I hate saying the overused “Wow, just wow!” but this wicked handmade Boba Fett handbag by catpenfold deserves it. Sadly, it’s sold. However, I spotted an equally amazing Doctor Who Ood clutch still available for purchase at her Etsy shop.
Via Neatorama
‘What did you do in the 1980s, Daddy?’ For those who want to know what it was like to be young(ish) and middle class in Britain during the 1980s, then take a look at the Pet Shop Boys in their one-and-only feature film, It Couldn’t Happen Here. Originally planned as an hour long pop promo to accompany the release of their third album Actually, It Couldn’t Happen Here captures the style, the pretensions, the cultural obsessions and some of the most popular music of that decade.
The Pet Shop Boys are a hugely under-rated band, whose compelling, beautiful and catchy music by Chris Lowe, can often disguise the power and passion of Neil Tennant’s lyrics. For you see, despite what the music press claims (that means you NME), or the modes by which the band present themselves (daft hats and outfits), there is really nothing ironic about the Pet Shop Boys at all. They mean everything they do. Which is why It Couldn’t Happen Here is so frustrating. It could have been like The Monkees Head for the 1980s, with a hard, political edge, but it wanders without any sense of direction through a series of segments that revolve too literally around the songs.
That said, for a pop film it’s not all that bad, and the quality of the songs, and some of the eye-catching performances (Joss Ackland, Gareth Hunt, Barbara Windsor) make it almost passable. If only Derek Jarman (who collaborated on a stage show, and directed the promo for “It’s A Sin”) or Lindsay Anderson (the director of If… and O, Lucky Man! who would had directed the concert film of Wham, yes, Wham, in China) had been asked to direct rather than Jack Bond, then things might have been different. Even so, Bond made it look sumptuous and Neil Tennant found out he couldn’t act.
Time methinks to release the film on DVD.
My dear friend, Paul Darling, posted this image on his page. Instantly, it attracted attention as so many different people seemed to agree with the statement:
My idols are dead and my enemies are in power.
Maybe it connected because we live in the UK under a Tory government? But friends in Europe also agreed. And yes, there is something alluring about this photograph, and something also quite French and existential. So, what do you think? Does this image speak to you? If so why?
While you have a wee think about that, here’s The Stranglers “No More Heroes”.
With thanks to Paul Darling!
Paris: City of Fashion is an elegant little featurette from British Pathé, which looks at a variety of women’s fashions from the 1950s, posed against the boulevards and avenues of the gorgeous City of Lights. Watching it makes me feel I should be Cary Grant wandering around markets on the lookout for a Swedish 4 shilling, an “Hawaiian Blue” or a “Gazette Moldar”.
Redditor HeavenSk8 spotted this wildly amusing tee-shirt somewhere in Puerto Rico.
You know you’d watch the shit out of this if it was a real movie. I like how it’s sleeveless and features the George Clooney incarnation of Batman.
Via reddit
While looking up a suitable image for last night’s post on disco by Simon Frith, I came across a film called Disco Fever, a disco-exploitation oddity from the same year as the article, 1978.
As a fan of both disco music and cult cinema I was surprised to never have heard of this, and now I’m wondering if any of our readers have seen it? In case your memory needs jogging, it stars Casey Kasem and some dude called Fabian, and a lot of the action seems to revolve around a discotheque which is onboard a jumbo jet. Here’s the original trailer for further investigation (this film may just be so bad it’s good, or it may just be so bad):
A friend of mine recently posted a link on Facebook to a series of photos titled A New Kind of Beauty by photographer Mr. Toledano. When I hit on link I was immediately taken aback by the power of his imagery.
Are these people the shock troops of the future of the human body? I don’t know. But what I do know is that I’m starting to see a lot of similar faces on news anchors, TV and movie stars and magazine models. Is some sort of new consensus on what constitutes “beauty” in our era being drawn?
Mr. Toledano writes:
Is beauty informed by contemporary culture? By history? Or is it defined by the surgeon’s hand? Can we identify physical trends that vary from decade to decade, or is beauty timeless?
When we re-make ourselves, are we revealing our true character, or are we stripping away our very identity?
Perhaps we are creating a new kind of beauty. An amalgam of surgery, art, and popular culture? And if so, are the results the vanguard of human induced evolution?
