#Ian Mathers

[dustedmagazine]

Godspeed You! Black Emperor — "NO TITLE AS OF 13 FEBRUARY 2024 28,340 DEAD" (Constellation)

The night of the election in America, Godspeed You! Black Emperor played a show in Toronto. As they almost always do, they said nothing. No interaction beyond playing music and then expressing wordless thanks to the crowd as each stepped off stage to the roaring feedback surge that closed out “Piss Crowns Are Trebled” and the concert. Even if they’d taken a moment to check the news that night, what was there to say? As suggested last time here, the ineffable, unspeakable power of the Montreal collective can be read at least partially as the only possible response to the deranged and deranging power of repression and evil in the world. 2021 felt dark. Suffice it to say that things have not gotten better and appear set on getting quite a bit worse.

The title this time, of course, is a reference to the verified (and thus almost certainly lower than actual) death toll of the genocide in Gaza at the time of creation. Associate and Constellation labelmate Jessica Moss released her own powerful statement on the same issue this year, and again, things have not improved in the meantime. It’s enough to lead to a rare appearance of lyrics, with “RAINDROPS CAST IN LEAD” featuring a poem in Spanish read (and written? as always, the band remains gnomic) by Michele Fiedler Fuentes. Of course the current album will be viewed in light of current events (they almost beg you to do so, from track titles and statements on down), and while no Godspeed You! Black Emperor record is exactly drowning in levity, they cast a particularly grim panic over affairs here.

If G_d's Pee AT STATE'S END! frequently felt like the massive, sweeping motions of some sort of gestalt entity, it’s fitting that things here feel fractured at times, if no less cohesive. Halfway through “PALE SPECTATOR TAKES PHOTOGRAPHS” it feels like there’s a fire alarm going on behind the banks of sound. One of the guitarists frequently sounds as if they’re trying to pickaxe their way through a boulder (especially on parts of “BABYS IN A THUNDERCLOUD”). The opening “SUN IS A HOLE SUN IS VAPORS” sounds equally as if they might be tuning up for most of its length and like it’s a shame they’d already gotten around to using the name “Anthem for No State” as a title.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor has always been oriented towards apocalypse (the machine has been bleeding to death since their first album as a group, if not long before), and it continues to be queasily terrifying how swiftly the world rushes to meet them there. These are always someone’s last days; the rest of us wake up each morning and fall a little further down. They themselves say, this time, “what gestures make sense while tiny bodies fall? what context? what broken melody?” That may be the reason they close with “GREY RUBBLE - GREEN SHOOTS,” a tidy just-under-seven-minutes that presents both a stirring crescendo and an aching coda. Determined as always to nurture what is left growing after all the valedictions and maledictions are handed out. Every triumphant moment here feels wrested from the jaws of death, all too aware of who still gets claimed. They, and we, have to keep going.

Ian Mathers

[dd-the-man-without-fear]

Neurotically Yours/Foamy The Squirrel: Support

by iLL WiLL PrEss/JiMathers [Jonathan Ian Mathers]

[mikurulucky]

I forget what Foamy rant this was from, but to this day, one of the funniest insults I know comes from it: "Fuck yourself in the eye socket with an overturned tractor-trailor" XDD

[thesinglesjukebox]

LADY GAGA AND BRUNO MARS - "DIE WITH A SMILE"

14 years after "Grenade," Bruno finally found someone who would do the same...

[5.70]

Kayla Beardslee: Hey, when is that Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars collab being released? [5]

Ian Mathers: Mars and Gaga are both skilled at their craft in a way that often seems like a throwback to an earlier era of the art/industry, taking the biggest swings possible in terms of seeking mass appeal without feeling like they're compromising or calculated, talented mimics and style chameleons when they want to be. Working together on a big, heartfelt, suitable-for-all-occasions ballad actually feels perfect along those lines. The result is the kind of sturdily good (or "good," depending on your sensibilities) song that, if it catches you at the right moment in your life, might make you bust out crying. [7]

Joshua Lu: This collaboration would've been unthinkable in 2010; now that their careers have somehow converged, the outcome feels weirdly predictable. The emotional heft, vocal runs, and vague nostalgia are there, even if all it does is fill that "Perfect Duet"-sized hole in pop radio. "Die With a Smile" can't help but feel underwhelming in the context of their career trajectories — the kind of corny balladry that Bruno's outgrown and that Gaga mostly uses just to recapture the general public — but it's impossible to wholly reject when it's this nicely crafted. [6]

Grace Robins-Somerville: Most Obamacore song of 2024, hands down. "Die with a Smile" is this very specific meld of the era when you couldn't go to the supermarket without hearing a Bruno Mars ballad and when Gaga was doing a country pivot (although this is far blander than anything on Joanne). It's been a while since I've heard such blatant Grammy bait. [3]

Jackie Powell: Entertainment Weekly's Joey Nolfi wrote that “Die with a Smile” is a song that recalls “the emotional bravado” of “Shallow,” the Grammy- and Oscar-winning smash from Lady Gaga’s A Star Is Born. He’s correct. “Die With a Smile” thrives upon accented and intentional dynamics while making vague and simple lyrics mean more than it they do on the page. That’s also what made “Shallow” so convincing. The difference on “Die With A Smile” is that Bruno Mars is more Lady Gaga’s equal than Bradley Cooper ever was. Mars has more to sing on a song that has Gaga’s name billed first, but both artists shine without the other having to sacrifice. Gaga’s part, which begins at around a minute and a half until the song's end, transforms this from a Silk Sonic B-side into something that’s much more memorable, emotionally resonant and cinematic. It's a song that makes me wish I had someone to sing it to.  [9]

Katherine St. Asaph: So old-fashioned that YouTube's preroll ad recommended me Botox, and so definitively a Bruno Mars song that I'm genuinely unsure why the credits are in the order they're in. It works, albeit in an unexciting way, because Bruno and Gaga have practiced melodrama for years -- see "I'd take a bullet straight to my brain" and "not even the Gods above can separate the two of us," respectively -- and have also practiced singing pretty then belting big. [7]

Jeffrey Brister: When it comes to Bruno Mars, I want immaculately executed genre pastiche, something that sounds like the past but keeps a thrilling modern affect. Gaga, for all of her artsy subversion and slight avant-garde leanings, has just as much of a traditionalist impulse, if not stronger; under the right circumstances, the results can be explosive. That alchemy is present here: two artists synced up and bringing out the best in each other’s performances. There is absolutely nothing new here, but it’s polished and perfectly executed. I’m a mark for that sort of thing. [7]

Jonathan Bradley: It's not right to say Bruno Mars is so adept with pastiche that he transcends it; pastiche is his artform, his milieu, the genre that this genre artist seeks to perfect. "Die With a Smile" has two ideas: the first being the familiar terrain of the Bruno Mars ballad, and the second being "What if a Bruno Mars ballad was Jeff Buckley?" Even a few years after the 1994 release of Grace, pop music seemed like it only had room in its past for an artist like Buckley: a soulful and beautiful singer-songwriter who leaned toward rock-god charisma rather than folkish introspection. Mars has Buckley's swooning fragility as well as his stormy squalls of guitar, but for all that Buckley represented the last of something, he never sounded like he was going over someone else's territory. That fundamentally does not work for Mars's attempt to recreate the sound; navigating someone else's territory is Mars's entire point. If "Die With a Smile" has a third idea, it's the addition of Lady Gaga, who is herself no stranger to pastiche (see the Madonna-isms of "Born This Way," the heartland rock of "You and I," or the way she slipped effortlessly into the Hollywood prestige turn that was "Shallow"). Here, she delivers only competence, as if she'd been asked to sing backup on a new recording of "When I Was Your Man" and found out at the last moment that the assignment had changed. [5]

Harlan Talib Ockey: Once you get past the surprise of "Die With a Smile" being a Jeff Buckley impression, it's remarkably insubstantial. "If the world was ending I'd wanna be next to you" sounds clunky and hyper-literal next to, say, "I'd catch a grenade for you". At least the harmonies are nice. [4]

Iain Mew: Bruno Mars's progression makes it a fruitful idea to go back and invert "Grenade" from a distance. Back then, he took the prospect of death as an opportunity to bitterly prove his unmatched love. Now he meets no less than the end of the world with smooth certainty that it's a chance for mutual togetherness. Lady Gaga's way with projecting intensity and sincerity in the most extreme contexts makes her the perfect foil, and for two lines after she comes in, it's transcendent. Then Mars comes back in, and not only is there not enough space for Gaga to shine, there's barely any space at all. Maybe the old anxiety hadn't gone away completely after all. [7]

Alfred Soto: Bruno Mars hasn't sounded this convincing a love man in years, if ever. Too convincing: Gaga is a backup singer on her own single. Mars sure would fuck himself if he could. [5]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: Someone pointed out recently how absurd it is that Lady Gaga's Twitter bio is literally advertising for the HBO Chromatica Ball special, Haus Labs cosmetics, Joker: Folie à Deux, and now "Die with a Smile." That sums up my feelings toward this entry into the Gaga canon: random and indicating a certain directionlessness—or perhaps overdirection?—in her career. She sounds great, and the bridge is perfect TikTok fodder, but she and Bruno Mars sound like they have as much sexual chemistry as brother and sister.  [4]

TA Inskeep: Mars and Gaga sound nice enough together, but there’s no frisson, no spark; they’re just two famous singers, singing a duet for you to stream and buy.  [5]

Scott Mildenhall: To the song's great benefit, the annihilatory proposition is underblown. Instead, its precise lilt is folded and finessed throughout, heading hither and thither without over-accelerating or escalating. It's a fine balance between ostentation and undulation. There's minimal vocal chemistry, but the blend is happening elsewhere. [7]

Hannah Jocelyn: I was with family over the weekend, and my brother asked “who is this??” like it was two stunning new artists on their debut single. Upon learning it was Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars, his excitement dissipated. Only Andrew Watt could make two of pop’s best vocalists sound anonymous (don’t get me started on that weightless drum sound he's inexplicably made his signature). I can’t tell where Gaga ends and Bruno begins, which is a horrible mental image. [5]

