#Still Ruins

[dragonageconfessions]

CONFESSION:

It was during the pandemic/lockdown when I discovered if you go in and out of the Still-Ruins, the tier 3 craft items on the desk respawn if you leave one of them.

[bandcampsnoop]

1/11/24.

I was perusing Austin Town Hall, and I listened to Still Ruins - an Oakland band that, according to Nathan, sounds "like a track just waiting to be used for a rainy scene in a John Hughes film". Still Ruins has an EP available on Smoking Room Records.

When I went to the Smoking Room website to check out the release, I saw this LP from Hotline TNT up for order. This is their debut LP reissued in a limited release (including a Grimace purple...yum).

And while I was late to the Third Man release of "Cartwheel", I thought I'd better post this so anyone who wants a physical copy can land one. The debut album has a shoegazy feel - I still like the My Bloody Valentine and Hum comparisons - but the wobbly guitar also sounds a bit like Polvo.

Hotline TNT (former members of Weed) are based in Brooklyn, New York.

[verflares]

just how long is forever? // not long enough, with you

pssst. check this out on inprnt :]

[inkskinned]

you said you were stuck in a time loop, which was fine. i feel like late-stage capitalism has us all in a time loop, ammiright? you came barging in at 5:33. in the morning. i hadn't even processed the idea of coffee.

but you had this look of utter panic in your eyes. terror like the ocean. you grabbed my cheeks. im in a time loop.

i don't know why in movies the first reaction is to deny it. when someone is panicking like that, it's not appropriate to ask them to calm down. it didn't matter if i believed it, what mattered was that you believed it so much that it was consuming you.

so here we are. i pour you some of the dark roast. "you look like utter and entire hell," i say.

you push your fingers into your eyes. "you always say that."

i try to think of something funny to say that i wouldn't have said on previous time loops, but jokes don't land without the proper timing (lol). "remind me to think -"

"-yeah, of a joke that only works in the future. and before you say anything, i know you're pissed i just stole your punchline." you bolt the coffee, which is wild. it's very hot. you don't seem to notice.

i blow on mine to cool it down. i both am very pissed at you and also i can't see you in this amount of panic without wanting to help. but i'm also not really sure what we are, not since i saw you kiss her like that, no offense. it just was like, kind of rude when you knew i liked you.

and besides. i'm just like, barely a person. i write omegaverse fanfiction. i love the concept of a time loop, but what the fuck am i gonna do? send an alpha in there? i open my mouth.

you point at me. "you're about to ask why me. and then say some disparaging shit about yourself. i'm just a nerd who plays dnd or something. that self-own is slightly different each time." you sigh. "i know you think you can't really help me. i don't know who can help me. i only came to you because you fucking believe me." you check your watch, sigh, and throw your head back. you cover your eyes with one hand. "i've come here on 26 separate revolutions," you say. "you have believed me every time. and yeah, i have no idea how you fit into this but i just -" you sigh again. "i just like fucking talking to someone about it."

"do you need more cof-" i start, but you're already holding the empty cup out. i frown at it. "you're not getting any more until you promise not to bolt this one like an animal."

you laugh a little and sit up, pushing your hair out of your face. "okay, that's new dialogue. but to be fair to you, i'm not usually this rude. i'm still pretty new at all of this." you check your watch again. another sigh. i guess you're cruising for a personal best in the Sigh Olympics.

i almost tell you im not an NPC but i've played enough video games to know i'm very much an NPC. i pour you another cup. "so what happens in the loop?"

"really bad explosion." you mutter into the mug. you put your elbows on the table (rude) and bury your face in your arms like an angsty teenager. one hand floats up while you talk, because evidently you literally can't talk without your hands. "i have to save the day and there's this bomb and i have no bomb training and it keeps moving, you know."

"do i die?"

you peek up from your arms. "yeah. bigtime. you keep trying to run or stay or do anything and you always super die."

"oh."

"to be fair, like, everyone dies in it though.... so you're in good company."

i hate that you make me laugh. i hate that being around you always feels tingly and strange, this electric tension between us. something that is evidently (given how you stuck your tongue down a stranger's throat literally 3 days ago) (well. 3 for me) super one-sided. i take a sip of my coffee and close my eyes.

i die today, i guess. a little spark of panic starts at the top of my hands and starts whipping up my wrists.