More of A New Kind of Beauty after the jump…
In 1987, the B-52s produced an incredible public service announcement for AMFAR (The Foundation For AIDS Research) with the late NYC-based video artist Tom Rubnitz (best known for the “Strawberry Shortcut” and “Pickle Surprise” videos) and several of their closest famous friends. The colorful tableau vivant recreated the “Sgt. Pepper” album cover with the flowers spelling out “Be Alive”
Along with the B-52s, you’ll see Korean video artist Nam Jun Paik, Allen Ginsbeg, Dancenoise, “voguing” pioneer Willi Ninja, Nile Rodgers, Joey Arias, Tseng Kwong Chi, Mink Stole, ABC’s David Yarritu, “Frieda the Disco Doll,” John Kelly as the Mona Lisa, Lady Bunny, performance artist Mike Smith, Kenny Scharf, David Byrne and then-wife Adelle Lutz, model Beverly Johnson, NYC “It Girl” Dianne Brill and Quentin Crisp among many others.
If this isn’t eighties enough for you already, note the presence of “Randee of the Redwoods” (comedian Jim Turner) the acid-fried MTV “presidential candidate.”
Drag superstar Alexia Twister recreates Madonna’s entire Super Bowl spectacle in Brazilian gay club Victoria Haus - a rather amazing feat considering this show was probably produced with less money than the cost of Cee Lo’s dressing room deli tray.
Francoise Hardy in a Paco Rabanne tracksuit.
A candy-colored Sixties’ short film promoting Paco Rabanne’s new belt line set to a cartoon soundtrack - sounds like Wile E. Coyote and The Roadrunner.
This appeared on French TV series Dim Dam Dom.
“You may have thought you heard me say I wanted a lot of bacon and eggs, but what I said was: Give me all the bacon and eggs you have.”
I like this Ron Swanson meets Dr. Seuss design by Tom Trager. You can never have enough of Ron Swanson, IMHO.
Via UPROXX
It appears that someone is having a little fun with the whole “sacrilegious” Disney/Joy Divison tee-shirt controversy...
Some crafty anarcho-inspired culture hackers have made their own Crass/Mickey Mouse mash-up tees and discretely deposited them neatly folded in Disney boutiques. Unsuspecting shoppers will either be baffled or delighted by their DIY creation.
Me, I’m delighted! I need one of these! Now, I’ve got… Mickey envy.
Click here to see larger image.
Via Submitterator
Black Milk Clothing, the same fashion retailer who brought you the Steve Buscemi dress, now have “exposed muscle” leggings for purchase.
I suppose if your goal in life is to have sexy legs like Slim Goodbody, these leggings would be an obvious choice to complete your wardrobe.
Via BuzzFeed
Romanian “model” Ioana Spangenberg, whose waist measures a shocking 20 inches on her 5ft 6 frame, swears she pigs out on fatty foods daily. Now I’m no doctor here, but this doesn’t look natural at all. I wonder if she wore a corset for years and forced her body to become a “human hourglass”? I don’t know, but it’s shocking to say the least.
Below, an image of how your organs are pushed down after years of extremely tight corset use.
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
X-ray images of corsets (1908)
(via Daily Mail)
Looking like an advert for Swinging London, Joe Massot’s 1965 short Reflections on Love mixes pop documentary with scenes devised by writer Derek Marlowe and (apparently) an uncredited, Larry Kramer. Though everything looks rather beautiful, it is such a terribly straight film, and considering the talent involved, and doesn’t really offer much love for the audience to reflect on. Then, this was the Sixties, when everything was new and exciting, and getting hitched in a registry office was daring and rad. O, how innocent it all seems. Massot went on to direct George Harrison’s Wonderwall and later, Led Zeppelin’s concert film The Song Remains the Same. Kramer went on to script Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (1967), and Ken Russell’s Women in Love (1969), before writing his novel Faggots in 1978. As for Marlowe, he wrote the classic double-agent spy thriller, A Dandy in Aspic, and followed this up with a series of idiosyncratic and stylish novels (from crime to Voodoo to Lord Byron), which are all shamefully out-of-print, and not even available as e-books - publishers please note.
