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UPDATE Friday, March 13: this event has been canceled. Refunds available at point of purchase. It’s not just the establishment figures, represented here by glad-handing Charlie Swibel, head of the Chicago Housing Authority, and crooked First Ward alderman Fred Roti (both played with brio by Thomas J. Cox) who get in Byrne’s way. They want things to continue pretty much as they always have. (At one point Cox’s Swibel laments, “I could make this city beautiful if people got out of my way!...

The Whites and the Reds. The Projects. Cabrini-Green. The notorious public housing development whose near total demolition was finalized ten years ago had many names. But to the thousands of people who lived there, they were home. In 2000, Chicago launched the Plan for Transformation, a sweeping project to demolish 18,000 units of high-rise public housing across the city. Through demolition, the city said in its plan that it would then be able to rehab roughly 25,000 units of public housing....

The next time you’re cruising on Lake Shore Drive south of McCormick Place, look to the lake and try to imagine how different your commute might have been if Mayor Richard J. Daley had pulled off his most audacious public works plan—a major airport built in Lake Michigan, five miles from shore. Unlike a “Chicago” airport built in adjoining unincorporated DuPage or Will Counties, Chicagoans would take the lion’s share of the jobs generated by an airport on the south side....

Pleasure Chest Ram Bookstore Finalists: Lover’s Playground (previously Frenchy’s), Te-Jays Adult Books

Are you aware that the American tradition of Mother’s Day has origins in feminism and the peace movement? You can read up about the origins of the celebration and some contemporary campaigns to improve the lives of mothers worldwide at the Zinn Education Project’s website, which includes the Mother’s Day Proclamation written in 1870 by East Coast writer, suffragist, and social activist Julia Ward Howe. Howe wrote the proclamation in response to both the American Civil War and the Franco-Prussian War, and called upon women to stand up against the unjust violence of war and convince their husbands and sons of the uselessness of killing other men....

I generally consider Brandon Seabrook a jazz guitarist, and over the years he’s made plenty of recordings where he plays in that tradition, both in relatively straightforward bands led by the likes of Ben Allison, Jeremy Udden, and Eivind Opsvik and in unusually charged ways alongside folks such as saxophonist Chris Pitsiokos and drummer Tomas Fujiwara. Seabrook’s main instrument is electric guitar, but he’s also done a lot of fascinating playing on tenor banjo, including in Brian Carpenter’s exploratory trad-jazz ensemble the Ghost Train Orchestra and his own early trio Seabrook Power Plant....

Cole’s 2338 N. Milwaukee 773-276-5802 coleschicago.blogspot.com Runner-Up: Simon’s Tavern

Queen! Slo ‘Mo Finalists: Party Noire, Energy

Music Box Theatre Logan Theatre Finalists: Carbon Arc at Davis Theater, The New 400

Andersonville Galleria Humboldt House Finalists: Wolfbait & B-girls, Neighborly, Rep-Chi

Soppressata from ’Nduja Artisans ndujaartisans.com Ever since it burst onto the scene with its spicy, spreadable Calabrian meat butter, salumi start-up ’Nduja Artisans has been expanding its production line with heritage meats like Wagyu salame di manzo, Wagyu bresaola, Berkshire hot coppa, and a black-label ’nduja made from Mangalitsas and Ossabaws. But it’s the new spicy soppressata that takes cured pig meat to an even higher level. Brick red thanks to Calabrian chiles and flecked with chunks of pure white fat, it has an intoxicating fermented funk that telegraphs the punch of its deep porky goodness....

Since 2004 Plastic Crimewave (aka Steve Krakow) has used the Secret History of Chicago Music to shine a light on worthy artists with Chicago ties who’ve been forgotten, underrated, or never noticed in the first place.

Afro-Futurism The seven members of Afro-Futurism may perform at Second City, but they don’t deal in sketch revues. In fact, they’re less a company than a collection of black comics—performing solo stand-up routines, for the most part, punctuated with rap segments fronted by Marcel “Mr. Greenweedz” Wilks. There were a couple misfirings on the night I attended, as when an overly zealous Shantira Jackson tried to make a political point by getting the audience to yell out “No!...

Arnie the Doughnut Can a rainbow-sprinkled doughnut and a rules-loving man find happiness together without one eating the other or without both running afoul of the overzealous condo board president? These are the central questions of Frances Limoncelli’s adaptation of Laurie Keller’s children’s book, and while some of the solutions defy basic logic, who really cares? Doughnuts make everything better! Lifeline’s current production is a delight, from George Howe’s songs to Rachel Sypniewski’s doughnut costumes, and especially Juanita Andersen’s performance as the evil condo board president and the French Cruller....

Since 2004 Plastic Crimewave (aka Steve Krakow) has used the Secret History of Chicago Music to shine a light on worthy artists with Chicago ties who’ve been forgotten, underrated, or never noticed in the first place. Older strips are archived here.

Welsh singer Cate Le Bon pretty much floored me the first time I heard her music about five years ago, and I’ve been a fan ever since. She masterfully collides a rude rock flair with a refined singing style that’s steeped in British folk and art-pop. Lately she’s fallen in with some of the rougher denizens of the California garage-rock scene (she now lives in LA), and last year she made a raw collaborative record with Tim Presley of White Fence (under the name Drinks) that made me wonder if her old sound had flown the coop....

Our Reader event card is full this fall, with three big public engagements. First we have our first Mobilize political event at Sidetrack bar on Thursday, October 10. Reader reporters Ben Joravsky and Maya Dukmasova will be live from 5:30 to 6:30 PM, and then we’ll watch the Human Rights Campaign presidential town hall live on CNN. It’s a free event, 21+, with food from D.S. Fajita Factory. Presidential candidate Marianne Williamson is in Chicago that night, and her team says she’s planning to attend....

In Brian Coleman’s liner notes for the 2010 Get On Down reissue of Common’s Resurrection, producer No I.D. (aka Dion Wilson) talked about his early collaborator, the Twilite Tone, who was also Common’s DJ. Specifically he credited Tone, born Anthony Khan, for helping catalyze the growth of Chicago’s hip-hop community in the late 80s and early 90s: “Tone was a house DJ, too, and he took what he got from the house scene and started his own hip-hop scene,” No I....

Help at Home LLC Right at Home Finalists: Argentium, Chicago VNA, Inc, Healing to Heal Another, Home Instead Senior Care, Lutheran Social Services of Illinois, Visiting Angels