Kemp Powers

Starting today, audiences in Los Angeles can take their first worthwhile break from the summer blockbuster madness with one of the few award-worthy pics released so far this year (other than Ratatouille). First, a disclaimer. Do not let the trailers for Talk to Me, the new biopic starring the always excellent Don Cheadle and Chiwetel Ejiofor, mislead you. This is not a film about the civil rights movement, or race in America. Those who...

Good grief, BET. First, the Black Entertainment Television network embarrasses black college students across the country with College Hill, a show that proves a house full of black college co-eds can be as useless as a house full of white ones. Now the MTV-show-dipped-in-chocolate experiment kicks into overdrive with last night's premiere of Baldwin Hills, a new single-camera docudrama that proves that when it comes to effortlessly reinforcing stereotypes, BET still reigns supreme. Promoted...

Back during the most heated moments of the Shaq vs. Kobe war that (probably) lead to the dismantling of the championship Lakers, I had an equally combative debate with a co-worker about which of the two players should get the heave-ho. My co-worker, a lifelong Lakers fan, said there was no way Kobe, the best player in the NBA and in the prime of his youth, should be traded instead of the frequently overweight...

Oh, that Peanut Butter Wolf. Leave it to one of LA's busiest DJs to stick it to the digital music crowd by dusting off a week's worth of vinyl and taking his 45 road show to more than half a dozen of the most popular clubs in town. Peanut Butter Wolf vs. LA kicks off this Sunday, June 10, when the vinyl maestro begins a seven day marathon of LA club gigs. The rules...

Q: What do you call a road with five to seven lanes of traffic in one direction, if the only way to exit this road is by going to the right? Pose that question to most Angelenos and the answer would be "a freeway, stupid!" But they'd be wrong. The answer is the increasingly popular proposal by LA County Supervisor Zev Yarolslavsky to convert Olympic and Pico boulevards into one-way streets in order to...

A friend is flying in from Australia on Friday. It's his first trip to Los Angeles, and he comes bearing gifts. Authentic, "only in Australia" kinds of gifts. I'm talking Penfolds red wine. I'm talking an Akubra hat. I'm talking a stuffed koala for my son (in Pietà form no less, cradling another tiny stuffed baby koala that sings Waltzing Matilda. Fuckin' show off). I thought I'd forgo the "here, have a fridge magnet"...

LA's Stones Throw Records are quickly becoming the most important purveyors of independent hip-hop in the new millennium, much like East Coast indie stalwarts Rawkus were in the late 1990s. There is, however, one particularly notable difference between the two. While both labels are known for their independent spirit and bohemian rosters of hip-hop artists (Stones Throw with Madlib and his many aliases, MF Doom, J Dilla, et al and Rawkus was with Mos...

Maybe it's because of its residents' blogginess, but these days everyone seems to know that downtown LA is booming. However, flying way below the radar is Koreatown. Yes, you already know it's the place to go for your late night barbecue and karaoke needs, but the boozin', beef-eatin' hood (best known to those outside LA as one of the places ravaged by the 1992 riots) has quietly been getting a $1 billion makeover that...

One of the most publicized weapons in the city's decades-long (and some would say, losing) battle against street gangs has been its gang injunction, which prohibits known gang members from hanging around with other gang members, having alchohol, not following curfews and more, under penalty of arrest. Today's LA Times covers city attorney Rocky Delgadillo's announcement that the injunction would receive a much-needed overhaul. Why? Well, in addition to it not working very well,...

As expected, I was relieved to see that Chicago won the chance to host the 2016 Olympics - something I stated in a post that Tony was nice enough to link to today. In that post there are some nasty comments that I would like to respond to. The overall message of my article was that Los Angeles doesn't need the Olympics, and no amount of name calling changes that opinion. In recent history,...