From the desk of Jeremy Dean…

I’ll start by saying ‘Sorry.’ We’re gonna be cruising through a lot of things at once, drifting off into the occasional tangent David Foster Wallace-style. Ready? This’ll be a long one…

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httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X05jmkant5U

So we just learned from Destructoid that Namco Bandai’s Katamari Forever will be coming to the US this fall. We are so thrilled we want to bust our beloved FriendsWithYou Rainbow Dance (see above). I mean, “Stand up, Jump Jump Jump, Laugh Ha Ha Ha, Huggy Party, Kiss Kiss Kiss,” the music’s only appropriate. If you are sad, or want something sugary for your eyes, visit FriendsWithYou’s website. The Miami Duo’s 2006 Skywalkers event with other artists makes me want to just Katamari those art balloons into one giant happy ball.

Now back to Katamari Forever, I mean, what else is there to say? Check out the preview below and save up for that PS3!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2I-iIVuyZ0I

After 16 months, I have a feeling we are merely feeling the effects of the Great Recession right about now. So Sharper Image, Circuit City, and perhaps the soon to follow General Motors, have all but left us with useless plastic shopping bags and soon-to-be-null warranty papers. But something actually had an impact when we learned that the maker of PLEO – Ugobe has now filed Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Protection in Idaho. Not really a big deal, perhaps, but you’ve played with PLEO like we did, you’d probably feel a little sad, to see such an innovative (and cute) product go. Take a look at PLEO’s youtube demo below, if you never owned one, this is your last chance. Recession we truly hate you.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAYUb10YtsU

[ Image courtesy of Gizmodo ]

Listening to last year’s Kid Cudi tape in anticipation of his full record coming out soon on Kanye’s label, I started noticing one sample pop up over and over again in my daily life.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grPfVlj7Go4 540]

I’ve played out Band of Horses‘ second record ‘Cease to Begin’ by now but had taken a late pass on their debut ‘Everything All the Time’ until hearing Cudi’s track ‘The Prayer.’ ‘The Prayer’ samples ‘The Funeral’ from that record to moving effect so, of course, I had to look into the original.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmoNyh8PPhc 540]

Then I started noticing it everywhere, including in this recent jaw-dropper making the rounds from Danny MacAskill, a 23-year-old street biker, who’s completely changed the rules of the game with this clip alone.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z19zFlPah-o 540]

And Fully Flared‘s come up a lot lately so allow me to close it out with this clip from another game-changer, Guy Mariano, tearing through his FF part tracked to ‘The Funeral,’ as well as ‘Is There a Ghost’ from ‘Cease to Begin.’

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbUdKf1rawQ 540]

A post by Bobby at Kitsune Noir got me thinking about some of the more commercial work done by director Chris Cunningham — namely, commercials.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykXkmVURI-w

Bobby’s post referred to one over at Dazed Digital focusing on Cunningham’s recent TV spot for Gucci’s Flora fragrance. In it, a woman exerts a mysterious, natural force over a field of 20,000 fake, white flowers to a soundtrack of Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love,’ which Cunningham worked with Summer to re-record for the project in Nashville last year.

Cunningham, whose body of work includes such groundbreaking videos as Aphex Twin’s Come to Daddy and Bjork’s All is Full of Love, isn’t new to the commercial game. And, in the case of an of-the-moment director like Cunningham who often gets signed up on the strength of his name and given free rein, sometimes we all luck out and get something just a little bit bizarre.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E57FKectTKM

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nOzL8vF4_M

Yeah, I’m gonna catch hell from Kohn for another fashion post, but the new UNIS collection is on my radar so hard right now. Spring ’09 photos below:

Also, I realize I should have popped into the shop long ago, or at least kept current on their blog — turns out that new issue of Wooooo I’ve been searching for high-and-low with zero luck (big nope’s at Universal News, Atlantic and St. Marks)? Yeah, they’ve got it.

We’ve had this new headphone collaboration between WeSC and Ed Banger Records in the shop for a little bit now, and it’s been garnering a lot of interest thanks in large part to Ed Banger art director So Me and his distinctive style.

Speaking of So Me, I’m taking a late pass on this one, but figure it’s a good time to wax a little nostalgic with a So Me video created for last year’s mixtape savior Kid Cudi, a young Cleveland cat who’s got lyrics and style for miles.

Check out So Me’s video treatment for ‘Day ‘N Nite,’ which sees the Kid wandering the streets in a haze, just trying to make a little sense of it all. Keep an ear out for what this Kid drops next — as of late, a couple bangers in the form of She Came Along, which works off of a Patsy Cline sample, and Sky Might Fall, one hell of a song produced by Kanye West for Cudi’s official solo debut which may or may not be featured on Transformers 2.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxICYD1CUwA