Arts & Entertainment

What you’ll see at Heritage is unlike anything you’ll see anywhere else. It’s pure silliness, pure Colorado, pure pleasure, an odd mix of dramatics, song, utter craziness and actors just sort of palling around with the audience. Veteran T.J. Mullin writes a lot of the material and delivers his roles with laid-back but assured humor. With the exception of Kira Cauthorn, who’s rapidly adjusted to the nutty style required, most of the actors have been around forever. Annie Dwyer, a fearless and inspired clown, supplies much of the energy and lots of surprised laughter. Rory Pierce knows how to be manly and also how to show off his legs in a dress; Alex Crawford is a mean percussionist and a dry-lipped funnyman; and nothing would work as well as it does without the vigorous and nimble musicianship of Randy Johnson.

Kurt Lewis opened this small, comfortable performing space with Bold Girls, a fine play about Ireland’s Troubles directed by Anthony Powell. Now Paragon Theatre has made the place its permanent home. A welcome addition to Five Points, a historic part of Denver, the theater will also be used for music, poetry readings and classes. Everyone knows that crossroads are magical places, and Lewis intends to create a vibrant center here, featuring a fertile fusion of cultures and art forms.

Rachel Corrie has been a lighting rod for controversy since her death in Gaza at the age of 23, when she was run over by an Israeli soldier driving a bulldozer while attempting to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home. And My Name Is Rachel Corrie has proved controversial, too. The play was too hot for the New York Theatre Workshop, which originally planned a presentation in 2006, then postponed it indefinitely. But Denver audiences were able to see it last fall, thanks to Countdown to Zero, Brian Freeland’s new company that intends to stage nine more significant works before disbanding. The house was packed almost every night, and Rachel Corrie’s parents even came to Denver for two performances, including one that was followed by a panel on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Terry Ann Watts gave a beautiful and open-souled performance as Sister Helen Prejean, the real-life nun who has worked for years with death-row inmates, making her exactly the sort of wise, calm woman you would want beside you in a crisis. Watts was quietly dignified throughout Dead Man Walking, but you could see the mingled rage and pity in her eyes when she was confronted with men who claimed to be only doing their jobs: the rigid, callous prison chaplain, the officer in charge of strapping down the condemned man, the governor who used the convict’s last chance for clemency as a political photo op. And she made the moment when Prejean finally broke down and wept almost unendurably poignant.

Shane is just a small role in Contrived Ending, an original play by Josh Hartwell. He’s one of those dopey, marginal little guys whom no one in his high school respected, and who gets put down constantly even after high school is over. He also invents all kinds of lies to make himself seem more important. In Conundrum’s production, playing Shane as a muffled little dormouse who nonetheless possesses a spark of spunk and integrity, Steven J. Burge almost stole the entire show.

The conceit of this sendup of Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare’s bloodiest and most incoherent of plays, is that a wandering troupe of five actors is presenting it as a musical. Buntport actually got us through the entire plot, using a board with caricatures and lightbulbs to tell us which of the five actors was playing which of the several dozen characters at any given moment, a van that moved from place to place on the stage, all kinds of goofy props, and the company’s usual combination of literacy and lunacy, playfulness and skill.

No other company in town matches Buntport’s humor and inventiveness, and the group’s take on Moby Dick was no exception. But perhaps the funniest bit occurred at the very beginning, when Erik Edborg re-enacted the entire leviathan of a novel using nothing but a red plastic fish and a round fishbowl.

Kent Haruf’s Plainsong won critical acclaim for its quiet beauty, and Eric Schmiedl’s stage adaptation — miraculously — comes close to doing the novel justice. This isn’t one of those theater pieces that wows you on the spot; instead, Plainsong stays with you, settling slowly into your consciousness until it becomes part of the way you see the world. This is largely because of Schmiedl’s fidelity to the novel; he keeps much of Haruf’s writing, the rhythm of the prose providing a steady pulse beneath the action. As a result, the plot has less to do with forward movement than with a kind of inexorable unfolding that makes you feel as if you are watching a moving, living frieze.

How We May Know Him is a brain-tease of a play that acts on your cerebral cortex, not your guts. It’s a story about four women: Val, a Christian zealot; Simone, a new-agey television host; Nicola, a soldier of fortune; and Nicola’s partner, the sometimes waspish but usually lost and bemused Wren. The action is surreal and much of the meaning metaphoric — but that doesn’t mean that Ellen K. Graham’s script is murky or hard to follow. A series of short, sharp, freaky scenes make up the action, and in Paragon Theatre’s production, there were all kinds of things to engage your intellect and attention.

To some extent, actors are at the mercy of the productions in which they appear. An exciting show can make an okay actor look terrific; an excellent actor can seem weak if trapped by circumstances. So far this season, Trina Magness has emerged with honor from two productions that simply didn’t work. She played the first witch in the noisy, ill-conceived Macbeth staged by Listen Productions, giving the harridan a sinuous and insinuating grace that chilled the blood. And in Red Herring at the John Hand Theatre, while the play lacked finesse, Magness came close to redeeming the evening with her Maggie, the stereotypical detective’s doll, a role she played with dry and understated wit.

Who would have thought that the coolest Friday-night party around would be at a stodgy art museum? But sure enough, on the last Friday of every month, the Denver Art Museum turns itself into a lively all-ages club, complete with local DJs or bands, a cash bar and a host of kooky activities — guided meditation in the Asian galleries, séances surrounded by selections from the Louvre, pedicure operations painting miniature artwork on your toes — that are sure to get those cranky old curators bristling behind their bifocals. The events are free with the normal price of admission, and they end by 10 p.m. — leaving you plenty of time to hit the town and act like the drunken buffoon you really are, knowing that you’ve already gotten your fill of high-falutin’ culture.

Although there were some disappointments at Curious Theatre early in the season, How I Learned to Drive — a reprise of the first-ever Curious production ten years ago — was a hit, and the company continued to roar forward with two of the most exciting productions on a Denver stage this year. 9 Parts of Desire, a play by Heather Raffo, revealed the depth and complexity of Iraqi culture through the voices of several women, and in a gutsy, beautiful performance, Karen Slack played them all. Equally riveting was The Lieutenant of Inishmore, a rollicking, blood-soaked farce by Martin McDonagh, brilliantly acted and directed, that had you simultaneously wincing down in your seat and laughing aloud.

Neither The Gin Game nor Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? are particularly timely, though the latter is an American classic and welcome viewing any time. But at Paragon, Warren Sherrill’s productions of these two plays made them contemporary. The Gin Game featured Jim Hunt as a man fighting the ravages of time and his own loneliness in the most ungracious way possible, with Patty Mintz Figel as his cunning opponent; despite the unspectacular text, you felt deeply for these lost people. And Virginia Woolf was a jolt of rage-fueled adrenaline, with Sherrill’s sure directorial hand evident in everything from the strength of his casting to such tiny details as the real snapdragons used in one scene.

The play was an old chestnut, but thanks to impeccable casting and insightful direction, Paragon Theatre Company breathed new life into Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? You couldn’t help admiring Martha Harmon Pardee’s vitality and sheer, pull-out-the-stops courage as Martha; she came across as funny, smart, wrenchingly vulnerable and, in her own way, honest. Sam Gregory’s George at first seemed the weaker of the two antagonists — but it didn’t take long for the audience to figure out that George was a deadly opponent. These two had been fighting forever; it’s what they did instead of sex. Add Ed Cord as Nick, blankly pleasant at first but slowly revealing his soulless ambition, and Barbra Andrews’s secretly spiteful Honey, and you had a mind-bending combination of slow simmer and all-out combustion.

Luscious and lyrical, a feast for the eyes, ears and mind, The Light in the Piazza reminded you of just how romantic a musical can be. Every performance was a gem. Katie Rose Clarke was a luminous Clara; David Burnham, too, sang like an angel. And at any point, if you happened to get bored watching superb actors carry an absorbing plot or listening to varied and heart-stirring music, you could study the exquisite architectural contours of Michael Yeargan’s set, admire the vibrant colors of Catherine Zuber’s costumes or take in the shifting play of light created by Christopher Akerlind. This play left you dizzy with pleasure.

With Ragtime, it felt as if Boulder’s Dinner Theatre had opened the doors and let in a great whoosh of invigorating air. This is one hell of a musical to stage, one based on an important book that marries a meaningful plot with a smart, perceptive script and terrific songs. To create a cast, artistic director Michael J. Duran teamed up with Jeffrey Nickelson of Denver’s Shadow Theatre Company, and Nickelson himself played the enigmatic angel-devil Coalhouse Walker. The energy and discovery created by this fusion of talents from the two companies was palpable, and the production was a joy, buoyed by strong performances, filled with memorable moments and crammed with musical numbers that ranged from meltingly lovely to funny to wildly exhilarating.

Here’s the setup: a man and woman are seated at a bus stop after a pleasant first date, and she suddenly reveals that she’d really like to have a baby before her biological clock runs out. As the woman, Alicia Dunfee began sweetly but became more and more aggressive as she attempted to coax, bully and physically force her unsuspecting date into giving up his sperm. She pleaded. She danced. She stomped. She placed her purse at her breast and attempted to nurse it. Finally, she toppled the hapless male onto the floor and straddled him. The scene brought down the house — but since Dunfee is now visibly pregnant, perhaps it was an early hormone flush that made her performance so boldly unforgettable.

Is there anything Kathleen M. Brady can’t do? We’ve seen her in classical and modern plays, in comedy and tragedy. This year we found out that she can sing, and sing she did in A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum, rich-toned and full-throated. Brady played the role of the shrew Domina (the name speaks for itself) with such humor and vitality that you couldn’t imagine why the male characters weren’t falling all over her instead of the mushy little ingenue.

Jacob is the intensely effeminate butler — or, as he prefers, maid — of the gay couple at the center of the frothy, splashy La Cage Aux Folles. The role is a guaranteed laugh-getter, and Milton Craig Nealy played it to the hilt, with infectious style, humor and enjoyment.

As Jen, the sister in the two-person musical John and Jen, Gina Schuh-Turner turned in a wonderfully committed performance. She not only acted well and sang beautifully, but she brought a particular subtlety to the stage — at times heart-meltingly tender, at others hilariously funny. And in one memorable song, she morphed into a loud, shrewish sports mom, screaming out instructions as her young son struggled through a Little League game.

Seymour is a nerdy soul who’s faced with a Faustian bargain when he finds and tends a man-eating plant that offers him money, prestige and the love of Seymour’s beautiful co-worker, Audrey — but only if Seymour keeps feeding it flesh. It’s a ridiculous premise that fuels a goofy show, but Brandon Dill, an expressive actor with a strong voice, actually made you feel for the guy.

Before BAD was officially BAD, Dede Frain founded the social network that would grow into Babes Around Denver on the strength of a little First Friday gathering in 2002 that quickly outgrew one venue after another. She began to organize other lesbian networking and singles events, started a website and newsletter, and last year finally left the mainstream workforce and went full-time in her role as big BAD girl. Since then, Frain has added a women’s business series with guest speakers and has a million other ideas up her sleeve. For gals who love gals (as well as their gay and non-gay pals), BAD is good.

A man and a woman have just woken up, and they don’t know who they are. A young woman enters, and she tells them cruel things — that they’re suspected of murder, that they’re not, that they’re actually married, but unhappily so. She identifies herself as their lawyer, then later as their daughter. Laura Norman took this baffling role and played it with feeling, hinting at an unknowable but fascinating subtext, and as a result, she held the audience spellbound.

Sean Tarrant’s gifts are many: He’s tall, lithe and athletic; he has a good voice and a magnetic presence; his work is informed by a discriminating intelligence. And when he’s on stage, it’s hard to watch anyone else. As Paroles in All’s Well That Ends Well, Tarrant showed that even a laughingstock can have some humanity, and perhaps even moments of likability.

When the young Marlon Brando undertook the role of Marc Antony, he appeared on screen oiled and muscular, a glorious young god. Richard Thieriot, on the other hand, sauntered on in shorts, looking like any yuppie Boulderite out for a run. But after a while, you realized what he was up to — and it was an entirely refreshing and original interpretation. He muted the poetry and passion of the great speeches and gave “Friends, Romans, countrymen” just enough juice to accomplish his ends — and as a result, you heard the great rhetorical set piece as if for the first time.

Sarah Fallon has a lovely voice and she knows how to speak Shakespeare, giving the poetry its due without ever sounding phony. At the Colorado Shakespeare Festival last summer, she brought real humor to the role of the jilted Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream — broad but never over the top.

