Minor-league baseball teams with cellar-scraping talent dream of the kind of national press that the Kansas City T-Bones got last month. Only problem: It was for all the wrong reasons. Our otherwise earnest Northern League club had planned a “Welcome to the Neighborhood” promotion for Michael Vick, the shamed NFL star who is incarcerated at Leavenworth prison on dogfighting charges….
Fortunately for those of us used to relying solely on a high school textbook version of American history, historians such as Mitch Yockelson plug some gaps. Yockelson, who works at the National Archives, shares the rarely told tale of World War I’s rough equivalent of D-Day at a free lecture at 11 a.m. at the National World War One Museum…
It’s not summer until you’ve felt the glorious sensation of chlorine up your nose. And then it’s still not technically summer until the solstice on June 21, according to the same unfun pedants who insist that the 21st century didn’t actually start until the year 2001. Get a jump on the solstice and the pedants today, when the Kansas City,…
Americans normally watch soccer as a sleep aid rather than for entertainment purposes. As a result, we miss the terrific English pastime of drinking pints of beer while yelling at a referee’s decision to reward a penalty kick or waiting for David Beckham to suffer a hamstring injury. O’Dowd’s Little Dublin Irish Pub at Zona Rosa (8600 Northwest Prairie View…
Robert Heishman is interested in breaking down artistic boundaries. A well-known local artist and photographer who has collaborated with the likes of Radiohead and Merce Cunningham, Heishman envisions a world in which visual artists explore written works and writers can project their words through visual media — a kind of artistic cross-cultural inversion. OK, so maybe Philip Roth won’t be…
Missouri will pick a new attorney general this fall. Three state legislators want badly to be the Democrat on the ballot. Margaret Donnelly, Jeff Harris and Chris Koster have raised a bunch of money; at last report, they have a total of $2.1 million to spend. The candidates will briefly set aside their donor call lists for the attorney general…
Elena Wagner suffers from multiple sclerosis, but a special kind of movement helps. “I belly dance to keep myself somewhat in shape and somewhat mobile,” she says. During her annual Fusion Fest at the Lenexa Masonic Lodge (13417 West 94th Street, 913-888-6564), Wagner and friends dance to benefit others with MS. And as the event’s name suggests, they’ll do more…
Duality is often associated with disparity, but in the case of PEZ, a brand famous for being both a brick candy and a line of toy candy dispensers, collectors worldwide spend enough dough for the dichotomy to prosperously synch up. Learn all about the candy and its container at a screening of PEZ Heads, followed by a talk with Shawn…
The Great American Barbecue isn’t your typical cook-then-eat BBQ festival. Take today’s activities in the event’s “Town Square Area”: carnival, $5 Segway rides, tofu tasting, beer garden, Southern Living culinary demos and hot-air balloons. OK, one of those things is made up, but you get the idea. Sure, there are barbecue contests from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but there’s…
“Things never happen the same way twice.” Thus boometh Aslan the lion (Liam Neeson), alias the Son of God, popping his computer-generated shaggy head briefly into The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian to pep-talk a bunch of discouraged Brits into fighting the good fight again. As in life, so in sequels. Aslan and other once-key figures — and, by extension,…
Occasionally, the Department of Burnt Ends receives misdelivered mail. If the envelope has not been properly sealed and the letter happens to fall open on the desk, it magically becomes our property. So here is the best misdelivered letter we received this week. Click on the image for a full-screen version. Categories: News Tags: Department of Burnt Ends, news
“Pirates” by Mr. Gnome, from Deliver This Creature (El Marko Records): The Cleveland duo of singer-guitarist Nicole Barille and drummer-pianist Sam Meister may call itself Mr. Gnome, but Mr. Goliath would’ve been a more apt name. As full-length debut Deliver This Creature demonstrates, the group specializes in a mighty breed of coliseum-sized, metal-rimmed art rock. Breathy interludes full of acoustic guitar…
