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Local label HoZac retired its Blackout festival with a memorable blowout in 2006, then resuscitated it in 2011; for its third year back, the notoriously rowdy, beer-soaked punk-and-garage party runs for four nights at the Empty Bottle, with a lovingly curated lineup of local and national acts that represents a huge range of generations. The fest kicks off Thu 5/16 with an art show featuring work by Goons, Greg Shirilla, Nick Ryle, and others, plus live music by Ohio underground-rock legends Mike Rep and Tommy Jay, local punky pop band Negative Scanner, and Minneapolis punks the Sleaze....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » I don’t know whether Heffernan has ever done letters-to-the-editor duty, but I did, as a lowly intern well before the advent of widespread open commenting and closer-to-universal Web access, and… it wasn’t all that different. There was less–in terms of raw numbers–idiocy, but there’s no reason to attribute that to anything but the barrier of purchasing a postal stamp....

“What’s your editorial staff?” I asked Susan Richardson, who on September 18 takes over as editor-publisher of the venerable Chicago Reporter. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Let’s assume the rebuilt website—underwritten by a grant from the Open Society Foundations—that the Reporter intends to roll out in a few weeks is a thing of beauty. A website is like an orca; it’s insatiable. How can Richardson’s tiny staff feed the beast and still find time for the long, probing pieces that earned it its iconic reputation?...

I used to be the slightest bit skeptical of the story Grant Achatz tells of the famous pheasant and burning oak leaf course at Alinea that reduces nostalgic diners to tears. That was until I witnessed the phenomenon myself at the first incarnation of Next. After my mate took one of the opening bites of the night—from a slice of brioche piped with foie gras torchon and garnished with roasted mustard seed-apricot jam—she held back her head, closed her eyes, and misted up....

MAURITIUS Northlight Theatre Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » It’s hard to imagine Teach and Donnie in American Buffalo rhapsodizing over anything other than the resale value of the rare nickel that gives that Mamet play its title. But in Rebeck’s world, the stamp shop run by the dyspeptic Philip (Gary Houston) is an island of specialized knowledge and fetishistic obsession, where the mere act of touching a unique stamp creates jealousy and tension, and amateurs are held in disdain....

friday10 Friday10 Regina CarterThe Flat FiveKilling JokeTennis Saturday11 Black TuskClare BursonThe Hideout Holiday BallKilling JokePunch BrothersQueers Sunday12 LatimorePunch BrothersThe Sword Monday13 Nick Mazzarella Trio Wednesday15 Andrew BirdNick Mazzarella TrioMy Chemical Romance THE FLAT FIVE Earlier this year this five-piece group was chosen by the Reader as the Best Cover Band That Only Plays One Gig a Year, and there’s a surprisingly large amount of competition for that spot. The Five are Scott Ligon (principal arranger), Kelly Hogan, Nora O’Connor, Gerald Dowd, and K....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » In the past few years he’s released a string of disparate albums for the German label Winter & Winter. On Las Vegas Rhapsody (2006), a collaboration with Japanese pianist Fumio Yasuda and Swiss orchestra Kammerorchester Basel, he sings American pop standards like “You Make Me Feel So Young” and “You Go to My Head,” delivering more or less straight-ahead renditions atop lush instrumental arrangements....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » There’s an interesting history of the Roland TB-303 synthesizer over at the No Dough Music blog. The 303 failed to catch on doing what it was designed to do (providing bass lines for musicians working without a full band) but turned out to be world-shiftingly good at something its creators probably never imagined (making the mind-altering throbs and squeals that would inspire the subgenre of dance music called acid house, which in turn provided the foundation for the first wave of UK rave culture)....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Chicago Tribune, September 4, 1933. Among murderers, there are two basic philosophies of body disposal: “lumpers” prefer to concentrate the telltale byproducts of homicide in a single location, even to the extent of creating their own private and unmarked cemeteries; “splitters” like to sow bits and bobs of their victims across the map, apparently in the belief that such distribution will foil forensics and impede identification of the deceased....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » When the holidays descend upon us each December and the concert calendar cools off, the time is ripe to check out all of the great local talent you tend to take for granted most of the year because they played around town all of the time. It’s a good exercise to indulge in, as it can remind us how strong the Chicago music scene really is....

