We know D.C. Get our free newsletter to stay in the know.
Morning, readers.
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rSqsT33MXk]
*Above, please find your morning Afrobeat fix: Ikebe Shakedown on “Don’t Contradict.” [Full disclosure: That guy on the congas? That’s Dave Bourla, college associate of mine. Further disclosure: Ikebe is a dirty, dirty band. Bourla says they’ll hit Bossa Bistro, right around the corner from City Paper, in late March.]
*The Guardian is all over the high-profile-writer-polling beat. Last week, the pub solicited writerly tips from the usual luminary suspects. Today, different luminaries choose the best books of the decade. Ballot-getters include Zadie Smith, Cormac McCarthy, and Bryson.
*Elsewhere at the Guardian (which, yeah, a lot of links, but man, they’re keeping it vivid today!): Gorillaz have taken over the music blog! And it’s borderline awesome. Meanwhile, the Hurt Locker/Avatar feud has spawned some totally incendiary memos.
*Related: The Los Angeles Times reports that the new Gorillaz record, arriving March 9, will feature a Snoop Dogg collab. Bruce Willis, fresh from what was by all accounts a wretched turn in Cop Out, appears in the video for the first single.
*Avatar! Yes, we note it above. But did you know that the Koreans get to see it in 4D?!
*Seth Grahame-Smith, author of such undead-pastiche classics as Pride & Prejudice & Zombies and Sense & Sensibility & Seamonsters tackles an all-American subject: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. Reasonably awesome trailer here.
*Wednesday Wordplay Corner: Coudal Partners share their blackboard habits. The game: mash up the name of a book with the name of a band. (Some of them, come to think of it, recall Grahame-Smith.) “The Things They Might Be Giants Carried”; “Necronomiconway Twitty”; &c. The studio’s blog has a comprehensive catalog, to say the least.
*The @criterion Collection is sponsoring a Kurosawa trivia competition in honor of what would have been the cinematic titan’s 100th birthday. Every weekday this month, Criterion’ll give away some swag—DVDs, posters, t-shirts, &c.—to the savviest cinephiles. Follow their (collective) ass on Twitter to get involved.
*Tonight in City Lights: “On/Off the Grid” at Irvine Contemporary.
Read more Arts stories
This isn't a paywall.
We don't have one. Readers like you keep our work free for everyone to read. If you think that it's important to have high quality local reporting we hope you'll support our work with a monthly contribution.