Archives: May 2021

Dish & Drink KC: A tiki pop-up in Westport this weekend, a new sports bar in Waldo, and your last weekend to order Observation Pizza

Photo courtesy of Social/Brick House. Now open: Social debuts as Waldo’s newest sports bar Though the restaurant Brick + Mortar worked to pull crowds to 7425 Broadway after Tanner’s ended its 20-year stint in the location, the concept never really caught on. The brand-new Social, which is now open to the public, hopes to cement itself as a permanent fixture…

Premiere: “Wednesday” live video at Crossroads Hotel KC

Photo by Kian Pritchett Noah Spencer has been a touring member of The Greeting Committee since 2018. Between tours, the multi-instrumentalist singer-songwriter began writing music of his own. That all culminated in his single “Wednesday,” which premiered Feb. 25.  While writing the song, as well as the rest of his forthcoming EP, Census, Spencer couldn’t help but miss the excitement…

Blue Koi is leaving 39th St. and our spicy little hearts are broken

Photo by Emily Standlee Today the venerable Blue Koi Noodles & Dumplings announced it would close its cozy Midtown location. We’d fill up this space with crying-face emojis if we could.”From the bottom of our hearts,” reads a post from the restaurant’s Facebook account, “we want to thank you, our staff, and the community for the love and support you’ve…

National WWI Museum and Memorial honors national heroes Memorial Day weekend

Photo by David Everett In celebration of Memorial Day weekend, the National WWI Museum and Memorial is hosting a range of events for all ages, including the first-ever hot air balloon glow, to honor veterans and active-duty military members. Events begin Friday and end Monday. Admission is free for veterans and active-duty personnel and half-priced for the general public. MEMORIAL…

Sebastian Junger’s Freedom asks why independence fails

Sebastian Junger at True/False.// Photo by Dan Lybarger Because he’s covered wars, storms, forest fires, and other cataclysmic events, it’s easy to anticipate what might be in Sebastian Junger’s non-fiction the way it’s reasonable to guess what kind of novel Stephen King might write next. His breakthrough 1997 book, The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men against the Sea,…

First Lady Jill Biden to make a Kansas City appearance on Thursday

Jill Biden is making a stop at Metropolitan Community College this Thursday to highlight a vaccination clinic happening there. // Image courtesy of Jill Biden First Lady Jill Biden will pay a visit to Kansas City this Thursday as part of a continued effort to highlight community colleges and federal retail pharmacy partners that hold mass COVID-19 vaccination clinics. Biden…

In Kansas City, a wave of evictions could push gun violence to new extremes this year

Housing problems and gun violence go hand in hand, experts say. And in Kansas City, both may be about to get even worse

Photo by Jonathan Rados When Bryan Murrell first found the house, he could barely imagine anyone had ever lived there. It was boarded up, filled with trash, everything in complete disarray. But Murrell, a part-time home renovator, knows this house on a corner of Prospect Avenue in Kansas City’s Washington-Wheatley neighborhood can be a happy home again. He spent his…

Creature Feature: Naveen will steal your heart with his gentle nature

Naveen // Photo courtesy KC Pet Project We have teamed up with KC Pet Project to host a weekly “creature feature” on a loveable and adoptable animal here in the KC Metro. This week’s local Adopt an Animal features Naveen, a 3-year-old Mastiff and Shepherd mix. He resides at the Kansas City Campus for Animal Care at 7077 Elmwood Avenue in Kansas City,…

Pot Roast is KC’s viral TikTok feline celeb

Pot Roast is one special cat. Pot Roast the cat went from being hidden in a sorority house to being TikTok famous. Her owner, whose name has been rescinded for privacy reasons, found Pot Roast during a college finals week her sophomore year in 2014. Missouri University of Science and Technology, or what used to be known as the University…

