#Choice Music Prize 2016

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Alex Abad-Santos at Vox:

For taxonomic purposes, Eurovision is an international song contest. Technically, the European Broadcast Union (EBU) created the event in 1956 to foster post-WWII European unity, but has largely expanded beyond that function and Europe itself, with countries like Australia and Israel participating. The closest reference point for people in the US is American Idol, the extremely popular reality television singing contest that once crowned national treasure Kelly Clarkson. Think: polarizing and sometimes very disparate musical acts from each represented country, a public vote, and a night of live performances, but with the added elements like spooky Austrian comedy and whispers of a rigged vote for Sweden. Is there any better way to symbolically present peace than getting in costume and singing a silly pop song in a lighthearted musical competition? What if I told you that there is no prize money for the winning country’s band — only bragging rights, a trophy, and national hosting duties for the next Eurovision?

There is absolutely nothing like Eurovision. With nothing and seemingly everything on the line, Eurovision has become an international spectacle, perhaps the international spectacle aside from the Olympics. It’s a fantasy that both undergirds and undermines everything you think you know about Europe and pop music. But as we gear up for another chapter of ostentatious music acts sing-fighting for zero money, the biggest story heading into this week’s (May 7 to May 11) contest in Malmo, Sweden, threatens that escapist reputation. Protests over Israel’s participation have punctuated the lead-up to the event, with activists asserting that Israel should be barred, given its military assault in Gaza, which has killed tens of thousands. It’s far from the first time that politics and war have made their mark on the proceedings, but now Eurovision faces a huge question over its existence, its history, and who is and isn’t allowed to take part in a competition that’s supposed to really be about European novelty.

Eurovision can’t be replicated

Eurovision usually bends toward more conventional, meaningful winners like last year’s Loreen (who has won twice), 2016’s Jamala, and 2021’s Måneskin. ABBA and Celine Dion have also won the competition, and are its most famous alums. This year the UK’s Olly Alexander, from the successful pop band Years & Years, seems like a ringer. But the winners only tell part of Eurovision’s story. Eurovision can feel vaguely psychedelic, which is what makes it a joy to behold. And the contest is at its best when it leans into unmitigated absurdity and the unexpected. Take, for example, Austria’s 2023 entry: “Who the Hell is Edgar?” by Teya & Salena. The female duo met on Starmania, a talent show in their native country, and wrote “Who The Hell is Edgar?” to address “an industry that all too often doesn’t give women enough credit for their hard work and expertise,” according to the official Eurovision website. [...]

How Eurovision winners are crowned

As my colleague Zack Beauchamp has previously detailed, voting is split between a popular call-in vote from the public and a jury that consists of music industry professionals from each participating country. Thirty-seven participants will compete in semifinal rounds — beginning on May 7 — in hopes of qualifying for one of the 26 total spots in the grand final on May 11.

Jury voting is like Olympic judging, with each country giving out a maximum of 12 points (and all the way down to one) to the twelve best of the night in the grand finale. Sometimes, the jury vote — the vote from music professionals — doesn’t exactly coincide with the televote. Last year, the judges picked Loreen from Sweden’s “Tattoo”, while the public selected Käärijä from Finland’s “Cha Cha Cha” as the best of the night. The jury placed Finland fourth, which spawned a conspiracy theory about rigging Sweden’s win so the country could host in 2024, the 50th anniversary of when ABBA won. The low-ish stakes make for a fun bit of drama, but the disconnect between the jury and the popular vote has led to questions about why the jury votes have as much sway as the millions of calls coming through. Perhaps they shouldn’t; the winner would likely be a little more out of the box if the more conventional jury votes didn’t carry equal weight.

Sweden’s alleged rigging is also not unlike some previous bits of Eurovision history, like the time Switzerland picked noted Canadian Céline Dion to represent the famously neutral country in 1988. Rules at the time did not specify that a singer had to be born in the country they represented, and Dion was a burgeoning star internationally. Dion, of course, won the whole thing. That said, while Eurovision is a “competition” and a winner is crowned, megastars like ABBA and Dion are exceptional exceptions of Eurovision victors. Eurovision winners don’t usually become worldwide superstars. The list of winners — 1982’s Nicole? 2002’s Marie N? 2006’s Lordi — are probably blue Wikipedia links for normies. That should underscore the idea that Eurovision is really about the entertainment of the night, the stunts, the scintillating swing for the fences, rather than the actual score. [...]

Can Eurovision still be fun this year if the biggest story about Eurovision is Israel-Palestine?

Ahead of the competition in Malmo, the lead-up to Eurovision this year has been a series of protests and proposed boycotts against Israel’s participation in this year’s competition. The gist: Israel should not be allowed to participate in Eurovision because of its continued attacks in Gaza. A country at war shouldn’t perform at an event about unity and peace.

The opposition to Israel’s inclusion — Israel has participated in Eurovision since 1973 — isn’t without precedent. Critics of Israel’s participation point out that just two years ago, Eurovision disallowed Russia in a similar situation. On February 25, 2022, Eurovision banned Russia a day after its invasion of Ukraine. At the time state broadcasters from participating countries like Iceland, Finland, Norway, and The Netherlands called for Russia’s ban, which the EBU ultimately granted, citing Eurovision’s mission to protect “the values of a cultural competition which promotes international exchange and understanding” and saying that the event “unites Europe on one stage.” Speaking on the ban, Eurovision’s executive supervisor Martin Österdahl said that Russia’s exclusion was a decision about upholding the core values of democracy and human rights core to the event’s spirit. “When we say we are not political, what we always should stand up for are the basic and ultimate values of democracy. Everyone is right to be who they are,” he said in December 2022. Since then, Russia has suspended its EBU membership and has not returned to the competition.

[...] While Curran insists that the contest will be apolitical, its actions might not be interpreted as such. Palestinian flags will not be allowed at the competition nor will any pro-Palestinian symbols or signs referring to Israel and Hamas’s war. The Israeli flag will be allowed because it’s a member state and only participants’ flags are permitted, with the exception being rainbow and LGBTQ flags.

Eurovision is a singing competition that technically supposed to be an apolitical event, but inevitably, politics shows up one way or the other, as we see in jury votes. This year, Ireland’s act was forced to change their pro-Palestine message, and the mere presence of Israel in the competition has caused calls for protests and boycotts.

The winner gets to host the next year’s competition.

See Also:

Vox: Eurovision says it’s “apolitical.” History says otherwise.

[bts-bangtanies]

BTS at Mnet Asian Music Awards 🎙️ - 10 to 14 December - MAMA Week 2018 in South Korea, Japan and Hong Kong ⛲️🎢🏯🧋Where they performed “Fake Love” and “Anpanmam” in Japan (12 December 🇯🇵) and RM gave ‘Opening speech’, “Airplane Pt. 2”, “O!RUL8,2?”, “Love Yourself Remix” and “Idol” in Hong Kong (14 December 🇭🇰)

MAMA 2018 x 9 awards including 3 Grand Prizes: Best Music Video “Idol”, Worldwide Fans’ Choice Top 10, Global Fans’ Choice, Favourite Music Video “Idol”, Favourite Dance Artist (Make), Best Asian Style, Album of the Year ‘Love Yourself: Tear’, Artist of the Year and Worldwide Icon of the Year

Plus Special Awards: Best Producer of the Year (Pdogg), Best Choreographer of the Year (Son Sung Deuk), Best Art Director of the Year (MU:E) and Best Executive Producer of the Year (Bang Si Hyuk)

Winning Daesang x 20 (grand prizes) since 2016:-

Artist of the Year x 7 (2016 - 2022)

Album of the Year x 5 (2018 - 2022): ‘Love Yourself: Tear’, ‘Map of the Soul: Persona’, ‘Map of the Soul: 7’, ‘Be’, ‘Proof’

Song of the Year x 3 (2019 - 2021): “Boy with Luv”, “Dynamite”, “Butter”

Worldwide Icon of the Year x 5 (2018 - 2022)

