Chicago Reader: print issue of December 24, 2015 (Volume 45, Number 13)

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 | D E C E M B E R 2 4 , 2 0 1 5 – J A N U A R Y 6 , 2 0 1 6

Food & Drink The 21 best new Chicago restaurants of 2015 32 Arts & Culture The year’s top movies, theater, comedy, books, and TV 13

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

EDITOR JAKE MALOOLEY CREATIVE DIRECTOR PAUL JOHN HIGGINS DEPUTY EDITOR, NEWS ROBIN AMER CULTURE EDITOR TAL ROSENBERG FILM EDITOR J.R. JONES MUSIC EDITOR PHILIP MONTORO ASSOCIATE EDITORS KATE SCHMIDT, KEVIN WARWICK, BRIANNA WELLEN SENIOR WRITERS STEVE BOGIRA, MICHAEL MINER, MIKE SULA SENIOR THEATER CRITIC TONY ADLER STAFF WRITERS LEOR GALIL, DEANNA ISAACS, BEN JORAVSKY, AIMEE LEVITT, PETER MARGASAK, JULIA THIEL PHOTO EDITOR ANDREA BAUER GRAPHIC DESIGNER SUE KWONG MUSIC LISTINGS COORDINATOR LUCA CIMARUSTI SOCIAL MEDIA COORDINATOR RYAN SMITH CONTRIBUTING WRITERS NOAH BERLATSKY, JENA CUTIE, MATT DE LA PEÑA, ANNE FORD, ISA GIALLORENZO, JOHN GREENFIELD, JUSTIN HAYFORD, JACK HELBIG, DAN JAKES, BILL MEYER, J.R. NELSON, MARISSA OBERLANDER, BEN SACHS, DMITRY SAMAROV, ZAC THOMPSON, DAVID WHITEIS, ALBERT WILLIAMS INTERNS MANUEL RAMOS, KACIE TRIMBLE ----------------------------------------------------------------

IN THIS ISSUE 4 Agenda Hellcab, John Oliver at the Chicago Theatre, the film Extraordinary Tales, and more recommendations

happened in 2015 even before Rahm released the Laquan McDonald video.

11 Transportation A planned revamp of LSD promises better trips.

CITY LIFE

ARTS & CULTURE

8 Technology Artist and author Dmitry Samarov on quitting social media 10 Joravsky | Politics A lot

13 Public Art Preservationists couldn’t stop Bill Walker’s All of Mankind mural from being buffed.

15 Theater Death, dark comedy, and Afro-Futurism: Chicago theater was true to our times in 2015.

16 Comedy Seven Chicago comedians, groups, and shows that killed in 2015 17 Lit All the books we liked in 2015— and some theories about why we enjoyed them 18 Small Screen The top ten television shows of the year 19 Movies J.R. Jones’s 20 favorite films of 2015

MUSIC

21 The year in music Six writers drill down into rap, jazz, punk, metal, and more 25 Shows of note Ian’s Party, Taylor Bennett, Reaction NYE, Mac Sabbath, and more

FOOD & DRINK

32 The 21 best new Chicago restaurants of 2015 They aren’t all steak houses.

CLASSIFIEDS

33 Jobs 33 Apartments & Spaces 35 Marketplace 36 Straight Dope What would the standard of living be if you divided the world’s wealth equally?

37 Savage Love Get in the holiday

spirit with a male chastity belt! Plus: “dump” = “Trump”?

38 Early Warnings Murder by Death, Gary Numan, Wolf Eyes, and more shows you should know about in the weeks to come 38 Gossip Wolf Chance the Rapper’s DJ Oreo hosts Oreo Fest, and more music news

ON CHICAGOREADER.COM

SENIOR ACCOUNT MANAGER EVANGELINE MILLER ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES AARON DEETS, BRIDGET KANE MARKETING AND EVENTS MANAGER BRYAN BURDA DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL JOHN DUNLEVY BUSINESS MANAGER STEFANIE WRIGHT ADVERTISING COORDINATOR HERMINIA BATTAGLIA CLASSIFIEDS REPRESENTATIVE KRIS DODD ---------------------------------------------------------------DISTRIBUTION CONCERNS distributionissues@chicagoreader.com CHICAGO READER 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654 312-222-6920, CHICAGOREADER.COM ---------------------------------------------------------------THE READER (ISSN 1096-6919) IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY SUN-TIMES MEDIA, LLC, 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654. © 2015 SUN-TIMES MEDIA, LLC. PERIODICAL POSTAGE PAID AT CHICAGO, IL. POSTMASTER: SEND CHANGE OF ADDRESS TO CHICAGO READER, 350 N. ORLEANS, CHICAGO, IL 60654.

NYE

The best New Year’s Eve events of 2015 Say hello to 2016 with everything from a masquerade ball to a seafood feast to a night of improv.

ON THE COVER: ILLUSTRATION BY RYAN DUGGAN. FOR MORE OF DUGGAN’S WORK GO TO RYANDUGGAN.COM.

BY READER STAFF

MOVIES “FISH AND CAT IS ONE OF THE MOST imaginative movies I’ve ever seen,” Ben Sachs writes. “Shahram Mokri’s audacious puzzle—which screened at Gene Siskel Film Center in February as part of its annual Festival of Films From Iran—unfolds in a single 130-minute shot, but not in real time; the story contains flashbacks, flash-forwards, and hallucinations. The filmmaking is never less than stunning . . . ”

Read the rest of Sachs’s films-of-the-year list at chicagoreader. com/movies. For film editor J.R. Jones’s list, turn to page 19.

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Hellcab " MICHAEL BROSILOW

THEATER

More at chicagoreader.com/ theater Blaspheme: Zirkus der Sonne Let’s be generous and assume writer-performers Amy Haeussler and Kristen Tallon intend their program copy—which calls this clumsy hour-long muddle an “ethereal, visually stunning show”—as satire of the blinkered self-aggrandizement favored by a certain subset of performance artists. Indeed, Haeussler and Tallon seem at times intent on lampooning eastern European image-based theater, with its angsty clowning and narrative incoherence—except they also make fun of dimwitted Canadian fisherman who blather on while stuffing their mouths with grapes, and aging southern belles befuddled by a contemporary gay pride parade. In all, it’s difficult to deduce if the awkward duo identified any meaningful target for their satire, or why they felt entitled to ridicule others when their own work is so slipshod. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 1/21: Thu 8 PM (no shows 12/24 and 12/31), Annoyance Theatre, 851 W. Belmont, 773-697-9693, theannoyance. com, $8.

Dynamite Divas: A Tribute to Women of Soul Promising them $2.5 million apiece, a billionaire inventor recruits four legendary black singers for a very strange day’s work. Nancy Wilson, Roberta Flack, Gladys Knight, and Aretha Franklin are confined in a “holding chamber,” where they bond while undergoing “diva development” sessions that include (holographic?) visits via “assimilator” from the likes of Billie Holiday and Dinah Washington. These preparations culminate in a live concert broadcast worldwide over every television channel in existence. There’s no parsing the exuberant nonsense of Jackie Taylor’s latest jukebox musical, so it’s best just to surrender to a mostly strong cast performing some great songs. Rhonda Preston’s Wilson and Rashada Dawan’s Knight take a while to kick in properly, and Melanie McCullough’s Flack never

4 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

really arrives at all, but Shari Addison’s Franklin is a marvel from start to big finish. —TONY ADLER Through 1/24: Thu 7:30 PM (no shows 12/24 and 12/31), Fri 8 PM (no shows 12/25 and 1/1), Sat 3 and 8 PM, Sun 3 PM, Black Ensemble Theater Cultural Center, 4450 N. Clark, 773-7694451, blackensembletheater.org, $55-$65.

R

Hellcab Once an edgy late-night offering, Will Kern’s portrait of a crappy day in the life of a Chicago cabdriver—which ran for nine years starting in 1992—has become a Christmastime tradition at Profiles Theatre. That’s not to suggest, however, that director Eric Burgher and his enormous cast of 33 players have toned down the ferocity of the work. The parade of jerks, drunks, horn dogs, and lost souls who pass through the taxi on a gray Christmas Eve remains as vivid and gnarly as ever. As the driver, Chicago newcomer Zlatomir Moldovanski brings a surprising vulnerability to a role that seems on the surface an exercise in sneering misanthropy. He might profess to hate humanity, but by the end we don’t believe him.

—ZAC THOMPSON Through 1/10: Thu-Fri 8 PM (no shows 12/24-12/25), Sat 5 and 8 PM, Sun 7 PM, Profiles Theatre, Main Stage, 4139 N. Broadway, 773-549-1815, profilestheatre.org, $35-$40.

House Party, 1923: Obsession The premise of this listless one-act play calls to mind The Great Gatsby; set during the Jazz Age, it unfolds at a ginsoaked shindig hosted by a mysterious millionaire. With very little prompting, several interchangeable guests begin making confessions about secret loves and the various ways they’re haunted by the past. But everything about the execution is halfhearted: the aimless script (which was written by the cast), the ho-hum performances, and an interactive component that’s dropped about a quarter of the way through, after one unlucky audience member has been dragged onstage to look uncomfortable.

Things are so tepid and muddled, it’s hard to say after the half-hour show’s abrupt ending whether you’ve just

seen a comedy, a drama, or what. —ZAC THOMPSON Through 2/5: Fri 8 PM (no shows 12/25 and 1/1), Annoyance Theatre, 851 W. Belmont, 773-697-9693, theannoyance.com, $15, $12 students.

Dear James Franco Improv R inspired by fan letters written to celebrities. 1/2-2/27: Sat 9 PM, Under the

Improvised Twilight Zone The cast of the Annoyance’s hour-long, three-episode escapade are adept at carrying audience suggestions far afield. On the night I attended, “Elian Gonzalez” led to a story about a robot searching for his father, who turns out to be Hitler.

“A four-year-old spending two days in an apartment with his dead mother” inspired a postapocalyptic world without adults, where elementary school children try to run the planet while struggling to tell time. As in Rod Serling’s original television series, each unhinged saga ends with a moral lesson, and part of the fun here is watching the rotating narrators try to find instruction in stories that by design have no determined ending. It’s a smart evening, marred only by the troupe’s propensity to laugh at their own material. —JUSTIN HAYFORD Through 1/20: Wed 8 PM, Annoyance Theatre, 851 W. Belmont, 773-697-9693, theannoyance.com, $8.

Drink, Date, Laugh! Paul FarahR var hosts a night of comics telling their most embarrassing relationship

DANCE

The Nutcracker The Joffrey BalR let performs its founder’s version of the holiday classic for the final time.

Through 12/27: Tue-Wed and Sat, 2 and 7 PM, Thu and Sun 2 PM, Auditorium Theatre, 50 E. Congress, 800-982-2787, joffrey.org, $32-$136.

COMEDY Bye Bye Liver: Hello 2016 Dress to the nines for a New Year’s Eve performance of Bye Bye Liver, the comedy show/ drinking game, along with a glass of champagne, a shot of Malort, hors d’oeuvres, and a dance party. Thu 12/31, 8 PM, Public House Theatre, 3914 N. Clark, 800-650-6449, pubhousetheatre. com, $40.

Gun Theater, 956 W. Newport, 773-2703440, undertheguntheater.com, $12.

stories. Fri 1/1, 8 PM, Laugh Factory, 3175 N. Broadway, 773-327-3175, laughfactory. com, $20.

Ron Funches The comic from R Undateable performs stand-up.

Tue 12/29, 7:30 and 9:30 PM, Zanies, 1548 N. Wells, 312-337-4027, chicago.zanies. com, $30 plus two-drink minimum.

Funny Old Broads Ring in the New Year with a group of ladies who know how to put on the ole song and dance at this variety show from Caryn Bark. Thu 12/31, 8:30 PM, Skokie Theatre, 7924 N. Lincoln, Skokie, 847-677-7761, skokietheatre.com, $45.

Mike Lebovitz The local stand-up R performs. 12/26-12/27: Sat 7, 9, and 11:15 PM; Sun 8:30 PM, Zanies, 1548 N. Wells, 312-337-4027, chicago.zanies.com, $25 plus two-drink minimum.

New Year’s Eve Party with Under the Gun Theater The night includes a buffet dinner, performances of Under the Gun Improv and Porn Minus Porn, two drink tickets (and the option to buy as many more drinks as you like), party favors, and a champagne toast at midnight. Thu 12/31, 8 PM-2 AM, Under the Gun Theater, 956 W. Newport, 773-2703440, undertheguntheater.com, $50.

New Year’s Eve Cornstravaganza The night kicks off with an open bar and buffet, throws some improv and sketch shows in the middle, and ends with a dance party and champagne toast at midnight. Thu 12/31, 8 PM-2 AM, Cornservatory, 4210 N. Lincoln, 773-650-1331, cornservatory.org, $55, $100 per couple.

NYE 2016: Comedy Countdown The Puterbaugh Sisters host a night of comedy that includes stand-up from

John Oliver on Wed 12/30-Thu 12/31 at the Chicago Theatre " AP PHOTOS

Best bets, recommendations, and notable arts and culture events from December 24 to January 6

so the fact that Peary finds them in Haverhill isn’t surprising. More intriguing is the revelation, halfway through the film, that Montana’s publisher, John L. Goldwater, also claimed to have created the characters. Peary doesn’t pursue this twist, which complicates Archie’s authorship (not to mention the premise for his film); instead he hits the road again to find an old girlfriend of Montana’s who may have been the real Betty. Their meeting, though sweet, is anticlimactic.

—NATHALIE LAGERFELD 69 min. Sun 1/3, 3 PM, and Thu 1/7, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center

Black Nativity Meets Kwanzaa, on Sat 12/26, features Langston Hughes’s work set to jazz " AP IMAGES Martin Morrow, Kevin Williams, Natalie Jose, and Drew Frees. Tickets purchase an open bar until midnight, party favors, passed appetizers, raffles, and a champagne toast. Thu 12/31, 9 PM-1 AM, the Comedy Bar, 500 N. LaSalle, 312-8360499, comedybarchicago.com, $125.

John Oliver The host of Last R Weekend Tonight With John Oliver performs stand-up. Wed 12/30-Thu

12/31: 7 and 10 PM, Chicago Theatre, 175 N. State, 312-462-6300, thechicagotheatre.com, $55-$78.50.

Under the Gun Improv Classic R Improv teams from across the city go head-to-head in this five-week

tournament to win bragging rights (and a cash prize). 1/2-1/30: Sat 7:30 PM, Under the Gun Theater, 956 W. Newport, 773-270-3440, undertheguntheater.com, $10-$12.

VISUAL ARTS Art Institute of Chicago “Holly Days,” a family festival featuring a special look at the museum’s Neapolitan creche and holiday-decorated Thorne Rooms, plus a craft station where you can create a diorama featuring holiday traditions.

Sun 12/27-Wed 12/30: 10:30 AM-3 PM. Sun–Wed 10:30 AM–5 PM, Thu-Fri 10:30 AM–8 PM, Sat 10:30 AM–5 PM. 111 S. Michigan, 312-443-3600, artinstituteofchicago.org, $23, $17 students, seniors ($5 discount for Chicago residents), free kids under 14; free for Illinois residents Thursdays 5-8 PM.

LIT

Black Nativity Meets Kwanzaa R A performance of the work by Langston Hughes, set to jazz music.

Sat 12/26, 5 PM, Lutheran School of

Theology, 1100 E. 55th, 773-256-0700, lstc.edu, $20.

Carol Todd Haynes’s Far From Heaven (2002) slayed critics with its provocative presentation of modern racial and sexual issues through the lens of a high-Hollywood 50s melodrama. Haynes returns to that formula with this adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1952 novel The Price of Salt, which deals with a lesbian affair. Cate Blanchett is the title character, a New York wife and mother struggling to escape from her straight marriage, and her mix of bravado and vulnerability has seldom been used to

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in Pittsburgh who took on the National Football League with his 2005 paper asserting that legendary Pittsburgh Steelers center Mike Webster had suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (brain degeneration caused by repeated blows to the head). Will Smith gives an ingratiating performance as the comically egotistical but passionately idealistic doctor, and there’s strong work from Alec Baldwin as a former NFL physician counseling Omalu and the ever-reliable David Morse as Webster.

Less impressive is Albert Brooks, whose dramatic performance as Omalu’s supportive boss collapses under the weight of too many bad one-liners. —J.R. JONES PG-13, 121 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6, Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Crown Village 18, Ford City, Landmark’s Century Centre, River East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Webster Place

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Chicago Amplified Admission to WBEZ’s NYE party includes five drink tickets, hors d’oeuvres, stories from the Moth, live music by Diana and the Dishes, and a dance party with tunes from DJ Ayana Contreras. Thu 12/31, 8 PM-2 AM, Mayne Stage, 1328 W. Morse, 773-381-4554, maynestage.com, $135.

Moth StorySlam The folks of R the Moth StorySlam are all about shared human experience through

storytelling. This time around ten people picked at random share their experiences, inspired by the theme “Joy.” Tue 12/29, 8 PM, Mayne Stage, 1328 W. Morse, 773-381-4554, themoth.org.

The Poetory A monthly spoR ken-word reading featuring music by the Corner and DJ Duane Powell.

Extraordinary Tales

MOVIES

greater effect; Kyle Chandler is moving as her anguished husband, who refuses to accept the truth about her sexuality and leverages custody of her daughter against her. Unfortunately their fine work is weighed down by Rooney Mara’s inert performance as Carol’s young lover, a countergirl at Bloomingdale’s who suggests a doll with the battery removed. As a love story this left me unsatisfied, though I enjoyed the lush period trappings (from costumer Sandy Powell and production designer Judy Becker) and the flattering sense of how enlightened I am compared to people in the 1950s. —J.R. JONES R, 118 min. For venues visit chicagoreader.com/movies.

Archie’s Betty In this earnest but unsatisfying documentary, Gerald Peary visits Haverhill, Massachusetts, the hometown of cartoonist Bob Montana, to find the real people who inspired his long-running comic book and newspaper strip Archie. Unfortunately there’s a popular Archie, a down-to-earth Betty, and a snobby Veronica at every high school,

Concussion An experienced investigative journalist, writer-director Peter Landesman (Parkland, Kill the Messenger) brings a responsible, fact-oriented approach to his politically fraught stories, which comes in handy with this exposé of brain trauma in pro football.

Based on a GQ article by Jeanne Marie Laskas, the film tells the story of Dr. Bennet Omalu, a forensic pathologist

Mon 1/7, 7 PM, the Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park Ave West, 312-801-2100, promontorychicago.com, $5.

Tuesday Funk Featured readers R at this outing of the monthly live-lit series are Christopher Sweet,

Robert O’Connor, Mare Swallow, Lori Rader-Day, and Chuck Sudo. Tue 1/5, 7:30 PM, Hopleaf, 5148 N. Clark, 773-3349851, tuesdayfunk.org.

More at chicagoreader.com/ movies

Daddy’s Home Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg, who costarred in The Other Guys (2010), reteam for this by-the-numbers farce from director Sean Anders (Horrible Bosses 2). While sweet and occasionally waggish, it’s too predictable to transcend mindless entertainment. Ferrell, playing to type, is an overzealous stepfather and smooth-jazz radio producer who feels threatened when his kids’ biological father, played by Wahlberg, roars into town on his motorcycle. Linda Cardellini of Freaks and Geeks is the kids’ mother, and her grounded performance makes the ensuing hullabaloo at least somewhat tenable.

Ferrell and Wahlberg’s chemistry is infectious even when their jokes flop, but the conflict between them never seems like something a fist bump won’t fix. With Thomas Haden Church and Hannibal Buress. —LEAH PICKETT PG-13, 96 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6, Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Crown Village 18, Ford City, River East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Webster Place

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Extraordinary Tales Poe R lovers rejoice: animator Raul Garcia has collected his B

impeccably faithful short films The Tell-Tale Heart (2005), The Fall of the House of Usher (2012), and The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar (2013), along with two new episodes and a framing device involving a philosophical raven, for this memorably eerie and beautiful feature. “Heart” is the standout, patterned after the black-and-white comics of Alberto Breccia and floridly narrated

by Bela Lugosi from a scratchy old LP; running a close second and third are “Valdemar,” whose homage to 50s horror comics perfectly suits a climax in which the title character collapses into goo, and the new “Masque of the Red Death,” given a haunting mock-watercolor treatment. Roger Corman, who produced a string of belovedly cheesy Poe adaptations in the 60s, supplies the voice of Prince Prospero, and Christopher Lee lends his sonorous tones to “Usher.” —J.R. JONES 73 min. Sat 12/26, 8:15 PM; Tue 12/29, 6:15 PM; and Wed 12/30, 2 and 7:45 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center The Hateful Eight Django Unchained convinced me that Quentin Tarantino is out of ideas; this follow-up, another western, didn’t persuade me otherwise, but it takes a more thoughtful approach to his usual preoccupations (revenge, mainly). In Wyoming, presumably during the tail end of Reconstruction, a blizzard strands a bounty hunter (Kurt Russell) and the outlaw he’s transporting (Jennifer Jason Leigh) at a rest stop with a grisly cast of characters, one or more of whom may be surreptitiously trying to break the outlaw free.

