Numerous live music and theater performances are being held in the Chicago area to raise money for survivors of the recent gulf coast catastrophes. Here are this week’s benefit shows; see the roundup at www.chicagoreader.com for events taking place next week and beyond. FRIDAY 30 Callie’s Tally Pegasus Players, 1145 W. Wilson, 773-878-9761 :00 Staged […]
Tag: Vol. 35 No. 1
Issue of Sep. 29 – Oct. 5, 2005
Posted inArts & Culture
Stones in His Pockets
Marie Jones’s Tony-nominated comedy about filming a historical epic in a small town in County Kerry doesn’t provide mind-bending insights into the colonizing effects of Hollywood culture. But it does provide a fabulous showcase for the two actors who play all the roles, primarily two beleaguered extras. By casting the remarkably adept duo of Will […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Snips
[snip] Let’s have the Bible and Koran thumpers teach both sides too. Christopher Hitchens writes in Slate, “Houses of worship that do not provide space for leaflets and pamphlets favoring evolution . . . should be denied tax-exempt status and any access to public funding originating in the White House’s ‘faith-based’ initiative.”
Posted inArts & Culture
Who Moved Her Cheese?
Barbara Ehrenreich’s plan goes awry in her follow-up to the best-selling Nickel and Dimed.
Posted inMusic
Achim Kaufmann Trio
German-born pianist Achim Kaufmann started his career in the 80s, working in a variety of free-improv, fusion, and mainstream jazz contexts, but it wasn’t until 1996, when he moved to Amsterdam, that his playing truly took flight. The city has long been a springboard for creative musicians, and its anything-goes scene demands a focus and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Richard Swift & the Sons of National Freedom
Secretly Canadian recently issued The Novelist, the 2003 album by Angeleno Richard Swift, together with a disc of new material, Walking Without Effort, as the two-CD set The Collection Vol. 1. The title’s a bit presumptuous (Richard who?), and the liner notes don’t offer much insight into the man’s background. But after listening to the […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The Treatment
Friday 30 HOWLING HEX Neil Hagerty has never abandoned his influences–the former Royal Trux guitarist has been mining the blues and the Rolling Stones’ version of it since his early days in Pussy Galore. But he’s brought more art damage to the genre than most. His latest project, a rotating cast of musicians he calls […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Wide Open Beaver Shot of My Heart, a Comedy With a Body Count
A subtle, wearying darkness has always lurked beneath Ian Belknap’s droll, literary comic monologues, and in his new solo piece he looks that darkness square in the face. Twenty years ago his adored grandfather was murdered, a crime that’s never been solved, and not long afterward his 40-year-old alcoholic father killed himself. Now that Belknap–an […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Reverence: The Films of Owen Land
A startlingly original filmmaker, Owen Land lived in Chicago in the 70s but dropped out of sight years ago. His films, also long unavailable, are at once hilarious and hermetic, playing complex word and image games that can’t be fully unraveled. In the longest and best on this the first of two programs, On the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
System of a Down, Hella
SYSTEM OF A DOWN are nu metal’s Mothers of Invention: they make left turns out of nowhere, segueing from Slipknot to Sublime, and write dumbed-down but sneakily political lyrics about giant cocks and “gonorrhea gorgonzola” and suchlike. Singers Daron Malakian and Serj Tankian play at being hammy meatheads, parodying the snotty Blink-182 whine and the […]