On March 8, 2010 my good friend, Matt Roff (Southpaw, Franklin Park Public Assembly) will open a new burger joint on Franklin Ave. in Brooklyn. The restaurant, Dutch Boy Burger, will be accessible through the main bar at Franklin Park as well as the storefront entrance on Franklin Ave. The food options are nothing less than amazing. You’re all in for a treat. I’ve had the honor of working on his menu designs and some other pieces of collateral and we’re printing these today. I thought I’d give a little peak. We’re hitting them with the sometimes nasty, but in this case vintagey-lookin’ Copperplate Gothic and the utilitarian master font Futura. I can’t wait to see these printed and dripping with burger grease. Congrats to Matty who is just one of those guys who gets things done. This looks destined to be another huge success.
Here’s my first color roll of film with the little Poketo Slim Angel Wide Angle. These turned out exactly as I had hoped and it’s so amazing to see the difference in the light between NYC and LA. I love NYC, but look at the February weather in LA.
Lately, I’ve been getting back into shooting film which I haven’t done in years. John Moshay turned got me excited about it when he showed me some of his shots one time I was out in LA and convinced me to buy a Lomo Diana. Since then, I’ve dusted off my old Nikon and I also purchased this little Poketo Slim Angel Wide Angle Camera. It’s really nice to carry around as it fits in your jacket pocket and the 35mm film is a little more consistent than the 120. I love the vignetting around the edges and the clarity in some of these shops especially the Pittsburgh Paints sign and then 659 on this stoop in Park Slope. As my days in NYC are numbered I am trying to take as many shots as possible. These little film cameras are making photography feel a little more exciting for me. There is that anticipation again about what a shot is going to look like which never really happens anymore with digital.
A few months ago I found this red Lomolito sitting in a cabinet in my studio. It still had about a dozen shots left on it so I took with me to the farmer’s market at Grand Army Plaza and took some shots there as well as in Prospect Park. Some of the ones turned out pretty well. I find with these disposal lomo cameras you get a lot more grain on the photos which I like, but the color are less unpredictable and saturated as your standard Lomo. Regardless, I think you get four disposals for about $12. If you put the little colored lens over the flash it is supposed to put a filter on the images. This worked best with the green one while the yellow filter made everyone look really sick.
Here are a handful of photos taken with my Lomo Diana. They’re all from Half Moon Bay – one of my favorite places on Earth and home to my favorite meal on Earth: The Dungeness Crab Sandwich at Barbara’s Fish Trap.
I didn’t buy a lot of music this year. I seemed to continue to backtrack through old stuff that has slipped through the cracks. However, thanks to some kind friends and great websites I managed to stay a tiny bit connected. I think I only saw a few shows: The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Vetiver, and The Radio Dept.. Not a great year for live music and me. So, here’s a list in no particular order. I also tried to include some LaLa’s links to a song or snippet. Support these artists. Buy their music.
Tap Tap – On My Way My friend, James Dugan, introduced me to the band Hefner back in the mid-90s. They are without question my “most favorite” band. Thanks James. Last year, he introduced to Tap Tap’s debut which was incredible. It’s hard to believe the follow-up that came out this year, On My Way, is even better. It takes a while to grow on you, but when it does you’re hooked. Feels like the Kinks at times, but with a more home-made sound. It was, according to my itunes, my most played record of 2009. I couldn’t find a legal stream of one of their new songs, so here’s a track from the debut entitle 100,000 Thoughts. Buy it here.
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The XX – XX I kept hearing about this album and finally downloaded it. On first listen it didn’t do much for me, but it turned out to be something I played almost daily while working. It’s minimal, poppy, sometimes sonic – a real dreamy record that you don’t tire of. It was also Rough Trade’s album of the year – so there’s some cred for you. Buy it here.
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Devendra Banhart – What Will We Be He’s been one of my favorites for years now and this is one of his best. Really interesting song arrangements, beautiful lyrics and completely bizarre in parts. Great stuff. Buy it here.
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Woods – Songs of Shame I heard their cover of Graham Nash’s “Military Madness” on East Village Radio and was immediately intrigued. The 1971 Nash album Songs for Beginners is one of my all-time favorites and the cover Woods did was great. Soon after I picked this up and listened to it for a good chunk of the summer. It feels really outdoorsy, sun-kissed and homemade. Buy it here.
