Oct 22-28, 2014

Oct 22-28, 2014 / Vol. 28 / No. 35

Cover Story

It came from the walk-in cooler

Walk with me through a swinging door into Hell. Enormous vats bubble and steam over open flames, sharp knives slice into bloody flesh, boiling oil awaits its next victim. The temperature and humidity form a soupy miasma of overripe odors and dampness, and you must concentrate to stay upright on the slippery floor coated in…

Alison Leininger

Screaming while streaming

With Halloween right on top of us, it’s Netflix Streaming to the rescue. Here, in alphabetical order, are 10 recommendations currently in rotation and available for screening from your TV and/or computer. CARRIE (1976). Director Brian De Palma’s adaptation of Stephen King’s novel is one of the great horror classics of the past half-century, as…

Matt Brunson

St. Vincent: Blessed be Bill Murray

ST. VINCENT***DIRECTED BY Theodore MelfiSTARS Bill Murray, Melissa McCarthy It’s been attributed to everyone from Oscar Wilde and Edmund Kean to Groucho Marx and Edmund Gwenn, yet it actually feels like the adage “Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.” has been around ever since the first Greek philosopher-comic slipped on a banana peel. 2014 has…

Matt Brunson

Weekly horoscope (Oct. 23-29)

For All Signs: This week begins with the new moon eclipse in the sign of Scorpio on Oct. 23. Scorpio is a sign of shared resources. These include money, time, and energy that we share with one or more people. The stock market, NATO, banks, insurance, and the IRS are under the auspices of Scorpio.…

Vivian Carol

Dating Roulette

Being single is awesome most of the time. You wake up and go to sleep when you want to. You can have cereal for dinner and nobody complains. If you forget to pay the electric bill, the only person to have an argument with is yourself. Toilet seat up or down? Not my problem! Unless…

Abby White

Bizarre crime from Charlotte police files (Oct. 23)

H.B.I.C.: A mom we really want to befriend called police to prove a point to her shittily behaved kids. At about 10:30 p.m. one recent evening, she reported to police that her children were being disrespectful and involved in delinquent behavior. According to the report, “the reporting person wanted this incident documented.” *Finger snap.* Scam…

Ana McKenzie

Ebola Challenge

When your mother lives in West Africa, you might spend a night or 20 lying awake, freaking out about Ebola. My mom’s living and working at a school in Equatorial Guinea — that’s the other Guinea, the one where there hasn’t been an outbreak, yet. Still, West Africa is just a little too close for…

Ailen Arreaza

Survival of the Realest

A little over two years ago, Erika Stokes was having a run-of-the-mill Friday night. The 32-year-old sales executive at Electrolux was ready for bed, so she completed her nightly hair routine, brushing and wrapping up her straightened tresses in a silk scarf. Although she adored natural hair, she worried that the look might be too…

Emiene Wright

A ride down MLK provides peek into city’s racial psyche

A drive along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard will get you through parts of Uptown easily, offering a view straight out of a tourism guide. But chances are you’ve never realized the street, which was renamed in 2007 from Second Street to honor the civil rights icon, provides a coincidental journey and look into the…

Jarvis Holliday

CD Review: Slipknot’s .5: The Gray Chapter

Fans weren’t sure what would happen after the death of Slipknot bassist Paul Gray in 2010 and the departure of drummer Joey Jordison in 2013, but the rest of the Iowa-based heavy metal group got together to record their fifth studio album late last year. While the album starts off with the solemn “XIX,” it…

Jeff Hahne

The hard cider wave comes to Charlotte

I’ve typed for miles about the explosive growth of Charlotte’s beer scene in recent years. Now, fellow drinkers, be prepared for the rise of hard cider. First, some quick terminology. In the rest of the world, “cider” refers to apple juice that has been fermented. In America, “cider” refers to apple juice prior to fermentation;…

Jonathan Wells

A new designer look for Nabucco

As I sat in on a rehearsal of Opera Carolina’s rendition of Giuseppe Verdi’s Nabucco last week, I found myself captivated, unable to move — and not because Belk Theater’s plush new seats were holding me hostage. And not because the performance is particularly dynamic either. In fact, Nabucco is a pretty static opera, says…

Kimberly Lawson

Alynda Lee Segarra’s greater good

Alynda Lee Segarra doesn’t have a problem writing personal lyrics — she just doesn’t share them often. The ones she does offer for public consumption through her band Hurray for the Riff Raff are folk songs from a storyteller’s perspective. Though the 27-year-old has been crafting lyrics for more than a decade, it’s only recently…

Jeff Hahne

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