Delivering what Glide magazine called “a night of superb musicianship capable of time travel and otherworldliness,” acclaimed drummer Kofi Baker, son of legendary Cream drummer Ginger Baker, brings his three-man ensemble to the Redstone Room on August 10, his Kofi Baker's Psychedelic Trip trio reinventing the music of Cream and inspiring MusicEnthusiast.net to rave, “Across the board, these guys nail the sound and the feel without – and this is important – seeming like some Las Vegas tribute band. They're the real deal.”

Headlining a two-day music festival at the Codfish Hollow Barn, the South Carolina-based ensemble SUSTO brings its Americana and alt-country stylings to Maquoketa on August 10 and 11, the artists' Fine 2Day Fest demonstrating the skills that led SoundingBoardBlog.com to rave, “The band brings a level of passion and thoughtfulness to their performance, and the way they play engulfs your attention and resonates a sense of authenticity. You can see how this is one of those bands who truly love to play music.”

Saturday night's performance of Thesmophoriazusae was a bit like the talent show at the end of summer camp. Featuring a lot of inside jokes, jabs at society as a whole, and many familiar faces, director Bob Hanske’s production serves as the wacky capstone to Genesius Guild’s summer of entertainment in Lincoln Park.

Lord knows we don't need any more awards for movies and the people who make them. But after watching the latest sequel to Mission: Impossible – hell, after watching its first 10 minutes – I was actively wishing that someone would at least fashion an oversize blue ribbon, or maybe an Edible Arrangements bouquet of some sort, in recognition of “Best Pre-Opening-Credits Sequence.” Because the one that writer/director Christopher McQuarrie and company have devised for Mission: Impossible – Fallout is practically a movie of its own, and an awfully good one.

Concluding their 2018 season with a world premiere at Augustana College, the Mississippi Bend Players will, from August 3 through 12, stage a collaboration between an Emmy-nominated writer/producer and a Broadway-veteran director: the pitfalls-of-show-business comedy Beginner's Luck, written by noted sitcom scribe P.J. Lasker (The Golden Girls, Barney Miller) and directed by the Great White Way's Philip Wm. McKinley (Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, The Boy from Oz).

On display from August 4 through September 17, a very special summertime exhibition will showcase the collaborative efforts of the Figge Art Museum, the nationwide program Students Rebuild, and Davenport Community Schools' Creative Arts Academy in Students Rebuild: Facing Difference, a beautiful and moving collection of student self-portraits from around the globe and here in the Quad Cities.

Led by rock legend Buzz Osborne, who has been touring with his band for 35 years, the sludge-metal and hardcore-punk musicians of The Melvins make a return appearance at the Rock Island Brewing Company on August 6, with AllMusic.com writing of the iconic group, “Their ability to combine punk with a strong Black Sabbath influence had a major impact on everything from grunge to alternative metal to doom metal and stoner rock.”

Lauded by Living Blues magazine as “21st Century Blues at its best,” the Memphis-based artists of the Ghost Town Blues Band perform an August 4 Harley Corin's concert presented by the Mississippi Valley Blues Society, treating audiences to the soulful, electrifying effects of, as Living Blues stated, “what can happen when the past is distilled through young sensibilities, voices, and instruments.”