POINTS OF ENTRY
The Payola Chronicles
 What do you do when a music marketing company out of Brooklyn asks if they can put you on their promo list and send you music and concert tickets in exchange for you writing reviews on your blog? You start a new series called The Payola Chronicles.
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Redesigning the Towers and Turrets*
 For the past few months I have been posting a series called Great Counterculture Logos and getting feedback from the likes of Paul Pascarella of Gonzo lore, PD at Skull Skates and Jordan Cooper at Revelation Records on how their respective marks came to be...
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It's All Around You...
 Some of the best artistic inspiration that crosses my path on a daily basis is not in the galleries (although I post on that here as well) but on the walls and back alleys I pass through on my way to work. The best of these pieces are posted in the aptly titled ongoing series Art I Pass By On My Way to Work. Cooler still, they are all geotagged.
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WORK WORTH DOING An Interview with Lorraine Gauthier and Alex Quinto
as featured on blog.industrialbrand.com and eco.psfk.com
"Ladies and Gentlemen, Greenland is melting!"
This was how Lorraine Gauthier and Alex Quinto introduced themselves at this year's ICOGRADA in Seattle. It was early in the conference and the first statement that truly made us sit up and take notice. We would learn that the pair had worked on Bruce Mau's exhibit Massive Change, a massive undertaking unto itself tackling the world's most critical problems from a designer's perspective. They then went on to create Work Worth Doing, a design studio "working at the intersection of the business, cultural and philanthropy sectors bringing design thinking and design processes to a host of social and environmental challenges".
Yes, Greenland is melting. This can interpreted as a catastrophic event, threatening ocean circulation patterns and Europe's climate. But from a different perspective, it also stands as an untapped economic resource for Greenland and a potential water supply for Africa. From this latter view, the Greenland issue no longer becomes a problem, but a solution. It is all in how you approach the challenge.
We recently interviewed Lorraine and Alex to further discuss the potential of design in creating positive change in the world.
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ICOGRADA 2006 Defining Design on a Changing Planet
(the writer's cut)
I have just returned home and begun an intensive recovery that is befitting of the work hard / play hard ethic with which our team tackled these past four days at ICOGRADA’s Design Week in Seattle. The news has been on the television all evening: looping footage of the escalating tension between Israel and the Hezbollah; of blown out Lebanese neighbourhoods and clips of Anderson Cooper chasing after the next ground zero. After dinner, we rent Syriana, remembering its scenes of a claustophobic and heavily armed Hezbollah-occupied Beirut; trying to make some sense of it all; but, of course, it only serves to underline the point that there are no simple answers, no defined lines that clearly separate right from wrong, the good guy from the bad guy; and a harsh reminder of what we are up against as we return from this conference back to reality with our heads full of optimism and ideals.
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DESIGN
A Sensitive Dependence: The Search for a Canadian Identity in Graphic Design
This past summer, on the balmy shores of Lake Huron, I took part in a wine tasting where the libations in question were all by the same wine maker, they were all from the same grape and all bottled in the same year. The defining difference between the three bottles was one of a very specific geography. The first bottle had been cultivated from the grapes on the southern hillside of the winery; the second bottle's fruit had matured in the valley while the last bottle had its roots in the acreage just across the highway. Within these controlled settings, the differences in taste seemed ever more apparent and strangely, more relevant. By reducing the variables to a matter of a few square kilometres, we had derived from the wine its true essence.
This experiment came to mind as I listened to the debate at the launch of the GDC's Graphex 2006 National Design Competition. The panel of international and highly qualified judges consisted of Rick Poynor, Min Wang, Debbie Millman, Robert Sarner and Tan Le. The topic was "Is there a definitive Canadian style in our graphic design?" READ MORE..
IDEAS
Music for the 21st Century
"The most beautiful chord is made from dischord"
-Heraclitus
On May 29, 1913, 'The Rite of Spring', performed by Diaghiler's inimitable Ballet Russes made its world premiere at Paris' Théatre des Champs Elysées. The physically unnatural choreography accompanied by the atonal, rhythmically ambiguous music of Igor Stravinsky was too much for the audience's sensibilities. Hissing and booing grew to such a volume that the dancers were unable to hear their cues and the performance eventually dissolved into a state of chaos and rioting in the theatre. It was in this fashion that Modernism in music was born and in this sense did Stravinsky foreshadow all that would follow in the tumultuous 20th century.