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Girls – Album My one friend called this album the pinnacle of hipster drivel. Perhaps? The video for “Lust for Life” looks like a Terry Richardson low budget video. However, the song is probably the song I had stuck in my head most of the year other than the various Sesame Street songs embedded in my brain thanks to my 2 year-old son. The rest of the album is nowhere as fantastic as “Lust for Life”, but still a solid piece of work. Buy it here.
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Sharon Van Etten – Because I was in Love Yet another minimal modern folk record. Although, this one comes with astonishingly full vocals. Sharon’s voice is haunting. The songs are all lyrically rich and her range surpasses many of her contemporaries. I am surprised this wasn’t on more lists I read. I couldn’t find a legal stream for her, but you can download an mp3 from the great Brooklyn Vegan site. Buy it here.
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Built to Spill – There is No Enemy It’s amazing that the best band in the Pacific NW in 2009 is the same band that was the best band in the Pacific NW in the late 90s. A lot of people will argue with that, but Built to Spill put out their best record since Perfect From Now On. My only regret was not seeing them live this year. Fantastic record that gets better with every listen. The best thing to come out of Idaho since the potato. Buy it here.
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Harper Simon – Harper Simon I love Simon & Garfunkel. I “celebrate their entire catalog.” Paul Simon is one of my favorite songwriters and his voice is pure bliss. Harper Simon, his 37 year-old talented son, sounds a hell of a lot like a young Paul. This record was, for me, almost like a new Paul Simon record (from back in the day as they say). The melodies are catchy and there is some great harmonizing in the production. Paul co-wrote two tracks, but don’t take anything away from Harper. Definitely one of the hidden gems of the year. Buy it here.
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Vetiver – Tight Knit The second Vetiver album, To Find Me Gone, is one of my all-time favorites and, sadly, this one doesn’t get too close to that. It is still, however, a terrific album full of beautiful melodies that make me dream of the West Coast. It’s timeless really as the sounds hark back to the early 70s. Definitely a record for warm Summer nights. Buy it here.
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City Center – City Center I don’t know much about this band but I read comparisons to Panda Bear and Atlas Sound as well as got to hear some samples over on the ISO50 site. It quickly became my album of choice when on a plane. Luckily, I did a lot of flying this year so I was able to listen to this quite a bit. It puts you to sleep in a good way – broken beats and rhythms with some nice folky pieces thrown in for good measure. Buy it here.
It’s our last Winter in New York City. The first snowfall of the season is always the best. It’s so beautiful out. No one seems angry or agro right now – just lots of people out walking around, catching snowflakes on their tongues and pulling kids in sleds. Cars drive slowly and are courteous. The city seems soft. It all changes 24 hours later when everything turns slushy and grey, but for that first little bit you forget where you are. It’s that perfect kind of snow like soft confetti that sticks and mounts up perfectly. I’m looking forward to taking Jack out for some sledding in the AM – his first time. I’ll miss this next year. So, I figured I’d dust off the tripod and head across the street to Prospect Park to take some pics.
New Year’s Eve is just around the corner and I just finished up the poster for the New Year’s Eve bash at Franklin Park. You’ve got some leaf clusters thinking they’re fireworks up in the sky of this poster and everything else is just as it seems. Happy early New Year – is this decade really over?
My wife sent us this email to her close friends after our beloved old cat, Gatto, passed away.
Gatto passed away this weekend. She lost her life to cancer.
Thank you for your compassion, patience, calls, texts, emails, and listening to me over the past few months. It has not been easy to watch her lose her fight against cancer. Though, she did put up a good fight and hung in there as long as she could. She was one tough kitty.
Gatto is one of those rare animals that is more human than cat. She is funny and wise, lovable and irritable, cuddly and loving, and above all she is very loyal. She loves eating turkey, playing hide and go seek and fetch, and making the bed. She sits on a chair at the table and joins us for meals. She adores Jon and Jack. She is even nicknamed Jack’s “night nurse” as she helped me take care of him at all hours of the night. She is his baby monitor.
Gatto is my beloved pet, companion, greatest love, and really, truly my best friend. I will miss her every day for the rest of my life.
My dad grew up swimming and surfing on Muizenberg Beach in Cape Town and it’s still one of the best places you can swim in the World except for the numerous shark attacks. I came across this great photo of Muizenberg’s colorful changing rooms on Flickr. The photo credit belongs to Wayne Champion.
