Chicago Reader: print issue of June 16, 2016 (Volume 45, Number 36)

C H I C A G O ’ S F R E E W E E K LY | K I C K I N G A S S S I N C E 1 9 7 1 | J U N E 1 6 , 2 0 1 6

Act Two The Profiles Theatre story continues. 11

Music Can DIY art coexist with corporate money? 27

In 2015, 38 percent of the electricity generated in Illinois came from coal.

Illinois is the fifth-largest coal producer in the U.S.

Only about a tenth of Illinois’s coal is used by power plants in-state.

Illinois has 22 coal ash impoundments, the secondhighest number in the nation.

COAL’S LAST STAND Even as people bemoan its environmental and health effects, the prospect of its demise sparks fear and nostalgia in Illinois.

By KARI LYDERSEN 14

2 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

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THIS WEEK

C H I C AG O R E A D E R | J U N E 1 6, 2 01 6 | VO LU M E 4 5, N U M B E R 3 6

TO CONTACT ANY READER EMPLOYEE, E-MAIL: (FIRST INITIAL)(LAST NAME) @CHICAGOREADER.COM

EDITOR JAKE MALOOLEY CREATIVE DIRECTOR PAUL JOHN HIGGINS DEPUTY EDITOR, NEWS ROBIN AMER CULTURE EDITOR TAL ROSENBERG DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS FILM EDITOR J.R. JONES MUSIC EDITOR PHILIP MONTORO ASSOCIATE EDITORS KATE SCHMIDT, KEVIN WARWICK, BRIANNA WELLEN SENIOR WRITERS STEVE BOGIRA, MICHAEL MINER, MIKE SULA SENIOR THEATER CRITIC TONY ADLER STAFF WRITERS LEOR GALIL, DEANNA ISAACS, BEN JORAVSKY, AIMEE LEVITT, PETER MARGASAK, JULIA THIEL SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR RYAN SMITH GRAPHIC DESIGNER SUE KWONG MUSIC LISTINGS COORDINATOR LUCA CIMARUSTI EDITORIAL ASSISTANT CASSIDY RYAN CONTRIBUTING WRITERS NOAH BERLATSKY, DERRICK CLIFTON, MATT DE LA PEÑA, ANNE FORD, ISA GIALLORENZO, JOHN GREENFIELD, JUSTIN HAYFORD, JACK HELBIG, DAN JAKES, BILL MEYER, J.R. NELSON, MARISSA OBERLANDER, DMITRY SAMAROV, KATE SIERZPUTOWSKI, ZAC THOMPSON, DAVID WHITEIS, ALBERT WILLIAMS INTERNS JESSICA KIM COHEN, MARC DAALDER, KT HAWBAKER-KROHN, FARAZ MIRZA, SUNSHINE TUCKER

IN THIS ISSUE 12 Transportation Prepaid bus boarding debuts on Belmont, but why doesn’t Loop Link have it yet?

13 Criminal justice IPRA’s new video archive does little to cut through the fog of Chicago police shootings.

7 4 Agenda The Marvin Gaye Story at Black Ensemble, The Art of Falling, Funny Women Festival, the film Genius, and more recommendations 7 Pride Month events Pride Fest, the Reader’s Pride Booze Cruise, and more LGBTQ-centric happenings

CITY LIFE

ARTS & CULTURE

21 Theater Bat Boy: The Musical swoops into town at last.

22 Comedy Stand-ups, sketch comedians, and storytellers seek redemption at Snubfest.

23 Visual Art Collectors present rare Scopitone films at Comfort Station.

24 Small Screen UnReal takes a real look at reality TV.

8 Essay How language perpetuates sexism and discrimination in the comedy scene 11 Act two The theater community responds to the Reader’s investigation of abuse at Profiles Theatre.

25 25 Movies Humans and Orcs battle for supremacy in an adaptation of the medieval fantasy game Warcraft.

MUSIC

33 In rotation The Numero Group’s latest compilation of forgotten American records, John Olson’s compendium of a year’s worth of daily record reviews, the quarter note, and more current musical obsessions 34 Shows of note Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Breadwoman and Grouper at Bohemian National Cemetery, Pere Ubu, and more

CLASSIFIEDS

41 Jobs 42 Apartments & Spaces 43 Marketplace 44 Straight Dope If the sun went out, how long would it take us to freeze?

45 Savage Love What’s the deal with diapers? (And is it a deal breaker?)

46 Early Warnings Buzzcocks, Sun Ra Arkestra, Kanye West, and more 46 Gossip Wolf ESS hosts its ninth annual Experimental Garage Sale, and more music news.

FOOD & DRINK

39 Restaurant review: Smack Shack The Minneapolis import stays afloat when it keeps things simple.

41 Key Ingredient: Lavender See how the sausage gets made at Three Floyds Brewpub.

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FEATURES

---------------------------------------------------------------VICE PRESIDENT OF NEW MEDIA GUADALUPE CARRANZA SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER EVANGELINE MILLER ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES ARIANA DIAZ, BRIDGET KANE MARKETING AND EVENTS MANAGER BRYAN BURDA DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL JOHN DUNLEVY ADVERTISING COORDINATOR HERMINIA BATTAGLIA CLASSIFIEDS REPRESENTATIVE KRIS DODD ---------------------------------------------------------------DISTRIBUTION CONCERNS distributionissues@chicagoreader.com CHICAGO READER 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654 312-222-6920, CHICAGOREADER.COM ---------------------------------------------------------------THE READER (ISSN 1096-6919) IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY SUN-TIMES MEDIA, LLC, 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654. © 2016 SUN-TIMES MEDIA, LLC. PERIODICAL POSTAGE PAID AT CHICAGO, IL. POSTMASTER: SEND CHANGE OF ADDRESS TO CHICAGO READER, 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654.

ON THE COVER: DESIGN BY CREATIVE DIRECTOR PAUL JOHN HIGGINS; PHOTO BY GETTY IMAGES

MUSIC

ENERGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT

Coal’s last stand

Even as people bemoan its environmental and health effects, the prospect of its demise sparks fear and nostalgia in Illinois.

BY KARI LYDERSEN 14

Can DIY music and art coexist with corporate money?

Young creative studio VAM wants to fund and promote Chicago’s underground artists—without sacrificing their distinctiveness to the mainstream.

BY LEE V. GAINES 27

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 3

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www.BrewView.com 3145 N. Sheffield at Belmont

Movie Theater & Full Bar $5.00 sion admis e for th s Movie

18 to enter 21 to drink Photo ID required

Fri, June 17 @ 6:00pm Sun-Wed, June 19-22 @ 6:00pm

Keanu

Fri, June 17 @ 8:00pm Sun-Wed, June 19-22 @ 8:00pm

Neighbors 2

Fri, June 17 @ 10:00pm Sun-Wed, June 19-22 @ 10:00pm

Clown The Jungle Book

Sunday, June 19 @ 4:00pm

Upcoming Special 30th Anniversary Screening!

Fri, July 1 - Sun, July 3 at 8:00pm

Big Trouble In Little China

Tickets: http://bigtrouble30th.bpt.me

4 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

THEATER

More at chicagoreader.com/ theater Bars and Measures Troubled jazz bassist Bilal thrives off chaos, while his rock-steady classical pianist brother Eric craves order. Playwright Idris Goodwin tries to squeeze two epic battles from their fraught rivalry. The first concerns their efforts to turn common musical ground into a brotherly demilitarized zone, and the second concerns Bilal’s possible involvement in terrorism and Eric’s struggle to believe his brother’s innocent. It’s potent stuff, even with Goodwin’s reductive musicology and undervetted plotting (Bilal’s a federal detainee yet spends regular time with Eric inventing jazz riffs in an ill-defined prison room), but in only 70 minutes neither story is adequately developed; the evening feels like a highlights reel. Still, director Tara Branham coaxes nuanced, satisfying performances from Osiris Khepera and Anthony Conway as the warring brothers. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 7/17: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Prop Thtr, 3502 N. Elston, 773-539-7838, propthtr.org, $15.

The Divine Sister Gay royalty Charles Busch lovingly mashes up golden-era nun flicks in this drag farce presented

by Hell in a Handbag. As Mother Superior, David Cerda shares Busch’s appreciation of old-Hollywood stylistic tropes, particularly when they’re combined with naughty camp. It’s fun to see director Shade Murray bring his professionalism to this pageant-style silliness, and he indulges in the best way possible with Charlotte Mae Ellison and Chad’s float-size turns as a miraculous sister and a weapons-grade atheist. The site-specific location offers limited returns (sure, there’s a bar in back, but the phrase “cunt face” goes down easier outside of a church), and the wackiness wears after 90 minutes or so, but Chad’s male-male drag performance as a schoolboy earns big laughs every time. —DAN JAKES Through 7/10: Thu-Sat 8 PM (no show Sat 6/18), Sun 7 PM, Ebenezer Lutheran Church, 1650 W. Foster, 773-561-8496,

handbagproductions.org, $16. $38 VIP (includes drink ticket).

Hauptmann The 1986 premiere production of Hauptmann was a very big deal.

The critics raved and two illustrious careers were launched—those of writer John Logan and star Denis O’Hare. Now the original director, Terry McCabe, is commemorating the auspiciousness of it all with a 30th-anniversary staging that’s thoroughly competent but fails to demonstrate what the fuss was about.

Set in a prison cell in 1936, the play introduces us to Bruno Hauptmann, the man executed for killing the Lindbergh baby, allowing him to tell his story and argue his innocence. We’re meant to find him compelling, if not necessarily trustworthy. But in George Seegebrecht’s performance, he rarely moves beyond a hapless, bewildered victimhood. The lack of any competing aspects in his character kills any mystery and dulls out the show. Things only get interesting in a courtroom scene, when the prosecuting attorney (Brian Pastor) hectors Hauptmann on the stand. —TONY ADLER Through 7/10: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 3 PM, City Lit Theater, 1020 W. Bryn Mawr, 773-293-3682, citylit.org, $10-$29.

The Jungle Book An adaptation of the stories of Rudyard Kipling R

by Tracey Power, this rollicking The-

atre-Hikes production might be one of its most appropriate yet to be staged outdoors. Like the veteran jungle creatures they played, the cast paid no mind to the Pullman State Historic Site’s blistering, mid-90s heat on the afternoon I attended. Enhanced with puppetry, percussion and loads of animal noises that piqued the kids’ curiosity, the story follows Mowgli (played by earnest, carefree Eldridge Shannon III), the man cub who’s orphaned and raised by wolves.

With the help and fierce loyalty of his bear friend, Baloo (William Goff), and sage panther Bagheera (Felix Mayes), Mowgli learns to navigate dangerous jungle forces, from wacky, overpowering gangs of monkeys to his vicious tiger archnemesis, Shere Kahn (Timothy Sullivan). —MARISSA OBERLANDER Through 7/3: Sat-Sun 1 PM (except Sun 6/19, 11 AM), various locations, theatre-hikes. org. F

Forest, 847-604-4975, lakeforesttheatre. com, $49.

one of my favorite theaters in the city; an opening here is a religious experience, an immersion in joy and truth.

In this case, the truth is the brilliance and trauma of Marvin Gaye (Rashawn Thompson), whose talent made him wildly famous but whose personal demons—a family legacy of abuse, violence, shame, and despair—destroy him. The show is narrated by Gaye, in his heavenly realm, where he’s found freedom and a way to forgive his father, Marvin Gay Sr. (Henri Watkins), an ordained minister who shot him to death when Marvin Jr. was just 44. The story of Gaye’s rise and fall is strewn with musical numbers in this revival—always a highlight of a show here—and Thompson, cast in Jackie Taylor’s jukebox drama, has the charisma and power to inhabit the title role. The songs will be familiar, but for some of us the particulars of their conception will be newly revelatory. —SUZANNE SCANLON Through 7/10: Thu 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 3 and 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Black Ensemble Theater Cultural Center, 4450 N. Clark, 773-769-4451, blackensembletheater.org, $55-$65, seniors $49.50-$58.50.

A Small Oak Tree Runs Red The old ghosts of the south R come alive in this beautifully audacious

The Secret Garden There can’t be many companies that choose to make their debut on a good-size proscenium stage, performing a conceptually tricky Broadway musical in a manner that requires period dress, a 24-member cast, and a 15-piece orchestra. So the folks at Lake Forest Theatre deserve points for daring to go big on this 1991 work

by Marsha Norman and Lucy Simon, about a ten-year-old British girl—raised in the Raj and orphaned by a cholera epidemic—who finds herself consigned to the bleak Yorkshire estate owned by her Uncle Archibald. Still, director Steve Malone might’ve done better to start small. Although he’s populated his cast with competent artists, Malone’s use of them is alternately muddy, static, or puzzling. And his decision to keep the orchestra out of sight defeats the benefits of its size: the piped-in music sounds prerecorded. It doesn’t help that, as Archibald, Edward Fraim seems forced to sing outside his range. —TONY ADLER Through 7/2: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Lake Forest Theatre, 400 E. Illinois, Lake

musical, but it’s a well-made one, with a strong book by Howard Lindsay and Russell Crouse and a killer score by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. Still, it’s hard to make it soar the way it does in this flawless, faithful revival. The casting is great—particularly Kerstin Anderson and Ben Davis, who have a palpable frisson as Maria and Captain von Trapp—the performances lively and quick. Most impressive of all, though, is how well director Jack O’Brien is able to balance the comedy and pathos in the material, earning big laughs one minute and moving us the next. —JACK HELBIG Through 6/19: Wed 2 and 7:30 PM, ThuFri 7:30 PM, Sat 2 and 8 PM, Sun 2 and 7:30 PM (except 6/19, 2 PM only), Cadillac Palace Theatre, 151 W. Randolph, 312-902-1400, $21-$112.

tragedy by Lekethia Dalcoe. Directed by Harry Lennix (The Blacklist, Chi-Raq), this true tale of Mary Turner (Tiffany Addison)—a young woman eight months pregnant who was lynched in 1918 after denouncing the similar murder of her husband—is told through fearless, emotionally bare performances, ethereal language, heartbreaking melodies, and the sheer brazen truth. And while there are one or two confusing moments in this world premiere, the cast always pulls you right back in. It’s a chilling reality that’s painful to face; but cathartic as well. Based on the standing ovation and conversations heard in the hall, it seems I’m not the only one who left this Congo Square Theater production forever changed. —A.J. SØRENSEN Through 7/3: Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 2 and 7:30 PM, Sun 2 PM, Athenaeum Theatre, 2936 N. Southport, 773-935-6860, congosquaretheatre. org, $22.

The Sound of Music The Sound of Music might be a mildly kitschy, R slightly old-fashioned, middlebrow

Tapped: A Treasonous Musical Comedy This Forth Story production of Jed Levine and Brad Kemp’s new musical comedy is awfully bad but also kind of endearing. The bad touches pretty much everything. Levine’s book, in which

Flamenco Passion ò CHERYL MANN

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Best bets, recommendations, and notable arts and culture events for the week of June 16 For more of the best things to do every day of the week, go to chicagoreader. com/agenda.

dweebish do-gooder Steve and lonely NSA analyst Mary fall in love while attempting an Edward Snowden-esque takedown of domestic spying? Doesn’t make sense even on its own terms.

Kemp’s music is dull; Holly Gombita’s choreography annoyingly peculiar; the band needs loads of work; and the lyrics, though clever at times, tend to state the obvious. Worst of all, something—maybe the maddeningly drawn-out scene changes in Molly Todd Madison’s staging—stretched the running time to three hours on opening night. There’s some sweet relief, though, in the charm and spirit of the cast—particularly Laureen Siciliano as Mary. She may actually be talented. —TONY ADLER Through 7/3: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 2 PM, Theater Wit, 1229 W. Belmont, 773-975-8150, theaterwit.org, $35.

The Untold, Untrue Love Story of Bill and Hillary Clinton Late in this fanciful hour-long history of the Clintons’ early-1970s romance, the ever-striving Hillary voices her long-range plan: she’ll be the Democratic nominee for president in 2008, because by then “feminism will be normal.” It’s a moment that epitomizes the missed potential in Grace Perry’s and Lyndsay Rush’s script. Only occasionally does it meaningfully exploit the social-revolution-is-nigh exuberance that saturated the left-leaning worldview four decades ago. Instead, most of the time it dallies in familiar Clinton hyperbole: she’s a privileged, ambitious ice queen, he’s a sax-playing, fast-food-eating, womanizing Arkansas doofus. It makes for some easy if only rarely innovative fun, somewhat diminished by director Sarah Ashley’s intermittently hesitant staging, as when law student Bill holds a combative press conference announcing himself as candidate for Hillary’s new boyfriend. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 6/29: Wed 8:30 PM, iO Theater, 1501 N. Kingsbury, ioimprov.com/chicago, $12.

start to finish; some combinations take getting used to, others—like Hubbard Street and Second City—come together like peanut butter and jelly. —MATT DE LA PEÑA Through 6/19: Wed-Thu 7:30 PM, Fri 8 PM, Sat 3 and 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Harris Theater, 205 E. Randolph, 312-3347777, hubbardstreetdance.com, $57-$109.

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Flamenco Passion Ensemble Español presents Dame Libby Komaiko’s Bolero and other significant works from the company’s repertoire as part of a yearlong tribute to her legacy. The ensemble also unveils the world premiere of Iroko, a new ballet choreographed by Ángel Rojas and Carlos Rodríguez. 6/17-6/19: Fri-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 3 PM, North Shore Center for the Performing Arts, 9501 Skokie, Skokie, 847-673-6300, ensembleespanol.org, $26-$46.

Art Institute of Chicago “Vanishing Beauty,” more than 300 pieces of jewelry and ritual objects from a variety of Asian cultures. 6/19-8/11. Sun–Wed 10:30 AM–5 PM, Thu-Fri 10:30 AM–8 PM, Sat 10:30 AM–5 PM. 111 S. Michigan, 312-4433600, artinstituteofchicago.org, $25, $19 students, seniors ($5 discount for Chicago residents), free kids under 14; free for Illinois residents Thursdays 5-8 PM. Reggie’s Rock Club “Pancakes and Booze Art Show,” more than 80 emerging artists exhibit their work, with live body painting and audio performances, plus a free pancake bar. Fri 6/17-Sat 6/18: 8 PM-2 AM. $10. 2109 S. State, 312-9490121, pancakesandbooze.com.

Funny Ha-Ha The show returns R with storytellers, journalists, comedians, and live-lit practitioners

sharing their funniest material. Tonight’s lineup includes Keith Ecker, Carly Oishi, Jeremy Owens, Ines Bellina, Rosamund Lannin, Jill Howe, Amy Sumpter, and Claire Zulkey. All proceeds benefit literacy group Sit Stay Read. Fri 6/17, 6:30 PM, Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, 773-227-4433, hideoutchicago.com, $10 suggested donation.

Songs of the Blue God Kalapriya R presents a performance by traditional Indian dancer Priya Venkataraman,

inspired by Krishna. Sun 6/19, 6 PM, Univ. of Chicago Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th, 773-702-2787, kalapriya. org. F

COMEDY

Batsu After a wildly successful R six-year run in New York, this interactive Japanese-style game

show is coming to Chicago. Watch as participants attempt goofy challenges and losers are subjected to humiliating punishments. Dinner and drinks are included. 6/17-8/26: Thu and Fri 8 PM, Kamehachi, 1531 N. Wells, 312-664-3663, kamehachi.com, $25.

Central Intelligence

Chicago’s Funny Women R Festival In its fifth year, the female-centric fest features more than

400 performers, including Joan & Ro, the Real Housewives of Improv, and Kristen Toomey. 6/16-6/18, Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont, 773-327-5252, chicagowomensfunnyfestival.com, $15, $37.50-$57.50 day pass, $100 all-festival pass.

DANCE

ò MINDY TUCKER

The Art of Falling This uproariR ous, highly inventive collaboration between Hubbard Street and Second

City, pairing irreverent sketch comedy with contemporary dance, seemed destined for an extended run after a successful debut performance in 2014. That prophecy has now been fulfilled, albeit with a few tweaks in the script to keep pace with pop-culture trends and a wild presidential-primary season. (I counted at least two new zingers that induced prickly laughs from the audience.) The narrative centers on the premise that people are bound to make missteps during their lives, especially when it comes to relationships. The beauty of this production, though, is that the artistic relationship feels natural from

VISUAL ARTS

One hundred and 12 years later, actors, singers, and musicians gather together to explore all things sensual in Joyce’s masterpiece. Thu 6/16, 7:30 PM, Irish American Heritage Center, 4626 N. Knox, 773-282-7035, irish-american.org, $15.

Adam Cayton-Holland Stand-up R from the Beard Award-winning writer and comic. Sat 6/18, 8 PM, North

Bar, 1637 W. North, 773-123-5678, liveatnorthbar.com, $10, $7 in advance.

Univ. of Chicago Logan Center for the Arts “American Glass Now,” a group show featuring the stained glass work of contemporary artists. Awards ceremony and reception with artists will be held on Fri 7/8, 7-9 PM. 6/17-7/10. Mon-Sat 8 AM-10 PM, Sun 4-8 PM. 915 E. 60th, 773702-2787, arts.uchicago.edu.

Zhou B Art Center A group show featuring work from artists from around the world, “Lexicon” invites visitors to write down what each piece means to them, and then display their writings next to the work. Opening reception Fri 6/17, 7-10 PM. 6/17-7/9. Mon-Fri 10 AM-5 PM, Sat noon-7 PM. 1029 W. 35th, 773-5230200, zbcenter.org.

LIT

LaShonda Katrice Barnett The R author discusses her novel Jam on the Vine, the story of one woman’s

struggle for equality. Tue 6/21, 6 PM, 57th Street Books, 1301 E. 57th, 773-6841300, semcoop.com.

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Bloomsday Immortalized in his novel Ulysses is the day that James Joyce met his future wife, Nora.

MOVIES

More at chicagoreader.com/movies NEW REVIEWS Central Intelligence A high school sports hero (Kevin Hart) grows up to become a frustrated accountant, then back into his life comes the obese loser he befriended in school, now a crazy, buffed-out CIA agent (Dwayne Johnson). This has a pretty good laugh quotient as far as big-budget action comedies go, but who came up with the idea of making the pint-size Hart, one of the sharpest comic actors working, play straight man to the giant, ham-fisted Johnson? (Big men are seldom funny onscreen—there’s a reason Chaplin, Keaton, the Marx Brothers, the Three Stooges, Woody Allen, and Hart all stand or stood about five-foot-five.) Amy Ryan lends able support as another CIA agent tracking the Johnson character, who’s gone rogue, and Jason Bateman has two abrasively funny scenes as the former school bully, now a self-righteous Scientologist. Rawson Marshall Thurber (Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story) directed; with Danielle Nicolet and Aaron Paul. —J.R. JONES PG-13, 107 min.

ArcLight Chicago, Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Crown Village 18, Ford µ

Never miss a show again.

EARLY WARNINGS chicagoreader.com/early

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 5

AGENDA reographed and erotically charged dance sequences shot by Jo Heim and Félix Monti. Ayelén Álvarez Miño and Juan Malizia are enticing as the young Nieves and Copes; director German Kral makes smart use of them out of character as well, inserting sections in which dancers and choreographers get the real-life Nieves to reminisce. In Spanish with subtitles. —ANDREA GRONVALL 85 min. Fri 6/17, 2 and 6 PM; Sat 6/18, 7:45 PM; Sun 6/19, 4:45 PM; Mon 6/20, 8 PM; Tue 6/21, 8:15 PM; Wed 6/22, 6:15 PM; and Thu 6/23, 8:15 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center

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6 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

De Palma Filmmakers Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow interview Brian De Palma, director of such durable thrillers as Scarface (1983), The Untouchables (1987), and Mission: Impossible (1996). As a documentary, this is pretty lazy; Paltrow and Baumbach simply walk De Palma through his filmography and collect his best stories (most of which involve him clashing creatively with someone and ultimately being proven right). But this systematic approach has a nice leveling effect in that his more obscure, offbeat projects (Greetings, Phantom of the Paradise, Home Movies) get as much attention as his signature films (Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Blow Out). De Palma came up in the business alongside Scorsese, Coppola, Spielberg, and Lucas, and the rap against him has always been that, despite his mastery of suspense mechanics, he lacks their strong personal vision.

Nothing here really contradicts that, though the sheer variety of De Palma’s work reveals an artist more eclectic and ambitious than people usually acknowledge. —J.R. JONES R, 107 min. A De Palma retrospective screens all week at Music Box; for listings see chicagoreader.com/movies. Music Box Finding Dory Thirteen years R after the acclaimed Finding Nemo (2003), Disney/Pixar deliver

a perfect facsimile, with the aquatic characters setting off on another ocean adventure. The gentle clown fish Nemo and his kvetching father, Marlin (given voice by Albert Brooks), live happily on the Pacific coral reef where the previous film left them, but then their pal Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), an amnesiac blue tang, has a flashback of her parents that leads her, and eventually Marlin and Nemo, on a journey to reach the fictional Marine Life Institute in Monterey, California.

