Carrot Top Records Around The Country

Many Carrot Top Records artists have taken it upon themselves to play shows in the next few days.
Friday, 10/26 (TONIGHT) :: The Handsome Family :: Engine House Theater :: Madrid, New Mexico
Saturday, 10/27 :: Antietam :: Hank's Saloon :: Brooklyn, NY
Sunday, 10/28 :: Wee Hairy Beasties :: The Hideout :: Chicago, IL :: 4pm Kids 8pm Adults
Monday, 10/29 :: Speck Mountain :: Township :: Chicago, IL :: w. Companion

Wee Scary Beasties- Creepy Lullabies

Have a kid you wanna subtly morph into a knowledgable little son of a gun with good music taste and a knack for vinyl? Even if the answer is no...you hopefully love halloween, love classics like the Mekons + Devil in a Woodpile + Kelly Hogan hey? If you don't know and love these musicians, what kinda Chicagoan are you???? 

The point is, whip out your Fisher Price turntable, put your batman jammies on, and dance to the Wee Scary Beasties double 7" Creepy Lullabies (or go with the digital download if ya want) out on Carrot Top Records subsidiary WeeBeatz Records! Made up of Jon Langford + Sally Timms of the Mekons, Kelly Hogan (Neko Case, Pine Valley Cosmonauts) and Devil in a Woodpile, these songs are brilliant for any age and put you in the halloween spooker spirit with some "mighty jug band talents of front porch settin' old-timey blues ...Shangri-Las finger-popping flavor, [and] fresh seat-of-the-pants harmonies." The Wee Hairy Beasties credit kids (and their parents) for having a brain and knowing how to use it! 

Buy music from the Wee Hairy Beasties HERE or come in and get it at saki!

Scroll to the bottom to buy the 7s", the digital, or get Wee Hairy Beasties' other release Holidays Gone Crazy in time for some excellently fun holidays!

Wee Scary Beasties-Pumpkinhead by carrottoprecords

Handsome Family & Megan Reilly in Chicago

Carrot Top Records is ramping up for this upcoming weekend in Chicago! The Handsome Family are coming through town, and the second they hit the road back to Albuquerque, Megan Reilly stops by with guitarist James Mastro (Ian Hunter, Bongos). Here's the schedule:




Thu, September 13 | The Handsome Family w/ Daniel Knox | saki | FREE in-store | 6:30pm
Fri, September 14 | The Handsome Family w/ Jon Langford | Mayne Stage | Show: 9pm
Sun, September 16 | Megan Reilly w/ Joan Osborne | City Winery Chicago | Show: 8pm
Mon, September 17 | Megan Reilly w/ Joan Osborne | City Winery Chicago | Show: 8pm
Tues, September 18 | Megan Reilly | Frequency | Madison, WI

Come support some of our favorite music and say hello to us!

Megan Reilly in Chicago Saturday!

Photo by Jason Creps

This weekend is busy for us at Carrot Top Records. Very busy. Very exciting.

Megan Reilly comes in town with her band – Steve Goulding (Mekons), James Mastro (Bongos), & Tony Maimone (Pere Ubu) – this weekend to celebrate her recent album The Well. There are two chances to see her while she's in town on Saturday.
• Saturday, June 9 @ 4pm | saki | w/ Julie Byrne...FREE! All-ages!
• Saturday, June 9 @ 9pm | The Hideout | w/ Speck Mountain

The Chicago Reader calls Megan's voice "beautifully ethereal and unexpectedly strong," in their writeup about The Well. Thanks for the support, Mister Margasak!

While in town, Megan & crew will be joining Jon Langford to co-host his WXRT show "The Eclectic Company" and will be joining the wonderful Freedy Johnston at Frequency in Madison on Thursday, 6/7.

Photo by Colleen Quigey

This week Megan's been getting lots of love. The folks at BLURT ran an 8 out of 10 review of The Well, MAGNET highlighted Megan Reilly's track "Throw It Out," and the Reader wants you to go the Hideout show!

In other great Carrot Top news, Speck Mountain will be putting out their third album, Badwater, with us in late summer! After months of an intricate mixing process, Speck Mountain passed off their tapes to our friends at Chicago Mastering this week. We are all giddy with excitement, so join us Saturday at the Hideout to hear some rocking new tracks from Speck Mountain!

Seasick: Tales & Songs of Ships & Islands

We've got a great lineup of in-stores for you this weekend at saki, starting with Laura Gibson on Friday, but if you need to kickoff your pre-weekend right, you should go check out this Sarah Vowell & Jon Langford double bill at Second City's UP Comedy Club!

SEASICK: TALES AND SONGS OF SHIPS AND ISLANDS WITH JON LANGFORD AND SARAH VOWELL will pair the New York Times bestselling author's stories with the music of Jon Langford. Sarah Vowell's writing is often heavy on history (and comedy), ranging from stories on the locations of presidential assassinations to the plight of the early North American pilgrims. Jon Langford is pretty much living history himself, as one of the founding members of the legendary punk band, The Mekons, and now as a staple in the Chicago music scene.

