GRN Apple Tree

GRN Apple Tree has long been one of my favorite clothing companies. Throughout the years they have managed to stay unique with their designs, avoiding most of the overdone/overused trends that most clothing companies fall into. There is a series of GRN Apple Tree's newer designs that I particularly like. The series features large prints and masked monochrome or black & white photos, masked by angular shapes. The designs are large and bold, but stay fairly minimal without being to over-the-top. The Pommier V-neck, Snap Shot and Lamp V-neck are a few of my favorites.

World Wide Renewal Program

Adult Swim is at it yet again! Quickly following up their last free download compilation with World Wide Renewal Program, download it here. This time around Adult Swim has teamed up with record label Chocolate Industries. Featuring artists such as Cool Kids, Diverse, Hollywood Holt, Vast Aire along with plenty of other experimental Hip-Hop big names. Adult Swim deserves major props for not only teaming up with such great artists to create these compilations, but also for making them free to download!

Remix Rush :: Divine

Sebastian Tellier has been in the electronic music game for years, making sexy beats supported by his smooth classic vocals. Tellier has collaborated with such artists as Mr. Oizo, Guy-Manuel De Hommem of French Electro forefathers Daft Punk, and more recently had remixes of his single "Divine" done by Donovan, Midnight Juggernaughts, Night Facilities and my personal favorite done by fellow Frenchman Danger. Danger, who has quite a an impressive remix resume (not to mention some of the coolest promo graphics I have seen), has done an excellent job of taking Tellier's bouncy electro-pop jam and transforming it to a dance floor fist-pumper.

MP3 :: Sebastian Tellier - Divine (Danger Remix)
(BONUS) MP3 :: Sebastian Tellier - Divine (Night Facilities Remix)

Akutou Loves You

The amount of talented illustrators, designers and artists out there today is sometimes overwhelming. Everyday I find a new illustrator or designer that has so much talent, but on occasion I find one that really appeals to me. Akutou, or Thomas Pereira, is a French designer that really struck me upon visiting his website. Having done work for clients like RAC, Futurecop!, Threadless, and doing work like this, this and this Pereira is on a fast track to becoming one of my favorite illustrators. He also has a great music blog on his site worth checking out.

Midomi VS iPhone

There's nothing worse than forgetting the name of the artist who sings a song you heard. Or when you hear a song in a store an really want to know who the artist is that sings it. Midomi for the iPhone takes care of these problems along with providing many other cool features. This iPhone application allows you to sing, hum or play a song into your iPhone's mic, then searches Midomi's music database to match your singing, humming or the song with the closest results. You can also simply say or type the name of a song or artist to search the Midomi database. After you do a search and results are found you can then purchase the artist's tracks from iTunes, view YouTube videos, view photos and see more tracks available from the artist. The application's interface is very simple and easy to use. I only hope that the database becomes a bit more expansive, as many of the more obscure songs I have searched have no results. Overall a great application with many uses.

Josh Spear: Big Ticket Tuesday

I absolutely love Nooka watches... and what's cooler than a Nooka watch? A free Nooka watch. The crew over at JoshSpear.com has started a free giveaway every week which they are calling Big Ticket Tuesdays. Each week they will select a various item, and then devise a way for one reader to win this prize. This week the prize being given is an awesome camouflage Nooka watch. Head on over and check out the rules, and check back every Tuesday for a new prize!

Das Monk

As far as I am concerned the quality of graphic tees has pretty much been on a downward spiral for the past few years, but once in awhile you find some gems. Das Monk has some cool minimal, but well designed tees. Best of all they ship for free worldwide if you buy 2 or more tees.

via :: addic[tee]d

MGMT

I am a little behind on this one, and I can't believe I didn't start listening to MGMT (their website is horribly awesome) until just recently. When I think of music of the current decade, I think of music inspired by the past revisited and done right this time. MGMT sounds like classic rock done right. Their first full length album Oracular Spectacular was released in stores in January of this year. It was only after hearing the remix Justice did of MGMT's track "Electric Feel" that I decided to check them out. After hearing the original version of the song I discovered that I actually like it better than Justice's version (even though it's a great remix), and I love the entire album.