This is Tarantino’s bleakest and most violent film, but it’s also his slowest, a meditation on vengeance and justice in America and possibly in his own movies. Why he needs three hours to draw no apparent conclusion is unclear. With Samuel L. Jackson, Walton Goggins, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, and Channing Tatum. —TAL ROSENBERG R, 187 min. Screens in 70-millimeter at Music Box. Century

12 and CineArts 6, Crown Village 18, Music Box, River East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Showplace ICON Joy I wouldn’t call this a complete dud, but it’s the least engaging David O. Russell feature I’ve seen, rehashing the sort of family backbiting he explored more profitably in Silver Linings Playbook (2012), The Fighter (2010), and Flirting With Disaster (1996). Jennifer Lawrence holds the whole thing together with her tough, emotionally direct performance as the title character, a divorced mother who bets everything she’s got on a patented new kitchen mop she hopes to sell on the QVC channel.

Making her life miserable are her jealous sister (Elisabeth Röhm), their distracted, unaffectionate father (Robert De Niro), and his viperish second wife (Isabella Rossellini), who puts up money for Joy’s enterprise but proves anything but generous. A miscast Bradley Cooper struggles through his role as a humorless marketing executive, and the plot turns lumpy as Russell, seeking a big, triumphant climax, throws one business reversal after another at his dogged heroine.

With Diane Ladd, Virginia Madsen, and Edgar Ramirez. —J.R. JONES PG-13, 124 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6, Cicero Showplace 14, City North 14, Crown Village 18, Ford City, River East 21, Showplace 14 Galewood Crossings, Webster Place Man Up What if you wound up with the wrong person on a blind date?

Ben Palmer’s mistaken-identity rom-com might sound like a lost plotline from Love Actually, but stars Simon Pegg and Lake Bell transcend the tired material with their rich interplay. Their characters spend too much time pretending not to like each other, and their caustic banter is weighed down by myriad genre cliches (nosy family members, corny power ballads, public declarations of love). Yet there’s a surprising honesty in their one-on-one conversations about the perils of dating, the illusion of romance, and the trappings (and traps) of commitment. —IAN SIMMONS R, 88 min. Sat 12/26, 4:45 and

Orion: The Man Who Would Be King This British documentary chronicles the rise and fall of Orion, a masked singer whose Elvis-like voice and look won him passing fame following the King’s death in 1977. Sly record-company executives led fans to believe the man behind the dazzling eye mask was really Presley, yet the crooner was an aspiring Mississippi singer, Jimmy Ellis, who enjoyed his sudden stardom but quickly grew weary of the gimmick. Director Jeanie Finlay (The Great Hip Hop Hoax ) takes a compassionate look at Ellis’s life and career, and in doing so elevates one of rock ’n’ roll’s more bizarre footnotes into an affecting parable of fame, ambition, and identity. —ERIC LUTZ 90 min.

Sat 1/2, 7:45 PM, and Tue 12/5, 8 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center Sisters Tina Fey and Amy Poehler star as grown, unmarried sisters whose elderly parents decide to sell the family home and move into a retirement community; left alone in the house on the weekend before it changes hands, the siblings throw a wild party and high jinks ensue. Sort of a feminine remake of the Will Ferrell-John C. Reilly dud Step Brothers, this Universal (read: garbage) release is short on wit and long on vulgarity, though Fey and Poehler strike a blow for gender equality by proving they can scrape their jokes off the floor as well as any man. Jason Moore (Pitch Perfect) directed; with Maya Rudolph, Dianne Wiest, Samantha Bee, Rachel Dratch, and Kate McKinnon. —J.R. JONES R, 118 min. Century 12 and CineArts 6 Youth of the Beast This R explosive 1963 gangland saga established Japanese B-movie

director Seijun Suzuki as an auteur with domestic film buffs but also set him on a collision course with his employers at the Nikkatsu studio, who considered his themes bizarre and his stories incoherent.

Jo Shishido stars as a disgraced cop who infiltrates a yakuza gang, though the plot serves mainly as a landing strip for Suzuki’s crazy ideas (at one point the hero uses a lighter and aerosol can to set an adversary’s hair on fire) and surreal images (a hooker screaming for her fix sees her white-suited pusher float away like a little angel). Suzuki goes for pure excitement: a brassy, hyperactive jazz score drives the action, and the fights and beatings burst off the screen, scored with vicious sound effects. The overall mood is one of kinetic restlessness and perverse hallucination. In Japanese with subtitles. —J.R. JONES 91 min. Sat 1/2, 5:45 PM, and Mon 1/4, 6 PM. Gene Siskel Film Center v

CITY LIFE technology

Why I quit social media cold turkey in 2015

T

here was an ad that ran during the 90s that really creeped me out. It was from AT&T or some other remnant of the Bell Telephone monopoly, and it proclaimed that We’re all connected. I’ve rarely felt connected to individual people, much less all people, so the mental image the ad produced—millions of cables and signals tethering and binding us to each other—was alarming. I paid little mind to the Internet. I was a cabdriver and painter who was suspicious of photography, so what good could anything on a computer screen do for me?

Yet by the beginning of 2015 my daily routine was punctuated and organized by tweets, e-mails, and notifications emanating from the smartphone I carried at all times. When my phone did not emit the requisite signal for a few minutes, I’d keep refreshing Twitter, Instagram, Gmail, or whatever platform I was obsessed with at the moment. I hated myself for letting it get this bad. How had it happened?

In 2003 I married a database programmer and she suggested I make a website. I had learned how to turn on a computer only a few months before, but she built the site from scratch, hand-coding each HTML page. I had my brother scan in a bunch of slides of my paintings and drawings to make JPEGs. The marriage fell apart shortly afterward, and I was left to run the page. I repeatedly wrecked it and built it back up again until I figured things out. Having devoted so many sleepless nights staring into that screen, I eventually decided to look around to see what others were doing. New sites to promote art seemed to spring up every other day, and I uploaded images to all of them—I figured that I’d throw everything I could against this virtual wall until something stuck.

MySpace was the first site where the daily affirmation and encouragement of other’s responses became a thing I looked forward to and craved. When I signed up, the lines between self-promotion, career advancement, and friendship began to blur. The platform

allowed me to share my artwork, tell people what music I liked, become acquainted with the people making that music, get hired to illustrate their records—and I even met the occasional girl. The community was exciting and exhausting. The site made me feel as if I was part of a larger creative universe, a place where I could be accepted and recognized in ways that rarely occurred in the “real” world.

The most important reason for me to log on to the Internet every day was to publicize my work, but I also felt a compulsion to keep up with what everyone in my online circle was doing. This became a kind of job in itself, and an often demoralizing one. I couldn’t help but envy those with more “friends,” or wonder whether my “friends” reciprocated my interest, admiration, or love. The quest to raise my profile or status became a preoccupation.

There was no way to avoid those fluctuating numbers next to my avatar.

I used to text my friends about the crazy things that happened to me during my cab shifts. Joining Twitter in 2008 gave me a way to do the same thing in public, with a larger audience. It was a note-taking tool for things I was writing, and it helped me grow an audience. But the desire to keep tabs on what friends and followers were saying worsened.

By the time I got a smartphone I was a goner; obsessively checking my time line dozens of times a day became routine. I was still meeting people and getting jobs and affirmation, but it all felt like a grind, a chore. “Twitter is how I connect to the people who pay my rent, so I have to do it,” I’d tell myself. I had to pretend that my “followers” were friends, and that it was pro forma to “like” the things they did and said. I never followed many Twitter accounts because I knew that scrolling through a time line filled with thousands of people would leave me little time for anything else, but this made many people who followed me feel like I didn’t like them, or worse, that I believed I was above them.

Early this year I moved to a new neighborhood after a relationship ended. One of my ex’s

8 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

DMITRY SAMAROV

By DMITRY SAMAROV

criticisms was that I too often had my nose stuck in my phone rather than engaging with her or others in our physical surroundings.

Staying “connected” to all those virtual friends and keeping up with their every thought estranged me from a woman I lived with and loved. I’d excuse myself during dinner at a restaurant to sit in a bathroom stall and scroll through my time line. If we were at a party I’d be the guy on the couch staring into a screen rather than meeting an actual person’s gaze.

I’m not saying Twitter killed our relationship.

But the virtual search for attention from my followers helped separate me from someone real who was actually paying attention. So this past March, I quit Twitter.

A few people who only knew me through Twitter were disturbed enough by my departure to inquire about my mental health, but I assured them I was as (relatively) sane as I’d ever been. The most immediate result was a substantial increase in free time. I still had Instagram—which I’d joined as a lower-dose alternative—but the world seemed a lot less hectic.

On a Saturday this past July, as an experiment, I decided to delete Instagram as well.

Later that night I went to see a band at Schubas and sketched them as they played, a thing I’ve been doing for about 30 years. Since getting a smartphone I’d become accustomed to taking a picture of my sketch and immediately posting it online. But that night I looked out at the packed room of sweaty strangers, then down at my sketchbook, and that’s it—no instant affirmation. I was forced to think about my present situation, with no virtual overlay to mask my isolation.

A week later I walked into a Verizon store and traded in my iPhone 6 for a basic flip phone. The guys working there treated this as an act of betrayal—they couldn’t understand why anyone would do such a thing.

In the weeks that followed I ran into more people I knew than I had in years. I’ve read more books and articles this year than I have in a long time. When I get on a bus or train now I spend a good part of the ride noticing my fellow passengers or the scenery going by. I’m present in my life for many more hours a day than I used to be. It has felt like waking from a dream, one in which I was constantly looking into a screen.

The feeling of connection, social media’s supposed raison d’etre, is actually an addiction, one that’s hard to kick. I’ve never been good at being casual at anything; I’m either in or I’m out. For me social media was like a drug—I’d refresh the feed and there’d be another line to read, another link to click, another rabbit hole to fall into. I had to quit cold turkey. The trouble with the attention you get on the Internet is that it’s both fickle and fleeting—but once you get a little, you spend an unhealthy amount of time chasing more of it.

I can’t disconnect from the Internet completely, nor do I want to. At least not yet.

As an artist, I still have to make a living by e-mailing collectors and other clients, and I value the vast and accessible information the Web provides. I still have the same site my ex-wife made almost 12 years ago. I send out a newsletter every Monday. But I won’t “like,” “follow,” “favorite,” or in any other way signal my approval or endorsement online anymore.

Maybe we are all connected like that old phone ad insisted, but I’m better off having some say about the terms and conditions of my connection. v

Reader contributor Dmitry Samarov is a Chicago artist and the author of Hack: Stories From a Chicago Cab and Where To?: A Hack Memoir. While you won't find him on Twitter, he's still online at dmitrysamarov.com.

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CITY LIFE

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Read Ben Joravsky’s columns throughout the week at chicagoreader.com.

POLITICS

While you weren’t watching

By BEN JORAVSKY

F

or most of the world, the calendar starts in January. But in Chicago, the New Year apparently began on November 24, when Mayor Emanuel finally released the video showing police officer Jason Van Dyke gunning down Laquan McDonald.

With that, Chicagoans awoke to the realization that—OMG!—we’re living in a corrupt autocracy ruled by a jerk. How come no one told us?!

For the benefit of the sleepyheads, let me run through just a few of the things that, politically speaking, happened in the first ten months of 2015—before you were paying attention.

JANUARY: Having spent the better part of the last two years swearing up and down that they would never, ever, ever vote for Mayor Rahm again, voters emerged from their New Year’s hangover to discover that his only opponents

were four guys they’d never heard of.

That’s because Cook County Board president Toni Preckwinkle—who had been crushing Mayor Rahm in the polls—chickened out and didn’t run. Not knowing what else to do, many Chicagoans went back to sleep.

FEBRUARY: Chicago has a mayoral election in which the two highest vote getters are Mayor Emanuel (45 percent) and Cook County Board commissioner Jesus “Chuy” Garcia (33 percent).

Since no candidate received more than 50 percent of the vote—in an election in which roughly 65 percent of the voters didn’t vote— Emanuel and Garcia headed to a runoff.

Suddenly reporters filled their stories with sentences explaining how the election works.

Apparently voters didn’t realize we had a mayoral runoff system, even though we’ve had it for years. Proving once again that there’s really no reason for Mayor Emanuel—or any

10 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

politician—to conceal information from the public, since the public is generally more than happy to remain uninformed on its own.

MARCH: In an effort to save his political career, Mayor Rahm raises more than $30 million from various bankers, hedge funders, and other titans of corporate America—aka, his base. He then spends that money plastering the airwaves with commercials.

One commercial shows him in a sweater, apologizing, without actually saying what it is that he’s done wrong. Another commercial pummels Garcia for not having a plan to deal with the city’s fiscal nightmare, even though the mayor has no plan either.

Almost as soon as those commercials go on air, voters forget their pledge never to vote for Rahm and fall into line. Proving, once again, that you can’t go wrong underestimating the fortitude—or attention span—of the average Chicago voter. As Mayor Daley established years ago.

APRIL: Two weeks after voters reelected the mayor, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools, takes a leave of absence. It turns out the feds are investigating her role in awarding a no-bid $20.5 million contract to Supes Academy, a company for whom she once worked.

Voters are aghast, saying, if we’d only known that Mayor Rahm’s handpicked schools CEO was corrupt, we never would have reelected him. Even though many details about the shady deal had been known for months.

Proving that the best way to keep voters ignorant is to put stuff in the newspapers.

MAY: Voters realize they’ve elected a governor named Bruce Rauner who’s been cutting programs, like aid to people with autism, while everyone was distracted by the mayoral election. Chicago voters can be excused for not realizing there was a gubernatorial election in 2014, since less than half of them voted in it.

JUNE: Having campaigned on a promise to make the hard choices to save the city from its mounting financial obligations, Mayor Emanuel takes the easy way out by borrowing another $1 billion or so to pay off the city’s debt. That means he’s borrowing money to pay back the money he already owes. Voters are outraged, saying if we’d only known Rahm had no fiscal plan . . .

JULY: Having finally paid the $640 million he owes the teachers’ pension fund, Mayor Emanuel turns right around and asks the pension fund to lend him back that money at 7.75 percent interest, so he can use it to pay for the upcoming school year. Thus turning teachers

into loan sharks. Voters have no reaction because it’s summer and no one pays attention to boring stuff like pensions when it’s finally nice and you can go to the beach.

AUGUST: Forrest Claypool, the mayor’s new schools CEO, makes headlines for firing a bunch of central office employees that Byrd-Bennett had hired. Then, when the press isn’t paying attention, he hires his pals to fill those vacancies. Proving that while Claypool may know nothing about education, he knows how to work the press. Voters have no comment as they’re still on summer break.

SEPTEMBER: Mayor Rahm gets chased out of one of his budget hearings by activists who are on a hunger strike, because he broke his promise to reopen a south-side neighborhood high school. Meanwhile, the mayor says he may not have enough money to get through the school year without laying off thousands of teachers.

Voters are shocked, saying, if we’d only known Rahm was going to break his promises on school funding . . .

“I HAVE TUITION TO PAY AND CASINOS TO VISIT.” —Former schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett

OCTOBER: Byrd-Bennett pleads guilty to charges of steering the $20.5 million contract to Supes in exchange for “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes and kickbacks.” As part of the case, feds release e-mails in which Byrd-Bennett tells Supes officials to hurry up and pay her because, “I have tuition to pay and casinos to visit.” It’s the greatest line in local politics since “I’ve got this thing and it’s fucking golden.” Voters say—in retrospect, Blago doesn’t look so bad.

NOVEMBER: Under orders from Cook County judge Franklin Valderrama, Mayor Emanuel grudgingly releases the McDonald tape. Protesters take to the streets demanding that the mayor be recalled, momentarily forgetting that we blew our chance to recall him back in April.

Happy New Year, Chicago. Let’s hope that 2016 is the year you finally pay attention. v

v @joravben

CITY LIFE North Lake Shore Drive is due for a revamp. How public transit is prioritized is an open question. ò JOHN GREENFIELD

TRANSPORTATION

Better trips on LSD

By JOHN GREENFIELD

E

arlier this month at a hearing on the North Lake Shore Drive reconstruction study—dubbed “Redefine the Drive”—officials promised all options for rebuilding Chicago’s coastal highway are still on the table. But the Illinois Department of Transportation, which has jurisdiction, isn’t seriously considering the simplest way to help more people travel more efficiently: trading existing mixed-traffic lanes for bus-only lanes.

Immortalized in the eponymous song by local rock group Aliotta-Haynes-Jeremiah (R.I.P. bassist Mitch Aliotta, who passed away in July), the northern portion of Lake Shore Drive is 60 to 80 years old, and overdue for a rehab. IDOT and the Chicago Department of Transportation are collaborating on the plan to rebuild the section between Grand and Hollywood.

They expect to get approval for the design from the feds by 2018, with construction starting as early as 2019. The project could cost more than $1 billion and will take years to finish. Starting in July 2013, the departments hosted several public meetings where residents shared their ideas for the overhaul.

During a recent hearing at the Chicago History Museum, planners from IDOT noted that North Lake Shore Drive sees 70,000 transit trips a day on nine routes, accounting for onefifth of all passenger trips on the drive.

IDOT projects the population of the study area—bounded by Touhy, I-90/94, and I-55— will grow 15 to 20 percent by 2040, based on a state analysis of Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning data. The department predicts the number of transit trips on the Drive will increase by the same amount during this period, but car trips will flatline.

To meet the growing transit demand, the project team is considering alternatives like bus-on-shoulder (which already exists on some Pace lines) and bus-only lanes, possibly with rapid-transit-style stations along the route. Light rail is even in the mix, although it would likely be cost prohibitive.

Liberating transit riders from car-generated congestion via dedicated lanes is a no-brainer, since buses are exponentially more space efficient than automobiles.

During the hearing, planners stressed they haven’t ruled out any possibilities for reconfiguring the Drive. But afterward, IDOT project and environmental studies section chief John Baczek told a different story to Charles Papanek, who reported on the meeting for Streetsblog.

Baczek said it’s unlikely any existing travel lanes will be converted to transit-only use, because this would reduce capacity for drivers, and car trips aren’t expected to decrease.

Therefore, adding bus lanes would probably require widening the highway.

A few problems with this logic spring to mind. If taking right-of-way from cars and giving it to transit makes driving a little slower and buses much faster, people who don’t need to drive will be encouraged to switch modes.

Conversely, widening the eight-lane roadway by another 15 or 30 feet would create an even bigger barrier between neighborhoods and the lake, and possibly gobble up parkland.

To get more perspective on Baczek’s statements, I contacted other local authorities and advocates for their views on lane conversions.

Asked for his department’s position, CDOT spokesman Mike Claffey replied, “The study team [including CDOT] is in the process of carefully assessing the impacts of various alternatives on both Lake Shore Drive and surrounding streets.”

Representatives for Gold Coast alderman Brian Hopkins, Lakeview alderman Tom Tunney, and north-side congressman Mike Quigley (who sits on a House subcommittee that makes decisions on transportation funding) said all three politicians are open to the idea of transit-only lanes on the highway.

Metropolitan Planning Council vice president Peter Skosey said that since IDOT projects transit use will rise as driving plateaus, it makes sense to dedicate lanes to buses.

“It’s preferable to take advantage of existing infrastructure before adding lanes,” he said, noting that bus corridors could eventually be upgraded to light rail.

Active Trans director Ron Burke argued IDOT’s assumption driving won’t decrease is a self-fulfilling prophesy. “A smart strategy can accommodate all travelers with fewer cars within the existing footprint by converting single-occupant car trips to transit, biking, and car pools,” he said. “Focus on moving people, not cars.”

“A SMART, COMPREHENSIVE STRATEGY CAN ACCOMMODATE ALL TRAVELERS WITH FEWER CARS WITHIN THE EXISTING FOOTPRINT. . . . FOCUS ON MOVING PEOPLE, NOT CARS.” —Active Trans director Ron Burke

If lane conversions turn out to be a deal breaker, it would be easy to speed rush-hour buses on the drive with little inconvenience for drivers via movable lanes. During the morning commute, one of the eight existing lanes could be reserved for inbound buses, with four maintained for southbound motorists, while the lighter reverse-commute traffic would share three lanes. The layout would be reversed in the evening.

IDOT has rarely been ahead of the curve when it comes to transportation planning.

However, new IDOT secretary Randy Blankenhorn is the former head of the progressive Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, so there’s hope the state can be persuaded to rethink lane conversions—if there’s enough public outcry in support for the idea. v

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

A vision of North Lake Shore Drive with rapid-transit corridors ò THOM GREENE

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ARTS & CULTURE

Bill Walker’s All of Mankind was painted over, paving the way for the sale of Northside Stranger’s Home Missionary Baptist Church. ò ERIN NEKERVIS/PAUL JOHN VHIGGINS

“SUCH A JOY. A VERY SPECIAL FILM. A LOVE LETTER TO FILM ITSELF.” Kenneth Turan, LOS ANGELES TIMES

“WILL THRILL YOU AND CHANGE THE WAY YOU WATCH MOVIES.” Matt Patches, ESQUIRE.COM

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COHEN MEDIA GROUP PRESENTS

PUBLIC ART

All of Mankind wiped out

By DEANNA ISAACS

T

he possession of something extraordinary isn’t always such a wonderful thing. ¶ What do you do if, in a city of high-profile collectors of multimillion-dollar art, your treasure is too precious to neglect, but not valued enough to attract the support needed to maintain it?

