Results tagged “rachaelyamagata”

Rachael Yamagata and Bumpus are playing a show next week at Logan Square Auditorium to raise money for Ryszard Basiura, the father of a friend close to both acts who has been incredibly ill and faces mounting hospital bills. Darren Spitzer of The Changes (ex- of The Changes? Are they even still "officially" together any more?) will be donating his DJ skills between and after the bands as well.

Yup, here it is, the inevitable "Best of 2008" music list (a later post centering on the top local offerings is forthcoming). In order to spare our readers the pain of reading through yet another list that tries too hard to impress with obscure releases or toe the party line on Stereogum / Pitchfork approved artists, we continue our personal decade-plus tradition of merely listing what we actually liked in 2008. That means that the albums below are the one we kept finding ourselves turning to when we wanted to kick back and enjoy some tunes. Sure, there was more artistically challenging stuff released this year than some of the selections below -- and we certainly do appreciate that sort of thing -- but our year end list reflects which music ultimately did for us what we think rock and/or roll is ultimately meant to do to any listener: it grabbed us by the heart and/or crotch and wouldn't let go.

Rachael Yamagata has managed to accumulate a fervently fan base since the release of her debut EP five years ago. While her music keeps popping up in various movies and television shows, she hasn't managed to capture the larger cultural zeitgeist with massive album sales, so it's not hard to see why her previous label might have balked and dropped her when presented with the material that went on to populate Yamagata's sophomore album, Elephants ...Teeth Sinking Into Heart. Their loss.

Tuesday, Sept. 30

This is the year we officially gave up on MOBfest. We've been involved with MOBfest every year since its inception, and even started to get involved this year (anyone who knows us can figure out which bill we had a a hand in), but finally just realized that the whole thing is a rather pointless endeavor. Their mission statement, according to the MOBfest website, is: We are a three-day music business seminar focused on building...

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.

We hear there’s a free show featuring Chicagoist favorites The Assassins and local kids The Redwalls tonight. Now a free show featuring The Assassins would be enough to get our collective panties in a proverbial bunch but there is a nice little added bonus to this evening’s festivities. Chicago homeboy and musical chameleon Chris Holmes is coming into town to DJ this evening’s event. Since moving out West a few years ago Holmes had moved...

Rhett Miller has spent quite a bit of time in Chicago. Between his band The Old 97's recording albums with local engineer Chuck Uchida, and constant touring that always seemed to treat Chicago as more of a home base than his native Dallas, we could be forgiven for viewing him as a bit of a homeboy. In recent years old homeboy has made a few grabs at pop stardom spending a decent amount of time growing a solo identity apart from the band that made him famous. And who could fault him? Wouldn't you trade in country licks for Gap ads and mainstream adoration? We probably would, especially if a supermodel wife was thrown in to sweeten the deal.

What’s rarer then a one-eared jackalope? It’s a talented singer-songwriter given room to breathe by the major label music machine. Luckily for all involved Chicagoan Rachael Yamagata is a rare beast indeed. Her smoky vocals plumb the depths of human emotion while her ever morphing band provides backing that runs the gamut from willowy to brawn. Yamagata is an arresting live entertainer who peppers her cathartic performances with dashes of self-deprecation and witty asides. Chicagoist...

Chicagoist is a fan of the John Hughes-ian film genre wherein there’s a totally hot girl that no one else seems to notice is totally hot. Said girl frets and worries that she will not be asked to the prom/dance/concert by poorly coifed 80’s band by whomever has been cast as the movie’s anti-hero/stud. So, to compensate, she tries all kinds of goofy stunts to become what she thinks the guy will like only to discover that in the end she’s most likable just being herself.

MOBfest is dubious at best in its claims of being a major player in the record industry even though it continues to infer that it has helped create album deals for Rachael Yamagata, The Killers and Kill Hannah. It’s pretty obvious that all of those groups had things in the works, though, long before they hit the stage at what is currently Chicago’s only music festival that claims to draw in the big label A&R...