Bridget

A lot of times, artists go through a series of style incarnations until they cultivate the look and sound in which they are best appreciated. Or, if you want to get really cynical about it, the artist finds the aesthetic that is most marketable.

Before Alice in Chains got grouped in with the other Seattle grunge bands, it spent the better part of the ’80s rocking out with gigantic teased hair and a vocal caterwaul that wasn’t out of place on a Twisted Sister album. However, before the band slowed its music down to the brooding “Angry Chair” tempo, you can see just how shameless late singer Layne Staley’s ’80s butt-rock posturing was in this recently unearthed footage of a 1986 show filmed at University of Washington’s Kane Hall.

The band was then going by Alice N’ Chains, but they must have decided to make the spelling more straightforward when the band got all earnest in the early ’90s. As Stereogum pointed out, Alice in Chains never had the punk roots of Seattle staples like Nirvana and Mudhoney. Even still, amid its sea of flannel wearing contemporaries, Alice in Chains always kind of looked like metal dirtbags, and I mean that affectionately. How else to you explain that heinous long chin-braid that Staley used to rock?

It’s also worth noting that Stanley was the only member of this incarnation of the band to move on to the version we all became acquainted with in the early ’90s. So that could very well account for some of the difference in sound. Or, you know, the difference in sound could be attributed to the fact that hair metal just wasn’t profitable in the ’90s. Either way, thanks to former band member Johnny Bacolas for sharing this little slice of lost musical history with the rest of us.

[h/t Stereogum]

With Gene Simmons thankfully keeping his mouth shut for the last few months, Billy Corgan has decided he needs to make enough grumpy-old-man comments for the both of them. Since he’s already made time to compare his musical impact to that of Kurt Cobain, lashing out at fans, as well as calling 90s music meaningless, now he’s lashing out at the current pop scene, stating it, “is headed towards a form of pornography” before encouraging rock bands to get “more aggressive.”

Speaking on a morning show in Australia, Corgan took issue with the over-sexualization of female pop stars, saying that the industry encourages them to perform in, “really inappropriate ways to gain attention because it’s really all about getting YouTube hits.” Apparently, Corgan hasn’t paid much mind to the past four decades of pop music, or just doesn’t see the similarity between Madonna touching herself on stage in 1984, Divinyls touching themselves a decade later, Britney Spears handling things in the early oughts, and Miley Cyrus’ performance at the 2013 VMA’s. Not that any of them are great ways to present females in music, but selling female sexuality in music is hardly a new trend.

Even beyond showing skin, Corgan made it clear that he thinks rock stars and pop stars should be at odds, or at least less than friends. Stating that he doesn’t see the “very cozy relationship” between the two as a good thing, he said that “everyone should stay on their side of the street.” In short, Corgan thinks rock stars are “supposed to be an independent individual who pursues a vision to an end” and pop stars are, “supposed to do whatever they can do to pray at some horrible idol of fame which is ubiquitous and fleeting.”

So basically, Billy Corgan envisions a world where Dave Grohl is pitted against Taylor Swift in some sort of MTV-fueled “West Side Story.”

At the end of the day, it’s obvious that Billy Corgan is struggling more than just about anyone with fading into obscurity, and the rather uninspired sounds that have filled his last few records don’t give him the best soapbox to shout from. At the same time, the more he keeps making wild statements, the slower his fading will be, and maybe he’ll decide to drop the endless pretension and make a decent album before it’s too late.

Joel Freimark hosts a daily music-related webseries here and you can follow his daily music musings and suggestions HERE as well.

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Frank Underwood will see you now, well… soon. Binge watchers everywhere are eagerly counting down the days until the release of House of Cards season three on Netflix this Friday. But wait, what’s that? You haven’t caught up yet? Don’t worry readers, we can get through this together. The internet is here to help you get back on Kevin Spacey’s good side just in time.

