bjork
Today's Song: Tweet 'C 4eva'
Rich Juzwiak · 06/21/12 01:53PMIt's been 10 years since Tweet's hit masturbation ode "Oops (Oh My)," with little chart activity in between ("Call Me" went Top 40, so she isn't technically a one-hit wonder, but still...). In another era, there would be no Tweet to speak of a decade later, but thanks to the magic of the Internet, she remains a presence who's taken to releasing a series of barely commercial R&B songs accompanied by the #TweetTuesdays hashtag. These kicked off with an impressively sung remake of Aretha Franklin's "Day Dreaming." The third in the series, "C 4eva," is below. Beatless but propelled by rhythmic cricket sounds, the song finds Tweet oozing delicately over an acoustic guitar. It's equal parts Deniece Williams and Aaliyah. It's so ethereal, it's practically ambient. It sounds like it blew right past the shackles of pop aspiration.
Today's Song: Björk 'Virus (Hudson Mohawke Peaches and Guacamol Rework)'
Rich Juzwiak · 05/31/12 03:15PMThis track, Hudson Mohawke's beat-blessing take on "Virus," one of the best tracks from Björk's often inaccessible Biophilia album, has been around for a few weeks now. But I kind of hate the set-it-to-post-and-forget it-tomorrow cycle that so many songs go through on the Internet. Calling it a "cycle" seems wrong, even. There's rarely any building anymore, just a kind of plopping down and letting whomever is paying attention have at it. I understand blogging momentum and how the sheer quantity of released music makes for very brief relationships (believe me, I get that), but sometimes it's nice to hold onto something for a little while.
The Grammys Are Better Than the Oscars Now
Drew Magary · 02/13/12 03:40PMWhat's New in Music
James Apsimon · 10/10/11 06:10PMA Majority of Icelanders Believe in the Existence of Elves
Seth Abramovitch · 09/19/11 12:28AMThe Gawker Guide to Fall Music
Max Read · 09/01/11 05:09PMA Salute to Every Hilarious Kristen Wiig Character — Except Gilly
Brian Moylan · 12/08/09 04:02PMKristen Wiig is a comic genius. So our hearts went pitter-patter when we learned she was getting an entire Saturday Night Live primetime Christmas special. But then: of course the NBC suits picked her most annoying, only unfunny character.
Kelly Klein Spreads Out, Gittis Estate Goes into Contract
cityfile · 09/29/09 07:22AM
• Kelly Klein, Calvin Klein's second ex-wife and a photographer, horse enthusiast, and social fixture, has paid $2.091 million for a two-bedroom co-op at 2 West 67th Street, the building that she's resided in for years. [Cityfile]
• The Southampton mansion once owned by Howard Gittis, the right-hand man to Ron Perelman who passed away in late 2007, has reportedly gone into contract for "about $45 million." The 14-acre estate, which Gittis picked up for $9 million in 1993, is being bought by an unidentified financier. [NYP, Corcoran]
• Bjork and Matthew Barney have closed on the purchase of a condo at 160 Henry Street in Brooklyn Heights. The couple paid $4 million for the four-bedroom pad. Meanwhile, their former place at 180 West Houston Street is still on the market for $1.7 million. [Brownstoner via NYO, BCRE]
• Attorney Bruce Kaye and his wife Deborah have sold their two-bedroom condo at 15 CPW. The 32nd-floor apartment, which the Kayes bought for $7.8 million in July 2008 and put back on the market for $11.9 million in April, sold for $11.7 million to an unidentified buyer. [Cityfile]
Have Björk and Matthew Barney Split Up?
Brian Moylan · 09/04/09 01:07PMIs Brooklyn Heights Ready for Björk's Köokiness?
