Archive for August, 2009

Flying Lotus released an EP today which included some remixes as well as 2 new ambient tracks, i’m definitely a fan of both, the man has some talent, when you see him live you’d never think this would of came out of him especially when he drops Lil’ Wayne.

Mux Mool has been on tour with Dark Party(Eliot Lipp & Leo 123) for awhile now(I think 2 or 3 months now in a Scion), he’ll probably be at the Chicago Tycho show this weekend, pinch him for me if you see him he will be the 6 foot 4 guy that should be playing but you might be able to catch him in town later the next week or in your town if you don’t live in Chicago because he has been all over the US, either way this is one of my favorites by him.

Nike has a great mix series going for people that workout unlike myself (except i’m starting up a roller hockey team, if you live in Brooklyn and play indoors let me know), one of the better ones on iTunes is the LCD Soundsystem one which is 45:33 mins long. Well DFA is doing a remix EP which includes this Prince Language remix that i’ve heard him use and kill dance floors with, hope its on vinyl.

Went to the Seaport this weekend in Manhattan to see School of Seven Bells and also caught The xx, really nice stripped down…gentle punk? is there such a thing? either way, they have a ton of buzz and definitely worth checking out.

Flying Lotus – Endless White

Mux Mool – Eagle Fantasies

LCD Soundsystem – 45:33 (Prince Language remix)

The XX – Shelter

Tycho / ISO50 Live Friday, 8/21/09

Name 2 professional athletes that wore the number 77 or 76.

The first to comment with the correct answer will win two (2) tickets to Friday night’s show (21 and over please). Enter your answer in the comments of this post. Be sure to include your email in the form so that we can contact you if you win. And please, only enter if you plan to attend the show.

Good luck!

Cover image by S.Hansen

Color Management: A Field Guide
Whether you are designing for print or for the web, making the leap from what you see on your computer screen to the outside world can be a tricky process, fraught with unpredictable changes and unexpected results. The web is full of information regarding color management and sifting through it can be very overwhelming. Contradictory opinions abound and it can be difficult to find reliable sources of information.

Over the last few months, Scott and I have been researching this topic extensively. With the addition of the new Epson 9900 to the studio, we wanted to be sure that our printer workflow was optimized and producing a consistent output. With the help of Kirk Economos of Meridian Cyber Solutions, we have implemented a color management system that works for us. Below we have tried to aggregate this knowledge into a simple and useful guide, designed to help you ensure your studio is set up correctly. It is not intended to be the end-all article on color management by any means — but it’s a good place to start if color management isn’t something you have previously implemented or considered.

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Choir of Young Believers have finally hit the States this week, the band reminds me a lot of Band of Horses but Choir might have the upper hand on the singing end. I’ve seen Jannis sing maybe 3 times when they stayed with me this winter and each time it might of been the most impressive human talent i’ve witnessed even beating out any Nathan’s hot dog eating contest. Jannis strips the songs down live to just him singing on guitar and his lady friend on cello and some pedals and they can literally do any of their songs that usually involve up to 9 people if I remember correctly.

New Radiohead came out Monday, download it here.

After listening to this 13+ minute Destroyer song I think they should change their name for 2 reasons: first one is because I want to use the name because Destroyer might be the best band name ever and the second is this song doesn’t destroy at all, its whimsical at moments almost and drones around like a Piano Magic song until we’re introduced to an almost disco kick and it becomes a whole different exotic animal.

Slow Hands told me Manuel Tur is still in his teens?? if that’s true than this kid will be owning the electronic/disco scene by the time all this mates finish college if he can hold down this diversity and sound. Can someone like Trus’me or Prince Language do a long edit of this song, i’d love to have that on vinyl.

Choir Of Young Believers – Claustrophobia

Radiohead – These Are My Twisted Words

Destroyer – Bay of Pigs

Manuel Tur – Stay Feat. Larissa Kapp

Ghostly 10 Year Chicago 8/21/09 - Purchase poster at studio.iso50.com

Buy tickets online | More info @ Ghostly | Purchase Poster

Details:

GHOSTLY 10 YEAR ANNIVERSARY: CHICAGO
The Empty Bottle
1035 N Western Ave
Chicago, IL United States
View Map

Live Performances by:
* Tycho / ISO50
* Kill Memory Crash
* Solvent
* Dark Party
* Mike Servito

August 21, 2009
9 PM 21
$15 ADV / $20 Door

Jackson presents The Ghostly 10-Year in Chicago

As Ghostly International hits the 10-year mark, we’re throwing a series of pretty-big-deal parties in select location across the globe. Having torn the roofs off Los Angeles, San Francisco, Detroit, Miami’s Winter Music Conference, and Detroit’s Movement festival, we now aim our music cannons at Chicago. The evening’s bill includes music/design phenomenon Tycho, melodic electro legend Solvent, local industrial legends Kill Memory Crash, and Eliot Lipp’s Dark Party. A DJ set from Mike Servito rounds out a night of truly outstanding music.

