Category Archives: The Features

These are our features. They come back either weekly, bi-weekly or monthly.

Adventures, Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: All Tomorrow’s Parties NY 2010 (Day One)

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all photos by author.

Coverage of Day Two
Coverage of Day Three

Once a year the music geek Illuminati meet in their secret headquarters tucked deep in the Catskill Mountains of New York to revel in an orgy of booze, obscure band t-shirts, and unbelievable live music performances by the best-of-the-best in underground music past and present. They call their yearly gathering All Tomorrow’s Parties New York (ATP NY); this weekend the Catskills played host to the third such meeting of the music-minded with a phenomenal three day festival that is really unlike any other. Only at ATP NY could I be dancing at 2AM on a Sunday in a microscopic hotel lounge to the live DJ skills of Kool Herc (the undisputed father of Hip-Hop), spot Jim Jarmusch and GZA of the Wu-Tang Clan across the room, and get high-fived by a group of complete strangers because I am wearing a t-shirt for the obscure noise-rock band The God Bullies. For a music geek the trip to ATP NY is a pilgrimage that must be made at least once before you die. This weekend was my second time attending this spectacular celebration of live music and the international music-geek community.* It was one of the most pleasant and enjoyable weekends of live music I’ve ever had.

Each year ATP NY opens with an evening of full album sets as part of their Don’t Look Back series.** This year’s festival opened with the ridiculous Friday night line-up of The Scientists, Mudhoney, Iggy & The Stooges, and Sleep. Each would perform at the highest level and raise the bar for the band to follow. After watching the legendary Australian post-punk rockers The Scientists play their first ever US-show, Mudhoney time-warp us all back to the dirty and dangerous Grunge emergence, and The Stooges whip the crowd into a sweaty inferno fueled by their own mashed human bodies, Sleep emerged to crush us with two-hours of ultra-heavy stoner-doom metal. How any of us survived the first night to continue rocking for another two full-schedule days is a miracle.

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Dupont Circle, Food and Drink, We Love Food
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We Love Food: Tabard Inn

Photo courtesy of
”
courtesy of ‘Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie’

There are two types of people in D.C.: those who go to Tabard Inn every chance they get, and those that have never been. I have a friend that even uses it as his go-to first date location. And though I like to knock his dating style at any possible point, he really is on to something with this one. It’s casual yet classy, and has that hidden gem feel. Boys, take note. It’s like giving a girl a puppy – she literally won’t be able to resist you.

And calling it a hidden gem is really the best way to describe this particular restaurant. It’s technically located just off Dupont Circle, but isn’t exactly on a high traffic street. And to get to the restaurant you have to wander through the lobby of the hotel, which has a distinct bed and breakfast in rural Maine feel to it. It doesn’t exactly scream high class restaurant. And the restaurant isn’t exactly clearly marked – once through the lobby you hang a left at the stairs, walk through the lounge and head to the hostess podium just outside the bar. She will lead you through the bar and then all the sudden the dining room opens up and it’s like being in some classy lady’s very large kitchen full of some very fun friends.

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Interviews, Life in the Capital, People, The Features
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Living in DC: The Nationals’ Perspective


Nationals Park / Photo by Max Cook

If you’re an outsider looking in then it’s easy to paint each resident of the greater D.C. metropolitan area with a political brush. People living in Maryland, Virginia or D.C. know the District is widely regarded as being the epicenter of the American political spectrum.

In anticipation of Glen Beck’s “Restoring Honor” rally at the end of August, We Love DC author Ben H. Rome emphasized that Washington’s culture remains as diverse as its people. The interests of people who live here go beyond day jobs and politics. Living in D.C. is a catalyst for an active and intellectually stimulating lifestyle. Not only do the Washington Nationals know this, but they embrace it.

When they’re not at Nationals Park or on the road, Nationals players take advantage of their new home.

