You know that friend in your circle who knows every hotspot in your neighborhood? Whether it’s that perfect dive bar on a desolate side street, or that happening fusion restaurant that makes no sense on paper but tastes amazing, Andrew Steinthal will lead you in the right direction.

The 33-year-old music publicist turned food enthusiast began his restaurant review website, The Infatuation, with partner Chris Stang five years ago. Reading one of their reviews is like talking to your funny friend who comments not only on the food, but the staff, the music, the frighteningly low height of the ceilings. Essentially, it’s a thorough and conversational resource for all things food and beverages throughout New York City and the boroughs. The website even has a “Friday Fives” pick that asks people in the entertainment biz and beyond to list their favorite places to eat (like Aziz Ansari and The Yeah Yeah Yeah’s). I spoke with Steinthal about his new favorite restaurant, his exciting plans for The Infatuation, and where to get the best poached eggs in New York City.

What inspired The Infatuation?

My partner Chris and I met in college and started this site in April 2009. We also came up in the music business together, and always had different plans of how we were going to take over the world and what our business was going to be together. As we approached our later 20s, we began really enjoying the changing restaurant culture in New York, and there were no restaurant reviews that spoke to us in terms of content, and actually helping you find a restaurant for a specific purpose. We’re New York Magazine readers, and we couldn’t believe that NY Mag didn’t have an app (we do), and that it didn’t have more search functions than Critics’ Pick. We started to become the people in our respective circles that our friends would call when they needed a restaurant opinion. Everyone would call if they had a date they need to impress, or their parents coming to town, or just wanted to find some late night eats. And then we realized that there is a lack of non-pretentious, friendly restaurant recommendations online, and we decided we were going to tackle writing restaurant reviews, even though we had no clue how to do that, which is kind of the beauty of it.

Totally. They’re funny and easy to read because they’re very honest and raw, very conversational.

Exactly, they’re very conversational. And they’re relatable. Our whole thing was that we wanted to represent the every person, and most of the stuff in the dining space when it comes to reviewing food content is super high-end and a bit snobby. And don’t get me wrong, there’s a huge market for that. A lot of people fit in that niche, and they really care about the chefs and where the food comes from and how long its been dry-aged and all that, but most regular people just want to know if the restaurant is good, what they serve, what the scene is, and what it’s useful for. The majority of diners could careless about who the chef is, they just want to know that it’s the right spot.

What’s your professional background?

We have music business background; Chris is in marketing and I was in Public relations for a while. Since we’ve spent so much time shaping people’s careers and nurturing them along, we really know how to build something, so we use similar tactics for our website. . We’ve done all these silly things to cultivate a fan base, and people have shared the website with their friends, and its been really cool to see it grow. Five years later, here we are! We actually both left our jobs two weeks ago.

So now The Infatuation will be a full time gig?

Yes, now it’s full time. We’re trying to take what we’ve done in NYC and get it rolling in other markets. We want to find other people who will be Infatuation reviewers all over the country. Our first cities to roll out shortly will be San Francisco, Chicago, and Denver.

How do you hear about these all these places sprouting up in the city?

It’s a little bit of everything. The best recommendations always come from the community.  People hit us up on Twitter or send us emails saying we have to check out so-and-so spot, and that’s really where we find the gems. We try to stay up on restaurant openings and older places that have been around for a long time. Our main objective is to keep a balance of ‘of the moment’ spots, places that are timeless, and neighborhood gems.

Well, as a Williamsburg resident I welcome the Brooklyn reviews! I recently read Megan Collins’ “Friday Fives” picks about Greenpoint and have a bunch of new places to try.

Greenpoint is an exciting place to live right now. There are a lot of great spots. Have you been hanging out at Tørst?

Haven’t been there yet, but I hear they have quite the beer selection.

You should go. If you like beer, it’s awesome! And Glasserie is really great too. It’s a bit far, but worth the trip.