As in the original movie, there’s no hint of pop-culture snark: the elemental emotions at work and

REVIVALS the childlike awe at the undersea world—rendered once again in colorful, carefully researched, lovingly precise animation—contribute to the sense of a story timeless and pure. Andrew Stanton returns as director, sharing duties with Angus MacLane; among the other voice actors are Idris Elba, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy, and Bill Hader. —J.R. JONES PG, 103 min. ArcLight Chicago, Century 12 and CineArts 6, Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Crown Village 18, Ford City, Lake, Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Showplace ICON, Webster Place Genius Good editors strive R to make themselves invisible, which is what makes this affection-

ate biopic of Maxwell Perkins—who guided Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Thomas Wolfe into print—such an odd surprise. Screenwriter John Logan, drawing on a book

by A. Scott Berg, focuses on the tempestuous relationship between Perkins (Colin Firth, excellent) and Wolfe (Jude Law, boisterous) as the quiet, sensitive businessman patiently hacked the grandiose author’s epic manuscripts down to size. The movie ends rather abruptly with Wolfe’s death, as if Perkins had no importance in his own right; no doubt he would have approved. Michael Grandage directed; with Nicole Kidman, Laura Linney, Dominic West (Hemingway), and Guy Pearce (Fitzgerald). —J.R. JONES PG-13, 104 min. Landmark’s Century Centre Our Last Tango For over 40 years Maria Nieves and Juan Carlos Copes were a celebrated Argentine dance team, popularizing their distinctive brand of tango through tours of Europe, Japan, and the U.S.; their long-running Broadway show Tango Argentino was nominated for three Tony awards. This documentary about their tempestuous partnership on and off the stage includes archival footage and contemporary interviews, but its strongest moments are the dramatic reenactments: inventively cho-

L’Inhumaine Marcel L’Herbier directed this French silent feature (1924), a sci-fi fantasy in which an opera singer dies from a poisonous snakebite and is brought back to life through the ministrations of a Swedish scientist. 135 min. Facets Multimedia founder Mihlos Stehlik introduces the screening. Sun 6/19, 4 PM. Facets

SPECIAL EVENTS The Crossing Syrian refugees— among them a filmmaker, a musician, a TV journalist, and a psychologist—attempt to reach Europe by boat in this 2015 Norwegian documentary by George Kurian. 55 min. Kurian takes part in a discussion after the screening, part of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival.

Mon 6/20, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center Drift: An Evening With Jim Vendiola The independent filmmaker screens his 2010 short Drift and work by five other artists. 77 min.

Sat 6/18, 8 PM, Chicago Filmmakers; also Tue 6/21, 6:30 PM, Columbia College Hokin Hall Raiders! The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made Jeremy Coon and Tim Skousen directed this documentary about a trio of Mississippi boys who created their own shot-by-shot video re-creation of Steven Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. Screens as part of a double feature with Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation. Sun 6/19, 2 PM. Music Box Renoir: Revered and Reviled Documentary maker Phil Grabsky (In Search of Beethoven, In Search of Mozart) shifts his focus from music to painting with this profile of Pierre-Auguste Renoir, which draws on a collection of 181 Renoir works at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. 87 min. Sat-Sun 6/186/19, 11:30 AM. Music Box Scopitone Party 2 Music “videos” from the 1960s, originally distributed in a jukebox format. See page 23 for more on the program. Wed 6/22, 8 PM. Comfort Station v

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AGENDA The 47th Chicago Pride Parade will be on the march June 24. ò LOGAN JAVAGE

Night Out in the Parks brings world-class performances to neighborhood parks!

Enjoy FREE movies, theater, music, family fun, dance and festivals at your neighborhood parks all summer!

PRIDE MONTH

Let your pride flag fly

F

ollowing the tragic nightclub shooting in Orlando, Chicago’s upcoming Pride Month celebrations feel more significant than ever. While it’s been difficult to find joy between vigils and crucial discussions about safety, the LGBTQ community has always known how to celebrate in spite of violence. Here’s a list of events happening around the city that offer solidarity, sun, sand, and some seriously good snackage.

Against Me! Laura Jane Grace, the transwoman who burned her birth certificate at a North Carolina show earlier this year, leads her folk-punk band on songs like “True Trans Soul Rebel” and “Gender Dysphoria Blues.” Sun 6/19, 6:30 PM, Metro, 3730 N. Clark, metrochicago.com, $26.50.

Back Lot Bash Lisa Loeb, Taryn Manning, and Gina Yashere are just a few of the guests at Andersonville’s largest outdoor women’s festival, featuring a comedy night, wine tastings, DJ sets, and a whole lot of girl power. 6/16-6/26, times vary, parking lot behind Cheetah Gym, 5238 N. Clark, backlotbashchicago.com, $7-$35 single day pass, $40 weekend pass.

Chicago Pride Fest North Halsted’s annual celebration brings Jordin Sparks, Dumblonde, and Daya to its concert stage, along with local acts like the Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus.

The two-day festival also includes a variety of food, drink, and art vendors geared towards the LGBTQ community. Sat 6/18-Sun 6/19: 10 AM-10 PM, Halsted and Waveland, chicago.gopride.com. F Chicago Pride Parade Chicago Fire star Monica Raymund serves as grand marshal of this year’s

parade, which stretches between Lakeview and Uptown and showcases 150 different participants.

Sun 6/26, noon-3 PM, Montrose and Broadway, chicago.gopride.com. F Chicago Reader Pride Booze Cruise Sail aboard the Tall Ship Windy with music, food, and drinks—including brews from Lakeshore Beverage—while taking in the skyline at sunset. Fri 6/24, 6:45 PM, Navy Pier, 600 E. Grand, eventbrite.com, $40.

Dyke March A “grassroots mobilization and celebration of dyke, queer, bisexual, and transgender resilience,” the 20th edition of Chicago’s Dyke March brings together performers and community organizations for an afternoon of support and celebration. Sat 6/25, 2-8 PM, Humboldt Park, 1400 N Sacramento, chicagodykemarch.wordpress. com. F Out in the Field: Slushies and Science This Field Museum hosts this party exploring sexual behavior in nature, including virgin shark birth and same-sex mating rituals between penguins.

All funds raised will go directly to families affected by the Orlando shooting. Tue 6/21, 6-8 PM, Sidetrack, 3349 N. Halsted, fieldmuseum.org, $5.

Proud to Run The 35th Proud to Run event takes place along the lake and includes a 10K run and a 5K run/walk, all to promote healthy Pride celebrations and raise money for LGBTQ causes like the Center on Halsted. Sat 6/25, 8 AM, Montrose and Simonds, proudtorun. org, $50.

View our entire schedule of events online now at:

nightoutintheparks.com

Anna Pulley “It has been MANY / years, but I am not done griping / about The L Word,” writes former Chicagoan Anna Pulley in her new book all about pussies. Women & Children First hosts the author for a reading and signing of The Lesbian Sex Haiku Book (With Cats!).

Thu 6/16, 7:30 PM, 5233 N. Clark, womenandchildrenfirst.com. F Star Whores: The Pride Awakens GayCo Productions hosts a night of “outrageously gay improv adventure celebrating those who get paid for ‘making wookie,’” featuring stories inspired by the real-life accounts of sex workers.

Fri 6/24-Sat 6/25: 10:30 PM, the Playground Theater, 3209 N. Halsted, eventbrite.com, $15.

TKO: Pride Celebration The Center on Halsted shimmies into the Pride Parade weekend with a rooftop bash starring RuPaul BFF Lady Bunny. Admission includes two drinks and snacks. Fri 6/24, 6-9 PM, 3656 N. Halsted, chicago. gopride.com, $20.

TransMale Beach Party This shoreline shindig invites all transmen and their allies out for a day in the sun.

Sat 6/25, 10 AM-5 PM, Hollywood Beach, 5800 N. Lake Shore, chicago.gopride.com. F You’re Being Ridiculous: Pride Show Jeremy Owens brings the Pride edition of his storytelling cabaret back for another year of rainbow connections. Sat 6/18, 7 PM, Women & Children First, 5233 N. Clark, womenandchildrenfirst. com, $10 suggested donation. v

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 7

CITY LIFE

Ù

OUR MOST READ ARTICLES LAST WEEK ON CHICAGOREADER.COM IN ASCENDING ORDER: Julia Weiss ò JULIA WEISS

ESSAY

Chicago comedy has a real gender problem

By JULIA WEISS

S

o you know that children’s cartoon Caillou? With the obnoxious little boy with the terrible voice and the stupid values? It’s based on a series of books by Hélène Despu-

teaux. When I was a nanny, Caillou was an unfortunate part of my daily reality. I hated the title character with a passion most would reserve for actual humans who’ve hurt them or a loved one—real-life people, not

ones dreamed up by a French-Canadian woman. But despite being strokes of pen on paper, Caillou was my deepest abhorrence. Unable to contain my loathing, I did what any rational, American 20-something would do and I took to Twitter. But then I stopped myself. What if this fictional little prick had a terminal illness? You see, Caillou has no hair and I didn’t want to make fun of a kid with cancer—even a made up kid. So I googled, “Does Caillou have cancer?”

Turns out this is a question a lot of people have asked.

The first question on Chouette Publishing’s Caillou FAQ page was the very one I had. “Why is Caillou bald?” I thought I’d be relieved to learn that this fake kid wasn’t suffering from a terrible disease. But I wasn’t. Because what I found was a little piece of casual white male supremacy.

“Caillou stands for all children.

He doesn’t have curly blond hair, a carrot-top, brown hair, glasses, or ethnic features, because he represents all children. We wanted to make Caillou universal so every child could identify with him. And they do! Caillou’s baldness may make him different, but we hope it’s helping children understand that being different isn’t just OK, it’s normal.”

Caillou represents all children, so they chose to make him a white boy.

That is our everychild. A white male.

Chouette has since changed their answer—stating that the series started with Caillou as a baby and

“Chicago comedy has a real gender problem” —JULIA WEISS

“Jeff Awards committee, Steppenwolf, and others condemn abuse alleged in Reader investigation of Profiles Theatre” —AIMEE LEVITT

“‘Unfortunately, I am the villain’: Profiles Theatre artistic director Darrell W. Cox responds to Reader abuse investigation” —JAKE MALOOLEY

“A critic’s mea culpa, or How Chicago theater critics failed the women of Profiles Theatre” —CHRISTOPHER PIATT

“At Profiles Theatre the drama—and abuse—is real” —AIMEE LEVITT AND CHRISTOPHER PIATT

Diameters of circles are proportional to the number of page views received.

they didn’t want to confuse kids by adding hair. (They kept the part about helping children understand that it’s OK to be different, so like, good for them.)

Of course, Chouette didn’t manifest this mentality. They didn’t invent white male supremacy. They surely thought they were saying something really lovely by telling the world that a little able-bodied white boy is the blank human canvas, and anything else would be too “other” to be relatable. Chouette and Caillou merely express the values of the world in which they exist.

So why does this matter? I mean, we don’t have to watch the show (and honestly you shouldn’t—it’s so, so bad). It matters because this stuff doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Nothing does. The reason Hélène Desputeaux made Caillou male is the same reason we call women “female improvisers” instead of just “improvisers.” We’ve got a real gender problem.

IN JANUARY, IO’S Charna Halpern posted on Facebook to defend herself from allegations about an alleged phone conversation with a victim of harassment. In addition to her defense, she made several tonedeaf and problematic statements about women, lying, and her community. Several fed up members of the scene, many of whom don’t work directly for Charna anymore, took to her page to educate her. It was a tense conversation, Charna was defensive and caught off guard—she really hadn’t realized that there was anything wrong with what she said

Ñ Keep up to date on the go at chicagoreader.com/agenda.

SURE THINGS THURSDAY 16

FRIDAY 17

SATURDAY 18

SUNDAY 19

MONDAY 20

TUESDAY 21

WEDNESDAY 22

× Spri ng BBQ The French-American Chamber of Commerce in Chicago invites you to enjoy a prix fixe menu featuring a grilled prawn salad, a grilled pork loin, and a boozy adult sundae. 6 PM, Cafe des Architectes, 20 E. Chestnut, cafedesarchitectes. com, $55.

ã C raf t Party/Craf t Beer Sacred Art, Neighborly, Mint Home, and Lillstreet Art Center join forces to host an evening of crafts and brews. The party features DIY craft tutorials by local artists including Vichcraft, Heart of an Astronaut, and Kraeo Handmade. 6-9 PM. Begyle Brewery, 1800 W. Cuyler, begylebrewing.com, $15.

× Fiest a s Puertorriqueñas Celebrate all things Puerto Rican with four days of lively music, authentic food, and carnival rides, all leading up to the Puerto Rican People’s Parade, which takes place on Sat 6/18 at 2 PM. 6/16-6/19: Thu and Fri 3 PM, and Sat and Sun, noon, California and Division, chicagoevents.com. F

Pr ide Fest The two-day street fest is just a warm-up for Pride Parade on June 26.

The Boystown takeover kicks off with a Pet Pride Parade, local street vendors, and three stages of music with performances by Dumblonde and Jordin Sparks. Sat 6/18-Sun 6/19: 10 AM-10 PM, Halsted between Belmont and Addison, northalsted.com. F

○ Chicago Cubs vs .

Saint Louis Cardinals The Cubbies face off against their feathered rivals to the southwest in a three-game series at the recently renovated Friendly Confines. 6/206/22: Mon-Tue 7:05 PM, Wed 1:20 PM, Wrigley Field, cubs. com, $36-$109.

M Th e Ya rd : A st aged reading of Ec lipse d The Yard, a professional youth theater company, partners with Steppenwolf for Young Adults (SYA) for a staged reading of Danai Gurira’s acclaimed play Eclipsed.

7 PM, Steppenwolf Theatre, 1700 N. Halsted, steppenwolf. org, $10, $5 for students.

E Ro of top Ci nema Cl ub Enjoy a number of classic films—including My Best Friend’s Wedding, Pulp Fiction, and Casablanca—on the rooftop of Doubletree

by Hilton all summer long.

6/15-7/17: Wed-Sun 8:30 PM, DoubleTree by Hilton, 300 E. Ohio, rooftopcinemaclub.com/ chicago, $16.80.

8 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

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CITY LIFE or with her theater. That, of course, is the problem.

Foot firmly in mouth, Charna had inadvertently sparked much needed conversation and revelation within the comedy community. Harassment policies were created, revised, reposted by theaters across town.

Many theater and training center owners reached out to their communities to express their commitment to fighting some really ugly, destructive problems. This is great. Harassment, abuse of power, under-representation, and intimidation are bad, and it’s valuable that we’re taking action against them. But they’re ultimately not the problem.

Sexism is what lays the foundation for bigger issues like the ones we’ve been navigating in Chicago comedy this year. But Chicago comedy doesn’t have a sexism problem, per se. Chicago comedy simply exists in a sexist world. And we can’t just write up a policy to undo our programming.

When we shrug our shoulders and say, “It’s a man’s world,” what we’re really talking about is androcentrism. Peter Hegarty and Carmen Buechel, who studied androcentrism in 39 years of APA journals, define it as thinking which assumes “maleness to be normative and attributes gender differences to females” (hey, remember Caillou?).

Androcentrism manifests at the most basic and pernicious level in our language. We use words like “he,” “him,” “his,” “man,” and “men” to cover either males or the collective of all people. For example, take this passage from Truth in Comedy, co-authored by none other than Charna Halpern: “After an improviser learns to trust and follow his own inner voice, he begins to do the same with his fellow players’ inner voices.

Once he puts his own ego out of the way, he stops judging the ideas of others—instead, he considers them brilliant, and eagerly follows them!”

Meanwhile we use “she,” “her”, “hers,” “woman,” and “women” to refer only to females. Limiting the use of female-gendered words

Charna Halpern, cofounder of iO Theater ò RICHARD A. CHAPMAN/SUN-TIMES

while a llow ing ma le-gendered words broader use positions men above women.

Let’s take another look at the passage above, but this time with female pronouns: “After an improviser learns to trust and follow her own inner voice, she begins to do the same with her fellow players’ inner voices. Once she puts her own ego out of the way, she stops judging the ideas of others—instead, she considers them brilliant, and eagerly follows them!”

Note how it is no longer generic advice for any improviser. The use of female-gendered pronouns has limited the audience. “He” has the power to define “she,” but “she” can never define “him.” “She” is other, different. “He” simply is.

Because the languages we speak have a strong impact on perception and cognition, it follows that androcentric languages imbed sexism into the speaker’s worldview.

SO WHAT DOES that world look like?

The Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film found that in 2015, women comprised only 22 percent of protag-

onists and 33 percent of speaking roles in the top 100 domestic films.

Women make up only about a quarter of our elected officials at the state and federal levels. On a cultural level we tend to devalue women’s sports, even when our national women’s soccer team consistently outperforms our men’s.

We tend to define women through their relationships to men, while allowing men identities of their own. A man is a Mr. regardless of marital status, but a woman is miss until she’s a Mrs. Women are generally expected to take, and give their children, men’s last names. Traits defined as feminine are valued below those defined as masculine.

We tend to trust men and distrust women. From infancy, we’re are bombarded with messages of binary gender performance, from clothing to toys to parenting styles. Girls are encouraged to be passive, to be pretty, to be experienced by others.

Boys are encouraged to be active, to be strong, to do the experiencing.

So there’s an angle. An idea of where we are and of how we’ve gotten there. So how has culturally ingrained sexism influenced our community and comedy at large?

Because humor is considered a masculine trait, we assume men’s proficiency in comedy. We simultaneously assume women’s deficiency. A mediocre man has an easier time making a team than a decent woman. Female dominated shows have to be significantly better than male dominated shows to be considered just as good. (The same is true for people of color, LGBTQ people, and anyone else who doesn’t meet the Caillou standard of humanity.) Samantha Bee’s new late-night show is incredibly smart and funny, Jessica Williams is consistently the best part of The Daily Show, SNL’s women are outperforming the men weekly—and yet we’re still inundated with articles, forums, and discussions about why women aren’t as funny as men. We aren’t even given the respect of “whether or not.”

I was privy to a conversation among men from a prominent Harold team several years back. They were angrily discussing a woman on their team. “She pulls so much focus.” “She plays for laughs too much.” “She’s a selfish player.”

These were dudes who cycled through sure-fire homoerotic gags every show knowing they’d hit. But this woman had the audacity to be FUNNY while they were being funny, and sometimes she was FUNNIER than they were. They compared her to another woman on the team, the one they liked to play with, the one who tended to be a more passive support player. Passive support players are valuable of course, but when we demand that women play that way and punish them for being active—that’s our sexism showing.

This bias is often echoed in team selection and performer promotion.

A man who is hilarious and goes for the joke may find himself on numerous teams within a theater; a woman who is the very same may not even make it onto one.

As a performer, I’ve had coaches and teachers fail to see and note instances of sexism in rehearsals, shows, and classes. Conversely, as a coach, I’ve had male performers talk and laugh through note sessions and

actively refuse to participate in exercises I would bring into rehearsal.

We’ve all seen or experienced men shouting over women, negating women’s choices, using derogatory language on stage. It’s not surprising. People who don’t want to have the more challenging conversation will dismiss that as “bad comedy” instead of unchecked sexism.

And that may seem small, but it’s what makes us say, “He’s bad to women, but he’s a good friend. He’s kinda douchey, but he’s funny.” Our androcentrism, having positioned men as inherently more valuable humans than women, has kept us from holding these guys accountable for their actions.

SO LET’S GO back to #Charnagate.

The stage has been set for something like this for a long time. We’ve been evolving beyond the limitations of language, and challenging the imbalances we’ve inherited from a forever of bullshit. This feminist fire has been burning in Chicago for a few years now. And now, thanks to a dumb comment by a powerful woman, the community has been engulfed.

Women suddenly felt empowered to open up about experiences they’d kept secret, frustrations they’d only spoken about amongst themselves.

We saw conversations once reserved for kitchen corners at house parties leap into the spotlight. Men were shutting up and listening and evaluating their behavior. Of course there were perhaps too many men who feared a “witch hunt,” who searched their histories for any misstep an angry woman might use against them. There were a lot of “See? Not me!” white-knight posts from well-intentioned men who perhaps wanted to distance themselves from the Bad Guys. And the Bad Guys, for the most part, were noticeably silent.

But overwhelmingly, the reaction was productive and lead to long overdue action in the community.

We’ve seen men and women take responsibility for their own prejudices and problems and start to grow and change. Men have been examining their own behavior, J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 9

CITY LIFE

ACT TWO

At Profiles Theatre, the truth keeps marching on

Actor Emma Couling and others handed out copies of the Reader in front of Profiles Theatre last Thursday. ò COURTESY EILEEN TULL

Theater professionals in Chicago and elsewhere respond to the Reader’s investigation of abuses within the north-side storefront.

By AIMEE LEVITT

T

heater professionals in Chicago and across the country reacted swiftly and angrily to the publication of last week’s Reader cover story, “At Profiles Theatre, the drama—and abuse—is real,” condemning the alleged abuses at the north-side storefront theater and standing behind a group that has emerged to protect non-Equity theater professionals. Darrell W. Cox, coartistic director of Profiles, also reacted, dismissing the allegations and declaring himself a proponent of workplace safety.

“For those who have not read [the article], I recommend you do so,” Cox wrote in a statement posted to the theater’s Facebook page on June 10. “The article’s overa rc h i n g messa ge of zero tolerance for workplace abuse is powerful and right. Unfortunately, I am the villain in the Reader’s approximately 12,700-word article. . . . The article has made it impossible for me to respond further to the women’s statements in a way that would convince anyone who believes their statements are accurate.”

10 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

Cox also invited Lori Myers and Laura Fisher, two of the organizers of Not in Our House, the activist group working on a code of conduct for non-Equity theaters, to meet with him and coartistic director Joe Jahraus “so we can resolve our perceived differences and work together to fight for this cause.”

Myers responded with a statement posted on the NIOH Facebook page on June 11. “The statement is a study in PR crisis management,” she wrote of Cox’s message. “This is a patent effort to minimize the many serious acts of misconduct uncov-

ered and reported by the Reader. . . . NIOH is prepared to meet with Mr. Cox, but will not be used as part of his PR games. An apology is due from Mr. Cox. It is what the truth, and NIOH, requires.”

Meanwhile, Penelope Skinner, the playwright of The Village Bike, scheduled to open at Profiles in August, released a statement in which she announced she was withdrawing rights to the play. “In light of the serious allegations made against the management, it would seem unwise for a production of this play—or indeed any play—to go on at that theatre until a full investigation has been made into their practices.”

In the wake of the story, several artistic associates announced their resignation from Profiles. By the evening of June 12, the names of all ensemble members and artistic associates had been removed from the theater’s website, except for those of Cox, Jahraus, and playwright Neil LaBute, who “remains an unequivocal artistic influence on the ensemble,” according to the site. By June 14, the entire site had been stripped of content.

NIOH prepared a petition to the board of directors of Profiles requesting the removal of Cox and Jahraus as the theater’s coartistic directors—although Cox and Jahraus are the board’s president and director respectively, and ensemble member Eric Burgher is the treasurer. The group plans to deliver the petition in person on Thursday at noon; a peaceful demonstration outside the theater will follow.

Prominent members of Chicago’s theater community—most notably Anna D. Shapiro, artistic director of Steppenwolf—hurried to condemn Profiles on social media.

Chris Jones, chief theater critic for the Tribune, made his own Facebook statement on June 11, after taking a few days to sift through the many reviews he had written of Profiles over the years and to examine his own role in promoting the theater’s work.

“I found the allegations contained in the piece to be exceptionally distressing and painful,” he wrote. “The

theater is a place of trust—actors need to trust each other to be able to make great art; audiences, critics included, must be able to trust that what they are seeing on stage is the work of professionals operating in a professional workplace. Those allegations would suggest I took too much on trust.”

The Jeff Awards committee announced that it plans to respond to a second petition written and circulated by members of NIOH to revoke Cox’s Jeff Award for best actor for his 2010 performance in Killer Joe. The committee also reinforced its support for NIOH and the code of conduct. The League of Chicago Theatres removed the listing for Profiles from its website.

The loudest and most vociferous response, however, has come from the theater community. On Twitter and Facebook, there has been an outpouring of support for actors and crew members who alleged they’d been harmed at Profiles, and for NIOH. There has also been widespread condemnation of Cox and the theater.

