The Hideout, the 26-year-old Bucktown live-music fixture that has hosted alt-rock stars from the White Stripes to Smashing Pumpkins’ Billy Corgan to Neko Case, will shut down Nov. 7 and could close entirely by next year. The announcement comes after a former program director, Mykele Deville, posted at length about the “trauma and pain” he experienced during his tenure from summer 2021 to last spring.
“In our shared office, the leadership team often communicated by shouting, crying and bickering, creating a tense and distracting office culture,” Deville, also a rapper and poet, wrote on Instagram Oct. 19. “I would tell them that I found the ways they communicated harmful, yet they persisted.” Deville added the team blamed entertainment he booked — particularly Black, Latino and LGBTQ artists — for low attendance. After a vandal spray-painted racist graffiti on the building at 1354 W. Wabansia Ave., he wrote, another Hideout employee declared “Black Lives Matter” in a statement, only to receive a reprimand from co-owner Katie Tuten.
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In a statement Monday, the Hideout’s owners, Tim and Katie Tuten and Mike and Jim Hinchsliff, said they take “the concerns voiced by Mykele Deville and others in the community very seriously” and plan to work with a human resources organization “with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion,” beginning with an “audit of our policies and practices.” They added that they hoped to reopen in 2023 with “new leadership.” They did not comment further to the Tribune.
Deville also wouldn’t speak further about the Hideout, located in a 100-year-old frame house off Elston Avenue.
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In addition to allegations about owners, Deville in his post gave examples of abuse from others in the Hideout community — a customer spit on him for trying to enforce COVID-19 mask guidelines, and a white artist “cursed and berated me in front of staff.” In both cases, Deville wrote, Hideout leadership neglected to support him, allowing the artist to keep a residency.
Some artists and musicians canceled upcoming shows in response to Deville’s post, Block Club Chicago has reported. Musician Kikù Hibino, who had booked a concert at The Hideout with other artists for Nov. 29, was among those who pulled out. “I have always wanted to play at the HideOut. So I looked very much forward to our first show at your venue,” he wrote in a letter addressed to the club and posted on social media. “However, I regret to inform you we must cancel the show.”
In their statement, the Hideout owners, who own the property in addition to the club, said they “acknowledge the deep pain Mykele and others are feeling” and “understand it will take time to build trust, to foster open communication, to develop a meaningful plan for change and then to implement it.”
Steve Knopper is a freelance writer.
