RECOMMENDED

The 1990s and early 2000s, especially, were a crucial time for Victor Villarreal. After successful runs with punk pioneers Cap’n Jazz and Owls, among others, he disappeared from the scene he helped establish to focus on other, non-musical endeavors. His seven-plus-year absence ended in the summer of 2009 when the Chicago guitarist resurfaced in DeKalb, a small college town an hour and a half westward, with a handful of strings and headful of new solo material—his first ever to feature his own vocals. Villarreal played a couple of shows to support “Alive,” his debut album, before reuniting with his old bandmates a year later to tour with Cap’n Jazz. The months thereafter were quiet for him, and aside from an odd release here and there and a number of appearances supporting fellow Chicago outfit Joan of Arc on guitar, nobody really knew what Villarreal had been up to. Read the rest of this entry »

RECOMMENDED

Following the successful reunion last year of Chicago’s seminal nineties emo band, Cap’n Jazz, it seemed only a matter of time before the city’s other genre stalwart, Braid, would also announce their return. Bob Nanna and co. return to the Metro (where their initial departing shows occurred way back in 1999) with the hope to recapture the energy of their brand of post-hardcore that became so influential long after their breakup. Read the rest of this entry »

Monument

By Leor Galil

There’s a pre-concert ritual many gig-goers may be familiar with: gawking at band merchandise. Usually, there’s a flashy T-shirt or a tour-only vinyl that will whet some music fan’s appetite.

Yet, the most interesting item Nick Wakim’s band, Castevet, had to offer at a house show in Logan Square in early August couldn’t be bought. It was a photo of the Chicago quartet’s latest album, “The Echo & The Light,” on display at a record store. In Japan.

“We’re kind of a big deal in Japan,” Wakim said, jokingly, as he showed some of the other musicians on the night’s bill the photo on his iPhone 4. “No big deal.”

Joking aside, Castevet’s success is a big deal. For a band that plays basement shows as often as Castevet, the opportunity to release an album on a foreign label like Japan’s Stiff Slack Records doesn’t happen every day. Castevet is doing something big. And that big thing is emo.

Emo, or emotional hardcore, has gone through a lot of changes since it became a vital sound in the Washington, D.C., post-hardcore scene in the mid-eighties. Its most recent iteration saw a marriage of pop-punk melodies and emo lyrical introspection boost bands like Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance to the No. 1 and 2 spots on the Billboard charts, respectively. Emo experienced a wave of backlash along with its success, be it in the form of the British tabloids that called emo a cult, or other bands that saw the genre as flaccid and one-note.

Read the rest of this entry »

Growing up listening to music, it’s easy to overlook the fact that band members are growing up too. As the years go by, you dust off stacks of albums, listening to them nostalgically, albums like “Analphabetapolothology,” the retrospective collected works of Chicago’s teenage emo forerunners Cap’n Jazz. Guess what: you aren’t the only one interested in playing these songs again.

“I’m not sure who brought it up first,” drummer Mike Kinsella says about the idea of reuniting—their last performance was back in 1995. In the interim, each band member has gone on to be in seminal outfits such as the Promise Ring or Joan of Arc. These days are a bit different from their teenage years. “Instead of being like, ‘We’re going to jump in the van with one change of clothes and play basements around the country’, it’s now like, ‘Well I can only be gone for a few days at a time because I can’t get a full-time babysitter’,” says Kinsella. Read the rest of this entry »

By Tom Lynch

Everybody knows somebody who knows somebody in the Wilmette-born emo-pop band, as the four-piece was so immersed in the various “scenes” of Chicago and its suburbs before it got famous and its mouthpiece married one of the Simpsons. When Newcity did this cover story on FOB back in May of 2005, I met Pete Wentz at the Pick Me Up Cafe in Lakeview; he seemed as normal as can be, humble even. We talked about the newest “Star Wars” and how fans—teenagers—sometimes recognized him at places like movie theaters. He came off as genuinely mystified by his band’s growing popularity, and grateful to the dedicated fans. Just an excited kid.

Who’s to say if Wentz’s personality changed once he became rich and famous; the band’s music didn’t—not really, anyway—but as it turns out, according to a blog post by Wentz himself that went live yesterday, FOB may be no more. Or Wentz might be out of the band. Or something. 

Read Wentz’s address to his fans after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

RECOMMENDED

Those who say Weezer’s 1996 record “Pinkerton” laid the groundwork for what emo was to become don’t give enough credit to Sunny Day Real Estate’s 1994 Sub Pop debut, “Diary”—the most perfectly titled record of the genre—which truly set in motion the spinning wheel of eyeliner and tear-soaked sleeves.  What’s easily forgettable now is that back in the mid-nineties, “emo” wasn’t quite the derogatory term yet, and “Diary,” being the classic record that it is, still holds up as an accomplished rock record, with deep and meaty distorted guitars ravaging their way through a tornado led by Jeremy Enigk’s youthful, genuine vocals. (Both the debut and the band’s “LP2″ have been re-released with bonus tracks.) The band tours now with its original lineup—Sunny Day first broke up in the middle of recording its second record—which will help remind everyone that this band essentially started a genre on an impossibly high note. That it’s been all downhill from there is hardly Sunny Day Real Estate’s fault. (Tom Lynch)

Sunny Day Real Estate plays September 24 at Metro, 3730 N. Clark, (773)549-0203, at 8pm. $27.

RECOMMENDED

Mike Kinsella, under the Owen moniker, has released a handful of records, some quite impressive, some shrug-inducing, all possessing their share of cringe-worthy moments as Kinsella offers his whispery emo one-liners. “No Good for No One Now,” from 2002, still stands as Owen’s best, and even 2006′s “At Home with Owen” had its moments of grace and invention. Kinsella’s new record, the bluntly titled “New Leaves,” doesn’t feature the songwriter taking any great strides in musical direction but, as with his previous releases, his phenomenal guitar-playing keeps the record afloat, the intricate and precise guitar pieces blending together seamlessly and beautifully. “New Leaves” is a very, very pretty record, as Kinsella, like much of his work with Owen, bases the musical pieces in acoustic guitars and sweet, sweeping melodies. “These old bones don’t feel so old when I’m home with you,” Kinsella sings on “Never Been Born,” and his on-the-nose romantics come off more genuine than you might think. Tonight, Owen performs as a full band, and gets opening-act help from Bob Nanna (Braid, Hey Mercedes) for the early show and Davey Von Bohlen (The Promise Ring, Maritime) for the late show. It’s an old-school emo kid’s dream! (Tom Lynch)

September 18 at Beat Kitchen, 2100 W. Belmont, (773)281-4444, at 7:30pm & 10:30pm.

By Tom Lynch

We’ve entered a strange and unpredictable time for independent music labels, and though that could really be said for any time in the history of rock music, it feels more immediate now with the morphing of the music industry into a digital behemoth and the whole economy-in-the-toilet thing. Local label Touch and Go’s recent announcement of consolidation was a swift kick in the chops for those in the business and those who are simply fans, a consequence that in many ways finally made the current crisis a reality for plenty outside the sphere. Things are changing, business models are shifting, and what’s here today could just as easily be gone by later today.

When a new compilation CD of local acts arrives on your desk with a press release that informs you it’s from AEMMP records, the student-run label out of Columbia College, a few questions arise. What are these students trying to accomplish with a twenty-one song, in some ways old-school, comp? In these tumultuous times, what can the instructors and supervisors imbue in their students other than that when they graduate college, they’re entering the worst job market in a generation, and a music industry that’s become less and less dependent on label representation? Threatened by full economic collapse and the implications that would have on the music industry and the arts world at large, what do these kids expect from any of this? Read the rest of this entry »

RECOMMENDED

Local five-piece outfit Yourself and the Air breezes through its new EP “Friends of All Breeds” with significant indie-rock swagger. (An incessant xylophone on one track works much better than you would expect.) The pop element and use of multiple voices reminds me of Bound Stems’ work, as does the somewhat advanced structures put to use. “Friends of All Breeds” serves as evidence that there’s more original material to be made by this band, but as first steps go, the record is rather impressive. The dual guitarwork, intricate, clean for the most part, has the most lasting impact. (Tom Lynch)

April 3 at Subterranean, 2011 W. North, (773)278-6600, 9:30pm. $7-$10.

Although widely considered the greatest musical genius who ever lived, Johann Sebastian Bach never wrote for the modern symphony orchestra nor the piano, because neither existed back when he was composing.  But this doesn’t stop pianists and modern orchestras from performing his music, although in the case of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Bach was principally heard in overblown Romantic orchestral transcriptions for the early decades of its existence.  I can still remember CSO conductors routinely performing Bach harpsichord concertos as if they were piano concertos, complete with a pianist.  James Levine was a pioneer here in the early 1970s, presenting all six of the Bach “Brandenburg” Concertos at Ravinia with a small chamber orchestra as Bach scored them, with himself playing the harpsichord.  Sir Georg Solti was a Bach lover and recorded the “St. Matthew Passion” and the “b minor Mass” and even a set of “Brandenburg” Concertos that were never finished nor released, which the orchestra used to fondly refer to as the “Abandonburg” Concertos.  A number of early music specialists have been brought in to conduct Bach and other early music composers with varying success, but it was always a struggle to get the strings to eliminate the wide vibrato that is a performing staple for so much of the nineteenth-century music that is the orchestra’s central repertoire and which end up slowing down the brisk tempos needed for effective  performances of eighteenth-century music.  One solution is to hire conductors who will gladly perform Bach with a small chamber orchestra and harpsichord, but without alternating the orchestra’s playing style and while still keeping the tempos slow.  Read the rest of this entry »