#I mean those are just this weeks this whole decade has just been like PANDEMIC PRIME MINISTERS DOWN QUEEN DOWN BOAT STUCK ELON TWITTER

[accursedvoid]

You literally can’t wake up a single day in the 2020’s without some historical event happening I swear.

[deadpresidents]

On the cliffs of Normandy, in a small holding area, the President of the United States was looking out at the English Channel. It was only six weeks ago, on the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings, and President Biden had just finished his remarks at the American cemetery atop Omaha Beach. Guests had been congratulating him on the speech, but he didn't want to talk about himself. The moment was not about him; it was about the men who had fought and died there. "Today feels so large," he told me. "This may sound strange -- and I don't mean it to -- but when I was out there, I felt the honor of it, the sanctity of it. To speak for the American people, to speak over those graves, it's a profound thing." He turned from the view over the beaches and gestured back toward the war dead. "You want to do right by them, by the country."

Mr. Biden has spent a lifetime trying to do right by the nation, and he did so in the most epic of ways when he chose to end his campaign for re-election. His decision is one of the most remarkable acts of leadership in our history, an act of self-sacrifice that places him in the company of George Washington who also stepped away from the presidency. To put something ahead of one's immediate desires -- to give, rather than to try to take -- is perhaps the most difficult thing for any human being to do. And Mr. Biden has done just that.

To be clear: Mr. Biden is my friend, and it has been a privilege to help him when I can. Not because I am a Democrat -- I belong to neither party and have voted for both Democrats and Republicans -- but because I believe him to be a defender of the Constitution and a public servant of honor and of grace at a time when extreme forces threaten the nation. I do not agree with everything he has done or wanted to do in terms of policy. But I know him to be a good man, a patriot and a president who has met challenges all too similar to those Abraham Lincoln faced. Here is the story I believe history will tell of Joe Biden. With American democracy in an hour of maximum danger in Donald Trump's presidency, Mr. Biden stepped in the breach. He staved off an authoritarian threat at home, rallied the world against autocrats abroad, laid the foundations for decades of prosperity, managed the end of a once-in-a-century pandemic, successfully legislated on vital issues of climate and infrastructure and has conducted a presidency worthy of the greatest of his predecessors. History and fate brought him to the pinnacle in a late season in his life, and in the end, he respected fate -- and he respected the American people.

It is, of course, an incredibly difficult moment. Highs and lows, victories and defeats, joy and pain: It has been ever thus for Mr. Biden. In the distant autumn of 1972, he experienced the most exhilarating of hours -- election to the United States Senate at the age of 29. He was no scion; he earned it. The darkness fell: His wife and daughter were killed in an automobile accident that seriously injured his two sons, Beau and Hunter. But he endured, found purpose in the pain, became deeper, wiser, more empathetic. Through the decades, two presidential campaigns imploded, and in 2015 his son Beau, a lawyer and wonderfully promising young political figure, died of brain cancer after serving in Iraq.

Such tragedy would have broken many lesser men. Mr. Biden, however, never gave up, never gave in, never surrendered the hope that a fallen, frail and fallible world could be made better, stronger and more whole if people could summon just enough goodness and enough courage to build rather than tear down. Character, as the Greeks first taught us, is destiny, and Mr. Biden's character is both a mirror and a maker of his nation's. Like Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan, he is optimistic, resilient and kind, a steward of American greatness, a love of the great game of politics and, at heart, a hopeless romantic about the country that has given him so much.

Nothing bears out this point as well as his decision to let history happen in the 2024 election. Not matter how much people say that this was inevitable after the debate in Atlanta last month, there was nothing foreordained about an American President ending his political career for the sake of his country and his party. By surrendering the possibility of enduring in the seat of ultimate power, Mr. Biden has taught us a landmark lesson in patriotism, humility and wisdom.

Now the question comes to the rest of us. What will we the people do? We face the most significant of choices. Mr. Roosevelt framed the war whose dead Mr. Biden commemorated at Normandy in June as a battle between democracy and dictatorship. It is not too much to say that we, too, have what Mr. Roosevelt called a "rendezvous with destiny" at home and abroad. Mr. Biden has put country above self, the Constitution above personal ambition, the future of democracy above temporal gain. It is up to us to follow his lead.

-- "Joe Biden, My Friend and an American Hero" by Jon Meacham, New York Times, July 22, 2024.

[bidaubadeadieu]

that post going around about why murdering one (1) exec of British petroleum is worth millions of tons of CO2 is so dumb and ppl are eating that shit up. I hesitate to respond to that post because I simply do not want to spread it, but no matter, you've heard arguments like this before. because I work on climate policy for a living, allow me to ask a few comprehension questions:

- why assume that the sudden death of a company official would decrease production of oil by 1% for a month? why not 0.5% or 0.25%? Whether there is any decrease and how big that decrease is are empirical questions, you can't eyeball it. The other scenario, reducing production by 25% for a day, is preposterous unless all the employees are taking a 2 hour mourning period.

- is this belief not inconsistent with the other commonly held belief on the left that CEOs are parasites and don't do shit? If value is derived from labor, do you honestly believe that 1% of BP's revenues (totaling over 100B each year) are attributable to one person? Even a few people?

- you can go online and search BP's org charts. BP has nearly 100 people with just the title "senior vice president", spread across a dozen business units like "innovation", "advocacy", "finance", "legal", and laughably, "sustainability". Anyways, which of these units contains the person you're going to shoot dead? How are you dealing with the fact that they have intentionally padded these groups to insulate from sudden shocks?

- the energy industry is, famously, characterized by inertia. The whole reason they are in this mess is due to their inflexibility. In a time of crisis, such as missing leadership, they're going to keep on chugging! The people who supposedly steer the ship are dead, and the people who actually know how to work the oilfields are still alive, couldn't that make transitional change less likely?

- ah yes! All those oilfields! BP has dozens of them, spread around the globe, filled with hordes of middle management. how, logistically, do you think that this change will happen? will it be that each worker presses buttons on the rig 1% more slowly? Or will it be that new oil sites are 1% slower to be sited and begin operation. These things employ thousands, operate sometimes for decades, and remember, they have production quotas to fill.

- what about demand? killing oil execs doesn't reduce the number of people trying to fill up their cars and keep the lights on, because oil consumption is largely inelastic. if production was lowered by 1%, the company will raise prices (just as they did during the pandemic) to maintain profit levels. In order to introduce elasticity to the market, we need real alternative choice in energy source and tech we use in our daily lives, which means subsidizing renewables, electrified transit, and regenerative agriculture, aka boring wonk shit when do I get to kill?

- this experiment has been and is already being run. In 1992 an Exxon exec was murdered and clearly that didn't solve anything. 30 years later, the guy that did it is still serving time in a prison in NJ. Russia has had a string of oil execs deaths lately for reasons I don't pretend to totally understand, but likely relating to the Ukraine war and exerting control, and no, they're clearly not worried about production declining or this hurting the Russian economy.

In short: No, this problem isn't fucking solvable by a well-placed bullet or two, or five.

[dustedmagazine]

Mint Mile — Roughrider (Comedy Minus One)

Photo by Patrick Masterson

Mint Mile has been an active concern for going on a decade now, but the build has been slow: Three promising EPs were finally followed by a sweeping full-length that dropped the week after the bottom dropped out on reality and the pandemic began. Ambertron was a grand triumph in a year that did its best to stifle such art, but its casual, communal air felt out of sync in a year where easy connection was impossible. Like time and those of us that survived, however, the band has moved on. Those changes are well processed and documented on the appropriately titled Roughrider.

The best place to start with Roughrider might be right at the end with “I Hope It’s Different.” The alt-country ensemble SIlkworm’s Tim Midyett has been writing for and helming with the steady assistance of bassist Matthew Barnhart, guitarist Justin Brown and drummer Jeff Panall is here led by Nina Nastasia on vocals instead — an acclaimed songwriter in her own right whose “That’s All There Is” Silkworm covered way back in 2003. Nastasia looks optimistically to what comes next as she sings “I hope it’s different / Not just another good time / Insulated by uncomfortable lies” set to the band’s twangy slow dance and given added flourish by Poi Dog Pondering’s Susan Voelz organization of the strings. It’s like opening a window and walking outside, the promise of fresh air and a new environment before you after Midyett’s scrawling shifts and meandering moods.

That doesn’t mean “I Hope It’s Different” is the best song here, exactly. Mint Mile has taken up the mantle of the kind of unspooling Americana Jason Molina used to excel at so well, which is a funny thing to say given Roughrider’s brevity relative to Ambertron. Even so, the band is firing on all cylinders here regardless of track length; “Interpretive Outlook” does every bit as much with its sub-three-minute runtime as “Brigadier” does pushing eight. The breadth of musicianship is on full display and Midyett’s songwriting expands or contracts to fit the music as needed; his roughened, unsparing delivery had me recalling early Jets to Brazil and Lucero.

But perhaps even more so than Ambertron, this is a record about community. To wit: The band shines brightest when the core four are accompanied, which is almost always. The fluid grace of Brown’s pedal steel guitar and Barnhart and Panall’s anchoring rhythm section never sounds better than when there’s just a little something extra — Susan Voelz’s violin, say, or Alison Chesley’s cello. I was disappointed to discover frequent associate Howard Draper did not bring back the “magic spackling thing” as a credit from Ambertron, but nevertheless, his piano, organ and lap steel guitar frequently add a magic touch where an otherwise strong song could’ve settled. There’s Corvair’s Heather Larimer lending vocal assistance on “Empty Island.” And for Silkworm fans, “Halocline” and “S c ent” each feature Joel R.L. Phelps on saxophone. You could write out the whole list of credits for how many contributors are worth noting and for how much they add to make such a satisfying record.

As with Ambertron, though, the best songs on Roughrider happen when Mint Mile piles on the people in a gradually growing jam that stretches the band’s legs. Mirroring “The Great Combine” and “Amberline,” “S c ent” and “Brigadier” probably started as simple singer-songwriter sketches but grew into enormous, swooning spins. MIdyett appropriately struggles on “Brigadier” to hit an attempt at his highest registers as he sings “Can’t overcome the life we made” while the strings skitter and Panall’s percussion finally brings the band to a crashing finish, where Draper’s pulsing, spirit-cleansing organ takes you out. It’s a real thing of beauty.

The whole album and band — really, we should be more generous and call them a collective — is a thing of beauty. Once again, Mint Mile has delivered music with weathered emotional complexity that retains an open-ended sense of optimism that, maybe from now on, the ride won’t be so rough. How easy it is to fall for that kind of burdened but unbeaten perspective.

Patrick Masterson

[nickgerlich]

WFH Blues

The way we work was served a major paradigm shift during COVID. Suddenly, most of us found ourselves working from home 100% of the time. That whole thing about work-life balance suddenly tilted the other way, and in many cases, not only were we working from home, but working when we wanted to from home.



But now that COVID—although still among us, but in diminished numbers—is slipping into the rear view, companies have continued to demand their employees return to the office, at least for part of the week. Amazon is the latest, requiring a minimum of thee days’ presence starting this May.

Well, there’s all that real estate these companies have. Empty offices don’t make much sense, and since they are a sunk cost with likely ongoing debt service, I can understand why some CEOs and others in upper management want to see their employees return. Or maybe it’s really just all about control. You decide.



Regardless of how total WFH is slowly slipping away in a growing number of cases, even the hybrid model is wreaking havoc on other businesses. Notably, restaurants near office complexes—meaning either central business districts or corporate campuses—are feeling the effects of less employee presence. It has gotten to the point that Mondays and Fridays are becoming near ghost towns at some eateries, and they are struggling to adapt.

Restaurants that cater to the corporate crowd often find themselves rather quiet on weekends to begin with, but if the weekend is now four days, it means a new business model is needed, and fast. They are paying rent for 168-hour weeks, not just a few days. I’m convinced, though, that even those three remaining days may not be like they were before COVID.

It’s sobering to think that even just a couple of decades ago, WFH would not have been feasible for many people. Broadband internet had not become a public utility like it is now, and Zoom and Teams were not even an office worker’s dream. It was during the pandemic that I was able to see how much I could save by not dining out. It was then I fell in love with cooking, if only out of necessity. And once we returned to campus, I just started bringing my lunch many days. I hardly ever go out for lunch anymore.

And then there are the people who are still able to WFH all the time, in spite of the recent return to offices. These are people who not only do not need a prepared meal, but also do not need office wear. Can anyone say yoga pants and t-shirts? Yeah. Let the ripples through the economy continue.



As for me, I have been in hybrid work mode ever since 1997, when we started offering online courses. It is a blessing and a curse, because it means I can take my work with me. The problem is, I can take my work with me. It’s a seven-day-a-week job that goes on from daybreak to bedtime, all of which I am good with. But just know that sometimes I am coming at you from a hotel room.



I see the changes around me, too. I am not the only one doing WFH on a pretty large scale. Most of my colleagues teach two of their three courses online, because that is where the demand is. It also means fewer students on campus. All of this means fewer people dining in the food court in my building, or across the street at a variety of places. We’re just not doing life and work the way we did, and we can thank the digital era for it.



In the future, smart companies will figure out how to downsize their real estate footprint. I hear all the talk about collaboration and such, but I am not convinced. I collaborate just as well from afar, and prefer it. I get far more done at home than at campus, because I am always tempted to pop in someone’s office for idle chit-chat, and definitely not to collaborate, even if it is friendly fun. And then there are all the random interactions in the hallway or at the water cooler. Time sucks, I tell you. My most productive hours each day are the three hours I put in at home before actually going to work.

