A WOXY Christmas
HOT Cyber Caroing Sick of "White Christmas" and "Jingle Bells"? Rejuvenated, Cincinnati-based online radio station <a (or="(or" The Gaurdian's Web site (blogs.guardian.co.uk). "Shane's Yule Blog" is a surprisingly coherent collection of random thoughts in his first couple of posts, MacGowan rails against the smoking bans in Ireland and Scotland (something he's ignored while onstage…
The Rich Get Richer, the Poor Get Jailed
Graham Lienhart Calling for more — not less — emphasis on social services in the city budget are (L-R) Dan La Botz, Michael Patton and Thomas Dutton, protesting near Fountain Square. The people who successfully campaigned against a sales tax for a new jail have turned their attention to proposed city budget cuts. Members…
White Lies, Black Celebrations
I'm not feeling the holiday spirit. That's not to say I don't have much to celebrate this year. I'm a newlywed who proposed so awkwardly on New Year's Eve that I promised my wife I'd try it again every year until I get it right, and this year marks my first replay. I'm also a…
Film: Men at Work
Universal Pictures Angelina Jolie and Matt Damon are husband and wife in Robert DeNiro's epic CIA drama, The Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd is the best Martin Scorsese film since Goodfellas. The brooding, thoughtful script from Eric Roth (The Insider, Munich) examines the early days of the Central Intelligence Agency from the perspective of…
Cover Story: The Year in Film and Music: Listopia 2006
Sean Hughes Heartless Bastards Top Five Posthumous Releases of '06 By Singer/Songwriter David Wolfenberger (bluejordan.com/david) Bob Dylan: Modern Times In case we'd forgotten just how old Zimmy was, he put out this gem of an album that sounds like it could have been recorded in the Catskills in the 1930s. Nevertheless, as a card-carrying…
News to Use
Don't Tell Gordon Peace activists are planning a surprise party for Gordon Maham, who will be 90 years old next month. Maham, a conscientious objector who served three years in federal prison during World War II, has been a tireless worker for an end to the nuclear arms race. The party is at 1 p.m.…
Cover Story: The Year in Film and Music: Real Life vs. Reel Life
Geoff Raker The Year in Film and Music "The truth," a character quips in Oscar Wilde's timeless comedy of manners The Importance of Being Earnest, "is rarely pure and never simple." That the speaker is a liar and the character spoken to has invented his own history only adds to the deliciousness of the…
Rumors, Lies and General Misunderstandings
· Like Over the Rhine's annual Christmas show at the Taft Theatre, local Jazz great Steve Schmidt's yearly "Christmas Spectacular" has become a Cincinnati music tradition around the holidays. This year, Schmidt's organ trio plays Thursday (at 8:30 p.m.) and Friday (9 p.m.) at The Comet in Northside. Schmidt (who's whipping out his Hammond organ)…
Music: Sounds Like Christmas
Sarah McLachlan — Wintersong You may need a pretty big stocking to call this year's holiday CDs stocking stuffers. With a deluge of releases, it would take a sleigh to carry this year's selection. Here is a look at some of the more notable holiday CDs that have hit shelves at your favorite retailer.…
Footprints in the Snow
Jake?s Notes: This song is a tribute to James Kim, the father who gave his life trekking through the snowy, Oregon wilderness trying to save his wife and two girls who were stranded. I broke down in tears as I wrote this song and imagined how his wife, Kati, must remember that final moment before…
News: Sun Dance
When Christians think of Christmas, they think of the birth of the Son. But for some people, this time of year actually marks the birth of the Sun — a spiritual event linked to the longest night and the return of the light. Called Yule or Saturnalia and other names down the millennia, behind the…
Music: Splendor in the ‘Grass
Ryan Noga/Asiproductions The Rumpke Mountain Boys (L-R), Jason Wolf, Travis "The Hippie" Gates, Adam Copeland and Ben Gourley) take "Newgrass" to new heights. For the past five years, Jason Wolf and the Rumpke Mountain Boys have been entertaining audiences in the Cincinnati area and surrounding regions with a Bluegrass/Jam hybrid that he and the…
In My ‘Expert’ Opinion…
I'm a big sports fan, and I always enjoy reading the "experts" who predict the winners and losers before a particular season begins. I doubt anyone who calls themselves a baseball expert picked the St. Louis Cardinals to win the World Series or the Detroit Tigers to reach the Series. On the other hand, a…
News: A Creek Runs Through It
Mill Creek Watershed Council Mike Miller takes a break while canoeing on one of the less obviously polluted sretches of the Mill Creek, a long-troubled urban stream. The Commodore of the Mill Creek Yacht Club believes the waterway is in better shape than it used to be. Although there are still abuses occurring today,…
Where Do UC’s and Xavier’s Seasons Go After the Shootout?
