Recently we read yet another article about the word “like” as used by those darn kids today. We feel like we’ve been reading incarnations of this article since we became aware of the phenomenon, a verbal tic that, like it or not, has been more or less embraced by youths and even adults since the ’60s. However you characterize it — a “filler” word, a nonsense qualifier, or, as we used to insist to our parents, a way of tempering whatever you’re talking about — it’s like, pretty much here to stay.
For proof, we’ve put together a brief history of the most prominent appearances of the “like” craze in pop culture, from a 1920s New Yorker cartoon to Clueless. Indeed, almost as soon as the word rose to prominence, the pop cultural references began to be self-aware, if not flat-out self-mocking. Shaggy’s surfer-dude lingo is already half-ironic, and of course by the time Zappa got his hands on “Valspeak” in the early ’80s it was already something to be cruelly satirized. However, this hasn’t staunched the flow, and teenagers continue to use the word willy nilly, no matter how their teachers wail. Click through to see some of our favorite ‘like’ abusers in pop culture, and let us know how you feel about the word in the comments.
Sometimes, it seems like you have to be one thing or the other — an athlete or a brain, a princess or a criminal. But as we learned from The Breakfast Club, that’s simply not the case. We recently took a look at intriguing photos of famous authors playing sports — proving once and for all that nerds can be athletic too — and that got us thinking about the famous musicians who’ve also dabbled in the physical arts, often times with each other. Click through to see George Harrison taking on Bob Dylan at tennis, Robert Plant playing soccer in a speedo, Elvis in his football finery, and more. It’s enough to get our blood pumping.
This week saw the release of the music video for “Otis,” Kanye West and Jay-Z’s Otis Redding-sampling single from their new album Watch the Throne, and all their jocular tomfoolery got us to thinking about the other gents we know who have teamed up to bring us great duets, bro-on-bro style. Because after all, no girl will ever love you as well as your homeboy, right? Right. From the wonderfully cheesy to the just plain wonderful, we’ve collected some of our favorite all-man duets in music history here (you can also check out our feature on classic lady-on-lady musical collaborations, if we’ve gotten you in the mood). Click through to take a listen to our picks, and let us know which of your favorites we’ve missed after the jump!
Say what you want about fancy equipment or an expensive studio setting — a lot of what makes a photograph memorable is all about having an interesting subject to work with and being at the right place at the right time. Case in point, Baron Wolman, who was Rolling Stone‘s first chief photographer back in the late ’60s, during the magazine’s first three years. Now, over 200 of the iconic images that he captured during this incredibly important period of music history are being released in a new coffee-table book.
“I enjoyed shooting every musician I ever photographed, each in a different way but each with respect for him or her, with great joy in the moment,” he explains. “When I was shooting a concert I didn’t ‘hear’ the music, I ‘saw’ the music. Through the lens I was looking for single visual moments which would reflect the essence of the performance in the pages of Rolling Stone.” Click through to preview some of our favorite photos in the iconic collection, from a pic of Ike and Tina sharing a San Francisco stage back in 1967 to Pete Townshend grinning at the piano in 1968 London.
To many, collage is an under-appreciated art form – perhaps merely because often it’s too accessible to be considered Capital-A Art. After all, every semi-creative teenage girl’s walls will inevitably become a massive collage, and even in our age of recycling and DIY, there is often an establishment resistance to art that is built out of the art of others. There’s also a movement for exactly that idea, of course. Regardless, we love us some collage, and since music is ultimately nothing but a very grand tonal collage anyway (Girl Talk aside), we think album covers are the perfect vehicle for this particular form. These album covers, created from found paper, disparate ideas, reassembled photographs and pieced-together letters, manage to be strange, lovely, and completely apt all at once. Click through for 15 of our favorite collaged album covers, and let us know your own favorites in the comments!
Here at Flavorpill, we’re into music. And like any group of music nerds with access to the Internet, we like garnering suggestions from people we trust about the best bands out there. So who better to suggest some great musicians than, well, some great musicians? After all, they should be experts on the subject. Here, we’ve compiled a list of our favorite musicians’ own favorite musicians for your listening — and obsessing — pleasure. After all, if you live, breathe and sleep Frank Zappa (as yours truly admits to doing for a spell in her teenage years), now you know which bands to listen to, just to, you know, complete the experience. Of course, just like us mortals (and probably even more so), musicians’ favorite bands change with their mood, the season and what they ate for lunch, so consider the following a snapshot, or in at least one case, just what John Darnielle would say in front of a firing squad. Ah, obsession.
The craft beer market has gotten crowded these days, with all manner of IPAs and double bocks vying for space on the grocery store shelves. Breweries have begun differentiated themselves not only with zany ingredients — passion fruit! coffee! saffron! — but also with clever names and interesting pop culture referring titles. Recently, there’s been a wave of music-inspired suds, giving the nod to storied jazz greats or amping up a favorite new indie band. From Wilco to Frank Zappa to Outkast, seems like everyone has a beer these days. We’ve rounded up fifteen music inspired microbrews for your perusal, after the jump.
Music nerds who are also beer nerds, prepare yourselves for a total geekgasm: The Asheville Brewing Company is teaming up with the Bob Moog Foundation to create Moog Filtered Ale. Yes, you read that right. There is going to be a beer named after the dude who invented the Moog synthesizer. Want to taste it? You’ll have to make your way to North Carolina between May 27th and July 31st.
But how about those of us who don’t happen to live in or near North Carolina? What are our musical brew options? After the jump, check out six more past and present beers distributed or inspired by musicians, just in time for barbecue season.
Today at Flavorpill, we finally got that Avatar is Pocahontas trailer that we’re sure you were anxiously awaiting. We realized how much the Toyota Trucks logo looks like Frank Zappa’s mustache. After watching these spoiler clips from The Office, we wondered if it’s lame if it makes us cry when Pam Beasley finally gives birth next Thursday night. We were deeply, deeply disappointed by Carly Simon’s big reveal — and then we found it wasn’t true! (Side note: Does anyone else find the fact that this story involves playing a record backwards totally insane?) We encountered some rather Jersey Shore prejudice from da club of all places. We enjoyed Jezebel’s take on how classic children’s books might be updated for “today’s young MySpacerati.” And finally we met the terrible rock bands who lurk on the album charts for years at a time. These are also known as the bands VH1 likes to play when we’re at the gym in the morning.
Painter Ward Shelley describes his art on the subject of art as a “matter of record,” tracing minute details about artists and art movements with oils on frosted mylar. Shelley — represented by Williamsburg’s Pierogi Gallery — conducts months of research on his subject matter, which ranges from performance artist Chris Burden (detailed above) to Andy Warhol’s Chelsea Girls to Frank Zappa. Each piece is mesmerizing, like a graphic novel employing stream-of-consciousness to tell the story of Art with a capital A.