That’s the question that has plagued the Thomas family, whose legacy includes the Northside Stranger’s Home Missionary Baptist Church and its remarkable Bill Walker mural, All of Mankind.

Painted across the entire front of the building, surrounded by the empty land that used to be part of the Cabrini-Green public housing complex, All of Mankind was a compelling sight even if you didn’t know that Walker (1927-2011), who painted it in 1972, had previously spearheaded the south side’s legendary Wall of Respect. Or that some consider him the Diego Rivera of the United States.

Look, the mural seemed to say to passersby, here is something so urgent it has spilled out from the constraints of proper stained glass windows to cover every inch of this facade.

The mural’s central image consisted of four towering but simple figures, standing with arms entwined. They represented an ideal unity, a human connection that could transcend differences of race, religion, or sex. But they were set in a context of painful historical reality. Above them, along the peaked line of the church roof, was a question: “Why were they crucified?” And all around was a litany of names and events that question implied, starting with Jesus, Gandhi,

and Dr. King. The whole thing was flanked by imploring masses of mankind.

Powerful stuff—but not anymore. On December 10, while a small group of preservationists were scrambling to figure out how to raise the money to save the mural, All of Mankind was whitewashed.

The preservationists include Jeff Huebner, who has written at length about Walker in the Reader, and has spent the last three years working on a book about him. Huebner was one of those who got word that the mural was being painted over, and rushed to 617 W. Evergreen, near the intersection of Clybourn and Halsted, only to find that it was too late.

The painters were just finishing up. “It was shocking,” Huebner says.

On the other hand, there was an element of deja vu: in 2004, a major mural that Walker had painted on an interior wall of the church had also been abruptly whitewashed.

The Northside Stranger’s Home building was an Episcopal church when it was built in 1901. Catholics took it over in 1927, when the neighborhood was largely Italian, renaming it San Marcello. In the early 1970s it was run by a Benedictine priest, Dennis Kendrick, who raised money for repairs, allowed a counseling center for heroin addicts to set up in the basement, and commissioned Bill Walker to turn the structure into a work of art.

But, Huebner told me, the methadone center didn’t sit well with the archdiocese, which closed the church in 1973 and later that year transferred the title to Stranger’s Home, then

headed by the Reverend Dempsey Thomas.

One of Thomas’s daughters, Christmas Trotter, has succeeded him as pastor; other members of his family sit on the church board.

Chicago Public Art Group founder Jon Pounds has been in contact with the church off and on since the 1990s, when Public Art first offered to help find money to get the murals restored. They managed to do a demonstration project, but the full restoration never happened. The family has been trying to sell the building, which is within the Cabrini-Green Development Zone, for years now, starting with a multimillion-dollar listing price.

This fall, on the market at $999,900, the building found a buyer. A representative for the church board, who didn’t want her name used, confirmed that a contract has been signed and the sale is pending. Preservationists were given five days to find the money to either move the mural—which Pounds says is not a viable option—or to counter the offer and buy the building.

“There just wasn’t enough time to put that together,” Pounds says. “But we did not think the mural would be painted over. We thought we’d be able to deal with the buyer.”

Not enough time? Here’s what the church spokesperson had to say about that: “We had five and a half years to repair those murals and nothing happened. We got no support. The money wasn’t there. And our demographics have moved out. So we had no choice. The only logical decision was to paint [over] the murals.”

And then she got to the crux of the matter: “No one was going to buy the church with the murals on it.”

So maybe, in the city’s hottest development area (as the real estate listing described it), the repairs were never the issue. v

v @deannaisaacs

HITCHCOCK TRUFFAUT DIRECTED BY KENT JONES WRITTEN BY KENT JONES AND SERGE TOUBIANA

cohenmedia.net © Cohen Media Group/Artline Films/Arte France 2015.

All Rights Reserved. Photos courtesy of Philippe Halsman/Magnum Photo.

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ARTS & CULTURE

From top left: Bad Jews, The Little Foxes, Stop. Reset., Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play, The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence), The Tempest ò CHARLES OSGOOD; LIZ LAUREN

THEATER

Dark days, dark comedy

By TONY ADLER

L

ast year at this time I was writing about the spate of deaths that overtook Chicago’s theater community during the late summer and early fall of 2014. We lost at least a half-dozen artists—from thirtysomething actor/playwright Sati Word to 79-year-old teacher/director/mentor/griot/quiet benefactor Sheldon Patinkin—in a bare few weeks.

If the shocks slowed some in 2015, they certainly didn’t leave off. May was the cruelest month, beginning with the loss to cancer of Russ Tutterow, longtime top playwright nurturer at Chicago Dramatists, and 41-yearold actress Erin Myers. A couple weeks later came news that 40-year-old PJ Paparelli, whose leadership caused and then weathered a schism at American Theater Company, had died in a car accident while on a trip to Scotland. Also in May, Martha Lavey (one of the very few genuinely singular people I’ve ever met) suffered a stroke just as she was winding

up her 20-year tenure as artistic director of Steppenwolf Theatre.

Lavey survived and, from what I hear, continues to progress through a long recovery.

So does the community as a whole. This year saw Columbia College naming a theater after Patinkin, and September 19 marked the first Chicago Theater Memorial Bike Ride, “celebrating those we have lost” and benefiting the Actors Fund.

Meanwhile, the shows kept coming. Here are a round ten of my favorites, in more or less random order.

Theater Wit wins my Annus Mirabilis Award for presenting no less than three of the best dark comedies of 2015, all of them staged by the company’s artistic director, Jeremy Wechsler: Bad Jews, Mr Burns: A Post-Electric Play, and The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence.

Joshua Harmon’s Bad Jews (running through 12/27) looks at first like an ethnic comedy in the embarrassing old style, with

spoiled Jewish kinderlach fighting dirty over a trinket owned by their newly deceased grandfather. Before it’s finished, though, the cunningly mounted, ruthlessly performed play has opened out into a painful look at the ongoing effects of the Holocaust. Speaking of holocausts, Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play opens in a postapocalyptic moment when, all the comforts of ComEd having been wiped out, a small cadre of survivors comfort themselves by recounting the “Cape Feare” episode from The Simpsons. Playwright Anne Washburn and a delightfully Dumpster-designed production demonstrated how a campfire tale plus time can equal religion. Finally, with dry wit, Holmesian intricacies, and a crack Chicago-built cast, Madeline George’s The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence explored the ironies of modern tech’s Great Disruptor cult.

Goodman Theatre contributed two entries to my list of faves, dipping back into the past for a revival of Lillian Hellman’s 1939 The Little Foxes before shooting into the future with the Chicago premiere of Regina Taylor’s Stop. Reset.

The Hellman play is a no-brainer as far as I’m concerned: a taut version of an admirably constructed drama starring the merciless Shannon Cochran as Regina Giddens, a sort of smalltown southern amalgam of Machiavelli and

Lucretia Borgia. Stop. Reset. is a little harder to justify, seeing as how it didn’t strictly work.

Still, its Afro-Futurist spin on the struggles of a dying publishing firm was not only bold as hell and passionately realized, but important in that, as I argued in my review, “it offers a way past the familiar strategies for representing American black people on the American stage.”

Stop. Reset. resonated with allusions to Shakespeare’s The Tempest; one of my other bests of 2015 was The Tempest itself, as magically codirected by Aaron Posner and Teller of Penn & Teller for Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Sly, gorgeous, and full of sleight-of-hand, the production vindicated all its preopening hype and more, never departing from solid storytelling even when Prospero was levitating his daughter.

Still more favorites . . . Kurios (Cirque du Soleil): steampunk in excelsus, but real humans with prodigious skills; Three Sisters (the Hypocrites): Chicago’s party theater met Chekhov; The Herd (Steppenwolf Theatre): Steppenwolf ensemble veterans helped give tragic dimension to Rory Kinnear’s drama; Travesties (Remy Bumppo Theatre): Remy Bumppo aced Tom Stoppard’s cerebro-slapstick. v

v @taadler

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 15

ARTS & CULTURE RSM

R

Second City-trained comics Bartz and Gerrity take control onstage, Wilcop contributes dramatic music, sound effects, and even just single tones to change the direction of a scene. The result is something completely original that brings a different energy to live comedy.

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Friday, December 25 @ 10:00pm Sat-Sun, December 26-27 @ 9:30pm Mon-Tue, December 28-29 @ 9:00pm

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Rebecca O’Neal j ELIAS STEIN

COMEDY

Local comedy breakouts of 2015

By BRIANNA WELLEN

A WHOLE BOOK could be written on what happened in the Chicago comedy scene in 2015.

And it wouldn’t be a short book—it’d be, like, the seventh Harry Potter book. Alas, the Reader has only so many pages.

These are the year’s breakouts. Check them out before they’re gone—I have a nagging feeling that we’ll soon lose these standouts to one of the coasts.

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Rebecca O’Neal If the name “Rebecca O’Neal” sounds familiar, it’s probably because the local stand-up performs nearly every night at comedy showcases across the city. She regularly talks about her life as a bike messenger, her disappointment upon learning “Yo, Robot” was just I, Robot in Spanish, and what it’s like walking around with an NPR tote bag on the south side of Chicago. But she’s not just performing: O’Neal produces the monthly showcase Congrats on Your Success and hosts the weekly open mike at Cole’s (yeah, the one started by Cameron Esposito—look how far she’s come!).

So if the name Rebecca O’Neal doesn’t sound familiar, don’t worry. It will.

Goodrich Gevaart Goodrich Gevaart first appeared on my radar last year as one of the organizers and hosts of the Comedy Exposition. The festival’s successful second year—and great contribution to the

16 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

local comedy scene—would be reason enough to include Gevaart on this list, but it just so happens that he’s also hilarious. One of the jolliest comics working in Chicago at the moment, he can even make depression sound delightful: “I call it practicing the dark arts . . . it’s more fun to think of myself as a sad magician!”

Natalie Jose This stand-up, who hosts the weekly variety show Sadsacks and Wisecracks and is also the lead singer in a Patsy Cline cover band (!!!), appeared in the OWN Network pilot My Life Is a Joke, and showed up on Last Comic Standing, where Roseanne Barr sang her praises. Barr is just letting the world know what we in Chicago have known for years: Jose is an American treasure. She’s an effortless performer who pokes fun at her job, relationships, and lifestyle without sounding apologetic. She’s willing to laugh along with you while describing herself as the “haunted house” of the dating market.

Gnar Gnar Shredtown The trio known as Gnar Gnar Shredtown—Zach Bartz, Kevin Gerrity, and musical director Dan Wilcop—have turned the rules of improv on their head. Forget the three-beat structure that informs Chicago long-form improv—these guys take a suggestion and run with it until they’ve squeezed it dry, then move on. And who says sound effects aren’t important? While

Southside Ignoramus Quartet This sketch-comedy group may come across as overly casual—their performance space is a tent in cast member David Pintor’s parents’ backyard—but their show is actually one of the most thought-provoking in town. They tackle issues plaguing their neighborhood (Pilsen) and represent a demographic they don’t often see on the city’s larger sketch-comedy stages: their own. Made up of Hispanic comedians, Southside Ignoramus Quartet comically bring their culture and experiences to the audience.

Sketch of the year: Selena returns as a zombie during the apocalypse, but no one wants to kill her—“We can’t lose her again!”

Late Late Breakfast This mashup of stand-up comedy and game shows started as a monthly showcase in 2013, featuring local comedians doing their sets while getting pelted with pies, purposely heckled, or whatever other wacky premise hosts Danny Maupin and Tyler Jackson presented.

But this year it became so much more. In its purest form, it’s still a Saturday-brunch show with no lack of Bloody Marys, free pancakes, and high jinks, but the crew behind it have added “breakfast for dinner” shows, celebrity roasts (the roast of Donald Trump kicks off their 2016 calendar), and started a New York edition. LLB’s gathered so much momentum in the last few months that I’d guess 2016 is going to be the year of breakfast comedy.

Bell Hop Ian Abramson is responsible for creating a whole new genre of comedy. His stand-up is often interactive, and last year’s grandest contribution was Seven Minutes in Purgatory, which thrived by putting comedians in an awkward, silent box while performing their sets. Bell Hop starts in an elevator in the Virgin Hotel and continues to the 25th floor; it’s a nonstop comedic, well, “experience” might be the best way to describe it. Framed as a showcase in which things just keep going wrong (the first performance ended with Abramson’s arrest), it allows comics to try something unusual—PowerPoints, characters, moments of complete anticomedy—all led by Abramson, the insane yet brilliant ringmaster. v

ARTS & CULTURE Lagercrantz In the Unlikely Event by Judy Blume I Will Love You for the Rest of My Life: Breakup Stories by Michael Czyzniejewski Marvel and a Wonder by Joe Meno The Physics of Sorrow by Georgi Gospodinov Single, Carefree, Mellow by Katherine Heiny FOOD

Cocktails for Dingdongs by Dustin Drankiewicz and Alexandra Ensign Cooking Like a Master Chef by Graham Elliot Dinner at Home by JeanMarie Brownson The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science by J. Kenji López-Alt

LIT

All the books we liked in 2015

By AIMEE LEVITT

LET’S FACE IT: there’s no way this is going to be a definitive list of the best books of 2015. There were too many that came out this year and too few reviewers to read them all. Plus, there are some books you’re just more interested in reviewing than others, either because you have definite preferences in authors or genres or because you’re more willing to accept certain recommendations than others.

We also seem to write a lot about books we like—the vast majority of our reviews this year have been positive. I’m not sure why that is. Do we subconsciously preselect books for review that we’re already pretty sure we’ll like? Time is short, and there’s so much good TV to watch!

Seriously, it would probably take longer to slog through the new Jonathan Franzen than to binge watch the entire final season of Mad Men Or have we somehow fallen prey to the epidemic of niceness that has swept through the literary community—and the accompanying hope that the authors of the books we review will someday be in the position to give us jobs or at the very least retweet our best and wittiest 140-character thoughts and let us think they are our friends?

Was 2015 an unusually good year for books?

Or is our reluctance to trash too many books a sign of the ongoing decline of literary culture, a sad reversal of the days when writers and critics would get into fistfights at cocktail parties? Or so I’ve been told. I cannot imagine people who sit behind desks all day are very adept at fisticuffs, especially if there’s alcohol involved.

I do not feel equipped to answer any of these questions on behalf of the other book reviewers.

I do know that I, personally, would love if Judy

Blume or Sarah Hepola wrote to me offering their undying friendship just because I declared in a public forum that I thought their books were great. Sadly, this hasn’t happened yet. Still, it did not mean my admiration for In the Unlikely Event and Blackout was any less sincere. Conversely, fistfighting at cocktail parties is not really my style. I’d be more likely to hide behind a bookcase and read all the titles very, very slowly (which is actually what I did do the one time I found myself at an event with someone whose book I disliked).

As for 2015 being an unusually good year for books—I don’t know, maybe we were just lucky in the books we chose to review? Maybe next year we’ll get some real stinkers. And then we can eviscerate them for your entertainment. But for now, here’s a list of all those books we liked.

COMICS

Displacement: A Travelogue by Lucy Knisley March: Book Two by John Lewis and Nate Powell Out on the Wire: Storytelling Secrets of the New Masters of Radio by Jessica Abel The Oven by Sophie Goldstein

HISTORY

Blood Runs Green: The Murder that Transfixed Gilded Age Chicago by Gillian O’Brien Emmett Till: The Murder that Shocked the World and Propelled the Civil Rights Movement by Devery S. Anderson MEMOIR / BIOGRAPHY

Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan Blackout: Remembering the Things I Drank to Forget by Sarah Hepola M Train by Patti Smith Reagan: The Life by H.W. Brands Silver Screen Fiend: Learning About Life From an Addiction to Film by Patton Oswalt Unfaithful Music and Disappearing Ink by Elvis Costello Your Band Sucks: What I Saw at Indie Rock’s Failed Revolution (But Can No Longer Hear)

by Jon Fine

SATURDAY, JANUARY 16 7PM

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Garland Jeffreys with special guests Ligon and McDonough SUNDAY, JANUARY 24 7PM

Ten Strings and a Goat Skin / Kilgubbin featuring Sean Cleland • In Szold Hall SATURDAY, JANUARY 30 8PM SUNDAY, JANUARY 31 7PM

Elidades Ochoa y Barbarito Torres SUNDAY, JANUARY 31 11AM & 3PM

Justin Roberts & His Not Ready for Naptime Players Kids' Concert SUNDAY, JANUARY 31 4PM

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FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 5 8PM

Au Pair featuring Gary Louris (The Jayhawks) & Django Haskins (The Old Ceremony) SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 6 7 & 10PM

MUSIC WRITING

The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic by Jessica Hopper POETRY

Breakbeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip Hop ed. by Kevin Coval, Quraysh Ali Lansana, and Nate Marshall RELIGION

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates Dime Stories by Tony Fitzpatrick

Rescuing Jesus: How People of Color, Women, and Queer Christians are Changing Evangelicalism by Deborah Jian Lee

FICTION

SCIENCE

Captain Underpants and the Sensational Saga of Sir Stinks-a-Lot by Dav Pilkey Fear of Dying by Erica Jong The Ghost Network by Catie Disabato The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David

Infested: How the Bed Bug Infiltrated Our Bedrooms and Took Over the World by Brooke Borel Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari and Eric Klinenberg

ESSAYS

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1/15 1/22 1/29 2/5 2/12 2/20

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DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 17

ARTS & CULTURE Parks and Recreation j ELIAS STEIN

second season follows the trial, which seems like it’ll be a drag but is more compelling than anything from season one, thanks to some extraordinary performances and fascinating character development.

Catastrophe (Amazon Prime) Call me an Anglophile, but British people really get TV right. This series starring Sharon Horgan and American comic Rob Delaney first aired on the UK’s Channel 4 in January and made its way to the U.S. via Amazon Prime in June. The six-episode season follows a couple who spend a passionate week together and end up with a baby on the way. The show is hilarious and heartwarming because the two leads don’t take life too seriously and also seem to genuinely like each other. This isn’t a will-they-or-won’t-they rom-com, and it’s all the better for it.

SMALL SCREEN

Top ten TV shows of 2015

By BRIANNA WELLEN

THERE IS TOO MUCH TV in the world. This year alone there were more than 400 scripted series on the air, according to Variety, and who knows how many more reality and documentary shows. Also, I am just one person. Sure, I would love to do nothing but watch television, but then I would have no free time and I probably still wouldn’t be able to watch everything. There are plenty of shows that are possibly among the best of the year that I just haven’t seen (looking at you Game of Thrones and Fargo) and just as many that I love because they’re so trashy and ridiculous they aren’t making the cut (Married at First Sight, any iteration of the Real Housewives franchise, every competitive cooking show). But sitting down and reflecting on what’s been on the air (or Internet) from January 1, 2015, until now, these are the shows that stood out.

BoJack Horseman (Netflix) Who would have thought that an animated show about a horse-man hybrid would be the most emotional series of the year? BoJack’s second season follows the title character’s quest to be a better man, er, horse, er, horseman. There are plenty of ridiculous premises and even more jokes, but BoJack sets itself apart with a moving subtext about what it means to be good.

Broadchurch (BBC America) Fox tried to bring this drama stateside, but even with David Tennant reprising his role as the lead detective investigating the murder of a small child, it just didn’t catch on. It did, however, attract some curiosity about the British source material, which aired its second season this year. The first season ends (without giving too much away) with the capture of the murderer of an 11-year-old; the

18 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (the CW) Maybe I’m revealing too much about how I live my life, but Rebecca Bunch (Rachel Bloom, America’s new sweetheart) was the television character I related most to this year. She’s charming, delusional, and equal parts insecure and overconfident; plus, she deals with every important moment in her life by singing (don’t we all?). I’m still not entirely sure how a musical comedy about a crazy girl who’s stalking her ex-boyfriend made it on to network television, but I’m not going to question it. I’m just going to let the songs “West Covina,” “Settle for Me,” and “I Give Good Parent” play on a loop in my head.

Empire (Fox) The runaway hit of the year has given us the best melodrama on network television since Shonda Rhimes’s heyday. Two Oscar-nominated actors (Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson) give the performances of their lives every week alongside up-and-coming musicians. This show has it all: drama, fashion, music, humor, and, even though they’re complicated, good old-fashioned family values.

Jessica Jones (Netflix) This late-in-the-year series could be 2015’s best. It was encouraging to see Marvel, a brand not typically known for feminist entertainment, use an action-noir show to address issues of rape and abusive relationships and

give the upper hand to a badass female character. Krysten Ritter (whom I fell in love with on Don’t Trust the B in Apartment 23) slays as the title character, and Kilgrave (David Tennant, yes, on my list twice) will surely go down as one of the most chilling villains in television history.

