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T R - IN THIS ISSUE THEATER music veteran Martin Atkins brings dependable indiepop fi vepiece @ 17 Beyond the Canon Simeilia together all sorts of scenes onstage Varsity release album number HodgeDallaway wants to three and Avondale record shop FOOD & DRINK P TB 03 Culinary Confession Why I’m decolonize dramatic literature No Requests throws in the towel ECS K KH speaking up about Abe Conlon 19 Existence It will take more than CLR H OpenYourLobby to address M EP M OPINION TDKR NEWS & POLITICS racism in American theater 31 National Politics The major C EBW 06 Joravsky | Politics Hey MAGA parties benefi t too much from our AEJL stop using Dr King to justify police rigged system to pursue reform SWMD L G DI BJ MS brutality 32 Savage Love Dan Savage off ers EAS N L 08 Photo Scenes from funeral advice to straight men questioning GD AH homes on the front lines of the what it means to be heterosexual L CSC -J C EBN B coronavirus pandemic L C M DLCMC 26 Records of note A pandemic J F S F JH I can’t stop the fl ow of great music H C MJ M KSK Our critics review releases that you N D LJL can enjoy at home MMAM -K 29 The Secret History of J R N JN M O M S CS Chicago Music A tragic plane ------crash deniedhornrock juggernaut FILM DD J D 20 Review Babyteeth explores the Chase their legacy SMCJ G diff erence between being alive and 30 Early Warnings Rescheduled SSP actually living concerts and other updated listings ATA 21 Movies of note Pete Davidson S IDM N ARTS & CULTURE shines in TheKingofStatenIsland CLASSIFIEDS D DC W 13 Community How Chicago artists LuckyGrandma is sparkling and 34 Jobs MPCY D are spreading the message that utterly delightful and Jasmine 34 Apartments & Spaces E ASL K Black Lives Matter Batchelor’s performance in The 34 Marketplace SEC K K 14 History A group of Black Surrogate stands out amidst the ADVERTISING archivists is helping communities heavy subject matter -- @ create their own narratives fi lling in C what history books have le out MUSIC & NIGHTLIFE - @ 15 Party Celebrate Juneteenth with 22 Feature Why do indie musicians VPSA M Bosses in Bonnets and Preach put up with penny payouts? O P G CRM TP G F G’ 16 Comedy Dwayne Kennedy is the 25 ChiMusic With his 30 Gossip Wolf Midnight Dice SA R L M-H L S voice of Chicago supergroup Pigface industrial issue a passport to hesher heaven CSM WR

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C ©C R Unchecked immunity A tribute to Big Floyd From soldier to worker P C IL A C RR Governor Pritzker granted A gig poster that imagines if Maya Dukmasova traces the RR T ® nursing homes and hospitals George Floyd had survived and history of police unions in last immunity for most malpractice. his rap career had a resurgence week’s cover story.

2 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll When A Great Deal Matters, Shop Rob Paddor’s... FOOD & DRINK Evanston Subaru in Skokie A CULINARY CONFESSION GRAND REOPENING OUR SHOWROOM IS OPEN! NO APPOINTMENTS ARE NEEDED WELCOME BACK DEALS! % % % % 0% 0063 MONTHS00

FORESTER OUTBACK ASCENT IMPREZA And why I wish I had a year ago 9:00AM-8:00PM 9:00AM-6:00PM By M S Monday-Friday APPOINTMENTNO REQUIRED Saturday Social Distancing & Face Masks will be ast July I told myself I was done with Abe muncher. Spearheaded largely by another Required for all Customers and Employees Conlon. But here I go again. onetime underground chef and brief Fat Rice L If you’ve paid much attention to the employee, Joey Pham, it took the form of a Voted “Best Auto DeAlership” Reader’s food coverage over the last nine blizzard of Instagram posts quoting former By CHICAGO Voters’ Poll 2019 years, you know Conlon as the once obscure employees accusing Conlon, and in some cases S underground chef who opened Logan Square’s his partner Adrienne Lo, of everything from TOP-QUALITY INSPECTED USED CARS & SUV’ Fat Rice and went on to build a national repu- racism, to cultural appropriation, to wage IMPORTS & DOMESTICS SUBARU FORESTERS tation for food inspired by the southern Chi- theft. ‘17 Honda CR-V LX AWD ...... Automatic, Full Power, White, 24205A ....$17,995 ‘16 Forester Touring ...... Automatic Sunroof, Leather, Silver, 23651A ....$18,995 nese peninsula of Macau. But what comes across strongest is the pic- ‘17 VW Passat 1.8T SE AWD...... Auto., Leather Sunroof, Grey, 6485A ....$14,995 ‘17 Forester Ltd...... Automatic Sunroof, Leather, Silver, 24102A ....$17,995 ‘16 Honda Fit EX ...... Automatic, Moonroof, 13K, Black, 24485A ....$13,995 ‘16 Forester Prem...... Automatic, Sunroof, Heated Seats, Red, 24456A ....$16,995 If, for some reason, you were paying at- ture of Conlon as arrogant and dismissive; a ‘17 Hyundai Elantra Value Ed...... Automatic, Blind Spot, Black, 24367A ....$12,995 ‘14 Forester Prem. ..Automatic, Sunroof, Heated Seats, White, 24116A ....$13,995 tention to Chicago restaurant social media belittler and a berater prone to unpredictable ‘12 Acura TL w/Tech/Navi/ ...... Leather, Moonroof, Black, 24284A ....$11,995 two chaotic weekends ago, you know that explosions of rage; exhibit A in the case against SUBARU OUTBACKS / ASCENT / CROSSTREK ‘13 Hyundai Sante Fe 2.0T AWD .. Automatic, Full Power, Black 23373B ....$11,995 ‘19 Ascent ...... 8 Passenger, Sunroof, Eyesight, 4K, Grey, P6528 ....$25,995 reputation got dragged—and dragged hard. culinary toxicity. ‘14 Buick Encore...... Automatic, 1-Owner, 42K, Ruby Red, 23690A ....$10,995 ‘16 Outback Prem...... Automatic, All Weather, Alloys, Black, 24117A ....$17,995 In fact, the issue arose out of the collective Some might ﬁ nd it easy to dismiss the com- ‘11 Honda CRV EX AWD ...... Automatic, Sunroof, Silver, 24311A ...... $9,995 ‘16 Legacy 3.6R Ltd./Navi...... Automatic, Full Power, Blue, 24428A ....$15,995 agony and protest in the aftermath of George plaints of former employees with suspicion, or ‘15 Kia Soul ...... Manual, Full Power, Alien2, 21917A ...... $7,995 ‘17 Crosstrek Ltd...... Automatic, Leather, Sunroof, White, 34321A ....$19,995 Floyd’s murder: a number of Chicago chefs and downplay their severity as disgruntled snow- ‘13 Hyundai Tucson GLS ...... Automatic, Full Power, Bronze, 24460A ...... $6,995 ‘16 Crosstrek Prem...... Automatic, All-Weather, Hyper Blue, 24275A9 ....$15,995 restaurants were called out on social media ﬂ ake sniveling, but the stories took me right A+ for various forms of alleged bad behavior after back to a warm summer morning in a narrow RATED posting seemingly self-serving support of the condo kitchen when Conlon treated myself EvanstonSubaru.com Black Lives Matter movement (or in one case, and two colleagues to the mother of all temper 3340 OAKTON - SKOKIE • 847-869-5700 outright rejection of it). tantrums. *Add tax, title license and $300 doc fee. 0%financing for 63 months. Monthly payment of $15.87 per $1,000 borrowed. But the Conlon A air was the real popcorn But let me back up. I moonlight as an editor Finance on approved credit score Subject to vehicle insurance and availability. Ends 7/3/2020 ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 3 FOOD & DRINK

The Chicago Reader is community-centered continued from 3 in his recipes. I also arranged for several hun- for an independent magazine about cooking dred dollars’ worth of terpenes to be shipped and community-supported. with cannabis. It’s called Kitchen Toke, and my way from a San Francisco manufacturer like my job at the Reader, it’s lots of fun. I get eager to get them into the great chef’s hands. to work with chefs from all over the country, (Terpenes are aromatic organic compounds most of them passionate about their work that give different cannabis strains their and thrilled to see it featured in a coffee-ta- distinctive aromas and fl avors. They’re fun to ble-gorgeous, internationally distributed print cook with.) Like a drug dealer, I delivered it all KEEP THE magazine. to Abe at Fat Rice’s back door in a paper bag. I’ve written about Conlon a bunch of times He seemed excited to get started, but by over the years for the Reader. There’s no ques- then our deadlines were fast approaching. tion he’s a brilliant chef. I’ve loved his food. His It was too late to mount an outdoor photo stories were funny, interesting, and entertain- shoot, and over the phone Rivera and Conlon PRESSES ing. I always took Abe’s calls. had tense disagreements over locations and I had heard him, on occasion, be a bit curt timing. After this, Rivera told me Conlon and dismissive to employees—and even tried to “throw you under the bus” for the to Lo—but I chalked it up to the everyday poor communication that had so far stalled pressures of a busy chef on the rise. Some the process. In a separate exchange with me, ROLLING chefs punch their way up in the business by Conlon blamed her for the same thing. “Some punching down on their staff. It’s an all too shit might be coming your way,” he texted me. commonly accepted truth about the industry. “Sry.” You could say I was among those in the media One thing you can count on about Rivera is You are at the heart of this newspaper. Founded who considered Fat Rice a “darling,” as Pham that she doesn’t take shit from anyone. And in 1971, we have always been free, and have always described the food press’s infatuation with the another: she’s fiercely loyal to the people chef and the restaurant. who work for her. A third: she has no time for centered Chicago. Help us to continue to curate Conlon had served cannabis-infused dinners drama. She suggested that we kill the Conlon coverage of the diverse and creative communities with his underground supper club X-Marx be- feature and move on to something else, but I of this fabulous city. fore he opened Fat Rice, and I knew he loved to was panicked that we had nothing to replace smoke weed, so of course I wanted to feature it with in time, and I convinced her to stay the Your donation keeps the presses rolling. him in Kitchen Toke. Independent of myself, course. “It’s just one day,” I argued. “You’ll the magazine’s founder and designer Joline shoot [photos of] him. We’ll get the recipes. Rivera had the same idea, and we each pitched I’ll write the story, and we never have to deal CHIP IN HERE: Conlon about featuring him in our upcoming with him again.” I vouched for him, even after www.chicagoreader.com/members fall issue. he tried to get me in trouble with the boss. I Rivera floated the possibility of Abe cook- didn’t tell her about Abe’s text describing her ing at some high-profile events she’d been as “kind of a mess.” I desperately wanted to commissioned to curate (for a New York City make it work. clothing designer, a hip-hop festival, a New A date and location was finally set, and Year’s Eve party). Meanwhile, Conlon and I Rivera distributed a detailed schedule with spitballed ideas, imagining a twisted Gour- deadlines to all involved. Photographer Frank met-style photo spread with recipes, set in a Lawlor would shoot Conlon in Rivera’s kitchen forest preserve, with Abe cooking an outdoor while Conlon prepared one of the fi ve recipes feast infused with compatible strains and ter- he promised but had yet to deliver: Pâté- pene isolates for his friends. Rivera and I told Stuffed Onion Petals With Cannabis Brown him he could cook whatever he wanted. Butter Aromatized With Terpenes and Shatter But it was a busy spring leading into a busy Sherry Gastrique. I was going to sit in, a fl y on summer. In May, Abe was cooking at events the wall, there to report on whatever came out surrounding the National Restaurant Associa- of the ever-quotable Conlon’s mouth as he did tion’s annual convention and the James Beard his thing. The other dishes, by necessity, would Awards, and later things got hectic when Fat have to be shot later, in a studio with a food Rice got an expensive new kitchen remodel. stylist. Rivera and I were busy putting together the In the days leading up to the shoot, we re- rest of the issue, and working our other jobs, peatedly asked him to tell us what he needed WANT TO DONATE VIA CHECK? Make checks payable to “Chicago Reader” and mail to Chicago Reader, Suite 102, 2930 S. Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL 60616. and communication became erratic. But in late in terms of ingredients, equipment, and props. Include your mailing address, phone, and email—and please indicate if you are June, Conlon proposed a menu of fi ve dishes, We asked him for the recipes he committed to okay with us thanking you by name in the paper. and per his specs, I purchased a few hundred develop because we had a commitment to send dollars’ worth of cannabis for him to play with them to the tester in Los Angeles ASAP. But 4 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll FOOD & DRINK

stretches of days passed between communica- a new chef on board, ready and raring to go. tions, usually e-mails sent from Lo. Forget him, we told each other. These were not ideal conditions for a photo When I reflected on it later, I actually felt shoot, but Kitchen Toke is a scrappy operation. bad that I’d lost my cool and spoken so unpro- We roll with the punches. fessionally. And I thought about the restaurant When the day came, I met Abe at the door. industry and its endemic problems and fi gured He seemed perturbed. He couldn’t fi nd a good Abe might be dealing with issues a lot more parking spot, so he had to hu and pu a stack troubling than a low-budget indie photo shoot. of plastic storage containers full of ingredients All I could think was “Thank God I don’t have from a couple blocks away. On top of that, he’d to work for that lunatic. That must be awful.” I cooked for the governor the night before, so I told a few friends what happened, but I mostly fi gured it had been a rough morning. kept it to myself. Maybe that’s why I kept my mouth shut after I’m not writing this story now, in all its ugly I introduced him to Lawlor and Rivera, and he detail, because it feels good to kick Conlon demanded she remove her little Malteses be- when he’s down. He’s issued his apologies and cause he didn’t want to “stomp on one of them promises to do better on Instagram and in and kill it.” interviews in the Tribune and Block Club. (But There wasn’t much time to process the if you’ve ever spoken to Conlon for more than level of threat in that statement before things ten minutes, you know that they sound like went completely o the rails. Conlon became they’re coming from a completely different increasingly agitated as he set up his mise en person.) By the time this went to press, he place, complaining about what a shitty week hadn’t responded to my request for comment. he’d had, how the whole process had been I’m writing this story a year after this all fucked up and a huge pain in the ass for him, happened because I can’t stop thinking about and how he wasn’t getting paid for all the trou- all the times I got hints and full-stop red lights ble he’d taken. That subject had never been that something was seriously wrong—and I broached—Kitchen Toke, like any journalistic continued to champion Conlon and his work. endeavor, doesn’t pay its story subjects. So I There’s been a debate in food media in refi nally spoke up: “Abe, when Food & Wine does cent years about whether it’s ethical to cover a feature on you, do they pay you?” the work of known abusers, and I’ve paid lip This stunned him into momentary silence service to it myself. So I could’ve stopped for a before he schooled me: “But I get the equiva- minute and reconsidered writing about Conlon lent of $30,000 in free advertising! And you the time he broke away midsentence during a know what, Mike, you guys aren’t Food & phone interview to chew someone out in the Wine.” But the question set him o . He began background. pinballing around the kitchen, slamming I could’ve told him to fuck o when he start- ingredients around, and bellowing about the ed talking shit on my boss. things we promised and never delivered, all After that ugly morning last summer, I punctuated by numerous salivary F-bombs. I could’ve started asking questions instead of couldn’t help but notice his knife kit was open trying to put it all behind me. on the counter. At one point, Abe stepped And this spring, I definitely could have toward Rivera, and Lawlor stepped between spoken up when a colleague secured a recipe them. from Conlon, via Lo, for the Reader cookbook That’s when Rivera pulled the plug. “This project we were working on. But instead I is over,” she said, and left the kitchen, while let it slide. “The world’s a mess right now,” I FROM OUR FARM Lawlor and I o ered Abe increasingly urgent thought. “That’s all in the past, and it’s big of encouragement to get out, as he continued to them to help.” rant. I’ve been looking back and wincing at some TO YOUR DOOR “Abe, shut up,” I said. “Nobody wants to hear of the gratuitously shitty things I’ve written it.” over the years as a restaurant critic. A few “Keep your mouth shut and get out,” I said. days ago a friend texted me their opinion that VIRTUE, IT’S AT OUR CORE And then like a dime-store Don Corleone: “every man, and certainly every white man, “You’re dead to me,” I said. “Fuck you.” has behavior to regret.” Maybe I’ll end up re- VIRTUECIDER.COM TO ORDER Between Rivera, Lawlor, and myself, we’ve gretting writing this story, but not as much as I worked with hundreds of chefs in our careers, regret using my platform to boost a media dar- but this was something entirely unprecedent- ling who turned out to be no darling at all. v ed. In the aftermath, we were pretty shook up. ENJOY RESPONSIBLY © 2020 Virtue Cider, Fennville, MI 49408 But we shook it o . Within 20 minutes we had @MikeSula ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 5 NEWS & POLITICS

