#I SAW THAT YOU LIKE TRANSISTOR HELLO YES ME TOO

[bookenders]

WIP Blind Date Spinoff: How to Save the World in 12 Easy Steps

[Do you wanna read another amazing WIP? Do a spinoff!]

First Spinoff Date! Yay! I rolled the dice (literally) and got @cookiecuttercritters Fantasy/Scifi Kitchen sink slash Slice of Life screenplay.

Here’s the Blind Date Intro post - I highly recommend checking it out.

Now, on with the show!

[I read up to ep. 5, btw! It’s fantastic! Everyone go read it right now!]

General impression of WIP: Title, yes. WIP intro, yes. Concept, yesss. This is my exact brand of weird bonkers shenanigans. I can totally see this being sold as a script book; it’s ripe for the imagining.

Character intros in the script are solid. Not sure how formatting works for alien-ish characters, but I think you nailed it. (I come from the desert and have seen news stations fry eggs on car hoods and bake car cookies, so the opening made me chuckle.) I think I might be the target audience for this kind of story because I love me a good cliche/genre trope giggle served with a dollop of the absurd.

It kinda reminds me of Futurama, actually, the way everything is set up visually. And I love it.

Favorite part of WIP: The visual puns (and just puns in general) are great. The sidewalk eggs not being fried right before the cutaway, EXIT PURSUED BY BEAR (Shakespeare nerd is appeased), the Clark Kent reference, all of the subverted and poked-fun-at tropes and stereotypes, I love ‘em all.

I wish I could tell you every single one I loved, but that’d just be a really long list of out of context jokes. Which would be a sin, because you should really read the pages to experience them at full pun strength. 

A compliment about writing style: Dude. The dialogue? Quirky, snappy, and fun. Your style really lends itself to self-awareness, too, which is perfect for this kind of humor writing that evolves into something bigger than it started as. 

Favorite character: John Smith! I’m a sucker for the everyman. And he’s serving such a crucial role in this story: he’s the litmus test. He’s the guy you look at to remember that oh, no, normal exists and it’s not this dude. And of course he’s the Chosen One’s go-to guy. 

And I see that his role gets a lot more complicated as the story goes on. I, for one, am psyched to see where he ends up in the grand scheme of things.

A post that I liked a lot: Just one? Ugh, fine. This art is gorgeous and I really get a feel for her character! Also, all the episode posts. Because they’re excellent.

What I’m looking forward to seeing next: I really wanna finish the whole season and learn more about how everyone is connected. The plot you’re weaving is intricate and intriguing as hell. I wanna see where this goes!

Anything else?:

If you don’t have a copy already, I recommend picking up The Screenwriter’s Bible. I had to read it for two of my film classes and it’s a lifesaver (another is Story by Robert McKee, which is more popular and well-known and works as a writing guidebook too!). 

I’m not sure what medium you’re going for - like, podcast or tv serial or web series or what have you, and a lot of scripting advice will be only relative to that medium, and my experience is with feature/short film and television series, so I can’t really comment on that. 

If you want more nitty-gritty commentary/concrit, shoot me a message! I know a lot of people don’t like that kind of thing being public. 😊

[ruthransom]

( kristine froseth. twenty two. she/her) i think i just saw RUTH RANSOM ride by on a golf cart . at least i think it was them . after all , SAY IT AIN’T SO BY WEEZER was blasting on the transistor radio . maybe they were on their way to work , i hear they’re a DRINK CART GIRL . but they totally could have been on their way to SKINNY DIP IN THE POOL . guess we’ll never know . you’ll definitely know its them when you see A CHERRY LOLLIPOP STAINED TONGUE, A WINK TOSSED AT A STRANGER, AND HEART SHAPED SUNGLASSES PAIRED WITH HER UNIFORM around the country club . let’s just hope they stay off the green after hours or else the sprinklers will get them ! ( pepper. twenty four. est. she/her. eating disorders. )

ABOUT THE MUN. what if 😳 what if my b 😳 what if my back didnt hurt 😳  hi, hey, hello all, my name is pepper and i have never once been on time to anything. honestly i was even born late, so at least i’m on brand rn! i am going to insert a link to ruth’s google doc in a second but first a bit about me so we can get to know each other! i am a simp for hunter schafer,,,, women am i right. whew. i have a small yorkie who means the world to me (bitch i’m a motha !!!! no drama !!!!) , i am on tiktok way too often, i pretty much exclusively drink sparkling water but i have never tried la croix. i am v canadian or at least as canadian as you get in ontario and when i was a child i thought that god looked like king trident. i am a proud fergie fanatic. i am an english major who just relearned how to spell pacifist like three hours ago. we exist. anyways, thank you for putting up with me here is the link to ruth’s intro (if you clicked on the one that you saw in her app,,, yes this is the exact same thing skjdskjd.) and please like this if you would like to plot!!  

