Chaniga Vorasarun

Music: The Kills. Keep On Your Mean Side. Two former art school kids put out one of the best growling, stylish blues rock debuts this year. They look like they live in a basement surviving on a diet of cigarettes…and more cigarettes. They sound like the smoke that snakes between trench coats and sweaty walls, and probably take more than a little inspiration from a red-and white-striped elephant. But Hotel (him) and VV (her) are the anecdote for what ails the disenchanted hipster now too cool for the uber-popular White Stripes. Her vocals stray somewhere very near the likes of PJ Harvey. His strumming can go from skuzzy to western to raw and never miss a beat. If you can look past the stage names, the bang-covered eyes, the Kills heroine chic tones will slip right under your skin.

Style: Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Their debut album, Fever to Tell, only came out this month, but Karen O has already been named the ‘It’ Girl of style by the likes such magazines as London-based the Face. I guess when you’ve got the Strokes cheering in your dark and dirty corner, it’s pretty hard to not be cool. Replete with plastic, spandex and neon, Karen O has made the most unfashionable decade of the century fashionable again. Writhing in yellow stripes and black suspenders, she has the charisma that propelled the band to underground superstardom and (un)fortunately made polka dots this season’s pattern of choice.

Film: Maggie Gyllenhaal. Her breakout role came while she was crawling submissively with office files in her teeth. Secretary to James Spader’s boss. Maggie Gyllenhaal had a few notable roles before this role in Secretary including a part in brother Jake’s breakout cult film, Donnie Darko. But Big Sister is making a name for herself…and in a big way. Following in the footsteps of the first Indie Wondergirl, Parker Posie, Gyllenhaal is making quality choices and doing quality work. Look for her in Shattered Glass, an account of the demise of fraudulent journalist Stephen Glass’s career, released this summer.