No Expectations 136: Choo Choo
New LPs from Star Moles, Pileup, and Lala Lala. Plus, the joys of 'being a regular,' an essay collection on tennis, and 'The Pitt.'
No Expectations hits inboxes on Thursdays at 9am cst. Reader mailbag email: Noexpectationsnewsletter@gmail.com. Daily Chicagoan, the local news newsletter I produce at my day job with WTTW News (PBS Chicago), can be found here.
Headline song: Friko, “Choo Choo”
Thanks for being here. I went to two shows last week, and both brought me to Lakeview’s GMan Tavern. It’s not an exaggeration to say that I spent my twenties at this bar. Though it’s been years since I lived in a neighborhood where it’s a convenient walk or bus ride away, it’s still one of my favorite places in the world. Being back Thursday and Saturday reminded me how much that place meant to me and how it was the setting of so many good memories in my life. There’s a reason it keeps getting named “Best Neighborhood Bar” in the Chicago Reader’s annual Best of Chicago poll.
My first visit was right after I turned 21. At the time, I was entering a writing career, and most of my college friends had either gone to grad school or moved back home. I was lonely and underemployed, but this was the first place where the door guy remembered me, and the bartenders knew my drink order immediately. Right off the bat, I felt welcomed and comfortable. So, it became a second home. I celebrated each new journalism job there, mourned each subsequent layoff, and got to know all the staff and regulars, many of whom are still close friends. For a few years, I hosted and booked an annual New Year’s Eve party, where I got bands to DJ a free event to raise money for a neighborhood food pantry (it’s been a decade, but the 2016 lineup of Finom, NE-HI, Twin Peaks, Knox Fortune, and Whitney will forever be one of the most fun nights of my life). As it’s steps from Wrigley Field, it’s also where I partied when the Cubs won the World Series. I also remain in the fantasy football league my GMan friends started in 2014.
Now, for any young people here, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend going to a bar as much as I did at that age. I definitely should’ve read more books and saved more money, but being a regular was absolutely formative for me. As long as you tip well, don’t cause problems, and are kind and respectful, a neighborhood dive can become an oasis. GMan’s owned by the guy behind the iconic venue Metro and staffed mostly by musicians, so I got to meet so many artists just sitting on a corner barstool: members of the Replacements, Rage Against the Machine, Alkaline Trio, house music legends, not to mention actors, athletes, comedians, and journalists. The Lawrence Arms’ Brendan Kelly was even my weekday bartender for several years, and through osmosis, I developed a near encyclopedic knowledge of Chicago punk. They even let me use their back room for interviews, including one where I made Ryley Walker listen to Leonard Cohen for the first time.
Though only one bartender and one door guy are still working there since my first visit in 2012, it’s remained largely unchanged despite all the new faces. Sure, there’s a cocktail menu now, and the pool tables in the back (where they filmed some of The Color of Money) were taken out to become a concert venue, but the same regulars are there watching Jeopardy every evening, and it’s still a full house after a Metro show or a Cubs game. On Saturday, I ran into a bunch of old buds—each of us making a return to the same corner of the bar where we’d congregate throughout the 2010s. While I’m not really a weekly regular at any bar these days, it was nice to remember how a place can feel like a community and how things can still feel the same even when everything’s changed. Also nice? Still realizing I get “the regular’s discount.”
Here’s the spiel for new subscribers: Each week, you get a wildcard main essay (often new album recommendations), a 15-song playlist, as well as updates on what I’m listening to, watching, and reading. Sometimes you’ll get an interview with an artist I love, and other times it’ll be a deep dive into one band’s discography. Since I’m a Chicago-based writer, this newsletter is very Midwest-focused. So, if you live in this city too, you’ll also receive a curated roundup of upcoming local shows to check out.