[immabewriting]

Five Teachers Walk Into A Bar... -Chapter Six

A/N: Hey guys! As always please and review and also School starts tomorrow for me and so I might not be able to update as much as I want to because school but I’m going to try! Anyway on with the show~

A week later

The hemsworth house was something out of a movie or beachside spa commercial. Both stories had wrap-around decks that Chris meticulously cleaned every week. Both floors had beautiful mahogany floors that made cleaning easy especially with a daughter and a dog that was just as messy as her and their backyard was practically the beach! So naturally the boys always wanted to hang out at Chris's house when they could and it didn't help that Hemsworths wife Elsa was a wonderful chef and hostess.

So that's where they found themselves that Sunday. At Hemsworths house, sitting on the deck drinking, eating, and some curing hangovers.

"Evans, did you see Nancy again?" Pine asks him between bites of chips and guac.

"Actually we met up for lunch on Thursday." Evans says with a smile.

"How was it?" Cavill asks.

"It went pretty well, we got lunch at this place near the school and we just ate and talked... it was nice."

"Oh god, look how gushy he's getting." Hiddleston says with slight disgust, partly because he had a hangover.

"Oh you're just mad the girl from the bar doesn't like you and you hate it because everyone likes you." Evans retorts.

Tom sticks his tongue out at him, "She does like she just doesn't know it." All the boys groaned.

"Tom just let it go, so what she doesn't like you?" Pine asks. Tom narrows his eyes at Pine and then sips smoothie. Something dawns on Pine.

"Oh," he says.

"What?" Tom asks.

"Oh my god."

"What?!"

"You like her!"

"What! No! I- no I don't!" Tom rejects.

"You totally like her!" Pine exclaims.

"That actually makes a lot of sense," Cavill says.

"Who's side are you on?!" Tom asks. Henry raises his hands in the air.

"Dude admit it you like her." Evans says. Tom huffs and crosses his arms like a seven year old in his chair. All the boys laugh and move on from the subject just as Elsa walks out with more food.

"I hope you're hungry! I made some ceviche." She tells them as she sets the platter down.

"Elsa you are an angel truly." Pine compliments. Elsa laughs and ruffles Pines hair. She was wearing a yellow sundress that flowed off her bulging belly carrying twins.

“Chris darling, you have to take India to her dance class.” Elsa told him. Chris groans, “Now?”

“Well I would but…” she says pointing to her tummy.

“Fair point,” Hemsworth says getting up. “Anyone wanna come with?” he asks. Pine stands up, “What the hell I’ll go.”

“Alright, India love lets go!” India came bounding down the stairs in her little dance outfit and bun and all three of them set off to the dance studio.

“Very good girls! Not lets practice our pas de bourreé.” Sana instructed. This class was almost over and now she was going to teach her last class of the day, thank goodness. She loved teaching these classes but she had things to do. Friends to hang out with, she was 28 for crying out loud! She needed to be more adventurous than Netflix and fancy wine. Honestly, the only action she got was by the hot theater professor that was ogling her last week and that was just sad.

The girls all lined up and started practicing their steps as Pine, Hemsworth and little India walked in.

“Daddy we’re early!” India huffs, she crosses her arms.

“Honey, its only ten minutes. Look all your friends are here.” Hemsworth says pointing to the group of little girls in the corner. India ran over to the group. Pine looked around the studio when his eyes met the girl from the studio. Oh god. Oh god it was her. Oh my god. Maybe she wouldn’t notice him—nope. She saw him. She saw him and recognized him. Oh god. He grabs Hemsworths arm and pulls him to the side.

“What? What’s going on?” Hemsworth asks.

“That’s her!” Pine whispers.

“Who?”

“The teacher! She’s the girl I saw last week!”

“The girl you stalked?”

“I didn’t stalk her! I just saw her from the room and I peeked—Okay that sounds like stalking but I didn’t!”