Jerry Dowling Crosstown Shootout Week arrived with a buzz about no buzz, then went out with a buzz. We understand these teams a little better now, no thanks to ESPN, and we at least know what we see even if we don't always like it. The University of Cincinnati brought a basketball team with…
Cash Is in the Eye of the Beholder
It's a question that I have been asked thousands of times: "How does a blind person identify money?" Unless a person has enough residual vision to identify money by sight, the only way blind people can identify money is to develop a workable system for memorization. Blind people are all different, so there are lots…
Holiday Productions
For another week or so you can catch holiday productions at area theaters — some wrap up this weekend, while a few others continue until the end of the month. Cincinnati theatergoers were cheered this season by several new shows (Cincinnati Shakespeare's Every Christmas Story Ever Told is a comic delight; it wraps up its…
Cover Story: The Year in Film and Music: Head Games
Picturehouse Films Nicole Kidman plays Diane Arbus in Fur, director Steven Shainberg's "imaginary portrait" of the famed photographer. Robert McKee, the screenwriting lecturer and author of Story, believes that three distinct styles of movie narrative occupy a pyramid of importance: classical design, minimalism and anti-structure. The first is by far the most popular, with…
Film: Motown Redux
Paramount Classics (L-R) Anika Noni Rose, Beyonce Knowles and Jennifer Hudson are the Dreamgirls. We walk side by side through life, but we might never fully understand one another's worlds: those who embrace musicals and those who don't. For some, the unabashed emotionalism of swingin', singin' drama might work only on the stage; for…
The Right Ingredients
The Westin is sporting a new look these days — Ingredients (21 E. Fifth St., downtown, 513-852-2740) has sprinkled some pizzazz in the hotel's lobby with its modern furniture and gourmet-to-go concept. Along with lunch and breakfast fare, Ingredients offers a coffee bar (with Starbucks beans and Tazo teas), a lounge area and free wireless.…
Cover Story: The Year in Film and Music: The Long Goodbye
Picturehouse Films Robert Altman, whose career as a director spanned more than 50 years, died on Nov. 20. From United 93 to Borat, the illusion of authenticity has been at the forefront of this year's best movies. In an era of reality TV, behind-the-scenes documentaries and pervasive Internet access to every subject imaginable, that…
Art: Dolls, Dolls, Dolls
Jim Fugett Rhonda Gushee's distinctive figures are a highlight of ArtWorks Gallery's Figuratively Speaking. The current exhibition at ArtWorks Gallery, Figuratively Speaking, is a collection of dolls. More accurately, the exhibition investigates some of the most interesting ideas that contemporary art has to offer — the Freudian theory of the "uncanny," the complexity of…
Locals Only: : Fetal Position
Joe Lamb Eatafetus Trio The phone rings. It's Miguel Ricardos, the guitar player for local Punk band Eatafetus Trio. He says the band is running late, but they can be recognized when they walk into the bar because he is wearing leopard-print pants. Not quite believing him, a simple jean jacket is what will…
Diner: Destination: Dinner
Meadowlark Go: 2094 Miamisburg-Centerville Road, Dayton Call: 937-434-4750 Hours: 11:30 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday; 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m. Friday-Saturday; 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Sunday Prices: Moderate Payment: Major credit cards Red Meat Alternatives: Seafood, chicken and vegetarian options Accessibility: Fully accessible Grade: A- Elizabeth Wiley stood in her packed dining room surveying the scene. A long, dark wooden…
Living Out Loud: : His Bic Pen & the Future
Robert Yager Richard Ford Back in late October, I had the pleasure of talking to Richard Ford about his new book, The Lay of the Land, which had just been released and for which he had begun a long book tour that continues until year end (see "On the Road Again," issue of Nov. 29-Dec.5).…
News: Clinical Decision
Joe Lamb Budgetary hearings are usually pretty mundane affairs, but controversial proposed funding cuts prompted a large turnout for the Dec. 12 hearing at the Duke Energy Convention Center. Cincinnati officials are scheduled to decide this week on what services to cut in the 2007-08 municipal budget to avert a projected $28 million deficit.…
