While we were hanging out in Barcelona this past week, we heard several reports that the 3D fad is going beyond the movie theater, in fact being offered very soon via the smartphone by the name of LG Optimus 3D, both for capturing 3D media and displaying it without the aid of glasses. Sounds fantastic – will Kayne West and Hype Williams employ it?

The video you’re about to see, if you like, is a music video for the song “All of the Lights” by Kanye West featuring Rihanna and KiD CuDi. It’s also got mentions of a half-dozen other artists that apparently gave their voices to the spectacular as well. Lots of lights, lots of flashing lights, lots of typography that’s lovely.

Behold the power of Zynga, that company that whipped up a couple of games a few years back and has one whole hell of a lot of money now. They’re responsible for Mafia Wars, a game that started doing big business on Facebook and is on the fast track to taking a top spot in mobile entertainment through apps. Now they’re working with none other than Dr Dre to promote his LONG awaited third album: Detox. The promotion will come in the form of a “Hustlin’ Wit Dre” portion of the game where players will collect Dre-related items, see the music video for the single “Kush,” and get an “exclusive” video message from Dre.

This isn’t the first time Zynga’s worked with those in the extended family of Dre: earlier this year (2010) they celebrated 10 million visitors in two weeks by having Snoop Dogg blow of a four-ton armored truck in Nevada. Of course they did.

See here both the video for Kush and the destruction of the armored truck. The first video is probably NSFW.

[Via Reuters]

Music dum da tut dadaaa! The Beastie Boys, one of the most awesome (I was going to say prolific, but not really, right?) bands ever in the history of the world are in the process of one or two albums being released. They’re called Hot Sauce Committee I and Hot Sauce Committee II, both of them having the same track list. What in the what? You’ll love it.

Ch-check it out, here’s the list of the songs from these albums:

1. Tadlock’s Glasses
2. B-Boys in the Cut
3. Make Some Noise
4. Nonstop Disco Powerpack
5. OK
6. Too Many Rappers (featuring Nas)
7. Say It
8. The Bill Harper Collection
9. Don’t Play No Game That I Can’t Win (featuring Santigold)
10. Long Burn the Fire
11. Funky Donkey
12. Lee Majors Come Again
13. Multilateral Nuclear Disarmament
14. Pop Your Balloon
15. Crazy Ass Shit
16. Here’s a Little Something for Ya

[This list from Mic to Mic]

Now, you might be confused right this moment because if you’re like me, you didn’t even realize the first part of this album was out, now they’re announcing the second half as remixes. You’re right to be confused. Originally the first part of this album was announced in 2008/early 2009, but then it was found that Adam “MCA” Yauch had cancer. Bummer!

He seems to be making a recovery, or at least there’s no new news, so at least he’s not getting worse, I hope. Oh god I’m worrying myself now.

But as far as per all of our confusions on the release of the albums, check out this radical bit of info courtesy of Clash Magazine:

An email sent out on 10/17/10 from the Beastie Boys announced: “Although we regret to inform you that Hot Sauce Committee Pt. 1 will continue to be delayed indefinitely, Hot Sauce Committee Pt. 2 will be released on time as originally planned in Spring of 2011.” An email sent the following week now clarified that Pt. 2 would be released with almost exactly the same tracklist as was announced for Pt. 1, excluding the track “Bundt Cake.”

Ohhh, ok. That makes a lot more sense. I tell you what. This day, in this futuristic world of ours, especially given the eternal status of the Beastie Boys, I don’t think they’ve gotta worry about doing anything solid for this album other than the music. People are gonna find the tracks one way or another, just so long as the boys make em, they’ll be harvested, archived, and blown out of stereos across the earth.

The lesson to be learned from all this? Go, be great, then do whatever you want. We’re living in the future, and love is universal.

When you go to a show where N*E*R*D is performing, you should clap your hands together and hope they brought along their screens. Don’t get me wrong, they’re pretty neat to see with nothing behind them at all, but when they’ve got those screens out, whoa, wow, heck, hay, you know your eyeballs are about to be set on fire. The first time I saw them was on the Kanye West “Glow in the Dark” tour (also featuring Rihanna and Lupe Fiasco. Lupe had nothing, which made him hardcore. Rihanna had a bunch of pyramids with light-up tops, which made her performance wild but not equivalent. Not equivalent to what? To the gigantic screens of lights that both N*E*R*D and Kanye had lighting up the night in a fancy new world that would never be the same again.

The images you see above and below are presented courtesy of Pharrell Williams and the gang over at the BBC Ice Cream blog which, if I’m not mistaken, is actually for real updated by the members of the band / their alter egos STAR TRAK. These photos were titled “MSG X NYC X N*E*R*D” When they were posted just the other day.

