-- 19-year-old lad from Felton -- a fascinating, frightening place -- calls cops after his weed gets pinched. Which he was trying to sell in downtown Santa Cruz. And doesn't get arrested. [Chron] -- Same-sex marriage bill OK'd, ready to be TKO'd by Arnold. [Chron] -- Obama in SF! [Examiner, via BCN] -- Boom! Bomb threat forces Southwest Airlines jet back to Oakland Airport. [CBS5] -- Hsu caught, in hospital after falling down on...train......

There are no less than three fantastic music festivals all taking place over the weekend of September 14-16. What gives? And how do we choose? Since we live in the bay area, perhaps our decision has been made for us: we're heading to the inaugural Treasure Island Music Festival presented by the fine folks at Noise Pop and Another Planet. The two day festival features 14 bands each day on two stages with mostly hip......

-- "Given" (featuring artists Darwin Bell, Bret Hansen, and Danyol): Winner of SF Weekly’s "Best Polaroid Artist" award, Darwin Bell, makes clever, energetic pieces from the text he finds around the city, snapped up by his trusty Polaroid. Come check out his work, along with equally-talented artists Bret Hanson and Danyol, at this opening reception party starting at 6:30 p.m.-9 p.m. at 575 Castro (at 18th St. [formerly Harvey Milk's Camera Store]); admission is......

Next Thursday, July 19th, Sonic Youth perform 1988's double album Daydream Nation in its entirety at Berkeley Community Theatre. The acclaimed album is lauded for its artistic vision and flowing dynamics from lulling instrumentals to all-out noise. We have a pair of tickets for one lucky winner to (re)discover the underground masterpiece. Watch the video for "Teen Age Riot" and enter to win. (Contest ends 7/15. Winner will be notified via email.) Tonight catch brazen......

--Have you checked out the footage (above, 4:34) of someone driving their Prius into the N Judah tunnel? The derisive laughter as the driver sheepishly gets out of the car is awesome. Also, the title of the YouTube clip (Judah's Prius) is genius. (We don't know how to get rid of those white edges on that YouTube screen.) [N Judah Chronicles.] --Hey! There's an update on the dude who flipped over the hit-and-run guy's......

Last week's winner: the SJ Metro . Cover article: San Jose Pride - family day in the park on Saturday, Gay Rodeo, Women's Music Festival this weekend. A new queer nightclub in downtown San Jo. Problems with contracting for paratransit at Santa Clara County Transit VTA . Annalee Newitz on notableness on Wikipedia. The Ann Arbor Film Festival at Foothill College. And now for our frontrunner, the SF Weekly, big trouble at the Culinary Academy......

You've still got the Berkeley World Music Festival today, and Indiefest's Hole in the Head fantasy/sci-fi/horror film fest is in full swing! Your other options include: --This looks like a can't-miss! ACT is presenting Fields of Gold, a musical about Amish teens in the throes of rumspringa (sampling the modern world). Set to the music of Sting. We quote: The songbook of Fields of Gold features a mix of Sting and The Police’s most beloved......

It's another music giveaway bonanza this week! First up is a prize pack from Sea Wolf. They've been touring with Silversun Pickups (see a few SSPU members in the video for "You're A Wolf"), but they're a far more mellow outfit: Alex Church's vocals and melodies are gentle, strummy and soothing. Sea Wolf open for Devotchka on Friday night at the Grand Ballroom Bimbo's, and we have a pair of tickets for the winner......

Did you miss us last week? Here are our excuses: we caught a cold, had a birthday, and were up to here with work at our dayjob, for real. We're back now and anxiously awaiting a copy of Or, the Whale's brand new CD Light Poles and Pines to arrive in our mailbox. The few songs we've previewed on their site offer up banjo, steel guitar, and a chorus of male and female vocals......

Tonight we're wishing a great big Happy 4th Birthday to DJ Ted and his baby BAGeL Radio. The party is at Bottom of the Hill with performances by Birdmonster, Division Day and Two Seconds, and yes there will be cupcakes! The show is 18+ and only $10, but for those of you who aren't in the city tonight you can still listen in to the party performances thanks to the fine folks at Lala.com.......

We've been doing far too much reading about relevance and contemporary classical music as of late, so we're looking forward to the opportunity to hear it in a nice room with other people. The SF Tape Music Festival going on all weekend at ODC Theater (3153 17th St at Shotwell) features three distinct programs of audio art over a pristine 16-speaker surround sound system. We like the mix of legends (Brian Eno, with a world......

What? This isn't Thursday? OK, all this holiday brouhaha has made us a day late from our usual posting schedule but we just know you'll forgive us. To make it up to you, we want to share a brand new video from Trainwreck Riders. According to our buddy Nat, last week the band hit the streets with a super 8 camera and a bag full of costumes that they dug up from their basements. They......