“It’s definitely a fun place to be. There’s always a lot going on in this place whether it’s professional teams or politically. There’s always something you can pay attention to in the news. It’s kind of the center of a lot of things so you always feel like you’re in an important place,” Nationals pitcher Craig Stammen said. Continue reading →

All Politics is Local, The District, The Features
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Campaign Notebook: September 2, 2010

Photo courtesy of
‘Polling Place Sign’
courtesy of ‘moonShadows7’

Well, we’re down to the wire here. Early voting has started. Also, this is the first week where there has been a significant change in outlook, and that’s a bad thing for the guy on the wrong end. There are only eleven days left until the primary, and Mayor Adrian Fenty is facing a double-digit deficit in the polls. Can he recover in time? Well, let’s get down to the nitty gritty. Continue reading →

We Love Arts
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We Love Arts: Something You Did

Theater J’s Something You Did is a perfectly serviceable little production of a little play that revolves around very little personal growth and revelations that aren’t very revelatory.

Update, 3:08p: If you’ve seen the play – or don’t intend to – and want the spoiler-ific version of this review, absent the deliberate efforts at avoiding revealing plot, you can check out my comment.

When City Paper wrote about Theater J subbing in this production for the original contender they quoted Artistic Director Ari Roth. He spoke about filling “a very particular slot – that of our High Holiday season-opener, hop-scotching the Days of Awe, a period of personal and collective reflection.”

Which makes it so odd that the one thing this play absolutely lacks is any hint of reflection from any of the characters.

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Food and Drink, People, The Features, We Love Drinks
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The Last of the Summer Wine

Photo courtesy of
‘la terrasse’
courtesy of ‘jenny downing’

It may be September, but we denizens of DC know that doesn’t mean an automatic reprieve from hot weather. Though autumn’s official start will arrive in a few weeks, we still have plenty of swelter left. So, what to drink in this transitional time, this ‘tween season not quite summer and not quite fall?

Luckily for us, we’ve got a lot of brilliant local sommeliers to help us over the hump. I asked a quintet to recommend some current favorites to drink now and as the seasons change, and they’ve responded most generously. There’s an embarrassment of riches here – wine recommendations, vinology knowledge to inspire you to learn more, and some tempting food pairings to whet your appetite! So join me as we explore a beautiful array of wines to sip while enjoying the last of the summer heat, as the hazy lazy afternoons slowly give way to the crisp bounty of autumn color.
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We Love Weekends
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We Love (Holiday) Weekends, September 4-6

Photo courtesy of
‘Life is the game…..’
courtesy of ‘LaTur’

Samantha: I love spending holiday weekends at home.  You don’t have to stress over travel plans and delays, and instead get to enjoy your precious free time to the max.  Friday night I have dinner plans to go to POV and I can’t wait to catch the fantastic view (and good food, of course).  Saturday I will be heading over to once again see the Chuck Close exhibit for FREEand then will most likely get some frozen yogurt from FrozenYo.  Sunday I will be scooping up some antique finds in Leesburg at The Old Lucketts Store.  And on Monday I will probably take a nice long walk around the monuments, I mean what could be better?

Tom: Wooo, long weekend time!  It’s an extra special treat after spending last week along the Oregon Coast and with my family in California.  After all that, I need to be refreshed on why it is that I love DC so much.  Look for me on Barracks Row this weekend, and at Eastern Market, and maybe even over at Star and Shamrock on Monday.  I’ll also be working to turn my Brookland back yard into a proper garden this fall, so a trip to Garden District, and probably the Home Depot, are in order to get things underway for my planter boxes.  Of course, it’s also potato season at the farm, so I’ll likely be out for Pancakes & Potatoes at Great Country Farms on Saturday, and I’m hearing tell that there’s a distillery open in Loudoun County making their own rye whiskey…   Continue reading →

The Features
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Tips For Discouraged Nats Fans

Photo by Max Cook / We Love DC

NatsTown, we know you’re down in the dumps. Dibble’s gone, which in the eyes of some is a victory in itself, but so is that other guy. You know, that guy everyone was taking about for a year and needs Tommy John’s surgery? Yeah, that guy.

