In the recent weeks I’ve been working on a new project with H-Farm Ventures, a very good venture incubator here in Italy. H-Farm is very unique, built around an old farm just outside Venice, it consists of various structures that house all their startups, and also a couple companies they founded. The project we are doing together is really amazing and I can’t wait to tell you about it. I’ll announce it over here first, sometime during the end of September and the beginning of October, and I’ll also talk more about H-Farm and their founders in the future, but for now take a look at some pictures I made of the campus.

P.S. If you happen to pass by Venice add me and PIG Mag to your Foursquare friends, I’m constantly adding the best places to hang out over there.

Happy summer to everyone. I’m leaving for my holidays on Friday, going around Italy with my girlfriend. For the occasion I made a new tape. Volume 22.

Tracklist below, with iTunes links where available.

1. SBTRKT: Wildfire
2. Little Dragon: Ritual Union (Tensnake Remix)
3. Vanilla: Sure
4. The Avalanches: Since I Left You (Stereolab Remix)
5. Toro Y Moi: Saturday Love
6. Alice Smith & Aloe Blacc: Baby
7. James Pants: Kathleen
8. Metronomy: Everything Goes My Way
9. Best Coast: Boyfriend (Lindstrom Remix)
10. The Rapture: How Deep is Your Love (Ade Bushby Mix)
11. Joakim: Forever Young
12. Active Child: Hanging On
13. Blood Diamonds: Grins
14. I Break Horses: Winter Beats
15. White Elephant: Sir John
16. Grimes: Vanessa
17. Com Truise: Hyperlips
18. Holy Other: Know Where
19. Lana Del Rey: Video Games

Notes:

SBTKRT: in my top 5 albums of 2011 so far. Vanilla: from a new french label called Juicy Tunes (check out their copy). The Avalanches: Mythical 10 year old track which will be re-released in september, this remix is a rare and lost one from back in the days. Toro Y Moi: a cover of a song by Alexander O’Neal & Cherelle not included in their album. James Pants and Metronomy: 2 tracks from their latest wonderful albums. Best Coast: A new Lindstrom remix of a track from their 2010 album. Com Truise: my favourite electronic album of the year. A downtempo version of what I think the next Daft Punk should be… Lana Del Ray: My favourite single song of the summer. And the video is lovely too. View Below.

(Above picture: my girlfriend and me having a Spritz in Venice)

Again, happy summer!

(Photos by Sean Micheal Beolchini for PIG Mag)

Do you remember my first post on this blog? I went to visit Stile Bertone, the company who designed some of the best cars in history, from Lamborghini’s to Ferrari to Alfa Romeo’s and many many more. I made a photo gallery of their basement full of old prototypes that never went into production. I was lucky enough to be amongst the few in the world to be able to document it in pictures.

Well’, 6 of those jewels are now going to be auctioned. Yes. Next Sunday here in Italy, during the amazing and suggestive Concorso D’Eleganza Villa D’Este on Lake Como. So Kanye, jump on the plane and come over to bid on one of these, we want to see it in your next video.

And if someone has some spare money for me, I’ll take the Lamborghini Marzal. Thank you.

Anyway, I’ll be there in Lake Como documenting the Concours with some pictures. You’ll see them over here.

Links:
My first post on Museo Stile Bertone
Stile Bertone Official Website
Crazy collection of concepts from Bertone to be auctioned (Autoblog.com)
Concorso D’Eleganza Villa D’Este
Lake Como

A quite annoying thing is that with my tapes I spend at least one hour to build a playlist in a certain order, but my friends can’t sort the songs by track number. Unfortunately iTunes interface designers thought they had something better to do instead of doing a simple menu with “sort by track number”. But there is actually a way to do it, and I made a video to show you. My iTunes is in italian but it should still be clear.

Thank you.

*(If you read me through the rss feed you probably saw my last post about the 90’s. Unfortunately it was a draft that slipped for mistake through the google cache. I was writing down some notes and quick thoughts and hit publish for mistake before deleting it. I hope you enjoyed that 90’s the dancey playlist though :)

Anyway, this post is for two reasons. The first is to quickly talk to you about the design studio I’m setting up, and the second one is to publish the tracklist for my new tape, number 21.

As most of you probably know by now Simon’s tapes are a selection of my favourite tracks that air on PIG Radio, and organized into 80 minute playlists (for cd burning). So a special thanks goes to D3Pop for his music selection for the Radio. For those of you who don’t know, PIG Radio is an online web radio which airs 24/7 non stop since 2005 and plays what I’d like to define as the REAL POP music. New, creative, fresh, intresting and talented artists from around the world. PIG Radio is free and there’s no advertising, so go and listen to it now! Theres’ only 300 listening slots available at any given time.

