Weekend America for Saturday, July 17, 2004


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How did your life collide with the headlines in 2007?
Iraq, the subprime crisis, Facebook, immigration, oil prices - 2007 had no shortage of hefty headlines. We'd like to hear about how these and other major news events of the past year affected you. Where did your life collide with the news in 2007?

What's your holiday performance story?
The office talent show, the neighborhood caroling posse, the school pageant ... At holiday time we often sing, dance, and dress as shepherds. Did you bloom in the warmth of your audience's adulation, or freeze up like the snowman you'd rather be building? Did your holiday performance change your life or that of someone close to you?

Broadcast Information for July 17, 2004

Music Bridge: Start From Scratch
Artist: Galactic
CD: Crazyhorse Mongoose (Capricorn)

Lost in Translation
John Rabe hits the streets with Weekend America's intrepid Teen Editor and recent high school grad Simon Hanna, for a language lesson in teen-ese. They'll decode teen lingo, from "Daisy-dukes," to "cribs."

Quiz yourself:
Test your teen-ese knowledge

Music Bridge: Universal Traveler
Artist: Air
CD: Talkie Walkie (Astralwerks)

Spying on My Son
When your 16 year-old stops talking to you, and comes home with alcohol on his breath, what do you do? Barbara Bogaev talks to one mother, about trying to get into the head of her teenage son.

Simon Hanna

Simon Says
Simon Hanna, our guest Teen Editor, tries to calm parents' qualms, in a discussion with John Rabe.

More about Simon Hanna

Music Bridge: Four Corners
Artist: The Sea and Cake
CD: One Bedroom (Thrill Jockey)

Philosopher's Corner
For something that never existed, Weapons of Mass Destruction have gotten a lot of press. We've read the reports; we've heard the pundits. But why, in the end, does the WMD question matter? We turn to our resident philosopher, Morry Lipson, for an answer.

Wendy Spero

Summer Job Follies
What was your first job? For performance artist Wendy Spero, it involved going door-to- door selling sharp objects--with a mustache. She reminisces.

Online resource:
Wendy Spero's Web site
59 E. 59 Theaters

Music Bridge: Brightness
Artist: Lanterna
CD: Highways (Badman)

Skerker the Soothsayer of Weekend Weather...
Ben Skerker's unusual survey of events, celebrations, unplanned gatherings and -- of course -- his prognostications on weekend weather.

Giant Robot
Magazine

Enlarge

Pop Goes the Culture
Mini-sculptures that look like cookies; A death metal band celebrated in small Mexican towns. Barbara Bogaev talks to the editors of Giant Robot magazine about the latest trends bubbling up from the urban underground.

Online resources:
Giant Robot homepage
Giant Robot Store
Brujeria Web site
dehara Web site (in Japanese)

Anonymous 4
Yo-Yo Ma

Fresh Old Sounds
Classical music junky Steve Seel plays some of his favorite new tracks. The medieval choral group Anonymous 4 does folk music. Yo-Yo Ma plays the cello while holding it between his knees, and the Handel and Hayden Society sing a chorus for peace.

Music Reviewed:
Wayfaring Stranger - Anonymous 4 from the album, American Angeles
Concerto in B flat Major for Cello - Yo-Yo Ma from the album, Vivaldi's Cello
Song for Anthena - Various composers from the album, Peace: Choral Album for Our Times

Poetry Behind Bars
A young man from Los Angeles reads his poem "Where I'm Coming From," which he wrote from inside a youth detention center.

Online resources:
Full text of the poem "Where I'm Coming From"

Music Bridge: 1/2 Way Three
Artist: Seth P. Brundel
CD: Devil's Pawn (Aesthetics)

Will Smith
I, Robot

Popcorn Chronicles: I, Robot
Summer wouldn't be summer with out really bad movies. Will Smith's newest release, might be just the ticket. Paddy Hirsch gives a preview.

Online resources:
The "I, Robot" movie Web site
Fansite and FAQsite about Isaac Asimov
"Movie recharges interest in Asimov"

Peru Circus

Gallery

Live Event: Circus City Festival
We all have days when we consider running away and joining the circus. Most of us change our mind before we get a chance to pack our bags. But in Peru, Indiana, this weekend, hundreds of teenagers are preparing to make that daydream become real at the Circus City Festival. We drop in live on the festivities, with correspondent Chad Bouchard, who's hanging from a trapeze as we speak.

