The Smoking Jacket is Playboy’s way of giving you a SFW outlet to keep up with the comings and goings of the Playboy universe. Since I shot with Playboy TV’s Badass last year and this year (commercial above) they wanted to interview me about what it’s like to shoot hot naked women.  They asked me to have sapphic undertones to my interview to make all the readers want more — which is funny to me — but I give Playboy what they wanted.

I talk about which model has my favorite boobs, butt, who surprised me with their red pubes, and all those other questions you may have wanted to ask me but were afraid to. Read the whole interview here and enjoy a huge gallery of my SFW photos of Justine Joli, Jelena Jensen, Shay Laren, Masuimi Max, Mosh, Heather Vandeven, Brianna Jordan, Courtney Cruz, Darenzia, Aria Giovanni, Justene Jaro, Renee Perez, Asa Akira, Adriana Sage and Krista Ayne.

A couple of weeks back Fader TV sat down to do a video feature on New York’s ASAP Rocky but got a a nice cameo from a large chunk of Hip Hop’s future. Along with the whole ASAP crew, Rocky rolled in with Oakland’s Main Attrakionz and SpaceGhostPurrp who recently moved from Florida to New York. Rocky had been playing host to both up and comers.

Check out the Interview and be sure to check out Rocky and Purrp at Santo’s Party House tonight!

Fuckin’ eXquire! Our boy, Mr. Muthafuckin’ eXquire has been making big moves lately, in preparation for his upcoming LP Lost In Translation, out September 11. The Brooklyn native recently sat down for an interview with SHHO to discuss his roots, his introduction to rap, and his creative process. Sick interview, straight up. Watch it.

Check out our Bloglin profile on eXquire if you’re not yet familiar with him, and come September 11, download Lost In Translation right here on the Bloglin. For free! Huzzah!

The world isn’t flat. Writing about grime – a musical form inherently and intrinsically British – while living across the Atlantic can be maddening at times. You can catch the tracks and peep the videos, but that boots-on-the-ground intel and visceral experience will always be missing.

That’s why grime needs Mixclique, the duo comprised of DJ/producer Neon Beats and DJ Ethic. A couple of grime heads from Ipswich, Mixclique have been making waves in the scene for about a year now. With major DJs supporting Neon’s instrumentals, and Ethic’s steady hand keeping the trains running on time, Mixclique aims to touch every part of the grime scene – from production and DJing to music and mix releases.

Their most exciting project is Mixclique Vision, a series of interviews, freestyles and DJ sets that the guys are recording for a global audience. They’ve already interviewed heavyweights like the Butterz crew, Dexplicit, and Spooky (of Keep Watch mix infamy). For grime fans outside of the UK, Mixclique Vision is quickly proving itself to be an essential resource.

Sonically, Neon Beats is coming into his own as a grime producer, building off last year’s Ahead of Grime and Just in Grime EPs. His bootleg mash-up of Teddy’s “Afghan” and Darq E Freaker’s “Cherryade” blends two major grime tracks into one banging instrumental. Here’s P Money doing his thing on the beat:

Neon Beats – Afghan Cherryade – Elijah & Skilliam Ft P Money, Royal-T, Starkey, Swindle – 14/07/11 by Neonbeats

Neon Beats’ hottest track yet “Too Much,” a collaboration with Lady Leshurr, who spits like a machinegun over the hyperactive riddim. Here’s hoping Neon has some more of these beats in the queue. If he does, Mixclique will have the tracks and the vision for a true grime experience. Even if you’re not there with them.

You know them, you love them: it’s Nadastrom. Dave and Matt were recently interviewed by club legend Cosmo Baker for Scion A/V. The two talk about their earliest collaborations, the surprise success of their Pussy EP, and (of course) moombahton.

The rise of Nadastrom mirrors the rise of DC, which after years of being a cultural buzzkill finally forged a creative community. They’ve since moved to LA to work more closely with Dubsided label head Switch, but they still represent DC: the duo headline Wednesday’s Moombahton Massive at the U Street Music Hall, along with Sabo, Zuzuka Poderosa, DJ Orion, and Thee Mike B. ¡Dalé moombahton!

