Orange County's Leading Source Of News, Culture And Entertainment
Orange County's Leading Source Of News, Culture And Entertainment
In this week's Weekly, I blab about some of my favorite things in music this year. Since my ego clearly cannot be contained to just a half page on a newspaper, I've got even more favorite things here (as referenced at the end of the article–that's what we call “convergence” in the biz). ] FAVORITE …
The LA Times, industry publications the Wrestling Observer and Sherdog and plenty of other sources report that autopsy results are leading authorities to believe that the deaths of an Orange County professional mixed martial arts fighter and his wife were exactly what they appeared to be when news broke yesterday: a murder-suicide. Justin Levens, 28, …
Continue reading “Deaths of OC MMA Fighter, Wife, Suspected to be Murder-Suicide”
*Updated, with new information on the bottom… In the Department of WTF comes this: local Armenian genocide denier Ergun Kirlikovali is circulating an online petition demanding an apology from, amongst other groups, the Armenians that the Ottoman Empire genocided in the early 1900s! In his most recent column for Turkla.com, Kirlikovali links to and references …
Continue reading “Local Armenian Genocide Denier Demands Apology…From Armenians”
I'll use any excuse to post Jay Buchanan videos, or those of just about every artist playing this shit-hot show Saturday at OC's venerable Gypsy Lounge. It's an acoustic-Christmas-type toy drive gig benefiting the Joyful Child Foundation, featuring (deep breath) . . . Jameson, Jay Buchanan, the Pawn Shop Kings, Chris Paul Overall, AJ Degrasse, …
The country is abuzz with President-elect Barack Obama's choice of Saddleback Church's Rick “Purpose-Driven Life” Warren to offer the invocation at next month's presidential inauguration. Let others debate the merits of the choice–I personally think Warren's beginning to wade into the political waters he long swore to forsake–but what interests me is that Warren is …
Continue reading “Has Orange County Christianity Jumped the Shark?”
One of the pleasures of belonging to Village Voice Media is that the company hosts the best roster of food critics in the country–but you don't have to believe my boosterism? Who's the only food critic ever to win a Pulitzer Prize? Jonathan Gold of LA Weekly. Who's going to be releasing a memoir of …
Continue reading “Eating Food with a James Beard Award Winner”
Gonna be a good next few days for the Blank Tapes, the kinda-country, kinda-folky, forever-funky yet mostly-acoustic band led by sonic svengali Matt Adams, who, years and years ago, did some illustrations for the Weekly's inky fishwrap edition. Matt has since abandoned OC for the woolly streets of Oakland, but he's still kind enough to …
I don't shop at Bloomingdale's, but I like going through its front entrance to get to the mall. Why? In the store's entryway, you can see into Charlie Palmer's kitchen through this eye-slit of a peep-hole. From it, you can spy all the cooking action and the Top Chef dreamers doing it, and that's exactly …
Continue reading “Spying Charlie Palmer's N Complaining About Crustacean”
All the major ski and snowboard areas in the local mountains are now open in some fashion or another. Bear Mountain in Big Bear opened some terrain on Saturday, but Mountain High Resort in Wrightwood gets honors for being the first area open top to bottom on Wednesday. Bear's big sister, Snow Summit, opened today …
Continue reading “From the Valley to the Summit, Ski Season is Finally Upon Us”
Yes, most advent calendars start on Dec. 1. Eat it. Christmas is awesome. Sorry non-observers; I love you but it's true. You get presents, you get to give presents and spread holiday good tidings and so on. And come on, Candy Cane Joe-Joes. Since Christmas music is perhaps the most awesome part of the holiday, …
Continue reading “Musical Advent Calendar: Before Braille, 'Merry Christmas, I'm Cheating'”
Alright, so it's been out for a while but, hey, it's new to us. Anaheim's Thee Makeout Party's album Play Pretend is a rollicking jam of fun-loving pop. Until you get your hands on a copy (if you don't already have one), check out a sampling on the band's MySpace. Specifically:– 2 EZ 2 Luv …
Continue reading “Thee Makeout Party– Play Pretend (Teenacide Records)”
Not a ton of stuff this week–but we've already had Britney Spears and Snoop, so what more do you want? There are some good new ones: the ridiculously ripped LL Cool J, for instance. Find 'em after the jump! ] LL Cool J, Feb. 12 at the House of Blues, AnaheimOn sale: 10 a.m. Saturday, …
Continue reading “On-Sale Saturday: LL Cool J, Bone Thugs, More”