At this point everyone has seen this tattoo that Mike Giant put on Dash Snow in 2000, right?

...but check out this new Vans shirt (you should click the image to see it larger)...

...I guess you can't really copywrite a tattoo, and inspiration can come from anywhere, but...

I have a new book out...

Click HERE to see a Sneak Preview!!!!

Skateboarding has reached a new low???

Or a new High?
You be the judge...

Buried Treasures-Part One

Last week I started digging through my storage space which presently contains over ten years worth of stuff I've collected. Most of it is junk that I don't need anymore, so I figured it was time to do a big edit. If any of you have ever tried this, it's a pretty darn emotional experience. Every box I crack open is filled with evidence and memories of life's bold triumphs and bitter failures. It feels kind of like a psychic colonic. As I sat around over the weekend looking at all this stuff I decided it might be a good idea to share some of the things I'm finding...so the next few posts from me are going to be treasure reports. They say one man's trash is another man's treasure...hopefully you find these to be the latter...

As I went through a box of books I pulled out this old book about Jean Cocteau. I don't even remember when I got this thing, but it's pretty yellowed, so it must have been a while ago. Anyway, if you've never heard of Jean Cocteau, he was a poet, novelist, artist, illustrator, photographer, stage and film director who came to prominence in Paris in the 1920's.

I guess you could call him a surrealist, but he never really associated himself with that. I first got into him because of his drawings and paintings (above), but I soon realized that that was only the tip of the iceberg. Cocteau was one of those artists that created as if he had some sort of magic wand. He never let the idea of "mediums" confine his art. he simply created what he wanted to create, regardless of whether he was trained in it or not. The result is an incredible life's work that I highly suggest you pursue further.

This is one my my favorite Jean Cocteau quotes: "The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, the finish by loading honors on your head."

This tattoo was on a very sweet woman in Hunt Valley, MD. She said that she got a Pooh+Tigger waffle iron for Christmas and took the box and herself immediately into the tattoo shop and got the tattoo of Pooh right from the image on the box.
I have a Winnie The Pooh tattoo, too, and while she tried to argue that mine had better coloring, I swore her into the ground that she had the superior Pooh tattoo. It is in fact the best that I have ever seen.

(And no disrespect to her at all on any level, you know, but please note her shoes towards the bottom of the frame: These are, like, third or fourth generation argyle ALife slip-on copies... Everyone knows the story, right? ...ALife came out with argyle slip-ons in 2000, and Vans sued them in 2001, stating that the ALife's argyle infringed on the classic and copy written Vans Checkerboard pattern, which is unreal because Vans had a copy write on just that exact size of two color square checkerboard that they use, whereas ALife was using a five color argyle pattern that was based on a much much larger diamond shape. Alife had to deal with the lawsuit for two years before Vans finally dropped it, only to release verbatim exact copies of ALife's argyle slip-ons a year after that... and then Payless Shoes copied them and at this point argyle slip-on shoes are literally available in every single cheap/bootleg/discount shoe selling establishment in the westernized world. Litterally... Go Vans! ...and again, no disrespect to the woman in the photo, I only raise the point to check in on how far this shoe style has gone since Vans was so incorrectly and flagrantly claiming that ALife violated in the first place... Again, GO VANS!)

DEFORMER may finally get published!

And into the hands of the people that have ordered them from Amazon.com...
But not until its release in Spring of 2008. More news when I get it.

My pal Stewie takes it from Torre Agbar in Barcelona. I always saw this building while skating around town, but this time I went into it. Pretty damn cool inside as well as outside.
It was inspired by Gaudi's designs, among many others...

Mike Mills for Blonde Redhead

Brendan just taught me how to post links on here, so I figured I would debut this new knowledge with this series of videos our pal Mike Mills just made for Blonde Redhead. We've been sitting on these for a while now, and seriously amped to share them with you. They are pretty damn epic. Mike Mills is a genius. Click on the links below to watch:

IMPURE HAIR
TOP RANKING
23
SILENTLY
THE DRESS

The best sneakers ever made in the history of earth have officially been made.

