Print Issue of March 29, 2018 (Volume 47, Number 25) by Chicago Reader

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S U I C I D E WA T C H Retired Chicago cop Dave Blancoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 14-year-old daughter Carli shot herself to death, sending the family on a mission to raise awareness of teen suicide. BY JOE WARD 12

2 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

THIS WEEK

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INTERIM EXECUTIVE EDITOR DAVE NEWBART CREATIVE DIRECTOR VINCE CERASANI DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY JAMIE RAMSAY CULTURE EDITOR AIMEE LEVITT FILM EDITOR J.R. JONES MUSIC EDITOR PHILIP MONTORO ASSOCIATE EDITORS STEVE HEISLER, JAMIE LUDWIG, KATE SCHMIDT SENIOR WRITER MIKE SULA SENIOR THEATER CRITIC TONY ADLER STAFF WRITERS MAYA DUKMASOVA, LEOR GALIL, DEANNA ISAACS, BEN JORAVSKY, PETER MARGASAK, JULIA THIEL SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR RYAN SMITH GRAPHIC DESIGNER SUE KWONG MUSIC LISTINGS COORDINATOR LUCA CIMARUSTI FILM LISTINGS COORDINATOR PATRICK FRIEL CONTRIBUTING WRITERS NOAH BERLATSKY, JORDANNAH ELIZABETH, ANNE FORD, ISA GIALLORENZO, JOHN GREENFIELD, ANDREA GRONVALL, KT HAWBAKER, JUSTIN HAYFORD, JACK HELBIG, IRENE HSIAO, DAN JAKES, MONICA KENDRICK, H. MELT, BILL MEYER, MICHAEL MINER, J.R. NELSON, MARISSA OBERLANDER, LEAH PICKETT, JANET POTTER, BEN SACHS, DMITRY SAMAROV, KATE SIERZPUTOWSKI, OLIVER SAVA, TIFFANY WALDEN, KEVIN WARWICK, BRIANNA WELLEN, DAVID WHITEIS, ALBERT WILLIAMS INTERN ASHLEY MIZUO ----------------------------------------------------------------

FEATURES

IN THIS ISSUE 4 Agenda The satire Women Laughing Alone With Salad at Theater Wit, Wes Anderson’s latest ﬁlm, Isle of Dogs, and more goings-on about town. Plus: our picks for alternative Easter and Passover events

CITY LIFE

7 Transportation Lima’s beautiful boulevard bike paths could be a hit in Chicago. 10 Politics Meet the trio of young Latino “Berniecrats” who shocked the Chicago political establishment on election night.

NEWS

Suicide watch

Since a retired Chicago cop’s 14-year-old daughter shot herself to death, the family has been on a mission to raise awareness of teen suicide. BY JOE WARD 12

ADVERTISING DIRECTOR CHRISTOPHER BEST SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER EVANGELINE MILLER DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL JOHN DUNLEVY ADVERTISING COORDINATOR HERMINIA BATTAGLIA

11 Religion This Passover, a group of teenage girls leads an exodus from rape culture.

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ON THE COVER: PHOTO BY MATTHEW GILSON. FOR MORE OF MATTHEW ’S WORK, GO TO MATTHEWGILSON.COM.

26 Shows of note Yo La Tengo, Majority Rule, Malcolm London, and more of the week’s best 29 Secret History Blues guitarist Joe Carter electriﬁed Chicago’s 1950s club scene, but he never recorded in his heyday.

ARTS & CULTURE

DISTRIBUTION CONCERNS distributionissues@chicagoreader.com

MUSIC & NIGHTLIFE

FOOD & DRINK

18 Theater The Goodman’s astute new Enemy of the People gives us a hero we can’t believe in. 19 Theater Do we really need another Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? Court Theatre thinks so.

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22 Movies With Ready Player One, Steven Spielberg ﬁnds his avatar.

31 Restaurant review: The Warbler The team behind Lincoln Square’s Gather attempt the allpurpose neighborhood restaurant. 33 Confections A Woodstock chocolate shop’s latest expansion will include a speakeasy and incubator kitchen.

CLASSIFIEDS

34 Jobs 34 Apartments & Spaces 35 Marketplace

MUSIC & NIGHTLIFE

Minimal techno master Wolfgang Voigt returns to his ‘imaginary, misty forest’

On the eve of the ﬁrst Chicago concert in nine years by his most beloved project, Gas, he answers questions from Whitney Johnson of Matchess. INTRO BY PETER MARGASAK 23

20 Dance The Process v. Product Festival at Columbia College demystiﬁes the choreography process. 20 Lit In My Lady’s Choosing, two writers create an interactive bodice ripper that’s both a send-up and a valentine. 21 Movies Mr. Rogers meets the Mexican drug cartels at the Doc10 documentary festival.

36 Straight Dope Why are processed foods supposed to be so bad for you? 37 Savage Love “What good’s a cock cage if you can escape from it?” 38 Early Warnings Posies, Snail Mail, Leon Bridges, and more shows to look for in the weeks to come 38 Gossip Wolf Emily Jane Powers writes pop songs ﬁt for a Pushcart anthology, and other music news.

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 3

AGENDA R

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Friday, March 30 @ 9:15pm Sunday, April 1 @ 9:15pm

I, Tonya

Animales Nocturnos Spanish playwright Juan Mayorga wrote this cryptic one-act 15 years ago, but its themes of immigration and urban isolation remain relevant, and they attracted Aguijón Theater managing director Marcela Muñoz. A stoic and cruel man preys on his downstairs neighbor and his wife after a new law encourages citizens to report individuals they suspect to be undocumented. Presented in alternating Spanish and English with accompanying supertitles, Muñoz’s production keeps its audience on its toes and its characters at a distance—literally—behind emblematic metal bars. Stilted and downplayed performances make it a mostly intellectual exercise rather than a visceral experience, but the questions it raises are undoubtedly substantive. —DAN JAKES Through 4/15: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 6 PM, Aguijón Theater, 2707 N. Laramie, 773-637-5899, aguijontheater.org, $25, $15 students, seniors, and educators. Bad Girls: The Stylists Akvavit Theatre stages the U.S. premiere of Astrid Saalbach’s Danish comedy, translated by Michael Evans and directed by Breahan Pautsch. Set in a hair salon, the caustic black comedy has a capable cast of five playing 28 characters, including the regular stylists (Kristin Franklin’s emotive and cheeky Mette stands out), customers of all ages and neuroses, and one mysterious stranger who propels the drama. Studying our concept of femininity seems to be the goal throughout the entire one-act, which sets the superficiality of a salon against larger life-cycle issues like weddings, children, and sexual dysfunction (heads-up on some explicit scenes and language here). With minimal plot and elements magical realism, this a tough one to digest for those used to linear storytelling. —MARISSA OBERLANDER Through 4/14: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 4 PM; also Mon 4/2, 8 PM, Strawdog Theatre, 1802 W. Berenice, 773-347-1350, chicagonordic.org, $25, $15 industry, students, and seniors. The Beauty Queen of Leenane Writer-director Martin McDonagh’s first play, originally produced in Galway in 1996,

4 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

about a mother and daughter locked in a toxic codependent relationship, is witty, brutish, and far too long. Yes, his characters are fascinating and complicated; it’s hard not to be beguiled by the play’s two loathsome/likable leads (ably played here by Wendy Robie and Kate Fry). But the story unfolds way too slowly. McDonagh’s highly repetitive dialogue, punctuated by sudden moments of outrageous violence, only drags things out. This isn’t necessarily director B.J. Jones’s fault; I remember repeatedly glancing at my watch 20 years ago when the play was ﬁrst produced in Chicago at Steppenwolf. And McDonagh’s fondness for squashing all hope for his characters—and for life in general—guarantees you’ll leave his play wanting less. —JACK HELBIG Through 4/22: Wed-Thu 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 2:30 and 8 PM, Sun 2:30 PM, Northlight Theatre, North Shore Center for the Performing Arts, 9501 Skokie, Skokie, 847673-6300, northlight.org, $30-$76. How I Learned to Drive Uncle R Peck is a polite man, able at his work, kind to those around him.

He helps with the dishes and tells his nephew Bobby never to be ashamed of crying. He teaches his teenage niece Li’l Bit to drive stick because “manual gives you control”—and he wants her to have control of her life. “I think men should be nice to women,” he says. In language that conjures up the sweet musk of the sodden fields of the south as easily as it evokes the casual barbarism of homegrown misogyny, Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer-winning How I Learned to Drive weaves a story of memory, manipulation, and pedophilia in 1960s America. As directed by Kayla Adams, the Artistic Home’s production, starring John Mossman and Elizabeth Birnkrant as Peck and Li’l Bit, is intense and devastating, shocking, and human. —IRENE HSIAO Through 5/6: Thu 7:30 PM, Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, the Artistic Home, 1376 W. Grand, 312-243-3963, theartistichome. org, $20-$32. Letter of Love (The Fundamentals of Judo) In this devised piece, four figures in mismatched shades of red discuss color theory, mothering, and the poetics of immateriality while elaborately judo-flipping one another. Mostly a vehicle for the fights, Aleksi Barrière’s show is based, oddly, on the lives of two

judo-trained modernist artists: Spanish playwright Fernando Arrabal and French painter Yves Klein. Arrabal, who used judo in his plays, blames his crazily fawning mother for ratting out her husband to Franco’s military police. Dejected Mom, voiced by Marzena Bukowska, gets her say, while Halie Ecker, another incarnation of Arrabal’s mother, this time at her most smothering, tangles suggestively on a mat with Mike Steele, who plays Arrabal. Then we get scenes from the biography of Yves Klein—for instance, Klein declaring that his newest paintings are henceforth “immaterial” yet still for sale—interlarded with quotations from his writings on color and martial arts. A confusing play. —MAX MALLER Through 4/22: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Trap Door Theatre, 1655 W. Cortland, 773-384-0494, trapdoortheatre.com, $20-$25. Merchant on Venice BomR bay-born playwright Shishir Kurup’s reworking of Shakespeare’s The

Merchant of Venice, written in blank verse the Bard could be proud of, focuses on Sharuk, a Muslim moneylender in contemporary LA’s Hindu-majority Indian-American community. When his rebellious daughter elopes with a Latino music producer, Sharuk—an arch-traditionalist in a secular culture—seeks vengeful gratification by demanding a chunk of flesh from his debtor Devender, a hipster venture capitalist. Kurup’s muscular, rhythmic text—at once classical and contemporary in its inventive wordplay—faithfully follows Shakespeare’s original story except for a suspenseful ending with a surprise 21st-century twist. Under Liz Carlin Metz’s skillful direction, the 15-member ensemble of this coproduction by the Rasaka and Vitalist theater companies delivers a show at once moving, funny, and exciting. Particularly impressive are Anish Jethmalani and Madrid St. Angelo as Sharuk and Devender and Priyank Thakkar as Sharuk’s comical servant. —ALBERT WILLIAMS Through 4/15: ThuFri 7:30 PM, Sat 2:30 and 7:30 PM, Sun 2:30 PM, Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln, 773-404-7336, rasakatheatre.com, $25. The Spitfire Grill In a small-town R diner, a woman overcomes her traumatic past to discover the beautiful

things in life. A musical adaptation of

the 1996 film, The Spitfire Grill has much in common with Broadway’s Waitress: The Musical, another adaptation that addresses similar themes and puts women in the spotlight. Performed in Ukrainian Village’s Windy City Cafe, Refuge Theatre Project’s production benefits from the ambience of a real restaurant, and director Christopher Pazdernik accomplishes a lot with minimal stage space and stripped-down technical elements. The second act is a rush of undercooked plot points, but the production is saved by the bond between Percy (Lauren Paris) and Shelby (Emily Goldberg), whose tender friendship gives them the strength to self-actualize. Their emotional highs counteract the shortcomings of the material, filling the cafe with warmth and compassion. —OLIVER SAVA Through 5/5: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 7 PM, Windy City Cafe, 1062 W. Chicago, 312-492-8010, refugetheatre.com, $30. Whales & Souls Based on its promotional materials, this “sensual fable for adults” centered on lesbian romance—by a company named Sexy Dirt Productions—sounds like some sort of abstract burlesque storytelling session. In reality, it’s closer to a Lorax-style ecology metaphor, only with a guy writhing around and simulating female masturbation. The ghoulish decadent narrator Randy (Chris Roe), a park tour guide, tells the campfire story of a ghost town’s ruination involving a clockmaker, capitalism, a lake monster, and horny witches. The trouble is, it’s difficult to imagine an audience both young enough to not wince at the cartoonish storybook aesthetic of Andrew Kramer’s piece and old enough to handle the sexually explicit material. For what it’s worth, Roe certainly goes for it in his depictions of seven characters, though I’m still scratching my head about what “it” is. —DAN JAKES Through 3/31: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Collaboraction, 1579 N. Milwaukee, 312-226-9633, sexydirtproductions.com, $20. Why Do You Always Wear Black? Organic Theater presents this take on the female characters in the plays of Anton Chekhov. Over a very long 60 minutes, four actresses run on- and offstage, recite monologues, pantomime emotions, and crumble sleevefuls of saltines. According to press materials,

Women Laughing Alone With Salad é CHARLES OSGOOD PHOTOGRAPHY

Best bets, recommendations, and notable arts and culture events for the week of March 29

these non sequitur vignettes are supposed to interrogate women’s roles in 19th-century Russia and in our own time and question whether Chekhov truly gave women their due. But had I not read the playbill, I’d have had no idea the women onstage had anything to do with Chekhov. Nor are there any references to women’s plight today. No question—including that of the title—is answered. What we’re left with is a bunch of unrelated skits and a lot of wasted crackers. Anna Gelman directed, and the ensemble devised the piece. —DMITRY SAMAROV Through 4/8: WedFri 8 PM, Sat 3 and 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln, 312-634-0199, organictheater. org, $25. Women Laughing Alone With R Salad Sheila Callaghan’s 2015 satire is more a series of tableaux

than a play: scenes of urban American psychosexual dysfunction. Driven mad by lifestyle memes, big Meredith pushes hard for a sexy-tough-girl persona; tiny, yoga-obsessed Tori memorizes the menus for brunches she’ll never eat; aging Sandy lets garra rufa fish exfoliate her to the bone; and they all pretend to like, no, love, no, celebrate eating salad. Meanwhile, the guy—appropriately named Guy—who connects them all imagines that he’s Kerouac disguised as a barista. The pieces are held together to some extent by the continuity of the characters, but the really powerful bond is the ferocious, culture-eating acid of Callaghan’s wit, hilariously rendered by Devon de Mayo’s staging for Theater Wit. The second act doesn’t culminate things so much as dance them off with some future-is-female cheerleading. Still, you’d be a fool to miss the first act on that account. —TONY ADLER Through 4/29: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Theater Wit, 1229 W. Belmont, 773-975-8150, theaterwit.org, $19-$70.

MOVIES More at chicagoreader.com/movies NEW REVIEWS The Citizen In the opening scene R of this poignant drama, an African refugee who has lived in Budapest for

years (ﬁrst-time actor Marcelo CakeBaly) fails an oral exam required for Hungarian citizenship. Determined to pass the next test, he pays for private lessons from a local teacher, a married woman about his age, and their intellectual bond evolves into romance. Other characters threaten their happiness, reminding us of the racism, both hidden and overt, that nonwhite immigrants face in majority-white countries. But what might have felt like a heavy-handed movie of the week instead seems natural and timely, largely because of Cake-Baly’s grounded performance; he infuses the role with genuine emotion drawn from his own refugee experience. Roland Vranik directed his own script.

In Hungarian with subtitles. —LEAH PICKETT 108 min. Screens as part of the European Union Film Festival; for a full schedule visit siskelfilmcenter.org. Fri 3/30, 8 PM, and Tue 4/3, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center. Final Portrait Geoffrey Rush so excels at playing real-life figures—pianist David Helfgott (Shine), the Marquis de Sade (Quills), Leon Trotsky (Frida), Peter Sellers (The Life and Death of Peter Sellers)—that one welcomes the very idea of him as sculptor and painter Alberto Giacometti. This tongue-in-cheek biopic, written and directed by Stanley Tucci, catches the artist in 1964, near the end of his career, as he fumes and fusses over a portrait of U.S. art critic James Lord. Played with cosmopolitan charm by Armie Hammer, the critic deeply admires Giacometti and gamely sticks it out as the painter struggles to get the face just right, and their afternoon sitting stretches out over weeks. The gag is that the revered artist has no idea where he’s going with the canvas and will follow his brush around for all eternity if no one makes him stop. With Tony Shalhoub and Sylvie Testud. —J.R. JONES R, 90 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6, Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21. Ice Mother In this Czech drama, a 67-year-old widow (Zuzana Kronerová) finds love, friendship, and a renewed sense of purpose after joining a winter swimming club for seniors. Director Bohdan Sláma refuses to infantilize or condescend to his elderly characters: the protagonist is a complex, independent spirit, and her love interest (Pavel Nový), a homeless septuagenarian who sleeps on the swimming group’s bus, defies the lusty geezer stereotype with his confidence and enigmatic sex appeal. Unfortunately the middle-aged people often seem like caricatures, particularly the woman’s two vile sons; one is a mooch, the other a snob. In Czech with subtitles. —LEAH PICKETT 106 min. Screens as part of the European Union Film Festival; for a full schedule visit siskelfilmcenter.org. Sat 3/31, 8 PM, and Wed 4/4, 8:15 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center. Isle of Dogs Wes Anderson R returns to stop-motion animation— the form that generated one of his best

features, The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)— for this fanciful tale of renegade pooches in Japan. Twenty years in the future, canine overpopulation and disease force the mayor of ﬁctional Megasaki City to banish every dog to a nearby trash island, where they live out a bleak and hungry existence until the day the mayor’s young ward crash-lands his plane among them. The little crew of alpha dogs (given voice by Bryan Cranston, Bill Murray, Edward Norton, Bob Balaban, and Jeﬀ Goldblum) were modeled on the hard-bitten characters in Akira Kurosawa’s crime dramas, and the magical settings, obsessively detailed in the Anderson manner, were inspired by the woodblock prints of the Edo period. Mr. Fox, based on a Roald Dahl book, had a winsomeness this movie lacks, but the director and his hip writing

partners (Jason Schwartzman, Roman Coppola, Kunichi Nomura) infuse their imaginary world with winning deadpan humor. —J.R. JONES PG-13, 101 min. ArcLight, Century 12 and CineArts 6, Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21, Webster Place.

Montparnasse Bienvenue In the opening scene of this fast-moving French comedy, a young woman ejected from her lover’s apartment beats her forehead bloody against the front door— and she’s just getting started. Laetitia Dosch gives a wildly funny performance as the red-headed heroine, Paula, whose audacity knows no bounds: needing a job and a place to sleep, she first passes herself off as an experienced nanny and later crashes with a stranger who’s mistaken her for a long-lost friend. The easiest route to a roof over her head would be finding another man to take her in, but she’s still obsessed with her lover— an up-and-coming photographer whose most famous image is a portrait of her— and she treats the dance-club lotharios in her orbit like so much chopped liver. Paula flies off the handle whenever anyone points out that she’s now “a free woman”; from her perspective, freedom is nothing but chaos, and she’s more

agrees to her treatment, admitting, “I’m an open wound.” One might say the ﬁlm is illuminating in its opacity: one comes to it expecting bold insights into mental illness but leaves with a new appreciation of how invisible such illness can be. In French with subtitles. —J.R. JONES 87 min. Fri 3/30-Thu 4/5. Facets Cinematheque. SPECIAL EVENTS Best of CineYouth Award winners from the 2017 CineYouth Film Festival, which is open to ﬁlmmakers aged 22 years and younger. Wed 4/4, 6:30 PM. Chicago Cultural Center. F

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Open screening A free-form assortment of ﬁlms, either completed, excerpted, or in progress. Work should be “family friendly” and run 20 minutes or less; DVD, Blu-ray, and electronic ﬁles accepted. Sat 3/31, 8 PM. Chicago Filmmakers. F Raising Bertie Director Margaret Byrne started out making a documentary about the Hive, an alternative school in predominantly black Bertie County, North Carolina, but the school ran out of funds and shut down, so she decided

Final Portrait than willing to share hers with everyone else. Léonor Serraille directed this sharp debut feature. In French with subtitles. —J.R. JONES 98 min. Screens as part of the European Union Film Festival; for a full schedule visit siskelﬁlmcenter.org. Fri 3/30 and Mon 4/2, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center. 12 Days In France, any person involuntarily committed to a mental hospital is entitled to a judicial hearing within 12 days. Raymond Depardon, best known in the U.S. for his documentary The 10th District Court: Judicial Hearings, shot dozens of these sessions by special arrangement with the court, and his ﬁlm singles out ten of these lost souls as they try to explain themselves to a “liberty and custody” judge. One subject spontaneously punched a stranger on the street, another compulsively interrupts the judge, and yet another claims that he hears “the voice of the electric chair.” More often, however, the patients seem lucid and self-knowing; one even

to follow three male students as they returned to the public high school. Things are rough for them there: they’re all two or three grades behind, dealing with poverty and family dysfunction, and as Byrne tracks their progress over five years, their career prospects in the rural area settle at the level of barbering, landscaping, harvesting, and serving up fast food. Byrne wanted to call attention to the poor education afforded these young men, and her best evidence is her own subjects: one needs his mother to fill out his job applications for him, and another is still playing for the football team as he struggles to graduate at age 21. Near the end of the documentary the Hive reopens as a small community-resource center, which highlights the need for more social services in the boondocks but also reminds you that the original school played its part in leaving these young men unprepared. —J.R. JONES 105 min. Byrne attends the screening. Thu 4/5, 7 PM. Northwestern University Block Museum of Art. F v

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 5

AGENDA R

READER RECOMMENDED

b ALL AGES

G Send your events to agenda@chicagoreader.com

Adult Easter Egg Hunt at Longman & Eagle é CAROLINA M. RODRIGUEZ

EASTER & PASSOVER

Buck tradition—and matzo, and Peeps—at these weekend events Adult Easter Egg Hunt Search around Logan Square R to win prizes from Jim Beam, Revolution Brewing, and more. After the two-hour hunt, celebrate with food and drinks at a block party. Proceeds beneﬁt One Tail at a Time, a pet adoption center. Sun 4/1, noon-4 PM, Longman & Eagle, 2657 N. Kedzie, 773-276-7110, longmanandeagle.com, $5.

