Inaugural Feywill Music Festival This Weekend
Everybody has their own parameters for summer these days. Schools are gradually starting earlier every year, so many students’ “last day of summer” was in early August, while the calendar says it’s not until Sept. 22. But if you declare summer as “everything before Labor Day,” this is the last weekend of the season. And…
Comedy: Brian Knab at Brew Ha Ha
“For 20 years I’ve wanted to do comedy,” says comedian Brian Knab. “I don’t even remember what prompted me to send an email to Go Bananas back in the winter.” That whim landed the 38-year-old a spot on Pro Am night at the club. It was his first performance since his high school talent show…
Events: Pittie Please Find a Cure
Outside of getting a new chew toy or changing up the typical walk route, life as man's best friend can get a little monotonous. Instead of taking Spot for a stroll around that same old block this weekend, why not give him a little exercise somewhere new for a good cause? This Sunday, you and your…
Music: Gillian Welch and David Rawlings
Eight years ago, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings released the exploratory and occasionally misunderstood Soul Journey, where Welch took a more directly personal stance in her writing as the duo injected a shade more vitality (and electricity) into their old-time musical presentation. Maybe the album’s mixed reviews negatively impacted Welch, or maybe her creative well…
Onstage: Home
Three decades ago playwright Samm-Art Williams, a member of the Negro Ensemble Company, wrote Home. It was presented in New York City in 1979-80, picking up Tony Award and Drama desk nominations for best play, and had a busy life onstage for several years including a 1981 production at the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park…
Bomb the Music Industry!
Bomb the Music Industry! began seven years ago as a rotating Punk collective, exploring a sound one critic described as “Ska for smart people.” But the conceptual aggregation has since evolved into more of an actual band with a slightly more conventional Indie Rock presentation. That evolution is clearly evident on BTMI!’s sixth album, the…
Music: Bomb the Music Industry
Bomb the Music Industry! began seven years ago as a rotating Punk collective, exploring a sound one critic described as “Ska for smart people.” But the conceptual aggregation has since evolved into more of an actual band with a slightly more conventional Indie Rock presentation. That evolution is clearly evident on BTMI!’s sixth album, the…
Events: Taste of Blue Ash
Blue Ash jams to Pat Benatar (9 p.m. Friday), REO Speedwagon (9 p.m. Saturday) and the tribute band Creedence Clearwater Revisited (7:30 p.m. Sunday) at its end of summer bash, the Taste of Blue Ash. The musical performances, which include many local acts throughout the day, are the heart of the event, drawing thousands annually.…
Events: Tailgate Bash and The World Cornhole Championships
Competitive beanbag games — who would've thought it would have come so far from its humble beginnings in Price Hill? Well, this is the big time, baby. It's also your chance to see who has the sacks to take top honors and cash prizes. The last round of the championships (4-6 p.m.) are part of…
Gillian Welch and David Rawlings
Eight years ago, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings released the exploratory and occasionally misunderstood Soul Journey, where Welch took a more directly personal stance in her writing as the duo injected a shade more vitality (and electricity) into their old-time musical presentation. Maybe the album’s mixed reviews negatively impacted Welch, or maybe her creative well…
Art: Go Ahead … Touch Me!
