Month: October 2021

The sneaker just might be culture’s most effective modern-day canvas. These days, names like Hatfield, Abloh, and Bembury hold just about as much cultural weight as Haring, Warhol, and Basquiat. If you’re a sneakerhead, I challenge you to give me the name of the artist who created the last painting that moved you. Having trouble? Now think about the last sneaker collaboration that had you frothing at the mouth. Was it by Aleali May, Sean Wotherspoon, or Kanye West? Did it make you want to dive deep into the designer’s inspirations and reference points? More importantly, did it make you check your bank account?

A fire pair of sneakers will get people lining up around the block. But even the most exclusive colorways can be bought on GOAT or StockX just days after launch for a markup. A true custom kick? A bespoke one-off? Those are wearable pieces of art that straight up can’t be replicated.

To help you find a sneaker customizer that fits your vibe, we’re breaking down eight big names at the top of their respective games. These creative minds are sure to get snatched up by big brands one day. In the meantime, let them help you turn heads and draw the eyes of the most stylish strangers on the street.

Katty Customs

How big sneaker brands like Nike and Adidas haven’t scooped up Nicolle Knight aka Katty Customs yet is a mystery to us. So intricate they’re impossible not to fall in love with yet so seamless that they look factory-made, the work of Katty Customs is consistently top-notcht. It’s no wonder that Knight has attracted the eyes of celebrities like Allen Maldonado of Sneakerheads fame — for whom she made a truly wild pair of Jordan 1s, managing to capture the actor’s multi-faceted career while reflecting his restless spirit.

Whether she’s making shoes for Chris Brown, Saweetie, or Zion Williamson, Katty approaches each design with a level of craft and attention to detail that offers insight into the personality of whoever she is designing for without ever veering toward cheesy “writing on the shoe” maximalism. She understands that your sneakers are a statement and she ensures that each design she undertakes is dope enough to captivate onlookers while also holding secrets and easter eggs for the wearer. It’s a fine tightrope to balance and she aces it every time.

Whether she’s putting a luxurious spin on a high-top AJ1 or dressing a Jordan IV in bold tones that would make even UnionLA envious, Knight’s designs will help you grab eyeballs in a major way. And isn’t that the whole point, at the end of the day?

The Shoe Surgeon

Dominic Ciambrone’s moniker Shoe Surgeon is more than just a name. Ciambrone truly embodies that title, approaching his custom designs with a level of intense care and commitment to breaking sneakers down to the studs. Through his Los Angeles-based Surgeon Studios, Ciambrone and his team of fellow sneaker surgeons do everything from elegant dye work to swapping the sole of one shoe and putting it on another.

Yes, they’re on that Frankenstein shit.

Recently, Ciambrone has been sharing some of the work from fellow designers out of the Surgeon Creators Academy and it’s jaw-dropping to see all of the talent he’s collected under one roof. This is Kanye making My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy-level stuff we’re talking about. With patchwork colorways and designs that rival pros like Tinker Hatfield and Virgil Abloh, Ciambrone and the work coming out of Surgeon Studios is always a thrill to behold.

Jake Danklefs

If I showed you a collection of Danklef original sneakers you wouldn’t be able to differentiate them from Nike’s originals. The level of craft and care displayed in each individual pair of sneakers customized by Danklef is unreal, whether he’s swapping a midsole or repainting a colorway, his work is seamless, expertly integrating his designs into the silhouettes he uses as his canvas.

Danklef’s Instagram feed is full of post after post of sneaker colorways that would otherwise snag top spots in every publication’s best sneaker year-end lists.. if only they were official! The fact that they aren’t — well, that makes them all the cooler.

Jigga

Donnell McFadden Brooks, aka Jigga produces beautiful saturated custom designs that display an intense level of detail. Whether he’s dropping a chaotic street art-inspired pair of AF-1s or a simple five-color remix on an Air Jordan, Brook’s designs have a lot of depth that helps make his designs jump out at you like a 3D painting. Brook’s consistently produces work that is a pleasure to get lost in, which is what you want on your Instagram feed.

