Popscene and Live 105 proudly present SXSF : A South By San Francisco Music Fest with Persephone's Bees (Oakland), The Duke Spirit (UK), Ting Tings (UK) and Hottub (Oakland). We all know (at least you should) that Persephone's Bees puts out some awesome Russian-influenced pop music but this particular show we are most excited about The Duke Spirit. They are hitting the West Coast for a run of dates through LA, Seattle and San......

Let's Get Lost (1988): Bruce Weber followed around jazz trumpeter and heroin addict Chet Baker on a year-long excursion, "from the West Coast, to the East Coast, to Europe--including a stop at the Cannes Film Festival--with interviews with Chet, colleagues and friends, including dueling insights from his third wife, a former British show girl, and three children in Oklahoma, and from old flame Ruth Young, a sardonically throaty torch singer." Screens tonight at 7......

San Francisco's 4th Annual Walk for Life along with a counter demonstration...

Conceited much? This year's abortion bash, Walk for Life-West Coast, will take place tomorrow, Jan 19, on the lawn area of Justin Herman Plaza down by the Embarcadero from 10:30 a..m. to 1:30 p.m. And we can't wait! What are you going to wear? We're going to sport our beaver fur-trimmed coat, because...well, we're sure there's a smug murder joke in there somewhere. But if you're able to get up that early on a Saturday......

The NFL's 2008 Wild Card Wknd has arrived at the same time as this rainstorm front......

With the perpetual rebuilding process that is the San Francisco 49er franchise, every so often an old part of old successes will cycle back through SF. This Sunday, Gilroy’s second-most-favorite export returns to the Bay Area at the reigns of Chucky Gruden’s particular strain of West Coast Offense. You never should have been run out of town, Jeff....

Starting out this week, Peck the Town Crier is celebrating his sophomore CD, Groundhog's Day by performing at Pier 23. You can hang out with this San Franciscan native from 7:30-10:30 for absolutely nothing - it's free. "Recorded at the famed Hyde St Studios in San Francisco, Groundhog’s Day blends Peck’s unique story-raps and verbiage with hand played instrumental arrangements that pull from the gambit of [great] American music..." It's a bit weird, a bit......

San Francisco is America's most "walkable" city...

An update on news about the oil spill ...

Recently we featured The Kin in the weekly music column, New Tunes Tuesday #4. We did this for a reason - they've recently become one of my favorite bands. Just as we were impressed when we saw them for the first time at World Cafe Live in Philadelphia in June, we were equally impressed with their West Coast debut performance this week at The Independent. Instantly the audience responded positively to the well-blended vocals,......

SFist interviews Charlie M. from The Happy Hollows. They are playing the Fillmore tonight with the Silversun Pickups...

ODC Theater welcomes Guggenheim Fellow Donna Uchizono and her New York-based dance company with its west coast debut,Thin Air. Hailed by the almighty New York Times as "brilliantly imaginative," Uchizono draws inspiration for Thin Air from the Buddhist concept of "emptiness," which "stresses the interrelatedness of all things and quantum physics, which among other things made it possible to understand the atom. And, as the basis for our understanding of electrical currents and how......

We love it when events combine movies and music! So check out The Orchestra of Piazza Vittorio, a documentary about the creation of a multi-ethnic world music orchestra from Italy. Diverse residents of the Piazza Vittorio neighborhood in Rome banded together and created the multi-ethnic world music orchestra in an attempt to save a historic movie theater from destruction. The movie then follows the orchestra's unlikely rise to success and the various musicians' stories.......

Stephen Kellogg & the Sixers (a band with a breakfast cereal/basketball name - catchy, right?) have started their Dirty Ol' Fall Tour on the West Coast, starting in Long Beach, then L.A. and tonight in San Francisco at Cafe du Nord. At the beginning of December, they will end up in their hometown of Northampton, Massachusetts playing two final shows at Iron Hall Music Hall. Playing over 300 shows in the last two years Stephen......

Aspiring painters of urban village scenes would do well to get themselves to Bernal Heights at once. From the armada of sandwich boards and the pony-tailed guy enjoying a pensive cup of coffee at Progressive Grounds, to the verdant street trees and the pair of rowdy sidewalk philosophers holding court near the eastern end of the block, it’s quite the bustling display along Cortland Ave. Private lives seem a low priority here, as even the back yards of local bars, cafés, and restaurants are open for business. Sidewalk rest stops are a big calling card on Cortland between Andover and Bennington, the heart of Bernal Heights’ vibrant commercial district. There are benches in front of restaurants (Valentina Ristorante), benches in front of salons (Bernal Heights Nail Care), benches in front of markets (The Good Life Grocery), benches in front of saloons (Wild Side West). The result: A remarkable feeling of community, evinced by how it appears as if everyone might actually know everyone else’s name. It’s like a West Coast version of Andy Griffith’s Mayberry...only on Cortland, there’s no Barney Fife. Auditions may or may not be held regularly at Skip’s Tavern and Wild Side West for the role of Otis the Harmless Town Drunk....