...UMBRO by Kim Jones has beaten everyone. By huge giant ridiculous margins.




...and as it turns out now, the second best has been made as well --although these could beat the other ones in many circles for being non-leather. RESPECT.
AcneJeans/Tretorn


...and just for full on bonus, these aren't sneakers but are arguably superior because they are just perfect "shoes." (made by the brand that's just called B)

New York Report

Last Thursday afternoon I was walking around New York City's chelsea district when I stumbled into a gallery that looked like this!!

It was an installation by assume vivid astro focus and in order to see it correctly you are supposed to put on 3-D glasses. There were all these little hoods hanging off the wall woth holes where you put your head inside. There seemed to be some strange music eminating from behind that wall...I peeked my head inside and you'll never guess what I saw!

It was Brendan! (aka BARR) also known as our co-editore. He had been performing in this room here, surrounded by psychedelic swirls, mirrors, fun fur and flashing lights for over three hours!! I have to say it was really nice. For his finale, he did an acapella cover of a New Order song and it nearly brought me to tears. You know, the one where it goes, "Up, down, turn around, please don't let me hit the ground..." Yeah that one. Good song.

After that I went over to Printed Matter for Chris Johanson's book release party/signing. I got so caught up talking there that I didn't take enough pictures of the event. I hate when I do that. The photo above is a good (albeit blurry) shot of poet/writer/musician Sean Kennerly, who wrote the introduction to Chris' book. This photo was from the performance at the opening when Chris played "jazz" guitar and Sean read excerpts from the intro. Here's an example of Sean's text: "I’m not really sure about all this. Everything then was in some kind of ether, like time wasn’t passing and everyone tried to cancel out their hope, purposely wasting their time and flaunting the complete lack of practical use of all their activities. But secretly we all probably did want to be recognized on some level, recognized at least for not trying to be recognized."

Last night BARR came over to my hotel because he hadn't seen Issue Seven yet. Andrea (Brendan's awesome GF) took photos of us geeking out over the new size. This is a documentation of one of the best things about putting out a magazine. It's like Christmas day, an experience especially wonderful when you have such great friends to spend it with.

Only because so many of you asked...

Chris Johanson (artist and exDeepthroats and exTina Age 13) and Hisham Bharoocha (artist and ex Black Dice, ex Lightning Bolt and current Soft Circle) have really stepped up to the plate this time by teaming up with not only each other, but also Sean Kennerly and Kish in the new band Flowers of Flesh and Blood who played their first show on friday at Union Pool in Brooklyn. Heavy heavy "downer rock" is how Chris described it. I would agree, accept that I would add "ruling." Heavy Heavy Ruling Downer Rock! TRIUMPH!!!
--side/fried note: among the intense roster of people in attendance was SF outsider rock heavyweight John Dwyer (Landed, Coachwhips, OCs, OhSees, Burmeess, Hospitals, Dig That Body Up Its Alive, etc) walked in halfway through the set and grabbed my butt from behind.
BF: Whoah, John, what are you doing here?
John: I'm on tour, I'm playing up the street, but I walked over to check this out.
BF: How crazy is it that Chris and Hisham are both in the band? [ed note: John knew Hisham from the Providence, RI punk scene before moving to SF to become close with Chris Johanson through that scene and in fact Hisham and Chris both introduced me to John within a month of each other about 7 years ago]
John: I know, when I heard I left my show to come and see this! I'm gonna go stand up front.
The Tall Firs played, too, and their drummer is incredible... but this post is really about Flowers of Flesh and Blood, Photos below.