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POLITICS Chicago's Free Weekly Since 1971 #TVKUV9TKVGT 2GTHQTOGT! Grave robbers %4'#6+8' 51.76+105 (14 Hey, MAGA, stop using Dr. King to justify police brutality. %4'#6+8' 2'12.' By B J 5WRRQTVKXG #HHKTOKPI CPF )QCN &KTGEVGF 2U[EJQVJGTCR[ CPF n a futile attempt to justify the unjustiﬁ able, This brings me to the latest atrocity in *[RPQVJGTCR[ HQT #FWNVU Trumpsters have resorted to grave robbery. journalism perpetrated by John Kass, the right- I That is, they’re claiming great leftists wing columnist for the Chicago Tribune. /#: - 5*#2'; .%59 and civil rights activists as their own—now In his June 11 column, Kass argues that .QECVGF KP &QYPVQYP 'XCPUVQP that these great leaders are dead and unable to Black Lives Matter activists who take a knee speak for themselves. to protest police violence against Black people This is not new. I’ve seen Trump and his fol- are members of a cult threatening to destroy YYYOCZUJCRG[EQO lowers talk up everyone from Muhammad Ali to America. OCZUJCRG["CQNEQO FDR when it suits their needs. Apparently, they And if these “neo-Marxists” get their way, NWG TQUU NWG 5JKGNF 2TGHGTTGF 2TQXKFGT We Couldn't Be Free Without You— have no American historical antecedents of law-abiding Americans won’t be allowed to KIPC 2TGHGTTGF 2TQXKFGT Support Community Journalism their own that any decent human being would stand for the national anthem. Or, as Kass puts want anything to do with. it: “The high priests of the left tell us those who 6 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll NEWS & POLITICS

Dr. King would not be on your side, MAGA. He lived for about three more years after the Important NOBEL FOUNDATION Selma march—and he was active until the end. don’t kneel during the national anthem are In 1966, he moved to Chicago and led guilty.” open-housing marches through the southwest In reality, the only person punished for his and northwest sides. And how did the crowd of behavior during the national anthem is, of white southwest-siders respond to King’s mes- Reader News course, Colin Kaepernick, who was banished sage? They called him the N-word and hit him from the NFL for taking a knee to protest police in the head with a rock. Due to business closings and for safety purposes, brutality. In 1967, King spoke out against the Vietnam the Chicago Reader is going biweekly with a print So, in one fell swoop, Kass plays the victim War. For which right-wingers called him a even though his crowd is the victimizers. Slick Commie. run to 600+ locations, including our box route. On move, Johnny. J. Edgar Hoover, the lunatic who ran the FBI the o� weeks (June 4, June 18) the Reader is just Now, to the grave robbery. In trying to ex- back then, had a hateful obsession with King. being distributed as a free PDF, with a small press plain that he’s not really the racist his position Hoover had his agents tap King’s phones and run to fulﬁ ll subscriber and library mailings. would lead you to believe he is, Kass invokes motel rooms. They collected dirt on King that the name of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And I they tried to use to discredit his movement and quote . . . drive him to suicide. We are also making a limited number of copies “I’m no theologian, but my ancient Greek It’s called COINTELPRO—look it up. available for special short-term subscriptions, 12 Orthodox Christian faith teaches us to con- In 1968, Dr. King planned a Poor People’s demn racism and support the oppressed. We’re Campaign in Washington, D.C., in which he weeks for $50, and every week’s issue will be mailed judged on sins we commit as individuals. The called for a full jobs program, guaranteed to your home. late Archbishop Iakovos, seen in old news income, health care for all, and affordable photos with piercing eyes and black robes, housing. stood with the late Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. And the right told him to shut up and stick to Just a few hundred copies will be sold of these very in Selma in 1965. Both religious men abhorred civil rights. (Not unlike Laura Ingraham telling limited souvenir editions of the Reader: judging entire groups of people by skin color. LeBron James to “shut up and dribble.”) secure.actblue.com/donate/chicago-reader-print-12 But they are long gone.” And in the last days of his life, he was in To read this, you’d think Kass is righteous Memphis standing up for the collective bar- and holy because he belonged to a church gaining rights of striking sanitation workers, whose former leader marched with King. almost all of whom were Black. And that Archbishop Iakovos and Dr. King Lastly, he didn’t just sort of vanish, as Kass Find the full curated PDF download of the Reader at valiantly tried to judge all people fairly. But suggests. No, he was murdered at the age of 39. then they passed. And so . . . And even after he was dead, Senator Jesse chicagoreader.com/issues Well, Kass doesn’t come right out and say Helms and other Republicans fought to keep his by Wednesday each week. what his point is. But it seems to be that some- birthday from being a national holiday. “King’s how or other those knee-taking Black Lives action-oriented Marxism,” Helms said, “is not Matter “neo-Marxists” corrupted Dr. King’s compatible with the concepts of this country.” dream. Sooooo . . . When in doubt, blame the Marxists. Protesters who actually take a stand for the Without Stevie Wonder’s e orts, I’m not sure oppressed and against racism killed Dr. King’s we’d even have a King holiday—if Ingraham dream. Which is also Kass’s dream, as he be- was around back then, she’d probably have told longs to Archbishops Iakovos’s church. Stevie to “shut up and sing.” Got that, America? So, sorry, I can’t sit here and watch some Look, Archbishop Iakovos deserves a lot of dude use Dr. King to prop up a position that credit for going to Selma in 1965 to march with King would most deﬁ nitely abhor. Dr. King. His presence helped win over public Look, MAGA—as Donald Trump calls you—I opinion for the civil rights movement—a move- can’t help it if you’ve linked yourself to a despi- ment that was vehemently opposed by the cable human being leading a racist cause. sorts of people who enjoy reading John Kass’s But if you feel compelled to find someone column. Just saying. from the past to justify your beliefs, go rob the But I think most of us would agree that Dr. graves of those who might share them. Like King would be kneeling with the Black Lives Jesse Helms. Or J. Edgar Hoover. Or the guy in Matter activists if he were still alive, and taking Marquette Park who threw that rock—presum- a strong stand against police randomly killing ing he’s not with us anymore. unarmed Black people. And stop desecrating the life and legacy of Thank you, In fact, I think this moment calls for a brief the great Dr. King. v refresher on the life of Dr. King, for those too young to remember him. @bennyjshow The Reader team ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 7 The responderslast

Funeral homes on the front lines of the pandemic P GG

8 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll hen we say essential frontline I had one scenario where the man died of workers we think of doctors and COVID and we were scheduled to go bury Wnurses, delivery workers, and all him and then the wife and one of the sons of the industries and people providing us came down with it so they weren’t even able with the resources we need to stay alive. to leave the house. So I loaded the body in But as the United States surpasses 100,000 the hearse and I swung by their house. I let deaths from COVID-19, another industry has them come out and at least look through the been witness to the devastating toll of the window and see that the body was in the cas- pandemic. Funeral homes have always been ket. I went by myself to bury him. And I had the last responders, serving families during a young man that was only 37 that died from some of their darkest moments. Now with an COVID and he worked at the Milagro tortilla increased workload, a lack of resources and factory. space, and ever-changing regulations, funer- “One weekend between Saturday and Sun- al directors are having to adapt to the unique day we got ten cases of COVID death where I needs of the profession, while worrying for had to actually close my doors for that week their own safety. and not accept any more cases just to be able to service them and not get overrun. Right now, the non-COVID cases are like the minori- ty, where we’re still sending some people to Mexico and we’re still doing some burials. In a normal month we would do 20 [funeral “It’s been arrangements] and in May we are up to 65.” —M M M F H heartbreaking. LV ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 9 “The African American culture is to hug, kiss,

and greet family members at the wake all on the front line. From the removal as well as the repast, where we gather from the place of death to directing the for a family dinner. This cannot be done service and everything in between, it’s at this time. The number of COVID-pos- being done by a family member. itive cases has doubled the number “It has always been a challenge to of cases we would generally have at keep work separate from my personal one time. The number of cases has re- life with the nature of the business, mained steady yet high. and our services are needed 24 hours “We are the ‘forgotten’ last respond- a day, including holidays. During this ers, while the government focuses on crisis, it is that much harder to have getting PPE to health-care workers time for yourself with the increase in in hospitals and we that handle the death and confusion.” —N N deceased with the same virus are R overlooked. This is a family-owned and NS -operated facility. We as a family are NF H S S 10 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll “We have limited the hours

of wakes, changed the viewing room to only ten seats six feet apart, closed o our lounge and co ee area. We require everyone to use a face mask or face covering, and signs are posted throughout the funeral home to remind the family and guests to continue to practice social distancing. “Most families that I help are big close-knit families where the decedent might have six or more siblings, three or more children, the spouse, and many more immediate family members. Following the ten-people guidelines has been a true challenge. Since we know that during the funeral arrangements more than two people usually come to help each other make the proper decisions on their loved ones’ funerals, we meet with them in our open lobby area to keep everyone safe and yet still help them in a digniﬁ ed way. “On a personal level, I have to keep my feelings and fears at bay. It is very stressful to keep myself safe and take the proper precautions at work. Staying at home does not count for me. I have my own family to care for and keep safe as well. So I’ve had to change how I enter my home after coming from work or doing a funeral so I do not expose my family to anything.” —Y P PF F HG P ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 11 fact of somebody coming and consoling that send an e-mail, don’t send a text, pick up the ly, and when they can’t have that grand send- “I would ask you, person, it means so much, and that’s just been phone and call them and say, ‘What is it that o that they’ve always wanted for their loved erased and taken away. I need to do for you today?’ And whether it’s one, it leaves them broken. And we can only do ‘Well your aunt died and you need to pick “And so my message to people is just to a meal, sending flowers, cutting their grass, so much as our profession, but we also need ten people from the family.’ I mean, can you reach out to this family because, depending weeding their garden, getting groceries, or their family and friends to step up and to just do that? When people come to a wake they on their situation, they are very isolated when something, it could be the simplest things. Or circle them and to show them that nobody has talk and they reminisce and there are picture they have a death due to COVID. If they live it could just be that that person just needs to forgotten, that they’re loved.” —C boards and videos and memorabilia. The body together they’re quarantined, they can’t leave pour their heart out to you on the phone, and Z - is displayed for everybody to see and to o er the house, somebody else in their family might all you do is listen and it means the world. ZM C L a prayer, or it’s a cremation urn. The mere be sick. Reach out to them, call them, don’t “The funeral brings some closure to a fami- AH v 12 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll ARTS & CULTURE

A mural by Squeak and Mario Mena on the South Loop Petco COURTESY BARRETT KEITHLEY

Murals can be found at small businesses like Wildwood Photography, Conexion Salon and Spa, the Denim Lounge, Cafe Cancale, Mojo Spa, and Store B Vintage, as well as larger spaces like the Petco in the South Loop and two Jewel-Oscos on the south side. Keithley’s background is in painting and event coordinating. He began to professional- ly paint six years ago, creating work based on his experiences growing up in Morgan Park. Perkins has an educational background and a master’s degree in art history and museum studies. She has curated in galleries all over Chicago and is now heavily involved in the hip-hop gra ti scene. The duo’s knowledge of curating and art-making combined with their experience working closely with Chicago Loop Alliance has provided insight into their plan- ning moving forward with Paint the City. Last week, they launched a GoFundMe campaign to support the artist community that has also been hit hard due to the pandemic. Although the project is already launched, Keithley and Perkins are asking folks to donate so artists involved in Paint the City can be compensated for their time and supplies. COMMUNITY ART boarded-up storefronts. The project’s mission Keithley says, “The initiative is also the begin- is deeply rooted in Black Lives Matter and the ning of our continuous e ort to connect local support of justice and equality, and so far the businesses with artists and to beautify our How Chicago artists are group of artists has painted ten buildings on city’s abandoned properties.” And Paint the the city’s south and west sides. Keithley ex- City hopes to prolong their support of local plains that the inspiration behind the project artists. This ongoing project has the inten- spreading the message that started because of the boarded-up abandoned tions to help fellow artists and to stimulate the buildings that have long existed in the city, local economy through art and entertainment. prior to the recent protests. “Once the civil In places like New York City, murals are Black Lives Matter unrest began, we too wanted to take a stand being painted over as they are considered and use our form of art activism. We want to “vandalism.” However, Chicago’s shops and Muralists use boarded-up storefronts as their new canvas with Paint the City. heal the city through art. We also identified neighborhoods are thriving with support as that local businesses and artists were being locals spread their message with art—for B SNL a ected by the pandemic to begin with, so we now. This is what makes these canvases so literally said, ‘Let’s do this!’” precious—they are ephemeral. Because busi- Businesses contact Paint the City and are nesses will eventually remove these board- then partnered with artists who work on ed-up walls, the plywood canvas will take the biked from McKinley Park to Humboldt covering up the sad plywood with words of their storefront. Perkins and Keithley first artwork with it. And this is something that Park last Friday to deliver a package to a rmation and strength. began to e-mail chambers of commerce and a all major cities are seeing across the U.S. Arts I someone. A 30-minute ride up to the A few days before my bike ride, I saw “All few alderpeople who sent them the names of initiatives are being taken to the streets, and northwest side would be good to exercise my Lives Matter” painted in lazy black lettering boarded-up businesses. Some businesses have to the storefronts lining those streets, filled winter legs, although the 85-degree tempera- on a Humboldt corner store. Now “Brown speciﬁ c requests, like certain images, text, or with people seeking justice for the murder of ture was testing my ability to do so with ease. people stand with Black lives” is painted over colors, whereas others simply want to spread George Floyd and the numerous stolen lives of What I saw along the way—and what I’ve seen those words. Chicagoans have been empow- positivity to support Black Lives Matter. Paint Black folks around the world. v between the groups of folks at protests—were ered by the demonstrations and those emo- the City has been working with Somos Arte bright hues, large lettering, artwork, ﬁ gures, tions are being illustrated across the city. Collective, an arts and education team, to help If business owners are interested in par- and political statements adorning buildings, Enlisting more than 75 artists to work on with outreach in the communities it serves. ticipating in the initiative, they can e-mail windows, and public spaces. These new mu- 15 buildings around Chicago, Barrett Keithley “We always make sure the businesses are [email protected]. rals have taken the place of many boarded-up and Missy Perkins launched Paint the City, aware of the murals to create a stronger bond storefronts, gas stations, and grocery stores, which creates images of hope and unity on with the artist’s community,” says Keithley. @snicolelane ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 13 Martin Luther King Jr. at the Chicago Freedom Movement Rally in Soldier Field FROM THE CHICAGO URBAN LEAGUE PHOTOS COLLECTION THE UNIVERSITY ARTS & CULTURE OF ILLINOIS AT CHICAGO SPECIAL COLLECTIONS AND ARCHIVES

