Category Archives: Tastemaking

Apr 23 2013
Leave a comment
Brooklyn, Let Everybody Know!, Music, Tastemaking

Let Everybody Know!: Preview of !!!’s Thr!!!er

One of the best new albums of the year — and definitely one of the most danceable — will be coming from !!! (Chk Chk Chk, for those who don’t read symbol) very, very shortly. Thr!!!er, a play on Michael Jackson’s classic title, comes out April 30, featuring relatively-tight songs, voice modulators that make singer/frantic dancer Nick Offer sound REALLY REALLY DEEP, and grooves galore. Pitchfork has the preview.

Advertisement
Apr 20 2013
Leave a comment
Awesomeness, Music, Tastemaking, Uncategorized

Record Store Day

Here’s info on the annual celebration of putting the needle in the groove. It’s increasingly a lost art, but still, no one’s going to ever feel as fondly about the cassette tape or the CD, are they?

Apr 17 2013
Leave a comment
Awesomeness, Media, Music, Really Good TV, Tastemaking, The Internets, TV

Sequestered in Winterfell? The Hold Steady Helps Soundtrack Game of Thrones

During this past Sunday’s HBO premiere of Game of Thrones Season 3 Episode 3, a group of rogues sang a song called “The Bear and the Maiden Fair,” a boisterous drinking song popular in Westeros. After the episode’s dramatic SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT conclusion, an especially boisterous, fully-rocked-out version of the song played over the closing credits, courtesy of The Hold Steady — in a hipsters-meets-Lannisters treatment previously journeyed to via The National’s “Rains of Castamere.” Wired explores the phenomenon smartly, and reveals the news that the Hold Steady’s version will be available in our world’s version of celebrating Ye Olde Mystical Tymes — for Record Store Day on April 20.

Apr 10 2013
Leave a comment
Let Everybody Know!, Music, Tastemaking

Let Everybody Know!: Sean Nelson’s Back (With An Adorable New Video To Boot)

We’re big fans of Harvey Danger from way back — Stephen Thompson from NPR Music astutely points out that “one hit wonder” isn’t a fair billing for the band, in that their output was consistently strong and smart and deserving of the audience that only “Flagpole Sitta” seemed to get.

Harvey Danger singer Sean Nelson is back with the first song from an upcoming album, accompanied by an absolutely adorable video in which an animated Sean courts a snowman. (Snowwoman?) See it all at the Mighty NPR here.

Apr 09 2013
Leave a comment
'Merica, Awesomeness, Food, Marketing Run Amok, Tastemaking, The Internets, Trenchant Social Commentary

A Pizza With An Ear Infection: Sandwich Monday Takes On the Crazy Cheesy Crust Pizza

Oh, ‘Merica. In the never-ending quest of American fast food chains to fill us with fat, Pizza Hut has created a cheese pizza with bowls of cheese ringing the pizza. We wish we were kidding. It’s called the Crazy Cheesy Crust Pizza, and it is undeniably all those things. Even though a pizza is clearly not a sandwich, the awesome team at NPR’s Sandwich Monday took the plunge (into a pool of cheese) to review the Hut’s latest offering. Hilarity ensues. Oh my God, does hilarity ensue.

Apr 05 2013
Leave a comment
Actual Celebrities, Awesomeness, Media, Movies, Tastemaking, Writing

Speaking in My Official Capacity as a Pulitzer Prize Winner, Your Movie Sucks

In honor of the life and career of game-changing film critic Roger Ebert, a delicious highlight reel (as it were) of some of his all-time classic digs at bad movies. Our favorite line? “Add it all up, and what you’ve got here is a waste of good electricity. I’m not talking about the electricity between the actors. I’m talking about the current to the projector.”

Mar 28 2013
Leave a comment
Let Everybody Know!, Music, Tastemaking

Let Everybody Know!: Telekinesis Might Have the Album of the Year

Proving you can’t see everything at SXSW you should, even though you tried really, really hard, here is Telekinesis, via NPR Music, with their First Listen feature of Dormarion, which might be an early candidate for Album of the Year. Just over a half hour, 12 songs all gorgeously constructed, made by a drummer-first multi-instrumentalist who enlisted the help of Jim Eno of Spoon (another drummer with impeccable pop sensibilities). Have a listen.

Mar 25 2013
Leave a comment
Actual Celebrities, Lyrics (and/or Lyrical Analysis), Media, Music, Tastemaking, Trenchant Social Commentary

Yes, Nick Cave Is Singing About Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus

Nick Cave: Genius? Crazy? Both? We’re leaning both, after not only confirming today on chance listen to “Higgs Boson Blues” from his amazing new album, that he does indeed rhyme “Hannah Montana” with “African Savannah” to start off a verse. He also envisions Miley Cyrus at Toluca Lake, and invokes Robert Johnson. Well, we were at least expecting that last one.

Have a crack at the lyrics yourself, on the laughably-named Song Meanings website.

(Says one fan, “in my opinion it’s about someone who checks into a motel who writes down everything he is experiencing on his trip and stay there. i’m pretty sure it’s drug related.” You think?)

Feb 20 2013
Leave a comment
Awesomeness, Disasters, Ersatz Celebrities, Food, Tastemaking, The Internets, Trenchant Social Commentary

Roasting Guy Fieri: Parody Site Takes On Frosted-Tipped Flavor Explosion King

Oh, Guy Fieri. First, your restaurant gets one of the most scathing, vitriolic reviews in the history of restaurants in the New York Observer, citing his birth as “the beginning of a year when the world caught on fire” and then just getting more hateful from there. Then, the New York Times’ Pete Wells reviewed the restaurant in a series of the most deliciously snarky questions ever put together into a single review, including “Hey, did you try that blue drink, the one that glows like nuclear waste?” and “Is this how you roll in Flavor Town?”

Now, we learn that Guy Fieri has not parked the guysamericankitchenandbar.com URL. We know that because of this completely awesome parody website/menu. Our favorite details might be the bidet that plays Smash Mouth or the picture of David Lee Roth stapled to a deep-fried snake, and really, you just need to read the whole brilliant thing.

Tagged , , , ,
Feb 17 2013
Leave a comment
Sports, Tastemaking, The Internets

Today’s NBA Stars: They Can Beat Michael Jordan at Something

The always-excellent crew at The Basketball Jones, our favorite Canadian-based basketball and pop culture podcast, is down in Houston for All-Star Weekend, and with it being Michael Jordan’s 50th birthday this weekend — a fact not lost on Fall Out Boy in their random duet with 2 Chainz — they took it upon themselves to ask the participants in this year’s All-Star Game to come up with things they’re better at than the Greatest of All Time. Answers included Uno, Checkers, dressing, drawing, mouth-grape-catching (of course), and a whole lot of video games. And, from the Matt Bonner we’re clearly all fans of, cribbage.

← Older posts