After the rush of winning the 2013 Moth GrandSlam storytelling competition faded, Lily Be (née Lydia Edith Lucio) noticed that her fellow storytellers were overwhelmingly white. “When I heard I was the first Latinx to win the Slam I was like, ‘Are you serious? How can that be?’” she says. “It’s not like we’re some out-of-the-way place. It’s Chicago.” Telling stories around the table, that was just a thing my family did....
Andrew Burton/Getty Images Dems don’t have to agree with Hillary on everything. The missing square puzzle, which in one variation or another has been around for centuries, is based on distortion so subtle our eyes don’t see it. “How low is the self-esteem of America’s Democrats?” Carney wondered.
When former Reader staff writer Peter Margasak began programming the Frequency Series in 2013, he envisioned concerts that would expose audiences of different avant-garde musical disciplines to artists from other genres that they had not heard before but might well appreciate. Margasak left the Reader and Chicago in order to move to Rome in 2018, but he’s continued to program the series, (which usually takes place on Sunday nights at Constellation) as well as a semiannual festival....
Michael Gebert Robert Adams Sr. at Honey 1 BBQ Chicago has its own distinct barbecue heritage, shaped by the great migration from the Mississippi Delta to the north and by the proliferation of slaughterhouses in the mid-20th century. That heritage’s days are numbered anywhere north of Cermak and (roughly) east of Austin. The glass pits are fairly unique to Chicago, made by two plants here (Avenue Metal and Belvin J&F Sheet Metal), but the principles are the same as in any great barbecue region: you cook the meat over wood fire for many hours, slowly breaking down the collagen in cuts like pork ribs, pork shoulder, or beef brisket....
Logan Square venue-slash-restaurant Township is on the slow grind to reestablish its intimate concert hall after it abruptly shut down in late November—the venue went dark after MP Shows leader Brian Peterson wound up selling his stake in Township to co-owner Tamiz Haiderali and a then-unnamed new partner. It turns out Haiderali’s new partner is Mark “Max” Brumbach, the man behind Wicker Park BBQ spot Smoke Daddy who also fixed up Humboldt Park bar California Clipper in the late 90s....
Chicago’s musicians and venues were among the first affected by measures against the spread of COVID-19, but even before Governor J.B. Pritzker issued a shelter-in-place order on Friday, March 20, record stores had also started feeling the pain. Social-distancing practices caused an economic slowdown so quickly that on March 13, Record Store Day organizers postponed this year’s RSD, scheduled for Saturday, April 18 (it’s tentatively moved to June 20). The following day, 606 Records in Pilsen closed early for the day, posting on Instagram that the normally busy 18th Street strip was so quiet you could “hear the spray paint....
Since debuting in 2008, Ian’s Party has evolved from its humble suburban punk origins into an annual Wicker Park-based mini fest showcasing underground Chicago artists (though there are always a few acts from the greater midwest thrown in for good measure). Over the years it’s grown in ambition and in its commitment to inclusivity and artistic diversity. Even those who consider themselves particularly well-versed in the scene are all but guaranteed to be introduced to a local act that they didn’t know they were waiting to hear....
Any future history of Chicago hip-hop would be incomplete without a chapter about rapper Lucki. Starting with his startling 2013 debut, Alternative Trap, he’s been shaping and tightening a distinctive style built on forlorn storytelling and a languorous flow. His zonked-out affectations can make his songs seem tossed off, but when you listen deeper, the vulnerability, anxiety, and tension he carries in his gritty groan strike you with full force. Lucki has been on a remarkable streak the past couple years, and his third full-length in 15 months, May’s Almost There (Lucki/Empire), lands like a three-pointer in the final seconds of a blowout second quarter in game seven of the NBA finals....
While the increasingly discordant standoff between striking musicians of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and their management continues to silence Orchestra Hall, the musicians are picking up their instruments for a series of free concerts at other venues. The discord, so far, includes warring bar charts (purporting to show how well CSO musicians are doing in comparison to musicians in six other major orchestras); claims by both sides that if the other has its way the CSO, as we know it, will cease to exist; and, on Thursday, a verbal attack on philanthropist and Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association board treasurer James Mabie by Chicago Teachers Union president Jesse Sharkey over the main issue in the strike: pensions....
Q: We’re a happily married couple from Europe, longtime readers, both in our 30s, and both interested in having sex sometimes with other people. Before the pandemic we were invited to a private sex party in a major European capital. It was an age- and face-controlled swingers night with background checks on every participant. It was our first experience and it was eye-opening, wonderful, and very sexy, even though we were too shy to fool around with anyone else....
