I’m taking a break. Everybody seems to be taking breaks lately so I feel my time has come to take one too.
However, a new podcast will be up this week and expect some newsflashes every now and then too.
Saturday July 28th vic&lloyd are mixing an allnighter at Café St.Georges in our very hometown, Roeselare that is. Which might just be considered as somewhat of a come-back gig for us (yes, it’s been this long - over a year- so shame on you rsl promoters!) And we’ll bring a very special extra guest, by the name of Shimmy Timmy, our Brother on the Harmonica!
On-point tv will see some updates, maybe a stand-alone site too, stay tuned for that.
After Summer I’m joining a groupexpo in Antwerp which seems to be quite a big thing, more info will follow when I’m back, after my break.
VanWidderVoeGidder Tape2 is still in the making too, and should be finished end of August, fingers crossed.
That being said I’m working on a major project to be launched in 2008, in order for me to focus on that, I need to take some distance from the blogosphere.
I hope you don’t mind… Hell, I hope you do mind, like I’m missing my commentors! Rest assured though, I’ll always be here, only now less frequently, definitely no four-posts-a-day style anymore.
About to lift off for another brilliant evening at BlueNoteRecordsFestival in Ghent. Wednesday was very nice, almost succeeded in convincing Shadow to do an interview, but the tour schedule was just too damn tight, too bad.
Thusfar I’ve only managed to properly arrange one interview, the rest of the bunch seems to be in superstarstatus. Which I can only respect.
However, I will still be knocking on management’s doors of the likes of Zap Mama, Guru and Sly Stone. Although chances to interview that last one are extremely small, but then again same went for Roy Ayers last year, when numerous attempts of setting up a meeting ended up in a nice long chat with Roy, about his sneakers, amongst many other topics - you’ll get the whole interview in one of the future podcasts, don’t you worry about that!
Anyway, I’m all into Sly & the Family Stone nowadays. Particularly this tune called “Babies making babies”, as featured on one of my favourite mixtapes, by Rob Swift.
And on that note, I’ll let Sly (on the photo to the right) himself do the rest of the talking. Read the Vanity Fair story on where he’s at nowadays, Or let’s go back, way back, back into the time:
There’s more Sly, here’s the man, the myth, living the life, basically:
A German student named Lisa Rienermann looked up in Barcelona and found letterforms in the sky created by the negative space of buildings. The projects called ‘Type the Sky’
6 Billion Others tries to draw a portrait of contemporary mankind by by asking questions about universal values. What is happiness? What lessons can we learn from life’s difficulties?
Last month I joined Jan Peeters to interview Ben Westbeech, protégé of Gilles Peterson on his new label Brownswood Recordings.
A couple of hours before Ben Westbeech’s gig in Leuven, we join him for a beer and a relaxed chat in front of Leuven’s train station.
After having launched our joint criticism on the strange and not that well succeeded architectural combination of the neoclassical train station, its ultramodern canopy and the red brick bus station, our conversation takes of with Bristol, a safe haven for new electronical sounds coming from for instance Massive Attack, Tricky, Portishead and Roni Size. Bristol seems to be quite a heavily bass-influenced town… (Read the rest of the interview.)
Damn, what can I say, here’s Baloji with Amp Fiddler in the studio. And then the third killer steps in the spot, and he goes by the name of Peter Lesage! It’s brilliant!
Last month I’ve made the EPK that’s accompanying the release of Soul:Id’s highly anticipated debut album ‘Sex, Love and Philosophy’
I’ve had some great times getting to know the band and I must say I’ve rarely seen such dedicated people, focussed on doing things the right way. Seeing things happen made me realise it actually is not so surprising they’re debuting on the infamous ABB Soul label in the States. (with releases in Japan and the UK following shortly after)
The album is a killer, it was featured in Billboard. Still, no press interest in Belgium, strange, isn’t it? I guess it’s the stereotypical story, you’ll have to succeed abroad before you get noticed. As you’ll see in the video though, the band has been touring internationally already.
A video interview with tons of exclusive video material will be featured on on-point tv somewhere next month. Busy times on the editing tip, learning a lot of new tricks. Stay tuned for more tv, and needles to say, please spread the word. Because here’s what to expect:
- Graffiti Royal Video (ft. SozyoneGonzalez, Shake, Rekto, Olivier Stak, etc.)
- Ben Westbeech Interview
- Dave Decat Interview
- Soil&Pimp Sessions Interview
- BlueNoteRecordsFestival Interviews
- etc. etc.
And after that I’ve got another round of jobhunting to do.
Time for me to plug some more music. Live music. Funk music. Straight outta Brussels comes The Peas Project: an 11-piece live funk outfit, influenced by a dozen of genres and known for their strong live reputation.
I still have to edit the footage over their blazing gig at Jazzbreak just a while ago. I missed out on their Brussels Jazz Marathon show on the Grand Place but looking at the pictures on theirspace it looks like Brussels sure was put on fire that night!
Their debut album “This Is Our First Record” is in stores, I’ll hit you with some live footage later on, but for now, here’s their new clip: “Our Funk Process”.
For live dates, check their myspace, and to all bookers outside of Brussels, Book these cats!