This promises to be a very unique night of music, comedy, history, and all-out nerd-dom that you really should NOT miss. To make the deal even sweeter, every ticket comes with a copy of Sarah Vowell's new book Unfamiliar Fishes! For a mere $20, you can't beat that!

SEASICK: TALES AND SONGS OF SHIPS AND ISLANDS WITH JON LANGFORD AND SARAH VOWELL is this Thursday night at UP Comedy Club! The show starts at 9:30!

Get tickets here!

Hideout's Fifth Annual Christmas Panto

We attended our third Hideout Christmas Panto. As always it stealthily avoids my ability to adequately describe what we saw. The AV Club posted a good interview with Sally Timms about the Brit panto tradition and the liberties taken by The Hideout crew.

I may never fully recover from what I saw that night. I took pictures.

Cleopatra (Jon Langford) and Eunuch (Amy Lombardi)

The Hideout's Christmas Panto

Every year I talk about how awesome this is, and every year you ignore me to your own unhappy detriment. By popular demand, Sally Timms and pals are putting on the Fifth Annual Hideout Christmas Panto. This year's theme is Egyptian/Cosmic, with our beloved Jonboy Langford playing...

Cleopatra, Queen of DeNial “Oh No I’m not” and the Hidden Treasures of the Mummy’s Tomb. In the role of a lifetime, Pantomime Dame Jon Langford channels his inner Liz Taylor to star as the mesmerizing Queen Cleopatra. Featuring Tim Tuten as King Tuten K Moon, the Boy King, Gnat Ward as Queen Woadicea of the Ancient Britons, Mike Bulington as The Mummy, Callie Roach as Indiana Hump and a swarthy mass of yet uncast Hideout regulars as Julius Geezer, Mark Apathy, Lord Curmudgeon and other Ridiculous Romans, Smelly Early Britons and Senile Soothe Sayers.

Yep. So put on a smile, have some drinks, hiss at the villains, cheer the heroes, and take part in the long English tradition of (holiday) cross-dressing.* The first year, they built a full-on PIRATE SHIP on stage!

So what else do I gotta say to persuade you? GO.

At the first one, Jon's mum confided in me that her son seemed "to enjoy it a bit much." You can take the boy out of England, but you can't take the England out of the boy, I reckon.

Robbie Fulks and Jon Langford at Hideout Chicago

Monday night we finally made it out to see Robbie Fulks' regular gig at the delightfully early time of 7pm. (Yeah, I'm old. Piss off.) Of course, The Hideout is always awesome, and, of course, the music was great. They took turns singing a combination of originals from each of them mixed with some classic country standards. I think my highlight was Robbie singing the BEEyootiful Wynn Stewart made famous by Merle Haggard number "Sing a Sad Song." Yowza! Revelatory for me. While Jon accompanied, Robbie also sang Jon's classic "Nashville Radio," which I'll guess was probably a first for both of them.

There was a really good crowd, so much that Jon asked, "Robbie, how long have you been doing this? You get more people on a Monday night than The Mekons get in Barcelona (? memory) on a Saturday!" I thought he was gonna rip on him for not inviting him until now, but no. Jon's a wee bit too classy for that, at least he was Monday.

I took a few pics of "The Odd Couple" from the back which came out quite dark, and shot a couple of videos, which came out pretty well. They're all posted after the jump.

Exclusive: Jon Langford prints at saki!

You can get 'em here and nowhere else, people! Prolific musician and visual artist, Jon Langford (of Mekons fame, not to mention countless other projects) has made wood-mounted prints based off of his "saki" painting, which hangs beautifully over our fireplace... no, seriously, we have a fireplace in our store.

These limited edition 7"x7" prints are available only at saki, or our mail order site. The prints are scanned from the original painting, mounted on plywood, burnished, distressed and varnished... in short, they're beautiful.

Individual prints of Marc Bolan, John Peel, Johnny Cash, Jimi Hendrix, George Harrison, Ian Curtis, Sun Ra, and Doug Sahm are $120

The set of 8 prints is $850

Stop in and check them out! Don't forget to pick up Jon's new album, Old Devils, available on CD and LP!

Hideout Annual Christmas Panto

Any excuse to see Langford and company dress up in pirate regalia in ever-increasingly less credible environments is OK by me! Throw in Christmas, zeppelins, booze, and what I assume is a tip of the cap to my favorite WKRP episode, and you've got a sure fire winner!

Thursday 12/17 7:00 & 10:00

Friday 12/18 7:00 & 10:00

The Hideout Players present

The Third Annual Hideout Christmas Panto

Ho Ho Ho; the Humanity 

Prior to his career as a purveyor of gifts, Santa Claus was a zeppelin pirate

Fancy dress encouraged

*** early family friendly show ***

*** late 21+ less friendly show ***