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singerorpheus · 2 months ago

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i just watched hadestown word vomit

- eva is so intense its actually so powerful like wow she really yelled at some notes u can rlly feel the injustice

- she changed so many of the notes and maintained so much of the musicality still like wow. this is a generational run i fear

- tearing up at eva's performance count: 3 (anyway the wind blows, all i've ever known, promises)

- at one pt during chant (iirc?) shes on the ground like on all fours from being robbed by the fates and shes so frustrated and angry she like slams the floor so hard full body

- we are honestly so lucky to have her eurydice immortalised via proshot

- this is a side point but i really wonder how eva's eury and donal's orpheus would play tgt like would it be INSANE or would it be too much bleeding heart

- also lil bit of costuming i noted is that eury's inner lining of her coat is actually a dark red, kinda like hades' red back panel vibes...

- eva n reeve were cuddling n giggling away during living it up it actually distracted me from amber LOL those lovebirds

- REEVE DID THE LYRIC ORPHEUS RUN UP FROM THE BACK TO CLIMB UP THE SCAFFOLDING TO THE STAGE!!! WHO CHEERED i thought they took that out!!!

- orpheus jumping in front of eury during way down / eury blocking orpheus from the fates pre-papers.... let me hear u orphydice nation

- phillips bass is wow!!! and his acting is wow!!! the silent treatment/cold wall between his hades and persephone is soooooo cool and his doubt comes in really comes across as a 'this happens to me so this will happen to orpheus too' parallel (if that makes sense)

- he also surprisingly has a lot of moments that he plays for laughs but theres no dissonance at all hes totally playing this sarcastic sillyness(?) that STILL makes his hades comes off as mean and serious

- i was practically at the opposite end of where i sat last time so i was v far from where hermes is at usually so im a little distant from the little moments that andre mightve had :(

- but i rmb hearing somewhere that his hermes is much more solemn n professional distance than mel's which i totally got from this

- side side note. i do miss hermes persephone yuri.... we need that back in the zeitgeist

- before our lady starts, hermes leads persephone out and she kisses him on the cheek, andre does this thing where he like pulses a wing of his jacket (if this makes sense?????) so that it looks like he has a cartoon beating heart it was sooo cute

-let me clarify my thing about doubt comes in/act 2 and donal and reeve's respective orphei bc i fear i am an orpheus girl and this is my blog where i talk about orpheus:

i didnt realise how much donal plays orpheus up for laughs until reeve ('you want to take me home? / yes', 'orpheus u did it! / yes. now what do i do?') reeve just plays it earnest and wide eyed the whole time which is not at all a minus

i truly truly thought donals choices in act ii were so phenomenal bc the absolute whacking he gets in papers were not at all superficial and he sacrifices a bit of vocal stability to express how tired and beaten down he is even in epic iii and by dci hes hitting himself on the chest to practically jumpstart himself to carry on and reacting so poorly to the fates taunting him where he was doing so well in wait for me

granted i was on the wrong end of the theatre to see reeve but he was just barrelling on, but not without a couple of stumbles of course. that falsetto is totally killer tho in dci. idk if lyric orphei do the falsetto but if they could they should (edit: dylan does do it a little bit!) bc its so slay i only remembered it when i heard carlos'. i dont think reeve went as high as he could but his vocals throughout were just. genuinely felt like a cd was infront of me.

- also another detail i can just about remember is that im pretty sure donal brings his notebook onto the turnstile cos i rmb being able to see his blocky LALALA on his notebook which made me laugh but reeves just singin it on the turnstile sans notebook

- the WE fates are the best running fates right now. @ me for real

- amber is so amazing. like. nothing else to say more than shes amazing. her mannerisms and movement for seph is just classic n never seems rehearsed. just wonderful. a seph of all time truly.

- also her our lady is just her doing drunken fist its crazy how shes stumbling about in those heels and not even slipping

- this is 🩷❤️❤️‍🩹💞❤️‍🔥🧡❤️‍🩹💕❤️‍🩹💕❤️‍🩹🧡❤️‍🩹🧡❤️‍🩹🧡🤎💞❤️💓💖💞💖💖 all my love for the workers in lyric hadestown i love u all. i got to see chris and tiago and lucinda again. i heard tiago thruout the workers chorus hes so great love u alllllll

- when the workers went if u can do it so can she if she can do it so can we during wait for me reprise and then theyre literally behind orphydice on the turnstile was CRAZY to me i do NOT remember this staging its so much more devastating

- also i was clapping like crazy so my audio is NUTS sorry in adv HAHA

- can corroborate new trombone guy is cute LMAO hes a different guy from when i saw ht last may 😭

#jazz.txt #again if i have more i'll edit #long post /#sorry for the lp but every time i go why did i spend so much money to go to london i need to rmb this is what its for!!!!!!#ily hadestown!!!!

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cuddlyreader · 1 year ago

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I'd love to hear your top 7-10 OTPs! I'm guessing Leyton and Delena are both on the list?

Hello! I'm reusing my answer from an old post for this because I am proud of it. :)

Brenda and Dylan (Beverly Hills 90210) - As I have said before, I love Shannen Doherty. This show is the reason why. Brenda was my favorite character from day one, and her romance with Dylan was so intense and epic. This one has to be the first time an emotionally damaged character stole my heart. He needed her screaming and crying at him to understand that someone loves him because no one did until then. She needed his recklessness to temper her own. They grounded each other with their love.

Buffy and Angel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - Watching these two fall in love and be unable to resist it was so much fun. They were actually doomed from the start. I mean…a vampire and a vampire slayer…that has tragedy written all over it. She literally killed him, and he came back from a Hell world (sounds familiar). Then, they fell right back in love (hmm, also familiar). They loved so hard, and their world was always in peril, which kept the angst level pretty high. For years, Angel wallowed in the torment of guilt that his soul provided. She gave him a purpose…her purpose. Her entire reason for being was to save people. She made him want to do that, too. He made her realize that not all monsters are evil and not all “good” guys are good. In my mind, they found their way back to each other and lived happily ever after.

Willow and Tara (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - These two had the most beautiful and sweet love, and I am bitter that the idiot writer killed off Tara. Shy, bookish Willow really grew into a powerful and strong witch because of this relationship. She could fully be herself, and it was amazing. Tara, sweet Tara, was so kind and compassionate. She held Willow accountable in her magic, which turned out to be pretty important. I won’t even get into the fact that at this time, there was very little LGBTQ representation on television. Yep, I’m still angry.

Pacey and Joey (Dawson’s Creek) - Dawson’s Creek is my comfort show. I watch it all the way through several times a year. There is nothing that soothes me like it does. When this show aired, there was nothing more enjoyable than watching Pacey and Joey fall for each other against their own wishes. Pacey knew first, and he tried not to act on it for the sake of their friend Dawson (I won’t go into how annoyed that makes me given that Dawson didn’t want her.). Joey fought it with everything she had for the same reason and also because it was so real that it scared the hell out of her. He pushed her to grow and become the person she was meant to be, and she accepted him as is without any expectations other than they would do it together. They had the best dynamic. They bickered and laughed and cried, but they worked at their relationship like you do in grown-up relationships. Even when they broke up, they cared about each other consistently. My favorite episode is when they get stuck in K-Mart overnight. Joyously, they were also endgame.

Max and Liz (OG Roswell and Roswell, New Mexico) - By now, I have established that I love intense love. That’s exactly what og Max and Liz had. Liz was very structured and academically driven. Max was very closed off from everyone including Michael and Isabel. He opened her mind and heart to possibility. She made him feel and be open about it. They loved so intensely that even supposed alien fate couldn’t keep them apart. I was so sad the show was canceled so soon, but I am eternally grateful that they were endgame and that I got to see it. They sort of switched the emotional roles of new Max and Liz, which I like. They would still do anything for each other, so they are still my OTP. Admittedly, I haven’t watched the last season because I’m sad about it being the last.

Peyton and Lucas (One Tree Hill) - Look, they were always drawn to each other, but their timing was awful. I loved how no matter what, they were there for each other, even if it was just as friends. Peyton was the broken one in this relationship. She lost too much at too young an age. Feeling so deeply terrified her. And let’s face it, Lucas was intense. He felt everything and didn’t shy away from it. It was immensely gratifying to see them finally be happy together.

Logan and Veronica (Veronica Mars) - Logan was a real ass at the beginning of this show, and they were full-on enemies. So, I can honestly say I did not ship them at first. The metamorphosis that Logan goes through to be a better man is truly remarkable. To be fair, they both have emotional damage in this one. Veronica copes with her losses by saving others, but her love for Logan scares her. They both had to work out their own stuff before they could successfully be together. Thankfully, we got to see that they made it. I have no comment about the killing of my beloved Logan.

Damon and Elena (The Vampire Diaries) - Anyone that follows me knows that these two are my current obsession. Damon has literally spent over a century and a half being abandoned and rejected by his father, mother, brother, and love. To say that I love him is the understatement of the century. He had no intention of falling in love with Elena. He wanted to save Katherine, and her rejection nearly killed him. He feels everything so much that he can’t cope, and then he snaps. Elena saves him. Period. She makes him feel human because she treats him like one. She expects him to care and makes him want to do better. And he does, starting with her. He loves her so much that it is palpable. Damon makes her look at herself and the world differently. He pushes her to be and accept her true self no matter who that is or who she is with. I am elated that they got their long and happy human life together.

