Jonathan is a photographer/artist/musician living in Davidsonville, Maryland.  He plays bass in the post-rock band Sawhorse who recently released a new album entitled Cover it in Asphalt. He plays guitar in the screamo band Age Sixteen who also just released a new album entitled Open Up Finders, Please (which I reviewed HERE).  You can check out Jon’s photography work HERE.

Boogie

this guy has been blowing my mind for a few years now. every photo i’ve ever seen by this guy is amazing. he actually doesn’t fail at the fact that he’s a street photographer, shooting black and white, long after the heyday of the small format leica guys. seriously, this guy, wtf.

Frederick Nietzsche

so this guy pretty much single handedly invented post-modernist thinking. bad rep for a while because the nazis used some of his writings out of context as propaganda. i could go on forever about nietzsche, it’s like reading freud, swift, and rousseau all at once. subject matter ranges from truth and lying to the role of religion in our time, nihilism, whatever. look up any work by this guy, it will change the way you think about well… thinking, seriously.

Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood

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marjane satrapi writes about her life growing in tehran, iran during the fundamentalist revolution and the iraqi invasion in the 80′s. yea it’s a graphic novel, so even if you don’t  read a lot you can probably finish it in 2 hours tops. it’s one of my favorite books i’ve ever read. she also directed the film made from the  books, which is seriously incredible. so if you wanna see a girl in the 80′s buying banned michael jackson and iron maiden tapes, getting arrested for wearing nike high tops and back patches and also learn about what life is actually like “over there”, read this, the books are fun, really well written and illustrated.

The Big Picture is the best blog on the Internet right now. They’re doing a “Year in Review” event in 3 parts. They posted the first installment today so go check it out.

Here are a few of my favorites.

Check out the entire series HERE.

2) I’ve got an Architecture Boner

Extremely Comfortable looking Guest House with ‘Sleep Cells’ HERE.

Backyard on the Roof HERE.

A Villains Dream Lair HERE.

Sick Modern Seattle House HERE.

3) Jason de Caires’ Creepy Underwater Sculptures

I wonder what people are going to think when these sculptures are found in the future and no one remembers where they came from. So fucking creepy.

More Pictures/Interview HERE.

The photograph was used in a psychological study. It seems that only 4% of students who look at the photo actually notice Mary falling to earth in the center of the shot.

According to the book Photography Handbook: Media Practice, this is Mary Miller, who had lived with her sister in Buffalo but had recently left saying she was going to Indiana to visit other relatives. (Her sister said she couldn’t think of a reason for the suicide, but remember divorce was very taboo back then.)

She checked into this hotel as “M. Miller, Chicago”, locked herself in the bathroom and crawled out onto the window ledge. Photographer Russell Sorgi happened on the scene by chance; driving home from another assignment he saw a speeding police car and followed it. In the book, he describes the mechanics of how he set up and took the shot. It was one of those cameras that you have to remove the exposed slide and put in another one for each shot. He took two establishing shots as she sat on the ledge, and had just slammed the third slide into the camera when Miss Miller waved to the crowd and pushed off.

The photograph was used in a psychological study. It seems that only 4% of students who look at the photo actually notice Mary falling to earth in the center of the shot. It was also used to amazing effect by Neil Gaiman in the story “Passengers”, in Preludes and Nocturnes.

Hello, miss, I would like a cup of coffee while I wait.
What are you waiting for?
Oh, you know, the usual.. the end of the world.

Via HERE.

This blog details the daily routines of famous artists/scientists/thinkers/and politicians. I particularly like the responses of writer Joseph Campbell.

So during the years of the Depression I had arranged a schedule for myself. When you don’t have a job or anyone to tell you what to do, you’ve got to fix one for yourself. I divided the day into four four-hour periods, of which I would be reading in three of the four-hour periods, and free one of them.

And of writer Saul Bellow,

Of course he worked the morning of the nosebleed, lying down on the futon in the studio whenever the bleeding started, and then getting up to scrawl out a new paragraph. When he hadn’t returned for lunch, I carried a bite out to him and found him typing vigorously, his face and his T-shirt covered with blood.

Others HERE.

2) Yamaguchi Otoya Photo

According to a Time Magazine article November 14, 1960:

“In a bleak cell at a Tokyo juvenile detention home one night last week, a mop-haired teenager mixed a palmful of tooth powder with a few drops of water and scrawled a message on the wall: “Seven lives for my country. Ten thousand years for His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor!” Then Otoya Yamaguchi, 17, tore his bed sheet into strips, knotted them into a rope, stood up on a toilet bowl and hanged himself from the light fixture in the ceiling. Yamaguchi, who last month stabbed Socialist Chairman Inejiro Asanuma to death at a political rally, had lived his bloody samurai tradition to the end. His suicide was an act of owabi—apology to those inconvenienced by his murder of Asanuma. “

via HERE.

1)  Beating a Dead Horse

I recieved my Thursday/Envy split in the mail today.  The packaging is really beautiful and deserves to be seen up close.  These images are huge btw.

2)  Joshua Hoffine

In honor of Halloween it seems that every blog on the internet has posted Joshua Hoffine’s photos. 

more HERE.

