Here and Now: Chris Bachelder
We live in a fractured, rapidly evolving culture, one in which reality often seems lifted from a Vonnegut novel. Surreal has become real. Few writers deal with this notion better than Chris Bachelder. His first novel, 2001’s Bear v. Shark, trained its lacerating satirical eye on America’s media-saturated, competition-crazed culture by way of a hilariously…
The Chalets — Check In (Setanta)
THE CHALETS — CHECK IN There is something irresistible about a Pop/Rock band featuring guy/girl counterpoint vocals. How far would the B52s have gotten with just Fred Schneider's histrionic yelp? Who would have noticed an Exene-less X? How about a Thompson only child? Ireland's Chalets understand the dynamic all too well and trade on…
Devon Campailla
CityBeat Archive The Cincinnati Black Theatre Company celebrates the works of August Wilson on Sunday. Shuffling and reorganizing staff is on the agenda at NEW EDGECLIFF THEATRE (NET), where DEVON CAMPAILLA has become associate producer. She's appeared onstage in several NET productions (and with Clear Stage Cincinnati, Know Theatre and Rising Phoenix) and stage…
Web Onstage: NKU says Y.E.S. to new theater
Historical Satire: In the Wake of King Death REVIEW BY MARK STERNER More than 75 years ago, Robert Frost penned these lines as a metaphor of the theater: "The play seems out for an almost indefinite run./Don't mind a little thing like the actor's fighting./The only thing I worry about is the sun./We'll be all…
Honesty, Trust and College Basketball Coaches
Jerry Dowling Whenever a college football or basketball coach tells you the sky is blue, be very careful with the information. Check the sky yourself and see if it looks blue. Ask three or four other people for confirmation. Don't just trust it outright. Many a reporter has written gibberish on the words of…
Police Chokeholds and Nonviolent Suspects
Does this fact pattern sound familiar? During an arrest, the suspect is allegedly placed in a chokehold by police. Suspect dies. A federal civil suit follows. Roger Owensby Jr.? No, this is a case from Michigan, and the January 2007 opinion from the U.S. Court of Appeals from the Sixth Circuit is instructive. The Sixth…
Cover Story: Why We Smoke
Sean Hughes The Joy of Smoking Smoking cigarettes feels good. But no one is supposed to say so. We know a lot about the science of smoking and the habits of smokers. Tobacco might be the most thoroughly studied plant in the world, meticulously quantified in numerous surveys by universities, public health agencies and…
Upcoming Concert Reviews of Man Man, Richard Swift and More…
Ground Control Touring Man Man Man Man with Culture Queer and The JohnMikeAustin Experience Thursday · Southgate House After a 30-year career struggle and 14 years after his untimely death, Frank Zappa is just now beginning to gain some semblance of respect for his compositional, conceptual and orchestral genius. Tom Waits has toiled away…
Take-Out Idol
HOT Chinese Idol We Americans can dislike China for their commie ways, but — besides making cheap products for U.S. consumers at rock-bottom labor prices and some amazing cuisine — they also have some good ideas about how to make American Idol more palatable (or, better yet, make it disappear completely). Beginning next month, China…
Know Your Customer
When I worked in a wine shop, most customers were open-minded, eager to learn and willing to try new things. But there were other "interesting" customer types that we all recognized: Cherry-Picking Loners: These folks never want help or ask questions; they aren't rude but just drift through the shop, looking at everything, searching for…
Living Out Loud: : A Lion in Winter
The old man picked a bad time to come into the store. We were short-handed on that Monday morning, and I was anxious to leave my part-time consulting job at Elgin Office Equipment downtown because I was up against deadline for a column I hadn't even started yet. His movements were slow. He was stooped…
Tax No-How
I haven't done my income taxes yet. Probably I'll get money back; if I owe, I guess I'll figure something out on the 16th. Same with buying gas. I don't exert myself to scout out the cheapest in the city. I've made attempts, such as the last time I ran out of gas. The temperature…
Message at the Crossroads
Once again I'm dismayed that CityBeat readers have chosen Crossroads Community Church and its pastor, Brian Tome, as the best church and religious leader the area has to offer (Best of Cincinnati, issue of March 28). In a CityBeat article from 2004, Tome states, "You cannot say the Bible supports homosexuality. It does not." ("Gays…
Rene Denfeld — All God’s Children: Inside the Dark and Violent World of Street Families (Publicaffairs)
Rene Denfeld —All God's Children: Inside the Dark and Violent World of Street Families Read this book and you'll never look the same way at young kids hanging by Bogart's on Short Vine or begging spare change outside drugstores. That latter activity is "spanging," according to the street-kid vocabulary described in All God's Children.…
Music: Yo Bum Rush the Flow
Michael Lavine Yo La Tengo aren't afraid of you and they will beat your ass … with dynamic Indie songs that flutter between epic drones and buoyant Pop. The title of rarified indie trio Yo La Tengo's new album, I Am Not Afraid Of You And I Will Beat Your Ass, has caused some…
Film: The Seekers
Kino Will Oldham (below) and Daniel London share a moment in Old Joy. Kelly Reichardt, who directed Old Joy, sees her film as a kind of new-age western in which men — past their youth but not necessarily their hopes and dreams — go into the wilderness and test each other's commitment … with…
Lookwhos: Look Who’s Eating: Rina DiMarco
Graham Lienhart Scotti's Italian Restaurant, named after the original owner's friend and famous opera singer, Antonio Scotti, was founded by the DiMarco and Scoleri families and has been in its current location for about 54 years. Siblings and current owners Rina, Marco and Pasquale DiMarco are the fifth generation of this family tradition. All…
