Jay-Z and Kanye West only play “Niggas in Paris” like 158 times at every performance, so there’s been some speculation as to why they’ve taken so long to make a music video for it. Now, it seems like they may have delayed the concert footage-heavy clip simply to build our curiosity about what it’s like to see them do the song live. So, was it worth the wait? Well, that depends on how you feel about strobe lights, Gothic architecture, Will Ferrell interludes, big cats, and feeling like you’re trapped inside a kaleidoscope with the rappers and their hot-girl entourage. Watch and decide after the jump, but first a word to the wise: That epilepsy warning at the beginning of the video is no joke.
Now that The Artist has made its star, Jean Dujardin, a household name in the United States, where can we expect to see him next? Perhaps, like such other European crossover stars as Christoph Waltz and Javier Bardem, he’ll play a villain in a big, American action movie. In a hilarious and — because it does star Dujardin, after all — charming new video, Funny or Die imagines what that audition process might look like. See 2012′s biggest silent-film idol point a gun at James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, and even the Bridesmaids ladies, after the jump. And then, just try to stop yourself from daydreaming about where we’ll really see him next.
Could your day use an extra dose of punk rock? (Note: The answer to this question is always “yes.”) If so, you’ll want to check out Teenage Wasteland, Berlin-based designer/illustrator Niklas Coskan’s fun collection of teen-outlaw character drawings. Each image features a cigarette-smoking, occasionally weapon-wielding juvenile delinquent uttering classic punk lyrics, from the Runaways fan singing, “Hey boy, you’re my good time” to the Bowie T-shirt-clad gent surrounded by Iggy Pop’s immortal words, “No fun.” Check out Teenage Wasteland after the jump, and then visit Coskan’s website to see more of his work.
Entertainment Weekly is so wild about The Vampire Diaries that this week’s issue features three separate covers, which find Nina Dobrev snuggling up with Ian Somerhalder, Paul Wesley, and both fang-wielding fictional brothers at the same time. As Pop Culture Brain has noticed, that final image — a scantily clad shot of two vampire dudes romancing the human lady the both love — is mighty reminiscent of Rolling Stone‘s 2010 True Blood cover (minus the Demoiselles d’Avignon-style stares and creepy blood splatters).
Although we admit to never having watched an entire episode of The Vampire Diaries, the cover got us thinking: What’s the deal with vampire love triangles? As we noted in our recent roundup of pop-culture love triangles where the girl should have stayed single, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Twilight (where the conflict is between a glamorous vamp and a studly werewolf) also fit this pattern. There have already been endless think pieces on why teen girls find vampires so attractive. Could it be that the fantasy isn’t just about dating (or marrying or sleeping with) the undead, but also has something to do with being so desirable that two supernatural creatures are willing to fight over you? Readers, what’s your theory?
There are love songs, of course. There are break-up songs. And then there are songs about relationships that don’t fit into either of those categories — the ones about love affairs that aren’t ending, even when something has gone seriously, perhaps irreparably wrong. Romantic crisis anthems, if you will. The newest of Montreal album, Paralytic Stalks, which is out this week, is all about a relationship in peril; the band’s mastermind, Kevin Barnes, recently told Spin, “The general theme of the whole record is trying to keep myself together when I’m faced with all this madness, trying to keep my relationships together.” It struck us that we don’t hear these stories told in song nearly enough — and since Valentine’s Day, with its perfectionist conception of love, is around the corner, this seemed like a good time to compile them.
Children of the ’90s, do you remember Real Audio? How about Sonicwave, the world’s first Internet radio station, and the first time you heard the word “podcast”? As Sonos reminds us in an attractive and educational new infographic, these milestones are all a part of the 120-year history of radio, which kicks off with Nikola Tesla in the 1890s and stretches all the way through to today, with services like Turntable.fm and Spotify. Give yourself a crash course in the medium after the jump.
Now that they’ve gotten their mid-season shows off the ground, it’s pilot-buyin’ time for the major networks. That means that, in the past few weeks, we’ve been deluged with news about shows in development, with headlines featuring such names as Louis C.K., Mindy Kaling, J.J. Abrams, and Roseanne Barr. Thankfully, for those of us who’ve had some trouble keeping up, The Hollywood Reporter was kind enough to post a full list of what we can look forward to from ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, and The CW in the 2012-13 season. Since that roundup is still pretty daunting, we’ve narrowed the list to the 11 shows we’re most looking forward to; check them out and find out why we can’t to see them after the jump.
Believe it or not, we are trying our hardest here at Flavorpill HQ to stop feeding the Lana Del Rey fire. But we can’t just ignore this brilliant Suzanne Collins/LDR mash-up from Holly Laurent of Second City. In Lana Del Rey’s “Hunger Games,” Laurent replaces the lovelorn words to “Video Games” with verses on Katniss and company, giving us such brilliant couplets as, “Heard you haven’t finished book three/ Honey, when you do…” The visual element, which replaces Del Rey’s pastiche with overexposed shots of retro-futurist landscapes, stinky fish, and early footage from The Hunger Games movie, is also spot on. We especially like that Laurent’s mini-bouffant reminds us more of Snooki than Lana.
When the first season of FX’s American Horror Story ended in a bloodbath, we wondered what was in store for Season 2. Would the same main characters return as ghosts, primed to haunt a new family? In fact, as creator Ryan Murphy confirmed in a call shortly after the finale, in December, the show will totally reboot this year, with a new set of locations and characters. While we thought he had the right idea, it was difficult to imagine the prospect of American Horror Story without a wonderfully campy Jessica Lange performance. But Murphy also allowed that some actors will return in new roles — and, thankfully, he confirmed to Andy Cohen on Bravo’s Watch What Happens Live last night that Lange is slated for a comeback. He didn’t clarify what or how large her role will be, but hey, we’ll take it. [via Vulture]
