"Washington Dramatic Club -- About Thebes." One of the players in an Egyptian-themed charity benefit staged at the Belasco Theater in April 1909 for an audience including President and Mrs. Taft. 8x10 inch glass negative. View full size.
TAG Heuer has announced that they will debut two new 39 mm diameter vintage inspired Carrera timepieces at Baselworld 2015 (next month - our live coverage begins HERE March 18th). Notably, they will feature the historic HEUER logo on the dial. The first timepiece features a silver and blue dial and displays hours, minutes, small seconds and date. It is a tribute to a 1963 Carrera design. It is powered by the COSC-certified Caliber 6, which has a 44-hour power reserve. It features a glass box sapphire crystal on the front and back, and comes on a matching blue vintage...
July 8, 1939. "Golden Gate International Exposition, San Francisco -- General Motors Day badge held by Miss Fisher Body." Whose parts all seem to fit unusually well. 8x10 negative originally from the Wyland Stanley collection. View full size.
Yeah, yeah, yeah I lifted this title from Phobia's 2003 EP of the same name. It's the first thing that came to mind when I needed a catchy title. And it got you to click, right? Hey, at least I'm honest, as I'm guessing most people would never had noticed. Anyways, let's get to it.
Artwork by Pierre
The Australian trio, The Kill, has released what seems to be an endless supply of splits and EP's over their now 15 year career. Admittedly, the last thing that interests me is 1 or 2 grindcore songs from a band, so I usually skip over those type of releases. But if you give me an album to digest I'm all over it like stink on a monkey. So here we have their second full length album, Kill Them...All and boy is it a doozey. I'd venture a guess that this is some of the fastest grindcore I've ever heard. Yeah all grind is fast, but this seems to be ratchet up a few notches than most. 19 songs, 27 minutes and cover of Anthrax's "Metal Thrashing Mad", that I wouldn't have even recognized if I didn't read the press release. Not for the meek.
[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]
I remember having a Putrid Offal demo tape and 7" from way back (pre internet) during the tape trading days of the early 90's. This French band, formed in 1991, basically worships at the throne of Carcass (circa Reek of Putrefaction/Symphonies of Sickness). It's taken 24 years but they are finally releasing their first full length album, Mature Necropsy. Featuring all their 1990's material rewritten, recorded, it's 29 minutes of old school gore grind. Now before you get your panties in a bind, they are also offering as a separate release, Premature Necropsy, which is all their original material, remastered (but otherwise untouched), for your elitist pleasure.
[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]
Mindful of Pripyat, from Milan, Italy are a new band, having formed in 2014. They've wasted little time by already giving us an EP, ...and Deeper, I Drown in Doom..., featuring 16 songs over 21 minutes (Unseen Terror & Defecation cover songs included). Why is a grind album that's 27 minutes considered a full length but one that's 21 minutes is an EP, I'm not quite sure, but the band is calling this an EP. For being around such a short period of time, its quite stunning how professional and tight their sound is. Think Terrorizer and early Carcass with absolute razor precision backed by a solid production. This trio also has all members sharing vocal duties. One of the better albums I've heard this year.
The Senate Armed Services Committee voted unanimously to send on Ash Carter’s nomination for a full vote. Lawmakers want him in the Pentagon by week’s end.
Southern Italy is famous for its soft tailoring, but you don’t have to go all the way to Naples to get a soft shoulder. One of my tailors, Steed, is famous for their natural shoulder line. When they were in town this weekend as part of their US tour, I stopped by to chat about my next commission. During our conversation, they were nice enough to show me what goes into their shoulder construction.
As many readers know, Edwin DeBoise worked for Edward Sexton (of Tommy Nutter fame) and Anderson & Sheppard before starting his own tailoring house. His current style is quite close to the Anderson & Sheppard drape cut — a bit of fullness in the chest with a nipped waist, close skirt, and soft shoulder. Despite all the shaping, there’s actually very little padding inside their coats, as you can see above.
Here you can see the different layers that go into the shoulder. The very top is the lining and underneath that is the shoulder pad. The black material is demett — a soft, felt-like fabric that extends into the sleeve head. It sits on top of the horsehair and body canvas, partly to protect the wearer from the rough horsehair below (the stuff can be a bit prickly). Finally, the bottommost layer is the jacketing, which in this case is a cream herringbone tweed. Baste stitching holds everything together.
You can get a better sense of the thickness of the shoulder pads here, in these two photos David Isle took for StyleForum (these were taken at Steed’s workshop in Cumbria). Unlike most tailoring houses — including those on Savile Row — Steed doesn’t use ready-made pads. Instead, they make their own from cotton wadding. This allows them to control the thickness and shaping better when they’re adjusting something on a client.
In fact, I originally went in on Sunday to see if they could add a little more padding to my right shoulder. Most men have a dropped shoulder that corresponds with their dominant hand, but mine is especially dropped. Since Steed makes their own pads, they’ll be able to adjust the thickness to hide the defect (as much as it can be hidden, anyway), while also giving the illusion of a natural shoulder. As Edwin put it, you don’t want to overdo it, otherwise it’ll both look and feel awkward.
Below you can see some variations of Steed’s shoulder constructions. Voxsartoria’s three-piece suit is slightly more padded, while David’s green checked tweed is a little more natural. Things are adjusted according to the jacket’s style and the customer’s preferences. All, however, are excellent examples of that soft English shoulder line.
“Gianni Agnelli, Fred Astaire, an all those who have followed in the Duke of Windsor’s footsteps…were dead right: a tux trumps any other outfit any night, any occasion, any decade.”
Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is seen here in an image captured by the Rosetta spacecraft. The mission's Philae lander hit the surface with a big bounce, demonstrating the comet's surface is hard. Image ESA/Rosetta/NAVCAM
Astronomers tinkering with ice and organics in the lab may have discovered why comets are encased in a hard, outer crust. Read the rest
