HubArts.com

Hear O'Malley talk about *that* scene

You may remember our rave for Boston comedian Mike O'Malley's performance on "Glee" last week, as the blue-collar dad defending his gay son. Callie Crossley interviewed O'Malley yesterday on her WGBH FM 89.7 "Callie Crossley Show," in advance of last night's "Glee" season finale. It's worth a listen, not just because she quotes us to him, twice! Not sure why they use a video player, but oh well. The fun starts at about 42:00.

We'll get to the book in a moment. The new Pernice Brothers CD, "Goodbye, Killer" drops June 15 and it's another gorgeous set of melodic rock and pop. Sunny on the surface, mordant underneath, always erudite: it's impossible to mistake Joe Pernice's voice and lyrics for anyone else's. When was the last time you heard an album that namechecks Ford Madox Ford and Leni Riefenstahl? My favorites are the jaunty title track and chiming rockers "Something For You" and "Fucking and Flowers." The anthemic "The Great Depression" is irresistibly catchy, although it's either about an actual depression or the worst girlfriend ever.

Once in a while Pernice gets too cute by half - a spoiled "Bechamel" as romantic metaphor - but that's kind of a trademark, actually. You have to go too far regularly to get to a classic like, "I'd kiss your ass to kiss your ass again" (in the twangy, broken-hearted "Newport News"). Pernice sings the same way - occasionally there's a falsetto note he can't quite hold, as on the refrains in "The Great Depression," but somehow that too makes it all work.

My previous favorite Pernice disc was "Discover A Lovelier You," which for all its varied sounds seemed to be of a single dreamy mood. "Goodbye, Killer" reminds me more of "Revolver," which I've also been listening to a lot since I got the Beatles box - a collection of disparate songs held together by the voices and guitar sounds. Love the guitar work all over the place by Pernice and  James Walbourne (also of the Pretenders), especially the electrics on the throbbing "Jacqueline Susann" and the slide on the title track, which sounds like it dropped off a Rod Stewart album circa "Gasoline Alley."

(Photo: Pernice, center, with bandmates Ric Menck and Walbourne. Not shown: Bob Pernice, known as "Other Pernice." Pic by Mike Ritter.)

Referencing other artists is a rock critic's crutch of course. But Pernice keeps reminding me of Elvis Costello, and not just because of the glasses and (sometimes) beard, or the way he can go from the new wave of "Jacqueline Susann" to the bucolic country of "We Love The Stage." It's the way he produces pretty sounds that seem to curdle when you hear what he's actually saying. Like Costello, Pernice seems to enjoy coming off as a misanthrope. And like Costello, you get the sense that all the bristly wordplay is a romantic's defense mechanism, and once or twice an album the armor drops. Anyone who protests so eloquently that he's not "The Loving Kind" probably doth protest too much.

But then again.

Let us now consider "Pernice To Me," the paperback released simultaneously with the CD.

The slim volume comes from Ashmont Books, the publishing arm of Dorchester's Ashmont Records, both of which are basically Pernice and the one-woman conglomerate known as Boston publicist Joyce Linehan, who also serves as Pernice's manager. "Pernice To Me" - which I and other Linehan fans have been demanding for many months - recounts the communications between the pair, documented over time by Linehan via the @ashmont twitter account. They share the author credit.

Example:"Pernice to Me: We're touring in YOUR car? All I can say is, that piece-of-shit lezmobile better not break down. And I'm driving." (A footnote in the book explains that Linehan does drive a Subaru, although she is not a lesbian.)

No less an authority than critic Robert Christgau says that the book is a kind of music journalism, offering "little glimpses into the highly unglamorous life of an indie-rock lifer." Christgau seems to think it's the life that's given Pernice the nasty mouth. I don't know Pernice, but I have to figure it's part performance, a way of amusing himself via the caricature of an infantile, egomaniacal, misogynistic, utterly self-centered artist. Because if it was all for real, Linehan would have (justifiably) killed him by now.

"Pernice to me: People keep saying I'm a curmudgeon. It's like you invented this character. Tweet that."

