Sometimes you’ve just gotta get stuff off your chest. Equally (and except in the case of certain mammary reduction procedures), it can be good to witness others getting stuff off their chests. So in the spirit of purging, why not add The Rant to your reading list? Founded as a ‘side project’ by Paul Meats of Was Not Me and ‘Silent G’ from Idle 55, this publication is a beautifully illustrated ode to complaint. If you sign up it will arrive regularly in your face, like a vexatious litigant. Meates says, “it tackles the big issues such as ‘how Walt Disney stuck his hand up the Muppets arses and stole their souls’”.

Issue #1 asks, what will become of The Muppets’ distinct personalities? “Children all over the world have had some form of contact with the Muppets and they want rainbow connections. They want to be easy and they need to be green.” True. And the plot is thickening like a pricey brand of poster glue. Have a look at what’s happened here.

Join Meates and co at their launch this Saturday, grab a drink and tell them what you think sucks the big one.

By Penny Modra

Person Pitch is the ideal title for Noah Lennox’s latest record, save maybe The Ecstatic Dreams of an Embryo In and Out of the Cool Ocean. Transmitting live from the Animal Collective member’s boyish imagination, it’s a restless and colourful record, foggy and crystalline by turns, but always as natural and inevitable sounding as the sun’s arc across a clear blue sky. Like all great albums it’s got that magic quality of making you feel like you suddenly miss something you’ve always known, and it’s genuinely ‘ambient’ in the sense of creating a feeling of the moment.

Like the watershed Richard D. James album, Panda’s new sound is a generous birthday present to pop music; its advanced electronics sound both alive and boldly futuristic, like somebody confident and joyous about getting that little bit older. A micro-chopped and FX-heavy zoo of samples sit close to Lennox’s clipped-lip choirboy singing, and cartoon adventure field recordings – trains, pelicans et al. – are constantly dipping in and out of the aquatic mix. The songs are long and the production mesmeric: Do the Future Surf Hall Desert Island Dance. 

By Mark Gomes

Start flexing your calves and pulling up your sweat bands - there are some seriously worthy stairs to clamber. Block Projects have filled the innards of the Block Arcade with a conceptual exhibition space designed for artists, hand picked by a team of fervent curators. These creative sorts have built the gallery upon the philosophy of providing a platform for fresh talent to exhibit in a commercially viable environment. In a field which pays much attention to highly established artists, this may be otherwise challenging.

If you seek higher ground, request a peek at the rooftop space where launch parties unfold. Here you can view Melbourne from a peculiar angle. Abandoned buildings and tight laneways viewed from a birds-eye perspective are a reminder that secrets can still be discovered in this town.

Block Projects currently features the work of Jordan Snedding. The orchestrated layers of oil on canvas create an infinite regress of colour and prove a genuine creative workmanship. This one is well worth the stairs.

By Isabel Dunstan

Emerging from the bargain bin of parachute tracksuits and happy pants, this week ThreeThousand embraces the Coogi jumper

No, we don't need glasses, or a lobotomy. Our affiliation with the much-ridiculed "Aussie Icon" emerged late last week when we saw a Coogi Sweat on top of dark denim and leather lace-ups. All images of Kel and Kath bum dancing in their matching ensembles were replaced with the urge smother ourselves in multi-coloured wool.

Like a virtual op-shop, if you can sift through Coogi online crap there are some definite jewels in the multi-colour mayhem. While we're first to admit the label isn't for everyone, the knits and track jackets are pretty fly in a Snow "emmm-i-licki-bom-bom-down" kind of way. Just steer clear of the woven shirts.

By Nadia Saccardo

It is an often overlooked fact that punk and the do-it-yourself mentality went beyond just music to encompass publishing, clothes and of course film.

UK author and academic Jack Sargent is one of the editors of the book No Focus: Punk on Film  and curator of Focus on Punk – a program of films, documentaries, and rare and unseen shorts that charts the chaotic and anarchic history of punk cinema.

Looking beyond the much-covered Clash and Pistols, Sargent delves into roots of punk counter-culture.

Highlights include: Emilio Estevez (in arguably his greatest role) and Harry Dean Stanton in the essential Repo Man; the John Water’s trash classic Desperate Living; the first ever ‘punk’ film, Derek Jarman’s Jubilee; a peek inside the reclusive world of DIY legend Billy Childish; a detailed look at the achievements and influence of The Gun Club; Wayne’s World director’s first effort Suburbia; and, a collection of incredible shorts covering the punk and no-wave scenes and the bands and characters who populated them. This not to be missed run of films shines a big bright light on the movement that put the power in the hands of the people. Viva la revolution.

By Leith Thomas

Johnny Rubble's official job is to design public transport infrastructure, but don't hold it against him!  He completely redeems himself by doing what any good red-blooded boy would do on his days off - he makes bright plastic jewellery celebrating various artifacts of pop culture. Polaroid cameras, boomboxes, cassette tapes, Nintendo-related fandom & that superb icon of the 80s, the keytar, will soon all be making an appearance on a decolletage near you.

All of his designs come in super-bright pink, eye-gouging yellow, brain-melting blue, dazzling red & radioactive apple green.  A perfect little dash of colour for your oh-so-Melbourne all black ensemble! Don't be so shy.

By Gala Darling

Ripple is a new Melbourne-based project that has found a cunning way of redirecting internet advertising profits to charity. This enables you (kind, caring, charitable you) to donate without actually spending a cent.

When you click on one of the charity icons on Ripple, you are taken to an ad page. And, badabing badaboom, the money that the advertisers would have paid to the website is zapped directly into the bank account of the charity you chose.

These clever kids – Melbourne’s Robin Hoods of IT if you will – also have a search bar on Ripple (with downloadable toolbar) which is powered by Google. This directs revenue to the website for every search run. Excellent homepage material: click a little here, a little there, run all your searches from it, and all the while you’re donating money to charity. The price of benevolence has never been so low.

The concept was coined six years ago by Matt Tilleard, and put into action with the help of Jehan Ratnatunga and Simon Griffiths. The launch will feature the afore-mentioned good-looking individuals, wine, music (provided by GapTooth DJs), food, and a general spirit of good-will and worn-out benevolent mouse-fingers.

By Roya Azadi

At some time or another we’ve all had that crazy notion that it’s much cheaper to make your own lunch. It’s not. By the time you buy everything for your sandwich, make it, transport it, you’ve lost about 5 years of your life, you’re down $20 and your bag smells.

What we’re trying to tell you here is that you should leave it to the experts. As Evan said in the first season of The Secret Life Of Us (and don’t ask why we remember this), “Sandwich people are born not made” and Nick and Despina, the husband and wife team at The Little Tuckerbox, seem born to do it.

No matter what your preference is you’ll struggle to break the $6 mark so you can go away with a cheap and friendly experience rather than the city’s all too familiar cheap and nasty experiences.

By Chris Barton