A smaller group of theater professionals who had direct experience with Profiles publicly shared their own allegations of mistreatment at the theater for the first time, including actresses Emily Vajda and Harmony France, who published long accounts on their personal blogs. “I was so proud of the work that I did on that stage,” Vajda wrote. “I still am. And I feel uneasy, a bit ashamed, that I have this pride for performing on a stage that was used for predatory purposes.”

Several theater teachers announced they would be teaching the NIOH code of conduct to their students, although Fisher cautioned that the code is still a work in progress.

On June 9, a group of actors went to Profiles to distribute copies of the Reader to passersby. Later that night, a second group plastered the theater’s front windows with newspapers on which they’d written, “Whatever the truth requires,” the theater’s motto. (“NIOH does not

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YOUR CHICAGO BIKE AND CAR ACCIDENT LAWYERS

CITY LIFE Essay continued from 9

—Darrell W. Cox, Profiles Theatre coartistic director

condone the destruction or defacing of public or private property,” Myers wrote in a post on the group’s Facebook page.)

Very few people have stepped up to defend Profiles. One did not exist at all; a person posing as New York-based actress Sarah Lasko used her name and photo to create a Facebook account to troll other commenters on Cox’s Facebook statement. After the real Lasko and others protested, Facebook deleted the account.

Colin Mitchell, editor in chief of the LA theater website Bitter Lemons, posted an essay in which he suggested that the actors and crew members who spoke out about their mistreatment at Profiles should assume some responsibility for what had allegedly happened to them, since they’d been consenting adults.

“I’m sorry,” he wrote, “but if you allow crap like this to happen, then YOU are to blame.” In response, Hollywood Fringe, a major sponsor, announced that it was severing its partnership with the website.

On June 12, the site’s publisher announced that she was removing Mitchell from his position, effective immediately.

“The response has been overwhelming,” Myers says. “I hope we can be there for one another and the survivors. We’re looking to the future of the code of conduct. We need to remain steadfast and not turn into a mob.” v

v @AimeeLevitt

This essay is excerpted from the first issue of The Hambook, a Chicago-based quarterly magazine about improvisation, edited by Lee Benzaquin. To read the rest, go to thehambook.com.

est. 1967

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with lots of new loveliness

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“THE ARTICLE’S OVERARCHING MESSAGE OF ZERO TOLERANCE FOR WORKPLACE ABUSE IS POWERFUL AND RIGHT.”

women have been speaking up.

What a great start.

When news broke about Trailer Park Boys actor Mike Smith’s arrest after assaulting a woman, co-star Lucy DeCoutere quit the show. She won’t work with a bad dude. Right now, that’s what we as a community need to do. We need to break off our personal and professional relationships with our community’s known predators, regardless of their talent.

We need to hold people accountable for their behavior and comments, on and off stage. That’s the only way they’ll grow and change. We need to stop compromising our values, our good hearts, and our commitment to equality. We need to hold ourselves responsible for what this community and ultimately what this industry can be, instead of playing into the same old bullshit.

We’re told not to be too sensitive.

Not to sweat the small stuff. To have a thicker skin. But it’s saying “he” when you mean “they” that perpetuates male superiority. And it’s demanding that women be passive and pretty to be attractive to men that quiets us up and makes us stop being goofy when we’re kids.

And it’s casual sexism that fosters the environment that protects and harbors predators, abusers, and harassers. Anton Chekhov put some very valuable words into a woman’s mouth in his play Uncle Vanya. “The world won’t be destroyed by war or fire, but by the petty little violences we inflict upon each other every day.” To paraphrase—Even I, a Russian man in 1896, can recognize that microaggressions are real. And they matter. And they’ll be our undoing.

So let’s stop. Let’s change. It’ll make for better comedy. And besides—this shit gave birth to Caillou. And isn’t that reason enough to undo it? v

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please recycle this paper JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 11

CITY LIFE The preboarding pilot program at the Belmont Blue Line stop. ò JOHN GREENFIELD

TRANSPORTATION

Pay it forward

Prepaid bus boarding debuts on Belmont. Why doesn’t Loop Link have it yet?

By JOHN GREENFIELD

E

arlier this month, when the CTA announced its plan to test a faster bus-boarding method on the #77 Belmont Avenue route, my first reaction was “huh?”

The six-month pilot, which started last Monday and is in effect from 3 to 7 PM on weekdays, has customers who catch the westbound Belmont bus from the Blue Line’s Belmont-Kimball station paying their fares in advance. When the bus arrives, they walk right on via both the front and rear doors without having to pay onboard—just like getting on an el car.

Prepaid, all-door boarding is a key time-saving feature of fast bus systems around the country (including New York City’s Select Bus Service lines and Seattle’s RapidRide routes) because it shortens “dwell time” at the stops.

So the decision to try it in Chicago was a no-brainer.

The head-scratcher for me was that the CTA has been planning to implement off-board fare collection along the Loop Link bus-rapid-transit corridor for years. But nearly six months after that route launched last December, prepaid boarding still hasn’t materialized.

12 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

In contrast, there was no advance notice about the Belmont experiment until this month.

Why did the CTA decide to test prepaid boarding on the #77 before making this long-awaited upgrade to Loop Link?

The downtown BRT corridor already features red bus-only lanes, limited stops, raised boarding platforms, and special signals that give buses a head start at traffic lights—all of which help shorten travel times. But in 2014, before construction on the corridor began, the city revealed that it planned to implement prepaid boarding only at one of the eight Loop Link stations, located at Madison and Dearborn.

And in fall 2015, the city announced that prepaid boarding wouldn’t even be in place at that station in time for the system’s December debut. Instead, the CTA planned to pilot it at Madison-Dearborn sometime this summer.

But the transit agency says there are several reasons why the Belmont station, which is also served by the #82 Kimball bus, is a good location for the program’s maiden voyage.

The stop is one of Chicago’s busiest rail-bus transfers—more than seven million rides were

taken on the Belmont bus in 2015. The agency says boarding times on the Belmont bus can be as long as five minutes, which often results in “bus bunching,” the hated phenomenon where customers wait an eternity for a ride only to have two or more buses appear at once.

CTA spokesman Jeff Tolman says the agency still plans to test off-board fare collection at the Madison/Dearbon Loop Link station later this year, in collaboration with the Chicago Department of Transportation. “While that location is different, the concept remains the same, and [the Belmont] pilot will help us to identify feasibility for any future opportunities.”

While there’s no guarantee the Loop Link prepaid boarding pilot won’t be pushed back again, Tolman did have one good piece of news about the BRT corridor: when the system debuted in December, the transit authority required bus operators to approach the raised boarding platforms at three mph so as to avoid smacking customers with their side mirrors. Along with the lack of off-board fare collection, the rule was a factor in why the $41 million Loop Link project initially seemed to have little effect on cross-Loop travel times.

Tolman says they’ve finally gotten rid of this infuriating speed limit.

On Wednesday of last week, I checked out the prepaid boarding setup on Belmont. As you leave the subway, signs direct westbound bus passengers toward a fenced-off waiting area on the wide sidewalk on the south side of the station.

Two CTA employees, a young woman and an older man, were there to shepherd customers through the process. The man was standing by a battery-powered portable Ventra reader, mounted on a dolly at the cattle chute-like entrance to the waiting corral, and riders were required to pay their fare before proceeding.

Each batch of customers formed a line to wait for the bus, but the woman encouraged them to create an additional queue. “We’ll be boarding at the rear of the bus as well,” she explained. The man kept an eye on a Transit Tracker screen, and if two buses were due around the same time, the employees would direct riders to form three lines.

I went around to the north side of the station, where a line of eastbound riders had assembled at a regular bus stop. When the eastbound bus arrived, it took two minutes and 35 seconds for everyone to file on

through the front door and successfully tap their Ventra cards.

I returned to the prepaid boarding bullpen.

When a westbound Belmont bus arrived, the female employee held the back doors open and customers swiftly walked on through both entrances, with no need to tap. It took only one minute and 15 seconds to completely load the bus.

I talked to people from the next batch of riders. Everyone I interviewed was a daily commuter, so they’d experienced the new boarding protocol earlier in the week. They all spoke positively of it.

“It’s been working out great,” said Anne Trainor, who commutes from her home near Belmont and Austin to her job at a downtown insurance company. “This speeds the boarding process significantly, so I’m getting home earlier.”

“[Off-board fare collection on Belmont] has been working out great. This speeds the boarding process significantly, so I’m getting home earlier.”

—Anne Trainor, CTA commuter

A Jehovah’s Witness named Nick, who asked to be identified by his first name only, was nattily dressed in a necktie and porkpie hat, and stood proselytizing outside the station with some colleagues. He agreed the new system is an upgrade. He gives out literature at the stop every Wednesday, and because it previously took so long for buses to board, sometimes the lines of riders would wrap around the station, making it difficult to pass out copies of The Watchtower.

Religious differences aside, let us pray that the city implements this apparently successful prepaid boarding method on Loop Link sooner than later. That way the BRT system can live up to its potential to be a divinely efficient way to travel across downtown. v

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

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CITY LIFE A video the Chicago Independent Police Review Authority made available shows a police officer shooting 28-year-old Ismaaeel Jamison at a bus stop near 63rd and California in November 2012. ò IPRA

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

IPRA’s new video archive does little to cut through the fog of Chicago police shootings

By STEVE BOGIRA

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ith the June 3 release of a batch of police shooting videos, Chicago’s Independent Police Review Authority has given the public what it’s been clamoring for. But as visitors to IPRA’s portal have already learned, videos of police shootings rarely are clear, coherent, and germane.

Many of the videos show “hours of things like cops milling around at crime scenes and grainy images of tree tops,” as WBEZ put it.

And even when a video is in focus and captures a shooting directly, it’s hard to know for certain what’s happening in it, let alone make any fair judgments, without more information. Few videos, in other words, are like the one showing officer Jason Van Dyke killing Laquan McDonald.

Time will tell if IPRA’s data dump is a “watershed moment” that signals a “new era of handling public records” in the city. The videos, audio clips, and preliminary police

reports pertain to 102 cases, 74 of which concern officer-involved shootings; the remaining videos and audio files are related to Taser discharges and other police use-of-force incidents.

“These materials may not convey all of the facts and considerations that are relevant to the investigation of an officer’s conduct,” IPRA’s chief administrator, Sharon Fairley, cautioned reporters on June 3. “Sometimes videos may capture only a portion of an event, and leave out critical facts and context that are also relevant when assessing the conduct of anyone that’s involved in an incident.”

That’s absolutely true. The problem is that under IPRA’s new policy, although videos of police shootings will be released quickly— usually within 60 days—the “critical facts and context” may not be made available to the public for months or even years.

The police reports that will be released with the videos generally contain sketchy

information: when and where the incident occurred, and a brief narrative of it.

The more comprehensive supplemental reports should provide details about what preceded and followed the shooting and what happened off camera—but they often aren’t completed for weeks. And even after they’re turned in and approved, they won’t be made available by IPRA—not until its investigation of a police shooting is completed, and even then, only after a successful Freedom of Information Act request.

The version of the incident in the initial report and the supplementals is, of course, the police perspective. A more objective picture may emerge when the officers involved and other witnesses are questioned by IPRA investigators. Transcripts of these interviews, likewise, will only be available through a FOIA after IPRA’s investigation has been completed.

There are valid reasons not to release information from an IPRA probe before it’s been completed. For example, witnesses who have yet to be interviewed by IPRA could shape their stories based on the prior testimony of others if they’ve been apprised of it.

Valid or not, all this means that under IPRA’s new quick-release video policy, citizens will be able to watch the videos months before they can intelligently assess what they’re watching.

IPRA can reduce this troublesome gap between release of the video and the release of the “critical facts and context” by picking up the pace of its shooting investigations, which sometimes take two years or more.

One of the technically clearer videos IPRA made available shows a police officer shooting 28-year-old Ismaaeel Jamison at a bus stop near 63rd and California in November 2012. Jamison, bare-chested and muscular, seems agitated in the video: he’s pacing at the bus stop, and he waves an arm when a squad car arrives. An officer points his gun at him, Jamison charges the officer, and then Jamison crashes to the ground. The police reports say Jamison battered the driver of a CTA bus and attacked other people on the street before the officer shot him in the chest and foot in self-defense. Other officers Tasered Jamison when he tried to get up.

The video of the Jamison shooting has been viewed more than 63,000 times. Three and a half years after the incident, IPRA has yet to decide whether the actions of police were justified, and since the investigation is still “pending,” the initial police reports are the only “critical facts and context” available from IPRA. Fairley’s goal is to have most shooting investigations closed within six months, according to IPRA’s spokesperson, Mia Sissac.

First, though, there’s a backlog of older cases to close. Sissac says that while completing those investigations, IPRA will be studying what took them so long, in an attempt to increase efficiency.

Complicating matters is the fact that IPRA’s days are numbered: in April, Mayor Emanuel’s Police Accountability Task Force called for IPRA to be replaced with another oversight body, and Emanuel said last month

“Sometimes videos may capture only a portion of an event, and leave out critical facts and context that are also relevant when assessing an incident.”

—IPRA chief Sharon Fairley

he plans to do just that. Sissac says Fairley hopes that whatever lessons IPRA learns in the meantime will be used by the new oversight agency.

The Police Accountability Task Force called for better investigations, not just quicker ones. Improving both the quality and efficiency of investigations is easier said than done.

A larger investigative staff surely is needed. “It’s our hope that there will be a much more robust budget” for the new oversight agency, “which obviously includes people power,” Sissac says.

If a larger staff produces more rigorous investigations, that also should mean reports with more “critical facts and context” will eventually be offered to the public. But how many people will read them? The public wants videos. Not many of the reports will go viral. v

v @stevebogira JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 13

COAL’S LAST STAND

Even as people bemoan its environmental and health effects, the prospect of its demise sparks fear and nostalgia in Illinois.

By KARI LYDERSEN

Blasting at the Eagle River coal mine just outside Harrisburg drove many residents from their homes. ò KARI LYDERSEN

14 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

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t looks like a postapocalyptic landscape.

The people in this corner of southern Illinois have disappeared, leaving their quaint, once-tidy homes behind only to be reclaimed by prairie grass and field mice. The cozy gazebos, children’s playground equipment, spacious porches, and basketball backstops that remain are cracked and peeling.

Residents once enjoyed these amenities while gazing out at the rolling hills and lush forests of southern Illinois.

But that landscape has been replaced by huge gashes in the earth that reveal tumbled gray rocks, reddish soil, and the all-important seams of glistening black coal. The place now seems populated by a race of giant machines, massive yellow backhoes and dump trucks that ply the cluster of strip mines around Harrisburg and other small towns some 300 miles south of Chicago. Signs warn of the frequent blasting that has driven traumatized residents from homes on the perimeters of the mines.

And waste from the mines is ubiquitous— sprawling, towering piles of it rise behind schools and the Cottage Grove Cemetery.

Thick orange liquid oozes from the Willow Lake coal waste impoundment into a stream.

And black coal dust coats cars and buildings in the still-populated areas just outside the footprint of the mines.

More than 200 coal-fired power plants nationwide have closed or have announced closures since 2010, including two shuttered in Chicago in 2012. And the nation’s largest coal companies have declared bankruptcy, as low natural gas prices, environmental regulations, and increasing amounts of renewable energy have turned coal from the bedrock of our country’s energy supply into an increasingly uneconomical power source.

But coal is deeply rooted in Illinois, on both the mining and electricity sides. And at places like the Eagle River and Rocky Branch Mines in southern Illinois, the industry still feels very much alive. One could say that coal is making its last stand in Illinois; and even as people bemoan its environmental and health effects, the prospect of its demise sparks fear and nostalgia.

Illinois is the first place coal was discovered

by Europeans in North America, in 1673 along the Illinois River. Coal was once mined across the state, even in the Chicago region, hence place names like Coal City, Carbon Hill, and Carbondale. Today there are still 22 mines in operation, and Illinois is the country’s fifth-largest coal producer.

Illinois coal production increased to 59 million tons in 2015 from 33 million tons in 2010, though prices slumped for coal from

Coal miners at the Gateway Mine near Coulterville funnel into an outdoor elevator to start their evening shift in March 2006. Gateway is one of several Illinois mines owned by Peabody Energy, the world’s largest privately owned coal company. ò AP PHOTO/SETH PERLMAN

the Illinois Basin—a geologic formation covering much of Illinois and parts of Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee—as coal prices plummeted nationwide. Illinois coal-mine employment has dropped even when production has risen, since modern technology requires fewer workers to extract coal.

There were 4,100 people employed in coal mining in Illinois at the beginning of 2015, according to the state’s Department of Natural Resources. Phil Gonet, president of the Illinois Coal Association, says that 732 jobs were lost last year, and another 600 layoffs have been announced for 2016, bringing the total below 3,000, with more layoffs likely to come. That’s compared to 10,000 Illinois coal miners in the mid-1980s and 50,000 in the 1930s.

“For some of these towns in southern Illinois that have a coal mine, that’s the only game in town,” Gonet says. “Coal miners are making $80,000 a year, and there are ancillary jobs that support the coal industry. If the coal mine closes, that means much more than the

200 or 300 jobs at the mine. It has a big impact throughout the area.”

That leaves residents of coal counties in a difficult situation, trying to demand environmental, economic, and labor protections from coal companies at the same time they fear the industry leaving or shrinking and taking jobs and taxes with it.

“Coal mining is all we know,” says Tom Vaughan, a county board member and former high school English teacher in Franklin County who, like his neighbors, grew up playing amidst the “gob piles” of coal-mine waste, burning coal to heat the home, and learning as a young boy not to “pee on a clinker” of spent coal fuel “because it smells really bad.”

“We’ve broken generations of men in the mines—they can’t lift their arms above their heads”—because of years of stress and injuries—“and they’re on oxygen,” Vaughn continues. “But they have a lot of respect, there’s a certain pride to it, a certain courage. There’s this feeling, this hope we’re going to bring it

back. Because if the industry goes down, a lot of people go down with it.”

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nly about a tenth of Illinois’s coal is used by power plants in-state.

Illinois coal plants mostly import coal from Wyoming, which has lower energy content but less sulfur, burning more cleanly and allowing plants to meet state and federal clean air regulations even with outdated equipment. Since many power plants have installed pollution controls or will need to install them to meet upcoming regulatory deadlines, proponents of Illinois coal argue they can and should be using Illinois coal.

Most Illinois coal is exported to other states and sent abroad, as it can be easily shipped down the Mississippi River out to the Gulf of Mexico. China has been a hungry market for coal from the U.S., though demand there is dropping steeply as the economy slows and the country invests in renewable energy. J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 15

COAL’S LAST STAND

continued from 15 Illinois coal is significantly cheaper to mine, per amount of energy content, compared to coal from West Virginia and the Powder River Basin in Wyoming, which were responsible for 11 percent and 40 percent of U.S. coal production, respectively, in 2014. Illinois had 6 percent of the nation’s coal production that year.

“The one thing Illinois coal has going for it is our coal is easy to extract, and we have plenty of coal,” Gonet says. “Appalachia has been aggressively mining coal for a long time, so the low-hanging fruit is gone. We have a lot of easy coal to extract, so our coal companies are going to be the low-cost producers. And in a shrinking market, the low-cost producer is going to win.”

Illinois coal has become even cheaper and easier to extract with the advent of longwall mining, an underground mining technique in which huge machines essentially chew into coal seams, extracting the coal and letting the ground collapse behind them. This is much more efficient than the traditional “room and pillar” underground method, where miners left columns of earth and coal holding up the roof of the mine.

There is much opposition to longwall mining in downstate Illinois, even from the many citizens who support mining as a whole. Longwall requires significantly fewer employees than other types of mining. And it involves massive subsidence, causing the earth to drop many inches or even feet, with often devastating consequences for the homes and farmland on top of the mine.

In Hillsboro, a central Illinois farming town, Larry Schuete points out where the gravel road cutting a straight line across the fields of brown corn stalks dips down about four feet.

About 1,500 feet farther south the land rises by the same amount. The field between the dip and the rise has pools of standing water. A flock of snow geese seems to be enjoying the water, but the pools threaten to drown Schuete’s crops. Such subsidence is expected and taken into account as part of longwall mining.

This is the Deer Run Mine, owned by the company Foresight Energy and its parent since a troubled merger, Murray Energy.

Schuete’s fields are in the “panel” next in line for extraction, he explains as he examines the map showing the mine’s 17 numbered panels and the names of the people who own the surface above each section of minerals. In Illinois, as in many states, ownership of minerals below the ground is separate from ownership of the land above. Once the coal is carved out below Schuete’s land, it will subside up to six

16 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

Flooded farmland above the Deer Run Mine in Hillsboro. Longwall mining causes the ground to drop many inches or even feet, often with devastating consequences for the homes and farmland on top of the mine. ò KARI LYDERSEN

“THE COAL COMPANIES SAY THERE IS A WAR ON COAL. ACTUALLY IT’S THE OTHER WAY AROUND.” —Harrisburg resident John Simmons

feet, by the company’s own estimates, he says.

Schuete thinks this will ruin his crops.

“They will be flooded, no doubt about it,” he says. “I don’t know what we’re going to do.

The water will be trapped in here, it has no way to get out. They can come in and sink your land and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Once billed as one of the region’s most productive mines, Deer Run has hardly produced any coal for a year now. That’s because of a fire smoldering belowground that company officials have apparently so far been unable to extinguish, even after trying to seal the mine, pumping nitrogen underground to try to starve the blaze of oxygen, and other measures. Mining experts say company officials likely don’t know where the fire is, but they know it exists because of elevated carbon monoxide levels that led federal regulators to bar workers from the mine. Meanwhile, Foresight is pushing forward in seeking permits for a 7,700-acre expansion of Deer Run.

Schuete and neighbors who’ve formed the group Citizens Against Longwall Mining stress that they support mining as a whole— in fact, they can’t imagine their region without it. Schuete himself used to work at a coal-fired power plant, which is visible just beyond his fields, smoke and steam billowing from its two stacks.

“We’ve got to have coal,” he says. “I just don’t like the methods of mining that are taking place now.”

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llinois is one of only three of the nation’s 25 coal-producing states that don’t have a “severance tax” requiring companies to pay a small portion of their profits to the state or local counties. A small but growing coalition of Illinois activists and civic watchdogs is pushing for a coal severance tax to be implemented here. An October study by the Chicago-based Center for Tax and Budget Accountability J

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JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 17

COAL’S LAST STAND

continued from 17

found that a severance tax similar to those in other coal states could raise more than $60 million a year, which could fund services and infrastructure in coal-producing counties.

The funds could help repair roads damaged by coal trucks or other impacts of mining, and could be invested to spark other types of economic development so counties aren’t so dependent on coal.

The funds might also be necessary for environmental remediation, some worry, since coal companies in bankruptcy might not be able to fulfill their promises to clean up mines once mining stops.

Peabody Energy, the world’s largest privately owned coal company, is headquartered in Saint Louis and operates multiple mines in Illinois. Like other coal companies nationwide, it has an arrangement called “self-bonding” under which it promises the government that it will have the future assets necessary to clean up the land it’s mined to approximate its state prior to mining.

But Peabody’s financial fortunes have

plummeted in recent months, and on April 13 the company announced that it’s filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Environmental groups are demanding that Peabody be forced to put money aside for future cleanup; otherwise the responsibility could fall on the cash-strapped state government.

“Peabody’s financial condition speaks for itself,” said Howard Learner, executive director of the Environmental Law and Policy Center.

“Peabody’s management has not navigated the energy market, where low natural gas prices have outcompeted coal and energy efficiency is holding down electricity demand in the U.S. while China’s economy grows at a less robust rate than previous years. The risk is that Peabody’s responsibility to clean up from its mining operations will be washed away in a bankruptcy proceeding and Illinois taxpayers will be left holding the financial bag.”

Coal companies and industry backers oppose both forcing companies to put up more money for future remediation and imposing a severance tax. Gonet argues that the latter would make it harder for Illinois coal to com-

pete with nearby states without a severance tax—namely Kentucky and Indiana—where coal companies might choose to mine instead.

Meanwhile Peabody officials have said their operations meet the requirements under federal law for self-bonding, and say that despite their current troubles, in the future they’ll have adequate funds to clean up their mines.

Peabody did not respond to requests for comment for this story.

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n many states, particularly in the south, the same companies generate power and sell it to customers, and they charge the customers directly for the cost of making power and building and maintaining power plants. That’s how it worked in Illinois until deregulation in the late 1990s. Now, in Illinois as in other deregulated power states, utility companies like ComEd or alternative electricity suppliers sell electricity to customers, and those suppliers essentially buy power from different companies.

(An obscure agency called the Illinois Power

Agency actually decides where ComEd and the downstate utility Ameren buy their power, an arrangement meant to prevent conflicts of interest in part since ComEd’s parent company, Exelon, owns the state’s six nuclear plants and other power-generating facilities.)