Nothing foreshadows calamity quite like small children in close proximity to valuable artwork. “Look but don’t touch,” the routine admonition of parents, is the standing order behind many of life’s public activities. This prohibition on physical contact — a sense crucial to our relationship with the world — is the subject of a new exhibition…
Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s
It’s been less than a year since Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s brought their newly trimmed lineup to MidPoint and tore up the Southgate House with a righteous tumult indicative of the more streamlined Indie Rock on their third album, last year’s self-released Buzzard. The album itself was an uplifting end to a…
Art: Order of Selection
Artist Stevie Grueter digs rocks out of the ground with a railroad spike. She's barely 5 feet tall and lugs them home like she's cradling a baby. That's where her art begins — on the uneven surfaces of rocks.Her life began in the rubble of an earthquake. It struck the Greek island of Crete, killing…
Music: Whispering Beard Folk Festival
The resurgence of beards as a youth fashion statement happened around the same time groups of young music-makers and -lovers began turning to purer forms of music to identify with and express themselves. Some hypothesize that the “back-to-roots” phenomenon (check the number of “Indie Folk” bands at the MidPoint Music Festival this year for proof)…
Music: Josh Eagle and The Harvest City
As Josh Eagle frames an answer, it quickly becomes apparent the response he’s offering has little in common with the question. Eagle pauses, then smiles. “What was the question?” he inquires. “I’m the king of fucking tangents. Hit the ball in left field and I’ll run in the opposite direction.” That might be one reason…
Literary: Ernest Cline
Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One is a geek's paradise, a futuristic thriller that looks back to the 1980s and its various pop-cultural touchstones — everything from the Atari 2600 and obscure Japanese anime to the Vision Quest soundtrack and the films of John Hughes — with addictive, often inspired glee. Set in the grim, resource-challenged America…
Art: CF3 Cookout/Swap
Cincinnati Form Follows Function (CF3) is an organization for fans of Modernist, mid-20th-century architecture and design, like the Terrace Plaza Hotel or Frank Lloyd Wright's Cincinnati homes. Once a year, CF3 members welcome newcomers and other interested parties to an outdoor cookout/swap meet at Bellevue Hill Park at the end of Ohio Avenue in Clifton…
Events: Final Friday OTR Skate
Admit it, you still think about the days as a kid when you and your friends would grab your roller skates and head to the rink for the day. Well, this Friday you can bring those days and Disco back to life with the Final Friday OTR Skate party at Over-the-Rhine Recreation Center (1715 Republic St.). …
Music: The Desert Gun
Madison Bowl in Oakley is stuck in another time — orange booths, dimly lit bar, pinball machines, a jukebox, the smell of stale smoke. Ah, the yellowish ambience. Murray Stall, drummer for new Alternative/Progressive rockers The Desert Gun, greets me in the glow. Tall, thin and always talking or moving, Stall wears skinny jeans and,…
Music: The Midpoint Indie Summer Series
It’s been less than a year since Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s brought their newly trimmed lineup to MidPoint and tore up the Southgate House with a righteous tumult indicative of the more streamlined Indie Rock on their third album, last year’s self-released Buzzard. The album itself was an uplifting end to a…
Morning News and Stuff
Libyan rebels today successfully breeched Moammar Gadhafi’s compound in Tripoli, although it was not immediately clear whether or not Gadhafi was in the complex. Mahmoud Shammam, a Doha-base spokesman for the rebels' interim council, said, "We don't know who is inside Bab al-Aziziya. We believe that there is someone there and that he is leading…
Squeeze the Day for 8/23
Music Tonight: The Southgate House's Parlour stage will be rockin' tonight with firecracker energy and creative, complex song structuring as Pittsburgh foursome edhochuli (yes, named for the unlikely cult hero/NFL ref) comes to Newport for a 9 p.m. show. The band is joined by excellent local Post Punk/Post Hardcore trio Knife the Symphony and Vacation,…
Cincinnati World Cinema Is ‘The Perfect Host’
