Listen Up! This week in music, in playlist form
A Spotify playlist that serves as a guide to this week’s music section.
New show announcements: Jeff Beck, Anti-Flag, Garth Brooks
Usually this post comes Tuesday afternoons, but I got a bit behind yesterday, and pushed it back to Wednesday. Good thing, because a few big show announcements came in this morning; here’s your roundup of concerts coming to town soon: Announced this morning, Garth Brooks is coming to Consol Energy Center along with his wife,…
Final Performances for barebones’ Streetcar
Four more shows at the New Hazlett through Saturday
Lynn Cullen Live 12/02/14
Video Archive Suz and Lynn on political correctness. Chris Rock talks about race, class and the president. Supreme Court considers the power of nuance. Audio Only Archive Listen to the Audio Archives on with our new Apple and Android Apps or the computer audio player.
MP3 Monday: Jesse Mader
After a conspicuous* absence last week, MP3 Monday has returned to your life, bolstered by holiday food and cheer, and full of local music. This week’s free track comes from Jesse Mader, formerly known as J. James, whose latest album, Breath by Breath, got a favorable review from me a couple weeks ago. Judge for…
Pittsburgh marks World Aids Day with free HIV testing
In honor of World Aids Day, the Pittsburgh Aids Task Force and the Allegheny County Health Department are offering free HIV testing in two locations. Additionally, the Heinz Chapel in Oakland will hold its annual World Aids Day Memorial Service at 7:30 p.m. 7 a.m. – 7 p.m. Free HIV testing Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force…
Local Comics Artist Gets Online Syndication
Today’s the launch of WaynoVision, an online strip on GoComics by veteran comics artist Wayno. Wayno by Wayno Here’s the first installment, an irreverent take on your favorite web-slinging superhero. GoComics is part of the Universal Uclick syndicate, whose roster of comics includes everything from Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes to Dilbert and Pearls Before…
Lynn Cullen Live 12/01/14
Video Archive Malaysian Airlines and a poorly thought out tweet. Donald Blankenship of Upper Big Branch mine is criminally charged. Darren Wilson resigns from police dept. UPS case of a pregnant worker and unpaid medical leave. Pittsburgh Public Schools funds a parade, not new textbooks. Audio Only Archive Listen to the Audio Archives on with…
Finnbogi Petursson’s Second/Second entrances at Wood Street
Something about fall’s hasty passage into winter makes fire-watching a top priority — a dose of heat on the face, that anthropocentric gratification that nature is under control and available at my leisure. Hours pass, the light patterns get me subconsciously decoding chaos. My boots appear to be smoking. Exit nature, enter a gallery. Such…
New Releases
Amuck Detonate (Self-released) amuck412.bandcamp.com Four new tracks from the local rapper, produced by Kiltervision and Amuck himself. Amuck sings almost as much as he raps here, and the tracks pull from industrial music and rock as much as from contemporary electronic music, meaning the whole thing feels fresh, but at the same time like something…
A Streetcar Named Desire at barebones productions
A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE continues through Dec. 6. barebones productions at the New Hazlett Theater 6 Allegheny Square East $30 888-718-4253 or barebonesproductions.com The name “barebones productions” is a tad misleading, given the sumptuous squalor in its perfect incarnation of Tennessee Williams’ classic A Streetcar Named Desire. Directed by Melissa Martin, this production of the…
Rewriting Tradition: Why some families are saying goodbye to Thanksgiving’s outdated gender roles
Adele Biller remembers the days when, on that fateful third Thursday in November, her husband Robert used to walk through the door after his annual Turkey Bowl golf outing, sit down, eat and then watch football. That was his entire Thanksgiving Day contribution. “That’s how it used to be,” Adele says of her retired husband.…
Smart Blonde at City Theatre
SMART BLONDE continues through Dec. 21 City Theatre 1300 Bingham St. South Side $15-56 412-431-2489 or citytheatre company.org There’s probably not a funnier five minutes in the history of film than Judy Holliday playing gin in Born Yesterday. As the quintessential dizzy blonde Billie Dawn, Holliday first created this comedic masterpiece on Broadway, and then…
Small Business Saturday: For locally owned stores, holiday sales are a large part of a successful year
When entrepreneur Thomas West was looking for a location to open his small business, he quickly decided on East Liberty, a burgeoning neighborhood that’s been the site of increased development over the past decade. “I wanted to get into a neighborhood that everyone was talking about,” says West, who owns men’s-clothing retailer Trim Pittsburgh. “It’s…
