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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
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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
Hip With The Kids
Paul McCartney's side-project The Fireman have a third (?!) album out - and it's available online AND non-DRMed in a wide variety of formats.
Pretty audacious move for such a big name, especially considering that The Beatles are still unavailable on iTunes. Big thumbs up, Sir Paul.
11th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: Terminator Salvation
Action packed trailer up for the not-too-shoddy looking Terminator Salvation, with gravel voiced Christian Bale going toe to toe with an Army of Arnie types.
11th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
THE Aaron Rose
You may have heard us mention Aaron Rose on this site, as a pioneer of the Lower East Side art scene, one-time boss of English Steve, promotor of many fine Skateboard related artists and director of the recent documentary Beautiful Losers.
Well it turns out he's now in Gossip Girl as rich chick Selena's artist squeeze. Or is he? Huffington Post has the details, via the New York Post.
10th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Notes from the Big Banana
Back from a successful mission in New York and Brooklyn, taking in New York's best steak (24 years running!), a great William Eggleston exhibition at the Whitney and a trip to Coney Island ...all topped off with an unscheduled sighting of Bret from Flight of the Conchords at Union Pool in Williamsburg. Boom!
More snaps in surveillance and on Flickr.
10th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Dark Was The Night
The National's Dessner brothers have produced a new compilation titled Dark Was The Night - aimed at raising money for Aids charity the Red Hot Organization.
32 artists have recorded exclusive tracks for the album, which will be released by 4AD on February 16th. In alphabetical order:
Andrew Bird
Antony + Bryce Dessner
Arcade Fire
Beach House
Beirut
Blonde Redhead + Devastations
Bon Iver
Bon Iver & Aaron Dessner
The Books featuring Jose Gonzalez
Buck 65 Remix (featuring Sufjan Stevens
and Serengeti)
Cat Power and Dirty Delta Blues
The Decemberists
Dirty Projectors + David Byrne
Kevin Drew
Feist + Ben Gibbard
Grizzly Bear
Grizzly Bear + Feist
Iron & Wine
Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
Kronos Quartet
Stuart Murdoch
My Brightest Diamond
My Morning Jacket
The National
The New Pornographers
Conor Oberst & Gillian Welch
Riceboy Sleeps
Dave Sitek (TV On The Radio)
Spoon
Sufjan Stevens
Yeasayer
Yo La Tengo
5th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Shopping With Kanye
Sure, Kanye West might have a new album out - but I'll leave the review to HHG. If you're looking for christmas present tips however, you could do with checking out his excellent blog. The pin art clock above is just one product he tips his hat to.
5th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Unforgiven
(dir. Clint Eastwood)
Malpaso
THEN: Seen as something of a resurgence for the serious western, Unforgiven tells the tale of two retired gunslingers (Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman), who are approached by a short-sighted young hopeful, after a local whorehouse puts up a bounty for two brutal cowboys. Meanwhile, hard-nosed sheriff Gene Hackman rules the town with an iron first - and runs any bounty hunters out of town.
David Webb Peoples' excellent script re-wrote the heroism, bravery and gentlemanly behaviors of the old west into a bloody, misfiring, mauling - and cast Eastwood perfectly as a bastion of days gone by. The film was something of a return to form for Eastwood, as both and actor and a director - and the Academy duly noted him for both. He moved up a notch in directing terms after this and hasn't really looked back.
NOW: Still unbelievably powerful, if anything, Unforgiven has improved with age, sitting comfortably with the films that it was made in honour of, at the western's throne. Eastwood handles the action and the direction like a master carpenter - showing a magnificent storytelling skill inherited from the likes of Don Siegel and Sergio Leone. There's no flashy camera work, just a restrained observation that never interferes with the story and serves it perfectly.
Eastwood's central performance as William Munny is so reserved and withdrawn, it's surprising you can feel anything for him at all. Few actors can remain silent in a scene while everyone talks around them - and still steal the show, but Eastwood does it, drawing heavily on much of his prior screen history to silently fill out Munny's back story. Morgan Freeman comes a close second of course and the pair of them have a great chemistry, which would be repeated masterfully in Million Dollar Baby. Brutal, engaging, vengeful and brilliant.
