One can only speculate on the path that brought Amebix back together. Bassist and singer Rob Miller (onstage, he dubbed himself the Baron) spent a number of years after their breakup as a swordsmith on the Isle of Skye, while his guitarist brother Chris (Stig) soldiered on with the 1987 lineup’s other members in the aggressively mediocre crust band Zygote. Their current tour features Stig and the Baron together with veteran drummer Roy Mayorga, formerly of such groups as Nausea (early ‘90s crust punk), Shelter (mid-‘90s Hare Krishna-affiliated hardcore punk), Soulfly (late-‘90s Brazilian-influenced heavy metal) and Stone Sour (unspeakably bad Midwestern nü-metal featuring members of Slipknot).

Amebix’s brooding, guttural sound relied on bass that alternately slithered and pounced, drums from a pagan funeral orgy, and guitars that slashed but never shredded. But guitar tones weren’t all that heavy metal bestowed on crust. Grandiosity and an edged-weapon fetish were also prominent parts of the Amebix experience. Over three increasingly negative albums—their 1984 debut “No Sanctuary,” 1985′s “Arise!,” and 1987’s “Monolith”—Amebix went from singing about taking the kingdom of heaven by storm to waking in a sweat from the American dream as the bomb bays opened. Punk may have given Amebix its politics and the Baron his growl, but metal taught them to mix yearning with apocalyptic anxiety. Fearing the Bomb and mental hospitals, Amebix simultaneously celebrated axe-wielding pseudo-Viking nihilism. On the balance, it was a sort of tribal paranoia, primitive in its aspirations, absurd in its fears, and deeply, deeply rooted.

Taking as their logo a sketch of a demonic head by Aleister Crowely associate Austin Osman Spare and “No Gods, No Masters” as their slogan, Amebix nevertheless managed to find a certain accommodation with the soul-draining, nuclear-proliferating world around them. Traveling around Europe for a decade, they eked out a living, on one occasion selling the doors in their squat to buy glue. There were better moments, as with the six months they lived in their drummer’s parents’ Dartmoor manor house. When the parents returned, Amebix was banished and the drummer was diagnosed as a schizophrenic; the band wrote a song about one of his anti-psychotic prescriptions.

Time would go to prove their appeal was as much a matter of lifestyle as of sound or lyrics. Elsewhere in Europe and in the U.S. too, Amebix inspired generations of crusties to think of the world as hostile, life sensibly paranoid, and clothes never washed. But even a black shirt can’t hide the crust forever—it’s a temptation to call train-hopping squatters black-clad, but the sun ends up fading it to a fashionable gray. Crusties have never been one of punk’s more populous subclans, but there’s been a consistent stream of folk answering the call to turn off and drop out. No surprise that they get compared to hippies too—one former Amebix member is now in Hawkwind, a nearly three-decade-old psychedelic folk act. But as the relatively clean-cut (but still darkly dressed) Amebix faces a crowd half its age, with the band’s patches and lyrics tattooed and stenciled on them, a song off “Monolith” comes to mind: “The Power Remains.”

Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. May 29. Friday, 6pm. (312)949-0121. $15. reggieslive.com

MDC's Dave Dictor live in Torino; rockito/flickr

Between its length and the troubles it caused with police, Millions of Dead Cops didn’t last as a name. MDC became the group’s new moniker “for posters and parents,” and took on a new meaning with every album after their self-titled debut. “Multi-Death Corporations” was followed by “Millions of Dead Children,” then “Millions of Damn Christians,” “Metal Devil Cokes,” and “Millions of Dead Cops” again several times. “Millions of Dead Contractors” had a brief tenure, and now the band is back to plain MDC. So do they actually encourage listeners to kill cops? In a word, no—as singer Dave Dictor explained in a recent interview, “It’s understanding why someone would go so far as to kill a cop. This is poetic license. I write songs about the angst of a police society.”

