Aug 21, 2013
I first saw Jeff Austin walk on stage at the Abbey Pub in 1999. There must have been about 20 people in the audience and, oddly, it seemed like about half of them were related to the guy. He huddled around a single microphone with his cohorts in Yonder Mountain String Band and delivered a set of...
May 30, 2013
Another Summer Camp is in the books. Despite the many many festivals hosted in these parts during the summer, and and its sometimes schizophrenicbookings. it's still the closest think we have to Chicago to a major jamband festival. We'll even forgive them for taking place in the late spring. In the week since the festival...
Mar 20, 2013
Buzzfeed recently reported on a curious feature that Google offers as a part of its Google Drive (formerly Google Docs) product. Many spreadsheet jockeys have been known to start a series in the first two cells of a worksheet (e.g. Days Of The Week, Months of the Year, etc.) and use the autofill feature...
Nov 24, 2012
Contributed by: Chris MurtaughIt was a family affair at Chicago's Vic Theater on Black Friday. Following a turkey stuffed evening, Cornmeal returned to Chicago for their annual holiday show, a homecoming of sorts for the band and presumably many in attendance. With the departure of the Nowak brothers announced in late summer, I was interested...
Oct 24, 2012
On their recent swing through Chicago, two members of Yonder Mountain String Band, bassist Ben Kaufmann and guitarist Adam Aijala, dropped by Chicago Music Exchange to try their hand at some of the store's inventory of classic instruments. Kaufmann is excited to try an Ampeg double bass, claiming this is the second time in his...
Oct 21, 2012
Lots of great reports coming in from this one... Check out videos for The Beatles' "Hey Bulldog" and "40 Miles From Denver" below. Night two at the HOBYonder Mountain String BandOctober 20th, 2012House Of Blues - Chicago, ILSet OneUp On The Hill Where They Do The Boogie, Roll On Blues, Trophe, Idaho, Don't Worry, Happy Birthday,...
Oct 20, 2012
Jam filled night in Chicago with Trey and Yonder playing a few short blocks from another. Check out the video below where Jeff dedicates a tune to his new friend Phil Lesh.Yonder Mountain String BandOctober 19th, 2012House Of Blues - Chicago, ILSet OneTrain bound for Gloryland > Sideshow Blues, Fingerprint, Rag Doll, Spanish Harlem,...
Sep 15, 2012
Update 9/20 with band lineupIt certainly seemed like TAB was going to make a habit of hitting Chicago's Riveria Theater in February. After two wildly successful and stylistically diverse shows in 2010 and 2011, we were let down when a winter tour wasn't routed through here in 2012 -- and even more disappointed when Phish avoided Chicago during this...
May 11, 2012
The 30db / Van Ghost pairing was just one of the many inspired double (sometime triple & quadruple) bills that the Abbey Pub has been programming lately and certainly one of the most high profile, considering the national prominence of the artists involved, yet a strong sense of Chicago hung in the air all night. This...
Feb 22, 2012
This feature has been updated (February 2012) since its original publication in April of 2010. I swapped out the ninth band and added some honorable mentions. The remainder of the text remains largely untouched.We can crank up the amplifiers and layer on the production, but the acoustic guitar -- natural and authentic -- just isn't going...