With all the bearded musicians making pretty music in this town—Fleet Foxes, Cave Singers, the Pica Beats—it's easy to forget that we built this city on rock and roll. Tonight's show will remind you. Wild Orchid Children play spastic jams laced with acidic vocals and psychedelic guitars. Navigator vs. Navigator remembered to take their ADD medication, but they've still got some spiraling-out-of-control, passionate moments. Finally, instrumental brethren Bronze Fawn and You.May.Die.in.the.Desert will be a nice warm-up to the crazy train. (Comet Tavern, 922 E Pike, 322-9272. 9 pm, $6.) MEGAN SELING

No matter who wins on election day, the blissful truth is that George W. Bush will no longer be president. Stranger Genius Award–winner Jonathan Raban—who, in addition to being one of the best novelists in Seattle, writes intelligent, funny, and furious political commentary—will take part in a group discussion titled "After Bush." As we get closer to the election, it's important to consider what the nepo-tastic dumb-fuck has done to the face of American leadership in the 21st Century. (Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave, 652-4255. 7:30 pm, $5.) PAUL CONSTANT

Trouble the Water isn't the most comprehensive Hurricane Katrina documentary, but it's a damn compelling reminder of what happens when a half-decade of indifferent Republican leadership meets a natural disaster meets racism. Aspiring rapper and Ninth-Ward resident Kimberly Rivers Roberts filmed her neighborhood during the breezy, uncertain hours before the storm and kept the video running as she and her family fled, terrified, into their dark, cramped attic: "If you don't have money, and you don't have status, you don't have a government." Just in case you forgot why this election is so important. (See movie times, www .thestranger.com, for details.) LINDY WEST

For its 13th year, the SLGFF is running with a light "homo horror" theme, complete with history's queerest scary movies (The Hunger, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2) and the closing-night exhumation of Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. But hidden within the horror is an impressive collection of documentaries about fascinating gay artists, including "Buddhist bubblegum" musician Arthur Russell, queer filmmaker Derek Jarman (whose SIFF-winning doc screens tonight), and those ambitious souls who vie for the title of Miss Gay America. (Various venues and times, www.threedollarbillcinema.org, $6–$30. Oct 17–26.) DAVID SCHMADER

Seven years ago, this violist stunned a gathering of Seattle viola students with Salvatore Sciarrino's masterpiece Three Brilliant Nocturnes. Awestruck by Sciarrino's sorcery of near-silent bow strokes and gossamer harmonics, students crowded the stage for a look at the sheet music. Knox returns to Seattle to tout his stately new disc, D'Amore, with works for the little-known viola d'amore, a rustic, woodier-sounding cousin of the viola. Knox will play Three Brilliant Nocturnes and Iannis Xenakis's La Legende d'Eer, an electroacoustic classic infested with gritty rasps and squirming textures. (Meany Hall, UW Campus, 543-4880. 7:30 pm, $10, all ages.) CHRISTOPHER DELAURENTI

Lauri Chambers is a matriarch of abstraction. She works in black, white, and tones of gray, often on small pieces of paper and modest segments of Masonite. Not every one of her works will grab you, but when one does, it will keep you there and quiet for a surprisingly long time, feeling grateful for small wonders like not knowing which stroke preceded which, and new shapes and depths that materialize the longer you look. (Francine Seders Gallery, 6701 Greenwood Ave N, 782-0355. Reception 2–4 pm, free. Through Nov 30.) JEN GRAVES

DJs are competitive buggers, even when there's nothing at stake. But throw in a Rane Battle Mixer as a prize (plus local pride), and the claws really come out. Seattle techno crew Knight-riders hosts this six-jock competition that stresses old-school DJ skills like track selection (strictly from vinyl records), mixing, continuity, crowd response, and stage presence. Kris Moon, Kristina Childs, Same DNA, Jimmy Hoffa, Doughboy, and Trench will cram as many awesome cuts as possible into their 10-minute, mano-a-mano sets. Expect decknical fireworks. (Nectar, 412 N 36th St, 632-2020. 9 pm, $10, 21+.) DAVE SEGAL

