From the lab of André Michelle, a flashcoder working from Berlin, let me introduce you to this week’s new timewaster. Although, can it really be considered wasted time if you’re doing something that seems, in a way, productive (making music)? Do you think my boss will buy that level of bull hockey; not only buy it, but cheer, guffaw, clap me on the back and reward my creative initiative with the offer of a pay raise or introduction into some dubious-sounding sort of profit-sharing program? Yes? No? Outlook Not So Good?

If you like that (have you clicked over yet? Do it! Click the buttons! Hear the blips! Taste the rainbow!), you’ll love this – a flash simulation of a vintage Roland drum machine. Oh, and by the way, I’m sorry to drop something so addictive on you in the middle of what seems to be a nationwide firing frenzy. Disclaimer: check this out, click around, make bleep-bloop tunes to beat the band; but please, by all means, do it discreetly. DISCREETLY, I SAY.

I first noticed the work of FCTN, a creative studio based in Orlando, FL, when I came upon this dreamy clip they produced for Georgia-by-way-of-North-Carolina’s Washed Out. It’s such a perfect treatment of a seriously chilled out song, I had to check out their site.

It’s worth taking the time to poke around both the Work and Play sections and getting to know some of their previous projects, some of which are pretty cool, like this series of intense short web clips produced for a BMX company to showcase all of their team riders in the context of a mini-movie.

…or maybe the men: a couple guides-to-living that hit all the important notes. The importance of a signature drink, and how to figure out what the hell it should be in the first place. How to give a proper toast. The only ‘emo’ band you can justify listening to (hint: The Cure/The Smiths). What to do with any drinking challenge (hint: accept it).

From The Essential Man:

The idea for this blog came to me when I began picturing what I would tell my future son through his growing years.

Or maybe what I would tell myself 20 years ago if they get DeLoreans to somehow actually work.

Or quite possibly what I would say to punk teenagers on the stoop, as that bitter 90 year old man who everyone thinks is crazy.

From 1001 Rules for My Unborn Son (soon to be a book):

Let’s get some things straight before I get old and uncool.

I’m used to arguing against strict gender divides, but I will somehow always keep a soft spot for even the most outdated traditions related to the concept of how a gentleman should behave. Of course, we’ll make mistakes. We’ll ruin women’s lives, our friends’ lives, perhaps the lives of our children even as we ruin our own. This is inevitable. But it’s an important point that these guides make:  it will forever be our responsibility to always, always try.

From Guitarati, via Murketing –

So from now on, whenever you hear any music, try to feel a color. Do not force to see, but just let it occur to you. It might sound hard initially, but once you know how to do it, you are in for a surprise!

The idea is to further exploration of the color-music relationship, which Guitarati points out is ‘a concept that has been around for centuries.’ Explore the site and see for yourself. Pick a color that seems to fit your mood, and the site will direct you to a list of songs that ‘feel’ like that color. Quick side note: they charge $0.01 per song stream, so I’m curious to see how this business model plays out – as a recent book points out, “from the consumer’s perspective, there is a huge difference between cheap and free.”

Click to open video in a new window

But, anyway, that’s not the main point, which is ‘what is it like to listen to a color?’ Along those lines, take my word and set aside a few minutes for the short film above titled ‘Synesthesia.’

This comes from the creative duo Terri Timely, via Kitsune Noir. It depicts, with some perfect visuals, what happens when people process their sensations in rather unconventional ways: smelling music, listening to food, and so on.

Remember Muxtape.com? If you never had the pleasure, what you missed was the best music-sharing platform designed for the web so far — most aesthetically-pleasing, easiest to use, unmatched in its ability to retain the aspect of human connection so central to making and sharing mixtapes in the first place.

As always, the good die young and Muxtape fell victim to a swift RIAA crackdown. But it didn’t stay dead for long.

The new Muxtape is up-and-running, as I discovered the other day after typing in the URL in a fit of nostalgia. But the outline has changed. So their first problem was with facilitating the illegal distribution of copyrighted material? Now, they’ve gone the opposite direction; as a platform for bands, all the material belongs to the distributors.

Until now, Myspace had still been the best way to connect with bands on the web. In fact, that’s about all it’s been good for after Facebook came along to show us that social networking doesn’t have to be ugly and clunky.

Muxtape may be a better answer. It does look promising, offering artists a chance to go beyond simply connecting with their fanbase. With features like the ability to present HD quality video, it feels like there’s less being compromised. And with bands like Sigur Ros, Grizzly Bear, Yacht and others on-board, it’s off to a very good start.

Hulu continues its evil plot to take over the world with the introduction of Hulu Desktop, its new application for Windows and Mac that brings the streaming goodness of Hulu’s shows directly to your computer without you having to open up your web browser.

The sleek, shiny design is a given with a Hulu product, as the site is known for its easy to use interface. The desktop application gives full access to Hulu’s library of shows and movies, plus the integrated use of controls not just from your keyboard, but also Windows Media Center and Apple remotes.

All in all, a pretty sweet application that brings your computer one step closer to an all-in-one home media center. [Geddem at Hulu.com]

I know, reading one blog posting about another blog feels a bit like slipping into a coma, but this is no ordinary blog. It’s Spike Jonze’s blog.

Well, Spike and a couple other contributors who presumably worked with him on Where the Wild Things Are since that seems, roughly, to be the theme of the site:

In October 2009 Spike Jonze’s feature film rendition of Maurice Sendak’s classic story Where The Wild Things Are will hit movie theaters worldwide.

This place has been established to help shed some light on many of the small influences that have converged to make this massive project a reality.

Bookmark it now for daily random gems such as this, posted by Spike today: a frame-for-frame remake of the video he originally shot for the Beastie Boys’ ‘Sabotage’.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LR4Y5N211Fo