Articles
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Screwballs You never know what the world will throw at you. It’s one of the hardest lessons to learn, but at least there’s occasion in Conway to practice swinging at life’s surprises. On Saturday, the Hilltown hosts its fourth annual Chesbro Challenge, a very silly...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Leisure, Wellness
Wilderness survival films tend to focus on bears, wolves, sheer rock faces, and toppling (at least once per movie) into a cold, surging river. But most hiking safety tips — while often a matter of life and death — deal with more prosaic issues. The American Hiking...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter, Uncategorized
Testing the WatersSince it re-opened in March under new ownership, the Waterfront Tavern has been looking for ways to let the Valley know that it’s an up-and-coming nightspot all over again. One appealing addition to the music venue’s regular lineup: Wednesday...
by Gary Carra | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter, Uncategorized
This weekend, July 8-10, marks the 30th year of Greenfield’s Green River Festival. The much-ballyhooed hullabaloo has been feted by the likes of Rolling Stone and USA Today as one of the nation’s must-catch summer festivals in recent years, with its...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, News, News of the Weird
In May, an apparently devout woman named Katy Vasquez of Winter Park, Florida, posted a sincerely written entry on Facebook — and told Huffington Post in an interview — that she had just seen a “sign from God,” a cross, as a smudge in her infant’s...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
When I was a younger man, I looked at my father’s record collection as if it were a collection of lost gospels. He was a Dylan nut who branched out to collect lesser-known folk types, and while my friends were keeping up with what was happening in our own time, I...
by From Our Readers | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Letters from our Readers, News
Mental for Basemental I’ve been a reader of the Advocate for many years and I just wanted to say that I have really been appreciating Will Meyer’s Basemental column over the last several weeks. I’ve been to some of these basements and DIY venues...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Gene Brienre, makes his way to the opening celebration for the 44-unit Gordon H. Mansfield Veterans Community building — his new home.Select Soldier On military veterans were given the opportunity to purchase an equity stake in their homes. The idea is for veterans to...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter, Wellness
Hi Yana,I recently attended one of your workshops about the G-spot and it worked! My partner and I went home that night and I squirted. But it’s so strange because when I squirt it doesn’t happen as I climax. It isn’t like a climactic orgasm. It just feels crazy good...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 5, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Events in the coming week may trick your mind and tweak your heart. They might mess with your messiah complex and wreak havoc on your habits. But I bet they will also energize your muses and add melodic magic to your mysteries. They will...
by Chris Rohmann | Jul 2, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Stage, Stagestruck
Three of the four shows I saw at the National Theatre in London last month were star vehicles, and the fourth one’s ensemble cast featured a very well-known face. The first three also, coincidentally, ended in sudden reprieves from ignominious deaths. Another...
by Peter Vancini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
How did you get connected with Greenfield Gallery?I was just looking for my own art space and I was kind of shopping around the area. I think that was the second place I looked at and I was just completely enchanted. It’s such a great space. I love how the owner lives...
by Peter Vancini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, News
The lights are finally on in a small storefront on Worthington Street in downtown Springfield, just in time for the official June 8 kick-off gala for Make-It Springfield, the “pop-up makerspace” that’s aimed not just at refurbishing the empty storefront it moved into,...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Arts, News
On a cool Friday night in early May, guests filled the Greenfield Gallery to celebrate the abstract paintings of Greenfield artist Joseph McCarthy. About 60 people came through to chat over wine and cheese, and the gallery sold several works. When Rachael Katz and...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Featured, Uncategorized
SUNDAY: High Water MarkIt’s been one year since the relaunch of the Ashfield Lake House, which means a funkadelic anniversary show with music inside and outside, featuring the return of What Cheer? Brigade, Providence’s best 18-member brass band, plus performances by...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 30, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Picnic Perfect Fourth of July is the most picnic-iest holiday of the year, and we’re here to help you pack the most delicious, envy-inspiring, locally-sourced picnic basket of your life. You’ll notice that we didn’t make any of the food ourselves; that’s because this...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Food + Booze, News, Uncategorized
The staff at the Valley Advocate have been to many picnics, parties, hootenannies, hoe downs, shindigs, and festivals, but only one of us has ever tasted the infamous vodkamelon.Amanda Drane, our Third Eye Roaming yogi, claims to have made a vodka infused melon with...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Hoop DreamsThis summer is pretty much guaranteed to be a scorcher. The Valley’s best way to scratch that b-ball itch while enjoying some air conditioning is probably the Basketball Hall of Fame’s annual 60 Days of Summer, which provides 60 consecutive days of...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Shrew(d) ObserversIn a presidential election cycle as bizarre and theatrical as this one, it’s fitting that some of our weirdest art would start to imitate political life. Lauren Gunderson’s play The Taming — inspired in part by Shakespeare’s comedy The Taming of the...
