BMW AG

L.A. Daters Are Massively Superficial, Poll Says

Prepare for shocking news from a dating site that looked at different American cities' online courtship rituals: Los Angeles is superficial. So says WhatsYourPrice.com, which checked Google Analytics and surveyed 3,401 of its L.A.-based members to measure its users' habits. What's really surprising ... More >>

Takashi Murakami Premiered His Very Weird First Feature Film at LACMA Last Night

In front of a giant movie screen, Takashi Murakami speaks as a large, pink creature next to him flaps its arms up and down excitedly. Imagine your average pink manga character with human arms and legs topped off by a head with huge eyes and darker pink strands of what looks like hair. The cute chara ... More >>

Asa From Shahs of Sunset: Rapping at Elat Market L.A.'s Persian Food Culture

If you're following the L.A.-based reality show Shahs of Sunset, (and we're certainly not judging you if you aren't) you've probably become acquainted with Asa Asa Soltan Rahmati. And if that's the case, you've probably noticed that her favorite things are music, gold and Persian food. In what we gu ... More >>

Jason Shmelnik, Dancing With The Stars Veteran, Dies With Two Others in Valley Crash

One of three young people who died in a fiery crash over the weekend was identified in reports as Jason Shmelnik, a 21-year-old who had performed as a youth on Dancing With the Stars' "Champion Kids" competition in 2007. He was not driving when the BMW he was in careened out of control, reportedly ... More >>

Chris Benton, Pepperdine President's Son, Facing Two Years in Prison for Threatening to Kill His Dad

The troubled son of esteemed Pepperdine University President Andrew K. Benton will serve two years in prison, says the L.A. County District Attorney's Office, for threatening his father at the family's on-campus home and "possession of a firearm by a narcotic addict." Chris Benton, 27, allegedly br ... More >>

How Adam Grandmaison Is Changing the Way You Look at BMX

Though he's one of the most successful men in action sports, Adam Grandmaison doesn't roll up for our interview in a BMW -- he still rolls up on his BMX bike. Now, if you even had to Google "BMX" or if it made you think of the X Games, get ready to start re-thinking. Grandmaison's working to change ... More >>

We Love Morrissey but C'Mon: Dude Totally Ripped off Bryan Ferry

Twenty years ago I discovered Morrissey; he gave expression to the deep isolation and longing for connection that I felt as a suburban misfit. As I grew older it became less about the Pope of Mope, however, and more about the well-dressed man singing operatic odes to skinheads and small-time crimina ... More >>

Silicon Beach: 5 People Making L.A. a New Tech Industry Capital

Los Angeles may be 350 miles south of Silicon Valley, but it's making strides to close the distance between the two in terms of sheer brain power and inventiveness (with a little bit of entertainment thrown in for good measure). Here are five people from our People issue helping to make that happen.

Ying Wu and Ming Qu, USC Grad Students From China, Identified as Shooting Victims

The USC grad students murdered in a 1 a.m. shooting outside their apartment have been identified as Ying Wu and Ming Qu, according to USC officials. They were both 23, and had traveled from China to study electrical engineering at the prestigious USC campus. But the area surrounding USC is notoriou ... More >>

Tragic Video: Old Woman in Wheelchair Vs. Hump in Los Angeles Sidewalk

We alert you, this gorgeous Thursday, to the ever-deteriorating state of L.A.'s streets -- so nicely, if tragically, demonstrated by Mahdokht Nakhost, a Northridge resident in a wheelchair. The LA Daily News posted a video this morning of Nakhost's neighbor struggling to push her over a monster hum ... More >>

Devin Petelski's Death in Crash With LAPD Prompted $5 Million City Settlement: Cops Appeared to Lie

The case of Devin Petelski vs. the LAPD came to a quiet end last year. The 25-year-old was killed when her BMW was T-boned by an LAPD cruiser on Venice Boulevard on the night Oct. 15, 2009. Her family sued the department, alleging that the officer behind the wheel was speeding with no emergency lig ... More >>

Best L.A. Twitter Beefs of 2011 (and Who Won)

​Like most news bloggers, we probably spend too much time on Twitter. Tips arrive in real time -- quicker than on news television, or over the wire -- and Twitpics open us up to a world of witnesses. In effect, we might also talk about it too much. (Online celebrity rags are guiltiest of all: ... More >>

Andrew Bynum, Lakers Center, Caught Parking in Two Handicap Spaces

NBC Los AngelesBynum shoots for two.​NBC Los Angeles investigative reporter Joel Grover is at it again (is it sweeps?), and this time he bags a big one: Lakers center Andrew Bynum. The reporter and his crew shot the baller with his car parked in two handicap spaces as he loaded up groceries a ... More >>

Chang Qui, Teen BMW Driver, Cited When Three-Hour Mall Trip Ends in Death of Dog Who Remained in Hot Car, Authorities Say

mioi​A teenage driver was cited for suspicion of animal cruelty after her 1-year-old dog, left in a closed car while she went to a mall for three hours, died from apparent heat exposure, authorities say. It happened in the Ontario Mills Mall parking lot in Ontario Monday evening when security ... More >>

Car-to-Car Shooting on 10 Freeway in Baldwin Park Puts Man Behind Wheel of BMW in Critical Condition

