Final Night of Buddy Guy’s January…

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Ken Sumka runs down his top 21 shows of 2011 — complete with videos! What was your #1 show of the year? Tell us below, or on Facebook. Read More From Ken Sumka & Watch Video Of Each Show

2011 Lollapalooza Line UpIt was the Summer of 93 (XRT) and while there was only one Chicago band playing the sidestage of Lollapalooza (The Coctails) Chicago’s Urge Overkill were well represented as the sound engineers played their Saturation album (loudly) between EVERY mainstage act. It was almost as if they were there.

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It was right around the first of the year, the time when bands and artists announce their spring and summer tours. A time when, deep in the throes of winter’s doldrums, we dream of warmer days ahead; perhaps walking to work from the “L” without several layers of space-age fabrics protecting us, baseball teams not mathematically eliminated from post-season contention and the days when we have to make the Sophie’s choice: which show to go to when choices are abundant. As the show announcements came fast and furious, the third week of May was shaping up to be unbeatable; like a Cubs/Cards weekend series, a rapid succession of can’t miss shows.

First was Paul Simon, doing two dates: a big show at the palatial Chicago Theatre, then he announced a second date, the night before at the considerably smaller Vic Theatre.  Echo & the Bunnymen realized the 30th Anniversary of their debut had come and gone, so they decided to tour in celebration of that milestone by performing ‘Crocodiles’ and ‘Heaven Up Here’, front-to-back. Then, Elvis Costello announced that he was reprising his ‘revolving songbook’ concept, which had a successful run in Chicago back in 1986. And the Cars broke a nearly 25 year hiatus and were not only releasing a new record but hitting the road. And as it happened, those four bands/artists were all playing the same week!

Could it be done? See each of those shows in a single week? Read on…Watch Video & Read More From Ken Sumka

While I do love the CBS Tuesday night drama The Good Wife, starring Julianna Margulies (who by now is an honorary Chicagoan, given her ER and The Good Wife credentials) I do have a bone to pick with its’ Chicago setting. Sure they use the Cook County seal, the Chicago Police wear real CPD unis and reference Chicago locales, but not a single frame is shot in the 312 or 773 area code, it’s all done in New York. Even ER just shot a few short outdoor scenes here, the bulk of it was done at the Warner Bros lot in Burbank. Very few shows shoot everything in one place.

As of last week, you can now watch two shows that are set in and star the ‘City That Works’: The Chicago Code and Cash Cab: Chicago. Both shows are shot entirely in Chicago and make our city look good and put a lot of hard-working Chicagoans to work in front of and behind the camera.Read More From Ken Sumka & Watch Video

We’re barely into the second month of 2011 and I’ve already seen a show that will be tough to beat as best show of the year for me: Cheap Trick at the Northern Lights Theater at Potawatomi Casino in Milwaukee. Cheap Trick already did the ‘perform an album in its’ entirety’ concept way back in 1998 when they did their first four albums over four nights at Metro, chronicled on their “Music For Hangovers” live CD and a featured performance by XRT’s own Lin Brehmer on “On The Radio” found on the ONXRT, Live From the Archives Volume 4.Read More From Ken Sumka & Watch Video

I don’t know about you but having lived in or around Chicago almost all my life, I’m way too used to flooding basements.  My first time was in the Mid 1980′s, living in Glen Ellyn, Illinois.  We came back early from a Northwoods vacation when we heard from neighbors that our neighborhood had been hard-hit and our basement had a few feet of water.  The first thing I saw was my drum kit floating on the water, it’s a sinking feeling you never quite get used to.

Twenty-five years later and many basement floods later, the feeling I got last Saturday morning when I looked outside was unchanged, I looked out to the street and didn’t see pavement, only water.  I didn’t even need to go downstairs to know we had water down there, it was only a matter of how much.  It ended up being 6-8″ in spots.  We spent most of Saturday pumping it out and all day Sunday cleaning up the mess.

We didn’t lose much this time around but have lost plenty in past floods, so those of you who lost a lot, I feel your pain.  One pain I cannot imagine is that of some friends/old neighbors who had 8′ (yes, FEET) of water in their basement from a June flood, lost everything they had in their finished basement and were well along their way to restoring it when this weekend’s storm hit.  Despite installing massive safeguards to prevent this from recurring, they were inundated with floodwater.  No matter how bad you got hit, someone always has it worse and yet some are spared.

Oh, that drum kit of mine that was floating back in the 80′s, it was floating this time round too, it survived then and survived this time too.more

One of the great pleasures of parenthood is reliving your childhood through your child.  Our one-year-old little girl really enjoys Sesame Street.  Now being that young, she doesn’t ‘get’ everything on the show: the spelling, the counting, the vocabulary, etcetera.  However, she does enjoy the music, the colorful characters and the dancing. She loves the dancing.more

April is usually a time when we begin anew with baseball on both sides of town.  And yes, baseball is afoot in Chicago, it’s just that our boys in blue and black are floundering, both teams are below .500 as May approaches.  Our Bulls were just recently outmatched by the Cleveland Cavs, ending their playoff run and season.  One team that’s red-hot in Chicago and has been all season is our Chicago Blackhawks. more

It began in June of 2007, when arguably the best ‘heavy’ in television history left the small screen forever: Tony Soprano ate his last onion ring in a diner with his family.  It’s still open for discussion what exactly happened to The Soprano family but we do know we’ll never see them on television again.  Then, last year Vic Mackey of F/X’s ‘The Shield’, met with an equally ambiguous end, the cop/thug left the force and–gasp–took a desk job, a fate maybe even worse than death for a man whose moral compass was always stuck on the wrong side of virtue.  Whether he was killing a fellow cop (in Episode 1, no less) stealing from the Armenian mob, or picking on “Dutch” Wagenbach, Vic Mackey was a compelling anti-hero we hated to love.more

Ken has radio in the blood. He has worked on-air in one capacity or another for over twenty-five years. His humble beginning was at 10-watt WGHS 88.5, a station located on the 7th floor of Glenbard West High School, where he first heard and spun the likes of R.E.M., The Smiths, The Replacements and Joy Division in the early 1980’s. more