Medium

Renowned illustrator Antar Dayal has just released his limited edition Obama print, the latest in the Artists for Obama series which includes prints from Shepard Fairy and Scot Hansen. Perhaps not as well known by the cool kids as Shepard Fairy, Antar Dayal is a prolific illustrator, best know for his scratchboard engravings. His client list ranges from Bank of America and American Express to Apple Computer and Captain Morgan and now the Barack Obama campaign. Mr. Dayal tells us his reason for creating the print for the campaign.

I am honored to support Barack Obama’s history-making presidential bid through one of his many visionary platforms, including recognizing the importance of art in America. My artwork is inspired by his words, wisdom, accomplishments, and expression of our hopes and dreams for a better America. Our world is facing seemingly insurmountable economic and environmental challenges. It is a rare occurrence to behold a leader like Barack Obama who understands what America must do in order to reclaim itself on the world stage. As a first generation immigrant, I have confidence that America can collectively overcome these challenges under Obama’s presidency. YES WE CAN!

There are some pretty cool images of the engraving and printing process up on his blog, so go check it out and check out the video from the Obama campaign. Purchases of the Artists for Obama prints are 100% contributions to the campaign and count toward your overall contribution limit of $2300.

Links
Artists for Obama/Obama Store

Texas hip-hop icon, Devin The Dude, will be bringing his eccentric brand of hip-hop to the 512 on August 1. Outside of his longtime Rap-a-lot partnerships Devin has also worked with everyone from De La Soul to Dr. Dre and is definitely one in a million in terms of showmanship and dedication to his craft. Opening will be Austin natives Gerald G, Southbound and BigBadMedium.com comrades, Mike and Ike. Also opening will be Fat Tony, Giovanni, COD and Kriminals. Quite a varied display of Texas hip-hop, which should go over well with Devin’s varied fan base.

Links
Devin The Dude
Gerald G
Southbound
Mike and Ike
TheScrewShop.com
AustinSurreal.com

The big homie Dj Manny was on News 8 Austin today looking like Richie Tenenbaum …working out and dj’ing at Pure Austin off of only two hours of sleep.  The story is pretty interesting…but the video really makes it great.

“Hot girl, we’d look hot.”  © Dj Manny

Good stuff homie.

Check out the video here. 

Yo! It’s been a bit since I’ve caught up with y’all, been busy with all sort of stuff, but what I always do is listen to music. I just posted up some tracks onto Muxtape.com…how come no one told me about this earlier? Apparently it was just launched in March, but it’s a pretty cool way for wannabe djs to post up some playlist and real djs to post up actual mixes. For us non-djs , it’s sort of like when you used to make record a tape for someone, except easier and all online. According to wikipedia, the website has a pretty cool backstory:

Muxtape is a website that allows users to upload playlists of MP3s, based on the idea of a mixtape. It was created by Justin Ouellette in March of 2008.

Ouellette came up with the idea after being a disc jockey at his university’s radio station. The site became unexpectedly popular within two days of its launch. In April, Ouellette estimated the number of users as “ostensibly … more than the population of Germany, less than the population of Japan”, however this fact is not supported by any third party traffic estimates, which show muxtape userbase at being less than 100,000. The site is supported by links to Amazon.com. It has a very simple design and cannot be searched. Ouellette explains that the important part of a mixtape, which he tried to preserve on his site, is about discovering new music instead of someone finding music they are already familiar with.

Any site that is about discovering new music is cool with me, especially when it has usable features like linking to your current last.fm account to scrobble your songs. I posted up the Southern Soul mix to test it out, pretty easy uploading and easy way to share what you’re listening to. Either way go listen to my muxtape (and a few others as well) Post up yours in the comments section, let us know what you’re listening to.

http://thehonestape.muxtape.com/

http://rawla.muxtape.com/ 
(very dope LA mix by RawLa)

http://starvingartist.muxtape.com/
Australian artist Paul Walsh’s mix

Damn! I thought last weeks remix was fire….for the second in The Five One’s series of remixes and cutting room floor material we have a The Five One’s remixed and revamped version of N.E.R.D.’s “Kill Joy.” Not only does it feature new verses from The Five One, but it’s reproduced with some added sections and keys. Peace!

Download
NERD-KillJoy (The Five One Mix)

Links
Five One Official Page
Five One on Myspace