Jun 22-29, 2016
The Pride Issue: Layers of LGBTQ Progress
Fighting the Formulaic in Terrorism Coverage
Members of minority groups know the stomach-turning sensation when something awful happens and news media join the hunt for someone to blame. Jews, Arab-Americans, Chicanos, Vietnamese immigrants and others all silently hope the perp wasn’t “one of ours.” It happened again with the massacre at Pulse, an Orlando, Fla. LGBTQ night club. Authorities quickly identified…
Minimum Gauge: Ticketmaster’s Half-Hearted “Giveaway”
HOT: Half-Hearted “Giveaway” Those who’ve bought tickets through Ticketmaster over the past decade-plus were probably excited to see that they had been “gifted” free vouchers for tickets to upcoming concerts. The giveaway was the result of a lawsuit settlement in which Ticketmaster was accused of attaching deceptive fees to sales. What could’ve been a good…
Concerts and Clubs Calendar (June 29-July 5)
Wednesday 29 Arnold’s Bar and Grill – Todd Hepburn. 7 p.m. Blues/Jazz/Various. Free. Bella Luna – RMS Band. 7 p.m. Soft Rock/Jazz. Free. Blind Lemon – Sarah Hutchinson. 8 p.m. Acoustic. Free. * Bogart’s – Brian Fallon & the Crowes. 7 p.m. Rock. $32.30. Boswell’s – Open Mic. 7 p.m. Various. Free. Century Inn Restaurant…
Fourth of July Fireworks and Celebrations
In 1777, the freshly minted United States celebrated its first anniversary in a manner fit for the vision that Founding Father John Adams had predicted the year before in a letter to wife just after signing the Declaration of Independence — that the holiday would be “solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports,…
Your Weekend To Do List (June 24-26)
FRIDAY 24 EVENT: INTERNET CAT VIDEO FESTIVAL In its quest to create a “purrfect” summer for visitors, the Cincinnati Art Museum is mixing serious scholarship — Divine Felines: Cats of Ancient Egypt, an exhibition of 80 cat-related objects, plus three smaller shows — with the sublime silliness of the Internet Cat Video Festival.The latter is…
Stage Door: Something Fishy Going On
If you’re pining for the vacuum of weirdness that left town with the conclusion of the 2016 Cincinnati Fringe Festival, fear not. The folks behind the Fringe at Know Theatre tonight are opening a show that’s as strange as anything you would have seen earlier this month around Over-the-Rhine. Steve Yockey’s The Fisherman’s Wife is…
Morning News: Council passes budget; NAACP to put Cincy in national spotlight; House Democrats stage sit-in over gun control
Good morning all. This is my last morning news before I jet off for D.C. followed by a week of vacation. You should still feel free to hit me with news tips or just tweet bad jokes and puns at me while I’m gone, though. Cincinnati City Council was nice enough to finish up its…
LISTEN: Orchards’ ‘Summer In Bloom’ from Forthcoming Old Flame Records Debut
Orchards is one of the latest Cincinnati bands to join the roster of Old Flame Records, the established indie label founded in Brooklyn in 2008 and brought to Cincinnati after founder Rob Mason moved to town. The label has embraced Greater Cincinnati’s rich music scene, releasing material by local acts like Automagik, Harbour and Frontier…
The Pride Issue: Layers of LGBTQ Progress
Following the historic Supreme Court ruling one year ago that legalized same-sex marriage in the United States — in a decision that will forever include the name of Cincinnatian Jim Obergefell, who sued for the right to be recognized as the surviving spouse on his husband John Arthur’s death certificate — this past year has…
All for One: The Harlequins Release Debut for Dizzybird Records
Three years isn’t an inordinate amount of time for a band to allow an album’s worth of material to coalesce. For Cincinnati’s The Harlequins, the gap since the band’s last releases — the Sex Change EP and a rarities collection, Bee Sides: Volume 1, both issued in 2013, and a live album from 2014 —…
Sound Advice: Kishi Bashi at Fountain Square (June 24)
Over the course of his decade-and-a-half-long career, Kaoru Ishibashi has enjoyed the best of all possible worlds, exploring the boundaries of Electronic Pop with his own band, Jupiter One, helping Kevin Barnes realize his creative visions with of Montreal and establishing his own unique sonic platform with the distinct solo project that bears the pseudonymous…
Sound Advice: Passion Pit at Bogart’s (June 24)
Last November, during an uncommonly candid conversation with novelist and burgeoning podcaster Bret Easton Ellis, Passion Pit frontman Michael Angelakos said he couldn’t remember a time when he didn’t hate himself. Angelakos also discussed his bipolar disorder and unequivocally came out as gay. Those facts can’t help but inform listeners’ perception of Passion Pit, the…
Sound Advice: Sister Sparrow & The Dirty Birds at RiversEdge (June 23)
Sparrows are among the most familiar and populous birds on Earth. They are also among the most undervalued; their great numbers, generally drab appearance and unexceptional song have made them targets of neglect or derision. In the late 1950s, China even declared them a danger because of their grain diet and included them in the…
