Angelica LeMinh has bragging rights for life that the one and only Ursula Rucker called her phone, talked to her for two hours, and commended her on her stalking techniques (she likened it to “the perfect amount of persistence”). Philly’s most poetic Supasista waxes lyrical (for the lounge) about politics, street credibility, and raising her babies.

ALM: You just finished playing the Sistahood Celebration in my hometown with one of my best girls (Amalia Townsend www.myspace.com/sekoya). You’ve also been through Montreal a few times. Tell me about the crowds and the difference between playing Canada and the United States.

Ursula: Vancouver was great this last time, but I never have a bad show in Canada, I’ve also played Toronto. Like Europe, the audiences tend to be more open and progressive about what they know, and their awareness of culture and art is more acute. I haven’t performed extensively in the States, but I don’t think the current climate is too encouraging. I still don’t have a booking agent, and women doing poetry are always going to be beneath the radar. I was excited last summer to perform in Atlanta, a city renowned for being musically progressive, but the crowd was so unresponsive that I was almost bored. I’ve played in Ohio and Chicago, and it was like performing on a space ship.

ALM: Can you talk a little more about the current political climate and the war that hasn’t ended?

Ursula: Well, it’s no secret, and people would do better if they refused to accept trying to keep it secret. I remember I was in Vienna on tour for Supa Sista, and I already had a fear of flying, but this was just after 9/11 so it was exacerbated. I was pregnant with my third child, had left the other two at home and when I saw that night vision shot, I just started crying and wanted to come home. When people heard us speaking English and knew that we were American, the reactions of how they perceived us were completely different. Now, it’s only getting worse and worse for peace. I’m not a punk, but I’m for peace. I realize that as a super power, a First World country (if we’re going to rank), we can’t just sit back and do nothing in the face of such an attack, but what we’re doing right now is not protecting our country, we’re trying to oppress and control another one to fully participate in capitalism. But I appreciate the opportunity to travel and get the truth, because our media here is totally skewed. I think that people have lost that instinctual feeling to see something and react as aware folks and question further. I want to throw something everytime I see our president on the television. There is nothing elegant or eloquent about anything that ever comes out of his mouth, and I am ashamed.

ALM: Are you going to vote for Senator Obama?

Ursula: I don’t know who I’m going to vote for. You’re never actually voting for anyone, it’s just the lesser of evils. It’s like the police officers, you can’t be that good of a person if you are a cop. At least not in Philly, with the corruption that’s involved.

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For those of you who live in the Chicago area, you should attend the Shots in the Dark Launch Party tomorrow, April 28th! For more details on the location and what’s happening when, click here!

The Lyrical Lounge gets an exclusive peek into the minds and personalities that represent Animate Objects, a crew that sets out to call attention to questioning accepted social norms of work (music), love and life. Their name and music is an active social commentary, and Angelica LeMinh gets to the sum of their hearts:

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Chicago, IL (April 17, 2007) - The April 28th episode of Shots in the Dark will be recorded at the Shots in the Dark Launch Party at Hero Headquarters! The episode will include the usual geek news, as well as interviews with Tim Demeter, Mike Norton, and Skottie Young. You can participate in this week’s show just by attending the party and saying hi! The party will be from 10am - 9pm on Saturday, April 28th at Hero Headquarters, 1530 W. Lake Cook Rd. in Wheeling, IL.

Other activities at the launch party include gaming of many different kinds including Heroclix, raffles and auctions of signed goods from Brian K. Vaughan, Robert Richardson, Sean McKeever, Eric Wight, and Geoff Johns, as well as original sketches and pages by creators such as Phil Hester and Ande Parks. Half of the proceeds from the auctions and raffles, as well as 100% of the proceeds from any sketches done at the event will be donated to the Hero Initiative ( www.heroinitiative.org). The Shots in the Dark launch party also kicks off the Grand Re-Opening Week of Hero Headquarters which will culminate in their own celebration on May 5th!

Don’t forget there are now THREE great Shots in the Dark episodes available for download on the Shots in the Dark website, including the gang’s interview with comics legend Jeph Loeb!

 Angelica LeMinh’s second interview for the Year of the Lovers puts the lovely and talented Melange Lavonne  in the hotseat to chat about who all and what all she loves. The mellow and confident force to be reckoned with knows that she prefers Riley to Huey after only watching one episode of Boondocks, and has a hard time discerning that Mos is the bigger Blackstar, but knows for sure that she prefers him as an emcee to him as an actor (though who knows that he was actually an actor before he was an emcee?) She’s candid and intelligent, able to respond to questions of all realms of experience, so without further adieu…
 

ALM: Do you think hip hop is dead? Nas shows more than just one mic in that video, what are the dangers of such a high profile emcee running around making claims like this? I read an article in Total Chaos* that states that ”we’ve been saying it’s dead since the first time Puffy picked up a mic” so how do we negotiate working within an artform that has “dead” for almost twelve years?

