NSA NEWS MOVES TO A NEW HOME

Dear all,

After only a few short weeks at this address, we've been invited to take up a more prestigious residence.... so we're moving this blog to a new address:

http://www.nosuchagencyblog.com

We have some cool neighbors (as part of the Creative Contraband Blog Network) over there and we hope you'll like the new look and feel.

Please click the link above to continue to follow No Such Agency and for a special offer on limited edition Falcon T-shirts (for men and women).  There will be more exclusives on the new site (including a world exclusive interview with Echo & The Bunnymen very soon).  You can also follow our activity via the RSS feed.

See you all over there!!!

Love...  NSA.  

Brett Domino on Britain's Got Talent

Brett Domino, Britain's number one stylophone entertainer, came face to face with Simon Cowell on Britain's got talent at the weekend.  With a keytar slung, erm, high, and his trusty trio by his side he performed in front of the nation.

Brett Domino (a.k.a Rob Madin) is my step brother.

See what Simon made of the Brett Domino Trio here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgJ1HX1ejQ4

Pillage by Brantly Martin

My old friend, Brantly Martin, has written a novel.  Now, in all honesty it was one of those - 'Is this gonna suck and I'm going to have to be nice scenarios?'

Thankfully it's actually pretty fantastic, gritty, crazy, funny stuff.  At least this exert is. 

What's great about this is that we've all said it, but Brantly did it.  He was a New York City club promoter and a downtown socialite who quit all that and become a novelist.  Pretty inspiring.

Read  an interview and the exert here:

http://www.powerhousebooks.com/book/1004.

Well done mate.

'Pillage' a novel by Brantly Martin is out now.

Flaunt goes all hippie dippy on us. Or do they?

This from Flaunt...

Dearest Sons & Daughters of the Earth-Mother's Demon Seed,

We want YOU to come out to the beach and participate in a momentous occasion of creative expression!
 
This Saturday afternoon, Flaunt magazine and Edward Sharpe + The Magnetic Zeroes are hosting a happening at Dockweiler Beach, Tower 53.

This happening is in fact a group photo shoot——we're looking to have 100 of our friends and fans meet us at the beach AT 1PM to create and photograph (and video) all types of beautiful human geometry.

Can you make it? Will you be there? You must!

Just so you know: Photographs of this event will run in Flaunt's forthcoming Issue 104: The Visionary Experience; an exclusive video of the event will be hosted on Flaunt.Com.

Please respond back to me (asap) if you can confirm your attendance. I'll then respond with Dress Requirements (ALL WHITE—see attached photo for inspiration) and Directions.

For all those who plan to participate in our Human Geometry Beach Happening, the below link leads you to a map and general direction of Dockweiler Beach. We’ll be at Tower 53. Its basically near LAX. Please be sure to ONLY WEAR WHITE, FLOWY GARB, color details should only be present in headbands, scarfs, belts, or other accessories. CANT WAIT to see you all there.

http://maps.google.com/maps?client=safari&oe=UTF-8&ie=UTF-8&q=dockweiler+beach+los+angeles&fb=1&split=1&gl=us&cid=10903755205952560227&li=lmd&z=14&t=m <http://maps.google.com/maps?client=safari&oe=UTF-8&ie=UTF-8&q=dockweiler+beach+los+angeles&fb=1&split=1&gl=us&cid=10903755205952560227&li=lmd&z=14&t=m

They also sent this photo so that you get some idea of what's happening tomorrow...

I'm still none the wiser, but whatever it is, it's surely going to be fun, AND you get to be in Flaunt Magazine.  Now, where did I leave that kurta?

The Man With Kaleidoscope Eyes

Photos courtesy of Josee Nadeau.  Images (c) Alan Aldridge Inc.

If you were to have looked up the word 'surreal' in the dictionary between the hours of 7pm and 10pm last night (PST) you might have found to your astonishment that as you opened the page, multicolored flowers grew before your eyes, little talking fish swam across the paper, onto the back of your hand and became tatooed onto your arm whilst the words melted into a forrest of color, populated by the most weird and wonderful characters - at once completely strange, yet still unnervingly familiar.  This was because The King Of Psychedelia, the legendary Alan Aldridge opened the doors of his exhibition -  Tripping The Art Fantastic at Mr MusicHead on Sunset Blvd.

Okay, so that might not have happened to everyone.  Okay, it might not have happened at all, but seeing this show last night made me want to believe that things like that could happen...

Alan Aldridge makes me want to believe in magic.  There! I said it.

