[SIC] 326: Me No Pop I

Vol. 7, No. 16. An associative ramble to start, then the links. No [SIC] Talks due to illness, but lots of replacement collateral. Open in a browser if you know what's good for you.

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And special thanks to Piers Fawkes, Iolanda Carvalho, Ilirjana Alushaj, Celeste Blewitt, Jesse Kirshbaum, Daniel Yadgard and Rob Hubbert for featured contributions this week

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Oh hello.

There’s something going around. Not only did my [SIC] Talks guest have to bail out yesterday, under the weather, but it’s been a common complaint at meetings all week long. I’m still managing to stay healthy, tho the malaise may be at the heart of my dissatisfaction lately with my Vol. 7 subject headings. This week I reverted to the headings circa v.6 - and they’ll probably change again next time to something more evergreen.

Apropos of that - while I ponder, I’ve decided to take next week off from the weekly Thursday digest. I’ll still do a daily microdigest for paid subs (including a first-ever Thursday version) so feel free to subscribe as a little year-end gift to yourself: it’s an $8 commitment (and of course a favor to me). I unlocked the Wednesday post this week so you get a sense of what you’re in for.

To further illustrate the feel of the daily microdigest and to compensate for no [SIC]Talks, here’s a little substitute for your ears: the latest episode of Culture Club Show Half Hour, the weekly pod I do with Jeff Carvalho on Fridays.

Jeff, as you may remember is co-founder of Highsnobiety, which announced yesterday that GQ global style director Noah Johnson is its new editor-in-chief. I don’t know Noah but I saw him play tennis once at a US Open-adjacent event that Jason Stewart and Chris Black from How Long Gone hosted for On, the sneaker brand. Jason incidentally wrote up A Year of Los Angeles Dining for Taste Cooking this week, which I enjoyed, since it’s been almost that long since I was in LA proper.

HLG was the show I listened to more than any other in 2024 (and in 23, 22, 21 and probably 20), which I thought of while reading Bobby Hundred’s Best of 2024 post from yesterday, which has some great stuff spanning film, music, TV and media (looks like Bobby’s got a TV show in the works himself, btw). Among Bobby’s picks including a top 10 newsletter shout out for [SIC] Talks alums Casey Lewis’s After School (ofc) and Aaron Stern’s Another Newsletter, which is more of a deep cut but also a fave of mine too. Subscribe to those if you don’t already, please.

Aaron’s associative rambles are a sublime ideal for me and since he likes to throw to images to illustrate his thoughts here’s a new painting from the painter Cynthia Talmadge, The Diplomat’s Wife’s Altitude Sickness on the Tarmac, San Salvador. Painted on sand, it’s sublime, too. It’s apparently from a show at Marc Selwyn in LA, which is new to me.

Also from LA, also new to me: Avalon, the DJ / Musician who I stumbled on while scrolling IG after finding Cynthia’s painting and who just had a big feature in Interview that she secured by her own personal outreach (according to Mel Ottenberg in response to a now-deleted snarkpost congratulating her publicist, anyway). Pitching well is what I’m trying to do when I’m not newslettering, so this Seth Godin post on why Ideas need handles: the thing about subject lines struck me this AM.

[SIC] Weekly titles are generally pulled from the ether; today’s was originally “Analog Mountainclimbing” inspired by what I took to be Avalon’s management company in her IG bio. But then I stumbled across this *excellent* Ze Records compilation, featuring a longtime favorite of mine, “Me No Pop I,” the one-off single by Coati Mundi and backed by the criminally unsung Kid Creole & The Coconuts.

The compilation is 100% gold with the possible exception of the final song, “In the Closet” by Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, but I’ll let you decide for yourself. Listen to the whole thing immediately and let it enliven your weekend.

Digging into the Coati Mundi song turned up a charming lo-fi, silly music video, shot in pre KIDS Washington Square Park where Hernandez looks great dancing around the fountain to the delight of whomever happens to be hanging around.

