KASKADE- TURN IT DOWN

The American DJ, Kaskade has been blessing us with amazing electronic music for years now,
but his latest album, "Fire and Ice" was monumental in the electronic music billboards, hitting
#5 on the iTunes chart on its first day of release.

Kaskade, who resides in Los Angeles has collaborated with female vocalist, Rebecca for most of his past albums. This album features a broad set of collaborations, with vocals and other electronics from artists such as Skrillex, Steve Aoki and Fiona.

The top songs on his latest album are "Eyes", which was released prior to the album's official release,
"ICE", and "Turn it Down", which just came out with a music video this past week.
The video received a whopping 2,000,000+ views in only 2 days on YouTube. The music video features lead vocalist, Rebecca along with other female vocalist, Natasha, with closeup shots of them singing in different outfits on a neon-lit ice rink. The video incorporates ice-skating, smoke and beautiful light along with illustrated visuals of lips singing the lyrics of the song.

Here is the video!

SF's MiMOSA

San Francisco native, MiMOSA is an electonic dj is a dubstep/glitch-mob/grime DJ who has been blowing up for the past couple of years. After releasing his fourth album, “Silver Lining”, he has slowly become one of the most popular American, underground DJs in the United States. He is said to be one of the top west-coast exports, touring other areas of the US for only two years now.

The young producer’s energy on stage is said to be “magnetic” and he has been priveledged enough to share the stage with such big-time electronic artists as Rusko, DatSik, Bassnectar and Flying Lotus. His name quickly spread after his two festival shows in the California desert at Coachella and Burning Man. His sound is said to take his audience through sounds of urban chaos and unreal euphoria. Last year, we at Karmaloop missed out on his performance at Paradise Music Club in Boston, but are looking forward to covering his show tomorrow at the larger Boston venue, Royale.

MiMOSA’s quickly spreading talent and fame stems from his thick fan-base on the west coast, but east coast fans alike all pledge their allegiance.

“His show (at Paradise) was unbelievable. His combination of sounds surprised me thoroughly!” said new fan, Rachel Liou.

We will update you on his show later this week! For tickets, you can visit ticketmaster.com, but hurry up, because rumor has it that this show will most-definitely sell out quickly! 

GOODWOOD NYC

New York City-based company, GoodWood, is a simple brand that prides itself on offering bracelets, necklaces and other jewelry all made of wood. The small company started out in 2007 combining both art and fashion when designing products that are engraved and assembled into wooden accessories. All of the products are designed in the GoodWood workshop in Brooklyn, NY and retail in stores in Manhattan, Boston, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

The company’s products are hand sanded, painted and assembled with careful attention to detail. The logo combines a G and a W, giving the look a simple, yet elegant design. Many GoodWood products have been worn by celebrities, such as Snoop Dogg, Nas and Chromeo. The company also collaborates with other brands such as Nike, DC Shoes and Mishka, and plans to collab with more companies, mainly based in New York City.

GoodWood products range in price from $19.99 up to $200. They offer custom designed pieces, which are completely hand painted, and involve crystals and wood inlays. KARMALOOP.com’s underground brand-segment, KAZBAH started offering GoodWood products on the site in 2010. With much success, the company is now featured exclusively on KARMALOOP.com and because of the “upgrade”, thousands of new consumers are purchasing GoodWood’s special accessories. 

ARAAB-MUZIK / SBTRKT Review

November 3^rd was the SBTRKT show at Royale Boston. As noted before, this dude has been buzzed about non-stop for the past couple of months in the states and overseas. The show scheduled for 8PM, with synth-electro opener, Araab-Muzik didn’t commence until 10PM. This delay was a surprise for myself and the group of people I was with, along with that fact that Araab-Muzik ceased to impress.  

