Kanye West Good Morning Video

Pretty Dope

Every Day in Vane - August 21th - 23th 2004

21th: Camera Phone

22nd: Baltra blowin' smoke

18th: Did a shoot on Anna's roof on Saturday photographing her, Ammar and Jeff. Much thanks to Ammar for the assisting...photo's of Amma coming soon.

August 2008 Gallery

STAY FRESH

Last Wednesday, my boy Christian and his partner Brandon, the production duo better known as Fresh Prodeuce, competed at the iStandard Producer's Showcase.


Their beats were be judged against 10 select up and coming NYC producers by a panel of industry heavyweights, competing for a Roland prize package and possibly the opportunity to land some serious record placements.

The panel of judges included Lenny S., (Senior VP of A&R for Roc-A-Fella / Def Jam), Devo Springsteen (Grammy Award Winning Producer for Kanye West "Diamonds", John Legend, Cassidy, etc.), Omar Grant (Creative Director of A&R for EMI Publishing), and Illmind (Producer for G-Unit, SkyZoo, etc.)

Straight up, them boys shut it down. The emcee of the show thought that they had cheated and put in extra beats because Fresh Pro is on some next level shit. The DJ had to come over the loud speaker with That Was Only 5 Beats to put dood in his place. While most the competition relied on samples and borrowed sounds, Christian and his boy are legit musicians, and doods actually play their own riffs and drum lines. Chopping up enough vocal samples to keep the crowd happy, their banging bass lines and musical style ran from synthed out futuristic bangers, to head nodding club beats to raw, Dirty-South style bass with a more musical inflection, all while retaining a signature, Fresh Pro sound.

For all their industry weight, the judges were moved. First words that came out were, "Can I get that CD?!?" while shouts of TO! came from some females in the crowd, since Brandon resembles the Dallas wide-out.

Keep your eyes on these boys, talent like theirs doesn't stay unnoticed for too long.

Every Day in Vane - August 15th - 20th 2004

Been so busy the past couple of days, but have been taking photos...

15th: Vane Legal Dept...

16th: This is Anna you can follow her every move at twitter.com/annafrenkel

17th: It's my worst nightmare...

18th: Reminds me of my schoolyard days...

19th: Obama is all up in the club!

20th: This dude sings while he cuts your hair..wish he rapped

August 2008 Gallery

NOT FINDING GOD

I recently just finished reading The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, and I would highly recommend it to anyone, religious or not, whether Jesus is your homeboy, or if you just left your Jesus piece at home. Dawkins, an accomplished evolutionary biologist, argues from a scientific and humanist viewpoint why he overwhelming believes there is no God, highlights the historical fallacies of the Good Book, and goes on to further to establish why organized religion has historically been a dividing force.

Understanding the essence of his subject matter, Dawkins never takes himself too seriously, but his impassioned critique of modern religion can't help but strike some note of truth underneath his humor and wit. In today's environment of blind Bible-thumping and religious wars, this book is especially pertinent for any logical, rational mind

These summer weekends are numbered...

Summer just flew by didn't it? I'm trying to enjoy these warm days as much as I can before NYC becomes painfully frigid...

Everyone seems pretty excited about headin out...

First stop Belmost in Union Sq for Alex G's birthday

Happy Birthday homie
hope you had a good time....
Then hit up Sahara East to kick it with the boys
WTF...can they even do this?

Had brunch with Anna this morning, the omelette at Cafe Brama was delicious...finally a place where I can add chicken to my breakfast!
Saw this guy selling some crazy book and got in the mood to bookshop
I've always been into old school russian cover designs
Hit up Strand for a couple of hours...its so hard to leave that spot


This is what I ended up buying...seems like a pretty interesting bunch of books...
I wonder if there is a Men's Computer Literacy Handbook is....oh wait...thats right...we don't need one...

Book was published in 1992, I wonder if they would still have a white dude in a ski mask for the cover if it was published today. Its so interesting how the whole meaning of the word "Terrorism" has changed so much in the past 4 years.

Every Day in Vane - August 14 2004

Today was Pakistan's Independence Day



August 2008 Gallery

Every Day in Vane - August 13 2008

I didn't leave my house today, worked from home and took this shot of my brother Ali



August 2008 Gallery

Janelle Monáe's : The Chase!

