6 May 2014 ←
Spin Reviews Wussy's Attica!
I'm hoping to write something about Wussy's new one as well, but this review by Jason Gubbels pretty much nails it.
In related news Pitchfork, 5 albums and more than ten years in, finally decides Wussy is worth a few paragraphs.
2 April 2014 ←
Wussy Is On Tour
And I was fortunate to see them in Vermont last night. The stage was small and bar was intimate, but they played like they were playing for 350 people, and not just the 50 or so in the crowd. As my friend remarked, their rhythm section is really tight, giving Chuck and Lisa a foundation to let go with their guitars and vocals. If you like noisy melodic rock songs, there's no one out there who matches their sound and melodies.
Even though it doesn't come out until May, they were selling their new CD, Attica!, at the show. On first listen it sounds great: more produced, like their last album, but with the darkness and soul from some some of their earlier ones. You can find new tracks here and here. I can't think of a better, more under-appreciated band.
1 April 2014 ←
F-Stop Magazine Group Show: The Natural World
Four images from my Falconiformes series are featured in F-Stop's Group Show this month. There's a lot of good work featured here, and I'm happy to be featured among it.
31 March 2014 ←
Throwing K-Cups
Marco, no fan of K-cups, reminds us not to judge too harshly those who are.
21 March 2014 ←
Coffee (and other substances) As Sport
In response to Khoi Vinh, Jason Kottke has a great little piece about how everything kind of taste has turned into a sport. Couldn't have said it better myself.
27 October 2013 ←
Rest In Peace Lou Reed
On my drive home this afternoon, I kept thinking of things I might like to write in memory of Lou Reed. But Sasha Frere-Jones pretty much summed it up perfectly, so there's not much more to say.
Except to reiterate how much Reed meant to me in my youth. He was cool, or at least cooler and different than the Grateful Dead and all the other stuff that seemed so boring at the time (no disrespect to the Dead). And he wrote about things I didn't know about or understand, like "Heroin", and "Some Kinda Love", and "Coney Island Babies"and "Dirty Boulevards", and domestic bliss, and death, and whatever the hell else was on his mind.
I still remember going to New York City on a high school trip and being so excited to find Velvet Underground cassettes(!) at Tower. So much of the music and art I listen to and appreciate today can be linked to discovering him and the Velvets as a teenager. Thank you Lou.
22 October 2013 ←
Falconiformes Series
I'm very happy to announce a new series on my portfolio site, which I'm calling Falconiformes.
With the series I'm photographing the falcons, hawks, owls, and ravens that reside at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science (VINS) in Quechee, VT. They are rescued birds; they have all been injured in some way, often by vehicles, and spend their lives in large wooden and metal raptor enclosures. Without VINS and other rescue and rehabilitation centers like it, these birds could not survive on their own.
As a photographer, I've always been interested in the different intersections that spring up between man-made and natural worlds. So it made sense to use my camera to describe these magnificent creatures caught within an artificial environment that, however necessary and well intentioned, could never hope to replicate the limitless trees and skies they would normally inhabit. What do these plumages and talons and wingspans look like caged and confined? I didn't intend for these photos to be sad, yet there's a sorrow here that's hard to escape. Nevertheless, I also hope that the birds' beauty can be seen.
19 October 2013 ←
The Roseland Ballroom is Closing
Among so many other good shows, it'll always be the first place I saw Yo La Tengo.
19 October 2013 ←
An Apple Retail Employee's Anonymous Insider's Perspective
I'm not sure how legit this is, but it's a good read.
19 October 2013 ←
'What is Digital Art Worth?'
Good question. Compared to a lot of the prices you see at art auctions these days, it's worth some but not a lot. There's a relationship between this and digital photography that might be worth exploring further.
16 October 2013 ←
The Bus
I really love these comic strips, originally published in the late-70s/early-80s in Heavy Metal magazine. (via HTMLGiant)
1 March 2013 ←
The Web Standards Project Ends
Thanks to the hard work of countless WaSP members and supporters (like you), Tim Berners-Lee's vision of the web as an open, accessible, and universal community is largely the reality. While there is still work to be done, the sting of the WaSP is no longer necessary. And so it is time for us to close down The Web Standards Project.