[sharpth1ng]

who more likeli to sing song call me maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen (born November 21, 1985) who is a Canadian singer and songwriter who after studying musical theatre for most of her school life and while in university, garnered mainstream attention after placing third on the fifth season of Canadian Idol in 2007 and in 2008, released her folk-influenced debut studio album Tug of War in Canada before it was internationally released in 2011 and whose breakthrough came in 2012 with her acclaimed single "Call Me Maybe", being declared the best-selling single of that year, selling over 18 million copies, reaching number one in more than 19 countries, and leading to major record deals with Schoolboy Records and Interscope Records and whose sophomore studio album, Kiss, released later that year and included the single "Good Time" with Owl City, charting in the top ten in Canada and the United States and in 2014, made her Broadway theatre stage debut, playing the titular character in Cinderella for 12 weeks and the following year, she released her third studio album, Emotion, influenced by 1980s music, dance-pop and synth-pop, which included the singles, "I Really Like You", "Your Type" and "Run Away with Me" and jn 2016, Jepsen performed in the television special Grease: Live and voiced in the animated film Ballerina and her fourth studio album, Dedicated, which included the singles "Party for One", "Now That I Found You", and "No Drug Like Me", was released in 2019, along with a B-side follow-up titled Dedicated Side B a year later and whose sixth studio album, The Loneliest Time, which includes the singles "Western Wind" and "Beach House", was released in October 2022, and its companion album, The Loveliest Time, followed in July 2023 and has received three Juno Awards, three Billboard Music Awards, and an Allan Slaight Award, in addition to nominations for the Grammy Awards, MTV Video Music Awards, Polaris Music Prize and People's Choice Awards, ol’ bill bob or stuartson jones?

@phoenixisconfused What. The fuck.

No but secretly this made me laugh so hard IS THIS HER WIKIPEDIA PAGE???

[allthingsdarkanddirty]

BIG TROUBLE... BIG SALE! For a very limited time, grab a copy of Big Trouble on Sullivan's Island by Susan M. Boyer or just 99¢ at the retailer of your choice!

Universal: https://geni.us/CarolinaTales1

From the author of the bestselling Liz Talbot Mystery Series comes a novel about family and secrets, and the lengths we’ll go to in order to protect both.

Can this charming do-gooder carry the day?

Charleston, SC. Hadley Cooper has a big heart. So when the easygoing private investigator gets a request from a new friend to stake out her husband’s extramarital activities, she immediately begins surveillance. And when her client is discovered dead on her kitchen floor, the Southern spitfire is certain the cheater is the culprit … even though he has the perfect alibi: Hadley herself.

Flustered since she observed the cad four hours away in Greenville at the time of the murder, the determined PI desperately searches for clues to tie him to the crime. But when her ex-boyfriend, who happens to be the lead detective on the case, arrests a handy suspect, Hadley fears a guilty man is about to walk free.

Can this Palmetto State sleuth make an impossible connection to prevent a miscarriage of justice?

With dry wit and delightful dialogue, Susan M. Boyer delivers an eccentric, vegan gumshoe sure to appeal to any fan of Southern women’s fiction. With her merry band of sassy friends, Hadley Cooper is a Lowcountry detective you won’t soon forget.

Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island is the engaging first book in the Carolina Tales series. If you like strong heroines, quirky sisterhoods, and plenty of Southern charm, then you’ll love Susan M. Boyer’s wonderful whodunit.

Read Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island and take a trip to the lush Lowcountry today!

About Susan M. Boyer:

Susan M. Boyer is the USA Today bestselling author of thirteen novels. Her debut novel, Lowcountry Boil, won the 2012 Agatha Award for Best First Novel, the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense, and garnered several other award nominations. Subsequent books in the Liz Talbot Mystery Series have been nominated for various honors, including Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Okra Picks, the 2016 Pat Conroy Beach Music Mystery Prize, and the 2017 Southern Book Prize in Mystery & Detective Fiction.

Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island, the first novel in her Carolina Tales series, won the 2024 Independent Publisher Book Award silver medal in Southeast Regional Fiction and was a 2024 National Indie Excellence Award finalist.

Susan is a lifelong Carolinian. She grew up in a small North Carolina town and has lived most of her life in South Carolina. She loves beaches, Southern food, and small towns where everyone knows everyone, and everyone has crazy relatives. You’ll find all of the above in her novels. She and her husband call Greenville, South Carolina, home and spend as much time as possible on the Carolina coast.

Find Susan Online! https://susanmboyer.com/links

[otherpplnation]

Garth Greenwell on Style, Opera, Kentucky, Mentors, Poetry, Bulgaria, Prose, Good Art, and Magnetism in Language

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 626, my conversation with author Garth Greenwell. The episode first aired on February 26, 2020.

Greenwell is the author of What Belongs to You, which won the British Book Award for Debut of the Year, was longlisted for the National Book Award, and was a finalist for six other awards, including the PEN/Faulkner Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, it was named a Best Book of 2016 by over fifty publications in nine countries, and is being translated into fourteen languages. His second book of fiction, Cleanness, was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award and was longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize, the Joyce Carol Oates Prize, the L.D. and LaVerne Harrell Clark Fiction Prize, and France’s Prix Sade (Deuxième sélection). Cleanness was named a New York Times Notable Book of 2020, a New York Times Critics Top 10 book of the year, and a Best Book of the year by the New Yorker, TIME, NPR, the BBC, and over thirty other publications. It is being translated into eight languages. A new novel, Small Rain, is forthcoming from FSG in 2024. Greenwell is also the co-editor, with R.O. Kwon, of the anthology KINK, which appeared in February 2021, was named a New York Times Notable Book, won the inaugural Joy Award from the #MarginsBookstore Collective, and became a national bestseller. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, A Public Space, and VICE, and he has written nonfiction for The New Yorker, the London Review of Books, and Harper’s, among others. He writes regularly about literature, film, art and music for his Substack, To a Green Thought. He is the recipient of many honors for his work, including a 2020 Guggenheim Fellowship and the 2021 Vursell Award for prose style from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has taught at the Iowa Writers Workshop, Grinnell College, the University of Mississippi, and Princeton. Greenwell currently lives in New York, where he is a Distinguished Writer-in-Residence at NYU.

***

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[booksandwords]

Bob Dylan by Mª Isabel Sánchez Vegara. Illustrated by Conrad Roset

Age Recommendation: Early Primary Topic/ Theme: Power of Music, Individuality, Biographic Setting: America Series: Little People, Big Dreams

Rating: 5/5

I do like the way Sánchez Vegara tells Bod Dylan's story. She includes his original name, the embarrassment he faced as a child and the minimal items he moved to New York with. Things that are left out, the pure struggles of being an artist I don't mind it here. There is more than enough to fill this out, especially given the range of his career, the uniqueness of one of his accolades and the way he has influenced and impacted generations. I really appreciate the choice to focus at least some of the book on his private, near isolationist tendencies. That is important for kidlets to see…. that you don't have to be on all the time, that not all successful people are social or highly public figures.

I'd completely forgotten about the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016, though I don't respect him as much as it is implied we should for not going to that ceremony. Unless he was seriously ill he should have been, not for himself but for all the people and all the precedent that was set by his receiving the award. He was the first musician to receive that award, since then others have been nominated but none have won. Sorry, I find it a bit off-putting to not mark the moment for others.

The illustrations are bold and Bob Dylan himself is kinda quirky. The style really suits the individuality that Dylan is famed for. Roset uses light and shade so well. It is slightly blocky but effective, the lighting does change as the light source does. The final page, an image of little Bob playing the harmonica at sunset, is stunning. The lighting means all his lines are visible but the focus is very much on the sunset. All the scope and scale are also done well. The illustrations just make this book. Oh, and I love the freckles most obvious on the cover illustration (blame my current affection for Stray Kids' Felix for just noticing freckles).

[thelastmixedtape]

Rusangano Family win RTÉ Choice Music Prize Album of the Year 2016

.@RusanganoFamily win @choiceprize__ Album of the Year 2016 #RTEChoiceMusic

Rusangano Family have won the RTÉ Choice Music Prize Album of the Year 2016 for album Let the Dead, Bury the Dead.