Baloji is going strong.Another video was just uploaded. This time around a high-quality 9-minute feature. Listen and feel the vibe, it’s quite heavy if you ask me:
Love the camerawork and the editing too. More info on Baloji’s Hotel Impala album soon!
Lately I’ve been feeling the need to share some serious topics with you. About online and cultural trends, to be specific.
Some of you will probably find this quite boring, just know that these topics in fact àre all about you, so they do concern you. I’m sorry to say so but you won’t escape marketeers, you won’t escape the media, and since you’ve read this far already you’re damn far from escaping the web.
Introducing Andrew Keen, whose book “Cult of the Amateur - How Today’s Internet Is Killing Our Culture” seems to be growing into becoming the hype of the year.
Basically the web2.0 revolution (read: blogs competing newssites, youtube killing traditional tv watching, etc.) has always been looked at as being the democratisation of content.
The user taking over, making his own decisions, therefor liberating himself from the big corporations, serving other users with what they really want, not with what is dictated by major companies.
Keen, however, believes this is all a bunch of crap. Amateurs have indeed partially taken over the content-monopoly once driven by professional journalists, tv-makers, designers, etc. But this hasn’t given us the cultural revolution so many had hoped for.
Web2.0 has given opportunities to certain talented people, but the really big successes are, for instance, webcam videos about nothing, blogs about nothing, etc. So how does this justify the demonisation of classic media?
Being an amateur myself, I must say I don’t feel offended. On-point is not a political blog and I don’t think I ever pretended holding the truth.
I think it’s good to finally see someone stand up and take a stance against the crowdsourcing trend, a trend that is nice, but isn’t holy, I think.
Anyway. Stay tuned and think about it, these are the times we’re living in!
- “If we’re going to use the internet as a self-publicating platform, we nééd to have something to say. Otherwise it degenerates into a state of digital narcicissm where everything simply becomes a reflection of ourselves. We Twitter ourselves to death and we use the internet to tell the world what we had for breakfast or what we watched on televsion and that’s not valuable for ourselve or for any type of collective conversation.”
- “We need middlemen. We need experts. Whether experts are in marketing or in creativity, whether they’re in finding talent and figuring out how to polish it and distribute it. These are the core players in every media system..
- “The flattening of culture, the idealised web 2.0 system, where the intermediarists go away has profoundly unfortunate and often dangerous consequenses.”
- “Media literacy is the thing we need to build now. We have this open system, the challenge is to read it critically. The challenge is not to believe everything that is posted up on Wikipedia. The challenge is not to think that this sort of idealised media system can deliver us truth. -…- Truth is even harder to find.”
“The great seduction of the internet is to become a broadcaster ourselves, to use it as a platform to express ourselves. -…- I think we need to remind ourselves that there are many times where we need to remain silent, where we need to remain in the audience.”
Very much looking forward to hearing your opinion on these statements. I hope you still dare to comment after that last statement though.
Kind of lost touch with Good Magazine, my bad, I shouldn’t have. Not only did these people learn us about Object Orange, in Detroit, a while ago. By now they seem to have built a collection of, well, really Good Videos. Check all of them, or let’s just start with some favourites:
Well I’ll be damned! Just today I asked him when the video was going to be uploaded, and guess what, there he is: SozyOne Gonzalez speaking upon the artwork he’s done for Baloji’s upcoming album.
From what I’ve heard the album is one master listening experience, haven’t heard anything but the intro yet, but I’m already hooked.
Saturday I’ll be in Ghent for the Citykingz graffitijam. Hope to see some of the visitors present, look at the line-up, there’s a whole lot of killers in there if you ask me!
Dave Decat will be one of the next people featured on on-point tv. Until then, check out this promovideo by Carhartt, for who he made several award-winning campaigns, which you’ll probably recognize.
Having seen BBC Panorama’s “Scientology and Me” I’m not sure I should continue blogging about these freaks. Then again, they shouldn’t have stepped on my doorstep either:
Watch the legendary BBC episode right here. Must-see material it is!
“Mardi gras of the Sisypha”, the debut album of The Sedan Vault finally sees its limited edition vinyl re-release. And as you can tell, indeed it features a poster by yours truely, my first illustration work published actually.
Limited to 330 vinyls, this is obviously a collector’s item. Plus, the album is killer.
After the huge succes of Ame’s Shining Back mix, we decided to hit you with another J Dilla Samples Montage. This isn’t a new one though, ‘Donuts - The Blueprints’ actually hit the web a long time ago, well received on numerous prestigious forums and boards, but after that kind of vanished.
But the mix is a classic, so we had to share it with you again. JtotheC added some artwork and well yeah, there you have it.
As always with these cratedigging gems, don’t ask for the tracklist, there is no way we can share that with you, matter of fact, I don’t even have one, it’s all in the allmighty mastermind of Ame, who by now, you should know from numerous After Hours productions!
Last week’s interview with Martha Cooper was one of the nicest in a long time. So nice I forgot some of my questions, what can I say, I’m an amateur…
Martha Cooper gained international recognization for her pioneering photos of early hiphop culture, being the first ever to capture graffiti and breakdancing.
The final edit ended up being over 10 minutes of video, in which I didn’t want to cut, so take your time, watch, listen or in other words: check it out. And spread the word if you’re feeling it:
Check out her latest book Street Play, The Hiphop Files, We B* Girlz and Subway Art, for some classic material!