Power is sold on an open market, mainly through “auctions” where it’s purchased to send to Illinois customers. Since the explosion of horizontal hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” natural gas has been so cheap that electricity generated by burning natural gas often outcompetes coal in the auctions. Wind power is also cheaper than coal-fired power. Meanwhile the lingering effects of the economic crisis and increasing energy efficiency measures have caused power demands to taper off.

All this means that in Illinois, energy produced by coal is much less lucrative on the auction block than it used to be. The outlook for coal became so grim in 2014 that the company Ameren actually paid the company Dynegy to take over five of its Illinois coal plants.

In May, Dynegy announced its plans to close multiple Illinois coal plants with the power to

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COAL’S LAST STAND

Toxic coal ash stored at the NRG power plant in Waukegan was found to have leached into groundwater.

Illinois has 22 coal ash impoundments, the secondhighest number in the nation. ò KARI LYDERSEN (COLOR); RICHARD ANDERSON

generate 2,800 megawatts—about 30 percent of southern Illinois’s total generating capacity, according to the company.

In 2015, 38 percent of the electricity generated in Illinois came from coal, and 50 percent came from nuclear power, according to Energy Information Administration data. In 2002, by contrast, 46 percent of the electricity generated was from coal and 49 percent from nuclear. Exelon says its nuclear plants have also become less profitable, and it’s threatened to close several of them if the state legislature doesn’t pass a bill guaranteeing more profits for nuclear energy.

Many Illinois coal plants are facing deadlines to install different types of pollution control technology because of state agreements negotiated by former governor Rod Blagojevich and federal limits on emissions of mercury and other toxins. If the federal Clean Power Plan to reduce carbon dioxide emissions survives ongoing legal challenges, Illinois and other states will also have to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide released from power plants. That will likely mean some kind of “price” placed on carbon emissions, making coal-fired power even less competitive in the energy marketplace.

There was a time when much research and investment was poured into the concept of “clean coal,” new coal plants with cutting-edge technology to remove almost all the carbon dioxide and other pollution from the plant’s emissions. The idea was to capture the carbon dioxide that would normally be emitted and store it underground somewhere. But such “carbon capture and sequestration” has never been done on a commercial scale, and all indications are that it is just too cumbersome and expensive.

“For the foreseeable future, there will be no clean coal,” says Dave Lundy, an energy and government affairs consultant who formerly promoted a proposed “clean coal” plant operated by the company Tenaska Inc. in Taylorville, Illinois. “The economics were challenging even when natural gas prices were high. There’s no chance now unless something dramatic changes,” Lundy says.

Central Illinois was the proposed home of the landmark FutureGen plant, meant to be a zero-emissions coal plant employing carbon capture and sequestration. But after years of efforts by the U.S. Department of Energy and Illinois politicians including Barack Obama himself, in February 2015 the Obama administration canceled the FutureGen project.

Another massive so-called clean coal plant that was built in central Illinois, the Prai- J

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continued from 19 rie State Generating Station, has been a financial and technological debacle.

Peabody was originally a majority owner of the plant, which burns coal from a nearby Peabody mine. The developers convinced leaders of numerous towns in Illinois, Missouri, Ohio, and other states to sign long-term contracts to buy power from the plant at rates that turned out to be far above market price, and to cover construction costs that ballooned far beyond original projections. As the plant’s finances deteriorated, Peabody unloaded its ownership interest. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation, lawsuits were filed, and towns remain desperate to get out of their contracts.

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or more than a decade, neighborhood activists and even national and international environmental groups demanded that Chicago’s two coal plants—in Pilsen and Little Village—be shut down. An agreement was eventually negotiated

by Mayor Rahm Emanuel to close the plants.

The owner of the plants, the company Midwest Generation, ultimately shuttered them even before the agreement required, in 2012, because it was so hard for the plants to make money.

Midwest Generation ultimately declared bankruptcy, and in 2014 the company NRG bought its six Illinois coal plants, including the two defunct Chicago plants. The other plants in that group are also on shaky economic ground, and experts expect that several of them will close in coming years.

That prospect presents a mixed blessing for residents of Waukegan, the majority-Latino city of about 90,000 residents on the shore of Lake Michigan 40 miles north of Chicago. A coal plant built in the 1920s sits on the lakefront right by downtown, providing jobs and tax dollars but also pollution. The plant has never been issued an operating permit in compliance with the Clean Air Act of 1990, since legal challenges by environmental groups have been going on for years. Opponents, including the Sierra Club and Environmental Law and Policy Center, allege the plant isn’t in compliance with air pollution standards, and that its cooling system—sucking in, then discharging Lake Michigan water—kills scores of fish. There is also toxic coal ash stored on-site, which in the past was found to have leached into groundwater.

Illinois has 22 coal ash impoundments, the second-highest number in the nation according to a 2011 report by environmental experts.

Environmental advocates are worried that as

20 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

Waukegan alderman David Villalobos, left, and resident Julio Guzman dream of an alternative energy future for their town. “How cool would it be if it becomes a green city on the North Shore?” Guzman says. ò RICHARD ANDERSON

power plants close, communities will be left with deteriorating coal ash reservoirs that could leak or collapse. The state government is currently drafting rules governing coal ash storage, but the version proposed by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency is far from adequate, advocates say.

Growing up in Waukegan, neither David Villalobos nor Julio Guzman knew that the hulking brick building with three smokestacks right by the popular local beach was a coal plant. Guzman finally learned about it after studying environmental geography at Colgate University in New York and then returning to his hometown.

Once Villalobos learned about the coal plant and the health risks it poses, he made it an issue in his successful race for city council last year. Villalobos and other civic leaders dream of seeing Waukegan’s quaint downtown revitalized and parks built on former industrial sites. But the massive coal plant on the lakefront could be a major impediment. “If I

was an investor I wouldn’t invest next to a coal plant,” Guzman says.

At a hearing of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Chicago in March, Waukegan residents described the coal plant as an environmental justice issue, just like the Chicago plants in the Pilsen and Little Village neighborhoods. The particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, and other emissions from coal plants are linked to significantly higher rates of asthma and respiratory and cardiac disease for surrounding residents. And working-class Latino residents like those who live near the Waukegan plant are statistically considered more vulnerable to health problems, and disproportionately lack access to quality health care.

About three years ago Waukegan religious leaders came together with other local residents and Sierra Club organizers from Chicago to found the Clean Power Lake County Campaign. The campaign is focusing both on the negative impacts of the coal plant, and what will happen when it closes, which Sierra Club

organizer Christine Nannicelli describes as an “inevitability.”

They are demanding NRG set aside funding and come up with a plan to help the city build a solar farm or other clean energy or economic development to replace the tax base and jobs that will be lost with the plant. A poll taken earlier this year showed 70 percent of Lake County residents want clean energy to replace the coal plant.

“The fear is that the company is just going to walk away and we’ll be left with this site contaminated and sitting in limbo for decades,” said Villalobos, 34, standing on the beach and gesturing at the massive pile of coal beside the plant on a warm afternoon in mid-April. He would like to see a brewery built on the site of the coal plant, maybe even in the historic brick structure itself.

“I think Waukegan is in the midst of reimagining itself,” adds Guzman, 22, who is starting a job with an energy delivery company. “How cool would it be if it becomes a green city on the North Shore? We can no longer be the path of least resistance where companies can do whatever they want. This needs to be a viable community that makes its voice heard.”

In a statement, NRG spokesman David Gaier says that the company has “been very up front about our plans for the Illinois fleet, and we’ve kept our promises to invest in and deliver massive environmental improvements.”

But back in Harrisburg, John Simmons says the demise of the coal industry can’t come fast enough.

A longtime construction contractor, Simmons loved the solid redbrick house he built himself on a wide expanse of lawn. But the Eagle River strip mine opened across the street, and Simmons felt like he was constantly experiencing earthquakes from the blasting.

That and the noise and dust took a serious toll on his health, he says, and he ended up leaving the home, selling it for far below what he considered its market value.

“The coal companies have hurt more than they’ve helped,” says Simmons, whose car sports a homemade decal reading IF YOU DON’T LIKE BREATHING, USE COAL. “The coal companies say there is a war on coal. Actually it’s the other way around,” Simmons says. “They’re shortening people’s lives and getting away with it. They’ve got people so over the barrel for a job. And it’s sold to China, it’s not even all-American coal. I’d like to see them lose every dime they have. Not the miners, but the owners.” v

@karilydersen

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ARTS & CULTURE Anne Sheridan Smith and Henry McGinniss ò MICHAEL BROSILOW

THEATER

Bat out of hell

By ALBERT WILLIAMS

I

t’s been nearly 20 years since Bat Boy: The Musical had its world premiere on Halloween night in 1997 at the Actors’ Gang, the California theater company led by actor Tim Robbins. And it’s been a little more than 15 years since the show had a high-profile off-Broadway run in 2001, winning the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Musical and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical.

Yet only now is Bat Boy receiving its professional Chicago premiere, in a well-sung, high-energy production by the Griffin Theatre Company. I don’t know why it’s taken so long for this oddball, engaging if macabre cult item to make its way here, but it was worth the wait. With its perverse sense of humor and driving but varied pop-rock score, Bat Boy is a smart, darkly comic fable that resonates both as a campy spoof of grade-Z horror flicks and a thoughtful, if irreverent, consideration of an age-old theme: What separates us human beings from our animal ancestors? Can education, language skills, love, and faith tame the bloodthirsty beast inside each of us?

With a script by playwrights Keythe Farley and Brian Flemming and a score by songwriter Laurence O’Keefe (whose subsequent

R

credits include Legally Blonde and Heathers), Bat Boy was inspired by an article in the now-defunct supermarket tabloid Weekly World News. “Bat Boy Found in West Virginia Cave!” screamed the cover of the paper’s June 23, 1992, edition, illustrated with the photo of a pudgy, freakish bald humanoid with razor-sharp teeth. As chronicled by WWN over the next 15 years, the mysterious Bat Boy embarked on a series of wild adventures, at one point joining the U.S. military to fight in Afghanistan after 9/11. (“Bat Boy Meets with Bush at Camp David,” WWN reported in November 2001.) WWN also tracked down the stories of Bat Boy’s ancestors, including an accused witch burned at the stake in Salem, a soldier in the Revolutionary War, and a Prohibition-era Chicago gangster.

But the musical’s Bat Boy has a far different history than the one WWN invented for its running character. In Farley, Flemming, and O’Keefe’s version, the teenage mutant—half human, half bat—is discovered by three dope-smoking amateur spelunkers from Hope Falls, West Virginia, population 500. They capture the half-naked creature, and the local sheriff takes the boy to the home of the local veterinarian, Dr. Thomas Parker, for examination and possible euthanasia. But while Tom’s away on a hunting trip, his wife, Meredith, and their teenage daughter, Shelley, take an unlikely liking to the boy. Shelley at first wants to keep him as a pet, while Meredith wants to humanize him. She names him Edgar and teaches him to sing and then to speak. Edgar’s a fast learner, and with the help of some BBC language tapes he’s soon rattling off erudite phrases in an impeccable upper-crust English accent.

Yet as his intellect and language skills develop, Edgar becomes more and more unhap-

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pily aware of his animal nature. It’s not just his pointy ears, darting tongue, and fangs; it’s the fact that the only nourishment Edgar can take is blood. Discovering this, Tom the animal doctor covertly satisfies that appetite, secretly feeding Edgar a steady supply of small furry animals. Tom professes to be Edgar’s friend, even a father figure—but he’s really only letting the lad live in order to please Meredith, his estranged wife, who’s developed a strong maternal protectiveness toward the boy.

Griffin Theatre’s production—directed by Scott Weinstein, with some wonderfully loopy choreography by Rhett Guter and Amanda Kroiss—features deft lead performances by the gangly, agile Henry McGinniss as Edgar, Matt W. Miles as Tom, Tiffany Tatreau as Shelley, and Anne Sheridan Smith as Meredith.

Most of the supporting cast play multiple roles, switching characters and even genders with a quick change of wig or costume in full view of the audience, with whom the actors sometimes playfully interact as well. An array of wildlife, from a cute (but doomed) little bunny rabbit to a swarm of bats, is represented through clever puppetry designed

by Lolly Extract and Amber Marsh, adding to the homemade flavor of the piece. The effect is simultaneously casually scruffy and slickly precise. The offstage band under the direction of keyboardist Charlotte Rivard-Hoster delivers the rock score with a good crunchy feel, though some sound problems at the opening performance obscured the lyrics. This problem will, I hope, be addressed in short order; Bat Boy deserves full appreciation for its witty writing as well as its boisterous spirits. v R BAT BOY: THE MUSICAL Through 7/24: ThuSat 7:30 PM, Sun 3 PM, Den Theatre, 1329-1333 N. Milwaukee, 773-609-2336, griffintheatre.com, $39.50; students, seniors, and veterans $34.50.

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JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 21

ARTS & CULTURE Josh Johnson, who won the stand-up prize at last year’s Snubfest, now writes for The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon. ò BRUCE DEVILLER

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T

he idea for Snubfest originated like so many others: over cocktails. Comedian Angie McMahon, her husband, Tom, and Robert Bouwman, the cofounder of improv theater the Cornservatory, were a few drinks deep at a Christmas party in 2005 when they drunkenly joked about starting a “fuck you for not picking me” event for comics who’d been rejected by stand-up, improv, or sketch festivals. But unlike most booze-fueled notions, this concept hit the ground running. Three weeks later performers from across the country took the Cornservatory’s stage at the first annual Snubfest.

Now in its tenth year, Snubfest is a place for up-and-coming comics to finally get noticed and be validated after years of being slighted.

And based on the eventual successes of past performers—T.J. Miller, Vanessa Bayer, and Cameron Esposito among them—redemption is sweet.

“A few people [running other local festivals] had an objection to it,” Angie McMahon says.

“There was some talk of ‘Why would they want to go to your reject fest?’ ” But thanks to the involvement of a huge local comedy aficionado, Zanies owner Bert Hass, Snubfest had no trouble getting the attention of performers.

“Bert Hass does not leave Zanies,” McMahon says. “He gets talent based on his scouts and videos, so the fact that he was coming out of the club to see this up-and-coming talent,

people came out of the woodwork from across the country.”

Hass has acted as a judge ever since, awarding spots on Zanies lineups to the best stand-ups each year. Each night of the festival is a competition judged by prominent figures from the worlds of stand-up, improv, sketch, and storytelling who can provide the best of the snubbed with more opportunities, some of which are bigger than the festivals that originally issued a rejection. This year’s panels include Tim Kazurinsky (Saturday Night Live), Matt Barbera (Just for Laughs), and Lily Be (The Moth).

The festival has grown each year, and now takes place over a span of four days in two different venues: Under the Gun Theater and Zanies. While the expansion is welcome, it leaves Snubfest with an unfortunate consequence: snubbing people. The first year McMahon was able to accept everyone who submitted, but by the third year she had to start turning people away. However, McMahon says that’s no reason to be discouraged—it’s just part of the biz.

“Michael Palascak—he’s been on Conan and Comedy Central and was a finalist on Last Comic Standing—got rejected from Snubfest,” McMahon says. “Everybody gets snubbed from something.” v R SNUBFEST Wed 6/22Sat 6/26, various locations, snubfest.com, $15-$20.

v @BriannaWellen

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ARTS & CULTURE

The Scopitone makes its debut in the midwest, 1964.

VISUAL ART

ò SUN-TIMES PRINT COLLECTION

Scope it out

By JOHN OWENS

A

bout 15 years ago, vernacular photo collector Nicholas Osborn was rummaging through a flea market in Wisconsin when he came across a bunch of 16-millimeter reels.

They featured kitschy performances by B-list 1960s music acts, formatted in a way that resembled the modern music video: one was of singer-songwriter duo Dick and Dee Dee poorly lip-synching their tune “Where Did All the Good Times Go” while a bevy of scantily clad dancers moved clumsily behind them on the Santa Monica Pier; another captured platinum-blonde model Joi Lansing singing the

torch song “Web of Love” while ensnared in a giant spiderweb.

Osborn was fascinated by what was on the reels, but he was equally delighted with their quality. “They were obviously directly from a distributor, so they were pristine and in perfect condition,” he says from west-suburban Brookfield, where the items are stored. “And they were shot in Technicolor, so the films were stunning to look at. The colors were so vibrant, they just popped.”

What Osborn found was a collection of three-minute films that were originally played in Scopitone jukeboxes, which for a brief time

in the mid-1960s were a staple of American taverns and pool halls. He now owns about 60 reels, and with the help of his friend and fellow vernacular photo collector Ron Slattery will showcase the best of them at the second annual Scopitone Party at Comfort Station in Logan Square. It’s part of the Vernacular Photography Festival, a 23-day show curated

by Slattery that kicked off on June 10. The Scopitone show will last somewhere between one and two hours, and based on the response to last year’s screenings, there should be a good turnout.

“We had to turn people away [last year],” Slattery says. “Young crowds go crazy over them.”

The Scopitone films are descendants of the better-known “soundies,” musical shorts distributed in coin-operated jukeboxes called Panorams, which were around in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The production of Panorams was halted during World War II, and the technology didn’t resurface until the late 1950s in France, when the CAMCA company (an acronym for Compagnie d’Applications Mecaniques a L’Electronique au Cinema et a l’Atomistique) reproduced the jukebox in a vertical cabinet. CAMCA gave the device its new name, Scopitone, and soon top French pop stars like Juliette Gréco and Johnny Hallyday were being featured in segments for the European market. Miami lawyer Alvin Malnik, reportedly backed by the east-coast Mafia syndicate, brought the jukebox to America in 1963 and soon after partnered with Chicago-based Tel-a-Sign to manufacture it; Tel-a-Sign then contracted with Harman-ee Productions, a company owned by actress Debbie Reynolds, to produce the content.

From the beginning of its time in America, Scopitone had problems. The Wall Street Journal reported on its mob ties in 1966, and the company was sued by the folk group Back Porch Majority for inserting “lewd” shots of dancers in its Scopitone film The Mighty Mississippi. And the machines were constantly breaking down in bars. “They were difficult to keep running,” Osborn says, “because they aren’t conventional jukeboxes, due to the film factor.”

The Scopitone company formally went out of business in 1969, and the jukeboxes disappeared from bars shortly afterward. Today they’re collector’s items, fetching prices as high as $8,000 on sites like gameroomantiques.com and showcased as museum pieces in places like the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and Third Man Records, the hip Nash-

ville record emporium owned by Jack White.

A vintage Scopitone jukebox, which Slattery currently houses in his cluttered storage space in Brookfield, will make an appearance at the Comfort Station screenings.

Slattery often has problems firing up the 60s-era techno wonder—it makes sputtering, wheezing noises when it’s plugged in—but it’s still a marvelous-looking device.

It stands about seven feet tall, and the lower half of the machine looks like a traditional jukebox, dominated by a huge speaker and an area where a customer can insert a coin and make song selections near the center. On the top of the Scopitone is a 26-inch screen where the shorts are projected. Turn the machine around, open it up, and see how it operates: 36 tiny reels are queued up, side by side; when a customer makes a selection, the chosen film drops into an area where it’s threaded and illuminated.

“When it’s working, [the jukebox] is a beautiful thing to watch in action,” Slattery says. “To hear the mechanism turning, it’s just a killer.”

But the main attraction, of course, is the films. The closest thing to “celebrities” featured in the Scopitone shorts are R&B singers like Lou Rawls, pop crooners like Billy Eckstine, Brook Benton, and Vic Damone, trumpeter Herb Alpert, and somewhat surprisingly, English progressive-rock band Procol Harum.

Yet the performers are overshadowed by the gaudy, eye-popping Technicolor and the well-recorded audio. The Scopitone reels had magnetic soundtracks (most films in the predigital age had optical soundtracks) that give the audio more resonance.

The most noticeable aspect of the Scopitone productions is the straight-maleoriented, 60s-era sex. Invariably, female dancers wearing either bikinis or bra and panties perform period dances like the frug or suggestively thrust and kick toward the camera. Many times, the choreography has no relationship to the song—in Brook Benton’s “Mother Nature, Father Time,” a medium-tempo R&B ballad, the dancers are shaking and undulating three times faster than the music. “The titillation factor is huge, and part of what makes the Scopitones special” Slattery says. “It’s like a blast from the past that you didn’t know existed.” v R SCOPITONE PARTY 2 Wed 6/22, 8 PM, Comfort Station, 2579 N. Milwaukee, comfortstationlogansquare. org. F

v @john_p_owens JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 23

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nReal’s tagline could be: “Money. Dick.

Power.” It’s the phrase that Rachel (Shiri Appleby) and Quinn (Constance Zimmer), the producers of Everlasting, a Bachelor-style reality show, get tattooed on their wrists in the second season’s opening scene.

To them, it’s the holy trinity—“in that order,” Quinn quips. It’s the motivation for every move they make in their professional and personal lives, which carry over to the contestants, who are just hoping to find love.

UnReal’s cocreator, Sarah Shapiro, knows a thing or two about what really goes on behind the scenes of such a show—she used to be a producer on The Bachelor. Onetime Reader staffer and current UnReal writer Gina Fattore says that every story line goes through Shapiro, who then decides how realistic each one is.

That context makes everything on UnReal seem all the more chilling. The show is on Lifetime and comes on immediately after The Bachelorette airs on ABC on Monday nights.

Sure, Chad, one of this year’s Bachelorette contestants, may be a crazed lunatic who pounds plates of lunch meat and physically threatens other contestants; there’s likely still a producer poking and prodding an already mentally unstable man for the sake of good TV. But how does someone like that even get cast?

According to UnReal, the people who do the hiring have mental issues of their own. They thrive on manipulation, and need weak people to manipulate—even the on-set therapist uses blackmail to ensure that she’ll be on camera.

In season one, the viewers’ entry point into this twisted world is Rachel. She woefully returns to the show after comparing her job as a field producer to “Satan’s asshole” and having a complete mental breakdown on camera. She tries her best to maintain some moral high ground by protecting certain contestants’ secrets and acting regretful every time she tricks them into catfights. In season two, she’s high on power (and cocaine) and returns to the set as the head bitch in charge. It’s a change that highlights Appleby’s impressive range as an actress—she believably shifts between the two extremes while staying true to the character.

This season UnReal does something that The Bachelor franchise has yet to undertake: cast someone of color as the main contestant. Unfortunately, Rachel employs this as a means of convincing herself that she’s using her power for good. Who cares if she forced a girl to drop out of college, or made one of her employees cry until she vomited? She’s making history!

But nothing can hide the evil core of her job.

“We’re not camp counselors,” Rachel shouts at a new, naive producer. “We don’t solve problems, we create them and point cameras at them.” There’s no telling if Rachel will return to her more well-intentioned ways. Maybe this new, heartless Rachel is forever, just like the three words inked onto her wrist. v R UNREAL Mondays at 8 PM on Lifetime.

v @BriannaWellen

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WARCRAFT s

Directed by Duncan Jones. PG-13, 123 min.

Get showtimes at chicagoreader.com/movies.

ARTS & CULTURE

Warcraft

MOVIES

Games people play

By J.R. JONES

M

ovies adapted from video games are a disreputable genre, and Warcraft isn’t likely to change that. Critics savaged the movie when it opened last Friday, competing to see who could come up with the most withering put-down and who could be first with the laborious punch line “Game over.” Of course, everything is a competition now: the gaming of America, which began with the emergence of team sports in the early 20th century and accelerated with the advent of video games in the 1980s, has reached its logical conclusion in a presidential contest destined to play out as a real-time strategy game. Fox News and MSNBC are indistinguishable from ESPN, focusing on the candidates’ strategy to the exclusion of all else. Already the candidates hunch over their phones, firing off Twitter insults at each other and checking their TV screens for evidence of a direct hit.

For the uninitiated, Blizzard Entertainment’s Warcraft is one of the giants of genre, a medieval-fantasy franchise whose inaugural game, Warcraft: Orcs & Humans (1994), helped popularize multiplayer gaming. The story was the usual D&D stuff: in the land of Azeroth, a human kingdom masses for battle against the invading Orcs, who have taken advantage of a space portal to escape from their own screwed-up planet. (You know the Koch brothers are working on something like ssss EXCELLENT

sss GOOD

this right now.) Two sequels followed before Blizzard debuted World of Warcraft (2004), an online version that’s become the most popular MMORPG (“massively multiplayer online role-playing game”) of all time. Over its lifetime the subscriber-based game has logged more than 100 million accounts, and with that kind of fan base the movie Warcraft doesn’t have to be any good—all it has to do is be. This past weekend it grossed $286 million, more than 90 percent of that outside the U.S. These kind of numbers explain why even dramatic filmmakers are trying to capture the aesthetics of video games. George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road, a king-size hit for Warner Bros. last spring, is a perpetual-motion machine with all the hurtling momentum of a first-person shooter game. Earlier this year it was followed by STX Entertainment’s Hardcore Henry, which producer Timur Bekmambetov (Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter) and writer-director Ilya Naishuller created by editing together stuntmen’s point-of-view footage, collected with camera helmets, into a supposedly continuous take. You can look forward to more of this in the cinema of the 21st century: continuous action will become the norm, and stasis will become as quaint as silent-movie intertitles.

