Tonight: Roller Girls! Vivian Girls!

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The Chop will admit it. We were late to the party this time. We remember hearing that they were getting up a roller derby league at the Fullerton Skateland and thinking That’s fucking awesome! It’s like a punk rock show on wheels! Unfortunately, that was around the same time we started traveling abroad extensively, and it took us an insanely long time to actually attend a bout.

Charm City Roller Girls skate tonight @ Du Burns Arena. 6 pm

By the time we did, Fullerton Skateland was in the distant past and the Charm City Roller Girls had moved down to Du Burns Arena and evolved into something that was part punk-rock show, part family fun-fest, part professional sporting event, and part beer league softball tournament, complete with raging afterparty in the Canton bars.

To put it briefly, CCRG is one of the things that makes Baltimore a great city. If you haven’t been out to a bout yet, you’re missing out on the one of the best events in town. You’re also ‘off the bus’ so to speak, because the league has enjoyed tremendous support from the city (the people that is, not city hall), and deservedly so.

In it’s growth, CCRG has managed to pull off one of the most difficult feats for any organization; remaining truly DIY and fiercely independent, yet putting on a production that is 100% professional from start to finish. Being entirely skater-owned and operated requires an enormous commitment of time and a high level of skill and dedication both on and off the track, and these women not only pull it off, they make it look easy.

So we’ve got our tickets for tonight’s bout, and we’re planning on showing up early, cause that place fills up fast. (Word to the wise: get that beer wristband as soon as you walk in, before the line forms.)

Vivian Girls play the Ottobar tonight. 8:30 pm.

Sad to say we can’t make the afterparty though, cause we’re heading back uptown to the Ottobar to catch Brooklyn’s Vivian Girls with Wet Dog, Happy Birthday, and Weekends.

We’re a bit late to the party on Vivian Girls too, since the first time we went to see them play was with Fucked Up at the new Talking Head with like 15 other bands. The Chop has no patience anymore for 15 band bills, so we sat at the bar and waited patiently (read: drank heavily) for a long time, not realizing that the show was on 2 stages and we were sitting through the crap end of it. So we missed Vivian Girls entirely.

We were pissed about it too. You know a band is good when their sound is squarely between Sleater-Kinney and the Wipers. Seeing them tonight will go a long way toward making up for what we sat through last time.

Going All Pro @ CA, Bar Bacon Comedy @ Golden West Tonight

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We think we got it now. It’s all starting to make sense. It’s the weekend now, right? Like that time when everybody knocks off work and goes to do fun stuff? That’s howcome you haven’t been around so much, huh? You were waiting for the weekend.

Well it’s here, and there’s no shortage of fun stuff going on this weekend. We don’t know what you’re thinking of (hell, we never do, do we?) but we’ll definitely clue you in on what we’re up to.

First up we’re heading over to the Creative Alliance to catch the premiere of Going All Pro, the latest documentary from Baltimore’s own Charles Cohen. Going All Pro is an up close and personal look at Oriole Park’s Clancy the beer man. If that leaves you scratching your head, then shame on you, Baltimore. It means you haven’t been out to the Yard often enough.

When you go out to your neighborhood bar, you get to know the bartender a little, don’t you? You expect to see him there after a while and he becomes a friendly and familiar face and it wouldn’t be the same without him, right? Well, take it from the Chop, who watches more Oriole baseball than is healthy, and most of it from a sneaked-into box seat in section 12… these guys are just the same. Fancy Clancy is as much a fixture downtown as the Bromo-Seltzer tower.

Going All Pro premieres at CA tonight. 7 pm.

Director Charles Cohen is something of a Baltimore fixture in his own right. You might already be familiar with the Baltimore Community Issues Examiner from his contributions to Citypaper, including one from 2004 about Fancy Clancy and other publications or from any of his other films, including The Last Season, an excellent doc about the closing of Memorial Stadium. The Chop can remember seeing that one premiere, and there was no shortage of grown men crying, to be sure.

A q&a with Clancy and Cohen will follow the film, and lucky for us it’s only 41 minutes in length, which means we can make a 9 o’clock date at nearby Salt. That will leave us just enough time to get back uptown for Bar Bacon.

Bar Bacon hits the Golden West tonight. 11 pm.

It’s Volume III, Book II tonight… whatever that means. We suspect it has something to do with comedy duo Velvet Glovular, Seaton Smith, Sean Jokes, Dorian Grey, and Mike Moran. “A Comedy Tour of Paradise Island” means you can trade in that PBR for a seabreeze. We won’t tell.

Gary B & the Notions, Big Big Bucks @ Hexagon Tonight

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Sad to say it Baltimore, but this is another post more about what we’re not doing than what we’re actually getting up to tonight, due to a lot of bad information out there on that interwebs. Sometimes it happens that way, but you know what? That’s the great thing about Baltimore. There’s always a plan B. Or in this case, Gary B.

Gary B, Big Big Bucks play Hexagon tonight. 9 pm.

So we were going to head downtown tonight to check out the Baltimore screening of Jameel Saleem’s Cream Soda, but according to the film’s Facebook page and the Landmark Theaters’ schedule, that’s actually not happening. It’s been postponed for ‘sometime in April.’

We were kind of looking forward to it. As far as independent film goes, anybody can make a documentary these days, but you don’t often see truly independent romantic comedies, so Cream Soda might be worth checking out just for that fact alone. When you take into consideration that it seems to be mostly sex-driven and not actually that romantic at all, that’s twice as much reason to watch.

After the Film, we were planning on ditching the afterparty, and heading up to Golden West instead to see J. Robbins’ new project The Office of Future Plans. You probably don’t remember it, but the Chop’s first post ever dealt with OFP, and we were quite pleased. But alas, that show’s not actually happening either.

Fortunately, the Hexagon Space is coming through for us tonight, hosting Gary B and the Notions along with Allston, Mass’ Big Big Bucks, who are touring nationally and are fresh off their SxSW appearance.

These two acts ought to complement each other well, since both are solid, fun to listen to power-pop. If you’re reading this and thinking ‘I’m not the type of person who goes to places like the Hexagon. It’s full of super-indie hipster snobs. I’ll stick to the 8×10 or Power Plant Live.’ then you should definitely come out tonight, because this is going to be one of the most unpretentious, balls-out fun shows you’ll see for a while.

Raise a Glass to Healthcare: Our Bi-Weekly Political Roundup

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It’s gonna be a good one tonight. That’s an understatement. It’s going to be a celebration three years and three generations in the making.

The Baltimore Chapter of Drinking Liberally celebrates its third anniversary tonight at Joe Squared, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Hell, it might even be warm enough to sit out on that nice patio they have there.

Drinking Liberally meets tonight at Joe Squared. 7pm.

As always, DL meetings are very informal, and open to anyone of a liberal bent. New members are encouraged to stop by and become new friends. And judging by what we’ve seen on the Twitter we’ve got a lot of new friends out there. Come on Baltimore… its time to live up to all that tweeting you did on Sunday. Come on out and give us your take on healthcare, the tea-party wingnuts, and the general awesomeness of Nancy Pelosi.

As for the Chop’s take on it, we saw it coming the whole time. A year ago we were telling anyone who would listen that something would get passed. Sure, we wanted that something to be single-payer. We wanted that something to at least have a public option. But when it all came down at the end of last week, with Kucinich coming to Jesus and the whip count steadily increasing, we weren’t at all surprised. The votes have been there the whole time, and if there was ever a day when congress went through the motions just for show, it was Sunday.

That sounds strange to say, but it’s true. They could have had two hours debate and a 20 minute vote and been done.

All in all though, we think its a good deal. We like the bill. Obama promised Change and this bill is full of changes. The Chop has been generally pleased with Barack Obama (don’t ask don’t tell notwithstanding), and we’re even more pleased now.

We also want to share with you this link we were sent (via the DL mailing list) to the SEIU website. They’ve made it incredibly easy to see how your representative voted on the bill, and added a contact form to voice your gratitude or displeasure. (In Maryland only Roscoe Bartlett (R- 6th District) and Frank Kratovil (D- 1st) voted no. If you live there, give them what for.

Charles Village Civic Association Meeting Tonight

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Here it is… We’re disappointed that there still seems to be no on-the-ground citywide organizing effort to stop the WalMart PUD, even though it’s already been shown that there is citywide interest in such organizing, as demonstrated on Facebook.

After the somewhat embarassing confusion of March 9th in Remington, we decided to do a little actual homework like a grown-up blogger for a change.

CVCA meets at 2801 N. Charles tonight at 7:20 pm. WalMart Will be discussed.

So we sent an email to the Charles Village Civic Association yesterday stating in plain terms that we live near Charles Village, and are specifically interested in stopping WalMart, and asked if it would be worth our while to attend tonight’s meeting.

The prompt and courteous reply we received was short, but indicated that all are welcome. So if you have any interest at all in stopping WalMart from extending it’s insidious tentacles into Remington, we encourage you to come out tonight. The Meeting is at Ss. Philip and James Church at 2801 North Charles St. (map), and starts at 7:20 pm.

We realize this is in direct conflict with tonight’s Drinking Liberally meeting, so you’ll just have to decide what sort of progressive you are. Or run really fast from one to the other, like we’re tempted to do.

If you’ve not yet signed the online petition against WalMart, you can sign it here.