Cops were never the only target of MDC’s ire. Mothers on drugs, soft drinks, factory farmers, Christians, Bob Avakian’s cult-like Revolutionary Communist Party, businessmen, homophobes, and the DC hardcore band Bad Brains all earned spiteful tributes. Their first single, “John Wayne Was a Nazi,” is a representative sample of their phlegmatic agitation. Leaping from the unintentionally hilarious—“John Wayne was a Nazi/He liked to play SS/Kept a picture of Adolf ol’ boy/Tucked in his cowboy vest”—to the bombastic—“John Wayne slaughtered our Indian brothers/Burned their villages and raped their mothers/Now he has given them a white man’s lord/Live by this, or die by my sword”—without once emitting a catchy riff, MDC developed a reputation as a mediocre band, despite a modest national following.

More cynically, MDC was known for trading in other people’s outrage. When Bad Brains left another band’s singer a nastily homophobic note instead of money they owed him, it was MDC, not the other band, that wrote songs against Bad Brains and attacked them in every interview they got, long after Bad Brains exited the hardcore scene and devolved into an increasingly erratic and drug-addled reggae unit. No surprise that MDC’s real contribution was radicalizing punk. Not that they were the only ones involved, of course, but together with the rather less humorless Californians the Dicks and Dead Kennedys, they popularized veganism, made peace with hippies, and created a template for the boring punk diatribe. And thus in 2009, bands are still complaining about Reagan. But age-mellowed MDC took no pleasure in the politicization of the scene and, in Dictor’s words, the domination of “this self-righteous zealousness…[and] nitpicking.”

For this Friday’s show, MDC has a slightly broader repertoire to draw from. Take “Knucklehead” off “Metal Devil Cokes” (“I’m a knucklehead, you’re a knucklehead, we’re all knuckleheads”), an album named by drummer Dejan Podobnik’s young son. As middle-aged men, they’re inevitably nostalgic, hence the tributes to the salad days of Maximumrocknroll magazine and the rants against the “poseur punks.” MDC might not strut like spring, but they never were terribly kinetic in their prime. At a minimum, they won’t play “Free Bird.”
Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. May 1. Friday, 6pm and 10pm. (312)949-0121. $10. reggieslive.com

Peelander-Z; courtesy of the artist

Japanese musicians Peelander-Red, Peelander-Yellow and Peelander-Blue met in New York City in 1998 and started Peelander-Z. It was then a quirky, Power Rangers-themed band with all the distortion, screaming, and high-speed guitar solos that characterized punk, but their lyrics never deviated from sugar-amped positivity, and their costumes, while clearly DIY, were never black.

On the contrary, the self-styled “action comic punk” band is about fun. Guitarist and vocalist Yellow (Kengo Hioki), who speaks with a charming flair for malapropism, says, “Energetically we are crazy to a band.” Their enthusiasm matches the speed of their music and the incomprehensible whirr of their manic, heavily-accented lyrical proclamations. A verse from “Ninja-High Schooool,” for instance, goes something like, “It’s hard to learn karate chop/Yes! all day long jump kick/We can make some pork chop/After eating, take a nap!”

Peelander-Green joined the band last year after Blue had to leave. In keeping with the band’s inconsistent but detailed backstory, Blue returned home to assume the throne of Peelander planet. The band’s nominal mission on Earth is to collect smiles to bring back to their home planet—they claim to hail from the Z Area on its surface—in order to feed its people. According to Yellow, the smiles of the audience also give the musicians more energy, which in turn elicits more smiles. This is “new-style Peelander communication.”

The three current musicians, Yellow (Kengo Hioki), Red (Kotaro Tsukada, bass and vocals) and Green (Akihiko “Cherry” Naruse, formerly of the Portugal Japan, drums and smiles) perform in a variety of brightly colored costumes that mimic not only slightly disheveled Power Rangers, but also Mexican lucha libre wrestlers and Playmobil figures.

