In The Third Coast: When Chicago Built the American Dream, Chicago native Thomas Dyja transports readers to a time in the Windy City’s recent past when artists and innovators flourished. Focusing on the years between

 It makes sense that Sufjan Stevens would have a soft spot for Christmas. After all, the holiday touches on several of the songwriter’s most pervasive motifs: Christianity, childhood nostalgia and Americana. What’s surprising

Only a small number of blues musicians are still alive among those who were raised in Mississippi and moved to Chicago in the 1950s to contribute to the modern, electric blues sound and influence other forms of American ...

 Two founding members of Milwaukee’s late Theatre X, Conrad Bishop and Elizabeth Fuller, recently released Co-Creation: Fifty Years in the Making, a profound memoir based on five decades of cooperating as partners...

 Harlem-folkie-wonder-cum-Chicago-blues-badass Taj Mahal gets the legend treatment as Columbia honors the singer/songwriter/storyteller’s back pages with a hidden treasures/stuff-we-haven’t-made-money...

Wednesday, Sept. 12, is the first Global Female Condom Day. Although the day is meant to be international in scope, it is coordinated by the National Female Condom Coalition, a group of U.S.-based organizations. During my 15 years working...

With the group's third CD, Certain Stars begs the question: Just what is "indie" rock? The Milwaukee/Chicago quartet (which takes its name from a Superchunk song) offers a profusion of...

The seventh annual Milwaukee Comedy Festival opened at Next Act Theatre's space this past weekend. It continues through Aug. 11. The 2012 festival feels a bit more organized than previous festivals, as stand-up, sketch and improv comics, primarily from...

To paraphrase the Exploited, punk's not dead—it's just taking a brief vacation in Milwaukee. The upcoming No Coast Mohawk Fest features more than enough first-generation-inspired punk to satisfy even the most die-hard of fans...

James Pankow is fond of telling the story of the record producer who told him, “Man, if you get rid of the horns, we'll sign your band.” Pankow, one of the founders of and trombonist for Chicago, likened the advice to telling Elton John...