Lost AT E Minor

WE'RE SUPPORTING

Brooklyn-group School of Seven Bells have just released my new favourite album of 2008 — Alpinisms —a slow-building, crackling collection of songs which sneak into your subconscious and spin endlessly like an old, beat up 45. Read more

WE'RE LISTENING TO

It’s only fitting a band of Canadian rootsters like this would tap a mythical figure of folklore for their namesake. Indeed, Ottawa’s The John Henrys understand the power of the familiar. Read more

WE'RE THINKING

GeekStiff4U is offering some pretty nifty, hand-crafted, skull-shaped USB flash drives that can be worn as rings. The $156 price-tag may ward off non-geeks, but that’s the point. This item is only for people really committed to transferring data in style.

WE'RE WEARING

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

WE'RE TRAVELLING TO

Over at Apartment Therapy, Cemusa has been cited as the design group responsible for the stylish glass street furniture popping up around New York City. 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'RE READING

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.