Mystik Spiral, Down Boy, Coveralls
Mystik Spiral is a cover band that specializes in alternative ’90s rock for Halloween parties. Down Boy is Chicago’s first and very own Yeah Yeah Yeah’s tribute band Presenting full-album and variety setlists of alternative rock selections from the last 25 years, Coveralls provide an immersive, true-to-album experience with deliberate arrangements and snazzy outfits!
Dead Sun, Necromoon, Sleep Keeper, Edlear
Dead Sun are professional tshirt salesmen playing ballads of moodsludge and doomgaze Necromoon describe themselves as “corn fed shoegaze with slow core and post rock influences” Sleep Keeper creates a crushing, dreamy, and atmospheric live show with heavy distorted guitars, pummeling drumming, and doom-laden melodies. Edlear is a band from Chicago. Their debut singles, Dishes/The Lottery, move circuitously – never fully presenting themselves, forever dancing somewhere in the peripheral. Not quite spinners, not quite stoned, the music moves along at a workmanlike stumble. Always teetering on that precious edge of fuzzed out bliss and a crumbling internal monologue. The songs manage to pull you in with their lush distortions and sneak in the gut punches of a life squandered. The communal experience of losing the lottery becomes a solitary albatross and a quiet life of responsibility its sullen counterpart. There is loss in everything, even in not getting fucked up.
Zastava, Harvey Waters, Ira Glass, Sunshy
Equal parts scratchy, melodic, cold and guttural, Zastava is a post-punk/noise rock band from Detroit, MI. Harvey Waters describes themselves as Earth Tone Goth ira glass is a post-hardcore band from Chicago sunshy is a noise pop band from Chicago.
The Paper Cups, Bike Thief, Naked Brunch
The Paper Cups are a local Chicago garage rock band with all original songs and a unique sound. This 4 member band brings together the unforgettable lyrics and melody of great song writing and fiery guitar shredding to create songs that with stick in your head for days. Bike Thief mostly plays indie rock, but will throw in some singer-songwriter, Brazilian, and dance vibes along the way. What can we say? We’re Italian (not actually), people are gonna love us. We like to have fun on stage and It shows through our music. Naked Brunch is a four-piece slut rock band from Chicagoland. Groovy, irreverent, and eclectic, this is body-bumping rock’n’roll that’s meant to be seen live.
Grady Drugg & The Kabong Band, Prathloons, Toosh
Grady Drugg has made a career out of playing multiple instruments across multiple genres, being a sideman for artists such as Willi Carlisle, Dylan Earl, Dreamgirl, and Ings. They are putting out an album with the help of Tape Dad (subsidiary of Gar Hole Records, label of Nick Shoulders, Chris Acker, the Local Honeys, etc), and they, as well as their whip ass band are incredibly excited to finally bring their own music to audiences across the country. Prathloons is the Chicago-based songwriting project of Collin Dall. His songwriting layers poetic, melancholic lyrics atop glacial arrangements on guitar, drums, piano, & violin. The songs reminisce on the mess of getting old, the woes of life-long relationships, & accepting that the meaning of our time on earth is simpler than we think: to love and listen, and to hope for the same in return. Toosh makes rock music that goes elsewhere. As one time signature bends into another, Toosh only plays at structure and repetition, wistfully changing keys and tempos like bees cuddling in flowers. Grounded in twisted rhythms, tonal ambivalence, and liberatory politics, Toosh’s recurring message is— change is constant and relentless.
Bora Bora, Lawrence Tome
Bora Bora is a trilingual band from Chicago that plays Tropical Space-Folk music, synthesizing the lush sounds of Brazilian AM Gold with crunchy Velvet Underground sonic tones. Lawrence Tome is the King of the River. Lawrence Tome will lull you into a trance before drenching you in lilting melodies and somber stories, packaged neatly in harmonic wrapping paper and taped shut with the sticky side of eras long gone. Lawrence Tome was born and raised in a Norman Rockwell painting. When startled, Lawrence melts into a puddle of tears.
Dick Texas, National Photo Committee, The Part Timers
Dick Texas makes Experimental Folk and is from Detroit, MI National Photo Committee describes themselves as “Interesting rock, the Chicago way”. The Part Timers formed in 2022 and began playing shows in 2023. The band had a rotating cast of members throughout the spring and summer, but settled into their current lineup in the fall of 2023 to record their debut EP ‘Clock In’. The EP was a stepping stone towards a sound which they are now honing in on – pulling from roots rock, 90’s alt country, and indie rock, The Part Timers form a musical palette which weaves its way in and around the expansive tradition of twangy rock n roll.
Melodic Canvas, Bled Tape, Brinstarr
Melodic Canvas emerged from the deep woods of Northern Michigan in the fall of 2016 as the creative undertaking of musician and visual artist Evan Alderton. An experimentalist at core, his music contains a fusion of alternative rock and shoegaze, with traces of americana . Melodic Canvas sonically echoes the angst ridden era of the 90’s and brings the fervidness and visceral intensity into the modern day. Heavy reverb, loud blaring guitars, and eerie, atmospheric soundscapes make his music distinctively haunting, evoking an “under the skin” feeling in listeners. After various lineup changes, Evan has finally gathered the best incarnation yet while retaining inspiration from the vast mysteriousness of nature and the dark, hidden corners of the mind. Endlessly thriving on idiosyncratic, eccentric, and melancholic ideas, exploring and encapsulating the unseen and unheard. Bled Tape is the solo recording project and occasional live band of Francis Shannon since 2015. Manic and unpredictable indie rock with noise elements and experimental flourishes in abundance. brinstarr is a three piece band from the city of Chicago. Formed in 2021.
Lowtown, Intoner, Cat Tag, Butthole
Lowtown is a collective of Atlanta music scene vets–what started as a two-piece country outfit has morphed into a four person art rock experiment that plays with various iterations of post punk, gothic sensibilities, and melodrama. Known for their cinematic flair, Lowtown puts on a live freak fest of feeling and creates a world that is uniquely their own. Intoner is noise Rock with something for everyone Cat Tag is a Chicago based emo band Butthole. They are the shit.
Drook, Seventh Cloud, Gerfety
Drook is a pop band from Richmond, Virginia. Formed in 2019, Liza Grishaeva, Matthew Shultz, and Tyler Smith splice together elements of pop, indie, rock, and electronica, focusing them into a single point. Drook’s live show puts this synthesis on full display, underscoring the energy and dynamism of the band’s catalog as it leaps from one stylistic corner to the next. The band has been hitting the road hard the last two years, including a month-long support tour with Turnover and MSPAINT this spring. Seventh Cloud from indiana plays alt rock/ shoegaze Gerfety describes themselves as Chicago 3-piece Shadow Rock