Taylor Alatorre: The drums treat every other measure like it's a climax because the entire song, or more precisely its billing, is one undifferentiated climax. Which means no build-up, no peaks or valleys, no memorable grooves or meaningful sense of release. It's just those two names together on a lighted marquee, a chart-watcher fanfic straight out of 2012, What Could Be measuring short against What Must Be, which in this case is the greatest common denominator of softer-than-talcum piano balladry. At least "Grenade" had cartoon bloodletting on its side, and "Shallow" had the benefit of context. "Die with a Smile" reaches for that old doomsday rhetoric out of sheer reflex, even when the prophesized end is painted in washed-out watercolors, like a dream whose outlines dissipate five seconds after waking. Andrew Watt's approach to retromania is less playful than the Smeezingtons' was, but also strangely less reverent, since if you truly revere the music of the past then you don't try to half-seriously Mandela effect yourself into its hit parade. [2]

Nortey Dowuona: Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga getting to coast by cornering the market on having both vocal talent and a modicum of charisma -- you know, the old-fashioned model -- would be frustrating, but at least Watt's patient hand is keeping this over there next to the white Broadway crowd. Anything but more Bruno funk. [7]

Mark Sinker: Obviously I want to claim I’m only onboard with Bruno as a project at last thanks to Gaga’s in-video cigarette — casually centred, disgustingly compelling — but I have to admit it’s something entirely more wholesome: the actual topic, the actual melody, the actual delivery! He got me in the end! (Also, I like thinking of him as a little monster. He is a little monster….)  [8]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Would be a [6] with flipped Mars-Gaga ratio, but even then this would not quite get to the force of melodrama that would allow it to reach exit velocity and escape the great and depressing middle ground of tasteful 20th-century pop pastiche. These two have taken enough stabs at staid, boring pop songs for all occasions that they have become the legacy acts they once aspired toward and collaborated with. Good for them; bad for us. [4]

Kristen S. Hé: As much as I wish this Venn diagram had produced something more adventurous, it's arguably harder to write a song like this -- one that'll probably be on radio rotation for decades, and that I'll never object to hearing in any context. I've often found Bruno's schtick cloying and insincere, but here, I'd believe it even without Gaga's added star power. Bruno, please stay in this lane forever. (Gaga, please don't!) [7]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

[alldancersaretalented]

Things I won't be surprised by if they happen 2024/25

Szyndlar Sisters go to NYCDA (and TDA) and both take home a title

Cami, (Crystal) and/or Ian finally breaks the 3 title curse

Shannon decides to do NYCDA nationals next aswell - just to annoy Molly

Easton teaches at P21 again (if Molly doesn't lock him out of the studio)

Molly finds another 5 sets of twins to add to her P21

Radix changes it's nationals format again - leaving only CanDance and Evoke to have full studio comps there

Club and Gateway become Arizona's P21 and Mather (just cause Club lost so many dancers to Gateway, rrrivals)

Political dances in honor of the upcoming election (I imagine Democrats and Republicans as different costumes (red/blue) and Trump and Biden front and center having a choreographed fist fight)

Hopefully a lot more jazz, now that Regan proved that you can win BD with an up tempo jazz solo

Another big studio scandals (since there always seem to be some)

[letters2fiction]

Welcome to Letters2fiction!

The concept here is to send in a question or a letter request, and you’ll get a response from your fictional character of choice, from the list below. Please stick to the list I’ve made, but of course, you can ask if there’s some other characters I write for, I don’t always remember all the shows, movies or books I’ve consumed over the years and I’m sure I’m missing a lot 😅

Status: New Characters added - Thursday March 21st, 2024

TV SERIES

A Discovery of Witches:

Matthew Clairmont

Baldwin Montclair

Gallowglass de Clermont

Marcus Whitmore

Philippe de Clermont

Jack Blackfriars

Sarah Bishop

Emily Mather

Diana Bishop

Ysabeau de Clermont

Miriam Shepard

Phoebe Taylor

Gerbert D’Aurillac

Peter Knox

Father Andrew Hubbard

Benjamin Fuchs

Satu Järvinen

Meridiana

Law and Order:

Rafael Barba

Sonny Carisi

Joe Velasco

Mike Duarte

Terry Bruno

Peter Stone

Hasim Khaldun

Nick Amaro NEW!

Mike Dodds

Grace Muncy

Kat Tamin

Toni Churlish

Amanda Rollins

Olivia Benson

Rita Calhoun

Casey Novak

Melinda Warner

George Huang

Sam Maroun

Nolan Price

Jamie Whelan

Bobby Reyes

Jet Slootmaekers

Ayanna Bell

Jack McCoy

Elliot Stabler

One Chicago:

Jay Halstead (Could also be Will if you want)

Antonio Dawson

Adam Ruzek

Greg "Mouse" Gerwitz

Dante Torres

Vanessa Rojas

Kevin Atwater

Sean Roman

Matt Casey

Kelly Severide

Joe Cruz

Sylvie Brett

Blake Gallo

Christopher Hermann

"Mouch"

Otis

Violet Mikami

Evan Hawkins

Mayans MC:

Angel Reyes

Miguel

Bishop

Coco

Nestor

911 verse:

Athena Grant

Bobby Nash

Henrietta "Hen" Wilson

Evan "Buck" Buckley

Eddie Diaz

Howie "Chimney" Han

Ravi Panikkar

T.K. Strand

Owen Strand

Carlos Reyes

Marjan Marwani

Paul Strickland

Tommy Vega

Judson "Judd" Ryder

Grace Ryder

Nancy Gillian

Mateo Chavez

The Rookie:

Lucy Chen

Tim Bradford

Celina Juarez

Aaron Thorsen

Nyla Harper

Angela Lopez

Wesley Evers

BBC Sherlock:

Greg Lestrade

Mycroft Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

Moriarty

Molly

Bridgerton:

Anthony Bridgerton

Benedict Bridgerton

Simon Basset

Daphne Bridgerton

Eloise Bridgerton

Kate Sharma

Edwina Sharma

Marina Thompson/Crane

Outlander:

Jamie Fraser

Claire Beauchamp Randall Fraser

Frank Randall

Black Jack Randall

Brianna Fraser

Roger MacKenzie

Fergus Fraser

Marsali Fraser

Jenny Fraser Murray

Ian Murray Sr.

Ian Fraser Murray

Murtagh Mackenzie

Call The Midwife:

Shelagh Turner / Sister Bernadette

Dr. Patrick Turner

Nurse Trixie Franklin

Nurse Phyllis Crane

Lucille Anderson

Nurse Barbara Gilbert

Chummy

Sister Hilda

Miss Higgins

PC Peter Noakes

Reverend Tom Hereward NEW!

Narcos:

Horacio Carrillo

Peaky Blinders:

Tommy Shelby

Downton Abbey:

Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham

Cora Crawley, Countess of Grantham

Lady Mary Crawley

Lady Edith Crawley

Lady Sybil Crawley

Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham

Isobel Crawley

Matthew Crawley

Lady Rose MacClare

Lady Rosamund Painswick

Henry Talbot

Tom Branson

Mr. Charles Carson

Mrs. Hughes / Elsie May Carson

John Bates

Anna Bates

Daisy Mason

Thomas Barrow

Joseph Molesley

Land Girl:

Connie Carter

Reverend Henry Jameson (Gwilym Lee's version)

Midsomer Murder:

DCI Tom Barnaby

Joyce Barnaby

Dr. George Bullard

DCI John Barnaby

Sarah Barnaby

DS Ben Jones

DS Jamie Winter

Sgt. Gavin Troy

Fleur Perkins

WPC Gail Stephens

Kate Wilding

DS Charlie Nelson

Sergeant Dan Scott

NEW! Once Upon A Time

Regina / The Evil Queen

Mary Margaret Blanchard / Snow White

David Nolan / Prince Charming

Emma Swan

Killian Jones / Captain Hook

Mr. Gold / Rumplestiltskin

Neal Cassidy / Baelfire

Peter Pan

Sheriff Graham Humbert / The Huntsman

Jefferson / The Mad Hatter

Belle

Robin of Locksley / Robin Hood

Will Scarlet

Zelena / Wicked Witch

Alice (Once in Wonderland)

Cyrus (Once in Wonderland)

Jafar (Once in Wonderland)

Gideon

Tiger Lily

Naveen

Tiana

Granny

Ariel

Prince Eric

Aladdin

Jasmine

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Hercules

Megara

Tinker Bell

Merida

Red Riding Hood

Mulan

Aurora / Sleeping Beauty

Prince Phillip

Cinderella

Prince Thomas

NEW! The Vampire Diaries / The Originals

Stefan Salvatore

Damon Salvatore

Caroline Forbes

Elena Gilbert

Bonnie Bennett

Enzo St. John

Niklaus Mikaelson

Elijah Mikaelson

Kol Mikaelson

Rebekah Mikaelson

Freya Mikaelson

Finn Mikaelson

Mikael

Esther

Marcel Gerard

Davina Claire

MOVIES

The Pirates of the Caribbean:

Captain Jack Sparrow

Barbossa

Will Turner

Elizabeth Swann

James Norrington

Kingsman:

Merlin

Harry Hart

Eggsy Unwin

James Spencer / Lancelot

Alastair / Percival

Roxy Morton / Lancelot

Maximillian Morton / The Shepherd

Orlando Oxford

Jack Daniels / Whiskey

Gin

BOOKS

Dreamland Billionaire series - Lauren Asher:

Declan

Callahan

Rowan

Iris

Alana

Zahra

Dirty Air series - Lauren Asher:

Noah

Liam

Jax

Santiago

Maya

Sophie

Elena

Chloe

Ladies in Stem - Ali Hazelwood books:

Olive

Adam

Bee

Levi

Elsie

Jack

Mara

Liam

Sadie

Erik

Hannah

Ian

Fourth Wing - Rebecca Yarros:

Xaden Riorson

Dain Aetos

Jack Barlowe

Rhiannan Matthias

Violet Sorrengail

Mira Sorrengail

Lillith Sorrengail

Bodhi Durran

Liam Mairi

[wankerwatch]

Commons Vote

On: Passenger Railway Services Bill (Public Ownership) Bill: Second Reading

Ayes: 351 (96.6% Lab, 2.3% Ind, 0.8% Green, 0.3% SDLP) Noes: 84 (100.0% Con) Absent: ~215

Day's business papers: 2024-7-29

Likely Referenced Bill: Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Description: A Bill to make provision for passenger railway services to be provided by public sector companies instead of by means of franchises.