But now listen! Listen to me! Look at the screens and tell me if you can still see afterward. Tell me how much of a new world we live in when the background of a show is no longer just a drapery or lit up letters spelling KISS, but screens made of lights able to present any number of arrays of patterns or non-pattersn. Flowing and burning and glistening and sparkling into the future.

See more of these flashing lights of N*E*R*D in the classically limited Pharrell Williams Super Post. And note how the images are from the Glow in the Dark tour, where they brought with them one giant screen rather than the several smaller screens they seem to be using now. And ALSO note that it might well have been just one big hunk of the screen used later in the show for Kanye’s spaceship. Hotness.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies outer space category.

Hooray! Our old pal Jenny Lane has another music video! If you’ll remember, we did a feature on her colorblaster “Say Say Say” and then another on the robot loving “You Start a Fire”. Today there’s another masterpiece of loveable modern technology, this time in 2D animation form. This is the video for “Whoopsy Daisy,” a big fluffy pillow full of fabulous sweet-jam music and sugar-coated candy animation. And it’s all a dream.

The story goes that Jenny’s fast asleep, dreaming of her relationship situation in some sort of heaven environment, boots-a-walkin and being shadowed by a gigantic blue furry monster. In a marshmallow party I’ve not seen since Bjork’s “I Miss You” (1996, directed by the always epic John K.) Take a peek and devour it fully, and let your heart be filled with love when Lane realizes the true fur of love near the end. So cute!

Look at this huge crew!

Concept: NMtrix, Shop Around
3D modelling, Mocap & Animation: NMtrix
Directed by NMtrix & Shop Around
Character- & background design: Niels kalk
Storyboard: Shop Around (Bert Dijkstra & Niels kalk)
Live-Action: Shop Around (Bert Dijkstra/ Zoltan Korai)

Producer: Patrick Nijman
Animation Director: Michael Visser
Technical Director: Johan Boekhoven

Animators:
Gurkan Ylmaz
Muharrem Bayrak
Eric Reniers

Modelling:
Egbert Stuger
Robert Everhardt
Arthur Kwadijk

Video-edit:
Arjen Mancini

Mocap:
Noortje Noordstrand
Nathan Ornick
Jolande Junte
Jasper Brekelmans
Marco Mepschen

Choreography: Willempje Vrins
Dancers:
Jenny Lane
Walid
Bora Serin

Whoopsy Daisy song:
Written by Jenny Lane / Alvin Lewis
Produced by Joeri Saal
Co-produced by Jenny Lane
Recorded at Studio 150
Additional keys recorded at EP Service
Mixed by Skiggy @ The Pelican Studio’s
Mastered by Darius van Helfteren @ Amsterdam

Jenny Lane: Vocals & Backing Vocals / additional Keys
Alvin Lewis: Keys
Boele Weemhoff: additional Keys
Frans Molenaar: Guitar
Tim Barning: Bass & additional Freaky Stuff
Ben Bakker: Drums
Patrick Mijnals: additional keys
Len van de Laak: Additional freaky stuff

To see more Jenny Lane, take a peek over at her iTunes page for track purchasing, her Facebook page for chattering, and her Twitter page for twittering!

And BONUS below the gallery there’s a making-of! You get to hear Jenny speaking her native language (not silly sally English, since she’s Dutch), you’d never guess it hearing her sing though, ay? There’s lots of fun 3D tracking stuff going on and fancy technology!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies brightness category.

Behold, a tiny collection of guitars turned into masterpieces of weirdness by a collection of artists of such odd disparity. One guitar basically has nothing to do with the next other than the base and in a couple cases, the region from whens the artist cometh. The photos we’ve got below were taken at the place where this show resides: Grumpy’s Downtown Minneapolis. This show was originally conceived as part of the Amphetamine Reptile Records 25th anniversary bash, and runs until September 30th, 2010. Go look! Have some tater tots and really tasty chicken strips and a brew!

La-La Land Gallery (owned and operated by artist/Minnesota native Kii Arens) and Ox-Op (that gallery that hasn’t been open for EVER behind Grumpy’s downtown Minneapolis) present customized Waterstone Guitars by this fantastic list of master artists and designers: Aesthetic Apparatus, Arbito, Brynn Arens, Kii Arens, Anthony Ausgang, Gary Baseman, Keith Brogdon, Andrew Brandou, CLUTTER Magazine, DALEK, Steve Ellis, Ed Fotheringham Ray Frenden, HAZE-XXL, Myles Karr, KOZIK, Jessie LeDoux, Little, Friends of Printmaking, Rob McBroom, Michael Motorcycle, Niagara, Juliette Oken, Martin Ontiveros, Plasticgod, Chris Reccardi, Chris Ryniak, Snaggs, Savanna Snow, Gary Taxali and Amanda Visell. Most of these guitars are for sale here: [OX-OP]

Grumpy’s Downtown
1111 Washington Avenue South
Minneapolis MN 55415

Below you’ll notice two sets of photos. The detail pics of the guitars in perfect light are done by OX-OP, the rest, photographed in the bar, are by WFDJ. Use liberally.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies 3D category.

