The Hottest Party In L.A. Is Named After Some Bitch “Rhonda”
A drag queen or maybe a full tranny stamps my hand. Pause. Now this is what I’m talking about!
Latest Articles
“Big League Chew” — Conversations over Stolen Food, Pt. 3 of 4
This afternoon Amanda offered me gum, and I hadn’t chewed gum in a long, long time. I ran through my history with chewing gum. When my sister and I played whiffle-ball on the front driveway, using our garage-door as backstop, I’d pack roughly a third…
Thoughts on DIT Fest in Kent, Ohio
I was nervous all week about DIT Fest. The whole thing seemed out of control. Tao Lin, Sam Pink, Jordan Castro, Richard Wehrenberg and like two hundred bands…
Everybody Left: DIT Fest 2010
We did a ‘high five’ motion. I leaned over the center console of my car. We hugged. I said something like, “See ya.” He said something like, “Later, man.” While walking away from the car, he looked at me. I waved and smiled a little. He smiled a little, I think.
How I Became A Social Media Millionaire In One Week
Woke up today, thought ‘it would be sweet to be a millionaire.’ Logged onto the internet and learned about ‘social media.’ Seems like those guys are often millionaires. Made the decision to become a social media CEO.
Damon Pablo: NYC Street Photographer
Los Angeles native Damon Pablo is a self-taught street photographer living and working in New York City. He uses a Leica rangefinder camera and shoots only black and white film, which he then has hand processed locally for the truest approach to street photography.
I’ve Been Hoarding Episodes of Hoarders
You notice it the minute you walk into my apartment. Who am I kidding, you can smell it before you even get to the door. The neighborhood kids gossip about it, my friends have given up on seeing me, and my family has all but disowned me. It’s a problem I’ve kept hidden for months and have never quite been able to admit. But it’s become far too obvious to ignore, and it’s time to stop hiding. I am a hoarder, and what I hoard is episodes of the TV show Hoarders.
Sparklehorse and Dangermouse: Dark Night of the Soul
Even though the presence of outside lyricists pulls against the most obvious autobiographical readings, Dark Night of the Soul sometimes treats these concerns with a self-awareness and gallows humor it’s difficult not to trace back to Linkous himself, as when Iggy Pop himself, rock’s paradoxically indestructible cartoon hero of self-destructiveness, is employed to intone “pain, pain, pain, I’ll always be in pain.”
Face-to-Face with the World: On MyFreeCams.com and Digital Intimacy
The world is folded in upon itself. As Marshal McLuhan noted ages ago, the electronic age ushers in the global village. And MyFreeCams.com is a global village. As night falls and I ready for bed, women in the Philippines are just rising. I see the early sun pouring through their windows; I hear roosters crowing; I see her eat her Philippine breakfast.
Surrogate Semantic Family
To call someone a “bro” is a hyper-heterosexual form of endearment; to pronounce it bra is to increase that sentiment by two- or three-fold. That “bra” is short for brassiere has nothing do to with this venture.
Who Will Make Our Dreams Come True When Oprah’s Gone?
Our jones for Oprah started because she asked the right questions as a reporter, extracted the most important tears from the most important people and brought to light the issues others passed on. She did Good. And out of that came Oprah the Mogul, Oprah the Car-Gifter, Oprah the Career-Launcher.
The Four Ways You’ll Probably Die
The modern definition of biological death is the cessation of electrical activity in your brain. The most common causes of biological death in the United States are heart attack, cancer, stroke and emphysema (read: you’ll probably die one of these ways). Wonder how each of these afflictions actually feel when you’re dying from them.
How to be My Boyfriend
That reminds me: sex. I like to pretend that I’m a secret freak-on-a-leash in bed, but I don’t think I actually am. I’m too into being tender and loving and kissing a lot. But if you want to be rough and crazy, I guess I can go that way, too. And don’t worry about not having a big penis. Those actually scare me.
Riga For Guns
Inside are three policemen shooting simultaneously at different targets. In the way they shoot – with aggression and, despite the dark, with insane precision – the policemen give the impression that they are pro-death in situations requiring action beyond the verbal.
Beatniks and the Roots of Hipsters
I think some writers could mention the hipster’s obsession with clothes or music, but every American subculture has an obsession with defining themselves with clothes and music. That is just being American.
Saving Is For Suckers!
I read all the financial press. I’ve read all sorts of investing books, from Andrew Tobias to Suze Orman. I still end up overwhelmed and confused. Like many women, I fear an old age of ramen and a cardboard box under a bridge somewhere.
Camille Paglia is Sick of Lady Gaga
The critic and sexual theorist Camille Paglia has declared her disdain for pop sensation Lady Gaga. In London’s Sunday Times, Paglia – an avowed fan of Madonna – declares Gaga “the first major star of the digital age.” The phrase implies disconnection and falsehood: the critic’s own preference for what she might term analog pop is clear.
Will People Ever Get Sick of Lady Gaga?