Mr. Quintron is an entertainer and an inventor from New Orleans, a black-magic scientist and organ-grinding nightclub singer, plowing through everything in his path with a two-tier keyboard rig tricked out to look like the grill of an oncoming hearse. With him as always are his patented Drum Buddy, an analog drum machine whose engine is a light bulb and a rotating coffee can, and his better half, Miss Pussycat, a homemade puppeteer and maraca shaker par excellence. With Golden Triangle and TacocaT. (Chop Suey, 1325 E Madison St, 324-8000. 9 pm, $10 adv/$12 DOS, 21+.) ERIC GRANDY

So much new art is about exhaustion—and who can't relate? But Seattle artist John Grade's work seems to have just awakened from a long rest. He labors over perfectly crafted sculptures, often in wood and held together by various bonding elements rather than hardware, and sends them out to be abused by the elements—tied to the grille of a truck, stuck in a slot canyon, submerged in an oyster bay. They return banged up but looking better and always ready for more. (Bellevue Arts Museum, 510 Bellevue Way NE, 425-519-0770. 10 am–5:30 pm, $7. Through Nov 30.)

Possibly the first, probably the best, and surely the prettiest film about young, urban Native Americans, 1961's The Exiles follows a handful of twentysomething Indians as they wander through long-disappeared sections of Los Angeles. Director Kent MacKenzie, then a student at USC, recorded quiet, rambling monologues from his subjects, which play over gorgeous black-and-white footage of their nightly pursuits: drinking, gambling, dancing, playing air piano, brawling, climbing up stairs, walking up hills, and slowly disappearing down lonely dead ends. A discussion with Stranger Genius Award winner—and notable Native American—Sherman Alexie follows. (Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave, 329-2629. 7 pm, $9.)

Open Letter is an exciting new publisher that translates fiction from around the world in affordable, attractive editions. Its second publication is The Pets, an Icelandic thriller about a misanthropic man looking for love and finding a distasteful old friend in a rough situation instead. Bragi Ólafsson, a former member of the Sugarcubes, has written something weird and wonderful; like Jar City and other Icelandic mysteries, it's like an anorak-heavy cop show on acid. (Elliott Bay Book Company, 101 S Main St, 624-6600. 7:30 pm, free.)

It's not that Sarah Vowell's first few books—Take the Cannoli and Radio On—were bad; they were really, really funny. But when the NPR commentator (and sometimes animated superhero) started writing books about American history, like Assassination Vacation (a road trip to presidential assassination sites) and this month's The Wordy Shipmates (about Puritans and their sexy, sexy secret lives), she found her calling. Vowell tells us where we are by exploring—hilariously—where we've been. (Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave, 800-838-3006. 7:30 pm, $5.)

The Gigantics is Onry Ozzborn. And who is Ozzborn? He is one half of Grayskul. And Grayskul? Grayskul are signed to the legendary Rhymesayers and are a part of Oldominion. Oldominon? Oldominion is a decade-old collective of rappers, producers, and DJs from Portland and Seattle. How does all of this relate to the Gigantics' new and brilliant CD, Die Already? The work is an ambitious synthesis of the local and national lights that are connected to the underground. Die Already is a burst of pure hiphop energy. (El Corazón, 109 Eastlake Ave E, 381-3094. 8 pm, $15 adv/$17 DOS, all ages.)

CHARLES MUDEDE

If you can squint at its moral problems (rogue Apaches from central casting circa 1966, a female lead who is a Pandora's box of fucked-up gender politics), Appaloosa is a pleasurable western—with none of that newfangled deconstructionist-western nonsense. Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen are laconic guns-for-hire who ride the plains and mete out justice; Jeremy Irons plays the silver-tongued (and baggy-faced) villain. Objectively, the film is a bucket of clichés, but Appaloosa keeps a light touch. It feels smooth, familiar, warm. (See movie times, www.thestranger.com, for details.)

It's amazing how far America hasn't come in the past 10 years. New Yorker Danny Hoch wrote Jails, Hospitals & Hiphop in 1997, but this constellation of monologues could've come from last week. Two young actors tag-team these text messages from the skulls of angry prison guards, depressed inmates, a hopeful crack baby, and a white kid who fantasizes about being a rap superstar: "I got this rare skin disorder where I look white, but I'm really black... Even though I live in Puyallup, I still got the ghetto in my heart." (Balagan Theatre, 1117 E Pike St, 718-3245. 8 pm, free. Through Oct 11.)

