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Horse Lords saxophonist Andrew Bernstein delivers a different strain of...
Saxophonist Andrew Bernstein is a major contributor to the churning intensity of noisy Baltimore art-rock band Horse Lords, and while the music on his forthcoming second solo album, An Exploded View...
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For its 20th edition, experimental Baltimore festival High Zero hits the road
High Zero is a festival of improvised and experimental music that made its debut in Baltimore in 1999. Created by the Red Room Collective, an artist-run organization that’s been holding concerts at...
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Chicago emo rabble-rousers Regular Oatmeal get it together for this year’s...
Regular Oatmeal front man Nick Cartwright sings like he’s being dragged from his bed after sleeping in way later than he (and, well, society) deems acceptable, his drawn-out words heavy from the...
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Trouble in Mind and Paradise of Bachelors team up for a weekend of the finest...
Trouble in Paradise, a meeting of the minds between tastemaking Chicago label Trouble in Mind Records and North Carolina’s heady Paradise of Bachelors, takes place over the same weekend as Riot Fest,...
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Fearless song and dance troupe Fendika headlines Ethiopia Fest Chicago 2018
Melaku Belay is a master of Eskista, a shoulder-popping Ethiopian dance style thought to have been inspired by the movement of snakes, as well as a student of the dance traditions of the approximately...
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Michael Nesmith brings his pioneering country-rock group, the First National...
Though the loss of many beloved baby-boomer musicians in recent years has made this decade seem cruel, it’s also been a time of resurrection for several bands and projects of members of that same...
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Professor Emeritus gives a Master’s level class on metal on Take Me To the...
I admit a mea culpa for not getting around to this Chicago band’s 2017 debut Take Me to the Gallows (No Remorse Records) a little bit earlier. The album strides into the fray with a handily segmented...
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Calle 13 co-founder explores his bloodlines with diverse styles on his...
Three years ago wildly imaginative producer and MC Residente (aka René Pérez) disbanded Calle 13, the shape-shifting hip-hop and reggaeton project he started with his stepbrother Eduardo José Cabra...
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Singer-songwriter Natalie Prass lets us know the revolution will be danced
“Keep your sisters close/ You gotta keep your sisters close,” backup singers breathe into the retro-90s R&B chorus on “Sisters,” by Natalie Prass. In line with the title of her new album, The...
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Chicago rock polymath Seth Engel continues making some of the best power-pop...
Unassuming Chicago musical wunderkind Seth Engel has his hand in too many musical projects to print in a short concert preview; even listed on his website, the titles of albums he’s produced,...
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Fusion innovator Terry Bozzio swings through town with his enormous drum kit
If you’re the specific kind of nerd who has ever picked up a copy of Modern Drummer, you’re probably familiar with musician Terry Bozzio. A next-level shredder, Bozzio put his chops to use backing...
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Idles make punk perfection by fusing the personal and the political on Joy as...
The name “Idles” is something of a misnomer—the members of this five-piece UK punk band have worked their tails off to cement their sound since forming in Bristol in 2011. By the time they...
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Cumulus finds a way up with downcast northwestern indie-rock
Seattle singer-songwriter Alexandra Niedzialkowski, who records and performs as Cumulus, shows her deft understanding of the mystique of the style of indie rock that emerged out of the Pacific...
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At Etta, chef Danny Grant plays with fire at a cooler price point
The talent behind Maple & Ash's Gold Coast lands in Wicker Park. I was suffering from mental gout two and a half years ago when the Gold Coast's Maple & Ash opened in the midst of a citywide...
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Sketch show Black Boy Joy presents a refreshing depiction of young black men
Comics Devin Middleton and Jordan Stafford send up race without pulling punches. The Annoyance Theatre is a low-key haunt where improvisers and other comedians incubate new, unexpected material....
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Court Theatre’s Radio Golf makes a rousing conclusion to August Wilson’s...
It's a nail-biting mayoral race—in Pittsburgh. The final play in August Wilson's "Century Cycle," Radio Golf, set in the 1990s, is a story about a little guy trying to survive the American political...
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Let us be thankful for this solo album of stripped-down pop from Melkbelly...
Last October when I interviewed the four members of Chicago guitar-rock band Melkbelly for a feature on their then-upcoming LP Nothing Valley, I asked them about their songwriting methods and...
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Reunited 90s hip-hop hitmakers Bone Thugs-N-Harmony hit the road
The pinnacle of Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s artistry and commercial success was their 1995 album E. 1999 Eternal, a smooth and spooky smash hit dedicated to the death of the group’s mentor, gangsta rap...
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Grouper’s mystical ambience comes through clearer than before on Grid of Points
In a spring Pitchfork feature about Liz Harris, who records and performs as Grouper, contributor Ben Ratliff wrote that when she submitted her new album Grid of Points to Kranky, the Chicago-based...
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Joey Purp and ZMoney are only getting better, to the benefit of Chicago
If Joey Purp hasn’t already convinced you he’s one of Chicago rap’s best stylists, his new Quarterthing (self-released) should do the job. He bares his teeth on “Godbody Pt.…
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