It's not too early to make plans for Halloween weekend, and if you want to make this year especially memorable, hop a plane to Las Vegas for the Vegoose Music Festival. It's an impressive lineup of tons of bands in one place: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, The Mars Volta, The Raconteurs, Cat Power and the Memphis Rhythm Band (we'll see about that), Gomez, Fiona Apple, Jenny Lewis, BRMC, and a bunch of those jammy/jazzy......

Two films about the Middle East involving food: "AnTEAcipation" screens at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (701 Mission St. @ 3rd) as part of the SF World Music Festival. This documentary takes a gradual, personal approach to the role of tea growing on the Laz people of Turkey. The 8pm screening is preceded by a lecture on the Laz that starts at 7pm. "Border Café (Café Transit)" is an Iranian film about a......

We’ve been on tour of sorts this week, but since it’s for our day job we regret to inform you that there’s nothing very rock about it. We are happy to say that we’re meeting some fellow –ists along the way though. Last night we met and chatted with Kyle and Nicole from DCist. We commiserated with Kyle about the burden of keeping up too many blogs (check out his excellent music blog Information Leafblower)......

Sometimes you need to clean yourself up, get serious, and move in with daddie for a few months before you head to Latin America for a new gig. The District bids Jenna Bush adios. D.C.-based television shows have an elderly audience and DCist has some suggestions to fix that. They're also throwing Butterstick the panda bear a birthday bash. Yeah, we may have a few issues with our World Cup broadcasters here, but this guy......

Check out SFist Shelley with Henry Rollins (!!!) at last week's benefit for the West Memphis Three! MUNI madness: while SFist Eve meets the famous head of MUNI, Mr. Nathaniel Ford, SFist MattyMatt grits his teeth and waits in vain for the elusive 33. What else have we been doing? We're going to DocFest, the Mission Creek Music Festival, theater, and air guitar championships. We also went to check out the new Beard Papa......

Perusing the club listings for December, we're seeing an awful lot of blank calendars. We reckon that means many of SFist's great music venues are being rented out for holiday parties. Perhaps even parties to which we were not invited. Party throwers, don't be afraid to invite SFist. We promise not to do anything untoward that might tarnish our sterling reputation. Not like we did last year. Dear readers, there is a wealth of good......

SFist interviews Ambulance Ltd....

Our concert picks for the week of 7/28-8/3. This week offers you chances to see spanking new UK rockers, hiphop's underground acts and chart-toppers, and yet another show by Tegan and Sara. We love those cute lil' Canadians, but how many times have they played San Francisco this year? Tonight starts early with a free performance by Nine Black Alps at Amoeba. The young lads of the UK's band-of-the-moment will rock you later at Popscene......

Photographer Rob Kunkle spent last week taking pictures of the acts at the Mission Creek Music Festival, which was held at multiple locations across The City last week. Pictured are The Gentlekin. Check out all the pics on Flickr. Events included readings, DJs and live acts. Events were held at spaces as diverse as Artist Television Access, Adobe Books, Cafe Du Nord, 12 Galaxies and the Edinburgh Castle. It was the ninth annual such......

Our concert picks for the week of 6/9-6/15. **Free stuff alert**: Guest lists aren't just for writers, weasels and friends of the band anymore. They're also for the fine, fine readers of SFist. Engage the Expand-O-Tron to get you +1 on the guest list for:Amusement Parks on Fire at Popscene on Thursday, June 16th The Futureheads at The Fillmore on Saturday, June 18thSpeaking of Popscene, tonight MSN Music presents a "Popscene Appreciation Party" with Kasabian......

Our concert picks for the week of 6/2-6/8. Are you feeling festive? Lucky for you, the Mission Creek Music Festival takes over several fine San Francisco venues starting this week. They've curated some of the best bands this city has to offer while throwing in a national act or two to satisfy your wanderlust. Chances are one of your friends is playing MCMF at some point, so there's no excuse not to go. Start tonight......

Our live music picks for the week of 2/24-3/2. We might have mentioned that the big music news this week is the 13th annual installment of Noise Pop, the Bay Area's very own indie music festival. In fact, this here link to the festival schedule could practically write this column for us. Many Noise Pop shows are already sold out, but don't fret, SFist's Noise Pop coverage is as good as being there, and we......

For those of you who like your ethnomusicology less with the pan flutes and more with the non-Western modalities, the San Francisco World Music Festival is presenting a number of innovative programs for the next two weeks. Headlining the festivitires is San Francisco's own Kronos Quartet, who are playing a special local show, sandwiched in between their European tour and their upcoming BAM Next Wave performance in New York....