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 | O C T O B E R 2 7, 2 0 1 6
2 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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THIS WEEK
C H I C A G O R E A D E R | O C T O B E R 2 7, 2 0 1 6 | V O L U M E 4 5 , N U M B E R 4
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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 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, MAYA DUKMASOVA, ANNE FORD, ISA GIALLORENZO, JOHN GREENFIELD, JUSTIN HAYFORD, JACK HELBIG, DAN JAKES, BILL MEYER, J.R. NELSON, MARISSA OBERLANDER, LEAH PICKETT, DMITRY SAMAROV, KATE SIERZPUTOWSKI, DAVID WHITEIS, ALBERT WILLIAMS INTERNS ISABEL OCHOA GOLD, JACK LADD
THE MAGIC ISSUE
A brief, wondrous history of Chicago magic
Using her illusions
New York had Broadway. LA had Hollywood. Chicago had magic.
Self-styled “experimental illusionist” Jeanette Andrews is attempting an ambitious trick: transforming magic into a cerebral art form.
BY DAVID WITTER 14
BY RYAN SMITH 17
Five magic shows to see now Catch local illusionists and touring acts at venues old and new. 19
From cards to coins to expert advice, Magic Inc. is Chicago’s onestop shop for wannabe and veteran magicians.
The secrets of Chicago’s not-so-secret society of magicians. BY KEVIN WARWICK 22
BY BECCA JAMES 20
4 Agenda Dogs of Rwanda, Rebecca O’Neal, Diana Thater at the MCA, a conversation between Abbi Jacobson and Samantha Irby, and more recommendations
VICE PRESIDENT OF BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT NICKI HOLTZMANN VICE PRESIDENT OF NEW MEDIA GUADALUPE CARRANZA SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER EVANGELINE MILLER ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES FABIO CAVALIERI, ARIANA DIAZ, BRIDGET KANE MARKETING AND EVENTS MANAGER BRYAN BURDA DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL JOHN DUNLEVY ADVERTISING COORDINATOR HERMINIA BATTAGLIA CLASSIFIEDS REPRESENTATIVE KRIS DODD
CITY LIFE
8 Street View Lyntuan Jones wears his art on his sleeve. 8 Development The World Series isn’t the only big thing coming to Wrigleyville.
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ON THE COVER: ILLUSTRATION BY CORNELIA LI. FOR MORE OF LI’S WORK, GO TO CORNELIALI.COM.
Behind the magic curtain
IN THIS ISSUE
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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.
All that and a bag of tricks
MUSIC FEATURE
Accidental rock stars
American Football became heroes to the emo scene after breaking up in obscurity—and 17 years later, they’ve returned with a second album. BY LEOR GALIL 32
9 Identity & Culture How to avoid being an offensive jerk with your choice of Halloween costume 10 Space A visit to the residential headquarters of the Ghost Research Society in Oak Lawn 12 Joravsky | Politics Trump gamed Chicago Democrats before he bashed them in the press. 13 Transportation Black activists discuss the importance of transportation justice.
ARTS & CULTURE FOOD & DRINK
25 Halloween Seventeen spooky things to do this week 27 Lit For James Gleick, the most interesting part of the history of time travel is what’s unfolding now. 27 Theater In an ugly election season, the rousing Hamilton shows us the light. 28 Lit In Future Sex, Emily Witt examines new ways of fulfilling desire. 29 Small Screen Aymar Jean Christian gives underrepresented artists a voice with Open TV. 29 Dance #SayHerName draws parallels between Sandra Bland and two prominent black female activists. 30 Movies A minor character plays a major role in the Barry Jenkins drama Moonlight.
MUSIC & NIGHTLIFE 38 Shows of note Elvis Costello, Insane Clown Posse, GZA, and more 40 The Secret History of Chicago Music Rude Guest bridged two-tone and third-wave ska in the 80s.
47 Restaurant review: Pro Samgyubsal The Korean barbecue joint is a destination for grilled pork belly.
CLASSIFIEDS
49 Jobs 49 Apartments & Spaces 51 Marketplace 52 Straight Dope Is there a better way to evacuate a skyscraper than down the stairs? 53 Savage Love Is it reasonable to expect sex from a spouse seven nights a week? 54 Early Warnings The Damned, R. Kelly, Morrissey, and more 54 Gossip Wolf Bands dress up as better bands for Halloween at Cole’s, and more music news.
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 3
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AGENDA R
READER RECOMMENDED
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For more of the best things to do every day of the week, go to chicagoreader. com/agenda.
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ripping yarn. Instead, Lewis delivers the gripping tale of a callow, lovesick young man who only went to Africa to be with his crush and got much, much more than he bargained for. —JACK HELBIG Through 11/19: Thu-Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 5 and 8 PM; see website for repertory schedule, 16th Street Theater, Berwyn Cultural Center, 6420 16th, Berwyn, 708795-6704, 16thstreettheater.org, $20.
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4 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
Send your events to agenda@chicagoreader.com
THEATER
More at chicagoreader.com/ theater Allá en San Fernando Collectivo El Pozo presents Allá en San Fernando as a commemoration of 72 would-be immigrants murdered on August 24, 2010, victims of corruption and bloodlust along the border between the U.S. and Mexico. Raúl Doronte’s play (which is performed in Spanish with English supertitles) begins on a desert plain, with two snickering assassins, a knife, and three helpless women— Judith (Leslie Magdalena Holguín), Salomé (José Rochel), and María (Carolina Escrich). As they mutter prayers under their breath, the women are summarily executed—and I don’t know how to describe what comes next except as a highly redemptive clown journey through the afterlife. It is so weird, and so weirdly beautiful, to hear these dead souls gossip and tap dance; Holguín is delightful as a kind of ringleader. The play allows itself such winning levity in its second act that the mournful aspects—the solemnity, the candles—start to feel overceremonious and dull. —MAX MALLER Through 10/30: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 6 PM, Citlalin Gallery and Theatre, 2005 S. Blue Island, colectivoelpozo.weebly.com, $20. The Bottle Tree Beth Kander’s new drama centers on and takes an empathetic look at Alley (Kathryn Acosta), the younger sister of a notorious school shooter, as she tries to move on at a new school, then ten years later, when she’s still trying to come to terms with his actions. Amy Szerlong’s Stage Left Theatre production slowly creates a convincing and rich character portrait. Too much, though, gets lost behind its central poetic visual metaphor, and flashback scenes can’t overcome the stagnating effect of therapist couch back-and-forths. —DAN JAKES Through 11/20: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Theater Wit, 1229 W. Belmont, 773-975-8150, stagelefttheatre.com, $18-$30. The Dancing Plague The Right Brain Project’s new ensemble piece examines the outbreak of involuntary dancing
that struck Strasbourg, Alsace, in 1518. Over the course of a month, some 400 people danced without stopping, many dying of heart attack or exhaustion. It all ended as quickly and mysteriously as it began. Playwright Joseph Ramski focuses on tensions between medical and religious authorities as they attempt to diagnose and cure the plague, as well as the way civic and church leaders shore up their power by exploiting the townspeople’s fear. It might be resonant, topical stuff were it not for Ramski’s overly digressive structure, which obscures much of the fundamental storytelling. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 11/19: Thu-Sat 8 PM; also Sun 10/30, 5 PM; Mon 11/7 and 11/14, 8 PM, Right Brain Project, 4001 N. Ravenswood, 773750-2033, therbp.org, $20-$25. Dark Sisters Composer Nico Muhly’s inspiration for this opera was a 2008 raid on a Texas compound of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints, in which the government, concerned about early forced marriages and polygamy, removed the sect’s children. It’s powerful material, developed by librettist Stephen Karam into a feminist drama that focuses on the lives of five wives of a single husband/prophet. But it was written for seven voices (six of them female) and a 13-piece orchestra. In this production, by Third Eye Theatre Ensemble, a rotating cast is accompanied only by music director Jason Carlson on keyboard. He does a valiant job, and on the night I saw it the show featured piercing dramatic performances, but we’re left wondering what the score should really sound like. —DEANNA ISAACS Through 11/6: Fri-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Prop Thtr, 3502 N. Elston, 773-539-7838, thirdeyete. com, $20, $15 students. Dogs of Rwanda Written and R performed by Sean Christopher Lewis, this powerful world-premiere
production skillfully balances two stories, one public (the 1994 Rwandan genocide), the other personal (an account of two young American missionaries caught up in the upheaval, told by one of the survivors), without getting bogged down in lots of reportage or distorting the facts for the sake of a
Grounded George Brant’s R 2012 one-hander about an air force pilot grounded by pregnancy,
then transferred to drone duty takes a well-worn topic, the psychic damage wrought by military conflict, and finds something new to say by focusing on the ways battle has changed since the advent of remote-control air strikes. In particular, Brant explores the alienation of fighting a war as if it were a video game and the strain of living a life that consists of 12 hours of stalking and killing followed by 12 hours of domesticity—as Brant’s protagonist, the Pilot, puts it: “It would be a different book, The Odyssey, if Odysseus came home every day.” Director Lexi Saunders has fashioned a spartan production that depends entirely on the show’s lone actor, Amber Kelly, to engage and unnerve us, something she does with remarkable power and grace. Through it all Kelly keeps us in her crosshairs, and in the process she, and Brant, open up our eyes to the fresh hell that is postmodern warfare. —JACK HELBIG Through 11/6: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 2 PM, Pride Arts Center, 4147 N. Broadway, 1-800-737-0984, theaterofthought.com, $18-$25. Leavings Gail Parrish’s new drama has exciting potential, but this world premiere by Polarity Ensemble Theatre reveals a sprawling, sometimes confusing script in serious need of restructuring and compression. It’s the story of a 111-year-old African-American woman in Chicago whose singular mission is to heal the ancient wounds the legacy of slavery has left on her family—including the conservative white Mississippi governor with whom she shares some ancestors and her troubled young great-nephew, who refuses to accept that he is the father of a black baby with “white eyes.” This is a promising work on an important subject, and director Ashley Honore Roberson’s well-acted production is worth seeing, but Parrish needs to heighten the suspense inherent in the tale’s premise. —ALBERT WILLIAMS Through 11/20: Thu-Sat 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln, 773-404-7336, petheatre. com, $25, $20 seniors, $10 students. Lecherous Honey This promenade-style production from Cock and Bull Theatre is presented as an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts, but what it really does is strip all the nuance from Ibsen’s plot and do the play as if
it were a dime-store historical romance set somewhere in Norway, near a fjord. Helene Alving, the widow of a ship’s captain, has pressured her son, Oswald, into coming home from his artist’s life in Paris, ignorant of the fact that Oswald has inherited syphilis from his dead father, who caught it in the course of an affair with the maid. Oswald now falls in love with the daughter of that same maid, his half-sister, even as syphilis eats through his bones. In Ibsen, you get Helene’s unbearable disdain for her husband’s wrongdoing, mixed with simultaneous love and contempt for their son, mixed with Oswald’s illness and mounting dread. In Lecherous Honey, you get mother and son dry-humping on the couch. —MAX MALLER Through 11/12: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Berger Park, 6205 N. Sheridan, 773-761-0376, cockandbulltheatre.org, $25, $15 students. Macbeth As a veteran of Ariane Mnouchkine’s legendary Théâtre du Soleil, French actor/director Georges Bigot can claim impressive avant-garde bona fides. The mere fact that Chicago’s Theatre Y was able to collaborate with him in developing this idiosyncratic Macbeth is impressive. But the onstage result is an exasperating grind. The piece starts out interestingly, with the witches (“When shall we three meet again?”) presented as hippie chicks, alternating between sweet nothings and vicious roars while backed by a 1950s pop hit, the Diamonds’ “Little Darlin’.” Their scenes remain creative respites throughout. But virtually everything else here is built around an elementary opposition—false facade vs. savage reality—that first grows tedious and then, given the technical shortcomings of some of the players, ludicrous. It’s telling that in Bigot’s hands Shakespeare’s briefest tragedy comes in at three hours. —TONY ADLER Through 12/14: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Sun 4 PM, Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division, 773-769-3832, theatre-y.com, $25. Multitudes British actor John Hollingworth bit off a lot when he decided to write a full-length play—his first—about racial and religious tensions in Bradford, a large English city with a significant south Asian population. Turns out to have been more than he could chew. Multitudes tells a complicated story complicatedly while at the same time oversimplifying it: the various narrative lines step all over one another even as pat characters (white fears are represented, for instance, by a racist, alcoholic dolt) undermine any real interest. There’s no relief to be found in Liz Carlin Metz’s production, a collaboration between Rasaka and Vitalist theater companies. The show lacks momentum, location changes are insufficiently delineated, and double or triple casting creates confusion. At times I found myself wondering whom I was watching and why. —TONY ADLER Through 11/13: Thu-Fri 8 PM, Sat 4 and 8 PM, Sun 3:30 PM, Victory Gardens Theater, 2433 N. Lincoln, 773-871-3000, victorygardens. org, $20-$30.
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Best bets, recommendations, and notable arts and culture events for the week of October 27 Giordano Dance Chicago presents its Fall Series o GORMAN COOK
Abbi Jacobson and Samantha R Irby This will be, undoubtedly, the funniest literary event of the fall, fea-
human experience, but Diana Thater contemplates the perspectives of animals. Multiple projectors, monitors, and LED lights enhance her film and video work for a walk on the wildlife side. Artist talk Sat 10/29, 3 PM. 10/29-1/8, Tue 10 AM-8 PM, Wed-Sun 10 AM-5 PM, 220 E. Chicago, 312-280-2660, mcachicago.org, $12, $7 students and seniors, free kids 12 and under and members of the military, free for Illinois residents on Tuesdays.
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Decade Nomi Dance Company celebrates its ten-year anniversary by restaging old works and performing new dances from artistic director Laura Kariotis, company member Katie Carey, and guest artist Daniel Williams. Sat 10/29, 8 PM, Athenaeum Theatre, 2936 N. Southport, 773-935-6860, nomilamaddance.com, $12-$37.
Fall Series Giordano Dance ChiR cago presents its fall performance featuring a new work by Peter Chu. Fri
10/28-Sat 10/29: 7:30 PM, Harris Theater, 205 E. Randolph, 312-334-7777, giordanodance.org, $15-$75.
COMEDY R
Longer! Louder! Wagner! The Second City Wagner Companion Lyric Opera joins forcers with the Second City for this comedic and operatic look at the creation and staging of Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle, starting from its beginnings in 1848. 10/27-10/30: Thu 7 PM, Fri 2 and 7 PM, Sat 2 PM, Sun 1 and 4 PM, Civic Opera House, 20 N. Wacker, 312-332-2244, civicoperahouse. com, $35-$65.
R
Malika Ameen If you’ve been R inspired by The Great British Baking Show’s Chetna, Nadiya, and Tamal
Rebecca O’Neal One of ChiR cago’s best stand-ups takes the stage. Sat 10/29, 8 PM, Laugh Factory,
3175 N. Broadway, 773-327-3175, laughfactory.com, $17 plus two-drink minimum.
to use more south Asian flavors in your baking, you could do worse than learn from Ameen, a past Top Chef: Just Desserts contestant and former pastry chef at Aigre Doux, who has just published her first book, Sweet Sugar, Sultry Spice. Sat 10/29, 4 PM, Read It and Eat, 2142 N. Halsted, 773-661-6158, readitandeatstore. com.
VISUAL ARTS Chicago Design Museum “City of Ideas: Architects’ Voices and Visions,” architect and writer Vladimir Belogolovsky curated this exhibit exploring the purpose of architecture through text, audio recordings, images, and projections. 10/28-2/25, 108 N. State, chidm.com.
o MICHAEL JARECKI
DANCE
Tuesday Funk This monthly R reading series features eclectic works by local writers. This month’s
LIT
Mary Mack The folksy musical stand-up performs in celebration of North Bar’s three-year anniversary. Thu 10/27, 7:30 PM, North Bar, 1637 W. North, 773-123-5678, liveatnorthbar.com, $10, $8.
o LOREN EGELAND
Saturn Returns As any astrology neophyte knows, each time Saturn returns to the orbital position it occupied the day you were born (approximately every 29 years), your life falls apart, and if you embrace the upheaval, you may emerge a new, more resilient person. In her new confessional disquisition about love, loss, loneliness, Tif Henderson explains the Saturn return as though it were obscure esoterica (ditto the concepts of determinism and free will). Henderson and her wholly likable cast of four playfully and poetically excavate the chaos in their lives, as well as their efforts to find belief systems to keep them anchored. It’s consistently entertaining and intermittently insightful, but its tangential structure, with new performance conventions arising every few minutes, renders it largely incoherent. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 11/19: Thu-Sat 7:30 PM, Neo-Futurarium, 5153 N. Ashland, 773-275-5255, neofuturists.org, $25, $9.99 students and seniors; pay what you can at the door on Thursdays.
turing Broad City’s Jacobson chatting about her new release, Carry This Book, with Irby, the former Chicagoan, Meaty author, and blogger behind Bitches Gotta Eat. Fri 10/28, 7 PM, Senn High School, 5900 N. Glenwood, womenandchildrenfirst.com, $30.
Medea Benjamin The cofounder R of Codepink: Women for Peace discusses her book Kingdom of the
Unjust: Behind the U.S.-Saudi Connection. Tue 11/1, 6:30 PM, City Lit Books, 2523 N. Kedzie, 773-235-2523, citylitbooks. com.
Tara Betts The author reads from R her book Break the Habit. Wed 11/2, 6:30 PM, City Lit Books, 2523 N. Kedzie, 773-235-2523, citylitbooks.com.
lineup includes Megan Stielstra, Coya Paz, Cesar Torres, Mary Robinette Kowal, and Veronica Arreola. Tue 11/1, 7 PM, Hopleaf, 5148 N. Clark, 773-334-9851, tuesdayfunk.org.
MOVIES
More at chicagoreader.com/movies NEW REVIEWS American Pastoral Ewan McGregor, taking over for a departed Philip Noyce, makes his directorial debut with this adaptation of Philip Roth’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. I haven’t read the book, but I’m guessing Roth brought more nuance and authority to its story of a New Jersey family in the 1960s and ’70s than McGregor and screenwriter John Romano have with this cultural cartoon. David Strathairn plays Roth’s stand-in, Nathan Zuckerman, who hears the family’s history from a classmate at a high school reunion; in flashback, McGregor is the father, a cheery Newark businessman, and Jennifer Connelly is his baleful wife, a former beauty queen. They’re the picture of middle-class stability, but their little American dream collapses after their furiously stuttering teenage daughter, blankly portrayed by Dakota Fanning, goes off the deep end as an antiwar radical (cue Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth” on the soundtrack). A scene in which the daughter’s hippie friend comes on to the father in a hotel room epitomizes the film’s tone of bourgeois outrage and self-pity. With Peter W
Field Museum “Drawing on Tradition: Kanza Artist Chris Pappan,” Pappan’s contemporary take on Native American ledger art. 10/29-1/13, daily 9 AM-5 PM, 1400 S. Lake Shore, 312-922-9410, fieldmuseum.org, $15; $12 students and seniors; $10 kids 4-11; free on the second Monday of the month. For “Underground Adventure” add $8, $3 kids. Hyde Park Art Center “War Stories,” a collection of Mary King’s drawings, paintings, and collages exploring the impact of war. Opening reception Sun 10/30, 3 PM. 10/30-1/22, Mon-Thu 9 AM-8 PM, Fri-Sat 9 AM-5 PM, Sun noon-5 PM, 5020 S. Cornell, 773-324-5520, hydeparkart.org. Museum of Contemporary Art “Diana Thater: The Sympathetic Imagination,” most artists attempt to reproduce the
Never miss a show again.
EARLY WARNINGS chicagoreader.com/early Mary King’s They Blinded My Eyes o MARY KING/DAVID ETTINGER
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 5
AGENDA Oasis: Supersonic o LO SAI HUNG
fast-motion and negative photography. —DAVE KEHR 65 min. Jay Warren provides live digital-organ accompaniment. Fri 10/28 and Sat 10/29, 10:30 PM. Logan
SPECIAL EVENTS
B Riegert and Molly Parker. —J.R. JONES R, 108 min. Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21 Beauty and the Beast This 2014 adaptation of the French fairy tale looks spectacular, with vibrant landscapes and lavish 18th-century costumes, but Léa Seydoux, as the fair maiden, and Vincent Cassell, as an arrogant prince in flashback and the beast in a motion-capture performance, are stiff and perfunctory. Their sudden switch from mutual animus to true love—which the 1991 Disney animation negotiated through a credible getting-toknow-each-other montage—is unconvincing, and the movie fails to render the lovers compelling or compatible. Christophe Gans (Silent Hill) directed. In French with subtitles. —LEAH PICKETT 112 min. Fri 10/28, 2 and 7:45 PM; Sat 10/29, 3 PM; Sun 10/30, 5:45 PM; Mon 10/31, 7:45 PM; Tue 11/1, 6 PM; Wed 11/2, 7:45 PM; and Thu 11/3, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center Jack Reacher: Never Go Back Can anyone have missed the irony of subtitling a lame sequel Never Go Back? Perhaps the next one will be called Jack Reacher: Never Go Back 2. Tom Cruise returns as the former military policeman and globe-trotting adventurer of the Lee Child novels and the 2012 release Jack Reacher; the athletic Cobie Smulders gives him a run for his money as an army major who’s been framed for espionage, and Danika Yarosh is the teenage girl who shows up in Reacher’s life when her mother files a paternity suit against him. Edward Zwick, who directed Cruise in The Last Samurai (2003), is too high-minded to have fun with this sort of material, and the movie plays like a little brother to the star’s more ambitious and imaginative Mission: Impossible thrillers. Cruise’s boyish good looks have finally begun to give way, and his jowlier appearance here makes you wonder how long he can stick it out in his preferred genre. —J.R. JONES PG-13, 118 min. Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Ford City, Lake, River
6 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Showplace ICON Oasis: Supersonic Noel and Liam Gallagher, the bickering brothers of the chart-topping British band Oasis, each served as an executive producer for this two-hour documentary—though “detente” might be a better word. Despite the ample running time, the movie focuses almost entirely on the musicians’ precipitous rise from 1993, when they were discovered by Creation Records owner Alan McGee, to August 1996, when the band reached its zenith with two sold-out shows at Knebworth football stadium in the UK. The Gallaghers weren’t the nicest of playmates—”Fuck that cunt!” was Noel’s reaction when longtime bassist Paul McGuigan dropped out, complaining of nervous exhaustion—and director Mat Whitecross gives due attention to their coldhearted sacking of drummer Tony McCarroll and their tabloid dustups with their estranged father, Tom Gallagher. In the contemporary audio interviews supporting the archival footage, the brothers are relatively mum about each other, concentrating on the rock stardom they craved and clearly relished. —J.R. JONES R, 122 min. Music Box
REVIVALS The Mummy Brendan Fraser stars in this 1999 bockbuster, ostensibly a remake of the Boris Karloff-Karl Freund classic. PG-13, 124 min. Screens as part of the Field Museum’s “Field Trips: Cinema Science” series. Sat 10/29, noon. Music Box Nosferatu A masterpiece of R the German silent cinema and easily the most effective version of Dracula on record. F.W. Murnau’s 1922 film follows the Bram Stoker novel fairly closely, though he neglected to purchase the screen rights—hence, the title change. But the key elements are all Murnau’s own: the eerie intrusions of expressionist style on natural settings, the strong sexual subtext, and the daring use of
Chicago International Children’s Film Festival The 33rd Chicago International Children’s Film Festival seeks to “introduce new, thoughtful, provocative, and culturally diverse films for children.” For a full schedule visit facets.org/ children+youth/festival. Fri 10/28Sun 11/6. Facets Cinematheque First Nations Film and Video Festival Created to “[showcase] works produced by Native American film and video makers,” the First Nations Film and Video Festival presents its annual event, taking place at multiple venues around town. For a full schedule visit fnfvf. org. Thu 11/3-Sun 11/13. Kartemquin Fall Showcase The Chicago-based documentary studio presents a three-night showcase to cap off its 50th-anniversary year, with previews of its latest works in progress and premieres of newly completed films. Wed 11/2-Fri 11/4, 6 PM. Arclight Love Is All You Need? Kim Rocco Shields directed this drama about the forbidden heterosexual romance between a university football star (Briana Evigan) and a journalist (Tyler Blackburn) in a world where homosexuality is the norm. 123 min. Sun 10/30, 2 PM. Center on Halsted Presenting Princess Shaw Chicago-born singer-composer Samantha Montgomery, aka Princess Shaw, seeks personal and artistic validation in this affecting documentary. When she’s not working at a New Orleans nursing home, Montgomery attends local open-mike events and uploads her a cappella performances to YouTube. Unbeknownst to her, she finds a fan in Israeli musician and video artist Ophir Kutiel, aka Kutiman, who mixes her renditions with instrumentals from other YouTube contributors and gets her noticed by a wider audience. Montgomery’s music is informed by her hardships—childhood abuse, poverty, losing a lover—and as her emotional struggles continue the movie starts to straggle. Ido Haar directed. In English and subtitled Hebrew. —ANDREA GRONVALL 80 min. Screens as part of the Chicago Festival of Israeli Cinema; for a full schedule visit israelifilmchi.org. Thu 11/3, 7 PM. Music Box v
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CITY LIFE
The proposed development includes a seven-story hotel and a Big Star taqueria. o JAMES AIELLO
DEVELOPMENT
The World Series isn’t the only new thing in Wrigleyville
o ISA GIALLORENZO
Street View
Off the wall LYNTUAN JONES WEARS his art on his sleeve. He constructed his hoodie and tote bag from one of his paintings on canvas. Both pieces are samples from Create the New World, the brand the 25-year-old recently cofounded. Jones’s hat also exhibited one of his creations, a resin-coated swatch of canvas decorated with copper disks. “This outfit is me,” he says, “in my natural form.” —ISA GIALLORENZO See more Chicago street style on chicagolooks.blogspot.com.
ON MAY 1, 2013, during a talk at the City Club of Chicago, Cubs owner and chairman Tom Ricketts said that if the team wasn’t allowed to increase advertising signage in its ballpark, including a 5,700-square-foot video board in left field, the Cubs might bolt. “If it comes to the point that we don’t have the ability to do what we need to do in our outfield, then we’re going to have to consider moving,” Ricketts said. “Simple as that.” He got the Jumbotron, but the threat was a balk. The move was never going to happen. The mere suggestion of, say, the Rosemont Cubs, was ludicrous. Because, for decades—and even now, as the team contests its first World Series since 1945—the Cubs’ main draw has been Wrigley Field. The reasons for this include Wrigley’s century-old stadium and its funky, vintage north-side neighborhood, both with a national following thanks to years of game broadcasts on WGN. That, and the Cubs’ lovable losers persona, which lowered
expectations for performance while guaranteeing a good time in the party atmosphere of the Friendly Confines. The Cubs have now—to our incredulous delight, and after several painful years of team restructuring—shucked the lovable losers component. But as the Ricketts family has acknowledged in its careful restoration of the stadium, the venue will continue to be the franchise’s most dependable attraction. And that makes the coming changes—currently represented by the bombed-out construction zones bordering the stadium— more than a little jarring. Contrast Wrigley to the concrete fortresses of newer stadiums—including that unfortunately renamed Guaranteed Rate Field across town. Cubs Park has been sitting neatly in the midst of a neighborhood of human scale, mostly surrounded by two- and three-story brick, frame, and brownstone homes, for more than 100 years. The Rickettses seem to understand the iconic value of the fringe of rooftop viewing
perches these homes provide— they now own and operate the majority of them. But on the west side of the stadium, they’re doing something on a different scale entirely, putting up a five-story office and retail building, a seven-story, 175-room Starwood hotel and restaurant facility, and a plaza beer ga rden dom inated by another giant video screen and a stanchion that’ll apparently bear the name of a sponsor. Meanwhile, on the southeast side of the stadium, across Addison Street, M&R Development and Bucksbaum Retail Properties is constructing the huge Addison & Clark complex around and behind the small corner buildings housing the only survivors among the businesses that previously occupied that block—Sports World, an auto repair shop, and a ticket broker. The massive new development will consist of 148 rental apartments, 150,000 square feet of retail and restaurants, a fitness club, a ten-screen movie theater, and more than 400 parking spaces.
The sum of these three buildings looks to be a bulky, characterless intrusion better suited to Rosemont than to Wrigleyville, as hard to like as the four new clubs for 1 percenters planned for inside the stadium. (Members will enjoy premier seats, separate entrances, and the ability to avoid the rest of us riffraff in private clubrooms.) Maureen Martino, executive director of the Lakeview East Chamber of Commerce, says that local business ow ners are excited about the changes: the combination of a winning team and redevelopment is going to bring in more people, and may, she says, answer the perennial question “How does the neighborhood survive when there’s no game, or during the winter?” Her answer, and the one supplied by the Rickettses, may dismay some longtime fans and neighborhood residents. “As we see Wrigley Field being developed, we’ll see a different face of Lakeview,” Martino says: “More of a tourist destination.” —DEANNA ISAACS
¥ Keep up to date on the go at chicagoreader.com/agenda.