certain communities are impacted by police the tools to be able to do that work. So you brutality and over-policing more than other know, through this particular project, we were communities,” says Flores-Clemons, who is the able to do that.” university archivist and director of archives, And those tools can be essential in docu- records management, and special collections menting history. Blackivist Erin Glasco, an at Chicago State University. “A lot of that is independent archivist, researcher, and orga- still very much in the minds and hearts of our nizer, says, “archivists in this moment—espe- individual community members.” cially in this revolutionary moment that we’re Documenting the relationship between in—are really uniquely posed and have a lot of Black communities and law enforcement can unique skills that lend themselves very well to show the connection between generations and what’s happening in the streets.” the incremental progress made—or the lack Recently, citizen-recorded video has helped thereof. dispel police accounts of misconduct: a “When I think about the whole idea of 75-year-old man pushed to the ground in Buf- community control of policing, that isn’t falo, New York; two students violently arrested something new,” says Tracy Drake, an archi- in Atlanta, Georgia; beanbag ammunition shot HISTORY vist at Reed College. “But if you know your at protesters in Austin, Texas. Stressing that history, you can trace that term back to what social media isn’t an archive, the Blackivists the Black Panthers were fighting for in the say archivists can help people properly archive The Blackivists on documenting 60s. They used that exact same phrasing, but what they capture. The group published a most people don’t know that and can’t make guide this month that provides tips for orga- that connection. So that’s why it’s important nizers, protesters, and anyone who wants to movements to document it in all those phases. So you can document a movement. see, ‘Wait, we’ve been fi ghting for community “The video evidence doesn’t lie,” says Glas- A group of Black archivists is helping communities create their own narratives, control of police for over 40 years.’” co, who served as the research team lead for fi lling in what history books have le out. Much of that history had not yet been re- the #NoCopAcademy campaign—a Black and corded. Last year, the Blackivists consulted Brown youth-led grassroots e ort to stop the B AN with members of the Illinois chapter of the construction of a $95 million police academy Black Panther Party. An important part of the in Chicago. “I know when people were taking process was capturing the organization’s oral these videos, they weren’t thinking they were hen major movements rock the course is happening. The importance of this is further history. going to be seen, that they were documenting of American history, Black voices and amplified by what Blackivist Stacie Williams “Largely, the records that we have are human rights o enses, but that’s exactly what Wperspectives are often left out—out of says seems to be “most of white America’s government documents and secondary book they were doing. So I think that’s something textbooks, out of major museums, and out of collective gasp moment” that racism and op- sources, but a lot of that story wasn’t told by very powerful that I would like to see more public record. pression still exists. the Panthers themselves,” Drake says. “So this archivists very carefully and intentionally and Enter the Blackivists. Started in 2018, this “I think just even knowing and seeing that in was an opportunity to document that history mindfully get into.” group of six Black archivists in Chicago works that moment is understanding that our history [with them]. And that narrative creates a coun- Even as the industry becomes more diverse, to train and consult with community groups on has not always been documented, according to ternarrative to the larger history that we know white archivists, curators, and museum techni- how to properly preserve archives, prioritizing the dominant structures that did that type of about them and it allows us to disable any mis- cians still make up a majority of positions na- projects that fi ll in the gaps in history. documentation in this country,” says Williams, conceptions and preconceived notions that are tionwide—almost 90 percent. But there have “Aside from our respective institutions, it’s who is director of the Center for Digital Schol- false that people have about them.” always been Black archivists, the group notes, important for us as Black information profes- arship at the University of Chicago Library. Working directly with community members although the work of those trailblazers often sionals, archivists, and librarians, and records “So, the importance I think of all of us being is a key focus of the Blackivists. The group has went unseen. managers, to be able to provide and share this in our respective spaces and trying to elevate worked with Honey Pot Performance since “There has been this growth in terms of expertise, these skills, with our communities the histories, the stories, the narratives, the 2018 on their Chicago Black Social Culture Black archivists being in the field, but for a and with our people,” says Skyla S. Hearn, a material culture, all of it, of Black people in this Map—an online public humanities project doc- period of about 30 to 40 years, there was just former chief archivist and director at the DuS- country is so important.” umenting Black social culture from the Great maybe about fi ve or seven, and they all knew able Museum of African American History. “So Last fall, some Blackivist group members Migration through the early 21st century. This each other, and they were spread out across we all work together at various sites and events worked on a project with the Smithsonian to project focuses on the emergence of house the country,” explains Steven D. Booth, an ar- to educate the public about archives and also speak with Chicagoans on the west side about culture in the 1980s so the group consults with chivist with the U.S. National Archives where how to do the work as citizen archivists.” what happened in days after Martin Luther those who attend the Honey Pot events to give he manages the audiovisual collection for the The job of these memory workers is even King Jr. was killed in 1968. Those stories, says do-it-yourself archiving help. That is a part of a Obama Presidential Library. “They weren’t in more essential today as the police killing of Blackivist Raquel Flores-Clemons, explain how larger commitment to help Chicago. a position to do the work that we’re currently George Floyd has reignited widespread pro- the National Guard treated Black residents at “There are a lot of materials out there that able to do now. And so, we do this work for tests across the country and discussions on the time, but aren’t found in any textbook. need preservation, that need care, and we our communities, for our families, but also in the historic narratives. Black communities are “It traces directly to what is happening, why don’t pretend to be able to do all of that work honor of them.” v again, in the current movement, working to things are the way they are, why people are re- ourselves,” Hearn says. “So we really have to ensure they have the power to document what sponding the way they’re responding, and why uplift, encourage, and also provide people with @ArionneNettles 14 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll P P AJC R Fri /, midnight, streaming at @Bossesinbonnets and @Preachimprov on Instagram ARTS & CULTURE

Preach is ready to celebrate Juneteenth ELIASRIOS

or the Fourth of July, and still many don’t even know what the holiday is. Bosses in Bonnets and Preach hope that Pass the Plate puts June- teenth on more people’s radar. The members of Bosses in Bonnets fi rst had the idea to do a Juneteenth show earlier this year—before there was even a threat of the city shutting down—and have been working on sketches for it ever since. Originally the show was going to be staged at Steppenwolf, but when the theater canceled its June pro- gramming, the group decided to pivot to putting on a virtual show so as to not waste the material they were already working on. At the same time Preach was thinking about putting on a Juneteenth show. That’s when Kayla Pul- ley, who is a part of both groups, brought them together to not only collaborate but lighten the load of work that goes into putting togeth- COMEDY er a virtual show, something neither group has done. Celebrate Juneteenth with The show has been built through weekly Zoom video meetings that serve as more than Bosses in Bonnets and Preach just brainstorming sessions. “For my mental The groups are teaming up for an all-day comedy party on June 19. health it’s been good because it’s the one thing that’s been constant right now,” Pulley By B W says. “It’s something to continue lifting us all up during this time. Also creatively it’s been really cool because like, one of us will have an n June 19, 1865, news of the Emancipa- those who can’t watch along in real time, but idea and bounce ideas off of each other, and tion Proclamation freeing American the idea is for these artists of color to hold then we see all the different places this one Oslaves finally reached Galveston, Tex- space for the Black community all day long. idea can be taken. And that’s a really cool thing as—a full two and a half years after it was “We wanted to set it up almost as like a with collaboration happening is just how all signed. Accounts differ as to why it took so sketch festival or video festival where we’ll of us have started using di erent parts of our long for the slaves of Texas to be told of their have the program out before we release our imagination while working with each other.” freedom, but they didn’t hesitate to celebrate, sketches to let people know when things are Bland agrees, “It’s just kind of a creative dubbing the day Juneteenth. For decades, happening and when they can see certain party, which I love. It’s really been therapeutic Juneteenth celebrations were common in performers perform their pieces,” says Ashley as well because along with being a think tank, Black communities, but the holiday gradually Bland, a member of Bosses in Bonnets. “We it’s been like we’ve been able to sort of confi de faded into obscurity as it was written out of wanted to make it a day of celebration since in each other and let each other know that history. Still, the annual celebrations never [Juneteenth] should be nationally recognized with everything going on that we’re gonna be completely stopped, taking the form of barbe- as a day of celebration.” OK.” cues, church services, and, this year in Chica- Trinidad and Tobago was the fi rst country Some of the material Bosses in Bonnets go, a comedy show. to declare Emancipation Day a national hol- originally created will remain in the lineup, Bosses in Bonnets, a sketch group made up iday in 1985, and since then other Caribbean but the content continued to evolve and grow of Black women, and Preach, an improvised countries have followed suit. In the U.S., in reaction to the ever-changing world the spoken word collective made up of artists of Juneteenth is still only recognized as a state groups were creating in. But overall it is a Providing arts coverage color, are coming together for Pass the Plate: holiday, with three states—Hawaii, North celebration. A Juneteenth Celebration. The virtual show Dakota, and South Dakota—still holding out. “We want it to be a release, where people in Chicago since 1971. will take place on each group’s Instagram page And even in places like here in Illinois, where feel heard, where there are pieces that they re- (@Bossesinbonnets and @Preachimprov) it has been a state-recognized holiday since late to,” Pulley says. “We hope that this show starting at midnight on Friday, June 19, with 19 2003, there is not a universal agreement to can just be all the feelings that a person needs di erent videos featuring sketches and poetry celebrate by giving folks the day o work and to feel right now.” v dropping every hour. Eventually all the videos encouraging cookouts and parties the way www.chicagoreader.com will be available as a playlist on YouTube for there is surrounding things like Memorial Day @BriannaWellen ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 15 ARTS & CULTURE

COURTESY THE ARTIST

the single most source of pain and misery for people of color throughout this world for gen- JUNE 20 erations! But I try not to say things like that SAT @ Online anymore . . . because I’ve found once you have Wisecrackin’ said something like that to a white person . . . you almost never get a second date.”

SAT JUNE 20 @ Online Other comedians regularly sing his praises Sophia Lucia’s Freak Show Cabaret W. Kamau Bell met Kennedy in 1994 in Rogers (EVENT REPEATS WEEKLY) Park. “It was at one of the open mikes up at No Exit Cafe,” Kennedy told me on a phone call last month. “Kamau was about two weeks into FRI SEPT 25 @ Shore Club comedy, and I was coming back after a break. I Beer Fest on the Beach - Oktoberfest had been there the week before, and he came up and introduced himself and we found some similar sensibilities . . . we’ve been friends to add your event to ever since.” In 2012, Bell suggested that Ken- TIXREADER COM nedy be hired for the writing sta on his FX and see it listed here weekly, political talk and variety show Totally Biased please send an email to With W. Kamau Bell, and comedian Chris [email protected] COMEDY Rock (the show’s executive producer) readily agreed when he heard Kennedy’s name, saying Dwayne Kennedy is the voice of Chicago that Kennedy was funnier than everybody else And it’s a voice the rest of the world needs to hear. when they both were performing at the same clubs in New York City in the late 80s. By S C-J He’s consistent . . . and did I mention he’s omedian, writer, and actor Dwayne Ken- in the south suburbs, and frequently works hilarious? Don’t miss nedy is truly a comedian’s comedian. He into his comedy the kind of analysis about the The new album includes a track titled “The Chas appeared on screens and stages since city-state and community development that Dog Don’t Bite Unless . . .” in which Kennedy the 80s, getting his start in Chicago at the open longtime Chicagoans can relate to. On the new dreams up a seemingly endless loop of ridic- an issue mike at Zanies on Wells Street. He’s had guest album (a comedy set edited from three live ulous scenarios where a dog owner is laying spots on sitcoms like Seinfeld and Martin, and nights at the Punchline in San Francisco in down the rules for a new person meeting their his TV debut itself wasn’t too shabby: in 1989 2018), he talks about summertime in Chicago, big, vicious dog, including “the dog don’t bite Get the Next 12 Weeks he guest starred on the show 227 playing op- a beautiful time but also “shooting season . . . unless your heart rate rises above 120,” and of the Chicago Reader posite fellow visiting actor Halle Berry. I don’t know what it is about the warm weath- “the dog don’t bite as long as you don’t do After years of work in the clubs, he won the er.” He continues, “I’m glad when it becomes yoga in front of the dog . . . don’t do downward Delivered to Your Home 2002 Best Comedian award at the U.S. Comedy wintertime in Chicago and gets to like 39 dog in front of the dog, because dogs feel like Arts Festival, and appeared during that era degrees below zero, because all the gangsters they invented that and they’re not receiving on the Late Show With David Letterman. He’s got to go in the house . . . which I feel bad for any ﬁ nancial compensation.” Kennedy’s Face- also written and produced for television (FX’s anyone in the house now getting their ass wh- book and Twitter feeds are always a testing Totally Biased With W. Kamau Bell, the 2013 upped.” He pauses, then jumps in with precise ground for snippets of material, and he stays Arsenio Hall Show reboot). Last year, Kennedy timing, “but at least now I can walk to the gro- on current topics. Just in the last few weeks, won an Emmy award as the supervising pro- cery store and get that wheat bread that I’ve he’s shared his take on the intersection of ducer for fellow comedian Bell’s CNN series had my eye on all summer!” the Black Lives Matter movement and social United Shades of America. liberation alongside musings on the pan- He’s probably the most successful Chicago He’s at the ideal corner of smart and funny demic, and sometimes all in the same biting comedian you’ve never heard of, and I think Kennedy’s words on violence, race relations, post—he attributed the quote “No Lives Mat- everyone in this city needs to buy his new and social justice are nuanced and thought- ter” to “COVID-19” in one, and quotes “White album Who the Hell Is Dwayne Kennedy? (Oak ful, and sometimes a train barreling into you Supremacy” as saying “Black lives matter? Head Records) and pick up his 2016 EP Oh that you didn’t hear coming. A recent joke What’s next, giving the Indigenous (peoples) No! It’s Dwayne Kennedy and sing his praises that didn’t make the album (but which Oak their stolen land back?!” Kennedy is the voice chicagoreader.com/ alongside me. Here’s why: Head Records issued on YouTube as a video that Chicagoans know and the voice that the support preview): “I used to let white folks have it . . . rest of the world needs to hear. v His home base is still Chicago let me tell you man, your pathological greed Kennedy grew up both on the south side and and compulsive need for control has been @hollo 16 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll THEATER

Simeilia Hodge-Dallaway COURTESY THE ARTIST handful of predominantly white male-penned plays. While some of these works are indeed literary masterpieces, some audiences grow tic and fragile kernel of our hope; that one weary of their inevitable return, and many day Black lives will matter to not just some, are sociopolitically outdated. For example, but all, and that Black youth will have the some works by David Mamet are arguably freedom to indulge in art without the heavy due for a decades-long rest in the archives weight of death pressing on their necks. before being revisited again, if ever. One artist helping to cultivate that hope is The dogged repetition of these plays in the founder and artistic director of Beyond academic curricula creates a damning co- the Canon (BTC), Simeilia Hodge-Dallaway. nundrum for young Black theater students. Each Wednesday on Instagram Live at noon “A lot of institutions had ignored this work (CDT), BTC o ers a virtual writer’s room that and were still teaching the same plays that champions hidden plays by Black, Asian, Lat- they were familiar and comfortable with,” inx, and Middle Eastern playwrights. During says Hodge-Dallaway. “How can you go your the chat, viewers can connect with the fea- entire education and leave without knowing tured writers, comment, ask questions, and any living POC playwrights? We are setting celebrate each other and the work. students up to fail when competing with their Hodge-Dallaway is an award-winning au- white counterparts. The work exists. Let’s thor; dramaturg; founder of Artistic Directors engage with it.” of the Future; executive director and creative Chicago theaters have made a push to put producer of the Black Lives, Black Words In- out more Black works. As the news often su- ternational Project, which will be hosted on- perfi cially reports on the tragically constant line; and producer of the I Am . . . Fest at the murders of Black people at the hands of Goodman last year, which concluded with the police, the coverage can sometimes lack the U.S. premiere of The Interrogation of Sandra same level of compassion and consideration Bland by Mojisola Adebayo. Hodge-Dallaway a orded to white victims of murder. Stories is also a Black play specialist. are often reported alongside less-than- BTC began in 2016, and Hodge-Dallaway’s flattering-photographs, and call out irrel- initial intention was to find a way to share evant prior indiscretions, dehumanizing her extensive play library. “How do we get the victim. This is where theater can help to the plays from the shelf into the hands of correct the record and soothe the hearts of a those who need them most, and how do we grieving community by shifting the point of help them to become teachers and ambassa- view from the arresting o cer to that of the dors for the next generation?” she asks. The victim. closure of the education system in the wake Many plays in Chicago over the past sev- of COVID created an increasing sense of eral years have deftly addressed various urgency. perspectives on police brutality and Black BIPOC PLAYS MATTER Hodge-Dallaway went to publishing houses pain, reclaiming the narrative and infusing such as Methuen and Playwrights Canada the stories with compassion. One of the most Press and asked them to donate plays that are recent and powerful examples of this was Kill Moving Beyond the Canon languishing on warehouse shelves to young Move Paradise by James Ijames at TimeLine POC students. “These plays are our legacy,” Theater, a surrealistic, heart-wrenching, Simeilia Hodge-Dallaway wants to decolonize dramatic literature. notes Hodge-Dallaway. Then, each week, BTC and challenging examination of the souls gives away free play texts, the fi rst week’s lit- of the departed and the preference of white By S F erary selections being a two-book anthology America to filter its empathy through the edited by Hodge-Dallaway, Audition Speeches consumption of Black trauma as entertain- eorge Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud What is the purpose of theater in the midst for Black, South Asian, and Middle Eastern ment. Running in the same vein was Tilikum Arbery, Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, of a pandemic, in a political moment where Actors. by Kristiana Rae Colón at Sideshow Theatre, GRenisha McBride, Atatiana Jefferson, the world is rising up to protest and march “It was important to me to ask publishing a metaphorical, visually and aurally en- Jordan Edwards, Botham Jean. The space of in solidarity with human rights? Theater houses for anthologies so we are exposed to chanting piece that leverages the story of a this article could solely consist of the names serves as a device to document; it serves as each other’s cultural perspectives. I became killer whale at SeaWorld against America’s of those Black lives who are no longer with a vessel to cradle the emotional weight of richer in my mentality researching and read- history of treating Black bodies as animals. us due to police brutality. Police murder. Yet the moment, and perhaps most importantly, ing Black, South Asian, and Middle Eastern (A streaming version of Tilikum runs this this is an article about theater, which in the it serves as an investment in the future. As plays,” she says. Friday, June 19, as a Juneteenth fund-raiser shadow of death feels extremely small and theaters across the world sit dark in a COVID Historically, the traditional American the- for Colón’s Let Us Breathe Collective.) Hood- insignifi cant. quarantine, the arts hold the most optimis- ater canon has consistently regurgitated a ed, or Being Black for Dummies by Tearrance ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 17 THEATER