“Okay so you stalked Sana? Does that mean India has to go to a different dance studio because she’s really good.”

“No I just—Oh god shes coming over.” Pine says.

“It’s been nice knowing you buddy.” Hemsworth says patting him on the back. Pine glares at him as Sana walks over to him.

“Hello Mr. Hemsworth, how are you?” Sana asks.

“Doing well, how about you? How was your week?” he asks her. Pine standing awkwardly behind him.

“Well it was great, no guys ogled me this week.” She says looking at Pine.

“I peeked!” he shouts. The entire studio looks at them and Pine hides behind Hemsworth again. Sana looks at the girls, “We still have five more minutes girls! I want you to practice your 1, 3, 5 forms.” The girls nod and start practicing.

“I’m gonna, check on Indie and um, fix her hair…” Hemsworth says walking away, leaving Pine and Sana alone.

“Look I’m sorry for what happened last week.” Pine apologizes.

“I’m over it.” She tells him.

“You’re a really good dancer.”

“You said that.”

“I know, I just, you’re really good. And you teach.”

“The world costs money.”

“That’s very true.” Awkward.

“Look, I think we got off on the wrong foot.” He says.

“I think throwing a water bottle at you is more than getting off on the wrong foot.” She retorts.

“Okay true, but I want to make it up to you. What can I do?” he asks. She raises an eyebrow and crosses her arms. Was this a dream? Hot professor was asking to make it up to her? The ball was totally in her court. Okay Sana don’t get too crazy.

“Are you doing anything after this?” she asks him.

“Um, no…” he answers.

“Then you are going to pick me up after this class and take me to get ice cream.” She tells him. He looks at her confused, “Seriously?”

“Yes. And it has to be at the place with castle made out of ice cream cones.” She informs him.

“Cone Castle?”

“Yes, that place. I want to go there.”

“Okay, I’ll pick you up after this class.”

“I can’t wait.” She says with a small smile.

He smiles back, “Me either.”  

Seriously? He got a date? Hemsworth thought from across the room.

Tag List:  @notsomolly, @linzinator, @boxfullofcats, @blown-transistor, @seattlite09, @shhiminmybluecastle, @emarich7, @othersideofforty @laughing-baubo, @nerdmom42, @lilydale-chicken, @theshortbuthappyone, @survivingstudentlife, @pretty-sexy-silly-mismash, @toc1985, @lokilockedcougar,  @purelyvictorious, @stephenmcfeely, @reblogiwill, @mrsblofeld, @ladyvic3, @au-revoir-la-dignite

Next Chapter

[sfusummerfestival]

Artist Spotlight: PindieGamer

🎨🎨🎨🎨Hello everyone! We’re here to again to highlight another one of our amazing artists in today’s Artist Spotlight - PindieGamer! 🎨Introduce yourself! Hi! I’m PindieGamer, local jrpg game nerd and pin maker! That one with the knight mascot and many shiny things haha. 🎨How did you first start getting into creating pins/art in general? Pin creating started for me back in late 2018 where I kinda stumbled into it. I was browsing merch based off of the game Transistor, and that’s when I saw pins were a thing that existed haha, and it snowballed from there. Discovered local pin makers, did a bit of research here and there, self taught myself how to vector, and off to the races we went! 🎨Has your art style changed since you’ve started your art career? How so?   It definitely has! Even between my first set of pins to my current ones, I can see a significant change in proportions and detail. I have some amazing friends to thank for that in helping with anatomy and their (very appreciatively honest) opinions on if something looks good or not. Big BIG shout out to ElleLynri and JeileenArt, two amazing local artists that I hope you guys will have the pleasure of seeing some amazing art from. 🎨What's the most memorable thing you've experienced as an artist? People liking my stuff? Ahaha it’s always that “For real? You like it? I’m glad you like it!” cathartic feeling. Online is certainly one thing, but in person is something else altogether. That moment when you see someone’s eyes light up makes me want to continue this for as long as I can. 🎨What are your favourite JRPGs right now? Can we expect to see pins of these series at your table? Final Fantasy! I just finished playing FF9 the other day, and now am slowly working my way through FF8. I can see why FF9 was more low key, but more praised, just, wow. And yes, I hope to expand the FF pin collection eventually. I should have some FF7 pins ready though by the time this interview is published hehe. 🎨Where can people find you on social media so they can keep up with your new pin collections? You can find me primarily on Instagram @pindiegamer, but also on Twitter too (same handle) if you’re into more behind-the-scenes rambles and first look at WIPs.

