Art I'm Geeking Out Over

Neill Cameron, who's a pretty amazing artist, does an advent calendar every year where he draws a different type of Santa every day at the request of his readers. It's called SantaSketchFest and it is pretty great! This drawing is of (Jack) Kirby Santa, requested by my favorite internet writer of all time, Chris Sims. For those of you not in the know, Jack Kirby co/created the Fantastic Four, the New Gods, most of modern comics as we know them, etc. The type of forced perspective, elaborate costume and "Kirby Dots" in this piece are some of his trademarks. You can see the rest of Neill Cameron's Santas, most of them non-comics related, here.

As you may have heard, Tron: Legacy is premiering this Friday in theaters around the nation (JK, you definitely know this). This movie was made by Disney, which also owns Marvel. This means Cross-Promotion. Usually this is stupid and lame and it sucks. However, Tron combined with superheroes is so awesome that it overwhelms the cynicism that springs from corporations trying to exploit one type of my nerdery to make money off another type. All of the Marvel/Tron covers can be found here and, with the exception of that ridiculous Spider-Woman one, they are all awesome. Full disclosure: I'm listening to the Tron: Legacy soundtrack as I type this.

This is an amazing picture by Kid Liger of all the Lantern Corps in the DC Universe currently being featured in Brightest Day and the Green Lantern books. If you don't know what this is, you aren't reading Green Lantern. If you aren't reading Green Lantern, the fuck are you doing with your life? (things that are less awesome than they could be). Point being, it's my desktop background and I don't think it's going to change for a while. via Bleeding Cool

Does this need an explanation? Seeing as I know nothing about it where it's from, I sure hope not. Two of my favorite things, together at last. Via my buddy Jack

Random Good Music- 12/5/2010

Music, it's pretty great, right? The only thing is, there's so much of it out there that's great! How can you sift through it all? I haven't found a good way yet.

But my point is I found some pretty great tracks that I thought y'all might like.

1. Did you know that Vampire Weekend's Contra had an iTunes only Bonus Track? I sure didn't. And it's some bullshit, because I totally would have bought it. Oh well, I may be the last one to the party on this but in case I'm not, here it is. Pretty good, right?

2. Robyn is pretty amazing. Have I listened to "Stars 4-Ever" 40+ times in the last 2-3 days? Sorry, that shit is classified. Wikileaks says yes though. The point being, you probably already have that track. BUT do you have the A-Trak remix of Indestructible? Man, I bet you do not! Suck all the joy you can out of this track, because life can be pretty tough sometimes.

3. As some of you might be aware, I like mashups quite a lot. My favorite ones are from The Hood Internet. Yup, better than Girl Talk- I said it! They just dropped a Metric mixtape and while all the tracks are dope as fuck- #5 has been on repeat all damn day. I hope you like it: http://www.thehoodinternet.com/2010/11/hood-vs-metric.html

The Hood Internet x Metric by hoodinternet

4. Deerhunter! That's a band people talk about quite a bit. Until recently, I was not one of those people. Then I heard this remix- now I am! Wow, this sure is good. One of those great tracks where you can dance to it, work to it, exercise to it, or listen to the lyrics and get kind of depressio. All pretty great qualities!

Deerhunter - Helicopter (Diplo & Lunice mix) by maddecent

5. Depressed Buttons- Mixmeat Mixtape. I knew nothing nothing about this group before @hoodinternet recommended their mixtape on the twitters. Now I know nothing about them except that I will be purchasing their EP on Dec. 14th. Damn good.

Depressed Buttons-Mixmeat Mixtape by maddecent

6. Adam Warrock is a rapper I've been talking up to pretty much anyone who will tolerate it. In addition to his excellent full-length album and remix album, he also does a free track-log "sketchbook" where he posts non-album songs in order to keep his creative juices flowing. His new one, "Best Friends (Nedroid)" has been on loop since it came out. It's based on the comic Nedroid(and if you aren't reading this, what is your problem?) and is about the main characters, Reginald and Beartato, having a rap battle about who is a better friend. It manages to be both hilarious and dope at the same. You can listen/download it for free here.

7. Drake- his flow sucks and he's not very good at math (√69=8.306623863 or, I guess, ate something). Sure he's kind of clever, but you know who is more clever? Almost every other rapper I listen to. But, there are DJs who can take these raw components and make something great out of it. In this case by cutting Drake out of the track almost entirely. It's good!

8. Mashups! We covered this already. But check this out- New Kanye vs. Neutral Milk Hotel. Does it work? Would it be on my blog if it didn't? (No, it wouldn't)

In My Beautiful Dark Aeroplane Over The Fantasea by MysteryStain

9. The entire new Kanye album on repeat all day, every day, holy shit it's so good. I'm pretty sure Kanye took lots of sounds he knew I'd like, put them together just for me, and then decided he might as well make millions in the process. Hearing this album is like going back in time to when I was a baby and laughing for the first time. Or conversely, it's like realizing that this is one of the few albums I'm willing to pay the full 15.99 for, even though I'm paying a premium for one itunes exclusive bonus track. Shit, I'd pay double- Kanye deserves it. Have I been effusive enough? Buy this GD album.

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The Epic Rescue of Princess Ficas

I decided to gather the documentation of me and @fearlessdc's adventure in rescuing a princess that had been lost, using a mystical conveyance. The princess is also a tree. And the mystical conveyance is the metro. It was Epic as fuck.

Point being we went through some hijinks to rescue that damn thing, and here is the proof!

Oh shit, Velociraptor! "Clever girl..."

Princess Ficas is trying to figure out where she would like to go.

That is one happy Dendrophiliac. Down, boy!

That guy in the background is suspicious of Princess Ficas. We later stabbed him.

I am a Tree-Pimp. Note the purple attire. Does she look good to you?

This is me doing the hard sell with the Tree-Pimping. This opportunity is slipping away, get her while she's good!

For those wondering: Yes. Alcohol was definitely involved in our quest. What of it?!? You wanna start some shit! Shut the fuck up!!

Sorry.... There may be alcohol involved in the composition of this blog post.

Anyway- the Epic Rescue of Princess Ficas was a highlight of my trip. Some real Lord of the Rings shit. I was Aragorn. @fearlessdc was Frodo. No takebacks, I called Aragorn! I guess he can have Gimli. He can't have Legolas, because he has to be played by a girl.

Anyway, we finally ended up throwing the ring into Orodruin, the volcano in Mordor. The thing is:

And that's why we took the metro.