The summer is finally starting to dwindle down as August creeps into the calendar this weekend. In Chicago, the summer seems to end after Lollapalooza, but before you start having those “I gotta go back to school so I’m super depressed” thoughts, look forward to the weekend!
This weekend, the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival takes place along Milwaukee Avenue from California and Ridgeway. This festival is filled with live music, fine art, local vendors, and diverse food from the Logan Square neighborhood.
If that isn’t enough to make you trek out to the far west side of the city, the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival Live art Masterpiece Battle takes place on Saturday, August 1st and the winner walks away with a $500 prize. So if you have any artist friends looking to make extra cash, pull them out and celebrate the arts!
Chicago is an artsy city, come experience it firsthand!
Check out the live music schedule behind the cut…
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Columbia College Chicago is hosting the 5th annual Printers’ Ball this Friday! [July 31st]
The shenanigans goes from 5pm-11pm at the Ludington Building. [1104 S Wabash]
In case you are not familiar with Printers’ Ball – it’s basically the biggest literary party in Chicago.
- Over 1,500 people attend
- Over 200 local, national, and international literary organizations hang out and give away free print material
- Live DJs
- Live Bands
- Literary Death Matches
- Readings by Chicago’s biggest writers
- Free ink on paper, including magazines, books, broadsides, and more Paper making demonstrations and more
- People serenading you with poetry and short stories in the elevators [Elevated Diction]
- Meet and greet editors, publishers, and writers, and more.
The magnitude of this event is ridiculous.
If you are involved in print culture of any sort, or if you write, or like to read, or like beer, you should probably go.
And this’ll be one of the only times you’ll be served alcohol on school campus ever. Well, legally, that is.
BEST PART: It’s completely FREE and all ages.
See you there
-Devan Marie
Ok, we just have rabbit love this month. First FYW brought you Frightened Rabbit, and now White Rabbits. For you future indie rockers, I think the rabbit name is finally played out so choose your next animal victim… mongoose? raccoon? dwarf hamsters?
Anyway, White Rabbits grabbed my attention last week when my boss sent their video over to me. The way the instrumentals are captured in this video include one of the best performance shots I have seen in months.
To give you some background, the Brooklyn based 6-piece indie rock band has two releases, including their newest May 2009 release, It’s Frightening (maybe a stab at the Frightened Rabbit?), debuting on Billboard’s Top 200 albums at #184 in the United States.
Check out their buzzworthy video below, and then leave your vote… will it be the Frightened or the White Rabbits?!
-AB
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IClBpch9vmM&hl=en&fs=1&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6&border=1]
Kris Myers of Umphrey’s McGee is putting his drumming talents to use in a few side projects through out the next month.
On Tuesday, July 28, he’ll be at Webster’s Wine Bar (1480 W. Webster) with the Kris Myers Quartet. The show should be pretty jazzy (he does have a masters in jazz drumming) and its free so stop by at 9:30 to check it out. And he’ll be back at Webster’s with his quartet on Tuesday, August 25, at the same time.
The Kris Myers project which has the same make up as the Kris Myers Quartet will be doing a post Lollapalooza show at Reggies (2105 S. State) on Saturday, August 8, at midnight.
Then on Tuesday, August 18, Kris will be playing with DJ Wyllys on turntables at 9pm at the Tonic Room (2447 N. Halsted). This super dancy show costs only at $8.
These will be my first time checking out Kris’ side projects but if he lives up his Umphrey’s awesomeness (I’m sure he will) these shows are definitely worth checking out.
-Nikki
We all know Wicker Park Fest is this weekend, but Pilsen is going to explode tomorrow for the 2nd Annual Ghetto Division Block Party! If you are unfamiliar with Ghetto Division shame on you. This DJ collective is made up of some of the World’s best House, Tech House, and Ghetto Tech DJ’s. Made up of core members: Charlie Glitch, Rob Threezy, Rampage, Moon Man, D-51, M-Dok, Cue-Tek, and the Chicago Dead Beats; Ghetto Division is known globally. Between them they have releases out through Labels such as Mad Decent, Night Shifters, Brick Bandits, and Ol’ Heads. If you want to really enjoy your Saturday the block party is where you need to be. I also forgot to mention they’re bringing out a few special guests Saturday, my biast favorite Black Holes, Capcom, and Mr. Fly By Night Himself Willy Joy. There will be and open BBQ so bring whatever you want to eat, and of course what block party is complete without a little graffiti.
Make Sure you don’t miss this, 18th ST and Carpenter, tomorrow from 10am-10pm! Just to get the mood going here’s a link to mix-tapes and tracks from Rob Threezy and Black Holes!!!!
