TREND TALK: MUSIC FESTIVAL SEASON

By: Joanne Joseph,

Certified COOL contributor

Music festival season continues with the Essence Music Festival. 

The festival celebrated its 20^th anniversary last week with legendary artists like Prince 

and Nas (a certified fave) headlining, and included game-changing performances 

from Janelle Monae and Erykah Badu… they always deliver. The festival hit record 

numbers this year with 550,000 attendees. 

He needs no introduction

The Essence Festival, which is held every year in New Orleans, did not disappoint. The 4-day event began on Thursday July 3rd  and concluded on Sunday, July 6th. Each performer brought their A-game to the stage impressing a huge audience at the Mercedes-Benz Super dome.

Janelle Monae

Prince served us a retro vibe with his new fro and bell-sleeved shirt. He completed his look with a digitally printed photo of himself on the front of his pants… can you blame him? One of  our favorites, Janelle Monae, stayed true to her signature black & white look… she can do wrong. Erykah Badu… we can't hate on her fearlessness.

Erykah Badu

As the summer continues, be on the look out for more coverage of this year's certified COOL festivals.

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FASHION FILES: GOLD ALL IN MY...

Nike has just released a few liquid gold dipped versions of some of their most 
popular women's sneaker styles. We just got our hands on the highly prized 
liquid gold Nike dunk sky hi wedge. These Margiela-inspired show stoppers come in packaged in an all white tone on tone box, and feature high end details such as perforated leather interior lining, a gold metal NIKE brand plate on the back of each shoe,
an AU (period table element reference) stamp on the tongue, and an extra pair of 
laces in case the shimmer look isn't your thing. 

These definitely get a "gold-dipped" COOL stamp from us!

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ART SAKE : PICASSO BABY

JayZ becomes art in a new york art gallery, as he performs

‘Picasso Baby.’ The six hour performance

was shot then edited to this exciting 10 minute video.

Being an art school graduate, I’ve attended my fair

share of totally confusing performance art

shows where everyone watching would pretend they

knew what they had just experienced. This is

is the smartest use of an art form that can

sometimes go over anyone's head.

JayZ is bringing the art worlds back together.

That's the coolest thing ever!

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COOL FAM

Will & Jaden Smith... That's COOL

The kid has a dope fashion line too (www.msftsrep.com/‎). Gotta love that.

WATCH THIS : MRS. CARTER'S THRONE

Within minutes of her game-changing Super Bowl 47 performance, Beyoncé launched her upcoming world tour deets on her website with opulenent imagery fit for a queen... Queen Bey that is. The expertly-crafted, royally-themed campaign is an indication that she's got her eyes set to take the Queen of Pop throne once and for all. Like her or not, Beyoncé is making all the right career moves and she is already shutting it down this year. Major cool points awarded for making a commercial to promote the UK leg of her tour. Watch and enjoy... this is good stuff. All hail the Queen... 

See more COOL here.

COOL PEEPS : THE KING

Martin Luther King was and still is one of the coolest people to live. Anyone confident enough to put themselves out there to promote virtues will always get cool points in our book. So here are some of the great MLK's most essential words of wisdom to marinate on.

WORK: All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.

LEADERSHIP: A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.

ETHICS: Means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek. The time is always right to do what is right.

SERVICE: Life’s most persistent and urgent question is:  “What are you doing for others?”

JUSTICE: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

VALUES: If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values – that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY: Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.

CONFLICT RESOLUTION: Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love. Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.

THE END OF DISCRIMINATION: I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

VISION & PERSEVERANCE: I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the promised land! I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land. (From Dr. King’s final speech the night before his assassination).

BIG SHOUT:
Thanks to Mark Toth for pulling these great words of wisdom from MLK.
Thanks to H.Q. Roosevelt for the amazing photos!

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FASHION FILES : Teyana Taylor X Adidas Originals

Teyana Taylor is set to release the x adidas Originals Harlem GLC on Feb 15th. Will you be copping a pair? I'm actually digging the color and the back laces feature. Not crazy about the bulky shape of the shoe though. The verdict on these... They're COOL. What say you?

Updated 2/20/2103 - Cop a pair here (unless they're sold out). Stay tuned for more launches of the hard-to-get kicks in different color ways.

See more COOL here.

 

ART SAKE : ART BASEL 2012 BRAINWASHED

We dropped by the controversial Mr. Brainwash's pop up gallery in South Beach during Basel. We felt kind of weird being so close to the "criminal art-ist," who was inches away from us, casually mingling with the spectators. It was kind of like we too had committed a crime, or had sold out to our fellow artists just by

being there.... that is exactly what peaked our interest and made the exhibition 

even more exciting. 

It was like we had entered the forbidden gallery where

the artist became like a negative stereotype of a corporation and the executives took all the credit for the minions doing all the hard work. Seriously, there 
were actually other artist creating more work in a roped off area in the gallery. We think Mr. Brainwash was intentionally mocking all the controversy around him... that part was actually kind of COOL.

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