"shit," you say. you look at your watch and jump to your feet. "i have to go. if i can come back, i will. i am still trying to figure out when is best to do everything, you know? the order of stuff. maybe morning isn't good for us."

i look up at you and think about how you keep kissing me in the back of my car and in alleyways and in the dark. and i can never fucking get a read on you. and i also think about how incredibly panicked you look. how broken. how long have you been doing this? "i don't want to die," i say.

you glance downwards. "well, you're not really dead, you'll come back in the loop."

"but i will have died." my hands are shaking. i am trying really hard to stay calm.

you push your hands through your hair again. "i really have to go. i will have this discussion with the next version of you, though. it is like, something i am thinking about."

"but i don't get a next version," i say. i don't really have the language for this, because i haven't had 26 tries with you. i only have my memories: you, a week ago. drunk and telling me you loved me in my ear. you, kissing her anyway. you, months ago, throwing up on my birthday, whispering to me i ruin everything i touch, always, over and over. please don't ask. i can't ever fucking have that be you.

i run my finger along the rim of the mug. "i don't want to die in this one."

you seem baffled by this. "i get that but - time will reset, you'll be fine, you won't even remember we talked about this."

"but i know now." i stand up too. "i have to live the rest of this day knowing i could die. knowing i probably am going to."

"you could always die, to be fair."

i feel my hands get out of control. "earlier, you said i always say a different insult about myself. what if you're just going through different parallel universes and those are all just different - but real - versions of myself? what if you're not in a time loop, you're in a fucking universe loop?"

"if it helps, i've wondered this too. also, you're hot in all of them. if that helps."

i point at you. "no flirting. i'm trying to figure out if i die today."

"who's flirting?" you catch my wild hands and give me that long, perfect smile. like we're in this together. "i won't let ya die." you check your watch and sigh again. "well. maybe not this time."

i grit my teeth. you are so not making quips at me while i try to explain the existential dread i'm having. "does the time loop reset if i fucking kill you?"

"honestly i don't know how long it continues after i die, because i just wake up. it could be that the loop goes until the explosion for everyone, and we're all in the loop, or it could be that when i die, the loop restarts. when i die i wake up, is all."

i pull away from you and stalk into the kitchen and start doing all 3 of my dishes. "okay, first, you know i was joking. and secondly, this is exactly my point. you don't know if this is just a parallel universe. maybe in the ones where you died, the explosion happened and nobody reset and it's just you travelling." i have to stop and push the heel of my palm into my eyeball. "... how often have you died?"

i look at you. you look at me. you give me this very sad, halfway smile and a little what can ya do shrug. something in that action seems so old and weary that i want to burst into tears.

"i have to go," you say. "really. for real. there's this family of five i save from getting into a car crash. and i know it's like oh but we're all gonna die in the explosion anyway, what's the point. and..." you shrug again. "it matters to me, is all. at least i saved them for now. at least i saved anything."

you pad over to me and wrap me in a tight hug. you always seem so tall against me. i feel your cheek rest against the top of my head for a moment. for a second, it's just us, and the space is warm, and my heart is a little broken hare.

you leave me there, and i stand in my stupid badly lit kitchen with my stupid mugs. i think about you. i start texting my mom that she needs to get out of the city, but it feels pointless.

i don't know what to do. tomorrow is the same day for you. but i have to prepare to die in my today.

[indietapes]

Still Ruins - Of Devotion (Indie Pop)

🕑 1 min / Text: Adrian Release Date: Jan. 08, 2024 Back in November, we featured Still Ruins' music here on our blog. Now, the talented trio from Oakland, California is back with another beautiful indie pop/rock jam titled 'Of Devotion.' Their music is like a throwback to the '80s, and I really enjoyed the dreamy melodies and the vintage chorus effect on the guitar. If you haven't checked out these guys yet, make sure to give it a listen! Stream: https://open.spotify.com/track/4DzwgEjIsp6O6ahsjMUcIa ✔️ Available on our Indie Playlist on Spotify.

[chloesimaginationthings]

Gregory has it best out of the new FNAF protagonists..

[lotus-pear]

cringefail exes oh my god

[klunah]

i really had to draw them with their matching bat costumes 🧡💜

happy late(?) halloween !!

[choccy-milky]

how seb and clora get together in my fic 💕bc what better time and place to confess and share your first kiss than around a bunch of inferi + the dead body of a man you just killed?? 🥰💖

[teaboot]

Sometimes at work it's not my place to tell people the things I want to say, and I find I often go home at the end of the rougher days to stand blankly in my shower and tell myself over and over what I wish I could pass on.

This accomplishes very little, and mostly just gives me a tension headache, but through it all I think I've narrowed myself down to a few solid things I'd like to tell people the most.

