BOOK: Vans Book (published 6/09)
AUTHOR: Doug Palladini
FUN FACT: Vans has been holding it down for over 40 years and started making special customizaions in the early days of the company (when iD was still something that Freud talked about). Shoppers could bring their favorite fabric by the factory, and the Van Dorens would put together a pair of shoes for them that week. You can design your own Vans through the company site today.
WHY COMPLEX IS CO-SIGNING IT: While the kids are going nuts because Vans is O.G. skate, affordable, and there are about a billion colorways to choose from, this book breaks down a history of the company. History is boring, right? Author/curator Doug Palladini pre-empts your study hall whining by giving you the tales from the super heroes’ mouths. Chapters with skaters Tony Alva, Steve Caballero and John Cardiel; surfer Joel Tudor; music legends’ tales from the Warped Tour; and a photo essay on Frenchman Dimitri Coste’s crazy collection each show a facet of the company that you wouldn’t know otherwise. When it comes to reading we need a lot of pictures to look at, and this does the trick with 208 pages that include photographs by champions of the lens CR Stecyk, R. Grant Brittain, Art Brewer, and Trevor Graves.
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Although we consider ourselves fairly well rounded individuals, we're always looking for ways to better ourselves. At first when this new book What A Man Should Know, Vol. 1'J.Crew's first foray into a men's guide'fell into our laps, we were worried that it was a long-winded outline on how to correctly crease our khakis. But it turns out the book offers principals about the basic knowledge a man should have, in fashion and everywhere else.
The WASPY shop tapped author Max Blagg to lay out 50 fundamentals for dudes to follow if they want to “raise cocktail conversation to a whole new level.” You'll be able to get the handy step-up guide at J.Crew's new Tribeca Men’s Shop or online for $20. If you buy one at the Men’s Shop, you'll also get your choice of a limited edition necktie. See the ties and our 5 favorite tips from the book below…
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Okay, so for some reason a company has bought the stage rights to American Psycho and is planning to turn it into an ’80s musical. And we’ll be frank: we don’t understand this AT ALL.
Sure, some movies have worked on Broadway–Legally Blond, Shrek, The Producers–but those are all broad comedies. We’re talking about a movie that was adapted from an actual, no-pictures, BOOK. Two severed thumbs down, American Psycho: The Musical. And in case any of you would-be impresarios are considering adapting other books-that-became-movies into musicals, take our advice and don’t do it. Especially not these five book/movies…
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It's been 15 years since Japanese street fashion label A Bathing Ape chin-checked cool guys who thought they'd seen and worn everything. The brand still generates unmatched blog buzz with everything from key chains to varsity jackets, but now the first official chronicle of the company is coming to bookstores.
Aptly titled A Bathing Ape, the 368-page book takes a look back at Bape's design history, through pictures of products like G-Shocks, all over printed hoodies, and sneakers, along with the celebrities like Kanye West, Pharrell and T.I who wear them. The book will be distributed by Rizzoli International Publications and will retail for $60.00 in November. Check some preview pages after the jump.
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The Fourth of July weekend is supposed to be about cookouts, fireworks, and sharking, but if you’ve had enough outdoor fun and want to post up at the crib with a good book, you could do worse than Jeremy Fish’s latest, Once Upon A Time…
The SF-based artist/skate mogul/Aesop Rock pal has compiled some of his favorite drawings, photographs, and paintings in a leather-bound tome that retails for $50. Highlights include a foreword by the aforementioned Def Juxer and a section devoted to photos of people who’ve gotten tatted up with Fish’s work. Pick it up at Upper Playground stores or online and check a few pages from the book after the jump.
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As longtime comic book heads, we’ve always had a place in our heart for a well-rendered female form, whether She-Hulk, Jean Grey, or Witchblade (big up to our dude Mike Choi!). Of course, mainstream comic art has its limits'limits that have long been crossed in erotic art from the Kama Sutra to R. Crumb and Playboy’s Little Annie Fanny. And now those transgressions have been lovingly cataloged by Tim Pilcher, whose Erotic Comics: A Graphic History from Tijuana Bibles to Underground Comix comes out this month.
More than just a visual history, the book reads like a labor of love; images from pre-Depression nudie comics to modern-day Mexican sensacionales are presented along with insightful essays that make the book perfectly suitable for a coffee-table centerpiece (albeit an intesnsely NSFW one). After the jump, check out some relatively tame images from inside the book.
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The age-old problem with any kind of virtual sex'phone, cyber, telegraph'is that you can’t actually see who you’re talking to. But would you really want to? Behind those sexy voices are real people, who are now being revealed in the new photography book by Phillip Toledano called Phone Sex. In the coffee-table book, all of the operators divulge some anecdote or philosophy they’ve gained while on the job. Read the thick lady above’s confessional after the jump, and see more eye-opening photos from the book that drops in July.
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If you’ve read or watched Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, then you know the legend of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, the innovative journalist whose wild drug-fueled adventures became just as famous as his manic, “gonzo”-style observations. But who was the real man behind the ether? Academy Award-winning director Alex Gibney’s new documentary Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson strives to profile the late writer like never before.
Narrated by HST’s close friend Johnny Depp, the film uses reenactments of his life, scenes from his movies and interviews with friends like President Jimmy Carter and Hell’s Angels bigwig Sonny Barger to unravel his outrageous life. The film hits theaters on July 4, so get familiar with the trailer below.
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Whether or not you read Charles Burns‘ critically-acclaimed comic series Black Hole, you might have seen his surreal artwork. He did the cover for Iggy Pop’s 1990 album Brick By Brick and created the classic art for Coke’s short-lived OK! soda, along with a slew of other books and commercial work.
Now, French publisher United Dead Artists has collected some of his best frames for a new book called Permagel. The anthology includes 32 large-format printings of art from Black Hole, Big Baby and the rest of Burns’ work thorugh the years. Right now it’s only available in Europe, but a U.S. printing can’t be far behind. View more frames from the book below.
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Regardless of how the movie adaptation turns out, Toby Young’s 2003 memoir How To Lose Friends And Alienate People is one of the most hilarious accounts of the publishing world ever written. The story follows freewheeling British journalist Young, who moves to New York and spends five years at Vanity Fair magazine, where he tries to make it in high-pressure Conde Nast culture. As you probably gathered from the title, it doesn’t go so well.
The movie’s first trailer just leaked, and it seems to be lacking the subtle, snarky sense of humor that made the book such a success (although Jeff Bridges’ Graydon Carter impression looks solid). Still, it was directed by Curb Your Enthusiasm vet Robert Weide, so we’re willing to reserve judgement until we see more. The movie comes out on October 3, so watch the preview below.
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