Peelander-Z is about halfway through its frantic 66-show, two-month tour, which included nine performances in three days at Austin’s South by Southwest festival. “Every show is crazy, I love it,” says Yellow. The band is promoting their fifth full-length album, “P-Pop-High School,” which was released in stores last Tuesday.

The album is intended as something of a departure from the band’s past style. Though they hang on to a loud and unpolished sound, several of the songs, such as the title track and “Let’s Go! Karaoke Party!” drop to brisk medium tempo, and there’s less distortion too. According to Yellow, the idea was to make the songs more approachable so “everyone can dance and sing along with us.”

The band is also increasing its already heavy emphasis on nonmusical performance. They have expressed interest in performing without music one day, and Yellow promised that they would be repeating the act from their music video for “Ninja-High Schooool” which contains a few minutes of antics before the band even launches into the song. “We are going to be big and fight monster and finally be friends,” says Yellow. “If you come to the show you might see the big squid.” They also plan to continue bringing the audience onstage to play their instruments or to participate in their lucha libre antics and their classic human bowling act. “We love punk rock and we love wrestling, we love Japanese animation, we love Power Rangers…If you like cosplay, like anime, Mexican wrestling…wear a mask, if you people want to do something, come with us and you can do on stage…You can scream your mom’s name!” And, Yellow asked me to warn potential audience members, “If I pick somebody, they’d better come on stage and dance with us!”
Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. April 19. Sunday, 8pm. (312)949-0121. $12. 17+. reggieslive.com

Don Caballero; courtesy of the artist

There are reasons for keeping the band’s original name, despite the departure of three-quarters of the original lineup. One is that Don Caballero’s style hasn’t changed much over the years: many parts of “Punkgasm” are little time-capsules of the band’s late ‘90s work. Another reason: the nostalgic fans. It’s not just about keeping them happy; according to Che, “There’d be no one in the audience if we called it something else.” So the present Don Caballero uses the critical acclaim of predecessors to draw a crowd. But what’s in a name, anyway?

What’s in any label, for that matter. Don Caballero has always resented genre pigeonholing; the mere mention of the phrase “math rock” elicits exasperated sighs from the band. Their current label, Relapse Records, mostly represents metal bands with a heavier sound than Don Caballero, but that doesn’t bother Che. “We don’t fit in with a lot of the other artists on the label,” he admits. “But I think you’d find that on just about any label we could end up on.” Even Che himself has trouble describing their sound. It could be modesty: “Blowing smoke about my music, in a verbal form, is not my strong suit.” Or it could just be that it’s difficult to acknowledge that Don Caballero’s distinctive style has gradually lost its innovative edge. Surprising changes in time signature have become expected, even though Che executes them just as masterfully.

What Don Caballero has tried to do over the past decade or so is create an association between musical perfection and complex, math-y rhythms. Che maintains that Don Caballero achieves this. “I used to say that we’re trying to set a higher standard, but that makes me sound like an arrogant fool, so I’m not going to say that,” he says. “But it leans in that direction.” His goals are no loftier than those of other artists: “I mean to create something that someone’s not going to forget easily once they come into contact with it.” This is becoming more and more difficult in an industry where the tricks of yesterday are the standards of today. Che struggles to “make peace” with the evidence of Don Caballero’s inability to make a lasting impression: the four-year turnover rate of their college-age fans. “As soon as you graduate, you’re not going to remember our name, you’re not going to ever listen to us again. You’re going to forget all about us,” he says, only slightly bitter.

Whether or not Che’s fatal prognosis is true, it’s perhaps the sentiment that motivated the band to try some new tricks on “Punkgasm.” The last song, for example, features Che on guitar, with Doyle taking over the drums. But the most significant change is the addition of vocals: Che sings on five tracks. This major development “wasn’t really very thought out,” according to Che. “Some of the songs that have vocals on them actually happened in sound check. I started singing, and we were like, let’s make that a song.” The album is less rhythmically disorienting than previous ones (or maybe we’ve just become accustomed to the style), with tight rhythms that coalesce to create winding melodies. Old fans, wherever they are—out of college and into their 30s—will not be disappointed: “Punkgasm” still has that special Don Cab something. It’s not the same as it used to be, but it’s still Don Cab.

