The place was spooky enough before the goth bands loaded in: low ceilings, walls padded with crude tapestries, the air funky with incense. And there was, of course, already a cross hung prominently behind the stage. The opening act, a local duo called Leper, added a couple candle-topped pillars, a smoke machine, and a red light, and one warm Saturday in February the Chicagoland Community Church became a sounding chamber for a dark night of the soul.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Chicagoland, at 836 W. Aldine, is a stone’s throw from the Alley and the rest of the counterculture mall surrounding the old Punkin’ Donuts. It’s a “nondenominational house of worship” formed with guidance and financial support from Uptown Baptist. In a mission statement on a Web site offering consultation for church “planters,” cofounder Jon Pennington writes that he and his wife “have a passion to reach people [and] groups not adequately reached. Particularly the poor, punks, and young urban professionals. We are passionate about Biblical theology, multiplying cell groups, and including the liturgy in contemporary-alternative worship.” Dave Verdin, the 22-year-old leader of the the CCC youth group called the Belmont Undead, runs goth night. He’s wearing heavy black eyeliner and a mesh shirt. “They call it nondenominational just so we can do fun stuff like this,” he said.
Feldstein, a fine-featured blond with a clean pageboy, introduced two numbers in a row by saying, “I like this song!” Both he and Shaw fumbled with the drum machine, but he fingered his bass crisply, one arm whizzing out at intervals to trigger effects on a synthesizer. Shaw, a thirtysomething specter in heavy eye makeup, blood-colored lipstick, and a long, hooded cape, wailed and contributed metal-inflected guitar. Around 20 people listened attentively, seated in pews. Leper played mostly loud slow ballads with quick runs in the fills, but when a dance-speed tune finally came up one girl banged her head gently.
A trim, bald 27-year-old in a skintight black tee folded his arms and shrugged. If he hadn’t driven all the way in from Round Lake, he informed us, he would’ve left when he found out it was a Christian event. “I kind of got conned,” he said. “On the Internet it said ‘free drinks.’”
