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IN THIS ISSUE T R resists making audiences feel good 21 Guide The stages are dark but - 10 Immigration A er her husband Chicago theater is alive on the @ was deported Katrina Jabbi moved page her family to Gambia to be with P T B him Then the pandemic happened FILM E C S K K H 24 Movies of Note The Beach C L R H House is a daring horror debut M E P M TD K R The Kissing Booth retains the C E B W ludicrous energy of its predecessor A E J L and Relic is as tender as it is S W M D L G D I B J M S terrifying E A S N L CITY LIFE 36 Gossip Wolf Early Chicago G D A H 03 Street View Authenticity comes hiphop group He Who Walks L C S C -J C E B N B fi rst for artist Muhammad Naqee Three Ways share two s demos L C M D L C M C Lillerne Tapes releases an eclectic J F S F J H I compilation to benefi t Brave H C M J M K S K BOOKS Space Alliance and Urban Growers N D LJ L 14 Next Chapter How one couple Collective and local rappersinger M M A M -K channeled their love for books and Myquale drops a serene new EP J R N J N M O M S C S each other into running the Dial ------16 Quaranzine How Chicago OPINION D D J D zinemakers are adapting to the 38 Criminal Justice The false hope S M C J G pandemic MUSIC & NIGHTLIFE of Ghislaine Maxwell’s arrest SS P 17 Read This new reads by and 26 Feature Triad Radio Chicago’s 40 Savage Love Dan Savage A T A about Chicagoans to add to your pioneering experiment in on whether cheating really is a S I D M N list commercial freeform radio le the relationshipextinctionlevel event D D C W 18 Housing The Voucher Promise airwaves in Now longtime M P C Y FOOD & DRINK D 04 Cookbook Feature Cookies chronicles the “illusions” of the program director Saul Smaizys is CLASSIFIEDS E A S L K keep you healthy soup makes you Section program moving its archives online 42 Jobs S EC K K sane 22 Indie Bookstore Map More 32 Chicagoans of Note Toronzo 42 Apartments & Spaces ADVERTISING than local shops keeping us Cannon bluesman and bus driver 42 Marketplace -- @ NEWS & POLITICS well read 33 Records of Note A pandemic C 06 Joravsky | Politics Republicans can’t stop the fl ow of great music - @ are outraged over Madigan but THEATER Our critics review releases that you O P A M A G F V P S silent when it comes to Trump 20 Low Tech Spectacle Manual can enjoy at home G ’ C R M T P 08 Isaacs | Culture Sahar Cinema celebrates ten years of 36 Early Warnings Rescheduled S A R L M -H L S Mustafah’s The Beauty of Your Face lighting the lamp of art concerts and other updated listings C S M W R
N A V M G -- - J L S B THIS WEEK ON ------CHICAGOREADER.COM D C [email protected] -- CHICAGO READER LC Obama CBA demands BP D R L T E R housing ordinance A- S V C C E B amid multiple crises T C R O P-R F C F ------Fearing displacement of longtime south- R ISSN - side residents, activists with the Obama R LC Community Benefits Agreement want S M S C IL -- the city to preserve land for affordable C © C R housing. We tell their story in a multime- P C IL dia, cross-platform collaboration with A C R R SoapBox Productions and Organizing that R R T ® features a microdocumentary, podcast episode, and editorial piece as part of SoapBox Action Works. 2 CHICA O READER - JULY ll When A Great Deal Matters, Shop Rob Paddor’s... CITY LIFE Evanston Subaru in Skokie GRAND REOPENING OUR SHOWROOM IS OPEN! NO APPOINTMENTS ARE NEEDED WELCOME BACK DEALS! % % % % 0% 0063 MONTHS00 ISA GIALLORENZO FORESTER OUTBACK ASCENT IMPREZA street view
You do you 9:00AM-8:00PM 9:00AM-6:00PM Monday-Friday APPOINTMENTNO Authenticity comes fi rst for artist Muhammad Naqee. REQUIRED Saturday By I G Social Distancing & Face Masks will be Required for all Customers and Employees have been more interested in fashion in ample of the luxury items composing his look, the past few years,” says visual artist in addition to a Chanel ring, Gucci bracelet, Voted “Best Auto DeAlership” “I Muhammad Naqee. “I have so much and tiny diamonds drilled on his teeth. “I like By CHICAGO Voters’ Poll 2019 respect for fashion designers. It’s so much the top main designers, and right now I have S tedious thinking and discipline.” Naqee, 30, so much respect for Kanye West,” he says. “I TOP-QUALITY INSPECTED USED CARS & SUV’ is also a designer himself—he makes jewelry, think he’s hilarious, and so talented! He can IMPORTS & DOMESTICS SUBARU FORESTERS ...... Automatic, Full Power, White, 24205A ...... ‘16 Forester Touring ..Automatic Sunroof, Leather, Silver, 23651A ...... $18,995 bags, and hats, and often customizes his own tamper with a bit of everything and actually ‘17 Honda CR-V LX AWD $17,995 ‘20 Kia Soul LX ...... Manual, 8K, Cherry Black, P6475 ...... $14,995 ‘17 Forester Ltd...... Automatic Sunroof, Leather, Silver, 24102A ...... $17,995 clothing. On the day he was photographed, he make it cool. I don’t take his crazy antics too ‘16 Honda Fit EX ...... Automatic, Moonroof, 13K, Black, 24485A ...... $13,995 ‘15 Forester Prem. Automatic, Sunroof, Heated Seats, Silver, 23349A ....$15,995 was sporting a pair of Yeezy slides on which seriously. I think he’s honestly one of the best ‘18 Hyundai Elantra Value Ed. ..Monroof, Blind Spot, Silver, 24523A ...... $12,995 ‘15 Forester 2.5i ...... Automatic, Full Power, Silver, 24325A ...... $14,995 he painted his two older sisters as demons. artists that ever lived.” ‘13 Hyundai Sante Fe 2.0T AWD .. Auto., Full Power, Black 23373B ...... $11,995 SUBARU OUTBACKS He was also wearing rings and a necklace he He subscribes to a similar philosophy as ‘15 Toyota Corolla LE ...... Automatic, Keyless, Silver 24504A ...... $10,995 ‘16 Outback Prem...... Automatic, All Weather, Alloys, Black, 24117A ...... $17,995 ...... Automatic, 1-Owner, 42K, Ruby Red, 23690A ...... ‘15 Outback Ltd...... Automatic, Sunroof, Leather, Black, 23927A ...... $17,995 created, a mask with a colorful camouflage West when it comes to style: “Do exactly what ‘14 Buick Encore $10,995 ‘15 Kia Soul ...... Manual, Full Power, Alien2, 21917A ...... $7,995 he designed, and a T-shirt on which he wrote you wanna do at all times. Do what makes you SUBARU CROSSTREK / WRX / ASCENT ‘0z9 Chevy HHR LT ...... Automatic, Sunroof, Beige, 24265A ...... $6,995 ‘19 Ascent ...... 8 Passenger, Sunroof, Eyesight, 4K, Grey, P6528 ...... $24,995 “My life is ending.” “It’s a realistic reminder happy, because then you’ll get the true authen- ‘13 Hyundai Tucson GLS ...... Automatic, Full Power, Bronze, 24460A ...... $6,995 ‘18 WRX Ltd...... Manual, 8K, Heritage Blue, P6547 ...... $24,995 that we’re always closer to death,” he explains. tic result from yourself, and people are always ‘08 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo 4x4Automatic, 64K Black, 24250A ...... $6,995 ‘17 Crosstrek Ltd...... Automatic, Leather, Sunroof, White, 34321A ...... $19,995 “Everything is slipping, slowly but surely. It’s gonna see that. People can always feel your A+ not anything negative, though.” authenticity. Always wear what you want. If RATED Naqee’s outfi t also included many gifts, such you’re honest, you’ll receive the energy you EvanstonSubaru.com as zebra pants he got from his ex-girlfriend, a want.” v 3340 OAKTON - SKOKIE • 847-869-5700 shirt given by a gallerist in Pilsen, and a Burb- See Naqee’s art on Instagram at @ *Add tax, title license and $300 doc fee. 0%financing for 63 months. Monthly payment of $15.87 per $1,000 borrowed. erry bag given by his aunt. The latter is an ex- naqeespaintings. Finance on approved credit score Subject to vehicle insurance and availability. Ends 7/31/2020 ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 3 FOOD & DRINK
Virtual Connections, Real Fun! COOKBOOK FEATURE Two days of fun, prizes, and virtual get-togethers to keep the beer flowing for our guests and the funding flowing for Tree House cats! Cookies keep you healthy, FRIDAY 4PM TO 9PM + SATURDAY 2PM TO 8PM soup makes you sane Two compilations about cooking and community from Belt Publishing AUGUST 21+22, 2020 By M S wonder if one day we’ll be able to correlate and family would mobilize to produce a kind 2020 Cat Walk is a virtual event flowing Friday to Saturday, August 21-22. Your ticket enables a second surge in Chicago COVID-19 cases to of pastry potluck: a dessert table laden with you to visit one or two bars for specials, or any of our partnered pubs and breweries! Ithe fact that fi ve months into the pandemic, a bonanza of cookies and sweets, the surplus Using your TH mask & Passport (and your perfectly-honed social distancing techniques), Lincoln Park got sick of its own cooking. If it usually collected by each guest at the end of the enjoy Cat Walk carry-out specials from our partners! Each pub will have a Tree House table turns out June’s reopening of bars and restau- party as a wedding favor. with staff and volunteers stamping passports and sharing table prizes. rants is even partly to blame for another wave This tradition hasn’t died. Recipes, some of tragedy, I’m gonna blame the sourdough bros more than a century old, have been handed Then, enjoy your tasty beverages and food at who traded their boules for Corona buckets this down over generations, even today perpetuat- your own Cat Walk experience in your home! summer. ing in Facebook groups with tens of thousands Of course cooking isn’t the problem. Cooking of members. Tawse tapped into this culture— Your Cat Walk ticket purchase BUY YOUR TICKETS ONLINE TO HELP has been one of the few reliable sources of com- just in the nick of real time—on a road trip helps support Tree House & entitles “EVERY CAT THRIVE!” fort in this malignant mess. Cooking is an eas- to the Mahoning Valley Historical Society’s you to a Cat Walk Swag Bag: YOUR TICKET AND DONATION SUPPORT ily solitary activity, but it’s inevitable second Cookie Table and Cocktail Gala at the Basilica • Tree House face mask SOCIALLY CONSCIOUS SHELTERING & act, eating, is inherently communal. There’s of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Youngstown • Cat Walk Passport — Your guide ANIMAL WELFARE IN CHICAGO. nothing more lonely than eating alone (except in February, just before everything went o the drinking alone). rails. to carry-out specials at our EARLY BIRD TICKETS partner pubs. Have a great party $15 AVAILABLE ONLINE JULY 1-31 That’s why the recent release of two books Therein she was confronted with a massive at home for TWO days! from Belt Publishing about the inextricable spread of some 8,000 donated cookies, guarded REGULAR TICKETS bonds of cooking and community seem like by the Youngstown State University football • Access to our Cat Walk Videos: $20 AVAILABLE ONLINE JULY 25 - AUGUST 22 Cat fun, contests, prizes, and our bittersweet timing. But I’m biased. team’s defensive line (to ensure an equal Final Toast Live Stream! OPTIONAL ADD-ON: TREE HOUSE-THEMED The Belt Cookie Table Cookbook by local food distribution of the wealth). From this single + $10 HOME SCAVENGER HUNT GAME! writer Bonnie Tawse studies a unique wedding event, Tawse made connections and collected tradition native to Pittsburgh (my hometown), 41 recipes and their family backstories, tested treehouseanimals.org/catwalk nearby Youngstown, Ohio, and all the hills and them at home under lockdown, and produced Funds raised will help the over 4,000 adoptable and community cats that Tree House serves annually. hollows in between. For new immigrants in this extraordinary collection of cookies. To help Tree House via a business sponsorship, contact: [email protected] the early 20th century, wedding cakes were Buckeyes, Clothespin Cookies, Pecan Tassies, “dear” (as my Gram would say), and so friends Pizelles, Snowballs—you may know J 4 CHICA O READER - JULY ll Search the Reader’s online database of thousands of Chicago-area restaurants at chicagoreader.com/food. FOOD & DRINK
Stained Glass Cookies BONNIE TAWSE baking contest. In 2020, three generations of Benchwicks had platters of cookies displayed them by di erent names, depending on where on the enormous cookie table: Rachelle you’re from—but even without photos you can Benchwick, her son Ryan, daughters Carissa visualize their collective majesty and the labor and Stephanie, and Ryan Benchwick’s daugh- that makes it possible; e pluribus unum. ter, Sage, who baked these cookies and was The same principle underlies the Soup & awarded the title of 2020 Youngest Baker. Bread Cookbook by former Reader editor Mar- tha Bayne, in a second edition published under 2 cups fl our Belt’s Parafi ne Press side hustle. OK, really it’s 3/4 cup butter (one and a half sticks), a third incarnation, born out of the Hideout’s softened 12-year-old Soup & Bread event series, founded 1/2 cup Life Savers or Jolly Ranchers by Bayne in 2009 and interrupted in March— 1⁄4 cup sugar when everything went o the rails. That fi rst 1 teaspoon vanilla year, Bayne collected recipes from professional pinch of salt and amateur cooks alike (Tawse and myself Optional: food coloring for the dough included), who’d dish their home-cooked soups out of crockpots in front of the stage each Unwrap and separate the candies (Life Sav- Wednesday night, over the years collecting ers or Jolly Ranchers) by color then place in nearly $100,000 in donations toward Chicago separate small resealable bags. Crush into bits hunger relief efforts. That first spiral-bound using a meat mallet; set aside. collection, designed by former Reader art Cream the butter and sugar until fl u y; add director Sheila Sachs, was released by Surrey/ vanilla. If you would like to create a colored Agate in 2011 in expanded form, fi lled out with dough, add food coloring now and stir until similar stories of the power of soup to build completely blended. Add flour and salt, then community. Celebrity soups like Doug Sohn’s mix by hand until a dough is formed. Wrap the Sausage Chili and Stephanie Izard’s Pear, Pars- dough in plastic wrap and chill for 30 minutes. nip, and Pistachio Soup shared equal billing On a lightly floured surface, roll out the with equally extraordinary potages like artist dough 1/2-inch thick. Use any shaped cookie Derek Erdman’s Pizza Soup and radio producer cutters desired, but you will need the cutters in Robin Linn’s 40-Watt Garlic Soup. Besides all two sizes: one for the cookie and one smaller to that, Soup and Bread was—is—always a reli- cut out the center “window” where the crushed ably, mellow good time. hard candy will go to make the “glass.” (Sage Born in a recession, and now reborn in a pan- used heart-shaped cookie cutters, and the demic, the pages are likely to inspire pangs of cookies were dyed in a variety of colors.) longing in anyone who showed up at the Hide- Cut as many of the cookies as you can out on a cold Wednesday night with a couple from the rolled-out dough; place these on an of bucks or a crockpot of liquid gold. I have to ungreased cookie sheet covered with parch- believe Soup & Bread will come back (just as ment paper. Using the smaller cookie cutter, I have to believe I haven’t plundered my last cut out the inside shape, carefully peel away the cookie table), but for now the rerelease of the cut piece of dough. You can bake these as mini cookbook can do some good: half the royalties cookies, without the candy, or set aside and from its sale go to the Greater Chicago Food reuse this dough. Depository. The other half will go to grassroots Bake the cookies at 350 F for five minutes. hunger-relief and mutual aid organizations. Remove from the oven and using a demitasse Right now, I don’t need better reasons to spoon, carefully fill the hole in the middle of stay inside and make soup and cookies. each cookie with the crushed candy, about 2/3 of the way full. (If you overfi ll, the candy will Stained Glass Cookies bleed out on top of the dough.) Return to the Sage Benchwick oven and bake for about seven to ten more minutes, until cookies are golden brown. Do not The Benchwick family could possibly be the transfer cookies yet! Allow the cookies to rest eastern Ohio version of the Von Trapp Family on the cookie sheet so that the liquifi ed candy Singers, except the Benchwick talents are in the center of each cookie can cool and hard- apparently in the kitchen, whipping up baked en. Once candy has hardened, transfer cookies goods. Their skills are best demonstrated to a wire rack to cool completely. v each year with their participation and suc- cess in the annual Cookie Table and Cocktails @MikeSula ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 5 NEWS & POLITICS
Illinois’s Republican congressmen, Darin LaHood, Rodney Davis, Mike Bost, Adam Kinzinger, and John Shimkus, issued a joint statement denouncing Madigan but are mum JULY 25 @ Online on Trump. U S CONGRESS SAT Sophia Lucia Presents: Freak Show Cabaret! (EVENT REPEATS WEEKLY)
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2GTHQTOGT! POLITICS %4'#6+8' 51.76+105 (14 %4'#6+8' 2'12.' 5WRRQTVKXG #HHKTOKPI CPF )QCN ‘Harper Valley hypocrites’ &KTGEVGF 2U[EJQVJGTCR[ CPF Republicans are outraged over Madigan but silent when it comes to Trump. *[RPQVJGTCR[ HQT #FWNVU Yes, Madigan should step down. But then I By B J thought he should go—or be forced out—after /#: H C R A M | E C N I S LY K E E W E E R F S ’ O AG C I H C - 5*#2'; .%59 it became clear that he’d ignored sta er Alaina .QECVGF KP &QYPVQYP 'XCPUVQP Hampton’s request that he stop another Madi- ith all due respect to Republicans and controls—did pass legislation favorable to gan operative from harassing her. “good-government” civic citizens, I’m Commonwealth Edison, including overriding Clearly, Democratic legislators in this state YYYOCZUJCRG[EQO Wnot joining your posse, riding out to then-Governor Quinn’s veto to pass the Energy take my advice almost as much as their alder- OCZUJCRG["CQNEQO string up House speaker Michael Madigan, the Infrastructure Modernization Act in 2011. manic counterparts in Chicago. NWG TQUU NWG 5JKGNF 2TGHGTTGF 2TQXKFGT state’s most powerful Democrat. But let’s face it, the legislators probably Meanwhile, the Republicans are outraged— STAYKIPC AT 2TGHGTTGF HOME 2TQXKFGT Or its former most powerful Democrat. I would have done that anyway. I can’t recall the outraged I tell you! think we can agree that Governor Pritzker—and last time the General Assembly took a strong The five Republican congressmen from Illi- maybe even Mayor Lightfoot—have surpassed stand against the utility companies—especially nois—Rodney Davis, Darin LaHood, John Shim- him. in the pre-Pritzker era. kus, Adam Kinzinger, and Mike Bost—issued Don’t miss Last Friday, Madigan took a blow when So, if you ask me, ComEd gave Madigan some- a joint statement, declaring: “The people of U.S. attorney John Lausch Jr. announced that thing that they could have gotten without giving Illinois deserve better than Illinois Democrats’ Commonwealth Edison had fessed up to having him anything. But, of course, no one’s asking me. embarrassing, systemic corruption.” an issue essentially bribed the speaker by doling out For its confession, ComEd gets o fairly free. Pardon me while I retch. What a bunch of do-nothing jobs and contracts to many of his Yes, they have to pay a fi ne of $200 million. But frauds and phonies. I haven’t seen so many Get the Next 12 Issues of the Chicago Reader friends and cronies. that is chump change to a company worth bil- hypocrites since the school board members in Delivered to Your Home In exchange, well, it’s not clear what ComEd lions of dollars. Jeannie C. Riley’s classic country hit “Harper got for allegedly bribing Madigan. For what it’s worth, Madigan’s spokesman Valley PTA”—a song so old that only Madigan, chicagoreader.com/support The General Assembly—which Madigan says that Madigan says he did nothing wrong. me, and a few other geezers remember it. 6 CHICA O READER - JULY ll NEWS & POLITICS
In the song, the members of the Harper Valley As for corporate Chicago . . . But I suspect many landlords hired Madigan speaker. Basically, he worked out a deal with PTA chide one woman for wearing a miniskirt. Among Madigan’s fl aws is his law fi rm, which or Cullerton or Burke not so much to win the Mayors Daley and Rahm. They let him run the Even as they cheat on their wives, drink too specializes in property tax appeals. For years, he tax break as to curry favor with the Big Three. General Assembly and he used his vast powers much, and knock up their secretaries. represented some of Chicago’s most prominent Sort of like ComEd doling out do-nothing jobs to to make sure they got just about anything they So, yes, the Republicans are all pu ed up with downtown landlords in appeals brought before Madigan’s cronies. wanted—be it TIF extensions, O’Hare land outrage over Madigan. But they can’t bring his political allies at the Cook County assessor’s From time to time, I entertain myself by grabs, Olympic funding, and so forth. themselves to say one word about their leader, o ce. Is that legal? Yes. Should it be outlawed? looking at the big shots who operate out of So, I won’t kid myself into thinking Madigan Donald Trump, who’s committed far worse Of course. buildings represented by Madigan, Cullerton, was a legislative antecedent to Alexandria crimes than Madigan. Madigan’s not the only high-ranking Demo- or Burke. It’s a fun game to play while you’re in Ocasio-Cortez. Let’s run down just a few of Trump’s dirty crat with a flourishing property tax business. quarantine. But I’ll say this for Madigan: when Rauner deeds that spring to my mind, in no particular Former state senate president John Cullerton A few years ago, I was delighted to discover tried to destroy collective bargaining rights in order . . . and Alderman Ed Burke had them as well. that the private equity fi rm of Bruce Rauner— Illinois, it was Madigan who fought back. Intimidating witnesses, snubbing congressio- Where was the outrage from corporate Madigan’s archrival—was located in a building I’ve no doubt that Rahm and Cullerton would nal subpoenas, lying constantly, fi ling lawsuits Chicago all these years? Nowhere. Many of the represented by Madigan. As was the office of have sold out the unions in a heartbeat had it to conceal his taxes, fi ring prosecutors who ex- movers and shakers in civic Chicago are located Ken Griffin—the hedge fund billionaire who not been for Madigan. It was Madigan who kept amine his crimes, fi ring employees who testify in buildings whose landlords hired Madigan or gave millions to Rauner’s campaign. Rauner from doing to Illinois what Scott Walker against him. And rape. Cullerton or Burke to lower their property taxes. When I saw that ComEd was represented by did to Wisconsin. Must not forget E. Jean Carroll’s allegations The funny thing is, my bet is these landlords Jenner & Block—one of the premier pinstripe And that’s probably why the Republicans— that Trump raped her. probably would have gotten those tax breaks law fi rms in town—I decided, what the hell, let’s and all their corporate cronies—hate him so And yet, not a word from the Republicans even if they hadn’t hired Madigan, Cullerton, or play the property tax appeal game. much. about any of the lawlessness of the miscreant Burke. Jenner & Block is located at 353 N. Clark, in a So no, I won’t be joining their posse. To quote they worship. They’re so afraid of one little It doesn’t really take a legal genius to win towering, gleaming high-rise whose landlord is Jeannie C. Riley—they’re all a bunch of “Harper presidential tweet. They look the other way. an appeal from the assessor’s o ce. It doesn’t represented by Madigan’s law fi rm. Valley hypocrites.” v And now they lecture us on Madigan’s malfea- take much more than having the patience and Why am I not surprised? sance. Please. diligence to fi ll out a bunch of forms. Look, I’ve had problems with Madigan as a @bennyjshow
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ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 7 NEWS & POLITICS
Sahar Mustafah TAMARA HIJAZI
fi rstborn. So grief takes its toll on her, and that trickles down to the relationship with Afaf. She comes o as incredibly harsh, but what I intend to do with almost everything I write is to have readers understand where characters are com- ing from. I’m not interested in justifying behav- iors. I’m interested in what are the choices that we make, the forces that carry us along? And that can be said for the shooter, which is why I include him. I’m also defying that trope of the Palestinian mother who tends to su er and is basically abused by a domineering husband.