Behold the weaponized hotness. The fabulous electronic guitar duo Ratatat are on a world tour and they’re coming to First Avenue, thusly there is a concert poster for it. Illustrated by Chris Burns (yours truly) and distributed without official clearance. Free bullets of musical magic for sale today.

View larger version by clicking gallery thumbnail below or by heading on over to the portfolio of CB where you will find many other eyeball enlightening items of such wonder and magic as you certainly never have seen before!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies under the influence category.

This lady, this lady named Lady Gaga, she is releasing a remix album. First she had a new-god-level selling debut album, then she made an EP, now there’s this sort of “greatest hits” remix album. Since there’ve been countless remixes of her work already before this studio-approved one, I had to take a tiny dig at it. And while I was at it, I saved the psd file for you so you could too. All of that’s below.

The font that’s used on this cover, this cover being the UK version of “The Remix”, is Trade Gothic Bold No. 2, or something similar to it. Ram some fonts in there, see what comes out.

Download the photoshop file – wfdj_ladygaga_theremix_photoshop.psd and remix it yourself. Probably you’ve gotta also find that Trade Gothic font too if you don’t already own it. Then also take a peek in the tiny gallery below for the original and the blank copy. That one is also made for lovin you.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies album art category.

Let’s talk. Let’s talk for a moment about blogging. About how it’s a bit of a faux pas to report on things that are in between a year and ancient. That is, how dare I write about something that happened 2 years ago, it’s not new and it’s not vintage! It is a blog crime. But hello! Let’s break this silly tradition. Let me do it right now, here’s something right around the borderline – here’s some colortastic photos taken by photographer / writer / fabulous dude Ryan Muir at The Flaming Lips headline ATP NY 2009, at Kutshers Country Club.

Now BEHOLD these ultra-amazing photos of this concert. The Flaming Lips always put on these sort of concerts, always with the lights and the balls. So many balls, so many lights, everyone loves it! It’s a big hippie slam festival every time they roll through the town.

Now go look at this gallery. Keep in mind that it’s not new and it’s not vintage. Fear for your life, for it is wrong! But perchance you’ve not seen these images before, and perhaps your MIND is blown by these photos, an amazing array of fantastic arrangements in space… and time! Look upon them and laugh in merriment, then put it all in your psychedelic colored corncob and glass pipe and smoke it.

Ryan Muir is a prolific photographer and writer for the Brooklyn Vegan.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies color category.

There’s going to be a concert with music in it because this Minneapolis record label turned 25 years old. That’s intense, man. The rock and roll poster and tshirt design are designed and executed by Aesthetic Apparatus. Would you like to know more? *ding*

You chose yes. Good job.

This show is going to be BIG FAT HUGE. It takes place at Grumpy’s on the North East side of downtown Minneapolis, where lots of wild things have gone down before. One time I sang “Let’s Get Crazy” there. I don’t know, but I don’t think they’ll be singing that song at this concert. At the bottom of this post, you’ll be able to put your eyeballs on a few more pics of the artwork. All white and red and black like someone who just got the piss beat out of them.

Amphetamine Reptile Records 25th Anniversary Show
Start Time: Saturday, August 28, 2010 at 1:00pm
End Time: Sunday, August 29, 2010 at 2:00am
Location: Grumpy’s Bar (Downtown) Outside Event!
Street: 1111 Washington Ave. S.
City/Town: Minneapolis, MN

Outdoor & Indoor Festival. This is a 21+ only event.
Master Of Ceremonies: Dr. Sphincter!

MUSIC:::::
Melvins
Boss Hog
Hammerhead
The Thrown Ups
Today Is The Day
Gay Witch Abortion
God bullies
Vaz
White Drugs
And…maybe mooooooore

ART::::::::
AmRep Retrospective – Danial Corrigan photo exhibit.
GUIT•ART
Show curated by Kii Arens • Waterstone Guitars • OX-OP
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=116510191715579&ref=mf

TICKETS:::::
http://amrep25thbash.eventbrite.com/

HOTEL:::::::
Aloft is a GREAT Hotel 1 block from the club,
and they’re giving amazing rate for AmRep BASH attendees!
http://www.starwoodmeeting.com/Book/amphetaminereptilerecordsbash

Indie sponsors helping us pull this off. Find their Facebook page and thank them!!
WATERSTONE GUITARS • http://www.waterstoneguitars.com/
ENCORE MUSIC • http://www.encoremusicshop.com/
SURLY BEER • http://www.surlybrewing.com/

Sassy fb page for this event: 109499822423140

——————————————————

Now look at these prints!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies red and black category.

