[soliloquy id=”34008″]  The TV Girl audience is a hyped and dedicated one. As I walked into Schubas way too early to sit down and have a drink with my friends, […]

Wicker Park Fest swallowed up Milwaukee Ave. from Paulina to Damen this weekend, drawing throngs to catch the likes of Against Me!, Snail Mail and Porches at the three-day event. […]

[soliloquy id=”33756″]  How does House of Vans do what they do? I thought to myself as I watched concertgoers flood into the House of Vans concert venue, housed in a […]

It’s not a true Pitchfork Festival unless it rains (or gets hot and humid). But the festival didn’t ever get rained out, and the acts didn’t disappoint. (There was a […]

After a slightly rainy Friday made use of all the Lyft ponchos that were being handed out at one corner of Pitchfork Music Festival, Saturday felt a lot nicer. The […]

City Winery celebrated an auspicious hip-hop-iversary, the release of The Beastie Boys’ Hello Nasty album 20 years ago. The officiants were the kick-ass B-Boys tribune band She’s Crafty, formed after co-founder […]

Vacationer, comprising Kenny Vasoli, Ryan Zimmaro, Michael Mullin, Greg Altman, and their producers, Matthew Young and Grant Wheeler, brought a frill free, though colorful, performance to Lincoln Hall Thursday. The […]

If you live in Chicago long enough the annual Pitchfork Music Festival feels like one big backyard barbecue. Fortunately, unlike my last one, we didn’t see much rain and the […]

On one fateful and pretty damn hot evening, the Empty Bottle hosted Har Mar Superstar, the musical superhero that is Sean Tillman, for two shows of Sam Cooke covers. Right […]

Chicago finally got a break from the brutal heat on Friday, and the breezy, balmy evening was made extra special with a truly amazing night of music, fronted by the […]

Whenever I think of Glassjaw I think of the downpour before one of their Riot Fest performances in Chicago. Whenever I think of Quicksand I think of their lack of […]

Since the Greenwich Village folkies put the aesthetics of beat literature to music in the early ‘60s, a cavalcade of singer-songwriter successors has followed. Stylistically, little has changed. Limiting oneself to […]