Sheety Pages

Yesterday Mitch Berg at Shot in the Dark went after over an editorial in last week's local alternative weekly paper The City Pages like a B-52 working over the Baghdad Division of the Republican Guard. A reader had e-mailed me last week as well wondering if I had caught that edition of City Pages since it was bursting with pieces on the war.

Indeed I had picked up a copy of the City Pages in question last Friday while quaffing a few brews at a local watering hole before the NCAA college hockey West Regionals (the last beers that I would see for a good while thanks to the nanny state attitudes of the NCAA) but couldn't bring myself to read the editorial in question or any of the articles dealing with the war as I knew that the smarmy, post-modern ironic tone of the City Pages writers would only serve to unnecessarily agitate me. I needed to save my anger and bile for the coming hockey games where they would be vented the first time a referee was foolish enough to make a call I didn't agree with. And, it turned out, for the NCAA bureaucrats who wouldn't allow you to leave the arena between games to whet your whistle and enjoy some non-concession stand food. God forbid if we were to allow ADULTS the freedom to choose to consume an alcoholic beverage or two.

So I stuck with the one section of the City Pages where you at least have a chance of avoiding lurking political commentary. The restaurant reviews. I was lucky in that the restaurant reviewed in last week's edition was located in Minneapolis. Had it been in one of the Western Suburbs or even worse a mall (gasp) the reviewer would have been unable to pass up an opportunity to bash middle class America as that appears to be the mission statement of the pseudo intellectuals who run the paper. An upscale joint at the Eden Prairie Center will be unmercifully panned while a rat hole on East Lake St. that slops tacos will get rave reviews.

The music and movie reviews are even worse. At least the restaurant critics attempt to let their readers know whether they should pass or partake of the dining fare. The music and film critics aren't writing their reviews for readers. They're writing them for other critics and those insiders who they're trying to impress. Which is why they try to dredge up the names of as many obscure bands (music) or directors and films (movies) as possible in the course of their reviews. The fewer people who have heard of them the better. It's not about informing your audience, it's about proving how much smarter than them you are.

I also suspect that the City Pages critics have a quota system that awards points for movies and music based on certain established criteria, although even with this system its often impossible to tell whether they like or dislike a particular movie or musician. I can't count the number of times I've reached the end of a City Pages movie review only to sputter, "So should I see the fargin' thing or not?".

Here's what I imagine the quotas might look like:

Music Reviews

Ironic name for band +10
Obscenity in band name +20

Band sings about hating Bush +10
Name of band is 'Hating Bush' +20

Music is from Third World country +10
Music is anti-Israeli Palestinian rap +20

Live Music

Band hates their audience +10
Band gets drunk and fights with audience +20

Band plays in local dive +10
Band plays at inner city community center +20

Band's lyrics are completely unintelligible +10
Band's lyrics are unintelligible except for obscenities +20

Movie Reviews

Film is playing at Lagoon Cinema in Uptown +10
Film is playing at U Film Society +20

Film has subtitles +10
Film is in French with no subtitles +20

Film is made in Third World +10
Film is made by Third World Marxist +20

Film has gay/lesbian undertones +10
Film has bi-sexual/transsexual/transgender undertones +20

Film has unconventional plot structure +10
Film has no plot structure +20

Film has heavy anti-American theme +10
Film has heavy anti-suburban values theme +20

And I'm just starting to scratch the surface here. In conclusion, if you're in a bar with nothing else to read you might be able to find a restaurant review in City pages to occupy a few moments of your time (and not lead to a angry spit take with your precious beer as the rest of the paper likely will). Otherwise the menu is a much better option for stimulating reading.