An American Kitchen In the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing, conspiracy comedy might seem a tasteless paradox. But Scott Anderson in An American Kitchen rushes boldly into the center of that oxymoron, drawing much of the play’s tense humor from our realization that terrorist violence often begins at home, with discontented U.S. citizens. Funny but not entertaining, Anderson’s ambitious experiment only partly succeeds: in this sitcom world the characters’ desperation stagnates, all their tension and energy diffused by comedy....

Jericho Theatre Works, at the Edgewater Presbyterian Church. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » This horrendously muddled drama by Donald Williams Jr. is potentially a timely offering, given current efforts to revive the fervor that installed Harold Washington as Chicago’s first black mayor. A combination of political thriller and what George C. Wolfe’s The Colored Museum satirized as the formulaic “mama on the couch play,” this work comes complete with such stereotypes as the embittered ex-radical and his sermonizing mother, sharp-tongued sister, and idealistic college-kid brother....

In its 21st annual installment, this festival is straying from the promise of its name. Cantatas and orchestral pieces by the Baroque era’s Big Daddy still dominate the festival’s four programs, and the inclusion of J.S.’s near contemporaries, both major and minor (including Biber, Scheidt, Molter, Bertali, Cesare, Biscogli, Marini, and, perhaps inevitably, Vivaldi), is probably justified. But why is Mozart on the bill? And Mendelssohn? The event’s organizers point to the precocious maestro’s historic role as the man who revived his fellow Leipziger’s reputation in 1829 with the first performance of the Saint Matthew Passion since 1750....

Emergence Dance Theatre is an anomaly in an anomalous discipline–a postmodern company that, like many these days, straddles the boundaries of performance art, time art, and dance yet does not have a liberal agenda–here art for art’s sake rules. Imagine, program notes without pedantic explanations of the philosophy, the meanings and sources, the Marcusian or Freudian discourse, and the raison d’etre of the company or its members. Their work is unabashedly beautiful too, sometimes sentimental and sweet but never cloying....

Country rockers the Cactus Brothers marked their turf by kicking off their 1993 debut with a cover of Merle Travis’s “Sixteen Tons.” Tennessee Ernie Ford’s 1955 version of the song was an exercise in finger snapping and studied cool, but the Cactus Brothers rock down to the center and come up with an ominous dose of black lung. Lead singer Paul Kirby sounds both defeated and defiant as he snarls away against a wall of rhythm guitars, sawing electric fiddle, and hammered backbeats, testifying that the company store really is the maw of hell....

If you’re looking for an interesting “pooperie,” as the late Mayor Washington would have said, look no further. The two-week Next Dance Festival, now in its second annual incarnation, provides a peek at a wide variety of Chicago groups and choreographers. The senior and junior companies of Sundance Production brought the old Medinah Temple down with their energy in their first appearance at Dance/Africa last fall. Modern choreographer Frank Fishella continues his series of “Desire Dances” with two more that focus on the vagaries of gay love, while Winifred Haun offers a new abstract duet, Compliments, set to the music of Frank Zappa and UB40....

William Finley Green November 16 In the 1970s Alison Knowles worked and reworked a series of performances and documents, collectively known as Identical Lunch, that grew out of her habit of eating a tuna sandwich and drinking a glass of buttermilk every day and inviting friends to do the same. Photographs of the proceedings included the Star-Kist logo, and somehow Knowles was invited by the company to visit the factory where the fish was canned....

When fans buy tickets for Pearl Jam’s show in Chicago this summer–probably July 10, definitely at Soldier Field–they’ll be buying tickets through a unique computer system devised by southern California’s ETM Entertainment Network. The company says its massive automated system can handle an extraordinary 10,000 telephone calls simultaneously. Thus far, reports from the field are that the system works. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “It went great,” reports Doug Kauffman, an independent promoter in Denver....

Dear Reader, Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » A few weeks back [Hitsville, December 16] Wyman, the record critic, wrote of “a Liz Phair” whose LP was being bungled by burping record executives. The mismanagement was so bad that the LP was in danger of falling off the Billboard charts, undoubtedly giving it less longevity than the putrid Voodoo Lounge or Division Bell LPs. After reading Wyman, the record critic’s, article I felt nothing but anger towards the record company, Billboard, and the nation for not buying this album....