BKB Eggstravaganza R Vertical Egg Hunt Kids ages four to 12 are invited to climb

their way to Easter eggs hidden high among the climbing walls of Brooklyn Boulders. Adult supervision required. Sat 3/31, 9 AM-noon, Brooklyn Boulders Chicago, 100 S. Morgan, brooklynboulders.com/ eggstravaganza, $20 (adults free).

Easter Basket Soccer Tournament Grab six buddies, lace up cleats, and spend Easter competing at this seven-versus-seven indoor soccer tournament. Each team is guaranteed at least three games, and prizes are awarded at the end. Sun 4/1, 2:30-7:30 PM, CIBC Fire Pitch, 3626 N. Talman, 773-327-3473, ﬁre-pitch.com, $30.

6 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

Easter Sunday brunch at Hopcat Forget communion wafers. Today’s menu includes mac-and-cheese sandwiches, White Russian-inspired waﬄes, and a Bloody Mary bar. Sun 4/1, 10 AM-3 PM, HopCat, 2577 N. Clark, 312-257-2599, hopcat. com.

Jewish grandmother who “sings pop and disco parodies about her three grown children while discussing her upcoming Passover Seder.” Sat 3/31, 7 PM, Second City de Maat Theatre, 230 W. North, third ﬂoor, 312-337-3992, secondcity. com, $13.

He Is Risen In this Easter-only sketch show, four pastors from the ﬁctional Trembling Mountain Church preach the good news. Expect sacrilege. Sun 4/1, 8 PM, Annoyance Theatre, 851 W. Belmont, 773-697-9693, theannoyance. com, $8.

RVA brunch fund-raiser In support of Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Rape Victims Advocates (RVA) throws an Easter brunch to raise money for trauma resources and legal services. DJ Ruby Des Jardins, a volunteer at RVA, spins tracks. Sun 4/1, 11 AM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600, emptybottle.com. F

Marshmallow Drop Thousands of marshmallows rain down from a helicopter, with three separate drops for diﬀerent age ranges. Prizes are given for most marshmallows collected. Also, don’t eat them. Fri 3/30, 11 AM-12 PM, James Park, Oakton and Dodge Streets, Evanston, 847-448-8260, cityofevanston. org. F Merriam: A Matzah Ballin’ Good Time Celebrate the second evening of Passover with the comedic character Merriam Levkowitz, a

Vibrational Sound Journey and Gong Wash Find Zen in the tug-ofwar that is the holidays by immersing yourself in the “sacred sounds” of ﬂutes, bells, hand drums, gongs, and more. Blankets, pillows and comfortable clothes encouraged. Sun 4/1, 6:30-8:30 PM, Japanese Culture Center, 1016 W. Belmont, 773-525-3141, japaneseculturecenter. com, $30 in advance, $35 at the door. v

CITY LIFE

TRANSPORTATION

Peruvian pedaling

One of Lima’s boulevard bike paths é JOHN GREENFIELD

Lima-style boulevard bike paths would be a nice addition to Chicago’s cycling network. By JOHN GREENFIELD

biked my way through Lima, Peru, earlier this month, and while the streets are crazy congested, one of the features I enjoyed the most was the capital city’s extensive system of boulevard bike paths— an idea I’d love to see copied in Chicago. Particularly in Lima’s cycle-friendly neighborhoods like hip Miraflores and tony San Isidro, the grassy medians of large streets like Avenida Arequipa (where the city’s car-free Ciclovía event takes place every week) often have cycling and walking routes running through the center. These trails link up nicely with the city’s popular bike path, which runs through lush, palm-tree-studded parks on cliffs above the Pacific Ocean. I pedaled many of these boulevard routes on a couple of rides during my long weekend in Lima. That included an excellent excursion led by the rental and tour service Lima Bike to a hilltop observatory at the south end of the city, plus an independent ramble with my partner during the Ciclovía. The Tropic of Capricorn climate was ideal for cycling, and the paths were populated by a diverse mix of cyclists, from Lycra-clad roadies to sharply dressed older ladies with handlebar baskets full of flowers. The main impediments were the ubiquitous, slow-moving ice cream vendors on giant yellow trikes. Oboi Reed, the leader of the Chicago-based transportation justice group Equiticity, who traveled to Lima in February to give a talk at the World Bicycle Forum, agreed that the Arequipa bike path is “awesome.” Reed said he could imagine Chicago taking a similar approach in the medians of Stony Island Avenue, which would make it easier to pedal to the upcoming Obama Presidential Center from the far south side. The strategy might also work nicely on many of the grassy strips within Chicago’s extensive boulevard system, including thoroughfares like King, Drexel, the Midway Plaisance, Garfield, Western, 31st, California, Marshall, Douglas, Independence, Franklin, Sacramento/Humboldt, Kedzie, and Logan.

Jim Merrell, advocacy director for the Active Transportation Alliance, told me he feels the concept is deﬁnitely worth exploring. “Just like Active Trans has been advocating for using Chicago’s riverfront to create a new network of bike trails, the boulevard system represents this great existing resource, so that’s definitely an interesting idea,” he said. “The boulevards are a great place to look to create a safe, high-quality, low-stress bike network.” Merrell noted that Active Transportation’s first fund-raising event, launched decades ago when the group was called the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation, was the Boulevard Lakefront Tour, featuring a route that stitched together the aforementioned roadways. “The boulevard system was originally envisioned as an ‘emerald necklace’ connecting Chicago’s major parks, but like so many of our city’s resources, it was eventually turned over to cars. So boulevard bike paths would be a great way to honor that original legacy.” He added that the service drives of the boulevards, located closest to the sidewalks, might be another option for creating bike routes. Merrell acknowledged that there would be some traffic engineering challenges to work out. For example, when the Lima boulevards cross other major streets, cyclists are sometimes required to make three street crossings to get to the next median path, which is annoying. But this Peruvian approach could be a relatively simple way to greatly increase the number of family-friendly bikeways in our city without the political challenges that come from taking street space away from drivers. “So it’s a really intriguing concept that we’d really be eager to hear further discussion of,” Merrell said. Come on, Chicago Department of Transportation, how about taking this idea for a spin? While the boulevard bike paths proposal could take years to be realized (it’s possible there would be some backlash from local park preservationists if green space was turned

into paved trails), my Peru trip also left me wishing we could bring back Chicago’s version of the Ciclovía, dubbed Open Streets. The Ciclovía movement started in Bogotá, Colombia, decades ago and has since spread to cities all over the world. During Ciclovías, streets are closed to cars and opened for walking, biking, skating, and other forms of healthy recreation like Zumba and break dancing, often on a weekly basis. The events also promote social integration, since the car-free streets encourage people of different classes and races to visit each other’s neighborhoods.

Lima’s Ciclovía takes place every Sunday morning on several miles of Avenida Arequipa, which connects Miraflores with the historic city center. When I participated during my visit, I was struck by the event’s joyful vibe, with Limeños of all ages enjoying the sunshine on bike, foot, and scooter. Between 2008 and 2013, Active Trans staged a series of Open Streets events. But the nonprofit ultimately gave up on the effort due to a lack of organizational and financial help from City Hall. As Bogotá bike advocates I’ve spoken with have pointed out, Ciclovías are a highly cost-effective way to provide recreational opportunities across a city, something Chicago sorely needs. But given the previous lack of support for Open Streets from the Richard M. Daley and Rahm Emanuel administrations, plus our city’s current budget problems, I won’t hold my breath for City Hall to step up. v

John Greenfield edits the transportation news website Streetsblog Chicago. m @greenfieldjohn

It’s Not a Job, It’s a Career Learn More about the Carpenters Apprentice and Training Program. Visit www.CarpentersUnion.Org Or Call 847-640-7373

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 7

SPONSORED ADVERTISEMENT

It’s one thing for a store owner to open a location in a new Chicago neighborhood, but it’s quite

another to become so charmed with the area that you actually move there yourself. For Tiffany

Paige and Mike Biersma, co-owners of the award-winning boutique Modern Cooperative, “where vintage modern meets handmade,” that’s exactly the seductive pull Hyde Park had on them, the community they’re now proud to call home. Originally Pilsen residents, the couple opened the Modern Cooperative Hyde Park location in November 2015. Right from the start, the store became a shopping destination on 53rd Street with its curated combination of mid-century modern and vintage Danish furniture, modern Scandinavian-inspired home décor accessories, and unique pieces from over 90 local artists, predominantly from the Chicago area. Modern Cooperative has been attracting design-savvy Chicago locals as well as destination shoppers since Tiffany and Mike opened the store’s ﬁrst location in Pilsen in 2012. It became one of city’s largest vintage modern boutiques with an expansion to Thalia Hall in 2013, collecting honors from TimeOut Chicago, the Chicago Reader, and Chicago magazine and mentions in The New York Times, Travel + Leisure, The Boston Globe, Chicagoist, Chicago Social, and more. The store’s new and vintage offerings are a nice complement, because as Tiffany explains, “… mid-century modern furniture came out of a time when re-

sources were short after a war and the local handmade movement really caught on and got much stronger after the recession and people really had to look inside themselves and become more resourceful. So both movements, to me, make a lot of sense working together.” Even before the store opened, when they were spending long days moving inventory and setting up displays, Tiffany and Mike were struck by the friendliness and sense of community in Hyde Park. They became regulars at some of the local businesses for after work dinner and drinks, like A10 Hyde Park and Pizza Capri, and wondered what it might be like to live in the neighborhood. They made the move to Hyde Park in June 2016, and now live just two blocks away from their store. Tiffany says, “Everything you need is right here – you can run all your errands, you’re close to the lake, and people speak to each other and say hi on the street. It’s all super friendly and down to earth – like a small town in the big city – and I’ve made lots of friends in the last two years that I see on a regular basis.”

Modern Cooperative manager Megan Fox, a former resident of Bridgeport, decided to move to Hyde Park in the summer of 2017. She had never been to the neighborhood before the store opened, but now lives just one block away. No one at the store seems to be immune to the area’s charms. Even part-time employee Diana Arce has recently moved to nearby South Shore. Some of Modern Cooperative’s most unique ﬁnds come from local estate sales, and Tiffany loves the story of buying an original Danish teak dining room table and chairs from the estate of a retired Hyde Park professor, restoring it for the store, and then later selling it to a young family from the neighborhood. The dining set may have had a long history, but it didn’t have a long journey – it was originally bought in the 1970s on the same 53rd Street block as Modern Cooperative from the former Scandinavian design store, Scan Furniture. And just like Tiffany and Mike Biersma, it’s staying in the neighborhood. 1500 E. 53rd Street 872.244.7477 moderncooperative.com

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 9

CITY LIFE (Front) Beatriz Frausto-Sandoval, Alma Anaya, and Aaron Ortiz with (back) Jesús “Chuy” García and Bernie Sanders é VIA FACEBOOK

POLITICS

Making history

Meet the three young Latino “Berniecrats” who shocked the Chicago political establishment on election night.

By RYAN SMITH

esús “Chuy” García had a good excuse for waving a broom onstage at his election-night party like a zealous White Sox fan celebrating a series sweep. It was meant to symbolize a sweep of the electoral kind. The mustachioed congressional candidate had easily won his primary, and his slate of young Latino candidates from the southwest side—Alma Anaya, Beatriz Frausto-Sandoval, and Aaron Ortiz (plus Cook County assessor candidate Fritz Kaegi)—all stood victorious that night. “We have made history. You’ve made history,” he told the cheering crowd at the Apollos 2000 theater in Little Village. Politicians are usually full of hyperbolic bluster when they make proclamations about “making history,” but García may have been on to something. On a night when a pair of aging white men with deep pockets grabbed the headlines in the gubernatorial race, three political neophytes—all millennial-aged people of color who align themselves closely with Bernie Sanders’s insurgent wing of the Democratic Party—staged a minor coup of the

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Chicago machine on the southwest side. “[They were] young people of color who were first-time candidates. They took on big-money interests and the Democratic machine, and they won,” said Emma Tai, executive director of progressive organization United Working Families, the Illinois partner of the Working Families Party. The UWF endorsed all three candidates. “We stand ready to take on the corporate Democrats who have let incarceration, violence, gentriﬁcation and unemployment ravage our communities. And [the] results show that the voters are with us.” Who would have thunk it? Few gave Ortiz a shot in hell of ousting state rep Dan Burke in the First District. The incumbent and his brother, Alderman Ed Burke, are part of a powerful political dynasty that has endured for so long Ortiz wasn’t even born when Dan Burke ﬁrst took office in 1991. Did a 26-year-old high school counselor from Back of the Yards really think he was going to beat an established cog in the Chicago machine while getting outspent three to one? The SunTimes editorial board practically sneered at

the idea, saying in an endorsement of Burke that Ortiz’s campaign “should be a wake-up call to Chicago progressives to put forth an even mildly experienced candidate who can beat an incumbent on the issues.” It wasn’t the only time Ortiz was dismissed as a serious candidate—he heard a lot of criticisms based on his age or identity. “The worst was on Election Day when I heard someone from the Burke team say, ‘If we get this young kid from Gage Park or Back of the Yards, he’s going to bring gangbangers into the neighborhood,’” he says. “I guess they have this mentality about me because I’m Latino and from the neighborhood. It’s very frustrating.” Despite the long odds, Ortiz edged out Burke by about 700 votes, 53 percent to 47, which shocked almost everyone—including the winner of the contest. “Even right now, I still can’t believe it,” Ortiz said last week at the “Team Chuy” office at 3520 S. Archer, his voice still hoarse from the election night celebration. “We actually pulled this whole thing off.” You could make a convincing case that Anaya—who worked for García before running for the county commissioner seat he was vacating—was an even more unlikely candidate than Ortiz. She’s a 28-year-old native of Guadalajara who immigrated to Pilsen from Mexico with her family at age six. During her high school years, she and her mother and sisters fled her father because of what she describes as a “domestic violence situation” that left them without a home for an extended period of time. Life as both an undocumented immigrant and a homeless teen left her feeling incredibly disenfranchised. “I stayed in the shadows—I never told anybody that I was homeless and undocumented because you automatically have this stigma,” says Anaya, who has since become a U.S. citizen. It wasn’t until her ﬁrst fund-raising event a few months ago that she began speaking openly about these parts of her biography. But it turned out doing so opened doors rather than closing them, and Anaya eventually made her life story a central message of her campaign. “I was undocumented and homeless” began one of her video ads. “I had so many people coming

up to me and saying, your story inspires me,” she says. Even with a message that resonated with many constituents, Anaya faced an uphill battle against well-connected Democratic opponent Angie Sandoval, who had the political and ﬁnancial backing of her father, state senator Martin Sandoval, and state senator Tony Muñoz. Pilsen and other parts of her district were blanketed with anti-Anaya mailers during the last couple weeks before the election, some of which struck an anti-immigrant tone (“Alma Anaya isn’t from here,” read one mailer in bold print). Yet Anaya pulled off a upset over Sandoval by a 3,500-vote margin—57 percent to 43 percent. Frausto-Sandoval’s origin story has some similarities to Anaya’s. Her family was also from Guadalajara before moving to Chicago in the 1970s. Her career choice as an immigration lawyer was in part inspired by her father, a steelworker and union steward she described as suffering a lot of harassment and discrimination from his bosses and the police. As with a host of younger progressives, Frausto-Sandoval, 37, decided to run for office after the election of Donald Trump in 2016. “I think that this year we’ve been living under Trump, living with our immigrant communities under attack, all of us that come from immigrant families have felt the need to become more involved,” she says. Her attempt to become the ﬁrst Latina judge on Cook County’s 14th subcircuit wasn’t taken seriously in many circles. The Chicago Tribune’s endorsement of her opponent, Marina E. Ammendola, quoted a bar association saying that Frausto-Sandoval’s private practice “has not prepared her for the circuit court bench.” But that didn’t stop Frausto-Sandoval from being voted in by a significant margin, 58.1 percent to 41.9 percent. The three Team Chuy campaignmates believe their victories signal a rising tide of transformational progressive politics. “I definitely think it’s a continuation of what you’ve seen starting with 2015 with Chuy’s [mayoral campaign] and Bernie’s presidential campaign,” says Ortiz. “A lot of people in our community now understand that it is possible to have progressive leadership in their communities. But the only way to actually accomplish any progressive movements here in the southwest side is that we need to work together. I think this is just the beginning.” v Maya Dukmasova contributed reporting.

m @RyanSmithWriter

CITY LIFE

Left: The RTI interns with DePaul and JUF faculty at the ﬁrst-ever anti-rape culture seder last May at DePaul University. Above: The Haggadah é STEPHANIE GOLDFARB

RELIGION

The eleventh plague

This Passover, follow a group of teenage girls on an exodus from rape culture. By DEBRA FILCMAN

small group of Jewish teenage girls in Chicago believes in a promised land. Their belief is not as literal as the one they learn about each year at Passover seders—ritual dinners that celebrate Jews’ freedom from slavery in Egypt and arrival in Canaan—but just as real. After all, that story is thousands of years old, and they’re now fighting a different kind of oppression: rape culture. For these girls, the promised land is a future in which gender equality is the norm, and sexual violence is history. Their primary tool is “The Revenge of Dinah: A Feminist Seder on Rape Culture in the Jewish Community,” the Haggadah, or text that guides participants through the seder, that they completed last year. Their hope is that it will change the way people think about rape culture. A lofty goal, it began simply enough. A

diverse group of ten high school girls from the city and suburbs was selected for the ten-month paid Research Training Internship program run by the Jewish United Fund and DePaul University. As they came together twice a month to learn social research methodologies and discuss their experiences as young Jewish women, they realized, for the ﬁrst time, that there was language to express thoughts and feelings they’d had for years. “When it came to rape culture, a lot of my students had never heard that term,” says Stephanie Goldfarb, director of youth philanthropy and leadership at the JUF and the director of RTI. “But we would ask, ‘What’s keeping you up at night?,’ and they were describing what rape culture is without knowing there was vocabulary for it.” They learned other terms too, like “toxic masculinity,” “victim blaming,” and “benevolent sexism.” But they selected “rape culture”

as the theme for the program’s culminating social justice project, the feminist Haggadah. They were prescient: they made the decision more than a year before the #MeToo campaign swept the nation. Two factors led them down this road. First, they learned about the oft-neglected tale from Genesis in which Dinah, the patriarch Jacob’s only daughter, is raped by the local prince. The girls were moved enough to give Dinah a seat at their seder table—the one usually reserved for Elijah, the prophet who, it is believed, will someday announce the arrival of the Messiah. Guests are invited to tear off pieces from the roll of duct tape that marks her seat, signifying the silence many victims of sexual violence are forced to endure. The second inspiration was the 2016 presidential election, which unfolded during the course of their internship. “The things I remember most was when

the Billy Bush tapes came out,” Jordana Bornstein, now 18, says, referring to the Access Hollywood tape on which then-presidential candidate Donald Trump said his approach to hitting on women was to “grab ’em by the pussy.” “It was a really good example of how these individual aspects of rape culture were happening right in front of our eyes,” she continues. “It was the first time I’d learned about something that I’d never heard before but observed so many times before. Having the more academic language was helpful for me to be able to digest it.” Fellow intern Becca Gadiel, now 17, notes, “A lot of the language we saw people in power and media using was happening on such a global scale, but it was also really personal. I wish I could say I was surprised by [how much the idea of rape culture resonated with the group], but unfortunately I know from my own experiences and from my friends in my high school that it can be a really big issue.” The prevalence and normalization of these experiences, like catcalling and street harassment, convinced Gadiel that the conversation had to continue. But she and the other interns wanted to make sure people did more than just talk, a desire that informed the way they altered traditional seder rituals. “This was the first time they had ever thought about Jewish ritual as something that belonged to them, and how they can make it their own,” Goldfarb says. Take the traditional four glasses of wine consumed during a seder, for example. Not anymore, the girls said. Instead, their Haggadah explains how alcohol plays a big role in rape culture and suggests skipping the wine. The ten plagues of Egypt, typically called out during the meal as a reminder of how God encouraged the Egyptians to release the Israelites? Nope. The new Haggadah offers a more modern take on plagues—specifically, the plagues of sexism and sexual violence—and includes “The RTI Ten Commandments of Being an Accomplice, Fighting Patriarchy, and Shutting Down Rape Culture.” “The Revenge of Dinah” is available to download for free on the JUF’s website, JUF. org, and the girls hope people will use it in their seders this weekend. “We’ve used [the Haggadah] during seders at our synagogues,” says Bornstein, “but when people start using in their homes, that’s when it will start to make a big impact.” v

m @DebFilcman MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 11

Dave and Sheila Blanco at their home in Hegewisch

SUICIDE WA T C H Retired Chicago cop Dave Blancoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 14-year-old daughter Carli shot herself to death, sending the family on a mission to heighten awareness of teen suicide. By JOE WARD PHOTOS BY MATTHEW GILSON

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The family has marked the spot on their driveway where 14-year-old Carli died.

