Them Bones Places Third in Memphis’ IBC
Cincinnati Blues foursome Cheryl Renee and Them Bones are back from the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, where they came in third place in the "band" category. The group, competing against dozens of bands from around the world, won cash and other prizes for their impressive victory. —- Them Bones earned its way into the…
Walter Mosley Creates Drama
Walter Mosley hates to be pigeonholed. Perhaps that goes back to his origins: His mother, Ella Slatkin, was Jewish; his father, Leroy Mosley, was African American. His genealogy perhaps instilled in him a desire to explore different avenues, and that’s what his life has been about. A computer programmer until he was 34, he’s now…
Suzie Wong’s on Madison (Review)
“Who is this Suzie Wong, anyway?” my husband asked as we opened the restaurant door on a particularly frigid January night. His comment quickly threw me into a film noir mood, which isn’t all that extraordinary if you know my husband. In the movie reel in my head, Suzie sneaks up behind our detective, surreptitiously…
Music: Chatham County Line
By all appearances, Chatham County Line is a Bluegrass band. But things are clearly not always as they seem. Guitarist Dave Wilson, mandolinist/multi-instrumentalist John Teer, banjoist Chandler Holt and upright bassist Greg Readling certainly satisfy the Bluegrass archetype, but their songs, their frenetic stage presentation and their intention to evolve and grow as a band…
Red Idle Rejects (Profile)
When Steve Bowling first got together with his bandmates in Red Idle, the band he helped assemble a decade ago, they began by playing original songs for each other. Bowling breezed through a few of his compositions, eventually hauling out “Where the Lonely Reside,” a Countryesque tune informed by Bowling’s Appalachian roots, which sparked an…
‘Earthquakes’ Featuring State Song
Some people have long thought DJs and dance clubs are hastening the death of live music. But can’t they all just get along? That’s the approach of "Earthquakes," the monthly live music/dance night at Northside’s Mayday. On the last Saturday of every month, founder Kendall Bruns (and fellow DJ John Hogan) spin a variety of…
Music: Dana Hall
Dana Hall isn't merely a Jazz drummer — he's a magician who elicits the same jaw dropping reaction with a kit and sticks that David Copperfield gets when he makes aircraft carriers or the Statue of Liberty vanish. The gifted rhythmatist started out by earning a degree in aerospace engineering at Iowa State before getting…
‘Help for Haiti’ Benefit
Last week’s cross-network TV telethon raised more than $60 million to aid a devastated Haiti, and in the coming weeks local musicians and venues will be doing their part for the cause (which isn’t going to cease needing monetary support anytime soon). Organizers for Sunday’s “Help for Haiti” benefit at Oakley’s 20th Century Theatre put…
Music: Winter Blues Fest
The Cincy Blues Society's Winter Blues Fest is beginning to rival the organization's long-running, successful summer Blues Fest in terms of talent and lineup size. The fourth annual event takes place Friday and Saturday, and if you ever wanted to explore the Blues talent in Greater Cincinnati, you won't find a better event. Utilizing the…
Music: Cancer Bats
Nobody likes getting robbed, but Liam Cormier especially hates it. The likely reason the Cancer Bats vocalist is so ardently against the crime is because it’s affected him and the rest of the Toronto band before. In an April 2008 interview with Eye Weekly, Cormier discussed a then-recent Canada/U.S. tour being interrupted by robbery. While…
Music: Help for Haiti Benefit
Organizers for Sunday’s “Help for Haiti” benefit at Oakley’s 20th Century Theatre put together a show in just a few days, and the massive and diverse roster of performers shows just how quick to help local artists are when an important cause comes up. The 6 p.m. concert will have Them Bones featuring Cheryl Renee,…
Help for Haiti, Remembering Esme and Beating the Winter Blues
More Help for Haiti Last week’s cross-network TV telethon raised more than $60 million (and counting) to aid a devastated Haiti, and in the coming weeks local musicians and venues will be doing their part for the cause (which isn’t going to cease needing monetary support anytime soon). Organizers for Sunday’s “Help for Haiti” benefit…
Esme Kenney Memorial Benefit
Those who pay attention to local news will no doubt remember the tragic story of 13-year-old Esme Kenney, a student at the School for Creative and Performing Arts who was murdered while jogging near her house last year. Kenney loved music, studying guitar, cello and vocals, so this Saturday's memorial show at Northside Tavern is…
