Verb Issue R88 (July 26-Aug. 1, 2013)

arts culture music regina

Photo: courtesy of alan smith

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chEER up competitive cheering: tougher than you think

thE dEad south cello-infused bluegrass from the prairies

thE wolvERinE + Fill thE void films reviewed

kytamiblurs genres at connect

issue #88 – July 26 to august 1issue #88 – July 26 to august 1

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2July 26 – aug 1

Please recycle after reading & sharing

EditoRialPublisher / Parity Publishingeditor in chief / ryan allanmanaging editor / Jessica Patruccostaff writers / adam hawboldt + alex J macPhersoncontributing writer / Victoria abraham

aRt & pRoductiondesign lead / andrew yanko graPhic designer / brantin fixcontributing PhotograPhers / baily eberle, maxton Priebe, adam hawboldt + alex J macPherson

BusinEss & opERationsoffice manager / stePhanie liPsitaccount manager / kerri senkowmarketing manager / Vogeson Paleyfinancial manager / cody lang

contactcomments / [email protected] / 306 881 8372

adVertise / [email protected] / 306 979 2253

design / [email protected] / 306 979 8474

general / [email protected] / 306 979 2253

culture entertainmentnews + oPinion

among thE staRs Saving lives from the air. 3 / local

chEER on! Behind the scenes of competitive cheerleading. 4 / local

policing thE policEOur thoughts on outfitting police officers with video cameras. 6 / editorial

commEntsHere’s your say about cutting ties with the monarchy. 7 / comments

Q + a with stand youR gRoundTennessee hardcore. 8 / q + a

nightliFE photos We visit the Whisky Saloon. 15 / nightlife

livE music listingsLocal music listings for July 26 through August 3. 14 / listings

thE wolvERinE+ Fill thE void We review the latest movies. 16 / film

on thE Bus Weekly original comic illustrations by Elaine M. Will. 18 / comics

taking cEntRE stagE Play challenges viewer’s interaction with art. 9 / arts

FEEding FoodiEsWe visit the Salt Food Boutique. 12 / food + drink

musicWalk Off The Earth, Behold! The City + The Sojourners. 13 / music

thE dEad southBluegrass from the heart of the prairies. 9 / arts

gamE + hoRoscopEsCanadian criss-cross puzzle, weekly horoscopes and Sudoku. 19 / timeout

on thE covER: kytamiRocking out at Connect Fest. 10 / feature

Photo: courtesy of west olson

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contents

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3July 26 – aug 1

locallocal

@verbRegina

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Feedback? text it! (306) 881 8372

tan is a dummy. Not the kind of dummy who lacks common sense.

No, Stan is an actual dummy. A man-nequin, made of rubber.

Day after day Stan waits in dark-ness — if a mannequin can indeed wait — for the STARS team to bring him to life. STARS is Saskatchewan’s helicopter air ambulance service, and twice a month nurses and paramedics in the organization must run through a simulation session to keep their skills sharp. That’s when Stan comes to life.

“We’ll have a transport physician or a clinical educator in this room over here,” says flight nurse Jai-mie Ratcliffe, pointing to a computer room. “They’ll say we’re going to land in such and such a place and pick up a patient that was involved in, say, a motor-vehicle collision. They’ll give us the vital signs and what kind of state the patient is in.”

Then it’s up to the nurse and the paramedic to save the patient’s life. In a trial scenario, Stan will show signs of a person who has just been in an ac-cident. His pupils will dilate, his blood pressure will rise and fall. “If you’re not ventilating properly, it does a true gas exchange,” says flight paramedic Gennifer Bergson. “He responds ex-actly how a human would respond.”

Every now and then, a smoke machine will be brought into the trailer. It will be turned on and someone will yell, “The helicopter is on fire!” This doesn’t mean the simulation is aborted. Instead, the crew will continue to work on Stan through the haze and chaos.

They do this so, when a real-life situation occurs, they’ll be prepared for anything and everything.

When a call comes in to STARS’ head-quarters, the air ambulance team has

eight minutes to get the helicopter in the air, ten minutes if it’s night. Soon as it comes in the pilots check the weather to make sure it will be safe to fly to the site and back. While they’re doing that, the nurse and the paramed-ic are in the medical room preparing. If it’s an Early Automated Dispatch — like a motor vehicle collision in which a person has been ejected from their car — as long as the weather permits, they’re in the air. “On the ground, it’s usually a medical decision to go,” says pilot Yves Bolduc, “but once we’re up in the air, [the pilots] are the ones that are in control.”

Separated by a curtain from the medical crew, the two pilots go to work. One is solely responsible for flying the helicopter. “It’s kind of like playing the drums,” says pilot Lee Davis, as he shows me the inside of the STARS’ BK117 helicopter. “One hand is doing one thing, the other is doing something else. Your feet are working the pedals. It may seem complicated, but after a while it’s like riding a bike.”

And while the one pilot is safely getting them from Point A to Point B, the other guy is talking on the radio to people at the destination, planning the trip, doing fuel calculations, cross-checking the altimeter, and more. A lot of the time these pilots don’t even know the severity of the call.

The medical crew does, though. And while en route to the destination, the nurse and paramedic are behind the curtain, making a treatment plan and getting the equipment ready.

The first STARS base was launched in Regina on April 30th, 2012. Since then, another base has been added in Saska-toon and they have transported (and treated) more than 400 patients. But just because the crew is highly trained

doesn’t mean every call runs smoothly. On the pilot end of things, sometimes finding a proper landing zone can present problems. “We responded to one call that was right in the middle of a hillside,” says Bolduc. “It was very hilly, very hard to find a place close by to land. Those things will happen.”

Back behind the curtain, the medi-cal crew are no strangers to challenges, either. Once they bring a patient on board, anything can happen.

“If a patient goes into cardiac arrest back here, the nurse can’t stand up so they’re trying to do CPR like this,” says Bergson, holding both her hands flat and making tiny up and down motions. “I can bend over to help, and often I have to. But then I can’t walk for a week afterwards.”

“Or,” says Ratcliffe, holding a small maroon device that looks like a gun, “if we have to intravenous super fast and we’re having trouble finding a vein we have to remedy the problem, quick!” Ratcliffe pushes the trigger of the gun (known as an EZ-IO), and the bit spins around like an electric drill. “We attach a needle to this and drill it into your bone. The centre of your bone is hollow, so that way we can give you all the medication and fluids we’d give you with a standard IV.”

This is just the tip of an iceberg called “the challenges STARS faces.” But rest easy. Should you ever find yourself in the back of a STARS heli-copter, you’re in the hands of consum-mate professionals.

The kind of professionals who take great pride in what they do. In saving people’s lives.

s

shooting FoR thE staRs

behind the scenes at saskatchewan’s only air ambulance service by adam hawboldt

Photo: courtesy of adam hawboldt

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5July 26 – aug 1

@verbRegina

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local

ere’s something you might not know: the first cheerleaders

were men.True story. Cheerleading began

back in the late-19th century when Princeton university students began yelling, “Rah rah rah! Tiger tiger tiger! Sis sis sis! Boom boom boom! Ahh-hhh!” during a football game. Soon there were appointed “yell leaders” who sat in the stands, leading the chants. The fad soon caught on with other schools, and in 1898 a “yell leader” from the University of Min-nesota ran onto the field and began leading the chant.

