Passionate about life? Or just your clothes?

Robin Rhode - Microphone (2005)

Robin Rhode is from Capetown, South Africa and draws on the streets, literally. His simple, playful lined concepts are suprisingly new and able to establish a fascinating middle ground between 2D static tradition and 3D interaction. In addition to floating in a world of new perspective, Robin transcends medium by dialoging his artistic statements as performances, photographs, and drawings at the same time. Check out his some of his pieces in flash series here.

Charlemagne is one of the most solid projects to come out of recent Madison. In addition to being beautiful stand-alone listens, his sounds are an interesting reflection of the city's conflicted persona. The overwhelming pop quality coexists with lopsided wooden-chair singer-songwriter charm, ending an occasional phrase with a subtle twang of nerdiness. Charlemagne is currently finishing up a national tour with his last stop here in Madison in May. I caught a spectacular low-key performance last year (complete with knitting harmonies) at the recently "deceased" Catacombs and will always remember with nostaligia how perfectly the set seasoned my tea. The newest album Detour Allure is available from the website.

Charlemagne - Pink and Silver (mp3)

This is why I will NEVER get a job. Because I can't stop seeing through the all bullshit of this stuff. Even for one second. And certainly not long enough to make it to my lunchbreak and then all the way through the week to collect the paycheck. "Wherever people need energy, we're there to give them a cold can." While we're just "chilling out" in our "lounge" next to the "skatepark". This sort of culture marketing is the new propoganda that shows no respect for and destroys culture. Which most of us deserve... because it works.