(Source: yum-in-the-tum)
Happy 2012, people!
I have just realised that reindeer must have been christened so because they are basically deers that love to wear reins. Slash were forced into wearing them by us evil humans and got lumbered with the moniker. I often have these mini epiphanies that seek to disprove the theory that achieving success in higher education equals brains and common sense. I was definitely sleeping off a hangover in my uni hall cell during the common sense module.
Oh dear, it has been a while hasn’t it. Soz. In my defence I was a little tied up over the festive period. And not in a ribbons at the wrists tacky sexy Santa outfit and hot man, or weird CSI-style kidnapping scenario, kind of a way.
No, perhaps disappointingly for you lot- though not for me re kidnapping thing- I have no such tales to tell. I have simply been working flat out on the day job. You know, what writers have to do to put a bit of roof over their heads until someone notices their brilliance, which of course is likely to be never.
I stole a few hours for myself on Christmas Day or thereabouts to chat to my mum etc., down a couple of Miniature Heroes and a lot of kir royales, tuck into some delicious turkey and Nana’s famous Xmas pud- only had a spoonful but try telling my waistline that- and grab a bit of Christmas telly (the wonderful Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake and a gazillion different flavours of Cirque du Soleil being notable highlights) before getting my nose right back firmly up against that grindstone.
Such deprivation of partying and sleep (in that order) makes Raspberry Charlotte an ill girl, and has inevitably led to me winding up with an evil virus where I now feel like I can only imagine poor old Pat ‘The Earrings’ Butcher did last week. Poor, poor me, I can no longer partake in my favourite pastime, talking, as my throat now produces a purry kind of croak a la Mariella Frostrup. Actually this is the only identifiable bonus of said debilitating virus- the sexy Mariella growl is an improvement on my usual drone.
Good news is I’m on the mend so expect more words here very soon, from another continent most likely- tres exciting. Watch this space etc.
RC x
I’m also listening to this as I’m researching on this miserable cloudy lovesick Saturday afternoon..
1 // Cinnamon // Fatima // 2 // Trips To The Moon Feat. Ed Black // Opolopo // 3 // I’ll Be Gone Feat. Jazzu (Album Redo) // Mario & Vidis // 4 // Kill Me (John Talabot’s Killed in Room 616 Refix) // The Golden Filter // 5 // Shopping Cart (Maxxi Soundsystem Remix) // Parallel Dance Ensemble // 6 // Welcome To Daytrotter // Toro Y Moi // 7 // Get The Get (Mia Dora Remix) // Roots Manuva // 8 // Flow // Disclosure // 9 // Mama Grizzlies // Graphics // 10 // Liiines (XXXY Remix) // Ghostpoet // 11 // Foreign Language Feat. Jess (Elizabeth Rose Mix) // Flight Facilities // 12 // The Keeper (Banks Remix) // Bonobo
(Source: champagnemoustache)
the bomb.
If this is what it’s like to live in Cloud Cuckoo Land, I’m checking in.
British artist Xenz, whose new solo exhibition ‘Cloud Cuckoo Land’ showed this weekend, describes his work as Monet with traffic lights. His stunning fantastical landscapes are stolen from the depths of his imagination and expressed through a marriage of techniques, where fine art welcomes graffiti in for a bit of slap and tickle and lets Xenz record the results for our viewing pleasure.
When DPO’s editor and regular Jim’ll Fix It asked me to attend Xenz’s new show at Blackall Studios in the ‘Ditch, which featured a collection of his works from the last couple of years, I pretty much bit his hand off. Ask him to show you: if I did my job properly he’ll still bear the scars. The PV itself was a nice, standard affair - nice set-up, nice people, lots of fashion and beards, ran out of booze early - and in addition to seeing Xenz’s brilliance in the flesh, as an added bonus I was looking forward to picking up tips for some incoming sartorial trends from the arty types in the know. At one point I was delighted to see a girl with a long, grey fox tail affixed to her rear end, and was just making a mental note to dig out my furry cat’s ears hairband and jump on the fake-animal-attribute bandwagon when I realised that alas it was not a tail but just her big furry scarf trailing from her handbag. The disappointment.
I believe the exhibition was pretty much sold out when I arrived fashionably not that late at all, and with good reason. Xenz’s beautiful mob of mosaics and murals come to life via a smattering of exotic species and natural wonders, released into the wild through his passion for ornithology and an appreciation of the sheer volume of species that share our planet. Should you allow yourself to be immersed in one of his paintings it’s both highly possible and very easy to believe that you have in fact stepped inside of one of his dreams. Speaking metaphysically, of course. And in these darkest of days, where in the run up to the festive period most of us are wondering how we’ll muster up more than a Terry’s chocolate orange as a prezzie for our mums whilst the one percent throw Heston-branded Christmas puddings from their ivory towers having bought them on eBay for £200 because they sold out and they really are a must-have, shouting “Let Them Eat Pudding!” as they shower down on us like no-doubt-delicious-tasting little bombs, to be swallowed up inside one of Xenz’s phenomenal and luscious bird-of-paradise-filled utopias seems a welcome relief. In addition to the numerous smaller-scale canvases Xenz is now working with large-scale murals and IMHO the bigger the Xenz the better, although they are still capable of being broken up into bite-sized pieces for credit-crunched living rooms like mine. All in all it was a great show, and I’m now no longer an interested bystander. I’m a devotee.
‘Socrates’, by the hugely talented fine art illustrator Finn Campbell-Notman.
In depth interview coming soon, I promise.
Style vibes
I’ll have what she’s wearing.
If only my job allowed me to wear such awesome things on a daily basis, like this amazing Tom Binns couture bikini top & shorts combo being worn so well by Rihanna on her current tour.
As I’m sure many others do, I sometimes pay homage to my dream outfits (as seen on..) by taking my favourite elements and interpreting them into more wearable outfits better suited to one whose life is more Stagecoach than stadium stage.
As a result, today I will be wearing an acid yellow blouse, a chunky neon and black gem-encrusted bib necklace, black shorts and some nude-coloured fishnets (which are enjoying a general Rihanna-inspired revival moment in my wardrobe this month). With a big woolen coat, of course, because it’s a bit nippy out.