Then and there, organized cheer-leading was born. And for the next four decades or so it was men who were down on the field. Eventually women began to take part, and in the ‘50s Lawrence Herkimer (con-sidered by many the great grandfa-

ther of modern cheerleading) came along and introduced aspects like pom-poms, spirit sticks, pleated skirts and more.

This is the image many people have when they think of cheerlead-ing. The problem is, most people are mistaken.

According to a recent study by the Na-tional Centre for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research, cheerleading ranks second in America. The study went on to say that cheerleading is the #1 most dangerous sport for females, that 65.2 percent of all catastrophic injuries in youth sports occur in cheerleading, and that falling while performing a gymnastic stunt has a greater impact than being tackled by a professional football player.

No such study has been conducted about cheerleading in Canada, but

that doesn’t mean it isn’t as poten-tially risky in the Great White North. Cheerleading has evolved into a continent-wide competitive sport with human pyramids and high-flying stunts. And with this evolution comes the increased chance of catastrophic injury. Just ask Shanda Leftley.

A few years ago, back when she was a competitive cheerleader at the U of S, Leftley did serious damage to her knee. She doesn’t remember ex-actly how it happened, but she knows it hurt. “I have bad knees, patello-femoral syndrome,” says Leftley. “My knee caps and bones grind together. I’m not sure exactly how my injury happened, but I remember it was my third year at the U of S. We were going through a routine, I tweaked my knee and it popped out. I was supposed to take three months off, but we had nationals the following week so I competed anyway. I never let my knee heal properly.”

Given the competitive nature of modern cheerleading, none of this comes as a surprise.

“In cheerleading you see injuries all the time,” she admits. “Concus-sions are extremely common, un-fortunately. I mean, we’re throwing girls in the air and those catches are difficult, no matter how well-trained the bases are. If they do something they’re not supposed to do in the air … the girl could fall. Or she could fly out of the stunt group altogether. So concussions happen.” So too do injured ankles, hurt wrists, broken bones and dislocated knees.

Which brings us back to Leftley: why didn’t she let her knee heal prop-erly? The answer is, because she’s an athlete. And like a hockey or football player, cheerleaders compete through adversity because they don’t want to let their team down.

“You can’t be missing someone from your stunt group,” Leftley explains. “You have to be there for each other no matter what. You don’t miss practice because you’re sick or sore. You need to be there. If you’re not, pyramids can’t go up or you can’t work on your whole routine. You need to be there for your team. If you’re really sick or sore you can … take breaks, but you need to be there.”

When people miss time, routines can’t be run. Setbacks occur and the team suffers. And when competition time rolls around, they won’t be ready.

One of the first things you’ll notice if you go to a cheerleading competition is the noise. They’re loud — really loud. In the practice area there are mats everywhere, with a team on each. All the coaches are screaming counts at their teams, the athletes are talking and yelling, practice music is playing. On the competition floor, maybe 20 feet away, they’re playing competition music at top volume.

“There’s noise everywhere. It’s a very hyped-up atmosphere,” says Leftley. “Everyone is on edge.”

And that’s something the casual cheerleading fan might not notice at competitions— the tension.

“When you’re on your practice mat, you can’t help but notice the team on the mat next to you. You’re competing against them,” explains Leftley. “It’s easy to get distracted. You look and they just did a full-up and think ‘We don’t have full-ups.’ It can be discouraging.”

Combine that with anxiousness and maybe a couple of missed skills during a practice run, and cheer-leading competitions can leave even the most calm athlete a tad frazzled. But you can’t let that get to you. Competitive cheerleaders spend three days practicing their routines, and countless hours in the gym working out to build muscle. The show must go on. “You can’t focus on what others are doing,” says Leftley. “You can’t change what they’re doing. You just have to focus on your routine.”

And if you train hard enough, you may run a clean routine. And that, says Leftley, “is the best feeling. You leave the floor feeling like a million bucks. You’ve worked with this group for so long, so hard.”

Which begs the question: did male cheerleaders at Princeton or the pom-pom waving ones from the ‘50s ever get the same feeling?

h

Evolution oF chEER

inside the world of competitive cheerleading by adam hawboldt

Photo: courtesy of shanda leftley

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6July 26 – aug 1

editorialeditorial

ast week a disturbing video made headlines with every major news

agency in the country. The video, shot through a car window, shows two Quebec police officers beat-ing the ever-loving crap out of an aboriginal man in the Unamen Shipu community.

And while many reactions to the incident range from outrage to questions about what precipitated such behaviour, we believe that there is a way to prevent such an occurrence from happening. And that’s why we propose that police officers be outfitted with a small camera to record what they are do-ing. A constant reminder that they are being watched will encourage police accountability, which in turn will help alleviate unnecessary violence. And at the same time, a visual recording will help protect officers by capturing their perspec-tive of events.

Yep, we believe attaching cameras to cops would benefit both officers and the public, and we think it should happen now.

Now, in the aforementioned incident there was a camera rolling, but it wasn’t official police video. Films shot by the public are too one sided, and often don’t tell the whole story. And while it’s impossible to say whether a camera attached to the officers would have prevented such a situation, it is likely that the officers would not have been quite so quick to resort to what appears to be rather extreme measures.

Actually, it’s more than just likely. It’s almost a certainty. You see, police officers in Rialto, Cali-fornia have conducted something of an experiment in conjunction with the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Criminology. 54 officers were outfitted with miniature video cameras and microphones — de-vices small enough to be clipped to a collar or sunglasses or a hat — which recorded their interactions with the public. The officers were expected to activate the devices whenever they left a patrol car, and the recordings were automatically uploaded to a central server back at headquarters.

The rest of the force went about business as usual.

And what the data revealed was nothing short of staggering.

In the first 12 months the cameras were in use, the Rialto police depart-ment experienced an 88 percent decrease in the number of com-plaints filed against their members. What’s more, the study revealed that officers used force 60 percent less often; interestingly, when force was exercised it was twice as likely to be used by a cop without a camera.

And to mitigate concerns that the cameras would only be switched on after something had happened, the devices boast a feature called a “pre-event video buffer.” Essentially, this continuously records and holds the most recent thirty seconds of film when the camera is off. That way, whatever happens that would cause a police officer to turn the recording device on is likely to be automatically captured, as well.

Now, the trial wasn’t without its detractors, and many officers weren’t thrilled by the idea of being forced to wear a camera, feeling it was unnec-

essary to have “big brother” watch-ing everything they do. Which is odd, don’t you think? After all, the police are essentially the instruments of big brother, and isn’t it fair that if big brother is watching the public then it should also be watching the police?

But we digress. The point of the matter is that having a cam-era attached to a cop dramatically improves safety for all. It makes perfect sense: on the one hand you have the police on camera, which has been shown to diminish abuse of power. On the other hand you have Joe Public who, upon realizing an officer is wearing a camera, is much less likely to do something to cause an altercation. As a result there are less incidents, less arrests without

reasonable grounds, less “he said, she said,” less of darn near anything.

