A little bit of weekend music now. George Lewis Jr., better known as one-man band and motorcycle aficionado Twin Shadow, covered Peter Gabriel a few months back at a party held at the Chateau Marmont in L.A. by Mulberry. Swanky. Lewis Jr.’s cover of ‘Here Comes the Flood’ (a great song in it’s own right, by the way) practically redefines the definition of smooth. Fun fact: we met Twin Shadow once, and he’s quite possibly the best looking man on the planet. Amazing hair too. Take a look at the video below:
The last of our videos for today (thanks, Vimeo!), and one not as unpleasant as it sounds. Fear not, squeamish readers, the ‘Morgue’ in question is what NYT staffers refer to their news clipping and photo library store as. No cold slabs here. Just a ton of what they call “dead used material.” Best history lesson you could hope for. Take a look below:
Time for our third video of the day, this one featuring Aaron Draplin, the chief of the rather excellent (and extremely covetable) Field Notes brand. If we don’t have a Field Notes notebook in our back pocket, we feel a little lost, so it’s great to know where the inspiration comes from. Not only do they simply look cool, gazing at Draplin’s almighty collection takes you back in history, each book showcasing a specific moment in design, and more specifically an exact moment in American history. The very definition of the word ephemera, we’d say. Fascinating. Take a look below:
We love Jon Hamm, we love Mad Men, and we love a bit of knowing humour (who doesn’t?) Luckily for us (and you) the good people over at Rookie have combined all three in the form of this question and answer session. A bit silly, yes, but Don Draper could do with smiling once in a while. Take a look below:
We’ve dug into the video vault today and found a few snippets well worth watching. First up is this Jake Davis (ofTest Shots fame) shot video of the Japanese chaps at Globe Specs at work. Part of a series of films commissioned byK Swiss focusing on well turned out characters with a real passion for business, the short film features company owner Tetsuya Okada discussing why he wanted to set up his own place after years in the eyewear business. Lovely stuff. Take a look below:
We were saddened to hear the news that the great Maurice Sendak, author of the all-time classic Where the Wild Things Are, passed away the other day at the age of 83. WTWTA was much more than simply a children’s book, and stayed with many of its readers, including ourselves, well into adulthood. After some Twitter lobbying by the likes of Neil Gaiman and others, The New Yorker has graciously unlocked the two page comic Art Spiegelman created after meeting Sendak in 1993. As another writer who used what is traditionally seen as a child’s medium (in Spiegelman’s case, the comic book, in the form of his devastating Maus series) to say something much more profound, we’re sure they had plenty to discuss. It’s a beautiful, simple insight into the minds of two great writers, one of whom is sadly no longer with us. Take a look right here.
Some cracking advice over at the reliably excellent Mr. Porter on how to add a twist to that staple of the cocktail cabinet, the Bloody Mary. It’s the first thing we reach for in the morning after a tough night. Head on over and have a look by clicking right here. Make sure to have a read over their handy list of common errors often made in the creation of the drink too. After all, what’s the point in making your own cocktail if you’re not going to do it correctly?
We were shocked and saddened to hear about the death of Adam ‘MCA’ Yauch of the Beastie Boys from cancer yesterday. He was 47. Although he’d been unwell for some time, it still doesn’t prepare you for the actual moment when someone you grew up listening to passes away. There are plenty of more elegant obituaries around than anything we can write, so we’re just going to put up a selection of some of favourite Beasties moments and pay tribute to a man who will be sorely missed. R.I.P. MCA.
Twelve years is a long time to wait for anybody. The Avalanches‘ debut, and so far only, album Since I Left You came out in 2000 and blew everyone else away. It was a masterpiece – painstakingly created and effortlessly executed, poignant, funny, and beautiful. There wasn’t anything like it beforehand, and there hasn’t been anything remotely like it since. As the years have passed, rumours have continually surfaced that another album was due, but each one proved to be false (D’Angelo and Lauryn Hill fans, you’ll sympathise). Building tracks almost entirely out of thousands of samples, as the band do, takes a long time. There’s finding the records, then cutting them up, and finally by far the longest process: getting clearance for using them all. Now, however, it seems like they genuinely might be surfacing again.
Last weekend the Australians posted a cryptic link on their Twitter pointing towards a new mixtape created under the pseudonym Henry Chinaski, after the Bukowski character, stating that it “may or may not be mixtape by ♥ ∆v∆L∆NCH∑≤ ♥.” Modular, their label, subsequently denied all knowledge of it. The signs, still, are promising. It bears all the hallmarks of their work – the subtle humour, the fixation on certain themes, the excellence of the craft. Whoever made it, it’s wonderful and it’s free. You can pick up ‘Sleepy Bedtime Mix for Young Ones’ right here. In the meantime, for those of you who might be too young to remember the band the first time round, take a look at the still great video for ‘Frontier Psychiatrist’ below. Here’s to the comeback:
We love a good hotel, and we love Brooklyn, so when we heard about the new Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg, we were always going to be all over it. Once a cooperage that crafted barrels and casks, the building has been reborn as a 72-room oasis that serves as something of a primer on what visitors can expect from the neighbourhood. For instance, the mini bars in each room are stocked with small-batch liquors, housemade ice cream and artisan granola. There’s also a locavore restaurant onsite called Reynard’s and a house butcher (!).
Behind the operation are, among others, Australian hotelier Peter Lawrence and restaurateur Andrew Tarlow, who has struck local gold with Marlow & Sons, Roman’s and Diner. The renovations to the building are also provincially appropriate: its aged wooden guts were used to make the beds and ceilings, while the roof has been capped with a massive glass box than opens onto a patio bar. Lots of surprises here, though the most impressive one is that rooms start at $179. Now, if only we could find an excuse to go to New York.