That’s just one of the ways in which this is not the story readers might expect; did that make it hard to fi nd a publisher?
In the industry it’s important for publishers to package books—they’re only letting in certain narratives. Books by Arab American writers are relatively limited; I felt a responsibility. BOOKS I just didn’t want to continue to inflate the stereotypes. I’m heartened by readers who’ve A Palestinian Chicagoan coming- reached out to say they hadn’t read this before. Without going into spoiler territory, can of-age story you talk about the ending? I’m an optimistic person, but I’m also resist- Sahar Mustafah’s The Beauty of Your Face resists making audiences feel ing making audiences, particularly white good. audiences, feel hopeful and good. My endings are always in service to the experiences of my By D I characters. I had rejections with notes about how I needed to drop the shooter, which re- ahar Mustafah’s novel, The Beauty of to me. I was born in Chicago, and I went to St. ally infuriated me. I thought it seems like the Your Face, is the story of Afaf Rahman, Simon the Apostle, on the south side; it was the industry’s just going to reject it because they Sthe middle child in a Palestinian Amer- neighborhood Catholic school. We were the don’t want me to tell this story. I don’t give the ican family struggling to make its way in only Arabs and the only Muslims in that school. shooter time; I don’t allow him a confession. I Chicago. It’s bookended by a terrorist attack When I was ten years old we went overseas to think it’s wrong to even speculate beyond “OK, on a Muslim school for girls, with fi nal chap- Palestine. We were there fi ve years, which was here’s how he became radicalized.” I don’t have ters that are likely to leave you discomfi ted, formative and probably the fi rst time I felt like answers. I’m not trying to solve the problems but the heart of it is a coming-of-age journey I belonged. There were many expats like me; of the world. But I like to think that after read- among characters both unexpected and we all went to an incredible school founded ing this a reader is going to have shifted a little recognizable. It’s the fi rst novel for Musta- by American Quakers. I came back to Chicago bit maybe in their thinking. fah, whose collection of short stories, Code as a sophomore at Gage Park High School, and of the West, came out in 2017. (She’ll discuss graduated from there. Will we hear more about this family? it at a Women & Children First virtual event Providing arts coverage on August 5 at 7 PM.) Here’s an edited ver- Afaf has trouble at school and more No, at least not for the time being. I just fin- sion from a phone interview last week. trouble at home; her stomach “knots ished a fi rst rough draft of a second novel; it’s in Chicago since 1971. up” when she thinks about her mother. such a strange time to release a book, in the Deanna Isaacs: This is a story steeped in What’s up with that character? pandemic. Thank goodness I had this other Palestinian American culture, but it’s also project. I need to let this book go on its jour- a real Chicago book; how did that happen? She’s not the kind of mom that a child deserves. ney among readers, and I need to continue to I was imagining her as someone incredibly write. v www.chicagoreader.com Sahar Mustafah: This is not autobiographical, broken. She’s displaced from her country but the settings are obviously super familiar when they immigrate, and then she loses her @DeannaIsaacs 8 CHICA O READER - JULY ll Donate to get Leor Galil's best articles over the past 10 years of Chicago music! chicagoreader.com/leorbook
ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 9 IMMIGRATION Living in exile A er her husband was deported, Katrina Jabbi moved her family to Gambia to be with him. Then the pandemic happened. By C D -DR
n February 14, 2018, Katrina Jabbi and her husband Buba needed a distraction. Buba had a meeting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, the next day. The Jabbis lived in Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin. OThey both were o work, Katrina from her Amazon store and Buba from his job as a long-haul truck driver. They dropped their fi ve-year-old daughter, Nalia, at school, and left their one-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Aisha, with a babysitter. They bought fl owers, candy, and balloons and set up a Valen- tine’s Day party for their daughters on the kitchen table. In the evening, they took the girls out to dinner. Katrina, who was 31 years old, was pregnant with their third child. After dinner, they drove Nalia to Katrina’s mother’s house for a sleepover. Usually a drop-o at grandma’s was uncere- monious. But on this night Katrina did something unexpect- ed. She told Nalia to “turn around and I said, Go give daddy a hug and say goodnight.” She now wonders if she had a sense of what was to come. Anxiety was, of course, the most logical emotion for the family to feel before a check-in with ICE, an agency that had the authority to remove Buba from his home and his family. “I know he didn’t sleep well,” Katrina said. “He never really did before any of his check-ins, because it’s so uncertain. You just never know what is going to happen.” A few months earlier Buba received notice that ICE had bumped his appointment date up by six months, from June 2018 to December 2017. He had to work on the new date, so he contacted the agency to reschedule. They moved his ap- pointment to February 2018. Since Donald Trump took o ce, the Jabbis had heard stories of immigrants getting detained during these appointments. Any deviation, even a change in date, felt like cause for concern. On the morning of February 15, Katrina and Buba woke up early to drive the 160 miles from their home to the Milwaukee ICE o ce. An agent escorted Buba to his appointment while Katrina sat in the waiting room. Katrina has the kind-but- fi rm disposition required of a woman with small children, meaning she isn’t easily rattled or upset. But she started to worry. She watched the hands tick on a clock in the waiting room. It felt like the process was taking longer than usual. Then she got a text from her husband: “I’m going to the Gambia.” Katrina called his phone, but he didn’t answer. She began to sweat and shake. She felt like she was going to pass out. When Buba fi nally picked up, he said, “They’re taking me.”
10 CHICA O READER - JULY ll Katrina recalled later that an o cer told her served as the assistant chief counsel for that she couldn’t be on her phone in the wait- the Department of Homeland Security, the ing room. She made her way downstairs to agency that houses ICE, in Atlanta. During the lobby. Another o cer handed her Buba’s his fi rst few years on the bench, he denied wallet, car keys, and wedding ring. Katrina 88 percent of asylum claims. Buba wasn’t asked if she could see her husband, but was applying for asylum, but Atlanta immigra- told that wouldn’t be possible. “What am I tion judges have a reputation as being some going to tell my kids?” she yelled. of the harshest in the country. “I probably wouldn’t practice immigration law if I was he February 15 check-in with ICE was [in Atlanta],” Laureen Anderson-Stepanek, Buba’s 14th. At the time, he was one of an immigration attorney who worked on T2.6 million immigrants on ICE’s “non- Buba’s case, said. Buba was “dealing with a detained docket,” a system that requires really hostile court,” she added. people to check in with the agency at varying Pelletier ordered Buba deported. Buba intervals. People on the non-detained docket came home and told Katrina he’d received either still have cases working their way “fi nal orders of removal,” the legal term for through the backlogged immigration court, deportation. Buba reserved his right to ap- or they’ve received a deportation order that peal the decision, which meant he couldn’t the government, for some reason, can’t exe- be deported for at least 30 days. There was cute. Buba was on the latter track. also a logistical issue: Gambia was not is- Buba had lived in the United States for suing travel documents for its citizens to 23 years. He arrived in August of 1995 on a return, meaning the U.S. could not actually tourist visa, a year after a military coup in deport Buba. He knew this. So he decided to Gambia. His visa allowed him to remain in live his life as if nothing had changed. the country for a year, but he overstayed. Six months after the deportation order, He met Katrina in November of 2009 on Buba was on a job driving through Louisiana a Greyhound bus and it was “love at first when the taillight on his truck burned out. sight.” “I’ll never forget when he got o the Police o cers pulled him over, ran his name bus. It was almost like my soulmate was leav- through the system, and discovered that he ing me.” Katrina punctuates the melodrama had a final order of removal. Buba was de- with a laugh. “I remember looking out the tained. Katrina couldn’t a ord their condo window like I didn’t want to be away from on her own, so she gathered their belongings him.” They kept in touch and a few months and moved to a cheaper place. She made sure later, “I packed my bags.” Katrina is a U.S. to keep track of his immigration documents, citizen, born and raised in rural Wisconsin. anything that could one day prove useful. She has an endearing, nasally midwestern ICE released Buba from immigration de- accent that comes out when she says words tention after six months. ICE still couldn’t like bag. “I put my stuff in storage, and I obtain travel documents from Gambia, so went to drive with him in his truck.” the agency let him out, but he wasn’t free. When they first started dating, Katrina They put him on an order of supervision, the knew Buba was having issues with his status immigration version of parole. He’d need to but, “Did I understand exactly what? Abso- check in with immigration agents as often as lutely not. I had no clue or understanding of they requested. what a green card was, what removal pro- For the fi rst year, he reported every three ceedings were.” Together they moved into months. Then it dropped to four months, a condo in Atlanta. Katrina was headstrong, then six months, then nine months, then and Buba could mellow her out. She was once a year. He was required to tell ICE if white and Christian, he was Black and Mus- he’d moved or switched jobs within 48 hours lim. They learned about each other’s faith, of the change. During check-ins, he had to and also found space to make jokes. Katrina answer questions about his “nationality, laughed as she remembered asking Buba circumstances, habits, associations, and if she could pray over him. He brushed her activities.” Buba also needed to ask ICE away, telling her, lovingly, “Get your Jesus for permission to work or move outside of hands o of me!” Georgia. In 2010, Buba’s case went to immigration In 2012, Buba and Katrina had their fi rst court in Atlanta. Judge Jonathan Pelletier child. The next year, they got married and had spent 16 years as an attorney for the Im- moved to Wisconsin to be closer to Katrina’s migration and Naturalization Service, the family. Marriage, they thought, might pro- agency that managed immigration before vide a pathway for Buba to become a citizen. ICE. After ICE’s creation in 2003, Pelletier Katrina filed an I-130 petition; if granted, ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 11 Buba would begin the process to be a per- through post-traumatic stress disorder right of it growing up,” Katrina said. “But like, manent resident, based on his status as the now.” this was some depression. I mean, it was husband of an American citizen. The couple Katrina enlisted others to write letters to crippling, where I could barely function. had an interview with an officer from the the court to vouch for Buba’s character, and Some days I could barely eat. And then you United States Citizenship and Immigration to try and demonstrate the pain that would have to take care of yourself because you’re Services. USCIS is housed within the De- come from his deportation. One friend spoke pregnant and you’re thinking, Oh my gosh, partment of Homeland Security, and admin- about how Buba welcomed her and her chil- is this baby gonna make it?” She continued. isters adjustments of immigration status to dren into his home when she was fleeing “There’s no way you can prepare yourself “There’s those who are eligible but doesn’t carry out an abusive relationship. Katrina’s own dad for this. None. Like financially, mentally, immigration law enforcement. wrote about the fi nancial and emotional bur- emotionally, physically. It’s like a grieving USCIS approved the application in August den Buba’s deportation would cause Katrina. process. You feel like that person died.” no way you 2015. What Katrina and Buba didn’t know Buba’s brother wrote about the potential Katrina didn’t know what to do. She goo- was that USCIS had no jurisdiction over his for violence or ostracization he and Katrina gled “husband deported,” “deportee wife,” case. Since an immigration judge had or- could face in Gambia because of their in- “moving with deported husband,” searching dered him removed, in order to make chang- terracial and interfaith marriage. Katrina for people in situations similar to hers. She can prepare es to Buba’s status through USCIS, they fi rst signed her letter two days after Buba was didn’t think anyone could really understand needed to get the Atlanta court to reopen taken into custody. “It was hard for me to what she was experiencing. But soon she his case. “[Reopening a case] is not some- even be strong for our children,” she wrote. found a whole Facebook world of women yourself for thing that the court likes to do,” Anderson- “I am pregnant, and I could barely nourish who, unfortunately, knew exactly what she Stepanek said, “But that particular court myself. I am literally and physically sick.” was going through. Women in mixed-status was even less likely to do it.” The attorney cited the letters, the preg- families who experienced deportation and For a person who’s been ordered deported, nancy, and the depression Katrina has strug- were deciding whether to have a long-dis- this. None. the process of changing immigration status gled with since she was a teenager, but the tance relationship or uproot their lives in through a marriage is profoundly complicat- court denied the request. America and move. ed. With stacks of di erent cases laid out on Before Buba was deported, Katrina took She introduced herself in the groups and It’s like a the desk in front of her, Anderson-Stepanek the children to visit him at the jail. “I told my many o ered to talk on the phone with her. began our interview last year by saying, oldest, I was like, You know, daddy is from They told her about their own decisions to “Let me give you some Immigration 101.” If a a di erent country. And he doesn’t have the stay or to go. Katrina said she wouldn’t have person is deported or ordered deported, but right papers.” As she recounted this story felt certain enough to make the choice to grieving they entered the nation with inspection at a a year later, Katrina said this last sentence move to Gambia had she not met the other port of entry and they’re married to a U.S. almost like a question. How could she begin women who’d already made that move. “[Our citizen, usually there’s a three-step process to tell a fi ve-year-old that her father had dis- kids] deserve to have their father in their process. that can put them on a path to citizenship. appeared because of paperwork? “I had to life,” she said. First they ask the court to reopen their case. explain it really simple,” she said. “He’s not In June of 2018, when she was fi ve months Then they submit waivers to be pardoned for a bad person, but they want to take him back pregnant, Katrina traveled alone to Gambia an unlawful presence in the country and to to his country.” for the first time. She would spend three You feel like request reentry. weeks envisioning a life there for herself and The fi nal step requires travel to a native bout a week after Buba was taken into her children. She decided that the Jabbis country. Because Gambia refused to issue immigration custody Katrina started would keep fighting to bring Buba back to that person travel documents to its citizens, Buba Aa GoFundMe page. She raised almost America, but they’d do it from Gambia. couldn’t leave the U.S. “He literally couldn’t $14,000, which helped make up for the im- Katrina packed the girls’ favorite things— participate in that process,” Anderson- mediate loss of Buba’s income, but telling her cupcake mix, sugary cereal, Play-Doh, color- Stepanek said. story also elicited hate, as swarms of racist ing books—and worried about leaving their died.” “We were trying to save money,” Katrina posts fl ooded her social media feed. “It was home and friends. She warned Nalia and said. “I wasted almost like, honestly, a whole just really cruel,” she said. Aisha that in Gambia there aren’t so many year doing that. And then we paid fees for Even with the influx of money from the water parks and rollercoasters. “We can that. And nothing came out of it.” GoFundMe, Katrina couldn’t a ord to stay in make our own fun,” Nalia assured her mom. their home in Wisconsin Rapids. She packed “We forget that there’s a whole other fam- n 2018, after agents took her husband up what she could into a shipping container, ily waiting for us,” Katrina said, referring to into custody, Katrina drove to an already sold the house, and moved into her father’s Buba’s parents and siblings. “They have the —Katrina Jabbi Ischeduled appointment with an immi- basement. The children didn’t comprehend same feelings and emotions as my family gration attorney. The attorney said her the permanence of Buba’s absence. When over here. And it’s fair that they get to see only option was to petition the court for an Christmas came, Nalia said she was excit- their family, their grandkids and their niec- emergency stay of removal, a process that ed because it was a special holiday which es and nephews. And my husband deserves would prevent the government from deport- meant “daddy was coming home.” She said to meet his son and see his children.” ing Buba. It cost $1,500. Katrina needed to the same when the baby, Noble, was born in prove that her husband’s deportation would November. When Katrina went into labor she n 1907 Congress passed the Expatriation cause the family “irreparable harm.” Depor- called her husband, but Gambia is six hours Act, which stripped American women of tation alone does not constitute irreparable ahead of Wisconsin. He was asleep. Itheir citizenship if they married noncit- harm. “It’s absolutely traumatizing,” Katrina “When people speak of mental illness and izen men. In 1915, the Supreme Court ruled said. “I honestly believe that we’re all going depression, you know, I’ve had my bouts that women knew when they married non- 12 CHICA O READER - JULY ll citizen men that they’d lose their citizenship. and dying grew each day in the U.S. while in Over the next few decades, the Expatriation Gambia the caseload stayed low. It seemed Act lost its power as it generally fell out of like they’d be safer from the virus if they fashion to write laws that explicitly tied stayed in Africa. But she also considered women’s personhood to their husbands. the reality that borders could be closed for a But like the women of the early 20th cen- very, very long time. Their son needed to be tury, many women who today join their de- seen by a doctor as quickly as possible. ported husbands outside of the U.S. don’t see After unsuccessfully contacting several their lives abroad as much of a choice at all. airlines, Katrina’s mother called her sena- They refer to themselves as living in exile. tor’s office and learned about repatriation They argue that by deporting their hus- fl ights to D.C. that the state department and Chicago Reader bands, the immigration system has forced the U.S. embassies organized for stranded them to live abroad. citizens. The flight from Gambia was set In March 2019, 13 months after her hus- to leave in the first week of April. Katrina band’s deportation, Katrina packed her received a form explaining the repatria- three kids and ten boxes into the car and tion process. In it, the State Department drove four hours to O’Hare International wrote, “the approximate cost of this fl ight Airport. She strapped her five-month-old is $1,900 per passenger—please note that son to her front and pushed Aisha in a the fi nal cost could be more.” The total cost stroller, with sippy cups, bottles, and baby of Katrina’s original fl ight back to the U.S., formula stuffed in its cup holders. Nalia for her and all three of her children, had walked by her mom’s side. After eight hours been $1,500. Now she’d be expected to pay in the air, they arrived at Gatwick Airport in the U.S. government $7,600. She had no London for a six-hour layover, where Katrina other option. To board the fl ight, passengers rechecked her boxes. She couldn’t imagine needed to sign a promissory note to the gov- doing this without the help of a camerawom- ernment indicating that they’d pay back the an and reporter from Matter of Fact TV, who amount in full. were documenting the journey. Next up was After waiting for nine hours in the air- a seven-hour fl ight. port, she and the children had their tem- When the pilot announced they had peratures checked and boarded the flight arrived at Banjul International Airport in on April 7. Katrina covered her mouth and Gambia, Katrina felt a wave of relief. She nose with a scarf and helped her kids do the and the girls walked down the stairs into the same with their airline-issued sleep masks. 90-degree heat, then to the security line. On Due to his status as a deportee, Buba wasn’t the other side of a glass window they saw allowed to join. “Our kids begged for him to Buba, holding a pink bouquet. It was surreal. come with us,” Katrina said. “They just don’t The moment Katrina had been waiting for understand. I’ve just explained he has to was fi nally here. have special papers to come back to Ameri- The girls ran towards Buba squealing. He ca, then they ask more questions.” The girls chicagoreader.com/puzzle squatted and they jumped into his arms. cried at the airport as they said goodbye. “Africa has been waiting for you,” he said. They landed in D.C. in the middle of the Katrina and Buba hugged and kissed. For the night. Katrina’s brother, who lives in Virgin- fi rst time, Buba held his son. “Hey,” he said. ia, helped arrange a hotel room for the night “You’re with daddy now.” and a fl ight the next morning to Wisconsin. She said that no one took their temperatures he children met their grandparents and or told them to quarantine after arrival, but aunts and uncles and played with their they did anyway. Do Not Touch Puzzle Tcousins in the family compound in Kotu. Things have been slow going as they Piece together the first of our iconic They went to the beach. They celebrated readjust to living in America and to the re- Stay Home cover series. Ramadan. But earlier this year, Katrina and ality of lockdowns and social distancing. It’s Buba also noticed that their baby, Noble, unclear when she and her children will be wasn’t growing as he should. The doctor sug- able to go back to Gambia to see Buba, both This is a 432-piece, 18” x 24” puzzle. The gested he might have a genetic disorder and because of COVID-19 and because of her new cost of this puzzle is $60 + $10 for shipping. encouraged the family to take him back to the debt with the U.S. government. The prom- (U.S. orders only) U.S. to get diagnosed, because in Gambia they issory note that Katrina signed stipulates didn’t have the proper technology. Katrina that until she has paid o the $7,600 cost of booked a ticket for March. the fl ight, she and her children cannot get Then the fi rst case of coronavirus arrived new passports. Their current ones expire in in Gambia and the country went into a na- 2024. v tionwide lockdown. Her fl ight was canceled. Katrina watched as the numbers of infected @plz_CLARify ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 13 ARTS & CULTURE
