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Rest in power to the King of Blackabilly

The two of us were destined to meet. Eric “Shoutin’” Sheridan, who died of heart failure on April 29 at age 72, called himself the King of Blackabilly. And as far as I knew, I was the only other Black musician hanging out on Chicago’s white and Latine-dominated rockabilly scene.  Sheridan had moved here in […]

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Tinariwen enhance the Tuareg blues of Amatssou with touches of country-and-western and ambient

In 2017, Reader critic Peter Margasak noted Tinariwen’s recurring practice of featuring rock musicians as guests on their records. Their new album, Amatssou, doesn’t change that approach, but it perfects it. Originally, the long-running ensemble of Tuareg musicians (also known as Kel Tamasheq, meaning speakers of Tamasheq) intended to make the album at Jack White’s […]

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Los Angeles electronic artist Mareux soaks in gloomy romanticism on the new Lovers From the Past

Mareux is the project of Los Angeles producer and vocalist Aryan Ashtiani, whose music incorporates postpunk, goth, and the European electronic styles he heard via Polish MTV during his summers in Iran as a youth. Mareux’s 2013 debut, the four-song EP Decade, is full of sun-flecked synth-pop that mixes bouncy moods with its wistfulness, but […]

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Pinksqueeze poke fun at indie rock’s status quo

Chicago four-piece Pinksqueeze should be in the rotation of any local indie-rock connoisseur, and not just because of their skill with their instruments. Sure, these twentysomethings play with the confidence of seasoned veterans who’ve been gigging since before they were born. And sure, their musical chemistry gives an affable warmth to everything they play, whether […]