Which brought to mind Blackbird Spyplane’s kinda-controversial Timeless Style is a Lie post from Tuesday. Hard agree on the concept, hard disagree on the Harrington Jacket character assassination, if for no other reason than I’ve got one circa 2016 from Pilgrim Surf Supply that really is timeless.

Irrespective, BBSP is a favorite of mine - so it’s nice to know [SIC] qualifies as somebody favorite too: Emma Waterman’s post on 🔟 (of many) newsletters that have brought [her] joy, perspective and knowledge this year featured this humble digest alongside titans including Perfectly Imperfect, Feed Me and Zine

Another favorite of mine is of course [SIC] Talks Alum Daisy Alioto’s Dirt, and not just because they included my Gas Station Order this week. Corollary to that, from SuperOkay major domo Rob Hubbert: “Good newsletter generally for the CPG heads, but what really caught my attention was the section on the “the shape of America” report from Hims and Hers Of the 5k adults surveyed, 70% would rather lose 10 pounds than gain 100 friends”

Wild. Speaking of friends, homies Heidi Hartwig and Amy (Gunther) Ellington are uniting for the Friends From New York and KCDC’s Night Market on Saturday - which is an all ages, free danceparty and last-minute holiday gift bazaar.

I’m headed there on Sat after stopping in at the return of Free Screen Printing at fave artist ESPO’s Peace Manufacturing storefront in Cobble Hill - the first since Steve moved to Tokyo a year ago. Meet me there.

More friends: from [SIC] Talks alum IIijana Alushaj: “Hey Ben! Hope you've been well! I wanted to reach out as I just launched issue two of The Pop Manifesto and wanted to share it with you! Enjoy and let me know if you have thoughts!”

ilirjana

A post shared by @ilirjana

And from another [SIC] Talks alum, Jesse Kirshbaum from Nue Agency and Beats & Bytes : “I just dropped my 2024 year in review. it would mean a lot to me if you highlighted it… the link for the trend report is here/ And here is an Adweek article [Brands Should Pay Attention to Music Culture]”

Final friend submission: from Daniel Yadgard of Fishs Eddy: “Morning sir … hope your [sic] well. I’m sure you have heard this already but sending along anyway in case you have not:”

I hadn’t - but therein was Kareem’s reflection on his early VICE days, including a mention of yours truly:

“Andrew Creighton - the president, didn’t have an office. Ben Dietz -head sales guy, didn’t have an office. And I was absorbing phone calls. They were on the phone all the time and they talked fucking loud. They talked loud, like they were IN offices. And … you’re just absorbing this information… it was sick… it was like getting an MBA in business or media or the media business”

Made me smile. Was true. And nice to hear. Also true: the HR guy’s office had previously been a closet. He was absolutely not named “Giorgio Scorpio,” though. Jjust what Kareem called him, I guess.

Bringing it all home: Kareem’s story reminded me that even in our chaotic moment, there are still Rules for Modern Life, and when I read David Coggins’s post In Praise of Small Gestures, I made a note of it. You should too.

Hope that all tides you and your tabs over a while. Happy holidays in the meantime, everyone. Now, at long last, the links.

Ben

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[SIC] 326: Me No Pop I

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The Macro Narrative

• “It’s Game Over for Facts” How Vibes Came to Rule Everything from Pop to Politics. Facts are dead, writes Jess Cartner-Morley, and they’ve been replaced by vibes, “now item No 1 on boardroom agendas worldwide.” / The Guardian

• Hence: The Grinch comes for Beyonce in ridiculous album art recreations / Creative Bloq

• And ergo: The Year in Brain Rot / The New Yorker

• From Iolanda: Trip down memory lane or looking back to move forward... 😉 [Did Nostalgia Rule 2024's Creativity] IBB Online

• Forward looking: The ‘vibecession’ is over as optimism gains steam/ CNBC

• And Quartz’s What's Ahead 2025. 2024 was a transformative year — and 2025 promises to reorder the global business landscape at an even more dizzying, breakneck pace / Quartz

