Every trick in the book
Oars flanked the podium in the sterile, textbook-filled upper mezzanine of the UVA bookstore—a silly sight. In front of a crowd split between faculty and young MFAs, Jeb Levingood, editor of UVA graduate literary journal Meridian, took to the podium with a fictional and fanciful introduction about how the local novelist John Casey [...]
Where the fire code meets the social code
Popular perception these days is that small music venues are under attack. At the end of a year that saw the imposition of a very, very quiet 55dB noise ordinance in some neighborhoods, and the shuttering of music operations at Random Row Books (which still hosts plenty of other events), the fear isn’t entirely out [...]
A collection lays Beattie's career bare
The 48 stories that Ann Beattie, who teaches at UVA, published in The New Yorker are collected in a new hardcover volume that serves as an invitation to reflect on her long career.
Space trash
I met with two songwriters behind the Red Satellites, guitarist Drew Carroll and singer Kevin Hivick, for caffeine and conversation last week, but mostly to ask them, in light of rumors that they’ve been banned from certain venues for breaking stuff, what it feels like to be considered the most dangerous band in Charlottesville. The tinkly [...]
The natural bridge
If you’re a fan of Cher’s “Believe,” Kanye West’s “Heartless” and Daft Punk’s “One More Time,” then, boy, does this year’s TechnoSonics festival have the song for you. It’s called “Social Sounds from Whales at Night,” an eight-minute diddy that applies that ubiquitous Auto-Tune vocal effect to whale songs. The composer and sound collagist Douglas [...]
Parachute drops new record news
I went to see Parachute the last time they were in town because, you know, how can you not be curious? Though I went expecting screaming ‘tweens, inside I found myself standing slackjawed, in awe that the dudes in jeans and tees, who waited to pursue music full-time until they finished their undergraduate degrees, were [...]
Adrift in Will May's sea of images
Will May says he doesn’t want me to write about the small picture of an open-mouthed Glenn Beck
To bomb or not to bomb?
Billy Upski Wimsatt uses his graffiti tag as his middle name, to remember the years he spent “redecorating Chicago.”
Thank you, Burr Beard
Let me play Devil’s advocate here for a moment. Burr Beard—the controversial general manager who left WTJU last week less than six months after being hired, citing “family concerns”—is the best thing that ever happened to UVA’s community radio station. When Beard announced plans to introduce changes to WTJU’s programming that DJs feared would curb [...]
It's hip to be in a square
When I was given the assignment of traveling to a local elementary school to square dance, the first thing I did was panic. (I’m not much of a dancer, or at least it terrifies me.) The second was to go home and beg my girlfriend to come along. Fortunately, she had nothing else to do [...]
Darkness, light and Josh Ritter
The Festy Experience kicks off this weekend in Nelson County. This year’s lineup was curated by the Infamous Stringdusters, and includes local acts like Trees on Fire, and Devon Sproule and Paul Curreri (who will play together), and national acts like Railroad Earth and Toubab Krewe. Most exciting for many folk lovers is the Idaho-born [...]
Birdlips and Wes Swing; Rapunzel's; Saturday, September 25
Birdlips and Wes Swing are two local folk acts that split their time between here and elsewhere
If The Invisible Hand makes it, how will they get there?
The Invisible Hand is about a month away from releasing its first album, a self-titled, professional effort that rounds the rough edges of the band’s ferocious live show without diminishing the music’s intensity. The album is a 45-minute behemoth that marries the fidgety power pop vision of songwriter Adam Smith with a band eerily suited [...]
If The Invisible Hand makes it, how will they get there?
The Invisible Hand is about a month away from releasing its first album, a self-titled, professional effort that rounds the rough edges of the band’s ferocious live show without diminishing the music’s intensity. The album is a 45-minute behemoth that marries the fidgety power pop vision of songwriter Adam Smith with a band eerily suited [...]
Low overhead, with room for headbanging
In late March, the local seven-piece pop band We Are Star Children released a single called “City Saints” on its Bandcamp webpage that allowed friends and fans to buy the track for as much—or as little—as they were willing to pay. On the side of the page was a tiered payment system that offered the [...]
Festival of the Book news; free LCD Soundsystem tickets
Information on the above items is one click away.
Thoughts upon the occasion of releasing a record
A look into the emotional pitfalls that await one local musician. Plus, a look inside this week’s paper.
The indigenous "genius" of Sally Gabori
I intended to speak with the artist Sally Gabori for this article, but was informed in a terse e-mail that she is not available for interviews.
Merle Haggard cancels Charlottesville Pavilion gig
Due to illness, the "Okie from Muskogie" singer won’t be swinging through town after all.
“Musical: The Online Musical” needs your help being written
Plus, UVA celebrates Chopin, and ATO’s "Casino Jack" renders Abramoff
Five ways to have a good weekend
Dungen, Secretly Y’all, sacred harp singing, and a couple ways to comemmorate Patriot Day
Lady Gaga; The John Paul Jones Arena; Wednesday, September 8
During her first song Wednesday night at the John Paul Jones Arena, “Dance in the Dark,”
Dave Matthews Band will play John Paul Jones Arena twice in November
Once just ain’t enough for these local dudes.
The Reel Music Ensemble breathes new life into old films
The local composer Matt Marshall fell in love with silent film when, at age 13, he saw Lon Chaney Sr. —“the Man of 1,000 Faces”—in a PBS broadcast of The Phantom of the Opera. “There was a beauty to it, just the sight of people moving through sets,” says Marshall. “It was like a combination [...]