Fukushima

The First Los Angeles Ramen Yokocho Fest: Crowds and Ramen Burgers Steal the Show

Going to a food festival (especially one being held for the first time) is always a risky thing. As these things always seem to be held during the summer, there will be heat. There will be crowds. And, above all, there will be lines. Which brings us to this past weekend's first annual Ramen Yokocho ... More >>

The Best Concerts to See in L.A. This Week

Don't forget to check our constantly-updated Los Angeles Concert Calendar Monday, August 26 Courtney Love TROUBADOUR Musician, actress, writer, artist, designer -- love her or hate her, she is Courtney Love. Nothing can stop the 49-year-old icon from partying, guitar shredding and unconventional c ... More >>

The Best Concerts to See In L.A. This Week

Don't forget to check our constantly-updated Los Angeles Concert Calendar Monday, July 29 System of a Down HOLLYWOOD BOWL The Monty Python of heavy metal, System of a Down's irreverent and sometimes downright Dadaist take on its chosen medium achieves an unlikely yet enduring resonance thanks to s ... More >>

Too Bad The Wolverine Isn't as Interesting as Hugh Jackman

The Best Concerts to See In L.A. This Weekend

Don't forget to check our constantly-updated Los Angeles Concert Calendar Beyoncé STAPLES CENTER Like her fellow Texan Erykah Badu, Houston-raised Beyoncé is part of the opening-night festivities at the BET Experience. But Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter's worldview is markedly different from Bad ... More >>

The Best Concerts to See In L.A. This Weekend

Don't forget to check our constantly-updated Los Angeles Concert Calendar Friday, June 14 LoveyDove CASEY'S PUB One of Los Angeles' choicest homegrown musical sensations, boy-girl adventure team LoveyDove have created an unusually irresistible blend of artful expression, psychedelic atmospherics, ... More >>

The Best Concerts to See in Los Angeles This Weekend

Don't forget to check our constantly-updated Los Angeles Concert Calendar Friday, May 17 The International Swingers VIPER ROOM With New York's Met Gala "punk" event and exhibit dominating the media last week, it's sadly ironic that the innovators and music makers responsible for this in-your-face ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend

Friday, February 22 Kurt Rosenwinkel KIRK DOUGLAS THEATRE Kurt Rosenwinkel's playing is richly complex and challenging, and while he is smarter than most of us, smart people also feel. Thus, to label this guitarist as "intellectual" or "cerebral" does him a disservice. He is more poet than scientis ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend

Friday, February 15 Foxygen ECHOPLEX If you add up the ages of Foxygen's 20-something Sam France and Jonathan Rado, then subtract it from the current year, you will verge on the era from which the duo's album, We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic, takes its cues. There isn't a '60s ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Week

Monday, February 11 Hindu Pirates SILVERLAKE LOUNGE The days of oh-so-crude adjectives like "surf" and "garage" are well behind O.C.'s Hindu Pirates now. For while the Pirates are in fact darlings of the surf-skate industry, as evidenced by their clean and pristine session last year at Hurley's in- ... More >>

Contamination: It's What's For Breakfast

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend

Friday, February 1 Vieux Farka Touré, Fool's Gold ROYCE HALL Music critics often describe Vieux Farka Touré as "the Hendrix of the Sahara," but the Malian guitarist doesn't really sound much like Jimi Hendrix. Instead, Touré has a distinctively exotic style that's more similar to the music of hi ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Week

Monday, January 21 Baron von Luxxury, Yellow Alex, Yung Skeeter THE SATELLITE Electro-pop comes in splendiferous shapes and sizes. And Baron von Luxxury brings the wicked-wit version, in which DeBarge, ELO, Hall & Oates and other formerly uncool '80s soul stylists float through the disco in super-s ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend

Friday, January 18 Femi Kuti EL REY THEATRE In 2009, the Nigerian government forcefully shut down the Shrine, the home base of Afrobeat originator Fela Kuti. By now, however, not only is the Shrine back, it's a government-endorsed museum -- a sign, Femi Kuti told one reporter, that the revolutionar ... More >>

Director Sion Sono Exposes the Depravity of Modern Japan

Cinefamily hosts a double feature of his films

The Best Concerts to See in L.A. This Week: Oct. 22-26

Monday, October 22 Kaki King EL REY THEATRE There are actually several versions of Kaki King. The Atlanta native first came to attention busking in the subways of New York City, but she wasn't panhandling for change by strumming creaky versions of "Free Bird" or "Sweet Child O' Mine." Instead, the ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in L.A. This Weekend

