News broke on Monday that Oluwatoyin Salau, a 19-year-old Black Lives Matter activist, was found dead in Tallahassee days after she’d tweeted about being sexually assaulted by a Black man. On Tuesday a video of a young Black woman being thrown into a Dumpster by a group of Black men went viral, and later the same day a video of a Black man hitting a Black woman in the face with a skateboard spread across tens of thousands of Twitter feeds....
Joe Berrios—one of the last vestiges of Chicago machine politics who stacked his payroll with relatives and oversaw a vastly unfair property tax system—is out. “I think that he’s probably going to enjoy his retirement, but he wants to make sure the office is transitioned in a great way,” said Jacob Kaplan, executive director of the Cook County Democratic Party. Even though Fritz Kaegi is the favorite to win and is leading in the results, the election might not be completely resolved tonight, as a third candidate, Andrea Raila, is planning to challenge the results in court....
Producer and songwriter Justice Hill, 29, got his start in the Chicago scene in the mid-2010s playing keyboards as a sideman. He also makes soulful hybrid pop under his own name, and in April he released his debut full-length album, Room With a View. On Saturday, August 14, he’ll play a patio show at the Hideout with his group Nightime Love. I went to Berklee for two and a half years....
Style this well coordinated doesn’t come ready; marketing student Allison Roa, 20, adapted most of her garments to create a cohesive look in which even the shoelaces were accounted for: “I decided to put on green laces with pink and green beads just to match my hair, and then the outfit as a whole,” she says. “The bag, I thrifted it and added a heart pom-pom because it looked too simple on its own....
Last week, we offered a (very partial) guide to some theater and dance events (as well as pop-up performances, playwrights, and artist-activists) that our writers and some curators in the community are excited about this fall. This week, we’re following up with tips from two visual arts curators, as well as ideas for getting out of your house and enjoying some views of other homes and landmarks through (socially distanced) architectural tours....
Isa Giallorenzo Kim Gordon at the 25th Chicago Humanities Festival So what was Kim Gordon wearing during her interview at the Music Box Theatre for the 25th Chicago Humanities Festival? A very French, very Françoise Hardy look—motorcycle jacket and all. She came off as a Francophile too—so laid back that her silences and half answers turned out to be the highlight of the evening. When interviewer Alison Cuddy said she hoped things got less awkward as the talk proceeded, Gordon responded with a doubtful look that made the audience crack up....
A couple of weeks ago, Reader contributors Kaylen Ralph and Catey Sullivan wrote about streaming productions with resonance for this double whammy nightmare season of Halloween and Possibly The Last Free Elections in the United States. (Oh, and there՚s still a deadly pandemic raging.) They joined Reader theater and dance editor Kerry Reid in an e-mail discussion of what stories like this mean in these very anxious days. Below is an edited version of that dialogue....
ARTIST: John Garrison SHOW: Kali Masi, Two Houses, the Jacob Horn Trio, Acceptor, and Dan K at Quenchers Saloon on Sat 6/9 MORE INFO: johngarrisonart.com
Allosexual Used within the asexual community to mean someone who is not asexual Bear A person within male gay culture who projects an image of rugged masculinity Bottom surgery Typically refers to three types of surgeries: vaginoplasty, phalloplasty, or metoidioplasty Datemate A gender-neutral term for a person you are dating Gaff A device that hides the bulge of a penis Grandy Gender-neutral term for grandma or grandpa
When local label and collective FeelTrip hosted a showcase at Beat Kitchen last month headliners Peoples Temple of America were about to release an album called Trust No Man. Guitarist Ben Leach tells me the pop-leaning punk outfit began working on the record in the summer of 2013, and Trust No Man came out at the beginning of this year. PTA doesn’t sound like the other acts in the FeelTrip family, which includes psychedelic mastermind Dam Gila (aka Adam Gil of Yawn) and electronic wiz Starfoxxx (who cofounded the label), but all these musicians skew toward making music with strong hooks....
