Chicago Cultural History
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Wilbur Holmes: images of the West Side with Grit and Grace
Carlos of Surplus of Options (a smokin’ hot Antique/Resale shop full of curiosities here in Chicago) found these pictures… in fact, he picked up dozens of them… at a West Side Junk shop for almost nothing. I was immediately struck by the photos, both for their composition and tone. I bought the pictures from him…
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Chicago: in all its fried, dyed, laid-to-the-side (or perhaps natural) glory.
I was watching my “Best of Soul Train” DVD box-set this weekend (of course), which includes tons of original TV spots for Ultra Sheen and Afro Sheen (two black haircare lines manufactured by Chicago’s own Johnson Products). Iconic brands, to be sure. During the glory days of Black Haircare manufacture in Chicago (roughly the late…
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Dorothy Donegan: Chicago’s own Jazz Cover Girl
Darkjive focuses mainly on soul music born and bred here in Chicago during the golden era of Chicago Soul: the 1960s through the late 1970s. Anyone who knows me, however, knows I am passionate about a variety of music that has come out of our city: especially soul, blues, and jazz. That said, recently an…
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Tom Tom 84 goes Hollywood.
Tom Tom Washington (pictured at left) is basically my hero. He’s also a very humble and cool individual to be around. As a Chicagoan and a music lover, his distinctive Horn and String Arrangements are like home to me. Tom Tom came up in Chicago’s Ida B. Wells Projects and studied music under the tutelage…
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Cult Movie of the Week: the spook who sat by the door.
Goodness. I am reviving the “Cult Movie of the Week” category for a minute based strictly on this film. I am also seeking out the book it’s based on, as well as the soundtrack. I was sucker-punched by Herbie Hancock’s future funk interpretation of a Spy/Espionage movie score. I was in love when I heard…
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Sophia Tareen’s Chicago Soul Food Sign-of-the-Times
photo by Southern Foodways Alliance. Sophia Tareen’s article published on various platforms this month, entitled “Chicago Soul Food Disappearing as Blacks Leave, (excerpted below) brings up a number of over-arching issues as to why these community institutions have had some hard times, but leaves out any solutions, leaving us with sort of a hollow ‘sign-of-the-times’…
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Disco Nights at the Cabrini Green Summer Fest, 1979
Jamming and juggling on a warm summer’s afternoon in the days when Jane Byrne was mayor… and Disco was king. Two years later, Jane Byrne moved into Cabrini Green in part as a publicity stunt. Below, a bit more footage: an unnamed local group can be heard (but not seen) performing a version of Teddy…
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Betty Everett: there’ll come a time
It was last summer. I was privileged enough to hear the iconic (and prolific) arranger Tom Tom Washington play a few chords of the tune “There’ll Come a Time” on a piano stationed at a Recording Studio on 80th and Stony Island, where in the vacant lot next door they grew cabbage. It was electric,…
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Ebony is Back…. and fly!
Oh. Goodness. To be clear, Ebony never left us, but it did sort of lose influence in the Black Community. But, wow, have they stepped up. And, I’m prouder than ever to pass by their headquarters here in Chicago (on South Michigan Avenue). To give a little background, Ebony (launched in the 1940s by the…
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