The Jinx (HBO) Speaking of chilling villains, here’s Robert Durst—except he’s a real person. It’s rare to have the kind of access to a psychopath that Andrew Jarecki had for his true-crime documentary series. Proving that truth is stranger than fiction, Jarecki delves into a real-life murder mystery that is hard to turn away from, full of bizarre details and invasive, though compelling and revealing, moments with beady-eyed Durst and his burps heard round the world.

The Last Man on Earth (Fox) The pilot episode of The Last Man on Earth, sticking to its title, is carried entirely by one man: Will Forte. Seeing him deal with a postapocalyptic earth with just a bevy of sports balls with Sharpie-drawn faces on them is both humorous and heartbreaking. The Last Man on Earth progressively introduces more characters and plot lines and jazzy visuals, but Forte’s performance and his character’s internal struggles are the silly, emotional heart of the show.

Parks and Recreation (NBC) There are plenty of successful sitcoms that overstay their welcome; by the series finale you forget about the magic that made you love the show in the first place. But Parks and Recreation boasts the rare distinction of never dipping in quality and going out on its own terms. The final season served as the perfect love letter to Pawnee, Indiana, and the last episode gave fans everything they wanted without pandering. It’s the show I will miss most going into 2016.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Netflix) Tina Fey needs to always work in television.

In Kimmy Schmidt she found the perfect balance of the ridiculous, dark, and heartfelt, and Ellie Kemper proved herself to be a true leading lady. And between his one-liners and performance of the original hit “Pinot Noir,” Tituss Burgess as the character Titus is the gay black werewolf we never knew we needed in our lives. For him alone we owe Fey everything. v

Get showtimes at chicagoreader.com/movies.

ARTS & CULTURE

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MOVIES

2015 at the movies

By J.R. JONES 1. White God Could Hungary be the new Romania? Next month Chicagoans will get a look at László Nemes’s debut feature, Son of Saul, a Holocaust drama like no other, and earlier this year the Gene Siskel Film Center presented the local debut of Kornél Mundruczó’s arresting, dreamlike White God. A child could follow its story, about a spirited schoolgirl who scours the city in search of her big old mixed-breed dog, but that child would be in psychotherapy for years if he saw the climax, in which hundreds of shelter dogs tear through city streets on a deadly rampage.

2. 99 Homes This has been a banner year for two of Chicago’s finest: John Cusack (Maps to the Stars, Love and Mercy) and Michael Shannon, whose portrayal of an Orlando real estate shark in 99 Homes surpasses even his Oscar-nominated performance in Revolutionary Road.

Ramin Bahrani (Chop Shop, Man Push Cart), America’s answer to the Dardenne brothers, captures the human tragedy of the subprime mortgage crisis, getting great work not only from Shannon but from Andrew Garfield as a young construction worker, desperate to

reclaim his family home from foreclosure, who becomes the hustler’s conflicted protege.

3. Spotlight In this engrossing drama, writer-director Thomas McCarthy (The Visitor) chronicles the yearlong crusade of the Boston Globe to expose the Catholic Church’s systematic shielding of pedophile priests. Open Road Films managed to turn this indie effort into a serious Oscar contender by courting not just critics but news reporters, who were invited to press screenings and responded with enthusiastic commentary. Much of this commentary celebrated the movie’s attention to journalistic process, yet what really distinguishes Spotlight is McCarthy’s understanding that the Globe, by refusing to see the problem for years, betrayed its responsibility to the community just as the church did.

4. Maps to the Stars David Cronenberg’s Tinseltown horror movie bombed with critics and quickly disappeared, but it’s the Canadian director’s edgiest, most intimidating project in years, slicing into the ghastly soul-sickness at the heart of Hollywood entertainment. The story of a

violent schizophrenic (Mia Wasikowska) who schmoozes her way into a job as personal assistant to a petulant, fast-wilting movie star (Julianne Moore), the film portrays Hollywood as a rigid hierarchy enforced by vicious cruelty, in which monstrous egos feed on the weaker ones surrounding them.

5. Queen and Country

an writer-director Chaitanya Tamhane, centers on a smart, dedicated human rights attorney with the cards stacked against him: his client, a rabble-rousing folksinger with a history of dissident activity, is accused of having performed a song that incited a man to kill himself, and despite the flimsiness of the case, the system works against the defendant at every turn.

American comedies suck (Get Hard) suck (Entourage) suck (Sisters). This year brought a few cagey low-budget efforts—Patrick Brice’s The Overnight, Shira Piven’s Welcome to Me— but I was more tickled by movies from Australia (Josh Lawson’s sex comedy The Little Death), New Zealand (Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi’s vampire romp What We Do in the Shadows), and Sweden (Roy Andersson’s deadpan art film A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence). The best of all came from 82-year-old British master John Boorman (Point Blank, Deliverance); continuing the personal memoir he began with Hope and Glory (1987), Queen and Country is a jubilantly anarchic service comedy in the tradition of Stripes and M*A*S*H, with a delectably dour performance from Richard E. Grant and a brilliantly manic one from Caleb Landry Jones.

7. Mommy

6. Court

This gripping drama was Iran’s submission for the Academy Awards in 2010, but rights issues delayed its U.S. release until this spring, when it premiered locally at Film Center. The writer-director, Asghar Farhadi, won an Oscar for his subsequent drama, J

Courtroom dramas will always be with us because they speak to people’s hunger for justice, but few movies dare to portray the legal system for what it really is: an expression of the state that created it. Court, the debut feature of Indi-

At 26, Xavier Dolan has already shown dramatic skills well beyond his years, and his fifth feature, a chamber piece of sorts involving two grown women and a teenage boy, marks him as North America’s most inspired young filmmaker. Mommy revisits the single-mother-versus-teenage-son psychodrama of Dolan’s debut feature, I Killed My Mother (2009), but since then his sympathies have shifted more from the son to the mother—in Mommy, a Quebecois widow (Anne Dorval) trying to control her incorrigibly rude and increasingly violent teenager (Antoine Olivier-Pilon) with only the help of a concerned neighbor (Suzanne Clément). Few films have captured so vividly the joy, pain, and responsibility of parenthood.

8. About Elly

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 19

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ARTS & CULTURE continued from 19 A Separation (2011), and like that film, About Elly is a personal story layered with legal, ethical, and social pressures, as the title character, an unmarried kindergarten teacher, arrives at a beachfront villa to vacation with some married friends and then mysteriously disappears. Farhadi is essentially a moralist, but in his singular films, morality reveals itself not in tendentious speeches but in action, amid constantly shifting circumstances.

9. Youth Italian writer-director Paolo Sorrentino is only 45, but his grand philosophical comedy Youth persuasively confronts the discontents of old age, providing rich roles for three respected actors who all came to prominence around the time Sorrentino was born: Michael Caine as a retired orchestra conductor, Harvey Keitel as a lionized filmmaker, and Jane Fonda as the filmmaker’s hard-hearted star. Sorrentino’s previous feature, The Great Beauty (2013), won an Oscar for best foreign film, and one can see why American art-film lovers warm to him: his velvety tales of the rich and famous draw on Visconti’s sense of old-money splendor and Fellini’s sense of transporting fantasy.

10. Results Nothing is funnier than human weakness, which is why real actors can often dig out laughs beyond the reach of sitcom hacks and SNL ad-libbers. Writer-director Andrew Bujalski, our foremost chronicler of nerd passion (Funny Ha Ha, Mutual Appreciation), has gotten great work from amateur players, but for this superlative screwball comedy he’s recruited three seasoned professionals. Kevin Corrigan stars as a fat slob with an inheritance who falls for overachieving personal trainer Cobie Smulders; he can’t buy himself a body she’ll love, so instead he throws money at her boss, a dopey wellness entrepreneur played by Guy Pearce.

RUNNERS-UP: 11. The Assassin (Hou Hsiaohsien). 12. The Diary of a Teenage Girl (Marielle Heller). 13. The Forbidden Room (Guy Maddin). 14. Best of Enemies (Robert Gordon and Morgan Neville). 15. A Poem Is a Naked Person (Les Blank). 16. Room (Lenny Abrahamson). 17.

Bridge of Spies (Steven Spielberg). 18. What We Do in the Shadows (Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi). 19. Black Mass (Scott Cooper).

20. A Most Violent Year (J.C. Chandor). v

v @JR_Jones

Chicago jazz TO ME, THE ESSENCE of the Chicago jazz and improvised-music community is live performance. More than records made in many other jazz cities, records made in Chicago are documents of what a band does onstage—and that’d be a fair description of almost everything on my list. An aesthetic shaped by onstage performance tends to make for an album a bit less splashy or conceptual than many of the picks that dominate year-end lists, but none of these efforts is lacking in artistry and excitement.

—PETER MARGASAK

Josh Berman Trio, A Dance and a Hop (Delmark) Cornetist Josh Berman seems to have found himself leading this deft, agile trio with bassist Jason Roebke and drummer Frank Rosaly.

The group’s music balances an investment in sound for its own sake against conversational phrasing and limber, precise rhythms.

And though the elegant gestures Berman makes in the midst of his improvisations can be dramatically bent and contorted, the trio operates as a single, nimble intuitive organism.

Tomeka Reid Quartet, Tomeka Reid Quartet (Thirsty Ear) For years cellist and composer Tomeka Reid has played in groups led by Nicole Mitchell and Mike Reed (among many others) and in the collective trio Hear in Now. This year she finally released her first album under her own name, and the wait was worth it. She leads a great band—New Yorkers Mary

Halvorson on guitar and Tomas Fujiwara on drums, plus Chicago bassist Jason Roebke—through original compositions that alternate between elegant and thorny, lithe and turbulent, all the while demonstrating a sure grasp of swing-based improvisation and abstract collective spontaneity.

Michael Zerang & the Blue Lights, Songs From the Big Book of Love (Pink Palace) Veteran percussionist Michael Zerang has rekindled his interest in composition by writing tunes for this bracing postbop quintet, which includes some of the city’s sharpest talent—cornetist Josh Berman, reedists Dave Rempis and Mars Williams, and bassist Kent Kessler. Throughout this album’s eight raucous, celebratory, and buoyant jams, the five of them rip and roar, mixing extroverted soloing with soulful ebullience whether they’re dancing through Middle East-inspired melodies or hurtling through steeplechase grooves.

Chicago Reed Quartet, Western Automatic (Aerophonic) The impressive debut album from the Chicago Reed Quartet is also its swan song, bristling with unfulfilled promise.

Mars Williams, Ken Vandermark, Nick Mazzarella, and Dave Rempis each contribute a pair of tunes, adding diversity and excitement—sometimes the group punctures upper-register blowouts with unexpected serenity, and sometimes it embraces plush Ellingtonian elegance.

Makaya McCraven, In the Moment (International Anthem) To make this impressive album, drummer Makaya McCraven culled improvised passages and grooves from more than 48 hours of live recordings made during a weekly residency at the Bedford in 2013—he cut and pasted, looped, rearranged, and even added subtle keyboard washes. The drummer assembled a stellar cast of musicians for the residency—guitarist Jeff Parker, trumpeter Marquis Hill, vibist Justin Thomas, and bassist Matt Ulery, among others—and while their personalities remain intact, McCraven’s compositional mind-set is what allows the raw material to cohere into a new body of groove-oriented work.

ELIAS STEIN

ELIAS STEIN

MUSIC

Chicago places in Chicago hip-hop RAPPERS LIKE TO REMIND you where they’re from, often by peppering their lyrics with mentions of the spots they know best.

Here are five of my favorite references to Chicago locations in local rap songs this year. —LEOR GALIL

Vic Spencer, “Sony Walkman,” The Cost of Victory Vic Spencer lets his familiarity with his gritty city surroundings seep into The Cost of Victory, and his emotive growl feels like the cracks in the sidewalk you’ve walked over enough times to memorize. On the track “Sony Walkman” he references a specific school: “Ninety-six, I was in the back of Lane Tech trying to get me some top.” It’s a crude but effective reminder that passersby rarely see as many dimensions of a place as the people who occupy it.

Lil B and Chance the Rapper, “First Mixtape Based Freestyle,” Free (Based Freestyles Mixtape) Anything goes on this impromptu mixtape, but Chance makes time to ask if he can take a moment to give some props. After tipping his hat to West Chatham, he says, “Can I shout out that Harold’s on 87th real quick?”

Harold’s has three restaurants on that road, including one in Chatham, right by the

Red Line stop at 87th Street.

Harold’s lovers tend to have favorite locations, swearing that theirs cooks the best stuff, and Chance is no different—a couple weeks before recording this mixtape, he Instagrammed an order from “that Harold’s on 87th.”

Zro Fox featuring Sasha Go Hard, “Might Not,” Zro Fox Few local MCs put love front and center like Hologram Kizzie, aka Psalm One. Before she dropped Psalm One Loves You in September, she teamed up with tongue-twisting rapper Probcause to record five songs as Zro Fox. Psalm shows her grasp of Chicago history on “Might Not,” shouting out pals who earned a record deal at the Regal Theater on 79th Street; the landmark building is cherished by locals, much like Psalm.

Ty Money, “United Center” The United Center is home to champions—Chicago will never forget Michael Jordan—but also tends to feel like a bubble that’s imper-

vious to the horrors of the world outside. On “United Center,” a response to dashcam footage of Laquan McDonald’s shooting death at the hands of police, Harvey rapper Ty Money steamrolls through a litany of systemic injustices that have devastated minority neighborhoods. The pain he means to evoke is never clearer than when he brings his outrage right to the door of the arena that’s been home to so many celebrations: “I just saw a body outside the United Center / And they left him in his Jordans.”

Rich Jones featuring Montana Macks and Jordan Looney, “Milwaukee Ave,” Pigeons & Waffles Rich Jones casually half-sings, half-raps about stumbling through the bars and darkened corners of Milwaukee Avenue. The song’s dreamy, twinkling instrumental and Jones’s simple, affectionate performance remind me of the many warm evenings I’ve spent walking through the bustling patchwork of diverse neighborhoods along that street. Even if you’ve never ended a night “blacked out on that Blue Line,” as Jones raps, this heartfelt tribute to a stretch of Chicago road will help you appreciate its possibilities anew.

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 21

YEAR IN REVIEW

MUSIC

Electric Wizard

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22 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

ò STEVE GULLICK

I KNOW IT’S PERVERSE to compile a year-end list of concerts (“Want to hear about some great stuff you probably didn’t see?”), but please consider these as ongoing recommendations—all five bands below will slay your face no matter when you catch up with them. I left off some truly spectacular shows to avoid repeating previous years’ lists, among them Arkona, Godflesh, Yob, and Ghost (who turned out to make surprisingly good date music). If I had room for seven, I’d definitely also include Anaal Nathrakh and Cloud Rat. —PHILIP MONTORO

Electric Wizard at Metro on Tue 4/7 The final moment before Electric Wizard take the stage feels like the portentous pause before an end-boss battle—you know something huge and evil is on its way, and for just a second you have the luxury to be afraid of how badly it’s going to fuck you up. Then the preposterously heavy riffs kick in, sucking all the light from the room in a conflagration of lurid menace, and in no time you’re thinking with nothing but your brainstem. At the party I went to afterward, fittingly, someone had set the living-room table with dinner plates covered in sloppy fistfuls of coke.

Ufomammut at Reggie’s Rock Club on Wed 5/13 Onstage these amplifierabusing space sorcerers create a sort of reverse sensorydeprivation chamber: their magma-thick grooves recirculate hypnotically, roaring and thundering like the plasma in a cosmic cardiopulmo-

nary system, until it’s impossible to pay attention to anything else. Judging from the narcotizing buzz vibrating all my soft tissues, I’m pretty sure my mitochondria were banging their heads too.

Babymetal at House of Blues on Thu 5/14 I’ve never laughed so much at a concert—and not the mocking, behind-my-hand kind, but giddy, incredulous, what-thefuck-is-happening laughter.

Babymetal’s infectious train wreck of sunny, sentimental J-pop, brutally compressed deathcore, and goofball techno was only half the spectacle: I also had to contend with the girls’ exhaustingly frisky choreography and the alarmingly enthusiastic crowd. The band dressed as Japanese ghosts, and a guy in the pit came in costume as a tomato.

False at the 2040 on Fri 8/7 One of the most celebrated bands in U.S. black metal played a tiny, musty sweatbox in the basement of an unlicensed venue in Pilsen,

and it was awesome. False sounded like a tornado full of roofing nails trying to play a bleak and beautiful symphony, but offstage they were warm, charming, and even silly—I bonded with their singer, Rachel, over a cat we both gravitated toward in the backyard, and the guitarist who introduced himself as Skorpian had scissored the bottom edge of his red shorts into a toothy pirate fringe.

Mgła at Reggie’s Rock Club on Thu 11/12 These Polish black-metal masters write lyrics that read like a vivid and persuasive suicide note, and their stage presence is so icily nihilistic it seems almost contemptuous: they walked offstage without a word before the last note of their set had even finished reverberating in the air.

But the stark grandeur and hopeless dignity of their melancholy, corrosively violent music spoke for them—and the band’s clear awareness of the futility of their efforts only increased their power.

Malcolm London at a protest for Laquan McDonald in the South Loop on November 25

YEAR IN REVIEW

MUSIC

ò PAUL BEATY/AP PHOTO

in part to a constant media drumbeat (especially from Vice, Spike, and the like) about south-side and west-side youth violence. But to reduce these vast, vibrant communities to tragedies and troubles ignores the fact that the Black Arts Movement in Chicago has remained a fertile talent incubator. Of the scores of amazing south- and west-side artists I’ve seen in 2015, these are the five I’m most eager to watch move forward in 2016. —JAKE AUSTEN

Musical arguments against the hopeless Chi-Raq stereotype PRIOR TO THE ASCENDANCE of Michael Jordan, if you said “Chicago” anywhere in the world, regardless of language barrier, you’d be greeted with finger guns and mentions of Al Capone. But now the peaceful period of international Be Like Mike-ism has passed—Chicago is once again synonymous with gunfire, thanks

Malcolm London This young Austin activist (or “abolitionist,” to use his preferred term) gained his biggest spotlight for being arrested in a demonstration after the release of the Laquan McDonald video, but he’s more than just a messenger. In a concert later that week, he deftly danced between hip-hop and poetry, not only consistently expressing a clear, focused point of view but also demonstrating impressive artistry. He even busted out an original house-music song, which for a 21-year-old these days is as

JUST ANNOUNCED

2/7

2/14

LIVING COLOUR 7 & 10 PM

December 31

B.J. THOMAS

STEVE EARLE

The Kinsmen In the late 90s, local teen R&B gospel sensations Youth Edition had a brief brush with major-label fame. One of my favorite ’15 developments was seeing the current not-so-youthful edition of the group reinvent themselves as the Kinsmen, with smooth harmonies and boy-band moves intact. In addition to continu-

Sam Trump The most likely to succeed of the bunch has to be Bridgeport-based Texas transplant Sam Trump. He transmits a laid-back vibe that combines jazz, soul, and indie R&B, using a hypnotizing voice and sharp instrumental skills (on trumpet and surprisingly soulful ukulele).

Throw in his off-the-charts charisma, and it’s easy to imagine the longtime Sidewalk Chalk sideman gaining a national audience. His emergence as a make-the-ladiesswoon front man is my favorite local development of 2015.

1/1 Todd Sheaffer of Railroad Earth NEW YEAR’S DAY BRUNCH SHOW - 1PM

1/1 Lynne Jordan & the Shivers 1/3 Pokey LaFarge - Special Solo Show 1/10 The Bad Plus 7 PM

DIRTY DOZEN BRASS BAND

1/4 & 1/5, 1/25 & 26

Phenom This improvisational word-

December 30

CHICAGO ROCK N’ SOUL REVUE

VALENTINE’S DAY! 2 SHOWS

Shawnee Deznae With only a few shows under her belt, this neosoul songbird is already making ambitious choices that showcase her beautiful voice. I’ve seen a hundred vocalists sing “Summertime,” and I can honestly say that her sparse, chilling version is as fresh and original as any I’ve heard.

ing to sing their 90s classics, they’ve introduced new original songs—and even some Jesus-fied covers of such unlikely contemporary cuts as “Classic Man” and “I’m in Love With the Coco.”

COMING SOON

ON SALE AT NOON WEDNESDAY 12/23 ON SALE TO VINOFILE MEMBERS MONDAY 12/21

1/12

rare as getting the charges dropped after you’ve been hauled in for aggravated battery to a police officer.

smith released a new album, I Didn’t Come I Was Sent, in 2015, proving that he’s still as dexterous as he was in his early days as a cipher champ. An MC’s MC, he continues to bring jazz technique to rap, and hearing him nimbly jump between vocal styles can make you feel like you’re getting a free hip-hop history lesson with every concert ticket.

