Archive for July, 2011

Every day we share a single photo from our Flickr Pool shot by one of our faithful and talented readers (that’s you!)

Saw a photo in the pool today that just plain-out made me smile. I don’t have a story or an anecdote I can relate this photo to, but it’s just too good not to share. Anything I could try to hope to write would inevitably just get in the way of an image that is entirely self-contained – if you click through to Flickr you can see it a little bigger for maximum detail, and I implore you to do so.

So without further ado, from YvrClick is an impeccably timed and well-sen image that begs the age-old question, How Many Dogs Can You Fit in a Car?

Gary

Welcome to Crowdsourced Sunday, a curated batch of photos from our Twitter followers.

On Saturdays we send out some tweets from our @VIAwesome account, asking our followers to tweet us photos of what they got into during the day. Check out the great batch of pictures we received below:

		@c_fender: Fireworks tonight taken from under the Granville St. Bridge, North Side.

		@travisflowpro: from @travisflowpro:

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China put on a great show in English Bay tonight in the first night of the annual Celebration of Light fireworks! As one of the JUDGES I had my eyes trained on the sky critiquing the show and have been sworn to secrecy on how they scored. What I can say is that it’s not surprising how great their presentation was, considering China is one of the returning champions and all. However there was a huge surprise in the skies tonight – a crazy stunt plane that zipped in around 9PM and absolutely destroyed the limits that existed in people’s brains (read: my brains) about what kind of stunts an airplane could perform. I’m going to assume you were there and you saw this insanity, but if you didn’t you’ll surely see some footage on the news really soon. It was nuts.

I overheard a lot of people asking who was responsible for the plane’s appearance, and after a tiny bit of digging I found out that it’s actually a Red Bull stunt plane and the pilot was Pete Mcleod, the youngest professional pilot competing in the Red Bull Air Race World Championship. And he is clearly insanely good at what he does.

Pete Mcleod, photo Red Bull

Here’s a photo that Pete posted to Facebook shortly after his flight tonight, with the caption “Shoes are off after one of the coolest aerobatic flights I’ve ever done. Vancouver you are a MAX POWER! crowd!! Thanks!!!”

Again: nuts. So awesome. Thanks to Red Bull and thanks to Pete!

Thrice weekly I bring you personified pieces of our city. Reaching into all of the different neighbourhoods I collect images of all types of inanimate objects, then bring them to life!

OBJECT: Surveillance camera
NEIGHBOURHOOD: Downtown Eastside

Every day we share a single photo from our Flickr Pool shot by one of our faithful and talented readers (that’s you!)

It’s amazing how we tend to travel into the wilderness and measure the success of the excursion in terms of how much (or how little) wildlife we see. I haven’t seen many owls in my day – although I have certainly heard them a fair bit – but if I took a walk through Pacific Spirit Park and saw one, I’d be right happy. Now, if on that same walk, I had the pleasure of seeing FOUR different owls, I’d have myself a new favourite park.

While I don’t know what savageblackout‘s favourite park is, but a recent four-owl day might go a long way in influencing that choice. But then again, parks are different in that you need not pick a favourite – you can love them all equally. Here is owl.

Gary

The Bassment is a weekly article bringing you coverage of the best in Hip Hop and Electronic music from around Vancouver. Weekly interviews, event coverage, album and concert reviews that show how awesome our city’s electronic and hip hop scene really is.  If you think there is someone or something that needs coverage in this city in regards to the Hip Hop / Electronic community then get in touch with us.

Woodward’s W2 spaces have been an ongoing contribution to the electronic scene in Vancouver. From DJ shows to art galleries thee spaces have given many of us a place to enjoy the scene we love. This summer the W2 Media Café is having it’s first ever DJ camp for girls. The camp runs from August 1st – August 5th and is aimed at young women ages 14-18. The Goal for the camp is to empower young women by teaching them the skills to creatively express themselves through music. Campers will learn a variety of skills like how to setup and sound check a P/A system, traditional turntablism, setup and use of digital controllers and turntables, cataloguing and maintaining a music library, and how to create their own mix. All with no experience required.

