Articles
V-Spot: What Do I Do With My Dude Pubes?
Hi Yana, I have a question I’ve been wondering about (okay, obsessing about!) and I do not think I am alone in this one: What does a man need to do about hair “down there”? I keep my pubic area trimmed but unsure what is the best and safest method for my scrotum. Any...
Free Will Astrology: Gemini will meet people even Hemingway could stand
ARIES (March 21-April 19): A mushroom shaped like a horse’s hoof grows on birch trees in parts of Europe and the U.S. If you strip off its outer layer, you get amadou, spongy stuff that’s great for igniting fires. It’s not used much anymore, but it was a crucial...
Basemental: Some Armchair Philosophy on Making Music in 2019
One of the more difficult things about making music is the shape and form of the modern music industry. There are so many reasons why talented bands might develop a loyal and dedicated niche audience and never break through to larger success. At this point in time it...
“Breathing In, Monotypes:” Abstract nature art in layers of ink
At first glance, Doris Madsen’s artwork seems to be a collection of slightly abstract paintings inspired by nature: a frigid island shore, an overhead bird’s eye view of Greenland, the stark Icelandic countryside, and a collection of pitcher plants. But on closer...
Plants of the Bible on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
Plants of the Bible are a dream pop duo with synths and rich mellow vocal harmonies. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Plants of the Bible:
Bizarro Briefs: The Great Flat Earther Cruise Tour of 2020
Flat Earthers are arguably one of the easiest people to poke fun at. Raise your hand if the first time you heard about the group of people who still believe that the Earth is flat, you thought it was a joke. Well, those fine misinformed folks are planning a cruise...
Letters to the Editor: Rep. Neal should back the Green New Deal
Welcome Back, Valley Advocate In response to “An Advocate History” and “Still at it After 45 Years,” published March 21 – 27, 2019: Thank you so much for becoming the Valley Advocate again. I had about given up on you as there was little of interest left, just...
Valley Advocate Staff Picks: NoHo Hoedown, Waiting for Godot, and Life/Like
The NoHo Hoedown at the Iron Horse // FRIDAY The newly created Valley Twang Cooperative is bringing a night of local roots music to the Iron Horse Music Hall on Friday featuring three bands. There’s rockabilly/ country group Flathead Rodeo, Americana acoustic string...
Is High School Too Soon for Military Recruitment?
Each year, high school students across the country see uniformed members of the armed forces within school walls offering information on how to join up. But a local organization asks the question whether these soldiers are overselling a dangerous career path to an...
Clueless Parent: The Ancient Art of Anger Management
I got an email from a PR firm this week with the subject line: “The Epidemic of Extreme Parenting: How to Self-Assess.” I would say it was an interesting coincidence that it appeared just before the launch of this column, but it isn’t really. When I became a dad early...
Editorial: Compassion Needs to Cut Through the Distractions with Gun Deaths
Following the Parkland shooting last year, I was inspired by the activism of many of the student survivors, who marched to their state capital and lobbied Washington for gun control. The Advocate did a story about how those students were inspiring students in our own...
The V-Spot: Why Do I Cry After Climax?
Hi Yana, I’m perplexed as to why, for the last 20 years, I start bawling like a baby when I masturbate and orgasm. It only happens when I envision my ex-lover, who I had a five-year extramarital affair with in the ‘90s. We were both musicians in a college town. We...
Free Will Astrology: Is grilled cheese the key to more sex, Virgo?
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Kermit the Frog from Sesame Street is the world’s most famous puppet. He has recorded songs, starred in films and TV shows, and written an autobiography. His image has appeared on postage stamps and he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of...
Cinemadope: Rite of Spring – the 14th year of the Pioneer Valley Jewish Film Festival
With every March in the Valley comes a feeling of renewal — the Spring Bulb Show at Smith, that exquisite extra hour of daylight, a breeze that doesn’t slice through your very soul. And with that new sense of life comes the urge to get out and about, to emerge from...
Stagestruck Abroad: Toronto — Shades of Identity
Greetings from Toronto, where it’s still winter, the wind whipping in from Lake Ontario is keen and bracing, and so is the theater. I’ve seen two plays here, a one-man show and an eight-woman show, both of them the work of bi-cultural authors, performed in key venues...