Clary and Jace (Shadowhunters) - I love Jace with every fiber of my being. I just want him to have love and happiness. He did not get that deserved love from his parents, and he never felt like he deserved it after that. Clary brought him to life. She was caring and compassionate for everyone: mundane, shadowhunter, or downworlder. Loving her opened Jace’s heart to everything. I choose to believe that the ending we got means they find their way back to each other and live happily ever after. I know I could finish the books, but I honestly cannot read Cassandra Clare’s writing anymore. Besides, where they are in my mind is good for me.

Magnus and Alec (Shadowhunters) - Magnus is one of my favorite characters ever. He’s loved many times over the centuries he’s lived, but what he has with Alec is so much more. Like all shadowhunters, Alec doesn’t trust downworlders, but for him, it’s more than that. He believes he has a duty to his family, and being with Magnus flies in the face of that duty. Magnus not so subtly or easily pushes past Alec’s defenses. Once they get together, they make each other better, and it’s literally magical. Their wedding was everything I could have hoped for as far as endgame goes.

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dweemeister · 3 months ago

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Reactions to the 97th Academy Awards nominations

Well, I've taken more than a full day to process most things. Forgot to post this last evening, so this is a bit delayed. But here goes nothing:

Full disclosure: I have seen 7/10 Best Picture nominees. Emilia Pérez I have procrastinated on because I unfortunately have not been able to drown out all the discourse surrounding it. Nickel Boys has not been given a wider release by MGM and I'm Still Here - Brazil's first ever nominee in Best Picture - has not even ventured outside the major cities.

At this moment, The Brutalist would be #1 on my ballot. I think it's a magnificently directed, sometimes overly self-serious epic about a failed American Dream, but especially about the relationship between artist and patron. I think Adrien Brody is even better in this lead role than he was in The Pianist (2002), which he won Best Actor for what feels like eons ago. I think Guy Pearce is underrated in Supporting Actor, and I still wonder how this was made for less than $10 million. I know this is a cynical movie and paints midcentury America in a poor light, but how I wish director Brady Corbet in Q&As and interviews would not so easily declare that the American Dream is a sham. You film is an immigrant's story (and a beautifully told one). Not the immigrant's story.

Wicked is in trouble, Best Picture-wise. It missed in Director, and it missed for its screenplay. No film since Grand Hotel (1932) has ever won Best Picture without either a Director or Screenplay nomination. That just feels like too much history for Wicked - which I very much enjoyed, but am more ambivalent about the direction - to overcome. So if Ariana Grande - who should be considered a co-lead, not supporting - doesn't win in March, can we please take a deep breath before we post stuff online?

Did Anora and Conclave peak too early in awards season? I'd like to see Mikey Madison take home Best Actress, but the film has been losing ground to Emilia Pérez for some time. And I can see many older members of the Academy thinking that it's essentially softcore porn (which parts of it can be, but the film is far much more than that). Conclave fits that mold of "Film the Academy Really Respects, but Doesn't Love Enough to Put Down as Their #1 Choice". Director Edward Berger is on my shitlist after All Quiet on the Western Front (2022, Germany; the link takes you to my write-up to the film and why I think the film is a terrible adaptation of the original novel). But, other than the oppressively dark color palette that looks terrible on home screens, I really liked that tale of Vatican drama. I would be fine with Fiennes winning, if it came to that.

A Complete Unknown - which is essentially a concert movie that told us little more about Bob Dylan that I already knew - overperformed. James Mangold in Director? No. Monica Barbaro in Supporting Actress? Eh. Adapted Screenplay? Please. And the kicker: I've never really taken to Timothée Chalamet, and I think it bewildering he becomes the youngest actor to receive a second Best Actor nomination since James Dean (posthumously, for 1955's East of Eden and 1956's Giant). Best Actor skews older than Actress, sure. This one was powered by older AMPAS voters, wasn't it?

I saw The Substance on Sunday after I missed its original release back in September/October. Too busy with work and body horror is one of my almost "no-go" subgenres. I admired the film far more than I liked it. And I had the biggest grin on my face as we got to the chaos of the final half hour. It's a fascinating film, and congratulates Coralie Fargeat on the Director nomination (I agree!). Would I vote for The Substance in any category? No, except for Makeup and Hairstyling. I thank that one's a shoo-in for reasons I won't go into here.

Denis Villeneuve's Dune: Part Two got a lot less love than the first part. Now, I thoroughly dislike the source material (I was assigned it during summer school and adding to this... the teacher who taught it was not great) and I'm very ambivalent towards some of the people who appear in these movies (read: Chalamet). But the movie just continued to remind that there's a far superior movie made with very similar themes that was also set in a desert. And in fact, author Frank Herbert was inspired by that movie when he wrote Dune. The movie? Lawrence of Arabia (1962). By the time I reminded myself of the Dune-Lawrence connection a third of the way through the former's second part, I watched the remainder out of obligation. I suspect AMPAS voters want to award Villeneuve if he completes Dune: Messiah... and that's not even a guarantee.

A24 really botched the release of Sing Sing, did they? I know A24 has its fans online, especially among younger cinephiles. But - giving you some inside scoops here - theater owners from outside the big cities tend not to like the fact that A24 tends to super-promote one movie at a time (like I Saw the TV Glow or Civil War earlier in 2024) and give short shrift to the others. A24 is also notoriously bad at following up non-big city theaters about their release strategies and intentions. Sing Sing dearly paid the price for the studio's concentration on The Brutalist.

Did we really just fucking nominate The Apprentice for Actor and Supporting Actor? I haven't seen the film, but do we REALLY want Donald Trump to chime in on the Academy Awards season? I think AMPAS is in the mood to "send a message" rather than honor quality filmmaking right now, and that 's being shown here and - ostensibly - with those 13 nominations for Emilia Pérez.

The little Latvian movie that could, Flow, becomes only the third animated movie to have been nominated for International Feature (Waltz with Bashir and Flee before it). It overperformed on the day, and it's what I would vote for on Animated Feature. Made on free software for a pittance, it is incredible what director Gints Zilbalodis was able to do. It'll cross borders and generations, easily.

Elsewhere among animated works, I'm overjoyed for Memoir of a Snail and Adam Elliot. Australia's stop-motion animation poster child is a name that more people should be familiar with, and this nomination is very much overdue. Not enough people saw this film, though. So the nomination is 100% a win. Pity that Mars Express couldn't find a way to break through here, but even fewer people saw that in theaters, comparatively.

Inside Out 2 is gonna find a way to win this over The Wild Robot and Flow, isn't it? AMPAS loves their Pixar and Disney. They have never given an Oscar to someone outside a major American studio or anyone not named Hayao Miyazaki (I acknowledge that he is a fantastic filmmaker, but unlike some of his other anime colleagues, Miyazaki gets far on name recognition alone and he gets a lot of big Hollywood figures to campaign for his films).

Speaking of The Wild Robot! Kris Bowers' score to the film is the score of the year. Bowers is one of a few young handful of composers who I hope usher in a new age of Hollywood film score composers that will not only usher in a promising future, but also understand the value of melody and the richness of what orchestras - or orchestras combined with electronic elements - can provide (which I think many recent film score composers are abandoning).

And now I risk the wrath of people - largely folks my age and younger and the Letterboxd crowd - on this website. As a film score diehard and multi-instrumentalist, seeing all that praise for Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross' score to Challengers (which I think should've been nominated for Editing, but nothing more) was, frankly, grating to me. I thought the score was play far too loudly in emotional scenes. And just because the whole fucking score is banger club/workout music does not necessarily make for what I consider to be effective film scoring. (If you think I'm delusional... the music branch of the Academy includes composers and lyricists and producers but does not include the musicians who play those scores. Many of those who play on film scores hail from small ensembles or orchestras, and probably think similarly and might even consider Reznor and Ross' process to be a threat to their futures in film scoring). In short: I'm fine with Challengers not being nominated in Score.

But fucking hell. That is one of the worst Best Original Song slates I can remember in sometime. My god.

Congratulations to France's Miyu Studios, who either produced/co-produced/distributed three of the five nominees in Best Animated Short. And just going to show how democratic the short film categories are, there were three past nominees on the shortlist for Animated Short, each of whom are major figures in the world of contemporary animated shorts - Don Hertzfeldt (World of Tomorrow), Dice Tsutsumi (The Dam Keeper), and Torill Kove (The Danish Poet and Me and My Moulton). Not a single one of the previous nominees made it.

Three monkey movies in Visual Effects (Better Man, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, Wicked)? Hilarious.

#97th Academy Awards #Oscars #AMPAS #Anora #The Brutalist #A Complete Unknown #Dune: Part Two #Emilia Pérez #The Substance #Wicked #Sing Sing #The Apprentice #Flow #Memoir of a Snail #Inside Out 2 #Mars Express #The Wild Robot #Challengers

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princesscolumbia · 11 months ago

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Code of Ethics - Chapter 17 - Hyperarousal

The last few days have been a bit more stressful than anticipated, which actually worked quite well to create the emotional payload for this chapter, but due to the distractions of preparing for my kiddo going into surgery (scheduled, we've known this was coming for over a year), I'm not entirely sure it's up to my usual quality. Hopefully, this lands well and I won't have to redo it later:

Diane finishes the task of driving off the slavers while her team rescues the slaves. The aftermath promises to be an emotional roller coaster of epic proportions.

Preview below the cut, and same warnings as last chapter, gore tag applies:

Diane felt like she’d chugged an entire vending machines worth of energy drinks.

Katrina had directed her to a four-way corridor junction that, sure enough, was where two main arteries of traffic converged. The halls were wide, which gave her plenty of room to maneuver even if they provided absolutely no cover.

