Stuff We Love: Haunted Cleveland Tours
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Morbid Curiosity : Haunted Cleveland Ghost Tours Back in 1935, Cleveland became home to one…
The Book of Mormon is coming to Playhouse Square
Broadway’s hottest ticket, The Book of Mormon, is coming to the Palace Theatre next year as part of Playhouse Square’s 2012-’13 Key Bank Broadway Series. Written by South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the extremely silly, relentlessly profane, and excruciatingly hilarious musical will make its Cleveland debut on June 18 of next year.…
806 Wine Bar Closed, Joe Cimperman Trying to Block Former Owner From Taking Over Space
Last spring we chronicled the problems that arise in Tremont when seasonal visitors start dropping in on the neighborhood’s bars to ensure that the beer taps and glassware are functioning properly. Many complaints involved the 806 Wine Bar on Literary Avenue, where the stereotype of erudite merlot-sipping weenies is replaced by scenes more closely resembling…
Stuff We Love: 78th Street Studios
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Unlikely Fashionista Soiree: Third Fridays at 78th Street Studios In just a couple of years,…
Stuff We Love: Battery Park
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Neighborhood That Looks Like It Was Imported: Battery Park What is this place? Just a…
Noodlecat to Land at West Side Market
“We’ve been talking to Gary [Thomas, owner of Ohio City Pasta] since December about putting a Noodlecat into the Sideshow space,” says Jonathon Sawyer, still on a plane at Miami International Airport. The West Side Market space, right across the aisle from Ohio City Pasta, has been vacant for months. “We’re going to take off…
Looks Like Green Day Will Be Inducting GNR
After weeks of speculation, and weeks after all the other presenters were announced, it looks like Green day will be inducting Guns N’ Roses into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 14 in Cleveland. According to Rolling Stone, the American Idiot guys will induct the band at Public Hall in two weeks.…
Freedom to Marry Petitions Approved by Ohio Attorney General
This morning, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine approved the initial summary language for a marriage equality amendment that would repeal of the 2004 “Defense of Marriage” Amendment. The Freedom to Marry movement and its sponsoring group, FreedomOhio, had submitted its second set of preliminary petitions to DeWine last week — revising the language he initially…
Boozy Wedding Guest Dances With Groom, Flips When Bride Cuts In
“Tiss iz my go ta move, loook out.” Don’t cut in, don’t you ever even think about cutting in, on Brooke Burke when she’s mid-spin on the dance floor. Oh, you just married her dance partner at this very wedding? Doesn’t matter, back off. That’s the boozy message Ms. Burke sent in late March when…
Stuff We Love: B Side’s Mug Night
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Reason to Strain Your Wrist:: B Side Liquor Lounge’s Mug Night A basement bar jammed…
Stuff We Love: Ohio Knitting Mills
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Place to Buy a Sweater From the 1960s: Ohio Knitting Mills Steven Tatar unearthed a…
Stuff We Love: Josaphat Arts Hall
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Secular Use of a Former Church: Josaphat Arts Hall St. Josaphat Roman Catholic Church was…
Doors Shut on Dragonfly and Garage Bar
As of today, Dragonfly and Garage Bar (1865 W. 25th St.) are closed. Marlin Kaplan, chef and owner, says that landlord Adam Waldbaum decided to shutter the businesses without warning. “I found out he slammed the doors just like everybody else,” Kaplan told me. “The business was really doing well.” Waldbaum offers a different explanation,…
Turkey Targeting Return of Antiquities in Cleveland Museum of Art’s Collection
Antiquities can be a dirty business, especially so in recent years as countries like Italy and Greece target museums across the world in attempts to take possession of artifacts they believe were looted illegally from their soil. The Cleveland Museum of Art was one of many museums that handed over millions of dollars worth of…
Video: OSU Fans Toss Seat Cushions After Kansas Loss
“Lane violation my tush.” Buckeye Nation suffered a hit on Saturday night, no news there. And we honestly were pretty bummed OSU went down after Kansas clawed back from a 9 point deficit at the half. But after the game, a certain faction of Buckeye Elite gave the school another black eye when they rained…
Don’t Hold Your Breath for a Guns N’ Roses Performance at Rock Hall Inductions
Yeah, we’ve been done this rumor-laden road before, but the question of whether Guns N’ Roses will perform during the Rock Hall induction ceremonies in Cleveland is one at the tip of a lot of fans’ tongues. What started as a yes, drifted into maybe territory, and eventually took a nosedive into the land of…
Cities Vying for Early ‘Avenger’ Screenings in Facebook Contest
The Avengers will hit theaters May 4. Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, Houston, and Miami will see early screenings on April 14. Five other cities will join them. The Marvel movie, which you might remember from that time when they filmed scenes here in the streets of Cleveland, will be shown in the five…
Stuff We Love: The Harold. T. Clark Library
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Place to Peruse Priceless Tomes: Harold T. Clark Library, Cleveland Museum of Natural History In…
Stuff We Love: Really Cheap Booze
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Really Cheap Place to Drink: Two BucksWhen Two Bucks opened in Avon two years ago,…
Stuff We Love: Jerky-n-Spice
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Way to Burn Your Tongue Off: Jerky-n-Spice If you’ve ever finagled an entire free lunch…
Cleveland Cops Are Actually Ticketing for Jaywalking Right Now
