Illustration / Pink cloud tracing paper
I awoke the other morning from the sleep of the damned, a fitful spell of tossing and turning courtesy of a mild dose of the flu and the constant rattle of the JMZ trains as they hurtle across the tracks outside my window. As I adjusted my eyes to the morning light and reacquainted myself with my blurry surrounds, I was struck by a moment of epiphany. It was a subtle realisation, and the culmination of a series of vivid dreams in which certain episodes from my past had been flashed momentarily through my reluctant mind. [A quick aside: I often find the early morning brings the most profound clarity of thought, those minutes of stillness before the brain is swamped by the relentless stimuli of twenty-first century society. Is it global warming or global warning? That is the question] But I digress, for I was struck on this particular morning with this simple but strangely reassuring thought that as you get older, and your choices become more and more narrow, life gets increasingly easier. Not necessarily from a technological point of view. Heck, it’s hard enough deciphering a set of instructions from Ikea these days let alone figuring out how to use your mobile phone. But rather, the path down which you trundle seems that much clearer with every passing year; with every quick rebuttal. When I was young(er), I wanted to be any number of things - to work a stack of different jobs; to live in a handful of different countries; to date the entire female cast of Degrassi High. These days my goals, like those of most of my peers, are tempered by the heavy hand of reality. Which is a good thing. And a calming thing. It means that I know what I want to do. And while the ambition still burns intensely, the road towards it is much more focused. It’s achievable. At which point of the epiphany, I promptly rolled over again, shut my eyes and ears to the grinding cacophony of the morning rush outside, and feel asleep. [illustration by Jeremy Holmes]
Also by ZOLTON
There’s some awesome new work up on New York-based illustrator, Sam Weber’s website, including this one above which is did for the Soulpepper Theatre. We asked him a little while back about what his studio workspace was like: ‘I am fairly particular about where I like to work, and what sort of stuff I like to have around me. There are things that I look at often — a book of Max Ernst collages, one on Yoshitaka Amano, and a big stack of clippings from magazines and the Internet that I will periodically leaf through to get inspired’. Read more
Many years ago, when my hair was longer and my clothes were shabbier, I played guitar in a Sydney-based rock band. We never come to anything more than a few years worth of gigs and a deeply closeted aspiration to take the radio charts by storm. We never did. A lack of talent intervened, but it was damn fun while it lasted. Anyway, at one point during this debauched period of my life, I had a friend who was the frontman for the exotically named, Blue Apples of The Moon. He had an unusually resonant baritone and a penchant for writing epic music. One day he handed me a demo cassette with a batch of his new songs on it. I took it to work with me the next day, whacked it into my Sony Walkman, and immediately swooned amongst the lulling tones and fretfully beautiful lyrics of this Leonard Cohen classic. I was gobsmacked. Totally mesmerised. And having never heard it before, I presumed that my friend — this humble frontman of a bizarrely named rock band — had just penned the greatest song of our generation. For about eight minutes and seventeen seconds, I was convinced he was genius. That was until one of my workmates pointed out that it was actually a Leonard Cohen masterpiece, one of many. It turns out that my friend’s demos were on the other side of the cassette. And they were pretty average. But hell, anything would be after this unholy precedent.
A little while back, we ran a week long diary from Australian pop band, The Grates. It was kinda to get a window into the world. Hell, voyeurism is the new black. So we asked Melbourne-based rock band, The Basics, to do the same thing as they bring their music to the deepest reaches of Australia’s Northern Territory. These are the words of bassist and vocalist, Kris Schroeder: ‘Friday November 7. Darwin. It’s a weird old joint this one — I can probably compare it closest to Queensland’s Cairns, with the backpacker industry making up the life and character of the Central Business District. This makes it particularly good for bands, as you’ve got a ready audience staying only metres away from the music venues. Today was our first Darwin gig (at Monsoons), and it was a ripper. I’d organised with my mate Nathan to bring up the Sunshine Reggae Band from Ikuntji in the Western Desert, and they were going to be the first Indigenous band to play in the main street of Darwin, which is apparently quite a cultural breakthrough. The best bit was how well received they were, someone saying “This is great, because it’s what you should expect to see in Darwin, not just bloody cover bands all the time.” Quite chuffed. By the time we played it was packed out, and everyone was loving it. Job done’. Read more
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The illustration work of Monika Melnychuk is wonderfully detailed and beautifully coloured. We interviewed her recently and asked, given her rather nomadic existence, where she is based these days. Read more
It’s a fight: Mr Bacon vs Mr Tofu. Who will remain at the top of the foodchain? If you’re a toy freak, this will go nicely on the desk alongside your Berbrick, Kaws and Macbook Pro. Yup, it’s never too early to start planning Christmas gifts.
