August 7:
Some pictures from the last couple weeks.

This was taken on Bond St., currently the most expensive street for downtown residential apartments on the east side. And yes, that is a high-end fashion boutique. This is the sartorial equivalent of seeing an investment banker ashing his cigar onto a homeless person.

A rather arresting sculpture at the New Museum. I still hate so much about how this museum displays its art (the presentation devalues the individual pieces, democratizing the exhibits into their lowest commonalities), but they always have one or two knockouts. And it's free on Thursdays!

July 30:
This video and the song below have kept me in high spirits lately. Enjoy.
Amazing Baby - "Head Dress"

July 25:
Where have I been? Well, a lot of places. Mostly work. And the bar. But! This is not about me. This is about my favorite random rock n roll songs by bands all but forgotten.
Superdrag - "Phaser"
The Kiss Offs - "Bottle Blonde"
Gwenmars - "Venus"
The Slats - "Diabetic Coma"
Actionslacks - "Joan of Arc"
Blackbud - "Heartbeat"

July 9:
Okay, so I was in Seattle and Tacoma and Portland for about 10 days. I did all the typical northwest things: I saw three concerts, hiked, went to the beach, read in cafes, bought books at Powell's and CDs at Sonic Boom, drank a lot of microbrews, etc. etc. And saw all my great friends out there. Great times.

I also saw WALL*E, which is just plain brilliant. As in, one of the best films of the past several years brilliant. As in, if I could buy you a ticket right now to go see it, I would brilliant. GO SEE IT. THEN SEE IT AGAIN.

On the music front, Cut Copy's been doing some handy remixing lately...
Ladyhawke - "Paris Is Burning (Cut Copy Remix)"

And that dumb Pharell/Santogold/Julian Casablancas song for Converse has a very clever video. I don't mind pop music, but this whole endeavor strikes me as so fake.

June 23:
The new Wolf Parade album is quite good, a kind of melodic ramble through the band's usual city vs. rural binaries with plenty of sense and nonsense. Highly recommended.
Wolf Parade - "Language City"

In the art world, I just stumbled upon Sunday L.E.S. Guess I missed what looks like a beautiful show: Saul Becker. Who even does landscapes anymore? Besides severly abstracted ones like Julie Mehretu? Let's bring this trend back soon. And ring the damn death knell of portrait photography already.

June 20:
David Fincher (Fight Club, The Game, Zodiac) has a new film coming. With Brad Pitt, based off of on F. Scott Fitzgerald story. Something to be excited about.

June 19:
It's going to be a great day I mean week I mean year: Greg Gillis just launched his new Girl Talk album. Which is to say THE NEW GIRL TALK ALBUM IS OUT. It's pay what you want. It's also pretty amazing so far.

June 17:
Tonight I saw God and he was a bunch of Icelandic musicians singing nonsense lyrics at MoMA.

June 16:
Tomorrow I'm seeing Sigur Rós at MoMA. THANK YOU TRAVIS. He was there with me in Seattle when I had a goddamn religious experience at their Benaroya Hall show.
Sigur Rós - Gobbledigook
The Radio Dept. - Pulling Our Weight (I can't stop listening to this song for some reason. It's like resting under blankets.)

June 15:
The birthday party at Lotus was supreme fun, and thanks to all who came out! Some pics here, others here.

June 2:
BEA was ridiculous and exhausting and quite fun. Maybe I'll talk about it in a later post. For now, though: isn't it great how crazy the world is sometimes?

May 29:
I just discovered ROJO, which looks like a magazine and art collective in Sao Paulo. They do amazing work. You should check out some of their amazing work.

May 28:
I just finished The Ridiculous Race, an absurd travel narrative that you should order on Amazon. Really.

Go for it.

No, really. REALLY.

Anyways, later this week I'm going to Los Angeles (aka Anti-Ryanville) for Book Expo America. I expect it to be as mind expanding for my nerdier inclinations as the climax of 2002 was for acidheads. In honor of the jaunt...

9. The Doors - People Are Strange
I just always imagined Jim Morrison wrote this one while dropping mescaline on Sunset. If this were set in New York in the 70s Jim would've called it "People Are Mugging Me for Change So They Can Buy Smack and One Day Make a Career out of Fetishizing CBGB's Nostalgia."