Stomping Ground Customs

The work of Stomping Ground Customs (aka SGNY) has been featured on high-profile outlets like Complex, and High Snobiety thanks to the brand’s uniquely vibrant custom designs that look straight out of a stylish high production anime.

SGNY kicks vibrate with movement and energy and look more like something you’d see hanging in the halls of your museum than they do something you’d wear on your feet. This makes them feel all the more otherworldly when you actually do see someone rocking a pair!

Breanna Berry

Breanna Berry aka Colorado’s Queen Of Shoe Art is the go-to pick for professional sports players who want to step out onto the court or field with some custom drip. Her Instagram page is full of special sneakers she’s designed for players like Javonte Williams and Donta Williams and Berry has partnered with organizations like the MLB and the Boys & Girls Club to help bring her hand-painted custom designs to life.

If loud eye-catching graphic designs are your thing, Breanna Berry is the customizer for you.

Vandy

If you’re looking for a sneaker customizer with a robust line of customized products that drop at a rate that rivals your favorite sneaker brands, look no further than Vandy. Armed with a retro website that recalls the days of Web 1.0, Vandy customizes sneakers and apparel in a way that makes each piece feel like a brand new brand.

Vandy isn’t a customizer to follow if you’re looking for designs that hold the source material in high regard, instead, Vandy takes a more punk rock approach, smashing classic designs together with his own unique aesthetic to create something entirely new.

Vijz Bespokes

Sneaker customizers can’t really be described as subtle. Even when customizers aren’t plastering loud cartoon graphics and wild fonts on their designs, they still tend to utilize super saturated paint and bright combinations intended to catch your eye. Vijz Bespokes (pronounced “Vice”) takes a different approach.

Based in the Netherlands, Sam Van IJzendoorn, aka Vijz will go to great lengths to elevate each of his designs beyond the boundaries of the surface material he’s working with, whether that means cutting up and re-arranging a sneaker’s mudguard, readjusting a silhouette’s shape, or treating each panel on a single sneaker as a brand new canvas to execute a different idea.

It sounds like a radical approach, but Vijz is able to make big changes while still presenting an end result that looks elegant and undisturbed. He’s truly a master cobbler in the SNX game.

Jon Gruden recently resigned from the Las Vegas Raiders, but it had nothing to do with the Raiders’ performance on the football field. A series of emails Gruden had sent revealed homophobic, racist, and disturbing comments about members of the NFL, NFLPA, and others. As a result, anyone associated with Gruden is quickly removing him.

Among those is EA Sports Madden series. The most recent game, Madden 22, currently has Jon Gruden as the head coach of the Raiders. Today, EA Sports released a statement that Gruden would not only be removed as the Raiders head coach but would be removed from the game entirely. A generic likeness will replace him.

This isn’t the first time EA has responded quickly in a situation like this. When the Washington Football Team announced their plans to change their nickname from a name offensive to Native Americans, EA was quick to announce plans to do the same in Madden 21.

The change will likely come in the form of an upcoming patch that will provide the update to the game and remove Gruden from the Las Vegas sidelines, and it seems unlikely that Gruden will ever appear in the Madden games, on an NFL sideline, or in an NFL TV booth ever again.

Matt Amodio’s Jeopardy! streak came to a sudden and shocking end on Monday, but that’s nothing to sneeze at: With 38 consecutive wins, he has the second longest run in the game show’s history, ahead of James Holzhauer’s 33 wins but way behind Ken Jennings’ 74. In that time — only nine days of shooting, by the way, in which he banged out five episodes a day — he amassed a whopping $1.5 million in winnings. What’s he going to do with it? The answer: probably not much.

The 30-year-old grad student was on CNN doing a kind of exit interview, during which he was inevitably asked about how his life will change with a new bounty of cash. But his answer wasn’t as interesting as one of his Jeopardy! questions. “Boring answer, but I’m going to say my goal is to not touch a penny any time soon,” Amodio replied.

