What’s New

The biggest news in Chicago Blackhawks land is actually not the best news. They put Nicolas Beaudin on waivers which means that another terrible Stan Bowman trade is rearing its ugly head. However, onward and upward as the team clearly has a plan for the future.

It seems as if their plan is to be as bad as possible so that they can have a chance at winning the Draft Lottery in 2023. That would mean that generational skater Connor Bedard will be coming to town as the number one overall pick.

Tanking doesn’t guarantee anything but there are some other consolation prizes in the top five that would certainly help as well.

Having Arvid Soderblom go to the AHL in favor of Petr Mrazek and Alex Stalock is proof that they want to be as bad as possible for this reason. Soderblom is a very good young goalie that is better off playing in the AHL this year. There is no reason to keep him up on this disaster of a team.

In the same set of Monday transactions, the Hawks also sent Kevin Korchinski and Samuel Savoie to their respective junior teams. There is no reason for those guys to hurt their development playing for this bad team all year long.

The Chicago Blackhawks made a few big roster moves on Tuesday.

Going there, playing in the World Juniors, and feeling good about their games is the most important thing. We will certainly see them in 2023-24.

The Hawks weren’t done making surprising moves this week. On Tuesday, they made a bunch of transactions in addition to the Beaudin news. A few of their young players have been sent to the AHL so they can get ready to start the season with the Rockford Ice Hogs.

Cole Guttman, Lukas Reichel, Michal Teply, Josiah Slavin, and Isaak Phillips have all been assigned to the Hogs. David Gust and Kale Howarth were released from their PTOs and sent to Rockford as well.

The only player there that might come as a surprise to some folks is Reichel. He is the organization’s top prospect right now and a player that they hope to become a star. He is easily one of their best nine forwards but there is no point to play him in the NHL to start.

He will certainly get his NHL moments in 2022-23 but it is much better for him to run the offense in Rockford ad continues developing. This Blackhawks team is going to be very bad so there is no point in having him skate on their third or fourth line.

As the team gets better by adding more young talent, the hope is that Reichel is right there with them all. Dominating this season in the AHL will do him so many favors in terms of his future.

With the first game of the season just over a week away, the team is down to 20 forwards, 12 defensemen, and three goalies. It should be interesting to see what the final roster looks like by the time the puck drops for real.

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It starts with the hips—that’s the first thing you’ll notice when you watch Divino Niño play live. The Chicago-based five-piece can’t seem to stand still onstage. First their swaggering hips get loose, then their long arms flail, and soon the musicians are completely unbound, the picture of freedom. To watch Divino Niño is to experience that freedom yourself: to move your body not because you came out ready to dance to anything, but because the group’s pulsing, hypnotic music reminded you how good it could feel. 

The band’s 2019 debut album, Foam, is ethereal and psychedelic, gliding seamlessly through beach rock, dream pop, and indie rock, its pastiche held together by the mellow, breathy vocals of guitarist-singer Camilo Medina and bassist-singer Javier Forero. When Medina, Forero, guitarist Guillermo Rodriguez, and drummer Pierce Codina toured to support Foam in 2019—adding keyboardist Justin “JV” Vittori for the road—they danced through set after set. They were surprised when audiences didn’t do the same. So when Divino Niño set out to make their next album, the new Last Spa on Earth, they were determined to try something different. 

They both moved to Chicago for college, where Medina met Rodriguez at the School of the Art Institute. In the early 2010s, when Divino Niño began to play shows around Chicago, they felt their sound wasn’t full enough—instead of a drummer, they’d been relying on electronic percussion loops. In 2014 they invited Codina into the group to help carry the delicious arrangements they’re now known for. When Vittori toured as a support player with Divino Niño in 2019, he liked it enough to become a full-fledged member the following year.

Watching Divino Niño perform or even just sitting with them as a group, you can pick up on the special chemistry among the musicians. You’ll frequently see them share knowing grins from across the stage or even a hug between songs. The band members clearly know that together they’re greater than the sum of their parts. 

“Lately, I feel like another door has opened up to Chicago’s music scene,” Forero says. “There’s a crazy house scene, there’s a techno scene. I think the city is very colorful in that perspective—you just got to know where to look.”  

Last Spa on Earth feels more personal than Divino Niño’s previous music: its themes include embracing loneliness, seeking catharsis after a period of desolation, and releasing guilt from a strict religious upbringing. While writing Last Spa on Earth, Divino Niño became fascinated with neoperreo, a wild subgenre of reggaeton pioneered in many cases by women. Though the scene’s epicenter is online rather than in a particular city or region, major figures are based in Mexico, Chile, Spain, and elsewhere. Divino Niño took inspiration from the likes of Ms Nina, Bad Gyal, and Argentinian group Ca7riel y Paco Amoroso, and the band got excited to put their own twist on the sound—which included writing more lyrics in Spanish. 

