Cover Story
The eSports phenomenon finds a home in Detroit
The Detroit Renegades are best known by the names on the back of their team jerseys: Hershicals, MrFreshAsian, and the two X2Twins. The four lanky, teenage athletes awkwardly find their spots on stage as laser lights zigzag over their heads from atop the screen. Meanwhile, DJ Invisible hypes an audience of hundreds of pre-pubescent spectators…
‘Guitar god’ Kaki King will perform with the DSO string ensemble at the Cube
Thirteen years ago, guitarist and composer Kaki King landed herself on Rolling Stone’s list of the “new guitar gods,” which went on to say that King was a “genre unto herself” with her incredible emotional dexterity and genre-bending, layered fingerstyle techniques. Since then, she’s maintained the title with various projects. While it has been five…
Detroit Artists’ Test Lab to host free screening of ‘Louder Than Love: The Grande Ballroom Story’
What do Led Zeppelin, Janis Joplin, Pink Floyd, John Coltrane, and the Velvet Underground all have in common? They all once took the stage at the historic Grande Ballroom in Detroit. Though the iconic rock venue located on Grand River Avenue closed its doors in 1972, it has served as a source of music myth…
‘Friends’ gets a musical makeover with parody run at City Theatre
The words “Unagi,” “pivot,” and “we were on a break,” are cemented in the annals of pop culture thanks to a little show called Friends. Fifteen years later and everyone’s favorite gaggle of besties is back and this time with music. The off-Broadway misadventure FRIENDS! The Musical Parody delivers a fast-paced, music-filled romp through the…
Chicago’s Mick Jenkins brings spoken word wisdom to the Shelter
Chicago hip-hop is having a moment. A new generation of diverse storytellers, all equipped with an informed sense of emotional and spatial awareness, are bubbling to the top. Among them is Free Nation’s Mick Jenkins. The young MC made major strides with his sophomore LP, Pieces of a Man, which finds Jenkins throwing down on…
MOCAD unveils winter exhibitions with visual stories from France, Miami, and Southeast Michigan
This year’s group exhibitions deliver works from all over the world and from our very own backyard. From the south of France, Unfurled: Supports/Surfaces showcases work by more than 14 artists created during 1966 through 1976 while the country endured social upheaval. Parallels and Peripheries, an ongoing series originating in Miami, explores art in relation…
Bueller? Bueller? Emerald Theatre Brew and View revisits ‘Ferris Bueller’s Day Off’
For a screenplay that was written in just six days after a one-sentence pitch with a cast of virtual unknowns, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off became the first cinematic how-to guide to playing hooky — not to mention a sightseeing trip through the Windy City. The 1986 John Hughes comedy starring Matthew Broderick as Ferris Bueller…
Minimalist synth lord John Maus returns to Detroit with ‘Addendum’
While a button-up dress shirt, slacks, and a shaggy head of hair might not scream untamed experimental synth performer, John Maus defies his uniform. His wildly expressive, hypogenic, pop-laced, Ian Curtis-esque live performances and his shimmering synth catharsis has helped the 38-year-old forge a cult following. His latest tour follows a year defined by triumph…
Special needs artists shine in ‘Mirror, Mirror’ exhibition at CCS
Since 1994, the Friendship Circle has provided inclusive social and creative opportunities for special needs adults in search of a platform to express themselves. An extension of the organization’s art programming, which also includes restaurant skills and bakery training, is Friendship Circle Soul Studio — which will post up at the CCS Center Galleries through…
French pastry shop Cannelle opens this week in Detroit’s Capitol Park
Birmingham French pastry chef Matt Knio’s second Cannelle location opens on Feb. 1 in downtown Detroit’s Capitol Park. Knio announced the opening on Cannelle’s Instagram page and with signage on the door at the new store, which is at 45 Grand River Ave. across from Lovers Only. Knio has already established himself as one of…
Friends of late musician Johnathan Gogoleski raise money for suicide survivors
Johnathan Gogoleski was the type of musician who could play most any instrument he picked up, and his influences ranged from Black Sabbath to Pink Floyd to Elvis. In fact, as a kid, he used to go to school dressed up as Elvis, and in recent years took the stage with a number of local…
Ale Mary’s in Royal Oak tries out CBD-infused drinks
Updated Feb. 14, 2019: Ale Mary’s and other Metro Detroit restaurants are no longer serving CBD-infused drinks following a crackdown from local health departments. Most folks know it simply as CBD, though the scientific name for it is cannabidiol. To many, it’s the “safe” cousin of THC — it’s a cannabis-derived compound that doesn’t get you…
