Chicago Best Weekend Bets

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We write stuff. Here’s some of that stuff from the last week that may be applicable to your preferences!

• Am I Gonna Die Alone? A Chat With a Professional Matchmaker
  
• Twins.com is not owned by the Minnesota Twins.
• Robin Thede is our Funny Human of the Week.

Us too!

• The Chicago Reader’s annual Top Chef-style cooking competition the Key Ingredient Cook Off is back. This thing is always a blast.
• Rick Ross brings his Rather You Than Me tour through Chicago with a date at the Chicago Theatre.
• The Chicago Critic’s Film Festival wraps up tonight, with an exclusive screening of the buzzed-about the trippy new film A Ghost Story, as well as Menashe, Mr. Roosevelt, and Lucky.
• North Mississippi Allstars‘ The Prayer For Peace tour stops through Lincoln Hall with support from Alvin Youngblood Heart & Rev Sekou.
• Chicago Craft Beer Week’s kickoff party event Beer Under Glass happens at the Garfield Park Conservatory tonight! Drink a bunch of fancy beers surrounded by beautiful plants.
• The Family Crest and Trevor Sensor play Schubas.
• Jambinai, Imedla Marcos, and Naga play Empty Bottle.
• The Minimalist Podcast brings their celebration of the artfully sparse to a live recording at Thalia Hall tonight.
• Beau Sample and Joel Patterson of the Hideout’s resident folk group Devil in a Woodpile appear live in collaboration with Oscar Wilson.
• Weirdo experience in store for anyone at The Hideout, starring Jenna Roxy and the Church of Modern Love.
• The Logan Theatre’s showing damn Purple Rain late at night tonight. Steamy.
• Midnight Oil and Boytoy play a rock show at The Vic.
• Savory Motel, Elk Walking, and Victor perform music at the Beat Kitchen.

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Monsters of trailblazing first wave indie rock, Meat Puppets and Mike Watt share a double bill tonight at Lincoln Hall!
• Very good standup Nikki Glaser headlines Thalia Hall tonight, with support from ex-Chicagoan Tom Thakkar!
• Big Freedia and Downtown Boys play a strong as hell one-two punch of a show at the Empty Bottle, in celebration of the Empty Bottle’s 25th anniversary.
• Queer variety show SPACE at Hyde Park’s Revival theater is back for another inclusive night of mind-expanding comedy, dance, storytelling, and more!
• Prom night for grown ups, Prom-A-Llama Boom! Boom! 2017 happens at 1st Ward in the back half of Chop Shop in Wicker Park, gives yall the chance to strut your stuff like you’re back in high school but you don’t have to sneak booze in, they’ll just have it!
• Subterranean’s got a show from Vancouver Sleep Clinic, Magicks, and Anti/Beyond.
• Locals Big Sadie celebrates the release of their new album, Keep Me Waiting, tonight at the Hideout, joined by their friend Gia Margaret.
• The Museum of Contemporary Photography’s got a cool looking mixer which allows you to meet and chat with MoCP staff and council members, to hear about what goes on behind the scenes over there. What a nice opportunity.
• Pert Near Sandstone, Dead Horses, and Growler play Schubas!
• It’s very much worth the trip out to Long Grove, IL if it’s for the Long Grove Chocolate Festival, happening all this weekend and starting tonight!
• Folk musician Jodee Lewis headlines the Hideout with an opening set from Escaping Pavement.
• Freelance Wrestling’s back with another indie rasslin’ event at the Berwyn Eagles 2125 out in Berwyn. Check it out if this is your sort of thing!
• Ballyhoo!, The Holdup, and Darenots play Beat Kitchen.
• America’s Got Talent weirdo Tape Face is doing whatever it is that he does at Park West tonight. Magic or something I think? Or juggling?