HitTheBooks. That’s where you’ll find me this Saturday. Probably all afternoon, looks like there’s gonna be a whole lotta checking to do, all about mags ‘n’ books ‘n’ independent publishing. Props to Ephameron and Hessenhuis to make this happen!
People who search using only Google, and nothing but Google miss out on 72.7% of the possible search results.
That’s basically the main conclusion two American universities drew in this here study.
I plaid guilty as well, the damn thing is imported in my browser, as with most of us by now, I imagine.
Does anybody out here still remembers the glory days of Altavista - now called AlltheWeb? In tough competition with Yahoo for a while, when the third dog stepped into the game to basically flip the script and take over their business? It sounds almost nostalgic.
Anyway, here’s a top100 of alternative search engines, it’s amazing how many they are. Business blogs seem to be stuck on the question “Is Search still the big business opportunity for the web?”
And yes, it sure is, watch out for web3.0 coming at you, the semantic web. I might get a little deeper into that one of these days. It shouldn’t always be about style and music and design and stuff, now should it?
It’s a late pass, but by popular demand, here is the tracklist of the latest podcast, if you haven’t done so already, why not download it right away? I mean, look at that tracklist, there’s a fair share of exclusive unreleased and even some never-to-be-released material in there!
La Mescla - Days Like These (produced by Gusto) Ugly Ducklin’ - Friday Nights Slum Village ft. Q-Tip - Hold Tight Isley Brothers - It’s Your Thing 45King - Put The Funk Out There Bob Ballistic - 11 Juli (produced by Fonz) The Stylistics - People Make The World Go Round DJ Iron - Closer JayLib - Unreleased Instrumental INT - Do You Want It? Jazzy Jeff ft. Slum Village - Are You Ready? James Brown - Take Some Leave Some William Devaughn - Be Thankful (vic on the robotic outro) Audio Two - Top Billin’ Bob James - Nautilus Gil Scott-Heron - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (lloyd edit) Isaac Hayes - Good Love Interlude - Toot Sweets, The Candies You Whistle Lloyd’s Ill Herbie Hancock Mash-up ft. Mos Def, Q-Tip, Bilal, a.o. Lootpack - Answers Instrumental Craig Mack - Flava In Ya Ear Theo Parrish - Ugly Edit (with an extra lloyd edit) Al Jarreau - You Don’t See Me James Brown - Funky Drummer James Brown - Soul Power Outro - Spread Love ft. DJ PatCa
After the downloading, burn it on a cd-r, print the cd-cover, and plug it in your car stereo system, make your trunk rattle!
I’ve very muched enjoyed the videos of the Google Zeitgeist 2007 conference. Most of them might not be as interesting to most of you so I’ve decided to pick just one for you trendwatchers out there: Josh Spear talking about the whole online community thing, commenting on various new services which I hadn’t heard of yet:
Josh Spear launched him self into online stardom by blogging over at joshspear.com. He’s running his own company now and the blog itself is run by eight (!) other people.
Here are some statements, who might not make any sense unless you see Josh speak upon it. I think the man is actually making sense spotting some trends, and I’ve found these to be very complimentary to my reading of Generation Me - I hope I’ll find some time to share my thoughts on that one, once I’ve finished reading.
“Universities are basically ignoring new media.”
“Ten dollars for a virtual red rose (…) Virtual gifting will be big!”
“…she’s a bit of a new media whore.”
“Dating is gaming. Dating has been gaming on tv for ages, but it hasn’t translated on the internet yet, until now.”
“Brands should integrate, not infiltrate.”
He also speaks upon the succes of Threadless, a t-shirt site selling limited edition t-shirts, designed by users and voted upon by the same community. A concept run by two dudes, who sold over a million t-shirts a year.
Which made me wonder if I were to upload some design, how many users would vote it into the actual printing phase (because just because you contribute a design doesn’t mean it will automatically be printed, you’ll need the community’s approval for that to happen)
With another feature in ‘Brussel Deze Week’ and a dozen of blogs speculating on the who’s and how’s behind Bonom’s killer streetworks, our man seems to keep head cool and blesses us with another masterpiece:
We know you’ve been waiting for this to happen ever since we unplugged early in the morning some Sunday last month - yeah we saw you jumping on those tables - so we’re back on a go again: Tonight, All Night, at Le Tavernier, Free Entrance, Free Love, all of that. Come get down with the get-down!
I’m a sucker for patterns. The idea that there’s virtually no start and no end to these repetitive aesthetics just makes me go round and round.
Which is brilliant, especially since I’m talking this Summer’s favourite fashion accessoire: The Pattern.
I don’t know if we’re supposed to look at this as another revival of the retro lifestyle or whatever, I for one see it as a counterreaction to the minimal styles we’ve been witnessing over these last couple of years, notably in music and graphic design (last Spring wearing white bermudas was quite minimalminded too).
Speaking of which, I actually pointed this out to brother vic a couple of months ago, how each and every graphic design seemed to be amped up by some extra plantlike curly forms and styles, simply for the sake of filling things up. I didn’t quite like that, however, in fashion it does get my groove on.
