Lana Del Rey Wins the Internet

Are you f***ing kidding me? A$AP Rocky as JFK?

The fact that these two young trendsetters wanted to work together is awesome enough, but even more heartening is that there is clearly something clicking here artistically. We all got a taste of it with this KickDrums-produced preview -- a song that neither camp has released in full -- but with this next-level music video, we see that Lana and A$AP together are greater then the sum of their parts.

Enjoy.

Lana Del Rey: Back to the Future

I generally don't consider myself to have worthwhile taste when it comes to slow-moving, epic-voiced female singers. My particular preferences seem to cultivate artists leaning towards the spectrum of "potentially insane ironic rhymespitters."

But recently, when the sun gets low and I start to think of the teenage years I never had (in 1950's Southern California, that is), nothing spaces me out better then some Lana Del Rey. Her whole style is like if the world's most hipster Tumblr account had a baby with Lady Gaga....so basically, I'm saying Lana's half-cyborg. YEA, she's that good.

Lana is to musical innovation what Steve Jobs was to technological innovation. Pure simplicity mixed with pure vision.

Enjoy. 

Suggest Unto Me Your Biographies

This blog just passed the venerable 50+ views mark. I'm going to ball-park that only 25 of those were me, so either my half-assed attempts at SEO maximization are working and forcing people to stumble upon "Of Bombay and B.Doyle," or there is a burgeoning market for content with regards to media critiques and avant garde gangsta hip-hop. 

So, let's interact: I need biographies to read. As previously mentioned, I just finished Neil Gabler's Walt Disney biography, and am currently in the midst of Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs biography. Shoot me a suggestion of a biography about an epic personality or epoch-defining businessman, and I'll friend you on Facebook! Oh, the private pictures of mine you could view.

But seriously, biography suggestions. I wants them. Now. This Mumbai heat makes "epic" books the only kind worth sitting down and reading.

Above: Mickey Mouse, the product of a tortured, perfectionist soul, according to Neil Gabler.

Moody's: India "Stable"

How you like them apples, Standard and Poor? Moody's noted today that the lower growth trends as of late are "unlikely to become permanent or even mid-term features of the Indian economy."

This is of importance to B.Doyle for two reasons:
1) The rupee (and thus, my paycheck) may not be doomed after all, and...
2) These next 11 months in Mumbai may have some economic growth meaning for the ol' career, aside from that intangible "experience" factor.

Of course, I'm not letting my hopes and dreams simply ride on the verdicts of finicky ratings agencies. No, I'm  much more comforted by this Business Insider slideshow explaining "Why Everyone is Freaking Out About India." Madness, illuminated.

Grow, damn you, grow!

Content Innovation: If Disney Can Do It, DealBook Can Do It

I recently finished Neil Gabler's "Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination." Disney pushed a lot of innovation in his day, but one area where he was incomparable was his innovation of "content" -- his perfectionism for his film's storylines, character development and overall themes was unparalleled. He never compromised, and he never rested on his laurels.

Flash forward sixty years, circa the B.Doyle era: reading New York Times' "Dealbook" section -- which previously held a scintillating aura of New Media excellence, not to mention some damn good writing -- it strikes me that the whole section has become fairly boring. Everything about it -- the content, the dearth of videos, even the bush league "single-column" listing of articles -- gives me the impression that Andrew Ross Sorkin stopped trying to really push the site's envelope, maybe, eight months ago. And in a digital media age where there's still a wide-open playing field to prove true "excellence" in content delivery and style, absolutely no website should be resting on its laurels.

Aww, but maybe I'm just salty because I miss the inimitable Kevin Roose on my DealBook homepage. He's since moved onto greener (except not...) pastures at New York Magazine. And I'm probably in no position to take Mr. Sorkin to task, considering he's only about ten years older then me and has already written a generation-defining expose and, well, founded "DealBook."

Regardless, I would like to point to Business Insider as the Internet's premium example of a true content innovator. They combine Huffington Post's penchant for addictive lists and slideshows with a fair bit of trenchant insight and solid numerical analyses. And damn if the site doesn't know what I want to read -- take their slideshow of "The World's Hottest Billionaire Offspring." Now that's some good juice!

To conclude: Dealbook's gotten weak, Business Insider rocks, and the Internet has yet to see its "Walt Disney." Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some BI slideshows to peruse.

Sorkin: Less squawking, more Dealbook-ing, please!

Rupee Hits All Time Low...Morale at All Time High...

So the Indian rupee was in a hell of a free fall this week...as of a few hours ago, it hit yet another "all-time low" of 57.12 rupees to the American dollar. That's bad news for the millions of us who get our paychecks in rupees...and ostensibly even more demoralizing for the small minority of us who had the option of working for the good ol' American simoleon.

Thankfully, this unfortunate bit of news is the only annoyance I've had in an otherwise fantastic week. Every fellow worker I've encountered here is young, cosmopolitan, and educated. Case in point: on my team of seven analysts, at least three have MBA's, all are under the age of 30, all are well-paid, and all are extremely articulate on the unique economic and social challenges their country faces on the road to economic stability. Anecdotes may not speak as loud as statistics, but it's still hard to get down about a few inauspicious economic indicators when I see first hand the growth and excitement of business here. 


Worse comes to worse, I'll just start acting in Bollywood movies for some extra cash, maybe do some back-up dancing. I could show the guys below a meannn Harlem Shake...

The Illustrious Rhymesayers of the Ivory Towers

Smart, hard-working people make great music. Sometimes as great as any wild-haired, drug-addled artist -- not to say the two are mutually exclusive. It was true with Columbia-educated Rodgers and Hammerstein, with Yale-educated Cole Porter, and it's damn true now.

Case number one: Kinetics and One Love. Recently Cornell-graduated. Writers of such recent Billboard hits as "Airplanes" and "Strange Clouds," and composers of my personal favorite Lana Del Rey remix:

Case Number Two: Hoodie Allen. A 2010 UPenn Graduate who...not gonna lie...I was pretty damn skeptical about. But the dude has pretty much conquered the Internet, and hell if he doesn't make some catchy tunes. I'm not quite certain of the boundaries between Internet supremacy and "mainstream" supremacy anymore, but I'll just go ahead and say that this guy is as close to mainstream success as any former dorm-room rat of our generation. 

Case Number Three: Mike Posner. 2010 Duke graduate. Huge overachiever. Creator of J. Biebz' "Boyfriend," and great music in general. Innovator.