This weeks edition of the filter sees a techno-heavy Friday in Chicago, led by an appearance at Smartbar from FUNCTION of Sandwell District fame, as well an appearance from Dialated Peoples turntablist extraordinaire DJ BABU at the Shrine. Our pick of the weekend comes courtesy of the fine selectors at A Love Supreme, as they […]

By this point, you’ve undoubtedly seen the onslaught of hype behind the massive  Spring Awakening taking over Soldier Field this weekend. As their touting of the current prevalence of “EDM” is in good hands, this weeks quick edition of The Filter pays heed to a couple other noteworthy events, notably Neo Soul songstress Jill Scott […]

With the City launching their new FREE “Loops and Variations” series in Millennium Park, we’ve decided to run a special Thursday edition of the filter  (We’ll still be running with our standard Friday- Sunday Picks on June 8th). It’s been approximately 10 years since we’ve last seen Chris Clark here for a Warp records tour appearance […]

The work-in-progress that is The Filter continues during this unusually spring-like start of June. The usual house and techno fix is fed with some residual stateside performances from DEMF and Mutek artists, and the street fests are in full swing as well, making their presence felt with some neat performances at Do-Division. For our pick of […]

Those subscribers to the early Meiotic newsletters back in 2002-2003 will recall our Chicago event recommendation email signatures, and our linking to m50’s local event page (which he still keeps up to this day), as well as to the old Modsquare site, amongst others. With the slew of attention that electronic music has garnered over the past […]

Well hello sir; it’s good to see you again.It seems like just yesterday that one of our all time favorite guests  during the YFL and JACKSON era of shows – one Mr. Alfred Darlington, aka  DAEDELUS – graced us with a virtuoso monome performance in signature dandied-out attire. The Los Angeles based Darlington – whose prolific output over […]

Longtime Perlon staple Sammy Dee returns to Chicago with his new label Ultrastrech in tow as he makes his debut appearance at the venerable SmartBar.

Culturally inclined Chicago music patrons can breathe a sigh of relief; the schedule for the Lunchbreak Music Series at Millennium Park’s Jay Pritzker Pavilion is out, and though the fall/winter reorganization at the CCC was cause for a certain amount of concern, this news coupled with New Music Mondays schedule all but confirms a smooth transition of duties from the former Department of Cultural Affairs to the Chicago Office of Tourism and Culture.

It’s hard to believe it’s been eight years since we booked Matthew Dear for his first solo gig in Chicago back in 2003, just after his first Jabberjaw single was released on Perlon. He had actually dj’d here as part of a couple Ghostly tours in 2001 and 2002, so we had hoped for a live performance, however Matt’s PA wasn’t tweaked to where he was performing it out on a regular basis.

Since we typically have cobwebs and fog from NYE strolling about our brains for a couple weeks after ringing the new year in, we figured several things to be probable truths:

1. There are others who would likely be in the same blurry position.
2. It would be quite nice to get said others together for a quaint and cozy night of warm beats and libations in a not-so-clubby-or-basementy environment.

When Rajko Müller’s BEAU MOT PLAGE (Playhouse) was released to an unsuspecting public in 1998 under his ISOLÉE moniker, little did he know that it would cement him in electronic music lore amongst house and techno connoisseurs worldwide…

Since the early nineties, Jochem Paap (the Rotterdam artist owes the nickname Speedy J to his DJ skills) has been unanimously considered to be one of the first techno producers to come from the Benelux. Together with people like Laurent Garnier, Aphex Twin and Richie Hawtin he helped raising the genre just after it had escaped the Detroit delivery room. He comes to Chicago for one of three exclusive North American dates…

Meiotic, In Your System, and Peoplemuver present the second in the EXPOSITION music and art series featuring the highly acclaimed experimental electronic minimalist composer/producer THOMAS BRINKMANN.

Alongside Mike Ink, the Basic Channel collective and Pole, Thomas Brinkmann is one of the leaders in the ongoing German-born study of isolationist dub-inspired techno.

In celebration of the Chicago arrival of Sonar – Barcelona, Spain’s highly esteemed festival for Advanced Music and Multimedia Art – three longtime Chicago staples (Abstract Science, In Your System and Meiotic) invite you to the SECRET SON@R gallery presentation and musical exposition.

This late breaking exclusive features none other than the world renown techno juggernaut ROMAN FLÜGEL.

“Being an integral part of the Detroit dance scene, he was the man behind the legendary Record Time store and as such gathered an encyclopedic knowledge of music. Mike is one of those rare guys who know all the roots and culture of electronic dance music, who see beyond the hype and divisions in the scene and know exactly what this music is.”

The master of the Chicago via San Fran sound is back! MARK FARINA returns to Chicago this Wednesday for a special midweek throwdown at EvilOlive. Check for full details on the facebook event page!

“All music is essentially a borrowed language; indebted to its forebears, but dependent on those who care about it to expand and perpetuate it. With all this in mind, Borrowed Language, a new label not based out of any city in particular, seeks to give something back

Allay Soul (I <3 House Wednesdays) celebrates 5 years of bringing the Chicago get-down this Wednesday with the mad genius that is Detroit's THEO PARRISH. Unlimited by the simplistic boundaries of genre...