The modern web, and you and I, have so much to thank these guys for.
1 March 2013 ←
The Armory Show on Artsy
Speaking of shows in New York, most of the 2013 Armory Show is available to be seen on Artsy. I'm new to Artsy, but I'm intrigued.
1 March 2013 ←
Eliot Porter's Photographs of Birds
I was in New York City a couple of weeks ago and happened upon these photographs of birds at the MoMA (in a gallery curated by the artist Trisha Donnelly). I also saw Charlotte Dumas' Anima series, photographs of the burial horses of Arlington National Cemetery, at Julie Saul Gallery. Both photographers treat the animals they are photographing with a reverence and respect, without trying to make them look extra cute or overly beautiful. Porter's tiny birds are violent and thrilling; Dumas' horses tired and soft. "Nature" photography if very often the most boring kind of photography out there. These particular series transcend the category, and I haven't stopped thinking about them since I left the city. The Dumas photographs come down on March 9th, Porter's Birds on April 8th. Both shows should be seen.
25 February 2013 ←
Jerry Saltz on the 1913 Armory Show
[...]Matisse came in for especially harsh criticism. (More, even, than Duchamp's sensation-causing Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2.) When the show reached Chicago, art students tried Matisse in absentia for "artistic murder, pictorial arson ... criminal misuse of line," and burned copies of his paintings. They tried to burn him in effigy, too, but were thwarted by local authorities.
What is the modern day version of this? Chris Ofili getting getting shouted at by Giuliani during the 1999 Sensation show?. There's plenty of "shocking" art out there. But are we, as a culture, still able to be shocked by pure technique?
20 February 2013 ←
Maura Johnston starts Maura Magazine for iOS
I loved Idolator when Maura ran it, but pretty much stopped the day after she left (was fired?). This should be worthwhile.
In addition to Andrew Sullivan and Marco Arment, it's exciting to see all the new self-publishing that's happening these days.
20 February 2013 ←
James Duncan Davidson Reviews the Sony RX1
The RX1 gives me no-compromise images in a package that comfortably goes with me anywhere [...] [T]here has not a single time that I've been out and about with only my RX1 and regretted not having my big SLR with me.
Lots of good practical thoughts here. Duncan has a very spare way of photographing. Andrew Kim liked it as well. Steve Huff loves it. Ken Rockwell thinks it's too expensive. Tim Ashley overwhelms with tests and information. Dpreview likes it. Is $2798 too much for this (plus $448(!) for the viewfinder)? Part of me wants to find out.
11 February 2013 ←
Designers Will Code
David Cole offers some good thoughts for designers who are thinking about becoming coders. I've been tempted to try coding, but the time commitment has always seemed insurmountable.
8 February 2013 ←
Tom Breihan defends Mumford & Sons
[I]n their sound, I hear trace elements of [...] AC/DC. That band's secret weapon, as every reader of the great rock-critic contrarian Chuck Eddy already knows, was always drummer Phil Rudd. Rudd's secret: He never played fills. Instead, his ceaseless boom-boom-boom heartbeat-pulse helped grant that band's songs an irresistible forward momentum and lent them a secret connection to disco. Mumford, of course, have no drummer. So their secret weapon, it turns out, is frontman Marcus Mumford's right foot.
I think Breihan's comparison to AC/DC is quite apt. (Though when he criticizes Mumford's vague lyrics, I wonder what Indie rock he's been listening to for the last five years.) I only have so many hours in the day to listen to music, and I have little use for Mumford. But I think I understand the appeal. I've always wondered what my old college friend Ben Kaufman thinks of them.
8 February 2013 ←
Is George W. Bush A Good Painter?
Well, according to Jerry Saltz, he's certainly trying. I'm vaguely intrigued. I wonder if the Outsider Art Fair would have him?
