WBEZ 91.5 Chicago

Unlike many cancelations yesterday, snow wasn’t to blame for the second Chicago Liquor Control Commission hearing on the troubled Congress Theater being rescheduled to March 26.

Controversial venue owner Erineo “Eddie” Carranza has switched lawyers for the second time in seven months, and his latest attorney—number three in the series representing him on several fronts with city agencies—requested more time from Deputy Hearings Commissioner Robert Nolan to get up to speed on the case.

Nolan granted the request over the objection of assistant corporation counsel Maggie Shiels, who is pursuing five city charges against the Congress for violations that could cause the revocation of its liquor license. The Congress also is involved in Deleterious Impact/Public Nuisance Hearings with the Department of Business Affairs and a case involving 37 code violations with the Building Department.

Carranza initially was represented by Homero Tristan, a politically connected lawyer who had served as Chicago Commissioner of Human Resources before he resigned following charges of public misconduct from the city’s Inspector General.

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Launched last month but continuing through the end of March, the Oak Park Public Library, 834 Lake Street, is hosting an ambitious serious of film screenings, discussions and live performances celebrating “America’s Music.” (The temple to literature in the town Ernest and Frank Lloyd made famous is one of 50 across the country to receive a grant funding this worthy endeavor.)

Noting this news here partly is self-serving: Tonight, this blogger will participate in a chat entitled “Who Needs Gatekeepers? Music Criticism in the Digital Age” with Val Camilletti of the legendary Val's Halla Records. (The fun starts at 7 p.m. in the Main Library Veteran’s Room, and admission is free.) But this is far from the only noteworthy event.

My Columbia College Chicago English Department colleague, friend and celebrated jazzbo George Bailey has been leading discussions of some great music films on Tuesday nights at 7 as part of the series.

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Does Chicago finally have an office of the sort that champions local sounds and facilitates the music community’s interactions with city government in lesser burgs such as Austin, Memphis, Nashville, San Francisco, Seattle and Portland?

Maybe, though the folks staffing it aren’t calling it that yet, and they’ve done very little so far to make anyone aware of it.

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Following in its tradition of surprisingly gullible and shortsighted reporting on Chicago’s most troubled music venue, DNAinfo.com declared in a headline yesterday that “Congress Theater Owner Wants Venue Restored to Its 1920s Glory,” adding in the lede of the story: “The days may be numbered for anyone who loves to complain about the dismal bathrooms.”

Well, controversial venue owner Erineo “Eddie” Carranza may indeed want the historic theater restored to its prime. But as is made clear in the city Building Department’s ongoing legal proceedings against him, which cite a daunting list of 37 violations, he’s got a long way to go to get there.

In fact, city inspectors recently ordered the Congress closed to the public for eight days, from Jan. 31 to Feb. 7, because of the lack of quick-release “panic bars” on exit doors—a situation that proved fatal during the notorious stampede at the E2 Nightclub in 2003.

Furthermore, the violations on the upper levels of the building have resulted in the second and third floors being sealed off to concertgoers.

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Reviewing the debut release by Weezer approximately a million years ago—O.K., it was 1994—I noted the similarities between the cover of the so-called “blue album” and that of Crazy Rhythms by the Feelies. Interesting, to be sure, but more important as far as the music was concerned, “Weezer has more in common with the late, lamented Big Dipper, another group of slacker wise guys that you just had to love,” I concluded.

Who, you may ask? Ah, kiddies, those vaunted indie-rock ’80s were a time of seemingly boundless if chronically underappreciated riches, with countless groups beyond the better-known likes of Dinosaur, Jr. or the Pixies amply worthy of your newfound attention or overdue rediscovery. The Boston quartet Big Dipper places high on the list in that regard, and the group in recent years has offered two valuable points of entry.

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While we mourn the death of any great artist, some losses hit harder than others. Though they ultimately are but a footnote in rock history, the Troggs are a brilliant footnote—an indispensible high point between the British Invasion and punk rock. A band of single-minded originals, they remain immortal to anyone who’s heard them, despite the death from cancer of singer and songwriter Reg Presley at the age of 71 on Feb. 4.

Presley was the most unlikely of rock stars. Born Reginald Ball in the nowheresburg of Andover in southern England, he was working as a bricklayer when he formed the band. He essentially had one subject as a lyricist—frustrated teenage lust, not a bad topic for Valentine’s Day—and a rudimentary knowledge of music and composition; there are perhaps a half dozen chords utilized in most of the band’s canon.

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