But first things first. The studio! Based in Milan, Italy, the goal of the studio is to design useful and fun objects for everyday use.

A quick design cv below:
I was born in 1974 in Milano, grew up in the 80’s and 90’s studying at art schools and practicing product design. Since back then my passion has always been to follow brand and product design marketing and communication, having been lucky enough to be a kid and a teen right in the middle of a lot of the great product success stories, from Walkmans to Jordans to Swatches and Apple’s. Dropped out from the Politecnico di Milano Industrial Design faculty (needed to work), published PIG Magazine and PIG Radio for 10 years and was part of the team who created Super Sunglasses, for which I’m very proud to say it has become a worldwide phenomenal success. This stimulated me to go back into design again so I decided to open my personal studio and use my skills for companies who would like my designs. Zimen is the nickname I always signed on my drawings since the early 90’s, and probably the name of my studio. Above this post is the new logo. I hope you like it!

So to celebrate I created edition 21 of my Simon’s tapes.

Thank you and enjoy!

Tracklist (with itunes links where available):

1. Washed Out: Eyes Be Closed
2. Cut Copy: Pharaohs & Pyramids
3. Radiohead: Lotus Flower (Radio Edit)
4. Nite Jewel: It Goes Through Your Head (DaM FunK’s Club Dub)
5. Lykke Li: I Follow Rivers (The Magician Remix)
6. Crystal Fighters: At Home (Scuola Furano Remix)
7. Selebrities: Can’t Make Up My Mind
8. Winter Gloves: True Blue
9. Fleet Foxes: Helplessness Blues
10. Grimes: Vanessa
11. Nicolas Jaar: Variations
12. Jai Paul: Btstu
13. Visions Of Trees: Sometimes It Kills
14. MGMT: Brian Eno (Cornelius Mix)
15. Southern Shores: Grande Comore
16. Jamie xx: Far Nearer

I have a friend, an Italian friend who went to live in Los Angeles some years ago. He is a filmmaker and his name is Federico Vitetta. He mainly works with Lakai and Girl Skateboards, the companies founded and run by Rick Howard, Mike Carroll, Megan Baltimore and Spike Jonze.

Well, two days ago Federico sent me an email to show me his recent work, a video entirely made by him and Johannes Gamble for Lakai and Girl Films. The video is about the new Mike Carroll shoe, the number 5, which has been made to celebrate Lakai leaving Podium Distribution and becoming 100% Girl Skateboards co.

I shall say that this is really a great piece of advertising and probably one of the best I’ve seen so far in the skateboarding genre. As Federico told me yesterday on Skype: “I celebrate the transition my way, with a new ad that contains all the elements of Girl Film (Girl Skateboards Visual Production co)”.

I wish Federico a great success!

Watch the video below:

Details:

Carroll 5 “Out of Control” – Lakai
Directed by: Federico Vitetta / Johannes Gamble

Client / Advertising Agency: Lakai Limited Footwear, Los Angeles, USA
Client Brand Manager: Kelly Bird

Production Company: Girl Films, Los Angeles, USA
Executive Producers: Rick Howard, Mike Carroll, Megan Baltimore, Spike Jonze
Head of Production: Aaron Meza
Associate Producer: Martino Properzi
Director of Photography: Pasquale Baudaffi
Camera Operators: Sam Newman, Pasquale Baudaffi, Ben Fordham
Editor: Johannes Gamble, Federico Vitetta
Lead VFX Artist: Johannes Gamble

Original music piece written by Zoobof & Vic-20
Sound Designer: Alberto Bof
Song: “Electro Magnetic Rampage”
Mixer: Alberto Bof
Producers: Zoobof & Vic-20

Talent:
Mike Carroll
Guy Mariano
Daniel Espinoza
Vincent Alvarez
Jesus Fernandez
Brandon Biebel
Nick Jensen
Sylvain Tognelli
Sebo Walker

Hello.

Here I am again with a tape. Sometimes I ask a friend to compile a tape for my collection. The first one was obviously made by Giacomo, who is responsable for the music on PIG Radio and my favourite music connoisseur.

This time I asked a friend, one of our music pushers, a man who collects all kinds of vinyls and has complete libraries from many record labels in his living room. He’s one of the few selected people in the world to have access to the legendary and mysterious Clitspit! Michele Cesana aka Sci-Fi Pogo (this is his official.fm page) has a very distinctive taste so I asked him to compile this Balearic Pop playlist or as he defines it, “Emotional Pop”.

