BIRTHING BEAUTIFUL COMMUNITIES brings birth workers to communities of color in Cleveland, where infant mortality rates rank with Third World nations
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| clevescene.com m | May 10 - 16, 2017
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- !9 s 6/,5 - % . O Dedicated to Free Times founder Richard H. Siegel (1935-1993) and Scene founder Richard Kabat Group Publisher Chris Keating
CONTENTS 5PFRONT
Publisher Andrew Zelman Associate Publisher Angela Lott Editor Vince Grzegorek
Frank Jackson goes on the offensive, Jeff Johnson goes on the defensive, plus the convention center needs a new GM
Editorial Managing Editor Eric Sandy Music Editor Jeff Niesel Senior Writer Sam Allard Staff Writer Brett Zelman Writer-at-large Kyle Swenson Web Editor Laura Morrison Dining Editor Douglas Trattner Contributing Dining Editor Rachel Hunt Stage Editor Christine Howey Visual Arts Editor Josh Usmani Copy Editor Elaine Cicora Interns Johnny Cook, Lawrence Neil
&EATURE
'ET /UT
Birthing Better Communities brings birth workers to women of color in Cleveland
Advertising Senior Multimedia Account Executive John Crobar, Shayne Rose Multimedia Account Executive Kiara Davis
All the best things to do this week in Cleveland
Creative Services Production Manager Steve Miluch Layout Editor/Graphic Designer Christine Hahn Staff Photographer Emanuel Wallace
!RT
Business Sales Assistant/Receptionist Megan Stimac Controller Kristy Dotson Staff Accountant Margaret Manzo
The evolution of Deborah Pinter
Circulation Circulation Director Don Kriss Euclid Media Group Chief Executive Offi cer Andrew Zelman Chief Operating Offi cers Chris Keating, Michael Wagner Human Resources Director Lisa Beilstein Digital Operations Coordinator Jaime Monzon
3TAGE
Three women fight over the leftovers of a life in Salvage
www.euclidmediagroup.com
&ILM
National Advertising Voice Media Group 1-800-278-9866, voicemediagroup.com
A Found Footage Fest at the Grog Shop, plus our review of The Wall
Cleveland Scene 737 Bolivar Rd, #4100 Cleveland, OH 44115 www.clevescene.com Phone 216-241-7550 Retail & Classifi ed Fax 216-241-6275 Editoral Fax 216-802-7212 E-mail scene@clevescene.com
$INING
Cleveland Scene Magazine is published every week by Euclid Media Group. Verifi ed Audit Member
An upgrade and a transition in Asia Town, plus a bevy of food tours and another new barbecue joint
Cleveland Distribution Scene is available free of charge, limited to one copy per reader Copyright The entire contents of Cleveland Scene Magazine are copyright 2017 by Euclid Media Group. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission of the publisher is prohibited. Publisher does not assume any liability for unsolicited manuscripts, materials, or other content. Any submission must include a stamped, self-addressed envelope. All editorial, advertising, and business correspondence should be mailed to the address listed above. Subscriptions $150 (1 yr); $ 80 (6 mos.) Send name, address and zip code with check or money order to the address listed above with the title ‘Attn: Subscription Department’
-USIC
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Ronnie Baker talks about the stellar cast on his latest album, a chat with Rocket from the Tombs, plus all the shows to see this week
3AVAGE ,OVE Traps and Triggers
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UPFRONT
THIS WEEK
MAYOR FRANK JACKSON presented a legislative package last week that he said was aimed at improving Cleveland neighborhoods. He said the ordinances (some of them already passed, some of them pending, some of them new) were in keeping with statements he’s made for years about measuring a city’s success by the extent to which all people get to “participate in prosperity.” He planned to introduce much of the package to city council Monday night. “This legislative agenda is about the future of Cleveland,” Jackson said at a press conference the previous Thursday afternoon. “And in that future are neighborhoods and the people of Cleveland. All of this is about how do we move this city forward, move this city into the future.” As the election season heats up — Cleveland’s primaries will be held on Sept. 12 — Jackson’s mayoral challengers contend that the so-called “Healthy Neighborhoods” initiative is a political ploy, presented in reaction to a recurring accusation against him: that he has encouraged downtown development at the expense of Cleveland’s struggling neighborhoods. The legislative agenda, politically motivated or not, represents much more of an investment in neighborhoods than the Quicken Loans Arena renovation. Jackson argued in a Plain Dealer opinion piece last weekend that the Q deal was also an “investment in neighborhoods” — an Orwellian assertion, to be sure. The collection of ordinances allocate funding from a $25-million pot of funds from a $100-million bond issuance two years ago, and from revenue received through the income tax increase passed last year. Jackson thanked Cleveland voters for their support of Issue 32 more than once during his remarks.
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Photo courtesy of clecityhall.com
FRANK JACKSON, ON THE OFFENSIVE, SETS ‘HEALTHY NEIGHBORHOODS’ AGENDA tracking. Jackson also announced the allocation of $17.9 million from the increased tax revenue for the rehabilitation, renovation and/or replacement of portions of rec centers across the city. Councilman and mayoral challenger Zack Reed was
“He literally took stuff from my website. He’s never talked about midnight basketball. Never.” — Zach Reed
The ordinances will focus primarily on economic development and violence reduction. On the economic development side, one ordinance would create mixed-use developments in targeted neighborhoods. Another would allocate funding for home rehabilitation. Another would authorize the economic development director to provide funds to help encourage entrepreneurship and retail in neighborhoods, “where the traditional development model
might not have worked.” Jackson also said that the city would partner with Habitat for Humanity to build 25 new homes. On the violence reduction side, Jackson announced ordinances to accept funding for a Safe Routes to School program, to add money to a “hospital-based violence interruption program,” which would be overseen by the Cleveland Peacemakers, and to partner with Case Western Reserve University for youth violence data
dumbfounded when he heard the remarks, he said, because the new “agenda” felt carbon-copied from his own. “He literally took stuff from my website,” Reed professed. “He’s never talked about midnight basketball. Never.” (Jackson said the city was considering expanding its night basketball program to include more locations.) “And now he wants to rehab houses? All he ever wanted to do was demo, demo, demo,” Reed continued. (Jackson did announce, in addition to the home rehabs, that the city would be contributing $5 million to an existing $5 million fund from other sources for demolitions.) Reed said he read both the legislative summary and media reports and discovered that he and the mayor now seem to have very similar ideas. “The only difference is he’s had 12 years to implement his plan. We’ve
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Josh Mandel, in a video posted to Twitter, tells politicians to “fund Trump’s wall.” No word yet from Mandel’s spokesperson on why he’s making videos for the Mexican legislature.
Massive new Superman exhibit debuts at the Cleveland Public Library. Southpark Mall, meanwhile, plans summer opening of Mall Guy exhibit at Hot Topic.
Aut-O-Rama announces retro summer series on Tuesday nights featuring movies like Animal House. In keeping with the theme, patrons are politely asked to neck instead of make out..
Your boss isn’t buying your excuse that you can do your job in 4 days and take the rest of the week off because that’s how LeBron does it.
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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Jeff Johnson, eyeing the future.
had three weeks to put this together. All we want is four years.” Reed reiterated his campaign slogan, that Jackson has neither the leadership nor the vision to lead Cleveland into the future. But he added two new qualities to the list of Jackson’s deficiencies. “He doesn’t have the energy or the imagination either,” said Reed. Jeff Johnson also found the remarks disingenuous. Where Reed has made violence-reduction (via jobs) the central theme of his campaign, Johnson has hammered “neighborhoods” as his marquee buzzword. “I think it’s totally disrespectful, in the 12th year of his term, for [Jackson] to come out as this champion of neighborhoods,” Johnson said. “My reaction is this is clearly an election year effort to come off as something that he has proven not to be.” Johnson said it’s telling that Jackson waited for an election year to hire an “anti-violence person” (Duane Deskins) and to allocate the $25 million that’s just been sitting around, untouched. “It’s not a coincidence,” Johnson said. “And it’s just not sincere. This is a man I do not recognize. This is Frank Jackson the candidate, not Frank Jackson the Mayor.”
Johnson conceded that some of the ordinances were good ideas, though he argued Jackson was attempting to take credit for existing ideas — the Safe Route to Schools plan, for example, which has been citizen-led for years and expanded lately in response to the murder of 14-year-old Alianna DeFreeze. He said that Jackson has successfully communicated important ideas about neighborhood development as well — “his new [communications] team must be working overtime” — but that the ideas weren’t the problem. “With this administration,” said Johnson, “the problem has always been going from ideas to implementation.” — Sam Allard
JEFF JOHNSON RESPONDS TO CAMPAIGN ATTACKS Jeff Johnson was on the defensive on another issue earlier this week. He released a public Facebook statement Monday saying that recent attacks against him regarding the eligibility of his candidacy would be “defeated soon.” “I have already accepted my past mistakes and the punishment that came with it,” Johnson wrote. “From then on, the Ohio Supreme Court, Cuyahoga County Court and the
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FREE EVENT three stages OF live local and national bands, plus vendors and a complete kid’s zone. Look for beer & craft cocktails on Erie Street, and, of course, ribs from participating downtown Willoughby restaurants & national vendors.
| clevescene.com m | May 10 - 16, 2017
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UPFRONT voters of the two city wards I have been elected to the last eight years have recognized my achievements and given me a second chance. I continue to thank them for that.” Late last month, a resident named Ed Davila filed a challenge with the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections alleging that Johnson was not allowed to hold public office because of his criminal record. Davila cited an Ohio law that bars people convicted of bribery from holding public office. Johnson responded at the time that the charge was without merit and reiterated that position Monday. He was convicted of extortion, he said, not bribery. He did concede, in an interview with WKYC, that neither he nor the city’s law department had ever sought a ruling previously. In an earlier interview with Cleveland.com, Davila didn’t appear persuaded by that defense: “I guess one man’s extortion is another man’s bribery,” he said. The Board of Elections will hold a hearing May 15 to consider the challenge. Johnson’s message to his
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supporters Monday was not only a response to critics of his criminal record, but also a reaffirmation of his “Neighborhoods First” campaign. It was, moreover, an additional rebuke to Mayor Frank Jackson’s “Healthy Neighborhoods” legislative agenda discussed above. “All residents of Cleveland share a desire to live in a city that we feel prioritizes us and respects us as unique and special,” wrote Johnson. “It does not matter to me where you live in Cleveland, or what your race, ethnicity or personal wealth is. What matters is you chose to live in Cleveland, and I am fully committed to you first and foremost. ‘Neighborhoods First!’ is more than a slogan to me. It represents my love and commitment to Clevelanders, and those who support us. You deserve a Mayor fully committed to investing in you, and where you live ... every day, month and year — not just during an election year.” — Allard
PLAY THAT FUNKY MUSIC, WILLOUGHBY ASCAP identified Willoughby Brewing Co. last week as one of nine bars and restaurants nationwide that is broadcasting or playing copyrighted music with neither
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
permission nor payment. ASCAP is one of three main performing rights organizations (PROs). They’re the middlemen between songwriters and platforms that broadcast music (radio stations, Pandora, sports arenas, restaurants, etc.). “The songwriters who write the music really depend to a very significant degree on royalties from public performances of their work,” Jackson Wagener, ASCAP’s VP of Business and Legal Affairs, tells Scene. “That’s something that often gets overlooked.” In the case of Willoughby Brewing Co., they had stopped paying their ASCAP fees a few years back. Wagener says the organization contacted them dozens of times to sort out the issue before terminating their license in May 2016. From that point to the present, a copyright infringement claim could be placed any time a band performed a song written by one of ASCAP’s 600,000 or so members. That’s what happened in December 2016, when ASCAP sent an independent investigator to the brewery to find out if they were still dipping into the ASCAP library. The investigator found three violations: performances of “I Will Survive,” “Just What I Needed” and “Play That
Funky Music White Boy.” Wagener says that Willoughby Brewing Co. paid its unpaid dues up to May 2016 on Wednesday — the same day the civil complaint was filed. He’s hopeful that that indicates an amicable settlement. As of now, Willougby Brewing Co. remains unlicensed by ASCAP. “When you’re using someone’s intellectual property, it’s really the right thing to do to make sure they get paid,” Wagener says. — Eric Sandy
‘GRAY DEATH’ OPIOID BLEND REARS HEAD IN OHIO For a while now we’ve seen overdoses in Ohio continually linked to a combination of heroin and fentanyl. The heroin supply chain is such that, as the drug is trafficked from Point A to Point Z, dealers along the way “step on” the heroin and cut it with fentanyl or a chemical analog. The result is extremely dangerous. Now, police are warning of a blend of opioids, like heroin and fentanyl, being cut with U-47700. It’s been called “gray death” or “gray” (whereas U-47700 on its own is called “pink”). Gray has the appearance of concrete, and it’s been linked to deaths in multiple states.
The drug has been conďŹ rmed in Hamilton County (Cincinnati), and the state attorney general is investigating other possible cases. This latest trend ups the ante on the fentanyl front, one that already had addicts around the U.S. running to drug forums online and issuing “fent warningsâ€? for particular cities. We’ve been told by law enforcement in Summit County that the paranoia surrounding the fentanyl boom has led some users to methamphetamines, which in turn have been showing up in drug busts cut with fentanyl as well. At the same time that police are dealing with gray on the streets, we were told this week that they’re looking toward the OhioPennsylvania border for the next wave. Acryl, another fentanyl analog, has caused several overdoses in western Pennsylvania recently. It’s a
DIGIT WIDGET 40 Homicides in Cleveland in 2017 as of May 8. The most recent victim was 19-year-old Lamont Clinkscales, who was shot in Buckeye-Woodhill Saturday night.
84 Food trucks operating in Cleveland, 16 more than last year. The ďŹ eld has become so crowded that trucks like Umami Moto, MotorMouth and Calzone Zone are cutting bait.
$1,800,000 Projected 2018-2019 deďŹ cit for Parma City Schools, even after signiďŹ cant budget cuts. Nevertheless, voters declined to pass a school levy there last week.