[ecotone99]

[SF] The Road to Hell is Through Kentucky

“Criminal Record?”, asked a highway billboard of James as he drove by. It was only after he’d passed it and cranked the radio up contemptuously that the sign’s red-lettered answer registered: “No pardon - only job! Call us!” A moment later, he was coating his borrowed ride in limestone dust with a wide 180, moving the transmission to protest as he turned. He steadied, facing the sign’s rear in silhouette, as the early evening sun stung his eyeballs. He grabbed his mom’s sunglasses from the console and got back up to speed.

A text alert sang out from his days-old phone as he pulled up across from the billboard. Seeing its preview from his lock screen, he sighed at the thought of reading it all and turned the engine off. Hey James, your mom gave me your number. I knew you and Tim were close and it was good to see u today-

A message from another world. One where driving high was a fact of life, and if people perished, God must have needed another angel. He wondered why they didn’t speak of God’s need for their man-slaughtered victims too - wouldn’t they need less reforming in heaven anyways? At least Tim had only killed concrete, and himself, and good on him for avoiding the condescending treatment by dying. That, and Kentucky. If only James had had the privilege…

He called the billboard’s number in a hurry.

“New Pathways Employment Services - how may I help you?” the exotic-for-Kentucky woman chirped.

“Uh, hi, yeah, uh, I saw your billboard and called about work. I have a record.”

“Great! So, I just need some information from you. You’re calling from where, sir?”

“Kentucky. Richmond’s where I’m closest to for big cities-”

“Good, good. Just needing to know which office to transfer you to, you’re good to hold?”

James checked his battery. This new thing was a tank.

“Yeah. Can you not play music though?”

“I’m afraid that’s automated, sir. I’ve heard worse holding music myself, though. Good luck with the position!”

“Thanks. You t...fuck.”

James flicked the phone to speaker and let it sing jazz in the passenger seat where his suit jacket lay crumpled. Even the birds were quiet, like an audience of kids for a transistor radio ball game.

At least you got invited.

And at least he got to see Tim’s parents, who actually gave a shit that he was still sober and had bothered to come out.

“Hello?” a man asked from James’s phone.

“Oh, hi,” James answered, seizing the phone and switching it off of speaker. “This is the Richmond office for New Pathways?”

“It certainly is! I am the HR coordinator here. You’re interested in working for us?”

“Yes. I could use that, yessir.”

“Well - you’re in luck. We call ourselves research, but really, that does us a disservice. We got federal funding, we got pay for you, obviously, and we’re even helping out this beautiful country.”

“Amazing! So - what needs to happen on my end?”

“We would just have to meet up in person to go over a few things. Confirm your record - maybe a first for you - and make sure you are up to the task as a participant.”

“I’m up to anything. I need the work, obviously, but I’m also glad if other people can be helped.”

“So are we...so are we. And we will. How is tomorrow, the Monday then, for you, uh…”

“James. James Alexander.”

“Alright, Mr. Alexander. You name a time, and we’re over at 584 McArthur Road here in town.”

“I can do noon.”

“Beautiful. You have yourself a good night then, Mr. Alexander.”

“Night.”

The sunset was warm as James slumped in his seat to smile at it.

/

New Pathways’ office building loomed like a new law firm; the glasswork must have used up a small beach. James braced himself and walked through into its drafty lobby, where a young man in the middle of the lobby glanced up from his typing to ask James:

“How can I help you today, sir?”

“I’m here for a noon appointment with New Pathways, with your HR person.”

The secretary kept typing at half-speed with one hand and pushed a separate button with the other.

“I’ve let Mr. Wilson know you’re here. Would you care to take a seat, and grab yourself a water or a coffee if you’d care to? He’ll be down right away.”

“Yeah, sure, sounds good.”

The seating area was an island of clutter off to the side of the bare foyer. Its resident coffee pot was burned to a crisp, and the seating was sparse. Still, James helped himself to coffee and picked up an old Psychology Today to read in a patterned armchair.

