Agenda

Icepack
Peer-to-Peer

He's experienced a career renaissance of late, being feted by New York's Vision Festival in 2007 and collaborating with a younger generation of innovators. Flanked as it is by 12 boys and girls, vibraphones, guitars and such, you'd think a little 3-foot-high plastic penguin would be hard to spot. Wikipedia's disambiguation reveals that there are Kurdish, Senegalese and Japanese singers named Issa. The album finds her grappling head-on with her conflicted cynicism about West Coast vapidity. Early Southern recording star Charlie Poole had a profound effect on Loudon Wainwright III's music development, hence LW's recent tribute High, Wide & Handsome (Second Story). I'm sensing a comeback for the super Starr MC who first made waves in the 215 in the mid-'90s. If you've gotta squeeze The Big Pink into a handy single-serving sorting slot, the label'd be "shoegaze," simple enough. Nate Wooley will be performing with a completely different trio — which is somehow appropriate given the trumpeter's resistance to predictability.

From its wealth of snaps from Schonberg, who dwelled amongst his city's druggiest for 10 years, to Bourgois' active character-driven text, "Dopefiend" feels lived-in. The 1973 play by Mark Medoff (Children of a Lesser God) unfolds in a New Mexico diner, where classes and generations collide in a violent situation.