Ontario, C.A.-bred Charles Phoenix is a true master of Los Angeles history, kitsch, and trivia. His nostalgia-inducing slides, painstakingly unearthed from forgotten decades at L.A. yard sales and second-hand shops, were something we long enjoyed at Losanjealous.com. And we once spotted him rocking a mariachi suit quite handsomely to boot. This fun-loving tour guide, performer, archivist, and author has recently been getting back the love he gives, with an appearance on Martha Stewart’s show and vast kudos for his “Disneyland Tour of Los Angeles.”

This weekend in Glendale, Mr. Phoenix presents his Moonlight Rollerway Jubilee, a spectacular night of Charles’ slides, accompanied by live organ and some kick ass pro roller-skating displays, followed by free snacks and a late-night skating party. Spending a night with Charles is a fun-filled retro romp to be sure, we took just a minute to catch up with this urban docent to research what his top taco pick is in the City of Angels. Turns out, his impeccable taste does not falter when it comes to Silverlake’s Mexican food purveyors.

Hey Charles Phoenix, what’s your favorite taco?

Charles Phoenix: “I love tacos! All kinds of tacos. In fact I’ve hardly ever had a taco I didn’t like. Growing up here in Southern california I’ve been eating them since I could chew. It’s difficult to choose a favorite. But…if I had to, it would be the carnitas taco at Alegria, a little Mexican restaurant in a strip mall in Silverlake. Carnitas dripping in fat served in a medium sized flour tortilla with fresh chopped white onion and cilantro and a lemon wedge on the side. Simply delicious.”

Bookstore shelves practically sag under the weight of every tome published on the art of graffiti. Nothing tells the story as beautifully or fully as the epic Graffiti L.A., released last year by author and photographer Steve Grody, who has been shooting walls in Nuestra Señora since 1990. The full color pictures are stunning, while Grody details the basics of the art form for the curious, simultaneously exalting it as the important evolution in painting that it is. He also gives voice to some of the city’s best to speak for themselves on long-ranging debates about style, technique, mediums, and what makes an artist a graf artist. Plus, it finally gives L.A. writers the props for pioneering, innovation, and progression that is deserved.

Bravo Mr. Grody, we can’t wait to see what’s next. And we gotta know, what’s your favorite taco?

Steve Grody: “Thanks for the support! Though it’s hardly an obscure spot, Senor Fish at 1st and Alameda is a regular save-my-ass when I”m hungry place. I most often get the seafood burrito, but also the seafood quesadilla or omelet.”

3 supreme Jersey douches from the site

Douchebag1, the genius behind one of the internets’ greatest websites, hotchickswithdouchebags.com, is a busy man. His website gets millions of visitors every day, his email box is clogged with picture after picture of douchey douches and their hot chick companions, and he’s got a book coming out later this year. We managed to catch up with one of LA’s finest internet nerds, to ask him: What’s your favorite taco?

Douchebag1: Some of the best tacos I have every had are fried oyster tacos in New Orleans.

She’s beautiful, she’s intelligent, she’s laugh-out-loud funny, and she’ll carve your heart out like a Mexica Priestess jocking Huitzilopochtli, thereby allowing you the honorable death you should only be so lucky to have.

In other words, we are in love with Ask A Chola (aka Dr. Chola McGraw) and her various alter and alter-alter egos. Her varied, humorous, and insightful video campaigns dole out insight into the differences between cholas and ninjas, dying with honor, plus a chola’s place in our computer commercials. She is part Sith Lord, a former lover to Subcomandante Marcos, an aggressive backer of affirmative action for pirates, a dabbler in haiku and spoken word poetry, and the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s baby. Her interests are “cholacentric historical revisionism and writing the chola back into Western history where she was written out,” plus an agressive Go Green campaign. “I really want to stop global warming, so we can all just get back to killing each other.”

This shoulder-bumping beauty loves and reps Califas and East Los, so you know she knows herself something about good Mexican joints in this town too.

Hey Ask-A-Chola! What’s your favorite taco?

“My favorite Mexican food in L.A. is Burrito King in Echo Park. The tacos and horchata are the bomb at Burrito King! I love the physical location of the Echo Park one. It’s so damn noisy there on Sunset and Alvarado. And it’s like an urban island. The lighting, especially when the sun is setting, is magical. I don’t know how to explain it. It’s like a blanket and I feel safe. They are open really late too. The homies working there will flirt with you, though, and ask for your Myspace. Jajaja…”

Love and respect, Chola! Now, here’s that Myspace to save the Burrito King homies some talk-time…

www.askachola.com

www.myspace.com/askachola

www.youtube.com/askacholatv

The taco lifestyle crosses all boundaries and includes anyone who wants to be a part of it– emerging art stars born in South Carolina are no exception. Graphic designer Shepard Fairey, who made his name on the streets of LA, is a resident and promoter of our city even when he’s attending art premieres in London or putting his work up on the streets of Copenhagen. A massive influence on street art, our city, and the taco lifestyle as a whole, we’ve been wanting to ask Shep about his favorite taco spots for a long time…

Reached by telephone, Shepard was unequivocal about his favorite taco spot: Cactus Taqueria #1 in Hollywood. His whole crew from his business, Studio Number One, digs the tacos and burritos at Cactus, and can be found there on the regular.

With some notable exceptions (such as the excellent tacos recommended by our Mayor), The My Favorite Taco column hasn’t produced so many Holy Grails among the city’s spots. Some dudes haven’t even ever had a damn tekko in their life!