$495 Baseline price for a night at the Christmas Story House, where up to six guests can stay in the third-oor loft space year-round, beginning June 1.
heavy-duty version of fentanyl that’s resistant to Narcan and 100 times more powerful than morphine. —Sandy
GLOBAL CENTER GM GETS QUIET BOOT Mark Leahy’s last day as general manager of the Cleveland convention center and Global Center for Health and Innovation was this past Wednesday. He’d led the $465-million publicly ďŹ nanced facility since a few months after it opened in 2013. There was no public announcement of his departure, nor has a permanent replacement been named. Multiple calls and emails over two days to Dave Johnson, spokesperson for the convention center, were not returned. Cuyahoga County spokesperson Mary Louise Madigan conďŹ rmed Leahy’s departure this past Thursday but couldn’t address speciďŹ cs, including whether he quit or was terminated. Scene has heard from two sources that Leahy was indeed ďŹ red. “Mark Leahy’s contributions to the opening and ongoing operations of the convention center/ global center were many and he will be missed,â€? Madigan said in an emailed statement Thursday afternoon. Sources said friction had developed between Leahy and George Hillow, the executive director of the Cuyahoga County Convention Facilities Development Corp., a non-proďŹ t created by the county to oversee and work with SMG, the company that actually operates the convention center and the 20-percent vacant albatross formerly known as the Med Mart. “Bad management,â€? explained one source who was familiar with the Leahy decision. A recent third-party study that hammered the Global Center for its 20-percent vacancy, calling it an eyesore, didn’t help. While Leahy told the Plain Dealer in late 2016 that he was “very, very pleased with the numbers, very optimistic about the future,â€? and while the convention center exceeded event goals as a whole in 2016, exhibition hall events, the major draws, only tallied 36, which fell 14 short of the goal of 50. The convention center, as all do, continues to lose money, to the tune of millions of dollars a year. Multiple messages to members of CCCFDC went unreturned. — Vince Grzegorek
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
Readers of the PD will have noticed that on Sunday, the Metro section returned. A dedicated local news section is only the most visible of “a whole bunch of changes” at the paper that editor George Rodrigue announced last week “We’ve heard calls for more local news, more investigative reporting, more stories about solutions, more recognition of people doing the right thing, and more help taking advantage of cultural, recreational and educational opportunities,” wrote Rodrigue. “Now, we are rolling out answers to those requests.” In addition to the Metro section, the PD beefed up its investigative staff. Rodrigue announced that Jo Ellen Corrigan (nursing homes), Teresa Dixon Murray (Verizon data overages), Brie Zeltner (public health), and James McCarty (environment) would be joining investigative reporters Rachel Dissell and John Caniglia in various enterprise reporting projects. Reporter Ginger Christ, formerly of the transportation beat, and former arts, home and garden writer Julie Washington will join Zeltner on the health team, along with fitness columnist Zach Lewis. Rodrigue said that some visual changes — more graphs and charts and an enlarged index, for example — would make the news easier to navigate. On the Cleveland.com side, editor Chris Quinn on Monday announced a broad new project called “Greater Cleveland” that will devote five reporters to covering child poverty in Cleveland. It is, according to Quinn, “the most ambitious advocacy project we’ve ever attempted.” The first stories won’t be published for a few weeks, Quinn said, but the digital team’s top reporters, Leila Atassi and Mark Naymik, are both attached. The reporting team spent time volunteering at Boys & Girls Club of Greater Cleveland to get to know their sources, Quinn said, and will remain as volunteers through the process, which, he acknowledged, is an “unprecedented dynamic”. Cleveland.com hopes to form a community advisory panel that would meet bi-monthly to talk about
the project’s progress and other questions. All subjects will remain anonymous, as to do “no harm” to the children whose stories they’re following. “We have two over-arching priorities with this project,” wrote Quinn. “One is that everything we do be aimed at helping the children. The other is that we do no harm. We are not going to do anything that might hold our story subjects up to ridicule, and not using their names will spare them from anyone so cruel as to blame them for their poverty.” — Allard
FEDERAL JUDGE RULES AGAINST ARMY CORPS IN DREDGING DISPUTE U.S. District Court Judge Donald Nugent ruled last Friday against the Army Corps of Engineers in a years-long dispute about the placement of material dredged from the Cuyahoga River. The Army Corps, which performs the annual dredging, has wanted to dispose of the sediment directly into Lake Erie. That method is cheaper than dumping the sludge in confined disposal facilities, but critics like the Ohio EPA and the Port of Cleveland say there is room in the CDFs and dumping the polluted sediment in the open lake is environmentally unsafe. Nugent agreed. “The Corps does not have the authority to simply disregard or eliminate any requirements or restrictions it is subject to by statute or by its own properly enacted regulations,” Nugent wrote in his decision. “The attempt to do so can indeed be considered arbitrary and capricious, unlawful, and/or in excess of its delegated authority.” The Army Corps was in violation of the law when it delayed its dredging, Nugent wrote, and must now pay for CDF disposal. The Corps has already done so for 2015, but would have been reimbursed if Nugent ruled in their favor. “The Port of Cleveland is pleased with the ruling,” Port president and CEO Will Friedman wrote in an emailed statement to Scene, “which we hope provides final resolution on the law regarding proper disposal of Cuyahoga River sediment.” Officials from the Ohio EPA and Cuyahoga County were also pleased with the decision. — Allard
scene@clevescene.com t@clevelandscene
Photo by Tim Harrison
FEATURE BIRTHING BEAUTIFUL Cleveland’s infant mortality rate, especially among African-Americans, ranks as poorly as Third World nations. Christin Farmer and her team are bringing birth workers to communities of color to help solve the problem By Sam Allard THE NON-PROFIT BIRTHING Beautiful Communities is housed in a two-room suite on the secondfloor of the Agora Complex at Euclid Avenue and East 55th. It looks like a cross between a yoga studio, a daycare center and a community development corporation. BBC was founded three years ago by a woman named Christin Farmer. Armed with a “super small grant” ($4,200) from Neighborhood Connections and a team of volunteers, Farmer set out on a mission: providing education and care to area women of color during their pregnancies. The mission was critical. Cleveland has long suffered the ignominy of infant mortality rates equal to (and in some neighborhoods, in excess of) Third World nations. And while the region’s leaders have devoted increased funding and attention in recent years — the establishment of the First Year Cleveland initiative was aimed specifically at curbing infant mortality rates — the problem persists and worsened. In 2015, the Ohio Department of Health released an alarming report that showed mortality rates had risen that year, and that black babies were dying at three times the rate of white babies.
Christin Farmer (Second from right) and part of her team.
Christin Farmer ran the Greater Circle Living program at University Circle Inc. from 2011 to 2016. She was born and raised in Hough and currently lives in Glenville, the adjacent neighborhood to the east. Sitting at a desk across from a multicolored playmat earlier this month, Farmer told Scene that BBC grew out of her own fascination with and passion for prenatal care — she’d wanted to be a nurse-midwife since she was a teenager, when a reality show upended the stereotypical hysterics of birth she’d seen on TV until that point — and out of a dire community need. When Birthing Beautiful
Communities first started, Farmer said, the ambitions were small: She’d planned to host a series of workshops in Glenville about healthy pregnancies and birth outcomes. “We did a baby belly retreat,” Farmer said. “We did a movie night. We did a baby-wrapping event. And we did something for the dads — a pop-up event at a local restaurant to talk about their experiences around infant mortality and loss.” The workshops were an enormous success, Farmer said, and it so happened that the Cleveland Foundation was looking to direct funding toward lead poisoning and infant mortality programs in
response to high-profile community health problems. They decided to fund a pilot program in Hough that would to train five to 10 women as doulas — birth workers who assist mothers before, during and after delivery. Farmer said that the doulas provide social (not medical) support during labor and delivery, and are friends and advocates until the end of the “fourth trimester,” when a child celebrates its first birthday. (And sometimes long after.) At the State of the County Address last month, Farmer appeared in a video that explained the work of her organization. She said that over the past 18 months, | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
WE WENT OUT WHEN YOU COULDN’T. CATCH UP ON LAST NIGHT WITH SCENE’S EVENT SLIDESHOWS. ONLY AT CLEVESCENE.COM SCENE
BBC doulas have attended 70 births with no infant deaths. The goal of BBC, as relayed in the video and in a later interview, was to utilize a “village approach,” where an expectant mother is “part of the family” and BBC is part of hers. “I’m always a little shocked when people say, ‘Christin, this is so innovative,’” Farmer told Scene. “I’m like, ‘I guess maybe it’s retroinnovative. Women supporting women? This is nothing new.’” BBC receives its funding through the Ohio Department of Medicaid, via First Year Cleveland, and through grants from the Cleveland Foundation and GUCCHI, the Greater University Circle Community Health Initiative. BBC finished a training session in March and certified nine new community birth workers. It was a comprehensive training that included all nine components of BBC’s holistic training model, a model that doesn’t focus exclusively on the pregnancy. Farmer said that there are a number of factors that can affect a woman’s birth outcome, and many of these factors are particularly acute in communities of color. In fact, one of the big reasons Farmer felt compelled to start BBC was because of the observable lack of black birth workers in the region. This was in spite of the fact that Cleveland is home not only to the Cleveland Clinic and University Hospitals, but one of the country’s seven nurse-midwifery programs, at Case Western Reserve University. “It’s a disparity,” said Farmer. “And considering the fact that low birth weight and infant mortality disproportionately affect AfricanAmerican women … I don’t know if you want to use the term ‘appalling’ or just ‘ridiculous.’” But having doulas of color makes a difference for expectant mothers in the black community, Farmer said. The city’s lack of black birth workers has resulted in a lack of cultural care and sensitivity at the major health institutions. “In the black community, we often have to resort to our own organizations and circles, so that we can ensure that we get the care that we’re most comfortable with,” she said. “That’s why all of BBC’s training and classes have a cultural context to it.” Farmer was a first-generation college student. She attended
Kent State University and initially enrolled in the nursing program. She found the curriculum — and the college lifestyle — much more rigorous than she’d anticipated and ended up switching majors. But her birth work continued informally and on a volunteer basis as she prepared to re-apply to midwifery school later in life. “When I wanted to form [BBC], I literally couldn’t find any black doulas in Cleveland,” Farmer said. She sent out messages on Facebook and said that “slowly but surely,” she met a couple of them. “Ironically, we all lived in the same neighborhood.” They discovered that they had all already been serving women on a volunteer basis. This led to another emergent issue that Farmer (with her experience in community development and her abiding interest in bridging the gap between economics and health) thought was important to address: the inability to make a comfortable living in birth work, especially serving the African-American community. “The women who can’t afford a doula are the ones who are more likely to need a doula,” Farmer said on that issue. That’s why an additional component of BBC is training women who ultimately work on a contract basis for the organization. Many of the organization’s clients go on to train as doulas because of their positive experience, which is why the “village” analogy is especially apt. Doulas are paid $20 per hour and can spend upwards of 100 hours with women who need the most support — the lowest income clients with limited family support and low access to nutrition and transportation. (Farmer said that traditional doulas may charge anywhere from $500 to $2,500 just for their presence during the delivery and for a couple of prenatal visits.) The BBC doulas are much more engaged in the life of the pregnant mother, focusing not only on the physical health but on the emotional and mental health of the client as well. “For many of these women, they finally find a place of acceptance,” Farmer said, “where they can talk to people who know what they’ve been through and who can relate to them. It’s a sister circle. It’s a village, and everyone has a role.”
sallard@clevescene.com t@scenesallard
Photo by Tim Harrison
FEATURE
Amy Lomis, Denise Barone, and Beverly Haettich
MAY FLOWERS Three Northeast Ohio mothers recount the pain of giving their children up for adoption, and the journey toward reunion many years later By Eric Sandy
FOR YEARS, BEVERLY HAETTICH’S HUSBAND gave her a single red rose at Christmastime. It was a nice gesture, she says, especially because Robert wasn’t otherwise the flower-giving type. Then, one year, Christmas passed without a rose. She asked why, and Robert finally revealed that the rose had been meant to symbolize the missing part of their family, their daughter who had been given up for adoption decades earlier. It was a painful time, the adoption, and Haettich says that it probably would have just made her cry if
she’d known the meaning behind the rose all those years. A few months before that revelation, Haettich got a phone call at work. After a long search for a daughter born in 1966, Adoption Network Cleveland had helped fi nd her. “I was so excited I could hardly stand,” she says. “I felt like I just
had a baby.” This is one of Adoption Network Cleveland’s hallmark missions: reuniting birthparents with their adopted children. There’s no cookiecutter formula to it, and no two stories are exactly alike; adoption is an emotional and often very difficult experience for all involved. For more than two decades after her first daughter was born and then given to an agency in Indiana, Haettich lived with the mindset that she simply mustn’t think about it. For a while, the very thought of searching for her daughter compelled feelings of guilt. “I had been told always, ‘Don’t think about
it. Don’t do anything,’” she says. At the hospital, in 1966, Haettich was given a Polaroid picture of her and the baby girl. She never told anyone about that photo, and she kept it hidden in a drawer for decades. Now and then, she’d take it out and quietly contemplate the path not taken. It was Haettich’s 16th birthday when that path was set — her mother broached the looming subject and asked if she was pregnant. “It was a horrible day for me,” she says. “They didn’t want to talk about it.” The environment in the 1960s was not great for unwed mothers, | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
15
Photo by: Denny Petkovsek / Instagram: @inthe216
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FEATURE “My parents came and picked me up and there wasn’t a word spoken. I think that’s what was so hard about this: You just live with this eating at you the whole time.” — Beverly Haettich
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
especially those living in the more cloistered Midwest. Cultural norms were unkind, treating unwed mothers like black sheep. Haettich’s parents channeled that feeling in the language they used to talk about the pregnancy: “How could you do this to us?” Before long and without any debate, Haettich was sent to Fort Wayne, Indiana, where she lived for three months at the Woodhaven Home for Unwed Mothers. It was a low-slung, church-looking building that housed more than 40 unwed mothers during the time she was there. Woodhaven was so crowded that Haettich had to sleep on a rollaway bed and share a closet with another girl. The time was spent laboring from day to day: cooking, cleaning, inventorying various items around the home. “We were kept busy,” Haettich says. They didn’t go to school, and what should have been her junior year passed by silently back home. The birth of her daughter was a painful day spent in shock, signing papers and, briefly, stopping for a photo with the baby. “[My parents] came and picked me up, and there wasn’t a word spoken,” Haettich says. “I think that’s what was so hard about this: You just live with that eating at you the whole time. Even after my husband and I married, it was very hard for us to talk about it.” The following year, Haettich’s best friend and next-door neighbor suddenly disappeared. She was pregnant, and her parents had sent her away as well. But that, of course, isn’t what they told people: They told Haettich’s parents they had sent their daughter to ballet camp. “I thought, well, that’s strange,” Haettich recalls. “We were both dancers. Why wouldn’t she
have mentioned this to me?” And that same sense of confusion and guilt compounded privately as Haettich grew up. Many women in Northeast Ohio were in the same position, all carrying different versions of the same grand narrative. Many, but certainly not all, had been secreted away like Haettich; that was just what was done in those years. But Haettich didn’t have that catharsis of community until she introduced herself to them. It was her husband who encouraged her to go to meetings with Adoption Network Cleveland when the group formed in the late 1980s, and there she found a community that felt much the same way she did. She cried through those meetings for the first few years. There’s a sense of community, but it’s not always a pleasant feeling. It’s difficult. It’s a reckoning, and all along, the network was doing what it could to help reunite birthparents and children, to ease the pain of an unlived history. When the call came for Haettich, everything changed. The woman she met was admittedly a stranger when she and Robert visited their birthdaughter at a third-party friend’s house in Indiana, where she lived. The first question the grown woman asked Haettich that day was a direct and painful one: “Why did you give me away?” The only answer, dwelt on for a generation and part of a longer, more involved story: “I had no choice.” They sat and talked for a while about that. In the ensuing 20-plus years, the couple has seen their birthdaughter about once a year. They’ve brought the daughter they raised, too, and even her children. “We’ve just had some grand times there,” Haettich says.
Adoption Network Cleveland has been at the forefront of addressing the unmet needs of adoptees, birthparents and adoptive parents since its founding as a shoestring volunteer group in 1988. Executive director Betsie Norris, herself an adoptee, molded its mission as adoption grew from a “simple legal event” often kept hidden from view to a more open and widely discussed part of American life. At various times, the Network has led the vanguard in untangling an adoption “crisis,” by pushing for policy changes and new laws. In 2013, state legislators approved a law that allowed adoptees born in Ohio between Jan. 1, 1964, and Sept. 17, 1996, to request their adoption file held by the Ohio Department of Health — if their birthparents didn’t specifically block that access, which is rare, but nevertheless a policy that had been a thorn in the side of advocates pushing for all-in open access. That 32-year span covers some 400,000 people. Those born before 1964 already had access, as did those born in late 1996 and on, but for years state law blocked anyone born in the interim from accessing their birth records.
In fact, Norris’ own adoptive father, Brad Norris, was a well known attorney who originally helped lobby for the 1964 law that sealed adoption records. As the years wore on, she says, he came to regret that effort and began encouraging lawmakers to change it. When lawmakers finally did so with the 2013 bill, it signaled a tidal shift in states opening up adoption records — with that caveat that birthparents may preemptively shut it down. “For better or worse, Ohio probably set a precedent,” Norris says, “in that some legislators want to take a conservative view, and they don’t want to just make the records completely open without giving birthparents the chance to redact.” Pennsylvania and Arkansas, for example, recently passed laws similar to Ohio’s. And so the matter of birthparents and adoptees coping with their paths — and attempting to connect loose ends in their lives — remains a situation in need of assistance. And even with therapeutic meetings and fellowship, the yearning to reunite, for many, is strong. Often enough, adoptees begin trying to pierce the void in earnest as they
approach adulthood and need valuable insight into their medical history. With the advent of online forums, those private searches found a sliver of hope in desperate pleas: “I was adopted out of Lucas County in 1977. I was born to a high school mother in Toledo Hospital. Looking for any information that might help me find my birth family.” “Looking for my sister who was given up for adoption. My mother resided in Ohio until 1962. She had a baby girl in late June 1960; between the 21st -25th.” The 2013 bill gave a more direct path.
