Afro Monk

Art Basel is coming on up in Miami and plan to post some more things listed under art. I love with art and design come together with music. Audiowood is a company that is producing some incredible designs of turntables.

You can check out some more of Audiowood’s creative work at their website.
They also got some matching iPod docks. Audiowood Site

I’ve always been into visuals ever since I started downloading my first Mp3s and using WinAMP. I’ll never forget the days of just staring at WhiteCap. WinAMP had all sorts of fun plug-ins for visuals.

That was many many years ago. Now with all the fun gear that has been developed you can do some pretty intense stuff. Now there are deticated VJs who soles job is to take care of visuals.

The Menace to Sobriety consist of DJ Mitch Mitchem & VJ Roach. They are a team located in Tampa and are taking advantage of using visuals. I met Mitch back when I use to goto USF. These guys aren’t just assigning music videos to each track played, Roach and Mitch work together so this is a live experience more so than a pre-planned set of videos. It’s great to see real detication on their part truly syncing themselves together and not just have any visuals up on the screen.

Check out more of their videos they have online on their YouTube Channel.

They are currently taking bookings bookings@themenacetosobriety.com

I’m a big fan of vinyl toys. Ever since I saw the customizable Munny’s, I totally dug the whole customize culture.

There are many toy designers out there but one stands out of the crowd, Julie West.

Julie West has a definite unique style and theme with all her work. She is not limited in toy design but also creates beautiful illustrations and prints. Although her style is very feminine I can appreciate her work and see how many women around the world collect her work.

We are lucky enough to have Julie West in town this week-end for a solo show at Pink Ghost! The event is October 24th at 7pm. She will be signing her art book at the store. Be sure to check it out!

For more information and directions check out the Pink Ghost site.
Also if you want to check out some of Julie West‘s work online visit her site as well.

Videos like this make me happy. Something about sound and visuals just make so much sense to me. The extra layer of digital visuals just blows my mind. I have fond memories of spending hours staring at Electric Sheep or iTunes visualizer while listen to some of my favorite albums. What I really like about this is how it changes based on what is heard by the microphone. Keep in mind this installation has been put in a hotel in Brussels. Would love to fly out with a lovely woman friend and check it out. The installation is called Disturb Me.

Here is another piece of artwork that is mind blowing. Anything to do with light and design intrigues me. This is an installation done at a park called Sonumbra. It reacts to people playing underneath it creating magnificent light patterns.

The Sonumbra was featured in one of the MOMA exhibits and also being show in this years London Design Festival. It reacts and plays sounds to the objects around it. The Loop.pH group created it mainly for remote locations to provide interaction, light, and sound for interactivity in empty areas. Here is a link to a video of it in action. Sonumbra Video

The Cat Piano is a short film directed by Eddie White and Ari Gibson. It has won many awards already. The short film is narrated by well known artist Nick Cave. The film originates from a poem written by Eddie White.

I’m all about short films and this one is great. No longer than 10min of your time. Beautiful music and exceptional performance by Nick Cave. The color hues are warm and give that true beatniks environment. Enjoy!

Jessica Doyle is one of those artist that when you see her work you just get a warm sensation from. Her prints are extremely intricate and have this complex yet simple style to them.

This year I was shown her work for what I thought was the first time yet it seemed so familiar to me. I later realized that back when I lived in Brickell with Nichole, she had one of her prints on the fridge. Ever since that moment I’ve associated Jessica Doyle’s artwork as something that is comforting.

Jessica’s work is lovely and something that could piece a room together with simple small prints. Her themes are extremely creative and range from mushrooms to fishes to seasons. It almost makes you want to place a series of each theme in each individual room. I will say even as a man the work is appealing to the eye despite the clear feminine style to it. I never told Nichole no that’s too girlie to put on our fridge because I don’t think if you’re a man or woman you won’t stop stare at the patterns and attention to detail. One of the best and worst parts is that her artwork comes in small prints. This makes it affordable to anyone who’d want to add a little life to certain area of home or office but at same time I wish some of her work would be available in larger sizes but I figure that’s why most of her work comes with four prints.

Go support this beautiful artist and order some prints. I was surprised how much you could get for simple $20. She’s simply a lovely person and artist. You can follower her on Etsy, twitter, facebook, etc… all on her blog – Jessica Doyle

This is something that has really blown me away. I had the pleasure of speaking to one of the guys behind this project. I lost all the stuff I had written down for this but this is just a teaser of what these guys are working on. My hat goes off to them for all the hard work they putting into this. Things like this help push music to another level creating another layer of experience the body takes in while out in a club besides the sense of hearing.

I think this is the appropriate time to post this because tomorrow Nosaj Thing will be preforming with his new visual experiment as well. Big up to the New Zealand crew for this! I lost the URL to the project but I’ll be updating you all on this project as it progresses.

Check out some more stuff from the NZ gang at: Speed of Sound

Designer Charlie Pyott has come up with a portable record player, the Lino. As a recent adopter of vinyl this seem extremely appealing. Not very practical for audio quality but something I’d possibly look into if had reasonable price tag.

The way it works is visually shown above. Two cables come out of the device, USB and Audio. The USB could power the unit via computer/laptop or power outlet. The audio cables I assume would be set of RCA’s on the opposite side.

This thing would turn any coffee table or flat service into a turntable. I’m going to say that this device is probably a terrible idea for scratching and DJing. Could be useful for a DJ though if get some freshly cut vinyl from a producer and want to check it out on the fly.

Hope to see this for sale one day…

Check out more of his designs:  Charlie Pyott

Bomb It – The Movie

I Love artwork. I consider most graffiti art.
My personal view of some graffiti is vandalism.
When you bomb private locations I consider it vandalism.
The idea that some people do it for vandalism makes sense but it’s destruction.
One in my eyes should promote life not destruction yet life is cruel.
I pay more respect to the artist side of the culture than the idea of anarchy.
With that said though public space should be public space.

This movie puts a lot of perspective on it.
They try to show both sides but obviously bias.
Hope you enjoy it!

Big up to Barcelona!
That was the most impressive to me…

Here are a few images that were recently taken in California.
What created these beautiful images and patterns in the sky?

Rockets.

This is the residue of missiles in the clouds.
Apparently this is caused by unburned fuel particles from the rockets.
Once entered into the atmosphere it freezes and then spreads out due because it reaches the less dense upper atmosphere.