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3 Albums Worth Your Time This Week
Lala Lala, Heaven 2
Lala Lala’s Lillie West spent her formative years and first few albums living in Chicago. I’ve seen her play countless times, totally solo or with a full band, in several states and two countries, and each performance has been electric. Over the past half-decade, though, she’s left Chicago for stints in Taos, Iceland, and now Los Angeles. Though I miss running into her around the city, I’m grateful that she’s putting out her best work yet with the lush and immersive Heaven 2. Released via Sub Pop and produced by Jay Som’s Melina Duterte, she fully dives into the mesmeric electronic palette she’s been perfecting since 2021’s I Want the Door To Open. Songs like opener “Car Anymore” boast ping-ponging keyboard stabs, and on “Anywave,” searing blasts of distortion merge with bubbly synths. However gauzy the arrangements get, it’s always hypnotic, especially paired with West’s ability to make gutting emotional revelations sound conversational. The title track opens with the lines, “Heaven is a moment / Hell is a life / I'm forever broken / Neck against the knife,” but it still somehow sounds inviting. West thrives at a memorable chorus, and you won’t find a better one than on the single “Does This Go Faster?” For all the dreamlike melancholy here, it obvious West is having a blast making music again.
RIYL: M83, Grapetooth, New Order
Pileup, Leave the Light On
With a name like Pileup, you’d expect an onslaught of noise, controlled chaos, and a copious amount of pummeling riffs. That’s all there in spades on the Portland indie rock band’s sophomore LP Leave the Light On, but there’s also a graceful, often beautiful pop-minded core throughout the tracklist. Standout single “Lightning” bursts open with wailing lead guitars, but also delicately plucked banjo, before main songwriter Nathan Urbach coos, “I shouldn’t stand out in the open / I saw you up against the ocean in a dream.” This is shoegaze at its most transportive and introspective, especially on the winsome “Going Away.” This is a band that operates on extremes. There’s the plaintive folk of “Willow Leaves,” dirgelike slowcore of “Turning,” and a raging 6-minute guitar freakout in “No Pyre, No Rememberance” all populating the back half of Side B. It all works seamlessly.
RIYL: Shoegaze that doesn’t suck, riffs that rip, and melodies with a soft core
Star Moles, Highway To Hell
Star Moles, the folk-pop project of New Hampshire native and Philadelphia resident Emily Moales, finds a true spark in casual approaches. Her last LP, one of 2025’s best, was called Snack Monster and was tracked largely via a Tascam recorder. A minute into her stellar follow-up, Highway to Hell, Moales catches herself singing a wrong lyric, pauses briefly, and mutters something on the mic, and corrects course. It doesn’t detract from the song, a soaring ‘70s-inspired opener that’s cheekily called “The End.” Rather, it adds intimacy and charm: the two winning qualities make this one of the year’s clear standout albums. She’s perceptive and funny on songs like “Time,” which kicks off with a line like “Sometimes I think I’m making a friend when I see a smiling face / but then it comes to an end / They get whisked away.” Elsewhere on “Overdog,” she’s singing as if she’s simultaneously letting you in on an inside joke and allowing you to read her diary,” when she says, “I need you like I need a hole in my head / I need a hole in my head / How else could I sing?” For the low-key facade these songs are wrapped in, Moales makes songs that sound timeless and effortless. A sneaky stunner of an LP with a whimsy and theatricality that’s infectious.
RIYL: Harry Nilsson, playful piano, Fiona Apple, loose and breezy writing
What I listened to:
The No Expectations 136 Playlist: Apple Music // Spotify* // Tidal
1. Friko, “Choo Choo”
2. villagerrr, “Locket”
3. Pileup, “Lightning”
4. Swapmeet, “I Know!”
5. Accessory, “Safeword”
6. Ken Park, “Nosebleed”
7. Sluice, “Zillow”
8. Buck Meek, “Soul Feeling”
9. The Clearwater Swimmers, “Engine”
10. Lala Lala, “Even Mountains Erode”
11. Greg Mendez, “I Wanna Feel Pretty”
12. vega, “out there”
13. Hiding Places, “One Hand”
14. Jackie West, “New Moon”
15. Star Moles, “Real Magic”
*Note: vega’s “out there” is not on Spotify
**Second note: I need to apologize for last week’s Spotify playlist. I no longer use the service, but I still port over the weekly mixes there using a web app. 95% of the time it works great, but not last Thursday. I usually check to make sure the tracklist is all set, but I didn’t last week, so listeners got a track by the ‘80s metal outfit Extreme instead of Mod Lang, who have removed their music from Spotify. Readers also heard a Deerhunter song, “Desire Lines,” in there too, instead of Nashpaints’ “Desire”, but that honestly worked. It’s a good thing I double checked this go around, because you would’ve had to listen to “Out There” from The Hunchback of Notre Dame soundtrack instead of the single of the same name by vega.