DAVE BLANCO CALLED FOR HIS DAUGHTER CARLI, BUT SHE WASN’T THERE.

The 14-year-old had stayed home from school that day with a stomachache, but she was in good spirits, even laughing and joking with her father—a retired Chicago police lieutenant—as they watched YouTube videos on that Tuesday, April 4, 2017. The jovial nature of that morning was a welcome respite from the past few months, when Carli’s battle with mental illness had reached crisis levels. But after she received an acceptance letter to the highly competitive

Whitney Young High School—her dream school—and some treatment for her illness, Carli’s family thought she might have turned the corner. That day in particular, Carli seemed more happy than usual. Carli suggested she and her father get lunch at Zoup!, one of her favorite spots in Hegewisch, the southeast-side neighborhood where the family lives. Dave agreed and went to get ready, telling Carli to do the same. But when he got back, Dave quickly began to panic. After 30 years on the force, he sensed something was wrong—but even he wasn’t prepared for what he found.

After calling for her and getting no answer, Dave went outside through the open back door. He walked to the driveway, where he saw the grim scene: Carli had shot herself to death. Shock, grief, and a feeling of incomprehensible loss washed over him. So did the desire to die. “I wanted to go with her—immediately,” he recalls. He started screaming and panicking as he clutched his lifeless daughter. A neighbor, a police detective, heard the commotion, alerted 911, and ran over. “I was holding her. There was nothing I could do,” Blanco says. “I saw my gun laying there . . . I said J

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 13

Carli’s room is the same as it was before she died by suicide.

continued from 13 something like, ‘Wait for me, Carli. I’m coming with ya.’ And I put the gun to my head and I pulled the trigger.” The gun went off, but another officer who had quickly arrived at the scene was able to pull it away from Dave’s head at the last second. The bullet grazed his scalp, but he ended up largely uninjured. Carli’s mom, Sheila, rushed home from her job in the West Loop. “I said, ‘Who did I lose?,’” she said, recalling her conversation with a police officer when she arrived at the scene. “‘Did I lose one or two?’ I didn’t even talk to anybody. I just knew. It was a nightmare you can’t even explain to somebody.” THE TRAGIC END TO CARLI’S LIFE highlights a growing problem that’s being exacerbated by social media, increasing academic pressures, and a dearth of mental health services, and the stigma behind suicide continues to hinder progress on bringing the issue out into the open. In 1981, suicide was the sixth leading cause of death for kids aged ten to 14, according to the Centers for Disease Control. In 2016, it was the second leading cause of death for that group, and the third leading cause for those ages 15 to 24. That year, 6,159 people aged ten to 24 lost their lives to suicide, a 16 percent jump over the total in 1981. The

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number of suicides in 2016 was 840 more than the number of murders of teens and young adults the same year. On a per capita basis, the suicide rate for teen girls aged 15 to 19 was the highest in four decades in 2015. Despite the stigma behind the subject, Carli’s parents are working to help ﬁx the growing problem. The couple is sharing their story in hopes of reaching parents, teachers, and counselors who might suspect a child is suffering from mental health issues, which can also play a role in school shootings and other gun violence. The couple is still dealing with their own grief and guilt. But vocalizing their struggle could teach parents that their hang-ups about the subject or worries over violating children’s privacy aren’t worth losing a child. “It seems like you read every day somewhere some kid in the U.S. is taking their life,” Dave said. “It’s just unbelievable, the kids ten, 11, 12 years old. You think, what could be going on in their life to [make them] want to end it? We just feel like we want to do something.”

Since 1993, the Blancos have lived in the last house on a cul-de-sac in Hegewisch, a working-class neighborhood with many cops and other city employees. Carli lived with her parents and older sister, Katie, who is now a student at Illinois State University. Dave, 59, grew up in South Chicago with his ﬁrst-generation Mexican-American parents. His dad was an artist who worked at the nearby steel mills to help pay the bills, and his mom worked in the city’s senior citizens liaison office. Sheila, 53, grew up on a farm in northeast Iowa and eventually followed her two older sisters to Chicago, where the couple met in a bar. Sheila works for a food distribution company. Dave and Carli were close, and they shared a lot in common. Dave passed down his love of classical music and old movies to his daughter. One of their favorite activities was going to bookstores, and Dave found it hard to leave without buying his daughter a book or two. But instead of the books many middle-schoolers are attracted to, Carli would ask to buy chemistry books and college-level course books. Carli’s talents were seemingly endless. She was a straight-A student who dreamed of studying at the University of Oxford and becoming an astrophysicist. She could sing, play the piano and violin, and she took up the study of German and biochemistry on her own. Carli’s drawings in particular showed a voice and artistry rare in young teens, even if the subject of many of those drawings was her battle with depression. She was also a perfectionist, and any slight deviation from perfection would cause her great anxiety, her parents said. At one talent show, she played the keyboard and sang her dad’s favorite song, “Tiny Dancer.” Although everyone loved the performance, a minor mistake caused an anxiety attack and her dad later found her crying in the school’s basement. Carli’s activities also gave her solace from another problem: bullying. Kids at her school, the now-shuttered Saint Florian in Hegewisch, made fun of her appearance and her tendency to speak in a British accent and go by the name Sherlock (one of her favorite characters). At one point, two classmates threw rocks at her as she played at a nearby park. In sixth grade, Dave and Sheila noticed that Carli seemed depressed and had become withdrawn. “She was so happy and then suddenly, things just started to change,” Dave said. Bullying is obviously not a new phenomenon, but these days the attacks are coming in different ways, experts say. In decades past, bullying might have been conﬁned to more restricted hours, but cell phones and social media mean taunting messages can arrive at all hours of the day or night. And it’s easier for students to gang up on a target in a virtual environment where they don’t have to face their victims in person. What’s more, the put-downs—and humiliation—are now easily viewed by anyone with access to a victim’s Facebook page or Instagram or Snapchat feed. Because so much of her bullying happened online, Carli’s parents didn’t realize what was going on until it was too late, they said.

The photo that ran with Carli’s obituary

“Youths are not feeling that the world is a safe place, and social media is exacerbating that,” said Alexa James, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. “When it’s online, it’s constant harassment. Young people don’t necessarily have the capacity to negotiate those really big feelings.” Carli began burying further into her studies, teaching herself about string theory and memorizing every element on the periodic table. She suffered from bulimia and began withdrawing from friends. “She used to sit here and cry, ‘I don’t know why I’m so sad. I don’t know why I’m not happy,’” Dave said. As Carli’s problems grew, she transferred to Saint John the Baptist in Whiting, Indiana, for eighth grade and started seeing a school counselor. She also started meeting with a social worker every two weeks. Dave was able to spend more time with her too, having retired about a year before Carli’s death. But it wasn’t enough: Carli had told teachers she wished she could talk to her therapist more often. And when the social worker suggested she start seeing a psychiatrist, the family had trouble getting her an appointment with one. In early March 2017, the school principal called Dave and Sheila to say that students had heard Carli say she wouldn’t live to see her 14th birthday, which was only a couple weeks away. Dave and Sheila called a suicide prevention hotline, and were told to get Carli to a hospital. She was admitted, diagnosed with depression, and prescribed antidepressant medication. The diagnosis

seemed to offer Carli some relief: it eased the confusion surrounding her illness. After the hospitalization, Dave and Sheila were optimistic about their daughter’s prognosis. The acceptance letter from Whitney Young, which came at the end of her hospital stay, also helped. “We thought we were doing what we could to help her,” Dave said. “Even that last day, she seemed so happy.” CARLI’S BEDROOM LOOKS JUST AS IT DID before the tragedy. Virtually every space on the walls is covered in posters, much of it for British cultural exports like Doctor Who and Harry Potter. Bookshelves are stuffed with college textbooks and novels. Dozens of the popular cartoon bobblehead figures depicting Marvel and other movie characters remain in their boxes on top of Carli’s dresser, and her pet hedgehog still lives in its cage on a second dresser. On a recent weeknight, Dave and Sheila went through her belongings once again. Each item jogged a memory, like a trip to Comic-Con where Carli posed for photos with Star Trek actors Patrick Stewart and William Shatner. Other items, like condolence letters written from Carli’s classmates, jogged much more painful memories. They didn’t find her journal until after her death. Much of the first half is filled with drawings and notes that are cheerful, including a cartoon rendering of her family that has been blown up, framed, and hung in the living room. But the back half of the notebook contained more disturbing images that left little ambiguity about what Carli was going through as she grew more depressed. One drawing shows a side profile of a person’s head with a thought bubble that repeats the phrase “I’m OK” over and over, while text inside the person’s brain says, “I’m not OK.” They found a note written in German that spoke of Carli’s true intentions. “It was very hard, and everything we found that showed she needed help made us feel like we were failures, to be honest with you,” Sheila said. “Every single thing, we’d have to walk away and say, ‘Time out.’ It was devastating.” Dave also had to contend with the fact that his gun was used in the death. He kept ten guns in the house. Most of them were hunting rifles handed down from his father, and all of them except for one were locked in a safe. One gun was always on his waist, either his service weapon or his second pistol, which Dave described as a department-approved off-duty weapon. On the day of the shooting, Dave said, he left his gun on top of a cabinet, but only momentarily, and even that was unlike him. “I think that morning, because she seemed fine, I had a careless moment where I walked out of the room for a brief moment,” he said. The guilt caused Dave to be suicidal, and he began attending depression support groups himself. It’s something he still struggles with—and will for a long time, he said. “I’ll have to live with that the rest of my life, that I screwed up. And I believe I screwed up,” he said. “And everyone keeps telling me if it wasn’t that she would J

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 15

continued from 15 have found another way. Do you really think I’d feel better if I found her hanging? She just decided to use my gun.” Though research shows that access to firearms is associated with increased suicide rates—and suicide attempts by gun have an 85 percent success rate—Dave believes his daughter would have gone through with her plan no matter what. Of the ten- to 14-year-olds who committed suicide in 2015, more than 56 percent did so by suffocation, according to the CDC. Guns were used in 37 percent of the cases, followed by poison at 4 percent. For 15- to 24-year-olds ﬁrearms are the leading means of suicide, at 47 percent. Females are less likely to use guns. For the couple, after the death, grief turned to anger, anger at themselves for not looking for all the clues, anger at Carli’s peers for being so cruel, anger at the mental health profession for failing to fully educate the family and for failing to get through to Carli.

16 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

“These kids are slipping through the cracks,” Dave said. “The mental health profession didn’t even try to educate us or tell us things we needed to do or look for. And I think, if you’re a parent, it’s not that you don’t want to help your child, it’s just that maybe you don’t know how to help your child.” What’s more, Carli’s trouble in getting additional help before her hospitalization is not unique; experts said adequate access to mental health care is a growing problem across the country. In 2017, a study conducted by Harvard researchers showed just how hard it is for kids and teens to get treatment. The researchers posed as the parents of a 12-yearold with depression and found that, after two calls to each doctor’s office, they could only secure an appointment with 40 percent of pediatricians and 17 percent of child psychiatrists.

Meanwhile, the number of social workers and school psychologists is way below recommended levels nationwide, and in Chicago Public Schools specifically. The School Social Work Association of America recommends one social worker for every 400 students, but the ratio in CPS is one for every 1,200 kids, a report by Educators for Excellence found last year. The National Association of School Psychologists says one psychologist is needed for every 500 to 700 students, but nationally there is just one for every 1,400 students—a rate similar to the situation in CPS. Dr. John Walkup, head of child and adolescent psychiatry at Lurie Children’s Hospital in Streeterville, said every provider of mental health care is straining to meet demand. He said about 20 percent of adolescents will have a mental health issue, but only 10 to 30 percent of those patients get treatment.

WARNING SIGNS Like many families, Dave and Sheila Blanco navigated their daughter’s mental health struggles with little prior knowledge or past experiences to draw from. They learned a lot in the process, and even though it wasn’t enough to save their daughter, their hope is that their hard-gained knowledge can help others. Here are tips from them, along with mental health professionals, for other parents or loved ones of kids facing mental illness.

• LO OK

FOR BE HAVIORAL CHANGES: Carli had isolated herself from friends before her death, and also saw a sense of happiness come over her right before she died. Both can be signs a person is considering suicide, said Alexa James, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. A decline in school or job performance, or a shift toward being more confrontational, can also be warning signs, she said. So is saying goodbye to people or giving away possessions.

• ASK QUESTIONS: Suicide might be the ultimate

taboo subject, but addressing it head-on can help, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. Asking “Are you thinking of killing yourself?” sounds direct, but studies show it doesn’t lead to an increase in suicidal thoughts and can lead to a breakthrough, according to the group.

• STAY IN TOUCH: Research shows that suicide

deaths decrease when someone follows up with a person who seems suicidal or has attempted to take their life.

• LIMIT

ACCESS TO DEADLY OBJECTS: Access to lethal items increases the success rate of suicide attempts, according to the Harvard study. The study shows that suicide attempts occur with little planning and with available objects. Removing deadly weapons like guns or pills can help, studies show.

• BE VIGILANT: Teens who spend five hours or more per day on their cell phone or other Internet-connected device are 70 percent more likely to have risk factors for suicide, one study shows. The Blancos suggest limiting phone time, especially at night, when virtual taunts and texts can keep kids up and make the problem worse. “Get in the habit of telling [your kid], ‘I love you, you’re important, I value you, and give me your cell phone.’ And get in the habit of going through these messages,” Dave said.

• RESOURCES

The National Association of School Psychologists: bit.ly/SuicidePreventionTips The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 800273-TALK (8255) Suicide crisis text line: text START to 741741 National Alliance on Mental Illness Chicago referral help line: 312-563-0445

“It is legion,” he said of the access issues. “Every program that I know has some kind of strategy to manage the demand. Everyone works at it as best they can. At some level it’s going to require we do something fundamentally different in how we develop care systems.” Walkup said he is working on an effort to have primary care physicians, especially pediatricians, help provide mental health care to their patients. That could mean family doctors would provide early screenings for mental health problems or have informational sessions with parents. “We think they can cut in to the large demand,” he said. “Then there might be enough people to handle patients who have more substantive problems who might need to see a mental health professional.” Another issue, said a prominent Chicago pediatric psychologist who asked not to be named, is that more children at a younger age will voice suicidal thoughts, even if just casually. “They cancel the picnic and they say, ‘I wanna die,’” he said. “Years ago I wasn’t hearing anywhere near as much talk about suicide, even from kids six years old. . . . More kids are saying it when they don’t mean it. But we still have to address it”—which ties up the system even more. While their efforts to intervene, and the medical profession’s attempts to help, didn’t save Carli, the Blancos believe their tragedy can help save others. That wasn’t their plan at ﬁrst—the last thing on their mind was sharing their grief. But their path to advocacy involved an ill-timed mailing, more pain, and a conversation with a prominent Chicago Public Schools principal. CARLI HAD JUST RECEIVED her acceptance letter to Whitney Young when she died, and the school continued sending mailings to the family after the death. The mailers were painful reminders of a promising future that will never be, and Dave contacted the near-westside school to say Carli wouldn’t be enrolling after all. After learning of the tragedy, principal Joyce Kenner sat down with the family to offer her condolences and to apologize for the mailers. The conversation led to the school’s efforts to raise awareness of mental health issues, and the Blancos agreed to help. At ﬁrst, Dave and Sheila met with school counselors on what to look for in depressed students. Then, the couple shared their story before a large roomful of teachers, parents, and students. That second session happened to take place on the morning after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, left 17 people dead, and the issue of teen mental health was again in the forefront. “It was powerful,” Kenner said. “That began a great dialogue. We want to be able to identify any signs of mental health issues students are feeling. We want parents and teachers to know what to look for.” Kenner agrees the problem is growing. “Absolutely” it’s a bigger problem now, she said. “It’s different than it was for me growing up. I applied to one college and was admitted. Now kids apply to colleges with ACT scores of 34, 35, 36 and are getting wait-listed. Kids feel a lot of pressure. There’s added stress.” Representatives from NAMI were at the talk. The group has reached 7,500 CPS students in recent years

as it seeks to spread awareness of mental health issues among kids. James said presentations typically include first-person accounts, but many of their speakers are parents of kids who attempted suicide and lived. With the Blancos willing to open up, the impact is that much more moving, she said. “For parents in particular, it can become just far too painful for them [to talk about],” said James, the executive director for the local NAMI chapter. “Folks feel so much shame and guilt about the experience. So this was even more raw. And really more powerful for the parents in attendance.” Other parents in attendance shared their difficulties in getting appointments for their kids with child psychiatrists or psychologists. Sitting in the audience for the talk was Sophie Sanchez, a junior at Whitney Young who started a mental health awareness club at the school after her best friend killed herself. Like Carli, Sophie’s friend had seemed to be on the road to recovery when she died, and the shock was hard to process for Sophie to process, as it has been for the Blancos. She was glad to learn she wasn’t alone. “It was eye-opening for some of the people who haven’t experienced losing a friend or loved one to suicide,” Sophie said. “It’s very different when it becomes so real in someone’s life. It really touched a lot of people in my club.” The talks at Whitney Young were the first time the Blancos told their story in a public setting. “If we saved one kid, then we did something,” Sheila said. “Especially because that’s what Carli wanted.” AFTER CARLI DIED, THE COUPLE learned another thing about their daughter they didn’t know: she had counseled younger kids who were also bullied. She spent time with a seventh-grade boy who was having a difficult time and ate lunch with younger kids who were seen as outcasts, school officials told the family. After learning of Carli’s efforts, Dave and Sheila said they knew it would be their mission to continue helping kids who are bullied or facing mental health issues. “[Carli] was deeply wounded when she saw others mistreated or bullied, and often befriended those who struggled to fit in. As a result, she shouldered more pain than her 14-year-old soul could carry,” reads her obituary. “While we may never be able to make sense of Carli’s tragic death, it is her family’s deepest desire that those who were touched by Carli’s life talk openly about suicide, and learn more about this disease.” Speaking about Carli’s tragedy was especially difficult at their daughter’s prospective high school, Dave said. Doing so doesn’t necessarily diminish their pain, but they know that it’s the right thing to do. “It was so hard to walk into a building, seeing all these kids, saying to yourself, ‘Carli should be walking around this building,’” he said. “Because after I got to know Whitney Young, I really felt like if she just could have made it there, I think she would have been happy there. I’ll never know now, but I think it would have made a difference in her life. She would have found kids just like herself, and it would have made a difference.” v

m @jaydubward MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 17

ARTS & CULTURE

READER RECOMMENDED

b ALL AGES

Lanise Antoine Shelley and Rebecca Hurd

THEATER

Ibsen’s Thomas Stockmann: A hero you can’t believe in

é LIZ LAUREN

Especially in the Goodman Theatre’s An Enemy of the People

By TONY ADLER

or a surly old man in Victorian muttonchops, Henrik Ibsen has turned out to be endlessly adaptable. It seems every generation gets the Ibsen it needs. In the early aughts you couldn’t go a season without watching at least a few Hedda Gablers blow their brains out because of the patriarchy. Now we’ve got a spate of Thomas Stockmanns—courageous, tenacious, not a little nuts—blowing the whistle on small-town oligarchs in productions of An Enemy of the People. Including the astute and entertaining one running now at the Goodman Theatre.

18 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

And why not? Stockmann looks like the perfect hero for a time when scientiﬁc ﬁndings are belittled, the Environmental Protection Agency is on the ropes, and kids in Flint, Michigan, still don’t dare drink from the water fountains at school. The man Ibsen gives us is a physician who equates facts with truth and truth with virtue. He designed the system of pipes that feeds water to the mineral baths that have made a popular spa of his little Norwegian hometown. But when Thomas went off to bring the light of his knowledge to an apparently

benighted region in the country’s north, he left the actual construction of the system to the town fathers—led by his brother the mayor, Peter. And the town fathers cut corners to save money. Now that Thomas is back, working as the baths’ medical officer, he suspects that a rash of illnesses can be traced to the corner cutting. So he commissions a study the results of which prove, sure enough, that the system is compromised and pollutants from upstream factories are leaching into the bathwater. Never one to keep silent in the face of well-grounded conclusions affecting the common good, Thomas writes a scathing report saying the spa needs to be shut down, cleaned up, and completely rebuilt. Charmingly, he thinks this will make him a champion in the eyes of a grateful populace. Working from his own adaptation, director Robert Falls builds a running gag around Thomas’s expectation (based, for once, on absolutely no empirical evidence) that they’re going to throw a parade for him, along with his modest protestations that he doesn’t want anything ostentatious. He’s just happy to serve. Boy, is he ever dreaming. As brother Peter is the first to point out, a shutdown will cost the town precious income, not to mention its reputation as a healing getaway. And a true fix of the sort Thomas advocates will cost millions (another running gag: the mayor’s higher and higher estimates of how many millions), requiring a tax hike. Ibsen is great at teasing out the many strands of self-interest and conflicts of interest that insinuate themselves around everybody involved, Thomas not excepted, wrapping them up like those creepy pod tendrils in the 1978 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Courage here lies in staying awake long enough to keep from becoming a pod person yourself. Thomas is capable of that, and Ibsen clearly admires him for it. The original script ends happily, after a fashion, with a bloody but unbowed Thomas famously declaring that

“the strongest man in the world is the man who stands alone”—to which his wife and daughter respond with loving approval. But Ibsen also gave his strongman plenty of weaknesses—especially arrogance and self-righteousness, with their attendant tone-deafness, misanthropy, and even eugenic fantasies (third running gag: Thomas assuring people that he means “no offense” as he tells them how terribly stupid they are). Falls and his Thomas, Philip Earl Johnson, latch on to these frailties. Last year, when Falls directed Uncle Vanya to celebrate his 30th anniversary at Goodman Theatre, I wrote that he gave the play the wisdom of his 60-plus years, bypassing any reductive temptations to supply an empathic vision of a household full of suffering people. Same applies here, but with an interesting political twist. This Thomas is silly, noble, ugly, and blind; he says things that would make Bernie Sanders proud (in fact, he says things Sanders has said) and then reaches into the alt-right vocabulary of a Steve Bannon. If you think this Enemy is going to vindicate some cherished whistleblower romance a la Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, you’re wrong. Falls’s adaptation doesn’t end quite the way Ibsen intended. His approach works in large part because of the extraordinary gravitas of the cast, each member of which presents a life rather than a role. Scott Jaeck draws unexpected sympathy as the supposedly ruthless Peter. David Darlow opens a vein of rage as Thomas’s fatherin-law, Morton. And Lanise Antoine Shelley conducts a quiet study of her own as Thomas’s loyal wife, Katherine, coming up with some unexpected ﬁndings. v R AN ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE Through 4/15: Wed 7:30 PM, Thu 2 and 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 2 and 8 PM, Sun 2 and 7:30 PM (2 PM only 4/8); also Tue 4/3, 7:30 PM, Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn, 312-443-3800, goodmantheatre.org, $30-$97.

m @taadler

ARTS & CULTURE Mary Beth Fisher, Tim Hopper, Bryce Gangel, and Michael Aaron Pogue é MICHAEL BROSILOW

THE DOPPELGÄNGER (an international farce)

25% OFF

THEATER

Get out

Do we really need another Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? By JUSTIN HAYFORD

early everything’s in place in Court Theatre’s digestible Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, Todd Kreidler’s unnecessary stage adaptation of William Rose’s Oscar-winning 1967 screenplay. As in the film, the wellheeled Drayton family, led by progressive newspaper publisher Matt and liberal art dealer Christina, get impromptu implicit bias training when their headstrong daughter Joanna arrives unannounced with the fiance they’ve never met: John Prentice, a world-renowned research doctor who’s—gasp—black. When Prentice’s parents show up and discover their star son is ready to throw his life away by marrying unwisely, all manner of hell—by which I mean all manner of artfully arranged prickly conversations—breaks loose. Kreidler adds some superfluous plot points (Joanna’s now got a brother who died 15 years ago, Christina’s expecting a rich art patron who never arrives) and a couple of overworked metaphors (a blooming cactus, a telling children’s song). But mostly he elaborates on the film’s basic structure: a series of orchestrated parlor conversations and set speeches that lead almost everyone into the right-thinking light. But one key thing is missing: the world beyond the Drayton home. While the insidi-

ous strictures of Jim Crow America give the stodgy film a malevolent edge, they’re rarely palpable here. Part of the problem comes from the script’s emotional forwardness, a stark contrast to the film’s patrician rigidity. People here are largely incautious, rarely holding cards close to the vest but instead letting loose with little provocation, often when the room is full of people (in the film, characters are routinely tucked away in pairs, as though the whole affair is too volatile to discuss even semipublicly). Everything onstage feels more fleshed out and humanized than onscreen, an impulse that director Marti Lyons’s solid cast exploit convincingly if transparently. It just never feels like 1967. Or rather, not until Mr. Prentice’s pointed outburst late in act two, during which he paints for his son a horrifying picture of the life he’ll face. At best, white America will take credit for his research. At worst, it will leave him with a cracked skull, tormented children, and a wife who’ll come to believe he’s nothing but a nigger. It’s an extraordinary moment, when monstrous social forces finally crash the dinner party and threaten to crush everyone. Tellingly, it’s about the only moment in two hours that feels consequential: here things may change irrevocably for everyone. But soon thereafter they all end up at the dinner table (another overworked metaphor), largely convinced that love must be championed at any cost. As in the film, the imagined need to edify an audience leaves little room for challenging them. v GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER Through 4/15: Wed-Thu 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 3 and 8 PM, Sun 2:30 and 7:30 PM, Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis, 773-753-4472, courttheatre.org, $50$68, $45-$63 seniors, $37.50-$51 students.

FIRST WEEKEND 4/5 - 8 Excluding Saturday eve USE CODE: READERFIRST

Matthew-Lee Erlbach

A world premiere by (Showtime’s Masters of Sex)

Tina Landau

Directed by ensemble member (Broadway’s The SpongeBob Musical, Tracy Letts’s Superior Donuts) A side-splitting farce about ﬁrst-world greed and backroom deals

Rainn Wilson

featuring actor and comedian (The Office, Juno) as the Doppelgänger

with ensemble members Celeste M. Cooper, Audrey Francis, Ora Jones, Sandra Marquez and James Vincent Meredith

April 5 – May 27 | steppenwolf.org | 312-335-1650 Major Production Sponsors

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 19

ARTS & CULTURE LIT

Sweet, savage loves In My Lady’s Choosing, you can have the rake, the Scot, the Egyptologist, or all three. “In a Rhythm,” choreographed by Bebe Miller é ROBERT ALTMAN

By AIMEE LEVITT

DANCE

The Process v. Product Festival demonstrates how a dance gets made

THE CREATIVE PROCESS tends to be a mystery for some consumers of art. At the Process v. Product Festival at the Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago, though, audiences will get the chance to see exactly how choreographers build their work. The festival was born out of the back-toback scheduling of performances by Molly Shanahan and Bebe Miller, which will form the centerpiece of the festival. Over two weekends, the Dance Center will host panels, discussions, and workshops to enrich audiences’ understanding of the dances. “Things we take for granted in the field are not out there in the mainstream,” says Ellen Chenoweth, interim director of the Dance Center’s Presenting Series. “Most people don’t have a clear idea of what it means to choreograph, and this festival is a great window into that process.” For the two “Process Prism” panels, poets,

curators, and visual artists join choreographers to discuss where their processes intersect and diverge. During the “iLANDing Field Trip,” choreographer Jennifer Monson will take participants to the lakefront for an interdisciplinary workshop based on her research into movement and urban ecology. “One of the biggest features of concert dance work is it’s about the relationships within the ensemble,” says Chenoweth. “It’s about a group of people and how they relate to each other over the course of the creation of the work, and that’s really juicy and interesting and can be sensed on stage when you see the final product. Both of these works and the surrounding programming are exploring the relationships that get built over the course of creating a dance.” —OLIVER SAVA PROCESS V. PRODUCT FESTIVAL 3/29-4/7: times vary; see website, Columbia College Dance Center, 1306 S. Michigan, 312369-8330, colum.edu, prices vary by event.

IN 1964, ARTIST ALBERTO GIACOMETTI ASKED WRITER JAMES LORD TO SIT FOR A PORTRAIT. HE SAID IT WOULD TAKE ONLY ONE DAY.

“

EXUBERANT! ”

-Owen Gleiberman, VARIETY

GEOFFREY RUSH

ARMIE HAMMER

FINAL PORTRAIT WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY STANLEY TUCCI

A FILM BY STANLEY TUCCI

WWW.SONYCLASSICS.COM

STARTS FRIDAY, MARCH 30 VIEW THE TRAILER AT WWW.FINALPORTRAITMOVIE.COM 20 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

rom the very ﬁrst page, the end of every romance novel is a foregone conclusion: the hero and heroine will fall madly in love and live happily ever after. They will also have the best sex in human history. The only suspense lies in how they get there. My Lady’s Choosing, a new interactive romance novel by Chicagoans Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris, builds that suspense exponentially by providing a seemingly inﬁnite number of paths to your happy ending—which, not incidentally, travel through every landscape in the historical-romance world: a London ballroom, a gothic manor on the Yorkshire moors, the Egyptian desert, and, naturally, Scotland. “It’s a send-up and a valentine,” explains Zageris. The authors’ glee is infectious. It’s easy to imagine them sitting in a state of extreme sleep deprivation at a kitchen table covered with Post-it notes outlining various plot points, furiously typing up reimaginings of every romance cliche they could think of, and cracking themselves up. (“Your slightly blurred vision does not lie. There, bursting through silken curtains, piercing the night as a member would a sex, Benedict breaks through the entrance of Madam Crosby’s chambers.”) And that was, in fact, how the book was created. They hadn’t intended to write a chooseyour-own-adventure romance. But last year when they went to the Denver Independent Comic and Art Expo to promote their first book, the Nancy Drew parody Taylor Swift, Girl Detective: The Secrets of the Starbucks Lovers, they realized they needed to fill out their merch table. So they threw together a pamphlet called How Ill Is Your Repute?, which Curran describes as “a Buzzfeed quiz for 17th-century maidens.” It was featured on the comics website Bleeding Cool and attracted the attention of an editor at Quirk Books who suggested letting the questions lead to

different story lines to satisfy various readers’ personalities. While Curran, now 35, has been a romance fan since adolescence, when she discovered a copy of a novel by Julia Quinn and realized it was supposed to be funny, Zageris, 33, came later to the genre. “Growing up, I avoided anything that looked like romance,” she remembers. “I thought it wasn’t for me.” Instead she focused on the romantic elements of The X-Files and R.L. Stine books, which she summarizes as “a lot of making out, and then someone would die!!! It was a terrible model for relationships.” Already they’ve had positive reactions from early readers of My Lady’s Choosing, even from those who don’t identify as romance fans. Many of those, however, feel the need to qualify their enjoyment by adding some variation of “It’s not great literature, but.” Curran and Zageris ﬁnd this puzzling, but also a typical response to romance. “You’re made to feel ashamed for liking what you like,” Curran observes. “You don’t think you can divorce the stuff that gets picked on the most from people who consume it.” Adds Zageris, “It’s interesting in this day and age, that people, mostly women, feel the need to say, ‘I can’t really like this, but I love it.’” v MY LADY’S CHOOSING: AN INTERACTIVE ROMANCE NOVEL By Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris (Quirk). Book release party Wed 4/4, 7:30 PM, Women & Children First, 5233 N. Clark, 773-769-9299, womenandchildrenfirst.com. F

m @aimeelevitt

Nadia Murad in On Her Shoulders

Doc10 Thu 4/5-Sun 4/8. Davis, 4614 N. Lincoln, 773784-0893, doc10.org, davistheater.com, $16.

MOVIES

What do Mr. Rogers and Mexican drug cartels have in common?

They’re both featured in this year’s Doc10 documentary festival at the Davis Theater.

By J.R. JONES

recent addition to Chicago’s festival calendar, the Doc10 documentary festival debuted in 2016 and moved to the Davis Theater last year with a mix of accessible, cable-ready titles (Obit., Casting JonBenet) and more challenging work from around the world (The Cinema Travelers, Death in the Terminal). That binary strategy continues this year with, on the one hand, portraits of Elvis Presley (The King), Ruth Bader Ginsberg (RBG), and Fred Rogers (Won’t You Be My Neighbor, already sold out) and, on the other, studies of drug cartel violence (Devil’s Freedom) and the breakup of Yugoslavia (The Other Side of Everything). We’ve reviewed six of the ten features below. The festival runs Thursday through Sunday, April 5 through 8, and tickets are $16; for more information visit doc10.org. —J.R. JONES

Bisbee ’17 Documentary maker Robert Greene (Actress, Kate Plays Christine) surveys the title Arizona town on the 100th anniversary of the Bisbee Deportation of 1917, when a sheriﬀ’s posse of more than 2,000 men rounded up nearly 1,200 striking copper miners (most of them immigrants) and left them to die in the New Mexico desert. The ﬁlm is rich and multifaceted, as Greene employs an array of styles (historical reenactments, direct cinema-style portraiture, musical numbers) to investigate the complex relationship between Bisbee’s past and present. Greene also thoroughly considers the town’s diverse population, interviewing artists, retirees, government employees, law enforcement agents, and members of the working class. The impressive scope recalls some of Frederick Wiseman’s panoramic community portraits (Aspen; Belfast, Maine), but the mosaiclike approach is fresh and surprising. In English and subtitled Spanish. —BEN

SACHS 118 min. Greene takes questions by Skype after the screening. Sat 4/7, 1 PM.

Devil’s Freedom Hard to watch and harder to forget, this chilling documentary by Everardo González gathers ﬁrst-person testimony from the victims and perpetrators of drug cartel violence in Mexico. Tales of kidnapping, torture, and execution accumulate as González moves from witness to witness, their faces concealed by plain brown wrestling masks; by contrast, the questions serve to unmask them emotionally, especially the guilt-ridden cartel soldiers. Like Joshua Oppenheimer’s acclaimed 2012 documentary The Act of Killing, this one dares viewers to recognize the sad humanity of those who commit atrocities and the furious humanity of loved ones who thirst for revenge; sitting calmly between these two groups are the torture survivors, whose suﬀering seems to have won them a

preternatural wisdom. In Spanish with subtitles. —J.R. JONES 74 min. Sun 4/8, noon. The King Eugene Jarecki has directed two of the most extraordinary political documentaries of the new century: Why We Fight (2005), a 40-year history of the military-industrial complex, and The House I Live In (2011), exposing the tragedy of the U.S. drug war. This new project may sound a little more fun—the filmmaker takes off in a 1963 Rolls-Royce once owned by Elvis Presley, telling the singer’s life story as he rolls through Tupelo, Memphis, Nashville, New York, Hollywood, and Las Vegas—but ultimately Elvis serves as a metaphor for American decline. Rock critic Greil Marcus argues that Presley embodied “the pursuit of happiness,” whereas Van Jones and Chuck D. finger the King as a racial coward and a cultural thief. Like the director’s other projects, this is intelligent and ambitious, but the cultural insights are too familiar to merit yet another trek through Presley’s troubled life. —J.R. JONES 107 min. Jarecki attends the screening, part of the closing-night program. Sun 4/8, 7:45 PM. On Her Shoulders This documentary profiles human rights activist Nadia Murad, a Yazidi Kurd in Iraq who was forced into slavery by ISIS. Director Alexandria Bombach avoids the details of Murad’s brutal captivity, showing instead the intense pressure and responsibility the 23-year-old feels as a spokesperson for her people.

ARTS & CULTURE

As Murad makes the rounds of Western talk shows and prepares to deliver a three-minute speech to the United Nations Security Council, Bombach emphasizes how, even among politicians and diplomats, Murad’s story is often reduced to a sound bite, and she notes the prurient interest of the media and the public as they ask Murad to recount her trauma over and over. Interviews woven throughout the ﬁlm give Murad the opportunity to speak freely about the ongoing plight of Yazidi refugees, the questions she wishes journalists would ask her, and the questions she’d like them to stop asking. —LEAH PICKETT 94 min. Sat 4/7, 4 PM.

RBG Documentary makers Julie Cohen and Betsy West celebrate the career of Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, noting her recent emergence as a feminist rock star but, more importantly, her early work as a litigator fighting for equal treatment of women. Brenda Feigen, a cofounder with Ginsberg of the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project, provides dramatic recollections of the attorney’s first argument before the Supreme Court in 1973, in the case of an air force lieutenant denied the benefits her male peers received. A chronology of Ginsberg’s subsequent victories shows how patiently and shrewdly she worked to establish the existence and pernicious effects of sex discrimination (her strategy, one male colleague observes, was like “knitting a sweater”). On the personal side, witnesses recall her love of opera, her warm friendship with fellow justice (and ideological opposite) Antonin Scalia, and her long, happy marriage to Martin Ginsberg, a successful New York tax attorney who loyally supported her judicial career. —J.R. JONES 97 min. Sat 4/7, 9 PM.

The Other Side of Everything During the communist takeover of Yugoslavia, bourgeois living spaces were handed over to the proletariat, and the apartment owned by Mila Turajlić’s family in downtown Belgrade was divided in half to be shared with a poor family. For this fascinating documentary, Turajlić (Cinema Komunisto) records the process by which her mother reclaimed the other side of the unit and threw open doors that had been locked for 70 years. This milestone turns out to be mainly a framing device, but inside that frame lies a family portrait rich in political history: Turajlić’s great-grandfather, Dusan Peles, signed the Declaration of Uniﬁcation that created Yugoslavia in 1918, and her mother, professor and activist Srbijanka Turajlić, helped lead the uprising that drove president Slobodan Milošević from power in October 2000. Located across the street from the British embassy, the apartment provides an ideal vantage point for street protests that roil the capital in the run-up to the 2017 presidential election and suggest that the civil tensions of the Balkan conﬂict still simmer. In Serbian with subtitles. —J.R. JONES 107 min. Mila and Srbijanka Turajlić attend the screening. Sun 4/8, 2 PM. v

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 21

Get showtimes at chicagoreader.com/movies.