SURE THINGS THURSDAY 27
FRIDAY 28
SATURDAY 29
SUNDAY 30
MONDAY 31
TUESDAY 1
WEDNESDAY 2
Ý Art of At ari book re lease Tim Lapetino discusses his book about the artwork in Atari video games. The event also features a special selection of pinball machines and video games and a collection of Atari paraphernalia. 7 PM-midnight, Logan Arcade, 2410 W. Fullerton, 872-206-2859, loganarcade.com.
ò The Art of the Ma squerade The Art of Blackness and Civilized Empire host a costume party with DJs Rae Chardonnay, Joe Kollage, and Jukie Tha-Kid spinning hip-hop, Afrobeat, and house music all night. 10 PM, the Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park, promontorychicago.com, $15, $10 with a costume.
Chicago Humanities Festival It’s time for our favorite annual two-week marathon of writers, artists, scientists, philosophers, cooks, and musicians, this year converging to talk about “speed.” Sat 10/29-Sat 11/12, various times, various locations, 312494-9509, chicagohumanities. org, $20-$50, most events $10 for students and teachers.
J Andersonville Dessert Crawl More than 20 neighborhood restaurants—including George’s Ice Cream & Sweets, Kopi Cafe, and Vincent—offer up tastings of sweet treats. Choose either the “Candy Corn” or “Caramel Apple” route. 2-5 PM, various locations, andersonville.org/ dessertcrawl, $25-$30.
No rthalsted Ha lloween Parade More than 2,000 costumed Chicagoans march through Boystown for the parade’s 20th anniversary. It’s preceded by the Ruby Red Relay, in which local business owners race in drag for the Legacy Project. 7:30-10:30 PM, Belmont and Halsted, northalsted.com. F
Ú NaNoWriMo This November the bookstore plans to write a novel Exquisite Corpse style: after collectively deciding on the theme and genre, 28 patrons will each have a day to hang out in the bookstore (with free coffee!) and write a chapter. 11/1-11/30, Volumes Bookcafe, 1474 N. Milwaukee, 773-6978066, volumesbooks.com.
& Taste of Clark St reet This neighborhood crawl features bites from ten local restaurants plus a wine and beer tasting at Rogers Park Fine Wine and Spirits. 5-8 PM, Clark between Albion and Touhy, facebook.com/ rogersparkbusinessalliance, $15-$30.
8 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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Read Derrick Clifton’s columns throughout the week at chicagoreader.com.
CITY LIFE Please, don’t be like model Karlie Kloss, who wore a Native American headdress during a 2012 Victoria’s Secret fashion show. o EVAN AGOSTINI/AP
IDENTITY & CULTURE
The walking dread
How not to be an offensive jerk this Halloween By DERRICK CLIFTON
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n Halloween a few years back, a train ride killed my vibe before I could even get to the party. I had decided to go as Roman Zolanski, a former alter ego of Nicki Minaj, and was outfitted in a bushy blond wig and a hooded velvet sorcerer’s cape. (Another friend I was meeting up with that night was dressed as “Super Bass” Nicki.) After taking a seat on the el, I looked toward a rowdy group
of fellow twentysomethings that had congregated just a few feet away. There I saw two young white women wearing spinoffs of the “Sexy Indian Woman” costume sold in most pop-up Halloween shops—featuring feathered headdresses, fringe boot cuffs, and a tan skirt and top. I found it difficult to conceal my disappointment at their tacky, culturally appropriated outfits, and looked on with a furrowed brow
and a curled lip. Moments before the group arrived at their destination, one of them caught my expression. She looked at me blankly before walking off the train. As much as I wish this were an isolated incident, I’m far from the only person who has felt palpable disgust with racist or culturally disrespectful costumes on Halloween. To be clear, this isn’t about so-called political correctness. Rather, it’s about understanding how some costume choices promote harmful stereotypes, belittle the traditions of marginalized ethnic groups, or send the message that it’s fine to accessorize with other cultures “for fun” when the originators face everyday discrimination for just being themselves. For example, I took a cursory look at social media following the final presidential debate, and Donald Trump’s racist remarks about “bad hombres” entering the country from the Mexican border inspired some Halloween costume ideas. One post even joked about how it’d be easy to pull off the “bad hombre” look since a “Mexican” costume (think sombrero, big mustache, and a poncho) runs about $20 dollars. But unless you’re Mexican or Latino and you’re offering some kind of commentary on the sad state of politics, this would be in poor taste. Think about it. A major party presidential candidate has repeatedly disparaged Latino immigrants during the campaign, promising to build a wall to keep them out if he’s elected. Why add insult to injury and aggravate the everyday racism already experienced by this group by showing up to Halloween festivities making light of their plight? It’s an avoidable offense. Some people, through their Halloween costume, genuinely wish to pay homage to a pop culture figure of a racial or ethnic group different than their own. That’s understandable. And there’s plenty of ways to do it without causing harm. In these parts, I’d imagine Chance the Rapper will be a popular Halloween choice. He’s actually been encouraging it. Since early October, he’s been selling his signature baseball cap with a “3” online. (They’re so popular that there’s now a back-order list.) Re-creating Chance the Rapper’s general look and style couldn’t be easier. Pair the “3” cap (or improvise one of your own) with a light jacket, a simple tee, and maybe even jeans or overalls. If you don’t have a mustache, a fake one could work. You don’t even need a wig with kinky hair for this. And with that, you
have a complete costume that doesn’t veer into the racist territory of blackface performances. It’s just that simple. Although some Halloween stores sell makeup to make people “look” Native American, Chinese, or African, the availability of these products doesn’t count as justification for participating in a show of cultural ignorance. If you’re not black and you’re dressing up as a black celebrity, makeup isn’t necessary to make yourself appear “more convincing” in costume.
Why aggravate the everyday racism already experienced by these groups by showing up to Halloween festivities making light of their plight?
To be sure, racial insensitivity isn’t the only potential problem when it comes to Halloween costumes. In recent years, some choices have come at the expense of women and femmes. Just a few weeks ago, one online Halloween store went to market with a $70 “Parisian Heist Robbery Victim Costume Kit,” a clear shot at Kim Kardashian’s harrowing experience of being held against her will during a jewelry heist. The costume includes a white robe, a long black wig, two feet of rope, fake jewelry and—yes—a gag. The reality star feared for her life during the ordeal, and worried that the robbers would sexually assault her. Regardless of anyone’s personal opinion about the Kardashians’ influence on celebrity culture, it’s a terrible costume idea. Unfortunately, that won’t stop some people from buying the robbery victim package. In case it isn’t obvious, violence against women shouldn’t be anyone’s convenient punch line. Nobody wants to be the killjoy during what should be a lighthearted evening. Taking a moment for respectful consideration goes a long way in keeping Halloween fun for everyone. v
ß @DerrickClifton OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 9
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He ain’t afraid of no ghost DALE KACZMAREK doesn’t consider himself a ghost hunter. “I’m not out there with a gun, hunting ghosts,” the 63-year-old says. Nor is he a ghostbuster—though people started calling him that in 1984 when the Ivan Reitman-directed film was released. (Incidentally, a wall of dusty celebrity photos in Kaczmarek’s basement includes a framed shot of him with Ghostbusters star Dan Aykroyd, whose sincere interest in the paranormal inspired him to write the movie with Harold Ramis.) “I’m a ghost investigator,” he clarifies. “A paranormal researcher.” He’s also the author of several books—Windy City Ghosts, Windy City Ghosts 2, Field Guide to Haunted Highways and Bridges, among others—and president of the Ghost Research Society, a group that has been looking into hauntings and similar phenomena since 1977. (Side note: If you can scare up a minute to visit the group’s website, ghostresearch.org—with its spectral cursor and “Unchained Melody” instrumental soundtrack—it’s a real scream.) The Ghost Research Society is headquartered in Kaczmarek’s basement, in a house he shares with his wife on a quiet street in southwest-suburban Oak Lawn. Cheery ghost decorations adorn the exterior of the house—
only temporarily, it turns out, during the Halloween season. But downstairs, it’s ghosty 365 days a year. Kaczmarek’s office, tucked in a corner, houses an extensive library of books and reference materials, a file cabinet stuffed with investigative paperwork, maps of supposedly haunted locations around Chicago and the burbs, and dozens of ghost knickknacks he’s collected over the years. Spilling into the nearby furnace room are research materials, including a series of artifacts that he’s brought back from investigation sites—a tendency he says his wife “does not like at all.” Among the objects is a brick from “Death Alley” behind the Iroquois (now Oriental) Theatre in the Loop, scene of a 1903 blaze that would be the deadliest theater fire in American history. Another of his macabre treasures is a railroad spike from the site of a 1918 train wreck near Hammond, Indiana, in which 86 circus performers perished. “Sometimes, unfortunately, a ghost can be attached to an item brought back,” he says. The main room in the basement is home to several computers, back issues of Fate magazine (“true reports of the strange and unknown”), as well as Ghost Research Society equipment. “We have a very extensive
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Ç Take a video tour of Dale Kaczmarek’s house at chicagoreader.com/space.
CITY LIFE Opposite: maps of supposedly haunted Chicago-area locations in the basement headquarters of Dale Kaczmarek’s Ghost Research Society This page: Kaczmarek surrounded by ghost knickknacks, books about paranormal phenomena, and various investigative materials; a shelf haunted by an old license plate; bricks Kaczmarek has brought back from investigation sites o KERRI PANG
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arsenal of tools that we use in investigations,” Kaczmarek says. “Everything from EMF meters that pick up deviations in electromagnetic fields to different forms of cameras, including infrared, full-spectrum, and ordinary digital cameras that can [detect] anomalies. We always say ‘expect the unexpected.’ You never know what you’re going to get involved with.” Around Halloween every year, Kaczmarek’s schedule fills up with talks, lectures, and
haunted tours. But ghosts, he reminds his audiences, don’t just appear in late October. What keeps him going after all these years, he says, is the pursuit of “that aha moment— or that aha piece of video or audiotape that I could bring to the public and say, ‘Here, I believe, is definitive proof that something exists beyond the grave.’” —LAURA PEARSON
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CreativeMirror.com OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 11
Read Ben Joravsky’s columns throughout the week at chicagoreader.com.
CITY LIFE Alderman Edward Burke, left, and GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump at the City Club of Chicago in June 2015 o CHARLES REX ARBOGAST/AP
POLITICS
Donald and the machine
Trump gamed Chicago Democrats before he bashed them in the press.
By BEN JORAVSKY
W
ith another presidential election upon us, it’s time for me to write my quadrennial Don’t fool yourself, Chicago column, in which I plead with independents and Tea Party types not to view a vote for the Republican candidate as a vote against the Democratic machine. I got this argument a lot from readers in 2008 and 2012, what with President Obama’s ties to Chicago and local political operatives like David Axelrod. Back in ’08, tons of Republicans tried to convince me that voting for McCain-Palin was somehow akin to opposing one of Mayor Daley’s TIF deals. Not that any local Republicans—such as Bruce Rauner, to name one—ever did that. But believe it or not, I’m still getting a few appeals from Tea Partiers these days, arguing that as an “opponent of the man” I should vote for Donald Trump, ’cause he’s an agent of change who will blow up the “rigged” system.
12 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
Good God, my friends, please don’t fall for that argument. You’d only be fooling yourself. For what it’s worth, it’s pretty obvious I wouldn’t vote for Trump even if he were the second coming of Leon Despres. But as it turns out, Trump’s a bust even on the antimachine front. OK, he doesn’t have as many ties to Mayor Emanuel as Hillary Clinton does—what with Rahm having worked in the Clinton White House and all. But for all his talk about the “rigged” system, the Donald proved to be pretty good at gaming said system when he rolled into Chicago in the early 2000s to tear down the old Sun-Times building and build Trump Tower. Building that tower required making peace with Mayor Daley and virtually every other powerful Democrat in this town. And by cultivating ties with Democrats, he was rewarded with a tax break (surprise, surprise) and permission to build his big-ass sign.
Trump donated $12,500 to the Cook County Democratic Party in 2005. No doubt he figured that local Democratic leaders—like Cook County assessor Joe Berrios and Alderman Ed Burke—might come in handy. Curiously, Trump also donated $5,000 to former governor Rod Blagojevich on the eve of his first election in 2002. Not sure why he did that—Blago had no direct say in building permits, zoning, or local taxes. Maybe they just had a special kinship as rampant narcissists obsessed with their hair. But Trump’s biggest local political donation was the $50,000 he donated to Emanuel’s first mayoral campaign. That donation came on December 23, 2010, a couple months before Rahm was elected. Apparently Trump was smart enough to figure out that Rahm was going to beat his competition—despite my endorsement of Miguel del Valle. In 2011, Emanuel’s administration approved the god-awful 20-foot-high “T-R-U-M-P” sign that the Donald felt compelled to plaster on his building overlooking the Chicago River. After the Tribune’s Blair Kamin criticized the sign in June 2014—calling it, among other things, “grotesquely overscaled”—Emanuel was quick to say that he hated it too, calling it “architecturally tasteless.” That set off the great Emanuel-Trump sign feud, which was about as believable as the mayor’s feud with Governor Rauner—speaking of Republicans who get along great with Rahm. In reality, Trump had a field day, because the controversy brought him tons of publicity. “I have the hottest brand in the world right now, and there are those who are saying I’m doing Chicago a favor,” he told reporters. “I’ve got thousands of people saying, ‘Don’t do anything with the sign.’” Doesn’t that sound just like Trump? By then, of course, there was nothing the mayor could do about the sign, as his administration had already approved it—a point that Trump took great delight in making. As part of the fallout, Emanuel had the City Council adopt something called the “Chicago River Corridor Special Sign District.” Had that ordinance been in place before Trump received permission, his sign would be much smaller.
But the law wasn’t in place back then—another point Trump loves to make, because he’s now guaranteed to have the huuugest sign on the river. So all in all, you might say that Trump’s $50,000 campaign contribution to candidate Emanuel was money well spent. But Mayor Emanuel’s not Trump’s only Democratic pal in town. Trump also hired Alderman Burke’s law firm to handle his tax appeals to Assessor Berrios’s office. Burke then won Trump several million dollars worth of property tax breaks. When Berrios came to my First Tuesday show at the Hideout last month, he insisted that Burke’s law firm had nothing to do with winning property tax breaks for Trump Tower. Trump got those tax breaks, Berrios said, because of the commercial vacancies in the tower. (The more vacancies in a commercial building the lower its taxable value.)
For all his talk about the “rigged” system, the Donald proved to be pretty good at gaming said system when he rolled into Chicago in the early 2000s to build his big-ass sign.
In other words, Berrios claimed that Trump would’ve won those tax breaks even if I had been handling his appeal. My bad. Guess Trump was just playing it safe by hiring Burke. Now, I don’t want to leave you thinking that there aren’t any reasons why you should vote for Trump. Oh, no. I don’t believe that. If you are, say, a bigot who despises Mexicans and Muslims, or a misogynist who thinks it’s been all downhill for our country since women got the right to vote, or a nihilist who thinks it’s time to give chaos a try, then Trump’s your guy. But don’t kid yourself into thinking that a vote for Trump is a vote against Rahm, Daley, or the Chicago machine. Trump’s been running with that pack for a long time. v
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Jason Ware campaigns against Rahm Emanuel on the el. o SARAH-JI PHOTOGRAPHY
TRANSPORTATION
Transportation justice matters
How access, economic, and safety issues affect travel choices in communities of color By JOHN GREENFIELD
W
hen it comes to improving Chicago transportation, city officials and advocates often focus on infrastructure, reasoning that street redesigns, public transit improvements, and better pedestrian and bike facilities will help make travel safer and more convenient for all residents. But decision makers sometimes overlook issues that are specific to communities of color on the south and west sides. Many of these areas have poor transit service, unsafe conditions for walking, and limited or no access to bikeways and Divvy stations. Transportation costs that may seem trivial to higher-income residents can be significant for poor and working-class people. And street crime and police harassment—problems that disproportionately affect African-Americans and Latinos—can be major factors in their travel decisions. To get some perspective on these topics, I spoke with two leaders associated with Chicago’s Black Lives Matter movement: Charlene Carruthers, national director of the Black Youth Project 100, and Jason Ware, an organizer with the #LetUsBreathe Collective. (We’ll hear from Latino activists in a future column.) “I do believe transportation access is an element of social justice,” Carruthers says. For starters, large segments of the south and west sides lack good access to the el system. That directly affects some of her group’s members, who have to make multiple CTA transfers to access downtown meetings. “Meanwhile, we know that public transportation is often concentrated in areas where economically advantaged people live,” she says. “That makes it harder for low-income people to access jobs, school, and activities.” Limited CTA service hours can also be a
problem in underserved communities, Ware notes. “While the Red and Blue Lines run 24 hours, the Green Line, and especially the Pink Line, stop running very early,” he says. “That makes it hard for people in Little Village and North Lawndale to get places at night.” Both activists also highlighted public transit problems specific to African-American teens. Chicago Public Schools students, around 38 percent of whom are black, are issued reduced-fare cards that get them on CTA buses and trains for 75 cents. Ware and Carruthers say they’ve witnessed and/or heard about incidents in which black teens who didn’t have a reduced-fare card or student ID with them were barred from taking advantage of the discount, even though some of these students were wearing school uniforms at the time. In a statement, CTA spokesman Jeff Tolman said that if a child who looks to be of elementary age doesn’t have a student fare card or ID with them, the bus driver or customer assistant can let them pay the reduced fare, but he indicated that teens who lack these items are required to pay full price. However, Tolman also said that there haven’t been enough reported incidents of teens trying get the discount without the proper fare card or ID to suggest that this is a routine problem. Still, Ware argues that this issue could be avoided if the CTA just gave free fare to CPS students. Even the reduced CPS fare can total a few hundred dollars a school year, and it’s not uncommon for students to ask him to tap his Ventra card to get them into the system, he says. “It could have a lot of impact if the city just gave every CPS student free fare,” he says. Along with problems with el and bus service, many lower-income communities have
little or no access to bike lanes, paths, and bike share, even with Divvy’s recent south- and west-side expansion. On the other hand, Ware says, poor and working-class residents may view new bike lanes and transit stations as harbingers of gentrification that could force them from their homes. For example, he notes that the $203 million revamp of the Wilson Red Line stop will make economically diverse Uptown more attractive to higher-income folks who want easy rail access to their downtown offices. It’s therefore important for the city make sure that black and brown communities are on board before reconfiguring streets to make room for bike lanes, Carruthers argues. “You have to ask, who wanted the bike lane—was it the neighborhood or just city officials making plans for newcomers?” she says. “Black people ride bikes too. But bike lanes, like new coffee shops, can be seen as markers of gentrification, so I think people have a right to be concerned.” The city’s transportation department generally does seek input and approval from local stakeholders before making major roadway changes. But in the past, opposition from neighborhood leaders and/or residents threw a wrench in plans for new bikeways on King Drive in Bronzeville, Division Street in Humboldt Park, and Independence Boulevard in West Garfield Park. Some advocates might disagree about whether these cases were missed opportunities to improve safety, or examples of the city yielding to the will of the community. Likewise, Carruthers and Ware say the city should proceed with caution when implementing its Vision Zero plan, which will lay out a strategy to eliminate all Chicago traffic fatalities by 2026.
“How do we make sure the enforcement doesn’t disproportionately affect communities of color?” Carruthers asks. “There are already more police in these communities than other parts of the city, and the mayor is hiring hundreds more officers,” Carruthers says. “Giving more resources to the police does not make brown and black neighborhoods safer— investments in education, jobs, and mental health do.” Chicago Department of Transportation spokesman Mike Claffey has said Vision Zero efforts will, in fact, be concentrated in the neighborhoods that are disproportionately impacted by severe crashes, largely lowerincome neighborhoods on the south and west sides. But beyond public transit and biking, from ta lk ing to these two activ ists, it sounds like the biggest discrepancies in the way white folks and people of color experience transportation and public space may occur when they’re pedestrians. Ware said his students’ route decisions are shaped by gang territory borders, and they might avoid standing on certain corners to avoid being confronted by police. “I’m fortunate because I drive nowadays,” Carruthers says. “But people who don’t drive don’t have a choice. They risk being harassed, violated, or even killed. I may sound very dramatic, but these are all the things that happen to black people at the hands of police in Chicago.” The CPD didn’t provide a response to Carruthers’s statements before press time. And while Donald Trump recently called for introducing New York-style stop-and-frisk policing to Chicago as a solution to our city’s gun violence epidemic, Carruthers says this is already the de facto policy in communities of color, noting, for example, that the rate at which African-American pedestrians are stopped and ticketed for minor marijuana possession has been shown to be exponentially higher than that for whites. From talking to Carruthers and Ware, the takeaway for local walking, biking, and transit advocates is clear. We’re not going to achieve real transportation equity in Chicago without taking into account the other social justice issues many African-American and Latino residents have to deal with on a daily basis. v
John Greenfield edits the transportation news website Streetsblog Chicago. ß @greenfieldjohn
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 13
A BRIEF, WONDROUS HISTORY OF CHICAGO MAGIC
New York had Broadway. LA had Hollywood. Chicago had magic. By DAVID WITTER
H
arry Houdini is sitting cross-legged playing a flute at the entrance to the Tunisian Village at Chicago’s 1893 World’s Fair. With his curly hair, it takes just a little dark makeup and a white, robelike wrap to transform the 19-year-old, who was born to Jewish parents in Budapest, into a Hindu fakir attracting visitors to the exhibit. When he’s not performing in costume, Houdini wanders the Midway Plaisance, swallowing and regurgitating sewing thread and needles to amazed audiences for tips. On the same stretch, Howard Thurston, wearing a suit and hat, is standing in front of the re-creation of a West African village. The 24-year-old calls out to passersby, promising that for a small fee they can see “savage” African dancers in jungle garb. When not shilling for the sideshow, Thurston too has a side hustle, including a card trick in which he changes suits with a wave of his hand. As the story goes, the budding illusionists chance upon each other somewhere on the midway and compare cards, shells, and handkerchiefs. Less than 20 years later, the once-impoverished young men would be the rival top magicians in the world, staging lavish touring productions in front of sold-out crowds. The serendipitous meeting of Houdini and Thurston at the World’s Columbian Exposition signaled the dawn of a luminous era of magic in Chicago. The period from 1890 to 1929 was the so-called golden age of magic in America, when Houdini, Thurston, Chicago native Harry Blackstone Sr., and others drew crowds to vaudeville houses and major theaters, and mounted enormous tent shows on tours across the country and around the world. In 1898, a still-unknown Houdini executed an elaborate stunt that helped him begin
14 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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building his legend: placed in shackles and leg irons and locked in a jail cell in the South Loop Levee District, he miraculously managed to free himself in what was the first of a series of prison breaks. This was also a popular period for seances, which Houdini reviled after he tried unsuccessfully to contact his recently deceased mother through a medium. The incident gave rise to the magician’s crusade to expose so-called spiritualists as frauds, which included making raids on the sites where they practiced. While in Chicago for a performance in March 1926, Houdini targeted spiritualist Minnie Reichert. He and his team reportedly brought along a photographer from the Chicago American, which ran a front-page story the next day headlined “Photo Proves Houdini Charge of Seance Fakes.” If Houdini and Thurston were the Beatles and Rolling Stones of the era, Blackstone could be compared to Led Zeppelin or the Who. Born Harry Bouton in Chicago in 1885, Blackstone by all accounts took his stage name from the Blackstone Hotel in the South Loop. A tall man with a wild shock of brown hair, he resembled an ostrich, and his magic was equally unusual. His repertoire included a vanishing horse, a dancing handkerchief, and a lightbulb that floated out into the audience. In a bid to outdo Houdini, Blackstone added elements of suspense and danger to his shows, including the famous lady-inthe-box trick. “While most magicians used a handsaw, which could easily be manipulated, Blackstone used an electric buzz saw,” Jeff Taylor, director of the American Museum of Magic in Marshall, Michigan, told me. “This was not only faster, more dangerous and unpredictable, but it made that high-pitched buzzing noise, which only added to the overall drama on stage.” The death of Houdini on Halloween in 1926, the introduction of talking films in 1927, and the Great Depression largely put an end to the grand magic tours of this golden age. But after World War II, the nation’s economy boomed, and Chicago boasted a population flush with disposable income and seeking amusement. As Broadway and national radio production were to New York City and Hollywood film production and movie stars were to Los Angeles, magicians and magic clubs helped fill out Chicago’s entertainment industry. Much of the localized boom time of the 1950s and ’60s featured “close-up magic,”
a style pioneered in Chicago that eschewed the large props and machinery of the magic caravans in favor of smaller illusions such as levitating cards, disappearing objects, and doves emerging from handkerchiefs. All the acts could be easily performed at a table or before an intimate crowd in a nightclub. During this time magicians like Bert Allerton, Clark “the Senator” Crandall, Jack Kodell, Celeste Evans, and many others filled clubs like the Empire Room in the Palmer House Hotel and the Pump Room in the Gold Coast. The Loop was also crowded with magic shops selling items from wands and card decks to prepackaged tricks. “When I was boy I would take the train from Logan Square, and at Randolph and Dearborn were three magic stores—Ireland’s, Joe Berg, and Abbott’s,” Eugene Burger, an accomplished magician and elder statesman of Chicago magic, once told me. “You also had National Magic Company, which was at the mezzanine of the Palmer House. . . . One other place was the Treasure Chest, located near Randolph and Dearborn. The shop had big windows and attracted a lot of tourists.” In midcentury Chicago, magic also flourished on the north side. The seminal store Magic Inc. moved in the early 1960s from downtown to its longtime location in Lincoln Square. During the day, the shop’s late co-owner Jay Marshall, dean of the Society of American Magicians, held court with his wife, Frances Ireland, who established “Magigals,” an organization for female magicians with Houdini’s widow, Bess. As the sun went down, the dinnertime crowd moved to Schulien’s (now O’Donovan’s) in North Center, where owner Matt Schulien amazed customers with his trademark trick: a customer picked a card that Schulien reinserted back into the deck, which he then threw against the wall, the customer’s card astoundingly remaining stuck while the rest cascaded to the floor. As the night grew darker and the neon flashed brighter, the crowd would migrate to the New York Lounge, which was located on Lincoln between Carmen and Winnemac Avenues. “When it was really late at night,” Burger has said, “the place you took your girlfriend to at 2 AM and didn’t leave until four in the morning was the New York Lounge.” It was here that Al Andrucci, known by the stage name Heba Haba Al and legendary J
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Chicago Magic continued from 15 for his risque humor, held court. In his most famous gag, he’d draw a chosen audience member’s initials on an ice cube with a pencil, drop the ice cube in a glass, and tell the person to palm the opening of the glass. Once the ice had melted, the initials would appear on the person’s palm. Perhaps the most famous magician of this era was Marshall Brodien. A Chicago native, Brodien got his start as a barker for the freak show at Riverview Amusement Park. But he became a national celebrity during his 20-year stint as Wizzo the Wizard on Bozo’s Circus and as the inventor of TV Magic Cards, which helped bring magic into the homes of baby boomers. During the 70s, the counterculture took hold of magic, once again in Chicago. “In the 1970s there was a backlash, as for many magic had become a man in a tuxedo, a series of jokes, a trick or two, kind of like a caricature from the movie The Incredible Burt Wonderstone,” says Neil Tobin, the local magician and necromancer. Enter Tony Andruzzi, one of the pioneers of a style known as bizarre magic. Along with his wife, Gloria Jacobson (who performed as Vampira), Burger, and others, Andruzzi began incorporating spiritualism, mystery, stage props like candles and skulls, and eerie music into his act in the early 70s. Andruzzi’s repertoire included plunging a needle through his hand without drawing blood, turning a skeleton key without touching it, and making a rock move as if it were breathing. While the illusions seen on Chicago’s stages today may not be quite as strange as those in Andruzzi’s era, a new generation seems to be falling under the spell of live magic as it becomes a more viable part of the city’s nightlife culture. In the House Theatre’s Death and Harry Houdini—which just finished its fifth run this summer—audiences gasped as the incomparable Dennis Watkins hung upside down, handcuffed, chained, and shackled in a tankful of water as he re-created Houdini’s Chinese Water Torture Cell, perhaps the magician’s most famous escape. The Chicago Magic Lounge, which opened in Uptown in early 2015, is playing a key role in reintroducing the city to its storied tradition of magic bars with a combination of close-up performers and classic cocktails in a cabaret atmosphere. “Magic is not just for kids,”
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“IN THE 1970s THERE WAS A BACKLASH, AS FOR MANY MAGIC HAD BECOME A MAN IN A TUXEDO, A TRICK OR TWO, KIND OF LIKE A CARICATURE FROM THE MOVIE THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE.” —Neil Tobin, magician and necromancer
Magic Lounge cofounder Joey Cranford says. “Magic and especially tableside magic, which was born in Chicago, is something you can see with your very eyes. Seeing one hour of magic up close is something that’s unlike anything else in entertainment.” After more than 50 years in Lincoln Square, Magic Inc. is experiencing a reawakening at its new location on Lawrence Avenue in Ravenswood; its onsite venue, the Jasper Theater, is the scene of shows and lectures by various hypnotists, mind benders, and conjurers. The shop’s staff have been around long enough to see the changes, and they’re witnessing a new crop of magic fans entering the store. “There has been a resurgence,” says Jay Collen, a magician who’s been a staff demonstrator at Magic Inc. for 12 years. “Just as television shows with David Copperfield or Penn & Teller brought in the last generation, for this new generation of fans YouTube and the Internet have been a great tool to generate interest. But once your imagination has been stirred by what you see on the screen, it’s only natural that you would want to see the real thing live. In this way magic is like a phoenix. Every time you think it’s dead, magic itself becomes magically reborn.” v
David Witter is the author of Chicago Magic: A History of Stagecraft and Spectacle (The History Press, 2013).
