Untitled Document It seems that central Illinois is mired in a “mess o’ blues” — and, brother, that is a good thing. Last Friday, Phillip Walker (man, was he great) played Starship Billiards, and on Saturday the Chatham Sweet Corn Festival featured, for the first time, local blues bands. In August, local blues shows will […]
Music
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Three Fridays and a Wednesday
Untitled Document In his press release Phillip Walker is billed as “An American Treasure.” Take a few moments to browse his biography at www.phillipwalker.com, and you may want to add the word “Unsung” to the accolade. Walker — to let you know some highlights — was born in Louisiana in 1937. His family moved to […]
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Potpourri
Untitled Document Every time you turn around, it seems, up pops another benefit for some person or organization. With so many deserving people in need, it’s hard not to become overwhelmed. Perhaps we can’t make every benefit or fundraiser in town, but we shouldn’t become indifferent to all. This Saturday, July 14, at the Sherman […]
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The feminine mystique
Untitled Document Gretsches and gams, gams and Gretsches. That’s the Gore Gore Girls’ bag, and if it’s not yours, well, you can’t say you weren’t warned. The cover of the Detroit quartet’s new CD, Get the Gore, says it all: two curvy lower limbs, set off to pornalicious perfection in stiletto do-me boots, and one […]
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Junior Varsity changes direction
Untitled Document For the Junior Varsity, home usually means the highway, but to write their new album, Cinematographic, the rock band hit the brakes. Earlier this year, the hard-touring quintet hunkered down in a Springfield house to craft their second release for Victory Records, an album the band chose to steer in a new direction. […]
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Hot spots for early July
Untitled Document Before you dive into this week’s installment of the greatest story ever told, make a note to check out the blog entry about yours truly at www.MySpace.com/scotteeerock. I’m not exactly sure how this member of the Lost Boys discovered my deepest, darkest desires, but now the whole world knows about my love of […]
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One big glorious grin
Untitled Document In his essay-cum-manifesto “The Fullness of Time,” the composer Carl Nielsen cautioned against the pursuit of novelty for its own sake: “. . . [T]he smaller and slenderer the talent, the more careful must it be to abstain from seeking great originality. Nothing in all art is as painful as unsuccessful originality. It […]
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A ganache of tweeness
Untitled Document Once you get past the stupid name, the simplistic songwriting, and the almost uniformly abysmal lyrics, Lavender Diamond is a really great band — but isn’t that like saying that George W. Bush would be a really great president if it weren’t for his policies? When does a drawback (or two or three) […]
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Variations on a theme
Untitled Document There are two great events taking place this Saturday, and I couldn’t decide which one to write about, but then it hit me like a bolt from the blue: Cover them both, man! On reaching this astounding conclusion I couldn’t help but notice not only the disparate genres of the two shows but […]
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Melancholy man
Untitled Document Starbucks references have become an indie cliché, a form of slackerist shorthand whereby privileged whites rag on the economic class that spawned them. To invoke the Starbucks brand in a record review is to dismiss the music under consideration as yuppie pabulum: It goes down easily enough, but therein lies the problem. Starbucks […]
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Bigger is bigger, not always better
Untitled Document I was recently in Chicago, playing a bar show on Friday with Micah Walk, a coffeehouse open mic on Sunday, and a theater-group spot on Monday and Tuesday. In the middle, on Saturday, I attended the famed Chicago Blues Festival — you know, the one they call the largest outdoor blues festival in […]
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Mid-June music sampling
Untitled Document It’s Sangamon County Fair time, so pack up the crew and make the annual pilgrimage to New Berlin, because this year’s entertainment is fabulous. In the beer tents, otherwise known as the Miller Lite Roc House and the Budweiser Pavilion, you’ll find our best local bands, including F5, the Mudbugs, Hot Property, and […]