When he was developing material for Foam, Forero didn’t feel confident using his native language. “I think at the time, for me, I didn’t think that Spanish could be cool when you’re singing,” he reflects. “I hadn’t found my voice. These people opened up a door of, ‘Actually, you can do it like this, and it’ll be really sick.’ That freed me up a lot.” The lyrics are almost all in Spanish throughout Last Spa on Earth.

“We played at this festival in Wisconsin, and it was at a farm, but yo, it was kind of like a party,” Medina says. “We lit that shit on fire. During the pandemic, I just accumulated too much pent-up energy, because I’m a social person. And then I went dancing once and I was like, whoa! I get the feeling that a lot of people are probably feeling like me, like they need to live a little bit. There’s too much darkness in the world, and I think we’re all looking for a release.”

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Never miss a copy! Paid print subscriptions are available for 12 issues, 26 issues, and for 52 issues from the Reader Store.

Chicago Reader 2022 print issue dates

The Chicago Reader is published in print every other week. Issues are dated Thursday. Distribution usually happens Wednesday morning through Thursday night of the issue date. Upcoming print issue dates through December 2022 are:

10/13/202210/27/202211/10/202211/24/202212/8/202212/22/2022

Download the full 2022 editorial calendar is here (PDF).

See our information page for advertising opportunities.

2023 print issue dates

The first print issue in 2023 will be published three weeks after the 12/22/2022 issue, the final issue of 2022. The print issue dates through June 2023 are:

1/12/20231/26/20232/9/20232/23/20233/9/20233/23/20234/6/20234/20/20235/4/20235/18/20236/1/20236/15/20236/29/2023

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Over the past two and a half years, I’ve assembled a lot of lists for Bandcamp Friday. I like sharing music that’s unfamiliar to people, and the occasion of a Bandcamp Friday—a 24-hour period when the platform passes along its usual cut of sales revenue to the artists and labels who made it a success—seems to encourage fans to take chances on albums or artists that are new to them. 

Bandcamp Friday is also a good excuse to share Reader stories about music available on Bandcamp. The following list of releases links to stories we’ve published since our previous roundup—just click on each title. If you want more Bandcamp-adjacent Reader music coverage, you can start with August’s roundup and follow the trail of links backward. Several of the following albums and songs are by acts at the World Music Festival, which runs through Sunday, October 9. The Reader has put together a comprehensive guide to this year’s fest, which you should definitely spend some time with too.

The Ableist, Staircase Wit

Paolo Angeli, Rade

Angry Blackmen, Reality!

The Arab Blues, The Arab Blues

Beats y Bateria, “Carolina”

Dorothy Carlos, Circuit Spectre

Cha Wa, My People

​​La Chica, La Loba

Justin Demus, Rapture

Discussing the Sun, Feel It All

Ana Everling & David Onderdonk, The Music of Guinga

The Final Solution, Brotherman soundtrack

Fire-Toolz, I Will Not Use the Body’s Eyes Today.

Annie Fish, Weird Like Me

Floatie, Voyage Out

Fran, “So Long”

Gabacho, “Sal de Mar”

Ganser, Nothing You Do Matters

Héctor Guerra, Perreo Cósmico

Holy Western Parallels, Holy Western Parallels

Kaleta & Super Yamba Band, Mèdaho

Sofia Kourtesis featuring Manu Chao, “Estación Esperanza” 

Magma, Kãrtëhl

Kali Malone, The Sacrificial Code

Medicine Singers, Medicine Singers

Midwestlust, split with Sarin

Nicole Mitchell & Fabio Paolizzo, Medusae

Nora Marks, The Buzzing of Flies

​​Occidental Brothers Dance Band International, Odo Sanbra

Juan Pastor Chinchano, El Regreso

Petbrick, Liminal

Praise, All in a Dream

Qwanqwa, Qwanqwa Volume 3

Rosaries, Anomie

Seffarine, De Fez a Jerez

Soft and Dumb, Soft and Dumb

Son Rompe Pera, Batuco

Sonnenzimmer & Coupler, Cat Pose

Soso, The Downs

Sudan Archives, Natural Brown Prom Queen

Tar, Tar Box

Urine Hell, Weakling

David Virelles, Nuna

Warforged, The Grove/Sundial

Yola, Stand for Myself

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The Chicago Blackhawks are going to be a bad team in 2022-23. When that is the case this year, it is going to catch nobody by surprise. There might be some folks that don’t follow hockey that much that are taken back by it but those paying attention know what is coming.