Originating house: Commons Current house: Commons Bill Stage: Committee of the whole House

Individual Votes:

Ayes

Labour (341 votes)

Abena Oppong-Asare Abtisam Mohamed Adam Jogee Adam Thompson Afzal Khan Al Carns Alan Campbell Alan Gemmell Alan Strickland Alex Baker Alex Ballinger Alex Barros-Curtis Alex Davies-Jones Alex Mayer Alex McIntyre Alex Norris Alex Sobel Alice Macdonald Alison Hume Alison McGovern Alison Taylor Alistair Strathern Allison Gardner Amanda Hack Amanda Martin Andrew Cooper Andrew Gwynne Andrew Lewin Andrew Pakes Andrew Ranger Andrew Western Andy MacNae Andy McDonald Angela Eagle Anna Dixon Anna Gelderd Anneliese Dodds Anneliese Midgley Baggy Shanker Bambos Charalambous Barry Gardiner Bayo Alaba Beccy Cooper Becky Gittins Bell Ribeiro-Addy Ben Coleman Ben Goldsborough Bill Esterson Blair McDougall Brian Leishman Bridget Phillipson Callum Anderson Calvin Bailey Carolyn Harris Cat Eccles Cat Smith Catherine Atkinson Catherine McKinnell Catherine West Charlotte Nichols Chris Bloore Chris Curtis Chris Elmore Chris Hinchliff Chris Kane Chris McDonald Chris Murray Chris Vince Chris Webb Christian Wakeford Claire Hazelgrove Claire Hughes Clive Betts Clive Lewis Connor Naismith Damien Egan Dan Aldridge Dan Jarvis Dan Tomlinson Daniel Francis Danny Beales Darren Jones Darren Paffey Dave Robertson David Baines David Burton-Sampson David Pinto-Duschinsky David Taylor David Williams Dawn Butler Debbie Abrahams Deirdre Costigan Derek Twigg Diana Johnson Douglas Alexander Douglas McAllister Ed Miliband Elaine Stewart Emily Darlington Emma Foody Emma Hardy Emma Lewell-Buck Emma Reynolds Euan Stainbank Feryal Clark Florence Eshalomi Frank McNally Fred Thomas Gen Kitchen Georgia Gould Gerald Jones Gill German Gordon McKee Graeme Downie Graham Stringer Grahame Morris Gregor Poynton Gurinder Josan Hamish Falconer Harpreet Uppal Heidi Alexander Helen Hayes Helena Dollimore Henry Tufnell Hilary Benn Ian Lavery Ian Murray Imogen Walker Irene Campbell Jack Abbott Jacob Collier Jade Botterill Jake Richards James Asser James Murray James Naish Janet Daby Jas Athwal Jayne Kirkham Jeevun Sandher Jeff Smith Jenny Riddell-Carpenter Jess Asato Jessica Morden Jessica Toale Jim Dickson Jim McMahon Jo Platt Jo Stevens Jo White Joani Reid Jodie Gosling Joe Morris Joe Powell Johanna Baxter John Grady John Healey John Slinger John Whitby Jon Pearce Jon Trickett Jonathan Brash Jonathan Davies Jonathan Hinder Josh Dean Josh Fenton-Glynn Josh MacAlister Josh Newbury Josh Simons Julia Buckley Juliet Campbell Justin Madders Kanishka Narayan Kate Dearden Kate Osamor Kate Osborne Katie White Keir Mather Kenneth Stevenson Kerry McCarthy Kevin Bonavia Kevin McKenna Kim Johnson Kim Leadbeater Kirith Entwistle Kirsteen Sullivan Kirsty McNeill Laura Kyrke-Smith Lauren Edwards Lauren Sullivan Laurence Turner Lee Barron Lee Pitcher Leigh Ingham Lewis Atkinson Liam Byrne Liam Conlon Lilian Greenwood Lillian Jones Linsey Farnsworth Lisa Nandy Liz Kendall Liz Twist Lizzi Collinge Lloyd Hatton Lorraine Beavers Louise Haigh Louise Jones Lucy Powell Lucy Rigby Luke Akehurst Luke Charters Luke Murphy Luke Myer Luke Pollard Margaret Mullane Maria Eagle Mark Ferguson Mark Hendrick Mark Sewards Mark Tami Markus Campbell-Savours Marsha De Cordova Martin Rhodes Mary Creagh Mary Glindon Matt Bishop Matt Rodda Matt Turmaine Matt Western Matthew Patrick Matthew Pennycook Maureen Burke Maya Ellis Meg Hillier Melanie Onn Melanie Ward Miatta Fahnbulleh Michael Payne Michael Shanks Michael Wheeler Michelle Scrogham Michelle Welsh Mike Amesbury Mike Kane Mike Reader Mike Tapp Mohammad Yasin Nadia Whittome Natalie Fleet Natasha Irons Naushabah Khan Neil Coyle Neil Duncan-Jordan Nia Griffith Nicholas Dakin Noah Law Oliver Ryan Olivia Bailey Olivia Blake Pam Cox Pamela Nash Pat McFadden Patricia Ferguson Paul Davies Paul Foster Paul Waugh Paula Barker Paulette Hamilton Perran Moon Peter Kyle Peter Lamb Peter Prinsley Peter Swallow Phil Brickell Polly Billington Preet Kaur Gill Rachael Maskell Rachel Blake Rachel Hopkins Richard Baker Richard Quigley Rosena Allin-Khan Rosie Wrighting Rupa Huq Ruth Cadbury Ruth Jones Sadik Al-Hassan Sally Jameson Sam Carling Sam Rushworth Samantha Dixon Samantha Niblett

Sarah Coombes Sarah Edwards Sarah Hall Sarah Jones Sarah Owen Sarah Russell Sarah Sackman Scott Arthur Sean Woodcock Seema Malhotra Shabana Mahmood Sharon Hodgson Shaun Davies Simon Lightwood Simon Opher Siobhain McDonagh Sojan Joseph Sonia Kumar Stella Creasy Stephen Doughty Stephen Timms Steve Race Steve Reed Steve Witherden Steve Yemm Sureena Brackenridge Tahir Ali Taiwo Owatemi Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi Tim Roca Toby Perkins Tom Collins Tom Hayes Tom Rutland Tonia Antoniazzi Tony Vaughan Torcuil Crichton Torsten Bell Tracy Gilbert Tristan Osborne Tulip Siddiq Uma Kumaran Valerie Vaz Warinder Juss Will Stone Yasmin Qureshi Yuan Yang Zubir Ahmed

Independent (8 votes)

Adnan Hussain Apsana Begum Ian Byrne Imran Hussain John McDonnell Rebecca Long Bailey Richard Burgon Zarah Sultana

Green Party (3 votes)

Adrian Ramsay Ellie Chowns Siân Berry

Social Democratic & Labour Party (1 vote)

Colum Eastwood

Noes

Conservative (84 votes)

Alan Mak Alberto Costa Alec Shelbrooke Alicia Kearns Alison Griffiths Andrew Bowie Andrew Griffith Andrew Rosindell Andrew Snowden Aphra Brandreth Ashley Fox Ben Obese-Jecty Blake Stephenson Bob Blackman Bradley Thomas Caroline Dinenage Caroline Johnson Charlie Dewhirst Claire Coutinho Danny Kruger David Davis David Mundell David Reed David Simmonds Desmond Swayne Edward Argar Gagan Mohindra Gareth Bacon Gareth Davies Geoffrey Clifton-Brown George Freeman Graham Stuart Greg Smith Gregory Stafford Harriet Cross Harriett Baldwin Helen Grant Helen Whately Jack Rankin James Cleverly Joe Robertson John Cooper John Glen John Hayes John Lamont John Whittingdale Julia Lopez Julian Lewis Katie Lam Kemi Badenoch Kieran Mullan Kit Malthouse Lewis Cocking Lincoln Jopp Louie French Mark Francois Mark Garnier Martin Vickers Matt Vickers Mel Stride Mims Davies Neil Hudson Neil Shastri-Hurst Nick Timothy Patrick Spencer Paul Holmes Peter Bedford Peter Fortune Rebecca Harris Rebecca Paul Rebecca Smith Richard Holden Robbie Moore Robert Jenrick Roger Gale Saqib Bhatti Sarah Bool Shivani Raja Steve Barclay Stuart Anderson Stuart Andrew Tom Tugendhat Victoria Atkins Wendy Morton

[femmefataleart]

Skye Mathers by Ian MacDonald

[open-hearth-rpg]

Open Hearth Video Roundup - April 12, 2024

Welcome to the weekly Open Hearth Gaming video roundup!

These recorded sessions represent only a portion of the games we play every week, and anyone is welcome to join the fun! If you'd like to play in games like these, join our Playabl community and click on the "Calendar" tab to sign up for upcoming games. To browse our entire library of session videos, please visit our YouTube Playlists page.

Open Hearth Gaming Calendar

Orbital (Session 3 of 3) Donogh runs for Mark and Puckett Cash Only rushes to get those star-crossed lovers out of their hunter's crosshairs. Rye calls up one of her regulars to spirit them away, thanks to the best smuggler in the sector! Meanwhile Hemlock sits down with Calla to come to an arrangement. But every scheme is sidelined by the awakening in the depths of the station, something in motion thanks to that surprise nuke...

