r/RVAmag

After years of legislative battles, vetoes, compromise negotiations, and numerous articles, Virginia finally has a roadmap for legal recreational marijuana sales. The state budget signed into law earlier this week establishes a regulated cannabis marketplace beginning July 1, 2027. Until then, many of Virginia’s marijuana laws remain exactly as they are today.

Here’s what you need to know.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/virginias-new-marijuana-law-everything-you-need-to-know.html

I’m celebrating this weekend by going to a million shows and drinking a billion beers. It’s going to be a super hot weekend, so make sure you’re working in some water between events!

Got a show coming up? New single? Simply want someone to talk music? Hit me up at griffin@rvamag.com.

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Shagwüf, Human Worm, The Smirks, Cyber Twin
Friday July 3rd at Banditos

It seems like Banditos is going to be the place to be this holiday weekend. Some of Richmond’s finest are on this bill to raise some money for Richmond Community Legal Fund, an organization that helps deliver legal support to those who might not have the means on their own. If the first name on the bill is Shagwüf and that doesn’t sell you, then I don’t know what will. This trio has got it all. It’s hard-hitting rock, wild and weird glam, and spacey, spicy psychedelic. They never fail to deliver a memorable show and an uplifting message. If you’re looking for some stadium-worthy performances, Shagwuf is your group.

Now we got Human Worm, one of the coolest synth acts around town. They’re somewhere in the middle of garage rock and indie pop, with powerhouse vocals from every member. They’ll get you moving, they’ll get you crying. What more can you ask for?

Speaking of dancing, we have The Smirks. These are some damn punk rockers right here. They hit like a truck and keep going. If you are into that broad Epitaph Records sound, you’ll love this group. They are going to be loud and fast, and you will not want to miss it.

Last up we have pop-punkers Cyber Twin. They’ve got a certain knack for catchy guitar riffs that you’ll still be hearing on the drive home. They’re jam-packed with energy and will really open things up and get the room jumping.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/music/rva-live-music-shagwuf-los-san-patricios-black-country-new-road-ostraca.html

Editor’s Note: Reminder, the sculptures are located on private property and are not open for general visitation. Access is available only through scheduled guided tours, with Labor Day weekend currently expected to be the final tour on the calendar. Tour information is available HERE.

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On an industrial property outside Williamsburg, forty-two American presidents have spent the last fifteen years waiting.

George Washington’s face is streaked black from rain. The back of Abraham Lincoln’s head has split open, exposing the steel skeleton beneath the concrete. Thomas Jefferson’s cheeks are fractured. Grass grows around their bases while puddles collect between them after every storm. They wait in the mud.

Each sculpture stands roughly 20 feet tall and weighs several tons. They appear to be carved from solid stone but beneath the surface a framework of steel rebar supports layers of metal mesh, plaster, styrofoam, and thick concrete that give each president both its enormous scale and surprising fragility.

Fifteen years of rain, freezing winters, and relentless Virginia summers have peeled away the concrete skin, revealing how they were built. Every fracture exposes another layer, making the sculptures feel less like monuments and more like men, worn down by time.

When these monumental sculptures debuted at Presidents Park in 2004, they were pristine. They were built to celebrate the office of the presidency and offer visitors a walk through American history.

But few people came.

Photos by Mike Avey

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/art/painting/the-strange-afterlife-of-virginias-president-heads.html

Richmond metal band GWAR says the Secret Service contacted the group following a recent performance at the Vans Warped Tour in Washington, D.C., that featured the mock execution of a Donald Trump effigy.

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Frontman Mike Bishop, known as Blöthar the Berserker, suggested the reaction to the band’s latest presidential execution was different from those that came before it.

“For years, GWAR would do whatever the fuck we wanted. We would kill politicians from both sides of the aisle. We would kill famous people. We never had any backlash,” Bishop said during a recent appearance on the Rocking With Jam Man podcast. “People acted as if GWAR had changed, but GWAR didn’t change. The world freakin changed.”

Bishop pointed to previous performances involving political figures, including former President Barack Obama, which he said did not generate the same level of reaction. “We killed President Obama, we didn’t hear from the Secret Service, but you killed Trump, and you better believe that there’s going to be some shit going on,” he said.

He also argued that pressure on artists and performers does not always come in the form of direct government action. “They don’t have to call the police on you,” Bishop said. “What they have to do is make it hard for you to make money.”

He cited large concert promoters and entertainment companies like Live Nation as examples of organizations he believes can face political pressure when controversies arise.

“Everybody wants to know who it is that we want to kill. But really, we don’t want to kill anybody, man. We just want to have fun,” Bishop said. “Maybe if we had to kill anybody, I would say it would be ourselves. That’s who we haven’t fucking killed yet.”