Here he is again, Sean Reveron, harbinger of the awesomely vile clothing line CVLT Nation, returns to the Bloglin, not in the form of a brutal Blackened Everything mixtape, this time in the flesh. Sean is an entrepreneur, underground music enthusiast, and purveyor of all that is heavy. Fortunately, he was able to answer five big ones on the intent of his new brand, the creative process that brought him to this point, and the state of metal in general. Escorting the public into a new epoch of foulness, this guy is on the cutting edge of fringe culture. Listen up.

Is Cvlt Nation something you do all on your own? You put out a lot of material outside of the design stuff such as mixtapes, album reviews, and all-around media articles, I can’t imagine you do that all by yourself?

Sean Reveron: No way…I couldn’t do it all on my own! My wife, Meghan, and I spearhead the project and do the majority of the blogging, like 60% of it. But we also have contributors from all over the world who are a part of the metal and punk scenes in their own areas, like in Ireland, Germany, Indonesia, England, New York, Texas, Cali – so we get a wide variety of coverage.

We don’t micromanage our bloggers at all, so they bring a lot of different perspectives and opinions to the blog. It’s really amazing that we have been able to connect with so many awesome and talented people from around the world, whether in music or art. The metal communities worldwide have been so supportive of what we are doing, and we see the site as a way to support creative people in the communities as well.

So I know you were working previously with Rockers. What happened with that? Was Cvlt something you’ve always wanted to do or a new concept that rose from the ashes of Knights of The Vampire Killers?

Sean Reveron: Working with Rockers NYC made up some awesome years of my life, but it was time to move on, and it was just natural for me to gravitate towards punk and metal imagery and music because of my background as a part of those scenes in the 80s. CVLT Nation is a culmination of ideas I have had for years, all wrapped into one brand, and the first season we paid tribute to KVK with one of our shirts, Legion. KVK will always have a special place in my heart, but it was more of an art project than a real clothing brand.

Yeah, I’ve heard you’re a veteran of sorts in the early L.A. punk/hardcore scene. Did you grow up listening to the SST guys like Black Flag and The Minutemen or skate punk type stuff like Suicidal Tendencies or The Adolescents? Had any interesting experiences with the bands themselves or at the shows? I mean you must’ve seen some shit.

Sean Reveron: I was into all those bands as a youth…it wasn’t either or for me. Being that I’m a Venice local, when we all got into punk in the 80′s it was natural that I became a Suicidal Boy. They were our local band, so we had to rep our hood. More than that, everyone in Suicidal Tendencies were our homies. Some of my favorite moments happened hanging out at Suicidal Park (Mar Vista Park) before shows, plus all of the leagues we had, like the Suicidal Golf Club, Suicidal Softball League & Suicidal Bowling League. One of my favorite memories was New Year’s Eve, 1983 – Suicidal played a house party in Santa Monica & played all Sabbath covers. It was a huge kegger, and the cops came & tried to smash our heads in, but we escaped, jumping over fences, running wild in the streets!

I saw Black Flag play mad times in all sort of places. I remember seeing them at their reunion show at the Santa Monica Civic, that was rad…everyone who was ever in the band performed that night, it was pretty epic, & The Misfits opened up. The next day, The Misfits went into the studio in Los Angeles & recorded their last album, Earth A.D.. Another gnarly Black Flag gig was seeing them perform outside the federal building in Westwood. What made this gig extra special is that for once the L.A.P.D. could not fuck with us because we were on federal property, so we could do whatever the fuck we wanted to do. I was super lucky to have grown up in the LA punk scene, but one thing I want to stress is that we were the outsiders, the weirdos, the freaks – & we were one huge punk rock family.