8. Folk Implosion - EZ L.A.
Hey, the whole album One Part Lullaby is beautiful, this song could just as easily been about astronauts or fig newtons.

7. The Raveonettes - Ode to L.A.
This does actually make the town sound nice. And Ronnie Spector shows up! Always a good thing.

6. Rufus Wainwright - California
He's said this song is about being served PB&J sandwiches at a party thrown by Marilyn Manson. I guess you can take the lanky goth kid out of Orlando, but you can't take Orlando out of the lanky goth kid. Zing!

5. Art Brut - Moving to LA
Who's better than pasty, rained-on whiners to decry LA?

4. Death Cab for Cutie - Why You'd Want to Live Here
How about pasty, rained-on whiners from Seattle?

3. The Decemberists - Los Angeles, I'm Yours
...Or Portland?

2. Guns 'n' Roses - Paradise City
People always think this was written by Axl on that one magical night when he visited [insert your hometown here], but let's just all agree this is obviously about L.A. I'm not kidding, I've heard people try to make real arguments for why this song is really about Vegas, or Boston, or Decatur.

And the number one song about Los Angeles is...

1. Frank Sinatra - New York, New York
If you haven't caught on yet I really hate L.A.

May 26:
If everyone had four day weekends, there'd be no war. Probably not a whole lot of work getting done either, but that's okay. This Memorial Day weekend feels like a whole lifetime of activity. Most of it alcoholic. Instead of going into detail, I'll just sum it up thusly: at the rooftop pool party in the East Village last night, Jacob said, "Is that twelve year old grinding her father?"

I'm about to head out to a picnic, but I had to come home for one purpose. Listening for the thousandth time to two songs that are more addictive than crack.
M83 - Kim & Jessie
Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way

It should be noted here that M83 have created the perfect soundtrack to summer. We should found a governing, transnational arts institution endowed with selecting which musicians parse the mood of each season. For Summer 2008, it's the Saturdays=Youth album.

The prize could be like, a hotdog made out of gold or something.

May 19:
Ah, Park Slope. Yes, this is my neighborhood. Sunday I went through a rain-or-shine street festival (rain) filled to the brim with families and eyeball-stabbing umbrellas. I also ran an exhilarating loop of Prospect Park. I personally enjoy living between 5th & 6th aves, which marks a kind of Border of Gentrification. I get bodegas and brunch places! 24hr pizza and the park! Apparently everyone else in New York is making fun of us, however.

May 18:

I'm not sure how much the New York Times is ever the bellwether of something great in the arts or just the old guy showing up to the party too late. Nonetheless I did enjoy their article on one-person bands like St. Vincent, Final Fantasy, and Panda Bear. I was blown away by Person Pitch last year - I still listen to "Bros" a few times a week - and it was nice to see some exposure for Panda Bear.

Speaking of late to the party, I just recently got the new M83 album. Yes it's amazing. Why would I ever doubt them? They make soundtracks for the platonic ideal of different film genres. It's only appropriate their videos aspire to fulfill that ideal.
M83 - Graveyard Girl
The War on Drugs - Pushing Corn

May 13:
I don't know why I find this so fucking funny, but I do.

May 11:
Lotus on Friday was pretty damn fun, with cameos by Jonna Angel and that guy Christian from Project Runway. Even if the DJ's after me played generic techno. I was reminded that Michael T is one of the most generous and genuine promoters in New York.

As for the internets, here's why The Onion will always be better than College Humor - The A.V. Club, a nice addendum with real intelligence and critical observation. For instance? Their article on 17 Living Cinematic Provacateurs.

This week, well this week will be crazy. Much to do and much to see and much to hear: Mayakovsky at MoMA, Cut Copy at the Bowery, Snowden at Mercury Lounge, and me at Dan's Magnetic State launch party in Greenpoint.

May 8:
I just spent way too much money at Turntable Lab. But man am I ready for Friday (see ad).
Jamie Lidell - Little Bit of Feel Good (Mr. Oizo Remix)
Be Your Own Pet - The Kelly Affair

May 6:
Big day. Trent Reznor decided to give away another record online, this time completely for free.
My friends Lorin and Gena are hosting their third installment of the FSG Reading Series at the Russian Samovar, this time with Alex Ross (The Rest Is Noise) and Rivka Galchen (Atmospheric Disturbances). 7pm, 256 W 52nd St.

