Shaving Quick Tip of the Day

Quick tip while I am remembering. When shaving, and remember to go with the grain, shave after a hot shower but with cold water. The cold water will make the blades on the razor contract and get closer together because of science. This creates a closer shave and the cold water also helps close your pores after a hot shower. The cold water is also effective as de-fogging my vanity mirror making the whole operation a lot less vague.

Up to SCALE: Bat For Lashes

            My favorite thing about modern music is how unabashedly weird it is.  I will stave off my love for Gaga this post and focus on a more off-the-beaten-path kind of girl.  The Brighton-born Natasha Kahn known as Bat for Lashes has the audacity to write songs about wizards, bats, and the karate kid all while taking herself and her music very seriously.  I first got into her when she released her debut album, Fur and Gold, a couple of years ago and from the get go loved how legitimately odd she is.  Bat has since shown up at every hipster bar and music festival across the world to show off her fur and gold and feathers and immaculate piano skills.

            Her new album, Two Suns, evolves her music into a more electronic and hypnotic place, which is one of my favorite places to be.  She is like the best parts of Imogen Heap and Joanna Newsom with a button nose.  The lead single, the aforementioned song about the karate kid Daniel, has pumping melancholy beats that menace over Kahn’s haunting pipes.  Bat has the ability to layer a complex web of sounds and then paint over them in watercolor strokes of melody that mesh each song into its own sonic playground.

            There is nothing better than a brash songstress that can at once use strings and synths to transport the listener to her world.  The power in that ability has transformed into the staying power for ladies like Kate Bush, Tori Amos, and Cat Power.  And like those other artist Kahn has her silver tongue a bit in her check.  She gets that not everyone will get what she is talking about, and for them there is the shear sonic pleasure.  Everyone else who can connect to not only the music but also the words will find themselves touched by Bat’s power, and they may even cry a gold tear like Kahn does on the cover of Two Suns.   

Up to SCALE: Dries Van Noten

Dries Van Noten is probably my favorite designer. Anyone who has ever gone shopping with me knows that I think most menswear in malls is boring. Whether it is the Gap, J.Crew, or Banana Republic companies just don’t put any thought behind the clothes they sell to men, khakis polos sweaters, repeat. While I know a lot of guys who love those stores and don’t want for anything else, I am certainly not one of them.
That’s why I loves Dries, he does a great mix between really amazingly done staples like suits pants and button ups while mixing in great stuff that will completely make a statement like palm print pants or a magenta fringed scarf. What he puts on the runway is pretty wearable if your brave and his runway collections are the clothes that go into his stores and department stores which is awesome since most of the time what you see in stock from most designers is a dumb down boring version of what they show.
Dries is a product of the Antwerp Fashion Academy in Belgium and still lives in Antwerp. He first hit the scene in 1986 but has only recently gained fame outside his small devoted group of fans and has recently won the International Award from the CFDA. His business is completely self financed, meaning he has no backers that have a say in what he designs and all of the money that comes from his sales go directly back into producing the clothes.
The bottom line is that Dries is a really talented guy who is influencing fashion and is totally worth supporting. His clothes are available in a lot of high end department stores as well as online retailers like yoox.com, also there is usually a good number of his stuff listed on ebay. Dries is a big name designer but his clothes are really not overpriced for what they are considering the thought and quality that goes into them as well as the type of business he runs.

