October 23, 2009 | New Trends | by Matthew Specktor |
Sometimes pessimism is more encouraging than optimism, because more is true. I’m a huge fan of Straw Dogs, but the English counter-Humanist philosopher’s Heresies is just as bracing: ‘Belief in progress is the Prozac of the thinking classes’. Living in Los Angeles, where a brittle, self-obsessed ‘hopefulness’ is everywhere, I might need this writer (who certainly shouldn’t be confused with the Men Are From Mars guy) even more than you do. But you do, you do.
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September 30, 2009 | New Film | 
by Matthew Specktor |
More timeless than current’. But I recently finished a long and complicated novel about Hollywood in the 60s, 70s and 80s, and am just now buckling down to write a short nonfiction book about this film, part of a series for Soft Skull Press. A little peremptorily written off as a mere ‘entertainment’, and also overshadowed by the in-fact-not-quite-as-good Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, this is a pretty dazzling effort: a coded Watergate-conspiracy narrative, a comment on the perils and pleasures of being fooled that’s also twice as much fun to watch as you remember. Which was pretty fun to begin with.
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September 30, 2009 | Cool Websites | by Matthew Specktor |
Whether or not you give a damn about baseball cards, you should read Josh Wilker’s captivating blog, Cardboard Gods. Using vintage Topps imagery — the stagey, shaggy and strange captures of forgotten ballplayers in the 70s — as a launching pad, Wilker takes off on flights about everything from memory to athleticism to middle-aged failure. The guy’s such a great writer it hardly matters. Post after post after post is a winner. Read more
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August 24, 2009 | New Photography | by Matthew Specktor |
Lisa Jane Persky takes beautiful, beautiful, photographs. To be fair, she also took my book jacket photo, but that doesn’t make her work less amazing. She covers a ton of ground: visit her site to look at vintage, CBGB’s era Debbie Harry, but stay for everything else.
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August 21, 2009 | New Music | 
by Matthew Specktor |
The Disintegration Loops, a series of melty, mutated tape transfers, are pretty staggering [listen to Dip 1.3 below]. But William Basinski’s recent 92982, which seems to compress the murmur of all of Brooklyn, could even be better. ‘Ambient’ doesn’t nearly cover it: there’s a grandness, but never a grandiosity, of scale. It’s meditative without being lulling, mysterious without being merely vague. Amazing stuff.
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August 18, 2009 | New Products | by Matthew Specktor |
The Thing. Not the John Carpenter movie, of course, but the subscription-only art object, curated by a different person each time. Jonathan Lethem’s Chaldron Optical System is the current one, an item of enigmatic and satisfying beauty. Who knows what will be next? Read more
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Not only is the scale of the things Italian street artist Blu is doing on the street, impressive — he does these huge pieces with just rollers with long extensions — even more amazing is how quickly he works. If you haven’t seen the stop motion animation he did, you should. It’s an animation on the walls of a street in which he’s painting, then buffing, then painting it again, with a succession of characters moving all around. It’s just insane how much work it takes to create these things. I don’t think anyone has ever done anything like it. Read more
Architect Jean Nouvel is on a roll. His projects are popping up everywhere, but this may be the grandest. In choosing Nouvel’s design, the competition judges stressed that this ‘is the most important act of architecture since the Eiffel Tower’. Read more
Australian label Eliza Clare/Adornus is the creative project of Samantha Grant, Sally Wilson and Emma Jackson and is named after Sarah Eliza Clare, a noted couturier in Sydney during the 1930s and 40s who was actively involved in the fashion industry until her early 70s. Read more
Ok, a confession. And one made with the full weight of its implications bearing down on me like a load of feathers. Extra soft ones of course (well, it is my confession). When I see bands play – and I mean good bands; bands with rhythm – my right leg gyrates like a stunned jellyfish. Read more
The Magazineer is ‘a blog about magazine design and print culture, written by people who love, and make, magazines’. Read more
Oh man! If I was twenty again, a jumble of nerves and a well of electric energy, I’d be in the front row for every damn MGMT gig. Read more
Tallest Man on Earth, the rasping Swedish folk singer-songwriter and one of the unsung heroes of 2008, recently recorded the beautiful song A Field of Birds, a nice adjunct to his summer album release, Shallow Grave. His sound is so loose and unmanicured, and carries a poignancy reminiscent of the rusty, early Bob Dylan.
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Yum, yum, cupcakes are fun. These creations are so clever, so arty, so damn bizarre that it would almost be a shame to eat them. Almost! Read more
Trip out with Sparrow Vs Sparrow’s retro illustrations, I love their aesthetic, color use and sense of humor. Read more
Karen Caldicott’s clay head models
British born, New York-based model maker Karen Caldicott has been making clay heads for all major US publications over the last decade. Read more
I live the upbeat, feel good tempo of the new single — A Hundred Hearts — from Philly group, The Swimmers. Off their latest album, People Are Soft, this song is a strangely fitting anthem for the blustery day outside.
Amazing cake designs by Charm City Cakes
Baltimore company Charm City Cakes produces the most innovative wedding and party cakes on the market. Inspiration for these creative bakers comes from everywhere: art, fabric, furniture, architecture, landscapes, science, and music, and each cake is individually designed to match your personality, and the theme of the occasion you are celebrating. Don’t miss these cakey engineering masterpieces. Read more
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
Very Cheap Bag totes are eco-friendly and made from 100 percent unbleached cotton. They’re sturdy, yet lightweight. We love them, and think you will too. So we have them for sale in our online store for less than nine dollars. Read more
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