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once again we could not be more grateful to topspin. they have put us in touch with an eclectic range of radical artists with whom we’ve had the most exciting and rewarding relationships. the gregory brothers, better known as the auto-tune the news guys, are no exception. a month or so ago they walked into our studio and told us they needed a new website. they then hit the road and we sent them our ideas as they criss-crossed the country on the youtube tour. the trick was to combine their already burgeoning aesthetic with a number of new levels of functionality. their old site had been pretty much built entirely by them using dreamweaver and they were understandably into something that would be a little easier to update. needless to say, but the process was a breeze and often funny too.

as the project went on we of course became more and more familiar with their work. aside from the classic auto-tune videos that we’ve all seen, it was very apparent that they were a talented 4 piece band in their own right. not only are they capable of making a hilarious youtube videos but they’ve got an album’s worth of solid, self-proclaimed?folk ‘n’ roll jams. hit up the music store on the new site to check some of them out. they just got back from playing bonnaroo festival and i’m sure will be announcing more tour dates soon. seriously, go. they’re fantastic people and their show is seriously unique.

gregorybrothers.com

thanks to the ladies and gents at topspin, we were asked to do a talk at the IFP independent filmmaker labs last week because of our work on tronsoundtrack.com. on thursday morning i spoke to a room full of documentary film makers hoping to find their way in the online world now that their various projects were nearing completion and needed some kind of apt promotion.

the talk went extremely well, which is surprising given it was literally the first thing of this kind that we’ve ever done aside from giles’s PACA panel discussion back in ’08. we’d like to thank rose vincelli and jonathan reiss for considering us for the task and for making us feel so welcome throughout the process. it’s looking like we’ll be doing more of these talks in future now that we’ve gotten a feel for it. we’ll try and post on twitter or similar when such things are about to occur. you know, should you want to come say hi or whatever.

i’d also very much like to add that i had no idea who jonathan reiss was when i met him over email, in person or when he introduced my talk. i mean i thought his name seemed familiar, but i never would have guessed this was the same jonathan reiss who’s work i have been in awe of for years. you see this is the man who directed the famously ‘banned’ happiness in slavery video for nine inch nails. a video that literally changed the lives of my friends and i when we first saw it in the 90s. few music videos come close to it in terms of sheer power, brutality and brilliance. suffice to say i thanked him not just for myself but for all the people out there who i know would want me to do the same, given half a chance.

you can view the filmmaker labs press release?here.

we’ve just had it confirmed that the site we did for daft punk’s TRON: legacy score, tronsoundtrack.com, was javascript site of the month in the january issue of .net magazine. click here to read the full PDF including a short interview with us about the making of the site. huge thanks again to remy sharp, mr doob, topspin and disney for the hook-up!