Cincinnati World Cinema continues its eclectic programing this week with The Perfect Host, a nasty little thriller featuring a gleefully perverse performance from David Hyde Pierce, which screens 7 p.m. today and tomorrow at the Carnegie in Covington.—- First-time feature writer/director Nick Tomnay's mind-fucking, tonally uneven movie opens with career criminal John Taylor (Clayne Crawford)…
A Stellar Gala of International Dance Stars
You know it’s going to be a good Gala when you get chills down your spine within the first five minutes — the first act, no less. Marshall Davis, Jr.’s “Summertime in Cincinnati” kicked off a stellar show with his knock-em-dead tap dancing to the sounds of Lonia Lyle’s lovely vocals and Christopher Lyle’s electric…
The Upset Victory’s Latest “Actions” (VIDEO)
Earlier this month, melodic rockers The Upset Victory unveiled its music video for the song “Actions.” The clip features several Cincinnati landmarks, shot around town at places like the Bromwell’s building downtown on Fourth Street and, most notably, in several of the city’s abandoned underground tunnels and passageways (the group was given permission by the…
Pippin (Review)
Meaning. Perfection. Absolute fulfillment. No easy things to find in life — or in musical comedy. Pippin, the peripatetic hero of the appealing 1972 musical of the same name, dedicates his life to an ideal that always seems just beyond his grasp. The Carnegie Visual and Performing Arts Center and Northern Kentucky University’s Commonwealth Theatre…
Events: Mustache Bash
The mustache — it's a hairy bridge between the nose and the upper lip. Its variations know no bounds and range from gritty to waxed to handlebar. A ’stache signifies adolescence, manhood or an inability to grow facial hair. The fact is a mustache is just plain classy … well at least sometimes. And sometimes-classy…
Morning News and Stuff
The two eldest sons of Moammar Gaddafi, Mohammad and Saif al-Islam, are now in rebel custody after being detained Sunday evening. Since Gaddafi is not Liam Neeson, President Barack Obama is confident the Libyan leader will soon step down from power.—- Not the Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi in the hit blockbuster movie, Taken. During an…
W&S Open: Days Eight and Nine
The semifinals — ATP during the afternoon, WTA at night under the lights — has an electric feel. On the men’s side, we’ve been following American Mardy Fish, and his match-up against Brit Andy Murray stirs the crowds. Murray won here in 2008, and Fish was a finalist last year (losing to Roger Federer), so…
Squeeze the Day for 8/22
Music Tonight: Handsome Furs is the Electro/Post Punk/No Wave project featuring Wolf Parade's Dan Boeckner and his wife, keyboardist and short story author Alexei Perry. On the road supporting its latest release, Sound Kapital (on SubPop), the duo comes to Newport's Southgate House tonight. The Furs aren't fighting for positioning on the Synth Pop bandwagon,…
Conan the Barbarian (Review)
Jason Momoa replaces Arnold Schwarzenegger in Marcus Nispel’s reboot of this would-be swords-and-sorcery franchise. Nispel — the revisionary behind 2003’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and 2009’s Friday the 13th — thanks to 3-D, throws axes, fireballs and likely everything else including the kitchen sink at audiences. As a Dungeons & Dragons fanatic from the 1980s,…
Spy Kids 4
Robert Rodriguez attempts to continue his family-friendly junior spy series with Jessica Alba as a top-level spy/stepmother who, unbeknownst to her “spy hunting” husband Wilbur (Joel McHale), recruits her stepchildren (Rowan Blanchard and Mason Cook) into the business of saving the world from the nefarious schemes of the Time Keeper. There’s a real aim here…
W&S Open: Day Six: Fish Beats Nadal
Only one opportunity to catch a match live, and thanks to a hook-up from the scheduling gods, it was Mardy Fish vs. Rafael Nadal. Yet another look at Fish, the men’s player with the most upside entering the U.S. Open, while Nadal seems to be caught in a slight free fall, so maybe this would…
Morning News and Stuff
Barack Obama yesterday morning in a written statement praising protestors’ “pursuit of a peaceful transition” called on Syrian President Bashar Assad to leave power. "The future of Syria must be determined by its people," the president said. "But President Bashar al-Assad is standing in their way. His calls for dialogue and reform have rung hollow…
