Here’s the official invite to a Comic-Con afterparty which gets the Monster seal of approval. On Thursday, July 22nd at Red Circle (420 E. Street in San Diego) from 9PM-2AM, check out good music at a nice venue. The event features a special DJ set by RUSKO + open bar reception from 9PM-10PM. This is a guest-only event, so please confirm your RSVP by emailing Megan [at] dubfrequency [dot] com!
We’re always happy to see characters crossing all over the place from 2D pages to 3D toys to omni-dimensional pixels in the matrix. Van Beater’s Crappy Cat is the latest drunken feline to make the leap into the digital domain of iPhone apps with The Crappy Cat App.
CrappyCat is down on his luck, and stuck between “who knows” and “who cares.” His life used to be amazing. Red carpet fashion shows, High tea at noon, picnics in the park with his closest friends, but then something changed. It is weird, he can’t quite remember, but the life he loved was ripped from him, and he just can’t quite put the pieces together again. His only friend now is the bottle and … well, just the bottle. All of that is about to change. As his past starts to unfold, he realizes that everything isn’t as bad as it seems. It’s much worse, and the world is hanging in the balance. Can he pull his life together in time, or are we all doomed? Join Crappy in the most epic tail of junk and stuff ever told! Ok, maybe not ever told, but it will be fun. I promise!
As with most temptations, the first “crapter” is free, with subsequent 32-page comics costing 99 cents for a download. And if you end up loving the story, and wishing you could cradle the Crappy Cat, the vinyl toy is on sale here right now.
Look at who jumped on stage with Widespread Panic and Eric McFadden at Red Rocks? The show was sold out, but Mitch found a way in.
I was actually watching the USA vs. England World Cup match on Saturday when Robert Green fumbled, allowing our guys to tie up the game against long-term rivals, England. You know that if I’m watching sports, that means a zillion other people must be watching too. The immediate snarky social media response was strong. Was Robert Green soon to be the new face of the fail whale? As it turns out, he got the Lego treatment, and the stop motion video “tribute” to the fumble will reach an even wider audience.
Mashable had this to say:
How do you know when you’ve reached the absolute pinnacle of Internet fame? When the web mocks your misfortunes — via LEGO. Well, Robert Green — oh most disgraced of England’s keepers — you’ve hit the big time, my friend. LEGO has undoubtedly become a hot viral video trend lately. Add to this established meme the fervor surrounding the World Cup and a dash of abject failure — if you care about soccer, you’ll note that this video depicts England’s Robert Green missing a super-easy-to-block goal — and you’ve got one hot vid.
This World Cup Lego USA vs. England video was created by Fabian Moritz, a 19-year-old German, as a commission for the UK’s Guardian. I have to say, sensitive guy that I am, I feel terribly for Robert Green. This accident is going to be treated similarly to the Lindsay Jacobelis “showboat” situation from the 2006 Winter Olympics. When we normal folks make a mistake, it usually doesn’t live on forever like this.
Speaking of mistakes, as I type this, the South African goal keeper was just given a red flag, causing a substitution, allowing a successful free kick, and ultimately resulting in Uruguay winning the game. On the upside, we’ll likely be able to soon see this immortalized in plastic by Mr. Moritz here.
I’m just going to get this out of the way up front: AWESOMESAUCE. Devo, always clever in their use of social media [see also Devo Color Study] to propel the mission of de-evolution, has organized a CAT LISTENING PARTY in conjunction with the release of their new album, Something for Everybody.
DEVO will stream their new album, Something For Everybody, on release date, June 15th in a room full of cats. After all, Cats are Something For Everybody.
It’s going on RIGHT THIS MINUTE over on USTREAM until 8PM PST. There’s at least half a dozen cats, close to a bazillion toys and at least one human with a wand in a room somewhere out there. For instance, as I type this sentence, a bushy-tailed beastie is going house on a sparkly pom-pom. You will totally waste time today on this, but if you can’t afford to watch the cats, you can turn away and still hear the full Something for Everybody album. Devo is one of my all-time favorite bands as much for their music and soundtrack work as Mark Mothersbaugh’s art and ideology. I’ve long since felt they were underrated and undercredited for their contributions to society. Hopefully this changes that. The album is available in stores and as an iTunes download now. What I’ve heard of the 17 tracks so far, I’m liking! “Don’t tase me, bro!”
Gary Baseman was one of the O.G. art toy guys, and he’s continued to evolve into increasingly pervasive and perverse projects. Here’s the official word on Gary’s latest interactive event, Giggle and Pop, which took place this past Saturday at the La Brea Tar Pits in L.A.:
Choreographed by Sarah Elgart, and featuring a song by Carina Round, this dynamic experience will create new and alternative memories of one of LA’s major landmark areas. Creating an atmosphere of whimsy and wonder, attendees who join the jollity by dancing or playing will receive limited-edition sashes with original art by Gary Baseman.
Jack from DailyduJour was on hand for the experience and wrote: “The performances featured a dozen costumed pink Chou Chous and a dozen tar pit girls singing the Giggle and Pop song while performing Sarah Elgart’s whimsical choreography.”
