Lilith

The Lilith Fair, which ends its 1998 tour Aug. 31 in Vancouver, British Columbia, will remain all-female, although leader Sarah McLachlan admits having considered male performers for next season. "That was one of my early moments of weakness from being beaten down by the media," said the Canadian singer. "I thought, 'God, maybe I should make this more equal.' . . . But no, definitely not. Lilith is what it is. It's a beautiful thing, so why change it?" The Backstreet Boys have issued a statement saying widespread reports that they are breaking up "are 100 percent false.

THE QUARTET OF thirtysomething women chatted happily as they wandered through the lobby of the Susquehanna Bank Center in Camden, talking about the acts they'd see at this year's Lilith women's music festival. But on entering the "shed" a look of horror came over one gal's face. She gazed upon the sea of empty seats and despaired, "Hey, where is everybody?" Where, indeed? For some concertgoers - and even more so, some concert promoters - summer 2010 is proving a season of discontent and disappointment.

Honey, who does your nails? Those scarlet-enameled talons belong to Lilith, a voluptuous vamp who has emerged from the primordial ooze to stage the sexual conquest of Los Angeles. Like most man-traps, Lilith teases her quarry with come-hither looks before breaking their hearts. Unlike most man-traps, when Lilith breaks your heart, she literally breaks it, ripping it from your chest and shredding it with her razor-sharp claws. Night Angel is the kind of horror show that puts the retch into wretched.

"Night Angel" makes a brief stop here before what is sure to be its headlong rush to the local video store. It's a cheapie horror movie about a woman named Lilith who was supposedly created at the same time as Adam. As it happens, Lilith's hang-up was that no one man could satisfy her carnal cravings. This put her in a dreadfully tough spot. So she began consorting with demons, an activity that gave her immortality but a very bad disposition. Since then, during certain lunar phases, she has reappeared on earth to kill people and spread her gospel of lust.

A month-long festival of dance at the Packard Theater, at the site of a former bank at 15th and Chestnut, was inaugurated last night in a blaze of theatrical derring-do. It was a stage technician's dream come true. Smoke secreted from what seemed to be the pores of a staircase and then hung in the air like a London fog. Red light, and more smoke, emerged from the depths behind the stage. Flames licked against the back walls. And every color of light, from the hottest red to the palest blue, played across the stage in intense beams and gentle waves.

The big novelty of Melanie Stewart Dance's concert on Sunday at Temple University's Conwell Dance Theater was a preview of a projected full-evening dance about Lilith, the female demon of Semitic folklore. The better reason for attending, it turned out, was to enjoy another look at two of Stewart's pieces from 1991, Obbligato and Buoy. Perhaps it is every dancer's fantasy to move to a cello, to sink one's limbs into its sinewy yet noble sounds. This is what Stewart does in Obbligato, to a score by Anthony Pirollo.

This is the weekend for new-wave elder statesmen, from the grand (Elvis Costello, 8 tonight at the Tower Theater) to the obscure (the Go-Betweens' Grant McLennan and Robert Forster, 10 tonight at the Pontiac Grille, 304 South St., 215-925-4053, $10). Local offerings are nothing to sneeze at either. Tonight at the Theater of the Living Arts (8 p.m., 334 South St., 215-922-1011) is a punk battle of the bands for the coveted side-stage spot on the Warped Tour. (It's sort of like the Lilith contest, but it's all boys with guitars.

L.A. Banks' story of Damali Richards, the spoken-word artist who splatters sulfuric vampire guts in Philadelphia alleys and Los Angeles nightclubs, was supposed to be one book, Minion (2003). That's all. But Banks' publishing house, St. Martin's Press, split the coming-of-age novel about the vampire slayer Damali and her drug dealer-turned-vampire lover, Carlos Rivera, in two: The second book was called The Awakening (2004). Readers demanded more. So the West Philadelphia author continued on with her fast-paced saga, writing two 400-plus-page paperbacks a year.

It's been labeled everything from an estrogenfest full of aging hippies to an empowering, inspiring celebration of women and sisterhood. And this summer, after an 11-year hiatus, Lilith Fair is back - battling lagging ticket sales and cancellations from major acts, but still going strong. On Wednesday, it made a stop at the Susquehanna Bank Center in Camden. "I've been to every Lilith Fair," said Kristina Diviny, 36, of Cherry Hill. She was stretched out on a blanket with three friends, all sipping beers, while strains of music from Jill Hennessy, the Crossing Jordan actress now embarking on a music career, drifted over the grass.