Of course, he’ll probably have to earmark a good chunk of that to pay for Yale University, where he’s a PhD student in computer sciences. Grad school ain’t cheap! But he should still have enough left over to live semi-comfortably. And he’ll always have those Jeopardy! GOAT competitions to line his pockets.

Amodio was also asked about experiencing a record Jeopardy! run in the midst of the Mike Richards mishegoss, which saw him having burning through a number of hosts, including the show’s now-infamous former executive producer-turned-almost-permanent emcee. But his answer about that was kind of boring, too.

“I was surprised by how little that affected me, because there’s a whole crew. Jeopardy ism’t just one person, it’s a team,” Amodio said. “And sure, one host was changing all the time, but there was so much that was the same. It felt pretty consistent throughout this whole thing.”

As for who should be the late Alex Trebek’s permanent replacement, Amodio doesn’t have an answer for that either. He said Mayim Bialik, who’s been filling in while the producers find a new one, was “fantastic.” And he says Jennings, who he hasn’t worked with (yet), would also be “fantastic.” But, you know, sometimes, in this wackadoodle world we live in, boring is good.

(Via CNN)

The phrase “shower thought” began appearing in the public lexicon somewhere after the turn of the century. Know Your Meme traces it back to around 2004 and its first appearance on Urban Dictionary was in 2009 when Mr. Kageka submitted an entry for “showerthought,” defining it as “an idea, thought or concept” that comes during part of a “morning routine.”

They’re defined on Reddit’s popular “Shower Thoughts” forum as “miniature epiphanies you have that highlight the oddities within the familiar.”

These thoughts seem to seep into our consciousness when we’re doing a mundane task that doesn’t require too much thought but allows our mind to wander, like when we’re taking a shower or brushing our teeth.

---

During these routine moments, the prefrontal cortex relaxes and your mind goes on autopilot, giving all of the bizarre brilliance we’ve subconsciously stored the chance to express itself.

For some of us, the thoughts come and go, we may smile a bit and then get on with our day. Others believe it’s their duty to share their shower thoughts with the world and they post them on Reddit.

Here are some of the more amusing recent entries:

“Somebody is probably mad at you for taking away their username,” —chizhi1234

“People that fake having a mental disorder clearly have one,” —UltimaBahamut93

“If you simply carry a mug with you, you’ll look like you belong anywhere,” —Peanutbuttered

“The generations in their older 20s and early 30s that vehemently hate TikTok is the beginning of millennials beginning to hate everything that young people do,” —crackshotslapshot

“Dryer lint is the average color of your clothes,” —Tragouls

A TokTokker by the name of @doublejynx has taken things a step further and recorded videos of himself coming up with shower thoughts every day for 365 days. In every video he shares a few of them, so he’s come up with more than a thousand over the course of the year.

His true brilliance is being able to have so many when it’s impossible to force yourself to have a shower thought. They come out of nowhere like a beautiful breeze or the sound of birds chirping.

Here are 18 of his best videos. Take a look at the entire post because there are some hidden gems in there.

“You might have made a decision that saved your life, without knowing it.”

“If he wanted to, Jeff Bezos could technically be Santa for a very large portion of the world.”

“If you add every number in existence, you’ll just get zero.”

“You can still see for a short time after being beheaded.”

“Every decision you’ve ever had led you to me.”

“There is a small percentage of rain that is made up of your tears.”

“You could be wearing the clothes you die in.”

“Why are there sidewalks in the movie Cars?”

“Your reflection is always slightly younger than you.”

“Everything you do could be the last time you do it.”

“You are traveling at least 1,000 miles per hour right now.”

“Every human in history has looked at the same sun you have.”

“What would happen if the atoms of a person somehow rejoined in the same exact way after they died?”

“Greek mythology was the Marvel Cinematic Universe of the ancient times.”

“There’s a waterfall of poo in every skyscraper.”

“Ghosts aren’t very effective against blind people.”

“We’ve woken up thousands of times and are still not used to it.”

“The older you get, the less people will attend your funeral.”