Eotenweard: The Old North (Session 4) Alun R. runs for Dom, Dominik M., and Pawel S. Amid the smoking aftermath of the Ogre's rampage our Heroes agree the solution to the ills that beset Stenholm (and a missing hawk) must lie within the nearby Treacherous Forest. There's evidence that someone got there before them, a grisly dismemberment, and a revelation of who is to blame. Then...the Heroes discover they have been misled; must identify the real villain; and confront that embodiment of the Darkness...

Trail of Cthulhu: Fearful Symmetries: Arc Two (Session 6) Lowell Francis runs for Alun R., Paul Rivers, Sherri, and Will H The characters arrive at Mathers Hall in Norfolk and Willford discovers the geography has changed in the two weeks since he last visited. They meet some of the guests-- a strange mix of folks deep in the secrets of magic, as well as staff who may be invested as well. The doctor receives a ride from Verity Dyse and becomes wary. Dinner and after reveals more secrets...and then a missing guest!

Trail of Cthulhu: Fearful Symmetries: Arc Two (Session 7) Lowell Francis runs for Alun R., Paul Rivers, Sherri, and Will H The morning of the shoot at Mathers Hall opens with a missing guest that few comment on. Paired up with fellow guests, the magicians learn more about their personalities and agendas. Richard skips the hunt, instead learning more about the origin of the mysterious Pascale Dumont. The investigation continues, with the good Doctor turning the tables on their host by admitting in private to the murder of Lord Bradbury. But then Lord Portmore's associate vanishes and there's an attempt on Verity Dyce's life which goes awry.

Dreams and Machines: Red King's Slumbers (Session 1) Lowell Francis runs for Eliot, José Feito, Kevin M, and Vince Session Zero and inciting incident for a short series of Dreams and Machines, a new setting inspired by Horizon: Zero Dawn and other sci-fi post-apocalyptic games. We create our characters, build bonds, and start things out so the players can begin to get used to the mechanics of this version of 2d20.

Dreams and Machines: Red King's Slumbers (Session 2) Lowell Francis runs for Eliot, José Feito, Kevin M, and Vince In the wake of their battle against the Thralls, our heroes discover an ancient cache containing a potentially dangerous technology, but decide to bring them along. They reach New Mossgrove and find out that recent attacks have changed the balance of power within the town...

Girl by Moonlight: On a Sea of Stars (Session 1 of 5) Donogh runs for Ian, Matthew Doughty, and Sabine V. Having awoken vengeful Gods with their meddling in time travel - a last branch of humanity hurtles through space in an interstellar ziggurat, hunted by the Leviathans. Our group of Pilots, chosen by their congregation to be doomed martyrs, is the only thing that can protect them - but it it only out there on a sea of stars that the pilots and their Engines feel whole, with an intimate bond and control over their own fate that the rest of humanity can barely imagine...

Girl by Moonlight: On a Sea of Stars (Session 2 of 5) Donogh runs for Ian and Sabine V. We are introduced to two of our pilots: Jet/Apogee the Outsider goes outside the Ziggurat to do some post asteroid-strike repairs, but returns to polish the Engine Shamash to its full glory. Cordelia the Enigma, living a double life as a maintenance worker who as Red Shift sneaks into the hangar bay to take the Engine Tezcatlipoca out on an unscheduled foray.

Godbound: Sundered Cycles (Session 32 of 33) Lowell Francis runs for Dan Brown, Ethan Harvey, Patrick Knowles, Sherri, and Tyler Lominack Interacting with the new pantheon our gods joined to their own, they work to learn more about the looming Draconic and Elemental Evil threats. Threadless builds her dragon, though there remains a flaw at the heart of it. Random speaks with his bride about their future. Tasos considers expanding his nightmare realm. Darius finds both a kindred spirit and a solution. And Ordevi takes his leave from the pantheon, heading out to spread word of the new gods via a knowledge aqueduct.

Godbound: Sundered Cycles (Session 33 of 33) Lowell Francis runs for Ethan Harvey, Patrick Knowles, Sherri, and Tyler Lominack The final session of the campaign.

Damn the Man, Save the Music! Donogh runs for Casey T, David Adrian Randall, and Thomas Manuel The employees of Revolution Records are (not) prepping for the imminent arrival of Mr Maestro! Jake J the local rockstar is desperately seeking a band, Brags the space case is trying to find the lost cat, Apple the overachieving temp is looking to reconnect with a cute skater boy! And they're wondering what Yu's beef is with the big shot and what exactly Purple means on the DEFCON scale...

Star Wars Saturday

Fellowship Rich Rogers runs for Cody Eastlick, Greg G., Kae, Steven Watkins, and Tyler Lominack The Fellowship of the Dilligent Spark travel to Dathomir to discover the sinister plot of Taron Malicos, then rush to face him and his Nightbrother band.

Stars in the Dark: Stars in the Dark II (Session 6) Anders runs for Marc Majcher, Mark (they/them), Rich Rogers, and Steven Watkins KABOOOM!

Off-Calendar Highlights

The Between: Stars and Suns, Season Two (Session 9) Madelancholy runs for Jack, Mike, Sarah W., and Steph "Coming and Going" - In an attempt to find out more about the Slugger, Ernest gets more involved in Bout Club, to his dismay. Sir Atticus listens to La Hortencia's story after fending off interference from a familiar acquaintance. Dame Georgie allows himself to be a temporary vessel to the Abbey's demonic presence, only to be betrayed more than once. Liat makes several tempting offers.

Trophy Gold: Hissing Darkness: In the Wake of Secrets (Session 1) Madelancholy runs for Dom, James, Jazy, and Mike Ferdinando The first of two concurrent series of this Rooted in Trophy (Gold) incursion, the characters wake too early in a Ship warped by perfect darkness…survival a priority.

Trophy Gold: Hissing Darkness: Whispers in Exile (Session 1) Madelancholy runs for Amanda/iamatrex, B, Jonn, and Marc Majcher The second group to find themselves in the strange eerie darkness of the Ship, the survivors make their way out of Cold-Sleep, finding terrible things in the next Set...

Trophy Gold: Hissing Darkness: In the Wake of Secrets (Session 2) Madelancholy runs for Dom, James, Jazy, and Mike Ferdinando The survivors manage to battle their way out of the Cold-Sleep Warrens...but now they find themselves in the twisted, warped halls and vents of The Maze, stalked by something deadly, even as the Dark calls out to them: Reunion. Rebirth. Remake. And one of their number does, succumbing to their urge to consume and be consumed...

Trophy Gold: Hissing Darkness: Whispers in Exile (Session 2) Madelancholy runs for Amanda/iamatrex, B, Jonn, and Marc Majcher Deep within The Maze, the survivors encounter the strange warping of the Ship and more signs of that which hunts them. Memories come unbidden and are made real, and calls from the Dark tempt further connection...

Paranormal Inc (Session 9) Madelancholy runs for Brent and Michael D. Down by the Haunted Riverside - What could go wrong on a day-long cruise of teambuilding/employee party fun-time? Rumours abound as strange occurrences plague their trip - is it the boat, the river, or the Very Good Boat Cruise Company themselves?

[cyarsk52-20]

Here Are All the Winners From the 2023 Oscars: Complete List

The 95th annual Academy Awards are hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.

The 95th Academy Awards take place on Sunday (March 12) at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood and air live on ABC, with Jimmy Kimmel returning as Oscars host for the third time. 

Related 

Jimmy Kimmel Jokes About Nick Cannon’s Kids, the Will Smith Slap in 2023 Oscars… 

03/12/2023

Everything Everywhere All At Once, which earned 11 nods, is the most-nominated film this year. One of those 11 nominations is for best original song (David Byrne, Ryan Lott and Mitski’s “This Is A Life”). They’re competing against Lady Gaga and BloodPop for “Hold My Hand” (Top Gun: Maverick), Tems, Rihanna, Ryan Coogler and Ludwig Goransson for “Lift Me Up (Black Panther: Wakanda Forever), Diane Warren for “Applause” (Tell It Like a Woman) and M.M. Keeravaani and Chandrabose for “Naatu Naatu” (RRR). This is Warren’s 14th nomination, with no wins so far. Gaga previously won this category for co-writing “Shallow” from A Star Is Born. 

Baz Luhrmann’s biopic on 20thcentury icon Elvis Presley, Elvis, was nominated for eight Oscars, including best picture; it also earned a best actor nomination for Austin Butler, who portrayed the King of Rock & Roll.

Check out the complete winners list below, updating live throughout the show. 

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

Angela Bassett in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” Hong Chau in “The Whale” Kerry Condon in “The Banshees of Inisherin” Jamie Lee Curtis in “Everything Everywhere All at Once” — WINNER Stephanie Hsu in “Everything Everywhere All at Once”

Best Costume Design

“Babylon” Mary Zophres “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” Ruth Carter — WINNER “Elvis” Catherine Martin “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Shirley Kurata “Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris” Jenny Beavan

Best Sound

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Viktor Prášil, Frank Kruse, Markus Stemler, Lars Ginzel and Stefan Korte “Avatar: The Way of Water” Julian Howarth, Gwendolyn Yates Whittle, Dick Bernstein, Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers and Michael Hedges “The Batman” Stuart Wilson, William Files, Douglas Murray and Andy Nelson “Elvis” David Lee, Wayne Pashley, Andy Nelson and Michael Keller “Top Gun: Maverick” Mark Weingarten, James H. Mather, Al Nelson, Chris Burdon and Mark Taylor — WINNER

Best Original Score

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Volker Bertelmann — WINNER “Babylon” Justin Hurwitz “The Banshees of Inisherin” Carter Burwell “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Son Lux “The Fabelmans” John Williams

Best Adapted Screenplay

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Screenplay by Edward Berger, Lesley Paterson & Ian Stokell “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” Written by Rian Johnson “Living” Written by Kazuo Ishiguro “Top Gun: Maverick” Screenplay by Ehren Kruger and Eric Warren Singer and Christopher McQuarrie; Story by Peter Craig and Justin Marks “Women Talking” Screenplay by Sarah Polley — WINNER

