The Pelican Report

Thanks for reading the holiday edition of The Pelican Report (part two of three). This week we will delve into music and literature to complement our usual stay of business and fashion. In the spirit of the holidays, many of the items mentioned in this week’s report make great gifts… Ahem, in case you weren’t aware, we like getting gifts too. But without further ado we humbly present the second installment of The Holiday Pelican Report, enjoy (or don’t, it doesn’t matter to us).

Sincerely,
Drew V. Davitian
Publisher

The Pelican Report
Issue 5, December 13th, 2009

Music

The Best Web Resources For Downloading Electronic Music (and they’re free, well most of them are)

https://www.beatport.com/
One of the greatest resources for DJs looking to fill out their digital music bags and amateurs who just want to lose themselves in a spiritual, spiral beat is Beatport.com, the quintessential e-store where tracks range from 99 cents to $2.50. The hands down coolest thing about Beatport, other than its extensive list of purchasable DJ top lists, is the broad range of remixes available for most current tracks that suit any mood, beat or tempo.

http://mattdarey.com/
Who would have believed a DJ popularized by BPM on XM would make the cut, but the extensive Podcast list from Darey and streaming mixes from his famous and usually kick-ass guests just rock. Check out the Nocturnal 226 Podcast which we think is quite possibly the best set Darey has ever put together.

http://youtube.com/
Now we all know You Tube is the best resource for cute animal and fat people falling down videos, they’ve made many a boring class much more interesting for us. Unbeknownst to many though, You Tube’s progressive search engine and extensive network of music uploading aficionados makes it an excellent resource to seek out hard to find tracks, even if you don’t know the tracks actual name.

http://www.hybridized.org/
Now this is the site to end all sites, especially if you like progressive house and breaks. Started in 2003 as a site to share Hybrid live sets, Hybridized.org has become a mass database of live sets from some of the greatest DJs and live electronic acts on the planet. The loyal and knowledgeable fan base that frequents the site is instrumental in the updating of play lists which trumps many professional pay sites. The absolute best part is, it’s all free. It’s just people who love music, making music for people who love music. (In our humble opinion, the best sets are those uploaded by Way Out West between 2005 and 2007.)

Literature

Books You Should Read Before You Learn How To Live

These novels have helped shape who we have become here at The Pelican Report and regardless of your age, if you haven’t read them you should. (If you have it might be beneficial to revisit them too.)

Catch-22 – Joseph Heller – One of the first books I lost myself in, Catch-22 engaged every facit of my senses. I swear I could taste the heavy salted Mediterranean air while balking at the idiosyncratic nature of Milo’s “syndicate” at the same time feeling an affinity for Yossarian’s plight. This book taught me to question the authority and the futility of some things.

Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov – This torrid and completely taboo love story taught me how, sometimes, love shatters boundaries but eventually all things end. Like Milton’s Paradise Lost, Lolita coerces the reader into falling for the Antihero, the perpetrator of lascivious and unspeakable acts. Nabokov does this through an amazing mastery of the English (his third) language. Frankly, you must read this book.

The Catcher In The Rye – J. D. Salinger – Salinger creates the teenager like no one else I’ve ever read: the duplicitous nature of trying too hard and yet not enough to grow up. This relatively short but incredible story speaks to the teenager that is still in all of us. A fitting comparison would be William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience. You’ve probably read this book but maybe it is time to read it again.

Matilda – Roald Dahl – This book sold me on reading. I read Matilda eight times in two years, in a period when I hated reading. How aptly witty Dahl’s meter is and his simplistic comical brilliance exudes from every page. This story should grip the child in anyone with its wide eyed and mystical views of the world. Harry Potter has nothing on Matilda, though when the movie was finally made, it was a total disappointment.

Books You Should ReadBefore You Die

For the mature part in all of us, the part that pays bills and polishes cufflinks, we must remind ourselves to remain teachable, or we die. The mastery in these novels (and poems) can sheer through the barriers created by the jaded experiences of adulthood. The lyrical bliss, pain and bewilderment contained in these pages should be enough to through anyone back into a juvenile curiosity.

Slaughter House Five – Kurt Vonnegut – I’m not sure which notion is more frightening, that this incredible journey of delusional characters and fantastical situations was spawned from Vonnegut’s brilliant but sordid head, or that much of this story is based on his real life experiences. Slaughter House Five is the novel that brought me to the dramatic realization that truth and reality can be lucid terms. Vonnegut, in searching for an explanation of his own life, has helped the reader find theirs and anyone who is closed to this notion should again flip the stale paperback pages of this amazing journey.

Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov – Yes our dear friend Nabokov is talented enough to appear on this list twice because as time passes we often need a refresher in life lessons. Where Lolita taught us about the insidious power of love and lust, Pale Fire reeks of beauty. A conundrum in itself, this novel speaks so powerfully, without saying anything at all. As many critiques claim this novel to be a trap door to catch those who enjoy pigeon holing, we here at The Pelican Report say read this story because its perfect in its sickness, and deranged in its beauty, like all good works of art.

The Tipping Point – Malcolm Gladwell – This book is a department from the previously mentioned works of fiction but in so being, also a must read. Gladwell claims his goal to be to help people, who generally suffer from overexposure to experiences with a lack of theory based analysis, to make sense of it all. He does this by suggesting “organizing structures” to interpret the data swimming around all of us. What this equation produces is incredibly witty and insatiably tenacious writing that engages the reader so strongly, he or she feels guilty to put the book down. I found myself comparing every one of his diagnoses to my thoughts and behaviors, is this me? Or is this me? Gladwell has clearly mastered the ability to see through the noise in his analysis and presentation of viral growth and everyone should re-spark their imagination and creativity whether it be in business or personal growth by reading this book.

Kubla Kahn – Samuel Taylor Coleridge – Before I knew much about literature I liked poems. I liked poems because they were short and, at the time, I thought easy to read. I liked poems because my brain had to do the work and not my eyes. I was a lazy reader, not a lazy thinker. I was blessed to have amazing teachers and professors along the way who quickly showed me the complex and sometimes infinitely blooming nature of poetry. Poems peel like never ending onions; they blossom like cavernous rose buds, with pedals of lyrical symmetry. In my humble opinion we cannot talk about poetry without mentioning dear old STC. You should read Kubla Kahn before you die, essentially because it is sometimes considered the greatest poem ever written; a perfect poem actually. In its perfection (like Pale Fire and Lolita) it expresses the inherent tragedy, or perhaps the Catch-22 of life: in its perfection it is categorically flawed. This divinely inspired poem written by Coleridge, as he woke from a Laudanum induced dreamscape, was interrupted half way through transcription and was never finished. Coleridge spent years trying to remember the next stanzas and couldn’t. What we are left with for all eternity is part of the only perfect poem ever written, entitled A Vision of a Dream: a Fragment and in this title lies the bittersweet nature of perfection in all things.

Fashion

Sunglasses To Combat The Winter Glare

Whether you are stuck in Upstate New York, Chicago, or still basking on the sultry sand of South Beach into late December, eye protection has never been more important or more stylish. Sunglasses are one of the few accessories that truly offer function to match the form (watches we concede do as well). We’ve scoured the internet to find the very chicest shades, whether you are looking cool on the ski lift, shoveling snow, or tanning on a yacht in off the coast of Marbella this winter.

Miss’ Dior Black And Pink Gold Glasses
N/P – Dior.com
http://www.diorcouture.com/dior.html