Rice: An American Band on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
This week’s Advocate Sessions band is Americana, blues and jamming rock n’ roll band Rice: An American Band. Check out Rice’s performance in the video below. Interview with Rice: An American Band:
‘From Farms to Table’ exhibition in Northfield celebrates land, bird, and beast
For the past year or so, the Deerfield Valley Art Association has had a gallery and gift shop at 105 Main Street in Northfield. Particularly at this time of year, downtown Northfield may offer more to those driving through than those who actually stop and walk around....
Valley Advocate Staff Picks: Goblet and Jeopardy, Poetic Open Mic, Women’s Film Fest
Goblet and Jeopardy at The Perch // THURSDAY Mar. 21 Thrashy Thirsty Thursday! The top floor of the Hawks & Reed Performing Arts Center in Greenfield is a nice open spot for some pits. Western Mass bastard thrasher’s Goblet and Brattleboro’s thrash metalist’s...
Letters to the Editor: Venezuela could be US’s Waterloo
Hampshire College price tag comparable to most private institutions In response to: “Letters to the Editor: What’s missing from the Hampshire College discussion” (March 14-20, 2019): Hampshire College gives deep discounts and takes in diverse student pop. Hampshire...
An Advocate History: The Valley’s alternative voice for over 45 years
The first edition of the Valley Advocate was published on Sept. 19, 1973, with a cover story titled, “Prophet & Profit — ‘Spirit’ Dies,” about a large hippie commune in Leyden called “The Brotherhood of the Spirit,” which became defunct when more than half of them...
Bizarro Briefs: A New Meaning for Phone Shield
A new meaning for phone shield A 43-year-old Australian man may have his phone to thank for the fact that he was left with only a small cut on his chin after he came under attack by a man wielding a bow and arrow in rural New South Wales. Confronted with the bow and...
Editorial: Still At It After 45 Years
Astute readers will no doubt observe the “plus” sign after the number 45 on this week’s cover. That is us coming clean that, no, this is not exactly our 45th anniversary issue. We wanted to bring you something like Chris Goudreau’s vast history of the Advocate...
Valley Show Girl: Adam Kozak and Music To Die To
Adam Michael Kozak grew up in the ‘80s listening to DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince and Aerosmith. When he was a child, his mother played the digital organ they had set up in their living room, which she mainly played Barbara Streisand and Andrew Lloyd Weber show...
Monte Belmonte Wines: No snobbism, stupid questions, or incorrect adjectives at Shelburne Falls Cork
“I think we’ve kind of created, like, a black barbershop type of community.” A black barbershop may not be one’s first impression when walking into the new wine shop, Shelburne Falls Cork, but that’s how renowned local chef and newly pinned sommelier, Michaelangelo...
Stagestruck: Degrees of Separation — Putting the opioid crisis center stage
Eight people are seated in a semi-circle at a meeting of Narcotics Anonymous. They are actually actors in a play, but though they’re not the recovering addicts they portray, each of them has a real-life connection to the nation’s — and the Valley’s — opioid crisis....
The V-Spot: How Do We Get Our Sex Life Back After Abortion?
Hey Yana, A couple weeks ago my boyfriend and I decided we weren’t ready to have a baby just yet in our life, and we got an abortion. After previously going through one in an abusive relationship years ago, this time was much easier on me and he was very supportive...
Cinemadope: The cinema scene of Franklin County
Despite its proximity to the more famous haunts of Northampton, Franklin County has always had its own lively arts scene. The Green River Festival, celebrating 33 years in 2019, is perhaps the most recognizable name, but other area venues like the Montague Bookmill,...
Free Will Astrology: Read banned books, Aquarius
ARIES (March 21-April 19): During the coming weeks, everything that needs to happen will indeed happen only if you surprise yourself on a regular basis. So I hope you will place yourself in unpredictable situations where you won’t be able to rely on well-rehearsed...
Stagestruck: Infinite Chances for Love
Nick Payne’s time- and mind-bending play Constellations receives its local premiere this month at Gateway City Arts, a production of Ghost Light Theater, the Valley’s five-year-old purveyor of contemporary plays that speak to universal themes. The piece has made its...
