Last month Chicago Tribune transportation writer Mary Wisniewski did a major service to the cause of bike equity in our city when she reported on a massive discrepancy in the number of tickets being written to bike riders in African-American communities compared to other neighborhoods. In the wake of this news, two local cycling advocates offered to share their experiences of “biking while black” in our city, and told me they’re determined to hold the Chicago Police Department accountable for ending its unfair enforcement practices....

Baked Cheese Haus is not the name of your older brother’s stoner-metal side project. But it may be the only outdoor-market sandwich slinger worth its own stoner-metal soundtrack. It’s definitely the most theatrical. Cheesemaker Joe Burns debuted this stunning sandwich a few years ago at the Christkindlmarket. But due to challenges with Daley Plaza’s electrical supply, it could only make occasional appearances at Brunkow’s summertime stands there and at Green City Market on Saturdays....

One out of every four police shooting victims has a severe mental illness. That lesson was echoed this holiday season when Chicago police encountered 19-year-old Quintonio LeGrier in the midst of an “emotional problem” and shot him dead, allegedly without warning, according to a lawsuit filed by the teen’s father. “By all accounts—official and unofficial—a minimum of one in four fatal police encounters ends the life of an individual with severe mental illness,” according to a report from the Treatment Advocacy Center, a Virginia-based nonprofit dedicated to eliminating barriers to the treatment of severe mental illness....

Most of the stories in Rebecca Makkai’s new collection Music for Wartime actually do concern music and war—if not true armed conflict then more metaphorical wars, like the slow death of a relationship or the misfortunes that befall an English professor who accidentally shoots an albatross (including plenty of terrible “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” jokes). The 17 stories here range from realistic, if mildly implausible, to blatantly surreal, like Johann Sebastian Bach popping out of a piano as its owner plays Minuet in G....

In September 2017, Jesa Espinoza and Rosemary Villaseñor opened Joyride Records in the Ukrainian Village storefront at 1914 W. Chicago that had previously housed Permanent Records. But Joyride is saying good-bye to that space—its final day will be Sunday, December 16, and until then it’s discounting part of its inventory for a moving sale. Espinoza says Joyride will take a couple months off while he seeks out a south-side location for the store, and he’s got his eyes on Bridgeport....

Brian Jackson/Sun-Times Media We know Mayor Emanuel has read some books, including many without pictures. But how often does he have the time for long philosophical novels about the dystopian state of modernity? For the last few days I’ve been lying in bed, fighting a cold and ruminating over the reading habits of Mayor Emanuel. Not having read the book, and generally doubting anything I hear from right-wing commentators on Fox, I was gearing up to congratulate the mayor for having an exceedingly open mind....

Remember Pitchfork? The three-day blowout is just a few months past, but some of the festival’s best acts are already returning to Chicago. As with the three stages at Pitchfork, October 8 presents fans with a choice between three festival alums: piano balladeer Tobias Jesso Jr. at the Empty Bottle, beat master DJ Jamie XX at Concord Music Hall, and the infectious groove of Shamir at Lincoln Hall. On October 9, Bully perform at Lincoln Hall, putting Alicia Bognanno’s scorching lyricism on display....

On Sunday thousands of people gathered in Uptown for the 48th annual Pride Parade, but the festivities were halted for about 15 minutes at the intersection of Belmont and Halsted by a group of 40 protesters. They’d formed a circle, hand in hand, and prevented other marchers from passing. They wore bandanas that read “Black Trans Lives Matter” and held large papier-mache heads of Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, and a unicorn, each affixed to a stick....

I must admit I took a little satisfaction from Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s dismal showing in the Sun-Times poll released over the weekend. For once, it looks like my estimation of what’s going on at City Hall is shared by a majority of Chicagoans. Actually, I think that some of the “Don’t know” vote could be quietly for Mayor Emanuel—they’re just too ashamed to admit it. I mean, it’s hard to openly cheer for a guy who’s so unpopular that he’s booed when his face pops up on the Jumbotron at Northwestern football games....

I’ll give our porn star-and-Putin-loving president this: just when you think there’s no further folly of his that could surprise you, bingo! Or had he—perhaps on a slow afternoon at Mar-a-Lago—just thrown a bunch of nation names into a Make America Great Again hat and pulled out Venezuela? Could we just as easily have been plotting the invasion of Canada? Artz is a frequently compelling spokesperson for the latter theory. He says the Bolivarian Revolution was a historic event that overthrew a corrupt oligarchy and established real democracy, though most people in the United States don’t know about it....