Twenty bodies later, she’d barely been nicked by one lucky shot once the slavers got smart and began using cover. That was okay, though, because that gave her the chance to figure out an interesting feature of the rifles; they had a function that turned them into low-yield grenades.

Sure, it would normally have been a waste of a perfectly good rifle with a nearly full charge...but thanks to the moronic first charge of the security grunts she had twenty more rifles to play with.

A little bit of instruction from Katrina once she’d discovered the user’s manual in the slaver’s ship’s database and Diane had managed to trigger the safety release on the explosive feature and lobbed the weapon down one of the corridors and just past the corner the guards were hiding behind. She heard a gruff voice bark a swear word over the whine of the overcharging power cell just before it detonated, eliminating one group of guards and letting her focus on the second. She turned and sprinted in the opposite direction of the corner she’d just blown up and stooped on the run to grab up another rifle. Pulling the trigger a couple times to ensure it was working, the two bolts she’d fired splashed harmlessly against the deck paneling down the hallway where she’d aimed it. Ignoring the test shots, she increased her speed until she judged she was close enough to the junction of corridors and leapt into a baseball slide. It wasn’t a perfect slide, her coat was so matted with blood by this point it was more of a sticky glide that left a trail, but it still did the job of getting her close to the cluster of guards around the corner and opening fire, peppering them liberally with energy shot.

“You know, Kat,” she said as she picked herself up from the trail of gore she’d left behind, “If it weren’t so sticky, this would actually be kind of fun.”

“Gotta love what you do, boss. Careful, you’re going to run out of slavers before your team manages to get all the women and girls off the ship.”

Another spike of rage lit her insides as the assistant confirmed multiple children were being sold into slavery and her claws came out almost of their own accord. Just then a crew member rounded the corner, one carrying a significantly bigger gun than the previous guards had, and before he even realized she was there she’d slashed him belly-to-neck and made an extra effort to rip out his throat. He hadn’t even had a chance to cry out before she gutted him.

Once again she found herself absolutely feeling like the coolest person on the planet as she simply...grabbed the larger rifle out of the guards hands as he fell. She didn’t have time to do more than feel impressed with herself as two more guards followed behind. With one hand occupied she acted mostly on instinct and jammed her fingers into one guard’s neck with a knife strike and lunged forward and sank her fangs into the other’s neck.

It wasn’t the taste of blood or even the warm fluid in her mouth that snapped her out of her near berserker state, it was when some of the liquid splashed down her windpipe, forcing her to cough that shook her hard enough she more on accident shredded the man’s throat in her paroxysms. She leaned forward, one hand on a knee while she used the un-investigated long gun as an impromptu cane, jamming the butt against the floor as she hacked and sputtered.

“Why the FUCK did I do that?!” she exclaimed as soon as she was able to draw enough breath, spitting alien blood from her mouth.

“Maybe expectorate later, boss, you’ve got incoming, looks like they’re taking you seriously, too. 34...no, 38 goons on their way to take you down.”

Grumbling, she straightened and inspected the weapon she’d grabbed off the dead guard. It seemed to just be a bigger, more dangerous looking version of the rifles she’d been taking off their person and realized they’d been using carbines for their standard response team carry. That made more sense than this thing, which had a much longer barrel and a bigger battery...until she spotted a fairly heavy looking casing that she couldn’t immediately identify.

As she started moving, she asked, “Kat, any reason I shouldn’t ditch this in favor of the carbines?”

“Two phrases, two words each,” chirped Katrina through the comms panels nearby, “Dual rails and auto-aiming.”

Katrina’s pronouncement made her realize she wasn’t holding an energy rifle, she was holding a railgun. A double-barreled railgun at that. Auto-aiming would be nice, but if it had fully automatic capability... “Kat, find out how we can get more cartridges for this thing,” she said as she slung it over her shoulder to carry it on her back, “Idiot who was carrying it clearly didn’t realize you don’t bring a long gun to an urban combat setting.”

Read the rest on Scribblehub

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blueberryshelves · 7 months ago

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Book Review

Title: Let the Rubble Fall Author: Mandi Lynn Bell

Series: Road Trip Snapshot, book #2

No. of Pages: 327

ISBN: 9781953388063

Cover design: original cover and pen name before book republishing in 2023.

Synopsis:

Marly moves across the country on a leap of faith, but will the familiar fear of losing someone she loves be her downfall?

For the first time since her parent’s death, Marly has a new sense of hope as she moves to Colorado to be with the boy she had met on her epic cross-country road trip. What’s supposed to be a fresh start, quickly goes awry after Dylan gets into an accident, leaving him stranded in the wilderness alone. As rescuers search for him, Marly is left panicked, wondering if he’s safe as she re-lives the day her parents died.

When Dylan is finally back to safety, it's Marly who’s left battered and afraid. Dylan is eager to heal, while Marly is determined to stop him from risking an injury again. What Marly doesn’t know is that Dylan’s drive to summit mountains goes much deeper than wanting to cross something off his bucket list.

Will Marly’s fear of losing Dylan be the exact thing that pushes him away?

Let the Rubble Fall is the second book in the Road Trip Snapshot Series. If you like sweet romance, outdoors, and coming of age, then you’ll love this story that will be sure to tug at your heartstrings.

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What did I think of the book?

Let the Rubble Fall by Mandi Lynn Bell My rating: ⭐ 1 of 5 stars (1.5) [Disclaimer: spoilers!] A year later, and I'm finally finishing the Road Trip Snapshot series! The first book had a lot of good things going for it that made for an enjoyable read, even despite the issues present in the book. I absolutely loved the 3rd book/standalone of the series. But Let the Rubble Fall is another case that has suffered from what I call the "curse of the second book". This book is labelled as a coming-of-age romance. But the story is riddled with so much drama, and irrational behavior from Marly that it left me wondering why her and Dylan were even together. From chapter 32 and onward, the book is written as if Marly has made good progress in her healing, and is more stable in herself. She's able to be the one to help her boyfriend, Dylan, in healing from his own grief and trauma, and even offers him closure from losing his grandfather. Frankly, I quite enjoyed the ending, and it showed the potential of how the book could have been from the start. But instead, we get a story that is 85% of Marly having pretty extreme mental breakdowns, and running away from her problems at every turn. She quickly becomes toxic and controlling towards her boyfriend, even becoming a hypocrite, when she starts seeing her parents deaths in Dylan's hiking accident. Any progress she made in the first book is lost. She never processes or deals with the loss of her parents in a healthy way. Nothing triggers her to change. She doesn't grow, or make any real character development throughout the story. But at the last 15%, everything suddenly takes a 180 turn, and the story finishes in the end as if she did. It makes the last chapters of the book feel completely disconnected from the rest of the story, and I'm so confused as to what the intended message is being conveyed here. The other issue I experienced with the book was an imbalance in details. Where there was a significant lack of basic character descriptions such as hair color, eye color, body build, etc. throughout the book, other things were over-described with too many unnecessary details crammed into a scene. This was something the first book suffered from as well, but it's even more of an issue in Let the Rubble Fall. I did enjoy the moments where Marly is describing the landscapes she travels to, and they provided a great deal of relief from the rest of the book, but there's not many of them. Favorite character/s: Lori, for being the "voice of reason" throughout the story. Dylan, for being strong in himself, and not letting Marly stop him from doing what he loves. What drew me to this book? It's the second book to the series I was reading. Honestly, I didn't feel that drawn to it on its own. Stars: 1.5 of 5 stars. It pains me a bit to rate it so low, but this really wasn't my idea of a good story or reading experience. View all my reviews

See my reviews for:

Meet Me at the Summit, Road Trip Snapshot book #1 My rating: ⭐⭐⭐ 3 of 5 stars!

The Trail to You & Me, Road Trip Snapshot book #3 My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 of 5 stars! - Events in book #3 occur after Let the Rubble Fall, but can be read as a standalone.

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lilyellowsongbird · 2 years ago

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Jeff Buckley - The Tear That Hangs Inside My Soul Forever

I don't really know where to start this. I never really know where to start things in general, especially when they mean a great deal to me. The curse of being a writer, I guess. I'll start with this: My favorite song is Jeff Buckley's cover of Just Like a Woman. I'm sure we all know that Bob Dylan is a fantastic artist, but his best songs are covered by other people. Just Like A Woman is no different, and Jeff makes the song his own, something ethereal, untouchable, all consuming.

Jeff Buckley was the son of Tim Buckley, another brilliant musician. He never really knew his father, as he left when Jeff was quite young. He did pass down his musical skills, and I thank him for that.

I think the brilliance of Jeff is his ability to be emotionally vulnerable. That's the brilliance of a lot of my favorite artists. Yes, all artists are sensitive in some way, that's why they're artists, but Jeff is on a different plane of raw emotion. Just look at Lover, You Should've Come Over. It takes someone who is deeply in touch with their emotions to write a song like that. On Jeff's only studio album, Grace, he travels through every emotion you could imagine, dealing with death and heartbreak in a way that reaches into the back of your heart and scrapes out those guts you thought were long dead. When he sings of lost love, drug use, and death, he somehow always pinpoints the exact complex emotions behind each subject. There is nothing vague about his poetry.

