According to bassist (and Grupo Fantasma founding member) Greg Gonzalez, "We have so many influences, when you come to see us it's a gumbo of sound." An apt metaphor for this pepper pot of a Latin jazz-funk fusion outfit currently boasting 10 members. Gonzales adds that the group's collective experience —and most of a decade […]
Brave new world music
When vocalist and composer Mariam Matossian made the move from her hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia to Greenville, S.C., she didn't figure on meeting any fellow Armenian musicians. In fact, for her first year in Greenville, when Matossian performed it was mostly at venues thousands of miles away with her Canadian backing band. Vocalist Mariam […]
Junker’s Blues
When you're a junker, it's hard to avoid magical thinking. Success is so dependent on serendipity you start to believe it's not just random. It was, for instance, easy to feel things were "meant to be" when I found, via that magical portal of Facebook, that my friend Rabuck was heading to the Biltmore Square […]
Artillery
Flood Gallery is one of the only galleries in Asheville exhibiting work by out-of-town contemporary conceptual artists. Given its out-of-the-way location, the shows are all too often under attended, but the gallery is at least attempting to introduce new aesthetics and ideas to the artistic discourse of Asheville. "Skink," by Mike Calway-Fagen, was at one […]
Spork
Big news and big excitement for local playwright, actor, teacher and Xpress contributor John Crutchfield: His play, Songs of Robert, has been accepted into the New York International Fringe Festival. The mid-August festival spans 16 days, 200 venues and draws about 75,000 people. It's Crutchfield's first foray there, and a chance to show his work […]
Soundtrack
From the opening notes, fuzzy and aggressive through Stella Blue's downstairs sound system, Wooden Toothe plants its feet firmly in the fuzzy-and-aggressive territory between country and punk. Yet this is no country-punk outfit. The quartet, fronted by sprightly bass player Pierce Harmon, nods to both Uncle Tupelo and the Sex Pistols with neither a twang […]
Festival dress(es)
Patton Ave. during Bele Chere. At Bele Chere’s Coxe Ave. stage. Carolina Gator Gumbo accordion player Jean Prewitt. Do they know they’re wearing the same dress?
Golden moment
Edgy Mama: ‘Mom, can you…?’
Regardless of what my kids need or want, whether or not they can get it themselves, or whether or not they easily can ask another adult for help, they always, always, always ask me first. And nine times out of 10, the first three words out of their puerile mouths are, “Mom, can you…?”
Video-a-Go-Go: The local video roundup
Tons of videos have surfaced from last week’s Laugh Your Asheville Off comedy festival — and that’s not all
The frill is gone
Wooden purse
Stripes + polka dots
Review of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers: Big, campy fun, well thought-out and executed, from the dancing to the singing to the set and costumes.
Need more Disclaimer? Turn the dial over to 570-AM
If you need a little more Asheville Disclaimer in your life (is there anyone who doesn’t?), listen to the 5 p.m. hour of “Take a Stand with Matt Mittan,” Fridays on WWNC 570-AM.
Catch the second week of Folkmoot USA
Things you might not have known about Folkmoot USA, the Waynesville-based international folk festival: It was started by a square-dancing surgeon in 1984. Groups from 100 different countries have performed. And each year, the festival features an entirely new program of performers.
This weekend on a shoestring
Beyond the snarl of Bele Chere’s festival crowds and hawkers, what sort of free or low-cost happenings can be found?
Talking bout my degeneration
After witnessing The Jesus Lizard with Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and Southern Culture on the Skids on Thanksgiving in 1993, Milton Carter came home that night and started punk band The Mathmatics (misspelling intentional). He enlisted his skateboard buddy Dougal Bailey on drums and guitarist David Cooper (replaced by Tom Cook a year later). Their […]
Bubble gum and gloom (but not so much witches-in-the-foggy-forest)
With song titles like "Neon Syrup for the Cemetery Sisters," lyrics such as "Iron lemonade, eat my face away" and themes of witches and bubble gum, Black Moth Super Rainbow makes the kind of music you'd expect from the mind of a mad daydreamer who had exiled himself to a smoke-filled basement littered with a […]
Sound Track
I have an aversion to hype. But Xpress-proclaimed "local rock hotties" Cobra Horse ― recipients of a significant acclaim in their short history ― can back that hype with ridiculous rock-and-roll. Cobra Horse kick out the jams at a recent Emerald Lounge show. Photo by Lydia See. During their most recent engagement at the Emerald […]
Spork
Here's a project that should be a boon for WNC media artists and professionals: A savvy online directory where artists can upload their portfolios, create profiles and get the word out about their skills. "We have such a huge amount of talent here," says Robert Zimmerman, whose company has developed the site. A grant from […]