Winter Blues Fest
Cure for the winter blues? Winter Blues! The Cincy Blues Society's Winter Blues Fest is beginning to rival the organization's long-running, successful summer Blues Fest in terms of talent and lineup size. The fourth annual event takes place Friday and Saturday, and if you ever wanted to explore the Blues talent in Greater Cincinnati, you…
Yost Jumps Races, Angers Teabaggers
Delaware County Prosecutor Dave Yost made it official today, ending his candidacy for Ohio Attorney General and instead launching a bid to become Ohio Auditor, a move that angers some conservatives.—- “Business, political and grassroots leaders across this great state have called on me during the last several days to put aside my personal plans…
Addressing the Situation
Clearly we can’t all have a Round 1 of Big and Carrie Bradshaw’s wedding in Sex and the City, but in the end it turned out that they kept it true to themselves anyhow: unique and simple. Having a beautiful and meaningful wedding while saving money and the Earth might seem far out of reach…
Art: A Seductive Journey at Clay Street Press
For the new year’s first opening show at Clay Street Press, Mark Patsfall is joined in a three-person exhibition entitled A Seductive Journey by Mark Dejong and Steve Pastz. The three traveled to Cambodia and Vietnam together in the spring of last year and have all made artistic responses to their shared journey. The profound…
Miss Julie (Review)
Playwrights, like novelists, often delve into their own lives for dramatic material. Sweden’s August Strindberg (1849-1912) was, his biographers suggest, more inwardly obsessed than most. His hammering naturalistic drama, Miss Julie (1889), bears witness. It emerged during the first of his three stormy marriages, this one to Siri von Essen, an actress of reportedly less…
Rejuvenated Chaos from Cancer Bats
Nobody likes getting robbed, but Liam Cormier especially hates it. The likely reason the Cancer Bats vocalist is so ardently against the crime is because it’s affected him and the rest of the Toronto band before. In an April 2008 interview with Eye Weekly, Cormier discussed a then-recent Canada/U.S. tour being interrupted by robbery. While…
Music: Earthquakes with State Song
Some people have long thought DJs and dance clubs are hastening the death of live music. But can’t they all just get along? That’s the approach of Earthquakes, the monthly live music/dance night at Northside’s Mayday. On the last Saturday of every month, founder Kendall Bruns (and fellow DJ John Hogan) spin a variety of…
Get Involved: Help for Haiti Events
Everyone enjoys the chance to say, “That was my good deed for the day,” so here are a few choices to help those in need in Haiti. Your wallet may feel a little lighter, but so will your soul. There will be a “Hair for Haiti Cut-athon” at Salon Urbanity, located across from Sawyer Point…
Art: New Voices at InkTank
Synergy will run high at InkTank for Final Friday, with a presentation of New Voices photographs and videos by School for Creative and Performing Arts students, under the aegis of Prairie Gallery. “New Voices provided an opportunity for SCPA creative writing students to explore the community around Washington Park in words and photographs. The work…
Art: Jay Bolotin at the Carl Solway Gallery
Jay Bolotin is one of Cincinnati's most important and intriguing artists, and his projects elevate the city's importance to national and international art followers. He's busy at work on the second part of his trilogy The Jackleg Testament, the first part of which is a woodcut motion picture with music (and an accompanying edition of…
Hughie/Krapp’s Last Tape (Review)
Critic's Pick Eugene O’Neill and Samuel Beckett bookend the playwriting spectrum: O’Neill uses lots of words, while Beckett is a minimalist. Works by each debuted in the late 1950s: O’Neill’s Hughie (a big role for one older actor with a small part for another) and Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape, a piece for a solo actor…
Comedy: Vic Henley
"My show’s always different,” says Comedian Vic Henley. “I try to mix it up when I come to (Cincinnati).” Henley plays Go Bananas about once a year and feels he really has his finger on the pulse of the Tristate. “I’ve been there so many times over the years, I know a lot of things…
Music: Esme Kenney Memorial Benefit Concert
Esme Kenny was by all accounts a 13-years-old prodigy — an intellectually and creatively gifted seventh grader at the School for the Creative and Performing Arts (SCPA) — when she was murdered last year near her home in the woods east of Winton Road. In the year since her death her family and members of…
Events: Cincy Winter Beerfest
