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THE ZEN OF BOBBY V

While I should have been outside enjoying the weather earlier this week I was busy watching a great little documentary on ESPN, The Zen of Bobby V. The Zen of Bobby V details the story of former New York Mets manager Bobby Vanlentine's transition to managing the Chiba Marines of Japan's Pacific League, as well as his seemingly one-man quest to save baseball in Japan. Valentine's love of the game, the Japanese culture, and basically everything else he encounters is incredible and really makes the film. I have no idea if this film, which recently debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival, is going to be airing again on ESPN or if it's going to be in any theaters, but if you find out it is I definitely recommend checking it out.

FRANK CHIMERO

A whole bunch of really nice illustration work by Frank Chimero at makemakemake.org. Be sure to check out The States, Greatest Hits, and The Small Print.

XYZ STUDIOS FOR DODGE

The latest spot for Dodge was done by Australia's XYZ Studios, and it is absolutely gorgeous. The piece combines vastly different visual styles beautifully, with the highly stylized characters blending seamlessly with the high-gloss, super-realism of the car. And that Grandaddy song fits perfectly.

MIKE REA

A really nice interview with Chicago artist Mike Rea over at Fecal Face. Mike makes absolutely ridiculous sculptures out of wood. I don't even know what else to say, his work is just incredible.

TRASH TALK

I'm actually enjoying the NBA for the first time in about a decade, and Steve Nash and the Phoenix Suns are a big reason why. That's why it's nice to see that Nash has started wearing his new Nike Trash Talk shoe, which is literally made of garbage. The shoe is pieced together from scraps from Nike factory floor, as well as other eco-friendly materials. And they look pretty good too.

MUXTAPE

Muxtape is just about the best thing I've ever seen. My friend John and I were just discussing a mixtape club and this wonderful site makes creating online mix-tape super simple and even enjoyable. The interface and player are really nicely done, and yes, you can only include twelve songs, but that's the beauty of the mix-tape, you really have to think about which twelve to include.

Have a listen to my Muxtape here

FORTS

A nice photography series by Hybrid Heart on one of my personal childhood favorites, fort building. Each fort was built in under two hours and used only materials found within the room. Building a spaceship out of a rocking chair and a bed sheet was always nice as well.

THINGS I HAVE LEARNED…

A nice video piece by Hillman Curtis about Stefan Sagmeister’s most recent interactive exhibition, Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far. The video piece is nice but does try little too hard, just like a lot of Curtis’ work. But it does do a good job of showing just how impressive Sagmeister’s work really is.

Visit the companion site here

HIGH SCHOOL BRANDING

An interesting look into the rebranding of a high school athletic program by the folks at Brainstorm. Very smart.

Via Uni Watch

RADIOHEAD – CEREMONY

I'm not exactly a Radiohead 'fan-boy.' I mean, I like them a lot and I'll check out everything they do, just like everyone else, but I don't necessarily love them. The same can be said for my feelings about Joy Division. Again, they were a great band and I enjoy them quite a bit, but I'm not about to have the Unknown Pleasures artwork tattooed on my back. But combining the two, as Radiohead did in one of their webcasts by covering Ceremony, has resulted in something that I really do love. And you can even understand what Thom Yorke is saying!

FIELD NOTES

Local boys Coudal collaborated with the equally wonderful Draplin Design Co. several months ago to produce the best little notebooks in town, Field Notes. They recently went live with the site for the incredibly well-reviewed products, and, as expected, it stays right in line with the beautiful design of the notebooks themselves. I got my Field Notes when they were part of Coudal's Swap Meat, and before they came with a pen and pencil set. And that makes me pretty sad.

TIGHTS ARE NOT PANTS

The sooner everyone can understand and accept this the better. TIGHTS ARE NOT PANTS!

THE DESKTOP WALLPAPER PROJECT

Have you been feeling like your desktop at work just isn't letting people know how interesting and creative you are? Then check out The Desktop Wallpaper Project Presented by Kitsune Noir. The art and design blog got 60 artists to create desktop wallpapers and will be releasing new ones each Wendesday. So far, there's been some very nice work by McBess, Rey Ortega, and UPSO.

100 GREAT ETSY ARTISTS

My wonderful girlfriend was recently named on a very nice list of 100 Great Artists at Etsy. You can find all her lovely work for sale at her Etsy store, Wombats In Vests. Now go buy some art!

