It’s been a long wait—and the festival is happening two weeks from tomorrow, on September 15—but J. Cole’s Dreamville Festival has finally announced its lineup. The festival will feature Cole, who hails from Fayetteville, as well as hip-hop heavyweights Nelly, Young Thug, and Big Sean. The inimitable SZA also sits toward the top of the […]
Allison Hussey
Posted inFood & Drink
Ponysaurus Presents Another ACLU Benefit with Rafiq Bhatia, Wye Oak, Body Games, and More
In the spring 2016, Durham’s Ponysaurus Brewing released its Don’t Be Mean to People saison as a way to push back against HB 2. The brewery hosted a day-long concert to benefit last spring, and these days, Don’t Be Mean to People is a staple This fall, the beer’s mission gets re-energized with two days […]
Posted inMusic
The Triangle Has More Music Festivals than Ever This September—Here’s How to Make Sense of It All
In most of the rest of the country, late spring and early summer make up prime music festival season. But this year, September is host to a slate of music festivals that make for a dizzying four weeks of entertainment in the Triangle. They cover just about every corner of music, from up-and-coming hip-hop stars […]
Posted inMusic
Gillian Welch to Receive the Thomas Wolfe Prize at UNC This Fall
For more than twenty years, singer-songwriter Gillian Welch has issued some of the most intimate, gorgeous songs of this generation. Her songwriting speaks to the unusual beauty and excruciating pain of the human condition, from the catastrophes and coincidences that fall on April 14, to a moonshiner’s ruinous career, to a girl being blessed with […]
Posted inMusic
Mountain Man Has a New Album Out Next Month, Listen to Three Songs from Magic Ship Now
It’s been a while since we last heard from Mountain Man, the three-woman ensemble of Molly Sarlé, Alexandra Sauser-Monnig, and Amelia Meath—eight years, in fact. The trio issued its gorgeous debut record, Made in the Harbor, in 2010, and after finishing touring around the record, the band’s members chased different projects (does Sylvan Esso ring […]
Posted inTravel Guide
A Short Train Ride From Durham to Raleigh Offers a Window Into the Triangle Mass-Transit Future
Light rail in the Triangle is a messy subject, as evidenced by this publication’s stories and comments section on a fairly regular basis. The debates about its $2.5 billion price tag and the planned seventeen-mile route, from Durham to Chapel Hill, are fractals of conflict. But taking the Carolinian from Durham to Raleigh on a […]
Posted inMusic
Punch Brothers May Be Packed with Talent, But Their New Record Barely Stays Afloat
PUNCH BROTHERS Sunday, July 22, 8 p.m., $35–$183 Durham Performing Arts Center, Durham www.dpacnc.com P>unch Brothers has always been a band of big leaps. Its mere existence is a feat of sleight of hand. Its componentsmandolin, banjo, fiddle, acoustic guitar, and upright bassindicate a bluegrass ensemble on paper, but their music has always rejected any […]
Posted inMusic
Restless Musician Ryan Gustafson Embraces Being a Folk-Rock Gem on Unsung Passage
The Dead Tongues Saturday, July 21, 8 p.m., $12–$14 Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro www.catscradle.com North Carolina music history is lousy with singer-songwriters, from classic examples like John D. Loudermilk and James Taylor to a younger set that includes Ryan Adams and Tift Merritt. More recently, Ryan Gustafsona longtime Carrboro fixture who decamped to Asheville four years […]
Posted inMusic
Katharine Whalen’s Decade-Long Break from Playing Squirrel Nut Zippers Songs Comes to an End
KATHARINE WHALEN Saturday, July 7 9 p.m., $10 Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro www.catscradle.com One of the most commercially successful bands to ever spring out of the Triangle is Squirrel Nut Zippers, whose 1996 LP Hot sold more than a million copies. One of the group’s not-so-secret weapons was Katharine Whalen, whose smoky, Billie Holiday-esque vocals gave […]
Posted inMusic
Chris Brown Still Sucks
A comical side effect of the #MeToo movement has been the concern that it’ll ruin the lives and careers of powerful men. I say “comical” in the “laugh-to-keep-from-crying” senseto see the utter failure of this feeble strain of whataboutism, we need look no further than Chris Brown. On Tuesday, Brown headlines the Coastal Credit Union […]