Best Original Screenplay

“The Banshees of Inisherin” Written by Martin McDonagh “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Written by Daniel Kwan & Daniel Scheinert — WINNER “The Fabelmans” Written by Steven Spielberg & Tony Kushner “Tár” Written by Todd Field “Triangle of Sadness” Written by Ruben Östlund

Best Live-Action Short Film

“An Irish Goodbye” Tom Berkeley and Ross White — WINNER “Ivalu” Anders Walter and Rebecca Pruzan “Le Pupille” Alice Rohrwacher and Alfonso Cuarón “Night Ride” Eirik Tveiten and Gaute Lid Larssen “The Red Suitcase” Cyrus Neshvad

Best Animated Short Film

“The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse” Charlie Mackesy and Matthew Freud — WINNER “The Flying Sailor” Amanda Forbis and Wendy Tilby “Ice Merchants” João Gonzalez and Bruno Caetano “My Year of Dicks” Sara Gunnarsdóttir and Pamela Ribon “An Ostrich Told Me the World Is Fake and I Think I Believe It” Lachlan Pendragon

Best Actor in a Supporting Role

Brendan Gleeson in “The Banshees of Inisherin” Brian Tyree Henry in “Causeway” Judd Hirsch in “The Fabelmans” Barry Keoghan in “The Banshees of Inisherin” Ke Huy Quan in “Everything Everywhere All at Once” — WINNER

Best Animated Film

“Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” Guillermo del Toro, Mark Gustafson, Gary Ungar and Alex Bulkley — WINNER “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On” Dean Fleischer Camp, Elisabeth Holm, Andrew Goldman, Caroline Kaplan and Paul Mezey “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” Joel Crawford and Mark Swift “The Sea Beast” Chris Williams and Jed Schlanger “Turning Red” Domee Shi and Lindsey Collins

Best Original Song

“Applause” from “Tell It like a Woman”; Music and Lyric by Diane Warren “Hold My Hand” from “Top Gun: Maverick”; Music and Lyric by Lady Gaga and BloodPop “Lift Me Up” from “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”; Music by Tems, Rihanna, Ryan Coogler and Ludwig Goransson; Lyric by Tems and Ryan Coogler “Naatu Naatu” from “RRR”; Music by M.M. Keeravaani; Lyric by Chandrabose — WINNER “This Is A Life” from “Everything Everywhere All at Once”; Music by Ryan Lott, David Byrne and Mitski; Lyric by Ryan Lott and David Byrne

Best International Feature Film

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Germany — WINNER “Argentina, 1985” Argentina “Close” Belgium “EO” Poland “The Quiet Girl” Ireland

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Heike Merker and Linda Eisenhamerová “The Batman” Naomi Donne, Mike Marino and Mike Fontaine “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” Camille Friend and Joel Harlow “Elvis” Mark Coulier, Jason Baird and Aldo Signoretti “The Whale” Adrien Morot, Judy Chin and Anne Marie Bradley — WINNER

Best Production Design

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Production Design: Christian M. Goldbeck; Set Decoration: Ernestine Hipper — WINNER “Avatar: The Way of Water” Production Design: Dylan Cole and Ben Procter; Set Decoration: Vanessa Cole “Babylon” Production Design: Florencia Martin; Set Decoration: Anthony Carlino “Elvis” Production Design: Catherine Martin and Karen Murphy; Set Decoration: Bev Dunn “The Fabelmans” Production Design: Rick Carter; Set Decoration: Karen O’Hara

Best Cinematography

“All Quiet on the Western Front” James Friend — WINNER “Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths” Darius Khondji “Elvis” Mandy Walker “Empire of Light” Roger Deakins “Tár” Florian Hoffmeister

Best Visual Effects

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Frank Petzold, Viktor Müller, Markus Frank and Kamil Jafar “Avatar: The Way of Water” Joe Letteri, Richard Baneham, Eric Saindon and Daniel Barrett — WINNER “The Batman” Dan Lemmon, Russell Earl, Anders Langlands and Dominic Tuohy “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” Geoffrey Baumann, Craig Hammack, R. Christopher White and Dan Sudick “Top Gun: Maverick” Ryan Tudhope, Seth Hill, Bryan Litson and Scott R. Fisher

Best Film Editing

“The Banshees of Inisherin” Mikkel E.G. Nielsen “Elvis” Matt Villa and Jonathan Redmond “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Paul Rogers — WINNER “Tár” Monika Willi “Top Gun: Maverick” Eddie Hamilton

Best Documentary Feature

“All That Breathes” Shaunak Sen, Aman Mann and Teddy Leifer “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” Laura Poitras, Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Nan Goldin and Yoni Golijov “Fire of Love” Sara Dosa, Shane Boris and Ina Fichman “A House Made of Splinters” Simon Lereng Wilmont and Monica Hellström “Navalny” Daniel Roher, Odessa Rae, Diane Becker, Melanie Miller and Shane Boris — WINNER

Best Documentary Short Subject

“The Elephant Whisperers” Kartiki Gonsalves and Guneet Monga — WINNER “Haulout” Evgenia Arbugaeva and Maxim Arbugaev “How Do You Measure a Year?” Jay Rosenblatt “The Martha Mitchell Effect” Anne Alvergue and Beth Levison “Stranger at the Gate” Joshua Seftel and Conall Jones

Best Actor in a Leading Role

Austin Butler in “Elvis” Colin Farrell in “The Banshees of Inisherin” Brendan Fraser in “The Whale” — WINNER Paul Mescal in “Aftersun” Bill Nighy in “Living”

Best Actress in a Leading Role

Cate Blanchett in “Tár” Ana de Armas in “Blonde” Andrea Riseborough in “To Leslie” Michelle Williams in “The Fabelmans” Michelle Yeoh in “Everything Everywhere All at Once” — WINNER

Best Directing

“The Banshees of Inisherin” Martin McDonagh “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert — WINNER “The Fabelmans” Steven Spielberg “Tár” Todd Field “Triangle of Sadness” Ruben Östlund

Best Picture

“All Quiet on the Western Front” Malte Grunert, Producer “Avatar: The Way of Water” James Cameron and Jon Landau, Producers “The Banshees of Inisherin” Graham Broadbent, Pete Czernin and Martin McDonagh, Producers “Elvis” Baz Luhrmann, Catherine Martin, Gail Berman, Patrick McCormick and Schuyler Weiss, Producers “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert and Jonathan Wang, Producers — WINNER “The Fabelmans” Kristie Macosko Krieger, Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner, Producers “Tá”r Todd Field, Alexandra Milchan and Scott Lambert, Producers “Top Gun: Maverick” Tom Cruise, Christopher McQuarrie, David Ellison and Jerry Bruckheimer, Producers “Triangle of Sadness” Erik Hemmendorff and Philippe Bober, Producers “Women Talking” Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner and Frances McDormand, Producers

Billboard

Daily newsletters straight to your inboxHere Are All the Winners From the 2023 Oscars: Complete List The 95th annual Academy Awards are hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.

Read in Billboard: https://apple.news/AHKFOmlU5QtqosjZ_09EbPg

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[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 10, Number 11

Photo of Alan Licht by Stu Lax

One of the oddest, most disturbing developments in recent years is the devaluation of expertise. If a souped up auto complete program can write a screenplay, who needs writers? If scientific guidelines about how to stave off a plague make us angry or confused, who wants them? Anybody can be anything, given enough cash in their pockets, thought, evidence and fact be damned. So, it is somewhat unfashionable that Dusted continues to seek out artists who are good at what they do, whether they are conservatory trained or DIY, steeped in historical tradition or trying something new. Our monthly Dust highlights another batch of them. Bill Meyer, Andrew Forell, Tim Clarke, Jennifer Kelly, Jonathan Shaw, Ian Mathers and Bryon Hayes contributed.

John Butcher / Florian Stoffner / Chris Corsano — The Glass Changes Shape (Relative Pitch)

This autumn, English saxophonist John Butcher celebrated his 70th birthday. For the occasion his fellow musicians donned t-shirts proclaiming, “You can only trust yourself and the first ∞ John Butcher albums.” Yes, he puts out quite a few, and no, I’m not up to date. The completist’s task is even more daunting when one considers just how much music is packed into each of the nine improvisations on this concert recording, his second with guitarist Florian Stoffner and percussionist Chris Corsano. Timbres, volumes and modes of attack change from second to second, living up the album’s title; not even the music’s form I fixed. No one’s resting on laurels here. Corsano plays with rare spaciousness, and Butcher often seems to be playing up the contrasts between his horns’ tonal fluidity and the jagged edges of Stoffner’s contribution. Pardon the paradox, but each track is a subdivision of ∞, and there’s no end to the time you could spend getting profitably lost in one.

Bill Meyer

Cybotron — Parallel Shift (Tresor)

in 2019, legendary Detroit producer Juan Atkins rebooted his 1980s electro project Cybotron with Laurens van Oswald (nephew of Basic Channel founder Moritz) and Tameko Williams (Detroit In Effect). Atkins takes the technological matrices of his hometown’s now largely defunct manufacturing plants and Kraftwerk’s “Autobahn” and twists them through an afro-futurist wormhole. The trio’s latest 12” single “Parallel Shift” sets Atkins’ robotic vocals and lockstep machine beats against melodic synths and warm bass tones. As Atkins insists on a “parallel shift”, smuggled elements of Clintonesque funk and drifting reverie suggest subversion of strictly linear time. The B-side “Earth” is a more straightforward piece of electro with the emphasis on syncopation. The track flickers with sci-fi synths as Atkins posits human rhythms as a form of cosmic consciousness. Volume up and eyes closed, you will be transported.