Reggies Rock Club. 2109 South State Street. February 27. Friday, 8pm. (312)949-0121. $12. 17+. reggieslive.com

Although punk enthusiasts probably find their name and music familiar, over the years the Effigies have escaped a certain amount of coverage that has probably been due to them. During their heyday in the early and mid-Eighties, the Effigies had a huge following in Chicago and enough of one elsewhere to travel the country in a van putting on, in their own words, “manic live gigs.” But despite this following and their continual citation as one of the driving forces in the development of the Chicago punk scene, the band has been written out of a lot of this era’s history.

Much of the documentation that the hardcore scene inspired and provided a subject for focuses on the coastal cities, looking to New York, Los Angeles, DC, and London for footage and stories. The Midwest punk scenes, specifically those of Chicago and Minneapolis-St. Paul, have been widely ignored by the more mainstream media coverage. The book “American Hardcore” and its 2006 documentary film counterpart barely touched on Chicago, while 2007’s “Punk’s Not Dead,” a more comprehensive and wide-reaching film as far as interviewees and scope go, didn’t mention the Effigies at all. “Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground, 1981-1991,” Michael Azzerad’s 2001 chronicle, gives plenty of credit to the Midwest, but his allotment for the Chicago scene is dedicated primarily to Big Black, a band that achieved more underground success than the Effigies. The only overview that has given proper acknowledgement to the group is “You Weren’t There,” a 2007 film covering Chicago punk from 1977 to 1984, which justly portrays the serious influence that the Effigies’ fist-pumping noise had on both other Chicago bands and the hardcore scene as a whole.

Since their resurrection in 2004, the Effigies have released one full-length LP, “Reside,” bringing their total album count up to five (one of which, “Remains Nonviewable,” is a compilation of early material). Their recent work holds up well to the standards they created for themselves in their more youthful days: banging rhythms, subversive lyrics, barely distinguishable songs, and a thoroughly apathetic attitude towards the mainstream population that has ignored or discredited them. But the Effigies’ new incarnation is less of a revival of their old selves than a natural continuation of them, and it is this that sets them apart from the majority of we’re-back-again bands. A more relaxed and mature angst comes across on “Reside,” seemingly proving that punk does not become irrelevant with age while simultaneously promising that the energy that existed at Effigies live shows in the ‘80s isn’t going to go away just because the performers are now 45 instead of 20. When the Effigies play at Reggies on Saturday, no one present will doubt that punk is alive—they’ll just know that it’s a little bit older.

The Effigies with Dead Town Revival, Hotlips Messiah, Neverland, and Bread and Bottle. February 7. Saturday, 8pm. $7. 17+. reggieslive.com

Fourteen albums later, the Melvins have plenty to show for it. There’s the Nike SB tribute sneakers, the Zippo lighters, and canned meat product. More importantly, there’s the affection of loyal fans. In addition to regular roadie-ing, Kurt Cobain auditioned to play bass. Though he was rejected, his support of the band at the height of Nirvana’s fame caught the hungry eyes of record executives, and the Melvins got an acrimonious three-record deal with Atlantic and any number of slots on the ’90s’ slew of alt-rock festivals. But the Melvins were never driving at mainstream appeal, and if their profile has been low in recent years, the critical consensus has only solidified in acclaiming the group. From amplifier-worshippers like Boris (who take their name from a Melvins song), Earth, and Sunn O))) to technical post-metalers Neurosis or Pelican, the Melvins have no shortage of sincere flatterers. Only a few of them, however, have achieved the feat of Big Business’s Coady Willis and Jared Warren—simultaneously being in a Melvins-inspired band, and being asked to join the Melvins themselves, where they now play drums and bass, respectively.

