Category: Store Events

  • Allen Callaci Reads From Heart Like a Starfish at Quimby’s 6/29

    Heart transplant recipient and lead singer of lo-fi pioneers Refrigerator Allen Callaci will make his first ever appearance in Chicago to sing a few songs and read from his memoir Heart Like a Starfish (Pelekinesis Press).

    Heart Like a Starfish is Callaci’s account of that death-defying journey on which he had been given a 20% chance of survival. Callaci’s wonderfully chaotic tale is filled with music and pop cultural references and is told in a Kurt Vonnegut-esque style that captures the horror, humor and healing of his experience.

    Callaci has written for The Huffington Post, BK Nation, Inland Weekly and was selected as Inlandia Institute’s author of the week. Heart Like a Starfish was selected as a recommendation by Small Press Distribution for December 2016.

    “An inherent and consistently engaging read from beginning to end, “Heart Like A Starfish” is highly recommended for community library American Biography collections.” – Midwest Book Review, November 2016

    “Allen shares his amazing story by locating his personal experience in the midst of a network of relationships that sustain and define his life.” –John Davis (Folk Implosion)

    “For any generation… An astonishing story about how close life is to death.” – Claudia Lennear, featured singer in the Oscar-winning documentary “20 FEET FROM STARDOM”

    Thurs, June 29th, 7pm – Free Event

    Here’s the Facebook Event for you to SHARE with all of the people in the world.

  • DOUBLE BOOK LAUNCH at Quimby’s! Keiler Roberts Releases SUNBURNING & Jay Ryan Releases NO ONE TOLD ME NOT TO DO THIS, 5/20

    Keiler Roberts writes autobiographical comics. Sunburning, published by Koyama Press, is her fourth book in the Ignatz winning series Powdered Milk. keilerroberts.com

    “Keiler Roberts’ autobiographical graphic memoir captures the feeling of being a parent as well as an artist and writer better than any book I’ve ever read. There are no cliff-hangers or life lessons. It’s more about the texture of being alive: the melancholy, the unexpected small delights, and its unavoidable sense of aloneness. This book is written with insight, intelligence, and a deadpan sense of humor. I loved it.” — Roz Chast

    Jay Ryan has been making screenprints and concert posters in and around Chicago since 1995. No One Told Me Not To Do This (Akashic) is his third book collecting his favorite work, featuring prints made between 2009 and 2015, including posters for bands such as Andrew Bird, Shellac, My Morning Jacket, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr., Hum, St. Vincent, and others, as well as posters featuring Lil BUB, Cards Against Humanity, various bicycle races, film screenings, and pictures of sloths, walruses, and other mammals in states of troubled sleep. With a foreword by master illustrator Aaron Horkey, this volume comprises two hundred screenprints with commentary and original drawings used in the screenprinting process. thebirdmachine.com

    Jay and Keiler are friends who live in Evanston and both have daughters in kindergarten.

    Sat May 20th, 7pm – Free Event

    Share this event with the event invite on Facebook!

  • Free Comic Book Day 5/6

     

    Yes, we will have some free comics at the store (while supplies last). But the real celebration that weekend is Chicago Zine Fest! Go read some fun mini-comics there! More info about CZF 2017 at chicagozinefest.org.

  • Offsite: Field Notes Zine Night 4/27 at Field Notes Midwest HQ

    Swing by and enjoy an evening of zines, prints, and self-published art from a selection of local vendors.

    Beer from Half Acre and soft drinks will be on tap while you browse wares, try your hand at the “Make Your Own Zine Table,” and trade with other collectors.

    VENDORS

    At Field Notes Midwest HQ at 401 North Racine Avenue in Chicago (NOT AT QUIMBY’S).

    Thursday, April 27th, 6pm-10pm – FREE

    More info here.

    RSVP on Facebook

  • Damon Krukowski Reads from The New Analog, Joined by Bob Weston and Steve Albini 5/2

    Having made his name in the late 1980s as a member of the indie band Galaxie 500, Damon Krukowski has watched cultural life lurch from analog to digital. And as an artist who has weathered the transition, he has challenging, urgent questions for both creators and consumers about what we have thrown away in the process: Are our devices leaving us lost in our own headspace even as they pinpoint our location? Does the long reach of digital communication come at the sacrifice of our ability to gauge social distance? Do streaming media discourage us from listening closely? Are we hearing each other fully in this new environment? Damon Krukoswksi takes this on in The New Analog: Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World (The New Press, April 25, 2017). He is joined at this event by musician luminaries Steve Albini (Shellac, Big Black, Electrical Audio) and Bob Weston (Shellac, Volcano Suns, Chicago Mastering Service).

    “Millions of music-lovers have acquiesced to the shiny juggernaut of digital-age technology without asking its economic and cultural price. Damon Krukowski is an incisive, passionate, and, above all, rational critic of this new realm. No nostalgic conservative, he offers a radical defense of analog craft in the face of the digital hard sell.”—Alex Ross, author of The Rest Is Noise and Listen to This

    Damon Krukowski was in the indie rock band Galaxie 500 and is currently one half of the folk-rock duo Da­mon & Naomi. He writes for music and art journals including Pitchfork, Artforum, frieze, and The Wire. He is the recipient of an Arts Writers Grant from Creative Capital/Andy Warhol Foundation, and a fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internetand Society at Harvard University. He has also taught writing and sound (and writing about sound) at Harvard University. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. More info: dadadrummer.com, @dada_drummer on Twitter, thenewpress.com, or for publicity brivero(at)thenewpress(dot)com.

