There’s a wheel of fortune at Animal Haven (9800 West 67th Street in Merriam), and the fortunes at stake are more than monetary. The metro’s largest no-kill animal shelter is bursting at the seams, with 350 homeless pets at its facility and about 125 more in foster care. “We’re full enough right now that we’ve put extra kennels in our…
To prevent nasty recreational water illnesses, the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) offers six steps to promote healthy swimming: (1) Don’t swim when afflicted with diarrhea, (2) avoid allowing water into your mouth, (3) practice good hygiene, (4) take children for frequent toilet breaks, (5) change diapers in appropriate areas and (6) shower before swimming. Following these common-sense…
And we mean all filmmakers. From anywhere. Technically speaking, you don’t even have to be reading this announcement to be eligible to submit your short or feature film — be it narrative, documentary, animated or experimental — to Kansas City FilmFest 2010. (We just blew your mind, didn’t we? Please take a moment to ponder that and catch up.) Presented by…
Hey, you, low-stakes gambler and ancient-board-game aficionado. A $10 buy-in puts you in the running to make 90 percent of an optional side pool (in addition to other prize money) if you’re the highest placed entrant at one of the backgammon events sponsored by the Kansas City Backgammon Club. The five-year-old group rolls the dice every Tuesday at 6:30 p.m….
A cello can sound a lot like Slayer. Minnesota cellist Aaron Kerr counts that band among his many influences, alongside Pablo Casals and Miles Davis. Kerr’s original compositions include modern classical pieces, free jazz and ambient avant-garde weirdness, and he tweaks his instruments with an array of pedal effects to create a gigantic sound that can overtake a venue like…
We’re asking for subsistence! A camera zeros in on Mike Tuley at the mic. He’s dressed up like a punk-rock karate instructor in a white coat, with a headband tied around his ‘fro and his guitar strapped on. He leads his band, Ad Astra Per Aspera, in a kung-fu razor assault. We’re asking for subsistence! He sings it over and…
In this lushly produced but dispiriting new comedy, Katherine Heigl stars as Abby Richter, a successful but hopelessly uptight TV producer who is also perpetually single. Enter Mike (Gerard Butler), a big, boorish lunk of a hunk, whose cable show, The Ugly Truth, advises men and women to seek “lust, not love.” Abby finds his philosophy infuriating, only to discover…
The premise of this gentle existential farce from Norwegian director Bent Hamer is little more than an excuse for a series of deadpan vignettes about love, death and the meaning of life. Forced into age-mandated retirement, longtime train engineer Odd Horten (Baard Owe) quite literally goes off the rails and spends most of the movie dazedly wandering the wintry streets…
As an icon to both punk rockers and Americana musicians, John Doe can pretty much have his pick of collaborators these days. The frontman of X has been pursuing subdued tones on recent solo albums, but he has given his sound a twangy Bakersfield boost by hiring Canadian cosmic-country outfit the Sadies to back him up on his new LP,…
The arrival of Grandmaster Flash at Mosaic on Friday will mark a rare opportunity for the city’s music fans to enjoy a hip-hop pioneer in the flesh and on the wheels of steel. It will also mark the first opportunity for the Power & Light District to welcome with open arms a hip-hop act after the debacle surrounding DJ Jazzy…
You see zydeco, so you think high-energy, accordion-fueled Louisiana sound. Ernest James Zydeco does that but adds a laid-back feel to the Creole music party on Jubilee. That feel comes from playing for audiences in Kansas City, where the zydeco dance tradition isn’t as strong as it is in the Bayou State. What he throws into the pot is reggae…
Charles Thompson IV, better known as both Frank Black and Black Francis, is a hard man to keep up with. After disbanding the Pixies in ’93, Francis became Frank and embarked on a solo career that continued in his previous band’s noisome, punkish vein, eventually picking up backing band the Catholics. After a 2004 Pixies reunion tour, Frank roped him…
Like Mogwai or Godspeed You Black Emperor, Actors & Actresses rarely takes the quickest route to a musical statement. Each of the nine songs on the Kansas City group’s debut LP, Arrows, heats up at the speed of an iceberg (pre-global warming) before eventually crashing off the figurative cliff. The disc can be heard as the latest in a long…
When the actor Abe Vigoda finally departs from this earth, his soul — or at least his name — will live on in a Los Angeles band called, yes, Abe Vigoda. Vigoda the actor might be a tad flummoxed by Vigoda the band’s music, and not just because of his advancing age. The group’s energetic hybrid of tropical beats and…
Margaret May isn’t just another girl with a guitar. Crafting melodies that encompass raucous folk-punk and delicate, melancholic balladry, May has made a name for herself in the Kansas City music scene, wooing listeners with her raw, honest lyrics and Americana-infused sound. “My mom raised me on Joni Mitchell. That’s always my staple,” says May, who spreads the gospel under…
A few years ago, my friend Carol Ann traveled to South Korea to spend a couple of weeks visiting a friend. She came back loaded down with trinkets and souvenirs and couldn’t stop raving about the food: “It was very fresh, lots of vegetables and thinly sliced grilled beef served with lots of interesting and spicy condiments.” I can’t remember…
Kathryn Bigelow’s Iraq War drama The Hurt Locker is a full-throttle body shock of a movie. It gets inside you like a virus, puts your nerves in a blender and twists your guts into a Gordian knot. Set during the last month in the yearlong rotation of a three-man U.S. Army bomb squad stationed in Baghdad, it may be the…
Sometimes I feel for actors. Sure, the professionals starring in the American Heartland Theatre’s Are We There Yet? have it all going for them: talent, ovations, livelihoods in which they’re doing what they love. At the same time, making that living means that they have to appear in shows like Are We There Yet? where, for all their gifts, they…
When they’re good, a city’s parks provide a tangible return on a taxpayer’s dollar. Especially during a recession, parks offer free entertainment and a healthy escape. But park services are among the first casualties when a city’s budget needs trimming. The 2009 budget for the Parks and Recreation Department is $53,214,539 — about $3 million less than last year’s. The…
Dear Mexican: The mainstream media are making big noise about Sonia Sotomayor likely being the first Latina Supreme Court justice and how all Latinos should be proud. But Puerto Rican ain’t Mexican! The Supreme Court won’t have a shade of brown until a Mexican is among Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Antonin Scalia. What does the Mexican think of…
Title: The Independent: Kansas City’s Weekly Journal of Society Publisher: Mrs. Glee Gaylord and the Creel Publishing Company Date: October 4, 1941 Discovered at: Fairway estate sale The cover promises: “Sable Dyed Jap Mink = $545.00.” Representative quote: “Among those putting in an appearance: the personable Norruth Grahams; the George Siemens in conflab with the Joseph Snyders; petite Mona Belle…
Feature: “Where the Boys Are,” July 9 Vice on Vice If you’ve ever talked to one of the arrestees of these park patrols, you’ve heard a dramatically different version of the routine than what Nadia Pflaum reported in “Where the Boys Are.” When the cops don’t have to play nice and show off for the press, a completely different collective…
Ratt w/ Extreme
There’s a guy who comes into the place I work. He’s this short buff dude who would be otherwise unremarkable except for the fact that he’s unceasingly friendly and rocks the thickest porn ‘stache I’ve seen since Magnum, PI was still on the air. Thus, he is known simply as “Porn Star Mustache Guy” and we tend to giggle like…
