The Musical Side of the Feed diner in Chicago
Summer, 2025 (D. Hoekstra photo.)
I’ve been going to Feed since Donna Knezek and Liz Sharp opened the southern-inspired diner twenty years ago in a country-industrial gumbo of Humboldt Park.
Feed, 2803 W. Chicago Ave., is a couple of blocks north of the Milwaukee District railroad station. In 2005, the bar next door was the Famous Pizza Lounge (a.k.a. Hiawatha Inn), a former speakeasy with a curious clientele and a loud jukebox. Today, the Continental Lounge features a mural that pays tribute to the Milwaukee Road’s Hiawatha.
Christ Bambulas (1931-2013, a.k.a. Chris) owned the building that housed the two-story speakeasy and the restaurant. I remember having a cold Hiawatha beer in front of a faded train mural from my early days in the neighborhood.
“Chris inherited the building and the bar from his father,” Knezek wrote in an e-mail from her home in Albuquerque, N.M. after it was announced that Feed is for sale. Here is my Block Club story on that. “During World War II GI’s would get off the train just south of Grand Avenue and drink the bar dry. There were four bars at the intersection. Chris got his start running errands for the Mob when they did a shake-down on his dad, taking Chris and his brother as employees. When Chris went to prison for bookmaking, he sold the place to his girlfriend and it got the name Famous Pizza Lounge.” Today, the building is owned by Chris’s daughter. Feed is for sale, but it is only the business.
Continental’s speakeasy era on their wall.
When the pizza lounge was in full swing, it was around the corner from Superior Street Studios, where members of the Mekons and U.S. Maple rehearsed. It transformed into the Continental in 2007.
Former Chicago musician and Mucca Pazza member Nora Barton worked the counter at Feed from 2010 to 2019. In a recent conversation from Kentucky, she recalled musician-customers like LeRoy Bach (Wilco, Marvin Tate), jazz musician-promoter Josh Berman and glam-pop-rocker Bobby Conn.
Nora Barton. Thanks, Nora!
The Gothic-cabaret-jazz group Bakelite 78 performed Friday night sets at the pizza lounge from 2004-2007 and musicians dropped by after rehearsal. The colorful Bambulas tagged Bakelite vocalist-guitarist Robert J. Rial with the nickname “Bugsy” because he liked his Homburg Capone-style hat.
“Christ, well everyone called him Chris, loved the parlor jazz Gothic Americana we were doing,” Rial said in a phone conversation from his home in Kalamazoo, MI. “I got invited to a Greek Easter out in the suburbs and met the entire Bambulas clan. His brother Nick had a German war bride and me and the clarinet player (and current WGN-AM news anchor) Bob Kessler was asked to play behind Nick singing “All of Me” at the one-year memorial at her gravesite. It was kind of creepy. I was like the Frank Sinatra of the Greek mob. Chris told me a story about a man who frequented the restaurant that would become Feed.”
The story was about Felix “Milwaukee Phil” Alderisio, a hitman who turned mob boss.” Rial’s blues swing “The Ballad of Milwaukee Phil” appears on the 2006 Bakelite 78 debut album “It’s a Sin” with Rial dealing regretful lyrics like, “Oh sorrow, you shouldn’t have borrowed. Milwaukee Phil is comin’ tomorrow…Too many bets down at The Hiawatha-you’re hogtied in the trunk.”
Robert J. Rial at the Famous Pizza Lounge. (Courtesy of Robert.)
Barton now lives in Dayton, KY, a small town located on the Ohio River, approximately 10 minutes from Cincinnati. She deploys her cello through Planchette (like on a Ouija board) her improvisational project that appears in different venues and soundscapes. Barton sends her cello through an effects board that includes loop, delay and some harmonic shifting. Her album release was in 2020 at the Hungry Brain in Chicago.
The classically trained Barton remembered Feed as a convenient stop for her musician peers. “It was easy going,” she said. “You’d show up, get your food and get back to rehearsal. The rehearsal space is just a block away. The guys from Jamdek (studio, 800 N. Sacramento) were regulars. It was also BYOB so you could chill out.” Many customers would fetch their beer next door at the Continental.
“The prices were great,” she said. “Back in Donna and Liz’s days, they had bands play at brunch. They had a little Hammond organ on wheels. They’d make room in one of the corners and have like a three-piece bluegrass or honky tonk band play. I’m pretty sure it was acoustic.” Knezek said, “We never paid musicians but there was the organ and guitar for anyone who wanted to play. A few times someone played for their supper. And a few times there were customer appreciation parties with bands, pig roasts, and crawfish boils. Those were fun.”
“Feed Bird!,” (D. Hoekstra photo, 2025.)
Another key musical neighbor was M&S Organ, 2518 W. Chicago. Knezek recalled, “Before the organ we had a busted-up piano we found in the alley behind the organ shop. Not playable, but a beautiful piece of furniture. Some skateboarders helped us put it in the back of a truck, a mile later, the cops pulled us over for driving while white in East Garfield Park (where she lived.) Fortunately, I have a brother who was a cop, and it never failed to get me out of a cop encounter.”
Over the years, Knezek offered 25 percent discounts to police officers, teachers, and firefighters at Feed and her other restaurants, Leo’s Lunchroom and Bite. “That didn’t hurt either,” she said.
Rial loved Feed’s rotisserie chicken and the house banana pudding. Barton’s favorite Feed items were the brunch pulled pork hash (potatoes, sweet potatoes, pulled pork, and veggies sauteed together, topped with two eggs and a side of toast) and the gumbo, a Monday night special.
“I still remember one guy who got mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, and chicken,” she said. “It was so starchy. Then he would play a concert. (She laughed.)” The song never stayed the same at the wonderful Feed experience.
Feed portrait by Feed regular Dmitry Samarov. Courtesy of Donna Knezek.)
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