All posts by Ainsley Drew

December 2nd, 2011

Shutterclank!

Twice a year Shutterclank! magazine hits the presses to support traditional photographers and stir up discussion. Founded by photographers Kate Contakos, Chris Schuster, and Jake Reinhart, the hope is that the magazine will further the community of lens artists, spurring them to interact and collaborate as a result of Shutterclank!’s pages and related exhibitions. …more

August 22nd, 2011

No End In Sight: Industrial Icons “Front Line Assembly” Continue Their Assault

I’m inside of a cavernous nightclub, flanked by a packed bar that’s humming with anticipatory commotion. …more

June 8th, 2011

The Rumpus Review of My Heart Is An Idiot

Sitting down to watch My Heart Is An Idiot, the romantic documentary by FOUND Magazine founder Davy Rothbart and director David Meiklejohn, I expected a typical story of “boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy wins girl back…or loses her forever.” Allow me to dispel any preconceived notions: that is not the movie you’re going to get. …more

April 21st, 2009

The Shorty Q&A With Parry Gripp

Parry Gripp’s YouTube hits include Shopping Penguin, Spaghetti Cat, and Hamster on a Piano. He’s been called a Weird Al Jankovic for the internet age. But it might be more accurate to say that Parry Gripp a leading light of the YouTube artist movement. …more

March 15th, 2009

Ainsley Drew: The Last Book I Loved, Back to Basics

images2Barefoot Contessa: Back To Basics. My version of cooking usually involves a box, water, and a microwave, but Ina Garten breaks it down in a way that even culinary Tripp Palins like myself can grasp. I know what you’re thinking, “But this is a cookbook. You don’t read a cookbook, unless you’re cooking.” Wrong. The format of nearly all of the Barefoot Contessa books includes essays on domestic necessities including entertaining, place setting, floral arranging, selecting ingredients, and the like. Garten’s writing style is breezy and effortless, with a large dose of personality, minus the Food Network douchebaggery and BAM! Nearly all of the recipes can be adapted to vegan or vegetarian diets, and the “Easiest Brownie Pudding” will have you drooling down the spine. Featuring some of the best food photography around. Loved it.

March 2nd, 2009

The Rumpus Interview with Jason Kottke

sw-kottke“The site was becoming unmanageable as just a hobby… so I decided I either needed to quit the site or turn it into something I could live off of… The bigger challenge was how to balance taking the site seriously while simultaneously not worrying about it too much.” …more

February 25th, 2009

The Greatest Marketing Campaign Ever

josh-freesePaging all 1990s hard rock fan-girls, Josh Freese is yours…for a price. The drumming genius, who has been a member of The Vandals, Devo, and A Perfect Circle, in addition to backing countless artists, ranging from Avril Lavigne to Rob Zombie, is coming out with his sophmore solo album, Since 1972. But much in the way he began hitting the skins — as a preteen prodigy backing a Top 40 cover band at Disneyland — his marketing attempt is equally weird and unique. For $7 you get a digital download of the CD. For $50 you get the CD, a DVD, T-shirt, and a “Thank you” phone call from Freese. For $20K you get to play miniature golf with Maynard James Keenan of Tool. And then you get dropped at the side of the highway. And all of it goes up on YouTube. For a full rundown of what’s shaping up to be quite possibly the greatest marketing campaign of all time, check out Soundcheck on the OC Register.

February 18th, 2009

The Rumpus Interview With God-des & She

“We really are grateful to be able to do this for our job, and we’re grateful we’ve been able to travel and meet all these weirdos.” …more

February 17th, 2009

Adam Serwer’s “Hip-Hop from Pop Charts to Politics”

Adam Serwer peels back the layers of how hip-hop has helped to repropagate traditionally American ideals, even while struggling against the stereotype of being a race-related, superficial youth genre.

February 16th, 2009

The Rumpus Long Interview with Andrew W.K.

“I used to think that you had to be in a lot more pain and going through a lot more struggle to really prove that you were working hard, but then I realized that was just working really inefficiently.” …more

February 13th, 2009

The Shorty Q & A with T Cooper

T Cooper is has been labeled a transgender writer, but to boil it down to a phrase so simple and limiting is an insult. …more

February 11th, 2009

The Shorty Q&A with Mary Roach

Mary Roach has written best-selling books about dead bodies, ghosts, and fucking. Her work is accessible and unflinching, presenting a variety of quirky or unsavory topics in a manner distinctive and engaging. …more

February 2nd, 2009

At the Intersection of Football and Porn

By now everybody has heard that last night football fans in Tuscon got thirty free seconds of Jenna Jameson doing what she’s famous for in a mistake that was the answer to every teenage boy’s prayers. So Comcast messed up and showed some porn, PETA’s girls-on-vegetables ad was banned, and a few years ago Janet Jackson had a pierced nipple slip. …more

February 1st, 2009

The High Definite: Definitely Awesome

It’s rare to wade through the kiddie pool of the Internet and be taken out at the ankles by a website that’s the equivalent of a great white shark. The High Definite is such a site. A combination of random entertainment, snark, and style, it’s what most men’s magazines wish they could be.

