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Goose Island is far from an island unto itself these days. Thanks to its 2011 sale to Anheuser-Busch and its parent company, Belgian-Brazilian conglomerate InBev, it’s expanded its reach—you can now sip beers from Chicago’s “craft brewery” in all 50 states and all over the world, from São Paolo to Shanghai. May 2018 marks the 30th anniversary of Goose Island. To celebrate this occasion and commemorate our founder John Hall’s love of English beer, we collaborated with Fuller’s of London to create a 30th Anniversary Ale....

In late July a fire destroyed Mucho Culo, a near-west-side studio, performance space, and multimedia outlet as well as the home of local DJ and musician Erik Voit, aka Pranas. Voit made it out of the building with his laptop, hard drive, and Maschine Studio controller, but he had to abandon the rest of his music gear—keyboards, turntables, guitars, basses, microphones, synths—and audio/video equipment. “I estimate I had about $60,000 to $70,000 worth of stuff,” he says....

On March 12, the dancers of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago were onstage preparing for opening night of their spring program, Ohad Naharin’s DECADANCE/CHICAGO, at the Harris Theater. They continued to rehearse until 5 PM, the hour when Governor J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced guidelines for the cancellation of large-scale and community events to stem the spread of COVID-19. “How could we justify performing [that] night when the following day was not safe?...

Mortdecai Last week, when I was holed up with a bad cold, I was looking for some escapist entertainment I could enjoy while under a Nyquil stupor. I have the good fortune to live just a few blocks from a Redbox rental kiosk, so I thought I’d pick up some $1.50-a-night DVDs when I made a run to the supermarket for tissues and soup. Mortdecai is currently the featured new release at Redbox....

A Reader staffer shares three musical obsessions, then asks someone (who asks someone else) to take a turn. The Other One This 2015 Netflix documentary details the long, strange trip that’s been the life of Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir, following this humble and far-out dude on his seemingly endless journey as the anchor of one of America’s most prolific bands. Even some hard-core Dead detractors I know have gushed over how excellent and inspirational The Other One is....

A new amendment to Chicago’s Residential Landlord-Tenant Ordinance introduced by Mayor Lori Lightfoot at last week’s City Council meeting extends protections for tenants facing no-fault evictions. If passed, the changes would require landlords to give 90 days’ notice—instead of the current 30 days—to tenants whose leases they don’t want to renew. And, if landlords aren’t renewing a lease to “substantially rehabilitate or demolish” the unit, they’d be required to pay the tenants a $2,500 relocation stipend....

Pilsen hardcore heroes Los Crudos celebrate their 25th anniversary with nine days of music and art this fall. Desafinados, which roughly translates as “those who are out of tune,” will center on a gallery exhibition documenting the history of Latino and Chicano punk in Pilsen and Little Village; the Co-Prosperity Sphere will host Desafinados, which runs from Friday, September 30, through Saturday, October 8. Desafinados will also include an art fair, panels on queer art and local punk, and a literary night with readings by Michelle Gonzales (Spitboy) and Alice Bag (the Bags)....

Goldlink’s runaway 2017 hit “Crew” would be nothing without the buttery-smooth vocal hook from Brent Faiyaz. Raised in Columbia, a Maryland suburb that rests on an axis between Baltimore and D.C., the 22-year-old tried his hand at being an MC before he received a Twitter DM from a stranger advising him to stop rapping and focus his on other aspects of his music. Faiyaz wisely followed suit, making the stranger his manager....

In the wake of the latest blow to affordable housing construction on the northwest side—a City Council zoning committee no vote last week on a proposed development with 30 affordable units in the 41st ward—advocates and aldermen have joined forces on a new ordinance package. The proposed new rules would give affordable housing proposals the same due process in City Council that strip clubs currently enjoy. In an attempt to limit aldermanic prerogative—the City Council custom that affords aldermen wide latitude to veto development proposals in their wards—the ordinances would require aldermen to present hard evidence about any possible negative impacts the development might have on their ward....

In 1984, opening a blues lounge in Logan Square made little business sense. The neighborhood was (and still is) predominantly Hispanic, had a moderate gang problem, and was decidedly far-flung in relation to Chicago’s other blues hubs on the south and north sides. “People already had some preexisting judgment about Logan Square if you go back 30 years ago,” Tony Mangiullo says. “The idea of a blues club here was absolutely crazy....