The track record of young Sub Pop imprint Hardly Art is—irony alert—hardly lacking in artistic merit, but the Pica Beats' sophomore album, Beating Back the Claws of the Cold, is its finest release yet. Singer Ryan Barrett's songs strike a perfect balance between inscrutable but resonant lyrics and simply catchy melodies, and his assembled players surround his worn but able singing with bedroom symphonies of guitar, drums, bowed bass, oboe, piano, synthesized strings and horns, vocal harmonies, and even sitar. This album owns autumn. (Chop Suey, 1325 E Madison St, 324-8000. 8 pm, $7, 21+.)

Art Spiegelman has drawn some of the New Yorker's strongest covers—including the famous black-on-black 9/11 cover—not to mention the masterpiece that is Maus. His newest book is called Breakdowns: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young %@&*!, and it chronicles Spiegelman's eager childhood corruption at the altar of pulpy sex-and-violence comics (as well as a disappointing attempt to mail-order a log cabin). From that lurid launch pad, Breakdowns reprints some of Spiegelman's earliest—and most innovative—work. (Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave, 634-3400. 7:30 pm, $5.)

Liz Magor is a Vancouver, B.C., artist who makes sculptures out of painted cast gypsum: party trays, folded-up used jackets, woodland creatures either napping or dead. In this installation at the Henry, everything is laid out on tables like the remnants of a wild party—or the offerings of a louche boutique. This is the embodiment of the exhaustion of the consumptive class: you, everyone you know, even the well-fed animals out your window. Is this show better seen before or after your bank run? (Henry Art Gallery, 4100 15th Ave NE, 543-2280. 11 am–5 pm, $10. Through Dec 14.)

The Coen brothers' 1984 debut is a slow, mannered, almost minimalist spin on film noir, its blasted Texas landscapes shot in dull colors more disturbing than black-and-white. The plot is awash in adultery, double-dealing, and revenge, but what you'll remember are images—roads and walls and bullet holes—and a pair of perfectly odd/oddly perfect performances by the great M. Emmet Walsh and a young Frances McDormand. It's a true indie classic, and the Coens never made another movie like it. (Central Cinema, 1411 21st Ave, 686-6684. 7 and 9:40 pm, $5. Oct 2–9.)

The second part of Frances Ford Coppola's The Black Stallion is kind of boring and involves Mickey Rooney. But the first part—in which a little boy named Alec is shipwrecked on an island and goes swimming with the world's prettiest horse—is one of the most aesthetically joyous (and dialogue-free) sequences ever filmed. Too soon, civilization (and Rooney the shaved Ewok) comes calling, but even all the horse- racing stuff is worth watching for Teri Garr's sweet little face. (SIFF Cinema, 321 Mercer St, 633-7151. 10 am, $7 adults/$2 children.)

Why? frontman Yoni Wolf has a rapper's ear for tongue-twisting cadence, a singer's sense of melody, and a poet's command of language. In Wolf's world, even sensuous details reek of existential dread; he recalls the scent of two people as "the smell of our still-living human bodies and oven gas." Still-living? And with that ominous oven gas hovering. As a live band, Why? are just as stunning as Wolf's words, especially Josiah Wolf's juggling of live drum breaks and skeletal xylophone. (Vera Project, Seattle Center, 956-8372. 7:30 pm, $11/$10 w/club card, all ages.)

This nomadic duo sometimes draws criticism for being stoned hippies—and their Native-American sartorial style and woozy, shuffling music may initially confirm those suspicions. But Brightblack—Naybob Shineywater and Rachael Hughes, who recorded the new Motion to Rejoin on solar panels—create a sublime form of slo-mo soul music. It's a potent antidote for your financial-crisis blues. (Tractor Tavern, 5213 Ballard Ave NW, 789-3599. 9 pm, $12, 21+.)

