Street artist Specter gives some love to the American worker
We love our shopping carts here at LIAS, not just cos it’s our logo but simply because of their inherent symbolism. Whether they’re smashed up, brand new and shiny, discarded in a gutter, re-purposed into hobo RVs, dipped in gold or bent into furniture, there is a universal code that those 4 crazy wheels and running cage trigger. Unurth found several shopping cart sculptures that have hit New York recently, the work of street artist Specter. As Specter himself describes, “The four pieces are specifically aimed at street workers to honor the art in their work and themselves. Placing the sculptures in parks, squares and underpasses that are crossroads for the general public and street workers allows viewers to celebrate the worker’s elegance and determination.” As Unurth so astutely deduces, the placing of these carts on plinths also suggest a future when these workers (and carts) are nothing but relics of history. In America, that may ring all too close to home for some…
fenom takes one of the most potent spirits on Earth and brings it down a notch
If I had all the time in the world, I would share a tale with you all about my first time drinking absinthe. It was in the nascent post-Communist days of Prague, while the newly democratized nation was first finding its wobbly footing — well before Planet Hollywood struck, when the price of a beer was around 60 cents a pint and the air was crisp with the sense of magic and potential. There one night I found myself at a jazz club — laced in thick smoke the musicians were playing out of their minds, and I stepped up to the bar with a girl I’d met at the hostel named Lola Blamm. Yes, that was her real name. Neither of us had tried absinthe before but it seemed like the right thing to do, so the bartender had to walk us through the routine. He poured a tall glass of the emerald-colored liquid into a small glass, then stirred in some water transforming the clear brilliant green into a cloudy concoction. He then dunked a sugar cube in the liquid, lit it, and dropped the sugar into the glass. Needless to say I was entranced by the whole procedure. Me and Lola took a deep breath, swallowed hard, and proceeded to down the harsh beverage before us in large, thirsty gulps. While I understood it to be 80 proof alcohol, it turned out to be 80 percent alcohol, meaning 160 proof, meaning it burned a hole through my esophagus. When we slammed our glasses down, Lola and I looked at each other, eyes aflame, and…well, that’s where the story ends (for you, anyways).
When I returned to the States it was much to my dismay and frustration to find out that the absinthe we had lacked the vital ingredient of wormwood — the element that elevates absinthe from just a really strong alcohol to the type of liquor that can make you see fairies. Literally. (It was indeed because of the hallucinatory affects of wormwood which made real absinthe illegal in America and most of the free world.) Then, two years ago, some loophole opened up in the world of ATF and the real absinthe was re-introduced to America. And while the original 160 proof spirit is the only honest way to drink it, sometimes you need to take things a bit lighter. Enter fenom — handcrafted and distilled at a family-owned facility located in Fougerolles, France, that has produced authentic absinthes for more than 100 years. Using traditional methods of manufacture, fenom takes all natural ingredients (wormwood, fennel, anise, gentian and mugwort) and blends them together with natural spring water from the Vosges Mountains. They aim to carve out a new niche among high-end spirits by being the first absinthe created to consume in an undiluted form — meaning it has a lower proof (80 proof/40%) and clear consistency, making it a bit easier to drink…especially for the ladies. With only 63 calories per ounce, the formula is intended to be enjoyed without the addition of water and sugar, although allegedly it can be combined with mixers typically blended with other liquors like vodka and tequila. If you’re too lazy to figure out a good cocktail, fenom’s in-house mixologists have already developed several signature drinks to enjoy at home, such as the fenom Fizz and the French Kiss, which feature simple ingredients like lemon juice and Perrier water. Pick some up, and make your own indelible memories.
Available starting this morning, as in today, is Nom de Guerre’s revision of the classic Converse Skid Grip CVO canvas sneaker. Debuted in the early 1960s, the logo-less classic silhouette has done its time circulating with many a fringe scene, from tennis and boating socialites in its early days to surfers and new-waver in the 1980s. Nom de Guerre produced a short film directed by Zach Gold which features the shoe and other peeks at their upcoming FW10 collection, titled Countdown to Violence. The trailer can be seen below, or see the whole film starting today at Nom de Guerre’s flagship store in NYC. “Our approach to the Converse Skidgrip CVO shoe is also an exploration and study of uniforms, in particular. With Converse being a brand that has served as both a uniform and a statement of independence, we felt that it was an interesting juxtaposition,” explains Gold. NdG’s edition of the Skid Grip comes in jet-black rubberized cotton canvas, making it a little more sinister than the standard Converse Skid Grip CVO Cores. Pick them up for $95 online at Nom de Guerre, or if you live in New York go straight to their boutique at 640 Broadway, at Bleecker Street (212-253-2891).
This is a big day for just about every music nerd on the net, as 6 Daft Punk songs created for Tron Legacy have just hit the net. Kudos for @Hypetrak for putting them up on Soundcloud so we can all get a listen. As they’re tunes for a soundtrack, don’t expect any climaxing moments of fist-in-the-air booty shaking, but they definitely veer into a level of sinister that we have not previously heard from the two action figure, helmet-making-inspiring Frenchmen. Enjoy!
Disrupting the dismal dissemination of fashion discourse
DIS magazine traveled to sunny Venice Beach, Echo Park and other hipster-swarmed Los Angeles locales to see what fashion trends were hot on the street. Except like a very disoriented and confused Bruno, DIS only seemed to run into completely fabricated trends — such as velcro and suction cup accessories to keep your wallet on you while shirtless, piercings displayed on the outside of clothing, garbage bag purses, bungee cord halter-tops, baby carrying bags, blindfold sunglasses and of course wifebeater swimsuits (above). A pretty clever commentary on the inanity and pervasiveness of fashion mongering, which admittedly LIAS is often guilty of. Check out two galleries below — one before and one after the Jump — for an insightful peep into some hot (false) summer fashions…
One more additional slightly NSFW gallery AFTER the Jump…
The prototypical American streetwear brand celebrates their 30th
The latest addition to Stussy’s 30th Anniversary collection, titled XXX, is a collaboration with the classic Clarks Wallabee. To celebrate the occasion the prototypical American streetwear brand aligned with the iconic British boot to create a headturning Wallabee, one which fuses black leather with a ballistic nylon on the upper, combined with Clark’s distinctive crepe sole. A nice update on a timeless classic.
I’ll just let Thomas Traum describe this work, aptly titled Boats*Cars*Dollars*Girls*Helicopters*Jewellery*Skylines: “[This is] a typology of rap videos and an attempt to construct the most generic Rap and R&B video out of many. Musical genres are always heavily codified and rap seems to be one of the most extreme ones, each video has similar if not identical subjects, the same light, the same cars, the same girls, the same dance moves etc. Through their likeness they seem to be almost ‘classic’, just as classic theater or opera.” Not that all musical genres don’t have their uniforms and well worn cliches, it’s just that Rap videos seem to stick much tighter to their limited pool of tropes; the lack of deviation is startling. As it is “classic” in likeness, Traum broke the piece up into 5 “Acts”, and a set the video to Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 in C sharp minor — think of it as sort of a musical tether to keep you from getting swallowed up in the sea of enormous diamond pendants, well endowed video girls, Maybachs and general tides of bling. How thoughtful…
Eric Powell's cult comic makes the leap to the silver screen
It’s too early to call quality on this one, but seeing as The Goon is produced by David Fincher odds are stacked in its favor. Not only is the animation pretty remarkable, but its also very loyal visually to the original material. Based on Eric Powell’s 1999 cult comic from Dark Horse, The Goonfollows the adventures of a muscle-bound strongarm who’s the primary enforcer for a mobster named Labrazio. He and his friend/sidekick Franky battle off against the Nameless Zombie Priest and his numerous evil zombie gangs, with additional ghosts and ghouls galore. As the script is being penned by Powell himself, you can at least be sure the soul of the comic will stay intact. See the trailer below…