continued from 17 BIPOC plays in Chicago and beyond. While Arvelle Chisholm with First Floor Theater not wanting to spoil the surprise of all of the at the Den and graveyard shift by korde ar- writers who may be featured and have their rington tuttle at the Goodman also explored works given away for free through BTC, she these themes. provided a sneak peek of names and texts While it’s important to honor and inter- that may be featured. Some of the interna- rogate tragedy, it’s also crucial to push back tional playwrights may potentially include against the common and limiting narrative Lydia R. Diamond, Kwame Kwei-Armah, that the Black existence begins with slavery Donna-Michelle St. Bernard, David Yee, and and ends with police violence. It’s just as works such as The Convert by Gurira, Barber important, if not moreso, to explore works Shop Chronicles by Inua Ellams, One Night in with broader themes of joy, family life, sci- Miami by Kemp Powers, Detroit ’67 by Domi- ence, freedom, and adventure to create a nique Morisseau, The Adventures of the Black well-rounded portrait of Black humanity. Girl in Her Search for God by Lisa Codrington, Other recent Chicago plays that explore A Wolf in Snakeskin Shoes by Marcus Gardley, broader themes include two by playwright and anthologies such as The Methuen Book J. Nicole Brooks; HeLa, which reimagines the of Contemporary Latin American Plays and story of Henrietta Lacks through an Afro- Love, Loss, and Longing: South Asian Cana- futuristic lens, and Her Honor Jane Byrne, dian Plays, Mojisola Adebayo Plays One and which dissects the mythos around the legacy Plays Two, Lions and Tigers by Tanika Gupta, of Chicago’s ﬁ rst woman mayor. Byrne’s on- and Wole Soyinka play anthologies. BIT.LY/GOOSEDELIVERS stage run at Lookingglass was unfortunately Hodge-Dallaway hails from the UK and cut short due to COVID. Another play, How to works as an artist in multiple countries. Catch Creation by Christina Anderson, beau- When asked how artists across BIPOC com- tifully explored the perils around indulgence munities can band together to create lasting in the life of an artist; Lottery Day by Ike change as Black Lives Matter protests spring Holter gave a window into the joys of having up worldwide, she says, “A lot of POC-led an invite to the proverbial cookout; Katori organizations rarely work with each other. Hall’s Hoodoo Love smoldered with romance Our eyes tend to be on the larger institutions Donate to get Leor Galil's best articles infused with magic, metaphorical and literal; that might validate us. We have to advocate and Danai Gurira’s Familiar comedically out- for each other. Black and other POC writers over the past 10 years of Chicago music! lined the struggles of a Zimbabwean family simply cannot continue to let white directors assimilating (or not) into the U.S. direct our work.” With BTC, Hodge-Dallaway and associate The Black Lives Matter protests have chicagoreader.com/leorbook producer Sarudzayi Marufu hope to inspire sparked a reckoning, amplifying calls for the reading and production of even more change within arts organizations. While making promises to stage more Black and BIPOC plays is crucial, it has also been historically Chicago's Free Weekly Since 1971 used as a MacGuffin to distract from a the- THE ater’s inability to make fundamental changes u at the board and executive levels. This lesson was recently learned in excruciating fashion when Victory Gardens Theater advertised a single Black play from its Ignition Festival to paper over controversy—just after their entire ensemble walked out in protest of the recent executive leadership changes. Victory Gardens isn’t the only theater learning in public that the bar has been moved, as theaters implicated on the infa- mous Theaters Not Speaking Out spreadsheet have also discovered. Says Hodge-Dallaway, “Organizations simply think that they can write a statement and chicagoreader.com/donate think that is enough—and artists are saying We Couldn't Be Free Without You— ‘no.’” v Support Community Journalism @SheriFlanders 18 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll THEATER

UrbanTheater Company’s ensemble for Back in and critics who they ‘should have’ written the Day IVÁN VEGA about—essentially, how to do their jobs, which is what you are doing here.” After making a Facebook post in a space for artists of Guadalís Del Carmen and focused on the issues color and tagging the editor of the magazine, Humboldt Park residents face with gentrifi ca- we immediately were sent an apology e-mail. tion. We closed out our season with Back in the “I realize my response was unnecessarily ag- Day: An 80’s House Music Dancesical, written gressive and defensive, and I sincerely apolo- by myself and inspired by José Echevarría’s gize for it—you are right that erasure is a very memoir on Chicago dance crews, The Real common issue for companies of color and a Dance Fever: Book One. Both stories refl ected very valid concern.” American Theatre is not the voices of the residents in our community the only publication that has left us out. The and had sold-out runs. journalist of this story is not the only author And yet we are constantly on the precipice to respond to us with a tone rooted in white of exclusion because of the coming and going supremacy. This is all very common. of artists seeking to enhance their career, UrbanTheater’s legitimacy was never de- resulting in the gentrification of Chicago pendent upon receiving a Joseph Jefferson theater. Because UrbanTheater has not been Award or being featured in American Theatre. given the same value by the institutions that While Not For Sale, a show that featured white are committed to Eurocentric ideology, our actors, received a Jeª nomination, Back in the contributions to the ecology of theater are Day, a fully immersive experience centering overlooked. It is a cycle of value that is per- queer Black and Brown stories, did not re- petuated through academia, the press, and the ceive any Jeª recognition, even with double regional theaters themselves that make BIPOC the budget of any show in UTC history. Both THEATER OP-ED artists reject the learning or support of BIPOC productions received critically acclaimed theaters, in lieu of investing in the regional reviews, and even so we cannot ignore that ecosystem. access to more resources is a result of more Moving beyond #OpenYourLobby The larger Chicagoland theater community mainstream press and awards. will protest at Victory Gardens asking for fair The truth about American theater was ex- For BIPOC theaters, existence is resistance. and equitable treatment but will not rally, posed last week. A truth that BIPOC theaters uplift, or visit UrbanTheater, while selectively have known for quite some time: very little has By M G choosing whose work to amplify. Why is that? changed. Solidarity statement after statement Theater artists should not believe the lie that flooded my inbox while I was still grieving, theaters of color are inferior to white-founded still hugging my Black sons, still praying they n June 3, Chicago theater artists fl ooded Our audiences raised us. Many of our larger institutions. Larger institutions are in- never have to call for me the way I read George my social media with #openyourlobby; neighbors have worked assembly lines with equitably funded in comparison to theaters of Floyd called for his mother. I will never watch Oa call for theaters around the nation to our grandparents, gone to school with our color. Marginalized artists will continue to be that video and I will never know what it’s like open their doors to #blacklivesmatter pro- parents, and have had their children taught by drawn to spaces where microaggressions feed to write a statement in solidarity with the testers. As the producing artistic director at our artists. Closing our doors would be turn- their internalized inferiority by being sold on Black Lives Matter movement. As you can tell, UrbanTheater Company (UTC), a Black and ing our backs on our family. We are and have the idea of equitable pay. American theater I am teetering between anger and sadness, as I Mexican Chicago native, and mother, this call always been in service to them. UTC has been began during the colonial era and gave birth to put words to paper. exposed the truth about our theater communi- a donation center many times over, a press blackface, so why do we continue to uphold a As an artistic leader, the following has ty: the privilege of deciding to close our doors conference room, a polling place for numer- model that was meant to exploit us? never been clearer to me: our artists need to and separate ourselves from our neighbors is ous elections, a place for healers to gather, a In American Theatre magazine’s November come home and BIPOC theaters deserve to be nonexistent. screening location, and so much more. We’ve 2019 issue, dedicated to Chicago theater, there funded in order for us to adequately do so. When you grow up in and around your audi- had an open-door policy since occupying was an article entitled “How Chicago’s Scrap- We deserve to heal and we deserve to sustain ences, people hold you and your organization a permanent space in between the Puerto py Storefront Scene Sustains Itself.” As one of ourselves while serving our communities. accountable in ways that a mainstream theater Rican fl ags on Division Street. By partnering the few theaters of color with a space, UTC’s We deserve to have our voices lifted in every has never experienced. You see, UTC is a the- with our nonprofi t neighbors, like El Rescate, contribution to theater was entirely over- publication. We deserve to have whatever re- ater of color founded by, led by, and for people Vida/SIDA, the Honeycomb Network, and the looked. Our existence was absent, as were all sources are needed to tell our stories. We de- of color. This May, our beloved organization Puerto Rican Cultural Center, we are able to Chicago theaters of color. Only white-founded serve to have capacity to implement it all. We turned 15. Founded in 2005, and having done provide accessible theater productions to our organizations were covered. When our exec- deserve to exist. Being in solidarity with that work in Humboldt Park since 2006, we use residents. We are and will continue to be a utive director wrote the author of the piece radical thought is nice, but being an accom- grassroots marketing to draw audiences who theater based in our community. explaining how UTC “tends to be left out of plice and implementing that ideology is the have never seen a live theatrical performance. Our last season was titled “Born and Raised: the narrative,” we were e-mailed the following most anti-racist thing the American theater We’ve never had the privilege of putting up Chicago Stories by Chicago Playwrights.” It response: “I’d prefer theater companies focus can do. v art, just for art’s sake. Our mere existence is a began with a commissioned piece, Not For on treating their actors well and producing rebellious act. We exist because of need. Sale/No Se Vende, written by Chicago native meaningful work, rather than telling writers @urbantheater ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 19 B ss1/2 Dir. Shannon Murphy, min. FILM Available to rent on streaming services and VOD starting Fri /

Babyteeth of summer rom-coms, underscored by the experimental pop stylings of Tune-Yards. One of the film’s standout scenes follows and sympathy—falling in love when you are Milla and Moses going to a party together. young and dying. A slow tracking shot follows Milla as she ex- Shannon Murphy’s debut feature Ba- plores the apartment, lit by projections and byteeth is the most recent addition to the multicolor strobe lights, with an e ervescent genre, and one that feels far more mature and curiosity. Moses gives Milla a chance to complex than its young-adult counterparts. actually live, rather than just be alive, as her But despite its undeniable beauty on the parents have settled for. surface, the most emotional moments of Ba- Babyteeth eventually builds up to a power- byteeth are often muddled by its frantic and ful climax, but the disjointed path it takes to disjointed storytelling. get there cannot be ignored. Several scenes Babyteeth centers on Milla (Eliza Scanlen), are labeled with a pastel-colored title, like an Australian teenager with cancer, a set of chapters in a book, that teeter on disrupting hyperprotective parents, and a baby tooth the fi lm’s spontaneous and unstructured na- she still hasn’t lost. Milla meets what seems ture. The fi lm’s strength is in its centralized to be her polar opposite: 23-year-old Moses family unit, and exploring the idiosyncrasies (Toby Wallace) who sells drugs, has a rattail of each character and their relationship to and face tattoos, and like many young white being alive. And yet characters with no real men, carries himself like he isn’t afraid of stake in the narrative are spliced in and some- dying. times fracture the emotional momentum that Their budding relationship upsets Milla’s is built throughout the fi lm’s runtime. parents and disrupts the safe but suffocat- As Murphy’s first feature film, Babyteeth ing environment they have built for her. But feels raw and unfi ltered, but it can also feel Milla’s parents also rarely have a grasp of directionless and unrefi ned as a result. But if reality or the repercussions of how they are Babyteeth is a preview of what’s to come from REVIEW raising her. Her father (Ben Mendelsohn) is a both Murphy and screenwriter Rita Kalnejais, psychiatrist who substitutes meaningful dia- it is certainly a promising one. logue with prescriptions that numb the pain. Babyteeth gives its audience a lot to chew Babyteeth is a lot to chew on Her mother (Essie Davis) is his most a ected on, namely how we think about death, depen- victim, flipping between being too high on dency, and agency. It isn’t a fi lm that patron- Shannon Murphy’s promising debut feature explores the diff erence between painkillers to make sense of what is going on izes its sick protagonist or sees her as less being alive and living. in her own home and pushing her supply to than human because of a diagnosis. She is Moses for him to sell. not cancer personifi ed, she is a human being By C C But Moses and Milla’s relationship, while who wants to experience life in a way she was complicated and bordering on exploitative, never allowed to, no matter how ill-advised ver the last decade, there has been an and Earl and the Dying Girl to Stella Meghie’s blossoms quite beautifully. Scanlen and that may be. It’s a fi lm about taking control of influx in films and novels about teen Everything Everything, this “boy meets girl Wallace have a magnetic chemistry and their your life when it seemingly has already been Oromance and terminal illnesses, espe- with a terminal illness” phenomenon has characters talk to each other like they are the dictated for you. v cially cancer. From Josh Boone’s The Fault evolved into something of a genre all to itself, only people in the universe. Their love plays in Our Stars to Alfonso Gomez-Rejon’s Me exploring—with di erent degrees of success out in tender montages that feel reminiscent @codycorrall CHICAGO READER MASKS

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20 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll R READER RECOMMENDED b ALL AGES N NEW F FILM LGBTQ Fiction & Horror

NOW PLAYING guard also shines, making for an unexpectedly charming duo in this 2020 U.S. fi lm. Clever, quick-witted camera Creating a Character: The Moni work complements Chin’s impeccable comedic timing, Yakim Legacy while long shots depict New York’s Chinatown in loving, hyper-saturated detail. In this incandescent and utterly Creating a Character: The Moni Yakim Legacy aims to delightful debut, director Sasie Sealy delivers a spar- reveal the man behind the curtain, a movement teacher kling movie that centers the story of an elderly woman FREE who’s been training students at Juilliard for more than of color with the agency, care, and attention it deserves. 50 years. Yakim, once a pupil himself, studied under English, Mandarin, and Cantonese with subtitles. —N shipping the renowned mime Marcel Marceau. Still, viewers will L C 87 min. Through 6/25, Music Box Theatre IN USA probably be more familiar with his own star students, Virtual Cinema including Anthony Mackie, Jessica Chastain, and Oscar Isaac, all of whom took Yakim’s class and sing his praises. Yet, it’s lesser-known actor Alex Sharp’s (How Miss Juneteenth to Talk to Girls at Parties) success story that’s used to R A small-town beauty queen reckons with big bolsters Yakim’s. One year a er graduating, Sharp wins dreams in Miss Juneteenth. Nicole Beharie plays Tur- a Tony Award for his very physical performance in The quoise, a hardworking mother striving to give her Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which daughter a better future than she had, with powerful BY LOCAL AUTHOR DAVID JAY COLLINS epitomizes Yakim’s belief that movement is action and and elegant vulnerability. As a former pageant winner, action is acting. While upli ing, the subplot dilutes the she is the whole package—stunning, smart, hardworking, documentary, which would benefi t from placing and and empathetic—yet life has humbled her to cleaning leaving the spotlight on Yakim for a more in-depth look toilets and crippled her self-confi dence. Unresolved Free Short Story at his life. —B J 76 min. Music Box Theatre generational trauma looms thickly over the future of her Virtual Cinema daughter Kai (a sparkling and earnest Alexis Chikaeze) Northerly Island Join David’s Mailing List and drives Turquoise into a quiet existential panic. This screenwriting and directorial debut of Channing The King of Staten Island Godfrey Peoples is deceptively quiet and pared down. R In both his comedy and acting ventures, Pete The simplicity of the story showcases the setting: a Davidson has always maintained a grossly weird yet ach- dusty Texas town inhabited by plain old Black people. ingly lovable charm. This is on full display in Judd Apa- She turns the camera with love on characters who might tow’s The King of Staten Island. Davidson helped write otherwise be peddled as broadly comedic or as common the semi-autobiographical fi lm in which he stars as Scott, thugs, stripping away the legacy of caricature in favor a 20-something tattoo artist who is struggling to fi gure of domestic normalcy, throwing open the window wide life out while his widowed mom (Marisa Tomei) dates for a new, easy, languid breeze of Black cinema. The The Virtual Beach Ball a new guy (Bill Burr). Like Scott, Davidson’s real-life celebration of Juneteenth is that of overdue freedom, father was a fi refi ghter who died on the job—Davidson’s and Peoples paints a gentle portrait of waiting patiently father died during the September 11 attacks, a detail le through setbacks for the tiny triumphs that can trans- Online Auction out of the fi lm. The King of Staten Island follows Scott form the life of a humble poor Black woman and make as he slouches through life, refusing to apply himself her feel like Miss America. —S F 103 min. bac.givesmart.com to anything that might be remotely good for him, like In wide release on VOD pursuing a relationship with a childhood friend or getting serious about his artistic talent. It’s a story we’ve seen before (Miles Teller in 2013’s The Spectacular Now The Surrogate Virt comes to mind) that could easily go awry, but Davidson’s Jess (Jasmine Batchelor), an idealistic but fl ailing web The ual sympathetic performance keeps your attention as we designer, agrees to be the egg donor and surrogate for come to realize that sometimes growing up is just hard. her best friend, Josh (Chris Perfetti), and his husband, Tomei is excellent as the understanding yet exasperated Aaron (Sullivan Jones). Everything goes according to mother while Burr adds unexpected nuance to an o en plan for the well-meaning Brooklynites until a prenatal one-dimensional trope. Viewers familiar with Davidson’s test comes back positive for Down syndrome. Writer-di- role as a similar good-natured yet immature loafer in rector Jeremy Hersh’s microbudget feature debut isn’t 2019’s Big Time Adolescence may fi nd the typecasting a moral tale so much as a moral query: Josh and Aaron unoriginal, but the fact of the matter is this: it’s a type are reluctant to have the child, while Jess becomes Davidson shines in. —N D L R, 136 min. In more invested in the idea, and Hersh allows viewers wide release on VOD to consider both sides of the issue. Tensions mount as Jess debates whether to have the child on her own, consulting family, friends, and even acquaintances, but Lucky Grandma getting no closer to the right answer. Hersh examines R Tsai Chin stars as Grandma Wong, a scrappy the situation with nuance; the fi lm is compelling, if a little Chinese woman who experiences a sudden bout of luck, theoretical at times. Batchelor’s performance stands drawing the unwanted attention of neighborhood gang- out amidst the heavy subject matter (and in spite of sters. Though Chin’s performance as a cool, chain-smok- the fi lm’s artless aesthetic; microbudget doesn’t have to ing granny steals the show, Taiwanese fi lm star Corey mean plain)—she’s defi nitely one to watch. —K Ha’s tender portrayal of Grandma Wong’s hired body- S 6/19-7/2, Facets Virtual Cinema v ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 21 MUSIC