We are in a state of transition, and I suspect that once the current managers cycle out because of retirement, they will be replaced by the people who thrived during COVID and learned how to WFH. The workplace of the future will necessarily be connected, yet at the same time separated. Employees will work whatever hours they wish, unless there are scheduled Zoom meetings. Asynchronous will be the guiding principle.



Well, a guy can dream, right? I’m just glad I’m not one of those restaurateurs wondering if they’re going to make it to the end of the month.

Dr “Just Remember To Pay The Electric And Internet Bills“ Gerlich

Audio Blog

[oof-i-did-it-agaaiiin]

I’m gonna try to explain this as thoroughly as possible because I understand to someone who’s not immersed in musical theatre culture how this could be confusing. So to be as clear as possible I’ll try to answer these questions individually.

- wait so they acted it out each week for 35+ years without stopping?

Most shows on broadway perform 8 times per week, so generally the amount of performances is a pretty good metric for how long a show ran for. If it had 16 performances, it ran for two weeks. If it had 2,534 performances, it ran for about 6 years. If it had 13,981 performances, it’s Phantom of the Opera and ran for 35 years. By “run continuously” I meant it’s been the same production the whole time and not a revival or new production.

- they won’t act it again?

A broadway show closing means that that particular production is finished. There are other productions of Phantom of the Opera across the world that are still running, but the one on Broadway is closing. It’s very likely that in the future there will be a revival, which basically means it’ll be the same musical but with different cast, crew, set, choreography, staging, producers, director, etc. Basically everything that isn’t the text that’s in the script and the music on the page is new or changed in a revival.

For example, the musical Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street originally hit Broadway in 1979 and closed in 1980. It has had three different broadway revivals, one ran 1989-1990, another ran 2005-2006, and the most recent opened March 26th 2023 and is currently running. All of them had different casts, crews, and were all new interpretations of the original musical.

Just because this specific Broadway production of Phantom is ending doesn’t mean the show will never again be performed. Far from it.

- why is it stopping now?

From what I’ve heard? Money.

The amount of money that a show brings in is both dependent on and informs the length of its run. The more popular a show, the more performances, so it’s like a badge of honor for a show to go on for a long time.

Any broadway show is gonna cost money to mount and to maintain. Depending on the show it could cost A LOT, and boy is Phantom of the Opera COSTLY, but it was also popular enough to keep it alive for decades. However, it’s been losing money for a few years now, allegedly even before the pandemic.

- can’t they resume it next year?

Broadway is a location, a section of New York where all official “Broadway” theaters are located. There are 41 Broadway theaters in total, which may sound like a lot, but consider how many musicals/plays exist that could be performed on those stages instead of whatever show is being performed there.

“Being on broadway” is something very sought after, and a show making it to Broadway is like earning an award that says “this musical/play is important and popular.”

I mention this because the high demand for a spot on Broadway makes putting a production on “pause” next to impossible. It’s true that Broadway went on pause during the Covid-19 lockdown, but because all broadway shows were on pause there was no competition for a spot on Broadway. If Phantom were to pause now then it would be taking up a theater that could be used by a different show. And even if the Majestic theater were to mount a production of a new show while Phantom were on pause then its sets, costumes, and props, would be taking up valuable space. And what of the other show when Phantom decides to resume? Does it get kicked out? What if it was doing well? What if it was successful? Phantom just gets to elbow it out?

That’s why Broadway productions don’t pause and resume. The closest thing Broadway has to this idea is a revival, but it takes more than a year or two for any show to warrant a revival.

- is it a lack of money or a lack of interest?

They’re sorta the same on Broadway. As I said a show’s run is dependent on its popularity, and although Phantom will always be beloved, nothing can stay popular forever. Eventually the people who have the money to see the show have all already seen it. I’m sure the pandemic also hit New York tourism in a massive way and has had an impact on the choice to close as well.

- this reads like an old creature dying.

Sorta because it is? I mean, Phantom of the Opera as a story/musical isn’t dying, it will always be alive through other productions of it. For example, the production of it on the West End (which is like London’s equivalent of Broadway) has had over 14,000 performances! Phantom as a story isn’t going away.

The commotion about the end of Phantom of the Opera on Broadway is more so symbolic of what this show represents in its place on Broadway. 35 years is longer than I’ve been alive, and anyone younger than 40 likely can’t remember a time before Phantom of the Opera was on Broadway. It closing will make it less accessible to Americans who aspire to see it, but I think overall it’s more about the idea of it no longer being there.

It’s about the novelty of something that has always been there suddenly being gone. It’s like if Old Faithful just… stopped.

It’s inevitable that Phantom of the Opera will eventually get a Broadway revival, but that will be a separate and distinct production. The idea that a single production can stay on Broadway for so long is a novel idea in itself, and it marks the end of an era for musical theatre fans across America.

Since I made the post about how it was gonna end soon that happened to get widely shared I thought I’d give it a send off post as well.

[rosastristes]

Hello Tumblr,

It's been a while...

I'm much older now and boy, have both of us changed.

I'm surprised you didn't get rid of the younger version of me, and I didn't think it would be fair for me to continue on those accounts. So here I am, with a new one for current and maybe future me.

A lot has changed since I last visited you. I mean, a whole pandemic came and went, and I live in a new state now....well, it's the second new one, and hopefully the last. I love it here.

I still love horror movies and still obsessed with gore movies. I still love to read, but I don't have as much time to do that now. And I now use a kindle, something old me used to be against, but man, it's so much easier to read with now that I have a baby.

Oh yeah, I'm a mom now. I'm still a bit new, but it's come so easy to me. I know, younger me would be livid. I used to not want kids, and no, it wasn't on accid either. 10 years later, I realized I love this man so much I didn't know what else to do with that excess love.

Ah, you got me there, I'm married too. About to have our 6 year wedding anniversary. I don't know if you remember that boy I met shortly before I stopped visiting you? Yep, he became permanent. We'll be celebrating our first decade together in December. Isn't that crazy?

My weird? Well, I don't have it right now...I'm hoping I get it back but I don't know. Having a baby really changed my style and nothing I wore before fits now. I've only been a mom for a couple of months.

I also just don't know how to incorporate my weird with my job. I hate feeling like I dress like every other realtor, but my body is just changing too fast for me to keep up with my weird..maybe one day, I'll get the hang of it again. My piercings aren't going anywhere.

I got more piercings now since we last saw each other. I no longer have my Medusa, but I have some other ones, plus some tattoos too.

Oh, and I'm sober, too. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I decided on this. While pregnant, I realized how much clear headed I felt. After I gave birth, I had a couple of drinks here and there, but the way it made me feel, I immediately noticed the changes it caused me.

I'm proud of myself for it though.

There's still a lot I'm working on myself for. But can I tell you my favorite change that's happened to me since we last met?

It's crazy because younger me wouldn't have thought this would ever happen.

You ready?

I'm happy now.

I'm very happy really.

I have my reasons to live. I have someone to live for. I have someone to love and care for and not just because it's an obligation, but because I chose to.

I'm happy where my life is right now, and I'm happy with my marriage.

Something about making my own choices...

Anyway, it's good to see you Tumblr. I'll hang around a little more and maybe try and write a bit again. I still like writing when I can.

Sincerely,

Black Shroom

[animeraider]

Radio Free California - 2022 on Random Play and a few final thoughts for this FRUSTRATING year.

I thought about making a "best of" list, but I realized that I'd come up with something different every time I tried. So here is a highlight reel, cultivated from all of the 2022 RFC's. Feel free to put together your own list. I recommend putting this on random play for the best possible experience - I just went through all 51 episodes for 2022 and picked the ones that tickled my fancy at that moment. If I tried again tomorrow I would probably pick 246 different songs than are on this list. 

You should subscribe to my weekly playlists to get the full experience.

So what was your 2022 like? I usually do a recap of the previous year as my last blog post but I'm really not feeling it this time around. Face it folks, 2022 SUCKED. I had a decent career year with a couple of hit singles and videos plus my improvised piano album, and I got to see both Roger Waters and Bjork live (not on the same night), but overall...?

I mean, social media imploded and fragmented, led by the Chief Twit. The Previous Motherfucker is STILL hanging on all our necks instead of in prison where he fucking belongs. Far too many Americans embrace Fascism, Racism, and a large portion of the country is now a Hee-Haw version of The Handmaid's Tale.

I can't even imagine how weird it must be to be young in this country. My children grew up in one country and as of this year it no longer exists. They're not like those of us who are old enough to remember how it used to be. 

And just what the ever-lovin' FUCK is it with wanting to destroy power stations? This is supposed to start a race war? How fucking STUPID is that? It's like saying 1+2=Licorice. The sum is less than the parts.

Strangely enough, the Pandemic has put me in a position to leave, and I just might. I'm incredibly fortunate to live in one of the remaining pockets of sanity in this country and I don't want to leave, but I don't want to live in an isolated exception to the rule either. I'd rather the whole country be sane than just my little corner of it with with fascist fucks encroaching from all sides.

I have family in Canada, New Zealand and Spain - so I have options (although I don't speak Spanish). I also have possibly misplaced hope, so I have to admit that the decision isn't an easy one. I haven't made it yet, and there are other's I'd need to convince to come with.

The craziest part about all of this is that on a whole lot of specifics America had a great year. It's just that the terrible parts are so bad that they overwhelm the good parts.

I don't think there is a "best of" 2022 to be had. I think that this has been example after example of wasted talent, potential, and ability. I think of 2022 as a squandered year. There ain't no best to be had.

Now, there's two ways to look at that: To be depressed about it or to be determined to do better. I am choosing the second option.

Taking a step back from Social Media has given me something I hadn't even noticed I had lost: TIME. I reclaim my fucking time.

I have a new single coming out the first week of January and I'm going to focus on it for a bit, but then I'm going to hunker down and fucking FINISH this album that's been percolating for the past decade. Those of you who follow my music career have heard snippets of it, but only small snippets of it. I expect that promoting and performing that album is going to take up a lot of my time in 2023. I have tickets to see Arcade Fire on my birthday, so I'll take that day off.

And then I'm going to gear up for 2024, which I want to be my busiest and most productive year musically ever. There's a couple of reasons for that - a big birthday is coming up in 2024; one my own father didn't reach. Now I don't have his issues and expect to go on for decades yet, but I'm going to fucking CELEBRATE. I hope that the country will still be here for it. Another reason is that I have set a challenge for myself and it's a difficult one, but I damned well want to TRY.

I am absolutely awful at predicting the future, but I still want to try.

So let's shake off this past year, bury it, and roll up them sleeves and get to it. I fucking HATE Hee-Haw.

See you next year.

And because I love you, I leave you with my new single.

[cooloddball]

Someone submitted something in my inbox and they wanted to remain anonymous. Since this is an extremely long essay, I will put it under the cut. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

xxx submitted: hey, i was the one who ask what do you think of Misha and Jensen's current relationship First off all thank you for your answear it means much to me cause im easy to be convice and this person who keep telling me that they are no longer friends can be so convicing, so I'm actully trying to forget what she said 😅 so I'm just writing a few. she said that since they no longer work together, they will forget about each other, and do their common things like the gay jokes, face touches ect. With other people, and neglect each other, don't talk to each other, and then meet new people who will replace the other. And and she talked about the gish thing, she said she sure they didn't talk since the end of the series, because Jensen didn't know where Misha was and Misha didn't know about the Radio Company vol 2 (but i saw people say that, they were just pretending, because Misha liked something about Radio Company Vol 2, before the gish live, so in theory he already knew then or something like that) and She said Misha wrote a poem about Darius not Jensen and now I will write down what she sent me : I saw a post about Jensen's current activities on social media, and I've come to the conclusion the only person he doesn't interact with is mish. Sadly this makes my break up theory even stronger. I feel like this is a goodbye to one of the biggest parts of my life. They've moved on from "uk what I haven't told you today? That i love u"+ from "miss my only jensen" from "i love u misha i mean it from the bottom of my heart" from "jensen has no flaws" from "misha is the funniest thing ever happened to me" from all that love and affection from everything they developed together and now they're apart leaving their lives like nothing happened and call me a dramatic but they both have the same energy now as someone has after a big break up. and Jensen comments on almost every of his friend’s post except Misha’s"+ Jenmish is genuinely the best thing that has ever happened in my entire life. I owe them literally everything. They're the reason i hold on. Unfortunately on this essay i have to start using past tense verbs for them, and i have to continue on that. I don't know for how long y'all been in spn fandom. But even if u joined one year before the show ended you'd know how close and intimate jensen and misha were. Everything about them was unmatched.+ The chemistry and how they just fit eachother. They had always been all over eachother. Like they were holding on eachother for dear life. They completed eachother and were like world's most powerful thing. They were the definition of soulmatism. No matter where, they ALWAYS kept interacting with eachother. Each possible tweet or insta post. On cons that the other wasn't there, the other one would bring up the othere's name for no absolute reason. +The looks and repeated love confessions. How invested they were both into eachother. The family they had built together cuz we know how close dee and mish are (look all the charity work they've been doing together recently). There are youtube videos to proof everything I've said so far.When i say break up, my real intention is that they've grown apart. Everything started in the the third or forth month of pandemic. Before than jensen used to interact +(comment mostly) on almost all of misha's posts. But after a while everything just stopped. At first personally didn't care that much. Bcuz I believed too much in them that I thought not even the gods above could separate them. I told myself maybe they spend long hours chatting or video calling and that's why online public interactions are gone. But as it passed it almost diminished to zero. Except some likes from jackles and eventual ones from misha there weren't anything else.+ We got absolutely no content and the show went off too. We were helpless and were sticking to everything we had Dee had a big social media shot down, so as jensen. Misha was busy with the election. We got some interviews for it with all of them. But we didn't get much.except remember both of them pulling a bff