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/music/metal-punk/blothar-gwar-didnt-change-the-world-freakin-changed.html

During last week’s test run, the museum’s facade became a massive projection surface, illuminating the Boulevard after dark.

Read about it: https://rvamag.com/community/illumination-tells-americas-story-on-a-monumental-scale.html

It’s hard to impress people with just a building. Yet standing in front of the Virginia Museum of History & Culture last week during a test run for IllumiNATION, I found myself just staring.

It was grand, immersive, and for a moment made me feel more Virginian than I have in a long time, maybe ever. Our state sits dead center in the American narrative. The country’s greatest ideals were debated here, fought over here, and in many cases paid for with blood here. 

And admittedly, so were some of its greatest failures. 

Watching that history unfold across the museum’s facade, you walk away reminded that America wasn’t built somewhere else. A lot of it happened right here, on the same ground we drive across every day without giving it much thought.

For four nights, June 25 through 28, the museum’s entire front facade will become an 18,000-square-foot canvas for a 20-minute projection mapping experience that uses the building itself as part of the storytelling. Historic paintings, landscapes, figures, and pivotal moments from the American story transform the museum into something that feels equal parts history lesson, public art installation, and community gathering.

The projection bends the architecture to its will. Columns disappear, windows become portals, and entire scenes emerge from the building before dissolving back into stone. The result is an immersive experience that turns one of Richmond’s most recognizable landmarks into a living piece of history.

The technology is impressive and the scale is even more impressive but what makes IllumiNATION interesting is the timing.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/illumination-tells-americas-story-on-a-monumental-scale.html

The acquisition of the island’s last privately owned parcel clears a major hurdle for Richmond’s plans to create a public park along the James River.

The long-running effort to transform Mayo Island into a public park took a major step forward this week after the Capital Region Land Conservancy acquired the last privately owned parcel on the island, removing one of the final obstacles to unified public ownership.

The quarter-acre property at 510 S. 14th Street was purchased from 510 Property LLC, an entity owned by Louis Heindl. The site had remained outside city control even after Richmond acquired approximately 15 acres of Mayo Island in 2024 as part of a nearly $15 million deal that set the stage for the island’s future conversion into public parkland.

With the acquisition complete, the Capital Region Land Conservancy (CRLC) plans to work with the City of Richmond to eventually transfer the parcel for inclusion in the future Mayo Island Park. The move would bring the entire island under unified ownership for the first time in decades.

“This acquisition represents the culmination of more than five years of negotiations and work to acquire Mayo’s Island for a park,” said CRLC Executive Director Parker Agelasto in a statement. Agelasto noted that while the parcel is relatively small, it fills a significant gap in the center of the planned park and creates additional opportunities for future development of the space.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/mayo-island-is-finally-whole.html

I recently bought my first bicycle in more than a decade. Like most people, I started my search online, comparing models, reading reviews, and trying to figure out what kind of rider I actually wanted to be. Eventually I visited several local bike shops before settling on a new Fairdale.

A few weeks later, I received an email from Joel Alford announcing the opening of his new venture, Field Trip Bikes in Church Hill. Joel and I had never met. He had no idea I had recently become a customer at Richmond ReCycles, the shop he has owned since 2017. 

But his email got me thinking about how Richmond’s bike culture evolved over the last twenty years, from Slaughterama and the city’s DIY scene to the 2015 UCI Road World Championships and beyond.

In the early 2000s, there were BMX riders building dirt jumps, bike messengers weaving through downtown traffic, mountain bikers disappearing into the woods along the James, and road cyclists logging miles through the surrounding counties. Shops like Agee’s, Bunnyhop, and ReCycles served as gathering places, but cycling still existed largely as a subculture sustained by riders, mechanics, advocates, and true believers.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/field-trip-bikes-and-the-long-ride-of-richmonds-cycling-culture.html

The Canadian Music Project’s 2013 musical, Come From Away, brings us back to the aftermath of 9/11 to remind us that we took care of each other when the chips were absolutely down. It gives us a reason to believe in our humanity. Come From Away is a tragic musical comedy draped in the kindness of strangers and the perplexity of receiving it.

In the immediate aftermath of the attacks on the towers and the Pentagon, all flights in the air had to be diverted from major airports, as every single plane was now considered a potential weapon. Luckily for the authorities tasked with administering such a response, there was an enormous former refueling station and airport in the sleepy town of Gander, on the easternmost tip of North America in Newfoundland.

This true story, cobbled together from the anecdotal experiences of locals and their unintended visitors, details the chaos and casual generosity of people working together simply to keep it together.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/art/theatre/review-come-from-away-is-the-best-weve-ever-been.html