Itemizing the differences between the sludgeified, druggy abrasions of Big Business and the Melvins is a task best left to internet hairsplitters. One WHPK DJ summed the former up as “exercise music for stoners,” which perfectly captures their frantic bombast. Make no mistake—Big Business can cover the low end of the pitch spectrum, but they don’t neglect the riffage. Now a three-piece with guitarist Toshi Kasai, Big Business first recorded as an expertly-pedigreed power duo. Warren was in Amphetamine Reptile noise-rock heroes Karp, and Willis drummed for boozy garage punks the Murder City Devils. Their production values are superficially cleaner, but the effect is about the same as putting a plastic crown on a wino in the gutter, in spite of Phil Ek’s sainted efforts to hold them to the same bar as Built to Spill or Halo Benders. Nevertheless, Big Business has an optimistic feel, even if it’s apocalyptic at times. Given how few sludge/stoner/drone/doom bands can ever be described as “bouncy,” this is a welcome development. The $55 VIP tickets Reggies is selling guarantee seating for the Melvins; a message, perhaps, that Big Business demands pogoing.
Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. November 12. Thursday, 7pm. (312) 949-0212. $20, 21+. reggieslive.com

The night started off innocuously enough. We hung out in the VIP loft, enjoying half-off drinks and looking out over the empty room while the first band set up. We cracked jokes at their electric drum kit; the tinny rhythms they would use, vainly trying to accentuate their nu-metal sludge. But we were respectful, and went out into the audience to watch them as they shouted about the joys of Jesus.
Then it was our turn to take the stage. We were kind of worried—considering our band had made up two-thirds of the audience—that nobody would be left to watch us, but a good six or seven of our friends made it out to catch the performance. That would turn out to be six or seven more than I’d have liked. From the first song, I knew things weren’t going so great. The sound was off; we couldn’t hear anything but the guitar. Then, come the third song, we’d hear everything but: in the frenzy of playing, our guitarist accidentally knocked his volume knob to zero, and spent the next few minutes frantically plugging and unplugging his power cord before realizing the problem. In the meantime the rest of us chugged along, sans guitar, smiling gleefully as our optimistic visions of the night dissolved to farce.

In reality, it wasn’t quite so bad. Apparently, our own incompetence aside, the sound was okay down in the audience. And we still brought in more fans than either the first band or Werewolf, the metal act that headlined the night. Besides, the whole thing was kind of ridiculous from the onset—we stuck out like sore thumbs in the line-up. Even under optimal conditions, we probably would’ve been met with blank stares from a room full of confused metalheads.

“I can really see us playing with that first band,” one of the guys from Werewolf commented to a bandmate on the way out. Surely neither band would have said the same about us—but that’s probably a good thing. Watching Werewolf’s one hardcore fan drunkenly fist-pumping and throwing empty beer cans onto the stage made me kind of want to stop playing music forever. But then we got paid forty bucks, and all was alright in the end.

This year, I hoped the event would once again take place—so that I could write about it in disgust, not because I actually support it—but alas, apparently negative publicity and public outrage have convinced the church to pull the plug (I don’t know for sure those are the reasons behind the move, but I’d like to think so). This left me without an article to write, but in retrospect, it’s much better this way. Because, even if the event was still going on, it’s not like the organizers would be waiting eagerly by their telephones, anxious to discuss it with the press. And I’m not sure I’d be able to maintain my journalistic integrity and remain objective while reporting about it anyway. So hey, now the event is off, sparing the mindsets of countless children, and I still got to sound off on what a terrible idea it was. It’s the best of both worlds!

Anywho, since it seems there are no other “Nights of Terror” going on on the South Side (although I could be wrong—if anyone knows of one, be sure to send it a rotten pumpkin with a “Go to hell, bigoted fear-mongering assholes!” carved into it for me), we’ve decided to present you with a list of fun Halloween events taking place in the area instead. Granted, none of them will be as scary as Salem’s “Night of Terror” was, but that’s probably a good thing.

