Latest blog headlines Billy Corgan has time to design a guitar for Fender... (7/03/2008 13:04:38 PM) Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers at the United Center (7/03/2008 00:13:34 AM) Eddie's coming home (7/02/2008 17:30:48 PM) Beck, ?Modern Guilt? (Interscope) [3.5 out of 4 stars] (7/02/2008 09:48:50 AM) Demo2DeRo: Sleep Out (7/02/2008 09:48:50 AM) This Weekend: Dropkick Murphys and a worthy cause at the Hideout (7/02/2008 09:46:55 AM) Fleet Foxes, ?Fleet Foxes? (Sub Pop) [3.5 out 4 stars] (7/02/2008 09:46:55 AM) Alejandro Escovedo gets animalistic (7/02/2008 09:44:51 AM) Crazy Rhythms Redux: The return of the Feelies (7/01/2008 12:02:52 PM) F--- and run... and run again (6/24/2008 22:26:12 PM)
At age 57, with a storied solo career and a long history including time with punk-rockers the Nuns and alternative-country pioneers Rank & File and the True Believers behind him, Alejandro Escovedo has never sounded like he's had more fun recording than he did while making "Real Animal."
Jim DeRogatis: Two years ago, Tom Petty announced that he was swearing off large-scale arena tours for good. But on Wednesday, there he was again at age 57, leading the Heartbreakers through a satisfying two-hour set at a sold-out United Center, and with his laconic charm and trademark nasal twang as oddly endearing as ever.
Jim DeRogatis: While it has yet to recapture the glory days of the early '90s -- the musical bookings at Chicago's venerable Taste of Chicago have incrementally been improving in recent years.
Jim DeRogatis: When it comes to noteworthy milestones, the numbers are usually 10, 25, 50 and so on. The 15th anniversary seems like something only a polyester bride would celebrate. But then, Liz Phair has some indie cred to reclaim, a recording career to resuscitate and a new deluxe-edition reissue to sell and these were all the reasons she needed to return to her old sounds and former stomping grounds for a sold-out show at the Vic Theatre on Tuesday.
Always the perfect note to end Chicago's long hot summer of outdoor festivals, the 12th Annual Hideout Block Party takes place this year in the charmingly gritty industrial setting outside the club at 1354 W. Wabansia starting at noon on Sept. 20 & 21.
Over the last five years, on a strong EP ("As You Burn") released last August and on several demos before that, vocalist Carlos Paz, guitarists Ralph Gomez and Joe Trtan, bassist Louie Salgado and drummer Roger Guerrero have breathed new life into the sweet/sour, hard/soft merger, if not quite living up to their boast of conjuring the sound that would have resulted "if Metallica and Stone Temple Pilots had a child, it would've had Bush for step parents and Breaking Benjamin as a distant cousin."
ART ROCK | My Morning Jacket, "Evil Urges" (ATO)
Having spent its first decade building a loyal following straddling patchouli-scented jam-band fans and Pitchfork-quoting indie-hipsters -- an Allman Brothers for the alt-country crowd, or space-rock Wilco fronted by a reedier-voiced Lenny -- the Louisville, Ky., quintet My Morning Jacket began to walk the experimental/art-rock tightrope on its last album "Z" (2005), and it was rewarded with its biggest commercial success. Underscoring his desire not to be typecast as, you know, a mix of jam band fan and indie-rock hipster, bandleader Jim James told the New York Times, "I don't want people to think anything when they hear 'My Morning Jacket.' I just want them to think of a question mark."
It's hard to believe it’s almost July — the mid point for 2008 — but that can only mean one thing: IT’S TIME FOR A LIST!
If there's a more aptly named band in Chicago than the Frantic, I can't think of it.
Jim DeRogatis: If there’s a more aptly named band in Chicago than the Frantic, I can’t think of it. With high-profile gigs on the horizon at Metro this weekend, Taste of Chicago on July 1 and several stops on the Warped Tour in August, I caught up with guitarist-vocalist Kyle Dee at the tail end of the band's latest tour.
Jim DeRogatis: As any criminal-defense attorney will attest, "not guilty" does not mean "innocent." During the six-year wait for R. Kelly to have his day in court, the multitalented singer, songwriter and producer often sang of asking God to forgive him for unnamed sins.
If the electro-hip-hop, industrial-electronica backings sometimes sound a bit canned -- Vinson crafted the album using Ableton, an audio sequencer playable in real time like an instrument -- his sung/rapped/recited lyrics/tone poems contain bursts of humor, inspiration and poignancy, along with touches of high-school sophomore silliness (perfectly understandable, since he actually was a high school sophomore not that long ago). "It was a creative laxative of sorts," Vinson says of these sounds, and that's no b.s.