• Do some daytime stuff:
• The Empty Bottle hosts a Spring Record Label Fair today, featuring vendors from some of the city’s best indie record labels.
• Head to the Hideout this afternoon for the Make X book release party and BBQ, with music, comedy, and live readings happening!
• The Music Box Theatre’s got a pre-noon screening of the animated classic Watership Down.
• The Humboldt Mile 2017 is a charity mile race supporting suicide prevention and mental health education. A mile’s not even that far to run, so you should probably do this!
• Mayfest is the unofficial kickoff to Summer’s street festival season here in Chicago. Music, vendors, deep-fried food.
• Oh boy, the Midwest Anime and Manga Convention, Anime Central, comes to Rosemont this weekend. If you’re interested in this event, you probably already know about it, so I mean, I guess I don’t have to write it up here, but, you know… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

• Then, night stuff:
• Eddie Pepitone is one of the best standup comics going. You have two chances to see him headline The Hideout tonight, with opening sets from various Lincoln Lodge castmembers.
• Incredible 90’s rap group Digable Planets headlines the Metro. These guys are very good live.
• Fans of early Modest Mouse and other downtempo Pacific Northwest indie rock would do well to check out the very excellent Told Slant at Subterranean’s Downstairs space tonight. They’re joined by Hello Shark, Alex Napping, and Anna McClellan.
• The Lincoln Park Zoo’s annual gala ball, Zoo-ologie, is back with the fancy theme of A Midsummer Night’s Roar (like Shakespeare but lions!).
• Oddisee is a super underrated rapper that you should definitely check out at Lincoln Hall, with support from Oliver St. Louis.
• The Chicago Outfit Roller Derby collective has a rad looking home bout happening at the Windy City Fieldhouse.
• Americanaman Justin Townes Earle is at Thalia Hall with guests the Sadies.
• Jim Breuer is a stand up comic and he also has a vanity music project called Jim Breuer and the Loud & Rowdy, and you get to see him do both tonight.
• Miles Mosley + The West Coast Get Down and Swamp Heat appear at Schubas.
• Ha Ha Tonka, Trapper Schoepp, and The Inventors appear at Empty Bottle.
• Want to do a fun run at night in a sort of rave-y environment at Soldier Field tonight? Why not, I guess?
• The Hideout Dance Party’s got a DJ set from jockey collective Sonorama.
• Well-loved singer Norah Jones kicks off a two night run at the Chicago Theatre tonight. Wow!
• Oddball rapper Ugly God headlines the Concord Music Hall. This dude’s popular as hell in certain parts of the internet.
  

• Fake Limbs, Grun Wasser, and The Stranger play a great looking benefit at The Hideout for Support Ho(s)e, a collective of sex workers and their allies.
• The Empty Bottle has a nice fundraising brunch today, Mission Compassion Paw Adoption Brunch, which will feature a handful of adoptable dogs coming by for you to meet and maybe take home??
• Friendship, Advance Base, Donkey Hotel, and Fastness play a nice show at Ballroom Projects this evening.
• The Bridgeport Art Center hosts a Mac & Cheese Smackdown presented by Time Out Chicago. Go eat a bunch of cheesy noodles, yall!
• Night two of Norah Jones at the Chicago Theatre. Aloysius 3 opens!
• Big weekend for aging actors bringing their musical projects through town: Kiefer Sutherland’s playing some country tunes at Thalia Hall for some dang reason. Good on ya, Kiefer.
• The Logan Theater’s showing Hedwig and the Angry Inch at 11pm tonight.
• The Weeks and The Lonely Biscuits play Lincoln Hall.
• Windhand, Satan’s Satyrs, and HAIR play a heavy duty show at the Empty Bottle.
• The Music Box has a special cake tasting/screening of the new film A Quiet Passion for an event called A Quiet Passion (For Cake).
• Hippo Campus and Remo Drive play Metro tonight.
• The 4th Annual Battle of the Breweries Dodgeball Tournament comes to the Goose Island Barrel Warehouse. What a good time this will be!
• Arlie, Even Thieves, Karma Wears White Ties, and Tobacco Bandits are playing at Beat Kitchen.