Goodbye JPG Magazine... I will miss you

I have Queen running through my head. Of course, it's "Another One Bites the Dust." I am saddened to report that JPG Magazine is shutting their site down and discontinuing the magazine. I'm especially sad because I just finally got a new subscription from C.A.S. for Christmas.

We've spent the last few months trying to make the business behind JPG sustain itself, and we've reached the end of the line. We all deeply believe in everything JPG represents, but we just weren't able to raise the money needed to keep JPG alive in these extraordinary economic times. We sought out buyers, spoke with numerous potential investors, and pitched several last-ditch creative efforts, all without success. As a result, jpgmag.com will shut down on Monday, January 5, 2009.

If you haven't checked out jpgmag.com before, now's your chance. You have two days to soak in its goodness. The print issues I've had are treasured and kept. There's a whole issue on Noir! An issue on live music! An issue on shattered things... and so many more.

Almost 200,000 people logged onto jpgmag.com at some point during their existence, and that's pretty swell. Thousands of amateur and pro photogs together on one site sharing their art. That's going to be gone on Monday, and it makes me a little sick.

Before the bell tolls its last, check out these suggestions from Editor-In-Chief Laura Brunow Miner, and enjoy.

Download the PDFs of back issues, outtakes, and photo challenge selections. We'll always have the memories!

Make note of your favorite photographers. You may want to flip through your favorites list and jot down names and URLs of some of the people you'd like to stay in touch with. You may even want to cut and paste your contacts page into a personal record.

The Alarmists Hit the Studio

Check out this update from Tony Najm, bass player for local Minneapolis band The Alarmists:

Hello Everyone, it has been a while since we last chatted. We hope you've all recovered from Thanksgiving week, and being back at work isn't wearing you down too much. A lot has happened in Alarmists camp since we last spoke. Back in August, we were still looking for a producer, a studio to record in and all that stuff that comes with making a new record.

Through the powers of the internet we met Producer extraordinaire Andrew Lynch. Andrew expressed interest in working with us, and we were dumbfounded since his catalog includes producing the latest Earlimart record 'Hymn & Her'. So that was a pretty easy choice as we're all HUGE fans of Earlimart, and you should be too. As for what studio to record in? We contacted our longtime trusty friend Producer/Engineer Adam Krinsky, and he said 'you should definitely head straight down to Flyte Tyme, and grab a case of beers on your way.' As some of you may know Flyte Tyme has now become the great Masters Recording Institute, and it's where hundreds of pop records from the likes of Janet Jackson, Usher, Mariah Carey, and even Michael Jackson were made.

So into the Studio we headed for 10 days, we got all the music done on 12 FRESH tracks as they say :) The new record should be out early summer, a lot more updates and pictures will be coming your way. Thanks for reading.

Love,
The Alarmists

Please enjoy a slideshow of photos I took over a series of three days in studio with the boys. After hearing the few tracks I was privileged enough to be in the studio for, I can honestly say I can't wait for the new album. Enjoy!

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Minneapolis Artists for Obama

My boyfriend, c.a.s., introduced me to the Scanner blog a while ago and I read it every day. About a week ago the females at Scanner decided to remake a great Joan Baez poster created during the last draft. I really liked it, and posted the remake as my Facebook photo - tagging three of my girlfriends as the other three women. Little did I know that it would be picked up by a local online media source and posted... tagging myself and my three friends (the Gossip Girls) as the pretty faces. Oops.

As a result of the oops, and just really enjoying what the photo stood for, my friends and I decided to do it up Minneapolis style. What you see above is the Minneapolis version of the original Baez photo, skewed to reflect our position on the upcoming election. Pictured are Andrea Swensson, Alexa Jones, and Stacy Schwartz. Please feel free to repost and spread the word - but most importantly, don't forget to vote on Tuesday, November 4th.

Click here for the original Scanner post and Baez/Scanner photos.

Of Montreal Shakes Up First Avenue

Of Montreal is well known for their outlandish stage shows, and their latest at First Avenue definitely fit that description. First Ave's stage was extended about 10 feet into the pit and the barrier was an additional 3 - 4 feet back from that, taking up half the available floor space for the crowd. It makes sense that First Ave pulled the tickets from their outlets early as a result.