Your local feminist bookstore has reopened for browsing 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. 7 days a week
Curbside Pickup BOOKS Virtual Events Shop womenandchildrenfirst.com anytime! The Dial’s next chapter How one couple channeled their love for books and each other into running a business By B W
eidi Zheng never had plans to run a “It’s sort of hard to separate all the nervous- bookstore. In fact, neither she nor her ness and excitement I feel around owning a Hhusband, Peter Hopkins, had any retail bookstore from all that’s attached to the cur- experience when they were approached to take rent moment,” Hopkins says. over the Dial. But still, it was an opportunity Navigating the choppy and uncertain waters they couldn’t pass up. “What a story!” Zheng of doing business during a pandemic is daunt- says. “That’s the thing about people who grow ing enough for a seasoned shop owner, and up reading too many books, I simply cannot for a pair with no experience it could easily be refuse because it’s such a good story.” enough to call it quits. But Zheng and Hopkins And there’s much more to the story: Zheng are keeping the Dial afloat thanks to support and Hopkins had their fi rst date at the Dial in from Chicago’s independent bookstore com- the Fine Arts Building in the Loop in Decem- munity, loyal Dial devotees, and the couple’s ber 2018. When deciding where to go Zheng love for books and the store that brought them dropped the name of her favorite bookstore together. with a casual yet trying-to-be-cool “Have you “They met and married in a bookstore, so heard of it?” Hopkins had not only heard of I don’t need to tell you that they love books,” it, he built it. A woodworker and friend of the Gibbons says. “But their personalities really owners, he constructed the bookshelves when compliment each other in a way that I think the space opened as the Dial in 2017. Six months makes them good business partners in addition after their fi rst date, the couple got married and to good life partners. Peter is more precise, had a party at the bookstore. One month after methodical, and analytical and really has a han- that, store owners Mary Gibbons and Aaron dle on the business end of things in a way that Lippelt decided to get married themselves Aaron nor I never did. Heidi has a real passion and move to Michigan, and they asked Zheng and creativity that will draw readers into the and Hopkins to take over. The two signed an store and towards books they might not fi nd on agreement to take on the lease and the business their own. I can’t wait to see how they improve starting on April 1, 2020. on the shop in the years to come.” 14 CHICA O READER - JULY ll ARTS & CULTURE PEOPLE MAKE Peter Hopkins and Heidi Zheng COURTESY THE DIAL a mystery book and then talk about it via Zoom. BOOKSHOP The surprise aspect, Zheng says, really allows CHOICES. Zheng grew up in China where she started her to give readers something they would not reading around the age of four. Books became normally read on their own. And the results her entire identity, the way she understood have been overwhelmingly positive—not society and learned about the world around only were there more subscribers than books her. When she was 14, her family moved to the originally ordered, but it’s also become clear United States. Self-conscious about her accent from the discussions that readers have loved CHOICES and nervous about interacting with other stu- the books and sought out more works by those dents or teachers, she used books to learn and authors or similar stories. MAKE perfect English. “The last book I ever read in The two books Zheng recommends to cus- Chinese before I left the country was Lolita,” tomers now are The Undocumented Americans Zheng says. “It was very inappropriate, I don’t by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio and Minor HISTORY. know why my parents let me read it, at Lolita’s Feelings by Cathy Park Hong, both works that age no less. But I just kind of cross-referenced o er a multidimensional and very redeeming the Chinese edition and English edition side- depiction of the immigrant experience. Sim- by-side with words I didn’t know.” Soon after, ilarly, Hopkins recommends reading the play when Zheng was a junior in high school, Je rey Kim’s Convenience by Ins Choi, about a Korean Eugenides’s novel The Marriage Plot came family who opens a convenience store in Can- out, and she took that and ran. The book takes ada and the tension that develops between the place at Brown University in the 80s, and Zheng parents, who fondly remember Korea, and their wrote down every reference to an author or a children, who are ready for a new life. And for- book and created her own reading list of works mer Dial owner Gibbons, who started her fi rst related to continental philosophy—Nietzsche garden in quarantine, recommends Fermented and Heidegger among them. Vegetables by Christopher and Kirsten Shock- “It’s not lost on me that these are all dead ey, an intro to the art of fermentation. white men,” Zheng says. “But I think that’s also As the Dial has worked to fi nd its footing, the the function of being a fi rst-generation immi- support from other shops in the city has been grant myself is that a lot of the information I instrumental. “Here in Chicago the indie book- consciously absorbed was to help me assimilate store community is extremely supportive and and have the cultural currency to be able to helpful,” Zheng says. “There’s a lot of resource hold a conversation in the institution that is the sharing and guidance and a lot of warmth, too. university.” People would approach us first and be like, In the years since, Zheng has diversified you’re obviously new and this is a weird time, her own reading list, and now as the person in so this is what you’re supposed to do.” charge of the Dial she is working to do the same The Dial opened its doors for in-person for her customers. A lot of attention has been business on July 6, and despite a power outage given to Instagram, where every Saturday she on the first, very hot day, things have been STAND UP TO RACISM, posts fi ve weekend picks, providing a range of running fairly smoothly. Zheng and Hopkins books. “I pay a lot of attention to the genre split are working hard to ensure all social distancing BIGOTRY AND HATE. and the gender and the national origin of the regulations are being observed, but have still authors and try to squeeze in at least one trans- had as many customers as they can in at a time. Facing History & Ourselves has been lated work or work based in non-Western set- Future plans for the store include an initiative committed to creating a more just world tings just to kind of diversify what our readers to support local authors and cultivate that can see,” Zheng says. “And it’s not like checking community, as well as expanding the book club for over 40 years. We help educators use o a box, like we gotta have one Black female, program and eventually selling more custom the lessons of history to transform the we gotta have one Indigenous person. I also pay library furniture like the shelves Hopkins built next generation and stand up to racism, attention to the content, too, because I know for the store. For now, they are fi nding delight bigotry and hate. that not everyone wants to keep reading auto- in being able to share their love of books and fi ction or autobiographical work. I know there return to a sense of relative normalcy. Learn more at www.facinghistory.org/chicago are a lot of good scholars of Asian descent who “It’s really nice to have those interactions,” don’t write about Asian stu at all, and I want Zheng says. “It’s really nice to our regulars to feature those as well to show just another and put faces to the names, but it’s also nice to way that diversity is not just about amplifying kind of see that like surprise and joy on peo- voices talking about themselves, those voices ple’s faces when they walk in and realize it’s a are able to tell other stories as well.” bookstore.” v Another online initiative has been the monthly book club in which subscribers receive @BriannaWellen ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 15 CHICAGO ARTS & CULTURE
READER Andrea Pearson has been sharing her zines using Little Free Libraries all over town COURTESY ANDREA PEARSON MASKS it’s been a little tougher.” She plans to release No Pants Revolution 5 in August. Since March, more zine events have turned to a digital existence. Zine Club Chicago, which is hosted by Cynthia Hanifi n and usually meets at Quimby’s, has been meeting over Zoom to discuss zines on themes like “Fun-Sized” and “Power to the People.” Saturday Night Drink ‘n’ Draw, hosted by Alex Nall, had several digital drawing events—including a figure drawing session where a model posed over webcam. Local comics artist, teacher, and activist Bianca Xunise put on a Comics as Resistance workshop for Believer. The digital format drew a huge audience—around 500 people tuned in—but it also allowed for white supremacists to crash the event. When Believer asked Xunise if she wanted to pause or end the event, she said she wanted to keep going. “I know for non-Black people it may be shocking to experience [racism] when it’s not part of your everyday,” she says. “But, at this point in my life, I’ve learned to not give LIT it power and just keep going.” After the workshop, participants posted The Quaranzine scene their work with Xunise tagged. As for her own How Chicago zinemakers are adapting to the pandemic work, Xunise is glad for the chance to slow down. Staying home means she saves money By M K and has more time to consider which jobs she really wants to take. “Between COVID and the CHICAGOREADER. n May 2020, the Quimby’s Bookstore Ins- zinemakers existing in the pandemic world Black Lives Matter protests, it’s forced a lot of THREADLESS.COM tagram started going live with a New Stu of Zoom meetings, delivery apps, FaceTime Black creatives to ask: What do I really want to IThis Week video. Store manager Liz Mason calls, and endless scrolling? In Chicago, they’re be saying?” she says. sits next to a stack of zines, comics, and graph- adapting new ways to create, teach, connect, And for shoppers who miss zine browsing in ic novels. The colorful Quimby’s shelves spread and share their art and writing. person, Quimby’s has a creative solution. For behind her. As she holds new titles towards the Andrea Pearson self-publishes the autobi- $25, online shoppers can buy a “Qustomized” camera, comments start rolling in: “Miss you,” ographical comics series No Pants Revolution, Quarantine Zine Pack curated and mailed out Never and “Love Quimby’s,” and heart-eye emojis. and she had a busy summer of midwest zine by Mason herself. At checkout, customers miss a “It fi lls the void that is left by not being able and comics fests scheduled. When those plans can list their interests to guide her selection. to look at zines in the store,” Mason says. “Not derailed, she started interacting with digital The most requested subjects? Cats, pizza, show just drumming up sales, but continuing to cre- zine fests through hashtags—posting her and “witchy stu .” One request shared anon- ate the community that we love with zines.” work, leaving comments, and trading and sell- ymously on the Quimby’s Instagram included again. No thanks to COVID-19, all Chicago zine ing zines through the mail. “old horror movies, vaporwave, history, VHS, fests and events are canceled. Quimby’s Book- Chicago Zine Fest usually takes place at […] The Velvet Underground, uhhh I also eat a store—a hub of zine culture in the city—is open Plumbers Union Hall, but this year the fest lot of pierogis.” for limited hours, online orders, and curbside went digital on May 15 and 16. That weekend, Zine packs provide some counterculture pickup. From hand-stapling bindings to trad- Pearson left minizines in Little Free Libraries reading materials, of course, but they also help ing minicomics across festival tables, zine cul- all over town and posted their locations to the a small business and keep the community alive. EARLY ture exists in physical ephemera and thrives in #czf2020 hashtag. “I hope people find them “People post their zine packs and say, ‘I feel real-world interactions. Zines provide a space and get a good chuckle out of ’em,” she says. so seen,’” says Mason. “It was this really ther- WARNINGS to explore outsider art, counterculture, niche Still, a lack of zine fests was a hit to Pearson’s apeutic moment for them, and for me. It feels fandoms, and pretty much any obscure subject productivity. “The first two months of this like the pinnacle of my almost 20 years of zine chicagoreader.com/early under the sun. And as the simplest human in- were so paralyzing,” she says. “My normal way training.” v teractions go online, zines also provide a way of making zines is, ‘Oh, I have to get this done to spread information o the grid. So how are by Chicago Zine Fest.’ Without that motivator, @megankirb 16 CHICA O READER - JULY ll ARTS & CULTURE
Pilsen Community Books ALEXANDER GOULETAS Wow, No Thank You by Samantha Irby (Vintage) Brown and Company) Laugh-out-loud essays about getting older This nonfi ction work digs deep into the lega- and being a “cheese fry-eating slightly damp cy of 19th-century Mormon leader and char- Midwest person” outside of the midwest latan James Strang. COMING SOON The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Michael Zapata (Hanover Square Press) JULY 28 This author’s debut, a mystery novel about a Memorial Drive by Natasha Trethewey lost science-fi ction manuscript (Harper Collins) In this memoir the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Pew by Catherine Lacey (Macmillian) reflects on her mother’s life and how she A small town takes in a mysterious, silent, grieved when her mother was killed by her androgynous person and tries to uncover stepfather. their true identity. AUGUST 4 Prison by Any Other Name by Maya Schen- The Living Dead by Daniel Kraus and George war and Victoria Law (The New Press) A. Romero (Macmillan) An examination of the consequences of pris- A new zombie tale started by Romero and fi n- on reform ished a er his death by Kraus
Queer Legacies: Stories from Chicago’s AUGUST 11 LGBTQ Archives by John D’Emilio (Universi- Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey by Kathleen ty of Chicago Press) Rooney (Penguin Books) A deep dive into Gerber/Hart Library’s A novel based on the true story of the rela- records related to gay, lesbian, bisexual, tionship between a WWI messenger pigeon transgender, and queer-identified people and a soldier and organizations in the city Finna by Nate Marshall (One World) LIT Recipe for Persuasion by Sonali Dev Poetry celebrating the Black voice (HarperCollins) 25 local books to stock your shelves The second in a series of rom-com novels AUGUST 25 Add these new reads by and about Chicagoans to your list. putting a unique, modern twist on Jane Aus- The Sprawl by Jason Diamond (Coff ee House ten classics Press) Essays reconsidering the suburbs as cultural OUT NOW A novel following a young man growing up Saving Ruby King by Catherine Adel West hotspots in South Shore and coming to terms with the (Park Row) All Hack by Dmitry Samarov (self-published) idea of home West’s debut novel follows one young wom- SEPTEMBER 8 The Reader contributor’s illustrated memoir an’s life in the a ermath of her mother being The Seventh Mansion by Maryse Meijer about driving a cab in Boston and Chicago The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music killed in her home on Chicago’s south side. (Macmillian) of Florence B. Price by Rae Linda Brown A coming-of-age fantasy novel about humani- The Beauty of Your Face by Sahar Mustafah (University of Illinois Press) So Forth by Rosanna Warren (W. W. Norton ty’s relationship with nature (W. W. Norton & Company) About Florence B. Price, who lived in Chica- & Company) This debut novel looks at the a ermath of a go and was the first Black woman compos- A new collection from the renowned poet SEPTEMBER 22 violent attack on a Muslim school in the Chi- er in the U.S. to have her music played by a Maya and the Rising Dark by Rena Barron cago suburbs and the principal who must major orchestra The Taste of Sugar by Marisel Vera (Houghton Miffl in Harcourt) pick up the pieces. (Liveright) Twelve-year-old Maya must fi ght dark forces Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall (Viking) A novel based in 1898 Puerto Rico on the eve that only she sees in her south-side Chicago Between Everything and Nothing by Joe A collection of essays asking readers to of the Spanish-American War neighborhood to bring her father home in this Meno (Counterpoint Press) reconsider what feminism is and how they’ve YA fantasy novel. The author’s fi rst nonfi ction book, following shown up for women of color Troublemakers: Chicago Freedom Struggles two young men from Ghana and their quest Through the Lens of Art Shay by Erik Gel- OCTOBER 6 for asylum The King of Confi dence: A Tale of Utopian man (University of Chicago Press) Golem Girl by Riva Lehrer (One World) Dreamers, Frontier Schemers, True Believ- A close look at Chicago’s social movements A memoir about living with spina bifida and Everywhere You Don’t Belong by Gabriel ers, False Prophets, and the Murder of an from the 1940s to the ’60s through the work using art to change the way the world sees Bump (Algonquin Books) American Monarch by Miles Harvey (Little, of the legendary photographer people with disabilities v ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 17 ARTS & CULTURE
BOOKS The myth of housing mobility The Voucher Promise chronicles the “illusions” of Section 8. Evanston's "Speakeasy for Books" By M D is right down the alley at 1712 Sherman Avenue s cities around the country continue to tenant with a voucher than from one without. grapple with the economic and social Thus, voucher holders find themselves at Afallout of decades of racist public pol- the mercy of landlords, who steer them to Open for book browsing noon - 5 pm every day icy, a new book by Georgetown University units “that deliver the biggest profi ts, which sociologist Eva Rosen offers a compelling happen to be in the very neighborhoods from Virtual Literary Lunchbreaks with ethnography of the Section 8 housing vouch- which the voucher might a ord families the your favorite authors, Thursdays noon - 1 pm er program. Though The Voucher Promise opportunity to escape.” Since many voucher (Princeton University Press) is focused on a holders don’t have extra money for security low-income Black neighborhood in Baltimore, deposits and are operating on the tight dead- its insights apply to Chicago and probably lines set up by housing authorities, their op- Order online and get more info at every other segregated American city. tions are limited and the landlords can easily Section 8—now o cially called the Hous- leverage this by o ering units with attractive www.bookendsandbeginnings.com ing Choice Voucher program—has emerged cosmetic remodels, waiving security depos- in recent decades as the primary vehicle for its, and providing transportation to viewings. 224-999-7722 subsidizing rental housing. Just fi ve million “These tactics wrest control and choice away households across the U.S. receive federal from tenants,” Rosen writes. And, once they housing assistance, and more than half of have them in their units, “landlords exploit them are in the private housing market. the intricacies of the voucher rules to limit Where the federal government once allocated the movement of voucher holders out of their
