MONTH IN REVIEW: JULY

We hope you enjoyed your quiet July, Denton. August is around the corner and we're about to get filled with college students again. Oh well. Let's take a moment and have some nostalgia for some all-too-recent events that happened in July and remember some of the fun things we covered this month with Month in Review: July. 

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We interviewed wrestler, Gentleman Jackson, before a benefit show in his honor and learned about life with a broken neck, general mustache upkeep and the best root beer at Atomic Candy, among other things.

July was a big month for theatre in Denton, specifically musicals. Music Theatre of Denton put on a rousing original production entitled Square Roots. Square Roots was a parody of all things Denton history with lots of interesting folk participating in the fun. This included a song sang by two of our own city councilmen about water bills while they danced around on stage with shovels. On the flip-side, July also saw the first musical from the Denton Performance Lab this past weekend at a few places around town. The Tissue Issue was a satire based primarily on recent political events (more specifically, House Bill 2, among others).

Speaking of HB2, what’s come to be known as Twittergate also went down this past month. Late one night while following political events, city councilman Kevin Roden made some tweets in regards to what he believed some male’s reasons for being pro-choice were. Said tweets snow-balled into what could only be described as an internet riot by the next morning. Eventually, Roden took to the soapbox, writing both a response and his official thoughts on the subject on his website and inviting citizens into his home (with the promise of free beer) to discuss the subject as a group in what he called The Beer Summit.

The 4th Parade this year was a blast. 

The Happy Campers food truck gained a loyal following in the hot month of July with their amusingly-topped balls of shaved ice and flavored syrups. Now, if we could just get them to commit to some sort of a schedule (or start staying open late and serving boozey cones. We don’t know about the legality of this, but we could definitely stand for some Hendrick’s Gin in our Tiger’s Blood cone. They’d reach Denton-Legend status post-haste.

Speaking of, it was nice to start to see food trucks out at Denton bars in July. Both The Pickled Carrot and Shiitake Swerve were outside of Oak St. Drafthouse and Mulberry St. Cantina, serving their respective brands of mobile meals.

Oh yeah, and Mulberry St. Cantina opened a few weeks ago. We’ve had a couple of different experiences the few times we’ve been there. It’s always interesting to be in a bar before any particular clique has laid claim to it. That’s where Mulberry St. Cantina seems to be right now. So if you really like margaritas or tequila, you’d better get your group in there ASAP and start laying down claim to the space before the Rocking Rodeo crowd gets it.

Mulberry St. Cantina finally opened for business in July. Have you checked it out yet? 

3 Songs this month might not have introduced you to many new faces, but it did highlight some darn good tunes.

Aside from Mulberry St. Cantina, July also saw the opening of Goldmine BBQ on the square and the pre-natally spurned Subway on the square. We reported that the Subway sign was to be altered before opening after securing that info from sources... and we’re still waiting for that to happen. Last we were told, this week was to be d-day, but we won’t be holding our breath.

We let loose word of the Untapped offshoot, Canned, and how it will be coming to Denton in October. We’re already excited about hearing northwest weirdos Menomena and drinking lots of strange beers out of cans. More details to come soon!

Sean Treat kept us educated this month with Back in the Day, when he tied Denton roots to France in honor of Bastille Day.

Denton Square Donuts changed owners once again this past month. At some point, they’re going to have to realize that it’s the product being sold that is keeping people out of the space. Stop selling baked phyllo dough with random junk on top and start frying up some real, honest-to-goodness donuts, and we’ll be there multiple times a week. Promise.

There was lots of construction going on about town this month. Here's a peek inside the construction happening inside Lone Star Attitude.  

We spoke with two awesome female artists, both of which have their work for sale at DIME. Read our conversations with Cassie Arnold and Mandy Hampton, if you haven’t already.

Our Mr. Farris column gave us the inside scoop on all of the construction going on about the square - by the forthcoming Lone Star Attitude and East Side Social Club, and warned everyone about the looming construction on Hickory St. to create angled, back-in parking.

We talked with author Darin Bradley about scary fiction and how he created a fictionalized version of Denton for his book, Noise.

We found out that Midway Mart has beer tastings in another great video from Addison Day. 

What else happened in July, y’all? Are we forgetting something?

MONTH IN REVIEW - JUNE

The new pedestrian bridge over Loop 288 opened up in June. 

We spent a lot of the beginning of the month talking about our friends over at DIME, and with good reason. Not only did they have another of their bi-annual Etsy Denton bazaars at the Greater Denton Arts Council building, but we also got a few words in with co-owner and operator, Shelley Vaughn. While there, we also managed to snag one of Mandy Cave's wonderful watercolor paintings of Denton. You can grab one at the DIME store Monday through Saturday.

Around the beginning of June, we got a visual harbinger that Subway was coming to the square in the way of a neon green and yellow sign on the Texas Building. We showed it to you guys and not only did we find out that our little blog has its fair share of trolls, but also that y’all had a lot to say about corporations and sandwiches. So much so, in fact, that the owners of the building decided to replace the sign. Most of y’all were still pissed by Subway’s mere existence on the square. We’re less than a month away from their planned opening date, so we’ll wait to see everything goes down. 

While y’all were busy yelling about that, we also found out that there’s apparently a class 3 firearms (read: machine guns and silencers) dealer that resides on Hickory St. across from Rusty Taco. While you may see a sign that says, “Storrie Parachute Works,” know that that is only a portion of the business that goes on in that building. So let’s try to keep the people who happen to be really upset about Subway opening on the square off of Hickory St.

That said, Rusty Taco opened in June and was almost immediately packed. Sadly, Rusty Fenton, the creator of Rusty Taco passed away from kidney cancer last week.  

With the help of local economic advisor and avid cranberry juice drinker, Mike Seman, and always-awesome Julie Glover, we also uncovered the mystery behind the “Bear’s Den” sign over by Siam Off the Square. The spot was owned by songwriter Clint Ballard Jr. who died back in 2008. He apparently hung out there and drank beer with his buddies. That’s probably what we would do, too, if we had written hit songs for The Zombies and The Hollies and owned a building.

We heard conflicting rumors about Tim Love’s new Queenie’s steakhouse doing “wonderfully” and that business has been going "very poorly.” While it’s probably still too early to tell, we sure noticed the gigantic red and white “NOW OPEN” sign on the front of the building. We’re also still waiting on Mr. Love to invite us over for that interview we set up with his managers back in March. While we’re on the subject, Love did just close down the TCU location of his Love Shack burger restaurant, leaving one last shack standing.

The pedestrian bridge over Loop 288 finally opened, and we ran 6 miles (3 there and 3 back) to check it out. Have y'all taken the newly extended trail for a spin yet?  

In addition, we checked out a bike safety course for kids, got the inside scoop on the forthcoming Goldmine BBQ, recommended some kid-friendly summer plans, shared some new songs from local bands, got pumped for another new DIY space (this time for musicians), talked to the folks behind Spiderweb Salon, and learned oh-so-much from Shaun Treat about the history of Quakertown Park. 

July should be an interesting month. The 4th of July celebration will be at Apogee Stadium this year, we'll see a couple of new businesses opening up and plenty of good shows abound. What are you looking forward to in July?