Celebrate the third annual Cincy Winter Beerfest by sampling over 125 unique, cold craft beers inside the warm, toasty walls of the Hyatt Regency on Saturday evening. That’s over 15,000 square feet of beer! And because drinking for hours and hours can get boring (jk!), there’s also going to be live music, including party band…
Love Boats, Enchanted Forests and More
Weddings and receptions can occur anywhere. They don’t have to be in a church or a rented hall. They could be outdoors or at your favorite bar or an art museum. They could even be on a boat. “There are a couple of things I would change about my wedding, but the reception would not…
Nice Day for a Green Wedding
Most little girls at least have a blueprint of their wedding plans before they’re even in grade school. It starts simple enough: a bouquet of dandelions, a gown from the dress-up box and mud pies for dessert. By the time these little girls are grown up, however, their expectations will have changed. Maybe they’ve watched…
More than a Piece of Paper
If you asked a 9-year-old girl to describe her dream wedding for you, her vision likely wouldn’t involve purple and green Chuck Taylors, two brides sporting slick tuxedo vests or a drag show at the reception. But spouses Lisa and Adrienne Ray wouldn’t have had it any other way. The duo, who moved to Massachusetts…
Onstage: My Name Is Asher Lev
Chaim Potok, who died in 2002, grew up in a distinctive subculture, Hassidic Judaism. His parents, Polish immigrants, raised him in a household devoted to the practice of a strict religious faith. He was subsequently ordained as a rabbi and served as an Army chaplain during the Korean conflict. Returning home, he followed a new…
Wedding 101
The number of variables that go along with planning a wedding can feel overwhelming. But bridal exhibitions and conventions make it easier to sort out the lists of what you want, what you can afford and what’s available. Tracy Claiborne, who organizes the Cincinnati Bridal Expo, has more than 75 wedding professionals on hand to…
Comedy: Jeff Dunham
Once, while visiting The Late Show, David Letterman introduced Jeff Dunham as “a man who has twice won the prestigious Ventriloquist of the Year Award,” to which the crowd tittered. However, when Dunham came out with his Walter character, he killed, as usual. Ventriloquism might not be the hippest art form in 2010, but Dunham…
Dance: CDT ZviDance
If hot topics such as marriage and the courtship rituals of seeking a lover set to music by Stravinsky and Nick Cave sound appealing, you won’t want to miss New York City-based ZviDance’s first-ever local performances. Contemporary Dance Theater’s Executive and Artistic Director Jefferson James explains that ZviDance had been on her “short list” of…
Be a Part of Shepard Fairey’s Public Muralworks
The Contemporary Arts Center is looking for sites that want to be turned into public works of art in conjunction with the Shepard Fairey: Supply and Demand exhibit. The artworks will be pasted paper projects applied with wheat paste. They are not permanent, but some have been known to be long lasting. By submitting your…
Heartless Bastards Media Blitz
Cincinnati-bred band Heartless Bastards were all over the TV this weekend. Along with the group's stellar Austin City Limits debut Saturday (where the band showcased its diversity with the addition of fiddle and acoustic and lap steel guitar on a few songs), the Bastards appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live Friday night. —- Below is a…
Sherry: The Drink of the Moment
Sherry (the topic of this week’s Fermentations column) is probably the most overlooked major wine category in the U.S. today. Part of the reason, I think, is that Americans generally seem to prefer fruit-driven, plush, simple wines that tend toward the sweet end of the spectrum. Lighter-styled, more-complex dry Sherries that pair well with food…
Wilson, Teabaggers Plot Against GOP
An organizer of Greater Cincinnati's Tea Party movement is telling its members the Ohio Republican Party chairman is trying to manipulate potential candidates in the race for Ohio auditor to pit two Teabggers against each other and split the vote, clearing the path for the chairman's cousin to be the GOP's nominee in the race…
We’re on Team Levi
The personal travails of Sarah Palin’s family life normally wouldn’t be newsworthy if it weren’t for Palin’s sanctimonious public statements and campaigning on issues like teen sex, abortion and so-called “family values.” With that in mind, watching the protracted custody battle between Palin’s daughter, Bristol, and ex-boyfriend Levi Johnston over their daughter holds the same…
Common Cause, Others Fight Court Ruling
