Lot's Wife

Joanna Newsom, "Sawdust & Diamonds"

The voice has been reigned in while any songwriting restraint has been let go-- Ys is an overindulgent, audacious album. And a very good one.
Sample lyrics:

I wasn't born of a whistle or milked from a thistle at twilight
No, I was all horns and thorns, sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright
So: enough of this terror
We deserve to know light
And grow evermore lighter and lighter
You would have seen me through
But I could not undo that desire

I mean,  normally I would slap someone that wrote that. But, then again, I would imagine a kind of b-rated Vashti Bunyan-wannabe delivery: breathy vocals, maybe some wind chimes. But Newsom belts this shit out, it crescendos and climaxes in a gorgeous melody that springs out of nowhere... I guess I would describe it as having "sprung out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright," except someone already used that one.
Download sawdust_diamonds.mp3

Altman

I'm thinking tonight is a good night for some moody Gosford Park.

Down With Zobots

Good work Nicole. She can't hurt you anymore.

(Celebrity Week via Gawker)

Grrrrrrr!!

  OK we all know I LOVES me some bears. There is nothing funnier in this world. And I mean that in a "funny-mmm-mmm-good-laugh-while-we-fuck" kind of way. Two time CFDA runners up Jeffrey Costello and Robert Tagliapietra are just non-stop.

Their clothes are gorgeously not Bearish.

I just love that this HyperAmericanMasculinity thing is so played out in such the opposite way. Tongues firmly in cheek. Except for mine, which is licking my lips.

FourFour praises Chunk.

I praise RUGGED EXCESS.

Dial: Set to Swoon

Though it pained me to leave my early twenties yesterday, it was made easier thanks to the BFFs. Try to imagine, if you will, people so paralyzingly gorgeous and talented that to be around them is that strangest of potions: completely intimidating... and completely non-stop-boner-ville. If you imagined correctly, you imagined my friends.

Perhaps I love them for understanding the genius of the man. (why is he brooding so?)

Who could have guessed that heaven is a crisp, white button up?

Edge(s)

I'll talk all day about my love of post-near-death Sam Francis if you'll let me:

Jen Graves reminded me of Morris Louis, another stark-color-is-more-than-colorist-and-white-canvas-is arresting genius of abstraction/post-abstraction:

oh sigh.

5) Junya Watanabe

I briefly wrote about this collection awhile ago; Robin Givhan's article  about being made anonymous in clothes/masks is a great read.

Junya Watanabe's alarming collection is great in its juxtaposition between being a comment about terror and violence and about clothes that are actually very wearable and beautifully made.

Of course it is somewhat, if not entirely, disingenuous that much credit be given to luxury fashion when it decides to be political. "War is scary! People are dying! Buy this $2,000 trench coat!" It's ridiculous and not a true act of defiance or activism.

However, it is vital that conceptual design not be wholly removed from the culture and politics of the day. Side-by-side, Watanabe's collection seems more vital than, say, Valentino, because the clothes don't look like they are ignoring the world.

The other reasons Watanabe's collection resonates this season are more superficial: layers of street warrior aesthetic in combat green just look really damn good. Those punked out boots are super sexy.

Xiu Xiu "Save Me Save Me"

It's been raining for, what, like a million days in a row? It's time to break out Xiu Xiu.
The new album  doesn't have big standouts like Fabulous Muscles or Knife Play, but it doesn't have any glaringly bad songs either (I love most Xiu Xiu, but there is always a stinker or two that makes listening to their albums from beginning to end a no-go).

"Save Me Save Me" is the should-have-been-could-still-be single.

pic is from Xiu Xiu's lovely website.

Download save_me_save_me.mp3

6) Proenza Schouler

At what points do 1969, 1992 and 2006 intersect? I have no idea!
It could be on the touch generous side, but I think Lazaro Hernandez and Jack McCollough understood their references perfectly--  and made their best collection yet.
In interviews, they ooohed and ahhhed about loving the "naivete" in the work of Cy Twombly and Mark Rothko. They wanted to expand those prints and pallets into rigorous and structured tailoring for a line that is very much out of the early 90's-- and very, very much about what is current. Despite the influences coming from decades past, there is nothing romanticized about those histories.
Nostalgia is not present thanks mainly to the period of Twombly and Rothko from which they borrowed. This is not actually a period of naivete or reactive expression. This is '69: Twombly's scribbles are larger, more alone. They look tired, weary. This is Rothko right before suicide. The pieces that are present in this collection appear to be from the Rothko Chapel. This is his weightiest, saddest work.
the refrences:

That Hernandez and McCollough have such ability to reign in large, fully and previously realized work is surprising and effective. The prints have been deconstructed and paneled into gorgeous and challenging cuts.
So were the boys of Proenza Schouler themselves being naive? And, because of the success of the clothes, lucky? I don't think so. These are smart guys. The sophistication in the influences, and the end results of the clothes, speak volumes about how important these young designers are to American fashion.

But I LOVE Ed Bradley!

Fuck!