Tony Wright looks like shit. After 266 hours awake, Tony thought he’d cracked the world record for going without sleep and finally drifted off for a well-deserved snooze. However, if you thought he looked bad before, you should have seen him when he woke up and realized that he’d misread the clock, gone to bed too early, and fallen short of the record by a few hours. But Tony doesn’t care. He’s become such an authority on not sleeping that David Blaine (whose next stunt is evidentally a stay-up-athon) comes to him for advice. We thought we’d drop in on Tony and catch up on some sleep deprivation…
Archive for February, 2008
LONDON - FUCKED UP RAZE THE BAR
Fucked Up ravaged The Old Blue Last last week to mark the release of "Year Of The Pig." Every time they play the pub they just get better and better. The night’s highlight came when they performed the new record, an 18-minute tour de force described by the NME as “one big long headfuck of chaos that begins with organs like Led Zep’s ‘No Quarter’ and ends whipping a krautrock donkey into the sunset while gleefully pissing self indulgence on hardcore’s own boundaries.” Guest vocalist Jessica Penfold did a great job. Fucked Up are currently touring the UK with Gallows. Go see them.
Photos: Fucked Up at the OBL
Pre-order: “Year Of The Pig”
NEW YORK - WEEKEND CRUSH
We don’t know what’s going on, but for the past two months there have been a total of about five good shows in the city (two of which we put on). Then all of a sudden every band in the world is playing the same weekend. Thanks a bunch, people in bands. Anyways, good luck choosing between Sian Alice Group with Mike Bones at Lit, Excepter, Blood on the Wall with Eric Copeland, Black Mountain at the Bowery Ballroom and Glasslands, RZA, Atlas Sound with White Rainbow, Black Dice with the Skaters and IUD (Lizzi from Gang Gang Dance’s newish side project–oh, and also Genesis P-Orridge and Gibby Haynes will be DJing here), Soiled Mattress and the Springs, Sian Alice Group again, and Times New Viking opening for the Super Furry Animals on Sunday (we know, but still). We’d also like to take this time to thank Les Claypool for canceling his show at Terminal 5.
NOT FIT TO PRINT - BOOKOO WATER
As with most of the finer things in life, the real beauty of shitty bootlegs is in the details. Take "BooKoo Water" for instance. If they had just watered down a stolen crateful of red Vitamin Water and taped on their own label (which we will swear on a stack of our mother’s graves is exactly what they did), it might have been worth a chuckle. But aping the "inspirational" text on the side of the bottle is the kind of move that keeps you up at night wondering if they’re actually secretly hilarious.
LONDON - STUFF WHITE PEOPLE LIKE
Christian Lander is like the Jacques Cousteau of caucasians. His blog, Stuff White People Like, offers the most accurate analysis of
middle class crackers available on the internet. We dropped in on him to poke fun at honkies (it’s cool, I’m white).
ESTONIA - SUUR TÖLL
Back before CGI came along and ruined everything, Estonia produced terrifying stop-motion animation that would leave millions of Commie children with nightmares. One of the best films was Suur Töll. Kids were forced to watch it in an educational context
because the mythical giant is some sort of metaphor for
pig-headed Soviet might or whatever. This film
has it all: a psychedelic devil with a thousand pupils in his
two slitty eyes, hordes of sword-wielding invaders dressed like the KKK, mutant
fish, behemothic chickens, and a double-headed flying demon with udders and a barbed
tongue. Also, best use of analogue synthesizer in a cartoon. Watch it.
SOILED MATTRESS AND THE SPRINGS - “HONG KONG BONG”
Soiled Mattress and the Springs’ new album, Honk Honk Bonk!, sees the jazz trio’s brand of avant-on-hold Muzak falling into more tumultuous and hectic territories. It’s the kind of stuff that would make a perfect soundtrack to demented mash-ups of Ub Iwerks cartoons. This is why the new video for “Hong Kong Bong” is exactly that. Hope they don’t get a cease-and-desist from Disney.
SOILED MATTRESS AND THE SPRINGS - “HONG KONG BONG”
Soiled Mattress and the Springs’ new album, Honk Honk Bonk!, sees the jazz trio’s brand of avant-on-hold Muzak falling into more tumultuous and hectic territories. It’s the kind of stuff that would make a perfect soundtrack to demented mash-ups of Ub Iwerks cartoons. This is why the new video for “Hong Kong Bong” is exactly that. Hope they don’t get a cease-and-desist from Disney.
SOILED MATTRESS AND THE SPRINGS - “HONG KONG BONG”
Soiled Mattress and the Springs’ new album, Honk Honk Bonk!, sees the jazz trio’s brand of avant-on-hold Muzak falling into more tumultuous and hectic territories. It’s the kind of stuff that would make a perfect soundtrack to demented mash-ups of Ub Iwerks cartoons. This is why the new video for “Hong Kong Bong” is exactly that. Hope they don’t get a cease-and-desist from Disney.
NEW YORK - JACK WALLS AT FUSE
This Saturday Jack Walls has got a show at Fuse featuring a bunch of collages he made out of a single picture his old boyfriend Robert Mapplethorpe took. If you aren’t the type for going out and doing things, you can look at them all here or read him talk about them with Ryan McGinley here. Also, thank you for sparing us from dealing with your downer self.
DEAR VICE - RELEASE THE RAW SPIRIT
Dear Vice,
Here are some live action Don’ts from the Raw Spirit Festival in Arizona. It’s the world’s biggest celebration of raw veganism, world music and eco-peace.
Groovy,
TOM
NEW YORK - BLOOD ON THE WALLS AT OTHER MUSIC
Hey, tonight at 8 PM, Blood on the Wall is playing a free show at Other Music. They’re the band our reviews editor described as “the Pixies and Sonic Youth in a blender” when we asked her to describe them just now. Wow, how bad is that? Anyhoo, it’ll probably be an acoustic gig on account of being in a tinyish record store, or “unplugged” as one was once wont to say, but that shouldn’t stop you from going. If anything it should make you go even more.
NEW YORK - HAVANA GRANMA
So, Castro quit. Or he didn’t. Or technically he did, but now everybody who checks cnn.com once a day is an expert on the nuances of PCC politburo and you should get ready to be buttonholed at every bar or party you go to for the next couple weeks about how the country is "ripe for change." Besides the Elian Gonzales business and all those goofy assassination plots the CIA tried, I basically know fuck all about Cuba, so I decided to ask my Cuban grandma what it was like living there when I was just a glimmer in my mother’s undeveloped ovaries.