5th Dec 2008 - 3 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 5 star reviews
New York I Love You
Marmot and I will be leaving in a jet plane by the time you read this - off to the Big Banana for some R&R with English Steve. Tour reports will undoubtedly flow, but for now I leave you with a message from everybody's favourite frog.
Via David Emery.
4th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Best of the year....
The end of the year 'Best Ofs' are starting to trickle in, with Rough Trade beating a fairly similar track to some Chimpo favourites - but the numbers don't lie, and Last FM's chart clocks Coldplay as the favourite album and single of the year, with MGMT taking the artist top spot. Top 50s from Uncut and Mojo here
4th Dec 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Blood Letting
Phillip Noyce is capitalizing on the current Pirate phenomenon, with a proposed remake of the Errol Flynn classic Captain Blood. Truly one of my favourite films. ArrrrRR!
4th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
MP3 Pounds
In case you don't read Metro as you slog to work in the morning, you may have missed the low key launch of Amazon's UK MP3 store. The big news is they have a ton of albums at £3, reportedly to get a foot in the door and compete with iTunes. Far from being the usual low-rent crap, the £3 selection includes big sellers and new albums from the likes of Take That, Girls Aloud, Coldplay and Kings of Leon - as well albums you might want to actually listen to from heavy hitters like Led Zeppelin ...although they also have the CD of some of them for £3.98.
UPDATE: That didn't take long - iTunes now have a bunch of stuff for £4, including Fleet Foxes and The Black Keys.
4th Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Relaunching The Conchords
The new Flight of the Conchords series is set to premier on HBO on January 9th, but the Ferrell/Apatow/McKay website funnyordie.com will get an exclusive heads up on the first episode, showing it for a week from December 17th. They also have a bunch of clips and stuff from the excellent first series.
3rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Roboguitar
It's not quite The Empire Strikes Back, but Long Blondes guitarist Dorian Cox has been working with a robot hand to hopefully enable him to start playing guitar again, after he suffered a stroke.
3rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trial By Fire
Tim Ferriss, life management sensei and author of the excellent 4 Hour Work Week (more on that later), has a pilot coming for a TV show - Trial By Fire. The concept takes the ethos of his book, where organising your life better (i.e. not checking your email every 2 minutes) can leave you with lots of time to learn extra curricular activities super-quick. He's starting by attempting master the ancient Samurai sport of Yabusame.
3rd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
The Devil Uses Poladroid
Looks like reality might be emulating art, with rumours spreading that long standing US Vogue editor (and inspiration for The Devil Wears Prada movie) might be getting the boot to make way for her French counterpart. More interesting perhaps is the fact that Gawker seem to be using Poladroid to make their graphics.
2nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Battlestar / Caprica
The never ending stream of spin-offs and specials from the Battlestar Galactica re-boot continues, with prequel stand-alone Caprica now being developed into a full blown series. That's going to be after the next series proper wraps, as well as another prequel stand-alone The Plan, to be directed by Edward James Olmos.
P.S. Loving the Galactica propaganda posters pictured above. Available here and here.
2nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Promo Promo: Gedge In Jolly Hollywood
The Wedding Present's new Christmas EP is now available for download, and they have even gone to the trouble to film a new video for the track, with Uncle Gedge driving round his unlikely home of Hollywood.
2nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Pavement
Brighten the Corners: Nicene Creedance Edition
Domino
The Pavement re-release juggernaut continues at full-steam (wait, didn't the last review start like that?), with album number four now getting the super-deluxe treatment. Perhaps more than the previous efforts, Brighten The Corners: Nicene Creedence Edition is truly jam-packed with goodies, stretching it out to an epic 155 minutes.
In the overall canon of Pavement's work, support for Brighten the Corners may be a little divided. The album sold considerably more that it's predecessors - and features a couple of bonifide hit singles in Stereo and Shady Lane - but much of the scattergun rambling charm of the earlier albums had perhaps been polished away. In retrospect, the album shows a logical progression in the band's sound, and pre-dates the evolution of Malkmus's excellent solo albums - and can hardly be labelled as 'conventional'.
