Method ManStarr Hill Music HallMonday, October 30music “If you want a conventional show, you in the wrong spot.” So said Method Man in one of his many successful bids to pump up the crowd during his show at Starr Hill, and he was not lying. The concert started normally enough, as hip-hop shows go, with […]
Method ManStarr Hill Music HallMonday, October 30music “If you want a conventional show, you in the wrong spot.” So said Method Man in one of his many successful bids to pump up the crowd during his show at Starr Hill, and he was not lying. The concert started normally enough, as hip-hop shows go, with […]
The RochesGravity LoungeOctober 26 music Rumor has it that the Gravity Lounge will soon be closing. If that’s true, then a shadow hung over The Roches’ lovely show last Thursday night at the Downtown Mall space, the ideal venue for the intimate sounds and warm stage presence of the three-sister acoustic group. All this was […]
Using my infallible powers of precognition, I predict that 2007 will be a good year for magicians. And I\’m not talking about those faux-hip “street” magicians like David Blaine\-heir time is up. No, I\’m talking about the old-fashioned stage magician, the guy with the doves and the tuxedo. Late 2006 has already seen two tricky, turn-of-the-century magician yarns hit movie theaters (The Illusionist and The Prestige). Do I sense a trend akin to 1998\’s asteroid chic (which sweptâand destroyed\-he world courtesy of Armageddon and Deep Impact)? Ask me again next spring, when models are pulling rabbits out of their Christian Dior top hats on the runways of Paris.
PortastaticSatellite BallroomTuesday, October 17 music A brief history of Portastatic:Way back in the early ‘90s, there was this guy from Chapel Hill, Mac McCaughan, who wrote songs and sang in this band, Superchunk. Great band—had what I consider the single best anti-authoritarian anthem of the ‘90s, “Slack Motherfucker” (yes, it was better than “Smells Like […]
Catch a Fire (PG-13, 98 minutes) Aussie Phillipe Noyce (The Quiet American, Rabbit-Proof Fence, Patriot Games) directs this dark political thriller set in South Africa during the turbulent 1980s. Derek Luke (Antwone Fisher) portrays real-life hero Patrick Chamusso who was jailed and tortured after being wrongly suspected of sabotage at an oil refinery where he […]
I saw Dave Chappelle\’s movie Half Baked last weekend (I know, I\’m the last person in town to see it), and Chappelle is very funny, but it got me wondering.
Andy Friedman, painter and visual artist (he’s a cartoonist for The New Yorker), and singer-songwriter, has a strong Charlottesville connection that runs through local folk star Paul Curreri. Curreri says that Friedman was such a serious art student at Pratt, in New York City, that he became disillusioned after a gum eraser battle broke out in a professor-free classroom, and ultimately transferred to the Rhode Island School of Design. Friedman and Curreri were roommates at RISD, and later in Brooklyn, New York.
Eric ClaptonJohn Paul Jones ArenaThursday, October 12 music From a conversation with my 14-year-old companion on the way into Eric Clapton’s sold-out concert at the John last week: “It’ll be white kids and rich college students.” O.K., so maybe they’re not teaching about the Baby Boom in the schools anymore. Sure, Clapton attracts a segment […]
Man of the YearPG-13, 115 minutesNow Playing at Carmike Cinema 6 It’s always a bit depressing when you can imagine the entire pitch meeting that proceeded the making of a particular Hollywood film. I’m fairly confident the brainstorming session for Man of the Year went something like this: “How about Robin Williams as a wacky […]
Heavy Trash with The SadiesSatellite BallroomThursday, October 5 music You know, maybe you can have too much of a good thing. More than a few times in recent memory, I’ve attended concerts in our newly music-saturated little town, and been sadly disappointed at the lackluster size of the crowd. San Fran popster John Vanderslice drew […]