Here is a key to this week’s awesome cover of AC Weekly, featuring Metallica and the Orion fest bands standing in for the Beatles and their Sgt. Pepper album cover crew. Since Ringo’s in town this week as well, we added him too!
The Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority released the following information today, pertaining to the upcoming three-night Phish concert series (June 15-17) and the Metallica Orion Music + More festival (June 23-34):
“During Bader Field events all routes into Atlantic City will remain open including Route 30 (White Horse Pike), Route 40 (Black Horse Pike) and the Atlantic City Expressway.
“Event attendees have the option to park at the following locations and take a shuttle to the venue (pending availability/rates vary). Shuttles to Bader Field will begin at 2:00PM. Shuttles leaving Bader Field to these parking locations will begin after the concert ends.
* Atlantic City Expressway Intercept Lot
* Atlantic Avenue Parking Lot at Missouri and Atlantic Avenues
* Wave Parking Garage at Fairmont and Mississippi Avenues
* Atlantic City Convention Center Garage
“Event attendees have the option to park at the following locations and walk to the venue (pending availability/rates vary):
* 3800 Atlantic Avenue (bicycles and motorcycles only)
* 3700 Atlantic Avenue
* 3601 Pacific Avenue
* 10 South Albany Avenue
* 102 South California Avenue
* 26 South California Avenue
* 1600 Pacific Avenue
* 117 South Kentucky Avenue
* 152 South New York Avenue
* 1713 Pacific Avenue and 18 South Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard
* Casino garages
“The best walking route is to walk along the Boardwalk to Albany Avenue. Take Albany Avenue to Bader Field.
After the Event
“To facilitate the safe and orderly exit of event attendees, additional walking lanes will be available for a short duration along Route 40.
“Continue the party by walking back down Albany Avenue to the Boardwalk and visit the many hotel and resort restaurants and bars along the Boardwalk.”
One time “Loser” Beck is putting his indie-folk lifestyle on hold and performing at the least likely place you would expect someone in that genre to perform: Atlantic City.
Beck, who is booked at the Borgata June 23 — the same weekend as the Metallica Orion Music + More festival is in town at Bader Field — has been considered to be the voice of a generation, with his explosive hit “Loser” speaking to the disenfranchised youth of America. His father was a string conductor, and his mother was a regular at Andy Warhol’s factory, which has helped influence his music.
His style incorporates a vast amount of genres, including pop, rock, blues and soul. Before signing to a major label, his hit single “Loser” was produced in a kitchen on personal cassette tapes that weren’t released until he produced enough material for a full-length album.
Since his first major label album Mellow Gold was released in 1994, he has attempted to kill the notion that he would only be a one-time ’90s novelty act. Beck could have easily stayed underground, but the alternative music surge in the ’90s thrust him into the spotlight.
Beck took a break between 2002 and 2005, and released his most recent album, Modern Guilt, in 2008.
Several successful albums later, he has traded in his corduroy pants for designer suits, started a family and became a Scientologist. He recently worked on the soundtrack for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, producing the songs for Michael Cera’s fictitious band, Sex Bob-Omb.
Along with performing at the Borgata on June 23, Beck will also be headlining The Governor’s Ball Festival in New York City. He is co-headlining with Modest Mouse, who will be playing at the Orion Music Festival.
Tickets go on sale Saturday, April 28. — Samantha McCorry
Despite a new $30 million marketing plan for Atlantic City in the works aimed at attracting more visitors from the tri-state region, in addition to the upcoming debut of the Revel mega-resort, as well as several multi-day music festivals slated for Bader Field this summer, the Associated Press reports today that the breaks have been put on for good with regard to the luxury train service between New York and Atlantic City, known as ACES .
On Friday, the three casinos that paid for the service to start running Feb. 6, 2009 — The Borgata, Caesars and Harrah’s Resort — said they are putting the breaks on the three-year old service, which had yet to make a profit, even with reduced fares.