It was also surreal because Aldridge, who held the most popular art show of the year in London during last year (over 50,000 visitors to his exhibition at The Design Museum) chose such a small place for his first LA show of original work.  It transpires that Sam (owner of Mr MusicHead) is a dear friend of Alan's.  Ah! Nepotism lives!   They proved to be wonderful hosts though, presenting not only the artwork, but also the video installation intelligently and lovingly.  The place got crowded and stayed that way from the time the doors opened at 7pm to the time they closed (10pm).  

L-R - Alan Aldridge and fellow artist Josee Nadeau.

The line of people waiting to get their signed copies of The Man With Kaleidoscope Eyes - Alan's latest retrospective book looking at his extraordinary career, also stayed long throughout the night, until the last book was signed (for the security guard, more about him later) at 10.20pm.

Art show openings are funny things aren't they?  Sometimes you go because you know the artist, or your friends are going, or you know the gallery owner, or because it's free drinks or because you think someone famous might be there, and I suspect that last night, a lot of people went for a lot of those reasons.  The really funny thing about this show is that I've rarely seen, as weird as this sounds, so many people spend so much time looking at the art.  Everyone who walked into the room was immediately, and without any sense of  duty, sucked into the first picture that they saw.  And there they stood, each one slipping quietly into an artistically induced altered-state.  

'It's like taking acid' said one bright and rather lovely young lady who had been invited by one of the editors from Vanity Fair.  'Once you've committed to it, there is nothing you can do but go with it.  That's almost what this feels like'.  

She's right.  The detail that needs to be taken in, the journeys that your eyes have to go on to fully appreciate the extraordinary worlds that Aldridge creates, are so wondrous and plentiful in each piece, that you find you can't look away, and that you are taken to a place where nothing is quite right, but where everything is absolutely beautiful non-the less.  

Even the security guard was lost in one of Aldridge's images.  Someone could have stolen his shoes and he wouldn't have noticed.  No-one did of course.  Once through the doors we were all transported into Aldridge's mind... A place where there was no crime, (and judging by book and print sales - no recession) and where John Lennon (the, um, blue version of John walking down steps in his own brain) was alive and well and telling us that all we needed was love, whilst Elton John rode a piano like a bucking bronco.

I glanced across the room and saw Luis Barajas (owner of Flaunt Magazine) standing quietly on his own, studying an image from The Butterfly Ball.  He was silent and still, almost serene.  Now that really is magic.

Tripping The Art Fantastic @ Mr MusicHead, 7511 W.Sunset Blvd, Hollywood, CA, 90046. April 29th - May 13th.  www.mrmusichead.com

The new book - The Man With Kaleidoscope Eyes is available at Borders and all good bookstores and at www.alanaldridge.net

See the four page feature on Aldridge in the next issue of Flaunt Magazine

No Such Agency would like to thank Greg @ Fiji Water and all the other sponsors for their support.

Wrong was right for Depeche Mode

Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles, California.

Pictures courtesy of Paul Saye

The workmen who were building the new W Hotel complex on the corner of Hollywood and Argyle didn't go home when their shift finished at 5.30pm yesterday.  They stayed, elevated 50 ft in the air by the scaffolding running around the building.  There they sat waiting and watching as a surreal event unfolded before their eyes.

Hollywood Blvd. had been closed off hours earlier and a huge east facing stage was erected.  Slowly over the afternoon, hundreds, then thousands of people started turning up until, by 7pm, 10,000 people were standing on one of the world's most famous streets, waiting patiently for electronic mega group - Depeche Mode.  I was amongst them.

So okay, it was our wedding anniversary, for which last year we spent it at the L.A NME Awards and this year, it was to transpire that we were once again going to be at an event that was, in our opinion 'unmissable'.  We were standing a few meters away from the stage, VIP wrist bands, backstage passes and after party tickets secured on our persons, discussing the fact that our friend Sara Freegard in London had designed Martin Gore's stage clothes (shoes and all).  She had described the outfit as a kind of 'Teddy Boy from Space' look.  Well, quite.

We didn't have to wait long, and a mere 30 minutes after the official start time, Jimmy Kimmel (for this whole event was being recorded for his show) came out and stood amongst us to announce the band.

The roar from the crowd, despite it being a 'TV concert' was genuine and massive.   The opening number - Wrong proved that they are still as fresh, imaginative and haunting as ever.  An instant Depeche Mode classic, brilliantly delivered by  Dave Gahan, who looked amazingly fit (yes, I had pangs of jealousy and a commitment to lay off carbohydrates for a few weeks), Andy, and Martin, who really did look like a space teddy boy, with a bit of a Keith Flint edge. 