Are you keeping Passover or do you eat chametz anyway?

I do not keep Passover kosher. I apologize to my fellow heebs!

What’s one of your new favorite places to go eat?

This place in the East Village that I just discovered called Bikinis. It’s basically a cross between a Spanish café and a New York diner. Bikini’s are like Spanish sandwiches, which was news to me. They have incredible sandwiches; I ate breakfast there the other day and had probably one of the best poached eggs dishes ever. It’s delicious. It’s similar to Café Havana, but in the East Village and not as crowded and crazy.

The Infatuation’s “Friday Fives,” which asks people in the entertainment business their top five places to eat and drink is a really cool idea. How do you get in contact with all of these awesome people? For example, Brandon Boyd and Questlove?

It’s literally straight up hustling. A lot of times we’ll go track people down on Twitter. Being a publicist, I know a bunch of other publicists, and at least know the game in terms of how to present something to somebody to make it happen. It took me four years to get Questlove. I felt very accomplished the day that ran, because I worked really hard to get him! And someone actually pitched me Brandon Boyd, and I like Incubus, so that was an easy one. I once saw Aziz Ansari and basically accosted him! Amazingly, he remembered me the next time I ran into him and promised to do it…over the span of three years. I probably emailed his publicist 20 times and was like. ‘I’m so sorry I’m so annoying, but what are the chances it will actually happen now?’ And finally, it happened. I apologize to that publicist.

What are your goals for the future of The Infatuation? Where do you see it in five years?

We want to become that ubiquitous platform and brand that people turn to when they want to find a restaurant. We want people in Houston and Raleigh, and potentially London and Sydney, to know that they can trust The Infatuation for recommendations that will be useful. We see a big hole in the market there. Zagat was amazing, had a ton of brand equity, and was serving a purpose, but they never translated to the Internet so well. I don’t know real national or international brands that give you a curated opinion of restaurants, so we’re really trying to be that, and hopefully we can do that through reaching people. And The Infatuation is mainly for young people. Our audience is a lot different than most food publications. We reach a 20-something audience, and we communicate with them through social networking like Instagram and Twitter. We’re hoping we can take what we have made in New York here and replicate it across the country, and hopefully one day across the globe.

(Image: Ryan Muir)

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I sat down for a latte with Rachel Antonoff at Café Grumpy in Chelsea on a Wednesday afternoon. Antonoff has been busy preparing for her Spring 2014 fashion line and video, traveling back and forth to Los Angeles, and generally being a busy, young fashion designer.

Antonoff grew up in central New Jersey, and attended the Professional Children’s School in New York City. After realizing at a young age that theater wasn’t her calling, she went on to pursue writing, and soon after that she began to dabble in fashion. She sent some photos of her and a friend’s designs, wide-eyed and naive, to Teen Vogue, and the rest is history.

She greeted me with a hug. We had both just attended weddings with no plus-one invite, so the conversation began from there. We went on to discuss siblings (her brother is Jack Antonoff of Fun, who happens to date Girls’ Lena Dunham), neighborhoods, and her likes and dislikes.

Her Spring 2014 lookbook will premiere on Style.com’s Video Fashion Week, next week, and her video for the line will be available on her website.

Were you always into fashion? What led you to become a designer?

Not at all. I actually always and still do have a list of things I want to do and be. And weirdly enough this was not even on that list. I fell into it really late, sort of, in terms of when people find their careers. I really wanted to be a writer, actually. I was freelance writing around the city, and of course, I always loved clothes. Now I know that I was always designing, I just didn’t realize that’s what I was doing.

I design best when I’m jogging, usually, when I just daydream. And what I’m wearing in the daydreams is what I try to extract and make. And now I know that that’s my process.

What’s your favorite article of clothing?

