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Bokuchan’s ghost curry holds up in transit
It’s Shin Thompson’s pivot to Japanese soul food, from a virtual kitchen. In early March, Shin Thompson’s Furious Spoon ramen minichain was humming, with five locations in the city and Evanston, and a...
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On May You Be Held, Sumac are a beast of free improvisation, noise, and metal
There’s a lot of room in the vast and aesthetically diverse landscape of metal, but one powerhouse trio occupies its own sound-deconstructing universe: Sumac. The heady metal-centric music that...
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Spirit Adrift show us the timelessness and future of classic metal on...
Listening to modern traditional metal can sometimes be a little like meeting up with a special old flame. It’s a blast until you’re eventually reminded why it didn’t work out for the long haul—you...
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Chicago soul man Nate Barksdale makes smooth sounds to get us through the...
On the eve of the first day of fall, prolific Chicago soul man Nate Barksdale self-released Summer Was Over Before It Started. The pandemic eliminated so much of what Chicagoans cherish about the...
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Ladies and Martians
The Neo-Futurists and Theatre in the Dark offer shows for the spookiest of election seasons. After the uproar around Bill Burr's recent SNL monologue taking white women to task for their role in...
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Laura Jane Grace grapples with modern times on the urgent, stripped-down...
Lockdown has been hard on Laura Jane Grace. The front woman of Against Me! and Devouring Mothers is a natural performer with a strong social-media presence, but lately her Twitter account has been...
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Chicago’s Growing Concerns Poetry Collective use kindness to unite people...
The three members of Growing Concerns Poetry Collective all juggle other practices outside their collaboration. Their CVs are too extensive to discuss exhaustively, but poet McKenzie Chinn has built a...
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Noise-punk “supergroup” Brandy kills it on The Gift of Repetition
A few years ago Matthew Hord, who fronts Chicago-based noise-punk mainstays Running (and played alongside yours truly in a handful of local bands over the years), moved to New York City and linked up...
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Chicago indie rockers Mooner embrace tender reflection on their third album
For more than a decade, Chicago singer-songwriter Lee Ketch has used his band Mooner to perfect an earthy indie-rock sound that draws equally from Americana and power pop. On the group’s new third...
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Baltimore postpunk trio Quattracenta evoke myriad emotions on their new...
For their new second album, Baltimore postpunk trio Quattracenta teamed up with producer J. Robbins (Jawbox) and the Brokers Tip label, owned by Bob Nastanovich (Pavement, Silver Jews). Those familiar...
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Buddhist teacher Lama Lobsang Palden and local multi-instrumentalist Jim...
Ten years ago, Jim Becker sought out yoga and meditation teacher Lama Lobsang Palden, hoping to find physical and spiritual healing. But at the end of their first encounter, Palden told the local...
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Jeff Tweedy and sons play through the crisis on Love Is the King
Jeff Tweedy’s new solo album is a family affair. He made Love Is the King with his two sons: his eldest, Spencer (already a longtime musical collaborator), plays drums and organ on most of the record,...
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Envisioning democracy—in photos—at the MoCP
From literal and data-driven to poetic and hopeful, the galleries curated by Columbia College Chicago professors show what democracy means to them. When Raquel Monroe thinks of democracy, she...
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Chicago art-pop wonder Sen Morimoto captures the magic of his community
Chicago art-pop wizard Sen Morimoto made national news in July, when the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events removed him from its Millennium Park at Home virtual summertime music series....
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Crippled Black Phoenix make an urgent plea for humanity on Ellengæst
Listening to a new Crippled Black Phoenix record is a bit like unwrapping a present. Even if you have an idea what’s under the intricate ribbons and shiny paper, you can still get surprised.…
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Decades of friendship enrich a new collaboration by rapper Rich Jones and...
Rapper-singer Rich Jones and producer Montana Macks have been friends for nearly two decades, which surely helps explain how the Chicagoans’ new self-released album, How Do You Sleep at Night?, hits...
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Dutch rockers Molasses find new beginnings after tragedy on Through the Hollow
Molasses was born from the ashes of influential Dutch band the Devil’s Blood. Founded in 2006 by guitarist and vocalist Selim Lemouchi (“SL”) and fronted by his sister Farida (“the Mouth of Satan”),...
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Trumpeter Aquiles Navarro and drummer Tcheser Holmes demonstrate their...
Trumpeter Aquiles Navarro and drummer Tcheser Holmes begin their new duo album, Heritage of the Invisible II (International Anthem), with “Initial Meditation,” a red-hot vortex of percussion and...
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Chicago jazz-fusion unit Cordoba actualize their ambition on Specter
When The Sick Muse interviewed Chicago jazz-fusion sextet Cordoba in 2019, vocalist Brianna Tong talked about the ways improv-based music can be a megaphone for protest movements. “I don’t think it’s...
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Tawny Newsome and Bethany Thomas make thoughtful, soulful rock on Material...
Tawny Newsome and Bethany Thomas became friends in the 2000s, when they put in time as backup singers for a long list of forgotten bar bands, and in 2017 they both appeared on Jon Langford’s album...
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