Announced at live ceremony in Vicar Street tonight, Rusangano Family were confirmed as this year’s Choice Music Prize winner for their album Let the Dead, Bury the Dead fending off competition from the likes of Bantum, Lisa Hannigan, the Divine Comedy, Bantum, James Vincent…

[hldailyupdate]

This week the European leg of Harry Styles's much-publicised Love on Tour concludes in Lisbon. It's the final stop on a trip promoting the now Mercury Prize-nominated album, Harry's House, which has seen the singer turn his concerts into a space that holds a mirror up to his audience, making the show as much about them as him.

In and amongst the wide-leg trousers and wild-eyed dancing there have been stories of Styles helping to orchestrate marriage proposals and gender reveals from the stage, consoling fans who have been cheated on or helping others come out in a ceremony officiated under a rippling rainbow flag. For the thousands who have bought tickets, Love on Tour has been a travelling circus filled with the kind of innocent joy that pop music can inspire, as well as a place where Styles's young fans can come as they are and, for a few hours, unburden themselves from the weight of the world.

As one of the biggest pop stars on the planet, Harry Styles's repeated signposting of his concerts as a place of progressivism has served as a powerful antidote to the ongoing culture wars around identity politics. The tour has been punctuated with moments of the singer proudly demonstrating his beliefs, holding up flags borrowed from members of the crowd to pledge his allegiance to everything from Black Lives Matter to bisexual visibility. Following the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas in May, Styles announced he would be donating $1M from ticket sales to gun safety group Everytown, and in the wake of landmark American abortion legislation Roe v Wade being overturned the following month, Styles plucked a fan's sign that read My Body My Choice from a crowd member, carefully placing it in front of his drummer's kit.

These incidents can be easily waved away as cheap ploys for viral moments and trending stories, but Styles' brand of pop-timisim has a ring of authenticity that is central to his appeal. On matters of identity, sexuality and even love, he clearly shares the open-minded liberalism of his young fans. The fact he's celebrated it with many of their parents present has made that all the more powerful.

These moments of on-stage activism have become increasingly prevalent as young fans look to musicians to reflect their views and be a champion for the social causes of their generation. This shift in expectations means that silence on the news of the day is read at best as ignorance and at worst as complicity. At Glastonbury this year, artists including Kendrick Lamar and Olivia Rodrigo loudly aligned themselves with the pro-choice movement when performing; calling out Putin and standing with Ukraine has been a recurrent theme at concerts since Russia's invasion. In 2022, it's hard to believe that just over five years ago Taylor Swift kept tight-lipped about her views on Donald Trump in the lead up to the 2016 election, fearing speaking out could alienate some of her fanbase.

For Styles, who graced the cover of Vogue in a dress, and has launched his own line of iridescent male-polish, championing progressive ideas about identity is hardly a surprising move. Here is a star whose boundary-pushing style and transgressive gender expression has earned him comparisons to the likes of Prince and David Bowie, but like those pioneers before him his chameleonic style has also allowed him to be a blank canvas that fans can project ideas onto. Thanks to stylist Harry Lambert and an array of Gucci garms, his tour wardrobe has been a fantastical mishmash of oversized proportions and trippy patterns, giving his shows a wild, permissive atmosphere perfect for the messages he is trying to communicate.

A cynic might ask whether Harry Styles, or indeed any pop star, proclaiming their beliefs in front of a rapt audience is genuinely meaningful, but watching the reaction to his actions in the crowds has been undeniably powerful. The young people forming conga lines and arriving in a mass of pink cowboy hats and feather boas have seen many of the values and causes they care about ridiculed and questioned in the wider culture for years. Love on Tour has been a rebuttal to all that: proof that acceptance and tolerance are not hollow ideals, and a welcome reminder that sometimes the best way to kill your critics is with kindness.

via GQ Magazine. (28 July 2022)

[saucylittlesmile]

In that gif of Scott’s cool change in hold while doing turns, you wrote you understood why they removed it from the program… could you elaborate a little more? This is my first time seeing that gif and I think it’s an insanely cool transition and now I actually wonder why they changed it lol

2016 was the first season, I think, in which the partial step sequence was required to be in hold/touching at all times, including during a change of hold and twizzles. At the time, there was a lot of speculation on how the teams would manage this, though of course now we’re used to it.

Most teams use a hand on the torso - that is, while the twizzling partner twirls, the other skater keeps a light hand on their waist/chest/hips so that the contact isn’t broken. The other most likely choice, is to touch hands over the twizzling partner’s head, like a ballroom dance (Tessa’s twizzle utilized this option). Either is a relatively risk-free option.

VM’s initial choice was not so risk-free, making it a much more difficult and interesting movement; the chances of him missing catching her arm or the chances of his twizzle being called a three-turn, were much higher. Unfortunately, it also made for a more jarring movement, visually, which can have an impact on GOE. And in a season in which the were trying to prove themselves in changed ice-dance landscape, in which smooth, seamless skating was prized over almost everything else, and in which they were needing to compete against the originators of the smooth and seamless era, they opted to do the less-challenging, but more-marks option.

The arm-catch twizzle was used only at HPC; by their first competition at Autumn Classic, they had changed to Tessa’s hand on his torso. It was a much cleaner option, it suited their music better and the mood better, and given that their SD was unbeaten that season, probably the best choice.

But we can always look at HPC and know that they were capable of being both more technically difficult and creative than they could be rewarded for.

I’d forgotten that we only had clips from HPC, but this was the one with the twizzle (and I also forgot that apparently I’ve been obsessed with it from the beginning lol). And then ACI 2016 can be watched here.

[bts07legends]

the mistreatment of bts

Before BTS kpop was monopolised by 3 companies.

One of the major things you have to know in Kpop is that it’s monopolized by the Biggest 3 companies.

Usually when a group debuts, the Kpop industry will warmly welcome them.

But BTS were outsiders because they produced music that didn’t carry the typical Kpop sound.

Their music bashed so many different forms of society and they were trying to thrive with that raw meaning in their music in an industry that was incredibly superficial.

But as time went by...BTS were starting to become serious competition to all these privileged artists very early in their career.

They were rarely invited to Korean award shows, but they were pulling unbelievable numbers as much as the biggest artists in Korea at the time.

This really threatened the industry and they were doing absolutely everything they could to push them down and bring their own artists up.

Back in 2013,BTS were nominated for Rookie of the Year at the M-Net Asian Music Awards.However, even though they were the best selling rookie group of that year, M-Net refused to give them that award.Heck they didn’t even invite them.And when they did invite them a year later they only let them perform at the red carpet.

belittled in front of everyone.

In 2015,But they were only allowed to perform one song, while a 3 month old rookie group from the Big 3 got to perform 3 songs.

In 2016,BTS were still never given a proper waiting room during music shows.They had to practice and get ready in front of the bathrooms, and other idols looked down on them because of that. Keep in mind that they had the best selling album of that year.

That same year,BTS were invited to perform at the 2016 Busan One Asia Festival.They were supposed to perform at the end of the show, but Namjoon was injured.So SBS cancelled their stage without notifying BTS’s company.They basically invited the boys but didn’t let them perform.At the end of the festival, ARMYs were extremely furious and wouldn’t leave without a BTS performance.So SBS had no choice but to let the boys perform, but they didn’t broadcast their performance.

The boys went up on the stage without cameras, without proper lighting or a clean stage, only to perform for ARMYs who had been waiting all day for them.It hurts to watch this video. The boys were treated like they were absolutely nothing.

to be in their shoes and to slowly go day by day working hard with no respect returned and to swallow this pain at such young ages.. It’s really heartbreaking.

And let me tell you why BTS don’t appear on Korean TV shows anymore.In 2014, a year after BTS debuted, they attended their first real variety show.Keep in mind that half of them were minors at the time.The host accused them of plagiarizing the boy group EXO for wearing school uniforms in their music video "Boy In Luv". Yoongi was trying to explain that it was a misunderstanding and that they weren’t trying to copy them, but the host kept twisting his words.And because of that..EXO fans dragged BTS through h3ll and back.They made petitions for them to disband, trended plagiarism to the point where BTS had to go to court, and even sent them death threats resulting in them having to cancel several concerts.And not only that.When BTS won their first Grand Prize award at the 2017 M-net Asian Music Awards,EXO fans were giving them the middle fingers and chanting EXO during their speech.They and other fandoms started accusing BTS of manipulating the charts and even went as far as contacting MELON customer service to complain.

