Slug of Atmosphere Answers Valentines Day Questions

Valentine’s Day is right up there with National Talk Like a Pirate Day in terms of its lasting impact on our day-to-day existence. Or so we thought, until we heard about Slug’s recent interview with the A.V. Club, in which he answered 14 questions from readers on crushes, marriage, pick-up lines, and people who burst into tears after sex. Always a ham, the Minneapolis-based rapper and one-half of hip-hop duo Atmosphere gave readers some hilarious, sometimes insightful advice on the ups and downs of love.

Click here to read the interview.

Atmosphere’s When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold is out April 22 on Rhymesayers.

Cut Copy Announces North American Tour

Melbourne, Australia’s Cut Copy will head Stateside in March, hitting major cities in the U.S. and Canada, including a couple SXSW appearances and one performance at Coachella. The ’80s-influenced trio’s In Ghost Colours will be released on Modular April 8, and the band will be playing new tunes from the album. Best to snap up some tickets now, as certain shows are already sold out. Chop, chop.

Tour Dates
03/10 Los Angeles, CA: Echo*
03/12 Austin, TX: Karma Lounge (SXSW)
03/13 Austin, TX: Mohawk (SXSW)
03/17 New York, NY: Mercury Lounge*
04/25 Indio, CA: Coachella
04/26 San Francisco, CA: Mezzanine
04/28 Portland, OR: Doug Fir Lounge
04/29 Vancouver, BC: Richards on Richards
04/30 Seattle, WA: Neumo’s
05/02 Salt Lake City, UT: Urban Lounge
05/03 Denver, CO: Larimer Lounge
05/05 Omaha, NE: Waiting Room
05/06 Minneapolis, MN: 7th Street Entry
05/07 Chicago, IL: The Abbey Pub
05/08 Detroit, MI: Magic Stick
05/09 Toronto, ON: Lee’s Palace
05/10 Montreal, QC: Cabaret Musee Juste Pour Rine
05/12 Boston, MA: Paradise
05/15 Washington, DC: Black Cat
05/16 Philadelphia, PA: Pure
05/17 Baltimore, MD: Sonar

*Sold Out

Ghislain Poirier, Aaron LaCrate, Scratch Remix Yoav Single

Ghislain Poirier, Andre Allen Anjos (Remix Artist Collective), Human beat-boxer Scratch (The Roots), and Aaron LaCrate are the chosen ones to remix South African-born producer Yoav‘s track, “Club Thing,” off the recently released Charmed & Strange.

The wide variety of remix styles here–from Poirier’s bumping leftfield beats to LaCrate’s Bmore-style interpretation–are fitting for the digital release, whose original version is as influenced by the club as it is by Crowded House and Portishead. Listen to the tracks here, and watch the video for the original “Club Thing.”

Tracklisting
1. “Club Thing” (Album Version)
2. “Club Thing” (RAC Remix)
3. “Club Thing” (Ghislain Poirier Remix)
4. “Club Thing” (Scratch Remix)
5. “Club Thing” (Aaron LaCrate’s Gutter Mix)
6. “Club Thing” (Acappella)

Photo by Emilie Elizabeth.

Ghostland Observatory “Dancin’ On My Grave”

Ghostland Observatory has made a name for itself over the last few years crafting rock music powered by a torrent of electronic beats, and the Texan duo will soon unleash its third full-length, Robot Majestique, on February 26. For the occasion, Aaron Behrens and Thomas Turner have prepared this raw, feedback-laden remix of the album’s track, “Dancin’ On My Grave.”

Dancin’ On My Grave (Let There Be Vinyl Remix)

Singer Unhistories

Feed Slint, Comets on Fire, and Pink Floyd into a shredder and you come near to the experimental rock of Singer, a quartet whose four bizarros share vocal duties as well as fractured guitar epics. But their self-conscious artistry also has a sense of humor: “Please, Tell the Justices We’re Fine” and “Slow Ghosts” are tinkering experiments in weird that will make you smile. Meanwhile, “Oh Dusty” is a slow-burning masterwork of pained axe mastery, and “Dumb Smoke” brings the riffage as well as the math. Singers are brain teasers for sure; you could tell that from the titles. But they’re as fun as Bardo Pond and The Starlite Mints–worth it, in other words.

The Perceptionists’ Akrobatik Announces New Album

A while has passed since hearing from Def Jux hip-hop trio The Perceptionists, but recent news on group member Akrobatik‘s new album proves they are alive and well, just busy with other work.

The Boston-based rapper will release Absolute Value–the follow-up his 2003 solo album Balance–on February 19, and judging from the extensive list of guest artists, the release should vary widely in style and please hip-hop fans of many tastes.

Hezekiah, 9th Wonder, J-Zone, and the late J. Dilla contribute to the production aspect of the album, while Talib Kweli, Chuck D, Mr. Lif, and Little Brother join Akrobatik on the lyrical side, examining a wide array of topics that stretch from life on the road to Black America’s continuing struggle.

“Put Ya Stamp On It,” with Talib Kweli, has been announced as the album’s first single. A full tracklisting will follow shortly.

FriendsWithYou Teams Up with Santogold for Zune Arts

The latest visual artist/musician team to take on the Zune Arts film series (which has previously seen contributions from Motion Theory, Yuko Shimizu, Maps, Ratatat, and others) is Miami-based collective FriendsWithYou and Santogold, who have collaborated on the film Tickle Party.

The film concerns the adventures of two fluffy white creatures and a monster who cries rubies that eventually sprout into a Jack and the Beanstalk-style tree. FriendsWithYou used a blend of stop motion, puppetry, and 3D elements for the film, which is set to Santogold’s bumping “Say Aha” track. Zune brand marketing manager Rob Schaltenbrand notes that “the music of Santogold pairs really well with the creative vision for FriendsWithYou in the film,” and really, there is something fun about seeing 3D animation characters shake some booty and send out the positive message of caring over cruelty.