The Green Sisters on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
This week’s Advocate Sessions performer are The Green Sisters with their mix of old timey, folk, Celtic, and bluegrass music with lush four part harmonies. Interview with The Green Sisters:
Basemental: So Riffy and Good
Where have all the rock bands gone? Back in June, I wrote about multi-talented guitarist Wendy Eisenberg’s solo album Time Machine. Then she told me that she “just wants to be a good person and make very complicated music.” Still, since then, she’s been hitting the...
Staff Picks: The Mammals at Hinterland; Art of Adam Bosse; The Fly at Amherst Cinema
Saturday, March 16 // The Mammals at Hinterland One of my favorite folk bands of all time, The Mammals, led by Ruth Ungar and Mike Merenda (Mike + Ruthy), will be playing at Valley View Farm in Haydenville this Saturday in collaboration with Laudable Productions. The...
Letters to the Editor: What’s missing from the Hampshire College discussion
What we are not talking about when we struggle over the possible loss of Hampshire College Everything I have read in the papers about the possible loss of Hampshire College has centered on the value of its creative approach to higher education, the progressive social...
Anti-Racism Now: Chipping away at racism by talking face to face
“One of my first memories of discrimination was when I was 10 or so,” said Gloria Graves Holmes, one of two co-facilitators of the Bridge 4 Unity project. “When I was standing on a corner, getting ready to cross the street, a white man drove by me and screamed ‘Go...
Editorial: So Long, Sam’s Pizzeria
Last Saturday night after returning home from The Big Surf Dance, an indoor, 12-hour winter music fest supporting veterans transitioning into housing, at Hawks & Reed in Greenfield, I heard the sad news that Sam’s Pizzeria in Northampton was closing after 12 years...
Bizarro Briefs: A Year of Free Taco Bell
A year of free Taco Bell We have an update regarding the man and his dog featured in last week’s Bizarro Briefs who survived five days in a car in the snow on nothing but Taco Bell Fire Sauce packets. Taco Bell this week released an odd statement, both announcing that...
The Beerhunter: The Art of the Basement Brewpub
The motto for the town of Dalton is “heaven in the heart of the Berkshires.” And much like heaven, a lot of people never make it there. With fewer than 7,000 residents, Dalton is a sort of transitional space in rural Massachusetts, cushioning quiet little towns like...
Stagestruck: Happier Valley Comedy – Joy in the unexpected
Scott Braidman is giving me a tour of his workplace, the Hadley headquarters of Happier Valley Comedy, of which he’s the artistic director. It’s a bright, welcoming space in the Mill Valley Commons, a mixed-purpose building fronted by Route 9 and backed by cornfields....
Blaise’s Bad Movie Guide: The Love God?
Gather around kids, it’s Don Knotts time! Hands up if you remember everyone’s favorite nerd, starring in such classics as The Incredible Mr. Limpet and The Shakiest Gun in the West. I knew someone who counted The Ghost and Mr. Chicken among her favorite movies. But...
The V-Spot: What’s Wrong With My Sex Drive?
Content note: This column talks about non-consensual sex and traumatic reactions. Hi Yana, I’m a 24-year-old woman and I’ve had no sexual desire since my teens. When I was 18, I went out with a boy from my high school and when we went to his house, he pushed sex at a...
Cinemadope: Russian Icons
For many modern filmmakers, the shadow of Ingmar Bergman looms large. The great Swede, whose name has become a kind of shorthand here for foreign art-house film, was a revelatory experience for young filmmakers coming of age in a pre-digital era; seeing what he could...
Free Will Astrology: Your hairlessness makes you dogged, Scorpio
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The coming weeks might be a good time to acquire a flamethrower. It would come in handy if you felt the urge to go to a beach and incinerate mementoes from an ex-ally. It would also be useful if you wanted to burn stuff that reminds you of...
OroborO on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
OroborO combines experimenatal rock with punk, metal, and mathy riffs. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with OroborO:
Review: Art made on an iPhone 6?
Turners Falls artist ixchelailee has produced a series of digital collages that stand toe to toe with any other non-digital artwork that you might find in art galleries across the Pioneer Valley. Her exhibit, “Art as veil: hiding behind and walking through,” on...
Rep. Sabadosa champions immigrant driver’s license bill at discussion in Northampton
One undocumented woman’s husband was pulled over by a police officer and was asked to present his license. Even though he was obeying the rules of the road, he was arrested for not having a driver’s license. This was one common story from a group of local undocumented...