We think it’s about time Saskatch-ewan police start using this new technology. The cameras have been shown to work, and would improve both public and police safety, so why not start now? We all stand to benefit from this.

These editorials are left unsigned because they represent the opinions of Verb magazine, not those of the individual writers.

l

policing thE policEoutfitting officers with video cameras benefits everyone

@verbRegina

[email protected]


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7July 26 – aug 1

commentscomments

text your thoughts to881 vERB

8372

on topic: last week we asked what you thought about cutting our ties with the monarchy. here's what you had to say:

powEREd By thE cREw at moga moBilE

– Cutting Monarchy ties is like say-ing Santa isn’t a symbol of Xmas. Those waisting time on such pur-suits should spend time figuring how to improve Seniors lives.

– It is dishonourable and disgust-ing to suggest that we shouldn’t be honouring the Queen. The Royal family is a symbol of tradition, and we should not be taking that relationship lightly. People who suggest otherwise clearly do not understand all she does for our country. Shameful!

– Shame on you for saying that we should do away with the Queen and her family. It is a proud tradition to have the royal family as the head of our country, and they represent so much history. There is a new generation coming up, renewing everyone’s faith in the monarchy. If we cut our ties with them we’ll be just the same as the USA.

– Yes! We should absolutely sever our ties to the monarchy. It is in-sane that in this day and age our head of state isn’t even a Canadi-an. I agree the Queen is charming, and the boys sort of feel like some neighbour’s kids I’ve watched growing up over the years, but just because they’re nice doesn’t mean we should keep them around. We are an independent country and should strive to do whatever we can to establish that.

– Yes, cut our ties with the monar-chy. I am so sick of everyone blab-bing on about “tradition.” Their tradition is one of colonialism and exploitation. Why celebrate that?

– Oh man I agree we should cut ties with the monarchy, but Will and Kate...they’re so likeable! I just can’t. I want to not like them but I do. So long live the Quen!

oFF topic

– Nice article on Sam Klass. Great to read about an inspiring artist doing something a little different. Thanks for getting me pumped for Connect Fest VERB!

In response to “Fluid Identity,” Feature, #87

(July 19, 2013)

sound oFF

– First dance with a girl. 42 yrs ago grade 7. CJME put on a dance for the city’s school safety patrols. Asked a skinny blonde from a diff school. 1 dance never got a name. Danced with a few more that day. I was awkward spazzy hadn’t found the pelvis yet but same for everyone else. We all had a great time. Thanks CJME! Got a first dance story?

– Where’s ROBO COP like in the movie of the same title when De-troit needs him?? :-D

– Can’t believe Joni Mitchell said those things. Very harsh, and unin-formed when was the last time she even lived here? Return her crap to her who cares.

– To answer the question, that part of you which is animal dies. That

part of you that is higher being lives on. If you spend your life indulging the animal focussed on the crotch the material money etc. There isn’t much higher being grown to live on. You will go out like a light bulb!

– If you are wondering what hap-pens after we die why don’t you find out and get back to me.

– Whoever texted about Bieber being despicable, what did he ever do to you? I think you’re jealous o this success. Maybe if your life wasn’t so pathetic, you wouldn’t feel the need to tear his life down.

– Stop thinking about what you don’t have and start thinking about what you do have.

– Cheap ass and greedy always go hand in hand. Watch for it. You’ll see what I mean. Land-lords especially!

– Saskparty Members having voted 86% to abolish Canada’s Senate say the next Saskparty membership poll will be on abolishing women’s right to vote.

– Watched a few old westerns. The way they used to paint North American aboriginals as the bad guys, violent evil savages, is laugh-able. The film makers were the real primitives. Even funnier!

– It was small flickery snowy low res black and white with 2 chan-nels, But my generation was the first children to see the world unfil-tered good and bad through that

little window of light. It made still makes us different. More mature wiser in some ways but skeptical cynical. The burden of knowing for all generations since. Now acceler-ated with digital info tech. Where are we going with this? What will we become?

– Hey

nExt wEEk: what do you think of cameras on cops? Pick up Verb to get in on the conversation:

We print your texts verbatim each week. Text in your thoughts and reactions to our stories and content, or anything else on your mind.

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8July 26 – aug 1

q + a

stand youR gRound

s

tennessee hardcore group on their dramatic new ePby alex J macPherson

we wanted to present the listeners with something that was melodic and catchy.

daniel taylor

Photos: courtesy of the artist

@verbRegina

[email protected]


ince forming in 2007, Stand Your Ground, a hardcore band from

Johnson City, Tennessee, has gone through many personnel changes. After releasing Despondenseas in 2011, the group recruited vocalist Brandi Pillow, walked away from their record deal, and made the best album of their career. I caught up with guitarist Daniel Taylor to learn more.

Alex J MacPherson: Even though it’s short, Standards feels like the most com-prehensive and complete record you’ve released to date.

Daniel Taylor: It’s got a lot to do with the lineup we have right now. I feel like it’s the most solid lineup

we’ve had in the band, and one of the longer stretches. I’ve always been the primary songwriter, and Micah [Messamore] didn’t really get a chance to write for the one we put out before this, Despondenseas. I guess it’s a more pleasant listen. It is more well-round-ed and more well thought out. It’s also more structured.

AJM: It seems that the arrangements and the production are also more sophisticated. Was it difficult to bal-ance that against accessibility?

DT: We try to make guitar parts as intricate as we can with leads and melodies, and in that way I think we kind of set ourselves apart from other bands that are in the same genre. We try to have layers and multiple leads

going and whatnot, but we did very specifically decide we wanted to have choruses in these songs, whereas on Despondenseas you’ll find there’s almost no repetition. Those songs were written part by part, and once a part’s over we’d very seldom revisit it.

AJM: Which makes sense, because Standards is the most accessible record you’ve released to date. Was that intentional, or just a function of the new lineup?

DT: We had that in mind when we started to write. We’re not getting any younger, and not that we were like, ‘hey, let’s sell out,’ but it was a common direction that we were moving in. It was a natural progression, and it just so happened that it’s a better fit with this

lineup — but it was also a deliberate one. We wanted to present the listeners with something that was melodic and catchy, and something that where by the end of the song you know the melody line or the vocal pattern. That’s how you sell records.

AJM: The new album also seems to herald a change of direction, toward a broader sense of morality.

DT: The lineup we had in 2008, all of us were Christians. Only my

brother Johnson and I are left of the members from that era. It wasn’t so much that we were like, ‘hey, let’s not be a Christian band anymore’ as it was, ‘let’s write about stuff everyone can relate to.’

AJM: Which brings us back to Stan-dards, which I think is about the ways in which people perceive each other. What led you to write about those ideas?

DT: I think it’s something everyone can relate to, I think it’s something everyone deals with. Especially having a female vocalist, she feels judged by a lot of people. She’s a vocalist in a metal band, so she’s going to get compared to guys. But a lot of people are very quick to say she’s terrible or she’s a slut. People are going to talk; that’s never

going to go away. But it’s something she especially can get on board with because it happens so frequently in a predominantly male environment.