ARTS & CULTURE MOVIES

Steven Spielberg finds his avatar

The veteran fantasy ﬁlmmaker tells the story of a virtual-reality artist much like himself. By J.R. JONES

teven Spielberg’s empty sci-ﬁ epic Ready Player One takes place in a 2045 so dystopian that people spend all their time under headsets, inhabiting a virtual reality known as OASIS. The hero, 18-year-old Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan), lives in Columbus, Ohio, in a slum made of stacked-up trailers, so you can’t blame him for focusing on his virtual life, where he commands an avatar named Parzival and tries to win an Easter egg hunt embedded in OASIS by its mysterious creator, James Halliday (Mark Rylance), that will grant the winner half a trillion dollars and full ownership

ssss EXCELLENT

sss GOOD

Tye Sheridan in Ready Player One

of the invented world. Ready Player One is a gamer’s wet dream, its characters engaging in various contests that further the plot, and OASIS is jammed to the gills with pop-culture references. King Kong, Mechagodzilla, R2-D2, the Joker, and Chucky from the Child’s Play movies all put in appearances, and among the autos tearing around are the classic 1960s Batmobile, Speed Racer’s Mach 5, and the soupedup DeLorean from Back to the Future. The source novel, by Ernest Cline, contains several references to Spielberg’s movies, most of which the director cut. “I’m just going to leave myself out of it,” he told Entertainment Weekly. Yet what is the movie if not his autobiography? Like Halliday, Spielberg has created

ss AVERAGE

22 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

s POOR

•

a fantastic universe where we all hide from the real universe. He’s never been particularly good with the here and now: when his movies deal with reality, they’re usually set in the past (Schindler’s List, Amistad, Saving Private Ryan, Lincoln, Bridge of Spies, The Post); when they’re set in the present, they’re usually fantasy (Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds). The most topical ﬁlm he’s ever made—The Terminal (2004), about an eastern-European immigrant camping out in New York’s JFK Airport—was among his least successful both critically and commercially. Halliday may be Spielberg’s avatar, but the director sees him as more of a Steve Jobs ﬁgure,

and he’s cast Rylance, his favorite new actor (Bridge of Spies, The BFG), to play the software creator. Wearing horn-rimmed glasses, a shaggy wig, and a Space Invaders T-shirt, Halliday looks like Garth, Dana Carvey’s character from Wayne’s World, and as OASIS demonstrates, he’s spent just as much time in front of the TV. There’s one gem of a sequence in which the contestants must complete a route through the Overlook Hotel from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980), though most of the set pieces unfold on an epic scale, such as the T. rex attack on an urban metropolis that winks to Spielberg’s own dinosaur franchise. Amid this special-effects maelstrom, Wade Watts never emerges as a character, and the taciturn Sheridan is in constant danger of being out-acted by his own avatar. Who can connect with a hero when he’s just watching the story? I thought that was my job. v READY PLAYER ONE s Directed by Steven Spielberg. PG-13, 140 min. For listings visit chicagoreader.com/movies.

m @JR_Jones

WORTHLESS

Minimal techno master Wolfgang Voigt returns to his ‘imaginary, misty forest’ On the eve of the ﬁrst Chicago concert in nine years by his most beloved project, Gas, he answers questions from Whitney Johnson of Matchess.

Wolfgang Voigt é COURTESY THE ARTIST

WOLFGANG VOIGT PERFORMS AS GAS

Thu 3/29, 7:30 PM, Rubloff Auditorium, Art Institute of Chicago, 111 S. Michigan, sold out, all-ages

U.S. GIRLS, MATCHESS

Tue 4/17, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, sold out, 21+

SARAH DAVACHI WITH WHITNEY JOHNSON AND PHILLIP SERNA

Sat 4/21, 8 PM, Graham Foundation, Madlener House, 4 W. Burton, free with RSVP, all-ages

ew people have had as profound an impact on experimental techno as German producer Wolfgang Voigt. Since debuting as Mike Ink in 1991, he’s released hundreds of records under more than 30 names—Studio 1, Popacid, M:I:5, Sog, Wasserman—and in 1998 he cofounded the inﬂuential Kompakt label, whose operations also include a music shop and record distributor. The most important of Voigt’s many projects is undoubtedly Gas, whose lovely, unsettling ambient electronica he says was inspired by dropping LSD as a kid and walking through the dense woods in Königsforst park near his hometown of Cologne. Voigt released four Gas records between 1995 and 2000, wedding insistent, overlapping pulses to atmospheres that alternate between ethereal and magisterial—they tied together new age hypnotism and Wagnerian grandeur. In contrast to the clean, sterile electronic music that dominated the mid-90s, the Gas records are foggy swamps: when writer and recording engineer Steve Silverstein mentioned them in the Reader in 2005, he called them “murky,” “dirty,” and “cheap sounding.”

But after two or three listens, he wrote, their “claustrophobic, assaultive noise begins to feel warm, even beautiful.” For most of the past decade, Voigt has focused on a project under his own name called Rückverzauberung (“Reverse Enchantment”), a series of ambient recordings and installations whose abstraction and atonality he considers an evolution of the Gas aesthetic. By placing Gas on hiatus, he seemed to magnify its reputation, so that when he brought it back in 2017 with the album Narkopop, he beneﬁted from the combination of elated old fans and an Internet attention engine that didn’t exist in 2000. Narkopop largely picks up where Gas left off, while amplifying its sense of filmic grandeur—and yet another new Gas album, Rausch, will arrive on May 18. “Rausch” means “frenzy” or “intoxication” in German, while “rauschen” is sometimes used to describe soughing, rustling, or whooshing sounds. Voigt is headed to the U.S. for six dates, among them his first Chicago performance since 2009. For this interview he answered e-mailed questions from Chicago musician Whitney Johnson, whose multifarious talents have served her in Verma, E+, and Simulation,

among other groups, but who’s best known for performing on electronics and viola in the solo project Matchess. She also recently submitted her doctoral dissertation to the University of Chicago. “It’s a comparative sociology of sound art and art music, though focused more on the former,” she says. “Probably only ten people in the world actually care about the sociological splitting of hairs, but the research was so much fun—interviews in New York, Berlin, and here, lots of museum visits, volunteering at Lampo and at La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela’s Dream House.” As Matchess, Johnson opens for U.S. Girls on April 17 at the Empty Bottle. She also accompanies electroacoustic composer and performer Sarah Davachi at a Lampo concert on April 21, after which she leaves on a European tour with Circuit des Yeux—she’ll be playing in the band and opening the shows. This summer, Trouble in Mind Records will release the ﬁnal installment of her superb Matchess trilogy, entitled Sacracorpa. Her questions are in bold. —PETER MARGASAK

continued on 25

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 23

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24 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

Whitney Johnson of Matchess é EVAN P. JENKINS

1800 W. DIVISION

Est.1954 Celebrating over 61 years of service to Chicago!

(773) 486-9862 Both will appear in my music forever. Even if you can’t hear it.

continued from 23 What is your strongest sense memory from the Königsforst? Losing my way when I was young and getting on a psychedelic trip— something that still goes on. In M:I:5 you were using ratios, not unlike just intonation. Do integral structures continue to figure in your music? You’ve also mentioned Stockhausen as an influence— and that the Sog project, over ten years later, is related to M:I:5. How has your relationship with serialism developed over the years? Many questions in one. My whole artistic work has been, apart from some obvious exceptions, embossed by contradictions, respectively a certain synchrony of antithetical aspects. I was always fascinated by very atonal, experimental abstract art and music, while at the same time I love very linear, minimal, monotone, and straight grooving beats and loops. Since ages I have tried to merge these things in many diﬀerent ways. M:I:5 for instance is a project in which sample-based rhythmical music, played in certain intervals or clusters over a four-to-the-ﬂoor bass drum, leads to results you cannot really control. What sound from everyday life gets stuck in your head? Rauschen. Ian Murray at the University of North Carolina has said the following of Gas. Care to comment? “Gas utilizes these patterned, uncompromising repetitions to tap into an ambience that provokes movement from its listeners, just as it dissolves the focal points common to communal musical experiences: the charismatic frontman, the genius com-

poser, the laser-light show.” Couldn’t have said it better. Though each performance is different, do you tend to prefer clubs, venues, or galleries/museums? My goal is to make Gas live happen in as many different locations/situations as possible. But so far experience shows that playing it nonstop for a sitting and concentrated listening audience in front of a very big screen with a big sound system is still the best way of presentation. I love Rückverzauberung! It reminds me of Gas but as a vast, structureless sensorium; the meanings I associate are dissociated. Can you talk about the different thoughts that might come to mind from beatless as opposed to four-on-the-floor music? The four-to-the-floor bass drum is the final beat in my life since 30 years now. Apart from that, I like beatless music. In Germany they say the bass drum only goes away to come back. With Gas I was driven by the idea to combine abstract classical soundscapes with the techno bass drum in my very own way. Rückverzauberung was the offical follow-up project, without a bass drum, for around ten years. Now the bass drum is back again. There is a certain philsophy that says: things can come back if they know why they have been away. What sound do you remember best from your childhood? Does it appear in your adult music? The guitar riff of Marc “T. Rex” Bolan’s song “Get It On” and the sound of a French horn.

You’ve mentioned some theoretical and mythological inﬂuences in your work. What kind of theory—musical, critical, social, aesthetic—matters most to you right now, and how does it work its way into your compositional approach? In the 80s and 90s, I was very much driven by the idea to make certain kinds of references and interconnections from art and music history very recognizable in my work. In the early years with Gas, for example, I used to experiment with stuff like Wagner, Schönberg, or the myths of the romantic German fairy tales like Brothers Grimm. Today I don’t use any particular references anymore, because it leads to the wrong results. Gas is Gas.

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How do you diﬀerently listen while preparing for a performance or a recording? What sounds matter more in these aspects of your practice? I usually know exactly what I’m looking for. When I then go to the studio, I have to forget about it to ﬁnd it. Your projects have used so many instruments over the years: live, sampled, acoustic, and electronic. What have been some of the best and worst to work with? All and nothing is possible. At the end of the day, the sampler is my guitar. In the music you’re making today, are you most interested in frequency, tonality, or timbre? None of them. My only interest is maximum (artistic) freedom. Gas is inspired by forest imagery in German mythology, which tends to have a mystical, even magical quality. What do you make of the paranormal associations we’ve had with the forest through history? Let me quote the original Gas text from 1996. “Gas fantasizes about a sound body ranging somewhere between Schönberg and Kraftwerk, between bugle and bass drum. Gas is Wagner in the guise of glam rock, Hansel and Gretel on acid. An endless march through the undergrowth— into the disco—of an imaginary, misty forest.” Tell us a story of a time when sound had a profound impact on your psychology. The sound of the Roland TB-303 bass line and the epiphany by Chicago acid house in 1988. v

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 25

MUSIC PICK OF THE WEEK

Chicago Renaissance man Malcolm London blurs activism and art on Right Away Series

é YUVRAJ SINGH

CHICAGO’S MALCOLM LONDON juggles more roles at once than some people can list on their entire resumés: he’s a poet, activist, rapper, and educator. How does he do it? “I’ve come to the conclusion that I have to be my whole self at all times,” he told the website DJ Booth in January. “When I’m onstage and I’m a rapper, I don’t forget that I’m an educator and that there’s young people watching me.” That mindset is part of London’s appeal, and part of what makes him great as as an artist and performer; he can move an entire crowd while connecting with every single audience member on an individual level. In his songs—which deal with topics such as black positivity, community-centric activism, and the frustrations of societal constructs of masculinity—he gives each word a distinctive texture as he shapes it. At times it feels as if he holds on to his phrases a little longer than other artists would to ensure that any listener can fully grasp the weight of his message. It’s an intimate gesture that creates the sense that London is engaging with the listener one-on-one and for the moment the only thing that matters is that connection. On January’s Right Away Series (Savantry), he occasionally ignores his songs’ soul-inspired musical frameworks in a rush to get every last word out—perhaps because he started working on the EP with the intention of writing more poems. The results don’t always jibe with what’s expected of rappers today—from Chicago or elsewhere—and that’s just another part of London’s charm. —LEOR GALIL

MALCOLM LONDON

Sun-Wed 4/1-4, 8 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted, $25. b

THURSDAY29 Yo La Tengo See also Friday. 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 1807 S. Allport, sold out. 17+ For its new album, There’s a Riot Going On (Matador), Yo La Tengo borrowed the title of Sly & the Family Stone’s turbulent 1971 classic, but despite what the name might suggest, the music’s surface couldn’t be more placid. In fact, it’s one of the trio’s most gorgeously restrained albums. Selfrecorded on a home computer, and mixed by former Chicagoan John McEntire, the album has an attractively modest sound; aqueous organ drones, e-bowed electric guitar tones, gentle electronic and live percussion, and strummed acoustic guitars all cradle the tender, whispered vocal harmonies of Georgia Hubley and Ira Kaplan. Considering the current state of the world it may be no surprise that on this release the band embraces a kind of insularity: “Shades of Blue” and “She Might

26 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

She Might” both express a desire to hole up inside and a fear of ugliness outside. Likewise, the mewling ambience of instrumentals such as “You Are Here” and “Shortwave” present an immersive sonic cocoon, while the irresistible “shoo-wop, shoo-wop” backing vocals on “Forever” suggest a more innocent time. The group also delivers a dreamy slice of escapism with a delicate cover of Michael Hurley’s “Polynesia.” By contrast, on the album’s most upbeat song, “For You Too,” Kaplan addresses a darker side of life head-on. When his character describes his own lack of civility and hot-headedness before making a romantic offer of help and protection, it’s as if acknowledging his own imperfections and striving for self-improvement. There’s an apocalyptic feel as the recording winds down. On “Here You Are” the vocalists embrace what matters most in a world gone mad: “Most days, we circumvent / Tune out the world / Except our friends,” they sing with a somnambulant glow that feels like something between a last gasp and message from the heavens. —PETER MARGASAK

Yo La Tengo é ISABEL PINTO

Recommended and notable shows and critics’ insights for the week of March 29 b ALL AGES F

FRIDAY30 Yo La Tengo See Thursday. 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 1807 S. Allport, sold out. 17+ grid 8:30 PM, Hungry Brain, 2319 W. Belmont, $10. 21+ As a deep admirer of Matt Nelson’s playing in projects including the saxophone quartet Battle Trance and Amirtha Kidambi’s experimental outfit Elder Ones, I was super excited to hear what the saxophonist could do within the bruising context of Grid, a trio with electric-bass stomper Tim Dahl (a regular collaborator of former Chicagoan Weasel Walter) and drummer Nick Podgurski (Extra Life). When I first put on the trio’s self-titled album for NNA Tapes, I had trouble locating Nelson’s presence—it sounded like sludge music with coruscating guitar feedback and no discernible woodwinds. But I soon realized the harrowing sonic drapery that flows over the record’s grinding, slow-end creep is actually Nelson blowing through a range of effects pedals, creating sounds that might compare with those of a dying pachyderm letting out its final wails. Grid’s wonderfully heavy, lumbering din is more akin to doom than to free jazz, but there’s so much sonic activity in its upper register—as Nelson’s slither-

Majority Rule Seven Days of Samsara and Stay Asleep open. 9 PM, Subterranean, 2011 W. North, sold out. 17+

ing cries turn into granular matter that penetrates the gut punch of the rhythm section like liquid into sand—its heady improvisational ethos is apparent. There are passages where Nelson sounds like he’s actually playing a saxophone, but more often he conjures the type of blown-out howls saxophonists Don Dietrich and Jim Sauter make in the improvisational ensemble Borbetomagus. In Grid he grounds that assault within a maelstrom of stuttering, slow-motion beats over a low end thicker than the earth’s crust. —PETER MARGASAK

Lil Wop Chxpo opens. 6 PM, the Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park, $20, $17 in advance. b Chicago-raised, Atlanta-based rapper Lil Wop loves Gucci Mane so much he replicated the trap king’s iconic ice-cream-cone face tattoo on his right cheek. As Lil Wop told the Fader, Gucci Mane “taught me you can’t sound like nobody . . . To have the sauce, you gotta have all the ingredients. It ain’t all about wordplay.” Gucci clearly thinks his acolyte gets it, because last year he signed the emerging rapper to his Interscope imprint, 1017 Eskimos, and collaborated with him on a tune called “Paid in Full.” Lil Wop put the track on October’s Wopavelli 3, one of a rash of mixtapes he dropped last year; his just-woke-up groan and zonked-out nonchalance blur together into incoherent slush when

MUSIC

Lil Wop é SLAVEN VLASIC

you’re listening through the vast 2017 portion of his catalog, which spans four Wopavelli mixtapes. When he’s on, as is the case on the Wopavelli 2 single “Lost My Mind,” he shows he’s worthy of his mentor’s aﬀection. —LEOR GALIL

The music community that lives together reunites together: In recent years, many of the northernVirginia and D.C.-area screamo bands that warped punk back in the late 90s and early 2000s and went on to influence contemporary heavies (Touche Amore, anyone?) have reemerged. The group of bands in that scene—which includes City of Caterpillar and Malady, among others— would be incomplete without Majority Rule, whose three members teamed up again last year for the ﬁrst time since they called it quits in 2004. As singer-guitarist Matt Michel told zine-turned-blog Disposable Underground, the band regrouped after Page 99 guitarist Mike Taylor asked him if Majority Rule would want to partner with the band for a string of beneﬁt shows: “The idea of being able to make a greater impact with what we could raise as bands rather than what we could give as individuals was a big motivator.” The groups raised close to $40,000 for a handful of organizations that focus on advocacy for immigrants and refugees, LGBTQ rights, and reproductive freedom, among other progressive issues, according to the Washington City Paper. Majority Rule have since decided to continue their reunion, in part to raise funds and awareness for local causes in each city they play. Last J

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 27

3730 N. CLARK ST METROCHICAGO.COM @ METROCHICAGO

MUSIC

Find more music listings at chicagoreader.com/soundboard.

continued from 27

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year, the band reissued the three releases they put out in the early 00s on the longtime punk-hardcore label Magic Bullet Records (which was based in the same Virginia scene at the time) via founder Brent Eyestone’s new music company, Dark Operative. Majority Rule’s 2003 swan song, Emergency Numbers, is particularly worthy of deep study; its acerbic guitars and ﬂesh-lacerating vocals are quick to scald, and the group’s veiled lyrics suggest that just below the surface there’s so much more of their world to discover. —LEOR GALIL

FRI APR 20 / 8PM / 18+

L.A. Salami Cat Clyde opens. 9 PM, Schubas, 3159 N. Southport, $15, $13 in advance. 21+ Lookman Adekunle Salami cannot be contained. The British artist, who performs as L.A. Salami, maneuvers between blues, rock, and folk so effortlessly it seems almost ethereal. On “The City Nowadays,” a single from his 2016 studio debut, Dancing With Bad Grammar (Beat Records), his subtle use of electric riffs and drums to guide the listener in and out of his raplike verses and harmony-laden hooks is enough to settle one into his philosophical rollercoaster ride. “But when the markets dive / The poorest have to save face / They say grace ’cause only faith can pay today’s rates,” he sings. When he strips the song “Day to Day (For 6 Days a Week)” to the basics of roots music, including a harmonica, acoustic guitar and folksy melodies, he seems to lift off into Bob Dylanesque frequencies. It all sounds easygoing, and yet it’s powerful and magnetic—his 2017 NPR Tiny Desk performance of the song is a great example of that talent. Salami’s latest single, “Generation L(ost),” off his upcoming second studio album, The City of Bootmakers, which drops next month on Sunday Best Recordings, gives off nostalgic alternative rock vibes while he sings about a hopeless—seemingly millennial—generation. With opening act Cat Clyde, a Canadian indie folkster with her own dope, finger-snapping twang, on the bill as well, Salami’s show tonight at Schubas is sure to be one for the books. —TIFFANY WALDEN

Chris Speed Trio 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $15, $12 in advance. 18+

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I’ve been a huge fan of reedist Chris Speed for decades. He’s an improviser who’s adroitly experimented with various strains of jazz hybridization over his long career, whether transplanting rhythmic ideas from electronica into his avant-garde quartet Yeah No, toying with the music of Balkans in his fusion-heavy ensemble Pachora, or creating new chamber music in John Hollenbeck’s Claudia Quintet. Speed’s rigorous curiosity may take him in varied directions, but he ﬁlters all of his endeavors through a deep jazz foundation. In recent years he’s let that core of his musical personality glisten in a trio featuring bassist Chris Tordini and Bad Plus drummer Dave King. Last year the group dropped their second album, Platinum on Tap (Intakt), a gorgeously melodic affair that toggles between exquisite balladry on tunes such as the sensual opener, “Red Hook Nights,” and oﬀ-kilter swing, as on the seductive, jagged “Crooked Teeth.” Speed sticks exclusively to tenor saxophone, unleashing his velvety, beautifully muted tone on a dazzling

L.A. Salami é DAVID RICHARDSON

set of tunes, and though he wrote most of the music, he expresses himself just as much on its two covers. He dances through Hoagy Carmichael ballad “Stardust” as if he’s reinvented its melody and shrouded it in darkness, and sprints through a killer version of Albert Ayler’s “Spirits” as though it were a bebop theme—departing from the composer’s gospel-steeped vibe in order to break the melody apart and reassemble it into mosaiclike abstraction. Throughout the record, the trio blur the line between intricate blues and breathy tenderness. There are few working bands in jazz that excite me as much as this one; this is their overdue Chicago debut. —PETER MARGASAK