Here’s another reason why BTS don’t appear on Korean TV shows anymore.These 7 boys were treated so maliciously despite half of them being minors at the time.Doni & Coni are known for joking around but they really crossed the line with BTS.They mocked the vocal line members for not specializing in rapping, they straight up told Jin repeatedly to his face that he was the least talented member.They made fun of the song Yoongi made for them and implied he wasn’t worth anything to them, they forced Jimin, Jungkook and J-hope to do girl group dances and then mocked them for being too flamboyant.Then they made fun of all their stage names and mocked their fans and called them elementary schoolers and implied that they were all immature and fanatic.They were especially rude to Namjoon in particular.They made fun of his way of speaking, his way of dressing, his dancing, his rap, his name, his hair, literally everything.

Doni & Coni even admitted to treating BTS badly on purpose a few years later after BTS started getting really popular.

Here's a very unknown fact.As the industry came to realize that there was no stopping BTS, a lot of agencies tried to buy them from Big Hit Entertainment.Just like how SM Entertainment bought the boy group Infinite as soon as they started to become a threat to their boy group EXO.They bought them and decided to do nothing with them which led to a drastic decrease of popularity for Infinite and a huge increase of popularity for EXO.Bang PD who believed in BTS’s success from the very beginning got several calls from different companies, telling him to just give up and hand BTS over to them but he refused.He refused to give up on the boys because he really believed they were something worthwhile and that they actually could become something big one day.And he was right.

BTS’s success has gotten to a point where trying to suppress it or deny it is literally impossible.The only next step is to try and claim it as your own.The only next step is to try and claim it as your own.At first they were trying to recreate BTS’s success by making a new boy group, but now that they see it’s impossible they’ve decided to claim it as theirs.The truth is is that if SM Entertainment never existed BTS would have become successful a lot earlier.

Not only did BTS have to fight their way into the music industry as Koreans singing in a foreign language..

But on top of that, they had to deal with a massive prejudice against them because of the image Kpop has. So it’s really funny to me when kpop tries to take credit for BTS’s success when they are the sole reason for every single bad stereotype the west has about Kpop.

The whole "manufactured puppets, slave contracts, forced plastic surgery, dating bans, extreme diets" and more. Without Kpop attached to BTS’s name they would have had it so much easier.

The Kpop industry had no part in BTS’s success considering how they were the ones trying so hard to shut them out. BTS are not only being mistreated by the Kpop industry. They are being mistreated by the whole music industry.

The boys know they are being alienated in the western music industry. Namjoon was being straight forward with the system, he has realized that the system won’t change despite how much they deserve it.

I’m honestly proud they’re starting to stand up for themselves, they stood up for themselves back then but only by working hard and ignoring those who disrespected them. But now they’re in a position where they can speak loudly about this.

They know the racial barrier they are facing despite their talent and achievements and they are not afraid to talk about it anymore. BTS are fed up. ARMY is fed up.

it's really just ARMYs and BTS against everyone else. From the beginning ‘till now, it’s always been that way.BTS has the Western media, Korean media, Kpop stans and Western stans against them.All never showing BTS the respect and acknowledgement that they deserve and sabotaging them to surround their name with negativity.The whole industry neglected and refused to acknowledge BTS as artists, that is why they made their own way and paved it smooth and shiny.

[bts-bangtanies]

BTS at Mnet Asian Music Awards 🎙️ - 5 December 2019 in Japan ⛲️🎢🏯🥪 Where they performed “N.O”, “We Are Bulletproof Pt. 2”, “Boy with Luv”, “Mikrokosmos” and “Dionysus” 🍙🍚🍘

MAMA x 9 awards including all 4 Grand Prizes: Best Male Group, Best Dance Performance - Male Group “Boy with Luv”, Best Music Video “Boy with Luv”, Worldwide Fans’ Choice Top 10, Favourite Male Artist, Song of the Year “ Boy with Luv”, Album of the Year ‘Map of the Soul: Persona’, Artist of the Year and Worldwide Icon of the Year

Plus Best Collaboration for Lee So Ra feat. Suga “Song Request”, Best Composer of the Year (Pdogg) and Best Executive Producer of the Year (Bang Si Hyuk)

Winning Daesang x 21 (grand prizes) since 2016 - 🍐🍎🍉🍈🍑🫐🥝

Artist of the Year x 7 (2016 - 2022)

Album of the Year x 5 (2018 - 2022): ‘Love Yourself: Tear’, ‘Map of the Soul: Persona’, ‘Map of the Soul: 7’, ‘Be’, ‘Proof’

Song of the Year x 3 (2019 - 2021): “Boy with Luv”, “Dynamite”, “Butter”

Worldwide Icon of the Year x 6 (2018 - 2023)

[sherwynphilip]

BTS wins 🏆 Daesang at the 2021 MelOn Music Awards...

2021 MelOn Music Awards | 04 Dec. 2021

BTS took home 5 trophies at this year's MelOn Music Awards, including the 'Song of the Year' Daesang for 'Butter.' They tied with IU as the most awarded artist at the MMAs this year.

BTS took home:

🏆 Song of the Year (Daesang) - Butter

🏆 Best Male Group

🏆 Best Collaboration - My Universe (BTS & Coldplay)

🏆 Netizen's Choice

🏆 Top 10 Artists (Bonsang)

This year's MMA show was streamed online via 1theK's Youtube channel.

BTS has quite a sterling history with the MMA:

The very first time that BTS ever gave an award acceptance speech was at the MMAs, when they won 'New Artist of the Year' in 2013.

It's worth noting, too, that BTS' very first Daesang also came from the MMAs, when they won 'Album of the Year' for 'Wings' in 2016.

Most remarkably perhaps, it was at the MMA stage in 2019 where BTS swept all 4 Daesangs in one night, winning 'Artist, Album, Song and Record of the Year', thereby making history as the first ever KPop artist to achieve a 'Daesang All-Kill' at any Korean music awards show.

Let's take a look at BTS' Awards History at the MMAs and the records they have so far set...

1. Most Grand Prizes/Daesangs with 12 (coming in second is IU with 5)

2. Most Awards Overall with 35 (coming in second is IU with 19)

3. Most 'Artist of the Year' awards with 3 (2018, 2019 and 2020)

4. Most 'Album of the Year' awards with 4

2016 Wings

2018 Love Yourself: Tear

2019 Map of the Soul: Persona

2020 Map of the Soul: 7

(tying at second place are IU, Busker Busker, and 2NE1 with 2 each)

5. Most 'Song of the Year' awards with 4

2017 Spring Day

2019 Boy With Luv

2020 Dynamite

2021 Butter

(coming in second is Wonder Girls with 2)

Congratulations, BTS! 👏👏👏

#BTS #방탄소년단 #BTSx2021MMA

video: @1theK

[wishingicouldfly]

Boston Katie's Top Ten

My friends Ash and Katie and I decided to share our favorite fan fictions.

In which I host my friend @BKatie617 on my blog. I LOVE Katie's choices and funny enough, none of ours overlap, even though her picks are phenomenal. We *do* have a talented fandom.

If you want to read my list: it's here: Rosann's Faves and if you want to read Ash's faves, they are here.

Take it away, Katie!

***

Top 10 Fics of 2021, Or: The Year I Gave In To My Favorite New Obsession

Hello, I’m Katie - or, as some of you know me from the Twitter timeline, BostonKatie617. I’m a 40ish Larrie who has been a casual fan of 1D since their first album, became a Larrie to bond with my daughter, fell down the rabbit hole 2019ish (pre-pandemic), but then became part of the Larrie FBI to keep myself sane during the suckfest that was 2020. I fell into stan-Twitter to find a concert buddy for HSLOT, and somehow that lifechanging decision got me here: happily ensconced at my desk with a fresh mug of coffee, telling you about the story of how sSome of my moots and I were trading fic recommendations, which turned somehow in an insert-funny-story-here kind of way into all of us writing up our ten favorite fics.

