centeronhalsted.org Runner-Up Howard Brown Health Center

On Tuesday the New York trio known as Thumbscrew will release its debut album, an eponymous release for Cuneiform Records. The trio is comprised of guitarist Mary Halvorson (one of the brightest new talents in jazz), drummer Tomas Fujiwara, and bassist Michael Formanek. Halvorson and Fujiwara have worked together in many different contexts over the years, but within this group they feel like coleaders, masterfully colliding swing rhythms and melodic sophistication with carefully meted dissonance, surprise-laden structures, and potent doses of free time....

Q: My brother just broke up with his girlfriend for the second time in eight months. They had been together for two and a half years, and she became pretty discontent when she finished college and my brother entered law school because all his time and attention weren’t revolving around her. In January, she staged this bizarre, soap-opera-esque situation to make my brother jealous, and then broke up with him when he reacted predictably....

The title of Art Shay’s new photo exhibit, “Troublemakers,” was deliberately chosen to play with audience expectations, says Erik Gellman, the Roosevelt University history professor who curated it. Visitors may come in expecting to see images of hooligans. Instead they’ll find photos of scenes from the freedom movements of the 1950s and ’60s as they played out in Chicago. This includes one of his favorite pictures in the show, a 1956 shot of a circle of people holding hands at dusk, singing in protest against housing segregation in north-suburban Deerfield....

1720 N. Marcey and other locations 312-664-4394 binnys.com Runner-Up Vas Foremost Liquors

Chicago’s got plenty of great boutiques to pick up streetwear—Leaders 1354, Jugrnaut, RSVP Gallery, Saint Alfred, Fat Tiger Workshop—but the best place to get T-shirts from Lil Durk’s Only the Family collective-slash-label is at Exclusive773. OK, this south-side shop is the only place in town that sells OTF’s wares, which hints at just how deeply embedded this place is in the local hip-hop scene. RondoNumbaNine and Lupe Fiasco shot the video for Rondo’s “Life of a Savage (Remix)” at Exclusive, and plenty of local hip-hop royalty eventually sidle through the store—take a peek at its website to peep photos of looming figures Twista and King Louie posing in the shop, and, of course, the best rapper taking drill into pop (see BTK), Lil Durk....

Beyonce’s self-titled fifth album, released by surprise on December 13, turned the music biz on its head, stole a lot of the year-end critical thunder from 2013’s other big-name releases (including her husband’s), and gave an unexpected jolt to a pop-music world that generally goes into hibernation after Thanksgiving. Both a bold and deeply rewarding artistic statement and the work of one of pop’s most reliable names at what seems like the peak of her powers, it managed to sell a million copies in under a week at a time when even major releases have trouble breaking seven digits....

This October, Chicago Filmmakers—which screens independent cinema and offers filmmaking classes on the north side—will open the doors of its new location in Edgewater, a former firehouse located at 5720 N. Ridge. Erected in 1928, the two-story building features a towering facade with brown brick and terra-cotta elements laid out in a geometric design, broad windows, and a public garden on its northern side. Near the roof sits an intricately carved stone medallion, a popular feature of city buildings from the early 20th century that speaks to the pride the designers and builders took in their craftsmanship....

The comic-book hero Deadpool’s constant metajokes don’t just break the fourth wall—they slice it up and grind it to dust. If you manage to get your hands on the premium and limited editions of the machines, they feature a mini disco ball with illumination effects. To get your own, you might need Ryan Reynolds’s salary—the premium costs $7,599, and the limited edition is $8,999. Personally, I’ll be sticking to Logan Arcade to play....

In the seven years Gossip Wolf has covered local music (that’s 63 wolf years!), it’s become clear that bands returning from hiatus often disappoint their old fans. Who hasn’t gotten a case of the reunion blues from a former fave? Luckily, local trio the Poison Arrows have bucked the curse. The band returned in 2015, and since then this wolf has seen them drop some major ordnance live. On Friday April, 28, they released their first full-length since 2010, No Known Note (via File 13, the label run by guitarist Justin Sinkovich)....

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Tuesday, March 21, 2017. Report: Federal authorities aren’t prosecuting as many gun cases in Chicago as they are in other cities Federal authorities in Chicago prosecuted more gun offenders in 2016 than they had in almost 20 years, but they still didn’t prosecute as many cases as federal prosecutors in other cities, according to an analysis by the Sun-Times. Between September 2015 and September 2016, they opened 105 gun cases as compared to 73 cases during the prior year; federal prosecutors in Saint Louis reportedly opened nearly three times as many cases that same year....

For my money, the Marked Men remain the most relistenable band to come out of the stellar, and very incestuous, punk scene in Denton, Texas—not to mention being one of the key players in putting the city on the Lone Star map. It’s dirty and melodic pop-punk, but not in a one-string-solo Lookout Records sense; the Marked Men straight shred, all the while keeping their songs tight, focused, and, unsurprisingly, upbeat....

131 N. Clinton 312-575-0306 frenchmarketchicago.com Runner-Up Eataly

Vaughan’s Pub 2917 N. Sheffield

Whether you’re in the mood for an original musical comedy about William Henry Harrison or have an affinity for mariachi music, there are great events to try this weekend: Fri 6/23-Sun 6/25: The annual Logan Square Arts Festival, centered at the Illinois Centennial Monument (2595 N. Milwaukee) features not only arts vendors from across the city, but a robust music line-up. This year catch Air Credits on Friday 6/23, Metz and Joan of Arc on Saturday 6/24, and round out the weekend on Sunday 6/25 with Strand of Oak and Eternal Espiritu Zombi Group....

Today’s 12 O’Clock Track, “Western Horn,” comes from the collaborative album between Sunn O))) and Ulver that dropped on Southern Lord earlier this year entitled Terrestrials. If you’re at all familiar with the great drone of Sunn O))) and the dark experimentation of Kristoffer Rygg and Norway’s Ulver, then, as you might expect, the track is a kind of freebase improv that grows tenser and tenser with each passing minute (a little over nine in total)....

Thirty years ago, Bruce Rauner and Carl Thoma were two of four partners in the private equity firm GTCR, which Thoma had cofounded in 1980. They were pioneers in venture capital and leveraged business buyouts, and profited mightily before the partnership broke up in 1998. The Foundation, with assets of $156 million, also provides financial support for research, publication, exhibitions, and educational programs in its areas of interest, and lends works from its collection to other institutions....

QI’m 25, I’m virgin, and I find it quite difficult to relate with girls. My main problem is I can’t accept my sexuality. I’m into fetish SM. But it seems like there are two parts of me. The first part of me wants to lick women’s feet and be humiliated. The second part of me can’t accept the first part and only wants to love and be loved by a girl....