MP3 :: MGMT - Electric Feel
MP3 :: MGMT - Electric Feel (Justice Remix)
High Res Music Video :: MGMT - Electric Feel

CompleteTechnique

I don't often wear jewelery, most likely because I don't often find jewelery that I think is worth wearing or purchasing. This is not the case with the pieces made by CompleteTechnique. With much of their jewelry being inspired by the audio and DJ world they have pieces that include headphones, record player head shells, microphones, cassette players and speakers. Each piece is crafted from 14K/18K Gold or Platinum and constructed with the highest level of technique.

My Drive Thru VS Converse

Last month I began seeing Converse ads popping up in a bunch of magazines that featured Pharrell Williams, Santogold and Julian Casablancas. I, like many others I am sure, wondered what Converse had up their sleeve. On July 10th is was revealed that Converse had gotten the artists together to collaborate on a track in celebration of their 100th anniversary. The track titled "My Drive Thru" is available as a free download on Converse's website. The website also features many other musicians that are all often talked about in the blogosphere including MGMT, Bradford Cox of Deerhunter and Atlas Sound, YACHT, Kid Sister, Eleanor Friedberger of the Fiery Furnaces, Frank Carter of Gallows; Does It Offend You, Yeah?, and Sophie of Care Bears on Fire. Again this is yet another example of a company adapting to the changing digital world, creating music available for free to the listeners while still supporting the artists behind the music.

Also be sure to check out the amazing video produced by Pharrell and animated by visual effects masters Psyop. An interview with the Psyop directors is posted here.

In The Mod

In The Mod is a small application that every designer will love. The application comes in four different editions: The Flickr Edition, Webcam Edition, Your Images Edition and the Online Edition. The concept of each edition is essentially the same, creating swatches from various photos from either various Flickr photos, photos from your webcam, and photos in your personal library. Have you ever been inspired by the color way of your favorite sneakers, or by a photo that you took of a building in you neighborhood. In The Mod can import and use photos to create a swatch of 1-1,000 different colors, and then export the swatch to Photoshop of Illustrator. A handy little tool in any designers collection of apps.

Yewknee Summer Mix Series

Yewknee has begun the annual Summer Mix Series for 2008. While it's only been up for less than a week there are already plenty of great submissions. If you aren't familiar with the concept of Yewknee's Summer Mix Series the rules are simple. Compile a mix of your favorite music that follows a particular theme or concept whether it be obscure or obvious. Then get creative and come up with some cover art for your mix, upload it to your file storage of choice and then submit it. It will then be posted along with the collection of other great mixtapes and hopefully you will go down in history as a Summer Mixtape Master. If you'd rather not submit your own mix I still highly recommend checking out some of the mixes available. You will have plenty of themed mixes to last you throughout the summer.

Remix Rush :: Talk Like That

There is not a single bad word that can be said about The Presets. They have now released two amazing albums and plenty of dance floor pleasing EPs and remixes. With their ever growing resume, having fellow Australians Miami Horror remix their track "Talk Like That" makes the resume that much more impressive. Miami Horror, who also have quite the remix tracklist, has taken the track and added their signature electro-disco touch. Those damn Aussies just keep putting out banger after banger and I hope they don't stop coming.

MP3 :: The Presets - Talk Like That (Miami Horror)

200 Nipples

Behind the clever name of the t-shirt website 200 Nipples is also what could be a rather clever idea. This clever idea works like this - 100 limited edition tee designs are made available for purchase on the site (explaining the name 200 Nipples). The cost of the 100 tees begins at $1 and goes from there to $100. For example: t-shirt #1 is $1, t-shirt #2 is $2, t-shirt #3 is $3 and so on all the way to 100. The sooner you visit the site the cheaper you will be able to purchase the design for. The problem with the concept is finding a design cool enough for someone to want to fork out $40-$100 for. The design on the site at the moment is a design I wouldn't pay anymore than $10 for. So in order for this to work I think they are going to have to get some amazing designs by some very highly regarded designers. I like the concept though.

[via: Yewknee]

Intersection Magazine

I am by no means a "car guy", which is why I was surprised when I found myself purchasing the magazine Intersection the other day. Intersection magazine seems like a hybrid of a fashion, automobiles, art, design and urban lifestyle. With very well done art direction they seem to tie everything together perfectly. It's kind of the Dwell for the auto world.