Matt Arado is a part-time writer at the Daily Herald who focuses primarily on music coverage and feature stories for the paper's weekend entertainment section, TimeOut! He also works on Saturdays in the Daily Herald's Lisle office as the daytime DuPage County reporter.

Arado joined the Daily Herald's local news staff in 1999. He covered several beats while on staff, including the communities of Bartlett, Hanover Park and Mount Prospect.

In 2006, he starting splitting his time between writing feature stories for the paper and working on the daytime copy desk. He specialized in stories about pop culture, and in 2007 launched a popular DVD review column.

He was named to the Daily Herald's new Suburban Edge reporting staff in 2008, covering education and pop culture. In 2009, Arado switched to a part-time schedule so he could pursue a master's degree in fiction writing and teaching at Columbia College Chicago.

Arado has received a number of awards for his writing during his career, the most recent being a 2009 award from The Associated Press for a feature story about suburban record stores. He graduated from Lawrence University with a degree in English. He grew up in West suburban La Grange, and now lives in Chicago. Follow him on Facebook at facebook.com/matthew.arado.