Yes — a Fyre Festival LARP on Detroit’s Belle Isle is being planned
Updated on 2:44 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 30: The event has officially been banned from Belle Isle. But the producers say the show will go on at a new location. Updated on 7:33 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 29: This post has been updated with comments from the Department of Natural Resources, who say that the…
Icewear Vezzo to celebrate Motown Puma shoe release with Eastpointe meet and greet
Icewear Vezzo knows a thing or two about style, which is why the Detroit rapper is dropping a Puma sneaker exclusive to Foot Locker’s new Eastpointe location. Related The Motown Puma shoe features a splash of royal purple against an all-white sneaker and includes the logos of Icewear Vezzo and Motown Records across the heel.…
Trump jokes about global warming ahead of Midwest polar vortex
As Michigan braces for a blast of bitter cold arctic air to hit the Midwest this week, President Donald Trump took to Twitter to make a joke of the dangerous weather event and also take the opportunity to push one of his favorite conspiracy theories — that global warming is a hoax. “In the beautiful…
Gov. Whitmer declares state of emergency in response to extreme cold temperatures
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has declared a state of emergency in response to the sub-zero temperatures that are expected to hit Michigan this week. On Monday evening, Whitmer signed the state of emergency declaration as a surge of arctic air travels to southeast Michigan, bringing with it negative temperatures and potentially record-breaking windchill temperatures. “Keeping Michiganders…
Get ready to cry — Bon Iver will perform at Detroit’s Fox Theatre
It seems like forever ago that Bon Iver unleashed indie music’s unintentional, yet all-encompassing break-up/make-up album, For, Emma. Since then, frontman Justin Vernon has taken a meandering path down Kanye West Blvd. and a begrudging trek down Eminem Ave. As Bon Iver, however, Vernon has managed to parlay the idea of a “cabin in the…
New report finds Michigan is the most dangerous state in the Midwest for pedestrians
Michigan is the only Midwestern state to be ranked in the top 20 most dangerous states for walking, according to a new report. In the annual Dangerous by Design report by Smart Growth America, an advocacy group that researches urban planning and development, Michigan is ranked the 19th most dangerous state for pedestrians. The ranking…
Packard Plant owners must pay $185,000 in overdue taxes or risk foreclosure
Owners of the historic Packard Plant owe upwards of $185,000 in unpaid taxes from 2016, according to the Wayne County Treasurer’s Office. The news comes just days after the bridge of the historic Packard Plant collapsed onto East Grand Boulevard, causing traffic to be redirected while the remnants of the bridge were removed from the…
Michigan’s Paw Paw Public Schools accused of racial discrimination by ACLU
The culture at Paw Paw Public Schools hurts students of color, the American Civil Liberties Union claims. A “racially hostile educational environment” is how the ACLU described the southwestern Michigan school district best known for its continued use of a Native American name and image as its mascot. After a Freedom of Information Act request…
John Mayer’s body, a wonderland, will visit Detroit as part of summer tour
John Mayer is a man of many…talents. Hailed as a guitar god and a self-proclaimed “recovered ego addict,” the Grammy Award-winning artist is most famous for giving dude-bros anthemic permission to fumble with their dad’s acoustic in an attempt to get laid à la “Your Body is a Wonderland.” Beyond making the cross-over from dreamy popstar to…
Here’s a list of Detroit-area shelters providing warmth during the polar vortex
This week, the Detroit area is bracing for a polar vortex that will bring devastatingly cold temperatures to the midwest region. The blast of arctic air is set to hit the Great Lakes on Tuesday and is expected to last through Thursday. Residents can anticipate the coldest temperatures on Wednesday which are expected to drop…
Mootz Pizzeria and Bar opens in downtown Detroit
Thin crust pizzamaker Mootz Pizzeria and Bar is hosting its grand opening today near downtown Detroit’s Belt Alley. The restaurant is divided up into two components — a full service dining room with a bar, and a small counter with slices for carryout called the Side Hustle. In the latter, the slices are pretty close…
This hilarious Instagram series tells how Rocco’s built an Italian deli in Cass Corridor