“Psychopaths Among Us! The New Norm?” read its title on top of a photograph of a pretty woman holding a mask of her face. James cracked a smile. Happily, as the title story soon told him, there was no literal danger of increasing psychopathy among humanity. The more pressing challenge was children raised right acting wrong and not understanding what they’d done wrong quite well enough. The article’s last segment had a picture of a priest, sans mask, talking about the importance of community - though quickly clarifying that this did not need to come from a church. His unpictured fellow, a school principal, expressed the same sentiment.

“Mr. Alexander?”

James dropped the magazine to meet the HR person, who seemed younger than James even, and had an honest-looking face.

“Yes…” James stood for a handshake, “You’re Mr. Wilson, the HR guy?”

Wilson smiled.

“Something like that. It’s good to see someone reading those things. Are you a psychology buff?”

“I took some in college. I like how they can present it so simply, you know? It’s different from reading however many news articles on my phone that have different conclusions…”

“I hear ya...are you good with some stairs?”

“Lead the way.”

The second floor was denser, save for a couple expansive board rooms. Wilson led him to a modest office at the very end of the hall.

“Have a seat wherever you’d like!” Wilson said with a flourish, giving the option of two whole chairs. James sat down in the straight-backed one while his interviewer settled in behind his desk.

“So…” Wilson began with a smile, “I am so excited to have you with us. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of questions, but I felt like a brief introduction to what we do could be helpful to start - I’m guessing you saw the billboard?” James nodded.

“That’s quite an approach to branding. How many other desperate bastards have ended up in here?” That won him a laugh.

“We have had a few. Though - and this may sound like a lot at once - you seem more promising than most. That’s not me being intuitive or flattering you, full disclosure. We work with the criminal justice system and have read the basics of your case, as well as the kind of man you’ve been since.”

James bristled. “Well I’m glad at least you think I’m promising, based on that. No other employer has cared enough to see the change. ‘Recovered felon’ is really only a badge of honour in movies.”

“I know. Whereas for us, it’s a big deal.” Wilson clicked his pen and scribbled a note on a clipboard. “Have you ever heard of H-A-T-T?”

“That’s not a familiar acronym. Is that a therapy? A procedure?”

“Yes and yes. I’d be concerned if you knew it, so you’re likely not a liar. In short - it is about transference of feelings with a clear goal in mind.” It was James’s turn to laugh.

“You can do that? Chemically? That seems neurologically impossible and/or dangerous for both parties…”

“Don’t forget how we actually used to put people on antidepressants, James. The limits of what works and does not work are always changing...”

“Well, fuck me. That does sound useful. Outside of how it could be abused. Seems like a short walk to dystopia from a world in which that’s possible.”

“You’re not wrong.”

James eyed an old-school portrait above and behind his interviewer. There was a likeness there, though the painted figure had a chest full of war medals.

“Is that guy a relative?” James asked. Wilson smiled.

“He was my father.”

“I’m sorry...when did he pass?”

“Two years ago.” Wilson turned, pen in hand, and pointed at his Dad’s likeness.

“He’s maybe even worth discussing here. This is what I mean. People I’ve interviewed thus far wouldn’t even have asked that. How do you suppose someone who wears all those medals ends up dead in his 50’s? It’s not a trick question.” And still, there was no good answer to it.

“Is it stereotyping to assume he killed himself?”

“Yes...but as usual, you’re not wrong. He had a mini-Rwanda type situation back in Yemen, where there was ethnic cleansing happening and the UN were cowards.”

“Shit.” “Indeed. And he didn’t write a memoir or end up telling middle schools about it, he just ate a gun one day. Unnecessary guilt. Doesn’t much matter to the brain if it’s unwarranted, right?”

“Right.” The coffee was scalding. James set it down.

“And that’s kind of where this all started for me. I was so goddamn pissed that someone like him would die when other people can’t feel appropriately guilty for anything. Not that you’re one of those, so far as I can see.” Wilson stood up and went over to the window, overlooking an empty park and streets full of traffic. “And I figured, what if people were to feel what they were supposed to feel? What could that look like?”

“You have my interest peaked, at least.”

“And as it turned out - I’ve worked in ‘agencies’ for years - I wasn’t the only one with that idea. Scientists have been working on feelings transference for a while, and the possibilities are endless. They’ve gotten people who languished in therapy for years to feel less guilty about stuff that paralyzed them for years...” James grabbed a stress ball of the desk, and used it as prescribed for once.

“So this is early stages stuff then? I haven’t read one news article even about any of this.” Wilson turned around and came back to his seat.