Kids in wings, kids in makeup, kids with multicolored hair - they were all there. All bouncing, screaming, and reaching for the man. The one and only Kevin Barnes. The lead singer and face of the band, he's been getting a lot of love and attention lately. Both Rolling Stone and Paste Magazine had big feature stories this month and Of Montreal just released their new album Skeletal Lamping. In other words, the band's been busy.

The show began with gold Buddhas, but included skeletons, people dressed as animals, mythical beasts, warpaint, shaving cream, and a whole lot of feathers. Over the top? Maybe, but if any of these things would've been missing, it wouldn't have been an Of Montreal show. It was an amazing dance fest that included songs from various albums and had the crowd screaming along to every word. The band ended on a high note too; Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit." It was incredibly fun, and all you have to do is check out the slide show below to get a taste of the insanity. Set list after the jump:


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.
Click here for Set List

Set List:
Intro
Id Engager
So Begins Our Alabee
Triphallus, to Punctuate!
She's a Rejecter
For Our Elegant Caste
Touched Something's Hollow
An Eluardian Instance
Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse
Gallery Piece
Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games
Women's Studies Victims
St. Exquisite's Confessions
Eros' Entropic Tundra (Sad Love)
Nonpareil of Wisdom
October is Eternal
Wicked Wisdom
Disconnect the Dots
Knight Rider
And I've Seen a Bloody Shadow
Plastis Wafer
Beware Our Nubile Miscreants
Mingusings
Konsvinger

ENCORE
(Anyone keep track of the first two encore songs?)
Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nirvana Cover)

Show Closings: Get Your American Wanderlust

Two marquee shows close this Sunday, Friedlander Photography at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and Richard Prince: Spiritual America at the Walker Art Center. Both are sprawling, muscular shows by individualistic and enigmatic American artists, and it would be a pity for them to go out unseen.

Friedlander Photography is an enormous retrospective of Lee Friedlander's photographs. The show covers almost 4 and a half decades of work, opening with arresting color images of musicians in the Sixties (you can’t escape Miles Davis’ eyes). The retro free-wheels though the travels across the country, documenting America as it is lived. Over time, the smaller scale work becomes bolder, more conceptual, expanding Friedlander’s lens and capturing more of the beauty and contradictions of this country and culture.

If Lee Friedlander makes me want to travel, Richard Prince makes me want to fuck. His unabashed appropriation of popular culture, stripping down of fashion photographs and use of humor all shroud and convolute Prince’s identity, creating questions of the obligation of the artist to authenticity and identity. In an age where Warhol gets misread to justify American Idol, it’s refreshing to have some aggressive mystery, a tantalization and titillation. Go get yours while you can.

Friedlander Photography and Richard Prince: Spiritual America both close September 14.

What I did this week - The Republican National Convention

This week I worked for a liberal media group called The UpTake, which consisted of 15 or so videographers and photographers who documented the convention. We had live streams online of events as well as video of protests, concerts, raids, etc. You can see it all here: www.theuptake.org.

I was at four protests which all ended in tear gas, pepper spray and concussion grenades. Interesting, to say the least. It was pretty disappointing that I couldn't get closer to the actual convention, however. Sort of hard to do with 15 foot metal fences throughout downtown. St. Paul itself was dead. No one was really outside the perimeter of the Xcel Energy Center and the police presence was very scary and it all seemed like major overkill. It was a police state in all sense of those words. Riot gear, police on horses, bikes, foot, snipers on buildings.

There was a lot of tension between the public and police for most of the RNC. Obviously there were people who aggravated the situation and deserved to be arrested or needed tear gas to be dispersed. However, there were a lot of altercations where I witnessed the police as aggressors. Police maced and pepper sprayed photographers who were following police instructions, tackled reporters who were well identified as reporters, and pushed unaggressive people out of the way before even asking them to move. Reporters and photographers from City Pages, KARE 11, FOX 9 News and The UpTake were all arrested. There were, of course, a few protesters who made things bad for everyone. The "Black Bloc" anarchists who infiltrated the "Students for a Democratic Society" march on Monday broke store windows, pushed anything not nailed down into the street, and attempted to create barricades against the police. These people were definitely the minority though. Most of the students in the protest yelled at them and asked them to stop the vandalism. It was a sad state much of the time.

