Musicians Worth Checking Out As 2012 Gets Into Full Swing

moray mair | Everything about music | January 31, 2012

As January comes to a near end (thank god for that I hear you say), we can now gauge roughly (thereabouts…) some new talent that is thawing through the cool exterior of the critics. Also interesting to note that this year ‘old’ is the ‘new fad’. From Lana Del Ray to Alabama Shakes, it’s all about the right ingredients of either vintage rock n’ roll mixed with a Motown style or a take back at 90’s Britpop and some well decent guitar riffs.

Below we take a look at some Irish and International bands on the rise and mention some reasons why:

Alabama Shakes
Taking a step back to the original r’n’b soundings of Motown mixed with proper funk, here is a band that as first glance, you would pass them by and drop a quick dime. But this Alabama-based roots-rock quartet is set to release their debut album, ‘Boys & Girls’, on April 10 via ATO Records.
What’s so special about this band? Singer-guitarist Brittany Howard’s deeply emotive vocals are part of what has helped this band turn so many heads in late 2011. Think iconic soul singers from the 30’s right up to the 60’s and Brittany embodies parts of them all, not to mention her kick ass more than capable of rocking out band.
Check out the video, ‘I found you’ live from WNRN radio – if this is the band live from a radio studio can you just imagine a live show: Awesome!

Then we have the ever-pouting Lana Del Ray, with her seriously oversized lips, luscious vocals and overhyped controversial stories. Is she authentic or is she a by-product of millions of dollars of investment in producing the perfect damsel act? Despite her obvious ‘unnatural stage presence’ and awful live performances, her recordings are actually quite cool. For reasons other than the fact that everyone else thinks so… you should just check her out and make up your own mind. But either way, whether she was ‘born to die’, or born to ‘sing’, she can certainly get peoples attention.
And if all else fails she just signed a modelling contract.
So the never-ending pout has paid off.

Other bands worth mentioning from this sie of the pond include The Wonder Villains who are a quirky mainstream pop outfit who have been on the scene in Belfast for some time, but of late have began cropping up here and there around Ireland and the UK.
Radio in Ireland seems to be backing them at the minute and across the pond on BBC Radio 1 certain dj’s, that have been known to break new acts, are showing the band a-whole-lotta-love on daytime radio! (Which is, lets face, a massive achievement for any new band).
From the feisty ‘Zola’ (yes, its about the footballer and yes they performed in on ESPN), to the current Single ‘Ferrari’ doing the rounds in radio, these guys are surely on the cusp of something similar to them Two Door Cinema Club lads.
They certainly have the look, the sounds and the personalities. You can ‘Like’ them here, but we are sure you will ‘Love’ them in time.

510 total views, 1 today

Street Art At Its Best: Duchamp Was Here

woostercollective.com | Art and design | January 31, 2012

Duchamp was here. Nothing much to say about this - it is what it is – except to say that Duchamp was an inspiration for me and this tag on a toilet – somewhere on the planet – is funny, smart and definitely worth sharing.

310 total views, 1 today

Lumi’s Inkodye Lets You Print With The Sun

The Creators Project | Art and design | January 31, 2012

printing

This amazing new printing technique uses sunlight to reveal images on natural materials. Basically you can do your own DIY own screen printing.

Lumi, a design duo from LA have developed the process they call Inkodye – for “sun printing” – after researching printing processes for over five years. The result is a light-sensitive ink that fixes on fibers when exposed to the sun.

With some Inkodye, a printer, and natural light anybody can produce high quality prints on any fibrous surface. You can go to their blog to get tips and tutorials on the process from using it to print patterns on a lampshade to making an abstract design on a jumper.

291 total views, 1 today

Figurative Sculptures Embedded in Gallery Walls By Matteo Pugliese

Christopher Jobson | Art and design | January 31, 2012

I came across these bronze sculptures, by Italian artist Matteo Pugliese , as I was trawling through cyberspace looking for new work. The figures really do appear as if they’re in perpetual motion, in action, escaping from something, going somewhere, desperately. Lovely as they are though I couldn’t have them in my home – a bit too unsettling to have on your living room wall. then again if you could afford them, or the space you’d be living in a rather large place.

459 total views, 0 today

The Last (Faxed) Poem of Charles Bukowski

Dan Colman | Book reviews and writers | January 31, 2012

On February 18, 1994, Charles Bukowski decided to get a fax machine installed in his house. He then sent his publisher a poem on it;

oh, forgive me For Whom the Bell Tolls,
oh, forgive me Man who walked on water,
oh, forgive me little old woman who lived in a shoe,
oh, forgive me the mountain that roared at midnight,
oh, forgive me the dumb sounds of night and day and death,
oh, forgive me the death of the last beautiful panther,
oh, forgive me all the sunken ships and defeated armies,
this is my first FAX POEM.
It’s too late:
I have been
smitten.

