There’s only so much you can say about Heart—”Barracuda,” “Crazy on You,” Ann and Nancy Wilson, “These Dreams,” “Alone.” You either have an appreciation for the band’s soft to edgy classic-rock stylings or you don’t. But the cool thing about this particular Heart concert is that it’s at Billy Bob’s…

Five Easy Pieces is one of those polarizing films that cinephiles love to discuss while regular moviegoers are left wondering why they wasted an hour and a half of their lives watching the damn thing (if they even bother to finish it at all). Jack Nicholson plays an oil rig…

Lea Hernandez may not be a household name like Stan Lee, but when tragedy struck the manga-influenced comic book artist of such titles as Killer Princesses and Rumble Girls, her fellow creators leapt to her aid faster than a speeding bullet and didn’t even have to pull on any spandex…

A lot of people complain about how bad classic bands are after they get back together for their umpteenth reunion tour. There’s truth in that, but there’s also the sad fact that some bands can’t reunite for whatever reason—usually dead members—and in their place, the oldies touring circuit gets inundated…

If you’ve had an unexplainable urge for gazpacho lately, it’s because Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown was playing at the Angelika earlier this week, where it was the first installment of Viva Pedro, a Pedro Almodóvar film festival. If you hurry you can still catch the Oscar-winning…

Candlebox? Wow, who’d have thought those guys were still around? Oh, it’s a reunion tour with all original members. Who were the original members? Weren’t they from Seattle? I thought they were leftover metal burnouts who latched onto the whole grunge thing. The only song I can remember off the…

When you think of Chuy’s, two things usually come to mind: the Elvis Platter and the president’s underage daughters getting busted trying to drink margaritas at the Austin location. As Chuy’s celebrates its 18th annual Green Chile Festival, you’ll think of The Cat in the Hat as the chain adopts…

Q Cinema presents the return engagement of Loving Annabelle, the winner of the “Best Lesbian Film” title at last year’s Q Awards. The troublemaking new student at an all-girls Catholic school is Annabelle, played by Erin Kelly; the favorite English teacher who brings out her student’s knack for erotic poetry…

Dazed and Confused is widely regarded as one of the classic stoner films, but that description sells short the wistfully earnest heart of Richard Linklater’s 1993 film about the travails of high school juniors on the last day of school as they experience their first bout of “senioritis.” Dazed and…

Call me crazy, but when I first heard Kenny Chesney married Renée Zellweger, I actually thought they’d last. Not that I put much faith in celebrity marriages, but it just seemed romantic that the Hollywood starlet from Katy, Texas, embraced her rural roots and fell for the “aw, shucks” charms…

The word “hero” gets tossed around a bit too liberally these days, with fictional superheroes on movie screens and actors and ball players getting too much money and fame. The Dallas Historical Society’s new exhibit, Texas Heroes: Courage, Honor & Dignity, honors real people who actually did something to make…

Attending a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert in the 21st century isn’t so much about going to hear the band as it is about experiencing the Lynyrd Skynyrd institution, a cultural celebration of what used to be considered the antithesis of culture. It wasn’t too long ago that shouting “Free Bird!” at…

The idea of an ABBA musical at first sounded like a campy joke, but the Dallas Summer Musicals return engagement of Mamma Mia! is no laughing matter as audiences clamor “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!” and shovel out the money, money, money to see it again. The story, about a young bride…

Few artists have the ability to polarize an audience like Tom Waits. Music critics swear by him as one of America’s greatest songwriters. Most everybody else just marvels at the fact the man who had a broken-glass-on-a-gravel-road voice during his early-’70s heyday (and sounded like he was singing from the…

If in 1993 you scoffed at the notion that the lady singing “All I Wanna Do” was any more than a one-hit wonder, you weren’t alone. But here it is 13 years later and Sheryl Crow’s got a bona fide career. Some claim she slept her way up the charts,…

Few film pundits predicted the aloof little coming-of-age comedy Breaking Away would amount to much. But like its underdog hero, Breaking Away was a serious contender—nominated for five Academy Awards in 1980 (including Best Picture) and winning for Best Original Screenplay. A delightfully daffy Dennis Christopher stars as a recent…

If you’ve ever been to Benihana and marveled at those giant, ugly goldfish swimming around in the pond out front, then you have a lot to learn from the Dallas Koi Kichi Group as it presents its Fourth Annual Koi Show as part of Colleyville’s 50th Anniversary Celebration. The show…

This year’s Austin City Limits music festival lineup was announced last week, but it’s a bit underwhelming compared to last year’s and full of repeat offenders from previous editions. The general consensus for ACL 2006 thus far: “Nah, let’s skip it.”Now that you’re dead-set against Austin City Limits: “the festival,”…

If the idea of attending a regular Jim Brickman concert makes your skin crawl, then the mere mention of a Brickman show featuring nothing but Disney songs such as “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah,” “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” and “When You Wish Upon a Star” should induce panic attacks. If that’s not…

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a decade since Danny Boyle led the charge for Cool Britannia with the surreal and poignant Trainspotting. With an edgy Britpop soundtrack and a hungry cast of unknowns (including pre-Obi-Wan Ewan McGregor), Boyle transformed Irvine Welsh’s slang- and jargon-challenged novel into the…

If you’re a Neil Young fan and your ears still haven’t quit ringing from the last time he played over in Fair Park, then watching his recent concert film Heart of Gold in the sophisticated confines of the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth will definitely be more your speed…

While it’s debatable whether the zany cornball gags of Mel Brooks’ comedies are still truly funny in today’s climate of hyper-cynical jaded irony fests, there’s one staple of Brooks’ comedic oeuvre who’s undeniably a timeless laugh riot: the late, great Madeline Kahn. Sure, she was typecast as the shrill brazen…