And don’t give me that “lloyd, old school retro styles have been in fashion for years now“. Obviously you’ve got point, but it’s going mainstream now, it’s not only the trendy highschoolgirls rocking patterns, it’s everyone nowadays. Either that or I’m just focussing too much, then again, prove me wrong.
It was only yesterday that I sit down with one half of the infamous digitalovers to prepare our questions for what is bound to be an indepth interview on the life and works of streetartist ABOVE and guess what. Today the Brussels video of his European tour has been uploaded to his youtube channel. Ain’t that something?
Above is all about arrows basically. That and putting his name up. Up in the sky.
By now our charming local authorities seem to have removed all of the arrows, very much to our disappointment. So for now we can only watch the video, that actually shows only a small part of his work, and unfortunately doesn’t reveal any secrets.
I mean, how did he put up all them signs, on cables above some of the busiest and crowdiest places of the city. (read: Manneken Pis, Boulevard Anspach, Place St.Gery, etc. etc.)
You thought stacking chairs was impressive as a public art installation? Check this crazy rotating wall. Next thing you know we’ll be flipping buildings inside-out, with a big old canon bouncing on top! Lovin’ this:
The UK city of Liverpool is playing host to a rather kooky piece of artwork for the next 18 months. Called Turning The Place Over by Richard Wilson, it consists of a rotating wall that turns 360º.
Cut in the wall of an old Yates’s Wine Lodge, the installation sits opposite one of the city’s train stations and is costing almost $900,000 - that’s $50,000 for each month of its existence.
What can I say, this stacked chairs installation is just utter brilliance!
“…This amazing art installation was made by Colombian sculptor Doris Salcedo for the International Instanbul Biennale in 2003. She used over 1,550 chairs stacked on an empty lot between two buildings!”
In a day or ten Balo - of Starflam fame - will bless us with a sneak preview of his highly anticipated solo album “Hotel Impala”.
My interest in proper marketing is still present and I must say I was pleasantly suprised to see Balo’s myspace tweaked to the max ànd announcing a series of six promo videos which will be put online from June 11th on on his now empty youtube channel.
On top of that the videos feature some all-time killer on-point stars, such as Sozy.One Gonzalez, Amp Fiddler, Peter Lesage and Urbanus, amongst many many others. Needless to say I’m looking very much forward to this!
The first two of the following clips are playing, for the first one click play on the myspacepage, check it out and look for the surprise guest in there!
A lot of beatheads out there know about the infamous Dustbusters interview with JayDee. One long indepth talk about the whole of his career, by Y’skid and I.N.T. Thusfar the interview was only up for mp3 downloads, but what you didn’t know is that all of it was actually filmed!
I heard rumours of this getting a proper release or deal or whatever, none of that was confirmed so for now all I can say is check out this superb preview:
But Bonom and Lork seem to be on some bigger things now. Bigger as in, the size of an office block. Check out what these cats recently did, just a small walk away from Central Station, Brussels.
A baby in front of the King Boudewijn statue, could this be a clever provocation, or am I overthinking this one?
Just a little further, Bonom put up a big hand together with Bambi. See for yourself.
Fantastic flavour has been adding up since I didn’t find that much time to check all things new on this here worl’wideweb. But let me tell you, there’s a stàck of dopeness out there, to sum up just a few, here are some must-see’s / must-hears:
No words from no sponsors really, I just wanted to share some behind-the-scenes view on the archives. A whole lot of video right there, let me tell you, and as always, the best is yet to come. Next episode hopefully online by the end of next week, and the week after that, and the week after that! Whoop!
La Melodia has a first video online, Time, of the full length album dropping in Europe this Summer. Japan has got its release, we’re still waiting, the singles are out on vinyl already though, fans go cop that hotness! (ask your recorddealer or get it here for instance)
Remember the US Army Recruiting poster put up in Brussels?
Over at paracommando.com army duderonis are discussing the likeability of the concept.
Funny passage at the end where one claims no recruiting will happen on foreign soil.
Little did he know there are already three recruiting stations in Germany and at least one in Italy.
Funny to see there’s actually people out there buying the message.
Made me wonder how big that mass must be.
Sorry for the people crossing my path catching me staring at them; talking non-sense, it’s possible I won’t be having any normal conversation until I’m done watching all of David Lynch’s works.
And apparently I’m not the only one, there seems to be this dude who’s tracking down the original settings used in Twin Peaks. He even claims to have found the exact spot where the woodpecker from the intro is filmed!
With the expo opening in just a couple of days, I kinda saw this one coming, but it still leaves me a bit dazzled. I’ve been asked to write a short introduction, to myself.
It sounds simple at first, I honestly felt this was an easy one when replying: “Sure, no biggie, I’ll mail it to you right away!”
In comes the analyzing. Hell, I don’t want to introduce myself, can’t someone else introduce me? I can’t take my myspace bio, that wouldn’t make much sense.
A short text would do actually. It could easily be filled with some art school references and links to previous exhibitions or projects of that type. None of that on my resumé though. So…
I think I’ll just bullshit around it in a couple of lines, about coffee, ladies mistaken for muzes and vice versa, a lazy eye an ear to be cut off, etcetera, etcetera…
(As you can see on the photo, we’re almost ready to set things off, the two pieces in the front being completed right after I’ve published this here blog post.)
In exactly one week my first contributions to a group expo will be up for views.