There are “High Definite Exclusives” which include comprehensive coverage on such riveting subjects as Boner Jams of the 1990s and a list of the best sites that specialize in lists. There are random links that lead you to …more

February 1st, 2009

The New York Times Tackles Lesbian Separatism

Keeping the fires of fledgling feminism stoked is the responsibility of the Alapine lesbian community in the region of the Appalachians in northeastern Alabama. “Community” has become a loose term in this day and age, reflecting more a mentality during parades, parties, and politics than an actual, well, community. Not so with Alapine, as reported by the New York Times. …more

January 28th, 2009

Better Late Than Never: Bebe

 Bebe won a Grammy in 2005, and then promptly retired. These days, when there are pitifully few female Latin artists on the charts, this revolutionary gypsy songstress is sorely missed. In case you missed her flash in the pan, here’s a link to the video for “Malo,” the song that won her a golden phonograph.

This quirky, Spanish-language artist and actress eschewed the traditional marketing trajectory for a woman in la musica latina. (Notice how Shakira bleached her hair remarkably fast once she started catching attention in North America.) Usually buxom, sexy-fied women in chaps or low-cut blouses croon or hip-shake their way through marketing an album, or, worse yet, mimic the recycled, Hot Topic-laden advertising attempts that American pop-tarts endure. Bebe instead opted to play her guitar and curse so furiously on camera that the Grammy committee needed to mute sections of her performance on awards’ night.

On top of her musical pursuits, Bebe (aka, Nieves Bebe Rebolledo) …more

January 28th, 2009

The Inside-out Teddy Bear

Kent Rogowski’s unraveled and reraveled Bears are regular teddy bears taken apart, turned inside-out, and stitched back together. While this may be the stuff and stuffing that childhood nightmares are made of, the inverted critters are pretty endearing. Metaphor? Message? Cry for help? No matter what you take from it, inside-out teddy bears just look pretty cool. …more

January 28th, 2009

The Failed Shorty Q&A With Susannah Breslin

Susannah Breslin is the author of The Reverse Cowgirl, a blog known for its intelligent take on sexuality and pornography. She’s the author of You’re A Bad Man, Aren’t You. According to her website she’s writing a novel based on her experiences in Porn Valley, is represented by Endeavor, and is 6’2″. …more

January 27th, 2009

The Rumpus Interview With Tristan Taormino

Tristan Taormino is an example of multi-tasking at its finest. She’s the author of countless books, the editor of numerous anthologies including Best Lesbian Erotica series, a polyamory proponent with her book and website Opening Up , a relationship and sex expert, and an adult video producer …more

January 24th, 2009

The Shorty Q&A With Davy Rothbart

…more

January 15th, 2009

Rapture House

Rapture House has created a variety of avant garde projects, outre in both subject matter and execution. Consisting in part of the husband and wife team of Polly Frost and Ray Sawhill. …more

January 15th, 2009

The Shorty Q&A With Robin Maxwell

Female pirates, Leonardo DaVinci’s mother and cross-dressing, the sex lives of kings. Robin Maxwell writes about the parts of history that don’t air on PBS specials. …more

January 12th, 2009

The Shorty Q&A With The Twisted Monk

The Twisted Monk is the information-packed online rope store catering to both the elite shibari master and the bumbling couple tying each other up for the first time. With instructional videos, links, kits, and a blog, The Twisted Monk goes beyond just providing some string to fool around with. …more

January 11th, 2009

Waste Time Better: Random Alternative Self-Help Links by Ainsley Drew

Read The Secret online? Subscribe to daily affirmations and meditate for fifteen minutes a day? Or pay $90 for The Sedona Method? You’re nuts to think that stuff like that could possibly help you. Here are a few links that may or may not keep you an adequate number of cards to be considered a full deck. …more
January 9th, 2009

Psycho Dwarf

British parents are eschewing traditional fairy tales because of their “un-PC” and “frightening” tone. With Hannah Montana and the cast …more

January 7th, 2009

The Shorty Q&A With Chandra Moskowitz

Isa Chandra Moskowitz is the New York bred, do-it-yourself author of Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, and Veganomicon. She translated her discontent with the lack of vegan cooking shows into …more

January 6th, 2009

The Suicide Kings Slay ‘Em

It’s awesome when a competitive poetry event elevates itself to what the art can be. If you’ve ever had the privilege of seeing Jamie DeWolf, Geoff Trenchard, or Rupert Estanislao rock the mic, …more

December 26th, 2008

The Failed Shorty Q&A With Susannah Breslin

Susannah Breslin

Susannah Breslin is the author of The Reverse Cowgirl, a blog known for its intelligent take on sexuality and pornography. She’s the author of You’re A Bad Man, Aren’t You. According to her website she’s writing a novel based on her experiences in Porn Valley, is represented by Endeavor, and is 6’2″. …more

December 23rd, 2008

The Shorty Q&A with Rex Sorgatz

Internet celebrity, famed microblogger, and Fimoculous forefather Rex Sorgatz spends some time with The Rumpus. “I WILL FUCKING CUT YOU, PACHELBEL!” …more

December 23rd, 2008

Coveted Covers

The Readerville Journal’s “Most Coveted Covers” section allows viewers to judge a book by its cover. Contributors weigh the merits of designers’ wiles, while the meat of the pulp is left unscrutinized.

About

Ainsley Drew is a native New Yorker, freelance writer, and euphemism enthusiast. Her work has been featured in The New York Press, McSweeney’s, The Morning News, and Curve Magazine, among other totally sweet publications. An avid fan of all sports, but especially the NBA, when she's not stalking 6'10" centers she eats way too much Japanese food, plays word games, and hits on anything that moves. Aiming high, she hopes to one day be a notorious literary celebrity with her name in tabloids. She also has eleven fingers, so she can type faster than you. You can find her jerkethic.com and ainsleydrew. Be her Internet friend.

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