Mark Farina is based in San Francisco and has his roots in house music. Farina's fame, however, comes from a downtempo series called Mushroom Jazz. The best is the fourth, which was released in 2002 and had the noble ambition of reviving the beauty and sweetness of hiphop. "Hiphop is the most beautiful music in the world," the French DJ Cam once said. The truth of this statement can be found on Farina's Mushroom Jazz 4. (The Last Supper Club, 124 S Washington St, 748-9975. 9 pm, $10, 21+.)

In early September, Martha Manning—co-owner of beloved lesbian bar the Wildrose—was injured in a freak explosion at a gas station. Tonight, Chop Suey hosts a benefit, with an irresistible lineup starring the one and only Leslie and the LY's (you may know her as "the internet sweater girl," but to me she's Dina Martina without a wang) and—speaking of freak explosions—Seattle's own psychotic soft-rockers Connie and the Precious Moments. Go for the good cause, stay for the world-class freakery. (Chop Suey, 1325 E Madison St, 324-8000. 8 pm, $10–$15, 21+.) DAVID SCHMADER

Hallam Foe (the infinitely endearing Jamie Bell) is a creepy teenager who wears a badger pelt, hangs out in a tree house, and spies on people with binoculars. If those people are having sex, he's not above swooping down from his leafy bough on a zip wire to terrorize them. Writer-director David Mackenzie mines Hallam's eccentricities not just for oddball comedy but for outré sweetness, which creates a gently, but deeply, moral atmosphere. The film never punishes him for discovering that his freakier tendencies are simply who he is. (See movie times, www.thestranger.com, for details.) SEAN NELSON

Sean Wilsey created something really special with State by State: Each of the United States was assigned to an author, who tried to reveal the unique character and mystery of each state in three or four pages. Huge talents like Dave Eggers, Alison Bechdel, and John Hodgman contributed, making the book one of the best anthologies of the last decade. Wilsey will be joined onstage by State by State contributor—and former Sleater-Kinney member—Carrie Brownstein, who wrote the paean to Washington's weird trees. (Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave, 800-838-3006. 7:30 pm, $5.) PAUL CONSTANT

Minneapolis-based photographer Alec Soth was making complicated images, images of regular people and regular places that looked simple but refused to break down, long before he launched a blog in 2006. The blog revealed the quick and thoughtful mind behind his work—but then, one day in late 2007, it was suddenly discontinued. At least we know the man gives good art talk. He's here receiving an award from the Photographic Center Northwest, and then he'll speak at Seattle Art Museum. (Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, 720-7222. 2–3:30 pm, $8.) JEN GRAVES

This sweet little DIY idea invites film lovers into the homes and onto the couches of other film lovers, to love films together. This year's fest—the first ever—features 200 short films (all less than five minutes) screening in private residences around town, each with its own dedicated genre. The movies play all day long, while moviegoers wander from house to house, chatting, snacking, making friends, getting in fistfights maybe, touching each other surreptitiously on the thigh maybe, and watching films. Awwww. (Miscellaneous couches, visit www.couchfestfilms.org for details. 11 am–7 pm.) LINDY WEST

After jazz, the next intellectual art form to emerge wholly from the black-American experience is techno. Hiphop could have become intellectual, but it never evolved to the level of theory, abstraction, and difficulty. Techno, which was born around the same time as hiphop, became an intellectual art form in the early '90s, and Carl Craig was at the center of this transformation. The techno he and his generation produced (and continue to produce) is not about reality (or salary) but concepts—concepts in the mode of music. (Neumos, 925 E Pike St, 709-9467. 8 pm, $20 adv/$25 DOS, 21+.)

Mariachi-rockers Calexico may be headlining tonight, but the bill's more riveting act is the Cave Singers. It's hard to convincingly evoke shotgun-shack folk in 2008—especially for Seattle sophisticates like the Cave Singers. But their rickety shuffle, stark arrangements, inbred-goat vocals, and irresistible, serious-as-rotgut tunes transport you to a much more humid and thrillingly scary place than a classy old venue in downtown Seattle. Clap your feet and stomp your hands, y'all. (Moore Theatre, 1932 Second Ave, 628-0888. 8 pm, $20, all ages.) DAVE SEGAL

Sketch comedy is like the violin—played well, it's heaven; played ill, it's hell. Fortunately, this year's SketchFest (the oldest sketch-comedy festival in the country) is curated by Becky Poole, half of the Cody Rivers Show, and other people who know from funny. Tonight's late show looks especially promising: the All American Push Up Party (aka Dusty Warren, whose mind is a cyclone of sad clowns and Tupperware) and Seattle's collective of quality, young standup, the People's Republic of Komedy. (Theatre Off Jackson, 409 Seventh Ave S, 800-838-3006. See www.sketchfest.org for schedule, $15. Through Sept 27.)