CELEBRATE PORCHLIGHT’S 25TH ANNIVERSARY AT funds to cities for building and maintaining properties.” public housing, it now offers subsidies to Meanwhile, vouchers bring less money than PORCHLIGHT landlords for housing poor people. Tenants landlords in wealthier, whiter neighborhoods pay a portion of their income in rent, while would get from market-rate renters, which landlords collect the rest from the govern- adds an economic disincentive on top of ra- A THREE-DAY SILVER ANNIVERSARY ment. The “failure” of the public housing ex- cial and class biases against voucher holders VIRTUAL FUNDRAISING FESTIVAL periment (now widely understood by experts there. But fi nding housing in a lower-income FEATURING BROADWAY LEGEND to have been preventable and even planned) Black neighborhood doesn’t mean voucher AND ICON AWARD HONOREE has not resulted in poor people gaining access holders (who are disproportionately Black) JOEL GREY to less segregated, more resource-rich neigh- are free of discimination and class bias. borhoods, however. Rosen’s work adds to a Rosen’s ethnography of Section 8 is based chorus of research fi ndings from the last ten on the experience of renters, homeowners, FRIDAY, AUG. 21, 7PM CDT SATURDAY, AUG. 22, 7PM CDT years that have revealed vouchers to be inad- and landlords in the Park Heights neighbor- CELEBRATING PORCHLIGHT MUSIC THEATRE’S FEATURING PORCHLIGHT'S COMMITMENT TO 25 YEAR HISTORY AND A KICK OFF FROM NURTURING YOUNG AUDIENCES, equate for promoting housing integration and hood of Baltimore. Like many Black neighbor- CO CHAIRS DEANN AND RICK BAYLESS AND THE PRESENTATION OF THE LUMINARY AWARD DONNA LAPIETRA AND BILL KURTIS! TO ELAINE COHEN AND ARLEN D. RUBIN upward socioeconomic mobility. hoods around the country its history is one of AND MORE SURPRISES! While they alleviate the heavy fi nancial bur- de jure segregation and redlining that gave den of housing costs for some of the poorest way to blockbusting and white flight. The families, vouchers also help reinforce segre- neighborhood declined as deindustrialization SUNDAY, AUG. 23, 7PM CDT gation. Because the value of vouchers is usu- sapped jobs from its residents and various JOIN OUR 2020 ICON AWARD HONOREE ally calculated using metropolitan-area rental forms of discrimination and disinvestment FOR AN INTIMATE CONVERSATION WITH BILL KURTIS SALUTING JOEL GREY'S cost averages, the vouchers end up bringing in overlapped to hinder wealth building by the INFLUENCE ON MUSIC THEATRE! more money than market rents would to land- Black homeowners. In recent decades the lords in poorer neighborhoods. This incentiv- housing stock has aged and devalued, munic- AN ENTERTAINMENTPACKED, FREE izes landlords to aggressively court voucher ipal services have dried up, and the neigh- THREEEPISODE FUNDRAISING FESTIVAL! holders there. “In a complete reversal of the borhood has experienced an infl ux of renters state policy goals of the program, a program squeezed by market conditions and public FOR FULL SCHEDULE, PERFORMERS & MORE, VISIT meant to provide a safety net to tenants ends policy. While the homeowner and renter PORCHLIGHTMUSICTHEATRE.ORGPALOOZA up acting as one for landlords,” Rosen writes. classes in the area are overwhelmingly Black, She found that landlords can sometimes get the landlord class is disproportionately white. hundreds of dollars per month more from a It’s the voucher holders that are most often 18 CHICA O READER - JULY ll T V P R By Eva Rosen (Princeton POETRY CORNER University Press) The natural world By Anne K. Ream scapegoated for the decline of the neighbor- hood, however. It was terrifying, of course Off the coast of Durban Rosen documents in detail the class but there was no shock to it. a wall that is a wave races towards her divides that exist between homeowners, When the knife touches the skin and sometimes she rides it unassisted renters, and voucher holders (and it feels inevitable as rain. but mostly she dives To say a thing is unimaginable is into a silent muffled place reminds us, once again, that Black people an act of imagining. avoiding the glittering, too-bright chaos above. aren’t a monolith). Though her insights are WordsW and images fail ItI is hallucinogenic undoubtedly limited by the fact that she’s but the body knows. and dreamlike where she is a white woman, her observations about The world had finally caught up with her, but she the social dynamics between these groups that was all. The worst had ended is not breathing are crucial to understand for anyone doing the worst had yet to begin. and she Violence is ever and always a prelude. is not ready to give up on air. community organizing work or advocating
for public policy changes in neighborhoods TheT Buddhists say InI Glacier she wears like Park Heights. Like researchers of stillness bear bells to scare away the grizzlies. mixed-income housing in Chicago, Rosen The Christians preach In a mauling she knows to curl into herself underscores that proximity to higher- forgive and play dead income neighbors with more social capital Oprah admonishes until the bear, bored with her inertia Just let go and satiated from a prior kill, does not translate into tangible benefi ts for Even Bob Dylan sings skulks away. poorer voucher holders. Even when living Don’tDo Look Back. NoN one calls this capitulating to the perpetrator. cheek-to-jowl with better-o homeowners or Do they not see? This is the discipline of survival. unassisted renters, voucher holders are often We do not cling to the past isolated and stigmatized. it is the past that cleaves to us. She reaches the Mayan ruins atop Volcán San Pedro Rosen’s years of research and months of and makes an offering to The real lessons to be learned a god she does not believe in living in Park Heights lead her to conclude are in the natural world. before realizing that that “the ‘choice’ of where to live that policy- ThereT is no mercy. coming downd from the mountaintop makers hope to provide to voucher holders is The cruelty, the culling is its own form of treachery. largely an illusion.” Indeed by now we should is the point. Is it that she is tired from the journey upward? all be on guard when we hear policymakers You do not overcome Or is it the fault of the well-worn use the word “choice,” especially when new you persevere. ground beneath her feet? Rain is not cleansing, policies purport to o er “choices” to the most it releases the detritus. There is a certain quality of sleep marginalized people. “Removing financial EvenE in the Redwood Forest underunde skies that blanket lonely places. constraints to make room for choice is not everything is ugly when falling. But at Lake Atitlan always enough to allow people to take full Dead leaves the roosters crow all night. advantage of the available options,” Rosen bird carcasses There is mercy in their music. writes. She concludes the book with a discus- a spider’s web Somewhere it is always once a glittering mosaic the break of dawn. sion of possible solutions to the corruptions suspended between So she sings a prayer and shortcomings of the voucher program. breathb and air that is a mantra While the narrative, anecdotal parts of now an insect graveyard that is a wish. the book can feel truncated and lacking in made of tired, tangled silk. I can be kinder to the world depth and texture, it remains an engaging than the world has been to me. read. Most compellingly, Rosen offers a moving psychological portrait of her inter- locutors, revealing how people cope with Anne K. Ream is the founder of The Voices and Faces Project, an award-winning storytelling project, and the author of Lived Through This, neighborhood change and reconcile limited her memoir of a multi-country journey spent listening to survivors of gender-based violence. Her writing has been featured in The Washington Post, The New Republic, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Cambridge Companion to Bob Dylan and numerous other publications. opportunities and chronic disappointments. The mental gymnastics residents of Park A biweekly series curated by the Chicago Reader and sponsored by the Poetry Foundation. Poem curated by Nikki Patin, who holds an MFA in creative non-fiction from the University of Southern Maine, is a recipient of a 3Arts Make A Wave award in music, and was recently named one of “30 Writers to Heights undertake to deal with their realities Watch” by the Guild Literary Complex. Patin is the community engagement director for the Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation and the founder are at stark odds with policymakers’ rosy and executive producer of Surviving the Mic, a monthly live podcast and writing workshop series based on the south side of Chicago, where she lives with narratives about how people make decisions her six-year-old son, Tobias. about where they live and how neighborhood social bonds are formed. Instead, the people we meet in the pages of The Voucher Promise share what happens when your only way out of a neighborhood is through the story you tell yourself about it. v Poetry Foundation | 61 West Superior Street | poetryfoundation.org/events @mdoukmas ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 19 THEATER Lula Del Ray JERRY SHULMAN
LOW-TECH SPECTACLE Shadows and light Manual Cinema celebrates ten years of lighting the lamp of art. By I H
he cradle rocks above an abyss, and we could make another thing! Maybe we should common sense tells us that our ex- come up with a name!” They dubbed themselves “Tistence is but a brief crack of light “Manual Cinema,” and, project by project, they between two eternities of darkness,” writes developed the cinematic shadow puppetry Vladimir Nabokov in Speak, Memory, where they’re now known for worldwide. he describes the past as a series of illuminated “Definitely none of us were experts in this pictures, through which one’s character “be- medium,” says Dir. With a diverse array of back- a screen, a 2012 collaboration with video artist is required, how does everyone have a station comes visible when the lamp of art is made to grounds in theater, visual art, and music, the Rasean Davonte Johnson while in residence so no one is touching the same stu . We exper- shine through life’s foolscap.” Potent backlit company has developed a method and medium at the Logan Center for the Arts resulted in an imented with that on a video shoot in May for images magnifi ed to eyelash-fi ne detail before they compare to making fi lms. installation version of Lula Del Ray, with the [the forthcoming feature fi lm] Candyman, but being whisked away, with a sly billow of the “The process for each production takes at company performing live inside the black box it’s a weird position to be in when you have no curtain that brings the mechanism of the art least a year under ideal circumstances,” says theater as video of the work was projected onto federal oversight and you have to figure out abruptly into view also describes the magic of Kau man. “We do some written treatment but a screen in the lobby, where speakers created a what’s safe for you and your employees.” Manual Cinema, the homegrown puppet theater quickly move to more cinematic tools to develop surround sound environment, with audiences Reflecting on the last ten years, Kauffman company celebrating its tenth anniversary this an idea: storyboards, animatics, demo videos. encouraged to wander between the two. says, “Our tenth anniversary roughly coincides year. Using overhead projectors and cut paper Our shows don’t have a lot of dialogue or text, so An engagement at Theater on the Lake the with the decades of our lives. We started Manual visibly moved by hands, wires, and transpar- we rely on visual language, sonic language, and next year further solidifi ed their methodology: Cinema in our early 20s; now we’re in our 30s. So encies, Manual Cinema combines the low-tech cinematic language of editing, compressing, and “It’s a big theater, and we had a tiny footprint!” it feels like the end of a chapter, and the pandem- nostalgia of silhouettes in the dark with dazzling expanding time.” says Miller. “That’s when we hung a big video ic is making us think about the future in a new projections, cerebral design, and live music in “It is an iterative process and very designed projection screen and had us underneath it.” way and forcing us to reimagine what we do and quadraphonic surround sound. Mostly wordless, at every level,” says Dir. “Each time we bring in Each production thereafter has added more who we are.” another layer of artists, it changes—the show variables and possibilities to the product: pro- Miller remembers Manual Cinema’s first might begin with a storyboard, but then the jections, live actors, experimentation with depth international performance in 2014, the first Manual Cinema’s 10th R Anniversary Retrospectacular puppets are built and start to change the story. of fi eld, and so on. time Americans were invited to perform in the / - / : Lula Del Ray, / - /; The The composers start to change the story, and the Their touring schedule brought to a halt by Tehran Mobarak International Puppet Festival. End of TV, /- /; No Blue Memories: puppeteers. The show is remade over and over COVID-19, like others, Manual Cinema began “We went to Iran during the U.S. nuclear conver- The Life of Gwendolyn Brooks, /- / ; again. In that way it’s a lot like fi lm, written as a streaming archival video in April—to enthusi- sation. We did two shows to a packed audience, Frankenstein, / - / ; manualcinema. com, F screenplay, remade again in production, remade astic response. “You see one show, but we might and it was the fi rst time they fl ew the American in postproduction. We’re constantly cutting it.” not come back to your theater for two years—or fl ag in Tehran since the revolution. They didn’t “It is a living organism,” adds Kauffman. ever,” notes Miller. As it became clear that their have gaffer’s tape in the theater because they sometimes embodied, their productions tell sto- “There’s enough unknowns and curveballs that tenth anniversary performance series at the had been under the trade embargoes. It was so ries in images and episodes that fl icker by as the you don’t know what a show is until it’s fully Chopin Theatre would be canceled, they added emotional to be invited, and I feel fortunate to be artists rendering them work ceaselessly in the up on its feet on a stage”—he and Miller speak the four intended productions to the queue to be able to share our work.” drama of plain sight. rapidly, their words dovetailing into a single streamed starting July 27, billed as a “retrospec- “I don’t think any of us expected to be in this Artistic directors Drew Dir, Sarah Fornace, sentence—with “costumes, lighting” (Miller), tacular.” Yet still hungry for “the live element,” line of work or saw ourselves making this kind of Ben Kau man, Julia Miller, and Kyle Vegter fi rst “performers” (Kau man), “the timing of what the company has continued to work remotely to art when we started out,” says Dir. “All of us fell teamed up for the Rough House Experimental they’re doing—until it opens” (Miller). “We create a live performance streaming August 22 into it, and we’re grateful that we found it and Puppetry Festival in 2010. The Ballad of Lula Del made four or five versions of Lula as we were as a “Tele-FUN-draiser,” with 10 percent of the each other—or the work found us. For the fi rst Ray, their 20-minute piece on a single overhead learning how much more story we could tell” proceeds going to the artists who were in the ar- couple years it was just experimentation of the projector about a desert-dwelling teen’s quest (Miller). chival videos and previously booked for the run. medium, trying to fi gure out what this is, Manual for country music, proved so popular that they This collaborative, experimental approach They anticipate cautiously working in person Cinema. What makes it really creatively alive is found themselves performing all over town. “We has defined how the company developed its again this fall to develop an adaptation of A that we’re still trying to answer that question, did Lula at the Whistler, at Cole’s, at a bunch of particular art over the years. “A huge part of the Christmas Carol, a project long on their to-do and the work is continuing to give us new and bars in Logan Square, at friends’ events,” recalls ethos of Manual Cinema is showing the mecha- list. “There’s so much to mine right now: social exciting answers to that question. The answers Miller, who fi rst became intrigued with shadow nism and the technique of how we’re making the distancing, isolation, holidays with family keep changing, so that’s what makes it a worth- puppetry—and acquainted with Fornace—while show and sharing the stage with the fi nal image, members, what’s safe, what’s not. Can you visit while project to continue.” v working with Redmoon Theater the year before. but we didn’t start that way,” says Miller. After your grandparents?” says Miller. “We’re in the “We were like, Oh! People are into this! Maybe two years of working more traditionally behind process of coming up with protocols: what PPE @IreneCHsiao 20 CHICA O READER - JULY ll THEATER
scathing portrait of a city dealing with every- thing from the crisis in public education to po- lice violence to gentrifi cation (which is usually the knot tying all the other issues together). But it’s not docudrama: Holter sprinkles in superheroes, roman à clef nods to Chicago’s storefront theater (most notably in 2019’s Red Rex with Steep Theatre), and plenty of uproarious righteous humor. Exit Strategy was supposed to be revived this upcoming winter with Victory Gardens, but the COVID shutdown ended that plan. However, that title and sever- al others in the cycle (as well as his non-Right- lynd plays) have been published and can be ordered through your favorite indie bookseller. Border drama Isaac Gomez made his Steppenwolf debut in 2018 with La Ruta, a searing drama about the women who work in the maquiladoras (and have been murdered or disappeared in huge numbers over the past few decades) in Ciudad Juarez, across the border from Gomez’s hometown of El Paso. That play was based on interviews Gomez conducted with the women of Juarez. But he also created a one-woman show, The Way She Spoke, also drawn from interviews, that premiered in 2019 with New York’s Audible Theater, starring Kate del Cas- tillo. It’s available as a download with Audible. Native daughter Nambi E. Kelley, who is now a writer for Native Son MICHAEL BROSILOW Showtime’s The Chi, was born in New York City but grew up in Chicago, where she started her BOOKS 300 interview subjects) overview of the organ- career as an actor and playwright. Her 2016 isms that made Chicago theater world-class, adaptation of Richard Wright’s classic Chicago Read any good theater lately? from the 1950s on, focusing on artists and com- novel Native Son (a coproduction of Court The stages are dark, but Chicago theater is alive on the page. panies both legendary and overlooked. Theatre and American Blues Theater) brought For an in-depth look at how the theatrical the story of Bigger Thomas to life in a swift B K R sausage gets made, Ensemble-Made Chicago: A and searing 90 minutes. It’s available in script Guide to Devised Theater (2018, Northwestern form through Samuel French. Kelley has since University Press) by Chloe Johnston and Coya adapted Toni Morrison’s Jazz for the stage in o you can’t go to the theater because (ges- But here are a few titles to get you going—in- Paz Brownrigg is indispensable. The authors addition to her television writing. tures weakly toward everything). Sure, cluding a couple on history and practices in are theater academics, but also have fi rsthand Seeing The Light Sthere are streaming productions galore Chicago theater. experience in creating new work in ensemble— Like Kelley, Loy Webb is now a television right now—even if they lack the communal ex- The e-word Paz Brownrigg was a founder of Teatro Luna writer (for AMC’s NOS4A2). Her 2018 play- perience of live performance. But there is also For good or ill, our local theater scene has and is currently artistic director of Free Street, writing debut, The Light with New Colony, a special thrill to curling up with a great script historically been defi ned by the notion of en- while Johnston worked with the Neo-Futurists. was a compelling and taut two-hander about and becoming a director in your own mind, semble. What that means is open to interpre- This book combines interviews with members a Black couple dealing with the aftermath of a imagining how this world on the page looks tation (as a friend who is a biologist and the- of companies such as Albany Park Theater sexual assault and other relationship baggage. and feels in three dimensions. atermaker once observed on hearing encomia Project, Honey Pot Performance, and Looking- It’s available through Samuel French. She fol- Chicago has been blessed with many great about the theater community, “biologically, glass, while also providing practical hands-on lowed that up with 2019’s His Shadow at 16th dramatists, and in recent years there has been community means organisms competing for exercises for creating work in ensemble. Street Theater, about a college football player an explosion of new theatrical voices. It’s resources”). But two recent books examine the The magnifi cent seven personally a ected by police violence. We hope impossible to provide a comprehensive list of ensemble concept through the lens of history Chicago playwright Ike Holter’s “Rightlynd” that she, like so many other fi ne Chicago dra- indispensable plays from the last decade or so. and artistic practice. cycle of seven loosely connected plays, which matists of the times, will be back in production And unfortunately, some of the most memora- Mark Larson’s Ensemble: An Oral History of began with 2014’s Exit Strategy at Jackalope here as soon as COVID recedes into history. v ble shows have yet to be published in a widely Chicago Theater (2019, Agate Midway Books) and concluded with 2019’s Lottery Day at the accessible format. (Get on that, publishers!) is an exhilarating, exhaustive (700 pages and Goodman, offers a kaleidoscopic and often @kerryreid ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 21 www.bookendsandbeginnings.com
22 CHICA O READER -JULY JULY - CHICA O READER 23ll R READER RECOMMENDED Get showtimes and see reviews of everything playing FILM this week at chicagoreader.com/movies.
