If you’ve ever wondered what your favorite literary characters might be listening to while they save the world/contemplate existence/get into trouble, or hallucinated a soundtrack to go along with your favorite novels, well, us too. But wonder no more! Here, we sneak a look at the hypothetical iPods of some of literature’s most interesting characters. What would be on the personal playlists of Holden Caulfield or Elizabeth Bennett, Huck Finn or Harry Potter, Tintin or Humbert Humbert? Something revealing, we bet. Or at least something danceable. Read on for a cozy reading soundtrack, character study, or yet another way to emulate your favorite literary hero. This week: Salinger’s number two angst man, Seymour Glass. Read More »
If you’ve ever wondered what your favorite literary characters might be listening to while they save the world/contemplate existence/get into trouble, or hallucinated a soundtrack to go along with your favorite novels, well, us too. But wonder no more! Here, we sneak a look at the hypothetical iPods of some of literature’s most interesting characters. What would be on the personal playlists of Holden Caulfield or Elizabeth Bennett, Huck Finn or Harry Potter, Tintin or Humbert Humbert? Something revealing, we bet. Or at least something danceable. Read on for a cozy reading soundtrack, character study, or yet another way to emulate your favorite literary hero. This week: Robert Louis Stevenson’s two-faced mystery man (men?), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
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If you’ve ever wondered what your favorite literary characters might be listening to while they save the world/contemplate existence/get into trouble, or hallucinated a soundtrack to go along with your favorite novels, well, us too. But wonder no more! Here, we sneak a look at the hypothetical iPods of some of literature’s most interesting characters. What would be on the personal playlists of Holden Caulfield or Elizabeth Bennett, Huck Finn or Harry Potter, Tintin, or Humbert Humbert? Something revealing, we bet. Or at least something danceable. Read on for a cozy reading soundtrack, character study, or yet another way to emulate your favorite literary hero. This week: Kafka’s poor victim of metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa.
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The year was 2004 — a simpler time. The music? Freak folk, of course. Kevin Barker’s film The Family Jams follows the movement’s leading lights — Joanna Newsom, Devendra Banhart, and Vetiver’s Andy Cabic — on a US tour. If soothing psychedelia, Milk-Eyed Mender-era Newsom, guest appearances by the likes of Antony and the Johnsons, and lots of shirtless Banhart are your cup of herbal tea, you can check out a screening at Brooklyn’s reRun theater April 8th-14th. Watch the trailer after the jump.
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Is there a place for hardcore androgyny in the fashion world? Although the industry itself is made up of an endlessly colorful variety of sexual and gender rebels, models often represent a masculine or feminine ideal. For boys who look like girls, the going can be especially tough. But, with the news that Andrej Pejic, a remarkably beautiful, deeply androgynous male model, has scored a major ad campaign with Jean Paul Gaultier, things may finally be changing.
After the jump, we celebrate Pejic’s rise with a retrospective of culture’s most iconic androgynes (not drag queens and kings, but people who actually pushed the boundaries of gender in their daily lives), from the days of George Sand to the present.
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This week’s mixtape skews on the lovely and lyrical side, with a smattering of Rick Ross and some whatever-wave Brooklyn garage rock. There’s a new track from Deerhoof, too long in coming if you ask us, plus Yann Tierson, Antony and the Johnsons, and a sampling of an upcoming Witch House compilation. Right Click + Save as to download individual tracks or scroll to the bottom to grab the whole mix.
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Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons has always been an innovator and iconoclast; with the book and CD set Swanlights, he fuses music and art to create a hybrid as achingly romantic as the artist himself.
Although Antony’s music can always stand on its own, the two elements of Swanlights are best taken together. Page through the book as you listen to the album and you’ll find drawings, paintings, cut-outs, scrawled song lyrics, and photos of Hegarty that suggest a complex, conflicted relationship to the natural world. Just as in his music, the images build to intense, even violent, crescendos, then recede into the quiet of white space and delicate scribbles.
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View a gallery of more Big Ears photos by Josh Sisk here.
The Big Ears folks deserve massive credit for kicking off one of the more fantastically nerdy avant-music droolfests we’ve seen smack in the middle of an economic septic tank. Over three days, Knoxville, Tenn. found itself in the odd company of several hundred well-trained ears for a series of improv collaborations, tightly composed modern-classical performances, musical theater renditions, and dance parties. The weather was lovely, the ten-hour drive sucked, and Southern hospitality was no joke.
Our highlights and exclusive pictures of Philip Glass, Fennesz, Antony and the Johnsons, and Matmos after the jump.
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This one has been bugging us for a while. The uncanny resemblance is there, right? Or maybe we’re just nuts. Thoughts?
Also, this line from the Antony and the Johnsons Wiki always makes us laugh. And then think of Beeker from the Muppets. And then feel slightly uncomfortable: “Their early live shows were often opened by Dr. Julia Yasuda, an intersex person, who performed the welcome in Morse code.”
Related post: Advance Notice: Antony and the Johnsons’ “The Crying Light”
As we dive head-first into ’09, we’re all about hope. No, the presidential inauguration won’t solve everything, but the right soundtrack might. The good news? We’re off to a pretty serious start (it’s two weeks into the new year, and we’ve already heard tracks that out-strip pretty much everything from ’08).
After the jump, new tunes, unreleased tracks, and free downloads by Animal Collective, David Byrne, M. Ward, Neko Case, Antony and the Johnsons, and many more.
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