FOUR BOOKS THAT WILL MESS UP YOUR CHILDREN

Sexual education books are hardly necessary anymore: the internet will teach kids everything they need to know, and usually even more (DVDA, look it up!). But the funny thing is that some sex-ed books that were published in the last century can’t have helped any children at all to grow into sexually healthy adults. We know this because we met Jasper Smit recently, a Dutch comedian with one of the biggest collections of sex-ed books in Holland. And because we’re a bunch of rotten dirtbags, we immediately asked him for the nastiest things in his possession. “Most of the books we have are neet and sweet and give you decent advice, like that you shouldn’t have sex with someone if you don’t like the other person”, Jasper said. “But then I also have these books that will make them scared to death of masturbation and fill them with a lifelong repulsion of everything that has to do with sex.” We yelled at him to show us. And he did. Kids, shield your eyes--some stuff's ahead.

LITERARY - THE PERFECT LABOR DAY WEEKEND BEACH READ

Looking for the perfect book for Labor Day weekend? Something light and fun, breezy and romantic? The trendy novel that will make the perfect accessory to your bitchin' tan and killer 'do? Well, I've got the perfect weekend rec for you-- Beverly Hills 90210: Which Way To The Beach?

MOMENTS LIKE THIS ISSUE EXTRA - RAVE ON

As a special treat, we have here some images left over from the article on Gavin Watson's new book, Raving '89. This was the bit of raving that happened before it got all smiley faces and glowsticks. We had a chat with a man called Gary Ellis, who was instrumental in setting up the raves that Gavin was attending in warehouses, fields and the homes of unfortunate kids in 1989. Gary Ellis was the business minded end of the rave scene, and also had a thing for really big mobile phones.

BERLIN - PARASITES OF HELPLESSNESS

After spending the 80s in the USA, German photographer Miron Zownir moved to Russia in 1995 and decided to spend a good while there. His original plan was to document the Russian nightlife, but that proved sort of expensive so he switched to hanging out in the train stations. There he was drawn into a whole strange universe of bums, lunatic baby whores, and crazy people who had been kicked out of mental asylums (or had never been admitted in the first place). Now he’s back in Berlin, though he's never quite lost his taste for sex clubs, sketchy burly guys, or intoxicated actors. He made a controversial documentary about Bruno S. two years ago, and he's got a book coming out next month. Here are a few photos from it.

AUSTRALIA - A NEW BOOK ABOUT THE ART OF THE STREETS

I’m bored with graffiti. Actually that’s not entirely true - what I'm really bored with is the constant inane debate over art vs. vandalism that comes with graffiti. Let’s settle it here and now, and never be so boring as to speak of it again; graffiti is art as long as it’s not done on my roller door. Ok? ok!

NEW YORK - FUCK "OFFENSIVE" ART PROJECTS

Someone made a bunch of stickers that said FUCK on them, and in several different sizes too, and stuck those stickers on signs (first calibrating surface area so as to affix the appropriately-dimensioned sticker) as hilarious street art because the word FUCK is really funny. Like, can you imagine walking down the street and seeing a Ped X-ing sign, only it now says Ped FUCK-ing sign? That would just really make your day, right? Crack you up for the hours you’d otherwise spend in your miserable work stall, plotting ways in which to make the office manager’s life hell just because you have nothing better to do? And then what if you found out there was a book of all these FUCK street art situations? You'd rush right out to Urban Outfitters to get it and the giggles wouldn't stop for days.

LITERARY - TWO DIVISIVE "ART" BOOKS

Daniel Johnston
Rizzoli

The majority of Daniel Johnston's musical work was co-opted by his barnacle of a "manager" Jeff Tartakov a long time ago. Luckily he wasn't prudent enough to obtain publishing rights to Daniel's artistic output. Or maybe he just thought it was garbage on par with the dick doodles fifth graders scrawl on the inside covers of their history textbooks. And that's kind of the dilemma here: There's no such thing as "on the fence" when you're talking about a chain-smoking fat guy who takes fistfuls of antipsychotic medication and plonks around on a piano all day. If you've ever taken even a sideways glance at the marker-and-ink universe of Jeremiah the Innocent, Joe the Boxer, Casper the Friendly Ghost, et al., you know exactly what to expect from a 160-page book full of them. The mini-essays from Jad Fair and Harvey Pekar are a nice touch, but they aren't going to change anybody's mind. You'll either immediately pre-order this book and spend the next year boring the shit out of your friends until they ditch you, or you'll write it off as yet another sideshow from the world's most exploited idiot savant.

NEW YORK - IT'S CALLED WALLS, CHECK IT

So check it, it’s harder to find clean, legit space to write on than it is fuck anyone over 30 who doesn't have herpes. So when you’re not creaming over this message board thread, dreaming of all the ways you’d tag the shit out of this billboard or that rooftop, you can always just get this notebook. Check it, it’s called Walls and it’s all just…walls. Fuckin’ sweet virginal walls just begging for some sick writing. Oh fuck, see that one wall, how it’s all sort of crumbling on the edge, looking all urban and hot and ready for some fatty marker? Oh shit, oh shit, I’m about to…Wait, no. Actually, this is the lamest thing I’ve ever fucking seen.

NEW YORK - TOP TEN NEW AGE SELF-HELP BOOKS I READ IN 2008

I started off this year depressed, unemployed with no prospects, dumped, and fresh to New York with no money and none of my stuff, living with a freak of a dude who told me he wanted our apartment to be a sanctuary but kicked off my first night there setting off fireworks inside. Then came the boxes of weapons on a daily basis. As I watched countless knives and beat-down batons join the arsenal of guns, ninja stars, machetes, lead pipes, and bats with screws driven in, my sense of feeling safe in the world declined rapidly. Depressed and terrified, I turned ever more to meditation and self-exploration, and did a bunch of soul-searching that ultimately built my trust in the universe that all will be good and sane and calm and fantastic. And it was. OK, that's really heavy and I'm sure this makes me a wimp but fuck it, here are the top ten books I read that set everything dandy in my mind and in my life.

LONDON - VICE GUIDE TO: BECOMING A LITERARY WIZZ-KID

Every culture on earth needs its literary whizz kids, enormobrains fresh out of college who become overnight sensations, twatting the old guard with their hip novels that describe the new age in bold new ways. Even Papua New Guinea probably has its Couplands, its Easton Ellises, its Selfs, its Welshes, its Palahniuks. Though they're obvs gonna focus on the growing influence of tractors on agriculture than the information security implications of the superdominance of Google.

And you can be one of them too. Don't look so surprised. That semi-autobiographical novel about witty coffee shop assistants? That's your ticket out of Cafe Crème. All you need to do is change practically everything about it.