Skullbusters, Blonde Strangers and a lot of ambition: Try these 12 spring beers from Louisville brewing companies
The joy of the season is that you can really go a lot of different ways with your selection, and it will make sense. If it’s dreary out, you can always cozy up to a nice porter or stout, a remnant of the previous season, or if the climate is in your favor, you can…
8 free things to do in Louisville this week (5/2)
Tuesday Attend a Democratic Rally Waterfront Park (Big Four Lawn) & TBA 4 p.m. & TBA Participate by supporting — or protesting — a presidential candidate this Tuesday before the Kentucky Democratic primary on May 17. Bernie Sanders will be hosting his rally at the Big Four Lawn at 4 p.m. and Bill Clinton will…
Watch: Kyle Meredith spoke with Matthew Logan Vasquez of Delta Spirit about his new solo album
Matthew Logan Vasquez took a break from Delta Spirit to release his first solo record, Solicitor Returns, and spoke with Kyle Meredith about how it’s an autobiographical LP, adapting to family life as a musician now that he has a son and his beginnings. Vasquez plays at Zanzabar on Tuesday, May 10.
Visually Speaking: This week’s art news and events (5/2)
[The above image “Churchill Downs – Starting Gate” by Linda Bruckheimer is in “Spotted at the Racetrack” at Revelry Boutique Gallery.] Art news The Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft has just announced it will have free admission for one year thanks to a Delta Dental sponsorship when it reopens on June 4 (kmacmuseum.org). Kroger…
A Positive Spin
She’s a glamorous DJ, making her name by spinning records in the Louisville and Cincinnati party scene, but looking at her now, you would never know that she struggled in her youth due to the fact that she is a trans woman. Anyone familiar with the local nightlife in Louisville will be able to tell…
5 things to do in Louisville this weekend (4/29)
FRIDAY Toruk – The First Flight by Cirque Du Soleil KFC Yum! Center $38-$135; Times vary Since Avatar 2 is still two years away from release (seriously what is taking so long?), you can satiate your lust for blue cat people riding dinosaurs with “Toruk – The First Flight.” This Cirque Du Soleil performance is…
Our six favorite local songs from April
Cat Casual and the Holy Midnight – “By This River” Perhaps the saddest thing about this already sad song is the realization that it was meant to be part of a Louisville-themed compilation of Brian Eno covers. Why God (or god, gods, or Satan), could this compilation not come together? Eno is a national treasure…
A 600-year-old process: A Q&A with Hound Dog Press
[The above image is “Shadow Puppets” by Hound Dog Press.] Co-owners Nick Baute and Robert Ronk of Hound Dog Press (hounddogpress.com) work with old printing equipment (one is from 1892) on a daily basis to make letterpress prints. But they also live with the new. Their mascot, Daisy, is a 10-month-old hound dog. LEO: What…
Softcheque
With only one previous release under their belt, the 2011 classic Misericord, Softcheque has returned with a new album, Sand In Your Mind, out now courtesy of auralgamiSOUNDS. There is an elegance to their music that recalls Stereolab or Broadcast at their most pensive, or even the ethereal Southern gothic of Jarboe’s solo efforts. Comparisons…
Capturing the Kentucky Derby in all its equine glory
‘The Kentucky Derby: Derby Fever, Derby Day, and the Run for the Roses’ by Bill Doolittle (Carpe Diem Books and Shircliff Publishing; 175 pgs., $50) Much has been written about the Kentucky Derby. After all, Louisvillians have come to substitute the word Derby for spring, as if it is a season on the calendar. That…
Richardson’s follow-up novel is ‘GodPretty’
“Every time Gunnar punished me with his homemade elixir, the insides of my cheeks and lips would swell an’ tell for a week or more.” Teenager RubyLyn is grateful that she has a roof over her head and is living with family, but her uncle’s ideas for the righteous raising of a child regularly cross…
It is a Derby of grays, but bay Nyquist looms as favorite
A plane lands, a van pulls up to Churchill Downs — and boom! — out pops another gray horse for the 2016 Kentucky Derby. At least four grays are set to run in the Derby, which — according to a quick bit of research and a scan of the old gray brain cells — is…
Comedians Smith and Passafiume reunite in Louisville
Sean Smith and Patrick Passafiume are two Louisville originals. They are comedians who began their careers at open mics around town, and, after years of performing side by side and show after show, the two have grown to become best of friends. Now that their careers have taken off, it has become increasingly difficult for…
Voices of a new theater generation offer plenty of hope
It came at the end of a long season, but this year’s 11th-Annual New Voices Young Playwrights Festival at Actors Theatre of Louisville, which had a two-day run earlier this week, was no afterthought. The plays — eight of them, all penned by regional middle school and high school students — overflowed with ideas, ideals,…
The Kentucky Derby is STILL Decadent and Depraved, and So is Humanity
This week marks 46 years since Scanlan’s Monthly published Hunter S. Thompson’s legendary piece, “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved,” a subjective and hilarious report of the 1970 Kentucky Derby. The relatively unknown publication had commissioned the Louisville-born writer to cover the race and assigned British artist Ralph Steadman to tag along and do…
The beautiful one
My earliest music memory is hearing “Purple Rain.” I was 3 when it came out. I can’t picture exactly where I was when I heard it, most likely in the trailer we lived in at the time, but I do remember it coming through the radio, making its way into my tiny ears and rearranging…
Highway 20 Revisited: A Q&A with Lucinda Williams
Lucinda Williams. It’s a name that carries so much weight and gravitas within the world of music, it almost seems insulting to even write an introduction for her. Thirty years into her career, she still writes songs with the fire of dragons. She wins an armful of awards with every album she releases, including multiple…
Shift wars
A recent Internet meme made me giggle. A lot. The photo was forgettable, but the text said, “When I die I want a.m. shift to lower my casket, so they can let me down one last time.” One could easily swap “a.m. shift” for “p.m. shift” in the meme, and it would still be just…
RecBar, solid noshes to help fight off hoards of digital zombies
Tony Thomas and Corey Simms, both decade-long veterans of Fourth Street Live’s Lucky Strike, dreamed of opening a dining spot that combined their extensive restaurant experience and love of old-school arcade video games. Starting with the purchase of the genre-defining coin-operated Golden Tee Golf simulator, they horse-traded and wheeled and dealed themselves into an inventory…
Trader Joe’s wraps often save my day
I buy a lot of groceries at Trader Joe’s, from chicken to fruit to salsa, but one of my favorite aspects of the store is the ready-to-eat meals in the cooler case. Wraps, salads and sushi abound, with a ton of possibilities from which to choose, and most of them check in at a more-than-reasonable…
I don’t care who shares the ol’ water closet with me
Let’s talk shit! And piss! And ownership! And who belongs where and why! Let’s talk about the fear of a dwindling few who want to bar an increasingly expanding universe of transgender folks from taking a fucking squirt when nature calls … in other words, let’s talk about panic in the loo! And before we…
‘Always smash the picture’: Thoughts On Prince After His Death
The first time I saw Prince, his albums were nestled in a stack of records at my cousin’s place. On one, it was a midrange shot of him, bare-chested against a blue background with his hair blown straight and feathered away from his face. On the other, he was wearing a trench coat, a scarf…
Bevin is stealing from our children and grandchildren
Gov. Matt Bevin campaigned on the promise that he would “lead the charge” to cut taxes and shrink the government. “We are not borrowing money from our children and grandchildren anymore,” Bevin proclaimed. Conservatives love to talk about the debt, and they always seem to hide behind claims that they are fighting for our children…
