Victhor The Viking

I might have to get this book.  Leo Zulueta and the other interviews sound great!

Edition Reuss recently released Black Tattoo Art: Modern Expressions of the Tribal, a photographic homage to a particular genre of skin art. The book is curated by Marisa Kakoulas (lawyer, writer, circus lady, and blogger.) Above and after the jump, Boing Boing’s exclusive peek at some of the hundreds of striking, full-page images you'll find inside.

The 536-page hardcover includes work by tattoo artists from Borneo, Argentina, New Zealand, Japan, Singapore, Thailand, Europe and North America. The book weighs nearly ten pounds, and the binding is stitched with silver embossing. It's fat, heavy, and gorgeous.

“There has never before been a book on this style of tattooing in English,” Marisa told Boing Boing over email. “The style is called “blackwork,” where the artists are limited to one color and so they have to stretch their imagination in terms of design elements to create original works, rather than having a palette of colors and shading techniques to chose from as in other styles of tattooing.”

Some of the photos we selected to share on Boing Boing also include the use of a single additional color.

Black Tattoo Art examines how indigenous tattooing has evolved over the years, beginning with a history section, then each of the styles that originate in tribal arts.

Lots more photos from the book after the jump. NSFW-ish warning: one of them is a human hiney.

continue reading @ Black Tattoo Art: Modern Expressions of the Tribal Boing Boing.

For those of you who think that the New Om album God is Good is going to be much like their previous albums you are correct…but also incorrect. God is Good is the 4th studio album from the Om and the first full length album with new drummer Emil Amos. It is also their first album on Chicago-based indie record label Drag City.

Om sprang from the ashes of doom pioneers Sleep. When Matt Pike went on to form High on Fire, Al Cisneros and Chris Hakius went on to form Om. From their first album to their lasted masterpiece, you can hear the musical direction they are heading in.

This is a meditative soundscape. The feel of this album reminds me of an Indian raga [maybe it I the sitar at the beginning of the album]. This Steve Albini [Big Black, Rapeman] produced album is hypnotic. The vocals are a lot clearer than the previous albums and Amos’ drumming brings so much more dimension to the music. Don’t get me wrong, Hakius is an awesome drummer but I can hear the difference between Hakius’ playing and Amos’ playing. Amos brings almost a jazz quality to his playing that adds fullness to the songs.

The album starts off with the close to 20 minute long song Thebes. Halfway through the song the bass distortion kicks in. Unlike the 2004’s Variations on a Theme, the distortion on God is Good is not earth shattering. For those who like the low-fi bass distortion, you may find the distortion lacking the oomph that the early albums had. But I feel it adds an ambiance to the whole album that takes on a journey through death [which is the common theme on the album].

Meditation is the Practice of Death brings something that we normally do not hear on an Om record; Flute. The flute solo, by Lorraine Rath, is superb. Very cool. Cremation Gnat I and II is a change of pace from the normal Om opuses. They are both kinda funky and automatically make you tap you feet.

The only negative I have to say about the album is that the last 2 songs are two short. They are groovy and I wish they lasted longer. Other than that I think it is an awesome album and all card-carrying doomster should have it in their arsenal.

Rating: 9.5/10

Get it At Drag City

The new Black Crowes album “Before the Frost…” and the companion album “…After the Freeze” are a surprise for me.  I am Black Crowes fan and have really dug most of the albums they have put out but this one has that extra something that seems like the Crowns have been missing since Amorica.  First let me say you must get them both in order to get the whole feel. 

 The album is a mix of southern rock and what some would call alt. country.  This is nothing new for the Crowes or the Robinson brothers.  Ever since Southern Harmony and Musical Companion they have incorporated the blues/rock sound made famous by bands like the Allmand Brothers Band, Derek and the Dominos, and the Marshall Tucker Band.  But I feel this is the first Crowes album that have songs [So Many Times (from the Stephen Stills and Manassas Album “Down the Road”), The Last Place that Love Lives, and Fork in the River for example] that really bring the country into it.  This brings depth and weight to the overall continuity of the album(s) [However you want to look at it].

What I think was the key to the overall feel of the album is that it was recorded live before a live audience at Levon Helm’s Woodstock, NY studio, The Barn.  If you have not seen a resent Crowes live show you will not know what I mean.  The live show is what makes the Crowes such a great band.  The shows put life into the music that the studio albums have been lacking.  I believe that the Crowes feed off the audience and, as any musician knows, if the audience is diggin’ it you are diggin’ it too.

There are some cool surprises on the album that make me smile when I listen to them, for example the I Ain’t Hiding is nice funky song that has a cool “boom-ta/boom-ta” bass line that would fit in on any late 70’s TV theme song (in a good way).  And the Rich Robinson sung What is Home, has Scruggs style banjo on it that gives a cool after the rain smell and feel to the sound of the song.   

Overall, there is not one song that I would skip on these albums.  This is a real feel good, warm and fuzzy, album and is going to be an instant classic.

I give it a 10/10

Buy the CD/LP or DRM free MP3 at Amazon.com

Great review of Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother.  I have a books store gift card so this one is definitely, my next purchase!

The thing about it though is that it’s such a compelling read. The first time I read it, I literally didn’t put it down. I started reading it in bed one night and kept on reading it until 2am. This time I did manage to put it down, just about, but I still zipped through it at top speed. (It’s not as much fun reading something in manuscript as you probably think. You have to wait months to talk to other people about it, which turns out to be just as bad as waiting to read it yourself.)

via Tor.com / Science fiction and fantasy / Blog posts / 2009 Hugo Best Novel Nominee Spotlight: Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow.

I listened to an interview with Jeff Sharlet today and this book sounds fascinating! A Christian secrete society that runs the country.  Who Knew.  It is time for Babylon to burn.

Jeff Sharlet stumbled onto the Apocalypse when he was trying to help an old friend. Her brother, she said, had been through some tough times, but now he sounded better — maybe. She asked Sharlet to have dinner with him and find out what he was caught up in. It was nothing less than a well-organized, well-funded plan by Christian fundamentalists to establish a top-down control of governments and businesses around the world by a group that calls itself the Family. They’ve been going strong for more than seventy years. They’re not a conspiracy and there are no big secrets. They don’t call attention to themselves, but now, thankfully, Jeff Sharlet has, in his book, ‘ The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power.’ This Apocalypse has already come to pass.

via The Agony Column – Current Review.