Here are the facts: You’re fans of the newest team in Major League Baseball. In the inaugural 2005 season, you were ecstatic, vibrant, and full of hope. Now, much like the team on the field, you’re feeling deflated and flat. That jolt of energy experienced in June has escaped and all because of a silly elbow tendon.

It’s times like this that try the fan’s soul. Hence, a friendly reminder: One man doesn’t make a team.

It’s easy for outsiders to say, “Nats fans dropped like flies once Stephen Strasburg got called in for surgery.” Don’t give them that chance.

Here are some suggestions on how to handle the rest of 2010 and how to cope with young Stephen out of the lineup: Continue reading →

Sports Fix, The Daily Feed
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The Unbearable Lightness of Being Nyjer Morgan

Photo courtesy of
‘Nyjer Morgan diving to first’
courtesy of ‘MudflapDC’

If you decided to turn off last night’s Nationals game when they went down 10-3 after just three innings, I wouldn’t blame you in the slightest.  However, it turned out to be one of the craziest games the Nationals have ever played, featuring multiple plunkings by the Marlins’ pitching staff, a bench-clearing brawl, and six ejections drawn out over 9 innings.  By the end of the seventh inning last night, both managers were sent to the showers, along with four of their players.  It was the sort of game that had a performance art feel to it, as if you were just waiting to see what might happen next.

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Fashionable DC
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Washington Wardrobe: Lisa Rowan

Photo Courtesy of Lisa Rowan

On Lisa Rowan’s blog Quarter Life: The Beltway’s Best Vintage and Thrift, she focuses on showing readers how to clothe themselves frugally and without filling landfills with cast-off fast fashions. Judging by some of her posts, buying vintage and thrifted leaves plenty of money in the budget for a busy schedule of cocktail parties and events around town.

This month, Lisa is teaming with Sisarina and Jobsessed to present an event they are calling Fancy Little Things. In the back-to-school and work spirit of September, this fall fashion swap encourages women to prune their professional wardrobes and exchange their garments for someone else’s. Likely to be a particular boon to recent graduates with their first office that requires dressing up, anyone can benefit from emptying their closet of good garments they just do not wear and replacing them with something they might.

You might look for Lisa’s help if you find yourself overwhelmed at the swap or on your next thrifting mission – she has a knack for pulling the clothes that fit her style from a variety of sources. “Whether I’m shopping new or vintage, I’m drawn to clean lines, subtle details, and crisp fabrics.”
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Entertainment, Music, Night Life, The Features, We Love Music
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We Love Music: September Music Preview

Justin Jones live at the 9:30 Club's 30th Anniversary Show / Photo by Rachel Levitin

Fall has a distinct smell. It’s crisp and brisk, bitter but gentle, and refreshing. It’s not here yet, but sweater weather will be in full-swing in a matter of weeks. Sandals and shades go back in the closet while boots and cute little penny-loafers make their triumphant return.

No matter your personal preferences, fall is the end of care-free summer days, which leaves quite a few folks down in the dumps. Don’t fret! Fall isn’t that bad.

Pretty soon, you’ll be able to cozy up with your favorite blanket, rent a movie, make some hot apple cider (with hint of caramel), and relax. The steam from your mug will cling to each pore on your face while you catch a whiff of apple and cinnamon. That’s fall at its finest.

If you’re not the indoorsy type, I urge you to make the best of this season transition by taking advantage of the wonderfully talented local singer-songwriter and acoustic acts in town. There’s a nice spread of home-grown performers who are slated at spots all around the District in September. Here are some of the top pickin’s: Continue reading →

Talkin' Transit, The Features, WMATA, WTF?!
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Talkin’ Transit: On the Tube

I’ll wait while you watch that video, possibly for the second (or third time).

After seeing yesterday’s video for Metro’s new Train Arrivals by Phone service, I figured I’d go look through some of the video that Metro has posted over the last few years to YouTube.