Why do indie musicians put up with penny payouts? Streaming your favorite artists’ music is the least helpful way to support them. But they can’t abandon those platforms, because we won’t. By J R

Sooper Records, estimates that Spotify pays Sooper roughly $3,000 for a million plays, or 0.3 cents per play. Spotify isn’t a monopoly, of course, but its dominance gives it power: as Rob Sevier of reissue label the Numero Group puts it, “They are able to dictate rates, and no one can say no to them.” The Numero Group has posted a Spotify playlist of the shortest songs in its catalog, which it describes as “perfect for . . . getting our artists paid in the least amount of time.” (Spotify pays by the stream, not by the minute—bad news for jazz musicians, doom-metal bands, and other artists who tend to make longer tracks.) The playlist is titled “.004,” because that’s what Numero earns on average per Spotify stream (the playlist’s description says the amount is in cents, but it’s actually in dollars). For comparison’s sake, an $8 digital For many niche artists, streaming revenue is negligible. But those services also album sold on Bandcamp would typically net represent huge numbers of potential new fans. RACHEL HAWLEY an artist or label a bit less than $6.80, after the platform’s 15 percent cut and payment- processing fees. Assuming the album has ten he price of music has been in flux and other merch to make money. But now the but they’re typically a fraction of a cent per tracks, you’d have to stream the whole thing since it was first commodified on pandemic-related shutdown of live music has play. 170 times on Spotify to equal $6.80 at a rate of wax cylinders. Artists have rarely made even that precarious realignment unten- Spotify is the most popular service: ac- 0.4 cents. Few fans are that devoted. had much say in that price, though, able. “Most of the money I made from being a cording to a December 2019 report by Midia Still, Spotify doesn’t pay the least for or in how much of the money reaches musician would come from playing a show, or Research analyst Mark Mulligan, at this time streams. Bandcamp doesn’t pay for them at Tthem—and in some ways recorded music has speaking on a panel, or doing something phys- last year it had 36 percent of total streaming all, instead basing its business model on sales. never been worth less. As long as you have a ically with an audience,” says Chicago rapper subscribers worldwide, and this spring it In early 2019, a community blog called the stable Internet connection, you can hear any- CJ Run. claimed 271 million users, including 124 million Trichordist, which advocates for fairness in the thing from several vast, overlapping catalogs Stripped of gig income, independent artists subscribers. As a result, it’s been able to exert online music marketplace, published a data set at any time. Streaming services have made and labels are trying to squeeze more income industry-wide inﬂ uence on pay rates. The way that analyzed the 2018 streaming revenue of a countless hours of music available for monthly out of their recordings. It’s become suddenly Spotify calculates royalties is far from simple real but anonymous midsize indie label with subscription fees that average around $10, and urgent for them to decide whether the beneﬁ ts or transparent, though. The rate can vary about a billion streams annually. It estimated if you’re willing to listen to ads, it can all be of streaming make up for its drawbacks. depending on type of listener—subscribers 0.331 cents per play on Spotify, which provided free. In 2019, according to a year-end report by generate more royalties—and by what country 29 percent of the label’s streams and 49 per- The days of listening only to music you the Recording Industry Association of Amer- they’re in. In the U.S., mechanical royalty rates cent of its streaming revenue. Pandora, now could hear on the radio, a ord to buy, or copy ica, streaming services such as Spotify and are set by the Copyright Royalty Board, while part of Sirius XM, managed just 0.155 cents (4 from friends are long gone. Most musicians Apple Music accounted for 79.5 percent of U.S. performance royalty rates (Spotify pays both) percent of streams, 3 percent of revenue), and have had to accept that sales of records, CDs, revenue from recorded music, or $8.8 billion. are mostly negotiated with organizations such YouTube Content ID trailed far behind with an and tapes will never support them again—and Artists and labels are paid from the pool of as ASCAP and BMI. Other countries have their abysmal 0.028 cents (49 percent of streams, 7 given the notoriously stingy payouts from subscription fees and ad revenue that each own mechanisms. percent of revenue). Apple Music delivered the streaming, they’re focusing on live shows streaming service accrues. Payout rates vary, Glenn Curran, cofounder of local indie label best combination of volume and rate, with 10 22 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll MUSIC

percent of streams and 25 percent of revenue of it with artists. It continues to invest heavily serly royalty rates they get in return? espite a steep but brief dip in March, on a per-stream payout of 0.495 cents. in its podcast business, and recently struck an The market of streaming listeners is simply streaming consumption has continued Legal efforts to increase streaming pay- exclusive $100 million deal with Joe Rogan. too large to ignore. Curran estimates that for Dto increase—unsurprisingly, self- ments to songwriters and musicians (fre- Last month, Mark Mulligan of Midia Research Sooper’s most successful projects, streaming imposed isolation and social distancing hav- quently one and the same in the indie world) told Rolling Stone that musicians would need revenue is large enough to match sales rev- en’t decreased people’s appetites for music. have been halting, and the industry continues tens of billions of streams to earn what Rogan enue. “Not having digital revenue would be But if your goal as a fan is to help the artists to fi ght them tenaciously. Despite public crit- was paid. “What Spotify is saying basically is, a huge loss,” he says. Because streaming has you love support themselves, streaming their icism from A-list songwriters (among them ‘We value this podcast more than we value any low or no barriers to entry for listeners, it can music is probably the least helpful thing you Nile Rodgers, Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds, single artist on our platform,’” he said. help artists grow a fan base—it’s much less of can do, short of nothing at all. and Starrah), Spotify, Google, Pandora/ an investment to stream an unfamiliar album Buying music, for those who can afford it, Sirius XM, and Amazon are all individually o its credit, Spotify has attempted to than to buy one. Placement in the right stream- obviously puts more money into artists’ and appealing a 2018 ruling by the U.S. Copyright address the COVID-19 pandemic’s dev- ing playlists, whether created by users, labels, labels’ pockets. Record stores continue to Royalty Board in favor of the National Music Tastation of the music ecosystem. The publications, or the services themselves, can operate online during the pandemic (albeit Publishers’ Association and the Nashville company has donated ad time to governments also help musicians reach new audiences. mostly in a diminished capacity), but no inter- Songwriters’ Association International, which and charities, and it’s created a music relief Playlists can help artists in fringe genres too. mediary is necessary. The ease and ubiquity would increase streaming royalties owed to fund to match up to $10 million in donations. “We all know that a lot of these streaming sites of e-commerce has made it easier than ever to songwriters by 44 percent over a five-year In April it also debuted a new feature called have crook-level rates,” says Doug Kaplan, buy directly from artists and labels, if listeners period. Artist Fundraising Pick, a button that artists cofounder of oddball Chicago experimental are willing to seek them out. “I like to bring Even if you do pay for a streaming sub- can add to their Spotify pages in order to solic- label Hausu Mountain. “Things we’ve gotten people to my website, to my storefront, and scription, hoping to support your favorite it donations for themselves or for charities of into playlists have done very well, and that’s actually create long-term relationships with artists, little of your money will end up in their their choosing. provided additional income. I’m not gonna fans,” Rempis says. pockets—unless they happen to be everybody Unsurprisingly, many independent musi- complain about it.” Bandcamp, founded in 2008, allows artists else’s favorites too. Like most other streaming cians see this as a paltry response from the Labels and artists generally can’t conduct and labels to set their own prices for digital services, Spotify uses a pro rata model: all biggest player in the biggest segment of the A/B tests to determine whether streaming is downloads, physical media, and other merch— subscription revenue is pooled, and artists are music business. “They haven’t really done a net winner—that is, they can’t meaningfully for many of them, it’s replaced a freestanding paid a share of that total that’s proportional to much to remedy the fucking cataclysm that has determine whether abandoning streaming website. Artists and labels can offer their their number of streams for the month. This is happened to people,” says rapper-producer would help them make enough additional customers subscriptions, but generally the “fair” in a strictly mathematical sense, but it’s Joshua Virtue of Chicago label and collective sales to o set the loss of streaming revenue, site works like a shop. Bandcamp’s basic artist also a little like the electoral college, in that Why? Records. because they’re operating in an environment accounts are free, and it also sells premium you’ll end up paying Drake even if you never “The tip thing on Spotify and all of that where most listeners expect streaming to be monthly professional services. In contrast to listen to him. is a very half-assed way to be like, ‘If you an option. “Thinking of the music business as the complex, opaque royalty schedules of the A user-centric model, such as the one being wanna . . . ’ What’s so hard about that is a lot you either use streaming or not is silly,” says major streaming services, Bandcamp takes a developed by French service Deezer, could of these fans aren’t doing well either,” adds McNiece. “You have to use all the channels fi xed 10 percent cut of physical sales, and its benefi t fringe and indie artists at the expense Frances Farlee, a Sooper employee who also available to you. I don’t think people consume aforementioned 15 percent cut of digital sales of market-dominating stars, though industry works for Why? Records and manages rapper that way either.” drops to 10 percent if a client does more than observers are divided on how signifi cant the ef- Matt Muse. And success on Spotify can lead to addition- $5,000 in business per year. The information fect would be. Each user’s subscription money Saxophonist and Aerophonic Records al sources of revenue significant enough to fi ts on a single Web page. is split proportionally among the artists that founder Dave Rempis doesn’t stream his be worth sacrifi cing an awful lot of potential “That’s one of the best things about Band- user streams, and the formula is unaffected label’s catalog through Spotify or any of the sales. Curran estimates that a popular song camp,” says Jessi Frick, cofounder of Bay Area by a user’s total number of plays—which has other major players—Aerophonic maintains could pull down $10,000 to $30,000 for a sin- label Father/Daughter Records. “They are the side e ect of minimizing bot fraud and the a Bandcamp page, but Rempis has also built gle sync in a commercial or TV episode. But transparent about their fees and where they outsize infl uence of “super users” who stream a clear, detailed label website to allow fans the song’s popularity generally needs to be allocate their money.” Bandcamp is often com- hundreds of hours per month. to buy CDs and vinyl directly from him. He’s demonstrated by signifi cant streaming num- pared to a giant record store, with an inventory Though pop stars such as Taylor Swift have frustrated by listeners who treat streaming bers before it’ll attract the attention of music that includes a range of esoteric genres, and it fought for better treatment from stream- services as a “one-stop shop for music.” The supervisors. builds fan communities through social sharing ing companies, the currently dominant pro way streaming services siphon revenue and Matt Pakulski owns eclectic Oak Park label features and the journalism on its editorial site rata model would continue to disadvantage attention away from musicians, he believes, FPE Records, and his streaming payouts are so (to which I occasionally contribute). smaller players even if rates increased. Art- is much like what Amazon has done to book- meager that for the past two years he’s focused Bandcamp’s profile has risen in recent ists operating at a smaller scale also lack her stores or social media have done to indepen- on earning revenue through syncs. He sees months thanks to its response to COVID-19. On leverage. “We’re not like Taylor Swift,” says dent publications. “It requires one extra step it as the only way to provide a middle-class Friday, March 20, as lockdowns were begin- Scottie McNiece, cofounder of Chicago-based for people to go to the source,” he says, “rather lifestyle to fringe or indie musicians. “You’re ning around the country, the company waived progressive-jazz label International Anthem. than to buy it from these aggregators.” either Kanye or you’re somebody playing to a its cut on all purchases for the day. Bandcamp “We don’t have the power to be like, ‘We’re not It’s hard to argue that Spotify and its ilk basement with your friends,” he says. “I feel customers eager to send that extra 10 or 15 gonna use your streaming platform because don’t operate by extracting value from music— like there should be that mid level, like, you’re percent to their favorite musicians and labels you don’t pay good enough royalties.’ No one’s they’d be nothing without it, and if they didn’t a good musician and you get money for it. Not spent $4.3 million in 24 hours, 15 times the gonna give a shit if we do that.” pocket a share of what listeners think it’s a lot of money, but more than negative. That’s total on a typical Friday; when the company Spotify clearly has money to throw worth, they’d never be viable. Why do so many what I think is missing.” did it again on Friday, May 1, customers spent around—it just doesn’t want to share any more independent artists and labels tolerate the mi- $7.1 million. ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 23 MUSIC continued from 23 suggests, could commit to taking a temporary peers in Chicago, was key to its sales. “I wanted creating music into a source of revenue. Chi- “Even before March 20th we were already loss itself, instead of leaving artists to absorb to make it clear that if you’re coming to listen cago producer GLOhan Beats has worked for seeing huge numbers of fans use Bandcamp so much of the pandemic’s pain. to this album, you’re coming to help,” he says. A-list rappers such as Gucci Mane, Juice Wrld, to support artists who were seeing tours can- Some artists have used Bandcamp as the He may upload Jackie’s House to Spotify even- and Lil Uzi Vert. He occasionally livestreams celed,” Josh Kim, Bandcamp’s COO, told the only platform for their projects during the pan- tually, but for now he’s happy to see it valued in his work in progress, talking viewers through Recording Academy earlier this month. “So we demic—especially when they’re looking to see a concrete way. “It lets me know you give a fuck what he’s doing, and his audience sometimes wanted to highlight that even more and engage signifi cant revenue in a hurry. Rappers Open about my family in this moment.” donates via Twitch’s tip function. “This gen- as an entire community, and also encourage Mike Eagle and Serengeti released Quarantine Following the success of Jackie’s House, eration is mostly focused on music that is more fans to continue supporting artists until Recordings, their second album as Cavanaugh, Virtue and the rest of the Why? Records crew everywhere for free,” says GLOhan’s friend and things are recovered.” The company had an- on March 20. “We started making these songs released another Bandcamp exclusive in May: collaborator D2X. “I think I enjoyed albums a other “Bandcamp day” on June 5, and there’s a couple years ago and never fi nished them,“ the compilation Art Is Love Vol. 1, which fea- lot more when I used to buy them and listen to a fourth planned for July 3. This Juneteenth they explain on the release’s Bandcamp page. tures musician friends from a variety of Chi- the CD.” (and every subsequent Juneteenth), it will “Since we’re quarantined and are trying to cago scenes. It’s a fundraiser for the Chicago Open Mike Eagle suggests that consumer donate its share of sales to the NAACP Legal replace lost income from shows we decided to Community Bond Fund—the $1,300 raised so attitudes are at least partly to blame for the Defense Fund. put them out over the bandcamps to stimulate far is more than any of the label’s previous re- current state of the industry. “People get The revenue-share days have been a boon our personal economies.” leases have earned in their lifetimes on major upset at streaming, as if Spotify or Apple are to independent musicians and labels. Curran Eagle says that the statement was meant to streaming services, where the main benefi t is devaluing music,” he says. “Us as a society, we says March 20 and May 1 were the two all-time set expectations appropriately for an unmas- the potential to reach vastly larger pools of already devalue music, and these companies best sales days for Sooper Records, with May tered album. “I can be confi dent it would have users. have stepped in to fill that void and create surpassing March. “The real magic behind taken us a long time to make the same amount Inspired by the most recent wave of Black what the new marketplace is.” Though he con- what Bandcamp is doing,” he says, “is they’re of revenue from it if we had put it on streaming Lives Matter protests, many musicians used tinues to sell physical releases, he admits that mobilizing their consumer base in a really services,” he notes. Bandcamp’s June 5 revenue-share day to fund- in the digital realm he prefers the easy, instant intense way.” When Eagle is promoting a solo album, he’s raise for local charities, activists, and other access that streaming gives his fans—it beats Chicago industrial musician Jordan Reyes reluctant to deliberately limit access to his organizations supporting Black communities. the way he used to release music via carefully estimates that each revenue-share day has music, even if doing so might mean a faster Sooper Records artist and cofounder Nnamdï arranged zip fi les on fi le-sharing sites such as made enough money for his label, American payout. He has to worry about reaching as raised more than $10,000 from sales of his new Mediafi re. Dreams, to commission an entire album press- many people as possible. “When something EP, Black Plight, one of the best-selling items He wishes fans and critics better under- ing. “It’s nuts, dude,” he says. is what I base my next year or two of career on the site that day, and donated the money stood the economic di« erences between indie Bandcamp’s quick payment turnaround— cachet on, I have to take every precaution to to Assata’s Daughters, EAT Chicago, and oth- and major-label artists. Even when he appears usually one or two days after a digital sale— make sure it doesn’t fall through the cracks,” ers in need. Soul singer Wyatt Waddell wrote on year-end lists next to the likes of Drake and has also helped artists in urgent need of funds. he says. and recorded his protest song “Fight!” in less Young Thug, he feels closer kinship with indie Streaming services typically pay monthly, CJ Run was preparing for a year fi lled with than 24 hours, and has so far raised more than rappers such as JPEGmafi a and R.A.P. Ferrei- but for streams that happened two or even national tours before the industry shut down. $1,000 for Black Lives Matter Chicago, the Chi- ra—not because they make especially similar three months ago. Kaplan has been trying to Instead Run is self-producing new music, post- cago Community Bond Fund, and the Greater music, but “because we come from the same get money to Hausu Mountain artists within ing exclusive digital songs and albums to their Chicago Food Depository. Rapper Saint Icky world economically; we’re craftspeople trying a week. “A lot of artists can’t wait right now,” Bandcamp page (which they hadn’t really been released the single “Black Skin” exclusively to live on the strength of the craft.” Eagle also he says. using before) to make up some of that lost on Bandcamp and has raised $600 each for says it more bluntly: “Everything about our income. “I can actually make a few hundred Healthy Hood Chicago and My Block My Hood career is life or death. If I don’t treat my album ot everybody is Team Bandcamp—it’s dollars from selling my music, because it’s My City. Bandcamp also made its Juneteenth release properly, that’s my rent.” still a middleman, after all. While Rem- actually worth that,” they say. “Once all of this announcement in response to the protests. McNiece hopes listeners use self-isolation to Npis acknowledges that Aerophonic’s is over, I can know that I can go out on tour to actively engage with music, not just passively sales went up 400 percent on May 1, he dislikes make a living, but I can still also sell my music. hile musicians are unable to gig absorb it. “The importance of artists and cre- that Bandcamp uses the rhetoric of charity Why did it take me this long to put my first or tour, recordings remain a core ative people and culture has never been more and community to push what he considers a thing on Bandcamp?” Wsource of income for them, whether apparent than it is now, when we’re all stuck at marketing tactic. “Even if sales go up a ton Joshua Virtue has been unable to work his streamed, sold, or licensed. But they’re also home and we have nothing to do besides cook that day, which they have, [the extra 10 or 15 service-industry job, so he recorded the new by necessity fi nding other ways to earn money. for ourselves and consume art and media,” he percent] is not a lot of money for artists. And album Jackie’s House in three days and re- Livestreamed performances have proliferated says. for Bandcamp, it’s way less than they would leased it in April as a pay-what-you-can Band- rapidly, some supported by donations and Much like independent venues, indepen- spend on marketing to get that number of new camp exclusive. He’s using it as a fundraiser some ticketed. Each seemingly emulates a dent musicians need extra support during the users and new data into their service,” he says. for his mother, who’s supporting his sister, his different kind of in-person show: in Chicago pandemic—otherwise they won’t be around “For them, it’s a genius move, and I fi nd it very grandmother, and other relatives at her home they include street fests such as the fi rst vir- anymore by the time the virus is under control. cynical and problematic.” in Florida. He didn’t expect many sales beyond tual Do Division, public-funded shows hosted And for the vast majority of them, streaming Rempis would be more impressed with the friends and relatives, but in the fi rst two weeks by the mayor’s Instagram account, blues con- revenue won’t cut it. For Joshua Virtue, the company’s commitment to musicians if it made he earned more than $2,500 in donations rang- certs from the stage of a mostly empty Rosa’s imperative is simple: “I don’t want you to be the revenue-share days weekly, or reduced ing from $2 to $100. Jackie’s House has made Lounge, and avant-garde showcases such as broke, because then you won’t be able to make its percentage permanently. An organization more money than any of his previous projects. Experimental Sound Studio’s Quarantine Con- your sick art that helps me live!” v with Bandcamp’s resources that really wanted Virtue believes the clear charitable aim of certs series. to take a stand for musicians and labels, he the project, amplifi ed by community-oriented Livestreaming can make even the process of @jackriedy 24 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll MUSIC Chicago's