Fright Night 3D (Review)
Digging back into the movie archives, director Craig Gillespie (Lars and the Real Girl, Mr. Woodcock) sinks his teeth into this tale of an awkward teen (Anton Yelchin) who comes to realize that his new next-door neighbor (Colin Farrell) might be a vampire intent on building a coven in his town if the teen fails…
Beats, Rhymes & Life (Review)
Rap and Hip Hop have the staying power few expected when the music first hit the scene back in the 1970s on the streets of New York. The founding fathers and godfathers of the movement have inspired their progeny, and the seed has spread across the country and the globe, generating beats that have caused…
One Day
Director Lone Scherfig (An Education) teams up with novelist David Nicholls, adapting his own book, and stars Jim Sturgess and Anne Hathaway to re-create a one-day-a-year romance and drama of a pair of star-crossed lovers who meet the night of their college graduation and struggle to remain connected over the course of two decades. The…
Sarah’s Key
Two parallel stories from different eras intertwine and inform each other in Gilles Paquet-Brenner’s film, which is based on Tatiana de Rosnay’s best-selling novel. The structure is a delicate balancing act, since one story is set amid the atrocities of the Holocaust and the other concerns a journalist in modern-day Paris confronting family and professional…
Stage Door: ‘Pippin’ Steps Out at Carnegie
Stephen Schwartz is well known in the world of musical theater as the composer of Wicked, the mega-hit Broadway musical that’s been running since 2003 (more than 3,200 performances to date). But he started his career a long time ago, composing the music for Godspell way back in 1971. At the age of 24, he…
Squeeze the Day for 8/19
Music Tonight: The MidPoint Indie Summer Series on Fountain Square features some of Cincinnati's finest this week. Tonight's free show (7 p.m. start) is headlined by beloved local Indie Pop duo Bad Veins, which recently posted on Facebook that their second full-length is finished and they need extras for a video shoot for one of…
Friday Movie Roundup: A Sundance Resurrection
As it has every other corner of our cultural and economic landscape, the current recession hit the Sundance Film Festival hard, resulting in fewer films being picked up by the handful of distributors that still exist — and that still care about the types of films that need their nurturing. Couple that with the festival's unfortunate…
W&S Open: Day Five
The heart of the tournament sets up a day made for the remote control, but out on the grounds of the Lindner Family Tennis Center, you can only hope that your feet won’t fail you because who knows what you might miss as you’re dashing between courts to catch all that you can of the…
Q&A with Stevie Nicks
Stevie Nicks has truly enhanced and defined the role of women in Rock & Roll. She is the gold standard by which female lead singers in Rock bands will forever be measured against. The defining voice behind Fleetwood Mac since the mid ’70s, she has also been able to separate and create a wonderful solo…
MidPointer: Okkervil River Begins Tour
Saturday, one of the more anticipated bands performing at this year’s MidPoint Music Festival, Okkervil River, jump back on the road for several weeks of dates around North America, picking up the tour for its latest album, the Jagjaguwar Records release I Am Very Far. Before they get to Cincinnati (the third-last tour stop), the…
Squeeze the Day for 8/18
Music Tonight: Tonight’s the last time you’ll be able to catch Cincinnati-based trio The Rubber Knife Gang in town for a while. But it’s not for any kind of hiatus — no rehab or plastic surgery or whatever it is bands do on such breaks. Quite the opposite. It’s because the band is jumping on…
W&S Open: Days Three and Four
A sparse crowd arrives early on Center Court for the first match of Day Three (Aug. 16), which features one of the more intriguing players on the WTA roster thus far in 2011: Li Na, who reached the finals of the Australian Open and became the first native-born Asian player to capture a Grand Slam…
Enquirer May Change Size, Move Printing
Cincinnati's only remaining daily newspaper is considering moving its printing operation to Columbus and reducing the size of its print publication. The corporate owners of The Enquirer and The Columbus Dispatch have signed a letter of intent to have the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky editions of the local paper printed at The Dispatch's production facility.…