Night Shoot At the end of the month, fresh local label Automatic Recordings will be putting out its fourth release, a double seven-inch EP called Night Shoot from local rowdy rock ‘n’ roll four-piece Mama. The band’s been kicking since 2011, self-releasing tapes of goofy, over-the-top, shreddy cock-rock, but on today’s 12 O’Clock Track, Night Shoot‘s preview song “25 Forever,” these guys have smoothed things out and let their giddy power-pop influences shine....
With his 2014 breakout release, The Water[s], Chicago rapper Mick Jenkins demonstrated that his complex vision and deep lyrics benefit from the large canvas of a full-length record. That said, he cooks on EPs too. At the top of January, he dropped The Circus (Free Nation/Cinematic Music Group), which despite running less than 20 minutes provides him with plenty of time for clever verses. Atop the sleepy synths of “Different Scales,” Jenkins surveys hip-hop’s complicated landscape, framing his observations with a reference to Chief Keef’s underground staple “Faneto”: “Sosa been call this shit here the zoo,” he raps with levelheaded clarity and an unruffled flow....
Hyperprolific rapper and Culture Power45 label co-owner Marcellous “Infinito 2017” Lovelace and Chicago hip-hop scene player Sterling “Pugs Atomz” Price are both former members of the Nacrobats crew, and when Lovelace asked Pugs last year about releasing a vinyl compilation of old Nacrobats tracks, it kicked off a wave of celebrations that will continue through 2020. Pugs founded Nacrobats as a Kenwood Academy student in 1993, and the group ballooned to around 200 members before dissolving in 2003....
When Hurricane Maria ravaged Puerto Rico last fall, many of its residents sought temporary and permanent housing opportunities in Chicago. In November 2017, city employees and volunteers assisted evacuees at the Humboldt Park Field House with medical attention, winter supplies, and housing information. The result was a story about the role of public spaces in the aftermath of a devastating event. The exhibition was on display from May 4- 25 and will soon travel to New York, Orlando, and San Juan, Puerto Rico....
I listen to music for most of every day, every week, and I can say without hesitation that the majority of music released today shouldn’t be. Though professional and competently played, it’s so generic—so lacking in passion or purpose—that I don’t know how the musicians involved can imagine that anyone would bother to engage with it. It’s not that I’m too jaded to hear value in anything anymore—rather, I’ve learned how much genuinely interesting new music is being made, and I don’t want to waste my too-scarce hours on anything else....
Welcome to the Reader‘s weekday news brief. What possible Emanuel challenger Paul Vallas could bring to the table in 2019 Speculation has grown that former Chicago Public Schools chief executive officer Paul Vallas will challenge Mayor Rahm Emanuel in the 2019 mayoral race. The former candidate for governor and lieutenant governor has helped turn around several urban school districts and served as the city’s budget director for three years. He’s resigning from his current position as Chicago State University chief administrative officer in March, which has fueled even more speculation that he’ll become the most formidable Emanuel challenger....
Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Wednesday, October 25, 2017. Report: More than 160 former, banned CPS staffers working for charter, contract schools More than 160 former Chicago Public Schools employees “caught abusing students or stealing from the school district later landed jobs in the city’s privately managed charter and contract schools, the schools inspector general has found,” according to the Sun-Times. Three of the 163 barred employees were accused of sexual abuse by students and consequently given “Do Not Hire” status by the district....
The Reader’s archive is vast and varied, going back to 1971. Every day in Archive Dive, we’ll dig through and bring up some finds. In order to write his profile, Bogira spent many (very long) days with Cousins and delved into his life story, from his early life in Mississippi through his growing up in Memphis and the south side, his years at the University of Illinois and Harvard Law, his service in the Korean War, and his rise in Chicago law and politics, where he was known as both incorruptible and an outspoken opponent of the death penalty....