The reunion, for many, is an experiential crest. It’s a moment when the past and future fold inward, bringing divergent life paths together and forging new, sometimes unexpected bonds. Highland Heights resident Denise Barone reunited with her son decades after his birth. For her, it was the good sort of bond that emerged from that moment. Barone recalls Adoption Network Cleveland’s Linda Schellentrager bringing her a folder on the night
of her daughter’s Baccalaureate mass. She opened the folder and a profound wave of realization hit her: It was her son’s name, photo and a handful of identifying information — enough for a Facebook search. Floored with emotion, she tucked the details away and went off to the mass that evening. On Facebook, she stumbled onto a photo of her son and his family standing in front of a newly purchased home — with the address clearly visible. She sent a letter to say that she had been looking for him, offering only non-identifying information in case he hadn’t wanted to pursue the thread any further. Her son found the letter addressed to a name that no one called him, a name long left behind in his personal story; he was stunned, and immediately began piecing together his own online search for who could have sent it. Barone waited to do anything more until that fall, after she had sent her daughter off to college. She told her husband the news, and confided in a best friend, but otherwise kept the development private. Only in the fall did she really reach out with an email. (His reply went to her spam folder, and
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she missed it for a few days while she was traveling with a friend in Chicago. He happened to be in Chicago too, but Barone didn’t realize that until she got home.) They eventually set a time to talk on the phone, and a cathartic, positive conversation ensued. “It was just amazing,â€? she said, which led ultimately to a trip out West to actually meet him. “We talked for days and days and days.â€? She had begun her search many years prior through Westside Catholic Charities at a time when she could only receive nonidentifying information about the adoptive family. From there, she found herself regularly thinking about her son: where he was, how he was doing, what sort of young man he was growing up to be. She says she was always scanning faces of children in crowds. By the time he would have been 14 or 15, Barone was using the nascent internet’s search functions to do anything in the name of ďŹ nding him. Meeting with other women at Adoption Network Cleveland,
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— Denise Barone she said, helped nudge her in a more concrete direction toward addressing the painful missing piece in her heart and toward ďŹ nding resolution. “Those girls who got sent away: They’re my heroes,â€? Barone says. “I thought I had it rough; I can’t even imagine what they went through.â€? Barone’s experience in the late ’70s differed somewhat from Haettich’s experience a decade earlier. While Barone wasn’t sent away, she did ďŹ nd her pregnancy stamped with a stigma, and a pervasive silent treatment among friends, family and classmates. “It never comes up,â€? she says of that time. “No one talks about it.â€? “There are a lot of hurts and anguish in reliving that time in your life,â€? Barone says. “It is really,
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FEATURE
“There are a lot of hurts and anguish in reliving that time in your life. It is really, really difďŹ cult, because it’s never a happy time. No one looks back on it fondly.â€?
really difďŹ cult, because it’s never a happy time. No one looks back on it fondly. ‌ But you have to go back and revisit a lot of those hurts, and it’s all through your life. I’m not sure it’s over yet, but I’m better everyday. It’s been a gift.â€?
For Willowick resident Amy Lomis, her story plays out in a different era in the history of adoption in the U.S. By the 1990s, the perception of unwed mothers’ pregnancies had thankfully tempered, and Lomis says that her family was entirely supportive of her throughout her experience at age 14. But it was still a singularly unique experience few around her completely understood. “I always thought of it as a
positive experience,� she says. “And then I went to the birthmothers support group and they started saying things that I thought throughout the years but was too afraid to say anything. They were speaking a language that I didn’t know. I cried the whole time.� She says that interacting with Adoption Network Cleveland was more of a “clarifying� process than a negative one. Her daughter was born and placed for adoption in 1994. She says that her parents remembered the era of young women being sent away, like Haettich, but that counseling and communication urged them toward a more supportive parental role. “Ever since we made that decision — we’re going to stay in our community and face it — it started to be a very positive thing,� Lomis says. “They were very supportive of my decision. My parents said, ‘This has to be your decision.’� Lomis says Citizen Pie her experience was far different than women who were pregnant in earlier eras. Her own adoption process began with an “open adoption,� one in which the adoptive parents, the adopted child and the birthmother
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are all able to communicate and together to host an event on the know one another. “We thought we Saturday before Mother’s Day, and could be a part of her life and add then they workshopped that idea to her life, so that she would know with groups like Adoption Network that we didn’t do this because we Cleveland. didn’t want her, that we didn’t For years now, their behind-theabandon her,” Lomis says. For the scenes work has quietly changed first year, Lomis agreed to photos the landscape of thousands of lives and letters once a month. Later, in Northeast Ohio and elsewhere. that became an annual event for It’s a monumental thing to hear the her and her daughter. stories of families reunited, and to It worked well for a while, but know that, often enough, others her daughter’s life was unfolding never find that sense of wholeness, mostly out of of closure and sight. Personal progress. obstacles in her In many family came up ways, too, that eventually closure isn’t led her adoptive as final as it parents sounds. to cease “I laid in communication bed for weeks,” when her Lomis says daughter was of the time 5. Sometimes, following things change, her first and there’s no pregnancy. “I Betsie Norris real Ohio law was just so to prevent that. sad. It was Later, her birthdaughter’s really tough, but my parents gave parents got back in touch me that time to grieve, which and reestablished the open I think was good and healing. communication with Lomis. They Again, I was 14. Looking back on were fully reunited by the time her it I can see these things. But at daughter turned 16; she attended the time I didn’t really know what her daughter’s high school I was going through. It was very graduation. scary at some points. For years, The ups and downs of Lomis’ I struggled. I went to school, I experience, even with the backdrop played sports, I kinda went on with of a supportive family, led her to life, but there was always a piece of seek volunteer work with Adoption my heart missing.” Network Cleveland, where she fell She says that the Birth Mother’s into the world of birthmothers’ Day ceremony is so special to her many and varied experiences. because it does reflect the different As she says, there’s a language role she plays, compared with all its own for women who’ve Mother’s Day on the following traversed that territory, language Sunday. And, she adds, there that sometimes doesn’t translate remains a sense of loss that needs well into more common societal tending. conversations. Birthmothers from Northeast “There were some people who Ohio and beyond are welcome. The would say things like, ‘How could event takes place from 11 a.m. to you give up your own child?’” 1:30 p.m., on Saturday, May 13, Lomis says. It’s a stigma that at Lakewood Women’s Pavilion in persists on some level to this day, Lakewood Park. for birthmothers everywhere. The ceremony is, of course, very emotional. “We’ve tried to not be overly positive or overly negative, This weekend’s Birth Mother’s if that makes sense,” Norris says. Day ceremony will crystallize those “There’s grief involved, and it’s a stories and more. hard thing. But you don’t want to “It’s such a touching thing wallow in the grief and not have and such a common theme that hope, either. The ceremony strikes we hear from birthparents: that a nice balance of acknowledging their parenthood isn’t necessarily the grief and also acknowledging acknowledged,” Norris tells Scene. the hope and joy.” “It’s a very organic program. The birthmothers organize the program and lead the program.” esandy@clevescene.com The event originated in Seattle @EricSandy in 1990. Birthmothers there got
“There’s grief involved, and it’s a hard thing. But you don’t want to wallow in the grief and not have hope, either.” —
t
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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PRESENT:
The 6th Annual
DOWNTOWN WILLOUGHBY
RIB BURN OFF
Saturday May 20, Noon-11p
SUNDAY May 21, Noon-8p
MAY 26, 27 & 28
Presented by DTW Bar & Restaurant Association & SCENE
Presented by Flats East Bank & SCENE
DTW RIB BURN OFF
TASTE OF SUMMER
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In its 6th year, this event has become the most anticipated event to take place in Downtown Memorial Day weekend is the unofficial kickoff to summer and Taste of Summer is the perfect Willoughby. This two-day event is going to rock this town with three stages featuring live opportunity for people to get outside and enjoy the weather. This event will feature food, local music, plus vendors and a complete kid’s zone plus beer & craft cocktails, and, of course, ribs music, craft cocktails, beer, local vendors, Cavs and Indians on the big screen and activities for all from participating Downtown Willoughby restaurants & national vendors. ages.
Saturday, May 20 Noon-11p & Sunday, May 21 Noon-8p @ Downtown Willoughby
May 26-28 @ Flats East Bank A SCENE MAGAZINE EVENT
Tickets On Sale Now!
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Presented by SCENE
Presented by SCENE
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VAN AKEN BEER GARDEN
BEST OF CLEVELAND PARTY
ALEFEST
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SCENE Magazine presents the third annual Van Aken Beer Garden in Shaker Heights. The second Friday of each summer month we will celebrate the season with music, food, beer, wine, cocktails, retail vendors, and activities for the kids. Admission is free and this event is bike and pet friendly.
You nominated your favorite people and places, where to go for that perfect bowl of pho, the bartender who makes the perfect drink, your favorite sports player and much more. These were then narrowed down, voted upon and now we get to celebrate all of those named the Best Of Cleveland for 2017! Enjoy craft cocktails + music while meeting some of our Best Of winners for this year. Let's celebrate what makes Cleveland the place we call home.
The 9th Annual SCENE Magazine Ale Fest will feature over 100 beers from around the corner to around the globe. The celebration is packed with your favorite porters, stouts, pilasters,ales, wheats, Belgians, ciders, and lagers just to name a few. Ale Fest has live music, interactive games, food booths, local vendors and more.
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
everything you should do this week
GET OUT WED
05/10
FILM
Alone in Berlin Alone in Berlin, a 2016 drama by director Vincent Perez, centers on a working-class couple living in Berlin in 1940. In the wake of the death of their son, they secretly begin an anti-Hitler campaign. Inspired by a true story, the movie makes its Cleveland theatrical premiere tonight at 7 at the Cleveland Museum of Art, where it shows again at 7 on Friday night. Tickets are $9, $7 for CMA members, students and seniors. (Jeff Niesel) 11150 East Blvd., 216-421-7350, clevelandart.org. SPOKEN WORD
Cleveland Stories Dinner Parties Cleveland Stories Dinner Party is a weekly series that pairs fine food with storytelling. Through it, the folks at the Music Box Supper Club hope to help raise awareness of the mission of the Western Reserve Historical Society’s new Cleveland History Center. The goal of the Cleveland Stories Dinner Party is to “bring to life some of the fun, interesting stories about Cleveland’s past — from sports, to rock ’n’ roll, to Millionaires’ Row,” as it’s put in a press release. Admission is free, with no cover charge, although a prix fixe dinner, designed to complement the night’s theme, is $20. Doors open at 5 p.m., dinner is served at 6, and the storytelling starts at 7. Tonight, Joe Crea, the food and restaurant editor at the Plain Dealer, will discuss the rise of Cleveland’s food scene. The menu includes cream of mushroom soup, Salisbury steak and pierogi, and Napoleon puff pastry. (Niesel) 1148 Main Ave., 216-242-1250, musicboxcle.com. THEATER
Twelfth Night When a violent shipwreck separates Viola from her boat and twin brother, she washes up on Illyria, an exotic island. She disguises herself as a boy messenger and tries to pass herself off as a native. That, in a nutshell, is the plot of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. And like many of the Bard’s plays, misplaced affections and misunderstood intentions come into play. The National Theatre’s
The Hooley returns to Westpark. See: Saturday.
version of the play shows at 7 tonight and at 11 a.m. on Sunday at the Cedar Lee Theatre. Tickets are $20. (Niesel) 2163 Lee Rd., Cleveland Heights, 440-528-0355, clevelandcinemas.com.
original compositions. Tickets are $33 to $35, or $30 to $40 for CMA members. (Niesel) 11150 East Blvd., 216-421-7350, clevelandart.org.
THU
05/11
LUNCH
Walnut Wednesday Walnut Wednesday is one of summer’s great traditions. Today from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Perk Plaza at Chester Commons — at East 12th and Walnut streets — food trucks gather to serve up lunch to area residents and employees. Follow the Downtown Cleveland Alliance on Facebook for weekly updates on vendors, entertainment offerings and more. Admission is free, but the food will cost you. (Niesel) downtowncleveland.com. MUSIC
Brandee Younger and Courtney Bryan Tonight at 7:30 at the Cleveland Museum of Art, you can catch a performance by harpist Brandee Younger and pianist and composer Courtney Bryan. Part of the museum’s noteworthy performing arts series, the musicians will present an evening of the music of Alice Coltrane along with Younger’s
ART
Distinguished Voices: Lynne Tillman and Adam Pendleton Currently on view in MOCA Cleveland’s Mueller Family Gallery and Rosalie + Morton Cohen Family Gallery, Adam Pendleton’s Becoming Imperceptible includes dynamic wall-based graphic vinyl installations, a multichannel film installation, ceramic floor sculptures and framed silkscreens printed on mirror. The exhibition’s title comes from the writings of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari who claim that “to go unnoticed, is by no means easy.” Becoming Imperceptible explores and re-contextualizes African, American and European aesthetic and cultural movements, including historic art movements such as Dada and Minimalism, as well as contemporary social concerns such as Black Lives Matter. From 7 to 10 tonight, MOCA Cleveland hosts Distinguished Voices: Lynne Tillman and Adam Pendleton. Joining Pendleton for this
special conversation is acclaimed writer and critic Lynne Tillman, a Guggenheim Fellowship recipient with an influential career spanning more than 30 years. Moderating the discussion will be MOCA senior curator Andria Hickey. Tickets are $12 or free for MOCA Cleveland members and students with valid IDs. (Josh Usmani) 1400 Euclid Ave., 216-421-8671, mocacleveland.org. MUSIC
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Franz Welser-Möst conducts the Cleveland Orchestra tonight at 7:30 at Severance Hall as it takes on Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. With its lush melodies, the piece captures the magic of the world that Shakespeare created in his famous play. Renowned Israeli actor Itay Tiran and members of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus will be on hand too. Guest speaker Francesca Brittan, an assistant professor of musicology at Case Western Reserve University, will give the pre-concert talk, “Musical Magic Onstage,” an hour before the show. Performances also take place at 8 on Saturday night and at 3 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets start at $29. (Niesel) 11001 Euclid Ave., 216-231-1111, clevelandorchestra.com. | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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GET OUT ART
Tea Taste Democracy and Upside Down Objects Based in Brooklyn, New York, Yoko Inoue has been Spaces’ SWAP artist in residence for the past few months; her residency is up on May 12. During her time in Cleveland, Inoue has researched the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Japanese collection, particularly pertaining to former director Sherman Emory Lee. The museum’s longtime director was a “Monuments Man” in Japan during the post-WWII occupation and did important work in the protection and inspection of Japanese artwork, artifacts and cultural properties. Inoue’s exhibition, Tea Taste Democracy and Upside Down Objects, juxtaposes Lee’s scholarly understanding of Japanese cultural identity against the widely circulated kitsch figurines stamped “Made in Occupied Japan” and sold to America’s middle class as home decor. As part of the exhibition, Inoue has worked with the Cleveland Institute of Art’s ceramics department to create a series of figurines that question these objects’ contemporary value and relevance. Learn more from the artist herself from 6:30 to 8 tonight as Spaces hosts an evening with the artist. Admission is free. (Usmani) 2900 Detroit Ave., 216-621-2314, spacesgallery.org.
FRI
media and illustration. Opening with a free reception from 6 to 10 tonight, the exhibition remains on view through May 28. Tonight’s festivities include refreshments and music. (Usmani) 3910 Lorain Ave., 216-309-1090, canopy-collective.com.
“Rolling Stone is not just about music, but also about the things and attitudes that the music embraces.”