I got invited to this fabulous party last night in the Hollywood Hills, but instead of going I ultimately decided that seeing Lady Gaga on the VMAs was much more pressing. How could I miss her white carpet arrival…
Jon Cotner & Andy Fitch:Ten Walks/Two Talks
In the park, dead ends and doublings-back amplify the aimlessness of the dialogue, which ranges over immediate phenomena (“Do you like how backs of benches catch a glow from streetlamps?”), roommate stories, and wooly summaries of Aristotle’s and Wittgenstein’s views of language.
All The Boyfriends I’ve Ever Had in Chronological Order, Pt. 3 of 4
Maybe he felt creepy about that, but either way, I think he felt like he had to be very gentle and responsible with me, which led to a lot of anticipation. Then one night, we finally went for it. Or at least tried to. I really don’t think his dick got very far before I started screaming in pain. Have you ever lost your virginity? Shit fucking hurts balls!
Vera, An Ordinary Love
Vera intended her work as a way to incorporate something beautiful and thoughtfully-rendered into everyday life, whether spread out on a breakfast table or covering a bed or knotted around a neck. Formally trained at New York City’s Cooper Union, she made “wearable art” at a time when that was either a novelty or a luxury…
The Stylish Wanderer: Teenage Clotheshorse
At just fifteen-years-old, this LA based fashion blogger, known only by the moniker “The Stylish Wanderer,” has already made impressive inroads in the fashion and entertainment industries. She has modeled in various major label campaigns, was invited last year to attend NYC Fashion Week, and can currently be seen in a TV commercial airing nationwide.
Love and Movies
These are hard times for lovers. Longtime companions may not be endangered, but they’re in danger. Everywhere people are saying that passion doesn’t last. When you fall in love, it might be forever, but at some point, you’ll probably look at your husband, your wife, your lover, and feel frustrated, annoyed, bored, or simply not be turned on.
The Week’s Internet Shit Talking in Review
More stock shit talking on Tao Lin, word of murdering hipsters, Sean Penn on cocaine and a butt-hurt Wyclef Jean on this week’s Internet Shit Talking in review.
“Undercover” — Conversations over Stolen Food, Pt. 2 of 4
If we eat things before we exit can no one call…catch us? There’s habeas corpus but there’s something else. Body of evidence? Doesn’t physical evidence need to exist of the event? So long as we consume all evidence perhaps nothing can be done to us.
Uno Tango Mas, Pt. 2 of 2
It should have occurred to me that someone who moves to a continent – a continent – where she doesn’t know anybody or speak the language might have a fierce, even irrational, independent streak.
Books Spring Eternal
Old is new again. Again. The recent reappropriation of the past in American youth culture (see: steampunk fashion, the booming knitting industry, the comeback of the mix tape) might be indicative of a popular desire to return to simpler times. Or to work our hands instead of our cash. Or in the case of writer/illustrator Lane Smith’s new children’s book, It’s a Book, to remind us that reading books – as opposed to screens – is a worthy pursuit.
Stop Playing Fantasy Football. Now.
Somehow over the last five years, fantasy football has become ubiquitous. Girlfriends, old ladies, every man who knows how to turn a computer – they all play it. Hell, even my cat has a team – and it’s loaded. Why? Because it’s so darn “fun.”
Uno Tango Mas, Pt. 1 of 2
Once we got in our room I popped the cheap champagne I bought to celebrate the occasion. I hadn’t seen Sara in two months, which, under the circumstances, seemed an intolerably long time. We had been e-mailing each other every day, and, in a way, that made every day seem like another day I didn’t get to see her.
Hipstamatic for the People
It’s endearing how the detached cynicism with which hipsters confront their surroundings is tempered by a sentimentality for “old” things, namely, these circa 80’s photos—and how those compromised photos resembled the inception of photography in the 1840’s.
Meghan McCain: Dirty Sexy Politics
The political children who’ve sought the spotlight are few in number; most tend to seem shy and retiring once the camera lights fade. Certainly, Jenna Bush, who’s published a children’s book and appears on TV periodically, has refused to allow the world the access to her emotions that McCain, three years younger, freely grants.
Leaving My Body Behind, Just For A While
My preferred world is one of motion, activity, strength, flexibility. I can easily touch my palms to the floor, sometimes my wrists. (Which amazes all the doctors I’ve seen this year because, if one part of you is broken, they seem to think, the rest must be as well.)
Five Terrifying Serial Killers in Recent History
The five serial killers cataloged in this article are from Ukraine, the United States, and Japan. When they committed their crimes, they were 19, 48, 32 and 60 years old. Their murders were characterized by, among other practices, bludgeoning with hammers, mutilation, “skin suits,” rape, cannibalization, torture, video taping and necrophilia.
4 Buzz Bands for Fall
The summer festival season inevitably gives way to darker sounds worthy of intimate indoor concerts and snowed-in listening sessions. Here are four worthy up-and-coming acts with recent or impending releases.