TICKET INCLUDES GLASS OF BUBBLY

1/15 Peter Mulvey, Paul Cebar, and Willy Porter 1/17 Del McCoury Band 5PM

ROBERT RANDOLPH & THE FAMILY BAND

1/18 Syleena Johnson

7:30 PM & 11 PM

1/19 Kaki King THE NECK IS A BRIDGE TO THE BODY

January 7

1/20 Davina & The Vagabonds

7 & 9:30 PM WITH DJ MARK FULLAFLAVA

1/22 The Westies W/ WILL KIMBROUGH

DWELE

1/17 Del McCoury Band with Jeff Austin Band

8PM

WITH SPECIAL GUEST LUKE WADE (CD RELEASE SHOW)

1/23 Greg Brown 1/24 Sons of the Never Wrong

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WITH MICHAEL SMITH

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 23

YEAR IN REVIEW

MUSIC

The most painfully slow albums of 2015

Albums by Chicago punks playing Ian’s Party

BECAUSE SUCH an impressive glut of local punk full-lengths came out this year, to pick just five I had to come up with a narrower category. Luckily for me (and for you), local punk showcase Ian’s Party (see page 25) has supersized for 2016, moving into three relatively large venues and blowing out its lineup. I chose my five favorite 2015 albums from bands playing the festival—and even that was tough. —KEVIN WARWICK

Sweet Cobra, Earth (Magic Bullet) This long-standing posthardcore trio has filled its best record to date with thick, deep-cutting guitar riffs that sometimes hit surprisingly hard—“He Tall He” mixes dissonant postrock-style heaviness and sludgy, hard-stomping grooves. Vocalist-bassist Tim Remis has found a sweet spot with his vocal melodies, and more than ever before, he sounds like he’s spinning thoughtful, vitriolic yarns when he sings. Sun 1/3, 11:25 PM, Double Door (upstairs)

Absolutely Not & Rat Hammer, split LP (Berserk) How perfect—the bub-

bling, hyper-fried poppy sass of Absolutely Not rubbing elbows with the snarling weirdness of Rat Hammer, a four-piece that’s got more than a little Apocalypse Hoboken in its genes.

Plus each band covers a track from the other, which is a totally appropriate unwritten rule for split releases, in my opinion. Absolutely Not: Sat 1/2, 12:10 AM, Chop Shop (right stage); Rat Hammer: Sun 1/3, 8:55 PM, Double Door (upstairs)

Salvation, Royal Fucks (Cold Slither) This seven-track scorcher is a pleasant surprise: textbook old-school noise rock, with the scorched, apathetic yowl of front man Jason Sipe loosely holding together the trio’s volatile mix of screaming guitars and thrumming rhythms. “Drag” has a pretty self-explanatory title, but when Sipe brings up all his bile to shriek “Drraaaaaagg” over and over, he almost sounds like he’s being splayed out on a rack and pulled apart. Fri 1/1, 8:25 PM, Subterranean (upstairs)

24 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

Meat Wave, Delusion Moon (Side One Dummy) Meat Wave is a no-brainer for any list of the year’s best Chicago punk. This topnotch trio, fronted by guitarist Chris Sutter, had a great year: they signed with Side One Dummy, toured all over the place, and dropped an album of snotty but hooky postpunk-tinged winners.

The standout “Cosmic Zoo,” which comes at you in waves, is one of my favorite punk singles of the year—and not just locally. Sun 1/3, 12:15 AM, Double Door (upstairs)

Speed Babes, Let’s Go Explode (self-released) I like this album partly because of how compact and bare-bones it is—and because the band recorded it in 18 hours using a GarageBand app that front man Jesse Ewan had on his phone. That’s the gimmick, at least, but whether you care or not, Let’s Go Explode is a great example of how to write hooky pop-punk with as little adornment as possible.

Plus the lo-fi sound and rudimentary programmed drums add to the bouncy fun. Fri 1/1, 8:50 PM, Double Door (downstairs)

IT’S BEEN A BRUTAL YEAR. A lot of darkness has crossed our thresholds, so that even when we make time to celebrate—to embrace life and joy—we can never entirely escape all the reasons to do the opposite. With winter poised to strike and our TV and computer screens continually stained with what look like signs of the apocalypse, it’s a fine time to consider five of 2015’s most wretchedly, painfully slow albums—they don’t even try to put the “fun” in “funeral doom,” and that feels awfully appropriate. —KIM KELLY

Bell Witch, Four Phantoms (Profound Lore) When this Seattle duo released Four Phantoms this year, it seemed like everyone and their mothers finally realized that funeral doom rules—and specifically that Bell Witch excel at it. They range a bit beyond funeral doom’s mossy borders, adding melodic complexity to songs such as “Judgement, in Fire: I—Garden (Of Blooming Ash).” The album’s melodies and slices of near silence can be beautiful, but the total result is overwhelmingly heavy—it’s the sound of slow death, with lyrics about drowning, suffocation, and ultimate collapse set to music that moves at the pace of a condemned man’s leadfooted walk to the gallows.

Sunn O))), Kannon (Southern Lord) Kannon is Sunn O)))’s most accessible release to date, which means that to the majority of the population, its droning buzz and sepulchral vocals of course remain completely incomprehensible. The album ebbs and flows like the tide, never moving faster than a drifting fog, but it packs more intensity into one downstroke than most bands manage in an entire discography.

Un, The Tomb of All Things (Black Bow) Un is all about negation (the name kind of gives it away), and on The Tomb of All Things, the Seattle outfit do away with any tempo above ten bpm. The album sticks close to funeraldoom tradition, with tenplus-minute songs whose death-rotted vocals and lurching riffs shudder and collapse and extinguish any light that tries to sneak through the bleakness.

Chrch, Unanswered Hymns (Battleground) These Sacramento newcomers (known as Church before a name dispute lost them their vowel) fall on the cosmic side of extreme torpidity. Their debut album, Unanswered Hymns, takes as many cues from Yob as it does from Saturnalia Temple or Electric Wizard—this turgid stoner-doom gem arrives replete with eerie, windswept vocals, lumbering slow-motion riffs, and songs that scrape the 20-minute mark.

Ennui, Falsvs Anno Domini (Solitude Productions) Georgian trio Ennui turn away from the straightforward stomp of deathdoom to embrace a European brand of funeral doom, marrying heavy keyboards and chilling atmosphere to their own guttural invocations. The dilated melody of “When Our Light Dies Forever” crawls through the frozen mist on the Tbilisi band’s third full-length, Falsvs Anno Domini; its six songs total an hour and 20 minutes of pure misery and hopelessness. v

Recommended and notable shows, and critics’ insights for the weeks of December 24 and December 31 b ALL AGES F

MUSIC Mac Sabbath ò COURTESY ADRENALINE PR

FESTIVAL

Now featuring nearly 70 local bands, Ian’s Party plots an assault on Wicker Park

SATURDAY26 Taylor Bennett Morocco Brown, Logan, and DJ Oreo open. 7 PM, Lincoln Hall, 2424 N. Lincoln, $15. b

Melkbelly ò DAN JARVIS / MIDWEST ACTION

IAN’S PARTY STARTED nine years ago as a New Year’s Eve punk show headlined by the Brokedowns in their suburban hometown of Elgin. It not only honored the coming year, but also paid homage to their good buddy Ian (for mostly no apparent reason). The night quickly grew into a full-fledged festival that leans on beer-soaked midwestern punk-rock acts, and after spanning a handful of clubs in Elgin for a while, it moved into the city a few years ago.

This year the fest is at its all-time biggest and most diverse, with nearly 70 bands rocking “the crotch” in Wicker Park and taking over three of its venues (Double Door, Subterranean, Chop Shop). The BROKEDOWNS, who’ve had the honor of closing out the last eight Partys, headline opening night (Fri 1/1) at Double Door, while pop-rockers TRUMAN & HIS TROPHY (a band that features two-thirds of Meat Wave) headline across the street at Sub-T, which has performances on both of its floors. On Sat 1/2 banjo man AL SCORCH headlines Sub-T, and spazz punks ABSOLUTELY NOT close things out over at Chop Shop. The festival ends on Sun 1/3 with local favorites MEAT WAVE taking over for the Brokedowns in the festival-closer spot with a headlining set at Double Door, while indie-pop band PANDA RIOT wrap up the show at Chop Shop. All sorts of locals who operate outside of the usual Ian’s Party poppunk sound are playing over the festival’s three days, including math-rock trio PAPER MICE, noise-poppers MELKBELLY, crushing posthardcore outfit SWEET COBRA, slashing dark-rock band BEAT DRUN JUEL (see page 29), postpunks CLOSED MOUTHS, and skate-punk weirdos RAT HAMMER, to name just a very few. Visit iansparty.com for a full schedule and set times (which are subject to change). —LUCA CIMARUSTI Fri 1/1-Sun 1/3, various times, Subterranean (2011 W. North), Double Door (1551 N. Damen), Chop Shop (2033 W. North), $15 per day, $12 in advance, $30 three-day pass, $25 in advance, iansparty.com, 18+ (Subterranean shows are 17+).

When Chance the Rapper performed “Sunday Candy” on Saturday Night Live he pointed to where his younger brother was sitting in the stands while delivering a line about his grandma: “Only ones she love as much as me is Jesus Christ and Taylor.”

Chance and Taylor Bennett have largely kept out of each others’ work, which grants Taylor autonomy to find his way and develop on his own. His new Broad Shoulders (Tay Bennett Entertainment/Upnorth Music) boasts an inviting and stylistically rich low-key aesthetic that molds R&B with eclectic downtempo dance—and polishes the result down to its skeleton.

Taylor can rap with an instrumental like he’s racing in the Indianapolis 500, but on Broad Shoulders he exerts more control and frequently slows his flow to a croon. At his best Taylor performs with an ease that matches his sensual, breezy instrumentals, and his performances evoke a worldliness beyond his years. On the title track he gently raps over an elegiac piano melody while gazing into the future to consider his changing relationships with his brother and his new niece (Chance became a father just a few months ago). Chance shows up on “Broad Shoulders,” appropriate given the subject matter, though Taylor could’ve handled it on his own—because the talent is all in the family. —LEOR GALIL

Mud Morganfield 8 PM, SPACE, 1245 Chicago Ave., Evanston, $15-$27. b It was inevitable: Mud Morganfield, the eldest son of Muddy Waters, has recorded an album of his father’s tunes. Together with blues harmonicist Kim Wilson—who can re-create Little Walter’s licks quite well—Morganfield released For Pops: A Trib-

ute to Muddy Waters (Severn), a 2014 record that won “Best Traditional Blues Album” at the Blues Music Awards in Memphis earlier this year. The family bloodline gives Morganfield a distinct advantage; his voice is so close to his father’s you’d swear it was an album of old-track remakes that Muddy had locked away in the vaults. However, Morganfield is more than just a walking Muddy Waters jukebox.

Prior to this record he released two discs composed mostly of originals that helped him establish his own identity. Plus, it should be mentioned that, unlike his dad, Morganfield is primarily a vocalist—in a genre where most male artists play an instrument, this is a rarity. However, since his throat is his meal ticket, the singing certainly isn’t an afterthought. The man has enough lung power to cut through any guitar lick. —JAMES PORTER

DJ Spun John Simmons and Samone open.

10 PM, Smart Bar, 3730 N. Clark, $17, $15 before midnight, $12 in advance

Before DJ Spun helmed disco and house tracks in NYC, he cut his teeth playing punk in San Jose.

Punk and disco are often diametrically opposed, but Spun sees logical connections between them, which he summarized in a 2008 interview with journalist Andy Beta (“By the mid-80s, being into disco was as anti-establishment as you could get”). A couple years later he teamed with producer Liv Spencer to edit James Chance & the Contortions’ “Incorrigible,” teasing an irresistible groove out of the shrieks and hard angles from the no-wave master. DJ Spun’s punk spirit continues to hover on his tracks.

The never-ending “Forever,” off last year’s Stilovespunedits (Stilove4music), moves at a Kraftwerkian pace while its grimy percussion hits hard. The song should feel familiar to anyone who’s spent a good deal of time rummaging through early, crudely recorded house tracks, and it just might convert punks who are less interested in slamming bodies than in boogying. —LEOR GALIL J

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 25

1800 W. DIVISION

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

MUSIC

(773) 486-9862

Come enjoy one of Chicago’s finest beer gardens!

SATURDAY, DEC. 26........ THE TOOLS SUNDAY, DEC. 27 ........... DJ WHOLESOME RADIO WEDNESDAY, DEC. 30 .... FREDDY FLOW & THE MIXED NUTS THURSDAY, DEC. 31........ DJ BEN FRIDAY, JAN. 1................ SMILING BOBBY SATURDAY, JAN. 2........... THE FRONTRUNNERS FRIDAY, JAN. 8................ AMERICAN DRAFT SUNDAY, JAN. 10............ HEISENBERG UNCERTAINTY PLAYERS WEDNESDAY, JAN. 13 ..... ELIZABETH HARPER’S LITTLE THING THURSDAY, JAN. 14 ........ THE FLABBY HOFFMAN SHOW THURSDAY, JAN. 21 ........ AT LEAST I CAME EVERY MONDAY AT 9PM CHRIS SHUTTLEWORTH QUINTET EVERY TUESDAY AT 8PM OPEN MIC HOSTED BY JIMI JON AMERICA

Taylor Bennett ! COURTESY LINCOLN HALL

continued from 25 Usurper Macabre headline; Usurper, Cold Bearded Killers, and Whut? open. 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 2105 S. State, $18, $15 in advance. 17+

Never miss a show again.

EARLY WARNINGS chicagoreader.com/early 26 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

Chicago’s Usurper never reached the level of iconic death-metal royalty like Tampa scenesters Deicide or Obituary, nor are they weirdo innovators like Demilich or Atheist. Still, from the mid-90s to the mid-2000s, the band were dependable, making solid, fierce, brutal albums with just enough variation to keep you coming back for further demonic butchery. This show celebrates the 20th anniversary of their debut 1995 full-length, Diabolosis, but my personal favorite is their 2005 swan song, Cryptobeast, which moves away from blackened death towards a cleaner thrash sound by introducing Motorhead-worthy swagger and gigantic, clotted hooks to songs like “Return of the Werewolf,” “Reptilian,” and the standout “Kill for Metal” (“Kill! Kill! Kill! / Kill!! Kill!

Kill! For metal!”). This reunion will feature the awesome late-period lineup, with Dan Tyrantor (rather than founding singer General Diabolical Slaughter) on vocals, Rick Scythe on guitars, Joe Warlord on drums, and newcomer Scott Maelstrom taking over from Jon Necromancer on bass. Expect the set to cover their whole career—and the band to put a demonic inferno in the heart of longtime fans and newcomers alike. Two decades on, Usurper is still, as they put it, “On a mission of vengeance / In the name of metal / Drinking, thrashing, slaying / For the glory of metal.” —NOAH BERLATSKY

SUNDAY27 Tim Daisy 9:30 PM, the Owl, 2521 N. Milwaukee. F Percussionist and composer Tim Daisy concludes a December residency at the Owl with two sets featuring disparate approaches to music. Throughout the month he’s shown his curiosity by employing solo practices, ad hoc settings, and working groups like his Vox Arcana trio with clarinetist James Fal- J

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please recycle this paper DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 27

MUSIC Jon Irabagon

FESTIVAL

! CHRISSY PIPER

Reaction NYE rings in 2016 with plenty of bass

Skrillex ! PAUL MORIGI/AP IMAGES

FESTIVAL SEASON NEVER ENDS in Chicago; it just slows to a trickle. The next wave lands soon—minifests clog club calendars in January—but the brand-new Reaction NYE has a leg up because it hits just before the New Year. The giant two-day festival is the latest bash from EDM-friendly promotion company React Presents, who’ve had plenty of success with multiday fests: Mamby on the Beach, North Coast, and Freaky Deaky, which made its outdoor debut in October, all bear their logo. The team say they’ll turn the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont—the same venue that hosts Wizard World Comic Con—into an “authentic warehouse-style party,” though few jams in abandoned industrial buildings have also had an arcade and a skate park, as this will. Or a lineup like Reaction NYE. Wednesday includes loads of great Chicagoans (SHOWYOUSUCK, GLASS LUX, PROBCASE, DJ INTEL) as well as EDM lightning rod DEADMAU5 and two of the finest acts to play Pitchfork this year, CHVRCHES and RUN THE JEWELS. The grand finale on New Year’s Eve includes more lovely locals (MY GOLD MASK, CELINE NEON) along with ethereal pop duo PURITY RING, a project between producer Claude VonStroke and Chicago house legend Green Velvet called GET REAL, recent Bieber collaborator SKRILLEX, and the unstoppable CHANCE THE RAPPER. The fest offers hotel deals and tickets for a shuttle that connects to downtown Chicago, but the Rosemont Blue Line stop isn’t a big trek if you’re hoping to save some cash. —LEOR GALIL Wed 12/30 and Thu 12/31, 5:30 PM, Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, 5555 N. River Rd., Rosemont, $89-$99 per day, $130-$154.50 two-day pass, reactionnye.com. 18+

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zone and cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm. On his recent solo album An Amusing Mess (released digitally by his own imprint, Relay Records), Daisy embraces an approach he calls “on the ground,” which translates to sitting among a huge, splayed-out array of percussive devices as well as a radio and a turntable. There he generates a spontaneous journey that relies as much on happenstance and spontaneous inspiration as it does on his improvisational skills and extended techniques, with Cage-like surprises from radio and alarm-clock buzzers redirecting his actions at random. Tonight he’ll present a set of improvisations on

the marimba (a relatively new solo practice), and he’ll also play improvised duets with saxophonist Mars Williams. Last year Daisy released In This Moment, a terrific duo recording with Polish reedist Mikolaj Trzaska that surprised me with diverse, wonderfully thoughtful dialogues as opposed to fire-breathing fury. I won’t be surprised if the usual Williams bombast is similarly softened. —PETER MARGASAK

Russ Johnson & Jon Irabagon 9 PM, Hungry Brain, 2319 W. Belmont, $10 suggested donation.

28 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

The holiday creates a notoriously fallow time for live music in these parts, but sometimes that results in a great low-pressure gig, like this one featuring the knockout quintet assembled by Milwaukee trumpeter Russ Johnson. Not only has Johnson immersed himself in the local Chicago scene, he’s maintained a diverse network of associates from his couple of decades spent in New York, as evidenced by his relationships with both saxophonist Jon Irabagon and pianist Matt Mitchell, two of the most in-demand and exciting figures in the current NYC scene. Irabagon continues to churn out great work, including two radically diverse albums on his own Irrabagast imprint. Behind the Sky is a tender quartet session—and a rich quintet when trumpeter Tom Harrell contributes—with music composed to reflect the grieving process after the death of a loved one. The fiercely experimental solo sopranino sax recording Inaction Is an Action delves deep into extreme sounds—like unexpectedly guttural, industrial growls or dentist-drill-like upper-register whistles—and presents them within subtle compositional structures. Irabagon’s from Morton Grove, so it’s not unusual to see him turn up this time of year, but it’s a real treat that Philadelphia native Mitchell will join tonight’s strong local rhythm section of bassist Matt Ulery and drummer Jon Deitemyer. Mitchell is a trusted member of bands led by Tim Berne, Darius Jones, Dave Douglas, and Rudresh Mahanthappa as well as a distinctive leader in his own right—check out this year’s rigorous Vista Accumulation (Pi). The group will play originals by both Johnson and Irabagon. —PETER MARGASAK

WEDNESDAY30 Living Colour 7 and 10 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, $45-$64. b As a middle-schooler in the mid-90s with a subscription to Modern Drummer, I had the name Will Calhoun embedded in my brain even before the likes

of John Bonham and Keith Moon. A full-fledged ripper, the Living Colour drummer was a regular in the magazine’s pages, just as his equally virtuosic bandmates were hailed in nerdy gearhead rags like Guitar World and Bass Player. Still best known for their 1988 Grammy-winning debut single, “Cult of Personality”—not to mention the neon-yellow Body Glove unitard singer Corey Glover wore in the video— this NYC metal band spent the first half of the 90s weaving together pop, hard rock, and funk, pulling it off with mind-bending chops that likely made techy guitar players drool. Living Colour broke up in ’95, reunited in 2000, and have even released a couple of records since, but their legacy is heard more loudly than their new tunes these days. Some huge bands that smash together heavy metal and funk— from the good (Faith No More), to the bad (311), to the ugly (Red Hot Chili Peppers)—owe a tip of the hat to Living Colour, and today young hardcore groups like Turnstile and Power Wrench pay tribute by funking up aggro punk. For over a year they’ve been working on another new record, Shade, and after some delays, it’s expected to see the light of day in 2016. —LUCA CIMARUSTI

THURSDAY31 Bobby Bare Jr. Possessed by Paul James headlines; Bobby Bare Jr., Shawn James, and Zander Schloss open. 7:30 PM, Reggie’s Music Joint, 2105 S. State, $25, $20 in advance.

Last year’s documentary about Nashville oddball Bobby Bare Jr. titled Don’t Follow Me (I’m Lost) reveals some pretty basic truths. Like so many other midlevel musicians who eke out livings through touring, he finds his career floundering because his records don’t sell, and his home life suffers because he can’t afford not to be on the road. The film isn’t terrible, but it’s about as illuminating as a five-watt bulb. As is the case with most music documentaries, though, the saving grace is the performance foot-

Where are the rest of the music listings?

