Articles
by Advocate Staff | Jun 27, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Staff Picks
Happy Valley Guitar Orchestra at Hawks & Reed // FRIDAY, June 28 The Valley’s own premier guitar orchestra extraordinaire will be performing a show in Greenfield this Friday at Hawks & Reed Performing Arts Center. The guitar orchestra is made up of 15...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jun 26, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
Last week, New England Public Radio published a report quoting multiple former employees of the Iron Horse Entertainment Group (IHEG) alleging labor violations, including improper payroll deductions (also known as wage theft), late paychecks, and failure to post...
by Laura Holland | Jun 26, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured
Aptly named and thoughtfully installed, The Picture Book Odyssey of Peter Sís (at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art through October 27), lets us follow the artist’s footsteps on a pathway that is anchored in fact but also spins off into fantasy. Born in...
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 26, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Seal Researchers in Scotland have taught three gray seals to sing songs like “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” and the theme to “Star Wars.” Scientists at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland raised the trio of seals from birth in order to...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 26, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, Podcast
Dave and Trumpy talk about this week’s weird news — stories about disembodied toes, Bill Cosby’s prison lecture series, bringing your daughter to a crime spree, and multiple stories about poop. Listen here: You can hear previous episodes of the...
by Jennifer Levesque | Jun 25, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
“Hey Levesque,” I was greeted while walking up to the entrance. “Hey Levesque,” I replied. Not too many people share my last name, but it just so happens one of the bartenders at the Tank in my hometown of Agawam, does. The Cheers in Hampden County, where everyone...
by Blaise Majkowski | Jun 25, 2019 | Articles, Blaise's Bad Movie Guide, Columns, Featured, Film
Looks like Godzilla, king of the monsters is falling on hard times. Our reptilian friend’s new movie is having a hard time wooing audiences away from a flick about another prehistoric beast, sir Elton John. Even appearances by fellow cohorts Mothra, Rodan, and King...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 25, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
The best thing about summer theater in this region is its variety. Last weekend, for instance, I saw an Irish drama, an American musical and a world premiere. The premiere, at Barrington Stage Company, is a metaphor within a satire that becomes an indictment. America...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 24, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
When I was in London this month, I saw two Shakespeare plays. No, make that two and a half: the Bard’s most popular comedy, one of his least performed, and a new play in which he’s a character – and a plagiarist. Just a stroll along Thameside from the National...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 24, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Podcast
Lauren Simonds recently wrote a cover story for the Advocate, “An Old Stoner’s Guide to Modern Cannabis.” Here she sits down with editor Dave Eisenstadter on what research for the story was like, and also lamenting the time when stoners knew how to...
by Rob Brezsny | Jun 24, 2019 | Articles, Astrology, Featured
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Here are your fortune cookie-style horoscopes for the months ahead. JULY: Discipline your inner flame. Use your radiance constructively. Your theme is controlled fire. AUGUST: Release yourself from dwelling on what’s amiss or off-kilter....
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 24, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, The V-Spot
Content note: This column talks about nonconsensual relationship dynamics. Hi Yana! I’m a pansexual woman currently in college. I had a really bad relationship for about three months, and I ended it about nine months ago. I struggle with depression, anxiety, and PTSD,...
by Jack Brown | Jun 24, 2019 | Articles, Cinemadope, Columns, Featured
The trope of the working-class-hero has long had a place in American music, but particularly so since Bruce Springsteen’s career began to take off in the mid-1970s. Things only got more blue around the collar when his megahit album, “Born in the U.S.A.,” was released...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 22, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Ch’Chunk! blends together swing, gypsy jazz, and Americana to create its own modern take on jazz and roots music. The band performed live at the Summit View in Holyoke during the 2019 Best of the Valley Readers’ Poll party.
by Connolly Ryan | Jun 21, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers
Poetry by Connolly Ryan To an Unidentified Sunset Soloist I can’t see who it is singing her little heart out, perseverating her sweet head off, up in the attic of a red maple tree, but whoever it is belting it out like that, like there is no known limit to the...
by Monte Belmonte | Jun 20, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Monte Belmonte Wines
It’s all the same. Only the names have changed. Everyday, it seems we’re drinking rosé. Sometimes you tell the day by the bottle that you drink. And times when you’re all alone, all you do is think. About rosé. Also, it’s not all the same. New Jersey’s second most...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Staff Picks
Sam’s Folk Club: 1967 // FRIDAY You won’t need a TARDIS or a Delorean to travel back in time to the 1960s on Friday. The Shea Theater in Turners Falls and Eggtooth Productions will be hosting its swingin’ 1960s folk club as part of its Sam’s Club series. It’s a...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 19, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
One of the first things I noticed about Norway when I was there earlier this month – along with the brisk air, the clean streets, and the tall blondes (and taller blonds) striding along those streets – was the 19 hours of daylight. Not quite “midnight sun,” but it...
by Gena Mangiaratti | Jun 19, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Dori Digenti does not know the criminal histories of her yoga students at the Hampden County Pre-Release Center. “To me, they’re participants in a yoga class,” said the founder and owner of Breathing Space Yoga & Mindfulness Studio in Holyoke. “They’re just who...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jun 19, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured
I was on a hike with a friend and former colleague in 2012 when I first seriously considered the idea the Advocate is now undertaking. As we talked, it didn’t take us long to get to our frustrations that so many journalistic organizations were on shaky financial...
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 19, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Definitely not “Saved by the Bell” A man from Vermont learned that looking up clips from 1990s sitcom “Saved by the Bell” and driving on the open road don’t exactly mix. The man sideswiped a police car while trying to find an episode of the TV show on the internet....
by Jack Brown | Jun 18, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Cinemadope, Columns, Featured
Living in the age of Instagram has meant — for better or for worse — that everyone is a photographer, or thinks they are. Which in the end has been a great win, I think, and one that has opened the door to creativity for an untold number of people who otherwise might...
by Will Meyer | Jun 18, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Joey La Neve DeFrancesco, guitarist for acclaimed punk band Downtown Boys, also performs as La Neve. While La Neve is a project that certainly shares the political concerns of Downtown Boys, it is stylistically different all together. Drawing on house, industrial, and...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 18, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
The summer season has been slowly gaining momentum, and this week it explodes, with 10 shows in the Valley and Berkshires opening or already up and running. Among these are a pair of classic musicals, two uncommon love stories set in Ireland, a satirical look at...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 17, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Podcast
Author of the book “Ratf**ked: The True Story Behind the Secret Plan to Steal America’s Democracy,” David Daley has also served as the editor of Salon.com. He now calls the Valley home and has written several pieces looking closely at the campaign...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 17, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, The V-Spot
Hi Yana! My partner and I have been together for three years. In general we have a really great relationship with solid long-term goals in common and enjoy each other in many ways. However, it seems like occasionally we go through long stretches of poor communication,...
by Rob Brezsny | Jun 17, 2019 | Articles, Astrology, Featured
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Orfield Laboratories is an architectural company that designs rooms for ultimate comfort. They sculpt the acoustic environment so that sounds are soft, clear, and pleasant to the human ear. They ensure that the temperature is just right and...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jun 14, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Since the retirement of longtime “News of the Weird” columnist Chuck Shepherd, the Advocate has done “Bizarro Briefs,” our own collection of weekly weird news we find. Thanks to a partnership with Trumpy from Hits 94.3, with a similar...
by Our Readers | Jun 14, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
Burn biomass for the sake of the forest In response to “‘Biomass Isn’t Clean Energy’: Springfield activists blast state plan at hearing,” published June 6 at valleyadvocate.com (see page 6). I’m Mike Leonard, Consulting Forester, North Quabbin Forestry. I have a BS...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions performer is rapper Big Sav, who performs auto-biographical rap that turns the pains of life into music. Check out his performance in the video below. Advocate Sessions interview with Big Sav: This week also featured an audio...