ML: Hip-Hop never died. We can blame the saturated wackness and dumbed down lyrics on the A&R and executives who make the desicions in signing these particular artists, giving them big budgets, and guaranteeing heavy rotation from local radio stations and national video stations. So is hip hop really dead? No, not at all. It just isn’t in the spotlight. There are plenty of talented MCs who are worth listening to and talking about, but these cats aren’t getting deals because the man behind the desk decides that their content isn’t marketable.

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 Rather than focusing on following in the footsteps to become the next Great White Hope of Hip-Hop, Mic Sol figures to blaze his own trail. With all-respect due to Beastie Boys, 3rd Bass, Eminem and the like–why should an emcee’s success be based on his skin tone. (It’s the music you should be listening to right?) But Yo, don’t let me preach or be your convincer–go peep the chat and you’ll discover (what we already know) that Mic Sol is ‘all-the-way-live’ in any color spectrum. — Capt. Westside

For starters, tell us a little about Mic Sol. How long have you been emceeing and when did your appreciation for hip-hop culture begin? How’d you get the name “Flowgun?”

My name is Mic Sol and I was born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana. My apppreciation for hip-hop began with Beastie Boys “Licensed To Ill” and Run DMC. After that it was NWA “Straight Outta Compton.” I used to have my older sister buy their tapes for me by flirting with the clerk (she wasn’t old enough to buy them either) at Coconuts (or Peaches) in Broad Ripple, where the organic grocery store is now across from McDonalds.

I had an old rhyme where i called myself the “Flowgun capitalist”, and I dug it up while I was working on my album. I like the double meaning of like a shogun with a microphone as a sword or your mind as a gun spitting lyrical bullets. Once I released the album, people started calling me that.

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Saturday, March 3rd, 1pm Central…MC LARS Live on Play or Die!

That’s right boys and girls, it’s finally that time!

We teased you before…gave you a taste of the anticipation…

We told you he’d be on the phone, chatting with us, but it ended up being a farce- a lie- a, a, well, a mistake, really, but hey, who’s counting?

This time we’re making SURE he’s on the air by having MC Lars, the leader of the iGeneration LIVE IN THE STUDIO!!!

Who’s MC Lars you ask? For shame! Go whip yourself 3 times. You back? Great! www.mclars.com www.myspace.com/mclars

MC Lars is a fantastic post-punk laptop rapper. He rocks the nerdcore, he rolls with the English geek set, and sometimes, SOMEtimes, he just makes fun of the sorry state of affairs a lot of hip hop is in right now.

Play or Die is the show you know and love. We’ll still be talking all things geek: Comics, video games, tech; this time it’ll be with Lars giving input. We’ll be asking him those burning questions every fan wants to know to. You won’t know Lars unless you hear this interview.

So don’t miss MC Lars talking with The Geek (yours truly), Vag McCloud (there can be only one), The Viceroy (our man on the inside), Vicious Vince (the booth runner extraordinaire), and Victoris (always ready with a dick and fart joke), SATURDAY MARCH 3RD. Just click that lovely PLAY OR DIE link (or that one [or that one...or this one, for that matter]) and click “Listen AM” up towards the top. The show streams LIVE to YOUR computer from 1pm-3pm Central, and will be available for download in handy podcast form soon after.

And if you’re in the Chicago area, don’t forget to check out Lars LIVE at Champ’s. Just click the link for more info. Play or Die will be there, and you can meet us, greet us, and we’ll even let you buy us a drink! We’ll be in your ears at 1, and we’ll see you at Champs at 6!

-The Geek-

Hey Everybody–

I have a few new pieces up at Newsarama–my interview with Steve Niles covering his work on 28 Days Later: The Aftermath from FoxAtomic; as well as some news on some of his upcoming projects including City of Others from Dark Horse which debuted today in stores bringing him together with horror artist icon, Bernie Wrightson. Spread the zombie love!

Also, I was fortunate enough to cover Mega Con’s honoration of Dick Giordano, former editor-in-chief for DC Comics, and one of the greatest inkers to have ever worked in the comic book industry. It was really nice and fun. I’m so glad Newsarama decided to share it.

Coming up–Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray are talking about Jonah Hex and the return of the Western to comics. Also, I’ve just been informed that I’m attending a private, advanced showing of Frank Miller’s 300 next week so look for that piece to be on Newsarama Thursday morning.

