Yearly Archives: 2011
Sounds Good: Chris Isaak@Uptown Theater, The Royal Bangs@Jackpot Saloon
Things are slowing down a little bit around here…
After last weekend’s barrage of quality shows, we now are slipping a little bit into the doldrums of the live music season, which seems to run from about Thanksgiving to February or so.
It’s cold out (normally), so girls don’t want to go out. And if girls aren’t going out, then dudes don’t go out either.
That shouldn’t really be the case this weekend, though, because one, Chris Isaak is in town. And he brings his own tropical climate with him.
Don’t say I didn’t give you a heads up guys…
Starbeams: Top 5 Demands of Occupy Springfield Protestors
Police arrested eight Occupy Springfield protesters last weekend.
Now Here Are The Top 5 Demands of Occupy Springfield Protestors:
#5. Build a giant electric fence around the Stock Market.
#4. Poor people should get just as many "throwed rolls" as wealthy people.
#3. Graduating Kickapoo students need more poo to kick.
Glazer: Wave Goodbye to the Chiefs Matt Cassel & Todd Haley
MATT ”THE FRANCHISE” Cassel, was benched yesterday…
Chiefs coach Todd Haley came up with the hurt hand story. Matt might need an operation. Right. Matt has a sore hand, maybe a broken finger. Remember when Steve Deberg played with a stick in his finger with two of them busted?
It’s the beginning of the end for Todd and Matt.
Unfortunately for the Chiefs, it took too long in coming. I like Todd, it just didn’t work out. This team has been awful the entire time. They stunk last year too, if you’re being really honest. It’s time to say goodbye.
Mermaid: The Summer of Love; Out With the Geezers, In With the Boy Toys
I had a glorious summer- one of inner peace, reckless fun, and lotsa dating experiences…
The age group of the dudes ran the gamut from 33 to 60 (and no, it wasn’t Craig). Through my long, hard journey of men, I found that the strangest myth I knew did not hold truth. The myth that older men were wiser, more refined, and stronger emotionally than the younger crowd.
I have believed this my entire life. Even in high school I never went out with boys my own age.
I went out with college boys. So when the rest of my friends were going to Winstead’s on the weekend I was going to Steak and Ale. Back then, I think I had it right. Now I am not so sure…..
Glazer: This Just In…Chiefs Are a Clown Act; My Bet Is Safe!
It finally happened…
Tim Tebow and the Denver Broncos put the Chiefs out of their misery. It’s over folks. The Chiefs who in – get this – 25 regular season games HAVE PLAYED AND BEATEN NO GOOD TEAMS…WOW. Only the Baltimore Ravens and the Colts, who both beat our CLOWN SHOW, were playoff teams.
The Colts were seeing their window close and Baltimore crushed one of the NFL’s worst teams in the pretend play-off post season last year. Only the failing Chargers took a loss to the lowly Chiefs. This year we lost badly too two rising teams the Bills and the Lions. And neither of those teams are gonna smell a Super Bowl this year.
So yeah, we are a CLOWN SHOW.
Hearne: The Baby Lisa Story Nobody Else in KC (Including KCTV) is Reporting
As I’ve said before, some of the biggest scoops in recent years have been broken by the National Enquirer...
They may play a bit fast and loose with the celebrity fluff at times, but when it comes to nailing down news like the John Edwards love triangle or our own Missing Baby Lisa story, they play it pretty straight down the line.
Which brings us to the Enquirer’s "Twisted Secret Life Of Baby Lisa’s Mom" story.
Leftridge: Weekend Recap, Winners, Loser and More Than a Few Happy Trails
This HAS to spell the end for Boxcar Haley’s reign of terror., right….
Please tell me he’ll be shown the door tomorrow, lest I vomit blood down the front of my vintage Marc Boerigter jersey.
And before people start freaking out, and shouting that this was a team loss, let me stop you: you’re right. It was ABSOLUTEY a team loss.
Matt Cassel was his usual, terrible self. Jonathan Baldwin—who had one of the top catches of the year negated by a penalty (not his fault)—dropped balls like he was playing with hooks for hands. The offensive line was disgusting, getting soundly beat on a majority of their plays. The defensive line, which has been a continual weakness throughout this season, let some jerk named Lance Ball run over them.
YOU CANNOT LET LANCE BALL BEAT YOU.
Donnelly: The Jayhawks @ The Beaumont Club, November 12, 2011
Nothing fancy here. 
At least it didn’t seem fancy. It seemed simple and just right.
