Headbanging x Making Fire

Dude this video is AWESOME. Thanks Ash!!

David Ellis x BLU = COMBO

Check out this amazing looped timelapse video of David Ellis and BLU's collaborative piece for the FAME Festival in Grottaglie, Italy. The concept for the festival is pretty dope -- pairing international artists with local artisans in a small Italian town famous for their ceramics. The final product of this loose residency is a group show that takes place in, "one of the most ancient ceramics workshop of the area." I love the idea of bringing together contemporary artists with traditional craft. BLU, an Italian street artist known for his large scale murals with a political bent featuring bald, wide-eyed, flat characters collaborates with David Ellis, founder of the Barnstormers crew, who in contrast, has a more textured and illustrative style. The stop motion film does a great job telling the overarching story behind the collaboration set in an abandoned building in Grottaglie.

Old Skool Hip Hop Tapes

I remember staying up all night in middle school waiting for my favorite song to air on the radio with both fingers ready to press the play/record button. This dutch hip hop head has put up over 200 of his favorite old school hip hop tapes online for download with a great collection from Mr. Magic (rest in power) and other legendary NYC radio hosts. Totally amazing archive and resource for dedicated music folks. thanks scott!

The Mapping Project : Williamsburg

BODEGA warmly invites you to be a part of our first endeavor, The Mapping Project. The Mapping Project is an exercise in connecting creatives, startups, social entrepreneurs, and small business owners in the borough of Brooklyn in order to help bring their ideas to fruition. By creating an interactive digital map, we consider how geography and the proximity of an area’s clustered residents can stimulate change through collaboration.

This Thursday, October 8, from 7-10pm at 303GRAND - A Revolving Storefront, we’re having a party to gather YOU, Brooklyn’s creative and entrepreneurial force, to introduce you to one another, draw awareness to the project, begin creating a platform for connecting change-makers, and allow you to register for the project. The meet-up will start collecting the data needed to construct the digital interactive map of community members that will not only stand as a symbol of the growing movement taking place, but serve as a resource for the community to continue business development.

Mostly, it’s going to be rad. Please RSVP here:

http://www.themappingproject.eventbrite.com

We also want to give a shout out to our event partners, DJ Jubilee who will be spinning, 303GRAND, IfWeRanIt, cut&paste, and PBR who is generously providing free beer for the event.

Cheers,

BODEGA

HSNY Screening: Know Your Mushrooms

Im a huge fan of The Horticultural Society of New York and tonite they have an awesome program...a special screening of Know Your Mushrooms followed by a Q+A with Gary Lincoff, one of the experts interviewed in the film. Check the info and trailer below!

WEDNESDAY, October 7
Green Screen Film Series:
Know Your Mushrooms
With special guest speaker Gary Lincoff
Written, Produced and Directed by Ron Mann
Original music by the Flaming Lips

Mushrooms – we put them on our pizza and steaks and in our soups and salads, we marvel at their variety and are sometimes repelled by their grotesque beauty when encountering them in the bush. And yeah, some have even sampled their more exotic possibilities and asked the question: "Do mushrooms come from a far away planet?" Still, others have asked: "Can mushrooms save the planet?"

The world of fungi and their integral relationship with the health of the planet have only recently been appreciated. The oldest and largest living organisms recorded on Earth are both fungi. And their use by a new, maverick breed of scientists and thinkers has proven vital in the cleansing of sites despoiled by toxins and as a “clean” pesticide among many other environmentally-friendly applications.

Know Your Mushrooms follows uber myco visionaries Gary Lincoff and Larry Evans (two of the more expert and unforgettably mercurial characters in the community) as they lead us on a hunt for the wild mushroom and the deeper cultural experiences attached to the mysterious fungi.

At The Horticultural Society of New York
Doors open at 6pm; film starts promptly at 6:30pm
HSNY Members $5; non-members $10

T-Pain Obama Autotune

T-Pain x Obama = awesome. Thanks Nate.

Shaniqwa + Friends

My sister Shaniqwa in London curated an amazing show with folks from NYC and beyond! Amazing lineup from dope artists working across mediums. Congrats to the whole crew!!! Go out and support!