The Ruby Suns' Sea Lion hasn't received as much hype as some other recent Sub Pop releases, but the 2008 disc is one of the label's more interesting pop offerings of late. Leader Ryan McPhun moved from California to New Zealand in 2004, and his Kiwi experience has imbued the Ruby Suns' Beach Boys influences with South Pacific peculiarities. The drums sound more tribal, the string instruments twangier, the percussion zanier, the atmosphere other. Their music is the equivalent of biting into an orange and tasting pomegranate. (Mars Bar, 609 Eastlake Ave E, 624-4516. 9 pm, $6, 21+.)

When an SUV crashed into a gas station at the north end of Broadway two weeks ago, the question foremost in some minds was: "Will this delay the opening of Poppy?" Fear not: The new restaurant from Jerry Traunfeld—formerly of the world-famous Herbfarm, which is now officially passé—has opened next door, serving Indian-influenced dishes for around $30 per person. Among all the recent hotly anticipated restaurant openings (Spring Hill, the Corson Building, Spinasse), this may be the hottest. (The woman whose pants caught fire in the conflagration—pain at the pump, indeed—is recovering.) (Poppy, 622 Broadway E, 324-1108, www.poppyseattle.com. 5:30–10 pm.)

If anyone has the potential for perfection it's Joel and Ethan Coen, but Burn After Reading—their new comedy about infidelity and delusion disguised as a thundering thriller—is not perfect. The film is silly, odd, and distractingly oblique. But it's not without that fearless Coen brothers flair for using violence as elegant punctuation; Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand will crack your ass up as a pair of village idiots in possession of classified CIA intelligence, and J. K. Simmons is sublimely incredulous as a CIA higher-up who just can't believe this shit. (See movie times, www.thestranger.com, for details.)

If you've never been to the Puyallup Fair, you're insane. This big funky fest has something for everyone, from thrill seekers (who can get shot into the air by the Extreme Scream) to outsider-art lovers (who'll gape in awe at the Hobby Hall exhibits) to those looking for reasons to commit suicide (the morbidly obese people zipping around in motorized wheelchairs with deep-fried Twinkies should do the trick). (Puyallup Fairground, 110 Ninth Ave SW, Puyallup. 10 am– 10 pm, $10. Through Sept 21.)

Even if you loathe musicals, you should see Gutenberg! The Musical!, a play pretending to be a staged reading (singing?) of a new musical biography of printing-press inventor Johann Gutenberg. The two hilariously clueless playwrights unintentionally skewer every musical cliché, but it's their antic energy as they play a giant cast (including an anti-Semitic young girl who sells flowers she steals from Jews) that makes the play a comic gem. Your face will hurt from laughing too hard. (Erickson Theater Off Broadway, 1524 Harvard Ave, 800-838-3006. 8 pm, $10–$25.)

The first really great independent film of the fall is about a schlub returning home to visit his parents during a business trip. For reasons that may or may not involve anxiety about his brand-new infant son, he decides to never leave again. Director Azazel Jacobs cast his own parents in the film, and his childhood home, a garbage-strewn wonderland of a Manhattan apartment, is the setting. It's sad and funny and beautiful, just like going home. (Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave, 267-5380. 7 and 9 pm, $5–$8.50.)

People call Superamas a dance company, but the collective—based in Paris and Vienna—is really a pop-culture clusterfuck. Its BIG, 3rd episode (Happy/End) is a package of despair, wrapped in gold lamé. Its disjoined scenes include excerpts from Sex in the City, four jackasses rehearsing "Smells Like Teen Spirit," an orgy, men in a gym quoting Derrida, and many bared breasts. It drips with sex—cold, cynical sex—and hides venomous fangs beneath its smiling, glossy lips. (On the Boards, 100 W Roy St, 217-9888. 8 pm, $24. Through Sept 20.)

