Hello It's Me

Rocker Todd Rundgren brings long-awaited Utopia reunion to Dallas

Utopia has arrived for Todd Rundgren fans.

Todd Rundgren/Facebook

For fans of rock star Todd Rundgren, Utopia has arrived. Rundgren and his original band Utopia — consisting of members Kasim Sulton, Willie Wilcox, and Ralph Schuckett — are reuniting for their first North American tour in 32 years, with a date in Dallas at the Majestic Theatre on April 23.

The tour launches in Pennsylvania on April 18 and hits most major North America cities. Tickets go on sale February 23 at 10 am; pre-sales begin February 20 at 9 am.

As a companion to the reunion tour, Friday Music will release a 7-disc box set called The Road to Utopia: The Complete Recordings (1974-82). A limited-edition collection, it includes the band's seven classic albums, for the first time with CD digipak gatefold covers featuring original album artwork elements; rare inner sleeve art; and 2018 written commentary from the band.

Todd Rundgren's Utopia formed in 1974 after four years of making solo albums, including the seminal Something/Anything?, which included hits such as "Hello It's Me" and "I Saw The Light."

The band began as a prog-rock-progenitor septet featuring Moogy Klingman, Ralph Schuckett, "M. Frog Labat" on keyboards, John Siegler on bass, Kevin Ellman on drums, and Rundgren on guitar. Their music ranged from extended synth experiments to four-song albums. Their live shows were distinguished by video backdrops and computer-generated music that was ahead of the curve.

By 1976, the group had become the power-pop rock quartet Utopia, with Willie Wilcox on drums, Roger Powell on keyboards, and Kasim Sulton on bass — the best-known and most commercially successful Utopian incarnation.

In 1986, after 10 years of nonstop recording and arena touring, the band took a sabbatical. Rundgren went on to produce albums by Patti Smith, Cheap Trick, Psychedelic Furs, XTC, Grand Funk Railroad, Hall And Oates, and Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell.

The "sabbatical" is now over.

The tour even has an official pre-sale credit card, Citi, whose holders can purchase pre-sale tickets beginning February 20 at 10 am until February 22 at 10 pm through Citi's www.citiprivatepass.com program.

Tour dates are as follows:

April 18 – Penn's Peak, Jim Thorpe, PA
April 20 – Bergen Performing Arts Center, Englewood, NJ
April 22 – House Of Blues, Houston
April 23 – Majestic Theatre, Dallas
April 25 – Broward Center For The Performing Arts, Broward, FL
April 27 – Mahaffey Theater, St. Petersburg
April 28 – Tabernacle, Atlanta
April 29 – Carolina Theater, Durham, NC
May 1 – Paramount Theater, Huntington, NY
May 2 – Warner Theater, Washington, DC
May 3 – Town Hall, New York, NY
May 5 – Tower Theater, Philadelphia
May 6 – Orpheum Theater, Boston
May 7 – Ridgefield Theater, Ridgefield, CT
May 9 – Peabody Opera House, St. Louis
May 10 – Taft Theater, Cincinnati
May 12 – Pabst Theater, Milwaukee
May 13 – State Theater, Minneapolis
May 15 – 20 Monroe Live, Grand Rapids, MI
May 16 – Massey Hall, Toronto
May 17 – The Fillmore, Detroit
May 19 – Hard Rock Live, Cleveland
May 22 – Chicago Theater, Chicago
May 24 – Paramount Theater, Denver
May 26 – The Joint At Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas
May 27 – Comerica Theater, Phoenix
May 29 – The Wiltern, Los Angeles
May 30 – The Masonic, San Francisco
June 1 – Moore Theater, Seattle
June 2 – Revolution Theater, Portland
June 4 – Crest Theater, Sacramento
June 5 – Fox Performing Arts Center, Riverside, CA

concerts music

Movie Review

Jessica Chastain drama Dreams stumbles through steamy romance

Photo courtesy of Teorema

Isaac Hernández and Jessica Chastain in Dreams.

The opening scenes of the new drama Dreams are bracing, fictional sequences that call to mind real-life scenarios. In them, a young Mexican man named Fernando (Isaac Hernández) goes through a somewhat harrowing journey from the back of a semi truck in South Texas all the way to San Francisco. It’s a familiar immigrant story that seems to set the stage for a film with something interesting to say.

It turns out, however, that Fernando has not made the long and arduous trek for a job. Instead, it’s to be with Jennifer McCarthy (Jessica Chastain), a rich woman who helps lead a foundation dedicated to multiple things, including funding dance academies. Fernando, a talented dancer, and Jennifer have been in an off-and-on affair for years, with Jennifer wanting to keep their relationship a secret.

Although both are drawn to each other in an inexplicable, lustful way, their bond is tenuous, with each of them dissatisfied for different reasons. Fernando clearly sacrifices much more of himself than Jennifer, who wants for nothing except maybe more affection from her father, Michael (Marshall Bell), and brother, Jake (Rupert Friend).

Writer/director Michel Franco seems to try to inject tension into Fernando and Jennifer’s relationship from the start, an attempt that is only halfway successful. It’s clear from the way they greet each other - not to mention a steamy sex scene shortly thereafter - that they have known each other for a good length of time. Franco is able to get across this familiarity with an economy of scenes, and the intensity of their bond holds for a while.

But as the film progresses and both of them grow disenchanted with their arrangement, Franco starts taking the story in some odd directions. The biggest issue is that it’s never clear at what point in time the story is taking place. Fernando ends up making multiple trips back and forth across the border, with Jennifer doing the same at one point, and Franco’s use of flashbacks muddies the waters, wrong-footing the audience when he should be trying to draw them further into Fernando and Jennifer’s complications.

Revelations in the final act make the story even more confusing, as both main characters start saying and doing harsh things that seem to come out of nowhere. That would be all well and good if Franco actually committed to their changes of heart, but he keeps things wishy-washy for most of the final 15 minutes, resulting in an ending that makes little sense for either character.

Despite the story issues, both Chastain and Hernández give compelling performances. Chastain has been a little under the radar since winning an Oscar for The Eyes of Tammy Faye, but she keeps this character interesting longer than it should have been. Hernández has limited credits and appears to have been cast for his dancing ability, but he goes toe-to-toe with Chastain on more than one occasion and acquits himself well.

Dreams had all of the ideas to explore a more in-depth story about the complicated immigration policies between Mexico and the U.S., or how wealthy people take advantage of those less fortunate. But Franco never finds the right footing, settling instead for a titillating and somewhat mystifying relationship story that feels half-baked.

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Dreams is now playing in select theaters.

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