Because I’m rather new to this wonderfully addictive world of fic consumptions (truly, only falling into it in the fall of 2021), I decided to shape my write-up in a countdown sort style. I drew the cut-off at the stroke of midnight, 2021 (sorry Green Room, I finished you in the wee hours of brand new 2022, so you’ll have to wait until next year’s party to claim your medal). Expect to see some big names and few surprises: Sorry - I’m new to this! Take advantage of the flip side and throw recommendations of what else I should read. I keep a running tally on a spreadsheet and there are big names already in contention for 2022, but I’m curious to see if anyone can topple ‘em. Maybe I should sort out a prize. Hmm…

But that’s next year’s countdown. I still have to reveal my winners for the Top 10 Fics of 2021! Here we go…

10. Got the Sunshine on my Shoulders, by Hattalove.

This fic was a bit different for me. It’s adult-Larry who are adult-aged (I can do that easily), is a tweaked-up version of their reality (only Harry’s the music star, okay fine), but Harry and Lou are separated, and Harry’s trying to get married to a new partner - yeah, that’s where the record dramatically scratches to a stop for me, too. Harry returns to Holmes Chapel to get Lou to sign the divorce papers, and through well-orchestrated plot devices, he and Lou fall back together. It’s a cute story, a nice way to re-integrate familiar faces and names without shoehorning every name we’ve ever heard into the story (pet peeve alert). I was pulling for everything to work out (oBviOuSlY), and the resolution was different and cute enough that the story felt complete in a Wow-that-was-a-big-meal-but-I-don’t-feel-overfull kind of way. Not the end-all be-all (I can’t remember all the details of the other lads, but I remember I enjoyed them enough at the time), but I know I would enjoy re-reading it.

9. To the Ends of the Earth, by mak.

It’s 2015. 2016? 2015. Eh - the infamous 18-month-break has begun. It’s not AU, a genre I enjoy if they know what they’re doing. The departure sets the scene: Lou and Harry have broken up (or taken a break, depending how you look at it). Harry has disappeared off the face of the earth. Niall tricks Lou into going with him to visit Harry in Idaho, where he’s hiding out to get away from it all and recover. Only: surprise! Niall “can’t make it.” Lou stubbornly sticks it out, and we see how he and H repair their broken hearts. I do enjoy a story with tension over how they get together (never an “if” but a “how”). There’s a few cute Original Characters, but minor ones; this fic is all H and L. Wasn’t drawn out too long, didn’t resolve itself too quickly. An original setting and not too much smut-for-smut’s sake (don’t oppose it; I just like a reason for it). It’s cute, if that can be said about heartbreak stories.

8. Unbelievers, by IsThatYouLarry.

I feel like I’m going to get flak for putting this so low on my Top Ten. This was only the third fic I’d read, and the first one that was smutty-smutty. Like SMUTTY. Also, the first one with an enemies-to-lovers plot, and while it works incredibly well (I just re-read and liked it immensely still), it bothered me that you start en medias res, never an explanation for how these enemies were screwing in the locker room. It’s a Lou-POV story (90% of the fics I’ve read are, for some reason), though I’ve heard the author is working on Harry’s POV right now. This is THE Soccer Story, for Larry fic readers, for good reason. The characters are strong, the smut isn’t gratuitous, nobody’s dead (though Harry’s fam are all assholes, which was kinda hard, poor Anne!). Extremely well executed. I’ve concluded after my re-read that the only reason this is so low on my Top 10 is because I like the other stories more.

7. Dreaming of You, by VelvetOscar.

I don’t hear a lot about this fic. It doesn’t get mentioned often when talking about Top 10 lists, and I don’t hear it rec’ed that often. It’s short(er); not smutty; no real cliffhangers or pining. What it does have: young adult OT5 members working at Starbucks, and Harry becomes their favorite customer. It’s different (although I read two Starbucks stories back-to-back and sometimes they bleed together); I enjoyed the way the OT5 members were written as true to themselves, but in a very different setting. I wanted the story to go on and on. Everything seemed believable and how our boys would really react in the story; VelvetOscar is an incredible author talented at AUs. I was genuinely mad I couldn’t jump into the story and that this AU was…well..an alternate reality. That’s why it’s this high on the list. Now I want to go back and re-read!

6. Young & Beautiful, by VelvetOscar.

Yeah. Y&B. A pretty big litmus test of where people fall on so many things. This was the fourth fic I ever read and it OWNED ME. It was the first fic I read that was angsty. And when I say angsty, I mean, you with LOATHE characters, the author, and the rest of the world for 1) making them like this, 2) making the real people have to be in the situations they’re in, and 3) the rest of the world for making you have to do things other than just read the story. So: angsty. VERY angsty. Long. VERY long. Smutty. VERY smutty. And AU. VERY AU. In their author notes, VelvetOscar explained that they wrote Y&B because they wanted to see what would happen if they made characters totally different and free from constraints. I hated Harry for the first half of the fic. In fact, I think I hated the fic for the first half, but the writing was so good I was compelled to keep reading. It became an actual addiction. Things I loved: The writing; Niall’s character; Lou’s POV; the visuals; the intricate back-stories; the tension between hating the story but loving the writing/story. Things I didn’t: Harry is an asshole (at first) and I hate hating Harry; Liam is way too camp; everyone is FAR too rich; Poor, poor Harry and what he went through. Of note: The story was published way before Fine Line, but soooo many themes are here. I’m convinced it’s connected to the Falling MV, and Sunflower Vol. 6 (flowers and their meanings are an important part of Y&B). It’s an insane theory, but just watch. Also of note: when I finished the story, I just left the tab open for four days. I couldn’t close it and shut off my connection to the story. That’s good writing.

5. Walk that Mile, by PurpleDaisy.

Oooooh, this was my palette cleanser after Y&B! I didn’t realize I read so many of my favorites as my first fics, and then chased those feelings the rest of the year. This was just what I needed. It’s a start-as-strangers, Lou POV, AU type fic that has young adult Lou about to start law school going on a road trip with graduate student photography-obsessed Harry. Niall’s friends with both (all hail captain of the ship!) and vouches for them. So it’s not quite strangers, not quite enemies-to-lovers, but a beautiful love story that stays mostly true to who we know H and L to be. I’ve read it three or four times, every time I need something fluffy-but-not-too-fluffy to clean out any bad tastes, and it’s held up every time I’ve read it. Not too short, not too long, smut isn’t too smutty (but still there), they don’t get together too quickly, and the required misunderstanding isn’t too fabricated. It’s the Mary Poppins of Larry Fics: Practically perfect in every way.

4. Escapade, by Dolce_Piccante.

HA! I have a funny story. Everyone (or nearly everyone) in the fandom knows Jack McQueen. I’d been reading quotes about Jack McQueen, seen memes about Jack McQueen, told jokes about Jack McQueen - he’s like the 6th member (sorry Shawn). So I finally start reading Escapade because I had said I needed fluff. I fully expect Jack McQueen to be a wonderful OC, and I go on and on about who I’m picturing as Jack while I read the opening chapters. I kept waiting for Harry to show up and vie for Lou’s heart! MOTHERFLUFFERS! Yeah, so that was funny. Details: it’s a Lou POV, AU, where Lou is a 20-something virtuoso at Closing The Deal, and is made to go on a month-long destination wedding (Niall and Zayn? NOPE. Took me out of the story every time.) with all their family. Tired of dealing with questions about settling down, he hires Jack to be his significant other. It gets smutty, but it fits the plot tastefully, and hey, it turns into a love story. The OCs are so well written that I miss them like they were real. I wasn’t crazy about how much they changed Niall’s character, and Ziall is too distracting. The rest of it needs to be made into a movie. Immediately. Absolutely holds up to several re-reads, and is well deserving of the most iconic golfing meme of all time!