Anna, in the Darkness
According to Dream Theatre’s website, “the audience are never merely spectators, but instead are actively invited into the dream world of the play where possibilities are endless, nothing is out-of-bounds, and the fourth wall does not exist.” It’s an ethos that’s practically made for spooky Halloween performances, and “Anna, in the Darkness” takes full advantage of it. The play, by Jeremy Menekseoglu, focuses on a young teacher trapped in her living room while angry mobs gather outside to kill her—and the audience is right there, watching and waiting with her inside. The Chicago Tribune calls it “a chilling experience.” No doubt it should also be good fun.
Dream Theatre, 556 W. 18th St. Through November 2. Thursday-Saturday, 8pm and 9:30pm; Sunday 7pm and 8:30pm. (773)552-8616. $12 online, $15 at the door. dreamtheatrecompany.com

Coffin Bangers Monster Mash Party
Reggies celebrates Halloween with an extravaganza of the most twistedly appropriate variety. Dwarves (the band, not actual dwarves, although the latter would fit right in) headline the night, laying snarling punk vocals and lots of shredding over three-chord progressions of the punk and garage varieties, albeit with much more polish. But the real treat lies in some of the openers, which include the self-described “High Priestess of Pleasure and Pain,” Miss Maya Sinstress; the Nu Ethix Suspension group; the ambiguously-gendered Pain-Kurst Girls; and Tomas the Geek Magician, who’s opened for such acts as Insane Clown Posse and Cypress Hill. Now there’s one hell of a frightening Halloween line-up.
Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. October 31. Friday, 8pm. $20, 18+. reggieslive.com

I Know What You Did Last Summer: The 2008 Residency Show
Spend the night at your favorite Co-Prosperity Sphere, hanging out with the Lumpen gang and this year’s residents at the Harold Arts organization. The Harold Arts Residency features artists and musicians, and they’re celebrating the whole week with “Harvest,” a series of gallery openings and concerts to celebrate their collective efforts, including the release of their third compilation album, “Harold 2008,” and the unveiling of “HARQ,” their brand-spanking new quarterly. The special Halloween gathering includes the work of 31 artists, performances by Slow Horse, Arctic Circle, and Lesley Flanigan, a costume contest with “celebrity judges” (what that means, only Lumpen knows), and a haunted labyrinth—which, if it’s anything like their infamous cardboard-box rocketship ride, will surely be worth the trip in itself.
Co-Prosperity Sphere, 3219-21 S. Morgan St. October 31. Friday, 6pm-6am. $6

If the shock of punk’s first eruption has faded away, alas, the first wave of bands created a simplistic model slavishly imitated for decades. By 1980, punk had become a formula: throw three chords together, get a mohawk and a scowl, and there you have it—instant rebellion. Originally about breaking down tradition, punk had acquired its own set of taboos. Toronto natives Fucked Up, who play at Reggies on Thursday, self-consciously break dozens of them, and are all the more exciting for it.

With their mix of sarcastic wit and macho brutality, they could easily have fit into the 1980s hardcore scene. Singer Pink Eyes sports a sumo wrestler’s physique, a shaved head, a vicious bark, and the conspicuous habit of losing his shirt (or shorts) at the beginning of performances. Slam dancing, crowd sing-alongs, and destruction are as vital to a Fucked Up show as the music itself.

What makes Fucked Up more than just another group of delinquents with guitars, though, is the way they repeatedly confront the values of punk rock. While they’ve recorded dozens of two-minute rippers, they’ve also recorded eighteen-minute excursions—an eternity in the world of hardcore. And what a trip these opuses are, placing glam, Krautrock, Tropicalia, the Situationist International, and Ezra Pound influences next to traditional themes about hating the police, being hated by the police, and the bleakness of postindustrial comfort. Their new record even uses a string section, once considered the ultimate form of prog rock excess, with results that are not one bit gimmicky. But even their “traditional” punk songs are subversive—take “Generations,” an unintellectual but catchy rant about nothing in particular, which makes a three-minute mockery of the very crowds that chant along. The band has even become darlings of Canadian MTV, performing in a public restroom on live television and leaving it in ruins. In early October, Fucked Up accomplished what may be their most amazing feat, playing for twelve hours to promote the release of their new record, “The Chemistry of Common Life.” It sounds more like performance art than punk, but Fucked Up have always been the punk answer to punk rock, rebelling against the mohawked establishment rather than the tie-wearing one.

