Spring Break
If your recent trip to Florida, the Caribbean, Cancun, or other points south has you pining for more tropical breezes and typical island food stands, consider Cabana Jack’s Fresca Grille. Cabana Jack’s may have opened during a cold January, but the interior will warm you immediately. Owner Charlie Owens says he wanted “to bring the…
WNCW Hanging On For Dear Life
Here’s how to get ahead in the cutthroat world of commercial radio: first, get your attorney, a former FCC board member, to plead that you’re expanding your local radio station signal out of Albemarle so the good folks in Indian Trail can hear you. After that’s approved, leverage your signal many times over, to reach…
Beggar’s Banquet: Comfort For Drunks
Food experts have recently been fixating on a so-called “new” category of food called “comfort foods” which have been spawned by the dramatic events of 9/11. These are newly respectable foods which we are told we eat to make us feel better in tough karmic times. They include rich desserts, childhood favorites, and greasy fried…
No Love for Mobie
It looks like the SouthPark area’s experiment with mass transit just didn’t catch on. Only four citizens showed up to a meeting last Thursday on the future of the Mobies, scaled down versions of Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) that traveled a five-mile loop around SouthPark Mall. The idea was to offer people an alternative…
Is The Price Right?
So you’re at the grocery store, perusing the shelves for a decent bottle of wine. You’re in the mood for something red, maybe a Cabernet. As you scan the Cab section, you notice there are at least a couple dozen options, ranging in price from $4.99 a bottle to $69. Aside from $64.01, what’s the…
Letters to the editor
Time For One More Complaint To The Editors: Regarding Sam Boykin’s article about NoDa (“NoDa Veterans Welcome Changes,” April 3), he is right about some things. There has always been a lot of talk about what NoDa might be one day, but it just never seemed to happen. I have been going to the gallery…
Good eats
ALL AROUND TOWN ANNTONY’S CARIBBEAN 2001 E. 7th, 704-342-0749; 145 Brevard Court, 704-339-0303; 20910 Torrence Chapel Road, Cornelius, 704-894-0280. A fun, change-of-pace restaurant for a casual lunch or dinner. Limited menu features rotisserie-cooked barbecued meats, what else, Caribbean style. $ BRUEGGER’S BAGEL BAKERY All over town. Chewy bagels, crisp on the outside, and served with…
Homefront Adviser
He doesn’t signal when he changes lanes, has a potty-mouth that would embarrass a drunk Merchant Marine, talks on his cell phone at movies and has been known to attempt the “pull my finger” trick during negotiations. As diehard fans of Judith Martin’s “Miss Manners” newspaper columns, Arabs are simply appalled by Sharon’s boorishness. In…
Rewired
Bob Mould is a happy man. No, really. “There’s been a reconciliation of who I am as a person, as opposed to who I am as an artist,” he says. “I’m a late-bloomer, I guess — late in coming to terms with my fate, or my place.” Mould’s dark moods — and at times even…
Tender Bush Shuns Rabble Welcome
George Bush the Younger came to South Carolina a few days ago to raise campaign money for Rep. Lindsey Graham, who wants Strom Thurmond’s seat in the US Senate. Hospitable people that we are down here, some of the Democrats among us planned Mr. Bush a lively welcome. It did not deter us when it…
Gaff Track
* A new record label that’s based nearby will be making its debut next month. On May 21, Gaff Music, based just up the road in Lincolnton, will release both Apocalypso Now by Walter Egan and Pasajes by Charlotte’s own noted percussionist Jim Brock. Egan is probably best known for penning the hit “Magnet and…
Up In Smoke
They said they sued the tobacco companies for us, the people of North Carolina, but they lied. Lawyers for our state, including our current governor, told the courts they would use billions from cigarette manufacturers to pay escalating medical costs caused by smoking. Again, they lied. They said the funds from the settlement would go…
Music Menu
WEDNESDAY 4.17Eric Lovell Band / Avett Brothers — Nice double bill here, featuring the psychedelic Americana of David Childers Band multi-instrumentalist Eric Lovell and the front porch country and creekwater-clear harmonies of Concord’s Avett Bros. Both take the music different places than most local roots acts, yet both still contain a certain inherent honesty that…
Things Speed Up As You Go Downhill
World Class I: The US Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal of the Charlotte school desegregation case, thus ending mandated busing for racial balance. The school board approved Schools Superintendent Eric Smith’s budget, which includes the elimination of fifth-grade band and orchestra, big cutbacks in elementary schools’ foreign languages courses, and next to nothing…
Soundboard
Wednesday, Apr. 17 * Amos’ Southend Melvin Seals & JGB Arnie’s Tavern, Huntersville Scott Johnson Bayou Kitchen Bill Noonan Blumenthal Performing Arts Center David Sanborn Group w/ The Joe Sample Trio Cajun Queen 7th Street Gator Band Cajun Queen, Pineville 7th Street Gator Band II Dilworth Coffeehouse Open Mic w/ Bert Wray * Double Door…
Splendor In The Crass
I cringe at the sight of stupid human tricks: boob and ass flashes at Mardi Gras; jackass stunts; wet T-shirt contests. But nothing stirs my inner television critic more than the melodrama of reality dating shows, especially the breed that has become pervasive in the past two years: Warner Brothers’ elimiDATE, Universal Worldwide Television’s Blind…
Hellraiser
While most movie ads have to settle for rapturous blurbs from mere mortal film reviewers, the early one for Frailty, a new thriller that marks actor Bill Paxton’s directorial debut, is adorned with raves from A-list directors James Cameron and Sam Raimi and bestselling author Stephen King. Of course, Cameron has worked with Paxton on…
It’s A Dog’s Life
