Author: Richard Oxley

Hurling expletives with flair and ease, Jack Rebney has come to be known by a number of names, including “the angriest man on earth,” and the “Winnebago Man.”

Bazil’s got a bullet in his brain, literally. With a new lease on life and a band of oddballs along for the ride, he’s going to get back at the people responsible. Micmacs may be imported from France, but it certainly hits upon a not-so-foreign nerve.

Literary nerds will spot the beatnik shout-out pretty quickly when they here the name The Subterranean Howl. The band’s core songwriter Simon Milliman is an avid reader and designed the name that way.

There is something to be said for the smaller venue when it comes to seeing a live band. And that something is that it is simply a better experience compared to that of the large venue.

It’s been a little over a year since Vice President for Finance and Administration Lindsay Desrochers swung a sledge hammer into the side of the Portland Center for Advanced Technology, signifying its demolition. Now in its place, across from the PSU Bookstore, stands the iron and concrete skeleton of the new Academic and Student Recreation Center, structurally complete after receiving its final beam on Thursday.

A few years ago, I was passed along a CD from a friend whose musical predilections I greatly respected. “Listen and thank me later,” he said. So I threw it on in my office, aka my 1985 Volkswagen Vanagon, for musical reflection and criticism. The album was The Guest by Phantom Planet, a band most well known for their song “California” or “that song from The OC.”

Hey Lover may have immigrated to Portland from Knoxville, Tenn., but to talk to the band’s large collection of local fans one would never know it. Hey Lover is comprised of husband and wife duo Justin and Terah Beth who have spent the last five years developing a sound that is brilliant in its simplicity. With a punk ethos and an enterprising spirit, the group can run the gambit from slow, noise-filled refrains to driven, indie punk ballads.

If Hillary Clinton doesn’t nab the Democratic nomination for President of the United States, and it sure looks like she won’t, she may have other opportunities as a spokesperson for Energizer Batteries. Watch out energizer bunny, Hillary Clinton may just keep going, and going and going … Clinton hasn’t shown any sign of bowing out gracefully, no matter how much damage she does to her party or the greater good.

Almost 400 years ago, French playwright Moliére wrote perhaps his most popular comedy, Les Fourberies de Scapin. It is a play revolving around the character of Scapin, who is quite the trickster. His character is manipulative, conniving and devious–all played through a witty and sarcastic persona for the audience of the 1600s. Enter modern day playwrights Mark O’Donnell and Bill Irwin. Both have spent years in theater, Irwin as a professional clown, actor, writer, producer and director. He wears many hats, which has served him well, especially when the two adapted Moliére’s play to a more modern portrayal simply entitled Scapin.

Gas prices are breaking through the roof. The price of a barrel of crude oil has doubled within a year. The resulting charge for gas is spreading through the market, from the cost of food to how people are choosing to travel. Yes, everyone’s wallet is being picked by the gas-guzzling fiend our society has propped up over the years. And to this, all I have to say is: good.

Phillip Margolin has been writing novels for 30 years. Every one of his 12 novels has been a New York Times bestseller, and with his latest novel, Executive Privilege, he may make it 13. On Thursday, May 29, Phillip Margolin will come to Portland State to give a lecture, “How to Write a Novel in Your Spare Time,” at 7 p.m. in Smith Memorial Student Union, room 238. It’s a rather appropriate topic given that Margolin wrote many of his novels while working as a full-time attorney. Margolin can recall moments in his life as they line up with the release of his novels. “The year Heartstone came out, I argued at the United States Supreme Court,” Margolin said. “And in between my first and second books, I started handling major cases, like murder cases.”