Friday, August 31 Mark de Clive-Lowe BLUE WHALE As one might expect from a hapa Japanese-New Zealander who arrived in L.A. via Boston, New York and London, this keyboardist/DJ/music producer is a complex synthesis of musical styles and cultures. Mark de Clive-Lowe honed his craft in the United King ... More >>

Deliverance: On the Road With a Domino's Delivery Guy

From our 2012 Restaurant Issue, celebrating everything pizza in L.A. Sixteen-year Domino's veteran Mark Porter drives like my old driver's ed instructor. In fact, Porter's maneuvering of his red Hyundai on a recent Wednesday afternoon reminds me, viscerally, of that long-ago driver's ed class. Mayb ... More >>

LA Jazz Collective - Blue Whale - 1/11/12

SJ O'Connell​Matt Otto Duo Ariel Alexander Group Matt Otto Quintet Blue Whale 1-11-12 Better than...watching the People's Choice Awards Last night, after a few technical difficulties and a strict adherence to "jazz time," the second of four residency performances by the LA Jazz Collective go ... More >>

The Best Los Angeles Jazz Concerts of 2011

Blue Whale​Walter Smith III Blue Whale, December 17 Joon Lee, the modest personality behind Little Tokyo's Blue Whale, is an indispensible part of the local jazz community who books some of the most daring acts in Los Angeles. Saxophonist Walter Smith III, a hard-swinging transplant, was one ... More >>

Radiation From Japan Ended up in Southern California, UC San Diego Researchers Confirm

​Researchers at UC San Diego confirmed today that radiation from quake-and-tsunami-damaged Fukushima reactors reached Southern California. Though other tests have determined that minuscule amounts of nuclear material reached our shores, this one was trumpeted by USCD as "the first quantitativ ... More >>

California Girls on The Wane Because of Japan Radiation? Study Says Nuclear Release Could Mean Fewer Females Born in Golden State

Katy Perry, a limited resource.​Yes, we still wish they all could be California girls. But thanks to radiation from Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, there could be less of them. And more boys. A fascinating study out of Germany correlates release of radioactive material and ... More >>

Freeze-Dried Camping Foods Return: Just in Time To Escape From L.A.

Flickr / United States Marine Corps Official Page​ Shortly after the Fukushima disaster spread fears of a tsunami and radioactive plume hitting the Western United States, panicked buyers cleaned out many retailers of freeze-dried camping foods and left shelves bare at outdoor sports retailers. ... More >>

Japan's Sake Brewers Want You To Drink Up

True Sake/Sven WiederholtA selection of premium sake from Tohoku at True Sake​Need a reason to feel good about drinking? Japanese sake makers could use your help. Hit hard by the twin natural disasters of earthquake and tsunami, what's really impacting these often small, family-run enterprise ... More >>

Low Levels of Radiation Found in West Coast Milk: Far Below Levels of Concern, According to the EPA

Flickr/Ashley R. GoodNo need to fear milkshakes.​ According to reports from the New York Times and Associated Press, low levels of radioactive iodine from the compromised Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan have been found in milk in California and Washington state. Last week, tests of mi ... More >>

San Onofre Manager Says He Was Fired For Bringing Safety Concerns About the Nuclear Plant to U.S. Regulators

San Onofre.​A former San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station worker is suing the company, claiming he was fired weeks after bringing safety concerns at the plant to a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspector there. And yes, the Fukushima-crisis timing appears to be intentional: "This case ... More >>

'Simpsons' Show Faces Foreign Backlash Over Nuclear-Themed Episodes in Wake of Japan's Radiation Crisis

FoxThis photo would be censored on some stations.​Our favorite nuclear family is suddenly losing viewers in some parts of North America and Europe. And it hasn't done anything different. No, the L.A.-born Simpsons is a victim of thinned skinned censors who fear some folks can't stand to consi ... More >>

After Japan, Americans' Taste For Nuclear Power Sours

San Onofre.​In the span of less than a month, after watching disaster unfold in Japan, Americans have started to turn their backs on nuclear power. The latest Rasmussen Reports national survey finds a near three-year low among Americans who want to build more nuclear power plants: 38 percent. ... More >>

Higher Nuclear Radiation From Japan Detected in California, Other Western Region States

Fukushima.​Don't bite down on that suicide pill just yet, but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says radiation levels at West Coast monitors are up slightly. The readings follow last week's arrival of radiation from Japan's ailing Fukushima nuclear reactors, which are in dire straights ... More >>