Brit Marling: No Ordinary Earthling
A year ago Brit Marling was just another aspiring Los Angeles-based actress and filmmaker with visions of cinematic grandeur. Flash-forward 12 months and the 27-year-old is living the Sundance dream as a promising multi-hyphenate talent whose breakout film, Another Earth, is invading art-house cinemas across the country and whose blonde-haired, blue-eyed beauty has yielded glossy…
The Clash, ICP and Satan
[HOT] The Clash and the Clashes Many Punk fans around the world first learned about “real” London through the music of The Clash. The spirit of “The Only Band That Matters” has been hovering over the city lately, starting last month when the campaign to bring people to next year’s Summer Olympics included a version…
Head Games
CRITIC'S PICK How many people can make jokes in porcelain? Or even, going up to the next level, are witty in porcelain? Artists Katie Parker and Guy Michael Davis regularly carry off that difficult feat in the course of creating works of considerable beauty and technical éclat. Current examples of their joint productions may be…
Council Majority Reaps What it Sows on Zoning Delay
C incinnati voters can tell it’s an election year by the blatant demagoguery and pandering that’s going on. Instead of getting busy and crafting its own budget proposal to suggest specific cuts to avoid a $33 million deficit next year, Cincinnati City Council’s conservative majority is wasting time grandstanding about a relatively insignificant issue to…
Oh, How The Mighty Has Risen
Cincy trio The Mighty celebrates the release of its self-titled debut album Saturday at downtown club Mainstay. The 10 p.m. release party also includes performances by newcomers The Future Strikes and solid rockers A Decade to Die For. Have you ever reached for a drink at a party and grabbed the wrong one? Even if…
Read My Scripts
While you might think of a play or a musical as entertainment — which it is — there’s another dimension worth considering. They are also works of literature, words written on a page meant to be spoken or perhaps sung. The success or failure of a performed work often hinges on the quality of the…
Figuring Out the ‘Heat Index’
Day and night, local TV weather forecasters tell us how hot and humid it is and will be. They use “heat index” in summer, just as they had “wind chill” in winter, to increase our anxieties about weather conditions. My question: Although forecasters state “heat index” as fact, how do they know how hot any…
August 10-16: Worst Week Ever!
WEDNESDAY AUG. 10 The Lexington Herald Leader today reported that the state of Kentucky will give a 75-percent property tax break to a sweet biblical theme park that will have a full-sized replica of Noah's Ark. The state has already given $43 million in incentives to the Answers in Genesis folks who brought you The…
The Uninsured Take Another Hit
Hamilton County voters will decide if $6.5 million in funding should be cut from University Hospital after county officials recently decided to put a revamped property tax levy on the fall ballot. Commissioner Greg Hartmann, a Republican, introduced the proposal earlier this month to reduce the Health and Hospitalization levy, commonly known as the Indigent…
Mariah Reynolds and Double Dippers
[WINNER] MT. AUBURN PRESBYTERIAN: Long known as one of the most progressive and inclusive churches in the Tristate, Mount Auburn Presbyterian Church recently celebrated the 20th anniversary of its “Policy on the Inclusion of Gays and Lesbians.” The policy states, “We affirm that gays and lesbians are part of God's good creation and that they,…
Fast Good Food
According to recent research, typical Americans consume three hamburgers each week. Unfortunately, many of them are gulped down from drive-thru lanes at fast-food restaurants. If we eat so many of these quintessentially American sandwiches, why don’t we take the time to at least seek out quality? With the recent opening of Flippin’ Jimmy’s (14 E.…
Breaking Ground for Groundbreakers
The list of Cincinnati’s King Records acts whose influence on future musicians — often some of the greats of Rock & Roll — has proved greater than their own enduring fame is still growing longer. The latest addition is Lowman “Pete” Pauling and The “5” Royales. The Rhythm & Blues vocal group recorded for King…
