Leslie and the LYs come and go in a flash of glittery spandex. One moment, leading lady Leslie Hall is gyrating onstage, and the next she’s retreated to her home in Ames, Iowa, leaving you to wonder "who was that lady in the gold-lame jumpsuit?" and "Why was she rapping about gem sweaters?" Well, tonight’s your chance to find out, when Leslie and her crew play an intimate show at Subterranean. more ›

We love Sloan. Their latest album, The Double Cross, proves that the band, twenty years into their career, is showing no signs of slowing down. The only thing that excites us more than their records, though, is their live show. The quartet from Halifax is truly impressive as they display their indelible pop smarts and arena-sized rawk-n-roll abandon amidst a flurry of instrument switching onstage. Their concerts are truly joyous events, filled with dancing, hand clapping, fist pumping and a couple gallons of sweat. more ›

Admittedly, “Moon Furies” is a much less striking band name than “Moon Furries,” as we first misread it. But we still give them props for their upcoming endeavor; the band will venture to play 100 shows in 100 days and will donate all the proceeds to Chicago’s own Kellogg Cancer Center and its research efforts. more ›

It's a bit of a pain in the ass dealing with Scion's incessant need to seem cool and ultra-relevant in the eyes of consumers, but we aren't about to deny the fact that the company knows what it's doing when it comes to sponsored events. As part of its ongoing touring monthly, Radio 17, Scion will use Subterranean's space to feature a bevy of fantastic DJs including Drop The Lime, Style of Eye, Franki Chan, Gina Turner and Kid Color. With a full slate of house and disco in store, it's up to you where the night will take you. Our bets are on the back alley dumpster with a new friend (which may or may not be a half-eaten piece of cabbage). more ›

With cold weather finally upon Chicago, it’s easy for the city’s residents to feel defeated. And yet, press forward we must. Winter’s icy grip may be at our backs. But there are jobs to find, errands to run, and life to generally carry on with. (Soul-crushing wind chills be damned.) The best soundtrack for these daily affairs acknowledges the push-and-pull effects of the season. There’s the world-weariness of the gray, drab setting, sure. But if you stop and listen once in a while, you just might hear the beating, pulsating heart of a broad-shouldered city determined not to let the achromatic milieu drag them down. And whose music should color those who live lives of not-so-quiet desperation? Seafarer’s, for one. more ›

In the sea of independent music that Chicagoist covers from day-to-day it is very easy to muck through a bunch of promotional materials and get turned off by what seems like an insurmountable wall of same old, same old indie rock. When we got our hands on Mayer Hawthorne's debut seven-inch, Just Ain't Gonna Work Out/When I Said Goodbye, last year with it's signature heart-shaped, fire-engine-red vinyl, it was quite literally hard to miss. When we got past our love of the packaging and opened our ears we discovered what we loved even more: Hawthorne's hip-hop-flavored old-school soul sound. more ›

Local electro-pop trio Helicopters is using the release of its upcoming album, cleverly titled Slow Leak at the Seam, to help safeguard wildlife affected by the tragedy that is the BP oil spill. Or maybe they’re using the oil spill to spread their new album. Either way, here’s how it works: Every Tuesday, Helicopters will be releasing a new song from the upcoming album on their Bandcamp site. The buyer can download each track for a donation of their choosing, and all proceeds from these tracks (as well as from any music, merch or upcoming shows) will go to the Gulf Restoration Fund and the National Wildlife Federation. Plus, the first 200 people to donate $10 for any given track will get a free download of the album when it’s released this September. more ›

Nine months ago The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir's van rolled over, destroyed all their gear, and landed the members of the group in the hospital with varying levels of injury. Some members were discharged from hospital stays in hours while others ended up finding their recovery taking months. While we never doubted the band's dogged optimism and determination we have to admit that we are surprised at the willful speed of the members' recovery and are happily shocked to see that they will all be on stage at Subterranean tomorrow night to play their first show since the accident. more ›

If you are looking to culturally broaden your musical horizons, Subterranean's downstairs lounge is the place to be this Friday. The evening is another installment of their recently started bi-monthly World Music Fridays featuring bands that incorporate music from a vast array of countries and cultures into their sound. more ›

