Cover Story
Coming to America
They’re all around us. Sitting at Amelie’s eating croissants. Performing next to your kid at the end-of-year school recital. Kneeling in the pew behind yours at church. They are immigrants — documented, undocumented, political refugees — from around the world, each with a remarkable story of how they came to Charlotte. Stories filled with tension,…
The Iguanas tonight at Neighborhood Theatre (7/20/13)
Band weaves a colorful mesh of Latin rock, Cajun, New Orleans funk and R&B.
The Virginmarys at Neighborhood Theatre tonight (7/18/13)
British band boasts sounds of catchy, loud rock.
This week’s SketchCrowd (July 17)
So, Mr. Jones …
The Pull List (7/17/13): Digital Batman series goes to print
Plus, the books hitting the shelves this week.
Zimmerman verdict: Why am I not surprised?
The prosecution basically shot itself in the foot. Oh, and Florida sucks.
Live review: Marilyn Manson, The Fillmore (7/15/2013)
Shock-rocker performs 70-minute set for sold-out Charlotte crowd.
New keeper for the Catawba River…sort of
New (river) boss is (practically) same as the old (river) boss
3 questions with Simon Majumdar, Food Network judge
On television, he is the “won’t crack a smile” judge for such Food Network shows as Iron Chef America, The Next Iron Chef, Extreme Chef and now Alton Brown’s Cutthroat Kitchen. The day I met Simon Majumdar, he was fresh off the road and now mixing pasta dough, his face flecked with flour, as he…
The Wolverine finds comic kinship in MAX series
This is the closest the character’s comics have been to their ’80s roots for quite some time.
Album review: Sigur Rós’ Kveikur
Kveikur, the latest release from iconic Icelandic rock outfit Sigur Rós, emerges on the heels of a lineup change — last year the group lost multi-instrumentalist Kjartan Sveinsson — and subsequently begins the band’s shift toward a more aggressive and increasingly abstract music style. Debuting only a year after the fantastic innovation on their 2012…
Book Review: Joe Hill’s NOS4A2
Forget Christmas in July. Try Christmasland instead. Sure, Joe Hill’s new novel came out in May, but for those who haven’t gotten to it yet, now is the perfect time. After all, despite its 700-page heft, NOS4A2 flies by. Reviewers love to throw around phrases such as “a quick read” after they’ve slogged through a…
McCrory caught in a lie
He claims to have mingled with the Moral Monday crowd. Trouble is, no one’s ever seen him.
Hopeless, I turn to Charlotte’s rally for Trayvon for help (VIDEO included)
Soon after the verdict was announced I realized the world is more dangerous for my son than I ever imagined
Save the Date: Michael Pollan to speak at Queens University
Tickets are now available.
CL columnist John Grooms wins first place in 2013 AAN Awards
Here are the three columns that won our Boomer With Attitude the gold medal.
Block and Grinder: An unexpected combo
Block and Grinder sounds like a reference to ice hockey. Instead, it’s a spiffy new Cotswold canteen where owner Jed Kampe has drawn on experience of owning a local meat market to bring appealing flavors to a strip shopping center restaurant. To say the Cotswold community has wholeheartedly embraced this space (which has recently changed…
Weekend Film Reviews: Pacific Rim; and more
What’s new and covered in theaters.
Local Discovery: The Yolk Cafe offers great breakfast
One writer finds her “spot.”
Mama Ricotta’s celebrates its Wine Spectator Award… with wine
Experience authentic Italian food at this wine dinner.
Corey Feldman’s ‘Ascension Millenium’ video is terrible
Did you expect anything more?
Pacific Rim: Guillermo del Toro’s soggy summer blockbuster
PACIFIC RIM ** DIRECTED BY Guillermo del Toro STARS Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba If imitation is indeed the sincerest form of flattery, then director Guillermo del Toro dedicated his latest film to the wrong people. A title card at the end of Pacific Rim finds the Mexican moviemaker thanking special effects genius Ray Harryhausen and…
Dem Bones: Yard art a la muerte
Over the last three months I’ve seen a number of really creepy, yet very interesting homes. Here are the top 3 most elaborate.
Question the Queen City: Who was Harry Golden?
The former publisher of The Carolina Israelite, noted author and CPCC professor led a fascinating life
Luke Bryan at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre tonight (7/12/2013)
Country singer has spent the last six years showing that sometimes boys just wanna have fun, too.
Allen Stone brings social issues back to R&B
Every day taxes increaseSo is this our land or is this our lease?Papa says son, it’s the land of the freeAs he broke his back trying to make ends meet. Allen Stone is trying to change the face of R&B and soul. Instead of focusing on sex and romance, which is typically associated with those…
Opening Friday
What’s new in theaters this weekend.
No public hearing for pollution discharge permit on Neuse River
Tag this one #SNAFU: Situation normal, all fucked up.
Weekly horoscope (July 11-17)
Cancer The Crab (June 20-July 21): The retrograding Mercury floats backward in your sign. You likely thought you were firmly headed in one direction, but now things are looking a bit different, even confusing you. Hesitate, yes, but do not allow doubt to overwhelm your thoughts. Check your information. Proceed with your best plan after…
R.I.P. martial arts legend Jim Kelly
I was very disheartened to find out that one of my childhood heroes, martial arts bad brother Jim Kelly, recently passed away. He was 67. Kelly died at his home in San Diego, according to his ex-wife Marilyn Dishman, who shared the news on Facebook. He had been battling cancer. “James Milton Kelly, better known…
Video Game Review: The Last of Us is first among equals
Drawing inspiration from works like Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men and Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead, The Last of Us is a harrowing tale of survival in the rubble of a post-apocalyptic wasteland. The year is 2033. For nearly two decades, a Cordyceps-like fungal infection has ravaged the planet, transforming humans…
The Bard's bloody banquet in Titus Andronicus
There is more than enough malice and carnage in Titus Andronicus for a few worshipers of Shakespeare to seriously doubt he wrote it. Since the object of their bardolatry is universally acknowledged to have fashioned the atrocities of King Lear and the body count of Hamlet, we must be considering a degree of brutality and…
Junior Astronomers release first full-length album
Most musicians simply hope to be able to pay their bills. Many would like to tour regularly and play for hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Philip Wheeler, guitarist for the Charlotte rock band Junior Astronomers, isn’t afraid to think of loftier goals. “You want to be the dude who one day can walk into…
The Pull List (7/10/13): Image debuts paranormal, pre-apocalypse titles
Check out this week’s list of new releases in the world of comics.
This week’s SketchCrowd (July 10)
Poachers or murderers?
Are protesters responsible for decreasing Duke Energy rate hike?
Officially: Duke Energy and the N.C. Utility Commission are listening to the concerns of citizens. Unofficially: Shut up your shoutin’
10 dates for $10 or less
Being a cheap date never felt so right
Digital Boundaries: Hashtag America
Unplug for a day.
Album review: Camera Obscura’s Desire Lines
For 31 seconds of strings, the “Intro” to Desire Lines does a pretty amazing job of setting the table. The first swaths are airy and dramatic, slowly and elegiacally swaying, like a sad moment in an atmospheric film score. But the self-serious grandeur doesn’t last. An undercurrent of minor-key anxiety soon bubbles to the fore…
