Because he’s mainly known as a television personality, Clark the rock artist has had more to prove; here, he’s shown that he can sing into a microphone as well as he speaks into one.

Richison has aspirations to make the Arch disappear, David Copperfield-style. But he does old-fashioned rope tricks, too.

Loud Family frontman Scott Miller totally acquits himself as a rock critic, with one of the most interesting compendiums of music journalism since Robert Christgau’s “Rock Music of the ‘70s.”

The ‘80s were terrible on a national level, but vital on a local one. While hair-malfunctioning bands doled out dance clichés on FM radio, the Painkillers self-released one cassette. The buzz about Euclid Records’ reissue of those songs, 25 years later, is a testament to their brilliance.

Chicago power pop trio Material Issue reunites for one show at the International Pop Overthrow festival this week in Chicago; the fest took its name from that band’s 1991 debut album, which has just been re-released by Hip-O Select.

These days, R.E.M. are anything but simple. The songs on “Collapse into Now” are busily produced, with shifting, twisting rhythms; but they still flaunt R.E.M.’s beating-around-the-bush catchiness; and on this album the combo is in full-personality gear.

Now that the red carpet is rolled up like a map that had only one route, and movie people have come down from their Oscar high, it seems a good moment to examine an ego-free component of filmmaking: the music.

A chat with the songwriter behind the catchiest TV themes of the 70s (not to mention hits like “I’ve Got a Name”) about his new memoir, “Killing Me Softly.”

Hometown heroes The Bottle Rockets swing back through town as they continue their national tour with Marshall Crenshaw. Here’s a preview.