Mount Eerie, also known as Phil Elverum (ex principal member of The Microphones), released 7 new songs in May of 2004 while on tour in Australia.  If you’ve never listened to The Microphones or Mt. Eerie before think of lo-fi + folk music + sometimes subtle electronic noise experiments + recording on a reel to reel 8 track in a dusty log cabin + a squeaky chair on reverberating hardwood floors + choruses sung with a bunch of friends.  This is my favorite Phil Elverum release because it leaves out a bunch of the slow meandering experimentation found on his earlier releases to focus on the meat and potatoes – his sweet lo-fi folk songs.

Download HERE .

2) Shameless Self Promotion

My band, Pianos Become the Teeth, has posted a new song called Creatures of Habit. We’re going to be releasing it on a split 7" with NJ based screamo band Ezra Joyce. We’re planning a 10 day southern east coast tour in January (2nd to the 10th) from Maryland to Florida. If you can help us out in any way get in touch.

http://www.myspace.com/pianosbecometheteeth

http://www.myspace.com/ezrajoyce

3) Horses Personified

I can’t decide if this is really funny or really stupid. 3 of the oddest non-photoshopped pictures of horses I’ve ever seen.

HERE

Here’s some more music that’s perfect for Fall.  

Small Brown Bike and The Casket Lottery team up on this split to release a set of 6 collaborative songs.  My favorite moment on this split comes during the second song, at about 9 seconds in, there’s an almost inaudible yell that they left in the track for whatever reason.  See if you can pick it out.

“The Casket Lottery offer up a wicked new original, “Composing Myself (A Lullaby),” and the music for “Boardinghouse,” with Small Brown Bike contributing the lyrics and slightly harsher vocals, both of which continue The Casket Lottery’s musically intricate, layered, lush and emotional blend of melody and aggression. Small Brown Bike ably picks up the gauntlet with their original, the jagged, pounding and propulsive “Now I’m A Shadow,” and the more measured and building “Wrong Hometown,” with The Casket Lottery taking over lyrical and melodious vocal duty. Akin musically and ideologically, yet possessed of distinct identities, these two post emo, punk, rock, “whatever you got” warriors reach their greatest collaborative heights on the vocal and musical trade-offs of their reverent yet original cover of Queen’s “Under Pressure” and their acoustic plaintive lament “Riding With Death.” Whether taking turns trading originals, combining music, lyrics and vocals, or coalescing into a unyielding juggernaut, this EP is a unique rarity, as it not only succeeds as a distinct and excellent musical collaboration, but retains each band’s formative identity while establishing a brilliant new one in the process.”

Snatch it HERE.

Buy the vinyl HERE.

2)  Video for T-Bone

Andrew W.K. gets pelted with tons of trash at The Gathering but that doesn’t stop him from headbanging and loving you.

The headbanging begins around 2:34.

3) Macro Meats

Ugh, some guy decided to take macro photographs of popular processed meat products.  Pretty gross looking close up.

Check the entire set HERE.

Chuglife’s post on Loma Prieta made me think about how much I love their previous band Sailboats.

“Sailboats was a band from Berkeley. In 2003 they recorded a 2-song demo and played several shows throughout California. Unfortunately, they were involved in a fatal crash, in which 2/3 members did not survive, while on their first tour in 2004. Sometime before this they recorded an LP which will most-likely never be released. I was fortunate enough to witness their brief and amazing existence as their friend and on/off roadie. I created this page so that, hopefully, they will not be forgotten. They were the most warm-hearted, generous, talented people and to this day I can’t believe my two best friends are gone.”

I’ve heard that the car crash mentioned was just a rumor started by the band and that their breakup was actually just a routine falling out.  But I think I read that on a message board so it’s completely hearsay.  But anyway,  a couple of the guys in Sailboats went on to form Loma Prieta.

Download the 2 song demo HERE.  Or snatch it from their Myspace.

Then click on over to Chuglife’s blog and snatch Loma Prieta’s releases HERE.

Then buy the vinyl from discos huelga HERE.

2)  Hurricane Ike Pictures

via The Big Picture

See the rest of this incredible set HERE.

He just did an interview with SEESAW MAGAZINE that you can check out HERE.

2) This is a video of Adam Arcuragi playing Bottom of the River in a NYC flea market.  I know it’s old but it’s such a good video.  Sadly, I thought his full length was kind of boring.  This song rules though.

via La Blogotheque

A)  Alan Taylor’s photo blog The Big Picture, which is run by the Boston Globe, has a ton of amazing photographs from all around the world.  The Big Picture compiles photos from lesser known news stories with a focus on current events.  Here are a few of my favorites.

Each of the photographs on The Big Picture website have captions accompanying them.  The captions really enhance the photographs, so go check out the site.  MSNBC has a photo blog that’s kind of similar HERE.

B)  I wanted to go see Bon Iver at the Black Cat on August 1st but it looks like the show is already sold out.  Fugg.

C)  I never thought I would make a post about a clock.  But I want one of these.

A tube clock.  Fucking awesome looking.  HERE.