This week — a week late, to be perfectly honest — we revisit the dog days of summer ’98!
Robert Cass
195 Articles
Robert Cass lives in Chicago. For Popdose he's written under the Sugar Water, Bootleg City, and Box Office Flashback banners and collaborated on the series 'Face Time with Jeff Giles and Mike Heyliger.
Robert Cass
11 Min Read
The Boston-area band released only three albums before breaking up in 2000, but have reunited for a series of shows in Europe. Robert Cass takes a look back at their brief but stellar discography.
Robert Cass
5 Min Read
The incarcerated mayor of Bootleg City was deeply disappointed to hear that HarperCollins has canceled the publication of Billy Joel’s memoir, The Book of Joel, but a 1976 bootleg of the Piano Man in New York City has helped ease his pain.
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Robert Cass
14 Min Read
Prostitutes! Excessive partying! Jessica Tandy! These are a few of Charlie Sheen’s favorite things, and they all make cameos in this week’s Box Office Flashback to March 28, 1990.
Robert Cass
8 Min Read
Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark doesn’t officially open until March 15, but it’s already been slammed with some of the worst reviews in Broadway history. Luckily, Robert Cass is here to provide director Julie Taymor and her collaborators with a list of suggestions for a creative overhaul.
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Robert Cass
9 Min Read
Communists! Nazis! Old people! They all star in this week’s Box Office Flashback to January 28, 1982.
Robert Cass
4 Min Read
Todd Rundgren’s Utopia performed in Cleveland, Ohio, on October 16, 1974, but Bootleg City is where you’ll find the document of their concert.
Robert Cass
5 Min Read
When Captain Owen Honors was demoted by the U.S. Navy on January 4 for in-house videos he made almost five years earlier, he learned an important lesson: electric cars aren’t gay.
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
Music-derived chills, or “skin orgasms,” are experienced by certain personality types, especially during the holidays. Robert Cass goes up close and waaaay too personal to introduce readers to this phenomenon.
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
Louie Louie’s “Sittin’ in the Lap of Luxury” was one of the best singles of 1990, but what about the rest of his debut album?
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
A new Chicago stage production combines the first two movies of the “Alien” franchise with the music of Queen.
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Robert Cass
6 Min Read
Axel Foley, the Terminator, Supergirl, Mozart, and God all make appearances in this week’s Box Office Flashback to December 10, 1984.
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Robert Cass
10 Min Read
Robert Cass fills in for Jeff Giles this week and takes readers on a Box Office Flashback to October 29, 1996. (Rated R for adult language in anticipation of “Macarena” jokes.)
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
Mayor Cass tips his hat (and the rest of his wardrobe) to the outgoing mayor of Chicago, Richard M. Daley, and uploads a Nada Surf concert from 2008 for your downloading pleasure.
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
Songs from Midnight Oil’s 1993 acoustic tour are featured this week, while Bootleg City goes “unplugged” to fight light pollution (translation: a crushing electric bill).
Robert Cass
4 Min Read
Mayor Cass returns with an end-of-summer recap from prison and features a 1990 bootleg from Phil Collins’s Seriously Live! world tour.
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
The mayor of Bootleg City sends an update from prison, and the final two volumes of Y100 Sonic Sessions are featured in their entirety.
Robert Cass
6 Min Read
U.S. airports will soon be selling more alcohol to raise revenue for cash-strapped local governments, while airlines continue to charge fees for checked baggage and other services. Investigative reporter Robert Cass pretends to be outraged, then drinks.
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
Yesterday morning I decided to take a leisurely bike ride along Whiskey River, the main waterway that runs through Bootleg City. (Technically, the river is one-tenth moonshine due to a…
Robert Cass
7 Min Read
On Tuesday CNN’s Larry King announced that he’ll end his 25-year-old talk show this fall, having been beaten consistently in the ratings the past year by his 9 PM cable-news…
Robert Cass
5 Min Read
In addition to letting perennial electoral bridesmaid Matt Wardlaw write a chapter of my autobiography in exchange for bailing me out of an Arizona jail, I had to agree to…
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
I’d like to start off by apologizing for my absence last week. After deciding to boycott all things Arizona from Bootleg City, I realized I’d never seen the old London…
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
On April 23 Arizona governor Jan Brewer signed into law the state’s controversial immigration bill, which aims “to identify, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants,” according to the New York Times,…
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
On May 12 the American Civil Liberties Union filed two free-speech lawsuits in Scranton, Pennsylvania, defending citizens who were charged with using profanity by local police. Seven days later CBS…
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
The Bootleg City teacher’s union went on strike this week, delaying the production of this week’s mayoral update. Or is it “teachers’ union?” Or just “teachers union” without any of…
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
In 1987 Cannon Films, the studio that became (in)famous for churning out low-budget genre fare like The Delta Force and Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo, couldn’t convince audiences that the Sylvester…
Robert Cass
4 Min Read
Earlier this week I took a group of underprivileged kids to see the first big blockbuster of the summer movie season, Iron Man 2. Or at least they sounded underprivileged…
Robert Cass
2 Min Read
Last week I mentioned that my mom took me to see Chicago in West Germany in 1977 with Matt Wardlaw and his older sister— I mean, his mother. Yes, of…
Robert Cass
3 Min Read
Old days — good times I remember. Fun days, filled with simple pleasures. Drive-in movies, comic books and blue jeans, Howdy Doody, baseball cards, and birthdays take me back to a…