Madison

The Search for the Perfect Guitar, Part III

"Vintage Silvertone Acoustic guitar," "1977 Dobro Duolian," "Martin 00X1 Auditorium Acoustic Guitar (14 Fret)" are just some of the headlines advertising guitars on Craigslist, but how are you supposed to play them, hear them, feel them? When you order a guitar online, you're missing an important p ... More >>

Lowering Testing Standards is not an Effort to Help Poor Kids. It's a Way to Screw Them.

Story in The New York Times this morning about efforts in the Texas Legislature to cut back testing and course requirements for graduation from high school. If you sort through, most the alligator-tears for poor kids supposedly being pushed to learn too much stuff come from tea party types like stat ... More >>

Beer Dinners and Mardi Gras Events for the Week of February 6 - 12

Thursday, February 7 Bolsa Mercado is reviving Meet & Eat this Thursday. Chef Jeff Harris is creating a dinner in honor of the Meridian, Texas-based Red Caboose Winery, which was recently selected as a Top 10 Hot Brands by Wine Business Monthly. Dinner includes Gulf Coast red snapper, roasted and br ... More >>

The Odd Country Fair Brings Snow Cones and a Drum Line to Bishop Arts Tomorrow

Oddfellows restaurant and Dallas Odd Fellows Lodge #44 are hosting an Odd County Fair on Saturday from noon to 5 p.m. at 7th and Madison streets in the Bishop Arts District. The aim of the fair is to raise money for the Sunset High School marching band to make the trip to national band competition i ... More >>

Mardi Gras Oak Cliff 2012 Promises a Little Workout and Lots of Gluttony

MardiGrasOakCliff.com​With the Super Bowl out of the way, our attention now turns to the next excuse to eat, drink and be gluttonous: Mardi Gras. The non-profit organization Go Oak Cliff is hosting the third annual Mardi Gras Oak Cliff February 18 and 19 with several different events planned ... More >>

303 Bar and Grill is Open in Oak Cliff, and Its Namesake Special Will Eff You Up (Photos)

All photos by Catherine Downes.The 303 special.​303 Bar and Grill opened last Friday, and by the following Sunday afternoon people were packed into the Oak Cliff joint, eating, drinking beer and watching football. The restaurant is located in an old, renovated house on West Davis and Madison; ... More >>

Council Nixes Late-Night SUP For Proposed Greenville Bowling Alley. And That's That.

A conceptual rendering of the proposed bowling alley that will not go in next to Good Records after all​At long last, that proposed Greenville Avenue bowling alley, next to Good Records, just went before the Dallas City Council -- its last hope following the City Plan Commission's gutter ball over ... More >>

And Now a Look at a Former Board of Ed "Expert's" Revisionist History Textbook

​David Barton -- founder of Wallbuilders, former State Board of Education "social studies expert" and member of the Religious Right coalition that prodded Gov. Rick Perry to join the insufficiently Christian Republican field -- isn't exactly what you'd call a rigorous academic. What you might ... More >>

Hairspray: A Spritz of Fun

Wig out on a family friendly adaptation of John Waters' kitschy original.

NASCAR Legend Brings Moonshine to Modern Drinkers

If only grandma's apple preserves came bathed in moonshine​Unless your grandpa is fermenting batches of white lightning in his backyard, you're going to be hard pressed to find authentic moonshine in this neck of the woods. The moonshining, bootlegging culture of Appalachia and the South has ... More >>

Show Announcements: Flaming Lips, Neon Indian, The Orphanage Christmas Party Benefit, Yellow Fever, Reel Big Fish, Aquabats, Kristy Kruger, Junior Brown, Monotonix, Eric Benet & more

The Flaming Lips​The Flaming Lips have been performing in Dallas for over two decades. The last time they came through town, they stopped short just north of Big D, for a headlining performance at the 2010 NX35 Conferette, during which the power blew several times. Hopefully, they won't have as mu ... More >>

An "Impatient" Hunt on Lower Greenville Redo

Patrick Michels​On Tuesday we got a couple of sneak peeks at the Lower Greenville of the future -- meaning, the end of next year, all things go according to plan. Late yesterday, council member Angela Hunt, who's spearheading the streetscaping with Pauline Medrano, posted to her blog a recap of th ... More >>

About That "Chef-Driven" Food Trailer Park in Lower Greenville Rehab Plans

Click for a better look at the food truck lot developers are planning along Lower Greenville Avenue -- if, of course, they get the go-ahead from City Hall.​Over on Unfair Park, we've been covering this morning's announcement that the city's spending $1.3 million to rework two blocks of Lower Gree ... More >>

Slowly, Slowly, the City's Moving Closer to a Plan to "Stabilize" Southwest Center Mall

