August 2016 – Underground Bee

August 28, 2016August 29, 2016

The Flat Five at the Green Mill

The Flat Five — that wonderful Chicago group I’ve photographed and written about many times before — played three sets on Saturday, Aug. 27, at the Green Mill. As the band’s members observed, it may be the first time anyone has ever played a Hollies cover (“Carrie Anne”) at this venerable jazz club. But there’s a lot of jazz in what the Flat Five do, making this evening a real treat. The Flat Five’s long-awaited debut album, It’s a World of Love and Hope, comes out Oct. 14, featuring 12 songs written by Chris Ligon — the oddball songwriter who’s the brother of Flat Five member Scott Ligon. You can hear one song, “This Is Your Night,” on Soundcloud. Saturday’s show included songs from the new album as well as the Flat Five’s usual mix of obscure pop gems. Even though the group played from 8 p.m. to midnight (with a couple of breaks), it still played only a fraction of its vast repertoire.

August 28, 2016August 28, 2016

BÖC, Rob Mazurek & Emmett Kelly and Horse Lords

Friday, Aug. 26, was another two-concert night for me. Talk about strange juxtapositions. I started out the evening by driving to Skokie for a free show by Blue Öyster Cult at the Backlot Bash street festival… which was pretty good, as far as classic rock band shows go. But alas, I missed the big finish with “Don’t Fear the Reaper” and “Godzilla” so I could make it to the Hideout in time for a show on the more experimental end of the spectrum…

Blue Öyster Cult

Rob Mazurek and Emmett Kelly

I got to the Hideout in time to see the record-release show for Rob Mazurek and Emmett Kelly. Mazurek is best known as a jazz musician, playing cornet as well as using electronics. Kelly is a versatile guitarist, playing with both rock and jazz groups, as well as a fine singer-songwriter in his own right, leading the Cairo Gang. On the new album Alien Flower Sutra. Kelly’s voice drifts through strange sonic landscapes sculpted by Mazurek. The music was equally strange in Friday’s live performance.

Horse Lords

Their set was followed by Horse Lords, a band from Baltimore playing instrumental music that might get categorized as jazz — though it sounded to me more like progressive rock along the lines of King Crimson or krautrock, with guitar, sax, bass and drums locked into rigorous patterns. Whatever genre it is, it was damn impressive.

August 28, 2016

Tortoise and Ryley Walker concerts, in one night

Aug. 25 felt like a quintessential night of live Chicago music: seeing Tortoise at Millennium Park, followed by Ryley Walker’s late concert at the Empty Bottle. Tortoise’s instrumental music resonated beautifully in the Jay Pritzker Pavilion, with the band members constantly shifting around the instruments, playing intricate patterns with almost astonishing precision. The show also featured a nice opening by Homme (a duo I’d seen recently at the Pitchfork Music Festival).

Tortoise

Homme

Ryley Walker

Ryley Walker’s music seems quite different from Tortoise at first glance, and yet, there’s some similarity, especially when he is playing live with his excellent band. Like Tortoise and other Chicago bands — like Joshua Abrams and Natural Information Society — Walker and his collaborators know how to stretch a song out, to revel in grooves, to explore a chord progression or melodic motif in ways that are hypnotic and enchanting. Walker’s new album, Golden Sings That Have Been Sung, is terrific, but its jammy folk-rock songs only hint at how jammy the group gets in concert. I recommend buying the deluxe 2-LP version, which adds a record containing a 41-minute live version of “Sullen Mind,” a song that is a mere 6 1/2 minutes in its studio version.

Walker’s set on Thursday at the Empty Bottle was a marvel. And it was particularly special because it offered a rare chance to see Leroy Bach — who produced the album — sitting in with the band. And it’s uncertain how many more times we’ll get a chance to see the fantastic drummer Frank Rosaly playing with this band, as we did on Thursday; I’m told that Rosaly has moved from Chicago to Europe. That’s a loss for Chicago, but Thursday night’s wonderful sets by Tortoise and Walker showed that the city’s independent music scene — where rock, jazz, country and experimental music often overlap — is as vibrant as ever.

