On the “Weekend Update” satirical news segment on Saturday Night Live. anchor Colin Jost displayed a snapshot of an unhinged rant laced with profanity in the form of a Donald Trump post to Truth Social,...
Wednesday, May 276 - 10pmMyrtle, East Providence Join us for the 4th annual Motif Spoken Awards! We are excited to be returning to Myrtle to celebrate RI’s spoken word community. Want to see your favorite Rhode Island...
By Lillian MK Photography By Olivia Lunger By Izzy Cooke ...
The Music Awards went off without a hitch this year, and over the course of the evening more than 400 local music lovers dropped by to dance, listen, and cheer on fellow musicians. We'll have...
It’s often said (well, I definitely say this), that some of the deepest conversations and connected moments can happen while one is sitting in a car. This is certainly true for the duo, band, sisterhood...
Image: Olivia Lunger. Local Civil War re-enactor Bill Sherman was having trouble recruiting young people into the hobby, so he hit on a novel idea that is perfectly suited to Gen Z. He immediately telephoned his...
The Continental Congress, befooled. April Fool’s Day originated among the French a few years into the Revolutionary War. Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin had been pleading with them for any sort of assistance. The brand...
If you have been a craft beer lover over this past decade, you may remember when the first Rhode Island Brewery Passport was released. It was changed to an app in 2020. Six years later,...
No Kings 3, Mar 28, 2026 No Kings – nokings.org – is a non-violent protest movement responding to the monarchy-like concentration of power in the hands of the president, to the exclusion of Congress and the...
After attending Chalumeau’s release party for their album BLUE at The Met in Pawtucket last August, I wrote that if you ever got the chance to see them perform live, you should jump on it....
On February 28, after 20 years of being a community staple for first dates, Super Tuesday regulars, and movie fanatics alike, CWTheaters (previously called CinemaWorld) was forced to shut its doors for good. The decline...
Last year, I had a blast and a half working on a fun commercial shoot. I landed the gig because the fella producing, Josh Kirk, asked around to find an actor to portray the client’s...
Photo: Jenn Lombari. @jennlombariphotography ssa lin has been making a local splash like a rockin’ rainstorm after a record-setting blizzard, since releasing her first single, “tallboys,” at the end of 2025. The feedback has been good,...
Here are some hot new local tracks to finish melting the ice. The Hopeless Romantics – “Quiet Kind” The third and final single from The Hopeless Romantics’ upcoming debut album, “Quiet Kind” is also a reworked...
Okee dokee folks… PLEASE stop using AI. The more it knows, the more it grows. We are feeding a beast that will someday destroy us. AI is not your friend, though it may pretend to...
Graphic by Olivia Lunger. ...
Hey idiot, why are you and your friends getting high indoors? Don't you know? We have a planet, a whole, big planet filled with trees, rivers, and critters. The outside world doesn't have to start...
Medical marijuana was legalized in Rhode Island in January 2006, and by May 2022 even recreational sales became legal through state-licensed dispensaries and authorized retailers. Yet it still isn’t safe for medical users to come out of the closet....
Cover artist Elliott Italiano of Jamestown is a self-made glass artist. As a young adult, Italiano's interests centered on fashion, inspiring thoughts of pursuing a degree in luxury marketing and design. He relates to his past...
MAD Magazine cover, Feb 2016: Donald Trump and Alfred E. Neuman We fought a military war; our opponents fought a political one. We sought physical attrition; our opponents aimed for our psychological exhaustion. In the process...
Cover artist Mina Miki of Providence calls her baby blanket her longest friend. “His name is Blankie, but now he looks less like a blanket and more like a piece of tangled silk,” she says....
McKee’s Budget Includes Rollbacks for State’s Renewable Energy Programs PROVIDENCE — Five years after lawmakers passed the state’s first firm climate mandates, the historic Act on Climate law is in danger of getting rolled back by...
The closure of the westbound section of the Washington Bridge that occurred in December of 2023 has inspired major grievances within the greater Providence metropolitan area. Traffic within the city limits has become unbearable, especially...
