Is It Valentine's Day?

No. But I'm feelin' the love anyway...!
Marian Bantjes is a Canadian graphic artist with a knack for deconstructing organic shapes and an eye for pattern. She's designed for Sak's, The NY Times, and GQ Italia to name a few. Her flair for intricately woven patterns and color combinations is refreshing like a cool breeze on a March afternoon...

The heart is from her Valentines 2011 project. The work below is from her 20x200 project.

Look lightly!

Booker T. Beyond the MG's

And you thought legendary organmaster Booker T. had had his biggest hit with Green Onions...

  Booker T. and the M.G.'s - Green Onions

No Way Jose. His forthcoming album "The Road From Memphis" is going to surprise and delight many who may only be familiar with his 'Green Onions' period. It drops on May 10th and involves some interesting collaborators. The National's lead singer Matt Berninger, Lou Reed, Jim James (of My Morning Jacket) and The Roots are just some of the artists involved.
Be warned...great album ahead.

Here he is getting down with The Roots on "Everything is Everything"

Visionary Architechture

Ukranian artist/architect Iakov Chernikhov saw the future coming...and it looked really f*#&ing cool.  His drawings and designs from the 1920s and 30s are still uber-futuristic. In practical application of his talent for design he worked on industrialization projects such as smelting factories and chemical plants in Leningrad and taught youth at various high-schools, city-schools, and institutes. 

Folksy Bossa: Diego Paulo

Delaware natives "Diego Paul" blew me away.
When a friend recommended them to me recently I couldn't turn 'em off for hours. There's something addicting about their breezy bossa that combined with airy vocals makes me want to close my eyes and smile. There's a lot of beauty in their music...see what you think.

Recommended if you like: Devendra Banhart, Fleet Foxes, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Vocals that sound just like Ingrid Michaelson, Light Instrumentation including Banjo and Bongos, Bossa Backbeats, and GOOD MUSIC in general.

Diego Paulo Official Site ...click here


Loving the Spanish Schoolchildren Nostalgia


I love number 3 and 5...and all of them






Float on...

Hillary

Street Art Roundup

What's the deal with really awesome street artists favoring 2 syllable pseudonyms!?

By now everyone's heard of Banksy (Anonymous UK Graffiti Artist)...but lesser known Belgian street artist ROA creates spectacular black and white animal themed paintings and just finished covering Mexico with them.
Like Banksy,  ROA tends to incorporate existing imperfections on buildings and walls into his art making it seem like the building, car, wall or what have you was born with that bat hanging from it.


Unurth, a website that chronicles outstanding street art from around the world posted some of his work from Mexico.


Check out ROA's Flickr

XX

London

The Souljazz Orchestra

These Canadian guys and gals just got a nomination for "Instrumental Album of the Year" from the Juno Awards (aka the Canadian Grammies). Not to mention #1 Album of the Year by a Canadian Band by the CBC.

The new album "Rising Sun" blends tasty bass lines with tight horns and textured latin rhythms to create an uber danceable Afro-Cuban FuNk ExPlosiOn!!!
They appeared at Glastonbury last year and they're gearing up for a pretty extensive European Tour this summer...

If you're into this check out other Strut Records artists. Strut is a UK label dedicated to underground disco, hard funk, Afro-beat, and old skool hip-hop that doesn't disappoint.

Soul's the Word...

Hillary

Sounds Like A Virgin

Alligator - Passion Pit Remix! from Tegan and Sara on Vimeo.

Here's some more evidence that the 80s are coming back full force, in case you've been living under a rock somewhere and haven't noticed yet...

The Canadian indie twins, Tegan and Sara team up with Passion Pit for a remix of Alligator that I might venture to say is better than the original. It's reminiscent of early 'virginal' Madonna...minus the lace and red lipstick.

More Synth!

Golden Boy: Luis Dourado

26 year old Portuguese artist Luis Dourado takes the landscape to a whole new level of cool...and also the portrait...and the collage...

Above is the title work from his "Into Space" collection, which juxtaposes images of famous folks with mindblowing Dolomite landscapes to produce rather unlikely portraiture

While his "Essays"portfolio makes you wonder why you didn't think to look at those old yellowed paperbacks pages in a more artistically significant way...

In a word: BAMF
Luis Dourado Offical Site

Designer DJ's

What happens when you give graphic designers some headphones and a license to spin? 

This... http://designers.mx/

I couldn't agree more with the motto: Beautifully Designed Mixes. It makes sense that a lot of them are pieces of art in themselves rather than just mere jumbles of jams. Not to mention the sick cover art... 

And some are just enlightening....The Raw Ingredients

Who knew MIA ripped that riff from a Clash song??

Dig it

Startin' Up

Art and Music people. This is what this blog space is all about. Spreading it around...soaking it in...The kind of thing you might do with a bar of soap in a warm bath. It's all around us...let's bathe in it. 

Relax and Enjoy.

-Hillary