culture
Die Antwoord Ups The Music Game To The Ninja Level
These people are awesome: South African rap-ravers Die Antwoord (translation: The Answer) have dazzled the interwebs in a matter of weeks with their latest music video Enter The Ninja. A literal butterfly effect is happening here—Die Antwoord is rippling the music world with Zef flow.
Second Life Pianos
Piano music is as popular in Second Life as it is in real life. The setting is a virtual world—the music is real, interactive, and on key. This vivid photoset features pianos and players (avatars) in Second Life. 11 photos and 1 video.
Fans Take The Power Back—RATM’s Facebook-Induced No. 1
Bill Burton: “Sometimes we limit ourselves by what we believe we can do. We don’t even start. We don’t even try.” Burton delivered this powerful point in his TEDx talk last week, called How To Have A Christmas Number One Single, where, citing RATM’s rise to UK Xmas no. 1, he exemplified the boundless force of social media, and, through a storytelling memorization activity, he demonstrated the limitless—but often unrealized—potential of the human mind.
Dancing Graffiti
The film Bomb It portrays graffiti as the “biggest art movement in humankind.” With any movement there is opposition and many see graffiti or tagging as mere vandalism. Art or vandalism—where do you spray the line? “Graffiti is energy” says Bronx graffiti artist T-Kid and “it represents life” says artist Pose 2. The same can be said about dance—dance is energy—and it represents life in nearly every culture across the globe. The graffiti photos below show dancers and different types of dance around the world. Many images in this set were painted in the popular form of stencil graffiti. 14 photos and 3 videos.
Music Consumption in a 180°—Terry McBride Interviews.
The interviews below featuring Terry McBride—CEO of Nettwerk—offer terrific insight to the digital era of music. Terry points out that the ways in which we consume music are changing rapidly—largely due to smartphones—and that the “emotional glue” between fans and musicians is the essence of music business.
Modern Moral Values—Black, White, or Gray?
Moral values—are they learned or are they built into our genetic makeup? Are our brains hard-wired to draw a line between right and wrong? Different cultures might vary on specific issues—there are social activities you can do freely in Amsterdam that you would be arrested for doing in New York for example—but generally most current cultures make similar separations between right and wrong. In essence morals transcend culture, right? But why exactly do we feel the need to separate right and wrong—what is it that makes our moral clock tick?