Still working on my A-Ha piece for the Shotgun–there’s a lot of music to listen to beyond their initial album that spawned their one commercial hit in the US–”Take on Me”. I’ve decided to not only go over their discography but to compile a nice mix CD which I will list for any who are interested. They’re really good!

Go check out 803 Studios, I covered their anthology–Sequential Suicide, last week on Best Shots. They have open submissions for their next anthology. Daryn Beasley and I are getting to work tonight on our submission. I will be keeping a running log of our progress here.

Finally, a piece I’m finishing up titled, “Memoirs of an Electronic Lothario” may see print in the inaugural issue of Smith Magazine. Fingers crossed!

Have a great Wednesday guys! Just bought my books–this week is gonna be a doozy!
Steven Eks

Here’s a little interview I did via e-mail with Mr. Larry Niven, writer of books like Ringworld, Tales From Known Space, Protector and Crashlander. It’s short, and Mr. Niven’s answers are concise and to the point… but the most embarassing part is my fanboyish sucking up… I can’t help it… Oh, BTW, the interview was done in late November, early December.

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Greetings and welcome to the new ShotgunReviews.com. Since 1999, we’ve done our best to give you worthwhile (and often funny) reviews and columns, and it’s time to shake off the rust and do it a little differently. We’ve kicked around a few ideas regarding how we’d do this new thing, and we hope you like what you see.

The new design comes to us from Barb Hallock, a student of mine with the appropriate attitude for this place (that is, bad). The more bloggish format puts us more on par with the current landscape. After all, we’ve been doing this almost eight full years. It was time for a big change. I think that you’ll agree that the new format, with a huge list of categories and easy searching, is a good one.

As part of that big change, we’ve brought in an influx of new talent from a variety of places. The entirety of our Best Shots team, responsible for the Best Shots column that runs every Monday at Newsarama.com, is now operating here in several capacities. You’ll also meet several talented young writers, including Barb herself, who will be tackling a variety of topics.

However, if you’re one of the rare folks that has read us since 1999, don’t get too worried. Shawn Delaney will still grace us with terrific music reviews, as will Jonathan Birdsong and the Lyrical Lounge crew. The Russ is back on wrestling coverage in full force. L.I. Rapkin’s already kicking in some culture. Eric Barker’s already opened the film vaults. And they aren’t the only familiar faces lurking around.

In the next few days and weeks, you’ll see the roster expand a little more and you’ll see some new recurring columns and features that we hope will become favorites. If you want to check out the old stuff, the old site currently still exists in its full glory under the archive button. If you want to talk about any of the stuff, old or new, visit our newly established forums.

So there’s my big speech. Enjoy yourselves, express yourselves, and invite friends. ShotgunReviews.com never went away, but we are most certainly back. Thanks for your time.

Quote of the Day: “In art, all who have done something other than their predecessors have merited the epithet of revolutionary; and it is they alone who are masters.” –Paul Gaugain

I just got done sending Steve Niles, creator of 30 days of Night and Criminal Macabre, an e-mail that is 100% likely to turn into an interview regarding his work on “28 Weeks Later: The Aftermath”.  The story bridges the end of ”28 Days Later” to the sequel “28 Weeks Later”  Keep an eye on Newsarama for it.

Also–go to whatever devilishly evil corporate chain store is nearest to you that sells DVDs and buy “Unknown” starring Greg Kinnear and Jim Caviezel–it’s like Usual Suspects and Memento all rolled into one.  The ending has such a fulfulling payoff that I might just go buy a second copy to hit myself over the head with while I watch my first copy over again. 

Possibly going to see “23″ tonight for an advance showing–it pays to be a guy named Steve who knows guys who manage movie theaters named Steve.

Also, I picked up a copy of Arkham Asylum while I was in Orlando last weekend.  I must confess–I’ve never read this book.  I’m kind of pondering the possibility of reading it with the purpose of juxtaposing it with the most recent issue of Batman (issue #663) for a narratological breakdown and comparison of Morrison’s work within the Bat-Mythos–we’ll see after I read AA. 

I’m counting down the minutes ’til the moment I can openly hate Marvel for killing someone today!

EKS

The Big Question with Gene Ha
by Corey Henson

Gene Ha broke into comics in the early 90s, slowly building a name for himself with his work on Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix and Nightman. It was his collaboration with Zander Cannon on Alan Moore’s Top 10 in 1999 that really caught the eye of comic book fans and made Ha a highly sought-after artist in the industry. Since then, Ha has done covers for Captain America, Fantastic Four and Adventures of Superman, and an issue of Global Frequency that was well worth the extra couple of months we had to wait to get our hands on it.