Stand Your Groundaugust 2 @ the exchange$tba

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9July 26 – aug 1

artsartsarts

a rt cannot exist in a vacuum, but in so many cases the

relationship between artist and viewer is defined by physical presence in a certain space. Play, a pair of site-specific installations by Kathleen Irwin and Jeff Morton, turns this convention on its head and raises questions about the nature of art and the space it occu-pies — as well as the meaning and purpose of interaction.

Consisting of two pianos that have been painted red and installed at the Dunlop Art Gallery, one inside on a dramatic stage, the other outside on the street, Play recalls a time when pianos were focal points around which people gathered for entertainment and conversation. And because the exhibition depends on participation — someone actually playing the piano – the artists hope viewers will reconsider their own definitions of art.

“Art doesn’t need to be defined as a material object that stays there

forever,” says Irwin, whose strong background in theatre and what she refers to as “community engaged practice” has led her to a concep-tion of art as interaction. “Art can be something that deals more in the realm of thought. It’s conceptual. It’s a conceptual, ephemeral, performa-tive practice, rather than something that is material.”

One of the pianos is located outside the gallery itself. Because it has been painted red, it serves as a beacon to passers-by. There is a sense that the piano is only half of the artwork, that the idea of an unplayed instrument is somehow incomplete.

“Participation,” she says, “is neces-sary to realize its potential.” This is also true of the piano inside, but because it is located on what looks like a stage, and because Morton has arranged a method of replaying videos of each “performance” on a time delay, it chal-lenges viewers to engage in a way the outside piano cannot.

“The inside piano obviously mir-rors the outside piano by virtue of its colour and the way it’s framed,” Irwin says, “but placing it within the gallery amplifies what it is — it becomes a real signifier, and what the piano inside the gallery is signifying is something that engages you social-ly, but also engages you critically. As you start to play that piano, it throws the attention back on you, because it repeats what you have played into the piano.”

In the case of Play, the title can be interpreted as a command or a re-quest, but it is most helpful to think of it as a question — a conscious attempt to examine the beauty of the analog in a world saturated by the digital. And while the nature of Play is such that everyone’s experience will be dif-ferent, all that’s required is someone prepared to play.

Playthrough august 25 @ dunlop art gallery

taking cEntRE stagE Play upends the relationship between artwork and the people viewing it by alex J macPherson

n ate Hilts, who sings and plays guitar in Regina blue-

grass outfit the Dead South, grew up listening to folk and bluegrass, and eventually discovered bands like Trampled By Turtles and Old Crow Medicine Show. He wanted to play guitar in a bluegrass band, but his dream wasn’t realized until he met Colton Crawford.

“I was listening to Trampled By Turtles and he walks in and says, ‘God, these guys are good,’” Hilts says of one of his first meetings with Crawford. “I said I’d always wanted to be a singer in a bluegrass band and he goes, ‘I just got a banjo and I’ve always wanted to be a banjo player in a bluegrass band.’” After recruiting mandolin player Scott Pringle, and experimenting with sever-al other players, the group discovered Danny Kenyon, a classically trained cellist. With their lineup cemented, the

Dead South headed into the recording studio and out on the road.

The group’s debut EP, The Ocean Went Mad And We Were To Blame, was released late last month. Blending the traditional sounds of folk and bluegrass with the raucous spirit of alt-country, the album feels like a modern take on a century of musical history. Besides including the best line on the album (“I guess she’s my cousin / but she needs some sweet lovin’ anyway”), “Banjo Odyssey” sets the tone for the record — ragged banjo licks, spare guitar strumming, and Hilts’ whiskey-soaked vocal delivery rising above the mix.

“As much as I want to try to write traditionally, the times have changed,” Hilts says of the group’s sound, which balances inventiveness against a genuine love of the past. “The times have changed. We don’t go through the same things that were going on

back then. We’re a bluegrass and folk band, and the writing goes more on the folk side.”

The Dead South are adept at incor-porating a wide array of influences, from ideas drawn from country and early rock and roll to flashes of Danny Kenyon’s classical background. This commitment to creating new sounds, as well as their enthusiastic live perfor-mances and cagey songwriting, have positioned them as a band to watch in the months and years to come.

The Dead South august 2 @ casino regina summer stageno cover

@verbRegina

[email protected]


thE dEad south cello-infused bluegrass from the heart of the prairies by alex J macPherson


10July 26 – aug 1

Continued on next page »

Just thE BEginning

feature

hen Kyla LeBlanc was sixteen years old, she knew ex-

actly how the rest of her life would unfold. After more than a decade of formal training and countless thousands of hours spent practic-ing her beloved violin, LeBlanc was poised to find a job as a classical musician. She was determined to join a symphony orchestra and perform some of the finest pieces of music ever composed. And then everything changed. “When I was seventeen and graduating high school I switched violin teachers — and we did not get along,” LeBlanc says, a trace of bitterness creeping into her voice. “She would give me s**t. I got sat further back in the orchestra. I lost some status. And I just stopped enjoying it as much.” The situation continued to deterio-rate and, shortly after she finished high school, LeBlanc put her violin back in its case. She wouldn’t pick it

up again for almost four years.Today, Kyla LeBlanc is recognized

as one of the most innovative and exciting violin players in the country. Performing under the name Kytami, she draws on a wide range of musical ideas, from the shards of her classi-cal career and the rolling sounds of traditional fiddle playing to the edgy breakbeats of drum and bass. Her sound is entirely her own, a genre-bending mixture of analog and digital, old world and new. She believes music should not be limited by artificial boundaries, and that constructs like genre and style distract from the power of music to create meaningful connections between people. “People need to define and label things in order to understand what they are,” she con-cedes, referring to the impassable gulf between language and music. “I guess things need to be defined by words. But music is not.”

This idea rests at the heart of everything she does and serves as the

focal point of her second solo album. On a very basic level Kytami, which was released in early 2012, feels like an attempt to fuse classical violin with the enormous rhythms and grooves of electronic music. But this is simplistic. Kytami is much more than a crossover or an experiment; it is a reflection of its creator’s utter disdain for labels and conventions. The album is a testament to LeBlanc’s unquenchable thirst for new sounds and ideas, as well as her belief that erecting artificial barriers, linguistic or otherwise, are an offense against the power of music to tran-scend borders, political or otherwise. But LeBlanc did not come to embrace this view of music overnight.

After abandoning her dream of working as a classical musician, LeB-lanc moved from Vancouver to Whis-tler, British Columbia, where she spent her days riding her mountain bike and snowboarding. During this period, a boyfriend with an extensive record collection exposed her to a completely

kytami on her new solo album and musical vision by alex J macPherson

w

Photo: courtesy of xaVier walker

/Verbregina culturecontents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

11July 26 – aug 1

part of my style, my personal style, is that i try to be non-judgmental, so maybe that comes through in my music.

kyla leblancPhoto: courtesy of west olson

new range of sounds — electronic mu-sic emanating from England. “I guess the first electronic bands I listened to were New Order and Depeche Mode,” she says with a laugh. “Then I started dating this DJ from the U.K. who had an amazing record collection. That was my introduction to drum and bass and jungle, and it became a huge passion. I wanted to get to England but it never happened.” Eventually, she began re-learning how to play her violin by jam-ming with punk and metal bands. In 2002 she released her first solo album, Conflation, which featured a slew of hip hop producers and established her as a restless innovator. Then, four years later, she helped found Delhi 2 Dublin, a fiery party band whose fusion of Celtic and Bhangra sounds has won fans and acclaim across the country and around the world.

