Illinois news

• An eclectic group of artists salutes mysterious Japanese rock band Les Rallizes Dénudés at Bohemian National Cemetery

  14-06-2023 22:31 via chicagoreader.com
  
  You could call Les Rallizes Dénudés a “cult band’s cult band,” but I suspect that this Japanese group’s subversive energy and mysterious mythos could lure any curious weirdo into their orbit. Led by guitarist and vocalist Takashi Mizutani, the group formed in Kyoto in 1967, and in their early years they mixed the Velvet Underground’s […]
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• Bill Harris, improvising drummer and community platform builder

  14-06-2023 22:28 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Pittsburgh native Bill Harris moved to Chicago in 2011 because he wanted to play improvisational and experimental music. Four years later, the drummer, engineer, and composer launched Amalgam, a record label that also serves as an umbrella for a loose creative collective. He’s released plenty of his own work via Amalgam, including solo recordings, a […]
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• Teaching while trans

  14-06-2023 21:04 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Karen Topham didn’t set out to be a trans trailblazer. She just knew she had to save her life. But when she finally came out as trans 25 years ago this month (on her birthday, no less), she became the first public schoolteacher in the U.S. to transition while still on the job. Topham retired […]
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• ‘The prisoner is me’

  14-06-2023 21:03 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Although her shop is closing its doors, the mark that Faith Phillips and Wish Me Luck Tattoo left on Chicago will always remain.
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• Chicago Reader Volume 52, No. 18

  14-06-2023 20:16 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Chicago Reader Volume 52, Number 18. June 15, 2023
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• NYPD Cop Who Sodomized Black Man With Broomstick Released Early From Prison

  14-06-2023 19:52
  
  Photo: Getty Images
  Justin Volpe, the NYPD officer who brutalized Abner Louima with a broomstick in 1997, has been released early from federal prison.
  According to New York Daily News, Volpe was transferred on Tuesday (June 13) from federal prison in Sandstone, Minnesota to a Residential Reentry Management program, which puts inmates in halfway houses or allows them to return home to finish out their sentences. Volpe’s 30-year sentence was cut short by six years.
  Other details of his relea
  
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• Daydream believers

  14-06-2023 19:49 via chicagoreader.com
  
  The less political Second City tries to be, the more effective they are. At least, that’s the conclusion I’ve come to after seeing last year’s stellar mainstage revue, Do the Right Thing, No Worries If Not, followed by their latest, Don’t Quit Your Daydream. Don’t Quit Your Daydream Open run: Tue-Thu 8 PM, Fri-Sat 7 […]
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• Emotional landmines on the campaign trail

  14-06-2023 19:36 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Obama campaign operatives stationed in East Cleveland at the height of the 2008 presidential run felt like they were at the center of the political world. An idealistic—and existentially lost—Black gay man’s entrance into this volatile world forms the center of Fleetwood-Jourdain Theatre’s production of Aurin Squire’s Obama-ology, which entertainingly depicts what an emotional minefield […]
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• A queer hip-hop history lesson with He Who Walks Three Ways

  14-06-2023 19:30 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In 1991, rapper and promoter Duro Wicks began hosting a weekly hip-hop open mike at Lizard Lounge in Wicker Park. At that point, there hadn’t yet been many recurring hip-hop parties in Chicago. In 1986, DJ and producer Parker Lee Williams, aka P-Lee Fresh, had launched what’s believed to be the first such event at […]
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• Short commutes

  14-06-2023 19:27 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Impostors Theatre Company closes out its season with an anthology of five short plays by local writers, all derived from the prompt of “trolley.” It’s a mixed bag, opening with the delightful Anything From the Trolley? by Toni Flowers-McElrath (directed and choreographed by Anna Roemer), in which the passengers all engage in various dances offering […]
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• Call her Kayla

  14-06-2023 18:22 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Fresh off her success playing Winnie in Samuel Beckett’s daunting, dark one-hander, Happy Days, Chicago actor Kayla Boye is appearing in a lighter role, that of movie icon (and OG tabloid favorite) Elizabeth Taylor in a one-person show, Call Me Elizabeth, written by Boye. The show is being produced at Venus Cabaret Theater June 16-18. […]
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• ‘Did you hear about this?’

  14-06-2023 17:36 via chicagoreader.com
  
  We don’t want to jinx anything, but when it comes to live performance, have the vibes this summer felt a little . . . dare we say . . . better? For a lot of queer comedic writers and performers, the answer is likely a resounding, “God, no,” which would be a fair response to […]
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• Ugli’s Girldick. is a gay summer bop

  14-06-2023 17:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  The dream of the 90s is alive in Ugli. The Philly four-piece’s latest EP, Girldick., throbs with filthy bass lines, fuzzy guitars, and shimmers of distortion that borrow generously from Bleach-era Nirvana and their musical contemporaries. In five quick hits, Ugli take advantage of all the space that rock music can provide for contradiction and […]
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• During Pride month and all year long, the Here to Hear You campaign supports Chicago organizations centering mental health

  14-06-2023 16:45 via chicagoreader.com
  
  You may have heard medical experts and public health figures refer to the ongoing mental health crisis in the United States as “the second pandemic.” Mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia were already commonplace in our complex, fast-paced world before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 triggered a monumental […]
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• Freedom to read

  14-06-2023 16:30 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In July 2020, Amy Dodson posted a diversity statement on the Facebook page for the public library system in Douglas County, Nevada, of which she was director. Like many other statements posted in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, it denounced “all acts of violence, racism, and disregard for human rights,” and also said, “We […]
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• Support Illinois organizations working to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic with your purchase of the Illinois Lottery’s Twisted Treasure ticket

