Graffiti legends hit the MTA....one more week

DirtyPilot.com is exhibiting its new graffiti show, "Map Quest", online until November 7th...You have one more week to check out artwork from REVOLT, T-KID, COPE2, EWOK 5MH, GHOST, CRIME79, CES ONE, PART ONE, KR. ONE, YES2.

Map Quest is the closest these old skool graffiti greats will get to hitting the MTA (aka New York City subway!) In this collective show each artist has used a NYC transit map as a canvas for his graffiti. Check out the pics above.

If you have a few hundred bucks you can get yourself a piece of subway graffiti history.

Tuff City Tattoos, Bronx (My hip hop summer pt.4)

After a couple of days break from pounding the concrete I ventured uptown to the Bronx on the B train to see the Tuff City Styles tattoo (and graffiti) store.

I first came to Fordham Road in the late 80s. I still have the Triple Fat Goose down jacket I bought here. As you walk from the subway to Tuff City Styles you'll experience the bustle and hustle of this area. On the corner is Footaction USA with its selection of sneakers. If you wander around the corner you'll find this 40 foot mural complete with a Kanye West-looking character ;)

When I got to Tuff City Styles the graffiti influences run high - from the huge mural outside, to the canvas gallery and MTA subway train cars that are the tattooing booths! It's an amazing sight. I think it's run by CES, Yes2 and MED who painted at the "All-City Blackbook Show" a couple of days earlier.

Eastcoast/Westcoast Whilst visiting I spotted a familiar face from the L.A. graffiti scene. "Frame" was visiting New York this weekend and was painting a wall in the Bronx with a Japanese graffiti artist.

Frame, Los Angeles

My library I got myself a little bit of hip hop history. A graffiti book dedicated to Quik, Seen and CES with a foreword by Zephyr (of Wild Style fame.) It's translated for the Japanese market by DJ Honda.

All City Blackbook event @ 5 Pointz (My hip hop summer pt.3)

The second All City Blackbook event was held below the subway train tracks behind the legendary 5 Pointz paint warehouse in Queens.

This block party wasn't just a celebration of graffiti art, but represented the other hip hop artforms...b-boying (a b-boy 1-on-1 battle with $200 and a huge trophy at stake was well attended!) DJing (with Lord Finesse of D.I.T.C. (Diggin' In the Crates) crew represented on the turntables spinning breaks.) But, no M.C.s, although Large Professor, OC and AG were all billed, I didn't see them perform. Still a dope ass hip hop event.

All City Blackbook crew. On2 (left)

Lord Finesse. D.I.T.C., All City Blackbook Show 

Winner: b-boy Crazy, Crazy Force Crew, Switzerland (left);
Runner-up: b-boy Lehsé, Amen Zulu Skillz, France (right)

  All City Blackbook crew with b-boy Crazy

"Ready to Rock" b-boys in the cypher, All City Blackbook Show

I didn't get to see any of the O.G. graff heads paint the main wall: TATS Cru, TC-5, Yes2, CES, but lots of graffiti VIPs passed through on this day - check out my photos.

BG183, Tats Cru

REM 311 tribute (left); Yes (right)

CES (left); Doves, TC-5 (right)

Big shout to old skool party flyer king, Buddy Esquire, and Joey who kicked it with me. And always cool to see James Top. You'll find some of Buddy Esq's flyers at the Hip Hop Cultural Center in Harlem. I got one signed copy as part of the Joe Conzo "Born in the Bronx" catalogue which was supposedly limited to 250 copies.

Joey and Buddy Esq. (right)

It's biting...airfares and hotels drop prices

It's the holiday season, but from the emails I've received this week it seems the poor economy's taking a chunk out of the travel bookings and holiday cheer!

This month, Farecast tells me that despite holiday travel costing ~35% more than last year (probably due to increased gas prices) something odd has happened at the end of October. There's been a turnaround as fares have dropped as we enter the holiday and Christmas season and fares have actually fallen below last year's prices?! Now, it's safe to assume lower oil prices ($50 a barrel now from its peak of $145) may be the reason, but the truth is consumer confidence is at an all-time-low!

And connected to this squeeze is a tightening of the belt that's even affecting Vegas vacations. The hotels are already taking action. For CES in January 09, the hotels are cutting their losses and have dropped their prices by <$75. Even so, right now I think I'm going to skip CES and use the company's money more conservatively. So, no AVN either ;) The end of a tradition!

See below Can you can guess where the price line will plot from now until the end of 2008?

CES 08 is here...

These girls of CES look like they're built in China, but they're as American as, uh...MP3 and 1080p (I have no idea if that's right, but it sounds cool ;) ) even if the brands that they work for are Taiwanese (Creative) and Japanese (Sony Electronics).

At this year's show, I was registered as "qualified press" (is there such a thing as "unqualified press"?) courtesy of Yankee Group. And with that I got a few extras for my troubles (CES backpack anyone?) But, it was a tiring trip 'cause I drove the 270 miles from LA to accommodate a colleague from work. Urgh! Folks, that drive takes 4 1/2 hours *each way* and I was driving solo 'cause the dude didn't have a US license yet! Crap! Man, cruise control helped me stay out of trouble with the law....set it for 77 mph and c-r-u-i-s-e!

New gadgets What were the highlights for me, apart from the young ladies? Hmmm. Sony's OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) TVs that are 3mm thin?! Testing all those mobile phones? Or seeing the Ion U Record analog to digital converter gadgets (made by Numark, UK)?