What to do when you’re an independent, self-sustaining, Brooklyn-based graphic design studio that wants to keep up artsy, edgy appearances but you’ve only got a pretty un-arty, very un-edgy World Wildlife Fund Giant Pandas 2011 calendar in the house?

That’s right—Use your caption balloon sticky notes to make those endangered pandas say funny stuff every month. We thus give—apologetically belatedly—March’s Pin-Up Pandas. We’ll call them Javier and Fredo. You’re welcome.

Okay, universe. Okay. I get it.
Every year, I convince myself that, no, I do not in fact want to attend the musical and cultural orgy that is the South by Southwest festival because the town’s going to be a huge explosion of people and craziness and carnival debris and I far prefer to visit lovely Austin when it is actualy lovely and see our dear friends that live there when they’re not being stretched thin by one million activities and out of town visitors. And then every year, SXSW rolls around and I’m like, ‘Crap. Why did I not buy tickets to South by Southwest. Every band I’ve ever wanted to see is playing and it’s super warm down there and I think they’re handing out money to people on the streets.’ So I get it, universe. I GET IT!

But, just to show both you and me, universe, that there IS quality music that is not associated with this year’s festival, we’re featuring a brief interview and Song of the Week from a new Portland, OR artist, Sleepyvillian—AKA, Akila Fields. We received his album, Arithmetic, recently and were totally pulled in by it’s sweet melodies, subtle beats, and quiet beauty. Not knowing a thing about the guy, we decided to talk with him a little about his music, living in the legendary city of Portland, and joining the circus. No, really.

Kindness of Ravens: So Sleepyvillian is basically just you, right?

Sleepyvillain: Yes.

KoR: Where does the name come from?

Sv: It’s kind of silly, but when I was in college, a jazz trio I played with opened for a rock band and they asked us for a name. Rather than something like “Akila Fields Trio,” I knew I wanted villain in the titled so we just went with “Sleepyvillain.” This project is not related to that, but I kept the name.

KoR: That’s fair enough. I don’t think any bands have ever been like, “Listen to this cool, amazing story of how we got our name….” Oh, except Minus the Bear. Have you been playing music long then?

Sv: Yes. I’ve been playing piano since I was kid. I started when I was ten.

KoR: Crazy. I think I was still playing with Transformers when I was ten. Is your album being put out by anyone or are you totally doing it yourself?

Sv: No, I’m doing it all myself. It’s the first time I’ve recorded myself singing and also the first time I’ve done anything like this, stylistically. A beautiful set of interesting circumstances has brought all of this on. It’s been a fun challenge.

KoR: Well, it sounds great. So, did you for real tour with Barnum and Bailey? We’re pretty…er…really anti-animal-involved circuses, but what was that like?

Sv: Mmhmm. Yeah I know it sounds odd, but on the music end of things, it was kind of like playing a broadway show or something. The travel aspect of it was incredible—I’ve been to almost every major city at least once, and I saw music of all styles whenever I could. People bring up the animals a lot. It’s interesting—at the time I didn’t think anything of it, my mindset was mostly, “Whoa, you’re going to pay me to travel and play music….and i’m gonna live on a train?!” It’s definitely not for everyone, and takes a certain kind of person to do it. The repetition of playing 800 shows can wear on you.

KoR: I bet. Yeah, even in the cases where circuses aren’t actively ‘cruel’ to the animals involved, we’re just really against the idea of keeping them confined and forcing them into performing for people. There’s obviously a lot online about this, but this is a pretty concise page if anyone wants to check it out. So, back to you—tell us what do you like about Portland, now that you’re all settled down. We’ve heard very good things…especially for the vegan crowd.

Sv: I really like Portland. Everywhere I go, there are talented people, the city is beautifully laid out. Coffee and beer are plentiful. I kind of moved here on a whim, which I sometimes question, but several times a week, I’ll receive an answer. I’ve met incredible people here. And yes, it’s a vegan’s paradise (I’ve heard).

KoR: Yeah, I need to check it out. Any plans to tour? We hear there are lovely places to play these ‘rock concerts’ in the New York.
Sv: Someday hopefully. Baby steps. It was an awesome yet herculean task just to get it finished finished so the first step is to translate the songs for live performance. I love New York. It would be a dream to play there someday.

Until that day, we’ll have to settle for the soothing sound of headphones and speakers. Check out Sleepyvillain’s “Closer,” this week’s Song of the Week. And then head on over to Akila’s BandCamp page to hear more.

