Arcade Fire, with tUnE-yArDs Saturday, April 26 Starlight Theatre For the full slideshow, go here. Few bands are capable of inspiring such fan fervor (or inspire as much hipster hating) as Arcade Fire. When frontman Win Butler spontaneously performed a DJ set at the Union in Westport on Friday night, it inspired a mad explosion on social media among Kansas Citians –…
Without comment, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied former Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline’s request for the country’s highest court to review the suspension of his law license. Kline received an indefinite suspension of his law license in Kansas (which was already administratively suspended because he wasn’t paying the annual fee to keep it active) after the Kansas Supreme Court found…
Republican hawks since 2008, particularly those with a tea party bent, have possessed a fetishistic reflex to cast any triumph by President Barack Obama as an undeserved honor or an outright lie. When Osama bin Laden was captured and killed in 2011 after a decade of futility in locating the terrorist financier, former George W. Bush administration officials were quick to…
Farmer’s Ball The Bottleneck, Lawrence Saturday, April 26 The great thing about the KJHK Farmer’s Ball, especially for the bands, is that you’ve no idea who’s playing until show time. This ensures that the first band will play to an actual crowd, rather than wading through their set to a group of a few dozen vaguely interested, random early birds….
Local Natives with Moses Sumney The Granada, Lawrence Friday, April 25 For the full slideshow, go here. Pedigrees are a tricky thing in the world of indie rock. On one hand, it’s a must to at least be tangentially aware of the artists that you’ll be compared or associated with as you gain notoriety and build a following. However, if you…
Royals colors, yo. Bo Jackson, the coolest person ever associated with Kansas City, committed mystifyingly great athletic acts on a regular basis during the five years he was here in the last half of the 1980s. Bo lasering a ball from the warning track to home plate to throw out Harold Reynolds remains one of the most mind-boggling, freak-of-nature highlights…
The first month of the 2014 Major League Baseball season is nearly over and as we are about to head into May it is a good time to see how the rest of the first half of the season looks for the Kansas City Royals. Currently the Royals are one game under .500 after their four game series with the…
The winners won’t be revealed until tomorrow night, but two local barbecue competitors – brothers Mike and Joe Pearce of the Squeal Like a Pig barbecue team – will be seen in a smoking skirmish on the sixth season of Destination America Channel’s show, BBQ Pitmasters. In the world of competitive barbecue, the Squeal Like a Pig team (and yes, the…
This month World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) held its annual, and highly successful, pay-per-view mega-event Wrestlemania on Sunday April 6th in front of a sold out crowd of 75,167 at the Mercedes Benz Superdome in New Orleans. This year was the WWE’s 30th edition of this event dutifully named Wrestlemania XXX and featured many surprises for wrestling fans watching the event…
Say what you want about her, but Diana Ross is a diva’s diva. It’s true, but that’s really just one more reason to admire her. In March, the soul queen turned 70 – though you’d never know it with the way she struts, all decked out in feathers and glitter. And at this point in her career, Ross knows exactly…
In some ways, I’m kind of surprised that the Hold Steady still draws crowds. A decade ago, the Minneapolis-by-way-of-Brooklyn band made waves when it blended punk rock and slivers of 1990s grunge on Boys and Girls in America. On that album, lead singer Craig Finn shouts and spits his lyrics like a steroid-abusing Springsteen, offering a straightforward alternative to other…
From May 2 to June 7, the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes will play host to the world’s fastest horses and also welcome interesting ticket price trends. Also known as the Triple Crown Series, the three races will see a large spread of fluctuating prices, with the Belmont Stakes leading the bunch in increased price this year. Average…
Arcade Fire’s Reflektor was one of the most highly anticipated albums of 2013. An epic, sprawling record – part dance pop, part indulgent art concept – it was instantly acclaimed as brilliant and adventurous while simultaneously demolished as unfocused and overachieving. I count three great songs on its latest effort (the title track is big and catchy and fits anywhere…
Retro swing master Johnny Boyd is bringing his masterful five-piece band to the Californos Grand Ballroom this Sunday, along with the help of local vintage pop darlings Victor & Penny. If you thought the big-band era was long gone, here’s your chance to relive a little of that gold-tinged time in America. You can thank Jeff Freling and Erin McGrane…