All the Video Game Consoles I’ve Ever Owned in Chronological Order, Pt. 4 of 4
My assertion [in Part 1] that the TurboGrafx-16 was ‘the best console ever’ was kind of a little bit facetious. It might have a ‘special place in my heart’, but if I had to have only one console ever for the rest of my life it would be the PlayStation 2, and sales numbers seem to agree.
The Genius Delusion: Reflections on Elizabeth Gilbert’s 2009 TED Talk
While not all of these stories are ostensibly about the creative process, they nevertheless contain an important insight, anticipated by the ancients and borne out by the private lives of creative artists since the Renaissance: reaching for the sun is dangerous business.
Do Spoilers Spoil the TV Viewing Experience?
Nowadays, thanks to spoilers, we’d all know the identity of the culprit before she even pulled the trigger. We’d have spent months reading endless discussion of the cliffhanger and its resolution on internet chat boards, maybe even throwing our own two cents into the ring.
Everybody Get Out of New York (Or Don’t)
In New York, as David Cross likes to say, “You are constantly faced with this very urgent decision that you have to make about every 20 minutes. You have to decide immediately, ‘Oh my god, do I look at the most beautiful woman in the world or the craziest guy in the world?'” There are more than eight million other people bookended by those two superlatives, and while some, like your boss, might contribute to your stress, many of them reduce it.
The Last Story I Filed Before Losing My Job At A Music Magazine
Last week, the Decatur, Ga.-based music, film and culture magazine Paste announced that it was shuttering its print edition and sallying forth into the great digital future as a web-only publication—and, in the process, sloughing off its entire dozen-person staff. I was one of them.
Tao Lin: Richard Yates
The novel is not without plot, and indeed it is a great deal more concrete than the plots found in some of the author’s previous work. Stylistically Richard Yates bears more resemblance to Lin’s 2009 novella Shoplifting From American Apparel than it does to his previous novel, Eeeee Eee Eeee (2007).
Rappers I’ve Been Listening to Lately
Uses similes and metaphors often. Delivers ‘punch lines’ well. Seems well versed in pop culture. Seems to have a productive/effective work ethic and a Promethazine-Codeine syrup addiction. Signature ‘noises’ include [lighter ‘flick’/inhale], “young moolah baby,” and [high-pitched laughter].
Thinking About The Human Centipede
This Friday night I watched Tom Six’s The Human Centipede (First Sequence) on my laptop as the sun was setting in the background. It was almost the best movie I’ve seen this year, falling second only to Tom Cruise’s Knight and Day.
“W.F.” — Conversations over Stolen Food, Pt. 1 of 4
We (Jon Cotner, Andy Fitch) recorded forty-five-minute conversations for thirty straight days around New York City. Half these talks took place at a Union Square health-food store which, for legal reasons, we call “W.F.”
Tobacco Executive Has “Had Enough”
Tobacco Executive Tony Malroy, who controls the Benson and Co. Conglomerate – an entity that encompasses countless brands of cigarettes – has spoken out on unfair prejudices against cigarette smoking.
Dispatch from L.A.
But then I get pissed the hell off, like foaming at the mouth mad, because I can’t find this fucking bus stop a-n-y-w-h-e-r-e, even though my iPhone tells me it’s right here. I’m crossing the street, up and down, back and forth, trying to pin down the bus I need. Look down at my iPhone, back up at the street, down at my iPhone, back up at the street.
Close: The Destruction of the Individual
The face does not exist, for it has no essence, only factors of the face exist, only forces at play exist. And, as such, one will notice that in any Chuck Close portrait the face is almost always blank or violent, because it has no one singular telos, no singular emotion to convey, but instead, millions, most of which probably clash quite violently.
The Week’s Internet Shit Talking in Review
Shit talking this week experienced somewhat of a lull. While we did start off the week strong with the Glenn Beck’s rally—an event that later gained the enigmatic spiritual warrior the title “The White Malcom X” from one reporter at The Daily Beast—shit talking slacked during the middle of the week…
Five Models You Can’t Avoid No Matter Where You Go
One of my favorite pastimes is getting lost in a magazine store. Within seconds I’m high off the smell of all those glossy fantasies, the cologne inserts, and millions of dollars worth of ads for things I can’t easily afford.
Thank God for In-Flight Entertainment! But Where Are All the Black People?
I shouldn’t have been suprised. Outside of Tracy Morgan on 30 Rock, Chandra Wilson and James Pickens Jr. among the rainbow coalition on Grey’s Anatomy, and several other shows that include a black face or two in predominantly white ensembles (True Blood, Private Practice, Glee), prime-time TV lacks a significant black presence.
A Brief Phone Conversation With Harvey Pekar
I’d gotten his number from a man who used to book him for speaking engagements. He told me: “Harvey’s real cool, just give him a call.” So I did. The phone rang a few times, then Harvey picked up. I heard that same voice I came to know from his days on Letterman. It was scratchy and distinct, loaded with character.