In Case You Dont Want to Join the BLF

So I have returned, it’s been about 3 months since my last post. I had finals and moving plus general laziness, but that’s in the past so hopefully there will be more consistent posts on SCALE. To kick things off right after my hiatus I will be doing sort of a treatise on something the majority of men struggle with on a daily basis, shaving. I don’t think I have ever met a guy that truly enjoys dragging a razor of questionable sharpness across the old moneymaker each morn. So, I thought I would impart some of my knowledge I have learned over my near decade of shaving to the world via this blog.
The place to start is at what kind of razor you will use, manual or electric. Now most people who chose to use an electric razor use one because of their ease and for the ability to shave dry. I used an electric razor for a while and honestly the ease of it was not worth it. You get no where near as close a shave as you get with a manual razor and electric razors have a tendency to miss large swaths of hair on your face resulting in patchiness akin to a 14 year old in the throws of puberty. Also when I was using the electric my hair would grow back on a really funky grain that caused a lot of irritation. A good point is that no matter what razor you choose, you should be consistent in order to get a close shave and keep your face in proper homeostasis.
Almost as important as what kind of razor you use is in what direction you move that razor. The two options are with and against the grain. Against the grain is the direction that feels more like sandpaper. While shaving against the grain is the only sure way to get the baby ass style, at least for me, it caused major skin quality issues. If you’re not careful it is really easy to nick, scrap, scratch, and burn your face. Also, a day or so after shaving, you're skin can become irritated and you hair can get ingrown. Bottom line is that even though it is a great shave, it’s not worth the pain. If you have been shaving against the grain shaving with the grain takes some time getting used to. Although there is a drop in softness your skin will improve and since most ladies have a social framework and look before they touch, shaving with the grain probably won’t cause you to lose any female admirers. Stay tuned for future post on the topic.

Up to SCALE: The Go! Team

More and more these days the music scene is receiving new acts that are all about the mix of yesterday and today. And by mix I mean the remix. Lead by amazing DJs like Greg Gillis aka Girl Talk, who I saw in February and was flawlessly dope, acts have started to realizes that music is not only about what you do, but about how you can morph what others have done.
In this vain is the Brighton based The Go! Team. Formed by Ian Parton in 2000 as an attempt to fuse Sonic Youth style guitars, double dutch chants, and car chase music. What he got was a band whose music is most compared to theme songs, cheerleader chants, early hip hop and 70’s funk.
What he also got was the band's 2004 debut Thunder, Lightning, Strike. While touring with Franz Ferdinand Parton recruited more members to flesh out the live show and in doing so evolved the band away from the record and into its current state.
Their new album Proof of Youth is a slamming, bumping, and grinding non-stop ride. It feels like the cast of the Electric Company doing hip hop funk. It is every Saturday morning cartoon theme song you ever wished played in the club, and until acts like Girl Talk are more readily available, The Go! Team is the closest thing to the mixed and remixed music populating the current indie scene available to the masses. Plus their lead singer's name is Ninja; you just can’t argue with that.

YSL Fall Winter 08/09 Menswear Full Show.

Stefano Pilati, creative director at Yves Saint-Laurent, or YSL, decided for his fall 2008 menswear show he was going to do things a bit differently. Tired of the old up and down of traditional runway shows Pilati abandon the idea for a seven minute video featuring his latest designs. The video stars British actor Simon Woods, also known as Caesar Octavian from the HBO show Rome and Mr. Bingley in the Keira-classic Pride and Prejudice. The video is energetic and fly as hell; much more exciting then seeing eastern European teenagers clomp up and down a catwalk. The soundtrack is dope as well, Portished, LCD Sound System, Lou Reed, and Bowie remixed by Brian Eno. Oh and the clothes look great too, but what wouldn’t look great while jumping through plate-glass?

Up To SCALE: There Will Be Blood

I saw There Will Be Blood this weekend and I really… appreciated it. I know most movie reviews either gush or slander, I really can’t do either when it comes to Blood. I can’t say I really enjoyed it, I don’t think it is necessarily an enjoyable film, but that doesn’t stop it from being a remarkable movie.
If you haven’t heard this is the movie on everyone’s top ten lists, and it should be. Paul Thomas Anderson, who directed Boggie Nights and Magnolia, does a beautiful job on the script as well as creating an atmospheric mood that literally does not let you relax for two and a half hours. The film is based on Upton Sinclair’s Oil!, but from what I have heard it is a pretty loose interpretation so it is sort of inconsequential.
The movie is indisputably held up by Daniel Day Lewis as Daniel Plainview, a ruthless and plagued oil man in the early 20th century. He is captivating in the part and keeps the audience connected with the story for the entirety of the movie. The only caveat about Lewis in this role is that it sort reminded me of Bill the butcher from Gangs of New York. They are sort of similar characters in their lack of sanity, but at points Lewis can take an accent and character and shift it slightly towards cartoonish.
I also have to talk about Paul Dano as Eli Sunday. We first saw Dano in the so-overrated- I–cant-watch-it-anymore Little Miss Sunshine where he didn’t speak and he does a semi- 180 in Blood where he is so intense you feel like at any moment he is going to kill someone with his bare hands. I appreciate how he kept his role as an evangelical lunatic well below campy caricature.
The soundtrack is done by Johnny Greenwood from Radiohead and it is beautiful and awful and creepy as hell; which is to say fits the movie really well.
There is a nonlinear element to the story in There Will Be Blood which is interesting to me since it is an element I have seen in two other highly acclaimed movies in recent history Atonement and No Country For Old Men. This style of story telling has always been present in indie movies and so it is interesting that is bleeding over into the mainstream in such a prominent way.
Bottom lining it, even if you see There Will Be Blood and hate it as an experience; I hope you will realize what a cool and innovative mainstream movie it is, and why Daniel Day Lewis is so picky about the roles he takes.

