Coilhouse » Meredith Yayanos

Rachel Brice and Illan Rivière Duet, Tribal Fest 12

Meredith Yayanos — Wed, 23 May 2012 04:32:52 +0000

Reports are coming in fast and fervent from several friends who attended this year’s Tribal Fest in Sebastopol that the following duet between Rachel Brice (featured many times on Coilhouse) and Illan Rivière (also featured here previously) was one of the most electrifying performances at the diverse and thriving event:

Illan’s solo performance and Rachel’s group piece with her PDX troupe Datura are inspiring to watch as well. In fact, the entire video list for Tribal Fest 2012 over at YouTube is chock full of beauty and splendor and kinship. It would be easy to lose hours watching all of these wonderful dancers.

By the bye… a reminder that print Issue Six of Coilhouse Magazine features a beautiful in-depth feature about Brice and the modern tribal belly dance movement. We still have copies available for sale in the online shop, and when you buy that way, you also get a free, high quality download of a Rachel Brice music video that was produced for Coilhouse by the wonderful folks at Purebred Pro.

Post tags: Cirque, Dance, Events, Multiculti

Know Your Rights: Photography in Public (Courtesy of Lifehacker)

Meredith Yayanos — Wed, 23 May 2012 01:52:44 +0000

Over at Lifehacker, Thorin Klosowski has written a clear and edifying overview about First Amendment rights in the US as they apply (or sometimes don’t apply) to taking pictures in a public place:

Nearly every modern phone has a camera attached to it and subsequently more and more people are taking photos in public places than ever before. The shot might be as simple as snapping a picture of a parade or as tricky as recording video of a riot. Regardless of the reasons, the rules for photographing in public places are the same.

For the most part, your right to take photographs and video in public places in the United States is protected under the First Amendment under free speech. This includes snapping pictures of your favorite monument when you’re on vacation or taking part in a little citizen journalism. It’s not as cut and dried as you may think and it’s good to know your rights and the caveats that come with them.

He links to this handy, free downloadable flyer explaining your rights when stopped or confronted for photography. Both are definitely worth checking out.

And, from across the pond, in the UK, there’s also I’m a Photographer, Not a Terrorist.

[Lifehacker link via Marisa Kakoulas, thanks!]

Post tags: Activism, Britannia, Photography, Politics

In Observation of World Goth Day:

Meredith Yayanos — Tue, 22 May 2012 22:45:01 +0000

Happy horrorday, batlings! Shake ya cobwebs.

(Or if you’re feeling more subdued, you can always just peruse the rather vast archive of Coilhouse posts tagged “Goth“.)

“I’m So Goth I Shit Bats” needlepoint by Defiant Damsel, available on Etsy.

Post tags: Dance, Events, Goth, Silly-looking types

Brené Brown’s TED Talks: Vulnerability, Wholeheartedness, and the Epidemic of Shame

Meredith Yayanos — Sun, 20 May 2012 13:58:55 +0000

Brené Brown is a big-hearted, über-thoughtful Texan research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She has spent a decade of her life studying the effects of “vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame” on the day-to-day human experience. Both of her TED talks have gone megaviral, for understandable reasons. She bravely asks her audience to parse and confront the following quandaries:

How do we learn to embrace our vulnerabilities and imperfections so that we can engage in our lives from a place of authenticity and worthiness? How do we cultivate the courage, compassion, and connection that we need to recognize that we are enough – that we are worthy of love, belonging, and joy?

Here’s Brown’s first TED talk, from 2011, called “The Power of Vulnerability”:

Talk number two, from 2012, is called “Listening to Shame”:

Brown puts her finger on some extremely tender universal trigger points, and presses with gentle frankness. If you haven’t watched them yet, both of these talks are highly recommended viewing on a quiet Sunday afternoon.

Post tags: Faboo, Grrrl, Memes, Science

Opossum Massage by ME Pearl

Meredith Yayanos — Wed, 16 May 2012 09:05:48 +0000

DOIN IT RONG:

DOIN IT RITE:

Via Tristan.

Post tags: Better than coffee, Crackpot Visionary, Flora & Fauna, Memes, Silly-looking types, Stroke Material

BTC: SHOCK’s “Dynamo Beat” is Candy-Colored, Proto-Cyberdork/Cemetery Goth. Everybody Wins!

Meredith Yayanos — Mon, 14 May 2012 12:31:02 +0000

Good morning. Pretend for a moment that this is not, in fact, the Spring of 2012, but rather the Spring of 1982, now thirty years past. We’re in England. New Romance is budding. Rocky Horror is a’rockin’. The likes of Gary Numan, Spandau Ballet, and Klaus Nomi rule subterranean radio.