Can Can's Sun Records Revival is an ode to the classics—Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, all the great musicians who got their start at the famous Memphis studio—and local teenager Vince Mira is the perfect talent to perform such beloved songs. At first he's just a baby-faced kid—he can't be older than 16, and his acoustic guitar looks big against his slight frame. But when that kid opens his mouth, it's unreal. Mira sings Cash's classics with an eerily exact replica of Cash's whiskey-tinged baritone. The shock is what pulls the crowd in, but his charisma and talent is what keeps 'em coming back. (Can Can, 94 Pike St, 652-0832. 8 pm, free, 21+.)

Here is the first survey of Northwest video artists in the history of time. It includes 17 artists (e.g., Rodney Graham, Anne Mathern, Miranda July, and Kevin Schmidt), lasts 90 minutes, and is free even though it's at Seattle Art Museum, because it's within the lobby-plus area of the museum that is always free. The loose themes are music and nature, but what you'll see ranges from choreography to documentation, from political advocacy to pigeons and Led Zeppelin on the shore. (Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave, 654-3100. 10 am–5 pm, free.)

The famous Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, the mind at the center of the Central Library, will speak to Seattle about something it needs more of: "Public Space." Is there any way to get enough of this, Koolhaas? No. He's a great writer, theorist, and speaker. As for his book S,M,L,XL, it's the bible for an age that has lost all sense of gravity. We now float from hip to hip, from dip to dip, from building to building. (Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave, 386-4636. 2 pm, free.)

Every year, The Stranger gives the five best artists in Seattle a cheap QFC sheet cake, a $5,000 check, and a crazy-big party thrown in their honor. This year's winners: Lynn Shelton (film), Paul Mullin (theater), Sherman Alexie (literature), Wynne Greenwood (visual art), and Implied Violence (organization, loosely defined). The location: the gorgeous, crumbling, 100-year-old Moore Theatre, where you'll be able to wander with your drink up to the dark corners of the highest balcony. The entertainment: dancing with the Emerald City Soul Club, live music by Dyme Def, Daedelus, and James Pants. And oh yeah—it's free. (Moore Theatre, 1932 Second Ave, www.thestranger.com/genius. 9 pm, free, 21+.)

After landing with a thud in 2001, Richard Kelly's intoxicating, time-twisting teen drama has grown into a bona fide cinematic classic. This weekend, the Egyptian gives its midnight slot to Donnie Darko's superior director's cut, which adds some plot, extends some shots, swaps some music ("Never Tear Us Apart"!), and reveals Kelly's messy masterwork as the most extravagantly accomplished high-school flick since The Last Picture Show. (MVP of the star-studded cast: Mary McDonnell, who in a just world would've been nominated for an Oscar.) (Egyptian Theatre, 801 E Pine St, 323-4978. Midnight, $9.50.)

Sabzi and RA Scion's new album, Tobacco Road, is a hiphop pastoral. Its setting is RA Scion's first world, a rural Kentucky community that grows, cuts, and sells tobacco at auction. It's a way of life RA Scion left many years ago, and on Tobacco Road, it's a way of life he returns to through a melancholy mist of jazz vibes and slow hiphop beats. Tonight, Common Market bring Tobacco Road to the stage, headlining a bill blessed with the Total Experience Gospel Choir, Thee Emergency, and Feral Children. (Neumos, 925 E Pike St, 709-9467. 8 pm, $12, all ages.)

The Juan MacLean are kind of a secret weapon for DFA Records—low profile, but responsible for killer dance 12-inches like the muscular "Give Me Every Little Thing" and this year's delirious house revival "Happy House." As a live band, the Juan MacLean dish out a floor-shaking mix of live and programmed percussion, synths, effects, and vocals (with LCD Soundsystem's Nancy Whang). MacLean may not have an "All My Friends" under his belt, but he does have an agogo (it's like a cowbell) tucked into his pants, and he's not afraid to use it. (Nectar, 412 N 36th St, 632-2020. 9 pm, $10, 21+.)

ERIC GRANDY