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Scenes from last week’s Ali Hackett Dance Party in Malcolm X Park:

Come on out this Wednesday night, September 3rd, for Ali Hackett’s Post Labor Day party, 6-9 pm in Malcolm X Park!

Add it to your Google Calendar!

This weekend is traditionally huge for block parties in West Philly. This one, in the 5100 block of Hazel, was for the birds:

These young ladies were not terribly impressed with Spiderman:

Nise Wit Tha Beats on Myspace!

Saturday Spitters is a semi-regular series featuring artists from West Philadelphia’s growing hip hop scene. YouTube videos, MySpace pages, websites, etc. Know someone who should be featured as a Saturday Spitter? Send me a note!

Formerly a record store, a new salon called Behind the Hijab has a sign up at 52nd and Irving. The metal gate is open, but as you might imagine, the windows are covered, so it’s hard to tell whether they’re open for business or not.

A nice crowd turned out last night in Malcolm X Park for Scribe’s Street Movies series! It would have been nice if we could have selectively turned off a couple of the park’s brilliant lights to make the screen brighter, but you can’t have it all…

Here’s one of the films shown, an experimental adaptation of Amiri Baraka’s “Something in the Way of Things (In Town)” with music by The Roots. If you look closely, you’ll see that a number of the scenes were shot on 52nd St. and even in Malcolm X Park (1:18):

I noticed the 48th and Spruce Fruit Truck in there as well. The filmmaker, Bryan Green, is a senior film and video major at Drexel University and used to live at 52nd and Walton. In addition to a number of fiction projects, he’s also working on a documentary about Philadelphia genre-bending musician tU pHAce. Give him a listen. You won’t regret it.

Come see!

I’m pretty sure that Ashanti’s Bar-B-Que (52nd and Irving) has not been open at any point in the last 5 years, but I’ve always admired the signage. I was tempted to walk off with the plexiglass hand-painted Bar-B-Que sign leaning against the wall in this photo, less so the toilet.

Little video coming, but here are a couple of photos to tide you over:

Both, located on the West side of 52nd Street between Chancellor and Walnut, appear to qualify as “coming soon.”

The interior of Lincoln Photo Frame and Art is completely gutted, so it may be awhile.

Salaam’s Florals, however, looks like it’s much closer to being ready to open.

It’s pretty much going to look like this, just outside:

Malcolm X Park @ 52nd and Pine

6-9 pm under the Gazebo

Featuring Ali Hacket, King of the Oldies!