 

The second track for TV - Enjoy The Silence brought 20,000 hands in the air as 10,000 voices of varying degrees of quality sang  'All I ever wanted, all I ever needed is here in my arms' as I glanced across at my wife, and I felt moved, as I had the first time I saw her and the first time I heard that song.  The two things together overwhelmed me.  What can I say? It was my wedding anniversary and I am a huge Depeche Mode fan, as you'll probably have guessed.  Not because Martin is a friend, and that his fab daughter Eva sometimes stays with us (she now plays the Hello Kitty Strat that I was given by Elle Magazine - thanks Elle, it's gone to a good home), and that he lets us stay in his flat in London when we go home and not because some of his best friends (Sarah, Paul, Leah, Bill, Mark, Tracy and the rest of the gang) have become very dear to us  and not because I'm a melancholy sort, but simply because they have written some of the best songs of all time.

 

When the opening bars of Personal Jesus peeled out of Martin's guitar, the crowd erupted once again and the workmen on the scaffolding grooved along, holding their hard hats in the air.  Even the cops were nodding and mouthing what they thought were the words.

It was all over too quickly and the crowd dispersed magically, and a nice man directed us to the 'after party'.  

Security looked tight, and indeed, they announced loudly and in unison 'Only badge holders past this point... Sir, do you have a badge?  Only badge holders past this point... you have a badge?  Ah! Okay in you go'.  With incredible comic timing, a bum appeared and shouted at security 'Only badge holders are allowed in here?  Well how the fuck did I get in then?  Seriously, how the FUCK did I get in here?'  He looked as genuinely confused as Security did as they ushered him back into the street and my friend Marta and I laughed as loud as we had all week.

Normally after parties involve DJs, dance floors, and a bunch of liggers trying to get their photos taken with the band.  This one only had one of these three.  It was like a wedding reception where someone had forgotten to book the entertainment.  Nobody cared though, they were ecstatic to be in the same room as Depeche Mode - The Greatest Band On Earth.

L-R - Dan Barton, Martin Gore, Paul Saye

Thanks to Martin et al for a fantastic night.  See you in August at Hollywood Bowl.

Depeche Mode's amazing new album 'Sounds Of The Universe' is out now.

Tofer Chin sponsored by Flaunt

Tofer Chin isn't just a fantastic artist, he's also borderline crazy as this installation may confirm.  Or maybe that's just his genius.  Whichever way, we love him and we love his work.  You will too if you are there this Saturday night.  There is also an after party with VERY SPECIAL GUESTS.  You don't want to miss it if you can help it.

Depeche Mode show in Hollywood!

Tomorrow night.  

Depeche Mode are celebrating the launch of their new album with a free concert in the heart of West Hollywood.  It's gonna be a roadblock, but it's something that you really, really shouldn't miss.

See you there!  Actually, there will be 10,000 people so I might not see you.  I'll wave if I do.

New Look Flaunt Magazine - Exclusive!

Flaunt Magazine new look.

The Fashion Issue of Flaunt Magazine is going to be worth the wait.  

Whilst, other publishers are complaining about the recession, Flaunt is creating it's own stimulus package: 'an idealistic expression of the arts as a conduit for critical perspectives and uninhibited expression moving ever more into the realms of luxury'.  

The new look magazine is a luxury item in itself, still with the best editorial and most beautiful photography to be found anywhere in lifestyle publishing.  The new size (a little bigger) gives it more stand out and more room for the imagery, whilst the all new design, quality, touch and feel of the magazine sets new standards in independent publishing.   The content remains as cool and relevant as ever.  Congratulations Guys.  www.flauntmagazine.com

Black Math Horseman

Last night at The Silverlake Lounge, Black Math Horseman celebrated the launch of their first album.  

What I love about this band is that they are GENUINE.  I saw the odd out of place hipster there, and they didn't know whether they SHOULD like it or not.  They didn't have a frame of reference in their minds for whether this made them, well... postmodern or aloof or cool or whatever they thought would help define them.  The poor kids were lost inside their own skins.  Meanwhile, the real crowd (including a healthy smattering of less self conscious hipsters) knew exactly what they thought as they brought the house down.

Black Math Horseman are epic, they're genuine 'anti-stars', oh and they're very, very loud.