So it seemed darkly fitting that tonight, nearly a century later, with the world's eyes once again focused on Paris as the major themes of our time play out against the fiery backdrop of its poorest districts, that Stravinsky would feature on the roster as symphony-goers in Vancouver Canada were treated to an evening of new sounds and new ideas which also included Michio Kitazume's Ei-Sho and John Adam's 'The Dharma at Big Sur', a piece that was inspired by Beat writer Jack Kerouac's novel 'Big Sur'.
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OPINION Build Your Homes in Factories
Two years ago, while in Ontario visiting with friends and family, I was kindly invited to my cousin's new home for Thanksgiving dinner. Getting there required taking the subway out to Kipling, its westernmost stop and then driving another 40 minutes until we arrived literally on the edge of the GTA sprawl. Only a block away lay acres of razed land, once the fertile soil of farms and orchards, now reallocated to the purposes of souless and sterile suburbia. Is this what we were all striving for? I asked myself. Working our lives away for a carving of these spoils?
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JOURNEYS The Beijing Dispatch
There are people wandering along the side of the freeway. This is my first impression upon our arrival in Beijing. It strikes a deep set horror in me. Caught in the headlights, choked on the edge of the 10 lanes that spew out an air that you wear like another layer of skin, they look displaced, lost, left behind.
My god, I think to myself, 1.3 billion is too many; China's population is supersaturated; the levee has broken; people are spilling out everywhere.
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MARKETING Digging in the right yard: The viral marketing of It's All Gone Pete Tong
As featured on if.psfk.com, ihaveanidea.org and blog.industrialbrand.com
There was little coverage to be found in the mainstream media upon the release of the independent mockumentary "It's All Gone Pete Tong". Not that it deserved to be overlooked. The movie, about an Ibiza deejay, Frankie Wilde, who has to deal with going deaf, is not your average party flick. Picking up awards at a number of festivals, it is beautifully filmed and touches on a far deeper level than just spinning records and snorting lines. There is redemption in this movie. And everyone likes a little of that in their lives once in a while.
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CATALYSTS
Friday Tunage
THE EPOCHS - OPPOSITE SIDESAnother great band out of Brooklyn, The Epochs are making music that sounds like what Justin Timberlake would be doing if he had skipped his Mickey Mouse Club and Boy Band origins and simply focussed on creating catchy falsetto driven pop songs. Opposite Sides is a gorgeous, rambling track that seems to head out in five different rhythmic and thematic directions over the course of its 4 minute span, jumping between fuzz box dance beats, quiet psychedelic digressions and sweet ethereal harmonies. More from them can be heard on their MySpace site. 
SAY HI - NORTHWESTERN GIRLSSay Hi is going to be at the The Royal Unicorn Cabaret on February 16, and from what I have heard of them so far, it is going to be well worth checking out. Northwestern Girls starts with a Coldplay-on-Casios riff and simple premise ("Northwestern girls, with their fresh faces. Don't mess it up this time. They seem so nice. It must be in the air here") and then builds layer upon layer of analog and digital tracks to a worthy climax. Definitely check out the website for additional tracks not to mention its quirky D&D stylings. 
LOUIS XIV - GUILT BY ASSOCIATIONChe Guevara observed that "Cruel leaders are replaced only to have new leaders turn cruel". Pitchfork Media, the one time online underdog of indie music has in the course of just a few short years risen to the top of the pile, toppling the old guard publications like Billboard and Rolling Stone to become the new king-maker. Which means that it sucks when they hate you. And Pitchfork Media hates Louis XIV. Their main criticism of the band seems to be that their lyrics are too lewd and they are doing nothing that the Stones, AC/DC and The Strokes have already done a hundred times over. Apparently rock n roll is not just about sex and drugs anymore. It all seems a little harsh in my opinion. Take a listen to Guilt by Association and let me know what you think. You can also catch them on tour with Hot Hot Heat and the Editors. They'll be at the Commodore on Feb 5. Labels: Music, The Payola Chronicles
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Portfolio Updates
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