If you're coming into downtown Salt Lake City tonight, be prepared for big crowds. Look at what's going on tonight:

• The lights at Temple Square (bordered by North Temple, West Temple, South Temple and State streets) will be turned on at dusk - and the performance of "Savior of the World" starts at the Conference Center Theatre (on the corner of North Temple and West Temple) at 7:30.
• The "Light Up the Night Concert," featuring Jon Schmidt and the lighting of the tree at Olympic Legacy Plaza, is at 7 at The Gateway, South Temple and 400 West.
• And the Utah Jazz play the Sacramento Kings at 7 at EnergySolutions Arena, 301 W. South Temple.

Might I suggest taking Trax into the city?

------

Here's some more holiday fun this weekend:

- "Plaid Tidings," the "Forever Plaid" Christmas musical, opens tonight at 7:30 at the SCERA Theatre, 745 S. State St., Orem. Shows run every night (except Wednesdays and Sundays) through Dec. 23. Tickets are $12, or $10 for children, students and seniors, at the SCERA web site.

- Hogle Zoo unveils "Zoo Lights," its annual holiday light exhibit, starting Saturday at 5 p.m. at the zoo, 2600 Sunnyside Ave., Salt Lake City. It runs every night until Dec. 31 (except Christmas Eve and Christmas), 5-8 p.m. most nights, open 'til 9 on Fridays and Saturdays. Admission is $6, $4 for children and seniors (a dollar off for zoo members), and free for kids 2 and under, at the gate.

- The Utah Symphony and Utah Symphony Chorus perform "The Sing-It-Yourself 'Messiah,' "
Saturday and Sunday at 7 p.m. at Abravanel Hall, 123 W. South Temple, Salt Lake City. Tickets, from $7 to $14, available at ArtTix.

- The 2nd Generation Osmond Family Christmas - made up of the sons of Alan Osmond, one of the original Osmond brothers - is set for Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Capitol Theatre, 50 W. 200 South, Salt Lake City. Half of the proceeds will go to The M.O.R.E. Project, a charity dedicated to impoverished families in Brazil. Tickets, from $17 to $29.50, at ArtTix.

Labels: weekend schedule

When I'm not eating myself into a coma today, I'll be crying over my poor Seattle Seahawks - who, I'm sure, will be roasted and stuffed by the Dallas Cowboys this afternoon.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday.

- Secondhand Serenade, an acoustic solo project of California emo singer/guitarist John Vesely, plays at 5:30 at Saltair, 12408 W. Saltair Drive, Magna. Tickets are $19, at the door.

- oHgr, the band formed by Skinny Puppy's Nivek Ogre and now starring in the musical film "Repo! The Genetic Opera," plays at 7:30 at the Murray Theater, 4916 S. State St., Murray. Tickets are $18 at the door.

- Matisyahu, reggae star and observant Hasidic Jew, plays at 9 at Harry O's, 427 Main St., Park City. Tickets are $30, at the door.

- The eighth annual White Party ushers in the season at The Depot, 400 W. South Temple, starting at 9 - with Sultan, Jluvv feat. Joy, Josh Max and Dan Dixon. Tickets are $15, at 24tix.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Park City's Derek Hough has done what his sister Julianne has done twice: Guided a B-list celebrity to victory on ABC's "Dancing With the Stars."

Hough and his celebrity partner, model/actress Brooke Burke, took the top prize on Tuesday night's show - winning out over retired football player Warren Sapp and former 'NSync pretty boy Lance Bass.

Julianne, who took the trophy with Olympic speedskater Apolo Anton Ohno and Indy car racer Helio Castroneves, announced last week she was quitting "Dancing With the Stars" (after she and her partner, "Hannah Montana" co-star Cody Linley, were eliminated) to concentrate on her country-music career.

Labels: Derek Hough, Julianne Hough, Reality show

- The Salt Lake City Film Center marks the Transgender Day of Remembrance with a screening of "Trained in the Ways of Men" - a documentary about Gwen Araujo (pictured), a transgendered teen who was beaten to death by men who discovered, while being intimate with her, that she was biologically male - at 6:30 at the City Library auditorium, 210 E. 400 South. A panel discussion will follow. Free.

- Seattle rockers The Classic Crime plays The Avalon, 3605 S. State St., South Salt Lake City, with A Change of Pace as the opening act. Show starts at 6:30. Tickets are $10, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch spoke up for a Grammy-winning rapper doing a 14-year drug sentence - a man who will be freed by Christmas, after President George W. Bush commuted his sentence this week.

John Edward Forte had recorded his own rap CDs, and was a producer for the Fugees. According to this Washington Post account, Forte was arrested in 2000 in Newark International Airport with two briefcases containing 31 pounds of liquid cocaine. A first-time offender, the 33-year-old Forte received a minimum prison sentence of 14 years.

Thanks to the commutation, Forte (whose supporters have maintained a web site calling for his freedom) will be released from prison at Fort Dix, N.J., on Dec. 22 - though he will continue to serve five years' probation.

Hatch and singer Carly Simon were among those who advocated leniency for Forte. In a January 2007 letter to Bush, Hatch wrote, "Now is the perfect opportunity for John to be given the chance to provide positive benefits to society through his considerable musical talents."

UPDATE: The Tribune's Robert Gehrke filed this excellent account of how Hatch, via Carly Simon, got involved in Forte's case.

Labels: George W. Bush, Orrin Hatch

A cause with a celebrity attached will usually get further than a cause without one. Environmentalists who are fighting a sneaky Bureau of Land Management plan to sell oil-drilling leases near Utah's national parks are getting a boost from a local celebrity: Robert Redford.

After writing a scathing criticism of the BLM plan on The Huffington Post last week, the Sundance Kid appeared Monday night on MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show" to rail against the BLM and the Bush administration even further. Here's the clip:



Maddow was excited to have Redford on her show, even if via satellite. In her intro, she said, "Yes, the Robert Redford - Mom, get the camera."

The publicity over the BLM's sale plans - announced on Nov. 4, when the nation was busy paying attention to that election thingee - apparently is working. According to the Tribune's Patty Henetz, the BLM and the National Park Service are having high-level talks to smooth over BLM's end-around of the Park Service when it decided which parcels would be sold off.

Labels: BLM, politics, Robert Redford

- Kilby Court, 741 S. Kilby Court (330 West), Salt Lake City, is throwing a birthday party for its poster hanger and "door girl," Giselle Vickery (pictured), starting at 7 - with Kid Theodore, Drew Danbury, Secret Abilities and James Barlow and The Such and Such. Tickets are $6 at the door.

- Utah author Annette Haws will sign her novel, Waiting for the Light to Change, at 7 at Barnes and Noble Sugar House, 1104 E. 2100 South, Salt Lake City. Free.

- Brothers and Sisters performs at Urban Lounge, 241 S. 500 East, Salt Lake City, on a bill that includes The Comedown and Furs. Show starts at 9. Tickets are $7 at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

So, once again an undefeated, nationally ranked team is knocking on the door of the good-ol'-boys that determine college football's championship - and, again, the door is kept shut.

The 12-0 University of Utah's Utes - ranked No. 6 in the current BCS standings - will get to play one of the big-league teams in a major bowl game. (Probably the Sugar Bowl or the Fiesta Bowl, according to the Salt Lake Tribune's Lya Wodraska.) But a chance to play for the championship? Not gonna happen.

The insanity of this system - propped up by the big-money conferences for their own benefit, using polls and computers determine who's on top instead of actions on the field - has gone on too long. Heck, even President-Elect Barack Obama has weighed in on it, and now members of Congress are raising a stink.

An eight-team playoff is the only fair way to determine a champion. Then we can argue about which eight teams make the cut.

Labels: Barack Obama, sports, University of Utah

- The monthly Salt Lake Gallery Stroll is tonight, 6 to 9 p.m., at various galleries in and around downtown Salt Lake City. Among the highlights: The last day of the silent auction at Ken Sanders Rare Books, 268 S. 200 East, of the estate sale of Ken's dad Stan Sanders. (The Tribune's Roxana Orellana wrote about the Sanders clan - that's Ken pictured above, with some of his dad's stuff - and the sale in today's Tribune.)

- Now you know where all the disappointed Celine Dion fans will go tonight: Texas metal band Drowning Pool - now fronted by Ryan McCombs - plays tonight at 7 at Club Vegas, 445 S. 400 West, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $18, at the door.