DJs Betti Forde and DJ Miss M will be the instructors and I have included a little bit of info about them. Betti Forde has been DJing for over a decade and has toured internationally, including shows in London and Paris. Her music goes from house to hip-hop, disco to electro, retro to futuristic and she is also in the electro/hip hop duo Stink Mitt. This summer Betti was truly honoured to be selected as the DJ following Cyndi Lauper at her record-breaking Queen’s Park Pride concert, where Betti spun for hundreds of thousands of people. She used to be based in Vancouver but now works in Toronto and we’re lucky enough to have her extend her stay in Vancouver a little longer just to teach the camp.

Photo: Dre Weiss

DJ Miss M has proven to be one of the busiest female dj’s in North America. She has already received nominations for Toronto’s 2009 and 2010 Marc Ecko Stylus Awards for “Central DJ Of The Year” and “Best Female DJ Of The Year”, respectively. She has previously opened for T-Pain, Collie Buddz, Crooklyn Clan’s DJ Riz, DJ Shortee, Fatman Scoop, Montell Jordan, Girlicious, Jabbawockeez, Mario, Nelly and many more.

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Skateboard culture is deeply rooted in this fine city of ours. Not only does Metro Vancouver produce some of the world’s finest wood-wheelers, it’s also a major migratory destination for skaters from all over Canada. The Weekly Ledge(r) exists to update you on skate-related news and happenings in our town. Know the ledge, it’s not just used for sitting…

The ManWolfs strike today! The band of skateboarding heathens (as seen in the 2009 film, Machotaildrop), now have a shoe in éS Footwear’s Fall 2011 line. Machotaildrop creators/Vancouverites Corey Adams and Alex Craig put together the above video, Kick to Kill, to promote the éS shoe, and V.I.A. Most Awesome interviewee Rick McCrank along with plenty of locals and local spots appear in this creative flick.

The July 2011 issue (#113) of Concrete Skateboarding is now available in full online, along with a round-up of all the extras. East Van’s “Skinny” Tim McLeod is a skater, member of The Vicious Cycles band and a talented guitar builder who was recently featured on Push.ca. Ryan Decenzo and Jordan Hoffart were spotted by The Skateboard Mag’s video cam lens during a backyard mini-ramp sesh at Greg Lutzka’s Cali crib.

Brian Caissie’s second photo update from RDS’ Deadliest Skateboard Tour has dropped, and there’s video evidence of the Get Tricks contest marathon that happened in PoCo last Saturday - talent o’plenty. Cariboo Brewing has video-introduced Sean Lowe as the latest member of their growing skate team (I’d like a beer sponsor, please), and Chris Haslam filmed this Almost Skateboards commersh in Africa with little room for error…

VANCOUVER DAZE showcases and highlights the social life and scene of our beautiful city, covering all the misadventures and shenanigans at various cultural events, mixers, parties, meetups, and local happenings. We fiercely promote all the fun times the city has to offer along with the interesting people behind them. Follow more of my work/coverage over at RICKCHUNG.COM and on Twitter at @RICKCHUNG. You can pitch me HERE.

Volume 27: Yelp Tequila Sunrise Elite Party at The Mexican Antojitos y Cantina on Granville Street on July 26, 2011. Some photos courtesy of Yelp. More photos available on Flickr.

It had been awhile since the last Yelp Elite event, not including the joint V.I.A. and Yelp Expo 86 celebration. That’s because Vancouver has a brand spanking new community manager, the boisterous Robin McMillan (left with me and director of marketing Crystal Hendrickson).

For her first outing, billed as a ”Tequila Tasting Throw Down”, she kept it small with a fiesta at The Mexican complete with sombreros (one of which I totally stole), a deceptively durable piñata, Mexican beer and food.
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