I’m a hardcore punk and metal nerd myself and love the fact that you post reviews of underground releases that a lot of so called “headbangers” would have no clue about otherwise. Is extreme music just as much a part of the brand as the t-shirt designs and diy items you sell? What do you think about those who don’t listen to the music but embrace spikes, leather, and satanic imagery as a fashion statement?

Sean Reveron: I have always been into underground music; I think it stems from supporting my local bands and artists as a kid. Plus, one of my favorite things to do is to look for and listen to new or obscure music on the internet, and I am so happy I’ve been able to incorporate that into my blogging. CVLT Nation is all about heavy music, art, clothing & cultures, so heavy is pretty much integral to the brand.

For the CVLT Nation clothing brand, we work with artists who have ties to the music community through their artwork on albums and band merch, so the clothing itself is inextricably tied to the music. It’s really important to us to make clothing that speaks to people who are into the blog and the music and art we cover. As far as the “fashion” of looking dark, I try not to judge people for it, but I think maybe they should give the music a try so people don’t mistake them for posers.

Fair enough. If you could name one artist/band, or even a few, that are currently performing and putting out new material as an inspiration for the work you do now and how your musical tastes have evolved over time, who would it be and why?

Sean Reveron: The rad thing about CVLT Nation is that through our blogging, we are finding so many inspiring bands and artists. The underground is literally teeming with creative people, so it’s hard to point to just one or two. With music, we have some projects we are working on with bands that we find inspiring, like our Sonic Cathedrals mixtape series, where a band curates a mix of the music they find inspiring. We put one out last week with Altar of Plagues, and we have some in the works with bands like The Secret, Young And In The Way and Coffinworm.

As far as art goes, when we find artists that inspire us, we find a way to work with them on graphics for the CVLT Nation clothing brand. There are so many talented artists out there in the world, and we are trying to provide another platform for showing their work through the clothing and the blog. The great thing is that we have gotten so much good feedback from artists who want to be a part of what we’re doing.

How have my musical tastes evolved? I’ve always listened to dark music, I am just allowing more of it into my life than I used to. I still like a huge variety of music, but I am exploring heavy music and finding out how many different layers and textures there are.

—–

Thanks again Sean! Go on over to CVLT Nation, you can get the apparel right here as well, and get a fistful of blackness punched into your mind’s eye, you’ll be grateful you did.

Alexander Heir is a Brooklyn artist who is the man behind the sinisterly stylish clothing brand Death/Traitors and a screenprinting shop called Funbot Press, which has done diverse work for a wide spectrum of clients, from a gourmet Italian restaurants to the World/Inferno Friendship Society. He is also one half of record label Burn Books Records and plays in the band Teardrops. he’s also done a design or two or three for us over the years.

In addition to all of that craziness, he found some time to design Summer 2011′s Мишка’s Sacrifyce T-Shit, which is available in Black, White, and a Pink Tie-Dye, and even more to speak with us about his work, inspirations, and future projects. Are we going to hell by association?

Tell us about your line, Death/Traitors. When did it get started? Can you describe the mentality behind it?

Alexander Heir: I put out the first Death/Traitors design in early 2007, the 666 pyramid logo. I initially started making shirts because there was nothing out there I wanted to wear, the only cool shirts you could buy were either band shirts or reprints of old SEX/Seditionaries stuff.

I started using the 666 and other occult/masonic imagery because it’s so powerful, and really freaked a lot of people out. Plus, religious conservatives were and still are trying to influence their power more and more over the country, so the 666 was my little way of kicking back.

As far as commissioned work for bands, if they don’t already have an idea of what they want, I’ll ask for some lyrics or song titles and draw inspiration from that.

Check it out. I was interviewed by these Floridians for Neon Forest. You can read it on over here. We chatted about, oh, everything. Who am I really? Am I the guy you think you know? Am I the guy in this interview? You’ll never know and the harder you try to guess the more I will slip away. I am a mysterious goon with a buncha layers, like an angry onion. Try to get to know me!

The interview’s okay, just their attempt to help move this limited run of shirts I drew for them. Only Twenty-four were printed though.

Buy the T-shirt over here.

