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Trailer Park: The Mother Of Invention
"one part bracelet, one part mace... I call it... the macelet"
7th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
R.I.P. Ron Asheton
The Stooges reunion is over, as sadly guitarist Ron Asheton has been found dead at home, with a suspected heart attack to blame.
A Punk Legend. R.I.P.
We've caught him live several times, pre Stooges reunion. Check out how cooly he handles Bobby Gillespie's outburst here.
6th Jan 2009 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Promo Promo: TVOTR Dancing Choose
Promo up for TV On The Radio's forthcoming single Dancing Choose.
6th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Picassa for Mac
While iPhoto offers a pretty nifty set of features, there's something to be said for the speed and ease-of-use of Google's Picassa photo-management software, which is now available for Macs.
It also integrates nicely with some of friendly-Monopoly Google's other services, such as Web Albums and Blogger.
6th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Macworld
Big boss Steve Jobs may be out for at least this year's event, but the Macworld expo soldiers on - with the big keynote today (9am Pacific time) being addressed by #2 Phil Schiller. Likely announcements include a more media centre friendly Mac Mini, and DRM free iTunes with a more varied pricing structure. A 17" Macbook Pro also seems certain.
Less likely announcements include a mini iPhone, and a netbook Mac - but you never know.
(there's also this revolutionary keyboard-free MacWheel)
6th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Poster Boy
in the fine tradition of subverts comes new New York subway slasher Poster Boy. nice piece on him over @ NY Mag
6th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: Night At The Museum: Battle Of The Smithsonian
always prefer sequels where they don't put 2 in the title. even if if does take longer to type it all out...
6th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
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Noodle Time
Sounds like Prince is heading back to his noodle-tastic roots with new project Lotus Flow3r.
5th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: State Of Play
trailer up for the US remake of State Of Play
5th Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Prepare For Take Off
I wouldn't exactly describe it as a tidal wave, but the HBO PR machine is revving up nicely for the new season of Flight of the Conchords, which starts on HBO on Jan 16th. You can of course watch the first episode now, over at Funny or Die, HBO and YouTube, but if you're strong enough to avoid those mini-outlets you can tide yourself over with a load of downloads from Murray's Street Team, karaoke some of the songs over at Lip Dub Video Fansterpiece, join the Facebook group or get sucked into the fan club at Mel's Blog.
2nd Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
2009 will include...
...new stuff from Animal Collective, Anthony And The Johnsons, J Tillman, Robert Pollard, Franz Ferdinand, Phospherescent, Hot Panda, Robyn Hitchcock and U2 according to this giant list of releases up on Pitchfork.
2nd Jan 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet
Film Star Cocktails
Wondering what to drink tonight? Why not see the New Year in with a Woody Allen.
31st Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Will This Year Never End???
2008 is now coming to you in an extended director's cut...
31st Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Present: Flight Of The Conchords 2.0
what better way to round off 2008 than a new ep from FOTC?
30th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Invisible Christmas
jump on board The Invisible sleigh before they run all over 2009 with this Christmas Number One (hallelujah my arse etc...) the album's out in March(ish) and is pretty great: check this XFM session for a live preview of four of the tracks
24th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
MPFreeze
While you're waiting for the Queen's speech on Christmas Day, head over to Amazon for £3 worth of MP3's from their newly launched store. That will snag you one of several albums, including a couple that made this year's chimp top 5's. Enter code FREEMP3S at the checkout.
23rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Pope Palpatine
now the Pope's saying defending heterosexuality from the gays is as important as saving the rainforest...
#chimp71
#CurrentAffairs
#D.U.D.(DumbUpDudes!)
23rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Bees On Coke
bees like to dance a lot when they're high on cocaine too
23rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Super Surf
We've mentioned Pulitzer-winning photographer Vincent LaForet before on Chimpomatic, for his video short to promote the High Definition video capabilities of the new Canon 5D Mark II stills camera (get it here). That promo got him a ton of interest, and the owners of Smug Mug have generously funded his next project, which will be a surf movie with Jamie O'Brien, shooting out at the world famous pipeline wave.
There's an area-man approved element to the project too - as they will be shooting the film on a handful of the 5D cameras, as well as an adapted Red One.
22nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Northern Lights
Great pictures of aurora borealis or northern lights over at The Guardian
22nd Dec 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
BSG Webisodes
new Battlestar Galactica webisodes up - but frak! - only in the US (and youtube)
22nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Skate or die: Jason Lee
Quite possibly the world's most well-recognised skateboarder, Jason Lee is now far better known as that cheeky chap actor from My Name Is Earl - but as a teenage skater he was known to me as that young dude with big lambchops.