NoiseCollusionThe 10 freeway.​A twentysomething man behind the wheel of a white BMW was hospitalized in critical condition after he was shot on the 10 freeway in Baldwin Park, according to the California Highway Patrol. The shooting on the westbound 10 near Baldwin Park Boulevard happened abo ... More >>

Beverly Hills' Laemmle Music Hall Movie Theater Likely To Close

Laemmle Music Hall.​It looks like Beverly Hills' Laemmle Music Hall 3 will be the next of the great old movie theaters to fall in Los Angeles. The Beverly Hills Courier reports this week that the Laemmle folks will likely pull out in April as a result of a rent increase they can't absorb; it' ... More >>

John 5: Malice Man

Lawsuit Filed Against LAPD, City In Case Of Fatal Venice Collision

Devin Petelski​The parents of a young woman killed in a collision with a Los Angeles Police Department cruiser in Venice have filed a civil suit against the city, the LAPD, and officers James Eldridge (the driver) and Ramon Vasquez, attorneys for the family announced Friday. Devin Petelski, 2 ... More >>

Jerry Brown Aims $40 Million Fraud Suit At Former California Retirement Plan Head, 'Middle Man'

Jerry Brown.​Attorney General Jerry Brown announced he has filed a fraud lawsuit against the former head of the California Public Employees' Retirement System and a middleman accused of wining and dining him in order to procure $40 million in commissions from the massive investment pool based ... More >>

Top 10 'Green Cars' Announced: Which One Is Your Roadside Status Symbol?

Number one.​Remember when Escalades, Navigators and Hummers were all the rage? Dubs (20-inch-plus wheels), loud exhaust and bass music, right? Doesn't that seem like a million years ago? Today to be a true player in L.A., more modest hybrids are the status symbols to have. Kelly Blue Book on ... More >>

Cops In Fatal Crash Were Speeding, But Only Slightly

Devin Petelski​An investigation into the collision last month between a Los Angeles Police Department cruiser and a young woman who died concluded that the officer behind the wheel was speeding, but only slightly. The "black-and-white" was going between 41 and 45 miles per hour in a 45-maximu ... More >>

Woman In Crash With LAPD Laid To Rest; Questions Remain

​Devin Petelski, the 25-year-old Brentwood woman killed in a traffic collision involving a Los Angeles Police Department cruiser last month, was laid to rest during a small private ceremony Friday as questions remained about the Venice crash. Her family had retained the services of star attor ... More >>

Friends Of Crash Victim Allege LAPD Cover-Up

Friends of a Brentwood woman who was killed in a collision with a Los Angeles Police Department cruiser last month held a vigil this week and called for an investigation into whether the patrol car was speeding to an emergency call without its lights and sirens on -- a practice that was banned by th ... More >>

Homelessness Down, Eyebrows Up

We're not the only ones who did a double take when the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority reported this week that homelessness was down 38 percent in the county compared to 2007.Kevin ScanlonAdvocate for the homeless Alice Callaghan says the numbers don't add up.​ Let's get this straigh ... More >>

Hail the Conquering Chicken

Hainan (Chicken) Rice in Alhambra

Death Row's G-Funk Fire Sale

Death Row Records Auctions Off Its History in Fullerton

(All photos by Brandon Perkins. For full gallery, check out the Death Row Auction slideshow.) It was perfect. The portrait of Nate Dogg in itself was tacky, but Suge Knight's alleged tweaks to the painting -- black eye and multiple bullet holes -- were priceless. The frameless artifact wasn't th ... More >>

Snarking the Awful Golden Globes

... because they have zero integrity and credibility

TRS-80: Tron on Acid

Jay Rajeck founded TRS-80 in Chicago in 1997, and while the line-up and location have changed over the past 11 years, he's remained consistent in his delivery of relatively minimalistic, predominantly instrumental electronic music, which he often mixes with bizarre retro samples. The result is a s ... More >>

Theater Reviews: Hot and Ready, Tooth and Nail

Also: The Nothing Boys, Keep Your Pantheon, and more

Nightlife Nobu

Matsuhisa dresses up at home

Toby Barlow's Sharp Teeth

Baring our canines

Bishop Lamont-The Next Great West Coast Hope?

I...listened to all that Death Row stuff....and Lords Of The Underground, Busta Rhymes, Redman and Keith Murray, where your takes had to be so clean and ill to get off the phonetics that you were dropping. Your lines had to be crisp. Other cats don’t come from that school. It took me studying R ... More >>

Monkey Madness at UCLA

Violent radicals aim to kill Jules Stein Eye Institute researchers who test on animals

Primp'n Hos

Uncovering the goods in Hollywood Boulevard’s legendary stripper-ware shops

A Christmas Miracle, Times Two

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Riding the whirlwind in the bike lane

Mandingo Versus Metal

Beyond Coffee and Cigarettes

Driven

In Hollywood, your car is who you are

Ecology of Fire

Why the empire wanted to burn so badly

Can You Hear Them Now?

Unlikely activists shoot down Palisades cell-phone tower

Give it Away: A King's Ransom

Letters

Cine: Introduction

See Owen Run

Another top gun goes Behind Enemy Lines

Lit Crit

Blight of Other Days

The end of the trail for the Trail’s End Ranch case

Back to the Source

Uncrossing international pop

Guardian Satan

In a fix? This handyman can.