On December 13, I took a long drive to Des Plaines to pick up relatives of my friend Perry Kanlan, a showbiz-adjacent eccentric known as Dancin’ Man. The time on […]
Category: Music Feature
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Hemlock wants us to stay in touch
Carolina Chauffe doesn’t like to stay in one place for very long. Some of the most dramatic turns on her life’s path have been unplanned—she’s driven by what she calls […]
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‘I don’t need fans, I need comrades’
Patrick Haggerty has just made me cry. Though we’re talking over Zoom, a day before the 78-year-old heads out on tour in support of his second record, Blackberry Rose and […]
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Blind Arvella Gray
Editor’s note: This story originally ran in the Reader on January 7, 1972. It’s been transcribed exactly as it appeared then, and has not been updated to correct typos or […]
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The second-biggest news about Bandcamp this week
Friday, March 4, is the 20th installment of what’s become known as Bandcamp Friday, when Bandcamp passes along its usual share of revenue to the independent artists and labels selling […]
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A concert-by-concert guide to the Frequency Festival
After a COVID gap year, the Frequency Festival returns on February 22. The six-day event is an outgrowth of the Frequency Series, which is programmed by former Chicago Reader staff […]
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How Chicago helped put the Queen of Grunge back on her throne
On January 4, 2020, Jen Lemasters started She Bop, an Instagram account dedicated to recordings by women in rock. Lemasters has a huge record collection, not least because she and […]
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A tribute to Syl and Jimmy Johnson
Chicago shaped Jimmy and Syl Johnson, and the brothers stayed grounded here even as they became global heroes. The singer-guitarists moved up from Mississippi after World War II and played […]
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Duranguense: hecho en Chicago
Read in English Un estilo de música, de baile y de vestir. Todo eso es el duranguense, movimiento que surgió en Chicago a principios del siglo 21. El duranguense, un […]
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An interview with Saba: ‘For me, home is the people’
In late 2014, I was incredibly homesick: I’d just left Chicago for college out of state, and I was struggling to adjust to a new campus and an immediate world […]
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Bandcamp Fridays reach their third calendar year
In case your attention’s been elsewhere, Spotify has been at the center of another uproar lately: last week Neil Young pulled his music from the streaming service to protest the […]
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Catholic school house
In November 2021, news broke that filled the Chicago house-music community with pride. Hometown house legends Ten City were nominated for a Grammy for Best Dance/Electronica Album for Judgement, their […]
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Mandingo Griot Society: a global exchange born in Chicago
Foday Musa Suso absorbed centuries of tradition growing up in Gambia. As part of the griot caste, his family had performed a centuries-long role in Gambian society, narrating historical epics […]
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Duranguense: made in Chicago
En Español A style of music, dance, and dress: duranguense, which surged in Chicago at the turn of the 21st century, encompassed all of this. Duranguense is a hybrid genre, […]
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Chicago’s instrument industry helps the world make music
Like a giant urban phoenix, Chicago rose from the ashes of the Great Fire of 1871 to become a behemoth in architecture, the arts, and business. Thanks to its waterways […]