Clare E. Rojas Exhibition

If you haven't gone to see Clare Rojas' new show at Lizbeth Oliviera Gallery, I highly suggest it. Not only is the installation AMAZING, she made a hilarious short video installation in collab with Andrew Jeffrey Wright that's worth the trip right there. Clare really stepped up to the plate on this one. Be sure to check it out if you have time...(photos below)



Lizabeth Oliveria Gallery, 2712 S. La Cienega Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90034-310.837.1073 www.lizabetholiveria.com

it is official...

...Aaron's favorite expression is "step up to the plate" ! YESS!
You can hear him use it in two totally separate contexts in the post below.
That is the ultimate barometer of a love of a certain expression, when you apply it to multiple thoughts, or use it in consecutive statements.
Thanks for picking up the slack Aaron, Ed and I are total fuck ups!
sincerely
Brendan Fowler (total fuck up)

...ps, bonus points to anyone out there who can figure out my new favorite expression from the above text.

Video Days

Since Brendan and Ed don't seem to be stepping up to the plate in terms of posting on this thing, I guess I'll just keep up this barrage of self promotion posts as there's not that much else going on in my world that anyone here would likely care about.

So...this dude in the photo is Jay Buim. He's a talented little punk from New York whose been out here working with us on the Beautiful Losers movie. My band, The Sads, was recently asked to make a music vid and Jay stepped up to the plate as a director. We shot for two days last weekend and it was a blast. The people in the back of him are Arlo (cameraman) and Megan (actress/star of the video). I won't give much away in terms of plot, but let's just say Megan cries alot. Really alot.

Oh yeah, and this is us lip-synching...which if you've never done, is a very strange sensation indeed!! The video should be done in a few weeks....

Last Weeks News...

I know we've already wrote a bunch about the OTHER SCENES show at Roberts & Tilton, but I just got these great installation shots of the show. For any of you who can't be in LA...here's an idea of what the show looks like.


Daniel Higgs

Rita Ackermann

Gee Vaucher

Raymond Pettibon

Ryan McGinley

Daido Moriyama, Rita Ackermann

Becca Mann, Daniel Higgs, Pettibon, Daido Moriyama

Gusmano Cesaretti
These photos of No Age performing at the opening were shot by Cali and stolen from his blog (www.teenageteardrops.com)

Our Staff Ombudsman

This is John "Big J" Reynolds. If any of you subscribers ever wondered just exactly who it is that's managing those orders, packing those envelopes and stamping the outsides with that bitchin' rubber stamp, this is the man. He's also the one who answers your emails and drives the magazines around to all the local SoCal shops along with a thousand other little things that go into making ANP Quarterly work. He's also wicked at stencils and plays in the Japanese Motors. John's been working his butt off to get Issue 7 out to everybody, so today is hooray for Big J day! Send him a thank you email!!

He was also on the same flight with us down to Mexico. These photos were taken as we arrived at the Zihuatenejo Airport. This is John's surfboard. He just checked it through without a bag. Imagine the baggage guys surprise when he pulled it off the plane! Badass.

Photos: Aimee Acord

these are two of the most adorable kids in the history of earth, rite?
They came to our show in Edinbugh Scotttttttland....
we have two days left of our europe tour... paris the next two nites and then london one more time with the upset the rhythm team...
I swear to god that the blogs will be more regular on my side after we are home....
Hope everyone is well!!
LOVE
Brendan


PS. OH MY GOD, and not just to post a photo of Chan on the blog again, but really to say this, The new issue of i-D magazine is sooo good, ruling (the thing on Chan is unreal journalism--actually i-D are completely defining a new journalistic voice-and the photos by Karl Lagerfeld of her are nuts, not like the cover shot, but really crazy and new looking but also the whole issue is fully bomb) and also features thee sweatest two page thing about ANPQ in it... Thats why I'm posting about it... Thank you Jeremy and Ben!!

We've Been Away...

Ed and Brendan are in Europe, I've been in Mexico. As a place holder, check out these amazing paintings by Alex Kopps ( the original Gothic Dolphin) on the side panels of my Lambretta. Alex was also down in Mexico making the most punk rock degenerate surf movie ever. Look out!