- The Egyptian Theatre Company's production of "The Music Man" opens tonight at 7 at the Egyptian, 328 Main St., Park City - and continues with shows at 2 and 7 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Tickets, at $16 to $30 ($31 to $34 for cabaret tickets), are available here.

- Utah's own Marcus, runner-up on "Last Comic Standing," returns for a weekend's worth of shows at Wiseguys, 269 25th St., Ogden, tonight and Saturday at 8 and 10 p.m. Tickets are $15, at SmithsTix.

- The big rivalry game, the Brigham Young University Cougars vs. the University of Utah Utes, kicks off at 4 p.m. at Rice-Eccles Stadium, on the U. of U. campus, Salt Lake City. The game is sold out, so either go with the scalpers or watch on TV (on The Mtn.).

- Despite what Seth Rogen and Paul Rudd said in "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," you are not gay if you listen to Coldplay (even if Chris Martin does wear all that "Tale of Two Cities" faux-military garb). The British band brings its "Viva La Vida" tour to town, Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at EnergySolutions Arena, 301 W. South Temple, Salt Lake City. Country-rockers Sleepercar and Electronica artist Jon Hopkins are the opening acts. Tickets are $49.50 to $97.50, at Ticketmaster.

- Grace Potter and the Nocturnals - a funk/blues band from Vermont (where, apparently, they do have funk and blues) - play Saturday at Urban Lounge, 241 S. 500 East, Salt Lake City. Doors open at 9 p.m. Tickets are $10 in advance, $12 at the door, at SmithsTix.

Labels: weekend schedule

Utah's own Julianne Hough won't be dancing with any stars next year.

Hough, the professional dancer who guided both Apolo Anton Ohno and Helio Castroneves to victory on ABC's "Dancing With the Stars," on Thursday announced she's done with the popular show.

"I really, really want to focus on the music and, you know, kind of be taken seriously a little bit," she told Ryan Seacrest on his radio show.

This season was rough on Hough (pictured here on her final appearance Tuesday). She had an emergency appendectomy during the show's run, and this week was eliminated with her celebrity partner, "Hannah Montana" actor Cody Linley. (Her brother, Derek Hough, and model Brooke Burke are one of the three pairs in the finals.)

Hough has released two CDs this year - her debut country album, "That Song in My Head," and a holiday collection, "Songs of the Season" - and she says "music is where I want to be."

(Photo: ABC)

Labels: Julianne Hough, Reality show

OK, so this is a little cruel to some pre-teen David Archuleta fans. But it's also unrelievedly funny:





(Tip o' the hat to Wm. Steven Humphrey at The Stranger in Seattle, who unearthed this.)

Labels: American Idol, David Archuleta

- "World Wide Wayne," the second annual Westerns of the World International Film Festival - put on by the University of Utah's American West Center - featuring John Wayne movies and foreign films inspired by them, begins its four-day run tonight at 7 at the Post Theatre at Fort Douglas on the U. of U. campus. There's an opening lecture, followed by a screening of the World War II drama "Back to Bataan" (1945). Admission is free.

- Minnesota pop-folkie Mason Jennings plays, with opening act Zach Gill, at 7 at the Murray Theater, 4916 S. State St., Murray. Tickets are $25, at SmithsTix.

- The Australian Pink Floyd Show plays "The Wall" note for note - with laser lights - to mark the album's 30th anniversary, at 7:30 at the E Center, 3200 S. Decker Lake Drive, West Valley City. Tickets, at $37.50 and $27.50, are available at Ticketmaster.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

More people in Hollywood are speaking up about a suggested boycott of the Sundance Film Festival, because it lives in the same state as the headquarters of the LDS Church - which heavily supported the gay-marriage ban in California, Proposition 8.

At a benefit screening in New York for the new biography "Milk," co-star James Franco said he doesn't think much of the proposed boycott. "Sundance has no connection to the Mormon Church that I know of," Franco said, according to New York Daily News gossip columnists Rush & Molloy.

"Milk's" director Gus Van Sant doesn't endorse the boycott either, commenting, "So everything in Utah is just, like, off-limits?"

Josh Brolin, who also appears in the movie (as the San Francisco city supervisor who murdered Harvey Milk, the first openly gay politician elected to a major city office), found the silver lining in the Prop. 8 vote: "It's got people fired up. So I'm almost glad about that."

(Photo: Kambouris/WireImage)

Labels: LDS, politics

- California power-poppers Hellogoodbye - with opening acts Ace Enders and Never Shout Never - play at 7 at In the Venue, 219 S. 600 West, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $15, at 24tix.

- Country star Carrie Underwood, who's now the most successful singer to come out of "American Idol," brings her "Carnival Ride" tour to the E Center, 3200 S. Decker Lake Drive (2200 West), West Valley City, at 7:30. Tickets are $32 to $52, available at TicketMaster.

- Glam-metal band Lizzy Borden - with opening acts The Pedestrians and Meat - play at 8 at Club Vegas, 445 S. 400 West, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $20, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

The economy's even tough for right-wingers telling other people how to live their lives.

Focus on the Family, the Colorado-based Christian organization founded by James Dobson, is cutting 202 jobs - citing a drop in donations, which is where the group gets 95 percent of its budget.

Four of Focus on the Family's eight magazines will cease publication, going online-only.

The nonprofit group spent about $500,000 to support California's Prop. 8, the ban on same-sex marriage. How many employees could that money have kept working?

Labels: politics

Everybody's a critic - including members of the Salt Lake City Council (and the city's redevelopment agency board, which is the same thing), who got their first look at an architect's plan (shown above) to redesign the Gallivan Center downtown.

The makeover plan by EDA Architects would expand the amphitheater space for concerts, move the skating rink to the east (between the amphitheater stage and the Marriott Hotel), add a building with banquet facilities and bathrooms, and remove the birdcage the Tracy Aviary has there.

Looking over the plan, according to this story by the Tribune's Derek P. Jensen, city councilmembers couldn't resist playing art critic.

Carlton Christensen worried that the proposed building along 200 South would be "too cold" and uninviting to pedestrian traffic. And Luke Garrott questioned the decision to keep "Asteroid Landed Softly," Kazuo Matsubayashi's 15-year-old rock-on-a-pedestal sundial sculpture in the middle of the plaza, commenting that, "If it's not a joke, it's unintentional comedy."

My date for cocktails with Dan Savage is off.

I made the invite in the Culture Vulture column in the dead-tree Tribune on Tuesday, asking the famed sex-advice columnist and Seattle alt-weekly editor to visit Utah. My purpose: To show him that his call for a blanket boycott of all things Utah - in response to the LDS Church's hardcore support of the hateful Prop. 8, banning same-sex marriage in California - would do significant collateral damage to non-Mormon and gay-friendly Utahns.

On Monday, before my column hit the streets, Savage posted his RSVP on Slog, the blog for his alt-weekly The Stranger:

Best to the wife, Sean, and I get it, I get it: you're not all bigots and haters, and people marched against Prop 8 in Salt Lake City this weekend. But I'm not ready to make nice—on purpose or by accident—with the bigots and haters from Magic Underpants Inc. who donated money and time to Prop 8. ... You may have a beef with me and others "[singling] out Utah for [our] wrath over Prop. 8's passage," but we have a much bigger beef with the religious bigots that run Utah.

Dan, the invitation remains open. History is on your side, not on the side of the "bigots and haters" - and if a boycott facilitates the change you both seek, then the best of luck to you.

A lot of conservative Mormons in Utah would be overjoyed to know gays and lesbians are avoiding the state - and if those leftist Hollywood types don't come to the Sundance Film Festival, all the better. A boycott won't hurt the people you're targeting, and will do damage to many of your friends and supporters.

This isn't about whether sympathetic Utahns are more persecuted than California gays and lesbians. It's not a victimhood contest. That's the sort of us-vs.-them bickering that the anti-gay forces are counting on to keep their side on top.

There's also the argument that non-Mormons in Utah are enablers to the state's LDS-dominated power structure, and if non-Mormons don't like it they should move. Non-Mormons will tell you that this is their home, too - and if gays and lesbians wanted to help, they would move here in droves and join the fight.

(Imagine if a million gays and lesbians moved to Utah in the next two years - strategically placed in suburbs like West Jordan and Sandy, shifting the balance of power in the Utah Legislature just in time for the once-a-decade redistricting debate. Oh, the commotion!)