I am drawn to dresses because they’re easy, and I’m actually not a great stylist, which is interesting. I really don’t have a solid idea of what to put with what. I don’t ever feel like one of those people who looks put together, so a dress is an easy way to accomplish that. But really, especially now that I work in this field, I mostly want to be really comfortable all the time. I don’t do well with middle ground. I either go all the way with something or not at all. So I’d rather not try at all and wear sweats, which is why our sweatshirts came out and it’s working out well.

They are super cute. What’s the vision behind your Spring 2014 collection?

Thank you. Spring 2014 is themed “crush” and we are editing the video right now which will premiere on Style.com’s video fashion week, next week. I’m really excited about it, and my video as well. It’s all sort of inspired by the feeling of having a crush and how you think about what you want to wear for your crush.

There’s a song “He’s a Rebel,” by The Crystals. Maybe it’d be a good fit for your video.

Sounds amazing. I’m going to write it down. We’re actually scoring this right now so maybe it will work out.

Your collections are inspired by a variety of eras, most notably the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s. If you could go back in time, which era would you live in and why?

Style-wise or life-wise?

Both.

Well life-wise, to be honest, as a woman, I think you’d have to be insane to live in any other era than this one. Or if I could choose the future, then hopefully that. I certainly wouldn’t want to go back in time when it comes to general civil rights and stuff like that.

But style-wise, I may have to continue with this time, only because it seems like in so many past eras, while the style for women was really fun to look at, it may not have been as fun to wear. I feel like it’s a common answer to say women just looked better, and you were expected to dress up. That’s exactly why I wouldn’t want to live there. I’d like to look at pictures of it, but I don’t think I’d want that responsibility everyday of having to.

You and Jack are a power sibling team. Is he your number one go-to for advice?

Always, yes. We’ve always talked about everything and advised each other on everything for as long as I can remember. So there’s extremely few things I can imagine in like that I would not seek out his advice on. If there is advice to be sought, his would be the first. He’s great.

What made you switch from runway shows to video?

The shows were getting really expensive and over the top, and again with not wanting to have to half weigh things, I would rather not do one, then to compromise. I guess that’s not my best attribute, but I know that what we were spending was a fraction of what most people spend on presentations, and it was still through the roof. We had to realistically look and ask, are we increasing sales by having these? What really is the value? How else could we accomplish this? And Lena [Dunham] had the great idea for the video, and I loved the idea. And so at first I thought maybe I should do that and a show, but we should definitely do that. But then the more I thought about it, I figured we should take our funds and use them in one place and really make it great. I felt really disappointed at first, sort of like it was admission to failure. But then as we filmed the video and then when I saw it I realized it was actually, a video is a presentation that lasts forever.

I love that you use your mom, grandmother, and friends in your videos and presentation as models, displaying all shapes and sizes. It brings a realism to fashion that most people designers don’t. I wonder if you did runway still, if that would be different.

Thank you. Right, I don’t know, I mean I have a lot of issues with that. I feel like fashion is the same as any other creative art and for some reason its one of the only of the creative arts that’s viewed in this totally eye roll inducing fluffy, stupid way. I think a lot of it is unwarranted, but then there’s so much that goes on within fashion—for the most part we’re not doing ourselves any favors, to dispel this “Zoolander-ish” persona. And obviously it’s an age-old thing with the weight and size issue, but it is such a problem; it’s so gross, and I just don’t want to play any part in it.

Describe Rachel Antonoff’s “girl”?

I think she has been every girl, which kind of ties in to what we just talked about. I really like the idea that there are things my mom could wear, my grandmother could wear, and more specifically, I think the Rachel Antonoff girl definitely doesn’t take fashion too seriously. It’s not an elitist thing, its just fun, and about feeling good about yourself, as well as dressing for yourself.

What music are you into?

So much! I’ve always loved Broadway musicals and still listen to a lot of that. You know who I just discovered? Sky Ferreira. Have you heard any of her music?

Ummm…heard of her, but not really.