This week’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allows corporations to make unlimited contributions to political campaigns has been widely criticized by many moderates and progressives as an action that could distort democracy and confuse the electorate. Now Common Cause/Ohio is joining the wave of opposition, calling the decision “a major blow to established campaign reforms…
Friday Movie Roundup: King of the World Strikes Again
The Golden Globes remain a guilty pleasure marked by fashion faux pas (Sandra Bullock’s uninspired dress looked like something my prom date wore back in the day), longwinded speeches (Drew Barrymore and Mo’Nique could learned a thing or two from the pithy Robert Downey Jr.), a few pleasant surprises (including Christoph Waltz’s supporting actor win…
Extraordinary Measures (Review)
With the rise of basic cable, what we used to know as the “made-for-TV movie”— usually biographical, issue-oriented dramas the likes of which still fill time slots on Oxygen and Lifetime — is easy to avoid if you’re not actively seeking it out. Or, in the case of Extraordinary Measures, it’s trying to sneak its…
Eels, Pearl, Motion City Soundtrack and Spoon
January is typically a slow month for me, given the slightly lighter tour schedules that generally accompany the post-holiday, winter weather doldrums. And yet I find myself in the midst of a veritable shitstorm of assignments and deadlines and interviews and reviews and pre-planning and executing. Perhaps it’s a sign of a better 2010 to…
Stage Door: Last Chance for ‘Spring Awakening’
The best ticket this weekend could be the touring production of Spring Awakening, onstage at the Aronoff Center through Sunday. Because its subject matter is a tad gloomy — and a bit edgy for the typical Broadway show-goer — you shouldn't have any problem getting a seat for the 2007 Tony Award winner. And if…
ReUse-apalooza Tonight at Building Value
The nonprofit Building Value organization (which recycles and resells building materials) hosts its first ReUse-apalooza tonight to celebrate the benefits of reuse through art. The fun will include live music from Comet Bluegrass All-Stars, an opportunity to participate in a permanent installation of a community sculpture by Northside's Paul Lashua, step performance by the Allegacy…
R.I.P. Phil Blank 1952-2010
Local Blues musician Phil Blank lost his battle with cancer and passed away on Jan. 15. He was 57. A memorial service for the veteran singer/harmonica player/guitarist is scheduled for Jan. 30 at the Staley-Crowe Funeral Home in Deer Park starting at noon. —-For more on the service and Phil’s life, go to the funeral…
Freekbass Trio Debut Postponed
Tomorrow night's concert featuring the debut of a new trio that teams local Funk bassist Freekbass with acclaimed musicians Steve Molitz and DJ Logic has been postponed due to a road accident that's left Logic (pictured) unable to make it to Cincinnati. —- Logic has what is being called a “minor ankle injury” and should…
Dana Hall
Dana Hall isn't merely a Jazz drummer — he's a magician who elicits the same jaw dropping reaction with a kit and sticks that David Copperfield gets when he makes aircraft carriers or the Statue of Liberty vanish. The gifted rhythmatist started out by earning a degree in aerospace engineering at Iowa State before getting…
Chatham County Line
By all appearances, Chatham County Line is a Bluegrass band. But things are clearly not always as they seem. Guitarist Dave Wilson, mandolinist/multi-instrumentalist John Teer, banjoist Chandler Holt and upright bassist Greg Readling certainly satisfy the Bluegrass archetype, but their songs, their frenetic stage presentation and their intention to evolve and grow as a band…
Ohio Green Party Meets
The Ohio Green Party will hold its state political convention in Columbus this weekend, where it will make decisions on several important issues. Among the business that will be conducted at the convention is changing the organization's official status from a political action committee (PAC) to that of a minor political party.—- The change involves…
C. Spencer Yeh’s Standard Deviation
C. Spencer Yeh sees the world from a slightly different angle. The latest example of the 34-year-old Cincinnati-based multimedia artist’s unique vision is on display via Standard Definition, an exhibition at the Contemporary Arts Center that’s anything but standard. Occupying a slender hallway on the CAC’s second floor, Yeh’s first solo museum exhibition features three…
Music: Owl City and Lights
Whether he knows his ’80s Synth Pop or not, Owl City has struck a chord with everyone from Gen Xers to the tween set. Though Owl City is compared to contemporary groups like The Postal Service, echoes of Kraftwerk, New Order and OMD are evident, even if Young doesn’t know who the forefathers of Techno…
The Anti-American Dream
