Note to Steve Jobs: A Computer is not a Tic-Tac
Our iPods are dying as fast as maggots. What we once believed to be the sleek white lozenge of the future is now a symbol of throwaway, ephemeral knick-knackery. But this is not simply a Vulture phenomenon: Observe the white iPod earbuds disappearing from the subways, replaced by generic black ones. Observe the iShuffle and the Mac Mini, or more accurately, the lack thereof. The verdict is clear: Computers should no longer look like Tic-Tacs. Nor should shoes, cars, speakers or houses. Nothing winds up looking more dated then yesterday’s take on the future, and the day of the digital Tic-Tac is rapidly becoming yesterday.
Lost Sounds
This band has put out two good records and one crappy record, and for that we salute them. It is rare indeed to find musicians with the talent to succeed coupled with the courage to fail once in a while. These Tennesseans sometimes sound industrial, sometimes mechanically punk, and sometimes like Nintendo’s take on Bach, which equals Castlevania. But they are never gimmicky or cliche, and for this they have won the Vulture’s qualified and provisional support.
Bloc Party & Franz Ferdinand
Both of these bands will leave the magazines even faster then they arrived. Much like the Hives, the Bronx, the Stills and other “the” bands, neither of these A&R discoveries have the talent to back up their hype budgets. Both are a part of the “post-punk” movement, which is sort of like Gang of 4 without the heart or the politics. What you get is Peter Gabriel wearing a scowl and a leather jacket. At least the Gang of 4 have reunited for the sake of cashing in on this latest wave of manufactured nostalgia, scheduled to reach its climax at the Coachella festival were the Gang are headliners. Oh, how this pair of unworthy pretenders fill your Vulture’s stomach with the foulest bile!
Podcasting
This is what we like to call a “pre-trend,” which is either a trend that hasn’t happened yet, or a trend that’s just pretend, you know, made-up. Folks, our nation’s college radio stations and garage disk jockeys have been posting extended digital mixes to the web for the last six or seven years. iPods themselves are about to celebrate their fourth birthday. The only thing “new” or “hot” about Podcasting is the word itself, which was invented so “bloggers” and columnists could continue to write about old innovations without sounding ridiculously dated.
We’ve got an Indiana Jones for the Fedora
Spotted! Fedoras atop such heads as Jennifer Lopez, Mary Kate Olsen, Matt Drudge and Ving Rhames’ new Kojak. Noted! Neither pope nor policeman will deny that the wearing of hats is addictive. Seen! We observe in the pages of the Skateboard Magazine the presence of none other than the Fedora atop the head of Daniel Shimizu. Not only is Mr. Shimizu a skateboarder, he is also Japanese. If hats were Scrabble, Shimizu would be a Triple Fedora Score. Overheard! Petite Asian woman of conservative dress and impeccable hair asking Barney’s clerk whilst buying Dior shirts for her husband, admitting that while she was attracted to the Fedora, her husband “wasn’t quite ready for it yet.” Don’t ask us what we were doing at Barney’s. Only note that the Fedora is poised for a major comeback. And don’t jump to any conclusions about hats in general. While we are bullish on the Fedora, we are bearish on casual hats such as the baseball, the snap-brim “Jeff,” and the “Applejack.” Except for Fedoras, no hat is the new hat.
Camouflage is Eternal
Why won’t camouflage die? Three reasons: 1. Camouflage has a sponsor with very deep pockets who pays millions of soldiers to wear nothing but it during every hour of every day. 2. Fashion will always follow bloodthirsty gangs of working-class hooligans to the ends of the earth–just look at the Burberry plaid! 3. A certain number of the decadent and the unclothed will always manage to stumble, shivering, into the Army/Navy store, and often turn a few heads on their way back to the clinic. This is why the annual urban camouflage cycle tends to start in the dead of winter and peak by the end of spring. We’re in the middle of it right now.
Reebok Needs New Fonts
Reebok’s new campaign juxtaposes superstar headshots with documentary minutiae. They’ve got Lucy Liu beside a snapshot of her as a little girl at the playground, Allen Iverson beside his devil tattoo, and some tennis guy next to a tennis trophy. In front of it is the slogan “I AM WHAT I AM” in a blackletter font. Blackletter, as we all know, is the ornate, thick lettering often found slithering across the backs of convicts and the tops of newspapers. After Nike’s extensive use of blackletter in their 2003 Battlegrounds campaign, Reebok should have shelved it for a while. “Battlegrounds,” by the way, is exactly the kind of word to use blackletter on. Like the font, it’s a brutal, forceful, pointy, thick, mean, warlike word. “I am what I am,” on the other hand, is a whiney, emo slogan that would be best served by equally whiney, emo, hand-drawn letters, such as those simpering spidery lines found on the cover of J. Safran Foer’s latest emo tome. For Reebok to use blackletter here is about as appropriate as writing a love letter on the back of a napkin or signing the United States Constitution in crayon. In other words, we do not approve.
Google Gulps Down their Pride
As an April Fool’s prank, Google introduced Google Gulp, a new smart drink that takes away the drinker’s privacy, defrauds Wall Street investors, and remains forever stuck in a “beta” testing stage. The phony FAQ asks: “When will you take Google Gulp out of beta?” Google responds: “Man, if you pressure us, you just drive us away. We’ll commit when we’re ready, okay?” It is unlikely that Microsoft, for example, would poke fun at itself by releasing a phony document plotting to take over the world. Because Microsoft is plotting to take over the world, such a prank would be as funny as it is unlikely. The company simply takes itself too seriously. Upstart Google, on the other hand, hasn’t let a multibillion-dollar IPO dampen their faculty for sophomoric self-mockery. Of this we approve.
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