Fighting hate with more hate isn't working. Sometimes turning the other cheek isn't just the Christian thing to do, but it's the surest way to drive the other side bonkers.

Labels: LDS, politics

Oh dear, here it comes: "South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone - who have long poked their satirical sticks into the LDS Church's bear cage (such as the classic episode that depicted Joseph Smith's founding of the church) - are reportedly working on the Broadway-bound "Mormon Musical." (Could a title be more self-explanatory?)

According to the New York Post's PopWrap blog, Parker and Stone have developed a script with "Avenue Q" co-writer Mark Lopez and are shopping it around to producers - with Broadway actor Cheyenne Jackson (now starring in the stage adaptation of "Xanadu") may star in it.

No word on who's writing the music. Interestingly, the guy who composed the songs for "South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut," Marc Shaiman, was one of the major voices urging a boycott of a Sacramento regional theater because its artistic director - a Mormon - gave money to support California's ban on same-sex marriages.

If Parker and Stone are writing a play about Mormons, let us hope they write Utah state legislator Chris Buttars into the story - if only so we can hear that immortal "South Park" catchphrase, "Buttars, what is wrong with you?" employed to its best effect.

Labels: LDS

- Singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt (pictured) plays Kilby Court, 741 S. Kilby Court (330 West), Salt Lake City. Fast-rising indie-pop band Elf Power is the opening act; show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10, at 24tix.

- New York Times reporter Patrick Healy leads a post-election discussion, 7 at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, 410 Campus Center Drive on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Free.

- The Kuss Quartet - performing works by Haydn, Bartok, Stravinsky, and Smetana - will play at 7:30 at Libby Gardner Concert Hall, 1375 E. Presidents Circle on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $25, or $15 for students, available at the Kingsbury Hall web site.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Robert Redford has joined the chorus of opposition to the Bureau of Land Management's sneaky plan to lease wilderness areas in eastern Utah for oil and gas exploration.

In his first blog entry on the left-leaning Huffington Post, the actor/director/environmentalist decried the BLM for "cynically" announcing the lease sale on Nov. 4 - Election Day.

"The BLM didn't just try to slip the audacious Utah lease maneuver past the American people on an historic election day, it actually hid the ball from its sister agency, the National Park Service, and then rejected the Service's request for more time to review the scheme," Redford wrote.

"Words alone cannot do justice to the beauty of these places, but they do capture the absurdity of the Bush plan," Redford continues. "Oil and gas drilling in Desolation Canyon? Industrial development along the meandering Green River? The thought makes one wince."

- Blues/hip-hop performer David "Moose" Adamson - a k a Grampall Jookabox - and opening acts Ben Johnson and Shark Speed play at 7 at Kilby Court, 741 S. 330 West, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $7 at the door.

- The documentary "Courthouse Girls of Farmland," about a group of senior women in Indiana who posed for a controversial 2006 calendar to fight to save a historic courthouse, screens at 7 at the Main Library, 210 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City. Director Norman Klein and three of the women in the film will speak after the screening. There's also a panel discussion planned to talk about historical preservation. Free.

- Indie pop band of Montreal, which isn't from Montreal but Athens, Ga. (artists!), plays at 7:30 at the Murray Theatre, 4916 S. State, Murray. Tickets are $17, at the door.

- Satirical metal band GWAR, once Tipper Gore's favorite target of ridicule, performs at Saltair, Magna, with opening acts Kingdom of Sorrow and Toxic Holocaust. Show starts at 9:30. Tickets are $24, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Like a dog that won't let go of a bone, AmericaBlog's John Aravosis' campaign to boycott the Sundance Film Festival - as part of a larger boycott against all things Utah, after LDS Church members supported the anti-gay ballot measure Prop. 8 - shows no signs of slowing.

"Your Sundance registration money is quite literally helping to subsidize a donation to Yes on 8," Aravosis wrote in a post Saturday, following the tenuous links from Cinemark CEO Alan Stock's $9,999 donation to the Yes on 8 campaign to Sundance - via the festival's use of Park City's four-screen Holiday Village Cinemas, which are owned by Cinemark.

Never mind that Aravosis has his Sundance information rather skewed - he declares "the Holiday theaters are THE central location for anything and everything Sundance," which isn't the case at all.

The Holiday Village is the only permanent movie theater Sundance uses in Park City - the others are concert or lecture venues or, in the case of the Park City Racquet Club, a converted basketball court.

But the Holiday Village screening rooms are tiny - only about 150 seats each - compared to the cavernous 1,270-seat Eccles Theatre (where the major premieres are) or the 600-seat Racquet Club (where the U.S. Dramatic competition films screen) or the 468-seat Library Center Theatre.

The Holiday Village is home to more than 150 screenings during the festival's 10-day run, and cancelling those now (less than two months before the festival) would leave many filmmakers without a chance to show their films. The Holiday Village is also one of only two venues for press screenings, and without it critics would be scrambling to get into regular screenings - a further strain on a ticketing system that deals with enough sold-out screenings as it is.

Arguing that Sundance - an institution that has reached out to gay and lesbian filmmakers, workshopping such movies as "Boys Don't Cry" and "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" - is being anti-gay because it can't stop on a dime and give in to Aravosis' demands is foolish.

Here's a more positive idea to show your anger at Cinemark for its CEO's donation: A group is urging moviegoers to avoid seeing "Milk," Gus Van Sant's excellent biography of gay politician Harvey Milk, at any Cinemark theater. "Don't let Harvey Milk's legacy finance your oppression!," the protest's web site says.

Eugene Hernandez, editor of IndieWire, takes a thoughtful look at the intersection of independent film and the same-sex marriage issue - which has been all the talk in Hollywood this last week, both with the Sundance controversy and the news that the director of the L.A. Independent Film Festival (who is Mormon) gave a donation to the Yes on 8 campaign.

Labels: LDS, politics, Sundance

It's always good to see old friends who have done well for themselves.

Take Allie MacKay, the always-bubbly morning features reporter who used to work at Salt Lake City's Fox13 News (and, briefly, at KUTV, Ch. 2).

MacKay does the same job, presumably for a lot more money, at Los Angeles' KTLA. Last week, she was doing a remote from a silk-screening shop in Los Feliz, Calif., where she had a T-shirt made emblazoned with her picture and a picture of Joel McHale, host of E!'s "The Soup."

Of course, McHale played the clip on "The Soup" on Friday night. But he did so to slam MacKay for violating one of his pet peeves: Getting the name of his show wrong. (MacKay and the KTLA anchors referred to it as "Talk Soup," which is the predecessor of the current E! show.) Here's the clip from "The Soup":



Congratulations, Allie, all of us back home in Utah knew you'd make it big someday. All you need to do now is throw your beret in the air, Mary Tyler Moore-style, to show that you're gonna make it after all.

Labels: Reality show

- Rapper-of-the-moment T.I. plays the E. Center, 3200 S. Decker Lake Drive, West Valley City, tonight. The bill includes Jadakiss, Nina Sky, DJ Unk and Chino 4 Real. Show starts at 7:30. Tickets, ranging from $33 to $68, are available at TicketMaster. (Read my colleague David Burger's interview with T.I.)

- Oh! Oh! Oh-oh-HO! '80s boy-band sensation New Kids on the Block brings its reunion tour Saturday to the E Center, 3200 S. Decker Lake Drive, West Valley City. Natasha Bedingfield and Lady Gaga are the opening acts. The show starts at 8 p.m. Tickets, from $20 to $79.50, available at TicketMaster.

- Real Salt Lake faces the New York Red Bulls in MLS' Western Conference Final (though what the hell a New York team is doing in the Western Conference is beyond me), Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Rio Tinto Stadium, off State Street between 9000 and 9400 South, Sandy. Tickets, from $20 to $150, are available at the stadium web site.

- Comedian-actor Jamie Kennedy ("Scream," "The Ghost Whisperer") delivers his stand-up act, Saturday at 8 and 10 p.m., at Wiseguys Comedy Club, 269 Historic 25th St., Ogden. Tickets are $20, at SmithsTix. (Read Burger's interview with Kennedy.)

- The Italian singer Elisa will perform Saturday at 9 p.m. at Bar Deluxe, 666 S. State St., Salt Lake City. Tickets are $12 in advance, $15 on the day of show, at SmithsTix. (Read Burger's interview with Elisa.)