Sure, the chorus of Stereo is catchy and conventional, but it's surrounded by unhinged guitar work and primal vocals - not to mention the spoken word interruptions ("I know him, and he does" retorts Bob Nastovich in his best Wayne's World voice, "And you're my fact checking cuz".). Shady Lane crams a 20 minute epic into less than 4, while the show-stopping Embassy Row commits an orchestrated guitar riot to tape.
Conventional, perhaps not - but if you take Spiral Stairs' slightly out of place efforts out of the mix (Date W/ IKEA, Passat Dream), the original album is at least pretty cohesive for a Pavement album. Bring the collected b-sides into play however and it's a different story, transforming this into a sprawling, but thoroughly engaging trip.
Outtake/B-side The Hexx has already been featured on Domino's Worlds of Possibility compilation (albeit in a more concise form than the versions here), while Beautiful As A Butterfly and Cataracts lead into the raft of additional tracks that formed the b-sides of the singles from this period. The highlight of the rarities section of this release has to be the Radio 1 Evening Session, which provides studio quality recordings of the band running through The Hexx, Harness Your Hopes and Winner Of The, with the undisputed highlight being the band's cover of The Killing Moon - a track that provides perfect ammo for a stretched-out work-out.
Admittedly things taper away with some of the other live tracks from the era, but as the zany double barreled finale of Space Ghost Themes I & II come around (from the Space Ghost Coast To Coast TV show), the notion that Pavement had entered a more 'straight-forward' mainstream period is a distant theory.
While the Crooked Rain and Wowee Zowee re-releases arguably watered down their excellent starting points, Brighten The Corners here seems even better that the original - perhaps due to me approaching an album I perhaps was overly dismissive of from a fresh perspective. Either way, as these re-releases have shown, this was an incredibly productive band - kicking out 2 1/2 hours worth of decent material per album cycle, while the young pups these days struggle to produce a 12 track album and a couple of b-sides.
2nd Dec 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 4.5 star reviewsThe Big Picture: Mumbai
The Big Picture has an unsurprisingly excellent set of photos up from Mumbai. Proceed with caution.
28th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
One Man Flash Mob
Great commentary on this crowd-shot video of a protestor raining on the Queen's parade in Oxfordshire.
28th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
No Signal
Interesting run-down over at TidBits about how a mobile phone network actually works, allowing a call to a single number to find you pretty much anywhere in the world. Except the area around the second floor of my house.
27th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Cat Power
The Dark End Of The Street (EP)
Matador Records
Another round of mix-tape ready covers from Cat Power - with these leftovers from the Jukebox album sessions taking in Creedence, Otis and The Flying Burrito Brothers amongst others.
As with Jukebox itself, this record provides something of a mystery. While the song choices are more in keeping with my personal favourites than the previous album, the delivery is just plain predictable. Marshall gives a perfectly acceptable delievery of every song, but adds little personality to the originals and just sounds like a lounge room crooner - leaving you to think, "what's the point?".
Like watching X-factor, you occasionally are struck with how difficult that last high pitched warble might have been, and although you know Simon Cowell won't be giving her any grief there's just not much future in it past that Christmas number one.
27th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 2 star reviewsSteet View Fun
Plenty of fun spotted in Google's Streetview so far, particularly along Sampsonia Way in Pittsburgh, who may have had a tip about the cars coming their way.
25th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Dude Pics
Great book of photos up from the Iron Man set, over at the ever-entertaining website of Jeff Bridges. Don't miss the video clips of Bridges and Colin Farrell rocking out on the set of Crazy Heart either.
25th Nov 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
YouTuuuuube
YouTube seems to have gone widescreen, perhaps in an attempt to keep up with Vimeo.
25th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
iZagat
The indispensable Zagat restaurant guide has finally popped up for the iPhone. The £5.99 app provides all the 2009 results, in the same manner as their Blackberry-centric version, Zagat To Go. It also uses the GPS of the phone to hook you up with the nearest listed restaurants, hotel and bars - with results you can order by rating, type, cost etc.
