Young, Asian Love

Remember what it was like to meet your true love on the internet? Remember that intense month of binary flirtation and realising that your soulmate was not on the screen but the other side of the world? You must remember that first meeting; those rose tinted nine days that made you abandon your previous life and chase the dream of hazy young love?
No? Well these two do, and they took a camera that also remembers. Some people get all the stories.

Yes, it's very 'Vice/American Apparel/I-could-use-my-camera-properly-if-I wanted', but it's also genuinely sweet and appropriate. See it, and read the story here.

Red Team Fight A Good Fight

Despite previous endeavour Cheenah being a London indie band at the height of the I'm-in-a-London-indie-band bandwagon, there was always something slightly different about them, not least their attitude to it. In other words they never took themselves too seriously, and they were actually pretty good.

So, Cheenah disband somewhat as a reaction to the scene, and head in a totally different direction with a slightly different line-up, as Red Team.

So as the scene seems to be featuring a larger turn-out of electronic based bands, Red Team's sound is umm more electronic and tightly programmed. Except again, they're comparitively very good. I managed to see their first gig at The Monarch in Camden, and it was pretty special; a mass of electronics and effects used carefully, and to great effect; a wall of sound in the best possible way. (Standout track is the somewhat ethereal Absinthe).

Think Foals, Battles, Holy Fuck, DJ Shadow, Death in Vegas and some friends playing soggy biscuit... Catch the biscuit live as soon as you can, no-one wants to be last.

Merkley Shot 111 Naked Girls

I'm such a sucker for symmetry, today I fell into a semi-concious state of hypnosis on the tube when I realised they're symmetrical to the edge of your peripheral vision if you sit in the right seat.

Anyway, I've long been a fan of Merkley; a character who deserves a whole article for his various outputs rather than a measley blog post, but such is suchness. He takes brilliants almost-symetric portraits of friends and any girls who will get their clothes in a suitable environment, and he's just released a book documenting his glass-eye conquests.

Tar Magazine Premiere Issue

There is something unintentionally ironic about new magazine Tar running an article on overcrowding in its premiere issue. If there is one thing not needed at the moment, it's another magazine that promises a new wave, and burns itself out within a few issues.

Good thing Tar, despite its borderline cringeworthy mission statement ('tar' is an anagram of art, the distillation of organic matter, sticky stuff we pave roads and secure roots with - a foundation) has a few signs of longevity.

There seems to be a reputable publishing company at work behind it, and the inclusion of higher profile features, such as the main spotlight and interview with Benicio Del Toro gives it a certain seal of quality and scope.

That said, I hope that much like bed-fellow Tank, Tar manages to maintain quality of content, and hasn't peaked straight out the gate by using too much of its target content straight away, which reads like a dream list. However, given that it's a bi-annual we can hope this isn't the case.

Features include:

Matthew Barney, David Cronenberg, Andreas Gursky, Ryan McGinley, Terry Richardson, Naomi Wolf.

Offworld Bootleg In Youtube Widescreen (UNKLE - When Things Explode)

So it seems Youtube, famed for its viewing experience of watching something through a muddy veil has stepped up its game. Slightly.

Videos are now available in widescreen, and slightly higher quality. While this is good news, it's also somewhat frustrating when you have previous videos in widescreen that are stuck in the old format. Well, last night was tough, real tears of blood were shed in restless waking moments while I thought about all those lost ratings and views.

Here, for your masochistic viewing pleasure is the first in my Offworld Bootleg series, a new form of pirate music video made from bits of feature films, now in full YT widescreen. A divx is also available for download here (right click and save as).

(Please click here for more information on this project, and here for more music/film information)

Ballroom Voguing Beneath Wall Street

Todays image is taken from an article the 'New York Times' ran on the predominantly gay subculture of underground ballroom dancing with an acrobatic twist.

Otherwise known as 'voguing', it features teams with names such as 'House of Ninja'

Here

Princess Leia Is Old And Has A Sense Of Humour And Some Stories

Carrie Fisher, better known as Jabba The Hut's metal clad bit on the side has posted some choice segments from her autobiography on the Daily Mail website; that bastion of hip, relevant comedy and culture.

Here

It turns out she's pretty sharp on it, and makes self-depreciating light of some pretty unusual situations. Some choice selections below:


"Mike died in a plane crash in 1958, when I was two, and my dad flew to Elizabeth's side, making his way slowly to her front."

