ATLRetro

by Melanie Crew
Contributing Writer

‘This Week’ in Retro Atlanta is chock full of swell goodies!  We’ve got rockabilly! We’ve got films of yesteryear!  We’ve got blues, jazz and all the honky tonkin’ bluegrass you’ve been craving! So, If  you’re needing a rockin’ good time, come on out and live la vida Retro!

Monday, January 27

Follow the yellow brick road and join the LeFont Film Society in costume as they celebrate 75 years of Victor Fleming’s THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939) with a screening and costume party at the LeFont Theater! Or groove on down to Café 290 every second and fourth Monday of the month for a taste of Bumpin the Mango, ‘The groove that makes you want to move!’ Boogie on down to the Northside Tavern and spend an evening with Lola at her famous Monday Night Northside Jam!  Pork on down to Fat Matt’s Rib Shack for an extra helping of the rockin’ blues with The Pork Bellies!  

Tuesday, January 28

Get arty, 70’s pop-style and rock on down to Eddie’s Attic for a night of ‘jangle pop’ and psych folk with Robyn Hitchcock (The Soft Boys) and special guest Faye Webster! Smith’s Olde Bar gets bluesy with Tommy Castro & The Painkillers! Get rowdy and old-timey with the Locust Honey String Band with The Burnt Mountain Benders opening the show with their rowdy old-time outlaw stompin’ country at Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs! Boogie on down to The Star Bar and get groovy with The Funk Godfather, DJ Romeo Cologne and DJ Quasi Mandisco every other Tuesday! If you’re craving some old school rockin’ blues, come on down to Fat Matt’s Rib Shack for the JT Speed Band and some rockin’ BBQ! Or boogie on down to Darwin’s Burgers & Blues in Marietta for a taste of Bill Sheffield’s acoustic roots and blues! Rock on down to Blind Willie’s for an for a bluesy night with Timo Arthur! Jam it up with Joe Gransden and his jazz jam session at Twain’s in Decatur every Tuesday at 9 pm. The Entertainment Crackers gets bluesy with their folksy Americana sounds at the Northside Tavern. Get archeological while spending the night with the ever-daring man of exploration, Indiana Jones as the Northlake Festival Movie Tavern goes on a crusade with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ adventurous tale, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981) during their Salute to the Oscars series’ screening at 7:30 pm!

Wednesday, January 29

For a night sci-fi schlock and honky-tonk punk, thrash on over to the Masquerade for a night in Hell with the Nekromantix, The Creepshow and Ganges Phalanges! Or if you’re in need of some 90’s guitar rock tinged with a little indie dream pop, groove on down to The Star Bar for The Mad Flight, Misery Loves Chachi, Where.Are.We and Bahnof! Get your soulful boot stompin’ Americana fix at Vinyl with Swear & Shake and Neulore! For some old-timey inspired lonesome cowboy tunes and psychedelic pop, stomp on over to The Earl for Ben Trickey, Madeline and Montanus (The Long Shadows)! Catch The Hollidays slingin’ their 60s soul and rock n roll at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack! Or make your way to the Northside Tavern as Danny ‘Mudcat’ Dudeck fires it up with his rockin’ blues! Blind Willie’s gets bluesy with a tinge of jazz and southern soul with Scott Glazer’s Mojo Dojo! It’s Ladies Night at Johnny’s Hideaway which plays hits from Sinatra to Madonna for a generally mature crowd. It’s your second and last chance to get your fill of some artsy 70’s pop and psych folk with Robyn Hitchcock and Faye Webster at Eddie’s Attic! Whip on down and get adventurous at the Northlake Festival Movie Tavern as they screen Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ epic tale, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981) during their Salute to the Oscars series’ matinee screening at 11:30 am! And Oh là là! Make your way to Emory Cinematheque’s screening of Marcel Carne’s LES ENFANTS DU PARADIS (CHILDREN OF PARADISE) (1945) and get va-va-vivacious with a courtesan and her four lovers during their Global French Cinema series at Emory’s White Hall!