- CNN anchor Anderson Cooper will deliver the third annual McCarthey Family Lecture Series, on the topic "Reflctions on World Events and the Role of the Journalist," Sunday at 7 p.m. at Rowland Hall-St. Mark's School, 720 S. Guardsman Way, Salt Lake City. Free.

Labels: weekend schedule

Newspaper purists - a dying breed, indeed - will notice another step taken down a slippery slope in today's Salt Lake Tribune.

In the upper-right corner of Page 1, in the line of "teasers" (the insider term for headlines and pictures that promote stories inside the paper) is a small advertisement - 1-1/2 inches tall, 1-5/8 inches wide - for Macy's department stores. At a fast glance, it looks like just another teaser, but it's not. (An identical ad runs on the front page of today's Deseret News, but they put it "below the fold," in the lower right corner of the page.)

This is a first for the Tribune, and a fairly rare sight in American newspapers. It's more common in European papers.

The argument against front-page ads goes like this: The front page is sacrosanct - because if Macy's can buy their way onto Page 1, so can a political candidate or a corporation with a controversial project (say, for example, if EnergySolutions wanted to buy an ad to coincide with a legislative debate on nuclear-waste storage) - and anything that breaches the wall between news and advertising threatens the paper's credibility.

The argument for front-page agds goes like this: Ads in other parts of the paper - or on the main page of the web site - don't threaten the paper's credibility, so why should one on Page 1? Besides, newspapers need the money and shouldn't be so picky about how they get it.

What do you think, America?

Part of the aftermath of a failed political campaign is that natural allies turn on each other.

We're seeing it in the Republican Party after John McCain's defeat, and among gay-friendly liberals after the passage of California's ban on same-sex marriage.

The latest fight involves feuding alternative weeklies: Salt Lake City Weekly, The Stranger in Seattle, and New York's The Village Voice.

It started when Dan Savage (pictured), the esteemed editor of The Stranger and writer of a nationally syndicated sex-advice column, chimed in to support a blanket boycott of Utah (because the LDS Church and its members supported California's Prop. 8 and bankrolled much of the campaign). Savage said he and his boyfriend had been contemplating a Utah ski vacation, but now they will go to Colorado instead.

Of course, a blanket boycott won't hit its intended target (there are a lot of Mormons who don't live in Utah) and will cause collateral damage (think of the 3,000 Utahns who protested around Temple Square last weekend, or the gay-friendly Sundance Film Festival). But Savage is angry, and somebody has to pay.

John Saltas, the president of Salt Lake City Weekly, made such an argument in his weekly column. "A Utah boycott hurts the very people Savage claims to speak for," Saltas wrote, while also noting that Colorado is home to Dr. James Dobson's Focus on the Family and several other evangelical groups that also supported Prop. 8.

Saltas went even further, though, and terminated Savage's sex-advice column, "Savage Love," which had been running on the City Weekly's web site. "Since Savage hates Utah so much, there’s no point in us playing in his sandbox by sending him a regular check," Saltas wrote.

This announcement raised the ire of The Village Voice writer Roy Edroso, who condemned Saltas' action on the paper's "Runnin' Scared" blog: "Runnin' Scared and the Voice are astonished that the paper would defenestrate Savage on the basis of his views - especially when those views are entirely predictable from the tenor of his previous work. (Did they actually expect Savage to be gentle about a major gay-rights issue?) We can't think of another alt-weekly that would do such a thing and, till this happened, never expected it of the Weekly."

Can't we all just get along? I invite Savage to come to Utah (he can fly on an airline with a strong anti-discrimination policy, and we can find him a nice gay-friendly B&B, whose owners won't give a penny to tithing) - and I'll buy the drinks while Savage and Saltas debate the issue and find common ground.

I'm betting that is Savage came to Salt Lake City, the crowd of gays and lesbians that would greet his arrival would leave him staggered and impressed.

Labels: City Weekly, LDS, politics

Most years at the Sundance Film Festival, the celebrities party hard the first weekend, and are all gone by Tuesday.

This year, though, there's an added reason to clear out early: Some of them will be heading to Washington to see Barack Obama's inauguration, on Tuesday, Jan. 20 - right in the middle of Sundance.

E!Online's Leslie Gornstein reports that a gaggle of celebs - Anne Hathaway, Jane Krakowski, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Peter Sarsgaard, Spike Lee, Kerry Washington and Josh Lucas among them - will likely be jetting from Park City to Washington as part of the Creative Coalition, an organization of Hollywood stars and artists that work on social causes.

Obama's inaugural has affected Hollywood in another way: This year's announcement of Oscar nominations, usually a Tuesday event, will be delayed until Thursday, Jan. 22.

Labels: Barack Obama, Sundance

- If you like Christmas carols that sound like they were scored for a Jerry Bruckheimer movie, you'll love the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, which performs its live show - complete with synchronized lasers - at the E Center, 3200 S. Decker Lake Drive, West Valley City. Doors open at 6:30. Tickets, from $39.50 to $49.50, are available at TicketMaster.

- For real classical music that's also cool, the Kronos Quartet performs its work "Sun Rings" at 7:30 at Kingsbury Hall, 1395 E. Presidents Circle, on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $37.50, at the Kingsbury Hall web site.

- Louisiana band Cowboy Mouth, now backing their post-Katrina album "Voodoo Shoppe," plays at Bar Deluxe, 666 S. State, Salt Lake City. Doors open at 8. Tickets are $15, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Dan Mirvish, co-founder of the Slamdance Film Festival (Sundance's upstart kid brother), has always been a bit of a trickster. But his latest prank, with his partner-in-crime Eitan Gorlin, has stirred all kinds of trouble.

According to this New York Times article, Mirvish and Gorlin cooked up the story - which ran on Fox News and MSNBC - that an anonymous staffer in the John McCain campaign had said that vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin thought Africa was a single country and not a continent.

Mirvish and Gorlin invented a character, a policy analyst named Martin Eisenstadt (played by Gorlin), to dispense soundbites for reporters and bloggers. Eisenstadt even had a blog and a fictional think tank backing him up, the Harding Institute for Freedom and Democracy.

"Eisenstadt" also helped foster the story that Paris Hilton's grandfather was angry at the McCain campaign for insulting Paris in an anti-Barack Obama ad.

The purpose for doing all this? To pitch a TV show based on the Eisenstadt character - but also to show the gullibility of the mainstream media and the blogosphere.

It also shows that a hoax succeeds when the source material is wacky enough without embellishment. If Palin hadn't come off so clueless in early interviews, and so stubborn in later appearances, it would have been less plausible to think she didn't know Africa is a continent.

Labels: John McCain, Sarah Palin, Slamdance Film Festival

The furor over California's Proposition 8, the ban on same-sex marriage, marches on.

And just when you thought the Sundance Film Festival was out of the line of fire (by gay and lesbian activists going after all things Utah, because of the Mormon church's strong support of Prop. 8), now Sundance is the one being asked to boycott one of its own venues.

Activist John Aravosis posted this notice on his AmericaBlog that the CEO of Cinemark Theatres, Alan W. Stock, gave $9,999 to the Yes on 8 campaign. Cinemark Theatres operates 4,700 theaters worldwide, and operates more screens in Utah than any other company - including the 24-plex at Jordan Landing and the two Century 16s.

Aravosis is urging a blanket boycott of all Cinemark theaters. (This leaves militant gays and lesbians in Utah in a bind - some were already boycotting Larry H. Miller's Megaplex Theaters over the "Brokeback Mountain" cancellation in 2006.)

Stock - as I wrote Monday on my Movie Cricket blog - was raised in Roy, Utah, served on an LDS mission, and managed theaters in Ogden and Layton before being hired by Cinemark in 1986. On Election Day, he was back in Utah, overseeing the opening of a new 14-plex in Orem's University Mall.

Here's where Sundance factors in the mix: Cinemark also runs the 4-screen Holiday Village Cinemas in Park City, the only full-time movie theaters used during the film festival. (The other venues are either concert halls or converted spaces.) The Holiday Village theaters are the go-to theaters for the U.S. documentary competition, and the main venue for press screenings.

Movie City News' David Poland, writing on his Hot Blog, puts it directly: "Sundance will actually have to answer what is now a real question... will they financially support a theater in their group of theaters that is led by a Prop 8 financer?"

