Culture
Culture
‘Under The Skin’: A sick, haunting portrait of humanity
In 1964, Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart contextualized the term “I know it when I see it” in the case Jacobellis v. Ohio, stating that when it came to works of obscene media, “I know it when I see it.” I’d argue that this phrase works just as well at identifying works of genius. There’s […]
Culture
‘Roadshow’: exploring the kitsch of the past
Growing up, I often watched Turner Classic Movies, where big-budget musicals from the 1960s, such as Camelot, Hello Dolly!, Oliver! and Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang would air frequently. Movies such as these all feature an overture, intermission and entr’acte, as if they are actually being performed onstage. Biographer Matthew Kennedy studies this type of lavish […]
Culture
‘Phantom of the Opera’ lives up to its grand legacy
One day, while enjoying coffee at Java’s, I was shocked to find an advertisement for a revival of “The Phantom of the Opera,” done by Cameron Mackintosh at Auditorium Theater. I had seen it performed in the Playhouse Square Theater in Cleveland, Ohio five years before and been under the assumption that I would be […]
Culture
Interclass Living Council sponsors concert
As the narrator from “Field of Dreams” states; “if you build it, they will come.” In the case of guitarist Jeff Howard, who opened up a night of musical excellence at UR’s Drama House this past Friday, if he played it, they would come. After a few minutes of playing, Howard’s audience had already met […]
Culture
‘Rambler Channel’: reinventing nostalgia
Like a talking naked mole rat, Disney's tween culture is endearingly repulsive. I would know – at the crux of my own tweendom, lovable and conscientious Cody from "The Suite Life of Zack and Cody" became a go-to model for rendering my crippling fear of authority socially attractive. If Cody taught me anything, it […]
Culture
‘Madame de Sade’: chains, whips, and suffering
In today’s Western civilization, we pride ourselves in the excessive amount of freedom we believe we deserve – but is our extreme freedom one in which morality is applicable, and can freedom have a detrimental effect on the self? In a broad sense, these are the questions that the UR International Theater Program’s new show […]
CT Recommends
CT Recommends: Ibibio Sound Machine – “Ibibio Sound Machine”
Ibibio Sound Machine, a 2014 afrobeat dance collective fronted by Nigerian singer Eno Williams, knows its stuff, but not necessarily in the way you'd expect. The band doesn't do songs with ambitious structures that extend over six minutes. It doesn't have a field day with vocoders and drum machines in the way that's practically expected […]
Culture
Mac Demarco: “Salad Days”
Mac Demarco has to have some of the most obscene stage antics in indie rock. When he’s not smoking Viceroy cigarettes or crafting his self-coined “Jizz Jazz” in his Brooklyn apartment, he’s apparently pretty fond of exposing himself to his fan base-in the most grotesque of fashions. His track “Freaking out the Neighborhood” on 2012’s […]
Culture
Pentatonix: when music tells the story
On Wednesday April 9, Pentatonix (PTX) hit the Buffalo stop on its tour, in honor of its third-year anniversary. For the show, they gave the audience a tour down memory lane. The concert was a stroll along the path that led the group to its place today, covering both elements of the group as […]
Culture
Jesse Denaro: embracing real struggles, finding real answers
Vulnerable, urgent, tender and raucous, Jesse Denaro's "Dear, Love" LP is real. On the album, set to drop May 13, Denaro combines unvarnished rage with delicately voiced 11 chords and the kind of songwriting smarts that made John Mayer's "Room for Squares" so immaculate. Denaro as an artist captures a special sense of balance […]