Perhaps his most famous song, Hallelujah, is a Leonard Cohen cover. A simple, angelic cover of a sweeping epic. There are verses that Jeff uses in his cover that are not in Cohen's original, leading to the common misconception that Jeff wrote those verses. Those verses were performed live by Cohen, never on the studio recording, but Jeff makes them all his own. Jeff had an otherworldly ability to cover songs. He covered Cohen, Nina Simone, Edith Piaf, and Bob Dylan, just to name a few. It's incredibly difficult to produce a good cover of a song that is unique, but that is where Jeff shines. The production of Jeff's original songs is always high quality, with a full band to back his electric guitar and intoxicating voice. They thrill. They invigorate. They bring out feelings and movement you never thought you had. Jeff's covers are not bold and filling, but rather stripped to the bare bones, and in that lies their perfection. His covers are just his guitar and his voice. The guitar is simple, echoing through an imaginary chamber along with his voice. Jeff's voice rings out, bringing the focus to the lyrics. The original writers wrote perfect lyrics, and Jeff knew that. He was only responsible for making those lyrics sound as beautiful audibly as they are on the page. Instead of making the song about his own skill, he brought their original meaning to the surface.

I believe music finds me at the exact moment I need it in my life. I had known his cover of Hallelujah for years before I took a closer look at his discography. I used to take these long baths my freshman year of highschool. I would play the same songs every night, ever so quietly, as I laid there, floating in that tiny bathtub. Hallelujah would play and I would let Jeff's voice carry me away into the depths of a dark hole of depression. I don't know if I used that as an escape or a way to go deeper into my sadness. Jeff left me for a few years, until I got to college. In the past two years, as I've grown and my troubles have shifted away from the struggles of teenhood, I've found Jeff has been a constant companion. I listen to at least one of his songs every day. There is just something in his voice, this recognition and resignation to his life. I mean this in the best way possible, but he has the emotional understanding of a woman.

He only released one album, and despite its perfection, it leaves the listener wanting more. That makes his live performances even more of a treasure. It takes an insane amount of talent to make a live performance sound the same as the studio recording. It takes true genius to improve on a song during a live performance. He lets his voice run wild live. You can hear the pain in his voice. Every emotion is stretched over chords and complex vocal runs. When I listen to him live, I can't help but feel the deep ache I knew he was feeling as he sang. Each song achieves the impossible and becomes more beautiful live. If I could time travel and see any live show, first I would see Woodstock, but immediately after I would go see his show at Sin-e. It might be my favorite live album. It's the only live performance I've been able to find of Just Like A Woman, which makes it all the more special to me.

In life Jeff was a special gift, and people knew it. In death he has become a mythic figure. I pity anyone who hasn't had the pleasure of listening to his music.

Favorite Songs In No Particular Order:

Just Like A Woman

Hallelujah

Lover, You Should've Come Over

Grace

Mojo Pin

Eternal Life

The Other Woman

Forget Her

Mama, You've Been On My Mind

Live at Sin-e:

Just Like A Woman

Mojo Pin

Hallelujah

Lover, You Should've Come Over

LYSCO Live: 1, 2

Mojo Pin - Live at Wetlands

#music #nonfiction #opinion #90s music #90s alt #jeff buckley #lover you should've come over

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gerogerigaogaigar · 2 years ago

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The Roots - Things Fall Apart

The early 00s would see lightning quick evolution in hip hop and this album represents both the foundation on which those changes would take place and the last hurrah of 90s alt hip hop scene. And what a cast of features! Common, Most Def, Erykah Badu, J Dilla, and what I believe is Beanie Sigel's first appearance ever. Almost all up and comers who were hitting the turning point in their career and are now legends. All of this glosses over how well constructed Questlove's beats are and how well Black Thought and Malik B interact with them.

The Meters - Look-Ka Py Py

A great collection of funk grooves from the inventors of the groove. The influence on 70s funk is obvious but I tend to think of The Meters as the sample pack from which the golden age of hip hop is crafted. Taking these songs on their own merit isn't difficult though. Smooth organs, extremely tight punchy drums, and crisp choppy guitar. This album is the essence of funk. The platonic ideal of funkiness.

CHIC - Risqué

Disco is an unfairly maligned genre. The hate was manufactured by racist homophobes who had too much stock tied up in both rock radio as an industry and as an outlet for toxic masculinity. But the meme lives on. Twisted and malformed as only a meme can be. Leave your preconceptions behind and listen with an open mind. You may find that the link between this album and hip hop run deeper than just the bassline from Good Times. You might find that even disregarding the influence on future 'cooler' genres this is just extraordinarily good music. Risqué in particular finds just the right balance of bass and string swells to make the songs engaging to at home listeners and club goers alike.

Credence Clearwater Revival - Cosmo's Factory

A little bit country, a little bit rock and roll, a dash of psychedelia, and various other herbs and spices and you've got CCR brewing. Fogerty's raspy voice is the perfect compliment to the down home bayou vibe. Although this album is the most polished of their output the production values don't get in the way of the raw soul and heart. In fact it might be one of the best production jobs in rock music. And of course, it must be said, if you have not heard their epic 11 minute cover of I Heard It Through The Grapevine then you haven't heard one of the best songs ever recorded.

Smokey Robinson & The Miracles - Going To A Go-Go

Have I mentioned that I really love Motown yet? This is a really solid collection of Smokey Robinson's soulful songwriting. Really anything I've said about the Motown sound goes here as well so I won't be repetitive. This album is made up of song after song that could have been another artist's biggest hit.

Bob Dylan - Love and Theft

Y'know 500 isn't actually that many albums. And Bob Dylan has, like other albums. Better and more important ones. I'm not saying Love and Theft is bad, but is it really one of the 500 greatest albums of all time? How uh many Dylan albums did you put on here guys? Didya get Nashville Skyline, Desire, Before the Flood, John Wesley Harding, Planet Waves, Another Side? All better albums from the deeper recesses of his discography.

The Beach Boys - Wild Honey

W-what? really? I don't... Uh... I mean it's not a bad album at all. It's just. It's like. If there's a Beach Boys album that I forget exists it's this one. Um okay I'll review it for real though. So after the collapse of the Smile project the Beach Boys were left in a weird place. Brian Wilson had become even more reclusive and tension was high. The end result was Wild Honey, an album that clocks in at only 24 minutes and sounds more like bedroom pop than any Beach Boys record before it. It kinda works though, it feels hazy and tired and constricted. It feels warm but unlike previous records this isn't the warmth of the sun on a beach, it's the stuffy heat of a too small apartment with only one window in the summer.

The Grateful Dead - Workingman's Dead

In under a year The Grateful Dead went from twenty minutes psychedelic jam sessions to three minutes country rock songs. This was their first album in that country style and it's unbelievable how natural they sound. You would never guess that 69s Live/Dead and 70s Workingman's Dead could ever be the same band. Although I think it's overshadowed by American Beauty which they released only five months later this still marks the biggest turning point in their career.

#500 album gauntlet #the roots #the meters #chic #creedence clearwater revival #smokey robinson & the miracles #bob dylan #the beach boys #the grateful dead

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billscheft · 4 months ago

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Normally, I don't post anything this long that I didn't write, but Christ Jesus, this is soooo great. Bob Dylan's speech at Musicares from 2015.....

Bob Dylan’s MusiCares person of the year acceptance speech:

I’m glad for my songs to be honored like this. But you know, they didn’t get here by themselves. It’s been a long road and it’s taken a lot of doing. These songs of mine, they’re like mystery stories, the kind that Shakespeare saw when he was growing up. I think you could trace what I do back that far. They were on the fringes then, and I think they’re on the fringes now. And they sound like they’ve been on the hard ground.

I should mention a few people along the way who brought this about. I know I should mention John Hammond, great talent scout for Columbia Records. He signed me to that label when I was nobody. It took a lot of faith to do that, and he took a lot of ridicule, but he was his own man and he was courageous. And for that, I’m eternally grateful. The last person he discovered before me was Aretha Franklin, and before that Count Basie, Billie Holiday and a whole lot of other artists. All noncommercial artists.

Trends did not interest John, and I was very noncommercial but he stayed with me. He believed in my talent and that’s all that mattered. I can’t thank him enough for that.

Lou Levy runs Leeds Music, and they published my earliest songs, but I didn’t stay there too long. Levy himself, he went back a long ways. He signed me to that company and recorded my songs and I sang them into a tape recorder. He told me outright, there was no precedent for what I was doing, that I was either before my time or behind it. And if I brought him a song like “Stardust,” he’d turn it down because it would be too late.

He told me that if I was before my time -- and he didn’t really know that for sure -- but if it was happening and if it was true, the public would usually take three to five years to catch up -- so be prepared. And that did happen. The trouble was, when the public did catch up I was already three to five years beyond that, so it kind of complicated it. But he was encouraging, and he didn’t judge me, and I’ll always remember him for that.

Artie Mogull at Witmark Music signed me next to his company, and he told me to just keep writing songs no matter what, that I might be on to something. Well, he too stood behind me, and he could never wait to see what I’d give him next. I didn’t even think of myself as a songwriter before then. I’ll always be grateful for him also for that attitude.

I also have to mention some of the early artists who recorded my songs very, very early, without having to be asked. Just something they felt about them that was right for them. I’ve got to say thank you to Peter, Paul and Mary, who I knew all separately before they ever became a group. I didn’t even think of myself as writing songs for others to sing but it was starting to happen and it couldn’t have happened to, or with, a better group.

They took a song of mine that had been recorded before that was buried on one of my records and turned it into a hit song. Not the way I would have done it -- they straightened it out. But since then hundreds of people have recorded it and I don’t think that would have happened if it wasn’t for them. They definitely started something for me.