Poland vows to avoid press screenings at the Holiday Village ("nothing plays the HV exclusively," he writes), but for some members of the press - those with more-restrictive press credentials - that may not be a workable option.

Poland is urging Sundance to try to find an alternative venue, but there's no viable option with the festival only two months away. The Redstone Cinemas might have the screens, but running the shuttle buses out to Kimball Junction would cripple an already precarious transportation situation.

Labels: LDS, politics, Sundance

Scott Eckern exercised his constitutional right of free speech and, following the advice of his church - the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - donated $1,000 to the campaign supporting California's Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriage in the state.

Supporters of same-sex marriage exercised their constitutional rights and publicized Eckern's donation - and the fact that Eckern is artistic director of the California Musical Theatre, the state's largest nonprofit musical theater company.

These supporters of gay rights encouraged their artist friends who are gay and lesbian to boycott CMT. One artist who took up the boycott call is fairly famous in musical-theater circles: Mark Shaiman, who composed the songs for the musical version of "Hairspray."

Today, according to this report, Eckern resigned his job at California Musical Theatre, "after prayerful consideration to protect the organization and to help the healing in the local theatre-going and creative community," he said in a statement.

I feel sorry that a guy lost his job. I also feel sorry that 18,000 gay and lesbian couples who have married legally in California this year were told by voters that their marriages don't count. There are no winners in this mess, only victims.

Labels: LDS, politics

- The Hotel Cafe Tour - a collection of female singers, headlined by Rachael Yamagata (pictured) with Meiko, Thao Nguyen, Kate Havnevik, Lenka and Emily Wells - plays starting at 6:30 at the Avalon Theatre, 3605 S. State St., South Salt Lake. Tickets are $13, at the door.

- Disney on Ice opens its "100 Years of Magic" show, at 7 p.m. at EnergySolutions Arena, 301 W. South Temple, Salt Lake City. (The show continues through Sunday, Nov. 16.) Tickets, from $13 to $45, are available at Ticketmaster.

- The University Symphony delivers its fall concert, 7:30 at Libby Gardner Hall, 1375 E. Presidents Circle, on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $7 (or $3 for students), at the Kingsbury Hall web site.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

The Supreme Court of the United States will today listen to arguments about displaying religious monuments in public places - with a Utah case under the microscope.

The high court will hear about the dispute over Summum, the Salt Lake City-based spiritual group that wanted to erect a monument listing its Seven Aphorisms in a Pleasant Grove park where a Ten Commandments monument now stands.

Fun fact: Many of the Ten Commandments monuments placed around the United States were put there by the Fraternal Order of Eagles during the 1950s - a program that really took off when filmmaker Cecil B. deMille, promoting his 1956 epic "The Ten Commandments," arranged to have hundreds of the monuments installed. (There are nine in Utah.)

Maybe the Summum folks should hire Steven Spielberg to make an epic movie about their Seven Aphorisms.

Labels: religion

Are you Slippery Kitten material? (Actually, "material" may not be the right word, because being a Slippery Kitten involves removing material.)

The Salt Lake City burlesque troupe, which made a splash this summer with a Top 40 placing on NBC's "America's Got Talent," is holding open auditions Saturday at noon at Bar Deluxe, 666 S. State St., Salt Lake City.

Here are the requirements for the audition: You must be 21 or older (bring ID), have a two- to three-minute costumed routine ready to the music of your choice (music must be on CD), and have your hair and make-up ready. Also, bring comfortable clothes and shoes to dance in, as you will be taught a short dance routine that you will have to perform.

If you make the cut, you'll have to get a professional dancer's license - and you'll have to be available for rehearsals (Sundays, noon to 5 p.m., and Thursday nights, 8 to 10 p.m.).

And if you thought you could drop by and ogle the auditioners, forget it - the try-outs are closed to everyone but those auditioning.

Labels: Slippery Kittens

- Jam-rock band Steel Train plays at Kilby Court, 741 S. Kilby Court (330 West), Salt Lake City. Also on the bill: Dear and the Headlights, Forgive Durden and Mury. Doors open at 6:30. Tickets are $10, at the door.

- Chicago hardcore band Rise Against is the headliner for a show that includes Alkaline Trio, Thrice and Gaslight Anthem - all starting at 7 at Saltair, 12408 W. Salt Air Drive, Magna. Tickets are $28, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

A stint at Utah's Cirque Lodge last year seems to have done the trick for actress and former train-wreck Lindsay Lohan.

Giving her first post-rehab interview to Harper's Bazaar, Lohan, 22, is pretty candid about her hard-partying past: "I did it to myself, and I have to deal with the consequences. I'm thankful for what I can take out of it. Now I feel clear. That's my past, and I'm a different person now. I have goals and I'm working to achieve them. I'm not hanging out with people who are out every night getting f---ed up. ... And, I think that I'm happy."

In the interview, she talks elliptically about her relationship with DJ Samantha Ronson (though Lohan never mentions Ronson by name, because "I feel like it jinxes it"), and says she doesn't classify herself as a lesbian - though "maybe, yeah," a bisexual. She also talks about rebuilding her music and movie career, both of which were hurt by a reputation for erratic work habits.

Hollywood, she said, "builds you up to take you down and then sees how far you can come back. ... I don't really worry, though. I'm a fighter. I'm up for a challenge, and I won't settle."

Labels: Cirque Lodge, rehab

What Jon Stewart once called "the satirical-industrial complex" is undergoing a shake-up right now.

Out with the jokes about George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin. In with jokes about Barack Obama.

But what are the jokes about Barack Obama? How does a comedian satirize a politician whose stock-in-trade is optimism, idealism and - dare we say it? - hope?

That's the question I pose in today's Culture Vulture column in the dead-tree Tribune. Check it out.

Labels: Barack Obama, politics

Utah's own David Archuleta is reportedly one of the acts booked for the "Z100 Jingle Ball 2008," the annual Christmas extraganza in Madison Square Garden sponsored by a New York radio station.

Others on the bill: Katy Perry, Chris Brown, Leona Lewis, Ne-Yo, Jesse McCartney, Paramore, Brandy, and Lady GaGa.

Let's hope Archuleta and Perry don't get their set lists mixed up - though hearing Archuleta sing "I kissed a girl and I liked it" would be a blessed relief in some quarters.

Labels: David Archuleta

- Henry Rollins - actor, political commentator and former frontman for the seminal punk group Black Flag - gives a spoken-word concert at 7:30 at the Murray Theatre, 4959 S. State St., Murray. Tickets are $20, at the door.

- Jazz singer Karrin Allyson, whose recent work highlights Brazilian jazz, performs at 7:30 at the Sheraton, 150 W. 500 South, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $25, or $15 for students, at JazzSLC's web site.

- Up-and-coming country singer Matt Stillwell performs at 8 at The Depot, 400 W. South Temple, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $7.50, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

The Hate State.

That's what a fair number of bloggers and supporters of same-sex marriage are calling Utah, following the lead of AmericaBlog's John Aravosis - who is urging a boycott of all things Utah and all things Mormon, after the support of the LDS Church and its members helped pass California's Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriages in the Golden State.

"Utah is the new Coors," declared Dan Savage, editor of the Seattle alt-weekly The Stranger (and author of the sex-advice column "Savage Love"). "Since all Mormons-in-good-standing must tithe 10% of their earnings to their church, some part of any dollar you spend in a Mormon-owned business - and they're almost all Mormon-owned businesses in Utah - flows toward an anti-gay church that wages anti-gay political campaigns. Ski Colorado, Washington state, and British Columbia. Don't ski Utah."

Others have called for the Sundance Film Festival to vacate Utah (in part because the festival headquarters are at the Park City Marriott, and an owner of several Marriotts in southern California was a big Prop. 8 donor). Still others urge a boycott of Mormon artists - a list that includes Donny and Marie Osmond's current show in Las Vegas, Gladys Knight's concerts, and David Archuleta's forthcoming new album.



Funny, "hate" isn't what we saw spilling into the streets of Salt Lake City on Friday night, when 3,000 people picketed around Temple Square in opposition to Prop. 8 and the LDS Church's support of it.

We saw love. We saw commitment. We saw the beginnings of a movement. And we saw that Utah isn't as monolithic as people outside the state think.