SLAP THAT BASS Clout’s Joe Rizzo pounds out the riffs at Tremont Music Hall On Saturday the clouds parted and the rain stopped just in time for the 2002 Skyhoundz Hyperflite Canine Disc Championship, at McAlpine Creek Park. Unlike most little league games, the folks who brought their “kids” out to compete on this day…
Stargazer
For All Signs In recent months I have frequently written about the opposition of Saturn and Pluto in our zodiac. This is the symbol of forced change which began in April ’01 and is now approaching its finale in late May. Tension between these two planets has been prominent at some dramatic moments in history:…
Film Clips
NEW RELEASES HUMAN NATURE File this one away under the heading “When Good Ideas Go Bad.” Charlie Kaufman, whose script for Being John Malkovich was merely one of the most original pieces of writing seen in eons, returns with this unconventional comedy about an abnormally hirsute woman (Patricia Arquette) whose relationship with a repressed behaviorist…
Hairy Legs And All
When I was a kid, summer was simple. It was something to look forward to. School was out, there was nothing to worry about, and the weather was perfect for swimming. Most of these things ring true today as well. I still look forward to summer, although I admit it’s more complicated than it used…
8 Days a Week
WEDNESDAY 17This is it (maybe). The Charlotte Hornets take on the woeful Chicago Bulls tonight at the Charlotte Coliseum, in what may be the last regular season home game ever for the home squad. Tickets are $9-39, available by calling 800-4NBA-TIX. The Word Phoria: Spoken Word Festival is back with its next event at the…
Let’s Say The Hornets Leave. Then What?
That loud sucking noise you hear isn’t Ray and George, but rather the vacuum being created uptown by the Hornets’ seemingly imminent departure. It’s hard to believe the whole stupid, sleazy mess is finally coming to an end, but here we are. So what now? If the Bugs do indeed fly the hive, what’s going…
News of the Weird
Lead Stories * University of Toronto professor Steve Mann, 39, has for 20 years worn computer components on his body for ongoing research and even calls himself a cyborg, and carries enough documentation that he had never (even after September 11) caused problems with airport security. (He wears computerized glasses and headgear and an electronic…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: A cousin and I were visiting a friend of hers when we noticed a large hot air balloon in the garage (the kind a business would use in advertising). The friend told us her boyfriend had stolen the balloon for the fun of it and they really had no use for it.…
Spectator Sports For A Bug-free City
Some 15 years ago, Charlotteans looking to feed their sports jones either turned to ESPN — then a fledgling cable station starting to make real strides toward respectability — or searched the sports pages for events to take the family to. At that point, George Shinn had recently acquired the right to field a team…
The Blotter
* A man called his ex-girlfriend several times at work, communicating sweet nothings like, “If you keep playing your little games you are gonna get yourself killed,” and “If I find you with another man I’m gonna kill you and not him.” After each call the woman would simply hang up on him. Five minutes…
New Art: The Real And The Invented
In realist art, the artist is concerned with depicting the world as it is; in abstract art, the artist creates his or her own reality. Representational art, which also depicts “real” objects, may not be entirely “realistic,” seeking to use the appearance of things to offer interpretations of the world. Abstract art is sometimes defined…
The Price of Success
Is there a penalty for turning your season around, pulling off the biggest playoff upset in WNBA history and winning the Eastern Conference title? Yes. And now is the Charlotte Sting’s time to pay. Given the strong finish of the Sting in 2001, they will pick ninth out of 16 teams in the 2002 WNBA…
Spin City
On most weeks, provocative dance programs are a scarce commodity in Charlotte. Last week’s trio of events was a veritable deluge — Carolinas Concert Association wound up its season with the Moscow Grigorovich Ballet, North Carolina Dance Theatre completed its spring collection of new and contemporary works, and CP’s Dance Central capped their 19th season…
It’s Bull To Me
Boy, I sure am in the mood to see an animal get tortured and killed. What do you say we take in a good bullfight? Of course fans of “corrida,” as it’s known in Spain, don’t see bullfighting as the inhumane slaughter of an animal, but rather a graceful dance with death in which a…
Baseball Lit Starter Kit
Ask a healthy percentage of American sports fans what they loathe and it is all but guaranteed that the subject of literary types getting misty about the erstwhile National Pastime will be mentioned. Despite the frustrations engendered by the academic set’s unmatched love for baseball over all other athletic endeavors, it is undeniable that no…
Shannon To Leave Housing Authority With Full Pockets Exact amount of severance unclear
When Charlotte Housing Authority (CHA) head Harrison Shannon backs out of the agency parking lot for the last time, he’ll take more with him than his old files. Shannon, who resigned from the post earlier this year to pursue other opportunities, may drive away with a severance package that some speculate could be worth $100,000…
Arts Agenda
Preservation Hall Jazz Band of New Orleans New Orleans Jazz comes to the Belk Theater to transform the night into an era when Louis Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton ruled New Orleans. Sun., April 28, 7:30 p.m. $18-$35. Blumenthal Performing Arts Center, 130 N. Tryon St. 704-372-1000. Sunday Concerts on the Green featuring Davidson College…
Unlikely Bedfellows:
Teachers who visited the federal anti-drug website recently, theantidrug.com, found some unusual suggestions for drug prevention. Just after the drug czar’s $3.5 million advertisement linking drug use to terrorism premiered at the Superbowl, the site featured a link to a report about a conference held at the White House last summer on how to use…
