A growing number of musicians have mastered both notated and improvised music, but few have done it with more skill, insight, and sensitivity than pianist Cory Smythe. He won a classical Grammy for his work with star violinist Hilary Hahn, but he’s also become an integral part of groups led by percussionist and composer Tyshawn Sorey—another thrilling denizen of this rarefied turf—that improvise within Morton Feldman-inspired constellations of sound. On Planktonic Finales (Intakt) Smythe continues to destroy any and all borders that might otherwise separate his interests....

Record Store Day’s organizers originally promoted it as a celebration of the mom-and-pop shops that had survived music retail’s postpiracy nosedive while the likes of Sam Goody and Tower Records collapsed around them. But this international consumer “holiday” turns ten years old on Saturday, April 22, and as early as 2012 the Reader was already asking whether the whole production had jumped the shark. Record Store Day was starting to look like a way to transform brick-and-mortar stores into conduits for labels to feed overpriced limited-­edition vinyl to customers willing to stand in line for hours before anybody even powers up the cash registers....

For six years now, Riot Fest has been an outdoor spectacle, taking over a public park for days to celebrate “punk,” whatever that means in 2017—this year it runs from Friday, September 15, through Sunday, September 17. Riot Fest is now carrying on without cofounder and producer Sean P. McKeough, who died at age 42 in November. Spurred in part by McKeough’s passing, organizers discontinued Riot Fest’s Denver edition, leaving this hometown party the last one standing....

Mike Sula The mole bar at Cremeria La Ordeña #2 Back in October, when I wrote about the great southwest-side Guerrerense grocery Cremeria La Ordeña, owner Nicolas Aguado mentioned that he and partner Luciano Dominguez were scouting locations in Albany Park for a second spot to sell their hard-to-find cheeses, meats, beans, and moles. Yet I had no idea Ordeña #2 would top the original location in its amazing mole selection....

The selkie, in Celtic lore, are magical creatures formed from the souls of people drowned at sea. They’re capable of changing from seal to human by shedding their skins, which they must keep to change back. Chicago playwright Kristin Idaszak uses the legend of these shapeshifters as a jumping-off point for the three interlocking monologues that make up this evening of short, creepy tales. The beauty of Idaszak’s writing, though, is that she knows that the mundane horrors of everyday life are at least as terrifying as ghosts....

jphilipg/Wikimedia Commons Not all restaurant critics live here It takes a special kind of myopia to worry that restaurant reviewing is dying when more Americans are doing it than ever. (Online restaurant critic, the last job Americans will do.) But the old model—wherein the critic was an anonymous figure with the power to slam what needed to be slammed and the publication was big enough to (usually) withstand a restaurant’s fury without worrying about being cut off from access for future stories—has become rarer, although it survives in a few places (like this publication)....

After releasing a couple of albums surveying the tundra of postpunk—full of wide-open spaces, instrumental lunges, and feral howls—Beijing three-piece Re-Tros are pivoting toward a minimalism that draws people in rather than making them scurry away. During the best tracks on their forthcoming third album, Before the Applause (Modern Sky USA), Re-Tros condense the frisson of their past work into momentary bursts that fit neatly into a newfound Krautrock pulse. On recent single “8 + 2 + 8 II” they fill in large spaces that previously would have been left empty with a low-humming, cyclical synth melody that offers a gleaming, endless horizon for the band’s hypnotic pattern of handclaps....

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Tuesday, June 13, 2017. Rauner signs bill granting bail relief for nonviolent offenders Governor Bruce Rauner signed a bill that will grant bail relief for nonviolent offenders in Illinois jails. The legislation, which is effective immediately, should reduce jail overcrowding and is “an important step in improving our state’s criminal justice system,” according to Rauner. Nonviolent offenders will have “bail reviewed quickly and perhaps lowered if they’re indigent” and while jailed will earn credit toward paying any eventual fines if they are convicted, according to NBC Chicago....

There’s a bar at the downstage end of the performance space; audience members can belly up before the show and buy a drink, picking either the red cocktail or the blue—a reference, perhaps, to the red and blue pills Morpheus offers Neo in The Matrix. Remember? “You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes....

Presented by the International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago, the Chicago Latino Film Festival opens Thursday, April 20, and continues daily through Thursday, May 4. All films screen at River East 21, 322 E. Illinois. General admission is $13, $10 for students, seniors, and members of ILCC; a festival pass, good for 12 general admissions, is $120 or $90 for ILCC members. For advance sales call 312-431-1330 or visit chicagolatinofilmfestival.org. Following are reviews of eight features screening at the festival; unless otherwise noted, all films are in Spanish with subtitles....

