The Empty Bottle, 312 and WBEZ have teamed up to present the High Fidelity Music Series, an intimate and exclusive music series that kicks off next week. more ›

If you haven't seen The Interrupters yet, do so immediately. Bonus: One of the film's stars will be there. more ›

In light of new school closings, WBEZ and Catalyst Chicago compiled this fascinating map that shows where schools have been closed or turned around, how well the new facilities are performing and what has become of those old school buildings. more ›

It’s one thing to understand the sound of rock ‘n roll, but it’s another thing to understand the look of rock ‘n roll. Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz manages to capture both. more ›

This is one of the best local news apps we've seen. more ›

Having spent the first 23 years of my life being served by legitimately second-rate public radio enterprises, I'm sometimes surprised at how WBEZ is taken for granted by the locals. more ›

In college I would listen to WBEZ and think, "someday I'll make enough to be a member." Now that I can afford to do so, that feeling is gone. more ›

WBEZ's Justin Kaufmann sits down with Patrick Stump to go over the veracity of the singer's Wikipedia entry. Corrections and clarifications abound! more ›

Schadenfreude and WBEZ's Justin Kaufmann wraps up their season long series of parodies of Wrigley Field/Cubs fan archetypes with a spot-on send-up on Ira Glass. more ›

The Moth started out in 1997 as a storytelling series in New York. Stories are told live, open mic-style, no notes, and are strictly from the storytellers’ hearts and heads. The Moth then grew into a podcast and a radio show, and it’s become so popular that there are now monthly Moth StorySLAMS in Los Angeles, Chicago and Detroit. Each month has a theme, like fame, confusion, or danger. Storytellers have five minutes to tell a true story that pertains to that theme, whether it be funny or sad or both. Each story gets a score, the the one with the highest is deemed that months’ winner. more ›

tUne-yArDs plays in about an hour and a half at Pitchfork but if you aren't heading there (or even if you are) there's a great interview with her on tonight's Sound Opinions. For a taste of what to expect, and a taste of just how she does that which she does sao well, here's a video of her performing "Powa" at the Sound Ops taping. more ›

If you really want to see what Chicago is like on the Fourth, you need to fly over the neighborhood where all the Chicago cops (and therefore all of the confiscated fireworks) are more ›

First of all, our apologies for the headline, but really, we couldn't resist. When Arcade Fire was in town recently, between singing at a Cubs game, shopping in Bucktown, and playing three sold-out shows, they took a few minutes to sit down and chat with Sound Opinions' Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis. The interview's a good one, and punctures any preconception you might have that the group's members are a tortured pretentious lot. Between the friendly banter the band took time to play new arrangements of "Sprawl II" And "We Used To Wait." You can get a sneak peek at "Sprawl II" below and then tune in to Sound Opinions this weekend tonight at 8 p.m. or Saturday at 11 a.m. to hear the whole interview. more ›

If you haven't been introduced to the genius interview stylings of comedian Marc Maron's WTF podcast, you are missing out on one of the best things the Internet has to offer right now. His primary subjects are comedians both famous and infamous, and Maron has a knack for pulling information out of them that one would never expect. Instead of long and boring dissertations on "what makes comedy comedy," Maron instead opts to act as a combination of psychiatrist and subject, often pulling intensely information from his subjects and then using it to make an emotional connection or leap of his own. Through all of this Maron manages the nigh impossible and keeps the conversation between he and his guest (or guests, as often happens during his live WTF tapings) 100% entertaining. Riveting, even! more ›

A towering, bespectacled misfit who reads his poetry in front of bewildered rock audiences is a great subject for a song. (Or a fake death scare, for that matter). So no music fan can blame modern folkie Damien Jurado, performing in the WBEZ studios, for taking some poetic license on Thax Douglas, a local legend famous for reading brief, surreal poetry before live shows. There's just one problem: Jurado's romantic take on Douglas leaving Chicago for Texas is, well, not true. Here are the facts on Thax: He could be kind of a jerk. more ›

Police Internal Affairs officers are investigating the actions of police officers caught on video allowing bystanders to taunt a person in their custody in Humboldt Park. the incident came to their attention via WBEZ. Reporter Samuel Vega discovered the video on Youtube (via his facebook feed) posted by a user named "King-Dubb" on March 19. Both the video and profile have since been taken down, but Vega saved the video (embedded below) on his computer. more ›

WBEZ's Lee Bey shared two clips of a 1957 television drama filmed in Chicago called Chicago 2-1-2 on his blog last week. The show, as Bey noted, was part of a DuPont Anthology series on ABC and starred Frank Lovejoy as Chicago Fire Department Inspector Ed McCook, tracking down an arsonist. Chicago 2-1-2 — the "2-1-2" being the call signature for the main fire alarm office at the time — was essentially Dragnet for firefighters. more ›

Jessica Hopper and J.R. Nelson return with the "second season" of the WBEZ Hit It Or Quit It podcast. Hopper's hiatus is explained away with the claim she's been holed up writing scripts for the new shows (in fact she became a recent mom, going into labor at last year's Pitchfork Music Festival), while Nelson claims to have been locked up (a bunch of hooey). more ›

