Chance The Rapper, Hannibal Buress, and a bunch of puppets want to teach you what the fuck an alderman does
Aux Features MusicChance The Rapper continues to make it very clear that he’s not fucking around on the topic of Chicago politics and civic life; fresh off his donations to the city’s schools, his critiques of mayor Rahm Emanuel, and his purchase of local news site Chicagoist—once a mainstay of street-level city reporting, back before the implosion of the Gothamist brand—Chance has now launched a new video aiming to delve into the deepest, darkest secrets of the Illinois city’s politics: What the fuck, exactly, does an alderman do?
A whole hell of a lot, as revealed in the above video, which is being showed off as a sort of trial balloon for the kinds of things the new Chicagoist will be up to. But even if you don’t care about distribution of public funds, widespread corruption, or potholes, you still might get a kick out of the video, which not only sees Chance go “undercover” in the city for a little person-on-the-street interviews, but features his pal Hannibal Buress doing his best impression of a bribe-happy Chicago pol. (Also, there are puppets.)
But hey, we get it: Civics isn’t everybody’s thing. If you still want some new Chance content without the fake mustaches or empowering political shit, you’re still in luck: He also dropped two new singles (“The Man Who Has Everything” and “My Own Thing (Feat. Joey Purp)“) on Soundcloud yesterday.
13 Comments
Sorry. When I read that guy’s name, all I hear in my head is ABBA singing, “Take a chance on me….”
will they follow it up with explaining bursars & comptrollers?
And someday, the CHANCEllor of the exchequer .
I’m pretty interested in politics, and I think it’s good that Chance is trying to help get more people to think about their local elections where a lot more decisions that actually affect people day-to-day are made, but I still don’t feel like I know much about Aldermen or the system of Chicago city politics after seeing that. I hope they keep making these but maybe try and make them a bit more concise.
I still don’t feel like I know much about Aldermen or the system of Chicago city politics after seeing that.
That’s because there’s not much more to understand. It is simply a vestigial good-old-boy systemic scam at the expensive of the people of Chicago. That’s the point.
Maybe you could use Google instead of relying on a rapper to tell you about it.
Kiss the Alderman, kiss the Alderman…
I know what an alderman is because of Good Times.
Why is this 4:3?
I call bullshit. The problem is apathy. Young people don’t vote. Period. That makes them a less important constituent. Get off your ass, educate yourself and vote out those who are not using their power. You know, I, as a young black gay male helped our national youngest mayor of a major city’s get elected first to council and then mayor of Stockton. He is also our citys first black mayor. And he won his election without the backing of the good ole boys, major money or a name. It can be done! Now He is being attacked left and right because he is championing some pretty progressive policies and the Republican national movement wants to take him down now before he gets too popular. So I reached out to a The Root and didn’t even get a stock email response. Yet this overlong video with zero nuance or substance gets an article. Smh
AND who’s dick do I need to suck to get out of the greys? I’ve been posting via AVClub for years yet Kinja treat all me as a noob. Is it’s cause I do more than shake hands with other black dudes? Lol
I do not know much about this fellow but every single thing I have ever read has been positive.
I’m rather surprised this article made no mention of Widows, the recently-released heist/political drama (featuring an all-star cast + getting a fair amount of buzz/critical claim, albeit lackluster ticket sales), in which the political intrigue centers around a corrupt alderman’s race in Chicago’s south side.