BUTTERFINGERS

Bomb the Bass' new video for Butterfingers doesn't have an incredible amount of depth and I don't even really care for the song, but it gets by on cuteness alone. The Perish Factory directed clip features nothing more than the characters you see here singing along to the song, and somehow that's enought. But just barely.

Via Coudal

YES STUDIOS

Very nice work being done by Yes Studios. A very consistent, clean, Helvetica-heavy (not necessarily a bad thing) style. Be sure to check out Genius, Moloko, The Big Art Project, and The Stands.

POP MATTERS

Nikolay Saveliev's Pop Matters is a series of record sleeves filled with 'faux-academic material on pop music and the state of the record industry' and then snuck onto record store shelves. An excellent idea in itself and the simple design is great. His other work is really nice as well.

Via iso50

YEASAYER ON TAKE AWAY SHOWS

The Take Away Shows are consistently great, but their recent session with Brooklyn band Yeasayer is something special. Actually, I should say that the second part of their session with Yeasayer, the part filmed in someone's tiny Paris apartment with a group of very excited and kinda sweaty fans, is something special.

Yeasayer's All Hour Cymbals is available now on We Are Free

PUDDLEBLOG

Puddleblog is exactly what it sounds like, a blog about a puddle. More specifically, a blog about the puddle on the corner of Jay and Plymouth in Brooklyn. I realize it sounds completely ridiculous, but it's actually fairly interesting.

Via Clusterflock

HULU

In the latest ‘your computer and your tv are turning into the same thing’ news, Hulu launched today. The joint venture between NBC and Newscorp provides on-demand, streaming video of television shows and movies. The content seems to be fairly decent and the interface when viewing videos is pretty nice as well. Oh, and you get 30 second advertisements every 10 minutes! Could be worse.

EMO + BEER = BUSTED CAREER

Andrew Kuo's work can be found online at nytimes.com as well as on his blog, which happens to be named after the best 5’5” player in NBA history. Kuo's uniquely organized and thoughtful charts and graphs provide reviews of recent shows and albums, ranging from Lil' Wayne live in New Jersey to the new Beach House album.

Andrew Kuo's non-chart-related artwork can be seen here

DO, KEEP DOING, DO SOME MORE

Directed by Coan and Zorn of Not To Scale, Do, Keep Doing, Do Some More is a simply–animated, colorful piece, that stays away from the over-the-top retro-glam we're seeing so much of in motion graphics right now. The Garrison Keillor voiced spot for Honda is as smooth and subtle as his voice and delivers an eco-friendly message without being heavy handed.

Via Motionographer

FOURTH OF JULY

Somehow, after seeing Fourth of July open for The Good Life last fall, I totally forgot about them. They were great live and their debut album, Fourth of July on the Plains, is even more impressive. It's nice to see another great band come out of Lawrence, Kansas, and also great to see that it has ties to an old one.

She's In Love mp3
Fourth of July on the Plains is available now from Range Life Records

DAIRY TODAY

I once burned a copy of Sunny Day Real Estate's Diary and accidentally wrote ‘Dairy’ on the disc, but that has nothing to do with this. Pentagram recently redesigned the tradeshow publication Dairy Today and, while the content might not exactly be up my alley, the magazine looks great. With a different ‘cover model’ each month we can expect to be finding stacks of these in the backs of dairy farmers closets for years to come.

Check out the photoshoot and process on Pentagram's blog

PENGUIN PAPERBACK SPOTTERS

The Penguin Paperback Spotters' Guild is an incredibly extensive Flickr pool, filled with some gorgeous Penguin book covers. Every series, including Pelican Books, are well represented, with an emphasis on earlier publications. An incredible amount of very nice work.

For even more Penguin, I recommend Penguin By Design: A Cover Story 1935-2005 by Phil Baines

OFF-REGISTER

The Off–Register show presented by Foundation Projects opened last Friday at AV-aerie here in Chicago. It's a traveling exhibition of prints by artists who 'don't consider them printmakers.' I had a chance to check it out during the viewing on Saturday and the suprisingly small show included some nice work from folks like Maya Hayuk, Geoff McFetridge, and Mike Perry. The AV–aerie space, while also a bit on the small side, is a very nice conversion of old warehouse space. The next stop for the show is the Riviera Gallery in Brooklyn.

Viewings of Off-Register are available by appointment only through March 15

SEE YA LATER!