February | 2011 | ChinaShop

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Art/Design Gallery Angouleme is the Anti-San Diego

February 7, 2011 - 8:30 am

What do we know about big American comic cons? We know they are held in convention centers, deafening places filled with bright lights and berber carpeting. We know they are dominated by huge media companies. We know they are filled with socially awkward fanboys.

Well, Angouleme International Comics Festival, the largest comics con in the Western hemisphere and the crown jewel of the French bandes-dessines scene, is nothing like that at all.

Picture if you will a charming medevial town, filled with cheese, fine wines and sexy fire-eaters. In this town there are a number of comic-filled tents. And the comics they showcase are the most experimental, badass, lavishly printed, dirty, existentially questioning, silly and odd comics in the world. Except for one tent filled with superheros, which is tiny and sort of shoved into the corner. That’s what Angouleme is like.

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Gallery Music Young Jesus: The Second Coming

by Nicole Pajer

February 7, 2011 - 8:17 am

Young Jesus might consider themselves to be an average bunch of Joe’s from the Midwest, but Red Bull thinks they’re pretty sweet. The Chicago-based band won an opportunity to go head to head against Brighton MA in a national showdown called Rock The Route. Touring across Route 66, the bands competed every stop along the tour and earned points based on performance, fan interaction, fan base, and overall rock factor. A slew of celebrity judges, like the band’s new arch nemesis, the Shiny Toy Guns, offered their feedback and fans also texted in to cast their votes. At the end of the competition, Brighton MA slid into first but Young Jesus had a hell of a ride along the way.

I caught up with the guys at Red Bulls Studios where they were recording two new songs. The guys bum rushed the break room fridge and stocked up on Red Bulls, I slammed an energy shot, and then it was officially Rock The Route story time.

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Film The Green Hornet and The Dilemma

by Carter Jung

February 7, 2011 - 7:54 am

After a lackluster holiday season, two films are in theaters that are worth checking out: The Green Hornet and The Dilemma. Surprisingly still, both have something in common. “But wait,” you’re probably thinking. “One is a remake from an old radio serial turned TV show about a crime fighter and the other is about couples.” Yes, on the surface the two seemingly have little to nothing to do with each other except for their shared release day. So am I trippin’ balls? Nope. At least, not yet.

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Film Fridays Bill Murray Delays Ghostbusters 3 (Again) and More Dark Knight Rumors

by Jeff Nau

February 4, 2011 - 6:25 pm

In movie and film news, Bill Murray has officially halted production on Ghostbusters 3. This is nothing new:

“Harold [Ramis] tells a very funny story about the several months it took to get Bill to read the script for Groundhog Day,” says a source behind the production. “Every week or so, [Bill] would go up to Harold and say, “You know, I read 10 pages… they’re really good. Is it going to stay this good?” The source went on to say: “He hasn’t even read 10 pages [of Ghostbusters 3] yet, to the best of our knowledge.”

Read on for more movie news and nifty Superbowl ads…

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Music Mandy’s Music Mail 2/4/11

by Amanda Boyd

February 4, 2011 - 11:20 am

I instantly loved The Kills from the moment I first heard them (many moons ago now). Something about their gritty sound that just, in my opinion, exudes pure rock and sex and I can’t get enough of it. Have seen them a few times live (along with The Dead Weather) and have yet to see another chick on stage who’s as sexy or badass as Alison Mosshart. Here’s the first single off their forthcoming album Blood Pressures (out in the UK on April 4^th and the U.S. on April 5^th) entitled “Satellite”. Per The Kills website: For fans of the street hassle swagger and sass that has come to be associated with THe Kills, it’s still alive and well in their new material, but with an added depth and thoughtfulness which is undoubtedly reflected in the at, at times, frankly heartbreaking lyrics. The Kills haven’t disposed of their edgy rock identity, they’ve merely built upon it and created something even more special.

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Music Talib Kweli’s Road Rules

by Soren Baker

February 4, 2011 - 11:18 am

Talib Kweli learned an important lesson on the road. Before the Brooklyn MC broke out with Reflection Eternal, Black Star with Mos Def or embarked upon a successful solo career, he saw the importance of visiting places beyond the New York state line.