America is divided over a lot of political issues these days and it’s playing out on people’s lawns and flagpoles. Americans used to stay away from signaling their political beliefs from their homes unless it was a lawn sign near Election Day, but that’s changed a lot over the past five years.

In progressive neighborhoods, you’ll often see people with “We Believe” signs on their yards that show the homeowner supports liberal values such as equality, gay rights and Black Lives Matter. You’ll also see the occasional Pride flag to support LGBTQ rights.

In more conservative neighborhoods, you’ll find a wide variety of massive flags flying from people’s homes.

---

There is the Thin Blue Line flag.

These flags support police officers and started popping up after the rash of police shootings of unarmed Black people a few years back. On the one hand, they support law enforcement, but they also appear to be part of the backlash against the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Thin Blue Line flag.via Wikimedia Commons

There are also the thin blue, red and green line flags. These support cops, firefighters and the military all at the same time. Now, the funny thing is that the more colors people add to these flags, the closer they resemble LGBT Pride flags. Soon, we’re bound to come full circle.

The thin red, blue, and green line flag.via Amazon

Getting closer by the day.

LGBTQ flag. via Wikimedia Commons

There are also the big-ass Trump flags that either say, “Trump 2020,” “Trump 2024” or “Trump Won.”

“Trump Won” flag.via Amazon

The Gadsden Flag or the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag either means you’re a Libertarian or a Republican who likes guns even more than the average Republican.

The Gadsden flag.via Wikimedia Commons

Some Libertarians are moving away from the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag for the more inclusive, peace-loving “Don’t Tread on Anyone” flag. Because a true Libertarian believes in everyone’s personal freedom.

Don’t Tread on Anyone flag.via Proud Libertarain

There’s a new trend in conservative flags that should cause some alarm, and that’s the black flag. The black flag has been a symbol of anarchists throughout history but, in America, it has been a call to violence. During the Civil War, it was flown by Confederates to convey the opposite meaning of the white flag, which means surrender.

According to The Sun, Confederates would fly the black flag to communicate that “the unit would not give in nor surrender and that enemy combatants would be killed.”

That’s not a very kind message to send to one’s neighbors. Who wants to live next-door to anyone who proudly professes they are on the brink of murder? Why would anyone in a quiet suburban neighborhood need to tell anyone their back is against the wall and they can’t take it anymore?

What is happening in these neighborhoods or in America right now that has pushed them over the edge?

Is it the infrastructure bill? The tax cut for parents? The drop in the unemployment rate?

There are a lot of scary videos on TikTok of people hoisting the black flag to show that they’re ready to pop off at any minute and will take “no quarter.”

This guy in a quiet suburban nieghborhood is “not giving in” anymore.

This guy says America has gone “downhill” and to combat this, he’s showing his neighbors he’s ready to resort to violence.

This guy put out a cute little garden black flag to show he takes no prisoners.

Throwing up a huge black flag on your home doesn’t make you look tough, it shows that you have become irrationally afraid of people with different political beliefs and are on the brink of losing control. Your flag isn’t alerting your neighbors to the country’s impending doom, it’s actually a big red flag that shows you no longer believe in the spirit of American pluralism and feel the strange need to show everyone on the block.

Comedian Whitmer Thomas has been garnering attention for his 2020 comedy special, The Golden One, and now he’s announced a December tour that will feature some new material as well. The Golden One was produced by Bo Burnham (who has enjoyed some pandemic-related success of his own with Inside), Chris Storer, and A24, and came out in February of last year.

But as the special racked up rave reviews and continued resonating, Thomas continued working on new material and songs, building off pre-existing clips like “Partied To Death,” which you can also watch above. All the music from the show was actually released as an album which was titled Songs From The Golden One.

The short tour, dubbed The Collage Of Crap Mini Tour 2021, begins December 1 in Los Angeles and finishes up December 15 in Chicago. In an interview with our own Jason Tabrys last year, Thomas talked about how the blend of music and comedy helps him confront some of the darker subject matter he deals with. “I think it’s easier for me to write about it in music, but I feel more comfortable talking about it in comedy,” he said. “If there’s a joke or if there’s a larger funny thing, then it’s easier for me to talk about grief and stuff like that. Trauma.”