Design flotsam, jetsam.

Early last year, we wrote a guest piece comparing vegan ‘beef’ stew to the fine, fine music of Mr. Dan Black for our friend, Joshua, over at the Discerning Brute. Whereas we wholeheartedly stand by our comparison of european electro-pop to a nice, hearty stew, we’ve since revised our recipe and—given that it seems like there may well be a number of dreary, not-quite-spring-yet-godammit days ahead of us—we thought we’d share said revised recipe with you, dear reader. The main differences are the cooking technique (less boiling), use of home-made seitan (easier than it sounds and SO good), and the use of fresh broth rather than bullion cubes (less sodium, better taste). Now look outside. It’s time to make this stew.

Hearty Seitan Stew
• 16 oz. or so of Seitan, preferably home-made (The PPK has a great recipe, but we LUUUURV Terry Hope Romero’s seitan recipes in her vegan mexican book, Viva Vegan)
• 5 Un-peeled Carrots, cut into .5″ thick circles
• 5 Stalks Celery, sliced into .25″ pieces
• 16 oz. Frozen Peas
• 1 medium Sweet Onion (Vidalia or the like), diced into small pieces
• 3 medium un-peeled Yukon Gold Potatoes, cut into 1″ cubes
• 5 cloves Garlic, smashed, peeled, and diced
• 1 bottle or can of Decent Beer (we recently used Żywiec, a slightly sweet, medium alcohol Polish beer and it worked well)
• 2 tbsp. Teriyaki (we like Soy Vay…too much, maybe)
• 2 tbsp. Liquid Hickory Smoke
• 2 tbsp. HP Sauce or Vegan Worcestershire Sauce
• 6 oz. can of Tomato Paste
• 2-3 cups Vegetable Broth (preferably home-made—Allison of Allison’s Gourmet has a great sidebar on making vegetable broth in her current newsletter—it’s super-easy and well, well worth it)
• Olive Oil

Alright, that may seem like a lot of ingredients to some of you, but this is really a pretty simple recipe. And it makes, like, 72 servings or something, so it’s good for the long haul. First off, chop up your seitan into small chunks, maybe an inch or two in size. Whatever floats your boat, really. Brown the seitan in a tablespoon or so of oil in a large, heavy-bottom skillet—cast iron’s great. Do this over medium-high heat for five minutes or so, stirring the seitan to make sure it’s browning on all sides. Once it looks nice and appetizing, set it aside.

Without cleaning the skillet, warm another tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat, add your onion, and cook until it begins to caramelize, stirring often and allowing it to become a little translucent and brown a little on the edges. This’ll take seven minutes or so. Once that’s good to go, add your garlic. Lower the heat a tad to make sure the garlic doesn’t brown too much and cook for five minutes. Now re-introduce your seitan—”Seitan, I’d like you to meet Onions and Garlic. Onions and Garlic, this is Seitan. You may have heard of him.”—stir to coat and cook uncovered for a few minutes. Now throw in your teriyaki, smoke, HP or worcestershire, and half the beer, covering and cooking for 10 minutes or so. Uncover, stirring up the mixture and then adding your potatoes and a cup or so of broth. Stir and scrape the bottom of the skillet, using the liquid to deglaze the mixture and then re-cover, cooking for about ten minutes, but uncovering every so often to stir and check the tenderness of the potatoes with a fork. Once your potatoes begin to give a little but are still fairly solid, add in the carrot slices and re-cover, cooking for five minutes. At this point, most of the liquid should have absorbed into the seitan and vegetables, but if it hasn’t, cook uncovered over medium heat until the liquid’s mostly cooked off.

In a separate large pot, carefully mix together the frozen peas, celery, tomato paste, and the setian-vegetable mixture from the skillet with the rest of the beer and one to two cups of stock, depending on how thick you want your stew to be. Keep in mind that some liquid will cook off and the potatoes especially will begin to break down and thicken up the stew as their starch mixes in. And you can always add stock later if you’re unsure. Cook covered for at least a half hour and serve in hard-card wooden bowls by a fireplace in a dark, slightly seedy subterranean pub or country-side inn.