The tracklist is below (with iTunes links where available)

1. Smokie – We’re Flyin’ High
2. Manfred Mann’s Earth Band – Do Anything You Wanna Do (Extended Version)
3. Kate Bush – Sexual Healing
4. Gary Wright – Love Is Alive
5. The Cure – Pictures Of You (Extended Dub Mix)
6. Leon Ware – What’s Your World
7. The B-52’s – Deep Sleep
8. Lynsey de Paul – Rockerdile
9. James Pants – Through The Rabbit Hole
10. Alexander – Working My Way
11. Barry Gibb – Moonlight Madness
12. Godley & Creme – Cry (Extended Version)
13. Greg Kihn Band – Jeopardy (Special Dance Mix)
14. Royal Philharmonic Orchestra – We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome) (Extended Instrumental)

In the picture, Riad Alboraq where I stayed during my recent trip to Marrakech, Morocco. A wonderful place in the Medina. I suggest you to go there if you plan a trip to Marrakesh.

Hello, I’d like to wish you a happy new year.

I’ll start of by suggesting a couple good wines and list a new tape I made.

I spent new year’s eve with my girlfriend in Barolo, the town in Piedimont where the famous Barolo wine is made. This town is like a mecca for people who like to eat good food and drink wine. There’s even a surreal-post-modern wine museum, a must visit.

For new years eve we drank two bottles of a local wine made by a family that only produces one label. The wine is called “Aurelio Settimo Barolo Rocche“, and the year was 2000. It was so good that we finished the first bottle before the antipasti were over… Restaurant: La Cantinetta.

Barolo Wine Museum, the dinner room. The guy was actually playing the piano.

The second wine was consumed with my family on Christmas day and it’s a very special Valpolicella made by Giuseppe Quintarelli. I talked about Valpolicella wine in a previous post, and it was about another very good one made by Romano Dal Forno. In that post I mentioned Dal Forno as being the student of Quintarelli before making wines himself. The Quintarelli one is nearly as good and a bit cheaper, you should fetch a 2000 one for 60 euros. I suggest you to try one of these for yourself. Quintarelli also makes a very good relatively cheap wine (35 euros) called Primofiore. I suggest this one also :)

A cat on the desk of our hotel room in Barolo. He seemed very happy, probably the wine :)

Tomorrow I’m going to Berlin for the bi-annual Bread & Butter tradeshow, where I’ll meet up with Jeff, David, Phil and all of the crew, this time I’ll travel by plane and I compiled another tape for the occasion. My 20′th Simon’s Tape. In this tape I chose an easy tracklist, and even if lately I’m loving very high bpm dubstep music, I decided I needed more relaxing music. So here’s the tracklist below:

Car in the cold

Barolo

Barolo

Limone, a ski resort in Piedimont

Limone, a ski resort in Piedimont

Studying maths

Driving on thin ice

Another view of Limone, Piedimont

My girlfriend Chiara during our new years’s eve dinner

Mannequins

Chiara’s dog behind the fence

I wish Hipstamatic also had the option of a standard 3/2 ratio and not only square. Anyway, I’ll make some pictures in Berlin and post them over here.

Ciao!

I’m back. After several months of hard work I’m back. I have been working on the new PIG Mag and PIG Radio website, which will be online in the next weeks, and also developing the new PIG Shop, which will also be online in the next weeks with a special preview and some limited ad-hoc products made especially for the store! We also created a new brand just to make special products to sell in our online store :) The brand is called Zimen. But I’ll talk about all these things one at the time when we’ll launch them.

Meanwhile I also did a new “Simon’s Tape”. These tapes are a selection of the best music from PIG Radio. My last tape was almost a year ago, but hopefully I’ll be able to resume them on a monthly basis.

Since file sharing is not permitted I cannot give you the actual files, but here is the tracklist:

1. Pacific! – Narcissus
2. M.I.A. – It Takes A Muscle
3. Mount Kimbie – Mayor
4. Friendly Fires and Azari & III – Stay Here
5. Azari & III – Reckless For Your Love (Tensnake Remix)
6. Ali Love – Smoke and Mirrors – Radio Edit
7. Locussolus – Throwdown (Vocal)
8. Zola Jesus – Sea Talk
9. Röyksopp – The Drug
10. Caribou – Sun
11. Discodeine – Singular
12. Grimes – Devon
13. Julian Casablancas – I’ll Try Anything Once (The Strokes’ ‘You Only Live Once’ Demo)
14. Superpitcher – Joanna
15. Diskjokke – 1987 (Radio Edit)
16. Pictureplane – Goth Star
17. Cowboy Junkies – Blue Moon Revisited (Song For Elvis)

Thank you.

After the Diesel Be Stupid “alive” billboard this is another nice one I just saw here in Milan. The one for the new Mini Countryman. The funny thing is that they actually used up a side of a building to advertise a fake surf band called Malamalama (possible meanings here and here).