Psychedelic Horseshit, three scruffy, glassy-eyed slackers from Columbus, Ohio’s swelling lo-fi scene, join Fucked Up for the Midwest leg of their tour. They’re sure to bring a few of the more traditional elements of punk to the Reggies stage: out-of-tune guitars, torn clothes, dogged indifference, and the unconditional hatred of hippies. As the story goes, the band was formed when its members somehow managed to pull themselves together in order to crash a heinous long-haired jam session, and one of their favorite tunes, “New Age Hippies,” lambastes today’s youth for blogging about the world’s problems instead of, say, rioting in the streets. It’s safe to say that their attitude is much closer to the “I hate Pink Floyd” spirit.

Psychedelic Horseshit is part of a micro-scene mockingly dubbed “shitgaze,” so named for being as murky and impenetrable as early-’90s shoegaze records, except much, much lower-fi. Layers of sloppy guitar buzz and simple, lopsided beats drown out the atonal ranting of frontman Matt Whitehurst—it’s the ideal soundtrack for sleazy hangouts in squalid, mildew-scented basements.

There’s a real commitment to this ramshackle aesthetic, to snapped strings on cheap guitars and songs recorded in the band members’ living rooms. It’s also a wildly successful sound—Psychedelic Horseshit and their cohort of shitgazers have appeared in NME, on MTV, and on countless blogs, and the last time the band performed in Chicago, the venue was so crowded that promoters had to start turning people away. Used to performing at house shows in front of groups of their friends, the musicians were visibly amused by the huge turnout. “Don’t worry, don’t worry,” Matt warned after the first song of Psychedelic Horseshit’s set, “We’re supposed to sound crappy.” But behind the disheveled cascades of amorphous guitar racket and synth buzz lurk songs much catchier than anything on commercial radio. But then, punk rock was always about having fun, too.

Reggies Rock Club, 2109 S. State St. October 2. Thursday, 6 pm. $12. reggieslive.com

Best Baozi
Chiu Quon
Simply put, Chiu Quon is a Chinese bakery par excellence. Located on Chinatown’s main drag just southwest of the Cermak Red Line stop, it does a brisk morning business with cheap dim sum and equally cheap baked goods all day. But while the dim sum is merely decent, the pastries verge on transcendent. Baozi, or Chinese buns, are clearly the main attractions. Ninety cents gets you a fist-sized hunk of breadlike dough encasing any number of savory fillings. The smoky, succulent BBQ pork is a highlight, but none of the various offerings disappoint. While lacking somewhat in variety, the bean paste-focused sweet end of the pastry spectrum is also worthwhile. In addition to custard and bean paste baozi, there’s the small, dense, and bean paste-filled seventy cent moon cakes, and best of all, sesame balls, ninety cent lumps of bean paste surrounded by a ball of fried sticky rice covered in sesame seeds. Chiu Quon is one of those rare restaurants where the bill is smaller than the CTA fare; ride a bike and use the savings on some extra buns to take home. Cash only. 2242 S. Wentworth Ave. 10am-9pm every day. (Michael Joyce)

Best Dim Sum
Shui Wah
While food is the lifeblood of Chinatown, most Chicagoans will stick to their old leanings when it comes to dim sum there—Phoenix, Three Happiness, and Happy Chef are perennial favorites. Shui Wah, located in New Chinatown north of Cermak, serves up much cheaper and equally delectable fare. Sadly, the cramped space leaves no room for jolly cart-tenders, so the conventional method of serving dim sum is eschewed in favor of cranky waiters who will be a bit slow. This is also a result of Shui Wah’s popularity (especially among Chinese), but if you bring some earplugs and scrunch your eyes, the food will speak for itself. 2162 S. Archer Ave. 8am-3pm, every day. (312)225-8811 (Lisa Bang)

