Flesh PanthersNGC 2632 (Tall Pat/Dumpster Tapes) Zombotron wrote the new album’s lyrics by drawing inspiration from a list of about 100 words and phrases—”flies,” “city living,” and “linear energy,” to name a few. “There’s an insect theme in the album, but there’s also a mysticism that has to do with the planets and stars and space,” he says. Those themes inspired the album’s title, which is an astronomical-­catalog designation for the Beehive Cluster in the constellation Cancer (the ancient Chinese called it “Exhalation of Corpses”)....

When I first heard Nottingham duo Sleaford Mods, Jason Williamson’s unhinged vocal delivery immediately captured my attention. Their minimalist music—which is simply Williamson ranting about working-class struggles over Andrew Fern’s sparse, chintzy electronic beats—could appeal to anarcho-punks, hip-hop heads, and Mark E. Smith devotees alike. Williamson is a force: wide-eyed and frothing at the mouth, he breathlessly spills out his profanity-laden, machine-gun rap-ramblings, and onstage he’s the punkest, angriest madman you’ve ever seen perform....

“He shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Isaiah 2:4) Amidst the intensifying fighting, Samar, Jad, and their eight-month-old daughter Meriam left their home, which was in a part of Homs more prone to clashes between the people and the government....

It would be convenient if all the films that showed at the 74th Cannes Film Festival from July 6-17 could nestle together into a tidy box labeled “the new post-COVID cinema,” but the generalization won’t stick. For one thing, a good number of the feature-length releases that played here (The French Dispatch, Benedetta) were finished before the pandemic started and have been sitting on ice with distributors for a year. Others (especially many short films, like the ones in The Year of the Everlasting Storm) were shot under quarantine conditions, and include its realities....

Upstart garage punks the Bobby Lees formed after guitarist-vocalist Sam Quartin moved to Woodstock, New York, and took a suggestion from a friend to recruit her new bandmates from the local School of Rock. Now in her mid-20s, Quartin is an established actress who’s played alongside the likes of Crispin Glover, Michael Pitt, and Marilyn Manson, but in the Bobby Lees she gives you the idea that she might prefer basement shows to red carpets....

Two things immediately come to Alejandra Aranda’s mind when asked about her hometown of Iguala, Mexico, in the north-central state of Guerrero. The first is its scenic nature; how El Tehuehue hill serves as a beautiful backdrop to this city, home to more than 100,000 people. The second is the relentless bullying she experienced there, much of it from those closest to her. Aranda’s journey in the 90s mirrors what many LGBTQ migrants experience today....

When art is generous, so is the audience. A few days ago we began watching The Crown, the elegant new Netflix series about the reign of Elizabeth II, and episode two offered a scene so interesting I generously read more into it than it could possibly contain. He wrote: Early reviews lavished praise on The Crown, a project written by Peter Morgan, who hopes to eventually devote a season to each decade of the queen’s reign....

Showbiz ain’t easy. Come hell or high water or 90-degree temperatures and biting flies, the show must go on—and smile, damn it. The Lipizzan horses at Tempel Farms up near the Wisconsin border are troupers of the old school. On a recent disgustingly hot afternoon when any horse with any sense would rather be hidden away in a shady stable with a nice trough of water doing the equine equivalent of Netflix and chill, the Tempel Lipizzans were out in the blazing sun performing the same precision maneuvers their ancestors did in imperial Vienna 400 years ago....

Chicagoans is a first-person account from off the beaten track, as told to Anne Ford. This week’s Chicagoan is Ryan McLaughlin, luthier. “So I thought, ‘I want to make basses.’ Well, it turns out you don’t normally start off making basses. You go to violin-making school, and then if you’re still so inclined, you make a bass.

As a founding member of Ensemble dal Niente—and in the solo and duo programs she has presented since leaving them—flutist Shanna Gutierrez has consistently championed new music that pushes compositional and performance boundaries. The four pieces she’ll perform tonight include two world premieres and a work being performed in Chicago for the first time, and each one proposes a different role for her instrument. Opening the performance is David Means’s “Berliner Andenken” (1990), which blurs the line between live performance and installation by requiring the flute player to play at a succession of fixed music stands while another musician wreathes squelchy electronic tones around intricate woodwind phrases....

Local four-piece Slow Pulp had to deal with some real-life nightmares to make the dreamy indie rock on their debut full-length album, Moveys, which arrives Friday, October 9, via indie label Winspear. Near the end of the writing and recording process, singer and guitarist Emily Massey had to return to Madison, Wisconsin (where the band had formed), to help her parents convalesce after a severe car crash. A week later COVID-19 shut down the country, so the rest of the band (bassist Alexander Leeds, guitarist Henry Stoehr, and drummer Theodore Mathews) finished the instrumental portions in Chicago while Massey recorded vocals at her father’s home studio....

