Les Savy Fav: Let's Stay Friends Album and Tour

by Josh Teixeira

The first new record in six years deserves a party. And who rocks the party that rocks the body better than Brooklyn's Les Savy Fav? To celebrate last week's way-too-late release of Let's Stay Friends on French Kiss Records, LSF knocked off two sold-out nights in NYC, one in Williamsburg, the other at Bowery Ballroom.

CH was lucky enough to survey the damage at the Bowery show, which broke open with the muscular "Equestrian," the first song off of Let's Stay Friends. By the second or third song, LSF frontman Tim Harrington was already pulling an "Even Flow" and hanging upside down from the balcony. The set was largely pulled from the new album, and songs like "Slugs In The Shrubs" and "The Year Before The Year 2000" benefited from the taut energy of the crowd and the acrobatic delivery of the band. Another highlight was "Rage In The Plague Age," a track leaked last year and as such was met with an enthusiastic sing-a-long from the first note.

I really wanted to avoid mentioning Harrington's stage antics—as integral as they are to the performance, I think that lots of people miss how outstanding the music is by concentrating on wardrobe changes, hilarious repartee, and ball sac karaoke. But when said antics include an encore opened with an a cappella lounge rendition of "Bullet" by the Misfits and closed with Harrington laying down on the floor of the Bowery and enticing the entire crowd to do the same before exploding into the room-filling chant to end "Who Rocks the Party?," I'd be remiss if I left out those sweet gems.

The album itself, if a bit less intense than the full-frontal LSF live experience, is no less satisfying. A surprising return to the aggressiveness first captured on early favorites, like "Our Coastal Hymn," is mellowed by lots of melodic atmospherics, recalling early P.I.L. The songs are still the totally danceable, chant-able post punk you've come to expect, but are perhaps more well-honed than past efforts.

LSF has one last NYC engagement, opening for fellow Brooklynites LCD Soundsystem and Arcade Fire on Randall's Island before heading out on tour. I know you won't sleep on seeing them when they hit your hood, but be sure to cop their new jams first so you can sing along the whole time. Available now from iTunes, French Kiss or Amazon.

Bacon Scarf

by Ami Kealoha

If you are what you eat and like to wear it on your sleeve (or in this case around your neck), the bacon scarf makes a fitting accessory for metaphor-mixing bacon lovers. Made from 100% acrylic, it may not be the classiest of bacon scarves but what it lacks in quality it makes up with taste. Pick it up for $35 from Shopsin's General Store.

Thanks to Sterling for the tip!

Also on Cool Hunting: BLT Ring

The Crucible

by Ami Kealoha

From their recent pyrotechnic adaption of The Odyssey to a class on caboose restoration, Oakland, CA's The Crucible is an art school like no other. This episode is an inside look at the eight-year old institution, hosted by founder and executive director Michael Sturtz, who weighs in on the role of fire metaphorically and literally. We catch auditions for the fire opera, watch students engaged in welding, glass slumping and wood working (just a few of the "industrial" disciplines taught at the facility), check in with some of the teachers and learn about their fire-spitting fire trucks.

Kakawa Cocoa Beans

by Tim Yu

With the look of fossilized dinosaur eggs, Kakawa Cocoa Beans represents chocolate in five different delicious forms. Covered in layers of white, milk and dark chocolates and finished off with a dusting of velvety cocoa powder, the roasted whole Criollo/Trinitario cocoa bean (some of the best in the world) in the middle provides a satisfying and needed crunch. We like the way you can really taste the different types of chocolates in waves of distinct flavors.

Authentic, rich and with great contrasting textures, the Kakawa Cocoa Bean is available for $28 per 12 oz. bag from Cocoa Puro.

Anglepoise Play

by Leonora Oppenheim

Among the newest, hottest creations in town at the London Design Festival this year, we happily noted that others were taking time to celebrate an old classic—albeit in new ways of course. Anglepoise, a lamp that's required little tweaking in the over 70 years it's been in production, is one of the brands that's found ways to playfully reinterpret their classic design as of late.

At 100% Design, Anglepoise presented two new versions of the lamp by British designer Kenneth Grange to celebrate 70 years of the original. Type1227 subtly reinterprets the original, while Type1228 adds a handsome green shade, showing how effective subtle changes in form and color can be.

Radically different, young British designer Anthony Dickens' variation, the Anglepoise Fifty, celebrates the original's form and maintains functionality. The half lamp was commissioned for a new range called "Anglepoise Play" that will "be aimed at a younger audience and represent all Anglepoise products that have a playful side to them." Anthony says "The idea came to freeze it at fifty degrees, cast it like an old archaeological relic, strip it of production complexity and shape it into something new which still retained a functionality and personality but added a heightened playfulness."

Across town, the kids were getting crazy with the Anglepoise theme at the Aram Gallery. Students from the Royal College of Art (70 of them) were given a brief by course director Ron Arad to "discover a new type of task light; one that would inherit the mantle from the Anglepoise, and that would be equally iconic." We loved Tiago de Oliviera Martins de Fonseca’s completely antithetical design. Dubbed "No Angle, No Poise," still retaining the form of the iconic design but changing its function by using rubber rather than metal and deliberately letting it slump from its usual elegantly-structured posture. (Pictured at right.)

Ospop Sneakers: The Exclusive

by Tim Yu

Not just made in China, these shoes were actually conceived of in the Middle Kingdom as well. For decades, the simple hi-tops have been the footwear of choice for Chinese miners, farmers, construction and factory workers. Called Tian Lang (Mandarin for "Skywolf") Trainers were originally produced in central China close to the Shaolin Temple in the Henan province 50 years ago. The new apparel company Ospop now works with the Tian Lang factory, making them available for the rest of the world.

Originally designed for the worker, they're extremely comfortable shoes with an insole usually used in athletic shoes. They've got a clean industrial-look, made with a twice vulcanized outsole and tough canvas. The character on the side means labor or work and if it can take the abuse of a mine worker, we're pretty sure it can withstand the meanest streets around your city or town.

Available in three different colors, check them out here. Each purchase supports an education fund for those in the Tian Lang area who lack the necessary means for their first year of university studies. Check with Ospop in the near future for purchasing details and dealers.