ATLRetro

by Melanie Crew
Managing Editor

Hey kiddies! Spring has sprung, so come on out and see what’s on the Retro menu this week! ‘Tis the season for outdoor festivals promising rockin’ shindigs and shakin’ shenanigans! And of course we’ve got all the red hot jazz ‘n’ blues you could ever want, a week full of classic cinema and so much more! So, get up and get out in Retro Atlanta this week!

Monday, April 6

Boogie on down to Octane Coffee for stoked!, featuring a night of classic punk and rock ‘n’ roll! Or polka it up at Pallookaville as they and Blast-Off Burlesque present Atlanta’s only Dingus Day Celebration featuring a Polka dance party with accordionist Vincent Aleandri and DJ Barbilicious spinning Polka hits! Truett Lollis delivers a night of blues and soul at Darwin’s Burgers & Blues in Marietta! Or boogie on down to the Northside Tavern and spend an evening with Lola at her famous Monday Night Northside Jam! Swing on by Big Band Night featuring Joe Gransden and his amazing 16-member orchestra at Café 290 every first and third Monday of the month! Blues it up with Bill Sheffield at Blind Willie’s! Get folksy with Jamie Laval at Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs! And for a night of tasty blues, make your way to Fat Matt’s Rib Shack for a side of Dry White Toast and a plate full ‘o finger lickin’ BBQ!

Tuesday, April 7

Get tempted with the best of ‘em at Landmark Midtown Art Cinema’s screening of Martin Scorsese’s THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST (1988) during the “Midtown Classics” series at 7pm! Or go where no man has gone before, to the Northlake Festival Movie Tavern for their screening of Nicholas Meyer’s STAR TREK II: WRATH OF KHAN (1982), during their “Classic Films on the Big Screen” series at 7:30! Eddie’s Attic dishes out a night of old-school doo-wop, R&B and soul with The Impressions! Groove on down to The Earl for a night with The Bright Light Social Hour and The Tontons! Funk on down to Aisle 5 for a night with The 200s, Progger and The Indie Revenge! Get really retro at Pallookaville with Jim Stacy’s culinary anthropological series, “Eat Like An American Colonist” at 7:30pm! The Star Bar delivers a night of retro shenanigans with Kool Kat Jeff Clark and Stomp & Stammer’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Trivia at 8pm, followed by ‘80s Dance Night! Get folksy with the Wrinkle Neck Mules at Smith’s Olde Bar! Fire it up with JT Speed at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack! Blind Willie’s delivers a night of rockin’ roots with Joe McGuinness! Jam it up with Joe Gransden and his jazz jam session at Twain’s in Decatur every Tuesday at 9 pm! Or boogie on down to Darwin’s Burgers & Blues in Marietta for a taste of Bill Sheffield’s acoustic roots and blues! And as always, The Entertainment Crackers get bluesy with their folksy Americana at the Northside Tavern!

Wednesday, April 8

Holly Golightly to the Studio Movie Grill in Alpharetta during their screening of Blake Edwards’ BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S (1961) at 7:30pm! Take a voyage to the Northlake Festival Movie Tavern for their screening of Nicholas Meyer’s STAR TREK II: WRATH OF KHAN (1982), during their “Classic Films on the Big Screen” series at 7:30! Jazz it up with Kool Kat Scott Glazer’s Mojo Dojo at Blind Willie’s! 529 rocks out with Glen Iris, Rope, Moonbase and SWOTS! Rock on down to Aisle 5 for New Car Caviar: A Jamgrass Tribute to Pink Floyd! It’s a hootenanny and a half at The Star Bar as Kool Kat Rich DeSantis and his band Honkytonk get smokin’ hot during their Slim Chickens’ Honkytonk Extravaganza event, featuring live-band old-time country and western tunes! Blues it up with Lola at Sweet Georgia’s Juke Joint! Get some soul with The Hollidays 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! And as always, it’s Ladies Night at Johnny’s Hideaway which plays hits from Sinatra to Madonna for a generally mature crowd.

