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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE....
Local Music News Column
By Tom Lounges
BEAT-in’ The Street...
Thank you to all who attended the Midwest BEAT Local
Music Awards last
month at the Back Door Lounge in Griffith. This was without a
doubt our best
turn out EVER!
Kudos to the many bands and artists who showed up to
accept their awards,
only a few of those who were voted by our readers as being the top in
their
respected fields were no shows.
Sadly, the lads in Disturbed, who cleaned up in four
categories were
performing in Canada that night and could not attend as they did last
year.
However, their good buddies in No One were on hand to accept on their
behalf.
Hopefully collecting up all of Disturbed’s awards and their
own awards did
not result in hernias for the No One guys. We’d hate to be
responsible for
them missing their first national tour this month! My thanks to
Jen, Heather
and the great staff at the Back Door Lounge for going above and
beyond, and
for braving the seemingly endless stream of bodies that kept coming
through
the doors all night.
Special thanks to Mike Meadows and Jim
Shepard of Lowell Guitar & Sound
for busting a nut running the PA all night, to Taxi for the use of
their PA,
and to the four bands who contributed performances that evening –
Drivin’
Blind, Taxi, Bonfire and Inzane.
It IS an exhausting process. From counting of
ballots, to the production
of the awards (we presented 168 awards this year!), to the planning of
the
food and entertainment... whew! But I can’t wait to do it all
over next year.
What’s Next?
Since we are all still recovering from the Awards night,
the only BEAT
BASH taking place this month is the one April 28 at Stardust Lounge in
Merrillville. Joining us on stage for this event are 24-7, Nast
Devin,
Autumn Dawn and Trauma. We’ll get busy again next month. On May 19,
we will
be at Twilight Zone, who are remodeling a portion of the club. Join us
for
this “unveiling bash” on May 19.
BIG DADDY KINSEY DIES
One of the Calumet Region’s true giants of music has
given us the blues
one last time. Sadly, it is not the kind of blues that he used
to growl out
at us from the stages of Bugsy’s in Highland and Leroy’s Hot Stuff
in
Portage.
As we were on our way to press with this issue, news came
that – Big Daddy
Lester Kinsey – passed away on April 3 after a battle with prostate
cancer.
He was 74.
The Gary-based blues great who first came to prominence
in the blues
community in the early 1950s, went on to perform alongside the likes
of Muddy
Waters and Albert King among others and was an early collaborator with
Lonnie
Brooks.
Kinsey was the patriarch of the world famous Kinsey
Report – Donald,
Kenneth and Ralph Kinsey – who started in the business backing up
Big Daddy
in his live shows and later on his albums.
My deepest condolences to the Kinsey family and the many
Big Daddy Kinsey
fans.
SMILER COOGAN’S CLOSES!
Pound another nail into the coffin of Chicago heavy
metal. Smiler
Coogan’s, which for nine wonderful years has been home to the darker
and
heavier sounds of Chicago’s music scene has been sold. The
club’s new
proprietors have already made it clear that they will not continue to
feature
heavy metal and hard core music.
Smiler Coogan’s now has the distinction of being
added to a long list of
regional venues that were the hub of the Chicagoland music scene –
The
Thirsty Whale, Club Dimensions, Midway Ballroom, The Avalon,
Chances R,
Exit, Jackhammers, Medusa’s and so many others.
Metal will continue to rule the stage there through
the end of this
month. On Monday, April 30th, Sabu and his staff will host a
very special
“Farewell Party.” On that night, there will be free food, no
admission
charge, discounted drinks and giveaways. It will be the last
time for all
the metal heads who came to call Coogan’s home to gather around and
bang
their heads in the hallowed concert hall.
Thanks go out to Smiler Coogan’s owner Sabu and its
publicist/agent Rodney
Pawlak for all the memories and good years!
FINKE’S COMES ALIVE!
After more than a year of pumping up the jams every
Friday night, Finke’s
Entertainment Complex in downtown Highland (8835 Kennedy Ave.) will be
reverberating with a new sound –– that of live music!
DJ-driven dance music will still have a hold on the
former Club
Dimensions, but only on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Beginning this
month, live
music comes to their big stage every Friday and Thursday nights have
been
declared “open stage night.”
“For our Thursdays, we’re emphasizing individual
players,” stressed the
club’s Chris Writt. “We want it to be like the old-fashioned
jam nights.
We want musicians to get on stage with other musicians that they
don’t
normally play with or maybe don’t even know. I don’t want
this to be an
‘audition’ situation where one band after another comes up and
plays a set
of their originals. I want to see real jammers up there. I want
it to be a
night where people never know what or who they might see.”