THE QUARTET OF thirtysomething women chatted happily as they wandered through the lobby of the Susquehanna Bank Center in Camden, talking about the acts they'd see at this year's Lilith women's music festival. But on entering the "shed" a look of horror came over one gal's face. She gazed upon the sea of empty seats and despaired, "Hey, where is everybody?" Where, indeed? For some concertgoers - and even more so, some concert promoters - summer 2010 is proving a season of discontent and disappointment.

It's been labeled everything from an estrogenfest full of aging hippies to an empowering, inspiring celebration of women and sisterhood. And this summer, after an 11-year hiatus, Lilith Fair is back - battling lagging ticket sales and cancellations from major acts, but still going strong. On Wednesday, it made a stop at the Susquehanna Bank Center in Camden. "I've been to every Lilith Fair," said Kristina Diviny, 36, of Cherry Hill. She was stretched out on a blanket with three friends, all sipping beers, while strains of music from Jill Hennessy, the Crossing Jordan actress now embarking on a music career, drifted over the grass.

At one of the Court Yard Hounds ' recent stints on the female-artist-celebrating Lilith Tour (landing here Wednesday), Emily Robison decided to introduce a favorite tune as "a classic chicks' song. " Uh, maybe that was not the best turn-of-phrase to deploy? "The audience started to roar in anticipation," shared Martie Maguire , Emily's sister and the other harmonizing voice and fiddling dynamo of the duo. "I'm sure they thought we were going into a Dixie Chicks song, not one of our favorites by Joni Mitchell.

L.A. Banks' story of Damali Richards, the spoken-word artist who splatters sulfuric vampire guts in Philadelphia alleys and Los Angeles nightclubs, was supposed to be one book, Minion (2003). That's all. But Banks' publishing house, St. Martin's Press, split the coming-of-age novel about the vampire slayer Damali and her drug dealer-turned-vampire lover, Carlos Rivera, in two: The second book was called The Awakening (2004). Readers demanded more. So the West Philadelphia author continued on with her fast-paced saga, writing two 400-plus-page paperbacks a year.

With Ricky Martin in town next week, you're probably all wondering if Alternative Choice is "Livin' la Vida Loca. " The answer is yes. Now what are the rest of the words after "Woke up in New York City"? I wasn't paying attention. I was too busy watching the video and contemplating the importance of leather pants. Secret Cinema is livin' la vida loca. Tonight's program at the Print Center (1614 Latimer St., 215-735-6090) is dedicated to the reel lives of strangers in "Other People's Movies," a bizarre and fascinating collection of parties, funerals and world travels from the '20s through the '60s.

No wonder Sarah McLachlan is putting the kibosh on the Lilith Fair. The femme fest - which played Camden's Waterfront Entertainment Centre on Friday, with McLachlan joined by Sheryl Crow, the Pretenders, the Dixie Chicks and Me'Shell Ndegeocello - made zeitgeist headlines in 1997 and did boffo business its first two seasons. Plus, the Canadian songstress' concoction has been a corporate sponsor's dream, a perfect opportunity for car and skin-care companies to make a show of their support for, say, breast-cancer research, while zeroing in on an affluent, four-fifths female audience.

Let me put it this way: Compared to Lilith, Eve was just another trophy wife. I mean, Eve was younger than Adam, and designed from the get-go to be more tractable, even submissive. She was created from Adam - talk about your biological role reversal - and for Adam. Of course, she eventually fed him one meal too many, but that's a story for another day. Lilith, on the other hand - now there's a woman after my own heart. In the medieval myth, Adam's first wife was created equal out of the same earth.

The Lilith Fair, which ends its 1998 tour Aug. 31 in Vancouver, British Columbia, will remain all-female, although leader Sarah McLachlan admits having considered male performers for next season. "That was one of my early moments of weakness from being beaten down by the media," said the Canadian singer. "I thought, 'God, maybe I should make this more equal.' . . . But no, definitely not. Lilith is what it is. It's a beautiful thing, so why change it?" The Backstreet Boys have issued a statement saying widespread reports that they are breaking up "are 100 percent false.

Halfway through the Indigo Girls' set Friday at Lilith Fair, the backing band left the stage and Sarah McLachlan, the tour's organizer and headlining artist, appeared. It looked like another of those totally scripted package-tour moments - the big star stops in to make the gratuitous cameo by rolling through an old warhorse. Yawn. Then McLachlan and Indigos Amy Ray and Emily Saliers began the spiritual "The Water Is Wide," and almost instantly, the crowd at the Waterfront Entertainment Centre went silent.