Words we haven’t heard lately, from activist James Yellowbank, quoted in U.S. Catholic (February): “To say that all Indians are alike is like saying that all the different nationalities and religions in Europe are alike.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » One urbanite runs up the white flag. “Let us suppose USX determined that the best and highest use of [its 585-acre South Works on the southeast side] in fact is residential, that people actually could be persuaded to buy homes there and that they would not die of heavy-metal poisoning before the first property-tax bill came due,” writes Ed Zotti in Chicago Enterprise (January/February)....

In his first feature Guatemalan director Luis Argueta deftly places his country’s struggle for political independence against the story of an 11-year-old boy’s coming-of-age. For six months in 1954 Guatemala went through a series of political crises as a U.S.-instigated military coup ousted the reform-minded leftist government. The events are seen through the eyes of Neto, the asthmatic elder son of a liberal judge. In Neto’s upper-middle-class household, his quietly authoritarian father and his nurturing yet wayward uncle–both in love with his mother–are implicitly proffered as political choices for Guatemala....

Cornershop Playing sitar on a rock record might in itself constitute a political act, for an Asian at least if not for a Beatle. It might also constitute a goof–an early Cornershop single reworks an Elvis oldie as “Seetar Man.” But the sitar’s sinuous metallic drone also mimics much of what the Singhs’ postpunk guitar peers, from the Jesus and Mary Chain to My Bloody Valentine, have achieved through massively orchestrated distortion: namely, a shimmering shadow melody piercing through the sonic overload....

THINKING IS FORM: For me, the most familiar of his works–gray felt suits on wire hangers and grand pianos wrapped in gray felt–have a raffish, intuitively poetic charm that doesn’t require much thought. The notion of Beuys as a thinker, as someone who created art that embodies social, philosophical, and spiritual ideas, might impress some people, but it will intimidate a lot more. I finally felt more at ease with this exhibition once I stopped regarding it as the minor show of a major artist and started appreciating it as the comprehensive show of a truly smart but finally minor artist....

Amid the twisted Columbus punk-rock renaissance spearheaded by New Bomb Turks, Gaunt, and V3, no band is more absurd than Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments, which has been churning out a terrific, if erratic, stream of outsider punk rock for almost five years and earning complete indifference from all but the most fervent record collectors. Not content to be merely marginal, they handicap themselves at every turn. TJSA practice an open-door policy, i....

To the editors: Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Inflammatory and unreasonable statements do not automatically become reasonably acceptable on condition that they are uttered by women. The fact that an individual or a class of individuals has been oppressed does not immunize their statements against scrutiny or criticism as many who sympathize with their plight seem now to believe. Ms. Bowman seeks laws that would prosecute men for making offensive sexual remarks so as to “make the streets safer for all citizens”?...

For almost three years K.SO sat in his prison cell, plotting his future and thinking about his past. How K.SO wound up at Cabrini is a long story that’s difficult to track. He’s reluctant to release all the details, starting with his age and name. “Just say I’m older than 25 but younger than 30.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » As for his name, he says: “I’m K....

Dear editor: Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Good firearm training disposes of the notion that anger is somehow part of self defense. Anger will kill you, not the perp. A trained individual will find the firearm in hand and ready to fire automatically. Once the decision has been made to use deadly force the only action that will reverse the process is the perp leaving, relinquishing a weapon or giving up....

What with all the scary things going on these days–AIDS, global warming, Michael Jackson–you don’t need to invent problems to raise your blood pressure high enough to power a fire hose. Yet polls show five to ten million Americans aren’t satisfied with the varied menu of real disasters the world so generously offers them. So they’re waiting for the end of the world. Bethel members and the Goers seem harmless and well-meaning....

You can hardly open up a newspaper or turn on the television without some sentimental type longing for the way things were back when people were good and a quarter went a long way. (How world wars, the Depression, and racial inequality fit into the rosy picture never comes up.) But a quarter still goes a long way at Frenchy’s, a combination store and cinema on State near Oak Street with 25-cent movies....

APRIL Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » If you’re into dried flower arrangements, aromatherapy, or fresh pesto you may want to stop by the fifth annual Herb and Scented Plant Sale sponsored by the Friends of the Oak Park Conservatory. More than 250 types of medicinal, cooking, and ornamental plants will be on sale from 9 to 3 today at the Conservatory, 615 Garfield in Oak Park....