Obama isn't city's only export to Washington
BIG SHOULDERS BALL | Concert brings Chicago's music, fans -- even our beer -- to D.C.
WASHINGTON -- Change has come to the D.C. music scene. The Chicago-based Hideout took over the popular Black Cat nightclub Monday night with a progressively booked Big Shoulders Ball.
Chicago violinist Andrew Bird -- who plays Carnegie Hall on Jan. 28 -- was the evening's headliner. Wearing a black suit coat, bow tie and white socks (no shoes), he fronted an all-star aggregation that consisted of the experimental instrumental band Tortoise, guest vocalists Sally Timms of the Mekons and Janet Beveridge Bean of Eleventh Dream Day and Freakwater.
(Sun-Times files)
After performing two songs with the group, Bird played a solo set heavy that blended baroque, funk, stray whistles and folk idioms showing a musician consumed by the beauty of exploration. The most elegant moments arrived in his tender cover of the Handsome Family's ''Giant of Illinois'' (''the sky was a woman's arms ...'')
The club sold out all 800 tickets for the ball.
Hundreds of Chicagoans made the trek for the event, including two buses of fans and musicians from the Hideout, which produced the show with Interchange, a Chicago-based volunteer group to engage citizens in the democratic process through music and art.
Although one charter bus broke down on the way to D.C., all road warriors were in good spirits at the cavernous club, framed by exposed brick and decorated with City of Chicago banners. Goose Island beer was served.
All concertgoers were given a four-page program that featured the complete text of Carl Sandburg's "Hog Butcher for the World." Hideout co-owner Tim Tuten wore a natty tux, as did ubiquitous Freakwater bassist Dave Gay, who led the low-fi country band through an organic cover of Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed, Delivered." Other rural Freakwater material like "The Waitress Song" would have been right at home on Thomas Jefferson's farm. Freakwater vocalists Janet Beveridge Bean and Catherine Irwin got into the spirit by wearing silver tiaras.
Appreciative fans crowded the stage to take pictures and asborb the presence of 93-year-old blues guitarist-vocalist David ''Honeyboy'' Edwards. Accompanied by harmonica player Michael Frank, Edwards delivered a haunting version of "Sweet Home Chicago" as well as Robert Lockwood's "Little Boy Blue."
"I never thought I'd live to see the day a black man get elected president," Edwards said after his set.
Fans lined up for his autograph while Icy Demons played an eclectic mix of Brian Eno-influenced pop and hip-hop. The band's most engaging number was "Power For The People."
Icy Demons was a perfect entry into jazz cats Ken Vandermark, John Herndon and Jeff Parker (saxophone, guitar, drums) who interpreted the avant-garde music of Sun Ra. The late space jazz giant cut his teeth in dark Calumet City gin mills not unlike the Black Cat.
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