Arts Agenda
Classical Music American Guild of Organists Summer Recital Series Featuring the Royal School of Church Music Evensong. Sun., July 21, 3:30 p.m. All recitals are free and open to the public; a free-will offering will be taken to cover the costs of the series. Covenant Presbyterian Church, 1000 E. Morehead St. 704-588-1290. American Guild of…
And He Kept A Straight Face
Headline of the Week: Bush pushes for business ethics Last week was a rough one for Dubya. First, the ongoing corporate scandals began tanking the stock market — bad enough. In the meantime, the whole sordid mess emboldened the normally timid press to point out that Bush benefited during his business career from the same…
Intro Course
Having fun and making people feel at home is the intent of Sushi 101 Noodle and Sushi Bar. Co-owner and Chef Hank Lim and Rick Taing, a silent partner, opened Sushi 101 last April. Says Lim, “I had been thinking about opening this concept in Charlotte for four years. I used to come up to…
Time Travel Has Come Today
Man by nature has the spirit of adventure at the core of his soul. Way back in fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Christopher Columbus felt compelled to sail the ocean blue in three little boats. In the 1960s, President Kennedy set a goal for the United States to land a man on the moon and bring…
Call Any Vegetable
Like most people with a backyard garden, I grow tomatoes. In my view there’s no better summertime meal than fresh-picked, vine-ripened tomatoes mixed with sugar and mayo served alongside a medium-rare ribeye steak. Add an ice cold beer, throw in some buttered corn on the cob, and life is good.Enjoyable as they are, controversy does…
Hangers To Debut Soon
To find out about the sewage in your area creek or lake, you might not have to go any further than your front door. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities(CMU) will soon inform county residents of nearby sewage spills by hanging door hangers on their doors.Vic Simpson, a spokesperson for CMU, says he is designing the door hangers, which…
The Wine In Spain
For those raised on California and French vinos, the wines of Spain can seem like a mystery. Sure, we’ve all seen and heard the word “Rioja,” but what exactly is in those dark, expensive bottles? Nowadays, really all you need to know about Spain is a few regions, producers, and grape varietals on Spanish labels…
Pennywise Broadcasting
You sometimes think you’ve heard it all in TV Land, but the decision to move a Columbia, SC newscast operation to function mainly out of Charlotte is a real head scratcher.WOLO-TV, the sister station of WCCB-TV in Charlotte, will likely be doing its 6 & 11pm newscasts from here by October, in a “merger” that’s…
Good Eats
All Around Town Anntony’s Caribbean, 400 S. Tryon St., 704-339-0303; 2001 E. 7th,, 704-342-0749. All locations have different owners. A hint of the tropics; rotisserie chicken with Jamaican jerk sauce, ribs, Paradise Island fish special, curries, and Caribbean styled greens. $$ Brixx Wood-Fired Pizza, 801 Scott Avenue, 704-376-1000; 225 E. 6th Street, 704-347-2749; 16915 Birkdale…
Just A-Walkin’ The Dog
Nothing gets a journalist’s juices flowing quicker than mention of a free meal. Or T-shirt. Or CDs, DVDs, or books on tape. The Jeep Outdoor Tour, which had parked itself at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, invited us last Tuesday to a press luncheon, replete with loads of lookalike alt-rockers, other local press (the Observer and some…
Sacred Steel Worker
Over the course of one dizzying year, Robert Randolph has gone from playing exclusively in churches for small congregations to opening for the Dave Matthews Band in front of 15,000 people at Madison Square Garden. And the 24-year-old product of northern New Jersey has taken this rocket ride by playing the decidedly unglamorous pedal steel…
Letters To The Editor
Hey, That’s Not Funny Responding to “Who’s the Comedian?” (Sex & the Queen City by Elizabeth Chapel, July 3), I have failed to comprehend why this newspaper would reserve valuable newsprint for an extremely insecure woman with a personal life that exclusively revolves around her vagina. . — — Adrian DeVore, Charlotte Pay Up, Football…
Get Shorty
Whether you know it or not, chances are you’ve been listening to Randy Newman’s music for decades. Over 100 singers have covered his songs, including Judy Collins, Etta James, Joe Cocker, Bonnie Raitt, Dusty Springfield and Three Dog Night, who had a number one hit with Newman’s “Mama Told Me Not To Come” in 1970.…
Franklin Freeman Won’t Go Away
Memo to the police department about the Franklin Freeman situation: This is a big deal. What we have here is the body of one black transvestite prostitute killed five days before he was scheduled to testify at a suspension hearing for an officer involved in a drinking incident gone awry. That coincidence has raised more…
Two Prophets + The Blasters
The Byrds Play Dylan (Columbia/Legacy) Chuck Prophet — No Other Love (New West Records) The Blasters — Testament: The Complete Stash Recordings (Rhino/Slash) On a winter evening in 1964, Bob Dylan walked into a Los Angeles recording studio and heard the future of his music. He was, quite literally, electrified. A group of five musicians…
Apparent Confusion
I hate people with children. They think the entire world revolves around their little bundles of joy. It’s one thing if their personal worlds revolve around their kids — that’s their choice. But the rest of us have other concerns. Some of these concerns include: having a quiet meal in a restaurant, being able to…
Music Menu
WEDNESDAY 7.17 Ph Balance — Signed to Indigo gal Amy Ray’s Daemon Records, the Ph’ers balance trip-hop beats, guitars, turntables and voice (Pam Howe’s gorgeous wail coupled with some pretty fair laidback rapping), walking the line between Southern pop and Portishead rather nicely. The band sounds refreshing in much the same way Digable Planets did…
Letter from England Part II
There’s a man at the beach with a letter from President Reagan. He is there every day, rain or shine, sitting next to a Sherman tank, selling self-published books about American soldiers in 1944.This breathtakingly beautiful South Devon beach, used as a practice ground for the D-Day Normandy landings, is on few Americans’ tourist itineraries,…