Trade pizza, beer and the HDTV this Sunday to hang out with some really smart women. WBEZ’s Off-Air Series is bringing writers Anita Chandwaney, Jane Hamilton, Parneshia Joness and Audrey Niffenegger together to discuss their individual creative writing processes. Eight Forty-Eight’s Alison Cuddy will play host to an evening that will include “personal video, real-time artistic creation and discussion about the context from which each of these writers construct their unique voices.” To us, that sounds like the writers will be speaking a lot of their personal experience in creative writing. Here’s some more information about the women who will be present, all of whom have been residents at Ragdale, an artist’s retreat North of Chicago where many writers escape to work: more ›

Look, it is no secret around these parts that I'm not exactly "into" sports. But when big ol' sporting events roll around I can appreciate their impact on pop culture and I can really appreciate the parties that spring up around them! So it's lucky for me -- and all other non-sports fans trying to not stand out at a Super Bowl party as they wolf down free beer, pizza, fried chicken and chips while everyone else yells at the TV -- some of the kind folks over at WBEZ have put together a video to help people NOT stand out at a Super Bowl party. Thanks to Mike Danforth and Ian Chillag for putting this together! more ›

The Sound Opinions at the Movies series is one of our favorites right now, happily perched at the very busy intersection of pop music and popular movies and hosted by two genuine fans who clearly love what they're doing. They've gone about as far back into the past as they can to pull their latest title, Jailhouse Rock. The King's star is rather dim these days, and it's good to give him some love, but can't help being disappointed they picked the third-best movie to do it. more ›

Tribune arts critic Howard Reich offers a near point-by-point rebuttal of last week's story from WBEZ's Jim DeRogatis regarding the exodus at the Department of Cultural Affairs. DeRo posited the story as a power struggle between the Department of Cultural Affairs and the Mayor's Office of Special Events when, in fact, many of the jobs at the department, including that of respected programmer Mike Orlove, are being transferred to the non-profit Chicago Tourism Fund. more ›

Of the former Vocalo blogs, Robert Feder's media blog was the centerpiece of them all and the foundation for which the others (Steve Dolinsky, Lee Bey, Achy Obejas, et al) came into orbit. more ›

While legendary thrash metal band Slayer was in town a couple weeks back to play a concert at UIC Pavilion, "Sound Opinions" hosts Jim Derogatis and Greg Kot interviewed guitarist Kerry King and drummer Dave Lombardo for the show's 250th episode on public radio, airing this weekend on WBEZ. more ›

Over on Vocalo, Mission Army K.R. did a series last week asking folks to create "f*ck it lists," the top five things they do not want to ever have to do. Torey Malatia's list was our favorite in the series, primarily because it showed the man has an excellent sense of humor (and he would have to in order to endure Ira Glass endlessly tweaking Malatia with each and every TAL sign off). more ›

If you are among the legions of Chicagoans toting an iPhone, there is no excuse for being out of touch with the news these days. Until recently, Chicago was not well represented in the iTunes store. In fact, what should have been the flagship of the Second City’s local news offerings was an embarrassment with a woeful and limited app from the Chicago Tribune. But this week’s rollout of a reconceptualized app from the folks in Michigan Avenue’s gothic tower is just the latest in a groundswell of Chicago media offerings for Apple devices. Here’s a quick rundown: more ›

While the actual Museum of Broadcasting remains a half-constructed shell of an building, the organization continues to induct members into its Radio Hall of Fame. Born contrarian Howard Stern is up for the honor (again) and like past years, he's lashing out against it and telling his listeners not to vote for him. Like Sherman, he will not run if nominated, he will not serve if elected. And all that was fine - until his invective turned to Carl Kasell. more ›

Pavement's Stephen Malkmus is often described as arch, almost the embodiment of the postmodern musician, but every time this writer has ever run into him Malkmus has always been unfailingly engaging and polite. So it's refreshing to hear him come across so comfortably and clearly in his interview with Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot on this week's Sound Opinions. He talks with the local music critics after Pavement's appearance at The Pitchfork Music Festival about his old band's entire career; from the earliest days of ex-drummer Gary Young's studio to Makmus apologizing for dropping names while mentioning it was on Thom Yorke's advice that they work with Nigel Godrich on their final album. He also discusses their "golden period" a.k.a. those albums upon which the critical tastes of almost an entire generation was formed saying: more ›

Dazed And Confused, Richard Linklater's big(ger) budget follow-up to his generational defining Slacker, always made us happier we were just a wee bit too young to have been the right age to fall prey to the hazing rituals displayed onscreen. more ›

With the trial of former Chicago Police commander Jon Burge set to resume with jury selection on Monday, WBEZ has recruited John Conroy, who originally covered the accusations and investigations extensively for The Reader, to blog the trial for them. It's a great get for WBEZ given the depth and breadth of Conroy's knowledge of the case; his still chilling 1990 piece "House of Screams" essentially broke the story wide open. more ›