Art: Colony at U-turn Art Space
U.turn, the cooperative gallery at 2159 Central Ave. in Brighton, begins its new year with an interesting and unusual set of exhibitions collectively titled Colony. Photographer Adam Longbonz's show, Half Breed, offers images of Caucasian young adults dressed like the Native Americans of yore. Travis Meinolf, a German-based “action weaver” whose work is in the…
Events: Know Theatre and CityBeat’s NYE Speakeasy
We’re turning the Know Theatre’s Jackson Street Underground bar into a 1920s speakeasy for our fourth annual swingin’ New Year’s Eve party. Dress in your best Roaring Twenties attire, all you flappers and fellas, and get ready to party like it’s Prohibition. All attendees will be asked for a secret password in order to enter.…
Music: The Auburnaires
The Comet in Northside presents a special New Year’s Eve shindig Thursday night with a reunion show by one of Cincinnati’s finest bands of yesteryear. The Auburnaires were kind of the like the house party band for Cincinnati’s Jockey Club/post-Jockey Club Punk scene, playing down-’n-dirty Garage Soul/Funk/R&B with an electrifying energy. The band — fronted…
Events: Masquerade Concert and Ball with the CSO
So maybe you aren’t looking to get super drunk and make out with a stranger in some random bar on New Year’s Eve. That’s cool. You don’t have to. Have some class and hang out with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra as they ring in the New Year with Masquerade, a concert and ball. Don’t worry…
Events: BB Riverboats’ NYE Cruise
While there’s a novelty to spending New Year’s Eve on a boat, there are some serious advantages, too: Your date can’t walk out on you (though she might swim for it if you’re a real cad) and as long as you plan for transportation at the night’s end, there’s no chance of a DUI. It’s…
Music: Grasshopper Juice Records’ NYE Party Bus
The folks behind local label Grasshopper Juice could hardly be accused of doing things conventionally. The label’s roster spans Indie, Hip Hop, Jazz, Electronica and Americana — and some GJ artists combine all of those elements (and then some) into one. For Thursday’s most unique New Year’s Eve blow-out, give GJ’s Party Bus/Music Festival in…
Music: The Koala Fires
Local Indie rockers The Koala Fires have the honor of having the first Cincinnati-spawned release of the new year/decade and, therefore, it’s the best local release of the year/decade so far! In all seriousness, The Beeping in Our Hearts is a strong effort that certainly has the potential to be on future “best of” lists.…
Events: Midnight in Munich
Time is relative so celebrate New Year’s Eve with some German flair at 6 p.m. at Mecklenburg Gardens. It might not be midnight in Cincinnati then, but it is in Munich! At the stroke of this relative midnight there will be an accordion song, lots of large handmade pretzels and a bunch of other German…
Events: Wendy’s Bridal Show
The Duke Energy Center is hosting an event for brides-to-be, bridezillas, wishful thinkers and anyone who loves white dresses and floral arrangements. Wendy's 30th annual Bridal Show offers exhibitions on Saturday and Sunday in everything from caterers and decorators to formalwear and travel. Talk directly to over 150 wedding day professionals and get access to…
Comedy: Lisa Landry
“I was the fat, weird kid,” recalls comedian Lisa Landry. “I was the geeky kid who was socially awkward and had a very sassy mouth.” And, like other kids, she didn’t get along with her brother at times. “He’s gay, so it was mostly over taking my dresses.” Today, she lives in Los Angeles with…
Music: Save the Music Benefit
Saturday night, you should be all sobered up and ready to get “Stone-d” at The Mad Frog. The Corryville club is hosting a benefit for VH1’s Save the Music foundation, which strives to strengthen music education in public schools. The night’s theme is The Rolling Stones — Blessid Union of Souls, Freekbass & Tobotius and…
Events: Boar’s Head and Yule Log Festival
As one of the oldest Christmas traditions, the Boar’s Head and Yule Log Festival came to Christ Church Cathedral on its 600th birthday in 1940. Since then this pageant has been presented annually for 70 years with costumes, an elaborate musical ceremony, mince pie, plum pudding and a hog’s head (because we ain’t got no…
Music: High Strange Drifters
In 2003, a group consisting of some of the best musicians in the area released Ancient Tones and Death Knells, a CD of traditional 17th-19th century broadside ballads from the UK, spun in a more modern context and released under the band name High Strange Drifters. It was a riveting effort, but the CD release…
The Young Victoria (Review)
The secret to any period romance drama lies in making it seem effortless. Without emitting so much as a sigh, Emily Blunt owns the role of Britain’s young Queen Victoria. Looking suspiciously like Orlando Bloom’s evil (and more compelling) twin, Rupert Friend eventually hits his stride in the supporting part as Prince Albert, the love…
