Cover Story: WHERE TO EAT:2006
Graham Lienhart Where to Eat: 2006 Where to Eat 2006: Your Ultimate Guide to Navigating the Local Dining Scene So many restaurants, so little time. That's my simple conclusion drawn from spending the past few weeks working to create CityBeat's 2006 Where to Eat issue. With 900-plus restaurants in Greater Cincinnati, even if you're…
Music: The Maestro
Clogs Bryce Dessner (seated) returns to his hometown this week to perform with Clogs and helm the eclectic MusicNOW Festival at the Contemporary Arts Center. Bryce Dessner has a soft spot for Cincinnati: It's where he grew up, where he grew to love music in all its multifaceted states. As co-curator of the MusicNOW…
The School of Creative and Performing Arts
Susan Photography, Susan Vrbancic Hey, look behind you!: Happily Ever After is at the Aronoff Center for the Arts Friday and Saturday. Spring is in the air, with the school year ripening into … recital time! After you go see your little darlings twirl in their tutus, take them to see other young students…
Not Just Classrooms
Despite problems with declining student enrollment and sluggish test scores, Cincinnati Public Schools (CPS) is garnering praise from at least one prominent education group. The Coalition for Community Schools, a Washington, D.C.-based alliance of more than 170 national, state and local organizations, is crediting CPS for its efforts at involving the public in creating "community…
NFL Draft Drama Is Better from a Distance
Jerry Dowling The NFL draft is the hype machine that's really an anti-hype machine, dedicated to tearing down the statues and monuments erected by college football's hype machine. The young gods of last autumn are in the laps of NFL talent nags. They're carefully measured and timed by now, folded, spindled and mutilated, and…
CSI: Comedy Scene Investigation
— What's up? — Manager down at the Empire Theater just called. Claims he just witnessed a comedy sketch being murdered. — Damn. That's three this week. — Lot of unfunny people out there. You know that. — So what was booked at the Empire tonight? — Improv. — God have mercy. When will it…
Film: All of Us United
Universal Pictures White-knuckler: Lewis Alsamari (left) and Jamie Harding play hijackers in the tension-laced United 93. Like many people around the country, I watched the signature events of 9/11 unfold in a surreal time frame on Good Morning, America. The confusion of images unspooling, the speculation about why the first plane hit the World…
No Alibi
If you seen it or heard it, maybe probably I did it Maybe or maybe not I admit what I committed Exhibit the truth because I'm living proof why I had no disguise, no verdicts, no alibis — "No Alibi," The Roots I have blown this, my final CityBeat deadline. It's Tuesday morning — now…
Film: Big-Sky Redux
Wim Wenders Sam Shepard is Howard Spence, a washed-up alcoholic actor indirector Wim Wenders' Don't Come Knocking. Cameras are rolling on the set of Phantom of the West, a mawkish western shooting in the Moab desert, but leading man Howard Spence (Sam Shepard) is nowhere to be found. A washed-up alcoholic loser, Howard has…
Cincinnati Black Theatre Company
Tim Perrino Radio Gals graces the Showboat Majestic stage through May 7. CINCINNATI BLACK THEATRE COMPANY (CBTC) has presented its biennial MIDWEST BLACK THEATRE FESTIVAL since 1998. This weekend is the first of two offering children's plays, dramas, musicals, readers' theater, Hip Hop and Broadway shows at several venues around town. Following a fund-raiser…
Speak. Hear. Dance.