Brian Moylan · 08/20/09 03:53PMA Little Piece of Iceland On the Hudson
cityfile · 08/20/09 11:57AMBjörk and Matthew Barney have put their West Houston Street apartment up for sale now that the couple is relocating to Brooklyn Heights. But that's not the only property the quirky Icelandic singer and avant-garde artist are looking to dispose of, it seems. Björk's home in Snedens Landing, the tiny hamlet in Rockland County overlooking the Hudson River, is also available to buy ($1.8 million) or rent ($7,000 a month). Needless to say, you can't find a "formal" dining room constructed out of stone and decorated with hard-carved wooden furniture and reindeer antlers just anywhere. [Real Estalker]
Lyor Cohen Takes a Loss, The Mayor's Ex-Wife Lists
cityfile · 08/20/09 07:34AM
• Lyor Cohen, the man who runs Warner Music, turned Def Jam into a music powerhouse in the '90s with Russell Simmons, and now happens to be Tory Burch's boyfriend, has taken a loss on the UES co-op he owned with his ex-wife, Amy. In 2006, Cohen and his then-wife paid $7.75 million a duplex at 8 East 96th Street. The purchase came about two months before the couple called it quits and now they've finally managed to unload the place: Google executive Julio Pekarovic and Maria Vasconcelos picked up the pad for $6 million. [NYO]
• Susan Bloomberg, the ex-wife of Michael Bloomberg—and mother of Georgina and Emma—has put her 4,472-square-foot penthouse at One Kenmare Square in SoHo on the market. The four-bedroom spread, which the mayor's ex-wife picked up for $10 million three years ago, is now listed for $11.5 million with Brown Harris Stevens broker Dennis Mangone. [NYO, BHS]
Bjork: Columbus Circle
Valerie Flame · 01/22/09 04:42PMCan Björk Save a Ruined Iceland?
Owen Thomas · 12/24/08 12:26PMMatthew Barney Facebook Divorces Bjork
Pareene · 12/15/08 01:55PMGay Troubadour Is Bankrupt Iceland's Only Hope
Richard Lawson · 11/25/08 03:39PMIf ever there was a grim picture of the current financial clusterfuck, it's the once artsy (Björk! sigur rós!), hip, and rich island nation wonderland of Iceland, which fell into cataclysmic economic failure earlier this month. And it happened pretty much overnight. Since the three major banks collapsed under crippling debt and a plummeting currency, job loss has been widespread—the architecture industry, for example, has seen some 75% of its work force laid off in the past few weeks. Now the seemingly peaceful population has devolved into an angry, violent mob, with a gay "troubadour" named Hordur Torfason leading the charge against the government.
Happy Birthday
cityfile · 11/21/08 07:46AMTina Brown's party earlier this week to celebrate the launch of her new site, The Daily Beast, could have just as easily served as an early birthday bash: The famed editor turns 55 today. Indie film powerhouse Christine Vachon is turning 46. Bjork is 43. Goldie Hawn is 63. Publicist Mara Buxbaum is 41. Retired football player Michael Strahan is celebrating his 37th. Actress Cherry Jones is 52. Real estate developer Daniel Brodsky is 44. Norman Siegel, civil rights lawyer and perennial candidate for public office, is 65. Congresswoman Yvette Clark is 44. Nicollette Sheridan is 45. And actress Marlo Thomas is 71. Weekend birthdays after the jump.
Top Five Classic Celebrity Paparazzi Attacks (As Inspired By Sienna Miller's LAX Handbag Assault)
Molly Friedman · 05/07/08 01:15PMCasual nudity enthusiast Sienna Miller became an official card-carrying member of that elite group of celebrities who unleash their hate of paparazzi by way of physical assault. As the Daily Mail reports, Miller swung her pricey purse at one pap's face yesterday at LAX, possibly because he was a resident of Pittsburgh, or maybe she simply mistook him for Jude Law (as the pictures show, there is a resemblance to the nanny-loving baldie). But Sienna's moment of outrage prompted us to recall our all-time favorite When Celebrities Attack moments in time, from Woody Harrelson's caught-on-tape choke-hold to Justin Timberlake and Cameron Diaz's romantically executed freakout years ago. Our five top picks after the jump:
Secret To Björk's New Video: 'Shrooms
Ryan Tate · 04/01/08 04:00AMFor her new music video, Wanderlust, Icelandic pixie queen Björk handed creative control over to two dudes in San Francisco, Isiah Saxon and Sean Hellfritsch who went into "ritual artistic psychosis mode" to envision the video, which of course involved getting high on psychadelic mushrooms. Not that there's any doubt about that when you watch the thing. Here's a recent YouTube comment: "the song awesome, but the video made me have a shroom flashback!" The Times discovered the 'shroomy secret behind the video while making its own "behind the scenes" video; in the excerpt after the jump you can even see the paper's reporter diligently double-check the drug use.