Find them at chicagoreader.com/soundboard.

MUSIC gland. The album shoots for the heart too—front man Davey von Bohlen’s delivery has the everyman charm of a bar regular who passionately sings along with his favorite songs whenever they come on the jukebox. Nothing Feels Good is jammed with cuts that encourage people to sing along as well, and von Bohlen keeps sharpening his pop-songwriting skills in Maritime, where he plays with Promise Ring drummer Dan Didier. When Maritime opened for American Football at Lincoln Hall earlier this year, Mike Kinsella favorably compared the band to Taylor Swift. The last time the Promise Ring played Metro was in 2012, and I was so taken by their fierce, fun set I went to see two more of their reunion performances. —LEOR GALIL

FRIDAY1 Beat Drun Juel Part of Ian’s Party (see page 25). 10:30 PM (set time), Double Door, $15, $30 weekend pass. 18+ Gories ò COURTESY THIRD MAN RECORDS

age. Bare Jr.’s bemused persona and raucous roots rock provide lots of shaggy-dog appeal, and thanks to Bloodshot the music is conveniently isolated on a soundtrack release that spotlights the sparkling combo of his soulful rasp and his easy fluency when it comes to raunchy rock, honky-tonk, and blue-eyed soul. He’s a terrific, self-effacing performer, the kind to play down the overblown commotion that’s inevitable when spending New Year’s Eve in a rock club.

—PETER MARGASAK

Gories Oblivians and Choke Chains open.

9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $40, $35 in advance.

Barflies characterize the drinking that goes down on New Year’s Eve as amateur hour, so who better to soundtrack the night than a band that started out as rank amateurs? When Mick Collins, Danny Kroha, and Peggy O’Neil first formed the Gories in 1986, only Collins could play an instrument. But much like the Cramps reanimated rockabilly, they made a virtue of primitivism, using rawness to shock new life into a cacophonous union of early electric blues, punk, and first-generation garage rock. Rather than ruin a good thing by evolving, the Gories broke up in 1993. They re-formed 16 years later for a victory lap tour with the Oblivians, and they’ve kept at it ever since. The Gories haven’t written any new songs, but the YouTube evidence from recent concerts indicates that rave-ups like “Nitroglycerine” and rhythm workouts like “I Just Wanna Make Love to You” haven’t been mucked up with flash or good taste. —BILL MEYER

Mac Sabbath Black Angus and Phat Kiss open.

8 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 2105 S. State, $25, $20 in advance. 18+ You’d think that food-themed parody would be a pretty whittled-down genre of music, but then

someone, or something, takes it to the next level.

This California circus—brought to you by at least one of the guys responsible for the group Rosemary’s Billygoat—are even more committed to their mission than comparable acts like Pizza Underground. With a faithful, supersize Black Sabbath sound, they run your favorite tunes through the parody grinder and fry up the gross pink stuff that comes out. (They also prefer to keep their identities secret and play under names like Ronald Osbourne, Slayer McCheese, and, well, Grimace, who’s metal enough just as he is.) The stage show is spectacular, and the band claim it’s all in the service of commentary on capitalism, economics, labor exploitation, and unhealthy eating—refried classics like “Frying Pan” and “Pair-a-Buns” genuinely rock in a cheap and greasy dollar-menu sort of way. Catch ’em now before the cease-and-desist order comes down (though it probably won’t be from Black Sabbath, who linked to Mac Sabbath on their official Facebook page). —MONICA KENDRICK

Promise Ring Into It. Over It. open. 10 PM, Metro, 3730 N. Clark, $51, $46 in advance. 18+ There’s no strong reason why the Promise Ring are playing all of Nothing Feels Good in its entirety for tonight’s New Year’s Eve bash. Sure, Jade Tree reissued the album this past fall, but it also rereleased the Milwaukee emo titans’ 30 Degrees Everywhere (1996) and Very Emergency (1999). Nothing Feels Good came out in ’97, which doesn’t provide a nice round number for an anniversary bash, and the band toured the reunion circuit three years ago. The best reason may be the simplest: Nothing Feels Good is fantastic. An important document of emo’s progression that transcends its scene and time period, the album sounds like the best of emo (and punk) in 1997, but I like to think anyone unfamiliar with that world can throw on the record and get hooked by the energy bolts of hardcore and the sugar rushes of rock that aim for the adrenal

This local trio channel the angular, aggressive guitar sound of Dischord-branded postpunk and anchor it with the straight-ahead, bottom-heavy rhythms of 90s alternative-radio rock—and the undisputed star of the show is front woman Donna “Pasty Face” Polydoros. On their recent seven-inch “This Is How I Get Over You” b/w “That Boy Musta Stole Something of Mine” Polydoros shows a flare for the dramatic, her overwhelming presence felt as much as heard as her massive, intense vocal range elevates the songs to something divine. During live performances Beat Drun Juel transform into an even wilder, heavier monster, explosive and unhinged. In the fall the band added drummer Mat Haywood (also of Velocicopter) and are currently planning on recording new material in 2016. —LUCA CIMARUSTI

Gories Oblivians headline; Gories and Running open. 9 PM, Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western, $25.

SUNDAY3

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MINISTRY

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JANUARY 15TH

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MEST

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JANUARY 22ND

BORGEOUS & MORGAN PAGE

JANUARY 28TH

BABES IN TOYLAND

JANUARY 29TH

EPICA

Pokey LaFarge Jack Grelle opens. 8 PM, City Winery, 1200 W. Randolph, $26-$32. b A throwback singer from Saint Louis who looks like he might’ve pumped your gas while you were passing through Racine in 1954, Pokey LaFarge casually flits between rockabilly, ragtime, trad jazz, early R&B, and honky-tonk balladry like there’s little more than a footstep between each of them. There’s nothing remotely contemporary about his sound, which sounds more beautiful and archaic than ever on the recent Something in the Water (Rounder), produced by veteran Chicago roots fixture Jimmy Sutton, with contributions from locals Paul Asaro, Alex Hall, Scott Ligon, Beau Sample, and Casey McDonough.

You might recognize a certain postmodern sensibility on his records, but with the appealing insouciance of his voice—which reminds me a good bit of Nashville’s Paul Burch—LaFarge frequently makes me forget his whole get-up. He’ll be performing by his lonesome tonight, a good test of whether he has enough charisma to hold his own without his fellow travelers behind him. —PETER MARGASAK v

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DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 29

30 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

FOOD & DRINK

Separating the meat from the chaff The top restaurants of 2015 aren’t all steak houses.

By MIKE SULA

I

f last year was all about Italian food, this year was all about red meat, with some five major steak houses opening over the past 12 months. Steak houses are sort of like the new Union Stockyards, with a never-ending supply of conventioneers herding into these cow palaces, releasing cash from their expense accounts like bovine emissions. Historically, they’ve been predictable, and I’ve tended to greet the announcement of a new one with dread. But lately I’ve been pleasantly surprised. If five steak houses sounds discouraging, as if our famously progressive eating scene is leaping back toward the cliche the national food media always foists on us—that we’re an unsophisticated cow town—take comfort in the fact that three of these establishments are wholly original takes on the form, and are worth spending some dollars in. (I’ll let you know how Maple & Ash and STK have turned out in the New Year.)

Mercat a la Planxa jefe Jose Garces broke ground first, opening RURAL SOCIETY, his interpretation of an Argentine steak house, with vegetables every bit as outstanding as the steaks. “I could return to Rural Society and happily forgo the steak,” I wrote, though I’d be sure to return

From top left: market fish special at Via Lima, chicken oysters at GreenRiver, arroz negro at Cantina 1910, flatbread and fried olives at Sociale, stroopwaffel at De Quay, porterhouse at Swift & Sons ò ANDREA BAUER

to the potent morcilla, blood sausage with enough “raisins, pine nuts, and such measures of clove, nutmeg, cinnamon, and orange that it could be served as a Christmas dessert.”

I found myself writing something similar just over a month later about BOEUFHAUS, a self-styled European steak house in an erstwhile Polish deli in Ukrainian Village. When you have creamy stracciatella loaded with smoked onion and plump, seared choucroute duck breast looking as good as the 55-day dryaged rib eye, you’ve made yourself “the sort of restaurant every neighborhood deserves.”

Finally, the Boka Restaurant Group’s long-awaited SWIFT & SONS, on the opulent ground floor of the thawed Fulton Cold Storage Building, featured the irreverent classic steak-house stylings of chef Chris Pandel.

Delicate and ethereally delicious celery root agnolotti and nearly gelatinous French onion soup were the precursors to the iron-rich meat butter of the rib cap and the beefy purity of the rib eye. “Who knows if Gustavus Swift would’ve felt at home in this gleaming, expansive meat locker,” I wrote, “but the Boka group and B. Hospitality have reimagined the steak house as something at once fundamental and original.”

Spain made a strong showing in Wicker Park and the South Loop. The folks behind Pops for Champagne opened BOM BOLLA, which came closer to evoking the spirit of a Barcelona tapas bar than anything in town, with the most varied selection of Spanish booze in the city to wash down “whole red prawns, salted and blazed scarlet; oysters on the half shell roasted in lardo and squirted with bitter charred orange; and thumb-size chorizos fired until they nearly erupt at the touch.” But Bom Bolla’s partner and operations manager W. Craig Cooper announced last week that the restaurant would shutter and that its long-term fate is uncertain.

“We do hope to address our financial health by the end of the month,” he wrote in a statement published by Eater. “I cannot say at this time if we will be able to reopen in 2016.” The sleeper in the south was SOCIALE, an unassuming but more expansive Spanish spot with flatbreads and large entrees that included the best pork chop I’ve had in years, and a soft phyllo-encased semolina custard “that won’t allow you to forget a very good restaurant that, at least outwardly, seems to want to be forgotten.”

A pair of izakaya represented Japan this year, beginning with mother and son Helen and Brian Mita opening IZAKAYA MITA in Bucktown, perhaps the most traditional, least reinvented expression of the Japanese J

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 31

FOOD & DRINK

Honorable mentions: BASCULE WINE BAR INTRO IXCATECO GRILL MITHAI RESTORA SEVEN LIONS WHITE OAK TAVERN & INN

continued from 31

pub we’ve seen yet, offering from the binchotan “rare bits, dressed with salt and sake or teriyaki—crackly ribbons of skin, fatty tail nubbins, and iron-rich gizzards and livers—in addition to more commonplace bird bits from the thigh and the breast, and a crusty, juicy chicken meatball,” as well as a great selection of sake and Japanese whiskeys that make it the Japanese pub the city’s been waiting for: “simple, honest, and welcoming, with a great variety of interesting things to drink.” Meanwhile, Kee Chan resurrected his LURE IZAKAYA in the ill-fated Macku Signature space in Lincoln Park, excelling particularly well at fried things like “chicken karaage, tender, crunchy

nuggets bedded on a bowl of rice” and slippery mountain yam offset by crunchy tempura batter nibs. Despite the sterile atmosphere, “it’s offering some of the most honest Japanese soul food in town—and certainly the best from the Chan brothers in a long time.”

If some Yelpers are to be believed CANTINA 1910 is the worst thing to happen to Andersonville since the ill-fated Premise. For me it was the best thing to happen to Mexican food in years. But after killing it with a progressive “midwest Mexican” menu that incorporates local ingredients in some very forward-thinking preparations, chef Diana Dávila left the three-month-old restaurant December 16 citing “irreconcilable differences” with management; her chef de cuisine and executive sous chef followed. Too bad—as I wrote, Cantina 1910 was “easily one of the best new restaurants of the year.”

I felt every bit as much love for THE BLANCHARD, where chef Jason Paskewitz has breathed new life into French standards in a casual, almost bucolic Lincoln Park setting.

The menu features lush, luxurious echoes of opulence: things like the oeuf Outhier, crowned with caviar, and the blanquette de veau, “a precisely cut, gently braised veal breast lightly draped in truffle-scented veloute, served with the customary vegetables—pearl onions, carrots, and trumpet mushrooms, roasted to intensify their flavors—plus summer squash, crispy sweetbreads, and in bold defiance of the commandment that the dish be entirely white, a garnish of pink and purple nasturtiums.”

They “were easily some of the best things I’ve eaten all year, making the Blanchard, “full of surprises yet still fundamentally French” and “pregnant with possibilities.”

Saag paneer at Pub Royale ò MARIANA JORDÁN

32 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

Boar shoulder at Bascule Wine Bar ò ANDREA BAUER

New York City restaurant emperor Danny Meyer made his first midwestern incursion (after Shake Shack) at GREENRIVER—a collaboration with the fellows behind NYC’s celebrated cocktail bar the Dead Rabbit—high atop the 18th floor of Northwestern Medicine’s Lavin Family Pavilion on the Gold Coast. Despite the odd setting it’s solid, with grounded crowd-pleasers like fried chicken oysters and spaghetti in uni-saffron sauce, along with an endless list of complicated culinary cocktails named after Chicago historical figures. “It’s a warm, comfortable environment where perhaps Meyer means to welcome more than just the hospital staff,” I wrote. “GreenRiver might not be easy to get to for much of the city, but I could see it being an easy hang for a certain species of Gold Coaster—kind of a Monk’s Cafe for Montgomery Burns. There’s no safer bar for a centenarian.”

When VIA LIMA quietly opened in North Center it vastly improved the city’s already commendable Peruvian offerings, featuring the bright, brilliant syncretic alloy of Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, African, and indigenous influences. From the acidic ceviches to the starchy, colorful causitas to the beef heart anticuchos, it’s delivering to a “neighborhood overcrowded with middling sports bars and more in need of a dose of rocotopepper-spiked novelty than most.”

Jason Vaughan, a veteran of Brendan Sodikoff ’s Hogsalt Hospitality, has never been to India, but you’d never guess it from eating at Heisler Hospitality’s PUB ROYALE, where he reinvents Anglo-Indian food (with some Chinese touches). From the creamed spinach-like saag paneer to the kung pao-like gobi Manchurian to the salt cod brandade samosas, this is “winning, fresh, and unre-

strained Anglo-Indian food in a place that’s mostly about the beer,” and the “imagination and audacity it takes” to pull it off “is just the first of many surprises.”

Similarly, at the Indo-Dutch DE QUAY postcolonial cultural appropriation produces some delicious things, like the mayo and satay “war fries,” tamarind-soy glazed duck breast, and pandan ice cream paired with spekkoek, or “bacon cake,” an almond spice cake with thin layers that resemble pork belly.

Kevin Hickey went home to Bridgeport and opened THE DUCK INN, making it “easily the most likable, comfortable, douche-free restaurant ever from Rockit Ranch,” featuring everything from his signature supersize Chicago dog stuffed with beef and duck meat to chili-cheese fries, chorizo-stuffed chicken thighs, and the “neatly square hamburger sandwich” on buttery grilled rye, blanketed with the gooey Brun-uusto cheese that was made for melting.” “It’s the return of a chef who is of the place and knows just how a new restaurant should fit in.”

Finally, in the penultimate month of the year a team of Hogsalt veterans under the command of Austin Baker quietly opened BAR MARTA in Humboldt Park. One of the most versatile of all Chicago chefs, Jeff Pikus is heading the kitchen, which is putting out craveable drinking food like angelic, ethereal double-fried french fries, almost meaty smoked eggplant seasoned with paprika and sumac cooled down with Greek yogurt, sherry-spiked chicken liver with crispy chicken skin shards, and roast chicken with sourdough fried in the bird’s own fat. It was a good way to end a good year. v

v @MikeSula

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CLEAN ROOM WITH fridge and microwave. Close to Oak Park, Walmart, Buses & Metra. $105/wk & up. 773-637-5957 EDGEWATER - NICE Room with

stove, fridge & bath, by Shopping & Transp. Elevator, Lndry. $116/wk. & Up. Call 773-275-4442

BIG ROOM WITH stove, fridge,

bath & new floor. N. Side, by transp/ shop. Clean w/elevator. $116/wk + up. 773-561-4970

1 BR UNDER $700 7022 S. SHORE DRIVE Impecca-

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

Laundry & Security on Premises.

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

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)

HYDE PARK

1 BR, 1st floor. $925 Newly decorated, hdwd floors, stove, fridge, FREE HEAT, laundry facilities.

Free Credit Check.

773-667-6477 or 312-802-7301

Account Executive The Chicago Reader is seeking an entry-level advertising salesperson to be based out of the downtown Chicago office. This sales executive will work as a member of a creative and collaborative team focused on digital, mobile, social, online and print advertising solutions.

The right candidate will work to form partnerships with local advertisers to assess and address their advertising challenges. We are seeking self-starters with a strong motivation to learn advertising strategy and who are comfortable in the digital world.

Responsibilities: - Cold-calling business owners and decision makers to set appointments - Use a consultative sales approach to identify business needs and goals - Create strategic custom solutions to meet customer needs and align our product set with their overall goals - Manage existing business and create new business to maintain a healthy sales pipeline Requirements: - Previous experience preferred - Must be familiar with the Reader brand - Must have some college education; bachelor’s degree preferred Professional, courteous and motivated individuals are strongly encouraged to apply.

Interested parties, please send resume, cover letter and salary considerations to garroyo@suntimes.com.

Please put "Account Executive" in the subject line.

The Chicago Reader is an Equal Opportunity Employer

BECOME A

FULL-TIME EDITORIAL PROJECT Manager sought, expert knowl-

HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONAL

edge in CMoS style (proficiency in other styles also beneficial) for broad range of manuscripts. Minimum 1–2 years publishing experience required and 1–2 years project management experience preferred, as is excellent score on applicant test. Compensation hourly. Interested? editingjobs@ amnet-systems.com

Sr. Accountant (Chicago IL) Masters- accountancy or rel fld + 1 yr exp. Accountant or fin. anal.

Apply to RCS & Associates CPAS, Ltd., 65 E Wacker Pl. Ste 1502, Chicago, IL 60601 Attn HR

312-236-9000 AAS Accredited Degree Programs:

REAL ESTATE RENTALS

STUDIO $900 AND OVER RAVENSWOOD. N. WINCHESTER. Studio available now.

$935. Beautiful courtyard building.

Hardwood floors. Heat included.

Close to Lawrence Ave. and great transportation. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

STUDIO OTHER CHICAGO, HYDE PARK Arms

Hotel, 5316 S. Harper, maid, phone, cable ready, fridge, private facilities, laundry avail. $160/wk Call 773-4933500

• MRI Technologist • Health Information Technology (includes 3 certifications: Medical Billing, Coding, and Medical Office Administration) • Non-Invasive Cardiovascular Sonography (diploma & degree options) • Diagnostic Medical Sonography (diploma & degree options)

Now offers Associate of Applied Science Degrees

For OPEN HOUSE info, visit WWW.MCCOLLEGE.EDU

This Dope’s

sTill legal in Dorm rooms

Get some at sTraighTDope.com

Diploma & Certificate Programs:

• Medical Assisting (also includes Phlebotomy & EKG) • Cardiology/Monitor Tech/EKG • Dialysis Technologist • Phlebotomy Technologist • Surgical Technologist (also includes Sterile Processing certification) • CNA • Pharmacy Tech • ESL

Office hours, programs, and class schedules vary by location.

Please call us or visit our website for details.

We accept international students.

MIDWESTERN CAREER COLLEGE

Chicago 20 N. Wacker Dr. (@downtown) (312) 236-9000

Naperville Blue Island 200 E. 5th Ave. 12840 S. Western Ave. (@Metra Station) (@Metra Station) (630) 536-8679 (708) 926-9470

Midwestern Career College is approved by the Division of Private Business and Vocational Schools of the Illinois Board of Higher Education. Gainful Employment information for each program is available on our website at www.mccollege.edu under program descriptions.

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 | CHICAGO READER 33

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 CHICAGO, BEVERLY / Cal Park

/ Blue Island Studio $525 & up, 1BR $625 & up, 2BR $875 & up. Heat, Appls, Balcony, Carpet, Laundry, Prkg. 708-388-0170

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

EVANSTON. CENTRAL AVE.

Large 1 bedroom available 2/1. $1030.

Stately building on quiet street, near Sheridan Road and Main Street, shops, restaurants, transportation.

Heat included, hardwood floors. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am to 3pm and Sundays 10am to 2pm.

DEPAUL

EXCHANGE EAST APTS 1 Brdm

$575 w/Free Parking,Appl, AC,Free heat. Near trans. laundry rm. Elec.not incl. Kalabich Mgmt (708) 424-4216

6930 S. SOUTH SHORE DRIVE Studios & 1BR, INCL. Heat, Elec, Cking gas & PARKING, $560-$850, Country Club Apts 773-752-2200

CHICAGO - HYDE Park 5401 S. Ellis.

1BR. $535-$600/mo Call 773-955-5106

BLUE ISLAND - Mod 1BR Apt, newly decorated, carpet, heat, stove, fridge, lndry room, private parking, $740/ mo + sec. Vic. of 119th & Western, 773-238-7203

Chicago, 80th & Dobson, 4 rooms, 1BR, 1 dining room, newly decorated, $565/mo + $565 sec.