Riding with Gonz for Blind in 1991, Jason Lee was the co-star of the mega-influential skate movie Video Dayz, directed by Spike Jonze (see above). He pioneered a lot of street skating moves, and was well known for big ollies and kickflips. As his acting career took off, insurance issues put an end to Lee's skateboarding career and he was forced to hang up his trucks.
I strangely recall the moment I read about him landing an acting job in a film by that Clerks guy, with that girl from 90210. Mallrats was a so-so affair, but Jason Lee's Banky character easily stole the show. Another amusingly obnoxious role in Chasing Amy sealed the deal and Hollywood came calling. Parts in the likes of Enemy of the State, Almost Famous, Vanilla Sky and Alvin and the Chipmunks followed and IMDB reports that he netted a cool $3M for the overlooked movie A Guy Thing.
No grumbling from me however, as Lee must now have enough clout to sidestep the insurance issue and has re-invested in skating - and re-started his once defunkt label Stereo with business partner Chris Pastras. Great artwork, great photography, great attitude.
And Earl? Great moustache.
Bonus Fact: Don't get cornered at a party, he's a Scientologist. So is Earl's brother, Randy.
Double bonus fact: Jason Lee's son is called Pilot Inspektor Riesgraf-Lee. Ouch.
Final bonus fact: He made a cameo as Kevin Bacon in the Yacht Rock episode Footloose.
Music Fact: The song from his part in Video Days was so in demand that it was released as a single, titled Jason's Song.
Photo by Atiba Jefferson. I urge you to visit his website.
19th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
iMacPlayer
The BBC have released a Mac version of the awesome iPlayer, so you can now download higher-quality versions of the week's shows - in addition to the already excellent web-based version.
19th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Gay Marriage Debate: Jon Stewart vs Mike Huckabee
Jon Stewart patiently taking apart the anti-gay marriage debate...
19th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
3D HDTV
it's coming... but you've still got to wear 3D glasses to make it work
18th Dec 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Bigger and Best
Forget the chimp top 5 charts, and head over to The Big Picture for their 3 part run-down of the year's best photographs.
UPDATE: Part 2 here, Part 3 here.
18th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Guy-Cam
ever wondered what it's like to be a Guy on Guy Fawkes night?
18th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Note to self
Head on over to Funny or Die to watch the Flight of the Conchords Season 2 premier ....but the bad news is it's suitable for US based chimps only for now.
17th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Get Lost
Lost is back for season 5 on Jan 21, and it looks like Jack and Ben are roomies....
16th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
X-factor Side Effects
Looks like X-factor winner Alexandra's Hallelujah cover has had some positive side-effects, with Leonard Cohen and Jeff Buckley taking numbers 24 and 25 in the Amazon MP3 top selling artists list....
Bonus fact: her mum was in Soul II Soul
16th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: Wendy And Lucy, What Doesn't Kill You
Michelle Williams in Wendy And Lucy, and Mark Ruffalo and Ethan Hawke in What Doesn't Kill You.
16th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Cruise Control
Tom Cruise has re-visited The Today Show, where he famously disagreed with host Matt Lauer in 2005. Unconventional, perhaps - but he comes off OK. Gawker have the details.
UPDATE: More look-I'm-not-weird-ness below.
15th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Clint On Gran Torino
NYT interview with Clint for his new film Gran Torino
15th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Best of 2008: Top 5s
With 2008 grinding to a halt, we're kicking off our round up of the year's best, starting with CJ. Already we're seeing a few consistent favourites.
15th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Shoes v Bush
apparently chucking shoes is a bigtime insult in the Arabic world... have to say, Bush dodges pretty swiftly
15th Dec 2008 - 2 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: Che and The Great Buck Howard
Benicio Del Toro as student poster hero Che and John Malkovich as The Great Buck Howard
15th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
D.U.D. (Dumb Up Dudes!): Bush - Midnight Rambler
one last barrage of nonsense from the Bush administration...
14th Dec 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Skate or die: Gator
Another hall-of-famer from the 80's was Mark Rogowski - aka Gator.
Alongside Mark Gonzales, he was one of the top riders for the high-flying Vision Street Wear line - and one of the top personalities of the era, frequently appearing in the top vert skater list, as well as a stunt skater role in the Christian Slater exploit-a-thon Gleaming The Cube.
Check him out above, calling his tricks out, 9 ball style.
Sadly, it all went wrong in the early 90's - culminating in him murdering a friend of his troublesome girlfriend, and burying her body in the desert. His surfing spiritual advisor pushed him to turn himself in, which he did - waiving all legal rights and receiving a 31 year sentence. He was also diagnosed as schizophrenic.
Continuing last week's movie inspired installment, Gator's story was eventually documented by the film Stoked: the Rise and Fall of Gator. See clip below.
12th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Wes Anderson on Bottle Rocket
Nice interview w Wes Anderson on his first feature Bottle Rocket over at the AV Club - Criterion version out on Blu-Ray soon
12th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet