Let's blow sh*t up. In a microwave. more ›

Fire crews are on the scene of an explosion at Sipi Metal Corporation, located in the 1700 block of N. Elston (more likely recognized by readers of this site as just a block away from The Hideout). Teachers at Creative Scholars preschool are considering an evacuation of its children due to the incident. Elston has apparently been blocked off around the building. More as word comes in. more ›

More explosions from imaginary transforming robots will again shut down downtown streets this weekend and cause a number of CTA reroutes. So what kind of weekend havoc are Optimus Prime and Megatron going to cause on weekend traffic? Besides the now-typical explosions, fireballs, skydivers, and helicopters, Wacker Drive will be closed between Wabash and State starting at 8 p.m. tomorrow night through 5 a.m. Monday July 26 and Wabash will be closed between Wacker and Lake starting at 8 p.m. tomorrow night and going through 5 a.m. Monday July 26. While the CTA has yet to post this weekend's reroutes, ABC 7 has a list of the affected bus routes here. more ›

• Officials are investigating the explosion of a manufacturing plant near Belvidere this afternoon; a man at a nearby tollway oasis was killed when he was struck by debris from the explosion.
• A recent pot bust turned out to be the largest in Kane County history.
• And so it begins: some areas already under a Winter Storm watch.

• Gov. Quinn outlined today how he plans to cut $1 billion from the state budget, including job cuts and asking some employees to give up pay raises.
• A violent month is drawing to a close; so far, 225 people have been shot in Chicago in July with 42 of those being deaths.
• A suspicious package found this morning outside Oprah's Harpo Productions, Inc building was proved to be safe.

Eight people were hurt this morning by a propane explosion at Cyrano's Cafe on the Riverwalk. Among the injured were two cooks; four of the injured were hospitalized while four others refused treatment. The propane tank that exploded had been fixed for a leak just yesterday. Witnesses credited Jessica Herum, 24, a deckhand with Chicago's First Lady boat tours, for acting quickly and using a fire extinguisher to help fight the fire in the immediate aftermath of the fire while awaiting the arrival of fire personnel. [CBN] more ›

Photo by BrianHagy
• The Blago probe has another victim: William Cellini, who was indicted by a Federal grand jury today for planning to extort Hollywood producer Thomas Rosenberg for money for the Blago campaign.
• Two people were severely injured in a fire after an explosion at Gigi's Restaurant in Naperville last night.
• Cook County Board President Todd Stroger promises his new spending plan, introduced next month, won't include any new taxes.

Breaking news: An Amtrak train and a freight train collided at 48th and South Shields Ave about an hour ago, and passengers are being pulled out as we write this. Developing. UPDATE 12:27: Don Rashid from Stroger Hospital is on NBC5 saying that Stroger is in a "stage 3 disaster." The footage is showing color-coded triage areas, and so far the green zone is empty. 12:30 Witnesses are describing a sound "like an explosion" when... more ›

We love Blur. And Super Furry Animals. And Happy Mondays, Pulp, and Supergrass. So it's not surprising that we enjoy Chicago-by-way-of-the-'burbs outfit Ultra Sonic Edukators. The group's writing style is firmly rooted in the mid-'90s British explosion; some fault them for that, but we are of the opinion that the world would be better off if more bands took their cues from that point in time. more ›

*This post contains spoilers about last night's Top Chef finale. T.S. Eliot wrote, "This is the way the world ends/ Not with a bang but a whimper." Our Top Chef world ended last night with a whimper from Dale, and two big bangs: a huge whoop from Hung as he was named the winner, followed with an explosion of confetti released from the ceiling of the studio. Chicagoist received a invitation to attend the... more ›

This week ended with the launch of the seventh and final Harry Potter installation. But while the world was consumed with Pottermania, it's important to remember that there were more serious things going on in the world, too – two of them in -Ist cities. Sampaist was shocked when a passenger jet crashed into the center of Sao Paulo, killing at least 200 people. The airplane, an Airbus A320, skidded off the runway at the... more ›

We've only cried twice at rock shows. Once was when the Flaming Lips opened for Beck, and something about "Lightning Strikes The Postman" (was it the strobes? the bullhorn? the crowd's empathic explosion? we don't know) caused our tear ducts to let loose and lose control. The other time was Friday's Arcade Fire show at the Chicago Theatre, as we were surrounded by as unlikely a crowd as we ever expected to see rejoicing in... more ›

Chicago native Jason Kanakis is one of those rare dudes who can honestly call himself a "career musician." He's has toured the world playing with the likes of KT Tunstall, Butch Walker, Rachael Yamagata, Aqualung, and an impressive heap of others. Now based in Los Angeles, Jason has an interesting perspective on how the Chicago music scene shapes up in comparison to the rest of the country, not to mention some pretty weird stories about life on the road. Fresh off a tour with Brett Dennen, Chicagoist caught up with Jason for a quick chat about touring, Chicago's music community, and Singapore's transvestite prostitutes. more ›

There are so many cultural institutions in Chicago that it'd be easy to overlook the Alliance Française de Chicago. In addition to being located inside a really cool building, this non-profit cultural exchange organization sponsors everything from language classes to lectures and gourmet food tastings. And movie screenings too. Tomorrow as part of their Ciné-club they'll be showing Playtime, Jacques Tati's 1967 classic. more ›