PHOTO BY KARA HAMMOND Free Weekly Since 1971 Today, I have a band called Pigface, and we played at Thalia Hall, November 30, 2019. And I’m so happy that we did that. My band is a collective of musicians from other bands and has always been diverse onstage in every conceivable way. But at Thalia Hall we were joined by Gaelynn Lea, who is a disabil- ity rights advocate. She won the Tiny Desk competition for NPR. She’s brittle boned and wheelchair bound, and plays ﬁ ddle like a cello. That was really special for me. But also through our connections with Add-2, the Chicago artist, he sent four artists that he is a mentor to: Just Chris, J. Lamar, Dai, and C.A.M. They jumped onstage and performed with us. I’m so happy to have had that connectedness across so many pieces of Chicago happen before things started to come apart. And I think, at least now, we can #CHIMUSIC35 see them coming back together.

You mentioned that the music scene in Chi- Martin Atkins’s greatest moment cago had that same energy when you moved here as London. More broadly, why do you think Chicago musicians, across different in Chicago music history genres, have become so influential worldwide? Everyone I’ve asked this question to With his supergroup Pigface, the industrial-music veteran brings together all before you has been a native Chicagoan. So sorts of scenes onstage. I would imagine that you might have a slightly diff erent perspective on this. By MAAC chicagoreader.com/donate I’ve got to say, there’s people just doing it, not complaining that they wish this could have happened or that could have happened. It’s ot only is 2020 the Year of Chicago in London and New York, he moved to Chicago like, “In the meantime, let’s roll up our sleeves Music, it’s also the 35th year for the in 1989—“by choice,” as he’s quick to point and make all of the diff erence we are able to Nnonprofit Arts & Business Council of out. Here he joined seminal industrial band do today.” Chicago (A&BC), which provides business ex- Ministry, formed the supergroup Pigface, and There are other cities that claim to be the pertise and training to creatives and their or- continues to collaborate with a wide range of capital of this or the center of that. And I think ganizations citywide. To celebrate, the A&BC artists. everybody here is so busy actually doing it has launched the #ChiMusic35 campaign at This interview was conducted by Ayana that nobody takes the time to wave the fl ag ChiMusic35.com, which includes a public Contreras, who’s a DJ, a host and producer at and talk about it and promote it. It’s a great poll to determine the consensus 35 greatest WBEZ radio, and a columnist for DownBeat place to be. moments in Chicago music history as well as magazine. One of the artists that jumped onstage with a ra e to benefi t the A&BC’s work supporting us, she’s called Dai. And I really like her music. creative communities struggling with the Ayana Contreras: First things first. What’s I follow her on Instagram. And most of her We Couldn't Be impact of COVID-19 in the city’s disinvested your favorite Chicago music moment? posts recently are like, “Hey, we’ve got a car Free Without You— neighborhoods. full of diapers and water. And we’re going to Another part of the campaign is this Reader Martin Atkins: If you’d asked me this ques- be at this location if you need anything.” And Support Community collaboration: a series spotlighting important tion, I don’t know, six months ago, I would it’s just so great to see—not just that energy Journalism figures in Chicago music serving as #Chi- have said the beginning of industrial music, of people trying to promote themselves, but Music35 ambassadors. This week, we hear Wax Trax! Records. I’m talking ’89, ’90, ’91, the people being involved in their communities from drummer, writer, and educator Martin band Ministry, and the same energy in the city and trying to make a diff erence. v Atkins. Born in the north of England in 1959, that I felt in London during the beginning of he joined Public Image Ltd in 1979. After stints punk rock. @marteeeen ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 25 Recommended and notable releases and critics’ insights for the week of June 18 MUSIC

PICK OF THE WEEK Hobbyist want you to dance in the dark to Side Fx

Little Simz TAMCADER

Quin Kirchner, The Shadows and the form or limitation, and the second immediately Light moves into something so er and more restrained. Astral Spirits Kirchner isn’t just playing around with these mini quinkirchner.bandcamp.com/album/the- movements; he’s exploring sound and visualization shadows-and-the-light through evocative pieces that transcend tangible reality, and he adds additional context with vivid The Shadows and the Light, the new album from titles such as “Lucid Dreams,” “Jupiter Moon,” and Chicago drummer Quin Kirchner, is an eclectic “Horizons.” The Shadows and the Light is a tight- collection of freewheeling studio performanc- ly plotted-out dream world that showcases Kirch- es with a diverse range of sounds. On its second ner’s creative spirit, as well as the seriousness and track, “Batá Chop,” the album features inﬂ uenc- reﬁ nement he brings to the table—you can prac- es of West African batá drumming and traces of tically hear the cogs systematically moving in his Afro-Cuban drumming (which Kirchner learned head from track to track. It all works because as a teenager while studying in Havana), but else- Kirchner is a strong musician who knows how to

COURTESYTHEARTIST where there are bebop fl ourishes and interplane- transform eccentricity into something that can tary adornments originally stylized by the mystical appeal to diverse listeners, rather than jazz afi cio- jazz mad hatter, Sun Ra. Opener “Shadow Intro” nados alone. —J E features Kirchner solo on overdubbed drum kit, congas, and synths, showcasing his chops without extraneous accompaniment. The album goes Little Simz, Drop 6 on to present organ- and horn-laden jazz that Age 101 Hobbyist, Side Fx allows his compositional abilities to shine, played littlesimz.co/Drop6 Self-released by a revolving all-star group of local musicians hobbyist.bandcamp.com/album/side-fx that includes bassist Matt Ulery, tenor saxophon- British rapper Simbi Ajikawo, who records as Little ist and fl utist Nate Lepine, Wurlitzer player Rob Simz, jumps right into your ears with her distinc- Clearfi eld, alto saxophonist Greg Ward, bass clar- tive beats and fl uid style on “Might Bang, Might inetist Jason Stein, and trombonist Nick Broste Not,” the fi rst song on the new Drop 6. “You ain’t (who also mixed and helped engineer the album seen no one like me since / Lauryn Hill in the along with Kirchner and Brian Sulpizio). The fi rst 90s, bitch,” she raps, laying down the law to any- CHICAGOEXPERIMENTALELECTRONICPOP duo Hobbyist are well suited to capture the few tracks on The Shadows and the Light seem one who might question her abilities or commit- anxiety that’s been our constant companion since the fi rst wave of the COVID-19 pandemic intended to be singular compositions, but then ment. “I am a one-woman army / I am the force upended the world. Producer Marc Mozga creates a stark, austere sound from programmed Kirchner begins to experiment with creating mini that we speak of.’’ Born in London to Nigerian movements; as one song ends, the next picks up parents, the 26-year-old Ajikawo has been put- percussion and synth licks, and his prickly, spacious beats and sparse melodies feel like they exactly where it leaves off . He does this with the ting out music since she was a teenager, starting could raise the undead. Meanwhile the restrained vocals of front woman Holly Prindle split fifth and sixth tracks, his own “Pathways” and with the self- released 2010 mixtape Stratosphere. the di erence between sinister and sultry, making her sound like a possessed lounge singer. an arrangement of the Kelan Phil Cohran tune In 2014, she embarked on the Drops series of EPs “Sahara.” “Pathways” is sparse and minimal, with (on her own Age 101 imprint), inspired in part by Mozga and Prindle worked on their new self-released EP, Side Fx, throughout April, recording Kirchner’s kalimba accompanied only by Ulery’s the experimental eclecticism of her early mix- its wobbly, dark pop songs on a phone app while sheltering in place. Despite the circumstances quiet pizzicato on upright bass; it ends with Lep- tapes—they combine a relatively minimal approach that inform the EP, Hobbyist stop short of going full doom-and-gloom. When Prindle compares ine’s so fl ute fl owing into “Sahara,” which quick- to production with raw lyrics and snippets of musi- ly swells with saxophones and rumbling drum fi lls. cal thoughts. Ajikawo put the fi nishing touches on the way she lives in quarantine to the habits of bunker-bound survivalists on the dub-driven Kirchner reverses this technique on the next two Drop 6 in April, while staying alone in her London “Preppers,” the two words she keeps repeating (“Cook my own / Build my own / Can my tracks, the all-horn quintet “Star Cluster” and the home due to COVID-19 concerns. Its five songs own / Shoot my own”) suggest she takes comfort in the power she has to provide for herself. septet piece “Moon Vision.” The fi rst erupts with retain some of the fi ery elements of Little Simz’s a flood of free improvisation on trombone, bass 2019 LP Grey Area, where her quick- witted lyrics —L G clarinet, and three saxophones, wailing without portray her as a force working against any lov- 26 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll MUSIC

OG Stevo COURTSYLJPRODUCTIONS

ers and power structures that might try to slow Ingrid Laubrock & Kris Davis, Blood her roll. But on the new EP, dreaminess and dread Moon creep into her songs: if she was a superheroine Intakt on Grey Area, then on Drop 6 she’s her slightly laubrock-intakt.bandcamp.com/album/blood- more mild-mannered alter ego, just trying to fi t in moon with the humans. On the EP’s last song, “Where’s My Lighter?,” Little Simz gives herself a progress Like so many other musicians based in New York, review: “In this world we need balance / I’m here saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and pianist Kris Davis nurturing my talent.” She’s joined on this track by migrated there. Davis moved from Canada in 2001; Because of the pandemic, our doors fellow Londoner Alewya, whose hazy voice adds Laubrock was born and raised in Germany, then eeriness to an understated beat punctuated by key- spent nearly a decade in England before moving to board riff s. The songs on Drop 6 are full of racing the U.S. in 2009. For as long as they’ve lived in the were forced to close until further thoughts about relationships and responsibility, dis- same neck of the woods, they’ve appeared on each rupted by moments of confusion provoked by the other’s records, and for a time they played together unseen forces that prevent us from leaving home. in the trio Paradoxical Frog with drummer Tyshawn notice. The livelihoods of our box It’s an entirely relatable journey as we all navigate Sorey. Blood Moon, their first recording as a duo, the pandemic. —S C-J exploits their exacting attunement to each other’s office workers, security, stagehands, idiosyncratic moves. On the hushed Davis original “Flying Embers,” their adjacent pitches shimmer Lucki, Almost there like the haze of an open fl ame, in sustained tones techs, and bar servers have been Lucki/Empire and short, pianissimo phrases that make you for- empi.re/blog.php?p=lucki--almost-there-album get what instruments you’re hearing. The pianist’s directly affected by this decision. restrained touch on the title track, a Laubrock com- Any future history of Chicago hip-hop would be position, seems to place her notes inside the tenor incomplete without a chapter about rapper Lucki. saxophone’s sound. And on the improvisation “Gun- Starting with his startling 2013 debut, Alternative weep,” soprano saxophone and piano exchange We want them to know how much Trap, he’s been shaping and tightening a distinc- roles from second to second, each threading quick- tive style built on forlorn storytelling and a languor- silver phrases through the other’s staccato rhythms. ous fl ow. His zonked-out aff ectations can make his Every one of the album’s nine pieces is a distinct, we appreciate their hard work songs seem tossed off , but when you listen deep- absorbing world unto itself. —BM er, the vulnerability, anxiety, and tension he carries in his gritty groan strike you with full force. Lucki and help support them has been on a remarkable streak the past couple OG Stevo, The Last OG years, and his third full-length in 15 months, May’s OG Music Group during this trying time. Almost There (Lucki/Empire), lands like a three- soundcloud.com/og-stevo pointer in the final seconds of a blowout second quarter in game seven of the NBA fi nals. Lucki fi ts In the months since Rogers Park native Stevon vivid tales strewn with drugs, fast cars, and heart- Odueze graduated from Northern Illinois Univer- break into songs that barely break two minutes, sity in December, he’s been singularly focused on and his subtle infl ections lend each track a noirish transforming his music from an undergraduate PLEASE DONATE: gravitas. As dark as he can get, he steers away from extracurricular activity into a career. And judging the morose; on “Pure Love-Hate,” Lucki’s voice from the pop-forward hip-hop he’s released in the threads through a brittle bell melody and a melt- past six months, he’s well on his way. As OG Stevo, jamusa.com/helpourstaff ing vocal sample with a subtle upli that gives his Odueze encodes melody into the DNA of his mike story of a past dalliance a sense of spiritual fulfi ll- technique to supercharge his instrumentals—even ment. —LG when he’s not outright singing, he often ends his ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 27 Find more music reviews at Stay Home. Stay Positive. MUSIC chicagoreader.com/soundboard. Stay Connected.