YouTubers The Fine Brothers have created an amazing recap of the two previous seasons for those looking to catch up with House of Cards. Even more incredible, the pair execute this spoilerific rehash in just one long, nine minute take. Watch it for yourself:

Given all the shady political backstabbing and extensive breaking of the fourth wall, condensing House of Cards down to nine minutes is a difficult task. Thanks to a blooper reel also released by The Fine Bros, you can see the crazy amount of effort it took to get the synopsis down. 17 takes!? I would have been struggling like President Walker after three. (See what I did there?) So, no excuses now if your friends haven’t watched the show quite yet. Send over this snazzy recap and then make sure they are invited over for your marathon session of season three this weekend. Grab some snacks, get comfy, and enjoy. Happy viewing!

Will you be binging season three all at once as I am or watching slow and steady? Drop those thoughts down in the comments below.

lockwiththehorns:

Last night, I started rewatching the first season of House of Cards with a friend who had only seen the British version. I'd forgotten the American House of Cards begins with Kevin Spacey strangling a dog. We got about 20 minutes in when my friend couldn't take it anymore. "Could we please watch the British one? I want to show you the British one. It's so much better," she said. So we bailed on Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright in favor of Ian Richardson and Diane Fletcher. I rather preferred it.

Obviously the British version is better. I've only seen an hour of it and its superiority is already clear. It's funny, unlike earnest, humorless America. The acting's better. The buildings are better. The central tension is better. Lacking all of the British version's wit, the central tension in the American version is: Is he a good guy or a bad guy? God, what a simple, ridiculous, Puritanical, stupid tension. That's the same tension as Breaking Bad, that's the same tension as The Lion King, that's the same tension as A Few Good Men, that's the same tension as Star Wars. It's the same tension as the fucking Bible! Zzzzzzzzzzzz.

The central tension in the British one (which, again, I haven't even watched fully—but here's my opinion anyway!) is: Is he an orchestrator or a manipulator? What's the difference between the two? How does wit complicate things? The humor is a heavy varnish, coating everything. It shines everywhere, from the overt jabs to the subtle super-British visual gags (like the uncommented upon salad-plate-sized blue ribbons on the coats of the politicians who've just won some award). Even more than I'm looking forward to the American season three, I'm looking forward to finishing the British version.

But! But I am still very much looking forward to the next stage of the trashy, smoldering, thin-brained, addictive American version. Sometimes—more often than I would like, and always unexpectedly, when I am walking down the street minding my own business, or strolling through a park, or perambulating down the aisle of a grocery store—I'll think "Zoe Barnes." Out of nowhere. Just those two words. Zoe Barnes. Oh, god, Zoe Barnes. Anyone who's made it through the second season will be with me on this. Poor Zoe Barnes.

The third season of the American House of Cards drops tomorrow. God bless Netflix for dropping a whole season at once. This one-at-a-time shit with Girls is killing me. To get you in the mood for Kevin Spacey's over-the-top perfidy, here's a pitch-perfect perfidy parody:

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Being 'the world's greatest detective' is one of Batman's things, so it makes sense that the new Arkham Knight trailer had a rock hard mystery hidden inside.

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Anyone should be proud for finishing Dark Souls II. From Software's sadistic action games are punishing by any standard. The community around the games, however, keeps upping the ante. What's one way to make Dark Souls II harder? Beating it in first-person with an Oculus Rift.

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If you're reading this, it's too late — Drake has just remade Billboard's hip-hop charts in his own image.

Late Wednesday, Billboard announced the news that the entirety of Drake's latest album If You're Reading This It's Too Late is charting on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop charts. Between those 17 tracks, and the four additional songs where he's a featured artist, Drake has a total of 21 songs concurrently charting. According to Billboard, this is the new record for most simultaneously charting songs from a single artist — it's something nobody else has pulled off. A whole 42% of the Top 50 is Drake. And he did it without gimmicky videos or radio premieres. The strength of the music alone got him to the top. Time to pop that champagne, Papi.

How is this even possible? This awe-inspiring chart domination is largely thanks to Billboard's 2012 decision to factor streaming numbers into chart position. Read More

Health and Medicine

Humans have a habit of playing with their food, which is evident from the steady increase in food additives in packaged produce we have witnessed in the past half-century. Food scientists chuck in these extra ingredients for a variety of reasons, such as to improve texture and flavor, or to make a product last longer or look more appealing.

Large and obvious birthmarks can make school life hard for children, but a couple of caring parents in the UK have found a controversial way to combat this issue. Tanya and Adam Phillips got huge tattoos stretching up their right legs to match the birthmark that their 18-month-old daughter, Honey-Rae, has on her leg.

