Cover Story
Apocalypsnow
Just after 4 o’clock on Friday, beaming like all of us under the first rays of sun all week, the volunteers at Walnut Street Baptist Church are changing shifts, which means the scene near the entrance to the temporary shelter is unusually frenzied with the movement of bodies and the queer language of a sudden…
WEB EXCLUSIVE: Journey to the top
I am chronically tardy. And in this instance, I was a couple weeks too late to witness the historic inauguration of President Barack Obama. But I must confess — I am not the least bit upset about that. Because in addition to having a problem with punctuality, I also am not a fan of crowds…
Mother of Curses
The new project from Todd Albert Rittmann, D. Rider takes his work with U.S. Maple and filters it through avant noise and improvisation. No real surprise, because he’s also worked with Cheer Accident over the years. The result: just short of mind-warping. The drums on “Dew Claw Don’t Claw,” sound as if they were cut…
3’s company
Never set off fireworks in the ghetto. That is the public service announcement brought to you by Jeremy Johnson, Drew Osborn and Brandon Duggins, collectively Workers. The Band Formerly Known As Your Black Star turned Duggins’s routine birthday celebration into an outtake from “COPS,” failing to heed engineer Erik Wofford’s advice to set, then scram,…
Dining Review: Let’s line up for breakfast at Meridian Café
Louisville has always been a breakfast-loving town, it seems, and citizens of Derby City have always had our morning favorites. From Canary Cottage back in our grandparents’ time to the Baby Boomers’ favorite, Lynn’s Paradise Café, and on to such modern attractions as the lovably urban Toast on Market and Wild Eggs (which just…
Staffpicks
Friday, Feb. 6 Silversmith Sarah Schneider As a young girl growing up in Southern Indiana, Sarah Scnheider had a knack for playing piano. As a classically trained pianist, Schneider eventually discovered that her hands could create more than just music — she took to metal design and fabrication as an undergraduate at Indiana University, and…
B-Sides
My Morning Jacket isn’t the only hometown group up for a Grammy this year. On Friday, IceBreakers (252 E. Market St.) is hosting a pre-Grammy party in honor of the late producer and MC Static Major, who passed away last year. Static was posthumously nominated for three Grammys for his work on Li’l Wayne’s hit…
Extreme Makeover: God edition
Since last summer, your Church Hoppers have visited nine houses of worship. And each one gave the Man Upstairs a slightly different look. Pleasant Grove Baptist Church saw him as the Dad-in-Heaven concerned with our everyday needs. “The thing that I remember,” said Zach, “is the married couple that stood up and said they got…
Inbox — Feb. 4, 2009
Thinkin’ ’bout Lincoln I enjoyed Scott Wade’s comparison of Abraham Lincoln and Barack Obama in the Jan. 21 LEO Weekly. Sadly but inevitably, however, the way in which President Obama will most certainly be like his fellow Illini involves an aspect of Lincoln’s presidency not known to us and not considered tasteful to discuss during…
Grimm tales
The track record of cults in America is as wholesome as Lenny Bruce. Heaven’s Gate in San Diego, David Koresh at Waco, Tex., and Jonestown in the jungle of Guyana conjure images of fanatical proselytizers, flame-engulfed nondescript compounds, mass suicides and Technicolor shame. A benevolent flip side to that is “cult” as communal living space,…
Rag Traveler
How many licks does it take to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop? According to Mr. Owl, it’s three; it takes a lot more than three licks in my metaphor, which is about — at its base — finding the joy in life. It’s been almost three months since I left…
The people’s court
Just last month, Louisville Metro government was named as a defendant in three separate lawsuits challenging Mayor Jerry Abramson’s authority. It turns out such lawsuits are quite common in Louisville, where many union leaders, neighborhood groups and residents embroiled in litigation say legal action is the only option to handle grievances with the city. Currently,…
Redefining Sheik
The conductors stood at the foot of a 300-seat auditorium on a wintry Utah day, watching as a rapt audience clanked beer bottles, ululated and hollered. Part exercise, part team-building, part roundtable discussion, the sounds served as the backdrop to an image displayed on screen. “It was really cool,” said Duncan Sheik, who along with…
Dining: Mug Shots
My friends Saint Graham and Flyboy joined me recently for a Sunday lunchtime visit to the Monkey Wrench, and as Flyboy eased his monster pick-up into a handy parking space, my first impression had absolutely nothing to do with the Monkey Wrench. Across the way at Barret and Oak stands the building I hazily recall…
Art Review: Call of the wild
Carl Borromäus Andreas Ruthart is not a name that rolls off the tongue. Unless you appreciate German Baroque art, his name has probably never rolled around in your brain, either. He was one of the top painters of animals in his day — the 17th century, that is. He is so well known for this…