The biggest thing still dividing cinema from video games is the character, a concept that has always been central to the dramatic

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experience but matters less in gaming. The Warcraft universe includes dozens of characters, fleshed out with fastidious backstories and given voice by professional actors, but every player knows that he himself is the true protagonist of the story. After all, the whole attraction of strategy games is agency, the ability to shape the action. When you’re participating in that action, the archetypal sword-and-sorcery characters may serve just fine, but what happens once you’re stuck in a darkened theater gaping at them, with nothing to do except feed popcorn into your trap?

How long would anyone want to sit around watching other people enact a game?

Director Duncan Jones understands the importance of characters. His first two features—Moon (2009), about an astronaut losing his grip on reality near the end of a threeyear lunar mission, and Source Code (2011), in which a soldier keeps reliving the same eight minutes in order to isolate and prevent a terror attack—branded him as an exemplar of high-concept sci-fi. Yet those movies would never have worked without their strong, willful protagonists, played by first-rate actors (Sam Rockwell in Moon, Jake Gyllenhaal in Source Code). Brought into the Warcraft movie to replace Sam Raimi, Jones came down hard on the script’s flat characterization. “It was the stale fantasy trope of, humans are the good guys, monsters are the bad guys,” he told the New York Times. “It just didn’t capture in my gut what made Warcraft, the idea of heroes being on both sides.”

Jones has remedied this somewhat, polarizing his narrative between the valiant and noble Sir Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel), of the human kingdom of Stormwind, and the valiant and noble Durotan (Toby Kebbell), an Orc chieftain of the Frostwolf clan. During a skirmish with the Orcs, Lothar and his men capture the green-skinned Garona Halforcen (Paula Patton), a half-breed torn between the clashing cultures, and her dilemma threatens to make her a three-dimensional character.

But there are so many other characters, the imagined cultures are so dense, and the imperative of keeping it all moving for two hours is so strong that no individual’s story can break through. Video games allow each person to escape into an invented world, but movies face a more daunting challenge: getting the world to escape into an invented person. v

v @JR_Jones

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Singer and rapper Jenae Williams walks through an art installation at VAM’s Fantasty party in March 2016. ò KATRINA JAYNE TARZIAN/DO312

Can DIY music and art coexist with corporate money?

Young creative studio VAM wants to fund and promote Chicago’s underground artists—without sacrificing their distinctiveness to the mainstream.

By LEE V. GAINES

O

n a Saturday in midMarch, nearly 800 people packed the cavernous near-west-side studio of painter Wesley Kimler for a party called Fantasty, billed as a celebration of Chicago’s DIY art and music scenes—and of the creative studio, VAM, that organized the event.

Fantasty was a one-year anniversary party for VAM. It began as an online magazine and now promotes the underground scene more directly, mostly by shooting artist profiles and other video series and curating video content from local

artists—though the studio also helps its partners realize their own work when it can. So far it’s gotten by without charging for any of its services.

At Fantasty, partygoers were treated to a borderline overwhelming array of performances. Figures dressed in white and wearing faceted, geometric animal-like masks skulked through the crowd. Colorful birds on perches or in cages preened near an art installation—a sort of waterfall of sparkling strings hanging from the ceiling—that guests could walk through. Video projec-

tions and Kimler’s huge paintings covered the walls, but the room was so full of people that it was sometimes hard to tell where the art was.

Live music ran into the early morning hours, including sets by DJs Taye and Sirr Tmo of footwork-music collective Teklife, producer Owen Bones, synth-pop group Glass Lux, self-parodic avant-garde rockers the Gnar Wave Rangers, and garage-pop band Soddy Daisy.

All the music and art (except Kimler’s) was by associates of VAM. But Fantasty had clearly gotten an assist from the corporate sector. Ac-

cording to VAM cofounders Vincent Martell and Jordan Phelps, Goose Island brought beer, Do312 provided an RSVP platform and help with signing in guests (the party was free with an RSVP through Do312’s site), and Red Bull paid for everything else that the studio couldn’t fund itself.

The musicians performed in front of a Red Bull logo several feet high.

This corporate presence might’ve surprised guests who recognized the names of the local DIY venues prominently featured on the party’s flyer: the Dollhouse, Young Camelot, Eco, and the Dojo. (Young Camelot had recently vacated its home, a church in Humboldt Park that’s since been demolished.) These collectives not only helped VAM choose the performers at Fantasty but also contributed in other ways: members of Eco stage-managed the party and DJed between the musicians’ sets, for instance, and folks from the Dojo handled the video projections.

Martell and Phelps (who collaborated on the sparkling-string installation) explain that they wanted to provide a worry-free night for the DIY operators, all of whom have put up with the precariousness of running unlicensed venues. “Our goal was to bring in all of these amazing spaces we’ve worked with and magnify them,” Martell says.

Nearly all the Red Bull money went to participating artists and musicians, to people who worked the party, and to Kimler (for the use of his studio). Martell says the studio also arranged for private security and got the proper permits from the city for alcohol and catering.

“When people heard of this idea of all these cool DIY spaces and VAM and Red Bull being on the same flyer, it was confusing for some people— and that’s totally valid,” he admits.

“The cool thing about Fantasty is you have all these DIY spaces who wanted to execute an event on a larger scale and not worry about police or the venue being licensed, and we had that. We found a really J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 27

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VAM founders Jordan Phelps (left) and Vincent Martell outside their Logan Square apartment

DIY INC.

ò DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS

continued from 27 cool venue. We found funding that would go back in their pockets.”

Martell and Phelps, who are both 26, have full-time day jobs. Since launching VAM in February 2015, they’ve largely funded it themselves—Red Bull has helped with just the one party, and Do312 has pitched in to pay artists at other events. Martell does what he calls “visual work” for a Japanese retailer he’d rather not name due to the amount of energy he devotes to VAM; Phelps is an actor and works in sales for Broadway in Chicago.

VAM consistently offers free admission to its parties (it’s had four over the past year, of which Fantasty was by far the best attended), and it’s a point of pride for the studio that it compensates everyone involved. The founders don’t pay themselves, though. “If we end up with any additional funds left from sponsored events or drink sales, that all goes directly back into the

production team,” Phelps says.

Because VAM doesn’t sell its services to artists, money is a constant concern. When VAM hosts, say, a musician’s video on its online platforms, or even when it helps an artist make a video piece using its personnel and facilities, it doesn’t usually ask for payment. “We will not charge for those services unless we’re commissioned from production companies, record labels, publications, galleries, et cetera,” says Martell. “Basically, those companies with sufficient funds.”

Martell wants to open up VAM to private donations so that the studio can do more. Phelps mentions other possible plans: “We’re looking to receive more support from local and national grants and potential private investors and advertising sponsorship in order to help us produce the highest-possible-quality work,” he says. “I think we’re still questioning how do we survive financially while still remaining

‘underground.’”

Given that VAM considers underground culture its territory, it’s worth determining how its founders define the term. “‘Underground’ is just another word for ‘new and emerging’ to me,” says Martell. “We look in-depth at their creative work to judge whether or not it’s different from commercial artists. We also look at their following and social-media presence. We will never work with artists who have a million followers. We’re looking for artists with unique perspectives who may need help boosting their presence in their respective fields and communities. Artists and spaces who are saying bold things in their work and challenging the media.”

Phelps adds, “Oftentimes remaining ‘underground’ can help them thrive. Underground does not always mean ‘new’ or ‘young.’ It means grounded and raw and honest.”

VAM didn’t seek out Red Bull, which may be why Martell and Phelps don’t consider it a compromise of their principles to accept the company’s help. “Red Bull approached us,” Phelps says. “We were so dedicated to making sure the funds came from us. Over the past year, we’ve learned to get over the pride and be willing to accept help from others. We can pay that forward to DIY collectives and the people that work on these events.”

Red Bull recently flew Martell and Phelps to a farm in Marfa, Texas, for a few days of brainstorming and networking with fellow entrepreneurs.

VAM was the youngest group there and the only one devoted entirely to the arts.

“It was a very interesting process.

We received mysterious packages in the mail,” Phelps says. “[Red Bull] does stuff like this—fly people out to the desert.”

VAM’s contact at the company, John Kosmopoulos, is on-premise marketing manager for Red Bull North America. He declined to speak to the Reader. “Unfortunately Red Bull employees are not able to be quoted by media,” he wrote in an e-mail. A request for comment sub-

“There’s really not a way to engage in this economy without working with corporations. If VAM is getting flak for being a sellout, they’re definitely not. They’re doing the important thing, which is focusing on the artists they want to focus on and actually paying their staff.”

—Katie Waddell of arts festival 2nd Floor Rear

mitted to Red Bull’s press office was never returned.

Scott Cramer, general manager of Do312 and owner of Cramer PR & Events, noticed VAM after its launch party, when it began profiling some of his contacts and clients in the music industry.

“I reached out to Vincent and Jordan, and we realized we had a lot of the same interests. I wanted to support what they were doing and work with them,” Cramer says.

Last July Do312 and VAM took over Wicker Park space Canvas for an event called My Party, featuring Owen Bones, Teen Witch Fan Club, and other artists. “That’s when I put them on Red Bull’s radar,” Cramer says. VAM and Do312 have since collaborated on a Pride event as well as on Fantasty.

Martell and Phelps use about 20 contributors, though not all work for VAM at the same time; they’re employed as contract laborers. The cofounders would ultimately prefer to turn VAM into a full-time job for themselves and their team.

VAM aims to be an advocate and an aid for Chicago’s underground arts community, but Phelps emphasizes that the studio doesn’t consider itself a DIY collective—its mission is to help keep DIY collectives alive.

VAM wants to spur collaboration between artists and arts scenes, as well as spotlight work by artists and musicians who might never get exhibits in prestigious galleries or shows in big venues. Martell and Phelps like the idea of building a hub for all kinds of Chicago-centric art— they might bring together club kids, a rock band, footwork producers, a textile artist, drag queens, and an artist who fakes Salvador Dali prints.

Martell and Phelps briefly attended the same college in 2008, but Phelps dropped out and Martell transferred to the University of Barcelona. The seeds of VAM were planted in 2010, when they began talking about their shared frustration that the people they felt deserved recognition in Chicago’s underground art and music scenes weren’t getting it.

J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 29

30 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

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DIY INC.

Partygoers at Fantasty in March 2016 ò KATRINA JAYNE TARZIAN/DO312

continued from 29 Martell, who moved to Chicago at 12 and spent his adolescence in Downers Grove, was inspired by the arts scene in Barcelona and wanted to carry that energy to Chicago. Phelps, a 2016 Jeff Award nominee for a supporting role in Theo Ubique’s Blood Brothers, was motivated to establish VAM by the potential he sees in the city’s artists.

It took about a year for the two of them to build a network of artists they wanted to work with—they didn’t want to launch a website with nothing on it. “There were some artists we researched who were disguised as interesting,” Phelps says, “but when we dug a little deeper, we discovered they were trust-fund kids.”

“Our main goal is to be a hub,” says Martell. “If you’re an artist doing cool shit and you need to promote a comic book, we’re here.”

“If you’re a jewelry designer and want a fashion editorial for it, let us know,” Phelps adds.

VAM has moved since its launch toward a stronger emphasis on video production, due largely to a partnership with local filmmakers and SAIC graduates Greg Stephen Reigh and Jeremy Freedberg.

Reigh and Freedberg, now VAM’s directors of video production,

have been involved with the studio for about a year and a half. VAM asked Reigh at the last minute to help Freedberg on a shoot for its Unfiltered series—video profiles of artists working in a variety of mediums, including Bones’s music production and the art forgeries of Michael Thompson.

Reigh works regularly with Young Camelot knight and local filmmaker Emily Esperanza, founder of the Wretched Nobles of the Exiled Dynasty film series, and he’s long wanted to document the city’s DIY venues and collectives. He pitched a video series to VAM, he says, with the goal of showing people outside the community that the scene goes “beyond punk shows in some dirty hipster’s house.” He’s so far produced five short documentaries about the Dollhouse, Eco, Young Camelot, the Dojo, and the Observatory.

He credits VAM with giving him the push he needed. “I told them what I’ve been wanting to do for awhile, which is the DIY series, and that I haven’t been able to for money and time reasons,” he says. “They gave me the funding and the deadlines. It was a way of getting me off my ass and actually making it.”

Freedberg says he appreciates the “unlimited creative freedom” Martell and Phelps have given him.

“I remember a very early conversation I had with [Martell], and he said, ‘Dude, you’re director of video production—you don’t need my permission to shoot something,’” he recalls. “It’s a powerful thing to be trusted like that.”

While Reigh covers underground venues, Freedberg focuses on the Unfiltered series, which profiles underground artists. “Or they have roots in the underground, or a rebellious mentality,” he says.

Unfortunately, it can put underground artists at risk to give them the wrong kind of publicity—DIY venues and the artists who rely on them are especially vulnerable, because their lack of proper licenses can get them fined or evicted if they don’t keep a low profile or luck into a sympathetic landlord.

“Generally speaking, in order to get around that, I walk on eggshells,” Reigh says. “I tell the people in these spaces, ‘If there is anything you don’t want me to film, let me know.’” Martell notes that VAM has refrained from revealing the addresses or even the neighborhoods of most of the DIY spaces it’s profiled.

“We’re less focused on the politics of the space and more on the art that’s being presented,” Phelps says.

“We’re not trying to piss anyone off so they chase them down and try to

shut down these houses.”

Reigh says that ever since Young Camelot, which he profiled for VAM last year, was forced to vacate its home—it’s been knocked down to make way for a six-unit condo building—he’s especially conscious of the downside of documentation.

“There is that lingering feeling that I might cause the downfall of a house, which is really stressful,” he says.

Phelps thinks the importance of documenting the work produced by underground venues and artists justifies the risks. He and Martell are frustrated with the city government’s lack of support for artists who fall outside the mainstream or don’t already have the backing of a corporate entity.

“Those collectives are doing really beautiful work. They’re not throwing ragers. They’re putting on art shows, hosting poetry readings, hosting podcasts—they’re educating the community at these events,” Martell says. “I feel like the city will gladly give a corporate venue money to throw a rager, versus the Dojo to host a poetry reading—which is fucking nuts. Something is backwards.”

Erin Delaney, who sings in the band Daymaker and lives at Eco, says her Pilsen DIY collective enjoys an unusual luxury—a landlord who’s “extremely comfortable with what we’re doing.” Eco was founded in 2005, and Daymaker guitarist Michael Egon Schiele, who also lives there, says “the owners originally operated it as an artist collective.”

For the past couple years, the space has played host to live music.

“I think what VAM is doing is preserving cultural events in Chicago that otherwise get zero attention,” says Delaney.

Delaney says she was impressed

by Reigh’s enthusiasm when he showed up at Eco last year to profile the venue. “The ethos of VAM came through Greg,” she says. She and Schiele’s relationships with the studio have blossomed in the months since. Schiele writes for VAM’s website, and he and Delaney worked as stage managers at Fantasty.

“To be honest, I would love to be

taken seriously and respected for the work we do with Eco shows,” Delaney says. “When VAM reached out and asked us to stage-manage their event, I felt so validated.”

Bones, who’s performed at all of VAM’s events, says he didn’t know what to expect at Fantasty, but was pleasantly surprised by its level of organization and efficiency. He remembers someone working for VAM approaching him before his set and asking if he had everything he needed.

“I don’t get that sort of treatment at venues, and this was a group of people who showed up for the good of the event,” he says. “To me, it seems like [VAM] brings together groups of people to do interesting things. They have some internal agenda I’m not fully aware of, but I’m rolling with it. I haven’t encountered someone who hasn’t enjoyed their events.”

Katie Waddell, founder of peripatetic two-day annual arts festival 2nd Floor Rear, says her mission is similar to VAM’s. She employs Reigh as a videographer (she’s a fellow SAIC graduate), and he connected her with the studio. Reigh, under the VAM banner, produced a short documentary on Waddell and 2nd Floor Rear in 2012.

Waddell’s festival takes place in alternative art spaces—only commercial galleries are excluded—and brings together artists who may not have access to major galleries or museums. The most recent event, February’s 2nd Floor Rear 2016, revolved around the social and cultural politics of being in a specific place, and it included VAM’s DIY series. VAM “supports the exact same scene and body of work I support,” says Waddell. She’d also like to transform her personal project into a year-round, full-time gig, and she’s likewise struggling with how to fund it. She says a lack of support from Chicago and Illinois government institutions means she’ll likely need donors with deep pockets.

“There’s really not a way to engage in this economy without working with corporations,” she J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 31

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continued from 31 says. “If VAM is getting flak for being a sellout, they’re definitely not.

They’re doing the important thing, which is focusing on the artists they want to focus on and actually paying their staff to make these films. I don’t know how people expect them to do all this without partnering with a more substantial organization or for-profit organizations.”

Bones points out that while other collectives in the city work hard to showcase lesser-known artists, VAM has a special ability to leverage corporate relationships to create a bigger platform and generate more funding.

“Let’s just face it—money sucks,” Reigh says. “But if we can put that shitty thing they call money into something that builds culture or anything worthwhile—anyone who calls me a sellout, fuck them. I don’t have reservations about taking money from Red Bull if they tell me I can do what I want.”

Chicago artists unfortunately often pack up their belongings and move to New York or Los Angeles, and Martell says part of the reason is a lack of validation, support, and funding here.

Those who do stay, Delaney says, “toil away in obscurity on a lot of counts—it’s outrageous how much incredible talent and creativity is in this city and that doesn’t get shared

outside of its borders.”

Delaney, Schiele, and the VAM team hope that the studio’s platform will encourage artists to remain in town and convince the rest of the country (and the world) that Chicago has arts and music scenes worth exploring and funding.

“We’re telling [Chicago] artists that you do have the power,” Martell says. “You are talented. You deserve to be compensated. I think the more resources we have in the city, or just someone rooting for you in the background, the more influence it is for artists to stay.”

Martell and Phelps say they eventually want to replicate what they’ve done in Chicago in smaller cities in the U.S. with similarly vibrant but underrecognized underground scenes. In the short term, however, Chicago will be their sole focus.

“VAM entered our spaces, our homes, and became part of our lives, and suddenly the horizon got wider,” Delaney says. “Suddenly there was more space to move around. I had not felt hopefulness toward the future. VAM made everything a little wider, and longevity seems like an option. It’s fun to dream about. We love what we do, and I think a lot of people have more confidence in what they do because of this organization.” v

v @LeeVGaines

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MUSIC IN ROTATION

bottom lounge ONSALE FRI 06.17

A Reader staffer shares three musical obsessions, then asks someone (who asks someone else) to take a turn. urn.

Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawa at South by Southwest in 2014 ò ANNA HANKS / FLICKR

MAT KEREKES & SECRET SPACE

ONSALE NOW

envy on the coast

06.17 THE KING OF MARS

OLD KING RASCALS / SWEET RASCALS / UNSPUN

06.24 WE WERE PROMISED JETPACKS PRISM TATS

06.25 HITSLEEP

REV GUSTO / THE BANK NOTES / RIVER SNAKES SCHOOL OF ROCK ADULT PROGRAM

The cover of Comfort Food’s Waffle Frolic

06.26 THE LATE STAKES

LUCA CIMARUSTI

JOHN LOMBARDO Host of Rubbed in

RODRIGO PALMA Bassist for

07.08 COMBAT ZONE VS FREELANCE WRESTLING 07.09 PITY SEX

Bob Mehr, Trouble Boys: The True Story of the Replacements This huge volume on the Replacements by former Reader staffer Bob Mehr is the best rock biography I’ve ever read. Chronicling every minute detail of the legendarily inebriated Minneapolis indie-rock band’s rise and fall, Trouble Boys is as dark and twisted as it is hilarious and fascinating. I managed to fly through its nearly 500 pages in less than a week.

Comfort Food, Waffle Frolic This one’s been rattling around in my skull for months—mostly I just feel stunned while trying to figure out how this local duo produce their ear-catching cacophony. Their latest Already Dead tape mixes primitive, repetitive structures and modern sounds, punctuating off-kilter horns with guitar skree and looped cackling—it’s primal, mechanical, and explosive. Imagine Beefheart jamming with the Books.

Various artists, Wayfaring Strangers: Cosmic American Music The Numero Group’s latest compilation of forgotten American records in its Wayfaring Strangers series focuses on the psychedelia-tinged country-rock that bubbled up in the wake of Gram Parsons’s brief career.

The songs on Cosmic American Music pay homage to the country-rock giant’s sound, beautifully fleshing out tales of heartbreak and hard partying.

Apryl Fool, The Apryl Fool Shortly after discovering this Japanese psych band, I was crushed by the realization that this twisted 1969 album is the only one they ever released.

It runs a wicked foundation of American blues through a trans-Pacific filter to create its slowsmoldering grooves. Damaged organs pounded into smeared bass lines recall early Can, and the band switches direction on a dime on the LSD-drenched nightmare “The Lost Mother Land Pt. 1.” Its wobbly synths and garbled vocals give this Eastern psych classic a disorienting “lost in time” feeling.

Wolf Eyes I saw Wolf Eyes in February and haven’t stopped thinking about their brainerasing power since. The music sometimes invokes Albert Ayler, Suicide, or Godflesh.

Sometimes it tickles me: A dude with a drum machine strapped to his chest is playing solo soprano sax? Now the sax is looped and layered into painful dissonance. Then, as if the audience had uttered a safe word, a throbbing pulse arrives, deafening and physical, with no definite downbeat or backbeat. A roaring guitar fills out the sound, prohibiting mental escape into an uninhabited frequency.

It’s a release of sorts—total, primal, essential.

NO REGRETS

FREELANCE WRESTLING PRESENTS

Reader music listings coordinator

Chris Bell, I Am the Cosmos Chris Bell’s only post-Big Star LP was released in 1992, more than 13 years after his tragic induction into the 27 Club. It picks up where he left off with his famous band’s #1 Record and journeys to a whole new spaced-out realm. Bell beefs up his power-pop formula and adds studio experimentation, dreamy synths, and a bummer vibe that feels even eerier with the knowledge that these would be the last songs he recorded.

Dirt, Dipped in Sugar at CHIRP Radio

John Olson, Life Is a Rip Off: The Complete Book John Olson’s homespun post-gonzo style makes this 400-page collection of 12 months of daily record reviews feel like something else entirely. The longtime Wolf Eyes noisenik uses his enormous set of self-created slang as he recounts everything he knows about each album and how he came to have it. His range of interests is staggering—Jimmy Dawkins, Cryptopsy, youth-crew hardcore demos, bootleg dancehall—and he covers it all without changing tone or breaking stride.

Saves the Day and Into It. Over It.

The quarter note The quarter note is the pulse we instinctively nod our heads to. Your heartbeat is already playing along. Sometimes it’s in plain sight, as with boots-’n’-cats dance music. Other times it’s suggested via syncopation; James Brown was a master of this (see “Mother Popcorn”). In reggae it’s oft omitted but omnipresent. The quarter note is there even in the trickiest compound meters. It’s an analytical tool to remember to not be analytical and instead to feel and communicate.

Stella Mozgawa Stella is the supremely musical drummer of Warpaint. She’s a master of color and groove, more tasteful than flashy, and her patterns are conversations built around the cyclic movements of her limbs.

She has a Roland drum pad in her kit, and plays sampled sounds with a human feel. I regularly return to “Hi” from the self-titled Warpaint album in awe. Also, her Instagram (@steezmeez) is pretty funny.

