Enjoy Saturday’s night of revelry, readers, because when you wake up the next morning (or afternoon, we don’t judge), it’ll be time to reassess your life and commit yourself to unreasonable goals in hopes of self-improvement in 2012. Resolutions come in all shapes and sizes, and while many are deeply personal, Flavorpill’s are very public. We’ve created a list of our cultural resolutions for the new year — changes we’d like to see in the arts and entertainment landscape over the next 12 months, from trends that need to die to movements from 2011 that should make a bigger impact in 2012. Read our resolutions after the jump, and leave your own in the comments.
Today at Flavorpill, we recalled 2011′s biggest band beefs, two of which involved Bon Iver. We met the entire Nintendo family, in a piece of deviantART that depicts all of its countless major characters. We watched a bizarre pair of elderly Christian twin sisters perform a pantomime to Radiohead’s “Street Spirit.” We discovered that Kelly Clarkson is a Ron Paul supporter, and also that she’s so educated about the Republican presidential candidate that she hadn’t realized he’s been accused of homophobia and racism. We laughed out loud at this spot-on faux flyer for Every New Year’s Eve Club Night Ever. We cringed our way through Salon critics’ discussion of “The Very Worst of 2011.” We enjoyed The Rumpus’s wide-ranging interview with Adrian Tomine. We were only occasionally stumped by this cool 1980s film alphabet poster, which doubles as a movie-geek quiz. We read that obligatory year-end think piece about the end of rock ‘n’ roll. And finally, we broke in our 2012 calendar with the news that Portlandia will make its second full episode of Season 2 — the one devoted to Battlestar Galactica – available to Facebook fans January 1st. Sounds like the perfect New Year’s Eve hangover cure to us.
Last week we stereotyped you by your favorite books, and this week it’s time to apply a bumper edition of our gratuitous generalizations to the world of music. Our stereotyping posts have become something of a tradition at Flavorpill, but still, here’s our obligatory disclaimer: this is an entirely tongue-in-cheek exercise, so don’t get all offended — and also, as ever, several of our favorite records are on here, and we’ll totally own up to all the stereotypes that apply to us. Anyway, with that said, here are 50 albums that keep cropping up on end-of-year lists and the sort of people that like them. Read More »
It’s that time of year again, when everyone from New Yorker critics to mp3 bloggers who barely write a single sentence about the songs they post embark upon that great equalizer: the best-of list. This week, Pitchfork has revealed its writers’ 100 favorite tracks of 2011, and as usual, it provides some subliminal insight into where young, indie types’ (we’ll do everyone the favor of not using that word) heads have been over the past 12 months. Indulge us in our overanalysis of what the site’s top 10 songs of the year say about us, after the jump. Read More »
This week, VH1 released their list of the 100 Greatest Songs of the ’00s, and as you might imagine, we disagree. Unsurprisingly, the list is heavily skewed towards the pop end of the spectrum, but even in that world, we were confused by a few of the tracks that made the top 100. Mystikal’s “Shake Ya Ass”? That terrible Evanescence song? Creed? Miley Cyrus but no Radiohead? Luckily, VH1′s top 10 is relatively respectable (we totally accept “Crazy in Love” as the best pop song of the decade, at least on this list), but that doesn’t mean we’re satisfied with it. To quell our snobbish balking (and present another view of the last decade), we decided to put together an alternative top 10 songs of the ’00s, limiting ourselves to tracks that didn’t even make VH1′s 100. Click through to see our picks, and feel free to let us know which songs we totally should have chosen in the comments.
Over the last couple of years, when our favorite bands have broken up, we’ve written a couple of posts suggesting new(ish) bands whose work you might enjoy if you like the work of the band who’ve just split. Being as we’re big REM fans, we figured we’d do the same when we got the news they’d gone their separate ways. So we sat down and started thinking and… well, it’s harder than it looks, really. You’d think there’d be heaps of bands that sound like REM these days, but curiously enough, there aren’t. Or not good ones, anyway. Sure, there was the slew of bad ’90s-era REM imitators like Live, and there are bands like Coldplay citing them as an influence. But beyond that, it’s something of a struggle. Still, we’ve soldiered on manfully, choosing ten of our favorite REM records and pairing them with ten newer records you might enjoy if you like them. (And let’s be clear here — we’re not suggesting the records we’ve chosen necessarily sound like the REM albums, just that they may appeal for similar reasons.) Your ideas are, as ever, welcome.
Earlier this year Justin Vernon of Bon Iver commissioned Greogory Euclide, an artist and teacher living in the Minnesota River Valley, to create the cover art for his band’s eponymous third album. Now, Denver’s David B. Smith Gallery is releasing the ethereal landscape as a 24″ x 24″ limited-edition print in a run of 500. For $225, you’ll get a signed and numbered artwork, with half the profits going to Agapé Riding Center and the Greater Mankato Area United Way Connecting Kids Program. Click through to see a two-part, behind-the-scenes video that shows Euclide’s elaborate process for creating the art for the LP. Spoiler alert: It involves snow.
With its new Orient Apple flavor, Absolut combines crisp apple sweetness with ginger spice. It’s a fusion we’re so enamored with that we created a soundtrack for it. Our Perfect Fusion compilation features an equally inspired blend of artists and sounds — and the whole thing is yours for free.
It includes UK folk-pop darling Emmy the Great, Aussie psych upstarts Cloud Control, and our latest tropical crushes, ChuCha Santamaria y Usted, plus mainstays like TV on the Radio, Bon Iver, and UNKLE. Check out the mixtape now and treat yourself to a taste of Orient Apple. Click through for the full track list and your free download.
1. The sale of Borders was officially approved yesterday, and as Gizmodo says, reading the 40-year-old book retailer’s goodbye email “is like watching Old Yeller in slow motion.”
2. Some exciting news for music lovers who hate to travel: YouTube announced today that it’s planning to live stream both Lollapalooza (August 5-7) and Austin City Limits (September 16-18). [via Billboard]
3. Should we take it as a bad sign that Warner Bros. has moved the release date of Zack Snyder’s upcoming Superman reboot — which stars Henry Cavill as the famed superhero and Amy Adams as Lois Lane — from December 2012 to June 2013? [via LAT]
4. Glee star Darren Criss is in talks to replace Daniel Radcliffe as the lead in Broadway’s How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying beginning in January. Considering how well Criss spoofed Harry in A Very Potter Musical and A Very Potter Sequel, this sounds like a smart casting decision to us. [via Deadline]
5. Today is Bon Iver Day! — at least if you live in Milwaukee. Celebrate accordingly. [via Vulture]
