Todd Snider, the Tennessee-based troubadour who has spent nearly fifteen years and more than twelve proper releases perfecting the humorous talking folk song, is, to put it simply, a strange guy who records and performs strange songs. His ironic eccentricity, however, is his charm. Part satire, part serious, part song,…
If you’re happy about no more Bush, clap your hands. If you’re happy about our first black president, clap your hands. If you’re happy and you know it, then your plans will surely show it. And if you’re not happy today, well, there’s always conservative talk radio. The rest of…
“For too many people,” says Marty Jones, organizer of Wynkoop Brewing Company’s thirteenth annual Beerdrinker of the Year contest, “the term ‘beer drinker’ conjures up a man in underwear and an ill-fitting T-shirt watching professional wrestling and drinking flavorless beer. But that is not the crowd we see.” Jones’s crowd?…
Bar time at the Park Tavern (931 East 11th Avenue) is roughly fifteen minutes fast, which means, of course, that last-call and you-can’t-stay-here cries leave the mouths of bar staff between 1:30 and 1:45 (real time) each morning, sometimes earlier. Boo, hiss and other profanities. It also means that when…
Comic books have always been an inspiration to graphic artist/photographer Marc Hughes. “Growing up,” he says, “comics were a big part of my art research. I followed artists and writers through the different books they drew and wrote, and it got me interested in different aspects of art and science…
Love holiday theater but feel downright nauseated imagining another year of salty Scrooge and pathetic Tiny Tim? Of dancing nutcrackers and Rudolph with his nose so obviously lit by a battery-powered forty-watt lightbulb? Who can blame you? If just one more anthropomorphized tale of redemption or adventure is likely to…
The trick to making any mechanical bull your bitch is to choke up on the saddle with your knees and thighs tight against the frame, lean loosely over the rope so that your center of gravity points toward the sky when it bucks, and hold on with one hand while…
“I want something to happen in people’s brains as far as their questioning of reality and what they’re looking at and what they’re assuming,” says John Bonath, whose newest exhibit — Real/UnReal: Botanical Studies, currently on display at the Denver Botanic Gardens — combines photography and digital manipulation of flowers,…
The Cherry Cricket (2641 East Second Avenue) — formerly Duffy’s Cherry Cricket and, before that, Mary Zimmerman’s Bar — didn’t always have a door guy checking IDs and stamping hands at 5:30 p.m., or a forty-minute wait for a table on a Tuesday night, or a national reputation for serving…
What’s it like watching Santa, Mrs. Claus and one of their special elves fly into Aurora via helicopter? “It’s like a mob scene,” says Pam Wilson, executive director of the Northern Aurora Business Association. “Once Santa gets out of the helicopter, all the kids run up to him and they…
The bummer about Bar Bar (officially the Carioca Cafe, at 2060 Champa Street) is not that the bathrooms are glacial, grimy, graffiti-covered dungeons. It’s not that the volatile mix of white, black, brown and out-of-town patrons are wont to drink until an altercation seems like a good idea. It’s not…
I have never before asked a bartender for permission to buy a drink. Why would I? Bars, taverns, saloons — they exist for the sole purpose of selling alcohol. Yet my first few seconds inside Scoreboard Restaurant & Lounge (3940 York Street) are so straight out of a movie —…
36 Hours of Keystone, we hardly knew ye, brah. For four years, we had to ingest an arsenal of trucker speed and energy drinks in order to shred groomers at 4 a.m. and chillax with local brews and live music for a day and a half straight. It was brutal!…
“Rita, I’m sick of this shit,” Tom says of his Beck’s bottle, then orders a Smirnoff screwdriver. His friends and acquaintances smirk at the switch. “This guy ain’t fucking around,” Rex exclaims. “You know,” Tom responds with mock irritation, “I’ve spent so much time learning how to drink, I oughta…
When touting the awesomeness of adult dodgeball leagues and tourneys, organizers and participants always talk about reliving the glory days of gym class. They talk about totalitarian school districts that have banned the game from recess and physical education classes. Sometimes they even talk about how good it feels to…
When the It’ll Do Lounge closed its doors last year after 27 years in business, regulars wondered what would happen to the small structure at 2001 West 48th Avenue. Two months ago, JD’s Neighborhood Bar happened, and if Deb the bartendress’s word is as good as her Bloody Marys, business…
Times are hard. Why, just last week, my scooter was stolen, my dog needed expensive dental surgery and an 800-pound hangover sat on my face, crushing my skull. Don’t even get me started on the economy and the whole wretched election season. I need some relief. “There’s some pretty heavy…
The Hill-Top Tavern (4907 Lowell Boulevard) will not run a tab for anyone. I know this because a sign taped behind the bar says so. Other signs, some written in Sharpie on scraps of cardboard and paper, some typed but so yellow they look like they were hunted, pecked and…
In Curious Theatre’s new quasi-musical, Speech & Debate, three teenage outcasts — Howie, Solomon and Diwata — each know a little something about the town sex scandal. Or at least they think they do. Openly gay Howie thinks a teacher may have solicited him for sex online; closeted-though-obviously-gay Solomon thinks…
The cops are everywhere by the time we roll up to the Squire Lounge (1800 East Colfax Avenue) just after 8 p.m. — two squads blocking (and facing) eastbound traffic, another pulled halfway onto the sidewalk, all of them screaming red and blue, all of it a familiar and strangely…
A six-foot-tall Venus flytrap. An elaborate scene from The Nightmare Before Christmas. Maybe just some spider webs and a jack-o-lantern. There’s no telling how volunteers and businesses will decorate their trunks for the City of Thornton’s second annual Trunk or Treat event. “It’s something that obviously touches a nerve with…
It all starts with a graying Latino gentleman wearing a jean jacket and a straw cowboy hat being told he can’t have a beer. “I’ll give you a bottle of water or a Coke, sir,” the bartender pronounces, “but I can’t serve you another alcoholic beverage tonight.” Poor bastard, we’re…
