Tobias Slater works for White Mischief, a London-based group that now regularly curates steampunk parties and events for die-hard fans of rocket packs, wooden rayguns and compasses. “Every day I check my Facebook profile and find another two or three friend requests from neo-Victorian, brass-goggle-wearing folk, some sporting the most incredible moustaches (and that’s just the women!),” Slater wrote in an e-mail. Still, he predicts the aesthetic will remain niche.
The full story, on Steampunk, is at INTELLIGENT LIFE.
“These films produce knowledge and they form opinions often about the weakest and most vulnerable people in society,” said Patrick Hazard, festival director. “They comment on places and situations that their audience may never come across directly. So we like to unpick these messages, develop them and also critique them.”
The full story, on London’s International Documentary Film festival, is at the NEW YORK TIMES.
A recent live performance by Vampire Weekend at the Garage in North London as part of their current UK tour was a reminder that not all bands embrace the element of surprise.
Vampire Weekend played through a set that included songs from their 2008 eponymous first release, a massive hit released on the UK-based independent label XL Recordings that sold 28,000 copies in its opening week but has since sold 498,000. Time Magazine named it the fifth best album of 2008 and Rolling Stone included them in their top 100 best albums of the decade (two slots above Danger Mouse’s the Grey Album).
The full blog post, on Vampire Weekend’s tour stops through London, is at the DAILY TELEGRAPH.
I don’t usually write about music or journalism produced by friends or colleagues, but when friends or colleagues happen to produce badass work, I gotta give due credit.
The San Francisco-based Mac McClelland, a former colleague of mine at Mother Jones, recently wrote a book about refugees from Burma called For Us Surrender is out of the Question, after living with refugees there in 2006. She tackles her subject with such a candid sense of humor that prompted me to tell her in a recent email that she was completely “punk rock.” She agreed.
Milan-based Joel Schalit, a fellow skateboarder and musician who gave me much journalistic motivation while living in London last year, recently wrote a book called Israel vs. Utopia, about Israel’s perceived identity in the West. This from the same writer who taught me to pay more attention to fliers, graffiti, adverts, street signs, menus, and other things you pass every single day.
Reactions to Joel’s work are here. More about Mac is here. Coincidentally, Schalit is the former associate editor of Punk Planet, which was published by Soft Skull Press, the same folks who published McClelland’s book.
“I think the best thing today is the acknowledgment that flamenco has come out of Spain and is now recognized on a worldwide scale as one of the top dance forms,” Miguel Marín, the festival director, said.
The full blog post, on London’s annual Flamenco festival, is at the NEW YORK TIMES.
For about six years, the New York-based three-piece band has won over audiences–and driven some away–with an ample supply of volume. The New York Times credited them with “reviving the ominous, feedback-drenched drones of the 1980s”, while the Washington Post described them as “the most awesome, ear-shatteringly loud garage/shoegaze band you’ll ever hear.”
At the 2008 SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, the band ended its set with a ten-minute-plus sonic meltdown that surely inflicted some hearing loss.
The full Q&A, with A Place To Bury Strangers, is at INTELLIGENT LIFE.
At the London screening I went to, there were plenty of gasps in response to Harris’s more outlandish comments and broadcast moments. Timoner is clearly trying to illustrate the problems inherent in our increasingly personal relationship with the internet. “We Live In Public” left me with an incredibly strong urge to remove myself from Twitter, delete my MySpace page, dump my LinkedIn profile and go completely offline. Unfortunately, the urge didn’t last long. Perhaps an hour later, I felt compelled (think Death Star tractor beam) to check my email and update my Facebook page status.
The full blog post, on the “We Live in Public” documentary film, is at INTELLIGENT LIFE.
“Visual theater” is a succinct explanation of what’s included in the festival’s lineup: the world premiere of “The Mill,” a show performed in a wheel of wood and steel suspended in the air; the bearded lady Jeanne Mordoj, who will juggle egg yolks and bamboo and perform with badgers and a mountain goat; and Circus Klezmer putting on a real-life wedding.
The full blog post, on London’s annual mime festival, is at the NEW YORK TIMES.
In keeping with the theme that viewers of art should decide for themselves what art means, the exhibit goes to great lengths to avoid clarity and specificity (there are few explanatory placards). Works of various media (audio, photographs, diagrams) defy simple, quick definition and, depending on your artistic leanings, the result can feel maddening or enlightening. During a recent visit, three young boys sat quietly and watched a strange film depicting people in animal costumes collecting flowers and roaming around in the woods.
The full blog post, on the “For the blind man in the dark room looking for the black cat that isn’t there” exhibit at London’s ICA, is at the NEW YORK TIMES.
Though not the sexiest of exhibits, little details throughout are often the most insightful: islands were often named for explorers’ wives; a 20,000-pound prize was offered in 1775 for discovery of a northwest passage; Arctic exploration was apparently assigned to the Royal Navy, who had time to kill after the Napoleonic War.
The full blog post, on London’s Maritime Museum’s Arctic exhibit, is at the NEW YORK TIMES.
