Author: Jake
Let’s take it across the pond this week. Dan Black is British and what’s cooler is that you hear it when he sings. I recently started listening to this dude. The first track that I heard from him was “Symphonies” with Kid Cudi. I really like that song. But I like this one even more. It’s called “Yours.” Escute.
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Author: Jake
I felt like it was time to swing back over to the hip-hop side of things. If you are an Adele fan then you are probably just coming down off of the “21″ release. I have a lot of respect for the girl. I really liked her first album, and thought she was amazing on SNL. A couple of weeks ago, Gilbere Forte’s manager flowed me this track that GF did together with Adele. I had the opportunity to shoot with Gilbere in the winter for and Edwin editorial. He is a super chill guy and I have a lot of respect for what he is doing. So, needless to say, I was pretty excited to see Adele and Gilbere collaborating on this track. It’s called “Set Fire to the Rain.” Give it a listen.
[photo: artwork from the cover of the featured track]
Author: Jake
Since this is the 50th post of La Musica Coolica, I decided to do sort of a double feature. The artist for this week is Velvet Underground. I can’t say that I’m a huge fan of Velvet Underground, generally. I feel like Lou Reed kind of rips off Bob Dylan a lot, stylistically. More than anything, I just kind of have to respect what the group did for experimental Rock. I sort of see them as the Sonic Youth, of the late 60’s, early 70’s.
Another reason that I have to respect them, is because I’m am so intrigued and interested in that whole nexus that they had going with Andy Warhol. To me, it is kind of cool that two huge New York, art icons of that era had meaningful interaction. I know that Jim Morrison hung out with Andy Warhol, too. But, I think that the thing with Velvet Underground was different. Partly because VU lived in NY, and was really in touch with the scene here, at the time. Basically, I’m just bleeding from the mouth about the way that I imagine things, though. Because in reality, I wasn’t there, nor do I have any concrete evidence to support any of my hypotheses.
I was first exposed to the group through covers of Velvet Underground songs performed by some of my favorite groups, growing up. Cowboy Junkies does a cover of “Sweet Jane,” that I listened to back in the day. Another one is “Here she comes now,” covered by Nirvana on “Outcestiside.” It is a really gritty recording, that barely passes for more than a jam session that just happened to get recorded. In fact, the first time it breaks into the chorus, Kris plays the first couple of bars in the wrong key. I personally think that it is one of the coolest tracks that I have every heard, primarily because of its raw quality. I love the way that Kurt starts really getting into it, vocally, toward the end of the track. So, the double feature that I mentioned earlier, is both the Velvet Underground version, and the Nirvana version of “Here she comes now.” You can check them out back to back.
Author: Jake
Our good friend Zach has been holding it down for a while now, at Kielhs. It just so happens that the brand teamed up for a benefit collab with Jersey bred [former] street artist Kaws. They held a soiree at the Kiehls flagship store to showcase the collection. Zach was kind enough invite me to cover it for SoJones. I was happy to oblige. I has as much fun kicking it with Zach and just catching up, as I did shooting. You know I had to get at least one good shot of the DJ working the fader.
Before tonight, I hadn’t really had a chance to take any NYC Christmas light photos. So here are my contributions, so far:
Tree at Rockefeller:
Zuccotti Park:
Author: Jake
Peanut Butter Wolf, AKA Chris Manak, is a California based DJ, who produces and mixes Hip-hop fusion tracks. Hip-hop fusion sounds like kind of a lame term. But I’m not feeling very creative at the moment, and that was the best that I could come up with.
I throw “fusion” in there, because the stuff he puts out is more than just a Timbaland-style beat with some rappers going back and forth over the top of it. A lot of tracks have a strong jazz flow to them. Other’s, have an overt disco flavor. Anyway, the track that I’m sharing today is instrumental. It is from the album “Peanut Butter Breaks.”
The song is called “Summer’s end.” I feel like this is fitting, because, although winter solstice is already almost upon us, winter just showed up in NY last weekend. It is a really mellow groove with some horns and a solid bass line. Give it a spin.
Author: Jake
Saturday was the first snowfall of the season, in New York City. Of course that had to be the day that we scheduled to do the first hair shoot for Reagan’s hair site. Hahahaha. It actually ended up going very well, considering that we shot everything outside, and it rained/snowed pretty much all day long. Luckily, we did the first set pretty close to our apt., pretty early in the morning before the really bad weather rolled in. The second part, we did under the Brooklyn Bridge, at the banks.
Reagan’s hair models were some friends that we met through my sister Sarah. They are both from Alaska, and happen to be in college together on Long Island. They were kind enough to make the trip into the city (and up to WaHi) so that Reagan could play with their hair, and take pictures of it. The shot above, is Haleigh, at the banks. Below is Brittany at Ft. Tryon.
In the afternoon, I was in Brooklyn doing some photos for a band called Game Rebellion (below). They were really cool guys and I had a lot of fun doing it.
Author: Jake
Entitled “Royal Protection Mutate Britain” by T.WAT. Photo presumably also by T.WAT.
Author: Jake
I have been back and forth about the whole Facebook conundrum, several times. You may recall this post. Then, almost a year later, I caved under peer pressure and reactivated my account. I have to admit that some aspects of it have been really pleasant. I’m still not 100% keen on it, though. Possibly still because of the bitter taste in my mouth that Myspace left.
