MUSIC: If you see a lot of guitar-toting ladies and gents around the Puck Building right now, that's because CMJ has officially begun. This means there is a ton of music happening (including at our own Gothamist House starting tomorrow). Tonight we suggest hitting up Brooklyn Vegan's show at Bowery Ballroom: Voxtrot, The Rosebuds, Dean & Britta...and so many more. 6pm // Bowery Ballroom [6 Delancey St] // $16, or free with badge THEATER: A.R.......

The bookstore chain Barnes & Noble confirmed that the Astor Place location will be closed due to high rents. A spokesperson told the Post, "We'd like to stay there, but we really can't afford it." Business analysts have rated the chain's stock to be "overweight" or simply "neutral." We suppose they'll stay open to take advantage of the seventh and final Harry Potter book going on sale, but compared to the big Union Square location,......

It’s been a couple of year since Baltimore auteur John Waters has brought a new movie to the silver screen but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been as busy as ever. Whether it’s guest starring on TV shows or curating art exhibits, Waters puts his distinctive, off kilter imprint on anything he’s involved in, even the lowly mix tape. After adding oddity to your holiday soundtrack with his Christmas CD A John Waters Christmas, Waters......

We don't kow whether to cheer or chastise after hearing that a musical of Nick Hornby's book, High Fidelity, will be coming to Broadway this December. We can see it now: A recurring song called "Top Five List," a ballad about Laura, an ensemble dance piece at the end when Rob opens the club. The musical will be set in New York City, which makes it the third stop for the concept (book was in......

The Boston Red Sox won the World Series last night for the first time in 86 years. Congratulations to them and their fans who prove that New Englanders actually have unruly monsters inside them that need to be subdued by lots of pepper spray. Now, whenever the Red Sox lose, they can no longer blame the Babe but just themselves. To their credit, they won eight games in a row, coming from a 0-3 series......

In the Times today, writer and music lover Nick Hornby tackles listening to music as you grow older in the Op/Ed section. He mentions Jon Landau's 1974 music review of Bruce Springsteen, "Growing Young with Rock and Roll," which famously had the line, "I saw rock 'n' roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen," but starts with "It's four in the morning and raining. I'm 27 today, feeling old, listening to my records, and......

After writing about how the upcoming movie, Raising Helen, seems like a real stinker, not to mention a poor cousin-once-removed from other someone-dies-and-leaves-self-centered-person-with-baby movies like the superior Mostly Martha, Jeffrey Wells of Hollywood Elsewhere posted this thought from Village Voice writer Justine Elias:NYC subway grafitti on movie posters is always good for gauging public reaction. Along with some added moustaches, beards, eyeglasses, and blackened teeth (every movie poster gets some of that), I've seen one......

This weekend, Gothamist was intrigued by the barrage of information about and by young twenty- and thirtysomething New Yorkers, works of both fact and ficiton. Basically, the dudes are trying to be funny and shznit in fiction while the ladies are freaking about what do with their actual lives. Sounds about right. The Post mentioned Kyle Smith's book, Love Monkey, which is called the male counterpart to Bridget Jones and the chick lit movement. Interestingly......

After being caught in development hell for three years, it looks like Dave Eggers' autobiography, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, is on its way to the big screen. Universal Pictures is picking up rights to the book from New Line, and Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don't Cry) will be developing the project. Interestingly, Nick Hornby and D.V. DeVincentis (screenwriter of Grosse Pointe Blank, High Fidelity) adapted the book. If the NBC-Vivendi Universal merger goes through,......

Sometimes, Netflix, as great as it is, is just not the same as heading to the video store, where you can browse through various titles and be inspired to watch something you weren't thinking about. It doesn't deliver on the instant gratification that sometimes a movie needs to bring you. Gothamist's favorite video stores are Movie Place on West 105th Street (237 West 105th Street/ 212-864-4620), Kim's Video (various locations), and the Cinematheque on Seventh......

The combination of listening to Ani DiFranco's You Had Time and reading Bridget Harrison's latest column (the one night stand question) in the Post totally depressed me. Well, mainly Bridget Harrison still being upset about her breakup depressed me. I think the Ani DiFranco song is lovely, which I was reminded of when I read Nick Hornby's Songbook, which is a collection of essays about songs he loves. (My favorite essays are the ones about......

The Writers' Guild of America announced the nominations for TV and film work in 2002. Three nominations for The Simpsons in the animated category and three for Sex and the City in the comedy series category. Nice to see Resurrection Boulevard get noticed in the drama area; I don't watch it, but at least it means that people are not only watching HBO. On the film side, the oddest thing is Bowling for Columbine getting......