• Exploded View
• Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

Singer-songwriter Jim White is just twisted and other-worldly enough to have attracted the interest of Talking Heads fulcrum David Byrne. At the time, in the mid-90s, Byrne's Luaka Bop stable comprised indigenous Brazilians almost exclusively. While that provides a sense of Byrne's captivation, it's of no use at all in characterizing White's sound.

His full-length debut in 1997, (Mysterious Tale of How I Shouted) Wrong Eyed Jesus revealed White as a personification of the Southern Gothic aesthetic, a brave explorer of the murky goo that makes its home where certainty, righteousness and an annoyingly bright light might reside in other minds.

• US Weekly
• Jamie Anderson, U.S. gold medalist in snowboarding and avid Tinder user

The smartphone-based matchmaking app known as Tinder has its fair share of both proponents (i.e., those who've scored a hookup or 12 out of it) and critics (including those who rack up nothing but "nopes" from other users, as well as prudes in general), but there's no denying its popularity since some bros from USC came up with it.

It's something we here at Weekly World Central have attempted to chronicle from a local standpoint, though our attempts to do so didn't go so well.

But Tinder seems to have found itself a gold mine of willing participants, so to speak, in the form of the young, strapping and (apparently) uninhibited athletes living in the Olympic Village at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia.

According to US Weekly — by far the gold standard of Olympic coverage and hookup news — the use of Tinder is so rampant among athletes it's been described as "next level" by the likes of Jamie Anderson, the recently crowned (and quite hot) gold medalist in women's slopestyle snowboarding.

This shouldn't really be a surprise, considering the stories that come out of the Olympic villages every two years about the abundant supply of condoms available to athletes looking for pre-event stress relief or post-competition celebration. Heck, during the Summer Games in London in 2012 there were event reports of "rogue condoms" that weren't officially sanctioned because they were branded by non-approved companies ... like the awesomely named Kangaroo Condoms for the "gland down under."

All of this leaves one question: do Olympic athletes rate each other's ... performance on a scale of 1 to 10, or is it on a medal system? And, if the latter, what rates a bronze-medal effort?

Valentine's Day is coming and you're probably going to spend it alone, again. Are you tired of looking for that special someone? Have you given up on OK Cupid and Tinder? Ashley Madison doesn't know what you want and Back Page is out of your price range? Maybe your "soulmate" has been staring you in the face? He or she might be liking your Facebook status right now.

MTV Asia created a Match Machine that will pair you with the most compatible Facebook user in your friends list. The results are based on where you live and check-ins, mutual friends, compatibility, likes, musical tastes and opinions.

The futuristic robo-remake hits theaters everywhere today. But is Robocop too good to be true?

Robocop takes place 14 years from now where the world is "robo-phobic" and evil scientist are capable of making disabled cops like Alex Murphy in to cybernetic, bad ass machines. Is this fictional action sci-fi stretching the "truth" by making movie goers believe that we could turn humans in to fully mechanical robots? Charles Higgins, associate professor of neuroscience and electrical engineering at the University of Arizona, talked to Discovery News about how unlikely and fictional Robocop is.

Don't expect to see superhuman cops for another 100 years or more:

“In the next twenty or thirty years, you will start to see people who are unable to walk do so with functional prosthetics,” he told Discovery News. “But to be superhuman is going to be much farther off. To be able to do the things that RoboCop can do, I think is 100 years off or more.”

For now, only monkeys could relate to Robocop:

“That would be the closest thing we’ve seen in the real world to something like RoboCop,” Higgins said. “Basically, one of the monkey’s arms could be paralyzed and it could feed itself with the robotic arm.”

• Photo courtesy of PHAT Entertainment.

12th Planet, Los Angeles based dubstep and drum and bass producer and DJ, and friends will be in town on Friday, Feb. 21, at the Rialto Theatre, 318 E Congress St. Protohype, Anitserum, STEADY and SPL are the featured acts in The Smog City Tour. SMOG RECORDS record label and its DJs are celebrating the new SMOG CITY vol. 2 album and its seventh year of making some of the world's most popular dubstep music.

So, we are confident that the eastside can handle Tucson Weekly's Dirty Thirty party from 5:30 to 9 p.m. at the Music Box Lounge, 6951 East 22nd Street.

We are throwing a monthly happy hour party every second Wednesday of the month.

We had a great time at the World Famous Golden Nugget. The staff was playing David Bowie and Elvis Presley tunes to celebrate their birthdays, and had some tasty cake with mousse frosting from Costco. There will be good free cake at every Birthday celebration.

There will be drink specials, and maybe we will get you free drinks. I'm not guaranteeing anything, but it could happen.


Click here to RSVP on Facebook and you share it with your friends.

The Arizona César E. Chávez Holiday Coalition has organized the first Dolores Huerta International Women’s Day Luncheon & Awards Ceremony from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Tuesday, March 4 at the YWCA, 525 Bonita Ave. Tickets are on sale now. Go here for more ticket information.