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USING HER ILLUSIONS Self-styled “experiential illusionist” Jeanette Andrews is attempting an ambitious trick: transforming magic into a cerebral art form. By RYAN SMITH
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- Ryan Duggan
look of mild puzzlement sweeps over the faces of several partygoers who’ve wandered into the secondfloor ballroom of a Hyatt in the Loop. It’s a warm evening in September, and the group has been sipping drinks in a crowded alley outside the hotel, where a DJ spins as part of the Chicago Loop Alliance’s pop-up event series Activate. They’ve come to see a magician perform, but there’s no sign of a flamboyant man in vest and no stage to be seen, not even a place to sit. Instead Jeanette Andrews, a diminutive red-haired woman in a plain black dress, invites them over to a table covered with playing cards and tiny bottles of perfume and proceeds to do a magic trick. “Magic trick” undersells it. The performance piece, which Andrews labels Tactile Taste Test, feels like a history lesson, a TED talk, a thought experiment, and a card trick all wrapped into one. The ten-minute routine—broken up into two five-minute sessions an hour apart—begins with Andrews’s request for the group to ponder their favorite childhood breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert, and then scrawl their thoughts on the faces of four playing cards. She tells them to find a corresponding smell from the two dozen or so bottles containing various scents and rub the residue on one on the cards to create what Andrews describes to them as “an abstract version of their favorite meals.” She briefly lectures about the science of olfactory perception. She quotes 18th-century Scottish writer James Boswell and Helen Keller (“Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived”), then instructs everyone to rip their cards in half and place one piece in their pocket. After an elaborate series of shuffles and tosses of card halves that leaves each
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leaves each audience member with a second piece, participants reach into their pockets and find—to their surprise and delight—that the two halves match perfectly—with the words and artificial smell intact. “Whoa, how did you do that?” exclaims a woman in a gleaming emerald-colored dress and high heels. Andrews doesn’t respond with an elaborate bow or disappear behind a red curtain. She simply flashes a cordial smile, thanks the audience for their attention, and prepares for the next group. “I’m an artist performing here tonight and I want you to participate in a magic trick that you will make happen with your own hands,” Andrews explains as the pack of onlookers approaches an hour later. Artist? It’s a label the 26-year-old uses deliberately and with care. After working as a paid magician since childhood, Andrews is now in the midst of the most ambitious sleight-of-hand feat of her career: once a more traditional trickster, she’s redefining herself as a contemporary illusionist and artist— someone whose act is more suited to the halls of museums and fine art galleries than kids’ birthday parties or chintzy theaters on the Vegas strip. “It’s ground I’m trying to navigate, and I can feel it shifting,” she tells me. “The thing is, a lot of what I’m doing these days doesn’t fit the stereotypes people have about magic. On a daily basis, people are still like ‘Oh, you have a rabbit?’ ” she says. “I view magic and what I do as an artistic medium in the same way a sculptor would a piece of marble. It’s a conduit I use to explore ideas.” “Experiential illusionism” is the term Andrews has coined to describe her personal brand of magic. She claims she’s the world’s only practitioner. Eschewing the classic form of dazzling audiences with an extended string of tricks, she marries illusions with audience interaction while seamlessly interweaving folklore and poetry and facts from the sciences, philosophy, and psychology. One of her biggest influences isn’t even a magician: the Danish-Icelandic installation artist Olafur Eliasson whose solo show, “Take Your Time,” she attended in 2009 at the Museum of Contemporary Art. “That changed how I saw everything,” she says. “He was coming at it from a phenomenological background, which was my interest
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“I VIEW MAGIC AND WHAT I DO AS AN ARTISTIC MEDIUM IN THE SAME WAY A SCULPTOR WOULD A PIECE OF MARBLE. IT’S A CONDUIT I USE TO EXPLORE IDEAS.” —Jeanette Andrews
in philosophy as well, and so I was seeing these visual enactions of so many concepts that I was interested in. But here was somebody that was really bringing them to life in a beautiful way . . . sort of, how do we engage groups of people, how do we create environments of people, how do we create a mood?” During her own MCA show in April called “Thresholds,” Andrews paired a series of illusions with each of the five senses. She began by pouring what appeared to be water from a clear bottle into a perfume bottle while relating a fable involving a French perfumer from a bygone era. Meanwhile audience members wrote their favorite scents on pieces of paper and handed them to Andrews, who seemingly chose one out of the stack at random—peppermint bark. She then sprayed some of the contents of the bottle into the air. The 300 people huddled into the first-floor lobby gasped and applauded: the mist smelled like peppermint candy. “She’s not just pulling out a hokey bag of tricks,” says Kristen Kaniewski, visitor services manager for the MCA. “She thinks about the show very holistically and is more interested in creating an experience rather than just making something flash or disappear.” That experience is a clever blend of truth and deception. Andrews will explain how olfactory glands work while simultaneously faking out those of her audience. Magic tricks and science might seem unlikely partners, but Andrews view the two as complementary.
“To me what’s interesting is what sparks our curiosity, our creativity. There’s so much in the world we don’t understand. Scientists I know talk about something like dark matter and . . . we don’t know hardly anything about it,” she says. “Most people are going to look at what I do and clearly know I don’t have supernatural ability, but they know there’s some sort of way that the illusion is being accomplished. And so there must be more than what meets the eye. So then the question becomes, ‘What is that?’” That sort of philosophical inquiry is a shift for Andrews. Growing up in the western suburbs, she began performing a more traditional kind of magic in 1994 at the age of four after she watched a Siegfried and Roy TV special. “I was amazed,” she says. “I sat there and I was like, ‘This is what I’m going to do for the rest of my life.’ ” She wrote the magic duo a one-sentence letter thanking them for inspiring her to be magician, and they replied with an offer of complimentary tickets to their Vegas show and a backstage tour, which she later took them up on. Andrews now cites her friendship with the famed magicians as one of the earliest signs that she was on the right path. She also proved a quick study, landing her first paid gig with the Butterfield Park District at age six performing for four-year-olds. The following year she was among a handful of national finalists competing for an appearance on a junior-magician-themed box of Kellogg’s Razzle Dazzle Rice Krispies. By age 14, she’d earned a membership in the International Brotherhood of Magicians on the strength of a sponsorship nod from Siegfried and Roy. Through her teenage years, she performed a fairly standard act, which she describes as “trick-trick-trick.” “I did all the stuff with the big boxes and all the really flashy tricks,” she says. “But then I just kind of realized I’m not a flashy person. I’m just not. It was fitting I didn’t win the Rice Krispies contest, because I’ve got no razzle-dazzle.” She was first inspired to alter her approach in 2004 after attending a Society of American Magicians conference in Saint Louis, where she heard German magician Topas talk about magic styles in terms of a crime scene: the killer, the victim, and the witness. The killer, according to Topas, is the David Copperfield-type figure perpetrating magic on the audience. The victims are typically co-
medic magicians who pretend the magic is out of control and it’s bad for them. The witness coexists with the phenomena and acts as a facilitator for the experience. Andrews realized she wanted to define herself as the witness, the rarest breed of magician because it involves the least amount of glory. “Coming out of years of being squarely in the entertainment industry, where you are a brand, it’s a change,” she says. “I love watching the performers, the rock-star types. But in these last two years I’ve moved more into this arts sector, where it’s not about you or your ego, it’s about your ideas. I’m not interested in doing this for my ego, I’m interested in the work for the work’s sake.” Not that she’s completely abandoned all vestiges of her old act. Her recent “Thresholds” shows closed with a trick she’s been performing for 18 years: plucking a petal from a rose, dropping it into a wine glass, and transforming it into a chicken’s egg. Once just a trick, it’s now part of a larger conceptual piece she’s dubbed Photosynthesis: Reexamined. Andrews says her intention is to elevate magic, to rid it of the frivolous elements that have reduced the form in the popular imagination to a punch line and restore to it the prestige it enjoyed in previous centuries. It’s a formidable objective, but there are signs that she’s making headway. In addition to having shows earlier this year at the MCA and the Birmingham Museum of Art, Andrews has an ongoing residency at the Pilsen arts organization High Concept Laboratories, a studio space she’s using to develop a new act with the working title Audiofaction, which she says will “explore the connection between sound, scent, and stories.” She’ll also be presenting an existing piece on November 5 during High Concept Labs’ fall open house. In January, she’ll begin a ten-day residency at LA’s Institute for Art and Olfaction, where she’ll further research and develop scent components for future illusions. In the end, Andrews hopes her work will help audiences recognize the world—not herself—as magic. “The idea for me is to try to create these small moments of wonder that point to the everyday deeply wondrous experience we live in,” she says. “If I can, for whatever brief moment of time, succeed in accomplishing that, I would die happy.” v
ß @RyanSmithWriter
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FIVE MAGIC SHOWS TO SEE NOW
THE MAGIC PARLOUR This hour-long magic show is exactly what it should be: funny, lively, intimate, and utterly baffling. House Theatre of Chicago member Dennis Watkins blends quickwitted improv and physical comedy with freewheeling patter as he performs classic illusions. Though his sleight of hand is impossibly subtle, it was the mind-reading tricks that seemed to have drawn several inquisitive skeptics back for another look on the night I attended. A curio-shop intimacy and cash bar encourage audience participation, and Watkins, with his Eagle Scout looks, clearly takes a mischievous pleasure in the unexpected. Just let your cell phone go off during the show and see what kind of fun he has. —KEITH GRIFFITH Open run: Fri 7:30 and 9:30 PM; Sat 4:30, 7:30, and 9:30 PM, Palmer House Hilton, 17 E. Monroe, 773-769-3832, themagicparlourchicago.com, $79.
- Ryan Duggan
CHICAGO MAGIC LOUNGE The Chicago Magic Lounge takes inspiration from the historic bars specializing in close-up or tableside magic that prospered alongside the city’s trick shops in the 1940s. Magicians work the crowd from the floor, moving from table to table to perform their tricks as opposed to sweating alone beneath a spotlight onstage. However there’s also
stage magic and bar magic— the venerable Bob Schulien, great-grandson to magic innovator Matt Schulien, was bartending when I visited last year. You’re invited to let the magicians wandering the floor greet you with an illusion at your table, and the host might encourage you to approach the bar for some card-trick sleight of hand—all between sets by the main-stage headliner. —KEVIN WARWICK Open run: Thu 7:30 PM, Sat at 7 PM, Uptown Underground, chicagomagiclounge. com, $27.50-$46.50. 21+
THE MAGIC CABARET Once upon a time, Chicago was a magic town. You could buy tricks and apparatus at Marshall Field’s and get a full-blown magic show with your dinner at Schulien’s. The waiters there invented what became known as the Chicago style of magic. It was up-close and personal, not too grand, but still astonishing, and best of all, it made the audience part
of the show. David Parr and Joe Diamond re-create this golden age in The Magic Cabaret, using homely objects like books and lightbulbs and (naturally) playing cards to bring their stories of old-time magic to life. The result is by turns funny, surprising, and spooky. But here’s the most amazing part: it really is fun for the whole family, not just the kids. —AIMEE LEVITT Open run: Wed 8 PM, Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln, magiccabaret. com, $20.
MAGIC CHICAGO The monthly showcase presents a mix of well-respected locals and touring magicians. Upcoming headliners include Kenrick “Ice” McDonald, whose November 2 set is sure to be packed with dove illusions, and the veteran mentalist Max Maven on December 7. Open run: first Wed of the month, 7:30 PM, Stage 773, 1225 W. Belmont, magicchicagoshow.com, $25.
O’DONOVAN’S A longtime home of Chicago bar magic, the former Schulien’s keeps the tradition alive with a roster of close-up magic performers providing tableside entertainment three days a week. Stalwart master magician Al James performs on Fridays, while a handful of other sleightof-hand artists fill in on Saturdays and Sundays. Open run: Fri-Sat 6-10 PM, Sun 5-9 PM, 1801 W. Irving Park, 773-4782100. F v
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ALL THAT AND A BAG OF T
From cards to coins to expert advice, Magic Inc. is Chicago’s one-stop shop for wannabe and veteran magicians. By BECCA JAMES | Illustrations by RYAN DUGGAN
Magic Inc. 1838 W. Lawrence 773-334-2855 magicinc.net
Red-Hot Prediction
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agic Inc. has more than a few tricks up its sleeve. Set foot inside the shop and you’re quickly greeted by affable clerks who also happen to be highly skilled magicians ready to demonstrate almost any illusion. On a given day, tricksters stop in to socialize and kill time comparing card-shuff ling techniques, collectors breeze in on a hunt for rare magic books, and wide-eyed children cross the threshold to experience the wonder of magic— and its attendant accessories—for the first time. The store claims to be “oldest continuously family-run magic shop in North America.” Original owner Laurie Ireland founded the shop downtown as Ireland Magic Company in 1926. After Laurie’s death, his wife, Frances, continued to run the business before partnering with her second husband, Jay Marshall. The couple, now both deceased, relocated the store in the early 1960s to Lincoln Square. It remained there until earlier this year when current owner Sandy Marshall, son of Jay and Frances, moved the shop to Ravenswood. The impressiveness of Magic Inc.’s longevity is outmatched only by its deep inventory, estimated to total some 10,000 items. Below are some of the most classic, novel, and interesting products Magic Inc. has to offer, plucked from the shelves by company manager Pedro Nieves-Bosque.
ß @WreckaFlames 20 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
Svengali Deck
Card-Toon
This cost-effective deck of cards can be used to perform upward of 125 card tricks. Rebranded by Wizzo the Wizard—from WGNTV’s Bozo’s Circus and The Bozo Show—in 1970 as TV Magic Cards, the Svengali deck has been sold by the millions worldwide for more than 75 years. $11.95
Created by acclaimed magician Dan Harlan, this trick has a spectator name any card before the magician shuffles the deck flip-book style, resulting in an animated stick-figure magician pulling a card from his top hat and turning it over to reveal—what else?— the spectator’s chosen card. $19.95
Clipped Scam Created by local magician Luis Carreon, this play on the classic three-card monte scheme involving an engaging series of sleights of hand is sure to fool even the most assured spectator into thinking he can locate his card—but wait, it’s in the magician’s pocket. $14.95
Betcha! How To Win Free Drinks For Life Written by infamous con man Simon Lovell—with a forward by the FBI agent assigned to follow him—this book is perfect for teaching you how to score drinks when you’re strapped for cash. The trick? You need to endear yourself to your audience, something Lovell is an expert at. $25
There’s nothing more embarrassing for a magician than asking “Is this your card?” only to be told “No.” But that momentary mistake becomes part of the trick when two wrongly chosen cards are turned over to reveal the number and suit of the correct card scrawled on the backs of the incorrect cards. $19.95
The Original Matchbox Penetration After this product had a two-year absence from the market, Magic Inc. purchased the global manufacturing and distribution rights from Barcelonabased magic shop Selecciones Mágicas to bring this impressive sleight-of-hand trick back so you can transform a matchbox from empty to filled by a brick of gold. $150
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How To: Fix Crepe Skin
Klaus The Mouse Don’t be fooled by Klaus’s slight appearance. As a magician’s assistant, the wind-up rodent works with any poker-size deck of cards to locate a spectator’s card, separating it from the rest of the deck. $34.95
6241 N BROADWAY • CHICAGO MON-SAT 11-7 • SUN 12-7 773-942-6522
Priceless The magician begins by asking, “How much do you think I paid for this [jacket/shirt/pair of pants]?” and with this trick’s array of gimmickry is able to instantly make any price quoted appear on a sale tag (complete with security feature) attached to said item of clothing. $59.95
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Mark Southworth’s Double Cross The magician has the spectator make a fist. He then draws an X on his palm using a special marker, closes his fist, and reopens it to reveal the mark is gone. The spectator opens his hand and finds the X has magically transfered to his palm. $59.95
FRIDAY & SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28TH & 29TH at Spirit of God Fellowship Hall, 16350 S. State Street, South Holland, IL
Scotch And Soda In this classic, best-selling trick, the silver and copper coins provided do most of the work, allowing the magician to appear to switch them in the spectator’s closed hand. $29.95
ALSO CHECK OUT THESE OTHER MAGIC SHOPS: Ash’s Magic Shop 4955 N. Western 773-271-4030 ashsmagic.com
Midwest Magic 9706 Franklin Ave., Franklin Park 847-455-4288 midwestmagic.net/shop
(One block south of 159th Street)
Friday 10AM - 4PM • Saturday 10AM - 2PM Some NEW (with Tags) & gently worn Designer, High end clothing for every occasion - Petite thru Plus Size FALL CLOTHING PROM DRESSES • CASUAL & BUSINESS ATTIRE FALL JACKETS & COATS • JEWELRY • SHOES AND BOOTS FORMAL WEAR • WINTER COATS • PURSES VISA, MASTERCARD & DISCOVER ACCEPTED All proceeds will support Restoration Ministries of Harvey and our life changing programs for at risk youth, recovering addicts and families struggling in poverty.
www.restorationministries.net OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 21
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- Ryan Duggan
BEHIND THE MAGIC CURTAIN
The secrets of Chicago’s not-so-secret society of magicians By KEVIN WARWICK 22 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
n a Thursday night in late September, men clad in bow ties and black vests work the floor of Uptown’s Chicago Magic Lounge like street hustlers, snaking through a grid of tables to swoop in on audiences of two or three at a time. At one table, a magician turns two coins into three within a woman’s clenched fist. Ten paces away a man’s chosen card transports from the deck into a smirking magician’s pocket. The Lounge, which opened early last year, is a throwback to Chicago’s many magic bars of yore—places like Schulien’s, the New York Lounge, and Little Bit O’ Magic, where performers practiced a particular form called close-up magic that’s done tableside in front of the onlookers’ faces. The draw is the thrill of being fooled by simple sleight of hand, the Isthis-your-card?-type illusions. What’s particularly special about the Magic Lounge is that it doubles as a kind of incubator. Whenever there’s a break in the action during the club’s Thursday- and Saturday-night stage shows, off-the-clock magicians—many of them among the Magic Lounge’s roster of 30 or so private members and each undoubtedly with a deck of cards in his pocket—cluster along the periphery of the bar to experiment with material on their peers, who most appreciate the rigors of the craft and who are most difficult to impress. Once the audience has gone, after-hours “sessions” overtake the club. Those in attendance workshop and talk shop with panache. “If you’ve got a new flourish and you want to do it, the late-night session is the time,” Magic Lounge host and cofounder Joey Cranford says. “That’s when magicians get together and share the secrets of what they all know.” When Cranford, who’s 39, opened the Lounge with fellow magic enthusiasts, he intended it as a clubhouse for magicians, a hideaway where tricks are shared and routines are sharpened offstage. “Our two-point mission is: (1) to reintroduce the public to this style of magic, and (2) to create both a community for magicians and a nightlife experience,” he says. On this particular Thursday, the showcase’s headliner is Eric Jones, a Philadelphia magician known for his coin work, which he displayed last year on an episode of the CW network’s Penn & Teller: Fool Us. Prior to the lounge’s stage show—while paid, seated customers are being charmed by the posse of magicians working the tables—there are side sessions happening among magicians lining the back of the room. Just below a VIP perch accessed via a flight
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of stairs, local magician Justin Purcell—who does a regular Tuesday-night gig at Logan Arcade—draws the focus of chatty card artist Simon Black. Purcell, 31, shows off the progress he’s made on a “color change” trick Black taught him a while back, in which, with a wave of the hand, a two of clubs becomes a queen of hearts, which becomes an ace of spades, and so on. In front of the long, rustic wood bar, James Sanden, a gregarious fortysomething and Lounge regular, works a deck for an audience of Danny Rudnick (known onstage as Mister Danny) and hobbyist Al Koslow, who seems tickled just to be in on the action. Dead center in the club’s back row, Eugene Burger— revered both as a longtime sage of close-up magic and keeper of a wizardlike beard—remains seated at his throne while the action whirls around him. The thrum of the room feels as much dictated by what’s happening away from the curtain as what’s happening directly in front of it. At one point even Jones, the night’s star, threads his way through the throng, and is soon overheard demanding, “I need to have a deck of cards in my hand.” THE MAGIC LOUNGE and the spirit of community that enlivens it originated in 2014 with an invite-only back-room club based at Magic Inc., a vital incubator in its own right as one of the few surviving brick-and-mortar trick stores. (“During the day, you can go to a magic shop, sit around with magicians and bullshit,” Cranford says of the stores’ role.) John Sturk, the Magic Lounge’s 33-year-old house piano player and one of its cofounders, was complaining about the lack of participation in more established fraternal organizations such as the International Brotherhood of Magicians and the Society of American Magicians (“the world’s oldest magic organization,” having been founded in 1902). “The same two or three people would take center stage while everyone else became spectators and just sat in the back to watch it like a show,” Sturk says. “I wanted to be able to perform stuff I was working on to other magicians and get coaching and feedback—I wanted us all to help one another.” Cranford was eventually initiated into the Magic Inc.-based fraternity, which remained nameless though its few members occasionally referred to it as the Session Club. It wasn’t long before he endeared himself to Sturk, who admits that during their first meeting he was “fooled pretty good” by one of Cranford’s card tricks. Cranford says being part of a devoted fellowship of magicians was invaluable: “One
week we’d work on how to do a torn-andrestored newspaper [trick] eight different ways,” he says, “the next we’d talk about how to make a mouth coil,” typically a tightly packed multicolored streamer that a magician will slowly draw out of his mouth. “John brought in books that discussed ways to do a trick and we’d make the prop instead of having to buy it.” After about a year, Cranford stopped practicing magic altogether and began working full bore on developing the Magic Lounge—which would be housed in the Uptown Underground space—while reporting back about the progress to Sturk and the other partners—magicians Terrence Francisco, Mike Rhodes, and the aforementioned Simon Black. Early on he met to discuss the concept with Bill Weimer, a magician and author of Now You See Them, Now You Don’t, a memoir about his time in Chicago’s magic-bar scene in the 1970s through the ’90s. Cranford says he began to realize the potential for a club to draw on the city’s significant magic legacy and breathe new life into the present-day scene. The start-up capital for the club ultimately came from charter membership fees paid by magicians such as Bill Cook. Cook founded the Aces Magic Club in northwest-suburban Arlington Heights six years ago. (The suburbs, it turns out, are rife with magicians.) After separating from a club based at PJ’s Trick Shop, also in Arlington Heights, Cook began furthering the belief that it’s OK for magicians to share, to be conversational instead of competitive. “I wanted to focus on being well-rounded entertainers,” he says. “What are the basic fundamentals of card and coin magic? What clowns can we get to help us make balloon animals? How do you pack so the TSA won’t rifle through your stuff?” For Cook, who has spent time wooing television audiences and corporate clients such as Apple, GM, and McDonald’s, the idea that magic should be shrouded in secrecy is antiquated, even silly. “I’ll physically take the gimmick out and hand it to you,” he says. “I’m an open book.” Magicians commonly slog through lecture tours and industry conventions to peddle howto notes and DVDs—it’s part of the job, part of the hustle. So why attempt to hide the mechanics of a trick in plain sight when it can all too easily be replicated and/or appropriated? For Cook and like-minded members at the Lounge, magic is more about the wonder of the show. “I play this game called Spot the Thief,” he says. “Two magicians do a similar trick. One explains he came up with it while sitting at a traffic J
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ALSO PERFORMING: Daryl Nitz, Johnny Rodgers, Ann McGregor, Joe Policastro, Chuck Christiansen, Eric Schneider, Monique Moyet Visit Jenifer French’s official website: JennyLovesJazz.com
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MAGIC
continued from 21 light, a kind of divine intervention, while the other says, ‘Well, I did balloon art for 15 years.’ See, Batman has a more impressive backstory than Superman. Superman has innate superpowers; Batman had to suffer for his art.” The push for more transparency and solidarity among magicians has helped boost the member rolls of the Society of American Magicians, according to Sturk, who now heads the Chicago chapter. (Where he once felt detached from the organization, he now seems to believe the most effective way to make positive change is from inside the institution.) “Famous illusion designer Jim Steinmeyer had a great quote: ‘Magicians guard an empty safe.’ It’s not ‘How did they do it?’ The important thing is, ‘How did it make you feel?’” Sturk says. “Magic is not nearly as secretive as you imagine it to be, though that’s certainly part of the atmosphere.” Sturk traded on that mystique last year when he added a Freemason-like element to the SAM
24 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
“IF YOU’VE GOT A NEW FLOURISH AND YOU WANT TO DO IT, THE LATENIGHT SESSION IS THE TIME. THAT’S WHEN MAGICIANS GET TOGETHER AND SHARE THE SECRETS OF WHAT THEY ALL KNOW.” —Joey Cranford, Magic Lounge cofounder
membership process to stir interest among new recruits. He dug up the annual initiation ceremony used in the early 20th century—and even flew out to see it in action at a SAM chapter in LA. Sturk believes that as fraternal organizations such as the Elks and Rotary continue to see their membership numbers trending downward, adding some extra appeal for would-be members is a sound plan for survival. The secrecy surrounding the initiation ceremony, for one, plays to the curiosity of those outside of SAM’s usual orbit. Sturk refuses to discuss details of the rite and says that interlopers (journalists especially) aren’t allowed to attend. But he goes on to joke, “Membership to the Society of American Magicians is very complicated. You have to pay $45 to the national council and your check has to clear.” AFTER ERIC JONES’S headlining set ends and the spectators have all made their exit, the Magic Lounge’s after-hours conclave finally begins in earnest. The remaining magicians
scatter throughout the space and make themselves comfortable at the bar and tables, taking the opportunity to ham it up more than a few notches above the reasonable volume they maintained throughout the show. Francisco, the Lounge cofounder who also happens to be a coin specialist, bounces between groups, chewing scenery with each trick he executes. Meanwhile hesitant novices sit back in their chairs, arms crossed, letting the parade of one-upmanship unfold in front of them. But it seems it’s only a matter of time—and maybe a few beers—before a jittery, slightly buzzed newbie summons the courage to perform for his peers, uncertain if he’s going to get through the routine without revealing the secret, the one that everyone else in the room already knows. “It’s really not exclusive, because all you have to do is show up,” Sturk says of joining the fraternity of magicians. “Just learn one trick and, boom, you’re a magician.” v
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READER RECOMMENDED
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Northhalsted Halloween Parade o CHRIS BENTLEY
HALLOWEEN
Best tricks and treats of 2016 Bric-a-Brac’s Halloween Brunch The Empty Bottle hosts a Halloween brunch featuring food from Bite Cafe and spooky music spun by the owners of Bric-aBrac Records & Collectibles, Jen Lemasters and Nick Mayor. Sun 10/30, noon, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, 773-276-3600, emptybottle.com. F Bye Bye Liver: Drink or Treat Sketch comedy show Bye Bye Liver presents a Halloween performance and drinking game replete with Halloween-themed drinks and seasonal beers, a costume contest, bobbing for apples, and plenty of candy. Sat 10/29, 9 PM, Public House Theatre, 3914 N. Clark, 800650-6449, byebyeliver.com, $25. Day of the Dead Chicago Gather at Harrison Park for an event that remembers and celebrates the dead with festivities such as ofrendas (altars), pan de muerto (Day of the Dead bread), face painting, and crafts. This year features an interactive, animated ofrenda projected onto the museum wall. Sun 10/30, 3-8 PM, National Museum of Mexican Art, 1852 W. 19th, 312-738-1503, chicagodayofthedead.org. The Fame Monster Mash Chicago drag trio Sadhaus performs the music of Lady Gaga, “the Mother Monster.” Dress up as a Little Monster for the costume contest. Sun 10/30, 10 PM, Berlin, 954 W. Belmont, 773-348-4975, berlinchicago.com. Halloween Live Drawing by Rachal Duggan Have you ever wondered what you would look like as a witch, zombie, or ghost fart butt? Illustrator Rachal Duggan dispels the mystery with custom portraits in each theme. Sun 10/30, 2:30-4:30 PM, Comfort Station, 2579 N. Milwaukee, comfortstationprojects@gmail.com, comfortstationlogansquare.org, $5.
