9 thursday

dance

Brushing Against the Divide. Studio 6A. Through Saturday. 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday; also 2 p.m. Saturday. $8-$12. 825-6624. The Christopher Watson Dance Company presents its spring concert, modern dances including "E Finito?" by guest choreographer Christine Maginnis, and the title piece by artistic director Christopher Watson. "Brushing Against the Divide" is danced to an original score played live by percussionist Will Fehlow. --Kim Surkan

music

Joan Baez with Richard Shindell. O'Shaughnessy, College of St. Catherine. 7:30 p.m. $32-$45. 989-5151. During my days as a folkie squatter, which now seem like a lifetime ago, I'd wander the Haight-Ashbury with a walkman and old dub tape of Joan Baez on one side and -- of course -- Dylan on the other and a yellowed copy of On the Road under my arm. I played the tape until it was warbled and incomprehensible from wear, frequently rewinding and replaying Baez's "Silver Dagger." Although Baez never quite reached as many people as Dylan, her emotional nudity always drew me in -- even more so than Dylan's anthems. Regretfully, I never got the chance to see Baez live while I was out there; either she wasn't touring or I couldn't afford a ticket -- I can't remember. Now she's coming to town, and I'll finally get my chance. -- Hildegard Hansen

The Inner World. Theatre de la Jeune Lune. 7:30 p.m. Through Sunday. $12; $10 students. 333-6200. Pangea World Theatre brings some 2000-year old classical Tamil love poems to the stage in an adaptation by Meena Natarajan. Directed by Dipankar Mukherjee, the show incorporates movement, narrative and music to tell these stories of love and longing, gossip, infidelities, jealousy and lust. Choreographer and performer Anita Ratnam leads an ensemble cast including Sharon Cage, Alfredo Pannelli, Luu Pham, Anna Sommers and Barbara D. Ryan. --K.S.

10 friday

music

Mark Eitzel with Sue Garner. 400 Bar. 9:30 p.m. $10; $8 in advance. 332-2903. Former American Music Club leader Mark Eitzel is one of the most powerful singers working today -- if the mic falls off the stage he might not notice, and you might not either. His songs are uplifting in that "guess my life doesn't suck as much as I thought" kind of way, and beautiful to boot. His new record for Matador, Caught In A Trap And I Can't Back Out 'Cause I Love You Too Much, Baby, is the best thing he's done since his AMC days, heart-ripping and maddening. A fantastic performer, Eitzel's a quirky sort, too -- last time he played the 400, he dedicated nearly every song to local booker Maggie Macpherson, even modifying lyrics to include her in his songs. Former Run On singer Sue Garner opens.-- Ryan Kallberg

dance

A Doll in Her Pocket. Loring Playhouse. Through May 3. Call for times and prices. 349-5631. A Doll in Her Pocket is the fourth show of this year's Ballet of the Dolls' "Lipstick Ballets" season. Based on an old Russian folk tale, the ballet fuses dance, hand puppets, marionettes and Kabuki-style rod puppets. A Doll tells the story of Vasalisa, a young girl whose life journey takes her deep into the woods to seek the wisdom of Baba Yaga, the mystical crone. Complete with masks and puppets by Jim Tepfer, this show brings a new look to the already wacky repertoire of artistic director Myron Johnson's Ballet of the Dolls. --Kim Surkan

film

El Mariachi. Coffman Theatre. 7 and 9:30 p.m. $3; $2 for students. 625-6984. Robert Rodriguez is somewhat of an indie legend, supposedly shooting his debut feature El Mariachi for a miniscule $7,000 and selling his body to science to raise the funds. Unfortunately for some die-hards, Rodriguez sold out as soon as he could, going on to make Desperado starring Antonio Banderas and From Dusk Til Dawn with Quentin Tarantino. The gritty El Mariachi -- about a wandering musician who's mistaken for an assassin -- exhibits the talent and the obsessiveness that landed the young writer/director/producer/editor in Hollywood in the first place. -- Annlee Ellingson

11 saturday

reading

Dorothy Allison. Macalester College, Weyerhaeuser Chapel. 7 p.m. Tickets are required and can be found at the Hungry Mind Bookstore and the Amazon Bookstore. 699-0587. Dorothy Allison broke onto the scene in 1992 with the publication of her first novel, Bastard Out of Carolina, but you probably already know that. Bastard, when it came out, hit big with critics and the public -- and not just due to the dusty Southern narrative and train-wreck appeal of family dysfunction. Allison's book took a hard, long look at the consistency of our interpersonal glue, and hit some pretty tender nerves along the way. Among Allison's lesser-known works are Trash, a collection of short stories, Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, a memoir and a compendium of narratives and essays called Skin: Talking About Sex, Class & Literature. Now she's out with a new novel, Cavedweller, which tells the story of Delia, who leaves her rock'n'roll lifestyle to reunite with her long-abandoned daughters. Allison's welcome gift, here and in earlier work, is to take a story straight outta Daytime Talk-land and make it unassailably authentic. Go if you can. -- Ross Sherman

Christopher Shillock. Terminal Bar. 9:30 p.m. Free. 623-4545. Repeat after me, real slow: poetry. Now try this: Terminal Bar. Then, if you can, work on putting these two oil-and-water terms into a single sentence. Tough, huh? Well, get used to the sound, because the Terminal -- alternately know as Gateway to Nordeast and Most Aptly-Named Bar in the Twin Cities -- has gone and gotten poofy on us. If all that incongruity hasn't sent your head spinning yet, check out Irregular Conjunctions, the self-published little volume of poetry by local writer John Christopher Shillock. Shillock will grace the Terminal's stage to read his work, which bounces from translations of Sappho to spiritual allegories to revolutionary tracts to "The Bathroom," which is about, um, going Number Two, among other things. In the final analysis, none of this is so weird -- an old lefty at an old bar reading to working-class stiffs. (But I swear, if Flem, the owner, starts quoting Baudelaire, I'm moving out of state.) -- R.S.

music

June of '44 with Fuck and The Boom. 400 Bar. 9 p.m. $8; $6 in advance. 332-2903. One of these bands has a cool name, and the other are stellar musicians with a firm appreciation for long, winding, explosion-in-slow-motion songs. Ha! Fooled you. Actually, they both have cool names, and are both stellar crews, though June of 44 surrenders a few points in cheekiness and gains them back through vitality. Rue on you if you miss this show, unless you've got a problem with attention deficit. -- R.K.

13 monday

music

Marina Glass with Slobberbone and Backyard Swingset. 7th Street Entry. 8 p.m. $5. ID show. 338-8388. Marina Glass is one of those bands that you wish played out more. Well, last summer they played every week at the 400 Bar. Then lead singer Dana Thompson had a baby and took some time off. Now they're back with sweetly sad down home tunes. Texas' own Slobberbone have made it through town a few times since last year and never disappoint. Their hardcore roots rock is creative and stimulating, to say the least. -- Amy Carlson

15 wednesday

reading

Colum McCann. Hungry Mind Bookstore. 8 p.m. Free. 699-0587. This Side of Brightness, Colum McCann's second novel, melds together two tales of New York City's quite literal underground. Nathan Walker, a transplanted Georgian, spends the early part of the century working as a sandhog -- tunnelling out a train line beneath the East River that will connect Brooklyn and Manhattan. In more contemporary times, a homeless man named Tree-frog holes up in a subway tunnel and prepares for a brutal winter. Spanning three generations, This Side of Brightness covers the ground between these two, in the process taking on race and class and all the things that make NYC what it is. And, natch, it was written by an Irish expatriate. -- R.S.

ongoing

Black No More. Guthrie Lab. Through April 19. Call for times. $15-$21. 377-2224. If a machine was created that could turn black skin white, would it end racism? This is the idea behind Black No More, a book by George Shuyler. Based on Shuyler's book, the Strib's own Syl Jones created a play by the same name, adding music, dancing, and a few twists. Now, I have to admit, I went in with high expectations. Three nationally recognized theaters took part in producing this play: the Guthrie, Mixed Blood, and D.C.'s Arena Stage. This play was supposed to be humorous, controversial, intelligent, and at the same time entertaining - and it was, kinda. Junius Crookman (Wendell Wright), a black doctor/scientist invents this E-race-o-lator and one by one, begins eliminating the black race in an effort to eliminate racism. The play is then spent following Max Disher (Gregory Simmons) around as he becomes part of white society, going so far as to attend white supremacy meetings, and eventually marrying a white woman. Add singing, dancing, and an array of costumes into the mix and you've got quite a political comedy. Unfortunately, the musical numbers come off as an after-thought, with sub-par songs and an imbalance of vocal talent in the cast. Watching racial stereotypes be criticized and satirized with little concern for political correctness is amusing, but after awhile it's just the same joke over and over again. -- Katharine Kelly