move. and texted eachother during an online con where everyone else were dead-serious about politics? That flickered something in me. That showed me that+ they can't ever possibly let eachother go. And the times everyone else were talking and these too would just talk random things together (the one jackels had a white hat on with stacy abraham).And then Misha posted that for jensen's bday We really overlooked it. That shit was too intimate. To close. Fav march baby? U just don't go around and called ur bestie baby and when u mean it deeply. Especially not when ur friend is jensen ackles the "I suffered form internalized homophobia my whole life+ but fuck my wife's an angel and i have an angel bf too and another angel which is his wife but I'd rather die than come out cuz my asshole dad pulled a John winchester on me". It doesn't work like that. But uk how mish is. Carefree and open. I believe they got into a fight bcuz of this. He didn't even like the post. AND that was when the tiny bit of interactions we had was gone too. For a while jensen didn't even liked his posts. After a month it started again.What made me finally believe in that they had grown too+ far: I still remember the night misha posted that he and jensen were going to have a con for gish together. I remember how hard I cried. Lile the whole world was given to me. But deep down in my heart I knew that something would definitely happen. It didn't sit right with me and unfortunately my senses never lie to me. Jensen showed up at the wrong time bcuz of misunderstanding the time zones (this was HILARIOUS). That's not even my point.+ I've seen that interview 3 times so far. It always reminds me of when i saw my ex at a party and we were both so thrilled to see eachother and we still loved the other dearly, but we just couldn't work it out. Jensen and Misha's expressions were EXACTLY the same. The genuine smiles and longs pauses were they just stared at eachother. I'm so happy that it was online cuz if they actually gave that looks to eachother standing right next to the other one I would've collapsed. Misha didn't know that jensen's album+ was out. And he got so embarrassed when he found it out. He didn't know that jensen was on set and hadn't been home for 8weeks. Jensen had no idea where misha was. And this means that they hadn't talked in a long long time.When you're that close with someone for more than a decade, i mean THAT close, even if u're separated from eachother you'd at least check on the once a week, or at least once in two weeks. But it was vividly clear that they hadn't. I hate how this world works. They would always be in my heart.+ I would be thankful from them for everything. It hurts, and it won't stop and im so sure I'd be carrying this pain for a long time. They mean too much to a lot of us. Sometimes I think to myself that god i love them so much. Remember in 2019 when we used to get SO many jenmishdee interactions? That was LIT. It was THEE year for us. I hope they're doing good. I really do. I hope we don't get more proofs and I won't have to update this thread. Cuz my heart won't be taking it very+ well.Something i gotta add U may say that Jensen's busy and that's why he doesn't comment. But he comments on a lot of jared and his new costar's posts. So that's no excuse. So yeah that's it. I don't know what am I supposed to think. english isn't my native language, so sorry for the mistakes

Here is my response:

I don't know who this person who has been talking to is but I have to say they seem to be project their previous relationship experience on cockles.

I believe Jensen and Misha are okay and are together. Social media likes and comments don't mean anything. I mean it's not like Jensen or Misha used to comment on each other's posts before. Jensen didn't even wish Dee Happy Mother's Day this year, does that mean they are not together anymore? Nope. He has other best friends he has known for over 20 years like Jason Manns, Steve Carlson etc that he doesn't wish happy birthday, does that mean they are not friends anymore.

Please let's not put value on social media likes. I don't even follow my own family on sm and I don't always like or comment on my bf's or bff's posts on sm. So it doesn't mean anything.

As for the Gish Panel, I have talked about it before, the time Jensen was slotted to attend the panel, he was meant to answer fan questions. I honestly believe they decided to not do it at that time because they knew the questions would be about Destiel and not their new projects. If you watched that panel, Misha knew that Jensen's album was out as I pointed out. He was just trying to promote the album and soldier boy. He knew Jensen had also buffed out. It was all to promote Jensen. Anything else you hear is trolls and antis just being loud. Also don't forget Jensen called him "babe".

If Jensen and Misha weren't okay, he wouldn't have attended or participated all those panels Misha organized especially for Gish. Danneel also posts a lot about RA and likes Misha's posts. I am 100% Misha visited the Ackles when he went to Colorado last month.

Stop listening to trolls and/or antis or just people who are projecting and look at facts.

[thisselflovecamebacktome]

I wanna circle back to this and give my longer thoughts now that my internet is back and I have a bit of time.

For full transparency, I'm looking at this through an Australian lens; so I make no promises about it being universal. I'm also going to focus on the fields that I have received degrees in and/or worked in because that's where my expertise is.

Over the years, there's been this big oxymoron where information has become both easier to access (generally and in some ways academic given most people can take HECS out for university) while also more restrictive (prices of university). Due to this oxymoron, we have reached a point where it's becoming increasingly normal for university degrees to become an personal experience, not something to achieve a door into the career you want.

When I first started university just under a decade ago, the first thing my first lecturer told the class was that unless we were planning to do a doctorate (in forensic science because originally that's what I was going to go to university for) or had a parent in the industry, we were not going to get jobs in the industry. It was a sentiment repeated in the two degrees I did (law and psychology) despite them being "growing" fields. Now I will say that of course I am pro learning for the sake of learning, but being practical, the $52,000AUD debt (which is cheap in comparison to most international countries from what I've been told) I acquired is no joke and not a privilege that everyone, especially those who can't take out loans, can afford to partake in. Like even with the loan, I took a year off (in which I changed degrees) to make sure it was worth it for me as someone in a poverty level family financially. This is especially the case when you're being told that chances are you're not going to be able to pay it off with a career of your choice afterwards.

Worse yet, the previous national government to Australia's current one hiked prices for certain courses (which people have noted are the ones that would most likely lead people to criticise said government but that's a whole other discussion), included ones "desperately in need" like psychology, during the pandemic. Though they did reduce both the requirements and costs of other degrees such as nursing and other medical fields and teaching (as have the state governments), it was too little too late (I also have my concerns with how the governments have done this because I truly believe it's led to underqualified and undertrained people in the field, but that's a whole other issue). A lot of doctors and students doing their internships/training were too burnt out to continue and it was made all the worse by the lack of psychologists because surprise, that was one of the fields that were now harder to get into AND because they didn't have the access to legal help because again, field that was harder to get into now. So now, despite having an easier time getting into the course, we're hearing more and more stories about how these students are getting burnt out faster once hitting the field... if they can even get to that at all because the lack of experience staff means lack of mentoring/training/internships which is a requirement of finishing these degrees. And then if somehow they get through all of that, they're usually met with jobs that are severely underpaid and unappreciated. A lot of this can be said about non university jobs like retail too.

And even in better paying fields like (usually the private sector given the public sector is underpaid) psychology and law, the amount of work that's being required of you really means that the pay per hour is not as high as people perceive. The average lawyer in Australia works 80 hours a week (38 hours is considered full time here for comparison) and when I worked as a receptionist at a private psychology clinic, I worked up to 65 hours a week (I was technically meant to work 37.5 hours a week but often worked overtime) and the psychologists I worked with, even the ones in training, saw over 100 patients a week which meant they were working at least 98 hours a week even before putting in any consideration for the work they do out of sessions (thankfully ours were at a minimum because the receptionists took over as much as we could; hence why I worked so much overtime lmao. But obviously we couldn't do certain phone calls or reports etc). When you take that into consideration, a lot of the time, the psychologists were actually making close to minimum wage for their time, even if overall they are on higher wages.

On the other side of the "information is easier than ever to obtain" side of things, there is so much free information on youtube and other platforms, including stuff they teach at university. This is amazing, and the only thing stopping everyone from getting their information this way is the perception that it's "lesser" than going to university; a perception that is slowly fading, especially in fields like the arts, administrative positions and technology from what I've seen. Social media and other technology related fields are also among the fastest growing fields, especially since the pandemic. So why not take advantage of this extra information; especially if you're not currently working, and try to make money without the costs or other downfalls of university level careers? And obviously that's not to say that I think creators are lazy, I know a lot of work goes into it, a lot of them feel burnout too and obviously only very few people go viral and are able to maintain it. But honestly, the positives outweigh the negatives at this point in terms of financial risk, apathy (typically people creating content are doing so for content they like), flexibility, enhancing skills + connections to get other jobs and more.

And like anon said, that's a problem. But it's one that the government has waited too long to fix, and, barring a complete overhaul of the job market and university system, I don't know if we'll ever fix. And unfortunately, again like anon said, we're going to be worse off for it and it makes me both anxious and so incredibly sad to think about, ngl.

I actually have this feeling that we are approaching another internet bubble situation. Everyone is making money online so easly nowdays (only fans, tiktok, yt shorts, reels, twitch) and i see so many young people not caring about studing etc cause they wanna be Internet famous, but i feel like is getting oversaturated and there's nowhere to go but to burst this bubble.

So I have a lot to say about this but am on my phone atm (rip my home internet being out atm) and would rather have my laptop to type it out, but ultimately I agree and think society as a whole, especially the job market and economy, has a lot to do with it and ultimately we will be all the worse for it.

[insanityclause]

SPOILER ALERT: This article contains details of the first five episodes of Disney+’s Loki, & maybe the finale. Maybe.

EXCLUSIVE: “I have learned, at this point, having said goodbye to the character more than twice, two and a half times maybe, to make no assumptions,” says Loki’s Tom Hiddleston as the hours tick away to the finale of the Disney+ series drops early on Wednesday morning. “We’ll see where the ride goes now,” the Marvel alum adds.

As always with almost any project from the Kevin Feige run studio, that ride could continue, at least in some form or another. Certainly, the June 9 ‘Glorious Purpose’ premiere of the Michael Waldron penned and Kate Herron directed Loki proved to be the Disney+ and the MCU’s biggest small screen success so far. Also with any Marvel project, past Emmy winner Hiddleston was elusive on what could be coming next, be it in the Loki finale, another season or another appearance in the movies as the MCU shifts into its next phrase.

One thing is clear, after a decade playing the God of Mischief, Hiddleston still has a lot of Loki on the brain, in the best way.Leading towards the finale, I chatted with a UK-based Hiddleston about returning to play Loki and the search for who or what controls the seemingly all knowing, all powerful Time Variance Authority. The Night Manager star also spoke about filming during the coronavirus pandemic, working with Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Wunmi Mosaku, Richard E. Grant, and Sophia Di Martino, who portrays variant and soulmate Sylvie, and his upcoming AppleTV+ series The Essex Serpent with Claire Danes.

DEADLINE: There’s a great line in this season’s penultimate episode where your Loki and Sylvie are stunned at watch Richard E. Grant’s Classic Loki recreate Asgard to distract Alioth and you say “I think we’re stronger than we realize.” There seems to be a great resonance in the line that there’s a whole lot of Loki coming in the finale and probably more …

HIDDLESTON: I suppose it resonates with the theme that we all wanted to highlight about purpose and about meaning. Loki’s someone who’s probably been deluded by the idea that he’s burdened with glorious purpose, and that perhaps that purpose has been revealed to be fraudulent or meaningless, and maybe his self-image or the role that he has condemned himself to play is redundant.

His experiences through this story have shown him that there are actually more opportunities available to him, and you know, it speaks to this idea, like, can we change? Can we evolve, and in that evolution, is there room to grow? You know, so, I think the stronger than we realize I think is Loki finally understanding that, really, by caring for other people, that maybe there’s power in that, and I found that very touching, and the whole thing is an extraordinary dream.

DEADLINE: Speaking of an extraordinary dream, you have been playing Loki for a decade now, since the first Thor movie, We know you are going to do some voice work in the animated What If…? series, but how has it been having this series directly centering on him, in all his variants, so to speak?

HIDDLESTON: You know Dominic, I have enjoyed it so much, because I felt it was a gift and a privilege to be invited to come and sit at the table and think about what the show might be. Also, I suppose so many of the things that I’ve discovered about Loki as a character in the comics and a character in the Norse myths, in the canon, aspects that I’ve always thought were interesting, and understandably, there hasn’t been time or space in the movies to explore them.

DEADLINE: In terms of who he is?

HIDDLESTON: Those aspects of him have been externalized and embedded into this new story about identity itself and about integrating the disparate fragment of the many selves that he is or perhaps the many selves that we are. You know, we contain multitudes. Loki certainly contains multitudes. We have met many of those multitudes, including Alligator Loki (laughs).

DEADLINE: Sounds like you’re not done with those multitudes yet. From your POV, from conversations with Kevin (Feige) is there more that you see for the character as the MCU heads into its next stages?

HIDDLESTON: Well, I certainly don’t have Kevin’s brain or encyclopedic knowledge or capacity for invention. I’ve been on the ride for a while, and it’s been the most extraordinary journey, and to have lived through different iterations, different phases of the MCU, and I’m so grateful that I’m still here, and it’s been amazing to watch. I feel that the MCU is even more expansive, is even braver, more inclusive than it’s ever been.

DEADLINE: How so?

HIDDLESTON: I think the stories are getting really exciting. Not that they weren’t before, but I think they understand that the investment of the audience is very deep, and they don’t take it for granted for a second. So, yeah, I suppose the perspective I have on how Loki might affect the ongoing course of the MCU is this idea of the multiverse. People have already understood it when Miss Minutes is introducing Loki to the TVA. She talks about the multiverse and the war and that the sacred timeline, which is reality as we know it.

DEADLINE: It opens up the aperture certainly for new stories from all opportunities, doesn’t it?

HIDDLESTON: It raises questions of, well, maybe there are other parallel or alternate universes. Maybe there are other realities, and the possibilities there are endless. I feel that at the end of episode five, Loki and Sylvie are close to discovering the answers to the questions that they have of who is behind the TVA and that, somehow, this will provoke even more curiosity about…

DEADLINE: …Because in the Marvel Universe, answering one set of questions always leads to another set of questions, in many ways.