    Tuesday, May 2nd, 7pm – Free Event. Here’s the Facebook link to Share this event!

    Check out that tour poster!

  • Off-Site: Quimby's Freakdom Anniversary Panel at Chicago Zine Fest!

    Yeah! We’re really milkin’ that Quimby’s 25th anniversary thing.   offers the community a way to engage and learn through a selection of workshops held during the expo, and they asked us to do a panel that celebrates the way Quimby’s has contributed to the zine community. How could we resist? So during the tabling exhibition of CZF we’ll be doing a Quimby’s panel (from noon-1pm) called “Ever Evolving Bastion of Freakdom: A Retrospective of Quimby’s,” taking it’s name from the oral history of the same title we published last year. The panel will feature a discussion (moderated by CZF co-organizer Alex Nall) with store founder Steven Svymbersky (and owner of Quimby’s Bookstore NYC), Quimby’s Bookstore Chicago store manager and zinester Liz Mason, with special guests, Neil Brideau (former employee and founder of Radiator Comics) and artist/photographer/Quimby’s regular customer Oscar Arriola. Come for a rousing discussion of how Quimby’s Bookstore got started, how it has evolved over the years, and how each panelist played a vital role in where it is today! Here’s the Facebook event invite for this panel to share it with all your peoples.

    CZF’s tabling exhibition is Sat, May 6th at Plumbers Union Hall (1340 W Washington Blvd) – NOT AT QUIMBY’S. Quimby’s will have a table, yes! Here’s the list of other exhibitors, sponsors, and guests!

    Note: this is NOT at Quimby’s. It is at the Plumbers Union Hall (1340 W Washington Blvd).

  • PHD Comics’ Jorge Cham & Particle Physicist Daniel Whiteson talk what we don’t know about the universe at Quimby’s 5/18


    PHD Comics’ Jorge Cham and particle physicist Daniel Whiteson are experts at explaining things. Together they bring that expertise to a book about all the things we don’t know about the universe: WE HAVE NO IDEA: A GUIDE TO THE UNKNOWN UNIVERSE (Riverhead Books). You can think of WE HAVE NO IDEA as a handy guide the universe’s biggest unknowns. Cham and Whiteson have teamed up to spelunk through the enormous gaps in our cosmic knowledge armed with their popular infographics, cartoons, and highly entertaining and lucid explanations of science to explore some of the biggest unknowns in the universe. Why does the universe have a speed limit? What (or who) is attacking earth with tiny, super-fast particles? What exactly is Dark Matter? And for that matter…what is matter?

    A delightful combination of comedy and cosmology that is as charming as it is informative.
    —Zach Weinersmith, creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

    “Accessible and hilarious (the two best things it is possible for a book to be), We Have No Idea not only explores WHAT we don’t know, but WHY we don’t know it.  You’d think that’d be plenty, but Cham and Whiteson also provide the most credible and up-to-date scientific explanations as to what some of the answers to these huge (and hugely important) questions might possibly be, PLUS puns.”
    —Ryan North, author of Romeo and/or Juliet and To Be or Not To Be

    In WE HAVE NO IDEA, Cham & Whiteson explore why a vast portion of our universe is still a mystery, and what a lot of smart people are doing to understand it. Along the way, and with over 400 incredible, original illustrations, they illuminate everything from quarks and neutrinos to gravitational waves and exploding black holes.

    You may recognize Cham and Whiteson from their video about gravitational waves that went viral earlier this year, or from their individual careers. Jorge Cham is the creator of the popular online comic Piled Higher and Deeper, popularly known as PHD Comics and earned his PhD in robotics at Stanford. Daniel Whiteson is a professor of experimental particle physics at the University of California, Irvine, and a fellow of the American Physical Society. He conducts research using the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

    Thurs, May 18th, 7pm – Free Event

    For more info:
    phdcomics.com
    To interview Jorge & Daniel, contact: Al Guillen at aguillen(at)penguinrandomhouse(dot)com
    Invite your friends with the Facebook event invite here!

  • Quimby's Welcomes the Authors of Brick Through the Window: An Oral History of Punk Rock, New Wave & Noise In Milwaukee 4/29

    In late-1970s Milwaukee, a compact circle of locals drew from their city’s cultural heritage, as well as the examples of New York, London and Los Angeles, to embrace the new in the form of a dynamic punk rock scene.  Drawing on influences from 1960s garage rock and early ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll, Milwaukee punks created a formidable body of work.  A new book published by Brickboys/Splunge Communications, Inc., tells the story in the words of the pioneers and participants.