“It wasn’t like, ‘A-ha! This is what I’m going to do!” she says of her desire to explore electronic music with her

violin. “I didn’t know anyone else who had done it or was doing it; it just sort of happened over time. Part of my style, my personal style, is that I try to be non-judgmental, so maybe that comes through in my music.” These ideas are embedded in Kytami, which derives its strength not from the ten-sion between the relentless pulse of the electronic rhythms and the blistering snarl of her violin, but from her un-canny ability to fuse them together.

Most of the album was written and recorded in Toronto. LeBlanc chose to travel across the country because she wanted to work with producer Steven Mek, who shares her view of a world where music is a truly universal language. “When it came time to do the album we’d been working together on and off for years,” she explains. “I knew he understood my sound, what kind of sounds I wanted coming out of my violin. And we have a lot of similar influences.” The pair spent long days

working in Mek’s studio. Some songs grew out of simple violin melodies LeBlanc had preserved on tape, others from Mek’s bass-heavy electronic arrangements. “It was really collab-orative, and yet he gave me a lot of freedom to experiment and try things out,” she recalls. “We also had a lot of ideas we’d been sitting on for years, so we resurrected those and turned them into songs.”

Kytami opens with the sprawling and evocative “2 Lions,” a pastiche that mimics the depth and movement of a symphony while demonstrating that stately violin melodies can be fused with pulsating electronic grooves. “2 Lions” sets the tone for the album, which casts LeBlanc’s fiery violin playing against a bed of luscious elec-tronic sounds. “Safehouse Anthem” is a spacey synthesis, a fusion of menacing keyboard sounds, sparse violin, and vocals by Vancouver-based dub singer OSC. “Stay,” on the other hand, is a

song for the morning after, a languor-ous melody cast against delayed and distorted vocals by Josh MacDonald.

The most unusual song on the record is “Unity” which drops the melody from Johann Pachelbel’s famous “Canon in D” into an interna-tionalist anthem featuring vocals by a trio of LeBlanc’s close friends and collaborators. The song began as a tongue-in-cheek ode to Pachelbel’s “Canon,” which has been played to the point of meaninglessness by a wedding-obsessed society, before evolving into something else entirely. “I work so much with men,” LeBlanc explains. “It’s constant. So I wanted to do a track with all my girls who I work with and think are really talented.” Recorded in two sessions, one in Vancouver and one in Toronto, “Unity” emerged as LeBlanc’s attempt to transcend time and distance. “I had this idea of an east meets west type of thing,” she says. “It started with a beat,

but it actually turned into something much more serious.”

The strongest song on the record, and the one which best captures the essence of LeBlanc’s musical vision, is “Lotus Land,” which feels jagged and raw after the glassy perfection of the previous nine songs. An eight-minute romp through unexplored sonic terri-tory, “Lotus Land” shifts the focus from melody to emotion. It also gives a rare insight into LeBlanc’s creative process. “We’d sit together, I’d add some violin, we’d work on arrangements, we’d work on adding sounds,” she says of her collaboration with Mek. “[‘Lotus Land’] is just a jam we did. We got re-ally stoned and we were just jamming out. He was playing his keys and I was going through this Zoom multi-effects unit, just experimenting with sounds. It’s fun to run my violin through effects units and just find my own sounds. It was a cool moment in time, and that’s how it ended up on the album.”

And while “Lotus Land” might sound listless and meandering to some, it captures not only LeBlanc’s fascina-tion with new sounds, but also her innate sense of pace — the song builds a series of related ideas without ever finding resolution. Ultimately, the final moments of Kytami leave the listener wondering what LeBlanc will come up with next. And that is exactly what she wants. “Learning how to master your instrument is just the beginning,” she says with a laugh. “There’s so much more out there.”

Kytami august 4 @ connect fest 18$130+ @ connectfestival.ca

@verbRegina

[email protected]



12July 26 – aug 1

food + drink

a

Photos courtesy of maxton Priebe

s I marveled at the slim, shiny jars of dark red pickled cher-

ries with their elegant black and white labels, Chef David Straub, clad in a red apron and hair net, cleaned out pig intestines for sausage casings in the exposed, open concept kitchen as casually as if he was washing a couple of spoons in the sink.

He explained to me that at Salt Food Boutique they don’t use any filler and that they are dedicated to using old world techniques, such

as taking the time to crank all the meat by hand. Everything is made in-house from scratch, and they try to source the meat as locally as possible.

And there is definitely a lot of meat. Gourmet hot dogs, garlic herb sausage, pastrami, steelhead trout lox, Mexican-style fresh chorizo and bratwurst fill the coolers along with Salt staples such as the Salt Spicy and Salt Original sausages.

“We want to focus on really neat products for you to take home and make a charcuterie plate,” said

co-owner Jackie van Schie with infectious passion.

Salt’s four owners are also the owners of Flip Eatery & Drink, and Straub is the chef there as well. The shop was born to fill Regina’s char-cuterie void, but it was also a natural extension of the stuff they were already doing at Flip, such as the pastrami, which is a menu mainstay.

“We wanted to retail our products from Flip, so it grew from there,” said van Schie.

The shop, which lives up to its boutique name with clean wood counters, neat shelves, and cute jars with high-end looking labels, has provided the opportunity to feature many different kinds of products.

The shelves are full of golden pickled beets, Himalayan salt blends, salad dressings, spicy tar-ragon mustard, and mix and match marinades. A large dry-curing cooler with a countdown announc-ing timelines such as “350 days until prosciutto” and “8 days until dry-cured sausage” decorates the back of the shop.

Every morning, the team pre-pares a baguette for customers to

take-out and there is always a fea-ture sausage, a salad and a spread. When I was there the sausage was ginger beef cranberry sage, and the spread was an enticing olive and mushroom tapenade.

After much marveling, I tried the porchetta di testa or pig’s head, which was thick and fatty with a smooth, slightly rubbery texture. Next I had the thinly sliced pastra-mi, which was melt-in-your-mouth amazing, the salty rosemary Dijon ham and the delicate steelhead trout lox, which was very similar to smoked salmon.

After all that, I couldn’t help but buy the caramel popcorn with sea salt and chilies, which was prob-

ably one of the best decisions I had made all day.

