José James - Blackmagic (Brownswood Recordings)
Not solely because my wife and I like to ___y ___ to it, but as if Detroit electronic masters, say Amp Fiddler and Moodymann, got together with a hotshot young jazz vocalist of hip-hop & cabaret persuasion, entered the bloodstream, and was lovely. Grown folks ghetto techno soul.
Track 9 - “Blackmagic”
Enter the Void by Gaspar Noe
Come inside indeed. Noe’s film bleeds 21st century ennui—the credit sequence alone like flashing Tokyo Vegas punk rock. And we are not afraid.
A Free Man Of Color @ Lincoln Center
Jeffrey Wright kills it, of course, and Mos has indeed come a long way since his stage debut in TopDog/Underdog. This pseudo-farce omni-modern miscegenation polemic was a lot of fun and very, very entertaining. New Orleans was lovely in its time, quite the bomb, and consistently full of historical deaths / rebirths.
My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me
(Forty New Fairy Tales), edited by Kate Bernheimer (Penguin)
Francine Prose’s “Hansel and Gretel” begins “Tacked to the wall of the barn that served as Lucia de Medici’s studio were 144 photographs of the artist having sex with her cat.” and gets weirder and more intense from there.
M.I.A. - Maya (Interscope)
She is maddening, and brilliant (if childish). When electronic becomes punk it sounds like this. What other pop star says what they mean (politically), and means what they say?
Street Value: Shopping, Planning, and Politics at Fulton Mall by Rosten Woo, Meredith Tenhoor, and Damon Rich (Princeton Architectural Press)
Think you know Brooklyn? There is no way to really know the borough if you don’t grasp Fulton street and its hundred-year history of glorious urban commerce and fascinating social planning. And you won’t understand contemporary New York City until you are aware of the cultural implications of the present rezoning of the area. A very particular history of NYC is here. Real estate. Gentrification. Life’s rich pageant, y’all.
Jann Wenner vs. President Obama
Rolling Stone interview, October 15th
I cannot in all honesty say I’ve completely bought all of this administration’s protestations that they have not indeed done a lot of caving during Obama’s first two years. I will tell you what I found much more palpable and inspirational: Jann Wenner’s interview with the man himself in September. The case Obama himself makes that these guys are focused, fighting, and engaged, in the best manner possible, is more convincing. How soon was Rome built? (Was Rome actually ever really “built”?)
Exit Through The Gift Shop “by” Banksy
Everything you ever wanted to know about the contemporary world of creation, and was afraid was true. Art as corporation, as DIY small business Wall Street punk rock bonus capitalism. No one cares. Everyone cares.
Night Catches Us by Tanya Hamilton
At some point my generation will have to come to terms with the radical legacy of the sixties, aside from the pale remnants of that legacy narrated and left to us by the boomers themselves. We owe it to the Facebookers for this post-modern reckoning. Tanya Hamilton’s film is a quiet triumph that makes visceral a slice of time in Philadelphia where individuals dealt with a particular aspect of that very convoluted history—the Panthers and black revolutionary movements.
Free / The Last Newspaper at The New Museum
It was hard to tell where one of these New Museum exhibits ended and the other began, both exhibited on various floor spaces concurrently. Free was conceptually interactive and contemporary in the truest sense, while The Last Newspaper took one aback with working newspaper rooms on one floor, like installations, except, you know, working newsrooms. I actually took in both shows with Najela, making the whole experience even more difficult to process, though more rewarding (imagine chasing her around trying to keep her from destroying low-key “sculptures” and watching her stand transfixed by Takeshi Murata’s “Popeye” animation.
Janelle Monae - ArchAndroid (Bad Boy)
Because it’s very hard to be weird, original, elegiac, and funky. Why debate Nicky Minaj when the real deal is staring you right in the face? (With apologies to Erykah’s brilliant New Amerykah Part 2: The Ankh.)
Runaway video by Kanye West
As opposed to the My Twisted album, which I fear for all of its sonic virtuosity and brilliance might ultimately be without a soul or integrity, this long form video harnesses experimental artistry, recontextualizing the album. Kanye can’t act, but knows that well enough to use himself very well. Hype Williams “didn’t direct” (will he ever get to make another movie?). Abstract and lovely high low art.
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(More) Apologies:
The Secret of the Grain by Abdellatif Kechiche, Telephone video by Lady Gaga (though her music bites), Boardwalk Empire, How To Wreck A Nice Beach by Dave Tompkins, Black Swan (beautiful & batty), GATZ and UTOPIA IN FOUR MOVEMENTS repectively, both of which appeared on this list in previous years in workshopped guises, Jean Michel: Radiant Child by Tamra Davis, beautiful New York, the real Blueprint.
peace,
Papa-san
‘11