PWR BTTM / PETAL

07.10 THE PLOT IN YOU

ERRA / SYLAR / INVENT, ANIMATE

07.13 ARCHITECTS

COUNTERPARTS / SWORN IN / MAKE THEM SUFFER 1833 PRESENTS

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LUMINATE / EDAMAME UPSTAIRS AT BOTTOM LOUNGE

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THE STONE FOXES / MAIL THE HORSE

07.16 NETHERFRIENDS

TREE / BRIAN FRESCO / JON JAMES / FEMDOT / A.M. EARLY MORNING / DJ DAMNAGE UPSTAIRS AT BOTTOM LOUNGE

07.16 THE DYES

DJ KILLER DILLER RICO / DJ GENTLEMAN JOHN BATTLES THE NOISE PRESENTS

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THE WHITE NOISE / MY ENEMIES & I BOTTOM LOUNGE, SILVER WRAPPER & C3 PRESENT AN OFFICIAL LOLLAPALOOZA AFTERSHOW

07.30 LETTUCE 08.13 THE FALL OF TROY ‘68 / ILLUSTRATIONS

09.22 MOVITS!

SIDEWALK CHALK

10.08 THE AMITY AFFLICTION

BEING AS AN OCEAN / HUNDREDTH / TROPHY EYES / DEADSHIPS 1833 PRESENTS

10.11 PANTHA DU PRINCE LIVE www.bottomlounge.com 1375 w lake st 312.666.6775

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 33

MUSIC

Recommended and notable shows, and critics’ insights for the week of June 16 b

ALL AGES

F

Giuda ò COURTESY THE ARTIST

PICK OF THE WEEK

An enterprising Will Oldham shocks no one by teaming with the shape-shifting Bitchin Bajas

THURSDAY16 Bonnie “Prince” Billy & Bitchin Bajas See Pick of the Week. Bill MacKay opens.

8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, sold out. 18+ Jessy Lanza DJ Taye and Jeremiah Meece open. 9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $15, $12 in advance.

ò JESSICA FEY

BONNIE “PRINCE” BILLY & BITCHIN BAJAS, BILL MACKAY

Thu 6/16 and Fri 6/17, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, sold out. 18+

ON EPIC JAMMERS AND FORTUNATE LITTLE DITTIES (Drag City) Bonnie “Prince” Billy (aka Will Oldham) again demonstrates his malleability, tapping into the minimalist trance vibe of Chicago’s equally shape-shifting Bitchin Bajas. Singing phrases that seem taken from the sort of fortune-cookie messages pictured on the album art, Oldham still gives the record shape with a muted yet soulful warble, layering his wonderfully cracked voice over cycling, beguiling patterns of guitar, synthesizers, and winds that suggest Terry Riley leading a garage band.

The entire endeavor is marked by a breezy, almost soothing sense of experimentation—it’s a murkily recorded casual jam session where the musicians routinely discover effective licks and grooves and aren’t afraid to tinker with them. “Your Heart Is Pure, Your Mind Is Clear, Your Soul Devout” almost sounds like a Hindu mantra as the sound of a homemade gamelan dissolves in a milky wash of overdubbed voices and resonant keyboards, while “Despair Is Criminal” is little more than a plaintive vocal meditation over billowing synthesizer. The album frequently intimates the Indian roots of the American New Age movement, but the performances never approach hermeticism or fluff. Both Oldham and Bitchin Bajas will play short sets on their own before playing a longer set together. —PETER MARGASAK

34 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

On her 2013 debut, Pull My Hair Back, Canadian singer-producer Jessy Lanza displays an innate, almost alchemical ability to meld swooning R&B and austere electronics into a consuming fog. Her alluringly atmospheric music often threatens to blot out her lustrous, delicate vocals, but Lanza has put some muscle into her singing on this year’s Oh No (Hyperdub), ensuring that even her highest-pitched hooks and half-spoken chants groove with the pointed percussion and blustery electronics rather than get lost in them. At her best Lanza sounds like she’s dancing along with her own music and cheering for the euphoric rush it brings, as on “It Means I Love You,” where her vocals steer through the tinny lounge melody and tropical ambience that open the song while layers of footwork-influenced percussion build to the tune’s glorious release. —LEOR GALIL

Montana of 300 Reuben X, Ric Wilson, and Lisa Decibel open. 8 PM, Double Door, 1551 N. Damen, $25, $20 in advance. 17+ One of the great regional rap stories of 2016 is Baton Rouge MC Kevin Gates, whose decade spent grinding away on the independent circuit and dropping a flurry of mixtapes finally paid off big time.

His studio debut for Atlantic, this year’s Islah, peaked at number two on the Billboard 200 in February and has hung tight in the top 20 since, all without the mass hysteria and big press push afforded better-known rappers. Like Gates before him, Montana of 300, a Chicago native who grew up in the Low End neighborhood, is largely unknown outside of hip-hop circles and rarely covered in the press, but he’s grown into the role of regional rap star these

past couple years thanks to remixes, freestyles, and cyphers featuring the 300 crew that he posts on YouTube. And then there are Montana’s own singles: his breakout, “Ice Cream Truck,” showcases his natural melodic sensibility, fierce flow, and ear for serrated hooks (oh, and the song has garnered more than 17 million views in less than two years). The independently released album Fire in the Church (FGE)—which actually features Gates on “Goonies”—is scattershot and exhausting, though Montana never sounds tired, doling out metaphors and busting ass through the entire 18 tracks. It’s a lot to get through, but there are plenty of bright moments, like the triumphant “Daddy Used to Be the Plug.” —LEOR GALIL

FRIDAY17 Hayes Carll Emily Gimble opens. 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 2424 N. Lincoln, $20.

Hayes Carll still sounds very much like his irascible self on his first new album in five years, Lovers and Leavers (Thirty Tigers), where he embraces the ambivalent view of the record business shared by his Lone Star State predecessors Townes Van Zandt and Steve Earle. Produced with stark directness by Joe Henry, the new record lacks not just an obvious radio single but Carll’s trademark character sketches and excursions into wry humor; here he favors introspection instead. Carll’s gone through some life-changing experiences of the usual sort, including a divorce, and it’s refocused what he finds important. On Lovers and Leavers he celebrates the reliability of his friends while embracing the fleeting quality of romance on “Good While It Lasted,” drily singing, “It was good while it lasted / But it didn’t last too long.” Carll trusts in his voice’s parched twang, which is usually accompanied by little more than the spare percussion of Jay Bellerose, the lean bass of David Piltch, and his own scratchy acoustic guitar (though the roller-skating-rink organ Tyler Chester plays on “Sake of a Song” adds the perfect hint of atmosphere). If the new album is any indication of where Carll intends to push his music, he’s headed in the right direction. —PETER MARGASAK

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Giuda Cozy and Sueves open. 8 PM, Double Door, 1551 N. Damen, $15, $12 in advance. 18+ With the release of their rollicking 2010 full-length debut, Racey Roller—a perfect record of hard-struttin’, glam-flavored power pop—Rome’s Giuda introduced themselves as formidable masters of ceremonies for any and every disco-balled roller-rink get-down. The rhythms drive with gusto, the bass lines are down-picked, and the sing-alongs are too damn simple to be denied. That album’s follow-up, Let’s Do It Again, sashays in a manner unlike its progenitor: still plenty anthemic, its melodies are touched with a bubble-gum playfulness that’s welcome though a little less effective in riling you up (“Yellow Dash”). Last year’s Speaks Evil (Burning Heart) kicks off with “Roll the Balls,” a vintage Giuda track that’s complete with big-time hand-clapping opportunities and hard-nosed guitar licks, while “Working Class Man” begins with a dusty melody that could’ve easily been ripped right from a ZZ Top B side. The album as a whole weaves in the best parts of each of its predecessors—but not without marking its territory with a sweet, sauntering single like we haven’t heard from Giuda before (“It Ain’t Easy”). —KEVIN WARWICK

Bonnie “Prince” Billy & Bitchin Bajas See Pick of the Week on page 34. Bill MacKay opens. 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, sold out. 18+ Nails Full of Hell, God’s Hate, Eternal Sleep, and Gazzan open. 2 PM, Beat Kitchen, 2100 W. Belmont, $17, $15 in advance, all-ages; also 8:30 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $17, $15 in advance.

Oxnard sounds like a great place to have in your rearview mirror, so let us thank the southern California city for giving us grindcore and powerviolence trio Nails. Their releases have come on a steady three-year schedule; their newest, You Will Never Be One of Us, is their first on Nuclear Blast—a label that recognizes a good band as one that goes hard and fast and doesn’t fuck around. Produced

by Kurt Ballou of Converge, the record is a staggering, lurching, roaring monster of ugly grindcore and metal noises with tracks that slam, chug, and are on to the next before you’ve absorbed the damage. Then, just to prove they can, they settle in for the eight-minute-plus “They Come Crawling Back,” which is about a third of the total length of the whole record. The listener certainly isn’t cheated in density of experience, regardless of length.

—MONICA KENDRICK

SATURDAY18 Julianna Barwick Mas Ysa opens. 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $15, $13 in advance. 18+ Brooklyn singer Julianna Barwick first established herself using nothing but wordless vocals and a looping setup, forging constellations of ethereal melodies that seem to feed on themselves. As J

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6/17-6/19, 900 W. Randolph, tasterandolph.com, $10 suggested donation.

WGCI Summer Jam One of Chicago’s go-to stations for hip-hop hosts Fetty Wap, Jeezy, 2 Chainz, T.I., Plies, and Migos. 6/17, United Center, 1901 W. Madison, wgci. iheart.com, $20-$125. b Windy City LakeShake This lakeside festival features giants of modern country including Lady Antebellum, Tim McGraw, Jason Aldean, Martina McBride, and Travis Tritt. 6/17-6/19, FirstMerit Bank Pavilion, 1300 S. Linn White, lakeshakefestival.com, $99.50 per day, three-day pass $255. b

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Green Music Fest The festival promotes all things green and even includes a bicycle-powered stage. Black Joe Lewis, King Khan & the Shrines, Waxahatchee, and Langhorne Slim perform. 6/18-6/19, Damen between North and Schiller, greenmusicfestchicago.com, $5 suggested donation.

Myth Festival Inspired by Greek mythology, this celebration of electronic music is anchored by a broad range of Chicagoans. Experimentalist Hieroglyphic Being, techno vet DJ Skull, Primary nightclub owner Derek Specs, and hip-house originator Tyree Cooper are just some of the local heavy hitters on the bill. 6/18-6/19, Irish American Heritage Center, 4626 N. Knox, mythfest. com, $35, $65 two-day pass. 18+

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Nails ò JIMMY HUBBARD

continued from 35

heard on her 2011 effort The Magic Place (Asthmatic Kitty), the results were lovely but a little limited, so she wisely began working with other musicians and producers. On the recent Will (Dead Oceans) her essential methodology hasn’t changed: at the core of her songs are delicate vocal fragments that dissolve into a milky ether of reverb. Only now she’s fully cradling and complementing those sounds with her own piano and synthesizer lines as well as cello, percussion, and additional vocals from several collaborators. That means she can sound a bit like a hipster Enya sometimes, but at the other extreme is the closing track, “See, Know,” where a relentless synth riff and circular drums create a surprisingly refreshing air of paranoia. Mas Ysa, the solo project of Montreal musician Thomas Arsenault, who sings on Will, opens. —PETER MARGASAK

Breadwoman Grouper headlines; Breadwoman, Good Willsmith, and Simulation open. Bohemian National Cemetery, 3969 W. Bryn Mawr, $20. b In 1982 Los Angeles performance artist Anna Homler hopped into the “Whale,” her name for the blue 1961 Cadillac she inherited from her mother—and often used as in performances—and headed toward Topanga Canyon in search of poet-medicine woman Deena Metzger. During the drive something compelled her to produce an otherworldly stream of vocal sounds, a made-up language without meaning, and she whipped out her portable cassette recorder and taped it all, with results that suggest the ethnographic recordings of an imaginary land. Those tapes became the basis for her Breadwoman persona, in which she chanted spooky sounds over LA composer Steve Moshier’s creepy electronic mix of quasi-industrial smears, lo-fi beats, and eerie ambient washes. For her performances Homler would envelope herself in layers of ragged, loose-fitting robes with a babushka securing a hefty, hollowed-out loaf of rustic bread over her face (crude holes were cut out for her eyes and mouth). Earlier this year the project’s sole release, a 1985 cassette titled Breadwoman & Other Tales, was reissued

by RVNG, bringing back to life a long-overlooked obscurity that sounds remarkably fresh—it’s a kind of fictional world music free of sociopolitical signifiers. The project has been revived for a handful

36 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

of live performances, including this one, for which she’ll be joined by Steven Warwick (aka Heatsick) and a dancer who’ll play the role of Breadwoman as Homler sings. —PETER MARGASAK

Pere Ubu Obnox open. 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, 2424 N. Lincoln, $25, $20 in advance.

Over the past few decades Ohio has quietly grown a reputation as a go-to state for some of the finest—and weirdest—underground rock music in the country. And whether you’re talking about the fractured bedroom recordings of Guided by Voices, the drunken and damaged garage of Cheater Slicks, or the pummeling noise rock of Unholy Two, none of it would have been possible without David Thomas, the godfather of Ohio weirdos, and his Cleveland band Pere Ubu. Formed in 1975 after Thomas’s legendary protopunk outfit Rocket From the Tombs splintered apart, Pere Ubu has released a nonstop string of what he calls “avante-garage,” a brilliant, skronky explosion of angular punk, noise rock, and free-form experimentation. Pere Ubu is currently out in support of Architecture of Language (19791982)—the second in a series of box sets—which packages together early LPs New Picnic Time, The Art of Walking, and Song of the Bailing Man. The set also includes a fourth disc titled Architectural Salvage, a collection of odds and ends like B sides, alternate takes, and live tracks. While it could easily be written off as nonessential for casual listeners, it’s an excellent testament to how true Pere Ubu has remained to its sound, style, and aesthetic over the past 40 years. Opening this show is Obnox, the Cleveland solo project of Ubu disciple Lamont “Bim” Thomas, who also played drums for bands like This Moment in Black History and Bassholes. Originally started as a fuzzed-out garage-pop act, Obnox has evolved into a wildly soulful and smooth blend of punk, noise rock, and hip-hop. —LUCA CIMARUSTI

Radioactivity Bad Sports and Dumpster Babies open. 9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $10.

Radioactivity, a relatively new band from the incestuous rock scene in Denton, Texas, play garage punk wound so tight it probably glows in the dark.

Front man and chief songwriter Jeff Burke used

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to be in the Marked Men, who split in 2009 after four top-notch albums; a few years later Mark Ryan, also of the Marked Men, joined him in Radioactivity alongside two-thirds of Bad Sports, Daniel Fried and Gregory Rutherford. Wherever he goes, Burke takes his perfectionism and attention to detail with him—lots of folks think garage punk is supposed to be dumb and simple, but his bands prove just how much craft and intelligence this boneheaded genre can absorb without ceasing to be itself. On Radioactivity’s most recent album, last year’s Silent Kill (Dirtnap), Burke’s strained, urgent singing, undiluted by his bandmates’ occasional sweet backup vocals, perfectly complements the taut riffs—even the lyrical midtempo numbers thrum with nervous energy. I especially like the thoughtful embellishments and convolutions in the bass; it doesn’t just move from one note to the next in a straight line.

You might be tempted to call this “power pop” rather than “garage punk,” due to the high concentration of melodic and harmonic information in the otherwise stripped-down songs. But I think the word “garage” fits just fine—in most garages, no matter how dirty they are, you’ll find precision-engineered parts machined to within a thousandth of an inch —PHILIP MONTORO

SUNDAY19 Nicole Mitchell’s Black Earth Ensemble 7:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $10. 18+ Over the last five years or so, as flutist Nicole Mitchell has gravitated toward composing thematic suites with stretches of notated material, she’s quite naturally become more interested in expanding her band’s personnel. Her stunning new album Moments of Fatherhood (Rogue Art) is inspired by a collection of photographs portraying affluent African-Americans that W.E.B. Du Bois put together for the “American Negro” exhibit at the 1900 World’s Expo in Paris as a challenge to racist stereotypes. Mitchell wrote the music in part to honor her father, who died in 2012, but also to celebrate the state of African-American fatherhood at a time when, as she writes in her liner-note essay, “the gestures of care and commitment of African American fathers continue to be overlooked and unappreciated.” She recorded the music with saxophonist David Boykin and violist Renèe Baker, two of her most trusted Chicago collaborators, along J

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with clarinetist Sylvain Kassap’s Parisian Ensemble Laborintus and the remarkable New York-based Spanish pianist Aruán Ortiz—but while the cast is the most international grouping of her career so far, the music stands as some of her most unified and driven. A piece like “Explorers,” which moves easily in and out of new-music terrain, reveals a stunning new confidence in her ensemble writing while retaining the rhythmic fluidity at its heart. For the work’s Chicago premiere Mitchell has assembled a local cast with Baker, cellist Tomeka Reid, clarinetist James Falzone, vibist Chris Sies, drummer Marcus Evans, bassist Alex Wing, and saxophonist Jarrard Harris, along with Ortiz, whose presence is especially exciting. One of the most thrilling pianists at work today, he made a grand statement with his trio earlier this year on the record Hidden Voices (Intakt). —PETER MARGASAK

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Saxophonist Peter Brötzmann’s Chicago Octet began in 1997 (soon thereafter becoming a tentet), and though it wasn’t the first cross-continental working group to feature Chicago musicians, it was one of the most durable, ending its run only in 2012. The Brötzmann project was ultimately orchestrated by Ken Vandermark, who’s since led quite a few impressive ventures with European musicians and Chicagoans, but there have also been plenty others in his wake. This nimble quartet brings over Norwegian bassist Jon Rune Strøm and drummer Tollef Østvang as its rhythm section, and features Chicago cornetist Josh Berman and reedist Keefe Jackson as an agile, tart front line. With this gig the group is finally celebrating the release of last year’s Southern Sun (Stone Floor), a collection of original tunes by each member of the quartet. The album’s eight pieces stick with relatively direct themes, like Berman’s Ornette-ish “Blues” and Jackson’s jagged, then loping “Symbol Reform,” but while they’re all pithy, they ultimately exist to facilitate tightrope improvisation and strong rapport—within the simple structures the cast swings, murmurs, and screams.

—PETER MARGASAK v

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SMACK SHACK | $$$$

326 N. Morgan, 312-973-1336, smack-shack.com

NEW REVIEW

Consider the lobsters at Smack Shack The Minneapolis import stays afloat when it keep things simple.

By MIKE SULA

T

From top left: lobster roll, lobster Juicy Lucy, lobster boil, crab cakes, sea bass ceviche ò DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS

he proud and ancient lobstering traditions of Minnesota have until now remained relatively obscure. But from the Chippewa pulling bugs out of Lake Superior to the Minnesota food truck sourcing certified Lake Calhoun crustaceans, it’s been one of the state’s best-kept secrets.

Well, the last part is sort of true.

Smack Shack started as a mobile lobster-roll concern, serving poor man’s chicken shipped from Maine, and blossomed into a popular brick-and-mortar spot employing the seabed scavengers in all sorts of dishes. Now it’s expanded to Chicago, joining the ranks of modish casual seafood outfits such as Oyster Bah, Angry Crab, Lowcountry, and Cold Storage, the latter with which Smack Shack impertinently shares real estate on the ground floor of Google’s Chicago headquarters in the Fulton Market District.

But presented with the choice of the Boka Group’s broad and sophisticated approach and Smack Shack’s more focused and populist one, it’s difficult to imagine either drawing from the same customer base. Still, you might wonder what, if anything, a midwest import can prove to us about lobster.

All the nautical ornaments of your standard New England lobster shack are in place here: red-checked tablecloths, decorative lobster traps, and front and center a roiling

cauldron of stock saturated with onion and Old Bay Seasoning, into which the living creatures are plunged from the cool waters of their fiberglass Dura-Tech holding tanks straight to hell.

This 100-gallon stockpot produces one of two main signatures at Smack Shack: a straightforward lobster boil with the arthropods scalded red and sold by the pound, served on a metal tray with corn on the cob, red potatoes, slaw, a Leon’s Polish sausage, toasted milk bread, drawn butter, and a cup of the brew in which the beast was boiled. Your enjoyment of the lobster itself depends on whether you think this time-honored method is a smart way to cook lobster meat. A hard boil tends to destroy the delicate flesh, rendering it stringy and tough.

And that’s exactly what happens at Smack Shack.

A better way to go is with the restaurant’s other main offering. Its original lobster roll is of the creamy, mayo-drenched variety, here lightly dressed and flecked with tarragon.

The lobster itself is plentiful, chunky, and sweet, served on two slices of sweetish toasted milk bread joined on one end. Smack Shack’s Connecticut lobster roll is a similar proposition, but it comes on a bun and lacks much of the promised warm butter it’s meant to be dressed with.

From there Smack Shack does all sorts of unsurprising and questionable things to lobster meat. J

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 39

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FOOD & DRINK Crab cakes are served atop the creole corn salad maque choux. ò DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS

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SOUTH LOOP

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2105 S State 312-949-0120

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continued from 39 Appropriately enough, the restaurant applies it to mac and cheese, Cobb salad, and bisque.

But chief among the stranger delivery systems on the menu is an otherwise classic Minneapolis Juicy Lucy, the menu promising a burger stuffed with lobster and Taleggio. Instead a whole piece of claw meat appears on top of the patty, an absurdly inharmonious topping that’s easier to eat off the bun. On the other hand, the burger, topped with griddled onions and tarragon aioli, is bursting with juice and molten cheese, and, not surprisingly for a Minneapolis-born restaurant, is among the best things on the menu.

Something similar happens with the lobster guacamole: perched atop the avocado are large, unintegrated chunks of claw meat.

Lobster also keeps company with mussels, clams, and halibut in a watery, bland cioppino, presented in a cast-iron skillet, which retains plenty of heat to overcook the seafood.

Padding the menu are quite a number of items unrelated to lobster, both surf and turf. Oysters from both coasts are shucked in

a suspiciously midwestern style, the living creatures often shredded and devoid of liquor, gasping in the air on top of the ice. A fresh sea bass ceviche punched up with fruity Fresno chiles is a welcome diversion, as are sweet, meaty crab cakes served atop the creole corn salad maque choux.

Po’boys and fish and shrimp entrees round out the selections along with terrestrialbased proteins like fried chicken and steak, while desserts stay close to all-American archetypes such as red velvet cheesecake, banana cream pie, and a misshapen but otherwise lovely, lip-puckering key lime pie with vanilla-flecked whipped cream and painstakingly peeled lime wedges.

On the surface Smack Shack certainly sets itself apart with its nominal attention to the lobster. But in our current seafood-saturated dining environment, it’d be more effective if the restaurant focused on the two things on which it was established: lobster boils and lobster rolls. The rest is just chum. v

v @Mike Sula

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○ Watch a video of Pat Niebling working with lavender in the kitchen at chicagoreader.com/food.

KEY INGREDIENT

How the sausage is made

By JULIA THIEL

Lamb sausage with chopped cashews, Dijon mustard, Three Floyds Yum Yum pale ale, and lavender leaves, topped with lavender-infused bearnaise ò JULIA THIEL

L

AVENDER “tastes like potpourri, like soap,” says THREE FLOYDS BREWPUB chef PAT NIEBLING. “It’s not great. I can’t wait to not use it again.” In fact, the scientific name for lavender comes from the Latin word for “wash”—the ancient Romans used the flowers as a bath scent, among other things.

Challenged by DONERMEN food truck chef SHAWN PODGURSKI to create a dish with lavender, Niebling and sous chef Scout Hughes had to start from scratch: Niebling hasn’t used it much since culinary school, he says.

Hughes notes that one year they made a lavender barbecue sauce at Three Floyds, “and [the lavender] was all you could taste.” That sauce didn’t stick around for long.

“Everything I read said you only need a little bit because it’s so powerful,” Niebling says, “but with every test batch I had to keep adding and keep adding.” The pair experimented with using lavender to cure fish and duck, but what ended up working was putting it in (and on) a sausage: specifically, lamb sausage with chopped cashews, Dijon mustard, Three Floyds Yum Yum pale ale, and lavender leaves. The herb also went into a bearnaise, a

variation on the classic sauce that substituted lavender leaves for the tarragon and sour beer (Three Floyds Necropants) for the white wine.

After stuffing and smoking the sausage, Niebling brushed bread with butter, grilled it along with the sausage, then assembled everything: onto the bread went a black garlic-cherry sauce, then the sausages, topped with the bearnaise, candied lavender flowers, and microcilantro. “It sounds like it’s going to be completely brutal, but it’s not,” he says.

Tasting the sausage with a pint of Yum Yum— which the chefs chose because it’s citrusy and floral but doesn’t compete with the food— Hughes observes, “It’s not overpoweringly lavender. It’s sort of mellow.”

WHO’S NEXT:

Niebling has challenged TONY LOMANTO of KUMA’S CORNER to create a dish with SPOTTED DICK, a British sponge pudding with dried fruit.

“I wanted to give them holy water,” he said, “but I don’t think that’s going to fly.” v

v @juliathiel JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 41

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REAL ESTATE RENTALS

STUDIO $500-$599 CHICAGO HEIGHTS - No depos-

it. Large Studio, 1,2 & 3 bed. Free heat, gas, parking. $550-$800/mo.

708-307-4290

STUDIO $600-$699 PARK! 7455 N .

Greenview. Studios starting at $625 including heat. It’s a newly remodeled vintage elevator building with on-site laundry, wood floors, new kitchens and baths, some units have balconies, etc. Application fee $40.

