First of all, no one will be reading in the buff at this event. The "naked" part has to do with the new book, Naked Came the Leaf Peeper, a collaborative serial published in celebration of Malaprop's 30th anniversary. A dozen authors from in and near WNC contributed to the novel, billed as "A Southern […]

Guitarist David Brown and fiddler Cailen Campbell met while touring nationally with a bluegrass ballet. That was in 2006, they've since gone on to form dance band Contraversial. They perform at contra dances, house concerts, festivals (LEAF!) and selects bars (like 5 Walnut) as well as crafting beautiful music for waltzes. Contraversial plays a waltz […]

By now you've probably heard the sad/infuriating story about how local musician Dup Crosson (Saint Solitude, To All My Dear Friends) was robbed of $5,000 worth of equipment — a devastating blow to a professional musician. Now the happier news: The local music community is rallying behind Crosson with a benefit show on Thursday, March […]

Creative trifecta Michael Oppenheim (photos), Laura Hope-Gill (essays) and Michele Scheve (design) announce the launch of their latest collaborative effort, Look Up Asheville II. Picking up where architecture/prose book Look Up Asheville: An Architectural Journey left off, the new collection "draws greater attention to the work of James Vester Miller, the slavery-born contracting magnate," features […]

This is the seventh installment of this “fun, humorous, provocative evening" of dance, ranging from hip-hop and modern to folklorics and performance art. Performers are both amateur and professional, but the common theme is "work created by men and performed by men." Dancers include Joe Adams, Jim Julien, John Crutchfield, Sky McDowell, Douglas Haynes, Bob […]

Local roots rocker Pierce Edens has been road-testing his newest material (for an album set to drop later this spring) while on tour up and down the East Coast. Besides logging miles and perfecting songs, Edens and his band have been sharing stages and making friends with other groups, like Brooklyn's JP and The Gilberts. […]

Local hip-hop artist Chachillie (aka Chach, aka Charles Stewart) gave us a taste of his talent on last year's Secret B-Sides release (Chach raps on "On to You"). This year is Chachillie's year. He's already released several stylish, artistic videos and his full-length album, Goosebumps on Pangaea, is set to drop "moments before midnight" on […]

Need an advance St. Patty's day fix? Here's just the thing: Premier (and locally based) Celtic violinist Jamie Laval performs a St. Patrick's concert with his Large Band (EJ Jones on bagpipes and flute, David Brown on baritone guitar, Rosalind Buda on bassoon small pipes) at The Altamont Theatre. The two hour show on Friday, […]

Inspiration can come from the most unlikely of places. For author Tracey L. Pacelli, the impetus for her young adult novel, Time Warped, rose out of a battle with stage four melanoma. Pacelli beat the cancer, and, as she explains in an email, "in an effort to keep my daughter near me, I turned my […]

Multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire Jason Krekel informs us that the Krektones are instro-rock — "don't call 'em surf cuz we's in the mountains" — and they'll be releasing their first EP on Family Night Records (home of local bands Tony Wain and the Payne and Doom Ribbons). The four-song 45 includes a Ventures cover, Greg Cartwright's "Stop […]

You probably know Jon Reid as the musician formerly known as Jar-e. You might also know him from Twitter or other platforms where he's irreverent, sarcastic and downright funny. If you know him from his weekly AshevilleFM show “Race to the Bottom” (Sundays from 7-9 p.m.) then you already know what's in store when Reid […]

Asheville's only all-female sketch-comedy troupe is back, this time with a nine-show run at The Magnetic Field. If you were lucky enough to catch a LYLAS show before (they sell out fast), you might remember their side-splitting performance of "Carl [Mumpower] is Watching Us" (dressed in choir robes), or their send up of local Segway […]

Sara Benincasa, the author of the hilarious (and sometime squeamish-making) Agorafabulous! Dispatches From My Bedroom tells, in unflinching detail, the story of her struggle with anxiety disorder and debilitating agoraphobia. And while Benincasa — a former Warren Wilson College student and now a comedian and writer — doesn't exactly make mental illness seem glamorous, she […]

The last time Philadelphia-based hip-hop dance company Rennie Harris Puremovement was in Asheville was 2005. Seven years is a long wait for the return of virtuosic urban dance. But the company makes its way back to the Diana Wortham Theatre for a two-night run, Thursday and Friday, Feb. 23 and 24. This year marks the […]

"We are a blues/rock explosion in the vein of The Cramps, The White Stripes, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, etc.," writes Austin, Texas band The Ghost Wolves. Even more compelling, the guitar/drum duo (Carley and Jonny Wolf) take their name from their 125-pound arctic wolf-hybrid named Winter, who runs their merch table. They play Jack of […]

"If I lived in Brazil, would you come visit me?" asks Morgan Christopher Geer of Drunken Prayer on "Brazil," the opening track from his new album, Into the Missionfield. First this bit of news: You don't have to. While Geer has been based in Oregon in recent years,  with the release of Missionfield he's officially […]

Murder, drama, action, song and dance: The musical Chicago has it all. Set in the Roaring '20s, the play follows a pair of lady killers (as in killers who are women) — Vaudeville performer Velma Kelly who found her husband and sister in bed together and chorus girl Roxie Heart who took out her lover. […]

While Asheville has a high per capita resident-to-music-festival ratio, there's always room on the calendar for one more. And the inaugural Asheville Improvisational Music Festival won't just be something new, festival-wise: It will bring innovative sounds, compositions and collaborations to the stage at The Magnetic Field. “Improvisation, while often thought of as an exclusively jazz […]

While it's advisable to keep your reading and hiking/gardening/outdoor adventuring separate, The North Carolina Arboretum has cleverly combined boots and books into a two-day indoor-outdoor event in celebration of the Arboretum's 25th anniversary. Presenters include author Peter Loewer (“The Wild Gardener"), writer/naturalist/historian George Ellison, garden/interior designer James Farmer and Patricia Moore-Pastides, First Lady of the […]

Just because it's winter (sort of) doesn't mean it's not hula-hooping season in Asheville. Melanie MacNeil of Asheville Hoops announces two fun-filled hooping events (and even if you can't keep a hoop airborne, you can still get in on these). First, The Hooper's Ball (a benefit for Leaf in the Schools and Streets) takes place […]