Last Autumn I walked out of my office on Mercer Street to complete silence. As I walked to the Mercer Hotel, I saw tumbleweeds, a filthy cab, and the Tom Cat Bakery delivery truck with a bullet hole through it's windshield. Was Russell Crowe back?

"Excuse me. Not now sir, Mr Smith is on set."

Ah, between my arriving at work and noon, Mercer Street had apparently aged 5 years.
And barely survived the apocalypse. As the release of Will Smith's I Am Legend approaches, we get a sneak peek of the destroyed New York in the first theatrical trailer—which I have to admit looks pretty awesome.

Oh, and if I'd known all the shooting we saw each night under the Brooklyn Bridge was so they could rocket it, I might not have taken so many cabs.

View the full size 1080p still here. I particularly like the scorched Woo Lae Oak banner, and it's great to know Fanelli's is still the local of choice for the last man on earth.

The first video from one of my albums of year so far.

CD Candylion
Download Candylion (iTunes)
Via BrooklynVegan

Because Mike Mills + Miranda July = Top Ranking [video]

Via Your Daily Awesome via Andi

The BBC has gone behind the scenes at Lucasfilm and Industrial Light and Magic at their new San Francisco hq:

- The talent behind the visual effects
- Inside Lucasfilm (photos)
- Inside ILM
- Data Death Star

Which reminds me, does anyone have any new details about Lucas' Star Wars TV series?

@ www.bbc.co.uk

No, it's not "official," rather a fan-made mash-up video pulled from Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West. Either way, it's pretty special. While my least favorite song on Neon Bible, this video does it's job in making you listen to the track in an entirely fresh way.

Download: My Body is a Cage - Arcade Fire [mp3]

Thursday, April 12, see's the return of the Package Deals screening series to New York's Scandinavia House: Cold Hearts Revisited: Short Film and Music Videos from Iceland.

In this era of MTV Networks (with few music videos) and YouTube (fuzzy quality videos), it's a treat to watch cutting-edge and rarely-seen music promos and short films in a screening room with a beer vodka and friends. April's installment sees a return to the Icelandic event of late last year, adding a few new shorts, some to be shown in the U.S. for the first time.

Bands/Artists showing videos include Sigur Ros, Apparat Organ Quartet, Bang Gang, Egill Sæbjörnsson, Erla Haraldsdóttir, and features premieres from Reynir Lyngdal, Unnur Andrea Einarsdóttir (above, middle), Seabear, Trabant (above, right), and Gus Gus.

And yes, that is a man playing a piano made of toast.

@ www.packagedeals.org

"Gimme Shelter": see it again or see it for the first time. This is historical magic from the incomparable Maysles, with one shot that holds the entire film.

DVD: Amazon