HOT
Sneaky Sneaker Drop
Following in the footsteps of athletes and other rappers, Kanye West released the greatest shoe of all time in the form of the Yeezy II Red October on Feb. 9. Despite zero promotion outside of a tweet from shoemaker Nike announcing their availability, the entire stash of the limited edition shoes sold out in nearly 10 minutes. West had a falling out with Nike before the release (reportedly Nike failed to recognize his genius marketing ability) and will now take his shoe-selling/designing acumen to Adidas (which may explain Nike’s surprise dump). So far, reviews of the shoes say they’re great, but not as great as they think they are. And there ARE a few options if you really want a pair.
WARM
What a Country!
During the Olympic opening ceremonies, it’s always fun to guess which indigenous, modern cultural touchstones the host country will trot out. When they were in Australia, INXS and Crocodile Dundee were celebrated, while the London Olympics featured Mr. Bean and Paul McCartney. Russia has produced less popular cultural icons than most large countries, so it seemed logical that the Sochi Olympics’ visually stunning ceremonies would have little in the way of contemporary culture. Then the Russian Police Choir did a version of (not-Russian) Electro duo Daft Punk’s recent hit “Get Lucky” and the country’s biggest Pop export, one-hit-wonders t.A.T.u., performed the Russian teams’ theme song. Globally, the duo is known for its early-’00s hit “All the Things She Said” … and for pretending to be lesbians. We can only assume they’re saving Yakov Smirnoff for the closing ceremonies.
Ten minutes of this right before the torch-lighting ceremony would have slayed!
COLD
The Horror. The Horror.
The world was outraged once again to discover that sometimes musicians on TV don’t actually play their instruments live! The social-media red meat this time was provided by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who dared to mime their brief performance during Bruno Mars’ Super Bowl half-time show. Somebody inspecting photos from the show undoubtedly got a huge boner when they discovered that RHCP’s bass and guitar were not even plugged in. The band explained that the NFL insisted on the backing tracks due to the huge half-time production, which has to be set up, performed and torn down within about 30 minutes. The saddest part of all? The Chilis didn’t perform their old tube sock routine.
Chili Peppers rock out with their … socks out (NSFW):