It’s Complicated (Review)
One could spend much time on the shortcomings of It’s Complicated, writer/director Nancy Meyers’ (Something’s Gotta Give) latest romantic comedy about the love lives of the middle-aged and wealthy. (This time the setting is Santa Barbara.) Its tone is out of synch with our recessionary times, its soundtrack seems lifted from a dentist’s office Muzak…
The Princess and the Frog (Review)
Disney seeks to right a social wrong by adding an African-American princess to its hallowed galley of snow white maidens. Anika Noni Rose gives voice to Tiana, a New Orleans girl with dreams of opening her own restaurant in the Big Easy, but like most of the female heroines in the line, she’s not really…
CityBeat Podcast 40: The Year in Movies
CityBeat Managing Editor Jason Gargano discusses the films of 2009, how the recession has hit the film industry and his favorite works of the past 12 months. Read Gargano's related end-of-year feature story here. —- If you like what you hear, please support our podcast by subscribing to our podcast in iTunes or via our…
Thanks for Shopping Local
CityBeat's "shop local” holiday season promotion has wrapped up, and we thank the hundreds of Cincinnatians who took the pledge to support Greater Cincinnati’s economy by supporting locally owned independent businesses. Everyone who pledged to spend at least $100 of their holiday gift purchases to "shop local" were entered into a drawing for a prize…
The Winners Are …
CityBeat's "shop local” holiday season promotion has wrapped up, and we thank the hundreds of Cincinnatians who took the pledge to support Greater Cincinnati’s economy by supporting locally owned independent businesses. Everyone who pledged to spend at least $100 of their holiday gift purchases to "shop local" were entered into a drawing for a prize…
Music: Strings for Strays
So you got a little extra “walking around money” from Grandma for Christmas, eh? Maybe you’d like to donate a little so the puppy doesn’t get it? Oh, sorry, let me explain. Saturday at The Redmoor in Mount Lookout, the “Strings for Strays” benefit concert featuring local Newgrass kings Rumpke Mountain Boys (pictured) and Jam…
Backyard Treasures
Casting a wide net is Manifest Gallery’s usual mode of operation. The “neighborhood gallery for the world” on Woodburn Avenue in East Walnut Hills attracts entries and exhibits works from all over this country and beyond. However, a current exhibition called Backyard reflects a deliberate narrowing of the field. The six objects on display are…
2009: The Year in Review
This time of year is known for lots of traditions, from holiday office parties to Christmas trees and menorahs to last-minute dashes to the mall. A favorite tradition among the media is the Year in Review feature. Who were the emerging stars, the movers and shakers, the has-beens and wanna-bes? What were the highlights, lowlights…
Home for the Holidays
The holidays are a good time to be a music fan who lives in a town that has harvested a lot of talented musicians. Many of the ones who have moved away come back home for a visit and want to play a show. Bands that live around here and tour a lot might offer…
In the Nick of Time
Until recently, there was uncertainty as to whether or not Cincinnati Ballet could continue to afford live music to accompany its performances. As part of a recent groundbreaking $85 million dollar grant to the arts focused on music from longtime Cincinnati arts philanthropist Louise Nippert, beginning in the latter half of 2010, the Ballet will…
Christmases and Change
At the end of October, when we were getting ready to move our clocks back an hour, I vented about what I go through during this time of year — especially the holidays. Forgive me, but I have a few more things to work through. I hope you don’t mind playing my therapist. On top…
Music: Dan Karlsberg Group
The Dan Karlsberg Group’s show Sunday at the Blue Wisp Jazz Club will have a reunited-and-it-feels-so-good feel as bassist Steve Whipple and drummer Anthony “T” Lee return from New York City, where they both now live and work, to join Karlsberg (pictured) for an 8:30 p.m. performance. The trio — which played together for six…
That’s a Wrap!
Movie culture, like the rest of American can society at this late date, is in a serious state of flux. The one-two combo of the recession and the continued fracturing of the pop-cultural landscape have resulted in fewer movies of every size and stripe being made by fewer distributors both big and small (the once-venerable…
Family: Cop Has Grudge Against Us
A Cleves family is charging police harassment and misconduct following a drug raid at their home earlier this month, saying the resulting charges were trumped up and they are the target of an officer with a grudge. They also claim the officer involved, Lt. Steven Hickey, should never have been hired by the Cleves Police…
Dec. 16-22: Worst Week Ever!