  14-06-2023 16:20 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In recognition of World AIDS Day in 2009, the Illinois Lottery and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) launched a new Instant Ticket to raise funds for the Quality of Life grants, which are distributed to organizations across the state that work in HIV/AIDS prevention education, and treatment. Since its inaugural year, sales from […]
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• Support Chicago organizations working to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic with your purchase of the Illinois Lottery’s Twisted Treasure ticket

  14-06-2023 16:20 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In recognition of World AIDS Day in 2009, the Illinois Lottery and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) launched a new Instant Ticket to raise funds for the Quality of Life grants, which are distributed to organizations across the state that work in HIV/AIDS prevention education, and treatment. Since its inaugural year, sales from […]
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• Meat-and-potatoes rockers Razed by Apes celebrate a classic-sounding debut

  14-06-2023 16:15 via chicagoreader.com
  
  How could Gossip Wolf not love new Chicago trio Razed by Apes? Their lineup includes members of some of this wolf’s favorite knuckleheaded local hard-rock and punk bands—veteran drummer Patrick “Rusty” Gloeckle, for instance, has played in Satan’s Hallow, Midnight Dice, and Hitter, among others. Gloeckle, bassist Casey Moffitt,and guitarist Jared Mileger knock out the […]
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• In Motion: Joel Hall Dancers & Center uplift local artists and promote social change through urban jazz dance

  14-06-2023 16:10 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In 1974, Chicago dancer and choreographer Joel Hall cofounded the Chicago City Theatre Company to amplify the creative talents and stories of some of the city’s most marginalized individuals. A Black, gay man and Cabrini-Green native, Hall’s mission was to carve out a safe space where dancers like himself could pursue concert dance. Today, the […]
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• ‘Without that sketch, maybe nothing, baby!’

  14-06-2023 16:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  An interview with Chicago native Dewayne Perkins, writer and star of the new horror-comedy The Blackening
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• Meet Brian A. Flippin: A 2023 Men of Excellence Honoree

  14-06-2023 16:00
  
  Brian Flippin made good on two promises to his late father a few years ago.
  “Take care of my mom for him. And then put the Flippin name in lights. Make it famous,” he said.
  Flippin and his wife Linda have especially made good on that second promise as the proprietors of Flippin Flavors, a massively popular, made-to-order restaurant in Beverly. 
  However, opening a restaurant was not their original intention. Their enterprise started with a jerk marinade that Linda made. When she
  
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• No grand statements here

  14-06-2023 14:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Vincent van Gogh is to art museums what the Beatles or Jimi Hendrix are to the recording industry—times are tough or run out of ideas? Trot out tried-and-true cash cows and sit counting the receipts. To buttress their case, the Art Institute has filled out their slate of summer blockbusters with another dead-too-soon ringer, Georges […]
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• 3rd Annual Juneteenth Illinois Celebration to Be Held June 16 & 17

  14-06-2023 14:00
  
  The Cook County community is eagerly preparing for a two-day celebration and community recognition event as part of “Juneteenth Illinois.”
  This initiative serves to honor the official June 19th date and commemorate the historic occasion. This year marks the third annual celebration of Juneteenth by the county since its designation as an official holiday in December 2020.
  Leading the efforts this year are Cook County Commissioner Dennis Deer (2nd District) and Barbara Deer, the Execut
  
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• Hyde Park Summerfest celebrates Chicago hip-hop and more with a star-studded bill

  14-06-2023 13:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Over the past decade, Hyde Park Summerfest has transformed a small craft-beer event in a parking lot into one of the most anticipated outings of the summer. Now in its ninth official year, this labor of love by founder Jonathan Swain, creative director Dave Jeff, and recent partner Nosa Ehimwenman (president and CEO of Bowa […]
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• Chicago Worker Finds 3 Severed Heads At His Desk Following Job Complaints

  14-06-2023 05:25
  
  Photo: Getty Images
  A worker at a Chicago company that distributes human body parts for medical research has filed a police report after finding three severed heads at his work desk in what he claims was an act of retaliation from job complaints he lodged.
  According to People, the disembodied heads were discovered by Dale Wheatley, the transportation coordinator for the Anatomical Gift Association of Illinois, on a blue plastic storage tub by his desk.
  “At first I was confused,” Whea
  
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• It’s Tripping Billy’s Greatest Hits at the next Monday Night Foodball

  14-06-2023 01:16 via chicagoreader.com
  
  You could say Billy Zureikat was reborn on the day he fell while walking his dachshund Einstein. For eight years the doctors couldn’t figure out why his legs were losing muscle mass and giving out from under him. Basketball had been a big part of his life, but while the avid shooting guard’s game steadily […]
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• Civil Rights Attorney Arrested While Recording Traffic Stop, Lawyer Says

  14-06-2023 00:40
  
  Photo: LinkedIn
  A Mississippi civil rights lawyer says she was unlawfully arrested by Lexington police officers amid a lawsuit she filed against the department that alleges false arrests, excessive force, and intimidation.
  Jill Collen Jefferson, president of JULIAN, a civil rights organization that filed a federal lawsuit last year against the Lexington Police Department on behalf of the city’s residents, was arrested on Saturday (June 10) after recording officers during a traffic stop, ac
  
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• State Rep. Lilly Named Assistant Majority Leader in House Democratic Caucus

  14-06-2023 00:26
  
  State Rep. Camille Y. Lilly, a Democrat from Chicago, has been appointed as an assistant majority leader in the House Democratic Caucus. The nomination is in recognition of her extensive experience and effective leadership in addressing family-related matters, particularly in health and human services.
  “It is a privilege to have the opportunity to serve in a leadership role in the Illinois General Assembly,” Lilly said. “I truly appreciate the support from Speaker Welch, the Il
  
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