Thursday, January 30

Get your dancin’ shoes on and spend an evening, jumpin’ and wailin’ Big Easy-style with Aaron Neville and The Dirty Dozen Brass Band as they celebrate the roots of jazz and New Orleans at the Cobb Energy Center! Stomp on down to the Red Light Café for a night of renegade traditionalists and raucous Americana with Mipso and Hazel Ra during their Bluegrass Thursday event! The Star Bar delivers a night of Americana and bluegrass with Migrant Worker, Sailing to Denver and the Todd Prusin Experience! Stagger on over to Noni’s Bar & Deli for their Bitter Heroes event featuring DJ Brian Parris as he gets charmingly morose with a little New Wave, The Smiths and The Cure! Get funky at Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs with a little Memphis soul of the Swamp Funk Quartet and Bitteroots! Rock on over to the Crimson Moon Café for The Tom & Julie Show featuring tributes to tunes from the 60s to the 90s every Thursday! The Northside Tavern gets rockin’ with The Breeze Kings while the sounds and ‘blues woman power’ of Beverly ‘Guitar’ Watkins takes over at Blind Willie’s! Get your boogie on at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack, as Chickenshack featuring Eddie Tigner, delivers some honky-tonk blues! Darwin’s Burgers & Blues gets down and dirty at their Blues Jam hosted by The Cazanovas! Get your boogie on at Mary’s, as the East Atlanta venue gets funky with their weekly Disco in the Village. Hula on down to Trader Vic’s for a few cocktails with Kool Kat “Big Mike” Geier and his Polynesian pop lounge band, Tonga Hiti! Get really retro and experience Shakespeare’s world-renowned tale of juvenile lovin’, fatal attraction and feuding families as the Atlanta Shakespeare Company presents their rendition of ‘Romeo & Juliet’ in its 14^th Anniversary run at the New American Shakespeare Tavern until March 30^th! And it’s your last chance to take a walk on the wild side with Indiana Jones at  the Northlake Festival Movie Tavern as they screen Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ adventurous tale, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981) during their Salute to the Oscars series’ screening at 7:30 pm!

Friday, January 31

Make some mischief and run off with the circus, The Sexual Side Effects’ Rock-n-Roll Circus! You won’t want to miss this carnival of debauchery and fantasy with Kool Kat Amber Taylor electrifying the way delivering a tempting taste of some high-voltage post-punk, new wave space rock promising to satisfy every desire! The music line-up gets raucous with a whole lotta madness and mayhem featuring the glam rock of Jade Lemons & The Crimson Lust, some chanteuse-inspired folk rock with Geri X, a little old-time circus culture of rockin’ shenanigans of Kool Kat Aileen Loy with Till Someone Loses and Eye and a little 70s surf and new-wave dream pop with the New York City Queens!  And if that’s not enough, there’ll be a gluttonous amount of wayward and wicked performances to tickle your fancy, including Trick Oliver, The Baphomettes, The Black Lotus and so much more! So, come on down to the seediest show on Earth and get sultry while rockin’ out at the spectacle that is a true rock-n-roll circus!

Rock out 70s style at the Variety Playhouse as ZoSo delivers the ultimate Led Zeppelin experience, performing Led Zeppelin’s albums I through IV! Michelle Malone unplugs at her ‘Acoustic Winter’ CD Release Party at the Red Light Café with special guest Steed Kettles (Liberty Jones)! Do the Time-Warp and hang out with some musically-inclined transsexual aliens at The Plaza Theater as they continue their tradition of screening THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (1975) every Friday night, featuring the live cast of Lips Down on Dixie at midnight! Or catch Kuei Chih-hung’s Japanese women’s prison flick, BAMBOO HOUSE OF DOLLS (1974) at Cinefest! Eddie’s Attic delivers several decades’ worth of folk and pop rock with the Randall Bramblett Band! Jam on down to Smith’s Olde Bar and get psychedelic with the Jerry Garcia Band Cover Band (JGBCB) with a little booty shakin’ funk from Sugarfoot! Quasi Mandisco gets funky at The Family Dog! Darwin’s Burgers & Blues shakes it up with the Dan Sheffield Band! Danny ‘Mudcat’ Dudeck fires it up with his rockin’ blues at the Northside Tavern! Blind Willie’s gets down and dirty with Houserocker Johnson & The Shadows! Or blues it on down to Fat Matt’s Rib Shack for Billy George! Groove on down to The Loft for the funky jazz of The Soul Rebels and Jubee & The Morning After! And boogie on over to the Fernbank Museum of Natural History’s Martinis and IMAX for a couple of cocktails while dancing under the dinosaurs!

Saturday, February 1

Oh, boy! The Star Bar gets super ‘billied tonight at Hollyfest 6!  La Bamba on down and get revved while paying tribute to the most retro and rockin’est boys around, the Daddy-Os of rockabilly, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper! Put on your dancin’ shoes and boogie on down to the Kool Kids of Rock while rockin’ out with Atlanta’s Rock n Roll Underground featuring, Kool Kat Joshua Longino with Andrew & the Disapyramids, Red Rocket Deluxe, Kool Kat Caroline & The Ramblers, The Mystery Men?, Atomic Boogie, the Cadillac Junkies, The Cherry Bomb, The Sideburners, The Stink Bombs, Slim Chance & The Convicts, Divorce, Inc, and so much more! It’s a night you won’t want to miss, so all you Kool Kats and Kittens, shake a tail feather and come on down!