Wish You Were Here
Curated by Shaniqwa Jarvis
Saturday, October 3rd
11-6PM

8 Newburgh Street
Lower Level
London WC1

Where the Wild Things Are x OC

The folks at Opening Ceremony have partnered with the upcoming full-length feature film of Where the Wild Things Are for an amazing capsule collection. Choose from an adult-sized Max suit onesie ($610) to furry signature pieces that would fit the fall wardrobes of fashion-forward and wild things alike. Thanks Refinery29!

Mmmmm...Deep-fried Butter

My childhood BFF Wendy went to the State Fair of Texas near her current home in Dallas this past weekend and enjoyed the bounty of the State Fair -- corndogs, funnelcake, turkey wings, Texas tater tornado, and deep fried butter. Yes, that's right, DEEP FRIED BUTTER! The evil mastermind behind this artery-clogging creation, Abel Gonzales Jr., is the current State Fair Fry King and has come up with a slew of deep fried goodies over the past year including Fried Coke, Texas Fried Cookie Dough and Fried Peanut Butter, Jelly and Banana Sandwiches. For this year's fair he came up with an idea of scooping a golf-ball sized ball of butter (your choice of garlic, cherry or grape flavored), freezing, battering and dropping the little bundles of butter into the deep fryer. Check the full Dallas News story here. "It tastes like a doughnut hole or butter stuffed in a roll."

DEEZ NUTS @ Hip Hop Theater Festival

Founded in 2000 to celebrate work with a hip-hop aesthetic, the Hip-Hop Theater Festival is a 3-week celebration of art, dance and theater in the heart of downtown NYC. This year's program kicks off on October 1st with DEEZ NUTS, a workshop production in honor of the highly acclaimed underground rap duo The Beatnuts, written by long time music writer and egotrip member Sacha Jenkins, and produced with noted promoter and homie Peter Oasis. Deez Nuts explores the rich musical legacy of the Beatnuts through the performance of their tunes by the maestros themselves; Deez Nuts also canvases the sights, smells and characters of their native Corona, Queens. A fellow Queens-ite turned journalist, on a fact-finding mission, returns to the old neighborhood in order to meet group members Psycho Les and JuJu. This journey not only nets cultural nuggets about the Latino duo and their surroundings, but crucial observations about self and the state that created hip hop. Check the Beatnuts video below and support the family!!

Deez Nuts
A play by Sacha Jenkins. Produced by Peter Oasis.
October 1-3
The Ohio Theater
66 Wooster Street, NUEVA YORK

Movie Night: The Hunger (1983)

It's starting to feel like fall and i'm putting together my fall movie night list. To kick it off, I want to check Tony Scott's feature film debut; the 1983 vampire lesbian goth rock classic, The Hunger. Starring Susan Sarandon, Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie and set in New York, the film tells the story, "of a bizarre love triangle between a doctor (Susan Sarandon) who specializes in sleep and aging research, and a stylish vampire couple (Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie)." Check the trailer below. Thanks Jenn!

Friday Fun: DC Tea Party

Living in New York, Brooklyn in particular, I realize that we live in a kind of bubble. With over 138 languages spoken between the 8 million folks who populate our strange little community, our city is a pretty amazing cultural experiment in at least tolerance, and at best a celebration of diversity. In light of President Obama's recent push for a public solution to the health insurance quandry and some of the reactions coming out of the townhall meetings, it shouldnt have surprised me to see and hear some of the comments from the folks who participated in a recent anti-big governmentTea Party. But its a different reality to actually see the faces and hear the misinformation coming from protesters. On 9.12.2009, reporters from New Left Media went to Washington DC to document the Tea Party protests against, well, a lot of things, including health insurance reform, the IRS, abortion, global warming, and our "socialist/communist/fascist/Nazi/Muslim " president, Barack Obama. Some of them called for a return to McCarthyism, while others called for Glenn Beck to run for office--indeed, it seemed the only thing that everyone agreed on was Fox News. Thanks Dame!

Artist: Devin Troy Strother

Just popped by one of my regular blog destinations and was totally geeked to see the work of Los Angeles-based artist Devin Troy Strother. His multi-media works on paper address tell a story about contemporary issues of identity with sci-fi/comic book and pop cultural references. The multi-layered pieces marry elements of collage, colored paper cutouts, silk screen, cell vinyl, acrylic and more and remind me of the works of Romare Bearden. Thanks mylove!

