Cover Story
Rinse and repeat
Jala Miller moved about her new apartment while her mother, Janie, emptied boxes and her father, Dave, on his hands and knees, screwed a bracket onto the back of her flat-panel television. They were all sure it had fried in a recent storm. Turns out it only needed a fuse. It was the Friday before…
B-Sides: Music & Other Ephemera
Nappy goes political? Skinny DeVille tells LEO the Nappy Roots will soon be releasing a scathing diss aimed squarely at Mayor Jerry Abramson and the Metro Council. Upset over the expansion of Louisville International Airport and UPS and local government’s use of eminent domain in displacing area residents for private business growth, the group takes…
MMJ frontman dons sweater
Who knew jam-master Jim James was a cardigan fanatic? Seen prowling the streets of Germantown, and his newest home in the grand ol’ NYC, James, frontman for Louisville heroes My Morning Jacket, was spotted again here last weekend fastidiously buttoning himself up for a night of debauchery and dereliction at Angels Rock Bar. News of…
Crowd shows up to see jazz
Though reports vary, a surprisingly respectable crowd showed up, and fully attended, a jazz show Sunday evening. According to Rupert Stevens, events director for the Louisville Jazz Society, more than 400 people came out to see the Dave Holland Trio, who played a free show at Waterfront Park. “We’re delighted at the amount of people…
Inbox — June 17, 2009
Trainer: Bring On Slots I am a thoroughbred horse trainer. I don’t live in Kentucky, but I spend a good amount of time in your fine state throughout the year and it’s here where I have enjoyed some of the proudest, grandest moments of my life. As I watch racing in your state diminish, I…
Video TapeWorm
THIS WEEK’S TWIN PEEKS: INSIDE THE KORAN 2008; $24.95, UR There are roughly 1.5 billion Muslims in the world … and growing quickly. This scares the sepulchres out of the world’s 1.9 billion Christians, many of whom view Islam as a small, murderous cult of wild-eyed suicide bombers. Oh, those children of Abraham! They never…
Review: The eponymous pastry seals the deal at Danish Express
(Featuring Paige Moore-Heavin) You can, and probably do, call it a Danish pastry, but its roots lie in Vienna. Nevertheless, the Danes have made this rich and delicious pastry their own, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a better one in the Old Country than you can enjoy right here in Louisville at Danish Express.…
I Think We’re Closer To Fine Now
I hated her. She who dared compete with my little Debbie Gibson for chart position. She who toured the malls and made hits out of cover songs. Debbie wrote her own songs. Tiffany sailed through. Or at least that’s what I believed as a headstrong, awkward 12-year-old campaigning for the sweet, wholesome girl-next-door over the…
Chasing Amy
Amy Ray and Emily Saliers first met on the playground outside their elementary school in Decatur, Ga. It would be several years before the duo began making music together, first at high school talent shows, and eventually at cramped venues in and around their small Southern town. Now, more than two decades after their first…
Theater: Lilith presents two lives in two languages
(Looking for Lilith Theatre Company presents “StrangersExtranjeras” June 18-20 at the Rudyard Kipling. Directed by Jennifer Thalman Kepler. For tickets, visit lookingforlilith.org.) Looking for Lilith Theatre Company fills a vital role in our artistic community, allowing an array of women’s voices to be heard. “StrangersExtranjeras” is a project headed by two young women who served…
White supremacy lives in post-racial America
My next book is entitled, “The End of Race: Moments and Movements in Post-Racial America.” One goal of this work is to make the point that there are great differences between socio-political movements and moments, though the two are often confused. Moments are usually high-profile but short-lived. They are one-hit wonders. They temporarily excite us…
I Blame You
For a debut, this doesn’t sound like a new band, does it? Well, that’s because they aren’t exactly new. Nope, these are indie rock veterans, most notably, Rick Froberg, whose warrior wails fronted Drive Like Jehu, Pitchfork and Hot Snakes. Here, his full-throated cries dip, jab and prance around sparse, taut guitar lines that sound…
B-Sides: Music & Other Ephemera