It's a hilarious postmodern Punch and Judy act. And give Linehan credit: the twitter stream preceded @shitmydadsays by months, and that's now going to be a sitcom starring William Shatner as dad. What delicious irony it would be if Pernice's indie-rock life was glammed up by a "Shit My Rock Star Says" sitcom based on "Pernice to Me." Maybe if Costello isn't too busy with his talk show...

OK, two Lady Gaga-related items in a row is at least one too many, I know. But...

Mike O'Malley (left) is a Boston native and a huge Sox fan - he emcees things like the Hot Stove, Cool Music concerts - so this is HubArts-related. The guy deserves a shout-out for one great scene last night in "Glee's" Lady Gaga-centric episode "Theatricality," so we're going to give it to him.

Fox's "Glee" is a fun show, though I get tired of its relentless fabulousness - everyone is always having a moment, and the high-school kids' let's-put-on-a-show inspirations keep turning into these giant, Oscar-night-worthy production spectaculars. But Jane Lynch as psycho cheerleading coach Sue Sylvester is pretty much a must-see, and the actors who play the kids are mostly very good. It's hard not to root for Chris Colfer, who plays the just-out-of-the-closet Kurt; not long ago Colfer was a gay high school kid getting a hard time from his peers, and now he plays one on TV, with flair. That's him below, in full Gaga getup.

O'Malley plays Burt, Kurt's father, a blue-collar widower who accepts who his kid is, but isn't always perfect. In a recent episode, Kurt was hurt when Burt (sorry) showed up unexpectedly at school - but only to take Finn to a ballgame. Finn, played by Cory Monteith (bottom left), is emphatically straight, a big jock who's trying to be a better dude since he accepted his own singing and dancing side and joined the Glee gang. Lately Burt has started dating Finn's widowed mom, and Burt was trying to bond with Finn, but also maybe just a little too glad to have a jocky kid to take to ballgames and such. You following?

So last night, it turns out that the thing between the parents is serious - they're moving in together. And Finn is not cool with it. Not cool with mom knocking boots with Burt? Maybe. Not cool with the idea of bunking in with Kurt? Definitely. So Kurt, who has a crush on Finn, tries to make him comfortable by re-decorating their basement quarters...like a Morroccan harem from the 30s. Or something. I mean...whew. And Finn finally loses it.

Now this is where a less well-written show would have him learning some easy lesson about tolerance, or maybe admitting it's just the mom thing. But, uh, no. He comes right out with it. He knows why Kurt is excited about him moving in, and he calls him on it. "You think I don't see the way you stare at me?" he says. It's a supremely uncomfortable moment, and Kurt crumbles, eyes welling up, exposed and humiliated. But Finn is freaked too, probably for a combination of reasons, including the fact that being a better dude isn't easy. And he starts raging against the "faggy" decor.

And that's where O'Malley comes in. Hearing the F word shouted, Burt enters, infuriated but in control, and blisters Finn's ears with a speech about why the word is wrong, and how he used to say it himself the same way Finn says it, and he knows what it means, and he's not going to hear it spoken to his son that way. And Finn is entitled to believe what he wants out in the world, but not in Burt's house. And Finn can't answer, he leaves without a word. It's less than a minute of acting by O'Malley, but it's terrific. It looks like authentic living, a guy who has crossed a line and isn't going back behind it.

Of course "Glee" always has to go over the top, so the writers fuck it up with a scene at the end where Finn dons  major Gaga drag himself and sides with Kurt against some other jock bullies. It's way too on-the-nose, too much a moment, and totally "Glee." But in that basement scene, all three guys did some real acting, especially O'Malley. After that it was just a matter of mopping up and giving "Glee" loyalists their weekly tear duct hose-out.

O'Malley was funny in a gonzo supporting bit on "My Name Is Earl," and his laconic line delivery was the only thing worth saving in the terrible sitcom "Yes, Dear," which somehow ran for five season. His own show lasted a whole two episodes back in 1999. He's been very good as Burt, in what's really a straight acting role, and he just killed it last night in the most dramatic scene I've ever seen on "Glee."

You can watch the episode here (after the ad), and if you just want to see the scene in question, fast-forward to 25:17.

