with Sarah Julia + V.V. Lightbody + Liam Kazar

Doors 6:00 PM | Show 6:30 PM | 18+ | General Admission

Refer to the full schedule for set times

Al Scorch could only be from Chicago. He is a serious Artist and a gifted improviser-entertainer, whose powerful yet affable presence is distinctly mid-western in nature. From this highbrow, blue-collared well has sprung an interdisciplinary artistic oeuvre including songwriting, comedy, acting, spoken word, and writing. Scorch’s unmistakable Chicago provincialism sharpened its worldly edge as he expanded outward at 18 years old, taking to the road in search of himself and others. It was there—in the roots-meets-DIY Punk underground—that Scorch fell in with fellow multi-hyphenate troubadours and polymathic neo-vaudevillians of all stripes.

As a musical artist, Scorch’s songs fall at various places along the Roots spectrum, from traditional to alternative. He is a born storyteller, and his lyrics are imbued with literary sentimentalism; vivid with the autobiographical tragicomedy of a life lived, and aspirational in their working-class idealism. As a performer, he can devastate you with tragedy and agitate you with the fervor of political injustice, often in the same song—whether he’s flipping a traditional Irish or Appalachian folk tune or ripping an Al Scorch original. He plays guitar and banjo and sings, and talks. Scorch’s silver tongue, snap quick wit, and levity translate as a kind of comedy meets intellectual spoken-word sensibility, resulting in a live music experience as memorable as the music itself—but for different reasons. It is this Artist-as-Teacher-as-Entertainer dynamic that has kept Chicago audiences returning to his monthly residency at the Hideout for more than a year—a legendary institution in Chicago and US roots music. Indeed, Scorch’s music has found a home on various indie labels of note, from the Athens, Georgia based (and Elephant 6 associated) Orange Twin Records, to Chicago’s alt-country titans Bloodshot Records. His forthcoming album, co-produced alongside fellow Chicagoan Spencer Tweedy, will be released on Chicago’s Sooper Records, a bastion of visionary independent music across genres. 

Scorch is also a prominent Chicago content creator and influencer on Instagram and TikTok, with multiple viral video series including the beloved “Chicago Park District Bathroom Architectural Reviews” and his regular reviews of various masonry repairs across the city. He is also Chicago’s unofficial “Hot Dog Poet Laureate,” having penned a smash-hit viral poem elucidating the beauty of Chicago-style hot dogs in lyric rhyme. The poem, in the style of Emily Dickinson, led to collaborations with both the Chicago Poetry Foundation and Vienna Beef. He is currently embarking on a new sleep-ASMR podcast titled “Municipal: the Code of Chicago” in which he endeavors to read the entire municipal code of Chicago aloud.

Scorch is also a frequent contributor to the widely popular Youtube channel “Crime Pays But Botany Doesn’t,” the creation of his long-time friend and collaborator, ex-railroader turned self-taught botanist, and New York Times Best Selling Author, Joey Santore. The two met in their early years in mutual journeys along the DIY arts underground. Lately, Scorch and Santore swung their improvised video collaborations into a television opportunity, and Scorch made his television debut as co-host on two seasons of the show Kill Your Lawn. 

It is Scorch’s ability to bring all of these threads together—music, literature, storytelling, entertainment, spoken word, comedy—that has made him a local celebrity in Chicago. His multitudinous artistry, radiant humanism, and bittersweet comedic wit permeate all of his creations, wherever he tries his hand. Whether he is being interviewed about his latest creation on local television, or getting shouted out to sold out crowds at Wrigley Field by superstar Folk Artists, Scorch is rapidly becoming someone who embodies the spirit of the City he loves, and its laboring classes for whom he consistently advocates. Al Scorch could only be from Chicago.