News to Use
Death Row Drama In the tradition of the play The Exonerated comes Lucasville: The Untold Story of a Prison Uprising. However, unlike the former death row prisoners in The Exonerated, the subjects of this play are still sentenced to be executed. Lucasville, written with the cooperation of five men who were sentenced to death for…
Protecting Us from Foul-Mouthed Protesters
Cincinnati Police Department Assistant Chief Richard Janke, avid supporter of civil rights, gave the neo-Nazis a permit. The city of Cincinnati might start screening political groups that want parade permits so as to bar any groups whose messages are deemed offensive. That's the implication of a motion proposed this week in response to a…
Cover Story: Move Along
Snitching is still officially encouraged by new Ohio smoking laws scheduled to take effect at the end of the month, but anonymous snitching by itself won't be grounds for a fine. That's just one of the new developments in the statewide ban on indoor smoking, which voters approved last November but hasn't yet been…
Graham Parker — Don’t Tell Columbus (Bloodshot)
GRAHAM PARKER — DON'T TELL COLUMBUS In the late '70s era of the Angry Young Man, few were as wickedly literate, acidic, witty or as broadly focused with their vitriol as Graham Parker. His work with The Rumour, a blend of British Folk and Soul with a New Wave twist, vaulted him into the…
Music: Tenacious D
Guerrilla Funk Recordings Who stole the soul? Public Enemy frontman Chuck D says corporations have co-opted his culture and stripped it of everything that made it great in the first place. "If you're making a record you can't perform, there's going to be a problem." — Chuck D If it were up to me,…
Vulcan Freedom Fighters — Stardate Unknown (Alien Communication)
VULCAN FREEDOM FIGHTERS — STARDATE UNKNOWN It's difficult to describe this project without making it sound like a novelty. Put simply, VFF makes instrumental Rock music with copious amounts of dialogue from the original Star Trek series. As hopelessly nerdy as that sounds, the music on Stardate Unknown places it light years beyond the…
Behind the Hardcore
Local rockers American Hardcore have been through an almost soap opera-like couple of years. If nothing else, the band has a riveting first 15 minutes of their Behind The Music special someday. Formed in 2004, the band — full of more swagger than a Guns N' Roses tribute act on a rocky cruise ship —…
News: Deadly Laws
Graham Lienhart Ronald Keine Imagine it's the wild and woolly 1970s, and you and your friends decide to take your van and leave your quiet Michigan town to take a trip through the American Southwest. Just a few years after the film, Easy Rider, and not too long after author Thomas Wolfe chronicled the travels…
Diner: Review: Tropicana
Joe Lamb I have to admit something, readers: I was determined not to like Jeff Ruby's Tropicana. Until last weak I'd never eaten at any of Ruby's five local restaurants, which include Carlo & Johnny, The Precinct, The Waterfront and Jeff Ruby's Steakhouse. You see, I'm one of those gourmands who find it hard…
Timbaland — Timbaland Presents Shock Value (Blackground/Interscope)
TIMBALAND — TIMBALAND PRESENTS SHOCK VALUE If his new effort, Shock Value, is any indication, superstar producer Timbaland's entry into the mainstream has emboldened him. Though all original material, the guests and stylistic mash-ups give the record a schizoid mixtape vibe. Timbaland might have the most distinctive style of any producer, Hip Hop or…
Film: Rear Ended
Shia LaBeouf stars as Kale, a troubled voyeur, in Disturbia. Memo to the estate of Alfred Hitchcock: If the producers of Disturbia haven't already agreed to share the proceeds of their flick, then by all means approach them for royalties. Disturbia is Hitchcock's Rear Window transposed from Eisenhower-era Manhattan to the leafy confines of…
News: Secret Plans for The Banks
Christopher Smitherman wants more minority involvement in planning for The Banks. A new design for a proposed housing and shopping district along Cincinnati's riverfront is being shown behind the scenes to area leaders by a developer interested in building the project, and one key official said he expects ground-breaking for the long delayed plan…
Cover Story: Smoking Hot
Oliver Meinerding Keith Richards – A smoking Icon Individuals are usually eager to talk about the positive influences on their lives, about the heroes who made them the great people they are or aspire to be. "I picked up a guitar after I saw Jimi Hendrix in the Woodstock movie." "I became a teacher…
News: Dangerous News
Ben L. Kaufman Alexey Simonov, president of the Glasnost Defense Fund, responds to a question as Fred Weir (left), Russia correspondentfor The Christian Science Monitor, and Andrei A. Zolotov Jr. (right), editor of Russia Profile magazine, listen American reporters worry about subpoenas. Russians journalists fear assassination. Only Iraq and Algeria have been deadlier in…
Locals Only: : Vanity Theft
Vanity Theft Vanity Theft To vocalist/guitarist Brittany Hill, the name Vanity Theft suggests the idea of "being humbled. Experiences can kick you down." But this four-piece, all-women Indie group doesn't feel the need to defend womanhood. They focus on the music. Gender's in the backseat. Hey, when you're good, you're good. From the Lebanon…
Zlata Filipovic and Melanie Challenger — Stolen Voices (Penguin)
Zlata Filipovic and Melanie Challenger —Stolen Voices The title of Stolen Voices: Young People's War Diaries from World War I to Iraq is nonsensical; these aren't stolen voices but rather voices preserved. But the rest of the book is surprisingly effective. I expected a collection of childish pacifist treacle but instead heard a chorus…