That’s nothing new, but since people have been asking me about more info on when and where they should be to witness the first in a series of attempts to make the world a terribly on-point place… Sorry, got a little carried away.
Here you go:
Location:
Garcia Lorca, Rue des Foulons/Volderstraat 47-49, 1000 Brussels
(10 minute walk from the South station, 5 minute walk from the Bourse)
Hours: Wednesday May 30th: 14h - 21h (vernissage from 18h on) Thursday May 31st: 14h - 20h Friday June 1st: 14h - 20h
This Friday your favourite dizzling dynamic dj duo will be playing some tunes for the fine art lovers at “Die Young”, the new No New Enemies expo, opening at Mr.Ego.
Ricky Gervais once again ripped it at Letterman’s last week. He just won another award and is nominated for several online awards, etc. etc. Just watch him:
Came in tired last night and instead of moderating a comment, I deleted the coffee post. My apologies, luckily there was a back-up, so here we go again:
Well that’s no surprise. Take the test right here and put a number on that old addiction.
People that know me will have to agree how at times I’m actually all about coffee, and nothing but coffee. By the gallons really. Not a healthy attitude but it’s probably just a phase.
Note to self: read books on coffee and its effects on the human race.
In the spirit of Lionel we’ll be playing Le Tavernier all night long again, tonight. That’s right, this very night!
So be there, and do us a favour and bring along a whole lot of dames, song of the night will most likely be Rick James’ ColdBlooded. And with that, I found a reason to share that old - I’m Rick James - Dave Chappell video:
Almost Summer and that means flowers are to be blossoming again. If you’re into urban gardening and you want to put that old flowerpower in contrast with our concrete jungle, what better choice than the giraffe of all flowers: the allmighty Sunflower?
As absurd as it sounds this is no joke. A bunch of enthusiasts plant Sunflowers around Brussels every year. They started their action May 1st and their stories are up for reads at brussels-farmer.blogspot.com.
And this is the year 2007 so all of this was filmed, which is brilliant:
Actually as I’m posting this, there’s a plantation being started at the Botanique, at 13h30. Unfortunately I came accross this just a bit too late, I should have told you earlier, I’ll be quicker next time, promised!
All of my support to the people who are slowly but surely preparing their upcoming exams. Don’t panic, you’ll make it, if only you stay on-point!
Just know that times are stressful for all of us. Even for a hardheaded BBC journalist like John Sweeney trying to properly interview some Scientologists. Watch him go:
Why did this happen? Well, this might be a hint:
John Sweeney: “While making our BBC Panorama film “Scientology and Me” I have been shouted at, spied on, had my hotel invaded at midnight, denounced as a “bigot” by star Scientologists and been chased round the streets of Los Angeles by sinister strangers.”
Far away you said? Feel free to go take the Dianetics test at the Scientology shop near the Grand Place in Brussels. Wouldn’t recommend it though, they will label you “an instable personality” withouth a doubt, but do take the test, at your own risk. I didn’t.
The question came from the almighty vic who plans to go on a holiday, and apparently that features the reading of a good old book. My guess is most of the student readers would flip the logic behind that in a split second, but it’s just how it is, people read books on holidays.
The question, of course, is what books to read?
I’ve recently read the Michel Houellebecq’s “Elementary parts”, which was to depressing for me to recommend to anyone - maybe it’s just me being to sensitive, but I mean it.
Along with my recent interest in his work came the reading of “Pocket Essential: David Lynch”, a little book on the man and his works, very enlighting if you’re into that.
Shortly after which I started reading Generation Me, by Jean M. Twenge. Only two chapters read and I can already recommend this one as a must-read, especially for people working with this new generation, also referred to as iGeneration. I will write a review on this once I’ve finished reading the book. So necessary.
I’m still finishing my read of Josse De Pauw’s “Werk” and plan to start reading Brusselmans’ “Ex-Drummer” in a very near future.
Bring on the lists, and help a brother out, vic’s in desperate search of a good book to read, let’s help him out here!
I figured there’s no contactinfo at all on this here blog. This problem will all be resolved once I get to update the entire lay-out, but for now, I made a contact-category, with this very post in it, that should do for now.
Over a year ago you could catch lloyd and one half of digitalovers down the Brussels streets, heads up high, pointing to the sky, talking to people “check ça, y a une fleche!”
Weird intro, right? Not if you know we’re talking about the works of Above here. The man who gained international fame by putting up big and small arrows all around the globe. Only a couple of months ago the city of Brussels removed the ones in our very own capital. (we counted at least five of them in the Bourse area!)
We got in touch with the man - who replied to our interview request with the killer opening line: “sorry I’m replying this late, but I was on a six month world tour”. That is of course a very valuable argument. But the interview will take place, in time. The man’s back from his European tour now and will be putting videos online in the coming weeks.
Needless to say we love him for that!
Here’s a video of the man working his magic in L.A. (the video lives up the image of the artist I had in mind)
The schedule for tonight has been edited a bit, not only is there the fanclub allnighter, but right before that, Brothers on the Run are playing De Wezekapel in Ardooie - we’re not really all that urban all the time you know.
Special secret exclusive extra guest added to the show is none other that Victorious, aka JtotheC, on the mic and on some keys and some yelling and bouncing and whatnot. Come check that out, madness is about to take place from 20h30 on!