Under the banner of SHOCK, two young London lads with very excellent bone structure and pop ‘n’ lock skillz named Tim Dry (who would one day become Tik from the robotic mime duo Tik & Tok) and Richard James Burgess (who would go on to produce all manner of sophisti-pop) have joined forces with two young London lasses with very large hair and dovelike coos called Carole Caplin (who shall one day become far better known as the tormented fitness and fashion consultant to Tony and Cherie Blair) and Barbie Wilde (who is soon to be immortalized in celluloid as the creepyhot female Cenobite from Hellraiser II).

And they make this splendiferousness happen:

Via Brian Moroz, with giggly thanks.

If you enjoyed this darque ‘n’ tender morsel of obscure nostalgia, you may also appreciate:

Post tags: Better than coffee, Britannia, Cyberpunk, Dance, Geekdom, Goth, Hair, Music, Punk, Robots, Sci-fi

RIP Adam “MCA” Yauch

Meredith Yayanos — Fri, 04 May 2012 22:54:33 +0000

“I think every person has the ability to effect change. I think we’re often led to believe that it’s just celebrities [who] have some ability to effect change, but I think that what’s important for us to realize is that everyone of us affects the world constantly through our actions, through our every smallest action, through our every thought, our every word, the way that we interact with other people… we’re constantly affecting the world.”

~ Adam Yauch
(August 5, 1964 – May 4, 2012)

Adam Yauch. [via]

“Today I give thanks to those who fought and died for my right to party.” ~@RichardRushfield

An official statement from the Beastie Boys:

“It is with great sadness that we confirm that musician, rapper, activist and director Adam ‘MCA’ Yauch, founding member of Beastie Boys and also of the Milarepa Foundation that produced the Tibetan Freedom Concert benefits, and film production and distribution company Oscilloscope Laboratories, passed away in his native New York City this morning after a near-three-year battle with cancer. He was 47 years old.”

MCA, we love you. You can’t, you won’t, and you don’t stop.

Fellow mourning comrades, you are warmly encouraged to post your favorite BB jam in comments.

Post tags: Memento Mori, Music

“Pentagram Sam” by Da Grimston & Mist-E

Meredith Yayanos — Wed, 02 May 2012 23:59:20 +0000

Guys, I’m gonna be real with you.

I may have just peed a little in my witchy-pooh panties.

And that’s all I have say about this:

The sprawling, quicksilver lyrics to this bilaterally symmetrical magnum LULZ opus have been posted below, because they’re… well, just read ‘em. And weep bitter crimson diamonds. Ov Darqueness.

[via DJ Dead Billy / Dangerous Minds]

Read the rest of “Pentagram Sam” by Da Grimston & Mist-E

Post tags: Adornment, Cosmos, Crackpot Visionary, Cthulhu, Culture, Dance, Geekdom, Horror, Magic, Occult, Silly-looking types, Testing your faith, \m/

The Enduring Power of the NYC Vogue Ball Scene and “Paris Is Burning”

Meredith Yayanos — Tue, 01 May 2012 05:18:52 +0000

A quick heads up: NPR just posted “The Music and Meaning of Paris Is Burning“, an article by Julianne Escobedo Shepherd that discusses Jennie Livingston‘s classic 1990 documentary Paris Is Burning and the legendary scene and songs that it celebrates.

In addition to providing an overview of both the documentary and vogue ball culture (both past and present) the NPR feature includes testimonies from Big Freedia, Light Asylum, Zebra Katz, Del Marquis, and many others. A quick, great read. It’s also exciting to discover that the documentary –which has been, for decades, fairly difficult to track down a decent copy of– is now readily available on iTunes and Netflix Streaming.

The realm of Paris Is Burning: resonant and radiant as it ever was.

Post tags: Culture, Dance, DIY, Faboo, Fashion, Film, Gender, Grrrl, Music, Personal Style, Queer, Revolutionary, Sexuality

BTC: Birdy Nam Nam

Meredith Yayanos — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 08:21:35 +0000

Bonjour, mes petits concombres!

If you’ve already experienced Will Sweeney and Steve Scott‘s animated psychedelic 2009 music video for Birdy Nam Nam‘s tune “The Parachute Ending”, look away. Or, hey, don’t. Because you know it’s trippin’ AMAZEBALLS and you probably won’t mind watching it again over a nice morning bowl of strawberries ‘n’ Special K.

Most Birdy Nam Nam-related things tend to be –in this blogger’s humble opinion– pretty thoroughly amazeballs. The BNN DJ crew is comprised of four fabulous Frenchmen known as Crazy-B, DJ Need, DJ Pone, and Little Mike. They joined forces in 2006 and has been steadily gaining notoriety ever since thanks largely to their novel and challenging style of music-making: they take thousands of samples gleaned from various sources, press all of the beats and patterns into towering stacks of vinyl, and then assemble/spin these kaleidoscopic collaged elements live. It’s bleepy bloopy bonkers brilliance.

Enjoy, and have a gorgeous day.

[Hat tip to Mr. Maps!]

Post tags: Animation, Better than coffee, Dance, Drugs, Faboo, Music, Robots, Sci-fi, Vive la France