NEW EXHIBIT
ART
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ART
In Conversation: Diana Tuite and Alex Katz At a time when abstract expressionism dominated the international art market, Alex Katz explored abstraction with recognizable imagery by reducing his compositions to their most fundamental elements: line, form and color. In hindsight, these compositions foreshadowed the rise of pop art in the 1960s. BrandNew & Terrific: Alex Katz in the 1950s is currently on view in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation Hall through Aug. 6. The exhibition is organized by the Colby College Museum of Art in Waterville, Maine, and curated by Diana Tuite, Katz curator at Colby. In conjunction with the exhibition, Katz and Tuite will discuss the artist’s career and works at 7 tonight in the CMA’s Gartner Auditorium. Admission to the discussion is free, but registration is required. To register, visit engage. clevelandart.org or call the museum. (Usmani) 11150 East Blvd., 216-421-7350, clevelandart.org. SPOKEN WORD
05/12
The Artwork of James Quarles The Artwork of James Quarles, Canopy’s first exhibition of its third year, showcases new and recent work by local artist James Quarles. A graduate of Shaker Heights High School, Quarles moved to Columbus to study graphic design at Columbus College of Art and Design. However, by his junior year, Quarles changed his focus to fi ne art, using the skills he had learned in his design classes to construct his compositions. After graduation, Quarles returned to Cleveland to pursue his art career through freelance graphic design, clothing design and music, while showcasing his work at local galleries, coffee shops and bars. Quarles’ exhibition at Canopy explores a wide range of topics, from pop culture to social disorder, and includes portraiture, mixed
ages 10 to 14, Art Club offers intensive study into cartooning, ceramics, drawing, graphic design, painting and printmaking. An annual exhibition and sale for BAYarts’ Karen Ryel Ceramic Arts & Education Center advanced pottery students, Under the
- Jann Wenner
OPENS MAY 5 1100 Rock and Roll Boulevard, Cleveland, OH 44114 | rockhall.com | 216.781.ROCK ART
BAYArts’ Latest Exhibitions Opening with a reception from 7 to 9 tonight, BAYarts’ two latest exhibitions showcase work by students in many of the organization’s art classes. That includes Under the Influence: Advanced Pottery Students in the Sullivan Family Gallery and the Art Club Gallery Show in the Diane Boldman Education Gallery. An ongoing program for students
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
Influence is completely organized by the students and offers them real world experience while giving the community an opportunity to purchase inexpensive ceramics. Under the Influence continues through May 24; the Art Club Gallery Show remains on view through June 1. Admission is free. (Usmani) 28795 Lake Rd., Bay Village, 440-871-6543, bayarts.net.
Civics and Sandwiches Spaces opened their new home in Hingetown less than a week before Donald Trump was (inexplicably) sworn in as the 45th President of the United States. Now both Trump and Spaces have reached the end of their first 100 days. In conjunction with its new exhibition, The First 100+ Days, Spaces hosts a special viewing party today from noon to 2 p.m. for the City Club’s panel discussion on Trump’s first 100 days. Panelists include David B. Cohen from the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron, and Jessica Wehrman, Washington correspondent from The Columbus Dispatch. The panel will discuss the many complex issues facing the President and compare Trump’s first 100 days to other administrations. Meantime, Spaces’ exhibition focuses predominantly on Trump’s immigration policy and its effects on Americans and immigrants. Spaces’ Hingetown neighbor Jukebox is offering boxed lunches for $12.50 during the viewing party, but they must be purchased in advance on the Spaces’ website. Options include a Funky Chicken Sandwich and Mushroomhead Sandwich. The screening is free. (Usmani) 2900 Detroit Ave., 216-621-2314, spacesgallery.org.
GET OUT ART
Free Style: Tease and Tension Between Abstraction and Representation Curated by the organization’s cofounder and executive director Liz Maugans, Zygote Press debuts Free Style: Tease and Tension Between Abstraction and Representation, an exhibition showcasing local and regional artists exploring abstraction and its often-contentious relationship with representational imagery. Showcasing a diverse range of approaches to abstraction, Free Style includes prints, paintings, drawings and mixed media collages. Opening with a reception from 6 to 8 tonight, Free Style remains on view through June 24. Admission is free. (Usmani) 1410 East 30th St., 216-621-2900, zygotepress.com. SPORTS
Indians vs. Minnesota Twins The Minnesota Twins started the season with a bang and sailed into first place during the first two weeks of the season. They’ve cooled considerably since then, especially since a Tribe sweep in Minneapolis in April. Tonight, the division rivals commence a three-game series at 7:10 at Progressive Field. It’s the season’s first Dollar Dog night too. Tickets start at $13. (Niesel) 2401 Ontario St., 216-420-4487, clevelandindians.com. SPORTS
Lake Erie Crushers vs. Joliet Slammers Avon’s newly christened Sprenger Stadium became home of the Lake Erie Crushers in 2009. Never heard of ’em? Perhaps that’s because the Crushers play in the Frontier League, an amateur baseball league not affiliated with a major league team; the guys on the team play for the sheer love the game. Their salaries are so low, they often crash at fans’ houses for the season. Crushers’ games are good fun. Tickets and concessions are cheap, and the stadium features a big patch of grass where kids can run free. The Crushers open their season tonight against the Joliet Slammers. First pitch is at 7:05 p.m., and tickets start at $6. There’s a magnetic schedule giveaway and fireworks after the game. (Niesel) 2009 Baseball Blvd., Avon, 440-934-3636, lakeeriecrushers.com. ART
An Opening Reception The Cleveland Print Room’s Multiple
Exposure program brings artistinstructors into local schools for after-school photography programs. From 5 to 9 tonight, the Print Room hosts an opening reception for the Multiple Exposure Student Exhibition, showcasing and selling photos taken by students at Bethany Baptist Church, Campus International School, Harvard Community Services Center, Saint Martin de Porres High School, and St. Rocco School. Additionally, from 5 to 8 p.m. during tonight’s reception, the Cleveland Print Room presents CAC In Transition, an exhibition of photos produced this spring as part of a mobile art program by students at John Adams, Lincoln West, Scranton and Walton Schools. Thanks to a grant from Cuyahoga Arts & Culture (CAC), middle- and high-school students created self-portraits under the instruction of the Cleveland Print Room’s teaching artists. Admission to the reception is free. (Usmani) 2550 Superior Ave., 216-401-5981, clevelandprintroom.com. ART
Screw Factory Open House Only about three times a year do the studio artists of the Screw Factory open their doors to the public. Tonight is one of them. The Screw Factory (aka Lake Erie Building) hosts its Spring Open Studios from 6 to 10 tonight. Traditionally held on Mother’s Day weekend, the event is a perfect opportunity to pick up a last-minute gift for mom. Admission is free. (Usmani) 13000 Athens Ave., Lakewood, screwfactoryartists.com.
SAT
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PARADE
05/13
FESTIVAL
The Hooley Today from noon to 8 p.m., you can check out the Hooley on Kamm’s Corners, an annual block party that takes place on Lorain Avenue from West 165th to Rocky River Drive. The festival offers the usual quotient of crafts, live music, dancers from a host of area Irish dance schools, pipes and drums and plenty of family fun. Food will be available at the pubs and eateries lining Lorain Avenue and vendors will be on hand with kettle corn, ice cream, freshly squeezed lemonade and other festival staples. Two entertainment stages showcase a variety of musical acts and performers. Family-friendly activities include an obstacle course, a 30-foot fire truck slide
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and a pop-a-shot game operated by the St. Mark School Parent Club. Artist Alley will feature a selection of jewelry, toys, clothing, home decor, Irish-themed gifts, and handmade arts and crafts. Admission is free. Find details on the website. (Niesel) kammscorners.com.
SUN
05/14
Jr. The Distinguished Gentlemen of Spoken Word are a group of AfricanAmerican males, ages 8 to 18, who study the art of performance poetry. This special performance takes place at 2 p.m. today in the museum’s Gartner Auditorium. The event is free, but reservations are required. To reserve tickets, visit the museum website or call the ticket office at the number below. (Usmani) 11150 East Blvd., 216-421-7350, clevelandart.org.
COMEDY
Cleveland Improv Jam The Angry Ladies of Improv has hosted the Cleveland Improv Jam for four years now. A few years back, Scene described the show as “fierce, formidable and very funny.” The women have some serious experience too. Katie White-Sonby is an actress who’s performed at Clague Playhouse, Karamu and Kennedy’s Cabaret. Marjorie Preston is an alumna of Something Dada and Rockwell 9 improvisational comedy troupes. The event begins with a short-form set of improv games, followed by a longform improv set. It begins at 5 p.m. at Coffee Phix. Arrive early if you want to sign up and perform. Admission is free. (Niesel) 4485 Mayfield Rd., South Euclid, 216381-5706, coffeephixcafe.com.
FOOD
Gospel Brunch The monthly Gospel Brunch has been a spiritual Sunday staple for years at the House of Blues. Curated by famed gospel singer Kirk Franklin, the recently reinvigorated show puts a bit more emphasis on the music. This week, the local artist Lafayette Carthon and Faith performs. The all-you-can-eat musical extravaganza features Southern classics like chicken jambalaya, biscuits and gravy, and chicken and waffles. Seatings are offered at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Tickets are $40 and are available online, by phone or at the box office. (Niesel) 308 Euclid Ave., 216-523-2583, houseofblues.com. COMEDY
FILM
The Daughter Geoffrey Rush, Sam Neill and Miranda Otto star in The Daughter, a 2015 adaptation of playwright Henrik Ibsen’s The Wild Duck. The story centers on a grown son who comes home for his father’s wedding only to discover a deep, dark secret that divides the family. The movie makes its theatrical debut today at 1:30 p.m. at the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Morley Lecture Hall. It screens again on Wednesday, May 17. General admission is $9, or $7 for CMA members, students and seniors. You can purchase tickets on the website. (Niesel) 11150 East Blvd., 216-421-7350, clevelandart.org. SPOKEN WORD
The Distinguished Gentlemen of Spoken Word This year, Cleveland celebrates the 50th anniversary of Carl Stokes’ election as mayor of Cleveland with a series of community-wide events. As part of the celebration, the Cleveland Museum of Art has commissioned the Distinguished Gentlemen of Spoken Word to create and perform an original piece based on the writings and words of Carl Stokes and his brother, Congressman Louis Stokes
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
Rod Paulette Ohio comedian Rod Paulette, who returns to his home state to perform tonight at the Improv, has a deep voice that seems to carry through the room as he makes fun of racial issues. Like Donald Glover, Paulette plays off the stereotype of being a black man who acts white and he jokes about some of the struggles he’s subsequently encountered. In one bit, he talks about how people on the West Coast always assume he grew up on a farm because he’s from Ohio. “When’s the last time you saw a black man on a farm without a chain on his foot keeping his ass there?” he asks. “If you ever see a black man on a farm, sneak up on him, tap him on the shoulder and let him know he’s free.” Paulette performs tonight at 7 at the Improv. Tickets are $15. (William Hoffman) 1148 Main Ave., 216-696-IMPROV, clevelandimprov.com.
MON
05/15
SPOKEN WORD
Anthologizing Rock and Roll: Rhino Records and the Repackaging of Rock History Daniel Goldmark, a professor of music and director of the Center
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for Popular Music Studies at Case Western Reserve University, has written books on animation, fi lm and music. Tonight at 7 at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s Library and Archives, he’ll deliver the talk Anthologizing Rock and Roll: Rhino Records and the Repackaging of Rock History. He’ll discuss how Rhino Records, an independent label that regularly repackages preexisting songs into novel and often “history-defying” formats such as artist compilations, historical reissues, and especially the deluxe boxed set, has helped to defi ne an approach to selling music that has became standard practice in the music business. Admission is free and reservations aren’t required, so guests are welcome to just drop in. You will fi nd the Library and Archives on Cuyahoga Community College’s main campus. (Niesel) 2809 Woodland Ave., 216-515-1956, library.rockhall.com. SPORTS
Indians vs. Tampa Bay Rays Playing in baseball’s tough AL East, the Tampa Bay Rays have struggled to compete against powerhouse squads such as the Yankees, the Orioles and the Red Sox. And yet, the Rays have still managed to play .500 ball early in the season. Tonight, they open a three-game series against the Tribe. First pitch is at 6:10, and tickets start at $13. (Niesel) 2401 Ontario St., 216-420-4487, clevelandindians.com.
TUE
05/16
MUSIC
Classical Revolution Cleveland For many years, classical music wasn’t intended for the masses. Seemingly reserved for quasiexclusive concert halls, classical music hid from the outside world. Classical Revolution Cleveland helps tear down that wall and once again bring great chamber music to the people. Showcasing a variety of performers in bars, cafes and the like, it’s actually not that different from how people used to listen to chamber music. The third Tuesday of every month, CRC brings its wide array of chamber music to the Happy Dog at the
Euclid Tavern. Performers like the Trepanning Trio, Anime Duo, students of Cleveland Institute of Music and even Cleveland Orchestra members grace the stage in these exciting concerts. Full of immensely talented performers, CRC re-instills the relevancy of this vibrant art form. Tonight’s free, all-ages performance starts at 8. (Patrick Stoops) 5801 Detroit Ave., 216-651-9474, happydogcleveland.com. ART
An Interactive Art Event One of the city’s most recent successful collaborations between artists, art organizations and local business owners is the partnership between local arts nonprofit Graffiti HeArt (promoter of urban graffiti and street art) and CLE Urban Winery. The two entities have worked together since last summer, even before the winery opened its doors on Lee Road in Cleveland Heights. Through a combination of murals and fundraising events at the winery, the partners have developed strong relationships with each other, local artists and Cleveland Heights’ residents. Teaming up once more, the partners host an interactive art event tonight from 6:30 to 9:30, featuring local artist Rich Cihlar. Cihlar is the co-owner of E11even 2 at 78th Street Studios and owner of the Pop Shop framing studio in Lakewood. In followup to a similar event in March, Cihlar returns to the winery to lead another painting workshop. Described as a twist on traditional “paint and sip” classes, the event offers guests an opportunity to create original art under Cihlar’s guidance. Initially painting abstract, textural backgrounds with acrylic paint, participants next will use spray paint and stencils designed and cut by Cihlar himself to create crisp imagery with specific colors on top. At the end of the evening, each participant will leave with a 12-inch-by-12-inch piece of graffiti pop art. Tickets are $30 per person, and include a glass of wine. Proceeds benefit the Graffiti HeArt scholarship fund. (Usmani) 2180B Lee Road, Cleveland Heights, 216-417-8313, cleurbanwinery.com.
Find more events @clevescene.com t@clevelandscene
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ART THE EVOLUTION OF DEBORAH PINTER Natural Selections, now on view at the Maria Neil Art Project, is a Dresden creation by Dott von Schneider EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE we are lucky enough to bear witness to the evolution of an artist’s work — not by studio visits or any sort of peer relationship, but by simply having seen their previous work, accidentally stumbling across exhibitions and getting to understand their process. The evolution of an artist’s work is paramount in understanding their visual lexicon. I’m not talking about Picasso or painters who have gone through “periods,” using their mediums to shift mood; nor am I speaking of movements. No, this is a dialogue that an artist has with their work, their thoughts, their concepts, as going from one medium to another. It is about the evolution of their craft, and what is more exciting than experiencing the evolution of an artist’s work through actual mediums? I suppose this is what makes it thrilling to be an art collector and/or a curator. Omnipresent collectors, and owners of Maria Neil Art Project in Collinwood’s dynamic Waterloo Arts District, John Farina and Adam Tully had been wanting to produce a solo show with Deborah Pinter since her participation in the Flower Power exhibition at their space in May 2014. In that threeperson showcase, Pinter’s work was created by digitally scanning flowers, then manipulating the images before printing on sheets of polymer. This process is referred to as scanography. For those who do not know, scanography (also known as scanner photography) is a method pioneered by the American artist Sonia Landy Sheridan in 1968 and is a fascinating and widely regarded medium. The survey of Pinter’s work has been in your and my periphery since the late 1990s, from her computer generated, blackand-white photography, with hints and kisses of the human figure dominated by natural surroundings, to her Luminous Florals show at the John F. Seiberling Gallery in Cuyahoga Valley National Park that displayed her intimate, tightly colored palette portraits of flora, to this post-
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“Dresden Squares 1 - 4”
residency solo exhibition of prints filled with black, white, yarrows and browns. These latter and seriously visceral works are the result of Pinter’s residency in Dresden, Germany, through the Zygote Artist Residency Exchange Program and the Ohio Arts Council. Her original algraphy and monotype prints are direct reactions to being in Dresden and working at the Grafikwerstatt Studio. Upon her return, she continued to build upon the
truly powerful. There is a grouping of work — although the work is not, in fact, a grouping — titled “Dresden Squares 1 - 4” (pictured above). They are small pieces, 12-by-12inches each, yet they deliver an incredible impact. This dance of Protium copal tree pods, a flora originating in the Yucatan where the resin is used to make sacred incense the Maya use in rituals and ceremonies, is fucking mesmerizing. Why or how this tree
NATURAL SELECTIONS: A DRESDEN CREATION THROUGH JUNE 18 AT MARIA NEIL ART PROJECT, 15813 WATERLOO RD., 216-481-7722, MARIANEILARTPROJECT.COM
emotional and tactical experience gained. Walking into the Maria Neil Art Project gallery, we are confronted by lyrical plant distortions that intertwine and evoke the spines of modern dancers frantically expressing their raw being. To the left, we find another triptych where the branches are in static repose. The contrast between the two is
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
came into being in Dresden and was there for Pinter is kismet, and she made the absolute most of it. What is extra cool is that they are embossed, the resin having set and fissured on the paper. Movement and texture are paramount in these pieces. Actually movement and texture are present in all the works, especially the wall of prints that are not framed. It will take everything
in your power not to touch them. Seriously. Everything in your power. In the artist’s statement, Pinter writes, “… I believe that patterns communicate on a subconscious level an understanding of who we are, what we are. What I find most rewarding about working with this process is seeing the bold patterns emerge as stems and stamen crisscross like spokes in a wheel. The curving, splitting, folding, and twisting induce a feeling of pleasurable disorientation. There is a push/pull created between opposing elements that define both the floral and human: energy and dissipation; clarity and mystery; and presence and absence. These many contradictions allow me to continue to examine both nature Free Comic Book Day 2016. and my relationship to the natural world.” My favorite piece in Natural Selections integrates the Devil’s Backbone, a plant whose branch zigzags at 1-inch intervals, sprouting alternating leaves from its nodes. In looking at the work one would assume that Pinter uses oil stick, but that is not the case. This particular piece has what the French refer to as la poesie: beauty, body distortions, plants, plant distortions, beauty. The beauty of this print lies in its rawness and its many planes. The bold white against a heather gray background with black branches reaching up to infinity evokes a state of calmness. If you’ve ever driven through the desert at night, you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, imagine you are driving through complete darkness. The headlamps from your car are the only source of light along your drive as the cacti and Joshua Trees reflect the luminescence and cast shadows onto the star-riddled sky. That’s what this piece suggests. As a matter of fact, that’s really what many of the works in Natural Selections call to mind. Get off your ass and go.