6 February 2013 ←
Michael Jauchen Reviews Kenneth Goldsmith's Uncreative Writing
This review of Uncreative Writing at HTMLGiant gave me a lot to think about when it comes to creating art, teaching it, and everything that happens in between. Teaching someone how to be technically good isn't that hard. Teaching someone how to make something good is very hard.
Invariably, it's the uncreative exercises I assign that lead to a class's moments of best language, the moments when words get renewed, where surprise happens, those moments when my students put words together in ways that would be unlikely (or impossible) outside the confines of the assignment.
But most of my students remain most doggedly invested in their creative assignments (i.e. "Write any story you want"). When they read these to the class--the domestic drama narrated by the family cat, the child as secret serial killer, the priest revealed as a pedophile in the story's last line--they read them seriously, passionately.
In these kinds of exercises, the students own the words. Or at least they think they do. And it's that ownership, that authorship, they think, that makes the words good.
Even teaching what "good" is is tricky. Jauchen reminded me of a dialogue Jerry Saltz and David Edelstein, two critics I admire, had last July about Christian Marclay's The Clock. Saltz loved it, Edelstein thought it was a gimmick. But, more fundamentally, Edelstein wanted a narrative, while Saltz was fine with the imaginary connections he saw between the short clips that make up the piece.
6 February 2013 ←
The People's E-Book Kickstarter Project
This is a great idea that I hope gains some traction. Self-publishing gets easier and easier, and this project seems like the next step after self-publishing services like Blurb. (via Hyperallergic)
Unfortunately, in other cheap art news, 20x200 doesn't seem to be doing too well.
6 February 2013 ←
When Conservatives Try to Talk About Rap
Conor Friedersdorf points to some interesting test cases in the "culture war". I suppose it is "conservative" to fail to see the musicality of rap, as long as the importance of rhythm to music is ignored. But if you're going to write-off a whole genre of music because you think Sir Mix-a-Lot(!) is mindless, you're not a critic. You're a reactionary.
6 February 2013 ←
Interview with Canon's Masaya Maeda
Speaking of big things getting cheaper, this interview with Canon's Chief Executive points to a big push for more, and cheaper, full-frame DSLRs. This seems inevitable, but I hope they'd hurry the hell up. $1900 sounds "cheap" for a 6D, but I look forward to the day I can tell my students the can get something equivalent for $500.
There is a significant difference between full-frame and APS-C images. I begin my Beginning Photography classes with B&W 35mm film, and then move into digital. The students love the relative ease, and familiarity, of a digital camera. But they can also appreciate the difference between the flatness of an APS-C (or smaller) sensor and a 35mm negative. It's easy to forget that digital photography is still an infant.
6 February 2013 ←
Anandtech on Apple's New Fusion Drive
Anand Lal Shimpi spent a month with Apple's new Fusion Drive. I appreciate this kind of technology review (or really any kind of review) for taking its time and not rushing to judgement. Read the whole thing, but the short answer seems to be that its good but not great.
I'd seriously consider getting something like the new Mac Mini with one of these, but I can't help thinking the Fusion Drive is a sort of stop-gap until high-capacity SSD prices come down. Like so many things, we're waiting for the good stuff to get cheaper.
5 February 2013 ←
Wussy's New Mixtape: ...Popular Favorites
I missed this last month, but Wussy released a free mixtape of rarities, covers, live stuff and other randomness. I probably wouldn't suggest this as a suitable intro to the band, but for those in the know it's a nice surprise.
Anyone who follows me on twitter knows of my fondness for Wussy. If you're the kind of person who appreciates Lucinda Williams and Sonic Youth equally, you won't be disappointed. My entry points were the first two songs on their second LP, Left For Dead. Yours might be last year's Funeral Dress II and/or Strawberry.
5 February 2013 ←
Marc Maron Interviews Mel Brooks
On the WTF podcast this week, Marc Maron has a great interview with Mel Brooks. Maron's podcast is one of my favorites, and this is an especially good interview. There's something very satisfying about listening to two professionals, people who are very good at what they do, discuss their profession. It also helps if they're funny.
