We told you a couple of years back about how popular Philadelphia tavern Johnny Brenda's was getting in the music game, and less than two years later, this place has firmly established itself as one of Philly's prime live music venues.
The Fishtown bar converted the second floor of a 19th Century building into an intimate live venue that brings out exuberant crowds for an almost-every-night schedule of indie bands. The focus is on local acts, but on occasion they bring in bigger bands (they've featured The National, Grizzly Bear and The Walkmen since opening). With a capacity of just 300, Johnny Brenda's is one of the most intimate venues many of these bands play.
For pre- and post-show fun, the ground floor bar serves hand-pumped local brews and a surprisingly upscale menu (think Littleneck clams; goat cheese, arugula, and watermelon salad).
We're big fans of UNESCO's Creative Cities program which so far has quite rightly crowned Berlin as a City of Design and let Santa Fe don the cap of City of Folk Art. This month a new creative city has stepped up: Glasgow has been official christened a UNESCO City of Music.
Being a City of Music, according to UNESCO, is meant to help Glasgow preserve its music culture as well as make it an extra-attractive tourist destination. Home to great indie bands like Franz Ferdinand and Belle & Sebastian, and with a typical week of music in the city totalling 127 different gigs, you'd be hard pressed not to find something musical to entertain you on a night out in Glasgow.
The massively overhyped Brooklyn Flea market has gotten all the outer borough buzz this summer, yet somehow another nearby weekend afternoon shindig has flown under the radar.
The Brooklyn Urban Arts Market has been going on every other Sunday this summer, with booths from local artisans and vendors, and food from a variety of restaurants along Myrtle Avenue.
A project of the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Afro-Punk Festival, the market has also been bringing out an impressive and eclectic line-up of live music, including British rapper Slick Rick this past Sunday. Next up: Bronx DJ legend Afrika Bambaataa on September 7.
The Trocadero Theatre, a 138-year-old, 1,200-person Victorian venue, has gone through many incarnations in its time on Arch Street--hosting vaudeville, burlesque, movies and, since 1996, pop music.
"The Troc" has long been known as a place to discover local Philly bands, but as the surrounding Market East neighborhood has transformed into a more desirable location in recent years, the lineup has leaned towards national acts.
The still-quite-diverse list of upcoming shows includes everyone from dance pop duo Chromeo to Swedish heavy metal act Opeth and Bow Wow as Shad Moss. (Wait, Bow has yet another alternate persona?)
Local hipsters get more excited about low-key weekday activities at the Troc's smaller balcony space, including free movies on Mondays, along with Guitar Hero contests and $2 beers.
Set in the heart of Old City, The Khyber is one of Philly's longest-standing live music venues, and somehow has escaped morphing into a tourist trap, unlike most of its neighbors.
The laid-back dive bar is your best chance to catch a Philly band that will be famous a year from now, while many already-well-known local bands often return for the nostalgia factor. Upcoming shows range from local dance-rockers Fat City Reprise to indie rock vets Mock Orange and disco-punkers Electric Six.
For non-musical pursuits, the upstairs bar is open every night, with drinking specials that include $1 PBR until 11 pm and an open bar on Sundays for 10 bucks.
Finally, someone to speak for the expats: Rapper Eli Sweet found his niche as a performer-slash-English teacher after moving from Hotlanta--to Chengdu, China.
His MySpace page still lists him as Atlanta-based--and as "the dopest white rapper without a fade"--but after graduation from Haverford College in Pennsylvania, Sweet, who had been studying Chinese on and off for years, took an unconventional path to musical recognition in becoming perhaps the only white rapper in Chengdu. NPR's videos of Sweet in Chengdu present a completely different side of the Olympic hosts, but inspire us to visit just as much as those sweeping shots of the Watercube.
We wish Sweet were a more regular blogger, based on a March '07 entry about the popularity of the combover, the state of the bathrooms and what Chinese people think of their neighbor, Thailand. His on-the-ground knowledge of what Asian rap sounds like alone is priceless.
This Labor Day, jazz lovers won't be gassing up the family SUV or "staycationing" on their couches with a sack of Cheetos and "Kind of Blue" on repeat. They'll be at the Joy of Jazz Festival, a relatively new South African concert series taking place in Johannesburg August 28-30.
The location of the festival makes it a promising spot to host artists from both East and West, from Japanese pianist Keiko Matsui to Spanish-Afro-Cuban outfit Seda Jazz. If you've never heard Xhosa-language songs, the August 30 concert by local talent Camagwini is a must--and a relative steal at R250 (about $32).
If you can arrive and shake off the jet lag by the 28, you can even sit in on a performance workshop hosted by one of the featured musicians!
Jerusalem isn't the first place you think of to explore under-the-radar nightlife scenes, but everyone's favorite holy city has a surprisingly diverse party circuit, from gay clubs to street punks to wine-and-cheese bars.
And, like just about any other city in the world, you can always find some Bob Marley heads if you look hard enough. The Cube Bar, set inside the Mehane Yehuda market in central Jerusalem, is Israel's gathering place for the dreadlocked, shoeless, hippy dance crowd.
This laid-back, open-air bar is a casual spot for downing a few local Goldstar brews while chatting with a mix of Israeli reggae heads and American and Euro ex-pats. The parties get under way on Friday afternoons in the summer, when live reggae bands start playing at 4 pm. (Like most of the rest of Jerusalem, the party shuts down by sundown to observe Shabbos).