Get it here.
While the service has had a mobile phone version of their website for a while (zagat.mobi), for that you still have to be a website subscriber, which is a $25 annual subscription.
It's also worth getting the free Open Table app, which allows you to make restaurant bookings over the air, and ties in with the Zagat app.
AppleInsider has a more detailed write up of both apps.
24th Nov 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
GWiki
Not sure what I'm thinking about Google's new wikiable search results. Why would I want to adjust the search results to give me the answer I want - as if I knew the answer, I wouldn't be searching in the first place? Time will tell, but I assume it's all part of another massive data-collecting exercise.
24th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: The Wrestler
Looks like over-rated director Darren Aronofsky might finally be justifying his reputation. Trailer up for Mickey Rourke comeback match The Wrestler.
24th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Skate or die: Lance Mountain
Another one of the Bones Brigade, Lance Mountain has been skating as a pro since 1981, when he signed for Variflex. He was a dominant force in the 80's on Powell Peralta - just check him ruling the pool in the clip above (whizz past the jumpy video at the start). Hand plants, big airs and slides - plus the odd Gay Twist now and then.
As skating evolved into a street sport, Mountain moved with the times, setting up the influential company The Firm, responsible for signing maybe prominent skaters, including last week's Bob Burnquist. Lance has also starred in many notable skate films, including the Mike Watt soundtracked/narrated skate parody The Parallel in Girl's Goldfish video. No YouTube for that one, but skip along to 13:05mins here for this great little film.
Mountain was also the host of the excellent video magazine 411, which started in the 90's and was ahead of the curve in terms of multimedia programming - first on VHS tape, before graduating to DVD then the internet.
The Firm had their own cool videos too, so I've included a clip from Can't Stop below, entitled The Dream.
Bonus Fact: He invented the fingerboard, which grew legs (or wheels) of it's own and turned into one of the dumbest things you ever heard of. Also worth noting is his awesome name...
21st Nov 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Where You At?
You probably don't want to delve to deeply into the potential invasion-of-privacy issues, but recent developments are now allowing browsers to access your position, much like a GPS enabled phone browser - meaning websites such as Last Minute's Radar can provide you with location-centric data.
Google's Gears is one way of enabling such services, recent builds of Firefox include similar tech.
21st Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Met Maps
The Metropolitan Police have a useful Google Map illustrating crimes in your area. 3 crimes in my sub-ward in September, nothing too serious.
Over and out.
21st Nov 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
GnRSpace
It doesn't get more official than this.... Chinese Democracy is due in stores shortly, but you can listen to the album in full over at the bands myspace page.
20th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Soderberg vs Jackman vs Pollard
Variety has Steven Soderbergh's next film down as a 3D rock-opera version of Cleopatra, starring Hugh Jackman as Anthony .....and with music from Guided By Voices. Crazy, but possibly true.
Meanwhile, Pollard has refocused again - this time under the moniker of the Boston Spaceships.
20th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Life Begins At 40?
Not quite, apparently. It seems more likely to be all downhill from 39...
20th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Promo Promo: Wild Beasts
Check out this mind bending post-Seven Nation Army video for Wild Beasts' Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants.
19th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Format 22
YouTube is quietly testing a further improved format, according to The Times. We tipped you off to Format 18 a while back, but now they've bumped it up even further with Format 22. I'm guessing that the same trick (add&fmt=22 to the URL) will work nicely, although the original video will need to have been uploaded in a suitable resolution. Try the sample clip in fullscreen.
19th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
How Lightsabers Work
...I didn't realise they were adjustable. You never see anyone using a half length lightsaber.
19th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Foal Up
Sub Pop's Foals have just found out that they have the daunting task of following Men Called Him Mister on to the Madrid stage later this month.
18th Nov 2008 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Official Photographer
Being Barack Obama's official photographer seems like a full-time job.
