"Pick Up the Pieces" will be the first single from Money Mark's new album, titled Brand New by Tomorrow, which is set to be released on February 27 on Brushfire Records.

Pick Up the Pieces [mp3] [EXPIRED LINK]

If you like it, buy it!

For its fifteenth anniversary, XLARGE Japan has published a special collector magazine celebrating fashion and culture. Among the features and photos in the magazine is a portrait of Mike D, who is one of the original investors and current stockholder in the clothing store. XLARGE Magazine is edited by former editors of Grand Royal Magazine and Warp.

Outside of Japan, the magazine can be pretty hard to find. Check eBay if you really want it.

Note that the Japanese trailer of Awesome; I Fuckin' Shot That!" may be viewed at XLARGE Japan site.

Adam Horovitz is interviewed in today's Sunday Mail. Among the things revealed in the interview is the Beastie Boys will be performing a concert in Singapore.

December 10, 2006
Perfectly Beastie

The Beastie Boys, pioneers of white rap, are spreading the Good Vibrations. RITCHIE YORKE reports

IN the other hemisphere, the rain is turning to sleet and then snow and chill winds rip leaves from the trees as winter descends. The average North American's thoughts turn to heading south to warmer climes.

Beastie Boy Ad-Rock (Adam Horowitz) joins the yearning throng as he contemplates the prospects of an Australian outdoor summer show early next year.

The Beasties are headlining the Good Vibrations line-up along with Jurassic 5, Timo Maas, Cassius, Nightmares on Wax and a host of others at Doug Jennings Park on the Gold Coast on February 11. There's a total of four Australian shows and a Singapore date.

"I'm more excited than you know about playing this show. We're pumped. These shows are just perfect for us," said the almost 40-year-old Ad-Rock from New York, whose last local appearance was the Big Day Out two years ago.

"The idea of the Good Vibrations series of shows is to basically hit the audiences hard. We're going to go straight for the knees. That may sound like a negative thing -- but we're actually going to turn that into a positive thing.

"We're just going to play the classics. Go with what you know. It's pretty much a case of, 'We've come to rock your socks off'.

"That's what we're getting paid for, and that's what we're going to do."

Since hitting the top of the charts in 1981 as early white exponents of the emerging rap culture, the Beasties have established themselves as one of the leading touring acts in the game.

Ad-Rock, who wasn't a founding member, says the band are amazed at the extraordinary inroads rap has made internationally.

"We're all pretty amazed about what's happened to that form of music. Finally, in the past couple of years, people have stopped asking when the rap fad will die out. This stuff obviously ain't dying out."

He agrees that it might be an appropriate time for rap and hip-hop to be considered a separate form of music from conventional rock 'n' roll.

"You wouldn't say that reggae and rock 'n' roll are the same. You wouldn't say that jazz and rock 'n' roll are the same. There's a lot more than just one style out there.

"It makes me feel good to see where rap is going man. It's very interesting. A lot of people are making a lot of money that wouldn't necessarily be making a lot of money. It's definitely a way for some people to make some money.

"But the influence of rap producers is making it the biggest form of music around right now. And so the biggest artists in the pop world -- artists like Gwen Stefani -- are now getting the leading rap producers to make their records.''

He doesn't really have an answer to questions about what music has impressed him lately.

"But I'm also like a real weirdo in that I listen to a lot of older music. Not old, but older."

Several friends have written to inform me of a web camera at Oscilloscope, the Beastie Boys New York studio. I'm on the opposite side of the world right now, so nothing is going on in the studio when I view the camera feed. I assume that many fans who are located outside America are missing out on the studio action. If you are able to view the Beastie Boys in real-time and can take a screen capture of the camera feed (PC: Alt + Print Screen; Macintosh: Apple + shift + control + 3), email the images to us at o.watch@gmail.com to post here and in our Flickr pool. Don't mess with sizing or cropping the images; Midzi and I will take care of that. Please indicate the date and time you captured the image and your name so we can credit your submission.

O Watch screen caps will be located here. Click on O Watch in the Links section (see column to the right) for easy access.

Money Mark will release his new album entitled Brand New by Tomorrow on February 20th, 2007. The album will be released via Brushfire Records. Tracks on the album contain titles such as "Color of Your Blue," "Eyes That Ring," "Pick Up The Pieces," (the album's first single), "Black Butterfly," "My Loss," and "Summer Blue".

"This isn't your typical jump up and down and have fun record like I usually make," says Mark of the 11-song project.

"I was really vulnerable at the time I was making the album," Mark continues. "I was writing for therapy, just to get through my day. These songs didn't come easy. Maybe I wrote a couple in one sitting, but that sitting was a long dark night." (from ign.com)

Moneymark.com