The deafening buzz
The results are in. Combing through the country’s major music magazines, it’s clear that the best albums of 2001 were made by Bob Dylan, Bjork, Radiohead, Alicia Keys, Macy Gray, Ryan Adams, System of A Down, Jay-Z and the Strokes. Those are the artists who keep popping up on all the Best of 2001 lists…
Media: It’s An East Coast World
A couple of years ago, Bryant Gumbel was in Charlotte promoting his new gig on the CBS Morning Show. It was the standard stuff, but I remember actually stumping him for a minute, when I asked how New York-based media actually kept in touch with rest of the country. “That’s a good question,” Gumbel said.…
Still Drinking and Fighting
They may have won the contest, but the members of Flickerstick weren’t exactly the darlings of VH1’s Bands on the Run TV series. The show, which tracked the ‘Stick along with three other unsigned acts for eight weeks as they toured throughout the US, caught the five guys from Dallas, TX doing everything on camera…
Scene & Herd
Hog Pen: A visitor to uptown Charlotte Saturday would have been justified in thinking that just about everyone in our fair burg wore leather, feathered their hair, and still clung to the idea that acid-washed jeans look good the Easyriders Bike Show had rolled into the Convention Center. The big square building will likely…
Music Menu
WEDNESDAY 1.30 Jem Crossland & The Hypertonics — Anglo Crossland leads one of the catchier trios in town, doing the surf-rockabilly thing better than most anyone not named after a small city around here and a popular men’s magazine. I guess you can’t really call Crossland local, but his wonderfully lyrical guitar playing transcends all…
Another Week Already
NBA Commissioner David Stern, who’s been involved in a petty media war with Charlotte mayor Pat McCrory, picked a committee to look into the Hornets’ request for permission to move to New Orleans. Stern said he had no preference whatsoever in the matter, although reporters noted he stepped to the podium staggering drunk and wearing…
Soundboard
Wednesday, Jan. 30 Bayou Kitchen Bill Noonan Big Al’s, Mooresville Robin Brown Cajun Queen 7th Street Gator Band Cajun Queen, Pineville 7th Street Gator Band II Comet Grill The Relics Connolly’s Craig & Rich Dilworth Coffeehouse Open Mic w/ Bert Wray Double Door Inn Billarabi w/ Jeff Gates The Evening Muse Nini Camps w/ Doria…
Letters
Robinson’s Karma To the Editors: I found Tara Servatius’ article on Brian Robinson (“Get Out of the Way,” January 16) quite interesting. As a stakeholder regarding this topic — I live on the street where he moved the fixer-upper house in Tara Woods — it is tempting to launch into a tirade about how Robinson’s…
Ghost Of A Chance
It didn’t exactly wow them at the box office, but Ghost World (***1/2 out of four), Terry Zwigoff’s adaptation of Daniel Clowes’ underground comic book, deserves to rise above its niche status as a cult item and receive its proper due as a new generational touchstone for disaffected youth everywhere. Certainly, the character that Zwigoff…
The Blotter
* Is Your Refrigerator Running?: A prank caller is on the loose. A woman reported the offender to police, saying that someone had called her at her residence over 20 different times. Rather than tell lame jokes, this particular caller refuses to speak. The caller enhances his creepy reputation by making his calls at random…
8 Days A Week
WEDNESDAY 30 Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus rolls into town today. Expect all the usual clowns, wild animals and trapeze artists. Shows at the Charlotte Coliseum will be at 7:30pm today, tomorrow, Friday and Saturday at 7:30pm; tomorrow and Friday at 10:30am; and Saturday and Sunday at 11:30am and 3:30am. Tickets range from…
FilmClips
NEW RELEASES THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES Playing like a discarded X-Files episode yet based on a 1975 book by John A. Keel, this finds director Mark Pellington mining the same air of uneasiness that made his Arlington Road such a prickly treat. Yet while this new endeavor isn’t as tightly scripted as that earlier effort, it…
Change of Place
Typically when a restaurant wants a makeover, the management or kitchen staff is changed or the menu is changed. Sometimes even the interior is gutted and redone. But Vittorio’s Italian Cuisine not only changed its name, it moved across town. Vittorio’s is located on East Boulevard in Dilworth. Owner Vittorio Murillo reopened in this location…
Stargazer
For All Signs We continue with the strong Aquarian theme symbolized in our skies at this time. Aquarius, the Waterbearer, is a sign of humanitarian idealism and fair treatment for everyone. The position of planets in the solar system at any given time is the source of information for an astrologer’s sign forecasts. It is…
Pop Goes The Cherry
When MTV first came out, it was sexy in a challenging, alternative way, and it inspired a lot of teenagers to explore all kinds of things, including queerness and sluttiness. It was the early 80s and androgyny was thrillingly bold…all the boys and girls had eyeliner, padded shoulders, trapezoidal hair, numerous belts, and it was…
E-Auction Deals of the Week
This CL feature focuses on two different items each week: one, a good deal that should still be available as the paper hits the stands on Wednesday, as well as some of the funkier offerings we’ve discovered in our visits. The Weird: None other than a life-size, latex body corpse (provided your life size tends…
No, We Didn’t Make This Up
