TINY MIX TAPES

www.tinymixtapes.com



More on the mix tapes tip, with a twist. TINY MIX TAPES offers to create a custom mix, based on a phrase you submit. So, your offering of Songs for Your Best Friend who Lives in France, Where he is Hungry and Cold gets spit out as a bunch of track listings that you can go out and find. Poetic. Lazy?

Also, they do archive a series of mixes by Chocolate Grinder, which should introduce you to a bunch of music that you never heard before (that doesn't suck). Archive here.

LOUD FARM

www.loudfarm.com



For those into the band scene, both in San Francisco and elsewhere, there is Loud Farm. Freshly launched, they cull the web for articles on (mostly) independent music and post - boiling down the fat so to speak. So we're talking interviews, reviews, articles, and a well organized Bay Area music calendar. Clicking on Loud Farm takes you to all sorts of web projects that you never knew existed. But you should. Plus they have a fresh design scheme going on which makes me want to rush right down to their office and pinch someone's cheeks really hard til nice and pink.

LOBO

www.lobo.cx



Lobo is a design and animation company based out of Brazil but working internationally. Flipping through their projects you get the idea that they try to make the most out of each opportunity. Some of the concepts are stronger than others, but maybe my non-Portuguese-speaking-ass missed something.

Their website's Flash interface is a glimpse into the future of web design. In the PORTFOLIO section, check out the projects for REDE GLOBO (1), FORD (6), and GOL LINHAS AÉREAS (11). GOL, which is about the transformation of ideas, employs a lush, flickering light source recalling early cell animation. Belíssimo!

KITSUNENOIR & MUXTAPE

www.kitsunenoir.com/blog/mixtapes



Ran across this page which is essentially a collection of mix tapes, including the cover art (very important). That the tape has become the cd has become the .mp3 - no matter. Nothing more exciting, to me, than getting a personal mix. This is a glimpse, a journey, straight in to the center of another human. Ignore the words flapping from their lips, check out the music. Special special.

There also is Muxtape, who as of late is in transformation. Their caterpillar state was a site where you could listen to user mixes, with a really nice colorful interface that didn't make you miss the cover art. Somehow. Alas, the more attention focused on the Muxtape folks, the more intellectual property right issues started popping up. Currently they exist in some hybrid state where they are getting popular indie band members to create short mixes, while also promoting their tracks. I give Muxtape the benefit of the doubt. I hope they find a way to stay true to their original vision. Judging from their current moves, they are going in the direction of legal and possibly even profitable. Good luck!

FAILE

www.faile.net/winter_09



Faile, the international artist collective based out of Brooklyn, celebrates in font and color the excesses of contemporary urban life. I think of this work as both inspired by and flipping off advertising. Visually sampling one attention grabbing graphic after another into georgeous, apoloyptic visions. Not too much here to not like, except maybe their success, if you are so inclined.

SPIKE JONZE

www.vbs.tv/video.php?id=1137833099



The multi-talented Spike Jonze (music video directing, fancy pants wearing, hot hot talented ex-wife having, beard sporting, bad assing..) is now doing his part as a producer/creative director for Vice TV. Better known as VBS, the online media wing of the sprawling made-in-the-USA American Apparel hipster monopoly. The company that everyone loves to hate. The company with the print adds that offend everyone with boobs. Which I get and don't get. Conspiracy theories are so 1990's folks.

Regardless, VBS is really dope. Their programming is past gusty and mostly intelligent but always interesting. Vice's voice is unique, period, but especially in the online television sphere. Plus they are producing content that others lack either the ambition or balls to make happen. Check out their travel series. Can you say North Korea? When is the last time you saw a f*cking news crew north of the DMZ? Ganstas.

The first two episodes of Spike's Spends Saturday With, feature the inspired Kayne West and then MIA. For Kayne haters, of which there are too many, check out his episode and see if you feel any differently.

SAM CHIVERS

www.samchivers.com/portfolio.html



Sam is a bloke drawing down in Bristol. His color and line work is masterful - just knowing he is out there doing this pushes me to work harder and more. The fact that he pulls off these detailed designs as silkscreens makes them even more beautiful.

He is involved somehow, cannot figure out exactly how, with these folks: www.peopleofprint.com, and makes for a nice side trip.

DIESEL'S XXX PARTY CLIP

www.break.com/index/sfw-porn-clips.html



Perverted, funny & inspired. Not for those under 18 years. Unless you need a good laugh.

JUDD VETRONE

www.juddvetrone.com/pages/color3.php



What's to say?

SACRED MTN

www.sacredmtn.com/



It can be a trick to walk in both the worlds of design and art. It shouldn't be, and many people tell you that it's not, but I think it is. Maybe that is changing. Some people pull it off well.

I first ran into the people/person behind Sacred Mtn at the San Francisco Zine fest in 2007. He/they were drinking beer at 11:30 in the morning and selling these D-O-P-E silkscreened posters. When I tried to buy one the interaction became really drawn out and convoluted and strange and then kinda charming. A couple years later I am a serious fan.

Sacred Mtn puts out some incredibly imaginative stuff, comfortably dipping across a handful of mediums. They tend to induce this stupid, blissed-out, child-like expression in people. Ridiculous. And genius. Luckily you can stumble over their handy-work in galleries, web videos, design shops, magazines, on tshirts etc.

Don't miss the effects reel on the OrdinaryKids site (www.ordinarykids.com). OrdinaryKids is a Bay Area design studio specializing in interactive story telling, motion graphics, fake manuals and print design. As well Sacred Mtn acted as their Creative Director for three years.