Tis the season of grand eating as we have food festivals going off everywhere in L.A. But one of the biggest ones is the American Wine & Food Festival which is celebrating its 25th year and will take place at the Universal Studios back lot this Saturday. However, if you're thinking $300 is a pretty penny to pay for gorging yourself on the tasty treats and cocktails from the top chefs and wine/spirits purveyors......

GUNG HAY FAT CHOY! Come celebrate at LA's annual Lunar New Year Festival! Today the Golden Dragon Parade featuring lion and dragon dancers will thrill over 100,000 spectators along North Broadway. The festival continues until 8pm tonight, and runs from 10am to 3pm tomorrow at Broadway and Cesar Chavez. Parade 2pm-5pm Festival 10am-8pm // Chinatown // N. Broadway & College Street // Free THEATRE The Kinsey Sicks, a "Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet" perform their critically......

In 1966, Huey Newton & Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party. A militia organization, made up of black men & women to fight for their rights, and defend themselves against “capitalist pigs” (the US government). In the politically charged-era of the civil rights movement, the party reached out to their wide membership, with distribution of a newspaper entitled The Black Panther. The publication featured regular artwork from its Minister of Culture, graphic artist Emory......

It was scorching hot in West Hollywood on Sunday for the West Hollywood Book Fair, much too hot for the heavy, dirty jeans and tight, thick t-shirt I was wearing. I don’t know if it was because of the hangover I was nursing, the fact that I arrived a little late, or just the heat, but at 12pm when I arrived at West Hollywood Park near the Pacific Design Center, I had some trouble......

Monday Will Beall presents L.A. Rex 7pm @ Book Soup Robert Alter & Jonathan Kirsch discuss The Book of Psalms with David Ulin 7pm @ Central Library Mark Schapiro signs Exposed 7pm @ Dutton's Richard King presents Spirituality in the Workplace 7pm @ Vroman's Alan Alda presents Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself 7pm @ Borders, Westwood Tuesday Bill Clinton presents Giving: How Each of Us Can Change the World 2pm @ Vroman's......

O.J. to Auction Book Rights After a long string of controversies and cancellations, rights to O.J. Simpson’s If I Did It will be auctioned off on April 17, according to Los Angeles authorities. Freeing the slaves - in Los Angeles Tales of modern day slavery, in LA. And none of these people work for Disney. Benefit Concert For the Midnight Mission The Malibu Performing Arts Center (MPAC) was the place to be on March......

- Why did The Departed beat Dreamgirls at the Oscars even though Dreamgirls threw a lot of money in hyping it to voters? - Reuters - Where will you be tomorrow at 11:30am when the Doors get their star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in front of the Virgin Megastore? Also, according to the Doors website, jazzy drummer John Densmore, who helped give the Doors part of their unique feel, won't be in......

Los Angeles sure does have quite a few photography events. In fact, we have two this week alone. I already told you about the upcoming Photo L.A. shin-dig this weekend but there's also another event happening this weekend too as pointed out to be by tipster Jacob (thanks, btw) The event, called "Camera Works," is put on by the LA Chapter of the Advertising Photographers of America and is the 5th Annual Photo Exhibition......

“The known center of the universe is Ikea… the whole world is built on consuming and shopping,” local photographer Bill Owens quipped yesterday during a discussion of his photographic odyssey of 1970s suburban sprawl. Owens’ lecture at the USC graduate school of art was the trial run for presentations he will be giving at the MOCA Pacific Design Center today at 3 pm on his solo exhibit and The Getty on Sunday for the......

"They're giving it away free? It must be good!" Put on your best pair of ripped jeans and a collared shirt (floss it, of course). It’s time for all the broke posers of LA to pretend they’re cultured! You can’t miss with the second annual "Museums Free-For-All" day on Sunday, October 1. Of course, those broke non-posers will probably realize that most of the 20 participating museums are normally completely free (Getty Center, California......

Opening: Art Now Yeah, yeah. You can’t wait for Night Vision so you can be all hipster again like last summer. Until then, this Thursday is the start of MOCA Focus: Eric Wesley. Wesley “has become internationally known for his large-scale sculptural works that combine highly crafted objects with elements of performance and a wry, pranksterish social criticism.” At the Pacific Design Center. And while you wait for Klimt at LACMA, Contemporary Projects 10:......

LAist is going on a delicious spree from A to Z. This weekend, we finish up G as we attempt to sober up at Gozar after a few too many at The Abbey a few doors down. When first we heard of the restaurant Gozar, we thought it was “go, zar.” It never occurred to us that this mostly Spanish tapas restaurant, but with heavy Puerto Rican and Cuban influences, was the Spanish verbo......

Seminal punk band X has been around for over twenty-five years. While guitarist Billy Zoom and drummer D.J. Bonebrake may have been the bones and muscle of the band, Exene Cervenka and John Doe were its heart and voice. Possibly the most influential punk band to come out of the Eighties, X is still going strong. Their excellent "Live in Los Angeles" CD/DVD just dropped into stores on May 8. So it was with......

• Tonight at UCLA Live, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Mamet will be speaking at 8 PM. Tickets range from $25-35, or $15 for UCLA students. • At 7 PM, the Hammer Museum, author Marilynne Robinson will be reading. Her novel Gilead was one of the top 10 books of 2004 according to the New York Times. • MOCA Pacific Design Center hosts Royal Art Lodge artist Jonathan Pylypchuk for a free art talk at......

At MOCA at the Pacific Design Center, Frank Escher and Ravi GuneWardena, partners at Escher GuneWardena Architecture, will be giving an art talk on the Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec exhibition currently at MOCA. The talk begins at 6:30 PM. At Spaceland, see rowdy country rockers The Gourds with Von Cotten and Brokedown. Doors open at 9:00 PM. Tonight is the second and final Cheap Trick show at the Canyon Club. Doors open at 6:00......

Pay a visit to MOCA today, as the place will be swarming with activity. At 3:00 PM, see a screening of Two Generators, Rodney Graham's 1984 piece "documenting the night-time illumination of a river" at MOCA at California Plaza. The screening is free with musuem admission. After that, hang around until 5:00 PM when MOCA's weekly Immersion begins, featuring happy hour at Patinette, DJs, tours and lectures, as well as MOCA store events. At......