Gig recap: Cash Langdon, Glass-Beagle, Joe Glass at Gman Tavern (2/26)
A three-band bill with two Chicago acts opening, and all three are newsletter favorites? Also, it’s at the bar I’ve been to most in my life? Sometimes the universe gives you a sign to go see a stellar rock show on a Thursday night. After releasing the No Expectations-approved Dogs this time last year, I managed to catch Birmingham’s Cash Langdon live at the now-shuttered venue The Fallen Log. It rocked, but when he booked a return date later at GMan, he had to cancel the gig due to illness. It all worked out because Glass-Beagle, one of Chicago’s foremost bands combining gnarly riffs with ample twang, joined him alongside recent favorite and Sharp Pins member Joe Glass. All in all, it was the best way to start a weekend. Each band here is the real deal.
Gig recap: Margo Price, Logan Ledger at Metro Chicago (2/28)
Margo Price’s Hard Headed Woman was a 2025 favorite, and one LP that I’ve revisited a lot this year. She boasts an easy charisma and an even more natural knack for dynamic melodies and personality-filled lyrics. For whatever reason, while I’ve followed her career for years, last Saturday was the first time I had a chance to see her live. I had a better reason to attend than ever now that her band includes Friend of the Newsletter Sean Thompson (of Sean Thompson’s Weird Ears and Shrunken Elvis) on lead guitar. It’s a gig that he’s had for about a year, and if you’ve seen any live footage from social media or gotten lucky enough to attend a show, you’ll know my guy is nailing it. Never content to stay in one mode, scale, or style, the 18-song set boasted great covers (Blaze Foley, George Jones, Bob Dylan, Waylon Jennings, etc) alongside roaring renditions of her biggest songs: just a blast all-around, an efficient 80-minute gig of straight heat. I’m fully on the Margo train now, and I can happily report that a new Sean Thompson’s Weird Ears LP is arriving very soon.
What I watched:
The Pitt (HBO Max)
The older I get, the less interested I am in TV. “It gets good after the fourth episode? Wow, man, I gotta check that out.” While nine times out of 10 I’d prefer to watch a movie, HBO Max’s hospital drama The Pitt is a notable exception. It rules. It’s well-acted and well-written, smart enough where you learn something, but soapy enough to be compulsively bingeable. It’s tense and often gory thanks to its emergency room setting, but oddly comforting in no small part from regular onscreen depictions of kindness, compassion, and treating patients with dignity. Every doctor and nurse is likable (except for the medical student named Ogilvie), the claustrophobic and kinetic camerawork is gripping, and the episodes breeze by even when it reaches the hour mark. When I first saw a trailer for it before the first season, I thought, “There’s no way I’m going to watch this.” I’m glad I got over that knee-jerk reaction.
What I read:
String Theory: David Foster Wallace on Tennis (by David Foster Wallace)
I’ve been watching more tennis than usual this year. I realized my cable plan gives me access to the Tennis Channel’s app, which allows me to stream basically every non-Grand Slam WTA and ATP match. Beyond this sport being the one I played most growing up and one of my favorites to witness on TV, I honestly just love having something on during the day while I work. Another great thing about tennis is that it produces the best sports writing ever. This year, I’ve read Giri Nathan’s Changeover, about the rivalry between Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner, and I’m currently revisiting John McPhee’s classic Levels of the Game, about the 1968 U.S. Open semifinal between Arthur Ashe and Clark Graebner. But last week, I finally got around to a slim essay collection that’s been wasting away on my shelf: String Theory: David Foster Wallace on Tennis. Now, I had already read two of the five pieces compiled here: one on DFW’s childhood as a competitive and regionally ranked junior tennis player, and the other is his masterful New York Times profile of Roger Federer from 2006. Both are alltimers and both were a blast to reread. The new-to-me articles covered a bad memoir by former pro Tracy Austin, a scene report during the qualifiers at the 1995 Canadian Open, and an examination of the commercialization of the U.S. Open, where DFW complains about paying $3.50 for a hot dog. All were bangers. It’s been a long time since I last read his work, but it was a joy to rediscover why I loved it so much and still do.
The Weekly Chicago Show Calendar:
The gig calendar lives on the WTTW News website. You can also subscribe to the newsletter I produce there called Daily Chicagoan to get it in your inbox a day early.