L’Hôtel at Pittsburgh Public Theater
L’HÔTEL continues through Dec. 14 Pittsburgh Public Theater 621 Penn Ave. Downtown $15.75-56 412-316-1600 or ppt.org Hell, as Sartre is famously misquoted, is other people. Even more so if they’re all celebrities. That’s part of the premise of L’Hôtel, now enjoying its world premiere under the auspices of Pittsburgh Public Theater and its director, Ted…
Toy Story: PAL sets fundraiser for holiday drive
For about 24 hours starting on Christmas Eve, Jimmy Cvetic plays Santa Claus. He and the “elves” of the Western Pennsylvania Police Athletic League spend that time delivering hundreds of toys to underprivileged children across the region. But before that day can come, PAL actually has to raise the money for these toys. The group…
Local author explores addiction recovery through physical health
Jennifer Matesa’s new guide to addiction recovery doesn’t cover 12 steps. Instead, it runs a marathon on previously uncharted terrain. The Recovering Body: Physical and Spiritual Fitness for Living Clean and Sober (Hazelden) explores addiction treatment through exercise, sleep, nutrition, sexuality and meditation. Matesa, the Shadyside-based writer behind the award-winning blog Guinevere Gets Sober, says…
Less is More: Eve Picker is going to fill the city’s vacant lots — one tiny house at a time
Eve Picker hunches over a block map of Garfield. “There are 577 vacant lots here, 181 owned by the City or the URA,” she says. “This land is not a liability. It’s an asset.” Looking at a rough swath of North Atlantic and Penn avenues, she adds, “I’m going to build three or four houses…
The Theory of Everything
The Theory of Everything Starring: Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones Directed: by James Marsh At Britain’s prestigious University of Cambridge, in 1963, a bright young physics student named Stephen Hawking muses: If only there were an equation to explain everything in the universe. Hawking will in time come up with important and useful equations vis-à-vis…
Offensive Holding: Not much has changed in college sports since the Penn State scandal
In the final minutes of Amir Bar-Lev’s Happy Valley — a new documentary about the Penn State child-molestation scandal — the voice of Matt Jordan, a Penn State film professor, can be heard over footage of a throng of wild Penn State fans cheering for their team. The scene takes place during the first home…
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1 is mostly a preamble for the events of Part 2, which viewers will have to wait an entire year to see. But fans of the franchise should check in — newbies have no hope of following the story — especially if you prefer your teen dystopias gloomy. The two…
Savage Love
I am a bi male in my early 20s who until recently was in the closet. I have been exploring my sexuality for the past year, and I didn’t want to label myself and open a Pandora’s box of oppression in the American South before I knew who I was for sure. I learned through…
Happy Valley
Amir Bar-Lev’s new documentary examines how football-crazed State College, home of Penn State, reacted in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child-rape scandal. Bar-Lev posits, as many have, that blind adoration of the football program allowed former defensive coordinator Sandusky to commit his crimes for decades. After the program was tarnished, the community was left…
Short List: November 26 – December 2
SPOTLIGHT: Fri., Nov. 28 — Music Aleksey Igudesman and Hyung-ki Joo hope their sketch-comedy show BIG Nightmare Music will “wake up all the sleeping, dying people” in Heinz Hall. Serious musicians underneath clown wigs, the duo watched classical concerts become “elitist, spiteful fossils.” Touring internationally, they have sought to rectify this with mops, Irish stepdance…
Horrible Bosses 2
Having quit their jobs, the gang of disgruntled dudes (Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day) hopes to launch their own business. But a financing deal falls through, and — I’ll just skip ahead here — the next best plan is to kidnap a rich kid (Chris Pine, being amusingly douchey). Sean Anders’ comedy is…
Stuff We Like
Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever. Ridiculous holiday TV movies are Santa’s gift to the couch potato, and this new one looks to be this season’s liveliest argument: Instant cheese classic? Low point in culture? Needs more dog? Premieres Sat., Nov. 29, on Lifetime. Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures Ten Literary Evenings. Hear well-known visiting writers discuss…
Jingle Bell Rocks