When I first heard the music of Saskatchewan cousins Kacy Anderson and Clayton Linthicum, who’ve been performing folk music together as Kacy & Clayton since they were children, I found it a bit too polished; it summoned the spirit of Judy Collins more than Anne Briggs. But something about the duo’s third album, last year’s Strange Country (New West), transformed my initial opinion. There was an earnestness to the songs; it was clear the duo weren’t trying to pretend to be OG folkies, and that self-awareness came through when Anderson sang lyrics such as “Because everything I’m doing has already been done,” in “If You Ask How I’m Keeping....

Four Reader critics did triple—and, yes, even sextuple—duty last weekend, checking out entries in this year’s Chicago Fringe Festival so that you can see or strategically avoid them during the fest’s final days, September 8 through 11. For times, tickets, and other info, go to chicagofringe.org. —Tony Adler Elieida Rhiannon Frazier and Kate Farmin are so close to a classical vaudeville duo at times, the electrical charge between them so nearly attuned, that Ellieida should be required viewing for every self-respecting Marxist (Groucho, not Karl) in the greater Chicago area....

Richard A. Chapman/Sun-Times Come to the Hideout tomorrow for First Tuesdays to hear Karen Lewis talk to Mick and Ben about charters. As part of my ongoing effort to be more appreciative of every little good thing—no matter how little it may be—let me take this opportunity to congratulate the school board for postponing a decision on Noble’s latest charter high school application. Sorry, that outburst was not in spirit with my resolution to be cheery....

Denny Tedesco—whose father, guitarist Tommy Tedesco, was one of the greatest session musicians of the rock era—started working on his documentary The Wrecking Crew shortly after his dad was diagnosed with cancer in 1996, but it didn’t premiere until 12 years later, at the South by Southwest Film Festival. Another seven years elapsed before Denny could raise enough money to license the dozens of hit records excerpted in the movie, by artists as diverse as Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, the Beach Boys, the Monkees, Sonny and Cher, Ike and Tina Turner, and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass....

The films in the 17th Annual African Diaspora International Film Festival do what much media and even the public school system fail to do: educate. Through robust programming that gives meaning to the word “diverse,” the selections in this year’s festival illuminate the experiences of those living in the African diaspora around the world. The New York-based husband-and-wife programmers, Reinaldo Barroso-Spech and Diarah N’Daw-Spech, have chosen more than a dozen films that, through a variety of modes and genres, further dimensionalize already complex issues specific to those living in these communities....

2020 leveled everything and everyone. There was civil unrest happening. There was no place to go. Everybody got stuck. Do you just give up and succumb to it all? Or do you push, do you ride through? What do you do? There’s no way I can let these kids give up. I need to lead by example. That means creating space. That means we can talk about it. That means we can write a song about it....

Many Americans are extremely reluctant to talk publicly about race, a topic made all the more inflammatory by the lack of honest conversation. Race is the elephant in the room we wish would disappear, even when—or sometimes, perhaps, because—the media are saturated with harrowing stories about hate crimes, civil rights violations, education inequities, voter disenfranchisement, redlining, gentrification, and racial profiling by law enforcement. In addressing the last of these issues in the new Showtime documentary 16 Shots, about the October 2014 murder of Chicago west-side Black teenager Laquan McDonald and the trial of his killer, white Chicago Police Department officer and Hinsdale native Jason Van Dyke, writer-director Rick Rowley pulls back the curtain on an institution noted for closing ranks....

In one scene from the 2019 documentary Dusty Groove: The Sound of Transition, Rick Wojcik sifts through a record collection in the Pill Hill basement of Grady Johnson, a jazz saxophonist and one of Chicago’s first Black pharmacists. Wojcik owns the record store after which the film is named, and he frequents such spaces in the course of his job—much of his inventory consists of the jazz, R&B, and hip-hop albums he finds there....

Concerts are back, baby! Well, they’re back at some venues, with limited capacity and social distancing enforced. OK, we haven’t actually returned to Before Times status yet, but in-person shows are slowly ramping up for those who can risk attending. This week’s gig poster advertises two upcoming concerts at Reggies’ (on the Bananna’s Comedy Shack stage) by Las Vegas-based rockabilly band the Delta Bombers. The art and design are by Jason Lonon of Greensboro, North Carolina, who’s been making posters, banners, logos, and other art for bands, car shows, and burlesque events (often with rockabilly or retro rock ‘n’ roll connections) under the name Death-Ray Design since 2003....

Chicago loves the murals of Sandra Antongiorgi and Marcus Akinlana. The mural, which covered about 2,000 square feet and had been carefully restored by Antongiorgi in 2010 with funding from the community development organization Archi-Treasures, was completely wiped out—apparently speedily and without consultation with anyone who might care. Neither the artists nor the aldermen were contacted (its 200-foot span bridged the 26th and 35th Wards). “It was such an aggressive act,” Antongiorgi says....