The Arepa Place Latin Grill brings pocket-sized meals to Findlay Market
Isis and Christopher Arrieta-Dennis — Isis a native of Colombia and Dennis from the United State — have always wanted to own their own restaurant, but they couldn’t find the right fit. That is until they moved to Cincinnati. “We moved here for family, but we still wanted to own a restaurant without having to…
Little Planet Supper Club offers carefully curated tapas-style dinners from around the world
“My history with food started as a vegetarian years ago,” says Little Planet Supper Club chef Erin Ragsdale in a surprising plot twist — just days ago I had enjoyed a hearty “Around the World” dinner of succulent and juicy barbecued meat from a menu of her own devising. Ragsdale and her husband, Mark Celsor,…
‘Curb’ Episodes to Catch Up On
Life must be pretty decent for Larry David. He creates an iconic comedy series “about nothing,” uses his own less-than-likable qualities to shape characters that audiences love and, five years after the last season of his HBO series, decides to do it again. HBO announced recently that Curb Your Enthusiasm is far from over and…
‘Golden Days’ of Being Young and in Love
About halfway through talented French director Arnaud Desplechin’s intoxicating My Golden Days, his latest exploration into messy relationships of one kind or another, four teenagers gather around a television to watch a live shot of the Berlin Wall coming down, its graffiti-strewn sections being dismantled one section at a time. Three of them take in…
Art Museum Has a Divine Summer for Cat Lovers
In its quest to create a “purrfect” summer for visitors, the Cincinnati Art Museum is mixing serious scholarship — Divine Felines: Cats of Ancient Egypt, an exhibition of 80 cat-related objects, plus three smaller shows — with the sublime silliness of the Internet Cat Video Festival. The latter is a free public event occurring this…
CAC’s Performance Series Offers ‘Radical Variety’
It’s not an overstatement to characterize the Contemporary Arts Center’s just-announced, upcoming Black Box Performance Series as being like “nothing you’ve ever seen.” Even if you have a ticket and go, you won’t be able to see the new season’s first program — a movie — unless you’re a preselected elementary school student. That’s because…
Whatever Happened To Jasson Minadakis?
When I started writing about Cincinnati theater in the late 1980s, there wasn’t much beyond the Playhouse and Ensemble Theatre. But starting in 1994 (the same year CityBeat began), things began to heat up with the arrival of Fahrenheit Theatre Company. After two seasons, it evolved into the Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival, the forerunner of today’s…
Broadway star Kristin Chenoweth shares her personal journey through song with the Cincinnati Pops
Kristin Chenoweth may stand at just 4 feet 11 inches, but she has a voice as powerful as the Empire State Building is tall. A Broadway star whose career also includes acclaimed television and film roles, Chenoweth appears at Riverbend Music Center on Saturday with the Cincinnati Pops under the baton of John Morris Russell.…
Historic Conservation Board blocks demolition of the Dennison Hotel building, but the Joseph family plans to fight
If you’re a fan of long legal battles and arcane architectural and construction details, your Super Bowl might be on the way. An exhausting three-and-a-half-hour Urban Conservation Board hearing on the fate of downtown’s Dennison Building June 16 ended with cheers from preservationists. But that hearing — which capped months of maneuvering, rescheduled hearings, testimony…
Worst Week Ever! June 15-21
Idiots with Guns Prep for Unwanted Appearance at Local Community Event Gun owners, like many people who feel passionately about one issue or another, are represented most loudly by their dumbest group members. Sane, rational people who believe the Second Amendment and all that good stuff don’t make for riveting news these days. In light…
Coverage Gap
On June 26, 2015, while many Cincinnatians celebrated the Supreme Court ruling that legalized gay marriage across the country, Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County employee Rachel Dovel got some bad news. Dovel, 33, who has been transitioning from male to female for the past two years, says the library informed her it did…
Choral Community
The power of song has always been a force for social justice. Inspired by music from the Civil Rights Movement of the ’50s and ’60s, LGBTQ communities began to harness that power to bring about change starting in the early 1980s. MUSE: Cincinnati’s Women’s Choir was founded in 1983; Cincinnati Men’s Chorus was established in…
Your Guide to Pride
WEDNESDAY 22 Summer Cinema: Clueless — Pack a picnic dinner and settle in for a special Pride Week installment of Washington Park’s weekly free screening series. This week’s movie is Clueless, in which rich, plaid-wearing high-schooler Cher tries to boost a new students’ popularity (ugh, as if). Wear your plaid — the best-dressed guest will…
