Jan 4-11, 2017
Seeking City Hall: Looking ahead to yearlong battles over the mayor’s office and City Council
Minimum Gauge: Trump team reportedly asks anti-Trump artist Moby to DJ innaugural event
HOT: Moby to Dick: Seriously?! The man whose campaign rallies featured music by artists that despised everything he represents (including the persistent use of The Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” as head-scratching rally-closer) reportedly is unable to attract bigly musical acts to perform at events surrounding his upcoming presidential inauguration (although…
West Side gripped by ‘Doubt’
In 2004, John Patrick Shanley wrote Doubt, A Parable, a powerful, provocative drama. The play depicts a battle of wills between a young priest and an opinionated nun who believes he might have had an improper relationship with a student at the Bronx school where she serves as principal. It won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize…
Morning News: Preservationists promise legal action over Dennison; Sittenfeld, Black unveil senior initiative; new, weird Trump stuff
Hello Cincy. Let’s talk news, shall we? A group of preservation advocates are asking the city of Cincinnati to delay a demolition permit for the embattled Dennison Hotel and could take court action if it does not. The 125-year-old building, owned by Columbia REI, sits in a historic district and was the subject of a…
Morning News: Council campaign kickoff season; arrest made in Our Daily Bread shooting; NKY saw 36 percent spike in overdoses last year
Good morning all. Here’s what’s going on today in news. As we told you about in our cover story last week, the race for Cincinnati City Council is popping off. Multiple campaigns are launching in the coming days, including: — Democrat transit activist and former suburban police officer Derek Bauman’s, which will start Jan. 12…
Morning News: Millions in HUD dollars for local homelessness efforts; city likely to issue Dennison demolition permit; Kentucky legislature’s busy day
Good morning all. I hope you had a good weekend during which you didn’t lose any fingers or toes to frostbite. At last count, I still had all of mine, so let me type some news out for you. As more families experience homelessness, local groups struggling to serve them will get millions in federal…
WATCH: Cincy Indie/Psych Pop band Joesph’s “Glowing Flower” video
In CityBeat’s local music column Spill It this week we reviewed the new Glowing Flower EP by Cincinnati Indie/Pscyh Pop trio Joesph. Meant as a teaser for Temples, the forthcoming Joesph full-length album, the EP will be issued tomorrow (you can hear a couple of tracks now at joesph.bandcamp.com) in conjunction with a unique release…
Morning News: Winburn gets an FBI visit at City Hall; Trump involved in Ohio GOP leadership fight; Sen. Brown will vote against Trump AG pick
Good morning all. Yesterday was an eventful day at City Hall. Let’s dive right into the news. Councilman Charlie Winburn’s office got the kind of visit you never want to get last week when the Federal Bureau of Investigation came and seized some boxes of material that a member of his staff moved from his…
Stage Door: Four Things That Will Fade Away Quickly
It’s a shame that the touring production of A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder is onstage at the Aronoff only until Sunday. Most of the Broadway in Cincinnati presentations run for two weeks, but this one is in town for just one week. It’s a witty farce that won the 2014 Tony Award for Best…
2017 Best of Cincinnati Readers’ Poll!
Welcome to the 21st-annual Best of Cincinnati® reader's choice poll! Your votes will determine the area's best restaurants, bars, arts organizations, retail stores, services, parks, media personalities, sports teams, politicians, causes and urban experiences. Click here to vote in any or all of six major sections: Eats, Shops & Services, Arts & Culture, Nightlife, Sports…
Morning News: Winburn mulls mayoral run; Pureval cleans house; Gov. Kasich and Sen. Brown: unlikely allies for ACA
Hello all. Hope you’re somewhere warm and dry as the snow comes down this morning. Let’s talk about some news stuff, shall we? And then there were four. Maybe. Cincinnati City Councilman Charlie Winburn yesterday filed petitions for a mayoral run, making him the first Republican contender to edge that direction. Winburn is term-limited on…
Your Weekend To Do List (Jan. 6-8)
FRIDAY 06 EVENT: CAVALCADE OF CUSTOMS Do you like shiny cars? What about babes and WWE celebrities? If you answered yes to any of those questions, visit the Duke Energy Convention Center to check out the Cavalcade of Customs, a weekend-long car show featuring custom cars, hotrods and motorcycles, plus appearances from the likes of…
Credulity-challenging stories ahead of Trump’s inauguration
My New Year resolutions: I refuse to join Prozac Progressives (formerly Brie and Chablis Liberals) for a limousine ride-along in their post-election funk. I won’t embrace the inexplicable anger of the Alt-Right (formerly GOP) despite its imminent ownership of the Oval Office, Congress, Supreme Court and most state governments. And I can’t share the White…
What a Week! Dec. 28-Jan. 3
WEDNESDAY, DEC. 28 Debbie Reynolds said “F this mess” Wednesday and danced on up to the Halloweentown in the sky, following her daughter Carrie Fisher, who had passed away just one day earlier. Reynolds was 84 years old and in the process of planning Fisher’s funeral. Each a Hollywood star in her own right, Reynolds…
New Year, New Shows
One resolution that isn’t too daunting to take on is watching better TV in 2017. And with promising new series and seasons of returning programs premiering throughout, this one should be easy to keep all year long. Fargo – The third installment of this dark comedic faux-“true crime” anthology series takes place in 2010. Ewan…
Films to watch for in 2017
At the end of the year, critics do all of the things readers think of when they consider what it is that we do — documenting the best films of the past year while also gazing into our critical crystal balls to offer predictions about the future of cinema. There is the notion that we…