The Byrds, the Turtles, Sonny & Cher -- they made some of my songs Top 10 hits but I wasn’t a pop songwriter and I really didn’t want to be that, but it was good that it happened. Their versions of songs were like commercials, but I didn’t really mind that because 50 years later my songs were being used in the commercials. So that was good too. I was glad it happened, and I was glad they’d done it.

Pervis Staples and the Staple Singers -- long before they were on Stax they were on Epic and they were one of my favorite groups of all time. I met them all in ’62 or ’63. They heard my songs live and Pervis wanted to record three or four of them and he did with the Staples Singers. They were the type of artists that I wanted recording my songs.

Nina Simone. I used to cross paths with her in New York City in the Village Gate nightclub. These were the artists I looked up to. She recorded some of my songs that she [inaudible] to me. She was an overwhelming artist, piano player and singer. Very strong woman, very outspoken. That she was recording my songs validated everything that I was about.

Oh, and can’t forget Jimi Hendrix. I actually saw Jimi Hendrix perform when he was in a band called Jimmy James and the Blue Flames -- something like that. And Jimi didn’t even sing. He was just the guitar player. He took some small songs of mine that nobody paid any attention to and pumped them up into the outer limits of the stratosphere and turned them all into classics. I have to thank Jimi, too. I wish he was here.

Johnny Cash recorded some of my songs early on, too, up in about ’63, when he was all skin and bones. He traveled long, he traveled hard, but he was a hero of mine. I heard many of his songs growing up. I knew them better than I knew my own. “Big River,” “I Walk the Line.”

“How high’s the water, Mama?” I wrote “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” with that song reverberating inside my head. I still ask, “How high is the water, mama?” Johnny was an intense character. And he saw that people were putting me down playing electric music, and he posted letters to magazines scolding people, telling them to shut up and let him sing.

In Johnny Cash’s world -- hardcore Southern drama -- that kind of thing didn’t exist. Nobody told anybody what to sing or what not to sing. They just didn’t do that kind of thing. I’m always going to thank him for that. Johnny Cash was a giant of a man, the man in black. And I’ll always cherish the friendship we had until the day there is no more days.

Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Joan Baez. She was the queen of folk music then and now. She took a liking to my songs and brought me with her to play concerts, where she had crowds of thousands of people enthralled with her beauty and voice.

People would say, “What are you doing with that ragtag scrubby little waif?” And she’d tell everybody in no uncertain terms, “Now you better be quiet and listen to the songs.” We even played a few of them together. Joan Baez is as tough-minded as they come. Love. And she’s a free, independent spirit. Nobody can tell her what to do if she doesn’t want to do it. I learned a lot of things from her. A woman with devastating honesty. And for her kind of love and devotion, I could never pay that back.

These songs didn’t come out of thin air. I didn’t just make them up out of whole cloth. Contrary to what Lou Levy said, there was a precedent. It all came out of traditional music: traditional folk music, traditional rock ‘n’ roll and traditional big-band swing orchestra music.

I learned lyrics and how to write them from listening to folk songs. And I played them, and I met other people that played them back when nobody was doing it. Sang nothing but these folk songs, and they gave me the code for everything that’s fair game, that everything belongs to everyone.

For three or four years all I listened to were folk standards. I went to sleep singing folk songs. I sang them everywhere, clubs, parties, bars, coffeehouses, fields, festivals. And I met other singers along the way who did the same thing and we just learned songs from each other. I could learn one song and sing it next in an hour if I’d heard it just once.

If you sang “John Henry” as many times as me -- “John Henry was a steel-driving man / Died with a hammer in his hand / John Henry said a man ain’t nothin’ but a man / Before I let that steam drill drive me down / I’ll die with that hammer in my hand.”

If you had sung that song as many times as I did, you’d have written “How many roads must a man walk down?” too.

Big Bill Broonzy had a song called “Key to the Highway.” “I’ve got a key to the highway / I’m booked and I’m bound to go / Gonna leave here runnin’ because walking is most too slow.” I sang that a lot. If you sing that a lot, you just might write,

Georgia Sam he had a bloody nose

Welfare Department they wouldn’t give him no clothes

He asked poor Howard where can I go

Howard said there’s only one place I know

Sam said tell me quick man I got to run

Howard just pointed with his gun

And said that way down on Highway 61

You’d have written that too if you’d sang “Key to the Highway” as much as me.

“Ain’t no use sit ‘n cry / You’ll be an angel by and by / Sail away, ladies, sail away.” “I’m sailing away my own true love.” “Boots of Spanish Leather” -- Sheryl Crow just sung that.

“Roll the cotton down, aw, yeah, roll the cotton down / Ten dollars a day is a white man’s pay / A dollar a day is the black man’s pay / Roll the cotton down.” If you sang that song as many times as me, you’d be writing “I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more,” too.

I sang a lot of “come all you” songs. There’s plenty of them. There’s way too many to be counted. “Come along boys and listen to my tale / Tell you of my trouble on the old Chisholm Trail.” Or, “Come all ye good people, listen while I tell / the fate of Floyd Collins a lad we all know well / The fate of Floyd Collins, a lad we all know well.”

“Come all ye fair and tender ladies / Take warning how you court your men / They’re like a star on a summer morning / They first appear and then they’re gone again.” “If you’ll gather ‘round, people / A story I will tell / ‘Bout Pretty Boy Floyd, an outlaw / Oklahoma knew him well.”

If you sung all these “come all ye” songs all the time, you’d be writing, “Come gather ‘round people where ever you roam, admit that the waters around you have grown / Accept that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone / If your time to you is worth saving / And you better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone / The times they are a-changing.”

You’d have written them too. There’s nothing secret about it. You just do it subliminally and unconsciously, because that’s all enough, and that’s all I sang. That was all that was dear to me. They were the only kinds of songs that made sense.

“When you go down to Deep Ellum keep your money in your socks / Women in Deep Ellum put you on the rocks.” Sing that song for a while and you just might come up with, “When you’re lost in the rain in Juarez and it’s Easter time too / And your gravity fails and negativity don’t pull you through / Don’t put on any airs / When you’re down on Rue Morgue Avenue / They got some hungry women there / And they really make a mess outta you.”

All these songs are connected. Don’t be fooled. I just opened up a different door in a different kind of way. It’s just different, saying the same thing. I didn’t think it was anything out of the ordinary.

Well you know, I just thought I was doing something natural, but right from the start, my songs were divisive for some reason. They divided people. I never knew why. Some got angered, others loved them. Didn’t know why my songs had detractors and supporters. A strange environment to have to throw your songs into, but I did it anyway.

Last thing I thought of was who cared about what song I was writing. I was just writing them. I didn’t think I was doing anything different. I thought I was just extending the line. Maybe a little bit unruly, but I was just elaborating on situations. Maybe hard to pin down, but so what? A lot of people are hard to pin down. You’ve just got to bear it. I didn’t really care what Lieber and Stoller thought of my songs.

They didn’t like ‘em, but Doc Pomus did. That was all right that they didn’t like ‘em, because I never liked their songs either. “Yakety yak, don’t talk back.” “Charlie Brown is a clown,” “Baby I’m a hog for you.” Novelty songs. They weren’t saying anything serious. Doc’s songs, they were better. “This Magic Moment.” “Lonely Avenue.” Save the Last Dance for Me.

Those songs broke my heart. I figured I’d rather have his blessings any day than theirs.

Ahmet Ertegun didn’t think much of my songs, but Sam Phillips did. Ahmet founded Atlantic Records. He produced some great records: Ray Charles, Ray Brown, just to name a few.

There were some great records in there, no question about it. But Sam Phillips, he recorded Elvis and Jerry Lee, Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash. Radical eyes that shook the very essence of humanity. Revolution in style and scope. Heavy shape and color. Radical to the bone. Songs that cut you to the bone. Renegades in all degrees, doing songs that would never decay, and still resound to this day. Oh, yeah, I’d rather have Sam Phillips’ blessing any day.

Merle Haggard didn’t even think much of my songs. I know he didn’t. He didn’t say that to me, but I know [inaudible]. Buck Owens did, and he recorded some of my early songs. Merle Haggard -- “Mama Tried,” “The Bottle Let Me Down,” “I’m a Lonesome Fugitive.” I can’t imagine Waylon Jennings singing “The Bottle Let Me Down.”

“Together Again”? That’s Buck Owens, and that trumps anything coming out of Bakersfield. Buck Owens and Merle Haggard? If you have to have somebody’s blessing -- you figure it out.

Oh, yeah. Critics have been giving me a hard time since Day One. Critics say I can’t sing. I croak. Sound like a frog. Why don’t critics say that same thing about Tom Waits? Critics say my voice is shot. That I have no voice. What don’t they say those things about Leonard Cohen? Why do I get special treatment? Critics say I can’t carry a tune and I talk my way through a song. Really? I’ve never heard that said about Lou Reed. Why does he get to go scot-free?

What have I done to deserve this special attention? No vocal range? When’s the last time you heard Dr. John? Why don’t you say that about him? Slur my words, got no diction. Have you people ever listened to Charley Patton or Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters. Talk about slurred words and no diction. [Inaudible] doesn’t even matter.

“Why me, Lord?” I would say that to myself.

Critics say I mangle my melodies, render my songs unrecognizable. Oh, really? Let me tell you something. I was at a boxing match a few years ago seeing Floyd Mayweather fight a Puerto Rican guy. And the Puerto Rican national anthem, somebody sang it and it was beautiful. It was heartfelt and it was moving.

After that it was time for our national anthem. And a very popular soul-singing sister was chosen to sing. She sang every note -- that exists, and some that don’t exist. Talk about mangling a melody. You take a one-syllable word and make it last for 15 minutes? She was doing vocal gymnastics like she was on a trapeze act. But to me it was not funny.

