Obama and Springsteen downtown on Sunday

Barack and Michelle Obama are appearing on the downtown Mall on Sunday. The rally starts at 3:45 p.m., with gates opening at 2 p.m. Bruce Springsteen is opening for Obama with a solo acoustic set.

This could be a huge rally, even bigger than John Kerry's election eve rally at the same place in 2004, especially because, as The Professor points out, Obama's campaign is probably timing this with the Browns game in mind. The game starts at 1, so a stadium full of people will be emptying out around 4:15. Let's hope the tailgaters who stop by the rally aren't too rowdy.

Update: If you're going to the rally, take the Rapid. The Browns crowd and Obama crowd will completely fill downtown. "There won't be parking," the Cleveland police spokesman warns in the Plain Dealer today.

(Photo by Alex Hempton-Smith, from Flickr)

Steel layoffs

Cleveland's largest steel plant, and the most efficient steel plant in the world, will undergo voluntary layoffs, but it doesn't seem to be cause for huge concern so far.

Those of us who have lived in Cleveland have heard this kind of news plenty over the past few decades. Plant layoffs used to be commonplace. But, as we told in our June 2008 story Men of Steel, that kind of feast and famine was supposed to be the old way of doing things.

Granted, as you can see below by the Morning Star tracking of the parent company's share price, our story came out just before a massive crashing of the share price which has fallen some 72 percent since our story was published.

And global demand for steel is weakening due to the global financial meltdown (which technically is not a recession -- at least until the fourth quarter GDP numbers are released in January). A Reuters analysis piece published here says that steel demand could be suffering until next summer.

The Cleveland plant has idled its blast furnaces, but the layoffs so far are all voluntary. Don Whipkey, who was prominently featured in our story, says 11 workers were hired last week. Management is telling the union they should restart by late January or early February.

"There's no sense of panic. Actually, guys are looking for time off," he says.

The plant is increasing training for employees and keeping folks busy, just like they said they would, he says.

So nobody is overly frightened about the future of steel in Cleveland, Whipkey says. Not that it's easy to scare a steelworker: "We've been through it all."

Last Chance for Change: Jay Z Concert hosted by LeBron James

When I heard that Jay-Z was giving a free concert in Cleveland I figured it would simply be him jumping behind a DJ booth at a local club and rocking it out to just a few of his most popular hits. I would have been fine with that, overjoyed actually, after all he is my favorite hip-hop artist/business mogul. But when I heard it was for the Barack Obama presidential campaign and would be hosted by LeBron James, I knew it was going to be huge, monumental even. How could you go wrong LeBron James and Jay-Z together in one night sharing the same stage, it doesn’t get better than that. However, I never imagined in a million years it would be such an amazing event — complete with a live band, a DJ, an awesome light show and a video message from Barack Obama.

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen Jay-Z in concert, but this is definitely the most memorable. The first time was in 1999 during his Hard Knock Life tour while I was an undergrad at The Ohio State University. Now that was a great show, but it was only his second album so he didn’t have very many songs to perform. Tonight was an entirely different story. He rocked songs from his first album, released in 1996, to his latest hot single, “Jockin' Jay Z”. Fans of all ages got down at this concert and my 12-year-old son, Jordan, and I surely did. We left the show sweaty and voiceless. This was his first concert and one that I doubt he will ever be able to top. Jay-Z is a tough act to follow.

Special thanks to LeBron James, Shawn “Jay-Z" Carter, and the Chance for Change campaign for taking the time to put on such an awesome event and for encouraging people to vote.

Modern at the Metropolitan

I heard that there was some very intriguing Mr. Wizard stuff going on behind the bar at the Metropolitan Café so I went to the Warehouse District to check it out. It seems they’ve begun to mess around chem lab style to create a line up of out-of-the-ordinary and over-the-top cocktails.

Consider the new deconstructed dirty martini. The drink starts out the usual way- a chilled pour of vodka, in this case Hangar One but then things get…well, unusual. It’s presented with a big spoonful of green “caviar” on the side. To make it, pureed olives and their juice are combined with agar agar, a natural gelling agent. The briny pulp forms soft tapioca-like pearls. To get down and dirty with this drink, sip and then slurp up a few the salty “eggs” before swallowing. The taste is really good, and the extra shot of tongue in cheek humor makes it even better.