It’s hard not to sigh at another vector face or skull and diamond combo. I’m guilty of skull overindulgence myself. But Six Letter Word — aka illustrator, Diogo Potes — balances skulls with other macabre themes to create art that actually looks fresh and interesting. Read more
DJ Spooky — That Subliminal Kid — is just about the deepest crate digger around, trawling the barrels of long-lost record stores for choice vinyl to spin in his wickedly dubby sets. He gave us the inside word last week on his eight favourite songs right now via our sister website, My Secret Playlist. This is what he had to say about Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry’s Panic in Babylon: ‘If there’s anything that the twenty-first century has told us, it’s that dub is the real original hip-hop. Lee Scratch even had to make it clear in 1965 by adding “Scratch” to his middle name. Take that, Grandmaster Flash!’ Read the rest of DJ Spooky’s Secret Playlist.
Set in a remote Chinese village in the 1920s during a cholera outbreak and with a revolution bubbling in the background, The Painted Veil is a wonderfully tortured love story which excels on all levels. Based on the W Somerset Maugham novel, it was a labour of love for stars Edward Norton and Naomi Watts, who also produced the film. Read more
These very sweet folks from Seattle supported Broken Social Scene on our last American dates of the Spirit IF tour. Although they haven’t quite hit their stride as a live outfit, the tunes from songwriter Grant Olsen have some very lovely moments that fall somewhere between Velvet Underground and The Everly Brothers. I think Arthur and Yu could take over from where Grandaddy left off, though with better songs. No offense to Grandaddy.
This organic form, revealing itself from the sprawling metropolis of Barcelona via the marauding eye of Google, is the Santa Caterina Market. Designed by the late architect Enric Miralles it has a floating ceramic roof that drapes the bustling market below in a parental way. The coloured ceramics, of course, represent the smorgasbord of fruit and vegetables on sale within and enable a majestic view, not only for Google, but also to its immediate neighbours overlooking the site.
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Pictures taken at just the right time
You don’t have to be a skilled photographer to take the best snaps: some just appear out of absolutely nowhere. This site has collected together some of the funniest, cruelest, most alarming — yet completely spontaneous — photos circulating the web. Thank god for other people’s suffering! Read more
There are two Americas: one which strives to create its own culture, music, and art with a strong sense of ethics in mind, and another that drinks 32-ounce energy drinks before waiting on line to get into a club packed with women trying to get back at their overbearing fathers, and homophobic men with a fondness for Axe body spray. How do we bridge the divide?
Sam Weber on his favourite emerging artists
We asked illustrator Sam Weber to give us the inside word on some of the young artists who have caught his eye recently: ‘Francis Vallejo, Yoko Furusho [above], and David Jien [below]. For up-and-comers, they are a few with some really amazing work’. Read more
Alison Malone on her Daughters of Job photos
A couple of weeks back we featured the work of New York-based photographer Alison Malone, who went into the secretive environment of the Job’s Daughters to photograph the girls who are direct blood relatives of the Master Masons. This is the second part of that interview. Read more
Barack sweats it out on Election Night
While the rest of the world spent election night biting fingernails whilst glued to the TV set, it’s kinda nice to know that President Elect, Barack Obama, was doing exactly the same thing, as these wonderfully low-key insider snaps from David Katz reveals. Read more
This beautifully soft, handmade and dyed scarf is by the New York-based designer, Ryan Sullivan. They can be purchased through the Lost At E Minor store. Read more
Woohoo! We have five copies of the new Faint album, Fascination [Inertia], to give away to randomly selected Australian-based Lost At E Minor subscribers who leave a message under this post telling us about the last time they, ummm, Fainted.
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JB said | 28 September, 2006
Degrassi High! Oh sheeze what a blast from the past!