How En Vogue Is Voguing (Again)?

The forthcoming issue of Fader has a piece on the NYC voguing scene which apparently has a new, younger vibe that’s more about hip-hop and hood chic than sequined dresses and Hollywood starlets. Depictions and sampling of gay culture in the media have always been mad white-washed but, lately, they’ve also been kinda lame and boring (Lword, Top Model, Project Runway, etc.). But, as with most things, the missing ingredient , of course, is color–more specifically, for our purposes, blackness. It’s something, media’s powers that be have always known. Anytime, a pop culture subgenre gets stale, send someone to America’s hoods and see what the black kids are doing. It’s mass media’s “Easy” button; we’ll see if they use it.

I meant to post this video a long time ago. It’s by Hercules and Love Affair. They’re from Brooklyn and have been kinda hot for a minute. They brought back ’90s house/club/disco, and it’s kinda dope. The group is brainchild of producer/DJ Andrew Butler, along with two vocalists and a live band. “You Belong” features guest vocals from Antony from Antony and the Johnsons. The dude who dances/vogues with them in the video, and sometimes on stage, is Shane Oliver (above pic). He’s also the Creative Director for Hood By Air. HBA did all the clothes in the video, including Hercules’ main logo tee with “Banjee” (not one of these) on it, which I believe is the old-school term for a hood-masculine gays that’s made a recent comeback with influence of hip hop and homo thugs. Anyway,  it’ll be interesting to see if Ball culture goes overground again or if just the voguing aspect is extracted and sampled again. And, if so, for how long and with how much Madonna-culture-biting will it do so?

*And, yes, I only saw Paris Is Burning for the first time a few weeks ago (STEPHANIE!).

Nomi, Antony, Kim Anne, Andrew...Hercules And Love Affair

Hood By Air...Hercules-themed wear

Willi Ninja (1961-2006)

Shane of Hood By Air

Kanye’s Pastelle Line…Pics

http://kenewest.blogspot.com/2008/08/pastelle-samples-in-vman-magazine.html

photos from latest issue of V Man magazine

courtesy of http://kenewest.blogspot.com

VMAN Magazine, Issue 11

VMan is the men’s style mag in the Visionaire family that also includes V Magazine. The previously bi-annual magazine just went quarterly, inching closer to the other big dogs of men’s fashion. I’ve read it several times and found it pretty and engaging but was never really impressed with its content. But, the latest issue is worth picking up for two small-scale but excellent reasons. It features a small piece on NAACP Chairman Julian Bond. The piece reflects upon Bond’s rise to prominence in the 1960s–as founder of SNCC and electee to the Georgia House of Representatives in 1965–as an apt comparison to that of Barack Obama. In 1968, during the election, Bond became the first African-American to be proposed as a major-party candidate for Vice President. As he was only 28, he had to decline, as the constitution’s age requirement is 35. The piece is accented by a truly dope photograph of the baby-faced Bond back in ‘68. Mad cool.

Also, featured in the magazine, making it well-worth the $5.99, is an exclusive first look at Kanye’s new clothing line Pastelle. The looks are modelled by fellow Glowers-in-the-Dark Lupe and Rhianna and Yeezy himself. Admittedly, it is a very limited look, but the line looks predictably impeccable and there are def a few hints that the line just might be as original as West’s music.

I’ma go buy it now. Perhaps some scans are forthcoming, although, I’m sure web pics will surface soon.

Design Blog…Pentagram.com

Pentagram is a design collaborative that provides design services ranging from architecture, book design, interior design, graphics, product design, and a bunch of other stuff. Their list of contributing partners is a Who’s Who of design (not that i actually recognize more than a few names), including DJ Stout, former award-winning Art Director at Texas Monthly (woop woop!) and, one of my personal design heroes, Luke Hayman.