Oh, and there's Lotus on Friday. I've already found plenty of good new stuff to play. Like...
Michael Jackson - Don't Stop (Mike Mago Edit)
Late of the Pier - Space and the Woods

May 3:
This song is the equivalent of Wal-Mart sponsoring the Special Olympics, but I really don't care.
The Shangri-La's - Leader of the Pack (DJ Kue Remix)

May 2:
On the limits of language. I'm pretty sure I couldn't come up with anything more American and beautiful than the following:
Beefy Cheesy Melt - This is a "new" thing from Taco Bell. I have to give them credit for taking three ingredients and spinning decades of weed-fueled commerce out of every. damn. combination. of those three ingredients.
Bottomless Express Lunch - That first word just car crashed into the other two, like some drunk high school friend surprise visiting you at college. Try as you might, you just can't bring the contexts of "bottomless" and "express lunch" together. Try as might, Chili's.

I'm going to Los Angeles at the end of May. I'm hoping it's less this, more this.

April 29:
I'm not sure if Refinery29 started as an online shop or a fashion news destination site. Both are kind of "meh" (I think I'd like to try a shirt on if I'm going to be spending $150 on it). Their videos, however, are well produced. Mostly they make the lives of hot young designers seem just as awesome as you'd think. ("Yeah, so this came out of my trip to Scotland...")

Aside: Scott Sternberg looks like a prick in those new Gap displays for white shirt collaboration.

April 27:
Probably isn't true, but still pretty funny.

April 26:
Fuerzabruta is a must-see. If you're reading this, and you're in New York, GO SEE THIS SHOW. It's pretty difficult to describe. There's people flying around above your head, buckets of confetti everywhere, and... and... lots of stuff. You can get tickets online for 40% off.

April 20:
I was in Indianapolis to visit Chad this weekend. How can I sum up my experience? Let's just leave it at this:

April 16:
Summer is going to be so awesome.
Goldfrapp - Happiness
SebastiAn - Army

And don't you get the feeling Pitchfork.tv is going to be something truly great?

April 13:
There are a good eight months of the year left, sure, but I'm going to say that Cut Copy's In Ghost Colours and Portishead's Third will be among the year's best records. The Times has an article about the album and its slow slow realization. ...And a wholly useless piece about Trovata, which I'll post here because, well, not enough people are writing about them.

April 9:
Everyone loves George Washington.

Now you can love the Professor Brothers:

April 8:
C'MON EVERYONE LET'S ALL PLAY SCRABULOUS TIL WE DIE.
Then we can twitter about it. See the box? Up there ↑? It's new!
It's like I'm drowning in Web 2.0 memes. Remember, it's about breadth, not depth.

In the nonvirtual world, my friend Kelly may have outdone herself with her culled-from-friends monthly mix. March's motif was Spring Break Fever, and contains this gem:
Coconut Records - Nighttiming

April 7:
Something different, yes? How's about my firm respect/adoration for Trovata and A.P.C.? The genius of what these two brands do has to be seen equally up close and in panoramic.

Up close: the detail, cut, and fabric of each brand is, ahem, measured ruthlessly, and easily fit the style of a twentysomething young publishing type. Panoramic: each brand's backstory is interesting in its own way. Trovata was started by four SoCal college kids who got picked up by Barney's, and within a year won the prestigious CFDA award for young designers. While of the original quartet now only one remains (two defectors started Shipley & Halmos, which is intentionally more restrained yet still inventive), the latest selection is damn impressive. Google some news stories about it, you'll see what I mean.

A.P.C. is philosophically disparate from Trovata, though very similar in intention. Jean Touitou started the brand in Paris in the glammy 80s as a counterpoint to the overdesigned fashion of the time. He stripped away almost every detail of his clothing until something pure and balanced was left. Oh, and he was also a communist who in interviews still has a distaste for social status and capitalism.

I own two pairs of A.P.C. jeans and they are perfect. Not "hip," or "cool," but perfect. They go with everything and fit immensely comfortably. If I could afford it I would buy their clothes all the fucking time.

March 30:
Michael Haneke is rapidly becoming one of my favorite directors. I haven't seen his American remake of his Austrian Funny Games, nor do I plan on it. Tonight I watched Time of the Wolf, which is beautiful and affecting as anything I've seen in ages. For the film to truly work, the viewer should know next to nothing about the plot or images going in. So I'll just say, rent it and enjoy.

