I have my FYP absolutely dialed. The perfect combination of live footage of obscure hardcore bands ripped from late 90's VHS tapes, chiropractors giving life-changing adjustments, street fights, brain-dead flyover-state tradwives doing GRWM videos, and Miami-based fitness influencers showing off a driveway full of supercars in the ugliest colors known to man. Sure, social media can be a dark place, but if you play it right, you can dial it in and make sure you waste time wisely. It should be entertainment, after all.
London is my favorite city to visit. I am lucky enough to go often and have a great group of friends who are always down to have a meal. The River Cafe is my favorite restaurant in the world, and I force everyone to make the trek and join me by the Thames for a meal that locals most often describe as "expensive." The journey is worth every penny, the food is delicious and straightforward -- no tweezer shit or organ meats -- and the electric-blue carpeting and hot-pink pizza oven are iconic. Owner (and fellow podcaster) Ruthie Rogers is chic and still on the floor at 76. It's always fun, and the room absolutely hums every night of the week. Last month, my head was on swivel when Wes Anderson walked in with Noah Baumbach, Jarvis Cocker, and Tilda Swinton just as David Cameron was on his way out. Cool Britannia is alive and well.
Very rarely does new music make me feel deeply nostalgic for a very particular time in my life. Katie Crutchfield and her twin sister Allison (along with MJ Lenderman and Brad Cook) made an album that takes me back to being a teenager living in the suburbs. It's "late-night drive with the windows down, trying to articulate something you can't quite say out loud" music. It captures that time where nothing is supposed to happen, so everything feels heightened -- some real "handwritten poetry zine for sale at the merch table" type shit. I went to Cook's studio in Durham when they were finishing the album, and I loved being a witness to the process. Seeing musicians fully in sync will never cease to amaze me. I went to Kansas City to shoot Katie and Allison for the release, and I flew to Chicago in the snow to see them play a sold-out Thalia Hall. I don't want to be 17 again, but it's nice to be reminded of what that feels like, especially when the music is this good.
I read Keith's hit memoir I Regret Almost Everything in January, in one sitting, on a 19-hour direct flight from New York City to Singapore. It was great, and I knew it would be a hit. I had been going to his restaurants since before I lived in NYC. I spent most of my time at Schiller's in the Lower East Side; I had an omelet for lunch many times a week, and would do cocaine there on Monday nights. Don't get me started on Lucky Strike. I was asked to shoot Keith for Cultured, and I was nervous. He can get spicy on Instagram. His assistant opened the door at his apartment in West Soho, and I was instantly transported into his world. It's perfectly decorated, and he was sitting alone at the kitchen table with a newspaper. In front of him was a bottle of sparkling, a bottle of still, a spread of Balthazar pastries, and a fresh French press full of coffee. The mid-morning light was perfect, and he was happy to play ball for an hour. We don't have that many New York institutions left, but Keith is one of them.
I like Dijon's music as much as the next guy, but the live show blew me away. I have been to countless shows this year, a lot of them good, but this was different. This setup was 15+ people on stage (Bon Iver and mk.gee included) with so much gear that no one could move. The most riveting part was producer Andrew Sarlo's onstage mixing; it felt alive. The stereo field was in constant motion, sounds darting and reappearing, samples firing at moments that felt intentional but never obvious. The vocals were bent, stretched, and reshaped in real time. In an age when everything feels so rehearsed and art directed, this felt like anything could happen. I am glad I went to the worst venue in NYC on the first bitterly cold night of the season -- it was special.
My How Long Gone co-host Jason Stewart sold me on the Brick. It is a small square device with a magnet on the back. You download an app and decide which apps (the irony) you want to block. Once it's set, you tap your phone, and you cannot use those apps until you physically tap it again. I am hopelessly addicted to social media, but I am trying to get better. Specifically, at the gym. I would get very annoyed when a KMPG employee would sit, mindlessly scrolling on the pec deck when I wanted to get my sets in. As annoying as it was, I knew I was part of the problem; I was doing the same thing. Now, I Brick my phone before the walk to Equinox, and my workouts are faster and more efficient. Not to mention I feel superior to guys in better shape who make more money than me but can't stop scrolling to hit a PR.
Shaad D'Souza is one of my favorite people whose opinion I value greatly. He is young, engaged, Australian, and brilliant. He writes about music and culture for The Guardian, Pitchfork, and The Face. This year, he turned his Instagram account into what he calls "Shaad Magazine." Taking the images away and letting people get silly with it. Recent posts have included things like "American Horror Story: Don't Go on a Hinge Date on Christmas" and "Three Lady Gaga Themed Cocktails That Received a Decidedly Mixed Response From The Group." It's an insane way to use the platform, but it really works. Happy to say the kids can be very online and also alright.
Tillmans has been one of my favorite photographers for years and years. I went from a wedding in Sicily to Paris solo for 48 hours to see this show at Centre Pompidou before it closed. They let him take over the 6,000 m2 of level 2 in the Bibliothèque Publique d'Information before they renovated it for one of his signature installations. The show moves the way memory actually works: non-linear, jump-cut, emotionally logical rather than chronologically neat. Large, almost aggressive abstractions hang next to intimate portraits, still lifes, club scenes, political texts, oceans, bodies, screens, and paper taped directly to the wall. It's such a fun way to digest his work, the possibility of discovery in every nook and cranny of the space. There was still a line to take pictures with his famous Frank Ocean portrait. You can't win them all!