Hallowzine 2016 Chicago Zine Fest hosts a night of spooky readings, comics, and music from guests Jack Murphy, Jade Beach, Bianca Xunise, and Fresh2Death. Costumes are encouraged. Fri 10/28, 7 PM, the Chicago Publishers Resource Center, 858 N. Ashland, chicagozinefest.org, $5. Helltrap Nightmare 8: Halloween Helltrap Nightmare, the performance project that combines comedy and noise music, gets even more nightmarish for Halloween. Hosted by Sarah “Squirm” Sherman, the show’s eighth iteration features a haunted house plus performances from Melody Kamali, Rebecca O’Neal, and the Rat Boys. Sun 10/30, 9 PM-midnight, Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, 773-227-4433, hideoutchicago.com, $7. Hog-lloween Prepare to be haunted by the spirits of sows after sampling Frontier’s all-you-can-eat smoked Carolina-style pulled-pork sliders along with succotash, mac ’n’ cheese, and Rocky Mountain oysters. Mon 10/31, 6:30-9 PM, Frontier, 1072 N. Milwaukee, 773-7724322, thefrontierchicago.com, $15. La Casa de Santanas 2016 La Casa de Satanas hosts its annual performance-art-based haunted house featuring “violence, nudity, sexual content, and gore.” Fri 10/28, Sun 1-/30-Mon 10/31, 9 PM-midnight, 2058 W. 21st, 2058 W. 21st, lacasadesatanas.wixsite.com/satanas, $20. Little Bash of Horrors Bit Bash hosts a night of live music, food, drinks, and the chance to play spooky video games like the Brookhaven Experiment, Crawl, and Pony Island. Costumes are encouraged. Fri 10/28, 7-11 PM, Bottom Lounge, 1375 W. Lake, 312666-6775, bitbashchicago.com. A Memory Palace of Fear Theater Oobleck and ensemble member
Martha Bayne present a haunted house inspired by the spine-tingling minutiae of housing: eviction, foreclosure, mice, ghosts, etc. The “immersive theater installation” runs in installments of about 30 minutes each. 10/29-10/30: Sat 6-10 PM, Sun 1-5 PM, Silent Funny, 4106 W. Chicago, theateroobleck.com, $10 suggested donation.
LIT
Northalsted Halloween Parade More than 2,000 costumed Chicagoans march through Boystown for the parade’s 20th anniversary. It’s preceded by the Ruby Red Relay, in which local business owners race in drag for the Legacy Project. Mon 10/31, 7:3010:30 PM, Belmont and Halsted, northalsted.com.
By AIMEE LEVITT
Peek-A-Boo: Ooky Spooky Halloween Revue Burlesque group Kiss Kiss Cabaret brings back its Halloween show for the eighth year. Through 10/29: Fri-Sat 10 PM, Uptown Underground, 4707 N. Broadway, 773-867-1946, kisskisscabaret.com, $27.50. Scare You Very Much Stand-up Dave Helem and AMFM Magazine host a 90s-themed Halloween party and variety show. BYOB. Fri 10/28, 7-11 PM, Chicago Art Department, 1932 S. Halsted, #100, 312-226-8601, chicagoartdepartment.org. Too Much Fright Makes the Baby Go Blind The Halloween variation of the long-running Neo-Futurist show featuring 30 plays in 60 minutes. “Expect dark humor, heavy metal, and existential dread.” Sun 10/30, 10:30 PM, Neo-Futurarium, 5153 N. Ashland, 773-275-5255, neofuturists.org, $20. 203 Fear Street: All Saints + Souls DJs Nick Castle and the Golden Pony play alongside slasher films in the Commons Club. Special Halloween drinks and DJs Little Boots, the Hood Internet, and Rocktapussy keep the party going on the Cerise rooftop lounge. Sat 10/29, 9 PM, the Commons Club, 203 N. Wabash, 312-940-4400, virginhotels.com/the-commonsclub, $20. Whores of Horror: Freakshow Uptown Underground hosts a night of drinks and drag performances by Anita Jon, Ashley Morgan, Dixie Deveraux, Helena Handbasket, Juan M. Wett, Vivian Dejour, and cohost Coco Sho-Nell. Fri 10/28, 8 PM, Uptown Underground, 4707 N. Broadway, 773-867-1946, uptownunderground.net, $10 v
Back to the future
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he history of time travel began, at least according to James Gleick’s new book, Time Travel: A History, in 1895 when H.G. Wells published his novel The Time Machine. That’s not to say that no one had thought about traveling through time before, but those journeys had happened through supernatural means or the unexpected effects of getting conked on the head. Wells, Gleick explains, was the first to connect the notion of moving through time with science. The Victorians had developed machines to do things that, just a few decades earlier, would have seemed magical. If you can capture light, in photographs, or sound, in phonographs, or cross an ocean or a continent in less than a week, why can’t you control time, or, rather, move through time the way you move through space? Just a decade later, Albert Einstein would show that time is not absolute. The century that followed was full of theories of how time travel worked, philosophical inquiries into the nature of time-travel paradoxes, and a ridiculous number of time machines, time portals, and wormholes. But for Gleick (pronounced “Glick”), the most interesting part of the history of time travel is what’s unfolding now. “I had the sense [as I was writing] that something new is happening relative to time,” he says. “There’s a change in how we deal with time and what time means that’s as consequential and dramatic as what people went through 100 years ago.” Like Wells, we’re living in a time of rapid technological change that’s affecting the
way we think about time. We’re less concerned with controlling time, though, than we are with using it to send and receive messages. The virtual world makes sure we’re constantly connected to other people, and also to things that aren’t people, like Siri and the Facebook news bot. On YouTube, we can watch videos of things that happened both 50 years and five minutes ago. “Everything feels like it’s now,” says Gleick. “We have channels from so many different places at once, the notion of ‘real time’ expands the sense of now. The present is compressed and expanded at the same time.” Will we someday be able to time-travel through virtual reality, as in William Gibson’s 2015 novel The Peripheral? Or will the past, present, and future exist on a Möbius strip, as in the seminal Doctor Who episode “Blink,” where the Doctor, trapped in 1969, appears to be having a spontaneous conversation with a woman in 2007, only he’s on a DVD, reading lines from a script that she hasn’t given him yet? Gleick isn’t sure. All he knows is that something’s changing. “We’re not going to be able to understand it fully until we look back on it,” he says. Or maybe someone from the future is working on a way to tell us. v JAMES GLEICK: TIME TRAVEL BEYOND PHYSICS AND FICTION Sat 10/29, 4:30 PM, Ryan Center for the Musical Arts, 70 Arts Circle Dr, Evanston, 312-494-9509, tickets.chicagohumanities.org, $15, $10 students and teachers.
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26 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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Miguel Cervantes and Hamilton cast members o JOAN MARCUS
THEATER
From the $10 bill to triumph By TONY ADLER
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hicago’s Hamilton franchise opened at PrivateBank Theatre on October 19, the same evening as the final presidential debate. In any other year that might be considered a sweetly symbolic coincidence: the republic seen then and now, at its fiery birth and in stable maturity. But things are a little different this year, aren’t they? This is the time of Hillary and Donald. The season of the lesser evil, when many of us wish we could just mark our ballots “appalled.” Add to that all the traumas of the last few years, from Ferguson to Orlando, and you’ve got yourself one troubled body politic. Yet I’d say it’s precisely the ugly dysfunction of the moment that’s helped turn Hamilton into the heavily scalped phenomenon it is. While America gets a nervous tic waiting for the next horror to hit, Lin Manuel-Miranda’s musical takes a reassuring step back, not just to celebrate past triumphs but to suggest that everything we’re presently going through is tending toward the light. As if you didn’t know, Hamilton tells the tale of Alexander Hamilton, the founding father we’re pleased to find in our wallets but haven’t otherwise given much love until
now. Unlike such native-born, patrician contemporaries as Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, Hamilton was a precocious bastard from the West Indies, born out of wedlock to Rachel Faucette (who, from what I’ve read, deserves a musical of her own) and orphaned by the time he was 13. The show chronicles its namesake’s life in remarkably scrupulous detail, starting with his student days in New York and carrying on to his death during a duel fought against yet another homegrown patrician, Aaron Burr. We see Hamilton’s agitation prior to the Revolutionary War; his service during it; and his political battles afterward as, among other things, he campaigns to establish a national bank. We witness his marriage to Eliza Schuyler Hamilton; his passion for her sister Angelica; and his adultery with Maria Reynolds, which went disastrously public, triggering the nation’s first political sex scandal. Through it all we see a pugnacious, flawed, unpolished, wildly talented outsider—a civic Mozart to Burr’s Salieri—whom Miranda places squarely in the American tradition of immigrants out to make good. As the song says, repeatedly, this Hamilton isn’t throwing away his shot.
And crucially, we see the whole thing in colors. Shades of brown, to be specific. Every principal role in Hamilton (including the title one, neatly performed by Miguel Cervantes) is filled—with pointed historical inaccuracy—by people bearing Latino surnames and/or dark skin. The concept leads to some deep ironies that go unremarked by Miranda: slaveholder Washington, for instance, played by black actor Joshua Kirkland; Jefferson’s black mistress and slave, Sally Hemings, appearing briefly opposite Chris De’Sean Lee’s Jefferson, also black, in a moment that comes across as the racial equivalent of an Escher print, tying real and invented worlds up in knots. These oddities together with certain elisions— women never quite taking center stage, Native American issues dispensed with entirely— demonstrate just how fine a needle Miranda is trying to thread. It’s hard to fault him, though, for the battles he’s failed to fight when he’s kicked ass so beautifully in his chosen theater of operations. Whatever the shortcomings of the show, the sight of black Washingtons and Latino Hamiltons is inspiring—a potent way of telling us that American democracy can survive the roilings of an angry season. That we’re not here to be white, black, brown, or anything but free, equal, and prosperous. So then, Hamilton is rousing. Is it good, too? Yes, exceptionally. But not as innovatively as some have claimed. The famous hip-hop inflections of the score constitute only a small pivot away from conventional Broadway-style tunesmithing. Miranda is not the next Stephen Sondheim—not at this point, anyway. Just now he’s more like the next Stephen Schwartz, which is not at all a bad thing to be. An artist who, like Miranda, wrote his first hit (Godspell) while still in college, infusing it with pop idioms drawn from the culture around him, Schwartz went on to create smart, pleasing entertainments like Wicked. Miranda seems to possess a similar sort of genius. As he did with his 2005 breakthrough musical, In the Heights (which can be seen in a fine Porchlight Music Theatre production extended through December 3), Miranda brings an openhearted exuberance to Hamilton, leavened with showmanship and great wit. v R HAMILTON Through 9/17/17: Wed 1:30 and 7:30 PM, Thu-Fri 7:30 PM, Sat 2 and 8 PM, Sun 2 PM, Tue 7:30 PM; also Mon 12/19, 7:30 PM, PrivateBank Theatre, 18 W. Monroe, 312-9021400, broadwayinchicago.com, $62-$597.
ß @taadler
DADA chicago
2016
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ARTS & CULTURE
October 21-November 6
Friday, October 28 8:00pm Friday, Saturday, p.m. John Malarkey plays guitarSunday and sings. 6-9 Thoughts 760 Bob N. Milwaukee, about Dylan and Pop. Chicago (Chicago & Ogden) Saturday, October 29 7:30pm
Opening October 21,Xerxes 6-9 Flores p.m.& Dada Improv featuring Ethan Burke, Lydia Howe of the Annoyance Theater Sunday, October22,307:30 5:00pm Saturday, October
Dada verbal Steve and Musical Experiments. Chicago Fabulous Smith experimental Calling: Dan Godston, and punk band Penelope Rosemont, Jennifer Cohen and much more
Friday, October 28, 8:00 John Malarkey Guitar and song
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS
Saturday, October 29,Beth 7:30GARON, Penelope ROSEMONT, Dada Improv featuring Ethan Ken HIRTE, Gale AHRENS, PaulBurke, GARON, Xerxes Flores & Lydia Howe Joelthe WILLIAMS, Winston SMITH, by Annoyance Theater
Michael JAMES, Krista FRANKLIN,
Sunday, October Alexandria 30, 7:30 EREGBU, Janina CIEZADLO, Chicago Calling: Dan Godston, J.J. MCLUCKY, Ruti ECKSTEIN, Penelope Rosemont and others
Dennis CUNNINGHAM, Devin CAIN,
Friday, 4, 7:30 Helene November SMITH-ROMER, Tom PALAZZOLO, “Marvelous Freedom,” film by Devin Cain
Ron SAKOLSKY.
Saturday, 7:30 Also WorksNovember by Artur do5,CRUZEIRO-SEXAS, John Malarkey, guitar and song
Carlos CORTEZ, Tristan MEINECKE,
Sunday, November 6, 8:00 Jacinto MINOT, Franklin ROSEMONT, Do It Yourself SYLLA, Tatsuo Dada IKEDA,sculpture VENITA, & more.
Join
us as we celebrate 100 years of DADA — the imagination breaking free, dreams running rampant,
the mind on FIRE!
Organized by the Chicago Surrealist Group, the Friends of DADA, with other outstanding works and contributors.
www.dadachicago.com OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 27
My sister says, “It’s hysterical!” Wayland at the Tennis Center says,” It’s hilarious.” ...and JOEL, “LOVED it!”
Check out
Tales of the Lone Volunteer a 3’29” comedy film on YouTube http://youtu.be/ o2IS5yN9S4k
This film in not intended for mature audiences.
28 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
ARTS & CULTURE LIT
Zipless fuck 2.0 By AIMEE LEVITT
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ike most of us, Emily Witt grew up with a set of expectations about how her life would proceed. It was pretty much the same sort of life her parents, most of her friends, and most of the characters on TV and in the movies had: after a period of experimentation, she envisioned, as she puts it, “my sexual experience eventually reaching a terminus, like a monorail gliding to a stop at Epcot Center. I would disembark, find myself face to face with another human being, and there we would remain in our permanent station of life: the future.” Or, as my best friend once sang while drunkenly stumbling down a sidewalk late one night in our mid-20s, “Someday my prince will come, someday I’ll ge-et some.” This did not happen, at least not by the time Witt turned 30. Instead she broke up with a long-term boyfriend and began having sex with some of her friends, one of whom, it turned out, was not completely single and also maybe had chlamydia. “I thought the secondhand sexual freedom passed down by my parents had been sufficient to my needs,” she writes, “until it wasn’t.” Chastened, Witt decided to pursue the future on her own: she went to San Francisco, which, despite its lack of monorail, has Google, Facebook, and Apple—as close to the future as anyplace in America. There she encountered a wide variety of people experimenting with different forms of sexuality in order to fulfill their own particular desires. She describes their philosophies and practices in her new book Future Sex. There’s the porn actress who desires nothing more than to be anally fisted by a dominatrix named Princess Donna during a film shoot. (“It felt really full,” she confides afterward.) There’s the “internet sexual” 19-year-old college student who becomes a star on the website Chaturbate, a sort of Chatroulette for sexual voyeurs, “by dressing like an American Apparel model, revealing the depth of her existential despair, and making every one of her viewers feel as if he and only he were the person who might understand and rescue her from both her
tortured soul and her vow of celibacy.” There are the acolytes of orgasmic meditation, who believe in disconnecting sex from emotional entanglement through a process of controlled clitoral stroking. And there are the two polyamorous Google employees who codify the terms of their relationship in a Google doc, which they end up sharing with their friends. Witt’s descriptions of all these people are wry and funny, even the ones she dislikes (the orgasmic meditators, who put her off with their earnestness and relentless positivity) and the ones she sees through (the polyamorists who feel secure about embarking on sexual adventures because they can return to the safety of an established relationship; they eventually become engaged at one Burning Man and marry at the next). But even at her most skeptical, she never crosses the line into contempt; at least all these people can articulate their own desires. When the facilitators at a training session in orgasmic meditation ask her about her own, “I was conscious for the first time of the flat white screen that rolled down when I considered such a question, the opaque shadows of movement behind it. A vacant search bar waited, cursor blinking, for ideas that I, who did not consider an idea an idea until it was expressed in language, had never expressed in language.” She does no better when faced with a search bar on an actual computer screen that promises to guide her to any kind of date or porn video she could imagine, if only she could imagine it. She can’t get over her embarrassment during orgasmic meditation or bring herself to lift up her shirt during a webcam conversation on Chaturbate. She lacks the courage of a friend who seeks out casual encounters on Craigslist with the explicit goals of collecting some entertaining stories and becoming really good at sex. Witt finally finds a sense of freedom at Burning Man and also a deep personal connection and amazing sex—though each, alas, with a different person—but she realizes that the reason Burning Man is so successful is because it exists outside the constraints, and the laws, of the regular world. She ends her odyssey
in a very similar place to where she began. “Younger people, I hoped, would not need autonomous zones,” she writes. “Their lives would be free of timidity. They would do their new drugs and have their new sex.” Witt is aware she writes from a place of privilege. She is white, straight, and fancily educated. She lives in Brooklyn; writes for intellectual journals like n + 1, the London Review of Books, and the New Yorker; and has the freedom to spend a few months in San Francisco pursuing her inquiry into avant-garde sexual behavior and getting high on magical Altoids in the middle of a weekday. Superficially, her project is not much different from the one undertaken by Kate Bolick in Spinster, which also considered sex and the single woman, except instead of looking to the past for answers as Bolick did, Witt explores the future. There are much worse problems in the world right now. And yet, there are larger implications beyond her own personal happiness. Witt wonders if she, like many women, doesn’t know what she wants because she has spent so much of her life trying to conform to other people’s expectations of her sexual behavior. Her parents are comforted by the idea that sexual experimentation is a prelude to her finding the One and diving into the world of bridal magazines. Her partners expect her to be aroused, multiorgasmic, and emotionally detached, like the actresses in the porn videos they can now access for free from their laptops. The pharmaceutical companies take the money she spends every month on birth control pills without improving their technology so she won’t feel depressed or gain weight or have a six-month-long period. “Part of the reason I wanted to document what free love might look like was to reveal shared experiences of the lives we were living that fell outside a happiness that could be bought or sold,” Witt writes. “To experience sexuality was to have a body that pursued a feeling.” Is there any way the future of sexuality can liberate women—and men—from all these expectations (including being forced to distinguish between women and men) so they can understand what feelings their bodies are after and feel free to pursue them? For Witt, it’s an open question that she leaves the rest of us to answer. v R FUTURE SEX: A NEW KIND OF FREE LOVE By Emily Witt
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Aymar Jean Christian opens TV
A
ymar Jean Christian produced his first Web pilot, Nupita Obama Creates Vogua, in December 2014. The series explored a tumultuous love triangle between Curtis (musician Erik Wallace), Reyes (performance artist Kiam Marcelo Junio), and Gia (drag queen Saya Naomi), and featured original music, art, fashion, and choreography from its three stars. It was the series that launched Christian’s inclusive online television platform, Open TV. Since then he has produced ten projects created by and starring queer people, people of color, and women from a variety of artistic disciplines, and is in the beginning stages of dozens more. “The beauty in television to me is its ability to tell an infinite number of stories in really an infinite number of ways, and appeal to communities that might not get feature films made about them,” Christian says. At this year’s Chicago Humanities Festival, on a panel called “Slow, Artistic, Indie TV,” Christian and three creators of original series for Open TV—Ricardo Gamboa, Shea Couleé, and Nic Kay—will discuss the importance of
o ZAKKIYYAH NAJEEBAH
By BRIANNA WELLEN
independent television and the long process of producing each project. Gamboa’s Brujos follows a group of witches who are also gay, Latino PhD candidates; Couleé’s Lipstick City is a musical look at Chicago’s drag community; and The Bronx Cunt Tour follows Kay across the country as they (the pronoun Kay prefers) present their performance art—not exactly the kinds of stories that populate prime time. But Christian thinks they should. “We get so focused on the ratings of big shows and how much money they make and how long they last that we’ve lost our connection to each other, which is what television is supposed to do,” he says. Christian, 32, remembers first watching television when cable was exploding, and niche-driven networks were beginning to emerge. His gateways were MTV and Nickelodeon, and from there watching and analyzing television—specifically indie and Web-based series—became a constant in his life. While studying for a PhD in cinema studies at University of Pennsylvania he founded Televisual, a blog reviewing webseries. But it wasn’t until he moved to Chicago in 2012 to teach commu-
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nications at Northwestern University that he first thought about creating work instead of analyzing it. “I was inspired by Chicago and the cultural life here,” Christian says. “I think that being here and being around artists of various identities and skill sets reminded me that there’s this place for art in television.” And so after some fund-raising and behind-the-scenes contributions from the series’ stars, he produced Nupita Obama Creates Vogua. The media landscape today is similar to when he was growing up, he says, a time when “diversity was hip”: in the mid-90s a record-breaking 18 black sitcoms were on the lineups of five different networks. But even in the case of series praised for their diversity, such as Orange Is the New Black, a majority of the writers are white. Open TV was started in part to let people from unique communities tell their own stories instead of leaving them in the hands of outsiders. The lack of variety in writers’ rooms—the industry standard is 71 percent male and 86 percent white—not only narrows opportunities for women, people of color, and queer people but also diminishes the quality of the programming, Christian says. While he was working on Nupita Obama Creates Vogua, he let the stars alter their dialogue and contribute snippets of their own life experiences with great success. The result was a more sincere tone to the dialogue and story. The artists involved with the project had other talents besides acting, such as costume and set design, that helped raise the overall production value above that of a typical amateur webseries. In 2017 Open TV will launch at least six more original projects, both online and at events around the city. Christian hopes other underrepresented artists will be inspired to use the medium of independent Web-based television to share their experiences with larger audiences. “What I’m trying to do with Open TV is provide a space for people to come and see some quality work and give those creators the recognition to get them to the next level,” Christian says. “I want to show that in television today we’re no longer just thinking about comedies, dramas, and reality TV, we’re beginning to think about artistic expression across a number of disciplines and people.” v “SLOW, ARTISTIC, INDIE TV” Sat 10/29, 4:30 PM, Block Museum of Art, 40 Arts Circle Dr., Evanston, 312494-9509, tickets.chicagohumanities.org, $12, $5 teachers and students.
DANCE
Say their names SANDRA BLAND’S DEATH is shrouded in tragedy and mystery. In July 2015, Bland was driving on a rural Texas road when she was pulled over for failing to use her turn signal. An argument ensued and the 28-year-old was jailed for assault on an officer. Three days later, Bland was found dead in her jail cell of an apparent suicide, triggering a national outcry. Last month her family settled a wrongful death suit for $1.9 million. In #SayHerName, one of two solo performances in “The Body Wails, The Body Restores” at Links Hall, Vershawn Ward of Red Clay Dance Company draws parallels between the circumstances surrounding Bland and the controversial criminalization of two black female activists: Angela Davis, a scholar who joined the U.S. Communist Party in the 1960s, and Assata Shakur, aunt of Tupac and a member of the Black Panther Party, who was convicted of killing a state trooper on the New Jersey Turnpike in 1973 (she escaped from prison in 1979 and lives in Cuba, where she’s been granted political asylum). Dressed in an orange jumpsuit and confined to a makeshift cell, Ward stands in contrast to video footage of Davis and Shakur projected onto the wall behind her. In most instances, Ward seems more like a shadow than a red-blooded performer, subdued to the point of surrender. Save for a few lines of spoken dialogue that speak broadly about the plight of black women in society, she’s inclined to let the footage do the talking. If walls could speak, Ward seems to wonder, what would they say? She’s joined by Lela Aisha Jones, who’ll perform a politically inspired work, Continuum of Action.—MATT DE LA PEÑA “THE BODY WAILS, THE BODY RESTORES” Fri 10/28Sun 10/30: 7 PM, Links Hall at Constellation, 3111 N. Western, 773-281-0824, linkshall.org, $15.
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 29
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Fatherless son, sonless father By J.R. JONES
E
arlier this year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences faced a torrent of criticism when, for the second season in a row, it nominated only white actors and actresses in the four performing categories. Academy voters looking to address that imbalance this year will be all over Barry Jenkins’s Moonlight, an intimate and haunting drama about a poor, fatherless African-American kid growing up in the closet in the predominantly black Liberty City neighborhood of Miami. No less than three fine young actors play the boy at age nine, 16, and 26, and another three play the schoolmate whose fate is intertwined with his. Naomie Harris gives a striking performance as the boy’s angry, crack-addicted mother. But the strongest work comes from Mahershala Ali (Netflix’s House of Cards) in the supporting role of Juan, a neighborhood drug dealer who takes the boy under his wing. Ali’s character may disappear from the narrative after the first of its three chapters, but he continues to shape the boy’s emotional journey to the very last scene.
Adapted from a play by Tarell Alvin McCraney (an ensemble member at Steppenwolf Theatre Company), Moonlight dwells on questions of identity. McCraney stresses the protagonist’s mutability by giving him three different names: at age nine he goes by Little, the cruel nickname bestowed on him by classmates; at age 16 he tries to muster some self-respect by insisting on his given name, Chiron; and at 26 he submerges himself in his race, rechristening himself “Black.” The movie plunges into the touchy subject of homophobia in the black community, yet the protagonist is so rounded that he can’t be reduced to his race or sexuality; in fact the challenge for him is to fashion an identity for himself outside both these norms. Juan faces a similar dilemma: he longs to mentor the lonely child, but his criminal career prevents him from setting any kind of example for the boy. Juan is powerfully built, boss of a small drug crew, but from the first scene he reveals himself as a man given to small kindnesses, promising to pray for the ailing mother of his drug lieutenant (Shariff Earp). As Juan patrols
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Has Juan been incarcerated? Murdered by rival dealers? Has he simply pulled up and left, the same as Little’s biological father?
a condemned housing project, he hears something inside one of the units—it’s Little (Alex Hibbert), who has hidden there to escape from a trio of bullies. Jenkins shoots from inside the darkened unit as Juan pries the plywood off a window and angelic light comes flooding in around his tall, muscular form. “OK if I take the front door?” he jokes. Gentle and solicitous, Juan drives the silent boy to a fast-food joint and feeds him, then takes him over to the home of his girlfriend, Teresa (Janelle Monáe), to stay the night. In the morning Juan returns Little to his strung-out mother, Paula, expecting to be thanked, but she freezes him out; when he offers his hand to the boy in farewell, she turns the child away from him. McCraney positions Juan as the man who’s going to open Little up to himself. Cuban by birth, Juan loves the ocean; he takes Little to the beach for the first time in his life and teaches the boy to float, holding him parallel with the water. “I got you, I promise,” he says, something the child probably hasn’t heard too often. As they sit on the beach together, Juan advises Little, “At some point you gotta decide for yourself who you gonna be.” His words encapsulate the boy’s character arc, yet he might be speaking of himself as well. That night Juan discovers Paula and her boyfriend parked a few yards from his drug corner, smoking crack. When he pulls the mother out of the car to reprimand her, she wheels on him furiously, demanding to know what he wants from her child and reminding him that he makes his livelihood off her addiction. Hammering in the final nail, she spits, “You ain’t shit.” Ali gives a restrained performance that, combined with the character’s altruism, suggests great moral strength. Yet something in Juan’s swagger betrays the prideful element
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in his generosity, and Paula’s shaming of him is nothing compared to the comeuppance he receives in the first chapter’s final scene. Little, seated at the kitchen table in Teresa’s apartment, asks the couple why his classmates are calling him a “faggot.” They assure the boy that he’s too young to know if he’s gay—as Teresa puts it, “You’ll know when you know.” But just as they seem to be resolving his question, Little turns to the subject of Juan’s identity. “My mama does drugs?” he asks, and Juan confirms his suspicions. “And you sell drugs?” the boy continues, to which Juan, staring at the table to avoid Little’s gaze, can only reply, “Yes.” Without another word, the boy gets up from the table and walks out, leaving Juan to choke on the moment. When McCraney advances the narrative seven years, taking up with Chiron (Ashton Sanders) in high school, Juan vanishes from the movie. Weirdly, no one even mentions him, though the boy continues to find comfort and protection with Teresa. Has Juan been incarcerated? Murdered by rival dealers? Has he simply pulled up and left, the same as Little’s biological father? Maybe a scene on the cutting-room floor explains all this, but Jenkins was wise to discard it—the vacuum of information only enlarges the question of where Juan’s life was taking him. Meanwhile, Chiron suffers even worse bullying in school, and his long-standing friendship with his classmate Kevin (Jharrel Jerome) deepens into sexual passion before curdling into betrayal. That betrayal pierces even more deeply coming in the wake of Juan’s unmasking in the earlier chapter. Juan may have exited the story without explanation, yet his memory hangs over the action. In the third and final chapter, the protagonist has moved to Atlanta, gotten into bodybuilding, and reinvented himself as Black (Trevante Rhodes), a muscular drug dealer. The grown-up Kevin (André Holland) gets his number from Teresa and, ten years after they parted, tries to make contact again. But when the two men are reunited, Kevin can barely recognize his old friend. Chiron seemed like a boy that might turn into someone special, but Black, true to his name, turns out to be no more than the ghetto life he inherited. You have to wonder why the protagonist would aspire to be Juan, given that Juan couldn’t stand to be himself. v MOONLIGHT ssss Directed by Barry Jenkins. R, 110 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6, Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21
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OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 31
MUSIC
The reunited and expanded American Football: Nate Kinsella, Steve Holmes, Mike Kinsella, and Steve Lamos o ANDY DE SANTIS
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Accidental rock stars
American Football became heroes to the emo scene after breaking up in obscurity— and 17 years later, they’ve returned with a second album. By LEOR GALIL
32 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
his year’s incoming freshmen at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign can choose from among roughly 1,400 registered extracurricular groups: more than 100 athletic clubs, including Badminton for Fun and Numenor Foam Fighting, “a full contact sport based on medieval combat”; close to 100 fraternities and sororities; and more than 100 cultural organizations, among them the Phoenix Improv Company, BeatBox Club, and a LARPing society called Elysium on the Prairie. But once those students finish school, not many will continue to care about the stuff they did to amuse themselves between classes, even if they thought at the time that a role in, say, the Illini Voter Coalition might look good on a resumé. That should’ve happened to Steve Lamos, Steve Holmes, and Mike Kinsella after they finished their undergraduate degrees at UIUC. While at the school in the late 90s they’d focused on an unregistered extracurricular group, playing together in a basement band called American Football that borrowed from emo, postrock, and woebegone indie rock. By their own accounts, though, the band pretty much ceased to be a factor in their lives in spring 1999—as soon as they finished recording what would become their self-titled debut album. Kinsella and Holmes moved back home to the Chicago suburbs, while Lamos stayed at UIUC and earned a PhD in 2005. Downstate indie label Polyvinyl released American Football in September ’99, several months after the group dissolved, and that was that—nobody had any further ambitions for it. “To me it was always just for fun,” Holmes says. “I never even considered it as a career. It was like, ‘OK, that was fun, now I’m gonna get a job.’” Holmes now lives in Lake Zurich and works as a director of client services for ADP, which provides payroll and human-resources management and software. Lamos landed a job at the University of Colorado Boulder within a year of finishing his doctoral degree, and he’s currently an associate professor of English there. Kinsella left American Football behind too, though he continued to pursue music— he briefly worked in a day-care center after graduation, but he never tried to turn that or any other straight job into a career, instead focusing on his solo project, Owen, which released its debut album in 2001. In their two years or so as a band, American Football had played only a handful of shows—the lore that’s grown up around them says 12, though Holmes told Noisey in February that the real
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AMERICAN FOOTBALL, LOW, JOAN OF ARC
Sat 10/29, 7:30 PM, the Vic, 3145 N. Sheffield, $30-$35, all ages
number is somewhere north of 25—and their discography, which also includes a 1998 CD single, consisted of just a dozen songs. They should’ve disappeared without a trace, the way thousands of 90s college bands with similar track records did. But unbeknownst to Lamos, Holmes, and Kinsella, American Football began to gather a cult following. Today American Football is one of the five best-selling albums in Polyvinyl’s 20-year history—it’s sold more than 75,000 copies, pretty impressive considering that the band didn’t exist to promote it in any way. That changed after Polyvinyl announced a two-disc deluxe reissue of American Football in March 2014. The public response was so intense—preorder traffic crashed the label’s site, and the record peaked at number 68 on the Billboard 200 in June—that Lamos, Holmes, and Kinsella started considering something they’d never talked about before. Soon American Football reunited, and after an unannounced warmup show at Beat Kitchen in August 2014 (the venue billed it as an Owen gig), they made their grand return to the stage the following month with a headlining set at the Pygmalion Festival in Urbana-Champaign. American Football became a four-piece when they got back together, with Mike’s cousin Nate (aka Birthmark) on bass, and they’ve since headlined venues many times the size of Beat Kitchen—including Webster Hall in New York, the Electric Ballroom in London, and Shibuya O-East in Tokyo. “It just became this cool, ‘Let’s get the band back together every couple months’ kind of thing,” Mike Kinsella says. “We realized if we want to keep doing it, we can’t just keep playing 12 songs.” It took almost a year for American Football to get their heads around the next step in their unlikely reunion. While in the UK to perform at the Reading and Leeds festivals in August 2015, they decided to make another record. When they play the Vic on Saturday, they’ll be celebrating their sophomore album, also self-titled but referred to colloquially as “LP2”—it came out on Polyvinyl last week. “LP2” shares a lot of the distinctive features that made American Football’s first album an indie-rock touchstone. The shimmering, overlapping guitars seem to yearn for their own braided melodies the moment after they’re played; the tumbling, minimalist drums nudge the songs along and give them a wide-open sense of space; and Mike Kinsella’s depressive vocals reinforce the emotional weight of his plainspoken, earnest lyrics. The two records have a couple pretty stark differences, though:
American Football play Webster Hall in New York in October 2014. o RACHEL GULOTTA AND DANIEL INSKEEP
Mike sings with a confidence he hadn’t developed during American Football’s first goround, and the band sound tighter and more controlled, in large part because they’ve better matched their skills to their material. They wrote it over e-mail, exchanging song ideas via Dropbox—compared to their old process, Mike says, it was “night and day.”
