Reviews

How many different ways can you decorate your yard for the holidays? You might opt for the classy, minimal look with classic winter colors. You might choose a whimsical aesthetic with bright and multicolored lights, or you might prefer an over-the-top look with giant inflatables. Or, if you're 61 Putnam St. in Somerville, you might decide to create a portal to a prehistoric hellscape featuring a T‑Rex nativity and elves being torn to shreds by the skeletons of demon hellhounds while a raptor skeleton in a Santa hat flies overhead. Read more.

“Once, not long ago, a group of musicians came to Israel from Egypt. You probably didn't hear about it. It wasn't very important."

So begins The Band's Visit, with three sentences written in Hebrew, Arabic, and English and projected on a screen over the stage. Read more.

Loving to hate the absurd incompetence of the T is a time-honored Boston tradition as old as the train itself. The cathartic experience of venting about the T is a bonding and a uniting force of frustration in a diverse city, as easy to spark a conversation with as talking about the weather.

T: An MBTA Musical proudly carries on this tradition. Read more.

"I never expected to be a mother," Jennifer McClure writes in her artist statement. "I was forty-six when she was born, and I spent twenty-one days in the hospital after. When I got home, we had a long process of getting to know each other. She became more of her own person, while I let go of the self I thought I knew." Read more.

When did you realize that you were different?

For most of us, there isn't just one singular moment. We have entire lifetimes of collected memories where we come in and out of focus, blending in and contrasting against the world around us and noticing how we, our cultures, our families, or our traditions are or are not the norm.

The idea of a "lunchbox moment" has emerged as one such familiar point of connection for many within the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community. It can be defined as a formative moment in which a traditional Asian meal was brought to school and elicited some sort of reaction from non-Asian peers. Read more.

Even as the weather outside hurtles ever forward toward the wrong side of fall, the inside of the Prudential Center was full of flowers and life for Voyage, a temporary installation created in partnership with Fleurs de Villes and featuring the work of local floral artists. Eighteen mannequins, each decorated by a different florist, were adorned with stunning arrays of flowers to represent different global destinations. Read more.

We'd heard many good things lately about Orinoco, a Latin kitchen inspired by "taguaritas," rustic, family-run eateries found along Venezuelan roadsides, so we decided to drop by and check their array of Venezuelan and Latin American cuisines for ourselves. Read more.

A ring had formed in Davis Square. In its center, a woman sang into a bullhorn while a row of trombones behind her seemed to lean into their music, taking steps forward as they played. They closed the gap with members of the surrounding crowd, who were also banging their heads, dancing to the music, and unconsciously marching closer to the musicians, until it became hard to tell who was who. Read more.

"Everyone hydrating?" Grace Buchanan, the lead singer of Girl Sküll, called out to the small crowd which had gathered outside on the quiet, leafy Brookline street.

“As we say in my household, hydrate or die straight!!" Buchanan cried, pulling a series of faces and then leading the band into a thunderous, appreciatively garage-grunge, punk-screamo number that shook up the gray, sleepy day and caused passing children on scooters to plug their ears and hurry past. Read more.