by Steve Pfarrer | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
It was the era that became known as the Spanish Golden Age, when Spain was arguably the most powerful nation in western Europe, with a burgeoning colonial empire in the Americas and considerable territorial holdings in Europe, including modern-day Belgium, the...
by Gary Carra | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Featured, Uncategorized
The Springfield Business Improvement District isn’t trimming any fat with its 16th installment this year. Rather, they’re leading off with it. Or, more specifically, the locally notable band of same name.”FAT’s annual concert at Cityblock has always...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Paul Hoffman may be Greenfield Gallery’s most exhibited artist.The longtime illustrator, turned painter, has shown his work there three times, most recently his one-man show running through June 30. “What’s wonderful about the Greenfield Gallery is they’re dedicated...
by Robert S. Prattico | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Arts, News
These barbaric raids of aphotic-sick clouds tar by poison a horror with no boundary, appearing anywhere, pervasive as weather, assailing repeatedly without warning, leaving a vast pool of vulnerability and no shelter. 2 a.m. last call was happening everywhere.Again,...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Sibling RevelryThe Springfield-based Center for Human Development has been matching kids with mentors through its program Big Brothers Big Sisters of Hampshire County since 1975. Over the past four decades, more than 2,000 “littles” between the ages of 6 and 16 have...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Between the Lines, News
People say you can’t put a price on life, but Republicans certainly have. Ted Cruz (R-TX) thinks 100 human lives are worth about $159,800.Marco Rubio (R) doesn’t put as high a value on people, selling out the public for just $44,480. But at least...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, News
Strange creatures roam the wilds of the Valley’s Instagram feeds. That’s where we met George and Gracie, resident emus at the Starlight Llama solar-powered bed and breakfast in Northampton. “Modern dinos, these emus,” writes Boston resident Sonciary Honnoll...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Uncategorized
Visit from a Dark Horse As a teenager, Micah Scott was lost in a musical fugue, shuffling his tastes from Creedence Clearwater Revival to The Beatles to Pantera and Alice in Chains and back again. It wasn’t until his guitar teacher turned him on to Blind Lemon...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Columns, News, O Cannabis!
It’s summer! The season in which most Americans seek to do some deep unwinding by hopping in the car, on a plane, or a ship and getting away from it all. There is one thing millions of people aren’t seeking to leave behind, though, and it’s also headily conducive to a...
by Todd Crosset | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Letters from our Readers, News
We Had Our Own Brock Turner Situation in the ValleyThe sentencing of Brock Turner by California Judge Aaron Persky has sparked a national discussion of how we hold young drunk college men accountable for sexual assault. The general sentiment is that Persky was far...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, News, News of the Weird
The Bunyadi opened in London in June for a three-month run as the world’s newest nude-dining experience, and, since it only seats 42, it now has a reservation waiting list of 40,000. Besides the nakedness, the Bunyadi creates “true liberation,” said...
by Jack Brown | Jun 27, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Cinemadope, Columns, Film
Notes on WarWhen it comes to war and film, there will never be a shortage of stories. Whether tales of daring or death, on the front or at home, war can bring out the best and worst in us, and create lifelong strength — or leave one with lasting wounds. And while we...
