In the Loop

The band Tangleweed has been around for more than a decade, and over that time, their music has evolved. Heavily influenced by traditional American music, they’ve played bluegrass, old-timey, and jazz.  Several years ago, guitarist Scott Judd had a life-changing experience in the Sahara desert where he played with and learned from West African musicians. Now the “desert blues” is part of the band’s repertoire. They stopped by the Morning Shift to talk and play ahead of a CD release show at the Old Town School of Folk Music this Friday.

For months, U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk said he would write-in former CIA Director David Petraeus for president. This week, Kirk backed off that stance during an interview on WBEZ's Morning Shift. Kirk remains in a tight race with U.S. Rep. Tammy Duckworth in his bid for reelection.

We speak to Hal Weitzman, the Chicago Booth Review's editor-in-chief, about the quarterly publication's December cover story. It’s called "Advice for the Next President: Fifteen of America’s Top Thinkers Offer Their Ideas For How America Can Grow Faster, Stay Safer and Work Better."

Nico Deportago-Cabrera is no stranger to the streets of Chicago. The bike messenger, and Logan Square resident has spent the last eight years clocking insane travel times around the city: 30 minutes from downtown to Evanston, 18 minutes from the Willis Tower to Wrigley Field. He’s even been named the fastest bike messenger on the continent.  In the latest installment in our Working Shift series, we talk to Deportago-Cabrera about why he became a bike messenger, his record times, the Chicago biking scene and more.

Here at the Morning Shift we ask the important questions: Like, “why is everything ‘lit?’” Every generation is known to create their own slang terms to communicate. But millennials are growing up with Twitter and Tumblr at their fingertips and new internet terms seem to pop up daily. With the holiday’s approaching, we want to help our listeners decode the teenage-speak they will hear at the dinner table. Morning Shift talks with Kevin Smith, an editor at Buzzfeed and Jonathon Green, a lexicographer and author of Green’s Dictionary of Slang, about the history of slang terms and why you need to know what ‘woke’ means. 

The Radio Hall of Famer always said he want to be on the air until the very end, and that’s exactly what happened. Kent passed away at the age of 88, just a few hours after he signed off from his weekly radio show on V103. We’ll talk about “The Cool Gent” aka “The King of the Dusties” with his long-time friend, WBEZ and Vocalo’s own Richard Steele.

In the world of sports, you’ve got your official sponsors and your unofficial sponsors. Official sponsors — like American Airlines for the Chicago Cubs — pay millions upon millions of dollars to tie their brand to a team. Unofficial sponsors pay nothing, but still try to hitch their wagons to the train leaving the station, sometimes running afoul of the law in the process. Morning Shift talks to Crain’s Chicago Business reporter Danny Ecker, who covers the business of sports, about what official and unofficial sponsors of the Cubs are doing in the lead-up to the World Series. 

What constitutes fine art? That question is at the heart of a battle over which businesses in Cook County should have to pay an amusement tax of 3 percent on ticket and cover charges. Late this summer, an administrative hearing officer said that rock, rap and DJ sets do not count as fine art, a designation which makes performances exempt from the tax. That opened the door to taxing many smaller venues to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars. A final decision is expected in December. Morning Shift talks to WBEZ’s Dan Weissmann about the latest hearing on the issue, which took place Monday, and on the current state of the battle between venues and Cook County.

WBEZ sports contributor Cheryl Raye-Stout discusses what it will take for the Cubs to win the World Series.

Morning Shift takes a peak at how newsrooms decide what images to show when covering violent conflicts.