Below the fold, my favorites, including gems made for the inauguration, “Littering Rabbit”, and some behind the scenes at Metro videos.
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Entertainment, Fun & Games, Music, We Love Music
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The Winning Ticket: Marina and the Diamonds

As a way to say thanks to our loyal readers, We Love DC will be giving away a pair of tickets to a 9:30 Club concert to one lucky reader each week. Check back here every Wednesday morning at 9am to find out what tickets we’re giving away and leave a comment for your chance to be the lucky winner!

This week we’re raffling off two tickets to catch rising star Marina and the Diamonds at the 9:30 Club on Monday, September 6th.

Marina and the Diamonds is for the most part the pop vocalist persona of singer-songwriter Marina Diamandis. Or as her Myspace page suggests, “I am Marina. You are the Diamonds.” Under this guise, Marina covers a inventive range of dance-pop that solicits comparisons to an equally wide-range of peers. Marina takes on the comparisons to big girls like Christina and Britney by frequently singing cover versions of their tunes in concert. It’s this kind of gutsy move combined with her musical inventiveness (she writes all of her own lyrics and music) that gets her compared to the more inventive, indie-friendly, pop-divas like Robyn or Dragonette. Marina and the Diamonds have been around for awhile, but 2010 seems poised to be her break-out year as her long-anticipated debut album receives rave reviews and her recent tour dates have been raising eyebrows and quickening pulses here and in the UK. This show is going to be a really good time and probably your best chance to see Marina and the Diamonds before her name is on the tip of everyone’s tongues.

For your chance to win these tickets simply leave a comment on this post using a valid email address between 9am and 4pm today. One entry per email address, please. Tickets for this show are also available through Ticketfly If today doesn’t turn out to be your lucky day, check back here each Wednesday for a chance to win tickets to other great concerts.

For the rules of this giveaway…
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Entertainment, Penn Quarter, The Features, We Love Arts
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We Love Arts: In the Next Room or the vibrator play

Eric Hissom and Katie deBuys in “In the Next Room or the vibrator play.” Photo credit: Stan Barouh.

Ah, the Victorians! Always keeping the naughty bits tightly corseted. Such control freaks. At least, that’s our view of them now. It might come as a shock to learn about such inventions as the “electric massager,” on the scene in the 1870’s to relieve the frayed nerves of delicate housewives suffering from mysterious bouts of anxiety. Even more of a shock to learn before the dawn of the electrical age, physicians alleviated such symptoms of their patients the um, old-fashioned way, through manual manipulation. Yet somehow the resulting “paroxysms” and the accompanying relief were seen as strictly therapeutic and not erotic. Masters of keeping the physical and the sexual realms separate, those Victorians. One side Health, the other Damnation.

MORE: The history of humans sexual fantasies and exploration is a rich subject. The use of sex toys has been recorded hundreds of years ago, which makes dildos and vibrators available today on local stores and even online from sex shops like Plug Lust is not surprising. Read more on the topic with articles published by Fiona Petree.

Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company‘s 2010-2011 season is titled “A Striptease for Your Subconscious” – and if the first play out of the gate is any indication, this is going to be one wild ride. In the Next Room, or the vibrator play explores this acutely private dance between the physical and the sexual, between control and release. Yes, it’s a play about a male scientist/physician using a primitive vibrator on his female patients (and one male) to bring them to orgasm in order to restore the bloom in their cheeks, and yes there are several scenes depicting this, but there’s a lot more going on. Playwright Sarah Ruhl dances on the edge of fairy tale, weaving the mythology of feminine awakening with just enough sweetness to win over any prudish audience member. The final moment of reveal and revelation might still shock some, but its daringness is rather beautiful.