WEDNESDAY DEC. 16 There are a lot of bad choices one can make during his lifetime: driving drunk, having unsafe sex and giving a real e-mail address to the cashier at Best Buy are all pretty dumb. Hamilton County Commissioner Todd Portune today said his recent decision to raise the county cigarette tax was a…
Holiday Hot Spots
If you associate the holidays with drinking or just need to chemically alter yourself before or after family gatherings, here are some of the best places to live it up this season. Tonic on 4th Tonic on 4th is where to go when you want to hang out with bartenders who know what they’re doing.…
Music: Boom Bip with DJ Mowgli
Boom Bip’s career has skyrocketed since he left Cincy for the West Coast earlier this decade. Now based in L.A., Bip (Bryan Hollon) has done Peel Sessions, toured the globe, remixed tracks for Mogwai, Four Tet, M83 and Danny Elfman, remained the dominant force on Lex Records (also home to Danger Mouse) and formed an…
View from the Couch
Year-end “best-of” lists give me the jitters. Yes, I know: poor Phil. It’s true, though. Ranking 12 months’ worth of DVD releases is an overwhelming task. Worse still is the mad rush to watch as many as possible as the year fades in an effort to catch an overlooked title. The stacks of unwatched screeners…
Music: All the Day Holiday
Two of Cincinnati's most likely next-big-thing contenders (not that they aren’t doing really well as it is), All the Day Holiday (pictured) and Pomegranates spent 2009 working superb new records. ATDH's lush Dream Pop was introduced to the world via All the Things We've Grown to Love, their stunning debut for Linc Star/Warner Brothers, while…
Music: Noah Hunt and Jason Dennie
Singer Noah Hunt and guitarist Jason Dennie will perform together on New Year’s Eve with the 420 All-Stars at Stanley’s Pub, the place where the duo initially cut its teeth back in the mid ’90s. The fingerstyle guitar master Dennie (based in Michigan since 1999) and Hunt (singer for the Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band since…
NYE 2010: Worst Case Survival Guide
-Illustrations by Nathan Kissel HOW TO FIND A BETTER PARTY Pretty much everyone has a party on New Year’s Eve, even your parents and their friends, so it’s your responsibility to find the best one or else you’re in big trouble and you’ll ruin the greatest party night of the year for yourself and all…
Heroes of the Zeroes
As we approach the beginning of a new decade, I decided to try to think of 100 reasons why I've enjoyed covering Cincinnati music over the past 3,650 days. At first I was worried I might not be able to come up with enough. A couple of hours into an “off the top of my…
Re:Viewing the First Decade of the New Millennium
During the annual year-end celebrations and sentimental retrospectives, 2009 affords us the occasion to review more than just the milestones of a single year. Thanksgiving has come and gone, but I feel this is a more perfect opportunity to show my appreciation as a sign of the times. On a front that is both personal…
Magnificent Gifts
Cincinnati’s Classical music community was stunned and blessed by a remarkable gift announced on Dec. 10. Louise Dieterle Nippert, a long-time (although low-profile) supporter of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Cincinnati Opera, established an $85 million fund that will sustain those two organizations and Cincinnati Ballet for years to come. The fund will make it…
Sweet Child ’09
CityBeat’s music writing brigade found a lot to love about music in the last year of the ’00s (for those who claim the new decade doesn’t start until 2011 … get over it, math nerds). From locals to underground sensations to mainstream oddities and commodities, 2009 was something to write home about. We asked them…
Brave New World
If you’re a film buff, you might have noticed that several art/independent titles figuring prominently in 2009 and 2008 end-of-year awards lists — Summer Hours, In the Loop, Gomorrah, A Christmas Tale, Che — did not play a first-run theater in Cincinnati. Nor has perhaps 2009’s most talked-about art film, Lars Von Trier’s Antichrist. Or…
Music: The Sundresses and Wussy
Thanks to the weekend-friendly way Christmas falls this year (thanks, Jesus!), Saturday night looks like it might well take over alleged “biggest bar day of the year” (a.k.a. Thanksgiving Eve) honors. If you’re a fan of original local music, your choices for Christmas Steve — the customary name for “day after Christmas,” and by customary…
Cintas Workers and Dale Mallory
[WINNER] CINTAS WORKERS: Maybe Scott Farmer and the Cintas board of directors took their tips on how to run a business from old Charles Dickens novels. It would help explain why the Mason-based firm keeps getting multiple federal fines for workplace safety violations and why workers across the nation continually sue for back pay. Cintas…
Politicians Scurrying To and Fro
President Obama and his supremely obnoxious chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, should be more honest. The $871 billion health care reform bill passed by the U.S. Senate Dec. 21 after eight long and tedious months of debate is, by all indications, almost the exact bill that both men had in mind when they began this…
Events: New Year’s Parties, Dinners, Special Events and Survival Tips
Want to meet up with interesting strangers? Have you been known to blame it all on the mistletoe? Do you want to run 2009 out of town like it stole your money and called your mom bad names? Is Dec. 31 the last night you get to party before entering the witness protection program? If…
Music: Heartless Bastards and J. Dorsey Blues Band
The Heartless Bastards had fans stacked on top of each other last Christmastime at Northside Tavern (or so legend has it, since I couldn't get in) when they played a free two-night stand. You’ll have to pony up some dough this year, but the Bastards will again be home for the holidays (from their current…
Wise Owl (Review)
Located near Union Centre in West Chester, somewhere between the Marriott and Ikea, my husband and I found a surprise in a strip mall. Billed by a friend as a tapas restaurant and wine bar, the hubs and I arrived at The Wise Owl around 8 p.m. on a Saturday night prepared to fill our…