In The Abstract
The work of Barbara Fisher can best be described as abstract, relying upon a highly personal visual vocabulary. It appears to be as much about articulating an inner world as it is about participating in the creative process.In New Paintings, the current exhibit at Hidell Brooks Gallery, her mixed media pieces are decorative patchworks of…
Soundboard
Wednesday, Jul. 17 Arnie’s Tavern, Huntersville Scott Johnson Bayou Kitchen Bill Noonan Big Al’s Pub, Cornelius Jes & Sherry Cajun Queen 7th Street Gator Band Cajun Queen, Pineville 7th Street Gator Band II Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro Caitlin Cary Charleston Chops, Cornelius Kent Steel Comet Grill Tom Eure Connolly’s Craig & Rich Acoustic Double Door Inn…
The Blotter
My Shoe is Your Shoe: A larceny recently occurred at a warehouse in which 500 pairs of used, yes, used, shoes were stolen. It is unknown who took the boxes of shoes (or how they were transported) since the warehouse is occupied by several tenants with no dividers to separate the businesses. Score! A middle-aged…
See & Do
JULY17WEDNESDAYThe WNBA Charlotte Sting play the Orlando Miracle at 7pm tonight at the Charlotte Coliseum. Tickets are $8-50, available by calling 877-WNBA-TIX. The 107.9 Wednesday Happy Hour Free Concert Series continues today at Gateway Village with Sister Hazel as the featured band. The evening begins at 5pm, and admission is free. For more information, call…
Father’s Day
The screen version of Road to Perdition may be paved with good intentions, but that may not be enough to appease fans of the acclaimed 1998 graphic novel penned by Max Allan Collins and illustrated by Richard Piers Rayner. Hollywood has a long history of turning literary material inside out to suit its own purposes,…
News of the Weird
The “F” is for “Free Market”: China’s youth and young adults are increasingly beyond the communist government’s control in their spending and leisure habits, according to a May dispatch in Toronto’s Globe and Mail. Although party leaders still appear on “most-admired” lists, so do Bill Gates and pop stars such as the Taiwanese boy band…
Ask The Advice Goddess
Slummer Love I work in a little insurance agency and live a pretty routine life. Two months ago, I went to the bank to open a new account. When I reached the window, there she was — this breathtakingly beautiful teller. After two months of muttering, “Here’s my deposit slip,” I found the courage to…
Creature Features
Depending on your choice of escapist fare, heading to the multiplex this weekend might result in a childhood flashback, recalling those late nights of monster double features that used to be the after-hours bread and butter of local stations and then cable outlets like Ted Turner’s TBS Superstation. Reign of Fire and Eight Legged Freaks…
Finger Food
Move over, chicken wings. Charlotte has another spicy, inexpensive spot for food eaten by hand: an Ethiopian/Eritrean restaurant called Red Sea Restaurant and Bar. Anyone who has lived in Washington, DC is familiar with the abundance of Ethiopian restaurants there. In fact, Washingtonians claim their city has more Ethiopian restaurants than anywhere except Ethiopia. Frequenting…
Who You Calling Nuts?
I remember the first time I saw Fatal Attraction, featuring the pre-bald Glenn Close and a much younger Michael Douglas. I recall thinking what a whacked out psychotic bitch she was — how many women want to get laid by a guy so bad that they’ll slash their wrists with a razor for attention? I’ve…
Film Clips
CURRENT RELEASES THE BOURNE IDENTITY With real-life best buddy Ben Affleck off trying to save the world in the current The Sum of All Fears, it’s only fitting that Matt Damon would be involved in his own spy game in The Bourne Identity. In an attempt to make the dog-eared espionage genre more palatable to…
Stargazer
For All Signs Planets which are 150 degrees apart are known as “inconjunct” to astrologers. This is a challenging aspect that suggests circumstances that are on hold. Sometimes the aspect represents being trapped in a time bind for which there is no good solution. If we make the expected choice in a situation then we…
Putting The Squeeze On
They’re tough new rules that demand accountability but will also improve the lives of some of the Queen City’s poorest. Or they’re draconian mandates handed down by an inefficient agency that’s unfairly putting the screws to already disadvantaged people. That’s the issue at hand ever since the Charlotte Housing Authority (CHA) recently proposed new rules…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser:I have a male friend who has been part of my social group for almost a year. Though I’ve secretly been attracted to him, he has a girlfriend. Recently, he has been inviting me to do things (movies, dinners, picnics) that have not included the rest of our group. In fact, he has…
Fight Looms Over Future of Charter Schools
Lately it seems where there’s a charter school, there’s a battle brewing. Locally, a brawl between some faculty and administrators at Crossroads Charter High School on North Tryon Street over whether administrators inflated students’ grades to allow them to graduate has entertained Creative Loafing readers for the last six weeks.Now, at the state level, charter…
Back In The Saddle Again
It’s hard to pity a best-selling, Pulitzer Prize-winning author, but, in the case of Larry McMurtry, it’s possible. The 66-year-old author won his widest fame for Lonesome Dove, a sprawling narrative following an adventuresome, troubled cattle drive from Texas to Montana. The bitter heartaches, the senseless, random violence, the relentless difficulty of life in the…
Corporate Responsibility Washout
“Mr. Bush is not a real reformer; he just plays one on TV.” — Paul Krugman, New York Times columnistPresident Bush likes to talk tough. To hear him tell it, “My administration will do everything in our power to end the days of cooking the books, shading the truth, and breaking our laws.” He wants…