Within the magical A Midsummer Night’s Dream, realities dissolve and two pairs of lovers are bamboozled by fairies into losing track of their original alliances and switching partners again and again. The interrelated themes are that love is crazy and lovers blind, that we all live in a world of illusion, and that theater itself mirrors this shifting, upside-down universe. At the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, director Gavin Cameron-Webb set these shenanigans on a stage within a stage, and the design was simple, elegant and workable. The actors were all convincing, and they didn’t attempt English accents or pound away at the humor and exaggerate the sentiment as so many Shakespearean performers do. As a result, you heard the lines clearly — and since A Midsummer Night’s Dream is filled with poetry, that clarity made the production sing.

The old lady of My Old Lady comes with the dignified Paris apartment the protagonist has inherited and has to share with her until she dies. Now in her nineties — and with no intention of going anytime soon — the woman has led a life of culture and adventure, was for many decades the mistress of the protagonist’s father, and can’t understand why he’s being such a big American baby about it. Neither could the audience, when Patty Mintz Figel brought this woman to wise and enchanting life.

Gene Gillette held the stage with complete authority in The Lieutenant of Inishmore, a crazed, cathartic bloodbath of a play dominated by scenes of torture, murder and dismemberment. As the psychotic Padraic, unhinged by the death of his cat, he was dopey, sentimental and terrifying, and you believed he was capable of every violent act attributed to him — and a good deal more.

Jim Hunt has turned in some fine performances over the years, but in The Gin Game, his portrayal of an angry, agitated, aging man was his best yet — deep and committed, with every thought and emotion given its due. In the Paragon Theatre production, it was fascinating just watching the conflicting feelings traveling across his face, heart-rending to see this bluff, hale man fighting the increasing decrepitude of his own body with profoundly ill grace.

In Soul Survivor, Vincent C. Robinson clearly had a great time portraying the Devil as he attempted to win the soul of a quiet, rational man already quite happy with his life. He swaggered, teased and seduced the audience, uttered tee-hees of laughter that were both sinister and self-mocking, mugged, grimaced and, at one point, broke into an outrageous triumphal dance — and the audience enjoyed every moment just as much as he did.

Cordelia is utterly demented, way out in la-la land most of the time. But there’s one marvelous moment in Squall when she’s forced into something approaching sanity. It happens when the supposedly sane woman she’s been stalking seems to flip into madness, and in a sudden reversal, Cordelia tries to comfort her. This is a role that’s hard to play and could easily become monotonous to watch, but Karen LaMoureaux’s performance in the Modern Muse production was so honest, naked, sad and frightening that we remembered it long after the play was over.

Anyone can look at art on First Friday. But it takes a dreamer like sculptor and multi-media artist Marie Ev.B Gibbons to understand that some people might prefer to make art, which is why on every First Friday, passersby and art lookie-loos can create their very own miniature ceramic masterpieces at her place. March’s project was tiny clocks; past Mini-Shops have featured spring bulbs, baby faces, birds, bugs and more. Participants use molds to form the clay, which Gibbons fires in her kiln; the finished products are ready to pick up after about a week. The cost of each Mini-Shop is $10 — and the feeling that you’ve created something special with your own two hands? Priceless.

Rachel Corrie, a young American who went to Gaza to witness the plight of those who live there, was killed by an Israeli tank while attempting to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home. My Name Is Rachel Corrie is pieced together from her e-mails and journal entries. At one point she writes a friend, begging him to join the cause. “Come here,” she says, “come here” — playfully, seductively, urgently, perhaps a dozen times over. Julie Rada made that passage sing, providing one of the most touching moments on the Denver stage this season. She played Rachel Corrie with generous-hearted understatement, and with her dignity conveyed just what we’d lost with the death of this bright-souled, idealistic girl.

Thom Paine: based on nothing is a very odd play, a sort of bubble held together by a skin of words, and at its center is a single performer who keeps inventing and reinventing himself, creating varying personae out of phrases, cliches, story fragments and bits of stage business. How do you play an empty, grinning, cursing thing like this? Erik Tieze figured it out with a performance as precise and controlled as it was strong and dynamic, holding the audience spellbound with an intelligent but manic energy, blasts of feeling alternating with understated irony.

Uncle Peck is a monster who’s sexually abused his niece for years. Yet in an understated performance, Paul Borrillo managed to make him ordinary and likable, even vulnerable. In one charming scene, Uncle Peck was teaching a small boy how to fish — “reel and jerk…reel and rest” — and Borrillo’s portrayal was so strong that it took a few moments for the nauseating realization to dawn that this man was reeling in the boy along with the fish.

Everyone’s bigger than life in Tennessee Williams’s melodrama about familial battles in the hot, lurid South, and everyone talks nonstop, but Brick is required to say very little for a long, long time. Chris Reid made the character complex and multi-dimensional, so that his extended silences pulsed with feeling and thought — and when he exploded, everything around him went white, like the landscape during a lightning flash. His Brick was cruel and cowardly, passionate, tormented and subtle, with a quietly twisted sense of humor. A deeply felt and resonant performance.

Though it’s spent many years ensconced in the former Elyria Elementary School building north of I-70, the heart and soul of the Chicano cultural and theater collective El Centro Su Teatro never left the old barrio. El Centro has always meant to return to that neighborhood, so we applaud the center’s purchase of a property at Second Avenue and Santa Fe Drive, where it can return to its roots while looking fully toward the future — a future that will include a performing arts center with two theaters, a gallery space, an outdoor plaza and more. ¡Viva El Centro!

Talented silversmith, gallery owner with an eye for good design, community arts organizer, Aurora politician: Kim Harrell is a walking work of art. As the Aurora Art in Public Places Commission Chair, she helped bring work by local artists to the suburb’s depressed downtown and East Colfax corridor. And in 2006, she took her mission one step further, founding the East End Artists Association, which sponsors periodic district art walks.

The hoopla over the new DAM complex shouldn’t drown out the props due to the downtown library as a vibrant art source all its own. Quite apart from the permanent offerings in and around the DPL that have survived the endless construction next door — Daniel Lipski’s little horse on a big chair, the Edward Ruscha murals — the library continues to offer an impressive roster of exhibitions at its Western Art Gallery and Vida Ellison Gallery. Recent shows have featured the work of George Elbert Burr, Herndon Davis and Frank Mechau; fresh perspectives on Native American and Chicano artists; a host of offbeat art and children’s books; exhibitions devoted to the work of the DPL’s own staff; and, early last year, the 120-foot scroll manuscript of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, accompanied by some revealing photos of Denver during the Beat era. DAM the titanium torpedo, the library keeps on rolling.

Part of Lonnie Hanzon’s charm is in the way the visual designer seems to reappear like a flesh-and-blood Dumbledore — here and there, from time to time, fully wound — holding court over a magical world of his own invention. He’s created spectacular Parade of Lights floats, over-the-top Christmas displays in Hong Kong and the whimsical “Evolution of the Ball” sculpture at Coors Field, but Hanzon’s recent appointment as house artist and creative director at the Museum of Outdoor Arts puts the pointed cap squarely atop his serendipitous career. In addition to bringing back MOA’s winter Ice + Snow holiday installation this year, the erstwhile Merlin will have his own show at the museum in October, and his “maximalist” style will help drive the renovated institution’s visual direction when it reopens in April.

Despite the limitation of having just a small storefront for her modest gallery, Sandra Phillips has been noticed in the competitive Santa Fe arts district, and she’s done it by showcasing noteworthy Colorado artists, especially those working in ceramics. The culmination of her ongoing clay promotions was last fall’s Masters in Clay, done with Sally Perisho, which included giants of the medium like Paul Soldner, Maynard Tischler and Martha Daniels along with other talented artists such as Carroll Hansen, Katie Caron, Bebe Alexander, Julie McNair and Amy Chavez. By promoting the best, Phillips found success.

Boulder artist and University of Colorado professor Kim Dickey converted the Rule Gallery into a conceptual garden for Cold Pastoral last summer. Photos she took of gardens in France filled most of the walls, while the back wall of the gallery was covered with mirrors, giving the illusion of great space. These elements set the stage for the main attraction: gorgeous ceramic sculptures in the form of potted plants. Similar to the permanent ones Dickey did for the rooftop cafe at the new Museum of Contemporary Art, the sculptures at Rule were placed in two parallel lines, creating an allée. They were formally complicated, with a dizzying array of parts referencing leaves and finished in creamy glazes, making this “garden” one of the best places to beat the heat on a hot summer day.

Long before the current DIY movement was even DIYing around on its hands and knees, TACtile director Dianne Denholm was ahead of her time as the owner of the D’Lea’s fabric store. But she had a dream, which is now slowly coming to fruition, of creating a kind of collective, in which fiber artists and members of established fiber-arts organizations could meet and work, teach and attend classes, display their wares and buy materials. Inspired by the Textile Center in Minneapolis, TACtile is well on its way to becoming a community work of art, and Denholm should hold her head — and hands — high.

Over the years, Boulder collector David Tippit has gathered up nearly 900 psychedelic rock posters dating back to the 1960s and ’70s. In February he announced his intention to donate them to the Denver Art Museum’s Department of Architecture, Design and Graphics. Included in the collection are examples by the biggest names in the movement, such as Rick Griffin, Stanley “Mouse” Miller and Victor Moscoso. Although the posters are not yet on display, the museum plans to rock and roll with them some day.

The Colorado Photographic Arts Center no longer has its own gallery, but it still holds some 500 old photos. Last spring, Edge Gallery brought a choice group of them out of storage for the handsome Collections/Selections I. It was a rare guest slot at this artist co-op, which usually features only the work of members. The pieces were chosen by a CPAC committee and included an eclectic group of images by noteworthy photographers such as Edward Miller, Ken Hayman, Bernard Mendoza and Imogen Cunningham.

Willy Sutton from Regis University put together two impressive exhibits in the O’Sullivan Art Gallery that looked like a singular presentation. Sutton paired Denver’s Kevin O’Connell and Boulder’s Richard Van Pelt, both landscape photographers. O’Connell, who is best known for his luxuriously done platinum prints of the Colorado plains, turned on the color for these newer pierces and aimed his camera at a tree-filled park. The sensibility shift makes sense considering that the new photos mark the artist’s journey through a bone-marrow transplant. Van Pelt’s carbon prints depict little pieces of the wilderness in the spaces between developments, poetically juxtaposing nature and the built environment. The show successfully reconciled these distinctly different takes on nature.

New York photographer Collier Schorr gets pretty out there in Jens F., a large solo that is still on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver. It was originally part of Star Power, a series of exhibits on view when the building opened last fall. Using photos, montages, collages and even sketches, Schorr zeroes in on a very attractive teenage boy and poses him as though he were a female nude; it pays homage to Andrew Wyeth’s model and could-be lover, Helga, of whom he made secret paintings. Given the risks she took, Schorr was wise to take these photos in Europe, where attitudes about sex are more open.

Luxury goods usually dominate design exhibitions, but there are also design items meant to solve social problems. This is what Metro professor Lisa Abendroth gathered together to pull off the thoughtful Substance: Diverse Practices From the Periphery at the Center for Visual Art. The show was divided into sections called Access, Community, Education, Wellness and Shelter (which included an inflatable plastic tent for the homeless). The pieces were predictably functionalist, and therefore doctrinaire modernist in style. But this modern bent was the best part of the show, because it meant that everything was beautiful, even if that wasn’t what the designers had in mind.

The late Charles Eames and his second wife, Ray, created furniture classics in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s, seemingly hand over fist. Many, like their plywood-and-leather lounge chair and ottoman, are still being made. Eames’s granddaughter, Carla Hartman, who lives in Denver, has collected his work for decades and has special access to the still-running Eames Office in Los Angeles. For this show, laid out by Shannon Corrigan, Hartman assembled pieces from her own collection supplemented by those from the office’s archive. Interestingly, some of the best things were the one-off structural experiments for chair legs done in metal and wood.

Freelance curator Rose Fredrick came up with the idea of putting classic nineteenth- and twentieth-century Colorado landscapes together with contemporary ones, and the result was Masterpieces of Colorado Landscape, a traveling show that stopped at Foothills Art Center in Golden last spring and is now on view in a somewhat retooled version at the Denver Public Library. The show highlights the ongoing attraction of the Rockies to several generations of artists and demonstrates their diversity with the wide range of styles they used to capture our beloved scenery.

Artfully blending contemporary concepts with Western images is a popular pursuit for many Colorado artists, though few have been doing it longer or more successfully than Boulder artist Don Coen. The magnificent Don Coen took over the entire first floor of the Havu gallery and featured the artist’s depictions of ranch animals, which are often monumental in size and hyperrealist in style — sort of like pop art with a rural twist. In this way, Coen avoids the sentimentality that characterizes most of the Cowboy-and-Indian junk that typically makes up new art about the American West.