A
merican Football have their roots in Cap’n Jazz, an influential northwestsuburban emo band that existed from 1989 till ’95—Mike Kinsella played drums and his brother, Tim, sang. Holmes first saw Cap’n Jazz during his freshman year at Wheeling High, which he attended with both Kinsella brothers. “They were the coolest band in our high school,” he says. Cap’n Jazz introduced Holmes to the network of suburban shows in basements and VFW Halls—he saw the likes of pre-Braid band Friction and Gauge, and he was inspired to pick up the guitar. “You couldn’t overstate the influence of Cap’n Jazz for me personally, and for everyone else in our little scene,” he says. Lamos, who’d taken trumpet lessons as a kid, saw Cap’n Jazz in 1995 in downstate Danville.
“I’d never experienced that kind of energy, in terms of watching music,” he says. “I was like, ‘I wanna do this.’” Lamos had played in a jazz band at DePaul his freshman year, but didn’t care for what he saw as an academic approach to music; after transferring to UIUC his sophomore year, he tried his hand at bass and then settled on drums, teaching himself with some 1960s instructional books he’d borrowed from his dad. “I was like, ‘Oh, I know how to read music books—I could read these “teach yourself drums” kind of things,’” he says. He also figured that as a drummer he’d be in demand in Champaign-Urbana: “You pick the instrument most of the bands need around town.” Holmes and Lamos briefly played together in late ’95, a year or so before American Football formed. Holmes remembers that Lamos “was in some kind of punk band, and they wanted me to join on guitar.” He only rehearsed with them a couple times, in part because he was unimpressed with Lamos’s drumming. But his friend’s next band changed his mind: “When the One Up Downstairs started, I was like, ‘Holy shit, Lamos is really good!’ He’s just sitting at home in his room practicing with his little jazz books, and he just evolved
into this incredible drummer in the span of a year.” That short-lived group recruited Mike Kinsella too. “I sang, or I tried to sing, in the band,” he says. The One Up Downstairs only recorded a few songs before flaming out in 1996, and Polyvinyl released them digitally in 2006. “They broke up via fistfight,” Mike says. Holmes and Lamos began jamming, and because Holmes lived with Mike Kinsella, he got to hear a lot of it. “Holmes would bring home the cassettes of their demos—like, what they were just playing,” Mike says. “I was like, ‘This part’s awesome’—it sounded like Sea & Cake, just repetitive guitar noodles, and then Lamos’s really musical drums.” Soon Holmes invited his roommate to join on guitar, and he became the singer by default. “I think we were all looking to try to do something other than just rock or play really loud—so it worked out,” Mike says. Their new band, which would become American Football in early ’97, drew on disparate influences, including some relatively heady stuff they’d first encountered in college. Holmes says he fell down a rabbit hole that took him from Chicago postrock outfits such as Tortoise and the Sea & Cake all J
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 33
MUSIC continued from 33
the way to minimalist composer Steve Reich. You can hear them in American Football’s glimmering, cycling guitars, and in a 2015 interview for the Song Exploder podcast, Holmes admitted ripping off the Sea & Cake’s “Jacking the Ball” for his riff on the sprightly “The One With the Tambourine” (from American Football’s debut release, a self-titled three-song EP that Polyvinyl issued in 1998). Lamos mentions using a bossa nova beat on the tune—a flavor the Sea & Cake often borrowed as well. As a kid Lamos had played violin and trumpet in wedding bands with his father—he specifically mentions polkas—and as a way of honoring his dad, he brought the horn into American Football. “My father and I had an interesting relationship to say the least, but he was a big fan of me playing that trumpet, and the reason I played it was for him,” he says. “Every time I get to perform it, I kind of think of him, and it makes me happy that people allow me to play that damn thing in front of them—’cause I have no business doing that.” Mike Kinsella had shared bills with lots of hardcore bands in Cap’n Jazz (who were
34 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
pretty noisy and frenetic themselves), but he’d long gravitated toward melancholy rock such as the Cure and Red House Painters. His desire to back away from the aggression of hardcore affected his approach to singing, which he was still figuring out. “I was into the Smiths and the Cure, so I just thought lyrics were, like, ‘What’s the saddest thing you can think about?’” he says. Mike’s early lyrics are strikingly unselfconscious and poignantly vague, and despite his tendency to write in fragments and snippets, they convey great emotional detail. On “The Summer Ends” he sings, “Thinking about leaving / How I should say good-bye? / With a handshake? / Or an embrace? / Or a kiss on the cheek? / Possibly all three?” His lyrics can feel off-the-cuff, and they often nearly were. “I remember writing some lyrics in class—they weren’t a priority,” he says. “It was like, ‘Oh, OK—we have a show this week. Well, do you want to play six instrumentals and two with lyrics?’ And then I’d be like, ‘Well, I can probably finish this before the show,’ so I banged something out.” The tenderness and tranquility of American
Football’s music put them at odds with the posthardcore and emo scene that had nurtured them—though in that context, the choice to play quietly can feel just as confrontational as turning up to 11. The dreamlike “For Sure” on American Football opens with a somber, somnambulant trumpet melody, which melts into Kinsella’s almost timid vocals. “It’s funny that we came out of that scene, but kind of did a hard left and stayed associated with it,” Holmes says. “But I never thought of American Football as an emo band.” That’s not to say American Football didn’t have emo in their DNA. In the liner notes for the deluxe 2014 reissue of American Football, Holmes says he deliberately picked the same guitar tuning for the effervescent “Never Meant” that Victor Villarreal used for Cap’n Jazz’s later material. And when you run with emo bands, the label sometimes rubs off on you even when not much else does. As Lamos says, “Now I realize that indie scenes, and music scenes more generally, are just as much about a social group.” In part because of their position as an odd band out in their community, few people
seemed to get American Football the first time around. “A lot of our songs live were just totally instrumental, or very sparse vocals,” Holmes says. “Like ‘Five Silent Miles,’ it’s just this noodly, meandering thing. If you can picture that at a Champaign college house party where people are used to rocking out and getting drunk, it’s kind of, ‘What are these guys doing?’” Thankfully, Mike Kinsella’s history in Cap’n Jazz persuaded a few people to give American Football a shot. Holmes’s friend Jorge Ledezma (best known from hybridized Latin pop group Allá) remembers seeing the group play to a respectably large crowd at the Fireside Bowl. “They were bad—it was rough to watch,” he says. “Steve [Holmes], his back was always to the crowd. It took forever between songs, ’cause they had to tune everything, and that became a joke. [But] when they played a song like ‘The 7’s’ or a song where they really let loose, it was special.” Whether or not American Football felt they were doing something special, they didn’t try to make anything of it. Little about their approach could be described as professional.
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American Football’s self-titled 1999 album (left) and self-titled 2016 album
Mike Kinsella never even owned any of the gear he needed for the band. “The guitar he played was Steve Lamos’s. The amp he played usually was borrowed from a friend of ours,” Holmes says. “We had to borrow that amp to have band practice. Whether or not we could rehearse was dependent on whether or not they weren’t rehearsing.” Lamos admits that at the time he loved the idea of playing in gonowhere basement bands, so he wasn’t about to try to whip anybody into shape. “I think I had that problem,” he says. “It was all I was thinking about for a while, and it was just silly.” American Football arose to give three college kids a creative way to fight the boredom of living in a town surrounded by cornfields, and as such it had an expiration date. Saddled with loans, Holmes had to find a job immediately once he finished his undergraduate de-
gree. They’d started to burn out on one another’s company too—Holmes and Mike Kinsella had lived together for all four of their years at UIUC. A couple weeks after the two of them graduated in May 1999 (Lamos was already in grad school), American Football recorded their debut album onto ADAT tape at Private Studios in Urbana. They broke up without ever playing again, but Polyvinyl decided to release American Football anyway. “We knew at the time that it seemed like more of a project band—it wasn’t gonna be a band that was gonna hit the road,” says label cofounder Matt Lunsford. “We wanted to document them.” Polyvinyl’s catalog includes more than 300 releases, including albums by established indie-rock groups Deerhoof, Of Montreal, and Japandroids, but not one has the extraordinary sales history of American Football.
“Typically when a band puts out a record and plays a handful of shows, and for whatever reason it doesn’t work out and the band parts ways, those records tend to be records that aren’t remembered all that long,” Lunsford says. “The American Football record is such an anomaly—it came out, and it sold some copies, but people kept buying it.” Polyvinyl didn’t do much to promote American Football after its initial campaign, but the label kept making the album available—and it kept selling, at first slowly and steadily and then faster and faster. “It does seem like it was kind of a ramping up,” Lunsford says. “Never exactly a spike, but more a consistently upward trend—and that really seemed to start becoming even more apparent maybe in 2011, 2012.” That was when emo’s fourth wave—many of whose standardbearers had been influenced by American Football—began to break out of basements nationwide. At around the same time, Holmes found a forgotten trove of American Football demos and show recordings on cassette. Ledezma had bought a cassette-to-digital converter to digitize tapes of some jamming he and
MUSIC
Holmes had done together in the early 90s, and Holmes thought of another use for the device. “He’s like, ‘Hey, you know, I have a bunch of American Football demos and live stuff,’” Ledezma says. “‘Just for fun, you want to digitize it and see what it sounds like?’” In fall 2012, Holmes shipped a box of the original tapes to Polyvinyl’s headquarters, though the label didn’t have any plans for them. “It didn’t even occur to us that, ‘Oh, this is something that people would like to hear,’” Lunsford says. With sales of American Football climbing and the album’s 15th anniversary approaching, Polyvinyl decided to put together a deluxe reissue—the same reissue whose flood of preorders opened the band’s eyes to their long-gestating cult following. The label added the best odds and ends from Holmes’s cassettes on a second disc. Lunsford thinks that part of American Football’s appeal at the time had to do with how little documentation of their original run made it onto the Internet— before the 2014 reissue, it was tough to find anything but the records, their sleeves and inserts, and a few press photos. “I think that created a mystique around the band,” he J
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 35
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8:00pm • 18 & Over FOLLOW ON
IN STORES JAN. 27
ON SALE THIS FRIDAY AT 10AM! SULLY ERNA – Friday, Nov. 18 • MIKE GORDON – Nov. 20 THE NEW MASTERSOUNDS & TURKUAZ – Friday, Nov. 25 MICHAEL KIWANUKA – Dec. 3 • BRENDAN & JAKE HOLIDAY SHOW – Dec. 10 BRUCE IN THE U.S.A. –Dec. 28
SPECIAL GUEST: Dylan
LeBlanc NEXT THURSDAY! NOVEMBER 3
HILL
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 12
NOVEMBER 9
7:00pm • All Ages
8:30pm • 18 & Over
8:00pm • 18 & Over
AMERICAN FOOTBALL –Saturday, Oct. 29 • LOTUS –Friday & Saturday, Nov. 4-5 • JJ GREY & MOFRO –Friday & Saturday, Nov. 18-19 MARC MARON –Saturday, Dec. 3 • SNAP JUDGMENT –Saturday, Dec. 10 • ADAM ANT –Jan. 31 DRIVE-BY TRUCKERS –Feb. 2 • TOM SEGURA –Saturday, Mar. 18
JON BELLION –Friday, Oct. 28-Sold Out! • GOOD CHARLOTTE – Friday, Nov. 4 ELLE KING – Nov. 5 • REBELUTION –Saturday, Nov. 12 JIM JAMES – Saturday, Nov. 26 • UMPHREY’S MCGEE –Dec. 29 PATTI SMITH –Friday, Dec. 30 • THE DEVIL MAKES THREE – Saturday, Jan. 21 CIRCA SURVIVE –Saturday, Feb. 11 • PASSENGER –Friday, Mar. 17
BUY TICKETS AT 36 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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MUSIC continued from 35 says. “They were an enigmatic band that made this one record, and the vibe of the whole record was based around these photos that this guy Chris Strong took.” The cover art for American Football is a nighttime shot looking up at a second-floor window of the Urbana house where Strong lived while attending UIUC. The house became the image most associated with American Football—it’s the closest thing emo has to the Velvet Underground’s Warhol banana. “One of the things that made us start to really take notice that there was something happening with the record that was beyond our knowledge—we see these random things on Tumblr,” Lunsford says. “People making a birthday cake with the house, or somebody did a needlepoint of the house.” The house has become an unlikely tourist attraction—Lunsford claims that someone has scratched an X on the sidewalk where you can stand to get a photo that looks like the album cover. Mike Kinsella was the only member of American Football who had an inkling about their popularity, mostly because he maintained an active connection to the emo community by performing as Owen. “I’d play shows and people would ask for ‘Never Meant,’” he says. “I didn’t realize that American Football was more popular than the thing I was doing for 15 years, until it was slapped in my face.” (Holmes and Lamos went on to play in a country-tinged group called the Geese, which fell apart in the mid-aughts, but their audiences didn’t request American Football songs.) American Football started getting offers for reunion shows before the reissue even came out—after it went up for preorders in March 2014, they heard from the Pygmalion Festival, then from bookers in New York. Mike Kinsella says he placed a precondition on any reunion: this time the band had to have a bassist, and he wanted it to be his cousin Nate. (Originally there was no live bassist— Mike and Lamos recorded a few bass parts for the album.) Nate was already a fan of American Football, so it was an easy sell. “I really identify with the modesty of it,” he says. “I agreed to it knowing that I would just be, like, playing invisible frequencies—I would only be playing the root notes. I wanted to be there, to fill out the sound, but add as little as possible and try to stay true to what was on the recording.” He also fit into the band’s interpersonal dynamics comfortably. “Nate’s a big piece of bubble gum,” Mike says. “Everybody loves Nate, so he makes everybody get along.”
Ledezma remembers attending a Bulls game with Holmes and Kinsella after the offers started coming but before they decided to regroup. “Steve and Mike were like, ‘We really sucked, and I don’t want to suck now,’” he says. “I’m like, ‘It can’t be any worse than it was the first time around—you guys are probably much better musicians than you were before.’ I think that helped them decide.” Today two members of American Football live outside Illinois—Lamos is in Colorado, Nate Kinsella in New York. All three original members have kids, and Nate is expecting his first child soon. Their divergent schedules mean they can’t practice often, so when they do it tends to be in 12-hour marathons. The band that used to be a hobby is more of a part-time job. “Each time we get together it’s a treat—it’s a break from other work, or kids, or real life, just for a few days,” Lamos says. “After usually two or three days, everyone’s like, ‘Oh thank God, we get to go back home and do the things we’re supposed to be doing.’” American Football began testing out new material onstage before they decided to work toward a second album—Holmes says they played an instrumental version of the “LP2” single “I’ve Been So Lost for So Long” during a four-show run in Chicago around New Year’s Eve 2014. They shared 18 or 20 song ideas over Dropbox, then settled on their dozen favorites. With a March recording session fast approaching, Mike had to juggle writing American Football lyrics with work on Owen’s ninth album, July’s The King of Whys. “A lot of the immediate, initial critiques—‘Oh, this just sounds like Owen’—but it’s like, that’s just what my voice does. I’m not sure what else I’m supposed to do,” Mike says. The band sounds more assured—a product of many more years of experience as musicians—and so does his singing. “Before, the vocals were an afterthought,” he says. “It’s like, ‘Oh, I guess here, if I kind of yell,’ and after we already recorded the song I realize, ‘That’s not even near my range.’ I’d just go for it, and it sounds funny. This time we tuned to different keys and different capos—there’s all these tricks you can do to fit within my range.” The new album won’t please everyone, but American Football still remember when they barely pleased anyone. They already have their critics—Holmes brought his two daughters and son to see the band play at the Wrecking Ball Festival in Atlanta in August. “They’re generally unimpressed,” he says. “Not their thing.” v
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Ladysmith Black Mambazo Tinariwen with Dengue Fever
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Jonas Friddle & The Majority / Tangleweed FRIDAY, OCTOBER 28 8PM
International Mandolin Spectacular Featuring the Don Stiernberg Trio & Carlo Aonzo Trio
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 29 10:30AM SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30 10:30AM
Spooky Singalong 3855 N. LINCOLN
martyrslive.com ALL CUBS GAMES WILL BE SHOWN
THU, 10/27
GREAT MOMENTS IN VINYL PRINCE - PURPLE RAIN + HITS THRU ‘1999’ FRI, 10/28
HOOD SMOKE, SUPER DOPPLER WARS, COLE WILLLIAMS ALL CUBS GAMES WILL BE SHOWN SAT, 10/29 - JAM & SILVER WRAPPER PRESENT...
Kids concert • 10/29 show at Maurer Hall, 4544 N Lincoln Ave, 10/30 show at Armitage Hall, 909 W. Armitage Ave
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30 7PM
AMIRA Queen of Sevdahlinka
Featuring Amira Medunjanin, Ante Gelo (guitar), Zvonimir Sestak (double bass)
MONDAY, OCTOBER 31 8PM
PigPen Theatre Co. Four Concert Residency • In Szold Hall
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3 10PM
ERIC KRASNO BAND, THE LONDON SOULS
Philip Glass
MON, 10/31
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 5 8PM
CUBS ON 15 FT. SCREEN BEFORE SHOW
MAR CARIBE, UNKNOWN NEW, HEISENBERG UNCERTAINTY PLAYERS TUE, 11/1
YANKEE BLOOD, TATIANA HAZEL WED, 11/2
ST. MOJO, BLIND TRUST, VILLA AVENUE THU, 11/3
BIG C JAMBOREE… THE LUSTRE KINGS (NYC) FRI, 11/4
DOS SANTOS, LOS VICIOS DE PAPA, BEATS Y BATERIA, DJ AFROQBANO SAT, 11/5 - 7:30PM
URBAN RIVERS KICKSTARTER KICKOFF SAT, 11/5 - 9:30PM
GROOD (ACTUAL SHOW) SUN, 11/6 - SILVER WRAPPER & COMMUNION MUSIC PRESENT…
Mohsen Namjoo SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 6 7PM
Hiss Golden Messenger with special guest Tift Merritt
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 6 7PM
Hubby Jenkins
of the Carolina Chocolate Drops • In Szold Hall
ACROSS THE STREET IN SZOLD HALL 4545 N LINCOLN AVENUE, CHICAGO IL
11/4 11/5
Global Dance Party: Charangueo Old Town School Uncovered: Nina Simone: Reflection 11/11 Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver 11/12 Chatham County Line
WORLD MUSIC WEDNESDAY SERIES FREE WEEKLY CONCERTS, LINCOLN SQUARE
11/2 Pablo Sáinz Villegas 11/9 Charley Organaire/DJ Chuck Wren
BENJAMIN FRANCIS LEFTWICH, BROLLY
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 37
MUSIC
Recommended and notable shows, and critics’ insights for the week of October 27
PICK OF THE WEEK
Elvis Costello surveys the pop mastery of Imperial Bedroom
01/12
01/11
TORTOISE
EZRA FURMAN
MONOBODY
01/14
DREAM VERSION
01/15
JEFF THE BROTHERHOOD
BADBADNOTGOOD MATTSON 2
CHASTITY
TOMORROW NEVER KNOWS J A N U A R Y 11 T H -15 T H W W W .T N K F E S T. C O M
01/11
01/12
o MARY MCCARTNEY
BIG THIEF
SAM EVIAN + CAMPDOGZZ 01/13
WAND
IAN SWEET IN TALL BUILDINGS
38 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
Sat 10/29, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State, $38.50-$153.50. b
ACID DAD + FLAURAL JOE BORDENARO 01/14
FOXTROTT
ELVIS COSTELLO & THE IMPOSTERS
CEREMONY
NEGATIVE SCANNER MUUY BIIEN+ HOGG
ELVIS COSTELLO WAS JUST 27 when he and his crack working band the Attractions released their 1982 masterpiece Imperial Bedroom (Columbia). Made with longtime Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick sitting in the producer’s chair, it was Costello’s seventh studio album since 1977 and represented another huge leap in growth. Folks started comparing him to architects of the Great American Songbook like Cole Porter as he pushed beyond new wave toward timeless pop mastery, particularly with the devastating ballad “Almost Blue” and the quasi-bossa nova “The Long Honeymoon,” his noirlike chronicle of a crumbling marriage. Additionally, his verbal dexterity reached a new apotheosis: “The Loved Ones,” for example, opens with the lines, “Don’t get smart or sarcastic / He snaps back just like elastic / Spare us the theatrics and the verbal gymnastics / We break wise guys just like matchsticks.” It was the last fully collaborative effort Costello made with the Attractions, whose keyboardist Steve Nieve and drummer Pete Thomas are now in the Impostors, and on the albums that followed he floundered for the first time. Imperial Bedroom remains one of my favorite pop records of all time, and it will be the focal point of this visit. Costello won’t perform it in full, but considering his massive repertoire I imagine he’ll use its songs to build a platform to survey the shifting contexts of his catalog. —PETER MARGASAK
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b
ALL AGES
F
THURSDAY27 Insane Clown Posse Big Hoodoo, Blahzay Rose, and Trilogy open. 7 PM, Durty Nellie’s, 180 S. Smith St., Palatine, $28. In the e-book 7 Days in Ohio: Trump, the Gathering of the Juggalos and the Summer Everything Went Insane, author Nathan Rabin fails to see a connection between the masses who filled the streets for the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July and the grease-painted Insane Clown Posse superfans who attended the Detroit horrorcore group’s annual “gathering” that same month. In essence it’s got something to do with the way the country’s white lower and middle classes have responded to diminished economic prospects. Some have turned to Trump, while others have taken a different route—particularly those ICP fans who call themselves juggalos, which the FBI classified as a “hybrid gang” in its 2011 National Gang Threat Assessment. Juggalos are, typically speaking, white and lower class, just like the rappers who inspired their subculture, Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope. For more than two decades ICP’s members have rebuffed conventions of how they should act. It’s easy to dismiss their “wicked clown” aesthetic as silly—or suggest ICP’s financial success is the only thing that makes the group noteworthy—but they do take risks and say at least something worthwhile amid their juvenile rhymes and carnival sounds. Tonight ICP will play 1995’s Riddle Box, reissued in 2015 through Psychopathic Records in honor of the band’s 20th anniversary. Released the year after Korn set the nu-metal revolution in motion with the self-titled album Korn, Riddle Box mixes low-riding rap with metal grit, gleefully assailing the powerful and wealthy and, even more notably, the thoughtless stereotype of white working-class America as rednecks. Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope have always known how society views them, and in fighting back they created a universe and language that followers across the country can immerse themselves in. The outside world still doesn’t quite get it, and that’s kind of the point. —LEOR GALIL
FRIDAY28 David Ashley Drea Smith the Vibe Dealer headlines; Norty, David Ashley, and Morimoto open. 9 PM, Tonic Room, 2447 N. Halsted, $8. At the beginning of the year Chicago rapper-singer David Ashley—who’s also a member of R&B band Jody—quietly launched “Strictly 4 the Heads,” an ongoing series of raw, rough-and-tumble rap tracks he’s been uploading to Soundcloud at a once-amonth clip. Ashley’s worked on the series in relative quiet, though the tracks, each of which shares its name with the project’s title, move with vigor and power despite (and sometimes because of) their sonic flaws. The queasy synths that open the “Strictly 4 the Heads Pt. 1” and the compressed 808 percussion on “Strictly 4 the Heads Pt. 6” harken back to sun-beaten 90s Memphis street rap, though the real gritty texture comes from Ashley’s rapping. His coolheaded performances glide through stories that sound ripped from cell-phone notes as he
David Ashley o RACHEL GLASS
threads together rhymes about struggling through meager paychecks and shouldering the spiritual toll of Chicago’s murder rate. Ashley compresses his emotions with succinct force and drops bars with the ease of a point guard tossing a balled-up piece of trash in the garbage. There’s no shortage of Chicago rappers who can tap into the fear and horror of gun violence, but on “Strictly 4 the Heads Pt. 7” Ashley challenges listeners to rethink the way we compartmentalize and process crime that disproportionately affects young black men: “It’s crazy, yo / Lately death became an all ages show.” Tonight he’ll perform all of his “Strictly 4 the Heads” material as part of Rich Jones’s monthly hip-hop series All Smiles. —LEOR GALIL
Danish String Quartet 7:30 PM, Mandel Hall, University of Chicago, 1131 E. 57th, $35, $5 students. b I’ve spent the last few weeks entranced by the Danish String Quartet’s new album on ECM, a gorgeous recording that tackles works by three European composers of three consecutive generations—each piece being his first for string quartet. The most recent, Arcadiana by Brit Thomas Adès, opens the album with a lush, stylistically broad evocation of natural idylls, its seven movements veering from earthy turbulence to ethereal serenity. “Quartetto Breve” by Dane Per Nørgård lasts just seven minutes over two movements, though it shifts between emotional poles with the impact of an epic. 10 Preludes by Hans Abrahamsen, a onetime student of Nørgård’s, blurs the line between serialism and minimalism before pulling a sly postmodern finale by tapping some bright Renaissance polyphony. For this weekend’s visit the quartet will perform Shostakovich’s String Quartet no. 15 (1974), a somber and slow masterpiece that was the composer’s last for this instrumentation, and Schubert’s String Quintet in C, another last work, composed during the final weeks of his life. The group will be joined by Swedish cellist Torleif Thedéen for the Schubert. —PETER MARGASAK
Honeyblood Jay Som and Emily Jane Powers open. 8 PM, Subterranean, 2011 W. North, $14. 17+ At Lollapalooza a couple of years ago I asked Scott Hutchison, front man of Scottish indie-rock outfit Frightened Rabbit, if there were any exciting new bands in his native Glasgow. Without pause he proclaimed that Honeyblood, the two-piece of Stina Marie Claire Tweeddale (guitar/vocals) and Shona McVicar (drums/vocals), were the best thing to spring from the Dear Green in a good minute. I was charmed but not totally captivated by the band’s first two singles, which bounced between shoegaze shimmer and off-kilter pop sweet- J
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 39
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ness. That changed a year later with “Killer Bangs,” a straight-up rock song with spirited drums and one hell of a hook. It was polished enough to demonstrate the pair’s mastery of their instruments, but at the same time had enough heart to show them off as human beings. Honeyblood seemed to be on an upward trajectory . . . and then the drummer left. In a rare display of fledgling-rock-band perseverance, though, new drummer Cat Myers came aboard and suddenly made the twosome formidable, her hard and fast drumming forcing Tweeddale to pick up the pace in the best way. Their 2016 record Babes Never Die teems with the muscularity of “Killer Bangs,” but it’s tighter and louder and sustains the adrenaline through rocking anthems like “Ready
for the Magic,” “Walking at Midnight,” and “Sea Hearts.” “Justine, Misery Queen” and “Sister Wolf” fuel the 90s-nostalgia fire, referencing the power cum sweetness of Juliana Hatfield and the Breeders, which feels particularly impressive for a duo. —ERIN OSMON
Meshuggah High on Fire open. 8 PM, House of Blues, 329 N. Dearborn, $37.50. 17+ On Meshuggah’s new eighth studio full-length, The Violent Sleep of Reason (Nuclear Blast), these deranged Swedes refine the style they’ve made famous—death metal that sounds like it’s been fed through the nested gears of a colossal alien
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machine. This time the lyrics allegedly address terrorism, extremism, and the threat of religious dogma, but if you spend your valuable Meshuggah time trying to figure out what front man Jens Kidman is howling about, then you and I have different priorities. I’m here for the glitchy, labyrinthine rhythms—they don’t just shift gears, they whip and spasm and jump sideways into pocket dimensions. “Born in Dissonance” opens with a chunky, stuttering groove that sounds like somebody keeps restarting the YouTube stream, while “Nostrum” uses oddly weighted, bitten-off rushes that feel like a slipping chain. The riffs push around and delay what ought to be their backbeats, or set up a simple, repeated cell only to immediately shatter and mutate it. They dilate and unravel, invert their own logic, and phase one pulse against another. Drummer Tomas Haake has a favorite trick: he’ll play a steady ride against a fractally convoluted pattern whose patchwork of exotic time signatures mere mortals can’t hope to parse. Following that steady, comforting beat while the rest of the song goes haywire is like trying to hang on to your constituent particles while you’re sucked through a wormhole. And at Meshuggah’s live shows, they love to sync the dazzling detonations of their strobes to the complicated shit—which makes it even tougher not to end up as a cloud of plasma. —PHILIP MONTORO
Wadada Leo Smith & John Lindberg See also Saturday. 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $20. 18+ Trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith is in the midst of a remarkable stretch of creative energy as he nears his 75th birthday, playing at the highest level in a growing number of potent contexts. His Golden Quintet just dropped the impressive new double CD America’s National Parks (Cuneiform), which contains meditations on six different U.S. parks and focuses on the spiritual dimension of natural spaces being preserved for future generations. But some of Smith’s most thrilling work comes from his duo projects. This spring he released A Cosmic Rhythm With Each Stroke (ECM), an introspective recording with pianist Vijay Iyer that captures Smith at his most lyric and tender—though beneath the fragile beauty of his lines smolders his trademark intensity. The title suite is a commission inspired by late Indian artist Nasreen Mohamedi, whose work often features line-based drawings that blend abstraction and architectural precision. Iyer used to play in Smith’s Golden Quartet along with bassist John Lindberg, whose long-running duo with the trumpeter was finally recorded on last year’s Celestial Weather (TUM). Opening with Smith’s heartfelt tribute to bassist Malachi Favors Maghostut—the longtime anchor of the Art Ensemble of Chicago and the original member of the Golden Quartet Lindberg replaced—the album mostly consists of the Celestial Weather Suite, an improvisatory opus in five parts, each named for a harrowing natural calamity (e.g., “Cyclone,” “Typhoon”). The pieces may lack the unalloyed power suggested by their titles, but they do underline the rapport between the two players. For these Chicago performances the pair will perform as a trio with drummer Mike Reed, who’s worked with Smith on multiple occasions in recent years. —PETER MARGASAK J
TOMORROW NEVER KNOWS JA N UA R Y 1 1 T H - 1 5 T H • W W W.T N K F E S T. C O M
SCHUBAS - LINCOLN HALL - THE HIDEOUT - METRO - SMARTBAR
BADBADNOTGOOD + Tortoise Title Fight + CEREMONY JEFF The Brotherhood + Ezra Furman WAND + Big Thief Foxtrott + Open Mike Eagle IAN SWEET + Sam Evian + Mattson 2 Acid Dad + Chastity + Negative Scanner In Tall Buildings + Muuy Biien + Flaural Monobody + Campdogzz + Dream Version Joe Bordenaro & the Late Bloomers + HOGG Special Performance by: Sons Of The Silent Age performing David Bowie’s Low COMEDY AT THE HIDEOUT
Phoebe Robinson + Beth Stelling + Michelle Wolf Helltrap Nightmare Birthday Funeral
PRESENTED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 41
NOVEMBER 4 ON SALE NOW thechicagotheatre.com The Chicago Theatre prov ides disabled accommodations and sells tickets to disabled indiv iduals through our Disabled Ser v ices department, which may be reached at 888 - 609 -7599 any weekday from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Ticketmaster orders are subject to ser v ice charges.