If a city’s evolving culture can be measured by the proliferation of in-teresting and delicious food shops, then Salt is helping place Regina on the foodie map.

salt food boutique 160-2002 Victoria avenue | 306-206-1720

FEEding FoodiE cultuRE

lEt’s go dRinkin’ vERB’s mixology guidE

Flip caEsaR

Flip Eatery & Drink has a pretty amazing take on our good friend, the Caesar.

ingREdiEnts

tequilahouse-made clamato pickled hot pepperbeef jerky garnish

diREctions

Build like a standard Caesar. Or better yet, head over to Flip and have them do it for you.

salt food boutique is regina’s first charcuterie, and it’s full of delicious things you won’t find anywhere else. by Victoria abraham

@verbRegina

[email protected]


@Verbregina culturecontents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

13July 26 – aug 1

music

Photos courtesy of: mark somay / the artist / the artist

Coming upnext Week

walk oFF thE EaRth

Let’s take a trip back in time, back to last year. Do you remember the song that was burning up the airwaves — “Somebody That I Used to Know” by Gotye? Right. If you’ve heard of that song, chances are you’ve heard of Burlington’s Walk Off the Earth too. Why? Well, because they became a YouTube sensation when the five members of the band covered that Gotye song while all simultane-ously playing the same guitar. But Walk Off the Earth isn’t simply a cover band. They’re an innovative, multi-talented five-piece that makes highly original songs and videos. They’ll be playing the Queen City Ex before heading south of the border to enter-tain America. Tickets at the gate.

@ queen city ex wednesday, July 31 – free with gate

admission during queen city ex

It all started with a group of friends in Barrie, Ontario. At first they got together and jammed. They worked on their sound and eventually began playing really small local shows under the name, Behold! The City. That was in 2010. Since then, things have really sped up for this Barrie-based metal trio. With a lot of hard work and dedication they have evolved into an in-demand touring band. Not just in Ontario, but all over. In fact, this year alone they’ve been booked for several cross-continent tours. Featuring Justin Cox, Igor Efimov, and David Tennier, Behold! The City uses a vivid stage show and consummate musicianship to sing about things that matter to them — hope, passion and God’s love.

BEhold! thE city

It all started with a phone call. A few years back, Canadian bluesman Jim Byrnes called Marcus Mosely, a gospel singer from Vancouver, trying to get some back-up singers for a new album he had in mind. Mosely called his pals Will Sanders and Khari Mc-Clelland and the rest, they say, is his-tory. They formed an instant musical bond and, after their work with Byrnes, the trio formed a new band called The Sojourners. In 2007, the trio recorded their first album, Hold On, and they’ve been going strong ever since. Their music — gospel-infused with a mix of R&B, doo wop, country and blues — is a throwback that grabs hold of the audience right from the beginning. They’ll be in Queen City in October.

– by adam hawboldt

thE soJouRnERs

@ the club (@ the exchange)friday, august 2 – $tbd

sask music pREviEwThe SaskMusic CCMA Country Music Week Travel Bursary is a program that pro-vides financial support to music industry professionals to assist in travel, accom-modation and other related expenses incurred in their professional activities at the CCMAs. Funds are provided by the Saskatoon Country Music Week 2012 Host Committee. This is a first-come, first-served program; the application deadline is August 15, 2013. Please see www.saskmusic.org/index.php?p=Travel%20Bursa-ries for more information.

keep up with saskatchewan music. saskmusic.org

artesian on 13thmonday, october 7 – $19 (adVance),

$25 (door)

Verbnews.comentertainment contents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

14July 26 – aug 1

listingslistings

The most complete live music listings for Regina.

July 26 » august 3

26 27

2 331 129 3028

s m t w t

Have a live show you'd like to promote? Let us know!

gEt listEd

[email protected]

FRiday 26Yana and her band / Artful Dodger —

With Anna Ray Bagdasarian, Tara Dawn

Solheim and Jon Davis. 8:30pm / $7

FPg, soiled doves, no blood, no Foul / The Club — Hardcore, punk and

more. 7:30pm / Cover TBD

the MilkMan’s sons / Creekside

Pub and Brewery — Covering rocking

songs from the 50s up to today. 8pm /

No cover

dJ Juan loPez / Envy Nightclub —

This DJ loves requests, nothing is off

limits. 10pm / $5

u.v. Paint PartY / The Exchange —

Featuring DJ Izn and Neuf. 9pm / $20

dJ Pat & dJ kiM / Habano’s Martini &

Cocktail Club — Local DJs spin top 40

hits every Friday night at this popular

Regina hotspot. These two are sure to get

you on the dance floor. 9pm / $5 cover

big chill FridaYs / Lancaster Tap-

house — Come out and get your week-

end started with DJ Fatbot, who’ll be

doing his spinning thing every Friday

night. 10pm / Cover TBD

Men Without shaMe / McNally’s

Tavern — A guitar-driven classic rock

band. 10pm / $5

Marc labossiere / Pump Roadhouse

— A must-see singer/songwriter from

Winnipeg. 9pm / Cover TBD

Whatever / The Sip Night-

club — Playing covers

you’ll rock along

to. 9pm / Cover

TBD

dJ long-horn / Whiskey

Saloon

— Come

check out

one of Re-

gina’s most

interactive

DJs as he drops

some of the best

country beats around.

It’s time to get this party

started! 8pm / Cover TBD

alex runions / Whiskey Saloon — A

little country loving coming at ya from

Kipling, Saskatchewan. Runions will

have you moving your feet! 10pm / $10

satuRday 27iron kingdoM, itchY stitches, naraka, oblivion’s eYe / The Club — A

wicked night of awesome metal. 9pm / $10


This DJ loves requests. 10pm / $5

Men Without shaMe / McNally’s

Tavern — A guitar-driven classic rock

band. 10pm / $5

Marc labossiere / Pump — A must-

see singer/songwriter from

Winnipeg. 9pm Whatever / The

Sip Nightclub

— Playing

covers you’ll

rock along

to. 9pm /

Cover TBD

alex runions

/ Whiskey

Saloon — A

little country

loving coming

at ya from Kipling,

Saskatchewan. Run-

ions will have you moving

your feet! 10pm / $10

sunday 28buFFalo narroWs, dead south / Bluegrass, roots, revival rock and more!

8pm / Cover TBD

monday 29oPen Mic night / The Artful Dodger —

Come down and jam! 8pm / No cover

MondaY night Jazz & blues / Bush-

wakker Brewpub — Featuring Uptown

Jazz. 9pm / No cover

len gadica / Casino Regina — Come

out for an old-time dance party. 7pm /

$10 (www.casinoregina.com)

tuEsday 30creedence clearWater revisited / Casino Regina — Featuring the rhythm

section from the real CCR. 8pm / $60+

(www.casinoregina.com)

Five alarM Funk / O’Hanlon’s — Van-

couver’s party funk orchestra. 10pm /

No cover

wEdnEsday 31WednesdaY night Folk / Bushwakker

Brewpub — Featuring Buffalo Narrows.