It’s what you’ve always wanted. The world over the past forty or fifty years was/is so full of kitsch that I don’t doubt that we’ll never stop “uncovering” treasures such as this ruby you’re about to swallow. The Bay City Rollers sing their hit single “Saturday Night” in front of an audience of elderly citizens who are so excited to be there it is unbelievable. And wait until you see the lady knitting!

Oh Ann Margret is there too, rocking some HARD fashion. Friggin HARD AS HELL.

Also watch out for some really enthusiastic dancing.

I’ve got to let you know what the deal is with the watermark in the corner, too. It’s VJ Tom Yaz. In promotion of his undoubtedly fantastic video jockey business, he releases videos he’s got on file to the world via his Yahoovideo page. If you’re interested in hiring this excellent man, he’s in the Boston area and has been doing gigs since 1981 up to the present. He’s at http://tomyaz.com/, definitely consider hiring him. For sure. He rocks.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies celebration category.

Since the dawn of highschool there’ve been attempts by people enflamed by the art that affects them to show their love for it. Often this sort of thing disappears. It’s written on a desk, or now blogged and re-blogged, and it fades out. Of course the source, the music, that stays strong. Even the weakest song is still a song, a recording of that song or an orally passed down tradition, songs are rare to be fading. But then there’s the rarity: the strong second step. Designer Mico Toledo has taken that step, and done it in a way that sticks. For that extra amount of time sticking that makes it into a lovely design masterpiece, or set of masterpieces that will ring true into the future.

This project is called “Music Philosophy” and it is a rather excellent clash of brilliantly written lyrics and typography. Design of this caliber is often reserved for paying customers, but Toledo does this project as a hobby. The closest this project has come to the physical plane is some printed versions of the posters and a painting project on the wall of a friend’s apartment. Fab!

OH also there’s a t-shirt store.

To see more works by Mico Toledo, check out micotoledo flickr or email at micotoledo@gmail.com for requests for work. All designers like to feel loved!

BONUS: there’s another Cargo-Collective-esque collection site for these that I believe was made by Toledo too!

Lookin good chile!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies typography category.

Here we are with four of the most fantastic headphones to ever peep the light of music. They’re made by the CandyLab Limited group, known in the advertising world for their top-class 3D rendering, animation, and illustration. Each of the phones you see in this post is for a campaign working for Nokia telephones, but the earpieces themselves work wonders for your eyeballs on their own. The set you see above is based on Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. Utterly fantastic realities created by hands in the real.

Each of these headsets is modeled in Maya and rendered in Mental Ray. The cell-phones are modelled by Michael Strathearn and rendered by Fabrizio Fioretti, and all of the headphones are created by James Bowron. Included in these four are: Jukebox (pink), Reggae (rugged, boxes and cantops), Organ (pipes and fire), and Jules (horns and padding.) All of this is CandyLab.

These headphones remind a fellow of the positively undeniable benchmarks set by gigantic blockbuster films such as Return of the King or Speed Racer. Every time I take a peek at these headphones or those films I get all pumped up. If you watch the “making of” Star Wars that comes with the slightly-recent Silver-box DVD set, you’ll see an older gentleman who describes his first viewing of A New Hope in the theater. He says he sat down with his family for dinner and told them that his whole life had been changed. Believe that.

When people take the time to make something as magnificent as these headphones, even when its for something so trival as a cellphone advertisement, it matters to everyone, even the people who never get to see it exist. The bar is set, and it inspires everyone. Shockwaves are sent through the industry, advertising to graphic design to the people who aren’t even working for cash money profit.

Above and below we’ve got a gallery of the four sets of 3D-rendered headphones created by CandyLab for the Nokia phone campaign, plus a few extras from the CandyLab archives for some extra excitement. To get in contact with CandyLab for hiring purposes, choot an email over to jobs@candylab.co.uk, find them on http://twitter.com/candylab_uk/, or peek at them on their utterly lovely candylab.co.uk for shiny moving images.

NOTE: the last image in this gallery is called “Anti-Venom” and it was created by Candy Lab’s Creative Director Fabrizio Fioretti to promote the organic abilities of the studio. Modelled in Maya. Detailed in zBrush. Rendered in Mental Ray. Extremely hot’n'heavy.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies lights category.

