STOP PRESS! Charlotte Gainsbourg is using a nicotine patch!

Interview with Christian Bale

A NICE QUIET CHAT WITH CHRISTIAN BALE in which the most ardent actor of his generation speaks of starving for his art, falling asleep during scenes, and why John Connor—not Christian Bale—bears the lion’s share of the blame for that infamous explosion on the set of ‘Terminator Salvation’

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Robert Stone "Rosa Muerta"

Daft Punk Piano Medley by the Napkin Holder

Justice † Cross Piano Medley by the Napkin Holder

The Goal of the Year 2009

Andy Warhol "Self Portrait" (1978)

Iggy Pop - press conference "Preliminaires" (official video)

YellowKorner will distribute a collector photo series from Iggy Pop

YellowKorner, 1er label de photographie d’art proposera à partir du 25 Mai une collection exclusive de photos numérotés et signés par Iggy Pop et Xavier Martin, photographe célèbre pour ses portraits de Serge Gainsbourg, Robert Mitchum ou Catherine Deneuve notemment.

Les tirages seront disponibles en deux editions :

A framed and numbered Open Edition series, choice of one of three visuals,
sold with a 4 tracks from Préliminaires (King Of The Dogs)

* Une version Open Edition encadrée et numérotée avec 3 visuels au choix, vendus avec 4 titres de Préliminaires à télécharger

* Une edition limitée, avec un choix de 10 visuels chacun disponibles à 30 exemplaires seulement, numérotés et signé par Iggy Pop et Xavier Martin et proposé avec l’album Préliminaires en CD.

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Iggy Pop "Preliminaires" (2009)

A Deluxe Boxset is available at only 6000 units worldwide. This boxset contains the Préliminaires album, a collector Les Feuilles Mortes / King Of The Dogs 7 inch, the cover of which is Iggy’s portrait by Marjane Satrapi, and a 28 pages drawings booklet also by Marjane Satrapi.

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JAPAN SYNTHESIZER BAND COSMOS

Really good Depeche Mode interview in The Quietus

MD

Stevie Wonder Drum Solo Live In Japan 1972

Maxxi National Museum of XXI Century Arts, Rome by Zaha Hadid

J.S. Bach Chamber Music Pavilion by Zaha Hadid

Architect Zaha Hadid has been commissioned to create a unique space for musicians to perform Bach's solo works. Manchester Art Gallery, July 3 - 18. £28.50.

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How Addicted To Blogging Are You?

100%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

New Photos From Flight 1549

Wired has the amazing Part 2 of the story of Flight 1549 in Hudson River with some incredible photos.

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John Cale: 'It was all about revenge'

The Guardian has a story about John Cale and his debut as a visual artist at the Venice Biennale:

It sounds at first like an electronic whine, a build-up of noise in the amplifier. Then there's Lou Reed's voice, young but hardened: "When the smack begins to flow, and it shoots up the dropper's neck, and I'm rushing on my run, then I feel just like Jesus's son." Behind it all, there's that strange keening, humming note. Listen to the Velvet Underground's Heroin on headphones and you realise it's not feedback after all, not a synthesised warble, but the rich timbre of a violin playing a single note, held for a disturbingly long time. It's the darkest thing in the darkest of songs. If Reed sounds as if he's made a pact with the devil, then the musician who plays that buzzing fiddle - John Cale - must be the devil himself.

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Justin Timberlake "Mother Lover" [An SNL Digital Short]

Justin Timberlake -- Mother Lover
Uploaded by WESTSIDEFORLIFE - See more comedy videos.

Grizzly Bear - While You Wait for the Others - Jools Holland

Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks (Live on Later... with Jools Holland)

I really want this t-shirt, but it is sold out :-(

Gaspar Noé

The controversial French director whipped up a bona-fide storm at Cannes in 2002 with his rape drama Irréversible. Enter the Void suggests that age has not mellowed him, dishing out a tale of brutal murder and sibling love gone sour.

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Michael Haneke

Might this be Haneke's year? The lupine, gimlet-eyed Austrian was the hot favourite to win the Palme d'Or for Hidden in 2005 and scooped the grand prix four years earlier for The Piano Teacher. His latest, The White Ribbon, installs a rural German school as a breeding ground for fascism. The fact that Isabelle Huppert – the star of two Haneke movies – is jury president won't hurt his chances either.

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Chris von Steiner @ Strychnin Gallery Berlin

This guy has "golden trousers"

He just sold his mobile company BiBob to Telenor (Norway) for almost 100 million Danish Kroner. Just a couple of years ago he sold another mobile start-up, Telmore, to TDC (Denmark). I am now waiting for him to strike a third deal with Telia (Sweden)!

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Grizzly Bear features in New York Magazine and The New Yorker

Great articles in both New York Magazine and The New Yorker about Grizzly Bear (I was tipped by Ed Droste himself on his Twitter channel, here and here).

From New York Magazine:

Droste’s voice is a full-bodied, multi-octave-reaching instrument reminiscent of the more-earnest end-of-eighties New Wave (think Curt Smith from Tears for Fears or a less-campy Morrissey), but it took him a while to feel confident about it. “I was insecure about the songs, about my voice,” Droste remembers. “I was fearful of judgment and fearful of what people would think and just generally fearful.”

From The New Yorker:

When all four band members harmonize, Grizzly Bear sounds like a boys’ choir. This kind of harmony has its roots in the multitrack backing vocals that Brian Wilson produced on Beach Boys records like “Smile” and “Pet Sounds,” but it could just as easily be drawing on forms of American church music and on modern classical composers like John Tavener. Within the genre of indie rock, the move toward more singing done by more voices in a more articulated harmonic framework began somewhere in the early aughts, with artists like Sufjan Stevens.

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Disco is back...check these dresses @ American Apparel

Sonic Youth - What We Know - Later... With Jools Holland 28/04/09

Depeche Mode - Wrong (Later Live with Jools Holland 28.04.2009)

Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus (Later Live with Jools Holland 28.04.2009)

Hashima Island

Vice Magazine has an amazing article about a lost island in Japan this week.

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Marc Bolan & T Rex - Children Of The Revolution