Nederlander Invades Jam Country: Let the Rock Wars Begin! It was hard to see how the Nederlander Organization’s scheme to book rock shows at the China Club was supposed to challenge Jam Productions’ hegemony in Chicago rock promotion. While adequate and even appropriate for high-volume dance or rap acts, the cavernous and noisy China Club […]
Tag: Vol. 22 No. 1
Issue of Oct. 15 – 21, 1992
Posted inArts & Culture
Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra
Last year the period-instrument movement reached a new peak in popularity when the sound track of a lavishly produced biopic of baroque viola da gambist Marin Marais became a huge hit. The success was surprising but not totally unexpected. For almost two decades the public’s appetite for early music has been whetted by ensembles such […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The Straight Dope
Jumpin’ Jack and Lazy Jim, twins, emerge from a fancy restaurant only to find all the valets have split and a heavy rainstorm lies between them and their car, 100 yards away. Jumpin’ Jack bets Lazy Jim that if he runs and Jim walks, he will arrive at the car not only faster but drier. […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Still 35 Cents–and Now Cheaper Than Ever!/Buckner’s Boot/Purveyor of Succinct Biographies
Still 35 Cents–and Now Cheaper Than Ever! The Tribune’s Jeff MacNelly drew a wicked cartoon last week. Sinead O’Connor had torn up a picture of the pope on Saturday Night Live, and MacNelly imagined four priests watching the show. “Shame!” cries one. “Tearing up a photo of the Holy Father!!?” “Poor, pathetic little bald girl,” […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Basehead
Basehead’s debut, Play With Toys, is an album, but it’s also something more complex: the record’s bookended with a mysterious twangy bar band offering C and W versions of things like “Sex Machine,” and interspersed throughout is a bruising commentary on the songs. As main man Michael Ivey sings, voices assuage and contradict him, go […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The City File
Techniques that might be frowned on in a grade-school art class. From the description of Elise Ferguson’s new exhibit at Beret International Gallery on North Elston: “Elise will exhibit her series of items encased in synthetic blocks of ice. Some of these items are obtained from her body, such as: hair; saliva; finger nail clippings; […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Johanne, Tib, Johanne/Attowell’s Jig/La Moscheta
JOHANNE, TIB, JOHANNE and ATTOWELL’S JIG We’re Not Joust Theatre at Lawrence House Why do people do theater? Find a script, find a space, rehearse, rehearse, rehearse, sew some costumes, build a set–why do it? It’s a question that begs to be asked every now and then. And it’s a question two companies, We’re Not […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Bell of Purity Temple
In contrast to younger colleagues who favor ambiguities and a laconic, digressive style, the veteran Chinese director Xie Jin has steadfastly remained an old-fashioned storyteller. Influenced by 40s Hollywood and by his country’s folk-opera tradition–just as the new generation of filmmakers owes a debt to the European art cinema–Xie is at his most assured and […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The Trials of Jones
Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean somebody isn’t out to get you. That pretty well sums up the personal philosophy of Andrew D. Jones. “Oh yes,” he says, “when I start explaining my ideas, people look at me kind of funny, like I been shooting up some of that brown Mexican heroin. But you know, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Boogie Down Productions
Boogie Down Productions is KRS-One–autodidact, self-described “metaphysician,” and occasionally inspirational voice of moral and social reason in the checkered world of rap. Legend has it that he grew up alone on the streets of New York, teaching himself in libraries and finally finding a voice in hip hop. While at first flirting with the violent […]
Posted inMusic
L7–Bricks Are Heavy
BRICKS ARE HEAVY L7 Slash Records Ever since Nirvana’s Nevermind swooped out of the Pacific Northwest and up the charts, practically every band with electric guitars punched into overdrive and an address within a few hundred miles of Seattle has gotten caught up in the major-label signing frenzy. Never mind that what gives some of […]
Posted inNews & Politics
CAN of Worms
Why are Scientologists trying to wriggle their way into the Cult Awareness Network?
Posted inNews & Politics
Genetic Roulette
To the editors: I read with great interest your recent story “Life Without Father” by Bryan Miller [October 9]. Having heard of Single Mothers by Choice on WBEZ recently, I was amazed to hear the repetition of certain statements. The tone of the overall story seemed to be pointed in the women’s favor, ignoring any […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Reading: The Gospel According to Jack
If you find yourself chuckling as you read this article, ask yourself this: Where will you spend eternity? In heaven? Or in the lake of fire?
Posted inNews & Politics
Cynicism and Chicanery
To the editors: What sets the ideologue apart from the honest inquirer (or the honest letter writer, for that matter) are the levels of cynicism and chicanery to which the ideologue must resort to finesse the case he’s trying to make. Take any debatable issue. An honest inquirer will lay what cards he has on […]