A look at some noteworthy television this week: Lincoln Center Tree Lighting 2007 (Monday, 5:30 p.m, WABC 7) Good Morning America’s Sam Champion and WABC’s Sade Baderinwa host the first televised tree lighting of the season. There will be some performances by Lincoln Center’s resident companies and some guest’s from channel 7’s owner Disney on hand for entertainment for the 8th annual Lincoln Center Holiday Tree lighting. America at a Crossroads (Monday, 9:00 p.m &......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a pedestrian struck on 87th St. and Central Park West in Manhattan, a DOA in a tree off Woodhaven Blvd. in Queens, and a burn victim on 42nd St. and Vanderbilt Ave. in Manhattan. Sidewalk chalk outline artist Ellis G[allagher] was arrested by police and held overnight as he was being filmed by a PBS crew last week in Boerum Hill. Charges were dropped the next day and Gallagher......

Yesterday we opened the doors to Gothamist House and hopefully you were able to drop by or listen in on WOXY. In just a couple of hours we'll be opening up the doors again, for day two -- here's the lineup: Thursday October 18th 7:30pm - iLiKETRAiNS (MySpace) 6:45pm - Sam Champion (MySpace) 6:00pm - Dead Confederate (MySpace) 5:15pm - Bad Veins (MySpace) 4:30pm - The Big Sleep (MySpace) 3:45pm - The Teeth (MySpace) 3:00pm......

Last week we announced the lineup for day one at Gothamist House, and here comes day two. As a reminder, this year WOXY will be broadcasting from the space -- so if you find yourself at work you'll still be able to listen in! At the end of the week stay tuned for a Best of Gothamist House podcast, also provided by WOXY. Now, without further ado: Thursday October 18th 7:30pm - iLiKETRAiNS (MySpace)......

It's a big outdoor weekend, so good thing there are 51 outdoor pools opening up for the season around the city today (here's a "best of" list). If you prefer to stay dry, here are some options... EVENT: The Afro Punk series begins at BAMcafé tonight. The series kicks off with a spotlight on the Black Panthers, including "an Opening Night discussion with Black Panther co-Founder Bobby Seale, Gloria Rolando’s Eyes of the Rainbow (1997),......

Bonnaroo Has Begun While we couldn't make it down this year (a bit festivaled out between SXSW and Coachella and Sasquatch so far this year), Bonnaroo kicked off last night with a couple local favorites warming up the early arrivers. The National, Langhorne Slim and Apollo Sunshine among others took the stage for the Thursday night festivities. Much much more on the way for the rest of the week, including hometowners Sam Champion, El-P and......

Fox News Channel blowhard Bill O'Reilly and fellow Foxie Geraldo Rivera were in a heated argument on last night's edition of The O'Reilly Factor. The tiff was about a drunk driving illegal alien in Virginia killing someone and devolved into yelling and actual finger pointing with Geraldo starting out by pointing out to Bill that he was wrong. Since we usually avoid cable "news" like the plague, we were tipped to this morning, saw a......

Mister Cutlets is somewhat of a role model for me . . . maybe even a father figure. We are both food writers. We are both lovers of meat puns (his book is called "Meat Me In Manhattan" and my last post was about a place with the motto "Let's Meat At Sahara.") We've both appointed ourselves absurd nicknames. And we both find it appropriate, even though neither of us are super heroes as......

Sam Champion Leaves WABC Longtime channel 7 weather presenter Sam Champion left the station last week to work full time for ABC News where he has been the morning weather presenter for Good Morning America since September. Champion, who is not a meteorologist, originally joined WABC to be an anchor, but was quickly shuffled into weather presenting. After taking the Good Morning America weather presenter spot, Champion’s duties were reduced to the 5 p.m. newscast......

A look at some noteworthy programs this week: iVillagelive (WNBC & Bravo, Monday, 12:00 noon) NBC launches this lifestyle show focused on women on Monday. What makes it different from other such shows is that it is going to have an interactive component, since it is a spin-off from the NBC-Universal owned website iVillage.com. The 2006 Billboard Music Awards (WNYW 5, Monday, 8:00 p.m.) Yet another music awards show. The only reason it is noteworthy......

READING: Tonight at 192 Books, Marisha Pessl reads from Special Topics in Calamity Physics, her buzzy and well-received first novel. Seating is usually limited at 192 Books so call (212) 255-4022 to reserve a spot. - Krissa Corbett Cavouras 7pm // 192 Books [192 10th Ave. at 23rd St] // Free THEATER: Downtown writer/director/innovator Young Jean Lee kicks off the fall season at HERE with what the theater website describes as her own worst nightmare:......

Sam Champion, the WABC 7 meteorologist weathercaster (thanks for correcting, Toby) (not the band), will be the new Good Morning America weathercaster. Crain's reports that since Champion has been at WABC for 18 years, "his imminent departure could hurt the station as it competes with WNBC and WCBS." Gothamist would have to agree - Sam Champion is a cornerstone of the local NYC weather. The only current city weathercasters we know off the top of......

Sam Champion is: Noah Chernin - vocals, guitar Jack Dolgen - bass, vocals Ryan Thornton - drums, vocals Sean Bones - guitar, harmonica, vocals We were shocked...shocked! When we looked back at the BOTW archives and realized we had never featured Sam Champion before. Long time favorites of Gothamist, we recently caught them at Bowery Ballroon sandwiched between two of the hottest bands today in the Cold War Kids and Two Gallants. While we......

Tonight San Francisco rockers with the middle class rasp, Two Gallants, come to Bowery Ballroom. We interviewed them last week, and you should really check them out while they're in town. For serious. Opening up for them are Sam Champion (the actual NY weatherman still comes up first in a Google search) and Cold War Kids. Elsewhere in the city, Pela is playing with Project Jenny/Project Jan (at the Delancey). There's already ex-Art Bruter's and......

ART: For The Garden of Unearthly Delights, Gary Baseman taps into the id, the psyche of primitive impulses. Influenced by “The Garden of Earthly Delights”, a renaissance masterpiece by Hieronymous Bosch, Baseman creates what he calls "pervasive art". He uses both the channels of mass media TV, Film, Print, and fine art. [Right: Anita 11" x 8.5" Ephemera, mixed media] September 10th through October 8th // Tuesday through Saturday, 11am to 6pm // Jonathan LeVine......

This weekend marks the last two days you have to find love before Valentine's Day. So get out there! Quick! You don't want to be alone on a fake holiday do you?! It's okay, we love you, and we'll show you this by giving you a list of things to do this weekend. But we'd never actually pressure you to do them, we're just not like that: MOVIE: Make it an All Christo weekend. As......

So it's almost time to go home for the holidays, and you as a New Yorker have to bring the best presents. You know that right? The rest of your non-New Yorker friends and family look to you for your urban hipness, don't let them down. We, of course, suggest the gift of music. Local music. Music that isn't on MTV, because they get that outside of New York. We went to the local music......

If Thanksgiving is over, then Christmas trees all around the city must be lit. Here are three events the Daily News notes: - Tonight, the holiday tree at Lincoln Center will be lit. ABC 7's Sam Champion is hosting the event, which will feature high wire artist Pedro Carrillo, Sr., walking a tightrope across Lincoln Center's plaza and Mickey Mouse helping throw the switch to illuminate the 50 foot tree. Also, there are free saplings......

In case somebody is reading Gothmamist at the hour on a Friday... The droning, stoned-out Warlocks bring their multi-guitar rawk show to the Mercury Lounge tonight and tomorrow. On the bill tonight are Dead Meadow and Panthers. Tomorrow it's Dead Meadow and Vietnam. Both shows are highly recommended. Tonight, the Bowery Ballroom hosts the buzzed-about Dresden Dolls. Tomorrow tonight, the incredible Gogol Bordello hits Irving Plaza. Few who have seen them don't go away singing......

Trying to figure out what to do this Halloween weekend? We've got some ideas that are just slightly better than *bobbing for PBR... [First off, whatever you decide to do should be done while continually eating candy. Here are a couple of our favorite candy shops: Economy Candy in the LES & Dylan's Candy Bar in fancy pants Uptown.] Now on to the events... All Weekend: Go see Shaun of the Dead. It's a romantic......

We first caught the guitar heavy indie-punk band These Bones during CMJ, but we had heard their cover of Britney's Toxic long before then. With a sound that borders on garage anthem rock and choppy punk the bands style and energy certainly doesn't do anything to hurt their live show. You know how people don't dance at shows in this city? They do at These Bones. It's rock n' roll for the attention deficet......

Sam Champion is New York's musical anachronism. While most rock bands either bow down to Max's Kansas City circa 1975 or the UK in the post-punk wave of the early '80s, the finest band ever named after a local weatherman is all too happy to take its cues from the '90s. The slack trappings of Pavement are channeled through the ghost of Credence Clearwater Revival and the loping, folksy rumbles of Neil Young and......

Much to do this weekend. Much to do. Rothko, recently overhauled and much improved, has been on a roll as of late--if you can actually get in the door. Tomorrow night, there's yet another great show at the Lower East Side club: Bad Wizard and the Izzys. As is always the case, expect a lot of amped-up '70s rock, beer, whiskey and wailing guitar solos when the mighty Bad Wizard takes the stage. It's a......

[Coolfer has given us the cost-efficient music guide for this weekend...hooray for free concerts!] Attenion freeloaders, cheapskates, the unemployed, the stingy and the underpaid: It's a great week for free shows in NYC. If the weather holds up, this could be one of the better weeks of NYC freebies in recent memory. Tonight, the magical Ron Sexsmith kicks off Madison Square Park's evening performance series. Ron is arguably one of the better songwriters working today.......