I just spent the last hour reading four conservative critiques of the James Cameron blockbuster Avatar that’s currently breaking box-office records. While the pundits pile on, one can’t help wondering whether the right has finally tired of attacking President Obama and his administration. More likely, they’re just taking a break. Shooting at a big, easy…
A Growing Sense of Pride
Big changes are on the horizon for this year’s LGBT Pride Parade and Festival including new organizers, more events and a change in location. As with many things that evolve, however, the changes bring with them a fair amount of growing pains. Preparations already are well underway for Cincinnati’s 2010 LGBT Pride Parade and Festival.…
Music: Shiny and the Spoon
When “Simple Song” hits, it strikes with a scorching, heartfelt, catchy melody. The echoing “Canary in a Coal Mine” takes a sweet trip back in time. Listen close, and you’ll become that bird singing from the depths of a deep cavern. For Shiny and the Spoon, creating a whimsical, old-timey sound involves using subtlety and…
Batting a Thousand
Terry Teachout writes for The Wall Street Journal. His theater criticism is pragmatic and thoughtful, always worth reading. Earlier this month he wrote about “America’s Favorite Plays,” based on facts from American Theatre magazine. He listed the plays most often produced in the United States between 2000 and 2010. Cincinnati audiences are lucky — we’re…
What Would Jesus Do in Iraq?
Here’s another example of why many people are leery of Christians and their constant bellyaching about their faith being abused. Even though U.S. military rules specifically prohibit the proselytizing of any religion in Afghanistan or Iraq, it was revealed this week that a military contractor has been printing references to Bible verses on high-powered rifle…
NAACP and Cintas
[WINNER] LOCAL NAACP: The NAACP’s Cincinnati chapter and the Baptist Ministers Conference recently called out Cincinnati Public Schools for not hiring enough minority contractors as part of the district’s $1.07 billion plan to renovate and rebuild many schools. Because the project is paid using taxpayer money, CPS set a goal of using 20 percent but…
Sherry, Baby
When I was a kid, there were only seven TV channels and rarely anything good on any of them — especially on weekday afternoons before dinner. Since computer games and handheld entertainment devices hadn’t been invented, I spent much time after school riding bikes and “playing kill the man with the ball.” But each year,…
Jeff Dunham Dummies Up
Once, while visiting The Late Show, David Letterman introduced Jeff Dunham as “a man who has twice won the prestigious Ventriloquist of the Year Award,” to which the crowd tittered. However, when Dunham came out with his Walter character, he killed, as usual. Ventriloquism might not be the hippest art form in 2010, but Dunham…
Longtime Indie Radio Shows Move to New Station
Ideologically speaking, the local radio programs Alternating Currents and Every Woman are cornerstones of independent media. The movements they give voice to — women’s music at Every Woman and LGBT news and issues on Alternating Currents — are foundational to community radio, like WAIF (88.3 FM), which both shows have called home for more than…
Solitary Refinement
It’s easy to read too much into art. For example, in the video for electronic band Owl City’s huge breakthrough hit “Fireflies,” an old Speak & Spell toy is featured. Clearly an homage to Synth Pop pioneers Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD) who used the toy on their 1983 single “Genetic Engineering,” right? “I…
Art: Standard Definition at the Contemporary Arts Center
C. Spencer Yeh sees the world from a slightly different angle. The latest example of the 34-year-old Cincinnati-based multimedia artist’s unique vision is on display via Standard Definition, an exhibition at the Contemporary Arts Center that’s anything but standard. Occupying a slender hallway on the CAC’s second floor, Yeh’s first solo museum exhibition features three…
When Everything Changed
It was a long time ago. It was a time when politics were upside down, when elites were rarely mentioned and a backlash had already occurred when Richard Nixon was elected president in 1968. It was a time when college campuses were battlegrounds, when the angriest voices were found there and on urban streets and…
Jan. 13-19: Worst Week Ever!
WEDNESDAY JAN. 13Cincinnati City Council tried something new today, making news for something other than shouting each other down during their typically unproductive meetings. Jeff Berding and Chris Bortz today had to explain why last month they doled out $8,700 in bonuses, the only members of council to do so this year. Apparently, if you…