Watching The Jayhawks’ lead electric guitarist Gary Louris softly slide around the fretboard of his Gibson SG all night made me think, "Hey, I could do that."
Yeah, right.
He just made everything look so damn easy. Couple that with his soaring tenor vocals that are so naturally un-strained.
But it’s not easy. The fact of the matter is that Louris was just born to do this.
Glazer: Penn State Scandal Nothing More Than a Media Circus
It’s the worst scandal in college football history…
Sex with children, he’s being called a monster and football coach Joe Paterno and eventually the entire staff around him has already or likely will be fired – all of them. Remember the KU ticket scandal and Lew Perkins?
Some will be convicted of crimes.
YET JERRY SANDUSKY is free on $100,000 dollar bond.
What? Bonds are given to low level drug dealers, maybe an unarmed bank robber. So why is all of this more about being a media circus than something of genuine public concern? Because that’s all it’s been thus far, a media circus.
Donnelly: Lucinda Williams@Liberty Hall, November 11, 2011
Some critics think marriage has softened the jagged edges that defined Lucinda Williams’ songwriting and performing.
They say that Williams’ trademark angst, anger, and pain gave way to the boring happiness of a healthy and stable relationship when she married her longtime manager Tom Overby in 2006. They panned her latest release, Blessed, as sappy and lacking in grit, and wondered if her newfound happiness had stripped away her ability to find that tortured inner compartment she had used for so long to harvest material from.
It’s kind of the same argument that some have applied to Jeff Tweedy and his band, Wilco. After years of battling his demons, including a long stint addicted to painkillers, Tweedy finally got clean and proceeded to release several albums that simply didn’t match Wilco’s releases during the drug years. During a performance in the summer of 2003, a pale and sweaty Jeff Tweedy asked the audience, "Is everyone high out there?"
Starbeams: Thanksgiving Costs on the Rise, KCPD Uses its Noggin & Cain to KCSD?
It will cost 13% more to serve Thanksgiving dinner this year according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. Based on their projections, it will cost an average of $49.20 to serve Thanksgiving dinner for 10 versus $43.47 last year. This includes turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, rolls with butter, peas, cranberries, carrots and celery, pumpkin pie with whipped cream, coffee and milk. The turkey is the most expensive part AND had the biggest price increase – up $3.91 to $21.57 this year for a 16-pound bird.
The most expensive part of my family’s Thanksgiving dinner: the bail bondsman.
Glazer: Scribe Saddles Up For A Rough Ride On Weekend Football Picks
Some weeks it’s best to not put much out there…
There really are no real clear picks this weekend, the matchups are too close. This is just one of those tricky weeks in both college and the pros. Last week I went down hard in college 2-3, but made a huge comeback in the pros 4-0. So as the nation’s top guy in this area, and the numbers show, I’m here to make some very tough calls. So don’t go crazy.
Yes, I am just under 90% on picks now on well over 100 games for the season. It’s a number that likely will never be reduplicated. I notice by how few haters comment on these pics, that they are left with nothing to say but: AWESOME. Most of you appreciate this top advice from Kansas City’s most accurate football preview man. There’s no argument.
So I hope you have made a buck or two or won some pools. Maybe it’s just for fun, but here we go for this week’s hopefuls.
Katie: Pop Punk’s Not Dead Tour w/ New Found Glory, Set Your Goals, Wonder Years & Man Overboard
KCC photographer Katie Grogan has been a busy grrrl.
She’s been concentrating her talents on seeking out the kind of bands that would be more comfortable at the X Games than the Superbowl. You know, the kind of bands that have things pierced that you probably didn’t even know could be pierced. (What’s a body corset?)
In that vein, she thrashed out a night or two ago at the Midland to the Pop Punk’s Not Dead Tour with headliners New Found Glory, along with Set Your Goals, The Wonder Years, and Man Overboard.
To bear witness to that insanity, click on through…
Hearne: Houston, We Have Questions; Was Moon Landing Fake & Where R the Bluejackets?
What is it about astronaut quotes that make them so damn enduring?
From "One small step" to "Houston, we have a problem" – they’ve morphed from mere utterances into pop culture icons. And now that I’m trapped in Houston for the second time this year, it’s finally happened. I got kidnapped to the Houston Space Center – the home away from home of NASA – and forced by captors to take the new Discount Tire NASA Tram Tour. Which I can now report, is a bit of a snore.
In other words, don’t even think about canceling the family vacation to Bali Bali.
Not that I didn’t have a jolly good time, within reason, owing mostly to a college kid named Graham who was our tour guide. He updated me on vital NASA stuff like that after three long years on the job he’s still only making $8.75 an hour.