Denver painter Clark Richert is a perennial favorite with young artists, both the many students he’s influenced as an art professor at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design and others who have taken his lessons through osmosis. Richert is interested in advanced math, which he uses to determine the details of his paintings and other works like “Riemannian Tangercies,” his public-art piece in pavement and epoxy that decorates the fire lane at the Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver. That work was closely related to the paintings and digital prints shown at Rule last fall, in which he laid out non-repeating patterns using a range of colors against an indeterminate monochrome ground. An intriguing aspect of Richert’s oeuvre is the way he remains loyal to his principles while constantly changing the way his pieces look.

Instead of using shapes to define his artwork, contemporary conceptual artist Roland Bernier uses letters that form words. These letters are made of laser-cut mirrors, sawn plywood or printed vinyl. For a twenty-year retrospective — representing the second half of his forty-plus-year career — Walker Fine Art was transformed into what looked like a museum. One reason was that some of the installations, sculptures and bas-reliefs had been part of his Close Range show at the Denver Art Museum in 2001, but the best parts of Retrospective were all the new works that revealed Bernier’s relentlessness in following his unique aesthetic journey.

Twenty slides, twenty seconds each: That’s the challenge issued to creative types in this international phenomenon, wherein invited presenters may expound upon their private worlds, credos, outlooks or whatever in a visual quickie with strict restraints. Denver is a new spot on the Pecha Kucha map; watch for these structured slide jams quarterly at Buntport Theater. To prepare yourself, visit the P-K website.

Animals are a well-established topic for sculptors, and many examples can be seen around town in the form of metal or marble horses, stags, lions and eagles. Last fall, California artist Michael Whiting brought his own menagerie to the Plus Gallery for Walk in the Park, which featured constructivist renditions of a doe, a buck, a squirrel, a rabbit, a mouse — and a man and a woman — creating a hard-edged, dusty-colored Garden of Eden. Typically, sculptures of animals are meant to convey strength and beauty, but Whiting made the best of this tradition by instead casting them as players in a conceptual installation.

In their purest form, abstract paintings are about paint, but some artists base their abstractions on representational imagery. That’s what Boulder painter Amy Metier did in Position and Drift at the William Havu Gallery, using gardens and flower bushes as the basis for her vividly colored expressionist compositions. Paintings of flowers are often sweet and sentimental, but Metier’s are monumental and lyrical.

Denver painter Homare Ikeda, who was born and raised in Japan, made his reputation with densely composed nature-based abstractions so methodically produced that it sometimes took years to complete one. But after receiving a fellowship to work at Omaha’s Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Ikeda had a change of heart and decided to work much faster, creating more than 100 pieces during his few short months at Bemis. Surprisingly, kicking up his speed didn’t affect the quality of his work in any way, and the prints and drawings in Homare Ikeda count among the best things he’s ever made.

CU Art Museum director Lisa Tamiris Becker is committed to showcasing the accomplishments of the university’s distinguished art faculty. Last year, after the death of teacher and feminist conceptual artist Antonette Rosato, Becker had Rosato’s students mount one of her last pieces, a poignant installation called “Pattern That Connects.” The wall-hung piece, made up of fallen leaves that have been sewn into scores of little gauzy slipcovers, highlights the idea of fragility.

Victoria H. Myhren Gallery director Dan Jacobs organized a history-gathering project based on eight past members of the University of Denver’s art faculty, including some of Denver’s best-known artists. The lucky eight were Vance Kirkland, Arnold Rönnebeck, Louise Rönnebeck, John Billmyer, William Sanderson, Otto Bach, Mina Conant and Marion Buchan. Art-history grad students Petra Sertic, Laura Fry, Neely Patton, Jillian Desmond, Lauren Fretz and Kristin Bonk, as well as undergraduate Alisha Stovall, did the legwork for Eight Painters & Sculptors at the University of Denver, constructing a factual record of the department’s history by combing old records and bulletins. Some of DU’s best art teachers were examined in this important endeavor, and some of its best students deserve all the credit for its success.

Twenty years ago, Colorado art from the 1950s and ’60s was more often seen in thrift shops than in galleries or museums. But times have changed, and in the past ten years, many people, especially curators, scholars and collectors, have become interested in artwork from this period. Hugh Grant of the Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art is now the leading advocate for the forgotten Colorado artists, two of whom, Edward and Donna Marecak, were the subject of the large and thoughtful Marecak Diptych. Edward was a painter working in figural abstraction, while Donna was a premier modern potter. Although they sometimes collaborated, their respective styles were very different. At Kirkland, these artists live on through their work long after they’re gone.

In January, Robischon Gallery co-directors Jim Robischon and Jennifer Doran put on a full-blown salute to contemporary Chinese art in Face East, an authoritative group show. The two typically go all out for their exhibits, which in this case meant traveling to China to pick pieces right out of the studios and workshops of the selected artists. The exhibit included more than fifty paintings, prints and sculptures by some of the biggest stars of Chinese art and some of the most promising emerging artists. Several artists do work that comments on Chinese politics, while others are more vaguely political, referring to the collision of East and West in Chinese culture. Although China is a police state where cultural life is hardly encouraged, artists there are making the best of it, as they have for centuries.

Abstract-expressionist giant Clyfford Still was an anti-social egomaniac. When he died, his estate retained more than 90 percent of his lifelong output. This created an opportunity for Denver to build a museum specifically to house it all. The Still Museum won’t open until 2010, so its director, Dean Sobel, put together a stunning preview, Clyfford Still Unveiled, at the Denver Art Museum. A surprising aspect of this exhibit is the way the artist’s early representational work indicates that the figure — not the landscape, as widely thought — is the basis for his later classic abstracts. The gorgeous show, which stays open through June, handily makes the case that Still was one of the best.

Among the seven Star Power shows that inaugurated the new Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver last fall, David Altmejd is one of the few that are still open. A young Canadian artist, Altmejd covered the walls of the Family of Natasha Congdon Large Works Gallery with sheets of mirror, then created a series of anthropomorphic figures clad in mirrors as well. All that reflective material made the eponymous installation nothing short of an eye-dazzler. Selected by MCA curator and director Cydney Payton, this magical work was hands-down the best pick for the opening of the new building.

Sometimes shows that take on political topics have the character of earnest class projects in a high-school corridor, but that was hardly the case with Weather Report: Art and Climate Change, a mammoth show organized by curator and art theorist Lucy Lippard. It not only filled the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art to capacity, but spilled over to the Boulder Public Library and various other places. Lippard tapped some of the most famous environmental artists in the world along with Colorado artists of the same ilk. The resulting show was as provocative as it was beautiful.

It’s no big secret that the Front Range is one of the nerdiest places around: We boast one of the highest concentrations of science and research labs in the country. And what do all of those research geeks do when they aren’t watching the latest Heroes episode? They flock to the Wynkoop’s Mercantile Room for Cafe Scientifique, the wildly popular free gatherings organized each month by University of Colorado Denver Health Sciences Center professor J. John Cohen. Each Cafe Sci features a local expert tackling a different, ripped-from-the-headlines topic: for instance, Gwen Huitt, the doctor who treated infamous runaway tuberculosis patient Andrew Speaker, discussing drug-resistant TB, or Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey describing the latest developments in DNA analysis. While the subjects may be heavy, Cohen ensures that discussions are always lively and user-friendly (all the beers thrown back help, too). Get there early if you want a seat: These nerds are a force to be reckoned with.

Brazilian-born New York artist Vik Muniz is chiefly known for his funny photographs, but he isn’t really a photographer. He’s a conceptual artist who uses cameras to preserve his ephemeral re-creations of works like “The Last Supper.” For that da Vinci sendup, Muniz used expertly applied chocolate syrup, though he’s also turned to ad hoc art materials such as cotton balls, wire, thread and cut-up magazines. This spectacular solo was curated by Devon Dikeou, whose own Dikeou Collection includes “The Last Supper” and who cherry-picked the West Collection’s sizable Muniz holdings to come up with one of the best shows of the year.

Artists today want to tell stories, but a generation ago there was a group of artists who simply wanted to make beautiful paintings, and they were the subject of Color as Field, a magnificent exhibit at the Denver Art Museum. The traveling show was guest-curated by Karen Wilkin, for the American Federation of the Arts, and the DAM’s able Gwen Chanzit. Wilkin included color-field compositions by Morris Louis, Helen Frankenthaler and Kenneth Noland, as well as work by the style’s ancestors, like Mark Rothko, and creations by the movement’s heirs, such as Frank Stella. Not just one of the best shows last year, it was one of the best in decades.

Last spring, Robischon Gallery put together a beautiful and coherent exhibit that highlighted a range of contemporary abstraction while showcasing the work of more than a dozen artists, each with a personal aesthetic vision. To create this dazzling show, the gallery started off with a series of works on paper by an international star, Ellsworth Kelly. Then, mining its stable, Robischon brought in a bevy of other notable artists, including Brad Miller, Kris Cox, Trine Bumiller and Scott Chamberlin.

William Stockman was on everyone’s list of the most significant contemporary artists in Denver right up until he split around five years ago. He returned not long after, but quit making art while he made a living. In 2006 he went back into the studio, and it must have been just like riding a bike, because he picked it up again almost immediately, as proved by Nothing Is Hiding, his solo this past winter at the Singer Gallery put together by Simon Zalkind. Made up of poetically composed figural paintings and drawings created just since he relaunched his career, the show marked Stockman’s triumphant return.

Like many cities, Colorado Springs has a vacated railyard next to its downtown. Since it’s small and in Monument Creek’s floodplain, however, the city decided to turn it into America the Beautiful Park instead of developing it and to anchor the park with the stunning modernist sculpture “Continuum — the Julie Penrose Fountain,” by renowned sculptor William Burgess. Set in an elaborate group of pools designed by architect David Barber, the open loop of steel lined with hundreds of water jets is about four stories tall. And if the cascading water and gigantic size aren’t enough to inspire notice, the sculpture is on a rotating turntable. In good weather, the place teems with kids; surely, it’s one of the best ways to spend an afternoon in the Springs.

Old downtown Aurora has seen better days, and the city’s leaders have attempted to turn that fact around in any number of ways, one of which is the installation of public art in the area. Among the several commissions completed in the last year or so is “Ghost Trolley,” by Lawrence Argent, which sits in the center island across from the Martin Luther King Library. The sculpture, executed in translucent plastic, is a flattened, three-dimensional image of a trolley appropriated from a historic photo taken when these quaint streetcars ran up and down Colfax Avenue. The context combines the best of the past and present.

Even though it’s been widely ridiculed — and hated — it’s hard to deny the power of Luis Jimenez’s “Mustang” on the approach to Jeppesen Terminal at DIA. The 32-foot-high outdoor piece is a perfect example of the artist’s sensibility, bridging the gap between the high art of classic Western imagery and the low brow of the carnival’s garishly painted fiberglass ornaments. The gigantic rearing stallion, with its luridly blue coat, bulging black veins and glowing reddish-orange eyes, is pointedly disturbing, and the story of its creation matches that mood. Thirteen years overdue when it was delivered in February, “Mustang” was also over budget and the subject of lawsuits between Denver and Jimenez. And in June 2006, a piece of the sculpture fell on the artist and killed him. Nonetheless, Jimenez’s final work may have been his best.

The earliest movies were Westerns, probably because there’s something so archetypal and striking about the idea of a wild frontier with no boundaries — legal, spiritual or physical. It was the same anything-can-happen spirit that brought people to Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show, which is why the Buffalo Bill Museum hosted this display of film memorabilia, including more than forty original movie posters, artifacts (a shirt worn by John Wayne, as well as Slim Pickens’s cowboy hat) and screenings of such films as 1909’s The Life of Buffalo Bill in 3 Reels. It was a fantastic introduction to the still-popular movie genre. Just think: If there hadn’t been a Buffalo Bill, there might never have been a Shane.

Landmark’s latest theater not only offers the same great first-run and art films you’ll see at the Mayan, Chez Artiste and Esquire, but it has a lounge complete with a bar. And then there’s the snack deal: free popcorn and fountain drinks for the cost of admission. Granted, the tickets are a few dollars more than the current standard, but cinephiles with big appetites and a powerful thirst will more than break even. The real way to enjoy a movie here in true creature comfort, however, is to shell out a couple of extra bucks for the VIP option, which nets you deluxe chairs and wait service from on-call staffers until the movie begins. It’s a relatively small price to pay for celebrity treatment; the only thing missing is the red carpet.

Movie theaters that offer food and drink service are becoming almost commonplace. But that’s food and drink service in the lobby. The Aurora Movie Tavern is one of the Tavern chain’s “premier” locations, which means that there’s full waitstaff service in the theater itself. Press the call button at your seat during the film, and your server will bring the beverage of your choice — and what choices! There’s the Blue Thing, the signature margarita, or the Big Blue Thing for 2 — forty ounces of that signature margarita for $15.99. The Movie Tavern also mixes up a mean margarita and sells not just a bucket o’ beer, but the Tavern Tanker, which for $9.99, comes filled with your favorite brew — and then you get to take the Tanker home. Happy trailers to you!

