beccaelizabeth's dreamwidth reading list

Posted by Abel Charrow

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/music-dispatch-bjork-releases-insane-new-album-art-for-vulnicura/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229514

Another week, another new track from Modest Mouse! If they keep up releasing at this rate, we’ll have an entire anthology of new material at our disposal before we ever get our hands on a physical album. In today’s Music Dispatch, we have their latest, as well as the latest from My Morning Jacket, an anime-inspired music video for R&B’s Kelela, and exceedingly jarring new art for Björk’s recently leaked album, Vulnicura.

“Of Course We Know” is the brooding fifth single to come from Modest Mouse’s forthcoming Strangers to Ourselves album, slated to drop on March 17. The band has also announced a world tour, starting this Saturday in Florida, hitting a number of major festivals around the globe, and finally concluding in Canada this July.

My Morning Jacket will be releasing their seventh studio album, The Waterfall, May 4, and will be following it up with an eighth album, already in the works, sometime in the following year. The first single from The Waterfall is the accompanying track, “Big Decisions”. My Morning Jacket worked with veteran producer Tucker Martine, who also assembled their 2011 album, Circuital, and were inspired to use echo vintage rock and pop sounds throughout the project. [Consequence of Sound]

Paddle8 is currently auctioning off the elaborate, one-of-a-kind copy of Wu-Tang Clan’s “secret” album, Once Upon A Time In Shaolin. The nine-member rap collective worked on the pet project for six years, creating 31 tracks, and agreeing to never release the finished project commercially or digitally. Producer Cilvaringz explains on the auction site, “We felt that retail commercialization and mass replication would dilute the status of the album as a one-off work of art and compromise the integrity of our statement.” However, whoever ultimately wins the album at auction will own the rites to release it… eventually. They just have to wait 88 years. Offers as high as $5 million have reportedly already been placed. [Forbes]

Björk is not a real human. She is a philosophical persuasion, a nebulous arrangement of ideas, a super talented weirdo, and we love everything about her. Check out her otherworldly, suggestive new artwork for the upcoming physical releases of her new album Vulnicura, which she released shortly after it leaked at the top of the year. You will be able to pick the album in stores (if you still do that–we do!) in the middle of the month. And if you are lucky enough to live in New York, you can check out her exhibit at MoMA. [

Metallica are getting into the spirit of April 18th’s Record Store Day, announcing the release of a kitschy cassette of an early demo, “No Life ‘Til Leather”. The track dates back to 1982, a year before their debut, Kill ‘Em All. Drummer Lars Ulrich told Rolling Stone that record will also be re-released on vinyl and will kick off a series of remastered albums. About the early demo, he joked that it embodies “the same innocence and, I guess, borderline ignorance, of four kids barely out of puberty.” And if you’re curious if there is also a Cassette Store Day, there is.

Vulture convinced Susanna Hoffs of/from the Bangles to perform her 1988 track, “Eternal Flame”, at a karaoke bar in downtown Los Angeles, for their new “Get A Room” series. Yes, more of this, please.

Led Zeppelin have been deep within a massive remastering and reissuing project of their own, just last month celebrating the 40th anniversary of Physical Graffiti. The band will also be celebrated in a career-spanning concert film, titled Led Zeppelin, that will play in theaters on March 30. This concert film follows their 2007 reunion tour film, Celebration Day, with both being produced and distributed by Fathom Events. You can purchase tickets HERE. [Consequence of Sound]

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/music-dispatch-bjork-releases-insane-new-album-art-for-vulnicura/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229514

Posted by Kyle Hill

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/adam-and-jamie-race-two-giant-mecha-spiders/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229524

Luckily, failure is always an option.

In the last episode of “Jamie’s Racing Spiders” on Tested.com — yes it’s exactly what it sounds like — we get to see the fruits of Jamie Hyneman’s engineering labor. After dozens of hours of crafting and with two completed mecha-spiders in hand, the final test was to see if the creatures could get about on rough terrain. And of course, Adam Savage challenges Jamie to a race. It doesn’t go exactly as planned:

Though the racing spiders were more like masses of wriggling rigging than a Wild Wild West abomination, it was still satisfying to see Jamie’s bizarre plan come together. And if at first you don’t succeed, use some Hollywood camera tricks to make it look like you did:

Check out the fascinating previous videos too, where Jamie goes through the specs of building spider robots, with episode one, two, and three.

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/adam-and-jamie-race-two-giant-mecha-spiders/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229524

Posted by Dan Casey

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/geek-sundry-launches-their-twitch-channel-with-a-48-hour-charity-livestream/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229529

Park the House jokes at the door, people, because today it actually is all about lupus. More specifically, Geek & Sundry is launching their Twitch channel with a 48-hour charity livestream in order to raise money and awareness for the Lupus Foundation of America. The event kicks off today, March 3, at 5PM PT and will last until 5PM on Thursday, March 5. Considering that awesome celebrity guests like Felicia Day, Wil Wheaton, Alan Tudyk, the cast of The Guild, and many more will be in the house, you can be damn sure that it’s going to be the single best charity livestream you watch this week. If it isn’t, I’ll eat Pharrell’s hat. Yes, the entire thing. No, I won’t livestream it. I don’t like people watching me when I eat.

On a more serious note, Geek & Sundry chose to raise money for the Lupus Foundation of America in honor of Felicia Day’s friend Maurissa Tancharoen, who you know better as one of the showrunners behind Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Lupus is a mysterious autoimmune disease that attacks the body’s immune system and affects more than 1.5 million people in America alone. The Lupus Foundation of America is crucial in the ongoing quest to figure out a way to stop this disease in its tracks, thanks in large part to the funding it provides to lupus researchers, and the awareness and funds it raises to support the millions of people who are affected by this disease.

So, go ahead and click through to Geek & Sundry’s Twitch channel where they’ll be playing games, hosting live performances, giving away awesome stuff, and much more for 48 hours straight. Or you can just refresh this post come 5PM PT and watch right here — either way, you win, and hopefully lupus will lose.

What games would you like to see Geek & Sundry play? Let us know in the comments below or use the hashtag #LetsPlayTogether to join the conversation on Twitter.

http://www.nerdist.com/2015/03/geek-sundry-launches-their-twitch-channel-with-a-48-hour-charity-livestream/

http://www.nerdist.com/?p=229529