I WANNA FEEL HAPPY TODAY OK

If it's raining where you are like it is here, you need a pick-me-up. So here is the happiest Marc Jacobs collection, with three (THREE!) iterations of Beethoven's Fifth disco-fied, involving man-of-the-moment Robin Thicke when he was less sweaty, and Kanye. You're welcome!

Henry Diltz, the Seventies, and Beautiful Ugly Dudes

The Auckland Art Gallery (where I work) has this show on at the moment Who Shot Rock and Roll, and I was pretty skeptical and dismissive of it at first because it is so obviously a crowd-pleaser, and, you know, meant to draw in those crowds. I also thought maybe it would be a bit cheesy? Like embarassingly baby-boomerish or something (there is a lot of Mick Jagger in there). But then I saw it for the first time and, damnit, it's pretty cool. I'm slowly falling in love with Elvis Presley (who really reminds me of R-Patz!) and I wish this was the first photo I'd ever seen of Amy Winehouse, because she looks so tough and soft and mysterious all at the same time, and I would have thought to myself "who is this person? Man I really have to hear her stuff". Instead my initiation into Winehouse was a retail job where the other shop girls played her on repeat all day, every day. They ruined her for me before there was a chance.

But by far my favourite inclusion in the exhibition is a slideshow of something like 80 photographs from Henry Diltz. I didn't realise before this exhibition, but Diltz is the author of some of my favourite music photographs of all time. He is special because he takes Crosby, Stills and Nash (and Young!) - some of the ugliest dudes in rock ever (second maybe to Spinal Tap) - and can make them look angelic and serene.

Ok maybe David Crosby is always pretty hairy and goofy looking, but you don't notice so much in Diltz's photographs. Just look at these photos to realise what feats Diltz achieves in the portraits above.

Diltz took huge amounts of photos of Neil Young, who I am just going to go out and say is my number one favourite musician ever. And the first photo in this next series is my favourite photo of him.

Richard Pryor, David Cassidy and Jackson Browne are some of the others who were photographed by Diltz. Who knows how that David Cassidy photo came about but it's hilarious. And, well, Pryor could do anything and it would be hilarious.

He also makes those photos in which you catch yourself getting nostalgic for, and wishing you were in, the seventies. Which is all very silly for you to do because you never experienced the seventies and it didn't have the internet for god's sake. But still, it's a special kind of photo which does that to you. In these photos you can almost hear that folk-rock soundtrack.

Aaaaand let's finish with adorable animal photographs. What guys.

all images from Morrison Hotel Gallery

The Row Pre-Fall 2012

I thought I was done and dusted with Pre-Fall but then Mary-Kate and Ashley went and did a wonderful thing with The Row. This is one of those collections in which you don't just admire the clothes, but want to be the women that these clothes will make you.

Definitely worth mentioning is the commendable colour palette. Varying shades of navy and burgundy is somewhat of a revelation, and to then to go and throw in some salmon pink - how unexpected! How exciting!

I've been thinking about them a lot lately, and I have a theory as to why The Row is just so successful. Ok so obviously the main reason is that the Olsen's are good designers, but I believe that part of their appeal is due to how serious they are. I don't mean that they are serious about their vocation as designers, but that the whole tone of the label is deadly serious, and seriously earnest. Just look at the photos above to start with. Instead of the generic look-book assembly of photos you usually get for pre-fall, here we are presented with "A Portrait of Women in Clothes". It is almost unimaginable that their models will ever jump on the latest trend for smiling and their runway shows are more than - the set design, lighting and styling elevate everything to more of "A Study in Taste".

The Row is sometimes compared to Celine for their elegant, intelligent take on 'clothes for the real woman', but while I can find Celine's pretentiousness irritating, with The Row it is wholly endearing. Maybe it's got something to do with the difference between New York and Paris. East of the Atlantic you have enough big houses pompously prancing around with their hundred years of history and archives and highfalutin' traditions - you don't get more serious than Paris and Celine doesn't help. New York on the other hand has carved out a completely different niche and it's all street savvy labels like Alexander Wang and Rag and Bone (clearly I'm omitting labels like Carolina Herrera and Oscar de la Renta but I'm trying to form an argument here!) who carry with them a good sense of humour and large amounts of irony. There's not much solemn sincerity in NY, so The Row fill that gap nicely. And while it's easy to make fun of earnestness, at the same it can be totally refreshing.

I don't know if you guys know the band Xiu Xiu but they've got the same earnest thing going on. When they released Fabulous Muscles in 2004, Room on Fire had just been released a few months earlier and The Strokes were totally the rage. Back then everyone was digging this cool New York irony and laughing at Xiu Xiu lyrics like "I want you to like me". I was pretty impressionable at that time and assumed that The Strokes had the right idea and that Xiu Xiu were mildly embarrassing. But then a wise friend said something along the lines of "I would rather listen to someone earnest and sincere who commits completely than listen to some smug assholes who consist entirely of sickening levels of irony" . And that changed everything because I realised it was ok to care.

I will repeat this because it is important and everyone should always remember: it's ok to care.

And so bringing this back to The Row - they care, and that is cool.