As hilarious as Yelle’s (”yeah” + “elle”) new video for “Je Veux Te Voir” is, it’s also just about all the ironic French pop we can handle in one sitting, even with those catchy, exercise video-style, banging red booty shorts. Maybe it’s our inner teeny-bopper or our fascination with the global tween, but something about Yelle makes us want to jump around and scream.
If you’re down with the French singer’s bubblegum brand of club-feminism, ponder the value of “Parle Á Ma Main”, Fatal Bazooka’s campy, gender-flexing video in which she’s also made an appearance.
After the jump, we’ve also tracked down some vid-time of Yelle jumping around and screaming herself — in a giant gold vest no less — while making NYC go nuts at her show a few weeks ago.
As more and more people are finding out, the boys of N.E.R.D have been back in the studio. They’re not set on conquering the world, which is why it wasn’t put out in every public avenue — as of yet I don’t believe that there has even been a press release. In a nutshell, N.E.R.D are about the music and they have always been.
As soon as you as you so much mention N.E.R.D, most like to think they know all about the Neptunes and the beats they make etc etc. But my heart sinks a tiny bit at this because it means that N.E.R.D and their generating of real, good music is sometimes overshadowed by and because of the Neptunes phenomenon and what work they may have produced for others.
So get to know N.E.R.D! Most folks are finding them unrecognisably stimulating, raw, intoxicating, and energetic: quite simply a badass rock, funk, hip-hop band that can’t be boxed in.
With a succession of recent live shows, they’ve been performing edgy slants on some of their (and our) classics like Lapdance and introducing crowds to some of their newer creations, like Everybody Nose. Austin, Texas was the latest to experienceNERD live at SXSW in the only way appropriate according to Pharrell: with N.E.R.D themselves.
And note to Pharrell: Girls also know how to get down in the mosh pits.
If you’ve been hitting the mp3 blogs or clubbing at least semi-regularly as of late, you’ve no doubt caught wind of a trend in hip-hop that is progressing with varying degrees of success. Rappers and their producers are doing a bit of paradigm shifting for once, laying vocals over, of all things, electronic tracks (think techno, trance and dnb in particular).
If you want to be technical about it, the game’s been keen on thugstep, “trance-hop” (the term coined by XXL), etc. for a little over a year now. Usually featuring jacked-up BPMs, the songs are more ‘95 Love Parade than 125th and Lenox.
Possibly the best out of the bunch is Pittsburgh-MC-on-the-come-up Wiz Khalifa’s “Say Yeah”, which samples Alice DeeJay’s 1999 trance smash “Better Off Alone”. More than club-ready, the track is versatile and polished enough to make you forget how corny the source material is/was (respect to producer Johnny Juliano for keeping it in the fairway). The video is kind of cute, too.
As far as his other tracks, Wiz has more in common with his Southern counterparts than his European ones, yet when he professes to being consumed with the typical rap obsessions (cars, keeping the rep up, women and the paper chase), it doesn’t come off as puerile materialism or mere womanizing, but rather the admissions of a driven artist looking to be rewarded for his hard work and talent.
A self-professed “youngin’ on his grind”, Khalifa, 19, seems mature beyond his years (and his finger-snap, bubblegum rap peers) and admits to loving what he does and taking pride in his work. Having been constantly on the move as a child, he says that it was his father who broadened his musical horizons and gave him the foundation and confidence to begin writing songs at a young age. If the young rapper is on his grind half as seriously as he claims to be, the kid may be one of Pittsburgh’s best hopes for getting out of the Illadelph hip-hop scene’s shadow.
There’s nothing quite like a watching a young Japanese woman pull unnatural sounds from a horizontal, nearly six-foot traditional musical instrument that looks like the architectural model for the world’s most complex suspension bridge. With most artists, the experimental fun would probably stop there. Not so with Michiyo Yagi and her giant Japanese koto.
Plucking, strumming, abusing, and riffing away, Yagi improvises everything from the expected — hypnotizing sonic landscapes that make you meditate whether you want to or not — to the unexpected — driving rhythms that sound like rock and roll drum-chants.
Check out Yagi tonight and Friday in New York, when she joins some other fun folks for the four-day Haru Ichiban Festival (first breeze of spring) of new Japanese music.
The United Colors of Benetton has me convinced that not all major fashion companies contribute to world malaise. Benetton consistently keeps it real by giving back to world communities, and their most recent humanitarian campaign is no different. Last month, the company teamed up with Youssou N’Dour, one of Africa’s and Senegal’s best-known singers, to launch “Africa Works,” a spotlight on entrepreneurial Africa.
Here’s the gist: “The campaign promotes the Birima micro-credit programme in Senegal, a co-operative credit society founded by N’Dour. [It] offers financial services for SMEs [small and medium enterprises], craftspeople, professionals and artists to help them start and independently develop their business.“ (more…)
Monday, March 17, 2008, 7:00pm McNally Robinson (52 Prince St.)
AWAKE! A Reader for the Sleepless
Before you go out drinking green beer and pinching strangers on Monday, head to McNally Robinson for a reading from Brooklyn-based publisher Soft Skull Press’s new anthology for the sleepless, AWAKE! The reader contains fiction, nonfiction, poetry, comics, and more — all of which centers on the theme of insomnia. Monday night McNally will have contributors Ed Champion, Jonatham Ames, and Molly Kotteman share their work. Editor Steven Lee Beeber (The Heebie-Jeebies at CBGB’s: A Secret History of Jewish Punk) will host, and free coffee will be offered to keep you from nodding out.
For an allegory that explores lust and power, centers on prisoners after a political coup, and has a title like Blood Kin, Dovey’s debut novel was actually pretty funny when I saw her read awhile back as part of an emerging writers’ showcase. I recommend it.
You get two feelings experiencing Tabaimo’s graphic, wood block style images and animations. One is their gut-level creepiness: her obsessively detailed, distorted perspectives of banal commuter trains, body care, and public restrooms. Then you see the visual lyricism and Tabaimo’s quiet sympathy for her self-alienated subjects. It’s unsettling, but fascinating and oddly tender.
Opening today in New York, Tabaimo’s gone and made the experience of her work even eerier and more seductive. The floor-to-ceiling images and an interactive, raked floor implicate you in the images’ narrative bubble world. You’re still a voyeur, but in this show you feel it.
The annual South By Southwest Music Conference (SXSW) is known for some amazing acts, labels that come from the world over, and parties that go down in history. And heartache, because trying to capture the tectonic scale of SXSW with mere words has made more than one music journalist cry.
Festivities this year are going to be as big as ever, but the recent legends lined up for today’s Austin Blowout 2008 make the event unmissable. Iheartcomix and Mad Decent are joining forces to go all the way with 12 hours of live performances and they’ve collected two pools, vids, and free booze to boot.
The 4 stages with be laced with almost 50 bands and DJ’s — Diplo,Santogold, andFlosstradamus are all up — and a mouthful of other gems on the rise, like Heartsrevolution, who spin some mad mix of hipster head-banging electronica and high school angst-rock lyrics.
Dancing kicks up as the first record spins at 2 pm and won’t stop till 2 am. Right in time for the after parties, naturally.
2008 is going to be a year full of treats for those of us who love classic East Coast hip-hop. The Roots are going to release their highly- anticipated record Rising Down in April, Q-Tip’s next solo album The Renaissance drops in June, and Talib Kweli has just released a free (!) new mixtape entitled MCEO. But the album I’ve been waiting on since I heard about it from the man himself last year is Pete Rock’s new album, NY’s Finest.
One of my favorite producers of all time, the legendary Soul Brother # 1 is known for his completely unique, immediately recognizable sound that arguably pioneered NYC hip-hop in the ’90s. His legacy is enormous. Ask Kanye West, Pharrel, Just Blaze, or Timbaland; they’re all indebted to the man for inspiration.
So four years after his last album, Soul Survivor II, we can finally get to taste the fruit of Pete Rock’s undying labor: a joint venture between Soul Survivor Records and NYC indie label Nature Sounds. The record features an intimidating line-up of hip-hop Wu Tang’s Raekwon and Masta Killa, Redman, D-Block, Dipset’s Jim Jones, Max B, Styles P, and Sheek Louch, among others. Satisfaction guaranteed.
For more free stuff, grabbing NY’s Finest at FYE stores for a little while also nets you a DVD of Kanye West, Pharrell, Timberland, DJ Premier, 9th Wonder, ?uestlove and more. Don’t sleep on it.
Christian Lander is the creator of and main contributor to Stuff White People Like. We wrote here about all of the attention the blog was getting last month. Its popularity continues to grow rapidly so before Lander becomes too busy being featured in paper after radio program after opinion piece, we reached out and asked a few questions about how his newfound notoriety is playing out for him.
For having started this so recently, you’re getting some amazing press?
Yeah. There was the NPR interview and today I recorded one for the CBC and the National Post back home. These ones are cool because friends and family [back in Canada] are finally seeing it and these are folks who otherwise had no idea that there was any buzz. It’s offered some really strange opportunities. I got solicited by a margarita making appliance and they wanted me to write about it in the site. There are strange opportunities presenting themselves.
Do you think you’ll take them up on it?
[Laughs] Thus far I’ve made 13 dollars through Google Ads off of all of this.
9 million views and 13 dollars, huh?
Yeah, it’s strange. I’m still looking at [ad] packages and trying to stay realistic about it. I don’t really expect traffic to stay up there like it is. At the same time, I don’t want to throw all these ads at people and turn them off.
Why do you think people are still so up and arms about the content of the site? People are still calling you a racist left and right.
For some people the satire is just lost. I don’t know how anyone could think its racist. The guys from rent a negro have been in touch and thought that it was hilarious. Further, its not like you’re not going to get a job because a website says you like yoga and expensive sandwiches. These aren’t labels that relate to slavery and consumerism. In this way, the “multicultural” trends of the 80s and 90s were somewhat misguided as there was a push to say and accept that everyone is the same. I mean, everyone is similar, but there are cultural differences, right? (more…)