Where were the critics? Mangling lyrics? Mangling a melody? Mangling a treasured song? No, I get the blame. But I don’t really think I do that. I just think critics say I do.

Sam Cooke said this when told he had a beautiful voice: He said, “Well that’s very kind of you, but voices ought not to be measured by how pretty they are. Instead they matter only if they convince you that they are telling the truth.” Think about that the next time you [inaudible].

Times always change. They really do. And you have to always be ready for something that’s coming along and you never expected it. Way back when, I was in Nashville making some records and I read this article, a Tom T. Hall interview. Tom T. Hall, he was bitching about some kind of new song, and he couldn’t understand what these new kinds of songs that were coming in were about.

Now Tom, he was one of the most preeminent songwriters of the time in Nashville. A lot of people were recording his songs and he himself even did it. But he was all in a fuss about James Taylor, a song James had called “Country Road.” Tom was going off in this interview -- “But James don’t say nothing about a country road. He’s just says how you can feel it on the country road. I don’t understand that.”

Now some might say Tom is a great songwriter. I’m not going to doubt that. At the time he was doing this interview I was actually listening to a song of his on the radio.

It was called “I Love.” I was listening to it in a recording studio, and he was talking about all the things he loves, an everyman kind of song, trying to connect with people. Trying to make you think that he’s just like you and you’re just like him. We all love the same things, and we’re all in this together. Tom loves little baby ducks, slow-moving trains and rain. He loves old pickup trucks and little country streams. Sleeping without dreams. Bourbon in a glass. Coffee in a cup. Tomatoes on the vine, and onions.

Now listen, I’m not ever going to disparage another songwriter. I’m not going to do that. I’m not saying it’s a bad song. I’m just saying it might be a little overcooked. But, you know, it was in the top 10 anyway. Tom and a few other writers had the whole Nashville scene sewed up in a box. If you wanted to record a song and get it in the top 10 you had to go to them, and Tom was one of the top guys. They were all very comfortable, doing their thing.

This was about the time that Willie Nelson picked up and moved to Texas. About the same time. He’s still in Texas. Everything was very copacetic. Everything was all right until -- until -- Kristofferson came to town. Oh, they ain’t seen anybody like him. He came into town like a wildcat, flew his helicopter into Johnny Cash’s backyard like a typical songwriter. And he went for the throat. “Sunday Morning Coming Down.”

Well, I woke up Sunday morning

With no way to hold my head that didn’t hurt.

And the beer I had for breakfast wasn’t bad

So I had one more for dessert

Then I fumbled through my closet

Found my cleanest dirty shirt

Then I washed my face and combed my hair

And stumbled down the stairs to meet the day.

You can look at Nashville pre-Kris and post-Kris, because he changed everything. That one song ruined Tom T. Hall’s poker parties. It might have sent him to the crazy house. God forbid he ever heard any of my songs.

You walk into the room

With your pencil in your hand

You see somebody naked

You say, “Who is that man?”

You try so hard

But you don’t understand

Just what you’re gonna say

When you get home

You know something is happening here

But you don’t know what it is

Do you, Mister Jones?

If “Sunday Morning Coming Down” rattled Tom’s cage, sent him into the looney bin, my song surely would have made him blow his brains out, right there in the minivan. Hopefully he didn’t hear it.

I just released an album of standards, all the songs usually done by Michael Buble, Harry Connick Jr., maybe Brian Wilson’s done a couple, Linda Ronstadt done ‘em. But the reviews of their records are different than the reviews of my record.

In their reviews no one says anything. In my reviews, [inaudible] they’ve got to look under every stone when it comes to me. They’ve got to mention all the songwriters’ names. Well that’s OK with me. After all, they’re great songwriters and these are standards. I’ve seen the reviews come in, and they’ll mention all the songwriters in half the review, as if everybody knows them. Nobody’s heard of them, not in this time, anyway. Buddy Kaye, Cy Coleman, Carolyn Leigh, to name a few.

But, you know, I’m glad they mention their names, and you know what? I’m glad they got their names in the press. It might have taken some time to do it, but they’re finally there. I can only wonder why it took so long. My only regret is that they’re not here to see it.

Traditional rock ‘n’ roll, we’re talking about that. It’s all about rhythm. Johnny Cash said it best: “Get rhythm. Get rhythm when you get the blues.” Very few rock ‘n’ roll bands today play with rhythm. They don’t know what it is. Rock ‘n’ roll is a combination of blues, and it’s a strange thing made up of two parts. A lot of people don’t know this, but the blues, which is an American music, is not what you think it is. It’s a combination of Arabic violins and Strauss waltzes working it out. But it’s true.

The other half of rock ‘n’ roll has got to be hillbilly. And that’s a derogatory term, but it ought not to be. That’s a term that includes the Delmore Bros., Stanley Bros., Roscoe Holcomb, Clarence Ashley ... groups like that. Moonshiners gone berserk. Fast cars on dirt roads. That’s the kind of combination that makes up rock ‘n’ roll, and it can’t be cooked up in a science laboratory or a studio.

You have to have the right kind of rhythm to play this kind of music. If you can’t hardly play the blues, how do you [inaudible] those other two kinds of music in there? You can fake it, but you can’t really do it.

Critics have made a career out of accusing me of having a career of confounding expectations. Really? Because that’s all I do. That’s how I think about it. Confounding expectations.

“What do you do for a living, man?”

“Oh, I confound expectations.”

You’re going to get a job, the man says, “What do you do?” “Oh, confound expectations.: And the man says, “Well, we already have that spot filled. Call us back. Or don’t call us, we’ll call you.” Confounding expectations. What does that mean? ‘Why me, Lord? I’d confound them, but I don’t know how to do it.’

The Blackwood Bros. have been talking to me about making a record together. That might confound expectations, but it shouldn’t. Of course it would be a gospel album. I don’t think it would be anything out of the ordinary for me. Not a bit. One of the songs I’m thinking about singing is “Stand By Me” by the Blackwood Brothers. Not “Stand By Me” the pop song. No. The real “Stand By Me.”

The real one goes like this:

When the storm of life is raging / Stand by me / When the storm of life is raging / Stand by me / When the world is tossing me / Like a ship upon the sea / Thou who rulest wind and water / Stand by me

In the midst of tribulation / Stand by me / In the midst of tribulation / Stand by me / When the hosts of hell assail / And my strength begins to fail / Thou who never lost a battle / Stand by me

In the midst of faults and failures / Stand by me / In the midst of faults and failures / Stand by me / When I do the best I can / And my friends don’t understand / Thou who knowest all about me / Stand by me

That’s the song. I like it better than the pop song. If I record one by that name, that’s going to be the one. I’m also thinking of recording a song, not on that album, though: “Oh Lord, Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood.”

Anyway, why me, Lord. What did I do?

Anyway, I’m proud to be here tonight for MusiCares. I’m honored to have all these artists singing my songs. There’s nothing like that. Great artists. [applause, inaudible]. They’re all singing the truth, and you can hear it in their voices.

I’m proud to be here tonight for MusiCares. I think a lot of this organization. They’ve helped many people. Many musicians who have contributed a lot to our culture. I’d like to personally thank them for what they did for a friend of mine, Billy Lee Riley. A friend of mine who they helped for six years when he was down and couldn’t work. Billy was a son of rock ‘n’ roll, obviously.

He was a true original. He did it all: He played, he sang, he wrote. He would have been a bigger star but Jerry Lee came along. And you know what happens when someone like that comes along. You just don’t stand a chance.

So Billy became what is known in the industry -- a condescending term, by the way -- as a one-hit wonder. But sometimes, just sometimes, once in a while, a one-hit wonder can make a more powerful impact than a recording star who’s got 20 or 30 hits behind him. And Billy’s hit song was called “Red Hot,” and it was red hot. It could blast you out of your skull and make you feel happy about it. Change your life.

He did it with style and grace. You won’t find him in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He’s not there. Metallica is. Abba is. Mamas and the Papas -- I know they’re in there. Jefferson Airplane, Alice Cooper, Steely Dan -- I’ve got nothing against them. Soft rock, hard rock, psychedelic pop. I got nothing against any of that stuff, but after all, it is called the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Billy Lee Riley is not there. Yet.

I’d see him a couple times a year and we’d always spent time together and he was on a rockabilly festival nostalgia circuit, and we’d cross paths now and again. We’d always spend time together. He was a hero of mine. I’d heard “Red Hot.” I must have been only 15 or 16 when I did and it’s impressed me to this day.

I never grow tired of listening to it. Never got tired of watching Billy Lee perform, either. We spent time together just talking and playing into the night. He was a deep, truthful man. He wasn’t bitter or nostalgic. He just accepted it. He knew where he had come from and he was content with who he was.

And then one day he got sick. And like my friend John Mellencamp would sing -- because John sang some truth today -- one day you get sick and you don’t get better. That’s from a song of his called “Life is Short Even on Its Longest Days.” It’s one of the better songs of the last few years, actually. I ain’t lying.

And I ain’t lying when I tell you that MusiCares paid for my friend’s doctor bills, and helped him to get spending money. They were able to at least make his life comfortable, tolerable to the end. That is something that can’t be repaid. Any organization that would do that would have to have my blessing.

I’m going to get out of here now. I’m going to put an egg in my shoe and beat it. I probably left out a lot of people and said too much about some. But that’s OK. Like the spiritual song, ‘I’m still just crossing over Jordan too.’ Let’s hope we meet again. Sometime. And we will, if, like Hank Williams said, “the good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise.”

