THE SCENE: Condo Browsing with a Foxx
If you’ve just moved to Charlotte, you know how earnest developers are about putting up new condos for people just like you. What you may not know is how to decorate that condo in a way it reflects you, is effective use of the space, and doesn’t cost as much as you’re paying in rent.…
FILM: Chuck Nyuks
Is there anyone out there who isn’t aware of the Internet phenomenon known as the “Chuck Norris Facts”? In a nutshell, the “facts” are nuggets of wisdom concerning the martial arts champion and former Walker, Texas Ranger star. In all cases, they’re fabricated statements made to illustrate Norris’ toughness and take-no-prisoners demeanor. Reportedly, Norris himself…
CITIZEN SERVATIUS: Your Tax Dollars at Work
Photo credit Dale Johnson Hope you didn’t miss the stunning tulips uptown along Tryon Street last week, provided by your oh-so-broke Charlotte city government, the same folks who raised your taxes last year because they claimed they couldn’t afford to hire more police officers. The tulips cost the city a mere $8,460 for 940 pots.…
Striking at the Tip
Name of Kama Sutra Position: Striking at the Tip (oral technique for women) Getting into the position: During oral intercourse with the male, the woman is instructed to let her tongue flick all over the male appendage. Pointing her tongue like a straight arrow, the woman then repeatedly strikes the Òsensitive glans tip.Ó On a…
CD Review: Don’t Tell Columbus
Graham Parker’s Don’t Tell Columbus was released March 13, 2007. The Deal: Former angry young man mellows out (sort of) with age and the help of same tasty guitar hooks. The Good: Like Dylan’s “115th Dream,” Graham Parker’s “Don’t Tell Columbus” is a skewed personal take on American history. “I had the accurate compass,” says…
FILM: Money For Nothing
It used to mean something to be one of the all-time top-grossing moneymakers. It used to mean that a motion picture tapped into the national zeitgeist, or benefited from glorious word of mouth, or merely proved to be so entertaining that few could resist its charms. And now? It merely means that a heckuva lot…
THE SCENE: Dance of War
Prologue: On the agenda for Friday night was Nego Gato, a performance of music, dance and capoeira, a Brazilian martial art nicknamed the “dance of war.” However, how the night transgressed can be jokingly referred to as the “dance of options.” Act One: I was running late to attend NG, so I was still in…
No Sleep Till Brooklyn
One of the last places you might expect to find a dub outfit would be out on tour with heavy-hitters like Clutch, right? But if you’re talking about Brooklyn’s Dub Trio, who has been mixing it up with everyone from Gnarls Barkley to The Who, it’s really not too unlikely of a scenario. True, Dub…
Baaaabecue
Each year Charlotte gains dozens of Latino restaurants. Most of these are not the high-end, expensive upfits that draw a lot of press and well-heeled patronage. Many of these eateries are the mom and pop variety that offer comfort foods to Latino ex-pats yearning for a good, home-cooked meal. These spots do not feature talking…
Books, music, film and more
Over 30 events are scheduled for the six days and nights of CPCC ArtsFest. Throughout the week, there are lectures, exhibits, screenings, and book signings across the Central Piedmont Community College campus. You’ll find the biggies behind the colonnades of the Overcash Building at Halton Theater. Dr. Edward Hirsch keynotes Monday at 11:30 a.m. with…
Beggar with a baby
MOODSWINg
Well-respected men
When it comes to The Kinks, it’s time to revise your British Invasion primers and rock ‘n’ roll history manuals. For years, the band Pete Townshend once called the “quintessential English” act occupied an odd middle ground in rock’s back pages. They sold millions of records, collected Top 40 hits in three different decades (over…
Echo of Night
Charlotte’s Echo Foundation celebrates its 10th anniversary by bringing Nobel Prize laureate Elie Wiesel to Belk Theater. The novelist, essayist, peace advocate, and conscience of the species will unleash his quiet eloquence “Against Indifference.” Never content with righteous, egalitarian sentiment, Wiesel is ever arguing — compellingly — for global vigilance and responsible action. Best known…
Lexy
Profile
Dolphus Ramseur’s Top 10
Dolphus Ramseur is a North Carolina native and head of Ramseur Records. He and The Avett Brothers, one of the many bands on his label, just returned from a sold-out show in New York. Before that, Ramseur was taking his talent to the United Kingdom. He took some time from his busy schedule to share…
Art imitates art
UNC Charlotte does dance with a difference next week as the Department of Dance & Theatre brings The Kinetic Canvas to the beautiful Robinson Hall through April 1. Fronted by a “Realityness” photo exhibit in the Robby lobby, all four choreographies presented in the Anne Belk Theatre look outward from dance, taking their cues from…
