Throngs of Swedes eager to escape the land of the midnight sun are traveling to the land of eternal sunshine. Blame the obvious (weather), the logistical (Norwegian Air Shuttle’s new direct flight from Stockholm) or the sartorial (Acne Studios’ opening of a West Coast outpost); whatever the reason, Los Angeles has become a new home away from ‘Holm for many Swedish creatives. “Without fail, every single day there’s a bunch of Swedes in the lobby,” says Fredrik Carlstrom, who ensconced himself at the newish Ace Hotel while overseeing the recent launch of Austere, a nearby Scandi-centric retail showroom and event space. Come late next year, downtown L.A. will also house AYD (short for “All Your Dreams”), a Nordic-influenced members club designed by Andreas Fornell (formerly Acne’s in-house architect). AYD will boast Swedish chefs (Adam & Albin of Matstudio in Stockholm) and club “ambassadors” like the pop icon Robyn. “A lot of people are skipping New York and going straight to L.A.,” says Patrik Berger, who co-produced the Swedish duo Icona Pop’s massive 2012 hit “I Love It.” “It’s all in L.A. when it comes to pop music.”
Entertainment Weekly Premieres Ray & Remora Video for “Gold Soundz” Featuring Kim Gordon, Jeff Goldblum (and his dog, Woody), Stephen Malkmus and More!
My band Ray & Remora’s new video for “Gold Soundz” premiered today on EW.com. A big thanks to everyone who participated and helped out!
Directed by Snäckan B.
Edited by Ted Malmros
Shot by Snäckan B & Ruben Broman
Featuring (in order of appearance):
Kim Gordon
Mike Viola
Money Mark
Scott Shriner
Inara George
The Gold Soundz 1994 Dancers: Erica Carpenter, Stephen Patterson, Yvonne Lacombe, Erin O’Brien (with choreography by Caitlin Adams)
Jeff Goldblum (& Woody the poodle)
Stephen Malkmus
Special Thanks:
Miwa Okumura, Katrina Dickson, Lisa Milberg
Ray & Remora EP “1994” Out Today
|
|
|
Ray & Remora Video Premiere on USA Today Music Blog
The new video for Ray & Remora’s cover of Weezer’s “Say It Ain’t So” from our 1994 EP (available now!) premiered today on USA Today’s Pop Candy blog. Enjoy!
Diary of a Sperm Banker
My latest piece for the New York Times, in which I suggest that any man under 40 (and even men a few years over 40) who are considering having kids eventually should freeze their sperm now.
Ray & Remora (my new musical endeavor) premiere
Here’s a link to stream a track off my new EP, Ray & Remora / 1994. The album comes out May 6th, and I’m pretty darn proud of it. It’s six songs—all covers of songs that originally came out in 1994.
Some great videos are being crafted in our video factory right this very minute. I’ll post those as soon as they are ready.
In the meantime, enjoy Pavement’s “Gold Soundz,” as recorded by Ray & Remora!
Pre-order the CD via Aeronaut Records.
Here’s a track listing:
1) “Like a Fool” (Superchunk)
2) “Gold Soundz” (Pavement)
3) “Say It Ain’t So” (Weezer)
4) “Skull” (Sebadoh)
5) “Feel The Pain” (Dinosaur Jr.)
6) “The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory” (Guided by Voices)
Commander in Cheek
Gillian Jacobs Goes Back to School
A profile of actress Gillian Jacobs I wrote for NYLON.
She was not wearing this bikini for our interview.
Ever have trouble deciding what to wear? Now imagine you’re Beyoncé (as I often do).
This is a profile I wrote about stylist B. Akerlund (Beyoncé, Britney, Madonna) in the NY Times. It was a fun story to report, and hopefully it is fun to read, as well.
Cut Copy Profile / NYLON Magazine
How to Survive the World Air Guitar Championships, aka The Hangover Cure that Changed My Life
A couple of weeks ago, prior to the US Air Guitar National Championships at the House of Blues in Los Angeles, I was bemoaning the hangovers I knew awaited me since we foolishly decided this year to schedule the air guitar national finals a mere weekend before the World Air Guitar Championships in Oulu, Finland.
As host and “Master of Airemonies” for these events, my job is to set an example of inebriation for the competitors and crowd, as I often say from the stage: “One important rule here, please don’t be sober for this. It will just look stupid.”
So there I was, bemoaning my chronic hangovers, with their accompanying headaches—headaches so bad I cannot lay my head on my pillow and usually am forced to down 4 Advils and take 45-minute scalding showers in order to relieve the pain—when my friend and air guitar compatriot Mr. Hot Lixx Hulahan (aka Craig Billmeier) said, “A friend of mine claims to have a great hangover cure. I’ll email him.”
And, let me tell you — it changed my life! I’ve now road tested this thing in three countries with countless alcoholic beverages—from beer to Jägermeister to whisky to wine, and plain and simple: it works. On the worst days, I woke up with a very mild headache and general feeling that I had not gotten enough sleep (I was averaging 3 hours/night in Finland). But in general, I felt great.
The guy, to whom I owe an immense amount of gratitude, just wrote a blog posting detailing his prescription. I didn’t really follow this to the letter, mostly I just took the vitamins he suggested. Though I generally avoided eating red meat, the one night I did gorge a plate of Swedish meatballs, I noticed the hangover was stronger than the other days. Still, I no longer had the splitting, debilitating headaches of hangovers past.
So, THANK YOU AARON PROBE! And may this help the rest of you!
In short, go buy two bottles of vitamins:
•Vitamin B complex (with no added vitamin C in it)
•Milk Thistle
I took 1 of each pill each evening, about an hour or two before I started drinking, and then another 2 pills when I got home at anywhere from 2 to 5 in the morning. I woke up feeling great!
From Garden to Gullet: Doing Farm to Table at Home
There’s another great piece by Mark Bittman in the NY Times today highlighting research that suggests that getting Americans to mere eat one more fruit or vegetable per day would lower health care costs and save lives:
Each additional serving of fruit or vegetable would reduce mortality from cardiovascular disease by about 5 percent, to the point where if we all ate the recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables, we’d save more than 100,000 lives and something like $17 billion in health care costs.
I’ve been doing my part by growing herbs, fruits and vegetables in my garden at home. Here’s what I’m growing at the moment:
Kale, arugula, 4 varieties of tomatoes, 4 pepper varieties, basil, sage, rosemary, thyme, mint, shiso, kumquats, oranges, lemons, limes, persimmons, blueberries, and strawberries. Obviously everything is not at harvest stage at the same time, but the summer has been amazing.
Today, for lunch, I made an omelette with sautéed chopped shishito pepper, diced cherry tomatoes, basil and goat cheese, with a side salad of kale tossed with olive oil, sea salt and brown rice vinegar.
Few things in life are as satisfying as picking things from the garden, cooking them, and then eating them.
Nothing Really Matters: How I Spent My Summer of 2013
How to Shop and What to Look for When Buying an Antique Stove
A friend of mine who fronts the excellent band Ponyboy just bought a house in Nashville with her husband, and today she emailed me with this question:
I remember really liking the stove you used in your renovation (just from pics) and wondered where you found them and if they were pricey? Just trying to do a few upgrades.
Such a rock and roll conversation, right?
Well, it turns out I actually had some advice for her. These are lessons I learned when renovating my house—the house I recently wrote about in the Home & Garden section of the New York Times.
Here’s what I told her:
I found my stoves on Craigslist – they were in pretty mediocre shape when I got them, but I had them serviced and then re-chromed all the chrome pieces.
The cost was $800 for 2 stoves, delivered. Servicing was about $125 and rechroming was $500 for the 2 stoves. One is a Gaffers and Sattler (harder to find, don’t recommend as parts are weird and hard to replace) and the other is an O’Keefe & Merrit – these are everywhere, and places do restore them. See if you can find one already restored if you don’t want any hassles.
Do a search for “antique O’keefe stove nashville” and see what comes up or check craigslist. If you find one on craigslist, make sure you go through it stem to stern to make sure everything lights and works. I didn’t, and I wish I had!
Then I quickly checked Nashville craigslist and found this ad for an O’Keefe for $200.
If you’re looking in Los Angeles, these stoves are everywhere. Just be sure to make sure to light every burner and the oven and broilers. You’ll save yourself a lot of headache that way. Here are some photos of my stoves, post refurbishing:
If you need service on the east side of LA, I loved this guy at Eagle Rock Appliances.
If you need any parts re-chromed (if any of the chrome is rusted) I took mine to General Plating, south of downtown. They weren’t very fast or cheap, but they did a great job and I couldn’t find anything cheaper.
The Gaffers and Sattler stove is in my house, and the O’Keefe is in the guest house I rent out on Airbnb.
Bon Appetit!