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Buddy Guy Joanna Connor Band Finalists: Glad Rags, Matthew Skoller Band

Anastasia Chatzka anastasiachatzka.com That Anastasia Chatzka hasn’t experienced burnout is a wonder. The 31-year-old has financed her own business by working multiple jobs, designed her own fashion line, managed two boutiques (located in Ukrainian Village and Hyde Park), handled on-site alterations, presented seasonal fashion shows, and now plans to open pop-up shops in LA and NYC, all while keeping up a exceptional level of personable customer service. “I work from 10 AM to 10 PM just about seven days a week,” she says....

Chicago Cultural center 78 E. Washington 312-744-6630 chicagoculturalcenter.org Runner-Up: Wrigley Building

Owen & Engine Runner-Up: Hopleaf

AirBnB 

Chicago Diner Runner-Up: Ground Control

The first black superhero in mainstream American comics, Marvel’s Black Panther came with an African pedigree: in real life he’s the ancestral king of a small, impoverished sub-Saharan nation that conceals a secret empire, the whole operation empowered by an asteroid from outer space. That premise provides most of the fun in this big-screen adaptation, particularly in the form of the Dora Milaje, the king’s security team, who are badass women with shaved heads, neck rings, and flaming-red uniforms....

Black people are rarely portrayed in video games as anything other than stereotypes or ciphers. The few African-American characters who inhabit virtual worlds—whether Grand Theft Auto or Street Fighter—are typically gangsters, athletes, or sassy comic-relief types like Augustus “Cole Train” Cole, the thinly drawn professional sports star turned soldier from the Gears of War series—he’s primarily defined by his imposing physicality and profane one-liners. More recently people of color in video games seem like props or extras, their personalities so stripped that their inclusion appears to be simply for the sake of diversity....

Earlier this year Bob Dylan released his third consecutive collection of prerock American pop standards, Triplicate (Columbia). With 30 songs spread across three CDs, it rates as the most substantial volume yet. The album not only demonstrates that Dylan wasn’t kidding around when he started essaying tunes sung by Frank Sinatra (among countless others) a few years ago—it further reveals both his ardor for and understanding of the material. While his voice is more tattered than ever, his phrasing seems to sharpen with each passing year; there’s no missing the stinging futility in his delivery of the final line of “Stormy Weather,” or the less-than-certain optimism he injects into the post-hangover vibe of “The Best Is Yet to Come....

Just because it’s freezing doesn’t mean you need to act like a hermit. Bundle up and check out some of what we recommend for the week: Thu 1/21: The Village Tap (2055 W. Roscoe) hosts Stout Spectacular. Thirty-some stouts and porters, including Half Acre Malibu and barrel-aged options like Revolution Very Mad Cow, rotate their way through the bar’s taps starting today; there’ll be 13 at a given time, available over the next few weeks “until supplies run out....

In the dicey business of bringing historic opera to contemporary audiences, Lyric Opera’s current production of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky‘s The Queen of Spades is a winner. Three hours and 45 minutes long? Sung in Russian? No problem; deal me in. This exploration of obsession is compulsively watchable. Musically, it’s an embarrassment of riches, starting with the trio of men who launch the action: tenor Kyle van Schoonhoven and bass-baritone David Weigel as Gherman’s associates, and bass-baritone Samuel Youn—Alberich in Lyric’s Ring—in another neatly executed nasty turn as Gherman’s pernicious friend Count Tomsky....

Chicagoan Angel Marcloid has been making experimental tunes under more than a dozen pseudonyms since the 90s. As Fire-Toolz she conjures sounds that align with experiencing music during the current streaming era, where it’s possible to leapfrog between disparate artists, genres, and generations of music with the same dizzying speed and apathetic carelessness with which couch potatoes channel surf through thousands of networks. But unlike a TV zombie’s viewing habits, Marcloid’s work is always purposeful, even when it’s hard to figure out where she’s going; part of the fun of relistening to February’s Drip Mental (Hausu Mountain) and the brand-new Interbeing (Bedlam Tapes) is retracing her path through a ten-car pileup of retouched elevator music, unflinchingly harsh noise, industrialized and sugary pop, crunchy metalcore, and samples of computer technology and sputtering music gear....

Kingston Mines Buddy Guy’s Legends Finalists: Rosa’s Lounge, Blue Chicago, B.L.U.E.S.

Haberdash Runner-Up: Akira

The Promontory 5311 S. Lake Park 312-801-2100 promontorychicago.com Whatever your feelings are about the food and drink at Hyde Park’s the Promontory, you’d be hard-pressed to find much wrong with the venue’s performance space, a gorgeous room with atom-shaped chandeliers, a great bar, and clean acoustics. But what distinguishes the Promontory are the acts it draws, atypical groups and artists from various realms of underground hip-hop, jazz, soul, blues, R&B, and funk....

Gossip Wolf has seen the remarkable duo of guitarist Bill MacKay and cellist Katinka Kleijn play all over town since 2012, and they never disappoint. Using rigorous classical phrasing, precise pizzicato, chunky noise, swooping drones, and much more, they make every set feel like an alchemical adventure—and last month they finally dropped their debut LP, Stir, on Drag City. “It’s the result of our seven-year duo voyage: the two-headed flame of theme and improvisation,” says MacKay....

After months of protests and actions focusing on accountability for Chicago police abuses, one of the many groups rallying for change has unveiled a bold policy platform aimed at improving the lives of black people. Janae Bonsu, national policy director for BYP100, adds that the agenda serves as a toolkit that, while not exhaustive, will help inform organizing and activist work in the Chicago area and nationally. Making policy demands remains a key priority, Bonsu says, and functions as an important component of large-scale efforts to put the ideas into action....

Michael Gebert Bruce Sherman at North Pond North Pond and Green City Market are a natural pairing. They have been since 1999 when Bruce Sherman first arrived at the restaurant, which overlooks the pond at the northern end of Lincoln Park, and the market, now the city’s highest-profile, was just a year old. Sherman’s been a member of the market’s board for years and a familiar presence, which makes him doubly influential over what you see at the farmer’s market: he’s a buyer and he helps select the farmers and products you’ll find there....