1. Lily Allen, “The Fear”
A promising, synth-heavy cut from Allen’s upcoming album, It’s Not Me, It’s You, suggests that she’s no one-album-wonder [Stereogum]
2. Jay-Z [ft. Santogold], “Brooklyn Go Hard”
We predict that this Kanye West-produced anthem will be playing in a BK bar near you for months and months to come [Pitchfork]
3. Nellie McKay, “A Christmas Dirge”
Brooklyn Vegan just posted their 2007 Holiday Mix for your downloading pleasure, but we like this new song more [Nellie McKay via Brooklyn Vegan]
4. These United States, “Get Yourself Home (In Search of the Mistress Whose Kisses Are Famous)”
This twangy live cut from the D.C.-area indie rockers makes us want to yee-haw at our desks [My Old Kentucky Blog]
5. White Denim, “Sitting”
gorilla vs. bear just put out a list of their favorite albums of 2008, and these Austin up-and-comers topped it [gorillavsbear]
“Lorne brought her over to my house when she was head writer. She was very mousy. I thought, Well, they gotta be having an affair. But they weren’t. He just appreciated her talent. And now, suddenly, she’s become this sexy, showing-tit, hot-looking woman. I said to Lorne, ‘What the f*ck did she do?’”
- Hollywood agent Sue Mengers on Tina Fey’s unlikely transformation from comedic ugly ducking to swan [Vanity Fair]
MGMT spent their Thanksgiving holiday performing on Le Grand Journal in Paris.
Jane Mount and Jason Polan love to draw. Their love for drawing is infectious. Jason drew 132 Birds at the American Museum of Natural History. (He likes spending time in museums.) Jane painted *132 Birds Leaving the AMNH (response to Jason Polan), before she ever met him. (She really liked his drawing.) Now they are friends. Jane and Jason are both smart and funny and make work that’s smart and funny about this world that we live in that’s teeming with animals, people, good friends and strangers, clones (more animals!), books, films, and art. The best thing about Jane and Jason and the art that they make: it’ll make you more curious about all these things in this world that we live in.
Don’t believe me? You’ll have to **meet them yourself.
- Sara Lang Distin
* Jane’s 132 Birds Leaving the AMNH (response to Jason Polan) will be released on 20×200 this week. If you want first crack at seeing the print, sign up for the 20×200 mailing list here.
** Check out these emerging artists at Thrilla in Manila, a no holds barred draw-a-thon between arty friends at Jen Bekman Gallery to benefit 826NYC, Wednesday, December 3rd through Saturday, December 6th, noon to 6 p.m.
According to our friends over at GalleyCat, W. Hodding Carter just scored a book deal for A Year of Living Within Our Means, a timely work that will follow him and his family of six as they try out cost-saving techniques from the Great Depression and the first cookbook in America while on a tight budget.
But what exactly will that entail — boiling their leather boots? That’s what we wondering, and then we found a strange but helpful Web site with a bunch of Depression Era recipes for everything from doughnuts to beet jelly.
After the jump, check out the Poor Man’s Casserole (which as the author points out, artfully combines meat, potatoes and vegetables into one dish), and let us know in the comments if it’s something that you’d be willing to sample.
Unlike the most of the country, we decided to escape our own family drama with the big screen version, taking in Rachel Getting Married over the Thanksgiving weekend. The box office report indicates that everyone else caught Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn in their new comedy Four Christmases, which grossed a healthy $46.7m over the five-day period. (Rounding out the top five was Twilight, $39.52m; Bolt, $36.01m; Quantum of Solace, $28.13m; and Australia, $20m.)
But back to Rachel Getting Married. We had read only positive reviews for the Jonathan Demme/Anne Hathaway vehicle. We had heard the Oscar buzz Hathaway has been generating for her daring crossover from popcorn princess to indie bad girl. Plus we’re big fans of Demme’s previous work, which includes flicks like Silence of the Lambs and Philadelphia. It seemed like a no-brainer.
So why did we almost follow suit when over seven people got up and left our not-so-crowded theater?
“No topic was off limits. No question went unanswered.” That’s how MTV’s new one-hour documentary special Britney: For The Record — a “film” directed by Phil Griffin that the star says she decided to make because she wasn’t being seen in the light that she wanted to be seen in — opens. Shot over the 60 days following the MTV 2008 Video Music Awards, it plays out more like a very special episode of The Hills than VH1’s Behind the Music. Unlike some critics, we think that’s OK.
Sure, we went in skeptical — it was presented by Britney’s fragrance and her manager Larry Rudolph was an executive producer for chrissake — but we left rooting for the pop star’s impending comeback. Did we get snowed by this slick infomercial or is there a chance that Britney’s not bad — just totally not balanced.
Some highlights from the show after the jump.
Hadid, Foster on list to renovate Mecca: Mecca, aka Islam’s holiest city is seeking a face lift, and authorities are considering hot-right-now architects Zaha Hadid and Norman Foster for the job. They are among 16 contenders to create a new structure surrounding the Al Haram mosque, taking its capacity from 900,000 to 3 million, which would make it the highest capacity building in the world. Hadid has also been asked for input on upgrading “the whole area of the central district” of the city. [The National]
Records! And family and friends, of course. - Axel Anderson
My Technics headphones; peanut butter, hummus & jelly open-faced sandwiches (Shut up! They’re
fantastic!); DVR; Diet Coke; a rad boyfriend and an awesome (and supportive) family; Barack Obama; The Big Lebowski; NYC bars staying open past 2 a.m. - Leah Taylor
In no particular order: red velvet cake; the miracles of modern medicine; Google Maps; rain showers at midnight; second chances. Oh — and also I’m thankful for Russell Brand. - Shana Nys Dambrot
Bon Iver, The Shaky Hands, and The Blow; Pinkberry; McNally Jackson Books; Ariel by Sylvia Plath and I Was Told There’d Be Cake by Sloane Crosely… and lots of other corny things that I’ll just keep to myself. - Angelina Venezia
I’m thankful for Sacha Baron Cohen’s antics in Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa — totally rescued me from the abyss that is “family entertainment.” - Ashwin Sodhi
Lykke Li; AKA Potion Cafe and its open mic nights; Nelson’s Bicycle Shop; the School of Visual Arts and the model registry; William Esper Studio and Terry Knickerbocker; Gmail; the Northeast Kingdom; the Living Room and its awesome no-cover shows; Vamoose bus service. - Natalya Krimgold
Scrabble; cheap jukeboxes; Target Fridays at the MoMA; all Wes Anderson, early Judd Apatow and ’80s John Hughes; Ikea; Heroes, Chuck, Gossip Girl, 30 Rock and Life on Mars; George Saunders, Augusten Burroughs, David Sedaris, Lorrie Moore, Jonathan Lethem; Michael Cera; Y: The Last Man; the Beach Boys, Dolly Parton, Bruce Springsteen and various other oldies but goodies; emerging artists like Alyson Fox, Susie Ghahremani and Caroline Hwang; and all of you guys for reading us for the past month! - Caroline Stanley
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