Andrew Forell

Dean Drouillard — Mirrors and Ghosts (self-released)

This instrumental solo album by Canadian guitarist Dean Drouillard is a series of hazy noir scenes. At its brightest and most melodic, as in “Portland” and “Gorgasuke,” it’s reminiscent of the vivid, playful miniatures of Opsvik & Jennings’s A Dream I Used to Remember. Elsewhere, the album is decidedly more atmospheric and ambient, akin to the widescreen explorations of Daniel Lanois’s Flesh and Machine. The album’s largely introspective nature is no surprise when you learn Drouillard played and recorded all the instruments himself. His guitar playing in particular is evocative and tastefully restrained. At once intimate and widescreen, Mirrors and Ghosts feels both eerily melancholic and gently uplifting.

Tim Clarke

Fievel Is Glauque — Rong Weicknes (Fat Possum)

Though Fievel Is Glauque are technically a duo — songwriters Zach Phillips (Blanche Blanche Blanche) and Ma Clements on keys and vocals, respectively — for new album Rong Weickes they assembled a crack team of six other players. Musicians on drums, bass, electric guitar, woodwinds and brass flesh out a dizzyingly complex and gratifyingly daft soundworld. Think 1970s prog-folk; think Napoleon Murphy Brock–era Frank Zappa; think Julia Holter spiraling down a jazz-fusion black hole. Rong Weicknes is a LOT. Tellingly, many of the album’s most accessible songs, including singles “As Above So Below” and “Love Weapon,” plus the beautiful and relatively calm “Toute Suite,” arrive early in the track list. Opener “Hover” is perhaps the best example of the band’s bonkers “live in triplicate” working method, in which multiple takes are stacked one on top of another, then chiseled down to reach a final mix. It’s chaotic, like multiple candy-colored Escher staircases spiraling off in different directions at once. In this realm of music-making, too much is never enough, and the line between virtuosic brilliance and over-the-top absurdity bends and blurs. Given the chaos is cumulative, listening to the album from front to back tends to result in ear fatigue during the second half, no matter how many brave attempts it takes to tackle it all in one go.

Tim Clarke

Helena Hauff — Multiplying My Absurdities (Tresor)

Hamburg DJ and producer Helena Hauff’s debut EP for Tresor is three tracks of full-on throwback acid trance. Expertly structured over 22 minutes of build, crescendo and release, Hauff combines thumping beats and bass tones with a detached darkwave cool and a healthy smear of analogue soot. Think Roland drum machines & 303 bass, squelching synths, arpeggio runs and all nature of odd grimy ghosts grumbling in the machines. Hauff reaches her apotheosis on “Punks in the Gym”, named for an Australian rock climb known as the hardest in the world (and now closed as an Indigenous Heritage site). It starts hard, with the bass in the red zone and the drums not far behind, and arpeggiated synths screaming like a drill sergeant. The plateaus, when they come, are mere toeholds for the next ascent. It’s a relentless, punishing piece. And when, near the end, Hauff drops everything but the kickdrum, it’s like watching the sun rise at an outdoor rave to, hearing nothing but your beating heart.

Andrew Forell

Rafael Anton Irisarri — Façadisms

Rafael Anton Irisarri creates music with the grandeur of a vast, wasted landscape. He brings his experience as a mastering engineer to bear on all his recordings, rendering them dense and immersive, stacked high with thick waves of guitar and synthesizer tone. Façadisms is no exception and features two highlights. “Control Your Soul’s Desire For Freedom” features searing cello from Julia Kent and angelic vocals by Hannah Elizabeth Cox, and “Forever Ago is Now” features string arrangements from T.R. Jordan, which carry the album’s most anthemic chord progression. Façadisms’ blasted textures are never less than compelling, but these tracks are twin peaks within the record’s glowering sonic geography.

Tim Clarke

Charlotte Jacobs — Atlas (New Amsterdam)

Charlotte Jacobs’s songs are a little shy. They lurk in corners and grow up from cracks. They venture fluidly out of empty space, eddying and cascading through echoing caverns, with just a little glitch beat or a surge of synth tones to ground them. Jacobs is a conservatory Belgian composer and singer here making her first solo album. Her voice comes in breathy flutters, a little like Mirah at her most acoustic and spare, but she hedges that fragile bloom in masses of digital sound. A devotee of Ableton, she makes the synth sound like all kinds of instruments, a quacking oboe in “Celeste,” a ghostly choir in CYTMH.” Records seldom sound simultaneously this bare and this layered. There are many elements in play, but all scrubbed clean and hemmed in by silence.

Jennifer Kelly

Alan Licht — Havens (VDSQ)

With Havens, Alan Licht flips the attack-decay-sustain-release envelope of the guitar on its head, folding notes and chords over each other in waves. He does this with a heft to his tone, so that chord progressions become waterfalls and melodies emerge like vine-like shoots, growing in many directions simultaneously. Licht’s songs mesmerize with repetition, but the tones resonate such that they fold back on themselves, creating entirely new patterns for us to discern. The cover art reflects his steel string sorcery, as a dull-colored house surrounded by twilit swirling clouds emits beams of red, yellow, and orange light from its many orifices. A variety of energy levels and frequencies are represented here, and they reveal themselves in surprising ways. Throughout his career, Licht has straddled the worlds of indie rock and the avant-garde, and Havens tugs at both sides, creating a new universe entirely: one where resonance rules over everything else.

Bryon Hayes

Longobardi + Cecchitelli — Maloviento (LINE)

Italian sound artists Ernesto Longobardi and Demetrio Cecchitelli create minimalist environmental works built from droning sub-oscillations that emerge from a haze of white noise. The four pieces on Maloviento, titled by duration, are arctic. Slow, evocative of shifting ice and wind swirling across bleak landscapes.. 14’24” is frigid amalgam of staticky cracks and sheets of white noise that rise and fall with increasing intensity. The duo intersperses these with sounds of dripping stalactites and pings of some distant beacon signaling into the abyss. It immerses the listener in an alien and alienating environment in which you find yourself clinging to these noises as the only way to get your bearing. 21’18” is slightly kinder. More recognizably human sounds emerge. Breath labored by cold, a trudge of footsteps and a muttering voice culminating in the introduction of a flute. Tentative at first, it gathers strength and warmth before being absorbed into the ice. Riveting stuff.

Andrew Forell

Man/Woman/Chainsaw — Eazy Peazy (Fat Possum)

Young London sextet Man/Woman/Chainsaw emerged from the scene that includes bands like Black Midi and Black Country, New Road with whom they share a similar omnivorous musical DNA. Vocalists, bassist Vera Leppanen and guitarist Billy Ward have been playing together since they were 14. Now approaching 20, and joined by contemporaries Emmie-Mae Avery on keys, violinist, Clio Harwood violin, Ben Holmes on guitar and drummer Lola Waterworth, M/W/C play punk infused theatrical rock, not quite as knotty as their near contemporaries, but fully embracing the chaotic energy of musicians pushing themselves to fit all their ideas into songs that dance delicate and furious. The acutely observed kitchen sink dramas of “The Boss” and “Sports Day” burst from the speakers, withering in word, and balanced by Harwood’s sawing violin and Avery’s delicate keys. Leppanen a powerhouse on the former, Ward all snarling self-deprecation on the latter. In contrast “Grow A Tongue In Time” is almost dainty with its curlicue of violin, bass, and keys tempered by Leppanen’s rasp that speaks of a desperate frustration echoed in the washes of cymbals that swarm towards the end. A band with space to grow and one to watch out for.

Andrew Forell

The Modern Folk — Primitive Future III (Practice)

This expansive collection spans 20 songs and nearly as many years for the folk centric but ambi-curious guitarist Joshua Moss (who, full disclosure, recently started writing for Dusted). His music here takes many forms, from the blues rock chug of “Shiver Shaker,” which could pass for an alternate universe outtake from Jon Spencer’s Heavy Trash to the cosmic twang of “Hippy Sandwich,” running closer to Ripley Johnson’s Rose City Band or the Heavy Lidders or whatever Matt Valentine is doing this week. There’s room, too, for lucid, radiant blues-folk picking, twined with bowing in “Braided Channels” or abetted in shimmery gossamer by Jen Powers on dulcimer on “You’ll Have That,” or left to strike out unadorned on luminous (and aptly titled) “Subdued.” Some artists try something different to prove they can. Moss lets the change grow out of old roots, supple, green and lovely. One other item of note: all proceeds are earmarked for hurricane relief.

Jennifer Kelly

Paprika — S/T (Iron Lung)

Paprika had already released the excellent, caustic Let’s Kill Punk LP this year, so this new EP is an unexpected November surprise. Are you thankful? It’s pungent and nasty stuff — Paprika sounds like the grittiest elements of NYC punk rawk, c 1976, partying with the hepped-up hardcore of Government Issue or Dirty Rotten EP-period DRI. If that sounds like fun, it sort of is, if you can listen past the nihilistic sentiments expressed in tunes like “Catatonic Pisser” and “Wasting Time.” This reviewer especially likes the self-lacerating qualities of “Supply Chain Wallet,” which explores the ways in which even filthy, greasy punks have a variety of fashion sense, implicating them in capital’s machinery. The band is more direct: “I’m chained to my wallet / Don’t you fuckers know? / Money is dirt.” Word.

Jonathan Shaw

Rock Candy — Swimming In (Carbon)

Rock Candy is Krysi Battalene (Mountain Movers, Headroom) and Emily Robb. Both are guitarists of just renown who, if they decided to open up an optical shop, would specialize in third-eyewear. Together, they refrain from six-string calisthenics in order to focus on nuanced expressions of motion. “Swimming In” is all about drift, albeit with enough surface tension for a stuttering guitar figure to loom over the undulating organ-scape. “Across A Mirage” sets slide vs. reverb, each fighting for footage on a mechanical Clydesdale beat. The cost of vinyl being what it is, some folks might question the point of picking up singles. This year, Rock Candy is the angle that dispels such faithless notions.

