The Free Music Archive (FMA), a project by WFMU that’s based on the idea that free music downloads are a good thing for the music industry, has just launched and is now offering up 5,000 free tracks available for download. Go get ‘em.

Equipped with a bevy of volunteers as well as materials found from a trash bin at a construction site, LA-based artist Liz Glynn, pictured at left, relived the rise and fall of Rome in a 24-hour-long participatory performance at the New Museum this past Monday & Tuesday. Description and photos after the jump. Read more »

In an inspired example of collaborative, cross-media storytelling (or at least of creative marketing), RCRD LBL and Virgin Books have teamed together to release Tim Molloy’s debut novel How to Break Bad News—as well as its soundtrack.

The novel follows a twenty-something news producer as he goes on an undercover assignment at fast-food restaurant. The soundtrack, composed by Molloy’s friend and former roommate Eric Steuer, complements the story, much in the way a soundtrack will complement and heighten emotions in movies, television shows, and video games. Tim says: Read more »

This is the kind of thing I’m afraid I’ll accidentally do. Or else it’s the kind of thing I’ve secretly always wanted to do. I’m actually not so sure. From The New York Times‘ ArtsBeat:

A spokesman for the Broadway production of Neil LaBute’s “reasons to be pretty” said Sunday that the show’s producers had beefed up the security detail at the Lyceum Theater following an incident at the Saturday evening performance. During the first act, the character played by Marin Ireland (“Blasted”) lights into her ex-boyfriend, played by Thomas Sadoski (“Becky Shaw”), with a litany of all the things she believes are wrong with him. A male audience member must have felt something a bit too personal in the verbal assault because he stood, called her a bitch twice, said a few other things that cannot be printed, and stormed out of the theater. For those in attendance: No, it was not part of the show. Read more »

I spent the other night hanging at home with my friends, chatting and drinking dirt-ass-cheap champagne (because we’re classy, you see). For one reason or another our conversation drifted to the Kindle. I’ve always wondered why I never warmed to Kindle like everyone else seemed to. My friend Kenna provided a succinct, practical response to that question that I wanted to post it here.

While everyone else’s parents just adored the Kindle, all four of us hated it. Kenna reasoned:

“I think we’re the generation who knows how to use technology right. It’s so much a part of our lives that we feel comfortable finding new ways to use it–like Twitter or Facebook. But our parents can only understand it if they use technology to replace something else that they’re already familiar with. So they feel comfortable reading books on a Kindle, but we don’t.”

Well, it’s safe to say video games have done well for themselves. No longer are they considered the “junk food” of entertainment. Nope, now slaying the dragon and saving the princess (or whatever you’re into) might be considered a literary genre.

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