Visualati Substantia 1

I am and have always been extremely inept when it comes to creating anything remotely visually appealing.

And this bums me out huge.

As animated as my visual vocab can seem at times, when it comes down to actually translating any sort of mental to the medium, everything must be funneled into the motor system and then fumbled out of my clumsy little hooves. Unfortunately, seeing as my fingers have been blessed with the dexterity of a cerebral palsy victim, my wayward scribbles have never progressed much farther then the linings of some notebook pages. So, I've got loads of respect for those who just bleed pictures.

These dudes are on some peel-the-lids-off-your-third-eye shit. Check it.

(Oh but be sure to stick around for a brief mp3 giveaway bonanza following the presentation...basically this is an audioblog+ now)*

*The plus is for additional content! Wink!




Presenting DJ Scallywag's Dandy Little Art Symposium Vol 1.

Thomas Han







King of the dayglo-pastel, Dr. Mario-pill-rocking, cute-but-crazy school of art.

MARS-1







I want to go to the places he paints more than anywhere else I've ever dreamt of. I hope I get to go when I die. Please God, let me tear around these environments in some sort of gnarly organic spacecraft at some point. I promise I won't pretend to be retarded in order to skip the lines at Magic Mountain anymore (for reals though...).

Kozyndan





White guy, Japanese girl artist couple. By the looks of it, a match made in heaven. Their shit is soft and intimate yet bugged out. Bunnies, Giant Robots, mutants, school girls. You name it. Awesome. Their city panoramas are the jam.



akiza





Akiza's got the real honed in iconographic thing down pat. Now all this little shapeshifting china doll needs is some homies to help her get all viral in the States. I would love to see Akiza's start creeping across the urban landscape, covering up all these borrring Obey and Seizer posters.

Alex Pardee





This dude is definitely insane...insanely talented that is! A-haa!

No seriously, this guy is insane. He's also the best demented artist in the world, bar none.

He does the awesomely awesome comic Bunnywith and His Secrets of Hollywood book is also hilariously fucked up/brilliant.






Craola

Greg Simkins aka Craola is right up there in Pardee's range though. Simkins is the random tentacle go to guy fer sure.



Naoto Hattori








Ooops, almost forgot ya boy Naoto. Japanese transplant who specializes in extracting the gnarliest part of that one trip where you were just like "Fuuuuuck,this is tooo much...does this shit ever ennnnnd" and some transdimensional entity's all, "No! this. is. ETERNITY..." and you go "Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck". Yeah, he can paint that part no problem. He's like the illegitimate mutant child of a Geiger/Cronenberg headfuck.



Ok, now a smattering of random images...some of these just got right click saved with the quickness so I don't have the Artists name. Apologies. If anybody knows who's responsible for the one's I don't list the name on, by all means, hit me off with that info.

Initiate Eye Candy Overdrive Round 2

Alessandro Pautasso


Blaine Fontana




Stan & Vince







Chuck Anderson


High horse please...thank you. Can I get a monocle or something too...no?...alright, no, it's cool. Ahem...

As you've no doubt deduced at this point in our proceedings, I tend to gravitate towards art that exudes an air of, shall we say, universal peculiarity? Imagery perhaps best described as though the artist has somehow siphoned large swaths of raw, unconscious understanding from an unbound pool of creativity. Yet, without the application of extravagent analysis, the art still manages to stand alone as being aesthetically distinct and immersive. Alas, these inconsequential little trifles that so effortlessly circumvent the whole laborious process of overwrought scrutiny (as is dictated by the so-called "art world"), are, in turn, dismissed as merely "lowbrow" meanderings. As such, they are shunned for their abilitity to elicit,umph, gutteral reactions from those of us too enamored with these spastic utterings from the recesses of the reptilian part of our brains.

Well, aren't I the brute then! ::Laughter like the in the movie Amadeus:: Really...And so, I've no choice but to adopt a philosophy as follows: If you can't topple the oligarchy, then why not just disregard it entirely! ::Roomfuls of Amadeus laughter:: Hmm, yes yes, well allow me to speak frankly about the matter for just a moment...

I could gives a fuck about the supposed sea of metaphors and sexual parallels that surround your big ass red dot, shitbag.

Oh look, it's being bisected by a dashed line. I can not begin to fathom the implications. Oh and the edges are offset ever so slightly. Catch me, I feel faint. How large did you say? 50 feet across? My that's a lot of canvas. No mere peon could afford that, let alone get the studio space to house it, let me tell you. But I guess that's why you're the artiste and they're just poor! Ah! Oh, and will you look at these paint speckles in the corner. Was that an accident? No! Then here's a million dollars. Now where are my pills...darling, fetch me my pills...I'm restless. My mood has gone a pale blue...or is it...crimson?

Fuck that. Your shit looks laaaame. The 5 paragraph essay detailing precisely how hard you are blowing my mind is just the icing on the cake. That's the real high art...concocting some ultra premium bullshit statement so impenetrable, yet seemingly profound, that all the other overlords of bullshit feel the need to cozy up to your brilliant little enigma. Then the dominoes start falling and the next thing you know you're the Toast of the Town, the Belle of the Ball! ::Amadeus:: Pffff. Whatever helps you sleep at night. And not to say this isn't how things are with everything subjective: music, movies, fashion etc...but with "art" art (high fashion too), it just seems sooo much more painfully obvious that shit is arbitrary and people are fickle, sheepish, and most of all, retarded. All I can see is the man behind the curtain, surreptitiously sucking his own dick.