Jaywalking is the birthright of Clevelanders. Having no use for crosswalks and the common sense to know that dammit we’re in a hurry, screw those cars, the streets of downtown are basically a game of Frogger. That’s especially true in Public Square, which is groundzero for a purported crackdown by cops on Cleveland’s right to…
Video: Sinking Baskets from the Goodyear Blimp
If you don’t know Dude Perfect, they’re a crew of guys who pull off physics-defying basketball shots. They recently took their trick act to Northeast Ohio, hopping aboard the Goodyear Blimp. Incredibly, they sunk this shot from the sky outside the blimp’s hanger. Very cool. (h/t Fox 8)
Trailer: Documentary on Bullying at Mentor High School, Plus Reaction from School Officials
Five Mentor High School students have committed suicide in recent years. That’s a troubling number, and it hasn’t escaped the attention of parents or the media, especially when families say that bullying in the halls of the high school drove their children to despair. Two of those families have sued the school district. One lawsuit…
Struthers City Official Wants No-Sagging Ordinance
You are killing America. Here’s the thing about the great institution of Small Town Middle America: it can never just be, its always got to in a huff about something, positioning its white picket battlements against a perceived harbinger that supposedly threatens it’s very Small Town Middle Americanness. Music, Guatemalan immigrants, gay marriage – you…
Stuff We Love: Ping Pong at Sachsenheim Hall
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Place to Play Ping Pong in a Bar: Sachsenheim Hall Despite the game’s irrefutable awesomeness,…
Stuff We Love: The Bazaar Bizarre
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days. Best Craft Show for People Who Don’t Need Crocheted Blankets: Bazaar Bizarre The craftspeople who set…
Stuff We Love: Peeing Next to a Picasso
The Best of Cleveland 2012 issue is online and on the streets now. Read it, love it. In addition to the usual categories, there were some offbeat staff picks. We’ll be posting them here over the next few days.Best Place to Pee Next to a Picasso: The Velvet Tango Room Although it’s not the kind…
Cleveland Shelves Gassification Plans After Learning It Would Cost Millions of Dollars a Year
Turns out it was all garbage. Last week the City of Cleveland officially canceled its $1.5 million contract with the New Jersey businessman hired to design a trash-gassing plant the city wants on Ridge Road. The problem with the work performed by Peter Tien and his Princeton Environmental Group? Mostly he sucked at math. Despite…
Chardon Rocked By Another Deadly Shooting (Updated)
Update: The deceased is 28-year-old Ryan Sever, according to Chardon officials. He was killed after police responded to a domestic violence call at around 3 a.m. The caller reported her son had been fighting with his girlfriend but left the premises, according to the News Herald. When police spotted Sever on the sidewalk and approach,…
WTF is Up with These Mandel-Brown Polls
It’s science. You armchair political observers out there trying to handicap the upcoming Senate bout between Sherrod Brown and Josh Mandel are probably getting a little dizzy. Just yesterday we heard reports the race between the deep-pocketed Republican hopeful and sitting Senator was dead even. Now, over the Wheaties today we see another poll puts…
Video: ‘No Surf in Cleveland’
We’re obviously familiar with “No Surf in Cleveland,” the late 70’s song from the Euclid Beach Band (formed by two Scene staffers — Rich Reising and Jim Girard — don’t ya know), but we hadn’t seen this before: what looks to be a music video for the surf-pop Clevo phenomena. Yes, all the beach, Hawaiian…
A Random Cleveland Kindness
Despite our better efforts, these pages are usually filled with tales folks who’ve done wrong or otherwise dicked over their fellow man. Kathy Walters reminds us that’s not always the case. The account supervisor at Wyse, a downtown ad agency, was the recipient of a genuine random act of kindness last week, proving strangers don’t…
Old School of the Arts Building Going … Going …
We posted two weeks ago about the demolition of the 100-year-old School of the Arts Building at University Circle, just as it was getting underway. Now the dismantling of the old school is underway in earnest. As commuters headed home on Carnegie today, excavator buckets were slamming into the side of the building amidst a…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Welcome to the world’s most enchanting port of call: Glorious Cleveland, Ohio. Here you will find the greatest pleasures to ever have tempted mankind: Food to delight the taste buds of the gods. Beverage to conquer the most discriminating of thirsts. Leisure pursuits enjoyed in fashionable yet sensible attire, maybe with comfortable boat shoes but…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Best Reason to Love Cleveland The People When people from vainer places speak of Midwestern friendliness, it’s the template molded right here that they’re referring to. True enough, sometimes it takes a visitor to our shores to notice such things, but our region’s greatest asset just might not be our lake or our location. It…
Culture Jamming
TOP PICK SSX (EA) After a seven-year break, the snowboarding video game series returns to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 with one of its best outings. The action is more intense this time, as you free-fall onto snow-covered mountaintops and race downhill, trying to hit as many tricks as possible. It looks great, plays…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Best Place to Spend a Day Shopping Crocker Park Cleveland’s choice for high-octane retail therapy, Crocker Park is an all-day destination for strolling, dining, and — oh yeah — whipping out that Kate Spade wallet. Broad sidewalks, ample parking, and gorgeous seasonal landscaping give easy access to shops like Anthropologie and Urban Outfitters. There are…
Get Out!