August 28, 2016

The Rizdales at the Hideout

The Rizdales — a country band from London, Ontario — played Aug. 20 at the Hideout, apparently playing in Chicago for the first time ever. Although the group records original music by the husband-and-wife songwriting team Tom and Tara Dunphy, its most recent album is Blue Ain’t The Word: A Tribute to the Music of Ray Price, and this show was a tribute to Price and his music. Three Chicago singers joined the Rizdales onstage during the show: Jon Langford, Rachel Drew and Lawrence Peters, who also opened the concert. It made for an enjoyable night of old-fashioned country music.

August 28, 2016August 28, 2016

Comm to Black and Cinchel at the Comfort Station Fundraiser

I always love seeing concerts at Logan Square’s Illinois Centennial Monument — that tall column with the eagle on top — but these shows don’t happen often enough. So it was cool that Comfort Station, Maximum Pelt and Tall Pat Records teamed up for a fundraiser festival on Aug. 20. I was there for just a short time, arriving just as a brief rainstorm hit and then staying long enough to catch a playful, noisy set by Comm to Black on the outdoor stage and a meditative performance inside Comfort Station by Cinchel.

Comm to Black

Cinchel

August 15, 2016

Mbongwana Star at Millennium Park

The African band Mbongwana Star got the audience dancing on Aug. 11 at Millennium Park’s Jay Pritzker Pavilion, playing wildly infectious beats and beguiling, highly rhythmic guitar riffs and solos. This group from the Democratic Republic of the Congo includes two singers (Yakala “Coco” Ngambali and Nsituvuidi “Theo” Nzonza,) who were also founding members of the band Staff Benda Bilili (that name means “look beyond appearances”) — paraplegic musicians from the streets of Kinshasa. Last week on the stage at Millennium Park, Ngambali and Nzonza spun around in their wheelchairs, with Nzonza especially exuberant and demonstrative, frequently lifting his arms up with an air of triumph.

The show began with a fine performance by the Chicago-based group Dos Santos Anti-Beat Orquesta, which mixed some psychedelic and Krautrock touches into its Latin rock.

August 14, 2016

LCD Soundsystem at Lollapalooza

One of the main reasons to attend Lollapalooza this year was the reunion of LCD Soundsystem, and the band did not disappoint. It was blast to hear LCD’s greatest hits on the final Sunday night of Lolla (July 31), and the crowd around me was dancing with joy at the end.

See The A.V. Club for a gallery of my Lollapalooza photos. ; and click here for more of my Radiohead photos. Here are some additional photos I took of LCD Soundsystem:

August 3, 2016August 3, 2016

Radiohead at Lollapalooza

As expected, the highlight of this year’s Lollapalooza for me was Radiohead. It was great to see the band again after an absence of several years, and the new songs sounded very strong in concert alongside a career-spanning sample of Radiohead classics. During the song “Identikit,” as Thom Yorke chanted the line, “Broken hearts make it rain,” it actually did start to rain — just a few sprinkles. And as it turned out, that was the only moment during the whole evening when I noticed any rain falling. Although the concert was supposed to end at 10 p.m., Radiohead returned for a surprise second encore, playing two oldies, “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” and “Karma Police.” Interestingly, according to setlist.fm, the band’s written set list showed “Reckoner” as an alternative song to start the second encore, followed by “Silent Night.”

SET LIST:

Burn the Witch / Daydreaming / Ful Stop / 2 + 2 = 5 / Myxomatosis / My Iron Lung / Climbing Up the Walls / No Surprises / Pyramid Song / Bloom / Identikit / The Numbers / The Gloaming / Weird Fishes/Arpeggi / Everything in Its Right Place / Idioteque / There There

FIRST ENCORE: Let Down / Present Tense / Paranoid Android / Nude / Bodysnatchers

SECOND ENCORE: Street Spirit (Fade Out) / Karma Police

See The A.V. Club for a gallery of my Lollapalooza photos. Here are some additional photos I took of Radiohead: