Monae (That’s What I Want)

I played “Tightrope” on the show today. I didn’t realize there was a video. This is the best thing ever. (Please remember those four arrows at the bottom right make a video fullscreen.)

I adore how she moves. I first heard Janelle Monae on Studio 360; she performed on their live episode dedicated to time travel. She is crazy cool.

The ArchAndroid is out May 18th.

Boobquake

You may have heard that Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi blamed recent seismic activity on “women who do not dress modestly.” In an effort to test this claim, there will be a small experiment conducted Monday. Jen McCreight, and tens of thousands of fans, will wear revealing clothes and see if the earth moves.

Jen announced her intentions on her blog less than a week ago, inviting women to “join me and embrace the supposed supernatural power of their breasts. Or short shorts, if that’s your preferred form of immodesty.” Today the Facebook event is enormous and Boobquake has made it to CNN.com. There are t-shirts. Proceeds benefit charity. And the best part? In the photo of her that’s been appearing on all the news sites, Jen is wearing the XKCD shirt that reads, “Stand back, I’m going to try SCIENCE!”

Just a heads up.

Stay Tuned

This Monday, David Aguasca joins me in the studio for a new segment we’re calling Songs To Fight Bears To. Learn about David’s many adventures, and why he is a very cool person, at his blog Stuff David Does, and don’t miss (what I’m assuming will be) his radio debut!

A little farther out, nuzzled somewhere in between finals and the start of summer touring, both Sons of an Illustrious Father and The Tattle Tales will be on the show. There’s even a chance that one or both of them will break in the station’s brand new performance studio and make some magic on the air. Dates will be posted as they’re finalized.

Click on those links and show these bands some love. Keep inviting people to listen, read, friend, follow, and comment, and write me if you want to be on the show. There are plenty of Mondays to go around.

Infoviz Art

I went for the naked people, and they didn’t disapoint: The Artist is Present, the big-deal performace art retrospective at MoMA through May 31, is well worth the trip. A few of Marina Abramović’s pieces broke through my instinctive skepticism, doing wierd and entrancing things to the passing of time. A few didn’t, but were interesting enough anyway. See it for yourself.

On our way out, my friend and I found ourselves in front of a big screen filled with bobbing pink baloons. Each represented a real profile pulled from a dating website; touching the screen sorted them by age, sex, opening and closing lines, ideal first dates. You were invited to explore the swirling shapes, wondering about the people on the other side, or try your hand at avatar matchmaking.

Around the corner were other examples of “infoviz” art, creative representaions of real world data. Carefully planned and yet largely out of the artist’s control, data mining and information visualization is fertile ground. Edits to Wikipedia entries, airplane and taxi traffic, and computers pondering chess moves translate surprisingly well to museum walls.

Every morning, planes take off in a wave that rolls across the country with the rising sun. Rendered in glowing white against blank black in a looping video, this looks like fireworks, or anemone orgasms. Wonder about all those journeys and destinations; watch the cycles, like breaths. The sensual and cerebral layer deliciously.

Explore more artist/data collaborations in this Slate slideshow. Don’t miss the massive and engrossing piece on break-ups, or the eerie Radiohead music video. Of course, most data visualization doesn’t get labeled fine art, but it can be as fascinating and moving as anything in a museum: check out some of the best here and here.

Year of the Tiger visits TJN

Last week This Joyful Noise had its first on air guest, the fabulous bassist and singer and composer Emma Alabaster. We talked for the better part of the hour, and to anyone who missed it (is that everyone? that’s everyone, right?), I will try my best to get a copy. They’re telling me that won’t happen, but asking a few more times can’t hurt.

This week, I am proud to announce, we will be hearing the music of Year of the Tiger. Henry Ivry and Sable Young will be visiting the studio, where we will again test whether years of listening to Terry Gross actually qualifies someone to conduct a radio interview.

Here’s hoping. Nothing fell apart last time, unless you count that moment I left the mics on and wondered out loud why we didn’t hear the music (hint: it was because I left the mics on), which we just won’t.

Listen up, tomorrow (Monday) from two to three, WHCR 90.3 FM New York, and streaming live.

Symphony of Science

Carl Sagan was a treasure and an inspiration. Autotune is more of a mixed bag. What happens when they join forces to remind us of the beauty and possibility of our moment in this universe?

Catchy, ain’t it? Get your daily dose of perspective and grace at Symphony of Science. Let John Boswell’s project remind you, as Sagan says, “how lucky we are to live in this time: the first moment in human history when we are in fact visiting other worlds.”