by Jonathan Kermah | Jun 13, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Review
Twenty-one-year-old Amherst rapper Tyson Burnett, known as Big Sav, has turned his previous encounters with the law into a promising future. His catchy melodies over upbeat trap piano keys disguise the pain-filled lyrics like “I been lonely hoping that my light ain’t...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 13, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, News
The month of June means that it’s officially LGBTQ+ Pride Season, with pride marches moving across the country from the east to the west coasts of the U.S. Here in our humble rainbow Valley, we got started early with Northampton’s pride march and event on May 4,...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 13, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, Staff Picks
Drag Brunch with Hors and Friends for Franklin County Pride at Hawks & Reed // SATURDAY You can support Franklin County Pride and your local drag queens on Saturday morning in downtown Greenfield with a special drag brunch featuring the always magnificent and...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 12, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured
Summer is a time for the arts, especially here in the Valley. From the myriad theater groups who put on their summer plays to the collection of music festivals and outside performances that grace our part of the world while the sun shines high in the sky. Without...
by Dave Eisenstadter | Jun 12, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, News
Often this space is used to chide lawmakers for cowardice, stupidity, greed, or cruelty … and rightly so. But every so often, politicians get it right, and it’s important that we celebrate those times as well as bring attention to when our leaders fall short. So below...
by Chris Goudreau and Dave Eisenstadter | Jun 12, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
A cervine intruder It was a tense moment for an eastern Texas woman. She realized that her Lufkin home had been illegally entered when she heard glass breaking, so she went to hide in a closet and called police. Police decided to surround the house after learning the...
by Jennifer Levesque | Jun 11, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
When I opened the press release for this upcoming album release that was accompanied by a live set at Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA, there was one word that caught my interest: Mellotron. The instrument is similar in artistry and the complicatedness of a...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 11, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, The Beerhunter
Lauren Kendzierski had enough on her plate. By the time she decided to turn her homebrewing habit into something commercial, she was already managing a 10-acre farm with an orchard and vineyard, running the popular food truck and catering business Chanterelle To Go,...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 11, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
Hamlet, we recall, reminded the players visiting Elsinore that the theater’s job is to reflect “the very age and body of the time.” Times being what they are, it’s no surprise that quite a number of shows this summer do just that. The schedule in the Valley and...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 10, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Podcast
Cannabis expert and O Cannabis! columnist Karima Rizk talks with editor Dave Eisenstadter about two of her most recent stories with the Valley Advocate, one about her own cannabis growing experience and the other about finding your perfect dose. Listen below: You can...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 10, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, The V-Spot
Hi Yana, Over the course of the last couple months my partner’s sex drive has slowly fallen off, and is now creating tension in our relationship. We’ve been together for nine months, and true to form, the beginning was full of passion, romance, and sexual exploration....
by Jack Brown | Jun 10, 2019 | Articles, Cinemadope, Columns, Featured, Film
It shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone that the military mights of the world have long been concerned with what we’ve come to call “optics” — the way in which a given political action is perceived by a public that is surrounded on all sides by an endless media...
by Rob Brezsny | Jun 10, 2019 | Articles, Astrology, Featured
ARIES (March 21-April 19): We may not have to travel to other planets to find alien life. Instead of launching expensive missions to other planets, we could look for exotic creatures here on earth. Astrobiologist Mary Beth Wilhelm is doing just that. Her search has...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 7, 2019 | Advocate Sessions, Articles, Featured, Music
This week’s Valley Advocate Sessions performer is Jon Carroll & BraveSoul, who is a two-time Grammy Award-winning songwriter making R&B with soulful melodies and an inventive spirit. Interview with Jon Carroll:
by Our Readers | Jun 7, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Letters from our Readers, News
‘Everyone should march for climate, for justice, and for women’s rights’ In response to “Between the Lines: Looking to the Unexpected on Climate Change Solutions,” published May 30 – June 5, 2019. Here on the eve of my 65th birthday it seemed appropriate to send...