Online resources:
Peru Circus

Music Bridge: Chez Nous
Artist: Paris Combo
CD: Living Room (Tinder)

Friends, Lost and Found
Friendships are one of the most important and memorable parts of high school - and often the source of the greatest pain. Monique Murphy tells the story of what happened when two members of her group of girlfriends changed the rules, and fell in love with each other. This story was produced by Hillary Frank and Amy Dorn.

Simon Hanna

Simon Says
Weekend America's intrepid Teen Editor and recent high school graduate Simon Hanna talks to John Rabe about his own trials and tribulations with friendship.

More about Simon Hanna

Vanishing Sounds
The lifelong hobby of a Eugene, Oregon man has museums on both coasts salivating. For more than seven decades, this man has hunted and captured the "disappearing" sounds of the Northwest. What is a disappearing sound? Correspondent Tom Banse was privileged to get a listen.

Music Bridge: Smylax
Artist: Langtry
CD: As Upon the Rodeo Treatro (Sub Pop)

The Numbers Game
It can be shocking to older generations how mature today's youth are, particularly when it comes to sex. Chelsea Vargas of Youth Radio divulges a unique system devised by kids at her high school to measure their sexual experience.

Online resource:
YouthRadio.org

Music Bridge: Lakota Woman
Artist: Billy Childish
CD: The Billy Childish Native American Sampler, Other music by Billy Childish (Sub Pop)

Enlarge

Listening Post: President George Bush and the NAACP
The NAACP held it's annual convention in Philadelphia this week. John Kerry spoke and President Bush stirred up a hornets' nest by not speaking. Philadelphia is fifty percent African American, so the issue was a hot one. John Rabe checks in with Marty Moss-Coane, a talk-show host at WHYY in Philadelphia.

Online resource:
WHYY Web site

Music Bridge: Making It Pay
Artist: Dabrye
CD: Idol Tryouts (Ghostly International)

Deadly Art?
A woman dies of a heart attack. The medics come, and find her husband's art studio full of suspicious stuff: petri dishes, books on bio-terrorism and bio-warfare. Turns out, they were for an art installation and the FBI is investigating. Reporter Karen Michel takes us into the brave new world of making art, post 9-11.

More about Steve Kurtz:
"Art in the Age of Terror", posted June 24, 2004
"FBI takes no chances with artist", posted June 30, 2004

Bullies
Most of us probably have some pretty hairy memories of school - who wasn't the target of a bully at some point in our younger years? For Youth Radio's Quincy Mosby, the memory is still fresh.

Online resource:
YouthRadio.org

Music Bridge: Fahenheit Fair Enough
Artist: Telefon Tel Aviv
CD: Fahenheit Fair Enough (Hefty)

Elevator
Installation

Gallery

Going Up?
Elevator music is like the embarrassing uncle in the Hawaiian shirt and black socks. The Tang Museum at Skidmore College in New York State is trying to change our take on elevator music. Sarah Lilley explains.

Online resources:
www.inbetweennoise.com
Tang Museum at Skimore College

Music Bridge: And So It Goes
Artist: Jet Black Crayon
CD: Low Frequency Speaker Test (Funtion8)

Sailing Away
Today, for the 80th year in a row, sailors will race their boats from Port Huron, to Mackinac Island. The event draws 250 yachts, and tens of thousands of spectators. John Rabe talks to a documentary filmmaker who's recording the race for posterity.

Online resource:
Port Huron to Mackinac Island Boat Race
Overview of Genuine Risk

Music Bridge: Sin the Moon
Artist: Shark Quest
CD: Gods and Devils (Merge)

For the July 17, 2004 broadcast:

... on our December 15 broadcast:

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» The Huckabee Mystique: See video of Mike Huckabee and Chuck Norris.

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Weekend Weather

From the July 5 broadcast

Awful Car Night

Auburn, N.Y.
National Brewery Museum Opening Ceremony

Potosi, Wis.
Sand Sculpture Contest

Bruce, S.D.
Oregon Coast Geezer Games

Newport, Ore.
Annual Coolest Fourth of July Celebration

Fort Davis, Texas
Maui Invitational Band Festival and Blues Fest

Wailuku, Hawaii

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This week: Have you exper-
ienced any strange seasonal changes: springtime plants sprouting; squirrels sunbathing?
Let us know...

Weekend Weather

Awful Car Night

National Brewery Museum Opening Ceremony

Sand Sculpture Contest

Oregon Coast Geezer Games

Annual Coolest Fourth of July Celebration

Maui Invitational Band Festival and Blues Fest