Best Rock Club
Reggies
I’m going to let you in on a little secret: the owner of Reggies is not named Reggie. Maybe that’s why there’s no apostrophe. The name came about in homage to famed Green Bay Packer Reggie White…no wait, it was baseball Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson. Or maybe it was both—otherwise it’d just be called “Reggie.” The owner’s name is really Robby Glick, but he thought “Reggies” sounded cool because it added “a little shadiness.” Apparently Reggie is a shady name. But I don’t mean to make fun of the guy, because he’s got a pretty cool place here. One part record shop and music memorabilia store, one part restaurant and bar, and one part bare-bones rock’n'roll joint, Reggies has a lot going for it. Shows are incredibly diverse (previous performers include AIDS Wolf and Shonen Knife; Fucked Up plays October 23 and Danielson hits the stage November 5) and generally pretty cheap. Also, most are all ages, which is considerate, considering popular venues like the Empty Bottle are always 21+. And it’s only about two blocks from the Cermak-Chinatown Red Line stop, in an area that only continues to ride the wave of gentrification. Which is good—after all, we wouldn’t want too much shadiness. 2105-2109 S. State St. Record Breakers: 11am-11pm every day; (312)949-0125. Music Joint: Sunday-Friday 11am-2am; Saturday 11am-3am; (312)949-0120. Rock Club: open for shows; (312)949-0121. www.reggieslive.com (Gavin Fox)

Best Tea Room
Ten Ren Tea
Old Chinatown has myriad colorful signs jutting into the street competing for attention. Ten Ren Tea’s green and white Chinese characters are some of the most inviting. Step off the street into the mahogany interior, especially on a chilly day, and take in the smell of the revered brew. The store is neatly cluttered with beautiful teapots, assorted small Chinese remedies, everything from small boxes to giant urns filled with tea, and every conceivable device for the used for the production of tea. The selection covers the entire spectrum of Chinese tea from fruity hibiscus teas to the earthy pu-erh. If you’re lucky, they’ll have a couple samples. 2247 S. Wentworth Ave. Monday-Sunday, 9:30am-7pm. (312)842-1171. www.tenren.com (Ellis Calvin)

Best Country Food, if the Country You’re Referring to is China
Lao Sze Chuan
Chef Tony Hu is a bigshot. He owns three Chinese restaurants, and even used to have his own cooking show. How’d he get so big? It all started with a little restaurant called the Lao Sze Chuan. Lao, in Chinese, means “old”—Old Sze Chuan therefore refers to the “old Sze Chuan style,” Sze Chuan (or Sichuan) being Hu’s hometown province. As hometowns tend to do, Sichuan left a lasting impression on Hu, and in his homesickness here in America he decided to recapture the flavor of the meals of his homeland. With most Chinese restaurants here in America, the preparations are done in Chinese style, but the ingredients come from a variety of places closer by, from which they’re often easier and cheaper to ship. But Hu would have none of that. He prepares his Sze Chuan cuisine with authentic ingredients straight from Sichuan. It’s a strategy that’s paid off handsomely—Lao Sze Chuan has been so successful, he’s gone on to open Lao Beijing and Lao Shanghai. It just goes to show: you can’t beat good old home cooking. Lao Sze Chuan: 2172 S. Archer Ave. 11am-midnight every day. (312)326-5040. Lao Beijing: 2138 S. Archer Ave. Sunday-Thursday 11am-10pm; Friday-Saturday 11am-11:30pm. (312)881-0168. Lao Shanghai: 2163 S. China Pl. Sunday-Thursday 11am-10pm; Friday-Saturday 11am-11pm. (312)808-0830. tonygourmetgroup.com (Sean Redmond)