Before we start celebrating St. Patrick’s Day or get too far in the zone on the NCAA action, there are a few shows going on sale that we would like to talk about. more ›

We've heard some rumbling about the new graffiti book Graffitecture for a while now and the official release party is here. From 5 p.m. - 9 p.m. on Friday, February 23 at Heijfina, 1529 N. Milwaukee, you can catch a live graffiti and wall art installation while David Castillo and DJ small MVP spin music. Enough about the release party, you say, what's Graffitecture about anyway? Over 40 Chicago graffiti artists were given photographs... more ›

Texas is thawing, the Northeast is freezing, and a sort of natural order seems almost restored to the Ist-A-Verse. Almost. Londonist HQ—that is to say, the city of London—was battered by heavy winds, making it a bad time to be a twelve-meter (nearly forty-foot) tall snowman. Still, not everyone decided to keep warmly covered. Meanwhile, back indoors, the Big Brother racism is now causing all kinds of headaches for international diplomats, and Londonist got into... more ›

We won't be mistaking southern Illinois' Shawnee Hills region with Napa Valley just yet, although both are designated American Viticultural Areas. But a recent study shows that the Illinois wine industry is growing faster than anticipated. Much faster. more ›

A couple of weeks ago, the Sun-Times threw up a little blurb giving the heads up that peeps in the 630 and 815 area codes are probably gonna have to start dialin' it up, cause we keep running out of phone numbers. Now, we're not big math people. That is, we know how to do our taxes and balance a checkbook, but we don't really remember how the whole permutation/combination thing works, for instance. So, we were a little fuzzy on how we possibly could be running out of phone numbers in all these area codes we have. more ›

Will the Wicker Park and Bucktown gallery scene become another West Loop, an explosion of art spaces on a few shabby-chic blocks? The Wicker Park and Bucktown Gallery Association hopes not. In this week’s Chicago Journal, Around the Coyote Gallery Director and WPBGA Founder Allison Stites talks about how she'd like to preserve the organic feel of the neighborhood art scene. And for the time being, they don’t have much to fear. The West Loop... more ›

Last night was a completely different experience than the last time Chicagoist headed over to the Aragon for a Morrissey concert. The last time, the balcony wasn’t even open and only about one-fourth of the ballroom was full, but those of us there were singing, dancing and reveling in our love of songs about sad times, played expertly by a backing band of tightly clothed men. Fast forward to last night and a sold out... more ›

If there's going to be a fire and an explosion, we guess the best place for it to happen would be inside a fire house. Two compressed air tanks turned into missiles on Monday when a fire inside a rescue vehicle at the North Aurora Fire Department caused them to explode. The explosions caused $95,000 worth of damage to the truck, with one shooting through the roof of the cab and denting the building's ceiling, and the other through the back, leaving a hole in the truck's trailer. A bomb squad (but not The Bomb Squad, sadly), later detonated two other air tanks under piles of sandbags rather than risk them exploding as well. Firefighters on the scene said that the sprinkler system in the building contained the fire and prevented potentially millions in damage. more ›

The staff of Chicagoist woke up this morning with a general feeling that something was amiss. The news wires were lit up with stories of flying cars jumping over expressway barriers and giant reptiles terrorizing the south suburbs. All of this on the heels of yesterday’s house explosion in Lockport. Luckily the man, woman and dog living there escaped unharmed. more ›

Chicagoist has had a bad experience with chemistry set explosions, and all we can say is that we wish we'd been wearing some protective goggles and a fire-proof apron. Life in the burn ward ain't fun. more ›

It must be something in the air. Look beyond the explosion of neighborhood Summer Fests, “Taste Ofs”, and nationally recognized rock smorgasbords, and you’ll find… still more festivals. Taking a cue from music promoters, local theaters know you’re excited to spend hours upon hours being entertained along some kind of theme. Festivals grab attention, and these festivals grabbed ours: Darknight Theatrical Productions pays tribute to Twilight Zone master Rod Serling, presenting three original one-acts inspired... more ›

Since the Polish soccer team has played itself out of the World Cup, Chicagoist was looking for a new group of Poles to get behind. Tomorrow at 8pm, boxing fans can see some of Poland's best boxers at the Polish Boxing Explosion event at Odeum Expo Center in Villa Park. The headline fight is between Heavyweight Mariusz "The Gladiator" Wach (10-0, 3 KO's) and Canadian Aurthur Cook (12-1-1, 3 KOs) for the Polish Heavyweight title.... more ›

Naperville leads the state in nailing drunk drivers! more ›

Joe Meno, author & playwright more ›

We're not proud, but man we are facinated with bank robberies in Chicago this year. As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, Chicago was on pace to shatter the 1995 record of 195 robberies. On December 2nd, we did that. Local media has been tracking the robberies daily, with today's count at 212, according to an NPR report Chicagoist heard this morning. The robbery spree isn't limited to just particular Chicago banks. The pictures... more ›

Ahhhh. Thanksgiving. The time to visit family and, later, fight with them. It's a day where we try to convince people that Black Friday is actually named as such for another reason and we're not wasting an extra day off of work fighting for deals on sweaters that we wouldn't give to our amazingly adorable golden retriever. Thanksgiving means we watch football and get stupidly wasted the night before because there is some unspoken rule... more ›