Jason Wilber COURTESYWILBERTONERECORDS

continued from 27 Jason Wilber, Time Traveller rapped lines with a honeyed lilt. The sweet, ebul- WilberTone lient hook on February’s “Neighborhood Hero,” a jasonwilber.com song about departed friends, gives it an irrepress- We can’t wait to get back to making music and ible joy that’s strong enough to make sure their Jason Wilber is known to audiences around the dancing together at the Old Town School! memory lasts for generations. Odueze carries that world for his impeccable guitar tones and tasteful energy into his latest EP, April’s The Last OG (OG playing in support of the late John Prine over the Music Group), which packs euphoria into even its past 25 years. As Prine’s musical director, Wilber most sorrowful songs; atop the melancholy acous- helped steer him back to the minimal sound of his In the meantime, many of our classes are tic guitar and doleful keys of “Voices in My Head,” records from the early 70s and, in the process, show- he unloads a tight string of bars with such power cased that material’s lyrical and emotional weight. currently running online, and we are actively that it’s clear he can meet whatever challenges lie Throughout, Wilber also released his own impres- ahead. —L G sive body of work. His latest album, Time Traveler, is working on more ways to keep you making his fi nest hour; its transfi xing songs are as quiet and music and learning new things with us, from sparsely arranged as Prine audiences have come to Tengger, Nomad expect from Wilber onstage, but the style is unmis- home, in the near future. Beyond Beyond Is Beyond takably his own. “I was there at the dawn of the here tengger.bandcamp.com/album/nomad and the now when I opened my eyes and cried,” he sings in the first lines of the title track, which A vacation sounds pretty good right about now, opens the record. “And throughout the years, all of We are so thankful to be part of the wonderful doesn’t it? Or it would in a world without COVID- my fears have come true a thousand times.” These and supportive arts community in Chicago and 19, large-scale lockdowns, and an overabundance meditative folk songs circle a central theme: the of existential dread. Seoul-based Korean/Japanese negligence of humans toward the environment and are especially thankful for all our dedicated duo Tengger can’t do anything about the pandem- themselves. But Wilber is too good a songwriter ic, but their music can provide a bit of a mental to write mere polemics. These songs are their own students and teaching artists persevering with escape, or at least upli the spirit. Inspired by their excursions into reflective dreamscapes (“The Old own experiences traveling, the group create medi- Ones”), folk blues (“Spider”), acoustic pop (“Dust to us during this time. tative, light-as-silk sound sculptures by interweav- Dust”), and other prime singer-songwriter fare. His ing drone, psychedelia, Krautrock, and new age protagonists are o en outcasts: In “The Disappear- music with occasional field recordings and word- ance of Bigfoot,” Sasquatch is a wild beast attuned For updates, rescheduled concert info, ways to less vocals. On their latest album, Nomad, Tengger to her world until the scent of man wa s by and gets embrace the natural universe; chirping birds and her running. In “Living Space,” an astronaut tumbles help support our staff & more please visit sung melodies from vocalist and harmonium player through the stratosphere and fi gures out that space Itta lend a bright spirit to opening track “Achime,” “wasn’t what it was supposed to be . . . I miss my oldtownschool.org/alert before the birds seem to swoop down over a cliff to dog / I miss my family.” Wilber has a unique perspec- reveal so ly crashing waves on the following track, tive about the planet too: “We took it all for grant- “Bliss.” Though Tengger’s 2019 album, Spiritual, ed like a spoiled kid / Now we live to regret it.” Wil- Stay safe, sane, and keep on playing from all of dealt more in pulsating textures and gritty noise, ber’s relaxed vocals, like Paul Simon’s, make those Nomad is serene. Krautrock rhythms still appear kinds of lines hang an extra beat until their gravity us at Old Town School of Folk Music! on tracks such as “Eurasia,” but the album’s overall brings up a lump in your throat. Time Traveler isn’t a sense of movement feels more like the airy fl ow of drum record: Wilber’s fi nely laced guitar and mando- shapeshi ing clouds than the mechanical throb of lin arrangements are accented by Susan Anderson’s earthbound machines. Nomad wouldn’t sound out violin and Shannon Hayden’s cello. Producer Paul of place played in the background at a spa, but by Mahern (who’s worked with the likes of Blake Babies oldtownschool.org the end of its long-form closer, “Flow,” you’ll be con- and John Mellencamp) makes every moment glow. vinced that’s a good thing. —J L Despite its somber themes, Time Traveler isn’t meant to dull the pain; instead, these songs will likely make you feel at peace living with it. —MGv 28 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll MUSIC

1958, he’d landed a gig with Ferguson’s group, vocals from Jim Peterik of the Ides of March. and in the 1960s he recorded and performed But at least the band were back on the road. extensively with Woody Herman’s legendary On August 9, 1974 (the day Nixon resigned), band the Herd. Chase were fl ying to a gig at the Jackson Coun- Chase soon became an in-demand soloist, ty Fair in Minnesota when bad weather caused and made several appearances on The Ed their small plane to crash, killing everyone Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show. In the aboard: Bill Chase, keyboardist Wally Yohn, late 60s, while freelancing in Las Vegas, he de- guitarist John Emma, drummer Walter Clark, veloped an itch to start his own ensemble, and and the pilot and copilot. in 1969 he began to assemble players. By 1970 A tribute album titled Watch Closely Now, he’d formed a nine-piece band named after featuring alumni and associates of the band himself, “Chase,” recruiting three other trum- and released under the name Chase, came out peters—Ted Piercefi eld, Alan Ware, and Jerry in 1977. Beginning in 2007, surviving members Van Blair. All were likewise veteran jazz play- of Chase presented memorial concerts in ers and skilled arrangers, and Chase backed various cities. In 2014 they fi nally returned to them up with a rock-style rhythm section: Chicago for two “Chase Revisited” gigs at Reg- keyboardist Phil Porter, guitarist Angel South, gies’, which featured original bassist Dennis bassist Dennis Keith Johnson, and drummer Johnson—a certifi ed badass who had become Jay Burrid. Though Bill Chase had conceived a founding member of Peterik’s band Survivor of his group as instrumental, he soon added in 1978. v Terry Richards as lead vocalist. Chase moved to Chicago in order to take advantage of booking and recording contacts here, and the band played regularly on Rush Street. After signing to Epic Records, they re- Never leased their self-titled debut LP in 1971, which tapped into the horn-rock zeitgeist—it would miss a turn out to be their commercial peak, and the show A tragic plane crash driving, funky single “Get It On” became their biggest hit. again. That year Chase was nominated for a Gram- denied horn-rock juggernaut my in the Best New Artist category, losing to Carly Simon. Chase was named the top pop group (and number two jazz group) in the Chase their legacy 1971 DownBeat magazine poll, and WBBM even gave them their own local half-hour TV Bill Chase’s virtuosic nine-piece band, powered by four trumpets, belongs on special. The band had a reputation for blowing the same pedestal as Chicago and Blood, Sweat & Tears. headliners o¦ the stage, and they toured as far as Europe, Africa, and Asia. EARLY By S K Chase released a second LP, Ennea, in 1972, but during its production they had to replace WARNINGS two crucial members, Burrid and Richards. hen classic-rock fans refer to “the 1934 (his Italian American family changed its The album didn’t get the same love as the Chicago sound” they’re usually surname to make it easier for others to pro- debut, though the single “So Many People” Find a concert, buy a Wtalking about bands with horns. The nounce). There were a lot of musicians in the earned some airplay. Bill Chase soon declared ticket, and sign up to city’s rich history of jazz and soul, with horn Chase family—Bill’s father was a trumpeter, personal bankruptcy, dissolving the band, and get advance notice sections often at the forefront, infl uenced its and a great-uncle on his mother’s side had when he started rebuilding a few months later, 1960s boom of “horn rock,” exemplified by played for the New York Philharmonic and the he tried several sounds and lineups, hoping to of Chicago’s essential groups such as Chicago and the Ides of March Metropolitan Opera’s orchestra. fi nd a combination that would click with audi- music shows at and innovated by an earlier but less celebrated Bill started on violin, switched to drums, ences again. act called the Mob. As it continued to evolve, and then settled on trumpet in 11th grade. When Chase recorded their third LP, 1974’s chicagoreader.com/early. this rock-meets-jazz sound would be chris- After seeing Maynard Ferguson play with Stan Pure Music, Bill Chase himself was the only tened “fusion.” Kenton’s orchestra, Chase began taking his member remaining from Ennea. The band’s One Chicago horn-rock band that gets short own playing more seriously—and shifted his material also changed direction radically, shrift these days is Chase—no doubt in part focus from classical to jazz. After graduating relying less on vocals and more on heady, because their career was cut short by tragedy. high school, he enrolled in the New England instrumental jazz fusion. Unfortunately Pure The group’s founder, Bill Chase, was born Wil- Conservatory and then the Berklee College Music wasn’t terribly commercially successful liam Edward Chiaiese in Boston on October 24, of Music (then called Schillinger House). By either, despite featuring songwriting and lead ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 29 CHICAGO SHOWS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT IN THE WEEKS TO COME

EARLY WARNINGS b ALL AGES F WOLF BY KEITH HERZIK Ensemble featuring Dee Never miss Alexander, Angel Bat Dawid, a show again. and more 6/19, 8 PM, livestream at youtube.com/user/ Sign up for the oldtownschool newsletter at Vizitorz (Dushun Mosely & chicagoreader. Kenneth Green) 6/25, GOSSIP 7 PM, livestream at hothouse. com/early net/hothouseglobal VoiceBox with Cathy Richard- WOLF son 7/14, 8 PM, livestream Mya, 702 8/23, 8 PM, Thalia at facebook.com/fi tzger- Hall, canceled A furry ear to the ground of aldsnightclub New Order, Pet Shop Boys Vox Eff usis Vol. 2 curated 10/1/21, 6:45 PM, Huntington the local music scene by Lou Mallozzi featuring Bank Pavilion, rescheduled; Pamela Z, C. Spencer Yeh, tickets purchased for the GOSSIP WOLF SOMEHOW failed to Alessandro Bosetti, Audrey original date will be hon- Chen & Phil Minton 6/27, ored b cover local trad-metal masterminds 2 PM, livestream at ess.org/ Nombe, Bad Child 3/27/21, Satan’s Hallow before they went on hiatus the-quarantine-concerts 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, resched- in 2017, but thankfully four of that band’s Write On! Part II with Ben uled; tickets purchased five members kept going as Midnight LaMar Gay & Sam Lewis for original and previously 6/24, 6 PM, livestream at face- rescheduled dates will be Dice. If you enjoy banging your head till book.com/artspubliclife honored b it falls off, cutting the sleeves off denim Off Broadway 10/31, jackets, and making out with a hottie while Nikki Hill LESLIE CAMPBELL 8:30 PM, FitzGerald’s, Ber- blasting Dokken, then you’ll dig Midnight UPDATED wyn, rescheduled Eric Roberson 4/1/21-4/3/21, Dice’s new fi ve-song EP, Hypnotized. This NEW Roy Kinsey 6/19, 5 PM, live 2 Chainz, Allen Stone, Bam NOTE: We suggest that you 8 PM, City Winery, resched- wolf especially loves the delightfully pun- performance on the roof of Marley, Brandi Carlile, contact the point of purchase uled b ishing “Starblind,” with Mandy Martillo’s Bev Rage & the Drinks 6/24, the Empty Bottle; livestream Brittany Howard, Jufu, Leon if you need information Maggie Rose, Them Vibes lacerating vocals and a ripping solo from 8 PM, livestream at facebook. viewable at emptybottle.com/ Bridges, Moon Taxi, Nathan- about ticket exchange or 2/13/21, 8 PM, SPACE, Evan- com/beatkitchenchicago music-friendly-distancing F iel Rateliff , T-Pain 6/20, 3 PM, refunds. ston, rescheduled b guitarist Steve “Lethal” Beaudette. Hyp- Garth Brooks Drive-In Con- Lake County Folk Club Song livestream at facebook.com/ Santana, Earth Wind & Fire notized should be out on CD, vinyl, and cert Experience (screening) Circle 6/28, 6:30 PM, live- bustledotcom . . . And You Will Know Us by 7/3/21, 7 PM, Hollywood cassette this fall, but you can buy a Band- 6/27, 8:30 PM, SeatGeek stream at thelakecountyfolk- Song for Song with James the Trail of Dead, Green- Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley camp download now if you don’t want to Stadium, Bridgeview b club.org/online.html F McMurtry & Jon Dee Gra- beard 7/11, 9:30 PM, Empty Park, rescheduled; tickets Butl3r’s Funky Mondays with Live From Where They Live ham 7/8, 8 PM, livestream Bottle, canceled purchased for the original wait for an epic blast of adrenaline! DJ Butl3r Mondays, 6:30 PM, featuring Billy Prine with at facebook.com/fi tzger- Archers of Loaf 7/25, 10 PM, date will be honored b Since Gossip Wolf first wrote about livestream at facebook.com/ Dave Hoekstra 7/15, 8 PM, aldsnightclub Subterranean, canceled Simrit 7/7, 8 PM, City Winery, Chicago indie-pop veterans Varsity in subterraneanchicago F livestream at facebook.com/ Soul Uprising featuring Sam Randy Bachman & Burton postponed until a date to be 2015, they’ve become one of the city’s The Carole King & James fi tzgeraldsnightclub F Trump, Nola Ade, DJ Duane Cummings 6/12/21, 8 PM, determined b Taylor Story with Phoebe LP’s Happy Hour with Law- Powell 6/18, 6 PM, livestream Rosemont Theatre, Rosemont, Soulwax 10/3, 8 PM, Metro, most consistently excellent bands, balanc- Katis & Dan Clews 6/22/21, rence Peters 6/19 and 6/26, at youtube.com/user/Chi- rescheduled; tickets pur- canceled ing clever hooks, airily diverse arrange- 8 PM, City Winery b 5 PM, livestream at hide- cagoCultureEvents/featured chased for the original date Southern Hospitality featuring ments, and the trenchant, insightful lyrics Circa Survive, Gouge Away outchicago.online Fb Stay at Home Sessions will be honored b Damon Fowler, J.P. Soars, of singer and keyboardist Stef Smith. On 1/16/21, 6:30 PM, Concord Anthony McGill & Anna Polon- featuring Dabura, Adam Clem Snide 7/17, 8:30 PM, Fitz- Victor Wainwright 6/18/21, Music Hall, 17+ sky 6/26, 7 PM, livestream Rostek, Hummingbird 6/27, Gerald’s, Berwyn, canceled 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, Friday, May 29, Varsity dropped their third Dance Yourself Clean Indie- at facebook.com/uchicago- 8 PM, livestream at twitch.tv/ Dreary North Fest featuring rescheduled b full-length, Fine Forever, via Boston label Pop Dance Party featuring presents Fb spybartv Bastard Noise, Midwestlust, Lindsey Stirling, Kiesza, Mako Run for Cover, and it’s as wide and open Lights & Music Collective Option series presents Ab Stay at Home Sessions fea- Sea of Shit, and more 8/22, 8/10/21, 7 PM, Huntington as a long drive through a midwestern DJs 6/20, 8 PM, livestream at Baars 6/29, 1 and 8 PM, live- turing Jake Shore Drive, 3 PM, Subterranean, canceled Bank Pavilion, rescheduled; twitch.tv/lights3music F stream at ess.org/the- Flynninho, Maximo 6/25, Eluveitie 10/4, 8 PM, Concord tickets purchased for the summer a ernoon. Standouts include the DJ Jeff Moyer’s Virtual quarantine-concerts F 7 PM, livestream at twitch.tv/ Music Hall, canceled original date will be hon- divinely sprawling “The Memphis Group,” Music Video Mash Up 6/19, Option series presents Nat spybartv Emo Night Brooklyn 6/26, ored b about a crew of entitled jerks who collect 9 PM, livestream at pscp.tv/ Baldwin 7/6, 8 PM, livestream Billy Strings 7/22-7/23, 7 PM, 10:30 PM, Metro, postponed Harry Styles, Jenny Lewis nice furniture, and the crisp, eff ervescent ChgLateBar at ess.org/the-quarantine- livestream at nugs.tv until a date to be determined, 9/24/21-9/25/21, 8 PM, United Facs 6/25, 8 PM, livestream at concerts Tatsu Aoki presents Friends of 18+ Center, rescheduled; tickets “Reason to Run,” which features superla- audiotree.tv Jeremy Pinnell 7/22, 8:30 PM, Asian Improv Arts Midwest: The Format 7/23/21-7/25/21, purchased for the original tive jangle from guitarists Dylan Weschler Fiesta Back of the Yards 2020 FitzGerald’s, Berwyn Chicago’s Asian American 8 PM, Lincoln Hall, resched- dates will be honored b and Patrick Stanton. A multicolored vinyl 9/25-9/27, 47th between Ash- Planet Glazed featuring Wife Cultural Diaspora Volume 3 uled; tickets purchased The Sword, King Buff alo 7/1, version is available via Varsity’s Bandcamp. land and Damen b of Wrath, Mister Wallace, featuring Antonin Hoang, for original and previously 9:30 PM, Empty Bottle, Nikki Hill 7/31, 8:30 PM, Fitz- Hijo Prodigo 6/27, 8 PM, Yuko Fujiwara, Hiroshi rescheduled dates will be postponed until a date to be Avondale record shop No Requests , Gerald’s, Berwyn livestream at hideoutchicago. Mehata, Yoko Reikano, Ayaka honored, 18+ determined which opened in February 2019, will close Jazz Journalists Association online Nakama, Jason Finkleman & Goo Goo Dolls 8/6/21, 7 PM, at the end of June—co-owners David Bel- 2020 Awards Party featuring The Quarantine Concerts Joy Yang, Miyumi Project, Huntington Bank Pavilion, tran and Diana Bowden, who also run Carla Bley, Miguel Zenón, curated by International Skylanding 6/20, 7 PM, rescheduled; tickets pur- UPCOMING Kurt Elling, Zakir Hussain, Contemporary Ensemble livestream at hothouse.net/ chased for the original date the FeelTrip label, say they can’t justify Roscoe Mitchell, Tomeka 6/25-6/26, livestream at ess. hothouseglobal will be honored b Agnostic Front 8/23, 8 PM, renewing their lease during the pandem- Reid, Nicole Mitchell, and org/the-quarantine-concerts Tenci 6/25, 8 PM, livestream at Hammerfall, Beast in Black Subterranean, 17+ ic. The shop is open by appointment till more 6/18, 7 PM, livestream Rookie 7/7, 8 PM, livestream at hideoutchicago.online 10/7, 7 PM, Concord Music Chicago 10/14, 7:30 PM, Rialto June 28 (reserve a time on the FeelTrip at hothouse.net/hothouse- noonchorus.com Tiny Meat Gang (Cody Ko & Hall, canceled Square Theatre, Joliet b global F Todd Rundgren 1/26/21-1/27/21, Noel Miller) 10/1, 8 PM, Chi- Hoodoo Gurus 11/3, 8 PM, City Elrow 11/27, 8 PM, Radius Chi- site), and curbside pickup is still avail- Juneteenth Virtual Celebra- 8 PM, House of Blues, 17+ cago Theatre b Winery, postponed until a cago, 18+ able. Beltran and Bowden will keep sell- tion with DJ Vince Adams Sequesterfest (Vol. 4) Virtual Juneteenth Cele- date to be determined b FitzGerald’s Drive-In Concert ing music online, even without a physical 6/19, 5 PM, livestream at presented by Corbett vs. bration presented by the Hrvy 9/23, 6 PM, Chop Shop, featuring Waco Brothers, store. —JRNLG twitch.tv/djvinceadams Dempsey 6/28, livestream at AACM & Old Town School canceled School of Rock 7/3, 7 PM, Angelique Kidjo 6/25, 6 PM, ess.org/the-quarantine- featuring the Young Masters Charlie Hunter & Lucy Wood- location to be announced livestream at youtube.com/ concerts directed by Ernest Dawkins, ward 6/11/21, 7 PM, SPACE, before the show b v Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail user/NYCSummerStage F Small Business Live featuring AACM’s Great Black Music Evanston, rescheduled b [email protected].

