Cover Story
Racial justice in Louisville in black and white
Read about Anna Rohleder’s experience writing this week’s cover story in her column “Race as Shadow.” On a hot Sunday afternoon in July, The Carl Braden Center at 32nd Street and West Broadway became direct-action headquarters for the Black Lives Matter and Showing Up for Racial Justice movements. Around 60 to 75 people of a…
The Connection’s last dance: The historic downtown club was a three-decade fixture of the LGBTQ community
On Saturday night, The Connection had its last dance. The nearly-30-year-old dance club has been a fixture of the gay community since it opened in 1988. Owners George Stinson and Ed Lewis have been planning to close the club and focus on their massive, new development on the edge of Smoketown. So LEO went downtown…
LEO Podcast #35: Recently Released, featuring new music from Soft Self Portraits, RMLLW2LLZ and Scuzz Master
On this month’s Recently Released, three LEO contributors talk about and listen to new music from Soft Self Portraits, RMLLW2LLZ and Scuzz Master. Suscribe to the LEO Podcast on iTunes, and follow us on Soundcloud and Twitter.
10 things to do under $5 this week in Louisville (8/8)
WEDNESDAY Wings Denied, Artwork For The Blind, Alaya Modern Cult Records $5 | 7:30 p.m. Celebrate hump day this week with these three unique bands. All three put their own spin on metal, mixing it with other genres and styles. The show is all ages and music starts at 8 p.m. Voyager by Wings Denied Royal Wednesdays Hip Hop:…
5 things to do this weekend in Louisville (8/5)
FRIDAY Barbecue & Hops to Benefit The Olmsted Parks Conservancy Feast BBQ Free; 5 p.m. While you’re riding a trolley around downtown during the First Friday Trolley Hop, stop by the parking lot of Feast BBQ where they will have delicious barbecue, and Akasha Brewing Company will supply the beer. Proceeds from the event benefit…
Race as Shadow: Anna Rohleder’s experience writing this week’s cover story
This week, Anna Rohleder wrote the cover story “Racial justice in Louisville in black and white.” Why is race so hard to talk about — especially, as author Ta-Nehisi Coates would say, for people “who believe themselves to be white”? One reason may be that it is personal and impersonal at the same time. It’s…
Plush perks for Ramsey’s staff
The University of Louisville’s next president will be saddled with more than just baggage from James Ramsey’s tenure. The new president will inherit Ramsey’s top deputies, many of whom were given lucrative compensation packages and perks that experts say go far beyond the norm. Ramsey’s own buyout is $690,000, but the cost of his pledges…
Thorns & Roses: The Worst & Best
No ass print, please [Rose] (Former) UofL President James “Pharaoh” Ramsey sure does have a big set on him. Ramsey gave trustees conditions for his resignation, including hiring him on an interim basis and providing pay for an untaken year of leave. The trustees’ reply? Don’t leave your ass print on the door on the…
10 essential Alice Cooper songs
Before there was a Marilyn Manson to freak out the squares, there was Alice Cooper. For the last 52 years, Cooper (aka Vincent Furnier) has been making music. By the late ’60s, Cooper made his way to Detroit Rock City to up the ante on the macabre, and has been a key figure in the…
Stagecoach Inferno, a Wild West metal band
In the world of heavy metal there isn’t a shortage of subgenres: from thrash, sludge, stoner, death, doom, speed, power, nu, black (and unblack) metal, the list goes on. Within the sub-genres are again a multitude of even more categories like Latin, Christian, Neue Deutsche Härte (New German Hardness) and pornogrind. Then we have crossover…
The Pass: Canyons
Identifying what you do well as a band and delivering it in a straightforward and sincere way seems to be a solid method to build an album, and that’s what The Pass does well with their third full-length record, Cayons. With bouncy synths, funky guitars and steady drums, The Pass gets right to their upbeat…
Scuzz Master/DNK BDZ FMLY BND split
The Nirvana influence is tangible here — more on the Scuzz Master side of the equation than the DNK BDZ FMLY BND portion of the release, but no less relevant. The guitars are at the forefront for both — fuzzed-out and muscular in execution, a heavy hand guiding the way. Where Scuzz Master skews to…
Iamis: Go Supernovae!
