Chicago Best Weekend Bets

Kendrick Lamar is in Chicago this weekend. He just performed with the National Symphony Orchestra. Not a lot of popular musicians do that.

Also, tell all your friends to subscribe to the Chicago mailing list. We gave away tickets to Riot Fest and Lollapalooza to Chicago mailing list subscribers.

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

• Have your best October yet. Consult our YOUR BEST OCTOBER feature.
• Judah Friedlander told us about the worst gig he’s ever done.
• Issa Rae is our Funny Human of the Week.
• Larry David’s Bernie Sanders impression is eh. James Adomian’s Bernie Sanders is great.

• Local comedian Tim Barnes’ storytelling/interview podcast It’s All True records a live episode tonight at the Theatre at 1917 N. Elston, with special guests Tim Kinsella, ShowYouSuck, and more!
• Kurt Vile’s great and has put out like eight great records. He plays with Waxahatchee tonight, who is also really good, at Thalia Hall. Good show! Real good!
• Long-running Chicago-based math-pop-folk band Maps and Atlases play Beat Kitchen with guests Oshwa and Luggage tonight at the Beat Kitchen in celebration of the venue’s 25th anniversary.
• Park West hosts a screening of Warren Miller’s Chasing Shadows, which is, amazingly, his 66th snowsports film. Watch folks rocket off of cliffs, slide down mountains, and do other crazy snow stuff from the comfort and relative safety of a mid-sized venue.
• Youngblood Brass Band incorporates New Orleans brass, hip hop, and punk influences into a really cool, unique sound, you should go see them at 1st Ward tonight.
• Scott Nelson is one of the best improvisors in the city, you can catch him doing an improvised one man show as his alter ego S. Charles Nelson tonight at iO! It’ll be really good, I promise.
• The Tequila Tales is sort of like a town hall style storytelling/salon sort of deal. A head panelist guy poses a question or topic, and then opens up the floor to the audience for discussion. Sounds petty cool! It happens at The Pomontory in Hyde Park tonight.
• The Blackhawks play the Florida Panthers tonight at the United Center. Maybe you’re going? Maybe you’ll watch it on TV? MAYBE!!!
• A pair of Israeli choreographers teamed up with a Chicago dance company for the world premiere of a piece called Vanishing Point tonight at the MCA, catch that, along with a few other modern dance pieces tonight at the MCA.
• Tonight’s your last chance to catch The 17th annual Animation Show of Shows, a collection of some of the best animated short films from the last year or so, at the Siskel Film Center. This thing was really good, I saw it.
• Hinds, a garage rock band from Madrid, used to be called Deers but now they’re called Hinds. They’re playing Lincoln Hall with Public Access TV tonight.
• Elias Bender Rønnenfelt is in a bunch of dramatic post punk type bands, like Var and Iceage. Marching Church is a self-described “rock ensemble” lead by Rønnenfelt himself, and you can see them tonight with Hide and Final Grin at Subt.
• They’re showing early horror classic Frankenstein, originally released in 1931, tonight at the Logan Theatre!
• They’re also showing naughty boy classic The Lost Boys tonight at the Logan Theatre!
• Craig Finn, lead yawper for The Hold Steady, plays an intimate solo show this evening at the Old Town School of Folk Music.

