We’re still here.

Just shuffling about and reorganising things.

Will be back in no time!

These mahjong sets were released by Maison Martin Margiela to commemorate their third anniversary at the On Lan Street location in Hong Kong. Limited edition, of course. You’re given a set when you spend in excess of HKD$8,999 (or appx SGD$1,675) on the Martin Margiela 2009 Fall/Winter collection.

That’s alright, isn’t it? Considering how much the line costs in Singapore and the region…You can Pong this. Beats your Hello Kitty mahjong set for sure.

News and image source: Hypebeast

Image source: Colette

Good kitsch fun.

Colette’s celebrating Barbie’s 50th birthday (a year’s long celebration, it would seem) with Barbie table football…. the Barbie Foot. Designed by french designer Chloe Ruchon in partnership with Babyfoot Bonzini, a high-end Foosball retailer, Barbie Foot sells at Colette for a mere 10,000 Euros. I like how the value of kitsch can up both price and covetability of  anything to make it high-end - makes for a great discourse on the issue of Taste and Post Modern theory.

Image source: designboom

While contentious as the symbol of idealised feminity, Barbie without her arms is something freaky. And for a doll without genitalia, it can’t hurt too  much on the field. Lovely in pink…while keeping her ‘do.

Image source: Colette

oh, don’t we love the old and rocking! Bless!

What a trooper!

A friend posted this on Facebook. Makes Mondays all the better.

Synaesthesia is probably the only condition that more than a few creative types wished they had. It’s essentially the jumble-up and cross-wiring of different senses i.e. the ability to hear in colour or taste what you hear, so some people would literally ‘taste’ words, though not necessarily what makes sense: You say ‘purple’, and the synaesthete might taste earwax or something else on hearing ‘purple’; each word would ‘taste’ differently. Or they’ll see colours and numbers in spatial patterns all around their environment…Fascinating stuff.

Synaesthesia as a creative theme in design circles was rather trendy for a while. Synaesthetes were believed to better be able to create associations that can lead to better and more inventive musical or colour compositions (Miles Davis and Kandinsky were both synaesthetes.)

Here’s a video by Terri Timely (made up of Ian Kibbey and Corey Creasey), a two-sibling directing-duo who have made a short film inspired by their own (real) experiences in synaesthesia. Bloody nice art direction and everything else really.

Synesthesia from Terri Timely on Vimeo.

syn·es·the·sia syn·aes·the·sia (sĭn’ĭs-thē’zhə) n. A condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another, as when the hearing of a sound produces the visualization of a color.

First, you are drawn by the book. It could be an Enid Blyton or Nancy Drew, or classics such as Treasure Island, Heidi or Charlotte Bronte’s Villette. Obviously old - beat up, time-sooted and lightly-stained. All part of their charm.

It’s the bolt-and-nut, punched right through the centre of the book (stabbed disrespectfully IN the heart) that gets you. For a book lover like me, this is a post-punk art statement that has gotta hurt. What’s a randomly used, second/third/fourth-hand vintage children’s book that harks back to the childhood (circa 1984) doing in a CD store?

Singaporean band, Concave Scream’s latest CD comes encased and shrink-wrapped in a used book. What could be more fitting for a title: Soundtrack for a Book.

I am enamoured by the handmade feel of the CD packaging - decidedly eco-minded and one-of-a-kind. You’re almost guaranteed that you won’t own the same copy as the next Joe Smo (no two bookpages from different stocks could age the same), and when you are done with the CD, you can finish the book - provided you’re able to read through the hole.

I’ll confess that I’m not too familiar with Concave Scream’s oeuvre of work, but the 43-minute 9-track instrumental album sometimes sound like the Cocteau Twins, minus Liz Fraser’s ethereal vocals, which is the kind of “jangly” dreamy instrumental stuff that I was totally into, circa 1994.

View all the titles available at the Concave Scream site here, and don’t turn down the volume. Sample the music - it should be all about the Music, shouldn’t it?

The CD-Book is available at the Esplanade store, Gramaphone and Asylum. But we would much rather you pick it up at Books Actually, our smashing neighbours downstairs. Better yet still, climb the stairs after to say ‘hi’ and show us your edition. We’d love to see ya.

