Following the release of his 1969 film Easy Rider starring Peter Fonda and Jack Nicholson, director and prolific photographer Dennis Hopper escaped to Taos, New Mexico for a desert sabbatical. Having first visited Taos during the filming of Easy Rider, Hopper returned to pioneer a creative retreat of sorts for his friends and colleagues. Drugstore Camera, a clothbound collection of photographs taken by Hopper on disposable cameras, captures the idealistic spirit of the times and includes a forward by Hopper’s daughter, Marin. Iconic figures from the late 60s and 70s pose against the Western terrain, inside shadowy homes and along the road between Taos and Hopper’s homestate, Kansas.

Published by Damiani

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Our favorite new pop artist and ISSUE cover girl Elliphant has released a new single “Love Me Badder”. We’re especially excited about the cover art Elliphant selected from her photoshoot for ISSUE with photographer Jan-Willem Dikkers.

›› ISSUE Feature: Interview and fashion shoot with Elliphant

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Mackenzie Scott, or “Torres”, has released her much-anticipated sophomore album via Partisan produced by Rob Ellis (producer for PJ Harvey) and featuring Portishead guitarist Adrian Utley and PJ Harvey bassist Ian Oliver. On the heels of her 2013 self-titled debut, “Sprinter” has rooted Scott among other notable contemporary female rock’n’roll artists like Sharon Van Etten and Jessica Lea Mayfield. Scott’s lyrics are sharp, e.g. “Son, you’re not a man yet / You fucked with a woman who would know.” Meanwhile, her melody cuts directly through ambiguity and into tradition of rock’n’roll indie icons PJ Harvey and Helium’s Mary Timony.

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Frances Bean, daughter of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, hand-picked Director Brett Morgen for “Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck”. Morgen, whose outstanding documentary work includes “A Kid Stays in The Picture” and “Crossfire 10,” has once more crafted a visceral and incredibly detailed documentary using unprecedented access to previously untouched Cobain archives.

The footage in “Montage of Heck” spans Cobain’s life — from hyper-saturated home videos from his childhood in Aberdeen, WA to footage of his private life with Love and onstage performances. The years of Cobain’s youth that remain undocumented Morgen chose to fill liberally with Cobain’s doodles, writing and animated shorts made from over 8,000 hand-painted canvases. The film includes new interviews with Cobain’s close friends and family and is underscored by a veritable album of unheard Cobain and Nirvana cassette recordings. Immersive and at times painful, Montage maintains a course of integrity and charm, all the while driving at Cobain’s mortality and the nebulous suffering that underscored his legend.

Set in Palm Desert, CA and hedged by dusty mountains, indian casinos, white limos and plastic swans, Welcome to Me, directed by Shira Piven, is new territory for comedian and leading actress Kristin Wiig. Alongside Linda Cardellini, West Bentley and Joan Cusack, Wiig leads her darkest comedy yet as Alice, a woman whose borderline personality disorder and obsession with Oprah leads her to turn her $85 million lottery winnings into an excessive TV talk show about herself. Throughout all of Alice’s over-eager mania, Wiig maintains the nuance of her role, refraining from hyperbole so that every outburst is tempered with fragility. Whimsical and at times outright hilarious, Welcome to Me examines mental illness while guiding it as comedic fodder. The plotting of the film is as cookie-cutter clean as its subject is absurd. Ridiculous and consistently cringe-worthy – with a strange concoction of meatloaf cakes, childhood reenactments and live dog neutering in the midst of one giant psychotic breakdown – Welcome to Me is effectively easy to swallow albeit difficult to digest.

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Bill Fay, 1970s cult singer-songwriter, amassed a significant following over his 40 year silence. At the time of his early albums, Fay received very little commercial success and was eventually dropped from his label in the 1970’s. In the meantime, he has accumulated such fans as Jeff Tweedy of Wilco and Nick Cave. “Who Is Sender”, out via Dead Oceans, is Fay’s second release in 45 years on the heels of his 2012 return album “Life is People”. The album features Bills quintessential humanist vision and unusual, melancholic piano-guitar arrangements.

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This is writer Alex Garland’s directorial debut, following his acclaimed screenplays Never Let Me Go and 28 Days Later. Slick, stylish and slow-burning, Ex Machina pits sexy robot Alicia Vikander against nerdy coder Domhnall Gleeson at the behest of the alcoholic robot engineer Oscar Isaac. Fans of UK sci-fi TV show “Black Mirror” may notice similar casting, feel and themes tackled here. With its futurist philosophy and a dramatic yet open-ended culmination, Ex Machina accumulates high praise across the board.

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Actress, model and fashion icon Chloë Sevigny has been known for her effortless cool since the 90s. Beginning with her career at Sassy magazine and her appearances in Sonic Youth and Lemonhead music videos, Sevigny’s title as 90s “it girl” culminated with her role in Larry Clark’s 98 film Kids’s. Her effortless style has landed Sevigny in magazines world wide and in countless fashion brand collaborations, alongside her non-stop acting career in films like Boys Don’t Cry, American Psycho and The Brown Bunny. Sevigny’s new self-titled book curates moments from her days as a high school skater-punk, her life in New York and present tenure as fashion icon. Chloë Sevigny, out April 21 via Rizzoli, features both a foreword by Sonic Youth punk legend Kim Gordon and afterword by actress Natasha Lyonne.

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