The Beach House er-daughter duo Kay (Emily Mortimer) and Sam (Bella Heathcote) a er they discover their matriarch is miss- ing, Relic is a family drama fi rst and a horror movie could have rendered a richer fi lm. —S F 89 second, which benefi ts both the fi lm and the viewer. min. Now streaming on Netflix Edna (Robyn Nevin) does return, but true to the genre, something is off . Kay is instantly wary of her mother’s John Lewis: Good Trouble new peculiarities, whereas Sam is happy to have her R Real life American hero Congressman John grandmother back and hopeful she’ll be able to care Lewis is both honored and humanized by the documen- for her. It doesn’t take long for Edna’s dementia-like tary John Lewis: Good Trouble. The fi lm draws a direct symptoms to become more sinister, though. Simultane- line between the past and present, cutting between ously, the house starts to disorient all three generations Lewis’s accomplishments and newly-minted politicians of women. Literal twists and turns leave Kay and Sam such as Stacey Abrams and members of “The Squad,” trapped, until they aren’t anymore. More hauntingly highlighting the humbling task of stepping into the beautiful than plain haunting, and with scares and sen- giant shoes of a legend. Covering well-worn territory timent going hand in hand, Relic delivers a somewhat such as the Montgomery Bus Boycott, viewers are surprising ending for an ostensible haunted house treated to stunning, rarely seen Civil Rights footage movie. —B J 89 min. Music Box Theatre that was even new to Lewis himself. One particularly gripping scene shows a terrifyingly realistic nonviolence The Rental training session role-play in preparation for sit-ins at Vacation horror is here to stay. From The Lodge to segregated diners—that would turn violent. Starting his Becky to You Should Have Le to The Beach House, NOW PLAYING and short-lived enemies fi ghting. This might sound like life as a young man picking cotton, then ascending to people are looking to escape only to discover that no a tragicomic portrait of life on the skids, a nonfi ction the ranks of Congress, the fi lm reveals a man who is a matter how far you roam, no home is safe. Whether The Beach House variation on Eugene O’Neill’s The Iceman Cometh, but ruthless and cunning campaign opponent, a progressive temporarily relocating to mend a broken family or to R Jeff rey A. Brown’s The Beach House is a here’s the kicker: the Roaring 20s is actually on the out- and eff ective legislator, a hilarious, kindhearted fan of spend time with loved ones, there’s peril around every daring debut that proves you don’t need a big budget skirts of New Orleans (where the fi lmmakers are from), chickens and dancing, and a joyfully stoic man who pos- corner. In The Rental, two couples (Alison Brie and Dan to make a captivating cosmic horror fi lm. In an eff ort to and it’s doing just fi ne; the brothers staged the action sesses steely bravery in the face of white supremacists. Stevens and Sheila Vand and Jeremy Allen White) trav- save their tenuous relationship, Randall (Noah Le Gros) and recruited the ”cast” from among regulars at various Lewis says, “I lost my sense of fear. When you lose your el to the coast for a celebratory weekend that quickly takes his girlfriend Emily (Liana Liberato) to his family’s local bars. It’s unclear, however, what they’re attempting sense of fear, you are free.” —S F 96 min. turns into an uneasy outing when damning secrets start isolated beach house—only to fi nd that the house has to say or what questions their approach raises about the Gene Siskel Film Center From Your Sofa, Music Box to come to light. The rising tension of Dave Franco’s been occupied by an older couple who knew Randall’s documentary form—this is engaging but nevertheless Theatre Virtual Cinema directorial debut (produced by Joe Swanberg) plays estranged father. Tensions rise as they navigate their fails to accomplish anything of note. —K S well but lasts a bit too long, and once the relationship interpersonal relationships, but they quickly discover 98 min. Music Box Theatre Virtual Cinema The Kissing Booth 2 drama fi nally takes a hard turn into horror, the results there is something much more sinister bubbling under The Kissing Booth 2 retains the ludicrous energy of its are lacking. A slasher fi lm meant to scare the average the surface—and time is running out before it spreads. Fatal Affair predecessor. To recap, the fi rst fi lm follows late-bloomer millennial, the fi nal reveal will resonate with the Airbnb The tension of The Beach House is amplifi ed by a jarring If you’re the kind of person who enjoys yelling at the Elle (Joey King) and her best friend Lee (Joel Courtney) crowd for only a long weekend if at all. —B J score from Roly Porter and a truly electric editing style movie screen when characters make poor choices, during their junior year. Things are going okay until 89 min. Music Box Theatre that pulls you into the narrative. Liberato is a command- you may like Fatal Aff air. To be clear, this is not a good Noah (Jacob Elordi), Lee’s older bad-boy brother and ing heroine, combating both the horrors of contagion movie. However, its earnest cheesiness may provide an Elle’s secret crush, threatens to ruin everything. Pre- Yes, God, Yes and her gaslighting, emotionally absent boyfriend. Much a ernoon of quarantine distraction, and perhaps for dictably, Elle and Noah get together, and Elle and Lee Given the sheer number of coming-of-age fi lms in of the fi lm’s runtime may be slow building, but once it 2020 that’s enough. Black Hollywood royalty Nia Long remain besties, all aided by the titular kissing booth. The the world, it’s surprising how rare it is still to see a hits its crescendo it’s hard to not let it completely wash and Omar Epps play Ellie and David, two old friends who sequel employs another calculable script fi lled with fan- woman unapologetically masturbate on screen. Yes, over you. —C C 88 min. Now streaming indulge in a moment of passion that threatens to undo tastical beats. While Elle and Lee stay in California to fi n- God, Yes is Karen Maine’s plucky attempt to add some on Shudder Ellie’s troubled marriage to Michael, played by Stephen ish high school, Noah leaves to attend Harvard, leaving much-needed representation. Adapted from the 2017 Bishop. Infi nitely watchable and attractive, Long and Elle scrambling to apply to east coast colleges and earn short fi lm of the same name, the fi lm follows a Catholic Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets Epps and Bishop should all smolder on the screen more the tuition money to attend. This conundrum spurs the teen (Natalia Dyer) who discovers the power of self- To be a regular somewhere, to go where everybody than they do, but Peter Sullivan’s rather basic script fi lm’s highlight, a Dance Dance Revolution competition love while trying to unlearn the beliefs that tell her knows your name, and they’re always glad you came— never reveals their acting chops and sticks to the basic with a huge cash prize, which sees Elle coupled with a that masturbation is inherently sinful. Yes, God, Yes might that be the real American dream? Shot in late gimmicks of the genre. The infi nite appeal of romance- handsome new student. Viewers will guess the outcome uniquely captures sexual discovery in the age of the 2016 on what appears to be the last day of business at a turned-stalker fi lms like the iconic The Hand That Rocks well before the more than two-hour movie wraps, but early Internet—from asking A/S/L? in AOL chat rooms small but beloved Las Vegas dive bar called the Roaring the Cradle and Fatal Attraction lies in relishing the safe it’s still amusing to watch King and Elordi navigate these to utilizing a trusty vibrating Nokia to get the job done. 20s, this quasi-documentary by fi lmmaking brothers Bill escalation of the breach of consent through increasingly juvenile diary entries of a franchise (we smell a trilogy) But Alice’s sexual awakening is less of a come-to-Jesus and Turner Ross (Tchoupitoulas, Western) hones in on alarming, imaginative—and o en ridiculously implau- as their careers positively blossom elsewhere. —B moment than it is muted and fully uninterested in itself. the dynamics among the wearied staff and steadfast sible—methods. While the story for Fatal Aff air never J 131 min. Now streaming on Netflix Even with a breezy 78-minute runtime, Yes, God, Yes barfl ies as they say goodbye to their home away from quite reaches “bunny stew” levels of psychopathy, Ellie’s rarely justifi es the need for its extended form and lacks home. There are scenes that can be found at any well- inaction as the victim is terrifying and maddening (OMG Relic any real commitment to a complicated issue begging trod watering hole: drunken philosophers doling out JUST CALL THE POLICE), and a nuanced exploration R First-time writer-director Natalie Erika James’s to be explored fully. —C C 78 min. In wide wisdom (intelligible and not), tentative lovers fl irting, of that cocktail of shame, fear, and subsequent paralysis Relic is as tender as it is terrifying. Following moth- release on VOD v
24 CHICA O READER - JULY ll :
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ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 25 Remembering Triad Radio, where the usual was unusual Chicago’s pioneering experiment in commercial free-form radio le the airwaves in 1977, but longtime program director Saul Smaizys is moving its archives online. By R M
ost Americans became aware of Kraftwerk when “Autobahn,” the pioneering German Melectronic band’s first U.S. single, hit Top 40 playlists in 1975. But not fans of Chicago’s Triad Radio: they’d known about Kraftwerk for years, be- cause the nightly radio show had been programming tracks from the group’s fi rst three albums since 1971. Triad on-air host and program director Saul Smaizys had even played “Autobahn” in 1974—not the 3:27 single edit but the nearly 23-minute album version, from a test pressing of the Autobahn LP delivered by a record-company representative. “We put that on,” Smaizys says, “and the phones went crazy.” It was neither the fi rst nor the last time that Triad listeners were privy to previews of pop music’s future. Every weeknight from 1969 till 1977, first on WEAW and then on WXFM, Triad introduced Chicagoans to the music of soon-to-be stars: David Bowie, Genesis, the Scorpions, Donna Summer, and many others who would define popular music in the 1970s and 1980s. At the time, the status quo in radio was to broadcast short singles selected by program directors, not disk jockeys, but Triad defied that model. By airing pop and rock songs not marketed as singles, it helped con- struct a new status quo on the FM dial: the progressive album-oriented rock format. The progressive rock format referred to stations with eclectic programming inside the rock genre, and Triad certainly had that—but it also went further, becoming a Chicago pioneer of commercial free-form radio, which expanded its eclecticism to allow for any-
Photos by Saul Smaizys of Triad Radio, taken during the show’s 1970s run. From top le : Herbie Hancock, Jenny Hahn of Babe Ruth (at the Triad House), Michael Schenker with UFO, the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, and Moondog. SAUL SMAIZYS / COLLAGE BY RACHEL HAWLEY
26 CHICA O READER - JULY ll thing in any genre. The show’s producers, not of sharing the best and most distinctive voices became the show’s iconic symbol, ultimately we played,” Smaizys remembers. “We got in station management, selected the music, and with everyone willing to listen. Triad was, as adorning covers of radio guides as well as trouble one time by playing a song by a Black Triad supplemented its diet of rock with jazz, one of its early radio guides declared, where T-shirts and stickers. Panther member. He let out the F-word and we fusion, blues, reggae, folk, comedy, interviews, the usual was unusual. Aldona recalls that Triad programmed a kind of missed it.” Live radio had its hazards poetry, electronica, classical, experimental little bit of everything right from the start. without a seven-second delay. music, Eastern music, and more. Just about riad Radio was the brainchild of three “I liked folk, rock, and jazz, so we had a lot of When Smaizys joined Triad, Dennis Gray was any type of recording that sounded good (or at young Lithuanian Americans who wanted that,” she says. “Then we tapped into the idea still the on-air host. “For a while, he would do least interesting), Triad would play. Tto create an outlet for the vibrant music that record companies would send us records.” the announcing and I would cue the records,” Triad debuted just two years after the pouring out of the 1960s counterculture—they She laughs. “That may be why we started the Smaizys says. “Then I did two days of announc- nation’s fi rst acknowledged commercial free- felt it wasn’t getting the airplay it should on show in the fi rst place—free records!” ing and he did three days. We would fl ip it the form format, masterminded by former Top 40 commercial radio. Entrepreneur Donatas The show’s format expanded further in following week. He’d announce for two days jock Tom Donahue and broadcast in the eve- Bacinskas (aka Dan Bacin, who later founded early 1970, when Smaizys came on board. Also and I’d do three.” Eventually Gray moved on to nings over San Francisco’s KPMX. In Chicago, Bacino’s Pizza), artist Alvydas Biciunas (whose of Lithuanian heritage, Smaizys (pronounced play in local space-rock band Strato sled (which Triad preceded WGLD’s progressive-rock family owned Bridgeport’s famed Lithuanian smy-ZHEEs) was born in Würzburg, Germany, included Jack “Hawkeye” Daniels from the show Psyche, launched in 1970, and WXRT’s restaurant Healthy Food), and artist and writer in 1947, the same year as Kraftwerk cofounder Shadows of Knight), and Smaizys took over the reincarnation as a progressive rock station in Aldona (who prefers to go by her first name Florian Schneider (who passed away in April). announcer’s seat altogether. 1972 (John Platt, who helped establish the for- alone) met at a Chicago conference for Lithu- Smaizys’s family emigrated to the U.S. in 1949, Just as Triad’s programming was the anti- mat on WXRT, had been part of WGLD). Triad anian young adults. Around Christmastime in living in Cleveland for a spell before settling thesis of pop radio, Smaizys’s Zen-like calm also enlarged its cultural footprint by printing 1968, Bacin and Biciunas visited Aldona in her among fellow Lithuanians in Bridgeport. and baritone voice were the antithesis of the free monthly radio guides that eventually native Boston, inviting her to come back to Chi- Smaizys had been a radio enthusiast since rapid-fi re patter of the era’s “personality” disc grew to magazine size, often topping 100 cago and help them build their forum for new childhood: preparing for school meant tuning jockeys. His measured delivery communicated pages and branching out into events coverage, music. Bacin calls it an idea borne out of the in to WAAF to listen to pioneering Chicago confi dence, cool, and an almost intimidating editorials, and more. “boundless certainty of youth”—at the time, jazz DJ Holmes “Daddy-O” Daylie. “I always musical authority—but he still sounded like Given the Internet’s thorough transforma- all three of them were between 19 and 21. liked jazz and the blues,” Smaizys says. “I used the kind of guy you’d want to hang out with tion of music discovery, it takes a little mental Aldona and Bacin had begun a romantic re- to listen to Big Bill Hill. He had live remotes on weekends, checking out new sounds on the labor to imagine being a Chicago music bu , lationship, so though Aldona had just enrolled from clubs. I remember hearing Howlin’ Wolf turntable. scanning the AM and FM bands in the early at Boston University, she pulled up roots and live on the air.” 70s in hopes of fi nding something interesting. moved to Chicago. During the snowy trek to As much as Smaizys cares about music, his t fi rst, Triad had little local competi- But when those folks landed on Triad, it was the midwest, she listened over and over to Iron true love was (and still is) photography. When tion in the free-form sphere. Smaizys as though they’d become Dorothy stepping Butterfl y’s “In-a-Gadda-da-Vida” in the car. Bacin called him about Triad in early 1970, he Arecalls an underground progressive- out of black-and-white Kansas and into Bacin figured out how to buy airtime on was working a film-processing job at Astra rock show called Spoke that debuted on WLS- Technicolor Oz. local radio—Aldona calls him the “consum- Photo, which had become Chicago’s fi rst black- FM in 1968 with the tagline “The flesh that In 2017, Saul Smaizys began digitizing the mate salesman.” Triad launched in March 1969 and-white custom lab when it opened in 1955. holds the wheel of life together.” It featured show’s archives, which he maintains himself. on Evanston’s WEAW-FM, airing weekdays Bacin and Smaizys had met years earlier music by the likes of Savoy Brown, the Rolling On the GoFundMe page he created that year to from midnight till 5 AM. The show’s fi rst on- at a Lithuanian youth center on the south Stones, and Je erson Airplane, but by 1969 it fund the work, he explains at least part of his air host was a man named Dennis Gray, and side, and they’d bonded over music, spending was gone. In January 1970, WGLD-FM began motive: “I believe the contents of the archive because it broadcast just 25 hours per week, it weekends listening to records at Smaizys’s broadcasting a progressive rock format (in- will be of great benefi t to music fans and re- only needed one. apartment near Clark and Surf. “We’d listen cluding the show Psyche), and Bacin admits searchers in that period of musical history.” To cover initial costs—mostly airtime, since to the Rolling Stones, Frank Zappa,” Smaizys that it was competition—but “only to a certain The material that Smaizys still has includes in the early days nobody working for Triad says. “I had some electronic-music records. I extent. You have to have confidence in your lots of interviews, some with notables such was paid—Bacin cobbled together money had knowledge of a lot of weird sounds.” own approach.” Triad was steadily building an as Bowie, Kraftwerk, Pink Floyd, and Heart borrowed from family. In summer 1969, he and Those “weird sounds” were what prompted avid listenership, and record companies were and others with lesser-known artists, among Aldona generated additional income by selling Bacin’s call. He wanted Smaizys to pick out starting to pay attention. them genre-jumping jazz fl utist Hubert Laws, waterbeds at the Illinois State Fair. “It was background music to play behind Triad’s While Smaizys handled the airwaves, Bacin Irish folk musician Paul Roche, and Steve a heck of a lot of work and really hot!” Bacin on-air host while he announced the songs. took care of business, selling ads and securing Miller Band keyboardist Ben Sidran. He has recalls. Thankfully, advertising revenue even- Smaizys hadn’t considered radio as a profes- free product from record labels as well as correspondence with artists, including Ger- tually paid for the daily airtime. sion, but he liked what he heard and joined the interviews with artists. “Dan was really good man bands Can and Kraan; artist promotional The show’s name, Triad, is a musical term team. In spring 1970, Triad was barely a year at getting records for us,” Smaizys says. “He’d photos and bios; and copies of many of the for a chord that stacks three notes in intervals old but had already added a second shift on get jazz, rock, imports. He’d get blues. We had monthly Triad radio guides. of thirds, but it also referred to the show’s WXFM 105.9 FM (aka WXFM 106). For a short so much to choose from.” What Bacin couldn’t The archive also contains many “air checks,” founding trio. Bacin o ered a third meaning period, Triad aired on two stations: WEAW on provide, Smaizys bought from the import bin which allow a present-day audience to hear ex- in 1971, when he told a Billboard reporter that weekdays from midnight to 5 AM, and WXFM at the Loop location of Rose Records. actly what Triad broadcast 45 or even 50 years philosophically, Triad embodied “the imper- on weeknights from 8 PM to midnight. Listeners also sent in records from time ago. They’re snippets of live radio, often an en- ishable part of man as mind, spirit, and soul; When brokering two shows got too ex- to time—one couple, avid fans of the show, tire segment or show, and Smaizys’s tapes in- the common cord [sic].” As its opening theme, pensive for the growing but still financially contributed the 1971 debut album of pioneer- clude not just music but also DJ patter, station the program adopted Jefferson Airplane’s vulnerable enterprise, the Triad team dropped ing Krautrock band Faust to Triad’s growing IDs, interstitials, and sometimes commercials. “Triad,” a mellow, introspective groove from the WEAW slot. The show’s relationship with library. It was during this time, Aldona says, Smaizys wants this material to be available the 1968 album Crown of Creation. Bacin says WXFM—its home for the rest of its run—was that “Saul became more active in picking the to the public for free, just as Triad’s broad- that the Eye of Providence, specifically as it generally sound, but there were occasional music and drawing from his own tastes.” At casts and radio guides were always free—his appears atop a pyramid on the back of the dust-ups with station management. “They fi rst Aldona, Bacin, Biciunas had selected Tri- approach is an extension of Triad’s philosophy dollar bill, was a visual depiction of Triad. It kind of got down on us for some of the things ad’s music, but after Smaizys got involved, he ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 27 continued from 27 “At fi rst it was a one-sheet, folded in thirds,” 100 pages per issue. apartment of Robin McBride, the Mercury gradually became the sole programmer. His he says. “We’d send it out to listeners who sent Like a free, Chicago-based version of Rolling Records representative. It was on Armitage, love for Krautrock—an emerging form of us a stamp. From there, we made a booklet, Stone or Creem, the guide in its fullest fl ower across from the Park West. We did more inter- German experimental rock that combined hand drawn by our resident artist.” The guide featured not just Triad’s daily radio schedule viewing, and Bowie played a couple of songs