Rev on down to Smith’s Olde Bar as Cigar Store Indians delivers some foot stompin’ rockabilly with the Replacement-inspired tunage of Tim O’Donovan & The Longshot Saints and Buck o’ Five! Get rowdy and stomp on down to the Red Light Café for an evening of bluegrass and gypsy jazz with Smokey’s Farmland Band, Rae Fitzgerald and the Sweet Auburn String Band! Get folksy at The Earl with the Radio Birds, Besides Daniel and Small Houses! Or make your way to Cinefest for a kung-fu and Hong Kong horror double feature with Ho Meng-Hua’s BLACK MAGIC (1975) from 5-7 pm, followed by Chang-Hwa Chung’s FIVE FINGERS OF DEATH (1972) from 7-9 pm! Pop on over to The Strand Theater for Yacht Rock Review’s Schooner dispensing an evening of Steely Dan, including their 1977 album, ‘AJA’ performed in its entirety, followed by Electric Avenue, their alter-ego paying tribute to 80’s pop from A-Ha! to Tears For Fears and more! It’s night 2 of some 70s rock at the Variety Playhouse as ZoSo delivers the ultimate Led Zeppelin experience, performing Led Zeppelin’s albums V through ‘In Through the Out Door’! The Red Clay Theater dishes out ATL’s entertainment tradition of Spring Break party favorites with Banks & Shane! Eddie’s Attic gets rootsy with the Blue Dogs and Willie Sugarcapps!  Jazz on down to the Northside Tavern and get bluesy with Scott Glazer’s Mojo Dojo! Or trek on down to Darwin’s Burgers & Blues for Mudbone Turner’s Blues Band! Francine Reed belts out the blues with the Shadows at Blind Willie’s! Get geeky at Studio Space Atlanta as Markster Con Productions presents Hair of the Dragon, Winter 2014 edition, a Costumed Photo Studio Party! Come on out and meet some of the best photogs in the Atlanta costuming community and party it up with your fellow Cosplay pals! And as always, DJ Romeo Cologne transforms the sensationally seedy Clermont Lounge into a ’70s disco/funk inferno late into the wee hours of the night.

Sunday, February 2

Get vivacious and come out and play with the ever sultry Kool Kat Katherine Lashe and the  Syrens of the South as they get voluptuous at 7 Stages with their Vixon’s Valentease Show! Get your fill of a little love and a whole lotta lust with the saucy seductresses Kool Kat Talloolah Love, Lola lesoleil, Bourgeois Betty, Roula Roulette, Candi le Coeur, Greta Vontrol Lop, Tora Torrid and the mysterious magic of the Clark Gable look-a-like, Chad Sanborn! Or spend the day with a few Shaw Brothers’ productions at Cinefest as they screen a double-feature with Chang Cheh’s KID WITH THE GOLDEN ARM (1979) and Tokusatsu’s science-fiction flick, THE SUPER INFRAMAN (1975)! Get jazzy at Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs with Deb Bowman’s Jazz Brunch at 12:30 pm! Or get a taste of some gypsy jazz with Kool Kat Amy Pike and the Bonaventure Quartet at The Earl’s ‘dunch’ show!  And Banjolicious gets honky-tonkin’ at Big Tex for their Bluegrass Brunch from 12 to 4 pm!
Ongoing

Act 3 Playhouse presents Neil Simon’s play, ‘Brighton Beach Memoirs’ through Feb. 2! (LAST CHANCE!)

New American Shakespeare Tavern presents ‘Romeo & Juliet’ until March 30^th!

The Star Bar gets groovy with The Funk Godfather, DJ Romeo Cologne and DJ Quasi Mandisco every other Tuesday!

The Plaza Theater Time-Warps it up as they screen, THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (1975) every Friday night, featuring the live cast of Lips Down on Dixie at midnight!

Every first and third Mondays are Big Band Nights at Café 290, featuring Joe Gransden and his amazing 16-piece orchestra playing jazz and swing standards in the tradition of The Glen Miller Orchestra and other legendary groups.  Second and fourth Mondays are Bumpin the Mango, ‘The groove that makes you want to move!’

Every first Wednesday is the Graveyard Tavern’s Graveyard Swing Night, featuring the swingin’ jazz and boogie-woogie sounds of the Savoy Kings!

If you have a suggestion for a future event that should be included in This Week in Retro Atlanta or see something we missed, please email us at atlretro@gmail.com.