Michael Moore often worries about being seen—and worse, dismissed—as the plump, ball-cap-wearing windbag who barges into company headquarters, demands to see the chairman of the board, then gets kicked out or even arrested. He frets about being reduced to a stuntman of shtick, Captain Ambush, the guy called upon whenever a TV talking head needs a pissed-off pundit to…
There’s a song from the musical Gypsy called “You Gotta Have a Gimmick,” sung by three strippers. Each of those ladies realized that to stand out in a crowd, they had to create distinct personalities to grab attention away from the competition. Most modern restaurants have their own set of gimmicks, which isn’t such a bad thing in the…
25 Thursday E. Lynn Harris is cool because in his 1996 release of And This Too Shall Pass, the main character was an NFL quarterback who was gay. This man is progressive. In his newest work, Abide with Me, Harris returns with that progressive flair. Magazines across the country rave about his compelling ability to combine the themes of…
Time has tiptoed its way into the next decade, century, and supposed millennium. Whether you regard last Jan. 1 as the mark of a new millennium or merely the turning of three nines into three zeroes, looking to the past seems inevitable. Perhaps the idea is that in studying the mistakes and accomplishments of world leaders and warring peoples…
Bob Harvey is a fighter. You can hear that in his voice. He’s a teacher. You can hear that in his original songs. He’s a learner. You can hear that in the way he plays guitar, keyboards, and harmonica. And his band, The Bob Harvey Band, needs to get out more, particularly when it comes to crossing the great watery…
Long-jumping into the championship classWith a mascot like the Kangaroos, the image would be that the University of Missouri-Kansas City is awash with long-jumpers. Truth is, no track and field athlete from UMKC has ever advanced to the NCAA championships. But bad puns aside, things have changed this season … and hopes are high as freshman Deandre Free leaps his…
If the notorious Topekan Reverend Fred Phelps and his familiar “God Hates Fags” placard have to show up in a play, one can be grateful that is in a context in which it makes perfect sense. Such is the case in Moises Kaufman’s The Laramie Project, his brilliant follow-up to Gross Indecency: The Trials of Oscar Wilde, which opened off-Broadway…
Opera is nothing if not high melodrama. So when Terrence McNally folds his love of opera into his skill as a playwright, the lack of melodrama in the final product is a blessing indeed. His play about a group of gay men and their all-consuming obsession with opera, The Lisbon Traviata, was an adroit black comedy. His later brainchild…
The Kansas City Artists Coalition’s current lineup attests to the fact that there’s no discernable trend in art these days. There’s no central region of activity, no dominant ism, and no universal theme. For this writer, such plurality frustrates to the point of paralysis, resulting in a longing for the good ol’ days with all those comfortable rules. Luckily,…
Having a song dedicated to you from the stage at a rock show can be either a painful experience, like being serenaded with “Happy Birthday” for an eternity in front of a hostile, heckling crowd, or an invigorating thrill. Opening band Annie On My Mind set aside a little ditty for one Ryan Brown on Monday night, and he…
Billy Royce and his two-man crew must have their mojo working like a smokescreen; it’s almost impossible to find out anything about where Voodoo Kitchin’ does its home cooking. But cook they did Saturday night, running through a satisfyingly gritty, if rote, set of swamp rockers in the Stevie Ray Vaughan tradition. Unfortunately, because the trio’s bad moon didn’t…
The CD release party for Luqman Hamza’s new recording was hardly what you would call a gala affair. In fact, the only attendee in evening wear was Hamza himself, who seemed truly delighted by the enthusiastic response he garnered from an ardent, if small, crowd. Hamza was not the only artist on the evening’s bill, even though was the…
Lionel Richie paused after “Stuck on You” during his set Friday night to joke that fans of his ballads usually got engaged, got married, or got in a whole lot of trouble while listening to his songs. He left out “fell asleep.” Okay, cheap shot, but Richie chose to focus his energy on the drippier portion of his catalog….
Kristie Stremel might have been the official headliner on Monday night, but the crowd was not hers. Although she pulled out all the stops, covering a Creedence Clearwater Revival tune and playing her guitar behind her head, Stremel couldn’t wrestle the spotlight away from Tina, the artist she followed to the stage. True, the most boisterous crowd response of the…
Like The Get Up Kids, Shaking Tree is a local band that has presented a far greater impact on the national front than on its Midwestern hometown. True, the Lawrence-based quartet’s latest record, Matter of Choice, might be a little jangly for a town whose musical demographic leans toward the heavy, indie, or insurgent spectrum, but this sound is quite…
Jyemo was once a Kansas City band named Mop, and although some might say any change of name would have been for the better, its resulting moniker doesn’t appear in many vocabularies. Apparently, the band used the disdainful term “jyem” to describe unreliable sorts, so a friend who never showed up for his commitments became known as “Jyemo.” Fortunately, the…
Some CDs work better as an incentive to see a band live than as leisure-time listening fodder. One such release is the amusingly titled How I Lost My Manhood Playing Racquetball, which reveals hints of infectious energy and songwriting promise under the unfortunate cloud of foggy production, which occasionally renders the guitars tinny and the rhythm section virtually inaudible while…
It’s that time of year again, the weekend for Oi! bands, those hard-rockin’ champions of the working class, to descend on a local all-ages venue and engage in rollicking singalongs with a mix of local and travel-weary fans. For a quick primer, check out the recently released compilation Streetpunk ’99, which was recorded in remarkably clear fashion at last year’s…
A few options present themselves to people who aren’t getting what they want out of the Kansas City scene. Option number one: Bitch about it as often as possible at clubs and in Internet chat rooms. Option number two: Move. Option number three: Shut up and do something about it. The Main Street Saints’ Tim Nord has decided to…
We learned more from a three-minute record than we ever did in school. — Bruce Springsteen, “No Surrender” It would have been helpful for Bruce to disclose the title of that valedictory single. But then, “No Surrender” runs longer than three minutes, so nobody’s perfect. In the 16 years since Springsteen released that song, his work and the canons and…
So who exactly are these kids from Philly, and why does their record sound so absolutely vital, so totally rock in these decidedly nonrock times? Marah’s second album sounds like the work of the bastard children of the Rolling Stones, the Counting Crows, and Guided By Voices. Lead singer Dave Bielanko’s salty yet comfortable warble proves equally comfortable with rapid-fire…
A Joni Mitchell fan I know — that is, a woman who exclaimed in a recent e-mail that Mitchell is “everything” — described the heartbreaking new take of her song “A Case of You” on Both Sides Now as “profoundly sad.” It’s tempting to label any song set atop a gloomy string arrangement as sad, but “A Case of You,”…
E is not a happy man. His band Eels’ biggest hit was “Novocaine for the Soul,” a catchy song that was nonetheless kind of a downer, and record number two, Electro-Shock Blues, was a concept record about cancer that mixed danceable beats with somber lyrics. By contrast, Daisies of the Galaxy offers a glimpse at E’s lighter side. He’s still…
Those Boston-based road dogs are back at it again, and lead Bosstone Dicky Barrett’s shattered, strained-beyond-mortal-comprehension vocal chords seem up to the mighty task yet again. However, a nagging question remains: Does anybody still care? The mainstream ska train has crashed and burned, leaving Ferris unsaved and Big Fish unreeled. Does anyone who owns the multiplatinum Let’s Face It really…