• Related: Casey Lewis on The Biggest Social Media Trends of 2024 and What’s Ahead in 2025 / Marketer’s Brief Pod

• Also: [What predictions from 25 years ago tell us about the next 25 years] / The Media Leader

• And: From 'internet speak' to de-influencing: Top consumer trends of 2024. Trends moved quickly this year as brands rushed to pick up internet speak and high-low fashion underwent a renaissance / Vogue Business

• The Year Brown and Beige Ate the World. Mocha mousse" is the color of 2025, but brown is the color of the decade / Back Row

• Apropos of eating: In fashion circles, the breakfast meeting is toast. It’s time we brought it back/ Monocle

• More rewinds: The most popular New Yorker stories of 2024, as measured by “engaged minutes”—the total time people spent reading them / The New Yorker

• And The top 10 product designs of 2024. Spray-on trainers, a water-filtering bottle cap and inflatable self-defence devices for protestors / Dezeen

• Security-releated: The Artist Exposing the Data We Leave Online . Riley Walz is calling attention to the hidden deposits of personal information that power our digital lives / The New Yorker

• Corollary, from Piers: How the Right and the MAHA Movement Have Co-opted ‘Crunchy’ / NYT

• And Caroline Calloway’s interview with Haliey Welch / Interview.

• And also: Don’t Call It a Bachelor Pad. Grown men on TikTok are going viral for sharing glimpses into their meticulous homes, which they’ve dubbed “boy apartments.” / NYT

• Corollary: Is men’s grooming going alpha male again? / Vogue Business

• So, like… Are men okay? Our modern masculinity problem, explained. Why is it so hard to talk about masculinity? / Vox

Generationations

• Debunking ZIRP. Which came first, millennial-focused startups or millennial taste? / Tasteland

• Elsewhere: Starbucks is the new Venmo for Gen Alpha/ Fast Company

• How Gen Z ruined Guinness And the fetishisation of the mundane / The Spectator

• Corollary: The case for school uniforms is compelling. Sensibly enforced, they can have an equalising effect in the classroom / FT

Platformations

• The 2024 state of social media / User Mag

• Corollary? Reddit saw record growth in sports-themed Subreddits as it organically owns the sports social media crown / Digiday

• Apropos: You Know Who Posts on Social Media? Hardly Anybody / Social Media Today

• Hence? Elon asks for you to stop using hashtags/ X

• And Instagram now allows users to schedule DMs / TechCrunch

• Not me, but this person Traded News Apps for Rumble, the Right-Wing YouTube. Here’s What [they] Saw. / NYT

• Staying Human in the Age of Data / The Future Does Not Fit in the Containers of the Past

• Related: Surf the Human-Curated Internet/ Crazy Stupid Tech

• With Beehiiv, Tyler Denk Is Riding the Newsletter Wave. Tyler Denk has cultivated a brash online persona while building Beehiiv into a buzzy newsletter platform. Both are lucrative / Inc

• While Substack’s founders claim they’re powering the “The new media” in their expanded partnership with The Free Press/ Substack

• Back to Tyler: He’s on Howard Lindzon’s pod for Email’s Revenge: the new distribution King / Spotify

• And Emily’s got him for a Guest Lecture: Tyler Denk. beehiiv's CEO shares his thoughts on Substack / Feed Me.