Boycotting Sundance, as Daily Kos and David Poland's Hot Blog both argue, accomplishes nothing. Park City is a blue dot in a red state, Robert Redford's no Mormon, and Sundance has fostered gay and lesbian cinema - with titles such as "Go Fish," "Southern Comfort" and "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" - like no other entity.

(The idea of a Sundance boycott does give hack indie filmmakers a built-in excuse, though. Instead of saying a movie was rejected, a director can say, "Ahh, I pulled the movie before selection because I'm boycotting Utah.")

And a shotgun-blast boycott at everything Utah doesn't make sense either, because look at the people you'd hit in the blast. If you want a target, use this handy database and go after the businesses of those who directly donated to Prop. 8 supporters (something the Prop. 8 folks threatened to do to the amendment's opponents before the election) - such as this guy, the artistic director of a Sacramento-area theater who's now finding that people who work in musical theater (some of whom, believe it or not, are gay) don't want to work with him anymore.

Most importantly, don't fight hate with hate. Fight it with love - the kind of love we saw outside Temple Square this weekend.

UPDATE: Here's the word from the Sundance Institute, which has received some e-mails calling for a boycott or for Sundance to move the festival from Park City:

“The Sundance Institute has a long history, and in fact was founded, on the idea of championing diversity and freedom of expression," said Brooks Addicott, Sundance's associate director for media relations. "It would be a grave disappointment to us if the Sundance Film Festival were to be singled out for a boycott. For 25 years, the Festival has brought together a diverse range of independent voices, and we remain committed to creating dialogue around critical issues of our time."


(Photo: Leslie Sorensen-Means)

Labels: David Archuleta, LDS, politics, Sundance

- Pop-rock singer-songwriter-pianist Jon McLaughlin - best known for Oscar-nominated song "So Close" from Disney's "Enchanted" - plays tonight at 6:30 at the Avalon Theater, 3605 S. State St., South Salt Lake. Tickets are $14, at the door.

- Trolley Square, at 700 East and 600 South in Salt Lake City, will be celebrating its 100th anniversary Saturday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., with barbershop and choir singing, silent-movie screenings and food at 1908 prices - and a firework display at 8 p.m. Free.

- The African Children's Choir performs Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Kingsbury Hall, 1395 E. Presidents Circle on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $22.50-$32.50, $10 for children 18 and under, at the Kingsbury Hall web site.

- Pavement lead singer Stephen Malkmus brings his new band, The Jicks (featuring Janet Weiss, drummer for Sleater-Kinney and not the Susan Sarandon character from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show"), to the Urban Lounge, 241 S. 5oo East, Salt Lake City, on Saturday. Doors open at 8 p.m. Tickets are $16.50 in advance, $17 on the day of show, at SmithsTix.

- Danielson, a New Jersey-based gospel-influenced indie pop band that wears nurses' outfits (to symbolize healing), plays Sunday at Kilby Court, 741 S. 330 West, Salt Lake City. Cryptacize and Skeletons are also on the bill; show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10 in advance, $12 day of show, at SmithsTix.

Labels: weekend schedule

If you thought Election Day would settle everything, you thought wrong.

In the battle for gays and lesbians to be accorded the same rights to marriage as everyone else, the fight is still going on - and will be hitting the streets of Salt Lake City tonight.

Those who believe in gay rights are organizing a protest at 6 p.m. at the corner of North Temple and State Street - right in front of the Church Office Building, world headquarters of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Leaders of the LDS Church encouraged Mormons to support California's Prop. 8, a ballot measure that would amend the state's constitution to ban gay marriages - which have been legal in the Golden State for the last 4 1/2 months thanks to a state Supreme Court decision.

The ballot measure narrowly passed with California voters - after a bitter and divisive campaign that brought an estimated $22 million in donations from Mormons on the pro-Prop. 8 side.

About 3,000 protesters marched to the gates of the Mormon temple in L.A. on Thursday, as gay-rights groups have channeled their wrath on the LDS Church's role in the Prop. 8 campaign (even though other churches also supported the ban).

An online petition now circulating is demanding the IRS investigate whether to revoke the LDS Church's tax-exempt status. Backers of the petition quote the section of the IRS code that states: "In general, no organization, including a church, may qualify for IRC section 501(c)(3) status if a substantial part of its activities is attempting to influence legislation (commonly known as lobbying)."

(Speaking of taxes, singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge wrote a post on The Daily Beast, arguing that she and other gay Californians shouldn't have to pay state income tax if they don't have full rights. "That would just be wrong, to make someone pay taxes and not give them the same rights, sounds sort of like that taxation without representation thing from the history books," Etheridge wrote.)

Meanwhile, opponents of Prop. 8 are also mounting a legal challenge, arguing that California's initiative process was abused - because only small, technical amendments can be passed through initiative, not substantial changes to people's human rights.

An LDS Church spokesperson issued a statement in response to the L.A. protest: "The Church acknowledges that such an emotionally charged issue concerning the most personal and cherished aspects of life - family and marriage - stirs fervent and deep feelings. No one on either side of the question should be vilified, harassed or subject to erroneous information."

That last sentence might draw a hollow laugh from Prop. 8 opponents - who have a detailed list of "erroneous information" (or, as they are sometimes called, lies) trumpeted by supporters of the ban.

This battle is far from over, and it's not limited to California.

(Photo: Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Labels: LDS, politics

- "The Accidental Advocate" - filmmaker Jennifer Gerstle's documentary about her quadriplegic father, Dr. Claude Gerstle, as he pursues the debate over stem-cell research - will have a free screening at 7 at The Leonardo, 200 E. 500 South, Salt Lake City. Jennifer Gerstle will lead a panel discussion on stem-cell research, featuring experts in the field, after the screening. Free.

- Utah-born tenor Stanford Olsen performs at 7:30 in the Virtuoso Series at Libby Gardner Concert Hall, 1357 E. Presidents Circle, on the University of Utah campus, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $25, or $10 for students, at the Kingsbury Hall tickets website.

- Crooked Fingers, a Washington state band fronted by former Archers of Loaf singer Eric Bachmann, plays at 9 at Urban lounge, 241 S. 500 East, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $8, at the door.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

Fans of David Archuleta are being encouraged to mobilize to show a little Archu-love for their guy on local TV.

The fansite Fans of David is encouraging all Utah Archies to assemble Monday, Nov. 10 - the day before Archuleta's debut album hits the streets - at the WalMart in Sandy, so they can be on Fox13's mid-morning newscast with Big Budah.

Appearing in this crowd scene will be a sacrifice, since you will be letting the world know that:

• you're a fan of David Archuleta's music.
• you watch Fox News.
• you shop at WalMart.

For some, the assault on dignity may be too great.

Labels: David Archuleta

Maybe you should just stay in. Seriously, have you seen the snow today? Visibility downtown is next to nothing. OK, do what you want - I'm not your mother.

- St. Louis alt-rockers Ludo (pictured) play at the Avalon, 3605 S. State, South Salt Lake. The Higher and Eye Alaska share the bill; show starts at 6:30. Tickets are $12, at the door.

- The documentary "Beyond the Call," which follows three humanitarians who venture into war zones, plays at 7:30 in the Gore Auditorium at Westminster College, 1840 S. 1300 East, Salt Lake City. Director Adrian Belic will speak after the screening. Free.

- The Utah Jazz play the Portland Trail Blazers, at 7 at EnergySolutions Arena, 300 W. South Temple. Tickets, ranging from $10 to $150, are available at TicketMaster.

- Eagles of Death Metal - which is not a death-metal band, nor do its members actually fly - play at 9 at the Urban Lounge, 241 S. 500 East, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $17, at SmithsTix.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

While things went pretty much as expected in Utah on election night - Republicans still run pretty much everything they ran the day before (except for a Salt Lake County Council seat and a Utah House seat held by Speaker Greg Curtis) - the state's citizens did have some influence over votes elsewhere in the country:



- The Udall boys are going to the U.S. Senate - and Utah's own Robert Redford gave each of them a boost.

The Sundance Kid held a fund-raiser in September for Tom Udall, the Democrat running for the Senate in New Mexico. Redford also campaigned heavily for Tom's cousin Mark, the Democrat running in Colorado - even making a campaign stop in Aurora, Colo., last weekend.

Tom Udall is the son of Stewart Udall, who was Interior Secretary for JFK and LBJ. Mark Udall is the son of Mo Udall, longtime Arizona congressman and one-time presidential candidate.