Houston, times are tough…
Sounds Good: North Mississippi@Knuckleheads, Lucinda Williams@Liberty Hall, 11.11.11@Downtown Lawrence, Jayhawks@Beaumont, Jakob Dylan@Indie
After looking at my picks for this weekend, I realized they’re super heavy on the rootsy, Americana thing.
Which is nice, if you’re into that whole deal.
If not, hey, you’re just wrong, that’s all.
I guess you can always go down to the Sprint Center and watch the bloated carcass that ate Axl Rose haul his ass on stage and try to scream without shitting his pants.
Seriously, I know he’s all old and stuff, and probably needs money real bad, but maybe it’s time to hang up the “leather pants-sexy rock star- front man” thing and just sign up for Celebrity Boxing or something.
New Jack City: Eastwood’s ‘J. EDGAR’ Pulls No Punches—Plays For Oscar Nominations
It’s got to be great to have the kind of power Clint Eastwood still possesses today in Hollywood…
Without his name attached to it, I doubt very much J. EDGAR would’ve ever seen the light of day.
J. EDGAR, of course, is Eastwood’s highly anticipated bio-eppic of legendary F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover.
It’s also a major player in the upcoming Oscar race where it’ll most likely compete in the Best Picture, Best Actor and Director catagories.
As J. Edgar Hoover, Leonardo DiCaprio serves up yet another memorable performance—starting as a spry 24 year-old and continuing on through his controversial career spanning some 53 years to the fading fast age of 77 as an often vindictive and paranoid creator of the nation’s federal police force.
For 2 hours and 20 minutes we experience Hoover serving under an unprecedented six U.S. presidents. Excercising his personal power over the likes of Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon. Eastwood provides a fascinating insight into this larger-than-life man who however was incapable of coming to terms with his own shortcomings.
Leftridge: Chiefs’ Midseason Grades Part Two; The Defense, et al
In chapter one, available in the archives (by which I mean, um, scroll down on the page a bit), we took a gander at the midseason grades of the Kansas City Chiefs’ offense. Pretty horrid, when you really give it any sort of piece-by-piece analysis. In case you missed it, I made this bizarre, admittedly far-reaching analogy about a football team being a lot like a tree.
And though it clearly doesn’t make a TON of sense, I’m this far into the thing, goddamnit, and I’d be a coward to stop now.
Today, we’ll look at the defense and special teams, which, coming into the season, showed a certain amount of promise. Has that held up? Has Tamba Hali physically consumed a quarterback yet?! Has Javier Arenas returned 6 punts for touchdowns?! Did Ryan Succop kick a 70-yard field goal, or was that just a weird, Propofol induced dream that I had?
Read on!
The Defensive Line / Fat City-Pigeons: D
Wait, what are a bunch of fat, bumbling pigeons doing in our beautiful, leafy, make-believe tree?
Precisely.
Hearne: Jason Whitlock Rips Penn State Coach Joe Paterno on MSNBC’s ‘Ed Show”
Long time no Whitlock…
Been a while since locals have had a chance to chew on former Star sports scribe Jason Whitlock’s cud. Other than his blog on Fox. Or the odd pissing match call to 610 Sports’ Nick Wright to rile up local sports bloggers.
But last night the straw that used to stir KC’s sports shake was live and large on MSNBC‘s "Ed Show" dissing newly axed Penn State football coach Joe Paterno.
"If he had an ounce of self-awareness – and he’s no different than the athletes, the young immature athletes (but) this guy is 84 – he would have stepped aside immediately," Whitlock told viewers.
New Jack City: Producer, Eddie Murphy Bail in Major Oscars Shakeup After Stern Show Appearance
After being criticized for making offensive remarks while promoting TOWER HEIST last week, director Brett Ratner has stepped down as producer of the upcoming 84th annual Academy Awards show.
Making matters worse Eddie Murphy dropped out as host of the show as well. All that just 3 months prior to the big event!
According to industry news sources, it went down after Ratner had appeared on Monday’s HOWARD STERN SHOW where a graphic discussion of Ratner’s sex life went down.
Katie: Uptown Punk Night w/ Hollywood Undead, Asking Alexandra & Bogore
If you were lucky enough- and brave enough- to make it out to the Uptown Saturday for the World War III Tour featuring Hollywood Undead, Asking Alexandria, Bogore and We Came As Romans and party with KCC photo scribe Katie Grogan, this is what you might have seen.
Kids, shield your eyes, please.
Hollywood Undead