View this post on Instagram Last December there were no deli cases. No Italian wines. No sandwiches to speak of. Just a crazy deli dream. As part of our six-month anniversary, feast your eyes on Episode One of the Rocco’s Italian Deli web series! . Tune in next week for Episode Two: A Touch More…
Report: Michigan saw a sharp increase in white supremacist incidents in 2018
It isn’t your imagination — under President Trump, the United States has seen a surge in violent extremist activity. A new Anti-Defamation League study reveals Michigan is among the states that has seen an increase in right wing, white supremacist incidents. The Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism report shows that Michigan saw 69 reported incidents statewide in…
Chef Max Hardy is offering a free River Bistro meal for furloughed workers
River Bistro owner and chef Max Hardy is offering a free dish of Caribbean curry chicken over rice to furloughed government employees who show government identification. The offer is good for dine-in only through Friday evening at the Grandmont-Rosedale restaurant. “We have a lot of wonderful customers who are Federal Government employees that patronized the River…
Watch Jessica Hernandez go gaga over her daughter in new video for ‘Baby’
Given pop music’s track record with the word “baby,” it would be easy to assume that it is almost always in reference to a lover or a seductive term of endearment. For Detroit-native and fierce frontwoman Jessica Hernandez, though, it’s all about her mini. In her first single since becoming a mother, (and her first…
New downtown arena still can’t help Detroit Pistons increase attendance
It looks like a move downtown hasn’t helped the Detroit Pistons fill seats. The Pistons currently rank dead last for the percentage of seats sold out of all 30 NBA teams, selling only 76 percent of seats at Little Caesars Arena. The team fared only a little better in the 2017-2018 season, ranking 29th and…
Detroit’s Marc Evan Jackson invites federal government employees to free comedy show
There is literally nothing funny about President Trump’s petulant pout-fest over a fucking wall that has resulted in the longest government shutdown in U.S. history and has left over 800,000 American’s without a paycheck. But, if you have to laugh about it, Detroit native funny guy, Marc Evan Jackson, and his improv partner Paul F. Tompkins…
Paxahau shares full lineup for Movement Music Festival 2019
The anticipation is over as fans of Movement Music Festival can now revel in the full lineup release for the 2019 event. On Thursday, Paxahau dropped the lineup poster for the three-day festival returning for its 13th year to Detroit’s Hart Plaza on May 25-27. Included in the latest wave of artist announcements is the return…
Watch Benjamin Earl Turner tour Detroit in a truck bed hot tub in ‘JA RULE’ video
Benjamin Earl Turner has redefined the modern day American dream in his latest video “JA RULE,” released Wednesday. “Trying to make that I don’t give a fuck money,” he says. Meanwhile, the 28-year-old appears nude in a frothy hot tub in the back of a teal Mercedes pick-up truck. Turner, who spoke with Detour Detroit…
Detroit’s Packard Plant bridge just collapsed
Updated 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, Jan. 24: A spokesman for Arte Express, the developer that is renovating the Packard Plant, says the site’s long-abandoned pedestrian bridge collapsed from “a preexisting structural issue, due to temperature fluctuations that caused the collapse,” according to The Detroit News. The bridge was jointly owned by Arte Express and the city…
Barstool Sports thinks it knows Detroit based on drone footage
If there’s one thing that’s true about people from Detroit, its that we’re very protective of our city. Sure, we’ll moan and groan about the lack of public transit, the crazy high car insurance, and the fact that the sky seems to be grey for like 5 months out of the year — but the…
New York Times: Joe Biden campaigned for Michigan Republican ahead of midterms
Centrist Democrat Joe Biden campaigned in October for Republican Rep. Fred Upton just ahead of the midterms. Biden, who is considering a 2020 run for the presidency, did so at a time when Democrats were desperate to take control of the House and gain some power to stop Trump. The New York Times reports that…
Beans & Cornbread is bringing back Jim Crow-era shoebox lunches for Black History Month
Southfield restaurant Beans & Cornbread is bringing back its “shoebox lunches” in honor of Black History Month. Like last year, the lunches are served in custom boxes designed to look like the shoebox lunches from the Jim Crow era — a time when black people were banned from eating in restaurants, and had to pack…
Richie Hawtin, Gucci Mane, and more announced for Movement’s Sunday lineup