It would be kind of like hiring former Panthers coach George Seifert to teach a seminar on how to be a winner. The Charlotte Housing Authority (CHA), which has recently fallen into disrepute, has hired Phoenix Communications, Ltd., to help it improve its image. That’s the same firm, headed by Tom Drew, that handled public…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: In response to your advice to “Online or Out of Line” (January 16), I say, “Right on!” I’ve found that a majority of those who criticize people who use the Internet for sex are guilty of a little online mischief themselves. That being said, I have a confession of my own. I’m…
Black Leaders’ Minority Contract Strategy Unclear
Charlotte African-American leaders’ strategy to pressure the Charlotte City Council into resurrecting a minority contract program appears, for the moment, to lack solid direction. Most sources among the city’s African-American leadership seem to agree that city leaders should quickly put another program in place rather than taking six months to a year to concoct another…
Latest Impression
The 19th century is alive and well in Charlotte. J. Richards is an art gallery at Phillips Place. The art gallery is in one of many pastel stucco buildings which make up a shopping center which is so clean, carefully proportioned and sterile, one feels compelled to wipe one’s feet before walking the sidewalk. J.…
Friends Rally Around Real-life Santa
Don Chapman is one of those guys most of us wish we could be more like, if only we had the energy, the dedication and a more giving spirit. He’s a big, burly guy with a long, white beard who, despite his brawny appearance, is known as a talented craftsman with a kind and gentle…
Moliere Gets A Laptop
Has it really been 12 years since Charlotte Rep took on the pride of French theater, Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, a.k.a. Moliere? Yup, it was 1990 when a remodeled Spirit Square hosted a high-concept, high-tech version of Tartuffe that absolutely knocked me on my rump. Hotwired with video technology by director Randell Haynes, the assault on religious…
The Loaf Wins Four Awards
Not only are they stunningly attractive, they’re kick-ass writers as well. We actually have proof to back up the second claim. Creative Loafing won four awards this year from the North Carolina Press Association. They were handed out last week in Chapel Hill at the 2001 NCPA Awards presentation. The winners, and the judge’s comments,…
Dancing The Bard
Choreographer Mark Diamond, like most creative artists, is not content to rest on yesterday’s triumphs. Last season, North Carolina Dance Theatre presented his Streetcar Named Desire.” People whose opinion I respect called it the greatest dance he has created since he came to Charlotte. I can’t venture an opinion. I had a walk-on in the…
Who Knew?
In addition to bad posture, sagging bodies and outdated clothing, it’s one of those things that make us think, “God, I don’t want to get old.” What I’m talking about is that odd and rather disturbing habit the elderly have, especially those with no teeth, of appearing to be constantly chewing. What’s up with that?…
CL Theater Award Nominations
BEST ACTOR, DRAMA Alan McClintock Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (George), Skylight (Tom Sergeant), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Randle P. McMurphy) Bobby Tyson Drift (Lee) Carver Johns American Buffalo (Teach) Chad Calvert Turn of the Screw (The Master, Miles, Mrs. Grose, Narrator) Eric Foss Corpus Christi (Joshua) Graham…
Citizen Servatius: Somebody Stop Him
By now, you probably know the names of the important people who fought the hardest to keep the Charlotte Hornets in Charlotte: McColl. Harris. Schwab. Thompson. Wheeler. But do you know the names of those fighting just as hard to bring other businesses here or keep them? Neither does Charlotte automotive entrepreneur John Dables. When…
Arts Agenda
Classical Music Annual Richard and Betty Peek Recital and Masterclass Featuring Organist John Mitchener. Masterclass will be Feb. 2 from 9am-12pm, Recital will be Feb 3 at 4pm. Sat., Sun. Free. Covenant Presbyterian, 1000 E. Morehead St. 704-334-2283 Ext. 22. Concerto Competition Winners presented by Charlotte Civic Orchestra – featuring all the winners of the…
Charlotte Tech Wars
It’s a standard plot/character element of science fiction: computers gain too much power and try to control individuals and occasionally take over the world. The Matrix is based on this concept, not to mention Bladerunner, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Terminator and West World, among others. Science fiction isn’t tapping into this theme randomly, either.…
Change of Place
Typically when a restaurant wants a makeover, the management or kitchen staff is changed or the menu is changed. Sometimes even the interior is gutted and redone. But Vittorio’s Italian Cuisine not only changed its name, it moved across town. Vittorio’s is located on East Boulevard in Dilworth. Owner Vittorio Murillo reopened in this location…
Ostriches and Lemmings
Hold the front page! Charlotte’s outerbelt is stimulating sprawl! It’s official. The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Planning Commission has released a study showing that new development along the partially completed loop road is occurring far faster than anywhere else in the city. Developers are even building large developments along the route well in advance of the road’s completion.…
Goodeats
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 Advisor
Fifteen of the 19 September 11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, and so is Osama bin Laden. Is Saudi Arabia really a friend of the United States? If you subscribe to the notion that “a friend in need is a friend indeed,” then Saudi Arabia and the United States are great friends and likely will…