Contact Miss Taylor 773-483-7355

11007 S. Vernon, Attractive, Spacious, 1BR Apt, carpeted, heat incl., Section 8 Welc. $500 Move In + $700 rent.

312-636-9340

BURNHAM 2 BR Apt

Stove & fridge included. C/A. Newly decorated. $775/month + 1 month security. Call 708-288-3255

706 WEST 76TH STREET, 1 & 2BR Apts Available, heat included. Starting at $650/mo.

Call 773-495-0286

CALUMET CITY, HUGE 1BR, 1Ba, Newly rehabbed, appliances incl., $700/mo. + 1 month security.

Section 8 ok. Call 510-735-7171

1 BR $700-$799 1BR Apartment Near North & Cicero, no sec deposit, no credit check $770/month includes heat 877.350.5055

JAN. 1! Extra large Ravenswood 2 1/2 rm studio! Only 1 blk to Metra, LA Fitness, Marianos Grocery! LANDLORD PAYS HEAT AND COOKING GAS! HDWD FLRS, LOADS OF CLOSET SPACE! $975.00.

4830 N. Wolcott (773) 381-0150. www.theschirmfirm.com

1 BR $1100 AND OVER EVANSTON.

1 BR $800-$899 LAKESIDE TOWER, 910 W

Lawrence. 1 bedrooms starting at $825-$895 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

SOUTH SIDE LOVELY 4rm apt,

living, dining, kitchen, 1BR, 1BA, heat, carpet. $650 + 1 mo sec. Avail Now. 773-264-6711

AVAIL

AREA.

BELDEN/

SHEFFIELD. Great one bedroom available 1/1/16-9/30/16 for $1385 per month. Beautiful courtyard building, hardwood floors, heat included. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

1 BR $900-$1099

FOREST

LINCOLN PARK/ DEPAUL. W.

GEORGE & SEMINARY. Great 1 bedroom available 2/1/16-4/30/16. $1170 per month. New 12 month lease also available. Hardwood floors, heat included. Great location for DePaul and transportation. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

EDGEWATER. 1055 W Catalpa 1

bedrooms starting at $925 heat and cooking gas included! Application fee $40. No security deposit. Parking available for an additional fee. Laundry room in the building, wood floors, close to grocery stores, restaurant, CTA Red Line train, etc. For a showing please contact Millie 773561-7070 Hunter Properties,Inc. 773477-7070 www.hunterprop.com

Hyde Park West Apts., 5325 S. Cottage Grove Ave., Renovated spacious apartments in landscaped gated community. Off street parking available. Studio $674 Free heat, 1BR $833-$869 - Free heat; 2BR $995 Free heat. Visit or call 773-324-0280, M-F: 9am-5pm or apply online- ww w.hydepark west.com. Managed

by Metroplex, Inc

pied 3 flat. Eat in kitchen corian counters stacking washer dryer new carpet central air and heat. 1600.00 plus one month security no pets 773 230 5736

AVE.

Large 1-bedroom available now6/30/15. $1250. Stately building on quiet street, near Sheridan Road and Main Street, shops, restaurants, transportation. Heat included, hardwood floors. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9amto 3pm and Sundays 10am to 2pm.

GREAT EVANSTON CAMPUS

1 BEDROOM! Ridge/ Davis. Large 3½ room/ 1 bedroom. Available now7/31/16 for $1220. Beautiful courtyard building with hardwood floors, high ceilings. Heat included. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

GORGEOUS ENGLISH TUDOR

courtyard building! Beautiful hdwd flrs, built-in bookshelves, onsite lndry /storage. Only 2 blks to Irving Park "EL"! $1150.00 ht incl. (773)381-0150. www.theschirmfirm.com

1 BD LOFT condo in Printers Row Walk Score:99. Close to transit No pets or smoking. 405.831.1518.

Move in starting Jan 1 $2000

1 BR OTHER APTS. FOR RENT PARK MANAGEMENT & Investment Ltd. Summer is Here but.. Winter is on its Way! Most Include HEAT & HOT WTR Studios From $510.00 1Bdr From $550.00. 2Bdr From $ 775.00. 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath. From $1200. **1-(773)-476-6000** CALL FOR DETAILS

GORGEOUS

NEW

REHAB

Appls & Heat Incl. 73rd /Jeffery, 1BR $600. 79th/ Escanaba, 1BR $600, 2BR. $750. 3BR $875. 72nd/Eberhart, Studio $500. 76th/Aberdeen, 2BR $750. 79th/Ellis, 1BR $575.

82nd/Cottage Grove. Studio. $500.

Section 8 ok. Call 773.430.0050

6553 S. HARVARD, u p c o m in g area, 1BR starting at $680.

Large 1BR w/ DR, $800.

Hdwd flrs. Heat, stove & fridge incl. 773-310-1104

North Wrigleyville 4128 N. Clarendon Furnished rooms for rent from $135 a week or $540/month

2 blocks from the lake • 4 blocks from “El” Express bus stop at front door • Private bath Ceiling fans / mini-blinds New carpeting / refrigerator • Laundry in building Microwaves • On-site manager

By Appointment Only 773-929-7778 No Pets Allowed

COLLEGE GIRL BODY RUBS $40 w/AD 24/7

224-223-7787

34 CHICAGO READER | DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

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

CHICAGO - BEVERLY, LARGE 2 room Studio & 1BR, Carpet, A/C, laundry, near transportation, $640-$750/mo.

Call 773-233-4939

77TH/LOWE 1 & 2BR. May 2BR, 69th/Dante, 1st/ Bennett 2 & 3BR. Essex 3BR. New renov. ok. 708-503-1366

101st/ 3BR. 7 77th/ Sec 8

SUBURBS, RENT TO O W N !

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

Call 708-868-2422 or visit w ww.nhba.com

CHICAGO, RENT TO OWN! Buy with no closing costs and get help with your credit. Call 708-868-2422 or visit www. nhba.com

CALUMET CITY 5BR, 4BA, recently ren.,formal LR/DR, 2 car garage, hardwood floors, all appl. included.

Call Mike 708-372-6774

LINCOLN PARK. ADDISON.

Prime location 1 bedrooms available now. From $1245. Beautiful courtyard building steps from the lake and transportation. Hardwood floors, heat included. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

APTS. FOR RENT PARK MANAGEMENT & Investment Ltd. Finally summer is here Come Enjoy The Pool! HEAT, HW & CG INCLUDED. 1Bdr From $725.00.

2Bdr From $895.00. 3 Bdr/2 Full Bath. From $1200. **1-(773)-4766000** CALL FOR DETAILS

Large Sunny Room w/fridge & microwave. Nr. Oak Park, Green Line, bus. 24 hour desk, parking lot. $101/week & Up. 773-3788888 WINTER SPECIAL $500 To-

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

4 BR, 1.5 BA, Modern kitchen & bath, $1050-1350/ month plus security deposit, Section 8 ok.

847-909-1538 NO MOVE-IN FEE! No Dep! Sec 8

ok. 1, 2 & 3 Bdrms. Elev bldg, laundry, pkg. 6531 S. Lowe. Ms. Payne.

773-874-0100

CHICAGO SOUTH SIDE BeautiBEAUTIFULLY RENOVATED ONE bedroom in quiet owner occu-

8001 S. Drexel – 1BR $675 Stove and fridge, heat. incl. Section 8 welcome. Call 312.208.1771 or 708.890.1694

BRONZEVILLE 4312 S. King Dr. 1BR Apt, heat incl $545/mo + 1 mo sec. For applications. Call 773-548-7286

LINCOLN PARK LANDMARK.

BELMONT/ HUDSON. 2 buildings from the lakefront. Large 4 room/ 1 bedroom with full dining room, oak floors. Available now for $1330. Heat included. For appointment, call 312822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

ful Studios, 1,2,3 & 4 BR’s, Sec 8 ok. $500 gift certificate for Sec 8 tenants. 773-287-9999/312-446-3333

7637 S. PHILLIPS. Large 3BR, 2 Full Bath, hdwd flrs, renovated kitchen with appls, A/C. $1100/mo. Sec 8 Welc. 773-343-1808 before 6pm

MOVE IN SPECIAL!!!

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

Ashland Hotel nice clean rms.

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

Low rates daily/weekly/monthly.

South Side. Call 773-376-5200 ROYALTON HOTEL, Kitchenette $135 & up wk. 1810 W. Jackson 312-226-4678

2 BR UNDER $900 TWO BEDROOM APARTMENT. Third floor. Fullerton be-

tween Central & Austin. Available immediately. $850 includes heat and parking space. 773-889-8491.

SECTION 8 WELCOME 80th/ Ashland - Beautiful, newly remod, 2BR Apt w/office, 1BA. Near schools & transp. $800/mo, tenant pays all utils. $500 move in fee.

Avail Now. 773-775-4458 CHICAGO, 69TH PLACE & STONY ISLAND. 2BR, 1BA, 5 ROOMS. NEWLY REMODELED, HDWD FLOORS, SECTION 8 WELCOME. 773-7580309 CHICAGO, 5340 S. Seeley, 2BR House with dining room, full basement, 1.5BA, fenced yard, $850/mo + 1 mo sec.

773-896-7838 2051-53 W. GARFIELD. 4 rooms with 2 BR. Heat & cooking gas included. $800/mo + 1 month security. Proof of income. Call 773-436-6922 ENGLEWOOD NEAR 67th & Damen, $600/mo plus 1 mo sec, 2BR, 1BA clean & quiet block, owner pays all util. Cple preferred 773-471-0485 62ND/CALIFORNIA 2BR $740 or 3BR $920 Heat incl in all & Sec Dep req. O’Brien Family Realty 773-581-7883 Agent owned WINTER SPECIAL! 2BR, remod w/ cherry wood cabinets feat Kohler kit & BA. Ten pays utils. $575/mo + sec. 86 th/Escanaba. 773-415-4970 7701 S. South Shore Dr. 2 BDs with 1.5 Baths, Large Combo Living-Dining Rm, FREE Heat & cking gas. Prkng extra. $785-$800, Kalabich Mgmt (708)424-4216

2 BR, 1 BATH REMODELED, AC

SECTION 8 - OK $725. 630-827-3968

2 King Size BRs, 5 rms, 6122 S. St. Lawrence, new kit, BA,fans, crpt, appls, balc, lndry, $745 + utils.

Sec 8 & Seniors Welc. 312-5042008

Chicago, Near 61st & Ingleside. 2BR Apt, 1st floor, 2BA, utilities furnished, $800/mo + $200 Sec Dep. Call 773488-6013.

NO SEC DEP 1431 W. 78th. St. 1B R/2BR. $495-$595/mo6829 S. Perry. Studio $460. 1BR. $515.

HEAT INCL 773-955-5106

CHATHAM 556 E. 89th St. 2BR Garden Apt, Cent heat, tenant pays utils. $700/mo + 1 month rent and 1 month sec 773-617-3499

6715 S. CHAPPEL. 2BR, laundry on site, heat & appls incl, 1 blk from Jackson Park, parking incl. $800/ mo + sec. 773-885-8749

68TH & HERMITAGE 2BR $700 3BR $800. 62nd & May 2BR $800 3BR $900 HEAT INCLUDED. 847-977-3552

CHICAGO 7600 S Essex 2BR $599, 3BR $699, 4BR $799 w/apprvd credit, no sec dep. Sect 8 Ok! 773287-9999 /312-446-3333

BELLWOOD 2BR APT, 2nd flr,

no pets, W/D in bsmt, tenant pays elec & gas. Avail Now. $875 Michael Britton 773-297-7755

2 BR $900-$1099 10142 S. VERNON, 2BR, 1st floor, eat in kitchen, LR/DR, appls incl, wall to wall carpet.

Enclosed back porch. Sect 8 welc. $950/mo, heat incl.

Contact Willie, 773-580-6292

2BR/1BA RENOVATED; hdwd floors; large closets, laundry available; free heat & water. $1000/mo + $1000 dep. 8350 S Drexel; 773952-8137.

Chicago - 6747 S. Paxton, newly renovated, 2BR, 2BA, HWFs thru out, $975/mo, SS appls, heat & prkg space incl., 773285-3206

Chicago, 92nd/Ada, Spacious 1BR w/ DR, fplc, sunrm, heat & appl incl, hrdwd floors, $850/mo + sec. Section 8 Welcome.

773-415-6914

EVANSTON 2BR, 1100SF, great kit, new appls, DR, oak flrs, lndry, $1195/mo incls heat. 773743-4141 www.urbanequities.com

LINCOLN PARK. ADDISON.

Prime location large 2 bedroom available now for $1660. Beautiful courtyard building steps from the lake and transportation. Hardwood floors, heat included. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

2 BR $1300-$1499 LINCOLN

PARK.

ADDISON.

Great 2 bedroom available now–4/ 30/16! $1465 per month. Heat included. Courtyard building steps from the lake and transportation. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

AUSTIN - 5237 W. HIRSCH, unit 1. Lovely 1st fl, 2BR, 1 BA, hrdwd

2 BR OTHER CHICAGO, PRINCETON PARK

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

HARVEY - 14815 WINCHESTER . 3BR, 1.5BA, basement, $1100/

3 BR OR MORE UNDER $1200

mo + 1 mo sec. Section 8 ok.

Call 708-263-9636

Cornerstone Apts., 4907 S. St Lawrence, Newly Remodeled. 3 BR starting $998-$1090/mo. Visit or call (773) 548-9211. M-F: 9am-5pm or apply on line. www.

4907cornerstoneapts.com Managed by Metroplex, Inc.

CHICAGO EBERHART (close to U 3BR, 1BA, 3rd flr, Section 8 OK. 773-802-0422

of

61ST

&

C campus)

Includes heat. $1,100/month.

CALUMET CITY, 3BR, 1.5BA, 2 car gar, fully rehab w/gorgeous finishes w/ hdwd flrs. Sec 8 OK. $1125/mo Call 510-735-7171

3 BR OR MORE $1200-$1499 6343 S. ROCKWELL - 3BR, incl heat. hdwd flrs, lndry facility, fenced in bldg, fireplace, garage & appl.$ 1000/mo. Sec 8 ok. 773-791-

2 BR $1100-$1299 Evanston 1BR - Sun filled, 900sf, eat-in kitc, new appl, new windows, $950/heated. onsite lnd ry/stor. 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com

APARTMENT FOR RENT 5 1/2 large room apartment in 2 floor building, newly decorated, $1300. Heat included. Deposit needed. No pets. 5845 N Maplewood, Chicago. Call 773293-3399

CHATHAM BEAUTIFUL REMOD 2 & 3BR, hdwd flrs, custom

cabinets, avail now. $1100-$1200/mo + sec. 773-905-8487 Sec 8 Ok

CHICAGO, BEVERLY, 1316 W. 100TH PL. TOTAL REHABBED, HEAT & A/C incl. 6 rms, 3BR, Sec 8 Welcome, $1200/mo. 773-339-0182

FREE FLAT SCREEN!!! 109th/ Princeton and 66th/Loomis, 25BR, Remodeled w/ hdwd flrs. $700-$1500. Sect 8 OK. 773494-2247

1436 S TRUMBULL, New Remod 2BR, hardwood flrs, laundry . Heat not included .

Security system in bldg $1100 plus security 708-308-1788

Elmhurst: Beaut 1BR new appl, carpet, AC, sunny LR, overlooks pool $850 incls ht/ prkg. 773-743-4141 www. urbanequities.com

MATTESON 2 & 3 BR AVAIL. 2BR, $990-$1050; 3BR, $1250-$1400.

Move In Special is 1 Month’s Rent & $99 Security Deposit. Section 8 Welcome. Call 708-748-4169

2 BR $1500 AND OVER

LINCOLN PARK LANDMARK.

BELMONT/ HUDSON. 2 buildings from the lakefront. Large 5 room/ 2 bedrooms with full dining room, oak floors. Available now from $1700.

Newly renovated apartment for $1800. Heat included. For appointment, call 312-822-1037 weekdays until 5:30pm, Saturdays 9am-3pm and Sundays 10am-2pm.

RENT TO OWN 2, 3, 4 & 5BR Homes 2 & 3 BR apts also avail, Sec 8 OK. 708-737-2036 or 312-662-3963

74th & Artesian, Section 8 Welcome. Newly remodeled, huge 2, 1BA, hdwd flrs, separate utils. Sec dep req’d. 773-908-1080

8001 S. Dobson – 3BR $950. H/W flrs. Stove, fridge, & heat incl’d. Sec. 8 Welccome. 312.208.1771 or 708.890 .1694

SOUTHSIDE 8035 S. Marshfield, 3BR, 2nd floor, no Pets, $875/mo. + 1 mo. sec. dep. & all utilities. 773-8734549

SECTION 8 WELCOME. No Security Deposit. 7721 S Peoria, 3BR apt, appls incl. $1050/mo.

708-288-4510

COUNTRY CLUB HILLS vic of 183RD/Cicero.

4BR, 1.5BA $1400 & 3BR/2BA. $1450.

Ranch Style, 2 car gar. 708369-5187

5034 S. Michigan: Newly renovated 3BR, 2BA $1375. Hardwood flrs Stainless appls w/DW, Central heat/air, in unit w/d. 312.208.

1771 or 708-890-1694

CHICAGO: E. ROGERS Park 6726 N. Bosworth Ave. Beaut. 3BR, 2BA, DR, LR, Hrdwd flrs. Nr trans/ shops. Heat, appls, laundry incl. $1400. Available now. 847-475-3472

AND REPLY TO ADS Free Code: Chicago Reader

60 MINUTES FREE TRIAL

THE HOTTEST GAY CHATLINE

1-312-924-2082 More Local Numbers: 800-777-8000

www.guyspyvoice.com

W. 110TH ST. 4 B R HOUSE, WALL TO WALL CARPENTING. SECT 8 OK. $1275/ MO 773-285-3206

Ahora en Español/18+

Meet sexy friends who really get your vibe...

Try FREE: 312-924-2066 More Local Numbers: 1-800-811-1633

vibeline.com 18+

www.megamates.com 18+

CHICAGO, BUSY 110TH & Michigan Location. Retail 5251500 Sq Ft & office suites, from $275. Move In Ready. Call Kamm, 773-520-0369

HEALTH & WELLNESS FOR A HEALTHY mind and body.

European trained and certified therapists specializing in deep tissue, Swedish, and relaxation massage. Incalls. 773-552-7525. Lic. #227008861.

UKRAINIAN MASSAGE. CALLS in/ out. Chicago and sub-

urbs. Hotels. 1234 S Michigan Avenue. Appointments. 773-609-6969.

ROSCOE VILLAGE DELUXE 3br. 1-bath. Spacious. New lrg. kit.

Hrdwd. flrs. A/C, lndry. Nice yard w patio. Safe neighborhood!! Close to shop-ping, entertainment. & trans. $2 ,200/Mo. Call Bill 847-456-0094

roommates 40TH/ KING DR. Seeking Female

Roommate, private house, furn/ unfurn rm. Shared bath/utils. Avail NOW. $550/mo. 630-842-1739.

OTHER

SECTION 8 WELCOME, 219 S. T r o y , L uxury apt. 3BR, 2BA. Building built 7 years ago. W/ D in apt.

Sec 8 Approved 312-735-3212

NEWLY REHAB’ED 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6BR detached single family homes with 2BA, Sec 8 welcome, located in Southside Chicago & south suburbs. 224-436-5000

MUSIC & ARTS HEDDA GABLER BY Henrik

3 BR OR MORE

MARKETPLACE GOODS

CLASSICS WANTED Any classic cars in any condition. ’20s, ’30s, ’40s, ’50s, ’60s & ’70s. Hotrods & Exotics!

Top Dollar Paid!

Collector.

Call James, 630-201-8122

CHICAGO HEIGHTS 3, 4 OR 5 BR, 2 BATH, NEWLY REMODELED, SECTION 8 OK. 96 W. 15TH NO SEC .

DEPOSIT. 708-822-4450

Ibsen, Trans-lated by Nick Rudall, Directed by Mary Ringstad. Open Call Currently seeking 3 women ages 20 65 and 3 men ages 20 55 for supporting roles. The role of Hedda has already been cast. Please prepare a short contemporary monologue or be pre-pared to do a cold reading from the script. No appointment necessary. January 21, 6 9 p.m. & January 22, 6 8 p.m. Oakton Community Col-lege, 1600 East Golf Road, Des Plaines. For more info, call 847.635.

1897

MESSAGES CAVALIER

3 BR OR MORE $1500-$1799 Must See. 3 bedrooms at $1725.

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legal notices NOTICE IS HEREBY given, pur-

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DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 | CHICAGO READER 35

SPONSORED CONTENT

DRINK SPECIALS

STRAIGHT DOPE

By Cecil Adams Q : If you took all the wealth in the world

and leveled it among all the people in the world, what would our standard of living be?

