Music / The B-52s: ‘My Secret Playlist’
Our favourite retro-hipsters — and the only band to make Hawaiian shirts look at least kinda fashionable — The B52s have been doing it for more than thirty years, and they’re still writing great pop music. Their latest album, Funplex, is just that: fun plex twenty. Sorry, plus twenty. We like it. And we’re not surprised given the rather old-school Secret Playlist that Kate Pierson [first six songs] and Keith Strickland have assembled.
Jane Siberry / Bound By the Beauty
Jane Siberry changed her name to Issa, sold her home and most of her possessions (although she owns a pair of fabulous boots), and sells her music — digitally only, to cut down on plastic waste — by a self-determined pricing policy. She’s an incredible, profound songwriter and singer, and is doing it her way, for sure.
Joni Mitchell / A Case Of You
I had her very first album when I was a kid and had my own folk-protest band, The Sun Doughnuts. She was a huge inspiration, and her open tunings were a real influence on Ricky Wilson’s guitar playing.
Genoa Keawe / E Mama E
Feeling uptight? Want to make it alright? Just listen to this! Known as Auntie Genoa, she recently passed away. But she was the Queen of the old-school, real deal Hawaiian singers.
Chic / Le Freak
This song contains my favorite Nile Rogers line: ‘clams on the half-shell, and roller skate, roller skate’. Check out Nile Rogers’ WeAreFamilyFoundation.org, promoting peace and tolerance. It’s just what we need right now.
Kraftwerk / Trans-Europe Express
They are so innovative and it’s a rare treat to see them live — with real robots! Ricky, Keith and I were on Ricky’s sailboat on Lake Lanier during a lightning storm and we had this song blasting on the boombox as we sailed like the wind to get back to shore. It was very exci-tatious!
Komeda / It’s Alright, Baby
You just need to check out this poppy band from Denmark. There’s not much that can be said about them.
The Patti Smith Group / Pumping
This song has everything I love about Patti Smith and her group: it’s exhilarating, intoxicating and transcendent. When our band was starting out in Athens, Georgia, this song gave me the feeling that the possibilities were infinite.
The Stooges / 1969
In the fall of 1969, I was 16 and started attending a new school where I knew no one. My parents had one of those big stereo consoles and I would put on 1969 and play it as loud as possible and sing into a make-believe microphone while flailing myself across the living room floor. The Stooges articulated perfectly my teenage frustrations, alienation and boredom. Teenage angst was never more fun.
Tagged: My Secret Playlist, pop music, rock music
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Fans of Australian buzzsaw rock trio, The Vines, might like to check out our sister site, My Secret Playlist, where drummer Hamish Rosser has written about eight songs he’s digging right now. There’s some interesting choices in there including The Strokes, James Brown, and, gulp, Joan Jett.
Cold War Kids’ Loyalty to Loyalty
With their slow burning, ramshackle pop escapism, Cold War Kids have ignited a spark in that oft-derided indie music scene. So perk up! Their new album, Loyalty to Loyalty, can be heard in its entirety through the MTV Leak website.
Download the track, Something is Not Right With Me
[audio:http://sonnyvenice.phpnet.org/musique/michto%20mu/09%202008/04%20Something%20Is%20Not%20Right%20WIth%20Me.mp3]
The secret diary of The Grates
A few weeks back we asked Patience, frontwoman of Aussie pop starlets The Grates, to write about a typical day in her ever-hectic life. Today, it’s drummer Alana’s turn: ‘On the menu. I had soup and a sandwich. How very American of me. Actually, I really miss America. I can’t speak on behalf of the other two but I’m really keen to head back for a tour. Today I had quite a few over the phone interviews (in the biz we just call them ‘phoners’. If you are in an up-and-coming band, saying ‘phoners’ will make you appear as though you have done some too) which was heaps better than usual because my flatmates and I all went in for a cordless phone’. Read more
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We asked New York illustrator Christopher Neal about the inspirations behind his work: ‘Each job is different. Sometimes looking through old books and artist monographs will spark something. Other times, its just putting pen to paper until I get an idea. Things like music videos, movies, trips to the museum all seep in and resurface later in my work. For my personal work, a lot of it comes from my sketchbooks’. Read more
Is it that wrong for a man to have more than one wife? How about a woman with more than one husband then? Enter Francine Fleiss — the woman with five husbands! Sultry Francine has been flitting around the continent over the past decade, and has collected five husbands from five of Europe’s coolest cities! If you’re an aspiring husband collector then you can check out her tips to get your collection going. Cool Capitals is a fresh new alternative to the usual travel agents and sites. It specializes in travel to the less trodden European cities of Vienna, Valencia, Amsterdam, Antwerp and Zurich. They all possess a cool mixture of old and new culture that is a breath of fresh air against the typical touristy European destinations. Check out the site.