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10/27
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10/29
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SAT
WINDY CITY SOUL CLUB @ CHICAGO ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION (12 S. MICHIGAN AVE.)
STEP INTO THE DARK
HALLOWEEN PARTY FEAT. 12PM-FREE
SUN
10/30
TUE
11/1 WED
NIKKI LANE DAM-FUNK (DJ SET)
BRIC-A-BRAC’S HALLOWEEN BRUNCH
LA SERA SPRINGTIME CARNIVORE TV PARTY
MARATECK • MAURICE THE EMPTY BOTTLE’S ENTHRALLING CAVALCADE OF
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11/2
THE GOTOBEDS • ORDER OF NIGHT
THU
RICKY EAT ACID
11/3
SKYLER ROWE & JONATHAN VAN HERIK
9PM $5
10/29
[RYAN PACKARD, ANDREW CLINKMAN & ALEC WATSON]
AMERICAN DRAFT PERFORMING DANZIG’S DANZIG
10/31
THE HOYLE BROTHERS
FRI
10/28
PAPER MICE
PERFORMING TELEVISION’S MARQUEE MOON
MON
KITTY
FREE
FRI
11/4
11/5
THE HOYLE BROTHERS
NATURAL CHILD
COUPLER • VELCRO LEWIS GROUP 1PM FREE
SAT
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42 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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MUSIC Honeyblood o AMIRA FRITZ
AMOS LEE
LI VE IN C O NC ER ERTT
T H I S F RID RIDAAY NI NIGG H T! O CTO CTOBB E R 28 B UY TI TICK CKEE T S AT TI TICK CKEE T MASTE MA STER.C R.C O M T HE CH C H I C A GO TH T H E ATR E B OX OX OFFICE OFFI CE B Y P H ONE: 800-745-3000 800-745-3000 NEW NE W ALBUM
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SATURDAY29 Elvis Costello & the Imposters See Pick of the week on page 38. 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State, $38.50-$153.50. b Wadada Leo Smith & John Lindberg See Friday. 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $20. 18+
SUNDAY30 Amira 7 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music, 4544 N. Lincoln, $45, $43 members. b For most of her career Bosnian singer Amira Medunjanin has aimed to give a contemporary vibe to the centuries-old folk tradition from her homeland known as sevdalinka, a sorrowful form of balladry usually sung by women that dates back to Ottoman rule. The vast repertoire of sevdalinka primarily consists of romantic laments fueled by suffering and sadness—though these days it sounds like a kind of rhapsodized cafe music, a cousin to strains of American blues or Portuguese fado, with vocals often accompanied by an accordion or the wooden lute called the saz. As heard throughout her discography, including the forthcoming Damar (World Village), Medunjanin imparts a sophisticated urbanity to the form, adding instruments like guitar and piano to the mix while pushing it toward a kind of adult contemporary pop sound with a touch of jazz. She sings with remarkable control, finessing the emotional hearts of the folk songs into something sublime without surrendering their vulnerability. She’ll perform here with guitarist Ante Gelo and double bassist Zvonimir Sestak. —PETER MARGASAK
GZA See also Monday. 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, sold out. b When Staten Island’s Wu-Tang Clan signed with RCA in 1992, the groundbreaking hip-hop collective insisted that their contract allow each member to pursue a solo career in any way he wanted. It was an important move, giving each of the Clansmen a chance to spotlight their wildly idiosyncratic personalities. Being a part of arguably the greatest hip-hop group ever seems like a lot of
work as it is, but the members’ following solo works were also great—late 1994 into 1995 alone saw the release of Method Man’s impossibly smooth Tical, Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s unhinged Return to the 36 Chambers, and Raekwon’s mafioso-rap landmark Only Built for Cuban Linx . . . But the undisputed, stone-cold classic was Liquid Swords by Gza, aka the Genius. During a skit on Wu-Tang’s 1993 debut, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), Method Man famously explains why Gza is the group’s brain (“We form like Voltron and Gza happen to be the head”), and on Liquid Swords Gza’s deep, powerful voice booms forth lyrics about chess, philosophy, and martial arts over minimal, crispy, blownout Rza beats. The album is often considered the crowning, timeless achievement of the sprawling Wu-Tang catalog, and for good reason—it hits like a freight train. It’s garnered a lot of front-toback performances over the last few years, and Gza will be doing just that two nights in a row. —LUCA CIMARUSTI
SPIRI SPIRIT T AVAIL AILAB ABLL E NOW NO W
®
AMOO S L EE.C O M AM
MONDAY31 Gza See Sunday. 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, $35-$45. b Weyes Blood Wei Zhongle and Deadbeat open. 9 PM, Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, $10. On her shimmering new album Front Row Seat to Earth (Mexican Summer) Philadelphia chanteuse Natalie Mering, who performs as Weyes Blood, achieves a new level of grace, pushing her once folk-rooted sound toward the heavens. Her lovely voice has never sounded more powerful and precise, and with an assist from coproducer Chris Cohen (ex-Deerhoof, Cryptacize) her songs now convey a honeyed pop sheen, the austerity of her earlier work replaced here and there by a soaring sense of grandeur—for instance, “Used to Be” seems to imagine Karen Carpenter fronting a 60s girl group. There’s still a chronic feeling of doom, but it’s belied by the record’s loveliness, and Mering’s lyrics often suggest that she’s made peace with a disintegrating world. In “Generation Why” she sings “It’s not the past that scares me / Now what a great future this is gonna be”—though even that assertion is undercut by an air of uncertainty. Front Row Seat is a strong effort that takes its time asserting its full control, its darkness taking root only after its ethereal beauty has mesmerized the listener. —PETER MARGASAK J
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 27
ARAGON BALLROOM ON SALE THIS FRIDAY AT NOON! Get tickets online at ticketmaster.com www.peta.org www.true-to-you.net OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 43
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Find more music listings at chicagoreader.com/soundboard.
MUSIC Honeyblood o AMIRA FRITZ
AMOS LEE
LI VE IN C O NC ER ERTT
T H I S F RID RIDAAY NI NIGG H T! O CTO CTOBB E R 28 B UY TI TICK CKEE T S AT TI TICK CKEE T MASTE MA STER.C R.C O M T HE CH C H I C A GO TH T H E ATR E B OX OX OFFICE OFFI CE B Y P H ONE: 800-745-3000 800-745-3000 NEW NE W ALBUM
continued from 41
SATURDAY29 Elvis Costello & the Imposters See Pick of the week on page 38. 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State, $38.50-$153.50. b Wadada Leo Smith & John Lindberg See Friday. 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $20. 18+
SUNDAY30 Amira 7 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music, 4544 N. Lincoln, $45, $43 members. b For most of her career Bosnian singer Amira Medunjanin has aimed to give a contemporary vibe to the centuries-old folk tradition from her homeland known as sevdalinka, a sorrowful form of balladry usually sung by women that dates back to Ottoman rule. The vast repertoire of sevdalinka primarily consists of romantic laments fueled by suffering and sadness—though these days it sounds like a kind of rhapsodized cafe music, a cousin to strains of American blues or Portuguese fado, with vocals often accompanied by an accordion or the wooden lute called the saz. As heard throughout her discography, including the forthcoming Damar (World Village), Medunjanin imparts a sophisticated urbanity to the form, adding instruments like guitar and piano to the mix while pushing it toward a kind of adult contemporary pop sound with a touch of jazz. She sings with remarkable control, finessing the emotional hearts of the folk songs into something sublime without surrendering their vulnerability. She’ll perform here with guitarist Ante Gelo and double bassist Zvonimir Sestak. —PETER MARGASAK
GZA See also Monday. 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, sold out. b When Staten Island’s Wu-Tang Clan signed with RCA in 1992, the groundbreaking hip-hop collective insisted that their contract allow each member to pursue a solo career in any way he wanted. It was an important move, giving each of the Clansmen a chance to spotlight their wildly idiosyncratic personalities. Being a part of arguably the greatest hip-hop group ever seems like a lot of
work as it is, but the members’ following solo works were also great—late 1994 into 1995 alone saw the release of Method Man’s impossibly smooth Tical, Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s unhinged Return to the 36 Chambers, and Raekwon’s mafioso-rap landmark Only Built for Cuban Linx . . . But the undisputed, stone-cold classic was Liquid Swords by Gza, aka the Genius. During a skit on Wu-Tang’s 1993 debut, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), Method Man famously explains why Gza is the group’s brain (“We form like Voltron and Gza happen to be the head”), and on Liquid Swords Gza’s deep, powerful voice booms forth lyrics about chess, philosophy, and martial arts over minimal, crispy, blownout Rza beats. The album is often considered the crowning, timeless achievement of the sprawling Wu-Tang catalog, and for good reason—it hits like a freight train. It’s garnered a lot of front-toback performances over the last few years, and Gza will be doing just that two nights in a row. —LUCA CIMARUSTI
SPIRI SPIRIT T AVAIL AILAB ABLL E NOW NO W
®
AMOO S L EE.C O M AM
MONDAY31 Gza See Sunday. 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, $35-$45. b Weyes Blood Wei Zhongle and Deadbeat open. 9 PM, Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, $10. On her shimmering new album Front Row Seat to Earth (Mexican Summer) Philadelphia chanteuse Natalie Mering, who performs as Weyes Blood, achieves a new level of grace, pushing her once folk-rooted sound toward the heavens. Her lovely voice has never sounded more powerful and precise, and with an assist from coproducer Chris Cohen (ex-Deerhoof, Cryptacize) her songs now convey a honeyed pop sheen, the austerity of her earlier work replaced here and there by a soaring sense of grandeur—for instance, “Used to Be” seems to imagine Karen Carpenter fronting a 60s girl group. There’s still a chronic feeling of doom, but it’s belied by the record’s loveliness, and Mering’s lyrics often suggest that she’s made peace with a disintegrating world. In “Generation Why” she sings “It’s not the past that scares me / Now what a great future this is gonna be”—though even that assertion is undercut by an air of uncertainty. Front Row Seat is a strong effort that takes its time asserting its full control, its darkness taking root only after its ethereal beauty has mesmerized the listener. —PETER MARGASAK J
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 27
ARAGON BALLROOM ON SALE THIS FRIDAY AT NOON! Get tickets online at ticketmaster.com www.peta.org www.true-to-you.net OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 43
OCTOBER 28TH
BACHATAZO FEST
BACHATA HEIGHTZ, ALEJANDRA, KEWIN COSMOS, JR
OCTOBER 29TH
SNAILS: FREAKY
DEAKY AFTER PARTY
OCTOBER 30TH
DUKE DUMONT :
FREAKY DEAKY AFTER PARTY
NOVEMBER 2ND
WATSKY
WITT LOWRY, DAYE JACK , CHUKWUDI HODGE
NOVEMBER 3RD
SLEEPING W/ SIRENS
STATE CHAMPS, TONIGHT ALIVE, WATERPARKS
NOVEMBER 4TH
SCREECHING WEASEL BOWLING FOR SOUP,THE ATARIS
NOVEMBER 5TH NOVEMBER 8TH
EPICA
FLESHGOD APOCALYPSE, ARKONA, THE AGONIST
NOVEMBER 10TH LECRAE NOVEMBER 12TH
SNAKEHIPS
W/ CHARLES MURDOCH
WWW.CONCORDMUSICHALL.COM 2047 N. MILWAUKEE | 773.570.4000 44 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
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Find more music listings at chicagoreader.com/soundboard.
MUSIC %GG' N UQ6N/MM8 4366 L>3RSNU
Fake Limbs o MR. KING
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continued from 43
WEDNESDAY2 Peter Evans, Sam Pluta, Ben LaMar Gay, and Katherine Young 8:30 PM, Constellation, 3111 N. Western, $15, $10 in advance. 18+ Trumpeter Peter Evans established himself internationally a decade ago with a solo improv album called More Is More (Psi). As the title suggests, it was an exercise in sonic maximalism, a mind-blowing feat of intense extended techniques that seemed to contain every one of the instrument’s adventurous developments over the last century. In the years since Evans has reinforced his freakish talent in plenty of ad hoc improvisational settings as well as playing contemporary classical music with International Contemporary Ensemble and leading several tune-based bands. Still, his ferocious new Lifeblood (More Is More)—his first solo album in five years—suggests that he’s at his most arresting when alone. Over the course of 110 relentless minutes he demonstrates how he’s tamed his technique in the service of spontaneously constructed pieces that seethe with quicksilver riffs, gestures, and melodies, telling one high-velocity story after another. I’m certain that listening to this collection will prove more draining for most than it was for the trumpeter to play it. On his first Chicago visit since early 2014, Evans is touring with frequent collaborator Sam Pluta, a recently transplanted New Yorker teaching at University of Chicago. On their 2014 album Event Horizon (Carrier) Pluta uses his computer both to
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process the horn lines of Evans in real time—creating a zero-latency hall of refracting mirrors—and to forge a lightning-quick dialogue that makes parsing the elements a giddy exercise in futility. Chicago bassoonist Katherine Young and cornetist Ben LaMar Gay will join the fray. I’d be scared if I were you. —PETER MARGASAK
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Fake Limbs Screaming Females headline; Moor Mother and Fake Limbs open. 9 PM, Subterranean, 2011 W. North, $15. 17+
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As always with Fake Limbs, let’s get the Jesus Lizard comparison out of the way. The veteran foursome of Chicago punk boys are undoubtedly fans of the off-the-rails noise-rock exploits of Yow and friends. No denying it, and no faulting it. In addition the new Matronly, their first full-length for Don Giovanni, spews forth a hook-happy sass blended into an early-2000s jagged-punk flavor (note shades of NYC-based Level Plane Records and Rye Coalition’s early Gern Blandsten catalog). Accented by the manic timbre of front man Stephen Sowley—part pool-hall drunkard, part mad preacher man—a dark mass of hard riffs tumbles in step with the limber (and loud) drums, each tailing off like a bottle rocket on its way back down to earth. On “ICE 2 CU,” one of the record’s best tracks, a chugging floor-tom strut leads the way long enough to get you into the rhythm, but when the floor of the track collapses—sending it into a spiral of delay-loaded guitar and raving vocals—you have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, dust off, and find the groove all over again. —KEVIN WARWICK v
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No experience necessary. No experience like it. LINCOLN SQUARE • LINCOLN PARK
Sign up for guitar classes at oldtownschool.org OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 45
sipsbits
S P O N S O R E D
N E I G H B O R H O O D
C O N T E N T
Chicago has always been a city of distinct neighborhoods with their own sense of identity and tradition — and each with stand-out bars and restaurants that are worthy of a haul on the El or bucking up for parking. Explore some local faves here, then head out for a taste of the real thing!
FITZGERALDS // BERWYN Everyday: $6 Firestone Walker Opal pints
MOTOR ROW BREWING // NEAR SOUTHSIDE Thu, Fri, Tue, Wed: Happy Hour noon-6pm, $2 off all beers
MONTI’S // LINCOLN SQUARE Monday: $1 off Beers, Friday: $5 Martinis
FITZGERALDSNIGHTCLUB .COM
MOTORROWB REWI NG .COM
I LOV E M O NTI S .CO M
PHYLILIS’ MUSICAL INN // WICKER PARK Everyday: $3.75 Moosehead pints and $2.50 Hamms cans
REGGIES // SOUTH LOOP Wednesday $4 Stoli/Absolut and Soco Cocktails
SCHUBAS // LAKEVIEW $7 Modelo Especial + Don Julio shot
7 7 3 . 4 8 6 .9 8 62
REGGIESLIVE.COM
L H - S T. C O M
LINCOLN HALL // LINCOLN PARK $8 Modelo Especial Tallboy + shot of tequila L H - S T. C O M
DISTILLED CHICAGO // LINCOLN PARK Saturday Brunch (11am-2pm) Bottomless Bloodies & Mimosas
ALIVEONE // LINCOLN PARK Wednesday: 1/2 price aliveOne signature cocktails
D I STI LLE DC H I CAG O.CO M
ALIVEONE .COM
LINCOLN SQUARE
MONTI’S // 4 75 7 N TA L M A N // I LOV E M O N T I S.C O M
FAVE > AUTHENTIC PHILLY CHEESESTEAK
Like every good Husband and Wife Team, Chef James Gottwald and Jennifer Monti negotiated when they created their dream restaurant together. Monti’s Chef James wanted a place where he could relax with a beer and a cheesesteak while watching a game. Jennifer wanted someplace stylish but not too stuffy, where she could share a cheese plate and some wine with friends. They agreed on some “Philly-flare” showing their hometown roots — a casual vibe and menu featuring Authentic Philly Cheesesteaks, Pizza, Hoagies and more!
“. . . stuff this in your hole as fast as possible.” 46 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
— MIKE SULA / CHICAGO READER
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FOOD & DRINK
R PRO SAMGYUBSAL | $$$
3420 N. Milwaukee Ave., Northbrook 847-715-9073
Pork belly on the grill surrounded by side dishes o DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS
NEW REVIEW
Delighting in the belly of the beast With the new Northbrook Korean barbecue joint Pro Samgyubsal, Chicagoans finally have a destination for grilled pork belly. By MIKE SULA
T
hree-layered flesh” is the translation of the Korean word samgyeopsal, or what English speakers refer to less vividly as pork belly. Meat, fat, and skin stack up as the most popular cut on the grill among Koreans, and you can find it at pretty much every barbecue house in the city and suburbs. What you
don’t find very often—the way you would in Korea—are samgyeopsal specialists: operators who focus on belly, capitalizing on a national-size appetite for crispy, spitting-hot mouthfuls of pig belly, dredged through salty sesame oil and wrapped in lettuce leaves with a smear of funky soybean paste and a sliver of griddled garlic.
But now there’s a new strip-mall source for samgyeopsal bearing the logo of a smiling suicidal porker, and a name, Pro Samgyubsal, that, despite the less common transliteration, can only inspire confidence in the activities therein. The restaurant has two rooms, each with spacious tables inset with convex gas burners. It’s regrettable that these aren’t powered by char-
coal, but as they’re fired up and the yawning overhead exhaust fans kick in, any draftiness is replaced with a porky warmth that suffuses the air and seduces your olfactory system. There are just five choices from which to order when it comes to pork belly, distinguished by variations in cut, provenance, and preparation, each arriving as two thick slabs to an order. There’s a basic pork belly, a “natural” belly, “natural” belly with the skin left on, belly scored on the diagonal to increase the grill’s penetration, and finally, slices of hog jowl, which in terms of their fattiness and firmness taste fairly similar to pork belly. These choices all have subtle textural differences. If you favor a bit of a gnaw, go for the jowl or the skin-on slabs. If you don’t enjoy the resistance, get the more tender scored belly. It’s up to you, armed with tongs and scissors, to grill and portion these pieces, supplementing them with sliced white onion, garlic, chile peppers, and long leaves of pungent kimchi. Don’t forget to season them with sea salt. It’s also up to you how to package these little morsels: wrapped in cool lettuce or thin slices of pickled daikon, with the salted sesame oil gireumjang and the funky fermented ssamjang, a potent mixture of red chile and fermented soybean paste. You’ll have a modest assortment of the usual side dishes that come with a Korean meal, such as the radish kimchi kkakdugi, soy-marinated onion, and a few less common ones, such as spicy, chewy dried radish and sweet pickled onion that bears a striking resemblance to ramps. Pro Samgyubsal also offers a few beef options: Wagyu short ribs, boneless or flensed and unfurled from the bone like a tail, as well as thin, frozen curls of brisket that flatten and cook in seconds like a Steak-umm. The menu’s brevity underscores what’s important. There are only four soups available, which is remarkable given that soup is essential at every Korean meal. There’s a kimchi stew, a peppery, beefy ttaro gukbap, and the earthy bean-paste doenjang chigae that comes with each order. If you’re not feeling much like cooking, a large roiling cauldron of kimchi, tofu, and pork belly, a spicy and slightly sweet stew, can J
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 47
FOOD & DRINK
C H IC A G O
READER
S AND GOO PRESENT
E IS L A N D
! DANIELLE A. SCRUGGS
continued from 47
W IT H
/ CH ICAGO D N A R G 2W T WO / 113 E R 14, 2016 B M E V O N M O N DAY / PM 6:30 –10:00 MENU 4 - CO U R S E IRINGS A P D N A L S E IS W IT H G O O T T IC K E T S A
D E R .CO M / A E R O G A NER C H IC D B E E R D IN N A L IS E S GOO KET PRICE I N C LU D E D G R AT U T I Y
TA X A N D 1+ MUST BE 2
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be brought to the table, or if you’re feeling more spartan, a bowl of bibimbap—without hot sauce or egg but loaded with gondeure, Korean gondre thistle—can provide your daily recommended antioxidants. Apart from two cold noodle dishes— the sweet buckwheat noodle soup mul-naengmyun and its spicy, dry gochujangslathered cousin bibim naengmyun—that’s all the food there is at Pro Samgyubsal. Along with the usual Korean and Japanese beers, there are a few brands of the fermented rice brew makgeolli and a small selection of soju. But a lack of possibilities isn’t a liability at Pro Samgyubsal, when all you really need is three layers of flesh. v
" @MikeSula
A UTH E NTI C PH I LLY C H E E S E STEA KS!
T F A ER R C BE
PI
ZZ
S P DR EC INK IA LS
A
4757 N TALMAN · 773.942.6012 · ILOVEMONTIS.COM · 48 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
W
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@ILOVEMONTIS
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TRANSUNION, LLC SEEKS Sr.
JOBS SALES & MARKETING TELE-FUNDRAISING: FOR VETERANS DAY. American Veterans helping Veterans.
Felons need not apply per Illinois Attorney General regulations. Start ASAP, Call 312-256-5035
General QRM IS LOOKING for a Financial
Analyst to perform specialized quality assurance analysis related to Asset Liability Management including testing, reconciling and consulting with lead engineers to validate and modify QRM’s financial valuation and pricing models, behavioral models and structured security models. Develop documentation and testing patterns to ensure that all models properly integrate into the QRM Analytical Framework used by financial institutions and insurance companies to analyze and measure risk inherent in financial securities and derivatives including market, interest rate, currency and credit risks. Assess and monitor the accuracy, consistency, and suitability of existing models in the Analytical Framework to insure that risk calculations continue to capture applicable factors and parameters affecting results. Collaborate with clients and lead engineers at QRM to analyze clients’ needs to generate requirements for new functionality and customization within the Analytical Framework and provide testing and support for newly developed risk capabilities to insure consistency of calculations and transactions. Establish and meticulously monitor intraday continuous regression tests to ensure both consistency of calculations across newly built compilations and also efficient implementation of any necessary enhancements. Requires Master’s Degree in Finance or Financial Mathematics. Send resumes to: Attn: AXGC, P.O. Box 61038 Chicago, IL 60606.
Consultants - Global Strategy & Planning for Chicago, IL location to identify & create global strategy plans to achieve long-term goals of a global leader in credit info. & info. management services. Master’s in Business Administration + 2yrs exp. or Bachelor’s in Business Administration + 5yrs exp. req’d. Must have exp./ proficiency w/strategy development for a global business, conducting market research incl. customer interviews & market surveys, performing valuations for large projects (worth over $100M) using discounted cash flows, comparable & other valuation methods, presenting to executives, analyzing company financial reports incl. annual reports, 10-K, 10-Q, & financial databases (Bloomberg, Capital IQ). Must have passed CFA Level 2. Send resume to: C. Studniarz, REF: AG, 555 W. Adams St., Chicago, IL 60661
HEALTHCARE TECHNOLOGY Healthcare Technology Strategy Manager (Mult. Pos.), PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services LLC, Chicago, IL. Provide strategy, mgmt., tech. & risk
consulting services to help healthcare institutions anticipate & address complex bus. challenges. Req. Bach’s deg or foreign equiv. in Bus Admin, IT, Comp Sci, Engg, Info Mgmt, Health Admin, or rel. + 5 yrs post-bach’s prog. rel. work exp.; OR a Master’s deg or foreign equiv. in Bus Admin, IT, Comp Sci, Engg, Info Mgmt, Health Admin, or rel. + 3 yrs rel. work exp. Travel up to 80% req. Apply by mail, referencing Job Code IL1015, Attn: HR SSC/Talent Management, 4040 West Boy Scout Boulevard, Tampa, FL 33607.