The original version was twenty-one minutes long, and this is the revamped, re-scored (by Kula Shaker), re-edited (12 minutes) re-release from 1999, and still watchable pop-candy.
Previously on Dangerous Minds
A Dandy in Aspic: A letter form Derek Marlowe
Wonderwall: The Ultimate Sixties Flick?
Wonderwall Music: George Harrison’s little-known 1968 solo album
Unfortunately, I just discovered that this excellent Bill Cosby hoodie is no longer available from the online made to order website HeadHoods. Maybe if you write them, they’ll make you one?
Oh, and if you’re a Grace Jones fan, they have a hoodie of her, too!
Below, a GIF that serves no real purpose:
(via reddit)
Amusing “Black Fax” tee-shirt design by San Francisco-based artist Ryan De La Hoz. If you’re not familiar with the term “black fax,” it refers to “a prank fax transmission, consisting of one or more pages entirely filled with a uniform black tone. The sender’s intention is typically to consume as much of the recipient’s fax ink, toner or thermal paper or disk space as possible, thus costing the recipient money and/or denying the recipient the use of their machine (this is similar to computer-based denial of service attacks).”
The Black Fax tee-shirt is available for purchase at Ryan’s website, Cool Try.
Via Publique
Ossie Clark was a master cutter, who could run his hands over a figure and cut a dress to fit perfectly. He liked his dresses to lie next to the skin, nothing in between, capturing the wearer’s form, beauty and shape. Clark’s inspiration was dance, his idol was Nijinsky, and the movement, flow, and freedom of dance inspired his clothes to enhance the female form. At the height of his success, in the early 1970s, his clothes were worn by some of the world’s most beautiful women - Ali MacGraw, Patti Boyd, Gala Mitchell, Twiggy and Elizabeth Taylor. His leather jackets were worn by Keith Richard, while he designed a jump suit for Mick Jagger to wear during The Stones Exile in Main Street Tour. His favorite model, the beautiful Gala Mitchell said in 1971:
“Usually I lack confidence, but when I wear Ossie’s designs I know I’m beautiful and sexy. His clothes are like a play. I act to suit the mood of the dress. Fashion now is very sophisticated - as always Ossie had that feeling first.”
The magic of Clark’s fashion was the cut, the shape, the heart-tugging style, and the beautiful prints designed by wife Celia Birtwell. Together, Ossie and Celia brought a fabulous, ethereal beauty to fashion in the late 1960s, early 1970s, which has often been copied, but rarely equalled.
Here’s a small selection of Ossie and Celia’s fashions from German TV, circa 1969. Painting above David Hockney’s Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy (1971).
More of the Clark’s beautiful fashions, after the jump…
Fans of Japanese graphic design, rejoice: René Walter, of Germany’s Nerdcore website, has amassed an amazing collection of vintage Japanese advertisements on Flickr. He’s certainly found a lot gems.
Here’s a taste of René‘s Vintage Japanese Advertising (Misc).
More after the jump…
Here’s something quite lovely, a tour inside of Salvador Dali’s Spanish home.
Open Culture provides some history and description:
Along the Costa Brava in northern Spain, in the little seaside village of Port Lligat, sits the house that became Salvador Dalí’s main residence in 1930. It started off as a small fisherman’s hut. Then Dalí went to work on the structure, renovating it little by little over the next 40 years, creating a living, breathing, labyrinthine home that reflects the artist’s one-of-a-kind aesthetic. Writing about the house, the author Joseph Pla once said:
The decoration of the house is surprising, extraordinary. Perhaps the most exact adjective would be: never-before-seen. I do not believe that there is anything like it, in this country or in any other…. Dalí’s house is completely unexpected…. It contains nothing more than memories, obsessions. The fixed ideas of its owners. There is nothing traditional, nor inherited, nor repeated, nor copied here. All is indecipherable personal mythology…. There are art works (by the painter), Russian things (of Mrs. Gala), stuffed animals, staircases of geological walls going up and down, books (strange for such people), the commonplace and the refined, etc.
For many, it’s a long trip to Portlligat, and only eight people can visit the house at a time. So today we’re featuring a video tour of Dalí’s Spanish home. The interior shots begin around the 1:30 mark. If you love taxidermy, you won’t be wasting your time.
Nicely photographed. But I find the music a bit distracting.