- California's same-sex marriage ban, Prop. 8, was approved with about 54 percent of the vote - after a bitter and emotional campaign that saw members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (many of them in Utah) give a lot of money and time to ensure its passage.

The LDS Church's involvement in the campaign itself became a campaign issue, notably when a group called The Courage Campaign aired this ad depicting two LDS missionaries ransacking a lesbian couple's home and tearing up their marriage certificate. Church officials issued this statement in response:

"The Church has joined a broad-based coalition in defense of traditional marriage. While we feel this is important to all of society, we have always emphasized that respect be given to those who feel differently on this issue. It is unfortunate that some who oppose this proposition have not given the Church this same courtesy."

In other words, the LDS Church jumped into the ring with its boxing gloves on, then got its feelings hurt that somebody else would throw a punch. And considering the vitriol coming from the pro-Prop. 8 side, the criticism of the LDS Church was comparatively tame.

- And, finally, Utah can no longer claim to be reddest of the red states. Though Utah gave 63 percent of its vote to John McCain, both Oklahoma (66 percent) and Wyoming (65 percent) posted higher numbers for the Republican. (Conversely, Hawaii - the state of president-elect Barack Obama's birth - is the bluest state, with 72 percent of the vote for the Democrat. The District of Columbia gave Obama 91 percent of its vote.)

(Photo: Dennis Schroeder/Rocky Mountain News)

Labels: Barack Obama, LDS, politics, Robert Redford

Composer Kurt Bestor has always been a kind of middle-of-the-road guy, both with his music (which is accessible and quite popular in Utah) and his politics.

"I was Switzerland for a long time," Bestor told me Tuesday night at the Utah Democratic Party's victory celebration at the Salt Lake City Radisson. "At a certain point, you've got to stand up and stand for something."

A decade ago, Bestor - who lives in Utah County - was approached by Utah Democratic officials about running for Congress against then one-term incumbent Chris Cannon. He turned them down.

This year, though, Bestor decided to get involved. "I honestly had just grown tired of feeling powerless," Bestor said, adding that state Democratic chairman Wayne Holland urged Bestor "to use that name for more than selling Christmas music. ... I decided I'd be better off to use my name for political things I believe in."

Bestor got involved in a big way this year. He was a poll worker in the primary, and a delegate at the Democratic National Convention in Denver.

Attending the victory party at the Radisson was "kind of the concluding chapter of what I've been in personally," Bestor said. "I had to come here and see it through."

Labels: Barack Obama, Kurt Bestor, politics

Ana Flores-Sahagun, 22, of Salt Lake City, put her Obama love into a form that would have made the "Project Runway" folks proud.

Flores-Sahagun, a communications/advertising major at the U. of U., made the dress out of signs from the Utah Obama headquarters.

Labels: Barack Obama, fashion, politics

There's not a lot of "party" in the Utah Republican Party.

Though the R's won most everything they held when they came in to the election, and still control the governor's office and the Legislature, the mood is almost sullen.

The only one smiling at the Grand America Hotel, where the Republicans gathered, was Jason Chaffetz, the newly-minted congressman for Utah's very conservative 3rd District.

Otherwise, the TV crews were packing up, the busboys were taking down the food tables, and everybody was going home early.

Meanwhile, back at the Radisson, the party was just taking off. Club beats emanated from the Young Democrats of Utah suite, while a gaggle of hardcore Dems cheered the news that Utah Speaker of the House Greg Curtis (R-Sandy) was knocked out by Jay Seegmiller.

Labels: politics

This was the line at the bar at the Radisson, where the Utah Democrats partied:


Two lines snaked well down the hallway outside the ballroom, packed with thirsty Democrats.

This was the line at the bar outside the main ballroom at the Grand America hotel, where the Utah Republicans held their party:



"We are so slow here," said bartender Ozlem Kislali, a guest worker from Turkey who's been in Utah for about a year.

You walk into the lavish lobby of the Grand America hotel, and you have to look around to find the party going on.

Of course, the Utah Republican Party doesn't have as much to celebrate as the Democrats a few blocks away.

The Utah Republicans defended their two congressional seats, and got Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and attorney general Mark Shurtleff re-elected. But with Utah going for John McCain, while the majority of the nation went to Barack Obama, there wasn't the same cheering and exuberance that the Democrats were feeling.

There was plenty of hand-shaking, like when Huntsman ran into Utah's newest congressman, Jason Chaffetz. But seldom have a group that have won so much acted like they lost.

The vibe was also less gracious. While the Utah Democrats listened - and largely applauded - McCain's concession speech, the Utah Republicans missed a large chunk of Obama's victory speech a half-hour later. Instead, they heard from Utah's newest congressman, Jason Chaffetz, who prefunctorily acknowledged Obama's victory and then made this promise: "I will fight tooth and nail to reject socialism."

That's reaching across the aisle for you.

Labels: Barack Obama, Jason Chaffetz, John McCain, Jon Huntsman, politics

At 9 p.m. Mountain Standard Time, bedlam erupted in the Salt Lake City Radisson.

Chanting "O-Ba-Ma" and "Yes We Can," Utah Democrats cheers the news - declared by the major networks - that Barack Obama had gone over the top in the delegate count and would become the 44th president of the United States.

People cheered. Others cried.

"I've got goosebumps, man," said Utah composer Kurt Bestor.

The cheering continued for several minutes, between more news from the TV screens and a speech by the Obama campaign's Utah director, Suzanne Gelberman.

More cheering erupted when the networks called Colorado for Obama. Many Utah volunteers drove to Colorado to help campaign for Obama, and Gelberman said the win in Colorado would not have happened without Utah help.

Gelberman encouraged the Utah Democrats to keep fighting. "If a black man with a funny name can be elected president of the United States, I have no doubt you can change politics in Utah," she said.

Labels: Barack Obama, politics

The best music playing at the Radisson was in the small room occupied by Young Democrats of Utah, who were celebrating early with club music. (Their communications director, Crystal Young-Otterstrom, above, also had the coolest T-shirt.)

Matt Lyon, YDU's president, and his crew believe they have a lot to celebrate. YDU campaigned hard to find young first-time voters and get them interested in politics.

"Young people don't make the regular voting lists," Lyon said. YDU volunteers identified 4,000 young Democratic voters in Utah, and made 21,000 calls to find them and get them to the polls.

Labels: Barack Obama, politics

One of the most popular attractions in the Radisson is this standup photo of Barack Obama, where nearly everybody is getting their photo taken. (Here is Demontray Lockhart, of Salt Lake City by way of Kansas City, Kansas.)

Labels: Barack Obama, politics

In the main room of the Utah Democrats' election-night party, it's fun to play "emotional rollercoaster" with the crowd noise.

When a new batch of electoral-vote projections flashed on the TV monitors, the yeas and the boos alternated.

"Obama wins Iowa" - "YEA!"

McCain wins Utah" - "BOO!"

More cheers and boos came with KSL's projections in the Utah races. They cheered for Rep. Jim Matheson in Utah's 2nd District, booed for new Congressman-elect Jason Chaffetz in the Republican-heavy 3rd, more cheers for Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon - and a big cheer when Randy Horiuchi, in a close race for Salt Lake County Council, was declared the winner.

But the biggest and longest cheers came whenever a TV crew started shooting the crowd.

Labels: Barack Obama, John McCain, politics

Ryan Randolph has some 10,000 political buttons in his collection, going as far back as Theodore Roosevelt and William Jennings Bryan.

"This has been a great year for buttons," Randolph said, at a table where he was selling buttons with Obama, Hillary Clinton and other Democratic figures. There were more Obama buttons produced this year than John Kerry buttons in 2004.

"We're recording history here," Randolph said.

Labels: politics

The ballrooms at the Radisson in Salt Lake City are a rabbits' warren of activity, as the Utah Democrats are celebrating election night.

The local TV and radio (and, ahem, a blogger or two) are ensconced in one of the larger ballrooms, while smaller rooms are housing legislative candidates, Democratic supporters and smaller groups.

Spirits are high, with plenty of food and drink - and people watching any available TV monitor to see how Barack Obama is doing in the electoral count. (ABC has him up 200 to 124 at the moment.) Meanwhile TV crews are catching whatever candidates or partygoers they can find to fill time. For example, here's KUTV reporter Rod Decker interviewing Democratic gubernatorial roadkill, er, candidate Bob Springmeyer:


(Don't worry, Republicans - the Vulture will moseying over to the Grand America, where the GOP is partying, later in the evening.)

