American Idol Live Coming to RBC Center
You’ve spent two nights a week watching them this year, and on Wednesday, July 27, Raleigh will get a chance to welcome the American Idols, including Garner’s own, Scotty McCreery. The Top 11 contestants will perform a variety of solos and combo songs in what will certainly be a sold-out arena show. The lineup includes: Casey Abrams, Haley Reinhart, Jacob Lusk, James Durbin, Lauren Alaina, Naima Adedapo, Paul McDonald, Pia Toscano, Scotty McCreery, Stefano Langone, and Thia Megia. Tickets go on sale to the public on Friday, May 13 at 10am. This event will sell out, and it will behoove readers to seek a presale event during the week.
Death Cab for Cary
On Monday, August 8, Death Cab for Cutie will be returning to the area. This time the concert is at Koka Booth Amphitheatre in Cary. The band will be supporting their new CD, “Codes and Keys”, which hits stores on May 31. Frightened Rabbit opens.
Horner Foundation Continues of Honors for Roads Less Taken
1987 Sanderson graduate Paul Horner was killed nine years ago while paddling the Oyacachi River in Ecuador. From American Whitewater Magazine:
In all regards Paul was a tough act to follow, and leaves behind a soulful legacy of discernment. He despised television and fast food, never listened to commercial radio, and was generally suspicious of the corporate world, but was never self-righteous or prudish. He basically loved to challenge himself, and found every aspect of life worth examining. Descending rivers with close friends became a spiritual calling and a pursuit that he found to be true. His death is not to be compared with those of the inexperienced or the foolish, nor was it the result of a dreadful miscalculation brought on by a driving ego. Paul was simply pursuing his dream and it delivered him to this place, a beautiful jungle river in rural South America and the company of friends. A hero’s death.
Sanderson students the mid 80’s knew and liked Paul, though he really came out of his shell at UNC. Just before beginning college, I got to know Paul through family friends. Before long it seemed that everywhere I turned, a friend of mine knew him. He had a funny dichotomy of a quiet manner, yet very talkative when the right button got pushed.
Paul’s family and friends have started the Paul Horner Foundation. It aims to further the spirit of Paul by identifying and nurturing a Wake County public school student each year who wishes to engage in an unusual endeavor which might not necessarily be encouraged by his peers or the society around him. The Foundation believes it important to support young people who pursue uncommon goals in a spirit of kindness and individuality. The Foundation will fund a full scholarship to allow this young person, via a summer experience, to pursue an uncommon dream and thereby inspire those around him.
The application deadline for this year’s experience is April 30.
Cree Flashlight is Today’s Woot!
Today’s Woot! deal is a Cree LED flashlight for just $5. Cree, the world leader in LED lighting technology, is based in RTP.
John Butler, Gomez Coming to Lincoln
On Wednesday, July 20, the John Butler Trio will be playing at the Lincoln Theatre. Gomez opens.
Here Comes Hopscotch
Last year’s inaugural Hopscotch Music Festival was a booming success, showcasing some of the nation’s best up-and-coming indie artists during a three-day stretch across downtown Raleigh. The excitement continued to grow during the Winter as Hopscotch organizers planned their sophomore event (September 8, 9, 10). Last night the official lineup was announced , and it appears the gang is picking up right where they left off last year.
The Flaming Lips and Guided By Voices will carry headlining shows, however other great bands such as Drive-By-Truckers, Superchunk, The Dodos, Japandroids, J Mascis, John Vanderclice, Bandway, and many, many, many more!
Some fantastic ticket packages are now available (all show pass tiers will sell out, so don’t delay).
- VIP – 3-day pass includes admission to all club shows, both headlining nights at City Plaza, exclusive VIP entrance to the shows, and admission to the VIP opening night reception. $155
- All-Show – 3-day pass includes admission to all club and headlining shows. $105
- All-Club – 3-day pass includes admission to all club shows. $65
- City Plaza Friday – includes admission only to the City Plaza Friday show (Guided By Voices, Drive-By Truckers, The Dodos). $32
- City Plaza Saturday – includes admission only to the City Plaza Saturday show (The Flaming Lips, Superchunk, The Light Pines). $34
There will be smartphone apps for the event, and gogoraleigh will, as always, create a special Google Calendar for the events including set times, locations, links to maps of the location, and links to the artists websites.
Here is the full lineup of bands:
Gogo’s TWC Channel Guide Shows You Where the Damned Channel Is
How many times has someone said something like: “Watch this show. It’s on Bravo.” or “the game is on CBS College.” Where the hell are those channels? You flip through a hundred pages of guide data and still can’t find the damned show!
Sweet relief is here now with the alphabetical Time Warner Cable channel guide from gogoraleigh. Print the PDF as a 2-sided document, fold it in half, and you have a neat little half-page alphabetical listing of the more than 350 networks included in Time Warner’s service. Remember that SD channels are those under 1000 and HD channels are 1000 and above.
Rockstar Energy Festival Coming to TWC
The Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival is coming to Walnut Creek on Wednesday, August 3. The Raleigh date features these great acts.