Black Holes and Rob Threezy
We all love to party to great music, and DJ/Promoter/Blogger Rio Anderson knows how to get a party going. Founder of the Chicago based WTF ent. Rio has been throwing some of the best parties/event in the city for a few years now. Recently, he’s been DJing all over the place. Spinning everything from classic Hip-Hop to the best of House, Rio is one of the best new comers to Chicago’s growing DJ scene. You can catch him every other Friday at Crocodile for XOXO!!!!
Check out his first mixtape, it’s a perfect blend of new and old. When you’re getting ready to go out tonight make sure you put this on, I guarantee a great night!
Rio Mix 1
It was a magical day last Fall when I first laid eyes upon it. I was walking to catch the #8 Halsted bus after yoga when I suddenly found myself standing in the doorway of a heavily crowded restaurant whose front door read “The Counter”. Could it be? I wondered, Has my favorite burger joint opened up shop in Chicago? It appeared that, yes, my prayers were being answered on that foggy fall Tuesday. There are only two places in my hometown of Los Angeles that I will go out of my way to dine at to order a meaty main dish, and The Counter is one of them.
It is very rare that food grabs such strong hold of my attention that I feel the need to share it with the world, but here we are. I’ll give you the virtual experience…
Upon taking your seat at The Counter you are greeted with a clipboard, menu, and pencil. But this menu is no ordinary menu; it is one piece of paper with a long list of ingredients, and beside each item is a checkbox.
Step 1: choose the heart of your burger - veggie, turkey, grilled chicken, or beef – and how much – 1/3 lb, 2/3 lb, or 1 lb of meat.
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Photo by Brad Trent
I have had the chance to see some of my favorite bands multiple times live, and have even reached a point where I will miss a show because I have seen them live too many times. Who ever thought that would happen? Growing up in Indiana we were always overlooked for the smaller indie tours, arena rock and country music ruled the clubs.
Now that I’ve had the chance to see many different bands live, I find myself over-analyzing performances and bored with certain live performances. I am thrilled to say that this was not the case last night at Schubas Tavern.
Former AEMMP Records artist, Brice Woodall opened the show at Schubas, and then a band from Oakland, CA called Audrye Sessions took the stage. I had only heard a few songs by Audrye Sessions previously from their 2008 Daytrotter Session, but their live show sealed the deal.
After opening with a few slower songs, I was captivated by singer Ryan Karazija’s voice. The Oakland foursome had great chemistry on stage and the lone female of the group, bass player Alicia Campbell, proved to the audience that women can rock while still maintaining their feminine aura. Although their whole set was uniformly impressive, their final song is still ringing in my head 24 hours later and words cannot describe the “wow” feeling the audience experienced once it ended. Read more…
This past weekend at Pitchfork I had the chance to work in the CHIRP Record Fair selling AEMMP, Flameshovel, and File 13 merchandise. The CHIRP Record Fair is one massive tent consisting of local labels, record stores, and individual collectors looking to sell some merchandise while networking with other companies as everyone spends a (normally) sizzling weekend listening some of the hottest, up-and-coming indie bands.
Our booth was conveniently located next to Mexican Summer and Matador Records so the AEMMP kids had a chance to bond with both labels over the three days of Pitchfork. One guy who was working at the CHIRP Record Fair passed along a CD of his band, We Are Country Mice, and told us they have a show coming up in Chicago in August.
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The Pitchfork Music Festival is home to bands with strange names. You hear everything from the Jesus Lizard, The Dutchess and the Duke, Cymbals Eat Guitars, to one of my favorite stand out performances of Pitchfork, Frightened Rabbit from Scotland.
Frightened Rabbit was one of the opening acts on Sunday’s Pitchfork lineup, but they played to a packed crowd of early-risers and instantly gained new fans. A friend of mine is a big fan so I tagged along to see what this crazy-named band has to offer.
The 4-piece group of guys blasted into songs like “I Feel Better” and “Fast Blood” and then took the time between songs to interact with the crowd. Bands that acknowledge the crowd and give off a little bit of personality tend to be my favorites. The Scottish accent quickly drew me in, and the band mentioned they were big fans of playing Chicago. In fact, singer Scott Hutchinson claimed they have played Chicago more in the past year than their hometown of Glasgow.
Frightened Rabbit is a new band to my ears, but Scott & his brother Grant started the band back in 2004. The name Frightened Rabbit stayed with the band after Scott began using it as his moniker for early solo shows. With a 2006 & 2008 release under their belt, the Frightened Rabbits will be a band worth familiarizing yourself with.
Check out their video for “I Feel Better” after the cut.
-AB
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