Drazin cites Aleksandr Dovzhenko’s Arsenal (1928) as one of his favorite silent films. Yesterday I posted the first half of my conversation with longtime silent film accompanist David Drazin, in which he discussed his musical background and how he got started playing for silent-film screenings. In the second half, Drazin shared some of what he learned about the silent era from three decades of accompanying films. The previous post left off with Drazin admitting that, for the first ten years of playing to movies, he never rehearsed before a screening....

Similarities to the lead photo in last week’s Lagunitas post are entirely intentional. When I first started getting press releases for Lake View “beer cafe” Beermiscuous, which formally opened on Saturday, I didn’t feel too sanguine about it. I mean, that name! At least the folks who run the place have committed to it: the cafe’s slogan is “Drink around.” Beermiscuous doesn’t have a kitchen, just packaged snacks at the bar, but it allows outside food and maintains a collection of menus from restaurants that will deliver to the cafe—and Gyros on the Spit is just a few doors north on Lincoln....

There’s plenty to do this weekend. Here’s some of what we recommend: Fri 3/24: Local indie hip-hop label Closed Sessions presents a showcase of its artists—including Kweku Collins, Westerx, and Kipp Stone—tonight at Metro (3730 N. Clark). Leor Galil writes, “It’s long fostered a home for its artists, who are united by ambition if not by a signature sound. Every act has released music that conjures vast landscapes of ever-changing melodies, casting light on deep crevasses you can get lost in....

Beck‘s new album, Morning Phase, comes out February 25 on Capitol. Having released no recorded LPs since 2008’s Modern Guilt, Beck bummed me out with “Blue Moon” (the first released song off of his forthcoming LP), and not because it’s bummer music. While Morning Phase is reportedly Beck revisiting the well-received sad-sack symphonic folk-pop of 2002’s Sea Change, it also means that it’s a musician once known for his chameleonic tendencies rehashing familiar territory....

Paul Boucher A final majestic swing by Adam Dunn in the ninth last night. Twelve days ago, when Adam Dunn was traded to the A’s, White Sox fans assumed they’d seen the last of him—but he’s back in town this week for a final farewell. Oakland, struggling for a playoff spot, arrived Monday for a four-game series. The series concludes this afternoon, but with lefty Chris Sale pitching for the Sox today, Dunn almost certainly will start the game on the bench....

The past year has yielded numerous contenders for this honor. Finding Vivian Maier profiled the reclusive street photographer whose stubborn pursuit of her art epitomized the city almost as much as the random Chicagoans she captured on film. The Golden Age of Wild Chicago, compiled from the long-running WTTW show, provided a late-80s time capsule of local eccentrics and offbeat enterprises. Even Divergent, the dippy dystopian blockbuster adapted from Veronica Roth’s young-adult novel, offered a fascinating postapocalyptic vision of the city, where teenagers get their kicks wire-gliding between decrepit skyscrapers....

3600 N. Lake Shore 312-742-7930 cpdgolf.com Runner-Up Jackson Park

Pufacz / Wikimedia Commons In case you’ve forgotten, this thinking thing is a good time. Clarence Page raised an alarm this week in the Tribune. It’s an alarm that’s been raised so often it’s fair to say America by now is in a permanent state of alert. Roughly Defcon 2. The enemy galloping toward us from all directions is collective idiocy. Mulling this over, my thoughts naturally turned to All American, the 1962 attempt by Charles Strouse and Lee Adams to repeat the success of their Bye Bye Birdie by writing a vehicle for Ray Bolger....

Meanwhile, Hunter and Wright’s coach house was once tucked behind the Mandel mansion, the family behind Mandel Brothers department store and the University of Chicago’s Mandel Hall. Hunter thinks the main house burned down sometime in the 1960s, but both it and the coach house have a rich artistic legacy. “I know lot of older jazz musicians who lived in [one or the other],” she says. “Ken Chaney, the jazz pianist, had his grand piano in this space....

I spend most of my waking hours listening to music, and I consider myself lucky. It’s a challenge and a pleasure to try to keep up with the unstoppable flow of new sounds that arrives in my various mailboxes—both as downloads and on physical media—though I admit it’s been a decade since my hopes that I’ll finally catch up have been anything but delusions. But seeing musicians perform in person can help solve the problem in unexpected ways—or at least help me decide what to tackle next....

The vibe was relaxed, but prices were as eye-popping as the art at Expo Chicago’s annual collectors’ market. Here’s a sampling from a few of the hometown gallery booths at this past weekend’s Navy Pier event. $50,000 (and sold) at Rhona Hoffman Gallery:

The Green Mill 4802 N. Broadway Runner-Up Constellation

Columbia College continues its hip-hop crush this week with “B-Real: A Look Inside Urban Movements,” the second installment of its B Hip-Hop series. Like “B-Fresh” last October, “B-Real” is serious about critiquing unbridled masculinity in hip-hop. Fortunately, it’s also serious about B-boys and the streets they break on. Some of those streets are in Rio, where Lyon-born choreographer Mourad Merzouki recruited Compagnie Käfig, the Brazilian crew who headline the festival....

Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Wednesday, February 15, 2017. Rahm presented AG Sessions with a list of ways the feds can help Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel met with attorney general Jeff Sessions in Washington, D.C., Monday and presented him with a “wish list” of ways the federal government can help solve the city’s violence problem. Emanuel’s list included everything from “federal help to bolster police training, supervision equipment and technology to support for mentoring, after-school programs and summer jobs for at-risk youth,” according to the Sun-Times....

Well, that was unexpected. Pretty much everything, as it turns out. The show was embarrassingly sloppy on opening night, with weirdly negligent blocking, loads (loads!) of dropped lines, pacing so far off that the performance went a half hour longer than expected, moments of downright inscrutability, and a rotating set by William Boles that looked cool but generated a distracting amount of noise. Raúl Castillo made a bewildering mess of Geraldo, Paulina’s successful, supposedly sophisticated husband, turning him into a slow-witted naif....

Perhaps the most audacious touch of A Ghost Story, which opens today at the Landmark Century and the River East 21, is writer-director David Lowery’s decision to forgo the use of special effects in portraying the movie’s ghosts. Lowery depicts ghosts with actors standing under bedsheets, bringing to mind cheap Halloween costumes from childhood. The ghosts aren’t at all scary—rather, they seem ordinary, even a little pathetic. One can’t recognize the ghosts’ emotions, since their only facial features are provided by eyeholes in the sheets....

On the wall of the Lakeview hot dog joint Flub a Dub Chubs, there is a Polaroid of me looking sad and confused. At least I think it’s still there—I’m not sure because in the seven years since it was taken I’ve been too traumatized to make a return visit. You see, I made the “mistake” of ordering ketchup on my hot dog and was promptly added to the restaurant’s “wall of shame” for all who dare choose the red vinegary condiment over the city-sanctioned yellow one....