Posts

While it’s impossible to pinpoint a single peak in John Coltrane’s vast discography, Ascension is one of his most intense expressions of transcendental intent. Local musician Joshua Abrams knows his Coltrane, so it’s no accident that he’s given the name Descension to this summit between his group Natural Information Society and English saxophonist (and fellow Coltrane aficionado) Evan Parker, recorded in 2019 at London’s Cafe Oto. The title of the 75-minute piece suggests downward movement, but the recording proves just as effective as Coltrane’s music at inducing an ecstatic state—even though it incorporates influences that never showed up in the master’s work....

The Back Room Deal features radio personality and longtime Reader political writer Ben Joravsky arguing local Chicago politics with Reader staff writer Maya Dukmasova. With sharp wit and stinging analysis, Joravsky and Dukmasova cut through the smoky haze of the elections to offer you a glimpse of the current Chicago races—ward-level and, of course, mayoral. Will these historic elections be determined in back-room deals, like so many in Chicago’s past? Let Ben and Maya talk you through it....

ARTIST: Daniel MacAdamSHOW: Of Montreal and Deerhoof at Metro on Fri 3/13MORE INFO: crosshairchicago.com

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Thursday, September 1, 2016. Former CPS chief (and U.S. Secretary of Education) Arne Duncan on charter schools Arne Duncan sings the praises of charter schools in a new piece for the Atlantic. He briefly discusses his time running Chicago Public Schools, but mostly focuses on the general benefits of charter schools, and says it doesn’t matter whether a great school is a charter or not....

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. It’s nice to remember what an engaging book Eat, Pray, Love was, before overpopularity ruined it.

Jim Becker and Joe Adamik are resolute sidemen and longtime fixtures of Chicago’s live-music scene. The former often plays fiddle, guitar, and banjo in rootsy settings, both straight and twisted, while the latter appears most often these days drumming with jazz and improvisational combos. Their partnership began in 2000, when they were both members of polymorphous rock band Califone, and carried on when Iron & Wine recruited most of Califone in 2010....

The limousine as petri dish in Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis It’s been a while now since David Cronenberg opened a film with a proper credits sequence, as opposed to printing a few titles and leaving the remaining credits for the end. Until recently, the credits sequence had been a mainstay of his work. The Canadian filmmaker often said in interviews that he valued the convention since it created a buffer zone between reality and the world of the film....

The story Anthony Whitaker tells in his 90-minute country-and-western musical is the stuff of George Jones and Tammy Wynette songs: Donna (ably played by Kelly Combs), a southern gal in her late 20s/early 30s, tries to restart her life after she d-i-v-o-r-c-e-s her high school sweetheart after years of an abusive marriage. Or it could be, if Whitaker—who wrote the book, the songs, and the lyrics—was a stronger storyteller. The elements are there for a good yarn: a relatable problem, potentially interesting country-song characters (shrill, Bible-thumping little sis, kindly neighbor, hard-drinking ex), a southern setting (Greenville, South Carolina, circa 1980)....

Welcome to Flopcorn, where Reader writers and contributors pay tribute to our very favorite bad movies. In this installment, digital managing editor Karen Hawkins celebrated this weekend’s Super Blood Wolf Moon by watching Under the Cherry Moon, Prince’s follow-up to Purple Rain, with her sister Valerie, cousin Diane, and partner Samantha. She hopes they someday find it in their hearts to forgive her. Prince both stars and directs, and legend has it that after the massive success of Purple Rain, the studio greenlit the project without seeing the script by first-time screenwriter Becky Johnston....

When Jill Hopkins saw a post on the Facebook discussion group Ukrainian Village Neighborhood Watch about a proposal to hire private security guards to patrol a portion of the neighborhood in cooperation with the Chicago Police Department, it raised red flags. Host of the talk show Morning AMp on WBEZ’s sister station, Vocalo, Hopkins lived in Ukrainian Village in the 2000s, and she regularly checks the neighborhood watch group, along with similar pages in a few other communities, as part of the research for her broadcast....

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Monday, November 14, 2016. Planned Parenthood’s services are in demand in Illinois after Trump victory There has been a 50 percent increase in requests for birth control services at local Planned Parenthood offices since Donald Trump won the presidential election last week. Women are likely worried about the future of President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act under a Trump administration, according to Katie Thiede, vice president of development for Planned Parenthood of Illinois....

Most folks use December to wind down the year’s final projects and prepare for some old-fashioned holiday hibernation, but this past December 7 local rappers Joshua Virtue and Ruby Watson dropped their debut EP as Free Snacks. Virtue and Watson display the casual chemistry of consistent collaborators on Eat Good Tape, and their punchy delivery enlivens the EP’s relaxed, funky, sample-heavy production. On Tuesday, January 15, Free Snacks perform at the Empty Bottle—their first headlining gig since Eat Good Tape came out, and thus a de facto release party....

The Chicago Reader won five prizes at the 41st annual Peter Lisagor Awards Friday night. The contest is presented by the Chicago Headline Club. The paper won all five categories for which it was a finalist: in-depth reporting; feature reporting; education reporting; photography; and arts reporting and criticism. Here are the winning journalists and their work: Bravo to @JR_Jones on his Lisagor Award for best arts reporting and criticism! Here’s the winning piece, about Bill Morrison and his found footage wizardry....

In April 1999, I conducted a phone interview with singular pianist, composer, and thinker Muhal Richard Abrams, who died Sunday at his Manhattan home at age 87. I was writing an article about the Chicago native in advance of a special performance at the Cultural Center in his honor—Mayor Richard M. Daley had proclaimed April 9 of that year Muhal Richard Abrams Day in the city. I remember being nervous about chatting with such a towering figure—a cofounder of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), he provided the organization with sure-handed leadership for decades, operating with thoughtful clarity and an unshakable sense of purpose....

With the release last Friday of a batch of police shooting videos, Chicago’s Independent Police Review Authority has given the public what it’s been clamoring for. But as visitors to IPRA’s portal have already learned, videos of police shootings rarely are clear, coherent, and germane. Many of the videos show “hours of things like cops milling around at crime scenes and grainy images of tree tops,” as WBEZ put it....

UPDATED to add video of interview and listening party from May 9. Singer, poet, and teaching artist Jamila Woods did a stint as city spokesperson during the press run for her 2016 debut, Heavn. She’s an activist herself, and mentoring is her method of choice. At Young Chicago Authors, a youth literary nonprofit where she serves as associate artistic director, she helps developing minds tap into their poetic selves and use their voices for change....

The snow is melting, which means it’s time to make Lollapalooza predictions! This wolf thinks Drake and ASAP Rocky are locks—hat tip to Fake Shore Drive mastermind Andrew Barber, who posted that to Twitter and ought to know. Reunited Armenian-­American metal band System of a Down could show, as could rapper Action Bronson, indie-pop singer Florence and whoever’s in the Machine now, and Mark Kozelek favorites the War on Drugs. Potential locals on the bill: Save Money group Leather Corduroys, rapper Mick Jenkins, and garage wunderkinds Twin Peaks....

Seven months and over 223,948 lives lost. As a theater practitioner who has given her heart, soul, and emotional well-being to her craft, I think a lot about how we protect artists going forward. As studios resume production, theater conservatories open up to students, and theatrical unions release their own COVID-19 guidelines, we have to consider the importance of personal boundaries and emotional safety of every individual involved with these productions....