Sadly this was his last poem for 18 days later, 18 days after he finally embraced technology, the “laureate of American lowlife”, died of leukemia at the grand age of 73. This poem has apparently never been published in a bok format According to John Martin at Black Sparrow Press, the Fax poem has never been published or collected in a book.

Sop if you’re into Bukowski, or if you’ve never heard much about him why not have a listen to Tom Waits reading Charles Bukowski’s poem, The Laughing Heart. There are many more podcasts about if you surf about.

Enjoy them

334 total views, 4 today

Trifle Done The Traditional Way

Joseph x | Recipes from a mutant kitchen | January 30, 2012

It is astonishing how dishes move in and out of fashion. My grandparents would not be able to identify most of the food we eat today and, closer to home, much of what was commonplace in my childhood now rarely, or never, graces the table of an Irish home. In that context, I want to talk to you this month about trifle.

I was reared in a household where plain fare was our lot. Like most families at that time, we had dinner in the middle of the day and always had homemade soup followed by meat, potatoes and seasonal vegetables. For most of the year, we also had hot desserts, such as milk or steamed puddings, bread and butter pudding or perhaps stewed fruit and custard. However, on high days and holidays, trifle was always served, sometimes made with jelly but more often than not, with custard. We never tired of it, and indeed fought like proverbial dogs over the second helpings.

Later in life, it was my fate to marry a woman, who had a detestation for custard and so for many years, trifle never made an appearance; it was thus a pudding completely unknown to my children. However, with my wife’s passing some ten years ago, it has slipped back on to the family menu and there, as far as I am concerned, it will stay. Mind you, no one is suggesting that it should not be served. On the contrary, it is a great favourite and well it should be. It is a thoroughly delectable dish.

253 total views, 1 today

Badger Theremins And Musical Pigs: The Bizarre Mechanical Art of David Cranmer

The Creators Project | Art and design | January 30, 2012

What do you think of this work by British artist and inventor David Cranmer? He makes hybrid musical species such as this Badgermin; a machine that is equal parts theremin and taxidermy badger. the piece was inspired by a chat with a friend that went something like

My friend asked me what casing I would build my ideal theremin into. I replied, ‘Probably a traditional oak case, or maybe a badger.’ Eventually, it seemed the badger was the better choice.

And what about this steel pig that has 56 arcade buttons that trigger interchangeable banks of audio samples. Here it is in action at a gig by Cranmers band, Nine Owls In A Baguette, a collective of artists and musicians that incorporate specific themes tailored to the context in which they perform

343 total views, 1 today

Here Comes The Sun: The Lost Guitar Solo by George Harrison

Dan Colman | Everything about music | January 30, 2012

Here Comes the Sun is without a doubt George Harrison’s greatest contribution to The Beatles album, ‘Abbey Road’. So this video makes it all the more special. When Harrisons son, Dhani Harrison, returned to the recording studio at Abbey Road with legendary producer George Martin and his son Giles they decided to play with a mix of ’Here Comes the Sun’. What followed was extraordinary. They stumbled upon a long lost guitar solo that never made the final cut.

218 total views, 0 today

We Were Wanderers on a Prehistoric Earth: A Short Film Inspired by Joseph Conrad

Mike Springer | Film and animation | January 30, 2012

We Were Wanderers on a Prehistoric Earth is a short film inspired by Joseph Conrads masterpiece, Heart Of Darkness, was made for the Malaysian Tourism Authority and is an ode to the beautiful fauna and flora of the region. The title for the film is taken from the book;

“We were wanderers on a prehistoric earth,’on an earth that wore the aspect of an unknown planet. We could have fancied ourselves the first of men taking possession of an accursed inheritance, to be subdued at the cost of profound anguish and of excessive toil.”

The narration in the film is from Marlowe’s (the hero of Heart of Darkness) description of travelling up the Congo into the heart of darkness after Kurtz (the story was of course central to Coppola’s epic masterpiece, ‘Apocalypse Now’). The narration has such gravitas, such power, the words sing out with a poetic sense of wonder for a natural world that is no longer frightening, no longer in need of being subdued:

The great wall of vegetation, an exuberant and entangled mass of trunks, branches, leaves, boughs, festoons, motionless in the moonlight, was like a rioting invasion of soundless life, a rolling wave of plants, piled up, crested, ready to topple over the creek, to sweep every little man of us out of his little existence. And it moved not.