HIDDLESTON: Right. Yeah. Yeah, and I know that there are lots of, you know, interesting titles of movies that’ve been announced, which kind of hint at where it might be going.

DEADLINE: One of those that hasn’t been officially announced, but is rumored is a Season 2 for Loki, in gear under the temporary title of Architect on call sheets and the like …

HIDDLESTON: Well, yes, maybe, as I say, all the kind of multiple alternate realities are …it’s taken me 10 years to get a handle on this sort of mono timeline. The idea that this might be a multiverse is actually beyond my knowledge of physics.

DEADLINE: Well, I doubt that, but let me ask, and no spoilers for the finale or further, but if Kevin, Marvel, Disney asked you to do more Loki, are you game?

HIDDLESTON: (laughs) I have learned, at this point, having said goodbye to the character more than twice, two and a half times maybe, to make no assumptions. So, I’m also aware that I’m only playing him because of the audience, really. So, it’s not up to me. But I do love playing him, and every time, I seem to find new, interesting things about him. So, yeah, I’m a temporary passenger on Loki’s journey, but we’ll see. We’ll see where the ride goes now.

DEADLINE: On the ride, as the finale looms, there’s a ton of fan speculation out there and so much that people have hooked on to from the show. So, as the man at the center of it, what was your favorite part of Loki the series?

HIDDLESTON: That there was meaning in the making of it.That we crossed the finish line in the middle of a global pandemic and could create something, and more than ever, I felt really grateful for being able to do this job. I think in this there are some of those questions that we were all asking ourselves in the last 18 months in the show, you know, what do our lives mean?📷I love taking Loki in new directions. I love the contributions of my fellow actors, of Owen Wilson and Sophia Di Martino and Richard E. Grant and Gugu Mbatha-Raw, and Wunmi Masaku, they all brought so much to the table, and I’ll always remember that. You know, I’ll always remember just being in Atlanta with all of them and making our bonkers show. Yeah.

DEADLINE: Making your bonkers show in Atlanta as the world, as America was still in the heat of the pandemic. What was that like, because you were in production and then everything stopped and then you came back, right?

HIDDLESTON: I mean, people have used this word a lot, but it really was unprecedented. I think we did six weeks of filming before the hiatus, and then the production was suspended for four or five months, and we came back. At first, it was unfamiliar because we had to make adjustments, but the thing I remember most of all, quite honestly, is the diligence and resilience and spirit of our cast and crew.

DEADLINE: Really?

HIDDLESTON: Yes, and it remains extremely special for me, this project, for that reason.For me, it just demonstrated the character of these amazing people. It took a huge amount of planning and care and looking after each other. By that, I mean, being in the bubble. So, for many of us, the only other human beings we saw, really, were each other. So, we came to work, and we became a team, and the circumstances fostered this extraordinary team spirit, and so the memory of making it is really my incredible and deep respect and affection for my fellow filmmakers. People like Trish Stanard, our line producer. Richard Graves, our first AD. Kristina Peterson, our second AD. Autumn Durald, DP. Kevin Wright, our supervising producer, and so many others making sure everyone could stay safe and look after each other.It’s really…I find it…it’s very moving, and it’s remarkable, and I just want to salute them all because I couldn’t have done any of it without them.

DEADLINE: In that vein, you have just come off filming The Essex Serpent with Claire Danes for AppleTV+. Very different from Loki, and yet also a tale of what is real and who we are. Is that what attracted you to it on some level?

HIDDLESTON: I read it and immediately connected to it. Read the screenplay, the adaptation. It’s based on a novel by Sarah Perry, which was published in 2016 and is set at the end of the 19th century. It’s an extraordinary story about uncertainty and about our deepest fears and how sometimes our fears can distort our imaginings and how our minds can lie to us. About how we have to guard against that, and Perry sets it in this extraordinary time with a beautiful leading character of Cora Seaborne, played by Claire. Anna Symon adopted it.

There’s this community on the east coast of England who believe that an ancient beast has been awakened by an earthquake and that it’s dislodged all these fossils. But perhaps, it has also dislodged this ancient underwater monster, which has been used to explain certain unusual phenomena. This was in the era when Darwin had just been published a few decades before and people are starting to think, this Charles Darwin, he’s onto something. Still, fear spreads very quickly, and it’s a very fascinating time where science and faith are in conflict.

DEADLINE: When you describe it like that it sounds very Loki indeed.

HIDDLESTON: Maybe the themes are very Loki. Maybe that’s where they join up, but I’m playing a 19th century vicar who is trying to contain his community. You feel very destabilized by all these rumors. So, yeah, to go from Loki to a vicar was definitely new, a new territory.

DEADLINE: Literally and figuratively?

HIDDLESTON: Well, it’s my first significant time in Essex, where we filmed, which I feel embarrassed about. I’ve been to Essex before, but I’ve never been to the very, very eastern, most eastern coast of Essex. It’s the Blackwater Estuary, which then feeds into the River Thames, and it’s a very ancient part of England. It’s so marshy, it’s where in Great Expectations, that’s where Pip meets Magwitch for the first time. It’s all foggy and muddy and marshy and quite atmospheric and a perfect place to set a story about of uncertainty and fear and gothic romance. Clio Barnard directed it, and working with her has been amazing.

DEADLINE: You know, it occurs to me that of all the main Marvel characters, Loki has been such a constant, yet so ethereal in so many ways too. Is it jarring for you to jump back into the role with all the uncertainty it brings?

HIDDLESTON: You know, I’ve always seen it as sort of an extraordinary and surprising constant in my life for a decade. But, I don’t take it for granted because I don’t often…you know, it may end. It has actually ended, and those endings have been conclusive. I really thought a couple of years ago, after I made Avengers: Infinity War, you know, we all know what happens in that scene, and I thought, that’s it.I thought it’s over, and I was really proud to have been part of it. I was grateful for my time, but I thought that, my work would go off in a different direction. So, the idea that I got to come back and have another go was a complete delight, it truly was.

[howdon-aldi-death-queue]

NEW SAM FENDER INTERVIEW FOR NME

THE BIG READ

Sam Fender: “This album is probably the best thing I’ve done in my life”

The hometown hero has distanced himself from the ‘Geordie Springsteen’ tag, but there’s no shortage of rites-of-passage yarns and colossal tunes on the upcoming ‘Seventeen Going Under’

“You can see the ghost of Thatcherism over there…” says Sam Fender, pointing across the water to a vacant shipyard, where once the shipbuilding industry was so healthy that vessels towered higher than the rows of houses on the shore. We’re on the waterfront in North Shields, just outside Newcastle, and our photographer is snapping away for Sam’s first NME cover shoot.

The singer-songwriter stares stonily into the lens as wafts of seaweed and fishing trawlers are carried by the northern coastal breeze. He’s already been stopped for a few pictures with fans, but remains eager to point out the impact that Tory leadership has had on his working-class town over the last few decades. “It’s been closed since the ’80s, from the ghost wasteland of the shipyards. You’ve got all the scars of Thatcherism from The Tyne all over to the pit villages in Durham.”

It’s as good an introduction as any to the outspoken musician, whose 2019 debut album ‘Hypersonic Missiles’ was a record for his sleepy hometown to be proud of – tackling themes that range from male suicide (the heartbreaking ‘Dead Boys’) to world tensions (and the “kids in Gaza” he eulogised on its soaring title track). He set weighty topics against blisteringly well-executed Americana with the fist-in-the-air euphoria of Bruce Springsteen’s colossal choruses and sax solos. Much like his hero, Sam smartly weaves his own political standpoint and personal circumstance into gripping anthems of a generation, which earned him the ‘Geordie Springsteen’ tag.

“I can’t exactly bat off those comparisons, can I?” he says back in his cosy recording studio nearby. “At the same time, I don’t feel worthy of that tag. The first time I heard it, I was like, ‘That’s fucking sick’, but you don’t want to be riding off the coattails of The Boss for the rest of your life. I can write my own songs, they’re different and my voice doesn’t sound anything like Springsteen’s. I don’t have his growl; I’m a little fairy when I sing.”

He may have toned down the Springsteen vibes slightly on his highly anticipated second album ‘Seventeen Going Under’, due later this year, but there are still plenty of chest-pounding anthems capable of making your hairs stand on end: “I much prefer Americana to the music we have in our country at the moment. I love the leftfield indie stuff like Fontaines D.C, Squid and Black Midi, but I love a chorus and melodic songs. I think the American alternative scene has that down with Pinegrove, Big Thief, The War On Drugs.”

‘Hypersonic Missiles’ thrummed with a small town frustration almost that every suburban teenager could surely relate to. This was most notable on ‘Leave Fast’, where he sang about the “boarded up windows on the promenade / The shells of old nightclubs” and “intoxicated people battling on the regular in a lazy Low Lights bar”, a reference to his beloved local. But album two sees him fully embrace North Shields, an ever-present backdrop to cherished memories and harrowing life events of his youth and surroundings.

It’s no coincidence that the 27-year-old has turned inwards and penned a record about his hometown while being stuck at home like the rest of the country: “I didn’t have anything to point at and I didn’t want to talk about the pandemic because nobody wants that – I never want to hear about it again. It was such a stagnant time that I had to go inwards and find something, because I was so uninspired by the lifetime we we’re living in.

“I’ve made my coming-of-age record and that was important for me – as I get older, these stories keep appearing; I’ve got so much to talk about. I wrote about growing up here. It’s about mental health and how things that happen as a child impact your self-esteem in later life. On the first record, I was pointing at stuff angrily, but the further I’ve gotten into my 20s, the more I’ve realised how little I know about anything. When you hit 25, you’re like: ‘I’m fucking clueless! I know nothing about the world.’ It was a humbling experience, growing up.”

Early last year, before the pandemic hit, Sam was set to jet off to New York pre-pandemic to record in the city’s infamous Electric Lady studios founded by Jimi Hendrix. “Looking back, I’m thankful that it happened,” he says. “If I went off to New York and did my second album there… it wouldn’t have been the same record. I will go and do the third one in NYC, come hell or high water – I’m fucking out of here!

“The forced return home really informed the direction [of the record]. I was on the crest of this insane wave; we’d sold out 84,000 tickets for the [‘Hypersonic Missiles] arena tour that we still haven’t played yet. I’m still waiting to hear when it’s going to be rescheduled. It’s incredibly frustrating; I’ve got loads of frustrated fans. That was all cancelled on the day of the lockdown. I thought it was only going to be a couple of months and that it would be another swine flu thing, but fool me – I was stuck in the house like everybody else.”

It’s not the first setback that Sam has dealt with in his career. In the summer of 2019, he was ready to make his Glastonbury Festival debut with a Friday afternoon set on the legendary John Peel Stage, a rite of passage for any emerging artist, but had to pull out due to a serious health issue with his vocal chords. The mood in the room shifts dramatically at the mention of this devastating period: “I don’t want to focus on that, to be honest, because it’s just negative news and it’s in the past.”

“The further I’ve gotten into my 20s, the more I’ve realised how little I know”

Looking back now, he says, it was a tough decision, but ultimately the right thing to do: “We were doing so much at the time and I just burnt out. If you damage your vocal cords, you can’t take it lightly. If something happens like that and you keep going, you’ll fucking lose your career forever. I never want to end up behind the knife; I just refuse to put myself in that situation.”

The fact that his 2019 breakthrough ground to a halt again in COVID-decimated 2020 “was frustrating as fuck”, he says, “but I took solace in the fact that everyone was stopped in their tracks that time; it wasn’t just me.” This was in stark contrast to the singer’s experience of pulling the biggest moment of his music career in order to rest his vocal cords: “I didn’t talk for three weeks; I had to be silent and just watch Glastonbury on the TV, going, ‘This is completely dogshit’. But you can’t even say that out loud – you’re just saying it over in your head like a psycho. I’d take a pandemic over that any day.”

There was a brief flash of light when he headlined the opening night at the world’s first socially distanced arena, Newcastle’s Virgin Money Unity venue, to an audience of 2,500. Yet Sam’s not in the mood to wax lyrical about that, either. “It was amazing,” he says, “but it didn’t happen again.” A local lockdown in the North East brought the following shows – which would have featured Kaiser Chiefs and Declan McKenna – to a premature end in September: “It was another false start. We thought everything was going to get moving again but then we were just sat around [again].”

As for this reaction to the Government’s handling of the pandemic? It perhaps says it all that he’s selling face masks emblazoned with the words ‘2020 Shit Show’ and ‘Dystopian Nightmare Festival’ on his website. “I think everyone has said enough haven’t they?” Sam suggests. “I never want to see Boris Johnson’s or Matt Hancock’s face ever again. As soon as they come on the TV, I just turn it off.”

Political tension bubbles through ‘Seventeen Going Under’. Its second half boasts tracks such as ‘Long Way Off’, a brooding but colossal festival anthem brimming with angst and unease. “Standing on the side I never was the silent type,” Fender roars, “I heard a hundred million voices / sound the same both left and right / we’re still alone we are.” It’s gripping stuff; a Gallagher-level anthem ripe for pyro and pints held aloft.

Sam says the song is about feeling stranded amid political divisiveness here and in the US, epitomised when Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington back in January: “You’ve either got right-wing, racist idiots or you’ve got this elitist, upper-middle-class section of the left-wing, which completely alienates people like myself and people from my hometown.”

“The polarity between the left and the right has me feeling like I have no identity”

Closer to home, the last UK election, in 2019, saw the so-called ‘Red Wall’ crumble as working-class voters in the north defected from Labour to Tory. “The polarity between the left and the right has me feeling like I have no identity,” Sam says. “I’m obviously left-wing, but you lose hope don’t you? Left-wing politics has lost its main votership; it doesn’t look after working-class people the way that it used to. Blyth Valley voted Tory just north of here. Now, that is saying something! We’re in dire straits when a fucking shipbuilding town is voting for the Tories – it’s like foxes voting for the hunter.”