9pm / No cover

JaM night and oPen stage / McNal-

ly’s Tavern — Come on down and enjoy

some local talent. 9pm / No cover

Walk oFF the earth / Queen City Ex

— An unconventional, multi-talented

five-piece from Ontario. Free with QEX

gate admission

thuRsday 12 beats & a hat / Artful Dodger —

Presented by DJ Verbal & E-Major, come

enjoy two DJs with guest performances

the first Thursday of every month. 7pm

/ $5 in advance or at the door

druMhand / Creative City Centre —

World music done right. 7:30pm / $10

decibel FrequencY / Gabbo’s Night-

club — A night of electronic fun. 10pm

/ Cover $5

Ps Fresh / The Hookah Lounge — DJ

Ageless started spinning in Montreal,

DJ Drewski started in Saskatoon. They

both landed in Regina and have come

together to sling some bomb beats. 7pm

/ No cover

oPen Mic night / King’s Head Tavern

— Come out, play some tunes, sing

some songs, and show Regina what you

got. 8pm / No cover

d’PlaYground / Pump Roadhouse —

Playing rock and classic rock covers.

9pm / Cover TBD

three daYs grace / Queen City Ex —

A popular alt-rock band from Toronto.

Free with QEX gate admission

dJ longhorn / Whiskey Saloon —

Come check out one of Regina’s most

interactive DJs as he drops some of the

best country beats around. 8pm /

Cover TBD

FRiday 2the dead south / Casino Regina Sum-

mer Stage — Rocking out at the F.W. Hill

Mall on your lunch break. 12pm / Free

stand Your ground, behold the citY, once in a liFetiMe / The Club

— Hardcore and metalcore all night.

7:30pm / Cover TBD



limits. 10pm / $5

dJ Pat & dJ kiM / Habano’s Martini

& Cocktail Club — Local DJs spin top

40 hits every Friday night that are

sure to get you on the dance floor. 9pm

/ $5 cover

big chill FridaYs / Lancaster Taphouse

— Come out and get your weekend

started with DJ Fatbot, who’ll be doing

his spinning thing every Friday night.

10pm / Cover TBD

tequila Mockingbird / McNally’s

Tavern — Classic rock covers and party

tunes.10pm / $5



9pm / Cover TBD

loverboY / Queen City Ex — Multi-

platinum selling rockers from Calgary.


dJ longhorn / Whiskey Saloon —

Come check out one of Regina’s most

interactive DJs as he drops some of the

best country beats around. 8pm /

Cover TBD

satuRday 3dJ Juan loPez / Envy Nightclub —


limits. 10pm / $5

break doWn PartY band / Mc-

Nally’s Tavern — Classic rock ‘n roll

favourites.10pm / $5



9pm / Cover TBD

siMPle Plan / Queen City Ex —

French-Canadian pop punk rockers.


iRon kingdomcouRtEsy oF cassiE dEvanEy

/Verbregina entertainmentcontents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

15July 26 – aug 1

Photography by Bebzphoto

FRiday, July 19 @

whiskEy saloonThe Whiskey Saloon1047 Park Street(306) 570 8333

Music vibe / 100% countrydrink oF choice / Rum + CokecoMing uP / Alex Runions July 26 + 27, DJ Longhorn Aug 1-3, Tim Romanson Aug 8-10, Alex Runions Aug 15-17, and the Cory Brown Band Aug 23-25

nightlifenightlife

check out our Facebook Page! These photos will be uploaded to

Facebook on Friday, August 2.

facebook.com/verbregina


16July 26 – aug 1

spectre of death hangs over The Wolverine movie. Just lingers

there, like a pitch-black cloud.And that’s not a sideways pre-

diction about how the new X-Men spin-off movie may do at the box of-fice. Nah, it’s a comment on the actual movie itself. For those of you unfamil-iar with Wolverine (aka Logan), he’s a comic book mutant with adamantium claws, an adamantium skeleton, and the uncanny ability of self-healing. Meaning, the dude is nearly impossible to kill. And that’s an issue for Wolver-ine (Hugh Jackman) in this movie. You see, being basically unable to die has its drawbacks. You can live through darn near everything, sure. But it also means (especially when you’re in the superhero racket) that people close to you (people who can be killed much more easily) will eventually die.

For Wolverine, that person was his lover, Jean Grey (Famke Janssen).

When we first meet Wolverine in this film, he’s living off the land in northern Canada, alone with himself and his thoughts — thoughts of his own death. See, Logan/Wolverine has had it. He doesn’t want to go on living.

He wants to join Jean Grey in the great hereafter. But how do you kill yourself if you’re basically indestructible?

One day a Japanese assassin (Rila Fukushima) comes along and gives him the answer. Well, actually, she invites Wolverine to come back to Japan with her to reunite with a soldier he saved during the Second

World War. But when Wolverine arrives in Tokyo, still wrestling with his inner demons, he soon real-izes this isn’t just a simple reunion. The soldier he saved, Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi), is now old and dying,

and he wants to repay Wolverine for saving his life way back when.

How do you repay someone who saved your life? Well, if that guy is Wolverine you give him the one thing he wants more than anything: death.

To do this, Yashida proposes to transfer Wolverine’s mutant powers into himself so he can continue living.

There’s more to The Wolverine than just this simple plot line. There’s a romance with a damsel in distress (Tao Okamoto), a run-in with a bad villain named Viper (Svetlana Khodchen-kova), and a bunch of action-filled set pieces that will give summer block-buster fans something to talk about.

But The Wolverine isn’t really a summer blockbuster. Instead of going the route of other comic book movies (read: The Avengers, Superman, etc.), director James Mangold (Walk the Line, 3:10 to Yuma) opts for a more serious tone, a more character-driven story. That means a lot more inner turmoil, a lot less explosions.

And you know what? Kind of like Iron Man 3, the character study of this superhero works. The story unfolds like a noirish version of Shane or The Outlaw Josey Wales.

That’s not to say The Wolverine is perfect. It shoots for a classi-cally styled serious tone, but comes

undone near the end and winds up more blockbuster than serious flick. But, for the most part, it’s a pretty good addition to the comic-book-turned-movie genre.

Much better than, say, X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

film

a

kind of like Iron Man 3, the character study of this superhero works.

adam hawboldt

thE wolvERinE

diREctEd By James Mangold

staRRing Hugh Jackman,

Famke Janssen, Hal Yamanouchi

+ Rila Fukushima

136 minutEs | 14a


@verbRegina

[email protected]

Photo: courtesy of 20th century fox

dEath comEs knockingThe Wolverine is a character-driven superhero movie worth watching by adam hawboldt

@Verbregina entertainmentcontents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

17July 26 – aug 1

Photo: courtesy of sony Pictures classics

Fill thE void

diREctEd By Rama Burshtein

staRRing Hadas Yaron, Irit Sheleg

+ Yiftach Klein

90 minutEs | g

Fill the Void brings the audience into an insular, mysterious community by adam hawboldt

w


@verbRegina

[email protected]

hat do you know about Haredi Judaism?

Before watching Rama Burshtein’s film Fill the Void, I didn’t know much. My knowledge of Haredism ran some-thing like this: it’s the most conserva-tive form of Orthodox Judaism; due to a high birth rate the Haredi popula-tion grows rather quickly; they live their lives according to halacha (Jew-ish law); and the men have beards,

dress in dark suits, and wear wide-brimmed hats. Yep. That’s about it.

But after watching Fill the Void all that changed. Now it feels like I have intimate knowledge of Haredi Judaism. That’s because Burshtein pulls back the curtain and invites the viewer inside this insular, tight-knit community for an intimate look.