This blog will now resume not thinking about Lady Gaga at all.#

Monty Burns did it, of course! I can't believe no one else has reported it, but "The Simpsons" solved the 20-year-old Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery. In Sunday's episode, called "American History X-cellent," Homer, Carl and Lenny were loudly partying down in billionaire misanthrope Burns' mansion - long story - and Burns called the cops. But when Springfield's finest arrived, one of them looked at a painting on the mansion wall and recognized it as Vermeer's "The Concert" (right), stolen from the Gardner in March 1990 along with a dozen other works, several of them masterpieces, none of which have ever been found.With very unusual perception for the dimwitted cop, Chief Wiggum asked Burns how he came to possess "this miracle of measure and harmony." Burns contemptuously replied, "Is it a crime to want nice things and then to steal them from a public museum where any gum-chewing monkey in a Tufts University jacket can gawk at them?" Burns was arrested and imprisoned, leading to a "Green Mile" takeoff and - in another nod to the Gardner heist - Homer, Carl and Lenny posed as cops to break him out. Watch the episode here. The key clip:

If I was making up the front page today, I would have been tempted to put Alex Beam's hi-larious "radio wars" column on the front instead of the BU opera resume embarrassment. I was kind of disappointed he didn't find an opening to bring up Chris Lydon's former BUR salary, but nothing is perfect. ... Also in G is my theater column, "Theater company scripts say 'trim' and 'team up.'" I made a rookie mistake - I pitched a column idea that required eleventy-hundred phone  calls to do right. But it came out pretty good. ... Names and the Herald both do right by our local SYTYCD winner. ... Globe critic Sebastian Smee and blogger Greg Cook are still talking about localism, yokelism and other -isms. ... And Ryan has another hot tip, complete with a free listen.

You may remember her as the tall redheaded drink of water who played Cybill Shepard's teen daughter on a '90s sitcom. She's got something of a movie and TV career, including a stint as a detective on "Law & Order: Criminal Intent." But these days the Worcester native seems just as interested in her work at the piano as a singer-songwriter; you can look up her 2009 EP on iTunes. And this Friday night she'll be playing the Thanksgiving Hangover Show at Oliver's at the Cask & Flagon on Brookline Ave. The band Soap Stars follows at 8:45. Here's a taste of Witt at work:

I saw the new ad for Boston Mayor Tom Menino's reelection campaign during the Sox game last night, and I have to ask, What the hell were they thinking? If you listen to the voiceover, it touts his impact all over the city, saying he's a guy who doesn't do his business behind closed doors at City Hall. But if you look at the pictures, what you see is his empty chair and an empty desk doing nothing all over town. Menino is nowhere in sight, and to judge by the empty desk, he doesn't have anything to do, anyway. (Even the voiceover starts by telling us what he doesn't do.) I don't live in the city and don't have a stake in who wins, but this is a terrible spot. "Mad Men's" Don Draper, a genius on the emotional impact of advertising, would have laughed it out of his Sterling Cooper office before it got to storyboard. Sure, it's nicely shot, with hip angles and vaguely U2-ish background music, but a picture is still worth a thousand words, and the pictures here tell us Menino is a no-show. Just a few tweaks to the copy and it would make an excellent ad for one of his opponents. Watch:

UPDATE: Another World Music show just announced: Os Mutantes at the Somerville Theatre Oct. 4, 2009. Tickets, $28, on sale Tuesday at 10 a.m., at (617) 876-4275 or www.WorldMusic.org.

 Four new World Music shows were announced yesterday: A.A. Bondy Sept. 8 at Great Scott; Circulatory System Sept. 14 and A Hawk and A Hacksaw Sept. 18, both at the Cambridge YMCA Theatre; and Om, Oct. 12 at the ICA. Tix range from $12-$18 and go on sale next Tuesday at 10 a.m.,  at (617) 876-4275 or www.worldmusic.org. (The Bondy show is 18+.) In other news...

• Artists planning to turn out for Boston auditions for that Sarah Jessica Parker/Bravo TV reality show are being pranked.
• Bostix has 1/2-price tix for the Newport jazz fest Aug. 8-9, which we are now obligated to refer to as George Wein's Carefusion Jazz Festival 55. Under any name, $34.50 is better than $69.
• Read J.C. Lockwood on Picasso at Endicott College, on ArtThrob.