The worst that happened to me was walking through an area that was pepper sprayed about 30 seconds earlier. Yuck. I can't imagine getting a direct hit of that stuff. It's gross. Any time I was in danger I got out of the situation. A few of our reporters were arrested or detained, but all had the charges dropped as they were just there to document and not participate or condone the actions of the protesters or others. I was within a block of the tear gas and such more than once, but always made it out of the area without incident.

You can view the photos I took (along with some from others at The UpTake) here:

Day 1 of the RNC
Day 2 of the RNC
Day 4 of the RNC

Cheers -
Stacy

The Republican National Convention is Here

I spent today roaming the streets of St. Paul with members of The UpTake, a liberal media organization. You can check out a slideshow of some of the protests below. Also keep tabs on the convention via The UpTake's website here with continuing live coverage.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

You can also view photos of yesterday's Liberty Parade down Nicollet mall here.

Eight is Enough: The Concert to End Our Long, National Nightmare

Barack Obama said it in his speech accepting the nomination Thursday night- "We love this country too much to let the next four years look like the last eight." Right he is, and that was the sentiment of Andrew Broder of Fog and Joe Selinski of The Dad in Common when they heard the Republican were coming to town. Instead of sitting on their haunches and bitching about it, they got the Turf Club to donate space and a whole raft of their friends to come down and play a show to support the Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Proceeds at the door and all sales of the posters whipped up by Burlesque of North America went to the campaign, and judging by the crowd there, it was a success. Broder said that it gave him "a warm feeling" to see all these people out.

Cake in 15 was there freelancing for Spin.com and you can read that at http://www.spin.com/articles/twin-cities-bands-rock-obama. It's a little truncated for space and our miniscule attention spans, but you get the picture- the bill was packed, the room was full in waves and all in all, we got rowdy in the name of freedom and change. Cake in 15 doesn't want to tell you how to vote, but consider Chris Besinger of STNNNG's quote, given to you in it's entirety- "You've never seen a Republican man rock like this. Except Ted Nugent. And his rhythm section are pussies."


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Storyhill Plays Patio Nights at the Minnesota Museum of American Art

I know what you're thinking. "We have a Minnesota Museum of American Art? Where's that?" "St. Paul" is the answer you desire, and you'll find the MMAA has more to offer than you might expect. For the past five summers the patio at the museum has opened itself to a wide variety of local acts, ranging from STNNNG to Mark Mallman to Storyhill. I was lucky enough to enjoy the Storyhill show from the confines of the museums "cafeteria," as Minnesota decided to bestow a bit of rain on its concert goers.

Once upon a time Storyhill was known as Chris and Johnny. This was the early 1990s and the boys were extremely popular on the college circuit as an acoustic duo. The music evolved and outlasted various geographical moves from each of the men, and finally they became Storyhill. The lush vocal melodies and precise guitar arrangements have created a rock solid fan base for the band. The crowd at the MMAA hooted and hollered for more, bringing the boys back up for more than one encore.

Alas, I am not a writer and lack the words to convey the emotional lift one experiences at such a show, and so I leave you with photos taken in an extremely dark cafeteria at the MMAA on a rainy August night.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

You can listen to the album via the band's label here.
Check out more about the Minnesota Museum of American Art here.

Set list after the jump



Set List
Absaroka
Blazin
Mary
Sacramento
Angel
Weave Your Way
What Was Wrong
Well of Sorrow
Full Circle
Better Angels
Happy Man
White Roses
Give Up the Ghost
Paradise
Joe Snow
Hard Wind
Great Divide
Spaces
Somewhere
Loose
Good Rain

(These may not be in exact order/100% correct, as they were taken from Storyhill's actual set list... and I know they played "If I Could" at the end too)

SXSW 2008

So it's actually the last day of SXSW, and it may seem like I've been ignoring my blog, but in actuality I've just been busy blogging for my other website HowWasTheShow.com. It's been crazy here in Austin. I have only slight feeling left in my feet and my brain works about 1/3 of the time. However, I've gotten to see some great shows and I'm really enjoying myself. The 85 degree weather doesn't hurt either.

Please check out my audio (!) and text blogs (and photos...) HERE and HERE

Here's a few select photos from SXSW 2008:

OMGWHITERABBITS!!!



Basia Bulat



Tapes 'N Tapes




DeVotchKa



R.E.M.



Spinto Band




I believe this one explains itself