psychedelia, electronic music, and repetitive used a parade of art directors, and one of the but also a cultural arts calendar, a wide range on guitar.” The second tape, with the longer in- “motorik” rhythms—wasn’t immediately fi rst was Triad cofounder Biciunas, who added of reviews (albums, films, concerts, books, terview and impromptu solo concert, has gone shared by everyone at the show, but its his own calligraphy to early editions. The and theater), cartoons, editorials, horoscopes, missing, but Smaizys hopes it will turn up spaced-out, avant-garde sound soon became one-sheet quickly expanded to digest size, discussions about meditation, an arts-related somewhere in the Triad archives. He’s already Triad’s calling card. and by the end of 1971 it had already reached crossword puzzle, and even recipes (one digitized the brief clip recorded at WXFM. That’s not to say Triad’s playlist narrowed 48 pages. “Eventually,” Smaizys says, “we had explained how to make nicotine-free herbal Other artists Triad interviewed over the at all under Smaizys’s infl uence. Its bottom- enough material for a full-size magazine.” tobacco). Early issues were as free-form in years include Yoko Ono, reggae star Peter lessly eclectic palette included European thought and presentation as the evening Tosh, Ray Manzarek of the Doors, John Kay progressive-rock bands, electronic music, and broadcast. Later issues were more polished of Steppenwolf, and Scottish folk rocker the Afrofuturistic stylings of Sun Ra alongside and included feature articles on music celeb- Donovan (“He stayed all night and left in the jazz-fusion bassist Stanley Clarke, Ken Nor- rities such as Paul McCartney—those kinds of morning,” Bacin says). “One night we had dine’s Word Jazz, and meditations with Indian stories, Gillis notes, expanded readership. David Bromberg and his band, with Jackson spiritual leader Sri Chinmoy. It was unlike For eight important Recognized journalists such as Abe Peck, Browne,” Smaizys says. “It was a jam session anything else on Chicago radio at the time, previously editor of countercultural Chicago after one of their concerts. We recorded it.” and it drew scads of listeners, mostly teens newspaper The Seed, wrote for the magazine; On April 20, 1975, the day after Kraftwerk and young adults. A listener from Niles named years in the so did Mahavishnu Orchestra leader John performed at the Aragon, cofounders Florian Ron Friedman, who’d go on to work as Triad’s McLaughlin. The task of producing the guide Schneider and Ralf Hütter sat for a Triad in- comptroller, remembers the show shaping evolution of popular pushed the Triad team to expand, and at one terview. Kraftwerk’s infl uence on the birth of how he understood music. “Saul would play point it included more than two dozen employ- hip-hop is well-known, and British journalist Emerson Lake & Palmer’s ‘Pictures at an Exhi- ees and contributors, among them associate David Hepworth went even further in his 2016 bition,’ and then play the original version,” he music, Triad was the publisher Chris Vassilopoulos, editor Patrick book Never a Dull Moment—he wrote that the says. “Triad pretty much informed my musical Goldstein, and salesperson Jason Perlman. band and their Krautrock peers “contained the taste, from jazz to classical to rock in its di er- George Kase, now a director and owner with spoor [sic] that would lead to the dance music ent incarnations.” night school where Chicago Film Works after spending years in of the twenty-first century and a revolution New York native Rob Gillis, who joined the advertising, produced some Triad radio spots quite as big as the one that had brought along Triad management team in 1975 and stayed till (mostly station IDs and other promotional in- rock and roll.” the end, points out that the show’s anything- intrepid listeners terstitials) and helped out with art direction. “Kraftwerk might not even be known in the goes eclecticism followed an internal logic—it At the time, WLS, WVON, and WCFL distrib- United States if it were not for Triad,” Friedman wasn’t the radio equivalent of iPod shuffle. uted free weekly surveys, usually one-sheet says. “They were not being played anyplace “Triad played music in a way that made gathered faithfully circulars that listed the most-played records else in the country.” Smaizys’s relationship sense,” he says. “It had to have a groove. It had for that week. If those surveys were how you with Schneider was such that when he and his to have interesting rhythms or an atmosphere. at the vanguard of learned about what was happening in popular girlfriend toured Europe in 1979, they stayed at We were saying, ‘This is an adventure and music, then the Triad radio guide—which ad- Schneider’s penthouse in Düsseldorf. you’re going on it.’” The Triad team thought of vertised itself as “The Midwest’s Largest Free Triad conducted most of its artist inter- the show as a way to elevate the mind through sonic innovation. Magazine”—would expand your mind as huge- views in Smaizys’s production studio, in what sound. As Bacin told Billboard in the mid- ly and irrevocably as the show it supported. became known as the Triad House (Gillis 1970s, “The basis of radio today is the inter- would later call it the Triad Mansion, though meshing of education with entertainment. rtist interviews didn’t appear in the that doesn’t appear to have caught on). Rented They should be one in [sic] the same.” Triad guide till it got big enough to ac- in 1970, the Rogers Park house served as the Each fi ve-hour nightly Triad broadcast was Bacin acknowledges that the radio guide Acommodate them, but they were an in- command center for Triad’s growing media subdivided into regularly featured specialty was inspired by a similar publication that tegral part of the show’s on-air presence from enterprise as well as living quarters for Bacin segments. Flight 106 was an hour-long survey Peabody Award-winning radio executive Ray the start. David Bowie was among the first. and Aldona, Dennis Gray, and Smaizys. of contemporary rock, jazz, and blues. New Nordstrand cultivated in the 1950s at WFMT, In 1970, the Thin White Duke swept through By the mid-1970s, as Gillis remembers it, Sounds and New Releases introduced the where he served as an announcer for the fa- Chicago on a promotional tour, visiting radio typesetting and paste-up for the radio guide latest cuts from albums by national and inter- mous Midnight Special broadcast (it describes stations to push his third studio album, The took place in the attic, where the house’s national artists in a variety of genres. Sounds itself as “the world’s weekly aberration of folk Man Who Sold the World. Bacin remembers gabled roof provided plenty of space. The From Across the Big Swamp focused on Kraut- music and farce, show tunes and satire, mad- him as intense but soft-spoken. He recalls photo and reproduction studios were in the rock (Can, Kraan, Amon Düül II, Guru Guru), ness and escape”). In 1951 WFMT arguably be- Bowie’s “dual-colored eyes,” and that he wore basement, and the business o ce and dining prog rock (Triumvirat, Gentle Giant, Genesis), came the fi rst alternative radio station in the a pageboy haircut and tweed pants with two- area were on the fi rst fl oor. The second fl oor and fusion (Passport, the Mahavishnu Orches- U.S., and The Midnight Special has been airing inch cu s—not the image most associate with contained the living quarters, Smaizys’s re- tra). “Saul and I were in sync about having a regularly since 1953. the future Ziggy Stardust. cording studio, and the Triad record library. wide variety of music,” Bacin says. “Whether The full-size Triad monthly radio guide Smaizys says the Bowie interview almost “The record collection got to a point where it was Jimi Hendrix, John Cage, or Mozart, debuted in late 1971 or early 1972, and the didn’t happen. “He was at the station, but we it was all the way down one side of a lengthy there was a place for it on Triad.” show distributed it through local retailers who couldn’t get the tape recorder working. By the hallway and then some,” Bacin says. “That advertised in the magazine, especially record time the station engineer fi xed it, Bowie had to doesn’t count what Saul had in his studio.” n 1970 or possibly early 1971, Smaizys had stores and head shops. As the guide grew, it leave, so we only got about fi ve minutes,” he In 1972 Friedman, at that point still just a the idea to publish a monthly radio guide was called Cosmozodiac for a couple years, says. “Since we didn’t get the full interview, devoted listener, stopped by the Triad House in Iwith highlights from upcoming Triad shows. and by the middle of the decade it had topped we went to where Bowie was staying, at the response to an ad seeking a distribution man- 28 CHICA O READER - JULY ll ager. Next thing he knew, he was piling radio lead guitarist Fred Dobbs. The airplay led to mid-1970s, other free magazines with cultural new generations a glimpse of decade-defi ning guides into his AMC Gremlin at Chicago printer a bounty of bookings. “We got a lot of Chica- content, including the Chicago Reader and artists during their embryonic years. “I start- Newsweb. “I was hauling Triad radio guides go gigs in the early days. They called us the the Illinois Entertainer, had entered the fray. ed digitizing old interviews and air checks, from the printer to the suburbs, dropping them ‘Lincoln Avenue Sweethearts’! We’d pack the Record stores and labels that had once put a and copies of the radio guide,” Smaizys says, o at the record stores and head shops and sa- places.” After Ryan introduced Heartsfi eld to significant percentage of their local ad bud- “putting them on a server so people could lons that were advertising with Triad,” he says. Robin McBride at Mercury Records, the band’s gets into Triad now had more options. check them out for free.” Working at Triad was an all-in experience, self-titled debut LP, which included the single Given Triad’s proven success in breaking Sometimes that material overlaps with the though, so Friedman’s job soon got bigger. “Music Eyes,” hit in 1973. And even though a metal bands such as Lucifer’s Friend and the recordings Smaizys posted as podcasts, but it’s “You ended up doing all sorts of things,” he radio edit of the song existed, Triad played the Scorpions, Gillis recommended Triad shift from often more complete. Triad frequently aired says. “I was involved in the production of the six-and-a-half-minute album version. Dobbs free-form to a hard-rock format. Despite the only portions of artist interviews, and the free, radio guide, the late-night typesetting.” Smai- and Heartsfi eld’s current manager, Dick Reck, team’s valiant e orts, which included bringing downloadable archive o ers a chance to hear zys operated the reprographic cameras and both credit Triad for presenting songs at the in a new on-air host, the fi nancial picture grew them in their entirety. The recordings already assembled material for his shows using a four- length artists wrote them. grim. “In my head Triad had run its course,” available for free download include the Bowie track recorder—rather than always mixing Local fusion outfit Forest also credits its Bacin says. “I had gotten interested in the work and Kraftwerk interviews as well as chats with live on the air, he often made collages of music early success to Triad. “Underground radio was of Peter Zarlenga and was looking to do some- Pink Floyd (backstage at the International Am- and other material at home in advance. “Saul a big thing, and that’s how we found out about thing with his company, which was a combina- phitheatre in 1973), Gentle Giant (at the Triad did all sorts of pre-taped stuff,” Friedman Triad,” says Forest guitarist Ray McKenzie. The tion of philosophical truth and education.” House, on a tour promoting the 1974 album recalls. “Mixing comedy with music—true group, formed at Elk Grove High School, was In 1977, Bacin sold the radio and publishing The Power and the Glory), Yoko Ono, Moondog audio-media free-form. He had programs and inspired by what Triad aired—in particular the sides of Triad to Rick and Perry Johnson, own- (on Wabash Avenue outside Rose Records in schedules done a month in advance.” Gillis Mahavishnu Orchestra, Chick Corea & Return ers of the Dog Ear Records retail chain and the 1975), John Cale, and Anthony Braxton (whose agrees: “I have nothing but admiration for to Forever, and Weather Report. ”We made a Dharma record label, both based in northern two-part interview from 1970 includes three Saul’s skills, in the way he mixed music.” tape at Chicago Recording Company and sent Illinois. The Johnsons hired Bacin to spend solo alto sax improvisations). it to Saul,” McKenzie recalls. When Smaizys six months helping them fi nd their way. “I had Smaizys estimates that he has more than riad also helped German bands unin- played the Forest song “Monday Morning a list of things for them to defi nitely not do,” 100 seven-inch tape reels and cassettes still to volved with Krautrock break out in the Rain,” McKenzie says, it was the band’s big Bacin says, “and they did them all! For example, transfer. He also plans to continue digitizing TU.S., among them the Scorpions and break. “We got a bunch of gigs after that.” they turned the monthly magazine into a twice- promotional bios and photos, correspondence Lucifer’s Friend. “We seemed to have a bigger a-month publication. That didn’t work.” with artists, monthly radio guides, and other following in Illinois than other parts of the riad received a major boost in 1975 when Later that same year, Don Bridges bought the Triad ephemera. U.S.,” says Lucifer’s Friend front man John WXFM, licensed to Elmwood Park, began radio portion of Triad from the Johnsons. But The GoFundMe that Smaizys set up for the Lawton (later of Uriah Heep). “Without the Tbeaming its signal from atop the Sears its initial spark of freewheeling counterculture Triad archiving project in 2017 is still active, help of shows like Triad, bands like Lucifer’s Tower, which had been completed a couple optimism—what Bacin had called the “bound- and he eventually hopes to raise $5,000 to Friend—and many more under the umbrella years before. That broadened its range to in- less certainty of youth”—had faded. The fi nal pay for server space to host the files, cover of Krautrock—would never have gotten half of clude parts of southern Wisconsin and north- Triad radio broadcast aired in June 1977. Dave his time commitment, and acquire the other the recognition they deserved.” west Indiana. By then the show was already Freeman, a former Triad sales associate, picked resources needed to digitize the brittle, four- Gillis says that Triad’s reputation with Eu- having an impact bigger than its regional up the show’s evening time slot at WXFM for decade-old tapes and piles of documents. As of ropean artists and producers was such that footprint would suggest. jazz programming. The magazine continued for this writing, he’s about $2,200 short. in 1975 Giorgio Moroder, the future Father “Triad punched above its weight class,” a while longer, becoming more music-centric— For eight important years in the evolution of Disco, sent Smaizys a seven-inch tape reel Bacin says. “We started getting west-coast Gillis recalls in particular that editor Bill Paige of popular music, Triad was the night school containing an erotic dance track that featured correspondence for the magazine. I was trav- “did a great job covering the early punk/new where intrepid listeners gathered faithfully a woman’s orgasmic moans. Triad debuted it eling to New York and occasionally to Capitol wave scene.” But untethered from the radio at the vanguard of sonic innovation. The thrill in Chicago, playing only the instrumental pas- Records in Hollywood.” Because of Triad’s not show that had birthed it, by the middle of 1978 was as much in anticipating what Smaizys sages—and a few months later, the whole song insubstantial influence in a major American the magazine had folded too. Triad was gone. might play as in actually hearing the music. To charted nationally as Donna Summer’s “Love city, its personnel moved in circles that in- borrow the tagline of Ken Russell’s 1975 fi lm of to Love You Baby.” cluded the likes of Mick Fleetwood and Frank one but not forgotten. In late 2010, the Who’s Tommy, your senses would never be Triad also gave important support to Zappa. Bacin produced two Triad concerts fea- more than 40 years after Triad was the same. And by the end of the evening, you emerging local artists, of course. In late 1971, turing John McLaughlin, one at the Midwest Gfounded, Smaizys created the podcast might have a new favorite band half a world producer- manager John Ryan brought Triad Buddhist Temple—the fi rst time the building Remember Triad Radio. It was a short-lived away. “Triad was very important in Chicago, demos from a still-unsigned Styx, whose debut was opened for commercial use. project—he posted just eight episodes in fi ve and it influenced a lot of people,” says Ray LP with Wooden Nickel Records wouldn’t come Unfortunately, this turned out to be a peak months, ranging from 21 to 82 minutes in McKenzie of Forest. “They should be very out till August ’72. Singer- songwriter James for Triad, not a plateau. Gillis believes the be- length—but each of these air checks captures proud of what they did.” “JY” Young, the young band’s lead guitarist, ginning of the end arrived in April 1976: that a slice of a Triad broadcast. One episode bears Triad’s mission—to make the usual unusual, was already a fan of Triad. “On both my stereo was when WXRT, where Don Bridges had cre- the following description: “Just as it was and in the process elevate the minds and spir- and in the car, 106 was where the cool stuff ated a similar evenings-only free-form show heard in 1975 with commercials and all. Guru its of its listeners—also gave a major boost to was,” Young recalls. “They mixed in the blues in August 1972, expanded to a 24-hour pro- Guru, John Klemmer, Michael White, Jade the careers of emerging superstars. Name an and even Top 40 from time to time. The Siegel- gressive rock format. “Triad was no longer the Warrior, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Burnin’ Red adventurous artist who made it big in the 70s Schwall Band, the Butterfi eld Blues Band. To only game in town,” Gillis says. “It couldn’t do Ivanhoe, Arthur Brown, Sidney Poitier reads or early 80s, and odds are Triad 106 FM played me, they were the coolest things. Triad was what WXRT did, because it didn’t own WXFM. Plato, Moody Blues.” them. “Triad opened the door for so many of absolutely what we listened to at night.” It was still paying for radio time. Advertisers Smaizys started a Triad Radio Facebook the acts that were to become the mainstays Ryan also brought local country-rock band began spreading their money around.” page in 2012 or 2013, then launched the Triad of the next decade,” says James “JY” Young. Heartsfi eld to Triad’s attention. “They played Triad’s radio operation started bleeding ad Radio Audio Archive Project in 2017. It’s an at- “They were the front-runners.” v some of our first demos, like ‘Music Eyes,’ revenue before its monthly print guide did, tempt to revitalize the spirit of the media en- before we ever had a record out,” remembers but even there competition had grown. By the terprise for longtime listeners as well as give @journalofgospel ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 29 30 CHICA O READER - JULY ll ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 31 MUSIC