Election years suck, especially if you’re undocumented. Unable to vote, undocumented immigrants have to watch from the sidelines as millions of citizens decide who will shape immigration policy (and their lives) for the next four years. But voting isn’t the only way to participate politically, and for decades, undocumented immigrants have found ways to have their voices heard and serve their communities. I moved out of the suburbs when I was 14, but I was curious as to how things have changed (or haven’t) for undocumented immigrants, especially in a post-Trump world....
Remember those long, lazy pandemic weekends when there was nowhere to go and nothing to do but get drunk on hand sanitizer and measure the growth of your fingernails against the claw marks in your padded walls? Those days are over. Back in March Thommy Padanilam of Thommy’s Toddy Shop was plotting his second Malayali pop-up at Superkhana International, promising portable pothi choru; toasted banana leaf packets stuffed with rice, chutney, seasonal vegetables, and some kind of protein (egg scrambles, fried fish, or chicken)....
LA electronic producer Dayvid Lundie-Sherman, aka Say My Name, is the self-proclaimed pioneer of hardtrap, a combination of hardstyle and electronic trap. Lundie-Sherman blends the boisterous parts of those genres so effectively that distinguishing between them can feel like trying to figure out the difference between being pummeled by a ten-pound sack of quarters or being pummeled by a ten-pound sack of dimes—even to those familiar with the differences between electronic trap and electronic hardcore it may sound like every other over-the-top, frenetic “EDM” track at first listen....
I’m often in the position of introducing Chicago to New Yorkers who’ve never before spent time here. Writer friends land on a book tour; old college pals pass through for family weddings; publishing colleagues come by on business. You can have a good sense of Manhattan even if you’ve never set foot there—the movies have seen to that—but Chicago isn’t as familiar to the outsider. Watching ChiRaq, The Blues Brothers, and Perfect Strangers in quick succession won’t do a thousandth of what Woody Allen accomplishes in an opening credits sequence....
At first glance, the premise of Bob and Tobly McSmith’s cruise-ship-ready cash grab sounds like the sort of ironic musical-theater spoof that would be conceived by the irreverent and clever sketch writers and improvisers over at iO or the Annoyance—maybe for $10 a ticket in a late-night slot. And in the hands of those kids who are discovering the iconic series two decades after the fact, there’s probably some legitimate comedic material to be wrested from nostalgia for both the 90s and the heyday of must-see-TV network sitcoms....
The first public comment at February’s City Council meeting wasn’t about vaccine access, or the Office of Inspector General report on the Chicago Police Department’s brutality during last summer’s protests, or even the mayor’s decision to ease business capacity and social distancing restrictions while the pandemic raged. Over 100,000 Indian Americans live in Chicago and Hadden’s 49th Ward is one of the most diverse in the country. The ward overlaps with the Devon Avenue area, where a large proportion of the city’s South Asian Americans live and work....
Emily Cross started Cross Record in Chicago as a solo experimental-pop project and morphed it into a full band shortly before moving to Austin. But soon after Cross Record put out their debut full-length, 2016’s Wabi Sabi (Ba Da Bing), front woman Cross decided to give the group a rest. She became a death doula, providing holistic support for people in the last moments of life, and formed the folk-leaning band Loma with Shearwater’s Jonathan Meiburg and her husband, Dan Duszynski (also her chief collaborator in Cross Record)....
A man wearing an American flag slung around his shoulders like a crude superhero cape handed a street vendor named Cot a $20 bill. In exchange, Cot gave flag man a replica of the red “Make American Great Again” hat made famous by a certain celebrity billionaire turned inexplicably popular presidential candidate. Trump dismisses Obama as a joke of a president whom foreign leaders don’t respect, but turns debates into self-promotional infomercials blended with comedy roasts of his flailing Republican opponents....
At least for the moment, it appears the Jerry Lewises of the world have tired of attempting to argue that women aren’t funny. But local comedian Kelsie Huff says it can still be a challenge for women to break into the stand-up realm. “Women feel like they have to be perfect,” she says—and in stand-up, you’re going to blow it once in a while. The class is open only to people who identify as women, but Huff says the stipulation isn’t “antimale....
Dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic when one lives alone can be difficult enough–but when a couple or family are involved, there are distinctly different dynamics and hurdles to navigate. Evette Cardona: I had started to work from home while Mona retired so, in that way, it sort of worked. We were pretty fortunate. I’m blessed to be in a job where I could work from home. [Cardona is vice president of programs at Polk Bros....