Stylistics

• Why China will save luxury in 2025. Country to play pivotal role in global luxury market recovery, Deutsche Bank says / Jing Daily

• Is ‘barnfit’ next after ‘quiet luxury’? China’s Gen Z puts local spin on British countryside aesthetic, creating retail opportunities / Jing Daily

• Also heritage-coded: Messages with meaning: the enduring tradition of embroidery. Demand for personalisation is driving a revival, amid increasingly standardised fashion / HTSI

• And, from PIers: Remaking Bob Dylan’s Favorite Garments for Levi's® Vintage Clothing x A Complete Unknown / Levi Strauss

• We’re Trapped in a Menswear Echo Chamber. Can Women Help Us Break Out? / Inside Hook

• From Piers: the mission statement is pants but the apres-workout concept is interesting [Meet Re-Layer, London's Newest Aprés-Sport Brand] / Hypebae

• Elsewhere, from Celeste: “Ffern as a brand has such an intriguing strategy, the films that link with each scent released are so evocative” [Would You Buy Perfume You Had Never Smelled?] / NYT

• Hill House has sold 1 million Nap Dresses / BBC

• Gap launches elevated subbrand designed by Zac Posen. The line’s debut collection is holiday themed, with future launches planned for the spring / Retail Dive

Culturations

• A Minute With [the painster] Hopie Stockman Hill / Art Stuff

• And Upcoming Tokyo Exhibition Honors the Artistry of Ryuichi Sakamoto / Hypeart

• W David Marx’s new guidebook to Tokyo’s mid-century establishments / Culture: An Owner’s Manual

• Gerhard Richter once thought film wasn't for him—in Rome, his latest exhibition proves how wrong he was / The Art Newspaper

• What's In A Brow? Little thoughts on high, middle, and low art / The Melt

• ON CALLE: Photographer and collector Kayten Schmidt on Sophie Calle's ‘True Stories’ as a balm for living with loss / Editions Mag

• The Associated Press has released their 100 best photos of 2024/ AP

• Related: The year in Interviews: Aperture’s Must-Read Photography Features of 2024 / Aperture

• More conversation: Surface Stories With Kest Gak / Friends From New York

• THR profiles the always-busy multi-hyphenate Ryan Reynolds, who was named the publication’s Producer of the Year / The Hollywood Reporter

• From Celeste “Niche and classic, seafarers and a link to Captain Haddock of Tintin fame - what an intriguiging story of a tomb from hundreds of years past.” [Tintin And The Terrific Tomb: Essex Listing Is A Thrill For Herge Fans] / The Guardian

• Also a long-time coming: 2hollis’ tenacity is finally paying off After various experiments – not least medieval-themed trap – 2hollis has risen from the underground with elfin looks, a moshpit-commanding presence and a formidable sound that sneaks pop hooks into pulverising rage rap and EDM / The FACE

• Speaking of sneaky? Disney removed a transgender story line from an upcoming animated series about a middle school softball team / NYT

• Also disappearing: Why are Top Scientists Leaving Harvard? The Rot is Deep / Marginal Revolution

• Elsewhere: 11 of the Best Music Documentaries Ever Made / Lifehacker

• Corollary: The Life, Death, and Memphis Blues of Jay Reatard. Remembering a punk visionary and the songs he left behind / Oxford American

• From Celeste: “A great discussion on the history of bells and the intersection of art, the signal of time and reflection” [When Church Bells Stop Us In Our Tracks] / FT

• Apropos of jingle bells: Jingling Baby. Some new Xmas tunes before going OOO / Catchdini

Technopolis

• Google DeepMind unveiled a video-generation model to rival OpenAI’s Sora. Veo 2 much-improved physics and sharper resolutions / TechCrunch

• The Technology That Actually Runs Our World. You might have heard that algorithms are in control of everything you hear, read, and see. … And yet, cultural algorithms are only downstream of the larger, intractable forces that shape how art is made and supported / The Atlantic

• Case in point? The European Union will back a constellation of internet-providing satellites to rival SpaceX’s Starlink. The 290 satellites will offer services for EU governments, as well as private companies and citizens / The Verge

Media-tions

• US media company Forbes opened a high-end, private members’ club in Madrid. This new bricks-and-mortar outpost is aimed at business leaders, politicians, creatives and entrepreneurs in the Spanish capital/ Monocle

• Forbes is cutting ties with freelance writers, citing Google spam policies / The Verge