3. California Sold, by IsThatYouLarry.

This might be the most surprising entry on my list, especially that it’s placed so high. I read this fic very early on. It’s quasi-reality: Lou isn’t in 1D, but the rest of it stays mostly true. Lou is Harry’s childhood absolute-best-friend. It’s a Lou-POV, and there’s smut but not very much and not til late. Lou’s demi (closer to ace on the spectrum; he needs to feel an emotional attachment) and he fills the role of Harry’s beard for a limited time until Harry can come out. Or that’s the plan. It’s executed extremely well, I love friends-to-lovers stories, and I like the tension of when-will-it-happen in L&H beard stories (as much as I hate the need for such stunts; it feels hypocritical writing that I enjoy the trope, jesus what’s wrong with me). Maybe that’s part of my attraction. It’s a cute story that lets Lou and Harry be there for each other in every way possible in a world that does everything but let that be true out loud. It holds up for me in re-reads, but I know this story won’t place as high for everyone else.

2. Relief Next to Me, by Dolce_Piccante.

Ohhhh. I’m re-reading this (third time) now. It’s VERY smutty. It’s Lou POV. The OT5 are there, and some other friends too. Lou and Harry are strangers in a just-sex-partners who fall in love. Lou is an advert bigwig; Harry is a baker turned pastry chef; it’s a Ziam story and Liam (Zayn?) is Lou’s roomie. Niall fits in somewhere - works with Lou or maybe is Harry’s roomie (stories bleed together). It’s a lovely love story that’s compulsively readable. Seriously my go-to when things seem wrong, because this one gets it so, so right.

1. Tired, Tired Sea, by MediaWhore.

Absolutely no one is surprised to see this here. How lucky am I that Tired, Tired Sea was my very first fic?! If you’re still unfamiliar, think Adore You MV come to life, except without the magic powers. It’s a Lou POV, with zero smut (though some is implied). I don’t like that Harry’s a recovering alcoholic, don’t mind the strangers-turned-lovers trope (though it takes them long enough), and hate the light angst at the end. It’s necessary to complete the beautiful, beautiful arc that is second only to the love story of the ages that Harry and Louis are actually living. TTS is absolutely worthy of its legendary status and is required reading for any Larrie.

That’s it! That’s my Top Ten. I’m already well on my way to filing up slots for my Top Ten of 2022. Come visit me on Twitter (@BKatie617) or Instagram (@BostonKatie_617). Tell me (respectively, please) what I got wrong and what I’ve missed. It’s possible I just hadn’t gotten to it in time and is already on the list for 2022. Must have for fics: must be Larry-centric (although that’s an elastic term); must be a completed fic (I’ve only broken this rule for one fic and one fic only!); I don’t do ABO (yet); time-travel freaks me out; I don’t do paranormal type stuff. And no defaming the Muppets. No, I haven’t encountered a fic that’s broken this rule; it’s just a general life rule. A good one.

Thanks for reading! Hope to see you around! Long live Larry, and please Lord God or whoever’s listening: Let them love out loud! xx

[neocatharsis]

NCT Dream Is All Grown Up and Ready to Show What They Can Do

On a warm, late summer evening of 2016 in Seoul, South Korea, seven boys hoverboarded right into the most defining experience of their youth. Mark, Renjun, Jeno, Haechan, Jaemin, Chenle, and Jisung, then aged 17 to 14 years old, were making their debut as NCT Dream — a subunit focused on the youngest forces of SM Entertainment’s mega-group NCT. Their first title track, “Chewing Gum,” was as bubbly as its name, with choreography that required nimble maneuvers on the two-wheeled vehicle.

Fast forward nearly five years, and the Dreamies — as they are commonly known — are ready to cross another major threshold in their lives. Their highly-anticipated, 1.7 million-seller first studio album, Hot Sauce, is out today (May 10).

A few days before that, the members huddled together for a conversation with Teen Vogue via Zoom. Clad in black hoodies, face masks, and a few bucket hats, the initial impression is a striking contrast to the vivid atmosphere of their bright, cartoonish teasers for this promo cycle. Rather, this is NCT Dream in the blue hour, right at that moment of transition between the haze of preparations and the awakened reality of their most prominent comeback so far.

“We haven’t even started the actual promotions yet, but just from receiving this much love and support from our fans, we feel very touched, very, very inspired and supported,” says leader and eldest member Mark. Today, he’s wearing a pair of round glasses that complement his laidback, chill nature, while his expressive hands ruffle through his ocean blue hair, settling across his chest in an embrace. “We’re just focusing on how we can return the love that we received from them through our music.”

To say NCT Dream have grown — in all competencies — is not only obvious, but a meager understatement. Through their four EPs, the hoverboards became cardboard cars, then bikes, then motorcycles. Voices deepened, limbs grew longer, jawlines became sharper. And with all that, a number of accolades and records followed. Hot Sauce is currently the best-selling album among all releases from SM Entertainment. And out of all four current NCT units, the Dreamies were the first to receive a music show win, for 2017’s single “My First and Last,” and the first no. 1 on Korea’s largest music chart, Melon, with 2020’s “Ridin.” They received numerous prizes in Korean award shows, collaborated with English singer HRVY, released a single with American boy band Prettymuch, and also became global ambassadors of the World Scout Foundation in 2019 (an experience that culminated in viral mosh pits during the 24th World Scout Jamboree in West Virginia).

“When we debuted as teens, a lot of our music was very bright and cheerful, and that went with our age,” says the lavender-haired Jisung, who is the youngest of the group at 19. Although they are still the same endearing rascals off stage — the most chaotic footvolley game ever comes to mind — they have now “transitioned through all these phases, and with each of them we were able to show a higher level of maturity,” he adds.

In that way, Hot Sauce is their most seasoned effort yet. “We wanted to show NCT Dream’s charms through this ‘hot sauce’ vibe,” says the suave Jaemin, whose attentive eyes remain locked on the screen for most of the interview. “We have a showcase coming up where we plan to show a lot of our b-side tracks for the fans, so we’re very excited for that.” According to Haechan, the resident ray-of-sunshine of the group and owner of one of the most unique vocal colors of K-pop, they prepared a long time for this moment, and want to “show off that spicy side.”

Show off might be the best word choice indeed, as NCT Dream has dabbled with fire plenty of times before in their discography. Think of the rubbery, sticky synths of 2018’s “Drippin’” and its lyrics about a soaking wet love, or the dangerous atmosphere in 2019’s “119,” where they call themselves “twisted” and say “I like it like that.” In Hot Sauce, what was once un condimento is now a full course meal.

The album stimulates the eyes through the psychedelic TV ad-meets-taquería of the “Hot Sauce” music video, the nostalgic ‘90s photography of the teasers, the zany illustrations of the album packaging. For the ears, a 10-track collection of scorching pop with Latin and Afrobeat-inspired sounds (“Hot Sauce,” “Rocket”) and trap and hip hop — “Diggity”, “Countdown (3, 2, 1)”, “ANL” — but also soothing balms like the soft rock of “Dive Into You” and the crystalline vocals of “Rainbow,” a track co-written by Mark, Jeno, Jaemin, and Jisung, where they express “words we want to tell our fans,” according to Shanghai-born star Chenle.

That is because the Dreamies have a special reverence for Dreamzens, their fans. If it wasn’t for their support, the group’s fate could look much different now. Although it might seem counterintuitive in hindsight, the original concept for NCT Dream was to be a rotational unit. Members would “graduate” once they reached 20 years old in Korea (19 internationally), and younger, fresher faces would be added to the ensemble. It can be said that NCT Dream embodied the core concept of NCT as a whole: they held the promise of youth, its shifting nature, and the willingness to dream. But to come of age on screen and experience such foundational moments of life together begets a lingering bond — a transformation that can’t be nullified so easily.

In December 2018, Mark was the first to leave — and the last.

Dreamzens knew how special the original lineup (dubbed 7DREAM until today) was, and stood by his return and the establishment of a fixed unit. In 2020, they rejoiced as SM Entertainment finally decided to scrap the graduation concept altogether and announce Mark’s return. Hot Sauce is their first comeback since this news. “When I heard that I was coming back, I realized how big of an opportunity this could be,” says Mark. “And not only that, but to be able to be part of our first full-length album, I felt like I was lucking [out]. It all comes with the timing and everything, so, from all angles, I felt like the world helped out on this, and that our fans helped out a lot too.”