Sure, you know who was president during the Spanish-American War. But how about the language — other than English — featured in the Pixies song “Debaser”? If you can answer that one, you just might have what it takes to win a bonus round at one of the many Geeks Who Drinks pub quizzes around town. Four times during each quiz, participants get the chance to answer a random question, and the first one to show the correct (and legible) answer to the quizmaster wins a free drink and bragging rights for the night. Even if the useless trivia rattling around in your brain consists of nothing but TV commercials from the ’80s or bad reality TV, fear not: One of the greatest things about the Geeks is that they have a round for everyone. This could be your lucky night.

Neighborhood Flix Cinema & Cafe is such a welcome addition to the Lowenstein Theater complex, we can only wonder how we lived so long without it. Other places have mixed food and film, but never first-run movies with first-rate food. Neighborhood Flix combines a bar/bistro (with an initial menu designed by James Mazzio of 5 Degrees and Via fame) with progressive programming and intimate screening rooms for a powerful trifecta. Films cross the spectrum from Hollywood’s latest to documentaries to international flicks and second-run indies — and the crowds that flock here prove there’s always room for one more art house in a city filled with sophisticated cinephiles. The food selections are inventive (popcorn and popcorn shrimp!), the drinks are bountiful, and the price is right: $5 for matinees, and free for kids under five. The couch-style theater seating is so comfy, you’ll want to stay through the credits.

Programmed under the auspices of the Denver Film Society, Starz is not only a great place to see the latest in foreign and independent films, but it’s also home to nearly a dozen ongoing series that cover all the cinematic bases. There’s Cinema Q for the gay-centric crowd, DocNight for those who want an injection of reality into their film-going lives, and Rocky Mountain PBS Free Community Cinema, which offers a sneak peek of films to be aired later by the PBS series Independent Lens, to name a just few. For late-night fun, monthly Mile High Sci Fi nights combine comedy and B-movies, while Kids First! provides free Saturday screenings for the junior set. A recent addition, Seeing Double, even brings back the hallowed double feature on Thursday nights and Saturday afternoons. At Starz, variety and good taste go hand in hand.

While New Mexico keeps raking in the movie business, Hollywood continues to snub Colorado. But at least the Pepsi Center could get ready for its close-up when the Democratic National Convention hits town come August in Blades of Glory, the Will Ferrell/Jon Heder figure-skating extravaganza. Although the stars managed to skate right past this city, a nice aerial shot of the Pepsi Center made the final cut. Here’s looking at you, Denver.

Sure, Amy Adams was a sweet princess in Enchanted — but nothing says Colorado like John Elway. Fortunately, this state’s biggest celebrity didn’t have to say much in Resurrecting the Champ, the Josh Hartnett/Samuel Jackson vehicle that came out last summer. The script was loosely based on a story by former Denverite J.R. Moehringer, who lived in Los Angeles when he wrote the piece — but for the film, the action was ostensibly set in Denver, and a couple of scenes were actually filmed here. In one, Hartnett, who plays a reporter, is having lunch with his young son — who believes his dad’s story that he knows Elway. And when the kid spots Number 7 himself, he runs over to say hello. Fortunately, Elway doesn’t drop the ball — or the truth — during their quick encounter, and then shrugs it off. Critics did the same for the movie.

It’s not hard to “Get High on Film,” as the Independence Film Festival motto suggests, when the whole thing takes place up in the clouds at various venues in Buena Vista, Leadville and Salida. Last year’s inaugural cinema bash kicked off with a ceremony featuring filmmaker John Landis on the 12,000-foot summit of Independence Pass, and the rest was purely off the wall, with guests including Grease director Randy Kleiser (feted with a ’50s sock hop and screening at the Comanche Drive-In in Buena Vista) and the daughter of late comic actor Don Knotts. This year, fest promoters Lawrence Foldes and Victoria Meyerink will hit the heights again in the same slightly kitschy/sweet vein, with a tribute to Elvis movies, a critic’s forum with Rex Reed, a new juried film competition and guest Franklin J. Schaffner, who directed Patton, Planet of the Apes and Papillon.

Last spring, Jason Bosch e-mailed a visual missive to friends and supporters. “ArgusFest R.I.P.?” it queried over the photo of a distraught towheaded boy who embodied Bosch’s own inner feelings about his grassroots human-rights film series. The message was not just a plea for attention — and maybe even donations — but also a declaration by Bosch that he plans to move ArgusFest in new, bigger directions, by finding a place where it can stay put. And we’re all for that, because as it is, every week Bosch faithfully lugs his projector between Hooked on Colfax and the Mercury Cafe, bringing rarely seen topical films and documentaries to eager audiences. Bosch earned a Westword MasterMind award this year; a permanent home would help him take the best film festival in town to the next level. Micro-cinema or bust!

There’s no better way to enjoy a cheesy, cliched sci-fi “classic” than getting drunk with a few smart-ass friends and piling on the snarky comments and vulgar innuendo as it plays. That’s why we’re lucky to have Mile High Sci Fi, a group of hilarious local comedians who’ve picked up the torch of movie-riffing pioneers Mystery Science Theater 3000 and run with it. Free of the constraints of television, they can be as nasty as they want to be, and they make the most of the opportunity. Every month they transform another cornball classic into a platform for biting sarcasm and boob jokes — and they send girls around to sell beer while they do it. Once you’ve watched Barbarella with a frosty brew in hand while the MHSF crew cracks wise, you’ll never want to watch it in the privacy of your home again.

Colorado was a red state in the last presidential election. And it’s also home to that other Focus organization — which means that gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Coloradans find themselves living elbow-to-elbow with one of the most conservative groups (and, arguably, some of the most conservative people) in the country. What’s that like? Matt Kailey, author of Just Add Hormones and staff writer for Out Front, wanted to find out, so he began collecting poetry, short stories, personal essays and experimental writing from 33 GLBT Colorado citizens; the result is this absolutely fabulous anthology. Each piece is different, but a common thread runs through them all: living day to day outside the straight-and-narrow gender and sexual-orientation categories in today’s Colorado. Get out and be proud!

Mice are empathetic, feeling each other’s emotions. Rats are kind to one another. And whales possess spindle cells, the same cells that help humans and apes process emotions. These are all facts gleaned from the latest findings that Marc Bekoff — professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado at Boulder, member of the Jane Goodall Institute’s ethics committee and co-founder (with Goodall) of the organization Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals: Citizens for Responsible Animal Behavior Studies — includes in his book Animals Matter. The tome is not only a compendium of recent scientific findings, but also a call to action for animal lovers. Why, for example, does the United States Animal Welfare Act refer to rats, rabbits, mice and birds as “non-animals”? And what can be done to improve the lot of our scaly, furry and feathered friends? Animals Matter boils dense scientific studies down to an easily digested format, and also lists myriad ways we can better the lives of our non-human cohabitants on the planet.

Amy Reeder Hadley’s Fool’s Gold manga comic follows Penny, a typical high-school girl with typical high-school problems: namely, boys who are jerks. Penny starts a secret club to deal with her dilemma; she and other club members identify unworthy boys as “pyrites” (the club is disguised as a geology group) and throw darts at voodoo dolls representing the boys, vowing not to date them. As girls flock from the jocks to the nerds in increasing numbers, Penny rearranges her school’s social hierarchy — and finds herself at the top. But then she struggles with dating one guy while sustaining a strange attraction to a pyrite. The second volume of Fool’s Gold was released in December; Reeder Hadley is planning to make the series a trilogy, so fans will have to wait a little longer to learn whether Penny strikes out or strikes it rich.

With places proliferating where you can grab a decent drink at a decent price, the P.S. Lounge stands out because of its sweet extras. At some point during every evening here, each lady in your party will receive a single, sweet-smelling rose. But the free benefits extend to men, too. Every patron, whether male or female, also gets a complimentary bright-pink shot. (Rumor has it the key ingredient is Tampico punch.) So drink up, ladies and gents.

When the music community was hit by the news that Cricket on the Hill would be closing, shock waves spread through the scene. For countless locals, the Cricket will be remembered as the place they got their start, earned their keep, made their name or found the family they never had. The storied bar in Capitol Hill has been a part of so many lives here for so long that losing it is almost like CBGB closing in New York.

You have to love the way the folks at the Oskar Blues brew castle wear their roots-rock affinity on their sleeves. After all, what goes better with a cold Old Chub than a dirty-good, salt-of-the-earth blues band? Maybe a honky-tonk or alt-country combo puttin’ down a riff in a room that would be smoky if it could be? Join the free music club at www.oskarblues.com and get access to free monthly downloads of selected music from a changing roster of smaller indie labels such as Big Bender, Yep Roc and Bloodshot. We’ll drink to that.

Bret Bertholf performs classic honky-tonk as the frontman for Halden Wofford and the Hi-Beams — and he definitely knows his stuff. The Long Gone Lonesome History of Country Music, which Bertholf wrote and illustrated, is a flat-out wonderful look at the country genre in all its tacky, quirky, irresistible glory. Thanks to charming illustrations of C&W heroes and heroines and whimsical prose about style, fashion and the music itself, Lonesome proves thoroughly entertaining and unexpectedly perceptive, offering the sorts of insights that even dyed-in-the-wool country fans can appreciate. Kids will love it — if they can wrestle it away from their parents, that is.

What’s much more fun than watching American Idol every week? Trying to become the British Bulldog’s Rock Idol. Competitors had to choose songs from such categories as “’90s” and “female vocalists.” With the Bulldog’s buy-one-get-one-free drafts and well drinks, there were plenty of people in the audience for the would-be Rock Idols to entertain, and in this competition, singing was second place to entertaining. Will Rock Idol return for a second season? Let’s hope the folks at the British Bulldog are up for another round.

Driven by a desire to offer top-notch drum kits at an affordable price, Tony Chadwick founded Po’ Boy Drums, a Littleton company that offers drums manufactured in the same plants as the better-known and more established brands. The prices may be lower, but Chadwick doesn’t take shorcuts; the drums are made from the finest woods and undergo a special lamination process to keep the shells from warping or cracking. And Chadwick backs his product with a thirty-day satisfaction guarantee. No wonder we keep seeing more and more local drummers playing these kits.

Chris Soucy ain’t Jack Black. But as head man at a new local franchise of the alternative music school made famous by the movie, he does aim to instill youngsters with the collaborative rock-band ethic. Geared toward young musicians ages seven to eighteen, the school’s program includes private lessons and group rehearsals focusing on the kind of music that students’ parents probably grew up listening to; each session culminates with a live show at a local club. A week-long boot-camp version of the format will be offered this summer. You’re never too young to have a professional outlook on what you do, so go, go, go, Johnny, go.

Buying tickets for Swallow Hill shows has become downright fun since the folk- and acoustic-music haven instigated this selective web-radio option in February. Featuring aural previews of premium cuts by upcoming musical acts, it gives the discerning concert-goer a chance to test the milk before buying the cow. Plus, it’s just a swell listen.

Every scene needs a Zachary Vora. In the second issue of FM (Fucking Mountains), Vora took the Denver music scene and all its sacred cows to task, essentially asserting that while some acts are a big deal here, the rest of the country could give two shits — and so we should stop being so goddamn self-congratulatory about the whole thing. He’s partially right, of course; at times, we risk dislocating our shoulders as we pat ourselves on the back. Just the same, we’ve got it good here, and we don’t need validation from people who live elsewhere to take pride in that fact. Every scene needs an agitator to keep things grounded, and Monsieur Vora — whoever he may be — is ours.

A multi-platinum band in an era when such a thing essentially no longer exists, the Fray has earned the right for its members to be pretentious jerkwads if they choose. Thing is, they’re anything but. During their sold-out three-night stand at Red Rocks, the guys used all local support — Single File, Meese, Born in the Flood, Dualistics, Bright Channel and Flobots — when they could’ve given those slots to virtually any national act. And this past February, the outfit played three rare, intimate performances at the Bluebird, treating fans to a sneak peek of its new material. And if that weren’t enough, several members of the Fray’s road crew are locals. Love ’em or hate ’em, no one can accuse these guys of forgetting where they came from.

For nearly two decades, Carmen Allgood has been an ardent supporter of local music. The original host of Mountain Homegrown, she’s also sat on the board of the Colorado Music Association. And through her nationally syndicated weekly radio show, The Colorado Wave, currently carried on over a hundred stations, Allgood’s continuing to do her bit to expose the rest of the country to all Colorado has to offer.

The title “promoter” can be a loaded one, conjuring the image of some sleazy opportunist trying to milk coin off another’s god-given ability. But if you’re a musician on the local periphery, you can do no better than having John Baxter in your corner. Eschewing the limelight and any sort of credit, he’s the kind of music-first guy who’ll hate getting an award. But ask any of the artists he’s helped promote — from Ian Cooke to Ghost Buffalo to Tim Pourbaix to Killfix — and they’ll tell you how invaluable his help has been. Currently working his ass off for the Old Curtis Street Bar — where he’s helping provide one of the more diverse and consistently entertaining lineups around — Baxter can be seen night after night, day after day, nodding his head to the sounds of a scene he so obviously adores.