Film clips
Current Releases AMAZING GRACE Basically Amistad with only half the serving of self-importance, Amazing Grace examines the efforts of William Wilberforce, a member of British Parliament who fought to end his country’s involvement in the slave trade during the late-18th and early-19th centuries. Ioan Gruffudd, no stranger to heroic roles (Horatio Hornblower, Mr. Fantastic, even…
Sex flaws
News
Mini-me racing
Between Lowe’s Motor Speedway, The NASCAR Hall of Fame, Speed Street, and The Richard Petty Driving Experience, Charlotte is — whether we like it or not — essentially NASCAR’s home garage (not to mention home base for most of the drivers). And now there’s an additional form of racing based in town: Arena Racing at…
The execution of Janice Almitairi
Citizen Servatius
Pleased to meat you
Advice Goddess
Cheap Thrills
MILESTONE FILM SERIES Not your average movie viewing house, not your average movies. The folks behind this series have a fondness for theme nights. This week’s offerings include: March 25: Jack Nicholson Double Feature — Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, dubbed “The Classic” (early show, 7 p.m.); Martin Scorsese’s The Departed, The New Release (late show,…
Live Music Review: Keite Young
The Deal: Keite Young’s eclectic circus. The Good: Every now and then an artist comes along and bridges the gap between the “Get Crunk” generation and the “Purple Haze” generation; Joss Stone, John Legend, Nikka Costa and now Keite Young. With his eclectic fusion of funk and R&B, Young resurrected the sounds of rock ‘n’…
Mostly movies
Hot Linx
Word of the Week
FLAPDOODLE: n. Nonsense Example: Stop all this flapdoodle! This is flapdoodle! What kind of flapdoodle have you gotten yourself into now?
Live Music Review: Bettye LaVette
The Deal: Old-school soul songstress delivers the goods, old and new, with fire and sass. The Good: Bettye LaVette doesn’t perform songs — she’s possessed by them. She gets so far inside the song you can see her clawing at the walls, rending great holes in the fabric to vent her emotions. Saturday night at…
Carlos’ way
Breaking the Sound Barrier
We Heart…
Eileen on Camden Road. It’s my favorite boutique in Charlotte. Everything in the shop is less than $99, and you can always count on Eileen to have the latest and hottest fashions. I can find great clothes for both work and play! — Jenn Minigh, ad account executive Covenant Presbyterian Church in Dilworth. It’s a…
CD Review: Johnny Bush
Label: Icehouse Music The Deal: Deep dish country: bottomless Texas honky-tonk that’s smooth around the edges. The Good: After recording his biggest hit, “Whiskey River” in 1972, country singer Johnny Bush’s vocal chords were paralyzed by a rare neurological disorder. A couple of years ago Bush found a cure. With the help of botox injections…
The Blotter
BURNING HEAP O’ DOO: A south Charlotte woman told police someone set fire to a paper sandwich bag filled with the suspect’s feces on her door step. KIDS THESE DAYS: Somebody (or somebodies) climbed into an elementary school through an unlocked door, dispensed the contents of a fire extinguisher inside the school and took off…
Creative Loafing’s Political Party
Interested in local and/or national politics? Ever had the desire to smack Rush Limbaugh or kick Tim Russert in the gonads? Well, you’ve got to check out Creative Loafing’s Political Party. Modeled after Bill Maher’s TV show Politically Incorrect, Political Party is CL’s twist on a political talk show. But our show doesn’t happen on…
CD Review: Holmes Brothers
Label: Alligator The Deal: Blues, county, soul, rock and zydeco go to church. The Good: A new musical category needs to be created for the Holmes Brothers. Spiritual blues comes close, but you need to factor in folk, country and soul as well. You can’t really call it gospel because most of the subject matter…
Stargazer Horoscope
Aries the Ram: (March 20 — April 19) You are encountering a low cycle during this period. You have less energy than usual and even normal activities may seem to require more effort than you want to muster. There is also general interference in your love and social life. The meaning is clear. You need…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: I have a question about greed, trust and doing the right thing. I am part of a circle of women, many of them in their late 30s or 40s, and all with successful husbands and/or well-paying jobs. They are good people underneath it all, even if we sometimes call ourselves the “Wisteria…
CD Review: Jon Rauhouse
Label:Bloodshot The Deal: Neko Case’s pedal steel player stretches out over a gauntlet of genres. The Good: To younger listeners, this may be a real trip. But for older listeners, it seems like a natural thing for a pedal steel player to do — to pull from every genre his strings can reach. It’s an…