He’s even seen his own working-class friends peel to the blue side: “I’m like, ‘What the fuck is going on?’ I understand it, though. I’d never vote for the bastards because I fucking hate them and I know what they’re up to, but I get why people don’t feel any alliegiance to left-wing politics when they’re working-class.”

As ever though, Sam isn’t masquerading as an expert: “I’m not fucking Noam Chomsky, you know what I mean? I’m not going to dissect the whole political agenda of the Tories and figure it all out because I can’t. All I see is a big fucking shit sandwich – every day through my news feed – and it’s just, ‘Well: that’s what your dealing with.”

The singer is fond of describing North Shields as “a drinking town with a fishing problem”. Today he adds: “That’s been the backdrop of my life: all of these displaced working-class people. It’s a town that’s resilient that still has a strong sense of community. In a lot of big cities that’s dead. In London everything changes from postcode to postcode, but everything is quite uniform up here.”

When NME was awaiting Sam’s arrival outside the studio before the interview, a passerby clocked our photographer’s gear and asked, “Oh aye – are you waiting for Sam? We all know Sam – a good lad; very accommodating with nae airs or graces about him.” Another pointed to The Low Lights Tavern down the road, where Fender used to pull pints on the weekends: “He was a terrible barman, and he’ll be the first to tell you that. I think he got sacked about six times during his time there.”

Sam (who confesses of his bartending know-how: “He’s totally right!”) hit the local to celebrate when ‘Hypersonic Missiles’ won him a Critics’ Choice gong at the BRIT Awards in 2019, placing the trophy on the bar. “I owed The Low Lights one for being such a shit barman,” he says. “I wanted them to be proud of us because they fucking certainly wasn’t proud of us when I was around working there!”

“Celebrity stuff freaks me out. I’d rather just live my life”

He’s clearly a key member of the local community, then. How did he see the pandemic impact on his family and friends – especially when the North East faced the toughest Tier Four lockdown restrictions last December? Sam pauses before bluntly saying: “I lost more mates; there was suicides again. Mental health was the biggest thing. We lost friends who had drunk too much.”

A track on the new record, ‘The Dying Light‘, is an epic sequel to ‘Dead Boys’, with the poignant last line of the album ringing out “for all the ones who didn’t make the night”. Sam, unable to truly distance himself from The Boss after all, explains: “It’s very Springsteen. It’s my ‘Jungleland’ or ‘Thunder Road’ – it’s got that ‘Born To Run’ feel; there’s strings and brass [and] it’s fucking massive. It’s a celebration. It’s a triumph over adversity.”

He stresses that it was vital for him to be in regular contact with his friendship circle through that traumatic time: “It becomes important when you lose friends to suicide… You realise it’s always the unlikely folks. We lost a friend to suicide at the beginning of last year and it was someone you’d never expect. It really hits home; it’s important to check in on your mates.”

Sam has alluded in previous interviews to a health condition that he’s not yet ready to fully disclose, and tells NME that he spent three months shielding at the beginning of the pandemic: “I was alone for three months and that was very tough… When you’re completely alone and isolated, it’s impossible. I spent a lot of time drinking and not really looking after myself and eating shit food, but I wrote a lot of good lyrics.”

There’s a certain resulting bleakness to some of his new songs, but Sam also wanted light to shine through. “It’s a darker record, but it’s a celebration of surviving and coming out the other end,” he explains. “It’s upbeat but the lyrics can be quite honest. It’s the most honest thing I’ve done.”

You might expect a young hometown hero to rail at having been denied the chance to capitalise on his burgeoning fame in the last year or so, but Sam insists, “I still have imposter syndrome,” adding: “I don’t feel like it’s happened… I’m walking around the street and people ask for photos and it just feels bizarre. I’m like, really? I feel like I haven’t come out of my shell yet.”

Sam has rarely been one to court celebrity, and revealed in 2019 that he’d turned down the chance to appear in an Ariana Grande video. “It was an honour but I would have just been known as that guy in the video,” he tells NME. “All of my mates would have been flipping their heads off, but I don’t think she would really want an out-of-shape, pale Geordie. I’d rather just live my life, because all of this celebrity stuff freaks [me] out, you know?”

He might have to get used to it: things can only get bigger with the arrival of the new album. “As a record I think this one is leagues ahead [of ‘Hypersonic Missiles’],” he says, “I’m more proud of this than anything I’ve ever done. It’s probably the best thing I’ve done in my life. I just hope people love it as much as I do. With the first album, a lot of those songs were written when I was 19, so I was over half of it [by the time it was released]. Whereas this one is where I’m at now.”

“This is a dark record, but it’s a celebration of surviving and coming out the other end”

Still, he adds: “At the same time, this record is probably going to piss a lot of people off.” He’s referring to a line in one of the more political tracks, ‘Aye’, where he returns to his most enduring bugbear, divisiveness, and claims that “the woke kids are just dickheads”. Sam’s no less forthcoming in person: “They fucking are, though! Some 22-year-old kid from Goldsmiths University sitting on his fucking high horse arguing with some working-class person on some comments section calling them an ‘idiot’ and a ‘bigot’? Nobody engages each other in a normal discussion [online] without calling each other a ‘thick cunt’.”

He’s eager to make this statement, though, come what may: “I don’t fucking care any more. I’m not really sure how the reaction is going to be. People used to say things online about me and I used to get quite hurt about it, but now I’m like, ‘Well, they’re not coming to my house’… [But] I get so angry. In Newcastle we say ‘pet’ and someone was trying to tell me that was fucking offensive towards women. You’re not going to delete my fucking colloquial identity. It’s not even gender-specific; we say it to men and women. My Grandma calls me ‘pet’! That brand of liberalism is fucking destroying the country. We could be getting Boris Johnson and all them pricks out of office if we stopped sweating over shit like that”.

Sam might be outspoken, but he’s self-aware, too. When we were talking politics earlier, he said: “I didn’t want to start on ‘cancel culture’ because I don’t want to sound like Piers Morgan [and] I fucking hate that cunt. But there is a degree of it which lacks redemption; people fuck up. Everyone is a flawed character. If you’re not admitting that you have flaws, then you’re a fucking psychopath. The left-wing seem to be that way and the right-wing are fucking worse than they’ve ever been. Politically I have just lost my shit.”

In all of this uncertainty, though, it seems a sure thing that Sam Fender will take his rightful crown – as soon as the world lets him – with the colossal ‘Seventeen Going Under’. “It’s going to be a hell of a return,” he insists. “I know the fans are still there, you know? So I’m not really worried – I’m ready to go out there and do my thing. Finally!”

[pitubea1910]

10th Anniversary

Pairing: Harry Styles x Reader

Words: 4k

Warnings: -

Tags: -

Request: -

Notes: I was supposed to post this for their 10th Anniversary but I totally forgot about it and just found it on my drafts! So I hope you like it :)

MASTERLIST

The moment you woke up you knew what day it was without even looking at the calendar.

July 23rd 2020.

10 years. It had been a whole decade since all the craziness started. Looking back now, you would have never imagined everything you all had gone through in that time, how much you had grown up -together and separated-, how much your lives had changed.

You were a 15 years-old-girl when you met them thanks to your aunt Lou. When you first laid eyes on them, you just saw five loud and unstoppable guys. You would have never imagined that you would find four brothers and something else in them.

However, there you were, 10 years later, checking your Twitter timeline with a stupid grin on your face. It looked like 2012 all over again and you loved it. You missed those times like crazy. Of course, you knew the hiatus was coming the moment Zayn left the band -and they had earned every single day of it-, but that didn’t change how much you missed them all.

Even though you had kept in touch with the five of them it wasn’t the same. They were all busy with their own solo projects and they barely had the time to meet up. You couldn’t blame them, but you still missed them. Especially the green-eyed one.

Harry and you immediately clicked when you met. It turned out you had a lot in common and similar personalities. You had a tight relation with the whole group, but what you and Harry had was special. Probably it helped that you were the same age. But the truth was that it didn’t matter the reason, you were always together.

Everyone who saw you together and knew how your relationship was just kept on saying that you two would end up together. It turned out they weren’t completely wrong, although it never worked out the way you would have wanted. You were a couple for less than a year. It was the best year of your life and the worst break-up you ever had.

You loved him and he loved you, there was no doubt of that, but it was too complicated to keep it going. As much as you loved touring the world with them, spending every single day with Harry, you also needed a life of your own, you wanted to go to college and doing it from afar didn’t work for you. It was the hardest decision you ever made, but everyone understood and supported you. Harry the most.

It broke his heart as well, but he knew he couldn’t ask you to keep with his lifestyle. He had to let you go. You gave distance a chance, but with their schedules and the time zones it soon became impossible. You remembered the last FaceTime you had, how heartbroken you both were. But it was for the best.

You never lost contact though. Every single time he would come to London he called you to spend a day together. Those days ended up being the best days of the year and they usually ended with you two going back to his place and spending the night together. And every morning your heart broke knowing you had to say goodbye again. But you kept on coming back to him every time his name showed up on your screen.

Usually he was the one who reached out, which made sense since he was the one who was travelling all the time. That morning, that July 23rd, was different. You texted first for the first time in a long time.

Happy 10 years, Styles. Wish we could celebrate together. Love you.

You gulped before sending the text. He was probably in the States and he wouldn’t see it for another few hours, so after sending some other texts to Louis, Liam, Niall and Zayn, you got out of bed and headed to the shower. Usually, you would have to hurry to get to your internship, but with the pandemic you still didn’t have to go, so you had another day completely off.

However, before you got into the shower, you heard your ringtone. You frowned confused. It was way too early for your mum to be calling, so you had no clue who could it be. Maybe it was your boss, giving you an update on the status of your internship. With a sigh, you turned on the water and went back to the room, hoping it would be a quick call so you could go back to your shower.

You took the phone without even looking at the phone and answered it.

“Hello?” You said as you started walking back to the bathroom.

“Happy ten years to you too, love”, a deep known voice said on the other side, making you stop on your tracks as your heart started racing.

Quickly, you checked the caller and saw Harry’s name. He was probably the last person you expected to talk to that day.

“Thanks”, you finally managed to say when you put your phone against your ear.

“I’m guessing you didn’t expect my call?” He said. Judging by his tone, you knew he was smirking, which made you smile.

“You guessed correctly”, you admitted. “How are you awake?”

“I was out for an early run”, he said, making you frown.

“Wait, are you in England?”

“In London to be more accurate”, he said.

“R-really?” You stuttered.

“So maybe we can also make the celebration happen”, he said.

“Really?” You repeated. “I mean, yes! That would be great!”

You smacked yourself on the forehead for being such a nerd. He chuckled quietly before saying he had to make some calls during the morning, but he could pick you up at noon to have some lunch. You said yes immediately. Most of the restaurants were still closed, but he was Harry Styles. He always had a trick up his sleeve, and you couldn’t see what he would pull off that day.

Since you woke up way too early, the morning went off slowly. Or maybe it was just you being impatient. However, you finally got a text from Harry saying he was parked outside of your building. You grabbed your purse with the basic stuff -wallet, keys and phone- and a mask. Once you were sure you had locked the door properly, you went to the elevator.

Usually, he would wait for you in his car in case some recognised him. So it shocked you to see him casually leaning against the vehicle when you walked out of the building. When he heard you, he looked up from his phone. You couldn’t see his whole face due to the mask he was wearing, but his eyes told you he was smiling.

Despite all the precautions and distancing you were supposed to take, you knew it wouldn’t work with him. He was like a magnet and all you wanted to do was hug him and have him hugging you.

“Can I hug you?” He asked.

The fact that he was thinking the same as you made you laugh. All you did was hugging him tightly. He could always hug you, no matter what. He was the exception to every rule.

“I missed you”, you said with your eyes closed, which made him squeeze you a bit tighter.

“Me too”, he whispered.

You spent a couple of minutes just holding each other before he pulled away and opened the passenger door for you. You thanked him with a smile and got into the car and buckled up while he walked around the vehicle to get in before taking off the mask. You did the same and looked at him, the whole him this time.

“I love your hair short”, you said.

Harry looked at you with a dimpled smile and ran a hand through his hair -an old habit he didn’t seem to be able to shake but you loved- before turning on the engine.

“How long has it been?” He asked once he started driving.

“Christmas, I think”, you said after thinking about it for a moment. “Hans’ Christmas party before you went back to the States.”

“Right”, he said and looked at you, making you blush and smile at the memories of that night. “How have you been?”

“Locked”, you chuckled making him chuckle as well. “But good, I finished my thesis, watched a lot of movies and TV shows and baked. A lot.”

“You’ve always been good at baking”, he said.

“And you’ve always been good at eating”, you teased, making him laugh. “What about you?”

“I got stuck in the States until a few days ago”, he shrugged. “Didn’t do much either.”

“Sorry about your tour, by the way”, you said when you remembered. “I was excited.”

“Me too”, he sighed. “But some stuff are more important.”

You smiled a little and nodded to yourself. This pandemic had been, and was been, a wreck all around the world. As usual, you reached out to turn on the radio, which made Harry smile to himself. Ever since the first time you had got into his car, all those years ago, you would always start the music, no matter what. At first, he was surprised you took such confidences in someone else’s car, but he soon loved that detail about you.

“How is it going with your internship?” He asked when the song that was playing on the radio ended.

“I’m on furlough”, you shrugged and sighed. “I got an email last week saying some people would start coming back to work soon. But I don’t think that includes interns.”