Don Dietrich and Ben Hall RGB Dreams and Samson Stilwell open. 9 PM, Elastic, 3429 W. Diversey, $10 suggested donation. b Few instrumentalists are as closely aligned with a group and a sound as saxophonists Don Dietrich and Jim Sauter. Since 1979 they’ve worked with guitarist Donald Miller as Borbetomagus, a ferociously loud, overdriven improvisational ensemble that sculpts its blown-out attack with a mix of brutality and refined detail. During the course of nearly four decades the saxophonists hadn’t stepped outside that context aside from recording a single duo album and a trio with Sonic Youth guitarist Thurston Moore. That’s slowly changed in recent years: Sauter now has an ongoing duo with Oneida drummer Kid Millions, and last year Dietrich released two mind-melting albums. On Dietrich (Pica Disk), a high-pressure solo reissue that was originally released in 2002, his lines are slathered with penetrating electronic eﬀects that turn his tenor lines into live-wire hallucinations marked by wild psychoacoustic eﬀects and end-times mayhem. As a bonus the album contains the song “Chinese Root Letter/Tabulae Sex,” which was previously released as a seven-inch on Moore’s Ecstatic Peace Records in 1994. His second new release, Dietrich’s (Pica Disk), is a collaboration with his

MUSIC

style keyboard washes to lyrics about nature, love, and questing. “At night beneath the universe you walk with me / Shall I be ever near the edge of your mystery?” Byrne’s brand of mysticism and romance is familiar, but all the sweeter for being so. —NOAH BERLATSKY

Matt Piet A trio of Dave Rempis, Matt Piet, and Tim Daisy headlines; a quartet of Josh Berman, Keefe Jackson, Matt Piet, and Tim Daisy opens. 8:30 PM, Elastic, 3429 W. Diversey, $10 suggested donation. b

Julie Byrne é TONJE THILESEN ern / Towns that I’ve been in before,” on “Natural Blue,” almost lose their meaning, instead shimmering and falling away like the road under her wheels. Her guitar playing is also quietly inventive: on “Follow My Voice” she cannily and sublimely incorporates the scraping of her fingers as a percussive element, while on “Sleepwalker” she contrasts separate, simultaneous melody lines with a deftness that would make Mississippi John Hurt chuckle. The ﬁnal song, “I Live Now as a Singer,” adds Enya-

Since I first discovered the music of Matt Piet in the fall of 2016, the profile of the Chicago pianist has risen around town. Piet plays with the group of musicians associated with the Amalgam Music imprint, including drummer Bill Harris (the label’s owner) and saxophonist Jake Wark in Four Letter Words, and leads his own trio with bassist Charlie Kirchen and drummer Julian Kirshner. More recently, he’s also started working with a number of veteran players, and tonight he celebrates new recordings from two of these groups, both of which find him with one foot in 60s free jazz and the other in the present. Rummage Out (Clean Feed) is by the Disorganization, the pianist’s quartet with alto saxophonist Nick Mazzarella, cornetist Josh Berman, and drummer Tim Daisy. The two extended pieces on the recording reveal a composition-minded flow with shift- J

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daughter, cellist Camille, who goes note for note with him and matches his intensity. In 2011, Dietrich made a duo album with drummer Ben Hall called Spitfire (What the . . . ?). Here he plays without the amplification and effects he usually wields in Borbetomagus, and he has no problem relying on sheer lung power, brandishing his tenor like a scythe, cutting down everything and anything in his path, and slashing and bulldozing over Hall’s inexhaustible fury in a nonstop barrage of rolling rhythm and metallic sizzle. Earlier this year Hall dropped New Thing Called Breathing (Relative Pitch) with his twitchy sextet Racehorse Names, where he brings clarity to the group’s skittering collective improvisation, his splattery percussion nicely underlining the swooping reeds of John Dierker, probing strings of Mike Khoury, and prickly guitar of Joe Morris. —PETER MARGASAK

SATURDAY31 Julie Byrne Brett Naucke and Sam Wagster open. 8:30 PM, Bohemian National Cemetery, 5255 N. Pulaski, $20. 21+ “Follow my voice / I am right here,” Julie Byrne sings in opening lines of her 2017 record Not Even Happiness (Ba Da Bing). Its rippling melodies and diﬀuse spiritual yearnings will be familiar to fans of new-age hippie-coffee-shop folk like Nick Drake, Linda Perhacs, or Vashti Bunyan. But even if it’s well-traveled terrain, there’s no reason not to revisit it, especially with such an assured guide. Byrne’s got a full alto and a knack for surprising phrasing, splitting up words at unexpected intervals so lines like “Back on tour / Driving through southwest-

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MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 29

Chinmaya Mission Chicago

The Ravi Shankar Quartet

MUSIC

Find more music listings at chicagoreader.com/soundboard.

A journey into the realm of Ravi Shankar’s music by his senior disciples

Antonio Zambujo é ISABEL PINTO

Featuring

Gaurav Mazumdar - Sitar Barry Phillips - Cello Ashwini Shankar - Shehnai Arup Chattopadhyay - Tabla

Saturday, April 21, 2018 at 6:00pm (seating begins at 5:30pm) Yellow Box Theater 1635 Emerson Ln, Naperville, IL 60540

Online booking @ www.myChinmaya.org/ravishankar

continued from 29

ing points of reference; “Lost and Found” opens with traces of the keening spirituality found in the mid-60s work of John Coltrane before flipping to the tap-dance percussiveness of early Cecil Taylor in a wonderful duo passage between Piet and Daisy. Piet’s cohorts have a long history together, but he seems to be a natural ﬁt as he helps push the group’s improvisations from one episode to the next with both voluble and sparse keyboard transitions. The second new release, Throw Tomatoes (Astral Spirits), is by Piet’s trio with Daisy and saxophonist Dave Rempis. I caught an early performance of the group where Piet regrettably tried to match the power of the reedist, and the performance fell ﬂat, but their album indicates that he’s found a convincing rapport in this ensemble too. The music is more fiery and open-ended than his work with the Disorganization, but for each spell of raging intensity there’s a delicate, introspective response. Both releases show that Piet has already delivered serious dividends on his promise as a musician. —PETER MARGASAK

Malcolm London See Pick of the Week, page 26. 8 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted, sold out. b

Purists of Portuguese fado might think António Zambujo is something of a philistine for his penchant for teasing out commonalities between the lyric, sorrow-laden genre and sounds from around the globe—especially breezier forms from Brazil. Not only has he collaborated with Brazilian songwriters such as Rodrigo Maranhão, on his 2015 album Rua da Emenda (World Village) he covered a lovely tune by Uruguayan singer Jorge Drexler and gave Serge Gainsbourg’s “La Chanson de Prévert” a spry fado treatment. On his 2016 album Até Pensei Que Fosse Minha (Som Livre) he took his fusions even further, devoting the entire recording to the music of Chico Buarque, one of Brazilian music’s greatest and most poetic singer-songwriters. But no matter where Zambujo finds musical inspiration, the lilt of his phrasing, clarity of his voice, and emotional heft of his measured delivery retain clear connections to fado. His singing has never been better than on Até Pensei, where he essays Buarque’s gorgeous, harmonically sophisticated melodies with a tender vibrato that reminds me of Caetano Veloso’s sweet warble. Zambujo deftly modulates his delivery away from fado’s darkness, bringing a lightness to the songs, and ﬁnding a beguiling balance between the music of his homeland and its onetime colonial outpost. On tracks such as “Folhetim,” Zambujo applies fado instrumentation to Buarque’s songs, and more often than not he stays true to the tenor of Brazilian music, embroidering layers of acoustic guitars with weightless clarinet or trumpet. He’s been so successful at it that his record earned a Latin Grammy nomination as best MPB album [Musica Popular Brasileira], which is quite a distinction for a Portuguese singer. —PETER MARGASAK

TUESDAY3

WEDNESDAY4

Malcolm London See Pick of the Week, page 26. 8 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted, $25. b

Malcolm London See Pick of the Week, page 26. 8 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted, $25. b v

SUNDAY1 Malcolm London See Pick of the Week, page 26. 8 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, 1650 N. Halsted, $25. b

MONDAY2

please recycle this paper 30 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

AntÓnio Zambujo 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, $25-$32. b

FOOD & DRINK

THE WARBLER | $$$

4533 N. Lincoln 773-681-0950 thewarblerchicago.com Creamy barley with tamaricooked egg; crispy cauliﬂower é GILLIAN FRY

RESTAURANT REVIEW

The Warbler alights in Lincoln Square The team behind Gather attempt the all-purpose neighborhood restaurant. By MIKE SULA

n interesting thing happened in Lincoln Square recently. And when it comes to restaurants, that’s a sentence one rarely hears about the neighborhood. Now, just hold on to your double-wides, stroller moms. I love your turf, what with the 40 varieties of smoked sausage at Gene’s and the tiny Thai grocery and video store PNA, which sits among the largest concentration of Thai food in the city (some of it the very best in the city). God bless

the chocolate chip cookie dough egg roll at the Davis Theater’s Carbon Arc Bar, the kolokythakia at Barba Yianni, the cozy lodge in the Bavarian forest that is Huttenbar, and the marvelous handpulled noodles at Jibek Jolu. Props to Taco in a Bag. Harvestime Foods! Bistro Campagne! Monti’s! New Asia! Nhu Lan! There’s a great spice shop. There’s a store that sells mostly just vinegar. There’s a boutique entirely devoted to the delicate art of male facial grooming. I go to Lincoln Square a lot. What’s not to love?

But you can’t tell me Lincoln Avenue between Foster and Sunnyside isn’t, in many respects, the very definition of middle-of-the-road. So when the people behind one of the neighborhood’s more creditable establishments, Gather, decide to open a new restaurant right next door to the flagship, you have to take notice. That’s not to say you won’t be touched by doubt. Will their nachos be a thousand times more sublime than those down the street at Monty Gaels? Are the wings more crispy than those at Gideon Welles, a mere half block north? Are their flatbreads more artisanal than the ones at Nick’s Pizza, due west on Montrose? The Warbler raises concern just by offering these items—an apparent greatest hits of the banal bar food so many mediocre spots on the strip traffic in. But that’s the menu chef Ken J

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 31

Search the Reader’s online database of thousands of Chicago-area restaurants—and add your own review—at chicagoreader.com/food.

FOOD & DRINK

Roasted broccoli with horseradish-celery root slaw and preserved-lemon yogurt é GILLIAN FRY

continued from 31 Carter and his business partner, David Breo, have adopted for their more casual, inclusive sophomore restaurant. Carter is a chef who came into his own at Charlie Trotter’s near the denouement of that restaurant’s remarkable 25-year run. After that he clocked time downtown at the late Cibo Matto at the Wit. Four years ago, when he and Breo opened Gather, it was a place the neighborhood embraced for the chef’s upscale platings as much as for the burger, which also attracted people who didn’t even live in the neighborhood. I didn’t appreciate that burger at first, but I came around to it too. Is there anything else on the Warbler’s menu that’s as exceptional as the burger? Let’s see, among the don’t-call-it-pizza (er, “flatbreads”) and the appetizers, vegetables, salads, and grains, and a mere four entrees listed, there are things I’ll continue to think about long after this review lines the figurative birdcage of my brain. Here’s one: a bowl of barley. “Creamy” barley, the words beckon. The bowl is possessed of such an engrossing array of textures—mol-

32 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

ten tamari-cooked egg, cool pureed cucumber, verdant tahini-slicked gomae, crunchy black sesame, the bacony seaweed seasoning dulse, and slices of soy-and-sesame-slicked scallions—I startled myself with sudden cravings for it days later. It’s sensational. Here’s another one I can’t forget, one I assumed would just be a throwaway: a roasted broccoli side dish, plated with careful thought to composition and contrast, raw shavings of brassica stalk playing a crunchy counterpoint to horseradish-celery root slaw and lemon-saturated Greek yogurt set off by an everything-bagel seasoning mix. There’s a great cauliflower dish on the menu too, crunchy battered florets shimmering with a mildly sweet ponzu glaze with cashews, sesame seeds, and pickled red onion. Surprises like this made me wish I didn’t have to reserve digestive space for Carter’s meatier bites. Available as a single or double, the Warbler’s cheeseburger is a compromise between smashed and tavern styles, a resolutely thin, almost parsimonious patty with not-quitecrispy edges, a coarse grind, and a rare

center. All of which would be fine if it weren’t overwhelmed by a dry dome of briochelike bun, which crumbles under the pressure of a stern glare and fails to maintain structural integrity under the moisture of pickle and hothouse tomato. On each occasion I visited the Warbler it was packed well into the late evening, so I suspect the half roast chicken I was served, ghastly pallid and with rubbery skin, was a sloppy mistake from an overwhelmed kitchen rather than an aesthetic choice. But I stumbled over other executional errors that made me wonder how long it should take a kitchen to hit its stride. I encountered oversalted and oversauced cacio de pepe with dense, choreful whole-wheat bucatini. A near liquid brandade dripped from the potato chips inexplicably floating atop its surface. With so many high-quality plant-based dishes on the menu, I’m at a loss why bland deep-fried tofu slabs in a watery green curry would be considered an appropriate bone to throw to the vegetarians. That said, other dishes set a baseline for variety and basic satisfaction that ought to

widen the net the Warbler is casting. A provolone-stuffed sausage with mustard, kraut, and pickled red onion would go down a lot easier if its attendant grilled rye bread weren’t so dry. Korean-style fried chicken wings are a sweet, brittle-battered surprise even if their muted kick must be bolstered with the odd but not ineffective squirt of lime. And the aforementioned puffy flatbreads, while not the most transcendent crusts in the city, are at least the most acceptable pizzas west of Spacca Napoli (and south of Jimmy’s), with toppings ranging from bacon and egg to artichoke and squash puree to chicken sausage and garlic cream. The sprawling menu is all focus at dessert, where there’s naught but a skillet cookie, a chocolate-peanut butter brownie, and a carrot cake so heroic it obviates the desire for any other choices. Sliced flat, it possesses a density more like quickbread than traditional leaden carrot cake. Its butter-pecan ice cream topknot is mined with massive chunks of praline, and it’s all doused in caramel sauce for a finish that transcends the middling reputation of this dessert archetype. Cocktails? The Warbler has those too. All named for birds, some are subtler than others. The Rose Finch is a refreshing sparkler of gin and pink vermouth that carries not a hint of the Sichuan citrus shrub noted on the menu, while the Songbird is a huge departure from the late Bar DeVille classic, a murky fruit cocktail of barrel-aged and unfiltered gins and blackberry wine. Until the patio opens, the roomy, in-theround bar stocked with mostly domestic wines and beer may be the most comfortable place to park at the Warbler. The front dining room is close and crowded, and EVERYBODY IS SHOUTING, while the small rear dining room behind the kitchen is only slightly less constricted. The Warbler attempts to sing its song for every kind of eater. It’s a rare restaurant that does that very well, and while there are still some sour notes that need tuning, Carter and Breo have a far better chance of catching on beyond the borders of Lincoln Square than many of their neighbors. v

m @MikeSula

ETHEREAL CONFECTIONS

113 S. Benton St., Woodstock etherealconfections.com

FOOD & DRINK presents

Michael and Mary Ervin and Sara Miller é LISA BEARD

APRIL 9, 2018 6:30 – 8:30pm

doors open at 5:45pm

mHUB 965 W Chicago Ave CHOCOLATE

You don’t need a golden ticket to go inside the Ethereal Confections chocolate factory The Woodstock confectioner just keeps growing and growing. By JULIA THIEL

illy Wonka inspired generations of kids to dream of owning a chocolate factory when they grew up—but Sara Miller and Mary and Michael Ervin have achieved it in real life. Ethereal Confections isn’t a factory on the scale of Wonka’s, and there’s no chocolate river. But they do make their own chocolate from cocoa beans, which they turn into truffles, peanut butter cups, and bars in ﬂavors like pistachio-cranberry or strawberry with rose petal and pink peppercorn. Mary and Sara, now 36 and 37, became friends in college and worked in design for ﬁve years before they decided to launch Ethereal Confections as a side project in 2011. (Michael, who’s Mary’s brother and was Sara’s husband at the time, has been part of the business since the beginning but stayed mostly behind the scenes in a supporting role that has become more active over the past few years.) They began making confections like truffles, bars, and chocolate barks with nuts and dried fruit in a shared kitchen and selling them at the Woodstock farmers’ market. Before the end of the summer, business was good enough

that they rented a 400-square-foot shop in the center of town. They quickly outgrew that as well. In their current location, a former restaurant, they run a cafe with panini, soup, coffee, tea, hot chocolate, and cocktails in addition to their chocolate bars and confections. And once again, they’ve run out of space. Soon they’ll be moving to a 10,000-squarefoot building where they’ll not only expand their cafe and chocolate operations, but also add an incubator kitchen, a speakeasy, and more classes and tastings. They’ll be staying in Woodstock, which they say has supported their business from the start. “When we ﬁrst started selling [chocolate] I was at farmers’ markets in Wisconsin and Mary was selling here in Woodstock,” Sara says. “We had a much better reception in Woodstock; people were more excited about what we were doing.” To help out with the costs of renovating the building they’re moving into, they’ve created a Kickstarter to raise $30,000 (rewards include special-edition chocolate bars, food from their cafe, and invitations to parties at the new space). Michael says that when they announced their expansion plans on Face- J

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MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 33

GROUPON, INC. IS seeking a Senior Product Marketing Manager in Chicago, IL w/ the following responsibilities: Work in a tightly coordinated fashion crossSALES & functionally w/ product, finance, MARKETING marketing, brand & analytics; coordinate mktg efforts & support TELEMAREKTING SALES We are looking for high energy the product roadmap plan. 25% CLOSERS to sell radio ads to busi- travel req’d to various unanticipatnesses nationwide. $15/hr to start or ed locs in the U.S.; must live w/in commisison whichever is higher. normal commuting distance of Weekly pay & numerous bonuses. Chicago, IL. Apply on-line at http Sales or industry experience a plus s : / / j o b s . g r o u p o n . c o m / j o b s / R16483 but will train.

