Happy Birthday Mary!

All the best, Mary.
May this be your best year ever..

STO LAT

You can leave your birthday wishes for Mary in the comments section.

PS - And a Happy Halloween

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GREG!

Greg, wishing you a wonderful day and year.
May your tee times always be accomodating, your fairways fairly straight, and your putts generally easy.

STO LAT!

You can leave you birthday wishes for Greg in the comments section.

Music in Chicago’s South Suburbs

I’ve been wanting to write about this for a while now, since I reside in the southwest suburbs and have always been a southsider. Through the years, members of VAL have lived all over the Chicagoland area, and our current “home base” is still at THE LOVE DEN in Portage Park (near Addison and Cicero). Nonetheless, I have been some decent south suburban live venues make a run at it. I wanted to give them some mention. They treat their original indie acts with respect, and reward a good night’s set with honest door money.

Lot 4 in Chicago Ridge has been hosting local original bands for a few years now, and they have upgraded their stage, sound, and also have an outdoor beer garden with an acoustic stage as well. It’s a pretty large room, and quite impressive.

Champs Rock Room in Burbank has been around for a long time. They moved to a larger, better location only a few years ago. They are set up with a bar in front and a separate room for music in the back. This allows their regulars to hang at the bar without dealing with a cover, and preserving a quiet place to go during band breaks.

O’Malleys in Alsip has been a staple on the southside for a while. They have a professional stage, lights and sound. It’s one of the first southside venues that VAL played.

Any great indie bands out there looking for venues in the southland, contact the clubs directly. There is always a plethora of harder-edged bands down south and it’s great to see more variety entering the scene.

Music News

The Killers will release another album on NOV 13th.
It’s not a proper follow-up to SAMS TOWN, but a collection of B-sides, and other outtakes.
It’ll probably be great.
Details from CMJ here.



Check out the Pitchfork review of IN RAINBOWS by Radiohead.
They hit the proverbial nail on the radiohead.

Radiohead have f-you money

You may have already heard that the new Radiohead Album will be available at whatever price YOU SET.
Kinda like a donation to the cause.

You see, Radiohead can do this becuase they have a devoted fan base, exceptional music, and have recently completed their commitment to their record label. They are also pretty well off at this point. In short - THEY CAN DO WHATEVER THE HELL THEY WANT.
It's got to be a great place to be.

And, they will still make money. The cost of putting those songs online is minimal.
I bet the cost to make the songs was minimal (they are smart studio guys in their own right).
And now they will have a flood of fans (world wide) paying a few bucks here and there, some paying more, some paying less. I venture to say that most people would be very comfortable giving $10 for the album. Calculate that to about a million in sales worldwide, and you do the math.

PS - their last few albums have gone multi-platinum

An article on the subject from TIME Mag is here .

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARK!

An original VAL Army member, contributor to the Message board and THE BRUTHA.

Have a wonderful birthday bro!

STO LAT

You can leave your birthday wishes for Mark in the comments section.