Offering
the very best of old and new:
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Offering
the very best of old and new:
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3/14/11 Update
We've just added over one hundred more songs to the list, so come on down to Davenport's one Friday night and give one a whirl! Many of our customer requests are in this batch, so we likely have the song now if you asked us for it even as recently as last week!Also, we're trying out a newer, somewhat obscure manufacturer named Recisio, aka Karaoke Versions (or KV in our songbooks). They are the first French karaoke label we've encountered -- no worries, the lyrics are all in English :) Real instrumentation all the way, and so far they sound awfully good. The longer tracks haven't been cut, and the lyrics so far have all been accurate, which is just the way we like things.
And we were thrilled to find 22 previously unreleased Beatles tracks you probably won't find anywhere else in town! As well as current hits by Adele, Cee Lo Green, and others.
So join us for a night of singing soon!!!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
12/15/10 Update
200 new songs just added to the list - it's like Santa came early! :) Mostly contemporary hits this time around, but also a few oldies people have asked for as well. It's only 2 months since we re-printed the Songbooks, but we've been getting record numbers of specific song requests lately! Fortunately we were able to fulfill most if not quite all of your requests.Just click to view our Latest Additions if you can't wait to see what we added, or click on the Songs button above to view the full library. These new songs will be available at all our shows starting this coming Friday.
If you're looking for Christmas songs, we have a great selection! Just look under CHRISTMAS, under the letter C, in the Songbook by Artist.
Please note that due to the Holidays, karaoke at Davenport's will be on:
THURSDAY, Dec. 23rd (instead of Friday that week), &
THURSDAY, Dec. 30th, 8pm to 12am (instead of Friday that week).We'll revert to our normal Friday schedule beginning with Jan. 7th.
Happy Holidays from your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke!!!!
10/20/10 Update
With a little luck, the new Songbooks will be printed in time for this weekend's shows! The pdf versions are available for viewing now - just click on the [Songs] button above.We'll leave the Latest Additions page up for a bit longer, but all songs appearing there are now included in the full books -- the song numbers for the newer entries are preceded by a plus sign (+) to make them easy to spot.
Hola! The new edition of the Songbook By Artist contains a new Spanish section, under "S"!!! All Spanish language songs appear under their individual artist names as well, but are cross-listed in the new Spanish section to make finding them as easy as possible for you - enjoy!
For anyone counting, October 8th marked our 200th show at Davenport's!!!! Thanks to all for making us a success!!!
Happy singing,
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
8/20/10 Update
3rd Annual BEATLES KARAOKE PARTY!!!Be sure to join us at Davenport's on Friday night, 8/20, for our annual Beatles Karaoke Party!
Just return to the home page for all the fab details!
August 2010 Update
Friday August 6th....Please join our hostess
Alma Mendoza, her band, & friends
in a special encore performance of her ROCKING tribute show to one of the all-time greats, Stevie Wonder! In the Cabaret Room at Davenport's, followed by our regular karaoke show afterwards!
Click on the postcard for details...
5/12/10 Update
Sorry to say, no more Tuesday night karaoke at Purple Haze - the bar has CLOSED! Our apologies to all who came out looking for us on 5/11 only to find Purple Haze gone - we had no notice the bar was closing! We'd been hired for a minimum run of six weeks, so we were more shocked than anyone when friends started calling us just before our next show to say they'd driven by, and the venue was gone!We made a number of wonderful new friends in our short run at Purple Haze, and want to especially thank them for joining us at Davenport's for our Friday night shows!
We're in the process of starting the search for another Tuesday night venue, and we'll post the news here as soon as we have one.
Thank you all for your support!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
4/13/10 Update (Alas, this show is gone - see above.)
Starting tonight, please join us at our new venue, Purple Haze! Sonic Lizard Karaoke every Tuesday night in Wrigleyville!!! There's great drink and food specials here as well! We're trying this show out from 8 to 12 to start, so if earlier karaoke is what you've been looking for, here's the place to do it! We're at Davenport's as well every Friday night at 10:30, so now you can sing with us twice a week!Double your pleasure, and get your sing on.
... 