Thursday, April 9

Rev on down to Tannery Row Artist Colony as Garage71 Studio brings you a vintage motorcycle display and their Deep Eddy Vodka Artist Series, featuring Kustom Kulture Art and pin-stripe artist, Charles Tyre, and so much more! Kool Kat Spike Fullerton with the Ghostriders Car Club fires it up at the Clermont Lounge! Rock out with some punk cabaret at the Variety Playhouse with An Evening With Amanda Fucking Palmer (Dresden Dolls)! Jazz it up with Kebbi Williams during Oakhurst’s Jazz Nights at the Solarium! Get to the root of it all with Heather Luttrell at Blind Willie’s! The Earl delivers a night of rockin’ folk with Book Club and Hope for agoldensummer! Get old-timey and bluegrass it up with Whiskey Shivers and the Stovetop Ramblers at Smith’s Olde Bar! Get down and dirty at 529 with The Dirty Magazines, Alias for Now, Sex Snobs and Spray Tan! Get retro theatre-style as the Georgia Ensemble Theatre presents Don Farrell’s “My Fair Lady” by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, running through April 26! Have a saxxy good time with Pamela Williams, the “Saxtress” at Suite Food Lounge! It’s Bluegrass Thursday at Red Light Café, so stomp on down for a night with The Fustics and Brillig! It’s Mai Tai Thursday at Trader Vic’s, so hula on down for a night of fiery island tunes! 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! The Northside Tavern gets rockin’ with a little Chicago/Delta blues of The Breeze Kings! Darwin’s Burgers & Blues gets down and dirty at their Blues Jam hosted by The Cazanovas! Get your boogie on at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack, as Chickenshack featuring Eddie Tigner, delivers some honky-tonk blues! And as always, get your boogie on at Mary’s, as the East Atlanta venue gets funky with their weekly Disco in the Village.

Friday, April 10

Spring has sprung and so has the 3-day 79th Annual Atlanta Dogwood Festival in Piedmont Park, featuring live music, an artist’s market, festival food, rides, games and more! Make your way to the main stage for a rockin’ good time with Dangerous Basement, The Space Time Travelers, Freddy’s Finest, Angelina Sheri, The Harlem Albright Band, Eric Thomas & Elevate the Quest and more! Geek it up and get your Sherlock Holmes fix at this year’s 221B Con promising a weekend chock full of Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Who, H.G. Wells, The Hobbit, fan fiction and more, being held at the Atlanta Marriott Perimeter Center and running through April 12!  The Star Bar delivers a night of retro rockin’ R&B and Delta psyche with Bipolaroid, A Drug Called Tradition and Jessica Lee Wilkes! Catch Jack Clayton’s cinematic adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic, THE GREAT GATSBY (1974) at Earl Smith Strand Theatre at 8pm! Boogie on down with Yacht Rock Revue and their 6th Annual Reagan Rock Prom at Park Tavern! It’s a night of blues rock and soul at Smith’s Olde Bar with The Last Waltz Ensemble, Liz Brasher and The Georgia Flood! Swing on by Vinyl for a stompin’ good time with The Dustbowl Revival and City Hotel! Get musical at the Shakespeare Tavern with Andrew Houchins’ adaptation of Thornton Wilde’s “Our Town” running through April 26! Rock out with Radio Cult with Bambi Lynn at Hottie Hawgs BBQ! Make your way to the Red Light Café for a night with Jordan Igoe and the rock n roll soul siren, Rosey! Fancy it up with GSU’s Opera Theatre & Symphony Orchestra at the Rialto Center for the Arts as they present LA BOHEME by Giacomo Puccini at 8pm, running through April 12! The Variety Playhouse dishes out a night of roots rock with James McMurtry! Stomp on down to Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs for a night with Heather Luttrell! Blues it up with Selwyn Birchwood at Blind Willie’s! Get folksy with Mipso at Eddie’s Attic! The Northside Tavern gets rockin’ with a little Chicago/Delta blues of The Breeze Kings! Diedre & the Ruff Pro Band get the blues at Darwin’s Burgers & Blues! The Electromatics will have you shakin’ a tail feather under the dinosaurs as they deliver a night of Chicago and West Coast blues at the Fernbank Museum of Natural History’s Martinis and IMAX event! It’s a night of indie folk at the Tabernacle with The Decemberists! Blues it up with Larry Griffith at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack! And as always, Time-Warp it up and get naughty with some uber 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!

Saturday, April 11

Make your way to Piedmont Park for day 2 of the 79th Annual Atlanta Dogwood Festival featuring live music by Rhonda Thomas, the JP Blues Band, The Tin Man, the Natti Love Joys, Gareth Asher & the Earthlings, the Lefty Williams Band, Cigar Store Indians and more! Or spring onto Ponce for their 4th Annual Spring Festival on Ponce at the Olmsted Linear Park featuring 125 local artists, live acoustic music, gourmet food trucks and more, running through April 12! Oink on down to the Masquerade for Hogs & Hops Atlanta, featuring beer ‘n’ BBQ and rockin’ tunes by The Geeks and the Sweet Auburn String Band!