And after that… well..
You’ve heard about it on the streets, you’ve seen it happen in your dreams and we’ll be damned if you didn’t have all reason to believe the hype: vic&lloyd in the Fanclub in Kortrijk. All night, that is. From midnight till the early break of dawn, whoop!
Digitalovers.net pointed me to this one. The infamous Banksy is unmasked.
Apparently these photos had been circling around for about three years and were taking by photographer Peter Dean Rickard when Banksy visited Jamaica for some work, and where he visited Buju Banton etc. etc. Read more about it right here.
I wonder what’ll happen now, will the myth live on, will he finally face the people in what would have to be arguably thé most anticipated in-depth interview in recent art history?
It’s out there on the streets, it’s moving, it’s in constant dialogue with the public and its environment… This must be art! It be what it be, I’m all in favour of this wheatpaste craze, these Berlin cats took it to another level for me with this one.
For those wondering why I’m asking an ignorant cliché question such as “what is art?” or why I’m spying on who made you loose your art virginity, let’s just say I’m onto something big here, and I need to catch the meaning of art. That’s really all there is to it.
So even if you’re one cold-hearted bastard towards what is referred to as art, drop your thoughts in a comment, it’ll be of great help to me, yes, even when it’s total rubbish you’re speaking, don’t worry about that!
I stumbled upon this killer video featuring 4 galleries speaking their mind on ArtBrussels 2007. And I’ll be damned if that isn’t our favourite gallery diva: Alice in the screenshot! Brilliant.
If you don’t know about Alice yet, check out on-point tv for a chat with the legendary Delta and the infamous Olivier Stak, just two of their Artists Living In Constant Elevation.
Unfortunately I didn’t manage to finish my take on the whole artbrussels craze, I was lacking time.. and guts. The idea was quite edgy and I didn’t want to see my name on no blacklist, no sir!
However, I will bless you with exclusive Graffiti Royal footage in a couple of weeks. Graffiti Royal being an artbrussels party organised by Alice and Dalton, so I won’t leave you in the cold, no worries!
Off the streets of Kortrijk, Roeselare, Bruges and the whole of Belgian suburbia:
“Vic&lloyd? Ow them cats got it made, man”
>> “Waddayamean? Howsthat?” “Heard they got a fanclub now, man, they’re boomin’ business now!”
>> “Well they are quite sizzling hot, with them records and all… Think I heard them on the radio just the other week even!” “No shit Sherlock, they’re doing it big yo.”
Hold on. Let me correct this slight misinterpretation of the facts. True, vic&lloyd are doing it big and all, fans lining up every morning at the doorstep of On-Point Headquarters is a view we still didn’t get used to, but as for the fanclub, that’s a myth.
We are however mixing at the Fan-Club in Kortrijk this Saturday, May 12th.
All-frigging-night long, that is! From midnight till early in the morning (after which lloyd has a family dinner to attend, ow jolly)
It’s been a while since we even played close to our hometown, where there seems to be somewhat of an unspoken fatwa spoken upon us (look for Roeselare in the ppklts tour schedule…). But yeah, we’re back and Kortrijk is only 20 minutes away, so we hope to see a lot of local faces, funkateers steady steppin to the muse, hip to the game, you know what we’re talking about here!
Entrance is free by the way!
So come early (doors open at about 23h) and jampack the place, we’ll take it from there!
(And in case you were wondering, yes, that’s Scarlett rocking the brand-new V&LL logo, vic&lloyd, the official louis vuitton dons, eat that Kanye!)
As for the Brusselsbased readers: catch us in two weeks at Le Tavernier, Friday May 18th that is!
Time for another little survey. Don’t shoot me for going all cliché on you, but I’ve been walking around trying to figure this one out for a while now. The more I think about it the more confused I get, so…
What makes great art?
- And what makes a great artist?
To be perfectly honest I’ve had my annual Art-Brussel-morning-after-depression, having witnessed such a huge amount of so-called art… But of course, I don’t mean to force my opinion upon you, maybe some sketches àre worth thousands of euros, and was Zappa right when he said:
“Art is making something out of nothing and selling it”
As always, Frank was making sense, dead-on.
I think he got point, unfortunatly.
Still, help me out here, when you’re looking at art, what do you trust, the mind or the guts?
Did you ever had to rely on some connoisseur’s guidance to make you appreciate the next man’s work?
Thinking about it I start wondering what my first memory of art would be and I think it was Keith Haring, printed on glasses that came with a special kiddie hamburger menu. A couple of years later I discovered the works of Permeke to be quite killer to me. Which obviously makes the question even harder to answer: What makes great art?
Permeke was featured on the old 1000 Belgian Francs bills so I guess the circle is round after all, and Zappa was right.
Or not?
Then again, a man called Niko Stumpo once spoke wise words when he said:
This easily could have been a Michel Gondry piece, but it ain’t. It’s a killer stop-motion animation with waves of stuff. That’s all there is to it, but I’m a fan of these things, can’t help it.
It actually is a Dougal Wilson ad for ‘the Big Yellow Storage Company’.
Anybody out there that could help me burn huge AVI files on a dvd? Preferably with a free little open-source program of course.
