Monday Afternoon Quick Fix runs every Monday afternoon to showcase the best of Chicago music news, views and stories from around the interwebs and blogosphere that we might have missed.

• • The Chicago Reader’s Peter Margasak muses on whether pop-up record stores, such as those by Numero Group and Hot Jams, held on Record Store Day have an adverse effect on permanent brick and mortar shops. Additionally, Saki Records’ Patrick Monaghan explains why Numero’s pop-up, held at the Empty Bottle this year, is unfair competition on a day that is designed to celebrate indie record stores.
• • The Congress Theater saga continues. Last week, Chicago Pipeline posted a letter from Rhys Pareja, the promoter of the Twista, King Louie and Chief Keef show that was interrupted by a large police presence earlier this month. Pareja alleges that the two-hour interruption from the police barricade of North Milwaukee Avenue cost him $75,000. Additionally, local CAPS volunteer Joe Kopera has resigned in part due to how the incident was handled by First Ward Alderman Joe Moreno and Chicago Police. In a letter to the community, posted by Chicago Pipeline, he called Chief Keef’s booking “a smoke screen for police action.”

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Chicago’s Future Hits prove that music geared toward elementary school students doesn’t have to suck

The band, which formed in Summer 2011, features three notables in Chicago’s music and education scene. Matt Baron is a Chicago Public School ESL teacher and booker/manager of the excellent scene documenters Coach House Sounds, Emma Hospelhorn of Chicago’s New Millennium Orchestra and garage poppers Hollows and Columbia College Associate Professor of Audio Arts Ben Sutherland.

The songs of Future Hits are, per their website, “written specifically for elementary-aged students but can be enjoyed by folks of all ages, also include differentiated assessments, activities and lesson plans, all of which can be used inside and outside of a school setting.”

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Sonoi dropped by WBEZ’s Eight Forty-Eight on Monday to rock a track from their latest, Tropics Of Holland. The Chicago indie-pop trio performed the slow burning number “Cotton” that offers some warm, shimmering guitar play over a minimalistic rhythm while Adam Busch’s croon nearly gives the song a tribal quality. While Tropics Of Holland has been on Sonoi’s Bandcamp since November, the official release goes down this Thursday, March 15, at The Hideout, and tickets are available now. In the meantime, watch their WBEZ jam sesh below:

TODAY IS OUR INDEPENDENCE DAY.

And by that I mean, we survived a digital alien invasion to bring you a very special SXSW edition of Weekend Diversions. Won’t you follow me…follow me to freedom?

Yes. Yes, you will.

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We’ve been anxiously awaiting music from E+, a new project featuring members of Disappears, Heavy Times and Verma, and finally today our anxiety has been quenched.

Last week the band announced on their Facebook that they’ve completed work on a new EP, which was recorded by The Ponys/Bare Mutauts/Football member Jered Gummere. And today, the band unleashed the first song from those recording sessions, “Too Many Voices.”

“Too Many Vices” is a well crafted exercise in neo-psychedelia. The song rolls along Luca Cimarusti’s (Heavy Times) skin tight rhythm as bursts of new wave synths and cathartic guitar are littered throughout. Together with Damon J. Carruesco’s (Disappears) spacey vocals, “Too Many Vices” recalls something that would satisfy fans of both Joy Division’s dark post-punk and MGMT’s more atmospheric material. Listen to the track after the jump.

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Monday Afternoon Quick Fix runs every Monday afternoon to showcase the best of Chicago music news, views and stories from around the interwebs and blogosphere that we might have missed.

• • The Reader’s Miles Raymer breaks the news that there’s more to Tumblr than porn and Futurama memes; there’s also a music movement brewing with ties to Chicago called “Sea Punk.”
• • Brooklyn Vegan Chicago alerts us to the news that Dixie Square Mall in Harvey – made famous in the 1980 movie The Blues Brothers is set to be demolished.
• • Chicagoist provided us with this killer review of Portlandia: The Tour‘s recent stop at the Hideout. Surprise guests included Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy’s two sons Sammy and Spencer, The Mekons’ singer Sally Timms, and Eternals’ frontman Damon Locks.
• • The Tribune braved Friday’s gnarly weather to review The Kills’ gig at The Riviera. Sounds like it was well-worth the frost bite.
• • Time Out Chicago’s Brent DiCrescenzo isn’t afraid to kick Lana Del Rey when she’s down, and does so in what is likely the best-written indictment against the singer.

Dastardly | Photo by Tiela Halpin

From their raucous live performances to their elaborate music videos, it doesn’t take much media consumption to figure out that the members of Dastardly are pretty cool customers. The Americana outfit craft soulful harmonies around rich, heartfelt storytelling and playful rhythms. The group’s debut EP May You Never… was somewhere between Elliott Smith and light-hearted bluegrass. Since then, the band has moved into a house together, pulled off a musical variety hour at The Hideout that absolutely slayed and recorded a follow-up that sounds grown-up, but still knows how to amuse.

If 2011 was busy, expect 2012 to be jam-packed for the band. Dastardly releases Bury Me in the Country on January 31, but the band celebrates the album’s release tonight at Lincoln Hall with friends Brighton, Ma, and Santah.

Loud Loop Press caught up with Dastardly’s frontman Gabe Liebowitz to steal his storytelling secrets and to discover what brand of bourbon he consumes most often.

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