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book, the post got exponentially more views and reactions than anything they’d ever posted. “We thought, if the community support is already there—was there some way we could tell people about what we’re doing and get them to back us?” In the new space, the owners are hoping to be able to upgrade some of their equipment for making chocolate. Rather than buying chocolate from another company to turn into confections and bars, they make their own chocolate from cocoa beans—which was still a rarity among small producers when Ethereal started doing it ﬁve years ago. According to Michael, it was one of the ﬁrst 20 or 30 companies in the U.S. to do bean-to-bar chocolate (there are now about 180 across the U.S. and Canada). Mary had worked at a chocolate shop in college and says her boss there told her making chocolate from cocoa beans wasn’t something small companies could do. “He told me you needed a big factory with a lot of equipment,” she says. But on a trip to Madison not long after they launched their business, Sara and Mary talked to a chocolate shop owner who said she was about to try making her own chocolate from beans. “As soon as I knew that was a thing you could do, I wanted to do it,” Mary says. There’s a reason it wasn’t common: equipment for making chocolate on a smaller scale didn’t exist. “You really had to make it yourself,” Michael says. “I’ve always said the machine we use for the winnowing process, it was like building your own light saber. The main grinders we use are repurposed Indian lentil grinders. We have an old bread proofer we bought to keep chocolate liquid.” There

wasn’t a lot of information out there about how to make chocolate, either. “To learn to do it, we talked to a lot of chocolate makers,” Michael says. “There are some old books you can buy from the 50s that talk about chocolate making.” They source their cocoa beans from Central and South America and the Caribbean, visiting the farms that they work with; last year alone, Mary and Michael went to Ecuador, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. “We want to understand how it’s been grown, where our money is being used,” Michael says. In addition to making chocolate, Ethereal educates people about it: for several years, the shop has offered classes, and the owners hope to do even more in the new space. There are bean-to-bar classes, where people make their own chocolate from scratch, and pairings where attendees taste chocolate with beer, wine, or spirits. They focus on local companies so that the owners can come out and talk about their products, often partnering with Chicago breweries and distilleries for pairings. If they don’t meet their funding goal on Kickstarter, Mary says, they’ll still move to their new location—which used to be an Elks lodge—but may not be able to launch all their planned projects right away. All three owners say they’re excited about offering a place for the community to gather. “These fraternal organizations that used to be everywhere are dying, and we’re taking that place,” Michael says. “People want a place to gather, have food, socialize, run events—and the best they can ﬁnd, often, is the Starbucks.” v

m @JuliaThiel Making truﬄes at Ethereal Confections é BETH GENEGELS

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MIDWAY AREA/63RD KEDZIE Deluxe Studio 1 & 2 BRs. All

modern oak floors, appliances, Security system, on site maint. clean & quiet, Nr. transp. From $445. 773582-1985 (espanol)

PRE-SPRING SPECIAL - CHICAGO South Side Beautiful Studios, 1,2,3 & 4 BR’s, Sec 8 ok. Also Homes for rent available. Call Nicole 312-446-1753; W-side locations Tom 630-776-5556; CHICAGO HEIGHTS, 1, 2 & 3BRs, free heat, gas and parking, close to everything, section 8 welcome. $600 and up. 708-300-5020 CLEAN ROOM W/FRIDGE & micro, Near Oak Park, Food -4Less, Walmart, Walgreens, Buses & Metra, Laundry. $115/wk & up. 773-637-5957 7520 S. COLES - 1 BR $520, 2 BR $645, Includes appliances & AC, Near transp., No utilities included (708) 424-4216 Kalabich Mgmt N RIVERSIDE: 1BR new tile, energy efficient windows, lndry facilitities, a/c, incls heat - natural gas, $955/mo Luis 708-366-5602 lv msg $725/MO. LARGE 2BR 75th & Union. Near public trans, schools and shopping, appl incl. Sect 8 Welc. 708-334-5188 Newly updated, clean furnished rooms in Joliet, near buses & Metra, elevator. Utilities included, $91/wk. $395/mo. 815-722-1212 NICE ROOM w/stove, fridge & bath Near Aldi, Walgreens, Beach, Red Line & Buses. Elevator & Laundry. $133/wk & up. 773-275-4442 BIG ROOM with stove, fridge, bath & nice wood floors. Near Red Line & Buses. Elevator & Laundry, Shopping. $121/wk + up. 773-561-4970

CHATHAM - 7105 S. Champlain, 1BR. $640/mo. Sec 8 OK. Heat & appl. Call Office: 773-9665275 or Steve: 773-936-4749 CHICAGO Lovely 4 rm apt, 1BR, liv rm, din rm, kitchen/bath, heated and carpet flrs. Close to trans. $685, avail now. 773-264-6711 CHICAGO NEAR 80TH & Ingleside. Newly rehab, 1 BR, large LR, new kit, carpeted. $600. no sec, heat included. 708-921-9506

7425 S. COLES - 1 BR $620, 2

BR $735, Includes Free heat & appliances & cooking gas. (708) 424-4216 Kalabich Mgmt 6930 S. SOUTH SHORE DRIVE Studios & 1BR, INCL. Heat, Elec, Cking gas & PARKING, $585-$925, Country Club Apts 773-752-2200

Chicago - Hyde PARK 5401 S. Ellis. 1BR. $625/mo. Call 773-955-5106

Irving/Kimball 2BR new tile, laundry facilities, energy efficient windows, central heat/ac, $999/mo Call Luis 708-366-5602, lv msg NO SEC DEP

7801 S. Bishop. 2BR. $610/mo. HEAT INCL 773-955-5106

1 BR $700-$799 BLUE ISLAND - Large 1BR, fireplace, liv rm, carpet, new decor, appls ,din. rm, nr metra & pace, ten. heated, $725mo+ sec, Vic 125th & Western 773-238-7203

1 BR $800-$899 HUMBOLDT PARK. 1 & 2 BEDROOM apartments for rent. Newly remodeled. Next door to food store. $880/mo plus security deposit. Includes gas. Near shopping area. Tim, 773-592-2989.

1 BR $900-$1099 HYDE PARK LARGE 1BR WITH DINING ROOM. $1095. FREE HEAT 1ST FLOOR, NEWLY DECOR, HDWD FLRS, APPLS, FREE CREDIT CHECK, NO APP FEE. SECTION 8 WELCOME. 1-773-667-6477 OR 1-312802-7301 LARGE ONE BEDROOM near Loyola Park, 1341 W. Estes. Hardwood floors. Cats OK. $975/month. Heat included. Available 5/1. 773-7614318.

DOLTON - Newly remodeled 1BR. $825/mo. New appliances, heat, cooking gas & water included. Balcony, laundry. 708-224-5052

REAL ESTATE RENTALS

1 BR $900-$1099 1BR nr Elston & Milwaukee, Newly Remod, all new appls, all hdwd flrs. $900/mo heat incl. Call 847-370-9777

1 BR OTHER PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Los Vecinos Apartments, located at 4250 W. North Avenue, Chicago, Illinois, is opening its federally subsidized Section8 Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Single Room Occupancy (SRO) Rental Apartments. Rent calculations are based upon your annual income and income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for pre-applications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: Los Vecinos Apartments 4250 W. North Avenue Chicago, Illinois 60639 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM. March 26th and April 4th, 2018 PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Hollywood House Apartments, located at 5700 N. Sheridan Rd., Chicago, Illinois; a senior living community, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Studio and 1Bedroom apartments. Income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for preapplications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: Hollywood House Apartments 5700 N. Sheridan Rd Chicago, Illinois 60660 9:00 A.M. to 2:00 P.M. April 3RD and 10TH, 2018 PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Karibuni Apartments, located at 8200 S. Ellis, Chicago, Illinois, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Single Room Occupancy (SRO) Rental Apartments. Rent calculations are based upon your annual income and income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for pre-applications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: Karibuni Apartments 8200 S. Ellis Chicago, Illinois 60619 10:00 A.M. to 2:00 P.M. Thursday, March 29, 2018

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Leland Apartments, located at 1207 W. Leland Ave., Chicago, Illinois, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Single Room Occupancy (SRO) and Studio apartments. Income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for pre-applications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: Leland Apartments 1207 W. Leland Chicago, Illinois 60640 9:00 A.M. to 2:30 P.M. Mon., March 26 and April 9, 2018 PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Mae Suites Apartments – 148 N. Mayfield, Chicago, Illinois, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Studio apartments. Income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for preapplications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: Mae Suites Apartments 148 S. Mayfield Chicago, Illinois 60644 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM March 29th and April 5th, 2018 PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT San Miguel Apartments, located at 907 W. Argyle, Chicago, Illinois, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Studio, 1 bedroom and 2 bedroom apartments. Income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for pre-applications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: San Miguel Apartments 907 W. Argyle St. Chicago, Illinois 60640 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM April 2nd and 3rd, 2018 PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT Parkway Apartments, located at 712 W. Diversey, Chicago, Illinois, is opening its Waiting List for individuals in need of affordable Studio and 1 Bedroom apartments. Income limitations apply in order to qualify for residency. All requests for preapplications must be completed in person only and will be accepted at: 712 W. Diversey Parkway Chicago, Illinois 60614 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM April 2nd and 3rd, 2018 APTS. FOR RENT PARK MGMT & INV. Ltd. Hot Summer Is Here Cool Off In The Pool OUR UNITS INCLUDE HEAT, HW & CG Plenty of parking 1Bdr From $795.00 2Bdr From $925.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000**

CHICAGO - BEVERLY, large studio, 1 & 2BR Apts. Carpet, A/ C, laundry, near transportation, $680-$1020/mo. Call 773-2334939

GENERAL

APTS. FOR RENT PARK MGMT & INV. Ltd. SUMMER IS HERE!! Most units Include.. HEAT & HOT WTR Studios From $475.00 1Bdr From $550.00 2Bdr From $745.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000** ROUND LAKE BEACH, IL Cedar Villas is accepting applications for subsidized 1BR apts. for seniors 62 years or older and the disabled. Rent is based on 30% of annual income. For details, call us at 847-546-1899 ∫

6748 CRANDON & 7727 COLFAX MOST BEAUTIFUL APARTMENTS! 1 & 2BR, $625 & UP. OFF STREET PARKING. 773-947-8572 / 312-6134424 77TH/CARPENTER, MALE PREF, furn room, no drugs, secure building. Cable ready. FREE utils., shared kitchen & bath, $450/ mo. Senior Disc. References. 773874-4941

2 BR $900-$1099 1233 S. AVERS., newly constructed bldng, 2BR, handicap accessible, SS appls., tenant pays utils. $1050/mo. Section 8 ok. 773-895-2541 CHATHAM AREA, Gorgeous, 2BR, 1st flr, updated kit & bath.

$900/mo + 1 mo sec. Clean & Quiet. No Pets. 773-930-6045 newly decorated, 2BR & $3BR, $850/mo, heat incl, lndry on site. Contact Frank, 708-205-4311

2 BR $1100-$1299 EVANSTON: 2111 WESLEY, 2BR, near Northwestern, parking, storage, all utilities, A/C, laundry included. All wood floors, 2-flat. $1250/mo. Available now. 847-424-1885 or alanbirman@ hotmail.com CHICAGO, 2015 E. 74th St., 7 rooms, small pets only, $108 0/month. Immediate Occupancy. Call 773-955-3954

SECTION 8 WELCOME. NO SECURITY DEPOSIT. 710 W 81st Place, 3BR house, appls include. $1200/mo. 708-288-4510

2 BR $1300-$1499

CALUMET CITY SFH, 3BR, $130

0/mo. Voucher welc. Also avail: Apt in 4 flat. $1100/mo. Voucher Welc. Call Harold 312-456-1840

SUBURBS, RENT TO OW N! Buy with No closing costs and get help with your credit. Call 708868-2422 or visit www.nhba.com

2 BR UNDER $900

SEC 8 OK!

4950 S. Prairie. Remod 1BR. $700+. Heat, cooking gas & appls inc, lndry on site. Z. 773.406.4841

GENERAL

IKE SIMS VILLAGE APARTMENTS Will be opening the waiting list for its 2 Bedroom Apartments on Tuesday, April 3, 2018 through Thursday, April 5, 2018 from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. The Waiting List for the 2 and 3 Bedroom Apartments. will close on Thursday, April 5, 2018 at 3:00 pm. 3333 W Maypole · Chicago, IL 60624 773-638-1818 Phone 773-638-1833 Fax TTD/TTY: 711 ONLY COMPLETED APPLICATIONS WILL BE ACCEPTED. Maximum income and eligibility guidelines apply.

Villas is accepting applications for Subsidized 2 and 3 bedroom apt waiting list. Rent is based on 30% of annual income for qualified applicants. Contact us at 847-546-1899 for details

2 & 3BR Houses & T.H. Sec 8 OK. Call 708-625-7355

SUNNY AND SPACIOUS two

bedroom, seven rooms in an owner occupied 3-flat. Sun Room, formal Dining Room, Living Room, remodeled bath and kitchen with pantry, hardwood floors. If you see this apartment, you will agree it is beautiful. Third floor walkup, close to transportation and huge city Park. $1450 per month includes heat, security deposit required. Montrose/California. Available May 1st (312) 339-8211

GENERAL

6643 S. DREXEL: Newly renovat-

ed 3BR apt, hardwood flooring, Section 8 welcome. Any size voucher. Rent $1000/mo. Contact Alphonso 773-858-8787

1500 Block of S Kostner , 2nd fl, 3BR, close to pink CTA line. newly renov, new carpet & C-fan $1050. Sec 8 OK 312-818-0236 SOUTH SIDE. Newly Remod 3BR units, w/ security cameras, maint on site, sec 8 ok. $900$1300/mo. no dep. 773-544-5377.

3 BR OR MORE $1200-$1499 82ND & THROOP, free heat, newly decor 6 rms, 3BR, encl porch, decorative fireplace. $1100/mo. 1 month security. 773-874-8515

5900 W & 300 N. 1/2 block from G reenline & Oak Park. Renovated

3BR, sanded floors, heat incl. $1200/mo + sec deposit. Call 773626-8993 or 773-653-6538

3BR 1.5 BA, stove, fridge, w/d included, side drive pkg, Section 8 Welcome, $1300/mo plus security 708-596-9078 or 773-5629429

ROUND LAKE BEACH, IL Cedar

MATTESON, RICHTON PARK, HAZEL CREST & UNIV PARK.

CHICAGO 7600 S Essex PRE-SPRING SPECIAL - 2BR $599, 3BR $699, 4BR $799 w/apprvd credit, no sec dep. Sec 8 Ok! Also Homes for Rent avail. Call Nicole 773-287-9999; W-side locations Tom 630-776-5556

BRONZEVILLE

2 BR OTHER

BLUE ISLAND, Beautiful townhome, 2BR, 2.5BA, hdwd floors, appls, garage, overlooking golfcourse. Section 8 ok. Call 773344-4050

CHICAGO SOUTHSIDE. CHEAP CHEAP!!! Rooms For Rent, 79th & Escanaba $380-$400/mo. Utilities included. 773-387-7367

CHICAGO 94-3739 S. Bishop. 2BR, 5 Rms, 2nd flr, appls, parking, storage & closet space, near shops/ trans. $950 + sec. 708-335-0786

EAST LOGAN: 2BR + den/1BA. Remodeled 2nd floor unit; new kitchen w/SS appliances, updated bath, new hardwood floors, freshly painted. laundry in building, EZ parking, CAC, separate utilities. No smoking. No pets. $1500/mo + $1500 security deposit. Available May 1. Call 773-879-2430

LARGE 2 BEDROOM w/extra large balcony plus 2500 SQFT shop w/office. Near Midway. Will rent separately or as package. Call Roger 708-431-3822

CHICAGO, RENT TO OWN! Buy with no closing costs and get help with your credit. Call 708868-2422 or visit www.nhba.com

SECTION 8 WELCOME Newly Decorated. 74TH/East End 2BR. Hdwd flrs, Heat Incl. $775. 773-874-9637 or 773-493-5359

OVER

SECT 8 WELC, 71st & Wentworth,

LOOKING TO MOVE ASAP? Remodeled 1, 2, 3 & 4 BR Apts. Heat & Appls incl. Sec 8 OK. Southside Only. 773-593-4357

2 BR $1500 AND

3 BR OR MORE UNDER $1200 AUSTIN AREA, huge remodeled 3BR, heated, eat in kitchen, formal DR, appliances avail. $1200 +sec. Sect 8 ok. 708-857-7507 SECTION 8 WELCOME

Dolton - Available Now! 3BR, 1BA, garage $1000/mo. Appliances incl & security dep required. Call 773-447-1990

ADULT SERVICES

3 BR OR MORE $1500-$1799 BUDLONG WOODS, 5500N/ 2600W. Three bedrooms, full

dining room, spacious living room, 1.5 baths, many closets, near transportation, $1500 includes heat. Available May 1. Marty 773-784-0763.

SECT 8 WELCOME OR SHARE Refurb 5BR, Appl incl, laundry rm, C/A. 1132 E. 81st Pl. $1700/mo neg. NO Dep Req. 800-566-2642

SPACIOUS & BRIGHT 3BR, 5614 W. Division, 2nd flr, new decor, 1BA, gracious Liv & din rm. $1595 +sec. Sec 8 OK. 708-369-6791

5828 S. MICHIGAN - 2 B R $1140 & 3BR $1350 w/ 2BA, LR, DR, kitchen, sun and back porches. 2BR Grdn, $750. 773-370-1952

Gresham, 81st & Peoria. Spacious 3BR, 2nd flr. Quiet Bldng. Lrg DR & LR, hdwd flrs, Eat-In, Enclosed Porch. Theresa, 773-4508944 CHICAGO, 6859 S. EVANS. 3BR Townhouse, 1BA. Hardwood floors. Section 8 Welcome. Call 708-296-5477 for more information.

Austin Area, 2, 3 & 4BR apts avail close to trans, updated kit & BA, w/d hookup, no pets, $875-$1550+ util. & sec. 708265-3611 SECTION 8 WELCOME. Near

53rd & Indiana, lrg 4BR, near schools w/ stove & fridge. Newly decorated. $1200 + sec dep. 773-955-5024

Austin Area, 5BR, 2BA, newly remod. BA & kitchen, hdwd flrs, resp for lawn maint. No pets $1650+ utils & sec. 708-265-3611

GENERAL WHISPERING OAK APTS 2443 W. Dugdale Rd Waukegan, IL 60085 Sec 8 affordable housing waiting list now open for 1, 2 & 3 bdrm apts. Applications will be accepted M-W-F from 10am-3pm 847-336-44 NEW KITCHENS & NEW BATHROOMS. 69th & Dante, 3BR. 71st & Bennett, 2, 3 & 4BR. We have others! Section 8 Welcome. 708-5031366

FOR SALE

roommates SOUTH SHORE, Senior Discount. Male preferred. Furnished rooms, shared kitchen & bath, $440/mo. & up. Utilities included. 773-710-5431

AVAILABLE NOW! Spacious Rooms for rent. $400/mo. Utilities and bed incl. Seniors Welcome. No Sec Dep. 312-973-2793

CHICAGO 55TH & Halsted, male pref. Room for rent, share furnished apt, free utils, $ 440/mo. No security. 773-614-8252

Clean Rooms, use of kitchen and bath. Available Now. Call 773-434-4046

MARKETPLACE

GOODS

CLASSICS WANTED ANY CLASSIC CARS IN ANY CONDITION. ’20S, ’30S, ’40S, ’50S, ’60S & ’70S. HOTRODS & EXOTICS! TOP DOLLAR PAID! COLLECTOR. CALL JAMES, 630-201-8122

SERVICES CHICAGOCATSITTER.BIZ

Going out of town, vacation, working late? I can cat-sit! Play, feed, change water, clean cat litter, etc. Daily sitter photo updates $15/day for 1 cat ($20/day for 2+ cats) J. Dravillas jendravillas@yahoo.com 312-925-4222

3 BR OR MORE

CHURCH FOR SALE. Ready as a weekend getaway or convert to business, house or 2-unit. 30 minutes West of Wisconsin Dells. $49,900. 773-655-1099

PRE-SPRING SPECIAL Chicago Houses for rent. Section 8 Ok, w/ app credit $500 gift certificate 3, 4 & 5 BR houses avail. Call Nicole: 773-287-9999; W-side locations: Tom 630-776-5556

102ND & VERNON: 3BR, 2.5BA, 1 car gar., fin bsmt, lrg rms, All appls. Priced to sell fast! Brokers Welc. $159,900. State Wood Realty, 773-684-1166

ADULT SERVICES

OTHER

2 MONTHS FREE RENT! 5437 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago, IL 60625. 1600 S.F. Please call 312-927-1522, 7 rooms previously an optical. Prime spot for doctors office, chiropractor, dentist or optical. Across from 20th Chicago Police Department.

SOUTHSIDE - 55TH & Ashland,

3 BR OR MORE $1800-$2499 OLYMPIA FIELDS Newly remodeled 4 bedroom, 2.5 bath house, full basement. Beautiful area. 708-935-7557.

non-residential

MUSIC & ARTS

LORETTA LYNN FANS! Vocalist Jenifer French & the Twang Patrol country band are performing a tribute to country music legend, Loretta Lynn in “Honky Tonk Girl!” on Sat May 5 at 8pm at Davenport’s. http://davenportspianobar.com/events/jeniferfrench-honky-tonk-girl-tribute-loretta-lynn/

ADULT SERVICES

Cyril Court Apartments, a Section 8 Apartment Community located in the quiet South Shore Community, just minutes away from Lake Michigan. Enjoy living in our spacious studio and one-bedroom apartments designed for your comfort and convenience. You can enjoy an array of amenities including a clubhouse, elevators, laundry on site, and gated secure parking lot. We as well offer controlled access, and after hours emergency maintenance assistance. Residents enjoy monthly activities with their neighbors which creates a sense of community. Come in and ﬁll out an application and see why Cyril Court Apartments should be your new home.

FREE APPLICATION! JUST WALK IN, IT’S THAT EASY! *Must have valid state ID to apply

Applications accepted 10AM-3:30PM Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday

BUILDING HAS A SENIOR PREFERENCE!!

Preference as well given to disabled, homeless or displaced. Applicants subject to HUD income eligibility and other screening requirements. Rent based on 30% of adjusted monthly income.

7130 S. Cyril Court, Chicago, IL 60649 Half Block West of Jeffrey Ave.

(773) 588-7767 ext. 108 • TTY (711 National Relay)

www.CyrilCourtApts.com • Email: CyrilCourt@m2regroup.com

MARCH 29, 2018 | CHICAGO READER 35

SLUG SIGNORINO

STRAIGHT DOPE By Cecil Adams Q : Why are processed foods bad? If I REAL PEOPLE REAL DESIRE REAL FUN.

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take a chicken breast and process it into a paste, is it worse for my health than if I ate the chicken whole? Please help before I get butt cancer from a chicken nugget! —JIM HUFF

U N D E D 192

A : Let’s get the bad news out of the way, Jim.

