Future Islands musicianship surpasses soo many artists of his genre, his talent oozes out, sadly I haven’t seen him live but now its a priority.

Since the first time I heard D. Gookin I thought he was from another world but I had some much respect for this live show, its leaps beyond Dan Deacon or Tobacco when it comes to weird energy and psychedelics, I can’t wait to see how he does this as a one man show tomorrow night at The Glasslands.

Silk Flowers have to be born in the early 80s, there is no way you can discover this kind of music and make it and not have been bored in the early 90s. The clashing of EBM / Minimal Wave / …but this quirkiness that I can’t put my finger on makes this project pretty damn close to genius.

I grabbed Elite Gymnastics from Pitchfork(who have redesigned their site), to be honest I had the 3 other tracks picked out and this song seems to be an odd mixture of all the tracks above in a unexplainable way, does anyone else hear it? like it grabbed hints of things from the other songs, it could just be me.

The winners of a pair of tickets for the Tycho LA show at Echoplex Tuesday are:
mmh and Annie, congratulations!

There are still tickets available to the show and i’m happy to say they are sell very well, I wish I was going, below is ticket info for Portland and Seattle as well.

Upcoming Tycho Live Dates

08/30/11 – Los Angeles, CA – Tickets / Info
09/02/11 – Portland, OR – Tickets / Info
09/04/11 – Seattle, WA (Bumbershoot) – Tickets / Info

Giving back to the community isn’t always as easy as finding and sharing great design. Sometimes it requires spending time doing tedious details of a Photoshop document… and that is exactly what I’ve done for you.

Here for your use is a Twitter UI Photoshop template perfect for mocking up your page before updating it live. The template is spot on with Twitter’s current layout. In the Psd, each of element set is grouped into its respective area based on the page. Each layer is also labeled and color coded. Twitter mockups should be a whole heck of a lot easier now, enjoy!

Twitter UI Photoshop Psd (4.9 MB) | Version 1.2 — Share this

Download the PSD

For updates to the PSD you should follow @ShelbyWhite.

What a great long cut from Legowelt, synth noodling from another planet, I could listen to this for hours. DOWNLOAD HIS NEW ALBUM HERE FOR FREE.

Keep Shelly In Athens debut a song from their upcoming release, its haunting yet inviting in this bright opened up way, should be a killer release.

Bradford Cox does it over and over again, sounds like a classic already.

With all the buzz of the Balam Acab debut LP releasing this week, this Sleep Over remix has been floating around with it. I love how he lets all of his hisses and highs breathe like their blinking flashes of reflections that catch you noticing really quickly. The ending of the track is a real rewarding listen.

I could spend hours going through the Old S.F. website. Some interesting ones I found were the San Francisco Civic Auditorium, Union Square, Hunters Point, and Seals Stadium, but my favorite set has to be these interior shots of the Marina Branch Library.

Marina Branch Library was the 23rd branch established in the San Francisco Public Library system and originally opened to the public in 1954. It was designed by the architectural firm of Appleton and Wolfard at a cost of $156,742. Furnishings cost an additional $12,926.

Recently the branch underwent renovations and reopened in 2007 at a cost of $3.9 million. It’s a shame that libraries and offices rarely look like this anymore. Anyone else find any hidden gems on the site and care to share?

via Old S.F.

London based Anne Hardy photographs intriguing images of interior spaces. Her scenes are brought to life so convincingly that I thought they were the remnants of abandoned spaces, but they are actually meticulously crafted sets she creates in her studio from scratch.

See more of her work here.

Switzerland’s current national airline (no, not that old one with the best branding possible) has undergone a rebrand and Brand New has all the details. A lot of people have been grumbling that the original “cube” logo was better — and I certainly agree — but judging this at face value, I have to say I’m into into it.

Brand New via Sam Valenti

Further reading: Be sure to check out Shelby’s post on Swissair’s (the now defunct Swiss national airline) branding.

I’ve written about a few of my recent projects (404 Film, Nosh Promo, Firespotter Logo). These were all completed for Firespotter Labs, which is the startup I cofounded earlier this year. We started out with four of us and we are now thirteen, primarily engineers. Up until now, I’ve been the only designer. We are growing fast and the design needs of our company are such that one visually-minded pixel crusher is no longer enough. We are looking for another full-time interface designer.

Firespotter Labs is a startup. We are looking for someone that enjoys this kind of atmosphere. I’ve written a little bit about what it’s like and I couldn’t endorse it any more positively. Our first app launched about one month ago, so we are primarily working on it, but we have a couple other products in development that will need a lot of love.

If you’re interested, please email me at jobs[at]firespotter.com and use the subject line “Design Position”. We are looking for someone with a strong skillset in user interface design. Usability is key. If you can make things that look awesome as well, rock and roll. Please include a link to your portfolio and/or Dribbble. If you’ve worked on sites or apps in the past, it would be very helpful if you could link these as well.

We are hoping to fill this position as soon as possible.

Tycho will be playing live with the full band in Los Angeles next Tuesday to kick off a three date west coast stint leading up to the Bumbershoot festival in Seattle. We’re giving away two sets of tickets (two tickets in each set) to the LA show at the Echoplex. Just answer the following question in the comments for a chance to win:

Name the three most underrated electronic acts in Los Angeles right now

Please be sure you’ll be able to make it to the show on Tuesday, August 30th, 2011 and are 18 years of age or older. Winners will be chosen at random. Be sure to leave a valid email so we can contact you. Good luck!

Upcoming Tycho Live Dates

08/30/11 – Los Angeles, CA – Tickets / Info
09/02/11 – Portland, OR – Tickets / Info
09/04/11 – Seattle, WA (Bumbershoot) – Tickets / Info

I had the pleasure of meeting fellow San Francisco artist Amy Franceschini yesterday. Amy is from the design studio Futurefamers, a group of people who create “platforms for sociability within new media spaces; internet, wireless devices and public space”. I remember being aware of — and influenced by — their work when I was starting out in design but this recent meeting prompted me to take a look at what they’re been up to in the years since.

As you can see, their output doesn’t exactly fall within the scope of your average design studio — although they did design the Twitter logo. This excerpt from Amy’s bio sums up the themes I find most interesting in the work “[she] creates formats for exchange and production that question and challenge the social, cultural and environmental systems that surround her. An overarching theme in her work is a perceived conflict between humans and nature.”

Aesthetically pleasing and challenging at the same time, really great to see people doing work like this.

Futurefarmers