NOW IT’S OUR TURN: Local team seeks to keep up positive momentum from World Cup

Photo by Sindayiganza Photography. The FIFA World Cup tournament was full of thrills, drama, chaos, unity, and live television shots of devastated children in tears after their team lost a heartbreaking match. The final whistle brought...

Boatload of music: Titanic drama

Matthew Provençal as Thomas Andrews in ‘Titanic: The Broadway Musical’ at Bill Hanney's Theatre By The Sea July 23 – August 15, 2026. Photo by Mark Turek. The challenge to staging a production of “Titanic: The...

2026 Tattoo Awards Gallery Wall

The Tattoo Awards featured a gallery wall populated by local artists. Here is a selection of the artwork on display! By Brianne Elizabeth @foxhallowart By Victori Leo Riel Grab Your Heart & Go by Allie Boyer @peaceflowercreations MONSTROELIZASUE by...

BTS with DMK: Lily Spencer

Photo by Jess Lee Images. I met Lily Spencer in an acting class taught by Eric Lutes, whom many television fans will remember from the 1990s sitcom “Caroline in the City.” Eric, who now lives in...

2026 Tattoo Award Winners

Rachel WS. Favorite Animal/ Favorite Floral Tara D’Agostino – Iron Lion Tattoo By the numbers, Tara D’Agostino got her first tattoo at the age of 15, picked up her own tattoo machine at the age of 19, opened...

The Long Game: River Shook Arrives Home

Photo by Jillian Clark. ​There’s no feeling quite like finally being able to fully step into your own, to truly embrace your whole self and carry yourself through the world with that mentality. Not an identity...

Roots Report

Kai Nanfelt. Okee dokee folks… Last weekend I went on a ten-hour, each way, road trip to play a show. The drive wasn’t so bad, but the music was horrible. As I have mentioned before, I...

The Butterfly’s Shadow

Photo by Isaac Laliberte Wards 2, 9 and 12 all report the same. Mendez wins in each! It appeared that Providence was perfectly poised to usher-in its first female mayor in history. The polls were closed and...

A Flicker of Flame

“You’re late, Brother,” she said, hovering outside the weathered cottage near a pebbly beach, indistinguishable from the shadows cast by moonlight that hit the thick hydrangeas. It was late in the evening of a seawind-chilled...

NecronomiCon Comes to Providence

The NecronomiCon is a biennial celebration of the works of HP Lovecraft and beyond, and throughout the genre of “weird fiction.” Centered in downtown Providence, it boasts four days of literary panels, readings from various...

American Caesar Salad

It’s almost Cthulhu – pardon my hiccup, I meant, “election” – season again. And if the tactics of these times don’t make your head swim and your bowls ache, as if you were being eviscerated...

ON THE COVER: Bob Eggleton

When cover artist Bob Eggleton of Warwick first got interested in art and started sketching nightmarish creatures, he recalls, an aunt asked him, “What’s drawing a monster gonna get you in life?” He’s spent the last...

GREASE

Skyler Shields (Kenickie) and the cast of the Theatre By The Sea (Wakefield, RI) production of “Grease” running thru July 18, 2026. Photo by Mark Turek. “A-wop-bop-a-loo-bop! A-wop-bam-boom!” BY ALISON O’DONNELL ON JUNE 27, 2026 Grease is the...

Between Worlds with Sheila Isham: Resurrecting the American abstract expressionist at the Newport Art Museum

Isham, Sheila. Teth (#8 Creation Series). 1972. Acrylic spray on canvas. Newport Art Museum, Newport, RI. (Image courtesy of the Newport Art Museum.) Quite some time ago, I read a quip that the art of diplomacy...

Rhode's Clothes: Part 3 - A Strut Down Memory Lane

As an international student a year into Rhode Island, yet still only a breath into America, I finally found a question that I might be able to answer – this is my continued exploration of: What...

Discover Providence's Hidden Gem: Siren Spirits in Olneyville

Tucked inside the historic Harrison Steam Complex in Providence's Olneyville neighborhood, Siren Spirits is redefining what a visit to a distillery can be. Equal parts neighborhood gathering place, cocktail destination, and craft spirits experience, this...

Crank Up The Music -- It Makes Me Hoppy

Music makes beer taste better? In 2016, Vrije University in Brussels, Belgium, conducted a study that showed scientific evidence that music has an impact on our taste of beer. This study concluded that lower audible...

Roots Report

Cold Chocolate. Okee dokee folks… Well, summer is here and for me, summer is HELL! A few years back I wrote a song about my disdain of Summer for the Empire Revue’s “Cool” show. Here are...

Small Habits That Can Lead to Big Financial Rewards

America, the focus of this issue, runs on wealth. So here’s how to get yourself some. It’s the perfect opportunity to launch a new column aimed at helping non-one-percenters with financial matters. Feel free to...