Hayman made a name for himself designing mags like Travel + Leisure, then in 2004 took over at New York Magazine and made it absolutely gorgeous–part of a all-around make over led by new editor (2004) Adam Moss that rejuvenated a publication that had lost relevance/appeal (especially in design) since the days of Milton Glaser and the late Clay Felker.  Anyway, Hayman left New York (leaving it in the hands of former Adbusters whiz Chris Dixon) and now, as of June of this year, he’s Creative Consultant for Radar Magazine, the charmingly hard-luck magazine, now on its 3rd (!) re-launch

The section labeled “New” at Pentagram.com is a blog of the newest work that the company’s partners are involved in, individually and collectively under Pentagram.  But, because of the caliber of the partners involved, the section, by default, functions as a news blog for the design world in general.  A post back in June gave a pictorial tour of Radar Magazine’s new design, a collaboration between Hayman and Design Director Kate Elazegui. It’s really nice.

For anyone interested in what’s poppin’ in the world of design, the Pentagram blog is top-notch. Just go to Pentagram.com and click on NEWS or just dial in blog.pentagram.com.

Blag Magazine

Blag is a UK magazine I came across on the internet. I’ve never heard of it or seen it in stores.  It’s a pretty simple concept: an arts/music/film/style magazine that’s mostly interviews articulated with nice photography and slick design, with some fashion spreads interspersed. I like it, particularly the simplicity.  But, what I found really cool was that it’s run by just two people. Brit twins Sally A. and Sarah J. Edwards created Blag Magazine and its umbrella PR business, Blag Company, in the late ’90s, I believe, and they co-publish and edit the magazine themselves.  Sarah does the photo editing, Sally does the design and layout.  A quick flip through latest features online, reveals that almost every article consists of photos by Sarah J. and an interview conducted by Sally A. The company specializes in what they call “sponsored integrated content,” which sounds, from their About Us, like an alternative to having a ton of ads, a way to combine PR and publishing.  Anyway, I mostly just like the idea of a magazine run by very few people, with a super simple format/concept.  N.E.R.D.’s on the latest cover (above).

Black Swimmer Cullen Jones Rocks Gold in Beijing

A little over 15 minutes ago, USA won the Men’s 4×100 Freestyle relay, beating out the heavily favored French team (who had done some serious trash talking in the press, prior to the final) by, like, a centimeter (8 one-hundredths of a second, to be exact) in a super-dramatic come-from-behind win. Seriously, it was one of the most amazing races (in any sport) I’ve ever seen. The team smashed the world record by 4 seconds. The big story, of course, was that Olympic golden boy, Michael Phelps, who swam the lead in the relay, keeps his hope of winning 8 gold medals and beating Mark Spitz’s record alive.

But, my big story in all this is that of Cullen Jones, who as I write this, is the lone black figure on the medal podium, becoming just the second African-American ever to win a gold medal in swimming and the first to share/hold a world record. The first black swimmer to win the gold was Anthony Ervin, who tied for first in 2000 in the 50m freestyle. Interestingly, Ervin has a Jewish mother and Black and Native-American father and notably downplayed his race/ethnicity in interviews. Aside from the fact that, in his own words, he doesn’t really “look black” (very true),  Ervin said of himself, “I have always known that I am…part African-American and many other things. But I was naive, because I didn’t know that meant anything – or would have the ramifications it did at Trials.”

Hell Date

Posted in NEGROES, THE SEXE, TV with tags BET, Hell Date on August 8, 2008 by pizzarules

we all love hell date. i wanted to share with you a tidbit from the tail-end of an episode i caught today. the premise was that the female (the actor) really wanted to have a baby, and by the end of the date they are at a restaurant, and she’s trying to get the male (non-actor) to go to the bathroom and give her a donation in a plastic cup. she tries to hand him the cup, which she’s just put on a pitcher full of ice she’s just requested from the waiter. they’re fighting–she tries to hand him the cup, and it goes something like this:

female: come ON. just go to the bathroom and do it. it’ll only take a minute.

male: no.

female: come on.

male: i got another idea

female: what’s that?

male: how about i take you to the bathroom and give you the best dick of your entire life

at which point i fell out completely. keep in mind that the male is not the actor. he just said that shit on tv. what would his momma think? that’s what you call real tv.

try and catch it on rerun, you know it’ll be on for awhile.