Araab’s set, which was most-likely only 30 minutes was rushed. He was most likely late to the venue, but luckily, SBTRKT amazed the audience with his electro-soul filled percussion. Another surprise: There were two dudes on stage and SBTRKT’s mask was REALLY small! I was looking forward to seeing an epic tribal mask, such as the one seen in all of his photo shoots. Regardless, he was fast-paced and multi-tasked the whole show, banging on some drums and working with electronic equipment at the same time. The crowd was a weird one…The place didn’t get packed until Araab-Muzik FINALLY showed up. All in all, I think this night was bad luck and swayed my opinion of Araab-Musik’s “amazing” reputation. As for SBTRKT, I was glad he/they went beyond my expectations and sent the audience into another light.

- PETER

*LRG WINTER/ARTIST COLLAB

After the recent death of LRG’s creative director, Jonas Bevacqua, the funky, urban clothing line revamped their fall/winter collection. LRG, based in New York City has been one of the most popular brands sold on Karmaloop for almost a decade. Bevacqua’s sudden death was all over the media with many assumptions that the cause was drug-based. Hidden messages can be seen in stitching suggesting marijuana use, not to mention the logo is a tree.

The fall and winter collection this year is a combination of bold, bright colors, with jackets and coats that are more “gentlemanly”, rather than LRG’s usual street-wear sported by rich white kids and overweight rappers. They are trying to expand their consumer market by paying closer attention to designs as well as rounding up an artists’ collective that will design many different types of t-shirts and hoodies. One of the collaborations that LRG did with famous artists is a video shoot with muralist, AUGOR.

AUGOR and a film crew drove to the mountains of southern California, where they shot AUGOR bombing the side of an empty train car. The visuals from this shoot features musician Blu, LRG Snow team rider Justin Bennee, LRG Skate team members Chico Brenes, Tommy Sandoval, and Billy Marks. The location set LRG apart from their typical urban setting, and with snowy mountains in the background, the company shows us that they are ready to spread their new designs of the winter season.  

CLICK HERE FOR LRG HOLIDAY VIDEO

HARLETT AND HOLLIDAY

“I take after my mother’s entrepreneurship and the craftsmanship of my father.” Karmaloop’s head photographer, Jackie Earhart, who also happens to be my boss, made this statement when talking about her two brands, Holliday and Harlett. Originally from San Antonio Texas, Jackie has been a bad bitch since birth and now, shows this off through her art.

On the side of taking mass photographs all day long for Karmaloop’s retail website, she enjoys working (non-stop) on her crafty projects, such as her many tails of Harlett (literally, TAILS!) and her line of men’s leather wallets, which she collaborates on with her father.

Harlett is a line of women and men’s accessories, but these accessories are most definitely unique. The line features different organic products such as raccoon and rabbit tails, some of which include fades of pink or purple. Harlett also includes rabbit feet, feathers and leather braids. Told you this wasn’t your average accessory line! A lot of times we will joke about seeing “raver” kids dancing the two-step shaking their tails (and again, literal tails) to speedy electronic music. When I first saw her line, the first month of my summer internship at Karmaloop, I was immediately intrigued; yet a lot of times, others react differently.

When I first ordered a raccoon tail from Jackie, and later revealed it to my roommates, one exclaimed, “Pete, that is too much. That is fucking gross.” Well, when I hear (or see) these reactions when wearing the tail in public, I roll my eyes. Sorry guys, you have to have swag to wear Harlett. By the way, my other boss, Tommy wears a raccoon tail that only has a quarter tail actually remaining, while at the same time repping the rabbit foot! SWAG!

Jackie’s other line, Holliday is a set of beautiful, handcrafted leather wallets, shipped straight from south of the border from her father. These wallets are meant for guys, but women can pull them off well. There is a definite western feel to the brand, some, with fades of rich caramel and dark chocolate. There is a leather strap with a snap, so you can attach it to your belt buckle and let it hangout of your butt-pocket with no fear! At work, I often get a taste of the father/daughter business partnership as I hear Jackie stressfully talking to her dad on the phone about which leather dyes to use or what models are priorities to ship to the states.