Maron's been on a roll recently: Lucinda Williams last week, and on thursday Carl Reiner.
29 January 2013 ←
A Conversation With Steven Soderbrergh About Retiring
I found this whole interview strangely inspiring.
I stopped reading reviews of my own films after Traffic, and I find it hard to read any critics now because they are just so easily fooled. From a directorial standpoint, you can't throw one by me. I know if you know what you're doing, and, "Wow, critics"--their reading of filmmaking is very superficial. Look, nothing excites me more than a good film. It makes me want to make something good. But I have certain standards, and I don't grade on a curve. If you want to be a director, I'm going to treat you like I treat everybody. So it's frustrating when critics praise things that I feel are not up to snuff.
29 January 2013 ←
Amoeba Records Starts Out-of-Print Digital Download Store
Speaking of out-of-print albums, Amoeba Records (where I've been lucky to visit once) has started a digital download store specifically for out-of-print music. Apparently, if they don't know who to give the money to, they'll escrow it until the rights holder can be found. This seems like a great idea. They have a good selection of digitized Louis Armstrong 78s.
29 January 2013 ←
John Cale Played Paris 1919 At BAM Last Week
This I would have liked to have seen. I can't say I follow much of Cale's newer stuff, but his out-of-print Fragments of a Rainy Season has always been one of my favorite live albums.
28 January 2013 ←
A List Apart Redesigns
This is a great, responsive design for 2013. And a link blog too!
28 January 2013 ←
The Drama of the Quiet Car
Ever since I quit hanging out in Baltimore dive bars, the only place where I still regularly find myself in hostile confrontations with my fellow man is Amtrak’s Quiet Car.
How quiet can you get? (via Kottke)
28 January 2013 ←
How New Egg Beat A Patent Troll
It would be nice to see more companies stand up the way New Egg has. (via Boing Boing)
27 January 2013 ←
Michael Moore Defends Zero Dark Thirty
Sort of surprisingly, Michael Moore comes to the exact same conclusions I did about Zero Dark Thirty.
23 January 2013 ←
Vampire Weekend's New One Is Coming Out in May
The live track linked to here sounds good. I can't wait for the real thing.
23 January 2013 ←
Robert Christgau's 2012 Dean's List Write-Up
I always enjoy Xgau's (if I may be so bold) end-of-the-year music write-ups, and this is no exception. Here he compares Pitchfork's and Rolling Stone's, finding unusual consensus in Fiona Apple, Frank Ocean, and Kendrcik Lamar, but not much when it comes to his own list. For many years Christgau was the main man behind the Village Voice's Pazz and Jop Music Poll (man, I used to read the VV every week...) and the democrat in him seems to really believe in these polls. I like what he has to say about artists who, rather than being ground-breaking, simply continue to refine what they already do very well. Pitchfork, especially, is often in danger of ignoring that trait.
These days critics praise hip-hop popcraft more readily than rock popcraft -- that's why many will downgrade Wrecking Ball, not to mention Pink's felt and feisty The Truth About Love, records I applaud because I believe artists can just as well replenish or reinhabit formal strategies as well as demolish or redesign them.
And on old-timers like Loudon Wainwright getting ignored:
If twentysomethings want to like Kendrick Lamar's album more than Loudon Wainwright's, I say more power to them. The Cloud Nothings', even -- there's an imagined future there that neither Loudon Wainwright or I will ever know firsthand again, and why shouldn't someone whose life stretches ahead cherish that? But it bums me that it doesn't go the other way -- that the residual formal mastery of someone like Wainwright seems incapable of touching musical aesthetes of a certain age, who as children of 9/11 know better than they'd prefer that death is in the cards for everyone.
Finally, as a bonus, here's a link Sasha Frere-Jones' end-of-year-writeup. There's lots of other worthy links there as well.
20 January 2013 ←
Review of Hiroshi Sugimoto's Revolution
John Yau review's Hiroshi Sugimoto's new show in Munich.
18 January 2013 ←
Robert F. Chew Has Died
He was excellent as Prop Joe on The Wire. That show had so many wonderful character actors.