#Downtown nyc

[vsthepomegranate]

Born in Flames (1983)

by Lizzie Borden

[truckman816]

Manhattan Island 🗽🗽🗽Southern Tip 🚕🚕🚕🚕🚕Downtown 🏛🏛🏛🏛🏛🏛

[biglisbonnews]

Thoom Makes Downtown Grime Sexy in 'The Lights Are Falling Down' Sometimes you just need a messy make-out in Seward Park. For her latest single "The Lights Are Falling Down," Lebanon-born artist Thoom just wants to remind you "how fun making out is." With dirt-caked fingernails, furious ass-grabs and explicit tongue-heavy kisses, even the Dimes Square pigeons pecking meager scraps of garbage are cooing in excitement. New York-based Thoom lives for the downtown grime. Whether she's producing grungy trip-hop Soundcloud tracks in Chicago's DIY scene or smashing stages with New York's downtown club acts like the Frost Children and The Dare, Thoom's nose for offbeat energy and "the scene" is synonymous with her artistic brand. After releasing her debut album Pork in 2020, a nine-track amalgamate of stormy electronics and contemplative lyricism from her time in Beirut, Chicago and Berlin, Thoom's newest single "The Lights Are Falling Down" teases her forthcoming EP, Fantasy for Danger, due later this month. Inspired by the Safdie brothers' severe film Heaven Knows What, Thoom set out to capture the gritty carnality of spontaneous attraction. Crawling around Canal Street's Seward Park in her fur coat and undies, Thoom curates a relic from our Tumblr years, a mini-erotica whose mission is purposefully surface. "The documentation is the message," Thoom tells PAPER. "I’m just trying to express what I think is sexy and tell a story." The result is an intoxicating, psychosexual moment in time, existing for the feeling of something — a fantasy, a craving, a surrendering — and nothing more.Thoom's creative hand is potent and instinctively flippant, channeling her musical prowess with a penchant for chaos and experimentation. To listen to Thoom is to surrender to her dominion. "The Lights Are Falling Down" is as intriguing and intense as she is.Check out the PAPER premiere of the music video below, along with a behind-the-scenes look into the artistic creation of Thoom.Is your latest single “The Lights Are Falling Down” about love, lust or heartbreak?It’s about wanting something because it's bad for you. And maybe being a little turned on by it.The "The Lights Are Falling Down" music video is said to be inspired by the Safdie brothers' Heaven Knows What. Why was this a film that resonated with you?I love the Safdies so much. I just saw the make-out scene and I was like, that's exactly what making out feels like! That’s all you really need to tell a love story. Because the style you make-out in, how you use your hands, the clothes you wear and where you’re making out all tell the story on their own. I wanted the guy to look like Kurt Cobain and also vaguely resemble the classic Dimes Square mid-20s guy with medium-length hair that’s just drowning in pussy for some reason. And I want to remind people how fun making out is.Is there a personal story that also partially inspired “The Lights Are Falling Down”?My first boyfriend who was a car mechanic. That's why his fingernails were always dirty.You portray a hypersexual character in the video, filming intimate scenes in a public setting. Is this visual crafted using the lens of the female gaze, male gaze or neither?That’s hard to say because sometimes I look at girls as if I’m looking at them through a man's eyes. I directed the short film for myself, though. I love turning men into objects of desire. It gives me ultimate satisfaction.Can you elaborate on the various points of view you played with while directing "The Lights Are Falling Down?"I wanted it to be like someone sitting in the park with binoculars watching us. I wanted details of the make-out and ultimate sensuality. I love when you’re watching something and you feel like you can smell, touch or feel the image. I also just wanted it to be one thing. Barely anything else — only hints of a backstory.How have your frequent collaborators — like Club Eat, Frost Children and The Dare — influenced your sound or art practice?I’m totally a sponge. When I first moved to New York, I was going to as many shows as I could in every scene. That’s what I love about New York, you can just drift to all these different small cultures. I have to do that, otherwise I get bored quick. I remember one night I was going to see Harrison [The Dare] play. I called Ren [Club Eat] and was like wanna come see my friend play? He’s so good! At that time, different scenes didn’t really mesh like they do now. Now it’s a cesspool of artists, musicians, dancers, etc. Everyone’s feeding off of each other.You’ve described your work as “parodying the Western gaze.” What does that mean to you?I go through phases, you know? That's the nature of being an immigrant. Sometimes I feel very Arab, and ultimately that's who I am, but sometimes I feel like an American. I grew up in Lebanon and, during the war, me and my brother bought this Team America movie and we’d watch it and run around yelling, “Derka, Derka, Muhammad jihad!” What's next for Thoom?World domination!Photography by Francisco Russo https://www.papermag.com/thoom-2659638252.html