scene@clevescene.com t@clevelandscene
STAGE THE THINGS THEY SAVED Three women fight over the leftovers of a life in Salvage at None Too Fragile Theater DID SOMEBODY WHO EVENTUALLY became famous attend high school with you? Maybe you even dated that person, and you’ve carried that memory with you for all the years since. Hey, it could happen to any of us. And that’s part of the premise of Salvage by esteemed local playwright George Brant, now at None Too Fragile Theater in Akron. In this play that was originally commissioned by Theatre 4 in New Haven, Connecticut, a famous author Amanda Graham visits the home of Danny, her former high school squeeze. Unfortunately, the occasion is somber because 40-year-old Danny recently died in a car accident, and his mother Roberta and grown sister Kelly are sorting through piles of boxes of the personal stuff in his mom’s basement, where he lived. There’s plenty of tension involved since a flood is heading their way and they have to get all of Danny’s possessions, at least the stuff they want to keep, to higher ground. On top of that impending threat, hurricane Amanda has arrived, bringing with her condolences and lots of emotional baggage. For one, Roberta blames Amanda for ruining her son’s life by ending her relationship with him before she headed off to college. And 10 years later, just when Danny was recovering from that prom-era snub, Amanda published a roman a clef that detailed their doomed relationship in a manner that left Danny devastated and doomed to work at a dead-end job in a record store until his unfortunate demise. While Roberta’s dislike of the visitor burns with ferocity, childlike Kelly still retains a fondness for Amanda. Kelly had spent her childhood at the top of the basement stairs listening to Danny and Amanda talk and giggle in that same basement, between the songs on the records they were playing, and Kelly thinks that there still might be redemption that Amanda can provide. But all is not as it seems, and we soon learn that Amanda has a secret agenda to her visit, apart from paying her respects to Danny’s family. She’s at a crossroads in her life, and she believes she can find the right path if she unearths the needed material from Danny’s cluttered little room.
Photo by Brian Kenneth Armour
By Christine Howey
Derdriu Ring, left, and DeDe Klein
One can quibble with the some of the emotional structure of this piece, hanging all the weight of the drama on the slender peg of a fractured high school romance. (No one has been able to get over any of it? Ever? Really?) But there’s no denying that Brant writes with a keen sense of character, accented by crisp dialogue that keeps you totally involved. Plus, Brant weaves multiple details around and through these relationships, bringing out the humanity of each of the characters and making their plight feel credible. When simmering Roberta calls Amanda a “16-year-old apocalypse,” to her face, you actually believe that would happen. And when Kelly moons
dank room, trying to extricate himself from his memories of Amanda and their apparently idyllic adolescent life together. This is aided in no small part by the production at None Too Fragile, under the well-crafted direction of Sean Derry. DeDe Klein brings a no-nonsense air of determination to Roberta as she busies herself throwing out her son’s trash, even as her daughter seeks to hold onto all of it. Klein can snap off a snarky line with the best of them. And when Roberta plays her trump card with Amanda, revealing she has the stuff the younger woman is seeking, Klein’s Roberta revels in that leverage. In the role of Kelly, Kelly Strand
SALVAGE THROUGH MAY 20 AT NONE TOO FRAGILE THEATER, 1835 MERRIMAN RD., AKRON, 330-962-5547, NONETOOFRAGILE.COM
over her brother’s record collection — especially a particular Joni Mitchell song — and then avers that she’s “not looking forward to waking up tomorrow,” that also seems possible. Even the unseen Danny begins to take shape as you envision him in that
has perhaps the most difficult acting challenge as she observes the sparks fly between Roberta and Amanda. But Strand deftly juggles her character’s conflicting emotions upon seeing the adored Amanda. (“I hate that my brother is in the ground and I’m
so happy,” she says.) Strand adds necessary ballast to the dynamics, keeping the play on an even keel. And Derdriu Ring as Amanda is all cool distance and elegant sophistication, until she unveils her craven need to find something that can rescue her faltering career. This is not the most profound acting challenge the talented Ring has ever encountered, but she delivers the full measure of what Brant has written, and even more. Essentially, what we have here are three women trying to salvage what they need from the detritus of a man’s life that was not particularly well lived. There’s enough tragedy and hope involved in there for a couple different plays. And thanks to the skillful writing of Brant and NTF’s adept cast, the somewhat fragile conceit doesn’t sink under its own weight and delivers us to a place where we can reflect on the importance of rescuing hope from despair.
scene@clevescene.com t@christinehowey | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
MOVIES
Found Footage Festival hosts Joe Pickett and Nick Prueher got booked on three local morning news shows by claiming to be a strongman duo called Chop & Steele.
VHS TREASURE TROVE Found Footage Fest comes to Grog Shop By Jeff Niesel TWENTY-SOMETHING YEARS ago, Nick Prueher was working at a McDonald’s in Wisconsin when he happened upon a custodial training video in the break room. He popped it in the VCR and had such a good laugh that he decided to take it home and show it to his friends, beginning his career as a video collector. Prueher, who has since written for The Onion and The Late Show with David Letterman, now hosts and curates the Found Footage Festival, an annual showcase of strange and unusual videos. He and co-host Joe Pickett will bring a new show of “newly unearthed VHS treasures” to the Grog Shop at 7 p.m. on Friday, May 12. Tickets are $12 and are available at foundfootagefest.com. For the screening, Pickett and Prueher will provide live commentary and where-are-they-now updates on the people in the tapes they’ve found at garage sales and thrift stores and in warehouses and dumpsters throughout North America. “We always provide a live guided tour through our collection,” says Prueher in a recent phone interview.
“We have a segment of Satanic panic videos from the ’80s in the current show, and we explain why there was so much hysteria.” Other highlights of the new show include outtakes and on-air bloopers from over 10 years of North Dakota local news. “We met a guy who was an editor and director at a TV station in Fargo,” says Prueher. “He’s out of the game now. He said he disliked the job but what kept him going was the bloopers. He would make a copy and put them in a bin. He gave us 20 years of bloopers. We kick off the show with it. Lots of them are on camera but in one clip a woman tries to read a voiceover and can’t get through it without laughing. Her laughter is really contagious.” Pickett and Prueher will also screen a little-seen video clip of a “Welcome Home Desert Storm” parade in Hollywood featuring Roseanne Barr and Geraldo Rivera. “There is no record of this parade happening,” says Prueher. “It was such a disaster of a live broadcast. The microphones didn’t work right, and there were blaring sirens. Taco Bell
was a sponsor, and there is shameless promotion.” Since Prueher worked on Letterman for a few years, he received a tip from his former co-workers that Letterman’s old VHS tape collection had come up for grabs. “That was the call we’ve been waiting our whole lives for,” says Prueher. “It’s all weird, bizarre VHS tapes. There’s a Pete Rose instructional tape and a Mickey Rooney how-toact video and a video about how to raise ferrets. The tapes were used in a segment called Dave’s Video Collection, but there was a treasure trove of unused tapes. It was a bounty of new material.” The show will also feature footage from a prank pulled by Pickett and Prueher, who posed as Chop & Steele,
a weightlifting duo, on morning news shows. “We’re excited to show people the results,” says Prueher, “especially since you can’t see them on line now in the wake of [a lawsuit by a Wisconsin TV station]. Our prank establishes the point about how easy it is to put forth fake news.” Since debuting in 2004, the Found Footage Festival has toured the U.S. and Canada, making stops at the HBO Comedy Festival, Bonnaroo and the Just For Laughs Festival. The festival has been featured on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel Live! and National Public Radio.
jniesel@clevescene.com t@jniesel
SPOTLIGHT: THE WALL IT’S FRANKLY SURPRISING THAT in today’s political climate a movie called The Wall has nothing to do with Mexico and illegal immigrants. No, the wall that figures centrally in this high-tension, highly contained war thriller directed by Doug Liman (Edge of Tomorrow) is in the sunbleached desert of remotest Iraq. Behind the remains of this wall, an American soldier named “Eyes” (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) gets trapped in a psychological battle with an unseen Iraqi sniper (voiced by Laith Nakli). It opens Friday at Valley View, Crocker Park and Willoughby Commons. The majority of the 90-minute film finds Taylor-Johnson crawling and wincing and spitting in pain as his tormentor plies him for intelligence and teases him for fun. The sniper is so accurate that even as Eyes bobbed and weaved toward the wall, bullets managed to puncture his water bottle (to dehydrate him), break the antenna on his radio (to isolate him)
The Wall
and destroy his knee (to hobble him). It’s the first in a series of increasingly implausible plot points. The sniper, called “Juba,” wants this prey all for himself. He wants to talk to Eyes, to learn about his family and his hometown, and to figure out why he came to Iraq. From time to time, we’re reminded of Juba’s ultimate aims: “When this is all over I’m going to rip your eyes out,” he says. “I’m going to cut out your tongue and staple it to your chest.” (Efforts are briefly made
to humanize Juba, but we’re not at all encouraged to consider him a local savior or a daring vigilante: He’s pretty much evil to the core.) The Wall begins well enough. Eyes and Sgt. Shane Matthews (John Cena) are on a recon mission, scoping out the scene of a slaughter, where Iraqi contractors had been building a pipeline before they were gunned down. The two-man American team has been watching the tableau for 20 hours with no movement. Eyes
suspects the kills were the work of “a pro.” Matthews scoffs at that assessment, but when he finally walks toward the scene, he discovers that the victims were all indeed sniped, killed with single headshots. This makes for a taut setup and it creates some pretty good suspense right off the bat. But after Eyes finds refuge behind the wall, it’s a two-man show, and the immediate question becomes how on earth will a feature-length film evolve from this basic premise? Like other films in this claustrophobic and, crucially, low-budget thriller subgenre (Buried comes to mind), the film can at times feel like a thought experiment. But it’s passably entertaining, with one or two surprises along the way. The lack of plausibility, one suspects, comes with the territory. — Sam Allard
sallard@clevescene.com t@scenesallard | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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EAT ASIA TOWN UPGRADES AND TRANSITIONS Miega adds built-in grills for Korean BBQ, and Hansol picks up where Seoul Hot Pot left off WHEN MIEGA KOREAN Restaurant opened on the second floor of Asian Town Center about five years back, they had plans to install the sort of built-in grills that make Korean-style barbecue so much fun. Those plans were scrapped in favor of the more affordable tabletop hot plates, which are fine in a pinch, but don’t do nearly as good a job of browning — as opposed to steaming — the meat. When we learned that the restaurant recently had installed built-in infrared-powered grills, I scheduled a return visit. After being seated at one of the five or six grillequipped tables, we settled on orders of the galbi ($26.95) and the pork bulgogi ($19.95). Our server informed us at that time that they were out of lettuce wraps, an indispensable component of Korean BBQ. When asked why an employee didn’t simply go downstairs to the same wellstocked Asian grocery that we just departed, she responded with, “We don’t buy from them.” Our waitress brought over a nice selection of banchan, an array of small dishes filled with delectable items like spicy kimchi, bean sprouts in sesame oil and pickled radishes. She did not, however, offer cups of bori cha, the nutty barley tea that is automatically served at most Korean eateries. She also didn’t turn on the grills in time for them to properly pre-heat, which meant that we couldn’t begin cooking for nearly 10 minutes after she dropped off the raw food. Korean BBQ always requires more than a bit of management on the part of the diner, and Miega is no exception. Items like galbi, meaty bone-in beef short ribs marinated in soy, garlic and sugar, take longer to cook than the bulgogi, thin-sliced pork in a zesty red chile pepper paste. Also, the grills have two power settings, and we frequently needed to switch from high to low and back to keep things running smoothly. Like most nights at the Korean BBQ, expect to leave smelling like a fry cook. Despite the shortcomings, the food turned out excellent, with large portions of flavorful meat that we enjoyed with steamed rice. Miega has
Photo by Emanuel Wallace
By Douglas Trattner
no liquor license, so if you like to pair your Korean BBQ with soju as is customary, you’ll need to bring it yourself.
OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS, the longtime owners of Seoul Hot Pot closed, reopened and then closed their shop again after nearly 30 years in business. Last December the restaurant changed hands, with Soon Moh taking over and changing the name to Hansol. Despite the name and ownership change, this Asia Town eatery is still tops when it comes to Korean barbecue thanks to roomy tables with built-in gas grills and vent hoods that suck
the heat and dials back the sweetness of many classic dishes. “It’s almost the same,” he explains. “It’s the same food, but every cook is different.” For diners new to Korean cuisine, he recommends the dolsot bibimbap ($13.95), rice, beef, veggies and a fried egg layered into a hot earthenware bowl. After adding some gochujangbased sauce, the dish is stirred and enjoyed, especially the crisp rice stuck to the bottom of the bowl. Hansol excels at soups and stews, which arrive at the table bubbling away in a hot cauldron. The yukgaejang ($12.95) looks formidable owing to its fire-engine red hue from a heaping portion of red pepper
MIEGA KOREAN BBQ
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up most of the fumes. But the rest of the menu seems to have gotten a bit of an upgrade since the transition. Moh, who relocated from New Jersey, says that he brought with him a “New Yorkstyle” of Korean cooking that amps up
flakes. It’s indeed spicy, but it also is incredibly complex and delicious, with bits of beef, scallions and glass noodles. Another great option is the kimchi soup ($10.95), a tart, pungent brew loaded with cubes of silky tofu,
tasty bits of pork, and spicy pickled cabbage. Both are served with steamed rice, which can be added to the broth or vice versa. Unless you’re opting for the full-on meat-based barbecue adventure, you should add a few starters to your meal. Almost every table orders the pajun ($8.95), a thin, crisp and eggy pancake studded with bits of shrimp and scallions and served with a sweet soy-based sauce for dipping. Kimbap ($5.95) is a Korean-style sushi roll filled with egg, pickled veggies, seasoned beef and sesame-scented rice. Mandu ($6.95) are delicious meat and vegetable filled dumplings that are similar to potstickers. If you haven’t visited Seoul Hot Pot in years, you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the recently updated interior. The previous owners swapped out the musty carpet for hardwood floors and put in place a handful of other improvements that have made the experience a hundred times more comfortable.
