Mahjonng
Having dug out our old Joy Division records a little while back, we thought it would be a good time to check in with Karyl Czientzar from Chicago-based electro-pop group, Mahjonng: Who are you listening to at the moment? ‘I really like White Williams. TigerBeat6 consistently puts out good records, and this is only the latest of the greatest. I’m feeling the last Times New Viking record, and Dude N’ Nem’s ‘Watch My Feet’ is one of my favorites of recent times. And, of course my old buddies, White Rabbits’. Mahjongg create wicked grooves. And then you muck around with them and destroy the simplicity of the moment with these crazy skewered melodies. If we broke it down to three central elements, what are the key ingredients to writing a good Mahjongg song? ‘Beats are really important. Often a beat will inspire a melody. If a beat is somewhat complex, for me to understand and think of it as a groove instead of 17/8 or whatever, I have to write a melody as a guide, and those melodies usually stick. If a melody comes first, then the beat acts as a counter to it usually, instead of going along with it straight-up. I’m really into arrangements and I think that’s important with jamming out on riffs. So I suppose the key elements are beats, melodies and arrangements. I used to be stuck on chord changes a lot and I think we’ve freed ourselves up in that area’. Mahjongg the board game … who’s the band champ? ‘None of us actually know how to play! But if we all learned how I’m positive Hunter would dominate’. If you could be teleported back to any gig in history, which would it be? And what would you be drinking there? ‘I’d go with the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival or Monterey Pop Festival. I’d drink whatever I was lucky enough to get my hands on’. [illustration by Chris Ede]
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Crimea X is the coming together of two offbeat, disparate characters, DJ Rocca (Ajello, Super Sonic Lovers, Maffia Sound System) and Jukka Reverberi from 90s Italian glam cult rockers, Giardini di Mirò, who have often have been compared with the sound of Mogwai, Arab Strap, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. We asked them about their favourite music and they started with The Smiths song, Ask [listen below] ‘I saw them playing live on Italian TV. It was during the 80s when I was extremely young, and I’ve never stopped listening to this song’. Read the rest of Crimea X’s Secret Playlist.
I love the curated selection of abandoned swimming pool photos on Feature Shoot today, featuring work by Carlo Van de Roer and Albert Jodar, amongst others.
Win a set of Sony personal audio prizes
Thanks to Sony Australia, four Lost At E Minor readers will win personal audio prizes, including the new 8GB Walkman S series video MP3 player and the MDRXB500 Extra Bass headphones. Read more
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Australian illustrator Sarah Carter-Jenkins creates luminous, sensual artwork which practically glides across the page with its elegance, subtle colouring and intricate detail. Read more
A Dutch insurance company recently launched a pretty creative ad campaign that was put on the backs of buses in Amsterdam, making them look like they were actually moving backwards.
There’s a fun range of prints up on the Boo Ware site, a Sydney based t-shirt label that began selling at the legendary Paddington Markets in 2003. You can still find them there every Saturday morning. Their tees are ’soft and comfortable with original, quirky prints’.
Oh wow. The illustration work of Brooklyn based James Blagden is amazing. The colours leap out like flouro socks in a mid-80s Wham clip. Read more
I’ve been a big fan of Michelle Vandermeer’s work since I came across her Mini Majellen zines at this year’s Sydney Writers Festival. Describing herself as a doer — as in one of those people who are always doing or making something — Michelle’s work, which includes book binding, illustration, jewelery making and her zines, stems from an internal creative springboard and a double degree in architecture and graphic design. Her work is smart and succinct. Read more
Oh man, what I wouldn’t give to be able to sing like Neil Finn. His voice rasps with all the sincerity and integrity of a thousand heartfelt melodies. Heck, I’d probably trade my prized collection of Archie comics for just the chorus on this song. Driving Me Mad? You betcha(dupa). This man is a treasure. Bow low indeed.
The coolest band in Indonesia? I think so. White Shoes & The Couples Company describe themselves as a small band that is ‘influenced by Indonesian movie soundtracks from the 70s and inspired by the acoustic spirit of 1930’s classic jazz musicians’. But I like to think of them as carrying the torch for artists like Benny Goodman, Tahiti 80, and The Cardigans, all at the same time.
Listen to their track, Super Reuni.
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Italian-born, New York City-based photographer Paolo Ventura creates fairy-tale like pictures out of amazingly constructed, miniature dioramas that almost trick the eye into thinking he’s a tilt-shift photographer. Read more
Creative advertising packaging
Despite the intentions of many, it’s not so often that advertising — as an industry — truly thinks outside the box. Yet, when executed well, clever eye-catching advertising actually works. It does. As these examples will attest to. Read more
Hong Kong-based illustrator Man-Tsun draws dark and beautiful painterly images that look like they are straight off a high-end Japanese animated film. Read more
T-post: the world’s first wearable magazine
So here’s the scoop. Every six weeks, T-post subscribers get a new t shirt issue in the mail, with a news story on the inside and an artist interpretation of that story on the front. Yes, we agree. It’s clever, clever. Read more
Charlie Immer’s pastel-pallete sometimes obfuscates the gory violence in his surreal images. At other times, it heightens the gut-wrenching and visceral effect of his work. Read more
Thanks to Sony Australia, four Lost At E Minor readers will win personal audio prizes, including the new 8GB Walkman S series video MP3 player and the MDRXB500 Extra Bass headphones. Read more
The Demekin is an ultra compact camera with a preference for wide angles. It is the world’s first 110mm film camera with the fisheye lens, which gives each shot a soft focus, creating a gentle curve within the frame. We have them in the Lost At E Minor store for just $55. Read more
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