• Because? The Era of Media Arbitrage Is Dead / A Media Operator

• Related: How Perplexity calculates publishers’ share of ad revenue / Digiday

• Also: The Year 'Vogue' Lost the Plot / Back Row

Market / Influence

• What do management consultants actually do?/ YT

• Sorry, Mad Men. The Ad Revolution Is Here. Two advertisers are combining into a $30B behemoth to harness the data, tech and AI expertise now dominating Madison Avenue—and all the marketing you see / WSJ

• Related: Universal now hoovers up Downtown Music. Another collection of indie stalwarts falls to the majors / Network Notes

• "Brands today have to balance competing needs: more digital content to drive engagement, but also more consistency to drive long-term effectiveness" and more, by Tom Roach [Brand building must adapt to the age of creative fragmentation] /Marketing Week

• Like, How Do You Make Body Lotion Cool? The brands driving the body care boom are using technology, innovation, fragrance and collaborations to make their personal care products covetable / BoF

• Who Gives A Crap’s David Titman on becoming third-largest toilet paper brand in UK / The Drum

• Are luxury brands ruining Art Basel Miami? Showcase has turned into an orgy of brand activations, devoid of added value for clients / Jing Daily

• Couples are increasingly scheduling their weddings around dates when their local college football team isn’t playing/ WaPo

• EA College Football 25 is now the best selling sports game in US history / Yahoo

• Vis a vis NIL: Strictly Business chats with top Verve agents Bryan Besser, Adam Levine, Adam Weinstein, and Liz Parker about the current state of representation in Hollywood / Variety

• Elsewhere: From Piers: Lego has an IP problem / Fast Company

• Also problematic: Automakers Thrived in the Pandemic. Many Are Now Struggling. / NYT

• Ergo: Honda and Nissan are discussing a merger to compete with China’s electric vehicle industry / NYT

• Apropos of mergers, from Piers: Network of Supermarket Chains. The current landscape of supermarket parent companies and their subsidiaries — national chains, regional, local, co-ops, specialty, ethnic, and discount / Flowing Data

• Malcolm Gladwell on Finding Freedom in Abandoning Expectations / The Slowdown

• An interview with Chris Shimojima Founder and President, C5 Advisory. San Diego, CA / Unorthodox Blend

Eats, Drinks and Ephemera

• The Secret History of Risotto / The New Yorker

• Behind the Limitless Pursuits of Dansk Pepper Mill Collectors / Food52

• Somehow corollary?! The pure liberation of a personal urination device / NYT

The Natural (?!) World

• Recent panic over black plastic started with a math error / PopSci

• Researchers discover closest known relative to Psilocybe cubensis, also known as magic mushrooms; fungi potentially reached North America as much as a million years earlier than believed/ IFL Science

• Should Psychedelic Researchers Disclose Personal Use of the Drugs They Study? / Doubleblind

• Giant mushroom feeds family for a week / BBC

• The story of how the US created the most productive dairy cows in history—thanks to big data, public-private partnerships, and Danish immigrants / Works In Progress

• From Piers: LA tree enthusiast shares her love for the city’s canopy: ‘Something we took for granted’ / The Guardian

• Dubai to be transformed into pedestrian-friendly city with two-kilometre elevated walkway / Dezeen

• Ageing, static and skint: Nine charts that explain what's going on with London transport / London Centric

• from Celeste: A global conversation on developers, gentrification and how to draw people into live music venues, smaller venues and supporting the up and coming talents is one which I feel many grapple with [Saving England's Music Oasis From A New Wave Of Development] / NYT

• And finally, another From Celeste: [Is Naples The New Palm Beach?] / Town & Country

  

[SIC] 326: Me No Pop I

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Corollary Sources this week: The New Statesman / Elevator / 1440 / Offball / Morning Brew / Semafor / After School / User Mag / Public Announcement / Blood & Champagne / Feed Me / Brendan’s Communications Miscellany / The Future Party /