I heard a lot of very good female vocalist’s this weekend that I was impressed with, PhilistineDSGN aka Danny turned me onto Velour 100 which is a band from Ypsilanti, MI(home of City Center, Wolf Eyes, etc) while I started buying up a few songs of Kate Bush on iTunes that i didn’t have on this computer, I don’t even need that Chromatic’s Running Up The Hill remix anymore.

This Fever Ray video has to be a favorite of mine now, I try to explain to musicians that a video can be done with a small budget if you have creatives on your side that aren’t into recycling old ideas or following a certain formula, to be honest i’d love to just talk to some crazy on the street and get his incite on something totally off topic and whatever he says make that the video but this Fever Ray is far from simple, she just a has a great creative head on her shoulders.

As for Warpaint I heard it at Urban Outfitter while buying shoes, I love the recording style of this band a lot because i’d never listened to it if it was cleaned up, i’d probably think it was complete trash.

Kate Bush – How To Be Invisible

Fever Ray – Triangle Walks

Velour 100 – Dolphin Grey

Warpaint – Elephants

Fever Ray – When I Grow Up

Fever Ray – Triangle Walks

Those who have been following along will know that we’ve been talking about doing a color management guide for a while now. Well, it’s finally done and should go up early tomorrow morning. I’ve always been annoyed that there really aren’t any consolidated, plain-english resources out there for getting your head around color management so after talking with Alex, we thought it was time to put our own together. Over the past couple years I’ve begun to focus more and more on proper color management in my workflow and with the recent addition of the Epson 9900 it’s become even more important. After Alex and I worked through the the process of getting the 9900 online I figured it was finally time to put all that we had learned into a post as a reference point for others who are struggling with maintaining color integrity in their work.

We put this guide together because whether you are designing for print or web, it is important to have a good understanding of color management to ensure that your image looks the way you intended it once it leaves the confines of your computer. After considering the many factors that go into this process, Alex has written a comprehensive guide to color managing your documents from concept to finished product. We certainly aren’t billing this as the definitive manual for color management; it’s intended to be a working guide, a condensed set of essentials based on our own experiences working with various printing companies and our own equipment over the years. To help with the finer points, we enlisted color expert Kirk Economos of Meridian Cyber who has helped edit the guide to make sure everything is correct and in line with accepted industry practice.

So stay tuned, you should see the guide pop up here shortly.

As much as I love my Google Reader, I still prefer to get my design fix in printed form. In addition to providing the necessary dose of inspiration, magazines usually include insightful commentary and design criticism. I love this sort of writing on design and it seems like the best place to find it is still in the “unplugged” land of printed media. Additionally, with each one you get an actual piece of design to hold in your hand. It’s easy to forget how cool this is if you’re used to bouncing from blog to blog. After the jump, I’ve put together an overview of a the major players in the design magazine realm. Check out the list!

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Ya heard 'bout me?!

I just wanted to say thanks to Adobe for having me and to everyone for checking out the articles this week. I had a great time writing for Inspire, be sure to keep an eye out next week for guest blogger Joshua Davis.

And now for a few selections that didn’t make the Inspire post:

We follow a lot of Kompakt on the blog, they actually have been a big influence on the Moodgadget label as in having a Pop Ambient compilation series, Michael Mayer’s IMMER mix series and the classic TOTAL series. I picked 4 tracks that I think really stand out for me while giving it a good listen. This Coma track been perfect for these middle of the night insomnia sessions i’ve been having, a ton of quiet drives that swell while you’re finally dozing off sounds lovely to me.

I’ve been trying to think of another album that samples tennis and nothing comes to mind besides this new DJ Koze track, kind of reminds of something Philip Sherburne would use in a mix to separate some 90’s shoegaze and the most recent Villalobos 12″.

Justus Köhncke should be in Sebastian Tellier’s position and greeting you at American Apparel with 7 inch vinyl and One Size see-thru tee shirts, Justus has been doing the sexy playful and distant slow dance music since I can remember. Dirk Leyers of Closer Musik does an outstanding edit here by taking the original to a 10 min mark.

Thomas Fehlmann of The Orb doesn’t receive enough credit for his work under his birth name, the man did a crazy record with Dabrye, a gorgeous album called Honig Pump, and now adds another class remix to his catalog for The Field.

Coma – Sum

DJ Koze – 40 Love

The Field – The More I Do (Thomas Fehlmann Mix)

Justus Köhncke – (It´s Gonna Be) Alright (Dirk Leyers Remix)