Cool Peeps: Vivian Maier

I have always wished that I had the courage to be a street photographer but the fear of rejection, of having people angry at me for not seeking their permission - I haven't the kind of bold devil-may-care attitude of some, or the unstoppable force of curiosity, the compulsion to take photos, that other street photographers have.

Vivian Maier is the shit. She is amazing. Long story short, a whole bunch of her negatives (like, 100,00 of them - mostly undeveloped) were sold at auction in 2007 to a chap - he developed and printed her photos and was astonished at the results. Hundreds of beautiful images of people living in (mainly) the '50's and 60's.

Here are some of my favourites - click them to get glorious larger images :)

images taken from: http://www.vivianmaier.com/portfolios/new-york1/ - I love her sneaky self portrait on the bottom left, so sly!

BONUS: There is a doco coming out about her work/life/discovery called Finding Vivian Maier and the preview for it looks amazing. I can't wait.

Music Recommendations

I just realised that even though I worked in a music store for three years, I never really put any music recommendations up on the blog! Well, that's about to end. I'll try not to overload the blog with tunes, but that said, here are three albums that I have been playing an awful lot of lately.

Jessica Lea Mayfield - Tell Me

I freaking love this album. I love the moodiness, the loneliness, the angst - I always have loved angsty music and while Jessica has a bit of a country feel to her, her voice is so beautiful, lyrics so good, that I don't mind. (Kinds like Justin Townes Earle - more bluesy perhaps?). Excellent alternative folk-rock. Well worth a listen.

Dirty Projectors - Swing Lo Magellan

These guys are nutso geniuses. I love how catchy and quirky their music is. This is hands-down one of my favourite albums to listen to at the moment. It makes me really happy.

 If you've got time to sit down and watch a 20 minute long short-film, you should check out Hi-Custodian: a conceptual film by David Longstreth (the main dude from Dirty Projectors) using the music from Swing Lo Magellan featuring the band which is just as strange, dystopian, and beautiful as one would expect. Recommended SO HARD!

Bonus: check out Amber from Dirty Projectors in her collab with Major Lazer, "Get Free" - it's so, so good.

Foals - Holy Fire
I am a long-standing fan of Foals: I enjoyed Antidotes, and thought Total Life Forever was the bees knees - one of those albums you can't help but play over and over again. I think Holy Fire might be my favourite of the bunch though - it has a sophistication and polish that is so nice to listen to.

I make few excuses for my earlier life as an angsty teen who loved Bush, Incubus, A Perfect Circle, Deftones etc yet I feel like even young (semi-tasteless) Lucinda would have approved of Foals' new album as much as current Lucinda does. So moody, so dark, so good.

Finally, a "Real Job"!

That's right friends, I am no longer a retail wench. It was sad to leave Marbecks after three years and I'll miss the peeps I worked with but for the past three weeks I have been ensconced behind a desk getting to grips with the behemoth that is the Otago University Students' Association. My new co-workers have been lovely, and none of them judged me when I was introduced to beer pong on the last day of my first week and got quite drunk. It was Emersons Pilsner! And I am competitive as all hell so losing a game just makes me want to win it all the more...

It is so good being challenged on a daily basis. I know I complained about how much I wanted a challenging job while I was at Marbecks and, well, you get what you wish for right? REAL JOBS ARE HARD. Man, but they are so satisfying! My brain has been pulled and stretched like taffy over the last three weeks, and thankfully it hasn't fallen apart yet.

There are some pretty exciting projects coming up in the next month - the annual Capping Show which this year is themed around the Wizard of Oz, and the Battle of the Bands being the two massive ones. I've been spending a fair chunk of time on designing stuff for the Uni Games which are being hosted here in Dunedin in April. So much!

Here are a few wee things I've done this month and a taster of the Battle of the Bands artwork! Ooo!

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