The wild set of images your eyeballs are bout to peek at are designed and executed by picture chopper Valentin Fischer. A designer of some excellent repute, Fischer has rolled quite hard for this DJ show for quite a few months now! Each of these shows incorporates at least DJ Maks & NIL and in some cases, more than a couple others. In each poster for a show, a set of famous pals is illustrated with modifications made in the way of eyeballs and hair styles. Two DJs, two cartoons, two two two!

These shows continue all the way to the month AFTER this post is posted, right now when I’m posting it! And they are not going to stop ever, ever!

To find the music they play you’ll have to go to the totally disgusting looking yet surprisingly simple to use http://www.myspace.com/cowboysondrunkenhorses page. Your best bet, however, is to just head on over to a show.

Bop it.

But before all that! Look at the rest of these poster below.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies celebritarianism category.

Here’s a dude that’s gotten right into the right business. The business of having famous people trust you enough to take their photo. Or at least having people of some famous rapport have their agents trust you enough to have their client under your lens. Mister Patrick Hoelck has that power. He is a photographer and as long at he holds that trust, he’ll be making the bank. That trust doesn’t come just from knowing people who know people however, you’ve got to have more. Like, you know, skills, and such.

Hoelck has hella skills. Look at these lights! Look for example at the couple sets of photos of Jack Black and Kyle Gass’s Tenacious D and N*E*R*D, made up of Pharrell Williams, Pharrell Williams, Chad Hugo, and Shay Haley. These images are fabulous. Both of these groups of people are favorites of mine, and these images are among the best, most loving portraits of them I’ve seen! I wouldn’t object to having any of these right up on my wall.

Right up there!

And everyone looks so happy!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies celebritarianism category.

Oh so you don’t know who Pharrell Williams is? You LIAR! He’s a dude. For basically a billion years now he’s been producing music with his pals in Star Trek, they all make music in the band N.E.R.D., and they all bump up the brands BAPE, Billionaire Boys Club, and Ice Cream shoes. Two of those three are owned by them, or at least Pharrell, and the third happens because Pharrell’s got a sweet deal with Nigo. It continues now! He’s got a new watch, N.E.R.D. is playing some music at an air base, and Terry Richardson took some flash photos of Pharrell and Lupe Fiasco. I know you love these things.

This stuff can be found also at Terry Richardson’s Diary, if you’re into that sort of thing, or you could personally know Pharrell Williams which I totally don’t. Or maybe Lupe. Lupe know him!

And them all wearing BBC and A Bathing Ape prominently, all the time, it’s basically part of their brand trademark now. Will those brands continue forever? I don’t see why not. They’re still fabulous and the makers are still super rich. Let’s keep doin it.

The video below is a little interview with Pharrell about his second step in his “Perspective” series of what’s probably going to continue to be chairs. The first set of chairs looked to be two people’s legs in what appeared to be a sexually charged situation. This second one is more of a gears of war world of sitting. Of course, neither of these is as insane as his Takashi Murakami head.

Oh AND there’s something in here with UFFIE, who is a lady you’re all going to love some day. Some day you’ll ALL love her. Uffie.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies wearable category.

Hello oh my gosh what the weird and wonderful and wild? This is a soccer team that plays in California. Recognize their shirts? They’ve got derivations of a mark made by Shepard Fairey for the Obey Giant street art campaign. Indeed that was also a remix of a mark, originally the Misfits Fiend Club logo. But wait! Wasn’t the Misfits mark taken from something else too? You betcha. Let’s talk about this interesting path right now, all during a fabulous round of the greatest game.

So! What have we got here? The Obey Fiend Football Club. What’s that all about?

A few weeks ago, a few of the boys at the office had asked the OBEY staff if they wanted to join an indoor soccer league that plays every Thursday evening. Game times vary every week, some being at 8pm and some at 3am, where low lifes try to re-live their dream of being a sports star. Unfortunately, only one person said yes, so we had our human resource department hand select the one’s who’ve been written-up due to no shows at work, and especially those needing to shave off some of that extra gut for insurance purposes. We proudly present The OBEY Fiend Fútbol Club!

That message comes straight from the OBEY Clothing blog. Now they wear the shirts with the Obey Fiend Soccer Club mark on them. That’s very similar to the OBEY Fiend Club, and of course the other Obey Fiend images Shepard Fairey’s used as well.

ABOVE: Fine art Fiend Club on record cover. BELOW: Photograph by WKinteract of a graffiti paste-up of the Fiend Face as modified by Shepard Fariey.

Yay!

ABOVE: Shepard Fariey takes the Misfits Fiend and the Fiend Club and mashes it up with his own Andre the Giant Has a Posse / OBEY graphic to create the OBEY Fiend Club BELOW: The original source for the Fiend Skull I bet you might be wondering about. It’s from the classic weird-color horror The Crimson Ghost!