COURTESY ALLIGATOR RECORDS It takes about four or fi ve months for a CD to actually gain momentum. And then in the or fi ve countries before June of last year, and summertime, you tour on it. So just when I was now I wonder, “Wow, will I ever get a chance to getting ready to do the major gigs to promote do that again?” the CD, the pandemic came. I never took it for granted, but you miss it My fi rst CD for Alligator Records [The Chica- when you don’t have it. It’s just a little depress- go Way] did so well that I ate o of it for three ing, but I’m glad to have a job. I’m glad to be, I years. The festivals would call, and we’d hit guess, an essential worker—I didn’t know I was a bunch of di erent countries and cities. But an essential worker until they said you have to March 13 was my last gig. It was at FitzGer- keep coming to work, you know? ald’s, and everybody was freaking out because Our routes normally last about three we’re thinking they’re gonna close the city months, but with the whole pandemic and down. I was thanking everyone for coming out, the shutdown, this particular route lasted but I was like, “I don’t want to touch anything.” six months—which is unheard of. If there’s a They had hand sanitizer at the front door. lady who takes the bus every day at 5:45 in the People didn’t want to shake hands. It was only morning, I’m going to look down the street about a week before the shelter-in-place order. for her. Or she might tell me she’s not coming I always do well at that particular venue, to work tomorrow because she has a vacation and it was still kind of OK. Things were weird—not scary, but weird, where you think, M P H B “We have to get used to this.” With fans you M I F T can usually take a picture, or with your friends C & C W you do the brotherly hug, the chest bump, or T M Night three of the livestreamed festival whatever. Now, if you cough, that’s like a gun- Blues Music in the Key of Chicago, shot—everybody ducks for cover. presented by DCASE and WXRT. The online stu is what it is, but it’s hard to Sun 8/2, 6-8 PM, youtube.com/user/ ChicagoCultureEvents/featured. look into the camera sometime and not get that energy from the crowd. I’m very in the moment when it comes to music. I might see a pair day so I don’t have to look for her. Those people of red shoes in the audience, and I might say CHICAGOANS OF NOTE all of a sudden disappeared, because either something about them and put the attention they can work from home or their job didn’t on the person wearing them, and that might require them to come in anymore. So for about go into my next song. So it’s a di erent kind of Toronzo Cannon, bluesman a month, I was on the bus by myself for most stage, because there’s nobody to play o of. of the day. And all the while I’m reminiscing I’m trying not to be humdrum about it, but about things I’ve done musically that were, in it makes for good songs. There has to be a and bus driver my mind, great achievements. silver lining somewhere too. It can’t just be As musicians, I think a lot of us have lost our about being paused and how you felt in every “All of us have been put on pause, where we’re forced to go sit down and momentum. That’s been my objective: to not song, because that contributes to some kind think about our lives, because things can be taken away just like that.” lose my momentum with the music, and fi nd of depression or spirit of “Oh my God, woe is some way to be out there, doing livestreams me, the world is coming to an end.” So I still As told to J L or Instagram stuff or just putting a song out manage to write some funny songs. Songs to let people know I’m still here. All of us have that might take your mind o of the situation, been put on pause, where we’re forced to go sit or songs about relationships, written in the Toronzo Cannon is an internationally recog- sively Chicago blues musicians. And I thought down and think about our lives, because things weird way that I see them. nized Chicago bluesman. For more than 25 maybe we could get some kind of certificate can be taken away just like that. It forces you to What are the scenarios when we’re in a years, he’s also been a bus driver for the CTA. or something to make a splash out of playing say, “OK, I need a helluva plan B,” because this situation where we’re in the house together In September 2019, he released his second there. So we went to City Hall and met Mayor can always happen again. We have to sit and for 14 days? There are things that you might album for Alligator Records, The Preacher, the Lightfoot, and she gave me and Nora Jean Wal- think about what we’ve done, what we want to go through with your lover or something, the Politician or the Pimp. lace a certifi cate to take to Japan. do, and what we don’t, which could be a good funny things—leaving the toilet seat up, or While I’m on the west side, driving the thing. You have to reinvent yourself. underarm hair, or things like, “I didn’t know acebook has a way of making you feel good bus through economically deprived neigh- I try not to write songs about the pandemic. that you did that before quarantine.” So it’s a and making you feel bad, because you see borhoods that are fresh from the uprising or I don’t want to hear songs about COVID-19. You funny take on the 14 days of quarantine with- Fmemories of what you did in the past. Last whatever, stores are not open yet; our rider- can use metaphors or fi nd some kind of slick out talking about the elephant in the room. As year today I was at the mayor’s o ce to get a ship is not like it used to be because downtown way to write about the heaviness of what’s my grandma would say, “Laugh to keep from certifi cate to bring to Aomori, Japan, to kind of is still closed. Things are not in the groove yet. going on in society. But I wouldn’t want my crying.” v make us “blues sister cities.” For 17 years, the There’s no schoolkids. So I’m sitting reminisc- next CD to be a whole CD of COVID-19 songs, Japan Blues Festival in Aomori has hired exclu- ing about last year. I went to probably four you know? My last CD came out in September. @ToronzoCannon 32 CHICA O READER - JULY ll Recommended and notable releases and critics’ insights for the week of July 23 MUSIC
PICK OF THE WEEK Ben Baker Billington builds worlds out of serene synths on Quicksails’ Blue Rise
The album Lianne La Havas COURTESY THE ARTIST art for Blue Rise is by Sam Lianne La Havas, Lianne La Havas mines the sounds. Synthesizers are also the dom- Khan. Warner/Nonesuch inant sound source on McGaughey’s fi rst solo LP, liannelahavas.com but he’s swapped Chandeliers’ frequently lengthy jams for carefully layered constructions that sneak Born in London to a Jamaican mother and a Greek hints of complicated emotions into their catchy father, singer and guitarist Lianne La Havas takes tunes. Jaunty piano stabs challenge the bub- inspiration from both branches of her family tree bly wistfulness of “Glass Bottom Boat,” and the and beyond, finessing diverse influences into slowed-down voices and sandwich-thick low notes charming, sophisticated, and often heady alt- of “DVD Menu” sink through ascending swirls like pop. She made her full-length debut with 2012’s guilty memories of an afternoon that could’ve acoustic guitar-driven Is Your Love Big Enough? been spent more productively than clutching a and then slipped into something more electric remote control on the couch. “Passport” seems to on her 2015 follow-up, Green & Gold. Her new accumulate force as one sequence of blips over- self- titled album is the first she’s produced on takes another and fading echoes spiral away from her own with her band, and its songs of love, loss, the core groove, so that the track’s development Quicksails, Blue Rise and personal growth continue her eclectic pop feels like a traveler picking up resolve with every Hausu Mountain streak—it’s accessible yet hard to pin down. On a step of a journey. Listening to You Don’t Need a hausumountain.bandcamp.com/album/blue-rise synth-soaked cover of Radiohead’s “Weird Fish- Key to Leave is a bit like leafi ng through a strang- es,” watery keys break into an a cappella bridge, er’s diary: it feels quite personal, but since the writ- and the music builds into blissful alt-rock topped er didn’t need to spell out all the action, you’re le with her hearty vocals. “Please Don’t Make Me guessing as to just what it’s about. —B M MANYPROLIFICMUSICIANS call Chicago home, but multi-instrumentalist Ben Baker Billington Cry” channels 90s R&B with its slick, cinemat- ic sound, moving between minimalist drums and is a veritable Energizer Bunny. He’s been contributing otherworldly experimental sounds to sepia-toned acoustic guitar and waves of lush- NnamDï, Krazy Karl the scene since his mid-aughts stint in noise project Druids of Huge, and his musical resumé ly layered vocal harmonies. On the breakup tale Self-released is too long to reproduce in full here. Any outre artist looking for an open-minded collabora- “Seven Times,” La Havas pairs danceable grooves nnamdiogbonnaya.bandcamp.com/album/ with delicate, folky guitar and deceptively light- krazy-karl tor with a refi ned ear and exacting technique would be well advised to call on Billington, and sounding lyrics about nonstop crying and pray- many have: he’s played drums for free-jazz misfi ts Tiger Hatchery, industrial-gospel legends ing. By the record’s fi nal track, “Sour Flour,” she’s Our country has always privileged the powerful—a Ono, and twisted psych-improv outfi t ADT, as well as in the backing bands of Ryley Walker and overcome her heartbreak—its airy, complex instru- group that, historically and presently, has consist- mental rhythms and hand claps and her own little ed almost exclusively of straight white men. Since Circuit des Yeux. Billington has also helped shape the city’s experimental scene as a concert laugh signal that she’s moving into a new chapter the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, they’ve only programmer: he spearheads the Hideout’s monthly Resonance series, and during the COVID-19 of her life. —J L intensifi ed their avaricious push to feed the rest of pandemic he’s been helping organize Experimental Sound Studio’s celebrated livestream series, us into the grinder in order to prop up a broken, inhumane economic system. It can feel cartoonish- the Quarantine Concerts. Earlier this month, he became the assistant director of the Elastic Arts Scott McGaughey, You Don’t Need a ly surreal to watch the government of the wealth- Foundation, the Logan Square community arts nonprofi t that runs the eponymous performance Key to Leave iest country in the world use bullying and extor- space. But not to be forgotten amid all this activity is Billington’s long-running solo project, Shmee tion to force schools to reopen when that’s likely scottmcgaughey.bandcamp.com/releases to cause catastrophic spikes in COVID deaths, Quicksails. On Blue Rise, the latest Quicksails album for eclectic local label Hausu Mountain, while hospitality workers who can’t aff ord to stay he employs modular and digital synthesizers to create subtle, wide-screen tones. He teases If you’ve ever seen Chicago ensemble Chande- home risk their own health and that of everyone the featherweight atmospheres of “Florian’s Brush” with drum brushstrokes, telegraphing an liers, you’ve seen Scott McGaughey hunched close to them in order to serve the affl uent, say, a behind a bunch of black boxes and patch cords. pastry that looks like a coronavirus particle. Chi- imminent shift in mood as sudden as a summer storm—it never arrives, though, and instead Chandeliers have long taken an ecumenical cago musical polymath Nnamdi Ogbonnaya, aka he builds toward a cinematic, heavenly melody. Billington understands how to harness the approach to electronic music, weaving together Nnamdï, couldn’t do anything about the pandemic power of understatement, and on Blue Rise the tiniest details open doors to immersive worlds. clattering drum programs, squelchy funk punctua- torpedoing his plans to tour and promote April’s tions, and long, proggy melodies; the closest they Brat, a tremendous experimental pop album he —L G get to a rule is that hardware, not so ware, deter- released through the label he co-owns, Sooper ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 33 Stay Home. Stay Positive. MUSIC Stay Connected.
Pacifi ca Quartet LISAMARIEMAZZUCCO
continued from 33 ca Quartet join it with Jennifer Higdon’s satisfying- Records. But he’s used lockdown to release a fl ood ly contrasting Voices triptych (1993) and Ellen Taaff e of even newer music. In June, he dropped two sin- Zwilich’s cosmopolitan Quintet for Alto Saxophone gles and a righteous, rollicking postpunk EP called and String Quartet (2007), featuring dulcet-toned Black Plight, a response to the nationwide pro- saxophonist Otis Murphy. Pacifi ca play like fencers— We can’t wait to get back to making music and tests that erupted a er a white cop killed George all refl exes and restraint, ceremony and choreogra- dancing together at the Old Town School! Floyd in May; the EP made more than $10,000 the phy. So it was in the Bernhardsson-Rostad era; so it fi rst day Nnamdï uploaded it to Bandcamp, and he remains with Hartman and Holloway, though each donated it to local grassroots organizations Assata’s set of players sounds a touch diff erent in their inner- Daughters and EAT Chicago as well as to individ- voice roles. Pacifica’s interpretation of Ran’s quar- In the meantime, many of our classes are ual Chicagoans in need. Earlier this month, Nnam- tet foretells beautiful alchemies to come: Glitter is dï self-released his second album of the year, the inspired by artist Felix Nussbaum, whose paintings currently running online, and we are actively largely instrumental Krazy Karl. The title is an hom- became increasingly bleak and surrealistic as the age to Looney Tunes composer Carl W. Stalling, and Holocaust forced him out of Germany and eventually working on more ways to keep you making the music’s whimsical, quasi-symphonic mishmash into hiding. (He was executed at Auschwitz in 1944.) music and learning new things with us, from of math rock, postpunk, and jazz reflects the ani- At times the piece sounds like an aesthetic heir to mated energy of Stalling’s anything-goes cartoon the string quartets of Schoenberg and Bartók—nos- home, in the near future. music. When you fi nd yourself living in a society that talgic, sardonic, paroxysmal. That’s apt enough: they primes people to complacently believe a New York too crawled from the rubble of a dying world and City cop when he claims a Shake Shack employee grasped for what was still living. —H E poisoned his milkshake, sometimes the best way We are so thankful to be part of the wonderful to cope is to embrace the absurdity—and Nnamdï and supportive arts community in Chicago and does just that with the fractured, hectic melodies on Park National, The Big Glad “Milkshake Made My Tummy Hurt! It Must Be Poi- P Natty are especially thankful for all our dedicated soned!” Every time our country renews its commit- parknational.bandcamp.com/album/the-big-glad ment to bloodletting in the name of profi t, the dis- students and teaching artists persevering with jointed, uproarious chaos of Krazy Karl makes a lit- Chicagoland multi-instrumentalist Liam Fagan is tle more sense. —L G 18: young enough to treat emo bands who are still us during this time. establishing themselves (particularly critical dar- lings Oso Oso) as aesthetic polestars, but also old Pacifica Quartet, Contemporary enough to legally get the name of one of his favor- For updates, rescheduled concert info, ways to Voices ite albums (the Hotelier’s Goodness) tattooed on his Cedille arm. As the mastermind and sole musician behind help support our staff & more please visit cedillerecords.org/albums/contemporary-voices Park National, Fagan has figured out how to cut his own path in emo. The project’s recent debut, oldtownschool.org/alert It might seem backhanded or cute to say that a The Big Glad (self-released via Fagan’s P Natty Grammy–winning string quartet’s 16th record has the Records), relies on pop-punk propulsion, glisten- feel of a second act. But that more or less describes ing loop-the-loop guitars, and enough hyperactive Stay safe, sane, and keep on playing from all of the Pacifica Quartet’s new release, Contemporary hooks to enrapture the most distractible listener— Voices. The album is the ensemble’s second since in other words, it ticks all the boxes for the emo us at Old Town School of Folk Music! they changed up their ranks; violinist Austin Hartman subcategory known as sparklepunk. Though Fagan and violist Mark Holloway replace longtime members leans heavily on the subgenre’s basic components, Sibbi Bernhardsson and Masumi Per Rostad, both even his sloppiest melodies and quietest passages of whom le the group in 2017. The album also feels get an extra bump of personality from his youthful like a sequel because the three pieces it collects are debonair streak—which also intensifi es the feeling oldtownschool.org both too new to be widely recorded and too old to that he’s onto something new. On “The Key,” Fagan be completely unfamiliar. Only Shulamit Ran’s Glitter, sings about interpersonal friction in terms vague Doom, Shards, Memory (2012–2013)—her third string enough that virtually everyone has wrestled with quartet—is a world-premiere recording. The Pacifi - something similar, and his unvarnished, aggrieved 34 CHICA O READER - JULY ll Find more music reviews at chicagoreader.com/soundboard. MUSIC
Vile Creature DANIKA ZANDBOER
vocals might speak straight to you if you’ve ever had vilecreature.bandcamp.com/album/glory-glory- a falling out with a confi dant. —L G apathy-took-helm
The new third full-length from Canadian doom duo Protomartyr, Ultimate Success Today Vile Creature, Glory, Glory! Apathy Took Helm!, is BIT.LY/GOOSEDELIVERS Domino everything I hoped it would be. The queer vegan protomartyr.bandcamp.com/album/ultimate- band, formed in 2014, draw their fierce, efficient, success-today and elegant rage from their experiences of oppres- sion and resistance, and they use it to build strong These days, nihilism isn’t a choice—it’s a cor- support structures for their bursts and blasts of ner that we’ve boxed ourselves into in a feeble raw power. The tolling, far-off twangs of guitarist attempt to preserve some semblance of peace and vocalist KW on the elegiac intro to “When the of mind. By 2020, Protomartyr had already spent Path Is Unclear” set the stage for an impassioned more than a dozen years making malaise seem monologue that begins as the song opens up into ineffably cool, with vocalist Joe Casey serving up raw, churning fury: “You’d do well to take heed of tongue-lashings over gummy bass lines and brist- the subtlety of the winding stream, the spider of ling riffs. On the band’s new fifth album, Ultimate subversion.” Canadian all-woman choir Minuscule, Success Today, Casey confronts the decline of his founded by ukulele player Laurel Minnes, lend their own health alongside the decay of our planet due dulcet tones to “Glory! Glory!,” an almost divinely to human recklessness. In a bit of gallows humor in ethereal ode to the all-consuming power of nature the press release for the album, he says he treated that conveys the comforting sense that a er death it like it might be the band’s fi nal act: “I made sure your essence as well as your decaying body will get my last words in while I still had the breath to be reabsorbed by the environment. Never let it be say them.” Casey’s farewell letter reads like a laun- said that Vile Creature don’t provide moments of dry list of quagmires and calamities—rabid dogs and hope amid their all-too-accurate portraits of despair disease gnash through the anti-police dirge “Pro- and fury: the apathy in the album title is not politi- cessed by the Boys,” while the band must ward off cal indiff erence but rather the acceptance of death black bile to make way for golden light in the acid- when the struggle is done, and the angelic choir punk-tinged “Tranquilizer.” Ultimate Success Today on closing track “Apathy Took Helm!” sounds like a could have easily buckled beneath the weight of raging against the dying of the light. Drummer and Protomartyr’s dissatisfaction, but the Detroit four- vocalist Vic pummels the hell out of this record, as piece enlisted a seasoned crew of guests to help if they’re trying to dig up an unquiet grave. And as shoulder the load, including improvising saxophon- though this magnifi cent album weren’t enough, Vile ist Jemeel Moondoc, vocalist Nandi Rose (aka Half Creature have also just released a collaborative sin- Waif), and cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm. Thankfully gle with Tanya Byrne of UK doom duo Bismuth (who the extra hands don’t distract the band from their added keyboards to “Glory, Glory!”). The primal, postpunk whims: Casey still incants like a whiskey- ritualistic drone banger “In Tenebris Lux” benefi ts sloshed soothsayer, and the two-man rhythm sec- Black Lives Matter-adjacent groups and UK environ- tion still hot trots and syncopates with abandon. mental project Forest Carbon. Vile Creature met Had Ultimate Success Today been released in a year Byrne last year at the Roadburn Festival in the Neth- untouched by pandemic, rebellion, and locusts, it erlands, and the two bands later worked together would’ve landed somewhere between cautionary on music commissioned by the 2020 edition of the tale and philosophical inquiry. Today it arrives like a fest, before the whole event was postponed due to wretched proof of life. —S N S the COVID-19 pandemic. Vic and KW contributed their vocals to “In Tenebris Lux” via digital methods, which might not be their favorite way of collabo- Vile Creature, Glory! Glory! Apathy rating—but adaptability and acceptance of the cur- Took Helm rent moment can lead to innovative, satisfying work. Prosthetic —M K v ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 35 CHICAGO SHOWS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT IN THE WEEKS TO COME
