When did Halloween go from being about scary costumes to just being about… costumes? Well let’s not worry our fake blood-encrusted little heads about that just now. Instead let’s thank Idolator for compiling a handy countdown of the worst music-related costumes available this Halloween.
That’s right, if you feel the need to hide the fact you have zero personality this coming Friday, and wish to highlight the fact that you also have zero imagination, there are plenty of ready-made options out there for you to consider. Although I’d say that as these costumes are in that big old store known as “the internet”, you might be a bit late ordering them for this year.

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Tuesday October 28th, 2008 at 11:30 am

When I moved a few months back the biggest headheartache was what to do with my audio tapes. You wouldn’t believe how many compilations I made as a teenager. Suffice to say the time I spent making them was time spent not having a lot of sex.
So anyway, when I moved I couldn’t bear to part with them and chucked them in a couple of big plastic boxes which I then had to hide behind the couch. What I really need is one of these cassette closets, made by Dutch designer Patrick Schuur (click image to enlarge).
Apparently this lump of mentalism comprises 918 tapes, which is even more than are lurking behind my sofa. You can read more and see more and be agog more at Creative Barn.
Check out a video of the thing “in action” after the jump - or if you’d rather melt your old cassettes down, go here for some ghoulish inspiration…

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday October 24th, 2008 at 11:39 am

It is very difficult to find out any information about these headphones. I suspect they are just bog standard headphones decorated with hair, but the prospect of every woman on the high street looking like Star Wars’ bun-headed sex symbol is nevertheless almost too much for the male brain to bear.

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday October 10th, 2008 at 12:13 pm

Last week I went along to a Bloggers Meetup, which is a thing where lots of people who don’t usually see other people in real life go to see what other people look like. Turns out they look a bit like me, but with worse hair.
Anyway, it was sponsored by some people called Smirnoff, who it turns out make alcoholic beverages. Their mixologists kindly made a cocktail for this very website, and it contained neither poo, nor pee, nor bogroll.
It’s a twist on the Moscow Mule, and contains various ingredients related to “the outdoors” - blackberry, apple, er… ginger. It tasted rather zingy, and I am happy to share the recipe here should you wish to recreate it (click image to enlarge). Yes, it’s a bit more effort than just swallowing a tin of wifebeater, but sometimes it’s nice to pretend to be a bit sophisticated you know. If you need help learning how to place things in liquid, this video may be of some assistance.
In other news - if you happen to be the type of the person who “puts on nights”, you might be interested by Smirnoff’s Original Nights Night Vision promotion - it’s offering a number of promoters bursaries of £10,000 if they can come up with original, innovative ideas for nightlife ennertainment. You can get more info at the Night Vision Facebook page.

Posted by Stuart Waterman on Tuesday October 7th, 2008 at 10:25 am

[click image to enlarge]

Some band merchandise tie-ins are just too obvious, and take around twenty years to come to fruition. I say that as if the rap duo are going to be getting a cut of each pair of these shakers that ships, but somehow I don’t think their bank accounts are going to be getting much flava from this little operation.
Personally I’m still waiting for C&C Music Factory music factories, but these’ll do for the time being.
Available at drinkanddream on Etsy.com
[via muchmusic.com]

Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday September 5th, 2008 at 11:30 am

Time was when bands on the road would spend their “downtime” in debauched pursuits, hardly any of which required the use of pencils, paper and rubbers (well, maybe rubbers). In case you were in any doubt that those days are gone, check out what Girls Aloud have been up to in between tour dates.
On their recent “Tangled Up” tour, after entertaining zillions of people of an evening, the girls rushed offstage to get their pencil cases and started scribbling away to create designs for t-shirts that would best represent them as “personalities”. The t-shirts are in support of the Make-A-Wish Foundation UK, which is a charity for sick kiddies.

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Thursday August 21st, 2008 at 9:00 am

Remember this t-shirt, which allowed you to feel superior, more ironic and more head-up-arse hip than everyone else? Well here’s the next step - t-shirts bearing the names of bands that don’t exist, and hopefully never shall.

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday August 15th, 2008 at 10:00 am

Are you ga-ga over Burial’s album?
Are you? Really? Or do you feel you have to say that because loads of chinstrokers have? I have to admit I found the album dull. Maybe you need to listen to it on a night bus going through south London at 4am or something to really get into its dubstep vibe. I only travel by limo, so I don’t know if I’ll ever really “get it”.
For those who have bought into the Burial cult, though, these high-larious t-shirts will allow you to show that a) you’ve heard of him; b) you have “a sense of humour”; c) you are keen to let the world know these two facts through the medium of clothing.
Kind of a shame he appears to have just outed himself, then, although that is not confirmed at the time of writing and so on and so forth.
See more Burial-related reasons to spunk money up the wall at I Am Burial
[via Dubber's Twitter]
See more t-shirts and ways to make yourself look all nice like at Brandish and Catwalk Queen

Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday August 8th, 2008 at 10:29 am

We can pretend otherwise, but we all know that nowadays festival time is as much its own little fashion season as it is a period in which to enjoy music. And I don’t think I’m being sexist when I say that the gender most keen on festival fashion is the woman-shaped one.

So with that I’m going to round up some of the various festival-related fashion bits and bobs that my esteemed Shiny Media colleagues have covered in recent times.

This is going to be a bit like that scene in the clothes store in Pretty Woman! Fun times! *claps hands and jumps up and down*

Let’s start off with a very popular lady named Cath Kidston…

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Friday July 18th, 2008 at 12:20 pm

There are a lot of lovely things for the music lover to see and do at festivals, but there are also usually some eejits around to abuse your sensitive lugs. Drunken buskers who think they’re the new Pete Doherty. Some crew of religious nutters. Keane.
Well now you can take your own frickin’ music along, thank you very much, and you won’t need to worry about battery power because this wee box runs on MAGICAL SUNRAYS. Or solar power.
The pretty little Roberts solarDAB is the world’s first solar-powered DAB radio, and provides up to 27 hours of music juice.

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Posted by Stuart Waterman on Thursday July 17th, 2008 at 11:12 am