So the next time you’re kicking the old pumpkin around, remember the skull!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies sports category.

Oh you Choe, you just keep on whipping it out and twisting it out. What you’re seeing here is a slim and lovely preview presented by David Choe for his brand spanking new show called SIDEBUSTERS that will be taking place April 23 2010. What you’re looking at is tiny clips of gigantic murals and some milk-chocolate sized paintings straight out of the painting room of Choe himself. These paintings will be shown at the Sidebusters show somewhere in Beverly Hills. I ain’t even know where the gallery is going to be, but maybe I’ll tell you when the time comes. And also? He’s hanging out with Die Antwoord then too.

Blarf! Antwoord! They are a crazy group of weirdos. Weirdos that make amazing music and have a look that is extremely unique. First in this post you’re going to see the paintings being done for the event, then you’re going to see Choe and Ninja and Yolandi Vi$$er (both of Antwoord) just hanging out, preparing for what must be a totally wild show coming up.

Just look at them.

Actually maybe the show might be called “Nothing to Declare.” I’m not sure, updates from Choe are pretty convoluted. It’s part of his art…form.

I’m sure we’ll have more about Antwoord on WFDJ in the future, but for now, all the info you need is up on GOOD. Wicky weird wild.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies under the influence category.

Hey child, get out your powerful magic player of the music. That’s right, it’s the boombox. It’s the thing you get out and put a tape in there in the tape deck and BAM, you’ve got such a sound you can bring with you and blast all over everyone’s face in the streets. And all it takes to run it is 12 double-D batteries. Get some batteries! And look at this fabulous photo project by Lyle Owerko. It’s called, appropriately, “The Boombox Project” and he even whipped up an excellent nutshelled history of the box too! It’s all here, all of it.

So this fantastic artist, photographer, designer, cool guy Lyle Owerko took a whole load of photos of fantastic boomboxes and here they are in this classic set! And from his massive research bank comes this little diddy too!

The Boombox Project

A Visual Timeline of the Era of the Boombox

Exactly when the term ‘boombox’ hit the streets is not known for sure. In the United States, department stores apparently began using the term in marketing and advertising as early as 1983. Street slang linguists pin the term down at 1981, and define the boombox as “a large portable radio and tape player with two attached speakers.” Initially, it became identified with certain segments of urban society, hence adopting epithetic nicknames, like ‘ghetto blaster,’ and ‘jam box.’ But as the masses began to embrace these gargantuan conglomerations of electronics, lights and chrome plated gadgetry an inherent form of portable entertainment and expression was born. The boombox as it has evolved is now an icon of popular culture, it has been referenced by rockers, poppers, hip-hoppers, and graffers alike. It is a symbol of rebellion and a way to shout your message at the system. Turn up the volume on your boombox, whatever the size, and let the capstan wheels of the tape deck drive a favorite mix-tape to life… As the defiant voice of punk rock legend, Joe Strummer sang “This is radio clash using audio ammunition…”

The grids, the circles, the rectangles. These fabulous boxes of pure energy deserve all the looks and glances they get. And when they’re blasting fantastic mixtapes and such, they’re even better. But they’re also fantastically lovely just to peek at, so let’s do some peekin.

And I bet you’d be pretty pumped up if you could do something neat with these images, right? I bet you would. So check it out – Owerko hooked himself up with a fresh deal over at that gelaskins website where they sell skin of the mac. Check that out, download some backgrounds, click around and have a little fun, [here], but first look at these boomers below.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies photography category.

Not just my favorite kind of pizza, this multi-artist exhibition called “Barnstormers” is just about to blow your socks off with wildness and oddly-sensual curation. Take a peek first at the piece above. It’s a record player with giant speakers, all of it stashed and screwed into the base of a swanktastic seat. You look at that then you look at any of the pieces below, you tell me if you could’ve guessed they’d be in the same show. No way. But is that any deterrent for you? Naught! Discover the full spread.

ABOVE: “Bossanova” Mikal Hameed, Fully functional sound sculpture, 2010.

Pump it up! This show’s to be held at Joshua Liner Gallery, at an expanded space to accommodate their largest show to date. As it turns out, this rag-tag group of artists really is a collective that goes by the name BARNSTORMERS. Thirty-five x 2 hands of fury, all swinging their talents at this single show.

Take a peek below at images of nearly the entire show.

For the ENTIRE show you’ll have to see it live.

