Passive Aggressive Notes

WE'RE SUPPORTING

Abounding with references to the natural world and its corresponding rhythms, Australian artist Eleanor Yap creates the most incredible tapestry-like drawings. Yap’s rorschach-styled images, through their soothing symmetry and allegiances to nature, really seem to put the mind at ease somehow, despite their intense density and lively colors. I must say I was truly disappointed in discovering that her online shop is at this time closed! Sigh.

WE'RE LISTENING TO

Channeling Justin Timberlake and Alan Vega, or both or neither, Spanish Dancer is on his own axis, spinning to the BPM of a lost drum. At one point, between moving back and forth between Providence, Rhode Island and Miami, Florida, he discovered punk and his uncle bought him a ratty 50 dollar Cruise VMI guitar to mess around with. Subsequently, Spanish Dancer material is a little snarky, self-aware, and fun, while still retaining all the complex spastic freakout moments of his prior band, A Trillion Barnacle Lapse. His debut album, Burned Up, Bred High, is out now and we have the lead single, The Hustler [listen below], available for free download via the Music Download section of the Lost At E Minor site.

WE'RE THINKING

Wheeeeee! This game is so freaking fun! You move your cursor over each dot to make them split into four smaller dots ad infinitum.

WE'RE TRAVELLING TO

As a child, I took piano exams in over-sized white rooms, on baby grand pianos that felt unfamiliar and echoed strangely as someone across the room observed me in silence. It felt clinical, intimidating and completely devoid of warmth. Last week, I started noticing upright pianos, some painted haphazardly, others respectfully untouched plonked in the most unlikely places throughout Sydney. There was one on the edge of the baby pool at the local swimming pool, with a young girl in a rainbow striped dress tapping out a happy but disjointed melody; another shaded under a tree at the park on the way home. Read more

Peter Nalitch is Russia’s answer to Manu Chao. His video for the song Guitar is a Borat-like jab at low-budget, post-Soviet awkwardness — absurd English lyrics, Eurotrash earnestness, bad wipes, and cheap subtitles. But its tongue-in-cheekness is quite apparent, and the song is disarmingly catchy and romantic.

WE'RE WEARING

Love your Converse All Stars? Well, designer Daryl Van Wouw has taken his obsession to the next level, creating an entire pant and shoe configuration. Yes, it’s a very interesting design. But practical? That depends entirely on the whims of the individual.

WE'RE READING

DM Stith recently signed to Asthmatic Kitty, the same label as Sufjan Stevens, and has a new EP out this week titled Curtain Speech, featuring contributions from Shara Worden (My Brightest Diamond), Rafter, Sebastian Krueger and the string quartet Osso. Think Animal Collective and Grizzly Bear meets Arthur Russell. We got the rundown from him on his eight favourite songs right now and he kicked off with The Shangri-Las’ Out In The Streets [listen below]: ‘1:22 – 1:43 is a miracle. I’ve never been so obsessed with twenty seconds of high-hat and high school girl shrieks: it’s a raging teenage fantasy that all the composition notebooks in all the lockers of 1965 couldn’t write better. That the singers have managed to preserve their naivety perfectly in this three minute song may be the reason I feel recording pop music is worthwhile’. Read the rest of DM Stith’s Secret Playlist.