Brent Kado is somewhat of a Renaissance man when it comes to blogging. Rather than honing in on the super-specific, he prefers to keep his blog Avant Chicago open-ended; stop by his site and find everything from a list of things he did over the weekend to a link to photos of last night's party to a shout out for a gallery opening worth a peek.
While his posts about off-the-beaten-path-type news and events run the gamut, Avant Chicago is primarily driven by Kado's love of music. After attending a whopping 95 shows last year, the Indiana native says he can't imagine topping that kind of activity first-hand, but he'll surely offer a solid fix of music tips (particularly in the electronic and indie vein) any time you need one.
What's the gist of your blog?
I've always had a tag line that's kind of like "independent life, sort of alternative happenings and underground news." It doesn't always cover all those thing, but when I originally envisioned Avant Chicago, it was sort of a way for people like me to connect to things going on. We're all widely different, but there's this segment of Chicago that wasn't getting the kind of online coverage that some of the other blogs or websites were focusing on.
As far as my posts go, they're really random. A while back, all I was doing was links, basically my own version of a syndication feeder. But now it's more of a mix and match. I'll post pictures and flyers and blurb about event. It's definitely always an experiment; it doesn't have the consistency that a lot of blogs do but that keeps it fresh, hopefully.
If I read your blog today, gimme me one thing I'd learn.
Kind of the main thing we're writing about now is this movie situation now, so you might learn something about the movie-making process. [My wife and I write] are doing a movie based on Chicago's improv scene, a mockumentary not a documentary. It's about a bunch of actual improvisers that are just going through their daily lives trying to make it big. We've been posting a lot about that...We're getting ready to start shooting in two weeks.
How do you pay the bills?
I'm a manager at a major chain corporation bookstore. I sell a lot of junk on eBay, too. I also write for Gapers Block, sometimes for Innerview, Lumpen and Machine Media.
Your computer is surrounded by…
Well it's a laptop, so right now books on one side and CDs on another.
When you aren't loving blogging, you're loving BLANK in Chicago.
I guess the diversity, whether it's food or nightlife or neighborhoods or buildings. It's always different, everyday you walk out of your house, you never know what you might see. The original reason that I was attracted to a huge city was because of that massive diversity on all scales.
Name a local blogger extraordinaire.
Can You See the Sunset from the South Side? He's one of the few nonprofessional bloggers that posts several times a day.
Jessica Herman likes peeking into other folks' lives, which sure helps when she's grilling hip Chicago bloggers. If you'd like to shower a little love on a local blogger whose antics and anecdotes are your favorite flavor of procrastination, shoot her an email.