Anyway, it seems like it is pretty unavoidable these days. I read about it everywhere. I have read so many articles about how if they could just monetize the thing, it would be unstoppable, etc. It seems like Wired has a new take on Facebook, every month. But my favorite two Facebook factoids, as of late, are: A. Facebook is for broads, and B. The elderly is the fastest growing demographic of users. I’m not kidding, in either case.
Examiner sends around all kinds of emails with tips on promoting, etc. The latest thing they have going is some sort of contest, involving Facebook. Here is a quote from the email:
If you think you’re too old for Facebook, consider that the fastest growing group of Facebook users is people over the age of 35. Among that group, grandparents are some of the heaviest users.
What? Hahahaha. Some of the “heaviest users?” Ok, aside from the poor wording of that statement, I can sort of see some rationale behind the claim. The reason that I kind of buy into it, dovetails with my next point. The elderly are often home bound. With limited social options, I can see them resorting to Facebook, for interaction with others. The other demographic that spends loads and loads of time on Facebook according to something that I read on Animal New York (and according to my personal observation), is the softer sex. I have to say that it seems like women, stay at home moms particularly (not saying this with any sort of negative inference), seem to author the bulk of the “updates” on my feed. The Animal post was actually taken from an NY Observer article, on the subject. The article claims that:
Women are more likely to be chatting it up on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites you’ve probably never heard of, like “Bebo.” According to data taken from Google’s U.S. Ad Planner, a site that tracks popular Web sites’ traffic, 84 percent (or 16 out of 19) of the sites they studied have more female than male users.
The Observer also stated that a study conducted by the WSJ in October yielded similar findings. So what does this mean? Put the Examiner claim with the other studies, and it appears that Facebook is becoming overrun by elderly women. Hahahaha.
In reality though, I have recently read a few useful pieces relating to Facebook. The first one, was in GQ, earlier this year. This article lays out the low down with Mark Zuckerberg, his unrelenting desire to be the head of the organization he created, and the back story on the ever changing Facebook privacy policy, about which rumors still circulate (Facebook owns all of the IP right to photos posted by users, etc.).
The other article I referred to, appeared in Details. The article discusses virtual friend collecting and lays out some guidelines and protocol on how to deal with awkward Facebook moments. I have found it helpful, when trying to decide if I should un-tag myself in certain photos, etc.. It also discusses the idea of transparency and honesty on one’s profile. It probably seems pretty commonsensical, but it was actually kind of interesting.
Maybe it is kind of pathetic I have even felt like I needed any guidance when dealing with Facebook. Maybe I’ll be strong armed out by all of the elderly women who are taking over. I guess I wouldn’t be too bummed about that. Anyway, I find Idiotbook much more entertaining.
Author: Jake
More Bay-area organic hip-hop for you, this week. Brought together by Del tha Funky Homosapien, “Hieroglyphics” first appeared on the scene in the early 1990’s. Though Del is heavily credited as bringing the group together, his vocals are probably not the most prominent in Hiero’s tracks. Del shares the mic well with the whole lot of the Hiero crew. In case you don’t already know, all of the guys from “Souls of Mischief,” (Tajai, Opio, etc..), can be found in the mix.
As far as I know (feel free to set me straight) “Hieroglyphics” have have only produced two studio albums on a major label. One was released in 1998 called “Third Eye Vision.” The title may sound dirty (and I guess maybe it is), but primarily it refers to the ubiquitous graphic of the three-eyed straight lipped “smiley face” that serves at the group’s logo. The other studio album “Full Circle” was published in ‘03. In addition, there were a handful of discs put out on Hiero’s own label after “Full Circle” was released.
The song that I’m sharing today is from the “Full Circle” album. It samples Bjork’s “Army of me.” It has some swearin’. So, if you are opposed to that sort of thing, then it is probably best to pass up this track. The title is “Let it Roll.” Check it out.
Author: Jake
Ok, for the year anniversary (at least the first LMC post since the 1 year mark, Hehe.), here is Beck. I have been a little bit lackadaisical with the music writing lately because of the whole Brazil thing. Back in the saddle, though. So I figured that I would make it a good one.
Beck is a pretty amazing musician. It seems like most people have an opinion of his work. It is one of those hate it, or love it situations. I personally love it. I was first exposed to Beck, when the singles from “Mellow Gold” were in rotation. So, songs like “Beer Can” and “Loser” were my introduction. At first, I was really confused about the seeming lack of continuity in the ideas expressed by his lyrics. It took a little bit of digging deeper for me to finally understand that the stream of conscious-style-flow was one of earmarks of Beck’s M.O..
One great thing I really like about Beck, is that he has been a very prolific artist, over the years. I have a lot of respect for musicians who work hard. I can’t say that I have loved all of his records, with equal enthusiasm. Just the same, I appreciate that he is getting it done. The song that I’m sharing is from Midnight Vultures. To me, this is one of those albums that I could start from track No. 1 and just let it play the entire way through without skipping a song. Even though a lot of the songs are kind of experimental sounding, I’m sure that I’m not alone in my opinion on this one. Anyway, the song is “Nicotine and Gravy.” I really like the title for a couple of reasons. First, my friend Joel, who I used to play music with in high school, had a song called “Nicotine and Caffeine.” I feel like this song is probably Beck’s version of that same song. Here it is: Press Play.