Check out the full tour dates on the poster below.

Sunflower Bean splashed onto the scene, fresh of their teenage years with 2016’s stunning debut Human Ceremony. They proved they were no fluke on 2018’s dashing and reflective Twentytwo In Blue and then again on the 2019 King Of The Dudes EP. The New York City trio of Julia Cumming, Nick Kivlen and Jake Faber have now released their first music of 2021 in the retro-minded “Baby Don’t Cry” and announced over a dozen tour dates.

The song is produced by Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Jacob Portrait and recorded partly at the famed Electric Lady and the band’s own studio. There’s a distinct callback to 50’s doo-wop trios on the song, but with a decidedly modern take that sees both Faber’s drums and a drum machine driving the rhythm. Cumming’s vocals have the same gravitational pull she showcased on Yves Tumor’s track “Strawberry Privilege” last year, and Kivlen’s jangly guitar, which has become a hallmark of the group, round out the welcome return. The band commented on how focusing on the present informed the track:

“So many things in our lives are disposable. Content and news is consumed and discarded leaving us unfulfilled. ‘Baby Don’t Cry’ is about enjoying the real. The things right in front of us that give us meaning and how sometimes, even sad songs can give you that warm feeling of hope.”

Check out Sunflower Bean’s upcoming tour dates below and visit their website for pre-sale and general ticketing info.

12/9/21 — Burlington, VT @ Higher Ground Showcase Lounge
12/10/21 — Hamden, CT @ Space Ballroom
12/11/21 — Portsmouth, NH @ 3S Artspace
3/4/22 — Baltimore, MD @ Ottobar
3/5/22 — Millersville, PA @ Phantom Power
3/6/22 — Pittsburgh, PA @ Club Cafe
3/8/22 — Columbus, OH @ A&R Music Bar
3/10/22 — Indianapolis, IN @ HI-FI
3/11/22 — Louisville, KY @ Zanzabar
3/12/22 — St. Louis, MO @ Off Broadway
3/19/22 — Nashville, TN @ Exit/In
3/20/22 — Asheville, NC @ The Grey Eagle
3/21/22 — Durham, NC @ Motorco

Last week, Black Panther star Letitia Wright found herself being widely criticized after a Hollywood Reporter report claimed the actress was spreading anti-vaccination views on the set of the sequel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. More specifically, Wright was accused of sharing misinformation similar to a video she had previously shared on social media that caused her to delete all of her accounts following a wave of backlash. The controversial video (via EW) spread misinformation about not only the COVID vaccine but contained “doubts regarding climate change, accusations of China spreading COVID-19, and transphobic comments.”

However, on Tuesday, Wright quietly returned to Instagram where she posted a heavily religious-themed response, in which she denied spreading anti-vaccination views on the Black Panther 2 set:

It saddens me to have to address the reports published by The Hollywood Reporter on October 6th 2021. The report spoke about my conduct on the set of black Panther 2. I honestly assert that this was completely untrue.

Anyone who knows me or has worked with me, knows that I work incredibly hard at my craft & my main focus is always to do work that’s impactful and inspiring. That has been & will continue to be my only focus.

I will continue to hold onto Gods hands, and onto the scripture of Isaiah 54:17.

As for why Wright is personally responding to press reports, she reportedly parted ways with her publicity team after her first anti-vaccination controversy exploded in December 2020.

You can see Wright’s full Instagram post below:

(Via Letitia Wright on Instagram)

It’s a safe bet that Charlie Kaufman has one of the bleakest minds to ever infiltrate Hollywood. But the screenwriter, director, and novelist — last year’s 700-paged Antkind is even more bonkers than you think — has somehow never sold out. That’s to say, he’s never sullied himself with comic book fare or IP reboots. Then again, we never got to see his Gilligan’s Island.

