DAILYSESSION

By Joseph Alexiou-NewYork Press

The red and black walls of Demask, a high-end fetish wear boutique on Orchard Street, are lined with racks of leather straps, latex jocks, corsets, bodysuits, butcher aprons and other buckles, prongs, chains and kinky accessories. 

But according to the Antoinette, the store’s manager, who can be found most days and evenings at the counter, Demask is experiencing the economic slump in its own peculiar way. [Read More]

By Randy Kennedy-The NY Times

Back in the day, Cope2, a Bronx graffiti legend as big as a linebacker, usually found himself in proximity to police officers only when they were tracking him in the metallic darkness of a subway yard or when they finally caught up to him and hauled him in. [Read More]

By Vanishing Newyork

Along with frozen yogurt joints, the East Village has been overwhelmed by ramen noodle shops. Ramen shops are the new banks–one on every corner. And now another one is coming…to the corner long occupied by Love Saves the Day. [Read More]

By Beatportal

Warp Records, one of, if not the foremost label in the world of electronica, is celebrating its landmark 20th anniversary this year with a host of parties across the globe. [Read More]

By  Coolfer

Before the BusinessWeek.com article by Douglas MacMillan on consumers’ use of streaming services as substitutes for purchasing, I was the only one (as far as I know) to point out this harmful downside to free, ad-supported services.

In December 2008, I wrote that streaming services are not a boon for record labels because of two key reasons. First, they are a poor way to monetize recorded music assets. Here’s what I wrote in December: [Read More]

By Fact

The number of classic records released by Island is ridiculous. Career-defining albums from Nick Drake, John Martyn, Tom Waits, King Sunny Ade, Tom Tom Club, Pulp, Roxy Music, The B52s, Sly & Robbie, The Slits, Grace Jones, DJ Shadow, Portishead – the list literally goes on and on. And on.  [Read More]

By LINDA HOBBS-VIBE

Many rappers claim to work hard, but none seems to have had more energy to get busy like the late rapper Tupac Shakur. And to prove it, the deceased emcee is slated to drop another (you read right) album that was reportedly done to smooth over the West Coast’ tension with the East. 

In 1996, Pac teamed up with Boot Camp Click to work on the album, which will be called One Nation. The project was one of the rapper’s ways of showing media he wasn’t a bully, during the height of his beef with the Notorious B.I.G. After his murder September of that year, the album was shelved for years. A.E.G. has since acquired the rights of the 18-track project. 

One Nation features appearances by Tha Outlawz, Snoop Dogg, Busta Rhymes, Greg Nice, Big Daddy Kane, and the Notorious B.I.G. 

It’s scheduled to be released March 20, through iTunes.

By JEN CARLSON -Gothamist

So just where was artist Yoshimoto Nara tossing back a few before his arrest in February? Prior to getting arrested for drawing some smiley face graffiti on the L platform, he was at Niagara bar in the East Village. He adorned the place with original artwork on the walls there, too, but the owners didn’t try to arrest him, instead they put it under plexiglass to preserve it.

By ABBY GOODNOUGH –NYTimes

BOSTON — This may be the only place in America where Shepard Fairey, the street artist whose omnipresent portrait of Barack Obamahas become a touchstone, is not fully feeling the love.

Mr. Fairey appeared in two municipal courts here this week to fight a cascade of vandalism charges accusing him of pasting his work on public and private property from the Back Bay to Roxbury. While this is not his first encounter with the police — Mr. Fairey has been arrested more than a dozen times for posting his art on whatever surface catches his eye — it appears to be his biggest legal tangle to date. [Read More]