Coltrane Motion are amongst the city’s best of the rising crop of shoegazers - including Panda Riot and Tirra Lirra - to introduce a dance element to the subgenre’s typical swath of gauzy guitars. Such a development can be heard in Coltrane Motion’s upcoming June release Hello Ambition!, the title of which should give you an idea of where the band wants to go with its blend of upbeat electronica and psychedelic ambiance. The band was kind enough to share an advance listen of "Please Call It A Comeback" off Hello Ambition! more ›

If you’ve heard of Stardeath and White Dwarfs it’s probably due to their recent collaborations with The Flaming Lips’ including their cover of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album and a reimagining of Madonna’s “Borderline.” The two bands share a bloodline -- The Lips’ Wayne Coyne is Stardeath singer / guitarist Dennis Coyne’s uncle - both physical and philosophical. Stardeath’s debut The Birth bears a strong resemblance to their mentor’s noisier early days although the younger group’s psych tendencies are more melodic and less frightening than one would expect. more ›

Subterranean's monthly Trick Disco stakes claim to this week's edition of Weekend Dance Party. We first considered giving the nod to LA Riots, Members Only AV and Team Bayside High at Abbey Pub on Saturday, but the show's steep $15 price tag soured us a bit. Besides, tonight's Trick Disco is equally good, and at a cool $5, we see no reason not to make it our dance destination. more ›

The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir are on the road to recovery after their horrific van crash last month, but they still have mountains of hospital bill to tackle, and much of their gear needs to be replaced. So a number of the band's friends are getting together tomorrow night at Subterranean to play, celebrate life, and raise money for The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir. more ›

Grand Duchy is Frank Black's electro-pop rock side project he's got going with his wife, Violet Clark. Actually, maybe it's not a side project. Black seems to like to keep incredibly so maybe all his bands are main projects? Semantics. What is clear is that Grand Duchy is a delightful listen, and Clark and Black act as excellent foils to each other, teasing out gentle melodies and crafting delicate and ingratiating tunes that linger on long after the stylus has hit the label. more ›

Cage The Elephant may be from Kentucky but their sound is the stuff that British music mags drool over. If you slow down the Arctic Monkeys to a pleasurable speed that'd give you a good idea of what Cage The Elephant sounds like. Their single "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" is a midtempo rumination on what appears to be a pretty bummer of a day in the narrator's life with a musical backing off an early Beck album. The band mishes and mashes its influences into engaging nuggets of noise. more ›

The Format's Nate Ruess, Anathallo's Andrew Dost, and Steel Train's Jack Antonoff make up the core of new "super"-group fun., but we're told the auxiliary line-up fluctuates from show to show. We were just sent an MP3 of a jaunty tune off their forthcoming full length and just had to share it with you. more ›

Manchester Orchestra creates music that's is plaintive yet rejoicing, and we find the mixture alluring. The band borrows the nasal whine of glam rock and injects it into a bed firmly rooted in the indie rock that rules the CMJ college set. This creates songs that often feel like they're tripping over themselves with a sense of urgency as they try to convey their own inner truths and emotions through nothing more than a couple musical instruments. This is music that is earnest but never cloying. more ›

Low Vs Diamond make us wanna wave lighters in the air, drink pints of lager, and make out with Brits in the discotheque, so imagine our surprise when we learned they were based in California. They mine Muse and The Killers for their sound, which ain't all that surprising considering they were discovered by the same dude who signed The Killers. Low Vs Diamond is in town tonight to play Subterranean, so check out the video below and see if they might be to your liking. more ›

Matt and Kim play Subterranean tomorrow, and we have a pair of tickets for a lucky Chicagoist reader for the show. When we walked past the club yesterday one of our friends saw the marquee and asked if Matt and Kim were from Chicago, since they always seemed to be playing here. They're not, but Chicago does seem to have become the ridiculously energetic duo's second home, and they attract massive crowd of dance-happy listeners to all their area appearances. The band's super simple mixture of singer Matt Johnson's adenoidal vocals and pumping organ chords and drummer Kim Schifino's wide eyed smiling drum thumps ensnares any within earshot. We would say their enthusiasm in infectious, but that would be understating the vibe they throw off from onstage. No one leaves a Matt & Kim show in a dry t-shirt or without a smile. more ›

Chicago ex-pats Walter Meego are making a stop in their hometown tonight at Subterranean with Ra Ra Riot. Their album, Voyager, played a large part in the soundtrack of our summer this year, so as the temperatures start to dip, we can't think of a better band to go see as we mark the unofficial end of summer. more ›