Joshua Liner Gallery is very pleased to present the New York/Tokyo-based collective the Barnstormers in their first group exhibition at the gallery. With over thirty-five artists featured, this is the largest exhibition to date at Joshua Liner, which will double its gallery space temporarily to accommodate the special event. Expanding to host the collective’s full spectrum of art practices, the gallery will show individual works in painting, printmaking, photography, video, installation, and other mediums by the following Barnstormer artists:

Alex Lebedev, Alice Mazorra, Bluster One, Che Jen, Chris Mendoza, Chuck Webster, Cycle, Daikon, David Ellis, Dennis McNett, Doze Green, Ge-ology, GION, Guillermo Carrion, Joey Garfield, JPL (UFO), KAMI, Kenji Hirata, Kiku Yamaguchi, KR, MADSAKI, Manny Pangilinan (WELLO), Marlene Marino, Martin Mazorra, Maya Hayuk, Mikal Hameed, Mike Houston, Mike Ming, Miyuki (Pai) Hirai, Naomi Kazama, Pablo Power, Paul Coors, Pema Rinzin, ROSTARR, Ryan McGinness, SASU, Shie Moreno, SWOON, West One, Yuri Shibuya, and Yuri Shimojo.

Barnstormers Group Exhibition
March 18 to April 17, 2010

Joshua Liner Gallery
548 West 28th Street
3rd Floor
New York, NY 10001

Gallery Hours
Tuesday — Saturday 11 — 6PM
Phone (212) 244-7415
Fax (212) 244-7416
Email info@joshualinergallery.com

HEY: Check out previous Joshua Liner Gallery show previews we’ve done.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies music category.

For the month of March, our local music brain the Electric Fetus will be featuring the works of Paul Gardner of Flora Fauna! This means posters, posters, and more posters. This is one of those Minneapolis dudes who is hell of prolific and hell of genius. The event is something Electric Fetus calls MinnEconomy which, since they’re a Minnesota based music shop, makes them totally amazing – each month a local artist is featured, all of their product displayed at 10% off their regular cost. Worth it.

In the gallery below you’ll find a selection of Paul Gardner (Flora Fauna)’s works, basically all of them show posters, something Minneapolis injects into its bloodstream basically constantly. Love it, breath it.

The Electric Fetus presents MinnEconomy, a “shop local” program that empowers both shoppers and local gift makers/artists by offering them a forum to sell their craft. Every month the Electric Fetus will feature local Minnesota musicians, artists, and designers, showcasing the talent in our state. The featured items will be 10% off for that month.

Thursday, March 11, 2010
6:30 p.m. – Reception with Paul Gardner + Special Guest
7:00 p.m. – Phantom Tails in-store performance
7:45 p.m. – Moonstone in-store performance

Hooray that sounds totally fun and postertastic.

Time to get out of the cave, Minnesota.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies celebration category.

Those are exactly the two things I love to hear about on a nice Thursday almost-afternoon. You betcha. What we’ve got here are two amazingly fabulous new posters from our pals at graphic excellence’s gravity’s center: Aesthetic Apparatus. For two specific events: a show headed by Trey Anastasio, and a major design alert. Above you’ll see the poster that they only got to keep a couple of, below you’ll see “DEFCON: DOOM.”

Aesthetic Apparatus is heavy into doing show posters for musical artists and the like, but they’ve also got a sort of wild-weird brand character thing going on with their “Doomdrips” line of posters, shirts, toys, and other oddities. That’s what you see below in the DEFCON:DOOM print. For more of this madness, definitely check out the DOOM section of the AA store. Don’t get your fingers dirty on all the circles.

Then there’s the poster above. With an above-average disturbing description:

TREY ANASTASIO
w/ Classic TAB

Nothing says Valentine’s Day like getting dysentery and spending the night locked in the bathroom with a roll of toilet paper and a can of Lysol. But maybe you aren’t a romantic like we are here at Aesthetic Apparatus, maybe you enjoyed a rock show from the lead singer of everybody’s phavorite aquatic themed band. Regardless of how you spent the lover’s holiday, we’re sure all can appreciate a chocolate covered marshmallow guitar!

-you get the full AA experience. Romance and all.

*ALSO, for your enjoyment, I’ve included a few other DOOMrelated images below so you can see the DOOM at your very own clicker doorstep. The circle-warning still stands.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies music category.

Hello Spinal Tap Anvil Antwoord. You see back stage. This project right here is a photo collection taken on tour with two German bands (Bosse and Frida). The photographer has the name Heinrich Holtgreve and is really good at taking photos and making one photo tell the story of the whole space at once (or lack of story if that’s the case, if you know what I mean.) This set’s meant to show through documentation that touring with a band’s definitely not all glamourous diamond baths and sex with dollar bills and cheese snacks. Definitely not. Take this journey and smell the glove.

9 Pigmentprints / 100x150cm
2009

It’s a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll. I’m in love with photographs of generally dirty or poorly kept spaces in buildings. What a simple wonder it is to see where people have left things. Drawings on walls, stickers filling mirrors, stains and burns.