Jonathan Bitz has an unbridled passion for local music. The mastermind behind Syntax, the well-regarded literary-arts publication, his love for the scene has resulted in much-needed exposure for such vital Denver artists as Ian Cooke, Bela Karoli, Gregory Alan Isakov and Rachael Pollard. Last spring, Bitz and the Late Jack Redell created a three-day singer-songwriter confab titled A Moveable Feast, which spotlighted these acts and other emerging artists. That led to a traveling version of Feast, as well as the like-minded Living Room series at the Meadowlark, where Bitz currently handles booking duties. The scene would be nowhere near as vibrant without tireless evangelists like Bitz.

There are plenty of literary bloggers in Colorado, but most tend to divert their attention toward the coasts as the default harbingers of lit life. Not so at the New West website, which has a thread devoted to books and writers in the Rocky Mountain region. Boulder-based writer Jenny Shank offers almost-daily updates on local readings, publishing gossip and reviews of books penned by real, live Colorado authors; the blog also features in-depth interviews with such authors as Kent Haruf and Nick Arvin. Yes, Denver does have a lively literary scene — and you can find it right here.

Metal and hardcore are big draws in Denver, thanks in part to Uncle Nasty. You know this, of course, if you’ve ever tuned your dial to KBPI between the hours of midnight and 2 a.m. for Metalix, the long-running underground, metal-centric specialty show he founded. Six days a week, the best emerging talent is spotlighted, along with the town’s heavyweights. And during drive time, Nasty often brings in area acts for Local Band Hang Out Day and gives them the star treatment. His undying support for the music made here reflects the fact that he’s a part of the scene himself, as the frontman of Horse. Hail Nasty!

The name may be ridiculous, but Uddermadness is deadly serious about bringing innovative, exciting dance-music talent to Denver. Founded less than two years ago, Uddermadness quickly built a reputation as promoters with an ear for what’s hot and a knack for booking artists for their first Colorado appearances. From the pulsing, jazz-infused techno of Cobblestone Jazz to the infectious, irresistible sound of Booka Shade, this crew has been responsible for some of the most exciting dance-music events in the region. And with a number of top-notch productions lined up for the near future, Uddermadness has demonstrated that there’s always room for one more promoter on the scene — provided said promoter kicks this kind of ass.

DJ Ivy is an electronic chameleon behind the decks. Regardless of what he’s spinning — house, breaks, down-tempo and damn near everything else — his sets are always tasty masterpieces of dance-floor delight. He handles it all, from smooth and sexy funk to tripped-out space journeys and deep, pumping progressive grooves. Whether he’s opening for dance-music royalty or headlining his own residency, he always manages to craft thoughtful, heady sets that ignite the crowd. And no matter what the occasion, Ivy is the consummate professional: He brings it and leaves it all on the floor.

Aesthetically, DJ Bedz and DJ Quote have different styles — but their hustle is nearly identical. Both have worked tirelessly over the past few years to gain national notoriety for themselves and the city, with striking parallels in their individual trajectories. They both got their start in the clubs before branching out into the mix-tape game and then garnering slots on the radio — Bedz first on KS-107.5 and now on One-FM and XM radio, and Quote on 96.1 the Beat in Colorado Springs — as well as landing guest spots on Rap City and becoming members of several highly respected DJ crews. Bedz has also gained renown as the official DJ of the Denver Nuggets, while Quote has become an in-demand touring DJ, performing at high-profile parties across the country. Can’t knock the hustle.

“I don’t follow trends. Trends follow me.” While we’d be hard-pressed to pinpoint the exact origin of that declaration, if might as well have come from Peter Black (aka DJ Aztec, aka Pete Gurule). For well over a decade, this shapeshifting DJ and promoter has been exposing us to styles ranging from acid jazz and trip-hop to drum-and-bass and Afrobeat to electro and indie rock. Recently, he’s even added space disco and psych rock. Here’s to going Black to the future.

We recently heard a local tastemaker heap effusive praise on Michael Trundle: “He’s the first one in this town who played Shitdisco.” While that may not mean much to non-Shitdisco fans, Trundle and his longtime Denver 3 associate Tyler Jacobson have indeed been turning the masses on to the hottest music with their playlists and frequent listening parties at Lipgloss, the ridiculously successful, long-running weekly club night. The nationally renowned night isn’t just a hit with club-goers; it’s also become the destination of choice for such luminaries as Mike Joyce and Andy Rourke from the Smiths, as well as a number of touring acts who’ve been spotted stopping by La Rumba after their own Friday-night shows.

What if members of Born in the Flood joined forces with musicians from Hot IQs and other local bands to interpret the classic soundtrack from Chariots of Fire? The result would be incredible. We know, because we’ve seen it happen. The premise of Stand By Your Band — randomly mixing up members of Denver’s best local acts into new, temporary “supergroups” — is intriguing, and the results are often brilliant, as the ephemeral collaborations interpret their favorite songs in ways alternately hilarious and heartfelt. Side projects and guest slots are always a good way to spark inspiration, and the lighthearted, circle-of-friends vibe of this event makes it a low-risk, high-reward effort for bands and fans alike.

Monolith was a killer last year. But to truly enjoy it, you had to be in good — if not great — shape, because more than half the stages were located at the top of the stairs that ring Red Rocks. Sure, we could have just plopped down and enjoyed the offerings on the main stage, but then we’d have missed incendiary performances from local heroes and other up-and-coming indie acts. After the fourth or fifth trek up those endless steps, it became clear that the pack-and-a-half daily habit we’ve been nursing isn’t such a hot idea. We’ve since quit and are now in training for this year’s festival. If you’re considering attending, you should follow suit.

After completing El Diablo, his fourth album, Eric Shiveley sold his home in Denver and moved to the San Luis Valley to build a house and recording studio. And just hours before he was slated to break ground in November 2005, he purchased a cheap camcorder at Wal-Mart and began shooting Everyone But You, a touching documentary in which he set out to chronicle the process, but instead captured the feelings of exasperation that accompany being a struggling musician. The film, which highlights a number of great tunes from Shiveley and his friends, has been selected for screening at several prominent festivals across the country. If folks have the same reaction we did, Shiveley’s days of struggling may soon be over.

If any group was made for video, it’s 3OH!3. And on “Electroshock,” the so-normal-they’re-bizarre tandem of Sean Foreman and Nathaniel Motte prove it again with a gag-and-gore-filled trip to an operating room, set to a track funky enough to break hips. The results are as danceable as they are uproarious — an all-too-rare combination that explains the boys’ growing national rep. They’re slated to appear on more than forty dates of this year’s Warped Tour — but then, their Denver appearance last year outdrew all but a few national acts. They could deliver just the sort of “Electroshock” America desperately needs.

As Robert Frost once said, “To be a poet is a condition, not a profession.” Poetry is traditionally underfunded, leaving poets poor as church mice yet still determined in their ongoing quest to emote in chiseled language. In everyday prose, that means they’re a forgotten bunch, often with only each other to look to for recognition. To formalize — and further fuel — that rarefied poet’s network, local cultural couple James and Jessica Belflower started PotLatch, an online alternative book exchange where poetic souls can give away or swap poetry journals, books, chapbooks and more, all with the click of a mouse. That’s what we call rhyme with a reason.

Since its launch a little over two years ago, the quirky, eclectic Rope Swing Cities has issued nearly thirty releases in a variety of genres, ranging from the spacey electronic abstractions of Loafeye and the intricate mind-fuck programming of Ten to Tracer’s IDM soundscapes and the emotional indie rock of Roger, Roll. Every release is distributed as a free download from the label’s website, with select high-profile releases getting deluxe, limited CD treatment. A well-kept Denver secret, Rope Swing Cities has nonetheless established itself as a place for adventurous listeners to discover something new without risk, carving out a fantastic niche for itself even as the traditional concept of a label becomes more irrelevant.

The finest instrumental rock outfits cut to the chase. No extraneous instrumentation is required, and no microphones, either: just hard grooves, galloping rhythms and a burglar’s fondness for getting in and out quickly. Guitarists Adam Hester and Gil Romero, bassist Jeff Anton and drummer Rikki Styxx display all these attributes and more on their self-titled debut disc, which features the emblematic likes of “Phantom Surf Party” and “Backseat Rumble,” a sonic tribute to rebels without a cause. Like their coffins, these players are ready for anything.

Next to death, unrequited love is perhaps the cruelest of life’s inventions. Few things are as euphoric as the rush of endorphins you feel the first time someone truly steals the breath from your lungs — or as soul-crushing as later realizing that the one you love doesn’t love you. On The Fall I Fell, Ian Cooke does a masterful job of articulating the poignancy of such a scenario over the course of a dozen tracks. From the chamber-heavy instrumentation to Cooke’s unique vocal style, this disc is as compelling musically as it is thematically, and its packaging was both unique and perfect. Hands down, Fell was the best local recording of the past year.

While working at Rocky Mountain Recorders, Andrew Vastola has been up to his elbows in some of Denver’s best records. As engineer, producer or mastering pro, the studio wunderkind put his magic hands on some of our favorite discs by the Photo Atlas, Born in the Flood, Laylights, Hearts of Palm, the Wheel and many others. It’s the upcoming Swayback record, though, that really cements Vastola as a production juggernaut. Though three of the tracks on Long Gone Lads also appeared on the Forewarned EP, Vastola not only managed to make them sound better this time around, but he also got superior performances out of the band. Rocking on the other side of the glass, it looks like Vastola can’t miss.

Recently, a gal at the hi-dive noticed us watching a show off to the side and came over to offer us some unsolicited advice. “Listen,” she said, “if you want to really enjoy the show, you need to stand over here.” And she nodded toward the rear of the club, insisting that’s where the sound is the best. While we were grateful for the tip, the truth is that the sound at the hi-dive is flawless no matter where you’re standing — just as long as Devon Rogers or Xandy Whitesel is behind the board. The best soundmen in town, these guys deliver consistently crisp mixes with clear and distinct separation that’s music to our ears.

Littles Paia is known for his always-fascinating blend of folk and psychedelia — so it came as a surprise when he announced that at his show last summer at Rhinoceropolis, he would cover Nevermind in its entirety. Turns out Littles Paia (actually Adam Baumgartner, also of Bad Weather California and Navy Girls) grew up listening to early-’90s alt-rock and long ago taught himself every song from Nirvana’s commercial breakthrough. Donning a headlight to trip his wah pedal, he ripped through the classic record in under half an hour. Was it a per-note-perfect performance? No, but it perfectly captured the unfiltered, splintery spirit of Nirvana.

The one-man band is not a new thing. Not even in Denver. Reverend Dead Eye was once, and is again, a one-man band providing percussion, guitar, harmonica, guitar and vocals. Rather than inspired gospel blues, however, Dugout Canoe produces a rougher, much more experimental indie pop that defies easy categorization, since it incorporates elements of drone and folk as well as collage sound. This one-of-a-kind one-man band doesn’t really fit into any scene and plays only warehouse spaces and house shows, but he’s clearly a leading light showing the way to something new.

When Devon Shirley left his post as drummer for the Photo Atlas, he could hardly wait to resurrect this project. Watching the baby-faced, monkey-limbed percussionist perform with guitarist Holland Rock-Garden of Machine Gun Blues and keyboardists Nick Martin and Kyle Gray, it’s easy to see why. Shirley brings the same lightning-fast precision and grace under pressure that made his playing in the Photo Atlas so mesmerizing, but in Red Orange Yellow, he infuses it with jazzy subtlety, mathematical complexity and plenty of animal aggression. Gray comes unglued, Rock-Garden broods and Martin seems eerily calm, but all eyes are on Shirley as he treats the audience to an intricately woven and diabolically premeditated pummeling. The band’s expiration date is imminent, as Martin plans to move to Japan this summer, so get your beating soon.

Carrie Beeder’s violin magic has been a mainstay of the Denver music scene since 1994, when she began playing with performance-art weirdos Gladhand. Lately, however, she’s become almost ubiquitous, performing with Bela Karoli, the Wheel, Joseph Pope III, Hearts of Palm, Astrophagus, Born in the Flood, Everything Absent or Distorted (A Love Story), Dan Craig and her newly unveiled improvisational project, Recess. Folks like d.biddle and Roger Green are also eager to get a bit of the Beeder, and for good reason: Adding her inimitable touch while blending smoothly with a wide range of acts, she’s one part session player and two parts sensational string-sizzler.