(Watch video of inaugural ACES train ride from New York to Atlantic City in 2009)
Katie Dougherty, a spokeswoman for Caesars Atlantic City, told the AP that the end of the line for ACES was do in part of the “difficulty in scheduling it for peak times along the congested New York-to-Philadelphia route.”
“It was an issue of tunnel time and track time and being able to provide a convenient schedule for riders,” said Dougherty. “It just didn’t work out.”
The express purpose of the ACES train, which was dreamed up in 2005, was to lure New Yorkers to Atlantic City “who didn’t want to ride a bus or sit in three hours of car traffic on the Garden State Parkway.”
Joe Lupo, the Borgata’s senior vice president, said the casino was “very hopeful and excited” about the prospect of attracting more New Yorkers with the train.
(more…)
Rants and raves about burning topics that have caught my attention midweek, be it greedy corporate shenanigans, frustration or joy in regards to the Philly sports teams, a movie, show or DVD that has fired up my imagination, an intriguing personality, or what’s happening in the region. — Lori Hoffman, Associate Editor, Atlantic City Weekly.
I’m back after one month spent recovering from a total knee replacement. For those of you considering this surgery, think about it long and hard. It is an incredibly painful post-op recovery. I might be back at work after four weeks, but I think my mind was more ready for the return than my body was.
So what have I missed? Has Atlantic City fallen into the ocean?
While I’ve been catching up to the news about our region, it seemed at first glance like a typically quiet January, with only a modest amount of new shows announced.
However, there have been some major news announcements this week. After her Super Bowl performance, Madonna announced a world tour that includes a stop at Atlantic City’s Boardwalk Hall on Sept. 15. Metallica also announced that the band’s inaugural Orion Music + More music festival will hit Atlantic City for two days — June 23-24. The band will play with 22 other acts over the two days, including Arctic Monkeys and Avenged Sevenfold.
On the casino front, the Golden Nugget has agreed to a tentative agreement with the main casino worker union Local 54, while the Tropicana has declared its negotiations with the union as at an impasse, although the union says it is not that bad.
Revel is scheduled to open May 15.
ACH, the casino that lost the right to use the Hilton brand, made the announcement this week that the casino will soon have a new name. ACH will soon be known at the Atlantic Club Casino Hotel. The new name goes into effect March 13 and according to the casino COO Michael Frawley, “The company wants to offer better deals with regard to its gaming and dining offerings. It was very important to me that we had the word ‘club’ in [the new name]. Club means small, club is intimate and club is something that you [belong] to.”
Kenny Chesney
ATLANTIC CITY — Last week Atlantic City Weekly reported that five festivals were tentatively set to take place at Bader Field in the wake of last summer’s ultra-successful Dave Matthews Band Caravan that drew over 72,000 fans to the resort, one of which will be the A.C. Seafood Fest in mid-September.
Two events were approved by the City Council of Atlantic City in it Dec. 5 meeting to allow concert promoter Starr Hill Presents to host multi-day concerts June 15-17 and June 24-25. In its most recent meeting, Council approved Starr Hill’s hosting two other multi-day events in late summer — Sept. 22-23 and Sept. 29-30. While still awaiting confirmation, published reports listed three potential headliners for these four events as being the jam-band sensation Phish, which played three sold-out shows at Boardwalk Hall in October 2010, country-western sensation and six-time Academy of Country Music award-winner Kenny Chesney, and American heavy-metal pioneer Metallica.
Phish performed in Atlantic City for three days in October 2010.
If all goes as planned, and with estimates based on revenues tallied following the Dave Matthews Band Caravan, the four proposed music events could pump tens of millions of dollars into the local economy. It was also reported that the city may allow music fans to camp out at the 142-acre Bader Field this summer — something that was disallowed during the DMBC — if a water main extension could be provided by the Atlantic City Municipal Utilities Authority.
