I've decided to add a new category to Double Time Feel. I felt like there are so many bands that have been influential to the development of the music scene in Chicago, and they need to be recognized. The bands I'll mention here are no longer together, but in my opinion were vital to the history of music in Chicago. If you have any suggestions for such bands, I'm open to your thoughts.

I'd been thinking about making this a weekly contribution for quite some time, but it never gained much momentum because of everything else I already feel like I'm not getting to that is current. However, when I saw that Trenchmouth started a myspace music page, I jumped at the chance to get the ball rolling.

Trenchmouth were undoubtedly in a class of their own. There may have been a very distinct "Chicago" sound through the 80's/early 90's, but Trenchmouth redefined those boundaries and infused a very different set of influences in their sound. As with a lot of these early bands, I completely missed out on the live experience, but when you go back and listen to the Chicago punk bands of the day, such as Articles of Faith, Naked Raygun, Effigies, etc., it's pretty easy to distinguish what they were going for. Trenchmouth took that ethos and expounded on it, exploring territory that may have caught most 'punks' of the time off-guard.

I could go on and on, but instead I'll direct you to the myspace link where you can check out all sorts of stuff, including a great live video captured at Emo's in Austin, TX back in 1992. As dopey as the myspace world can be sometimes, I do think its a great resource to get a decent snapshot of a band, and it's good to see that bands from back in the day are starting to surface, whether by fans or the musicians themselves.

Whaddya' know, Chicago Public Radio gets two posts in a row! On my commute to work this morning, I caught an interesting segment on Eight Forty-Eight about a new documentary that explores the Chicago punk scene from 1977 to 1984. Entitled You Weren't There, the film covers bands such as Naked Raygun, Strike Under, Effigies, and Articles of Faith. It also goes on to explain how venues opened up around Chicago that gave these bands the opportunity to be heard. In fact, it still boggles my mind that the Cubby Bear, perhaps as punk rock as the Pope, used to be a hotbed for punk shows.

Check out the radio interview with the producers, and visit their Myspace page for more information on the screening of the film, as well as a "surprise show" that will be held at the Beat Kitchen.