Putting this event together is a community effort

"As far as what we do in the festival and who we're trying to present it to, it's sort of a selfish enterprise in a lot of ways: We're putting on the bands that we want to see," says Pitchfork publisher Ryan Schreiber. He adds that he thinks of his readers and festivalgoers as people like himself: "rabid, music-hungry music addicts, basically."

Months before the festival, the Pitchfork staff draws up a wish list of acts, many of which have been lauded in the publication's reviews.

"I pretty much go with what Pitchfork wants to do," Reed says. "Pitchfork has to be happy, and we have to keep the kids [concertgoers] happy. Then, at the end of the day, there may be some acts that I really want to add into the mix. I love to think about it like making a record: Every festival should have a different thing happening."

Once the concert is under way, Pitchfork staffers pitch in to help as needed, but the heavy lifting is done by Reed and his staff, which includes familiar Chicago music scene faces. such as Mary Jones (an artists' manager who handles artists relations), Tim Tuten (co-owner of the Hideout who serves as emcee), Howard Greynolds (a manager and former publicist who serves as stage manager), Johnathan Crawford (a graphics and Web design guru) and Anders Lindall (a free-lance writer who handles publicity; Lindall is a frequent Sun-Times contributor, but he is not involved in the paper's coverage of Pitchfork)

Jim DeRogatis