Calhoun
MUSIC | Triple threat Desdamona drops new disc: "Inkling"
Desdamona is a powerhouse in the local spoken word scene and hip-hop community. She co-hosts Poet's Groove at the Blue Nile every Tuesday night, and was also among the founders of B-Girl Be, the nation's premier event for women in hip-hop. She is also one half of Ill Chemistry, her collaboration with beat boxer Carnage the Executioner. In her spare time, she posts daily writing prompts on her Facebook page. Quickly following on the heels of BGB and her campaign for Too Big For My Skin, Desdamona is releasing her third album, titled Inkling, and will perform this Saturday at Sauce with Carnage, Big Mike, and Alicia Wiley.MORE »
VISUAL ARTS | With "Event Horizon" and "Benches & Binoculars," the Walker rolls out new views of its collection
In exhibits opening to the public on Saturday—with a preview at Friday night's After Hours party—the Walker Art Center is not just re-envisioning the way it presents work from its own collection, it's offering provocative new ways of thinking about the display of contemporary art.MORE »
"Event Horizon" at the Walker
Highlights and hidden secrets of the Walker's contemporary art collections are presented in a lively sequence of rotations that unfold throughout the exhibition's run.
THEATER | Brave New Workshop lights a fire under Santa in "Brett Favre's Christmas Spectacular"
The Brave New Workshop and its founder, Dudley Riggs, have won many accolades over the years for being, well, really funny. And just this week, I read in my neighborhood newspaper about how green the theater is, leading the charge by converting its stage lights to LEDs. Funny and green secures you quite a place in the hearts of the people of South Minneapolis, so when the opportunity to review the Workshop's latest show, Brett Favre's Christmas Spectacular: The Immaculate Interception, came my way, I knew I'd enjoy going to the show and laughing my ass off at satirical songs and jokes about family.MORE »
MOVIES | The Coens' perfectly tolerable "Intolerable Cruelty"
I can't believe I'm writing this about a Coen Brothers movie, but watching Intolerable Cruelty is just as enjoyable—and no more or less profound—than lying on the couch and watching a few episodes of Three's Company.MORE »
MOVIES | The Coens' "Man Who Wasn't There" makes metaphysical mincemeat of a solid setup
In my review of the Coen Brothers' debut feature Blood Simple, I said that it just might be the filmmakers' most successful movie in the sense that it does precisely what it sets out to do, and does it very well.MORE »
Coffee Festival
The 20th Annual Coffee Festival to Happen
November 21st, 2009 at Calhoun Square
Kitchen Window to make its new store location debut
THEATER | The Jungle Theater's "Seafarer": A wickedly entertaining tale of Christmas among the "surplus population"
In A Christmas Carol, the Ghost of Christmas Present takes Ebenezer Scrooge on an instructive tour of the downtrodden: clerks, miners, sailors, the huddled masses. Despite their humble means, it's revealed, the people Scrooge dismisses as "the surplus population" have a joy in their hearts that puts to shame the wealthy Scrooge's bitter discontent. In the context of this canonical narrative being enacted by theater companies all over town, it's downright subversive of the Jungle Theater to mount Conor McPherson's The Seafarer, a Christmas story that suggests that maybe the poor are just as messed up as the rich.MORE »
MUSIC | Do yourself a favor and lend an ear to jazz vocalist Nancy Harms
I don't much enjoy getting unsolicited CDs in the mail—especially when they don't come with a SASE. My first thought is, who gave this artist or manager my contact info in the first place and how am I supposed to fit it in my workload (invariably it's someone looking for coverage of an upcoming gig date that I set aside a month ago for someone else).MORE »
