Listicles

10 Hip-Hop Album Cover Cliches

We really love a spectacularly ridiculous hip hop album cover. You know, one that deploys all the common cliches with copious jewelry, fancy cars, naked women, suits, cigars, a lurking posse, toned and oiled muscles, maybe a skyline, the works. It’s hip-hop, it’s all about showing off and having fun doing it. All of those tendencies and more are featured in StreetLevel’s excellent listicle of 10 Hip-Hop Album Cover Cliches, although we’d like to add one more to the pile: the old, “I wasn’t available for a photo shoot so we hired an illustrator and this is what they did.” Here are some classic examples of the illustrated hip-hop album cover.

(via Asylum)

12 Movies Set on Military Bases

No doubt you’ve heard the tragic news of the events that unfolded at Fort Hood yesterday, a place so remote and different from our daily lives that we struggled to picture what the largest military base in the U.S. might actually look and feel like. As we always do, we turned to cinema for some answers. We came up with these 12 Movies Set on Military Bases.

Stripes (1981)

Eventually this devolves into a ridiculous Cold War fantasy, but for a while there it’s nothing but classic boot camp comedy. More military base movies.

25 People With Terrible Fake Tans

So it’s starting to get really cold and legitimately winter-y, and our spider-senses tell us it’s time to start the winter rituals: bears hibernate, elderly New Yorkers migrate to Florida, and we all wear fake tans every day for about six months.

Seriously, it’s about the only way we’ve found to keep a happy face through the dreary cold months, which may have more to do with the chemicals in the product than the sunny disposition it gives us, but we’re hopelessly addicted and can’t stop fake tanning now, no matter how terrible it looks. Much like the folks in Holytaco’s listicle of 25 People With Terrible Fake Tans. We’re not sure why they left the nice-looking fellow at right out of the list.

(via NextRound)

12 Best Celebration Fails

The celebration FAIL is possibly the most embarrassing if it’s happening to you, and often the most satisfying if you’re a spectator, because what’s better than watching obnoxious victors get some swift comeupance? Epic Carnival deals out some bubble-bursting pain with their listicle of the 12 Best Celebration Fails, and we’ve got a couple more for them, starting with this recent Fail by a Phillies fan (sorry, by the way, about the Series).

Another fantastic celebration Fail after the jump.

6 Music Videos About Journeys

One time while were riding in the elevator in a really, really tall building one of our favorite jams came on the muzak, and we felt transported to a dark, light-dappled dance floor. We’re not sure the other people in the elevator were transported to quite the same place, and it became clear when the doors opened that we hadn’t arrived at a disco, but for those few minutes (it was a really tall building) the music took us on a beautiful journey. And the best music videos often add to that sense of musical transportation, leading us to stunning and strange places, like these 6 Music Videos About Journeys.

“Time for Nothing” by The Parisians (directed by Nicolas Davenel & Thomas Delebecque)

We love all things stop-motion. Plus we’re Parisian, so this is a beautiful trip around our hometown. Travel to more music video journeys.

8 Animated Gif Blogs

Though we often feel like we don’t use them enough, we really enjoy animated gifs and appreciate their artistry a great deal. We may start to do it a lot more now that Urlesque has curated a top-notch listicle of 8 Animated Gif Blogs, which is a fairly invaluable resource given how many crappy animated gif blogs there are out there. Although we have another favorite to add to the list after the jump, our favorite from the listicle is probably GIF Anime, which has some questionable content as well as some really beautiful images, like this one.

Get more animated gifs.

The 35 Manliest Mustaches of All Time

You might say that we’ve been pretty heavily into facial hair lately, and that’s partially true, although we’ve been very exclusively dealing with beards. What about that other dominant genre of facial hair, the mustache, you might wonder.

Well, we haven’t forgotten about that–we actually prefer the mustache, truth be told–and we’re especially fond of the ’staches featured in Art of Manliness’s listicle of The 35 Manliest Mustaches of All Time. That said, we’re very impressed by Friedrich Nietzsche’s spectacular whiskers (pictured), but we’re dismayed by what we regard as an irredeemable omission, included after the jump. Another super-manly ’stache.

13 Delicious Songs About Candy

If you got a lot of Halloween loot you’ll be happy to know that nobody can stop you from eating as much as you want today: it’s National Candy Day! Somebody was thinking synergistically when they scheduled these two days so near each other. We’re going to take this opportunity to think about candy in more abstract terms, though. Because candy isn’t just delicious in your mouth: it’s also yummy in your ears. Candy is a popular metaphor for all manner of sexual innuendo in music (and sometimes people actually make songs about candy), as you’ll notice while sampling our 13 Delicious Songs About Candy.

“The Tootsee Roll” by 69 Boyz

Overlooked musical geniuses, them 69 Boyz. We wonder why they don’t teach this dance more often. More sugary songs after the jump.

Top 5 Comic Book Cities

You may have noticed that we’re huge architecture nerds, and, to a lesser degree, comic book fans. In a weird way, though, we’re maybe even more fond of the places where science fiction and architecture intersect and help to create spectacular, imaginary new constructions. We really enjoyed Architects Journal’s vidsticle of the Top 5 Comic Book Cities, although we’re a little surprised by the absence of some version of Metropolis from Superman.

(via NOTCOT)

25 People With Bee Beards

Last week we looked at some art and crafty facial hair substitutes in the days leading up to Halloween, plotting the possibility of knitting beards for our own costume. This week we’re contemplating facial hair of a very different, decidedly more organic and unruly sort: the bee beard. Holytaco has assembled a a listicle of apicultural facial hairstyles featuring 25 People With Bee Beards, although we’re surprised they left this calm fellow out.