The members are thankful for his return, too. “I like the members the most!” exclaims Chenle when asked about his favorite part of the comeback. At one point in the conversation, Haechan grabs Mark’s hand and dramatically declares, in English: “Mark, you are very special. NCT Dream means Mark.” He looks at the screen to make sure this moment is being registered. Flustered, Mark quickly pulls away and laughs it off as Jisung chimes in. “All the members have their own uniqueness, their own specialties, that’s the charm of NCT Dream.”

Soft-spoken Renjun, whose half-platinum, half-black locks are hidden underneath a beige cap, explains that he and his bandmates didn’t think much about the impending graduation when they debuted. “Especially because it was the [original] system for NCT groups, we just accepted that fact,” Renjun says. “But now that NCT Dream is fixed, there’s a lot of enthusiasm to come up with new concepts and ideas, and we’re very excited to show them.”

Jeno, whose sweet-eyed smile contrasts with his commanding rap and dance skills, says that they went through a lot of lessons and experiences since debut, but that the greatest one was “learning what we’re able to do and show in our stages, and through that, finding ways to connect with our fans and make sure they enjoy it.” After all, as Chenle adds, NCT Dream means “being able to dream the same dreams with our members and our fans.”

For now, they are ready to bask in the flavorful glory of this era, and all the outcomes it will bring. “One of our goals when we debuted was to bring happiness and healing to people’s lives, and we do feel like we were able to achieve that,” says Renjun.

“Our fans witnessed it all from the start. We grew together, so now it’s time to show what it is like with NCT Dream being adults,” adds Mark. “We can be a perfect example of what growth and development look like.”

© Teen Vogue

[scapegrace74-blog]

Mister April

A/N I had an angst-ridden update to the Metric Universe all queued up, and then I thought, nah.  The sun is shining, people are getting vaccinated.  Angst can wait.  So this little ficlet fits into the Metric Universe after The Second First Christmas, but before Calculation Theme.

The entire Metric Universe, now chronologically ordered, can be found here.

March 16, 2019, Spittalfields, London, England

“Wait.  You mean you’re actually Mister April?!”  Several bottles into the six-pack of Tennant’s lager that he had brought home after work, Claire’s exclamation was too incredulous for Jamie’s liking.

“Aye.  Every year since I signed on, save one.  At first t’was flattering, but now, weel...” He peeled the label from the bottle held between his knees, cursing the trajectory of their late night conversation.  The idea had been to take advantage of the fact they were both off tomorrow to spend some time with his girlfriend, listen to a little music, get a bit sloshed, then hopefully fall into bed together.

“Can I see?” Claire interrupted his momentary sulk.  “I mean, I’ve been dating a veritable calendar boy for almost two years, and I’m only just now figuring it out.  Seems a bit unfair, don’t you think?”

“Seems to me ye’ve seen me wearing far less, Sassenach.  But fine, look yer fill.”

Grabbing his laptop, Jamie entered his name and London Fire Brigade Charity Calendar into a search engine.  A stream of results filled the screen.  Claire’s eyes goggled and she grabbed the computer, opening the first image.  A much younger Jamie appeared, rugby shorts hanging from the graceful arcs of his hipbones.  He reminded her of a Thoroughbred race horse, not an ounce of flesh to spare, kinetic energy in masculine form.  She checked the date: 2012, before they had ever met.

Further clicks brought her to subsequent years.  Each showed a beautiful man in the prime of youth, fit, cocky, a devil-may-care gleam in his cornflower eyes.  She knew it was her Jamie, but she barely recognized him.

He was missing from the 2015 calendar.  Claire did the math and realized that he would have been in the hospital when that year’s pictures were taken.  Instead of primping and smoldering for the camera, he had lain in an ICU bed for weeks, before undergoing painful rehabilitation and numerous skin grafts.  The brash young man of the earlier images had disappeared, erased by an industrial explosion in an instant.  In his place, the Jamie she knew had emerged. More cautious.  More prone to sadness, but with a limitless capacity to spread joy.  Would she had fallen for him, had they met before his transformation?  She honestly couldn’t say.

By 2016, the pictures had changed.  Jamie posed in a shirt, sometimes unbuttoned to the waist, but always with his shoulders covered.  The gleam in his eyes had dimmed, and instead of an infectious grin, his smile was forced.  She was certain no-one buying the calendar would notice.  He was still a beautiful man, with his burnished curls and Nordic bone structure.  But she could see what those photos cost him.  She knew.

“Dougal wanted me tae show my scars.  Figured t’would be good publicity, I reckon. Heroic firefighter burnt like a human candle comes back tae fight fire ano’er day. I told him I wasna some charity case he could trot out when it suited him.”

She fetched his hand from his lap, giving it an understanding squeeze.  Jamie had once confessed that he felt comfortable bearing his scars to her alone because she had already seen him at his worst, and that left no room for pity.  He was a proud, stubborn fool, and she loved him.

“You know what this means, don’t you?  There’s only one way to make this right.”

Not waiting for his response, she rose, sought her balance for a moment, and went to grab her phone.  Connecting it to their TV audio, she scrolled her music library, looking for a suitable choice.

“Aha!” she exclaimed, pressing play.  A synthetic tambourine and clap bass filled the room.  He recognized the opening lines of OutKast’s Way You Move.

“What are ye on about, Sassenach?”

“You’ve been sharing your glorious body with the Greater London area and god know who else on the Internet for years, Jamie.  As a philanthropist, I applaud you, but as your girlfriend, I’m a tad perturbed.  I am hereby re-asserting my rights to exclusive content.  Now stop lollygagging and get your fine ass off the couch.”

“Sassenach...” he laughed, starting to grab hold of her meaning and feeling a shot of adrenaline course through his veins.  Even before his accident, he had never...

“Don’t make me put it on repeat, Fraser.  Oh, look, here comes the chorus!”

Claire sat back on the sofa, her legs tidily crossed on their coffee table.  The room was dark, except for the undying city lights outside.  No-one was there to see except the one person he trusted to look without staring, to laugh without mocking, to understand without judging.  He’d never known Claire to ask for something she didn’t truly want, and he wanted to give her everything she desired.  Even if it came at the expense of his dignity.

“Ye ken I canna dance fer shite, right?” he said as he stood, taking an extra long pull on his lager.  He was going to need all the liquid courage it could offer.

“I’m well aware.  But as the woman who shares your bed, I can testify that there’s nothing the matter with your sense of rhythm.  If it helps, don’t think of it as dancing.  Think of it as upright simulated sex.”

His face was already hot from the alcohol and embarrassment, but with Claire’s words he felt the heat spread downwards across his chest and towards his groin.  Almost without willing it, his hips began to twitch in time to the beat.

“Now we’re talking!” Claire exclaimed with a grin, leaning back like the only patron at a very private strip club.

He was still dressed for work.  The navy shirt he wore beneath his jacket had no buttons, so he began by easing it from under his belt, baring his navel briefly before sliding it back down.  Claire sulked dramatically, making him laugh.  

With the song’s next horn flourish, he reached behind his neck and lifted the shirt clean off in a single tug, shaking out his hair afterwards.  When he next glanced at the couch, his girlfriend’s smug smile was gone, replaced by a blatant leer that sent shivers down his spine.  She wasn’t even pretending to look at his face anymore, spending her time somewhere between his shoulders and his waist.  He wasn’t really sweating, but he made a point of wiping his pecs before letting the shirt fall to the ground.

“Enjoying the show?” he asked, already a tad breathless.

“Immensely.  Don’t stop now.”

Fortunately, his boots and socks had already been removed, so with the next verse he made a show of unbuttoning and unzipping his blue trousers.  Claire’s eyes followed the movement of his fingers like she was memorizing them for the exam.  He could feel his cock grow heavy.

With a shake of his ass for good measure, the pants hit the floor.  Only a tight pair of boxer-briefs stood in the way of utter nudity.  They were doing a poor job hiding his belated enthusiasm for Claire’s request.  The fact that her eyes were now glued to the bulge of his erection only encouraged his excitement.