This comes from James Gunn, fellow Hollywood weirdo, albeit one who’s more of the Troma gore variety. The Marvel/DC guy claims that in the late ‘90s, around the time Kaufman had his first screenwriting hit with Being John Malkovich, he pitched his own deranged take on the ‘60s classic about shipwrecked survivors forever stranded after a three-hour tour gone awry.

Kaufman’s Gilligan’s Island was, of course, far from faithful to the source. Gunn says his version found the islanders “starving & desperate.” Instead of making radios out of coconuts, they “started killing & eating each other.” Improbably, Warner Bros. was into it. Alas, Sherwood Schwartz, the show’s creator (and also the brains behind The Brady Bunch), was not.

The years passed, and Gunn, having had his own monster hit with the first Guardians of the Galaxy, tried to revive Kaufman’s Gilligan’s Island. This time, Gunn claims, the estate of the now-late Schwartz wasn’t having it either. “Anyway,” Gunn said, “if the Schwartz estate changes their mind, I’m here.”

Let’s not mince words: The estate of the late creator of The Brady Bunch should let James Gunn help Charlie Kaufman realize his dream of a Gilligan’s Island in which (presumably) Gilligan and the Skipper fight over the remains of the Professor, only to both be eaten by wholesome farm girl Mary Ann. It’s the dark reboot humanity deserves after the last several trying years.

(Via James Gunn on Twitter)

Dopesick: Season 1 (Hulu series) — Michael Keaton (who is still the greatest Batman in history, so don’t mess with him in any role) finally comes to TV beyond cameo mode. Here, he takes on Big Pharma as a physician whose patients are dying off amid an opioid epidemic, and Rosario Dawson portrays one of the heroes who want to take the makers of Oxycontin down. The title of the source material (Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors and the Drug Company that Addicted America, the book by Beth Macy) tells you a lot, but this trailer promises an intense ride, and the cast includes Michael Stuhlbarg and Kaitlyn Dever, who’s all over TV now and making Justified‘s Loretta proud here.

Just Beyond: Season 1 (Disney+ series) — This horror-comedy anthology bases itself on R.L. Stine’s BOOM! Studios comic book series of the same name. Expect plenty of supernatural journeys (with a personally affecting touch) through alternate dimensions with witches, aliens, and ghosts onboard.

DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (CW, 8:00pm) — Season 7 sees the Legends stranded in 1920s Texas after they defeated the alien intrusion. Astra attempts to fix circumstances with her powers.

Batwoman (CW, 9:00pm) — Season 3 arrives with Batwoman fending off Gotham’s threats while Batwing assists, and Luke can’t get used to his suit.

The Wonder Years (ABC, 8:30pm) — This reimagining adopts a different perspective (from the Fred Savage-starring original show) with the focus on an African-American family and their home base in 1960s Montgomery, Alabama. Don Cheadle narrates the usual tween ordeals and also the experience of being part of a Southern Black family. This week, “Take Your Son to Work Day” means that Dean goes to work both Bill and Lillian with very different results.

American Horror Story: Double Feature (FXX, 10:00pm) — The White House receives an unexpected visitor, who’s got a horrific plan in mind.

Awkwafina Is Nora From Queens (Comedy Central, 10:00pm) — Awkwafina’s semi-autobiographical series is deep into its second season, in which she gazes into the future with starry eyes. This week, Nora’s adjusting to New Mexico when she receives a letter from home that makes her question everything.

The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon — Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Nicole Holofcener, Victoria Beckham, Holly Humberstone

In case you missed these streaming picks from last Wednesday:

Bad Sport: Season 1 (Netflix series) — Sports and crime intersect in this show, which dives into personal accounts from athletes, coaches, and law enforcement. Expect to see the 2002 figure skating scandal (out of Salt Lake City), a weed-smuggling scandal surrounding an Indycar driver, a horse hitman committing insurance fraud, a basketball point-shaving scheme, and more bad boys who fell from grace.

Among The Stars: Season 1 (Disney+ series) — This show takes space fans behind the a vital NASA mission of fixing the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS), a tool that hopes to reveal the universe’s origins, although the job comes with a $2 billion price tag.