I know! I hadn’t either, because, exactly. That was my thought on the way to this wedding last weekend. It wouldn’t have even occurred to me to listen to her songs, and then for some reason it did. I listened to two of her songs, an old single and a new, and I don’t understand why she’s not hailed as a genius artist of our time!

What’s your favorite Broadway show?

Pippin. What’s yours?

Gypsy.

That’s probably my second favorite.

Favorite designers?

Miu Miu, Mary Benson, Melissa Coker for Wren, Band of Outsiders and Chanel.

Are you spiritual, and what’s your relationship with Judaism?

I am spiritual, I have to say, though, I’m not very religiously inclined, specifically. I guess I have to affiliate myself somewhere between agnostic and a humanist. I think whats here on the planet is magical enough and amazing. I don’t know what I believe regarding other things, but I feel so open to it. I do love the culture of Judaism. We observed holidays and went to Solomon Schechter. My mom grew up “Conservadox” and my dad grew up Reform, and we were somewhere in between.

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Spotlight On: Jayson Littman, Finance Guy Turned He’bro Founder
And many more…

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Indie rock/pop band Grouplove captured music fans’ hearts with their 2011 single, “Tounge Tied,” and they’re set to release their second album, Spreading Rumors, on September 17.

The funky and energetic quintet’s sound is a dreamy mix of pop, rock, and dance. I spoke with Ryan Rabin, Grouplove’s talented Jewish drummer, as he prepared for the group’s Seesaw tour, which kicked off on Monday, September 9, in Seattle, WA.

Rabin comes from a musical family (his dad was the guitarist and vocalist in the rock band Yes) and has been playing the drums for as long as he can remember. We chatted about Grouplove’s unique new tour plan (fans have the option to see them in a club or a church), as well as Rabin’s musical influences.

It seems serendipitous how the members of Grouplove all came together. How did you meet and realize you were all musically on the same track?

It was about four summers ago. For various reasons we all ended up individually on the island of Crete in Greece at an art residency in a little village. We met there, and we were all at very different places in our lives, but also all in the same transitional phases. We made friends and bonded over music but never actually played or collaborated together while we were there. About a year after we initially met, everybody visited me in Los Angeles. They were from all over—Christian Zucconi (vocals, guitar) is from New York. Hannah Hooper (vocals, keys) is from San Francisco, Sean Gadd (bass, vocals) hails from London, and Andrew Wessen (guitar, vocals) is also from Los Angeles.

They came over to hang and we ended up recording a couple of songs in my home studio. It was just supposed to be that one day, and it turned into two months of recording. Everybody moved into my parent’s house and we just kept making music together. Then we realized it was something really special and we didn’t want to pass it up and that’s when everybody kind of sold everything and moved out to LA to actually make the band work. That’s the short version!

You guys are gearing up for the Seesaw Tour, which kicked off in Seattle this week. It’s a two-night city tour with one electric show and one acoustic, which is an awesome idea. Who came up with it?

It was actually our manager’s idea. Many songs on both of our albums were initially formed on the guitar or the piano. For a band like us that’s frequently on the road and does a lot of event giveaways and private shows for radio station winners, we already have a bit of experience getting the songs down to some of their original forms. Our manager came to us and said why don’t we do a two-night show where one night is full electric sound, and the next night we strip it down and take it to that bare bones level where the songs started. We thought it was a cool idea and something our fans would really gravitate towards. Besides being in smaller clubs then we were used to and being closer to the fans, it’s cool for them to be able to experience the songs in a way that most fans don’t get to. Our lives shows are usually so energetic, and you kind of just get to let go of yourself as a performer, so I’m curious to see how it’s going to translate when the vibe is a bit more chilled out. The acoustic sets will be at offbeat places like a church, an old lodge in a cemetery, and other underground venues.

What have been some of the greatest differences in the creative process of your first record, Never Trust a Happy Song, and your new album, Spreading Rumors?