Kentucky Refugee Ministries will host a concert on Sunday, June 21 at 3 p.m. Jazz pianist Harry Pickens is scheduled to perform, as well as an international chorus, at Comstock Hall in the University of Louisville’s School of Music. Admission is free but donations are accepted. Doiron Julie Doiron returns to Louisville June 25 at…
Oohs and Aahs
Oohs and Aahs sounds lavish considering its humble genesis in the bedroom of Say Hi’s lone band member, Eric Elbogen. After relocating from Brooklyn to Seattle, it’s obvious that Elbogen was simply eager to piggy-back on Seattle’s recent resurgence as an indie-rock Mecca. Just like the influx of bands to the area in the early…
Gaming the system
Fair Grounds Race Course in New Orleans still was reeling from Hurricane Katrina in 2007, and officials there were looking for a way to up their revenue stream. The solution: When the four-month meet opened that November, the track added video gaming machines that allowed patrons to gamble between races on slots and other games…
Bishop to king
Richard Bishop is still getting used to being a solo artist. The former Sun City Girls guitarist watched that group disintegrate in 2007, after the death of drummer Charlie Gocher. Bishop, who played in the band for more than 20 years, has been releasing solo albums for 10. His latest, The Freak of Araby, is…
The Emerald hoards approach
Knock knock. The Emerald Ash Borer has arrived in the Bluegrass and, as unwelcome guests are wont to do, it’ll stay until all the food is gone. The metallic-green beetle was positively identified in Kentucky on May 22, 2009, in Shelby and Jessamine counties, and sightings in no fewer than four other counties, including Jefferson,…
Relapse
When you’ve spent the better part of a decade pushing the envelope, once it’s fallen off the table, is anything shocking? Eminem is back, and he’s still bashing his mom, ex-wife and C-list celebrities with the same punch and bravado as before, even if it no longer holds the sting as before. I wish I…
Too big for our bridges?
If the arc of the Kentucky General Assembly’s ongoing narrative over whether to use tolls to fund the construction of two new bridges were a plane, it would’ve been delayed on the tarmac, flown around aimlessly for a few minutes, and crashed into a nice empty patch of concrete below. To say the enduring stalemate…
Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth
It’s almost as if we’re leaving a huge chunk of Kentucky’s economy in a basket on Indiana’s doorstep. There it lies — crying, hungry, tired and abandoned. The note attached reads: “Dear Kind State, Please take care of our equine industry. We love it very much and it breaks our hearts to do this, but…
Jerry’s kids
The whispering about whether Mayor Jerry Abramson will run for another term has grown louder since the budget hearings began earlier this month. No one really knows what the mayor will decide later this summer, and potential successors aren’t waiting around to find out. Sources say Metro Council President David Tandy, D-4, is actively lining…
House of David
David Sedaris didn’t need the patch or nicotine gum to quit smoking. Instead, he opted for a more unconventional method — a three-month hiatus in Tokyo. “And it worked,” Sedaris, 52, says in a nasally voice that alternates between flashes of boyish excitement and deadpan observation. From a hotel room in Fargo, N.D., the American-born…
Murdering Patterson and other old songs
Patterson Hood doesn’t come off like the underappreciated pseudo-rock-star that’s been kicking around the scene for more than 10 years. He looks more like a middle-aged gas station attendant who sings of blue-collar plight on nights and weekends, the kind of Southern character who only exists in Tennessee Williams plays and John Prine songs. Hood…
The Bar Belle: The drunks of our lives
I use the term “drunks” loosely, because no one wants that label. That’s what your parents call the bums sifting through Dumpsters or your crazy Uncle Pete who says inappropriate things at the Thanksgiving table. But most of us have been intoxicated at one point or another. Most of us can handle our liquor and…
The Devil You Know
For many purists, the only true singer for Black Sabbath is reality TV star Ozzy Osbourne. Fair enough, but the first two albums recorded with wee Ronnie James Dio are pretty awesome in their own right. Because the original Sabbath lineup is technically together, Black Sabbath Mk. III has regrouped under a new sobriquet and…