No security deposit! For a showing please contact Samir 773-627-4894 Hunter Properties 773-477-7070 www.hunterprop.com

EDGEWATER!

1061 W. Rose-

mont. Studios starting at $625 to $675, All Utilities included! Elevator building! Close to CTA red line train, restaurants, shopping, blocks to the lakefront, beaches and bike trails, laundry onsite, remodeled, etc. For a showing please contact Jay 773835-1864 Hunter Properties, Inc. 773-477-7070 www.hunterprop.com

LARGE BEDROOM, $725 Newly decorated, dining room, carpeted, stove, refrigerator, FREE heat & cooking gas. Elevator & laundry room, free credit check, no application fee, 1-773-919-7102 or 1-312802-7301 OPENING WAIT LIST 1BR subsi-

dized apts seniors 62 yrs & older.

Pre-Apps taken - 6141 S. Michigan Avenue & 773-643-0374. For occupancy, applicants must meet the current HUD income guidelines and our tenant screening and selection criteria. Equal Housing Opportunity.

8324 S INGLESIDE, 1BR, newly remodl, lndry, hrdwd flrs, cable, Sec 8 welc. $660/mo.; 7000 S. Merrill, 2BR, hdwd flrs, lrg sunrm, new remod., cable ready, lndry, O’keefe Elem, $800/mo. Sec 8 welcome. 708-308-1509 , 773-493-

3500

7022 S. SHORE DRIVE Impecca-

bly Clean Highrise STUDIOS, 1 & 2 BEDROOMS Facing Lake & Park.

Laundry & Security on Premises.

Parking & Apts. Are Subject to Availability. TOWNHOUSE APARTMENTS 773-288-1030

QUALITY

APARTMENTS,

Great Prices! Studios-4BR, from $450. Newly rehabbed. Appliances included. Low Move-in Fees. Hardwood floors. Pangea - Chicago’s South, Southwest & West Neighborhoods. 312-985-0556

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)

MOVE RIGHT IN 8200 S. Drexel.

XL1BR, heat & appls incl. Newly remod., living/dining room, $660/ mo, no security deposit, Sect 8 OK. 312-915-0100.

MOVE RIGHT IN - Near 92nd & Stony Island, Garden apartment, 1 bedroom, 1 bath, $600/mo + security deposit incl utils. Call Theresa 312806-0646 CHICAGO SOUTH - YOU’VE tried the rest, we are the best.

Apartments & Homes for rent, city & suburb. No credit checks.

773-221-7490, 773-221-7493 79TH & WOODLAWN 1 B R $650-$700 2BR $775-$800; 76th & Phillips: 2BR $775-$800.

Remod, appls avail. Free Heat.

Sec 8 welc. 312-286-5678 WINTER SPECIAL $500 To-

ward Rent Beautiful Studios 1, 2, 3 & 4 BR Sect. 8 Welc. Westside Loc, Must qualify. 773-287-4500 www. wjmngmt.com

CHICAGO, 82ND & JUSTINE. 1BR. near transportation. $650-$695 /mo. 1 month rent + 1 month Security. Heat is incl. 773-873-1591 Chicago, Beverly/Cal Park/Blue Island Studio $575 & up, 1BR $665 & up, 2BR $885 & up. Heat, Appls, Balcony, Carpet, Laundry, Prkg.

708-388-0170 2BR

W/DEN

ON

2nd flr in Bronzeville, heat incl. $975; Updated 1BR w/ hdwd flrs, near Pill Hill, $725, heat incl, lndry facilty. 312-683-5284.

AUBURN GRESHAM. 8105 S. Paulina St. 1 & 2BD apts.

Sec 8 OK. Credit Check Req’d. $750$850. Tom 708-205-1448

CHICAGO, 81ST AND Clyde.

4rms, 1BR. 3rd flr, stove, refrigerator, decorated. $600/mo + 1 mo sec. 773-268-2796 û NO SEC DEP û 6829 S. Perry.

1BR/STUDIO $465 & $520 HEAT INCL 773-955-5106 CHICAGO, $595/MO . Large 1BR 75th & Union. Near public trans, schools and shopping, appl incl. Sect 8 Welc. 708-334-5188 8931 S. DAUPHIN. apt 1N. 1BR, no appls. Heat and Water incl. $575/mo. 1 mo rent + 1 mo sec.

Call Vincent 773-531-3531

WEST PULLMAN (INDIANA

Ave) Nice, lrg 1 & 2BR w/balcony.

1BR $550, 2BR $650. Move-In Fee $300. Sec 8 Welcome. 773-995-6950

CHICAGO - SOUTH SHORE Large 1BR, $6 60/mo. Free heat.

Near Transportation. Section 8 Welcome. Call 708-932-4582 EXCHANGE EAST APTS 1 Brdm $575 w/Free Parking,Appl, AC,Free heat. Near trans. laundry rm. Elec.not incl. Kalabich Mgmt (708) 424-4216 6930 S. SOUTH SHORE DRIVE Studios & 1BR, INCL. Heat, Elec, Cking gas & PARKING, $585-$925, Country Club Apts 773-752-2200

7603 S. Prairie – 2nd flr - 1 bedroom, newly decorated, hardwood floors, ceiling fan, heat included.

Call Dee @ (773) 371 – 1303.

1 BR $700-$799 PORTAGE PARK! 5602-10 W.

Wellington. 1 Bedrooms starting at $795 Includes heat. Application fee $40. No security deposit! Laundry facility on premises. Sunny living rooms, wood floors throughout, kitchen contains large roomy cabinets, walking distance to shops, grocery stores, restaurants and more!

For a showing please contact Jose 773-415-4911 Hunter Properties 773477-7070 www.hunterprop.com

PLAZA ON THE PARK 608 East 51st Street. Very spacious renovated apartments. 1BR $722 - $801, 2BR $837 - $1,009, 3BR $1,082- $1,199, 4-5BR $1,273 - $1,405. Visit or call (773)548-9300, M-F 9am-5pm or apply online at www.plazaonthepark apts.com Managed by Metroplex, Inc

SOUTH SHORE 1BR apt, newly renovated apt. hdwd flrs throughout, laundry, secure bldg w/surveillance system & wrought iron fencing. $740. 773-880-2414, 773-580-7797 82ND/S. MERRILL 1BR, new remod, hdwd flrs, formal DR, heated, appls, 1st floor, Nice neighborhood. $700/mo.

(773)988-7727 CHATHAM - 88TH & Dauphin, Spacious, lovely 2BR, laundry room, security camera, nr metra, $800-$900/mo, Call 312-341-1950

1 BR $800-$899 LAKESIDE TOWER, 910 W Lawrence. 1 bedrooms starting at $895-$925 include heat and gas, laundry in building. Great view! Close to CTA Red Line, bus, stores, restaurants, lake, etc. To schedule a showing please contact Celio 773-3961575, Hunter Properties 773-4777070, www.hunterprop.com LARGE ONE BEDROOM apart-

ment near Warren Park and Metra, 6802 N Wolcott. Hardwood floors, Cats OK. Heat included. Laundry in building. $825/ month. Available 8/1.

773-761-4318, www.lakefrontmgt. com

QUIET BUILDING CHATHAM, 1BR, 1BA, heat incl. lndry on premises, well maint, $77 5/mo. Avail 6/15/16. 773-233-7673

1 BR $900-$1099 BEAUTIFUL BRONZEVILLE 1BR, sun-filled 900sf, new kit, FDR, oak flrs, lrg deck, backyrd, $875/ heated 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com

Hyde Park West Apts., 5325 S. Cottage Grove Ave., Renovated spacious apartments in landscaped gated community. Off street parking available. 1BR $1195 - Free Heat, 2BR $1400 - Free heat, 4BR Townhome $2200. Ask about our Special. Visit or call 773-324-0280, M-F: 9am5pm or apply online- www. hydepark west.com. Managed by Metroplex, Inc

Wrigleville 2BR, 1400sf, new kit/ deck, FDR, oak flrs, Cent Heat/ AC, prkg avail. $1550 + util, Pet friendly, 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com CHICAGO, 1524 W. 89TH ST., newly updated, 1BR, hdwd flrs, LR/ DR, kitchen, heat & appliances included. $850/mo. Call 708-3331400 RAVENSWOOD 1BR: 850SF, great kit, DW, oak flrs, near Brown line, on-site lndy/stor., $1075/ heated 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com 3700 W DIVERSEY: Beaut 3BR, 2BA duplex, 1800sf, new kit, top flr, yard/prkg, storage, W/D, $1650+util.

773-743-4141 www.urbanequities. com

HOMEWOOD- SUNNY 900SF

1BR Great Kitc, New Appls, Oak Flrs, A/C, Lndry & Storage, $950/mo Incls heat & prkg. 773.743.4141

1 BR $1100 AND OVER RENT BY THE Room starting at

$1175 to $1300/month! Incredible opportunity to live in new Logan Square apartment 2211 N Milwaukee. Visit www.logansquarel.com for details.

LOGAN SQUARE BLVD Carriage

House, 2-story LR with fireplace, loft, 1 bedroom & sitting room, modern kitchen & bath, utils included. $1250/ mo. Non-smoking. 773-235-1066

______________

1 BR OTHER

Drexel Towers Apartments does not discriminate on the basis of disability in the admission or access opening of its wait list for one, two to, or treatment or employment in, its and three bedroom apartments to in- government assisted programs and dividuals and families. Drexel Towers activities. is a professionally managed, mixed-income, affordable rental APTS. FOR RENT property with attractive floor plans, PARK laundry and onsite parking.

MANAGEMENT

DREXEL TOWERS APARTMENTS is pleased to announce the

Drexel Towers will accept requests for applications by USPS mail only beginning June 1, 2016 and continuing until June 30, 2016. All requests postmarked after July 30, 2016 will not be accepted. To receive an application, send this form to: Drexel Towers Apartments, 3473 S. King Dr Box #361, Chicago, IL 60615. An application will be mailed to you. Completed applications must be returned

by USPS mail and postmarked no later than August 4, 2016. Applications received after August 4, 2016 will NOT be accepted. Applications cannot be obtained at Drexel Towers. No walk-ins or phone calls.

To request an application please completer the information below and mail to: Drexel Towers Apartments 3473 S. King Dr. Box #361 Chicago, IL 60615 Applicant Name: _______________ Date of Birth:________ Address: _____________________ City __________State: ______ Zip Code:_______________ Phone: _________________ Cell: _______________________ Email: ______________________ Number of Bedrooms Requested: ______________ Number of

Household

Members:

& INVESTMENT LTD. UNSATISFIED WITH YOUR LIVING CONDITIONS??

Spring is early LET’S GET MOVING!!

OUR COMMUNITY OFFERS...

HEAT, HW & CG Patio & Mini Blinds Plenty of parking on a 37 acre site 1Bdr From $7 50.00 2Bdr From $925.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000** CALL FOR DETAILS!

APTS. FOR RENT PARK MANAGEMENT & Investment Ltd. SPRING IS HERE...

IT’S MOVING TIME!! Most Include HEAT & HOT WTR Studios From $545.00 1Bdr From $550.00 2Bdr From $765.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000** CALL FOR DETAILS 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 ∫

ROGERS

ROGERS PARK! 1357-67 W

Greenleaf. Studio starting at $695 including heat! Close to transportation, laundry on premises, beautiful courtyard building. One block to Loyola Beach! $40 application fee. No security Deposit. For a showing please contact Samir 773-627-4894 Hunter Properties 773-477-7070 www. hunterprop.com

ALBANY PARK! 3355 W. East-

wood. Studios starting at $675 including heat & gas. Laundry in the building. Application fee $40. Close to CTA brown line train, stores, restaurant, etc. NO SECURITY DEPOSIT. For a showing please contact Saida 773-407-6452 Hunter Properties 773-477-7070 www.hunterprop.com

7500 SOUTH SHORE Dr. Brand New Rehabbed Studio & 1BR Apts from $650.

Call 773-374-7777 for details.

STUDIO OTHER CLEAN ROOM W/FRIDGE & micro, Near Oak Park, Food -4Less, Walmart, Walgreens, Buses & Metra, Laundry. $115/wk & up.

773-637-5957

Looking for things to do?

Visit

CHICAGO, HYDE PARK Arms

Hotel, 5316 S. Harper, maid, phone, cable ready, fridge, private facilities, laundry avail. Start at $160/wk Call 773-493-3500

CROSSROADS HOTEL SRO SINGLE RMS Private bath, PHONE,

CABLE & MAIDS. 1 Block to Orange Line 5300 S. Pulaski 773-581-1188 NICE ROOM w/stove, fridge & bath Near Aldi, Walgreens, Beach, Red Line & Buses. Elevator & Laundry. $130/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

42 CHICAGO READER | JUNE 16, 2016

l

l

CALUMET CITY 158TH & PAXTON SANDRIDGE APTS 1 & 2 BEDROOM UNITS MODELS OPEN M-F, 9AM-5:30PM *** 708-841-5450 *** CHICAGO, 7727 S. Colfax, ground flr Apt., ideal for senior citizens. Secure bldng. Modern 1BR $595. Lrg 2BR, $800. Free cooking & heating gas. Free parking. 312613-4427 SPACIOUS-SAFE 773-4235727. BRONZEVILLE, 3BR, heat included. Englewood, 1,2 & 3BR, heat incl. Dolton, 2BR, Gated Parking.

SUBURBS, RENT TO O W N !

Buy with No closing costs and get help with your credit.

Call 708-868-2422 or visit w ww.nhba.com LARGE SUNNY ROOM w/fridge & microwave. Near Oak Park, Green Line & Buses. 24 hr Desk, Parking Lot $101/week & Up. (773)378-8888 71ST/HERMITAGE. 3BR. 69th/ Dante, 3BR. 71st/Bennett. 2 & 3BR. 77th/Essex. 3BR. New renov. Sec 8 ok. 708-503-1366 CHICAGO - BEVERLY, large 2 room Studio, 1 & 2BR Apts. Carpet, A/C, laundry, near transportation, $650-$975/mo. Call 773-233-4939

ACACIA SRO HOTEL Men Preferred! Rooms for Rent. Weekly & Monthly Rates. 312-421-4597

ROYALTON HOTEL, Kitchenette $135 & up wk. 1810 W. Jackson 312-226-4678

2 BR UNDER $900 CHATHAM - 79TH and Calumet. 2BR 1BA, 2nd floor, updated. Near public trans. $820/ month. Credit check required.

Call 773-488-0143 DIVISION/SPRINGFIELD. LARGE 2 BEDROOMS,

$750 per month plus security, tenant pays heat.

312-401-3799

NEWLY REHABBED, 2-3BA apts., in nice 2-flat bldg., granite ctrs, appls, & prkg incl., $750$850/mo, 6424 S Loomis, Sec 8 welc. 919-520-0753 SOUTH SUBURBS - 2 bedrooms, 1BA avail. Newly rehabbed.

Rent from $800-$850/mo. Calumet City & Riverdale, IL. 312-2176556 7701 S. South Shore Dr. 2 BDs with 1.5 Baths, Large Combo Living-Dining Rm, FREE Heat & cking gas. Prkng extra. $785-$850, Kalabich Mgmt (708)424-4216

CHICAGO

SOUTHSIDE

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

BRAND new 2, 3 & 4BR apts. Excellent neighborhood, nr trans & schools, Sect 8 Welc., Call 708-7742473

CHICAGO SOUTH SIDE Beauti-

CHATHAM - 22 E 70TH 2BR, $750/mo. Sec 8 OK. Heat & appl. Call Office: 773-966-5275 or Steve: 773-936-4749

NO MOVE-IN FEE! No Dep! Sec 8

91ST/ADA 5 rms, 2BR, decor, hdwd flrs, c-fans, modern kit and BA, tenant pays heat. $725 + sec.

Brown R.E. 773-239-9566

ful Studios, 1,2,3 & 4 BR’s, Sec 8 ok. $500 gift certificate for Sec 8 tenants. 773-287-9999/312-446-3333 ok. 1, 2 & 3 Bdrms. Elev bldg, laundry, pkg. 6531 S. Lowe.

Call Office 773-874-0100

MOVE IN SPECIAL!!!

B4 the N of this MO. & MOVE IN 4 $99.00 (773) 874-1122

Ashland Hotel nice clean rms.

24 hr desk/maid/TV/laundry/air.

Low rates daily/weekly/monthly.

South Side. Call 773-376-5200

CICERO - 2 BEDROOM, $775 to $800, newly remodeled, laundry, free cooking gas and heat. 708990-1911 or 630-441-8026 BEAUTIFUL 2BR

apartment 7743-51 South Stewart $700 per mo 1st and last month rent req. heat incl. 773-547-9697

- University of Illinois at Chicago Healthy Older Adults Needed If you are at least 60 years old, and in good health for your age, you may qualify for the "White matter microstructure, vascular risk and cognition in aging" study in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC).

You may participate in paper and pencil tests, a history and physical and/or an MRI brain scan. This research will help us understand how brain activity changes in later life. The study will require 1-2 visits, and up to 5 hours of your time.

- You may receive up to $100 for your participation For more information: -- call: 312-996-2673 -- or email: lamarstudy@psych.uic.edu This study (Protocol #2012-0142) is being conducted by Melissa Lamar, Ph.D (Principal Investigator) at the UIC Department of Psychiatry, 1601 W. Taylor Street, Chicago, Illinois.

CHICAGO, NEWLY remodeled, 2 bedroom and 3 bedroom, clean secure safe building, rent from $650 to $750, 773-580-0270 CHICAGO, 7443 S. Dante. 2BR, 1BA, 1st flr, heat incl, quiet building. $800/mo. 1 month’s rent + 1 month’s security. 773-752-2764 CHICAGO NEAR 92ND & King Dr. 2BR, new rehab, $875/ m o .

Close to schools, parks, and public transportation. 312-617-1156

SOUTHSIDE RENOVATED 2

BR, 6050 S. Marshfield tenant pays utils, $635/mo please text/call 773-307-5090

CHICAGO

7600 S Essex 2BR

$599, 3BR $699, 4BR $799 w/apprvd credit, no sec dep. Sect 8 Ok! 773287-9999 /312-446-3333

AUSTIN NEW DECOR 2 & 3BR Avail Immed. Loc nr Augusta & Cicero. No Pets, tenant pays utils. $850 & $900 + sec. 630-816-9957

3BR 1.5 bath & 2BR: newly remodeled. Hrdwd flrs, heat & hot water incl. No Sec Dep. Sec 8 welc.. Call 9am-5pm 773-731-8306

2 BR $900-$1099 92ND & ADA, 2 bdrm, lg & spacious w/ DR, hardwood flrs, sunporch, fireplace, heat/appls incl sec 8 ok $1000/mo + sec 773-415-6914 6117 S. CAMPBELL, newly decorated 4BR Apt. Heat included.

Stove & refrigerator. $1000/mo + $1000 sec dep. Sect 8 welc. 312719-0524 CHICAGO, 5015-25 W. IOWA AVE. Augusta & Cicero. Newly Rehabbed, 2BR, $1000/mo. Section 8 OK. David, 773-663-9488 BELLWOOD 2BR APT, 2nd flr

East, no pets, W/D in bsmt, tenant pays elec & gas. Avail Now. $900.

Michael Britton 773-297-7755 4 ROOM, 1BR, New floors, Kitchen

& bath, Huge, clean, quiet, Section 8, 773-467-8200, $630/$930+Sep. Heat, 649 W 80 St-Jane

2 BR $1100-$1299 EAST ROGERS PARK, steps to the beach at 1240 West Jarvis, five rooms, two bedrooms, two baths, dishwasher, ac, heat and gas included. Carpeted, cable, laundry facility, elevator building, parking available, and no pets. Non-smoking. Price is $1200/mo. Call 773-764-9824.

CHICAGO - 2BR, 1ST flr, $1100/ mo, appls/heat, A/C, carpeting, blinds incl. near 95th/Cottage Grove. Sec 8 ok. No Pets. Smoke Free bldg 773-429-0274 EVANSTON 2BR, 1100SF, great kit, new appls, DR, oak flrs, lndry, $1175/ mo incls heat. 773743-4141 www.urbanequities.co Elmhurst: Sunny 1/BR, new appl, carpet, AC, Patio, $895/incl heat, parking. Call 773-743-4141 www.urbanequities.com

2 BR $1500 AND OVER

LARGE BRIGHT LINCOLN PK

2Bd, 1Bth, In Unit W/D, Roof Deck, Back Porch, HVAC, Fireplace, DW, Hardwood Flrs, Available Immediately. $2000-$2500 Call: 773 472 5944

2 BR OTHER OPEN HOUSE WELCOME TO Town Home Living and Affordable Rents at PRINCETON PARK HOMES A privately-owned south side Chicago rental town home community since 1944 Rents Starting at $844/mo Sat June 25, 2016 Noon - 6PM

FREE CREDIT CHECK – Applicants encouraged to bring last 6 pay check stubs, ID & Social security card.

Two and three bedroom residences featuring: Spacious landscaped grounds – Walk to public transportation (CTA, “El”) Nearby public and private schools - Ample parking – Convenient to shopping Centrally located Campus Park - Easy access to Dan Ryan Annual Resident’s Lawn & Garden Contest Each unit includes: Deck or patio – Private front and rear entrance – Basement with hook-ups for washer and dryer – Modern kitchen and bathroom cabinetry – Meet our manager Anthony Jackson, A.R.M. and professional staff for a guided tour: Princeton Park Homes 9119 S. Stewart Avenue Chicago, Illinois 60620 Phone: 773-264-3005 Visit our website at www.ppkhomes.com Open House Special: FIRST TWO-MONTH’S RENT FREE ON SELECTED 3BR UNITS! Directions: From Dan Ryan Expressway – Take 87th St. Exit south to W. 91st St. Right on 91st St ½ mile to S Stewart Ave. Left ½ block to rental office.

From W 95th St – Turn North onto S. Wentworth Avenue (200 W) and go 4 blocks to W 91st St. Turn left on W. 91st St. and go 2 blocks to S. Stewart Ave. Turn left ½ block to office.

ROUND LAKE BEACH, IL Cedar

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

CHICAGO, PRINCETON PARK

HOMES. Spac 2 - 3 BR Townhomes, Inclu: Prvt entry, full bsmt, lndry hook-ups. Ample prkg. Close to trans & schls. Starts at $816/mo. www. ppkhomes.com;773-264-3005

NEWLY REHAB’ED 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6BR single family homes with 2BA, Sect 8 Welc, located in Southside Chicago & South Suburbs.

312-292-8823 or 224-436-5000 CHATHAM, 736 E. 81ST (Evans), 2BR, 5 rms, 2nd flr $ 825/mo. 400 E. 81st St. (King Dr), 1st flr 1 BR, $700/mo.

Call Mr. Joe at 708-870-4801 MATTESON, 2BR, $990$1050; 3BR, $1250-$1400.

Move In Special is 1 Month’s Rent & $99 Sec Dep. Sect 8 Welc. 708-748-4169 SOUTHSIDE LOVELY 5 room apt: living rm, dining rm, kit, ba, 2 brs. heated, hdwd flrs 773-264-6711

CHATHAM AREA, GORGEOUS, 3BR, 2nd floor, updated kitchen & bath. $900/mo. Clean & Quiet. No Pets. 312-934-9029 3BR, AVAIL IMMED. Newly De-

cor, nr Pulaski/Cermak & pink line, $900. Tenant pays utils, laundry hookup, no pets. 847.720.9010

North Lawndale, 3BR, 1.5BA Remod Garden Unit, hardwood floors, $1100/mo, no security, leave message, 773-203-0288

3 BR OR MORE $1200-$1499 SAUK

VILLAGE

3BR,1BA

Ranch, 1 car gar, huge bkyd, laminate flrs, fresh paint, quiet area. $1200/mo + utils. Sec 8 OK. 708-271-2502

3 BR OR MORE UNDER $1200

3 BR OR MORE $1500-$1799

SECURED, LRG 6 rms, (3BR/1BA Apt) new kit w/SS appls, incl porch, lrg fenced-in yard, sec 8 ok. $1000/ mo + utils. $1000 sec dep req. $2000 to move in.

Avail Immed. 773-213-0187

ASHLAND AUGUSTA - 2nd

SECTION 8 WELCOME, 7 0 t h & Artesian, lrg 3BR, hdwd flrs, LR & DR, eat in kitch + bonus room. Ten pays utils.

Lndry room on premises. $11 00/mo. 312-613-3806 CHICAGO 5246 S. HERMITAGE: 2BR bsmt $400. 2BR 1st floor, $525. 3BR, 2nd floor, $625.

1.5 mo sec req’d. 708-574-4085.

floor, sunny 3BR, laundry, close to downtown, train, buses, all utilities free except lights. $1500/mo.