Filmmaker Mitchell Kezin follows his own obsession with Christmas music (his gateway disc was “The Little Boy That Santa Claus Forgot”) into an amusing round-up of holiday tunes; a cultural history of contemporary Christmas songs (from Elvis to “Back Door Santa”); and the vinyl junkies who collect the often-sneered-at music. Kezin checks in with some…
Central Diner
Central Diner 6408 Steubenville Pike Robinson. 412-275-3243 Hours: Sun.-Thu. 6 a.m.-11 p.m.; Fri.-Sat. 6 a.m.-1 a.m. Prices: Breakfast, appetizers, soups, salads and sandwiches $3-11; entrees $10-18 Liquor: Full bar Diner traditions differ regionally. In and around Pittsburgh, “diner” connotes a small, homey place specializing in big American breakfasts and simple, satisfying lunch; hot entrees (if…
Memphis
Tim Sutton’s portrait of a free-floating, iconoclastic Memphis blues singer-songwriter (Willis Earl Beal) is pretty free-floating itself. Employing a languid cinema-vérité style, the narrative often feels like a dream-like documentary, as Beal mopes around rundown parts of present-day Memphis, searching for inspiration. Other unidentified people come and go — a girlfriend, some fellow musicians, a…
Departing columnist takes stock of changes on local booze scene
I’ve written about drinking in Pittsburgh every week for over three years, sharing stories of the scores of brewers, distillers, bartenders, sommeliers, and wine/spirits importers and distributors who contribute to this citys booze culture. My biggest takeaway: Pittsburgh is a fantastic place to get a drink. It’s thrilling to take stock of how many breweries…
Pelican Dreams
Filmmaker Judy Irving, who had a hit in 2003 with The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, turns her lens to another bird, the California brown pelican. Her doc follows the rehabilitation of a young female bird, rescued from the Golden Gate Bridge, as well as that of another injured pelican that now lives as a…
Justin Strong, of AVA Lounge, returns with a new brunch event at Altar Bar
SO YOU THINK YOU CAN BRUNCH 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Sun., Dec. 7 Altar Bar 1620 Penn Ave Strip District $20 All ages 412-206-9719 or thealtarbar.com Last month, the latest iteration of Justin Strong’s AVA Lounge, in North Oakland, closed its doors. But while the former Shadow Lounge owner is spending time doing consulting work and…
Jimmer Podrasky works on a comeback after 20 years under the radar
JIMMER PODRASKY AND THE REDD-UPS 7 p.m. Fri., Nov. 28 Rex Theater 1602 E. Carson St. South Side $17-22 412-381-6811 or rextheater.com When his band The Rave-Ups was at its peak popularity, you might say Jimmer Podrasky was living like something of a star — appearing with the band in Pretty in Pink and on…
Baltimore club music meets Pittsburgh this weekend
BALTIMORE CLUB TAKEOVER 9:30 p.m. Fri., Nov. 28 Belvedere’s 4016 Butler St. Lawrenceville $10 412-687-2555 or facebook.com/obviouspgh Though cutthroat sports rivals, Pittsburgh and Baltimore have gelled in a certain sense: as musical cohorts, and as cities leading parallel musical lives. Baltimore DJ .rar Kelly explains that the current Baltimore club scene mimics what he saw…
Duane Michals on his huge retrospective at the Carnegie
STORYTELLER: THE PHOTOGRAPHS OF DUANE MICHALS continues through Feb. 16 Carnegie Museum of Art 4400 Forbes Ave. Oakland 412-622-3131 or cmoa.org One wall of the Carnegie Museum of Art exhibition Storyteller: The Photography of Duane Michals features a grid made of album covers from a 1983 record by a famous rock band. The display represents…
Touchfaster and The Ruckus Bros. sync Pink Floyd and The Wizard — live
DARK SIDE OF OZ. 6 p.m. Sat., Nov. 29 Mr. Small’s Theatre 400 Lincoln Ave. Millvale $15 All ages 412-821-4447 or mrsmalls.com What started as a one-off tribute to a well-liked but underappreciated Beatles album a couple of years ago has morphed, inadvertently, into something of a franchise, and the latest iteration is the biggest…
A Conversation With Duane Michals
Back before the Carnegie Museum of Art got the idea for the retrospective Storyteller: The Photography of Duane Michals — 10 years ago, in 2004 — Duane Michals himself published the book The House I Once Called Home. Michals combined poems and multiple-exposure images made by fusing old photographs he had taken inside his family’s…
Critics’ Picks, Nov. 27-Dec. 3
[ROCK] + FRI., NOV. 28 If recent weather has been any indication of what life in Buffalo will be like for the next few months, Sleepy Hahas might want to stay on the road — headed south — for a while. For now, the band hits the 31st Street Pub tonight in support of its…
Lynn Cullen Live 11/26/14
Video Archive Lynn and Tom discuss media personalities and Isabella Rossellini’s show, Green Porno. Is artificial intelligence potentially more dangerous than nukes? Ferguson continued. Audio Only Archive Listen to the Audio Archives on with our new Apple and Android Apps or the computer audio player.