TECHNOLOGY SENIOR ASSOCIATE, DATA & ANALYTICS (MULT. POS.), PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services LLC, Chicago, IL. Assist clients with defining their info strategy, architecture & governance. Obtain the most value from bus. intelligence (BI) & analytics. Req. Bach’s deg or foreign equiv. in Comp Sci, Comp Engg, Info Sys Mgmt, Bus Admin, or rel. + 3 yrs rel. exp.; OR a Master’s deg or foreign equiv. in Comp Sci, Comp Engg, Info Sys Mgmt, Bus Admin, or
rel. + 1 yr rel. exp. Travel up to 80% req. Apply by mail, referencing Job Code IL1024, Attn: HR SSC/Talent Management, 4040 W. Boy Scout Blvd, Tampa, FL 33607.
USER EXPERIENCE DESIGNER for Vibes Media LLC in Chicago,
IL lead user-centered design process for web & mobile products; oversee user research, IA, interaction design & user testing; utilize front-end web technologies; conduct qualitative & quantitative research; create mockups, prototypes, storyboards & other artifacts Bachelor’s in Communication Design or Multimedia Design + 2 yrs of exp in job off’d req’d Respond RD/Vibes PO Bx 4241 NYC 10163
TECHNOLOGY MANAGER, BUSINESS APPLICATIONS (MULT. POS.),
PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services LLC, Chicago, IL. Design & implement technical solns to improve bus. processes. Req. Bach’s deg or foreign equiv. in Comp Sci, Comp Engg, IT or rel. + 5 yrs post-bach’s, prog. rel. work exp.; OR a Master’s deg or foreign equiv. in Comp Sci, Comp Engg, IT or rel. + 3 yrs rel. work exp. Travel req. up to 80%. Apply by mail, referencing Job Code IL1023, Attn: HR SSC/Talent Management, 4040 W. Boy Scout Blvd. Tampa, FL. 33607.
FINANCE: Kraft Heinz Foods Company seeks Manager, Global Financial Planning & Strategy to work in Chicago, IL. Resp for prfrmng multi-yr financial planning, establshng financial targets, dvlpng M&A pipelines & executing transactns to drive financial perfrmnc & strategc thinking, globally. Degree & commensurate expernc reqrd. For details & to apply see req. #7431BR online at: http://www. kraftheinzcompany.com/careers.html
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS ANALYST, Plainfield, IL: Limited domestic Travel and/or relocate to multiple client locations nationwide to work with embedded systems; develop control mechanism for Automotive Braking System, Traction Control Systems, Antilock Braking System; Test/monitor variables using CANalyzer. Debug control system using winIDEA; write test scripts using C. Reply to: Calypso Soft, Inc., 23819 Mill Street, #5, Plainfield, IL 60544
Hub Group seeks Business Objects Solutions Specialist to lead design and support of enterprisewide bus. intel. apps and architecture. Oak Brook, IL. Bach. in Comp. Sci. or related req’d. 10 yrs IT exp and SAP HANA cert. req’d. See add’l skills reqts and apply at www.hubgroup.com/ employment. KCURA, LLC (CHICAGO, IL)
(Chicago, IL) Littelfuse, Inc. seeks Sr. Product Manager High Speed Fuse w/ Bach or for equiv deg in EE or rel fld & 5 yrs progressive exp in job offered or in Indust space w/ High Speed Fuse Mrkt, incl exp w/ defin, implem, sup & perform of electr circ protec prods; NPD, Prod Readiness List, S&OP, Prod Profit; & prod life cycle mngmt from intro through obsolescence. Occas global trvl reqd. Apply to N. Castillo, 8755 W. Higgins Rd, Ste 500, Chicago, IL 60631
seeks Software Engineer in Test responsible for driving customer confidence by assuring the quality of kCura’s current/future core products. Apply at: recruiting@kcura.com and reference Job ID: 2016-MM-ENG1004.
KCURA, LLC (CHICAGO, IL)
seeks Software Engineer in Test responsible for driving customer confidence by assuring the quality of kCura’s current/future core products. Apply at: recruiting@kcura.com and reference Job ID: 2016-MM-ENG1005.
KCURA, LLC (CHICAGO, IL)
seeks Advanced Software Engineer in Test responsible for driving customer confidence by assuring quality of kCura’s current/future core products & working under moderate direction of managers/senior team members. Apply at recruiting@kcura. com and reference Job ID: 2016-MMENG-1006.
NUTS ON CLARK Popcorn Stores
hiring for new location: Sales, cooks, stock, paid training. Starts immediately when working with a team. Apply in person @ corp. office, 3830 N. Clark St. Chicago 9 am to 10 am Mon Thru Fri. Must bring ID’s to apply
GENERAL TRUCK AND trailer
mechanic. Full- and part-time. Uniforms provided. Opportunity for advancement. Chicago. Call 630-2040502.
Advanced Telecommunication of Illinois, Inc. seeks Network Engineers. Worksite is Naperville, IL. C o n t a c t careers@aticti.com.
REAL ESTATE RENTALS
STUDIO $500-$599 Chicago, Beverly/Cal Park/Blue Island Studio $575 & up, 1BR $665 & up, 2BR $885 & up. Heat, Appls, Balcony, Carpet, Laundry, Prkg. 708-388-0170
STUDIO $600-$699
STUDIO $700-$899 EDGEWATER: Dlx Studio: full kic, new appl, DR, oak flrs, lndy, cats ok. $795/incl ht, water, gas, 773-743-4141 urbanequities.com
STUDIO OTHER LARGE SUNNY ROOM w/fridge & microwave. Near Oak Park, Green Line & Buses. 24 hr Desk, Parking Lot $101/week & Up. (773)378-8888 CHICAGO - HYDE PARK 5401 S. Ellis. 1BR. $600/mo. Call 773-955-5106 CROSSROADS HOTEL SRO SINGLE RMS Private bath, PHONE,
CABLE & MAIDS. 1 Block to Orange Line 5300 S. Pulaski 773-581-1188
Ashland Hotel nice clean rms. 24 hr desk/maid/TV/laundry/air. Low rates daily/weekly/monthly. South Side. Call 773-376-5200
PARK! 7455 N . Greenview. Studios starting at $675 $695 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. No security deposit! For a showing please contact Samir 773-627-4894 Hunter Properties 773-477-7070 www. hunterprop.com
1 BR UNDER $700
EDGEWATER!
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
ROGERS
1061 W. Rosemont. Studios starting at $695 to $725, 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
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 MARQUETTE PARK: 6315-19 S California, Studios, 1beds, 2beds from $600-$800, Free heat, no deposit. 773.916.0039
FALL SPECIAL: STUDIOS starting at $499 incls utilities. 1BR $550, 2BR $599, 3BR $699. With approved credit. No Security Deposit for Sec 8 Tenants. South Shore & Southside. Call 312-4463333 7022 S. SHORE DRIVE Impecca-
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)
Retail
Binny’s Beverage Depot is the Midwest’s largest upscale retailer of fine wines, spirits, beers and cigars, and due to our continued growth, we now have the following retail opportunities available in multiple locations to qualified persons over 21 years of age:
STORE ASSOCIATES
Lakeview * Lincoln Park * Grand Ave/Downtown * South Loop Skokie * Lincolnwood * Elmwood Park * River Grove We are seeking energetic, customer-oriented individuals to perform a variety of store functions. Qualified persons must be able to lift 40-50 lbs. and be available to work flexible hours. Previous retail experience a plus, with cashier or stock experience preferred. Candidates must be able to work nights & weekends.These are part-time positions with potential for full-time.
WINE SALES
Lincoln Park * South Loop * Logan Square Candidates will have good working knowledge of wine varieties, countries and regions. Qualified persons must be able to taste wines in a professional manner as allowed for educational purposes, as well as continue to develop knowledge of wine and other products.
DELIVERY DRIVER/STORE ASSOCIATE South Loop
We are seeking an energetic, customer-oriented individual to perform a variety of store and delivery functions. Qualified person must be able to lift 40-50 lbs. and be available to work flexible hours including evenings, weekends and holidays. Valid IL driver’s license with a clean driving record is essential. In return for your skills, we offer growth opportunities and attractive compensation.
Please apply online at www.binnys.com/careers EOE
OCTOBER 27, 2016 | CHICAGO READER 49
SOUTHSIDE - 8535 S. Green,
1 & 2 BR Apts, well maintained, hdwd floors, $625-$750/mo, security deposit required Call 773-874-8451
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 FALL SPECIAL $500 Toward
Rent Beautiful Studios 1, 2, 3 & 4 BR Sect. 8 Welc. Westside Loc, Must qualify. 773-287-4500 www.wjmngmt.com
CLEAN ROOM W/FRIDGE & micro, Near Oak Park, Food -4Less, Walmart, Walgreens, Buses & Metra, Laundry. $115/wk & up. 773-637-5957
Newly remod 1BR & Studios starting at $500. No sec dep, move in fee or app fee. Free heat /hot water. 1155 W. 83rd St., 773-619-0204 WEST PULLMAN (INDIANA
Ave) Nice,lrg 1BR $575; 2BR $650 & 1 3BR $850, balcony, Sec. Dep.req’d. Sec 8 Welc. 773-995-6950
61ST/MICHIGAN, Modern, cozy 4rm, 1BR, Tenant heated. $595/month, No security deposit, agent owned 312-671-3795 1BR, 84TH & PAULINA, $620/ mo + sec dep. Newly decorated, hdwd flrs, stove & fridge incl. You control your heat. 773-852-5463
BRONZEVILLE
4950 S Prairie. 1BR. Heat, cooking gas, appl incl. Sec 8 ok. Lndry on site, prkg. $680 & up. Z 773-406-4841
CHATHAM 8642 SOUTH Maryland 1BR, modern with appliances, off street parking. $600/mo + sec. 773-618-2231 Apts. $680-$725/mo. Heat Incl. Parking available, appls incl No Pets. 773-907-0302 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
76TH & PHILLIPS 2BR $750$800. Remodeled, Appliances available. FREE Heat. 312-2865678 CHICAGO - SOUTH SHORE Large 1BR, $660/mo. Free heat. Near Transportation. Section 8 Welcome. Call 708-932-4582 406 W. 119TH St. Large Unheated 3BR apt, no pets, sec 8 Welcome $780/mo + 2 months security. 708-862-8285
1 BR $700-$799
SECTION 8 WELCOME 3BR. 77 Ridgeland $850. Heat incl, Laundry on site. 85TH & PAULINA - 1BR, 2nd flr Apt, $600/mo + $600 sec dep & ref check. Quiet Bldg, Incl heat & fridge. Avail now. 773-297-8575.
ALSIP: LARGE 1BR, $695/MO & 2BR, 1.5BA, $875/MO. BALCONY, APPLIANCES, LAUNDRY & STORAGE. CALL 708268-3762
CHICAGO, 82ND & JUSTINE. 1BR. near transportation. $650$695 /mo. 1 month rent + 1 month Security. Heat is incl. 773-873-1591 $725/MO. LARGE 2BR 75th & Union. Near public trans, schools and shopping, appl incl. Sect 8 Welc. 708-334-5188 û NO SEC DEP û
6829 S. Perry. 1BR. $520/mo. 1431 W. 78th St. 2BR. $605/mo. HEAT INCL 773-955-5106
SOUTH SHORE 1 & 2BR apts. $575 & $700/mo. Heat incl. $300 Move-in Fee. Showing on Saturday. Call 773-620-1136 CHATHAM - 7105 S. Champlain, 1BR. $640/mo. Sec 8 OK. Heat & appl. Call Office: 773-9665275 or Steve: 773-936-4749 75TH & EBERHART. 1 & 2BR apts ceiling fan, appls, hdwd flrs, HEATED, intercom. $650/mo & up Call 773-881-3573
ADULT SERVICES
1 BR $1100 AND OVER
5701 W. WASHINGTON. 1BR
HUMBOLDT PARK. ONE bedroom apartment for rent. Newly remodeled. Next door to food store. $750 per month plus security deposit. Near shopping area. Monica, 773592-2989.
773-874-9637 or 773-493-5359
EDGEWATER 1000SF 1BR; new kit, sunny FDR, oak flrs, Onsite lndy; PKG Avail., $1095/incl heat. 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com
CHATHAM - 88TH & Dauphin.
CHURCHVIEW APARTMENTS Located on the corner of Oak and Lake Streets, Evanston. Units are spacious, kitchens with dishwashers, laundry on site, hardwood floors, wood burning fireplaces, large closets and ample storage, on-site maintenance. Shopping, restaurants and public transportation nearby . 1 bedroom, 1 bath is $1,000 and includes heat. Call Treva Kizart at 773-935-5433. LARGE ONE BEDROOM apart-
ment near Red Line. 6822 N Wayne. Hardwood floors. Pets OK. Laundry in building. $900-$925/ month. Heat included. Available 12/1. 773-7614318, www.lakefrontmgt.com
ONE BEDROOM APARTMENT
near Warren Park and Metra, 6802 N Wolcott. Hardwood floors. Heat included. Laundry in building. Cats OK. $900/ month. Available 12/1. 773761-4318, www.lakefrontmgt.com
WRIGLEVILLE 1BR, 1000SF, new kit/deck, FDR, oak flrs, Cent H eat/AC, prkg avail. $1295 + util, Pet friendly, 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com
515 W WRIGHTWOOD , Chicago, 1 bedroom, top floor, newly painted, heat included, no pets, available now $1200/mo. 773-6106025 or 262-857-7063
1 BR OTHER APTS. FOR RENT PARK MGMT & INV. Ltd. IT’S THAT TIME AGAIN! OUR UNITS INCLUDE HEAT, HW & CG Plenty of parking 1Bdr From $750.00 2Bdr From $925.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000***
APTS. FOR RENT PARK MGMT & INV. Ltd. TIME TO TURN THE FURNANCE ON!!! Most units Include.. HEAT & HOT WTR Studios From $545.00 1Bdr From $575.00 2Bdr From $745.00 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath From $1200 **1-(773)-476-6000**
Deluxe 2BR + den, new kitchen, FDR, oak floors close to beach. $1250/heated, 774-743-4141 www.urbanequities.com
ONE OF THE BEST M & N MGMT, 1BR, 7727 Colfax ** 2 Lrg BR, 6754 Crandon ** 2 & 3BR, 2BA, 6216 Eberhart ** Completely rehabbed. You deserve the best ** 773-9478572 or 312-613-4427
ADULT SERVICES
ADULT SERVICES
ROGERS PARK:
Lovely 2BR, lndry rm, security camera, nr metra, $800-$900/mo, 312-341-1950
1 BR $800-$899 LAKESIDE TOWER, 910 W Lawrence. 1 bedrooms starting at $875-$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
1 BR $900-$1099 LARGE ONE BEDROOM apart-
ment near Loyola Park. 1341 W Estes. Hardwood floors. Heat included. Cats OK. Laundry in building. Available 12/ 1. $925/ month. Small one bedroom apartment available for $750/ month. 773-761-4318, www. lakefrontmgt.com
ADULT SERVICES
COLLEGE GIRL BODY RUBS $40 w/AD 24/7
224-223-7787
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 ∫
LARGE 1 BEDROOM, $725
Nr Metra & shops, Sec 8 OK. Newly decor, dining room, carpeted, appls, FREE heat & cooking gas. Elevator & laundry room, free credit check, no application fee, 1-773-919-7102 or 1312-802-7301
FREE HEAT, near 73rd & the Dan Ryan on 73rd & Harvard Ave. Lrg 1BR & small 2BR available, w/ appliances. 773-8957247 CALUMET CITY 158TH & PAXTON SANDRIDGE APTS 1 & 2 BEDROOM UNITS MODELS OPEN M-F, 9AM-5:30PM *** 708-841-5450 *** SPACIOUS-SAFE 773-4235727. BRONZEVILLE, 3BR, heat included. Englewood, 1,2 & 3BR, heat incl. Dolton, 2BR, Gated Parking. FREE HEAT No Sec Dep/ Move-in fee! Sec 8 ok. 1, 2 & 3 BR. Elev bldg, laundry, pkg. 6531 S. Lowe. Call Gina 773-874-0100 126 EMERALD 5 & 2, fin bsmt
$1550. 142 Lowe 3 & 1, fin bsmt, $1125. 144 Emerald 3 & 2 + $1190. Appts 773.619.4395 Charlie 818.679.1175
WEST PULLMAN, 3BR, 4 rms,
near grammar & high school, tenant pays utilities. $1000/mo + $500 Fee. $30 appl fee. 312-483-3817
ACACIA SRO HOTEL Men Preferred! Rooms for Rent. Weekly & Monthly Rates. 312-421-4597
2 BR $900-$1099
2 BR UNDER $900 EXTRA LARGE 4.5 sunny rooms, remodeled, hwfl, 1-2 bedrooms. Two blocks Brown Line. Near Kennedy Expressway. $850 heat included. 773-710-3634.
BRONZEVILLE 4725 S. Vincennes Ave. 1st & 3rd flr. Spacious, smoke free, 5 rms, 2BR, hdwd, tile, c-fans/AC, Ht, wtr, appls incl. Lndry on site. $950 + sec. 312-450-9696
CHICAGO-Chatham Area, xtra lrg 2 bedrooms, newly remod, lndry fac. Clean/quiet/well maint bldg. Starting $850/mo. incl. heat. Sect 8 welcome. 773-510-9290
DLX 1ST FLR, 2.5BR, hdwd flrs, ceiling fans, lg LR/DR & ktchen, 3 car gar. 83rd & Maryland. $850, Free heat & appl incl. Sec 8 welc. 773412-0541
JUMBO,
AUSTIN. NEWLY DECOR 2BR & 2.5BR, hdwd flrs, secured bldg, Tenant pays utils, no pets. $675+. Call Before 7pm! 773-745-3437 CHICAGO
SOUTHSIDE
92ND & ADA, 2 bdrm, lg & spacious w/ DR, hardwood flrs, sunporch, fireplace, heat/appls incl, sec 8 ok $975/mo + sec 773-4156914
LOGAN
SQUARE 2 bedroom
7900 3A & 7906 3B S Wabash Lrg 2BR, 1BA, hrdwd flrs, free heat, remod. kitc., close to transp., prkg. $900/mo. $0 appl fee & 1/2 off 3rd mo rent. Pam Gore 312-208-1771
VICINITY 65TH AND St. Lawrence, modern, tenant heated, 2BR Unit. $725/mo. No Sec Deposit Agent Owned, 312-671-3795
CHICAGO, 9307 S. Saginaw, Newly rehabbed, 2BR, carpet, stove & fridge, heat not incl, $950/ mo. Sect 8 welc. Mr. Johnson, 773294-0167
5552 W. Gladys. 2nd & 3rd flr, 2BR apts. Heat incl, $880/mo. 5215 W. Augusta Blvd. 2BR. $865/mo. Move in special! 773-251-6652 CHICAGO - 2.5BR, $700/mo. Tenant pays heat. One month security & one month rent required. 69 South Wood St. 773-933-1008
WEST AUSTIN AREA. 2BR, 2nd floor, living/dining/laundry room, heat incl. secure building, $1,000/mo. Donnell. 773-584-1833 ROGERS PARK: 1700 Juneway, 2-3 bedrooms $900-$1200, Free heat, No deposit -312.593.1677
2 BR $1100-$1299
ful Studios, 1,2,3 & 4 BR’s, Sec 8 ok. $500 gift certificate for Sec 8 tenants. 773-287-9999/312-446-3333
AUSTIN AREA, Best deal, 2BR. $650-$695. Credit check required. 6 N. Lockwoood Call 708-204-8600
CHICAGO - BEVERLY, large 2 room Studio, 1 & 2BR Apts. Carpet, A/C, laundry, near transportation, $650-$975/mo. Call 773-233-4939
EAST CHICAGO, IN 2BR $675 heat incl; 3BR $650, tenant pays utils. 1 mo. free rent w/lease. Call MIKE 773-577-9361
71ST/HERMITAGE. 3BR. 77th/ Lowe. 2BR. 69th/Dante, 3BR. 71st/ Bennett. 2 & 3BR. New renov. Sec 8 ok. 708-503-1366
CHICAGO 7600 S Essex 2BR $599, 3BR $699, 4BR $799 w/apprvd credit, no sec dep. Sect 8 Ok! 773287-9999 /312-446-3333
2/4 FOR ROOM unheated apts.
SUBURBS, RENT TO OW N! Buy with No closing costs and get help with your credit. Call 708868-2422 or visit www.nhba.com
OAK PARK - Lg 2BR, hdwd flrs, decorative fire place, granite kitchen, D/W, close to trans. Heat Incl. $1295+. 708-359-1440
Evanston 1100sf 3BR, W/new Appl, oak floors $1275/mo incls heat. 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.co
CHICAGO, FAR SOUTH SIDE,
CHATHAM BEAUTIFUL REMOD 2 & 3BR, hdwd flrs, custom
CHICAGO SOUTH SIDE Beauti-
CHICAGO, RENT TO OWN! Buy with no closing costs and get help with your credit. Call 708868-2422 or visit www.nhba.com
Newly decorated, 2BR Townhouse, $640/mo. Section 8 Welcome. 773-873-4321, 8am-5pm
MOVE IN SPECIAL B4 the N of this MO. & MOVE IN 4 $99.00 (773) 874-3400
AUBURN GRESHAM, 1401 W 80TH , 2bed for $895 – No app fee,
ADULT SERVICES
ADULT SERVICES
EVANSTON 2BR, 1100SF, great kit, new appls, DR, oak flrs, lndry, $1250/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 $1300-$1499
85TH & HERMITAGE 2BR, $1000, separate dr. 93rd & Woodlawn, 4BR house $1400, newly remod.Section 8 ok 708-794-6485
BRAND new 2 & 3BR apts. Excellent neighborhood, near trans & schools, Sect 8 Welc., Call 708-7742473 apartment, 2-flat building, modern kitchen & bath, balcony, washer & dryer. $800/mo. Near Blue Line. 773-235-1066
73RD & DORCHESTER, 2BR, carpet, $1210; 119th & Calumet, 3BR, 2BA, carpet, $1350. No Sec Dep. Sec 8 ok. 773-684-1166.
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.
Freshly painted close to loop, and to transportation. Apts located in East Village. Bsmt and 1st floor av. now 708-428-5701
PILSEN AREA - R E M O D ELED Large 2 Bdrm, 2 Bath
Split level. Hardwood floors in Lv Rm & Dn Rm. Carpet in Bedrooms. AC & ceiling fans thru out. One Bdrm & Bath on 2nd Fl, One Bdrm & Bath in 3rd Fl with separate exit. Great for roommates. Pet friendly. Unit has its own furnace. Laundry & Storage room on 3rd Fl. Art Gallery on 1st fl. Electric, garbage, water & laundry facilities included. Rent $1,450/mo plus securities AVL immediately. Lease. Call Karly @ 574-806-1049
NR NEW MARIANO In Bronzeville 2+1BR apt, wood burning frpl, W/D, appls, hdwd flrs, 3rd fl r.$1300 +sec. 312-383-0178
2 BR $1500 AND OVER
LARGE TWO BEDROOM, two
bathroom apartment, 3820 N Fremont. Near Wrigley Field. Hardwood floors. Cats OK. Laundry in building. Available 12/1. $1695/ month. Parking available. $150/ month for single parking space. $250/ month for tandem parking space. 773-761-4318, w ww.lakefrontmgt.com
NORTH MENT--
CENTER
APART-
first floor of 3-flat; 2bedroom/1bath; hardwood floors; eat-in kitchen; formal dining; leaded glass; laundry in basement; central air; no pets; no smoking; $1500 plus utilities; available November 1; call Sue at 773-895-6551. SUNNY 7 ROOMS w/sun porch.
cabinets, avail now. $1100-$1200/mo + sec. 773-905-8487 Sec 8 Ok
2nd floor, 2BR, 2 full baths, hardwood floors, A/C, back yard w/deck, BBQ & gardens, washer/dryer available (extra). Lakeview 1443 W. Available Berteau, October/ November. $1950+ security. Call Dale 773-519-1300, df1347@ameritech.net
ADULT SERVICES
ADULT SERVICES
No deposit, free heat. 312.208.1771
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Try FREE: 312-924-2066 More Local Numbers: 1-800-811-1633
60 MINUTES FREE TRIAL
THE HOTTEST GAY CHATLINE
1-312-924-2082 More Local Numbers: 800-777-8000
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Try FREE: 773-867-1235 More Local Numbers: 1-800-926-6000
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Huge 3BR, Austin Area near Oakpark IL, w/d hookup, near major transportation, tenant pays utilities $1150/mo plus sec 708931-5555
3 BR OR MORE UNDER $1200
WICKER PARK: 1958 W. Evergreen, beautiful, 2 bedroom, 1 bath apartment, 2nd floor, immediate occupancy, $1600 + utilities and security deposit. No pets. 708650-2044 HALSTED & DIVERSEY, 2820 N
Mildred, 2nd floor, 2 bedroom, 1 bath, $1700, includes heat & 1 parking space. No dogs. 312-523-7188
2 BR OTHER BEAUTIFUL NEW APT! 62nd and King Dr. 2BDRM 72nd and Evans. 3BDRM 6150 S. Vernon. 4BDRM Stainless Steel!! Appliances!! Hdwd flrs!! Marble bath!! Laundry on site!! Sec 8 OK. 773- 404- 8926 CHICAGO, PRINCETON PARK HOMES. Spacious 2-3 BR Townhomes, Inclu: Prvt entry, full bsmt, lndry hook-ups. Ample prkg. Close to trans & schls. Starts at $844/ mo. w w w . p p k h o m e s . com;773-264-3005 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
8943 S. ADA. SAFE, secure 23BR, separate heating, nice flrs, school & metra 1 blk away, $875-$1200/mo. Section 8 welcome. 708-4656573
Studio, 1 BR, 2 BR & 3BR’s avail, Section 8 & Veteran Welcome South & West side locations for more info call Mario 773-4477947
3 BR OR MORE $1200-$1499
LINCOLN SQUARE AREA, 2023
W. Balmoral , 3 bdrm. Central AC, newly decorated, 1st fl. apt. laundry fac. hardwood floors. Quiet area. Tenant pays utilities. No dogs. Credit/ background check. $1,400 + security (773)414-0613 86TH & MORGAN, 4BR, 1BA HUGE 4BR, 2BA, W e s t s i d e , $900mo, stove incl, bsmt w/ crpt. ($1300) & 3BR, 1BA laundry hookup. Sec 8 OK. $50 Southside, hardwood, credit check + 1 1/2 mo sec 773- ($1200), close to trans & 456-2061 schools, sec 8 welc, 773-9885800 CHATHAM 3 LARGE BR 3rd flr. $995 / mo + 1 mo sec. New crpt in LR 114TH/ ABERDEEN BRICK 4 & DR, Coin laundry in bsmt. Nr Target BEDS HSE! SEC 8WELC! & Garrett’s Popcorn 773-562-4933. HARDWD FLOORS, BSMENT, GATED, 773-260-2631 APT: 70TH/ABERDEEN. NEWLY RENOV 3BR nr Austin & Studio & 2BR. $475-$695. 1 mo rent + 1 mo sec. House: Dolton 1505 Kasten Lake $1300. All new kit w/ granite counters & SS appls. DR, LR, hdwd Dr. $1300/mo. 773-651-8673 flrs, heat incl. 773-256-2070 2 FLAT QUIET building, 3BR, 2nd NEAR 63RD AND RHODES. floor, SS appl. 5723 S. Michigan Ave.
RIVERDALE, SECTION 8 ok. Newly decorated 3BR. Carpet, near metra, no pets, $925/mo + security dep. Avail Now 708-8291454
2128 W EVERGREEN, Wicker Park. Entire 2nd floor of owner occupied Victorian three-flat; 2100 sq ft, 2 bdrm, 1 new bath, den, 8’ parquet hallway/open-air guest room, eat-in kitchen, dishwasher, microwave, forced air heat & AC, on-site laundry, ample storage, street parking, security cameras, $2100 + utilities, 312-608-0125.