The first live concert a person attends undoubtedly secures a place in one’s heart, a manifestation in the mind as an un-erasable memory, no matter how terrible of a performance it actually was. When this question comes up and others, my age, are romancing over seeing Blind Melon or The Moody Blues, I get to bust out Weird Al’s name. My initial introduction to live music was through the satirist’s 1999 tour promoting his album Running With Scissors and I’m not ashamed to say it. He rocked the fucking house, “It’s All About The Pentiums” went significantly harder than the Puff Daddy (pre-P. Diddy) original. Oh yes, those were the days.

Since then, I’ve kind of lost sight of Weird Al Yankovic’s career, that’s not to say I ever renounced my fanhood, I just sort of stuck my head in the sand hoping I could loop The Food Album without having to necessarily fuck wit’ Straight Outta Lynwood. All that aside, our boy James Greene Jr. over at Crawdaddy Magazine gave an exceptional interview with the prodigious pundit of parody.

The multi-talented comedian gives us the scoop on his relationships with the celebrities he so gracefully mocks, his newest album Alpocalypse, which features the above “Perform This Way.” His new video parody of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” which has garnered almost 7 million (at the time of writing this) views. Al also shares his own thoughts on the past, present, and future of his career.

The length of those flawless curls speak volumes about his adventure as an artist, hurdling over copyright infringement and humorless musicians, to a place of genuine funniness. The insightful conversation with the maestro of mockery is  available to read here.

Photo by Ash Daniel

James Callahan is a prolific illustrator who has both created his own work with Barf Comics and contributed to tons of different projects, including some great work for Thrash Metal revivalists Municipal Waste and ourselves. James illustrated our recent tees for Mastodon and video game, Brütal Legend, which makes him basically the most metal dude who ever lived by proxy. If only he weren’t such a sweet guy.

In addition to all this, Callahan is the co-founder and art director for Born Ugly Magazine and he is working on his first graphic novel, Rotting in Dirtville. This season James also illustrated the Superfiends! t-shirt for our Summer 2011 line. A design that features all our favorite mascots done up as an 80′s cartoon super team in what has to be the best combination of things we love since peanut butter and chocolate. He took some time to speak with us recently about his influences, motivations, and future projects.

James Callahan: Think of the shittiest, most corn-ball joke you’ve ever heard. Now make it ten times shittier. Now draw a picture of it. That’s Barf Comics. It’s Leslie Nielsen and Weird Al high fiving in the center of a black hole. Or, if you want an answer that isn’t stupid, it’s me drawing stuff for record covers and skateboards.

How do you discern what kind of artwork to do when you’re commissioned by bands, like Municipal Waste? Does the music influence what you do in a major way, or do you just do whatever comes to you?

James Callahan: Sometimes people ask for something very specific, and sometimes they leave it wide open. When it’s left up to me, I try to come up with some combination of subject matters and styles that I’ve never seen done before, as futile a task as that can often be.

I usually am trying to come up with an image that, when I’m done and I step back, either makes me laugh, wince, or leaves me stupified…or all of the above.

James Callahan: Anything by Daniel Clowes, Jim Phillips, Frank Miller, Winsor McCay, and Charles Burns were endless sources of brain food. I couldn’t get enough of that stuff. It’s ruined me. I was also a a huge fiend for all things Batman or EC horror comic related. Really though, if I didn’t have to narrow it down… everything, all at once, every second, forever. I love comics.

What upcoming personal projects are you working on?

James Callahan: I drew the last two issues of Pirates of Coney Island, written by Rick Spears, which should be coming out this year. I’ve also been working on another comic with Rick called Die Pumpkin, Die.

I just had a project come out from Carhartt‘s skate division that I’m still amped on. Summon The Snake Beast was a three board series with a full color comic that I wrote and illustrated. I’m real gassed on how that came out. Decks for Freedom Fighter, Demon Seed, Ready Amongst Willing, some new work for Thrasher Magazine, and there’s always some Born Ugly stuff in the works too.