Every time we talk to someone about FADER they tell us how great the photography is, and obviously we're inclined to agree. Although every issue of the FADER is packed full of incredible photos, the photography issue is our chance to showcase the work of our contributors, who, in addition to shooting for us, are often involved in long term photo essays. For this issue Peter Van Agtmael documented the life of soldiers in Afghanistan and & Iraq, Krisanne Johnson re-examined the US AIDS crisis, Gabriele Stabile traveled to the refugee motels around the country and spent time with people in their first hours on US soil, and Sasha Cutter photographed homeless life on Hawaii's Waianae Coast. In addition to those photo essays, writer Charles Homans and Photographer Jason Nocito spent time with slow-groove hippies Brightblack Morning Light in the New Mexico desert, and Eddie "Stats" Houghton caught up with TV on the Radio just before the release of Dear Science, their most ambitious album yet. And that's not even mentioning the fashion story on the face-tattooed Lucky Torres, Gen Fs on School of Seven Bells, Serani, Wax Fang and a whole bunch more. In addition, we've got all the excellent regular content that you've come to love. Pick it up at your local newsstand, download it right here, and as always, stay tuned to theFADER.com for exclusive content and extras.

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or download the individual F57 full-issue PDF here.

Each Tuesday, FADER editor Matthew Schnipper highlights an underappreciated recent release he thinks we need to know about. This week it's Little Claw's "Race to the Bottom" 7-inch. Listen to "Race to the Bottom" below, buy the 7-inch from Fusetron (hurry, they only made four hundred) and read Schnipper's thoughts on the record after the jump.



I got an email from a friend of a friend who has colitis and whose doctors are presenting him with the same full removal of his colon surgery option that I had when I was 13-years-old. He asked me how it had affected my life, what the recovery was like. There was a lot of disease Inside Baseball talk between us that is both gross and not interesting, but my ultimate conclusion to him was that I could not imagine my life if I had not had surgery. We were speaking from a purely physical point of view, but I realized soon after that the effect on my life the few years I spent sick has a lot greater practical implications to my state as a person. Of course there are the natural growths that come from young pain, but the more practical implication is that I got really into music because I had a lot of free time because I was sick and missed a lot of school. When I was well enough to go to Barnes and Noble, my mom or dad would drive me there and I would buy a lot of magazines and books about music, as my nascent interest was just building. Different magazines and books opened me up to different sects, but the steadiest link that forged was everything I learned through Punk Planet, mostly about riot girl bands and a bunch of other things I don’t like much anymore. But I researched everything I read about fiercely and ordered compilations because that was how I could hear the most bands at once. I became somewhat obsessed with Kill Rock Stars via Bikini Kill and of all the different music that has cycled in and out of my life this ruff buzz is the sound that has stayed consistent. That is why I like Little Claw.

“Race to the Bottom” is two and-a-half minutes long and it is on a 7-inch with an ugly cover with a weird drawing. It sounds like they are singing through a faraway harmonica, playing with broken strings. Do you think in do-it-yourself culture there was an implication that you should do it? Or was it just an encouragement that if you choose to do it, you could go it alone? I have picked up a guitar a few times and the silver strings cut my fingers; I couldn’t do it. I don’t get the feeling Little Claw knows much better but they figured it out not on my behalf, but on their desire’s. This is what happens if you get sick and decide to spend your time holed up at home practicing, semi-professional amateur. We just went in different directions. I’m punk, Little Claw is punk. But I bet their fingers bleed and mine never do.

Last Friday on The Let Out (our weekly show on East Village Radio, made possible by Dewars) we played music from or about Los Angeles. Listen to East Village Radio this and every following Friday from 6-8pm EST and check the tracklist after the jump.

-Stream the 10/3 edition of "The Let Out" here.
-Download the mp3 for free directly here (right-click and save-as.)
-Add the show to your favorite podcasts by pasting this URL into your preferred podcast software: http://www.eastvillageradio.com/podcasts/2008/68.xml

Ice Cube, "How to Survive in South Central"
Beck, "Black Tambourine"
Freestyle Fellowship, "Cornbread"
Flying Lotus, "Camel"
Cody Chesnutt, "Boylife in America"
Los Angeles Negros, "El Rey Y Yo"
X, "Sex and Dying in High Society"
Mika Miko, "Business Cats"
DJ Quik, "Quik's Groove"
Kokane, "Slow Burnin' 22.5 Degrees Fahrenheit"
Guns n Roses, "Mr Brownstone"
The Doors, "Peace Frog"
The Weirdos, "Teenage (demo)"
Minutemen, "Shit from an Old Notebook"
Black Flag, "Police Story" (live)
The Urinals, "I'm a Bug"
The Bags, "We Don't Need No English"
The Germs, "Forming" Love, "Alone Again Or"
Pavement, "Camera"
John Phillips, "Drums"
David Crosby, "Orleans"
Neil Young & Crazy Horse, "Danger Bird"
No Age, "Boy Void"
Woolfy, "Two Far Gone"
Elyse, "Spirit of the Letter"
The Pharcyde, "Running" (Jay Dee Remix)
Yoyo f. Ice Cube, "You Can't Play with my Yoyo" (West Coast Remix)
Diamonique f. Kid Frost and others, "Still 4 La Raza"
Chico & Coolwadda, "Wild N D'West"
Quik, AMG, Mausberg & Suga Free, "Down Down Down"
Eazy E, "Boys N the Hood" (Remix)
Ceci Bastida, "No te Dgan Que No"
Unsexy Nerd Ponies, "1986 Valerie"
Down aka Kilo f. Snoop, "The G Way"
Aelpeacha, "Voyage to LA"
Leon Ware, "Why I Came to California"