The voice and singing style of Bela Karoli frontwoman Julie Davis is a perfect match for the group’s smoky, sultry, future-lounge sound. Her vocals are seductive, touched with a hint of danger, and wrap sensuously around the exotic, jazz-tinged music, subtly casting Davis as a classic femme fatale. Between songs, though, she comes off as funny, sweet and charmingly earnest. It’s not quite the Madonna/whore paradox that so many guys find compelling, but it’s close enough to be all but irresistible, while still 33 percent less offensive to feminists. Bela Karoli is good because it has an appealing, torchy sound and strong songs, but it’s Davis’s up-front presence that really counts.

Sure, you say you like classical music and great literature, but that’s usually just to impress the hottie at the bar. When was the last time you actually attended a classical-music show or literary reading? Yeah, we thought so. Fortunately, there’s still hope for us lowbrow slobs, thanks to Telling Stories Music and Readings, the brainchild of local classical musician and writer Jennie Dorris. This merry troupe of young virtuosos is bringing high culture to the Facebook crowd, putting on casual presentations of chamber works and readings of original essays at venues like the Laughing Goat Coffeehouse in Boulder and the Mercury Cafe in Denver — places where the show can be enjoyed over a foamy latte or sudsy beer. Each event has a clever theme; one show, “Rockstars,” featured all rock transcriptions. Get thee to Telling Stories, and the next time you say you like cerebral stuff, you’ll actually mean it.

Chris Adolf, leader of Bad Weather California, has that ineffable “it” factor that sets him apart. When he’s on stage, it’s almost impossible to look away, and when he’s really on, his performance is both epic and breathtaking. Adolf could easily turn that kind of power to evil as the leader of a cult or corporation, but luckily for us and the rest of the world, he’s focused that energy on doing good musically.

Trained since the age of six in the art of classical Chinese guzheng music (the guzheng is a plucked zither with an ancient history), this virtuoso Beijinger now living in Boulder works with one foot firmly planted in tradition. The other foot has walked off into a brave new world of contemporary fusion, a wide-open genre that Wu Fei fell into during her stint at the Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College. In the years since, she’s worked all over the world with the likes of Fred Frith, John Zorn, Elliott Sharp, Lukas Ligeti and other celebrated experimental/new-music cronies. She’ll travel back to China in August as guest of the month-long Beijing Olympics Performance Series, and she also has invitations to play in Dublin and Sardinia. Let’s enjoy her while we can; Wu Fei plans to move to Berlin in the fall.

Adding electronics to traditional songs isn’t exactly new. Decades after the form’s pioneers began experimenting with Moogs and other doodads, however, many musicians still find it difficult to use this technology in an expressive way. Not so Pumo, whose most recent disc, All Over the Moon, finds her and collaborator Graham Pearce using the inherent chilliness of electronic accoutrements to enhance the atmosphere of such compelling tracks as “Sandstone” and “Space Girl.” For both her sound and her future, the sky’s the limit.

The term “art rock” conjures up so many negative connotations that most groups influenced by the style tend to prefer the word “progressive.” But the Denver Art Rock Collective, also known as D.A.R.C., is devoted to resurrecting the label, as well as the movement’s often loopy spirit of adventure. D.A.R.C. promotes concert appearances by such members as New Ancient Astronauts, Yerkish, Amphibious Jones and the Inactivists; it also compiled recordings by the various acts on Denver Art Rock Collective Vol. 1, 2007, which embraced the most intriguing aspects of the genre while avoiding its excesses. Finding that balance is a real art.

Performers are often said to boast natural talent when their artistry is neither heavy-handed nor overly self-conscious — and in that sense, John Common has plenty of natural talent. But a more literal interpretation also applies to his latest recording, Why Birds Fly. Throughout tunes such as “Moonlight” and “Unseen Things,” Common weaves traditional instrumentation with the sort of found sounds heard in forests at night: the ambient noises of creatures that creep, crawl or take wing. These subtle touches make his work seem natural in every sense of the word.

While we don’t know who your favorite singer-songwriter is, we’re willing to wager a bet that his or her favorite singer-songwriter is Joe Sampson. Whether Sampson is playing with A Dog Paloma, sitting in with the Wheel or Bad Weather California, or just strumming and singing his pastoral folk tunes all by himself, he manages to maintain a rather unassuming profile. Like all the best songsmiths, though, he lets the music — and his growing list of admirers — do all the talking. And let’s just say his songs make for absolutely stimulating conversation.

Putting punctuation, especially exclamation points, in a band name is always a bad idea. Right, Panic! at the Disco? (Uh, make that Panic at the Disco.) And no matter how you say We Are! We Are!, you end up sounding like a stuttering idiot who can’t conjugate properly. Since this act is actually a powerful, hard-charging instrumental outfit capable of rocking faces off with wild abandon, We Are! We Are! thinking it’s time for a name change.

Anyone who knows anything about perfumes knows that a horrible but incredibly powerful smell is mixed in with more refreshing and pleasant aromatics. Abracastabya is a bit like that: Its name sounds like it should go with a screamo or post-hardcore act, but its music is much more experimental and artfully nuanced, not at all abrasive and obnoxious. Geoff Brent and Willow Welter came up with the name when they were playing around with new words, and it stuck. Friends have urged them to change the band’s name to be more in line with their eccentrically beautiful music, but when you have a moniker that magically memorable, why bother?

When former Insider Spider members Nathaniel Barsness and Greg Schoonmaker (also ex-Mannequin Makeout) joined with Diana Sperstad (formerly of As Seen on TV) and Suzi Bromfield (previously with Supply Boy and Catatonic Lydia), they wrote some of the most feisty, beautiful pop songs ever to grace Denver stages and performed them as the charming, energetic Games for May, whose name was taken from a Syd Barrett song. In April 2007, the outfit released its first and only album, The Season Is the Reason, and included in each copy a photograph of the band posing at Sperstand’s house, making each CD a collector’s item. Despite having released such an accomplished record, the group wasn’t able to capitalize on its achievement and wound up breaking up in May, ironically.

With three beautiful and golden-throated females singing sun-dappled melodies and gorgeous, nostalgic harmonies, and three rugged, musically gifted men providing accompaniment on banjo, guitar and trombone, Paper Bird offers plenty of crush material. But even if none of the aesthetically pleasing members of the act catch your eye, you won’t be able to resist falling hard for their old-timey songs, which blend elements of folk, jazz and country and deliver them with impeccable grace. Whether you bring a date to fall in love with or go solo and pick a bandmember to crush on, the state’s loveliest sextet has the key to your heart.

Avast, me hearties! If one day a year — September 19’s Talk Like a Pirate Day — is not enough time for channeling your inner pirate, then perhaps you belong with the Rogues of Colorado. These rascally representatives of our landlocked state can be found at the Colorado Renaissance Festival in June and July; look for their flag waving proudly above the Pirates’ Pub. The rest of the year they’re organizing toy and food drives, participating in highway cleanups or organizing private parties, including citywide treasure hunts, masquerade balls and other charitable events. So track down your ruffled shirt, peg leg, eye patch and parrot, because with the Rogues, you can talk like a pirate all year long. Yarrr!

Because hip-hop is such a highly combustible medium, few collectives stay intact over the long haul. Yet Analog Suspect and Selecta Roswell, the artists behind Dojo, have been making compelling music together for years; their ability to work in harmony with a range of collaborators, including each other, is a big reason why. On Duality, their latest recording, they gain inspiration from such guests as DJ Trauma and Le Parasite, and it carries over into “Kali’s Revenge” and a slew of other memorably deep cuts. The Dojo duo is a perfect match that no man should set asunder.

Jewell Tyme Music launched in the heart of east Denver in 2002, headed by rappers 800 the Jewell and F.O.E. But it wasn’t until last year that the imprint caught the attention of the rest of the city with the Joe Thunder/Selector Sam mix tape Drama Kings, starring F.O.E. and B Blacc and featuring the entire Jewell Tyme roster and its affiliates. And that was just the beginning: The label plans to release over ten projects in 2008, including albums from F.O.E., 800 the Jewell, Duce Wyld, Meezly and Haven and more comps from Joe Thunder, Selector Sam and DJ K-Tone. This is the type of hip-hop that Public Enemy’s Chuck D was referring to when he termed it “the Black CNN” — hip-hop that gives you real insight into what’s happening on the streets.

Spoke’s debut album, Wordplay, showcases the MC’s relentless scattershot rhyme flow. His style is like the second coming of Big Pun, his proclivity for complex rhyme schemes has listeners rewinding just to see if they missed anything — and he does all that in Spanish, too. Spoke’s live show is as good as his recorded output, mesmerizing fans with a spirited performance that has them hanging on every line. Spoke is currently doing shows and touring with rapper/producer Playalitical and lyrical mastermind Chino XL, as well as appearing on projects from Infinite Mindz and the Union Station, so it could be just a matter of time before he breaks out nationally.

Over the past few years, DJ Cysko Rokwel has become one of Colorado’s elite DJs: He has a weekly residency at Boulder’s Round Midnight, spins on Radio 1190’s hip-hop-centric Basementalism show every week, and backs up local artists A.V.I.U.S., Es-Nine and The 6th Grade on records and at live shows. But his biggest accomplishment to date was placing second at the DMC USA DJ finals in Delaware, making him one of the best turntablists in the nation. And as soon as the video of his DMC routine hit YouTube, a heated competition between Cysko and a California DJ broke out in the comments section, setting the stage for a possible DMC battle this year. We got Cysko’s back!

Headed by production maestro SP Double, the Boostwell crew boasts plenty of talent. Whether it’s the banging beats of SP or Flawless, the one-two punch of On Point, the lyrical mastery of ManDaMyth or the rapid-fire flows of Catch Lungs and Purpose, the consistent quality of this crew’s musical output is unmatched. This year, Boostwell will drop albums from Lost Gems (Myth, SP, Procise), On Point (Flawless, Fo-Chief), SP Double, ManDaMyth and mix tapes from Purpose and Catch Lungs, with contributions from other crew members EMB and Kontrast slated for the near future. While the crew may not be running the Colorado hip-hop scene yet, they’re making moves.

Does Drag the River still exist — and if so, in what form? That’s a difficult question to answer. The band allegedly broke up in 2007, only to reunite in order to promote You Can’t Live This Way, a first-rate CD issued by the Suburban Home imprint. Afterward, the players drifted back into the shadows, but a bio included on the outfit’s still-active MySpace page concludes with the phrase “It never ends.” That’s good news, if true. If not, it’s a real Drag.

No one will confuse Cephalic Carnage with a new act: Guitarist Zac Joe and his squad of aural assassins have been grinding out visceral riffage for more than fifteen years. Still, they remain as impressive as ever, and show it on every note of Xenosapien, their latest CD for Relapse Records. Rather than simply heaving out death-metal cliches, the musicians approach each track as a test of their skill and imagination. And on the likes of “Divination & Volition,” which is as technically impressive as it is brutally inventive, they pass with the highest marks in the class.

Plenty of musicians take umbrage if their group is called a bar band. Still, the finest acts with this label don’t need open taps or drink specials to work their magic; their playing is intoxicating enough. Witness the Informants, which boasts killer brass, a driving rhythm section, a lead singer (Kerry Pastine) capable of starting any party, and songs such as “Stuck on You” (from the album Stiletto Angel) that sound just as good to a designated driver as the folks along for the ride.

D.biddle is basically the brainchild of frontman Duncan Barlow, a member of the semi-legendary hardcore band Endpoint in the ’90s and thus no stranger to musical catharsis. When he started performing with this band, he focused on quieter but no less intense songwriting. The result has always been good, but the current incarnation of d.biddle has proved the best vehicle for Barlow’s thoughtful, incisive songwriting. In years past, a d.biddle show could be a contemplative affair, but you always got the sense that Barlow was ready to bring back a touch of the raw emotionalism he was so good at summoning. It’s there today, and the outfit’s mixture of brooding atmosphere and fiery emotions makes for one of the scene’s most impressive and inspiring performances.

If radio programmers, bloggers and hip-hop heads across the country react as favorably to Flobots as the folks here at home, this insurgent seven-piece hip-hop band could soon find itself the focus of nationwide buzz. There’s certainly a lot to love about the outfit, which earned its local reputation by putting on massively entertaining shows featuring thought-provoking, message-driven songs. And the act puts its politics where its mouth is, engaging in community activism and urging fans to follow suit. With the Agency Group doing its bidding and a rumored record deal on the horizon, Flobots are ready to take on the world.

Although burlesque is just now taking off across the country, women have been taking it off — artfully, theatrically, legally — in Denver for more than a decade. And now they have a great place to do so. The Pink Elephant Room features not only the most red-hot burlesque in the city, but also creative cocktails to pair with the tantalizing tease shows, courtesy of Anika Zappe, who spent years bartending before she got a place to call her own. Happy hour, when cocktails are discounted by two bucks, runs from 4:30 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings, but for some even happier hours, stick around for the Shimmy Shaker Show. It features an array of Denver’s best burlesquers, including the lovely ladies of Burlesque As It Was plus Mr. Exotic World 2007, Charlie Champale, the Room’s own boylesquer. Bottoms up!

