Body Double spill sources of inspiration
Spilling the milk and tea with Body Double; video still courtesy of Dalton Blanco.
Celebrating the release of Body Double’s debut album Milk Fed for Zum Audio — bandleader Candace Lazarou (fka Mansion, Pang) presents an exclusive Week in Pop curation of current inspirations and media items of extreme interest. A record orchestrated like an East Bay dive bar thriller; the b-movie directed mania begins with the dawn treader of doom "Head Axe", rumbling into the amplified antics of "The Floating Hand", the gilded radiator grill grunge of "Ready to Die", or the buzzsaw ode to ennui of "Waiting". "Prisonous Mind" champs at the bits and bars of restraint, the boss baller bravado bristles about "Bitch on Wheels", soaring over Soviet skies like Slim Pickens on "Embrace the Bomb" and further embracing the uptight air of a malcontent on "Bad Vibrations". Tensions permeate like an outlaw on the run and on the lam as heard on "Critter", the sobering closing time blurry-eyed ballad "The Party is Over", complete with JooJoo's cinematic rhythmic rework of "Bitch on Wheels". But now without further ado, it is our pleasure and privilege to present…
Candace Lazarou of Body Double's Week in Pop under quarantined conditions
Video still courtesy of Dalton Blanco.
Auntie Jan
Auntie Jan’s Instagram has been keeping my spirits up since the beginning of shelter in place. Jan Cordova is a successful businesswoman that was poisoned to death in the early 90s and she’s been roaming around empty malls trying to telepathically ask someone how email works ever since. I started using project management frameworks in her honor.
Watch more from Auntie Jan via Vimeo.
Automatic
Press photo via Stones Throw Records.
Automatic is the perfect pop band. Period. They would be a band I’d be into purely on the merit of all of them being hot as fuck, but it so happens that they are smart and substantial songwriters with excellent taste. They write bangers and that makes me want to write bangers.
Their avatars just played a virtual show in a virtual record store in Cryptovoxels and a little birdie told me that they’re putting out the demos of their excellent album Signal on October 2!
Ellis Martin
digital archivist / editor / photographer
Ellis has been putting up with my hissy fits during photo shoots for years now, so I ask him to work with me on pretty much everything. He took the back cover photo on Milk Fed, he helped with editing on the “Ready To Die” music video, he agreed to take over my social media accounts and send my nudes to the Smithsonian when I die… Somehow Ellis still had time to actual important work in archiving and put out the journal of Lou Sullivan, who is arguably the first publicly gay trans men to medically transition.
E Daley
I don’t understand film at all, much less art film, so I really appreciated it when E explained their work as exploring the imitation of the romanticized American West, and how this romance can emphasize and unfurl the delusion of the ‘god-bless-Americana’ gaze. My favorite thing about E’s video art is how it rings my bell on a superficial aesthetic level so I’m tricked to spend time with it and get poisoned by their ideas. My favorite music is like that too!
Media Meltdown: Franzia Kafka & Piranha
Media Meltdown is nuts! Their first show was Nic Cage vs. Jeff Goldblum: A Drag Show and I remember Franzia slowly disintegrating a la The Fly over the course of the night. Also, before they got too famous to do this kind of thing, they performed at my birthday party: Piranha did the Shatner version of “Rocket Man”, zooming a little toy rocket all over the room. Franzia dressed up like Brian Eno circa Roxy Music, sang “Baby’s On Fire”, made me smoke a cigarette and then licked the ashtray...it was so sexy and so gross. Basically Media Meltdown is all my favorite cultural references and feelings in one place.
Now they’re doing monthly drag shows and other weekly programming on Twitch, including a music video show called Total Request Dead, Cryptids: A Drag Show [date TBD] and a Halloween Pageant and “Spooktacular” on October 31.
Body Double’s debut album Milk Fed for Zum Audio is available now via Bandcamp and everywhere.