Concave Scream will  launch the album with a 60-minute gig on Sept 18 at the Esplanade. Tickets go on sale from Aug 6.

You bet I’ll be there with my copy of Villette.

Ok, I am on a roll here. A few days ago, I blogged about Visionaire’s Solar issue. Thanks to a well-connected little bird, I got my hands and ears on a back issue of the legendary Visionaire 53: Sound (Dec 2007).

Packaged inside a sleek domed case, the audio publication consisted of five 12-inch vinyl records (which also included digital versions on 2 CDs) which had a whopping 116 tracks, contributed by over a hundred who’s-who in the music, performance arts, and  fashion industry.

The Roll-call:- Musicians: David Byrne, Courtney Love, Michael Stipe, Adam Horowitz (Beastie Boys), Antony & the Johnsons, Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon (Sonic Youth), Nick Rhodes (Duran Duran), Karl Bartos (Kraftwerk), Andrew WK, Chan Marshall (Cat Power), Danger Mouse, Malcolm McLaren, Ruyuichi Sakamoto; artists: Robert Wilson, Yoko Ono, Christian Marclay, Doug Aitken, Gary Hill, Sylvie Fleury; DJs: Miss Kittin, Trevor Jackson, Towa Tei, Michel Gaubert; fashion designers: Alexander McQueen, Helmut Lang; bands: Littl’Ans, Fischerspooner, Unkle, Animal Collective… and many more.

Listen: Alexander McQueen collab with the Kinks’ John Gosling

Each contributor supplied a 1-minute audio sample, either previously unreleased or reconstructed songs and field-recording samples or spoken word pieces.

The 120-minute of repertoire of sounds range from the utterly banal (Helmut Lang’s recording of duck quacking in Long Island made the minute very strenous to listen to; like watching bulbous paint dry), not to mention pretentious (Yoko Ono’s record of the heartbeat), to the sublimely mundane (Liza Minnelli’s 1-minute field-recording of her walk to Broadway: the sound of her high heels clicking on New York’s street pavement until she opens a door and the sound of an orchestra in rehearsal pours out from the theatre.)

Listen: Liza Minnelli’s the Sound of Broadway

While Kate Moss was nowhere to be found, there is a very annoying 60-second loop of Linda Evangelista reciting her famous mantra “I don’t get out of bed for less than $10,000“; enough to make you want to slap the woman out of bed.

Listen: Linda Evangelista’s I don’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 a day

Listen: Maggie Cheung’s Morning

And there is Maggie Cheung, reprising her non-existant singing talent (last heard in her role for the Cannes award-winning “Clean“) in a one-minute wordless track ‘Morning‘. Thankfully, she only la-la-las through the song in a girlish voice which makes it somewhat bearable.

Yet there are still loads of other highlights including David Byrne’s short and sweet ‘Polaroid Picture’, Miranda July’s wry and quirky one-woman performance piece in which she voices a man, a girl and a woman all in the same breath.

But the best part of the sound mag has to be the cute MINI Clubman “Vinyl Killer” record player: a battery-operated toy car with speakers and a needle. Let the miniature car move along a record’s groove, and it magically plays each track, acting as a fully portable record player and sound system!

At a reduced price of $200 (original price $250) on amazon.com, that’s a Visionaire to get a soundache for.

All music clips above are under the copyrights of Visionaire. The songs included here are for promotional sampling only. If you like it as much as the writer does, please purchase it at www.amazon.com.

W came back from lunch with this new toy in tow. Essentially a 3-bulb torch, it is as kitsch as it is useless. We love it. Its hardware turquoise plastic body is enbossed with a phoenix and dragon, while the main lamp is outfitted in pink and green. We’re slightly perplexed by the position of the bulbs though. There’s the main torch in white, a bulb on the top in its glass house, and most confusing of all, a tiny useless bulb with a white cover that looked like a tail stub. Rather rude actually.. but cute. so cute.

oh and the side is actually a slip-on buckle that could buckle in theory, but doesn’t really. It also comes with its own an electrical plug.

It's a pet.

$5 from a hardware store on Smith St. Also spotted in a toy-store at Hong Lim Complex. (Not very discerning stockists)