Jack Riedy

@jackriedy.com

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Raw Deal out now jackriedy.com

mock-up of Pitchfork blurb for Jack Riedy's Raw Deal
Dismal record aside, da Bears are holding prime real estate in the northwestern suburbs hostage as a bargaining chip to weasel billions out of the city and state for a new stadium no one needs. Part of me hopes they move so that the city is spared the traffic and my parents can cash in on increased property values out in the burbs, but I know that the whiniest Chicagoans would find a way to blame "losing the Bears" on the teachers union.
Readers of the Reader’s music coverage should recognize the name Jack Riedy: He’s been publishing terrific, out-of-the-box stories about Chicago music in this very paper since 2018. Riedy is not only a talented writer but also a musician with a keen ear for irreverent indie pop. His March album, Raw Deal, lassos together rubbery funk bass lines, leaping jabs of ska guitar, and effervescent keys into unexpected arrangements that animate Riedy’s rambunctious melodies. On Saturday, August 2, Riedy and his backing band, the Dealbreakers, headline the downstairs space at Subterranean; Oux and Jon E. Keez open. Tickets cost $17.78 in advance, and the show starts at 7:30 PM.
That kind of attitude toward the world, I am ever more convinced, is the ultimate industrial output of capitalism. Whatever is not happening spontaneously, whatever is not driving a gold-rush frenzy among greed monsters, whatever is not obviously an effective means for selfishly motivated individuals to gather wealth to themselves, cannot happen. If it could happen, the rich would be starting up companies to do it; there would be an Apple of it, a Microsoft of it, an Amazon of it. If there are not those, then it is a pipe dream; everybody is too busy and harried and living on margins too thin to concern themselves with pipe dreams, to take on work that necessarily will take generations to complete, to extend our purposes out beyond the scope of narrow self-interest. Even the question of whether that's by design or simply a very lucky coincidence for the already-rich and the already-powerful isn't worth thinking about, because there's nothing to do about it in either case.
excerpt from a Vulture interview with Ravyn Lenae: "How has the energy changed at your shows as the song has blown up? Right now, I can look in the crowd and see exactly how it’s divided up. I see the die-hard fans who’ve been there since Crush or Moon Shoes. I see the people who’ve just discovered Bird’s Eye and are a fan of that album and are curious about my live performance. Then I see people who have heard only “Love Me Not” and know my name from that song; they’re a little skeptical. Sometimes they put their phone up with “Play ‘Love Me Not’” on their head. I like having to win them over. I like that challenge, and I like this period for me. I know my power onstage and what music I have coming out next, too."
In addition to reading all the “Ironheart” comics she could get her hands on, Thorne knew that she wanted to strive for authenticity, not caricature, when portraying a young Black girl from the South Side. One of the first things she tried to nail was the Chicago accent. “I watched a lot of Chicago YouTube girlies doing their vlogs, going to the mall or doing their makeup,” Thorne shared. “I listened to a lot of interviews of Chicago rapper Queen Key as well … I also listened to Black female Chicago professors … I wanted to hear a range of black women from Chicago and think about how their experiences affect their dialect and how that, in turn, could affect Riri.”
Oh, sure. But yeah the Stones… People in my neighborhood were calling me Mick for a while because all I was listening to was the Stones. Some Girls, that’s the record I really liked. I really liked disco as a younger kid when I was growing up in Chicago, in the South Side. I used to dance in the kitchen. Then all the sudden it became uncool. “Disco sucks!” Some part of me was like, “I wish it was cool to dance again”. I think that whole movement was started by guys who couldn’t dance. [Laughs.] When I heard Some Girls, that was the Stones acknowledging disco was cool, and it made rock ‘n’ roll sexy and danceable again. It was life-affirming that the Stones did that.
When writing this, I have thought often of Kendrick’s verse on the remix to Future’s “Mask Off,” in which Kung Fu Kenny declares “Prince live through me.” The very act of saying such a thing represents a fundamental misunderstanding of Prince’s whole deal. If anything, Future in the mid-2010s, or Wayne in the late 2000s, or Cam’Ron before him, were way closer to the second coming of Prince, a freaky-ass individual who shattered the mold with a paradigm-shattering combination of virtuosity and free association with the confidence to disregard what came before and break new ground.
ack Sweeney was on tour with Sly Stone, and business was slow. His Chicago-based seven-piece, One Eyed Jacks, had accepted a job as the erratic pop star’s backing band in late 1982. Long past his Woodstock-era prime, Stone had all but abandoned live performance seven years earlier. He was now attempting a comeback via small club shows, playing a series of one-night stands. One Eyed Jacks were used to gigging six nights a week on their own. When Stone was booked on Late Night With David Letterman, Sweeney encouraged him to pitch more performances. “I told Sly ten times, ‘When you go on Letterman, tell them we’re looking for work!’” Sweeney says. In response, Stone gave out Sweeney’s home phone number on national television. Sweeney definitely hadn’t expected that—but then again, he hadn’t expected to be living and touring with the former superstar in the first place.
flyer for Spread Joy / Artificial Go / Clickbait show at Burlington Bar on 4/4, with Jack Riedy DJing in the bar