Also The Onion A.V. Club's feature The New Cult Canon is wonderful.

March 27:
Where will I be on Saturday? Hosting Camp Out. See above. Although, given the normal route the eye travels over fields of data and image, you probably already have.

March 25:
This city is still surprising. I'm at the tail end of a grueling month of work: spirits are low, energy is sapped, morale is gone. And yet, today, there was the following.
My assistant got into grad school.
Lucy Liu and I made eye contact on the street.
I found my new favorite bar, the Pacific Standard. (Colson Whitehead's reading was hilarious. Truly hilarious.)

I also just downloaded Cut Copy's In Ghost Colours. At first listen it's pretty damn good.
Cut Copy - Out There on the Ice

March 24:
Joan Didion writes the way I think at my most lucid moments. I'm reading/rapturously devouring Slouching Toward Bethlehem. That's all.

As far as art goes, for those of you know of my deep love for Cy Twombly, and my obvious love of the written word, there's Christopher Wool. I first read about his paintings about five years ago. I was in Madrid visiting a friend and randomly picked up a Taschen book called Art of the New Millennium. Wool's two pages in the anthology just shell shocked me. Much like Twombly, he pinpoints the interstices of linguistics, abstraction, and representation. And then types a gigantic exclamation mark right over it.

March 22:
In my search for Roberto Bolaño-related podcasts (like this one and this one), I came across the hilarious Malcolm Gladwell story about his days at the Washington Post from The Moth. I've never been to a reading by The Moth—they've charged themselves with bringing back the oral storytelling tradition; alas they charge their public too much for me to attend—but I can at least enjoy the podcast.

Oh, and Bolaño's a genius and everyone should read him.

March 20:
Keehnan has a new blog. It's kind of beautiful.

March 19:
Yes, Be Kind Rewind is mediocre—except for the second act, the film is quite bad. Some movies should just be websites. Case in point: the whole "we broke the internet" gimmick on the movie's site is brilliant.

What is infectious about Michel Gondry is his sense of playfulness and creativity. I'm happy to report that's alive and well with my friends. I've started written correspondences with friends on the West Coast, often pairing the letters with odds and ends. I included racist robot cartoons in a letter to Westin; he sent me a letter on 3-D paper (with 3-D glasses included!). And my friend Kelly has started curating a monthly mix along different themes, culling one song each from her friends. February's "Love, Sex, and Black Presidents" was excellent. The link may still be active here.

March 18:
Long, exhausting day. All I want to do is listen to these songs.
Fuck Buttons - Bright Tomorrow
Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal

March 17:

March 11:
Goddamn is the new Portishead record Third good. I mean, really, wow.

But you probably knew that already. So let's talk books. Specifically, book events in New York.
Specifically:
The FSG Reading Series Presents
Donald Antrim (The Hundred Brothers, The Verificationist) & Rich Cohen (Sweet and Low) @ The Russian Samovar, 7pm.
Get there early for a seat. Stay late for the homemade vodka shots.

March 10:
The Film Forum is reviving Godard's Contempt for a few weeks, and if I was turned off by an initial viewing five years ago, this NYT article demands a reappraisal. I do believe Monsieur Jean-Luc has often been ahead of his time. His 2004 film Notre Musique was exasperating and didactic in the extreme; at the same time the film haunted me for weeks. Hell, just writing about it now brings it all back.

March 9:
Portishead

March 8:
Goddamn you Friday nights, you keep stealing my Saturday afternoons. Anyways: Great music video for MGMT's "Time to Pretend" here, and an intelligent debate on the use of the literary quotation at the New York Times' blog Paper Cuts here.
The Answering Machine - Silent Hotels
MGMT - Kids

March 7:
The entirety of the television I consumed in the 1980s just flooded back.

March 5:
Drunk driving. Pregnant women smoking. Workplace drunkenness. Casual sexism. Casual racism. Casual sex highly-supressed libidinous urges. Mad Men is hilarious and kind of sad, which is what one would expect from such a pitch-perfect takedown of our collective nostalgia for the 1950s. And you just thought grandpa became a jerk in his old age. He was always a jerk.