The current lineup of Widowers looks an awful lot like the now-in-limbo Constellations, with two-thirds of the same people, but Mike Marchant’s tight songwriting — with just the right blend of pop smarts and psychedelic swirls — and Cory Brown’s melodic drumming signal that this outfit is up to something very different. In just over a year of live shows, the act’s sound has evolved into a sticky, infectious garage-pop hybrid that’s accessible enough to draw a crowd, but just unique enough to stand out in that crowd. Guitarist Davey Hart flails and wails hypnotically at the edge of the stage while Marchant — all doe eyes and Julian Casablancas come-ons — purrs his abstruse lyrics and twists his guitar into new and interesting shapes. Meanwhile, Mark Shusterman’s fractured, flickering Rhodes adds just the right amount of sparkle. Driven home by subtle, insistent and undeniably sexy rhythms, Widowers melodies linger long after the last string stops vibrating.

Vaux billed its final show as a funeral and encouraged everyone to wear black. That turned out to be an apt suggestion, given how many fans at the Bluebird felt that night. As expected, Vaux didn’t go gently into that good night. Quentin Smith and company played like it was their last night on earth, with a molten ferocity that made everyone on hand simultaneously grateful to witness such a breathtaking performance and filled with regret that we’d never see it again.

Reunion shows are generally intended as a celebration of days gone by for those who were there the first time around, a moment for grizzled old-timers to reflect on how good it was back in the day. But in some rare instances, these shows also serve as a primer for the new breed, showing them just how it’s done. Such was the case this past September when three of Denver’s fabled bands from the ’90s — the Volts, Crestfallen and Christie Front Drive — got back together at the Marquis for Denverfest 3. Longtime fans were relieved to hear that their heroes hadn’t lost a step, while others discovered these venerable acts for the very first time.

While we all knew it was coming, few of us had actually braced for the inevitable crash when Planes Mistaken for Stars finally went down. And as we watched one of Denver’s truly great bands disintegrate in midair, it was difficult to shake the feeling of utter helplessness. Whoever said that all good things must come to an end must’ve been an eternal optimist — or a complete dipshit. Even so, we’re grateful that we were on hand to pay our last respects and see Gared O’Donnell and company give it their absolute all over the course of nearly two dozen songs.

When the Fray prepared for a sold-out three-night run at Red Rocks in August, its members asked their favorite bands, including Bright Channel, to play for them. The gig ended up being Bright Channel’s final public performance, and while much of the crowd didn’t seem to understand why this darkly atmospheric band was playing before Isaac Slade and company, everyone seemed intrigued. Although Jeff Suthers made a few well-deserved, lighthearted digs at the whole experience, how many underground bands can say they played Red Rocks as their last hurrah?

Due to a restrictive agreement for a show they’d played a few nights before, the members of 3OH!3 were unable to promote their performance at a Sims Snowboard-sponsored event at the Oriental in January. While this was a shame for the duo’s rabid fans as well as the Oriental’s owners — especially considering that the act had sold out the Gothic the previous Saturday — the show was a rare treat for the audience, who’d only expected to watch an endless parade of kids snowboarding down staircases on the big screen. So when Nathaniel Motte and Sean Foreman appeared on the stage, throwing Sims swag into the mostly underage crowd, the audience went apeshit. Then the goof-hop outfit proceeded to play the intimate show with the same energy and intensity they’d displayed at the sold-out Gothic.

In the late ’70s, David Kilgour started the Clean with his brother and a friend. That band went on to influence not only New Zealand’s underground music scene, but musicians around the world who saw that music could be raw, imaginative and fun all at once. The Clean never became a household name in the United States, but thirty years and several solo albums later, Kilgour toured the U.S. in support The Far Now, and ended up playing here this past November. With a rare grace and an impressive ear for timeless melodies, he and his band gave one of the most memorable performances of the year and even treated the audience to an early Clean classic, a lively rendition of “Tally Ho.”

Thanks to consistently engaging bookings at both of these clubs, we’ve found ourselves on countless weekends bouncing back and forth between the two joints. If Denver has a quintessential rock block, this section of Broadway is it. While the individual programming can be vastly different and the vibe is unique at each place, somehow the acts booked into these clubs complement each other — either that, or we just love local music so much we aren’t put off by the notion of consuming gutter punk and indie pop in the same evening. And we’re not alone: It’s not uncommon to see a proprietor of one club sneaking off to the other for a few minutes.

There’s certainly no shortage of shows where it’s perfectly acceptable to show up fashionably late, just in time to catch the headliners. But anyone who did this in September, when the LCD Soundsystem and Arcade Fire tour stopped by Red Rocks, really blew it, since both of these acts are worthy of headlining. After a vigorous set of pulse-pounding tracks from LCD that mesmerized the enthusiastic crowd, Arcade Fire took the stage and proceeded to all but burn the place to the ground with the sweeping grandeur of its majestic chamber folk.

It’s impossible to think of a show in the past year that made us happier to be Denverites. Slowly but surely, Ian Cooke has become one of the most vital artists in this region, and he proved it this night; with his honeydew voice and looped cello, he made songs that seemed to come out of the ground organically and fill the room with pure sound. Then came headliner and transplant Eric Bachmann in full-on troubadour mode. Initially accompanied by only a nylon-string guitar, his songs swung back and forth like the drunken louts they referenced. But when Elin Palmer joined the mix, followed by Cooke, the songs moved beyond downtrodden to something far more affirming. On this same night, we also witnessed a grown man passed out against a water cooler, nose pointing to the heaven. Awesome.

The slutty schoolgirl has got to be the most overworked, cliched sexual fantasy of all time — not to mention the most overused Halloween costume ever. Still, there’s a reason the archetype endures, perhaps because it’s just so much fun to don the lowest-cut crisp white shirt you can find, along with the shortest plaid skirt available, and start gathering looks from all the oglers. Last year’s School Girls Gone Bad party was the third annual at La Bohème and featured DJ sets and free entry for women dressed in their naughty-schoolgirl best. That’s reason enough to break out the uniform once again, but the parties also feature such staples of high-school fantasy as the sexy school nurse, cheerleaders and hot jocks, and the older-woman inspiration behind Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher.”

When Frames singer Glen Hansard and new talent Markéta Irglová agreed to co-star in director John Carney’s Once, neither expected much. So imagine their surprise when the joy-filled film became an unlikely hit that not only brought them together as a couple, but ultimately earned them an Academy Award for the impossibly gorgeous “Falling Slowly.” At the Ogden long before the Oscars, the pair shared music from the movie and plenty more, interacting with the crowd and each other in such an intimate a manner that the audience became not just witnesses to their love story, but part of it.

Creating the ideal jukebox is like making the ideal mix tape for someone: Part of the process is picking songs you like, and the rest is finding tunes the other person will dig. The Continental Club’s jukebox includes a collection of mix CDs, which run the gamut from punk to garage, surf, jazz, soul, lounge and country, with a few obscure nuggets thrown in. But it also has a fine selection of complete albums. Bottom line: Everyone should be able to find something they like on this juke, whether it’s Minor Threat, Merle Haggard, Frank Sinatra, Helmet, Ministry or Esquivel. You’ll probably even uncover stuff you’ve never seen on any other jukebox.

The Urban Dictionary defines a Spreadhead as “one who is a Widespread Panic fan, on an extreme level. Often characterized by smoking copious amounts of pot, eating caps, and dropping the occasional hit, and traveling through 3 states to attend a WSP concert.” In other words, the type of folks you’ll find at Moon Time on Wednesdays. Although we can’t attest to the pot or the caps, we know that this crowd has a strong affinity for a certain band from Athens, Georgia. At Widespread Wednesdays, Spreadheads gather and trade stories about the group while listening to live Panic shows (a new one each week). After that, there’s live entertainment from local musicians like Lake Effect, along with the chance to win prizes.

There’s no shortage of half-assed DJ nights or unlistenable open jams in the area, but by combining the two and being somewhat selective about who participates, JINXED! manages to create a truly exceptional experience. Hosted by Eric Halborg — frontman for the Swayback and multi-talented renaissance man — the Wednesday-night session has drawn members of Vaux, the Lawrence Arms, Hemi Cuda and, of course, the Swayback. Styles range from solitary sad bastard to full-blown avant-skronk rock — and if you’re lucky, you might even catch an unplugged version of your favorite Swayback tune. Around 10:30 p.m., the jam gives way to Halborg’s computer-aided deejaying. Though it’s not designed to fill the dance floor, it never fails to tickle the ears and the brain, providing the ideal end to a unique weeknight happening.

Skip Reeves isn’t called the “Funktogolist” for nothing. Dude knows his funk, which becomes obvious when you listen to his Saturday-night show on KUVO, “A Funk Above the Rest.” He’s working overtime spreading the funk gospel, and in his quest to make Denver one city under a groove, he’s been hosting the 1st School of Funk every other Tuesday at Jazz@Jack’s. There, in addition to laying down everything from Larry Graham and Funkadelic to the Gap Band and Kool & the Gang, Reeves also brings in some the city’s finest funk outfits, such as Soul School and Funkiphino.

DJs Low Key and Sounds Supreme (aka Justin Green and Nate Watters) originally started their weekly underground hip-hop parties in the basement of Shelter, with the goal of creating a night they’d want to attend themselves, one they could take pride in. Well, it looks like the duo has succeeded. Whether they’re throwing tributes to some of their heroes — cats like J Dilla or Notorious B.I.G. — or just playing everything from old school to new school to soul, these fellas know how to get the party started and the crowd grooving. And now the dudes are moving up as well, going from Shelter’s basement to the roof of the Funky Buddha Lounge every Thursday and becoming residents at Vinyl on Friday nights alongside DJ MU$A.

One of the fliers for Night of the Living Shred shows a picture of two naked chicks with skateboards. But while you’ll probably see some skateboard videos Thursday nights at Bender’s Tavern, naked chicks not so much. Still, the young rocker boys and girls do sometimes let their hair down in more ways than one. It’s hard not to, what with guys like DJs Wesley Wayne and Parris on the turntables throwing down everything from ’80s metal to old-school hip-hop and a whole lot more. For the past two years, these guys have been packing Bender’s dance floor and whipping the kids into a frenzy, in the process creating one of the city’s best nights to hook up. And if that ain’t enough, Wayne, Parris and promoter Charlie Morrison have also brought such renowned platter pirates as DJs Swamp, Qbert, Troublemaker, Goldenchyld, Platurn, Tittsworth and Klever to town.

Lately, happy hours at the Larimer Lounge have gotten happier. In addition to daily happy hours from 4 to 8 p.m. with $1 PBRs and Miller High Lifes, $2 wells and $3 you-call-its, the club has reinstated its late-night happy hours: Sunday through Thursday, midnight until close, you can grab $2 PBRs and High Lifes. The club’s also souped up its happy hours by adding a few attractions: Monday it’s Ninja Bingo; Wednesday it’s Courier Happy Hour, with free Benny Blanco’s pizza; Thursday it’s free Breckenridge barbecue; and on Fridays, you can catch Jim Yelenick (aka Sputnik Slovenia) singing and playing hilarious acoustic covers of the Clash, Turbonegro, Boomtown Rats, Madonna and Britney Spears.

Michael Hornbuckle is a hell of a guitar player — though that’s not too surprising, given that he’s the son of the late, great Bobby Hornbuckle, a local legend and a killer blues ax-slinger. Every Sunday at Bushwacker’s Saloon, Michael kicks off the blues jams, sometimes with his badass bass-playing brother Brian alongside, with a scorching set of his own tunes and covers. These blues brothers in action are enough reason to check out the weekly jam nights, but other local players also come by to strut their stuff before an appreciative audience that includes motorcycle guys and biker chicks who enjoy both the killer blues and the cool vibe.

Anyone who’s tried to play jazz knows that learning scales and modes is just part of the battle. To really understand the language of jazz, you have to perform with other people. At El Chapultepec Too, an outpost of the classic LoDo club, the Wednesday-night jazz-jam sessions serve as a proving ground for younger musicians who want to hone their chops in a live setting — whether horn players, bassists, pianists or drummers. Bassist Brian Wilson and veteran pianist Jeff Jenkins are usually holding down the fort, and when Greg Gisbert, one of Denver’s finest trumpeters, isn’t playing in New York, he’ll sit in with the younger cats. It’s hard not to get inspired when sharing the stage with guys like this.