[dustedmagazine]

As for the Future — S-T (Self-Release)

As for the Future mixes downtown cool with breezy bossa nova, convening a passel of New York City fixtures with Brazilian roots and inclinations. David Nagler, an experienced session hand who plays for Jon Oliver’s Last Week tonight, is the main songwriter and bandleader. He splits vocal duties with Alexia Bomtempo, a Rio native who has made her mark with a highly regarded tribute to Caetano Veloso and a jazz-bossa nova album titled Suspirio. Mauro Refosco, one of David Byrne’s go-to percussionists, adds a syncopated swing in hand drums, kit and that marker of Brazilian music, the cuica. And Ryan Keberle plays a fluid, evocative trombone, an odd instrument for such a small ensemble but essential here.

Nagler is a very clever lyricist, though perhaps a bit too clever on wordsmith-y entries like “Koan for the Music Business” and “My Therapist.” The former asks, “If a record drops in the forest, does anybody hear it?” to a swishing, shushing, ebullient cadence, imagining forest creatures trying to make sense of pop songs unheard by human audiences. It’s a little bit of inside baseball even before it name checks The Music Modernization Act, but hey, what do the writing teachers always advise: write what you know.

The Bomtempo tracks benefit from a sleek, fluid vocal style that slips through and past any verbal complications. She sighs and croons through “The Mob,” with effortless cool, unruffled and at ease, as clacking, rim-heavy percussion pushes forward and Keberle’s trombone executes arch, knowing brass flourishes in the interstices. It’s possible that the lyrics are just as fussily clever here as elsewhere, but they’re swallowed up in effortless sonic hedonism.

The sound here is very smooth and buoyant, whether it supports Nagler’s indie confessionals or Bomtempo’s chilly sensualism. It’s clear that everybody participating is very, very good at their respective instruments, and that they take pleasure in their blend of pop and Brazilian jazz. And yet, though the beats are heated and polyrhythmic, the brass inflamed, the songs come across as intellectual exercises. (For whatever it’s worth, the band name comes from an alternate title of a Claire Lispector novel.)  They’re too clean by half, and choked with jazz-handed, theatre kid energy. Not for me.

Jennifer Kelly

[adugas]

John Sex

[theladwhoisweird]

Repeating "Lovers Rock" by TV Girl twenty times or more in a row in order to fully absorb that downtown girl feeling.

And everytime i hear the line, "Are you sick me?", I would reply, "NEVER! I won't repeat you if I am." 🎧☕📖🎸💌🧸🍁🌫️👟📷

[gentlemanmotorslifestyle]

[diana-andraste]

Untitled (Hands), Jared Bark, c. 1973, from Photo Booth series

[gossamerg1rl]

the vibes i bring to the function

[bambi-eyes444]

mine <3

[vsthepomegranate]

Dirt ‘zine (1975)

By Mark Morrisroe

[newm8n]

˙⛧₊☾ its new york baby

[biglisbonnews]

