The Stranger Suggests
November 4 - November 11
Musicians and Landscapes
Photography
Though David Belisle is 10 feet tall, he has a unique knack for barely being there. The gorgeously unpretentious and intimate moments he captures make you feel like you're looking at someone's family album—if that family included Patti Smith, Karen O, Neil Young, and Fleet Foxes. This new exhibit includes candids and portraits, as well as landscapes taken during Belisle's time spent touring the world with R.E.M. and Yeah Yeah Yeahs. The show will be extra sweetened with a live set by Tiny Vipers. (Easy Street Records, 4559 California Ave SW, 938-3279. 7 pm [Tiny Vipers at 9 pm], free.)
See what else is happening Thursday »
Michael Jackson
Postmortem Celebration
Today brings two worthy opportunities to commemorate the man who would be King of Pop. The Kenny Ortega–directed film This Is It documents rehearsals for Jackson's would-be comeback shows and sloppily accomplishes the impossible: rehumanizing Michael Jackson, presented here as a tireless, meticulous, generous, and witty working artist. And at the Seattle Laser Dome, Laser Michael Jackson blasts the man's greatest hits over a high-quality sound system with entertaining lights. (For This Is It showtimes, see Movie Times: thestranger.com/film. Seattle Laser Dome, Seattle Center, 443-2850. 8 pm, $8.50.)
See what else is happening Friday »
Crawl Space's Final Opening
Art/Tears
Crawl Space is closing, which is cause for howling. This is the last opening. The show is Stranger Circumstances, featuring Seattle trio PDL, Italian artist Massimo Guerrera, Montreal's Alana Riley, and Vancouver's Ron Tran, focusing on encounters between artists and strangers. These encounters will happen at the opening. Things that have happened at past openings: beercycling, making out, ogling sewn fruit, art-encrusted toilets, Triscuit sponsorship, endless pathways to nowhere. Howl. (Crawl Space Gallery, 504 E Denny Way #1, 201-2441. 6–10 pm, free.)
See what else is happening Saturday »
David Bazan, Say Hi, the Sea Navy
Music
Tonight, former Pedro the Lion frontman David Bazan returns home from a solo tour that has seen him playing private shows in people's living rooms and traveling in a van paid for with donations from fans. This humble touring scheme coincides with Bazan's most recent album, Curse Your Branches, his first full-length under his given name, which has been aptly described as a breakup album, only with God instead of a girl. The record details Bazan's falling out of faith with evangelical Christianity and his subsequent attempts to drown his newfound agnosticism with alcohol. (Neumos, 925 E Pike St, 709-9467. 8 pm, $13, 21+.)
See what else is happening Saturday »
Devo
Music
Tonight Devo recreate their 1978 debut LP, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!—a concept album with (robotic) legs. Its 10 originals laid out the Akron, Ohio, band's theories of de-evolution with mordant wit and discordant, spastic electronic rock that still sends jolts of excitement through skeptics and weirdos of all ages. Their absurdly stilted, jaggedly funky cover of "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" is the cherry on this still-fresh cake. Plus, yellow boilersuits and flowerpot hats. (Moore Theatre, 1932 Second Ave, 877-784-4849. 7:30 pm, $38–$75, all ages.)
See what else is happening Sunday »
'Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant'
Film
I know. I am aware. Worst title ever. Are you a movie about a circus? Or are you a vampire movie? Or are you a movie about a vampire who was too busy daubing shoe polish onto his widow's peak to goddamn show up, so he sent his assistant? Du freak? But whatever. Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant is medium awesome, if you like ridiculous magical shit for teens (WHICH I DO). Two dudes stumble upon an underworld of weird sideshow creatures and warring vampire clans. "Can I turn into a bat now?" "No. That's bullshit." (See Movie Times: thestranger.com/film.)
See what else is happening Monday »
The Mountain Goats, Final Fantasy
Music
Each song on the new Mountain Goats album, The Life of the World to Come, is named after a Bible verse. "Genesis 3:23" ("So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden..."), for instance, is a song about singer-songwriter John Darnielle visiting his old place in Portland and how you can't go home again. As ever, Darnielle's spare acoustic songs tell compelling, detail-rich stories of human misery and persevering hope. Opening is Final Fantasy, the oddball conceptual chamber-pop project of prolific orchestral arranger Owen Pallett. (Showbox at the Market, 1426 First Ave, www.ticketmaster.com. 8 pm, $20, all ages.)
See what else is happening Tuesday »
Literary Death Match
Reading
Finally, somebody's figured out how to make literature competitive and, therefore, sexy: Literary Death Match is a nationwide literary shoot-out that brings the blood sport to books. Re-bar hosts a boozy hand-to-hand battle between three authors (in this case Aaron Dietz, playwright Kelleen Conway Blanchard, brand-spanking-new Stranger Genius Stacey Levine, and Chumbawamba lead singer Danbert Nobacon). Three judges (All About Lulu author Jonathan Evison, former Arrested Development writer Maria Semple, and some douchebag named Paul Constant) will crush the losers' writerly dreams and elevate the winner to eternal glory. (Re-bar, 1114 Howell St, 233-9873. 8 pm, $8 adv/ $10 DOS, 21+.)
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