Musical To-Do List for your Holiday Downtime

By Tankboy in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 18, 2007 5:55PM

Lucky enough to get a few days off for the Chrismukkah holidays? Several Chicago area music entities have been kind enough to give you time-filling options.

Lupe Fiasco’s sophomore CD The Cool drops today, and he has announced live dates from New York to Honolulu in support of it. Chicago's only chance to catch the hometown hero will be this Thursday during an in-store appearance at Wicker Park’s hip-hop destination The Bassment. While there, be sure to give Lupe your congrats … he just received a Grammy nomination for Best Urban/Alternative Performance.

Another way to quench your Chicago-based music thirst is to head over to the Metro this Saturday night, where good music and a good cause will come together. Skybox, Company of Thieves, and The Young Sea will bring their collective indie quirkiness together to raise money for Chicago’s division of 826, a nationwide non-profit writing and tutoring center.

Finally, anybody with an appreciation of area music history should absolutely make time to check out blues showman and Chicago local Buddy Guy’s “Chicago Blues Audio Tour”, a Chicago Office of Tourism produced audio tour and podcast. The tour runs 50 minutes, includes 15 stops, and is pushing towards a very respectable 100,000 downloads. Highlights include Guy’s narrations on The Original House of Blues, Maxwell Street, and more. Snag your free audio or video tour on iTunes or here.

Image of Lupe Fiasco via his MySpace page

Thanks Andrew!