“Traveling has definitely enabled me to appreciate other cultures musically, even cultures within hip-hop, whether it’s Down South, Midwest, West Coast,” says Kweli, whose new album, Gutter Rainbows, is due in stores today (January 25) and features the song “Mr. International,” which details his life on the road. “Me working with Hi-Tek early in my career and spending a lot of time in Cincinnati really opened me up. When I was first in Cincinnati, they were listening to a lot of E-40. E-40’s Federal was the album that they were on. Then it moved from the West Coast with E-40 and Spice 1 and Dr. Dre influence to a Down South influence with the rise of Master P.”

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Film Oscar Nomination for Banksy’s “Exit Through the Gift Shop”

by Richard S. Chang

February 3, 2011 - 10:35 am

We are firmly entrenched in awards season, though it could just as well be called Banksy season.

The famously incognito British artist is getting all sorts of accolades for his film “Exit Through the Gift Shop,” a documentary (or mock documentary, or neither) on a French filmmaker-turned-street artist, Thierry Guetta, aka Mr. Brainwash. The film is nominated for a BAFTA Award, and recently won the top prize at the Cinema Eye Awards.

And now it can add an Oscar nod.
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Music For Dee-1, Music Has A Mission

by Soren Baker

February 3, 2011 - 9:58 am

Though the South spawned such top-notch lyricists as Scarface, Big Mike, 8Ball & MJG and OutKast in the 1980s and 1990s, the region was never regarded as a lyrical hotbed. Lil Wayne is doing his best to correct this wrong.

Dee-1 may be next in line. The New Orleans rapper set the Internet ablaze in late 2010 with “Jay, 50, and Weezy,” an inventive cut where he imagined a conversation he would have with each artist. But rather than just begging to be signed, Dee-1 saluted each rapper before pointing out ways they could help their communities and the rap community.

Virtually instantly, Dee-1 became a rare Southern MC: a rapper known for his lyrics, his creativity and his musical agenda. “When you have a calling and a mission, it doesn’t matter where you’re from,” Dee-1 says today. “I think it’s just all about exposure to people and that’s what I’m focusing on, just getting exposure to people. I think that regardless of me being from New Orleans, being from the South, whatever people might label me as, I think it’s just a connection that people are going to make to my purpose and to my movement. So I don’t think that geography is going to matter.”

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Music Lee Fields: Soul Survivor

by Shop Keeper

February 3, 2011 - 9:56 am

Lee Fields is a self-described “Blues and Soul Man,” and judging by his passion for both, it’s easy to see how he made a name for himself: “The spirit is what binds everything,” Fields proclaims. “The spirit is always in mine. What I mean by that is that you’re singing from your soul, singing with your heart.” On Red Bull Music Academy Radio‘s Fireside Chat, Fields hits the ground running with his 1970s hit “Let’s Talk it Over,” the soundtrack to a man whose soulmate has just walked out the door — a situation perhaps best summed up by Fields himself who asserts that “if you got nothing to say to each other, than it’s done. It’s a done deal. That’s what the song is about.” Fields then goes guides the listener through some of his favorite and most inspirational tracks, spending extra time on Kool & The Gang’s “Jungle Boogie.” Watching K&TG at an early age made a huge impact on him, and was reason enough to inspire the lad to explore the dense musical terrain of soul and blues even then. What you love most about the guy is how dedicated he’s been over the past 30 + years, because here’s a guy that never struck it rich — and despite some impressive tracks that could have rivaled even some of the best of his time, flew under the radar and stayed alive. Disappointed by the onset of electronic music at the beginning of the eighties, Fields found it difficult to play clubs, and took to Real Estate, but still has manage to churn out albums over the years, keeping it going all this time.

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Art/Design Featured Gallery Cirque Berzerk: Welcome to Death’s Cabaret

by Nicole Pajer and Zoetica Ebb

February 2, 2011 - 11:11 am

Typical circus acts and themed cirque du soleil have been done so many times but none have dared to push the limits the way that Cirque Berzerk does. Affectionately referred to by many as “Tim Burton’s ideal nightmare,” Cirque Berzerk is a sexy Death-themed traveling circus, which experiments with edgy burlesque, saucy cabaret, alluring aerial acrobatics, daring fire eating, extreme contortion, and immoral temptation.

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