The result is astonishing. Whereas most films of this nature tend to lend themselves to cliché and stereotype, Burshtein’s does nothing of the sort. Instead, it paints a vivid picture of a cloistered (sometimes claustropho-bic) community and the people who inhabit it.

Set in Israel, the story begins with 18-year-old Shira (Hadas

Yaron), who is on the hunt for a husband. Okay, maybe hunt is the wrong word. See, in the Haredi com-munity marriages are arranged and, being of the marrying age, Shira has received many proposals. She and her mother (Irit Sheleg) sift through them to find a suitable husband.

Shira is excited, like many young women about to be married. But she isn’t foolish. She wants to at least see her future beau before she accepts his

proposal. So she and her mother hit the streets (and supermarket) to check out her suitors.

This part of the movie plays out like a playful comedy, something straight out of a Jane Austen book.

But then the film gets turned on its head. Shira’s sister dies in child-birth and the family is thrown into mourning. Amidst all this, her sister’s husband, Yochay (Yiftach Klein) contemplates moving abroad. Shira’s mother doesn’t want her grandson to be away from the community, so she begins to pressure Shira into marrying Yochay. Which, according to Deuteronomy, is totally kosher.

There’s a mutual attraction between Yochay and Shira, but Shira

remains weary. Should she follow her heart and marry who she wants? Should she give in to familial pressure and fill the void left by her sister’s death? Should she get married at all?

To find out, you’ll have to watch Fill the Void. And trust me, it’s well worth a watch. It may not be a perfect film — the plot is sometimes disjoint-ed and, at times, the melodrama is so thick you can bite it — but it’s still one heckuva foreign film. Mainly because Burshtein (who is ultra-Orthodox) uses beautiful camera angles, tight shots on faces and exquisite lighting to bring her world to life.

Oh, and the acting is excellent, too. With a lot of close-ups, the actors opt for gestures and facial expressions to take the place of words — and it works. It really works.

Much like the movie itself.Fill the Void will open at the Regina

Public Library on August 1; see regi-nalibrary.ca for more information.

…Burshtein…useses beautiful camera angles…to bring her world to life.

adam hawboldt

an insidER’s viEw


18July 26 – aug 1

© Elaine m. will | blog.E2w-illustration.com | check onthebus.webcomic.ws/ for previous editions!

comics

/Verbregina entertainmentcontents local editorial comments q + a arts feature food + drink music listings nightlife film comics timeout

19July 26 – aug 1

timeout

hoRoscopEs July 26 – august 1

© waltER d. FEEnER 2013

cRosswoRd answER kEy

acRoss 1. United group

of countries

5. Medieval farmworker

9. Plant life

10. Be of use to

12. Mason’s tool

13. Game played

with racquets

15. Billions of years

16. Garland of flowers

18. Acrobatic plunge

19. Furthermore

20. Relating to the pope

22. Start of a countdown

23. Take the helm

25. One with homework

27. Mediterranean resort

29. Pertaining to heat

32. Just as one would wish

36. Craving

37. Like new parents

39. Zodiac sign

40. A way for walking

42. Hotel in the country

43. Draped garment

44. Golden-yellow bird

46. Dessert apple

48. Freshwater fish

49. Remove all traces of

50. Nervously anxious

51. Unit of heredity

down 1. Fair-haired

2. Depressions

3. Naturally occurring

mineral

4. Arum lily

5. Satisfy a hunger

6. Day before

7. Strip of shoe leather

8. Limited

9. Part that faces forward

11. Cheer up

12. Beverages served

hot or iced

14. Put in the mail

17. Letter after delta

20. Groom oneself with

elaborate care

21. Gruesome

24. To do wrong

26. Family man

28. Number of

different kinds

29. Printed mistake

30. Valentine symbol

31. With no part left out

33. Slip away

34. Nest built on a cliff

35. Cut of meat

38. Open, in a way

41. Part of a parka

43. Bridge section

45. Carry with difficulty

47. Furious feeling

timeout

cRosswoRd Canadian Criss-Cross sudoku answER kEy

a

b

8 5 2 3 1 4 7 6 99 1 3 7 6 2 4 8 57 4 6 5 8 9 1 3 24 8 9 1 3 6 5 2 75 3 7 2 4 8 6 9 12 6 1 9 7 5 3 4 81 7 8 6 2 3 9 5 43 9 4 8 5 1 2 7 66 2 5 4 9 7 8 1 3

2 8 3 4 7 5 1 6 96 9 1 2 8 3 5 7 44 5 7 1 9 6 8 3 28 1 2 6 4 9 3 5 79 4 5 3 1 7 2 8 63 7 6 8 5 2 9 4 11 6 8 9 3 4 7 2 57 3 4 5 2 1 6 9 85 2 9 7 6 8 4 1 3

sudokua b 5 2 4 7

3 2 8 5 4 5 8 1 4 9 3 7 2 4 6 12 1 9 8 7 8 6 3 5 9 66 9 7 1 3

2 3 5 1 6 9 8 3 4 6 3 2 2 7 4 5 3 1 8 7 8 5 9 11 6 9 7 4 2 6 9 5 7 8 4

aRiEs march 21–april 19

You may lose your sense of self

this week, and feel like a stranger

in your own skin. Don’t worry, Aries. It’s a

passing phase.

tauRus april 20–may 20

You have been following a path

towards your goals that seems like it

will never end. Keep walking — just around

the next bend lies something amazing.

gEmini may 21–June 20

You are beautiful on the inside

and out, Gemini. Never forget

that. Not even if someone next week

thinks otherwise.

cancER June 21–July 22

You may be feeling a tad restless

in the upcoming days, Cancer.

Don’t just sit around complaining. Do

something about it!

lEo July 23–august 22

There could be travel in your near

future, Leo. Prepare for a great ad-

venture that will carry you through the rest

of the summer with a smile on your face.

viRgo august 23–september 22

A good tip to remember, Virgo:

when speaking of others, be sure

to speak well. Especially during the next

week or so.

liBRa september 23–october 23

Alone time. It may not be your

favourite thing, Libra, but you are

damn well going to need it in the next

few days.

scoRpio october 24–november 22

You know that old saying, “never

judge a book by its cover?” Well,

that applies to you this week, Scorpio.

Judge not, lest ye want to look like a fool.

sagittaRius november 23–december 21

Sometimes you have the urge to

try to fit square pegs into round

holes, Sagittarius. Try to fight that urge

this week, and go with the flow.

capRicoRn december 22–January 19

The old ways aren’t working that

great, so it’s on you to find a new

approach, Capricorn. Be creative — this

could reap untold rewards!

aQuaRius January 20–february 19

You may be forced make a mas-

sive decision this week, Aquarius.

Be bold, and mighty forces may come to

your aid. Or not.

piscEs february 20–march 20

Easy things may seem complicated

this week, like cooking dinner or

driving an automatic car. Don’t force it, Pi-

sces. You’ll get the hang of things eventually.

Verbnews.com

Verb Issue R88 (July 26-Aug. 1, 2013)

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Transcript of Verb Issue R88 (July 26-Aug. 1, 2013)