A couple of years ago, right after we got the TiVo, I was in the habit of watching Adult Swim cartoons. One of them was this stylish, eye-catching Japanese anime import called Cowboy Bebop. I’ve always been interested in anime, but found most of the few imports I ran across to be too coldly Mr. Roboto-Gundam-Warrior for my taste. And no, never could get the whole idea of why winsome girl “heroines” all have to be dressed like pervo dreamgirlz. But Bebop was different. It had incredible music, eye-popping visuals, evocative direction and editing, and fascinating characters. It sucked you…

Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune noted “Twenty great songs from 2005 that the Grammys missed” in this order: 1. “George Bush Doesn’t Care About Black People,” the Legendary K.O. 2. “When God Made Me,” Neil Young 3. “When the President Talks to God,” Bright Eyes 4. “Come Save Us,” Warlocks 5. “Devil in My Car,” New Black 6. “The Good Ones,” the Kills 7. “Here Comes a City,” Go-Betweens 8. “Bucky Done Gone,” M.I.A. 9. “Career Finders,” Perceptionists 10. “It’s for You,” Out Hud 11. “Everyday I Love You Less and Less,” Kaiser Chiefs 12. “Not About Love,” Fiona…

15 Minutes By: Nik Kershaw Nik is one of those “aha!” artists. He had one or two modest hits (in the States) in the 80’s, and as it happens I was one of the few lucky ones that bought his album that had “Wouldn’t It Be Good” and another dozen great songs on it. Actually, that’s not quite accurate. I was dumb enough to sign up for the Columbia Record “Club” in the 80’s, and I still have a bunch of dusty old cassettes kicking around in a box downstairs. There’s some great music in there, and I’ve been pondering…

Oh, my GOD!! This Canadian band, The McDades, played at the Chicago Celtic Fest earlier today. This crappy cameraphone image does not do them justice. The music they play is just… so assured and totally off the scale (not the musical one, the incredibly ****in’ cool one). As you can probably tell, I pretty much took pictures with my cameraphone all day, but this is the only one that I really regret is not a much better quality image (okay, the one of Buckingham Fountain could be a little better, too). I’ll be getting a better cameraphone in a few…

These guys (didn’t catch the group’s name) were pretty good, but not quite up to the level of play we heard in Seattle from the Irish Piper’s Club. Still, they were good and the fiddlin’ women did great on the one song we heard. This image was sent from Flickr as a blog entry, email or cameraphone image. Via: Flickr Title: photo_0029.jpg By: GinnyRED57 Originally uploaded: 17 Sep ’05, 6.00pm PST

Tickets: $12.00 senior/students/advance, $15.00 at the door. Synergy’s concert at Holy Moly is today at 4pm – the musicians will arrive some hours before that and I have a few errands to run and chores to do after church. It’s going to be an exhausting but fun day, and I’m really curious to see how many people turn up after my various attempts to get the word out. I was listening to their CDs “Transmissions” and “Baroque and Renaissance” last night and was struck again at the high quality of their musicianship – it’s exciting to be able to host…

Last night we went to see the latest offering at the Marriott Lincolnshire’s musical theater season, “A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum.” I’m really glad I didn’t read the rave reviews in the Chicago Tribune or at Chicago Critic before seeing the show, because then I would have known going in just how big a triumph Guy Adkins has in his portrayal of Pseudolus, the wily and wryly funny slave of ancient Rome. I vaguely knew the story: it’s a pastiche of characters and situations lifted from classical Roman and Greek comedies, mostly from the works…