Read on to get more of the story, and then let us know what you think about their decision in the comments!

More info: mirror (h/t: elitedaily)

“Although in our eyes she was perfect, I knew people would cruelly point and stare at her”

“I was stood at a check out till, when I saw an old couple whispering and staring at Honey-Rae’s leg. I was distraught. It was first time I had taken her out without covering her up and it confirmed all my worries and fears. People are cruel without even realising”

“We had talked about having duplicate tattoos done for a little while but that day my mind was made up”

“When the swelling went down, I showed Honey-Rae, and she gently touched it and smiled as she said ‘Match,’ pointing to her own leg. If I’d have needed any reassurance that I’d made the right decision that was it”

Banksy, a street artist revered by thousands for his ability to express powerful messages and capture our attention, has finally addressed arguably the most controversial topic he could have possibly used his art to comment on – the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Gaza strip.

In a mock tourism video the mysterious artist released on his website, he gives us glimpses into the tunnels he used to sneak into Gaza and the locations of his artwork, along with some brief interviews with locals. The artwork, along with the commentary laced throughout the video and his website, underscores the suffering endured by the people in Gaza and expresses the artist’s exasperation with the apathy he sees in the rest of the world.

Whether or not you agree with Banksy’s stance on the conflict, he has once again reminded us why he’s so famous – because his pictures are worth more than even 1,000 words.

More info: banksy.co.uk (h/t: streetartnews)

“A local man came up and said ‘Please – what does this mean?’ I explained I wanted to highlight the destruction in Gaza by posting photos on my website – but on the internet people only look at pictures of kittens”

“Gaza is often described as ‘the world’s largest open air prison’ because no-one is allowed to enter or leave. But that seems a bit unfair to prisons – they don’t have their electricity and drinking water cut off randomly almost every day”

Furr Division

Stevie Wonder never considered his blindness a "disadvantage," and he's proved his point for more than 50 years. But for all his fantastic talent, his blindness may have contributed to his skills nonetheless. Research has found overwhelming evidence to suggest that blind musicians' brains can be a lot more musically attuned than those of sighted musicians. 

Source: YouTubeChanged brains. When blind individuals lose their sight at early ages, it's certainly a disadvantage. But it has interesting positive effects as far as musical sensitivity goes. Blind children's brains undergo radical changes in order to make better use of the sensory inputs they can gather. Numerous fMRI and lesion studies suggest that individuals blind since childhood repurpose large portions of their visual cortex in order to respond better to auditory stimuli. Read More

iraffiruse:

Onward, steed!

Ever wonder how often people pay for drugs, alcohol or sex through the mobile pay site Venmo? Wonder no more. Vicemo now lets you see all the people doing just that in real time.

Obviously it’s some kind of bot that’s going through and doing this. For one thing, no human would just sit around and manually look for all of this (I hope). Besides that, it clearly just focuses on key words — like weed, drink and grass — which can lead to some pretty harmless payments showing up in the feed. Although, if you’re willing to use a service that openly posts your shit, maybe you deserve that. Then of course there are the people who are clearly joking because pretending to pay someone for drugs and/or sexual favors is just super hilarious.

Here’s a collection of some of the funnier ones:

[Vicemo]

my aesthetic

Banksy goes to Gaza.

 

The post The World is His Canvas appeared first on The World's Best Ever: Design, Fashion, Art, Music, Photography, Lifestyle, Entertainment.

As any boxer will tell you, jumping rope is one of the most efficient cardio workouts, one that hasn't changed much since it was invented. Until now. Enter the Smart Rope.

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Los Angeles-based music producer & composer Eskmo has a local record release show coming up! Playing in support of his second full-length release SOL, Eskmo AKA Brendan Angelides will be performing live at Bootleg HiFi on Thursday, April 16. Tickets...

dduane:

rootandrock:

coyotecomforts:

kedreeva:

officialabortionist:

itscolossal:

WATCH: Honey on Tap: A New Beehive that Automatically Extracts Honey without Disturbing Bees [video]

WITHOU T DISTURBING THE BEES THAT IS FANTASTIC BEES ARE GREAT

You don’t understand how fabulous this is!!