773-384-2772

SECTION 8 WELCOME WEST PULLMAN 255 W. 111th Pl, 6BR, 3BA, $1620. Newly remod, appls incl, full bsmt, garage. 5BR Voucher Accepted. 773-793-8339 NEAR 83RD & Yates. 5BR, 2BA, hdwd flrs, fin basement, stove & fridge furn. Heat incl. $1600 + 1 mo sec. Sect 8 ok. 773-978-6134 NEW DECOR 5BR, nr Harrison &

Pulaski, laundry hkup, gated yard, $1575. Tenant pays utils & lawn care.

No pets 847.720. 9010

WASH PARK, 2BR $800/ mo+sec.

3BR, $900/mo + sec. Newly rehab kitchen & baths, hdwd flrs, tenant pays utils. 773-520-7293

SECTION 8 WELCOME!

CHATHAM AREA, GORGEOUS, 3BR, 2nd floor, updated kitchen & bath. $900/mo. Clean & Quiet. No Pets. 312-934-9029

3 BR OR MORE $1800-$2499

SOUTHSIDE NEWLY REMOD-

ELED. 70th & Aberdeen. 3BR, 1st flr, laundry room, heat incl. $825 + 1 mo rent & 1 mo sec. 773-651-8673 AUSTIN 6 ROOMS, 3 BR, 2 flat, quiet building.

4923 W. Walton. $900+ security.

708-865-8903 69TH PLACE IN Stony Island,

2 brm, 5 rms, newly remodeled, hdwd flrs, sec. 8 welcome. $750. Call 773-758-0309

SOUTH HYDE PARK

3 brm 1 ba, vintage, very spacious, heat inc., 68th & Stony Island. $1000.

Call 858-699-5096

3BR, 5065 W. Jackson, lrg living & dining rm, nr trans, utils incl, no pets. $1500 /mo 773-255-2869

LARGE 3 BEDROOM 2 bath

apartment in Wrigleyville, 3820 N Fremont. Hardwood floors. Cats OK. Laundry in building. Parking available. $150/ month for single parking space. $200/ month for tandem parking space. $2100/ month.

Available 8/1. 773-761-4318, www. lakefrontmgt.com

UKRAINIAN VILLAGE 3.5 BR/2 baths, central air, hardwood floors, modern appliances, balcony, garage. $1800. Contact Jim @ 312.318.2525

3 BR OR MORE OTHER

$950 + sec., HEAT INCLUDED. hardwood flrs,secure buz door entry,SECTION 8 OK.Wilson - 773-456-1274

MOVE RIGHT IN, 1308 W. 52ND St., newer 4BR, House, 1.

5BA, 3 lvls, huge unfin bsmt, heat, A/C, 2 car garage. Sec 8 ok. $1500/mo. 773-895-2867

SOUTH HOLLAND 3BR ranch, w /full bsmt, 2 car garage, quiet street. $1100/mo + utilities. Call 773-636-9038

CHICAGO, 6111 S. Normal 2BR apt, stove/refrig., 6101 S. Normal 4BR T/H apt, newly decor. Sec. 8 welc. Call 773-422-1878.

VERY,NICE 3 BDRM - 3rd fl.

GENERAL 4BDR, 3BDR OR 6 BDR house

CHICAGO 4BR APARTMENTS 8457 S Brandon & 5BR apartment 2707 E 93rd St. 1st flr, Sec 8 ok, 3-4BR voucher ok; 847-926-0625 OLYMPIA FIELDS - beautiful & prestigious, 4BR, 3BA, ranch, huge fncd yard, near golf course, new kitch & bath, $2300/mo + 1.5 sec. Rent with option available.

708752-3065

available. Recent Rehabs. Appliances Included. No Sec Dep. Sect8 welcome. 773-386-4110.

FOR SALE 4 BEDROOM COMPLETELY

re-furbished home on 76 acres of recreational land NE of Antigo, WI $299,900.00 Call (715) 623-6375

CONGRESS & SPRINGFIELD

6 1/2 rooms, 3BR, unheated, $875/ mo + security. Quiet. No laundry, No dogs. 773-722-0105

CHICAGO HEIGHTS 3BR, 1BA, NEWLY REMODELED, APPLS INCL , SECTION 8 OK. NO SEC. DEPOSIT. 708-8224450

non-residential

CHICAGO, 79TH & INGLESIDE, 4BR, 2BA, laminate flooring & carpet, ceramic tile kitchen. Section 8 welcome. Call 630-674-8399

T W O locations to serve you. All units fully heated and humidity controlled with ac available. North: Knox Avenue.

773-685-6868.

South: Pershing Avenue. 773-523-6868.

SOUTHSIDE 10218 S. Perry.

3brm House, tenant pays G&E. Sec. 8 OK 773-759-4472

roommates

SELF-STORAGE

RECENT REHAB 2-5BR SF Homes. S. Holland, Dolton, Harvey, Markham. Sec8 Ok. $1000 Sec & Bkgrnd Chk. 630-247-5146 AUSTIN 3BR, QUIET neighbor-

hood, near school & trans, Heated, appls & C/A, tenant pays elec. 708735-3545

LARGE 3BR apt, hardwood floors, fans, stove, fridge and heat incl. Section 8 Welcome.

Call 773-581-8348 or 773-350-0788

CENTERS.

SOUTH SHORE, SENIOR Dis-

count. Male preferred. Furnished rooms, shared kitchen & bath, $510/ mo. & up. Utilities included. 773-7105431

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SECTION 8 WELCOME 3-5BR, 2BA, all appliances included, fenced yard, wood floors 6714 S Eberhart 312-804-0209 MATTESON, SAUK VILLAGE &

UNIVERSITY PARK. 4, 3 & 2BR, House/Condo, Section 8 ok.

For information: 708-625-7355

CHICAGO, 337 W. 108TH ST., newly refurbished, 5BR, 1.5BA, semi-finished basement, $1275/mo + sec. Mr. Williams, 773-752-8328 CHICAGO HOUSES FOR rent.

Section 8 Ok, w/app credit $500 gift certificate 3, 4 & 5 BR houses avail.

312-446-3333 or 708-752-3812

PORTAGE PARK NEIGHBORHOOD Sale Chicago. Old Portage

Park 47th Annual Sale. 60+ garages involved. Maps of sale and refreshments at Faith Church 5051 W. Belle Plaine. Saturday 6/18/16, 9am-4pm.

MASSAGE TABLES, NEW and

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BEAUTIFUL NEW APT! 7651 S Phillips 2-4BR $1000-$1350 6943 s Woodlawn 4 bdrm $1350 Stainless Steel!!

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JUNE 16, 2016 | CHICAGO READER 43

STRAIGHT DOPE

By Cecil Adams Q : In Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the

SLUG SIGNORINO

planet-killer device absorbs the sun to do its dirty work. This got me to wondering: If the sun suddenly went out, how long would it take us to freeze solid? —BARRY

A : Notwithstanding the primary source you

Human-made heat. Currently worldwide energy production, including fossil fuels and nuclear (but not solar and wind—no sun, remember?), kicks in about 18 trillion watts.

So, about 60 trillion watts, give or take.

Which may sound like plenty until we quantify the sun’s contribution to our current heat budget: 114,600 trillion watts, or about 1,900 times what’s generated here on earth.

What happens when the lights go out?

According to Una’s calculations, the equilibrium temperature on the surface of the earth would, after the planet cooled fully, settle out at 43.6 degrees Kelvin, aka negative 381 degrees Fahrenheit, aka not exactly A Sunday on La Grande Jatte—cold enough that almost all our atmosphere would turn to liquid.

(Hence “A Pail of Air.”) And that’s assuming the moon stays with us. The estimate drops one degree Fahrenheit without it.

Could humanity survive? Sure, at least for a while, but ideally we’d have a couple decades to prepare. The earth’s crust is a great insulator, and we could build underground warrens that tap into buried fossil fuels for energy; we’ll want to hook up some nuclear generators too. This gives us heat to warm ourselves by, electricity for charging our Kindles, and light for greenhouses. And of course there’s that core and mantle heat, which obviously gets more intense the deeper we dig. At the bottom of South Africa’s TauTona gold mine, for instance, nearly two and a half miles down, the air temperature is a balmy 130 degrees Fahrenheit—a good deal hotter than the recent record-setting (and lethal) heat wave in India, so at some point we may encounter the perverse-seeming situation of needing to rig up an air-conditioning system. One foresees a few other problems too: a population of pasty depressives, living a dank subterranean existence with dim long-term prospects.

Come to think of it, that sounds like the sort of society that sci-fi geeks living in their parents’ basements will be perfectly optimized for. At which point, I suppose, the operating cinematic reference becomes Revenge of the Nerds. v

Tidal energy from the moon. Heatwise, we don’t get a whole lot of help from our little satellite sidekick: just 3.6 trillion watts.

Send questions to Cecil via straightdope.com or write him c/o Chicago Reader, 350 N. Orleans, Chicago 60654.

cite—i.e., some Disney focus group’s idea of a movie plot—it strikes me that there are a few fundamental physical laws of the universe that just might work against the sun’s being abruptly extinguished. But OK, I’ll play along.

What might conceivably produce such an effect here on earth? In what’s probably the most realistic scenario, a passing high-mass object (black hole, rogue planet, etc) could pull our planet away from the sun, sending us spinning into interstellar oblivion. (Serious scifi fans—not your Star Wars types, I mean the real geeks—may have come across this conceit in a 1950s short story by Fritz Leiber called “A Pail of Air.”) Anyway, let’s say something like that just . . . happened, and that we’re not too worried about the various other problematic implications of such an event. We’re mainly worried about staying warm. Let’s start by compiling the sources of heat we currently enjoy, with calculations from the prolific scratch pad of my assistant Una: Core and mantle. The earth contains enormous amounts of residual heat from its formation, slowly being transferred from the core up through the mantle and eventually to the earth’s crust. Figure eight trillion watts from the core and 18 trillion from the mantle, for a total of 26 trillion watts.

Radioactive decay. Many elements on earth— uranium, thorium, potassium, et al—decay continuously, with heat a principal by-product of this process. Una estimated we can probably put the heat energy here in the neighborhood of 13 trillion watts.

44 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

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SAVAGE LOVE

By Dan Savage

What’s the deal with the diapers?

And is it a deal breaker? Plus: the young and confused, the pervy voyeur Q : I’ve been dating a nice

guy for a month or so. Sex is good, and we’re fairly compatible in other ways too. He told me he likes to wear diapers. He said he doesn’t want me to do it with him, but that every once in a while he likes to wear them because it makes him feel “safe.” He said that this odd behavior isn’t sexual for him, but I have trouble believing him. I’m not sure how I feel about this. He also said that it embarrasses him and he wishes it wasn’t something he needed. If you have any insight into what to ask him or how to make sure I can keep him satisfied sexually as we move forward (if we do), it would be appreciated. —DO I ASK POOPER EVERYTHING RESPECTFULLY, SIR?

A : You shouldn’t assume (contra your sign-off) that Potential New Boyfriend (PNB) is pooping his diapers.

Most guys who are ABDL (adult baby/diaper lover) are interested only in wetting themselves, if that.

(Some only wear, never fill.) It sounds like PNB is struggling with kink and/ or sex shame, DIAPERS, and the assumption you’ve made about the extent of his diaper play might put him on the defensive even if it’s accurate.

Seeing as he’s already evinced some shame where his kink is concerned, he may have told you there’s nothing sexual about his thing for diapers because he thinks it makes his diapers seem less sordid.

That said, DIAPERS, “this makes me feel safe” and “this makes my dick hard” aren’t mutually exclusive phenomena. His not wanting you around while he wears them is another clue there’s something sexual about his thing for diapers.

I’d advise you to say some vaguely affirming things (“Your diaper thing doesn’t bother me, and wouldn’t even if it were sexual”) without pressuring him to include you at diaper time. Don’t rush things—relationship-wise or diaper-wise—and focus on establishing a mutually satisfying sexual rapport/ repertoire.

Q : I’m an incredibly

confused man in my early 20s. I’m attracted to men and women. I could see spending my life with either.

But I think sexual activity with either sex would be confusing and strange. In sex ed, I always thought the whole idea of sexual intercourse was strange. I don’t think I’m asexual, but I’m not sure if I am bisexual. I am more attracted to vibrant personalities. I don’t think that I am just straight or just gay, because I have equal feelings for both sexes. Does this mean I could find equal companionship with both?

Should I wait until I find the right person and decide from there? —CONFUSED ABOUT SEXUALITY, HELP

A : According to the Tumblr

Blog Decoder Ring that came in my last box of Kellogg’s Feelios, CASH, you’re bi-classic (attracted to men and women), bi-romantic (could be with a man or a woman), a sort of demisexual/ sapiosexual hybrid (demis are attracted to people they’ve bonded with emotionally, sapios are attracted to people who are intelligent, and vibrancy may fall at some point between the two), and maybe falling somewhere on the asexuality spectrum. The best way to discover who/ what works for you is to get out there. If you find yourself feeling confused, just remind yourself that confusion—like

so much else—is a spectrum.

And wherever you fall on it, CASH, know you’ve got plenty of company.

ADMIRAL ★★ #$!%#"! ★★

Q : A local park in Seattle

often hosts gay men engaging in sexual activities.

As a straight female, I love watching man-on-man sex and really wanted to check out this park. I decided to try on a busy Saturday night, and sure enough, I saw a man giving a BJ to another man. I scared the men—they stopped their activities and left the park when they saw me watching—and I felt bad.

What are my options here?

—PECULIAR AND RARE KINK

A : Two options: Dress up like a dude and pass yourself off as one of the guys/parkpervs—guys into man-onman public sex usually aren’t adverse to being observed by other male park pervs— or stay home and watch gay porn on the Internet.

As for the two guys who knocked it off when they spotted you: They either thought you were a cop or thought you might be shocked or annoyed. Most park pervs go out of their way to be discreet, for their own safety (avoiding gay bashers or arrest) and out of consideration for late-night dog walkers, restless insomniacs, stargazers, et al.

One last reason they may have pulled up their pants: They weren’t interested in performing for you. But I’m not going to scold you (even at the risk of being scolded myself), PARK—you’re just as entitled to get your perv on in a public park as they are. v

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Send letters to mail@ savagelove.net. Download the Savage Lovecast every Tuesday at thestranger.com. v @fakedansavage

JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 45

Royal Headache ò DOUGLAS LANCE GIBSON

NEW

Laith Al-Saadi 7/26, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 6/16, noon b Anthrax 9/21, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Baroness, Pallbearer 8/21, 8 PM, Metro, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM, 18+ Carsie Blanton 10/8, 8 PM, Schubas, on sale Fri 6/17, noon Haley Bonar 9/6, 8 PM, Schubas, on sale Fri 6/17, noon Patrizio Buanne 10/13, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 6/16, noon b Buzzcocks 9/22, 8 PM, the Vic, on sale Fri 6/17, noon, 18+ Colbie Caillat 10/21, 7:30 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM b Catfish & the Bottlemen 10/12, 7:30 PM, Riviera Theatre, on sale Fri 6/17, noon b Chicago Westside Music Festival with Kelly Price, Slick Rick, MC Lyte, and more 8/20, 4 PM, Douglas Park F b Child Bite 7/30, 8 PM, Burlington DJ Quik 7/9, 10 PM, the Promontory Donkeys 8/7, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Eden 10/1, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall b Envy on the Coast 8/27, 7:30 PM, Bottom Lounge Failure 10/21, 9 PM, Double Door, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM, 17+ Anthony Green 9/25, 6:15 PM, Bottom Lounge, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM Helms Alee 8/12, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Holly Herndon 7/17, 10 PM, Constellation, 18+

Honey Ear Trio 8/5, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Jenny Hval, Cicuit des Yeux 7/15, 10 PM, Constellation, 18+ Jai Wolf 11/5, 11 PM, Metro, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM, 18+ Kero Kero Bonito 10/26, 6:30 PM, Subterranean, on sale Fri 6/17, noon b Lake Street Dive 9/23, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM John Mayall 9/30, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 6/16, noon b Moe. 9/23-24, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Whitey Morgan, Cody Jinks 9/29, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM, 17+ Mr. Gnome 10/1, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen Obsessives 7/30, 6 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Pantha Du Prince 10/11, 8:30 PM, Bottom Lounge, 18+ Porches 7/17, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Preoccupations 10/5, 9 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 6/17, 9 AM, 17+ Corinne Bailey Rae 8/4, 8 PM, Metro, on sale Fri 6/17, noon, 18+ Rival Choir 7/7, 6 PM, Wire, Berwyn b Royal Headache, Negative Scanner 7/14, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Ed Schrader’s Music Beat 8/25, 9 PM, Hideout Seratones 10/7, 9 PM, Empty Bottle, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM Sloan 11/11, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ St. Paul & the Broken Bones 11/1, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, on sale Fri 6/17, 11 AM Sun Ra Arkestra 7/16, 8 PM, Constellation, 18+ Terrorizer L.A. 10/29, 8 PM, Cobra Lounge

46 CHICAGO READER - JUNE 16, 2016

Tesseract 10/18, 6 PM, Bottom Lounge, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM Butch Walker, Suzanne Santo 9/10, 8 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Warpaint 9/30, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM, 17+ Kanye West 10/7, 8 PM, United Center and 10/8, 8 PM, Allstate Arena, Rosemont, on sale Sat 6/18, 10 AM Wild Child 9/17, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, on sale Fri 6/17, noon, 18+ Marlon Williams & the Yarra Brothers 9/20, 8 PM, Martyrs’, on sale Fri 6/17, 10 AM Woods 7/16, 11 PM, Subterranean

UPDATED Eve 6 6/23, 8 and 10:30 PM, City Winery, late show added b

UPCOMING And the Kids 6/23, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Anderson Wakeman Rabin 11/5, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre Belly 7/7, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ 9/17, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Big Business 7/2, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen Boris, Earth 8/14, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Cannibal Corpse, Nile, After the Burial 8/3, 2 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Car Seat Headrest 7/16, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Daughter, Lucy Dacus 7/27, 9 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Dragged Into Sunlight 7/6, 7:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+

b Bryan Ferry 8/6, 7:30 PM, Ravinia Festival, Highland Park Ace Frehley 8/26, 8 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Girl Band 7/16, 11 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Glass Animals 10/6, 8 PM, Riviera Theatre, 18+ Beth Hart 9/21-22, 8 PM, Park West, 18+ Helmet 7/15, 9 PM, Double Door, 17+ Honeydogs, Dusty Heart 8/18, 7:30 PM, SPACE, Evanston b I Prevail, White Noise 7/20, 6:30 PM, Bottom Lounge Jesu, Sun Kil Moon 11/13, 8 PM, Park West, 18+ Julie Ruin 7/14, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Kansas 11/4, 7 PM, Copernicus Center b Krewella 10/8, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall b Kublai Khan 9/1, 7 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Talib Kweli 7/2, 7 and 10 PM, City Winery b Stephen “Raga” Marley 6/24, 8 PM, Park West, 18+ Nothing but Thieves 7/29, 11 PM, Schubas, 18+ Ought 7/25, 8 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Over the Rhine 7/15-16, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Pet Shop Boys 11/5, 9 PM, Civic Opera House P.S. Eliot 9/13, 8 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Psychic TV 7/22, 9 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Lucy Wainwright Roche, Antje Duvekot 9/13, 7:30 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Darrell Scott 7/21, 8 PM, City Winery b Rory Scovel 6/25, 10 PM, Beat Kitchen Scythian 8/4, 8 PM, City Winery b Seahaven 7/17, 8 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Secret Keeper 9/23, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Shinedown, Halestorm 8/16, 6:30 PM, FirstMerit Bank Pavilion Sia, Miguel 10/16, 7 PM, United Center Sigur Ros 9/30, 8:30 PM, Chicago Theatre Travelin’ McCourys 7/29, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Tribulation 9/3, 9 PM, Subterranean, 17+ TTNG 8/13, 8:30 PM, Subterranean, 17+ KT Tunstall 7/7, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen Frank Turner & the Sleeping Souls 7/28, 11 PM, Double Door, 17+ Turnover 6/26, 5:30 PM, Subterranean b Twenty One Pilots 1/28, 7 PM, United Center Steven Tyler 8/13, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre v

ALL AGES

WOLF BY KEITH HERZIK

EARLY WARNINGS

CHICAGO SHOWS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT IN THE WEEKS TO COME

F

Never miss a show again.

Sign up for the newsletter at chicagoreader. com/early

Valley Maker 8/23, 9 PM, Hideout Foy Vance 10/28, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall Wailers 6/30, 8 PM, City Winery b Ryley Walker 8/25, 9 PM, Empty Bottle We Banjo 3 8/9, 8 PM, City Winery b We Were Promised Jetpacks 6/24, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge Wussy 6/24, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Yes 8/20, 8 PM, Copernicus Center b ZZ Top, Gov’t Mule 9/17, 7 PM, Rosemont Theater, Rosemont

SOLD OUT Alabama Shakes 7/19, 7:30 PM, Civic Opera House and 7/20, 7:30 PM, Aragon Ballroom b Bastille 7/27, 9 PM, the Vic, 18+ Borns 7/21-22, 7:30 PM, Metro b Echo & the Bunnymen 9/17, 8 PM, Metro, 18+ Foals, Lewis Del Mar 7/28, 11 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Jane’s Addiction, Nothing 7/2728, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Last Shadow Puppets 7/27, 9 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Lollapalooza 7/28-31, Grant Park Lush 9/18, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ M83, Sofi Tukker 7/28, 11 PM, the Vic, 18+ Morgan Heritage 8/24, 6 PM, Double Door b Mountain Goats 7/22, 10 PM, Subterranean The 1975 7/29, 10 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Pearl Jam 8/20 and 8/22, 7:30 PM, Wrigley Field Phantogram 7/31, 11 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Rocket From the Crypt 7/23, 10 PM, Subterranean Vince Staples 7/30, 10 PM, Reggie’s Rock Clubt, 18+ The Struts, Arkells 7/28, 11 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Third Eye Blind, Dreamers 7/30, 11 PM, Park West, 18+ Thrice 6/23, 6:30 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Two Door Cinema Club, Jaryyd James 7/29, 11 PM, the Vic, 18+ Violent Femmes 7/12, 8:30 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Wombats 7/13, 7:30 PM, Metro b X Ambassadors 7/29, 11 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ v

GOSSIP WOLF A furry ear to the ground of the local music scene IF THERE’S A harder-working local band than country quartet Dan Whitaker & the Shinebenders, Gossip Wolf doesn’t know ’em! After honky-tonkin’ through one of their two-hour Saturday sets at Cole’s, this wolf is usually tonked out—especially regrettable when Dan and the band go on to play from 10 PM till 1 AM at Bernice’s Tavern in Bridgeport the same night! As if their endurance didn’t do the trick, the ’Benders prove they’re the real deal with the new LP Truck Ride, which includes bouncing, steel-guitar-laced instrumental “Stony Island Stomp” and barreling barroom belter “Booze Is Good.” You can buy a CD at Cole’s on Saturday, June 18, or at the next Cole’s/Bernice’s doubleheader on Saturday, July 2.

On Sunday, June 19, Experimental Sound Studio hosts the ninth annual Experimental Garage Sale, featuring wares from electronic-kit makers, circuit benders, and homemade-instrument builders. There’s no cover, and a raffle of items donated by vendors benefits ESS. Chicago has no shortage of summer music festivals, and by the end of the season many become a blur of portable toilets, expensive hot dogs, and sets by 16 Candles. But Gossip Wolf is still interested in a few, including the brand-new Myth Fest, which runs Saturday and Sunday, June 18 and 19. It calls itself a celebration of international electronic music, and its name is inspired by Greek mythology— though it’s at the Irish American Heritage Center. The bill includes Swedish producer Jonas Rathsman, UK duo Waze & Odyssey, and Chicago acts such as hiphouse innovator Tyree Cooper, experimentalist Hieroglyphic Being, and Steve Mizek and Savile as Argot Soundsystem.

Humboldt Park 4 AM spot the Continental turns ten on Sunday, June 19, and celebrates with a barbecue at 3 PM. Gossip Wolf will attend to congratulate the bar on its graduation to “local institution” status—and to see what it looks like in daylight! —J.R. NELSON AND LEOR GALIL Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail gossipwolf@chicagoreader.com.

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RADIOHEAD A MOON SHAPED POOL A NEW ALBUM. OUT NOW. LIMITED EDITION WHITE VINYL AVAILABLE JUNE 17 EXCLUSIVELY AT INDEPENDENT RECORD STORES JUNE 16, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 47

GOOSE ISLAND BEER CO.

SINCE 1988.

©2016 Goose Island Beer Co., Chicago, IL | Enjoy responsibly.

CHICAGO,

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