Thursday | 29 Author! Author! Putting the Fun in Dysfunction Read the glowing reviews and you have to ask: Is Kambri Crews’ new memoir — about growing up poor in an abusive household — heartbreaking or funny? “I think it’s both,” says the New York writer, producer, publicist, speaker, and comedian. “I guess I had…
We Get Mail
A Little Casino Humor It’s another home run for big business at the cost of charity [“Cashed Out: Local Charities Could Lose Big When the Horseshoe Comes to Town,” February 29]. Maybe the Horseshoe Casino will care enough to donate to the charities. They could buy uniforms for the bands and equipment for the sports…
Local Band in Focus
Meet the Band: Stephen Arthur (vocals, bass), John Vasvary (guitar), and Noah Kemp (drums). Slightly Exaggerated: On their Facebook page, the Concord-based band promises to “puke onstage, light it on fire, and kick it into the crowd.” Which isn’t entirely true: “John puked onstage before, but it was in another, earlier band,” says Arthur (pictured,…
Sweet Retreat
Things are going so well for bakers Wendy Thompson and SynDee Klingenberg that they are taking the next steps in their expansion plan: By the end of April, the team behind Tremont’s A Cookie and a Cupcake will open Churned, a gourmet ice cream shop. The Lincoln Park-side space previously occupied by Dish Deli is…
CD Review: C-Ro Del-Fresco
(teamfresco.com) Cleveland rapper C-Ro Del-Fresco opens his new nine-song EP with a choppy but energetic number called “Cold” before coasting through the rest of the way in a deep, deep groove. Sounds like he’s finally found his footing. C-Ro’s rhymes are clean and his topics broad, touching on everything from mainstream rap — something he…
Concert Calendar
Cursive Cursive’s latest album, I Am Gemini, twists an eons-old mythological tale of twin brothers into an epic modern struggle between good and evil. The Omaha indie-rock band’s seventh LP (and first since 2009’s complicated Mama, I’m Swollen, which dealt with adulthood, sex, and mommy issues), Gemini toys with issues of doubt, betrayal, and other…
Back in Black
It’s been almost 20 years since Cleveland industrial rockers Lestat released an album, and things look a lot different to frontman Evan Nave. Forget the fact that he’s now in his forties or that he’s been playing with another band since Lestat split in the early ’00s. In 1994, the year their third album, Vision…
My Father the Soldier
On September 21, 1966, Marine Sergeant Thomas Patrick Kindt was killed in a firefight in Vietnam. He left behind a wife and a son, Tom Hubbard, who at the time was just two years old. Hubbard would grow up knowing his father only through photographs and the fragmented writing of his elders. It wasn’t until…
CD Review: Madonna
Madonna has never made an album that’s not messy. From her tenuous 1983 debut to her recent clumsy attempts at staying relevant in a pop universe that no longer needs her, Madonna LPs can be as frustrating as they are rewarding. Her 12th album tries to be several things: a breakup record, a dance collection,…
On View This Week
All Matters Gallery: Flight to Light. Photographs, stained glass, carvings, and more from 50 local artists celebrate the equinox and rites of spring, especially through the celebration of all creatures of the air. Through May 31 at 79 North Main St., Chagrin Falls. Call 440-247-8979 or go to allmatters.net. Artists Archives of the Western Reserve:…
CD Review: The Mars Volta
By now you know what you’re getting from the Mars Volta: super-pretentious musical oscillations, Cedric Bixler-Zavala’s haunted-house shrieks, ridiculous album titles, and another reminder that the remnants of one of the ’90s’ most exciting punk bands (At the Drive In) has turned into an unbearable musical jigsaw puzzle. Only one of the songs on their…
At the Arthouse
Oldboy The Cinematheque’s Cleveland Cult Film Festival 3 continues with Chan-wook Park’s 2003 masterpiece about a guy who’s locked in a hotel room for 15 years. After he’s released, with no explanation for his imprisonment, he turns on his “revenge” switch. Then the fun begins. Hollywood is remaking it and will most likely fuck it…
Home Movies