Before the fall of the Berlin Wall, adventurous jazz musicians in East Germany struggled to keep up with their comrades on the other side. While some artists in the east got opportunities to play abroad and collaborate with folks from beyond the wall, they often had to contend with serious government meddling. In 1979, for example, fantastic East German drummer Günter Baby Sommer was booked to perform at the Jazzwerkstatt Peitz, a small performance space in the east, with a band that included excellent West German trumpeter Manfred Schoof—a key figure in the advent of free jazz and an early cohort of Peter Brötzmann....

Noise in My Head: Voices from the Ugly Australian Underground In 2006, local label HoZac Records was launched by Todd Novak and Brett Cross, focusing on limited runs of garage-rock singles. Eight years later HoZac’s production has grown exponentially, moving on to releasing a neverending stream of full-length records by bands from all over the world operating in all different types of sounds, running a singles club, and frequently promoting shows....

They were about 12 minutes into the most recent gubernatorial debate last Wednesday when ABC Seven political reporter Craig Wall asked J.B. Pritzker the tax-rate question. Don’t feel bad, Craig—you’re not alone. Dozens of reporters have unsuccessfully asked Pritzker a variation on your question for the better part of the last year. In 2011, then-governor Pat Quinn and the Illinois General Assembly temporarily raised the state income tax rate to 4....

I’ve written often about John Corbett, and his multifaceted resumé makes it easy—he’s a professor, art gallerist, record producer, music journalist, and musician, as well as (full disclosure) a longtime friend of mine. In fact, ten days ago I covered a new reissue from Corbett vs. Dempsey, the label he runs with his gallery partner, Jim Dempsey. The original essays are witty and erudite, and cumulatively they serve as a giddy rejection of canon—Corbett makes a powerful argument that any list of the best or most important recorded music is necessarily a failure....

More and more operas are adding Broadway classics to their repertoire, in part to try to attract younger (merely middle-aged) audiences. Lyric Opera has in recent years used a classic musical to close its season, with quite a bit of success. According to Lyric’s website, its 2014 production of The Sound of Music sold the most tickets of any show in its history—71,074 tickets over 30 performances. So I suppose the idea is here to stay....

Pulitzer Prize-winning Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts Jr. is author of the best-selling novels Before I Forget and Freeman, the memoir Becoming Dad, and Forward From This Moment: Selected Columns, all of which have been released by Bolden—the African-American imprint of Agate, based in Evanston. The significance of such an accomplished author continuing to publish with a small independent press isn’t lost on Agate founder Doug Seibold. “When a writer like Leonard says I want to stay with you and keep working with you, it’s really important,” he says....

Chicago rapper and prison abolitionist Ric Wilson has ambition to spare. On his self-released 2016 EP, Soul Bounce, he traverses instrumentals inspired by bachata, British house, or arena EDM, and his loquacious, blustery performances sometimes feel aggressively out of sync with the bustling patchwork of beats—but he’s smart enough to use that tension to fuel his hooks. Wilson streamlines his sound on the new self-released EP Negrow Disco, for which tonight’s show—his first headlining gig ever—is a release party....

Alison Green Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney Brianna Wellen: Sure, a lot of memorable things happened before 8:30 PM. Bully started a respectable dance party at the Blue Stage, Ex Hex made the most of their few songs before the festival got (briefly) shut down, and a few measly raindrops caused a mass exodus to whatever nearby bar was accepting soaked-through dollars. The rain made things more fun, and those of us warriors who returned to the muddy park when it reopened surely deserve a badge of courage....

On Friday and Saturday at midnight the Music Box is showing Near Dark, Kathryn Bigelow’s first solo directorial effort, on 35-millimeter. The theater had planned the screenings as a commemoration of the film’s 30th anniversary, but now they double as a tribute to the actor Bill Paxton, who delivered a memorable supporting turn in the movie, and who passed away last month from complications following heart surgery. A chronically underrated player in American movies, the versatile Paxton fared well both in comedy (Weird Science, Club Dread) and drama (One False Move, A Simple Plan), bringing a likable earnestness to both genres....

Hip-hop has a bigger presence at Riot Fest this year than ever before—hugely influential acts such as De La Soul, Snoop Dogg, Ice Cube, and Cypress Hill are sure to steal some of the spotlight from the lineup’s army of guitar heroes. But some of the best rap artists at the festival are less well-known. If you want to see the shape of hip-hop to come, start with these five sets....