PBS got 26 nominations in yesterday's Primetime Emmys list. And WGBH wasted no time getting out a release letting us know that 16 of those nods came out of their shop. "Masterpiece" got 13 nominations, a record, including 11 for “Little Dorrit” (right) and two for “Wallander.” The “Little Dorrit”score was the most nominations ever for a single "Masterpiece" program. "American Experience" got nods for Outstanding Nonfiction Series and Outstanding Writing For Nonfiction Programming for “The Trials of J. Robert Oppenheimer.” And "Antiques Roadshow" was nominated for Outstanding Reality Program for the seventh time.

In other local news, Geoff says the BSO and its musicians have agreed on a contract extension into 2011, and links to a few examples of why no raise is a good deal at the moment.

GAH! I MESSED UP THE DATES IN THE ORIGINAL VERSION OF THIS POST. THE TWICE-POSTPONED EVENT IS NOW SET FOR THURSDAY - TOMORROW - JULY 9. CORRECTED VERSION FOLLOWS:

Due to the weather, last week the Museum of Fine Arts postponed its big outdoor karaoke party to July 8 - tonight. Well, the weatherpocalypse has intervened again. Now the MFA is moving the event to tomorrow night - Thursday, July 9 - at 6:30 p.m. in front of the MFA’s grand façade on Huntington Avenue. And now there will be a backup plan to hold the event indoors in case the weather once again intrudes.

At least it gives me another chance to run one of the deeply troubling hi-larious photos of museum staff striking vogue poses for the MFA's marketing staff camera. These two guys...it's just so wrong. Their Dunder Mifflin MFA nametags say Bill McAvoy (left) and David Blackman.

Everything else about the event should be the same as I wrote last week: "The Boston debut of 'Queen (A Portrait of Madonna)' by Candice Breitz, featuring 30 people singing to 'Vogue,' will be projected on the front of the Museum. The Museum is hoping for a big crowd to vogue and sing along. And the exhibit will be free and open till 9:45 that night. 'Queen' is part of a new exhibit, 'Contemporary Outlook: Seeing Songs,' opening at the MFA tomorrow and featuring a variety of international artists, 'explores the inspiration visual artists have derived from music' in a variety of mediums."

New Pernice CD and "Sh*t My Rock Star Says"

We'll get to the book in a moment. The new Pernice Brothers CD, "Goodbye, Killer" drops June 15 and it's another gorgeous set of melodic rock and pop. Sunny on the surface, mordant underneath, always erudite: it's impossible to mistake Joe Pernice's voice and lyrics for anyone else's. When was the last time you heard an album that namechecks Ford Madox Ford and Leni Riefenstahl? My favorites are the jaunty title track and chiming rockers "Something For You" and "Fucking and Flowers." The anthemic "The Great Depression" is irresistibly catchy, although it's either about an actual depression or the worst girlfriend ever.

Once in a while Pernice gets too cute by half - a spoiled "Bechamel" as romantic metaphor - but that's kind of a trademark, actually. You have to go too far regularly to get to a classic like, "I'd kiss your ass to kiss your ass again" (in the twangy, broken-hearted "Newport News"). Pernice sings the same way - occasionally there's a falsetto note he can't quite hold, as on the refrains in "The Great Depression," but somehow that too makes it all work.

My previous favorite Pernice disc was "Discover A Lovelier You," which for all its varied sounds seemed to be of a single dreamy mood. "Goodbye, Killer" reminds me more of "Revolver," which I've also been listening to a lot since I got the Beatles box - a collection of disparate songs held together by the voices and guitar sounds. Love the guitar work all over the place by Pernice and  James Walbourne (also of the Pretenders), especially the electrics on the throbbing "Jacqueline Susann" and the slide on the title track, which sounds like it dropped off a Rod Stewart album circa "Gasoline Alley."

(Photo: Pernice, center, with bandmates Ric Menck and Walbourne. Not shown: Bob Pernice, known as "Other Pernice." Pic by Mike Ritter.)

Referencing other artists is a rock critic's crutch of course. But Pernice keeps reminding me of Elvis Costello, and not just because of the glasses and (sometimes) beard, or the way he can go from the new wave of "Jacqueline Susann" to the bucolic country of "We Love The Stage." It's the way he produces pretty sounds that seem to curdle when you hear what he's actually saying. Like Costello, Pernice seems to enjoy coming off as a misanthrope. And like Costello, you get the sense that all the bristly wordplay is a romantic's defense mechanism, and once or twice an album the armor drops. Anyone who protests so eloquently that he's not "The Loving Kind" probably doth protest too much.