dtrattner@clevescene.com t@dougtrattner | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
35
Photo by Breanna Kulkin
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AS THE RESTAURANT BOOM has blossomed in Cleveland, so too has food tourism. Seven years ago, Taste Cleveland Food Tours (tasteclevelandfoodtours. com), an extension of a nationally owned brand of tours, set up shop, covering hot spots like Tremont, Ohio City and Little Italy. Recently, new entrepreneurs have expanded these offerings to provide their own grassroots tours of other culinary hot beds in the area. Asiatown Food Tour (nightmarketcle.com) was created as an extension of Night Market Cleveland, a popular summer event held monthly through the season. “For the first time this year, we will continue through the summer and into the fall and winter. We want to keep the excitement in the neighborhood month after month,” says Josh Maxwell, one member of the Small Organization Solutions team who oversee the tours. Meanwhile, the Westside Shuffle (westsideshuffle.com) takes up to 30 attendees on a three-hour bus ride through Old Asia Town and to four restaurants in the downtown St. Clair-Superior area. Leading the tour is Ewyn Tsang, who grew up in the tightknit Asian community and has a personal tie to many of the familyowned businesses. “We have a lot of people who are big foodies that like trying new things. They’re usually a mix of Caucasian and Asian,” explains Tsang. New additions to the tour this year: Superior Pho, Szechuan Gourmet, Pho Ha Nam, and Asia Food Company. Included in the $70 ticket are four courses (you will have leftovers) and two cocktails designed by Watershed Distillery to be enjoyed on the bus. Out west, Amy Collins and
Sharon Marrell were inspired to create Lakewood Dish Dash (lakewooddishdash.com) after taking a food tour in Virginia and loving the experience. “I’ve been living in Lakewood for 10 years and have been really impressed with the food culture here,” says Collins, who is also on the board of Taste of Lakewood. With over 50 independently owned restaurants within the municipality, a walking dining tour was a no-brainer. “We love hospitality, entertaining and building community, so when we came back we wanted to do it. But who has time to organize something like that?” she says with a laugh. Collins lost her job last year, which gave her the perfect opportunity to lay groundwork. She participated in the Start-Up Lakewood Ideation Challenge to galvanize momentum, starting the tours with a soft launch last October. One tour is focused on downtown Lakewood, one traverses Madison Avenue, and another hits the west end of Detroit Avenue. Each offers a sampling of five to six restaurants and food retailers. “It’s not a progressive dinner,” Collins clarifies. “You could have ice cream right in the middle; no need to save room.” From bite-sized samples at Urban Bulk Foods to family-style servings at Thai Thai, or whole pieces of pizza and draft beer at Angelo’s, the tour makes sure to represent what each destination is known for. Tours are capped at 12 people for three hours of tasting, covering about a mile and a half to 2 miles of territory on foot. A ticket will cost you about $45, plus a tip for your guide.
scene@clevescene.com t@clevelandscene
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Smokin Q’s BBQ and Beer House By Douglas Trattner IT’S BEEN A YEAR AND A HALF since Giovanni’s Ristorante owner Carl Quagliata announced that he would be opening a barbecue restaurant in the former home of Fisher’s Tavern in MayďŹ eld, which had closed after 82 years in business. Like all restaurant projects, this one took longer than anticipated, but the ďŹ nish line is now just two weeks away. “I honestly have no idea how the building has stayed standing,â€? says chef-partner Zachary Ladner, who was showing off the new Smokin Q’s BBQ and Beer House (718 SOM Center Rd., MayďŹ eld, 440-646-0411, smokinbbq.com.) What started out life as a residential home was added onto multiple times over the years, resulting in a disjointed and not altogether safe structure. Ladner says that most of the oor joists needed to be replaced and a new foundation poured to support the kitchen, which had been operating on a simple slab. “You should never rush an opening,â€? says Quagliata, who has opened more than a few restaurants in his time. But soon enough, large red neon letters in the window will light the way to “BBQ.â€? Ladner, who grew up eating barbecue in Texas, will be preparing Central Texas-style barbecue on a large gas-and-wood powered Southern Pride smoker avored with oak, apple and hickory
woods. The chef will take what he’s learned in the world of ďŹ ne dining (he’s been the chef at Giovanni’s for seven years) and apply it to barbecue. That means using topquality meats from the likes of Niman Ranch, New Creation, Creekstone Farms and Beeler’s. “I want it to be the best I can get,â€? Ladner says. Main courses like smoked beef plate short ribs (aka giant beef ribs), beef brisket, pork spare ribs, and pulled pork shoulder will be sold by weight and served one of two ways. Traditional Style is with sliced bread, slaw, pickles and sauce. El Jefe Style pairs the meat with housemade corn-our tortillas, slaw, salsa and guacamole. Other items from the smoker include half-chickens, Hudson Valley duck legs, and housemade jalapeno-cheddar sausage. Appetizers include garlic-chile chicken drumettes, brisket poutine with fries, curds and sauce, and pulled pork nachos. The Hot Chick sandwich is stuffed with pulled smoked chicken, slaw and sauce, while the Fat Heifer is layered with chopped beef, buttermilk fried onions, queso and slaw. In a nod to his Tex-Mex-obsessed days, the chef added a few tacos ďŹ lled with crispy shrimp, pulled pork, or pulled chicken. Sides run the gamut from honeybutter cornbread to ash-fried sweet corn tossed with chipotle butter and salty cotija cheese. A
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EAT
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smoked bean cassoulet is studded with beef brisket, pork shoulder, sausage and duck conďŹ t. Beer taps will dispense a nice selection of Cleveland and Ohio brews, while a list of creative cocktails will feature Ohio-made spirits. All of the above will make the perfect companion to a meal on Smokin Q’s wraparound front patio that features a towering stone-clad ďŹ replace. As you can tell by the pictures, Smokin Q’s is a step above the sawdustcovered roadhouses of the West. The 100-seat restaurant features a gorgeous wood bartop, cushy booths in the dining room, industrial lighting and walls of windows that bring in tons of natural light. But guests shouldn’t expect a stuffy ďŹ ne-dining establishment either, says Ladner. “We want it to feel casual, but we don’t want it to be the kind of place where people are doing shots at the bar,â€? he says. “There has to be some level of class to be a Quagliata restaurant.â€? He points out that meals will be served on butcher paper-topped metal trays, but there will not be disposable tableware or silver. Sides will be presented in cast-iron skillets. “Those little touches add more to someone’s experience by giving them something else to remember,â€? says the chef. When it opens in mid-May, Smokin Q’s BBQ and Beer House will serve lunch and dinner, plus takeout service.
VINCENT DELAGRANGE JOINS OHIO CITY PROVISIONS AS HEAD BUTCHER For the past three years, Vincent Delagrange has worked as a chef at Urban Farmer Cleveland, where he primarily spent his time in the butcher shop and kitchens cutting meat and making charcuterie. Starting May 9, he joined Adam Lambert and Trevor Clatterbuck at Ohio City Provisions as that shop’s head butcher. “He’s a fully trained butcher with years of hands-on butchering and charcuterie work,� Lambert says of his new hire. “As one of the best butchers in town, he’ll help us
get better.� Delagrange’s experience with old-school butchering methods meshes seamlessly with Ohio City Provisions’ practice, which involves bringing in whole animals from nearby farms, including its own in Amish Country. “It’s easy to cut ribeyes and
T-bones and pork chops, but how do your merchandise the rest of the animal and make it look presentable enough for people to spend money on cuts they might not be used to,� Lambert says, adding that attention to “alternative cuts� and value-added products like charcuterie are just as vital. Having another pair of skilled hands will take some pressure off Lambert and Clatterbuck, who have been working around the clock since opening day to complete all necessary tasks. “Sometimes it’s a bit of a struggle for Trevor and me to be the only two people that cut meat here — balancing everything else we have to do here is a fulltime job in itself,� Lambert notes. “The biggest thing for me is maintaining a nice, beautifully stocked and presented butcher case everyday.� Lambert can now dedicate more time and attention to charcuterie as well as a new lineup of prepared foods, which is something he’s been wanting to offer but couldn’t because of time constraints. “It allows me to focus more on charcuterie and ready-to-go meals that people can pick up and reheat easily at their house, which works out really well, I feel, for the local community here in Ohio City.�
dtrattner@clevescene.com t@dougtrattner
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
39
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE CHICKEN AND OUR 13 GOURMET SAUCES rice and greens is ingenious! They have a little kick to them but quite tasty. They were buttery and lightly sweet. I enjoyed my meal and will return in the future.” - Ladonna G. ★★★★★ “This is some Seriously delicious chicken. I have lived very ery close, and almost drive by there daily. Thought it was part of the convenient store, so I would not go there. here. After reading the reviews and being g extremely hungry, I took the more than glad I plunge, and I am mor much did. I will be coming g here so muc more.” - Stephanie L. ★★★★★ “It’s no joke, best fried chicken in Cleveland. They’ve got plenty of yourself, it’s all sides, but don’t kid yourse While there’s about the chicken. ch a variety of flavors the staff might not give you many clues past identifying the individual flavors.
Luckily there’s a brief explanation of them at the restaurant.” - Noah F. ★★★★★ “Oh my gosh this place has the best food.The chicken is superbly uperbly trimmed and seasoned to perfection. ction. Normally I always get the fried ed chicken but tonight I went with the e fish dinner for the first time and can’t stop jumping up-anddown with joy. Make sure you get biscuits and at least try the honey bisc the greens and nd rice. Thank you for culinary such great service and the culina gift you’ve given us.” - Sarah J. ★★★★★ Excellent xcellent fried chicken. Try the seasoned. soaked asoned. The honey ho biscuits, cuits mac & cheese, and rice are all must haves, too. The menu is enormous so you’ll have plenty of options when you come back for more. - Nichole K. ★★★★★
Hands down, the best friend chicken in town! We love the honey y crisp and the seasoned. Delicious, hot and fresh, esh, never sitting under a heater or warmer for hours. We host a lot of parties and people always ask for V’s! The sides are mediocre, in all honesty I’m not a huge fan fa of them, however,, the cornbread muffins are incredible! cornb dible! They’re great eat plain or with butter or honey. I have gotten a piece of their chocolate butter cream cake as well and that’s incredible too! It’s home made! I’m a huge fan of the old t school look of the restaurant. In my r opinion, nothing needs to change. Thanks for the awesome service! Ashley B.
chicken chicke dinner instead of spending cash at a KFC or any other fast food chicken chains. Best chicken ever!” Bunny Marie L. M
E H T T U O ! B S A B I L R L A D S N ’ A IT H S I F N E K C I H C
★★★★★ “Worth the stop & future excursions from the Near West Side in the future.I can’t find one thing wrong with V’s and the woman taking care of us was just the nicest and personable person ever. For all the food we ordered it was very reasonably priced and d held up well on the ride home// Stopping here in the near future iss in order as it puts lousy KFC’s, Popeyes, eyes etc to shame in terms of quality, price, and customer service.” vice.” - Jesco D. ★★★★★ “I went here after the good reviews and I was impressed. I had the regular/mild mild batter. The chicken was light, crispy and de delicious. The
“I absolutely absolute loved this his place! I will w be back soon!” n! - Lori M. “Five Stars aren’t Enough! This is 10 HON STAR FOOD!! LOVE THOSE HONEY sh ROLLS!! It’s my dinner tonight shrimp, slaw, fries and corn muffin. SO YUMMY” - Lonnie R. “Such a delicious choice for Fried chicken” - Nicole Elaine T.
“I absolutely love the food here! Best fried chicken I’ve ever had. People should stop in and grab a family
To Place A Catering Order Or Any Questions Call Us At 216.738.7000
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MUSIC
IT CAME FROM MEMPHIS Ronnie Baker Brooks assembled a stellar cast of musicians to play on his latest album By Matt Wardlaw
BLOSSOM MUSIC CENTER WAS the place to be on August 11, 1993. That was the day that legendary bluesman B.B. King brought his inaugural Blues Festival through town with a stunning lineup. The bill that day featured King and a dizzying collective of his blues contemporaries, including Buddy Guy, Junior Wells, Koko Taylor, Eric Johnson, and the father/son team of Lonnie and Ronnie Brooks. By the time that King took the stage at the end of the night, it had been an amazing afternoon and evening of straight-up blues education. For Ronnie Baker Brooks, the experiences he had on that tour remain ones that he’ll never forget. “It was amazing. Every night, it was like we were the happening thing in that town wherever we played that night,” he recalls. “We were pulling in, and you can hear it on the radio. B.B. King or whatever, Buddy Guy and we’d go to the after parties. Those were packed. It was just an amazing tour.” As a developing player, Brooks says that his time on the road with his Blues Festival comrades was invaluable. “You know at that time, it was like college. I got to see the best do it every night. Every night,” he says.
