The builders

Photo: Martha Williams

Joe Shanahan

Club owner

Shanahan’s love affair with Chicago culture started with childhood trips downtown with his parents from their South Side home. “My mother would take me to the Art Institute; my father would take me to Wrigley Field,” he says. Since then, he’s become more curator than spectator as owner of Metro and Smart Bar, two venues that have grown into Chicago institutions over the past 25 years, thanks to Shanahan’s ability to bring in big-name acts like Smashing Pumpkins, R.E.M. and Nirvana…before they were big names. “There is something to be said about the connection to the music community, and I’m so lucky to be in that position, between the fans and the bands.”—Scott Smith

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