It was definitely a more cohesive process this time around. It was much more collaborative. We were coming off three years of touring when we made Spreading Rumors. For Never Trust a Happy Song, we hadn’t toured much at all before making it, so in general we are a better band and better at playing together from all of the touring experience, so we capitalized on that. We didn’t really take a break after touring ended, we just went straight to the studio. It sounds like a tighter union and more of the songs were written together at the same time rather than bringing our individual ideas to the group and having them put their spin on it.

What inspired the title Spreading Rumors?

It originated a while ago from something that someone in our crew said to us at but we had forgotten. It was a long time ago and we sort of forgot about it. Then someone on our tour brought it up six months later when we were about to record do the album. We were thinking of weird funny names and then the title Spreading Rumors came up. It kind of stuck with us, and as we made the album it started taking on actual meaning for all of us and represented our process, and how the songs sort of spread like a rumor. They take on as they’re being written, and then as they’re released they take on a new life for everyone in the band and everyone who listens to the songs and interprets them in their own way. It’s about that objectivity and how songs take on a different meaning for all of us.

Your music video for “Ways to Go” stars a fake Kim Jong-Un as a young boy. Where’d that idea come from?

The director brought the idea and we thought it was so cool how a song can completely change someone’s perspective on a topic and bring that childhood innocence to someone. We also thought it was such a funny idea. The song sort of encompasses that innocence and vibe of selfish memory.

You grew up in a musical family. Tell me a bit about your musical trajectory and how you learned to play the drums.

My grandfather was a musician and so is my dad, so music has been in my family for a long time. My dad is a very accomplished guitar player and he never actually pushed me into music, which is why I think I wanted to do it so much. I have no idea why I picked up drums instead of guitar, I think I would have had a much easier time and the right access to people if picked up guitar, but I always gravitated towards the drums and piano. When I wanted to make music it was encouraged and supported and I think that’s what helped me develop into the musician and producer I am today.

How has your Jewish identity influenced your life and music?

In my life, Judaism has always been about tradition and family. There are so many different facets of Judaism within my family. We have reform Jews, atheists, and also Orthodox cousins who live in an Orthodox community in South Africa, so we really run the gamut of different levels of Judaism and how we consider religion and tradition. It was always important to celebrate family. We still do Shabbat when we’re together and really recognize the traditions. I think they’re important and Judaism has always been a part of my life.

Who are some of your and Grouplove’s musical influences?

For Grouplove, the influences are all over the place because we all have different tastes. For some reason that’s why the band works creatively. But I grew up listening to classical music that my parents would play to get me to go to sleep, and I think my first album I ever bought was Further Down the Spiral by Nine Inch Nails. I’m still a huge fan of Trent Reznor and I think a lot of his techniques have influenced me. There’s some stuff he did on that album that just really pushes the boundaries, especially for that time, I the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. Even musical arrangement-wise it was so outside of the norm of the time but still he managed to have a massive hit single and album so I thought that was really cool. Further down the line I got more and more into pop music like Michael Jackson. I think I lie in the two extremes. One side Nine inch Nails, one side Michael Jackson.

Right. As a pop lover, what did you think of Justin Timberlake’s performance on the VMAs?

It was a little long for me. I would have liked a little more ‘N SYNC to be honest, but I think he’s an amazing artist and he has really great songs. That’s what matters at the end of the day. It’s about good song writing, regardless of the genre.

Completely. What’s the coolest spot your played so far and where do you hope to play?

I always remember this festival called Optimus Alive! in Portugal. It was our biggest show at the time. It was our first time at the festival on the main stage, we played right before Blondie and Coldplay. No one really knew who we were, and it was just an incredible show. The fans in Portugal are so supportive. The power went out in the middle of another song and it was a crazy feeling. For a while Coachella was a dream festival to play at because I’ve been going for the last 10 years, but I think it would be pretty cool to play the Hollywood bowl in LA, since I’ve seen such great shows there like Radiohead and Nine inch Nails.

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