The music of Nashville singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier is a source of hard truths, lessons learned through a difficult life of addiction and heartbreak. The tunes on Trouble and Love, her first studio album in four years, are hardly celebratory and upbeat, but through recurring pain, loss, and loneliness there emerges a sense of hope. Today’s 12 O’Clock Track, which you can hear after the jump, is the album closer, “Another Train,” and on its surface the song is flecked by hurt: “You wrapped my arms around me / You built me up, and tore me down,” she sings, describing the end of a relationship that gave her a real sense of purpose and identity....

The music of Philadelphia MC and sound artist Moor Mother, aka Camae Ayewa, didn’t come to life for me until I had the chance to see her perform earlier this year, and suddenly her chaotic, psychedelic layers of samples and electronic noise made sense. After more than a dozen digital-­only releases, in 2016 Ayewa dropped Fetish Bones (Don Giovanni), an Afrofuturist-tinged indictment of institutional racism, sexism, and predation presented with intensity and fury, enhanced by a withering eye for detail....

A sinister familiarity bleeds through the tintypes in “Michael Koerner: My DNA,” the upcoming solo exhibition at Catherine Edelman Gallery. Silver crystals splinter across the dark-hued images, bordering oblong abstractions that overlap like Venn diagrams. These images are subtle introductions to Koerner’s personal history with chemical processes and their related traumas. Upon closer inspection, the delicate fractals appear like firework explosions or the edges of a disaster-signaling mushroom cloud, a reference to the hydrogen bomb the United States dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945, just 45 miles from Koerner’s mother’s childhood home....

Black police officers remain caught in the middle of the explosive debate over law enforcement in the United States. But it’s often difficult for them to speak freely when they’re torn between their jobs and their communities. Evan F. Moore: What are your thoughts on the [July 14] shooting of Harith Augustus in South Shore by a Chicago police officer? Knight: I do think the Blue Lives Matter movement is sympathetic to black police officers....

Comics Mike Barton and Josh Dunkin—both Second City alums and both founding members of the Pub Theater Company—long struggled to find an audience for a particular brand of humor. Perhaps that’s because the duo doesn’t always gift-wrap its jokes for the audience. Instead, Barton and Dunkin sing them in the comedy-rock band Nashville. “You’re in between being a musician playing at a music venue and a comedian playing during an open mike,” Barton says....

It may be fall, but at the Who Charted? podcast taping you can bet host Howard Kremer will be prodding you to “have a summah.” The comedian has released four musical-comedy albums based around that single phrase—Have a Summah, Have Anothah Summah, Summah This Summah That, and Summahtology. Exuding fun and charm, the stand-up has managed to avoid becoming an annoying one-trick pony. On the podcast Who Charted? Kremer, cohost/”chart keeper” Kulap Vilaysack, and fellow comics discuss what’s topping the week’s music, film, and other pop-culture charts....

This year the annual film noir festival Noir City: Chicago (which begins Friday at the Music Box) is going back to basics. All 18 of the selections are American, and all but two were made during the golden era of noir—that is, the dozen or so years following the end of World War II. The programming differs from the past few years, which saw the festival organizers looking for films outside the U....

Following two sold-out stints at the Empty Bottle earlier this year, hometown “instru-metal” heroes Russian Circles reward their local legions once more with this Metro date the day after Thanksgiving. And there’s plenty to be thankful for, as the postmetal trio put on one helluva performance. Though it’s been two years since their most recent LP, Guidance, was released on Sargent House, with six excellent albums in their catalog, the band never lack for set-building options....

There’s a mountain of evidence from around the world that automated traffic enforcement saves lives. For example, a 2012 study in the Journal of Accident Analysis and Prevention credited the widespread use of speed cameras in France with saving more than 15,000 lives over a seven-year period. They quoted a dozen or so drivers who complained that the tickets they received were unfair because they were issued while parks were closed, children weren’t present in school zones, or warning signs were missing, contrary to state law and city ordinance....

In its 12th year, the Hyde Park Jazz Festival continues to program a diverse lineup of jazz artists. Over the course of the two days, the event will showcase over 30 acts at various venues in Hyde Park while embracing countless styles, traditions, and innovations. Though there are plenty of big names on the bill—including Ravi Coltrane with Brandee Younger, Jason Moran (paying tribute to Willie Pickens and Muhal Richard Abrams), Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, and Dee Alexander—the fest puts emphasis on giants in niche scenes....