Who R U Rappers?????: Mixtape Vol. 3
D. Mawl is already back with a new mixtape and single. His style of hip-hop is vastly under-represented nowadays. It’s “conscious” without wearing that label as a marketing tool. It’s danceable and unflinching in dealing with issues that often have you hitting the “back” button on some “did he really say that?” steez. Case(s) in…
Dining: Aftertastes
Shady Lane Café, 4806 Brownsboro Ctr., 893-5118, www.shadylanecafe.com. This friendly East End spot has long been a favorite for breakfast and lunch and stays open for dinner Tuesday through Fridays. Each night offers a different dinner special, which ranges in price from $3.95-$6.95. (Reviewed 11/5/08; Rating: 87) Seviche A Latin Restaurant, 1538 Bardstown Rd., 473-8560,…
Cheerleader
The recently reunited Odds instantly invite comparisons with Sloan but pack neither Sloan’s walloping punch nor their endearing shagginess. At heart, The Odds are craftsmen, delivering unfussy arrangements, clean production and familiar chord progressions. This can make Cheerleader feel workmanlike in patches, and occasionally vanilla (“Cloud Full of Rocks” recalls Del Amitri, Deep Blue Something…
Broke and breaking the law
Unemployment in Kentucky recently soared to its highest point in two decades, with no relief on the horizon. This means more people will lose their homes as a result of being out of work, as foreclosures are expected to exceed the record number reported in the United States last year. And it seems the ripple…
Decade
Clifton Anderson is Sonny Rollins’s nephew and longtime trombonist. While his new CD is titled Decade, representing the years since his last solo recording, the keyword is swing. Accompanied by pianist Larry Willis, bassist Bob Crenshaw and drummer Al Foster, Anderson shows what he has learned in pacing and focus. “Noble” sets the stage for…
Present-traumatic stress
In the sandwich shop, the woman — pretty, rumpled, with two young children in tow — looks dazed. All around her, others have the same look: shellshock, perhaps, or a sluggish metabolism, slowed by a second long night on a 45-degree living room floor in a fitful sleep inside a sleeping bag snuggled up to…
Trees: The root of the problem?
There’s not much science behind how much ice a power line will hold before it falls. That’s because lines come in all different shapes, sizes and gauges, so there’s no standard — when ice like this comes, you just hope for the best. According to E.ON. U.S.’s Keith McBride and Darryl Evans, whom LEO Weekly…
A man & his bus
The Alvarez Avante Baritone’s home is a $1,000 custom case, way more than the guitar’s worth. Equal protection goes to the Martin HD28 — “High Diva,” as Keller Williams calls it — as does his 1936 Gibson L00, which his wife drained her bank account to buy. These have their own bunk on Williams’s tour…
Theater Review: ‘Elevator Plays 3’ is more up than down
(Specific Gravity Ensemble presents “Elevator Plays 3,” directed by Christie Baugher, Michael J. Drury, Rand Harmon, Corey Macon Long, Steven Rahe and Christopher Shiner. Continues through Feb. 22 at the Hertz Starks Building. For tickets, call 384-2743 or visit www.specificgravityensemble.com.) Operating under an unconventional yet fixed premise — like Specific Gravity Ensemble does — can…
Calamitous weather in Louisville: A brief history
It took just over four months for Mother Nature to top herself in Louisville. The windstorm that came Sept. 14, 2008, via Hurricane Ike and tore down countless trees and thousands of power lines — thus leaving thousands here without electricity, in some cases for longer than a week — was, until last week, the…
The queer patriot
I now have a winter hat that says “I (heart) Obama America.” I have never owned anything that would identify me as an American in a foreign country; there is a Canadian flag patch sewn on the backpack I use for travel in foreign countries. Ever since returning from D.C., I have worn my hat with…
Art: News Bits
You can now find visual arts news and updates on Fat Lip, our news blog, fatlip.leoweekly.com Bryce Hudson will sign his book “Explorations in the Shadow of Pop Culture” on the Feb. 6 First Friday Gallery Trolley Hop from 5-9 p.m. at The Green Building Gallery (www.thegreenbuildinggallery.com). The book signing is part of Hudson’s…
Streak stalled
April may be the cruelest month to T.S. Eliot, but he never competed in the Big East in February. Unbeaten in January, Louisville’s magic sleigh flipped into a ditch Monday. The roll U of L was on has been momentarily sidetracked. No. 1 UConn 68, U of L 51. It wasn’t that close. Forget that…
Video TapeWorm
THIS WEEK’S TWIN PEEKS: MIRACLE AT ST. ANNA 2008; $29.95, R This has been hailed as the greatest war flick since “Saving Private Ryan.” Don’t know about that, but this occasionally evocative drama from Spike Lee is a masterful bit of storytelling — in parts — thanks to James McBride’s novel and screenplay. The opening…