Jazz reedist Caroline Davis will be in town this weekend with her band Whirlpool. Says Peter Margasak about the group and their new record, “Late this summer they released their debut, This World and One More (Ears and Eyes), which demonstrates Davis’s adaptability to more ethereal and abstract terrain; unsurprisingly they tackle ‘Whirlpool,’ a tune by drummer Paul Motian, who veiled the steely power of his music with plush harmonies and gauzy atmospheres....

While we’ve all been riveted by Governor Blagojevich’s alleged plans to sell Barack Obama’s Senate seat to the highest bidder—and his subsequent decision to give it to charity—Mayor Daley has been busy making his own deals, mortgaging the city to balance the budget and win the Olympics. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » More than a fourth of the money was designated for a “rainy day fund”; I’m guessing Daley plans to use some of it on the Olympics....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “Oh great!” I thought to myself as my editor handed me an advance CD-R of the new Dark Fog release the other day, “Another Chicago psych record. This is going to suck!” Over the past few years, this town’s music scene has been hit with an overwhelming number of psychedelic acts. If you’re going out to a rock show these days, there’s a good chance that you’re going to see at least one of them....

From 5 to 9 Roscoe Village boutique Cinnamon holds its “It’s in the Bag” event, featuring gifts and gift certificates to neighboring businesses and restaurants with every purchase. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » From 6 to 10 there’s a nosh-n-shop event at Wicker Park restaurant Chocolate Grape. Admission is $20, which includes champagne, wine, cheese, and chocolate, as well as a chance to win a customized shirt from Kate Boggiano, a gift certificate from Erin Gallagher, a Lara Miller sweater, a consultation with personal stylist Julie Watson, and a wine-and-truffle gift box from Chocolate Grape....

Sometime Chicago Reader cover model David Bazan plays the Green Music Fest on June 27, but if you can’t wait till then to ogle his beardedness, lucky you, the Dave Bazan iPhone app was released last week. It’ll keep you up to date on all things Bazan: photos, videos, interviews, tour dates, major religious changes of heart, and the like. It’s only 99¢ at the iTunes store. Talk about summer savings!...

But what a hill the family now had to climb! The Pinnicks had to show that the missing Diamante would have proved their liability case. How could they possibly show that without the Diamante? The Pinnicks hadn’t been able to win without the car even with the mighty Corboy & Demetrio on their side. Now the firm was working against them! Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Doesn’t this seem reasonable?...

A.J. CREW“You’re Doo,” Nightmares & Daydreams(both self-released) Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » A hybrid house/rap beat, ringtone rave synths, an Auto-Tuned female vocal hook, a bunch of rhymes about clubs and women—in the hands of the Black Eyed Peas those elements add up to chart-dominating juggernauts as bland as they are popular. In the hands of Dude ‘n Nem, though, they add up to “Sounds Sexy,” which, while not exactly brilliant, is at least charming....

Previously we only briefly touched on the writing in Chicago by Day and Night: The Pleasure Seeker’s Guide to the Paris of America (Northwestern University Press), a guidebook published for the benefit of visitors to the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, but it would be a shame not to use the infinite space here on the Bleader to post a sampling of the fascinating passages therein. As editors Paul Durica and Bill Savage note in their introduction, “The writer or writers brag about Chicago’s legitimate cultural attractions beyond the Fair with that superlative overconfidence that secretly insecure Chicagoans specialize in....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “Last year, the Fayetteville, Arkansas, public school district closed its aging Jefferson Elementary School, replacing it with a shiny new building on the other side of the highway. The new building needed a name; the school board could have transferred the Jefferson name along with the students but did not do so. Or they could have chosen the name of another president; for example, they could have honored Bill Clinton, who had been a law professor at the university in Fayetteville and later became governor and then president....

Lead Story Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Charged with second-degree sex abuse, 16-year-old Jonathan Powell of Iowa City, Iowa, chose to take the stand in May to insist he’d had no sexual contact with the woman on whom his blood and saliva had allegedly been found. He said he’d merely bumped into her while jogging, gotten his foot stuck between her legs, and become so “entangled” with her that it took about 45 minutes to get free....