photo Anne Sherrill Bill Hascher spends a lot of his time in trees. It’s what he does. On a recent spring day, Hascher ascends a rope slung over a long, knobby branch of a century-old white oak. The limb is about 50 feet high — midway to the tree’s top. Hascher, who is 37, works […]
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Why Phil needs Joan
“For me, comfort is a slow death,” says Phil Lesh. The Grateful Dead are dead. Long live the Dead. It’s now been almost 11 years since the Grateful Dead broke up following the death of Jerry Garcia — the band’s lead guitarist, primary singer and, as the cliche goes, “spiritual leader.” But that hasn’t kept […]
Cartoons
Container excitement
photos by Cecil Bothwell Summer has arrived at The North Carolina Arboretum. It brings with it this year’s seasonal landscape exhibit, populated by colorful blossoms of all seasons tucked into beds and planted in containers, baskets and buckets. The memorable fragrances, colors and textures of the featured plants — arranged to demonstrate reproducible design — […]
The better part of valor?
It was a kinder, gentler, more discreet Asheville City Council. And appropriately, the change was reflected as much in what Council members didn’t say as in what they did. How great a concession the offer represents depends on how highly one rates Asheville’s chances of winning its lawsuit against the state. At a special June […]
Letters to the editor
Pick-your-own rules Mr. Sternberg’s recent perspective of CAN, development, and zoning violations [“Stay Off the Self-Righteous Slope,” Commentary, June 7] takes a complicated issue and attempts to make it seem black and white, with good guys and bad guys (Jerry’s developer guys being the good guys, of course). In an ironic twist, he even presents […]
Dream home or nightmare?
So you’ve fallen in love with our beautiful mountains, and you’re ready to buy your Western North Carolina dream home. How do you choose? The answer is: carefully. Living on a mountain entails serious personal and financial risks. The 19 counties that make up WNC are in a landslide-hazard zone, and the North Carolina Geological […]
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift
I flipped five years ago over the original The Fast and the Furious, a movie about Los Angeles’ subculture of car racing and high-stakes hijacking. It was stupid but enjoyable because of terrific racing sequences and charismatic actors, especially a relatively unknown bald guy with big biceps named Vin Diesel. In 2003 came 2 Fast […]
Cars
Neon, NASCAR and America’s magnificent desert scenery provide the unique visual backdrops for Pixar’s latest animation feature, Cars. Although a tad long and perhaps too sophisticated for pre-kindergarten tots, older kids will enjoy the movie’s high-octane action, and adults will delight in the in-jokes, the numerous cameo voiceovers and the sentimental tribute to 1950s car […]
I open myself up …
Important friends are better than lots of friends
Nothing else to do: Band of Horses The Pacific Northwest’s Blue Mountains are an appropriately impressive backdrop to catch up with Band of Horses’ front man and songwriter, Ben Bridwell. After all, Horses’ critically acclaimed debut, Everything All the Time, seems custom-built for the Northwest’s majestic scenery, boasting epic rock songs steeped in mile-high reverb. […]
Gallery gossip
• The current exhibit at Asheville Area Arts Council’s Front Gallery features another of Skip Rohde’s wonderful satirical paintings about the Bush administration. This one has Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice in NASCAR drag. (Japan will be the theme for July at Front Gallery. Along with exhibits of work by Japanese artists, there will be tea […]
Cartoons
Itchy and scratchy
photo by Cecil Bothwell If you love green, growing things, it pays to know your neighbors. And in our neck of the woods, one of the most important local residents to meet is poison ivy. Whether she’s living down the road or in your own back yard, rest assured that she’s in the ‘hood. A […]
Letters to the editor
Asheville’s slippery downtown slope Reading the comments about the Saturday feedings at Prichard Park [“Feeding the Fire,” May 31 Xpress], I felt horror at the reality of class privilege in our society and disgust towards the derogatory comments made about my fellow human beings. One emotion I distinctly did not experience, however, was shock. Asheville […]
On fire for heritage
Some weeks back, the little town of Spruce Pine hosted the second annual Fire on the Mountain. The festival attracted blacksmiths from all over the Southeast to this small community tucked in among the peaks of Mitchell County. But this wasn’t your typical conference where professionals get together to compare notes. Both Fire on the […]
Remote Cataloochee
Salad bar: An elk grazes along the road in Cataloochee, unconcerned about passing cars. photo by Jean Gard We stop on the Cataloochee Road and stare at two elk grazing, so close that I can read the tag on one (No. 68). Jean, on the passenger side, is busy snapping pictures as fast as she […]
Officially alternative
Imagine avant-garde exhibits lasting longer than two days: By sheltering educational programs as well as gallery space, the newly renovated Phil Mechanics Building gets to showcase out-there art and enjoy nonprofit status. The newest addition to the river-district arts scene is by far its most ambitious. The Phil Mechanics Building has the potential to fill […]
Why they fight
Boots Riley still believes a change is gonna come. Riley, the MC who slings rhymes for the hip-hop crew known as The Coup, was a community activist before he was a rhymer, and his passion for social change permeates many of his songs. Still triggering discussion: MC Boots Riley and DJ Pam the Funktress, of […]
Gallery gossip
• “Big Al” Carter, the Washington, D.C.-based artist who designed and painted the big mural at the YMI Cultural Center, will have work in an exhibit at the Cameron Art Museum in Wilmington, N.C., through Sept. 17. Recently, The Washington Post did a huge spread about the artist and his career as a public-school teacher, […]
Earful
Show review Cisco Playboys at Ed Boudreaux’s Bar-B-Que; Thursday, May 25: Four Stars • Genre(s): Western Swing, Cajun. • Be glad you stayed home if: Accordions and cowboy hats defy your notions of a rocking band. • Defining moment: The Playboys’ version of Harry Choates’ “Honky-Tonking Days.” I usually judge a band on what I […]