RON ORP New York

There was a lot of hater hot air released when The Roots took on their full-time gig as Jimmy Fallon's Late Night band that the legendary hip-hop group was phoning it in. But since the Philly ensemble arrived in the Big Apple three years ago, their on-air day jobs seem to just be a backdrop to their omnipresence around town. This weekend finds the band's leader ?uestlove back at PS 1 spinning the sounds of German industrial pioneers Kratwerk. And if that's not enough hobnobbing for one day, stick around the Queens museum for the launch of James Franco's newest publication, Dangerous Book Four Boys.

PS 1, 22-25 Jackson Ave in Long Island City, Sunday 3-7pm, $10-15

If you've ever had a conversation with a New York transplant who's just come from a trip to one of our local Targets, you probably noticed a pang of homesickness in their eye as they mumbled, "But it wasn't really Target." A venture out to Brooklyn's Atlantic Center or (gasp) all the way up to Marble Hill lands you in a retail hall that looks more like a Tijuana flea market than it does the suburban shopping oasis people have come to expect when they see the red and white bullseye. So what's a girl to do if she wants to celebrate Target's newest endeavor, The Shops, where they've taken five designer boutiques from around America (like Miami's The Wesbter) and plopped them in the middle of their stores with cheapo Target prices? Maybe a daytrip out to Jersey City is in order, where the Pavonia/Newport location does the best job of blending urban and suburban, basically the apex for a town combining the words Jersey and Citay. 

When Alternostalgia started kicking into high gear last year with the various celebrations of Nirvana and Pearl Jam's launches into the rock stratosphere, we didn't see this unexpected bit of grungy dirty laundry coming out: Everyone has begun confessing their love for Stone Temple Pilots! The onetime whipping boys for early 90s rock, scoffed at by Pavement's Stephen Malkmus as noting more than "elegant bachelors," seem to have discovered a cool pass as the band that a generation of teenage boys learned to play the guitar to. The Hold Steady's Dan Neaustadt has quietly had a little residency over at the Knitting Factory where each week he covers an entire album, celebrating hipster heroes from Beck to The Boss to Belle & Sebastian. Up this week, STP's "Purple," possibly the first time that album has been played in Williamsburg without being labeled a guilty pleasure.