Cover Story
Blame the Youth Invigorate Charlotte Pride
Kynadi Hankins drapes a rainbow pride flag over her shoulders like Supergirl’s cape and strikes a heroic pose. “She’s Super-gay!” says Francisco Gomez. The Charlotte band Blame the Youth are on the top deck of the AvidXchange parking garage, sweating bullets in the late morning sun. In addition to christening a new superhero, Gomez and…
Kendrick Lamar Gives an Eclectic DAMN in Charlotte
The rapper’s DAMN Tour offers a mix of artists and sounds ranging from party jams to stripper music to cerebral performance art.
Good Time sparkles with intensity
GOOD TIME *** (out of four) DIRECTED BY Josh & Benny Safdie STARS Robert Pattinson, Benny Safdie It took a few years, but once the silly fanboy snickering subsided, Kristen Stewart was able to move on from the Twilight series and reclaim her title as an accomplished actress with such credits as Camp X-Ray, Personal…
In This Corner of the World: Hiroshima, Mon Amour
IN THIS CORNER OF THE WORLD *** (out of four) DIRECTED BY Sunao Katabuchi STARS Rena Nounen, Yoshimasa Hosoya Sparse in its visual style yet weighty with its themes, In This Corner of the World is a Japanese animated feature that largely concerns itself with the bombing of Hiroshima toward the end of World War…
Muslim in Charlotte: Saad Haq
Last year, CL contributor Lara Americo debuted her photo series “Trans & Queer in the Workplace” in Creative Loafing between August and December. The series was eventually picked up by Huffington Post and served as the basis for Americo’s Chrysalis exhibit at C3 Lab. This year, Americo has decided to highlight another marginalized and misunderstood…
Weekly Horoscope (Aug. 24-20)
For All Signs Saturn turns direct on the August 25, 2017 for the next 5.5 months. This happens every year, but not on the same dates. While direct, Saturn is a taskmaster. (S)He is also the Judge or the Teacher. He has been retrograde since April 5, 2017. While he is retrograde, we are given…
The Blotter: Finders Keepers
Arrowheads A man filed a police report last week after he unexpectedly found the American equivalent of a buried treasure: a gun. The man told police he was doing surveying work near Robinson Church Road in east Charlotte when he hit something hard. He thought it was a rock at first, but the shape was…
Top 10 Performers You Should not Miss at Charlotte Pride
In addition to Charlotte’s Blame the Youth, which performs at 3:30 p.m. Aug. 26 on the Wells Fargo stage, Charlotte Pride 2017 will feature a range of other comics, drag performers, musicians and more. Here are 10 highlights: [Image-4] Deborah Cox She’s been entertaining Pride audiences since the mid-’90s and charting on the R&B and…
Barton Fink, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Kid Galahad among new home entertainment titles
(View From The Couch is a weekly column that reviews what’s new on Blu-ray, DVD and Streaming. Ratings are on a four-star scale.) BARTON FINK (1991). Being the first film to win three top prizes at Cannes (Film, Director and Actor) couldn’t prevent Barton Fink from flopping when it finally opened stateside. Nevertheless, this remains…
Listen Up: Blame the Youth on CL’s ‘Local Vibes’ Podcast
It’s Pride Week in Charlotte, and we’re celebrating with Amber Daniel and Francisco Gomez of Blame the Youth, who will be playing on the main stage at Charlotte Pride this year. We talk about their preparations for that show, existing as a political statement and writing songs about having sex in the woods. Be sure…
National Spotlight Is on East Charlotte Clinic, but Same Problems Remain
The temperature was already scorching outside of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center at 11 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 17, when a group of women gathered under a small tree to hold a press conference calling on the city to do more to protect Charlotte’s abortion patients. Save for a handful of media folks, however, nobody was there…
Trans Pride Turns Up in Charlotte
In last year’s Pride Guide, we reported on conflicts among LGBTQ organizations regarding diversity and trans representation at Charlotte Pride. Members of the local Trans and Queer People of Color Collective, a subgroup of Charlotte Uprising, said they were being ignored — or at best tokenized — by Charlotte Pride organizers. In the lead-up to…
Charlotte’s Pro Athletes Should Be Like Mike and Speak Out
In the last 14 days, this country has seen events that make the scope of sports seem paltry. Events such as the tragedy in Charlottesville and the subsequent civilian removal of a Confederate monument in Durham make you wonder if the concept of sport being independent of politics is possible anymore. Athletes such as Malcolm…
Who’s Up For Some Squash?
If you don’t typically lock your doors, now would be a good time to start. You’re going to be inundated with zucchinis. Behind the usual pleasantries, your neighbors are already probing you for weakness, trying to decide who among your fellow neighbors will be most likely to break and accept a bag-load. Gangs of farmhands…
Racist Imagery Infects Charlotte Music Scene; Pride Diversifies
Sometimes national becomes local. Earlier this year, Creative Loafing made a conscious change in the way we cover the news, shifting to a local-only focus in our reporting on government, housing, social justice, diversity issues, arts, music and food. But in the wake of the deadly Aug. 11 white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Va., national…
Yung Citizen Assembles a Tribe of Charlotte Talent for ‘Alive Sessions’
Chris Williams is trying to make the world a better place, starting with his hometown. The producer and emcee’s 2014 song “Power People,” released under Williams’ hip-hop name Yung Citizen, has taken on renewed resonance in the wake of the deadly violence sparked by white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia — not to mention the September…