• The Music Box hosts a discussion with Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor, the dudes behind the wildly popular podcast Welcome to Night Vale, who just released their first NOVEL!
• The Logan Theatre is just CRUSHING IT when it comes to Halloween-adjacent film screenings. They’ve got a showing of Gremlins (arguably a Christmas movie, but still) tonight.
• Here we go, the Logan is also showing the damn Shining tonight. That’s one of the best movies ever made! Go see it! It’s great! Right???
• Oddball indie label Graveface records hosts a pop-up shop/concert/spectacle tonight at the Niche Lab on North Ave! Music from The Marshmallow Ghosts, Dreamend, and more, plus scary stories and special seasonal gifts and souvenirs available for purchase!
• Guys Kurt Vile’s doing it again tonight at Thalia Hall. Waxahatchee will be there too, just like last night. Luv them both.
• Janeane Garofalo is just great, you guys. She’s just dang super likeable and has been a consistently solid presence in the comedy world for going on three decades at this point. See her do standup at City Winery tonight, it’ll be really good.
• The Columbia College-spearheaded Wabash Arts Corridor is illuminated tonight for the WAC Crawl, which features live music, dance, and large-scale street and public art displays in the South Loop.
• Spend an evening with the wildly popular Americana/rock band Lucero tonight at Metro. That probably means they’ll play extra long, that’s what “an evening with” usually means!
• Blues/jam rock icon Grace Potter plays a solo show at the Chicago Theatre tonight, she’s touring to promote the release of her debut solo LP, Midnight. I haven’t heard it though, so I don’t know what the full deal is here, for the record.
• The Loop’s monthly pop up alleyway art party ACTIVATE happens again tonight. RSVP to get free drink tickets! That’s cool!
• The General is a new bar in Logan Square and tonight they host a DJ night from some of the folks from local country punk institution Bloodshot Records.
• Experimental, mind-bending duo DRINKS plays the Empty Bottle with Droor and Anna Burch tonight!
• Your friends at 1st Ward hosts a pair of local acts-Workout Music and Goldhouse tonight for a special party show that you can attend.
• Have you been to the Museum of Contemporary Photography before? If not, this is a good time to go, they’re holding the opening reception for Grace of Intention, their latest exhibition, tonight.
• Schubas hosts 20×2 Chicago, a spoken word type show that gives 20 different people from across the Chicago cultural spectrum, to answer a given question. This edition’s question is “When did you know?” which is dang tantalizing, if you ask me! This will be neat!

• Do some daytime stuff:
• The Music Box hosts The Music Box of Horrors, a 24 hour horror film festival featuring screenings of such cult classic nuggets as XTRO, Deep Red, Maniac, and more.
• Local rockers Future Hits throw their 4th annual (family friendly) Halloween spectacular this afternoon at Schubas, singing bilingual, secretly educational songs to soundtrack a dance party and costume contest for all ages.
• Head down to Pilsen for the 13th Annual Pilsen Open Studios, an art walk organized by Pilsen-based artists and art lovers. Pilsen’s great and a nice neighborhood to spend time in!
• The Empty Bottle Book Club meets to discuss Aziz Ansari’s observational tome Modern Romance! Have a drink and talk about a funny/interesting book!
• Yoga + mimosas = Yomosas. U can’t beat that math, baby!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! See you at the Pomontory!!!!!!!!!
• Macaroni and cheese. We all love it. It’s our favorite food that makes us feel sleepy and bad after eating it. How sleepy and bad will you feel after overdoing it at the second annual Mac and Cheese Fest at the UIC Forum? Only one way to find out!
• The Chicago Cultural Mile Association’s got a new, cool looking event planned for this afternoon: The Halloween Gathering, which invites a ton of folks from across Chicago’s creative communities to colloborate on an all-day seasonal celebration, climaxing with a spectacular parade. Whatta Halloween dream.
• Wicker Park’s got their own Halloween type fun times thinger: Boo-Palooza 2015 converts Wicker Park into a Autumnal maret full of activities for families that don’t want to go to the zoo but do want to do Halloween stuff.
• The Lincoln Park Zoo turns SCARY today for their Spooky Zoo Spectacular, featuring arts & crafts, kid-friendly live entertainment, and trick or treating throughout the park.
• Oh BABY this is where you’ll find me this Saturday afternoon: Archie’s hosts a Doggie Halloween Costume Party, with proceeds from the photo booth and bar going towards the Chicagoland Bully Breed Rescue. DOGS IN COSTUMES YALL