Join us for karaoke
TUESDAY nights 8pm to 12
@ Purple Haze Bar & Grille
3415 N. Clark
$2 Domestic Bottles - $2 Jameson - Awesome Bar Food!Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
1/19/10 Update
New songs have arrived!! 200 additions you can look at right here on our Latest Additions page. All these songs will be at this Friday's and all future shows.There's recent hits by Lady Gaga, Leona Lewis, Black Eyed Peas, Brady Paisley, Jay-Z, Susan Boyle and more! Along with a number of great classics new to our list, from Stevie Wonder to the Rolling Stones to Pink! And nearly every customer request from the last few months has been filled, so check the list to see if we got your song in.
Please join us this and every Friday for karaoke at Davenport's, 1383 N. Milwaukee in Chicago. We start at 10:30 and go until they kick us out :)
Happy singing!!!!!!
1/02/10 Update
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!Special congratulations to our wonderful singer ELIOT for winning the Friday, January 1st karaoke contest at Davenport's!!! And thanks to all the participants!!! And especially thank you to the owners of Davenport's Piano Bar and Cabaret for sponsoring this event. Our winner received $100 cash, and will get a one hour showcase in the Cabaret Room at Davenport's!
Sorry there hasn't been an update here in a few months, but our Autumn was enormously busy. In addition to our weekly Friday shows at Davenport's, we did Thursday night "SCARYOAKE" shows for the whole month of October, culminating in our Halloween party - ten shows in all, just at Davenport's.
And a steady stream of corporate, holiday, and private birthday parties has kept us hopping! If you're considering booking us for a private party, please contact us well in advance as our schedule has been filling up - we already have three bookings for January and at least one in February. Work is good, and we're very fortunate to have it
Also, being named the #1 Best Chicago Karaoke for 2009 by Citysearchdidn't exactly hurt business :)
We haven't updated the Songbooks in 4 months, but we have a couple hundred new tracks we're bringing to the shows, so just ask if you don't see it on the list. Most recent customer requests have been filled - if there's a song you want us to get, please let us know! To whomever anonymously requested Empire State by Jay-Z, it should be on the last disc we got in, but we literally haven't had time to open the package! Yes, Christmas can be crazy :)
Hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful and healthy holiday season! Here's to lots of singing in 2010!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
8/28/09 Update
More new songs in! All the various customer requests from the past few weeks, plus a couple fairly rare tracks (the White Album version of The Beatles' Revolution, the obscure Hank Williams track Kaw-Liga) and another whole disc's worth of MOTOWN Originals (the original artists' recordings turned into karaoke tracks by Motown itself - you can't get more faithful than that!)View all our songbook additions since the last physical printing of the books right here.
A warm thanks to everyone (over 50 people!!!) who joined us for our 2nd Annual BEATLE's Party at last week's show! We raffled away free Beatles art, free Beatles books, free Beatles posters, and a free Peace Museum t-shirt autographed by Yoko Ono! We'll be doing this party every year, the Friday show after The Fest For Beatle's Fans (aka BeatleFest) is held at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare, every August in Chicago. (We won the t-shirt at this year's auction, with the proceeds going to The Spirit Foundation).
We were too busy hosting to take any photos! If anyone has some, e-mail us! :)
A fab time was most definitely had by all!
8/01/09 Update & Big News
We want to thank all our faithful followers very much for not one, but two important things!To everyone at last night's show, a warm thanks for making our Michael Jackson Tribute Night such a happy success! You were all amazing! Some 20 people did two or more Michael Jackson songs each, and well for such difficult material! We allowed repeats, but there were amazingly few. It was an education in how different Michael Jackson songs had affected so many people in different and personal ways. Many people introduced their songs with a short story about what that particular song meant to them. It was a deeply emotional night, and a great celebration of a singer we shall always remember.
Our second reason for thanks is that we'd just learned the night before, Citysearch named us, Sonic Lizard Karaoke, the #1 Best Chicago Karaoke for 2009! For our Friday night shows at Davenport's!
Ranked #1 by Citysearch - Best Chicago Karaoke 2009! |
So we're still a bit giddy about that :) And very, very grateful to all of you for supporting us!!!!
Good singing!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
7/26/09 Update
For those of you who like to purchase your own karaoke discs or songs, we've just updated our LINKS page with the best places to shop, and the latest technical info on what to shop for (and what to avoid). Please read the technical info before buying discs or downloads to bring to our shows! Thanks!
7/23/09 UpdateClick here to see all our Michael Jackson songs on one list!
Choose your Michael Jackson songs today for the
Friday, JULY 31 Michael Jackson Tribute Night (see below).
7/12/09 Update
Since last we updated this page, the world of music has been shocked, deeply saddened, and forever altered by the untimely passing of Michael Jackson. It's rather difficult to talk karaoke as usual when for most of us, music fans or not, there is nothing "usual" at all about a world without Michael Jackson.It is however a world full of Michael's music, and it's a better world for it.
So there's two things to tell you. First is that the Latest Additions list we've just put up today is almost entirely Michael Jackson songs. If we didn't have it and it was available, we got it. If we already had it but there was a better version to be added, we got that too. There's now enough Michael Jackson songs in our book to do an entire night of just Michael. Which brings up the second thing:
"Sing~Dance~Remember"
~Karaoke Tribute Night To Michael Jackson~
Friday July 31 ~ 10:30 to closing
Davenport's ~ 1383 N. Milwaukee Ave. ~ no coverSo if there's a Michael Jackson song in your heart, come let it out and share it with people that feel the same way! Sing, dance, and remember. And don't worry about someone else beating you to your favorite. This is one night when, if ten people all want a turn to sing Thriller, or Beat It, then we're playing them ten times.
6/21/09 Update
Welcome to summer in Chicago, and a Happy Solstice to everyone!We're having a hot time at Davenport's every Friday, and welcome to all the many new singers who've found their way to our show in the past month! It's fantastic having you aboard! Since there are so many new karaoake fans joining us on Fridays at Davenport's, we'd like to repeat a couple of things our regulars already know:
We call it a "Karaoke Showcase"
because you get to do 2 SONGS PER TURN, at least for the first half of the show, and all night when we can do that and still fit everyone in for a turn. The song slips we're presently using only have room to write in one song, but please feel free to turn in two at a time!There is a 2 DRINK MINIMUM at Davenport's on Fridays.
You can order soda or ice tea as your 2 drinks, but please remember it is a bar and it is a business! There's an additional $2 cover for the live show in the front room, but NO COVER for our karaoke show in the back room - for karaoke it's just the 2 drink minimum. Hey, those are both good deals!And please remember tip the wait staff, because they work dang hard for all of us, and without them we'd die of thirst! :)
Please join us every Friday. Summer's here and the time is right for singing your heart out!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
5/22/09 Update
The New Songbooks Are In!
Just in time for the warmer weather, the new edition of our Songbook gives you 1,000 more songs to sing than last summer! The new copies were bound and finished in time for last Friday's show at Davenport's, so come on out and checkout all the new titles. If you requested songs from us in the past year (or just more songs by particular artists), they're almost certainly in the book now - there were only 2 or 3 out-of-print titles we couldn't locate for you!Hey, that's not all! We've also replaced about 500 of our older tracks with superior versions of the songs made by Sound Choice (the best US manufacturer) and Zoom (the best UK manufacturer). We've also nearly finished acquiring all the discs we were missing from those tasty, out-of-print Canadian karaoke labels Dangerous and Sing King. It's rockin' good stuff!
Although everything on our present Latest Additions list is now integrated in the new Songbooks (those are the song numbers preceded by plus signs (), we'll leave it posted here at the website for now, and keep a few copies at our shows for those of you who just want to look at the new stuff. [Addendum 7/12/09: the Latest Additions page has now been replaced with only what's been added since the May Songbook printing.) If you don't find the song you're looking for, just ask us! We may already have it, because we're getting new stuff all the time.
Sonic Lizard Karaoke is proud to offer you one of the most diversified song lists in the world, with over 2,000 artists represented in our collection. You'll find songs at our shows you just won't find anywhere else.
So come and get your sing on with us every Friday at Davenport's!
Remember, we let you sing 2 songs per turn for at least the first hour!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
3/31/09 Update
Welcome to Spring!
Please come hear our hostess Alma, along with Natalie Myre
& Marianne Murphy Orland in their show "Girls Like Us"
at Davenport's, every Sunday in April! George Howe on piano!
Click on one of the links to learn more about it!And we've got more newly added songs for you - you can see them all online just by clicking here.
Your busy friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
2/26/09 Update
We've got new songs coming at you! Nearly 200 more will be on the list for tomorow's show at Davenport's, and there'll be several hundred more as soon as we can get all that typing done. New, consolidated songbooks should be ready by early April, but meanwhile we'll have weekly updates on our Latest Additions list at every show - and you can see them all online just by clicking here.We chased down nearly every customer-requested song that anyone asked for in the past year, so if you requested it, come on in and sing it!!!
To all of you who voted for us in the Reader's poll for Best Karaoke in the city, we'd especially like to say thank you! The results won't be out until March, but we're keeping a good thought :)
And please remember our hostess Alma is appearing in "Girls Like Us" at Davenport's, every Sunday in April This show went over so huge last November that it's back for a four week run!!! Follow the link for details, and we hope to see you there!
Keep singing - it's good for you!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
12/12/08 Update
Yep, as it says on the main page, we're back for just ONE MORE WEDNESDAY night at Davenport's! That's Wednesday night, 12/17. Karaoke will be in the front room, 9:30 to closing, immediately following JON MERCADO's show in the Cabaret Room. Jon's show starts at 8:00 - come for both!Time flies when we're having fun. As unbelieveable as it sounds, Friday night 12/26 will be our 100th show at Davenport's! We'd like to give everyone who comes that night $100 in honor of the occasion. Won't, but we'd like to! We're broke like everyone else just now :(
Hangover Heaven! On Friday January 2 we're starting early! Karaoke will begin at 8:00 and go all night! Yeah, yeah, we know... but you'll have had a WHOLE DAY to recover :)
Don't forget we're having an Inauguaration party, OBAMA KARAOKE, at our Friday Jan. 23rd show - the details are in the previous News Update below.
Alma has a show of her own coming soon: HeartSounds. With the incomparable George Howe on piano. In the Cabaret Room at Davenport's, Friday Jan. 9th at 8:00 pm sharp! Please join us for that! Being a Friday, her show will be immediately followed by karaoke as usual, of course!
BEATLES fans take note! We have some interesting and rare Beatles solo tracks newly added to our song list:
John's songs - I'm Losing You, and Oh My Love
Paul's song - Dance Tonight from his recent "memory almost full" album
And not one, not two, but THREE George Harrison works:
When We Was Fab, Isn't It A Pity, and Cheer DownIt's about time the karaoke manufacturers remembered George! We imported all these tracks from Merry Olde England. We have some things on the way to satisfy our customer's requests (the Four Seasons disc is still on backorder after two weeks!) and we hope to be printing new Songbooks before spring.
Peace!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
12/1/08 Update
Alas, no more Wednesday karaoke for awhile! We may give that another go in the Spring, but for now remember we have a great and diverse selection of CHRISTMAS SONGS for you to belt out every Friday night! Why go caroling on a cold Chicago night when you can do it in the warmth and luxury of Davenport's Cabaret Room, with a cheery cocktail in hand!And as we bid a fond (or not so fond) farewell to 2008, we're also looking ahead to 2009...
Inauguaration Week, karaoke shows around the globe (yep, the globe!) will be celebrating:
You can join the Songs Of Hope group at Facebook.com!
We'll be partcipating with our Friday show:
January 23, 2009
10:30pm @ Davenport's Piano Bar / 1383 N Milwaukee / Chicago, ILOBAMA KARAOKE!! Singing songs of Hope and Change!!
Be sure to join us that night when we'll Barack'n'roll!!!!!!!!!
11/1/08 Update
Our new Wednesday night shows in the front room at Davenport's have been extended through November 19th! (We won't be there on the 26th, that being the night before Thanksgiving.) Wednesday night karaoke goes from 9:00pm to midnight. We're making lots of new friends and having a blast on Wednesdays, so come in and join the party! Remember this is in addtion to our regular show in the back room every Friday night at 10:30.Also in November
Please join our hostess Almain:
"A Triple Celebration!"
Alma Mendoza, Amy Cole,
& Marianne Murphy Orland
do the songs of:
Carly Simon & Carole King
with Brian Felder on piano
8:00 pm sharp @ Davenport's Piano Bar
1383 N. Milwaukee Ave / Chicago / 773-278-1830
$15 cover/2 drink minimum
Reservations strongly recommended
10/1/08 Update
In addition to our regular Friday night shows in the back room at Davenport's, we'll be hosting karaoke in the front room at Davenport's every Wednesday night at 9:00pm for the month of October! Get your sing on with us twice a week this month!Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
September 2008 Update
An extremely full month lies ahead for us! Note that we have an early start time of 8:00pm for our regular Friday night show at Davenport's on September 5th.A little later in the month, Sonic Lizard Karaoke will be the proud hosts of the 2008 Chicago
Also in September -Internet Karaoke Forums Singers Gathering-
Being the national meetup of members of the J.O.L.T. online Karaoke Forum (formerly sponsored by karaoke.com) plus attendants from the local membership of the SingSnap online community! But you don't have to be a member of an online group to join us for the karaoke parties -
ALL SINGERS ARE WELCOME!
(along with any of your friends who just want to listen!)What this means is three BIG nights of karaoke, all set in the elegant confines of Davenport's Cabaret Room (1383 N. Milwaukee / Chicago). We especially hope some of our regulars will come out and strut there stuff! The nights and showtimes are:
Wednesday, 9/17 - 7:00pm to 11:30pm
Friday, 9/19 - 10:30pm to 1:30am (our regular Friday night showtime)
plus
Saturday, 9/20 - 7:00pm to 1:30am (a karaoke marathon!)
You can really get your sing on!!!
Alma Mendoza in her own show:
Don't Mess Around With Jim (Croce)
(please click on the link for details)
Her tribute show to the great Jim Croce
Fridays, Sept. 12 & 19 @ Davenport's
(8:00 sharp, followed by karaoke at our regular time)
7/10/08 Update
If you're a real karaoke veteran, the name Pioneer means something to you. Pioneer made the 12 inch karaoke laser disks many of us first sang from in the very early 1990's. They made really great versions of a number of songs, many of which have never been topped by later manufactures of karaoke discs. By the end of the decade the laser disk had gone the way of the vinyl record, replaced by the still popular cd+g format. Pioneer eventually re-issued their karaoke tracks in the cd+g format (minus the quaint videos that had been part of the laser disk format) but they did so rather late in the game, losing their dominance of the market and soon dropping out of the karaoke business completely. Pioneer cd+g's have been out of print for a decade now, and can be pretty hard to come by!Sonic Lizard has nearly half the Pioneer cd+g collection in our own library, and just recently we were lucky enough to acquire a few more. Hence this little trip down memory lane :)
We've started a fresh LATEST ADDITIONS page where you can see the "new" tracks, and we'll have them at all our shows starting tomorrow.
We've also tweeked our new sound system especially for the Pioneer discs. If you're a real karaoke geek like some of us, you might be aware Pioneer didn't set the gains correctly when they transferred their catalog to the cd+g format. We've compensated for that on our system, so you'll get to hear what these vintage karaoke tracks sounded like on the original laser disks -- they rock!
So drop in for our show, and get your sing on!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
6/22/08 Update
The new Songbooks are in! In fact they were ready in time for our Friday night show this weekend, and the singers gave them quite a workout! We now have nearly 6,000 unique songs for you to choose from, along with about 1,000 alternate versions or arrangements of those songs. It's not just about quantity though. We're continuously replacing songs we already have with superior versions as often as we can find and afford them, so the quality of our library continues to grow as fast as our size.Although everything on our LATEST ADDITIONS page is included in the new edition of the Songbooks, we're going to leave that page up awhile for our regulars to see all the new tracks in one place. You can also spot the new additions in the Songbooks by looking for a plus sign (+) in front of the song numbers.
Our shows have been much more fast-paced lately owing to the kick-ass equipment upgrades we've made. A special thanks to everyone at our first show in June for enduring the rough spots while we got all the bugs out of the new system! We've had our fastest and smoothest shows ever since, with more chances for everyone to sing :)
Just in time, as our Friday nights at Davenport's have been really hopping! We want to retain our karaoke SHOWCASE format as long as we can, as everyone loves getting two songs per turn. For the future we'll be starting each night with two songs per turn for the first rotation, but switching to one song per singer, per turn, as soon as it's necessary to give everyone who has signed up at least once chance on stage. Please remember your best chance to sing is always if you arrive and sign-up early!