The glaring problem with the 2007 San Francisco 49ers is that there are two 49er teams: the American football team that Head Coach Nolan II will put on the field of play this year, and the ownership team led by the hapless Dr. York. While Nolan's West Coast Ravens are being hyped as having come to fruition out from the dark days post-Mooch, Dr. York's ineptitude is threatening the sustainability of the Niners franchise to......

When you're delivering 3 gallons of GHB (the “date rape drug”) from areas north to San Francisco, maybe you should stick to the speed limit. A fool from L.A. was pulled over for speeding in Sonoma County when cops found the offending liquid in the car. Homeboy probably would have gotten off with just a ticket, but instead decided to act all sketchy, causing the CHP to search his car. The GHB, worth around......

It's just gotten easier to travel -ist to -ist on the West Coast -- British cheapo bus service Megabus is starting up next week between the Bay Area and LA. Megabus is already in Chicago too. The big draw are the $1 tickets (yes, you read that right, one dollar to go to LA) -- if you're one of the first four people to book on a particular bus, that's all you'll have to pay.......

Yesterday, the gentleman who came to be called The Genius passed away from leukemia at the age of 75....

No performance in Berkeley would be complete without a political statement. The Tyrant, a 65mn chamber opera west coast premiere which kicked of the Berkeley Edge Fest Thursday night at the Zellerbach playhouse, on the UC campus, does not disappoint. A tyrant, operatic tenor John Duykers, is confined to his throne, afraid of being overthrown if his august tush were to sit somewhere else. The libretto is loosely based on an Italo Calvino short story,......

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......

So a bunch of bloggers had a few drinks last night, or as someone on the Wall and SF Junto put it "some lame meeting of whiney bloggers at a hipster bar” when Alex and Maggie of the strangely peculiar blog, The Mayor and the Hair, came by and asked if one of them was Dean of Gavin Sucks. It was. And so, they dumped their alcohol on poor Dean, who had to spend the rest of the night wearing a wine and beer soaked shirt....

Catch Drawn & Quarterly cartoonists Gabrielle Bell (Lucky), Kevin Huizenga (Curses), and Anders Nilsen (Don’t Go Where I Can’t Follow) at the Booksmith (1644 Haight St), the SF stop on their West Coast book tour. The cartoonists will be presenting a slide show of their work, answering questions and signing their latest D+Q releases. Kevin Huizenga's short story collection, Curses, promoted Huizenga as "one of the brightest, most interesting new comix authors to appear in......

And so, the Giants finally pulled the trigger and signed the Barry. The money is about what was heard before- $16 million with enough incentive clauses to make it a possible $20 million. The only thing they got out of it as they were taken to the cleaners was no more Barry flunkies in the locker room. Ooh, boy. ...

In our latest episode, we examine the weaknesses that led to the exit of each franchise that was tossed from the playoffs last wknd. Going into last wknd’s action, there were no “complete” teams left – only those who had outweighed their weaknesses enough to advance to the NFL’s Divisional Playoff Round. ...

From the Usual Suspects, we found a link to a story about Doughgate (we like that one) in the Yale Daily News. As you might as well imagine, it's a big story over there. Anyways, it’s an interesting read as it gives you an idea how it's seen over there in Ivy League Land. Among other things, they have no idea about all the inside San Francisco stuff, like the high schools involved or who the people who hosted the party were. To them it's just a straight forward assault and battery....

Today was the opportunity to go to your local movie Cineplex (the Hacienda or the Emery 10 in Emeryville) and watch the live HD broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera matinee. We kinda blew it, as it’s a bit late for today, the screening starts at 10:30am on the west coast. But you’ll have three more opportunites to catch the show live from New-York: Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin" on Feb. 24th, Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" ,......

A few photos of Lake Tahoe and Squaw Valley...

Week Twelve of the National Football Season's regular season is here, post-Thanksgiving. Grab some leftovers and plunk down on the couch, here comes this weekend's set of Bay Area American football entertainment....

Those looking to swim in the Aquatic Park Lagoon this weekend are out of luck as the lagoon is closed to let park rangers search for the "rogue" sea lion that attacked up to fourteen people over the days and chased ten others away. ...