What are they putting in the PBR in Williamsburg that is causing young musicians to return to early Talking Heads albums for inspiration? Whatever it is, Suckers are drinking it by the gallon, and it’s working in their favor. more ›

Patrick Stump, former Fall Out Boy and a future Soul Punk, covers Kanye West at Schubas. Rolling Stone is there to document the whole thing. more ›

How easily we forget that a band is comprised of many members to make a whole. Though Jim James, lead singer, songwriter and guitarist of the popular roots-rock group My Morning Jacket, the band would not at all be the same if multi-instrumentalist, Carl Broemel, was not a part of their rich and robust collective. more ›

When it comes to having awesome outlets for good music on wax and CD, by Rolling Stone’s estimation, Chicago is doing pretty well. The magazine’s recent list of “The Best Record Stores in the USA: The top 25 spots for unique vinyl and CDs, from San Francisco to Boston” shows Chicago’s record stores snagging three spots on the list. Wicker Park’s Dusty Groove came in at #3, Laurie's Planet of Sound in Lincoln Square landed the #11 spot and Lincoln Park-based Dave’s Records made the cut at #24. more ›

There's a new story in Rolling Stone about the first six months of the Obama Administration titled "Obama So Far" and the magazine even features a new painting of Obama by Shepard Fairey, the man responsible for the iconic (and copyright controversial) HOPE poster. Fairey spoke to the Wall Street Journal about the new image. more ›

Rolling Stone has finally gotten around to posting the full version of their look at David Foster Wallace, who committed suicide in September. It's a fascinating read on the last days of the former Champaign resident and Illinois State professor not to mention the first thing from RS worth reading in ages. more ›

Way back before she became Avrilized, Chicago musician Liz Phair wowed the indie music scene with her stunning full-length debut, Exile in Guyville, an alleged song-for-song response to the Rolling Stones' Exile on Main Street. Fifteen years after Exile on Guyville's release, Phair finds herself listed as one of the greatest female guitarists by Venus Zine. The Chicago-based "leading source for coverage of women in music, art, film, fashion, and DIY culture" recently released a list of their top female guitarists of all time, itself a response to Rolling Stone's 2003 list of the top 100 guitarists of all time, a list that only included two females (Joni Mitchell and Joan Jett). more ›

Even before we moved to Chicago we were aware of Poi Dog Pondering, thanks to a splashy ad in Rolling Stone for their album Wishing Like a Mountain and Thinking Like the Sea. Their song "Thanksgiving," from the aforementioned album, always pops into our playlist this time of year; and it was really cool to see them open for David Byrne a few years back at Navy Pier. However, their newest foray comes as something... more ›

This is part of Chicagoist's continuing coverage of the Chicago International Film Festival. more ›

Even though rapper 50 Cent proclaimed to the world earlier this month that he would quit music (and deprive the world of another "In Da Club") if Chicago native Kanye West's new album "Graduation" sold more copies than his new CD "Curtis," the two have reportedly ended their feud via the universal peace maker -- alcohol. The two are both dropping albums on Sept. 11 and have been debating in the press for the past... more ›

It’s all fun and games until someone calls sell-out, but how is almost every artist not a sell-out when it comes to putting tunes behind a commercial these days? From the use of “Lust for Life” to get us aboard a Royal Caribbean Cruise to Wilco shilling for Volkswagen, what are the best or worst songs used in commercials? Mark Caro wants your comments about that over at his blog, Pop Machine. Do we care... more ›

The Comas have been at this shit for a while now. Originally formed in Chapel Hill, NC in 1998, their blistering brand of psychedelic-soaked garage rock has left a steady stream of sweaty, melted faces in its wake for nearly the past decade. They’ve collected some of the most desirable accolades an independent-spirited band can hope for, including contacts with North Carolina tastemakers Yep Roc and (currently) Vagrant Records, shoe shines from Pitchfork Media, Rolling... more ›

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. passed away last night in New York from brain damage due to a fall several weeks earlier. We never knew him, with the exception of Tankboy, who met him once, but we loved him like that teacher in high school, the only one you ever cared to finish your homework for or make an effort. His grammar was not English teacher perfect, and his paragraphs were curt, sometimes one sentence. He was,... more ›

If you keep up with your "Free Tibet" news, you may be glad to hear that the Dalai Lama is going to visit Chicago. more ›

We all know that lists are great for pulling in readers and encouraging debate. As a matter if fact, this trend has grown into obscenely silly proportions in the MS(music)M, but we suppose they will do whatever they can in an attempt to keep themselves fresh. We’re looking at you Blender, Q, Rolling Stone, and Entertainment Weekly. (We’re letting Time off the hook for this one since their recent music list was just so obviously wrong, and people tend to turn to them for news and not music.) more ›

It’s official. Barack Obama is a rock star. The senator has already won a Grammy, but he’ll soon have something possibly even more coveted – a portrait by Annie Leibovitz. Leibovitz will photograph Obama for a Men’s Vogue piece due out in October, about the same time his new book, “The Audacity of Hope,” will hit shelves. If you don’t recognize Leibovitz’s name, and we’re not sure how you couldn’t, you’ve probably seen her celebrity... more ›

