Park Place, the retail-and-restaurant development in Leawood, shares its name with one of Monopoly’s most expensive properties. It’s not hard to picture the high-toned restaurant Pig & Finch as an addition you might build on the game board’s version of Park Place, but it’s a real business at the real (local) Park Place. With the restaurant game in south Johnson…
This week, hundreds of Kansas City musicians travel down to Austin to eat tacos, drink Tecates and pray that somebody important notices their band at South by Southwest, the city’s annual music-industry festival. The critically acclaimed singer-songwriter Sam Baker lives in Austin. But on Thursday — right in the thick of the SXSW party — he’s heading north, to Kansas…
Inside an unremarkable three-story building near the intersection of Southwest Boulevard and Broadway, a couple of ShopBots are doing what they’re supposed to: following the programmed instructions of a human. But the industry under way here isn’t the usual manufacturing, and the human has two art degrees. One of the robots cuts at plywood that will be inked onto prints….
Morrissey There was so much sadness when Morrissey postponed his Lawrence show in early February, due to a bleeding ulcer. But he quickly recovered, and now he’s returning, a little more than a month later, to make good on his original promise. What can we expect from this performance besides a scarcity of meat products? Moz’s solo catalog is plenty…
The lineup for the first Kansas City FilmFest since the Alamo Drafthouse arrived downtown was announced last week. The eclectic program is in line with the mix of films that the theater’s customers have come to expect, but it emphasizes movies that haven’t screened here or seen commercial release yet, or (in one case) a film that has been out…
We get a take on Margie at the outset of Good People, onstage at the Unicorn. The middle-aged woman cashiers at the Dollar General, where her seniority makes her the top earner at $9-plus an hour. But that’s not why she’s being fired. As this play begins, she and her 20-something boss, Stevie, have stepped out back, downwind from the…
People have been saying it for years, but lately it’s almost undeniable: DJs really are the new rock stars. Need proof beyond Skrillex, Bassnectar and Girl Talk? How about this: Reports surfaced a few months ago that the casting agency responsible for Jersey Shore was planning a reality show in the vein of American Idol, but with electronic-music producers and…
Facebook: Murray’s Murray’s open sign will be back soon. The first year you live in Kansas City, you probably think spring arrives on March 21. The second, you start to buy into the idea that weather is a bit more fickle, so you officially deem it spring on Opening Day for the Royals. But by the third year, you understand…
Pig & Finch is offering upscale comfort food in a gastropub setting. The sister restaurant of the 801 Chophouse opened recently in Leawood’ Park Place. Photos by Angela C. Bond.
Former Smog dude Bill Callahan is one of the more exciting singer-songwriters in the world. He brought his dark, spirited folk tunes to RecordBar a few years back on his Apocalypse tour. Though his follow-up isn’t out yet, he returns to the venue Wednesday, May 8, for a show. (He’s also in Columbia, at Mojo’s, the night before.) Riding for…
Don’t worry. We recycle. The supermarket’s frozen-pizza section, which takes up damn near an entire side of a freezer aisle, keeps evolving. New brands push in among the familiar (though most are owned by a handful of multinational corporations – Nestlé manufactures Jack’s, Tombstone, DiGiorno and, weirdly, California Pizza Kitchen), adding new crusts and engineering new topping combos. DiGiorno, for…
Flickr: Photographus The Phillips Sisters were right, just hold on for one more day. Before America can be saved by Doritos Locos Tacos, we need to find our way out of the wilderness. And there is no signpost quite like the cream-filled one that is a Twinkie. So Zubaz wearers and beer-helmet donners, this is your moment. Twinkies has a…
Facebook: Midland A month without Jason Sudeikis and Kansas City starts to get edgy. Well, don’t go out and cheat with Dax Shepard just yet. Sudeikis is set to come back to our fair city for Giggle With Gilda – a night with the Second City national touring company. The benefit for Gilda’s Club Kansas City is set for Saturday,…
Photo by Sabrina Staires Name: Fred Bauters Occupation: Editor, Silicon Prairie News Hometown: The Midwest. I’ve lived in Michigan, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana, but call Cleveland, and its depressing sports teams, home. Current neighborhood: Prairie Village Who or what is your sidekick? My wife, our two cats (which are the size of small dogs) and my Brooks Ghost running shoes….
JJ’s Restaurant is gone, but the owners and surviving staff carry on. The Greater Kansas City Restaurant Association announced today that the “Dining for JJ’s” fundraiser it organized on February 23 – where 125 restaurants in the metro donated 10 percent of that night’s sales to a fund for staff members of the restaurant destroyed by an explosion on February…
The Chiefs could have a full shopping cart by week’s end. The Chiefs hit the restart button at the end of the season, picking up a new general manager, a new head coach and a new starting quarterback. But as with any down-to-the-studs rehab, there’s still a lot of work ahead. In the last week alone, the franchise has nailed…
Facebook: Tate Stevens Stevens is set to return to Kansas City. The last time Tate Stevens was in Kansas City, he was auditioning for the second season of X Factor at the Sprint Center. His return will be at a slightly smaller venue, but he won’t have to share the stage. The Missouri native and winner of season two will…
Curtis Stone will get all up in Kansas City’s kitchen on Wednesday, April 17. The Hy-Vee spokesman, Top Chef: Masters host and celebrity chef will be here for a conversation with Rainy Day Books’ Vivien Jennings. He’ll be promoting his new cookbook, What’s for Dinner?, slated to be released April 9. His fifth cookbook is organized by the days of…
Freedy Johnston is a 1990s one-hit wonder (“Bad Reputation”) who deserves far better than he has received from the music industry. The Kinsley, Kansas, native and University of Kansas dropout is a singer-songwriter with a terrific ear for pop melody, and all his albums are damn solid. Rain on the City, from 2010, is his most recent – an unassuming,…
Flickr: Paco Ros Get jumping, Missouri. Missourians tend to view exercise like everything else that might lead to change: Why don’t you do some and then I’ll decide whether I want to long after you’ve finished. We come by our obesity (projected to be 62.1 percent by 2030) honestly. Thus, it’s a bit of a surprise to learn that Missouri…
Facebook: Mema’s Bakery Doughnuts make up the breakfast of champions. I know better than to ask who makes the best doughnuts in Kansas City. Other than suggesting that a man or woman doesn’t know how to tend his or her smoker, that might be as close as we get to fighting words in this city. Instead, let us revel together…
Lisa Tanner Eight p.m. isn’t too late for “Monday Morning Rock,” is it? We almost missed this one: Marshall Crenshaw – maker of 1982’s ninth-best album and all-around pop-rock treasure – plays the Retro Lounge at Knuckleheads tonight at 8 (doors at 7). Crenshaw’s latest project is a series of EPs, titled I Don’t See You Laughing Now. Each KickStarter-funded…
Jaimie Warren The last time that Fat City checked in with caterers Wes Gartner and Jill Myers of Moxie Catering, the couple was planning to open their new restaurant, Voltaire, in the former R Bar location at 1617 Genessee on Valentine’s Day. “That was the plan,” Gartner says, “but we’ve had delays with licenses and permits.” The restaurant, which will…
Garage-soul quartet Alabama Shakes was one of the most buzzed-about bands of 2012, and 2013 is looking like the year it conquers America. The Athens, Alabama, group slides seamlessly among country, roots and rock, and is led by Brittany Howard, who channels Janis Joplin’s bluesy howl – but don’t tell her that. “I’ve grown tired of the Janis Joplin comparisons,”…