But then again.

Let us now consider "Pernice To Me," the paperback released simultaneously with the CD.

The slim volume comes from Ashmont Books, the publishing arm of Dorchester's Ashmont Records, both of which are basically Pernice and the one-woman conglomerate known as Boston publicist Joyce Linehan, who also serves as Pernice's manager. "Pernice To Me" - which I and other Linehan fans have been demanding for many months - recounts the communications between the pair, documented over time by Linehan via the @ashmont twitter account. They share the author credit.

Example:"Pernice to Me: We're touring in YOUR car? All I can say is, that piece-of-shit lezmobile better not break down. And I'm driving." (A footnote in the book explains that Linehan does drive a Subaru, although she is not a lesbian.)

No less an authority than critic Robert Christgau says that the book is a kind of music journalism, offering "little glimpses into the highly unglamorous life of an indie-rock lifer." Christgau seems to think it's the life that's given Pernice the nasty mouth. I don't know Pernice, but I have to figure it's part performance, a way of amusing himself via the caricature of an infantile, egomaniacal, misogynistic, utterly self-centered artist. Because if it was all for real, Linehan would have (justifiably) killed him by now.

"Pernice to me: People keep saying I'm a curmudgeon. It's like you invented this character. Tweet that."

It's a hilarious postmodern Punch and Judy act. And give Linehan credit: the twitter stream preceded @shitmydadsays by months, and that's now going to be a sitcom starring William Shatner as dad. What delicious irony it would be if Pernice's indie-rock life was glammed up by a "Shit My Rock Star Says" sitcom based on "Pernice to Me." Maybe if Costello isn't too busy with his talk show...

Glee, Gaga and Mike O'Malley

OK, two Lady Gaga-related items in a row is at least one too many, I know. But...

Mike O'Malley (left) is a Boston native and a huge Sox fan - he emcees things like the Hot Stove, Cool Music concerts - so this is HubArts-related. The guy deserves a shout-out for one great scene last night in "Glee's" Lady Gaga-centric episode "Theatricality," so we're going to give it to him.

Fox's "Glee" is a fun show, though I get tired of its relentless fabulousness - everyone is always having a moment, and the high-school kids' let's-put-on-a-show inspirations keep turning into these giant, Oscar-night-worthy production spectaculars. But Jane Lynch as psycho cheerleading coach Sue Sylvester is pretty much a must-see, and the actors who play the kids are mostly very good. It's hard not to root for Chris Colfer, who plays the just-out-of-the-closet Kurt; not long ago Colfer was a gay high school kid getting a hard time from his peers, and now he plays one on TV, with flair. That's him below, in full Gaga getup.

O'Malley plays Burt, Kurt's father, a blue-collar widower who accepts who his kid is, but isn't always perfect. In a recent episode, Kurt was hurt when Burt (sorry) showed up unexpectedly at school - but only to take Finn to a ballgame. Finn, played by Cory Monteith (bottom left), is emphatically straight, a big jock who's trying to be a better dude since he accepted his own singing and dancing side and joined the Glee gang. Lately Burt has started dating Finn's widowed mom, and Burt was trying to bond with Finn, but also maybe just a little too glad to have a jocky kid to take to ballgames and such. You following?

So last night, it turns out that the thing between the parents is serious - they're moving in together. And Finn is not cool with it. Not cool with mom knocking boots with Burt? Maybe. Not cool with the idea of bunking in with Kurt? Definitely. So Kurt, who has a crush on Finn, tries to make him comfortable by re-decorating their basement quarters...like a Morroccan harem from the 30s. Or something. I mean...whew. And Finn finally loses it.

Now this is where a less well-written show would have him learning some easy lesson about tolerance, or maybe admitting it's just the mom thing. But, uh, no. He comes right out with it. He knows why Kurt is excited about him moving in, and he calls him on it. "You think I don't see the way you stare at me?" he says. It's a supremely uncomfortable moment, and Kurt crumbles, eyes welling up, exposed and humiliated. But Finn is freaked too, probably for a combination of reasons, including the fact that being a better dude isn't easy. And he starts raging against the "faggy" decor.