Also remember if you're singing as part of a duet or group, we may have to count that as your entire turn on busier nights. If you aren't singing solo too, that won't make you any difference. But if you want to sing solo too, be careful about signing up for duets, as you won't always get to do both!
Now come on out and get your sing on! :>
6/2/08 Update
Nearly 300 songs have been added to our library since the last printing of the books in January. Eddie Vedder, Toots & The Maytals, Evanescence, Maroon 5, Rufus Wainwright, Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Bad Company, ZZ Top, Elvis Costello, the complete Grease soundtrack, more Amy Winehouse, rare Beatles tracks imported from Merry Olde England, and tons more! Just go to LATEST ADDITIONS to see all the new and tastey tunes! Get to our Friday shows early and try out something new before it gets packed!Summer's here and the time is right for singing your heart out!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
5/13/08 Update
A special thanks to all our dear friends that came out to Davenport's last Friday to help us celebrate our show's one year anniversary in the Cabaret Room! And to all the staff at Davenport's for making it a great year for us - and for surpising us with Alma's birthday cake!!! Congrats to Eliot, who won our grand prize for the evening, a Sony walkman cd/mp3/fm player! And an extra thank you to Cassie for the great ad design!
We've got a gaggle of new songs in, including the latest releases from Sound Choice. Just see Steve in the booth if you'd like to peek at the discs and pick a new song! It'll probably be July before we can print a new edition of our Songbook, as we've been hard at work and pre-occupied with a major upgrade to our equipment.Our venerable and massive (really massive!) 400 disc player has outlived its usefulness, and will be gone in a week or two, replaced by sleek, lean and mean new gear! The one-player-holds-all strategy was great in its day, but our library now consists of way too many discs to fit in the thing anyway. Look forward to smoother and faster running shows in the future -- and that means more turns for everybody :)
Good singing!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
3/18/08 Update
Please note we have gone back to our regular start time of 10:30, Friday nights at Davenport's. But keep an eye on this website or sign up for our mailing list to stay informed about future early start times as they occur.More Amy for you!
Check out our LATEST ADDITIONS - we have more Amy Winehouse for you, plus a load of new and unusual tracks we've been mining from the karaoke manufacturers in Great Britain! Joni Mitchell, Annie Lennox, Tracy Chapman, David Bowie, Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Midnight Oil, Donovan, 10cc, and (yes) even Jethro Tull!See you at the next show!
2/17/08 Update
Extra-Early start times! March 7 & 14 the show starts at 8:00!
That's right, come get your sing on with us all night long the first two Fridays in March! Karaoke at Davenport's from 8:00pm 'til closing! It's our "Karaoke Showcase" where you get to sing TWO songs per turn. As usual, no cover and only a one drink minimum (and soft drinks count).There's just a few new songs on our LATEST ADDITIONS list at present, but more are on the way! We've discovered some new karaoke outlets in Great Britain, where we're finding songs that have never been available in the USA. So keep an eye out for some very interesting additions to our librbary in the near future!
1/27/08 Update (revised)
We're always at Davenport's EVERY Friday!
Earlier start time on Friday, Feb. 1st
If you come to our Friday night shows at Davenport's, you may (or may not!) already be aware that our normal starting time is 10:30 because there's usually a live show in the same room from 8:00 to 9:30, and we get karaoke running as soon as we can after the stage gets cleared.If you run across advertising for a Friday night show at Davenport's, we'll still be there too! It's karaoke at Davenport's EVERY Friday, come rain or shine!
On occasions when there is no performer ahead of us, karaoke will start by 9:00 pm!
The next date that will be happening is Friday Feb. 1st. So join us early and sing all night!
Any nights we start early will be posted here at the website as soon as we're aware of them. Whenever there's enough notice we'll also send an e-mail to everyone who's joined our mailing list!
If you are ever in doubt about our starting time, just give us or Davenport's a call!
SONIC LIZARD KARAOKE: 630-886-6883, or
Davenport's Piano Bar: 773-278-1830If you weren't with us last Friday, the new Songbooks are in! More songs, and more time to sing them -- what could be sweeter??? :)
Until the next update...