RECESS: Bocce Ball Finale!

Please join RECESS: BOCCE with TRETORN this SATURDAY SEPT 26TH from 12PM-5PM as we turn COLONELS ROW into a sea of bocce courts to welcome the start of the Fall season. 32 diverse teams from the likes of MTV, ART DIRECTORS CLUB, THOMPSON HOTELS, SAATCHI & SAATCHI, COOL HUNTING and many more face off for the chance to be crowned RECESS bocce champion 2009 season. There will be additional courts for the public to test their skills at the game, as well as an opportunity to learn about the game if you're a beginner. We'll also be giving away TRETORN frisbees during the day. LEGAMIN food truck will be onsite offering European delicacies, and look out for the ladies on the bike serving cakeballs! FUNCTION DRINKS are providing sport beverages while KRONAN BICYCLES are offering free test rides around the island. So come out and play, and join us for the last RECESS soiree!

OneWebDay in NYC

OneWebDay Celebration in Washington Square Park at Holley Plaza (just west of the fountain) from noon - 2 PM

Speakers:
Medhi Saharkhiz, a member of Where is My Vote, will speak on the situation in Iran and the role the internet has played in allowing voices to be heard.

Hon Gale A. Brewer, New York City Council member, and Chair of the Technology in Government Committee, will speak on her views regarding the role the web will play in New York's future.

Phil Ashlock, of The Open Planning Project will speak on the open government effort in NYC: people working with technology and civic institutions to help make the functions of the city more transparent and participatory.

Also:
NYPIRG will be releasing their report, A Public Interest Internet Agenda.

NYCwireless will be hosting a BREAKOUT session BREAKOUT is a month long festival (Sep 17 - Oct 16) that aims to return creative work back to the streets of New York. BREAKOUT will provide tools and processes for working together - free wireless access, portable furniture, collaboration software, and more!

Music:
Aeroplane Pageant - up and coming New York indie rock

Hypernova refugee alt-rock from Iran (unconfirmed)

* This event will be webcast. * Free OneWebDay T-shirt for first 20 volunteers

Finally, for those who cannot make it to an event or watch online, on Sep 22 at 3.30pm, on Manhattan Neighborhood Network Ch.67 can be seen a film of last year's OneWebDay NYC Celebration including Internet luminaries like Jonathan Zittrain, Larry Lessig, Craig Newmark.

Shifting Vocabulary

Sept. 9: Governor David A. Paterson today signed legislation that will eliminate the use of the term “oriental” in reference to persons of Asian or Pacific Islander heritage in forms or preprinted documents used by State government, public authorities or municipalities. The law directs that existing forms be amended no later than January 1, 2010.

The term “oriental” is widely considered a disparaging term, but has been used in some forms and preprinted documents issued by State government, public authorities and municipalities.

Read the full press release here and the Village Voice's blog entry.

Little Dragon "Machine Dreams"

I first learned about Yukimi Nagano through a profile of the "nujazz" singer in Theme Magazine through her collaborations with Koop and appearances on Giles Peterson. Since 2005, Nagano has been hard at work as the vocalist for Gothenburg-based electronic quartet Little Dragon. The Swedish group gained some traction Stateside in 2008 with the sleeper single Twice off their self-titled debut. The naked piano chords on this stripped down and somber track highlights Nagano's arresting lyrics and ethereal vocals.

Machine Dreams is the highly anticipated sophomore effort from Little Dragon. With pumped up electro pop jams, lighthearted keys, and layered 80s-era synth effects, this album is unabashedly fun and danceable. Nagano's voice is perfect for this project, balancing out the group's production range with smart lyricism and baiting the audience with her breathy dreamy vocals. My favorite track, Blinking Pigs, has me shoulder shaking in the living room and reminds me of the best of late-80s dance-y girl pop. Check the video below made by Nagano's father and support this amazing group by picking up their album. Thanks Derrick for putting me on!!

Date an Asian

Calling all my Asian brothers!!! Brooklyn-based comedian Jen Kwok has your back. Check her pitch for dating Asian men in this hilarious video.