Premiered this morning on "Ellen," Kanye's new video smashes through a couple different walls in our brains' capacity to comprehend shit. First, it was debuted on "Ellen" (audience expansion). Second, it was co-directed by Roisín Murphy's stage director (artistic credibility). And finally, it references American Psycho, Coming to America and, uh, spaceships (we have no idea, but we're with it). And at the end of the clip, you can see the confused elation in Ellen's eyes and Kanye's just like "yep, that's it." We're flabberghasted. Try to make sense of it if you want. Kanye will be back on "Ellen" tomorrow for a live performance.

Hey look, 77 Klash made a video for his totally awesome "Mad Again" that does not fit with the subject matter at all! "Mad Again" is one of the more tense songs on the Code for the Streets EP (there's even the sound of a kettle about to boil over), but the video reminds us of a Gap ad, except instead of swingdancing, it stars the dude who produced Turbulence's "Notorious" wearing Rockers gear.

Bonus: Here's an older video of "Brooklyn Anthem," from the same EP.

Please welcome, if you will, The FADER's newest weekly columnist, A-Trak, who will be sharing with us all the life and times of a superstar DJ and globetrotting gentleman. His column is called Around the World until he tells us otherwise.

Part 1: Attack of the Unibros, Santogold, Chromeo and Kanye.



Attack Of The Unibros tour: great success! Let's recap, shall we? After spending 3 days mastering the Kid Sister album in London, being extra anal and working with the most awesomest engineers in the world to make the that baby bang like no other, I went to Germany for a triple-header of Unibro destruction with Boys Noize. We actually had a first show a week prior in Newcastle, but Germany is really when the tour kicked off properly. We hit Munich and played in a hot hot club. Like a dummy I showed up in a flannel shirt, which was promptly removed. I DJ'ed the first hour, then Boys Noize did an hour, and then we started going back and forth, tag-teaming. That turned into the format for the whole tour. Playing on the same mixer (me on Serato, him on CDJ's) made it really fun to tag-team because we were freaking the effects during each other's mixes. And it actually helped that we don't play the same type of tracks because we were never stepping on each other's toes, musically speaking. I made sure to do a little hip hop set at all of these shows too. It's fun because people don't expect it, so they end up flipping out. The next day was Berlin, with a surprise appearance by our broham DJ Mehdi. Mehdi's flight was delayed for like 8 hours or something ridiculous like that. He landed at almost 2am but was still able to come and DJ because these German parties go laaaaate. I had my video camera at all these shows. I asked this guy who actually makes videos to film the gig for me; I think he was really high because he literally filmed the disco ball for the whole night. And disco balls aren't kind to the autofocus function. The 3rd German date was in Cologne. That club was wild, there was giant candy everywhere and all these people in strange costumes dancing on stage: a bunny rabbit, a few horror masks and schoolgirl uniforms. It rounded off the weekend real lovely. We did at least 1000 people each night, it was a great first run.





After that I was finally able to rest for a few days in Berlin. It was my first time hanging out there. I really like that city, it reminds me of my old neighborhood in Montreal. Boys Noize has a dog that he brings to restaurants. We went to a spa and started working on a record together. He's got a whole bunch of gear piled up in his studios. I had fun twiddling knobs and banging on drum machines. Peaches also showed me around the city a bit and took me to the Holocaust Memorial. Another interesting thing about Berlin is that all these artists live in what used to be East Berlin. After the Wall got torn down there was a whole bunch of artsy squatting and it became like hotbed for creative types. And rent is dumb cheap!!



We played in Oslo at this spot Bla where I've played a bunch of times before. The big question was, what country's got better hot dogs, Norway or Germany? Germany is the birthplace of the bratwurst, but in Scandinavia they put these crunchy onion bits on their dogs. I can't call it! Boys Noize is also obsessed with this Norwegian candy called Bamsa Mums and I love that name. I couldn't stop saying it for like a week. Then we went to Paris where I guested at this Institubes vs. Boys Noize Records party. It was literally the 2 labels facing off, there were 2 stages on opposite sides of this big square room. The crowd was mad young, all Facebook kids. It was pretty friggin' glorious though. It ended super late and when I woke up I dragged my tired arse to the train station and hopped on a TGV headed to Bordeaux, where I had a gig by myself outside the Unibros tour. I slept some more on the train and when I got to my destination I realized my girl had been trying to call me a bunch of times. She had just read about AM and Travis' plane crash and wanted to tell me. I got the news as I awoke and arrived in this strange city by myself. It was really hard to digest. Thank god they're getting better now. I really didn't feel like DJ'ing that night but I went through with it and finally went home the next morning.