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
1/7/08 Update
New Songbooks coming!
It's a new year, and that means time for new songs! As of yesterday all the new titles have been typed into the database, and the NEW BOOKS will be rolling off the presses shortly. We hope to have the hard copies at our shows in a couple weeks, but the PDF versions are online right here right now! The book has grown by over a thousand titles in the past year, and the new edition will also reflect the replacement of about 300 old songs with improved versions.All the songs listed should be available at our next Davenport's show this Friday - we're just waiting on one last disc to come in. There will be a complete list of the newer songs out on the tables, along with the old songbooks until the new, consolidated books arrive.
We especially want to thank all our customers at Davenport's, along with Deb the manager, the owners, and all the incredible staff there for making 2007 such a happy and successful year for us!
We've tried to add all the songs you've all been asking for, and if it isn't on the list yet it only means we're still shopping :)
Happy New Year!!!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
9/21/07 Update
Do we have Amy Winehouse yet? Yes-yes-yes.
120 new songs have just been added, including the current hit Rehab. Lots of contemporary country music in this batch, along with whole discs of Melissa Etheridge, Linda Ronstadt, James Taylor, and a nice set of '50's oldies. Some lovely, vinatge R&B songs. And for the classic rock afficiandos, three great Moody Blues songs available on karaoke for the very first time. There's about 50 new artists represented on our list for the first time, so check out all the addtions! And more new stuff coming soon!Until the next update...
Good singing!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
7/6/07 Update
We now have over 5,000 songs!
More songs added in time for tonight's show! Complete discs of Sinatra, Nat "King" Cole, and one of Jule Styne/Stephen Sondheim compositions. More Broadway hits, some rare Carpenter's songs, 60's rock and R&B, and an import disc from the UK full of classic rock tracks. Come out to Davenport's and enjoy yourself!
6/15/07 Update
We've been shopping again! :) Just added in time for tonight's show, 200 new songs! In addition to the new titles, we also upgraded or replaced about 75 songs we already had with superior versions (mostly Backstage and Performance Tracks brand titles with Sound Choice or Zoom versions, in case you're keeping track:) In cases where the older version was actually better or had some redeeming qualities, we will be keeping that version on the list as well.
Highlights of our latest shopping spree include single artist discs of material by Prince, and The Bee Gees. Also in this batch we've added soundtracks for not one, not two, but four Broadway shows: Wicked, Hairspray, Thoroughly Modern Millie, and (long overdue for our collection) The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Incidentally, at least for the Broadway musicals, we will now be adding both the key and the length of the tracks to the Songbook when this information is available. Unfortunately that info isn't included with every disc, but it is becoming pretty standard where musicals are concerned. When available, it will appear in the Comments column next to the song titles.The rest of the new additions cover a bit of everything, both recent and older: rock, pop, country, and a little r&b. Finally, after all this time, a karaoke version of Donovan's classic song Season Of The Witch is available, and we're probably the first outfit in Chicago to have it :) Enjoy!!!
PS-
The new DIGITAL KEY CHANGER is finally on it's way! This is actually the 4th one we've ordered, but the first to turn out to actually be in stock. UPS has it scheduled for delivery Monday, so it will be at next Friday's show! Thank you all for your patience!
5/1/07 Update
Just in time for our new show at Davenport's, we've gone to press with a new edition of our Song Book that incorporates all of the additions to our disc library in the past three years. That's roughly 40 new pages of additional songs!Which is really too much to "blog" about here. As usual, the new songs in the book are marked with a plus sign (+) in front of the song number to make them easy for you to spot.
We're happy to say most of the additions are from the Sound Choice label. We've also bolstered the number of standards on our list, as well as adding a second batch of discs from Motown's original recordings series. And a number of tracks we already had have been replaced with superior versions, including nearly all of The Who songs on our list.
The new printing also features a new category. You can now look under MUSICALS (in the Song Book by Artist) to find Broadway and showtunes. This new section of the book is still quite thin, but we'll be fixing that when we go on our next shopping spree! If there's a Broadway song you'd like to see on the list, please drop a line to songrequests@soniclizardkaraoke.com - we'd love to hear your suggestions!