“I wouldn’t be in a hurry if I were you”, he commented as he checked the mirrors. “You don’t have a car to go to the office and I wouldn’t be too excited about getting into the tube.”

“I could always get a bike”, as soon you said that you both started laughing. You were the less sportive person you had even known. “Yeah, that was a good one.”

“Indeed”, he chuckled.

“I’m not in a hurry to go back”, you shrugged. “But it’s boring.”

“I know”, he sighed and looked at you for a moment. “But at least now we have time to hang out.”

“Like old times”, you smiled. Harry smiled softly and nodded.

“Like old times.”

“Where are we going by the way? Most restaurants are still closed”, you said.

You had been so focused on talking to Harry and watching him drive that you hadn’t been paying attention to the streets, so you had no idea where you were going.

“My place”, he said, surprising you. “My new place, actually.”

“You have a new place?” You asked even more surprised.

“Yeah. Too many people knew about the house in Hampstead. It was annoying”, he sighed. “Hopefully, no one will find out about this one.”

“But you loved Hampstead!”, you pouted. You loved that house too, to be honest.

“I didn’t sell it”, he shrugged with a smile. “I just don’t use it as official residency.”

“Good”, you smiled now. “So… your place.”

“You’re okay with that?” He asked a bit concerned.

“Oh yes! I just assumed we would to some restaurant”, you shrugged.

“I thought about it”, he nodded. “But even if they’re open, I feel bad for the people who have to work in them, so I guess it makes their lives less anxious with less customers.”

“Always so thoughtful”, you commented.

“Can’t help myself”, he said, his cheeks blushing a little.

You smiled sweetly and looked out of the window, now curious to see where he had moved to. Judging by the zone, you were in the south of London, although you couldn’t figure out exactly where.

Finally, he drove into a subterranean parking in a big brick building. The parking didn’t have many cars, which led you to believe that he didn’t have many neighbours. Harry parked at the very end of the place and, once he turned off the engine, you unbuckled yourself and got out of the car.

“Quite big for a few cars”, you commented looking around.

“I know”, he laughed after locking his car. “It’s a new building. Probably is four years old, so not many people live here yet. And those who do, have more than one car so…”

“You have more than one spot?” You asked.

“Those three are also mine”, he said pointing.

You smiled when you saw the familiar black Range Rover in which you had been so many times over the years. The other two spots were empty, but you knew he had the cars to fill them.

Without saying anything, he started walking to an elevator you hadn’t seen at first sight. You followed him while you checked your phone before throwing it into your bag for the rest of the day. When you got into the elevator, you looked around at how new it looked.

“How long have you been living here?” You asked, leaning against the wall of the elevator.

“A couple of years”, he shrugged and you nodded. “I was the second one to move in.”

“Really?” He nodded. “Nice”, you chuckled.

It didn’t surprise you when the elevator opened at the last floor. He had always liked high places and he had always said that he would love to live in a penthouse someday. It looked like he had fulfilled another one of his fantasies. As you stepped out, you saw that there were only two doors. Private.

“I’m the only one in this floor”, he commented. “These two places are the most expensive so”, he shrugged.

“More silence for you. Imagine a family with three children living across the hall”, you said.

“You would go crazy”, he laughed.

“Definitely”, you smiled a little.

It wasn’t like you didn’t like kids. You did. But when there were many of them, you got a bit nervous, especially if they were loud.

Harry took out a keychain and put it in front of where a locker should have been. It beeped and he pushed the door open. He looked back with a cocky grin.

“Snob”, you mumbled when he let you walk in first.

“Hey!” He laughed.

He took your bag and hung it next to the door while you looked around in awe. It was an open-space living room and kitchen, surrounded by huge windows from where you could see Vauxhall Bridge and the other side of the Thames. It was all decorated in cold colours, but it wasn’t a cold environment. He had managed to give his personal and warm touch.

“What do you think?” He asked standing behind you, a bit more closer than what you expected.

“Much better than Hampstead”, you admitted.

“You think so?”

“There’s no way teenage girls will camp just outside your door”, you shrugged.

“Good point”, he laughed. “Come, I’ll show you the balcony.”

“I’m not a big fan of heights”, you reminded him while he was dragging you by your hand.

“I won’t let you go”, he said.

Saying no to him was an impossible task. There was nothing you could deny to him, not when he gave you that dimpled smile that you loved so much.

To be honest, the views were breath-taking, it couldn’t be denied, but you didn’t go too close to the edge just in case and Harry didn’t push you. All he did was hold your hand tightly.

“I have to confess something”, he said after a while.

“What is it?” You asked quietly.

“I haven’t cooked anything. I was praying you were craving pizza”, he said, making you laugh out loud.

“I’m always craving pizza, you idiot”, you said giving him hand a gentle squeeze before going back inside.

He followed you inside but left the door open. While he ordered the pizza, you walked around the living room, checking out the photos he had framed and also the vinyl collection he had. You smiled a little when you saw that he had all One Direction CDs there as well, as vinyl.

When you started looking at the photos, the first one that caught your eye was one of the two of you, so many years ago, in the tour bus. You took it from the chest it was on. You smiled warmly as you remembered all those long hours stuck into the bus. Somehow, they all managed to make it fun.

In the photo, you and Harry were laying down on one of the sofas, sleeping while facing each other. You were cuddled up against him while he had one hand on your waist, hugging you, and the other one stretched over your head. You remembered having that photo as your lockscreen for so long.

“I think that’s my favourite.”

You hadn’t expected Harry to be just behind you. You hadn’t even heard him coming close to you, so you gasped and almost dropped the photo, but he was quick enough to catch it.

“So I would appreciate if you didn’t break it”, he chuckled.

“Sorry, you scared me”, you said.

“Sorry”, he said too and looked down at the photo before putting it back on top of the chest. “We really had fun that tour, didn’t we?”

“Wasn’t it the one when we started dating?” You asked. He nodded and turned around to walk to couch. “It really was fun.”

“Are you seeing anyone?” He asked all of sudden.

You chuckled and looked down before shaking your head. It was a question that always came up between you two. If the answer was positive it changed the whole mood of the time you spent together. It wasn’t like you didn’t want each other to date other people, but it still hurt to see it.

“Are you?” You asked.

“No”, he said and looked at you before smiling a little.

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that”, he said and looked down at his hands. He started playing with his rings, which he used to do whenever he got nervous.

“About what?”

“Us.”

“Oh…”, you gulped and looked down as well.

You always feared when he brough that up. Usually it was because he was seeing someone, so you guessed this time wouldn’t be different, even though he had just said he wasn’t seeing anyone. You bite your lip and nodded.

“Okay”, you whispered.

“I was going to wait until after we ate but since it came up”, he shrugged.

“You brought it up”, you quickly said.

“Good point”, he chuckled.

“Anyway”, you looked at him. “What is it? What’s her name?”

“Her name?” He asked confused. “I’m… I’m not seeing anyone. I told you.”

“Really?” You frowned, even more confused than him. “I just- Every time you want to talk about us, it is because you’re seeing someone.”

“Oh… I hadn’t thought about it, to be honest”, he said thinking about it before laughing a little. “It’s not the case now”, he shrugged.

“What is it?” You asked now curious but also fearful. What if he said he didn’t have feelings for you anymore?

“You know how we have always said that we can’t be together because of how messy my life is, right?” He asked and you nodded, having no clue where he was going with this. “Well, I’ve been thinking about it, and you were right about it back then. When I was in the band. Now it’s different.”

“How? You still have the same job”, you shrugged. “And I don’t want you to have a different one”, you quickly added.

“Yes, but I’m not touring all year long”, he explained. “Now I can take my time. It’s been two years since I dropped my first solo album and only last year, I dropped Fine Line. Yes, when I’m on tour I spend a lot of time on it, but I also have a lot of time between one and the next. Especially now that it’s been postponed.”

“Harry”, you interrupted him. “Go to the point”, you chuckled.

“Yes, sorry”, he smiled a little. “I want to give it, us, another chance.”

Your mind went completely blank as he said the words. You had no idea how many times you had dreamed about this and, now that it was right in front of you, you didn’t know what to say. Suddenly, you felt scared, confused, lost. You loved him? Of course you did. Was this a good idea? You got no idea. You only knew that the first time almost broke you and you didn’t know if you were ready to go through that again.

Although it could work out this time, a tiny voice inside your head said.

What if it didn’t? What if you just didn’t work as a couple?

Luckily for you, just then the bell rang.

“Pizza!” You exclaimed and got up, relieved to have some time off from that conversation.

Harry looked at you as you ran to the door, obviously running away from him at the moment. He had no idea what to think of that. Did that mean you didn’t feel the same way anymore? You only saw him as a friend? Or maybe it was just that you didn’t see it coming and felt a bit overwhelmed? He wanted to believe it was the latest, but his mind kept on going to the worst-case scenario.

Anyway, the food was there and he figured that giving you time to take his words in wouldn’t hurt anyone.

Harry had already paid for the pizzas when he ordered them, so all you had to do was take them. Once you closed the door by pushing it with your foot, you went to the isle that separated the kitchen from the living room and put them on top of it.

“This smell amazing”, you said while Harry was walking around the kitchen gathering the dishes, glasses and napkins.

“I’m drooling just by the smell”, he agreed. “Do you want to eat here, in the living room or out there?”

“It’s a bit chilly out there”, you said. “Maybe the living room and we can watch something on Netflix?”

“Sounds good”, he nodded.

Silently, you two moved everything to the living room and set the table up. When it was all ready, Harry turned on the TV and logged into his Netflix account before he started looking for something to watch while you poured water into the glasses.

“What about Harry Potter and The Priosioner of Azkaban?” He suggested.

“You know me”, you smiled widely.

It was your favourite Harry Potter movie, so there was no way you would say no to it. Harry smiled warmly and nodded to himself.

“I do”, he sighed before pressing play on the remote.

***

“I’m surprised you watched the whole movie”, you said two hours later when the movie was over.

“Why?” Harry asked.

He stood up and started taking everything back to the kitchen.

“Well”, you got up too and took the glasses. “You always fall asleep during the movies I choose.”

“Technically, I chose this one, so it would’ve been rude to fall asleep”, he said while you handed him the glasses so he would put them into the dishwasher.

“It’s rude anyway but whatever helps you sleep at night”, you said with a smile.

“Are you saying I’m rude?” He asked with his eyes narrowed after he closed the dishwasher.

“Contrary to popular belief, Mr. Styles… I know the whole truth about you”, you said, crossing your arms.

“And what is that?” He asked, mirroring your position.

“That you can be rude sometimes”, you shrugged.

“Falling asleep during a movie is not rude. It is… tiredness”, he said, making you laugh.

“And you always have a reply for everything”, you said.

“I like to be prepared”, he shrugged.

“Like I said…”, you laughed and leaned against the counter.

Harry laughed out loud and shook his head before excusing himself to go to the bathroom. You stayed there in the kitchen, thinking again about what Harry had said just before the pizza arrived. You had barely paid attention to the movie thanks to that.

You had no idea where that proposition came from. It had been years since you two had had any conversation about your relationship and you had no idea what you wanted. Yes, you loved him. Yes, you wanted to be with him. But you feared that this was just about him feeling nostalgic. You remembered vividly the great couple you two were, but you didn’t know if you could go through that kind of heartbreak again.

“You know what I’ve been trying to get better at during lockdown?”

You jumped a little since you hadn’t heard him coming back from the bathroom.

“Surprise me”, you said, still lost in thought.

“Football”, he said. You looked at him with an eyebrow raised, trying not to laugh.

“Really?” You asked. “How did that turn out exactly?”

“Awful”, he admitted, making you laugh.

“I figured”, you nodded and sighed, looking down at your hands.

You felt him coming closer until he was standing right in front of you. Yet, you didn’t dare to look up.

“You okay?” He finally asked.

“Where did that come from?” You blurted out. When he didn’t answer, you looked up. He was frowning and the look in his eyes told you that he was measuring his words. “About us.”

“From… what I feel for you”, he said like it was obvious. “What I’ve always felt for you.”

“Right”, you sighed.

“Don’t you feel the same anymore?” He asked worried.

“I don’t think there’s a world, a universe, where I don’t feel that way about you”, you sighed.

“What’s the problem, then?”

“Why now? How do I know that this, you wanting more again, is not something that will just go away?” You asked.

“I’ve always wanted more from us, (Y/N). The only reason we broke up was because we couldn’t make it work with our lives. We can now”, he said. Hesitantly, he took a step towards you and held your hands. “I’ve loved you since we were 18. I can promise you it isn’t going anywhere. Ever. And neither am I.”

“It…”, you sighed. “It just hurt so much when we broke up, Harry. I don’t think I can go through that again.”

“You won’t.”

“You can’t promise that”, you chuckled.

“I could”, he shrugged. “Because that’s a promise I plan on keeping.”

You looked down at your united hands and sighed. His hands had always been so big, way bigger than yours, which had always made you feel safe in a strange way. You bit your lip, not knowing what to do. You knew what you wanted, but you didn’t know if you were brave enough to do it.

“I love you”, you whispered.

“And I love you too”, he said back, rubbing your hands. “You’re my endgame.”

“Don’t use The Avengers against me”, you said, making him laugh. With a sigh, you looked up and it surprised you to find his green eyes so close to yours. “You can’t look at me with those eyes and expect me to give you a reasoned answer.”

“I don’t want you to follow reason”, he shrugged. “I want you to say what you really want.”

“You”, you said without hesitation. “Always. Every day.”

Harry smiled warmly and put some hair out of your face gently, before cupping your face.

Your heart was beating so fast and it felt so loud, that it surprised you that he couldn’t listen to it. You didn’t know what the right thing to do was, but you knew that reasoning about this wouldn’t get you anywhere. You knew you loved him, you knew you wanted to be with him. Maybe he was right. Maybe you could make it work this time. They said that third time was the charm, but maybe the second could be your charm.

“Is it a yes?” He asked, now looking at your lips.

“Yes”, you finally nodded.

His smile grew even bigger now before pulling you towards him and pressing his lips against yours. Just like every single time, you felt fireworks in your stomach. Ever since the first time you kissed him, you felt you could spend your whole time kissing him and would never get tired of it.

Maybe this time, you could do it forever.

[path-of-my-childhood]

How Aaron Dessner and Taylor Swift Stripped Down Her Sound on ‘Folklore’

By: Jon Blistein for Rolling Stone Date: July 24th 2020

At the beginning of March, the National’s Aaron Dessner traveled back to the United States from Paris, where he’d been living with his family, to shack up at Sonic Ranch Studio in Tornillo, Texas to work on the next Big Red Machine album with Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon. Those plans - obviously - soon shifted, as the reality of the COVID-19 pandemic set in. Dessner and his family were able to relocate to their home in upstate New York as lockdown orders went into effect, and the musician soon settled into a groove of homeschooling his kids and able to focus fully on music in a way he hadn’t in a while, due to the National’s regularly rigorous touring schedule.

In the middle of what Dessner describes as one of the most productive moments of his career, Taylor Swift called. A longtime and avowed fan of the National, Swift asked if Dessner wanted to try collaborating on a few songs remotely. He said of course, and asked if she was looking for anything in particular. He noted that he had plenty of material at the ready, but acknowledged he’d been in a more experimental mood, due to the Big Red Machine sessions; not to mention, Dessner added, he’d never really ventured into the pop world Swift has dominated for well over a decade. She told him to send everything he had.

“I think she was interested in the emotions that she feels in some of the music that I’ve made,” Dessner tells Rolling Stone.” So I just sent her a folder of things I’d done recently and was excited about. Hours after, she sent back a fully written version of ‘Cardigan.’ It was like a lightning bolt struck the house.”

Over the next few months, Dessner and Swift crafted the bulk of Swift’s eighth studio album, Folklore. Dessner spoke with Rolling Stone about working with Swift, their instant chemistry, how the album developed under a thick cloud of secrecy and more.

When Taylor first reached out, did she have a specific vision in mind for the album? She was a bit cryptic. I didn’t know that we were actually working on a record for quite a while. It just seemed that she was seeking me out to collaborate. And then we were both feeling very inspired by it. Once there were six or seven songs that we had written over a couple of weeks, she said, “Hey can we talk?” Then she said, ‘This is what I’m imagining,’ and started to tell me about the concept of Folklore. Then she mentioned that she’d written some songs at an earlier stage with Jack [Antonoff], and they felt like they really fit together with what we were doing. It was a very inspiring, exhilarating collaborative process that was almost entirely remote. Very sort of warp speed, but also something about it felt like we were going toe-to-toe and in a good pocket.

After “Cardigan,” how did these songs develop and do you think she pushed you in any new directions as a songwriter? When you’re working with someone new, it takes a second to understand their instincts and range. It’s not really conscious. She wrote “Cardigan,” and then “Seven,” then “Peace.” They kind of set a road map, because “Cardigan” was this kind of experimental ballad, the closest thing to a pop song on the record, but it’s not really. It’s this emotional thing, but it has some strange sounds in it. “Seven” is this kind of nostalgic, emotional folk song. Even before she sang to it, I felt this nostalgia, wistful feeling in it, and I think that’s what she gravitated towards. And “Peace,” that just showed me the incredible versatility that she had. That song is just three harmonized bass lines and a pulse. I love to play bass like that - play one line then harmonize another, and another, which is a behavior I stole from Justin Vernon, because he’s done that on other things we’ve done together. And actually, that’s his pulse, he sent me that pulse and said, “Do something with this.” But when she wrote that song, which kind of reminds me of a Joni Mitchell song over a harmonized bassline and a pulse, that was kind of like, “Woah, anything can happen here.” That’s not easy to do. 

So, in the morning I would wake up and try to be productive. “Mad Woman” is one I wrote shortly after that, in terms of sound world, felt very related to “Cardigan” and “Seven.” I do have a way of playing piano where it’s very melodic and emotional, but then often it’s great if whoever’s singing doesn’t sing exactly what’s in the piano melody, but maybe it’s connected in some way. There was just some chemistry happening with her and how she was relating to those ideas.

“Epiphany” was something she had an idea for, and then I imagined these glacial, Icelandic sounds with distended chords and this almost classical feeling. That was another one where we wrote it and conceived it together. She just has a very instinctive and sharp musical mind, and she was able to compose so closely to what I was presenting. What I was doing was clicking for her. It was exhilarating for us, and it was surreal - we were shocked by it, to be honest [Laughs]. I think the warmth, humanity and raw energy of her vocals, and her writing on this record, from the very first voice memos - it was all there.

Do you think that chemistry might’ve had something to do with her being a National fan, and you being a fan of her music? We met Taylor at Saturday Night Live in 2014, or whenever that was that we played and Lena Dunham was hosting. We got to meet her, and that was our first brush with a bona fide pop star. But then she came to see us play in Brooklyn last summer and was there in a crazy rainstorm, like torrential downpour, and watched the whole show and stayed for a long time afterwards, talking to me and my brother. She was incredibly charming and humble. That’s the nice thing about her, and a lot of people I’ve met that have that kind of celebrity. It’s great when you can just tune it out and be normal people and chat, and that’s how that felt. So, we knew that she was a big fan, and we really got into the 1989 album. Our Icelandic collaborator, Ragnar Kjartansson, is a crazy Swiftie. So we’ve kind of lived vicariously through him. I’ve always been astonished by how masterful she is in her craft. I’ve always listened to her albums and put them in this rarefied category, like, “How did she do that? How does anybody do that? How do you make ‘Blank Space?’” There was an element that was intimidating at first, where it just took me a second to be like… Not because I think her music is better than what we’ve done, but it’s just a different world.

Were there particular songs, albums or artists the two of you discussed as reference points for this album? “Betty,” which is a song she wrote with William Bowery, she was interested in sort of early Bob Dylan, like Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, I think. “Epiphany,” early on, felt like some weird Kate Bush-meets-Peter Gabriel thing. I think we talked a little about those things, but not a lot. Actually, I think she really trusted me as far as my instincts to where the music would ultimately go, and also the mixing process.  We really wanted to keep her voice as human, and kind of the opposite of plastic, as possible. That was a bit of a battle. Because everything in pop music tends to be very carved out, a smiley face, and as pushed as possible so that it translates to the radio or wherever you hear it. That can also happen with a National song - like if you changed how these things are mixed, they wouldn’t feel like the same song. And she was really trusting and heard it herself. She would make those calls herself, also.

You mentioned William Bowery - who is he? He’s a songwriter, and actually because of social distancing, I’ve never met him. He actually wrote the original idea for “Exile,” and then Taylor took it and ran with it. I don’t actually know to be totally honest.

We’ve been trying to track him down, he doesn’t have much of an internet presence. Yeah, I don’t fully know him, other than he wrote “Betty” and “Exile” with her. But you know she’s a very collaborative person, so it was probably some songwriter.

So it’s not an alias for anyone? No, no, no. I mean, I don’t know - she didn’t tell me there was a “Cardigan” video until literally it came out, and I wrote the song with her [laughs]. So I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure he’s an actual songwriter. She enjoys little mysteries.

With the National, you and your brother write the music, Matt Berninger adds the lyrics, and then you fuse it - was it a similar process on Folklore? Taylor is very collaborative in that sense that, whenever she sent a voice memo, she would send all the lyrics and then ask me what I thought. And sometimes we would debate certain lines, although generally she’s obviously a strong writer. So she would ask me if I liked one line, and she would give me alternate lines and I would give her my opinion. And then when she was actually tracking vocals, I would sometimes suggest things or miss things, but she definitely has a lot of respect for the collaborative process and wants whoever she’s writing with to feel deeply included in that process. It was nice, and was a back and forth, for sure. And she would sometimes have ideas about the production if she didn’t like something, especially. She would, in a tactful way, bring that up. I appreciated that, too, since I wanted to try to turn over every leaf, take risks and sometimes get it wrong. That always takes a second, to get over and then you start again.

You mentioned earlier that once you had six, seven songs, she was able to describe a concept behind the album. I’m curious what that conversation was like. She would always explain what each song was about to me, even before she articulated the Folklore concept. And I could tell early on that they were these narrative songs, often told from a different… not in the first person. So there are different characters in the songs that appear in others. You may have a character in “Betty” that’s also related to one in “Cardigan,” for example. And I think that was, in her mind, very, very important. It doesn’t seem like, for this record at least, that she was inspired to write something until she really knew what it was about. And I think I’m used to a more - at least lately - impressionistic and experimental world of making stuff without really knowing what it is. But this was more direct, in that sense. That was really helpful, to know what it was about and it would guide some of the choices we were making.

Every time she would send something, she would narrate a little bit, like how it fit, or what it was about. And then when she told me about Folklore as a concept, it made so much sense. Like “The Last Great American Dynasty,” for example, this kind of narrative song that then becomes personal at the end - it flips and she enters the song. These are kind of these folkloric, almost mythical tales that are woven in of childhood, lost love, and different sentiments across the record. It was binding it all together and I think it’s personal, but also through the guise of other people, friends and loved ones.

You were working in secret - how did that affect the process? Was that a difficult burden? It was. I was humbled and honored and grateful for the opportunity and for the crazy sort of alchemy we were having. But it was hard not to be able to talk openly with my usual collaborators, even my brother at first. I didn’t know if I could really tell him, because we normally… Ultimately, he helped me quite a bit, he orchestrated songs. But we always help each other. But eventually, we figured out how to do it. Towards the end of the process, I said to Taylor, ‘I really feel that I need to try a few experiment and try to elevate a few moments on the record because we have time, and we’ve really done a ton of work here, and it all sounds great, but I think we can go even further.’ And then she said, ‘Well what does that mean?’ And I explained how that would work, and the way that we work. Our process is very community-oriented, and we have long-time collaborators that we have a good understanding with. So I was able to say, to my friends, ‘This is a song I’m working on, I can’t send it to you with the vocals, and I can’t tell you what it is, but I can explain what I’m imagining.’ And the same with my brother, he knows my music so well that that was very easy for him to just take things that we were working on, add to that, and do his kind of work. So it was all remote and everyone was in their corner and we were shipping things around. It was incredibly fast because of that, because you didn’t have eight people needing to come to the studio. You had eight people working simultaneously - one in France and one in L.A. and one in Brooklyn. This is how it went, and it was fun. We got there.

When were you able to tell everyone who contributed that this was the Taylor Swift record, what was their reaction? You can imagine. I think they realized it was something big because [of] the confidentiality, and they were like, ‘It could only be a few things.’ I couldn’t tell them until, basically, when she announced it. Just in the moments after she announced it, I basically told everyone. I was like, ‘By the way…’ And they were thrilled. Everyone’s thrilled. Nobody seemed mad, everyone was thrilled and honored. Even Justin Vernon had not heard anything else except “Exile,” even though the pulse of that song “Peace,” he gave that song to me. It was important to have it be a surprise, and you know how it can be with someone in her position, with all the speculation, and she’s always under a lot of pressure like that. So it was really important to the creative freedom she was feeling that this remained a secret, so she could just do what we were doing.

Being such longtime friends and collaborators with Justin, what was it like hearing “Exile” for the first time? His voice and Taylor’s together? He’s so versatile and has such a crazy range, and puts so much emotion… Every time he sings when I’m in his presence, my head just kind of hits the back of the wall. That’s the same on this song. William Bowery and Taylor wrote that song together, got it to a certain point, then I sort of interpreted it and developed a recording of it, and then Taylor tracked both the male and female parts. And then we sent it to Justin and he re-did obviously the male parts and changed a few things and also added his own: He wrote the “step right out” part of the bridge, and Taylor re-sang to that. You feel like, in a weird way, you’re watching two of the greatest songwriters and vocalists of our generation collaborating. I was facilitating it and making it happen, and playing all the music. But it was definitely a “Wow.” I was just a fan at that point, seeing it happen.

Are there any moments that really stick out to you as particularly pivotal in shaping the sound of this record? The initial response. When we first connected, and I sent a folder of music and Taylor wrote “Cardigan,” and she said, “This is abnormal. Why do you have all these songs that are so emotional and so moving to me? This feels fated.” And then she just dove into it and embraced this emotional current. And I hope that’s what people take out of it: The humanity in her writing and melodies. It’s a different side to her. She could have been every bit as successful just making these kinds of songs, but it’s so great that she’s also made everything that she’s ever made, and this is a really interesting shift, and an emotional one. It also opens other doors, because now it’s kind of like she can go wherever she wants, creatively. The pressure to make a certain kind of… bop - or whatever you want to call it - is not there really anymore. And I think that’s really liberating, and I hope her fans and the world are excited by that because I am. It’s really special.

[lostcauses-noregrets]

I just wanted to add a few words to @tsuki-no-ura (x) and @momtaku’s (x) recent posts about negativity and ship hate in fandom.   I think I’m in a slightly different position from Mom and Tsuki because I’m explicitly a ship blog, so no one bothers to accuse me of “bias”.  However it absolutely incenses me when I see general meta and translation blogs being accused of “bias”, as if it’s a cardinal sin.  Everyone has their own favourite characters, relationships, and story arcs, and that’s fine, expecting anyone to be scrupulously neutral in fandom is just ridiculous.

@momtaku mentioned disingenuous Anons and I certainly get my fair share of those.  I’ve got several in my inbox right now in fact.  Usually I ignore them, or take the piss out of them, but the faux sincerity still incenses me.  If you don’t like a ship that’s fair enough, but why waste your time provoking other shippers and trying to “disprove” their ship? Viewing shipping as a contest to be won or lost is so futile.  The whole beauty of fandom is that you can ship whoever you want.  If you don’t like the canon ships, that’s fine, just ignore them. You don’t need to tear them down, that’s just a waste of your energy and mine.  The same goes for story lines.  If you don’t like the way a plot is progressing, by all means feel free to critique it, or create your own AUs, but don’t harass other fans who enjoy it.

Whether things are worse now than they were in the past is debatable.  I’m always wary of fandom nostalgia, of harking back to a golden age where ship hate was non-existent and all fans lived in peace and harmony.  Fandom has always been riven with disagreement and drama. I guess it’s inevitable when you bring a disparate group of people together who have nothing in common except a piece of media they are deeply passionate about but have very different interpretations of.  Some of the incidents I witnessed in older fandoms on LJ over a decade ago would make you hair stand on end, and in this fandom I’m still scarred by the fall out from the Serum Bowl.  Having said that, I do think the end of the series has definitely upped the ante.  There’s no more clinging to the hope that your ship will become canon in the next chapter, it’s all over and done with, so it’s understandable that some people will feel aggrieved and despondent, particularly after such a divisive ending.  Taking that frustration out on other fans is pointless and does no one any favours though.

Navigating fandom can be tricky at any time.  If you find a group of likeminded fans to hang out with it can be the most amazingly positive and uplifting experience, but it’s all too easy to get dragged into downward spirals of hate and negativity.  Mom and Tsuki’s advice to try and find a small group of folk to hang out with, and to spend time with things you love, your favourite fic or art or shitposts, is the best advice going.  The only other thing I would add is block and mute frequently.  You’re not obliged to spend time listened to people who drag you down, or viewing content that angers or upsets you. Blocking or muting doesn’t mean you’re passing judgement, it simply means you’re taking responsibility for your own online experience and curating your fandom experience, so don’t feel bad about muting content you don’t want to see.

Despite all the negativity, fandom is still a remarkable phenomena.  I was struck earlier on this week by AO3’s 2020 statistics update. On a graph showing a comparison of site traffic growth each year, you can quite clearly see a steep jump in traffic between March and April last year from 260 million page views per week to 340 million. That jump marks the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and the start of lockdown.  If ever proof was needed of how important fan fiction is to people, that’s it right there.  I posted a tweet about this graph on twitter earlier in the week and someone who identified themselves as an essential worker said that fanfic had been their escape, and that without it they would have had more breakdowns than they did.  I’ve always been a great believer in the transformative power of fanfic, and now more so than ever.  So Tsuki was right, whenever the negativity gets too much, go back and read your favourite fanfics for the 244th time, and remember you’re not alone.

[twh-news]

‘Loki’s Tom Hiddleston Teases Marvel Series Finale, What It All Means & Is There More Of The God Of Mischief To Come?

By Dominic Patten | Deadline

SPOILER ALERT: This article contains details of the first five episodes of Disney+’s Loki, & maybe the finale. Maybe.

EXCLUSIVE: “I have learned, at this point, having said goodbye to the character more than twice, two and a half times maybe, to make no assumptions,” says Loki’s Tom Hiddleston as the hours tick away to the finale of the Disney+ series drops early on Wednesday morning. “We’ll see where the ride goes now,” the Marvel alum adds. As always with almost any project from the Kevin Feige run studio, that ride could continue, at least in some form or another. Certainly, the June 9 ‘Glorious Purpose’ premiere of the Michael Waldron penned and Kate Herron directed Loki proved to be the Disney+ and the MCU’s biggest small screen success so far. Also with any Marvel project, past Emmy winner Hiddleston was elusive on what could be coming next, be it in the Loki finale, another season or another appearance in the movies as the MCU shifts into its next phrase.

One thing is clear, after a decade playing the God of Mischief, Hiddleston still has a lot of Loki on the brain, in the best way.

Leading towards the finale, I chatted with a UK-based Hiddleston about returning to play Loki and the search for who or what controls the seemingly all knowing, all powerful Time Variance Authority. The Night Manager star also spoke about filming during the coronavirus pandemic, working with Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Wunmi Mosaku, Richard E. Grant, and Sophia Di Martino, who portrays variant and soulmate Sylvie, and his upcoming AppleTV+ series The Essex Serpent with Claire Danes.

DEADLINE: There’s a great line in this season’s penultimate episode where your Loki and Sylvie are stunned at watch Richard E. Grant’s Classic Loki recreate Asgard to distract Alioth and you say “I think we’re stronger than we realize.” There seems to be a great resonance in the line that there’s a whole lot of Loki coming in the finale and probably more …

HIDDLESTON: I suppose it resonates with the theme that we all wanted to highlight about purpose and about meaning. Loki’s someone who’s probably been deluded by the idea that he’s burdened with glorious purpose, and that perhaps that purpose has been revealed to be fraudulent or meaningless, and maybe his self-image or the role that he has condemned himself to play is redundant.

His experiences through this story have shown him that there are actually more opportunities available to him, and you know, it speaks to this idea, like, can we change? Can we evolve, and in that evolution, is there room to grow? You know, so, I think the stronger than we realize I think is Loki finally understanding that, really, by caring for other people, that maybe there’s power in that, and I found that very touching, and the whole thing is an extraordinary dream.

DEADLINE: Speaking of an extraordinary dream, you have been playing Loki for a decade now, since the first Thor movie, We know you are going to do some voice work in the animated What If…? series, but how has it been having this series directly centering on him, in all his variants, so to speak?

HIDDLESTON: You know Dominic, I have enjoyed it so much, because I felt it was a gift and a privilege to be invited to come and sit at the table and think about what the show might be. Also, I suppose so many of the things that I’ve discovered about Loki as a character in the comics and a character in the Norse myths, in the canon, aspects that I’ve always thought were interesting, and understandably, there hasn’t been time or space in the movies to explore them.

DEADLINE: In terms of who he is?

HIDDLESTON: Those aspects of him have been externalized and embedded into this new story about identity itself and about integrating the disparate fragment of the many selves that he is or perhaps the many selves that we are. You know, we contain multitudes. Loki certainly contains multitudes. We have met many of those multitudes, including Alligator Loki (laughs).

DEADLINE: Sounds like you’re not done with those multitudes yet. From your POV, from conversations with Kevin (Feige) is there more that you see for the character as the MCU heads into its next stages?

HIDDLESTON: Well, I certainly don’t have Kevin’s brain or encyclopedic knowledge or capacity for invention. I’ve been on the ride for a while, and it’s been the most extraordinary journey, and to have lived through different iterations, different phases of the MCU, and I’m so grateful that I’m still here, and it’s been amazing to watch. I feel that the MCU is even more expansive, is even braver, more inclusive than it’s ever been.

DEADLINE: How so?

HIDDLESTON: I think the stories are getting really exciting. Not that they weren’t before, but I think they understand that the investment of the audience is very deep, and they don’t take it for granted for a second. So, yeah, I suppose the perspective I have on how Loki might affect the ongoing course of the MCU is this idea of the multiverse. People have already understood it when Miss Minutes is introducing Loki to the TVA. She talks about the multiverse and the war and that the sacred timeline, which is reality as we know it.

DEADLINE: It opens up the aperture certainly for new stories from all opportunities, doesn’t it?

HIDDLESTON: It raises questions of, well, maybe there are other parallel or alternate universes. Maybe there are other realities, and the possibilities there are endless. I feel that at the end of episode five, Loki and Sylvie are close to discovering the answers to the questions that they have of who is behind the TVA and that, somehow, this will provoke even more curiosity about…

DEADLINE: …Because in the Marvel Universe, answering one set of questions always leads to another set of questions, in many ways.

HIDDLESTON: Right. Yeah. Yeah, and I know that there are lots of, you know, interesting titles of movies that’ve been announced, which kind of hint at where it might be going.

DEADLINE: One of those that hasn’t been officially announced, but is rumored is a Season 2 for Loki, in gear under the temporary title of Architect on call sheets and the like …

HIDDLESTON: Well, yes, maybe, as I say, all the kind of multiple alternate realities are …it’s taken me 10 years to get a handle on this sort of mono timeline. The idea that this might be a multiverse is actually beyond my knowledge of physics

DEADLINE: Well, I doubt that, but let me ask, and no spoilers for the finale or further, but if Kevin, Marvel, Disney asked you to do more Loki, are you game?

HIDDLESTON: (laughs) I have learned, at this point, having said goodbye to the character more than twice, two and a half times maybe, to make no assumptions. So, I’m also aware that I’m only playing him because of the audience, really. So, it’s not up to me. But I do love playing him, and every time, I seem to find new, interesting things about him. So, yeah, I’m a temporary passenger on Loki’s journey, but we’ll see. We’ll see where the ride goes now.

DEADLINE: On the ride, as the finale looms, there’s a ton of fan speculation out there and so much that people have hooked on to from the show. So, as the man at the center of it, what was your favorite part of Loki the series?

HIDDLESTON: That there was meaning in the making of it.

That we crossed the finish line in the middle of a global pandemic and could create something, and more than ever, I felt really grateful for being able to do this job. I think in this there are some of those questions that we were all asking ourselves in the last 18 months in the show, you know, what do our lives mean?

I love taking Loki in new directions. I love the contributions of my fellow actors, of Owen Wilson and Sophia Di Martino and Richard E. Grant and Gugu Mbatha-Raw, and Wunmi Masaku, they all brought so much to the table, and I’ll always remember that. You know, I’ll always remember just being in Atlanta with all of them and making our bonkers show. Yeah.

DEADLINE: Making your bonkers show in Atlanta as the world, as America was still in the heat of the pandemic. What was that like, because you were in production and then everything stopped and then you came back, right?

HIDDLESTON: I mean, people have used this word a lot, but it really was unprecedented. I think we did six weeks of filming before the hiatus, and then the production was suspended for four or five months, and we came back. At first, it was unfamiliar because we had to make adjustments, but the thing I remember most of all, quite honestly, is the diligence and resilience and spirit of our cast and crew.

DEADLINE: Really?

HIDDLESTON: Yes, and it remains extremely special for me, this project, for that reason.

For me, it just demonstrated the character of these amazing people. It took a huge amount of planning and care and looking after each other. By that, I mean, being in the bubble. So, for many of us, the only other human beings we saw, really, were each other. So, we came to work, and we became a team, and the circumstances fostered this extraordinary team spirit, and so the memory of making it is really my incredible and deep respect and affection for my fellow filmmakers. People like Trish Stanard, our line producer. Richard Graves, our first AD. Kristina Peterson, our second AD. Autumn Durald, DP. Kevin Wright, our supervising producer, and so many others making sure everyone could stay safe and look after each other.

It’s really…I find it…it’s very moving, and it’s remarkable, and I just want to salute them all because I couldn’t have done any of it without them.

DEADLINE: In that vein, you have just come off filming The Essex Serpent with Claire Danes for AppleTV+. Very different from Loki, and yet also a tale of what is real and who we are. Is that what attracted you to it on some level?

HIDDLESTON: I read it and immediately connected to it. Read the screenplay, the adaptation. It’s based on a novel by Sarah Perry, which was published in 2016 and is set at the end of the 19th century. It’s an extraordinary story about uncertainty and about our deepest fears and how sometimes our fears can distort our imaginings and how our minds can lie to us. About how we have to guard against that, and Perry sets it in this extraordinary time with a beautiful leading character of Cora Seaborne, played by Claire. Anna Symon adopted it.

There’s this community on the east coast of England who believe that an ancient beast has been awakened by an earthquake and that it’s dislodged all these fossils. But perhaps, it has also dislodged this ancient underwater monster, which has been used to explain certain unusual phenomena. This was in the era when Darwin had just been published a few decades before and people are starting to think, this Charles Darwin, he’s onto something. Still, fear spreads very quickly, and it’s a very fascinating time where science and faith are in conflict.

DEADLINE: When you describe it like that it sounds very Loki indeed.

HIDDLESTON: Maybe the themes are very Loki. Maybe that’s where they join up, but I’m playing a 19th century vicar who is trying to contain his community. You feel very destabilized by all these rumors. So, yeah, to go from Loki to a vicar was definitely new, a new territory.

DEADLINE: Literally and figuratively?

HIDDLESTON: Well, it’s my first significant time in Essex, where we filmed, which I feel embarrassed about. I’ve been to Essex before, but I’ve never been to the very, very eastern, most eastern coast of Essex. It’s the Blackwater Estuary, which then feeds into the River Thames, and it’s a very ancient part of England. It’s so marshy, it’s where in Great Expectations, that’s where Pip meets Magwitch for the first time. It’s all foggy and muddy and marshy and quite atmospheric and a perfect place to set a story about of uncertainty and fear and gothic romance. Clio Barnard directed it, and working with her has been amazing.

DEADLINE: You know, it occurs to me that of all the main Marvel characters, Loki has been such a constant, yet so ethereal in so many ways too. Is it jarring for you to jump back into the role with all the uncertainty it brings?

HIDDLESTON: You know, I’ve always seen it as sort of an extraordinary and surprising constant in my life for a decade. But, I don’t take it for granted because I don’t often…you know, it may end. It has actually ended, and those endings have been conclusive. I really thought a couple of years ago, after I made Avengers: Infinity War, you know, we all know what happens in that scene, and I thought, that’s it.

I thought it’s over, and I was really proud to have been part of it. I was grateful for my time, but I thought that, my work would go off in a different direction. So, the idea that I got to come back and have another go was a complete delight, it truly was.