[ROCK] Third Eye Blind has taken some unexpected turns in its 20-year recording career, but one thing is for sure: if you were paying attention to pop music at all in 1997, you should be able to sing along to at least half of the songs on the San Francisco band’s self-titled debut. “Semi-Charmed Life,” “Graduate,” “How’s It Going to Be,” “Losing a Whole Year,” and “Jumper” were all released as singles, while “Narcolepsy” enjoyed AOR airplay as if it was also a single.
[INDIE] The latest from neo-folkies, Big Thief, out on Connor Oberst’s Saddle Creek label, is even better than their first. Out on June 9, the Brooklyn four-piece has outdone itself with Capacity, which mines much of the same territory as it’s near-universally well received predecessor, Masterpiece… just deeper.
[COMEDY] It takes balls as a stand up comedian to call yourself, simply, Talent. It’s kind of like calling yourself Madonna. But James “Talent” Harris, went there; and it’s worked for him. The host of Showtime at the Apollo, a star in movies Sunset Park and With or Without You, Talent is a New York City comedy veteran with an arsenal of hilarious Def Jam approved jokes.
[LITERARY] Naturally, co-founder Jonathan Welch would never himself throw a going-away party for the original location of Talking Leaves, the Main Street book shop in University Heights, which will close its doors forever next month. He’s not that kind of guy. A couple of fans, writers Brian Castner and Matt Higgins, are the instigators of the final farewell party that happens this Thursday, June 29, 6-9pm. There will be some some wine and some beer (courtesy Community Beer Works), and remarks by local writers beginning at 7pm.
[COMEDY] “You know, Ella Fitzgerald once worked on this stage. But did she put her butt on the floor? No,” said comedian Paula Poundstone on stage, laying flat on her back with her legs propped up on a stool. The 57-year-old comedian has been delivering her irreverent brand of stand up comedy for almost four decades. Appearing on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, on her own talk show on HBO, and recently in the Disney Pixar animated film Inside Out, Poundstone has had, by any estimate, a profound career in comedy.
[MUSIC FESTIVAL] You want Americana? How about this: A music and art festival the weekend before the Fourth of July, in the shadows of Buffalo’s iconic grain elevators, with a lineup of roots music artists assembled by the folks at the Sportsmens Americana Music Foundation. Silo City Live happens next Sunday, July 2 at Silo City, with two stages featuring music by Leroy Townes, Black Rock Zydeco, Ten Cent Howl, Shaky Stage, Mr.
[ART PARTY] The Buffalo Infringement Festival is just one month away, which means that artists are quietly laboring away at their performances and exhibitions, and the event’s organizers are desperately setting the stage for the 11-day, grassroots, citywide, totally egalitarian, anything goes art extravanganza. Next Thursday, July 6, there will be a festival preview and fundraiser at the Ninth Ward at Babeville.
[JAZZ] This year’s Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival will feature more than 1500 musicians performing on 19 stages over 9 days, starting on Friday June 23. This year’s headliners include old and new names with Mavis Staples, Cheryl Crow, King Crimson, and the legendary Maceo Parker (James Brown Band), with the Ray Charles Orchestra, and rising stars singer Joss Stone and Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox, all at the Eastman Theater.
“People must be taught and made to realize the advantages of a beautiful city. They must understand that beauty in a city pays, not only in the added pleasure in existence given to its citizens, but in a purely financial way, that it is, in truth, a civic asset of very great value.”
—Dr. Matthew D. Mann, Society for Beautifying Buffalo, 1909
We first see Beatrice (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi) parading the grounds at this antique Tuscan location as if she owns the place, barking out suggestions and orders to the staff and other residents. In her endless chatter (whoever wrote her subtitles clearly had to do a lot of condensing) are dropped so many names that for awhile it’s hard to take her seriously. Enough of it proves to be true that maybe it all is, and so maybe this facility was a gift from her family.