Go Supernovae!, Iamis’ first full-length since 2010’s Trance Inducer, tips its hat to the old crooner doo-wop sound — be it tremolo-ridden arpeggiated guitar riffs like in “Lead Hands” or Shawna Dellecave’s sauntering vocals. That’s not to say this is simply a throwback record — it also brings psychedelic grooves to the forefront in “Unsteady…
CAVE DWLR: Digital Addiction
Instrumental hip-hop can be a hard groove to dig into, but CAVE DWLR plays within the confines of the genre admirably. More EDM than straightforward hip-hop, the production here skews busy, with a lot of trap work and chopped samples. Despite that, CAVE DWLR’s compositions remain imminently danceable, with a solid beat that never loses…
Has been
What happens when the spotlight fades, when time moves past the artist as another generation picks its own stars and heroes? What has happened to the musicians of your youth who weren’t lucky enough to stay on the train of popularity, to hold onto the rocket of success? You might be surprised to know that…
Female comics to compete for ?‘No Balls of Meat’ title
If you haven’t heard of it before, you’ll know soon enough — “No Balls of Meat” is an all-female comedy contest that spans three nights this month at Play. There are two qualifying rounds (Aug. 6 and 13), and three performers move on to the finale (Aug. 27), when the winner is chosen. Besides the…
Louisville Community Acupuncture: ‘The Best Pricks in Town’
Louisville Community Acupuncture, run by husband and wife, Mike Sobin and Margaret Travis, merges the ancient Oriental healthcare technique with modern social-justice philosophies. The clinic has a sliding-fee scale and even a Free Pricks Day every May 1, which is also May Day, an international day honoring workers. The payment scale helps ensure that more…
Finn’s pot roast is a feast for all seasons
In case you hadn’t noticed, summer has clamped down on us fully now. It’s 95 outside as I write this, and the central-air is struggling. The humidity? Don’t even ask. It’s as if the giant evil spaceship in “Independence Day: Resurgence” is dropping down over the metro, only it’s a giant sponge dripping hot water.…
More tacos, with an apology
If you’ve read the Taste Bud before, you probably know that tacos are one of my life’s passions. Bacon is right up there, as well, although I don’t much care for bacon in tacos, which seems strange and ironic somehow. But pretty much any other meat in a taco? Yes, please. I apologize in advance…
Voting Hillary, fuck the noise
I fell in love with Sen. Bernie Sanders. I wanted to marry his brain — bought a ring and everything. I was on board, and, like Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko, I was ready for the long haul to the future. But the plan didn’t quite pan out, and, for a hot minute, I was so…
Let me take off my earrings
I have a few thoughts about Butler Traditional High School’s dress code/hair policy, which was abruptly suspended last week after community outrage. Let me say this right up top — or for those who aren’t used to AAVE, African-American Vernacular English — let me say this at the beginning: Black hair is not, and cannot…
University of Louisville Peacock: The search for the next president
The upcoming selection of a new president for UofL reminds me of when George W. Bush’s eight years were up: America wanted the exact opposite of what it had. The search criteria for finding the next university president is pretty simple: likable, trustworthy, intellectual, a proven educator, inclusive, transparent … pretty much the opposite of…
Your Voice: LEO Verse
LEO VERSE | LUCKY JIM | By Keith Welch Poor Jim Ramsey’s unemployed but average earners spare your tears regard the severance he’s enjoyed you couldn’t earn it 10 years All it took was several scandals willing escorts and sombreros federal funds that were mishandled the disgrace felled him like a flaming arrow So farewell…