It is possible that this is the worst team in the league. They will for sure be amongst the worst in the league competing for the 2023 NHL Draft Lottery. Although that is the case, it is obvious that some mistakes made by the former regime are hindering their ability to feel even better about the future.

On Tuesday, amongst many other moves, the Blackhawks put Nicolas Beaudin on waivers. That is a horrible thing for the franchise for a variety of reasons. It should make people very upset with Stan Bowman as this is another terrible trade that he made blowing up in their faces.

Beaudin was the first-round pick used by the Hawks that they received in the trade that sent Ryan Hartman to the Nashville Predators. Now, Hartman is a 30-goal scoring center for the Minnesota Wild while the Hawks are trying to give Beaudin away for free.

The Chicago Blackhawks are still seeing bad Stan Bowman trades affect them.

It is a shame to see this happen to this young man. It isn’t his fault that the team did him no favors when it comes to his development and it isn’t his fault that Stan messed up this trade so badly. Hopefully, he gets claimed by a good organization and gets his career turned around.

Between Artemi Panarin, Teuvo Teravainen, and Phillip Danault amongst others, Bowman has made some terrible trades. He has been gone for just under a year but he wasn’t even fired for hockey-related reasons.

It was really a disaster of a run for him as the GM of this team but it is time for them to move forward. Kyle Davidson seems to have a plan and that involves building this team the right way. It is just annoying that these bad trades keep rearing their ugly head. We can only hope that the new regime learns from this going forward.

Read More

Never miss a copy! Paid print subscriptions are available for 12 issues, 26 issues, and for 52 issues from the Reader Store.

Chicago Reader 2022 print issue dates

The Chicago Reader is published in print every other week. Issues are dated Thursday. Distribution usually happens Wednesday morning through Thursday night of the issue date. Upcoming print issue dates through December 2022 are:

10/13/202210/27/202211/10/202211/24/202212/8/202212/22/2022

Download the full 2022 editorial calendar is here (PDF).

See our information page for advertising opportunities.

2023 print issue dates

The first print issue in 2023 will be published three weeks after the 12/22/2022 issue, the final issue of 2022. The print issue dates through June 2023 are:

1/12/20231/26/20232/9/20232/23/20233/9/20233/23/20234/6/20234/20/20235/4/20235/18/20236/1/20236/15/20236/29/2023

Read More

Over the past two and a half years, I’ve assembled a lot of lists for Bandcamp Friday. I like sharing music that’s unfamiliar to people, and the occasion of a Bandcamp Friday—a 24-hour period when the platform passes along its usual cut of sales revenue to the artists and labels who made it a success—seems to encourage fans to take chances on albums or artists that are new to them. 

Bandcamp Friday is also a good excuse to share Reader stories about music available on Bandcamp. The following list of releases links to stories we’ve published since our previous roundup—just click on each title. If you want more Bandcamp-adjacent Reader music coverage, you can start with August’s roundup and follow the trail of links backward. Several of the following albums and songs are by acts at the World Music Festival, which runs through Sunday, October 9. The Reader has put together a comprehensive guide to this year’s fest, which you should definitely spend some time with too.

The Ableist, Staircase Wit

Paolo Angeli, Rade

Angry Blackmen, Reality!

The Arab Blues, The Arab Blues

Beats y Bateria, “Carolina”

Dorothy Carlos, Circuit Spectre

Cha Wa, My People

​​La Chica, La Loba

Justin Demus, Rapture

Discussing the Sun, Feel It All

Ana Everling & David Onderdonk, The Music of Guinga

The Final Solution, Brotherman soundtrack

Fire-Toolz, I Will Not Use the Body’s Eyes Today.

Annie Fish, Weird Like Me

Floatie, Voyage Out

Fran, “So Long”

Gabacho, “Sal de Mar”

Ganser, Nothing You Do Matters

Héctor Guerra, Perreo Cósmico

Holy Western Parallels, Holy Western Parallels

Kaleta & Super Yamba Band, Mèdaho

Sofia Kourtesis featuring Manu Chao, “Estación Esperanza” 

