#I am a lil bit stoned and this took me a solid minute to write and honestly i was so proud how much of the sentence structure and usage

[swampstew]

Raven! How are yooou?

Ily! Lots of hugs and love 😺❤️✨

Hola Su!

Haciendolo bien y tu? Ahora mismo estoy escribiendo y entre descansos limpio y bailo musica tecno. Cuales sontus planes para el fin de semana? Besitos bebesota<3

[arewelonely]

hogwarts maybe 6th year? jily arguing, reconciliation at the end.

also marauder banter!! yes!! yay!! it brought me so much joy to write. i love shenanigans.

---

“POTTER!”

He jerked his head up from his cereal, spoon literally paused in mid air.

Lily could see Sirius mumble some snide comment at Peter, who smirked, and James’ eyes twitched as he met hers. Her footsteps were loud and her robes rustled and her wand kept shooting out sparks because of how tight she was gripping it and how fast her mind was racing.

There were other people in the hall, yes, and professors peering over their breakfasts, probably mildly concerned, but his finger pushed his glasses back up on the bridge of his nose like he deserved a minute to ready himself and that was all she cared about.

“What in Godric’s name did you think you were doing?” she hissed as she approached, glaring and gripping the edge of the table right next to Remus.

“Good morning, Evans,” James inclined his pompous head.

“Top o’ the mornin’ to yuh, eh?” Sirius leaned over, cheeky grin and tongue poking out just a tad between his teeth.

“Bugger off,” Lily leaned in closer, hair almost falling into the platter of scrambled eggs that lay in between the boys. “Potter, who the fuck do you think you are.”

She was seething, the back of her neck hot. She wished so furiously she could be joining them for a calm breakfast right now.

James set down his spoon with a clunk and his eyes darkened. “What are you on about, now?”

“You self-entitled, presumptuous arsehole–”

“Lily, Evans, hold on a second–” he stood up and backed away from the table, shuffling his books into his arms.

“I–” Lily’s hand gripped tighter, eyes stinging, her nails piercing the inside of her palm. Her wand shot out directly in Remus’ direction–

Fuck, and his robes sizzled.

“Ah, shite, Lily,” Remus swatted at the smoke by his leg.

James held up one finger and began to strut around the long table to get to the side where Lily stood.

“Literal smoke out of the ears, huh?” Peter grinned at her, mumbling something about a lover’s quarrel, while Sirius leaned over the table and gave a hm, thrusting his cup forward and dousing Remus’ side in water.

“Oh my god, Merlin, Sirius, what the literal fuck–”

“You were on fire!”

“I was smoking.”

“And now you’re not!”

“Sirius, fuck, I’m soaked.”

“And you have a wand! Dry yourself off.”

“You look like you pissed.”

“No shit, Pete, you go on and fuck off too.”

“Ooh, hey, Pete, whatcha doin’ later today?”

“Nothin’, why?”

“Was thinking about devising an obstacle course around the dorms to pour buckets of water on Moons. Wanna?”

“Yes.”

“Isn’t your plan ruined now that I know about it?”

“No, it’s always fun to watch you tip toe around, all concerned.”

“Hey, you have never been more right, Wormy.”

“Fuck off, the two of you.”

“Evans.”

Lily’s vision blurred back into focus as James nodded at her. He stood tall, peering down at her, and he swallowed.

“Let’s go?”

She brushed past him, trying to check him a bit with her shoulder, but the bastard had played Quidditch for too many hours–she had to stifle a hiss when his upper arm was too strong. Her chest felt hot and heaving. She rustled out of the Great Hall and fisted her hands in her sleeves to try and dampen her sweat.

There were a few students milling about, murmurs about homework and petty friend dramas. Lily stormed past all of them, entering the quieter corridors that led to Transfiguration.

James was right behind her; she could hear his breathing as he followed her, and her wand began to spark again as her thoughts picked back up: James, Severus, the years-long rivalry, her unsteady and uncomfortable place in the middle.

She shoved her wand in her pocket to try and quell the tension, but found herself feeling vulnerable. She whipped it back out, spinning on her feet to press the tip at James’ chest.

He inhaled sharply but didn’t move, Lily’s wand quivering by his sternum.

They breathed heavily for a second, now alone in the castle corridor, halfway between the Great Hall and their first class.

James pressed his lips together. “Evans, I–”

She gripped his collar with her other hand to hold him in place–

“I told you never again.” The words spat out through gritted teeth. Her eyes were already watery.

His eyelids fluttered shut. “Evans, I–”

Fire heated in her chest, her vision swirled again. She let him go, wand falling to her side.

“Don’t say my name.” She shuttered backwards.

“What did you want me to do?” James’ voice rose in volume, panic seeping out now.

He liked calling her Evans. He liked being able to switch between ‘Evans’ and ‘Lily’. She knew this. He had told her this the other day, in the heat of a very different moment.

Lily’s eyes welled and her nose flared. “Nothing.”

“I can’t do nothing.”

“I told you to do nothing.” The words tasted bitter in her mouth and she swallowed hard. “I told you to do nothing!”

“He was... Lil–” James clamped his mouth shut. Lily pressed her back against the cold wall across from him, fingers scratching against the stones. “He was saying the most vile–”

“It’s NOT YOUR FIGHT!”

“I can’t just stand by!” His eyes flashed dark, affronted.

“I ASKED YOU TO.”

Their eye contact felt like metal: a solid rod connecting them both. It was painful to hold and horrible to break.

The tears were flowing now. Lily swallowed and leaned her head back. James’ face was bright red and his eyes were sparkling. She didn’t know what else to say. He was in the wrong, he should have known he was in the wrong–

“We talked about this, I said I despised pompous, showy acts of shit chivalry–”

“I said it wasn’t fucking chivalry, it was morals and decency, come on–”

“And I said, Potter–”

“If I can’t call you by name you can’t either, fuck off–”

Lily’s hands were in fists again, her jaw rock-hard. “I said I gave no fucks, you could not DO THAT anymore! I... I made that so clear!”

“You can’t just tell me what to do,” James started forward, hands flung high in exasperation.

“You haven’t even apologized!”

They could hear footsteps halting in the corridor behind them; they held their gaze–Lily’s eyes narrow, she hoped sending shit the prick’s direction, James’ wide and breath unsteady. She pinched the bridge of her nose and took off towards their classroom, letting out a noise of pure frustration when she couldn’t find an empty classroom on their way to continue the fight.

James’ hand wrapped around her arm and she instantly jerked it back, spinning around, mouth already open. He just stayed silent and tilted his head towards a doorway that had simply... appeared?

The fuck?

The prat and his Marauder friends, no doubt.

She followed him into an empty room, but couldn’t remember ever having had a class here.

“The Room of Requirement,” he muttered, going to pull the door shut. “Appears when you walk past it three times, when you need it–”

“Nobody will come in here?” Lily looked around: empty except for a few chairs and couches scattered on the edges, a small classroom with a wide space in the middle. She walked to the opposite side of the room from James, grateful for the space to think.

He shook his head slowly. “No, because we’re in it.”

“Okay, good.” Lily swallowed and crossed her arms.

The air fell still. Lily could hear her heartbeat.

James breathed in shakily. “Snape was with Mulciber and their nasty gang, and I overheard them planning something... something awful, a huge assault on the muggleborns, and I wanted to stop them, I wanted to stop their planning, so I stunned them and–”

Lily held up her hand. “You hurt them instead of going to Professor McGonagall, or Dumbledore. You inflicted pain when it wasn’t your battle to fight.” Her voice rose and she shook her head over and over again, walking closer with each sentence. “You stooped as low as them when you’ve tried time and time again to convince me you’ve changed, you were rash and forgot yourself and were presumptuous again and you still haven’t apologized!”

Lily found herself again with her wand pointed at James, and she pressed her lips together and eyes shut. Fuck. When she opened her eyes, he stood right in front of her and was running his hand through his hair. He had a tear rolling around in the inner corner of his right eye.

“It’s not your battle,” she whispered. Her hand shook.

“I will defend from now on. I won’t provoke.”

Lily narrowed her eyes and felt her heart rate increase again. She threw up her hands. “That’s what you said last time!”

“You said that last time.”

She let out a scoff, a sound of pure indignation, turned away. “Fuck off, you childish, disgraceful, petty ass–”

“I was wrong, I was wrong!” James sputtered out. He held up his hands. “I am sorry, Li–I...” Hand through the hair again. “I will defend only.”

She dropped her hands to her sides and stepped back. “I don’t want you near them.”

“Better me than you.” James’ voice was low.

“Fuck off, ass.”

“Okay, but you disagree?” He raised his eyebrows. “I have a better chance–”

Lily gasped. “Fuck you, you have a better chance–” her voice dropped into mocking, her face contorting.

James threw his hands up again. “Not ability-wise, come on, just they have less motivation to–”

“I don’t want you to get hurt!”

Lily held her hands wide and her wand clattered to the ground. She shook and her breath was shattered. Her chest felt sore, pulled in too many directions.

“It’s not your fight,” she choked, “you can’t get hurt.”

She lost her balance and tumbled to the ground, pain briefly registering in her legs and elbow as they caught her.

James crouched by her side so fast, it was like he had Apparated into position: not touching her, but so close. His hand ghosted over her arm and he spotted her as she righted herself. If they moved just a little their legs could intertwine, both curled up like pretzels right now, knobby and too large for their current position. But they stayed, and James pulled away when Lily was sitting again.

They were just inches from each other. Breathing heavily. She took stock: her elbow was skinned and she was sure bruises would blossom on her legs over the course of the day. She felt hot and raw.

James rubbed at his face.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I know you have too much to think about right now, I’m sorry I gave you something else.”

He swallowed. She knew if she lifted her head she’d have to look in his eyes. She knew she’d see his remorse.

“I... you know I wanted to fix it, to make it... to try and make the world safer for you–and I know that doesn’t excuse anything,” he rushed out hastily when she flashed her gaze towards him again. “I know that, and I... I’m really, truly sorry that I... I was impulsive, and didn’t think about the consequences–not only for me, but for you.”

Lily’s mouth twitched. Tears were dripping again and she wanted to punch him and hug him at the same time. Maybe hug after punch. Maybe punch after hug.

“I know there’s more to this than just me. I’m sorry I didn’t think about that in the moment.”

“I’m sick of forgiving.” Her voice was hoarse.

James’ chest heaved, his voice shaky. He took a breath. “You don’t have to.”

Lily shook her head. “Not just you, just...”

She leaned back, spreading her fingers out on the floor. James furrowed his eyebrows. “I’m sick of forgiving everyone. Petunia for lashing out, my mum for how she’s coping with Dad, Severus for giving over to...” She squeezed her eyes shut. “I... I’m sick of right now.”

“You don’t have to forgive me,” James repeated.

Lily blinked her eyes open, but felt more than saw as James bent forward a bit. He placed his hand right next to hers on the ground, still not touching. “You... whatever you need. Whatever you say, I’m gonna try and be better, okay? Defend only, protect instead of instigate.”

“I know you meant well.” She barely got the words out, the tears were choking her up. She knew he heard her.

“Stop, okay, shh.” James reached forward again and then halted. “Can I, do you want–”

Lily broke into a sob, leaning forward and grabbing James’ robes to her. She was so tired, he was so warm, they were sweaty from the argument and agitation and his arms held her so tight and firm.

“Fuck,” she sobbed, “goddamn, I...”

“It’s okay,” he whispered, and his back shook as he, too, released.

She bent her nose into his collarbone and rubbed her eyes against his bony shoulder, snaked her arms around his back. They held each other. Apologies and desperation and care.

His fingers rubbed back and forth on her back, her nails dug into his robes.

She exhaled shakily over and over again, eyes shut against his shoulders. She liked how sturdily his arms held her.

“I’m so sorry,” he mumbled.

Eventually, Lily pulled away first, as she always did, attempting to be strong in her moments of weakness. James watched her closely. He seemed worried and unsure, eye twitching and cheeks shiny.

She took a breath, pressed her lips together.

She reached out and grabbed his glasses, drying them off on her robes. Her voice was far quieter than she would have liked when she finally spoke, far from portraying the stable and steady woman she wanted to be. She looked at the glasses in her hands. “I still want you in my life if you want to be.”

“Goddamn, Lily, of course.” James fisted her robes puddled in between them. “I just, hey, look at me, gimme my glasses so I can see you–”

She quirked up her lip at that and waited for him to prop the glasses up and then, of course, run a hand through his hair. He returned his hands to clutching her robes in front of him.

“I’m a lot of work,” she said.

“Oh, Merlin, Evans,” James pulled her robes closer, eyes earnest, “we’ve already covered what I am: pompous, self-entitled, a total arsehole–”

“Presumptuous,” Lily muttered, glancing down at James’ hand.

“Yeah.” James sighed. “I know. I’m going to delegate the Auroring to McGonagall, okay? I’m really, really going to try. Lily?”

She met his eyes. “Yes, please.”

“And you’re not too much work.” James shook his head vigorously. “If anything, I know I am. I just... I like spending time with you. Even when you’re chewing me out. Even when I deserve it.”

Lily sighed. She took his hand in hers. “I like spending time with you, too. I like our bickering more than this, though.”

James squeezed her hand. “Me too.”

They looked down at their hands and held for a minute.

“Evans.”

“Ay, Potter?”

His eyes were shining. “You really make me happy. Going to always try and earn you.”

She smiled softly and rubbed her thumb over the back of his hand. “You make me happy, too.”

He raised an eyebrow, hesitant, questioning. “Call me Potter again?”

Lily smiled in response. She bumped closer, knees knocking knees. “Potter, I think we’re late for class.”

“Too late?” A twinkle returned to his eyes and Lily gave a smile at this sight. Her chest released.

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Fancy a walk around the grounds?”

“Yeah.”

They let go of each other’s hands as they pushed off the ground. Lily took a look around the room.

“You say this just appears whenever you need it?”

“Yeah, gotta walk past this spot in the corridor three times and the door opens to fit your needs.”

James held the door open for her and she watched as it blurred into nothingness once shut. Lily hummed in thought, walking slowly down the hallway.

“Why, whatcha thinkin’?”

Lily exhaled slowly and peered out of a window.

Outside, the morning was calm and the greenery was lush... a walk sounded like a nice way to wind down and let the energy settle a bit between them. Later, when they were more settled in their banter, when the air between them had had some time to relax... later, she would bring him back here and watch his eyes twinkle as she pushed him in the room, backed him up against a wall...

She turned to see those eyes blinking down at her expectantly. She tapped his glasses back up on his nose, smiling.

“Ah, Potter, I’ll tell you later.”

[curlythenord]

How It Began

Hey, so this is new, and weird. But I have no one to talk to about this to without annoying them, and this is basically my new and only hobby. And I like it a lot. And most of us are stuck inside anyways so why not?

Skyrim is quite a few years old, so maybe some of you have wisdom to give. Or not, and you could just hear about my faliures/achievements and laugh. Either way, this feels therapeutic in nature, and puts two things I love together. Writing and... well, Skyrim.

So, three or four weeks into quarantine, and I was already pretty out of it. I didn’t have any solid hobbies to pick from and I was waiting on amazon book deliveries. Then, Jenna Marbles posted her video “A Tour of My House In Elder Scrolls Online” and I watched it and I really liked it. She mentioned how much she liked it many times before and something about the fantasy and quests just struck a cord in my bored little heart.

It’s like the attraction of Animal Crossing that a lot of us are having, except it’s with dragons and magic and swords. Both are still very valid.

That afternoon I downloaded Blades on my phone and played for literal hours. Something about swinging a sword and killing trolls and monsters really got to me. I wasn’t a fan of building the town and upgrading the blacksmithy but otherwise I enjoyed it. Then on Easter I kinda browsed through amazon, wondering if I could buy the game right now because of quarantine and all that. We have a ps4 at home, it’s my little brothers. I found a copy of the 2016 beautified version on Amazon, and then he went and found it on the playstation store for way less.

Soon enough I caved to my desires and I bought it. And I was immediately obssessed. I spent like an hour JUST creating my character. I wanted her face paint to be just right and her eye color was so hard to pick because I kept getting getting stuck between this hella striking blue and this really cool dark golden/hazel color. (I decided on golden) I chose Nord after debating about it for awhile, and i’m still not regretting the decision. She has really dark black hair and dope ass war paint on her eyes. I know Breton was probsbly the better choice but the Nord character hasn’t been an issue at all. I do always forget to use her war cry thougj. I think it’s because I can only use it once a day (in-game) so it makes me scared to use it. Even though days are just around 20-30 minutes long without fast travel.

Her name is Toril, which means “thunder”, and I know shes my avatar and everything but like... she’s so cool.

I chose the Warrior stone, because I genuinely just wanted to fuck shit up with a Sword. I always thought I was naturally super bad at console gaming becuase I tried playing COD before and I was terrible. Like really bad. Like propably shot myself more in the foot than I shot anyone else bad. But with Skyrim? I keep getting better each time I play. And my attack strategies are getting so much better.

My usual way to fight is a shield and a one-handed weapon. Two-handed is just too bulky and I like swords and the protection of shields. Also it just drains stamina so fast and I don’t like that. At this point I just carry Two handed weapons incase an opponent is Really hard to kill without it. I also do magic-wielding on left hand (usually restoration spells) and a one handed weapon on right. It’s prefect for combat with slow but really damaging enemies, like dragons or trolls that you can back away from.

Recently, I began dual wielding and it’s honestly so fun. I just hate how much damage I take when I do it against a group of bandits though, so I keep moving away to heal or take potions, but it’s such a fun strategy to use with dragons when they land or just against one opponent.

Anyway, the game is amazing, the characters are fun and weird and yea they’re fake but the storylines are so interesting. I decided to go with the imperial gaurd in the beginning, so I went to Riverwood, and then eventually took main residence at Whiterun. I was a little slow on joining the companions, so I used to just stay at the inn before I lived with them, but a couple days ago I saved up enough to buy the Breezehome. Both a good and bad idea because I still go back to Whiterun a lot, but my quests are now taking me farther and farther away and now I can’t really pop back in whenever I need to store an unneccesary weapon or some dragon bones.

I also hardly let myself fast travel because I really like the game for the exploring aspect. Even though the foxes have given me jumpscares multiple times with their guttural panting.

So yea. After maybe two weeks of playing I’m at level 20, and I’m guessing I’ve spent over 30 hours on the game. I play a little bit each day, but my sessions are usually 2-4 hours long and happen in the afternoon, and if I get on after my brother at 12 am i’ll usually play until 2 before I get too tired. I’ve only got like 13% done though, or at least only 13% of the achievements. My highest acheivement right now is doing alchemy though so I’m not doing great.

I’ve been focusing on the quest with Delphine and Esbern recently, and I’m at the point where I just spoke to the dragon master/teacher of the Greybeards, then spoke to Arngeir about going to Windhelm/Winterhold. I figured I might as well finally visit the college there because I wanted to improve some magicka skills without using my perks. It’s weird though, because as soon as I got back to Whiterun and then headed out to go to Windhelm, I got absolutely raided by dragon attacks.

First, one appeared outside of Whiterun, and me being the pussy I am (after getting my head bit off Multiple times) just shot arrows at it from a distance as the soldiers dealt with it, and then ran over when it was dead to absorb the soul. Then when I was past the farms and the guards tower next to Whiterun, another dragon appeared. I used the Whirlwind sprint to stay next to it’s wing to keep it from biting my damn head off, then used some restoration spells when it was in the air, and dual wielded (when I could attack it) with the Dawnbreaker and this enchanted sword I found at the Sky Haven Temple that deals extra damage when attacking dragons. Absorbed that soul and headed on up to the snowy mountainous area that was on the way to Windhelm.

After dealing with a couple asshole white bears and some whisps, I hear a dragon and absolutely lose it. Why was I suddenly getting bombarded?? I decided to sneak on this one, and got my bow and arrow out. Eventually I got close enough to see not one, but TWO goddamn dragons, before realizing it was Alduin raising one to life (and realized he was salty because I was trying to destroy him by getting the Elder Scroll). Eventually I managed to kill it, still using Whirlwind sprint, healing spells, and dual-wielding. Plus some potions too.

I had to try a couple times for each of these by the way. Even with the second dragon I kept forgetting to save once I was a mildly-annoying-distance-to-repeatedly-walk away from Whiterun, which sucked but it’s whatever. I learned my lesson though and started remembering to save.

I got to Windhelm, which was weird territory because it’s run by Stormcloaks, and had to physically restrain myself from pummeling this drunk guy while he talked down to a Dark Elf and accused her of being a spy because she wasn’t a Nord. Also sometimes guards that aren’t from Whiterun will call me a thief (I unnsuccesfully tried to help out the guy who told me about Esbern’s hideout back in Riften) and it’s a lil annoying because I try really hard to make my character a decently good person. Sucks though because one of the achievements is joining the Thieves Guild and though I don’t necessarily want to do that, I’m gonna eventually unless I create a new character, which I don’t wanna do yet because I like mine too much.

Anyways this is already really long. I’m making another post to talk about my current opinion on choosing between Imperials and the Stormcloaks. If you have any tips, or questions, comment them! Or send me an anon, either is fine. I could literally rave about Skyrim for hours, as you have probably seen. Thanks for reading!

[grimelords]

My March playlist is finished! This one is slightly more diverse than usual, swinging all the way from vibraphone jazz to Bhad Bhabie to black metal so I’ve taken the liberty of actually sequencing it properly for you. So if you’ve got 3 hours you can listen to this straight through and be taken for a hell of a ride. No matter what you like I’m sure you’ll find something in here that you love.

Tahiti - Milt Jackson: For an unknown reason I had a big jazz vibraphone phase this month and when you're talking jazz vibraphone you're talking the Wizard Of The Vibes himself, Milt Jackson. I feel insane even having an opinion on this but it's a shame that some of the best vibraphone performances were made at a time when the actual recording technology wasn't really there, they all have this very thin quality that I think misses a lot of the great character of the instrument.

Detour - Bill Le Sage: Like compare this from 1971 to Wizard Of The Vibes from 1952, the sounds is miles warmer and gives so much more of the full range and detail of the instrument. I also listened to this song five times in a row when I first heard it, the central refrain is just so fuckin good. Like I said, big vibes vibe and who knows why.

Blowin' The Blues Away - Buddy Rich And His Sextet: Superhuman playing aside, it's unbelievable how good these drums sound. The whole first minute just feels like a tour of each specific drum and I absolutely revel in it. I feel like flute and vibes is a relatively rare combo so it's extremely nice to hear Sam Most and Mike Manieri go ham in tandem.

Yama Yama - Yamasuki Singers: A friend sent me this song that he's had stuck in his head for ten years ever since it was in a beer ad from the days when beer ads were incredible strange for complicated legal reasons about not showing people enjoying the product or something https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORfkh0OojxY and this incredible song is apparently from a 1971 French concept album where a couple of guys wrote a bunch of psychedelic songs in Japanese for an unknown reason that later became a massive drum and bass breaks album, and one of the guys was Thomas Bangalter from Daft Punk's dad! Music is crazy.

Alfonso Muskedunder - Todd Terje: I'm starting a petition to get Todd Terje to write the soundtrack for the next Mario Kart. I absolutely love this song and this whole album because it's so joyful and strange and it just sounds like nothing else I've ever heard. He seem to truly operate in a world entirely of his own.

Pala - Roland Tings: I love this song. It's like he wrote it with normal sounds and then went back and replaced every instrument with the party version. This song hands you a coconut and says welcome to the island where bad vibes are punishable by firing squad.

Keygen 13 - Haze Edit - Dubmood: There's a fucking album of keygen music on spotify and it's absolutely great and so good that someone's doing the work to recognize the value of the music this extremely weird scene produced and preserve it. If you don't know, back in the day when you pirated photoshop or whatever, you would download a license key generator which was a program made by extreme nerds who had cracked the license key algorithm to give you a fake one, and for unknown reasons they would make the keygen program play original chiptune music that someone in their nerd crew would compose. Who knows why but god bless them.

My Moon My Man (Boys Noize Remix) - Feist: The very concept of a Boys Noize remix of My Moon My Man is hilarious and it turns out it sounds absolutely amazing as well. Two great tastes that taste great together.

Low Blows - Meg Mac: I had a big Meg Mac phase this month too, listened to her album a lot and it's extremely solid. Great timing too cause her new one comes out in a month or so too. I really am excited to hear her next album because she's so good but I've always got this feeling that she hasn't reached her full potential yet, she's only going to get a million times better in an album or two.

Patience - Tame Impala: I love that the cover of this single is a pic of congas because it feels like that's the central thesis here. Kevin Parker bought some congas and is making disco Tame Impala now and I really couldn't be happier about it.

Unconditional (feat. Kitten) - Touch Sensitive: I love a 90s throwback done with love. There's nothing cynical or ironic about this it's just fun as hell!

Last Hurrah - Bebe Rexha: Get a fucking load of this Bebe Rexha song that interpolates Buy U A Drank by T-Pain for the chorus! It's a testament to how good that song is that she's using the verse melody as the chorus. T-Pain will quite literally never get the respect he deserves. Also this song goes for 2.5 minutes. There's something happening where pop songwriting is getting more and more compact, completely trimming the fat and ornamentation and it's very interesting.

Hi Bich - Bad Bhabie: Also I'm fully six months late on Hi Bich but I'm of the opinion that it's extremely fucking good. A perfect little reaction gif of a song and it only goes for 1m45!

Friends - Flume: I'm doubling down on my thesis about emo rap from last month but this song literally sounds like a Flume remix of a Hawthorne Heights song. The whole melody of it, the overlapping yelled/clean vocals. The lyrics obviously. I don't know it's just very odd how close it is. A sort of emo trojan horse to trick people into thinking The Used are cool again. 

How To Build A Relationship (feat. JPEGMAFIA) - Flume: I've been meaning to check out JPEGMAFIA (AKA Buttermilk Jesus AKA DJ Half-Court Violation AKA Lil' World Cup) for a while but this is the song that convinced me. There's just so much to digest in this. Every line is gold and delivered with massive conviction even when he realises it's total nonsense like 'dont call me unless I gave you my number'.

Bells & Circles (feat. Iggy Pop) - Underworld: Underworld alive 2019?? I love this song becuase Iggy Pop has been riding a fine line between punk provocateur and old man yells at cloud for a while now and this song is the perfect mix of both. You can't hijack airplanes and redirect them to cuba anymore and as a result it's over for liberal democracies. Just yelling about air travel for six minutes and it's good.

Guns Blazing (Drums Of Death Pt. 1) - UNKLE: This beat is some of my favourite DJ Shadow work I think. The menacing organ bass throughout, and especially the distorted drum freakout near the end. It's just great all the way through.

Homo Deus IV - Deantoni Parks: Another Deantoni Parks track like I was raving about last month. This whole album is great and flows together as a single piece of work amazingly. I love the purposefully limited sample palette of each track forcing an evolving groove throughout. He absolutely wrings every bit of variation he can get out of every single sound he uses and once you get into the groove of it it's absolutely mind blowing.

Boredom - The Drones: I love that The Drones can write a song about joining ISIS that's also a lot of fun. Spelling out radicalization in a way anyone can understand and sympathise with and then switching it in the second verse to spell out how we got into this situation anyway. 

Loinclothing - Hunters And Collectors: I love how much this song sounds like a voodoo celebration in christian hell.

The Fun Machine Took A Shit And Died - Queens Of The Stone Age: There's a good bit on the live dvd they put out after Lullabies To Paralyze where they play this song and they say it was supposed to be on the album but somebody stole the master recordings from the studio, which is an incredible and brazen crime. Then when they put it out on Era Vulgaris as a bonus track Josh Homme said in an interview "The tapes got lost. Actually, they were just at another studio, but we falsely accused everyone in the world of theft" which is extremely funny. This is really one of their best songs and I sort of really with it had been on Lullabies because it fits perfectly between The Blood Is Love and Someone's In The Wolf type of vibes, I love how it just kind of keeps shifting ideas and riffs throughout. An absolute jam overflowing with ideas.

10AM Automatic - The Black Keys: This song is an all time great in my opinion. It's so straightforward and so effective. I wonder if we'll get a blues rock revival ever or if Jack White still being alive and bad is souring everyone on that idea. This song also has one of my favourite guitar sounds in history I think - the outrageously huge sounding solo that comes out of nowhere and swallows up the rest of the mix like a swirling black hole near the end.

Gamma Knife - King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard: I've never gotten much into King Gizzard and because of their one million albums already it's hard to know where to start but I've been listening to Nonagon Infinity a bit and it's great, it's just good old fashioned 70s prog jams front to back.

Gina Works At Hearts - DZ Deathrays: I absolutely love this song and I absolutely love the second guitar sound in the chorus of this song that sounds like it's made out of thin steel.

Black Brick - Deafheaven: When I saw Deafheaven the other month I was right up the front and it was a life changingly great experience AND they played this new song live for the first time before it went up everywhere like three hours later which was very exciting to be given a sclusie like that. After they finished a guy behind me whispered to his friend "Slayer..." which was very funny to me.

Gemini - Elder: I found this band because one of my Spotify Daily Mixes was all stoner metal for a while, which is a good genre to see all lined up because it'll have Weedeater, Bongripper AND Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats right there in a row for you. Anyway this album is extremely good, the very best kind of stoner metal where it's groovy and fun and has big meaty riffs and ripping big solos and it's extremely easy to listen to three times in a row.

The Paradise Gallows - Inter Arma: My big obsession the past little while has been Inter Arma ever since Stereogum posted The Atavist's Meridian from their new album. It is just so fucking good and I can't believe I've never heard of them before. You know when you find out about an amazing band and then you find out they've been around for nearly ten years and you can't believe everyone in your life has been selfishly hiding them from you?

The Atavist's Meridian - Inter Arma: I think a big part of my enjoyment of this band has also been that I discovered them at the same time as I'm listening to an audiobook of the complete Conan The Barbarian omnibus so I'm very much in the brain space for music that sounds like it would be nice to swing an axe to.

Untoward Evocation - Impetuous Ritual: I love how halfway through this kind of just turns into a big swirling mist of dark sounds. It feels so formless and dark that it could just shake apart and dissipate at any moment and you'd look down to realise your skin is gone.

Eagle On A Pole - Conor Oberst: from Genius: 'In an interview with MTV news, Oberst stated “We were on the bus one day and a friend of ours that travels with us and works for the band kind of came out from the back of the bus and said that first line: ‘Saw an eagle on a pole… I think it was an eagle.’ And then this guy Simon Joyner, who is a great songwriter from Omaha and one of my great friends, he was on tour with us and sitting there and he was like, ‘You know, that’s a great name for a song.’ We kind of had a contest where he wrote a song with that first line, and [then] I did, and a couple of our other friends. We kind of all played them for each other. Simon’s is better than mine, but it is a good line to start a song.” Another version–Mystic Valley Band drummer Jason Boesel’s interpretation–is on the next album, Outer South.' The idea that such a good song has such a braindead origin only makes me love it more.

Lake Marie - John Prine: When I saw John Prine the other month he played this song that I had never heard before and I had to look it up after and now I'm completely obsessed with it. It feels like falling asleep during a movie and missing a critical plot point so the rest doesn't make sense when you wake up but is thrilling nonetheless. Also he absolutely screamed "SHADOWS!!!" when he played it which was a fucking cool thing to see a 72 year old man do.

Little White Dove - Jenny Lewis: The drums on this whole album are absolutely huge for some reason and I love it. My favourite recent sound is in the first chorus where there's a funny little pitch correction noise as she sings 'dove'. It's very strange and very very good.

Locked Up - The Ocean Party: I only found out The Ocean Party existed as they announced their farewell show this month which is a real shame but I'm glad I got to hear of them at all because they're very good. A very good song about that feeling we all know and love: driving for a long long time.

Plain & Sane & Simple Melody - Ted Lucas: I found out about this song from Emma Ruth Rundle's Amoeba Records video and she makes a good point about this whole album sounding like something's gone wrong and it got accidentally pitched down slightly in the recording process. It's unclear if that's what happened or that's just how he sounds but it adds a very softly spooky undercurrent to a very nice song.​ 

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