Today, the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day, rather than pretend like we know what we’re talking about and going on and on about some sort of thing that WE think is SUPER-funny and somewhat relatable and then artfully bring it back to the subject with a witty jab at “the man”…we’ve decided we prefer to defer to the ever-talented, Thao Nguyen—front woman of superbly named Thao and the Get Down Stay Down and Sisters of the Planet Ambassador for Oxfam America. She’s written a wonderful piece for Bitch Media that very much deserves the five minutes it takes to read (I’m a slow reader).

IWD is organizing thousands of events all over the world today to celebrate. Find one near you!

I know little to nothing about the band, Magic Man. They seem to be from Boston, though there’s a good bit on their bandcamp page about recording in the French countryside, so I guess they’re fancy Boston. And, though the name is singular, there appear to be two primary Magic Men, if you will—Sam Lee + Alex Caplow. But despite our severe lack of knowledge on the subject of Magic Man, we’ve got the one insight needed to write up a band on our Music Mondays—we really like their music. Indisputable fact. Prove me wrong.

See if you do too—check out their Song of the Week, “Darling,” and then head over to their bandcamp page to listen to their debut album, Real Life Color, or download it for free. That’s right, FREE! You know those French Bostonites. So giving. “Mon chére, I want you to have this album. It is, how you say, wicked awesome.”

Seeking: 1br – Cozy. Great light. Privacy, drafts non-issues.

Seriously, I want to live in this house. Wouldn’t you know it—New York City artist, Tom Fruin built it in Copenhagen, of all places. You know. The sixth borough.

The piece, titled Kolonihavehus—literally “allotment” in Danish, referring to small garden plots and their sheds—sits in the plaza of the Royal Library in Copenhagen and is made of metal, paint, and thousands of pieces of reclaimed plexiglass.

Purdy.

Quick post today, less due to lack of time to post, more due to lack of time to act.

The New York City Council is voting tomorrow on Intro. 371, an essential pro-choice bill that will bring transparency to controversial crisis pregnancy centers, what they do, and how they portray the pregnancy and abortion to impressionable young women and girls.

As you might be able to guess from the title of the recent report by NARAL (above), these centers, whose ads you likely have noticed all over NYC subways and bus stops (“Pregnant + Scared?”), are notorious for spreading misinformation as part of an anti-choice agenda. If you want to read more, check out the full report here (click to read on-screen, right-click to download, depending on your browser).

NARAL’s swinging into action, asking that those of us in NYC call our City Council members TODAY! Not sure if you’ve ever done it before, but it’s SUPER-EASY and totally not intimidating in the least. Usually you get someone who’s just excited to not be talking to a raving loon. And we were happy to learn that our guy, Brad Lander, is totally already planning on supporting Intro. 371 (District 39, raise the roof). You can find your gal/guy here quickly and easily and it just takes one minute to call. Then you’ll feel all warm and fuzzy all day.

NARAL’s also asking for volunteers tonight to run a phone bank to make a final push of support for the bill tonight. Just head on over to their offices—
Tuesday, March 1, 6-8:30 p.m.
NARAL, 470 Park Ave. South, 7th Floor South

So take a minute, make a call, and don’t let the jerks win. Holla.

I know, I know, I know. We’ve been kinda lax on the blogging lately. Honestly, it’s due to a nauseating combination of massive business, total laziness, and travel, some fun, some not so fun. But you know what, that sounds like a whole lotta’ whinin’ to me, right? Right? So we’re going to endeavor this week to make more blog posts, fewer excuses.

To start things off this Music Monday, we’re featuring one of our favorite new-ish bands—Baltimore’s Wye Oak. We went to a CMJ showcase a couple years ago to see Cut Off Your Hands (whom we reviewed WAY back when) and were caught off-guard when we were floored by the duo that makes up the spremely un-duo-sounding Wye Oak. They sway and swoon through songs, blowing them up to rocking, sonically-impressive heights and then pulling them tightly in to tiny wisps of emotions that endear you as a listener and as a human being. The drumming of multi-instrumentalist, Andy Stack, and guitar-playing of Jenn Wasner are both superb and work well with the surprisingly unique-but-familiar-sounding song-writing, but the real driving force of the music is Wasner’s voice. Honest, exposed, and beautiful, it gives the lyrics a gravity that swallows you whole.

Stack + Wasner are releasing their third album, Civilian, on Merge Records March 8 and it’s title track is our Song of the Week. Check it out. You will love it. We personally challenge you not to love it. When you’re done loving it, head over to NPR, where you can stream the whole album for free until it’s release next week.