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Art

Photo Gallery: Flavorpill at Fountain Art Fair

By Ali Gitlow on

Art Basel Miami Beach and the multitude of alternative fairs that pop up around Miami every December can feel like two warring worlds. On one side of the ring is South Beach, home to Basel proper at the convention center, glitzy vernissages, beachfront concerts and art parties with high profile celebrity attendees. On the other is Wynwood, Miami’s burgeoning area for quirky art spaces, warehouse installations, and dive bars. Here, nestled amongst a municipal landscape undergoing an identity crisis — giant new condos sit next to abandoned lots and derelict buildings — lies Fountain, a downtown, down to earth fair rich with DIY… Read More

Music

Photo Gallery: Sónar 2009

By Ali Gitlow on

With its brilliant weather, gorgeous beaches, and countless bars and clubs, Barcelona is a year-round party anyway. But each June, the Sónar Festival imports cutting-edge music from around the globe, touching down on the Spanish seaside town for three days of absolute mayhem. This year, Flavorpill’s Ali Gitlow was there tweeting it live, from diva Grace Jones’ hula-hoop laden rendition of “Slave to the Rhythm” and Crystal Castles’ onstage meltdown to encounters with the mysterious, milky summer beverage known as Chufi. Along the way she caught Konono No. 1, Animal Collective, Crookers, Gaslamp Killer, and a whole host of others.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW HER PHOTO RECAP OF THE… Read More

Music

Exclusive: Girl Talk Waxes on Broken Teeth and Breaking it Down with Big Boi

By Ali Gitlow on

With his fourth full-length album, last year’s Feed the Animals, Girl Talk has successfully cultivated the type of mythos and ritual commonly afforded to seasoned performers. Flavorpill’s Ali Gitlow rang Gillis up in the thick of summer-festival season to chat about choosing bands to tour with, crowd surfing over his family, the mystical potential of the year 2012, and a future foray into… Read More

Art

Food as Medium: Cooking Up Visual Delights with Artist Thu Tran

By Ali Gitlow on

Mixed media artist Thu Tran is truly a Martha Stewart for the 21st century (not to dis Martha, but the prototype’s in dire need of an update). Like Pee-wee Herman before her, the pint-sized hostess of Food Party — a whacked out hybrid cooking/puppetry show premiering on IFC tomorrow night at 11:15 p.m. — orbits an über-eccentric fantasy land. Past web episodes have found Tran crafting a Cheeto parfait for Jay-Z and Beyonce, canoodling with a baguette lothario, milking a psychic potato to produce chips, and making deviled quail eggs with Satan. These shenanigans all take place amidst Technicolor sets constructed mainly out of cardboard and populated by custom-made dolls, which sometimes help her cook and other times get fried up on her stove (which is lit by a hand-puppet… Read More

Music

Chiptune 101: Anamanaguchi Shows Us How to Hack a Game Boy [Photo Gallery]

By Ali Gitlow on

Early video gaming console developers must have had no idea that, twenty years later, a ragtag group of musicians would begin hacking their creations to produce a wacky genre known as chiptune. Often driven by nostalgia for the heyday of pixelated Mario and Luigi, this loose association of bands and producers creates a dizzying variety of music using the same stable of 8bit sounds, from Sabrepulse’s breakcore to Bubblyfish’s ambient dreamscapes to Hayzee’s chip-hop. Or, as 20 year-old Pete Berkman, the brainchild behind NYC-based group Anamanaguchi explains, “The whole idea is like back to the basics, everybody using the same sounds that are totally minimal and trying to make something that sounds bigger than the Game Boy or bigger than the Nintendo.” … Read More

Music

Exclusive: Prefuse 73 Denounces the Glitch-Hop Throne

By Ali Gitlow on

Talking to Guillermo Scott Herren (aka Prefuse73) is a lot like listening to his records. He bounces manically from one spot to another, winding words into a not-quite-lucid statement. It’s a wonder he can keep anything straight: Herren is currently involved in three completely different projects. He started folk-influenced band Savath & Savalas in 2000 and recently formed Diamond Watch Wrists with Hella drummer Zach Hill (both acts have records out in May). Over the course of his eight-year career under the Prefuse moniker, he’s been deemed the reigning overlord of glitch-hop, yet his new record, Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian, is a complex odyssey. His choice to record the album analog lends its tracks a tactile quality, revealing more to his aesthetic than choppy vocal samples and erratic beats.

In anticipation of his upcoming appearence at MoMA’s Monday Nights and in celebration of his recent, Flavorpill-exclusive podcast, our sister publication Earplug caught up with Herren to talk pigeonholing, multiple personas, and how to realize your musical deams in trying economic times. Read the full interview after the jump. … Read More

Music

Exclusive: Dan Deacon talks collapsing clubs and the end of his on-the-floor antics

By Ali Gitlow on

Known to eschew stages in favor of floors, sweet-faced Baltimore producer Dan Deacon regularly commands enormous crowds of sweat-drenched onlookers. Deacon, a former student of composition at the Conservatory of Music at Purchase College, uses crowds the way many would an instrument, dictating and inspiring the ways they interact. His bidding often includes dance-offs, human-tunnel formations, and trippy chorus chanting. … Read More

Music

Exclusive: Lady Sovereign Sobers Up (Well, Not Literally)

By Ali Gitlow on

Diminutive English rapper Lady Sovereign’s first album showcased a mélange of sounds, repping everything from UK garage to punked-up drum n’ bass. In the subsequent whirlwind of attention, the cheeky singer signed to Def Jam (Jay-Z inked the deal himself), scored Missy Elliott for a remix of the TRL-topping track “Love Me Or Hate Me,” and hit the road with Gwen Stefani. Music media built on the buzz, championing the pint-sized powerhouse as grime’s ambassador in America.

So what happened to her? After a bit of soul searching, Sov realized she didn’t want to be on a major label or be considered grime’s great white hope, and she went into incubation. Finally ready to poke her head back in the stage door, Sov is rather humbly releasing her second album, Jigsaw, April 7th on her own label, Midget Records. Three recent stateside gigs revealed a more mature, subdued side of Sov, who has traded in Adidas tracksuits and a side ponytail for streetwear and a down ‘do. Earplug rang her in London to chat about tossing her cookies at McDonald’s, ditching her trademark tracksuit, dropping diss tracks for Lady Gaga, and getting down with Playboy’s wee ol’ wabbit. … Read More

Music

Exclusive: Philly Street Bass Maestro Starkey Talks Deep Dub

By Ali Gitlow on

Philadelphia-based DJ and producer Starkey has his mitts entrenched in dance music’s low end. His floor-wobbling basslines and abrasive synths ring with allusions to everything from dubstep, grime, and electro to garage and bassline. When he’s not busy pounding the dance floor, you can catch him moonlighting with a SubFM radio show, Seclusiasis, playing moody, experimental downtempo with Aunt Jessica, and helping run Slit Jockey Records. Did we mention he also teaches music production and business courses at three colleges?

After the jump, we swap IMs with the dancefloor wrecker himself, talking heavy bass, the virtues of dancing to dubstep, and the pros and cons of a mighty MC. … Read More