Urban Planner: March 30, 2009

By Robin Hatch

Photo of Cut Off Your Hands by Treve Dromgool, from their MySpace.

MUSIC: Following a slough of successful shows at SXSW last week, New Zealand rockers Cut Off Your Hands will be playing at the Horseshoe Tavern tonight. Both Rolling Stone and Pitchfork have given these guys the seal of approval, so this is definitely one worth checking out (just so you can say you “saw them back when” and stuff). Joining them are Toronto’s Boys Who Say No. Horseshoe Tavern (370 Queen Street West), 9 p.m., $12.
WORDS: The Victory Café will host the second installment of their “Awkward Show and Tell” open mic series this evening. Tonight’s theme is “Weird Work/School Stuff,” so audience members are encouraged to bring their tales of inappropriate office behaviour, passive aggressive emails, and inevitably some perverted bosses. For those of you unfamiliar with the series, the theme of last September‘s event was “Things My Ex Gave Me” and saw love letters shredded, diamond rings given away to strangers, and a plethora of tears shed. Tonight hopes to be no less passionate. Victory Café (581 Markham Street), 8:30 p.m., FREE (as long as you’re 19+ and drinking).
FUN: Coca-Cola’s “Sogo Carry the Flame” RV tour will roll into the Distillery District around lunchtime today. Besides the Olympic torch that will be on display, there will be interactive activities providing history on the torch, information on the Vancouver 2010 Olympic games, and you can even nominate yourself to carry the Olympic Flame in 2010. Trinity Street Square in the Distillery District (55 Mill Street), 11:30 a.m.–1:30 p.m., FREE.
ART: The National Film Board‘s free animation workshops for adults continue tonight with “24 Frames Per Second,” an introduction to the techniques of Norman McLaren. Participants will learn about painting on glass, drawing on and scratching film, stop-motion animation, and pixelation. Though these aren’t professional filmmaking workshops and are meant for non-animators, all films created will be screened in the NFB Cinema at some point following the class. National Film Board Mediatheque (150 John Street), 6:30 p.m., FREE.