The truly fanatic can head to Zune Arts’ download section and send the film as a Valentine’s day e-card.

Read more on FriendsWithYou.

Fighting: Inking Through Darkness

In the hands of lesser men, a palette of skulls and evil Vikings, daggers and ’70s-inspired hippie nature themes would come together like some bad t-shirt display at Urban Outfitters.

That Fighting whips these elements into collages and illustrations that are timeless rather than trendy is a feat–one that wouldn’t be possible if not for the duo’s keen eye and serious drawing abilities.

Fighting is Lukas Geronimas and Niall McClelland, both 27. The pair grew up in a suburb outside of Toronto; they grudgingly met when their parents decided they would carpool to high school together. They bonded over Star Wars and eventually moved to Vancouver, where they began collaborating on t-shirts, zines, and commissions for avant-grindcore label Fathme, snowboard giant Burton, and Color, a local skate mag. Geronimas has since decamped to Brooklyn, but the pair continues to collaborate on gallery shows and clever t-shirt designs, among other things. We had a chat with them about some of their favorite things: skulls, fantasy creatures, and peach-infused pork.

XLR8R:You do a lot of collage work. Is there a way you usually start, and do you have a concept in mind from the beginning?

Lukas Geronimas: Collages are a way to appropriate and exhibit some of the terribly fascinating imagery that has been published and hidden inside books on library shelves where no one will ever see it. The library is like our soil, or our Petri dish, or whatever (it’s a fertile place). It gives us all the source imagery we could ever need, which allows us to go in whatever direction our brains ask us to go. Niall and I spend a day, at the beginning of large collage projects, sifting through volumes, marking pages, and making photocopies, and then we go home and start cutting our pages apart until we feel ready to begin the arranging and pasting process. We have concepts, yes–they consist primarily of wanting to make things awesome and rad.

What are some of your shared obsessions?

Niall McLelland: Basketball, exploring, rock ’n’ roll, forests, Kinkos, the library, and ramblin’ on.

LG: We nerd out to dark fantasy shit sometimes, and black holes, and we both really dig on eating and soaring guitar licks and the woods. Girls, too, although we don’t share them. Bud-dum ching!

What is your favorite fantasy creature?

NM: I’m not a huge fan of heroes or of villains, so I’m not overly keen on creatures who match the archetypes of “fantasy” realms. My current favorite is a dwarf named Tyrion, with mismatched eyes, a bumpy face, and half a nose, from a series of books from George R. R. Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire. He is neither the hero nor the villain, but simply a very intelligent, grotesque man of high birth with a love for whores and booze.

LG: The Japanese have demons called yokai; they are tricksters and fiendish but I think they’re sensible. They’re my favorite category of creatures. I really like thinking about the Leviathan, so maybe it’s my favorite single creature.

Will skulls ever go out of style?

NM: Sure, but fuck style. They might go out of “fashion” but skulls are timeless symbols of rebellion, of outsider thinking, of questioning authority. Sure, skulls are being pawned off on the masses right now, but you can always see the phony ones from the legitimate. I don’t think metalheads and punks are giving up skulls anytime soon. And like… Georgia O’Keefe was big-time into skulls, and 60-year-old moms the world over still love her work, right?

What was your favorite moment of 2007?

LG: The first bite of celebrated chef Matt Dillon’s ultra-tender, fat-infused, peach-topped, home-butchered pork at Seattle’s Sitka and Spruce restaurant. Holy heaven.

What was the worst trend of 2007?

NM: People being “over it.” Is that an ’07 trend? Can we lose that one? How ’bout people referring to themselves as “cool kids”? Isn’t that rule #1 of being cool? Don’t ever talk about being cool. Jesus, fucking internet.

Does your work for clients influence your personal work?

LG: I keep the business and the personal stuff on two different planes of existence, and I don’t know how to travel between the two using the same vehicle.

What things do you find scary?

NM: A large spectrum of things: spiders, murder, war, drowning, flying, failing, disease, decapitation, rape, basements… Too much really!

LG: Zombie movies. Dreaming about the death of family members, that’s scarier. And scariest is lying (p.s. joking and lying are very different).

What is the scariest song/album/band you have ever heard?

LG: The Wolf Eyes album Dead Hills. I bought it because it made me feel like shit on a beautiful sunny day. My roommate Catherine and I listened to it one Halloween and it really did us in, even with the lights on. It makes any death rap or black-metal stuff sound like lollipop gumdrop happy-pappy parade songs.

Where is your Graves zine available?

LG: We’re making them, but we haven’t published any yet. Niall and I are what some folks call “in a financial slump,” and other, less prosaic people call “being broke.” They’re going to get re-vamped online, and then we’re going to put them together in a little omnibus. We started making them to go along with our second season of shirts, back in 2005.

What is your dream project?

NM: Designing a city park? All the signage, the playgrounds, the paths. I’m interested in making wild things that are integrated into the lives of a large demographic, things that function at a high level but also challenge the standard form.

Is constant dissatisfaction with one’s work an important part of being an artist?

LG: If it’s a constant, I think all you need to do is account for it. Accounting for it is important, though, yes.

What’s the best advice you have ever received?

NM: Years ago, a friend was talking about his line work, and how it rarely showed any signs of error or uncertainty. He just figured, “Draw every line with confidence, so even when it’s off it doesn’t make a difference because it communicates the same thing.” Not sure if it was the best piece of advice I’ve received, but it definitely affected the way I drew from then on.

LG: I don’t think that’s something I can quantify. I think an eagle once told me that being the token of freedom is a warm drag, and that might have blown my mind.

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