The idea is simple: ‘The One80Project is a national competition inviting anyone with a good idea for an hour long drama to submit a 180 second pilot and an accompanying treatment. This is then judged by an expert panel of industry specialists to ultimately be produced and aired on MTV in Australia, online and on mobile’. Entries are now closed and they’ve narrowed the field to ten finalists. Our choice is Staying, a funny drama about people dealing with life after the death of a loved one, in which an unusual support group is formed by an odd assortment of people. A Breakfast Club for our time? Voting closes in 71 days and fifteen hours, though who’s counting. So show your support for these young aspiring Australian filmmakers.
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San Francisco artist Matthew Palladino’s work is on my obsessive website viewing rotation. His colourful, clean, folksy images have got me, though I must say that I’m not as drawn to some of his more overt examples of political subject matter as I am to his more personal, introverted images. Regardless, Palladino implements the most beautiful patterns and shapes with his watercolors. And I just can’t get enough. Read more
Marianne Goldin creates lush illustrations that convey a wonderful sense of drama amidst its classical romantacisim. Read more
God save the Queen. Oh, and Johnny Rotten, Sid Vicious, Steve Jones and Paul Cook too. Read more
Abstracted geometric forms, peculiar clockwork pieces, and a sense of childhood play; I can’t quite pinpoint why I love the jewellery designs of Sydney creative, Elke Kramer, but I do know that her jewellery is unique and off-beat, yet widely accessible and wearable. Read more
Every now and then you encounter a band whose sound cannot be confined to CD, Vinyl or a MySpace Music Player; a sound so incredible that it must be experienced first hand, in the flesh, where it can do some well-deserved damage to your eardrums. Sydney’s Dead Farmers are one of these bands. Read more
This water theatre by the British architect, Sir Nicholas Grimshaw of Grimshaw Architects, takes the form of a vertical seawater greenhouse, with the evaporators and condensers stacked vertically to maximise yield. The structure is not only a visible engine of sustainability but is also a large theatre auditorium. 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.
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David Holmes’ The Holy Pictures
David Holmes’ fourth solo album has been a long time in the making. The man who is best known for his scoring of films such as Ocean’s 11, 12 and 13, and remixing for bands like U2 and The Manic Street Preachers, took just over ten years to make his latest album. Read more
Adult Hotel opens in Nanning, China
State-controlled news outlet Xinhua reports that a new ‘adult hotel‘ is opening in Nanning, the capital of Guangxi Province in southern China. Apparently state censors think homosexuals and tattoo parlors sully their nation’s image, but not establishments aimed at facilitating heterosexual unions. The owner is apparently worried his business will be perceived as a brothel. Hmmm. In any case, the photos of a staff member demonstrating the, uh, equipment is caption-worthy for sure.
Lightspeed Champion performs The Kids unhinged
We met Lightspeed Champion (Londoner and former Test Icicles member Dev Hynes) backstage at Oxford Arts Factory at precisely 4.15pm. Read more
National Geographic Best Wild Animal Photos of 2008
National Geographic just announced the Best Wild Animal Photos of 2008. They’re all stunning, but I’m particularly fond of the one of a frog refusing to become lunch for a snake. It looks like they’re eating each other. My number two is the black-crested macaque hanging out on a beach. Read more
Christine Callahan’s colourful photography
There is magic in these photographs by New York photographer, Christine Callahan. The vibrant colors and the beauty in the everyday give me the feeling that everything is going to be just fine. Read more
This Powder Necklace features a pearlized Turbo Cinereus shell with tiny holes drilled into the bottom, filled with a sparkling silver-colored powder that when gently tapped, sprinkles a light dusting on the wearer’s chest. Designed by Stephanie Simek. 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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