Hey there, my name is Jen Kwok
And I'm here to tell you that dating Asians rocks
They have smooth skin and silky hair
So damn exotic, got that ethnic flair
So sweet and gentle, smell so good
So freaky, nasty, do what you always wanted to
So obedient, they'll please you like no one can
That's right, I'm talkin bout an Asian man

thanks kat!!!

The Kitchen Tuesdays: LAST CALL with Amir, Ge-Ology, Waajeed + the BLK JKS

LAST CALL!!! We're wrapping up our garden event series with a banger. Amir/Ge-Ology/Waajeed on the wheels and South Africa's BLK JKS (www.blkjks.com) host our closeout jam!!! We go till 2AM to say goodbye to summer.

**************
THE KITCHEN TUESDAY @ Jungle Garden
in association with PUMA and The Horticultural Society of New York

OUR LAST TUESDAY OF THE SEASON!!!!
8PM - 2AM
61 Kent Avenue and N10 Street
Williamsburg Waterfront, Brooklyn

TUESDAY 09.15.2009
DJ AMIR (Kon and Amir/OnTrack/BBE)
GE-OLOGY (Female Fun/Rotation)
WAAJEED (Bling47/PPP)

Hosted by the BLK JKS

Cakeballs by Sweet Jewels
Spacecakes by Let Them Eat Cake
Cheap Drink Specials!

$3 Suggested Donation at the Door
RSVP thekitchentuesdays@gmail.com

21+ ONLY!
Cash only, the nearest ATM is 5 blocks away.

From the Bedord Avenue L Train:
Walk west on North 7th towards the waterfront (Berry Street). Take a right on Kent Avenue. The venue is on the corner of N10th and Kent Avenue.

Rainy Fridays

I woke up this morning feeling a little blue and thought about one of my favorite books growing up, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Poor Alexander, "went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there's gum in my hair and when I got out of bed this morning I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day." Written by Judith Viorst and illustrated by Ray Cruz this classic makes waking up on the wrong side of the bed a little easier for everyone. happy friday!!

The Holy Mountain @ IFC

Mexican filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky lit a fire under the film industry when he released The Holy Mountain at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival. The followup to his debut film El Topo, The Holy Mountain is based on the French surrealist Rene Daumal's classic Mount Analogue and explores the psychedelic crevices of the Jadorowsky's mind. Also of note, The Holy Mountain was produced by Beatles manager Allen Klein (thanks wikipedia!). Once again, Jodorowsky plays the allegorically named lead, “The Alchemist,” who assembles a group of people from all walks of life and renames them for the planets in the solar system. Putting his recruits through strange mystical rites and divesting them of their worldly baggage, he leads them on a trip to Lotus Island to ascend the Holy Mountain and displace the immortal gods who secretly rule the universe. Check the original trailer below and buy tickets to see the film on the big screen!!

Tonite: Benefit Event for Kon

Tonite, the weekly Giant Step/Spinna party, Journey, will host a special benefit for Kon of Kon & Amir fame with DJ's Spinna, Rich Medina, Eli Escobar, Cosmo, Scratch and Amir. 100% of the $10 donation goes towards Kon's medical bills and expenses! Let's support our community. This is an especially important moment of reflection as Congress gears up for session and President Obama starts to push through his plans for public option for health care.

DJ, producer, record fiend and 1/2 of the widely acclaimed duo Kon & Amir, Kon has recently fallen ill. While his condition is dire, we're hopeful that in time he'll make a full recovery.

Kon and Amir are two of the most extraordinary but underrated beat diggers in the game. --Lord Finesse

Kon and Amir are legends in the beat digging game. Their compilations and mixtapes are classics and represent a style of Djing that's true to the essence of Hip-Hop. --A-Trak

SANTOS
100 Lafayette Street (btwn Walker & White Streets) DOWNSTAIRS - NYC 10013

DOORS 10PM-4AM / Admission $10 / 21 & Over- ID Required

Directions To Santos
A, C, E, J, M, Z, or # 6 Trains To Canal Street)
Or mapquest.com for Driving Directions

BLK JKS "After Robots"

Today is the day! After years of hard work, world touring and heart breaking, the BLK JKS debut album, After Robots, is out today! Come celebrate tonite with their album release/US Tour Kick-off at SOBs in NYC. You can stream the full album over at Jambase. Hear what the Johannesburg Mail & Guardian pegs as, "probably the most important South African album to have appeared in the past 20 years." For serious.