The also-rans
So many worthy films, so few slots … To that end, we asked each panelist to cite the one movie they were most sorry didn’t make our collective Top 20, as well as list by title two other “also worthies.” MATT BRUNSON Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001). Billed as a “post-punk neo-glam rock musical,”…
Letters to the editor
UP-STAGED It is unfortunate to read that the leadership of BareBones Theatre Group says the Arts & Science Council (ASC) does not “believe in what we do.” (Urban Explorer Handbook 2007: “BareBones Theatre Group” by Branna Calloway, March 7) I wish to set the record straight on ASC’s support for BareBones Theatre Group. Over the…
CD Review: Elvis Perkins
Label: XL Recordings The Deal: Mellow folkie’s dreamy debut. The Good: This one takes a little getting used to. Your initial impression might be — how the hell did this guy get a record deal? Perhaps the last name, Perkins is the key. His dad was Psycho’s Anthony, the Bates Motel’s crazed proprietor. But as…
The 10 Worst
1. SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND (1978). The winner (make that loser) by a landslide in the critics’ voting, this travesty finds Peter Frampton and The Bee Gees mangling classic Beatles tunes. 2. STAYING ALIVE (1983). Sylvester Stallone directs John Travolta in a kitschy sequel to Saturday Night Fever. Disco inferno, indeed. 3. XANADU…
America the fierce and surreal
The term “page turner” isn’t one that readers often associate with books of popular history, but author Jim Swanson pulls it off in his vivid, fast-paced story of Lincoln’s assassination and its aftermath. John Wilkes Booth and other Confederate diehards conspired to wipe out the top levels of the U.S. government, but only Booth was…
CD Review: Jon Shain
Label:Flyin’ Records The Deal: Local folkie’s eclectic mix of blues, gospel, folk and zydeco. The Good: The term folkie is a loose fit for Chapel Hill-based singer/ songwriter Jon Shain. Over the course of his career, he experimented with most of the other genres in his groups Flyin’ Mice and Weke before settling into the…
Neal Harper’s Top Five
Culture Surfing
Devilish ministers and profiteers
Performing Arts
A reporter laughs?!
Intrepid female journalist Maggie Kilgore takes us back during her high-flying career that paved the way for the likes of Diane Sawyer and Katie Couric. From the heights of flying with the Blue Angels and spending a day on the Goodyear Blimp to acting as a foreign correspondent in Vietnam as well as a Statehouse…
View From The Couch
BLOOD DIAMOND (2006). The message of this public service announcement masquerading as a movie is that consumers should take care not to buy “conflict diamonds,” baubles obtained by mercenaries using slave labor, then smuggled out of war torn countries. Since the film (set in Sierra Leone) quickly establishes that these “conflict diamonds” are mixed in…
Who’s sorry now?
Boomer With Attitude
Smoove like a foxx
Actor, comedian, singer and all around hipster Jamie Foxx is finally touring in support of his smash recording Unpredictable. Hear Foxx croon uptempo numbers and slow jams along with his stand-up routines and caustic comedy. His sidesplitting impersonations are alone worth the admission. Foxx will perform at the Charlotte Bobcats Arena beginning at 7:30 p.m.…
Round-up ramblings
Corkscrew
Music For The Movies
CRITICS’ PANEL Matt Brunson, Kandia Crazy Horse, Lynn Farris, John Grooms, Lew Herman, Fred Mills, John Schacht, Sam Shapiro, Samir Shukla, Ann Wicker Introduction by Matt Brunson When Bill Haley sang that it was “One-two-three o’clock, four o’clock rock,” he was in effect declaring that it was time for a new musical revolution in movies.…
Kickin’ it at the ‘Winds
Whew! Temperatures have already headed into the 80s and July is months away. You know what that means. Spring is here (it officially began on March 21). The new season of Carowinds begins today. The Carolinas’ mega-themepark is under new management, but it has the same thrills and spills as when it was Paramount’s Carowinds.…
All tossed up
Mouthful
Love and bullets (and one ugly beast)
It’s inconceivable that the names Eric Rohmer and Pootie Tang would ever appear in the same sentence, yet that’s the result of cowriter-director-star Chris Rock making I Think I Love My Wife. The film is an American bastardization of 1972’s Chloe In the Afternoon, the sixth and final movie in philosophical French director Rohmer’s “Moral…
Woman on fire
Ok, let’s say you were just hanging out with your girls spittin’ a few rhymes. Then, all of a sudden, you’re being tied to a stake and burned alive for practicing witchcraft. Fortunately, this could never happen during the 21st century, unless of course, you want to call the Iraq war a modern-day witch hunt.…