As the repeated chorus faded away, he carefully slipped the waistband over his now-rigid cock.  The material slid down his legs and he stepped free.  If someone had mentioned his scars in that instant, he would have no idea what they were talking about.

In the ensuing quiet, Claire sat up and very deliberately began to disrobe.  Once naked, she came at him like a heat-seeking missile, one hand reaching around his back to pull him tight and the other dragging him into a kiss.  They collapsed to the floor, rolling around on the area rug in a fight for dominance.  He let her win, because feeling her rise and fall over his length like a cresting wave was the best runner-up prize he could imagine.  

The sex was torrid, and frantic, and not at all polite.  The kind that left bruises and invoked daydreams for days.  Afterwards, they lay in a sweaty heap, trying to catch their breath.

“See?  I knew you had it in you,” Claire muttered into his clavicle.  “A bit more practice and you’ll be as good as the pros.”

“I didna realize I was auditioning fer a second job.”  He brushed Claire’s curls away from where they were tickling his nose.

“Oh, I have no intention of sharing your talents, lad.   Never fear.  But I wouldn’t object to a repeat performance.   Besides, I was so distracted by the show, I completely forgot to film you!”

Jamie groaned, pulling her tighter against him as sleep called him away to dreams.

[masquerade-at-home]

2021 Masquerade Awards and Judges

San Diego Comic-Con Category Awards

Graciously awarded by:

Our 2021 Masquerade Judges

Will be selecting a winner for each of the following categories: Best in Show, Judges’ Choice, Best Re-Creation, Best Original Design, Best Workmanship, Most Beautiful, Most Humorous, and Best Group.

All winners receive 2021 Masquerade Winners Medallions and complimentary tickets to San Diego Comic-Con 2022

Frank and Son Award for Most Outstanding Costume

$1,000 Cash Prize

Graciously awarded by:

The Frank & Son Collectible Show, of the City of Industry, California.  Frank and Sons is a giant one-stop show for all things collectible at their bi-weekly mini-cons and has supported fan costuming at our conventions with generous cash prizes for many years.

The David C. Copley Award for Most Innovative Costume

$500 in Amazon Gift Cards

Graciously awarded by:

The UCLA David C. Copley Center for The Study of Costume Design, judged and awarded by Copley Center Director Deborah Nadoolman Landis.

The David C. Copley Center serves UCLA TFT students, the university, the international community of historians, filmmakers and professional costume designers. The Center provides a home for the study of costume design history, genre research, costume illustration as an art form, and the influence of costume design on fashion and popular culture.

Costume Designers Guild Spotlight Award

Costume Design Book, a copy of  CDG Magazine, and a $100 gift card to Mood Fabrics, the largest online fabric store for designers and anyone who sews.

Graciously awarded by:

The Costume Designers Guild IATSE Local 892, representing Hollywood costume designers, assistant costume designers, and costume illustrators working at the highest levels of expertise in motion pictures, TV, commercials, music videos, and new media.

The CDG is part of the International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees (I.A.T.S.E.)

Meet Our 2021 Masquerade Judges

Jennifer May Nickel

Is a Costume Designer for Television and Film.  Classically trained in theatre, Jennifer holds an MFA in Costume Design from Carnegie Mellon University and also studied in England at Oxford University (St. Edmund’s College: Myth and Ritual in Theatre). A proud member of the Costume Designers’ Guild Jennifer has won the Elizabeth Schrader Kimberly Costume Design Award, The Cecilia Cohen Award for Excellence in Theatre and The WCDAC Achievement Award

Her Television Costume Design credits include Neflix’s Cabin with Bert Kreischer and Taylor Tomlinson: Quarter-Life Crisis, the CW’s Containment, Fox’s What Just Happened??! with Fred Savage, Syfy’s TV movie Miami Magma, the History Channel’s Legend of the Superstition Mountains, TLC’s TV movie The Secret Santa and Nickelodeon’s The Massively Mixed-Up Middle School Mystery.   Jennifer has Costume Designed various CollegeHumor Originals, SMBC Theater’s hit web series Starpocalypse and pilots for E!, Nickelodeon, Relativity TV and CrisisLab.

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Deborah Nadoolman Landis, PhD

Costume designer, historian and endowed chair at UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television Landis is the Founding Director of the David C. Copley Center for Costume Design. Landis received an M.F.A. in costume design from UCLA and a Ph.D. in the history of design from the Royal College of Art, London. Her distinguished career includes Animal House (1978), The Blues Brothers (1980), An American Werewolf in London (1981), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Trading Places (1983), The Three Amigos (1987), Coming to America (1988), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award, and the groundbreaking music video Michael Jackson’s Thriller (1983). Now considered ‘classic,’ characters she has designed, like Indiana Jones, have become international cultural icons. Her costume designs are found in the collections of museums including the Smithsonian Museum of American History (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones), the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame (Michael Jackson’s Thriller) and most recently, the National Museum of African American History and Culture (Coming to America).

A two-term past president of the Costume Designers Guild, Local 892, and a past-Governor of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (2013-2018), Landis sits on the Board of the National Film Preservation Foundation. She is the author of six books including Dressed: A Century of Hollywood Costume Design, FilmCraft: Costume Design, Hollywood Sketchbook: A Century of Costume Illustration and the catalogue for her landmark exhibition, Hollywood Costume, which she curated at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London in 2012. The exhibition, a celebration of one hundred years of costume design history while showcasing the designers’ contribution and process, open just three months, with an attendance of more than 265,000 visitors, became the most successful exhibition in the long history of that museum. The show then traveled to Melbourne, Australia, Phoenix, Arizona and Los Angeles. Landis is the editor-in-chief of the upcoming three-volume Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Film and Television Costume Design (2021).

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Garnet Filo

Is a Costume Designer with more than 40 projects under her belt. Recently she’s Costume Design assisted on several sci-fi series including The Orville and The Mandalorian; further developing her skills by working closely with their Costume Designers. Garnet has always been fascinated by the futuristic and the fantastic and her passion to bring these to life only continues to grow. She is the chairperson for the Costume Designers Guild I.A.T.S.E. local 892 Comic-Con committee.

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Allan Lavigne

Is a self-taught costumer, make-up special effects artist, sculptor, and [MJ1] painter with 40 years’ experience in costume fabrication Formerly a top costume winner for many years at fan conventions around the USA, including many San Diego Comic-Cons, he brings with him great insight from having honed his costume skills as an on-stage contestant himself. Since then, he has gone on to do work for Disney, Lucasfilm, Sony Pictures, and more. In his Bronze Armory studio, in the San Francisco Bay Area, he creates, lectures, and teaches.

His costume work has been exhibited in museums, at film premieres and at numerous conventions.   His current exhibit of screen-accurate motion picture and television costume reproductions “The Batman Armory” is featured at the San Francisco Cartoon Museum, requested by Warner Brothers to promote the new Batman encyclopedia: Batman: The Definitive History of the Dark Knight in Comics, Films and Beyond which Allan was technical advisor for. In a second gallery of the museum, his Wonder Woman costume re-creations accompany the featured exhibit about that character.

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Gigi “Fast Elk” Bannister (formerly Porter)

has been in the film industry for over 35 years as a SFX Artist, Director, Producer, and actor. Better known for her practical special effects and production work, Gigi is experienced on both sides of the camera. She has appeared in over a dozen films and television shows, and is a popular guest at horror conventions, film festivals, workshops, and seminars. For several years she has donated time at San Diego Comic-Cons to assist Masquerade contestants with their special effects make-up needs.

Gigi is credited as a Producer on Don Coscarelli and David Hartman’s “Phantasm V: Ravager” (2016) and Steve King’s “One For the Road” (2011) (Night Shift Anthology). As a character actor, she appeared in “Bloody Bloody Bible Camp” (2011), “Carnies” (2009), in “Small Town Saturday Night” (2009) (with Chris Pine, and John Hawkes), and again in Don Coscarelli’s “Bubba Ho-Tep” (2002) (Bruce Campbell, Reggie Bannister and Ozzie Davis). She has produced and directed on numerous projects including dozens of live events, fundraisers and seminars, six independent feature films, and six shows for television. More information on Gigi can be found on IMDb.