Movement Music Festival is prepping for its 2019 event with another lineup release to generate excitement around the festival’s return to Hart Plaza. On Wednesday, organizers Paxahau announced the Sunday lineup for this year’s upcoming festival. Included on the bill for Sunday are Movement alumni Richie Hawtin, John Acquaviva, as well as a special b2b…
The Flint Institute of Arts has a new African art exhibition
Dr. Robert Horn says his fascination with African art started when he was a teenager studying art and art history in the 1950s. But the first time he ever purchased African art was when he found a mask from the Senufo culture in a Greenwich Village, New York art gallery in the 1960s. “It was…
Stewart Francke gets political
Stewart Francke is Detroit’s 6 million dollar man. Not in terms of money, although the tunes the metro Detroit singer-songwriter has woven and the emotions he has channeled over more than two decades and a dozen self-financed recordings are priceless to his legion of devoted fans. No, Francke could claim that mantle because, like the…
The Vintage Electronics Expo is still kicking it old-school
Objects older than 25 years old are commonly considered to be “vintage,” which means the annual Vintage Electronics Expo is now, well, that. What originally started as a radio enthusiasts swap meet has now evolved into a love of all things retro and electronic. As smartphone technology has improved, rendering technologies of the past obsolete…
Gretchen Whitmer is fixing the damn marijuana system
A lot of things shifted last week in Michigan on the medical marijuana provisioning center licensing front, and prospects for the marijuana industry in general. At the prompting of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the Medical Marijuana Licensing Board adopted new rules that will allow provisioning centers that still have applications in process to re-open until March…
Savage Love: My husband looks at furry porn
I’m an early-30s hetero woman in a monogamous relationship with my mid-30s hetero guy. We’ve been together 10 years, married seven, no kids. We have a lot of fun — traveling, shared hobbies, mutual friends, etc. We have sex fairly regularly, and it’s not bad. However, his primary sexual fetish and main turn-on is furry…
Review: ‘Stan & Ollie’ pays heartfelt homage to comedy legends
There’s a poignant moment in Stan & Ollie, the tribute to comedy icons Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, when a studio receptionist doesn’t recognize Laurel. Forgetting his name and overlooking his aging face, she refuses to let him see her boss. Though her ignorance is depressing, it’s counterbalanced by the knowledge that this film will…
Grosse Ile uses cameras to track vehicle locations — and it’s not alone
An Electronic Frontier Foundation audit of automatic license plate recognition systems released in late November revealed that police in Grosse Ile have scanned 8.41 million license plates in 2016 and 2017. The location data picked up by the readers was then shared with additional databases on request. Of those scans, 99.92 percent belonged to drivers…
I’ve seen that look before
Once more unto the breach, dear friend, once more. Where to even begin? BuzzFeed’s would-have-been-a-bombshell report that President Donald Trump told Michael Cohen to lie to Congress, or the Special Counsel’s Office’s statement knocking it down? Maybe The New York Times’ story that FBI agents had investigated whether the president was a Russian agent? Or…
Review: Hazel, Ravines and Downtown brings raw power to Birmingham
What’s wrong with trying to be all things to all people? Well, because most people fail at it, that’s why. You know, as they say: Jack of all trades, master of none. Hazel, Ravines and Downtown shatters that saying. It’s an oyster bar, it offers nostalgia, it borrows from eclectic foreign cuisines, it’s trendy —…
Rufus Wainwright brings his music royalty to the 42nd Annual Ann Arbor Folk Festival
Rufus Wainwright is a man of many brooches. For more than two decades, the 45-year-old progeny of folk royalty Loudon Wainwright III and the late Kate McGarrigle has been revered as the rebel prince of “popera,” notably carving out a single throne in a velvet-curtained, gold-leafed corner of the adult-contemporary world. Sharp and shimmering, Wainwright’s…
Checking in with Detroit rapper Sada Baby
Over the past two years, few Detroit artists have risen as fast as Sada Baby. Born Casada Sorrell, the rapper hails from the east side of Detroit and is known for his energetic stage presence and penchant for dance moves. His current hit “Bloxk Party,” released in March, has received more than 34 million views…
Horoscopes (Jan. 23-29)
ARIES: March 21 – April 20 The “old story” has tattooed itself all over your life. At the moment, that residue is fading out to make room for things that have more to do with who you are now. Whatever you had to learn from going through the ringer has made room for a new…
