick 7 p.m. Wednesday, January 7 at the Starz Film Center, 900 Auraria Parkway in Denver. If you miss the Denver showing, catch a screening February 12th through the 15th at the Boulder International Film Festival