Every once in a while a new band comes along that grabs my atten­tion. I am so NOT a music critic but I do fancy myself some­what on top of the main­stream end of the Indie sound.

The last cou­ple of weeks Fitz and The Tantrums has been get­ting heavy rota­tion on our local non-pop, not quite totally edgy, yet still kinda cool  radio sta­tion in Atlanta — Dave FM.  When I first heard the track I thought pul-eeeze, such a rip-off of ABC with Mar­tin Fry. Yet– some­thing about it still intrigued me. So, I dropped the Divatude and did some research. Turns out they are really cool and I love their style and sound. The whole, soul, pop, blues, indie vibe is so fresh, clever, cre­ative and gen­uine. There are no auto-tune indul­gences, tire­some sam­pling or rap inserts fea­tur­ing DJ Fancy Frog or whomever.

At first I thought they would’ve been from the UK but they are from the good Ol’ US of A by way of Los Ange­les.
Ladies and Gents..all the way from the left coast…Fitz and The Tantrums!

I have down­loaded the entire album plus a few spe­cial releases..I highly rec­om­mend them. Check out their web­site or Face­book page or lis­ten to the entire album right now!

Com­pare them to ABC’s Look of Love after the jump.

If you’re like me and my BFF, you’re always look­ing for a nice bot­tle of wine to crack open and enjoy in the evening. Not for a spe­cial occa­sion, not for an evening with friends, not to enjoy with a spe­cial meal. No.… just because.

Hav­ing a glass of wine “just because’” really is about enjoy­ing the Sweet Life. Some­thing as small as this is a cel­e­bra­tion in itself. The prob­lem is, most of the time a decent bot­tle of wine is at least $18 — $25 a bot­tle. That’s not a lot when you’re out with friends at a restau­rant, but when you’re at home, that’s not a casual price.

I’ve found the answer — how does $10.99 sound?
Yes, you can truly buy a nice bot­tle of wine for $10.99. To top that off, it comes with a delight­fully charm­ing name and label; Cup­cake Vineyards.

Don’t just take my word for it, The Wine Spec­ta­tor gives the Chardon­nay 88 points.

I’ve tried the Chard and the Cab. Both are very good and I highly rec­om­mend them.

What’s even bet­ter is that you can give this as a nice host/hostess gift and it’s classy and reasonable.

Give it a try — what have you got to lose?

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

I’m in the plan­ning stages of some excit­ing changes at La Dolce Diva.

To get me started, I’d love your input! Could you spare a few moments to answer 10 questions?

It’s com­pletely anonymous.

I may have a few more sur­veys in the com­ing weeks — stay tuned.

You’re opin­ion mat­ters! You may see the very changes you sug­gest in the near future.

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE SURVEY

Thanks again for tak­ing the time!

La Dolce Diva, Inc.

Life’s a bath, Soak it up!

If you’ve read any­thing about my La Dolce Diva Bath & Body com­pany, then you know, I’m all about try­ing to pass on a pos­i­tive mes­sage to our Divas– In– Training…I guess that has to apply to boys with cooties too.

Some fam­ily friends of my Diva-Girl Niece have started a fresh niche busi­ness that I wanted to tell you about.

Graphic design­ers, John and Danny Clav­ijo said “Enough with the neg­a­tive!” and decided to do some­thing about all the rude, crude and not-so-cool stuff they were see­ing kids wear at schools, parks, shop­ping malls… you name it.

Some­thing pos­i­tive needed to be done. So they did it.

Movie: Julie & Julia 2009

We all know how this ends, Julia Child’s Mas­ter­ing of Art of French Cook­ing is pub­lished and becomes a world wide suc­cess. It’s in prac­ti­cally every chef’s kitchen library, whether the book has been cracked open or not. It is there. After you see this movie, you’ll  prob­a­bly be inspired to crack it open and make the Boeuf Bour­guignon a La Julia Child. I hope that didn’t spoil any­thing for you.

So, we know what hap­pens at the end of the story, which is really the begin­ning of Julia’s suc­cess, at what the French call “a cer­tain age”..meaning old and over 40. If you have read My Life In France based on let­ters and memen­tos saved and sent home by Paul and Julia Child, you may won­der why this wasn’t made into a movie on it’s own. Or maybe not. If it’d been made into a movie, it would prob­a­bly not have been any­more than a docu­d­rama that had a foodie based cult-following. It needed a spin and a sexy way of bring­ing it to the masses for box office bonanza. Enter Meryl Streep. Fol­lowed by Julie Powell.

Let’s start with the lesser known, Julie Pow­ell. I will address her as I know her from the movie, I won’t go into the foodie-blogger– back­lash she has received or her actual Julie & Julia Blog itself (I never read it), you can look into that your­self. Just Google Julie Pow­ell Backlash.

Reuters

If you think that that Meryl Streep was over the top in The Dev­ils Wears Prada as Run­way edi­tor Miranda Priestly, you are sadly mis­taken. In case you didn’t know it, she was based on real life Vogue Editor-In-Chief  Anna “Nuclear” Wintour.

Known to be quite fero­cious, demand­ing, con­de­scend­ing, pow­er­ful and any other adjec­tive you want to throw in that implies she may eat her young, have been used to describe her.

What can’t be denied is her work ethic and sur­vival instincts. Ms. Win­tour has been Editor-in-Chief at vogue mag­a­zine for 20 years.