Perry Simmons DJ Sol (aka Perry Simmons) spins at Crush on Main for his regular spoken word/Hip Hop/Soul shindig, The Vibe "You may know me as a political candidate and an attorney, but (right now), I am Hip Hop." — Fanon Rucker Professional and family demands aside, it's taken me four years to attend…
Locals Only: : The Blue Adler
Dana Strong Danny Adler Danny Adler's career is salted with so many amazing musical associations that he almost seems like a real-life Zelig, Woody Allen's fictional everyman who crossed paths with the great figures of the 20th century. The native Cincinnatian has worked with local talents like Bootsy Collins and H-Bomb Ferguson and foundational…
News: Political Play
A middle-class family becomes homeless after a company lay-off. For some this seems unimaginable; for others it's a reality. Miami University architecture students held an unusual demonstration April 17 in Piatt Park to promote empathy for the homeless. Thomas A. Dutton, professor and director of the Miami University Center for Community Engagement in Over-the-Rhine, led…
Books: Stalker Turns Novelist
C. Paul Sarkis Shari Goldhagen's debut novel centers on a pair of likeable but deeply-flawed brothers. Reviews of Shari Goldhagen's debut novel, Family and Other Accidents, have been so positive that she might not have to return to stalking celebrities for a living. She's done that kind of work for a number of magazines,…
News: Deciding District 2
Eric Chapman Jeff Sinnard, a full-time father, is a Democrat running for Congress Jobs, health care and the war in Iraq top the lists of candidates' concerns in the 2nd Congressional District primary. Judging by their wallets, front runners include incumbent U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Milford) and fellow Republican Bob McEwen and Democrats Dr.…
Upcoming Concert Events with Goatwhore, Pinback and More…
Yarrr PR Minmae High on Fire with Goatwhore, Watch Them Die and Retribution Thursday · Top Cats I still recall with fondness the day that my bespectacled College Rock buddy, who had previously eschewed all things hard and heavy, was transformed into a hapless headbanger by a single Ministry performance. "It's just so aggressive…
News: Democrats Aim for County
Eric Chapman Former Cincinnati City Councilman David Pepper and former Forest Park Mayor Stephanie Dumas want the Democratic nomination to run for county commissioner against incumbent Phil Heimlich. Check this out — it will be an election season in which local incumbents face serious challenges: · U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Milford) faces a serious…
Rumors, Lies and General Misunderstandings
· Successful local Rock trio Heartless Bastards have been announced as one of the artists performing at this summer's Desdemona Festival, an impressively ambitious new Indie Rock fest spearheaded by co-owner of downtown hot spot alchemize, Nick Spencer. Running June 23-25 along the Ohio River's edge at Sawyer Point, the outdoor event — similar to…
News to Use
The Future of the I-75 Bridge The Brent Spence Bridge Rehabilitation/Replacement Team recently narrowed to five the number of alternatives it is considering for the bridge and its approaches. Two public meetings will inform the public about the options under consideration. The meetings, organized as an open house, are from 3-8 p.m. May 2 at…
Music: Chamber, Now
EDITOR'S NOTE: We asked Bryce Dessner, co-curator of the MusicNOW Festival (and member of Cincy-born/Brooklyn-based Indie faves, The National, as well as Clogs), to tell us about the artists participating in this week's event. All shows are at downtown's Contemporary Arts Center. For more info, go to page 33 or cincychamber.org. · Awadagin Pratt and…
The Killing Has to Stop
I just wanted to thank Gregory Flannery for the thoughtful editorial regarding Kabaka Oba's shooting ("Killing Kabaka Oba," issue of April 19-25). If anything, this tragic incident should finally bring the violence and hell of Over-the-Rhine to the attention of city council. Too many people have suffered and are still suffering from the misery here…
News: Ancient Lessons
C. Matthew Hamby Every week Koffi Lamewona of Mount Healthy sits down with his wife to study in a room in their house dedicated to the pursuit of higher knowledge. They started in 1999, the year in which Lamewona, an immigrant from Togo in Africa, asked his father for advice after several disasters prompted…
Where’s Heimlich When It’s Time for Mediation?
Graham Lienhart A vigil in honor of Kabaka Oba led to a shrine outside City Hall. Standing in front of a crane on Theodore Berry Way across from the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, where The Banks was supposed to be under construction, Mayor Mark Mallory gathered an impressive group April 24 to talk…
Living Out Loud: : Maybe Five Years Ago
I can't remember exactly when I met Ellen. We were both drinking at a bar in Clifton and both pretty drunk. After the bar closed, we walked back to my place and fucked. This sort of established a relationship between us — one I really can't define. On one July night, maybe five years ago,…
Cover Story: Tips from the pros
Graham Lienhart Mellisa Mileto of Take the Cake has eclectic tastes prefering Boca, Myra's Dionysus, Walt's BBQ, Honey and more. Where to Eat 2006: Your Ultimate Guide to Navigating the Local Dining Scene Asking local chefs where they eat when not in their own kitchen has become a CityBeat tradition in our dining guides.…
Diner: Living to Eat
Woodrow J. Hinton My friends are in the Peace Corps in Kazakhstan. Their lives have changed dramatically as they learn the rules of the new culture, but whenever I talk about them all I can say is, "They eat horse." Why can't I get past this fascinating fact? Never mind that they don't have…
Ain’t Saved Enough
Notes: The Freddies and I recorded this song live at Go To Your Room Studios on Monday night. We got it right on the second take. I originally wrote this song as one of those Talkin' Blues numbers, but Sarah convinced me to gas it up a bit. I like the result of her advice,…