Labels: Barack Obama, politics

Where do you want to watch the results come in?

- The Utah Republican Party is having its party at the Grand America Hotel, 555 S. Main, Salt Lake City.
- The Utah Democrats are having theirs at the Radisson, 215 W. South Temple, Salt Lake City.
- There is a viewing party at the City Library auditorium, 210 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City, from 5 to 9 p.m. (when the library closes).

Not much else going on tonight, but there is this:

- King Khan and the BBQ Show, garage rockers from Montreal, play at 9 at Urban Lounge, 241 S. 500 East, Salt Lake City. Tickets are $10, at 24Tix.com.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

The reputation of Utah's ridiculously restrictive liquor laws took a hit in Australia this weekend, thanks to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Travel writer Rachael Oakes-Ash was ready for an alcohol-free trip to Park City: "Rumour had it the bars in the ski resort town of Park City served water instead of vodka. Not even the state's reputation for metres and metres of the world's driest powder every winter was enough to lure me across the Pacific if there was no chance of gluhwein to warm my toes."

But Oakes-Ash learned differently. "As it turns out, Park City has more ways to get sozzled in the Mormon state than any other Utah destination. The illicit myth just makes it twice the fun."

Oakes-Ash then explains how to order a "sidecar," and how bartenders get around the alcohol-content limits by calling liqueurs - such as Cointreau or Kahlua - as "flavorings."

So, if you see a heavy concentration of inebriated Australians on Park City's Main Street this winter, now you know why.

Labels: alcohol laws

This was the scene at my polling place, at an LDS ward near Salt Lake City's Capitol Hill. No lines, minimum wait, efficient poll workers - and even a chance to get a flu vaccine if you wanted one. (The posters said "Vote and Vaccinate.")

Not all polling places around America ran so smoothly this morning. At Penn State, nearly a thousand students were lined up before the polling stations opened. CNN reported mistakes by pollworkers, machine errors and long lines in Virginia, New Jersey and Ohio.

The idea that people have to stand in line for long periods of time to exercise their right to vote seems patently unfair, and unbecoming of a great nation. Rachel Maddow, commenting on her MSNBC show on Sunday, went even farther, calling the long lines "the new poll tax" - essentially giving up money (in the form of lost wages) in order to cast a ballot.

No matter the sacrifice, though, everyone should get out and vote today. If you're not sufficiently motivated by the issues or the candidates, go for the free stuff - Starbucks is giving out free coffee, Krispy Kreme is giving out red-white-and-blue donuts, and Ben & Jerry's is giving out free scoops of ice cream.

The best reason to vote, though, is that it makes you feel proud all day.

Labels: politics

- Copeland, an alt-rock band from Florida (I hope they filed their absentee ballots), with opening acts Lovedrug, Lights and Lydia play at 6:30 at the Avalon, 3605 S. State, South Salt Lake. Tickets are $14, at SmithsTix.

- Metallica rocks out EnergySolutions Arena, 300 W. South Temple. Opening act: Down and the Sword. Show starts at 7. Tickets, from $55.50 to $75.50, available at Ticketmaster.

- "I.O.U.S.A.," a documentary about our national debt, will screen at 7 at the Ragan Theatre in the Student Center at Utah Valley University, 800 W. University Parkway, Orem. Free.

Labels: Tonight's schedule

So much for leaving with dignity.

Utah congressman Chris Cannon has been a lame duck since challenger Jason Chaffetz knocked him out in the Republican primary. While the world went on with the campaign, Cannon apparently has been keeping himself busy promulgating a wingnut conspiracy theory.

According to this story by the Tribune's Thomas Burr, Cannon has been trying to get proof that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's best-selling autobiography Dreams From My Father was ghost-written by (and I'm not making this up, though somebody is) William Ayers, the Chicago professor and one-time Weather Underground member.

Cannon's evidence? A theory pushed by writer Jack Cashill, who says he compared word length and frequency of words used in Obama's book and in Ayers' memoir Fugitive Days.

But the Oxford professor who created the software Cashill used to make his comparison did an examination of his own - and the professor, Peter Millican, said it was highly improbable that Ayers wrote Obama's book.

Cannon, of course, dismisses Millican's analysis, claiming the professor is "miffed" because he didn't get a negotiated $10,000 fee to run the comparison.

Millican, in a column in The Times of London on Sunday, describes receiving "an urgent call from Bob, a man close to a Republican Congressman in the American West [, who] wanted to enlist my services in an effort to prove a scandalous allegation against Barack Obama." Millican then goes on to debunk the Ayers connection, tearing apart Cashill's argument in scholarly detail on his web site.

Cannon - whose most notable accomplishment during his six terms in Congress was his constant presence on Fox News touting Bill Clinton's impeachment - swears he's not trying to smear Obama with this 11th-hour investigation.

"I'm off to the side watching this thinking, 'This is interesting,' " Cannon told Burr.

Yeah, sure. Whatever you say. You're a disinterested observer here.

Good luck in private life, Rep. Cannon. Go pursue your B.S. theories on your own dime.

Labels: Barack Obama, Chris Cannon, politics

Consider what it's like to be Steve Young.

He's one of the most popular celebrities in northern California, thanks to his success as quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers. He's also probably the most recognizable Mormon in California - and possibly the most recognizable Mormon anywhere who's not an Osmond.

Now consider when those worlds - his California popularity and his Mormon faith - collide. That's what's happened with the battle over Proposition 8, in which California voters will decide whether to amend the state's constitution to ban same-sex marriage (which is currently legal there).

Leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints support Prop. 8, and have encouraged church members to donate money and time to pass it. And Steve Young is not just any member of the Mormon Church, but the direct descendant of the church's legendary president and prophet Brigham Young.

Over the weekend, word got out that a "No on 8" sign was posted in Young's front lawn at his home in Palo Alto, Calif. Young's wife Barbara sent an e-mail to Equality California, a gay-rights group, which read in part, "We believe all families matter, and we do not believe in discrimination, therefore, our family will vote against Prop. 8."

Mrs. Young further clarified her position and her husband's: "I am very passionate about this issue and Steve is completely supportive of me and my work for equality. We both love our Church and are grateful that our Church encourages us to vote our conscience. Steve prefers not to get involved politically on any issue no matter what the cause and therefore makes no endorsement."

This caused enough of an uproar that Young issued a statement to KSL Sunday night:

"Barb and I love each other very much. It is that love of each other and the Savior that helps us come to the decisions we do. For Barb, who has a remarkable and enviable compassion for others, those political activities are far more public than mine. Those who know me, know I chose long ago not to be publicly active in the political process. I do have strong opinions. I do vote and will vote on Tuesday, but those matters are private."

In many ways, Young is caught in the same bind as many Californians and many Mormons - trapped between religious dogma and human compassion. And if anyone thinks Mormons (or Utahns) are monolithic in their support of Prop. 8, this Sunday night vigil in Salt Lake City staged by those opposed to Prop. 8 should change your mind.

Labels: LDS, politics

Utah's favorite small-enough-to-fit-in-an-overhead-compartment pop singer, David Archuleta, releases his first album on Nov. 11 - but that didn't stop Entertainment Weekly's Shirley Halperin to give an advance review of the CD's liner notes.

The surprise is that while Archuleta's responses to questions - whether from Ryan Seacrest on the "American Idol" stage or over the phone with the Tribune's David Burger - are brief and opaque, the liner notes go on and on. To the tune of 3,500 words, of which 2,000 are thank yous.

Archuleta gives thanks to his parents, his friends, his musical influences (including Kelly Clarkson, Jason Mraz, Stevie Wonder, Natasha Bedingfield, John Mayer and Sara Bareilles), his vocal coach Dean Kaelin, everyone at Fox and his fellow "American Idol" contestants. And he gives a special shout-out to the folks at home:

Thank you to all of my neighbors and members from church who have shown their love and support every step of the way... It has meant the world to me to see the support from Utah, and I hope I make everyone there proud :) Go Murray, Utah!

"My problem is, it's either one line or, like, 300 pages," Archuleta told Halperin in a brief interview Saturday (at an after-party for Jason Mraz' L.A. concert). "I completely ramble, even in my interviews or just explaining things. And I didn't want to forget anyone! Gives you something to talk about, I guess."

Labels: American Idol, David Archuleta