Talk about your toys coming to life. Talk about Furries. Talk about fun. Note to Gary Baseman: Bring your act up to San Francisco. We’re into fun and furries! Our city has a deep history of frolicking! Lots more photos of Giggle and Pop here.
I didn’t know how the Lomography folks could really top the Space Monkeys camera by Dalek, but this is so cool, it speaks for itself:
Take the Lomography Spinner 360° in one hand, pull the cord with the other and release it. In a split second the camera spins 360° around its own axis and records everything that’s around you on a frame more than 4 times longer than a conventional landscape picture. Inspired by a futuristic concept from the 1980s, the Lomography Spinner 360° takes panorama photography to a new and accessible snapshot level.
What’s that about a futuristic concept from the 1980s? Well, it actually dates back to the 1780s:
Panoramic 360 degree imaging started in 1787 when English painter Robert Barker coined the term “panorama” for his paintings shown on a cylindrical surface. The name panorama derives from the Greek words pan (“all) and horama (“view) and truly stood for what Barker showed in his purpose-built panorama building on Leicester Square, London.
History buffs, continue here.
What’s extra cool about the Spinner 360° is that it takes regular 35mm film. Also:
Shoot from the hip, do the Rollercoaster, the Backflip, Toothbreaker, Timescan or manual long time exposures. There’s practically no limit to the experimentation offered by this camera! Every bit of your 35mm film is fully exposed and results in the sprocket-hole look unique to analogue photography.
Analogue! Bet your iPod4 can’t do that! Intrigued by these infographics? Learn the whole process with videos and a great, simple tutorial here. Learn more about Lomography in general here. Too restless and impulsive to read any more? The Lomography Spinner 360° retails for $145 here.
I know that image doesn’t exactly look like tons of fun, but just like our last Tuesday Time Waster: Incredibox, it involves clicking around your computer screen to make music. Although both applications happen to originate in France, ZenMaker trades clicking French-looking dudes to make soulful sounds for tapping purple orbs for Zen melodies. If you’re going to waste time, you might as well offset that guilt with some Zen acceptance. Get your Zen on here.
I wanted to like this album. On a positive note, it’s not godawful. But over the last 20 years since releasing Pretty On the Inside, Courtney Love has shifted her focus (very publicly) to being pretty on the outside. When you consider how much plastic surgery she’s had, from a molecular standpoint, we probably have no right to expect a new Hole album to sound anything like its early 90s predecessors. Whatever you think of Courtney Love (and all her well-documented antics), she’s not boring. That’s why it’s a shame that this album is, despite all that, such a dud.
For a woman who knows a thing or two about getting a party started, the titular opening track to Nobody’s Daughter is a major misfire. I initially figured there must be a Carly Simon cameo vocal. Nope, that’s just how Courtney sings these days. It doesn’t get better. “Skinny Little Bitch” is no “Retard Girl,” if you know what I mean. It sounds like an L7 tune circa 1992’s Bricks Are Heavy. Also: is this song autobiographical?
When I heard the first two notes of “Honey,” I thought: Please God, let the first line be “When I went to school…in Olympia,” but alas it’s more like ringing out a garbled ballad as Courtney quickly swallows a Luden. Fact: you can’t subtract Eric Erlandson and Melissa Auf Der Maur and add Billy Corgan and Linda Perry and still have Hole. The closest thing to a Live Through This type track is “Samantha” with its sweary contagious chorus of “People like you/fuck people like me/in order to avoid agony”.
While Courtney’s face has evolved, her music hasn’t. As a result, Nobody’s Daughter sounds dated upon its first listen. People are going to fault Courtney Love for lacking growth (guilty) and simultaneously failing to replicate the sound that made us fans in the first place (guilty). It seems doubly difficult for the female refugees of the grunge era to remain relevant. (After all, riot grrrls eventually become riot women.) Maybe Courtney ought to take a cue from her one-time rival Kathleen Hanna, who traded her Bikini Kill angst for a keytar and is still an indie darling as Le Tigre. Although, only one of the (sorta) shiksas remains a media darling just for being herself.
Sure, I could dismiss Nobody’s Daughter as I nearly did yesterday on Twitter, but there’s no fun in trashing an album by Courtney Love. She’s the underdog, and I’ve always rooted for her. And you know what? I’ll continue. I’ll probably just be listening to this instead.
After being off for Memorial Day, you probably have a pretty packed inbox, huh? Well, you’re not going to love me for this, then, but you should really check out Incredibox. This French musical “game” captured my attention all weekend long. It’s a bit like Inkstrumental in that you can make electronic tunes without any hint of musical talent. However, the way Incredibox is programmed, it’s almost impossible to compose a bad track. Each selection adds an element (percussion, chorus, etc.) to the virtual band, and you can subtract or change those components as you go. The result is sort of soulful electronica that’s pretty contagious. Although you can’t (yet) save or share your tune (as you can with Inkstrumental), you can download a looping randomized screensaver, which is seriously better music than most of what’s on the radio. Hat tip to Molly of The Neon Hive for this Tuesday Time Waster.
