Major news from Chicago’s favorite reverb-friendly garage jammers, Disappears—the band has parted ways with Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley due to scheduling conflicts. Singer-guitarist Brian Case tells Gossip Wolf that the split was amicable, and the evidence bears him out—this winter Shelley’s label, Vampire Blues, will release a collaboration that Disappears recorded with local droners White/Light in 2008 2009. Drummer about town Noah Leger (Electric Hawk, Anatomy of Habit) will replace Shelley behind the kit—he makes his debut with the band on Sat 9/8 at the Dust Up, a one-day mini festival hosted by Big Star (1531 N. Damen) in the restaurant’s parking lot. Among the other acts are Andre Williams & the Goldstars and Old Baby; starting at noon there’s also a record fair, with goods from the Numero Group, Kranky, Bloodshot, and more.
Last weekend local rapper Lamar Israel (aka Legit) dropped “Leave,” the final installment in a weekly free-song series he’s been calling #NewShitSaturdays. Israel launched the summerlong series in early June with “Bonjour!” and will cap off the project Sat 9/1 by releasing a compilation of all the #NewShitSaturday cuts called Feliz Sabado.
On Friday local air-guitar barbarian Justin “Nordic Thunder” Howard—famous for his prodigious beard, gnarly leather outfit, and bare-knee stage-length power slide, among other things—won the Air Guitar World Championships in Finland. It’s been a long journey for Howard, who took first place in the U.S. Air Guitar Championships at Metro in July 2011 (and appeared in the Reader as the subject of a B Side cover feature that August), but then missed the global crown by a hair. Second time’s a charm! Howard is also the first American to win the world championship in four years, which makes his victory even sweeter for all the patriotic American air guitarists out there. U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
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