Graphic by Eric Barao When the US Congress allowed the Affordable Care Act subsidies to expire on Dec. 31, 2025, they created a health insurance crisis that could have inspired a plot line for “American Horror...
On January 30, 2026, an estimated 5,000 Rhode Islanders – including students and numerous local businesses – participated in a historic, nationwide strike in an effort to get the tyranny of Immigration and Customs Enforcement...
Okee dokee folks… “Art is fucking political. Always has been, always will be.” I looked for a source to attribute this to but there doesn’t seem to be a definitive person who said it. Doesn’t...
Gregory Alan Isakov and band, with support from the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra at PPAC on Thursday, January 29, 2026. Photo by Gregory Alan Isakov’s tour photographer, Kenzi Everitt, @kenzieveritt. As the house lights dimmed on...
From left to right: Brendan, Charles, Peter, Wil, John, Daniel, Patrick Kinnane, and Jeffrey Azize. I am a hopeful romantic and a huge fan of romcoms. The films often have a woman in the lead navigating...
I’ve never known much about growing flowers. The few gardens I’ve started in my life ended all too unceremoniously, in death. And I’ve never known much about 3-D printing, either. In fact, probably attributed to...
Snow accumulation at TF Green Airport reached 37.9 inches, shattering the all-time record of 28.6 inches set during the legendary Blizzard of 1978. 07:01 pm EST - 2/23/2026TF Green AP, RI37.903:10 pm EST - 2/23/20261 SE...
2nd Story Theatre’s dominance of the East Bay continues as they solidify their expansion in Warren with a production of Stephen Karam’s 2012 Pulitzer finalist, Sons of the Prophet. Having just concluded a magnificent showing of Dancing at Lughnasa in the main theater (UpStage), 2nd Story’s new space downstairs (DownStage) follows the celebrated Lobby […]
Don’t go on a drunk ghost hunt, don’t act like a ho, and other vital advice for tomorrow’s Halloween haunting There are two types of people in this world: those who love a good scare and those who don’t. I fall into the former category, which is why Halloween is a special time of year […]
Bagge seeks to illuminate the life of a woman who was neither saint nor devil, but a human being with qualities both heroic and vainglorious. Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, staunch advocate for women’s reproductive rights and whose tireless efforts led to the financing of research that ultimately introduced the birth control pill, is […]
In contrast to the hard-driving numbers, The Silks reach down deep for the acoustic folk-blues dirge I’ve been accused of taking rock & roll a tad too seriously. You see, I’m one of those people who have lost countless hours of sleep wondering why it all went so wrong. How could an enterprise that once […]
I tell my friends all the time: don’t ask for my opinion if you really don’t want it. I have been called the Dutch Uncle, the one who holds no punches. I tell you like it is from my perspective and I don’t play nice when it comes to Spoken word/Poetry. So when my sister […]
Hi Nick, Borrowing from Eric B and Rakim, it’s been a long time, I shouldnt’ve left you without a dope note to read through. The end of the summer into fall threw me some curveballs and unlike the Red Sox, I didn’t see them break until I had already swung. For me, the onset of […]
Cindy Gilman knew something was wrong, but just could not put her finger on it. Three weeks before Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, when four coordinated terrorist attacks launched by Al-Qaeda upon the Twin Towers in New York City and the Pentagon in the Washington, D.C. area killed more than 3,000 people, the well-known Rhode Island […]
PLAY THE GAME HERE Click the link to play… How many faces do you see? Are you sure? Count again; some are not as they seem. Submit your answers to Editor@motifmagazine.net to be entered to win tickets to a party with the monsters themselves– featuring B.Dolan (w/ live band), Apathy, Big Nazo performing with DirtyDurdie, Boogie Boy […]
The market for frightening, Halloween-related theme events is at its seasonal peak and Providence, especially, affords many opportunities for experiential adventures beyond the standard haunted corn maze parking lots. Walking along Benefit Street alone can be a Lovecraft-themed adventure, as evidenced by the ambitious Executor that Theater of Thought delivered a couple of years back. […]