The film was made by James Griffiths, cinematography was by Christopher Moon with music from Lennert Busch, sound design by Mauricio d’Orey and last but not least Conrad’s words are spoken by Terry Burns.

181 total views, 0 today

Cartographic Birds and Plants by Claire Brewster

Christopher Jobson | Art and design | January 28, 2012

Cartographic Birds and Plants by Claire Brewster paper maps birds art

Claire Brewster paper maps birds art

Cartographic Birds and Plants by Claire Brewster

paper maps birds art

Do you like birds? Well paper artist Claire Brewster certainly does and she has created these beautiful cartographic pieces by meticulously cutting birds, flowers and plants out of old maps, atlases and other found paper, as she says herself:

My inspiration comes from nature and the urban environment in which I live and a desire to re-use the discarded, unwanted and obsolete.
Continue reading »

355 total views, 1 today

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore: An Oscar Nominated Film for Book Lovers

Dan Colman | Film and animation | January 28, 2012

I love anything to do with books and animation so this Oscar nominated short film; ‘The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore’ is right up my street. It’s made in an animation style that blends stop motion with computer animation and traditional hand drawn animation styles.

199 total views, 1 today

Future Orchard: A Fantastic Collective Enterprise In Cork City

moray mair | Culture and politics | January 28, 2012

Future Orchard is a collectively owned Orchard in Cork, Ireland and took off in 2009 under the leadership of Artist Elaine Garde-Wulff. She began with a hectare of land, divided it up into lots of 100 and sold the orchard off to interested parties; her friends, neighbours, etc.

This model of eco enterprise rejects the need for loans, capital investment or any dependency on grants instead all orchard shareholders have a vested interest in the orchard and create wealth by security of tenure under collective ownership. The shareholding is financially accessible to everyone with all embracing a co-operative and egalitarian approach to the project.

Since 2009 Elaine has begun to create her own currency using potato skins.

There are a few shares avaiulable if you’re interested.

333 total views, 2 today

Wonderful Light Stencils Created In Vietnam

Christopher Jobson | Art and design | January 28, 2012

Light Stencils in Vietnam

Vietnam street art stencils

Light Stencils in Vietnam Vietnam street art stencils

street art stencils

Light Stencils in Vietnam

Vietnam street art stencils

Light Stencils

Last year artist and photographer Wittner Fabrice created a number of unique light stencils in Vietnam. When he was in Vietnam he realised that the urban/rural divide was a prevelent there as anywhere else and so decided, as a sort of joke, to bring the ‘country mice’ into Hanoi to visit their townie cousins.

221 total views, 0 today

The Miniature LEGO Realism of Bruce Lowell

Christopher Jobson | Art and design | January 27, 2012

I am the biggest fan of lego. Even more so than my three year old daughter who is addicted to it – if that is even possible. Anyway these sculptures by Bruce Lowell are made from actual lego pieces. He generally finds inspiration in household objects and food. I’d love to meet this man and play with him all day, on the floor in a mess of lego bricks. These pieces are fantastic. Some of the best, fun, joyous work I’ve seen in ages. Are you as big a fan as me?

You can see more of his work here

350 total views, 0 today

Our Skills Exchange Talks At The Theatre Development Weekend In Cork

moray mair | All about mutantspace | January 27, 2012

Shamefully I forgot to post information up on the Triskel Development Centre Talks yesterday so if anyone is reading this you’ve already missed half of it. Thankfully you can catch two panel discussions tomorrow.

The talks have been organised by Corcadorca Theatre Company who are running the development centre in the Triskel Arts Centre, Cork City. It’s a great initiative that gives theatre makers the opportunity to use a free space for one week, free of charge, to experiment, play, create and fail. At the end of the week they are then obliged to show their work in progress to an audience. It’s a fantastic resource for Cork City and a good way to meet people and exchange ideas.

Anyway, to what you missed.
Today there was a panel discussion on where can developed work go?
The panel was made up of representatives from venues/festivals in Cork city who were discussing how work can be staged or programmed at their venues/festivals

287 total views, 0 today

Page 1 of 512 3 4 5

search our blog

check out our skills bank

Check out our bank where we pool all our skills for the benefit of our mutantspace members. It's free to join and registration only takes a minute

submissions to our blog

we're always delighted to publish your work in our blog. So If you want your art seen by thousands of people then go to our submissions page to get more info