“Assholes for Eyeballs” by Dark Meat, from Universal Indians (Vice Records): Any group with 17 musicians will inevitably be labeled a collective, but the Athens, Georgia, band Dark Meat earns that designation organically. Several of the band’s members live communally in Orange Twin, an “eco village” run by erstwhile Elephant 6 collective member Laura Carter. Dark Meat, which originated as…
Though largely obsolescent in the marketplace, old-school pop-punk bands still pack clubs. Fans welcome the opportunity to see their heroes play full shows indoors, as they did in the pre-Warped days. Strung Out won’t even make a cameo on the festival circuit this summer, instead working an itinerary that’s faithful to the title of its 2003 concert album, Live in…
“Cheney’s Toy” by James McMurtry, from Just Us Kids (Lightning Rod Records): By opening a song with the line I’ve had enough of this small-town bullshit, Texas roots rocker James McMurtry ensured himself an instant jukebox classic destined to win the hearts of patrons in thousands of bars across this country. Wry and cutting, with a call-it-like-you-see-it approach to lyrics,…
“That’s Not the Way it Should Be” by the Bellrays, from Hard Sweet and Sticky (Anodyne Records): Spiritual kin of the Dirtbombs, the BellRays, from Riverside, California, channel a similar blend of soul-soaked groove and steely garage clamor, highlighted by frontwoman Lisa Kekaula’s howling and growling Tina turns. Founded in the early ’90s, the BellRays have gained momentum since the…
“Dr. Black, your eleven o’clock is here.” “Very well. Send him in.” Psychologist Heather Black had been looking forward to her appointment with the Cure’s Robert Smith for two reasons. First, Disintegration had ruled her in high school. Second, Smith being responsible for such a mag-f’ing-nificent symphony of melancholia, the singer was the white whale of mental-health professionals everywhere. Dr….
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve driven by the squat, boarded-up, white-brick building at Seventh Street and Grand, just south of the Anthony’s Restaurant parking lot, and thought, That must have been one of the first White Castle burger stands in Kansas City. The architecture of those early White Castles is so distinctive that the tiny building at…
My recent column regarding the dissimilarities between Scots and Mexicans provoked a surprising amount of angry responses — by real Scotsmen furious that letter writer Great Scot could be so pendejo. Here’s the best reader carta. Dear Mexican: Having just read Great Scot’s question and your response, I can’t help but think that he is one of those Americans who…
Everybody knew what the e-mail meant. It went out last fall to employees of the Production Art Division of Hallmark Cards. It said that manager Lee Burner had scheduled a mandatory meeting for the next day. Somebody from HR would be there. Production artists were told to report to a conference room in the Rice Center, a section on the…
Burnt Ends, April 24 Real Smoked Beer I’ve been cooking on the Kansas City barbecue circuit now for about nine years, and the best barbecue beer I’ve found is O’Fallon’s Smoke beer. They smoke their hops before brewing, and the smoke flavor comes through wonderfully. It isn’t overpowering, like some of the German smoked beers. (They’re like drinking bacon.) It’s…
As a modern musical, Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens’ A Man of No Importance offers much of what you’d expect: a song celebrating a city (“The Streets of London”), an exclamatory showstopper about putting on a show (“Going Up!”), a slow-burning self-help number about getting stronger and moving on (“Welcome to the World”) and even a corny group-sing of the…
Malls can’t hide from their destinies. A Che Guevara belt buckle in the window of a former shoe store, for instance, signals a shopping center that might not be open for many more Christmases. Che and Elvis fashions caught my eye on a recent walk around Metro North Mall at U.S. Highway 169 and Barry Road. The shopping center, which…
When a major encyclopedic museum like the Nelson-Atkins decides to purchase a painting by Jess, everyone ought to stand up and cheer. Over the past decade, the Nelson has spent $10 million of the William T. Kemper Foundation’s money collecting work to fill major gaps in and augment its modern and contemporary collection. That effort culminates with the exhibition Sparks!…