• Then, night stuff:
• Weird comedy is king at Bell Hop, a monthly standup show at the Virgin Hotel presented by The AV Club. High quality local acts like Drew Frees, Natalie Jose, and Dave Helem are among those booked this month.
• Joanna Gruesome is a REAL good band and they’re playing at Schubas tonight with another very very good band, Aye Nako, as well as King of Cats and locals Hollow Mountain.
• Live man Ed Kowalczyk plays through Live’s placenta-spilling second LP Throwing Copper tonight at a solo show at Evanston Space.
• Trace Beaulieu and Frank Conniff from Mystery Science Theater 3000 riff on bad movies tonight for two shows (with two different movies!) tonight at comedy oasis @North.
• Chvrches is a really popular band that you can go see play a surprisingly intimate show at the Metro tonight. Good fun!
• Doomy metalfolk Windhand bring the sludge to the Empty Bottle tonight, alongside single-vowel bands Danava and Monolord.
• Arty folk rockers In The Valley Below headline Lincoln Hall tonight, with special guests Clara-Nova and Sexy Fights. This will truly be a great evening for fans of these three bands. Could you imagine?
• Logan Square dive The Burlington hosts a pop up music/night market from walking tour company Wild Onion with a slew of musical guests and local vendors showing off their goods using the medium of their choice!
• Punk rock freaks Shannon & The Clams headline Subterranean tonight alongside UK-based rockers Shopping. S&TC always put on a great show, I bet this will be good.
• Nu-emo superstars The Hotelier play Beat Kitchen tonight with Runaway Brother, Oso Oso, and The Spirit of the Beehive.
• Go to the Vic and watch Adam Corolla record a live episode of his podcast if that’s something that sounds like it’d be fun to do.
• Purveyors of pop punk emo stuff The Wonder Years, Motion City Soundtrack, State Champs, and You Blew It unite for a big time show at the big time Riviera Theatre. BIG STUFF FOR THE BIG TIME EMO POP PUNK STUFF
• Wildly popular standup show Simmer Brown returns for their fifth edition at the Bughouse Theater, with sets from Junior Stopka, Chris Damen, and Tyler Snodgrass, as well as the show’s three producers Prateek Srivastava, Rishika Murthy, and Sameena Mustafa.
• Broadway icon Kristin Chenoweth plays a special show at the Chicago Theatre tonight for you and your [Googles “chicago theatre capacity] 3,879 closest friends tonight.

• The WGCI Big Jam 2015 has the most insane lineup happening at the United Center tonight: our GIF man himself Kendrick Lamar headlines the whole thing, along with Future, Meek Mill, Fetty Wap, Monica (MONICA!), Rae Sremmurd, Lil Durk, Twista, and more. This is a s t a c k e d show.
• The new Protomartyr record is a real good one. You should go see them at Lincoln Hall tonight with Negative Scanner and Amanda X and hear songs from that new record and maybe some old ones too!
• The Music Box is screening the hotly anticipated Japanese double feature Attack on Titan, The Movie: Parts One & Two back to back starting at 5pm today.
• The Emporium Arcade Bar in Wicker Park is doing a marathon screening of some classic Simspons Treehouse of Horror episodes. Arcade games and classic gags, what else u need??
• Beat Kitchen’s Concert for Kids series continues today with a set from The Boogers, spearheaded by a Developmental Psychologist who also likes the Ramones. He performs under the name Crusty Booger. I’m on board with this.
• Oh man, this sort of thing might be more geared directly towards families but I’d really like to go too, but I’d feel bad about my stupid twentysomething butt taking up a seat an actual child could be sitting in at this screening of It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown this afternoon at the Logan Theatre.
• The Life & Times, Electric Hawk, and Last Giant are at Beat Kitchen tonight, another solid night of rock music.
• The Chicago Air Sex Championship comes to the Uptown Underground. It’s like Air Guitar but for sex. Not super into Air Sex tbh.
• The Beat Swap Meet at Empty Bottle this afternoon has a hand-picked selection of record dealers coming out to sell you some #rare grooves.
• The Live Ed man is back and ready to sing 2 u abt placenta again tonight at Evanston Space.
• And then stick around after the Beat Swap Meet to see Shannon and the Clams, Shopping, and The Baby Magic. Spend your whole day at the Bottle, you won’t regret it.
• Navy Pier has fun Halloween activities and scary stuff for you and your kids if you have kids.
• Nashville-based pop group Kopecky plays Lincoln Hall with Boom Forest. I’m going to be real with you: I’m not familiar with either band, and did NOT do my homework on this one, gang.
• Tonight kicks off a new series of appearances from the Chicago Philharmonic at the City Winery. Catch works by Schubert, Mahler, and Cooke in a nice fancy setting.
• The Abbey Pub hosts a benefit beer and wine tasting fundraiser from 3-5pm today, with proceeds going to the for the Irving Park Community Food Pantry. Get buzzed for a good cause!
• The Andersonville Dessert Crawl is a great time. It’s like a bar crawl but with sweets, you know? Hit up some of the neighborhood’s best restaurants and bakeries for special samples and treats!