Magma, Kãrtëhl

Kali Malone, The Sacrificial Code

Medicine Singers, Medicine Singers

Midwestlust, split with Sarin

Nicole Mitchell & Fabio Paolizzo, Medusae

Nora Marks, The Buzzing of Flies

​​Occidental Brothers Dance Band International, Odo Sanbra

Juan Pastor Chinchano, El Regreso

Petbrick, Liminal

Praise, All in a Dream

Qwanqwa, Qwanqwa Volume 3

Rosaries, Anomie

Seffarine, De Fez a Jerez

Soft and Dumb, Soft and Dumb

Son Rompe Pera, Batuco

Sonnenzimmer & Coupler, Cat Pose

Soso, The Downs

Sudan Archives, Natural Brown Prom Queen

Tar, Tar Box

Urine Hell, Weakling

David Virelles, Nuna

Warforged, The Grove/Sundial

Yola, Stand for Myself

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Most people are lucky to have one act that hits. William Horberg is well into his third. Horberg was born in Chicago and grew up around Belmont and Broadway in the Lakeview neighborhood in the 60s and 70s. He ran a repertory movie theater called the Sandburg at the corner of Division and Dearborn from 1979 to 1981, then moved out to Hollywood. He went on to a storied career producing films like A Rage in Harlem, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Milk, as well as TV shows like The Queen’s Gambit. Now he has turned to drawing as a way to explore the places of his childhood that left an indelible mark on him, to fix them in a lasting way as memories fade and bulldozers bury a past that informed everything he was to become.

There’s something about drawing—no matter the artist’s skill level—that can communicate people and places more intimately than any photograph. Evidence of human touch brings an intimacy no machine could ever replicate. When I look at Horberg’s pen-and-marker depictions of the landmarks of his childhood, I feel my way through those streets palpably in ways a frozen black-and-white print can never approach. It doesn’t hurt that I know many of these places from firsthand experience, but Horberg’s versions are from decades before I got to Chicago; some from before I was born. Yet I feel links to those bygone days in these vibrant and likable pictures.

Memory plays a starring role. Decades removed from his subject matter, Horberg has used family photos and period snapshots to get the details of the architecture right. There are certain things that are impossible to render without visual source material, whether perceptual or photographic—you just can’t make them up. The particularity of a cornice or how a street sign might have a typo or some other unique irregularity—these are aspects that make Horberg’s drawings distinctive. And yet, as a longtime Chicago resident, I can see the armature or skeleton of the city I know behind these long gone facades. No matter how many of these buildings have been demolished or how many businesses have succeeded ones that failed, something of the spirit of these blocks remains right where it’s always been.

Horberg’s depictions of neighborhoods like Old Town may not look instantly familiar to younger residents but they’ll surely recognize something like Crate & Barrel, which began as a small storefront on Wells Street before ballooning into a home furnishings brand. His drawing of Kroch’s & Brentano’s bookstore on Wabash in the Loop instantly took me back to the early 90s when I was a student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Coincidentally, the caption accompanying this drawing recounts a childhood incident of getting busted shoplifting with his friends. I had a run-in with a Kroch’s store detective myself a couple decades after Horberg. When I recount this to him via email, he’s happy to hear I was continuing his traditions.

“My Old Town: Growing Up in Chicago 1959-1986”Through 10/22: Tue-Fri 10 AM-6 PM, Sat 10 AM-5 PM, Sun by appointment, Firecat Projects, 2019 N. Damen, 207-249-9486, firecatprojects.org

Nostalgia for the people and places of childhood is a side effect of aging. The further we are from formative early locales and friendships in our lives, the more it feels like they’re gone forever—and that whatever has taken their place is lesser or lacking. Had Horberg not left town in 1987 his depictions of Chicago would undoubtedly be very different. Revisiting geography through the mind’s eye is almost the opposite of walking the same streets for decades on end and noticing incremental changes. I don’t mean this as a criticism of Horberg’s project but to note the specific slant of his approach. He names his exhibit “My Old Town.” It is a place preserved in amber.

This series was largely completed during the plague lockdown, a time when many artists looked inward by necessity and circumstance. If you can’t go outside you must find subject matter elsewhere. One’s past can be a deep well to draw from but holds its share of pitfalls and false paths. Fortunately for Horberg and for us, his looking back has produced images that teem with life even as they mourn what’s gone.

Horberg’s We Deliver depicts Lakeview’s historic Hotel Belmont residential building on a winter day. Credit: Courtesy the artist

When I first looked through this body of work I was reminded of the drawings of the late Wesley Willis. Horberg also relies on rulered perspectival lines to depict urban vistas and a colorful marker palette. Unlike a Willis, a typical Horberg drawing features at least one person, often a close friend or loved one. These images are as much a tribute to those who have come and gone as the burger stands and movie theaters that formed Horberg’s identity. 

By rooting his compositions in recognizable blocks of our city, the artist allows any viewer who’s logged time in Chicago to feel a connection. Whether he’s depicting the Hotel Belmont, the Bahá’í Temple, the Jazz Record Mart, or just a humble row of brick apartment buildings, Horberg’s Chicago is our Chicago as well. It’s a place where past and present are in a constant state of flux, a lively, often fraught state of constant renegotiation and debate. I know it better from looking at these drawings. 

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Most people are lucky to have one act that hits. William Horberg is well into his third. Horberg was born in Chicago and grew up around Belmont and Broadway in the Lakeview neighborhood in the 60s and 70s. He ran a repertory movie theater called the Sandburg at the corner of Division and Dearborn from 1979 to 1981, then moved out to Hollywood. He went on to a storied career producing films like A Rage in Harlem, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Milk, as well as TV shows like The Queen’s Gambit. Now he has turned to drawing as a way to explore the places of his childhood that left an indelible mark on him, to fix them in a lasting way as memories fade and bulldozers bury a past that informed everything he was to become.

There’s something about drawing—no matter the artist’s skill level—that can communicate people and places more intimately than any photograph. Evidence of human touch brings an intimacy no machine could ever replicate. When I look at Horberg’s pen-and-marker depictions of the landmarks of his childhood, I feel my way through those streets palpably in ways a frozen black-and-white print can never approach. It doesn’t hurt that I know many of these places from firsthand experience, but Horberg’s versions are from decades before I got to Chicago; some from before I was born. Yet I feel links to those bygone days in these vibrant and likable pictures.

Memory plays a starring role. Decades removed from his subject matter, Horberg has used family photos and period snapshots to get the details of the architecture right. There are certain things that are impossible to render without visual source material, whether perceptual or photographic—you just can’t make them up. The particularity of a cornice or how a street sign might have a typo or some other unique irregularity—these are aspects that make Horberg’s drawings distinctive. And yet, as a longtime Chicago resident, I can see the armature or skeleton of the city I know behind these long gone facades. No matter how many of these buildings have been demolished or how many businesses have succeeded ones that failed, something of the spirit of these blocks remains right where it’s always been.

Horberg’s depictions of neighborhoods like Old Town may not look instantly familiar to younger residents but they’ll surely recognize something like Crate & Barrel, which began as a small storefront on Wells Street before ballooning into a home furnishings brand. His drawing of Kroch’s & Brentano’s bookstore on Wabash in the Loop instantly took me back to the early 90s when I was a student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Coincidentally, the caption accompanying this drawing recounts a childhood incident of getting busted shoplifting with his friends. I had a run-in with a Kroch’s store detective myself a couple decades after Horberg. When I recount this to him via email, he’s happy to hear I was continuing his traditions.

“My Old Town: Growing Up in Chicago 1959-1986”Through 10/22: Tue-Fri 10 AM-6 PM, Sat 10 AM-5 PM, Sun by appointment, Firecat Projects, 2019 N. Damen, 207-249-9486, firecatprojects.org

Nostalgia for the people and places of childhood is a side effect of aging. The further we are from formative early locales and friendships in our lives, the more it feels like they’re gone forever—and that whatever has taken their place is lesser or lacking. Had Horberg not left town in 1987 his depictions of Chicago would undoubtedly be very different. Revisiting geography through the mind’s eye is almost the opposite of walking the same streets for decades on end and noticing incremental changes. I don’t mean this as a criticism of Horberg’s project but to note the specific slant of his approach. He names his exhibit “My Old Town.” It is a place preserved in amber.

This series was largely completed during the plague lockdown, a time when many artists looked inward by necessity and circumstance. If you can’t go outside you must find subject matter elsewhere. One’s past can be a deep well to draw from but holds its share of pitfalls and false paths. Fortunately for Horberg and for us, his looking back has produced images that teem with life even as they mourn what’s gone.

Horberg’s We Deliver depicts Lakeview’s historic Hotel Belmont residential building on a winter day. Credit: Courtesy the artist

When I first looked through this body of work I was reminded of the drawings of the late Wesley Willis. Horberg also relies on rulered perspectival lines to depict urban vistas and a colorful marker palette. Unlike a Willis, a typical Horberg drawing features at least one person, often a close friend or loved one. These images are as much a tribute to those who have come and gone as the burger stands and movie theaters that formed Horberg’s identity. 

By rooting his compositions in recognizable blocks of our city, the artist allows any viewer who’s logged time in Chicago to feel a connection. Whether he’s depicting the Hotel Belmont, the Bahá’í Temple, the Jazz Record Mart, or just a humble row of brick apartment buildings, Horberg’s Chicago is our Chicago as well. It’s a place where past and present are in a constant state of flux, a lively, often fraught state of constant renegotiation and debate. I know it better from looking at these drawings. 

Read More