“One of the things we’ve heard since opening the doors
is for us to focus
more on live local music,” said Writt. “Now we need to see
those people
here to support it.”
WASSUP?
• They just got back from a college tour and from
opening shows with G.
Love & Special Sauce. Catch Zambow (winners of the
Folger’s Coffee
“Unsigned Band of the Year” contest) live at Finke’s April 20.
• Tristen, the 17-year-old South Side singing wonder
that this publication
picked as its “Most Promising Regional Artist of 1999,” is
continuing to
prove us right.
Midwest BEAT was proud to sponsor Tristen and her
original song, “Easy
Jo,” on the new international compilation CD – USA/UK 2001: New
Music –
released this month via Savant International Records.
• NO ONE, whose self-titled debut national release on
Immortal/Virgin
Records has been pushed back from May 22 to mid-June, is hitting the
road
anyway. The South Side quartet comprised of former members of
Loudmouth,
Stoned and Black Talon, will kick off a 20-plus date tour of the
Midwest and
the deep South on April 9 at The Metro.
They are headlining the with Slaves On Dope (fresh from
the Sno-Core Tour)
and a national baby band, Factory 81.
• Fatal Order is celebrating it’s ten year anniversary
on April 21 at J.J.
Kelley’s and are showing a lot of class by giving something
back to the next
generation of rockers.
One dollar from every paid admission ($5) to this
show will be donated to
the VH-1 “Save The Music Foundation,” which helps to keep school
music
programs alive and well in our public schools. Nice touch!
• Two cool Chicago bands are using their talent to
create some good karma.
Clip and the Grammy-nominated Liquid Soul nominated this year in the
“Best
Contemporary Jazz Album” category) are doing three showcase gigs in
May to
benefit The AIDSRide Team. Dates are: May 16 @ Elbo Room, May 29
@ Joe’s and May 30 at Schuba’s. For more info go to: www.clipband.com
or
www.liquidsoul.com
• While on the subject of good things. I want to
pass along the news that
7-year-old cancer patient Mikey Williams, the subject of a benefit
show at
Rodney’s in Highland earlier this year, has been declared by his
doctors as
being in remission.
It’s Mikey’s second time battling cancer and
pinning it to the mat. He’s
a tough cookie. God bless and keep him strong and healthy.
• Congratulations to my good buddy Brian “Hit Mix”
Middleton of B96 and
his beautiful wife Kathy on the birth of their first child, Cory Keith
Middleton. The infant’s grandfather is veteran broadcaster,
Keith Middleton,
of local radio station WCGO in Chicago Heights. No confirmation
to the rumor
that Cory was born with a set of headphones on and a microphone in his
hand.
• Word is that some of the guys from the recently
disbanded Reality Check
are regrouping with some fresh faces and testing the waters at a few
jam
nights. The name being used for these pop-in shows is Blueshouse
EFX. No
other info as of yet.
• John Huber has finally pounded the last nail and
turned the last screw on
his newly renovated recording studio here in the Heartland.
Called, The
Spot, the facility also offers a bed and breakfast for bands.
How cool is
that? It will have a grand opening “tour” on May 19 from
noon to 10 p.m.
There will be food, drinks and jam sessions all day. For more
info, call
(219) 552-0722.
• Chicago’s Heartsfield was right there with the Eagles,
Poco and The
Flying Burrito Brothers, as one of the first bands in America to forge
a
hybrid of country and rock styles.
After disbanding in the early ‘80s, the group reformed just
over a year ago
when St. Louis-based indie, Bedrock Records, reissued their two
Mercury
titles from the early ‘70s and assembled a “new” live album from
old tapes.
Headed up by founding member Perry Jordan, the
revitalized Heartsfield
has just completed mixing its first new studio album, “Rescue The
Dog,” at
ARS Studios in Alsip. Watch for a late spring release via
Bedrock.
• Guitarist Rick Nielsen decided to shave off his
trademark braided beard
on stage during a Cheap Trick concert at the Coronado Theatre in the
band’s
hometown of Rockford. The snipping was a highlight of the
band’s annual fan
gathering – “TrickFest 2001” – and doing the honors were his
son Daxx
Nielsen and Trick’s road manager Carla Dragotti.
• In closing, I extend my deepest personal condolences to my
friend Dennis
DeYoung and his family. Lorraine DeYoung, the proud and supportive
mother of
the former STYX vocalist/songwriter, passed away after a long illness
on
March 23rd. I had the good fortune of meeting Mrs. DeYoung
backstage on two
occasions and would be hard pressed to name a more charming and sweet
lady.
Until next month...support the local
arts!
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