Kinky folks are like vampires. No, they don’t drink blood (most of them don’t, anyway), but like those winged fiends, they do their best work at night. No wonder some of the hottest BDSM action around (suspension, floggers and electrical toys, oh my) goes down at the Masters & Servants After-Hours Party at the Sanctuary private dungeon club every second Saturday of the month. You have to be a member to get in, but it’s easy to join (take an introductory class, attend three events, get sponsored by a member and shell out the $20 annual membership fee), and the all-night bang is definitely worth the buck. Rest assured that by the time dawn rolls around at the end of your first party, you’ll definitely feel whipped.

The first two Hiccups sports bars are known for hot bartenders and waitresses wearing ass-less chaps with their panties. But when Hiccups III took over this former Brewski’s location, the owners stepped things up, making this third spot the biggest and possibly the baddest of the bunch, with a big stage that attracts cover bands and the like (hell, even Jimmie Van Zant has played here) on weekends and Wednesdays, which also happens to be a good night for the ladies, who can drink free from 9 p.m. to midnight. And Monday through Friday, everyone can quench their thirst with five-dollar pitchers of beer. Let’s see: hot chicks, cheap beer, live music. Sounds like a winning formula to us.

Just over a year ago, Paul Piciocchi and Charles Trujillo opened the sleek and sexy Sutra Room in the short-lived Donkey Den space, then added Left on Lincoln in the front. After trying to operate separate clubs that catered to different crowds, they decided to join the two spaces, in the process creating the best of both worlds. But they didn’t stop there. To spice up the fun factor and change the energy on the dance floor, they put in two mini-stages and a mirror so that people could watch themselves dance. And they also added a swing and a stripper pole, presumably to boost the sexy factor. After all, the club is called Sutra.

The Piano Warehouse, which is located in Colorado Springs’s arts district, hosts semi-regular, all-ages shows whose cover donations go directly to the bands. While a lot of those shows are punk rock, the venue welcomes performances from a full range of underground musicians. And it’s truly a piano warehouse, with the bands setting up on one side of the spacious room and the audience mingling amid the piano models. We can make beautiful music together.

It may seem redundant to continue heaping praise on the Fox Theatre year after year. After all, the venue hasn’t undergone any major renovations in recent memory. But it doesn’t need to, because the Fox is still the best place along the Front Range to see a show. The sound is flawless, the sightlines unobstructed, and the talent is as compelling, relevant and diverse as ever. Nothing’s changed at the Fox — and that’s a good thing.

Since it opened in the lower level of a large church complex, Brooks Center Arts has become a haven for some of the town’s less volume-driven acts looking for a place other than a bar to share their music. The venue, organized primarily by filmmaker/songwriter Laura Goldhamer, is like someone’s large living room, complete with tea and other goodies sold at a discount in the back and a true all-ages policy throughout. Which means that people of all persuasions, and all ages, can come here for a special evening of music and art.

Taking in a show at Dwight Mark’s charming home in Highland is more like attending a friend’s dinner party than seeing a concert at a formal venue. Prior to the performance, folks nosh on light hors d’oeuvre and chat, then eventually make their way to the living room for intimate, one-of-a-kind performances by an array of engaging acts, from celebrated local talent to well-regarded imports. And while the idea of living-room concerts might alarm the neighbors, Mark is careful to keep the music at a reasonable level — so much so that when you’re standing on the porch, you can only faintly hear the sounds coming from inside. Props to Mark for a unique experience.

Although it’s a basement space, the Meadowlark features soft, tasteful lighting and a well-appointed interior that makes you forget you’re belowground. The room is well-suited to singer-songwriters and acoustic acts who thrive in small places, where they can better connect with the audience. And with a recent run of regular bookings, the once obscure bar has become a nice, clean place to see indie-rock frontmen playing rare acoustic sets, as well as louder bands like Red Cloud and A Shoreline Dream.

The thought of sending naive teenagers into the heart of the Ballpark neighborhood can be daunting for parents. But thanks to Soda Jerk Presents’ Mike Barsch and Ben Davis, such apprehension is unfounded when it comes to the Marquis Theater. Although all ages are welcome, the longtime promoters, who successfully put on all-ages shows at Tulagi and Rock Island for years before taking over here, clearly cater to the underage set. Barsch and Davis consistently put together stacked bills of emerging acts that appeal to the MySpace generation. Younger fans are ushered into a massive area in front of the stage that has clear sightlines and is completely separate from the space occupied by folks of legal drinking age — and the shows end well before the witching hour.

When he bought the nearby Sport Bowl Lanes & Billiards, Gothic Theatre owner Steve Schalk wanted to turn the spot into a live music/bowling center with a sci-fi theme, and even thought about having the Millennium Falcon crashing into the front of the place. While he didn’t end up going quite that far, the iconic Star Wars spacecraft became the inspiration for this spot, and space-themed murals lining one of the walls do give it the look of a spaceship. The venue itself is out of this world: One side is a live-music club that brings in local and national acts and features a state-of-the-art sound system (it had to live up to the Gothic’s standards, after all), while the other side houses the bowling alley, pinball machines and pool tables.

A Denver institution, the Lion’s Lair has always been a great place to see a show, whether you’re seeking the city’s best ear-splitting punk, metal and hardcore or taking in rare performances from iconic musicians like Graham Parker or Garland Jeffreys. Still, the place was due for an update, so kudos to Sarah Levin, who took over booking duties last August. She revitalized the venerable room by augmenting the usual dark and heavy fare with a steady stream of celebrated songwriters and acts from all facets of Denver’s vitally eclectic scene.

So you’re curious about whips and paddles, but you’re a little gun-shy? Think you want to be bound and gagged, but worried about pulling a muscle? If so, get your kinky self down to the Friday Munch ‘n’ Mixers at the Enclave, one of Denver’s private bondage, discipline, sadism and masochism clubs. The weekly social events are open to the public as long as you’re 21 or older and cough up $15, and they offer a gentle (of sorts) introduction to S&M, with everything from technique clinics on single-tail whips to deviant doggie parties (you actually do bring your dog) to birthday potlucks (everyone with a birthday that month gets a spanking). There’s no nudity allowed, and participation is limited, so there’s no need to worry; it won’t hurt a bit. That part comes later, when you become an official member.

After taking over the Toad Tavern this past August, one of Brice Hancock’s top priorities was to build a new stage. Today the tiny spot in the corner that couldn’t fit more than four people is no more; bands now perform on a better-situated platform that can easily accommodate at least a ten-piece act. And Hancock didn’t stop there. He also raised the ceiling about eight feet and beefed up the sound system, doubling the number of speakers and power amps and effectively transforming a quaint suburban bar with a stage into a full-fledged music venue.

There’s a reason this club keeps winning the Best Rock Club award, and it has nothing to do with its amenities. While the staff is welcoming and the drinks reasonably priced, the space itself isn’t impressive. In fact, the sightlines outside of the main area kind of suck, and the stage is so unadorned that even a homemade lighting rig operated by Phil the Fan would be a vast improvement. So, no, it’s not the amenities. The reason the hi-dive earns this award time after time is simple: Its programming is consistently choice, and the sound is impeccable.

Once again, the folks at Dazzle have shown they know what it takes to make a stellar club: first-rate music seven nights a week, great food (including the habit-forming $5 happy-hour menu) and two vibrant listening rooms. For more than a decade now, Dazzle has brought in a constant stream of outstanding, nationally renowned jazz talent like Donald Harrison, Red Holloway and John Fedchock, as well as younger up-and-comers like Ari Hoenig, Jonathan Kreisberg and the genre-bending Kneebody. And that’s in addition to its packed calendar of local luminaries, including René Marie, Ron Miles and Dale Bruning. Dazzle is still an apt name for this dazzling club.

Nearly two years after opening the basement-level Slim 7, Bill Ward expanded his subterranean empire to the other side of Larimer Square, taking over the 6,000-square-foot space that formerly housed the Champion Brewing Company and transforming it into two clubs, Pie Hole and Below. They’re about as yin and yang as it gets: Pie Hole is the brightly lit, sparsely finished late-night pizza joint, while Below is a dark, candle-filled gothic lair pulled out of the pages of an Anne Rice novel. Nosferatu would foam at the mouth at the sight of this killer den — but to make sure the place stays lively, Ward has brought in nationally known DJs, as well as Lipgloss DJ Michael Trundle, who helms the club’s weekly Recession Wednesdays.

A tub of ice-cold beer and a respectable payout at night’s end is all that most local bands can hope for, and yet few music venues provide such simple pleasures for the men and women who toil on stage for our enjoyment. But ever since Jeff Campbell, Martin Killorin and Jim Norris — the three kings behind 3 Kings Tavern — opened their venue two years ago, they’ve not only treated bands right behind the scenes, but they’ve treated music fans right, too, offering reasonably priced drinks in a very welcoming atmosphere.

Tyson Murray knows a few things about bars — and music. The Railbenders bassist was one of the original owners of Bender’s Tavern, and last summer he took over the former Wheat Ridge Bar & Grill, turning it into a damn cool spot. While the Taphouse may be only a fraction of the size of his former joint, Murray has it stocked with seventeen beers on tap, including Boddingtons, Kronenbourg, Hoegaarden, Beamish Irish Stout and a few local microbrews. And he keeps the rest of the place jumping, too, especially on Mondays, when the lovely and talented Angie Stevens holds court at the weekly open stage. And on Saturdays, there’s a steady stream of live blues and alt-country bands on, uh, tap.

Every once in a while, a bar opens that just feels like home — if your home had cheap drinks (we’re talking dollar PBRs all the time) and a damn fine jukebox stocked with everything from old-school punk to classic country to jazz and everything in between. The Continental Club is a simple, unpretentious joint — a little on the small side, but it works. And it’s a welcome addition not just to the Santa Fe arts district, but to all of Denver — particularly since it augments that jukebox by bringing in live bands like Whiskey Throttle and Lyin’ Bitch & the Restraining Orders.

Save for the jukebox and TVs, the Brown Barrel looks like it hasn’t changed since the ’60s. Hey, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right? It’s easy to walk past this joint; the exterior is about as nondescript as a plainclothes policeman at a dad convention. And it’s even easier to miss at night, since it can close as early as 11 p.m. depending on how busy it is. But if you’re an early-morning drinker and need a mug of Landshark Lager instead of a cuppa joe, the Brown Barrel’s the place for you — especially on Sundays, when happy hour runs from 8 a.m. to noon.

Every coffee snob has his favorite barista; it’s sort of like rooting for your hometown football team. But how do you determine who’s actually the best of the best? The answer was the first-ever Mountain Regional Barista Competition, held in March in Thornton — though the results were a letdown for latte-loving locals, since they can’t actually enjoy the efforts of several of the top contenders, who were either based in other states or didn’t serve drinks to the public. It was sort of like a fantasy football team winning the Super Bowl. Thankfully, you can partake of one champion’s work at a local coffee shop: third-place winner Heidi Bickelhaudt of Trident Booksellers and Cafe in Boulder. Bickelhaudt, who learned the ropes in such coffee hot spots as Chicago and Madison, Wisconsin, pulls a mean espresso and knows the secrets of roasting, too. Next time you get a cappuccino from her, you can tell your jealous friends you just had the best coffee drink around, and you won’t be talking java jive.

You’re allowed to bring tea, coffee, beer or wine into the new Black Box Theater at the Arvada Center, and such venues as Miners Alley, the Bug and Curious Theatre also allow sipping during performances. This is a trend we applaud — although inebriated audiences can be a nuisance, and no one should be crunching popcorn or rustling candy wrappers during performances. Now, if only local theaters would tackle the problem of dishwater coffee and uninspired intermission treats…

When the Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver opened this past fall, it was immediately celebrated far and wide for its plucky backstory, sleek design and striking exhibits. But few people mentioned the superb room on the top floor filled with little else but massive beanbag chairs. We’re not sure what, exactly, this space has to do with contemporary art, but it sure is awesome. It’s the perfect spot for a relaxing time-out with the kids after they’ve had more than their fair share of the galleries — or for a gigantic pillow fight with your hyperactive buddies. Better yet, sneak some drinks over from the rooftop bar and while away the entire afternoon. Every museum should have such a space, starting with the Smithsonian.

Too bad Mexico has already laid claim to Cinco de Mayo on its calendar, because that country doesn’t do anything to celebrate the alleged holiday — whereas here in the Mile High, May 5 is a party worthy of celebration. One weekend a year, generations of Denver’s Latinos head toward Federal Boulevard in their lowriders and whips, rolling on fat chrome wheels or bouncing on hydraulics with traditional gold spokes. The result is a cross between a car show and a parade. Some vendors peddle Mexican flags — even though half the people who come out to celebrate were born on this side of the border — while others sell tacos in the street. Teenage lovers hold hands, parents push strollers and point out the pimped-out cars to their kids. Aside from a couple of knuckleheads, the festivities are usually peaceful, and Denver makes sure there are more than enough police officers on hand to make people feel comfortable — or uncomfortable, depending on who you are.