by Gary Carra | Jun 22, 2016 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Nightcrawler
SWMRS boasts unique punk pedigree What’s in a name? The members of SWMRS are barely in their 20s and can already claim quite a lot. Reportedly inspired by watching Jack Black and his homage to headbanging — the film School of Rock — together in...
by Peter Vancini | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, News, Scene Here
In a cozy courtyard in downtown Springfield, nestled among red brick buildings and gray concrete parking garages, a small white quadcopter suddenly whirs to life on a makeshift launch pad in small patch of grass. At the controls is 16-year-old Briyanna Henry, who’s...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, News
Oh, Valley, we’ve loved you for such a long time now; we just wanted to count the ways. In celebration of the Valley Advocate’s relaunch we’re holding a love-in, right here, in these pages, right now. But we don’t have a rosy, puppy love going on with you, Valley. Oh,...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Newsletter, Stage
Wilkommen, Bienvenue Sarah Kilborne’s revelatory new night of cabaret delves into a little-known yet revolutionary moment in music history: queer music composed and performed prior to World War II. Her one-woman show is “an enlightening, enchanting trip to a...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Leisure, Newsletter
Dragons of myth come in all shapes and sizes, but human athletes have pared their real world replicas down to some clear-cut dimensions. A dragon boat is 40 feet by 4 feet, long and narrow and manned by 20 paddlers, sitting two by two. A drummer sits up front,...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, Newsletter
Red Hot Blues Shemekia Copeland sings electric blues, gospel, and R&B like her heart and soul depend on it. Whether she’s belting out a raucous blues-rocker, firing up a blistering soul-shouter, bringing the spirit to a gospel-fueled R&B rave-up, or digging...
by Will Meyer | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Basemental, Columns, Music, News
The magic of live music stems from the intimacy of being in the same room as the performer, but Sam Hadge’s talent is capturing that intimacy for the online world who couldn’t make it to the show.Since I started going to DIY shows with regularity about a year and a...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Featured, Newsletter, Uncategorized
The Friend Zone Dip your hippie head into a cool sonic pool this weekend by day-tripping up (or, hey, camping out) for the sixth annual Frendly Gathering, a three-day grassroots music festival in the Green Mountains of Southern Vermont. Vibe-wise, this fest is heavy...
by Blaise Majkowski | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Blaise's Bad Movie Guide, Columns, Featured, Film, Leisure
That time The Three Stooges went too far … nyuk, nyuk, nyuk As Kenny Rogers wisely sang, “You gotta know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em.” There have been many performers who have ignored this advice, plodding right along with their careers when they...
by Peter Vancini | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Featured, News
On April 25, the UMass College Republicans hosted an event in Stockbridge Hall featuring several prominent pop-conservatives. The event, “The Triggering: Has Political Correctness Gone Too Far?,” was billed as a discussion of the perceived excesses by social justice...
by Jack Brown | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Cinemadope, Columns, Featured, Film, Newsletter
Small films shown quickly, so see them today Showing movies is a tough racket, and the hard truth of the matter is that an opening weekend can make or break a film’s chances at breaking even at the box office. Do decently out of the gate, and you might get a chance at...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Between the Lines, News
When we set out to reinvigorate the Valley Advocate a little more than a year ago, we had some goals in mind. We wanted to bring our venerable newspaper back to its roots: alternative stories, for alternative people — and some mainstream folks who are still cool. We...