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lastchancevillagegreen · 2 years ago

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Weld Neil Young & Crazy Horse (Reprise) (released in 1991)

The last piece of the Neil Young puzzle that will be coming out in about three weeks in a reissue boxed set is his live album with Crazy Horse, the very excellent Weld. I bought a vinyl copy from some mail order company (the Sound Machine, perhaps or Siren Records, where ever it was I learned of their existence from Goldmine magazine, the only reason I ever bought the magazine was for it's ads) that I endlessly bought from in the 90s when I needed European copies of artists like Neil Young who I always bought on vinyl since the early, early days when I bought After The Goldrush on vinyl back when it came out. Both Young and Dylan were must buys on both CD and LP and if the US gave up on pressing vinyl I was a wise enough record fanatic to know Europe still sold these guys on vinyl. Above you see the album cover, the gatefold and then the back of the LP. Below are photos of all four of the record labels.

Arc which was included as a bonus disc on the Weld CD set has never been pressed on vinyl before. That is another why I'm so interested in this forthcoming big box set of LPs from Neil Young. The album is essentially nothing more than snatches of feedback, ethereal vocals snatches and if I'm not mistaken it opens with that now famous Neil Young quote, "It's all the same song!" The existence of this 30 minutes experimental comes from none other than Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore who suggested to Young that he release such an oddity. What are Thurston and Neil doing paling around together? Well, in 1990-1991 when Young and Crazy Horse were touring and recording what would become Weld, Sonic Youth (and Social Distortion) were the opening acts.

I was fortunate enough to catch Young and Crazy Horse on this tour in Bloomington, Illinois with my brother and his then wife (how many shows did the three of us see together, it seems like a mess of them, including a great show by Prince; my favorite piece of this memory is knowing we all remains friends to this day). I remember people at the arena carping about Sonic and booing them but the trio of us thought they were great. Thurston kept giving phony titles to the songs and honestly, they put on a sonic distortion of a show that was one of the noisiest and messiest shows you can imagine. And that's what you wanted! It all fit in with Young & Crazy Horse's epic sonic screeches and marathon Ragged Glory-feedback drenched songs. I often forget I saw this show mistakenly believing I didn't see Young until the early Aughts at The Fox Theatre in St Louis (I also saw him at the very first Farm Aid back when my first wife was still living and partaking in such nonsense as speed and rock and roll).

Before I lose sight of my point being here, below you will find the trio of discs that came out in 1991. It was a three CD set (not in a box, not wrapped with an obi) wrapped in shrink wrap only titled Weld with a bonus disc of Arc. Some sets were titled Arc-Weld and I've never quite understood what differentiated either set! Below you will find all three of the CD covers, followed by the jewel cases opened up. Then comes the back of the sets and I close out with a shot of the spine. You can see that Arc is distinctly the third disc (see the gatefold shots and then the spines).

Arc also came out as a stand alone release, odd as that seemed and despite having it as part of Weld, I wanted one of those weird stand alone copies. (My brother has a promo of Arc, which strikes me as even weirder!) Below is the cover of the disc, then the gatefold (the jewel case opened up) and then the back of the CD. Note there is no reference to "Disc Three" anywhere on this disc.

Here is a look at the spine of the album again showing that there is no mention of this being Disc 3 of anything for it is a stand alone release!

My rationale for posting these sets is because I'm excited for this big ol' box release of Neil Young music because this contains some of my very favorite Young music! And I wanted to be able to have the originals already lined up for comparative purposes in the future weeks!

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themosleyreview · 2 years ago

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The Mosley Review: Shazam! Fury of the Gods

There is a sense of balance that has been missing in the big blockbuster films these days. The balance between telling a story that has a theme that resonates with throughout the story and then the big CGI spectacle of the opening, mid and finale that acts as a button to the story more often. More films focus on the spectacle and even though it may be visually pleasing, it often just pads out the film without any of the visuals telling a story or even affecting it. This film didn't waste any of its time doing that, but the spectacle was informed by the plot and did affect the characters within it. What I truly loved about this film is that it kept that same since of wonder and darkness the first film started and it stayed in its lane. It connects to the soon to be rebooted DCEU, but it stands strong enough on it own to be a soft disconnect. The themes of growing up, responsibilities, acceptance and family were refreshing to see handled in such a skilled way. This film reminded me of the late 80's and mid 90's kid and teen films where they weren't afraid to address the humanity of the heroes. Growing up can be scary because you don't want to let go of the fun times where the world seemed so open and free before stepping into adulthood. This film tackles that subject through the eyes of the leads while still giving us a surprisingly fun family action film that has a horror edge to it.

Asher Angel and Zachary Levi return as Billy Batson / Shazam and they're still magnetic and fun. Billy now has to balance being a leader and teenager growing into an adult and that was great to see handled. Asher does this wonderfully and actual gets to shine in the more emotional segments. Zachary Levi takes on the majority of the weight this time as the adult version of Billy and through him, you see Billy's naivtey really become his weakness in so many ways. Zachary's comedic timing and joyful take on the character was spot on and he nails what its like to be a teen in an adult's body. Billy's journey from child to adult was hilarious and also heartfelt. Jack Dylan Grazer and Adam Brody couldn't be more of a perfect pair as the teen and adult version of Freddy Freeman. Jack truly steals the film with his amazing wit, charm and hilarious sarcasm. His energy is so infectious and I loved that he is the center of the story this time around. He truly delivers a show stopping performance and Adam Brody amplifies that as his adult persona. Adam shows the more cocky nature of Freddy when he's "super" which was so much fun. Grace Caroline Currey was wonderful and wise as Mary Bromfield. She is the oldest in the family and I loved seeing her embrace the real world while still having fun as a superhero. She is that reminder that we all have to grow up at some point and contribute to a household and the world in some way. Ross Butler and Ian Chen were fun yet again as the young version and the adult version of Eugene Choi. They both show off his intelligent and exploratory nature within their lair. D. J. Cotrona and Jovan Armand were fantastic yet again as Pedro Peña. The way he handles his coming out to the family was handled very well and builds to a moment of true acceptance and I loved that it was natural and not forced. Meagan Good and Faithe Herman were the heart of the film as the adult and child version of Darla Dudley. The innocence of the character was so much fun and beautifully showcased by both actresses. I couldn't get enough them together or even separately. Marta Milans and Cooper Andrews return as their foster parents Rosa and Victor Vásquez and they both get so many great moments to shine and really bring the family together in a touching scene.

The score by Christophe Beck was awesome and epic in all the right ways as the action in the film really ramps up. When the screen isn't filled with action, he nails the more emotional moments. Visually the film was stunning to look at and I loved that the colors popped. The creatures in the film were yet again another standout and ranged from terrifying to badass. Its been a long time since anyone has brought to life any of the iconic monsters of the Greek mythos and I loved every bit of their strong and sometimes violent nature. Where the film has problems is the last half of the film. It tends to feel bloated in the last 30 minutes as the same amount of destruction keeps happening that makes the film drag on. There are moments that could've trimmed or cut to tighten up the finale. Director David S. Sandberg directed the first film that was a fun Christmas themed family film that tackled some heavy themes and wasn't afraid to touch on the darkness of the villains. He continues that here and has made another fun family film that adults can enjoy as well. Even with the bloated third act, this was an action packed and hefty 2 hour epic that should not be missed. Do stick around for the 2 great credit scenes. I don't know where this franchise will go once the DCEU is rebooted, but I hope we see a payoff to the story crumbs leftover from these 2 scenes. Let me know what you thought of the film or my review in the comments below. Thanks for reading!

#shazam fury of the gods #zachary levi #asher angel #jack dylan grazer #adam brody #ian chen #ross butler #faithe herman #meagan good #grace fulton #jovan armand #dj cotrona #Lucy Liu #helen mirren #rachel zegler #djimon hounsou #marta milans #cooper andrews #grace caroline currey

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adamwatchesmovies · 2 years ago

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Maze Runner: The Death Cure (2018)

Overall, I still think the Maze Runner series would have been better off if it had ended a few minutes before the end credits of the first film. However, if you enjoyed the first film - and its sequel, a picture of much lesser quality - and you want to see where it all ends, this movie’s for you. The Death Cure is a satisfying conclusion that uses its budget effectively. This looks way better than something which cost about $62 million to make.

Following their betrayal at the hands of Teresa (Kaya Scodelario), the last of the Gladers – Thomas (Dylan O’Brien), Newt (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) and Frypan (Dexter Darden) – are looking for their captured friend Minho (Ki Hong Lee). Thanks to his blood, Teresa is close to finding a cure for the zombie-like Flare Virus but she wonders if the World Catastrophe Killzone Department (WCKD) and the bloodthirsty Janson (Aiden Gillen) aren’t taking things too far.

There have been so many dystopian YA franchises that fizzled before their story concluded. The Host, The 5th Wave, even the seemingly popular Divergent all ultimately went nowhere. To see a final movie where all the stories get wrapped up and we get a proper goodbye actually got me a little worked up. There’s a lot happening in this film, which means it’s got a fat running time. One hundred and forty three minutes feels excessive but I’ll take it rather than a Part 1 and a Part 2.