After David Bowie decamped from Los Angeles to the then-divided city of Berlin in the mid-70s, he recorded Low, “Heroes,” and Lodger. The three albums, known as the Berlin Trilogy, contain some of the most challenging music of his career, and he paid the price for it; to this day, none of them has gone gold. But their icy synthscapes, alienated lyrics, and robotic funk grooves seem prescient now, and the period yielded one of his most enduring songs, the anthemic “Heroes....

Chicago Style, a “forward-thinking” cocktail conference taking place next week for the first time, was born from conversations—and the goal of the event is to create more. Founders Shelby Allison (co-owner of Lost Lake), Caitlin Laman (beverage director at the Ace Hotel), and Sharon Bronstein (vice president of marketing for the 86 Company) are friends who often discuss their jobs and the beverage industry in general. “That’s how this conference came about,” Laman says, “from Shelby, Sharon, and I talking about our regular experiences, and the topics [we wanted to highlight] are the things we talk most about right now....

A few days before last week’s election, I got a call from a local political operative, freaking out over the fact that the lead items on the news were not about the upcoming mayor’s race, but about the ongoing sagas of R. Kelly and Jussie Smollett. Wait, wrong Maya utterance. No, the relevant Maya theory is that the local electorate is basically divided between those who passionately care and obsess about Chicago politics—like me and Maya and that freaking-out political operative—and those, alas, who don’t....

I should say right now that when we started this contest to determine the Greatest Ever Chicago Book, we knew it would be impossible to find one title that would satisfy every Chicagoan in terms of both greatness and Chicago-ness. Books don’t work that way. Neither does the experience of a city. Both of these things are entirely subjective, even more than the basketball tournament that inspired the shape of this contest....

For all things Saint Patrick’s Day, check out this essential guide to the river dyeing, parades, and more. If guzzling green Miller Lite while wearing a plastic bowler hat really isn’t your thing, here’s what we recommend: 3/12-3/20: Stop to smell the roses at the Chicago Flower and Garden Show at Navy Pier (600 E. Grand), and check out live gardening demonstrations, workshops, and a cake decorating competition. Sun-Thu 10 AM-6 PM, Fri-Sat 10 AM-8 PM

Seeking: tall, dark, and handsome alpha male Occupation: content specialist/creator and vlogger at Pretty in the Windy City What are you doing when you’re not working? Her friend says: “She is highly deserving, abounding with positive energy, and ready to meet her lifelong match!” I work A LOT! But you’ll find me either drinking lots of red wine with my best gal pals, reading, or catching up on my beauty sleep....

“I think the Music Box Theatre Twitter is flirting with me!” one of my cinephile friends told me a few years ago after an exchange of several responsive, charming tweets about movies. Alas, upon further investigation of the social media feed, we discovered the true love of whoever was running it was only movies, and they were eager to engage with any- and everyone who shared that passion. But still the question remained: who was the person behind the 90-year-old movie house’s feed?...

You can take a walk down Michigan Avenue from Roosevelt Road to Cermak on the sunniest afternoon of the summer, but no matter how bright the light, it won’t illuminate the full history of the street. New condos, bars, and restaurants abound, but only a couple signs remain to hint at this neighborhood’s lasting impact as an incubator of Black popular music from the late 1950s through the early 1970s....

Tequila Herradura and Cointreau Liqueur have partnered to create this summer’s perfect cocktail – The Herradura Silver Coin Margarita. To learn more about Tequila Herradura, the world’s most Gold Medal Awarded tequila, text ILHEMARG to 68405 to enter for a chance to win a trip for two to Casa Herradura in Mexico.* See https://www.herradura​.com Enjoy Tequila Herradura & Remy Cointreau at these locations (more locations coming soon!) Roscoe’s Tavern – 3356 N Halsted St, Chicago, IL 60657 Jensen Liquors & Lounge – 2228 W Station St, Kankakee, IL 60901 Adobo Grill – 215 W North Ave, Chicago, IL 60610 Cesar’s Killer Margaritas – Broadway – 2924 N Broadway, Chicago, IL 60657 Jacqueline’s – 3420 N Broadway, Chicago, IL 60657 City Social – 124 N Lasalle, Chicago My Buddy’s – 4416 N Clark, Chicago IL Village Tap – 2055 W Roscoe Steer, Chicago IL Barraco’s Orland Park – 18040 Wolf Rd....