Another Earth (Review)
A sad young astrophysicist (Brit Marling), improbably doubling as a high school janitor, shows up to offer cleaning services at the neglected home of the even glummer composer (William Mapother) whom she wronged years ago, even though they’ve never met. After much scrubbing, hemming and hawing, the long-faced pair fall in love, even as a…
Going Green Gets Easier
The Civic Garden Center of Greater Cincinnati is opening a new learning station that is aimed at teaching urban dwellers how to live green. The Green Learning Station, which is opening Aug. 20, will focus on teaching city residents about composting, catching falling stormwater for reuse and how to garden anywhere. “We wanted to create…
McClellan: Super Villian of Comedy
If you Google search “John McClellan,” you’ll find the late Democratic senator from Arkansas and the 19th-century chemist. So what is comedian, Akron native and onetime Cincinnatian John McClellan — who brought his "Punk Rock" stand-up tour to Northside's tiny music club/bar The Comet Aug. 13 — doing to distance himself from his fellow McClellans?…
Chris Burns [Hearth, Homestead]
When Chris Burns left The Bistro after seven years as chef, he'd made a lot of good connections in the farm-to-table movement. Now Chris and and his wife, Tess, are developing two new business concepts: Hearth, and Homestead. Hearth is a 21st-century general store, and Homestead will connect city folk with their rural heritage. He's…
A Horse of a Different Flavor
Darkness pervades The Chocolate Horse’s third album, Beasts, evidenced by the moody cover art (a horse’s ebony head atop a human form barely visible in the shadows) and actualized with a powerfully melancholy sound. And yet, flickers of light pierce the album’s dark veil. “This record was after a pretty intense portion of my life,”…
Dancing Wasabi (Review)
CRITIC'S PICK Those of you dancing your way through the summer heat with cool drinks and sushi should be sure to waltz over the Dancing Wasabi’s new location in Hyde Park. Owner Charlie Choi recently sold his Mount Lookout location, which will soon reopen as Cloud Nine. I hadn’t been to the Mount Lookout location…
Beta
Exiled from Main Street XXXXI: for Kevin Flanigan It was my birthday, but you know it wasn’t a big deal or anything. Like no one declared, “Let’s go out tonight and celebrate your birthday, Mark.” Going out just happened, as usual. It consisted, sadly, of driving up and down the strip — which I now…
Morning News and Stuff
Police are trying to identify members of a flash mob involved in a mobbery(?) that occurred at a Germantown, Maryland 7-Eleven on Saturday. Mohammad Jebanzeb, the store owner’s son, told NBC Washington that almost three dozen young people walked in the store and left a minute later with candy, sodas and other items without paying…
Q&A with Return to Forever
New York-based band Return to Forever made a name for itself in the ’70s as one of the premier Jazz Fusion ensembles, alongside Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orchestra. After a brief return in the ’80s, the band re-formed in 2008 and has seen wild worldwide success since the comeback. The group was a breeding ground…
Surprise! Pomegranates Release New Album
Yesterday, successful Cincinnati Indie Pop quartet Pomegranates (playing tonight at Brooklyn's Knitting Factory) gave fans an unexpected treat — a new full-length album. The Poms’ unannounced In Your Face Thieves/Chestnut Attic was issued on iTunes and other e-retailers and on 12-inch vinyl from the band’s original label, Lujo Records. The album project began as a…
Squeeze the Day for 8/17
Music Tonight: Louisville kings of transcendent Rock & Roll, My Morning Jacket, bring the tour for its recent Circuital album to Riverbend’s PNC Pavilion tonight. Tickets ($50.70-$56.35) remain for the 7 p.m. show. MMJ have been everywhere lately, showing up on VH1’s Storytellers and most of the late-night chat shows, in almost every music magazine…
W&S Open: Day Three: Roddick Melts Down
Although I missed the morning and afternoon session of Day Three, Brian Taylor snagged a few key photo opportunities. From Center Court, there are shots of the match between Svetlana Kuznetsova versus American qualifier Jill Craybas. The results, with Kuznetsova cruising 6-3, 6-4 into the second round, speak to the stout power of the talented…