Last October, Ha graciously took time away from his work on the forthcoming Top 10 prequel, The 49ers (due this summer), to talk to Shotgun Reviews about Alan Moore, the importance of Spaceman Spiff, the lack of racial diversity in comics, and, since he’s an outspoken political junkie, his views on today’s media and the war in Iraq. (Hey, if you want to know if Superman can beat up Thor, go read Wizard. We don’t toss softballs here.) (And for the record, Ha thinks Superman would kick the Odinson’s ass from here to the Rainbow Bridge.)

THE BIG Q&A

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“Breaking Bread with The Rev” Edition
with Missy Suicide of SuicideGirls.com
Big Questions with The Rev. OJ Flow

I was introduced to the Suicide Girls world at the beginning of 2003 when SPIN magazine ran an article on DIY websites for the punk, goth, and emo set. I became instantly infatuated with SuicideGirls.com for the obvious reason that there were girls that I could relate to doing pin-up work in a site that was virtually self-run, as opposed to the airbrushed plasticity of Playboy, Penthouse and other similar venues. But I also came to find that the community that was established was infectious and addictive. The popular theory on SG is that people come for the women, but they stay for the community. The site is incredibly user-friendly and easy to navigate, it’s relatively inexpensive compared to typical adult entertainment sites, and it has so much to material offer for men and women aside from the “nude & tattooed” that it’s easy to forget that it is in fact adult entertainment by definition.

Just this week, SG features interviews with film directors Alexander Payne and Antoine Fuqua, actor Topher Grace, and Ren & Stimpy creator Jon Kricfalusi. They have an incredibly active message board with forums ranging from sex & relationships, to comics, TV & politics. While the folks at SG never reveal their exact numbers, it is known that they do receive over a million hits a month, and the guy-to-girl subscriber ratio is surprisingly balanced. It’s easy to make friends on the site who share common interests (while maintaining confidentiality, if desired), and I myself have made some great acquaintances — in person and online, guy and girl — from all parts of the globe.

Missy Suicide is the founder of this incredibly successful site (all models and employees take on the “Suicide” surname when they join the family), not to mention SG’s best photographer.

THE BIG Q&A

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with John Cassaday
Big Questions with Troy Brownfield

We’ve had a few repeat guests here at the Big Question, but few have been as appropriately timed. John Cassaday, who has proven himself over the years to be a remarkable and vastly talented artist, takes on what is arguably his largest gig ever as the first issue of the new ongoing title, Astonishing X-Men, debuts.

His partner on the book has had a tiny bit of press lately regarding other ventures. That would be uber-screenwriter Joss Whedon, whose superlative series Angel just wrapped. The prospect of a Cassaday and Whedon team up on the most popular comic book heroes of all time has generated a palpable level of excitement in fan circles. Clearly, this is BIG NEWS.

Even as a groundswell of press erupts and fans snatch up a line-wide reboot of the X-titles (featuring other fan favorites like Chris Claremont and Alan Davis), Cassaday’s work continues to be seen in the never-disappointing Planetary and in the forthcoming project (by way of Europe), I Am Legion.

So now, let’s take a few with the man that Warren Ellis calls “an illustration god” . . . a man who Keifer Sutherland has been alleged to call “one good-looking motherfucker”, and a man who my wife is always looking for (whether she thinks I know she is or not) every year at Wizard World Chicago. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome . . . John Cassaday.

THE BIG Q&A

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The Big Question with Steve Janiak of Devil To Pay
by Troy Brownfield

Many are the mentions of the Indianapolis music scene here at the mighty Shotgun. You may recall our descriptions of last year’s epic Battle of the Bands that culminated in a victory for the hard-working Devil To Pay. The four member band (l.tor. Chad Prifogle, Rob Secrist, Steve Janiak, Matt Stokes) pulled down the grand prize of 10-large and went on to release their highly acclaimed Thirty Pieces of Silver on Benchmark Records. DTP’s record has made an impact on both sides of the Atlantic. Heavy sources like Sleazegrinder hail it as “a clusterbomb of stoney booze metal” while the sentiments are echoed from as far away as France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Australia. The group recently shot a video for their sublime anthem, Tractor Fuckin’ Trailer, and their laundry list of gigs keeps expanding throughout the Midwest and East Coast.

What may be better than the band’s constant ascent is the fact that it gets to happen at all. The extremely friendly Janiak, who serves as vocalist and guitarist, has had to conquer some difficult health issues in the past, including a genetically-related blood clotting disorder and some serious surgery. It was a true testament to the Indianapolis scene when bands threw in for a benefit to help out their pal.
(A sterling account of this tale by Danica Johson can be found here).

With that in their past and untold worlds to conquer in front of them, Steve Janiak of Devil to Pay took the time to visit and talk about throwing horns, the definition of troll, and how he outplays himself.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Steve Janiak.

THE BIG Q&A

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