And yes, there is a new Jethro Tull song on the list (in case you were wondering:) But alas, we do not like what Sound Choice did with Thick As A Brick. The sound is magnificent, the lyrics spot-on, but they made a very uninformed (and musically senseless) choice in how they edited the song. You can't win 'em all!
Until the next update...
Good singing!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
6/8/04 Update
We've done some serious shopping since the last printing of our Song Book, and acquired so many exciting new songs, where shall we begin?
Well, with The Beatles of course! We've substantially revamped our already extensive Beatles catalog, bringing in much better versions of many of the Fab Four's songs from the Sound Choice and AmeriSing labels (and replacing most of the inferior versions we'd been making do with). Perhaps even better than that, we've also added two volumes of early Beatles rarities appearing in karaoke for the very first time, thanks to an outstanding new British karaoke label named Zoom. We now boast 130 Beatles songs on our list. Now that's fab!It's hard to say enough good things about Zoom. The quality of their renditions is outstanding in every way, and the variety of their releases is, well, more than amazing. They have become the first label legally licensed to produce karaoke discs for The Eagles as well as Don Henley, and have issued volume one discs for both, as well as the first of two new Queen discs. We're proud to have already acquired these and several other Zoom discs (including their third volume of Eva Cassidy!), and expect to be adding many more in the future.
But that's not all stirring in Merry Olde England. We've also just added a couple discs worth of songs from an even newer British label named Sing To The World, and were totally blown away by how good their recordings sound. Thanks to them we already have Joss Stone's hit "Fell In Love With A Boy" on our list, months before a US label had touched it, some better versions of old classics (Rod Stewart, The Police, Gloria Estefan) than we've ever heard before, and some totally unique tracks such as Peter Gabriel's "Games Without Frontiers" and Dido's "Hunter".
Our international shopping didn't end with Great Britain. A small, newly started Canadian label named Sound King is specializing in Canadian artists, and we managed to track down one of two volumes of Guess Who songs they produced. This may be the single most authentic sounding karaoke disc we've ever heard -- it's spooky! It includes the first ever full length release of American Woman (the album version) as well as never-released gems "Star Baby", "Rain Dance", and others. Also on the Canadian front, we luckily just ran into a few discs from the long-out-of-print Canadian karaoke label Dangerous, which we just had to scoop up immediately, filling all kinds of holes in our song collection.
For you Norah Jones fans out there, we're happy to announce we now have the complete contents of her debut album on our list, as well as her new single "Sunrise". And you thought we were only shopping for oldies :) Actually we've added quite a lot of contemporary hits, including latest works from Lucinda Williams, John Mayer, Simply Red, 3 Doors Down, Britney Spears, Clay Aiken, Annie Lennox, Melissa Etheridge, Michelle Branch, The Darkness, and a host of others. Follow the link below for a complete look.
Sound Choice, the best manufacturer in the US (and also the most expensive) continues to churn out good stuff, and we've added many more of their 70's and 80's discs to our list, as well as the wonderful releases in their new R&B classics series. But now for the biggest news -- well, it's big for us die-hard karaoke fanatics anyway. Drum roll please! MOTOWN has begun issuing a line of karaoke discs using the ORIGINAL artist recordings, minus the vocal tracks. These are not recreations baby, these are the real thing! Temptations, Supremes, Smokey & The Miracles, Marvin Gaye, and some really deep cuts from the Motown vaults. We've added four of the first six discs released to our song list already, and hope this series really takes off. Wouldn't it be great if every record label followed Motown's example? Oh, the possibilities! The Motown song numbers we've added to the book begin with the letters MT, and have an annotation in the Comments column to make them easier to spot.
We've also added oodles of Dolly Parton, a lot of Heart, more Pretenders, not one but two tracks from the late and great Warren Zevon, and just in time to practice it a bit before The 4th of July (not to mention the polls in November) "Volunteers" by the Jefferson Airplane. Yes, we said Jefferson Airplane. It's pretty amazing how much new meaning some of those 60's songs have taken on recently.
Alas, there were no new Jethro Tull songs to get in the past year. Imagine that! As a consolation for the veritable mass of anglo-celtic folk-rock aficionados out there, you could always try singing Steeleye Span's 1973 smash hit "All Around My Hat". We did get that for you :)
Good singing!
Your friends at Sonic Lizard Karaoke
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