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...
Photo: Jackie Davis as Robyn and Kortney Adams as Sharon, by Mark Turek. Not since Oscar and Felix – or Laverne and Shirley – have we cackled so hard at the antics of mismatched roommates bumbling...
By Erin Kayata While waiting for Bring Your Own Improv to start, the girl who was taking tickets at the door approached and handed me a slip of paper. “Write your name down and hand it back to me if you’d like a chance to participate in the show,” she explained. This was my first […]
Fireworks Block Island Where: near Town Beach Pavilion, Block Island When: July 3, 7:30 pm Bristol Where: Bristol Harbor When: July 3, 9:30 pm Cumberland Where: Mendon Road across from Cumberland High School When: July 3, 9 pm Narragansett Independence Day Beach Party & Fireworks Where: Narragansett Town Beach, Town Pier, and North Beach Clubhouse […]
If you’ve ever seen people in the city scaling walls, leaping down staircases or vaulting over obstructions like they’re being chased by the bad guy in some action movie, you’ve been witness to parkour. Juliet Zailskas is the only female parkour practitioner in Rhode Island and she recently spoke with Motif about her love of […]
For Jason Denton, there is particular significance in being a part of the sprinkler installation team for Machester 65. Jay had tickets to the Station the night of the fire – luckily, he got delayed and missed the tragic show. It makes working on the sprinkler system for a West Warwick music venue especially poignant. […]
by Erin Swanson, Debralee Iacobucci and Mike Ryan You’re recently married, deliriously in love and in debt up to your eyeballs. Who knew that wedding cake cost more than a mortgage payment? Who could have guessed that sweet Aunt Irma would slip a five-dollar bill into your card and call it a day? Sadly, no […]
I have despised love ever since my engagement was called off over four years ago. Any date, except in the name of DareMe, I declined. I didn’t even RSVP to wedding invitations – they ended up as kindle. Men were no more than hairier friends and the first and only woman I dated left me […]
#1 Friday, July 5: 95.5 Summer Concert series featuring The Mowglis, 7:30 pm. All ages. Free! Waterplace Park. Someone recently asked me how I can tell when a band is getting big or going to make it. These days, it seems when the song is either inescapable from social media and commercials or if people […]
Brown/ Trinity Playwrights Repertory Theatre has a gripping line-up this summer with three new plays from Brown/Trinity MFA graduates. Each play will run in repertory for a week at Brown University’s Leeds Theatre on Waterman Street. Starting July 31, Festival Week, all three plays will be in repertory and on August 3, the Marathon Madness […]
No one likes to think about it on their wedding day, but the fact remains that not every couple who dives happily into marriage will wish to remain married till death do they part. The tragedy of divorce is made more complex for same sex couples who cross state borders to make their vows or […]
The Contemporary Theater Company (CTC) lives up to its name with 2013 summer-season opener Fuddy Meers, written in 1999 as a first professional work by playwright David Lindsay-Abaire. Unlike his more well-known 2006 Rabbit Hole that won a Pulitzer Prize and was turned into a film, Fuddy Meers is a genre-defying black comedy and domestic […]
