The 2008 James Beard Awards for best restaurant, best chef, best cookbook, etc. were announced yesterday, and Minnesota got skunked. We had three chefs in the running for Best Chef Midwest – Isaac Becker of the 112 Eatery, Tim McKee of La Belle Vie and Solera, and Alex Roberts of Restaurant Alma and Brasa, which … Read more
Let’s not get too hung up on labels like "Rising Stars." At age 48, with 17 discs of wildly varying merit to his credit (I’m one of the precious few who loved his ’80s meld of jazz and hip hop), saxophonist Greg Osby is less a rising star that an established albeit iconoclastic member of … Read more
In the last couple of years, the Twin Cities has gained a reputation as a hipster Mecca; the chic architecture (new Guthrie, Walker, and Central Library) has garnished international praise, the rocking music scene is hotter than ever with both indie and mainstream bands (Atmosphere on Conan! The Hold Steady opens for The Rolling Stones!), … Read more
It’s 105 degrees in here, and I can’t place the smell. Somewhere between hot feet and freshly popped kettle corn. Not distractingly smelly, but enough to remind me that I’m not at the Y, and I didn’t fall asleep in the sauna. This is Bikram Yoga. I am currently performing my favorite pose, called Savasana. … Read more
Same Old Man indeed. This is between Hiatt’s 15th and 25th release — depending on how you count best-ofs, live recordings, and groups like Little Village — and the reliability factor remains high. He’s an ersatz curmudgeon, a faux eccentric, a dilapidated Everyman with an undeniably big heart and an equally undeniable knack for songwriting. … Read more
John Hiatt is an ersatz curmudgeon, a faux eccentric, a dilapidated Everyman with an undeniably big heart and an equally undeniable knack for songwriting. He can jangle a slant-back country blues song or ambush you emotionally by confessing for redemption. He’s got elements of a Nashville pro and a guy who’s listened to a lot … Read more
BENEFIT EVENTIn Vino Veritas Traffic Zone Center for Visual Art plans to bring artist Robert Shetterly’s Americans Who Tell the Truth exhibit to Minneapolis in September, and tonight you’re invited to enjoy a decadent and insightful sneak-peek benefit event. Three years ago, Shetterly began painting realistic portraits of influential American leaders, past and present, who … Read more
Everyone knows: Wally’s Pet World sells the sickest, the oldest, and the mangiest animals. But that doesn’t stop George from heading nine counties and eleven hours toward some strip mall into Graysville. He drums a folded bag on his lap with his fingers. The car deviates toward the right side of the crooked road. "Look, … Read more
I walked outside The Cedar to wait for my ride after the Wendy Rule show last Wednesday night, when a group of passing guys stopped and one said, “I ‘aint neva’ seen no ass like that on a white girl befo’.” I expected them to break out into song and dance around me like Chris … Read more
All the ingredients for an experimental disaster are there: six characters on a non-elevated platform of white cardboard — a sterile space carved out in the corner of a dingy art gallery — all dressed in white, speaking in seemingly disjointed sentences, hugging the wall behind them, twisting, writhing, gasping. But Socktesting, however experimental, is … Read more