Since the start of the pandemic, Chicago has lost an incredible number of artists whose contributions to the local music community helped shape the sound of the city and beyond. They include drummer and vocalist Joe Camarillo, who passed away in January following a stroke. Since the mid-80s, when he was a high school student […]
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Ensemble dal Niente and Ken Vandermark explore the ties between chamber music and jazz
Ensemble dal Niente commissions and selects new music that earns the designation “new” not just because it’s freshly composed; it also challenges both players and audiences to experience performance in new ways. This program, jointly presented by Ear Taxi and the Hyde Park Jazz Festival, draws on the resources of Chicago in two ways. First, […]
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Meat Wave cram a lot of noisy energy and emotion into six songs on Volcano Park
Chicago punk trio Meat Wave were planning on touring for much of 2020 to push a new LP, but COVID cleared their calendar and delayed their album (as it did for so many working bands). Rather than sit around and wait, the band hunkered down to write, record, and self-release an EP of new material […]
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Edward Vaughn goes from engineering to shredding
To most Chicagoans, “Englewood” and “rock” are hardly synonymous, but guitarist Edward Vaughn reps his hood proudly as he follows his rock-star dreams. And where he’s from isn’t the only thing about him that points away from rock ’n’ roll: he also has a bachelor of science degree in aerospace engineering. “I’m from Englewood, so […]
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Melvia “Chick” Rodgers-Williams brings her big voice to the 15th annual Chi-town Blues Festival
Melvia “Chick” Rodgers-Williams is a dynamic, versatile blues and soul vocalist with a pretty sparse recorded legacy (mostly under her maiden name, Melvia “Chick” Rodgers). She’s deft and audacious enough to take on warhorses such as “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and Aretha Franklin’s “Dr. Feelgood,” retaining the power and feel of the originals while making […]
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Chicago indie-rock mainstays Eleventh Dream Day celebrate their 14th album, Since Grazed
When Chicago indie-rock stalwarts Eleventh Dream Day released their 14th album (and first in five years), Since Grazed, in April 2021, the pandemic prevented them from having a proper release party. The group, formed in 1983, are creeping up on their 40th anniversary, and though they didn’t hold together this long by being impatient, they […]
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Chicago musical wonder Macie Stewart takes command of her path on Mouth Full of Glass
Macie Stewart has her hands in so many different musical projects it’s a wonder she finds the time to sleep. She coleads enchanting art-rock band Ohmme, of course, which she cofounded with Sima Cunningham in 2014, but aside from her best-known gig, Stewart plays violin in a duo with cellist Lia Kohl, makes up one-third […]
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Lykanthea’s Dawn Birds welcome the autumnal equinox with song
Lakshmi Ramgopal, who makes music as Lykanthea, moved to the east coast in 2016 (she’s an assistant professor of history at Columbia University in New York), but she still considers Chicago her spiritual and musical home. “I visit the city at least once a month,” she says, “so a substantial part of my life happens […]
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Kampala-based producer Slikback soundtracks the death algorithm
On Tuesday, September 14, my friend James Kennedy publishes his second novel, a sci-fi thriller called Dare to Know. (His first, the YA fantasy The Order of Odd-Fish, was reviewed in the Reader in 2008.) I’m not going to attempt to rate the new book, because I’ve destroyed my credibility on that front by admitting […]
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Johnny Frigo became a top-tier jazz violinist in his 70s
Since 2004 Plastic Crimewave (aka Steve Krakow) has used the Secret History of Chicago Music to shine a light on worthy artists with Chicago ties who’ve been forgotten, underrated, or never noticed in the first place. It’s hard to believe that in more than 15 years of the Secret History of Chicago Music—at least 350 […]
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Jana Rush engineers her own empowerment
Experimental footwork producer Jana Rush recorded her breathtaking new album, Painful Enlightenment, while battling depression, but she’s careful not to romanticize that fact. “At that time, I couldn’t be consistent with anything. I could start something and good luck with finishing it,” Rush explains. “The loss of hope, it’s a strange and empty feeling, and […]
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Half Gringa drops a new single and plays a pandemic-delayed album-release show
Gossip Wolf has been following the work of local singer-songwriter Isabel “Izzy” Olive, aka Half Gringa, since she was still calling her project Tin Silos in the mid-2010s. Since adopting the Half Gringa name, Olive has been on an incredible hot streak: her 2017 debut, Gruñona, earned a spot in the Reader’s sprawling list of […]
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On their debut album, Central Heat Exchange envision a new indie-rock utopia
Throughout the pandemic I’ve noticed an uptick in long-distance musical collaborations, and the new self-titled debut from dyed-in-the-wool indie rockers Central Heat Exchange (Sunroom/Citrus City/Birthday Cake) is among the best. Chicago provides an anchor for the four-piece group, since more of the members live here than anywhere else: brothers Jake and Paul Stolz of local […]
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Chicago’s Wingtips bring a little light to the dark synth-pop of Cutting Room Floor
In 2021, the idea of editing yourself can sound cynical—it’s been tainted by social-media influencers who manufacture images and videos of a blemish-free life of luxury while struggling to make ends meet offline. But on their brand-new second album, Cutting Room Floor, dark Chicago synth-pop duo Wingtips suggest that self-editing can be part of a […]
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Buck Gooter honor late band cofounder Terry Turtle with short, sharp blasts
The style and sound of experimental music don’t hew to geographic regions. And Buck Gooter, a noisy duo from Harrisonburg, Virginia, perhaps best exemplify the concept. Convened in the early aughts, after Terry Turtle and Billy Brett met working at local restaurant the Little Grill Collective (known for hosting an early-career Old Crow Medicine Show […]