And that's where O'Malley comes in. Hearing the F word shouted, Burt enters, infuriated but in control, and blisters Finn's ears with a speech about why the word is wrong, and how he used to say it himself the same way Finn says it, and he knows what it means, and he's not going to hear it spoken to his son that way. And Finn is entitled to believe what he wants out in the world, but not in Burt's house. And Finn can't answer, he leaves without a word. It's less than a minute of acting by O'Malley, but it's terrific. It looks like authentic living, a guy who has crossed a line and isn't going back behind it.

Of course "Glee" always has to go over the top, so the writers fuck it up with a scene at the end where Finn dons  major Gaga drag himself and sides with Kurt against some other jock bullies. It's way too on-the-nose, too much a moment, and totally "Glee." But in that basement scene, all three guys did some real acting, especially O'Malley. After that it was just a matter of mopping up and giving "Glee" loyalists their weekly tear duct hose-out.

O'Malley was funny in a gonzo supporting bit on "My Name Is Earl," and his laconic line delivery was the only thing worth saving in the terrible sitcom "Yes, Dear," which somehow ran for five season. His own show lasted a whole two episodes back in 1999. He's been very good as Burt, in what's really a straight acting role, and he just killed it last night in the most dramatic scene I've ever seen on "Glee."

You can watch the episode here (after the ad), and if you just want to see the scene in question, fast-forward to 25:17.

This blog will now resume not thinking about Lady Gaga at all.#

"Simpsons" solves Gardner robbery

Monty Burns did it, of course! I can't believe no one else has reported it, but "The Simpsons" solved the 20-year-old Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery. In Sunday's episode, called "American History X-cellent," Homer, Carl and Lenny were loudly partying down in billionaire misanthrope Burns' mansion - long story - and Burns called the cops. But when Springfield's finest arrived, one of them looked at a painting on the mansion wall and recognized it as Vermeer's "The Concert" (right), stolen from the Gardner in March 1990 along with a dozen other works, several of them masterpieces, none of which have ever been found.With very unusual perception for the dimwitted cop, Chief Wiggum asked Burns how he came to possess "this miracle of measure and harmony." Burns contemptuously replied, "Is it a crime to want nice things and then to steal them from a public museum where any gum-chewing monkey in a Tufts University jacket can gawk at them?" Burns was arrested and imprisoned, leading to a "Green Mile" takeoff and - in another nod to the Gardner heist - Homer, Carl and Lenny posed as cops to break him out. Watch the episode here. The key clip:

Morning reading: WGBH v. WBUR and more

If I was making up the front page today, I would have been tempted to put Alex Beam's hi-larious "radio wars" column on the front instead of the BU opera resume embarrassment. I was kind of disappointed he didn't find an opening to bring up Chris Lydon's former BUR salary, but nothing is perfect. ... Also in G is my theater column, "Theater company scripts say 'trim' and 'team up.'" I made a rookie mistake - I pitched a column idea that required eleventy-hundred phone  calls to do right. But it came out pretty good. ... Names and the Herald both do right by our local SYTYCD winner. ... Globe critic Sebastian Smee and blogger Greg Cook are still talking about localism, yokelism and other -isms. ... And Ryan has another hot tip, complete with a free listen.

Alicia Witt plays here on Black Friday

You may remember her as the tall redheaded drink of water who played Cybill Shepard's teen daughter on a '90s sitcom. She's got something of a movie and TV career, including a stint as a detective on "Law & Order: Criminal Intent." But these days the Worcester native seems just as interested in her work at the piano as a singer-songwriter; you can look up her 2009 EP on iTunes. And this Friday night she'll be playing the Thanksgiving Hangover Show at Oliver's at the Cask & Flagon on Brookline Ave. The band Soap Stars follows at 8:45. Here's a taste of Witt at work:

Menino ad says one thing, but empty chair says another

I saw the new ad for Boston Mayor Tom Menino's reelection campaign during the Sox game last night, and I have to ask, What the hell were they thinking? If you listen to the voiceover, it touts his impact all over the city, saying he's a guy who doesn't do his business behind closed doors at City Hall. But if you look at the pictures, what you see is his empty chair and an empty desk doing nothing all over town. Menino is nowhere in sight, and to judge by the empty desk, he doesn't have anything to do, anyway. (Even the voiceover starts by telling us what he doesn't do.) I don't live in the city and don't have a stake in who wins, but this is a terrible spot. "Mad Men's" Don Draper, a genius on the emotional impact of advertising, would have laughed it out of his Sterling Cooper office before it got to storyboard. Sure, it's nicely shot, with hip angles and vaguely U2-ish background music, but a picture is still worth a thousand words, and the pictures here tell us Menino is a no-show. Just a few tweaks to the copy and it would make an excellent ad for one of his opponents. Watch:

New World Music shows, other morning reading

UPDATE: Another World Music show just announced: Os Mutantes at the Somerville Theatre Oct. 4, 2009. Tickets, $28, on sale Tuesday at 10 a.m., at (617) 876-4275 or www.WorldMusic.org.

 Four new World Music shows were announced yesterday: A.A. Bondy Sept. 8 at Great Scott; Circulatory System Sept. 14 and A Hawk and A Hacksaw Sept. 18, both at the Cambridge YMCA Theatre; and Om, Oct. 12 at the ICA. Tix range from $12-$18 and go on sale next Tuesday at 10 a.m.,  at (617) 876-4275 or www.worldmusic.org. (The Bondy show is 18+.) In other news...

• Artists planning to turn out for Boston auditions for that Sarah Jessica Parker/Bravo TV reality show are being pranked.
• Bostix has 1/2-price tix for the Newport jazz fest Aug. 8-9, which we are now obligated to refer to as George Wein's Carefusion Jazz Festival 55. Under any name, $34.50 is better than $69.
• Read J.C. Lockwood on Picasso at Endicott College, on ArtThrob.

WGBH scores for PBS in Primetime Emmy noms

PBS got 26 nominations in yesterday's Primetime Emmys list. And WGBH wasted no time getting out a release letting us know that 16 of those nods came out of their shop. "Masterpiece" got 13 nominations, a record, including 11 for “Little Dorrit” (right) and two for “Wallander.” The “Little Dorrit”score was the most nominations ever for a single "Masterpiece" program. "American Experience" got nods for Outstanding Nonfiction Series and Outstanding Writing For Nonfiction Programming for “The Trials of J. Robert Oppenheimer.” And "Antiques Roadshow" was nominated for Outstanding Reality Program for the seventh time.

In other local news, Geoff says the BSO and its musicians have agreed on a contract extension into 2011, and links to a few examples of why no raise is a good deal at the moment.

CORRECTED: MFA karaoke reset for Thursday

GAH! I MESSED UP THE DATES IN THE ORIGINAL VERSION OF THIS POST. THE TWICE-POSTPONED EVENT IS NOW SET FOR THURSDAY - TOMORROW - JULY 9. CORRECTED VERSION FOLLOWS:

Due to the weather, last week the Museum of Fine Arts postponed its big outdoor karaoke party to July 8 - tonight. Well, the weatherpocalypse has intervened again. Now the MFA is moving the event to tomorrow night - Thursday, July 9 - at 6:30 p.m. in front of the MFA’s grand façade on Huntington Avenue. And now there will be a backup plan to hold the event indoors in case the weather once again intrudes.

At least it gives me another chance to run one of the deeply troubling hi-larious photos of museum staff striking vogue poses for the MFA's marketing staff camera. These two guys...it's just so wrong. Their Dunder Mifflin MFA nametags say Bill McAvoy (left) and David Blackman.

Everything else about the event should be the same as I wrote last week: "The Boston debut of 'Queen (A Portrait of Madonna)' by Candice Breitz, featuring 30 people singing to 'Vogue,' will be projected on the front of the Museum. The Museum is hoping for a big crowd to vogue and sing along. And the exhibit will be free and open till 9:45 that night. 'Queen' is part of a new exhibit, 'Contemporary Outlook: Seeing Songs,' opening at the MFA tomorrow and featuring a variety of international artists, 'explores the inspiration visual artists have derived from music' in a variety of mediums."