Fans of NPR’s This American Life are likely familiar with comedian Mike Birbiglia, whose monologues are regularly featured on the show. He’s best known for his stories about dangerous sleepwalking (available here), which he learns are caused by REM Behavior Disorder. Essentially, his brain does not produce enough of the chemical that paralyzes the body during sleep. As he explains,…
Fries are blessedly not included in this eating challenge. If going out in a glorious blaze of burnt ends is on your bucket list, listen up. Zarda BBQ in Lenexa (11931 W. 87th St.) is hosting a burnt ends eating challenge Thursday, September 20, at 7 p.m. You pony up $10 as your entry free and then attempt to plow…
Aixois Brasserie is hoping to make a French connection with downtown diners. Photos by Angela C. Bond.
My Brother, the Vulture The Granada is hosting Red Bull Locally Thrown tonight. The event, hosted by Approach, will feature a smattering of some of our finest local bands and DJs. The gist of the show: A DJ (or in one case, DJ team) will collaborate with a band. Insane music and spinning ensue. The teams: SUNU with DJ Kimbarely…
FestBier is a liquid party. Gordon Biersch (100 E. 14th St.) kicks off its new Oktoberfest menu (which runs through October 21) with a tapping party for its FestBier lager tonight from 5 to 9 p.m. The brewpub in the Power & Light District will be offering samples of the new menu and beer tastings. There are now grilled bratwurst,…
Crissy Dastrup Chef Jasper J. Mirabile prepares tableside mozzarella. You just need to make a good shrimp Livornese to keep them coming in. For close to 60 years, that’s been the plan at Jasper’s Restaurant, and the shrimp, among other dishes, is why Travel + Leisure has named the Kansas City eatery to its list of the 30 Best Italian…
Wikipedia The Soul of Baseball came with a lot less controversy. Former Kansas City Star columnist Joe Posnanski hasn’t said much about his new book, Paterno. Today, he’s going to have to start talking. Posnanski will be a guest on Steve Kraske’s Up to Date from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. and is slated for a book talk sponsored by…
Colby (left) and Megan Garrelts in front of what will be Rye. A power washer sits next to a pink tricycle in what was once the dining room of the Lakeside Tavern, in Mission Farms. This occasional play space for two children is in the midst of a serious renovation. Just after 9 a.m. this September Monday, chef Colby Garrelts…
Photo by Sabrina Staires Name: Doug Marshall Occupation: Director/performer at Fishnets & Floorshows (KC’s Rocky Horror cast), onscreen (Steve Girthy) for Metro Pro Wrestling, stand-up comic and Web/graphic designer (for now) Hometown: Buckner, Missouri Current neighborhood: 39th Street Who or what is your sidekick? My closest friends and local artists Marc Shank and Anastacia Drake. They are usually privy to…
Mike Magoulas and John McDonald raise their glasses to a new beginning. New Boulevard Brewing Co. CEO Mike Magoulas met John McDonald, the brewery’s founder, in the late 1980s when McDonald was looking for investors. Magoulas, 59, says he thought McDonald would will his craft beer to success even before the first keg rolled off the line. “He was this…
When he’s awake, Mike dreams of being a successful comic. When he’s asleep, Mike dreams of making a neck pillow out of hot pizza. Thanks to his sleepwalking — the glum inertia of his days and the literal somnambulance of his nights — the wrong dreams are coming true. That’s the gist of Sleepwalk With Me, Mike Birbiglia’s first feature…
The meme of the 99 percent versus the 1 percent may wind up outlasting the Occupy movement that gave birth to it. Yet when it comes to dramatizing the financial crisis, American filmmakers continue to find Wall Street sleaze more fascinating than honest poverty. Like J.C. Chandor’s Margin Call, Arbitrage luxuriates in the architecture of high-end Manhattan even as it…
They nag at you. The little things you notice in your neighborhood. The details around the city that don’t add up. The bothersome questions to which you once knew — or believed you knew — the answers. Well, we know they bother us. We’ve driven by a misspelled street sign and wondered: How? We’ve slurped down that last-call Jäeger bomb…
Unafraid of pushing limits, the Unicorn has begun its 2012–13 season with a production whose title can’t be spoken. The Motherf**ker With the Hat, a dialogue eruption that etches a bare-all portrait of criminals, addicts and wannabes, is hilarious and raw and riveting. Stephen Adly Guirgis’ play ran on Broadway and picked up a Tony Award nomination for best play…
Shelf Life (Shipshape Music) Hearts of Darkness is KC’s most adored live act. Here are some reasons. People dance at the band’s shows. Girls turn up for the shows. The group plays long, sweaty sets. The female singers are cute and charismatic. It’s fun to watch the band’s many members (“3,000 lbs, altogether,” its Facebook page notes) huddled together, trying…
Past Mistakes and Hauntings (Self-released) As a child of the 1990s, it’s surreal to witness the alternative-rock aesthetics of that decade being recast in the context of revivalism. I’m not certain that Past Mistakes and Hauntings, the debut EP from Deco Auto, qualifies as a throwback, but I haven’t heard a local album all year that conjures up the Clinton…
Party Line (Golden Sound Records) What do you get when you toss yelping punk-lite vocals on top of sparse, surf-rock instrumentation? Something that oddly resembles a more electric Violent Femmes, it turns out — at least in the case of Party Line, the second EP from local trio the Empty Spaces. The record (recorded live in the band’s rehearsal space…
Coke Weed X (Range Life Records) The phrase Coke Weed X sounds like something a drug dealer mutters to passers-by outside a Bassnectar show. So it makes a certain amount of sense that this self-titled debut — from brothers Brian and Brendan Costello, who also play drums and guitar, respectively, in Lawrence folk-rock act Fourth of July — is heavy…
“I don’t know if people have any preconceived thoughts that this is going to be a quiet show,” says Melvins drummer Dale Crover. “But it’s certainly not going to be.” He’s talking about his band’s new lineup, which is on its way to all 50 states under the name Melvins Lite. This Melvins alter ego features Trevor Dunn on acoustic…
I love the word brasserie. It sounds brassy, upbeat, cheery — particularly when it’s spoken by an actual native of France, like chef Emmanuel Langlade. A co-owner of Brookside’s Aixois Bistro, he reminded me recently that brasserie translates as brewery. Unlike a bistro (another word I like), a restaurant calling itself a brasserie traditionally serves beer. And there’s beer at…
Every other summer, the H&R Block Artspace assembles the Kansas City Flatfile, an invitational exhibition of two-dimensional work stored in two metal chests of drawers in the main gallery. A rotating cast of artists and curators selects individual works from the artists’ portfolios to display on the walls, but the best way to experience the Flatfile is to put on…