“And B.B. King pulled me to the side one night we were in Miami and he said, ‘Son, I see you’ve been watching me every night. I wish they had something like this when I was your age, you know.’ He said, ‘But learn everything you can from all of us. Learn everything you can. And I want you to know that your father is just as good as I am or better. We just got different styles.’ And man, you know how inspiring that was? I mean, because he knew how much I loved my father. But he saw how much I admired him as well. He just put it all together for me, man. That tour, I was so grateful to be a part of that. So grateful. It was one of the best tours of my life.” Lonnie Brooks passed away at the beginning of April at the age of 83, not long after we had spoken with Ronnie. In a video message posted on his Facebook page, Ronnie remembered his dad, who seemed to know that his time was drawing to a close. “I had a conversation with my dad. He told me, ‘We got to keep going.’ So that’s what I’m going to do. I think that music is a healer. It helps you get through times like this,” he said in the message. “That’s what I’m going to do and that’s what I want you to do. Play his music, enjoy his work. Because he did it
from the heart. He loved his fans, he loved his family and he had a hell of a career and he raised his family. What more can you say about that alone? I’m grateful and thankful for him being in my life.” He released Times Have Changed, his latest solo record and his first in a decade, in January. Brooks first began working on songs in 2010 and got a significant boost when he connected with producer/drummer Steve Jordan, who brought important guidance to the project. “Once we got with Steve, it kind of went from zero to 100!” he says. “But then it slowed down because he was so busy. He was working with Clapton and with Keith Richards and so on. It took a while. But I’m happy, and I’m very proud of this record. I’m so blessed to have the great musicians on this record and the great special guests.” Even though there were delays, Brooks says that once they finally got into the studio, they knocked the record out quickly. “The first part of the sessions were recorded in Memphis at Royal Studios, and we were down there about a week. And I think we knocked out about six songs or more — finished and really done,” he says. “Then, we took a break, and we went back down to Nashville at Blackbird
Studios and we did another six songs. We took another break and then I had to come back to New York and finish some overdubs and we finally finished the record.” He admits that working with Jordan was initially a little bit daunting, but the longtime producer quickly put him at ease and encouraged Brooks to record a mix of his own material and a carefully chosen selection of covers. “I was a little intimidated at first. Because it was like, ‘Man, this is Steve Jordan,’ because of his talent and his body of work. He pulled me to the side when we got to Memphis and he said, ‘Look, I know you’re used to doing all of the different jobs that you did on your other records,’” he remembers. “You know, I would arrange the songs, I would write the songs, I would co-produce the songs. I had to tell everybody what to play. He said, ‘Look at the talent around this room. We’ve got your back.’ When he said that to me, it just made me feel so comfortable. That’s when I kind of knocked off the intimidation factor and just got into the music. It was a great time, and I was honored to have that opportunity.” In Memphis, Brooks recorded at Royal Studios. An amazing stable of musicians, including legendary guitarist Steve Cropper, | clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
jazz saxophonist Lannie McMillan and R&B vocalist Angie Stone, surrounded him. The house band of brothers, guitarist Teenie Hodges, organ player Charles Hodges and bassist Leroy Hodges, along with rhythm guitarist Michael Toles, bassist Willie Weeks and Jordan on drums, completed the core group on the Memphis sessions. The ďŹ rst tracks they laid down were covers of Curtis MayďŹ eld’s “Give Me Your Love,â€? featuring additional vocals from Stone, and the Alvin Cash instrumental, “Twine Time.â€? “I knew Alvin Cash. He would come through here and he knew my father very well,â€? says Brooks. “We got into [recording] it and Michael Toles, the rhythm guitar player, was tuning up. Me, Willie Weeks, Steve and Charles Hodges just started grooving. Steve thought it was Michael Toles playing rhythm and it was me. He said, ‘Keep that going, Michael, I like that!’ Michael’s like, ‘No, that’s not me — I’m tuning up! That’s Ronnie.’ He got up off his drums, came in the booth with me and literally got right up on me and was like, ‘Yes! That’s what I’m talking about!’ And man, that just inspired me that much more. That turned out to be one of the most fun songs that we did. Once we ďŹ nished the song, I was like, ‘Man, I’ve got to get my dad on this.’ He probably was in the studio when they originally cut this song.’ Dad was in Chicago. They went and picked up my dad,
Stone — we both were singing on the same mic Al Green did all of his stuff on. Ann Peebles, all of it. It was like walking into a museum. It immediately took that vibe. And then of course, Nashville was the same thing.� His version of Eric Clapton’s “Old Love,� a longtime setlist staple in Brooks’ own shows, calls to mind a number of experiences, including sitting in the audience at Buddy Guy’s club, Legends, in November of 1994, watching his father jam with the guitar legend during one of the three intimate shows that Clapton played there. Later, he and his dad were backstage with Eric and Brooks learned that he was already on Clapton’s radar. “He came back to the United Center here, and we got to hang out with him again. We didn’t play with him that time, but we got to hang out and talk and that’s when I gave him my Torch album,� he recalls. “It was funny, because my dad was like, ‘Eric, I want to introduce you to my son’ and Eric’s like, ‘I know Ronnie! Matter of fact, my fatherin-law loves Ronnie!’ And I’m like, ‘What?’ His father-in-law had a club in Columbus, Ohio, called Blues Station. I used to play there and he would call Eric in the middle of the night, ‘Man, you need to come check out this guy, Ronnie Baker Brooks.’ Eric’s like, ‘I know his daddy.’ But when I got to the show here in Chicago at the United Center, he’s like, ‘Yeah, I know Ronnie. Matter of fact, my father-in-law loves Ronnie. He’s here. Let’s go meet him! So he took us back to the other green room
and they cut his track.â€? He says that Memphis and Nashville each added their own avor to the songs that were recorded for the new album. “We used some of the same musicians that played on a lot of those hit records down there at that studio [in Memphis]. Matter of fact, we used the same mics,â€? he says. “The same mic placement. Boo Mitchell, who is Willie Mitchell’s grandson, he runs the studio and Willie Mitchell showed him and taught him everything he did back in the day. Even like where we placed the horns, tracked the horns and when we tracked the strings. That just immediately took that vibe, and we all kind of felt it. Even Angie
where his father-in-law was and he’s like, ‘Ronnie! Eric, that’s the guy I was telling you about!’ He’s like, ‘I know, I know!’ It was funny, man. But I didn’t know that Eric, I mean, I knew my dad, but I didn’t know that he knew of me. It was a good humbling inspiring moment.� Brooks will spend the year touring in support of the new album and has a steady stream of shows on deck including a return engagement at the Music Box Supper Club. He says he’s looking forward to being back in town and left us with a simple message: “Tell everybody to come on out!�
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45
MUSIC SONIC VISIONARIES Indie rockers Spoon expand their sound on their new album By Jeff Niesel AUSTIN’S ANNUAL SOUTH BY Southwest festival features a logjam of bands trying to woo industry insiders and demonstrate their viability to record label heads and marketing reps. Standing out from the fray doesn’t come easy. So credit indie rockers Spoon for coming up with a novel way of getting some well-deserved attention. During this year’s fest, the band played a trio of shows at the old location of Emo’s, a favorite local venue. The band rechristened the place “Eno’s” for the event, taking the name from its drummer, Jim Eno. The group even curated the entire lineup of support for the shows. “That was great,” says bassist Ron Pope when asked about the gigs during a recent phone interview. “Well technically, it’s not Emo’s anymore, but it was great to get back into that club, because I hadn’t been in there for years, and I had spent a lot of time in that place. It was awesome to be at SXSW because that’s just mayhem with so many bands there. We were lucky enough to be set up in the same venue for three nights in a row, not having to cart all of our stuff all over the city and play different venues. And we were able to select a bunch of bands to open up the shows. I think everybody had a really great time.” The Austin scene, which features a vast network of people who play in bands or work in music, has helped nourish the band, which singerguitarist Britt Daniel and Eno formed in 1993. “There’s always amazing places to play down there,” says Pope, who joined the group in 2006. “And it’s been home base for the band for forever. It’s where Britt and Jim started the band. Jim’s got an amazing studio there, so we still do a lot of recording there. It’s a great place and an inspirational place. I think it does probably subconsciously affect the way our band operates and sounds.” When Pope joined the band, it had already been signed and dropped by a major label, having put out A Series of Sneaks on Elektra Records in 2002. That experience, however, didn’t deter Daniel and Co. “Britt and I wound up having some breakfast tacos together, and chatted about what he was looking for in a guy and in a new bandmate and it seemed
46
like a pretty good fit,” recalls Pope. “A month later we ended up rehearsing in my basement in [my hometown of] Lawrence, Kansas, and ran through a bunch of the catalog songs, because Spoon was playing a show there. A couple months later I was down in Austin and we were recording for the Stranger Than Fiction soundtrack, and working on tracks for Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga.” As a songwriter, Daniel explores power-pop chord progressions, alternating drawing from pop and post-punk. “He’s a very hard worker and takes songwriting very seriously,” says Pope. “In all the bands I’ve played in and all the musicians I’ve played with, I’ve never been around a songwriter that is as obsessive about detail. He wants each individual component, each part, each melody, each thing that goes into the song to be the best that it can be. He spends a lot of time with headphones on, listening and trying
According to Pope, he lived up to the billing. “We’d been trying to get to work with him in some capacity, because we’ve been fans of his process and a lot of the records he’s made for years,” says Pope. “We finally got to work with him on [2014’s] They Want My Soul. When he originally came on, we were just going to have him mix the record. As we got into it a little further, we wound up tracking half the songs with him, and then he mixed almost all the songs. It was pretty obvious that everybody felt really comfortable around him. “ Pope says band members enjoyed working with Fridmann so much on They Want My Soul that they wanted him to work with them from start to finish on Hot Thoughts. “When They Want My Soul came out, everyone loved the result,” says Pope. “The last big show for They Want My Soul was in Buffalo, which is an hour away from him, so he came
SPOON, TENNIS 7:30 P.M. FRIDAY, MAY 12, HOUSE OF BLUES, 308 EUCLID AVE., 216-523-2583. TICKETS: $30-$40, HOUSEOFBLUES.COM
to figure out what we can do to make things better.” For its latest album, Hot Thoughts, the band collaborated with Dave Fridmann, the producer famous for his work with the neo-psychedelic rockers Flaming Lips. In 2001, Mojo magazine included the guy on its 100 Sonic Visionaries list and described him as “the Phil Spector of the Alt-Rock era.”
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
out to the show, and his whole family was there. He kind of pulled each of us aside separately, and was like, ‘Hey, let me know when you’re making a new record, ’cause I think we should make the whole record at my place.’ And that’s what we wound up doing. This time around, he produced and mixed all of it. He’s wonderful to work with. He pushes the band in different ways
and makes us go for crazier stuff and into directions we would not have gone into seven or eight years ago.” The album opens with the jittery “Hot Thoughts,” a song propelled by jagged guitar riffs and fragmented keyboard fills. The band shows just how much it has expanded its sound on “Pink Up,” a funky tune with a lengthy instrumental lead-in. “Oh god — there’s all kinds of crazy stuff on that song,” says Pope when asked about “Pink Up.” “There’s a lot of percussion, tons of French drums, really fuzzy bass at the end, there’s a lot of overly-effected keyboard, and there’s some bongos in that song. We haven’t worked up that one live yet, but it’s on our to-do list.” The ominous sounding “I Ain’t the One” began as an acoustic ballad before the band added sonic textures. “Britt told me he was trying to write like a loner, Johnny Cash-type song,” says Pope. “So it started out that way, and it worked, but it didn’t really seem like it fit on the record. One night after a SXSW show a couple years ago, [Britt] and [keyboardist] Alex [Fischel] were hanging out at Britt’s place. Alex started playing the chords on piano, and trying to approach it that way. Once it started sounding good, they ditched the acoustic guitar, and I think they slowed it down a little bit. Then it was just a matter of getting all the parts to work and the arrangement to be cool. It started out in a totally different direction, but that happens quite a bit with us. We’ll have one idea in mind, and then we’ll try it three other ways and see which one is cooler. Sometimes we wind up yanking a section out of one approach and gluing it to another one, and that might work really well.” Given the fickle nature of the music business, it’s a testament to Spoon’s staying power that the band’s persisted for more than 20 years. “For us, the big thing is just making consistently good records and trying as hard as we can to do that,” says Pope. “When we started working on this record, we wanted to sound hungry. We didn’t want to sound like a band that was happy with where we’re at, because we’re not.”
jniesel@clevescene.com t@jniesel
| clevescene.com m | May 10 - 16, 2017
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MUSIC BACK IN THE SADDLE AGAIN Country singer Joe Nichols reflects on the ebb and flow of his 20-year career By Jeff Niesel SINGER JOE NICHOLS RECEIVED a good dose of country music while growing up in Arkansas. “My dad played country music and I went to some of the places he played as a kid,” he says via phone from his Nashville home. Nichols performs at 8 p.m. on Thursday, May 11, at the Goodyear Theatre in Akron. “I knew how much it meant to him because he seemed to always be playing music. I started listening so much that I could tell what I liked and didn’t like. I listened to what he liked. That kind of got passed down to me a little bit, the music of Marty Robbins and Merle Haggard and Noble Ray Price.” Initially, Nichols debuted for a rock band. He didn’t wind up in the band, but it turned out to be a learning experience. “I was in a rock band for like 10 minutes,” he says. “This was back in 1993, maybe. I was maybe 14 or 15 years old. These guys were seniors in high school and had the coolest rock band. The singer had just moved away and they were hoping for a singer. People told them I was a singer, even though I was a little twangy. I was introduced to the band. We did a band rehearsal, but I can’t sound any way other than country. The drummer was the band leader. He said, “I don’t think it’s going to work out, man. You might be a little too George Strait for us.” Nichols moved to Nashville and released his first album in 1996. Though the record label that released it would drop him due to the disc’s poor performance, the album did give Nichols a glimpse of what could be. “When I moved to Nashville, I knew it wouldn’t be as simple as walking into a label and getting signed,” he says. “I had a lot of maturing to do. For about five years [after getting dropped], I had weird jobs. I delivered furniture. I unloaded trucks. I sold steaks door to door for one day. Meanwhile, I was trying to play every night and practice
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and sing every day and be better. I wanted to know myself. What do I want to sound like? What am I good at?” He says that thinking long and hard about his sound helped him get his deal with Giant Records. When Warner Bros. absorbed Giant Records (and Nichols along with it), label execs wanted Nichols to be “more poppy.” He didn’t agree with their strategy and amicably split from the label. He quickly landed on Universal South and relaunched his career with 2002’s Man with a Memory. “At that point, I had matured enough to start the process and start making a record,” Nichols says. “[Session guitarist] Brent Rowan was huge for me. He let me mature. We went through hills and valleys together. A lot of things then happened in a very explosive way.” Throughout the 2000s, Nichols delivered hit after hit. In all, he’s had six No. 1 hits and eight Top 10 singles over the course of his career. But for Nichols, who had wellpublicized personal problems during the era in which he became a bona fide star, all was not rosy. “From the time I moved to Nashville to the time I got the deal, there was a lot of growing,” he says. “I stopped negative thinking and started being me. Going into the early 2000s, I had a No. 1 song, which was a big confidence booster. People were looking to me as a sign that country music was coming back their way. When ‘Brokenheartsville’
I had success come my way, and I still treated it as if I was a teenager. I had too much fun. I was a little too pampered. It’s a blessing for me and I didn’t appreciate it enough.” As his deal with Show Dog/ Universal expired, he says he had to “reorient” himself and start “working hungry again.” That attitude comes across on his latest effort, 2013’s Crickets. “I have had to do that three or four times,” he says. “You’d think I’d learn by now. That’s the key. When you’re humble and hungry, you want to practice and make yourself better and find out what your connection with people is and what they like about you and what you want to play. If you figure those things out and do that on a daily basis, things work out.” He says he went into the studio the day after his Show Dog/Universal South contract expired. One
JOE NICHOLS, JOE HALL 8 P.M. THURSDAY MAY 11, GOODYEAR THEATER, 1201 EAST MARKET ST., AKRON, 330-690-2307. TICKETS: $35, GOODYEARTHEATER.COM
came out, it was through the roof. We had a couple more hits. The next album, Revelation, also did great. Throughout all this time, my mind was saying, ‘Hell, yes. This is great. This is amazing.’ I think my maturity had stopped at 22 or 23.
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
highlight, “Gotta Love It,” features a spirited horn section. “I wanted something with that feel to it,” says Nichols. “There are some country songs you wouldn’t believe had horns until you thought about them. Certain songs have that
ragtime and Dixieland feel to them. I thought it would be cool to have a little bit of a horn section to see what it would sound like.” Nichols says the Merle Haggard tune “Footlights,” another highlight, was for a Haggard tribute album, but he decided to put it on his album instead. “I’ve always been partial to that song,” says Nichols. “It’s my favorite Merle song and it was my father’s favorite Merle song. The Crickets album and the tribute album were being made at the same time. I asked the label owner and he let me have it for my album.” Nichols says he’s started work on a new studio effort but the songs have “changed direction” a couple of times. “I want to do what I do best and where I connect best,” he says. “Over the years, I’ve gotten country-er. Even [the song] ‘Yeah’ is countryer. It’s really progressive for me but has some element of country with the lower timbre voice. Our mindset has been that we want to put out an album that’s congruent with the message. The message is traditional country. This is what I want to do moving forward. The next single will be traditional country.”
jniesel@clevescene.com t@jniesel
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
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LIVEWIRE WED
all the live music you should see this week
05/10
10 X 3 Singer Songwriter Showcase: Hosted by Brent Kirby (in the Wine Bar): 8 p.m. Brothers Lounge. Ian Hunter & the Rant Band/Marti Jones: 8 p.m., $48 ADV, $55 DOS. Music Box Supper Club. Jag Off with DJ Krissy Krass: 9 p.m., free. Now That’s Class. Legendary Shack Shakers/Whiskey Daredevils/Lords of the Highway: 8:30 p.m., $6-$15. Grog Shop. Marion Meadows/Paul Taylor: 7 p.m., $40. Nighttown. Merge Quintet: 7 p.m., $12. Bop Stop. Old 97’s/Nicole Atkins: 8 p.m., $20 ADV, $23 DOS. Beachland Ballroom. PUP/Prawn: 8 p.m., $12 ADV, $14 DOS. Mahall’s 20 Lanes. Roots of a Rebellion/The Cat’s Meow/ The Quasi Kings: 8:30 p.m., $7 ADV, $10 DOS. Beachland Tavern. SOMO: The Answers Tour: 7 p.m., $22-$35. House of Blues. Doug Tuttle/Cross Brothers/The Sight/Jason Look: 9 p.m., $5. Happy Dog. Uni Ika Ai/Jenna Fournier (in the Locker Room): 8 p.m., $8 ADV, $10 DOS. Mahall’s 20 Lanes.
THU
05/11
Chris Hatton’s Musical Circus (in the Wine Bar): 8 p.m. Brothers Lounge. Jam Night with the Bad Boys of Blues: 9 p.m., free. Brothers Lounge. Marion Meadows/Paul Taylor: 7 p.m., $40. Nighttown. Northeast Ohio Drum & Music Jam: 9 p.m., free. Beachland Tavern. Rocket from the Tombs/Unholy Two: 8:30 p.m., $15 ADV, $17 DOS. Beachland Tavern. Saint Light/Matt Hectorne/Poro: 9 p.m., $6. Grog Shop. Strangelove: The Depeche Mode Experience: 7 p.m., $13-$25. House of Blues. Thin Lips/Heart & Lung/Old Souls/ Ghost Slime/Mister Fabulous & the bad boiz (in the Locker Room): 7 p.m., $8. Mahall’s 20 Lanes. Trailer Grass Orchestra (in the Supper Club): 8 p.m., $8 ADV, $10 DOS. Music Box Supper Club. Glenn Zaleski Trio: 8 p.m., $12. Bop Stop.