• This hive structure, if it works like the descriptions imply, would make beehives something super affordable, that just about anyone could install near their home and maintain. AND it would reduce the cost of harvesting honey by more than just the money-
• A typical honey harvesting device costs $200-300, plus the time it takes to use to harvest. For a Langstroth hive, you have to suit up (gear which can be pricey), remove the comb (which is highly disturbing to the bees), install said comb in the extractor (scraping all the caps off the comb first), spin out the honey, RE-open the hive (after suiting up and again disturbing the bees), and put the comb back.
• If you use a method that doesn’t require an extractor, you usually end up destroying the comb, which is damaging to the hive and intensively laborious for your bees because they have to completely remake the combs from scratch.

What this looks like is that you probably wouldn’t even need to suit up any time you wanted to harvest honey (though you would still need the equipment for installation of the colony and for inspections, etc, or if you’re still getting used to the colony). Removing the viewing window on a hive doesn’t disturb the bees at all (ours hardly even notice us), and the shift in the comb to start extraction is unlikely to cause enough disturbance to merit a response.

The bees get to keep/recycle all the materials they created (aside from the honey), and you get fresh, almost-effortless honey.

Perhaps the most important and AWESOME thing about this?? The “Flow Frames” that allow for this type of extraction can be used with pre-existing hive boxes. This means that folks who already own bees that are being kept in most kinds of hives, especailly the standard Langstroth hive boxes, can replace their old frames with Flow frames without having to start from scratch.

The Indiegogo campaign to start production on these launches in just a few hours (11AM AU EST, Feb. 23rd, 2015), so if you want to help these folks revolutionize bee-keeping, I would suggest signing up for their mailing list!

ok just checked out their indiegogo campaign and they surpassed their goal by 3,089% this makes me so happy

yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaasssssss

Yeah.

"Neo Roman Opera house" by the UNBELIEVABLE Kris Kuksi

Kris was a featured artist in Issue 002 of ‪#‎beautifulbizarre‬ - All issues can be found on our webstore at: www.beautifulbizarre.net/shop OR you can find 1 of our stockists at: www.beautifulbizarre.net/stockists

rant-model

Well. That doesn't really look comfortable, does it?

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Neill Blomkamp's Aliens film — which we've been speculating on since it was announced last week — is going to be a direct sequel to 1986's Aliens. In an interview with Sky Movies (promoting the soon-to-be-released Chappie), Blomkamp said he wants his upcoming film to feel like the "genetic sibling" to James Cameron's classic. "So, it's Alien, Aliens, this movie," he said, referring to his ideal canonic timeline.

Alien franchise star Sigourney Weaver added "I would love to take Ripley from orbiting around in space and give a proper finish to what was such an excellent story.

So, I guess we're pretending that Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection never existed?

According to the newly proposed timeline, the events of Alien 3 were what? A...

Continue reading…

In the Wednesday issue of the Austin American-Statesman, Texas legislators were pictured cutting a cake to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the state's ban on same-sex marriages.

Addie Broyles, the newspaper's food writer, tweeted out the image:

Hard to believe. On today's front page, TX legislators cutting cake to celebrate ban on same-sex marriage. pic.twitter.com/F04zIHD51O

— Addie Broyles (@broylesa) February 25, 2015

The cake reads, "10th Anniversary of 2005 Marriage Act."

Last February, a federal judge struck down Texas' same-sex marriage ban. The decision is currently on hold after it was appealed to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which heard oral arguments for the case on January 9.

The US Supreme Court will take up same-sex marriage cases from four other states later this year. The court is widely expected to rule that all states' same-sex marriage bans are unconstitutional, on the grounds that they violate people's due process and equal protection rights.

Further reading

• Supreme Court agrees to hear same-sex marriage cases
• Bakeries are at the center of the fight for LGBT rights. Why?
• Same-sex marriage rights are sweeping the US. Here's where each state stands.

The word "buffet" alone likely conjures up thoughts of national chains or, at best, an Americanized-Chinese version with accompanying mental images of steam trays full of lukewarm, oily food ranging from the mundane to the mediocre. Fortunately, the Greater Los Angeles area has a few buffets that shatter these sad...