March 4:
My favorite press (besides the ones I work for, of course) is the New York Review of Books, and they are having a "moving sale." Do yourself a favor and just go buy a smattering of their catalog, you won't regret it. My particular favorites are Geoffrey Wolff's Black Sun, Alberto Moravia's Boredom/La noia, and Patrick Leigh Fermor's A Time of Gifts. I just purchased Balzac's The Unknown Masterpiece, George Simenon's Monsieur Monde Vanishes, and V.S. Naipaul's Reading and Writing.

From the Love Songs soundtrack: Ludivine Sagnier, Louis Garrel, & Clothilde Hesme - Je n'aime que toi

March 3:
The weekend? A Guitar Hero Shredfest on the Wii (that "Medium" level is a bit of a misnomer after several beers), the stellar Cai Guo-Qiang retrospective at the Guggenheim (see below), Corner Bistro (2nd best burger in NYC, after Soho Park), Lo-Fi Fnk concert (great on record, meh in person), the ridiculously charming Love Songs, and Westin came into town to headline the Bowery in the band Say Hi.

...It was fun.

February 29:
I'm kind of obsessed with DIY craft projects. Which is odd, since I've never made anything with my hands more complicated than an IKEA desk. Still, I dream. How can I not harbor carpentry-related ambitions when there's things like this going on? I will attempt the Invisible Bookshelf this coming week. Mark my words.

I just saw Once. It's as amazing and touching as everyone says.

February 28:
In my dreams everyone dances like this.

February 27:
Christopher Honore's Ma Mere was talentedly terrible, if such a thing exists. (It does: before There Will Be Blood, Punch Drunk Love, Magnolia, & Boogie Nights, Paul Thomas Anderson made Hard Eight.) I have yet to see his second film Dans Paris, but I have high hopes for Love Songs. If anything, it has an incredibly charming trailer.

February 25:
MEGA MEDIA POST
So, I have been busy and running around like a maniac. Also, Mexico for a little while. That was nice.

But let's talk about Chris Anderson and why Wired has won the General Excellence Award five times in the last six years: because it's really fucking good. His article on Free is a must-read, and the latest issue is a thing of design beauty. Oh, and they're giving away this month's issue to anyone who wants it in the U.S. Not kidding.

Song One! She and Him - Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?
Yes, this is Zooey Deschanel & M. Ward. It's still swoon-worthy.

Also, some beautiful artstuffs on the internets. The highly addictive We Feel Fine. The always impressive Prate. The Why Didn't I Find This Last Week Jacob Magraw. (Astute aesthetes will remember him from McSweeney's 20.) Jason Salavon's project American Varietal is an abstract rendering of 200 years of U.S. Census data.

Song Two! The Mystery Jets - Young Love
(Thanks Cameron)

Jonathan Lethem's story in a December The New Yorker had me laughing on the subway like a buffoon.

Song Three! Hot Chip - One Pure Thought (Streetlab Remix)

And, um, Chip Kidd being weird. Hold out for the last one, it's a keeper:

February 12:
The TOC Conference has been very enlightening and I'm soaking up information and ideas as if the semester exam were tomorrow. Today I attended at panel on the place of literary bloggers within the publishing industry. The speakers ran the spectrum of opinions: Maud Newton of her eponymous site, Mark Sarvas of The Elegant Variation, Kassia Krozser of Booksquare, and Ron Hogan of Galleycat & Beatrice.

Eggers: The Brand (Does this make me proud or guilty to live in Park Slope?)

And before you view my latest work at, well, work, a note about musics: I'm really enjoying the new Hot Chip LP Made in the Dark and Times New Viking's Rip It Off.
Hot Chip - Shake a Fist
Times New Viking - (My Head)

More at BenjaminBlackBooks.com

February 10:
I'm about to attend the O'Reilly Tools of Change Conference. I'm told it's a bit of a madhouse, and I'm even going to the tutorials on Wednesday. I plan on being 2% smarter by Thursday. Which is perfect, since after that I'll be in Mexico for five days on a last-minute trip to Puerto Vallarta. I'm bringing a small duffel, two books, and my toothbrush. Oh man.

So, some new media. The new Helio Sequence record Keep Your Eyes Ahead is excellent, and I am addicted to Joan Didion's essays. I'm currently tearing through The White Album; Slouching Towards Bethlehem is next.
The Helio Sequence - Can't Say No
The Ting Tings - Great DJ (Calvin Harris Remix) via Disconap