"You know how they say that religion is the opiate of the masses? Well, I took masses of opiates religiously... At a certain point in my early 20s, my mother started to worry about my obviously ever-increasing drug ingestion. So she ended up doing what any concerned parent would do. She called Cary Grant."

"When I spoke about my mental illness publicly, I won great acclaim. I waited my entire life to get an award for something, anything (OK, fine, not acting, but what about a tiny little award for writing? Nope), I now get awards for being mentally ill."

"I weighed about 105lb at the time but carried about 50 of those in my face... So you know what a good idea would be? Give me a hairstyle that further widens my already wide face."

Trent Parke Profile In Tank Magazine

Trent Parke is the only Australian to have been represented by the revered Magnum photo agency. In their 10th Anniversary Edition, which has been a long time coming and worth every penny, Tank Magazine pay homage to this master of atmosphere.

Parke's most stunning photos happen in black and white, where he masterfully uses intensely bright weather to draw out dark atmosphere in his compositions among other brilliantly effective techniques. A selection of his work can be found here, some personal favourites being the ones below (taken from his Seventh Wave book), and one that turns a day on the beach into an Independence Day apocalypse. It's well worth purchasing Tank just to see the photos on paper if for nothing else.

'The Informers' Trailer Is A Bit Cloak And Dagger, And More Bret Easton Ellis News

There's something a bit funny going on with 'The Informers', the latest Bret Easton Ellis book to be made into a film. Following in the footsteps of the brilliant 'American Psycho', 'The Rules of Attraction' and the less than brilliant 'Less Than Zero', a bit of digging finds that most trailers have been taken offline, and coverage is very thin on the ground, especially for a film with a cast this good (Kim Basinger, Billy Bob Thornton, Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder, Rhys Ifans etc and the interesting Amber Heard).

The trailer looks slick, and spot on for how I imagine an Easton Ellis social scene. Whilst both 'American Psycho' and 'The Rules of Attraction' perfectly depicted their settings, I don't think that until this point any film has truly captured the nihilistic decadence of his soul-less-rich-kid work, be it an Easton Ellis work or otherwise.

In further Easton Ellis news, there was an interesting interview, albeit a bit raw, over at Suicide Girls of all places, where apparently he has a bit of a fanbase. Furthermore, it looks as though 'Less Than Zero' is set for a remake, by Tarantino no less... this could be interesting.

My Namesake Makes Good Things

So, whilst trawling the web I came across this Brooklyn artist who happens to share my name. Normally I'd take exception, but his stuff is pretty interesting, so it's probably not worth an argument.

Apparently exhibiting regularly since 1999, there are some very surreal and tense undercurrents at play in his work, with the focus frequently on textural aesthetic and form. Of paticular interest are the wall mounted painting/sculptures that seem to be evolving and trying to break free of the canvas, and the surreal plastic-draped box sculptures which exude menace.

Fever Ray; Karin From The Knife Goes It Alone

Fever Ray Myspace

So, it seems half of what's been best about electronic music in recent years is going solo. This news might explain the absence of sharp implement related activity beyond grime recently.

There's only one track up at the moment, but it hints at a very interesting, if not somewhat similar direction. It's slightly more rough around the edges, where The Knife was very precise, this is somewhat darker and more organic. Gone also seem to be the dramatics of mask and mystery, which might have become a bit banal if continued over a vast body of work.

However, I can't be the only one holding out hope for a third slice... despite half wanting them to take the slightly frustrating live-fast-die-young route, at least we might get to see her live.

Tim Walker Shoots Patrick Wolf

So, according to the Vanity Fair website, this little collaboration happened back in January of this year...

Tim Walker probably being my favourite working mainstream fashion photographer, and Patrick being one of the only worthwhile pop artists, it's a fantastic collaboration.

He is surrounded by the cygnets of the Ballet West in the Stag Ballroom of the Mar Lodge Estate, in Braemar, Scotland.

True Blood opening credits

True Blood is the new vampire series from everyone's favourite thing about American TV; HBO. The show's a bit like a sexed up Buffy, which is not a bad thing.

In fact it's a very addictive slice of teenage TV, a strange mix of candy floss disposability and genuinely tense/dark undertones. It pitches it's story against the deep south and uses the history of the area to illustrate it's key theme; vampire integration.

All I know, is it makes for a great title sequence; a bit Holy Mountain-ish, it's a fantastic bit of editing, utilising found footage etc. Anyway, 'True Blood' available at your local Pirate Bay.