Bill Meyer

Sif — Aegis of the Hollowed King (self released)

If you were going to make solo instrumental doom metal about video games, Dark Souls is certainly one of the few that feels like it actually fits. What makes the second LP from New Orleans-based Sif work as well as it does, though, is how much Aegis of the Hollowed King engages with what’s actually compelling about the FromSoftware series beyond any surface level trappings of swords, monsters and boss fights. Here focusing on what even they admit is an “understandably maligned masterpiece,” Dark Souls II, these four tracks don’t try to overwrite the game’s fantastic actual soundtrack (by Motoi Sakuraba and Yuka Kitamura). Instead they invoke how much of the experience of painstakingly making your way across Drangleic is suffused with melancholy horror (yes, occasionally leavened with moments of brutally-won success). That atmosphere has been translated into a doom metal idiom, but that just means even the most elegiac elements here continue to crush.

Ian Mathers

Sulida — Utos (Clean Feed)

The phrase “good old-fashioned free jazz” could be applied to this Norwegian trio’s album, no disrespect intended and none dealt. Marthe Lea’s gruff tenor sax balances the unbridled emotion and considered poise of Ayler and Tchicai, and Jon Rune Strøm and Dag Erik Knedal Anderson negotiate points of structure vs. flow in ways that would do Hopkins and McCall proud. There are also moments that bring to mind Don Cherry if he had given full allegiance to the Swedish woods instead of the world. And yet, the character of each musician shines through, so that this music feels alive rather than merely reanimated. Ready to rumble by unfailingly lyrical, Utos is a friend in unfriendly times.

Bill Meyer

[co-mixed]

A Horrible End or Never-ending Horror (but in Buffyverse)

A Buffyverse essay inspired by other Buffyverse essays.

(I’m using the most appropriate gifs and I thank all the creators in advance: @bscgirl99, @charmedslayer, @haydenpanettieres​)

Before I begin this long dig through heroism in both shows, I want to make it clear that it’s the shortcomings that make these characters relatable. So with all the criticism, I understand exactly where they are coming from.

If anything This isn’t a scientific work, this is an attempt to understand the characters even more. 

Also, this essay is heavily inspired by both “The Strength and Conviction to Lose so Relentlessly”: Heroism in Angel (by Ian Mathers) and The Three Faces of Anne: Identity Formation in BTVS and Angel (by Don Tresca) essays. The former originally made me want to contradict several points, but the more I thought, the more I wanted to contradistinguish both idealistic looks at what it means to be a Hero. This idea is the red thread in BTVS and Angel and no one really illustrates the conflict of a hero better than Buffy and Angel, since they both have to live this “heroic” life, and at different times choose different paths.

Heroism is a vast term and the quickest way to kickstart the conversation in regards to the Buffyverse is to recall Lindsey’s quote “Every day you sit behind your desk and you learn a little more how to accept the world the way it is. Well, here's the rub. Heroes don't do that. Heroes don't accept the world the way it is. They fight it.”

And this quote, while defining a hero (in Lindsey’s opinion though), immediately raises questions.

The Definition of Heroism for Buffy

The way I see it, Buffy’s understanding of heroism comes from several elements of her life. First, she is human. Her life is finite and she knows that. Even before coming face to face with her own mortality, she understands that one day her life will inevitably come to an end.

When she is first called, her place in the world is still undecided. She has no thorough plans or vision of her life as an adult, so in a way, it is simpler for her to rearrange her life and the image of the world to fit in the suddenly revealed supernatural side of it.

Despite that, she only fully encounters her own mortality by the end of s.1 (“Prophecy Girl”) and fully accepts her role as the slayer in “Anne” (s.3). To study that better, you might want to read “The Three Faces of Anne”. Don Tresca compares Anne’s Identities throughout her appearances and studies them according to works on Identity search.

So by the time episode “Amends” comes around, we have a Buffy who knows what her life is going to be like, and is ready to define her own understanding of heroism. She will fight every day, until one day she dies and a new slayer takes her place to fight the same fight. Despite Lindsey’s claim, she doesn’t fight the world, she, in fact, accepts it and her role in it. And she follows this role up to season 5 when she dies. Had “The Gift” been the last episode in the series, this definition would’ve certainly stuck.

Her transformation after being resurrected is what likely urges her to become the “hero” by Lindsey’s standard when she chooses to change the world instead of keeping up the fight.

Yet changing the world does not necessarily equal winning or even pushing the opponent far enough. With approx. 2000 newly called slayers there is still no guarantee that the world will become safer.

In fact, we get to see several outcomes here: In the episode “Damage” (Angel), where a traumatized slayer wreaks havoc, in the comics with pirate slayers and sired slayers (don’t make me use that word), and in In Every Generation, where in fact, changes do make the world safer although ultimately causing a restart of the slayer line.

But that’s a different Buffy, by all means, she’s been through a real death, a real afterlife, and a painful resurrection followed by depression. In the s.6 finale, Buffy was still prepared to fight an army day by day if it came to this. She wasn’t looking for an out which may be why she got one. This kind of reward may be a fictional concept but it teaches you a lesson nonetheless.

The Definition of Heroism for Angel

Angel has had a longer life, thus he presents a more complex view of heroism. At the same time, it is very different for him.

Throughout his life, Angel has high as well as low points, and each time he redefines what it means to be heroic, even if he doesn’t consider it so.

From the very beginning of his afterlife (when he was already a fully formed adult), he had a prospect of eternal life ahead of him. At some point, every experience and every choice had to be viewed through the lens of eternity. Darla was forever, the Whirlwind was forever, murdering and maiming, and torturing – all that was forever. And after he was already ensouled, his repentance was meant to be forever.

Angel’s point of view is that of a sympathetic villain with a soul rather than a hero: there is so much suffering in the world, it’s easier to let it all burn. It’s similar to what we saw from Dark Willow and it’s as far as creators usually allow their heroes when taking them to the dark side.

After getting his soul, Angel doesn’t abandon his pov. This is opposite to the way heroes in fiction generally look at the world, searching for hope and kindness.

And that’s easy to explain, let’s once again take Buffy, who lives in both worlds, thus sees both good and bad and gains a vantage point.

Angel, no matter how he tries to insert himself into real life, remains primarily in the supernatural domain and encounters the world at its worst. For him, Buffy was that first image of everything good in the world. This doesn’t make sense to the viewers now and doesn’t have to, but it’s most akin to a Petrarchan obsession. But at that moment being a hero for Angel was strongly tied to protecting this “goodness”. While this is also about redemption, it is still heroism.

Everything good in the world sends Angel to hell, so he is taken down a notch. He tried to fight as she does and he failed.

The episode “Amends” takes it further, offering us Buffy’s definition of heroism, the one she herself applies: “Strong is fighting. It's hard and it's painful and it's every day. It's what we have to do.”

Angel accepts her words, but by the end of the season still chooses what may be a hard and necessary thing but not necessarily heroic. Not by Buffy’s understanding anyway.

He comes back to that same conflict later when Darla awakens yet another identity crisis in him. It’s a question of how he has to fight. While preparing for one big and final takedown of Wolfram and Hart, he is informed by none other than Holland Manners about the ongoing Apocalypse and his place in it. He is a thorn in the side of one party and a soldier in another. He isn’t it, despite the prophecy and all the efforts Wolfram and Hart are putting into destroying him personally. This same notion comes back and hits him harder when Spike returns to challenge his place as a unique vampire with a soul.

All this comes back to Angel’s ego that constantly stands in the way of him becoming a true hero by the first, Buffy’s definition as well as by his own in season 2 (“Epiphany”).

“Angel: Well, I guess I kinda worked it out. If there's no great glorious end to all this, if nothing we do matters... , then all that matters is what we do. 'Cause that's all there is. What we do. Now. Today. I fought for so long, for redemption, for a reward, and finally just to beat the other guy, but I never got it. Kate Lockley: And now you do? Angel: Not all of it. All I wanna do is help. I wanna help because, I don't think people should suffer as they do. Because, if there's no bigger meaning, then the smallest act of kindness is the greatest thing in the world.”

This all is thrown away before the final battle.

Hero’s last stand: Buffy vs Angel

The duality of a hero’s depiction is shown in both finales and the episodes leading up to them. While Buffy is prepared to face yet another apocalypse and lay down the lives of her companions and her own, she expects to win. It’s almost as if she doesn’t accept defeat. Even if she dies, she is thinking further ahead, of a second front even, of fulfilling her mission as the protector from the dark forces. This is easier for her also because she knows her role (not just as “pivotal”) and has a higher calling as opposed to Angel, who is just said to be called to action by higher beings. Buffy has a full understanding of who she is, what, and why she does what she does. In a way, she comes to her show’s finale as a more mature hero. She goes into the fight with the knowledge that she will win, and it only reminds us how brighter the colors are in her world.

Angel, goes on a suicide mission and drags his teammates along with him. The difference here is, they are all weathered, they have luggage of massive losses, a battle that seems to have no end in sight, and plain being tired. They might all be 20-something but it certainly feels like a 30-year-old’s choice. This isn’t that surprising, considering how old at least three of them are.  And for them in particular it’s either a horrible end or never-ending horror.  (Meanwhile, Gunn’s been fighting the good fight since childhood, and Wes has nothing to live for.)

They make a relatable albeit ultimately useless choice. They mobilize all their power and resources to fight those who… provide them with said power and resources. They give their all to hurt their enemy just a little. In the process, they might have kickstarted the Apocalypse, signing everyone in the world (or at least in LA) up for their battle.

These are the actions of a passionary without support. In fact, Buffy has done that same thing during the infamous Sunnydale High Graduation, only in her case, she had consent from everyone who was prepared to fight.  Angel only asks his teammates.

Even as Angelus, Angel is used to winning. He is either superior on any battlefield or does not encounter the enemy at all. He always wants to fight the big bad himself instead of relinquishing his power or sharing it. Even in the final battle, he goes for the biggest thing - the dragon.

An eternal fight full of losses, the fight for which he already gave up so much (Buffy, his friends, his son) terrifies him. And this fight is painted as conformism.

If you look closer, this last stand feels more like overcompensating for the choice to take over Wolfram & Hart. Paying with your life for the mistake you’ve made. Is it heroism?

It comes back to the overused trope of choosing the ultimate sacrifice over a long path of redemption, despite the whole show surrounding this topic. It’s shown as a path to the much desired heroic status, while sometimes being a hero is just hard and maybe invisible work every day for the rest of your life, be it eternal or finite.

