MARGARET HAIR

News

Wrapping it up for the year

By MARGARET HAIR | April 26

At the beginning of this year, I wrote a column in this space that promised, in its headline, "Diversions: Now 2.5 times more diverting." I lied in that column about what we would actually accomplish - several times, in fact. Sure, I didn't know, necessarily, that much of what was being promised would not be accomplished in one school year. So our radio show went defunct, our Web site turned into a (very nifty-looking) blog, we never quite turned into the free-standing publication we had hoped.

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Grassroots festival is real, family-style

By MARGARET HAIR | April 26

Concert Review Shakori Hills Music Festival Silk Hope, NC Friday, April 20 4.5 stars When I planned to go out to the Shakori Hills Music Festival, I had planned to take a camera with me, hop around the way-out-of-the-way Chatham County farm and snap all kinds of slice-of-life kinds of pictures. Ended up not getting a camera. So here's a little essay-style recount of Shakori, a family-style music festival that breathes with the life of Chapel Hill's music scene, in an undeniably North Carolinian context:

News

Blonde Redhead gets accessible

By MARGARET HAIR | April 19

MUSICREVIEW Blonde Redhead 23 4 stars For Blonde Redhead, dreams can float on the same forgotten thought (melody) over and over, lulling the listener into a trance that only makes you susceptible to what's to come: the group's best record to date. Kazu Makino vocals linger somewhere off in the distance, giving the record a haunting feel in an easy-to-digest format. 23 has a sort of mussed-up, fuzzy version of the dissonant qualities the group had harped on.

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Arts series trying to balance books

By MARGARET HAIR | April 16

The arts don't make money, and neither does the Carolina Performing Arts Series. "It's not like running a private performing arts venue. It's not the case where we'll be making money on this," Executive Associate Provost Steve Allred said. "We're trying to bring top-level artists and still balance the books at the end of the year." It is a fact of funding that is common knowledge within the arts community but is not always understood outside of it, Executive Director for the Arts Emil Kang said.

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'Grindhouse' hit or miss on exploit

By MARGARET HAIR | April 12

Quentin Tarantino is a jackass. As a filmmaker he has never tried to keep that disposition a secret, flexing his somewhat frustrating talents for writing dialogue and handpicking actors to deliver it in films that increasingly are caricatures of themselves. Which is why, for his part in the double-feature "Grindhouse" - a movie experience that pays homage to the half-clothed girls, gory deaths and fast cars Tarantino has used as source material in his previous work - there were two ways to go:

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UNC brought into the fold

By MARGARET HAIR | March 29

Walking onto a Chapel Hill stage for the first time since 2001 to the tune of "Final Countdown," pop pianist Ben Folds was greeted by a full house of standing fans. A champion of singable melodies and on-stage silliness, Folds worked a sold-out crowd into a favorable frenzy Wednesday night at Memorial Hall. The concert was presented by Live Nation live music company, Cat's Cradle and the Carolina Union Activities Board.

News

Ben Folds returns to Chapel Hill

By MARGARET HAIR | March 28

If there's one thing that stands out to those who knew rock pianist Ben Folds when he was playing around town in the mid-'90s, it's the baby grand he brought to nearly every show. Considering the musical climate at the time - mostly post-punk with grungy guitars - the bulky piano would be hard to forget. "That wasn't just Chapel Hill, that was the world, so we didn't fit in at all," Folds, 40, said of the music scene at the time. "When you start and you don't fit in, it's just a liability. But if you continue to stick by your guns, it ends up being an asset."

News

Squirrel Nut Zippers

By MARGARET HAIR | February 15

CONCERTREVIEW Squirrel Nut Zippers Cat's Cradle Thursday, Feb. 8 4.5 stars On the way to the Squirrel Nut Zippers' first show in town in the last five years, I was so scared. What if they weren't as good? What if the image of them burned into my brain by the Christmas album in eighth grade - along with the opening riffs to "Hell" - was rendered a waste of space? What if this reunion was a terrible, terrible idea? Good thing none of that happened.

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Comedy spotlight

By MARGARET HAIR | February 15

There are so many ways to tell a joke: Deadpan it, overact it, improvise it, write it for someone else to deliver. Tell it like a story, even though you clearly weren't there. Yell at it, incite it, make goofy hand gestures at it and stomp it into the stage.

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As Blend, Wetlands has shot at success

By MARGARET HAIR | February 15

Every time I have been to Wetlands Dance Hall, I have been disappointed. Wetlands, though it has managed to shake the seediness and dirt left behind by Treehouse (seniors will remember not wanting to go to that club without a 20-person backup posse), could have been so much more. The space is great - after Cat's Cradle, it has the second highest capacity of any music venue in town.