Big Dumb Baby Invites You Into the Amusing World of 'Terrible Twos' "Have more fun!" Ashley Mayorquin exclaims as a way of introducing PAPER to the thesis of her newest project, Terrible Twos. Known to the Brooklyn music scene as Big Dumb Baby, the Nashville-born actor turned singer-songwriter, released her second EP today, a playful love letter to leaning into your silly side. The unhurried, thumping bass and glib lyrics that punctuate lead track "Jenny's Place" bring you into the amusing world of Big Dumb Baby. The alt-rock track offers a teasing but cheerful insight into the life of a Brooklyn 20-something — a wonderland of many, many roommates, city mice and dirty dishes.Describing her sound as "Shania Twain meets Pavement," the young artist infuses downtown indie-rock with a unique sunny Southern charm, proposing a distinctive and unfussy songwriting style that's reminiscent of Wet Leg and Soccer Mommy, with a cheerful Nashville twist.For the release of her fun-filled EP Terrible Twos, PAPER sat down with Big Dumb Baby for a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the project and how the Brooklyn music scene influenced her Southern sound. Tell me about your stage name.Initially, Big Dumb Baby was only going to be the title of my first EP, but I changed my artist name to it shortly after I released it. I love to laugh and have fun and be silly; the name Big Dumb Baby encapsulates this for me. The project and lyrics are written from my own personal experience, but it’s fun to tap into a persona just a little bit.What does this project mean to you?Coming from an acting background, I’ve always enjoyed the act of storytelling. However, for me, music is a much more accessible form of self-expression. Big Dumb Baby has been a way to share my experiences and connect with a wide range of people. Nothing makes me happier than hearing about how people relate to my songs.Is there a “thesis” to Terrible Twos?Have more fun! The first EP was a product of a much darker point in my life. However, these last few years have been really, really joyful. Terrible Twos is an expression of that.Terrible Twos is your second EP. What did you bring into this process that you learned from the experience of making your first EP?Oof, how to be direct. During my first EP, I was surrounded by a bunch of studied musicians and felt I lacked the vocabulary to communicate what I was hearing for my songs. Through playing shows and taking on the role of band leader, I’ve gotten more confidence around verbally formulating how I’d like things to sound, and in turn, I’ve become more hands-on in the production process.How has your sound evolved from the start of Big Dumb Baby?If you listen to my first EP, there's a lot of genre flipping. I was still figuring out how to blend my musical tastes in a way that was sonically cohesive. While all still distinct, the songs on Terrible Twos are more blended with one another. I think each song sounds like a Big Dumb Baby song, if that makes sense. I’ve tapped further into my own songwriting style, and I’m continuing to refine this in the new songs I’m writing, which is exciting!You describe your sound as “Shania Twain meets Pavement.” Can you tell me a little about what that means? Indie-rock is such a vague descriptor that can mean so many things, so I dislike referring to Big Dumb Baby solely as “indie-rock." If you’ve listened to my music, there’s no denying I’m very influenced by '90s indie rock projects like Pavement and Liz Phair, but underneath that, there are elements of pop and country (the Shania part). I’m from Nashville, Tennessee and grew up listening to pop-country radio every day on my way to school. While I don’t strive for this sound, I think it subconsciously seeps into my music and I’m totally okay with it.How does the Brooklyn music community compare to your experience in Nashville?The main difference is there is simply more of a variety of art being made in New York. Nashville is an incredible city for music, but my community here is much more expansive. My community here is not only made up of musicians but designers, writers, photographers, etc.How does the Brooklyn scene influence your music?The amount of talent here is mind-boggling. There are too many people to list, but for example: Shallowhalo, Precious Human, Grumpy and May Rio — not only insane writers, but they’ve all tapped into a sound that is so distinct to them. Everyone is doing their own thing and being really good at it. It’s pushed me to continue to explore and expand on what makes Big Dumb Baby different. I used to shy away from the theatricality of my writing because I didn’t want to be pigeonholed as the ex-theatre girlie, but being surrounded by artists who are unapologetic has given me more confidence to do the same.What artists are you really digging right now?Definitely all of the artists in my circle that already I’ve mentioned. In addition, my friends Carol (another NYC legend), Brennan Wedl and I.R. Michael have all written some of my favorite songs ever. Outside of that, I’ve been on an '80s deep dive. I can't stop listening to the albums Skylarking by XTC and Hats by The Blue Nile. Björk, Ted Lucas, J.J. Cale and Caetano Veloso are artists that also stay in rotation.What do you want people to know about you?I’ve been learning how to DJ with 19 friends in a rigorous training program we call “DJ Academy." Post-EP release, I’ll have more time on my hands, so someone should book DJ Academy for a weekly residency or something.Photography by Meghan Marin https://www.papermag.com/big-dumb-baby-terrible-twos-2659737896.html

[thunderstruck9]

Jorge Castillo (Spanish, 1933), "Downtown" from the portfolio Urban Landscapes New York City. Pigment ink print, sheet: 139 x 106 cm.

[53v3nfrn5]

Diane Cook: ‘Up on the Roof’ for National Geographic (2008)

Top: Thousands of grasses and plants were used to create Chicago City Hall's award-winning rooftop.

Bottom: Blossoming sedums brighten the roof of a Manhattan architectural firm as its windows reflect the Empire State Building.

[shootersview]