by Peter Vancini | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, News
From the comfort of a ranch-style home in Westfield, Zaid AlNassar says that the difference between his family’s situation in the strife-torn Middle East and their new life in the U.S. is “like the Earth and the sky.” The worries of those days seem a world away as his...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Against the Grain Korean artist Jaehyo Lee works with wood and metal to create both functional works and abstract shapes, embedding fresh-cut wood discs, bent steel bolts, and nails into “backgrounds” of burnt-black wood. Of his hulking, playful pieces, Sculpture...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Letters from our Readers, News
Guns ‘N’ Education “The Kirk Whatley Challenge: Before you write guns off, shoot one — safely” (June 16-22, 2016) by Hunter Styles attracted a lot of attention online. We posted the article to Facebook along with the question: Can you truly be anti-gun without first...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, News, News of the Weird
In May, the Norwegian Consumer Council staged a live, 32-hour TV broadcast marathon — a word-for-word reading of the “terms of service” for internet applications Instagram, Spotify and more than two dozen others, totaling 900 pages and 250,000 words of...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Leisure, Newsletter, The V-Spot, Wellness
Dear Yana,My girlfriend and I have been polyamorous for three years. We have established boundaries and as far as poly relationships go, it’s been pretty smooth sailing. Usually I’m a very low-jealousy partner.But lately she’s been flirting with this one woman that I...
by Rob Breszney | Jun 20, 2016 | Articles, Astrology, Wellness
ARIES (March 21-April 19): “The past lives on in art and memory,” writes author Margaret Drabble, “but it is not static: it shifts and changes as the present throws its shadow backwards.” That’s a fertile thought for you to meditate on...
by Chris Rohmann | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Stagestruck
Summer theater used to be known as “the straw-hat trail” and “summer stock,” both terms evoking familiar, innocuous entertainments presented for languid hot-weather audiences by (usually) amateur companies in tents, barns, and town halls. From the outset, though,...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Newsletter
Animal Dreams: Souls of Wildlife in Stone, Wood, and Paper by Holland HoaglandU.S. Fish and Wildlife Services, 300 Westgate Center Dr., HadleyThere are probably one hundred pieces and photos of Pelham artist Holland Hoagland’s artwork on display at the Fish and...
by Will Meyer | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Music, Newsletter
Downtown Jam Matt Robidoux is nervous. He is sitting on a patch of grass in downtown Greenfield, adjacent to a municipal parking lot and the Mexican restaurant Mesa Verde. Across the street, a small handful of musicians are shooting the shit and smoking cigarettes,...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Get Shorty Google “kid Trombone Shorty” and try not to smile. The top search result shows Troy Andrews, age 5, playing at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in 1991. The child is bug-eyed, with puffed cheeks, blowing into an instrument twice as long as his...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Go with the FlowThis Saturday, the village of Shelburne Falls takes the outdoors as inspiration for RiverWalk, a day of downtown activities celebrating art, nature, and the Deerfield River. From 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., the Friends of the Arms Library hosts a books sale....
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Metal Detected in AgawamThe Tank (American Legion Post 185) in Agawam isn’t just the local go-to spot for great buffalo wings — it’s a hangout pretty much guaranteed to be hosting something fun each weekend. This Friday will deliver four times the excitement, with...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
We’ve Got Mail In October 2015, the Art Club at Greenfield Community College put out a call for mail art. That’s “simply art that has been sent through the mail, but generally is made knowing that the piece will journey via the post,” and could include small painting,...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Orcs Gone WyldPrithee, take heed: The annual Mutton & Mead festival returns this weekend. The humble realm of Montague will be suddenly, and strangely, populated by creatures, craftspeople, warriors, musicians, mystical beings, and merchants hawking their handmade...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 16, 2016 | Articles, Newsletter
Greetings everyone, Welcome to the Valley Advocate’s newsletter! Twice a week we’ll be emailing you our top news stories and live coverage of the local art scene. In the next week, the Valley Advocate will relaunch, with emphasis on new columns, and a...
by Gary Carra | Jun 16, 2016 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Music, Nightcrawler
Pocketful of Sexchange reunites scene staples The Pixies’ Frank Black famously referenced them as a “dangerously untethered band specializing in abandon and dementia.” They’ve also shared stages with area upstarts The Unband and Fountains of...
by Yana Tallon-Hicks | Jun 14, 2016 | Articles, Columns, The V-Spot, Wellness
Editor’s Note: Sexual trauma is addressed in this week’s column.Hi Yana,I can’t seem to want to have sex unless I’m drunk.This has always kind of been the case, except for when I was a teenager, and horny all the time (and not drinking). Then when I got to...