Earhart recently made a necklace, which at first seems like your average necklace with a cross at the end. You’ll later figure out that this “holy” cross has a small knife inside that can be pulled out in an instant. Told you she was badass.

Holliday and Harlett are available on KARMALOOP.COM and if you want to check out Jackie’s photo-blog (which you should!), visit harleyandharlett.com.

-       

The Music Behind the Mask

UK-born, SBTRKT (Subtract) is a producer and DJ who is blowing up in the states. The mysterious dude, said to be Aaron Jerome, refuses to reveal his identity, age or music background to press and fans. He even goes as far as wearing his tribal-style mask on and off stage, for private interviews, photo shoots and press conferences. After years of sharpening his craft, this self-taught producer experimented by combining sounds of 2-step, house, soul, techno and dubstep that blend with surging melodies and complex percussion. SBTRKT’s unique noise has recently begun commanding American music-lovers’ attention.   

In SPIN Magazine’s latest “Dance Issue”, SBTRKT told journalist, Marc Hogan, “SBTRKT is essentially about getting away from the idea that you have to talk about your music to show what it’s about.” He went further by saying, “For me, it was more about creating music and letting it work on its own merits- not having to go out and say, ‘I am the person behind this, this is where I was born, and this is why I make what I do.’”

He isn’t going unnoticed, that’s for sure, with such fans and collaborations as Radiohead, Drake and Mark Ronson. Similar to the eclectic and electric sound of fellow UK-born singer-songwriter James Blake, SBTRKT’s album presents the soft, soulful sound of U.K. singer, Sampha, who also joins the masked man live on stage.

SBTRKT will be headlining a US tour this month and will be performing live in Boston at ROYALE on Wednesday, November 2^nd, 2011. For tickets: http://www.boweryboston.com/event/57607/

RECLAIM YOUR TV

KarmaloopTV has been promoting their up and coming TV Network for the past few months.
Karmaloop has signed famous rapper, singer, record producer and fashion designer, Pharrell Williams as
creative director.

Marketing strategies focus mainly on social networking, primarily Twitter and Facebook.
The hashtag, #RECLAIMYOURTV has become a Tweeting trend and has spread throughout the US as well as many other countries. Karmaloop, the world's largest online urban street wear retailer has close to 60,000 followers on Twitter, which has helped the TV network gain attention. KarmaloopTV has about 7,000 followers and plans to have over 20,000 by the time the cable network launches in January of 2012.

Their slogan, "Reclaim Your TV" is a call to action to America's youth, to move on from today's current
television trends. These trends include the numerous dim-witted reality shows that have taken over our televisions in the past decade, such as teenage pregnancy and wealthy, insane housewife reality shows. KarmaloopTV plans on highlighting only the hippest, up and coming music, fashion and entertainment trends, as well as television shows that are different, witty, entertaining and what creative director Pharrell Williams says, will finally, "Give America's youth a voice."

Currently, KTV has been holding a contest for a prize of $2,500. Contestants must submit videos of themselves explaining why they want to "Reclaim their TV". Anyone can vote for the hundreds of videos that have been submitted online and the person with the highest votes wins. This contest has been one of many of KTV's different marketing strategies spread through social networking. KARMALOOP.COM recently held a contest that is still going on, where contestants must submit pictures of themselves to be flown out to model for the retail website, and win a large gift certificate to the the website.

Karmaloop is gaining a much larger following than ever before. Their main, online retailer is the only place to find underground brands, much of which are exclusive to Karmaloop. The company, which is the fastest growing company in Boston at the moment, is also opening a high-end men's clothing store beneath their online headquarters on Boylston Street. "Boylston Trading Company" will serve Boston's stylish men, who don't mind spending a large sum on well designed and made clothing. There will also be a bar inside the store, a feature that will set them apart from other Boston retailers and keep them up with the competitive trends of New York City, Los Angeles and San Francisco.