​It was less than a month ago the city council's Economic Development Committee went behind closed doors with, among others, Office of Economic Development Director Karl Zavitkovsky to discuss what the what to do with Southwest Center Mall. They confabbed for more than an hour and emerged without ... More >>

Refusing to Throw The Beagle a Bone, Plan Commission Ponders Greenville Ave.'s Fate

View Larger MapAs expected, the City Plan Commission's Thursday-afternoon meeting did indeed get just a little contentious when it came time to discuss the specific use permit application for the former Beagle on Lower Greenville Avenue. In fact, it ate up almost half of the 80-minute meeting -- and ... More >>

Away We Go: Dave Eggers' Debut Screenplay is a Staggering Work of Not-Genius

The Von Ehrics Wrestle With Their Identitiy

Good Friday: Les Americains, Black Joe Lewis, Sarah Jaffe, RTB2, Jack With One Eye, Hayes Carll, Joe Ely, Gary Allan,Justin Nozuka, Automorrow, The Golden Boys, Daniel Francis Doyle, The Steps, Salim Nourallah, 100 Damned Guns, Loretta Lynn, Starhead

As national tours go, there's really only so much going on this weekend--as evidenced by the fact that, unless I'm forgetting some, we only previously spread word on three weekend shows already: the Lola's Stockyard show tonight with AA Bondy, Doug Burr and Telegraph Canyon, the Longhorn Saloon show ... More >>

On National Signing Day, DISD Recognizes its Outbound Athletes

Patrick MichelsJames Madison High recruits watch game highlights on an overhead video screen.On this (overhyped?) National Letter of Intent Signing Day, high schoolers all over the country chose which school they'd be suiting up for next. For some, it was as simple as faxing in a signed letter (a mi ... More >>

Gig Alert: Check Out Sleeping in the Aviary at Rubber Gloves Tonight

Yes, the weather outside is indeed frightful but, if you're done shopping, I can't think of anything better than heading to Denton and catching Sleeping in the Aviary tonight. The Madison band's core of Elliott Kozel (guitar/vocals), Michael Sienkowski (drums) and Phil Mahlstadt (bass), recently add ... More >>

Do Not Panic, Expo Park: Bar of Soap Is Not -- Repeat, Not -- Closed

Oscar Overhaul

Film 2007: Missed Opportunities

Kick yourself for not seeing these 10 movies

Old School

DISD trustee Ron Price does everything you expect from a politician. These days that's a problem.

The Parent Trap

Cherokees step in to break up an adoptive family over race

Oscar Overhaul

The Academy--y-a-w-n--Awards desperately need a shot of sports

Piece of Her Heart

My Home, the Hospice

Plus: Green Seeks Greene

Lost in America

Davy Rothbart found Found and other weird things

Dungeons and Drag Queens

CTD revives sweet, raunchy Rocky Horror; Arthur's in the dark in PRT's Camelot

Fretting

"We have mortgages, high cholesterol, and I swear I have arthritis in my fingers. Our sixth CD is due out this summer."

The Weird Girl

Erykah Badu is serious about saving the soul of the city

Money, Honey

That's all the city council cares about in the big debate over downtown development

Reverend Fix-It

Itinerant minister Charles Wilkerson promised to restore two ailing Christian schools to financial health. So why did the patients take a turn for the worse?

Out & About

Rainer Maria and Juno

Big Murk's Kids

Politics and mismanagement closed the books on the city's anti-gang program, but try telling this South Dallas fixture the problem's solved

High Spoons

Bare breasts, a bowl of red, and bad blood among the chili brethren in the Big Bend. Texas doesn't get any better.

Almost Famous

Sex and the City author Candace Bushnell isn't Carrie Bradshaw. Like, really.

Get yer ta-ta's out

Porn and Pimpadelic collide on the Southern devils' first video shoot

Hot and bothered

The city's ordinance governing topless clubs is a joke. But Bachman Lake-area residents are determined to get rid of the clubs by any means necessary.

Hungry girl

The Potted Plant Lady's strange tale of sex, money, and feeding Anna Nicole Smith

Yo, love me

Pimpadelic
Southern Devils (Self-released)

Wild man blues

Hasil Adkins drinks too much, screws too much, and rocks too much

Grow up

A little scuffle between kids turns into a nasty fight between grown-ups at DISD

Meltdown man

John Spano was just a dull, two-bit Dallas businessman before he tried to buy a professional hockey team. Now he's been charged with bank fraud, and his claims of wealth and business prowess are dissolving in the glare of scorching publicity.

Un-rock Star

Fired Pearl Jam drummer Dave Abbruzzese seeks life after fame in North Texas

Case hardened

In the studio and on the road, the education of Hagfish continues

Spouting rubbish

Dallas has run out of recycling excuses