Valley Show Girl: A queer punk drag show double rainbow
I’ve been hibernating the past couple of months. I just bought a house and have been focused mainly on that. The closest I’ve been to live music is listening to my vinyl — live — in my living room. I broke out of my hibernation recently, however, and attended my first...
Staff picks: 17 Years Boy: Epilogue; Big Surf Dance; Spring Bulb Show
Imo Nse Imeh: 17 Years Boy: Epilogue // Through March 15 Visual artist Dr. Imo Nse Imeh’s latest project “17 Years Boy: Epilogue” is now on display at Readywipe Gallery in Holyoke. His work is remarkable and powerful and absolutely beautiful. The exhibition stems from...
Resist Like It’s 1786: Modern protest movements have echoes of Shays’ Rebellion
The Daily Hampshire Gazette, one of the oldest newspapers in America, printed its first pages in the summer of 1786. From the start, things were tense in the Western Mass communities it covered. The front page of the earliest surviving issue of the Gazette reports...
Editorial: Massachusetts must consider supervised drug consumption sites
This past week, the state Legislature’s Harm Reduction Commission — the advisory group looking at solutions to the drug epidemic — released its report. As expected, the commission, which is made up of current and former drug users as well as doctors, government...
Bizarro Briefs: Polly Wants a Hit of Opium
Polly wants a hit of opium The farmers who grow fields of poppies in India to produce opium, which is sold on the medical market, often have to contend with seasons of uneven rainfall — but there’s another unpredictable factor that has been wreaking havoc on the crop...
Graphic novels come of age in Eric Carle Museum exhibit
Comic books and other forms of graphic novels haven’t always been met with respect from literary circles. During the 1950s, anti-comic book censorship called Comics Code Authority limited the kinds of stories and content that graphic novels could depict. Today that...
Letters to the Editor: Solar and recreation can coexist
Editor’s Note: Welcome to our letters to the editor page. Here you’ll find reader comments on Advocate articles and other news. We collect readers’ opinions from emails, letters, Facebook comments, and comments to valleyadvocate.com. Want to get in on this?...
Wellness: Going Barefoot to Connect with the Natural World
Remember playing shoeless in the grass as a kid, or feeling the earth under your feet as you ambled down your favorite path or sat barefoot by a lake or around a campfire? For some of us, those carefree days of foot freedom are but a fond memory. However, there are...
V-Spot: Is Hormone Replacement Therapy the Key?
Hi Yana, I’m a transgender male, no bottom surgery yet (there’s a good chance it’s not even in the cards for me, anyway) and I’ll be starting HRT (hormone replacement therapy) soon. I’ve always been very frank with partners that I’m not comfortable with being touched,...
Free Will Astrology: Stick with it like Bob Dylan, Gemini
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Genius inventor Thomas Edison rebelled against sleep, which he regarded as wasteful. He tried to limit his time in bed to four hours per night so he would have more time to work during his waking hours. Genius scientist Albert Einstein had a...
Cinemadope: CatVideoFest at Amherst Cinema
If you’ve been around the interwebs for a bit, you’ve almost certainly run across Henri. Henri — or, to use his full title, Henri, le Chat Noir — is an ennui-soaked cat whose subtitled French musings call to mind old arthouse imports. “If my tail wags, it is a reflex...
Basemental: Jesus Vio brings his ‘Dutch Science’ to the Pioneer Valley
Free Pizza was a punk band founded in 2009 and based in Boston. If the name isn’t too much of a giveaway, the ethos of the band was playful and goofy. The heavy-hitting upbeat rowdiness was accessible, earnest, and always a good time. In 2016, Free Pizza threw in the...
Orlen, Gabriel, and Avery on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
Orlen, Gabriel, and Avery perform folk music with rich vocal harmonies, lap steel slide licks, and ragtime inspired guitar. Check out the group’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Orlen, Gabriel, and Avery:
Stagestruck: Motor City Soul
There’s a party going on in the basement of Chelle and Lank’s house – an unlicensed after-hours drink-and-dance dive in inner-city Detroit. That is, until a police raid on a similar establishment explodes into violence and the neighborhood goes up in flames. Detroit...E-Edition
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