“Those are the good results I mentioned. The others...complications are likely, if not inevitable. Just like how a kidney transplant can be worse than none, so, too, can poor matching be awful - for both parties.” The notepad went untouched. Wilson was zoned in like a goalie at match end.

“And, really, that’s where we get to your case. We can keep making efforts at better matches with our procedures, and we will. But there is a population of society with less to lose and more to gain on this stuff.”

“Talk about an ex-prisoner’s dilemma…”

“Only your outcomes here are better than the original prisoner’s dilemma, I swear. What if I told you you could make a guilty piece of shit feel guilty for what he did? Reform him, preclude him from recidivism and thus from modeling criminality to his kids and the whole bit? That’s within reach, James. That is precisely what we are researching.”

“Goddamn…”

“The downside, and there is a real one, is that you would have to feel terrible things. Experience terrible things. And that shame and guilt or whatever is appropriate for the offender would be siphoned out of you into them, if you were a match.” James’s stomach dropped and he scratched at his armrest.

“‘...experience’?”

“Through VR. Very good VR. It makes use of brain matter from the original offender, while the transferee wouldn’t get the VR - they’d receive the physiological results of your experience via intraneural transfusion. And to you, your crimes would be 100% real until the whole process was complete. There would be no sense of self or even free will, per se - just you doing awful things. You’d feel similarly to how you felt when you killed your friend three years ago, to a much greater degree. That’s how we would be using H-A-T-T in this instance.”

“Fucking hell. I haven’t been through enough already to pass it on to someone else?”

Wilson sighed.

“If only. There’s a critical difference between contrition which obviously transformed you to be better and the kind of precursors to contrition that another person would require. And with getting you to experience new things too, there would be no limit on how much we could incentivize someone else.”

“That’s fucked up.” Wilson laughed.

“And isn’t the status quo? Isn’t broken people going back to broken families and expanding them while blaming the system? Isn’t 15-year-olds in the suburbs acting like how only terribly traumatized youth used to?”

James leaned forward unwillingly from the growing sense of weight.

“I don’t know if that’s a burden I’d want to bear…”

“We have no evidence that you would need to bear it past the procedure, though. We have more research into healing than re-incentivizing people, for obvious reasons. And, also, I lied.” James shot up out of his seat -

“Wait, WHAT? What…”

“On that first billboard you must have seen. There is a pardon at stake here. Not a chance, not conditional, but the real deal. You, free, with the potential to be a social worker or psychologist or whatever you want. Just think of that.”

James slumped down and eyed his coffee, awash with ripples from his near-outburst.

“Who’s the worst person I would have to be? Don’t tell me I have to be a serial killer.”

“You do have to be a serial killer, yeah. The alternative would be getting you to commit a bunch of more minor crimes which wouldn’t hurt you in the same way. We couldn’t map those to objectively awful actions the same as we can with famous murder cases - any robber could have secret good motives, after all.”

James tried his coffee again. It seemed stronger and more bitter, somehow. The mug at least made pleasant chiming noises as he drummed on it with his fingers.

“So there’s no way I will remember being Ted Bundy or whoever. I’ll just be Ted Bundy, then end scene, and I am me again, and Joe Pseudo-Psychopath is now Joe Repentant?”

“That’s close to it, yeah.” James looked at Wilson Sr. for a while. He still looked happy in his portrait, noble and American.

“I can do it with conditions. If I’m going to be on anything other than general anesthetic, I need to be confined for a few days afterwards. I break out in track-marks from any drug.”

“Absolutely. We have safe housing and medical as well as security staff.”

“And I want updates on whichever poor bastard ends up feeling what I felt, even if I don’t get his name or anything. I do not just want to be a lab rat.”

“Of course.”

Wilson’s right hand clasped his left. He didn’t blink very often for someone who thought so fast.

“And I guess naturally this is an ‘I talk I die’ kind of thing?”

“Not quite, though you would end up back in prison with no one to believe you. We have you on that one breach that no one else knows about, and would not hesitate to share it with your parole officer.”

“...Where can I sign?”

submitted by /u/SurelyHecked [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/2H5B6LZ

[dower]

“Out of the blue”: Forty years of musical influence

Musical youth

I think it's fair to say that the generation you were born in generally dicatates your musical tastes. Of course there are exceptions to this, some individuals seem to be born too late and some variations of music are truly timeless.

But. for most folks the musical taste is formed in their youth and then develops or dies depending on how engaged they remain during the ups and downs of life.

This is my journey, my life so far in sounds.

The summer of '77

I turned 12 in August 1977, and my Dad bought a good quality radio and a cassette tape recorder. No more listening to Radio Luxembourg on a tinny transistor radio late into the night in bed. I had found music. Real music.

And the journey starts

Coincidentally, it was the year NASA launched the Voyager mission on its Grand Tour across the solar system, and it carried a golden record embossed with the sounds and music from our earth. Amongst all the classical crap, Johnny B. Goode by Chuck Berry stood out as an excellent “message in a bottle” to toss out into the cosmic ocean. It said something very hopeful about our future. My future.

It was the start of my second year at “big” school, and I recall recording ELOs “Turn to stone” from “Out of the Blue” ... directly from AM radio onto a cassette tape using a proper AUX connection, cables and everything. While not entirely replicating the creation of the golden disc carried on Voyager 1, recording my first music was the start of my journey across the cosmos of music - kickstarting a lifelong deep connection to music. My music.

I was too young to understand punk, which had started a year before, and I quickly developed a love of heavy music: Status Quo were still anti-establishment, AC/DC was “just a racket”, and “Motörhead can’t sing”. I loved them all, plus a side-order of Queen and Meatloaf. It was fast, rocky and it spoke to me with heavy guitar riffs and ballad-style lyrics.

Sadly, the late seventies popular music scene was dominated by Radio 1 playlists; ABBA, Showwaddywaddy, The Wurzels, and The Bay City Rollers - and quite a lot of disco. It was mostly terrible. If we had the internet back then, or I had the money to buy independent label stuff then I’d be spending my time with the Stranglers, The Damned and Ducks Deluxe.

It took until 1979, and my parents splitting, to get a proper record player and the freedom to buy vinyl. My first single was Lucky Numbers by Lene Lovich. A poppy-post-punk track that, till this day, I have no idea why I bought it.

The Eighties

The end of the seventies saw the end of punk, fragmenting into New Wave (think Blondie, Talking Heads, The Cars, and The Police) and Post-Punk (Joy Division, Magazine, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Public Image). Peer and “sheep” thinking meant following one, and I went New Wave until that quickly went soft-in-the-head and became mainstream New Romantic (think Duran Duran, Ultravox, Culture Club, and everything else that came out of Rusty Egan’s Blitz Club).

I’d deepened my love of Heavy Metal, getting into Whitesnake and Deep Purple. It was my “style” if you could call it that. I wore jeans, long hair, cut-off jackets and was a “metal head” from 12 through 16 years old, up to 1982 when I moved into the sixth form and peer-grouped with post-punks and moved to a more affluent area.

It’s also when I properly discovered girls, so I smartened how I looked, got into the disruptive intelligentsia punk scene. But fuck knows why - but it was better than dressing like the gender-confused New Romantics.

With no money, my record collection centred around birthday presents, occasional trades and purchases. But I taped everything on the radio and bootlegged albums from friends on “borrowed” C90 tapes. I had been given a second-hand music centre and became my mums worst late-night-loud-music-nightmare.

I was still a kid, I hadn’t developed my own musical identity and very much led by school-related peer groups. I started to break free from the norms, but that was more of a reaction to the rise of manufactured new romance and the cultural backwater that living in rural East Yorkshire meant.

Last train to London

This would all change in 1984 when as a still-wet teenager I moved to London after landing a “cool job” in the city. I was rich, sort of (£7,500 a year), so bought a wicked stereo and went on a bender buying vinyl. Commuting from my flat in Kilburn to Farringdon every day meant recording “best of” tapes to play on my Walkman clone. I was as cool as a cucumber.

At the same time, I discovered the London club scene; I was a regular visitor to the clubs and bars of Londons West End; the Hippodrome in Charing Cross Road and Samantha’s off Regent Street were my regular haunts. Club music at the time was high-energy, so Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Hazel Dean - it wasn’t, to be honest, great music but played so very loud it went through you, you felt it.

I would get home at 3 am and create my club sound by winding the little stereo up until it could take no more. My neighbours, who I mostly never saw, hated my late-nights music blasts.

All grown up

It would stay that way until the release in 1986 (I was now 21) of Dire Strait’s Brother in Arms on CD. Overnight my collection of 300 vinyl records just seemed antiquated. CD quality was mind-bending to hear for the first time. I went mad and spent over £1,000 on a brand new stereo component system (which I mostly still possess) .

Mostly, my musical taste had gone mainstream, but the late 80’s saw the underground rise of House and Acid. By this time I had a car, with a sound system that included CD, so bass-laden house music was where I was at until the early 90s. But, like most folks, my first influences in music stayed with me - and have remained to this day.

The grim 1990s

By 1990, the Voyager 1 probe was now 4,000,000,000 miles away having flown past all the outer planets; it’s mission over. There was nothing new to record, much like my musical taste - not very much new stuff, not really. And then, for no scientific reason, Voyager flipped around and took the famous “pale blue dot” picture - a selfie of planet earth before slipping off into the featureless, quiet outer solar system.

By 1995 I didn’t play vinyl anymore - my decade-old deck got consigned to deep storage and would not see the light of day for another a decade - and vinyl wouldn’t re-appear back in my lounge until 2016. New music had become a little dull and formulaic, yes, The Strokes, Oasis, Blur and Pulp saved the world from totalitarian purgatory but nothing new was firing me up.

I discovered Jamiroquai and Faithless must be listened to at mental volumes, and when high on dope. More free money meant more music, louder rigs, a flirtation with MiniDisc and eventually a massive (at the time) CD jukebox for 300 CDs. I reached “peak sound” in the late 90s, with a pair of fridge-sized Cerwin Vega speakers powered by a massively powerful domestic rig. It would rattle windows and keep several postcodes awake late into the evening.

The iPod revolution

In early 2002 I visited New York and brought back a new invention called the iPod. It held a thousand songs, lasted for hours on a single charge and fitted in your pocket. It was almost unbelievable at the time. Overnight (again) my music collection was out of date - I spent weeks converting my existing CDs into MP3 and illegally acquiring a whole load more music.

Suddenly every track that ever existed was available free of charge, forever. When YouTube appeared, I now had every music video ever filmed available, too. I now had too much music, and with easy skipping, I had, in fact, reduced the range of music I was listening to.

Too much choice is not always a good thing, and when music moved onto my iPhone in 2008, I started to fall out of love with music. I had no stereo in my lounge anymore, and phone battery life was not conducive to mixing calls and music during a typical working day.

Streaming eveything

A year later in 2009 Spotify launched in the U.K. and I was pretty much straight in. My previous collection of music was made redundant for the third time - I probably had 10,000 MP3 tracks stored when I switched over to using a streaming service.

But I still didn’t listen to music at home, not really. I had a small sound dock for events, summer listening outside and occasional dinners but mostly music only existed on my iPhone.

But, on the road, on the train, on the tube, on planes I was back in love with music. And with Spotify I went back and re-explored my early choices and this time I discovered, for the first time, post-punk. Spotify had most of the smaller labels from day one, while big bands such as AC/DC stayed off the streaming platforms.

Hello again

And then randomly in 2015, I decided to fix my vinyl urge. I had lost most of my LPs over the years, but my wife had quite a few records, and we’d occasionally had a vinyl session on a Heath Robinson setup since 2008, but now I wanted to bring vinyl back into the lounge. I bought a modern turntable deck and a retro-looking Marshall speaker. Oh, and an original 1980s graphic equaliser for that authentic look.

I went on to purchase a few Amazon Echo devices, all attached to various music outlets around the house so now it’s just a case of “Alexa, play Ceremony by New Order”. Simple, and brought music into every room of the house. Nor does it require any technical knowledge ... anyone can ask for anything. Perfect.

My technology habits have gone full cycle and more; tranny->tape->vinyl->CD->Minidisc->MP3->Streaming->Vinyl. I still listen to the music from my formative years - 1978 thru to about 1987. In the last few years, I’ve also picked-up the live music bug again, nicely timed as punk turned 40 and all the old bands came out of the woodwork. But mostly my real musical taste is frozen in time, and space.

And Voyager’s Grand Tour of the solar system is complete, travelling at 10 miles per second, it is now over 13,000,000,000 miles away in interstellar space. Long after we’re dead, long after our sun dies, Voyager 1 will still be trucking along - still carrying Johnny B. Goode. I can relate to that; Voyager still carries the music of its formative years.