Music-related lists often exist only to create controversy. Compilations of the twenty greatest guitar solos, fifty most moshworthy metal albums or thirty most otherworldly prog-rock epics serve primarily to pad the letters to the editor section and to validate critics’ personal preferences. Though they might claim they’re encouraging debate, these authors often write with an artificially authoritative tone that…
How long has Thomas Lauderdale been sitting at his piano? Since returning from a walk with his dog, Heinz (the namesake of Lauderdale’s record label), the leader of the Oregon group Pink Martini has spent the past forty minutes talking about making enemies, making money and making a follow-up to 1997’s dazzling Sympathique. Except for one woof from Heinz, Lauderdale’s…
You know Internet dating has become mainstream when Disney cranks out a bland comedy featuring a randomly selected pair of mismatched stars to take on the subject. The meaninglessly titled Bringing Down the House is predicated on the biggest pitfall of cyber flirting — that the person you’re communicating with may bear little actual resemblance to his or her self-description….
John Shaft went to Africa, so why shouldn’t Die Hard’s John McClane? In the new action romp Tears of the Sun, Bruce Willis undertakes a jungle rescue operation on the Dark Continent, and for his part it’s a McClane adventure in camouflage, minus all the sass and most of the spectacle. As Navy SEAL squad leader Lieutenant A.K. Waters,…
Peace of the action: Bryan Stalder’s “I believe we can only achieve peace through military action” statement (Letters, February 27) reminds me of the one timeless line from the play Hair. To wit: “Fighting for peace is like fucking for chastity”! John C. Lipscomb II Kansas City, Missouri Letter Imperfect Bar-B-Q: Regarding the “Missed Q” letter from the February 27…
The other day, Bob Pierce got stuck in a crowd of pedestrians downtown. A policeman held up a hand in front of Pierce’s Jeep and a line of other cars while hordes of Wal-Mart managers, in town for their annual convention, jaywalked across 13th Street from Municipal Auditorium to Bartle Hall. Pierce wasn’t frustrated by the delay, though. “I was…
Stanford Glazer wants to talk. “How are you, dear?” he says on the other end of the line. “Listen, I’m not mad or anything. You can write whatever you want, darlin’.” But, he says, there are a few things he wants to get straight after the way I portrayed him in last week’s column. Sure, he declared personal bankruptcy…
On Valentine’s Day, the heavens let loose a torrent that flowed across parking lots and streets, overloading a 117-year-old sewer system in the Historic Freight House District, an oasis of restaurants and art galleries just across the tracks north of Union Station. The fetid water formed lakes around Lidia’s Kansas City and Jack Stack Barbecue, where servers were laying out…
Ray Braswell points to a pair of stunning early-twentieth-century brick apartment buildings just west of the Country Club Plaza and says, almost to himself, “Those are beautiful buildings there.” That observation from Kansas City’s most popular developer, spoken with a collector’s appreciation, is indisputable. Square patches of elaborate terra-cotta adorn all seven stories of these buildings, named for the writers…