Last month a big French study came out that tracked the diets of some 100,000 participants to better understand the relationship between cancer and what its authors refer to as “ultra-processed foods,” characterized by “a higher content of total fat, saturated fat, and added sugar and salt, along with a lower fibre and vitamin density.” And though butt cancer wasn’t named as a specific threat, the findings did in fact link a 10 percent proportional increase in consumption of such food with a 10 percent-plus rise in cancer risk overall. Further research is needed, but—brace yourself—it’s looking like chicken nuggets may not be amazing for your health. The good news? Your skepticism regarding any categorical condemnation of “processed foods” is entirely warranted. Not only is there nothing inherently bad about processed foods, the phrase itself is so capacious and variously defined as to be basically meaningless. Unless you’re picking grapes off the vine, you’re eating food that’s been processed somehow or other: milk is pasteurized; wheat is ground; salad mix is washed. A 2000 article in the British Medical Bulletin defined food processing as “any procedure undergone by food commodities after they have left the primary producer, and before they reach the consumer”—mere refrigeration counts. Moreover, food processing, far from being intrinsically bad, often employs creative ways to unlock nutrition in food or extend its shelf life. Nixtamalization, the practice of treating maize with limestone or lye, helped the Aztecs and Mayans get more protein and disease-preventing vitamins in their diet. Fermentation is used to turn milk into longer-lasting cheese and yogurt and to produce shelf-friendly dietary staples like Korean kimchi, Nigerian ogi (fermented grains), and assorted smelly preserved-fish dishes encountered at high latitudes. Salt took its own place among the processed foods early in the 20th century when we began fortifying it with iodine, essential for thyroid function. Just as adding vitamin D to milk took care of our national rickets problem, iodized salt pretty much wiped out goi-

ter, plus some serious developmental disorders also associated with iodine deficiency. It’s been floated as one factor behind what’s known as the Flynn effect: the three-pointper-decade rise in IQ observed in developed countries over the 20th century. So yeah, food processing has done a thing or two for humanity. We haven’t even touched on the fact that urbanization would have been a hell of a lot harder without food preserved for shipping from the hinterlands, or that the zillion hours of food-prep labor we’ve saved by not making everything from scratch would have fallen disproportionately on women’s shoulders. Does “processed food,” then, deserve its bad rap? Answer: no, which is something public-health experts are coming around on. The French study discussed above uses a four-category food-classification system that separates harmless or beneficial food processing from the problematic sort. NOVA, as the scheme’s called, distinguishes between unprocessed or minimally processed foods (e.g. meats, plants); processed culinary ingredients (sugar, vegetable oils); processed foods (canned vegetables, cured meats); and, finally, ultra-processed foods, defined as “industrial formulations with five or more and usually many ingredients,” including “substances not commonly used in culinary preparations.” And yes, the NOVA authors list “poultry and fish ‘nuggets’” in this last group. Again, one thing typifying ultra-processed foods is low nutrient density and high energy density, what with all that added fat and carbs. Those traits are much of (a) the real problem, as far as healthy eating goes, and (b) why Doritos taste so good. But I hope by now you’re distinguishing this kind of stuff from your homemade chicken paste, which isn’t the kind of processed food you need to worry about. Appealing as it sounds, though, I’m afraid I’ve got dinner plans. v Send questions to Cecil via straightdope.com or write him c/o Chicago Reader, 30 N. Racine, suite 300, Chicago 60607.

SAVAGE LOVE

By Dan Savage

The ins and outs of male chastity devices

What good’s a cock cage if you can escape from it? Plus: spanks on the QT Q : I’m in a D/s relationship

with a partner who owns my cock. We’ve purchased several male chastity devices, but I can pretty easily get out of them. My partner did some investigating and learned that the only effective devices work with a Prince Albert piercing—a ring through the head of the penis that locks into the device, preventing the sub from pulling his cock out. My partner now wants me to get a PA. I don’t want to get my cock pierced and I’ve said so, but I would very reluctantly do it to please her. My partner made an appointment for a piercing three months from now, on our second anniversary. She told me that we can cancel it if I can find an effective chastity device that doesn’t require a piercing. Do you or any of your contacts in the fetish world know of any devices that are inescapable? —PIERCING APPENDAGE UNNECESSARILY SCARES EAGER SUB

A : “I’ve never come across

a standard male chastity device I couldn’t pull out of,” said Ruﬄed Sheets, an IT consultant and chastity belt aficionado who as of this writing owns 37 different kinds of cock cages. “So PAUSES’s partner has obviously researched regular chastity devices well. “However, piercing is [just] one of two ways to ensure the penis cannot escape. The other is a full chastity belt,” Sheets continues. They “aren’t without their drawbacks—they are generally more expensive, are harder to conceal under clothes, and take longer to get used to, especially at night. But they are secure. I have three custom-fitted chastity belts and, once properly fitted, they’re inescapable.”

That said, for many male subs and their doms, the symbolism of a male chastity device is what matters most, not its inescapability. And as with other forms of sex play and most aspects of healthy relationships, it’s the honor system that really makes it work. “As in any negotiated relationship, you can cheat,” said Sheets. “But why cheat? They’re easy to keep on if you’re genuinely interested in submitting.” Fun fact: Locking a guy’s cock in an inescapable device doesn’t prevent him from coming.

Q : My girlfriend of four

months has unoﬃcially moved in with me. We began as a long-distance thing; I live in New York City and she lived in the Deep South. What began as her visiting me for the holidays ended up with her staying with me indeﬁnitely. She comes from a very poor family, and going back home means sleeping in her grandma’s living room. Things are going well, but we are moving fast. I’m not sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I’m loving it and loving her. On the other hand, I feel like she could be using me. She has found part-time work. She hasn’t pitched in for rent—I also have a roommate—but she has pitched in for groceries. Do I ask her for rent money? Do I send her back to her grandma’s place? I don’t know what to do because I feel like I am housing a refugee. —SHE’S HERE INDEFINITELY NOW

A : Instead of ending things

now to protect yourself from retroactively feeling shitty about this relationship if it ends at some point in the future, SHIN, you should

have a convo with your girlfriend about rent, reality, and roommates. Tell her that it can’t go on like this indeﬁnitely, as it’s unfair to your roommate. Tell her you appreciate the ways she’s kicking in now—helping with groceries—but eventually she’ll need to start kicking in on rent too, and then set a realistic date for her to start paying rent. You should also encourage her to think about getting her own place. Not because you want to stop seeing her—you’re loving it and loving her—but because a premature commitment like cohabitating can sabotage a relationship. You also don’t want her to feel so dependent on you that she can’t end things if she needs to. You want her to be with you because she wants to be with you, not because she’s trapped.

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Q : You ran a letter from a

man whose wife wouldn’t let him spank her. I’m a woman whose husband won’t spank me. I found a man like WISHOTK, and we meet up for spanking sessions. Neither of our spouses know. It’s only spanking, no sex. How bad should I feel?

—REALLY EROTIC DALLIANCES BUT, UM, MARRIED

A : Very bad. In fact, REDBUM, I think you should be spanked for getting spanked behind your husband’s back—then spanked again for getting spanked for getting spanked behind your husband’s back. And then spanked some more. v Send letters to mail@ savagelove.net. Download the Savage Lovecast every Tuesday at savagelovecast. com. m @fakedansavage

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EARLY WARNINGS

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MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 37

UPCOMING

Snail Mail é SNAIL MAIL COURTESY MATADOR RECORDS

NEW

Arc Iris 5/30, 9 PM, Hideout Bacon Brothers 7/12, 6:30 and 9:30 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 3/29, noon b Nik Bartsch’s Ronin 5/10, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Bloodshot Bill 6/3, 9 PM, Hideout Bongripper 7/13, 8 PM, Metro, on sale Fri 3/30, noon, 18+ Leon Bridges 9/24, 8 PM, Aragon Ballroom, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM, 17+ Chris Brown 7/28, 7 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Celtic Thunder 10/14, 7 PM, Chicago Theatre, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Ry Cooder 6/24, 7:30 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Ferry Corsten 4/27, 10 PM, the Mid Deerhoof 6/3, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Diplomats 7/28, 9 PM, Portage Theater Dodheimsgard 5/25, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Sam Evian 6/14, 9 PM, Schubas, on sale Fri 3/30, 9 AM, 18+ Mike Farris & the Roseland Rhythm Revue 6/20, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Festival Cubano with Gilberto Santa Rosa, Oscar D’Leon, Adalberto Alvare, Lisa Lisa, George Lamond, and more 8/10-12, 11 AM, Riis Park b Follakzoid, Lumerians 5/3, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle Jeﬀrey Foucault 6/18, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 3/29, noon b Ghost-Note 6/19, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+

Vivian Green 8/11, 7 and 10 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 3/29, noon b Handsome Family 7/13, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Helena Hauﬀ 5/19, 10 PM, Smart Bar Robyn Hitchcock & the Nashville Fabs 10/10, 8 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM, 17+ Island 10/1, 6 PM, Beat Kitchen b Pokey LaFarge 7/14, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Joyner Lucas, Eli 5/13, 7 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ John Mayall 6/12, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 3/29, noon b 6/13, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Melvv 5/4, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ The Naked and Famous 7/2, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Needtobreathe, Johnnyswim 9/8, 7 PM, Huntington Bank Pavilion, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Nina Nesbitt 4/13, 6 PM, Beat Kitchen b 104.3 James Throwback Thursday with Salt N Pepa, Montell Jordan, Rob Base, Coolio, All-4-One, Tone Loc, and Young MC 7/12, 7 PM, Hollywood Casino Ampitheatre, Tinley Park, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Anders Osborne 7/15, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Panic! At the Disco, Arizona, Hayley Kiyoko 7/17, 7 PM, United Center, on sale Fri 3/30, noon Petal, Camp Cope 6/24, 7 PM, Beat Kitchen b

38 CHICAGO READER - MARCH 29, 2018

Posies 6/23, 7:30 PM, Park West, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM, 18+ Cathy Richardson Band 5/24, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 3/29, noon b ‘68 5/27, 6 PM, Cobra Lounge b Snail Mail 6/16, 7 PM, Subterranean b Social Distortion 6/22, 8 PM, House of Blues, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM, 17+ Matthew Sweet 7/12, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b The Sword, Atomic Bitchwax 6/20, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ 3 Doors Down, Collective Soul 7/24, 7 PM, Huntington Bank Pavilion, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM Tony Toni Tone 8/10, 7 PM, the Promontory, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b U.S. Bombs, Dwarves, Murder Junkies 6/17, 6:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 18+ Sander Van Doorn 4/21, 10 PM, the Mid Jimmie Vaughan 7/24-25, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, on sale Fri 3/30, 10 AM b Tom Walker 8/27, 8 PM, Schubas, on sale Fri 3/30, noon, 18+ Hannah Wants 4/28, 10 PM, the Mid Gin Wigmore 6/13, 8 PM, Park West, on sale Fri 3/30, 11 AM b

UPDATED Juana Molina 4/9, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, canceled Ty Segall 4/8, 8 PM, the Vic, moved from Riviera Theatre, 18+

Acid Mothers Temple, Melting Paraiso U.F.O. 4/14, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen Alt-J 6/7, 8 PM, Huntington Bank Pavilion Animal Collective, Lonnie Holley 7/27, 7:30 PM, the Vic b Jon Batiste 5/4, 8 PM, Thalia Hall b Belly 10/6, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Bing & Ruth 5/11, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Terry Bozzio 9/18, 8 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Breeders 5/8, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Carbon Leaf 7/7, 6 and 9 PM, City Winery b Brandi Carlile 6/15, 7:30 PM, Chicago Theatre Charly Bliss 5/17, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle Marc Cohn 6/29, 8 PM, City Winery b Lucy Dacus, And the Kids 4/6, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Darlingside 4/19, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Dirty Projectors 5/22, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Eels 6/6, 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Erasure 7/27, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre Escape-ism 4/22, 9 PM, Hideout Fit for an Autopsy, Great American Ghost 4/17, 7 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Froggy Fresh 4/28, 6:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club b Fruit Bats, Vetiver 4/13, 7 and 10 PM, Schubas Alice Glass, Pictureplane 5/9, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Grendel 5/11, 8 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ H2O 5/5, 6 PM, Bottom Lounge b Albert Hammond Jr. 4/6, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Helmet, Prong 5/17, 8 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Hinds 5/15, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ Horse Lords 4/5, 9 PM, Hideout Imagine Dragons 7/13, 7 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park Integrity 4/6, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 18+ Jimmy Eat World, Hotelier 5/8, 7:30 PM, Riviera Theatre b Kansas 10/13, 7:30 PM, Chicago Theatre Kesha & Macklemore 7/14, 7 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard 6/10, 7:30 PM, Riviera Theatre b King Tuﬀ, Cut Worms 5/25, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ Leo Kottke 5/25-26, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Richie Kotzen 4/5, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Lawrence 5/26, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+

ALL AGES

WOLF BY KEITH HERZIK

EARLY WARNINGS

CHICAGO SHOWS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT IN THE WEEKS TO COME

Never miss a show again. Sign up for the newsletter at chicagoreader. com/early

Jeff Lynne’s ELO 8/15, 8 PM, Allstate Arena, Rosemont The Make-Up 7/6, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Matt & Kim, Tokyo Police Club 4/17, 8 PM, Riviera Theatre, 18+ Melvins 7/31, 7:30 PM, Park West b Messthetics 5/5, 9 PM, Hideout Mutoid Man 5/14, 8 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ No Age 5/10, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle Omni 5/9, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Peach Kelli Pop 6/18, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle F Primus, Mastodon 6/6, 7 PM, Huntington Bank Pavilion Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, the Head and the Heart 5/31, 6:30 PM, Huntington Bank Pavilion Russian Circles 4/22 and 4/24, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle Ed Schrader’s Music Beat 4/8, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle The Sea & Cake 5/23, 7 and 10 PM, Empty Bottle Slayer, Anthrax, Testament 5/25, 5 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park Sleep 8/1, 7 PM, Riviera Theatre b Speedy Ortiz 5/12, 9 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Spits 5/25, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Sunflower Bean 5/11, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ Taylor Swift 6/2, 7 PM, Soldier Field Frank Turner & the Sleeping Souls 6/23, 7 PM, Aragon Ballroom b Turnstile, Touche Amore, Culture Abuse 4/11, 6:30 PM, Bottom Lounge b Suzanne Vega 5/5-6, 8 PM, City Winery b We Are Scientists 6/22, 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle Jimmy Webb 4/13, 8 PM, City Winery b Weezer, Pixies, Wombats 7/7, 7:30 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park Wet 5/25, 8:30 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Wonder Years, Tigers Jaw 6/3, 5 PM, Concord Music Hall b Wooden Shjips 6/2, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Wyclef Jean 4/15, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Xylouris White 4/5, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Yanni 6/30, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre Yob, Bell Witch 7/8, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ v

GOSSIP WOLF A furry ear to the ground of the local music scene CHICAGO SINGER, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Emily Jane Powers has been crafting intimate, literate pop since the early 2000s—Gossip Wolf was especially taken with her 2014 book and download, Part of Me, which felt as much like a collection of poignant short-storystyle character studies as it did a series of songs. For the past three years, she’s been writing, arranging, and rearranging its follow-up, Restless (recorded with Erik Hall of In Tall Bulldings behind the boards), and it expands Powers’s musical palette considerably. The sparse, ringing folk of “Mourning Light” and the swelling woodwinds of “It’s Not Hard to Decide” should give fans of Feist and Iron & Wine much to ruminate upon. Last week, Powers self-released a lovely 180-gram vinyl version of Restless, and she’ll have copies at her record-release show at Beat Kitchen on Friday, March 30. Openers include Jessica Risker and Half Gringa. The irresistibly sweet sounds of poprock wizard Paul Cherry ﬁrst caught this wolf’s ear when he released his sublime ode to Olive Garden in 2014, and his tunes keep getting better and better. On Saturday, March 31, primo local label FeelTrip releases Cherry’s debut LP, Flavour, whose carefree melodies, sugary yachtrock licks, and chamber-pop harmonies are the stuff of dreams. He’s certainly earned his spot on the bill of the Pitchfork Music Festival this summer! Of course, you can also see him before then, and your next chance is his free record-release show this Saturday: it starts at 9 PM on the 25th floor of the Virgin Hotels location at 203 N. Wabash, and Divino Niño and Anna Burch open. Gossip Wolf has kept close tabs on post-Disappears trio Facs since they made their live debut in January of last year. On Friday, March 30, Trouble in Mind releases the band’s first full-length, Negative Houses, and that night they headline the Empty Bottle. Dim and Ethers open. —J.R. NELSON AND LEOR GALIL Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail gossipwolf@chicagoreader.com.

bottom lounge

Want to play?

ON SALE NOW

UPCOMING SHOWS

Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll teach you how.

04.06 ALBERT HAMMOND JR. THE MARIAS

04.07 COAST MODERN BAD BAD HATS / REYNA

04.08 CAPITAL VICES

SPEAKING WITH GHOSTS / ERABELLA

04.11 TURNSTILE

TOUCHE AMORE / CULTURE ABUSE 1833 PRESENTS

04.20 CHROME SPARKS X MACHINEDRUM ELA MINUS

Browse our class schedules online at

oldtownschool.org

04.21 FORTUNATE YOUTH TATANKA / CONCRETE ROOTS

04.22 RED SUN RISING

MOLEHILL / BALLROOM BOXER LUNAR TIDE FESTIVAL PRE-PARTY

04.26 FREDDY TODD b2b ESSEKS

CHARLESTHEFIRST / TSURUDA / KROMUH REACT PRESENTS

04.27 DUMBFOUNDEAD REACT PRESENTS

05.01 YUNG GRAVY SAVAGEREALM

05.05 H2O REACT PRESENTS

05.06 TRICKY 05.09 ALICE GLASS PICTUREPLANE

RIOT FEST PRESENTS

05.11 SMOKING POPES

RED CITY RADIO / THE DOPAMINES / KALI MASI RIOT FEST PRESENTS

05.12 SMOKING POPES

THE MR. T EXPERIENCE / KEPI GHOULIE REACT PRESENTS

05.13 JOYNER LUCAS ELI

05.17 HELMET PRONG

05.18 EMMURE

COUNTERPARTS / KING 810 / VARIALS RIOT FEST PRESENTS

05.19 FU MANCHU MOS GENERATOR

05.31 COMBICHRIST

WEDNESDAY 13 / NIGHT CLUB / PRISON RIOT FEST PRESENTS

06.01 MAD CADDIES AN EVENING WITH

06.23 SLOAN

REACT PRESENTS

08.18 SPAG HEDDY

PORN AND CHICKEN

www.bottomlounge.com 1375 w lake st 312.666.6775

MARCH 29, 2018 - CHICAGO READER 39

4544 N LINCOLN AVENUE, CHICAGO IL OLDTOWNSCHOOL.ORG • 773.728.6000

JUST ADDED • ON SALE THIS FRIDAY! 6/24 6/28 May

Ry Cooder (at Thalia Hall) Joseph Ike Reilly (month-long residency, May 10, 17, 24, 31)

FOR TICKETS, VISIT OLDTOWNSCHOOL.ORG SATURDAY, MARCH 31 4 PM

Steve Earle & The Dukes 30th Anniversary of Copperhead Road with special guests The Mastersons

THIS MONDAY! APRIL 2 RIVIERA THEATRE

SATURDAY, APRIL 7 8PM

The Steel Wheels

In Szold Hall

SUNDAY, APRIL 8 7PM

TY SEGALL

Robin & Linda Williams In Szold Hall

FRIDAY, APRIL 13 8PM

Bettye LaVette SATURDAY, APRIL 14 8PM

Martin Carthy

In Szold Hall

TUESDAY, APRIL 17 9:30PM

The Residents FRIDAY, APRIL 20 8PM

SPECIAL GUESTS:

AXIS: SOVA / THE BED BAND

SUNDAY, APRIL 8 • VIC THEATRE

Nancy And Beth

(Megan Mullally, Stephanie Hunt) FRIDAY, APRIL 20 8PM

Patty Larkin

In Szold Hall

SATURDAY, APRIL 21 5 & 8PM

Marshall Crenshaw & The Bottle Rockets ACROSS THE STREET IN SZOLD HALL 4545 N LINCOLN AVENUE, CHICAGO IL

4/6 Global Dance Party: Swing Brasileiro 4/13 Global Dance Party: ¡ESSO! Afrojam Funkbeat 4/19 Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre: Company Showcase & Preview 4/21 Pavithra Chari & Anindo Bose: Contemporary classical music from India

JUNE 13 • PARK WEST ON SALE THIS FRIDAY AT 11AM! BUY TICKETS AT

SATURDAY, JUNE 23 • PARK WEST ON SALE THIS FRIDAY AT 10AM!

WORLD MUSIC WEDNESDAY SERIES FREE WEEKLY CONCERTS, LINCOLN SQUARE

4/4

The NIU Steelband (Northern Illinois University) 4/11 Ian Maksin & Friends: Zaria, one year later

OLDTOWNSCHOOL.ORG