// August 28th, 2009 // No Comments » // Events
Make sure to come stop by 124 Ossington Ave tomorrow for the last night market of the season. These parties are great. Good people, cool stuff for sale (including Grade Scool tees) and from what I hear there will be some very special guests throughout the night. Very much hope to see you all out.
// August 27th, 2009 // No Comments » // Clothing, Music
Little did we know but one of the best inside track blogs as to what’s new in hip hop is being written from Toronto’s outskirts in the form of Peep The Stoop. If you like the hip hop music, culture, clothing any or of all of it you need to be adding this blog to your daily favourites on the quick time.
Never more than a few hours behind and usually a few hours ahead Peep The Stoop has the realm on lock and its becoming the newswire for hip hopheads all around. You can peep the stoop at www.peepthestoop.wordpress.com
Now you know.
// August 26th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music
// August 25th, 2009 // No Comments » // Art, Music
This came through @jayelectronica on Twitter. Its an aboslutely gorgeous application for youtube videos and he couldnt of picked a more enchanting song and video to get lost in the mosaic that is presented. Follow the link below and enjoy.
We are gifted so many gorgeous things everyday.
// August 21st, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Books
This store may boast the most intriguing and bizarre collection of books in the whole of Toronto. It’s the type of place that you immediately want to visit again after only spending a few moments browsing the titles that range from “All About Carnivals” to “Men In Women’s Clothes” (by the way that last one is from 1950). The store houses a personality all its own; the blood red colour of the floor, fans spinning incessantly overhead and the pungent odor that can only accompany books bound in the 19th century.
Some of the titles are eerily abstruse but in a manner that will peak your interest and beckon you to look onward. The staff is most helpful, inquire about the mailing list and if there happens to be something on your esoteric side that needs to be fed, they may just find it for you. Spend more than a moment and you will walk away with something creatively random that will keep you stimulated until your next visit.
Hours: Mon-Tues By appointment; Wed-Sat 11– 6pm; Sun 12-5pm
Location: 1229 Dundas Street West (416 531 2123)
www.monkeyspaw.com
Best Find:
Man Before Metals by N. Joly
Quote of Interest:
“By the help of the ruins which remain beneath the waters, let us endeavor to reconstruct in imagination these ancient dwellings, which a well-known savant, for once mistaken, asserted to have been built and inhabited by beavers.”
- Pg. 107. Joly, N. Man Before Metals, 1883 Kegan Paul, Trench and Co.
// August 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // History
You know how sometimes you are introduced to a personality on the web that you just fall in love with. There is some intrinsic quality in the eyes of the messenger that creates a bond with you, the viewer, on whatever adventures your new found lifelebrity leads you through.
Greg Sam is a lifelebrity, and while were fortunate to call him one of our closest of boys, his novelty as a journalist through his own personal travels is not reserved to only those who call him a friend.
If you are into blogs, and the lives of others, take time to tune into the photos, videos and tracks that play out in the document that is G Sam’s adventures. You can follow along with Greg at http://gregorysam.tumblr.com/ or on Youtube at www.youtube.com/gsam22
Travel safe G.
// August 18th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music
Toronto Bands, Times Neue Roman and Tonka Puma have been making songs together for the past few weeks. Yesterday they recorded “TORONTO, ” a song inspired by pool-hopping, humid thunderstorms, house parties and the garbage strike. They thought they’d share the in-progress demo with you Ontario kids. Summertime, Toronto.
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// August 17th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music
New mix out to start your week off right from two of our local favourites, Woodhands.
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// August 13th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Clothing, Events
Five & Dime is Toronto’s very own life style fashion trade show featuring many of the most innovative and stylish culture based brands. This year to kick off the show, Five & Dime and LRG are presenting Raekwon at Sound Academy on Saturday night with their “Get Nautical” VIP Schooner Sail (boat cruise) from 7 to 11pm. The boat will bring you back just as Raekwon steps on the stage. Walk your VIP ass down the plank and into the show. Not a bad night at all.
We have a pair of passes to give away to both!
Real simple, to win you must email info(at)gradescool.com with your answer to the following question.
List the original members of the Wu-Tang Clan.
All emails with the correct names listed will be entered into a random draw that will be held Friday (tomorrow) afternoon at 4pm.
Ready. Set. Go!
// August 12th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music, The Left Coast
Introducing our newest contributor, Andrew deWaard, with The Left Coast:
Photo credit: Gerald Deo
A weekend overshadowed with the Hughes Blues, it is perhaps not so strange to think of the Japandroids show here in Vancouver Friday night as a similarly nostalgic ‘homecoming’. This is a band that spent 2 years and 2 EPs wandering the wilderness of the largely venue-less (RIP Dick’s on Dicks) Vancouver indie/’weird punk’/lo-fi scene, only to spend the summer of 2009 blowing the hell up, fast. Propelled by a gushing Pitchfork Best New Track and Best New Music, East Vancouver’s (retrospective) pride and joy rapidly rose from the cover of our fair city’s weekly, to woxy darling, to Rolling Stone, and straight to the top: the New York Times has now printed — and ABC News’ Charles Gibson stoicly muttered — the (let’s admit, pretty stupid) word Japandroids. At a Constantines show here in Van a few months back, the Japs’ Young Hearts Spark Fire (mp3) came over the PA and a sizable chunk of the crowd started singing along: this was the new Vancouver Anthem. (Thanks to yours truly, the song briefly made a run for New York Magazine’s Song of the Summer). Oh, and dude had emergency surgery on a perforated ulcer (scar pic!) while they were on tour, a potentially-fatal abrupt stop to a long-awaited and recently resumed North American tour. So it’s been a bit of a summer for the lads, and it was good to have our ‘Rockers East Vancouver‘ back for a night. (more…)
// August 10th, 2009 // No Comments » // Books
Usually patios are reserved for beer and coffee drinkers attempting a mid-afternoon escape from the drudgery of the everyday, at Kensington’s This Ain’t The Rosedale Library this sought-after refuge is reserved for books. Bins and wheeled shelves greet you as you walk through the bargain section. The pink and blue backsplashes behind the books highlight the covers of poetry, art, philosophy and a delectable variety of random literature that simply implores you for a closer look. That random art magazine that is un-locatable at the conventional literary outlets are all here, waiting to be rifled through. The staff is responsive to all questions and do not hesitate to make recommendations depending on the book that you decide on. They can point you in the right direction or leave you to your rambling.
A store that houses great books but offers the variety to lead one in a new direction is a rare find. Ask about getting Allen Ginsberg on tape, the prospect is enough to warrant a visit.
Hours: Mon-Wed 11-8pm; Thurs-Sat 10-10pm; Sun 10-6pm
Location: 86 Nassau Street In Kensington Market (416 929 9912) www.thisaint.ca
Best Find:
Mexico City Blues by Jack Kerouac
Quote of Interest:
“I know how to withstand poison
And sickness known to man.
In this void. I’m no apprentice
When it comes to remembering
The eternity of suffering
Quietly I’ve been through”- Pg. 110. Kerouac, Jack. Mexico City Blues, 1959 Jack Kerouac
// August 10th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music
It’s been viewed over two and half million times, but maybe you havn’t seen it and probably I’m watching it again.
// August 5th, 2009 // No Comments » // Music
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Alexander The has a new song out for download. 15 Million Miles will get your August nights hop’in as up tempo drums and horns get your boots a ready for walking, running, or dancing on the spot. You can download your own copy of the song off www.alexanderthe.com.
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