Liberty Trees Map

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Corralled at the Blood Farm: The rise of the uniquely American plasma industry

“Foreigner.” I find it a harsh word that I hate seeing applied to others. Yet applied to myself, it’s the only word that half conveys how baffling I find this country at times. I’d like...

On the Cover: William Schaff

In his final year at college, cover artist William Schaff truly learned what it was like to work in a studio. “I developed a course of study in general fine arts with one of my...

Next to Normal at Trinity Rep: Intensity shines

Rachael Warren as Diana. Photo by Mark Turek. The Next to Normal audience is exposed to waves of raw emotions drowning your soul and dampening your eyes. You may wish you had premedicated with any of...

Spoken Award Winner Writeups

Blaq Sav. Photos by Lillian MK Photography. Favorite Free Verse Spoken Word 2026 Ashley Hosa Sending out a big congrats to Ashley Hosa, who came to the Spoken Awards with a multitude of wonderful supporters (shoutout to Ryan!)....

Obituary: Julian Forgue

The founder of the long-standing hipster-ish West Side restaurant Julians hadn’t been involved directly with the restaurant in quite some time. But his legacy persisted. A larger-than-life personality, you never knew at what event Julian...

Obituary: Lisa Gourley

Renowned supporter of local music and arts Lisa Gourley (Sometimes Lisa Gourleyx) passed away on June 15. Reading reactions on social media, you can’t help but notice how often the words “nice,” “kind,” and “photography”...

Summer Solstice

This beautiful Solstice moment, June 21, 2026 brings the winds of change into our lives. The pivotal points among the planetary movers and shakers of the Zodiac find Gemini, with Uranus and Ceres, reaching across...

2026 Tattoo Awards Photos

By Olivia Lunger By Lillian MK Photography ...

2026 Tattoo Awards Winners

Favorite Color Tattoo Evan Olin, Powerline Tattoo Runner-up: Luis Bold, Unicorn Ink Favorite Black & Gray Ryan Dowden, Dark Ritual Runner-up: Luis Bold, Unicorn Ink Favorite Black & Gray with Color Steven McDonough, Secret Safe Tattoo Runner-up: Rachel WS, Rachel WS Fine Art...

2026 Spoken Awards Photos

By Lillian MK Photography By Olivia Lunger ...

Stuff to Do

A Truly High Society Redux: Congratulations Bri Duffy

On New Year’s Day 2025, Hey Rhody recognized 10 people as “Up and Coming Change Makers” in Rhode Island. The accomplishments of these individuals are impressive and legion. Change Maker contributions range from providing youth access to outdoor resources, promoting tourism, and enhancing women’s healthcare to changing negative cultural stigma about marijuana. What? Has a […]

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Cocktail Recipes

When talking about American bar culture, one cannot separate the intrinsic cultural influence of individuals of color. What are considered classic cocktails have deep roots in African American communities, dating back to post-slavery and the subsequent Great Migration. The communities formed in larger northern cities became epicenters of culture, where libations flowed freely until the […]

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Roots Report

Okee dokee folks… The internet is a vast resource of knowledge, opinion, and a lot of bullshit, but occasionally I come across tidbits that are profoundly stated and I feel that I must share them. One of my Facebook friends wrote this about musicians and I could not have said it better: “Singers, songwriters, and […]

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Album Review: J. Michael Graham- Stuck

On his first full-length release, Stuck, singer, songwriter, guitarist, producer, and Rhode Island native J. Michael Graham showcases some stellar songwriting that explores the evolution of interpersonal relationships and finding the inner strength to move forward. With six songs and a run time of 20 minutes, the project is shorter than most full-length releases but […]

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Another Year of Film: Ann Clanton helps Black RI artists find their voices

Ann Clanton has spent two decades contributing to Rhode Island’s thriving journalistic and creative communities, providing support to the state’s African-American, AfroCaribbean and Afro-Latin filmmakers while running her own business, Ann Clanton Communications, as a consultant. Not only is she the founder of the Rhode Island Black Film Festival (RIBFF), an event designed to promote […]

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Oceanic Memory; Afrofuturist Reimagining: Exploring Black identity as a passage through literature and state

The Door of No Return, a powerful symbol of the Middle Passage and African diaspora, finds renewed meaning in contemporary Afrofuturist literature’s engagement with oceanic spaces and historical memory. As author Dionne Brand demonstrates in A Map to the Door of No Return, this threshold represents not just historical trauma, but also a complex site […]

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The Benefit of Crisis: An upcoming TedX Talk invites us to meet ourselves, wherever we are

5 minutes into talking with Claudia Cardozo, I’m taken aback by her overwhelmingly positive aura and calm presence. Claudia, originally from Colombia, is a corporate coach, who for the past couple of years has been working on the book that shares her story of self-acceptance. The book, Love is the Path, released officially in October, […]

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Ants in the City: Shelter as a right, not a privilege

“We must all learn to live together as brothers, or we will all perish together as fools. We are tied together in the single garment of destiny, caught in an inescapable network of mutuality. And whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.” ~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Over the last few weeks, the Providence […]

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