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…

Boats*Cars*Dollars*Girls*Helicopters*Jewellery*Skylines from Thomas Traum on Vimeo.

Remember that Terrafugia Flying Car we talked about last summer? They promised it was more than wistful ambitions and barely functioning proof of concepts, hoping to enter production as early as this year. Well apparently they’re one step closer, finally releasing the production version of their Transition Flying Car, which they’ve given a significant facelift. Good thing — the old version looked something like a 1970s Cessna with reversed wings smashed into the shape of an old AMC Gremlin. Yikes. The new ones no beauty queen but its sufficiently more pleasing to the eye, a paramount improvement if its to be aimed at the luxury, gotta-have-every-toy market. The new Terrafugia Transition Flying Car has a streamlined cockpit (first images of the interior available below), simpler window setup and cleaner, more linear headlights. It can still allegedly fly at 115 mph but has a slightly increased range of 490 miles, with a 35 mpg fuel efficiency. Reserve yours now with a $10,000 airframe reservation deposit here.

[View with PicLens]

In this short 3-minute TED video, venture capitalist Gary Lauder proposes a new street sign that could save us (theoretically) $2 billion a year. While the math may be a little fuzzy, the idea certainly isn’t. How many times have you pulled up to a stop sign in the middle of nowhere and wondered, Why in hell is there a stop sign here?! Well so have we all, and those signs annually cost us billions in pollution, fuel and time wasted. Sure the stops are necessary in certain places, but there should be a sign somewhere below a stop that incorporates common sense. And that’s the idea worth spreading…

Have $15,000 to spare? Then you too can have a briefcase custom made to match your stock 1997 Nissan 200SX. Industrial designer Beau Reid has a great concept for the everyman, customizing carbon fiber briefcases with fine leather and paints to match one’s supercar. Do you love your 1976 Volkswagen Beetle? Can’t live without your Ford Pinto or AMC Gremlin when you leave your car port? Immortalize your bucket with a matching briefcase by Dynamic Innovations.

One more design (modeled after the Bentley GT) after the Jump…

WIRED collected the winners of the Royal College of Art’s Green Concept Car competition. As they say:

Practicality is the last thing anyone considers when designing concept cars. A car made of glass? Windows like gun slits? …But practicality isn’t the point. Concept cars are flights of fantasy carrying auto design into the future. Since our future will be a place where a gallon of gas costs more than a gallon of Scotch, the students at Royal College of Art designed their cars that run on things like electricity and algal fuel.”

These are some of the most imaginitive and forward-thinking designs we’ve ever seen. Lots of people try to do advanced concepts, but some of these are off the moon. The above car was designed by Paul Howse — its a “luxury” car called the Enigma, and its electric motors would be solar-powered. Oh, and the passenger compartment uses “magnetic levitation” to lift and separate it from the rest of the car.

Holy crap, it makes that Minority Report Lexus look like an AMC Gremlin.

Check the link to see them all; they’re all worth a gander. Some are made of cloth, others have living room-inspired interiors that have high levels of IKEA-like customization possible. Beautiful.

Below is the winner of the Best Design Interpretation Award at the Pilkington Automotive Vehicle Design Awards. Frenchie Pierre Sabas’ Airflow has wheel-mounted electric motors and is made entirely of glass.

The Phoenix by Sergio Loureiro Da Silva of Spain…

Italian car maker Pagani have announced their Zonda Cinque, the first street legal version of the Zonda R racing car. The Cinque is powered by a 6.0-liter, 750 hp AMG V12 engine which claims a top speed of 220 mph. Wow. That’s fast. Not Faster One fast, but still pretty bonkers. The name Cinque derives from the fact that only five examples of these carbon fiber monsters will ever be made. Better get that Hot Wheels collection on eBay stat, racer boy…

More pics after the Jump

This somehow slipped by me, but BMW has released its concept of their new M1 Homage Concept. Yes, this happened a couple weeks back but whatever guy — this ain’t Jalopnik. We’ve got imminent Black Holes and Cocaine energy drinks to talk about! Anywho, god I loved this car back in the 80s — my brother had a huge poster of the original in Niki Lauda’s Marlboro/MacLaren colorscape, and I’ve been in love with it since. Designed by the legendary Giorgetto Giugiaro, the car was and is once again a vision of automotive perfection. Well done, Beemerfolk, well done.

[More Pics after the Jump]

Originally released between 1978 and 81, the M1 was essentially a race car retrofitted to be street legal, in order to allow BMW to enter it in the “production” car races (hence, it is their first and only mid-engined car). But only 456 production M1s were ever built, making it one of the rarest BMW models. Still, it’s one of those cars whose legend outweighs the reality of its success. Plans of the concept’s actual production have not been announced…

UPDATE: In the new issue of Automobile magazine they’re touting the new M1 as BMW’s Audi R8 killer. I call bullshit on that. First of all, the R8 is redonkulous. Second, it is real. How can a make-believe car kill a real car? Pssshhhh…

The original design was so sublime and instantly classic, that Andy Warhol did his own remix:

It seems both the Swiss and Ferrari have had very big weeks. The recently announced California had its pedigree verified this past weekend when a a 1961 Ferrari California Spyder set a new record for the highest amount ever paid for an auctioned car, bringing in $10,894,900 to its gleeful owner.

Previously owned by actor James Coburn (who kicked ass in The Great Escape), the car was only expected to sell for half the price. While race car versions of Ferraris have fetched nearly as much (including the previous record, set in 1990 for a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO at $10,756,000), this is certainly standard setting for a street car.

Problem is, can you even imagine the insurance on this car? You’d have to make your own course in your backyard to ever drive it. No wonder Cameron went so fucking mental with Ferris’ stupid antics. Kid was probably a de-testicled when his dad got home…