Charles Bradley looks like James Brown would have looked if he were hooked on lattes, and not angel dust. He’s got the ‘fro, the style, and the rhythm of another era, and it’s glorious.
His life story is quite something. So is his album, No Time For Dreaming. It’s a sultry, raw reminder of what disco murdered in a back alley in 1971. Check him out, courtesy of KEXP in Seattle, at SxSW:
If you like that, support the guy and get his album.
Peter Schiff is a radio host, and one of them big wheelin’ bankers the tent-folk’r all riled up about. In 2007 he argued that the US was headed for a financial crash, and an outspoken opponent of the crony/phony capitalism that’s brought us to this point. In these two videos he engages the OWS protestors, and then Dr. Cornel West. Enjoy.
La Blogoteque has an awesome video of Mumford & Sons performing in an alley in France. They perform two songs, one translated into French. What’s really spectacular is the camerawork. In an age of MTV quick cuts, each song gets one shot. The shooter freely wanders around and focuses on different aspects of the environment. Sit back, relax, and watch the whole thing in HD.
Whitest Kids U Know are no strangers to acute political satire (everybody remember the Honest Politician ad from last year?), and their video for the newest summer fun product is no slouch. The Nerf Nuke sounds pretty frightening, but these tots have an admirable handle on realpolitick.
“Ok, that kid can definitely not get a nerf nuke.” “Maybe we should just jump him now, while we can.” “But he hasn’t done anything to us. Isn’t that kind of messed up?” /*savage beating ensues*
Wrap that all up in a flag and Bill Kristol will buy Nerf stock like it’s going out of style.
I grew up among trees and farmlands, mountains and rivers and beaches with water like salted ice. I’ve never spent much time in the desert, but I don’t like it. It’s harsh and hateful, a land foreign, untrusting, and untrustworthy. Still, there’s an alien weirdness that is, in the right light, something like beautiful.
Ransom Riggs made this beautiful, startling, and sad video about one of the deserts saddest and uniquely alien places. The Salton Sea is California’s largest lake, but it’s a nauseating post-apocalyptic hellscape, inhabited by one crazy old man and thousands of dead fish. It’s one of the forgotten places of the desert, monument to hubris and the failure of foresight, and the punishing power of the earth turned foul.
Since I don’t speak Spanish (but did just eat a whole wheel of cheese), I ran the description through Google Translate. Laugh at the hilarious broken spanglish with me:
Scenes taken from Tenerife, more than 2,000 meters above sea level and over a year to capture all possible shades, clouds, stars, colors from a unique landscape and from one of the best skies on the planet. First in a series of videos nocturnal and Twilight Time Lapse taken in the Canary Islands trying to capture the beauty of each island.
HAHA STOOPID COMPUTE… dammit. You win this round, Google.
Asian carp are a serious problem. They’re displacing local fish and endangering ecosystems across North America. According to Wikipedia: Silver Carp (AKA “The A-holes of the sea”) are a pesky fish which are not indigenous to the Illinois River but have nonetheless invaded, setting up their annoying fish trailers and reproducing out of control and [...]
This city is filled with monuments, each with its own tenor and style. The Air Force monument is sleek, technical, and soaring. The Jefferson is contemplative, standing across the tidal basin from the city his statue watches, one feels an air of judgement, of our nation being watched and weighed. The Washington is an impersonal [...]
There’s a solid chance I finish up this hectic weekend with a new dog. I hope my many, many illegitimate children love him as much as this little girl loves her fearless bubble busting buddy. via Gamma Squad.
This dog doesn’t wait for some ‘superior being’ to deign to play a game with him. He takes his ball, and he makes his own fun. This dog is a winner. This dog is an uber-dog. I don’t use the ‘h’ word very often, but this dog is the greatest hero America has ever known. [...]