30 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll Have a strong opinion or perspective you’d like to share? We invite you to send ideas to [email protected]. OPINION

June 1 in Washington, D.C. KOSHU KUNII / UNSPLASH which both candidates are seen negatively by most voters.” You can probably guess the other election. It was four years ago when their families. “both Mr. Trump and his Democratic rival, To be fair, the Democrats have gone beyond Hillary Clinton, were disliked by a majority mere gestures. The party introduced the of voters.” Justice in Policing Act, a package of modest The Democratic and Republican parties reforms acceptable to the party’s corporate will continue to throw roadblocks in the path donors. But protestors are demanding real of third-party candidates—fi ghting to keep change. them off the ballot and out of the debates, The federal government must stop send- and denying them federal matching funds. ing money and military hardware to police But the biggest obstacle to viability for departments. It must end its disastrous war third-party candidates is easily fixed. Our on drugs that has devastated communities system of winner-take-all elections demands of color and turned America into the world’s that voters cast their ballot for the lesser of largest jailer of its own people. It must end the two evil establishment candidates, rath- the fraudulent war on terror that enriches er than “waste” their vote on a third-party corporate donors while making the world candidate whom the corporate media has more dangerous for ordinary Americans. declared unelectable. (Members of my own The money saved by ending these failed family refuse to speak to me because I sup- programs must be invested in programs that port third-party candidates for president.) actually help crime-ridden communities, This insidious system can be fi xed with a like free child care, adequately funded public simple program called Ranked-Choice Voting NATIONAL POLITICS schools, youth programs, a true national or RCV. In an RCV system, voters rank the health-care system that includes treatment candidates in order of preference. If none of for mental illness and addiction, and a fed- the parties get to 50 percent of the vote, the Let the people decide eral jobs program to transition America to a least popular candidate is stricken, and their green economy. votes are allocated according to the second The major parties benefi t too much from our rigged system to pursue reform. Of course, most of these reforms are choice of the voter. This system allows voters unlikely as long as our national politics is to select a candidate they actually believe in, By L CG controlled by corporate-owned parties. The rather than feeling pressured to choose the for-profit insurance and health-care indus- lesser evil. RCV encourages more voters to tries will continue to block any movement to- go to the polls. And it encourages third-party wards a national health-care system. Silicon candidates to get on the ballot without wor- Leonard C. Goodman is a Chicago criminal ple in the streets. Their initial response Valley and industries that depend on keeping rying that they will be blamed for electing defense attorney and co-owner of the newly of symbolic gestures and tokenism is not American workers in a precarious state, so the greater evil, just as Ralph Nader was independent Reader. encouraging. that they will accept low-paying gigs driving unfairly blamed for the election of George W. Contrast these images with Washington’s us around or delivering our groceries, will Bush in 2000. he inept response of our leaders in Wash- response to the cries of its major donors block any federal jobs program. Weapons Of course, RCV is vigorously opposed by ington, D.C., to nationwide protests fol- when, in March, the COVID-19 pandemic makers and fossil fuel extractors will block the corporate parties, who use the fear of Tlowing the police murder of George Floyd forced American businesses to shut down any reductions in the trillion dollars spent electing the greater evil to convince voters can best be depicted with two images. First, and workers to shelter in place. The leaders of annually on military adventures and the se- to withhold support from third-party candi- there was the image from June 1 of U.S. Park both political parties quickly joined together curity state. dates. Nevertheless, this opposition can be Police o cers in riot gear using tear gas and to save the investor class by unanimously The only way to achieve real reform is to overcome if Americans demand real change. fl ash grenades to clear peaceful protesters out passing the CARES Act, whose 880 pages— end the duopoly of the corporate parties and In 2018, Maine adopted RCV over heavy of Lafayette Square, so that President Trump clearly written by highly paid corporate to elect candidates to high o ce who are free opposition. The result? Voter turnout was could have his picture taken holding up a bible lobbyists—bailed out big business (i.e., big from corporate infl uence. In theory, this is an up, implementation was uncomplicated and in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church. donors) to the tune of $4.5 trillion, including achievable goal. Fewer and fewer Americans inexpensive, few errors were made, and out- Not to be outdone, last week Democratic companies like Boeing that were already sick express loyalty to the Democratic or Repub- comes were perceived to be fair. Nine other leaders of the House and Senate had them- prior to the virus. Congress decided not to lican parties. Roughly 40 percent of Amer- states have implemented RCV at some levels. selves photographed kneeling in Congress’s save the rest of the real economy. As a result, icans do not belong to either major political RCV is an important reform worth fi ghting Emancipation Hall wearing kente cloth small businesses are particularly at risk, as party. The largest block of eligible voters are for. It empowers independent and third-par- scarves. This performance was intended to FEMA estimates some 40 percent of them nonvoters who see no reason to participate in ty candidates by eliminating the “wasted illustrate the party’s deep concerns about don’t reopen after a disaster, a devastating a rigged system. vote” argument. And it gives Americans a the epidemic of police violence against Afri- blow to our great cities. Some 40 million According to Poll Watch in Sunday’s New fi ghting chance to achieve real reforms that can Americans. Americans have been disconnected from York Times, “This November’s election benefi t people over corporations. v Our nation’s leaders are finally being their jobs and their health care, and must could become only the second presidential forced to listen to concerns raised by peo- stand in mile-long food lines to provide for contest in the history of modern polling in @GoodmanLen ll JUNE - CHICAOREADER 31 OPINION

SAVAGE LOVE first same-sex encounter. sucking dick. It wasn’t hard for my VGL husband to find guys who wanted to blow I have recurring wet dreams about myself : My wife questions my use of the word gay him before quarantine and for years I Straight men question what it means to be heterosexual. as being potentially off ensive and I’d like to didn’t ask about it because I didn’t want get your take. I’m male and my male friends to know the details. But I knew he had By DS like to flirt and joke about performing sex video on his phone of some guys blowing acts on each other. We’ve never actually him that he sometimes watched and I carried through with it but I consider myself recently asked to watch one and I was on the “spectrum” and might be open to gay completely shocked. It wasn’t just a blow : I’m a 32-year-old straight guy. My wife another guy in high school. If you’re like most sex. My male friends and I say we’re being job. He spat in the guy’s face, called him and I have been married for four years and straight guys with one or two cocks in your or acting gay (though we’re all practicing homophobic names, and was just generally together for nine. We have a great marriage past, NOHOMO, I’m guessing you didn’t heterosexuals) and this is where my wife brutal. The intensity and violence wasn’t and all is well. We have been quarantining at tell the wife because you didn’t want her takes issue. For example, I might say “We’re something I’ve ever detected in my husband home since March. During this time, we have to feel insecure or spend all her free time so gay!” in our conversations but the word or been on the receiving end from my been exploring things sexually, which has corresponding with advice columnists about is used in a positive way. My wife makes the husband. When I pressed my husband been really fun. We have also been talking whether her husband is secretly gay. point that the word has a history of being he shrugged and said, “That’s how a lot more about our kinks and fantasies. One In fairness to the wife, NOHOMO, not used negatively, so may be considered of guys like it.” I’m not sure what to do. thing my wife really wants to try is an MMF every woman whose straight-identified male off ensive, and should only be used casually by —G A G G E threesome. I’ve agreed and she’s been talking partner admits to a little same-sex messing people who are more legit gay. Should I stop D about how hot it will be to make this happen around worries her boyfriend or husband is using the word gay this way? —GP once quarantine is over. She is particularly going to leave her for a dude or all the dudes. A: I read your letter three times and I still turned on by the fact that this would be my But this worry is common enough to be some- A: Jesus, just suck off one of your male friends can’t tell whether you’re appalled or you’re fi rst sexual experience with another guy. The thing of a cliché. A straight guy doesn’t even already—just get it over with—and then you jealous. Do you disapprove of your husband only issue is, in reality, it won’t be. The truth have to admit to having sucked one dick one have my permission to keep using “gay” as a treating someone that way or are you is that when I was in high school, a guy friend time for his wife or girlfriend to worry he’s compliment. disappointed that your husband has never and I fooled around a few times. I have no secretly gay; I get at least one letter every treated you that way? If it’s the former, well, regrets but those experiences only served to day from a woman who’s worried her husband : I’m a 35-year-old seemingly straight man, don’t watch any more videos of your husband reaffi rm that I preferred women. I never did is gay because he likes to have his nipples but in the past year—roughly corresponding throat-fucking his subby cocksuckers. If it’s anything with another guy and I never felt played with or his butt touched or because with the longest sex drought in the history the latter (and I suspect it is), GAGGED, then the need to mention these early experiences he has feelings. So while it’s not ideal that of my adulthood—I have had recurring wet you’re going to need to figure out how to to my wife. She just assumed I had never had straight or mostly straight guys don’t feel they dreams where I suck myself off. Probably articulate that clearly—something you failed a same-sex encounter. Now I feel like I’ve can be honest with their wives about their a dozen or so of these dreams, and I very to do in your letter—so you can tell your misled her or lied to her somehow. Should long ago and faraway same-sex experimen- much enjoy both sides of the transaction. husband you’d like it like that too. Not being I tell her the truth or just let her believe our tation, NOHOMO, it’s understandable that What do you think it means? Am I witnessing used for oral like that, of course, since you MMF threesome would be my fi rst time with many straight guys err on the side of keeping the stirrings of some latent bisexuality or don’t like performing oral sex. But maybe a guy? —N O H that shit to themselves. am I just desperate? Should I heed the call? you’d like anal like that? O MO But your question isn’t “Why didn’t I tell her —O U R O then?” but rather “Should I tell her now?” And B O R O Dear Readers: This is gonna feel a little A: If your wife reads my column, NOHOMO, I don’t think you have to. She wasn’t harmed S weird stuck onto the end of this week’s then you’ve just told her the truth and the by this omission—you didn’t deprive her of column, I realize, but I wanted to say advice that follows is moot. So here’s hoping information she was entitled to—and disclos- A: I usually don’t allow elaborate sign-offs, something about the protests all over the she doesn’t read my column: You don’t ing now would only serve to deprive her of OUROBOROS, but I’m making an exception country and the world. While I haven’t been have to tell your wife about the handful/ something, i.e. the excitement she feels about for yours because it’s brilliant. (To save able to personally attend a Black Lives mouthful of times you messed around with being there to witness what she thinks is your my other readers the trouble of googling: Matter protest over the last two weeks—I “oneiromancy” is the interpretation of dreams have deeply shitty lungs and I’m concerned to predict the future and an “ouroboros” is an about contracting coronavirus—I fully image of a snake swallowing its own tail, o en support everyone who has taken to the used as an infi nity symbol.) That said, I’m not streets to protest the violence of systemic sure there’s really any call to heed here—other racism and the specific violence inflicted than a call to start doing the kind of stretching upon Black people by racist cops. And that would allow you to suck your own cock if while I can’t be at the protests, my husband you were 1. to get limber enough and 2. your and I made a donation to bail funds across cock is long enough. But a desire to suck one’s the country to help out people who were own cock—or even an attempt, successful or arrested. (You can donate at actblue.com/ not—doesn’t mean a man is latently bisexual donate/bailfunds.) Please keep marching, or gay. I assume you’ve been masturbating please wear your masks (they work!), and for more than two decades, OUROBOROS, please—please—make sure you and everyone and just as there’s nothing gay about all you know is registered to vote. v those hand jobs you’ve given yourself, there’s nothing gay about the blow jobs you can only Send letters to mail@savagelove. please recycle this paper dream about giving yourself. net. Download the Savage Lovecast at savagelovecast.com. : I’m that rare gay man who doesn’t like @fakedansavage 32 CHICA OREADER - JUNE ll Chicago Reader

Instagram: @soberrabbit • Twitter: @boozetornado • Website: thewhitneywasson.com 22 Whitney Wasson

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