A red version of the faux caviar uses cranberry juice. What looks a bit like pumped up salmon roe floats in a fizzy white lime vodka cosmo producing a lava lamp effect. (If you find yourself staring at the glass instead of sipping from it, you’ve had too many and its time to call a cab and go home). To carbonate the drink, a batch- sans roe- goes into an empty plastic liter soda bottle, a hose retrofitted with a tire valve is inserted in the top, and the alcohol gets a hit from a Co2 tank. Sort of a cross between soda and champagne, these go down way too easy. So does the pomegranate martini. It features a float of citrus foam on top. A combination of egg whites, simply syrup, and lemon and lime juice, the stuff looks just like whipped cream, and is produced the same way, with a nitrogen canister.

What’s going on here is officially called molecular mixology. That’s a fancy and somewhat pretentious phrase for what is basically playing around in a food science kind of way, and it’s all the rage in trendy big city watering holes. Great new things happening here with the food too. The peripatetic and skilled Michael Herschman has taken over as Executive Chef and it shows. He completely overhauled the menu and reading it makes clear that everything- including steaks, chops and seafood entrees- has been benefited from his experience and creativity. There’s an appealing selection of appetizers, salads, gourmet pizzas, and reinvented bar food standards. A seared rare tuna starter gets nice sweet heat from a sugared wasabi vinaigrette. The pizza topped with wild mushrooms, parmesan, truffle oil and grapes (yes, grapes) is a mouthful of heaven with a wonderfully chewy crisp crust. For sheer indulgence- and something you’re not likely to make in your own kitchen- order a twin filet a la Oscar- two rounds of tender beef topped with roasted red pepper béarnaise and plated with butter poached blue crab.

I’m getting hungry and thirsty writing about all this. I may need to grab a seat at the Metropolitan again soon for more research.

Glass-half-full PR, economic crisis edition

We got a press release today that starts like this:

FLATS PROJECT TO MOVE FORWARD
Developers say Flats East Bank will happen, despite troubling economic times, but work to be temporarily suspended

Note how that last clause contains the real news, and it how totally contradicts the headline.

The journalist-cynic in me wants to rewrite it. But the wordsmith in me marvels at its nouveau-Depression tenacity, its Believe-In-Cleveland, ISG-forged-steel resolve in the face of a global credit seize-up.

In the rest of the release, developer Scott Wolstein, Mayor Frank Jackson, and the would-be development's top prospective tenants pledge they're still committed to the project, which they hope will get financed when the credit markets "return to some level of normalcy," as Wolstein puts it.

Kudos to local PR professional Nancy Lesic, the release's contact person and presumed author.

Actually, I can't resist rewriting it:
FLATS PROJECT WORK SUSPENDED
Developer insists Flats East Bank project will happen, despite company's debt and faltering stock price

Here's the Plain Dealer's rewrite:
Flats East Bank project put on hold
Work on the $522 million Flats East Bank project has been suspended, and the credit crisis raises questions as to whether the long-awaited development will happen.

A (Frog) Leg Up

Why is Kermit crooning with native Clevelander Jim Brickman?

You'll have to wait until the December issue to find out for sure, but here's a sneak peek at the illustration for that story by one of our favorite illustrators, Ryan Ostrander. Check out more of his work at his blog or web site.

(And in case you just love Jim, you can send a free e-card to a friend that features his single "All I Ever Wanted.")

Live Karaoke

Ready for more than your usual karaoke? Playing Guitar Hero in the basement lost its luster? Tonight, you can take the stage with New Decade at the Boneyard in Mayfield Heights for the first time since we proclaimed it Cleveland's Best Live Karaoke in our October issue. Register here, submit up to two songs (since Halloween is right around the corner, may be suggest AC/DC's "Highway to Hell" or the Cranberry's "Zombie" from the extensive song list), and invite your friends to check out your rock 'n' roll debut. (Or, if you just want to dance, Disco Inferno (Best Revival Band 2005) plays after the OSU-Penn State game at the Mayfield Heights Boneyard.) You can also check out the photos from our Best of Cleveland Party.