Get on the Bus

Black History Month couldn’t have a better spokeswoman than Awele Makeba, an award-winning actress/storyteller/educator who channels historic figures into learning experiences for all ages all over the nation…and the world. The vivacious Makeba engages all her talents in I’m Not Getting On Until Jim Crow Gets Off, a unique one-woman…

Clothes Call

The Denver Public Library’s Fresh City Life program holds one of the most egalitarian fashion stances around. It promotes local designers at such events as the enormously successful Frock Out Denver and by sticking to the general view that everyone can enjoy fashion — not just the rich and famous…

Goblin Cock

Besides possessing a great name, San Diego quintet Goblin Cock has the brains to go along with its ballsy brawn. Led by former Pinback frontman Rob Crow, the band has all of the subtlety of a pitbull–and that’s exactly what makes the band a wonder to behold. Channeling everything that…

Ski Incognito

Marc Moline, creative director and park designer at Echo Mountain ski resort, has long been a fan of TransWorld Snowboarding’s annual Team Challenge, in which the world’s best riders don silly uniforms for a competition that is as much about style as it is about skill. “It always looked like…

Celine Dion

There is little left to say about the singular Celine Dion that anyone who has ever been near a radio or TV set doesn’t know already. If you love her, you probably know all about her recent past, in which she held court in Las Vegas for five years. You…

Get Your Art On

An evening celebrating art and sensual stimulation, featuring the Westword Masterminds awards, fashion show, gourmet cuisine, live music and performances, art exhibits and more. Festivities begin at Vinyl and continue at 1144 Broadway and City Hall Amphitheatre; a portion of the proceeds benefit the Love Hope Strength Foundation. Sat., Feb…

Hurling Allowed

Tyler McNally of the Denver Gaels says the local Irish sports club, which promotes the rarefied games of Irish Football and Hurling, is growing all the time. That, he notes, is because, more than anything, it’s purely authentic. “A lot of our members are the real thing – expatriates from…

Lorey Hobbs, Homare Ikeda and Lorelei Schott at Carson van Straaten

The Carson van Straaten Gallery (760 Santa Fe Drive, 303-573-8585, www.vanstraatengallery.com) is currently showcasing a paean to nature in the form of a strong solo, New Works by Lorey Hobbs, installed in the front spaces, and a handsome duet, Colorado Abstract: Homare Ikeda & Lorelei Schott, in the back. Hobbs,…

Now Showing

Damien Hirst. You’d have to be living under a rock — or have absolutely no interest in contemporary art — not to know that Damien Hirst is a superstar, and that everything he makes is worth millions of dollars apiece. The tight solo at MCA Denver (formerly known as the…

There’s a lot to like in this Modern Muse production

It doesn’t get more minimal than this: As You Like It performed by six people on a stage where the set consists of little besides a large rock, swaths of fabric and a wooden swing; echoing footsteps announce an actor’s entry minutes before he or she actually appears; and everyone…

The DCTC brings something new to Shakespeare’s history lesson

Shakespeare’s Richard III is the quintessential story of power-lust, of a man willing to murder his relatives, betray his supporters and shed any amount of blood to acquire the crown of England. While Macbeth took us inside the villain’s psyche and made us understand both his craziness and his grief,…

Nothing but the Truth at the Boulder Film Festival

Nothing But the Truth, the opening-night attraction for the Thursday, February 12, launch of the Boulder International Film Festival, is an old-fashioned Hollywood flick in the best sense of the term. The plot, about a reporter (Kate Beckinsale) who goes to jail à la New York Times lightning rod Judith…

Confessions of a Shopaholic

The Confessions of a Shopaholic we need right now would be a handheld doc featuring former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain sobbing into the camera and begging the American public to forgive him for purchasing a $35,000 commode. With its curious release date — the film is meant to be…

Now Playing

Dusty and the Big Bad World. We all know about the Christian right’s attacks on textbooks, teachers, Halloween, the arts, public television and the words “happy holidays.” And we know what happened when these people finally got their very own president. Dusty and the Big Bad World is based on…

Green Speak Happens

Global warming will, sooner than later, fry the planet; free-for-all globalization will decimate our common concepts of commerce; unchecked overpopulation and its voracious demand for resources will burden the earth beyond its capacity to renew. And that’s the good news. The bad is that America’s addiction to foreign oil is…

Take a Shot!

You may not have a valentine this Valentine’s Day, but there’s a lot to love tonight. From 9 p.m.- 1 a.m., the Cherry Cricket, at 2641 E. Second Avenue, will offer its annual Anti-V Day Karaoke Party. “Pissed at your ex? Can’t afford a fancy dinner? Think Valentine’s is a…

Tyva Kyzy Times Two

It’s not every day that a group of all-female Tuvan throat singers and folk musicians stop in town, so consider yourself lucky to be able to hear Tyva Kyzy not once, but twice this week. “It’s pretty cool, because I think they’re the only all-female ensemble of throat singers in…

All Drama

Eric Schmiedl’s Plainsong, an adaptation of Kent Haruf’s award-winning novel, was one of the high points of the Denver Center Theatre Company’s 2008 season. Now Schmiedl is back as one of five playwrights participating in the Colorado New Play Summit, which features a staged reading of his new play, Eventide,…

Time to Get Ill

The Ill Affair and the illiterate Website Launch Party are back-to-back events exploring the boundaries of love and hate while raising money for RedLine art studio and illiterate magazine. “We’re looking at these words commonly viewed as oppositional terms and seeing how they interact,” says illiterate editor Adam Gildar. “How…

Sweet Avenue

I don’t refer to myself as a chocoholic. My addiction is much more severe: I consider myself a connoisseur. As such, know that I am nail-bitingly excited about the Havana District’s Travel the World Through Chocolate, which will showcase chocolate imported from the around the globe for our tasting pleasure…

Totally Tubular

Love it or hate it, television is an inescapable force in our culture. In recognition of this fact — and of the impending end of analog broadcasts (originally scheduled for February 17, but postponed until June 12) — artist Eric Matelski put together Poor Reception, a television art show featuring…

Lip Schtick

Last year, Christoph Heinrich, the curator of the modern and contemporary department at the Denver Art Museum, 100 West 14th Avenue Parkway, decided to take on a complete reinstallation of the permanent-collection galleries on the third and fourth floors of the Hamilton wing. His selections were chosen according to how…