That said, “Not Fade Away” is still my favorite finale on TV.

[ulkaralakbarova]

Karl Anton Verloc and his wife own a small cinema in a quiet London suburb where they live seemingly happily. But Mrs. Verloc does not know that her husband has a secret that will affect their relationship and threaten her teenage brother’s life. Credits: TheMovieDb. Film Cast: Mrs. Verloc: Sylvia Sidney Karl Verloc – Her Husband: Oskar Homolka Stevie – Her Young Brother: Desmond Tester Ted: John Loder Renee: Joyce Barbour Superintendent Talbot: Matthew Boulton Hollingshead: S. J. Warmington The Professor: William Dewhurst Mrs. Jones (uncredited): Clare Greet Greengrocer (uncredited): Aubrey Mather Monocle Man (uncredited): Austin Trevor Studious Youngster (uncredited): Charles Hawtrey The Professor’s Daughter (uncredited): Martita Hunt Mr. Verloc’s Visitor (uncredited): Torin Thatcher Mr. Verloc’s Visitor (uncredited): Peter Bull Man Walking Past the Cinema as the Light Is Renewed: Alfred Hitchcock Film Crew: Screenplay: Charles Bennett Director of Photography: Bernard Knowles Editor: Charles Frend Novel: Joseph Conrad Director: Alfred Hitchcock Additional Dialogue: E. V. H. Emmett Art Direction: Oscar Friedrich Werndorff Wardrobe Designer: Marianne Thanks: Walt Disney Continuity: Alma Reville Music: Louis Levy Sound Recordist: Angelina Cameron Costume Designer: Joe Strassner Dialogue: Helen Simpson Dialogue: Ian Hay Associate Producer: Ivor Montagu Scenic Artist: Albert Whitlock Camera Operator: Stephen Dade Art Direction: Albert Jullion Producer: Michael Balcon Music: Jack Beaver Music: Hubert Bath Assistant Director: Pen Tennyson Movie Reviews: CinemaSerf: Perhaps not one of Hitchcock’s most prominent films, but it’s a tense crime thriller telling the tale of a family of recent émigrés to Britain who are struggling to run their small London cinema. Oskar Homolka (“Mr. Verloc”) falls foul of some criminals who offer to pay him for carrying out an act of sabotage. This doesn’t quite cause the mayhem they desire so he is unwittingly, this time, involved a much more deadly action. Unbeknown to him, Scotland Yard are on to them and have planted a detective (John Loder) in the greengrocers who befriends the family. The plot unfolds slowly and tensely. Loder and (“Mrs. Verloc”) a slightly dewy-eyed Sylvia Sidney fall for each other as we go along. That storyline slightly districts from the suspense and the ending comes along a bit too rapidly for me. Great to watch, though…

[thesinglesjukebox]

CHAPPELL ROAN - "HOT TO GO!"

2-4-6-8, who do we appreciate? You all! This wraps up this month's coverage -- see ya in November!

[7.00]

Alfred Soto: Chappell Roan's The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess is a sparkling collection of moods and passing desires, best when euphoric. The ballads might have been even stronger had she spelled out their choruses. [7]

Dave Moore: Spelling is fun! [3]

Grace Robins-Somerville: It's been too long since we've had a "spell the words out with your arms" song in the zeitgeist, and seeing people do the H-O-T-T-O-G-O dance at weddings has cemented its staying power. It's nice that lesbians have their "YMCA" now.  [8]

Katherine St. Asaph: "Hot to Go!" is a crowd chant-along that shouldn't work at all as one. The template is "YMCA," but the difference and the problem is that "YMCA" is instantly parseable when spelled out, while "H-O-T-T / O-G-O" takes a moment's reassembly. The other highlight line in "baby, don't you like this beat? I made it so you'd sleep with me" is endearingly blunt -- more musicians should be that honest -- but nevertheless cannot honestly be chanted by anyone but Dan Nigro or Chappell Roan. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that "Hot to Go!" is hugely effective at getting crowds to chant along. [7]

Aaron Bergstrom: Retroactively furious about the idea that one or more of the Village People potentially did or did not endorse Jimmy Carter in the 1980 Presidential election. [7]

Scott Mildenhall: Who or what is a hottogo? The chant falls short of total clarity by going two steps further than succinct, but therein lies the charm. Bursting at the seams of some slightly thin fabric, Chappell Roan carries this so far and fast that she might struggle to find her way back. [7]

Leah Isobel: There are about five perfect hooks on Chappell's debut album. "Baby don't you like this beat?/ I made it so you'd sleep with me" is one of them, precise and funny and melodically flawless. I think that was the moment that sold me on her whole project: the bluntness balanced by craft, the expertise made human by the raw and embarrassing vulnerability of wanting sex, wanting recognition, wanting anything at all. Also, have y'all heard the fanmade Rhythm Heaven edit for this? Banger! [8]

TA Inskeep: Every generation gets a new cheerleading-cheer anthem -- think Toni Basil's "Mickey" or Avril Lavigne's "Girlfriend" -- and here's the latest, with a bit of "Y.M.C.A." thrown in for good measure. It's hard to ignore Roan's joy on this chorus; this is also a rare pop single where its meme-ability actually draws me in (cf. "Call Me Maybe"). How can you not smile when you hear this? [7]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Of all the guises that Chappell Roan inhabited on her debut album, this always felt like the truest — she sounds like Devo if they slayed, still gawking and midwestern and not quite fitting a perfect archetype of pop stardom but still, nevertheless, a star. The weepy ballads (some of them great) fade away in the face of this, the goofy chant-a-longs and dance instructions wearing one's resistance down on the strength of pure charisma and craft. There are hooks upon hooks here — I think I've had just the synth chord on the prechorus stuck in my head before. [9]

Ian Mathers: I took the number of times I've caught myself humming this song since I first heard the record last year and divided it by a very large number and got this score. I am not currently interested in Discourse beyond that. [10]

Nortey Dowuona: You're trying to take out Chappell Roan the way you took out Amy Winehouse and I don't like it. Not one bit.  Also, the '80s actually kinda sucked -- let's not go back. (This song is great btw.) [8]

Jel Bugle: I know everyone loves Chappell, and I’ve not really bothered to get too excited. I like the Casio keyboard sounds, and spelling out words in songs is always a good trick (see "D I S C O," and I’m sure Olivia has a spelling words out song?). I can see why Sabrina is winning the chart battle here in the UK. I just feel like this song is okay, warm rather than hot -- a sort of personality over the strength of the song. Plus, I’m getting tired of this song constantly being pushed to me by Spotify -- if it happens again the [6] becomes a [5].  [6]

Taylor Alatorre: For all the talk of Chappell Roan hailing the return of “recession pop,” this strikes my ears as more of a grasping imitation of the real than most of what PC Music was accused of putting out. Maybe that’s unavoidable given the generation gap, as well as the decline of the universal pop star – Chappell covers “Bad Romance” on tour, but she doesn’t exude the belief that she can be a legitimate successor to Lady Gaga. She’s ambivalent about the compromises required for mass appeal, even on songs like this one which are structured, at least internally, toward that end. It’s all the external festooning and DIY-style pageantry which redirect the song’s course toward a cozier ideal of attainable imperfection, a glitzy and glammy take on self-sabotage. Which, in the end, is its own kind of earnestness. “HOT TO GO!” is confident enough in its own gangliness to bill itself as a coming-out party where everyone, even the normies, is invited, despite the singer’s doubts about the long-term viability of this promise. [6]

Tim de Reuse: The appeal of "Pink Pony Club" was immediately evident to me on first listen. But this one's a silly Chappell Roan song: The narrative here is buried under catchy turns of phrase and the hokey pokey-ass pre-chorus, leaving us to wring pathos out of a few scant lines in the verses. So, what's the draw? The simple build-and-release drama of a I-IV-I progression? The energy of a jittery, unkempt synthesizer-driven beat? Is the chant of "H-O-T-T-O-G-O" sugary enough to overcome my pop-pessimist cynicism and light up my long-calcified dopamine receptors for once? Eh, kinda. It's well-constructed, but it just isn't aiming all that high. [6]

Will Adams: Silly fun pop that doesn't require much thought -- just do the little dance and enjoy yourself! [6]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

[ttownpromoc]

YOU ARE WANTED!!

Isaac Powell, Jack Whitehall, Landon Liborion, Ben Affleck, Chris Pratt, Marshall Mathers, Kat Dennings, Mila Kunis, Chiara Aurelia, Emily Bett Rickards, Simu Liu, Shay Mitchell, Tim McGraw, Vanessa Morgan, Tati Gabrielle, Ian Somerhalder, Jon Pardi, Adam Driver, Travis Fimmel, Kat Graham

WELCOME TO TINSELTOWN!!

The place where dreams can be made, and hearts can be broken. Living in the public eye isn’t always as glamorous as it seems from the outside. Don’t forget, that spotlight you love so much - it illuminates everything, including your flaws. Between the gossip, tabloids, and grudges this town chews people up and spits them out day after day. The trials and tribulations of the Hollywood elite are unlike any other, it’s impossible to relate unless you're one of them. The high paced, sometimes high stress can get to a person, causing them their careers. Others thrive on it. What will happen to you? Do you have what it takes to make it?

[jesstba]

MARTIN GARRIX UNVEILS EYE-CATCHING LINE-UPS FOR USHUAÏA IBIZA RESIDENCY

  Martin Garrix – Andrew Mathers – A-Trak – Bleu Clair – Blinders – Brooks – Citadelle – Dillon Francis – Disciples Dubvision – Elderbrook – Eleganto – Estaw x Steven Quarré – Ferreck Dawn – Ian Asher – Jax Jones Julian Jordan – Justin Mylo – KVSH – Lavern – LIU – Luicito – Magnificence – Martin Solveig – Matroda – Merow – Mesto – Moksi – NUZB – Osrin – Otto Knows – Pontifexx – Schillist Seth…