    Brick Through the Window: An Oral History of Punk Rock, New Wave & Noise in Milwaukee, 1964-1984 chronicles a small number of people who made history in a setting that produced internationally recognized bands such as the Violent Femmes, Die Kreuzen, Plasticland and Oil Tasters. Original interviews with such visionaries as the late Mark Shurilla and Richard LaValliere tell stories of imagination, creativity, resourcefulness and sacrifice.  Compiled from hundreds of hours of interviews, Brick Through the Window brings vividly to life a short-lived period of creativity and excitement in a heartland American town that was home to a musical subculture more prolific and diverse than that of many larger cities.

    And guess what? The last Saturday in April is Independent Bookstore Day (IBD), so enjoy it here with this extraordinary book! Click here for more info about taking the #MyChicagoBookstore challenge for an opportunity to get discounts on books!

    “For the men and women who created the world of music in Milwaukee, the most American of cities, this book is not just an important historical document; it’s critical.  Their story is told, and told well.  In interviews with the players, and fantastic photos, the adventures and misadventures are chronicled with more gusto than the beer that made Milwaukee famous.”  –Wayne Kramer, singer/guitarist/activist, founder, the MC5

    Co-authors Steven Nodine and Eric Beaumont will celebrate the release of Brick Through the Window with a discussion and book signing, with recordings of music mentioned in the book.

    For more info: 

    brickthroughthewindow.com

    e_beaumont(at)yahoo(dot)com

    Invite your friends with the Facebook invite for this event!

    Sat, April 29th, 7pm  –  Free Event

    More info about Independent Bookstore Day here!

  • Jillian Tamaki Launches Boundless at Quimby’s, In Conversation With Jessica Campbell 6/23

    In Jillian Tamaki’s new book Boundless (Drawn & Quarterly), Jenny becomes obsessed with a strange “mirror Facebook,” which presents an alternate, possibly better, version of herself. Helen finds her clothes growing baggy, her shoes looser, and as she drinks away to nothingness, the world around her recedes as well. The animals of the city briefly open their minds to us, and we see the world as they do. A mysterious music file surfaces on the internet and forms the basis of a utopian society—or is it a cult? Boundless is at once fantastical and realist, playfully hinting at possible transcendence: from one’s culture, one’s relationship, oneself. This collection of short stories is a showcase for the masterful blend of emotion and humor of award-winning cartoonist Jillian Tamaki.

      “Jillian Tamaki seems capable of drawing anything, in any style, and making it appear effortless. Her writing could be described in the same way, and it’s thrilling to see those twin skills of hers united in service of these daring, unpredictable, and quietly strange stories.”—Adrian Tomine, cartoonist of Killing and Dying

    Jillian Tamaki is an illustrator and cartoonist based in Toronto. She is the co-creator along with her cousin Mariko Tamaki of the graphic novel Skim, a New York Times Best Illustrated Book and a finalist for the Governor General’s Award. Their second graphic novel This One Summer earned a Governor General’s Award and a Caldecott Honor. Tamaki’s first collection of her own comics was the critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller and Eisner Award-winning, SuperMutant Magic Academy.

    This event will feature Jillian Tamaki in conversation with Jessica Campbell, the artist of Hot or Not: 20th-Century Male Artists!

    Jessica Campbell is from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada and is an enthusiast of jokes, painting and comics. She completed her MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she was the recipient of the Edward L. Ryerson Fellowship, and also a comics instructor. She has exhibited work in Canada, the United States, Australia, and Greece, and was selected as one of NewCity’s 2015 breakout artists. She is a member of the Chicago-based comics collective Trubble Club and has published comics with micro press Oily Comics, and contributed to Drawn & Quarterly: Twenty-Five Years of Contemporary Cartooning, Comics, and Graphic Novels.

    Invite your friends with the Facebook invite here!

    For more info:
    jilliantamaki.com/illustration
    Contact JULIA POHL-MIRANDA and SRUTI ISLAM
    publicity(at)drawnandquarterly(dot)com / 514.279.2221 ext 225

    Friday, June 23rd, 7pm. Free event!

     

  • “Too Much Fun Too” Comic Release with Logan Kruidenier and Live Musical Performance 3/10

    Logan Kruidenier’s experimental comic “Too Much Fun Too,” continues the mythological story of a tree-thing’s attempts to befriend and spend meaningful time with a turnip that it dug up. This work considers the nature of masochistic, repetitive routines, envious desperation and a scattered mentality.  Kruidenier loves creating work that deals with the universal, yet extremely personal theme of relationships between living beings, objects and media. TMFT also features a great poem by New York based writer and performer Connor Bush.  Logan Kruidenier has drawn major influence from artists such as Michael DeForge, Taiyo Matsumoto, Olivier Schrauwen, and video games such as Bioshock and the Super Smash Bros series.

    “Niiiiiccccceeeee.” – Connor Bush, writer and performer.

    The work of Logan Kruidenier has been featured in such places as: The Chicago Publisher’s Resource Center, Meathaus, Quimby’s Bookstore, the Mott St. Restaurant, the Beguiling, The Toronto Alternative Comics Festival, Ada Books and Desert Island Comics. 

    For more info visit: logankruidenier.com

    Invite your friends with the Facebook invite here.

    Friday, March 10th  7pm      Free Event