Oct 14, 2011
By Chris Tinkham
Web Exclusive
As Spanish actress Elena Anaya discusses her craft, she speaks with wonderment in her voice. She credits her passion for acting to her mother, who encouraged her as a child to play rather than subverting her daughter's curiosity with the word "no" or discouraging her from touching objects. Anaya unconsciously demonstrates this by picking up the digital recorder in front of her and banging it on the table, before realizing that she might be damaging it and apologizing. In director Pedro Almodóvar's latest film, The Skin I Live In, Anaya appears in a flesh-colored body suit that stretches from her neck to her feet and wraps around her fingers and toes like gloves. Her character, Vera, is both a prisoner and passion project of Dr. Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas), a plastic surgeon intent on creating a skin immune to cuts, insect bites and fire.
More
Oct 11, 2011
By Kyle Lemmon
Web Exclusive
Let's get this out of the way first off: prog-pop sibling duo The Fiery Furnaces are still a band and Eleanor Friedberger's debut solo album, Last Summer, is simply an outlet for the singer-songwriter's passion for '70s-influenced rock, pop, and fashion. Under the Radar talked with Friedberger about how the Furnaces' last proper album, I'm Going Away, led to her inaugural suite of solo recordings, musical love letters to New York, and her appreciation for Lindsay Anderson's 1973 surrealist comedy-drama fantasy, O Lucky Man!. More
Oct 10, 2011
By Laura Studarus
Web Exclusive
It’s hard not to smile when listening to a Casiokids album. The 8-bit melodies—created via their namesake Casio keyboards, of course—bounce and crackle with a Mario Bros. meets of Montreal energy. Check out our silly conversation about time travel, secret identities, and mayonnaise with the “kids.” Be sure to catch their set at our CMJ party on October 19. More
Oct 07, 2011
By Ben Schumer
Web Exclusive
Spencer Krug is a restless man who has never been shy about his myriad ambitions or apologized for them. His two bands—Wolf Parade and Sunset Rubdown—have been parked under “indefinite hiatus” for the foreseeable future. With his two beloved bands on the backburner, Krug is content to let his muse carry him wherever it may go. His perpetual creative momentum has led him to creating the alias Moonface which Krug hopes will help him avoid creative stagnancy. His debut LP as Moonface, Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped, is full of warm, buzzing organ drones, cascading melodic figures, analog beats and loops, but, as the title suggests, no vibraphone. More
Sep 21, 2011
By Kyle Lemmon
Web Exclusive
We chatted with the DC artist extraordinaire Cliff Chaing (Green Arrow & Black Canary, Zatanna) about the overall tone of the new Wonder Woman series he is drawing, his thoughts on violence and female sexuality in comics, and the DC Comics - The New 52 Art Tour. More
Sep 12, 2011
By Ben Schumer
Web Exclusive
Over the past few years, Handsome Furs—Dan Boeckner and his wife, Alexei Perry—have toured through regions of the world rarely ever visited by Western bands (Poland, Myanmar, Yugoslavia, China, etc.). As a result, they’ve been exposed to things about which we North Americans know little to nothing. Their third LP, Sound Kapital, finds the duo embracing the role they refer to as “closet journalists,” and as a result, morphing into a political band. More
Sep 09, 2011
By John Norris
Web Exclusive
Ask a blog-approved artist these days what bands from yesteryear were especially influential on them, and you'll often hear names like Galaxie 500, Spaceman 3, Orange Juice, The Cure, OMD, the evergreen MBV and Joy Division, and so on. More
Sep 08, 2011
By John Norris
Web Exclusive
More often than not when people talk about a "summer record," they're talking about those with a certain bounce and thematic preoccupation with, in no particular order: beach, sun, fun, boys, girls. More
Sep 02, 2011
By Chris Tinkham
Web Exclusive
U.S. audiences might know French actress Ludivine Sagnier best from her work with director François Ozon. Their three-film collaboration began with Water Drops on Burning Rocks, released in 2000, and culminated in 2003 with Swimming Pool, the half-English, half-French-language thriller that featured a bikini-clad Sagnier front and center on its advertising art. In a climate that's been increasingly difficult for foreign-language films to find distribution in the States, Sagnier, one of France's most well-known and respected actresses, has been a fixture in U.S. art houses over the last decade. Yet, she has resisted the lure of Hollywood; her occasional forays into English-language films have been for international directors. Sagnier's dynamic, multilayered performance in Alain Corneau's psychological thriller, Love Crime, will only amplify the overtures of American filmmakers. More