Yesterday, Intonation Fest organizers announced the final addition to the lineup for this summer’s two-day rock party in Union Park from June 24th through the 25th. And Chicagoist wants to give you tickets to see him. Former Wu-Tang Clan member Ghostface Killah will perform on Saturday in support of his new album Fishscale, which, like Wu-Tang, ain’t nothin’ to fuck wit. As reported here and elsewhere, Austin psych-rock legend Roky Erickson will also make a... more ›

Local rock critic Jim DeRogatis has spent the last few years pestering members of the Flaming Lips for interviews, haranguing them in the studio while they tried to get work done, bugging singer Wayne Coyne’s significant other for photos of the band and digging through years and years of smudged newsprint mining old interviews with and profiles of the band. This is just a long-winded way for us to say that DeRo has gone and... more ›

For some indie rockers, the closest they’ve come to examining the life of former Rolling Stone Brian Jones is attending a show by the band that cleverly nicked his name. This is a shame. As exciting as BJM’s experimentation and wigginess are, Mr. Jones had it all over them almost three decades before Anton Newcombe first wrestled someone to the ground onstage. more ›

As Black Sabbath, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Sex Pistols and others are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame tonight, we’re wondering how important such an institution is in a time when a “Top 100 Fill-In-The-Blank Bands Of All Time” list pops up every time we turn on the television. After all, the best AP writer David Bauder can do is to masquerade this mash note to Debbie Harry as a news story about the ceremony. more ›

Double standards, blatant finger-pointing, and accusations of selling out. In other words, just another week at Chicagoist. There were so many people falling on their swords last week that it was starting to look like a RenFaire-convention-for-the-blind around here. Perhaps we set the tone for martyrdom with this post on Kanye West on the cover of Rolling Stone. For whether it was faceless Latinas, the Cubs expansion project, or bands "selling out", there were no... more ›

We were sitting here minding our own business trying to take a nap until one of the other Chicagoist writers pointed out that Kanye West is on the cover of Rolling Stone this month. more ›

Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis are unusual. They have been long-time Chicago critical stalwarts in the rock and pop vein. They have pioneered the idea of written rock criticism expanded into a talk-show format on both radio and television. Instead of merely being pasty music dorks hiding behind a keyboard they have both been brave enough to be pasty music dorks reflecting the white glare of the public eye. more ›

The films that make up the Star Wars franchise have never been the “sleeper hit” of any summer. But we were still surprised to see Hayden Christansen’s pouty face adorning the front page of the Sun-Times this morning. Man, that Revenge of the Sith hype machine is something. Ebert gave it a rave review as did Michael Wilmington in the Tribune. Their accolades aren’t entirely surprising. Reviews of early screenings (most notably Kevin Smith’s review... more ›

While Lollapalooza is casting a big shadow over the other music events this summer, you don’t need to spend $85 (or $100 or $115) to see live music in the city. Metromix has posted dates for the various fests that celebrate local neighborhoods and musical genres this summer. Lineups for the neighborhood fests have yet to be announced but the schedules for the 21st Annual Chicago Gospel Music Festival and the 22nd Annual Chicago Blues Festival are out. Plus, they’re free. more ›

The well-worn cliché about British rock and pop audiences is that they are ready and willing to embrace a band that breaks the mold and presents something new—much more so than music fans over here. Just two years ago, music execs were in a panic over the lack of British artists on the Billboard charts. While Robbie Williams still remains a hard sell here, whatever plan was devised back in 2002 is clearly working. And... more ›

A wire story on Chicago-bred hip hop in this morning’s Red Streak runs with the idea that a high tide raises all boats. In this case, the motion of the ocean is courtesy of “recent” success of Kanye West and Twista. Members of Chicago’s hip-hop community interviewed for the article praise the underground scene, but note that Chicago’s also-ran status is due to a lack of management that can push local artists and, in turn, raise the profile of a city that’s had a thriving scene for years. In the early 1990s, Chicago became a flashpoint for the alternative rock scene thanks to bands like the Smashing Pumpkins and Screeching Weasel. Perhaps the “aughts” will be the time for Chicago’s hip-hop community to finally break wide. more ›

Unlike chocolate and peanut butter, politics and art are rarely two great tastes that taste great together. Witness Robert Mapplethorpe’s troubles with the NEA, the painting of former Chicago mayor Harold Washington in women’s underwear and this weekend’s Team America: World Police which is at the top of Chicagoist’s must-see list this weekend. Social commentary with puppets from the makers of South Park? Yes! And yet this only proves the above thesis as none other... more ›

If you haven't seen the Reader this week, there's an interesting cover story about a local college student, University of Chicago�s Loren Wilson, and his creation of a database that analyzes that Internet bastion of indie-rock coolness, Pitchfork. A Chicago-based website, Pitchfork is something of a guilty pleasure for Chicagoist. The site's staffers are pretentious, high-brow barometers of underground hype � the Rolling Stone of the indie world. (And they're just as easy to mock: Check out Popdork, indie label Sub Pop's hilarious parody of Pitchfork.) But their ability to write snarky reviews and expose readers to great unheard bands � their tireless cheerleading helped The Wrens, The Unicorns, and Broken Social Scene all achieve semi-fame over the past year � definitely appeals to our sensibilities. more ›