18th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Outside It's 80's America
After visiting Joshua Tree a couple of weeks back, I have been inevitably listening to The Joshua Tree. Still a great album of course, and also the first album I can remember people markedly anticipating. When it finally arrived it was bigger than imaginable, catapulting the Irish punkers into the big time, as they assumed the mantle of 'God's Cowboys'.
Old Grey Whistle Test aired this documentary about the band, which captures America nicely, and features the band shooting in downtown LA, getting fitted for cowboy hats and being generally moody.
18th Nov 2008 - 2 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Speak Into The Microphone Squidbrain!
Google's new voice-enabled search App should have hit the iTunes store by the time you read this. Versions for other platforms coming soon.
18th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Trailer Park: Keep Trekkin'
New trailer up for JJ's upcoming Star Trek re-boot. Never been a big fan, but I'm keeping an open mind.
Heroes bad/good guy Sylar is certainly fitting the part as the young Spock.
Check out some alternative Enterprise pics here.
17th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Home of the Hamburger
What's a trip to the US without an extensive testing of the beloved Hamburger? Long derided in the UK, there's much more to it than a limp Big Mac or a soggy Whopper.
Fatburger
Part-owned by Magic Johnson, the Las Vegas branch was seemingly staffed by middle-aged ex-cons trying to make a clean start. Cooked to order makes all the difference with fast food, and that was the USP here.
Verdict: Fresh and juicy, plus good chili. 8/10
Johhny Rockets
Only founded in 1986, this retro styled chain is perhaps a little more about style that food, but still serves a good, fresh burger. I went for the double-decker Rocket Double, with Chili Fries. We passed up the original Melrose location, but managed a lunch in the branch down at The Grove.
Verdict: Pretty good.... 7/10
In-n-out Burger
A firm favourite in California, this chain now includes over 150 branches. We made the effort track down the North Hollywood branch, near that little shit Larry's house - and the crowd was extensive. The plain and simple menu stands on it's own, but for those in the know there are double the options thanks, to the no-so-secret menu (1,2). I went Animal style.
Verdict: Far and away the best, and ridiculously cheap ($1.65 for a Whopper sized burger!). Throw in the secret menu and it's an unbeatable 10/10
P.S. LA is also the home of Hugh Hefner. We bumped into him too.
Other recommendations? Drop a line in the comments. Islands was on my hit list, but I ran out of time.
17th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Ape Shall Not Remake Apes
Rumors swirling of another Planet of the Apes reboot doing the rounds in Hollywood - this time focusing on the origin of the rise of the Apes, as previously told in Conquest of the Planet of the Apes.
17th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
24: Redemption
(dir. Jon Cassar)
Fox
On the run from the US government, littlest hobo Jack Bauer finds himself in the non-specific Africas, working at a school for orphans, run by ex-special forces buddy Robert Carlyle.
As a guerilla coup attempts to over throw the company, Jack and Begbie defend the boys from the child-soldier recruiting bad guys by any means necessary, as they attempt to get them on the last chopper out of the US embassy.
Meanwhile, Powers Boothe has assumed command of the US - but is reluctantly preparing to hand over power to President-elect Allison Taylor. The bad news is her son has a drug-using buddy who has some dirt on Government insider Jon Voight....
Slightly out-of-place entry into the 24 cannon, with the half-baked between-the-seasons tv movie breaking too many rules of the format. The real-time aspect serves no purpose - and with Jack towing a gang of kids everywhere he goes, it all seems a bit Seseme Street.
Things start to set up nicely for the next series proper, although presumably this back-story will be explained again to a certain extend when that series starts in January 2009. As a product of the writer's strike, this oddity may eventually become redundant - but judging from the focused-looking trailer for season 7, the writer's strike enforced hiatus may be just what the show needed to get its mojo back.
17th Nov 2008 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 2.5 star reviewsXmas Kick-backs
Why not throw a few bucks Chimpomatic's way this Christmas, by doing your Amazon shopping through our affiliate store. It's the Amazon you know and love and it's all shipped as usually, we just get a slice of the pie.
Spread the word and tell your friends - because a Chimp is for life, not just for Christmas.
14th Nov 2008 - 3 comments - Add Comment - Tweet