Bring in tha noise

Fall is in the air. Can you feel it?

And with fall comes music.

No other time of year is better for sitting around a campfire jamming out on guitar with a healthy buzz swarming your head. And no other time of year is better to go downtown here in Cape and check out a show.

Yes, the time of the City of Roses Music Festival has come again.

If you're new to Cape, chances are you're probably asking how a city like Cape can have a music festival.

Well it's not like we have Supernova headlining (they can't, since they don't even have a singer yet). Instead, the festival is probably the biggest showcase for local music in the area. Two days, dozens of bands, all in downtown Cape.

Live music fans are almost guaranteed to find something they like at the festival, with genres from jazz to folk to rock. So to make your COR experience a little easier, OFF has assembled a handy guide to festival.

And just so you have some perspective on the event, we also put together a COR primer with highlights from past years. Meanwhile music editor James Samons will tell you about the best local acts at the festival.

If performers with bigger names and more pop appeal are more your taste, this month also houses the SEMO District Fair. "American Idol" second-besters Bo Bice and Josh Gracin are two of the artists you can see there.

We interview Bice on page 6, but we didn't judge him as a product of a money-hungry music industry. At OFF, we'd rather leave that up to you.

Writer Richard Cason will also hit the streets at the fair early this year to give our loyal readers an idea of what to expect outside the grandstand.

Fall -- the best time of the year. Just don't get so buzzed you fall into that campfire.