Tuesday, June 30, 2009

SECRET WARS X REEBOK NYC T-SHIRTS FOR SALE

Ok people we have printed 100 in each design (below) - over half the stock has already gone to people stateside and we are now for the first time offering them out to people in the UK and Europe.

This is a very limited and special collaboration between Secret Wars and Reebok - The images were all created by Disco Teck and are part of a 3 t shirt collection.

These will not be released again - once they are gone, they are gone forever!

Buy a piece of SW history

£20 each

Grab one quickly by emailing shop@monorex.com - with your size and colour preference (s, m, l, xl, xxl)

NYC DIARY - Hard at work (Days 4, 5 & 6)

So the story continues....

Some more memories from the ECKO vs MONOREX battle


Quote from Disco Teck regarding the Monorex battle vs Ecko - "Our concept used 'Rex and the city' as the title and had 'ol Henry the 8th sat in the middle holding Carrie Bradshaws severed head on a platter...we added a Roast Rhino to the feast with a big apple shoved in its mouth to wind Mr Ecko up (which it did). It was a fair fight, with team Ecko grassping the 'live illustration battle' idea, and bringing some pretty funny disses (if not obvious social stereotypes). Of course there was no way we could win over the hugeley patriotic crowd, most of which had no idea who Henry the 8th was, or that 'Rex' meant 'king' in latin. So we lost...and raved it up london style till we got thrown out."





Daniel starting to loosen up ;)


JUNE 16TH - MR T's BIRTHDAY AND GALLERY BAR EVENT!

Below is a card Disco Teck designed for me - all the guys signed it and I was really chuffed as you can see..

Peeps signing my birthday card!

We started off the day nice and slow with a small picnic gathering in Brooklyn Bridge Park - The sun was not really shining but that did not take away the feeling of relaxation and detachment from the city I felt for a couple of hours.

If you have not been down to this park, you are missing out! As this place is a hidden gem that features in many Hollywood films.

Sick views and nice breezy air!




Gallery Bar (Orchard St)


A sick custom fixie we saw on the way back home in the Fixed gear London gallery show



JUNE 17TH - USA vs UK @ PUBLIC ASSEMBLY

After a couple of last minute hiccups we were set for the main event of the tour, thanks to YUME and ELURA for making this all happen.

Even though the venue was not a perfect arena for a Secret Wars of this stature, we dealt with it and both sets of artists put on an amazing show...Thanks to everyone that helped out!


Team USA warming up below


The Last Emperor came down from Philly to perform - check his SECRET WARS track on his myspace - CLICK HERE





The final wall by Team UK - Based on the old skool film "The Warriors"

Quote by Disco Teck - "This time arround we used the classic film 'the Warriors' as our inspiration, putting a twist on the Baseball Furies gang, with our own Cricket Furies, cruising around in a beat up london cab. We had one of the famous lines from the film 'can you dig it?!' on one side, with Obama (characature by the mighty Alfa) popping up on the right responding with his famous line 'yes we can!'. Get it?! clever innit."


The crowd vote was used to judge the 2 teams - Team UK won by a small margin... Thanks to all those that came along for hopefully the first of many Secret Wars events in NYC.

The UK wall was sold to our new friend Sam from giftd - She is originally from England but now lives out there and it was here first Secret Wars.... In my opinion she probably owns one of the best walls in Secret Wars history... Good bargain buy!


Photos by Jay, John Mcgall and Sam

Sunday, June 28, 2009

R.I.P MICHAEL JACKSON

We don't usually blog random things but this is different, Michael Jackson was a legend and inspired us all in some shape or form...

A huge loss to everyone but the legend will live on through his music and videos - we all talk about Thriller video but does any one remember the Moonwalker feature film?

Big props to Sway on writing this so quick!

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

NYC DIARY - Touch down in NYC (Days 1, 2 & 3)


Where do you start... This 10 day tour of NYC was one of the hardest and grueling trips away yet!