What's exciting about the luncheon is Huerta's return to Tucson. She will be in attendance and helping to present awards to outstanding community leaders in our community. The coalition is soliciting nomination for awards "to be given to women in our community that embody the strength, dedication, and passion for social justice that Dolores Huerta exemplifies."

Nomination deadline is Friday, Feb. 14th. The following two categories will be considered:

The Consuelo Aguilar Esperanza Award — Given to a woman leader 25 years or younger that demonstrates strong activism, love of community, and represents great hope for our collective future.

Si Se Puede Legacy Award — Given to a woman leader that has 15 years or more of advocacy in our community, and a long term history of activism on social justice issues.

The Arizona César E. Chávez Holiday Coalition is asking that submissions be e-mailed to [email protected] and include a one to two paragraph summary about the nominee. Submissions for the Esperanza Award should include the age of nominee. All submissions will be reviewed between the aforementioned dates, and anyone is welcome to nominate local leaders.

More form the coalition:

Dolores Huerta is co-founder of the United Farm Workers Union, and one of the most prominent Latina leaders of our lifetime. She worked to organize the most vulnerable laborers among us in the 1960’s and 1970’s, winning basic rights for farmworkers and negotiating landmark contracts with growers. She went on to found the Dolores Huerta Foundation, a non-profit organization devoted to community organizing, developing leadership skills, and encouraging civic engagement. Dolores Huerta has received multiple honors and recognitions, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her activism and civil rights work in 2012.

Dan Gibson beat me to the punch with his post about Ed Supe John Huppenthal shilling for the Goldwater Institute. Huppenthal voiced a robocall telling parents how they can use taxpayer money to send their kids to private schools. In his post, Dan includes the video of Brahm Resnick’s news piece about the robocall and a Facebook post by Democratic candidate for Ed Supe David Garcia, so I won’t repeat them. Both are worth a look.

Here’s a bit of the back story on the robocall, and it’s only a bit. There’s lots of unpacking to do about the Arizona's Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (ESA)— aka Educational Savings Accounts, aka (according to me) Vouchers on Steroids. I did some unpacking in an earlier post, and there’s plenty of material left for later. Now, though, I want to follow the money robocall.

A brief overview. The Goldwater Institute came up with the idea for ESAs as a second workaround (the first is our tuition tax credit law) to make vouchers legal in a state where the constitution prohibits the use of public money for religious instruction. (Did you know over 70% of Arizona’s private schools are religious?) The term of art for this kind of legislation is “backdoor vouchers.” In 2011, Arizona’s Republican-dominated legislature passed the ESAs into law for a limited number of students. In 2013, more students were added, and if a new bill passes this session, half of Arizona’s school aged children will be eligible for the taxpayer-funded private school vouchers. The conservative's ultimate goal is vouchers for all.

The Alliance for School Choice, a Washington, D.C., agent of the vast privatization/corporate complex, put together a script for a robocall to go out to Arizona parents whose children qualify for the ESAs. Huppenthal lent his voice to the robocall. Actually, he lent more than his voice. He lent the power and authority of his office to the message, making it sound like an official public service announcement. Huppenthal’s call sent interested parents to a website about ESAs created and funded by — get ready for it — the Goldwater Institute. And so the private-to-public-to-private-to-public-to-private cycle that begins and ends with the Goldwater folks comes full circle.

A fascinating story from Brahm Resnick on a robocall that went out using the voice of Arizona's Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal to remind parents of the state's Empowerment Scholarship Accounts and how they can be used to pay for private schools. Because of course he doesn't, Huppenthal fails to see an issue being the guy who oversees the state's public education system and meanwhile shilling for funds to be pulled from that system to send students to private schools. As you might imagine, some within the public school community see things otherwise, as does Huppenthal's likely opponent in his forthcoming campaign to be re-elected:

• Photo by G.PAGOMENOS/Shutterstock.com

There's another adult store popping up in Midtown Tucson. Le Boutique Erotica will open its doors tomorrow, and will be conveniently next to Ten's Showclub on the corner of East Speedway and North Rosemont Blvd. James Caddell, store manager, says that Le Boutique Erotica will be the biggest Corset dealer in Arizona and it's the "cheapest adult store in town." Caddell, 49, says that the shop won't carry any toys, but there will be over 700 different corset styles to choose from.

Caddell says he owned an adult clothing store in the past, but he doesn't like talking about it. Maybe he didn't want to talk about James's Boutique that was located on 4380 Speedway Blvd. "This isn't my first rodeo," James said.

Caddell says the shop will have an array of stripper wear, lingerie, belly dancing outfits, creative costumes, jewelry, perfume and heels. "We will have a little bit of everything," Caddell said. According to Caddell, the in-store hair salon is expected to open with the next few weeks. He also says they are waiting for the sign that was supposed to be completed months ago.