Skateboarding (and a whole lot more) is allowed today Downtown because the X Games are in town. / Photo by ~db~ via LAist's flickr pool. Can you believe it's already July 31? Well, here's a few interesting items tonight to celebrate the end of the month: GAMES: X Games 14 kicks off today and ends on Sunday. Performance venues are Staples Center, the Event Deck at LA Live and Home Depot Center. On the......

Fireworks, the Bowl, Dodgers baseball and Randy Newman. What else says July 4th in LA? / Photo of Hollywood Bowl by Pinky P via LAist's flickr pool. Hang on kids, only a few more hours ’til quitting time. FILM: The Aero Theatre’s Summer Laughs series starts tonight with a French double feature. Mr. Hulot’s Holiday (Les Vacances De Monsieur Hulot) from 1953. focuses on a man’s vacation where he seeks a little R&R. It’s......

"Knights of Cydonia" - Muse (One of the best videos of the year because we can relate to it via Guitar Hero 3 and we love Western themes. That and it's a great song.) Abstract 3's Armenian Folk Jazz @ The Baked Potato Muse, Feist, Jimmy Eat World, Modest Mouse, Silversun Pickups, Spoon, The Shins @ Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal Citywalk The Cult, The Cliks @ House of Blues - Disneyland Heavy D @......

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is scheduled to make a stop in Los Angeles Monday at the Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk. From his campaign: Barack Obama in Los Angeles Monday, December 10th Doors open 6:00 p.m. With performances by Ne-Yo and The Goo Goo Dolls Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk 100 Universal City Plaza Universal City, CA 91608 For security reasons, do not bring bags. No signs or banners permitted. Purchase......

It's a dream date for fans of Canadian songstress Feist and Austin's Spoon. Feist is just now making her break on the world stage, with a little help from Uncle Steve. But anyone with an ear to the Toronto indie rock scene could hear her coming ever since her solo debut, Monarch, was released on the heels of By Divine Right's "Bless This Mess" Tour (she was their rhythm guitarist). For most of this......

Sonic Youth continue to push the envelope. Two weeks ago they let it out that they're going to be working with Starbucks on a cd that will only be sold there, and today we learn that they are going to play a free gig at the Urban Outfitters on the Third Street Promenade. Is that where the Teenage Riots happen these days? Anyways, they're Sonic Youth and because their music has stayed pure throughout......

MTV to Bloggers: We sort of like you but not enough to give a shit about your coverage. LAist to MTV: We sort of like you but not enough to give a shit about your programming. When LAist was invited by MTV to live-blog the 2007 Movie Awards from an on-site "blogging tent," we asked ourselves one crucial question: is this going to be a cool opportunity to offer readers a unique perspective on the......

Experimental band Negativland once said that there's no word more powerful in the world than "free". We say they're wrong. We say there's no word more powerful than "holy crap". As in holy crap, there's free movies, free popcorn, and free parking today only at Universal CityWalk. Take the holy crap outta there and all you have are free movies, free popcorn, free parking today only at Universal CityWalk and it seems hum drum,......

Because drinking and driving is beyond passé: This week, local bartenders strutted their best Tom Cruise-in-Cocktail skills, but without any "proof" in their puddings. It was the annual Mocktail contest held at Universal CityWalk, where ten expert mixologists threw their best non-alcoholic mixes into...well, the mix at the annual "Battle of the Bartenders". The event was designed to promote awareness of the dangers of DUIs. Your turn to be the designated driver? Try one......

After hearing that a big event celebrating the launch of the new Nintendo system, the Wii was taking place at Citywalk, we made a B-line for the Wii-line and got to sitting. The long night in line at one of our least favorite places in Los Angeles, Universal CityWalk, Wii finally have our console in hand and now Wii have yet another thing to eat up any free time Wii might come across. All......

We're not the biggest fans of Universal City Walk, but, BIGHOMMIE77, thank you.......

Quick -- what happens when you want to put on an American Idol-esque show during the summer TV doldrums, and Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul, Simon Cowell and Ryan Seacrest are busy spending the bizillions they earned during the regular TV season? You get David Hasselhoff in the role of Randy; Brandy playing Paula, some Brit “journalist” named Piers Morgan playing Simon; and an aging Regis Philbin taking over Seacrest’s role in a two-hour waste......

Elf Power Back to the Web (Rykodisc) – They’re an Athens, GA band and part of the Elephant 6 collective of indie rockers. They’ve got a record label and a commune. Apparently this album is less poppy and more acoustic folk. Appearing live at Spaceland on 5/13. Sample tracks on MYSPACE. Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris All the Roadrunning (Nonesuch/Warner Bros.) – This is more a Mark Knopfler album than an Emmylou album. It’s......

This morning Blogging.la reminded us that today is the day to get free ice cream from the delicious-est ice creamery of all, Ben & Jerry's. But we realized we weren't sure where to find one. So we add this important breaking news: If you live in Burbank, Long Beach, Manhattan Beach, Huntington Beach, Northridge, Arcadia, Santa Monica, Sherman Oaks, Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley, Century City, Westwood, West Hollywood or Malibu, we urge you to......

Universal CityWalk gets the big WTF for what we witnessed in our short 45-minute jaunt to pick up a friend there last night. In that small period of time, there was much to witness: one hiccupping drunk laying on the parking garage men's bathroom floor, three separate fights and one bartender who didn't know how to make a Madras (you know, it doesn't need cranberry juice or anything). Security with their out-of-place ranger hats......

We spent the weekend at the Festival of Books trying desperately to figure out how to get into Hogwarts Platform (or Diagon Alley) but we spent the last week doing the following: - We tried to get someone to lose their job. - We wanted to tear the Hollywood Sign down. - The war on oversized cars in compact spaces was renewed. - We got tourist trapped at Universal Citywalk. - You told us......

Donna Summer said it best when she said, "You work hard for your money, so you'd better...try to not spend all your money in one place or risk being really deep in debt and then the rest of your life won't matter much cause you'll constantly be worried about spiking APR rates and a future without financial stability." Sure, we're paraphrasing a bit and adding additional meaning to the golden throated words of Ms.......

A couple of years ago we had the pleasure of attending an opening reception for a new installation at the Museum of Neon Art (hereinafter referred to as MONA, natch). We love neon--we embraced the colors with ferocity in the late 80s, we wax nostalgic over neon signs, and we respect our glass and neon artist acquaintance's work in the medium. And what's hot about MONA is that it's the only permanent institution of......

Last night at 12:01 AM there was a collective gasp among all obsessive XBOX owners when the game-to-end-all-games, Halo 2 was finally released to the public. Well, the small percentage of the public who felt driven to wait in a line for hours just to get their hands on a copy before the rest of the (sleeping) public. Halo 2, produced by Bungie and Microsoft has been said to be one of the most......