Katy Perry Kiss My Ass

Posted in CHICKS, OUTRAGE, THE GAYS with tags Jill Sobule, Katy Perry on August 7, 2008 by pizzarules

I saw this video for the first time today and was just dis-fucking-couraged to discover it is the fake lesbian shit i thought it to be. First, there are no girl on girl kisses. In fact, she doesn’t even look at any of the models writhing behind her. they, and her, are just male eye candy, and this whole song is just a big cliched farce.

Also, I remembered another song from the 90s called I Kissed A Girl, but every time i mentioned it to someone else i got a ‘you’re confused’ look. i know you doubt my memory, but goddamit, im right this time. check out the much better song and video above.

Why The Hipster Is Killing Culture

Posted in HIPSTER (IL)LOGIC, THOUGHTS?, WHITE PEOPLE with tags Adbusters, Hipster, The Dead End of Western Civilization on August 3, 2008 by grahamgriffeyjr

The latest issue of Adbusters features an article title Hipster: The Dead End of Western Civilization.  The title pretty much speaks for itself. The piece argues that modern Hipsterdom is the last of the counter-culture movements–a vapid amalgamation of its predecessors (’60s, hip hop, punk) that subsists by rapidly consuming cultural symbols, signs, and customs, evacuating them of all socio-political meaning, and exploiting the remaining facades for their stylistic properties. The author asserts that, if new culture is to be produced, this movement must first die and bury itself.

Anyway the article is well articulated, although it would have benefited from a less condescending/accusatory tone and at least one mildly useful interview.  Here are some quotes I liked:

(1) The dance floor at a hipster party looks like it should be surrounded by quotation marks. While punk, disco and hip hop all had immersive, intimate and energetic dance styles that liberated the dancer from his/her mental states – be it the head-spinning b-boy or violent thrashings of a live punk show - the hipster has more of a joke dance. A faux shrug shuffle that mocks the very idea of dancing or, at its best, illustrates a non-committal fear of expression typified in a weird twitch/ironic twist.

(3) Hipsterdom is the first “counterculture” to be born under the advertising industry’s microscope, leaving it open to constant manipulation but also forcing its participants to continually shift their interests and affiliations…Hipsters cannot afford to maintain any cultural loyalties or affiliations for fear they will lose relevance.

(4) An amalgamation of its own history, the youth of the West are left with consuming cool rather that creating it.

(5) An artificial appropriation of different styles from different eras, the hipster represents the end of Western civilization – a culture lost in the superficiality of its past and unable to create any new meaning. Not only is it unsustainable, it is suicidal. While previous youth movements have challenged the dysfunction and decadence of their elders, today we have the “hipster” – a youth subculture that mirrors the doomed shallowness of mainstream society.

**I also wander where the Hipster intellectual fits in all of this. The college-educated faction that enjoys the same style and diversions as the crowd the article seems to indicate but is also pre-occupied with applying its similarly anti-ideological stamp on fields like literary theory, media theory, and journalism.  Whereas the hipsters in the Adbusters piece avoid their social mandate to create by simply appropriating empty styles, hipster intellectuals seem so paralyzed (be it by fear or indifference) by the writer/intellectual’s obligation to generate new ideas that they retreat into cynical regurgitation of their favorite authors and generally stick to a self-obsessed, (not to be confused with “self-aware”) homogenous, blog/memoir-like vein of writing.

Go West

Posted in CHICKS, INDIE ROCK, WHITE PEOPLE with tags Liz Phair on July 29, 2008 by pizzarules

And it feels like I’ve got something to prove
But in some ways it’s just something to do
My friends turn me around and say,
“You go west, young man.”

Stepping down off my platform shoes
Sixty-nine in the afternoon
And I’m waiting for someone in the know
Like Pirner tells me on the radio
Says “Take it from someone who’s been there before,
You go west, young man.”

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