Video / Maya Deren
In recent years, Maya Deren is probably the artist who has influenced what I do the most and two DVDs — Experimental Films (above) and In the Mirror of Maya Deren — are the best window you can find into her world. Experimental Films is a collected body of work while In The Mirror is a great documentary on her life and art. She transfuses film with dance and myth to create a personal vision of poetry on film. She focuses on all the elements of film — light and shadow, rhythm of editing, and the architecture of the frame, to create a choreography of film which includes the camera as a dynamic element to lay out a mythological groundwork, the focus of the inner reality turned outward. Her films make me froth at the mouth.
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Julian Cope’s book Japrocksampler gives you a strangely clairvoyant view into Japanese rock n’ roll, something that had before remained a puzzling enigma to me. Reading this book made me envious of Julian Cope for having had to do all this research — it sounds like taking a bath in sweet wasabi. The book reads like cross between a fascinating history tome and a crazy story some drunk tells you in a bar. [see also Laura Veir's favorite book, The Motel Life]
My parents gave me the Madame Bolduc 3-disc set L’Anthologie for Christmas after having heard her singing by chance in a record shop in Canada. The many photos on the cover of a classy, strong lady are of Mary Roseanna Travers, or la Bolduc, who is considered to be Quebec’s first singer-songwriter. It’s hard to put your finger on this music, it has a rootsy American folk feel to it, it may be even slightly Irish, but it comes with beautiful French vocals and jaunty accordion playing. It makes me happy. [see also singer-songwriter Regina Spektor]
Magnus Mills’ Explorers of the New Century
I bought this book because of it’s cover featuring bearded adventurers on the icy polar caps waving their arms in fright. And I got what I asked for in multiples. It’s a windy novel, a classic adventure tale, with an undercurrent of black humor that morphs into a surreal ethically twisted fairytale. I can’t say too much, but I am happy to be able to judge a book by it’s cover, at least once in a while. [read also Toby Nathaniel's take on A Song Of Ice and Fire]
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I love the work of Joao Machado. It’s vibrant, distinctive, and compelling — broken bits of storylines immersed in drippings of bold shape and colour. Read more
In an over-saturated Swedish music scene, The Tough Alliance have delivered glistening electronic dance pop on their new album, A New Chance. Read more
Australian group Pivot have recently signed with the mighty Warp label and — even better (well, for us anyway) — have written a fun Secret Playlist for us. You can see where the many disparate influences have seeped into their latest recording, the beautiful and colourful, O Soundtrack My Heart.
We have a bunch of new playlists up on our sister site, My Secret Playlist, a music discovery website and weekly email publication in which we invite our favourite bands and musicians to give us the rundown on their eight favourite songs right now. Over the past few weeks, acts such as The B52s, Team Genius, Pivot, Jukebox the Ghost, Moby, Katy Perry, and the Dandy Warhols, among many others, have written about the music that inspires them. To sign-up to receive the weekly My Secret Playlist publication, just enter your email address into the website’s subscription box.
Italian illustrator and designer Massimiliano creates vivid, dynamic and richly textured work. We caught up with him recently and asked him what had been keeping him busy of late. Read more
Melbourne’s Alice Euphemia has been a swinging shrine to Australian independent fashion for a decade now, hosting some of our favourites including Romance Was Born and TV amongst countless others. The success continues, with Alice Euphemia having opened a second store in 2007 in the old Craft Victoria building on Gertrude Street in Fitzroy, Melbourne. Read more
When Big Brother means nothing more than a new low in television standards, the warnings of Orwell’s classic 1984 are more poignant than ever. Miniluv — or The Ministry of Love in Oldspeak — is where Winston was brutally tortured, brain-washed and ultimately learned to love Big Brother. And no, he wasn’t watching TV. Wear your highbrow literary tastes with pride. Created by graphic-tee fashion label the-affair and printed on soft American Apparel, this tee is available for purchase through our online store.
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Like a packet of perfectly seasoned pistachio nuts, I can’t put this album down until it’s well and truly finished: until every last morsel of taut, snappy percussion and hypnotic vocals have been digested. They’re like Animal Collective at the wind-down hour - slightly more stabilised and with the psychotic fits tempered into a soothing, trance-inducing pace. Somehow it’s also immediately catchy, laced with subtle hooks and soaring backing vocals. It’s the sort of sound that sucks you into their warm world, likely to cause you to miss your bus stop if your mind sinks too far into the rich chasm of tracks like Red and Purple [below] or The Ball. Listen closely, because this might well be one of the releases of the year.
Scour, a new way of searching the net
Have you heard about Scour yet? If not you will. It is quickly emerging as the most serious competitor to the Google search engine, with an approach based on votes and comments from users focusing on relevance. It delivers search results from Google, Yahoo and MSN, and the best feature is that each time you search, vote or comment, you receive points which can be exchaged for VISA gift cards. Sour gives you one point for each search, two points for each vote and three points for each comment. With around 6,500 points, you will receive a $25 VISA gift card. Not bad for doing something you’re doing now anyway for free.
When it comes to making an entrance, nothing says rock star quite like a pair of leather pants. 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?
I love the sense of intimacy about the work of Chicago-based photographer, Brian Ulrich. His retail project Copia ‘is a long-term photographic examination of the peculiarities and complexities of the consumer-dominated culture in which we live’. We interviewed him recently and asked him what camera he uses once he gets inside a store he’s photographing: Read more
This beautiful archival pigment print by New York-based illustrator, Fernanda Cohen, is called Fashion Ruined My Life. And it speaks for itself. Just look at her face! We have it for sale for just $75 in the Lost At E Minor online store. Read more
Happy, happy, joy, joy! We have a TV On The Radio poster designed by Tunde, as well as Dear Science on vinyl, to give away to a randomly selected Lost At E Minor subscriber who leaves a comment under this post telling us why they simply must have it.
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