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 6, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Activists, elected officials, and concerned residents packed a June 5 Department of Energy Resources (DOER) hearing in Springfield on a state plan to open up state renewable energy subsidies to plants that burn biomass — mostly wood chips, wood pellets, and other wood...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 6, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Staff Picks
Ona Canoa’s “Resonate” show at Pushkin Gallery // SATURDAY Hawks & Reed Performing Arts Center is starting a new “Resonate” series, which takes place in the three-story marble building at Pushkin Gallery in downtown Greenfield. Western Mass folk trio Ona Canoa is...
by Monte Belmonte | Jun 6, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, Monte Belmonte Wines
“This one’s good, what’s it called again?” “White wine.” “Freakin’ LOVE it.” Netflix and chill? Great. Netflix and wine and chill? Even better. Wine Country on Netflix and wine and chill? It makes for a nice evening. You may get a good laugh watching Wine Country, but...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 5, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, News, The Beerhunter
In the Advocate’s monthly craft beer column The Beerhunter, I keep my finger on the pulse of local craft beer business. The column began in 2014. From day one, I had plenty of little dramas and lucky breaks to cover, from small-business zoning woes to creative...
by Dave Eisenstadter and Chris Goudreau | Jun 5, 2019 | Articles, Bizarro Briefs, Featured, News
Swooping to the rescue The robot-controlled cameras that film us at all times waiting for us to mess up so we can be fined or arrested have spawned a new genre of Bizarro Brief: the bird photobomb as savior. One such 1984-like surveillance device in western Germany...
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 5, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Review
The work of two artists are on display now through June 30 at Easthampton’s Elusie Gallery in an exhibit titled “Daydreaming,” which features surrealistic illustrated pieces by Samson E. King with images of nature and everyday objects colliding in a kaleidoscope...
by Karima Rizk | Jun 4, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, O Cannabis!
On May 20, three adults collapsed in a Cape Cod restaurant after trying edibles for the first time and apparently took a relatively high dose. One woman fainted and her two companions were soon lying semi-conscious on the ground. While the unfortunate incident is not...
by Will Meyer | Jun 4, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Imagine it’s the year 2020 and you get invited by a friend to a local house show. The catch: you don’t know who the performers will be and you don’t know where it will be located until the day of the show. You must apply in advance to even purchase a ticket and then...
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 4, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News
Around 2009, Palmer Renewable Energy planned to create a $150 million 42-megawatt biomass energy plant in East Springfield at 1000 Page Blvd., a project that local environmental activists thought was scrapped two years ago. Now, a decade since the plant was proposed,...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 4, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Review, Stage, Stagestruck
In a season studded with world premieres (five at Williamstown Theatre Festival alone and three at Barrington Stage Company, for example), I’m equally struck by some of the revivals coming up in the Valley and Berkshires this summer. I don’t mean chestnuts from the...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 3, 2019 | Articles, Featured, News, Podcast
We’re relaunching the Valley Advocate Podcast! Last year, we had a good run partnering with Amherst Media to produce video podcasts. Now we’re back both with audio-only and video versions! Up first is guest Maureen O’Reilly, who talks about her...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 3, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food Booze and Beyond, The V-Spot
Hello! You’ve probably heard this question before, but how do you approach the topic of group sex with people who you think might be down? I have had a few scenarios happen organically, and been approached myself, but I’m scared of seeming like a creep (for example, a...
by Rob Brezsny | Jun 3, 2019 | Articles, Astrology, Featured
ARIES (March 21-April 19): “I don’t think we were ever meant to hear the same song sung exactly the same way more than once in a lifetime,” says poet Linh Dinh. That’s an extreme statement that I can’t agree with. But I understand what he’s driving at. Repeating...
by Jack Brown | Jun 3, 2019 | Articles, Cinemadope, Columns, Featured
The Bing Arts Center building, down on Sumner Avenue in Springfield’s Forest Park neighborhood, has had its share of ups and downs over the years. It started life as Kossaboom’s Service Station a century ago, and filled tanks for a few decades before a reconfiguration...
by Advocate Staff | May 31, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Valley Advocate Sessions performer is folk-rock singer-songwriter Lady Jane, who combines melancholic melodies with lyrics that pull on your heart strings. Interview with Lady Jane:
