Blues patriarch Big Daddy Kinsey had three sons who played together as the Kinsey Report.
Category: The Secret History of Chicago Music
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Johnny Shines belongs in the pantheon alongside Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf
Bluesman Johnny Shines spent the late 30s on the road with the great Robert Johnson, then lived long enough to win a W.C. Handy Award in the 90s.
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The Aces helped invent the sound of electric Chicago blues
The Aces are best known as a backing band, but they took the lead when it came to the future of the blues.
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A memorial to Alejandro Morales
Alejandro Morales’s death doesn’t just leave a hole in Chicago’s DIY music scene—it’s a loss to community activists, to affordable housing advocates, and to countless friendships.
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Kokomo Arnold helped shape giants of the blues
Kokomo Arnold’s recording career lasted less than a decade, but he changed the world by influencing the likes of Robert Johnson and Elmore James.
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Multimedia artist Frank Garvey makes music with robots to satirize late capitalism
Frank Garvey, creator of the long-running OmniCircus, also recorded two brilliantly unclassifiable albums in Chicago in the late 70s.
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Liof Munimula took their play with sound seriously
Liof Munimula’s toolbox included a 42-piece percussion setup, a shortwave radio rig with a 40-foot antenna, and a subversive sense of humor.
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Nearly a century ago, Dave Tough helped define Chicago jazz drumming
Chicago jazz drummer Dave Tough died young, only barely outliving the big-band era, but his influence lives on.
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Girl group the Lovelites hit big but never became stars outside Chicago
The Lovelites had their biggest success with “How Can I Tell My Mom and Dad,” which came out when they were so young they could barely tour.
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The Artistics belong in the top tier of Chicago soul and R&B
The Artistics could match the quality of the Impressions and the Chi-Lites, but not their chart success.
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The Chicago Loop’s sole hit featured guitar legend Mike Bloomfield
The Chicago Loop never outdid their first 45, despite a wild psychedelic single in 1968 that holds up great today.
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Resurrection Band opened the gates for Christian hard rock
The hard-rocking Resurrection Band arose from the Jesus movement in the early 70s and went on to help the modern Christian music industry break into MTV.
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Peter Berkow has spent five decades traversing at least that many genres
Chicago native Peter Berkow has been a producer and a professor, and moved from folk to funk to fusion to prog and back.
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Soul singer Bill Coday had two careers 20 years apart
Bill Coday’s early releases, especially on Denise LaSalle’s Crajon label, have been widely reissued—and his later soul-blues recordings are beloved too.
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The Kind were two bands—and the first has been almost completely forgotten
The Kind’s slick, glammy 80s records caught on locally, but their high-energy late-70s power pop barely made it to vinyl.