Forget the drama on the Don't Sleep European tour - What we went through in the first 3 days in NYC was much worse. Let me try and quickly explain what went down:

So the trip started off on a positive note with all the guys meeting at Monorex HQ, we all then slowly worked our way to Heathrow airport to check in on the lovely Virgin Atlantic. So far so good, everyone was present and on board our 6.5 hours flight!

@ JFK
When we touched down in NYC, we had our first small hiccup as Jay (Secret Wars Southampton) got stuck in customs for 3 hours - basically because he has a Arabic background! Crazy but true...NYC and America in general is not an easy place to be entering these days.

While waiting everyone was slightly panicking as we had 200+ SW t-shirts in our bags, that looked like we were smuggling through customs to sell...

After a couple of coffees and macchiatos, Jay was released on bail (joke) and was told to return to the UK within ten days.

Taxi to Brooklyn
Outside JFK there are lanes and lanes of taxis all trying to hustle tourists into over priced vans, after talking with a few we quickly realised that the price should be $75 rather than the $200 we were originally quoted for a 9 man van. Tip: Use booking desk inside for best price!

After loading up we all jumped in for a hot and sticky ride to Brooklyn, this ride was meant to take 30 mins tops but our luck had truly run out as we were stuck in traffic jams for over 2+ hours...The Secret Wars team were melting faster than ice creams on the beach - Jimi and co all resorted in stripping down to just shorts, due to shortage of cold air in the van.

The Apartment
We finally arrived at the apartments 4+ hours late and then found out our landlord who had the keys for check in decided to go off and have food, leaving us all stranded on the streets for over 4 hours!! The guy would not answer phone calls and explained it was our fault for being late ?!?!?!? So we were patient and all drank 40's on the street hoping he would be back soon...But this was not his plan and after much team talk, we all decided the next best thing was to go leave our bags at our friends (James your a star) and then get wasted in a bar in Williamsburg...It was a fun but tiring night!


DAY 2
Reebok customs on Broadway... We were asked by Reebok USA to host a custom session, people could come and buy the shoes the guys just painted.




Monorex artists Disco and Alfa in the studio


Meet the team

T (Mr Monorex and Secret Wars)

Daniel (Secret Wars Sweden)

Martyn (Camera man)

Disco & Alfa

Session & Sam

Marc Ecko & Reeps (UK Beatbox champion)

Jimi Crayon

Jay (The photographer)

The local bar - Freddies!


DAY 3 - Ecko battle
After a couple of days of drama the Secret Wars crew were finally settled and ready for action, the artists got to work in the studio and created some kick ass canvases...While Daniel (Secret Wars Sweden) and T got to work building the Ecko battle wall.

This event was a RSVP event and went on to be a cracking battle - Marc Ecko was in his element hosting and introducing the Secret Wars show alongside our main boy Reeps 1.

Ecko had invited people from the fashion and creative industry alongside celebrities from Sopranos, Def Jam etc..

Team Ecko was made up of Marcs best 3 designers within Zoo York, Ecko and Complex..While the Monorex team were the usual suspects Disco, Alfa and Jimi Crayon.

The crowd were vibing to the art and music supplied by DJ Session, the eventual winners were Team Ecko - But all in all it was a great night that ended up rolling on till 5am!

Huge thanks to Jason for helping put this all together and Marc for allowing us to use his office.

ECKO (Left) vs MONOREX (Right) @ ECKO HQ


Marc in his office (The venue for the battle) - The other half of his office is a basketball court!

Disco Teck in full flow


Marc explaining "this is not a fix" ;)

One of team Ecko's disses - teabagging and a set of nasty english teeth on our beloved queen.

The Monorex team wall based on Henry the VIII and Rex in the city! I loved it when our guys dropped the roasted Ecko rhino, Marc came over to me and said "I cannot believe they picked on my rhino, thats dark but I have the balls to take this!" It caused a small outrage among the crowd.




More reports and photos to follow!

Photos from Jay - More here
Photos also from Suelan Allison-Modrzejewski - More here