Archives: August 2015

The Pitch fall guide to Halloween

Friday, September 11 The Beast and the Edge of Hell open for the season | 7:30 p.m. West Bottoms, open weekends through November 7, fullmoonprod.com Saturday, September 12 End of the World Pub Crawl | 1-5 p.m. Martini Corner, 400 E. 31st St., endoftheworldpubcrawl.com Friday, September 25 Macabre Cinema and Chambers of Poe open for the season | 8 p.m….

The Pitch fall guide to visual art

Onward: Kansas City Art Institute Foundation 50th Anniversary Exhibition | Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, 2012 Baltimore, through September 26 In Pursuit: Kansas City Art Institute Faculty Biennial | H&R Block Artspace, 16 E. 43rd St., through October 3 Tuesday, September 8 ArtSounds: Bird-like, featuring the works of Mark Allen, Cara Strever and Cooper Ottum | 7:30 p.m. Kansas City Art Institute,…

The Pitch fall guide to performing arts

West Side Story | Spinning Tree Theatre at the Arts Asylum, 1000 E. Ninth St., through September 5, spinningtreetheatre.com The Oldest Boy | Unicorn Theatre, 3828 Main, through September 20, unicorntheatre.org The Addams Family | New Theatre Restaurant, 9229 Foster, Overland Park, through September 20, newtheatre.com Friday, September 4 KC Chamber Orchestra presents Mozart and Mendelssohn: Reaching for the Stars…

The Pitch fall guide to music

Sunday, September 6 KPRS 13th Annual White Linen Party, featuring Ginuwine | 7 p.m. VooDoo, Harrah’s Casino, 1 Riverboat Dr. Thursday, September 10 Ratatat | 8 p.m. Uptown Theater, 3700 Broadway Friday, September 11 Kelley Hunt with Julian Davis | 7:30 p.m. Polsky Theatre at JCCC, 12345 College Blvd., Overland Park Dancefestopia | 5:30 p.m. Berkley Riverfront Park, through September…

Music Forecast 8.27-9.2: The Psychedelic Furs, the Church, Boston, Blue Öyster Cult, Gwar, Modest Mouse, Thee Oh Sees

The Psychedelic Furs, the Church Forget that the Furs haven’t released new material since 1991’s World Outside. Founding members and brothers Richard and Tim Butler have such a powerful back catalog of material that hearing “Love My Way” and “Pretty in Pink” live should make it feel like the old is new again. Australia’s the Church, on the other hand,…

Jazz Beat: Ryan Heinlein and the Kansas City Bone Company

Kansas City’s second Charlie Parker Cele­bration concludes this week, and among the highlights is the premiere of the Kansas City Bone Company. Project H leader Ryan Heinlein brings together a dozen trombone players for a night of Parker’s music like you’ll rarely hear. Heinlein is joined on trombone by a core group composed of Jason Goudeau, Jeff Hamer, Marcus Lewis…

Tyler Gregory has a rare moment at home

Of the 10 or so people on the patio at Papa Keno’s in Lawrence, five are musicians present for the open-call jam under way. One of those musicians is singer, songwriter and one-man-band Tyler Gregory, who springs up from his seat, mid-guitar strum, to give me a hug. It’s only the second time we’ve met. Gregory is not one for…

Lauren Anderson’s debut is a triumph

An hour after returning to Kansas City from Topeka on a Sunday night — following a performance at the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge regional qualifier — Lauren Anderson is sipping wine on the patio of a Crossroads restaurant. She hasn’t taken off her performance makeup, and the moonlight finds its way to the glitter around her eyelids. “There was…

Season + Square’s owners ready their nearby Plate for a fall opening

Most Kansas City diners have never heard of Valter Nassi, the Italian-born owner of the celebrated Salt Lake City restaurant Valter’s Osteria. But Nassi’s presence will be felt when Andrea Morrow Joseph and her husband, Christian, open their East Brookside bisto, Plate, at 6201 Oak, later this year. “We’re pushing for early November,” Christian Joseph says. “We have some of…

Savory Spice opens first Kansas City store in Brookside

A friend of mine, a professional chef, once yelled at me for purchasing spices at any venue but a true spice shop. “If you buy them at a supermarket or, even worse, a dollar store, you have no idea how old the spices are,” he says. “They do get old, you know, and it affects the flavor and the potency….

Ryan Heinlein debuts KC Bone Company at Westport Coffee House on Thursday

If you missed our cover story on the major Charlie Parker Celebration currently underway, you might not know that starting last Thursday — and continuing until Sunday, August 29 — some of the area’s finest jazz musicians are filling rooms across the city in homage to a legendary Kansas City original.  Among the participating artists is Ryan Heinlein, trombonist and…

Talking with KC Zine Con organizer Marc Saviano and zine academic Frank Farmer ahead of this weekend’s inaugural event

For a few years now, longtime local zine maker Marc Saviano and a few likeminded friends have been thinking about organizing some kind of KC-based zine event.  “Last year, I tabled events for Pioneers Press and experienced a lot of these types of events and figured we could pull it off,” Saviano tells The Pitch. “So about February I just…

Jackson County discovers four instances of alleged inmate abuse at jail facility, asks FBI to help investigate

The FBI is investigating four incidents of potential inmate abuse at the Jackson County jail. County officials have invited the FBI to help determine whether the civil rights of four inmates were violated at the hands of a few Jackson County correctional employees. Joe Piccinini, acting director of the Jackson County Department of Corrections, tells The Pitch that four county corrections…

New Music Monday: Listen to Hmph’s ‘Cauliflower’ ahead of the band’s Wednesday album-release show at Mills Record Co.

Introducing math-rock duo Hmph (stylized as HMPH!), guitarist Ryan Lee Toms and drummer Jonathan Thatch. On Friday, the duo released its debut full-length, Headrush, on Haymaker Records, celebrating the release with a show at Harling’s Upstairs. Wednesday at Mills Record Co., the band has one more release show — free this time — before it sets out on the road…

Foo Fighters made the Sprint Center shake with sound last night

Foo Fighters, with Royal Blood Sprint Center Friday, August 21, 2015 If any one man is on the front lines to keep rock music alive and well, it’s Dave Grohl. He’s saving old recording studios and equipment. He’s soldiering on despite his well-known leg injury suffered during a show earlier this year in Europe (prompting the creation of some pretty great…

Ramen coming to midtown, too?

The simple answer? Yes. Chef Patrick Curtis has signed the lease for 3605 Broadway, a small space with a long dining history (Nabil’s, the Grille on Broadway, Mr. Good Chicken). He plans to turn the location into a ramen shop, for which he’ll make his own noodles. This space was most recently occupied by the vegan restaurant Foodoo, which restaurateur…

Larry Meeker steps down as chairman of the Kansas Democratic Party

Former Lake Quivira Mayor Larry Meeker won’t shepherd the Kansas Democratic Party to the right after all. The Pitch has confirmed reports by the Wichita Eagle and liberal blog Daily Kos that Meeker has resigned, just ahead of Demofest, this weekend’s large party gathering in Wichita. Party donors balked at comments Meeker made this week in The Pitch and the Eagle about possibly branding the party more…