Summer Harvest

It's a beautiful fall Friday in NYC and here's a peek at my Brooklyn summer harvest. The big tomatoes are courtesy of my neighbor -- fried green tomatoes for brunch tomorrow? Here's the recipe:

3 medium, firm green tomatoes
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup milk
2 beaten eggs
2/3 cup fine dry bread crumbs or cornmeal
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 Cut unpeeled tomatoes into 1/2 inch slices. Sprinkle slices with salt and pepper. Let tomato slices stand for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, place flour, milk, eggs, and bread crumbs in separate shallow dishes.

2 Heat 2 Tbsp of olive oil in a skillet on medium heat. Dip tomato slices in milk, then flour, then eggs, then bread crumbs. In the skillet, fry half of the coated tomato slices at a time, for 4-6 minutes on each side or until brown. As you cook the rest of the tomatoes, add olive oil as needed. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

We Can Make Sandwiches...

Happy Hump Day! This is one of my all-time favorite jams. The Detroit Grand Pubahs burst onto the national scene with this dancefloor anthem back in 2000. You can be the bun/And I can be the burger, girl/I know you wanna do it/We can make sandwiches. Thanks Sasha for dropping the video on me!

The Kitchen Tuesdays : No Ordinary Monkey

The weekly event series has been a huge hit with an amazing lineup of DJs and great music. Thanks to everyone who has made this late-summer jump-off a huge success. We have two more to go before we wrap up the summer so don't miss tonite's jam with the gentlemen of No Ordinary Monkey, our favorite disco party. They've been throwing underground dance parties since 2004 with some of NYC's finest guest DJs in secret loft locations and afterhours chinese restaurants! Come through on Tuesday and enjoy the musical stylings of one of New York's best kept secrets and dance the night away under the moon!! As always we'll have snacks, spacecakes, and drink specials! RSVP at thekitchentuesdays@gmail.com

p.s. this will be our second to last event! We'll be taking a break on labor day (09.08) and finishing off the series on September 15th with Amir, Ge-Ology and Waajeed!

*********
THE KITCHEN TUESDAY @ Jungle Garden

in association with PUMA
and The Horticultural Society of New York

Every Tuesday
8PM - Midnight
61 Kent Avenue and N10 Street
Williamsburg Waterfront, Brooklyn

TUESDAY 09.01.2009

NO ORDINARY MONKEY

Cakeballs by Sweet Jewels
Spacecakes by Let Them Eat Cake

Cheap Drink Specials!

$3 Suggested Donation at the Door
RSVP thekitchentuesdays@gmail.com

21+ ONLY!
Cash only, the nearest ATM is 5 blocks away.

From the Bedord Avenue L Train:
Walk west on North 7th towards the waterfront (Berry Street). Take a right on Kent Avenue. The venue is on the corner of N10th and Kent Avenue.

Vertical Farming

NOTE: This is one of the most important Op-Ed pieces I've read in awhile! Let's bring agriculture to the heart of our cities!!! Happy Monday reading.

By DICKSON D. DESPOMMIER

If climate change and population growth progress at their current pace, in roughly 50 years farming as we know it will no longer exist. This means that the majority of people could soon be without enough food or water. But there is a solution that is surprisingly within reach: Move most farming into cities, and grow crops in tall, specially constructed buildings. It’s called vertical farming.

"Imagine a farm right in the middle of a major city. Food production would take advantage of hydroponic and aeroponic technologies. Both methods are soil-free. Hydroponics allows us to grow plants in a water-and-nutrient solution, while aeroponics grows them in a nutrient-laden mist. These methods use far less water than conventional cultivation techniques, in some cases as much as 90 percent less.

Now apply the vertical farm concept to countries that are water-challenged — the Middle East readily comes to mind — and suddenly things look less hopeless. For this reason the world’s very first vertical farm may be established there, although the idea has garnered considerable interest from architects and governments all over the world.

Vertical farms are now feasible, in large part because of a robust global greenhouse initiative that has enjoyed considerable commercial success over the last 10 years. (Disclosure: I’ve started a business to build vertical farms.) There is a rising consumer demand for locally grown vegetables and fruits, as well as intense urban-farming activity in cities throughout the United States. Vertical farms would not only revolutionize and improve urban life but also revitalize land that was damaged by traditional farming. For every indoor acre farmed, some 10 to 20 outdoor acres of farmland could be allowed to return to their original ecological state (mostly hardwood forest). Abandoned farms do this free of charge, with no human help required.

Read the full NYTimes Op-Ed here.

Gold Coast Trading Company

Facebook is a strange and beautiful thing. A couple weeks back i was randomly "friend"-ed by Gold Coast Trading Company. A new line from Emeka Alams (formerly of 21MC), the transatlantic designer splits his time between Seattle and West Africa. Melding an interplanetary design sensibility with his life experience in both Nigeria and the US, Alams has set out to reshape the conversation about what constitutes African. He explains that, "it's not so much of rehashing slavery and rebelling, while slavery shaped our story it's not my history. I was tired of the same ol' hipster afro stuff I was seeing or the "Save Africa" tees. That has nothing to do with Africa or what's actually going on there. With Gold Coast Trading I'm just showing you the actuality of my Africa. Africa is more than just music and colors; it's so complex." Check the video inspiration from Gnarls Barkley for GCT's next season and peep the design jams below!

Gnarls Barkley - Going On

Happy 51st Birthday, MJ!

Happy Birthday, Michael Jackson! Brooklyn knows how to throw a birthday jam!! "Happy Birthday to ya, happy birthday to ya, happy birrrrrth-day!" 08.29.09 - Michael Jackson Birthday Celebration: Spinna x Spike Lee @ Prospect Park

Fat Pat and DJ Screw @ Maysles Institute

The Maysles Institute has only been open a year but they have had a phenomenal run of documentary programming bringing the lifestyles and social issues of regions around the world to their cinema space in Harlem. Besides screening documentaries from local filmmakers and the Maysles Brothers (Grey Gardens, Gimme Shelter, Christo in Paris) the Institute also has a youth media program and the Kham Film Project that supports Tibetan and American documentary filmmakers working to bring Tibetan issues to the greater public. Check their calendar for what's cookin' at the Cinema!

This week the Institute has programmed an amazing group of documentaries exploring the culture and lifestyle of 3rd coast rappers in Country Rap Tunes: A Dirty South Film Festival (Music Films and Videos From the 3rd Coast). As a Texas transplant, I find theres a lot of hostility in New York regarding southern hip hop and its so important for folks out here to understand the context for which a lot of this music has grown. I am really excited to support the Maysles Institute and go check out some of these films. Reppin' for my hometown, the showcase is debuting Soldiers for Cash, a documentary about the life of DJ Screw shot right before his death. Other documentaries focus on Houston luminaries including Pimp C, Lil Boosie, Fat Pat, ESG, South Park Mexican and H.A.W.K.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 27
Fat Pat: Ghetto Dreams
Fat Pat is one of the original members of S.U.C. and, alongside DJ Screw and Pat’s brother HAWK formed the Dead End Alliance (DEA). The best part of the film is the music video for Pat’s slab anthem, Tops Drop.

DJ Screw: The Untold Story, 8:00pm
Robert Davis Jr. a.k.a. “DJ Screw” is the master of “Screwed & Chopped” music, a technique of slowing the music to a drag personifying the underground lifestyle of the Houston streets that made him famous. With a small army of MCs known as the Screwed Up Click or S.U.C., Screw began a mix-tape movement that would one day take the music industry by storm. This DVD contains never-before seen footage of the one man who gave Houston its sound identity, at work and at play as well as interviews with the original members of the S.U.C., Davis’ family members and others whose careers are influenced by his music.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 28
S.U.C.: Soldiers United for Cash
Dir. Rel, 2004, 75 min.
Ariel Santchi’s crucial documentary provides the most in depth interview with DJ Screw. Outstanding performances by HAWK, a youthful Z-Ro and an endless freestyle by Lil Flip in pre-Flipperacci form.