Jay-Z Is A Genius offers some interesting insights into the rapper’s latest album art, and how it reflects his overall message of authenticity and lack of fakery (the pic appears to be Photoshopped, but it’s actually real paint covering the instruments).
The blogger calling himself The Last Psychiatrist manages to touch on the irony of representing authenticity via a real pic that creates the illusion of being an illusion, but he engages in a discussion of the message of authenticity and eschewing digital manipulation without mentioning “Death of Autotune” even once. Weird.
“Rapper’s Delight” turns 30. Generally considered the first rap song (and the one that introduced “hip hop” as a phrase), the Sugarhill Gang’s breakthrough hit introduced a new era in music, even if it took a few years for “mainstream” (read, “white”) audiences to realize it.
I’m not sure when I realized hip-hop was the new thing in music, but at some point I remember pondering what the next big thing would be (e.g. after punk and new wave laid the foundation for the ’80s), and then suddenly realizing I’d been listening to it for a while already.
My Lottery Garage: Lotus Elan S3 This one would be nice (it’s got 171 horsepower, not bad for a car that weighs less than 1500 lbs). But really any Elan would do, even a bone-stock version.
In Legislating From My Bench a concert pianist creates a health-care plan for concert pianists. Lots of inside-baseball jokes, but still pretty hilarious even for a general audience:
“Pianists shall be insured against the possibility of bad hotel room service meals, particularly against Midwestern Alfredo Sauce; but also not-entirely-unfrozen Mozzarella Sticks; and any boneless chicken breast which has been grilled more than fifteen (15) minutes. For each incidence of the foregoing, the pianist will be permitted one preposterous head-toss during the course of the concert; or one inappropriate flirtation with a member of the orchestra with which he or she is appearing, whichever comes first.” (via Sippey)
Nice Miata review from Autoblog The folks there obviously understand what makes the Miata great — it’s not impressive, or flashy, or prestigious, it’s just all kinds of fun to drive. That’s not the new Miata pictured above, obviously. It’s the car they compare it to. And they mean it as a compliment. And they’re right.
(pimped out Little Tikes Cozy Coupe image via DaddyTypes.com)
A nice little list from Wired that points up the way every generation rolls their eyes at the previous generation, only to have the next generation roll their eyes at them.
My favorite: “4. Well, the screens were bigger, but they only showed the movies at certain times of day.”
Another good one: “9. Is that the new iPhone 27G? Got multitasking yet?”
Well, maybe not overthinking, exactly, but A flood of flat-sevenths gets really, really deep into the music theory behind the Beatles’ music, particularly in the mid-’60s, between the early mop-top pop era and before the psychedelia of “Sgt. Pepper” and later. (via Kung Fu Grippe)
Adam Baer of Glass Shallot tries to book a “staycation” in his native L.A. via Priceline.com, with really interesting results. You may think, halfway through the first page (of 3), that you have a sense of what you’re going to be reading, but at the very end of that page you’ll begin to see the twist.
I don’t want to spoil the surprise, but the moral is that the best thing to bring on a vacation — or “staycation” — is your own sense of fun.
Irony, to a T: Is it possible to criticize the overthinking of T-shirt slogans, without engaging in the overthinking of T-shirt slogans? Maybe. I don’t know any way to do so. And neither does the author of this nevertheless-entertaining Gelf Magazine article. The full “evolution” chart (excerpted above) is definitely worth a look.
The birth of “Born to Run”“I’m still fiddling with the words for the new single, but I think it will be good.” — that’s Bruce Springsteen talking about the song “Born to Run,” the title track of what Slate calls “his first masterpiece.” The article provides lots of interesting and juicy details about the album’s history (including early versions of the words he was “fiddling with”)), even if it’s occasionally slightly out of touch with Springsteen (at one point it says of his early work that “previously it seemed as if he had a rhyming dictionary open beside him” when for at least one song — “Blinded By the Light” — he did in fact have one beside him).
Jay-Z Is A Genius offers some interesting insights into the rapper’s latest album art, and how it reflects his overall message of authenticity and lack of fakery (the pic appears to be Photoshopped, but it’s actually real paint covering the instruments).
