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[ad_1] The cozy back room of the Atlantic Bar and Grill in Lincoln Square looks like a mix between an Irish pub and a grandma’s house. It’s a blend of exposed brick, wood counters, tables with classic checkered cloths, and shelves cluttered with old Christmas decorations, kitchen products, and liquor. A fiddler plays folk music […]

[ad_1] The Reader Institute for Community Journalism (RICJ), which operates the Chicago Reader, is excited to announce its spring 2025 editorial internship opportunity. Applications open on Monday, December 9, 2024, and close on Friday, January 3, 2025.  Applications are open now through January 3, 2025. The eight-week program will run between January and May 2025.

[ad_1] At Shanghai Seminary, a new gallery in Bridgeport, it’s dark. Two videos by two contemporary collectives of entirely different cultural backgrounds are presented side-by-side in the dimmed exhibition space, installed on the same viewing plane as if their juxtaposition is just as important as the videos themselves. Qiuchen Wu (吴秋晨), the Chicago-based artist who

[ad_1] This story was originally published by the Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence in America. Sign up for its newsletters here. I always thought Junior and I would go to college together, that we’d be roommates after school. I always thought our kids would grow up together. Instead, when he was 19, I

[ad_1] This story was originally published by The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence in America. Sign up for its newsletters here. Melinda Abdallah is a Native Chicana, currently living in Wisconsin. She’s worked as a packer at a large worldwide facility but is currently an at-home nana and wife while healing from an

[ad_1] Molder Credit: Alex Ford Chicago’s metal scene has a well-deserved reputation as one of the country’s most eclectic and prolific. As 2024 comes to a close, local fans can celebrate their good fortune with a stacked double album-release show headlined by two of the area’s grimiest death-metal purveyors. Joliet four-piece Molder released Engrossed in

[ad_1] Machine Girl Credit: Courtesy of Signe Pierce Machine Girl makes rave music for weebs who’ve read American Hardcore. Long Island producer and vocalist Matt Stephenson launched the project as a solo effort in 2012, and its 2014 debut, WLFGRL, has aged like decadent toilet wine. The cover art features a close-up of a snarling

[ad_1] Foodman Credit: Courtesy In Context Artists Takahide Higuchi is drawn to simple pleasures. The Japanese producer also known as Foodman first created music in a PlayStation game called Depth, and his rudimentary experiments with the technology sparked an understanding that anyone can be an artist, regardless of skill or expertise. That notion in turn

[ad_1] Playfulness and purposeful converge in the music of Microplastique. The quartet’s membership includes some of Chicago’s busiest and most engaged rising improvisers. Percussionist and composer Adam Shead leads his own bands, plays in a collaborative free-improv trio with Jason Stein and Damon Smith, and runs the Irritable Mystic label—which just released Microplastique’s debut album,

[ad_1] Cass Cwik Credit: Sarah Elizabeth Larson Cass Cwik and his band the Small Gas Engines specialize in an engaging variety of folk music that recalls Bob Dylan and retro Nashville pop. This is well-trodden territory, but the Chicago singer-songwriter keeps the tradition fresh with a sure hand and strong ear for melody and arrangement.