RIP Chicago techno marvel and international cult figure Dan Jugle

by Leor Galil on June 20, 2018 at 5:20PM

Remembering soundman and musician Patrick Kenneally, who nurtured scenes in Chicago and Portland

by Leor Galil on June 18, 2018 at 1:44PM

Vlogger ZackTV devoted his life to making Chicago’s fractious rap scene into one community

by Leor Galil on June 4, 2018 at 7:26PM

In recent years Stoner traveled outside Chicago frequently, interviewing artists in Pittsburgh, Brooklyn, and beyond. He also expanded beyond music, talking to Fred Hampton Jr. about politics and taking an interest in the case of west-side teenager Kenneka Jenkins, who died in a Rosemont hotel freezer in September.

Singular pianist and musical mind Cecil Taylor has died at 89

by Peter Margasak on April 6, 2018 at 12:34PM

Masterful but overlooked Chicago jazz drummer Robert Barry has died

by Peter Margasak on March 6, 2018 at 2:24PM

Janet Bean, drummer for Eleventh Dream Day and cofounder of Freakwater, had been visiting Barry at Chalet. She'd gotten to known him when he and her late father shared an assisted-living facility in Lincoln Park called the Ivy Apartments.

This guy loved Mark E. Smith more than you ever did because he got a Mark E. Smith tattoo

by Aimee Levitt on January 25, 2018 at 8:19AM

"I bided my time and watched the guy for a while before I said something to him about it," Doerksen wrote. Because, you know, he's obviously a pretty heavy fan of the Fall, and they can be a bit . . .

Mark E. Smith, the acerbic voice of influential Manchester postpunks the Fall, dead at 60

by Peter Margasak on January 24, 2018 at 4:57PM

AUTHOR'S NOTE, JANUARY 26: Since publishing this post, it's occurred to me that by praising Smith I may seem to be condoning, rationalizing, or justifying aspects of his bad behavior that aren't acceptable under any circumstances. In 1998 he was arrested and charged with misdemeanor assault for attacking Julie Nagle, who at the time was his girlfriend and the keyboardist in the Fall.

Groundbreaking Chicago drill rapper Fredo Santana died this weekend

by Leor Galil on January 22, 2018 at 12:46PM

From the archive: Remembering radio storyteller Joe Frank

by Deanna Isaacs on January 18, 2018 at 8:57AM

Joe Frank: Work in Progress aired on WBEZ on Sunday nights, starting in the late 1980s, so it must have been around then.  The show was fiction that sounded like fact, laden with emotional truth and laced with music that worked the way a great film score works, building the mood. Over a career that extended another three decades—mostly on NPR, mostly from KCRW in Santa Monica, and often incorporating other actors—Frank inspired a subsequent generation of storytellers that includes Ira Glass, who was his one-time production assistant. 

Influential pianist, composer, and AACM cofounder Muhal Richard Abrams dies at 87

by Peter Margasak on November 1, 2017 at 3:30PM

Today's playlist: Meridian, Hoquet (Accidie) Keller Quartett, Cantante e Tranquillo (ECM) Vinnie Sperrazza Apocryphal, Hide Ye Idols (Loyal Label) Wolf People, Ruins (Jagjaguwar) Lars Gullin, Fine Together: The Artistry of Lars Gullin (Universal/Sonet)