EARLY WARNINGS b ALL AGES F WOLF BY KEITH HERZIK Club, canceled Never miss Box Tops 8/23, 8 PM, City Win- a show again. ery, postponed until a date to be determined b Sign up for the Braids 9/10, 9:15 PM, Empty newsletter at Bottle, postponed until a chicagoreader. date to be determined GOSSIP Breaking Benjamin, Bush 8/6, com/early 5 PM, Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Park, WOLF canceled uled b Brevet 4/9/2021, 8 PM, Beat Chuck Prophet & the Mission A furry ear to the ground of Kitchen, rescheduled, 17+ Express 3/18/2021, 8 PM, Chicago, Rick Springfi eld SPACE, Evanston, resched- the local music scene 8/1, 6:30 PM, Allstate Arena, uled b Rosemont, canceled Rascal Flatts, Chase Rice 8/27, LOCALHIPHOPGROUP He Who Walks CHIRP Record Fair and Other 7:30 PM, Hollywood Casino Delights 10/3, 8 AM, Chicago Amphitheatre, Tinley Park, Three Ways played a big role in develop- Journeymen Plumbers Local canceled ing the Chicago scene in the early 90s. Union 130 Hall, postponed Dan Rodriguez 5/22/2021, In 1992, cofounder Duro Wicks launched until a date to be determined 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, a short-lived but crucial hip-hop weekly in 2021 b rescheduled b Cimafunk 9/6, 8:30 PM, Thalia Sheila E. & the E-Train 9/13, at Lower Links, which put a spotlight on Hall, postponed until a date 5 and 8 PM, City Winery, HWWTW—they were big enough to open to be determined, 17+ postponed until a date to be Mavis Staples MYRIAM SANTOS for the likes of the Pharcyde, Arrested Dreary North Fest featuring determined b Development, and A Tribe Called Quest. Bastard Noise, Water Tor- Silverstein 2/9/2021, 6 PM, Casino Amphitheatre, Tinley Ty Segall 8/12/2021-8/13/2021, ture, and more 5/29/2021, Concord Music Hall, resched- (Lori Branch, the DJ for the four-person NEW Park b 8:30 PM, Thalia Hall, 17+ 2 PM, Subterranean, resched- uled; tickets purchased outfit, had already secured her own leg- Goran Ivanovic & Fareed Snoop Dogg v. DMX 7/22, uled, 17+ for original and previously endary status when she became the fi rst . . . And You Will Know Us by Haque 8/5, 7 PM, City Win- 7 PM, livestream at insta- Tinsley Ellis 3/8/2021, 8 PM, rescheduled dates will be female house DJ.) Unfortunately, the the Trail of Dead 7/31, 8 PM, ery b gram.com/verzuztv F SPACE, Evanston, resched- honored, 17+ livestream at merch-tent. Brandon James 8/2, 2 PM, Staged presents Michigander uled b Southside Johnny & the group’s music has been difficult to hear shop b Reggies’ Roof Deck F 8/6, 9 PM, livestream at Rick Estrin & the Nightcats Asbury Jukes 5/17/2021- for decades, but last week HWWTW rap- Peabo Bryson, Will Downing Lynne Jordan 8/3 and 8/10, audiotree.tv b 8/7, 8 PM, SPACE, Evanston, 5/19/2021, 8 PM, City Winery, per Juba Kalamka posted Technology 8/7, 8 PM, the Venue at 7 PM, City Winery b Steel Panther 8/16, 4 PM, postponed until a date to be rescheduled b Delivered 91/94 to Bandcamp. The name- Horseshoe Casino, Hammond Dermot Kennedy 7/30, 3 PM, livestream at steelpanther- determined b Spag Heddy, Effi n 8/8, 9 Cellar Boys Trio 8/1, 8:30 PM, livestream at universe.com b rocks.com Robbie Fulks, Al Rose & PM, Concord Music Hall, your-price download compiles two demos: FitzGerald’s, Berwyn F Marcus King Band performs Summer Sessions featuring Steve Doyle 4/16/2021, 8 PM, canceled 1992’s Check Your Lips at the Door and Circuit Des Yeux (solo perfor- The Last Waltz with Jennifer Fresh Da Juice 7/31, 4, 6:30 SPACE, Evanston, resched- Dave Specter 8/17, 8 PM, 1994’s Me, IBM and the Baby Jesus. mance and Q&A) 7/21, 8 PM, Hartswick, Devon Gilfi llian and 9 PM, the Promontory uled b SPACE, Evanston, canceled When Gossip Wolf covered eclectic livestream at noonchorus. 8/3, 8 PM, livestream at mar- Tino & the Latin Swing Factor I Am Fest 8/15, 2:30 PM, Marty Stuart & His Fabulous com; a portion of the pro- cuskingband.colortestmerch. 8/2, 1 PM, FitzGerald’s, Ber- House of Blues, canceled Superlatives 4/18/2021, 3 local cassette label Lillerne Tapes in 2012, ceeds will be donated to com b wyn F Incubus, 311 8/28, 6:45 PM, and 7 PM, Maurer Hall, Old the roughly 30 tapes it’d put out by then Healthy Hood Chicago b Loose Assembly 8/15, Twin Talk 8/14, 8:30 PM, Con- Hollywood Casino Amphithe- Town School of Folk Music, were mostly by midwestern weirdos. In Chris Daughtry 8/12, 8 PM, 8:30 PM, Constellation, 18+ stellation, in-person concert atre, Tinley Park, canceled rescheduled; 3 PM show sold the years since, Lillerne has hooked up livestream at onlocationlive. Mavis 80: a Newport Folk with concurrent livestream at Jimmy Eat World, Front Bot- out b com to benefi t the Park West Revival featuring Mavis youtube.com/user/constella- toms 8/28, 6:30 PM, Aragon Pabllo Vittar, Tatiana Hazel with weirdos from all over, releasing more and its staff b Staples, Jason Isbell, Brandi tionchicago, 18+ Ballroom, canceled 10/20, 9 PM, Metro, canceled than 70 additional tapes—among them Deer Tick & Friends In-Your- Carlile, Ben Harper, Trom- Mike Wheeler Band 8/7, King Gizzard & the Lizard Warning, Junkbunny 10/23, recent ambient projects from Australian House-Party live from bone Shorty, Grace Potter, 7:30 PM, Rosa’s Lounge Wizard, Leah Senior 7 PM, Subterranean, canceled composer Jim Sellars (aka Yunzero), Port- Fort Adams featuring Phoebe Bridgers, Lucius, M. Wiki, Deejay Earl 12/5, 8 PM, 10/16/2021, Wednesday 13, Haxans 9/25, Leon Bridges, Robert Ellis, Ward, Joe Henry, and more Beat Kitchen, 17+ 7 PM, Radius Chicago, 7 PM, Reggies’ Rock Club, land’s Fly Kin Mountain, and Moscow art- Sharon Van Etten, Tallest 7/31, 7:30 PM, livestream at Lil’ Ed Williams Blues Session rescheduled; tickets pur- canceled ist Y a ffl e . Last week the label dropped a Man on Earth, Courtney fans.com b featuring Lil’ Ed and more chased for the original and Wilco, Sleater-Kinney, Nnamdï stacked compilation, Lillerne #122, whose Marie Andrews 8/1, 7:30 PM, Mimosa Me Please featuring 7/30, 7:30 PM, Rosa’s Lounge previously rescheduled date 8/28/2021, 6 PM, Pritzker 38 contributors include those folks plus livestream at seated.com to Dott Daley, DJ Playmaka will be honored, 17+ Pavilion, Millennium Park, raise money for the Newport 8/9, noon, 2:30 and 5 PM, the Liturgy, Leya, Anatomy of rescheduled; tickets pur- Chicago jammers RXM Reality , M. Sage , Festivals Foundation b Promontory UPDATED Habit 8/21, 10 PM, Empty chased for the original date and Kindtree. Bandcamp purchases of Dirty Heads perform Super DJ Mr. Gac 7/31, 9 PM, FitzGer- Bottle, canceled will be honored b the comp benefit Black- and trans-led Moon 8/7, 7 PM, livestream at ald’s, Berwyn F NOTE: Contact point of pur- Minks 8/12, 9:15 PM, Empty Winnetka Bowling League Hyde Park-based LGBTQ+ center Brave veeps.com b Mt. Joy 7/23 and 8/6, 6:30 PM, chase for information about Bottle, canceled 10/3, 8 PM, Subterranean, James Elkington 8/1, 8:30 PM, livestream at noonchorus. ticket exchanges or refunds. Nickelback, Stone Temple canceled Space Alliance as well as Urban Growers livestream at youtube.com/ com b Pilots 8/29, 6:30 PM, Holly- Yam Haus 6/25/2021, 8 PM, Collective, who farm 11 acres in Chicago user/constellationchicago Music Friendly Distancing AJR, Quinn XCII 8/8, 6 PM, wood Casino Amphitheatre, Beat Kitchen, rescheduled, and “support communities in developing Farewell to Varick Street fea- featuring Helen Money and Huntington Bank Pavilion, Tinley Park, canceled 17+ community-based food systems.” turing Joan Osborne, Lee more 7/24, 5 PM, livestream canceled Not our First Goat Rodeo Ranaldo, Robyn Hitchcock, performance from Money Tatsu Aoki’s Miyumi Project featuring Yo-Yo Ma, Stuart Last week, Chicago MC Myquale James Maddock, Emma along with an interview and 7/31, 8:30 PM, Constellation, Duncan, and more 8/13, UPCOMING dropped the EP Passport Package, where Swi , Joseph Arthur, Jill music video from a surprise livestream at youtube.com/ 6:30 PM, Pritzker Pavilion, he swerves suavely between rapping and Sobule, Teddy Thompson, guest; donations to the user/constellationchicago Millennium Park, canceled The Drive-In Fest featuring singing atop a blend of Afro-pop, modern Rhett Miller, Jill Hennessy, Empty Bottle Reopening Armor For Sleep 8/14, 7 PM, Off Broadway, Handcuff s Lloyd, Bobby V, and more Betty 7/31, 6 PM, livestream Fund will be matched up Metro, postponed until a 4/3/2021, 8 PM, Reggies’ 8/22, 6 PM, Soldier Field funk, and minimalist R&B. Myquale has the at citywinery.com b to $5,000 to benefi t My date to be determined b Rock Club, rescheduled, 17+ South Festival Lot talent to transport you to serene climes, Michael Franti 8/15, 8 PM, Block My Hood My City. Ólafur Arnalds 10/27/2021, Oston, Saint Nomad 8/27, NB Ridaz, Lil Rob 8/28, 7 PM, and we could all use a little vacation right livestream at michaelfranti. View at emptybottle.com/ 7:30 PM, Art Institute of 7:30 PM, Beat Kitchen, the Vic b now. —JRNLG manheadmerch.com b music-friendly-distancing b Chicago, Rubloff Auditorium, canceled Neck Deep 11/25, 6 PM, Radius Daryl Hall & John Oates, Pvris, Royal & the Serpent rescheduled b Judith Owen featuring Pedro Chicago b Squeeze, KT Tunstall 4/7/2021, 8 PM, House of Birthday Massacre, Julien-K Segundo 5/12/2021, 8 PM, Haru Nemuri, Air Credits 9/5, Got a tip? Tweet @Gossip_Wolf or e-mail 8/26/2021, 7 PM, Hollywood Blues b 12/16, 7 PM, Reggies’ Rock SPACE, Evanston, resched- 9 PM, Sleeping Village v [email protected].
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CRIMINAL JUSTICE Any evidence that the CIA was working both mysteriously fell asleep, and shrieking with Epstein by, for example, installing hid- was heard coming from Epstein’s cell on the den cameras on his properties, or reviewing morning of his death. The false hope of Ghislaine video footage involving world leaders like As for Maxwell, a full-blown public trial former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, would also pose a threat to some powerful would be devastating for the agency. The men. Two puzzling facts about the case, Maxwell’s arrest use of children to obtain kompromat—com- however, suggest that an honest account of promising information—on foreign leaders the Epstein-Maxwell criminal network will If history is any guide, Jeff rey Epstein’s longtime partner is unlikely to pay shocks the conscience. And most of the girls not soon be forthcoming, even if she survives the price for their crimes. preyed upon by Epstein came from disadvan- to see a trial. First, although her criminal taged families or foster care. partnership with Epstein spanned at least 20 By L CG It is widely reported that all of Epstein’s years, the indictment focuses on just three properties were wired with hidden cameras. years: 1994 through 1997. This is highly sus- It is also generally understood that Epstein’s picious. It suggests that if the case were to go tremendous wealth—estimated at a half bil- to trial, the government would try and limit Leonard C. Goodman is a Chicago criminal explained that he cut the nonprosecution lion dollars—was acquired through sexual the evidence to those years, thus protecting defense attorney and co-owner of the newly deal with Epstein’s attorneys because he blackmail of some of the richest and most a person like Bill Clinton, who was a frequent independent Reader. had “been told” to back o , that Epstein was powerful people in the world, including passenger on the Lolita Express beginning above his pay grade: “I was told Epstein ‘be- Leslie Wexner, founder of Victoria’s Secret in 2001, immediately after he finished his ith the July 2 arrest and indictment of longed to intelligence’ and to leave it alone.” parent L Brands. time as president. Further, the narrow time Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime part- The problem for the victims is that a deep Robert David Steele, a former CIA o cer, window suggests that the prosecutors in New Wner of Je rey Epstein, the victims of dive into the Epstein-Maxwell network told a radio interviewer in 2017: “Many York might be playing partisan politics by their child sex-tra cking ring are once again would implicate not just powerful men like politicians have been compromised. It was a selecting the time period when Epstein was being led to believe that the truth about the Bill Clinton, who took at least 26 trips on Mossad/CIA operation . . . There are videos associated with President Trump, hoping to network of high-profile abusers and protec- Epstein’s private jet—nicknamed the Lolita of some of the most powerful players in the distract the mainstream press and the public tors will fi nally be revealed. Express—but also untouchable U.S. intelli- most humiliating positions. If this gets out, with a Trump sideshow. Prosecutors in the One victim, Maria Farmer, first reported gence o cials like Michael Hayden, who was not only are the politicians ruined, but the Southern District of New York have publicly Epstein’s crimes to the FBI in the 1990s, but CIA director in 2007 when Acosta was told to extortion game is over and suddenly, the feuded with Trump, and one of the prosecu- her reports were ignored. Maria is currently “leave [Epstein] alone.” infl uence CIA and Mossad wield over Wash- tors listed on the indictment is the daughter battling two forms of cancer. The arrest of Thus, the government has gone to great ington is gone.” of former FBI director James Comey. Maxwell has given her renewed hope. “When lengths to avoid any detailed investiga- Still, neither Congress nor the Department Second, why was Maxwell, a citizen of you wait a quarter of a century for some- tions into the criminal enterprise. Then in of Justice has made any e ort to investigate three countries, living in the United States thing, it’s pretty exciting when it happens,” November 2018, a reporter from the Miami the role of U.S. intelligence. This is not sur- knowing that she would be arrested? This she told the Daily Beast through happy tears. Herald embarrassed the government by prising. During the Obama administration, fact suggests that the government has al- “I really feel hopeful that . . . maybe they’ll identifying about 80 victims of the sex ring the only person prosecuted in connection ready worked out a deal with Maxwell’s law- go down the list of coconspirators.” Another and by telling the story of how the victims with the CIA torture program was John yers that would likely provide little satisfac- victim, Jennifer Araoz, said, “Maxwell was were double-crossed by Acosta’s office in Kiriakou, a CIA agent whistleblower who re- tion or clarity to the long-su ering victims. the center of that sex trafficking ring.” Her 2007. In response to this series in the Herald, fused to participate in and helped expose the In a functioning democracy, the people arrest “means some justice for survivors can federal agents arrested Epstein last summer brutal, illegal, and ine ective program. would get to learn the truth about their gov- exist.” Courtney Wild said that the arrest of and charged him under the same indictment The danger that an Epstein trial posed ernment’s involvement in criminal activity. Maxwell “gives me more confidence in our that had been drafted and shelved a decade for his powerful associates went away last But we live in a corporate state where the gov- system.” before. summer when Epstein was found dead in his ernment serves the moneyed interests and In a previous column, I described how the As a general rule, it is di cult to avoid deep cell less than a month after his arrest. The regularly lies to the people. Our best source federal government has covered up for Ep- dives into a case at a public criminal trial. o cial cause of death was suicide. But there of information about government crimes stein and Maxwell and their coconspirators. Wealthy people like Epstein and Maxwell can are reasons to suspect that Epstein was mur- has recently come from whistleblowers like Back in 2005, more than 30 child victims, a ord to hire experienced criminal lawyers dered and that the crime was covered up. A Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. But some as young as 14 when they were recruit- and investigators. At trial, they would have forensic pathologist hired by Epstein’s family the persecution of their publisher, Julian ed to become sex slaves for Epstein and his a strong incentive to expose the role of U.S. described injuries—“three fractures in the Assange, has made it harder to get the truth guests, were tricked into cooperating with intelligence agencies as part of a potential hyoid bone, the thyroid cartilage”—that are out to the people. The mainstream press has the FBI, based on the promise that the U.S. public authority defense. Also, because this “very unusual for suicide and more indicative become a lapdog to power. Thankfully, the attorney’s office in south Florida intended is a sex-tra cking case, it would be di cult of homicidal strangulation.” “I’ve not seen Internet has made it possible for alternative to prosecute the Epstein-Maxwell child sex for the CIA to simply classify all the evidence in 50 years where that occurred in a suicidal noncorporate outlets, like the Grayzone and ring. Instead, the lead prosecutor on the that links the agency to the defendant. This hanging case,” said Dr. Michael Baden, a Consortium News (and of course the Reader), case, Alexander Acosta, double-crossed the is a common tactic in terror cases where former New York City medical examiner. to investigate and push back against o cial victims and entered into a secret and illegal government lawyers typically argue that dis- Moreover, the two cameras outside Epstein’s lies. Support independent media! v deal to grant immunity to Epstein and all closure of any document about the CIA would cell were broken, the two guards who were his “potential coconspirators.” Acosta later be a threat to national security. supposed to check on Epstein every half hour @GoodmanLen 38 CHICA O READER - JULY ll eChicago Reader is now biweekly More than 50,000 copies will be available at nearly 1,200 locations across the city and suburbs. Find one near you: Upcoming Issues: chicagoreader.com/map
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ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 39 the cannabis platform OPINION a Reader resource for the canna curious
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40 CHICA O READER - JULY ll OPINION
JOE NEWTON noticing how hot your baris- Sandalwood): “Pro Domme ta is. here. Definitely let her know sure of an affair because the what’s going on, so she healing process brings the : What is the etiquette for doesn’t wonder if you’re OK, if couple closer together. (This breaking up with an escort she did something wrong, etc. is not a good reason to have you’ve been seeing regularly? It’s the job of a pro to under- an affair, of course, nor is it A little background: I’m stand and respect boundar- the reason why anyone has married and have been seeing ies. Thanks for a thoughtful ever had an affair.) Reinforc- an escort for the past three question.” ing the idea that affairs always years about twice a month. Daddy Lance (@Lance- destroy relationships: Couples The sex is amazing. We’ve Navarro): “Agreed 100%. The who remain together after an developed a friendship and majority of us are deeply affair usually don’t talk openly get along very well. The issue empathetic and prefer closure about the cheating while cou- is that I’ve gotten emotionally over mystery.” ples who separate or divorce attached. I constantly think A final thought from me: after an affair can hardly bring of her and she’s always on my Sex workers value trustworthy themselves to talk about any- mind. It’s negatively aff ected regular clients, and FOSTA/ thing else. my marriage and I need to SESTA and the coronavi- Now to quickly answer your break it off . I don’t want to rus pandemic have made it first questions . . . hurt her as I have genuine incredibly difficult for sex Yes, it is possible for two aff ection but I need to stop workers to find new regular people to remain monoga- seeing her. Do I send a note clients. Sending this woman mous for 20 years. It can be with an explanation? Or do I a generous final tip—perhaps done—of course it can—but ghost and stop sending her the price of a session, if you there are lots of people out text messages? I’m the one can swing it—would soften the there who think they’ve done who initiates contact. She blow of losing you as a regular it but are mistaken. Some peo- never reaches out to me fi rst. client and would tide her over ple who think they’ve been Thanks for your advice. —I ’ until she can replace you. in successfully monogamous M N Y relationships for 20 years have : That was great advice you been cheated on—or they A: Don’t thank me, IMNY, gave to “Virgin” in last week’s themselves have done some- thank all the nice sex column. I was a 39-year-old thing their partners might workers and sex workers’ virgin and started seeing regard as cheating—and the rights advocates who were sex workers. I found one TIRED OF DATING APPS? one-off infidelity or the ongo- kind enough to share their that had the kind of qualities ing affair or the happy end- thoughts a er I tweeted out mentioned by the sex worker Meet people the old-school way. ings were never exposed or your question and asked you quoted in your column. disclosed. #SexWorkTwitter to weigh in. She was a kind, caring, and And your partner is going The general consensus was compassionate person that I to find other people attrac- for you to send a brief note saw regularly for a year. Being tive—and not in 20 years. letting this woman know you with her gave me confi dence Today, right now, your partner won’t be booking her again. in my sexual abilities and is going to lay eyes on some- A short selection from the allowed me to experience one else they find attractive, responses . . . physical aff ection. A little HOPE, just as you will prob- Kalee D. (@GoddessKalee- while later I met my future ably lay eyes—but only eyes— LA): “I’ve had this happen wife. I was even able to tell on someone else you find a few times before and the her about my experiences attractive. Making a monog- couple that wrote me a note with sex workers and she amous commitment doesn’t with honesty were so deep- wasn’t off ended and didn’t mean you don’t wanna fuck ly appreciated. The others, I shame me. She was actually other people, it means you always wondered what I did intrigued. I hope VIRGIN will refrain from fucking other wrong or if they died in some takes your advice. If he fi nds people. If the lie we’re told freak accident.” the right sex worker, like I did, about love and attraction Maya Midnight (@ it will change his life. were true—if being in love MsMayaMidnight): “I’d be wor- —O G C with someone left you incapa- ried if a longtime regular dis- ble of finding someone else appeared during a pandemic! A: Thanks for sharing, attractive—we wouldn’t need Send a quick text or email OGC! v to make monogamous com- saying you’re taking a break mitments. We wouldn’t need but you’ve enjoyed your time Send letters to mail@ to promise to not fuck anyone together. No need for more savagelove.net. Download or extract that promise from detail about why. A parting the Savage Lovecast at someone else if being in love gift would be a nice gesture.” savagelovecast.com. FREE at chicagoreader.com/matches rendered us incapable of even SoftSandalwood (@Soft- @fakedansavage ll JULY - CHICAOREADER 41 leaders to defi ne shared rltd, CPA lic in any US using tables, schemas, & preparation; SQL, Pig, Miracle Massage. Ob- JOBS testing timelines and juris & 2 yrs exp in rltd fl d. views, queries (DB2/ Python, Command Line tain health, energy and GENERAL understanding of value Reqs 24mths exp audtng Oracle databases, SQL Interface, predictive joy. 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Hard floors HAGAR, MONTROSE, BANDS, MAUS, thank LOVE TO LOVE, TRY ME, nm.org/ Requisition followed by 5 years of or rel field and 2 yrs - Committed to & plenty closets space. you for all your Love & ID:REF7846V EOE progressively responsible of HR exp plus 1 yr of Teamwork Laundry amenities on SPACE STATION #5... Support “YES I HAVE A TATTOO experience with software F&B operations exp - Goal-oriented premises with heat 1250/ Love, Northwestern Memorial quality assurance and at 4 star/diamond Apply www.ezzanails. mo 773 369 1525 AND NO YOU CAN’T National Record World SEE IT.” Healthcare seeks Sr. testing. Experience must hotel(s). Exp must com/careers Hollywood Rose Analysts for Chicago, include a minimum of: include development of staciebpicturesit@gmail. 312-206-0867 com IL to maintain ERP 5 years of experience staffing concept during Senior Accountant LEGAL NOTICE 773-323-5173 system infrastructure with developing test preopening/rebranding of Prepare tax returns Fun with S. 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Res: Richard M Donna Watson Ellis REAL Quality Management Test, SOA Test, spec exp with eng design and Weisz Antiques, Inc. dba Advance Rehab Network, to develop and drive a flow, TOSCA, UFT, UI development; in lieu of Antique Resources; 1741 Inc. ESTATE return-on-investment Path–Robotic Process BS + 3 yrs, MS in Mech W Belmont Ave, Chicago based test automation Automation, and Win Eng; perm US work auth. IL 60657 RENTALS strategy for the Runner. Job location: Dir inquires to Institute of enterprise. Drive Chicago, IL. To apply, Gas Technology, 1700 S. TransUnion, LLC MARKETPLACE FOR SALE production of technical please visit https:// Mount Prospect Rd., Des seeks Sr. Analysts for GENERAL software test strategies, careers.northerntrust. Plaines, IL 60018, Attn: A. Chicago, IL location NON-RESIDENTIAL architecture, and utilities com and enter job Russell, HR. to develop & evaluate Zosia’s House Cleaning for all aspects of testing, requisition number analytical products. 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