Whether or not you think war is the answer, most people would agree that those individuals who join the military — many in search of a better education and future for themselves — deserve praise and respect. The sad truth is, many of our country’s enlisted try to make a…
Denver’s a pretty nifty place, full of killer views and happy people and slightly-lower-than-the-national-average gas prices, but it’s missing one thing: nautical miscellanea. No early-morning fog rolling in as unseen ship bells clank their solemn dirges. No ancient seafood shacks wafting aromatic promises of fried clams and chowder. No salty…
What do you believe about yourself? Jesse Jackson’s call-and-response poem “I Am — Somebody” has inspired the folks at Fresh City Life to ask Denverites that very question; their answers will be revealed in a short documentary, I Am a Library, and composed into lyrics by David Amram for a…
When Henry David Thoreau wrote, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” he knew those words spoke a truth about the human condition across the ages. Reading Walden today seems more relevant than ever with its prescription for living authentically and simply in harmony with nature. Thoreau didn’t…
Tonight’s premiere of The Hot L Baltimore was timed perfectly. “We’re all homeless now with the housing crisis,” says director Terry Dodd. “This is environmental theater with a really big, beating heart.” The play, written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lanford Wilson in 1973, will be staged in the lobby of…
No one embodies the glitz, the glamour or the glib insanity of Las Vegas like Wayne Newton. “I just think, whether you like him or not, he’s a cultural icon,” says Vonalda Utterback of the Theater Company of Lafayette. “He’s Mr. Las Vegas, by his own admission.” Now Mr. Las…
This weekend’s Welcome Table symposium at the Iliff School of Theology should prove that activism can lead to delicious food and honest creative expression just as easily as it encourages the cessation of such pleasures. The symposium was created by the Veterans of Hope organization, which focuses on collecting oral…
As an artist, Eric Matelski is always looking for new ways to promote his work. After attending classes through Denver Urban Gardens, he came up with the idea to merge two of his passions into a series of garden shows called Art Farm. “It’s pretty cool, because it’s just a…
“Eating before practice helps a lot.” With a mouthful of homemade pizza, drummer Sam Spitzer is explaining the secret of the Hollyfelds’ camaraderie. Before each rehearsal, the quintet sits down to a meal at the Spitzers’ home. What started as carryout has evolved to delicious home-cooked meals, compliments of Spitzer’s…
One of the outstanding educational programs at the Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities (6901 Wadsworth Boulevard, 720-898-7200, www.arvadacenter.org) is in the field of ceramics. The center offers classes and workshops about clay that are geared to either children or adults, and sometimes both. In a few weeks —…
Some rock photographers have it, others don’t, but Lynn Goldsmith is the pinnacle to which they all should aspire. A photographer since childhood and, perhaps more important, a career fan, she has a loving way with the lens that infuses her celebrity prints with surging, active life. That she loves…
You might already know about StoryCorps, a national initiative (featured every Friday on NPR’s Morning Edition) to document everyday history and the unique stories of hundreds — if not thousands — of Americans. But did you know that starting today and continuing through August 8, the StoryCorps MobileBooth (an Airstream…
We’re all embracing it these days, yet there’s more to the local food movement than meets the eye. After all, it’s nice to know that your food has a shortened carbon footprint and all, but did you ever stop to think about where it actually comes from? On Zweck’s Farm,…
Few writers reach the notoriety of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. He was a character and a legend, the founder of gonzo journalism and a living, breathing contradiction — a peace-lover who was also obsessed with firearms, for starters. To take on a biography of Thompson’s life is a task of…
Although textile maven Dianne Denholm’s TACtile Textile Arts Center has been developing for several months, she’s just now beginning to truly flesh out the center as both a meeting place and classroom for fiber artists and their guilds, and a public showcase for their wares. So tonight’s open house will…
Thanks to eighteenth-century astronomer Charles Messier, amateur stargazing can be a marathon experience. Over the course of his life, Messier catalogued 110 deep-sky objects such as nebulae, galaxies and star clusters. “An amateur astronomer would really have to stay up from dusk till dawn to pull off the Messier Marathon,”…
The Project Space at MCA Denver, where artists-in-residence are ensconced, has rapidly become one of the state’s most prominent venues — not just because of the high quality of the offerings here, but also because those offerings are often the work of Colorado artists. Since its launch last year, the…
If you’ve ever felt like a stranger in a strange land, you’ll completely grok Frolics and Frippery, a new exhibit of “intimate objects for the body” created by area artist Janice Jakielski, opening today at Vertigo Art Space. The soft-sculpture objects — cloth goggles, hearing devices and other wearables —…
You would’ve had to have made a very conscientious, hermetic effort for the past few years in order to avoid having any notion of the popularity of a particular made-for-TV movie called High School Musical. Disney continues to milk its unexpected cash cow with countless spinoffs, merchandising and sequels. Now,…
What do soda pop and extreme death rituals of Borneo have to do with each other? Is there any connection between craft beer and Renaissance polyphony? Not on the surface — but then, the Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar has a reputation for delving deep beneath the obvious…
Metal bands that transition from the underground to the overground can suffer painful backlashes. Thus far, though, Mastodon – part of a massive Rockstar Energy Mayhem Festival lineup that includes Slipknot, Disturbed, Machine Head, Underoath, Dragonforce, Five Finger Death Punch, The Red Chord, Suicide Silence, 36 Crazy Fists, Airbourne, Black…
“My Lord,” you might be saying, “Ween is still around?” And how, brother. Dismissed for two decades as a joke band, Ween has labored in sorta-obscurity while somehow simultaneously selling out shows and winning die-hard converts. How do they do it? Easy: Ween rules. In fact, the Pennsylvania group is…