Casablanca: 70th Anniversary Edition (Warner) This massive box set throws in just about everything you’d need for a party, including posters and drink coasters. There’s also tons of extras related to the 1942 masterpiece, including commentary by Roger Ebert, five feature-length documentaries, deleted scenes, vintage newsreels — even a Bugs Bunny cartoon. But it’s the…
The Dork Side
Cinema Wasteland has been one of the country’s best and most popular horror conventions for a dozen years now. And this weekend’s spring bash in Strongsville may be the biggest and bestest of them all. Guests include everyone from Richard Kiel (the guy who played Jaws in the James Bond movies) to P.J. Soles (of…
Savage Love
Dear Dan: I am the father of a recently out 18-year-old gay boy. Here’s the problem: My son is in a relationship with a 31-year-old guy. I’m not OK with that. Yes, my son is a legal adult at 18 and can make his own decisions, but he’s also still in high school. His mother…
Drink Up
If you think that April is sort of early in the season to be sipping lemonade, Tommy Kneeland couldn’t agree with you more. But as top mixologist and operating partner at Reddstone, Kneeland says there’s a very good reason the signature libation — originally created as a cooler for hot evenings on the award-winning patio…
CD Review: Miike Snow
The Swedish production team of Christian Karlsson and Pontus Winnberg, aka Bloodshy & Avant, won a Grammy for their work on Britney Spears’ corrosive 2004 single “Toxic.” With American Andrew Wyatt onboard, Miike Snow steer their intentions toward a more indie-pop direction, making electronic music for an audience raised on irony, nostalgia, and cool tunes.…
Slow Burn
It was surely one of the least tactful and most transparent statements a restaurant staffer has ever laid on us: “Brecksville is a pretty wealthy area, which fits our price point.” That sentiment, voiced by a recent GM of Seared in Brecksville, speaks directly to the build-it-and-they-will-come attitude of some restaurateurs, who mistakenly believe that…
Old News
Old age is a funny thing — or so I’ve been told: As much as we understand that physical and mental infirmities come with advanced age, we’re stunned when it actually happens to us. Indeed, creeping decrepitude often is a funny thing in The Velocity of Autumn by Eric Coble, now being performed at Lakewood’s…
Film Capsules
Salmon Fishing in the YemenAlfred Jones (Ewan McGregor) is Britain’s leading fisheries expert and is working on finding a suitably shocking cover for a fishing journal when his boss gives him an impossible task: bring wild salmon from British waters to the deserts of the Middle East. It’s essentially a PR move to improve British-Arab…
On Stage This Week
Lizzie Borden at Playhouse Square: A Real Whack Job Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother 40 whacks … We’ve all heard the rhyme. Now, thanks to the annual collaboration between Baldwin-Wallace College and Playhouse Square, we can bop along to the rock musical about that infamous small-town girl who presumably killed her…
Bad Seed
It’s every parent’s worst nightmare and something Eva Khatchadourian knows from the start: There’s something wrong with her son. And early in We Need to Talk About Kevin we know it too, because a teenage Kevin went on a shooting spree at his high school, killing several of his classmates. The movie was originally scheduled…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Best Club DJ DJ E-V E-V has been behind some of the best mixtapes to come out of our city during the past few years, including Bitch I’m From Cleveland and a collaboration that resulted in Kid Cudi’s Dat Kid From Cleveland. He also backed Mike Posner on tour. But E-V is at his best…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Best Team to Root For Cleveland Browns Even the Browns’ decade-long streak of unrivaled incompetence has somehow failed to dampen Cleveland’s passion. It’s a Browns town, first and always, despite our better judgment. We’ll talk about free agent wide receivers while the Cavs are playing, we’ll debate which quarterback to draft while the Tribe is…
Best of Cleveland 2012
Best Food Truck Umami Moto Prowling the curbs of Cleveland, Umami Moto has quickly built a following for its tasty Thai, Vietnamese, and Asian-fusion fare, including pad Thai, massaman curry on rice, and a Vietnamese bahn mi sandwich made with pulled pork. Partners Jae Stulock and Sandy Madachik launched the rig in 2010; they recently…
