(Self-released , CD)

After more than 30 years of writing and performing around the state, Georgia, Vt., songwriter John Gibbons has delivered his first solo album, Small Town Dance. And when they get a taste, fans of the Green Mountains’ vibrant roots, bluegrass and Americana scenes will no doubt wonder what took so long.... Read more

Before we tackle the issues of the day, I want to congratulate you, dear readers, for coming out en masse to the Blind Pilot show at the Higher Ground Showcase Lounge last Friday. “Indie” shows are a notoriously iffy draw at the area’s marquee juke joint. Not to beat a dead (iron) horse into the (higher) ground, but that’s why we don’t get as many of them as perhaps we should. But on this occasion, you guys really pulled through and came close to packing the place.... Read more

Living up to the legacy of one’s parents can be challenging for many of us. But what if your parents (and grandparents) were, like, kind of a big deal?

Sarah Lee Guthrie, 30, is the granddaughter of Woody Guthrie, arguably the single most important figure in the history of modern American songwriting. And her dad, Arlo Guthrie, isn’t exactly a slouch himself.... Read more

Gazing down Church Street, Brian Sisco takes a drag off a Marlboro and ponders a city proposal that would snuff out his regular smoke breaks.

“How far can the government go?” asks Sisco, a 25-year-old Burlington resident who works at his father’s store, Designers’ Circle Jewelers. “I realize children and families come here, but I’m not blowing smoke in babies’ faces.”... Read more

Mona and Leo Boutin used to raise beef cattle on their picturesque Williston farm. The cows would graze in the grassy field that sweeps up to the forest line, and drink from the babbling brook that cuts through the couple’s land.

That was before the Boutins worried about lead contaminating their groundwater. Water experts have since collected samples from the creek, and the couple has stopped drinking the well water.... Read more

Back in 1997, novelist David Foster Wallace reviewed John Updike’s latest for the New York Observer under a headline that asked, “Is This Finally the End for Magnificent Narcissists?” In his review — later republished as an essay — Wallace coined the term Great Male Narcissist (G.M.N.) for writers such as Updike and Philip Roth, explaining,... Read more

11/13/09: Chittenden Solid Waste District's (CSWD) Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) processes about 180 tons of single stream recyclables a day and over 42,000 tons of recyclables in a year.  See what happens to your recycling in a behind the scenes look at the MRF on the weekend of the 12th Annual America Recycles Day.... Read more

At the end of Maple Street in Derby Line, just before the roadway becomes rue Ball in Québec, stands a set of engraved granite pillars. The 6-foot-tall stanchions loom on either side of the blacktop, spanned by a steel gate with black painted bars spaced wide enough for an adult to squeeze through. The gate looks like something you’d find in a suburban housing development — not exactly high class, but innocuous enough.... Read more

The offices of Re/Max North Professionals in Colchester are bright, spacious and modern. Visitors are greeted in the reception area with a warm, glowing fireplace, a trickling copper fountain, and sketches of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s “Wrapped Reichstag.”... Read more

“Money can’t buy happiness,” the saying goes. Playwrights Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman convey this truism over three antics-filled acts in You Can’t Take It With You (1936).... Read more