Pump Up the JAMS

Sometimes when I discover new trends that are coming into existence I really wonder if people in the fashion business are getting bored. There is only so far you can really go, especially with menswear, that it makes it understandable when a trend like pajamas comes along. The interesting thing is, although this trend sounds ridiculous, I actually really like it.
The PJ look popped up first in Prada’s spring summer 2008 show (top) in a really literal sense with matching patterned shirts and pants. Now as a whole this looks exactly like pajamas, but what Prada was really trying to get across was more a sense of fantasy or going into a dream world; and of course you dream in pajamas.
The trend next showed up in the Lavin show in Paris (middle), and there it was much more subdued and more about Parisian laid back cool and thinking about sort of a light way to dress. Once PJs hit America at Duckie Brown (bottom) the trend finalized itself into its most wearable style. Ultimately the PJ trend is about a really relaxed way to dress, loose open shirt and loose pants. It is about summer heat and effortless clothes; and also about focusing a pattern or bright color into pants instead of a shirt.
I’m actually surprised this movement hasn’t caught on sooner with the amount of American men who idolize Hugh Hefner. And really, who doesn’t want to capture the sophisticated unpretentious style of a guy who walks around all day in a bathrobe, but makes it look desirable.
So I support this trend. I think it looks mad cool and comfortable and I will definitely be looking for some PJs to rock once the temperature gets above cold and rainy. I just hope it doesn’t increase my chances of falling asleep in class.

up to SCALE: MGMT

I just bought the MGMT (pronounced Management) album Oracular Spectacular and I am currently considering how I can take it intravenously. I really enjoy groups that take specific reference from music past and play them off one another, which to me is the prevailing force on Oracular Spectacular.
The Brooklyn based Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden started the band when they were freshman at Wesleyan and took a spin down noise rock and electronica before forming their own brand of psychedelic pop. Psychedelic is the first word that I thought of when I first heard them, they have a very seventies rock vibe to them that comes out in the vocals and use of electric guitars. MGMT’s other influences come out in how they layer synth and pop on top of this to create a more ambiguous, yet not any less enjoyable, sound.

Eric Harvey of Pitchfork said, "Knowing
that the Almost Famous notion of stardom doesn't exist anymore (if it
ever did), the duo of Andrew Vanwyngarden and Ben Goldwasser realize they're
"fated to pretend." It's a charming idea-- making a career out of fantasizing--
and on Oracular Spectacular, they not only accept their playacting destiny, they
demonstrate that, just maybe, it's a path more people should take."

They have been on tour with of Montreal and have worked with the same producers of The Flaming Lips. Oracular Spectacular came out in October and they are one of Rolling Stones “Artists to watch in 2008”. You should buy their album, it looks like this.

What is SCALE

SCALE has been an idea that has been kicking around my head for the past month or so. It came from my want to one day work in journalism plus my lack of time for journalistic experience times me reading that a blog is actually a legitimate form of journalism. So one night a while ago I started thinking about what I could write about and what I would name it. I started to think names and I eventually sparked on SCALE which stands for Style, Culture, Art, Living, and Entertainment.
These are the five things I will talk about on here, basically in the context of what I like and what I think guys and girls like me will like as well. There seem to be very few outlets for people who have diverse, albeit excellent, taste in all things currently relevent and I hope that this will become an outlet for me to share cool things I have found and likewise with the reader.
I don’t want this to be an advice blog or an irate and ranting blog. Hopefully it will be laid back and interesting, informative and cool, and always up to SCALE.