In 2017, opera and vocal recital will lead
When I was asked to write about what musical events I’m looking forward to in 2017, the choices were easy: Opera, Vocal Recital and more Opera. Cincinnati Opera has three operas on the docket instead of the usual four: Puccini’s unabashed weeper La Bohème, with Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra Conductor and Music Director Louis Langrée making his Cincinnati…
CAC will take clowns seriously this year
For Cincinnati’s visual arts scene, 2017 is the year to send in the clowns. With great anticipation, the Contemporary Arts Center is preparing to open the Swiss-born, New York-based artist Ugo Rondinone’s Once Upon a Time exhibit on May 5. This is the show, much talked about since first announced last summer, that features 47 life-size…
Onstage 2017: Musicals, Classics and Premieres
Half of the current theater season still remains and, regardless of what you enjoy watching onstage, there are multiple choices for you. Here is a selective guide in three broad categories to help you plan: Musicals The Broadway Series already has gotten the New Year started at downtown Cincinnati’s Aronoff Center with A Gentleman’s Guide…
‘The Fits’ continues to find success
The first line of this story could be “Once upon a time.” The Fits, the low-budget indie movie shot and set in Cincinnati and released earlier this year, has turned out to be quite a modern fairy tale. And it’s now being treated like royalty. Director Anna Rose Holmer, working with co-writers Lisa Kjerulff and Saela Davis,…
Northside’s Second Place is no runner-up
In the last few years, we’ve seen some interesting new restaurants and bars opening in Northside, giving locals more dining options than just really great tacos. But now there’s a place for those who want to watch the big game while eating good in the neighborhood. No, I’m not talking about the mythical Northside Applebee’s.…
Food Trends of 2017
Objectively speaking, 2016 was an absolute dumpster fire. If life was a Nintendo 64, I’d have hit the restart button last January. Sadly, there is no restart button in life, but there is in food trends. Let “out with the old, in with the new” be the mantra you whisper under your breath as you…
Minimum Gauge: Run-DMC sue retailers for jacking their brand
HOT: Retailers Accused of Illin’ If you’ve ever looked for your favorite musicians’ merchandise online and ended up anywhere other than an official artist page, you know there are often more “unauthorized” shirts, hats and other “branded” items than there are official ones. Hip Hop legends Run-DMC have also noticed, and the group is finally…
Morning News: Richardson touts political outsider status; Cranley announces labor endorsements; Ohio Supreme Court justice mulls run for governor’s seat
Good morning. Time for some news that isn’t related to the snow we might be getting tomorrow that everyone on Twitter is freaking out about. As we told you yesterday, Cincinnati now has a third entrant into its 2017 mayor’s race: former University of Cincinnati Board Chair Robert Richardson Jr. Last night at his campaign…
Streetcar Struggles: Small snags or signs of bigger problems?
Cincinnati’s first streetcar system in more than 65 years launched with great fanfare back in September. But now, after five months of the Cincinnati Bell Connector gliding around its 3.6-mile loop, the long-awaited and much-derided transit project’s ride has gotten rougher. Ridership numbers have been lower than expected, wait times to board the cars have…
As the 2017 mayoral election heats up, the controversial firing of former CPD Chief Jeffrey Blackwell resurfaces
In September of 2015, Cincinnati City Manager Harry Black abruptly fired then-Cincinnati Police Chief Jeffrey Blackwell. After a very tense Cincinnati City Council meeting where Blackwell’s supporters on Council sparred with Mayor John Cranley and Black over the chief’s firing before a packed house of angry community members and activists, CPD veteran Eliot Isaac was…
Sound Advice: Orgy with Powerman 5000, Death Valley High and Knee High Fox (Jan. 8)
Electro Rock band Orgy entered the public consciousness in the late ’90s with its harrowing, hard-hitting cover of “Blue Monday,” a 1983 hit by legendary Electro Pop group New Order. Fronted by enigmatic frontman Jay Gordon, Orgy caught the attention of Korn singer Jonathan Davis, who signed the band to his Reprise-distributed Elementree Records and…
Sound Advice: Big Thief with Sam Evian (Jan. 10)
One sure way to get everyone to consider the possibility that your debut album is a masterpiece is to give it that title, which is exactly the strategy that Brooklyn-based Big Thief chose for its recorded introduction to the world. And while Masterpiece might not be the monumental album that all of Big Thief’s work…
Joesph offers teaser EP ahead of next album
This week, Cincinnati Indie Pop trio Joesph is issuing a new EP, Glowing Flower, as a preview of its forthcoming full-length, Temples. The band is celebrating the limited-edition download with a party/performance Saturday at O Pie O (1527 Madison Road, East Walnut Hills, opieo.com). Admission to the 10 p.m. event is $5, and that includes…
Kid Stardust turns heartbreak into triumph with its debut EP and mere continued existence
Cincinnati band Kid Stardust’s long history but relatively short timeline is strengthened by unity forged in a crucible of discord that would have decimated lesser bands. Against all odds, the group completed its debut EP, Something Like This But Better, and the members anticipate a productive 2017. When guitarist Drew James describes Kid Stardust as…
Looking ahead to yearlong battles over the mayor’s office and City Council
If you thought you just couldn’t handle any more politics after the 2016 elections, take a deep breath. As you were casting your ballot in one of our country’s strangest presidential contests, some of the most potentially competitive local races in recent memory were just getting started. Take a look at the upcoming political landscape,…