JAGERMEISTER STAGE:
Jager Band – 1:45
Red Fang – 2:35
Kingdom of Sorrow – 3:35
Unearth – 4:35
Trivium – 5:40
EXTREME STAGE:
Straight Line Stitch – 2:05
All Shall Perish – 3:05
Suicide Silence – 4:05
Machinehead – 5:05
ROCKSTAR ENERGY DRINK MAIN STAGE:
In Flames – 6:25
Megadeth – 7:15
Godsmack – 8:30
Disturbed – 9:55
Tickets are on sale now. No word yet about family discounts for this show.
KE$HA Coming to The Walt
On Tuesday, August 9, KE$HA will bring the “Get $leazy Tour” to the downtown Raleigh amphitheater. The Citi presale is currently running.
Furthur Coming to TWC
Furthur featuring Phil Lesh and Bob Weir will be coming to TWC Pavilion on Thursday, July 28. The presale is on now.
Time for Attorney General to Investigate Ticketmaster
This morning tickets went on sale for Mumford & Sons playing at The Walt, a 5,500 seat venue, in June. Unfortunately, according to several accounts, the event was SOLD OUT at the time the “public” sale began. It appears that all of the event’s tickets were sold during the “pre-sale” that was only available to iPhone owners earlier in the week. So a city-owned facility is hosting a public event, however only those with an expensive phone had the privilege of buying tickets.
Tickets for Taylor Swift went on sale today as well, and the presale for that event began on Tuesday. My sister reported to me that within seconds of being able to get into Ticketmaster’s sale page, only 200-level seats were available.
Honestly I don’t care about who makes the phone involved in the Mumford sale, however I do have a problem, a BIG problem, with the lack of access the general public had to these tickets in a publicly owned venue. In the past presales have included a small block of tickets, often the best tickets. However the problem of finding accessible good seats at the time of the “public” sale has gotten out of hand. Several times in the last decade I have been on Ticketmaster.com the very second tickets became available for Walnut Creek seats, yet not a single time have I gotten seats in the venue’s front three sections.
Something is going on here. Is it that Ticketmaster is shunting all of these tickets to StubHub for extremely higher prices? Are they giving all of those seats to the promoter? Are presales the only way to get decent seats now?
I don’t mind the free market deciding the value of tickets, however the free market should have “free access” to seats at the market price, especially if the ticket seller implies that the limited supply tickets is available.
Because of the unjust nature of obtaining tickets at the time of the “public” sale, I will no longer assist ticket promoters with their sham by reporting this ticket sale time in my announcements. Instead I will either post the presale times or simply abstain from posting the information as it seems irrelevant and misleading altogether. In the meantime the State of North Carolina’s Attorney General’s office should investigate Ticketmaster’s operations for possible antitrust activity with events in our public venues.
Downtown Parking Fees On the Way?
Earlier this week news outlets reported that the City of Raleigh is going to seek more parking revenues as a way to cover a larger than anticipated revenue shortfall for The City. Not only will Raleigh go after unpaid parking fines, but will also consider selling ad space in parking decks and ending the practice of free parking during nights and weekends.
"The city’s not making enough off parking and it’s obvious people don’t like paying for tickets. That’s the issue," said City Council member Mary Ann Baldwin.
During the last decade and a half downtown Raleigh has undergone an enormous resurgence that went along with a $2 billion investment from the private and public sectors. In the late 90’s we started to see Raleigh most interesting new restaurants appearing in downtown instead of in the suburbs. Popular bars in the suburbs began to fade as a bustling nightlife emerged in downtown Raleigh. In fact, almost every single interesting restaurant to open in the last 10 years has been in downtown Raleigh.
Apparently the City of Raleigh wants to ignore the role of free parking in that renaissance. The introduction of nighttime parking fees is a huge deterrent for restaurant patrons who have an alternative. If this becomes the city’s policy, expect a renaissance of its own in North Raleigh. Downtown parking fees would be a huge boon to restaurateurs in the suburbs.
Increased parking revenues from downtown lots also would be a big boon to McLaurin Parking Company, the company that operates these parking structures. You may also know that company as…the inlaws of Mayor, Charles Meeker.
Nothing lasts forever. Hillsborough Street’s nightlife scene in the 70’s rivaled Chapel Hill’s Franklin Street. North Raleigh saw a ton of great restaurants open in the 80’s. The popularity of downtown in the last 15 years is a delicate thing. If the City of Raleigh wants that momentum to continue, it must proceed with extreme caution. As it is, downtown is not perceived as convenient to where people chose to live, it isn’t perceived as an easy place to park, and it’s wave is nearing the point where we’ve typically seen nightlife/entertainment cycles end in Raleigh’s history.
Mumford & Sons Coming to The Walt
The Dave Matthews Band isn’t touring this summer, but don’t fear, Mumford will be here. On Wednesday, June 8, Mumford & Sons will play the downtown Raleigh amphitheater. Tickets go on sale to the public tomorrow (Friday, 4/8) at 10am. However this morning there is a LiveNation iPhone app-based presale beginning at 10am. This one will sell out, so don’t dawdle.
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