While The Death Cure is nothing like the first Maze Runner story-wise, it contains the same kind of excitement. There are many action scenes and the one we get right from the beginning - a Mad Max-style chase across a desert - lets you know we’re in for a lot of pyrotechnics. Largely gone are the dull Cranks (the zombies). Instead, we get many scenes of the battle-ready Gladers narrowly evading their WCKD enemies and scraping together victories from the skin of their teeth. Actually, this brings me to a criticism. There are A LOT of moments where characters show up just at the right time to save the day. By the end, it starts to feel artificial. The plot is appropriately epic and exciting. The Death Cure manages to add emotional weight to the situation without dangling the same love triangle carrot so many of these teen-aimed films did but still, it stinks of cheap writing tactics. A couple more passes through the wringer would’ve made this picture tighter and less contrived.

A good chunk of the running time is given to the characters. Some of the stuff surrounding a B-story, with Walton Goggins playing the malcontent leader of the people surrounding the last city is just ok. Much meatier are the glimpses into the psyche of Teresa and Ava (Patricia Clarkson), the villains of the first two movies. They're given much more fleshing out. It helps make you understand why this whole thing even started. Yeah, some of the logic is still a little dicey but at this point, questioning it doesn’t make sense. It all comes together particularly well at the end as the characters manage to deal with the emotional baggage they’ve been hauling this whole time while the world falls apart around them. In a concluding chapter like this one, that's essential.

Seeing it a second time, I enjoyed The Death Cure more than I did initially. Maybe it’s because this is one of the better dystopian YA novel film series or because seeing the movies in quick succession - rather than with the large gap created by injuries actor Dylan O’Brien suffered during the filming of this picture - I was more attached to the characters than before. Either way, the fans will leave satisfied. (On Blu-ray, June 28, 2019)

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cuddlyreader · 2 years ago

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Hi friend! What are your top ten favorite OTPs of all time - in order, if possible. You're allowed to select more than one ship from the same fandom :) And I always love to hear the reasons why you love a given ship if you're up for including them! I'd love to hear your top ten female TV characters as well but don't want to be greedy :)

Oh, my. Well, I'm old enough that I can remember rooting for Kevin and Winnie on the Wonder Years. Lol. So, this is going to be fun and all over the place.

P.S. This is in chronological order and not by favorite because there's no way I could put them in that kind of order.

P.P.S. This is super long, so it's under the cut.

Top 10 OTPs:

Buffy and Angel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - Watching these two fall in love and be unable to resist it was so much fun. They were actually doomed from the start. I mean...a vampire and a vampire slayer...that has tragedy written all over it. She literally killed him, and he came back from a Hell world (sounds familiar). Then, they fell right back in love (hmm, also familiar). They loved so hard, and their world was always in peril, which kept the angst level pretty high. For years, Angel wallowed in the torment of guilt that his soul provided. She gave him a purpose...her purpose. Her entire reason for being was to save people. She made him want to do that, too. He made her realize that not all monsters are evil and not all "good" guys are good. In my mind, they found their way back to each other and lived happily ever after.

Willow and Tara (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - These two had the most beautiful and sweet love, and I am bitter that the idiot writer killed off Tara. Shy, bookish Willow really grew into a powerful and strong witch because of this relationship. She could fully be herself, and it was amazing. Tara, sweet Tara, was so kind and compassionate. She held Willow accountable in her magic, which turned out to be pretty important. I won't even get into the fact that at this time, there was very little LGBTQ representation on television. Yep, I'm still angry.

Pacey and Joey (Dawson's Creek) - Dawson's Creek is my comfort show. I watch it all the way through several times a year. There is nothing that soothes me like it does. When this show aired, there was nothing more enjoyable than watching Pacey and Joey fall for each other against their own wishes. Pacey knew first, and he tried not to act on it for the sake of their friend Dawson (I won't go into how annoyed that makes me given that Dawson didn't want her.). Joey fought it with everything she had for the same reason and also because it was so real that it scared the hell out of her. He pushed her to grow and become the person she was meant to be, and she accepted him as is without any expectations other than they would do it together. They had the best dynamic. They bickered and laughed and cried, but they worked at their relationship like you do in grown-up relationships. Even when they broke up, they cared about each other consistently. My favorite episode is when they get stuck in K-Mart overnight. Joyously, they were also endgame.

Max and Liz (OG Roswell and Roswell, New Mexico) - By now, I have established that I love intense love. That's exactly what og Max and Liz had. Liz was very structured and academically driven. Max was very closed off from everyone including Michael and Isabel. He opened her mind and heart to possibility. She made him feel and be open about it. They loved so intensely that even supposed alien fate couldn't keep them apart. I was so sad the show was canceled so soon, but I am eternally grateful that they were endgame and that I got to see it. They sort of switched the emotional roles of new Max and Liz, which I like. They would still do anything for each other, so they are still my OTP. Admittedly, I haven't watched the last season because I'm sad about it being the last.

Peyton and Lucas (One Tree Hill) - Look, they were always drawn to each other, but their timing was awful. I loved how no matter what, they were there for each other, even if it was just as friends. Peyton was the broken one in this relationship. She lost too much at too young an age. Feeling so deeply terrified her. And let's face it, Lucas was intense. He felt everything and didn't shy away from it. It was immensely gratifying to see them finally be happy together.

Damon and Elena (The Vampire Diaries) - Anyone that follows me knows that these two are my current obsession. Damon has literally spent over a century and a half being abandoned and rejected by his father, mother, brother, and love. To say that I love him is the understatement of the century. He had no intention of falling in love with Elena. He wanted to save Katherine, and her rejection nearly killed him. He feels everything so much that he can't cope, and then he snaps. Elena saves him. Period. She makes him feel human because she treats him like one. She expects him to care and makes him want to do better. And he does, starting with her. He loves her so much that it is palpable. Damon makes her look at herself and the world differently. He pushes her to be and accept her true self no matter who that is or who she is with. I am elated that they got their long and happy human life together.

Clary and Jace (Shadowhunters) - I love Jace with every fiber of my being. I just want him to have love and happiness. He did not get that deserved love from his parents, and he never felt like he deserved it after that. Clary brought him to life. She was caring and compassionate for everyone: mundane, shadowhunter, or downworlder. Loving her opened Jace's heart to everything. I choose to believe that the ending we got means they find their way back to each other and live happily ever after. I know I could finish the books, but I honestly cannot read Cassandra Clare's writing anymore. Besides, where they are in my mind is good for me.

Magnus and Alec (Shadowhunters) - Magnus is one of my favorite characters ever. He's loved many times over the centuries he's lived, but what he has with Alec is so much more. Like all shadowhunters, Alec doesn't trust downworlders, but for him, it's more than that. He believes he has a duty to his family, and being with Magnus flies in the face of that duty. Magnus not so subtly or easily pushes past Alec's defenses. Once they get together, they make each other better, and it's literally magical. Their wedding was everything I could have hoped for as far as endgame goes.

Honorable mentions:

Isak and Even (Skam)

Michael and Alex (Roswell, New Mexico)

Nancy and Ace (Nancy Drew)

Top 10 Female TV Characters (not in any specific order):

Brenda (Beverly Hills 90210) - I was and still am the "rebel" in my family, so Brenda was me. She fought for herself and to be herself and to live life on her own terms, and I think that is wonderful.

Buffy (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - Buffy was destined to be the hero, but she faced death and loss and came out stronger on the other end. Plus, I love the wit.

Willow (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - I was the shy, bookish girl in school. Willow's adorable geekiness was so endearing, and then she grew into this powerful, strong woman. Fantastic.

Joey (Dawson's Creek) - I probably relate to Joey because my mom died when I was four, and my brother died when I was twelve. Joey experienced terrible loss, and she understandably clung to Dawson as a lifeline. Her journey to adulthood is still my favorite thing to watch. She grew into herself and became a self-sufficient woman.

Veronica (Veronica Mars) - Veronica lost her best friend, and her mother left. Everyone that was supposed to be her friend abandoned her. So, she puts on emotional armor and finds a killer. This girl just doesn't stop fighting. She's ridiculously smart and intuitive. Also, I love her wit.

Emily (Revenge) - Emily had bad things happen to her, and she deserved to exact revenge. I love that she is intelligent and cunning and playing the long game.

Blair (Gossip Girl) - Blair put on a good front, I guess, but my girl was broken. Her mom was not nice to her. Her dad pretty much abandoned her. Her best friend slept with her boyfriend and then abandoned her as well. The guy she loves is too damaged to love her back properly. Blair just keeps on doing her best and loving those people that don't love her enough.

Callie (The Fosters and Good Trouble) - I'll probably get hate for this one, but I love Callie. She lost her mom and didn't know her dad. She went to juvie because she was protecting her little brother from the abuse she suffered in the foster care system. How could I not love this girl? Because the Fosters took her in and showed her what family is, she grew into a strong and successful woman. The whole journey was beautiful to me, and I'm not sorry.

Elena (The Vampire Diaries) - Elena lost both her parents, her aunt, her bio parents, her guardian, her own life, her brother (temporarily), and the love of her life (also temporarily). That's a lot for one person to endure even without all the supernatural happenings. She manages to hang on to her kindness and compassion. Through it all, she perseveres. I love her a lot.

Bonnie (The Vampire Diaries) - Bonnie is a badass hero. She saved all their butts so many times, and I'm here to give her the credit she deserves. Bonnie also suffered greatly, and I think that's why she and Elena are bonded. Bonnie struggled to get ahold of everything at first, but she literally became the woman who saved them all in the end.

#my asks #dr-alexandra-caroline-sloan #my favorites #beverly hills 90210 #dawson's creek #buffy the vampire slayer #roswell #roswell new mexico #veronica mars #the vampire diaries #shadowhunters #one tree hill #skam #nancy drew #the fosters #good trouble #revenge #gossip girl

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