Mayor Lucas and Rep. Cleaver announce $8.3 million for unhoused population

Mayor Quinton Lucas. // Courtesy KC Government. A portion of $8.3 million allocated from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development will fund 140 beds for the unhoused population in Kansas City through the Tiny Homes Initiative. KCMO will create a village with individual cabins to provide emergency transitional housing for the unhoused with office space onsite to provide…

Kansas City Public Library is reopening after COVID-19 closure

Kansas City Public Library Plaza location. // Photo by Jim Nimmo The Kansas City Public Library is looking forward to reopening many services that were not available for the past year. Physical library locations were closed amid a citywide shutdown in March 2020 and has since reopened most locations. Public access has been limited while reimagining a number of services provided…

Nominations are open for KC’s ’70 Over 70′ Awards

Photo courtesy KC Shepherd’s Center Do you know someone over 70 years old in Kansas City who deserves to be recognized for their community and leadership contributions? Look no further. As part of Older Americans Month, KC Shepherd’s Center (KCSC) is now accepting nominations for the fourth annual 70 Over 70 Awards to honor civic leaders, unsung heroes, or other…

Tir-Zah Mahlah’s It Could Go Either Way goes straight for emotional power

Courtesy facebook.com/iamtirzahmahlah The debut from Kansas City’s Tir-Zah Mahlah, It Could Go Either Way, is one of those albums you press play on, then find yourself 20 minutes with a mouth agape, wondering aloud, “Where did this come from?” It’s an out-of-nowhere album that blends jazz, R&B, poetry, hip-hop, and a myriad of other styles to craft eight songs that…

Drink this Now: the KC Box Car from the Stilwell

The KC Boxcar and clam chowder.// Photo by April Fleming For the years of struggle it required for Kansas City to finally get its downtown convention hotel, the opening of the Loews Kansas City Hotel should have been a bigger deal. But fate had the massive new property open in the Fall of 2020, when (to no one’s surprise) few…

Streetwise podcast has Steve from recordBar talking the future of live music, grooves from The Moose

This week on the Streetwise podcast we discuss trash films, enjoy a reading of Anne Kniggendorf’s Morning Glory Farms piece, jam to The Moose’s track “Ultraviolet”, and chat with Steven Tulipana about the future of live music in KC. Our episode this week is brought to you by Worlds of Fun. Streetwise is hosted by Brock Wilbur, editor in chief of The Pitch. Subscribe…

Smash rooms to fight the gloom

A room at Smash House.// Photo by Zach Bauman I am not a person who is prone to physical manifestations of anger. The rage I feel is a writer’s rage—the simmering, impotent rage that comes from having very small triceps and the shapeless body of an eel.  And yet I felt drawn—like an eel to a crayfish(?)—to Smash House, a…

The Moose’s Spature is the sprawling psych-rock journey into madness you need right now

Kansas City psychedelic rock collective the Moose’s new album, Spature, is a sprawling twenty six-song, two hour-long, double LP recorded over the last year and a half in the band’s attic studio. According to the Moose, Spature “centers around a brief history of a fantastical world, shown through psilocybin-inspired soundscapes, detrimental circumstances, and psychedelic creatures.” Inspired by everyone from King…

‘I have to go out and beg’: Residents grapple with utility costs as shutoffs resume

Louise Lynch, a Wyandotte County, Kan., resident, has struggled to get emergency rental assistance and faces the possibility the Board of Public Utilities will shut off her power and water. // Photo by Allison Kite/Missouri Independent The pandemic has been especially hard on Louise Lynch’s family. Her daughter caught COVID-19 as the virus first took hold in Kansas City and…

YouTube removes video of Shawnee Mission School District meeting due to false claims about the effects of masking

The video of Shawnee Mission School District’s most recent board of education meeting has been taken down by YouTube following “medical misinformation” from parents about the dangers or ineffectiveness of masks. During the board’s meeting on Monday, several parents from the district asked board members to reconsider the school’s current masking requirement, citing concerns such as diseases associated with decreased…