Double A, the much-anticipated lounge beneath Mercadito, is set to open November 12 at 8pm. Last week, I spoke with the club’s cocktail consultants, Tad Carducci and Paul Tanguay—a.k.a. the Tippling Bros—to find out everything I could about the bar. Read the excerpts from the interview to find out what’s in store.

How the Tippling Bros assembled an all-star bartending staff—and why those mixologists aren’t (yet) designing their own drinks

JK: We have a pretty small cocktail community in Chicago. When you went about assembling the team of bartenders at Mercadito, you definitely took some of the best bartenders in the city.
Tad Carducci: Yes, we did.
Paul Tanguay: Absolutely.

JK: What was your thinking behind that?
TC: First and foremost, it wasn’t to try to poach anybody from anywhere. I had personal relationships with basically everybody on the team, and months and months and months ago, we started planting the seed, saying, we’d love for you to come and help us out. And when we let people know that we were finally ready and looking, everybody that we opened with came to us and said, “Yeah, we absolutely want to come and work with you.”

JK: Did the two of you come up with all of the cocktails at Mercadito, or was it a collaboration?
TC: We came up with the opening cocktails—that was all us. Part of the reason we hired the team that we did was so that we develop the opening list, kind of to establish the Mercadito culture on the drinks side, and then the idea being to slowly give ownership to the team, utilizing their creativity. Our next menu changes will have more contributions from the bartenders. We’ll always maintain probably at least half of the cocktails on the list, but then leaving probably the other half for the bartenders to play around with and really get creative.
PT: In terms of building a team, if bartenders contribute to the menu, they feel like they’re part of it—they take ownership of it a little bit more.

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The ace shutterbugs from Darkroom Demons consistently capture some of the more amazing images of Chicago nightlife out there. It’s been a while since we featured their visual work on the blog—but when we got a look at their Halloween pics—vibrant, grimy, glam and just plain freaky—we just had to have ‘em. Here’s a compilation of Darkroom Demons Halloween 2009 photos from Angels & Kings, the Loft, Debonair Social Club’s anniversary party, and RiNo.

All photos: Darkroom Demons

With rumors swirling about Sonotheque’s future, partiers hit the dance floor extra hard Saturday night for the monthly Spandexxx party’s Halloween edition featuring a live set from Canadian act Dragonette. Everyoneisfamous photographer Clayton Hauck was there to capture the looks and the vibe—free and freaky, from the looks of it.

Photos: Clayton Hauck

You never would have known it was a Tuesday. Last night, Stone Lotus hosted Surreal’s 6th annual crazy sexy Lingerie Ball. Women sported Halloween-inspired nightwear—and outfits more often seen in the boudoir—all in spirit of the holiday. Check out the slide show for more info and photos.

Photos: Amy Mokris

Fever Ray itself provides a perfectly eerie Halloween soundtrack. So much so that if you piped its album out of your windows on Halloween you’d probably scare all the kiddies away and get yourself blacklisted from the next neighborhood block party. But for you super fans out there—and we know there are a lot of you—Fever Ray sold out the Metro show a few weeks back—here’s your opportunity to hear Karen Dreijer Andersson’s personal fright night favorites in this mix she did for popular electronic music site Resident Advisor.

Download Fever Ray’s Halloween mix.

Tracklisting:

01. Neil Young - Guitar Solo 1
02. Yo La Tengo - Everyday
03. Journey To Ixtlan - Corpse On The Mesa
04. Jad & David Fair - Nosferatu
05. Zola Jesus - Devil Take You
06. Bruce Haack - Mean Old Devil
07. Krause - Duo Canopolis
08. Burial Hex - Will To Chapel
09. Suicide - Ghost Rider
10. Amadou & Miriam - Ja Pense À Toi
11. Shackleton - Death Is Not Final
12. Entombed - Night Of The Vampire
13. Maddalena Fagandini - Interval Signals
14. Burundi: Musiques Traditionnelles - Chant Avec Cithare

Last night at Fulton Market hotspot Lumen, TOC readers and all-around sexy people partied with burlesque performers and took in a fashion show from Akira for the Sex Issue launch. Here’s a peek at what went down.

Photos: Amy Mokris

We’ve got a few pairs of tickets available for Thursday night’s Sex Issue party, 7-10pm, at Lumen—and guess what? We’re giving them away. Email promotions@timeoutchicago.com and we’ll enter you in a drawing for the tickets. What do they get you? The Sex Issue party is no stodgy affair—there’ll be burlesque performances, a fashion show from Akira, and (this is particularly worth noting) free food and drink. Tickets are $25 at the door for the indecisive, but we just know you’re gonna win. There’s more info at timeoutchicago.com/sexparty.

Mad about anything with three stripes and crazy mash-up music? I thought so—well then get on down to adidas. 923 Rush St where the sporty label is “Celebrating 60 Years of Soles and Stripes” and the Hood Internet is spinning its no longer tongue-in-cheek indie-meets-crunk jamalations with a 90s Flashback Party theme. Shoppers can nab adidas gear for 25% during the in-store party, 7pm-10pm.

Can’t make it? Get 20% off purchases of $100 or more at shopadidas.com with this coupon.

There was only one constant last night at the UIC Pavilion, a smiling petite blond with a gold microphone—and lasers. Otherwise, everything about Kylie Minogue’s first live show in Chicago changed completely about every 15 minutes—the dancers’ costumes, the lighting and bold graphics flashing on the vertical scrims, the Aussie diva’s wardrobe, the style of music—the whole theatrical scenario.

In one two-hour show we got Barbarella-style sci-fi airline hostess (“Come into my World”), Stephen Sprouse-inspired ’80s acid-house flashback (“Shocked”), buff guys showering in a gym/bathhouse while Kylie sings on a pommel horse (“Spinning Around”), cheerleaders with marching-band horns (“Wow”), military chic (“Like a Drug”), Hollywood starlet on chaise lounge flanked by rococo gold hounds (“I’m a Diamond for YouWhite Diamond”), New Orleans brothel with Kylie in lingerie (a reworking of “Locomotion”) and occasional “Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore” and video wall interludes—the whole night opened with echoes of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

Kylie might be something of an unknown in American pop circles—and she’s never played here, so she was extra thankful and warm—even inviting a superfan on stage for a photo opp. Later, she and her leggy back-up singers joined together for an impromptu acapella by request.

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I’ve been to a lot of shows at the Metro. And I’ve seen some weird ones. Marilyn Manson walking around on stilts in front of a Ouija board backdrop beckoning the crowd to spit on him comes to mind. Even last weekend’s Grizzly Bear show and the band’s powerful stage presence comes to mind. But none quite reached the light, costume and musical spectacle of last Saturday’s performance from Sweden’s Fever Ray—even if most of the show was covered in a thick—thick—shroud of smoke.

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