Under the tutelage of Grammy Award receiving hip hop duo, Big Boi and Andre 3000 of Outkast, emerges futuristic rock soul phenomenon, Janelle Monáe. Inspired by Fritz Lang's 1927 science fiction classic, Metropolis: the Chase Suite concerns an cyborg named Cindi Mayweather, who is fighting for love and freedom in the year 2719. Take Cindi's journey as she guides you into a world of unforgettable songs and powerful anthems wrapped in a new genre called cybersoul. Lyrically, she touches on race, slavery, love and segregation in magnetic songs such as "Many Moons" and Violet Stars Happy Hunting" which translates into what sounds like theatrical soul. The hauntingly beautiful, "Cindi" sounds like a moving Broadway classic, with operatic influences infused with hip-hop funk. "Metropolis" is reminiscent of a Bladerunner-like world where cyborgs fall in love with humans at their own peril.
-Nastassia Davis

Check her out on myspace here, her music is really fresh, i recently got plugged into it and love it. The CD is in stores today and is only $4.99 and can be found at your local retail store!

Every Day in Vane - August 12 2008

I know I have been saying this for a while but I'm bringing back the "Every Day in Vane" section. For those of you who don't know it's going to be an image or two from everyday of the month compiled into one gallery. I take photographs almost everyday so I might as well post them. The only different this time is that it will be in blog form (one after the other on a page) and not in a flash gallery. So here goes the first one...



August 2008 Gallery

Snoop Dogg goes Bollywood

Ok I'm not a big fan of posting stuff to this blog that isn't in one way or another related to Vane but you guys have to see this. Its a music video called Singh is King by Akshay Kumar feat. Snoop Dogg. It's really funny and definitely has viral value but ....seriously WTF?

Actually I have mixed feeling about it, on one hand it just seems like such an unsuccessful attempt to blend punjabi music and hip-hop and almost seems embarrassing for both parties but on the other hand its pretty funny and innovative, I don't believe I've seen something like this before.

I donno, what do you guys think?

JUSTICE x DIOR is FUCKING ILLL

Legendary fashion house Dior linked up with everyone's favorite Parisian Disco-edit duo, Justice, for the latest Dior Homme Spring/Summer 09 collection, held earlier in July at the Paris Observatory. These still don't even do the show justice [no pun intended], peep the youtub videos to witness magic.

Part 1


Part 2


Under the direction of Heidi Slimanne, menswear designer Kris Van Assche has created an amazing ready-to-wear line, staying true to Slimmane's minimal, slim silhouettes, clean lines, with an edge of dark grunge pairing black and grays with bold hues of blue, magenta, and metallic gold.



Justice's influence extends beyond the music, with each of the models sporting retro-futuristic shades, that when paired with the fashion, creates a visuall stunning, unique look that is reminiscent of street done high fashion.



Fucking Brilliant. Stay tuned for multiple streetwear bites...

In typical Justice fashion, the track features grand, orchestral piano chords, ripping guitar riffs, paired with hard, pulsing bass lines and just some good ol' dirty, dirty electro-synth. Justice might be hyped a lot, but these talented French doods deserve every bit of it. The download for the complete Justice track for Dior Homme S/S09 is available here.

The Relaxing, Productive and Wild Weekend

August is off to a good start! A bunch of new products go into production in a week for Fall08, Spring09 is almost done, The lookbook for Spring09 in under construction, I've been updating my site, did a lot of cleaning and organizing, got back into using twitter, been shooting more...etc! Just have a good feeling of being fully focused, which is keeps me calm while tackling this endless todo list.

Anyway...the weekend was relaxing, productive and wild..

I dont know if you guys are aware but Toasties is the new spot to hangout...


Just ask Brian M. Trunzo bout toasties and enjoy his 20min rant

Hit up Antiq after a while

She loves the camera


Why so surious...?








Next day Brunch with Anna and went to go see Step Brothers..which was actually pretty damn funny

Sunlight!


There was a crowd of 10 people trying to get a glimpse of these mushrooms...

Saturday hit up a rooftop party with Dave an Trunz...it was a good night to be out oudoors