Gawker: Records

The Five Best Album Cover Memes

Nick Douglas — Fri, 16 May 2008 01:01:51 EDT

"Show us what happens beyond the borders of classic album sleeves," says this Photoshop contest that's getting (as so many memes do) its second round of popularity in blogland. It's one of five fantastic album cover memes, brought to you by a generation whose greatest art is a tribute to the ephemera around the last generation's art.

1. Extended Album Covers: See above.

2. CD Cover Meme: Your band name is a random Wikipedia title. Your album name is the last four words of a random quote. Your cover picture is the third picture on this page.

3. I Am A Record Cover: Make yourself part of an album cover. (More on Flickr.)

4. Album Cover Collage: A series of ads for a music download site.

5. Worst Album Covers (also at Pitchfork 2007 and 2006). See also: sexy album covers.

And of course for serious people there is a blog about album covers. Why people spent so much time designing an image for my iPhone screen, I'll never know.

Birthplace Of Hip Hop Is A Future Tourist Attraction

Hamilton Nolan — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 10:08:31 EST

Good news, hip hop fans! It looks like the City of New York is going to save the building at 1520 Sedgwick in the Bronx, a.k.a. Sedgwick and Cedar, a.k.a the BIRTHPLACE OF HIP HOP, from destruction [NYT]. It's where DJ Kool Herc first started throwing parties and cutting records in 1973, leading eventually to those sweet, sweet hip hop sounds. Bad news, hip hop fans: a nightclub in Kips Bay just agreed to pay a $35,000 fine for keeping out black patrons in "urban wear" clothing, but letting in white people in the same clothes. When will the struggle for equality in crappy nightclub admissions end? Below, a documentary clip on Herc and the founding of hip hop in the building. Do the knowledge, yall.

City Records Show Three Years Of 'NYT' Building Debris Complaints

Maggie — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 11:55:23 EST

Everybody knows The New York Times' newly-erected skyscraper home has been plagued by falling glass, ice and vermin. In December, the Department of Buildings dropped by the place to investigate after what we thought was the third time debris was reported to have fallen from the building. Not so! A look at records kept by the Department of Buildings shows that people have been complaining about flotsam and jetsam raining from the Renzo Piano building since construction began in 2005—18 of the 33 complaints on record about the building are related to material flying off of it. Screwdrivers, bolts, steel, glass, i-beams, what have you. There was the time that wet concrete fell on to some NYPD cars below. Oopsies! And the time an entire window fell from the sky onto a car below. Then there's the succinct complaint from July 31, 2007: "Something fell off the building." You don't say? Yikes. After the jump, peruse the records.

To be fair, we'd guess that erecting a colossal office building with nerd elevators would make the neighbors a smidge crabby, perhaps inclined to phone in a few trumped up grievances against the big bad media company who also makes them fork over $500 a year for home delivery. DOB inspectors found no reason to request the Times take any followup action on four of the 18 falling debris complaints they investigated. Among the total 33 complaints levied against the paper's building, inspectors found no evidence of violations on 11. Then again, the city has issued the Times seven official violations, including a partial stop work order earlier this month, which looks to be still in effect, at least according to the Dept. of Buildings website. Hey, maybe all you Times-ers should take a stab at expensing hard hats. Or body armor.

We'd Prefer To Set The Record For Staying Off The Subway, But That's Just Us

pevans — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 17:00:56 EDT

To follow-up on our transit transients who intended to break the record for ~~most egregious waste of time~~ fastest ride through the entire NYC subway system, covering all of 230 miles in the process.

We are delighted to report that they did indeed set the record, by a full sixty minutes. We are not surprised to report that Guinness is not officially acknowledging the record because ~~they're stoners~~ they didn't set foot on the platform in each station.

Regardless, we extend to them our kudos, but we're not shaking hands because we anticipate they'll need to shower for 48 hours to decontaminate.

Straphangers Break Record [NY1]
The Subway In A Day [NY DailyNews]
[Image: Gothamist]