L Platform, Union Square

C/O Dan Gould
My initial reaction to the MoMA installation at Atlantic Ave. was mixed. I concede that people are inundated with advertising, and this was an opportunity to offer people something more cultured. Still, the motivation seemed a little suspect.
Seeing Poster Boy and Aakash Nihalani, however, remix the works made me very excited about the installation. While the public display makes the work vulnerable to vandalism, it also provides for the images to be appropriated and enter the larger cultural dialogue. It, therefore, brings a new life to the pieces and provides for more social commentary.

C/O Doug Jaeger
What I don’t quite understand in this story is why Doug Jaeger, the advertising brains behind the original campaign, was photographed participating in the vandalism? The move reduces Poster Boy’s street art to a publicity stunt. This makes the project seem calculated and doesn’t bode well for the MoMA or Poster Boy.
Update: NY Mag has the scoop. MoMA denies authorizing the vandalism. CBS Outdoors believes otherwise.
Update: MoMA is now lashing out. Police are seeking Doug Jaeger for questioning.
Hat Tips: Vulture, PSFK

Thanks for playing along, Cornelius.

img c/o the city reliquary
The City Reliquary (370 Metropolitan Ave.) is bringing it back to the 30′s this Friday night for their Depression-Era Fundraiser, featuring all sorts “historical diversions and entertainments.” They wrote in, saying, “Times are tough all around ‚Äì rollercoaster stock markets, job losses by the hundreds of thousands, bipartisan bickering with no relief in sight. It’s even tougher for 501 (c) (3) non-profit Community Museums.” So in honor or these tough times, they’ll have on hand:

Pie the Landlord!
Madame LuLu LoLo, Fortune Teller Extraordinaire
Hobo Photos a Go-Go
Depression-era movies
Oil drum fires
DIY Fingerless Gloves Table!
Prohibition-era Beer provided by the Brooklyn Brewery
DJ Stacher playing hits from the economically challenged 1930s (Harlem Jazz) and 1970s (early Rap); as well as Big Money tracks from the 1980s (disco) and 2000s (electro).

The Reliquary is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization with all sorts of vintage NYC collections, meaning your fortuneteller fees will be tax deductible! The door minimum is $10 and will help pay this and last’s month rent.
Here’s your post soundtrack:

Lets Lynch The Landlord – Dead Kennedys

Forget Nirvana. Paul’s Boutique was the real soundtrack of a generation. And now to commemorate its 20th anniversary, Adrock, MCA, and Mike D have finally released their own audio commentary. Finally, you can check them out waxing poetic on Chuck Woolery, throwing eggs, and chillin’ like Bob Dylan here. [Thanks Kevin]

Anyone going to SXSW? If so, PLEASE confirm that this act is for real.
The video below is an odd little promo for Tinted Windows, perhaps the oddest rock & roll supergroup in since… well, maybe ever. The lineup includes James Iha of the Smashing Pumpkins, Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne, Bun E. Carlos of Cheap Trick, and–the coup de grace–Taylor Hanson. Of Hanson. Check this out:
Tinted Windows – Promo

And according to Stereogum, they’re playing SXSW on 3/20 at the Billboard Showcase @ Pangea in Austin, and have an album dropping in April. If you make it to Texas for their debut set, be sure to get me pictures. Otherwise, I’m not sure I’ll believe this whole thing isn’t some sort of awesome joke.
Tinted Windows press release after the jump:

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Follow him here.

Looks like I just missed Banksy in the bathroom at Life Cafe 983 last night. Damn.

Noah @ MHoW
Since we’re all praying for warmer weather, Ferraby Lionheart & Noah and the Whale, sans Laura Marling, brought some country fair charm to Music Hall of Williamsburg last night. Makes me wanna put on a summer dress and walk around barefoot in the park– which is sad, as my window says its starting to snow. Seriously though, more of this please. Two bands with fairly equal playing fields and that’s all. It screams show up on time, the opener is just as important, not to mention wonderfully whimsical.
After Ferraby’s melodies drifted up and away, the Noah boys, whose website looks straight off of Zissou’s Belafonte, took the stage. There were lots of new goods to be played, as they are in New York mixing their next record which just might be of the same name as the last song of the set, First Days of Spring. Let’s all thank Charlie Fink for sharing his broken heart charms, bassist “Urby Whale” for wearing those zebra print shoes, and to all the boys, although some may disagree, for not playing into one fan’s urge to be in a Saturn commercial.
I’ve been left with a serious longing for Spring, in more ways than one…

Noah, Whale-ing (tee hee)

Record Tables at Eye and Ear
If you look at the life cycle of any ‘scene’–Hippies in San Francisco, Krautrock in Cologne, Punk in D.C.–their rise is always met with a climax. In the aftermath they usually remain vital. The media just chooses to turn their heads to something ‘newer’–to another corner of the country waiting to be excavated. I don’t mean to overly romanticize this phenomena. But, I think over the last decade New York (and Brooklyn in particular) has received its generous helping of attention and praise. At some point you stop and think: Has the the wave of creativity finally crested?
I would actually like to revise this notion that creativity might be turning its gaze away from New York. What has been so interesting in the rise of the blogosphere is the ability to continue the documentation process that in an earlier age would have been less available. The ability to do so provides for multiple areas of the country like Portland, Austin, Baltimore and New York to coexist and continue to inform each other.
This brings me to the Eye and Ear festival that I attended in December. The Eye and Ear Festival is a biannual New York-centric music and record festival that brings together some of New York’s most interesting talent (Zs, Ducktails, Cult of Youth and Symbols) with many of the labels (ESP, Wierd Records) that continue to support them.
Such a festival obviously is a huge undertaking for anyone; however, for Todd Brooks and his Pendu Organization, it is one part of his vision for nurturing young creativity. In the future, he hopes to encompass visual and writing mediums as well as music. The following interview touches upon his vision and is a testament to creativity thriving in Brooklyn.
How did you come up with the idea for the festival?
There are so many great labels in NY right now, and I wanted to help shine a light and make those labels more accessible to the public. Even before the recession hit, there has been a noticeable downturn in record sales with an upturn in music downloads.¬† We live in an age where great record reviews in blogs and magazines send people straight to P2P downloads rather than sending them straight to their local record store or mail-order.¬† I’m not against MP3′s or the internet by any means, I think both are a great way for people to learn about new music, but it separates the music from the entire experience. A lot of hard work goes into packaging of DIY records and tapes which are put together often literally by hand.¬† These unique objects are every bit a part of the music.¬† A record or tape is an object to be looked at as well as listened to, thus fitting the title for the festival: Eye & Ear.¬† The record fair is meant to highlight the physical part of the music in an overly-digitalized world of JPEGs and MP3s.

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