I’d seen badass actor Danny Trejo at a birthday party for Rob Zombie some years back. It was the Danny Trejo you’d always imagined, the one where a mere glimpse from his eyes makes you shit your pants. My mama comes from El Paso and one of her relatives once delivered money on horseback to Pancho Villa for the government, saying he had yellow eyes like a tiger. Trejo, from Echo Park originally, grew up as an armed robber, teenage drug addict, and prison boxing champion shuffled between the whole collection of Cali’s penal system. He is also a cat with intensely light-green eyes and a fearsomely iconic tough guy mug that I imagine could have given Villa a run for his money in the intimidation department.

This time, though, it was a warm, embracing Danny Trejo doing it for the kids, taking pictures and shaking hands. I felt bad putting him on the spot, but figured who else would know where to get tacos featuring the legendary and merciless peppers of Quetzlzaacatenango than this toughest of tough homegrown vatos.

I was hoping he’d at least shout out the name of one of his friend’s places from back in the day. Uh, but like a pinche pendejo, I put Danny on the spot, I could tell he wasn’t conjuring up his best recollection as I pushed and wheedled for an answer.

TACO: “So, where does Danny Trejo go for tacos in Los Angeles?”

TREJO: “Hmmmm…for tacos…(long pause)…aw man, that’s a hard one.”

TACO: “Or Mexican food in general, Danny…what are some of your favorite Mexican restaurants in Los Angeles?”

TREJO: “Hmmmm…let me think (longer pause)…Uh, well there’s this spot on Washington Blvd…(here it comes, I thought to myself) called El Tarasco. I like going there, they have pretty good food.”

In a way, Snr. Trejo can say no wrong, but when he said El Tarasco, the wind deflated from my sails, was he talking the chain with LAX El Tarasco? Uh, that place kinda sucks. Had I put Danny under too much delirious pressure to respond so he just said the first thing that came to mind?

With a little editorial investigation, TACO news-viking Erich Redson came back with the word that there was a different, smaller El Tarasco chain, to which we immediately dispensed our TACO forensics division to investigate the Trejo-trumpeted taco spot. There was a lot to love about El Tarasco Burrito in South Venice, perfect location just steps from the beach, a killer mural of a Central American countryside, in business since 1969, and two of the cutest waitresses I’ve ever seen. Within moments I felt the appeal.

There was a diverse menu with tons of make-your-own taco plates of heaping asada, carnitas, and chiles that looked good, but since burrito is in the name, I went for a chile relleno burrito and carne asada burrito as well. The food was definitely a big step above the other El Tarasco, with actual beans in the burritos instead of that mush. Not the greatest place we’ve ever stepped foot in, but it had some flavors worth coming back for, I would do the fluffy chile relleno burrito again, since it had all the right components, if I was in the area and the mood. Still– we’re not one to argue with a multiple felon, so El Tarasco burrito officially rules!

El Tarasco Burrito ~ 109 Washington Blvd. ~ Venice

(Photo from ocblog.net)

Your Black Friend Nashieqa Washington first turned us on to Gustavo Arellano’s column Ask a Mexican in the OC Weekly, and it wasn’t long before LA Weekly picked it up too, saving precious driving time searching out the hard copy and providing even more precious porno time on the internet. Gustavo’s straight-forward answers to befuddled gabachos and other Mex-impaired or curious citizens of So. Cal are not only hilarious, they are also illuminating towards the feelings, lives, and conflicts of Los Angeles’ majority culture. More than just comedy, Arellano’s snappy answers to honest questions are a refreshing shot in the arm for Southern Cali race relations.

Why do Mexicans wear their clothes in the ocean? Can you trust a Mexican to make your sushi? Huitlacoche? The Raiders? Machismo? Arellano has just published his first collection of Ask a Mexican columns, and the dead-on and funny answers lie therein!

Of course, TACO hits hard with the most probing questions…

“Hey Gustavo, what is your favorite taco in Los Angeles? ”

“Like any true Naranjero (Orange County resident), I largely eschew Mexican food in Los Angeles since Orange County Mexican is SO much better. But I do swallow my pride and enjoy the occasional taco. I’m sure they’re not the best in the city, but I’m an Orange County resident –I wouldn’t know better.

My choices are King Taco, the original location (close to sixth, I believe, off some freeway). More out of nostalgia than taste, although the salsa they use is still one of the few that makes me sweat. Burrito King in Echo Park/Silverlake where gabachos are intruding into barrios area of Los Angeles. Cute, vintage logo, and a greasy breakfast chorizo burrito that sops up any hangover. I’m not sure if it’s still there, but there was once a taco truck in East Los Angeles that sold two tacos for a buck and gave away free salsa. It was on the parking lot of those auto shops that have a giant, laughing bear as its logo (sorry for being so damned vague with locations–but again, OC boy).

But for cheap eats, nothing beats Ruen Pair in Thai Town. I always get the same bastardized dish: rice topped with onions, pepper slices, bamboo shoots, more pepper, garlic and meat: heaven through hell. 5257 Hollywood Blvd.”

Thanks G! We know Gustavo is also a big seeker-outer of racist signage depicting such things on taco stands as sleeping fat Mexican men in giant sombreros next to donkeys and the like…such images and of course probing questions, can be directed to Gustavo at garellano@ocweekly.com.