These heavily trodden places have a more than invaluable stash of cultural information smashed into them. How to harvest it though is the question and the quest.

Holtgreve does well.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies bad taste category.

For it is a freaking joyous day! Straight from the team-mates mouth, codename TheOmethod, we’ve got super new super early photo pics of this Shepard Fairey / Smokey Robinson poster collaboration. There’s a gold/black version and a “color” version of each of the two poster prints, with Fairey and Smokey signatures on em all. There’s a series going right now in the OBEY world called American Pioneers, dealing in the fields of art, music, and a slightly general category called “culture.” Smokey’s still hot!

The amazing Smokey Robinson was in the studio yesterday. He was such a kind and warm person and was a pleasure to talk with. He was signing the new Smokey prints with Shepard. They look amazing! Both images will come in the three color and the gold. – The Omethod

For more info on the Obey Giant art camp from those right up on in the inside, head on over to The Giant and get in on the Ministry of Information.

Also, if you’ll look low in the gallery, you’ll see the poster also on the way in this series made with for by and with photographer Glen E Friedman to make a lovely print of Cornel West.

Today Glen E Friedman and Shepard signed their latest collaboration print of Cornel West. The release date is unknown at this time. Here is a quick biography of Cornel West from wikipedia. – The Omethod

Of course this all leads up to the biggest show ever, of all time, ever, that being Shepard Fairey’s May 1st 2010 fine art show with Deitch Projects. This show marks a gigantic move for SF, both because it’s his first show with Deitch (also the host of such artists in the past as Keith Haring, Barry McGee, SWOON, and Yoko Ono) and because it’s the very last show Jeffrey Deitch will be doing with Deitch Projects before he moves on to be the head at Los Angeles MOCA. Big news, very big news!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies Celebritarianism category.

Hey doggie, you need a new record store to trade dollars for vinyl at? I have one for you. I have one for you right here. It’s called Shuga Records, and it’s in Minneapolis. The reason we-here at World Famous Design Junkies cover such a thing as a record store is this – it’s spectacular in there. And not only is it spectacular IN there, it’s pretty amazing on the outside too. It’s got a big fat painting on the side by Minneapolis stencil-art duo Broken Crow (Mike Fitzsimmons and John Grider) and Brooklyn’s Over Under (Erik Burke.)

The precise location of this shop on the physical plane is 165 13th Avenue North East Minneapolis, MN 55413. Go there. It’s beautiful. Lots and lots and lots of records. The amazing thing about this store is their collection of rarities. And they know exactly what they’ve got too, so get your billfold out. But you’s people who aren’t hardcore collectors can get in on the fun too, there’s stacks and stacks of records for 50 cents on the dollar.

Literally 50 cents records in good shape for realzies.

UND! Check out this video put up by the painters:

Then! Peekn’ at the gallery!

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies graffiti category.

Let us now devour the poster works of Minneapolis design team LandLand. They’ve made it their mission to toss out the traditions of rock postermaking and act on instinct. The use the Force. But tossing out that tradition doesn’t mean tossing out the tenants of design and good artmaking. These skills are high and present up on this collection of masterpieces. Look for yourself at a few of em, then take a trip to Minneapolis, rock capitol of the world!

Below you’ll find the following:

The Swell Season (w/ Rachael Yamagata) at the Pageant in St. Louis, Missouri.
Info: 5-color screenprint on 100# French cover stock • 19″ x 25″ • Signed & numbered edition of 225
Illustration/Design: Dan Black
Watercolor: Jessica Seamans

Built to Spill at First Avenue in Minneapolis, Minn.
Info: 4-color screenprint on 100# French cover stock • 25″ x 19″ • Signed & numbered edition of 100
Illustration/Design: Dan Black (PICTURED ABOVE)

Cursive w/ the Berg Sans Nipple at First Avenue in Minneapolis, MN
Info: 3-color screenprint on 80# cover stock • 19″ x 25″ • Signed & numbered edition of 80
Illustration/Design: Dan Black

France Has the Bomb 7″ Record release show at the Hexagon Bar in Minneapolis, MN
Info: 3-color screenprint on 80# French cover stock • 18″ x 24″ • Signed & numbered edition of xx
Illustration/Design: Dan Black

Check out the green Cursive poster – I and my gal went to that show and stole one of these posters off the wall. It was at First Avenue in Minneapolis. It’s been MONTHS since that show, and I just figured out who did the poster now. Wild stuff, yes?

These peeps are located at their site at http://landland.net/ If and when you go there, you can check out some older posters (the ones in this post are amongst the newest). I recommend them highly on especial account of their great inks application.

This post is part of the World Famous Design Junkies music category.