In the Next Room or the vibrator play presents us with a seemingly ill-matched couple – the practical man of science Dr. Givings (a briskly authoritative Eric Hissom) and his wife, the charmingly impulsive Catherine (a radiant Katie deBuys). Sense and sensibility, these two. The doctor plies his trade in the next room, protecting his wife from his work and denying her the deeper affection she craves. The love they share is blocked, just as the unseen walls separate the doctor’s operating room from the drawing room, as the society separates the physical from the erotic. Into their circle weave other blocked lives, some comical, others heart-wrenching. Continue reading →

Mythbusting DC, The Features
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DC Mythbusting: Back to School Edition

Photo courtesy of
‘Field trip’
courtesy of ‘clio1789’

It’s back to school time here at DC Mythbusting!  Our pencils are sharpened and we’ve got our Trapper Keepers ready (they still use those, right?), and we’re ready to bust some school-related myths.  The District’s schools get a bum rap: they’re often cited as the worst-performing schools in the country, and there’s an impression of hordes of students leaving the system for greener pastures (which are typically the suburbs or DC charter schools).  But are the country’s worst schools here in DC?  And is DC the worst school district in the country?  And finally, are students really leaving in hordes?

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Adventures, Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Amphetamine Reptile Records 25th Anniversary Bash

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all photos by author.

I think it is obvious, from all of my writing about it, that I love music. As you probably know, I try to share write-ups of all the great concerts that I go to in the DC area with you here at We Love DC. The shows that I share here represent about half of the shows that I see annually. I also spend a lot of time traveling the country and sometimes the world attending special concert events like Spiritualized at Radio City Music Hall, or Hallo Gallo (Michael Rother + Friends of Neu!). These shows don’t always get written about because I consider them my vacations. Some shows though are just so rare and unique that I feel compelled to share them here, even if they have nothing to do with DC. Such is the case with my trip to Minneapolis last weekend to attend the Amphetamine Reptile Records’ 25th Anniversary Bash.

Amphetamine Reptile Records is an indie record label that specializes in a particular brand of aggressive, depraved, barrier-busting rock and roll known as noise-rock. The bands on Am Rep pushed the noisier tendencies of hardcore and metal into a thousand different directions at once, producing some of the most creative, exciting, and challenging music known to man. Infamous for their crazed personalities and stage antics and famous for their musical innovation, the artist stable at Am Rep contains some of the most influential rockers you’ve never heard of. Grunge, alternative metal, and math-rock (just to name a few) would not be the same (or possibly have even existed) without Am Rep path-finders like The Thrown-ups, Hammerhead, Helmet, and Today Is The Day. Am Rep consistently put out amazing records that defined the noise-rock genre during their 15-year golden age. Since 2000, the label has been semi-retired, returning to the deep underground, releasing the occasional 7″, 12″ or album. Noise-rock is a genre near and dear to my heart, and Amphetamine Reptile Records is without question my favorite record label of all time. So when they announced that a slew of defunct Am Rep bands were reuniting in Minneapolis to celebrate the label’s 25th anniversary, I had the trip booked before my wife even had a chance to return my call to discuss it. If there is one concert worth being in doghouse for, it was this one.
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Sports Fix
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Sports Fix

Photo courtesy of
‘Zim be nimble, Zim be quick’
courtesy of ‘philliefan99’

Nationals
Record: 56-75 (Last in the NL East)
Last Two Weeks: 5-8

The impossible-to-miss, off-field story involves none other than his Royal Strasburg. Late last week, the team announced that a tear in Strasburg’s pitching elbow will require reconstructive surgery of the Tommy John type. The Nats enter the last month of the season looking towards next year, but it is also safe to say that many already think even next season could be a lost cause. Still, in the “looking forward” department, there is still at least one bright spot: Bryce Harper was on the scene at Nationals Park, putting on a Nats jersey and launching bombs during batting practice.

On the field, things have been up and down. Last week, the Nationals got swept at home by the lowly Cubs, but managed to take three out of four from a Cardinals squad that is very much in contention in the Central to conclude the homestand. For a team that’s been fairly lifeless in the past month, maybe the Strasburg news is a reminder that no one man makes a club. In the next two weeks, the Nats will play the majority of their games against NL East rivals, save one trip to Pittsburgh next weekend.

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