Super-slow songs, fake websites from TV shows and Bill Murray GIFs
It's Rob Walker's weekend linkdown, with this week's most delightful websites!
by Rob Walker
It’s just a matter of time until the weekend begins. And as you know, that time needs to be killed as enjoyably as possible. Here’s what I can offer you.
The Very, Very Extended Mix: If you have a lot of time to kill, please enjoy all the bizarre examples of songs radically slowed down — “Nowhere Man, 800% Slower,” clocking in at 21 minutes, 38 seconds, etc. — compiled by HiLobrow’s Peggy Nelson. The finale to this “#slowmemes” roundup is “Hitler is informed he is 800% slower.” Check it out here, and, uh, take your time.
A Quick One: Or if you’re in a rush, here is video documentation of (purportedly) the world’s shortest album. The vinyl record includes “an assortment of the best grindcore acts from the past two decades” and lasts a total of 83 seconds. Draw your own conclusions. Via BoingBoing Google+.
When The Actual Web Is Not Enough: A rather satisfying montage video of “TV’s Fakest Websites” — including YouFace, FriendFace, Searchies, BFFLink, and etc. — from The Simpsons and many more. Via Videogum.
Art GIFs of the Week: Today and Tomorrow picks a few favorites from a Yoshi Sodeoka exhibition at ANI GIF, “an online gallery for artists to explore the creative possibilities of the Animated GIF file format.” Lovely, actually.
Not Art GIFs At All: Meanwhile, SwissMiss points out this handy “reaction GIF” archive. Not lovely, but not bad.
Great (Forgotten) Moments In Branding: My very favorite packaging-design blog, Box Vox, unearths two examples of brands that settled on the same naming strategy to win the trust of skeptical consumers: Fact Toothpaste and (yes!) Fact Cigarettes. Not surprisingly, neither survived.
A History of Pegman: Ever wondered about the complete design history of the little icon-figure in Google Maps? No? Well BuzzFeed has it anyway, with lots of sketches of various alternatives to the now-familiar “pegman” figure — and it’s pretty interesting.
Time Capsule: The Awl’s Alex Balk, who is fond of trotting out pop-culture landmarks that remind his readers that we are all aging and will die, marks the 30th anniversary of R.E.M.’s Murmur with a clip of the band making its national television debut on Late Night. Michael Stipe is strikingly awkward, while Peter Buck and Mike Mills are as charged and jittery as caged animals. And “Radio Free Europe” still sounds great, no matter how old it makes me feel.
