The fourth installment of Hammerween goes down this Saturday at the Uptown Theater. It features music from local metal heavyweight Hammerlord, plus sets from Troglodyte, At the Left Hand of God, Architects, Six Percent, Moire and Hellevate. That’s a lot of thrashing and hair swinging for one room. Wear a costume and get a ticket discount at the door. This…
When the outside temperature dips, there’s nothing more comforting than a steaming bowl of pho, don’t you know? The weather is turning chilly. It’s time to think about soup. Kansas City hasn’t had such great luck with soup-only restaurants. A popular Westport restaurant in the late 1970s, the Souper, by all accounts served very good house-made soups and freshly baked…
Big news from Boulevard. Whoa: About a half-hour ago, The New York Times posted a story on its site revealing that the Duvel Moortgat Brewery of Belgium has purchased Boulevard Brewing Co., the largest craft brewery in Kansas City and the 12th-largest in the country. The deal is expected to close by the end of the year, and Brewbound is estimating…
Gaga for Grobes. Bit of a slow news day over here, which offers the luxury of clicking on things like The Kansas City Star review of the Josh Groban concert last night. Super psyched to learn “You Raise Me Up” made it into the set list. The thing about reviews is that they can’t really capture the visual experience, which is why…
Susan McSpadden, Johnson County Community College Johnson County Community College’s professor of English Andrea Broomfield will delve into culinary matters on October 29. Earlier this year, Andrea Broomfield had to put an idea for a new book – about the dining service on British cruise ships – on the back burner, as it were, to take up a fresh topic:…
Was there ever any doubt that Congress would kick the can down the road on the debt ceiling crisis until the last possible moment? In the end, however, enough noses came up for air from the legislative morass at Capitol Hill to pass a spending bill that averted a countdown to possible economic ruin later in the year. Here’s how…
A church basement might seem an unlikely place for a blues festival, but leave it to the good folks of Blue Heaven Studios to make it worth your while. The lineup for the 16th Blues Masters at Crossroads, spaced out over both Friday and Saturday night, features artists renowned in the world of blues. You can expect to hear the…
Brett Kinder has been around the proverbial block in the Kansas City music scene. He has done time with local bands the Black Water, Kill Pop, American Catastrophe and Angie Fights Crime, and now he’s back with a new project, NOW/here. NOW/here has just come out with its first EP, a self-titled five-song collection that pulls on the lapels of…
The Kansas City Ballet’s season opener, Fancy Free, makes a spirited introduction to Devon Carney, the institution’s new artistic director. Subtitled Joy That Knows No Bounds, the five-ballet collection spans eras and styles in playful pursuit of pure delight — a delight very much in evidence last Friday. The title ballet, Jerome Robbins’ “Fancy Free,” is the only one of…
Parallax starts with Kansas City’s most prolific jazz trumpeter, Stan Kessler. From Sons of Brazil to Trumpet Summit to the People’s Liberation Big Band, Kessler’s résumé is a diverse one. Add two experienced rhythm jazzmen, Roger Wilder on keyboards and Bill McKemy on bass and sousaphone. Top off the ensemble with drummers Ryan Lee and Brian Steever, two 20-something whiz…
When Sonic Youth disbanded, in 2011, hearts were broken and spirits were crushed. The band that paved the road for experimental noise and indie rock was calling it quits. Founding couple Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon had split. Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo wasted no time mourning, though. He released a solo album last year (Between the Times and the…
Huddled around a large table at Succotash, the girls of Grenadina are clamoring over menus and introductions. The morning has been a scramble. The band is set to take the stage at the Out in the Crossroads festival at Hamburger Mary’s in little more than an hour, and two of the band’s four members are managing calls and texts from…
Here Come the Mummies Here Come the Mummies is a funk band shrouded in secrecy. No one knows who’s in the band — the players dress up like mummies for every show. This is to protect the identities of the supposed Grammy winners who make up the group — which, as gimmicks go, is kind of hilarious. Each of the…
A rectangle of light spills from the truck window onto the pavement and shines down on a small group of men. The vehicle is parked in spot 846 at the American Royal. The men let their mouths drop open as though they’ve just seen a beautiful woman or a particularly choice piece of steak. One of them reaches out, his…
Don’t order the chicken cassoulet at the new District Pour House + Kitchen. Don’t ask for the ravioli, either. Or the chicken and dumplings. I tried ordering the cassoulet three times at the month-old restaurant — it’s on the printed menu, after all — and only on my third visit did a server tell me why the kitchen was going…
The local Catholic Diocese doesn’t want the medical research tax, Mayor Sly James won’t take a position on it. Proponents of the November 5 vote to raise Jackson County’s sales tax by a half-cent learned today that the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph opposed the measure outright. An open letter from the local diocese said that they didn’t like…
The strange and contentious machinations involving the Kansas City Museum took another turn on Wednesday when Kansas City Museum Advisory Board member Jim Malouff announced his resignation from the body. Malouff informed the KCMAB that he planned to send his resignation letter to Kansas City Mayor Sly James on Wednesday, but gave no further explanation for his departure. He was…
For weeks, basically ever since J. Cole debuted the song “Crooked Smile,” no one has been able to escape from it. It plays every three songs on the radio. That’s fine – it’s a great song. Solid flow, sing-along chorus (provided by TLC). Nice message. Easy to follow. Nothing like J. Cole’s show last night at the Midland. The night…
April Fleming Neko Case Liberty Hall, Lawrence, KS Tuesday, October 15, 2013 There seems to be general consensus that Neko Case is an extraordinarily talented singer and songwriter, but if you’ve never seen her perform live before (or heard her on NPR’s Wait Wait, Don’t Tell Me), you might not know that she’s also laugh-out-loud funny. And beautiful (come on…
Facebook: Boulevard Zon got some love in Colorado this week. The Boulevard Brewing Co. is once again walking away a winner from the Great American Beer Festival. The hometown brewery earned two medals this year at the Colorado fest, a bronze for Zon in the Belgian-Style Witbier category and a gold for Love Child No. 3 in the Wood and…
In 1988, Martha Stewart, who hadn’t yet become a household name, showed up to kick off the first Kansas City Holiday Mart. It attracted a handful of retailers and shoppers, but Stewart and the shopping event went on to ride parallel success waves: Stewart ascended todomestic goddess, and the Holiday Mart expanded to include some 200 retailers and 20,000 shoppers….