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FRI

$6 Jameson shots, $3 PBR bottles, “Hoppy Hour” 5pm8pm = 1/2 price IPAs + pale ales

S AT

WICKER PARK

SOUTH LOOP

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$6 Firestone Walker Opal pints $6 Finch Vanilla Stout 16 oz. cans $7 house wines $8 Few Spirits

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Bombs $4, Malibu Cocktails $4, Jack Daniel’s Cocktails $5, Tanqueray Cocktails $4, Johnny Walker Black $5, Cabo Wabo $5

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

$6 Firestone Walker Opal pints $6 Finch Vanilla Stout 16 oz. cans $7 house wines $8 Few Spirits

Moosehead pints $3.75, Hamms cans $2.50, Special Export Bush Longneck bottles $3, Foster Big cans $5

Wine by the Glass $5, Jameson $5, Patron $7, Founders 12oz All Day IPA Cans $3.50

$6 Jameson shots $3 PBR bottles

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

$6 Firestone Walker Opal pints $6 Finch Vanilla Stout 16 oz. cans $7 house wines $8 Few Spirits

Moosehead pints $3.75, Hamms cans $2.50, Special Export Bush Longneck bottles $3, Foster Big cans $5

Heineken Bottles $4, Bloodies feat.

Absolut Peppar Vodka $5, Original Moonshine $5, Corzo $5, Sailor Jerry’s Rum $4, Deschutes Drafts $4

SUN

$6 Jameson shots, $3 PBR bottles, $4 Temperance brews, $5 Absolut bloody mary’s

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

$6 Firestone Walker Opal pints $6 Finch Vanilla Stout 16 oz. cans $7 house wines $8 Few Spirits

Moosehead pints $3.75, Hamms cans $2.50, Special Export Bush Longneck bottles $3, Foster Big cans $5

Buckets of Miller & Bud Bottles (Mix & Match) $14, Guinness & Smithwicks Drafts $4, Bloodies feat, Absolut Peppar Vodka $5, Ketal One Cocktails $5

MON

$6 Jameson shots, $3 PBR bottles, $4 Half Acre brews, FREE POOL, “Hoppy Hour” 5pm8pm = 1/2 price IPAs + pale ales

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

CLOSED

Moosehead pints $3.75, Hamms cans $2.50, Special Export Bush Longneck bottles $3, Foster Big cans $5

All Draft Beers Half Price, Makers Mark Cocktails $5, Crystal Head Vodka Cocktails $4

TUE

$6 Jameson shots, $3 PBR bottles, $2 and $3 select beers

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

$6 Firestone Walker Opal pints $6 Finch Vanilla Stout 16 oz. cans $7 house wines $8 Few Spirits

Moosehead pints $3.75, Hamms cans $2.50, Special Export Bush Longneck bottles $3, Foster Big cans $5

Jim Beam Cocktails $4, Jameson Cocktails $5, Cabo Wabo $5, Malibu Cocktails $4, Corona Bottles $3.50, PBR Tall Boy Cans $2.75

WED

$6 Jameson shots, $3 PBR bottles, 1/2 price aliveOne signature cocktails, $4 Goose Island brews, “Hoppy Hour” 5pm-8pm = 1/2 price IPAs + pale ales

$10 All Rise Brewing Co. Flights of 4-20oz, $18 Imperial Flights of 4-37oz, $4 Jameson, Absolut & Sailor Jerry Shots

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Stoli/Absolut & Soco Cocktails $4, Long Island Iced Teas $5, Herradura Margaritas $5, Stella/Hoegaarden/ Deschutes Drafts $4, Goose Island 312 Bottles $3.50

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36 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

—KATHY WILSON

2105 S. State 312-949-0120

PHOTO: ALEXEY LYSENKO/ GETTY IMAGES

SLUG SIGNORINO

LINCOLN PARK

A : As it happens, Kathy, I’ve answered this

very question once before: back in 1991, when the USSR was on the verge of collapse, and with it, seemingly, the dream of the socialist utopia you’re describing here. At the time, with a gross world product of about $21.8 trillion, I calculated a global per-capita income of $3,100.

Fast-forward to 2015. But before we get into the numbers, a caveat: From today’s vantage, an exact comparison is tricky, because the units have shifted. I arrived at the 1991 figure by adding up all the world’s gross national products. Since then, though, gross domestic product has replaced GNP as the standard primary measure of economic health. So, admitting our comparison will be rough, what we come to is this: If we add up each country’s 2013 GDP, we get a gross world product of $75.5 trillion dollars. Divide that by the 2013 population, 7.2 billion, and we’re left with a per-capita world income of $10,500—a decent gain on 1991 even after you adjust for inflation.

Of course, this rising tide is hardly lifting all boats. The per-capita GDP of the ten richest countries in the world in 2013 was $76,500, that of the ten poorest a puny $433. Luxembourg has maintained the top spot now for two decades running, with Norway just behind it since 2000. (The U.S. typically clocks in around eighth or ninth, if you’re wondering.)

The other end of the GDP rankings hasn’t been quite as consistent over the same period, with Burundi, Malawi, and Ethiopia taking turns at the bottom.

So the numbers on inequality are stark.

But what if we take a broader view—globally, is inequality growing or not? Here things get more complex, and the question provokes a surprising amount of disagreement among economists. It seems that, aside from an income gap, there’s also an information gap: whereas tax returns in the U.S. and Europe provide rich (as it were) data for analysis, elsewhere researchers have to rely on surveys, which can return sketchier results—particularly with respect to where the wealthy have their money parked. So while some studies in recent years have indicated that global inequality is on the decline, a pair of IMF

economists warned in 2014 that when you correct for the “missing rich,” it actually “might not have gone down at all.” (One recent estimate put individual wealth kept in offshore tax havens at a gobsmacking $7.6 trillion.)

But countries don’t exist in a vacuum anymore, and further muddying the issue is globalization. This has been great for the booming middle classes of places like India and, especially, China, whose middle class is now the largest in the world. It’s been less great, of course, for the middle class in the U.S., where thus far the benefits of globalization have worked mainly to further enrich the 1 percent: imported Chinese goods have held down wages and employment (as documented in a 2013 paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research) while lifting the share prices of stocks held predominantly by the wealthy.

To hear the World Bank tell it, one of the more encouraging trends in terms of global income is that the proportion of people worldwide mired in extreme poverty—defined as living on $1.90 or less a day—will this year fall below 10 percent for the first time. Of course, that’s cold comfort to the 702 million who don’t make the cut, and $1.91 a day ain’t exactly a walk in the park to begin with. As Georgetown University economist Martin Ravallion, put it in a 2014 article on the subject, “The bulk of the developing world’s progress against poverty has been in reducing the number of people living close to the consumption floor, rather than raising the level of that floor.”

What Ravallion is talking about—and the substance of your inquiry, Kathy—is standard of living, a trickier metric than simple wealth.

Some economists have urged that we focus less on dollar figures, for instance, and more on holistic measures of prosperity that take into account such factors as health, education, and environmental sustainability. There’s an estimated $15 trillion in extant coal, oil, and gas that could be tapped, for instance, but that’s not exactly an ideal scenario—as we all should know by now. v Send questions to Cecil via straightdope.com or write him c/o Chicago Reader, 350 N. Orleans, Chicago 60654.

SAVAGE LOVE

DO YOU WANT TO MAKE $300-$1000 PER DAY?

By Dan Savage

The World Famous Admiral Theatre is seeking:

SERVERS & ENTERTAINERS!

Get in the holiday spirit with a male chastity belt!

A safety lesson not for the squeamish. Plus: ‘dump’ = ‘Trump’?

Q : After spending some

years in the doldrums after having kids, my husband and I are now enjoying hot kinky sex and the occasional free pass to fuck other people. We couldn’t be happier. I have a friend who was extremely keen for me to cage his cock with the same kind of locking male-chastity device I got for my husband—a fixed-ring stainless-steel type. I have two questions: (1.) It took some maneuvering to get my husband’s balls through one by one, followed by his cock, but he managed. Is it OK for his balls to swell up tight, get cold, and go purple when he’s wearing the cock cage and he is aroused? He says it doesn’t hurt, and he is wearing it only while I peg him—a couple of hours, tops. (2.) My friend couldn’t get his balls and cock into the cage. His balls never dropped as a child, so he had an operation that pulled them down but fixed them in place. Consequently they sit “high and tight” and can’t be pulled away from his body. Can you recommend a cage that might fit him?

He is into total submission and orgasm denial, and he wants to experience longterm forced chastity and relinquish control of his dick to me. (Hot, right?!) If a cage can’t work for him, are there other toys/methods I can use to give him that sense of surrendered cock and loss of control? —BITCH ABLY LOCKING LUCKY SLUTS UP PROPERLY

A : (1.) “The first rule of

thumb when it comes to male chastity is this: If the balls go blue or cold, take the fucking cock cage off!” said Christopher Miers, the founder and creative force behind Steelwerks (steelwerksextreme.com).

“For the sake of their

marriage and the longevity of their hot kinky sex life, BALLSUP needs to get her guy a cage that keeps him trapped but still in the realm of safe!”

A short primer for readers who aren’t familiar with male chastity devices: Most are anchored in place by a ring that goes around the shaft and behind the balls.

The penis slides into a cylinder that attaches to the top of the ring, and the cylinder prevents erections and can even punish erections.

(Some are lined with spikes.)

Once the chastity device is locked—cheaper ones with a wee padlock, custom ones with something more artful— there’s no way to remove it (and free the cock) without tearing the balls off.

Back to you, BALLSUP: Listen to Miers and toss the device you’re using now and get your husband a chastity cage that doesn’t turn his balls purple.

(2.) “I encountered my first client with the ‘balls not dropping issue’ a few years back, and it is a challenge when it comes to chastity,” said Miers. “For most of these guys, I encourage a PA (aka a Prince Albert, a device that involves poking a bonus hole in the urethra below the head of the cock and putting a ring through it) as a means of anchoring a lightweight chastity device.” But if your friend can handle some pressure on his balls, BALLSUP, a traditional style chastity device with a hinged or two-piece cock ring still might work.

a good relationship so far, and he’s great in a lot of ways, but that’s part of the problem. Next summer, he will be moving back to his hometown in the midwest. I just started my dream job, so there’s no way I would follow him. I’m uncertain about doing the long-distance thing. Since we’re only three months into this, should I cut my losses and call it quits and move on? Or should I enjoy these next six months and let the chips fall where they may, whether it’s the end of the relationship or the transition to long-distance?

Q : I’m a 29-year-old bi

A : I’m Dan Savage, and I

female living on the east coast, and I’ve been in a relationship for three months. It’s been a few years since I’ve dated anyone seriously, and I’m really enjoying it. We have

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A : Anything could happen in

the next six months. You could lose your dream job, this guy could decide not to return to his midwestern hometown after all, or you could turn on the news and learn a mega tsunami 300 feet high is racing toward the east coast and you have eight hours to get the fuck out before your city is washed off the map. So keep dating this guy, because, hey, you never know. What you want and where you want to be can change radically in six months’ time.

Q : Since you had the ability to make Santorum what he is today (a substance, not a senator), would you promote the new meme that Trump = dump? As in “I have to take a trump” or “I just took a major trump—like a transatlanticcable trump.” —GROSS OLD POLITICIANS

approve this meme.

v

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

DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 37

Gary Numan ò BB GUN PRESS

NEW

Dave Alvin & Phil Alvin 3/19, 9 PM, FitzGerald’s, Berwyn, on sale Fri 12/25, 11 AM Bear Medicine 1/24, 8 PM, Schubas Bongzilla 4/8, 9 PM, Reggie’s Music Joint Chelsea Grin 3/13, 7 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Diet Cig 2/10, 8 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Dirty Dozen Brass Band 2/7, 8 PM, City Winery b Family & Friends 2/27, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall Jauz 4/8, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 18+ Kindred the Family Soul 1/2, 7 and 10 PM, the Promontory, 18+ Calvin Love 1/25, 8 PM, Schubas Murder by Death, Tim Barry 4/2, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Nicky Jam 4/1, 7 PM, Aragon Ballroom, 17+ Gary Numan 5/15-17, 9 PM, Metro, 18+ Pig Destroyer 4/8, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Restorations 4/1, 8 PM, Cobra Lounge Boyd Rice 6/12, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Sheer Mag 3/31, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Stick Men 5/4-6, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Avery Sunshine 2/4-6, 8 PM, the Promontory Taake, Young & In the Way 2/26, 9 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Tech N9ne 4/28, 6 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Thirdstory 4/16, 7 PM, Schubas, 18+ B.J. Thomas 2/14, 5 and 8 PM, City Winery b

Wolf Eyes, Timmy’s Organism, Video 2/25, 9 PM, Empty Bottle

UPCOMING Abbath, High on Fire, Skeletonwitch 4/8, 6:45 PM, Metro, 18+ Above & Beyond 5/11, 7 PM, Chicago Theatre b AC/DC 2/17, 7:30 PM, United Center Animal Collective, Ratking 2/27, 7 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Justin Bieber 4/22, 7:30 PM, Allstate Arena, Rosemont b Buckwheat Zydeco 2/17, 8 PM, City Winery b Cannibal Corpse, Obituary, Cryptopsy 2/27, 7:30 PM, Metro, 18+ Shawn Colvin 2/19-20, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Commander Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen 2/25, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Cradle of Filth 3/1, 6 PM, House of Blues b Rob Crow’s Gloomy Place 3/16, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Decapitated, Black Breath 1/30, 7 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Dengue Fever 4/24, 8 PM, Schubas Dreamers 4/1, 9 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Dropkick Murphys, Tiger Army 2/19, 7:30 PM, Aragon Ballroom Eternal Summers 1/15, 9 PM, Schubas, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, 18+ Fall Out Boy, AWOLNATION 3/12, 7 PM, United Center b Fetty Wap, Post Malone 2/17, 6 PM, House of Blues b Lisa Fischer & Grand Baton 3/5, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall b

Eleanor Friedberger 2/24, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Kevin Griffin 1/8, 8 PM, City Winery b David Grisman Sextet 3/20, 5 and 8 PM, City Winery b Grizfolk 2/3, 7:30 PM, Lincoln Hall b Josh Groban, Sarah McLachlan 8/9, 7:30 PM, FirstMerit Bank Pavilion b Guster 1/29-30, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Gutter Demons 2/12, 8 PM, Reggie’s Music Joint Half Moon Run 1/27, 7:30 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Il Divo 10/22, 7 PM, Rosemont Theater, Rosemont b Il Volo 2/26, 7 PM, Chicago Theatre b G. Jones 3/19, 10 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Rickie Lee Jones 3/3, 8 PM, City Winery b Joseph 3/11, 9 PM, Schubas Lionize 2/13, 9 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Lunasa 2/20, 5 and 8 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music b Made of Oak 4/7, 9 PM, Schubas Marianas Trench 2/10, 7 PM, House of Blues b Kathy Mattea 3/13, 7 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music b Mavericks 3/18, 8 PM, Thalia Hall b Edwin McCain 3/5, 8 PM, City Winery b Don McLean 1/27, 8 PM, City Winery b Todd Meehan & Doug Perkins 2/26, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ Megadeth, Suicidal Tendencies, Children of Bodom 3/13, 7 PM, Aragon Ballroom, 17+ Mest 1/16, 7 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+

38 CHICAGO READER • DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016

b Metric, Joywave 2/12, 7:30 PM, House of Blues b Metz, Bully 1/16, 9 PM, Metro, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, 18+ Napalm Death, Melvins, Melt Banana 4/22, 8 PM, Metro, 18+ Dan Navarro 2/13, 6:30 PM, Schubas John Mark Nelson 3/5, 10 PM, Schubas Jennifer Nettles, Brandy Clark, Lindsay Eli 3/18, 8 PM, the Venue at Horseshoe Casino, Hammond Noam Pikelny 2/18, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Rachel Platten 3/19, 7:30 PM, Park West b Polica 4/16, 8 PM, Thalia Hall b Ron Pope & the Nighthawks 2/26, 6:30 PM, Metro b Chuck Prophet 3/23, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Queensryche 1/31, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ R. City 2/15, 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ R5 3/10, 7 PM, Chicago Theatre Ra Ra Riot 4/8, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, 18+ Radiation City 3/9, 9 PM, Subterranean, 17+ Bonnie Raitt 3/22, 7:30 PM, Chicago Theatre b David Ramirez, Lucette 3/2, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Rebirth Brass Band 2/27, 7 and 10 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Red Baraat 1/19, 7:30 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Tim Reynolds 1/16, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Rhapsody, Primal Fear 5/3, 7 PM, Concord Music Hall, 17+ Martin Sexton 1/28, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Slayer, Testament, Carcass 2/19, 7:30 PM, Riviera Theatre b Sleep 1/26-27, 8 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Ches Smith, Criag Taborn, and Mat Maneri 2/24, 8:30 PM, Constellation Sonata Arctica 3/28, 6 PM, Concord Music Hall b Southside Johnny & the Asbury Jukes 3/5, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Stick Figure 3/19, 8 PM, Concord Music Hall, 18+ Sticky Fingers 4/27, 8 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Mike Stud 2/18, 7 PM, House of Blues b Subdudes 3/24-25, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Livingston Taylor 3/11, 7 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Tedeschi Trucks Band 1/22, 7:30 PM, Chicago Theatre b They Might Be Giants 3/20, 3 PM, the Vic b Those Darlins 1/27, 9 PM, Empty Bottle Titus Andronicus, Craig Finn 3/13, 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ Toasters 1/29, 7:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+

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

Tobacco 1/14, 10 PM, Smart Bar, part of Tomorrow Never Knows Tonight Alive, Set It Off 3/1, 6 PM, Bottom Lounge b Too $hort 1/21, 9 PM, Double Door, 18+ Torres 1/15, 9 PM, Lincoln Hall, part of Tomorrow Never Knows, 18+ Hunter Valentine 3/18, 8 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 18+ Phil Vassar 1/29, 8:30 PM, Joe’s Venom Inc., Necrophagia 1/11, 7:30 PM, Reggie’s Rock Club, 17+ Dale Watson 3/5, 8 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music b Wavves, Best Coast 2/24, 6:30 PM, Thalia Hall b Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra 2/29, 8 PM, City Winery b Emily Wells 3/11, 8:30 PM, Beat Kitchen, 17+ Susan Werner 3/18, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston b Wet 2/5, 10 PM, Schubas, 18+ The Who 3/10, 7:30 PM, United Center Webb Wilder 1/9, 9 PM, FitzGerald’s, Berwyn Keller Williams, Kwahtro 1/30, 8:30 PM, Park West, 18+ Marlon Williams 2/10, 8 PM, Schubas, 18+ Steven Wilson 3/7-8, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Rita Wilson 5/3, 8 PM, City Winery b Wolfmother 2/25, 8:30 PM, Metro, 18+

SOLD OUT Beach House 3/1, 8 PM, the Vic, 18+ Alessia Cara 1/29, 7:30 PM, Metro b Gary Clark Jr. 4/1, 8 PM, Riviera Theatre, 18+ The Cure, Twilight Sad 6/10-11, 7:30 PM, UIC Pavilion b Daughter 3/11, 8 PM, Metro b Greg Dulli 3/18, 8 and 11 PM, Maurer Hall, Old Town School of Folk Music b Carly Rae Jepsen 3/12, 8:30 PM, Metro b Less Than Jake 3/3-4, 7 PM, Double Door, 17+ Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band 1/19, 7:30 PM, United Center b Underoath 4/7, 7 PM, Riviera Theatre b Vance Joy 1/22-23, 7:30 PM, Riviera Theatre b v

GOSSIP WOLF A furry ear to the ground of the local music scene IN 2010 GOSSIP WOLF reported on a forthcoming album called One in Two Parts by local industrial-metal duo Plague Bringer—and fans of the band’s turgid, squalling blasts are still waiting for it!

Last week on Bandcamp, Plague Bringer dropped “A Dismal Creep,” the first new track since 2013 of their distinctive “cyber-grind” (to quote the Reader’s Luca Cimarusti). Guitarist Greg Ratajczak promises he’s “going to finish this 90-minute two-disc set sometime in 2016” and that he “hopes to include a personal musical hero on guest vocals.” Please bring some more plague soon!

Last week local posthardcore unit AsHell dropped their debut, Lupa. Angelvoiced front man Kortland Chase says vinyl will arrive this spring, and the album is streaming on Bandcamp at bit.ly/ahlupa.

DJ Oreo, the west-sider who runs the decks for Chance the Rapper and Vic Mensa, brings the latest installment of his Oreo Fest to the Portage on Sun 12/27! The one-night mini festival also features Atlanta “it” producer Metro Boomin and a packed bill of great local rappers, including Martin Sky, ZMoney, Katie Got Bandz, Saba, and Leather Corduroys’ Joey Purp and Kami. Tickets are $25.

Local electronic-music maven Beau Wanzer is really into chilly synths and chili the food. Maybe that’s why he’s spent so much time in Texas over the past few years, recording with abstract noise duo Corporate Park? Last week the collaboration dropped CP/BW, an LP of ghostly, chattering postindustrial squelch. Though Gossip Wolf doesn’t recommend sticking your head through an electric fence or blowing up a power plant, it’d make a perfect soundtrack for either! —J.R. NELSON AND LEOR GALIL Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail gossipwolf@chicagoreader.com.

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DECEMBER 24, 2015 TO JANUARY 6, 2016 • CHICAGO READER 39

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