3BR, living room, bath, kitchen, newly decorated, $950/month, tenant pays utilities. Section 8 Ok 773-783-6040 or 312-613-7496
$900/mo. + sec. Tenant pays util. 773-858-3163
TWO 3BR APTS: Nr University of
Chicago, Woodlawn 3BR, 2BA $1000. Park Manor 3BR w/laundry, hdwd flrs, $1150. 312-683-5284
CHICAGO, 4019 W. Arlington,
3BR, 2nd flr, tenant pays all utilities, back porch, $995/mo. Price Neg. 773-966-4821
HARVEY 5BR, fridge, stove, newly remod. $900. Call 773-805-8181
RIVERDALE 3BR, QUIET
neighborhood, heated, near Bus line, Section 8 & Social Security welcome. $1,125. 708-288-9096
SECTION 8 WELCOME. No Security Deposit. 7721 S Peoria, 3BR apt, appls incl. $1050/mo. 708-288-4510
Newly Remod 3-4BR, new appls. $1200-$1500/mo. Sec 8 Welcome. Call 708-955-7795
SECT 8 OK, 2 story, 4br/2ba w/ bsmt. New decor, crpt & hdwds, ceiling fans, stove/fridge, $1465. 11243 S. Eggleston, 773-443-5397
3 BR OR MORE $1500-$1799 WEST LAWN: 6609 S Kilpatrick, Beaut. rehab 3BR 2BA house, granite ctrs, SS appls, cac, fin bsmt, 2 car gar, $1650/mo 708288-4510
3 BR OR MORE $1800-$2499
come. No security dep. 4841 S Michigan, 4BR apt, appls incl, $1300/mo.
COULD 219 KAINER Barrington be your new address? 3BR/2BA 4 rent. Spa bath, marble fireplace, whole house stereo. Walk to train. Free special needs pre-school in district. $1975. Call 847-809-5339.
ENGLEWOOD 4BR, 1BA,
OAK PARK 3 bedroom, 2 bath
newly rehab, 61st/Bishop, $1000 / mo. Sect 8 ok. Pets ok. Top flr of 2 unit bldg. 312-953-1232
sunroom, heat, parking, plus laundry, yard, $1800/mo. Call 773-818-0307
BEAUTIFUL 3BR, new decor, non smoking, heat incl, Nr Kennedy King College & trans. $800/mo. 773-960-8465 leave msg
DEPAUL, 1142 W WELLING-
SOUTHSIDE: 68th & Hermitage 3BR$800/mo, 68th & Emerald 5BR, 2BA $1050/ mo, 3BR, 1BA $800/mo 847-977-3552
LAKEVIEW, 1301 W EDDY, 3 bedroom, 1 bath, recently updated, $1850 + heat. No dogs. 312523-7188
BRONZEVILLE: SEC. 8 Wel708-288-4510
4BR
APT.
113TH/MORGAN.
Lovely 2nd flr, quiet building, stove, tenant pays heat, credit check. $950/ mo. No Sec Dep. 773-405-3472
RIVERDALE 3BR, 1.5BA Townhome, hdwd flrs, 1 car garage, near Metra & PACE, pets OK. $800/mo + sec. 708-539-8962
TON, 3 bedroom 2 bath, recently updated, no dogs. $2400 + heat.
312-523-7188
3 BR OR MORE OTHER
MATTESON, 2BR, $990$1050; 3BR, $1250-$1400. Move In Special is 1 Month’s Rent & $99 Sec Dep. Sect 8 Welc. 708-748-4169
80th/Phillips , Beautiful, lrg newly renovated 3BR, 1.5BA, hdwd flrs & appls inc. quiet apt. $900 & up 312-818-0236
CHICAGO, 59 S. HONORE, 5BR home, 3BA, full finished basement, $1550/mo. Section 8 Welcome. Call 773-919-7730
ADULT SERVICES
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Beautiful 3BR, Austin Area near Laramie & Jackson w/d hookup, hdwd floors, tenant pays util, $1100/ mo plus sec 708-931-5555 CHICAGO, 75TH & DAMEN, newly rehabbed 4BR home, 2BA, appliances included, 1 car garage, $1450/mo. Call 773-732-4545 DOLTON, GRANT ST., 4 B R , 2BA, bsmt, fncd bck yrd, garage, close to elem, avail 11/1, not sect 8 ready. $1450/ mo+sec. 847-289-2889
VERY LARGE 5BR, 2BA house, Austin Area @ Jackson & Cicero, w/d hookup, tenant pays util, $15 85/mo plus security 708-9315555
RETAIL/OFFICE NEAR HIP
Mall 1100, 2200 sf, walk-in cooler, stove, exhaust hood. Profitable. Unlimited Options Joe 847-640-9490
roommates PULLMAN AREA, Newly remodeled 111th St., East of King Dr. $450-$550. Close to shopping & 1/4 block to metra. 773-468-1432
MARKETPLACE
GOODS
Multifamily garage sale 1613 E. Kensington Rd 9a-3 pm Fri Oct28 and Sat Oct29 Come scare up a deal!
European trained and certified therapists specializing in deep tissue, Swedish, and relaxation massage. Incalls. 773-552-7525. Lic. #227008861.
4BR Coach House -$750. 1.5BA LR, lg kit & lg DR, fam rm & rec rm. fenced yrd. Sec 8 ok. 708-574-4085
MUSIC & ARTS WILLIAM HILL GALLERY
6442 S. Dorchester Avenue 312 351 0573 info@williamhillgallery.com / www. williamhillgallery.com 5 NOV - 10 DEC Julius Lyles, “Nothing but Racial Slurs” Opening 5 Nov / 5pm-10pm
CHICAGOLAND
VINTAGE
GUITAR SHOW, Sunday Nov. 6, 10am-5pm, Copernicus Center, 5216 W. Lawrence Ave. Buy-Sell-Trade, $5 admission.
NOTICES
UKRAINIAN MASSAGE. CALLS in/ out. Chicago and sub-
work? North Side Latin Progress, a 501c3 charity, located in Logan Sq. and Avondale, needs someone 2-3 hours a week for computer work (letters, flyers, notes, etc.). Servicing Latino Immigrants who suffer wage theft, etc. Replies by phone only: 773-227-5549 or cell: 312-343-0804 to Gretchen. com
urbs. Hotels. 1250 S Michigan Avenue. Appointments. 773-616-6969.
legal notices 2006 POLARIS SPORTSMAN 800. $2150. Plow, 3500lb winch, 4x4, 3277 miles/234 hours. Call at 2157924041.
GENERAL
NOT A TYPICAL Garage Sale!
High-end furniture: Walter E. Smithe dinningroom Bassett & Ashley couches & chairs endtables night stands lamps mirrors & more 4152 N. Damen 60618 Oct 22 & 23 9a-4p
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NOTICE IS HEREBY given, pursuant to “An Act in relation to the use of an Assumed Business Name in the conduct or transaction of Business in the State,” as amended, that a certification was registered by the undersigned with the County Clerk of Cook County. Registration Number: D16148418 on October 12, 2016 Under the Assumed Business Name of MEAN LITTLE ELF with the business located at: 3640 N. CHRISTIANA AVE., CHICAGO, IL 60618. The true and real full name(s) and residence address of the owner (s)/ partner(s) is: STEVEN HOLMQUIST, 3640 N. CHRISTIANA AVE., CHICAGO, IL 60618, USA
ARE LOOKING FOR volunteer
EDUCATION SLOWS INTERRACIAL. tinasmallrobertapedon.
NEAR 83RD & Yates. 5BR, 2BA, hdwd flrs, fin basement, stove & fridge furn. Heat incl. $1600 + 1 mo sec. Sect 8 ok. 773-978-6134
FOR SALE
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS
FOR A HEALTHY mind and body.
CHICAGO - 5246 S. Hermitage,
CHICAGO AUSTIN, WEST Garfield & East Garfield. All new! 1, 2, 3 BR, new kit., bath. All credit cons. Good rental history req. Sec. 8 welcome. 773-295-1846
MASSAGE TABLES, NEW and used. Large selection of professional high quality massage equipment at a very low price. Visit us at www. bestmassage.com or call us, 773764-6542.
HEALTH & WELLNESS
CHICAGO, 6111 S. Normal 2BR apt, stove/refrig., 6101 S. Normal 4BR T/H apt, newly decor. Sec. 8 welc. Call 773-422-1878.
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
CLASSICS WANTED ANY CLASSIC CARS IN ANY CONDITION. ’20S, ’30S, ’40S, ’50S, ’60S & ’70S. HOTRODS & EXOTICS! TOP DOLLAR PAID! COLLECTOR. CALL JAMES, 630-201-8122
NOTICE IS HEREBY given, pursuant to “An Act in relation to the use of an Assumed Business Name in the conduct or transaction of Business in the State,” as amended, that a certification was registered by the undersigned with the County Clerk of Cook County. Registration Number: D16148417 on October 12, 2016 Under the Assumed Business Name of T & Z ELECTRICAL with the business located at: 2957 N ELSTON AVE., CHICAGO, IL 60618. The true and real full name(s) and residence address of the owner(s)/ partner(s) is: JOSEPH SARPY, 2957 N ELSTON AVE, CHICAGO, IL 60618, USA
sation. Downtown + Wrigleyville office and via phone. "Top Tutor 2016" award from the Literacy Chicago. Dennis A. Jose 312-371-4301
STATE OF ILLINOIS County of Cook In The Circuit Court For Cook County, Illinois In The Matter of the Petition of Shani Francis Case# 16M2003658 For Change of Name. Notice of Publication Public Notice is hereby given that on November 30, 2016 at 9:00 AM being one of the return days in the Circuit Court of the County of Cook, I will file my petition in said court praying for the change of my name from Shani Francis to that of Shani Francis-Alim, pursuant to the statute in such case made and provided. Dated at Evanston, Illinois, October 17, 2016. Signature of Petitioner: Shani Francis. October 20, 27 & November 3
NOTICE IS HEREBY given, pursuant to “An Act in relation to the use of an Assumed Business Name in the conduct or transaction of Business in the State,” as amended, that a certification was registered by the undersigned with the County Clerk of Cook County. Registration Number: D16148371 on October 6, 2016 Under the Assumed Business Name of MUSIC ALIVE! with the business located at: 2477 W MONTROSE AVE, CHICAGO, IL 60618. The true and real full name(s) and residence address of the owner (s)/partner(s) is: LAURA OHMS, 2477 W MONTROSE AVE, CHICAGO, IL 60618, USA
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Lake Michigan in the Upper Pennisula. In a a beautiful 6,000 sq ft home with 250 feet of lake frontage. Built in 1999 on almost 2 acre lot. Easy access to local airport. Could be a B&B if desired. Priced to sell at $650,000. Large master bedroom on 1st floor and 3 bedrooms with full baths upstairs. Unfinished full basement which could have more bedrooms. Owner selling. Call for info at 906-789-1245
non-residential SELF-STORAGE CENTERS. 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.
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OCTOBER 27, 2016 | CHICAGO READER 51
SLUG SIGNORINO
STRAIGHT DOPE By Cecil Adams Q : We’re told not to use the elevators if
there’s a fire. But how are people expected to evacuate from skyscrapers? Does everyone really just take the stairs? I’m disabled, and I wouldn’t want someone risking their life carrying me down so many flights. Couldn’t they connect the tall buildings like hospitals do, so you could evacuate horizontally? —PRESTON
A : One World Trade Center, nicknamed the
Freedom Tower, reaches 94 stories into the sky. That’s 16 floors fewer than the ill-fated skyscrapers that once occupied the same site, but still, clambering down its 2,226 steps from top to bottom would be a schlep under ordinary circumstances, let alone with lives at stake. You’re not the first to suspect there must be a better way to clear tall buildings during a calamity than trooping every occupant down the staircases. In the 15 years since the towers fell, engineers have hunkered down to rethink building-safety design and emergency evacuation procedures. Conducting folks out of fiery high-rises through enclosed overhead walkways doesn’t seem to have come up, though. Many of us have been wheeled or gurneyed through the hospital skybridges you mention, of course, and some cities, including Minneapolis, Des Moines, and Calgary, have run with this idea, refashioning their downtowns into human-size Habitrails by linking buildings into a mileslong skyway network. These passages weren’t built as safety features, but rather for the convenience and comfort of shoppers and office workers in wintertime, and they’re typically only a couple stories above street level—not much help if you’re fleeing the 40th floor. Skyways aren’t notably cheap—connecting a new football stadium to the existing Minneapolis system recently cost more than $10 million—and they’re out of favor with urbanists, who fret about foot traffic being diverted indoors, thus robbing city streets of their vibrancy. More to our point, they also might not be the safest structures in an emergency: for one thing, as Minneapolis discovered during a 1982 department-store fire, they channel smoke from a burning building to its neighbors all too effectively. What, then, might replace a long trek downstairs? Hoping perhaps to capitalize on fears that official procedures are unreliable, canny entrepreneurs are now marketing individual emergency-response gear to potential evacuees. Reps for the SkySaver, an automatic rappelling backpack originally intended for urban-combat use, insist it could double as a “personal rescue device.” You clip your cable to something solid and climb out
52 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
the window, and it slowly lowers you to the ground—as long as the ground isn’t more than 260 feet away, ’cause that’s how much cable you’ve got. If jumping sounds better to you than dangling, the people selling the S.O.S. Parachute claim their product is safe to use from just 11 stories up, barely a hundred feet in the air. That’s close to the ground for even an experienced BASE jumper, and far lower than most paratroopers would be happy with. Remember too that city airspace can be both densely built and windy: one unexpected gust could slam you against a wall—or into your coworkers, should any of them have the same bright idea about chuting to safety. But what if, despite all we’ve been told, elevators turn out to be the best way out of a burning building after all? That’s the theory behind occupant-evacuation elevators, designed to address the safety concerns that once made elevators the number one way not to leave a building during a fire. In skyscrapers built on this principle, you’d evacuate by first taking the stairs to one of several sky-lobby floors—the ones where under nonemergency conditions passengers transfer from express to local elevators. (You might also get to the sky lobby via special shuttle elevators from designated “refuge floors” throughout the building.) The express car you eventually board contains drainage systems to prevent flooding and is protected from smoke by the pressurized shaft it travels through. The days of elevators returning to the ground floor and remaining disabled throughout a disaster may be numbered. So let’s forget parachutes and futuristic passageways zigzagging across the skyline— building safety is one field where disruption, to use the loathsome tech jargon, matters less than incremental improvement. Engineers seem to have chosen to fine-tune older concepts rather than chase eye-popping new ones, and that makes sense: in case of fire, you want your evacuation to be as dull and uneventful as possible. v Send questions to Cecil via straightdope.com or write him c/o Chicago Reader, 350 N. Orleans, Chicago 60654.
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SAVAGE LOVE
By Dan Savage
When sex is a sleep aid
Is it reasonable to expect PIV sex seven nights a week? Plus: how to DTMFA Q : I love my wife, but I
have a lot of resentment, disappointment, and insecurity over our sex life after four years of marriage. Right now, with kids and our busy lives, she’s content with sex once a week or so, and I need relief pretty much every night to help with my insomnia. What’s more, I really don’t enjoy porn at all, but if we aren’t having intercourse, there’s pretty much no other way for me to get off. Blame it on my fundamentalist evangelical upbringing, but I fear my porn use becoming an addiction. It makes me feel dirty. All I want to do is feel close to my wife, orgasm, and sleep. I think she does sincerely care and wants to help me, but is just so tired and busy with her career and our kids. And yes, I have talked and fought with her countless times. In weaker moments, I’ll admit I have also guilted her for her more “active” sexual past (with prior boyfriends) and for her current “neglect,” which I know is unfair and unhelpful. I just don’t know what to do.
—WHEN ORGASMS ENABLE SLEEP
A : You’ve been married four years, you have more than one child, you both work—and if you divide household labor like most couples, WOES, your wife is doing more/most of the cooking, cleaning, and child care. But even if you were childless, living in a hotel suite with daily maid service, eating only room service, and throwing your underpants out the window after one wearing, WOES, it would still be unreasonable to expect PIV intercourse every night of the week. Frankly, WOES, once-aweek PIV is more sex than most young straight dads are getting. And if you’re
demanding PIV from your wife as a sleep aid—“ask your doctor if Clambien is right for you”—it’s a miracle you’re getting any sex at all. Consider PIV from your wife’s perspective: Her husband fucks, comes, and falls asleep. She lies there for a while afterward, tingling, and may have to go to the bathroom once or twice. The PIV that puts her husband to sleep after a long day? It puts her sleep off. And if she wanted to get it over with quickly—because she was exhausted—she most likely didn’t come. That’s a recipe for resentment, WOES, and resentment kills desire. If you expanded your definition of sex, WOES, if your options weren’t PIV or nothing, you might not have to masturbate six nights a week. Because if your definition of sex included oral (his and hers), mutual masturbation, and frottage—and if these weren’t consolation prizes you settled for, but sex you were enthusiastic about— your wife might say yes to sex more often. Still, you’re never going to get it seven nights a week. So make the most of the PIV you’re getting, broaden your definition of sex and get another night or two of sex in per week, and enjoy porn without guilt the rest of the week. And if you’re concerned about the amount of porn you’re watching, try this trick: Lie on the couch or the floor or the guest bed, stroke your cock (even if it’s soft), and think dirty thoughts. Your cock will get hard, I promise, and you’ll get off. It’s how most people masturbated before the Internet came and ruined everything, WOES, and it still works.
Q : When I met my partner
of three years, I thought I’d hit the jackpot: a dom who
packs a wallop but knows how to listen and loves group sex (which is kinda my jam). Lately, though, we’ve had some rough patches, especially since he has had increasing financial trouble/ underemployment, whereas I am back in school and have too many jobs. I care about my partner a lot and feel very close to him in some ways, but I also see him taking advantage of me financially and demanding endless reassurance on top of this. So my desire is to DTMFA. But when I talk about my feelings in the relationship, he argues with me about what they are or should rationally be. I feel trapped. I don’t think I can stay with him, but I also don’t want to have a conversation about leaving. —SINCERELY TROUBLED UNDER CONSTANT KRITICISM
A : We need someone’s
consent before we kiss, suck, fuck, spank, spoon, marry, or collar him or her. But we do not need someone’s consent to break up. The other person’s pain is relevant, of course, and we should be as compassionate and considerate as possible when ending a relationship. But dumping someone doesn’t require consent. That means you don’t have to win an argument to break up with your boyfriend, STUCK, nor do you have to convince him your reasons are rational. You don’t even have to discuss your reasons for ending the relationship. You just have to say, “It’s over; we’re done.” It’s a declaration, STUCK, not a conversation. v Send letters to mail@ savagelove.net. Download the Savage Lovecast every Tuesday at thestranger.com. ß @fakedansavage
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 53
Morrissey o ALISON GREEN
NEW
Joseph Arthur & Nicole Atkins 11/25, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 10/27, noon b BadBadNotGood 1/15, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, Part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Big Thief 1/11, 9 PM, Schubas, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Bongzilla 11/17, 8 PM, Reggie’s Music Joint Ceremony, Negative Scanner 1/14, 9 PM, Schubas, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ CFM 11/25, 9 PM, Hideout The Damned 4/23, 8 PM, House of Blues, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM, 17+ Mike Doughty, Wheatus 2/18, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, on sale Fri 10/28. noon Foxtrott, Ian Sweet 1/13, 9 PM, Schubas, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Ezra Furman 1/12, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Futurebirds 12/1, 8:30 PM, Subterranean, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM G. Love & Special Sauce 1/14, 9 PM, House of Blues, on sale Fri 10/28, 11 AM, 17+ Ariana Grande, Ellie Goulding, Backstreet Boys 12/14, 7:30 PM, Allstate Arena, Rosemont Travis Greene, Anthony Brown & Group Therapy 2/25, 8 PM, Rosemont Theater, Rosemont, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM b Greensky Bluegrass 2/10-11, 8 PM, the Vic, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM, 18+
Hammerfall, Delain 4/28, 7 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Jeff the Brotherhood, Chastity 1/14, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, Part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ R. Kelly 12/13-14, 7:30 PM, Chicago Theatre, on sale Fri 10/28, 11 AM Ladysmith Black Mambazo 2/11, 5 and 8 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music, on sale Fri 10/28, 8 AM b Lawrence Arms 12/8-10, 9 PM, Double Door, 17+ Tove Lo 2/16, 8 PM, House of Blues, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM, 17+ Marineros 11/11, 10:30 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Mayhem, Inquisition, Black Anvil 1/23, 8 PM, Metro, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM, 18+ Jon McLaughlin 12/21, 7:30 PM, SPACE, Evanston b The Men 12/1, 8:30 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Rhett Miller 12/1, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 10/27, noon b Morrissey 11/27, 7:30 PM, Aragon Ballroom, on sale Fri 10/28, noon b Open Mike Eagle 1/15, 9 PM, Schubas, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Radkey 12/13, 6 PM, Cobra Lounge b Ragnarokkr Metal Apocalypse with Praying Mantis, Ross the Boss, Brocas Helm, Batteaxe, Exalted Piledriver, and more 5/19-20, 4 PM, Reggie’s Idan Raichel 3/20-21, 8 PM, City Winery, on sale Thu 10/27, noon b Isaiah Rashad 1/20, 8 PM, Double Door, on sale Fri 10/28, 10 AM
54 CHICAGO READER - OCTOBER 27, 2016
Real Friends, Knuckle Puck, Mat Kerekes 1/7, 3 PM, Concord Music Hall b Riff Raff 2/4, 7 PM, Portage Theater, 17+ Safetysuit 2/7, 7 PM, Lincoln Hall, on sale Fri 10/28, noon b Leroy Sanchez 2/23, 6:30 PM, Schubas, on sale Fri 10/28, noon b Sons of the Silent Age 1/15, 8 PM, Metro, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Tinariwen, Dengue Fever 4/11, 7 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music, on sale Fri 10/28, 8 AM b Title Fight 1/14, 7 PM, Metro, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon b Tortoise, Monobody 1/11, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, Part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Wand, Acid Dad 1/12, 9 PM, Schubas, Part of Tomorrow Never Knows, on sale Fri 10/28, noon, 18+ Xavier Wulf 12/11, 6 PM, Double Door
UPDATED Aretha Franklin 12/17, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre, rescheduled from 11/12
UPCOMING Amorphis 3/26, 6 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Anderson Wakeman Rabin 11/5, 8 PM, Chicago Theatre Animals as Leaders 11/25, 8 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Atmosphere, Brother Ali 11/21-22, 7 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+
b Band of Horses 11/16, 7:30 PM, Aragon Ballroom b Bouncing Souls 11/17-18, 7 PM, Double Door Broncho, Sports 11/5, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Eric Church 4/13, 8 PM, Allstate Arena, Rosemont Cloud Nothings 2/10, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 18+ Deadbeats 12/10, 8 PM, FitzGerald’s, Berwyn Diiv, Moon King 11/10, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Earthless, Ruby the Hatchet 12/2, 9 PM, Empty Bottle For Today 12/15, 6 PM, Bottom Lounge b Alex G 11/11, 7 PM, Subterranean b Ginuwine 11/23, 7 and 10 PM, City Winery b Giraffe Tongue Orchestra 12/3, 9 PM, Bottom Lounge, 17+ Helen Money 12/9, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ In Flames, Hellyeah 11/30, 7:30 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Ja Rule 12/16, 8 PM, Portage Theater, 18+ Jesu, Sun Kil Moon 11/13, 8 PM, Park West, 18+ King Dude 12/17, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen King 810 12/18, 7 PM, Thalia Hall b Lany 11/3, 7:30 PM, Metro b Benjamin Francis Leftwich 11/6, 8 PM, Martyrs’ Letters to Cleo 11/4, 8 PM, Double Door Lordi 2/14, 7 PM, Double Door Macabre 12/23, 6:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Mandolin Orange 11/10, 8 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music b James Vincent McMorrow 11/16, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Tony Molina 11/17, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Mystery Lights 12/6, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Nightmares on Wax, Romare, Adam Stolz 12/2, 10 PM, Smart Bar North Mississippi Allstars 11/6, 5 and 8 PM, City Winery b The Oh Hellos 12/10, 8 PM, Thalia Hall b Pack A.D. 11/16, 8 PM, Schubas Amanda Palmer 11/13, 7:30 PM, Thalia Hall b Partynextdoor, Jeremih 11/29, 7 PM, Aragon Ballroom b Pet Shop Boys 11/5, 9 PM, Civic Opera House Pigface 11/25, 9 PM, House of Blues, 17+ Sarah Potenza 11/12, 9 PM, Hideout Joe Pug 12/2, 7 and 10 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Queensryche 12/9, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Red Fang, Torche, Whores 12/10, 8 PM, Metro, 18+ Rusted Root, Devon Allman Band 11/3, 8 PM, Joe’s Live, Rosemont
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
Saigon Kick 12/2, 8 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 18+ Starfucker, Gigamesh 11/20, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Too Short, Mister F.A.B. 12/11, 9 PM, the Promontory Trails & Ways 11/3, 9 PM, Hideout Ultimate Painting 12/2, 9:30 PM, Hideout Umphrey’s McGee 12/29, 9 PM, Riviera Theatre, 12/30, 8 PM and 12/31, 9 PM, Aragon Ballroom, 18+ Uniform 11/12, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Vamps, Citizen Zero 11/15, 7 PM, Bottom Lounge b Sander Van Doorn 12/24, 10 PM, the Mid Vanic 11/6, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ Vektor, Black Fast 11/5, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen Liz Vice 11/30, 7:30 PM, SPACE, Evanston Roger Waters 7/22, 8 PM, United Center Xeno & Oaklander 1/28, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Yarn/Wire 11/11, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Zombies 4/13, 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+
SOLD OUT Brendan Bayliss & Jake Cinninger 12/10, 8 PM, Park West, 18+ Andrew Bird 12/14-16, 8 PM, Fourth Presbyterian Church b Lukas Graham 1/17, 7 PM, House of Blues b Highly Suspect 11/18, 8 PM, Bottom Lounge b Jason Isbell 11/18, 7:30 PM, Thalia Hall and 11/19, 7 PM, FitzGerald’s, Berwyn Kiiara 11/14, 7 PM, Bottom Lounge b Louis the Child 11/25-26, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Majid Jordan 11/6, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Marshmello 11/25-27, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 18+ Mr. T Experience, Nobodys 12/9, 7 PM, Reggie’s Music Joint, 17+ Roisin Murphy 11/7, 8 PM, Double Door, 18+ Conor Oberst 11/26, 8:30 PM and 11/27, 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Pup, Meat Wave 11/12, 7:30 PM, Bottom Lounge b Timeflies 11/4, 7 PM, Bottom Lounge b v
GOSSIP WOLF A furry ear to the ground of the local music scene HALLOWEEN IS GOSSIP WOLF’S favorite holiday—when else can you see Chicago bands pretend to be even better bands? Almost never! All hypotheticals aside, this wolf hears that a slew of local rockers will don costumes at Cole’s this weekend. The Chicago Singles Club presents a show on Friday, October 28, with ersatz versions of AC/DC (members of Meat Wave, Bleach Party, and Rad Payoff), Weezer (members of Strawberry Jacuzzi, Sheep Numbers, and Soddy Daisy), the Kinks (New Drugs), and Daft Punk (Sophagus and friends). On Saturday, October 29, Chicago’s best (and possibly only) all-female Misfits cover band, Hymen Moments, play alongside “Beck” (aka psych-pop locals Soft Candy), Jimmy Eat Girls (a Jimmy Eat World tribute by folks from Radio Shaq), and “Devo” (members of Soddy Daisy, Big Joy, and MTVghosts). Speaking of Halloween, it’s the best time of year for the bizarro “doom funk” of locals Gramps the Vamp. We’re all in luck, ’cause they headline Lincoln Hall on Sunday, October 30—the eve of All Hallows’ Eve, if you will—to celebrate their sophomore album, The Cave of 10,000 Eyes. In March 2016, Gossip Wolf mentioned the band’s Kickstarter to fund this very album, and they delivered the LP last week. It’s adventurous, spooky, and a little reminiscent of 70s blaxploitation soundtracks— perfect for DJing a Halloween party. Terrible Spaceship and North by North open the show, which starts at 8 PM. It’s been a minute since Gossip Wolf checked in on south-suburban rapper and 2008ighties crew leader Calez, but he’s been hard at work on his first full-length in two years. Calez self-releases Baby on Friday, October 28, and in case the album’s title doesn’t give it away, he’s about to become a father—he and his girlfriend are expecting a daughter in December. Calez mulls over his forthcoming parental responsibilities on Baby, whose soulsampling bump recalls early Kanye West. —J.R. NELSON AND LEOR GALIL Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail gossipwolf@chicagoreader.com.
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ARE YOU MODERN?
“Outstanding” —Chicago Reader
MOHOLY-NAGY PHOTOGRAPHY PAINTING DESIGN FILM Through January 3
This exhibition is organized by the Art Institute of Chicago, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Lead funding for the exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago is generously provided by Caryn and King Harris, The Harris Family Foundation. Major support is provided by Helen and Sam Zell, Zell Family Foundation, and the Terra Foundation for American Art. The exhibition catalogue is made possible by the Earl and Brenda Shapiro Foundation. This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional support for the exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago is provided by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary, the Terra Foundation for American Art on behalf of board member Charles Harper, the Moholy-Nagy Foundation, and Emily Rauh Pulitzer. Annual support for Art Institute exhibitions is provided by the Exhibitions Trust: Neil Bluhm and the Bluhm Family Charitable Foundation, Kenneth Griffin, Robert M. and Diane v.S. Levy, Thomas and Margot Pritzker, Anne and Chris Reyes, Betsy Bergman Rosenfield and Andrew M. Rosenfield, the Earl and Brenda Shapiro Foundation, and the Woman’s Board. László Moholy-Nagy. A 19 (detail), 1927. Hattula Moholy-Nagy, Ann Arbor, Michigan. © 2016 Hattula Moholy-Nagy/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
OCTOBER 27, 2016 - CHICAGO READER 55
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