Then I did a run of dates on the Santogold tour. Had to keep it moving. I was doing a 40 minute set after the other openers, right before she got on. I definitely couldn't play the same sets as I was doing with Boys Noize for Santi's crowd! The first date was in Philly, I drove down there with Catchdini. It was also Santi's birthday and her friends surprised her with a cake backstage. Free cake alert! From there I went to Toronto. This was a week before the Toronto Unibros show and the city was plastered with our posters. They even had giant posters on trucks! They went hard. Then we hit Cleveland, a city where I've had many a crappy show in the past. But this gig was actually enjoyable and may help fight the prejudice that I had built up against that city. Santi's crowd is really in the midst of crossing over, so you see a few hipsters but also some moms and stuff. One lady came and talked to me after my set and had never seen a DJ do tricks before. She was all like "I've never seen anything like that in my life, I'm about to tell all my friends about it!" My homie Chip Tha Ripper also came through and showed some love. On the Friday instead of putting my day off to its god-given use (resting), I flew to LA to play with MSTRKRFT at the Henry Fonda theater. Logical, right? I linked up with Steve Aoki when I got in town and he took me to his new restaurant that he just bought. It's a Korean BBQ and it was yummylicious. At one point during the meal Fat Lip (from Pharcyde) walked in, which was a bit strange because the restaurant isn't even really open yet. I'm still not sure how that happened. The show itself was dope, they had my name up on the marquee in big and the crowd was yoooouuung. Sinden was in town too so I went to check him out after and had to catch a 6am flight to be at the last Santogold show on my run, in Detroit. That was probably my favorite one too.





After a few days off in Chicago came the North American portion of the Unibros tour. In fact it was just 3 cities: Toronto, New York and Montreal. I arrived in Toronto with a painfully annoying stiff neck. So the first thing I did was look for a sauna to take care of that little situation. I didn't know my body was able to sweat that much! It did help though. The club was packed super early, it was a good show. Then came New York at Webster Hall. By a twist of fate Chromeo played Webster Hall while we were Toronto. So the Macklovitches sold out that room 2 consecutive nights! Yes New York was sold the heck out and there was electricity in the air that night. My favorite tidbit is that our friend DJ Eli got married that evening so Pase Rock, J2K and Amanda Blank came to our show post-wedding, still wearing suits. There's some cool pics from that show here. We had like 2500 people in there. And finally, the big closer, Montreal. Doing New York and Montreal back-to-back is crazy for me because it's like the sorta-hometown and then the real hometown. They had giant cutouts of the Unibro heads in the venue. I'm trying to track down a pair now actually. They had me doing TV interviews before the gig. I had such a good time just playing my set. Then Boys Noize got on and the liquor started flowing and all I can say is it was a celebratory end to the Unibro extravaganza! I tried to avoid the crowd surfs during this tour (crowd surfing is so 2007, dudes) but that night I couldn't resisit. Again, there's some great pics here.



But that's not all. I had to somehow get out of bed at 8am and rush to the airport to continue my adventures. I flew to LA and got in the studio with Kanye to do some work on the new album. I could only be there for a day so we crammed some long hours. Let's keep that for the next blog. I gotta fly to Paris in a few! Someone buy me a neck pillow.

Why did Love is All never become the biggest band ever? We put them on the cover of FADER Number 37! That's usually a guarantee of worldwide acclaim. While the band didn't exactly achieve unheard of success, 9 Times That Same Song is something of an office classic, so we were amped-and-a-half when our copies of A Hundred Things That Keep Me Up At Night came through the mail slot. The new album sounds a lot like the old album, but considering, like, 92 people heard that one, that shouldn't be a problem. Up above, watch "Wishing Well," featuring the beach (our favorite), hanging out (our favorite) and having fun (our favorite).

Infinitely beloved (by us) Jay Howell has a new zine, Punks Git Cut. More mindspray than his focused work on dogs, this zine tells you your style is fucked, that life will get better, that life is already good, that your parents do it watching Oprah. Check out some excerpts and Pick it up for five bucks (cheap!) and know that your life will be better. Seriously, we picked up his first zine for two dollars (inflation, wow) a few years ago and, all told, we're in a better place now.

Desolation Wilderness' White Light Strobing sounds like relaxing in a beach house with some wind chimes, a guitar and a million different effects pedals. In fact, every song on White Light Strobing is like its own mini beach vacation—washed in reverb and impossibly relaxing. Desolation Wilderness main dude Nicolass Zwart has put together an album that can soundtrack every vacation ever, which also causes us to put it on in the office, talk about how nice it is, and then blend margaritas all day. That's right, White Light Strobing is actually so calming that it puts us in instant vacation mode. The album is out November 4th on K Records, just in time to pretend it isn't cold outside.


Download: Desolation Wilderness, "And All the Boys Looked"

Read Sam Hockley-Smith's feature on Paper Route Recordz after the jump, and download "I'm Diffirant" here.