Thao with the Get Down Stay Down
Like a breath of fresh air, Thao Nguyen is a totally independent voice from San Francisco. With a dash of Modest Mouse, a splash of Feist and an eye for the quirkier side of life. Managed by the former president of the Kill Rock Stars label, Slim Moon, Thao sent her track — Like the Linen — to Laura Veirs, who connected her to her drummer, Tucker Martine, famed producer for The Decemberists and Sufjan Stevens. In August of 2006, her group — Thao with the Get Down Stay Down — began recording with Martine in Seattle and released the album We Brave Bee Stings And All in January of 2008 — an album that has since caught the attention of the iTunes generation. Yup, just wait for it to hit the next Apple Mac ad.
Tagged: Laura Veirs, San Francisco, Sufjan Stevens, Thao Nguyen, Tucker Martine
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Thao and the Get Down Stay Down (Adam Thompson on bass, keys and additional guitar, and Willis Thompson on drums and percussion) return with the follow up to their critically lauded album, We Brave Bee Stings and All, the best-selling record of 2008 for Kill Rock Stars. We checked in with Nguyen to get the inside word on the music that inspired it all. She started with The Avett Brothers song, Will Your Return [listent below]: ‘So catchy, forlorn, provocative and rakishly charming. It reminds me of touring. I love the cutting sincerity and the charisma of the Avett Brothers. And, totally unrelated, they are the nicest band in the world. Seriously. Ask anyone’. Read the rest of Thao Nguyen’s Secret Playlist.
Tweet this: Twitter is launching its own wine label. And that took only 41 characters. Now for the story behind it all. In an effort to help make a positive impact, Twitter says, they’ve teamed up with San Francisco-based non-profit Room to Read, which helps brings libraries and literacy to the world’s poorest countries. Read more
I love the male-female Lab Partners art and design team out of San Francisco. I have two of their pieces at home, which I purchased from the Outre Gallery in Melbourne. They are responsible for some of the most heart-warming, 50s styled, Gocco prints I’ve seen. Read more
Also by ARI STEIN
Ten years of German photographer Jürgen Teller’s candid, glamorous photo campaigns for Marc Jacobs’ men’s and women’s collections have been collated into one cohesive 576-page fashion bible. This book does an excellent job of detailing just how significant this collaboration has been for fashion, featuring appearances from the likes of Sofia Coppola, Charlotte Rampling, Meg White, Thurston Moore, Rufus Wainwright, William Eggleston, and Winona Ryder. Read more
One of the most intriguing stories I’ve come across this year is about a young artist called Yonlu, born Vinicius Gageiro Marques in the town of Porto Alegre, in Brazil. His story is short but fascinating. As it goes, this sixteen year old songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and virtual artist locked himself in his bathroom, signed on to one of the various suicide forums he belonged to on the Internet, and took his own life, remaining online until the very end. After his death, his father went through his computer and found numerous musical creations, including the songs that make up his debut album through Luaka Bop. It’s an amazing listen and very ahead of its time.
Edgar Muller’s three-dimensional street art
Some people are talented, others are just truly remarkable. German artist Edgar Muller makes these three-dimensional apocalyptic fantasy street art in cities across the world. His work is reminiscent of that of English artist, Julian Beever. Read more
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Sara Watson, a second-year student at the University of Central Lancashire, recently painted a car to make it blend chameleon-like into the background, creating the illusion that it has become invisible. A recycling firm that wanted some publicity donated the car to Watson, who spent three weeks meticulously painting it to resemble the parking lot in which it was parked.
On my recent visit to Barcelona, my love for Animal Farm led me to the Plaça de Geroge Orwell. There I discovered Oviso. The tiny café features hand painted walls and low wooden benches, where inhabitants enjoy great coffee for €1 and discuss music, beer, photography and the hordes of tourists that bustle just beyond the quiet square.
Clara Kraetsch and Doreen Schulz are the designers behind the hot Berlin design label C-Neeon, which hit hard onto the fashion radar after winning the Young Designers competition at the Hyeres Festival. Read more
I tossed and turned through three chapters of an epic Russian novel last night. Or so it felt as a constant stream of characters made their way past the stringent casting couch and into the deepest reaches of my dreams. Read more
Marton Schoeller’s new book of portraits aims to highlight the contrast between the extreme physiques of female bodybuilders and the vulnerability expressed through their eyes and nuanced facial expressions. Read more
Back in the day, when I was a skinny teenager on the great pedestal of life, I had a real obsession for the understated, low-fi, deliciously melodic and somewhat blurry sounds of the New Zealand Flying Nun bands. I would pool my meagre savings and canvas the local record shops, scouring the racks for the latest cassettes from The Bats, The Chills, The Clean, and, later, The Straitjacket Fits. Read more
There’s something quite attractively kitsch about the Lucky Dragons’ latest release, Dream Island Laughing Language. It’s undoubtedly unusual, and not too friendly on the ears, but something warm and fuzzy keeps creeping out of the broken drum rhythms and looped vocals. It’s a mish-mash of jangly folk licks, Squarepusher-style drum ‘n bass with a few Coco Rosie-esque experimental sound effects thrown in: intriguing, original, and fairly hard to describe!
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Good thing Kris Kuksi channelled the trauma of growing up with an alcoholic stepfather, his disdain for ‘the typical American life and pop culture’, and his fascination with the macabre into obsessive, baroque assemblages, paintings, and drawings. 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
With the recession still biting, it may be time to whip out the glue and the cardboard and make your next pair of cool kicks. Don’t know how they’d manage in the rain though? Read more
Trip out with Sparrow Vs Sparrow’s retro illustrations, I love their aesthetic, color use and sense of humor. Read more
Scanners’ new single Salvation
I love this track by London based rock group, Scanners, which is off their latest album, Submarine. Having toured with acts such as The Horrors, The Wedding Present, The Charlatans, Electric Six, and Juliette & The Licks, Scanners could well blow up in 2010. Figuratively speaking, not literally. No, that wouldn’t be fun.
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
Fourth is King make limited edition unisex t-shirts, printed on 50 percent polyester and 50 percent cotton construction, with custom embroidered tag on the left sleeve. Read more
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