No Nukes Vigil to Honor of Japan, Mark Three Mile Island Anniversary, Tonight in Westwood

FoxNo longer?​It feels almost like the '70s are back. Following Japan's nuclear crisis, demonstrators will hold a vigil outside the Westwood Federal Building to urge "a Non-Nuclear Future" for the United States and Japan. The action marking the thirty-second anniversary of the Three Mile Isl ... More >>

Japanese Radiation Reaches Southern California: Feds Say Don't Trip

A gift from Fukushima (which was an American design).​It's here. Radiation from Japan's ailing Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station was detected in Southern California by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency monitors this week. The trace amounts found in Riverside and Anaheim were said by ... More >>

Nuclear Power in the Wake of Japan: 2,452 Spent Fuel Assemblies Stored at San Onofre

San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.​Southern California's San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station has plenty of spent fuel on-hand, Fukushima-style. There are 2,452 spent fuel assemblies from three reactors (one is being used only as storage) there, we're told, versus 4,685 at the ailing, ra ... More >>

Radiation From Japan a No-Show in Los Angeles, But Does Arrive in Northern California

FoxHomer would be bummed.​Updated after the jump: Radiation detected in Sacramento. Should you worry about the weekend's rain? Lot of build up. No payoff. (Sorry to disappoint). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency radiation monitoring system in L.A. has found nothing above daily "back ... More >>

Japan Radiation Scam in L.A.: Email From 'Fire Department' Warns of Acid Rain, Hair Loss

hot-new-hairstyles.comNot funny, guys.​As if the mass paranoia in Southern California over that fabled radiation cloud from Japan wasn't ridiculous enough, it appears some Los Angeles email scammers are doing their part to feed the fear. Inspector Matt Levesque from the L.A. County Fire Depar ... More >>

Michael Collins, L.A. 'Enviroreporter,' Gets Local, Global Attention For His Geiger Counter Cam

Michael Collins and wife Denise Ann Duffield, who also works on enviroreporter.com.​Michael Collins has been covering the environment for 13 years. He's won several awards, including the Los Angeles Press Club's Journalist of the Year. But it wasn't his long-form exposes of gooey landfills th ... More >>

Japan Earthquake: Could Nuclear Power Plant Radiation Reach L.A?

Fukushima, on-edge.​Update: Minor amounts of radiation are projected to reach SoCal by Friday, after the jump. Could radiation from Japan's quake-stricken nuclear power plants reach Los Angeles? It's a long shot. But a look at Pacific jet stream animation shows that what happens in Japan doe ... More >>

Japan: If You Fly From LAX to Tokyo, Will You be Exposed to Radiation in the Jet Stream?

Japan Airlines​If you fly to Japan, will you be exposed to radiation, possibly in the not-so-friendly skies? It's a possibility. But you won't hear that from U.S. officials. At least not yet. The U.S. State Department issued an alert last weekend telling Americans to avoid travel to the earth ... More >>

Radioactive Clouds Antidote? A Big Fat Chill Pill For L.A., Public Health Officials Say

AirplaneCalmate, eses.​Updated after the jump: L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa weighs in with much of the same. The worst thing about radioactive clouds headed our way from Japan tomorrow? Panic, says L.A. County Public Heath chief Jonathan Fielding. "The biggest health impact is the psych ... More >>

Nuclear Crisis in Japan: Time to Reconsider the Safety (And Sanity) of Atomic Energy in the U.S?

FoxA d'oh in the real world can mean hundreds of thousands displaced.​Nuclear power has had a good run in the last 20 years or so. With 9/11 inspiring Americans to think more about how to ween the nation off Middle Eastern oil, atomic energy maybe even had a hey day in recent times. After all ... More >>

MY BIG FAT SWINGING HORN

This week listen up for Adam Schroeder, Allison Miller and Phil Ranelin

Q & A with Marcel Vigneron: Island Life, Going Molecular & Cooking with Bobby Flay

Marcel Vigneron of Bar210​Marcel Vigneron is probably still best known for season 2 of Top Chef, during which he displayed his talents for molecular gastronomy -- and for getting under the skin of his competition. After the show Vigneron, who still has his signature gravity-defying hair, moved ... More >>

Brick's Picks: Goodbye Pasadena Jazz Institute, Hello JI Lounge

Brick's Picks: LA Jazz Collective's Fall Festival, Saxophone Summit 2008