EDMONTON: City of bad names
The $2 million rebranding of Edmonton as “Edmonton” may have made Edmonton the laughingstock of the world, but this is just the latest boneheaded move in the rich history of Edmonton’s embarrassing problem with names. Look at that: “Edmonton” four times in one sentence. Pay me now. Recall the last branding blunder: K-Days. Short history: […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Seven to rule them all
Every festival has its own “feel.” Now see if you can tell what the acts at the Seven Music Festival Saturday in St. Albert have in common: The Strumbellas, The Rural Alberta Advantage, The Provincial Archive, Paul Woida, The Elwins, Sykamore, Frazey Ford, and The Royal Foundry. Yes, they’re all white, but that sort of […]
Adam Lambert gives new life to Queen
Queen is never going to replace Freddie Mercury. He was one of a kind. But what about the rest of the guys in the band? What do they do when they want to keep the band going after their lead singer died? Life isn’t fair. And so, in their desire to give these great songs […]
PLAYBILL: Streetfest serious about silly
Jesters, jugglers, fools, clowns and buffoons … but enough about Edmonton City Hall. Bah-haha! That joke never gets old. Nor does the Edmonton International Street Performers Festival, for its 33rd year in Churchill Square July 7-16. Performers include the Mellifluous Mr. Bombo, Dan the Balloon Man, The Great Balanzo, Kamikaze Fireflies, Tianna the Traveller, Silver […]
EDMONTON RADIO: Morning men
The pairing of Scott McCord with Yukon Jack on The Bear’s new morning show promises to deliver your maximum recommended daily dose of testosterone. These are two of the manliest men on Edmonton radio. Their voices are deep and gruff, and they talk of manly things, like sports. They speak their minds. Sometimes they lose […]
CANADA 150: Two long strange trips
It looks like each of us is going to celebrate Canada 150 Day in our own way – or not, as the case may be. It’s a free country. Edmonton novelist Janice MacDonald is marking the occasion with a new book called Confederation Drive, detailing two cross-Canada journeys: One the author and her mom took […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Canada Day with Sarah
As far back as high school, Sarah McLachlan’s yearbook predicted she was destined to become a rock star – and that’s exactly how her life played out. Her pair of albums from the 1990’s, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy and Surfacing, remain as powerful as ever, spawning such Canrock hits as Good Enough, Building A Mystery, Sweet […]
RACISM: Is it awkward yet?
To the woman who demanded to see a white doctor in Toronto, to the men who brandished Confederate flags in a Muslim neighbourhood in Edmonton, to the people who hurl N-bombs on the streets, the #MakeItAwkward campaign doesn’t want to hate you. They just want to talk. Meeting hate with hate isn’t getting us anywhere. […]
Shakespeare’s ‘problem’ play gets powerful reading
When Shakespeare penned The Merchant of Venice somewhere during the 1590s, there were few Jews in England – they had been thrown out by the King in the late 13th century. But the hatreds and prejudices that these unfortunate people faced were still fresh enough for the Bard to write what has been termed his […]
REVIEW: Shakespeare comedy goes disco
The Merry Wives of Windsor, one of two Shakespearian plays featured this summer by Edmonton’s Freewill Shakespeare Festival, was a commissioned work – by a patron no less than Queen Elizabeth I. Her Majesty loved the portly, sack-quaffing knight that Shakespeare created for his Henry IV, Part 1 and further developed in Henry 1V, Part […]