Without compressing and resaving in Premiere or anything, just some drag-and-drop program that’ll take it from there… I know a dvd can hold up to 120 minutes of footage, no matter the size of the original avi-file. Right?
We’ve been talking about it maybe just one too many times, but indeed, vic&lloyd gueststarred De Hop on Studio Brussel two weeks ago.
From what I’ve heard listeners enjoyed our attempt to “blend the old with the new. Old being some all-time favourite classics, new being some exclusive unreleased tracks by the likes of La Mescla, Bob Ballistic and dj Iron.”
Furthermore you’ll hear some Jazzy Jeff, Isaac Hayes, 45King, Slum Village, Bob James, Gil Scott-Heron, Theo Parrish, Lootpack, J Dilla, The Stylistics, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, etc. etc.
For the old-school heads, this is to be considered a sequel to the infamous VanWidderVoeGidder mixtape and yes, a prequel to the forthcoming VanWidderVoeGidder Two mixtape. The saga continues, can’t stop, won’t stop!
Download the cover, and,… well,… yeah… print it! (Once again a killercover by jtothec, aka vic-torious.)
Also, if you haven’t done so already, do subscribe to the on-point podcast, plug it in your iTunes or rss reader babies! Well worth it because we’ve got more where this comes from, the next podcast will be Ame’s Donuts Blueprints Mix, after that we’ve got vic&lloyd and then there’s a hot list of guestmixes coming up, so stay tuned and don’t forget to spread the word!
I’m currently finishing my read of Michel Houellebecq’s ‘Elementary Parts’. I started reading this now-classic because it was a cheap buy that came with the popular Flemish mag Humo, and it was on my to-read list anyway.
(I’m almost done with it now, and I must warn future readers, it doesn’t really cheer you up, it might even leave you in a nihilistic vague, which can be nice too, at times)
First time I saw the cover of the book, and later on the covers of the full series, the typography struck me. I’m not a connoisseur at all but it doesn’t take one to recognize how stylish these are. Some of them reminded me of the ‘Turks Fruit’ filmposter (designed by Wim Crouwel).
Apparently the bookcovers were designed by Gert Dooreman and Herman Houbrechts. And Fontshop.be tried to track these masterminds down, but something went wrong, so we still don’t know the story behind these magnificent coverdesigns. We do get some info on the used fonts, some questions are left unanswered though.
So for all fontlovers, help us out here, and name those fonts! The font used for the author names seems to be a hard one, furthermore those used on the covers are said to be hand-drawn… Check all covers right here.
They say it’s good for the readership to do a round-up every once in a while. To welcome the new visitors and to thank the regular commentors.
So here it goes: On-Point Headquarters was burning hot in April! Thanks to your massive support we were able to push the quality level up another notch, at least in my humble opinion we did. As for the rounding up, here’s what was up:
Pretty close to what was promised, right? I know you enjoyed most of this, so we’ll keep on keepin’ on, more podcasts, more live videos and more video interviews (Cum* maybe? Will need more requests for that though, hard fishes to catch)
All praises to the people pitching me content from time to time, appreciate it a lot! If you come accross some killer on-pointness, don’t hesitate and mail me at lloyd@on-point.be, or drop a comment if you prefer going undercover, which is on-point too!
Just the fact that as a little boy, Julius Popp used to think grown ups actually have a book with all mechanisms on how Life works, makes him my kinda fella.
Nowadays he sets up typographical waterfalls. And what more is there to say? Let’s watch him do his thing and explain it himself:
(Marketing boys who would want to jump on the idea, too late.)
Woke up this morning and I figured, time to spoil them readers again, hit them with another free music download. This time around it’s actually Citywurl Records doing you well, presenting a free EP, by Dyno. I particularly like Into The Sunshine, for obvious reasons.
If you liked this, and appreciated this being a damn free download, support your local hard working musicmen and go cop Dyno’s latest album “Dyno is Sol Waters“, out on Citywurl records, and while you’re at, ask for Billy Palmier’s debut album: “Urban Palmtree Flavours“ (Both are in stores and on iTunes)
Dyno warmed up for Soul:ID at Jazzbreak only a couple of weeks ago, one of the most solid hiphop sets I’ve seen in Belgian’s recent hiphop history, some live female backing vocals might add the needed little extra spice, but from what I’ve been told, they’re working on that too.
That being said, here’s some live action for you to vibe along with:
With these type of animations (see the Pulp Fiction videos too) I always wonder how this is being made. Anybody out there that’s active in this field? What are the programs used for this? Is there a specific name for this style? Or is it just plain cool?
Now, let me just finish some of my first disco edits, to make your asses dance to some exclusive shit tomorrow! Entrance is free, music is master and the ladies are top-notch, so I hope to see some on-point cats on the floor tomorrow!
Today from 13h til 20h there’s a Festival happening at Place St. Catherine/St. Katelijneplein, in Brussels that is. The organisation seems to be on a cause. And a damn good one too: free public sanitaries! Brilliant, ain’t it?
The name’s Pispottenfestival, and I for one am all in favour. Summer’s in the city and you don’t want to know what the South Station smells like these days. A while ago I even saw a man drop a load against the Beurs/Bourse… It’s no secret the capital of Europe from time to time just stinks! Seriously… the smell…
So yeah, go check that out!
