Fashion Designers A-Z
40th Anniversary Edition
The Collection of the Museum of Fashion Institute of Technology
Valerie Steele
Taschen, Taschen, Cologne 2022, 248 pages, 26.2 x 35 cm, Hardcover, ISBN 978-38365920172023, 512 pages, 15.6x21.7cm, Fashion ISBN 978-3-8365-8756-3
euro 25,00
From Azzedine Alaïa, Cristóbal Balenciaga, and Coco Chanel to Alexander McQueen, Yves Saint Laurent, and Vivienne Westwood, a century’s worth of fashion greats from the permanent collection of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City are celebrated in this fresh edition of Fashion Designers A–Z.
This accessibly priced and updated collection features photographs of approximately 500 garments selected from the Museum’s permanent collection. From an exquisitely embroidered velvet evening gown to Mondrian-style minimalist chic, each chosen piece is selected not only for its beauty but for its representative value, distilling the unique philosophy and aesthetics of each of the featured designers.
Texts by the museum’s curators explain why each designer is important in fashion history and what is special about the garments featured, complemented by 110 drawn portraits by Robert Nippoldt. In her introductory essay, director and chief curator Valerie Steele writes about the rise of the fashion museum, and the emergence of the fashion exhibition as a popular and controversial phenomenon.
21/03/24
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The Dream Syndicate — History Kinda Pales When It and You Are Aligned: The Days of Wine and Roses 40th Anniversary Edition (Fire Records)
The Days of Wine and Roses (Expanded Edition) by The Dream Syndicate
A 40th anniversary is sort of an odd date to celebrate with pomp and fanfare, which makes this overstuffed edition of the Dream Syndicate’s The Days of Wine and Roses exude at least a whiff of opportunism. And to be sure, History Kinda Pales When It and You Are Aligned is overstuffed: four compact discs, 260 total minutes of music, five different versions of “Definitely Clean” and seven (yep) of “That’s What You Always Say” (from the original record; the Down There EP version; a 1981 recording by the 15 Minutes, a band Steve Wynn formed with members of Alternative Learning; a rehearsal rendition and several live recordings—it’s a good song, but that’s a bit much, by any measure). Dream Syndicate completists and musicologists with big historical investments in the Paisley Underground will rejoice. What about the rest of us?
At the very least, we have occasion to remember a great rock record, one of a select few released from the California underground in the early 1980s that still feel absolutely necessary, song for song and note for note. If we stick specifically with punk and punk-adjacent LA, we might mention Black Flag’s Damaged, X’s Under the Big Black Sun, Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime and Gun Club’s Fire of Love. That’s some fierce company. The Dream Syndicate shared a label with the Gun Club, and likely shared a stage or two with at least a couple of those bands. But they were outliers in LA in those crucial years: not hair-trigger punks like Fear or Circle Jerks, not rootsy like Green on Red or the Blasters, not self-consciously arty like Screamers or Bpeople. Musically the Dream Syndicate was more aligned with New York bands, like Television or the Voidoids — and the Dream Syndicate confessed as much by name-checking La Monte Young’s famous NYC drone ensemble in their band’s moniker.
Mostly the Dream Syndicate was a guitar band, Wynn and Karl Precoda playing tangled and brash lines and working the space between dissonance and rock dramatics. You can hear that impulse, toward volume and catharsis, on a great-sounding live set included on Disc 4 of the edition, captured at the Country Club in Reseda, CA, sometime in 1982. “Then She Remembers” sounds like early Sonic Youth until Wynn drags the song back toward the textures of Neil Young and Crazy Horse at their most ragged and feral. In between songs, Wynn quips, “This is San Francisco psychedelia, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Blue Cheer...” He’s goofing on Cali punk’s north-south rivalries, but it’s not a bad set of references for the kinds of guitar antics the band gets into. That Reseda set is one of the real treats among all the accompanying recordings included in History Kinda Pales…, along with a recording of “Open Hour” from a 1982 live performance on KPFK, in which the guitarists channel Verlaine and Lloyd’s sense of interplay. Also check out the cover of “Folsom Prison Blues,” recorded in Tucson that same year; the band sounds like Rank and File on an especially whiskey-soaked night.
Amid all those extras, the most substantive music on the four discs can still be heard in the studio recordings that appeared as The Days of Wine and Roses in late October, 1982. Kendra Smith was still in the band, and her moody presence plays up the record’s Paisley Underground affiliations, as do the psych-rock acrobatics of “When You Smile.” But a lot of the story is told in the record’s first five seconds: those glorious, crashing notes that form the signature riff of “Tell Me When It’s Over.” It’s a great song, one of a few palpably heartbroken, sort-of-love songs from the decade (along with the Replacements’ “Unsatisfied” and Leaving Trains’ “Light Rain”) that laid some formative groundwork for the 1990s’ indie rock. The Days of Wine and Roses reaches its highest peaks on its several sort-of love songs: those just mentioned, “Halloween,” “Then She Remembers.” Those last two address desires that simmer with threat or explode into violence, and the music follows the same logic. If you haven’t for some time, listen to the ecstatic, free-falling guitar break that takes up the second half of “Then She Remembers.” It’s breathless, propulsive and razor sharp. Sort of like the passage of history.
Jonathan Shaw
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Continuing our celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars limited series (1984) with Mike Zeck's spectacular cover art from Secret Wars #1. In the pencils and inks, note the inclusion of Kitty Pryde, who ultimately didn't appear in the series, as well as Mister Fantastic and Thor, who were removed to fit the logo on the final printed cover.
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Out this week: Transformers #1 40th Anniversary Edition (Skybound, $3.99):
Skybound celebrates 40 years of Transformers comics with this reprint of the very first Transformers comic that came out from Marvel — and it’s printed on newsprint, to boot. There’s also a variant cover version featuring an homage to Bill Sienkiewicz’s original cover by Christian Ward.
See what other comics and graphic novels are arriving at your local comic shop this week.
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