FRI
05/12
Jason Aldean/Chris Young/Kane
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Obsessives/McCafferty: 7:30 p.m., $14 ADV, $16 DOS. Mahall’s 20 Lanes. Southern Culture on the Skids/ Woolly Bushmen: 8:30 p.m., $18 ADV, $20 DOS. Beachland Ballroom. Spoon/Tennis: 8:30 p.m., $30-$40. House of Blues. Moss Stanley: 10:30 p.m., free. Nighttown. Sykosis/Malice 213/Konipshun Phit/ Mettal Maffiz/Fit For a Funeral/ Tears of Olympus/Comedy of Brad Bishop/Cymatik: 6 p.m., free entry with a flier. Agora Ballroom. Time Canvas: 8 p.m., $10. Bop Stop. Travelin’ Johnsons (In the Wine Bar): 8 p.m. Brothers Lounge. Young Folk/CIM Jazz Trio: 9 p.m., $5. The Euclid Tavern.
The buzzworthy Brooklyn duo Overcoats comes to the Beachland Tavern. See: Friday.
SAT
Brown/Dee Jay Silver: One of modern country’s biggest stars, singer-guitarist Jason Aldean delivered yet another hit with last year’s They Don’t Know. The album opens with the hard rocking “Lights Come On” and then provides the usual quotient of ballads (“A Little More Summertime”) and rockers about hard-drinking nights out on the town (“They Don’t Know”). Aldean regularly includes Cleveland on his tours and draws capacity crowds. Expect his rowdy fans to be in good form at tonight’s show, the first of the summer season at Blossom. (Jeff Niesel) 7:30 p.m., $31.50-$71.50. Blossom. Overcoats/Yoke Lore: Count on NPR’s Tiny Desk Shows to highlight emerging, cross-genre talent; Overcoats are no exception. Hana Elion and JJ Mitchell’s intimate late-March performance in support of their just-released debut album, Young, has launched the Brooklyn-based duo into the limelight. Gorgeously harmonized, catchy and complex, their songs incorporate elements of folk, pop, soul and electronic music in a delicious, danceable composition; give “Leave the Light On” a listen for proof. Accompanied by an excellent
| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
backing band, Overcoats will bring a vibrant performance to the Beachland this Friday. (Lawrence Neil) 8 p.m., $10. Beachland Tavern. 9 Shocks Terror/Vanilla Poppers/ We March: 9 p.m., $12. Now That’s Class. Rachel Brown & The Beatnik Playboys: 8:30 p.m., $10. Nighttown. Zach Clayton: 6 p.m., $25. House of Blues Cambridge Room. The Cult/VOWWS: 8 p.m., $37.50$815. Goodyear Theater. Dirty Bourbon River Show (in the Supper Club): 8 p.m., $12. Music Box Supper Club. Exploding Lies/ Kill the Hippies/ Forager/Adam Gravy: 9 p.m. Happy Dog. Carlos Jones & the PLUS Band: 10 p.m., $10. Grog Shop. Jukebox Heroes: 9:30 p.m., $5. Brothers Lounge. Matthew Mayfield: 9 p.m., $10. Musica. Out of Eden: A Tribute to The Eagles: 8 p.m., $15-$20. Hard Rock Rocksino Northfield Park. The Scintas: 8 p.m., $29.50-$47.50. Hard Rock Rocksino Northfield Park. Shout!: 8 p.m., $5. Vosh Club. Sorority Noise/Mat Kerekes/The
05/13
Red Hot Chili Peppers/IRONTOM/ Jack Irons: When the veteran altrock group Red Hot Chili Peppers first announced tour dates for 2017, Cleveland wasn’t on the itinerary. But late last year, the group announced a revised schedule that includes tonight’s gig at Quicken Loans Arena. The tour supports the band’s 11th studio album, The Getaway. While the guys no longer perform wearing only strategically placed socks, we’d still love to hear punchy early classics such as “Catholic School Girls Rule” and “No Chump Love Sucker.” (Niesel) 8 p.m., $49-$99. Quicken Loans Arena. Animals as Leaders/Veil of Maya/ Alluvial: 7 p.m., $20 ADV $25 DOS. The Agora Theatre. Bringing Down the House:2017 Live Showcase: 11 a.m. House of Blues. Ronnie Baker Brooks/Sonny Moorman Group: 8 p.m., $18 ADV, $20 DOS. Music Box Supper Club. CLUBHOUSE/Captain Kidd/ Modernism/Spirit of the Bear: 9 p.m., $8. Grog Shop. Tony Cuda’s Jazz Cats: 8 p.m., $12. Bop Stop. Myron Davis: 8:30 p.m., $20. Nighttown. Dead Ahead Ohio/Powerful Pills: 9 p.m., $10. Beachland Ballroom. Disco Paradiso, Vol. 8 (in Club Atlantis): 9 p.m., $7. Now That’s Class. Emarosa/Cedar Green/Leav/e/ arth/Forage & Wander/Keys & Corridor: 8 p.m., $13 ADV, $15 DOS. Mahall’s 20 Lanes. FreshProduce/Chelsea Pastel/Red
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LIVEWIRE
KentStage The
=HGÍM FBLL MA>L> @K>:M LAHPL MB<D>ML HG L:E> GHP
Rose Panic: 9 p.m., $5. The Euclid Tavern. Anthony Hamilton/Raheem DeVaughn/Angie Stone: 8 p.m., $59-$125. State Theatre. Mo’ Mojo (in the Supper Club): 8 p.m., $10 ADV, $12 DOS. Music Box Supper Club. Part Time Lover/Glass Traps/John’s Little Sister: 9 p.m., $8. Beachland Tavern. Pile/Gnarwhal/Orca (in the Locker Room): 8 p.m., $10 ADV, $12 DOS. Mahall’s 20 Lanes. Pompous Ass (In the Wine Bar): 8 p.m. Brothers Lounge. The Real Soul Pleaser Play the Music of James Brown/Debaneise Byrd & Co.: 8 p.m., $8. Musica. School of Rock: 2 p.m., free. Beachland Ballroom. That ’80s Band: 9:30 p.m., $5. Brothers Lounge. Times10/Actual Trains/ Solomonphonic/Istvan Medgyesi: 9 p.m., $5. Happy Dog. Jackie Warren: 10:30 p.m., free. Nighttown.
SUN @ MIDNIGHT Justin Townes Earle ft. The Sadies
Tom Paxton and The Don Juans
Tue., May 16
Fri., May 19
Rocky Horror Picture Show Fri., May 19
Eric Johnson Electric Band
Scott Stapp Live and Unplugged
Red Wanting Blue
Sat., May 20
Thu., May 25
Sat., May 27
Bruce Cockburn
Robert Cray & Hi Rhythm
Wed., May 31
Fri., Jun 2
Wed., Jun. 7
Devon Allman
Al Stewart performs “Year of the Cat”
Mon, Jun. 12
Thu., Jun. 15
Ottmar Liebert & Luna Negra
ProgNation & Diamond Dogs present a 70’s Art/Prog Rock Show Sat., Jun. 17
ALL SHOWS AT THE KENT STAGE UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED Tickets available at www.kentstage.org or 877-987-6487 GMK [w cw i {{ © a{ B e~ JJHJF
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
05/14
The Growlers: 8 p.m., $20 ADV, $25 DOS. Beachland Ballroom. Mike Petrone (in the Wine Bar): 5:30 p.m. Brothers Lounge. Room 101/Fake Muslims/Deche: 9 p.m., $5. Now That’s Class. Xandria/Kobbra and the Lotus/Once Human: 6 p.m., $15 ADV $20 DOS. Agora Ballroom.
MON
05/15
Charley Bliss/See Through Dresses/ Heavenly Creatures: Brooklynbased indie band Charly Bliss repeatedly pops up on “bands to watch” lists. Its version of pop rock borrows from ’90s alt rock like Guided By Voices, but lead singer Eva Hendricks has a distinctive voice that provides a fresh take on the genre. The band’s recent fulllength debut has been getting rave reviews from AV Club and NPR. Single “Glitter” features chugging power chords and a minor chord breakdown, but more importantly has a chorus that will get stuck in your head for days. (Johnny Cook), 8:30 p.m., $10. Beachland Tavern. Mac DeMarco/Tonstartssbandht: Mac Demarco is well-known for on-stage antics and bizarre cover songs: Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s
“Takin’ Care of Business” used to be a regular setlist staple. He might be a clown on stage, but the music Demarco writes and records is pretty refined. His new album This Old Dog strips away some of the guitar echo from his previous albums, leaving more room for the surprisingly clear-headed lyrics. Title track “This Old Dog” is smooth and confident, pushing Demarco a little further into ‘serious songwriter’ territory. (Cook) 7 p.m., $25 ADV, $30 DOS. House of Blues. Samantha Fish/13 Cadillacs: Straight outta Kansas City, Samantha Fish has been making a nice dent in the roots rock and blues touring circuits. Her third album, Chills & Fever, just dropped, and it showcases Fish’s knack for winding up and down the neck and flexing bluesy licks over chugging percussion. There’s a lot of rock ’n’ roll coursing through Fish’s veins, but her songwriting chops remain entrenched in the blues. (Eric Sandy) 8 p.m., $18 ADV, $20 DOS. Beachland Ballroom. Skatch Anderssen Orchestra: 8 p.m., $7. Brothers Lounge. Illegal Drugs/Pack Wolf: 9 p.m., $5. Now That’s Class. Shaun Martin: 7 p.m., $20. Nighttown. Skating Polly/Obnox/Toma Doe: 8:30 p.m., $4-$10. Grog Shop. University School HS Band: 7:30 p.m., $10. Nighttown. Velvet Voyage (in the Wine Bar): 8 p.m. Brothers Lounge.
TUE
05/16
Chicago: 7:30 p.m., $59.75-$99.75. E.J. Thomas Hall. Balkan Strings Trio: 7:30 p.m., $20. Nighttown. Gerald Clayton Trio: 7 p.m., $20. Nighttown. Justin Townes Earle/The Sadies: 8 p.m., $25. The Kent Stage. Eyes Set To Kill/Bad Seed Rising/ The Nearly Deads: 6:30 p.m., $12 ADV $14 DOS. Agora Ballroom. The Family Crest/Trevor Sensor: 8:30 p.m., $12 ADV, $16 DOS. Beachland Tavern. Iron Chic/Signals Midwest/Worship This!: 8:30 p.m., $12 ADV, $14 DOS. Grog Shop. Outlab Session: 9 p.m., free. Bop Stop. Swing City Big Band: 7:30 p.m., $10. Vosh Club. Two-Set Tuesday featuring Jim Koeppel (In the Wine Bar): 7 p.m. , $5. Brothers Lounge.
scene@clevescene.com t@clevelandscene
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WANNA VAPE? LIVE ENTERTAINMENT
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| clevescene.com | May 10 - 16, 2017
MEET THE BAND: Crocus Behemoth (vocals), Gary Siperko (guitar, vocals), Buddy Akita (guitar), Craig Bell (bass, vocals), Steve Mehlman (drums, vocals)
“RFTT is a brutal rock experience. There is subtlety but it’s all in the context of two guitars wound up to max and driving for the ďŹ nish line. Stand back and hang on.â€?
THE NEW CREW: The proto-punk act Rocket from the Tombs only played the Cleveland area for about a year in the ’70s before dissolving and then essentially spawning Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys. Still, the band left a huge impression. Led by burly singer David Thomas, a former Scene writer who calls himself Crocus Behemoth, the band has evolved since those early days when the original lineup featured guitarist Peter Laughner, an iconic punk ďŹ gure who died in 1977, guitarist Cheetah Chrome, and drummer Johnny Blitz. Despite the changes in personnel, Thomas says the current lineup delivers on several levels. “The rhythm section is solid and reliable,â€? he says in an email exchange. “The two guitars, Gary Siperko and Buddy Akita, are well-matched. They complement each other. They play solid rhythm parts that mesh and intertwine. They play leads, each coming from a different perspective. They’re both hot players while neither minds doing the grunt work of holding things together when required.â€?
WHERE YOU CAN HEAR THEM: facebook.com/rocketfromthetombs
PACKING A PUNCH: The live shows still smolder as Thomas approaches them as a performance artist, regularly delivering his poetic lyrics with an unrivaled intensity. “Pile the amps on stage and go hell for leather — I think that about sums it up,� he says when asked about the band’s approach.
WHY YOU SHOULD HEAR THEM: The band started writing tunes on its most recent album, Black Record, back in 2012. It holed up at Suma Recording in Painesville to record the songs with engineer Paul Hamann. Album opener “Waiting for the Snowâ€? features guttural vocals and sinewy guitar riffs as Thomas croons, “you’re no friend of mine.â€? The song recalls the best ’70s post-punk, as does the hard-rocking “Welcome to the Dark Ages.â€? The band even gives its classic hit “Sonic Reducerâ€? another good go, capturing its raw power with the remake. One critic called the album the band’s â€œďŹ ercestâ€? record yet. “I agree with it,â€? says Thomas. “That’s not to criticize other albums unfairly but each of the preceding albums had some aws. We didn’t have a good drummer until Steve joined the band. The Redux album was recorded quickly and without sufďŹ cient time or facility to correct some things. Bary suffered for lack of preparation. Black Record had all the pieces fall into place.â€? WHERE YOU CAN SEE THEM: Rocket from the Tombs performs with Unholy Two at 8:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 11, at the Beachland Ballroom.
jniesel@clevescene.com t@jniesel
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SAVAGE LOVE TRAPS AND TRIGGERS by Dan Savage Dear Dan, My husband is nearly 20 years older than me, which was never an issue early in our relationship. However, for approximately the last eight years, we have not been able to have fulfi lling sex because my husband can’t keep an erection for more than a few thrusts. I love my husband and I am committed to our family, but I miss full PIV sex. I’m still fairly young and I enjoy sex, but I feel like I am mourning the death of my sex life. I miss the intimate connection and powerful feeling of sex with a man. My husband tries to please me, but oral sex is just okay and toys don’t have the same effect. We have tried Viagra a few times, but it gave him a terrible headache. I try to brush it off because I don’t want to embarrass him. I am curious about casual relationships, but I fear they wouldn’t stay casual. Also, I would feel guilty being with another man even though my husband said I could do it one time. On one hand, I feel like I should be able to have a fulfilling sex life. But on the other hand, I don’t want to be a cheater. — Now On To Having Awkwardly Realistic Discussions It’s not cheating if you have your husband’s permission, NOTHARD, but fucking another man could still blow up your marriage — even if you manage to keep it casual. Story time: I knew this straight couple. They were good together, they loved each other, and they had a strong sexual connection. (Spoiler alert: My use of the past tense.) The woman was all about monogamy, but her boyfriend had always wanted to have a threesome. She didn’t want to be the reason he never got to do something he’d been fantasizing about since age 13, so she told her boyfriend that if the opportunity ever presented itself, he could go for it. So long as the sex was safe and he was honest with her, he could have a threesome one time. The opportunity presented itself, the sex was safe, he was honest — and my friend spent a week ricocheting between devastated and furious before finally dumping her devastated and flummoxed boyfriend. During a drunken postmortem, my friend told me she wanted her
boyfriend to be able to do it but didn’t want him to actually do it. She didn’t want to be the reason he couldn’t; she wanted to be the reason he didn’t. So her permission to have a threesome “one time” was a test (one he didn’t know he was taking) and a trap (one he couldn’t escape from). I urged my friend to take her boyfriend back — if he would have her — but he’d touched another woman with the tip of his penis (two women, actually), which meant he didn’t love her the way she thought he did, the way she deserved to be loved, etc., and consequently he couldn’t be allowed to touch her with the tip of his penis ever again. Back to you, NOTHARD: My first reaction to your letter was “You’ve got your husband’s okay to fuck some other dude — go for it.” Then I reread your letter and thought, “Wait, this could be a test and a trap.” You say you’ve brushed off the issue to spare your husband’s feelings, but he may sense it’s an issue and, consciously or subconsciously, this is his way of finding out. If you take him up on his offer “one time,” and you make the mistake of being honest with him about it, he may be just as devastated as my friend was. So don’t take your husband up on his offer — not yet. Have a few more conversations about your sex life instead and address nonmonogamy/openness generally, not nonmonogamy/openness as a work-around for his dick. There may be some solo adventures he’d like to have, there may be invigorating new sexual adventures you could enjoy as a couple (maybe he’d love to go down on two women at once?), or he may rescind or restate his offer to let you fuck some other dude one time. Get clarity — crystal clarity — before proceeding. Finally, NOTHARD, there are other erectile dysfunction drugs out there, drugs that may not have the same side effects for your husband. And low to very low doses of Viagra — doses less likely to induce a headache — are effective for some men. Good luck.
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