It’s a night of rockin’ punk poets at The Star Bar with their I’M BEGINNING TO SEE THE LIGHT: A Tribute to Lou Reed event, featuring The Skylarks, Blake Rainey & His Demons, Bottlekids, Noel Summerall and Weary Heads! Rock on down to the Variety Playhouse for a night with The Bangles and A Fragile Tomorrow! Make your way to the Lefont Theatre for their screening of GREY GARDENS (1976), directed by David Maysles, Albert Maysles, Ellen Houde and Muffie Meyers at 10:30am! It’s a night of punk, blues and voodoo funk at Union EAV with Sonic Graffiti, Momcat and Bully Pulpit! Disco it up at Kavarna with the Susi French Connection! Get bluesy in the Music Room at Smith’s Olde Bar with the AJ Ghent Band and Greg Humphrey’s Electric Trio! Or stomp on over to the Atlanta Room for a night with Tedo Stone, Kip Bradley and Cicada Rhythm! Haunt on down to the Historic Oakland Cemetery for their Malts & Vaults: Where Beer Meets History tour, from 7-8pm! Costume it up at Battle & Brew in Sandy Springs at their Disney Cosplay Night, with photo-ops, costume contests and more! Or boogie on down to the Famous Pub in your best immortal get-ups for RITUAL’s Gods & Goddesses Party! Radar delivers a night of rock ‘n’ roll at Steve’s Live Music in Sandy Springs with a reunion show! Blues it up with Eddie Shaw & the Wolfgang at Blind Willie’s! Jazz it up with the Elgin Wells Group at the Red Clay Theatre! Get folksy for night 2 of The Decemberists at the Tabernacle! Darwin’s Burgers & Blues gets down and dirty with The Cazanovas! Get funky with Swami Gone Bananas and Vanilla Gorilla at the Northside Tavern! Diedre & the Ruff Pro Band get the blues at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack! Bluegrass it up with Nu-Blu at the Crimson Moon Café! It’s a night of hill country and juke joint blues at The Family Dog with The John Sosebee Band! 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, April 12

Eddie’s Attic delivers their Gospel Brunch, featuring Eric “Ricky” McKinnie (Blind Boys of Alabama), Harold Holloway & Co. and Danny ‘Mudcat’ Dudeck with the Atlanta Horns, at 11:30am! Then stick around for two rockin’ sets with Edwin McCain at 6pm and 8:3opm! Or brunch it up at Smith’s Olde Bar with Cedar Hill! It’s your last chance and day 3 of the 79th Annual Atlanta Dogwood Festival, so come on down and get funky with Alana Royal, Them Wagoneers, Crane and more! Support local artists and craftsmen/women at the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club’s Lovecrafts: Treasures from the Deep event running from 1pm to 6pm! Bluegrass it up with Front Country and City Mouse at the Red Light Café! Get traditional, Celtic-style at Steve’s Live Music with the Cape Breton Trio! Get some soul and tasty vittles at Fat Matt’s Rib Shack with Fatback Deluxe! And rock on down to the Crimson Moon Café for their Boomers Gone Wild event, delivering a night of ‘60s and ‘70s covers!

Ongoing

The Atlanta Contemporary Art Center presents the “Gilda Radner Research and Translation Center”, an unofficial academic-ish platform for the analysis of Radner’s life and comedy, running through April 11! (LAST CHANCE!)

The Alliance Theatre presents Phillip DePoy’s gothic murder mystery, EDWARD FOOTE, haunting through April 19!

The Georgia Ensemble Theatre presents Don Farrell’s “My Fair Lady” through April 26!

The Shakespeare Tavern presents Andrew Houchins’ adaptation of Thornton Wilde’s “Our Town” running through April 26!

The Marietta Museum of History gets Victorian as they present their “Peeling Back the Layers: Victorian Wedding Ensembles” exhibit through May 2, 2015!

The High Museum presents “Gordon Parks: Segregation Story” (‘50s Life Magazine photos) and “Leonard Freed: Black in White America”, (1963-1966) exhibits through June 7!

William Bremen Jewish Heritage Museum’s, “Where the Wild Things Are: Maurice Sendek in His Own Words and Pictures” getting wild through July 5!

Blast-Off Burlesque geeks it up with a night of adults-only trivia at the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club, every Monday at 8:30pm!

HepCat’s Hop gets swingin’ every second Wednesday of the month at the 57th Fighter Group Restaurant!

Nerd Film Mafia screenings at the Diesel Filling Station following NerdCore Trivia, every last Tuesday of the month!

ICON 80s: Music Video Dance Night rocks out at the Famous Pub every Friday night with a different 80’s theme!

The Star Bar delivers Stomp & Stammer’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Trivia at 8pm, followed by ‘80s Dance Night at 10pm, every Tuesday!

Boogie on down into Disco Hell at The Family Dog as DJ Quasi Mandisco delivers a night of classic funk, soul and disco the last Friday of every month.

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.