A Monolith Day at Red Rocks

It is easy to forget how lucky we are to have a place like Red Rocks nearby.

There's a reason bands have long made the pilgrimage to our natural wonderland of an amphitheater at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. Most famously U2 will always be remembered for belting Sunday Bloody Sunday to the world from Denver foothills.

The venue itself is iconic.

Time after time on Saturday, artists new to the venue stopped to admire with awe the dramatic rock outcroppings rising up high above them. It is no less impressive for the audience. Facing down the mountain onto the stage, the entire city of Denver spreads out before you into the great plains.

It's one majestic place.

Our one day foray into the Monolith Music Festival on Saturday was a great reminder of this.

Exhausted after hiking up and down the amphitheater more than a few times, we went home giddy -- and not too deaf -- after some rousing performances from bands we knew, and some we didn't.

Foals, Cut Copy, Vampire Weekend and The Presets were absolute highlights. Superdrag and The Fratellis, not so much. And our short misguided foray into White Denim was saved by a quick escape.

More on these bands in the days ahead, but here's hoping Monolith lives to play another year. Hat's off to the organizers for putting together such a bang-on lineup on Saturday.

In the meantime you can take a gander at Westword's much more comprehensive take on the two-day event HERE, HERE, and HERE. The Denver Post has photos and links to their still unspooling reviews HERE.

I don't necessarily agree with their takes on the sets I caught on Saturday, but that's the point of a festival like this: With five separate stages, there was plenty for everyone to dig!

It was a rocking good time in a setting that's 100% Colorado.

Rain for McCain

If you've been through a Colorado drought, you know how tense water rights in the American Southwest can be.

My guess is John McCain assumed the distraction of OIL! OIL! OIL! and a year of abundant snows in our mountains would be a good time to support the unsustainable urban sprawl in his corner of the dry desert southwest.

Apparently the Arizona senator thinks Colorado should be a bit more generous.

The reaction here has been averse, to say the least.

If the Republicans were coming to town...

...I am not sure Denver would be hyping this local connection at the airport:

I love my city!

Facing a Haircut in the Mountains

With bark beetles notably browning the pine trees here in Colorado, I have wondered how ski areas were going to respond to the sheer devastation of their slopeside canopies.

One of the defining draws for Colorado, our ski resorts depend on the idyllic mountain image people have for their winter and summer holiday escapes.

With all the trees drying up and setting up the potential for catastrophic wildfires, how do the ski industry and the Forest Service intend to regenerate vegetation and protect what needs to survive?

The Colorado Independent has some answers, some of which are a bit disheartening.

The Colorado visitors see in a few years may be very different from what they might expect to see.

News Moves the Pied Piper Down the FM Dial

While I was off cavorting on far-flung beaches drinking too many cuba libres, Colorado Public Radio made a huge announcement that will finally bring NPR News back from exile in the AM radio wastelands.

In doing so, they finally acknowledged something anyone who has been to a symphony or opera here in town recently would have told you:

Classical music fans are an aging, if affluent, breed.

Looking to the future, CPR has finally decided to put news front and center, while finding a way to placate listeners with an ear for opera and strings.

This spring KCFR finally heads back home to 90.1 FM, taking its rightful place as CPR's flagship station. Classical music will now move to a new slightly less powerful station at 88.1 FM. That crackly AM station will now be someone else's playground.

For a while there were some ominous rumblings that they would consolidate their signals on a single FM station. Listening to all the feeds would have required an HD Radio, which no one is really bothering to buy yet.

This new solution elegantly serves listeners, while acknowledging that NPR's unique news programming is better suited for finding new subscribers in the iPod era.

CPR just ensured at least one membership renewal this year.

The World Series comes to the Rockies.

Denver is going nuts right about now.

The Colorado Rockies win the National League Championship!

Next stop: World Series.

I don't think I'm quite ready for this yet...

I know it's never too early to start the snowpack base. But, just between you and me, let's keep it up in Breckenridge for now, ok?

"They had a mother and a father — and they abused them."

There was a landmark adoption this week in Colorado.

The big deal?

Legally, for the first time in Colorado, the children have two legal mothers. Jeannie DiClementi and Mary Ross, were the first gay couple allowed to adopt childen jointly in Colorado thanks to the new so-called second parent adoption law passed in the statehouse earlier this year.

"This law gives children in a one-parent family a chance to grow up in a two-parent home," [Colorado Governor Bill] Ritter said then. "This law will give children a better chance to succeed."

It may not be marriage or civil unions just yet, but it's just as important. I wish DiClementi and Ross the best for their new family!

The Rocky Mountain News has more here.