But hey, I'm young and naive. Look at me, trying to fight pretension with pretension like I'm the first person who ever questioned the ridiculosity of the system. Sigh...when will I learn. But truthfully, I just don't usually find the need to treat art like it's this Rubik's cube, when it can be this direct pipeline of communication, bundled as is for consumption. That inexplicable personal magnetism that a piece of art has, where you are subconciously deciphering and integrating the styles and symbols that have also been subconsciously embedded and layered, and you either connect or you don't connect, that's what fascinates me. When two extraordinarily complicated beings, the observer and the art (borne of another person's observations), each beset with countless rules, ideas, understanding, pasts, futures, etc., engage each other, the fact that a clear cut attraction or repulsion from this huge fucking equation can be reached at all, let alone in mere seconds sometimes, is amazing. Same with a song, same with people, same with anything. And when it's abstract, it's communication on a path seldom travelled, where certain logics and associations can be overwritten or dismissed and can spark a reaction or interplay not familiar to any other form of expression...but still it's there, that feeling. Maybe it's a clue to unraveling the world, maybe to understanding yourself, or maybe it's nothing at all, but it's personal, it's honest, and basically, it is what it is.


Yep.





Aw shit, I said mp3's too, huh. *(&$(*%$@@!!. (that was supposed to look like swearing in comic books or q*bert or whatever).

Cut Chemist- Spat

Cut Chemist- Storm (featuring Edan and Mr.Lif)

Maaan. This shit (Audiences' Listening) took forever, it was supposed to be fucking mindblowing. It's just good. Not even great. Oh well. It's basically exactly what you would expect from Cut Chemist if you weren't expecting an album like 5 years in the making. "Slap" is cool in a Kid Koala kind of way, just doing something goofy but inspired with turntables. And "Storm" would rock my world if it weren't for those fucking turntable stabs mixed waaay too loud that hit every bar. Why is that shit in front of the vocals??? It would be dope as a little background thingy but it kills this awesome song for me. Shiit, I wanna hear Edan. I can't even concentrate on his verse with that shit. Is that just crazy talk or are my speakers fucked up or what??? Help me out here.

Still, other good jams are The Garden, that Hymnal cut (check out Omid's Monolith for more of him, he's ill) and 2266 Cambridge.

Thom Yorke- The Eraser

Thom Yorke- Atoms for Peace

I like this. Yay. I was pretty worried I wouldn't after Hail to the Thief, but this definately feels like a solo affair. The density of the tracks are stripped down a great deal, straddling the line between complicated and accessible, which allows plenty of room for Yorke to do his thing. The over all feel of the album is much closer to Kid A, which is a good thing in my opinion. It's not amazing but it's really really good, which is more than I was hoping for.

Burial-You Hurt Me

Burial-Gutted

Burial-Forgive

Best thing to happen to dubstep since the Vex'd album. This self-titled album by Burial is fully shrouded with this deep ominous mystique that makes it shine above the standard dubstep club tune. The depth of production is amazing. The cryptic vocal sample intro and outro and the ambient interludes make it completely necessary to listen to this album as a whole in order to get the full effect. In fact, "Forgive", essentially an extended two bar loop, is one of the most beautiful things I have heard in a great while. It sounds like an angel, stuck halfway between two dimensions, singing a misty hymn that's being refracted by cracked mirrors through a blanket of fog. Sleep Spindles 3 material.

Dr. Octagon- Our Operators Are Masturbating

Dr. Octagon- The Turtle Skit

These two skits from the Return of Dr. Octagon are the best things off the album. The 3 new Kool Keith projects (this, Project Polaroid, and Mr. Nogatco) are as follows: weak, weaker, and fucking weaksauce. Dude's basically not even on the Return Album, the highest profile one, apparently over some gay ass dispute. There's some ok tracks (that one that's like mufucka's dress like they from Pakistan) but, aside from the skits, this shit does not feel like the legit return of the good doctor. Booo.

Wizone-Dissect the Style (feat Kool Keith) (Ming & FS Remix)

Here's some rarely heard Kool Keith over some vintage Ming & FS dnb/hip hop. See how much better he sounds with decent beats?!? But speaking of which...fuck man, what happened to Ming and FS!!! Subway Series was awful and Back to One was pretty crappy too. Aside from maybe this track.

Ming & FS-50 ft. Moleman

They need to bust another one of these epic transformer jams ASAP.

Ming & FS-The Human Condition

Ok, now some high flying pump up tunes to brighten your mood and mine. We got the ball tingling combo of Chromeo and Ed "so hot right now" Banger records, plus some obscure slap happy electric oompah jam that can and should generate smiles for miles.

DJ Mehdi feat Chromeo- I Am Somebody (Montreal Version)

Sagor och Swing- Not even gonna attempt typing the name...just dl it.



Goddamn. And now, a thousand years of sleep.....................