There will be music too
For the Banksy heads out there, it’s a shame but ‘London transport workers have painted over an iconic mural by “guerrilla artist” Banksy estimated to be worth more than £300,000.‘
At first Banksy’s work was controversial because of his topics. Then the streetart scene itself started criticising him for selling out and not keeping it real. Jealous ones envy, if you ask me. And that in its turn inspired Cam BsAs to call to free Bansky, an edit of one of his most famous works. (see above)
I’ve been a Banksy fan myself, and I still am, but clearly the man fell victim to a huge worldwide hype, which took his cultstatus to straight-up stardom. Nothing wrong with that though, but to see the estimated worth of his piece mentioned says just about everything. Did he not criticise the whole art-scene? Here’s Wooster’s take on the Banksy effect.
…how there’s only one month left to prepare my part of the upcoming expo. (May 30th till June 1st, Garcia Lorca, Volderstraat – Brussels)
Time for some action indeed. I plan to show a small dozen of works, all new but one. Feels kinda face against the wall really. Very much a deathline man though, but not for these type of things.
The usual thoughts ‘n’ doubts I guess, as dvlmn points out in the Delta commentings. Inherent to the process, or so it seems.
As for the release of the Sedan Vault’s vinyl I’m waiting for some newsflashes, but my guess is the vinyl (+ poster) will see light at around the same time as the expo, which would be brilliant timing, now wouldn’t it?
This week we’ll serve you another podcast: a vic&lloyd mix, almost exactly as broadcasted on De Hop, last Friday.
Last but not least I just want to show love to the new visitors, I see a lot of new names in the comments. Brilliant that is!
Just discovered the works of Lotte Klaver through trendbeheer.com. Never heard of her but I’m a fan already. Loving the minimal sketchy vibe.
One could get seriously poetic just by looking at this.
Now I’m no art critic so I can’t place this in a wider perspective, there are probably more artists in this illustration style (if you got names, feel free to share them). But I fell for Lotte’s work. It’s simply beautiful.
The long-awaited guestmix we made for De Hop was finally finished, on some trademark last-minuteness we’re currently checking on transferring the mix straight to the studio, if by any chance the web fails us now, lloyd will have to jump on his bike with that old cd-r.
We tried to blend the old with the new. Old being some all-time favourite classics, new being some exclusive unreleased tracks by the likes of La Mescla, Bob Ballistic and dj Iron.
So yeah, tune in tonight: De Hop, Studio Brussel, from 21h00 till 00h00 (we’ll be on around 23h00)
Thanks to Lefto, Gus and Kirsten for having us!
If you want more of that:
- tomorrow it’s our monthly allnighter at Le Tavernier, - and next week it’s the monthly Wonderful night, and right before that vic is djammin‘ at De Pianofabriek, alongside Grazzhoppa, Jef Neve(keys) and Nicolas Klummert(sax)!
Today I’ll be mostly tired, tired is what I’ll be and I presume you won’t mind.
Also I’ll feel so good today, without a doubt.
Tonight there’s Art Brussels, tomorrow there’s Graffiti Royal and after that it’s our monthly on-point allnighter at Le Tavernier.
Maybe I’ll catch you on one of the occasions, if not there’s always the next Jazzbreak and the next Wonderful coming up too!
But for now, I’ll be mostly tired.
It’s Thursday, join me now and be tired!
Or walk that water!
(And whilst doing that say “Nomd’jesus!” out loud, seriously.)
After the huge success of the Olivier Stak interview, on-point tv is back with the niceness for you and yours, putting the spotlight to the man called Boris Tellegen, the legend that goes by the name of DELTA!
This one cost me a whole lot of time and effort but it finally resulted into an 11minute feature, so sit back and check it out!
After you saw this, run to the shop and cop the Kroonjuwelen dvd (I know in Ghent it’s for sale at Toykyo), featuring a 48pages booklet and an amazing insight in Amsterdam’s graffiti scene in the early nineties. One bloody must-see it is, believe you me!
I assume all of you have their free “Extreme Letterproef” poster hanging in your living room by now? You better believe the hype though, it sure is for free!
Didn’t know they did these Delvaux shopping windows, that’s quite killer if you ask me, never linked them to this posh image, always considered them rather dirty. I love seeing people bridging gaps like that, especially when it’s being done in such a stylish way.
Now raise your hands if you feel like Cum* should be featured for a future on-point tv episode! I for one think they should.
this Summer’s fashion accessory will be: a Bottle of Water.
1- It is extremely stylish, if not now, in the very near future. 2- It comes in handy, always. 3- It actually helps, when thirstyness steps in. 4- It’ll make you quite a popular cat, especially with the thirsty peoples out there. 5- Chances are you’ll be pioneering the style down your block, which is a plus, always!
I told you some work was in progress, so here it is: the Olivier Stak video interview, filmed chez Alice:
The expo is currently running at Alice Gallery, till the 3rd of May, so go check that out! And don’t sleep on the upcoming Graffiti Royal event either, featuring Sozyone Gonzalez and Olivier Stak, amonst many, many others.
After this On-Point TV has a well wicked Delta video interview coming up (over 10 minutes of pure niceness!), thanks to Alice and Raph, and digitalovers for the support!