Chris Cunningham Interview in Vice Magazine

As part of their recent interviews issue (and one of their best recent outputs), Vice interviewed the elusive Chris Cunningham.

With a reputation for being a bit like Larry David crossed with a cave troll, he is surprisingly lucid and upbeat.

However, that might all be a bit boring (/) if he hadn't included a stomach turning 'self portrait', which is interesting as well as disgusting.

Here

Much like the porn he discusses in the interview, the reality is, however clichéd, that people have become desensitised to shocking imagery, and demand more to trigger a reaction. The point of interest here is where it even crosses the limit of human possibility, and much like Lynch's infamous baby in Eraserhead, overtakes genuinely explicit real-life produced imagery (such as war photography and genetic mutation, for example).

Once again Cunningham proving himself to be worthy of his visceral cutting edge reputation. Can't wait for the feature films he mentions, imagine a horror in the style of Rubber Johnny or the 'Sheena Is a Parasite' (pictured) video.

Commes des Garçons collaborate with H&M (opening tomorrow)

Following in the footsteps of Karl Lagerfeld, Stella McCartney, Viktor & Rolf, and Roberto Cavalli, Japanese label Commes des Garcons have organised an exclusive collaboration with H&M.

There is an interesting flash page for the collection here, featuring a changing light effect that works really well. As for the actual collection, I'm not too keen on the men's stuff, but for girls there's a couple of pretty cool things that will no doubt fly out like a lovely little greased up turd tomorrow morning.

Vote for Katie Paterson at Creative 30

OK, I'm not sure how long is left of this Creative 30 competition, but it's a pretty substantial prize for an artist to win. (Run by Volvo and Vice magazine).

Of all the entries, the only one that really stands out to me is Katie Paterson, who is doing some really interesting art conceptually, which includes making a moonlight bulb, making ice records, and mapping shooting stars... and not a hint of Shoreditch, very refreshing.

Unfortunately the whole thing feels a bit more Volvo than Vice, so all the more reason to vote for someone that stands out. Anyway, take a look at the entries, then agree, and vote for Katie! You can vote up to once a day, so pick your favourite person and give them a bit of support...

Arcade Fire Interactive Music Video for 'Black Mirror'

It's probably a bit behind, but I've just seen this which is very cool. The always brilliant Arcade Fire have done something really interesting with their video concept for Black Mirror.

Here

It's an interactive video where you can manually select elements of the music... I particularly like it with 2 (drums) deselected... anyway, great concept, good to see people trying new things, even better that it's Arcade Fire.

OldBoy remake

It seems Spielberg has gone rogue. Taking a scientologist and one of the worst screen writers with him, he's singlehandedly carrying a personal vendetta of rape and pilage across the boundary lines of 'my own exhausted shit ideas' and into the weaker territories of 'collective foreigners with functional imaginations'.

So far he's been spotted hurtling towards Ghost in the Shell like a bulldozer on MDMA and someone's tipped him and his boys off that the after party's happening over at OldBoy.

I look forward to a startled Will Smith when he's told it involves some hardcore method acting; eating a live squid, taking on 30 guys in a corridor with just a hammer, and cutting out his own tongue. Oh, you didn't hear Will? Yeh the actor never worked again... not many roles for actors without tongues.

Image 09/11/08

Wode by Boudicca

A still from the film made by Boudicca for their new perfume Wode.
Taken from www.dazeddigital.com.
www.boudiccawode.com

The First Blog

Like a geeky version of that Band of Horses song.
So I knew this blog had to start off like fireworks, you know, start as you mean to go on and all that. Usually when I need a great idea I'll sit on a train for a couple of hours, but apart from being a bit over the top for an internet blog, I don't have any trains in my house. But I do have a bath.

I don't know if anyone's managed to come up with a great idea in the bath before, and if they have I think it was either not a great idea, or they were pretty stupid, and as it's all relative, it was only a relatively good idea. You see, in the bath, your brain travels at about a 1000th of it's usual speed, and seeing as we supposedly only use a 10th of it anyway, it's not looking good for an Archimedes moment.

Anyway, so the best I could come up with was this blogging (verb) parody of Adaptation, where my first blog is all about coming up with my first blog, in the bath. Charlie Kaufman would be proud; I even had a narrator in my head putting together this post. I'm not sure if it was my own voice, but if it was, would that be self-indulgent? Wouldn't want that in a blog. No sir.