You can't change people. Not permanently, not for anythig. You can support them, encourage them, love them, give them tools and opportunities and resources, but you can't make them change. They can change themselves if they want to, but they have to want to, and they have to want it for themselves, because they're the only one that's certain to be with them forever.

For better or worse, you make your own choices, and blaming bad choices on others doesn't only work to absolve you of responsibility- it also robs you of control. Because if you say you only did something because I did something, then you arent only shifting blame- you're admitting that you cannot control yourself, that you cannot truly make choices for yourself, that other people can control you- and as long as you truly beleive that, you'll keep facing the same problems over and over. You'll keep letting others dictate your choices, because you'll beleive that they can, and you'll never be free.

White knights on horseback are from fairytales. Nobody can help you if ou're not willing to help yourself. To try, to put the dirty work in, to belive you're worth that effort- Act as though nobody is coming to save you. From a struggle, from pain, from bad relationships, from yourself. And when you do save yourself, because you will, because failure here isn't an option if you want to survive, you'll never find another dragon that can keep you prisoner.

Don't say anything to anyone that you wouldn't want them remembering forever.

Doing the right thing in bad circumstances is hard. It's the hardest thing. But if you make the choice to do that hard thing anyways, despite your fear, you'll go on the rest of your like knowing that you're the sort of person who did something.

The present only seems the hardest because the past I over and the future hasn't happened.

There's so much joy ahead of you, the kind you can't possibly understand until you see it yourself.

The responsibility of consequences is often disguised as the power of permission. "I won't do this if you help me", "I'll work on my anger if you do this for me", "I promised you I'd quit, but can I have just one?". The unspoken question is, "Can it be your fault if this goes badly?"

You cant make someone love you the way you need to be loved. Someone can love you very much and still be bad for you, even if you love them very much in return. Two people can love each other very, very much, and try their very best, and still be wrong for each other.

Sometimes being near to someone changes you, even in good ways, and the people you become don't fit together as well as the people you were.

Caring takes work. Even if it's real. Especially if it's real. And the most important gestures aren't the grand, poetic, songs-and-flowers-and-tears moments; they're getting out of bed even though you don't want to. Paying attention to things you don't enjoy. Scrubbing pans, or opening a window, saying "thank-you", or helping carry groceries into the house. The small things fill the big things- without the small, boring, mediocre things, big things feel hollow.

Thrre is honour and dignity in humble work.

If you are a cruel and spiteful person, then you will find every place you visit to be full of the same cruel, spiteful people. This is not because the world is as cruel as you, but because everywhere you are, you will be disliked. This is the curse that comes with being persistently cruel and spiteful.

If you are a kind and ppsitive person, you will repeatedly encounter kind and positive people, because as they grow familiar with you, they will be happier to have you near. This is the reward of being a kind and positive person.

When splitting paths with loved ones, briefly or forever, aim for your last words to always be "I love you".

[rolanslide]

Losing my fucking mind over this passage. you're telling me, after physically and emotionally torturing him, tricking him into building a doomsday device, emotionally manipulating him for YEARS, and ruining his relationship with his only remaining friend, this is what Ford counts as "crossing a line"? This is Fords breaking point? After everything? It's been over a decade since he's seen Stanley. He has no reason or intention to contact him. After all this time, he's still angry at him. And yet, Bill using his body, his voice, to tell Stanley that he hates him and never loved him is too much, too horrible even for Bill. THIS is what forces Ford to take action. AFTER EVERYTHING. Stanford Pines the man that you are. aa. aaaaaa

[jazzkrebber]

rip shadow and bone. we would have loved to see dark alina. we would have loved to see matthias finally get out of jail. we would have loved to see kaz learn to love. we would have loved to see zoyalai on screen. we would have loved to see wylan's story. we would have loved to see the ice court heist. we would have loved to see colm fahey. we would have loved to meet kuweii. we would have loved to see jesper get over his gambling addiction. we would have loved to see matthias relearn all he knew for nina. we would have loved to see inej find her family again. we would have loved to see mal find out what life is like without alina. we would have loved to see nina learn to live for herself, instead of her country.

we would have loved to see more of the characters we all know and love.

[kendyroy]

Logan & Wade looking at each other

(Part 2/?)

[prosekaipng]

project sekai the movie: ruined sekai and the miku who cant sing - Chara visual Key - Hatsune Miku

[indietapes]

Still Ruins - Perfect Blue (Indie Pop)

🕑 1 min / Text: Adrian Release Date: Nov. 21, 2023 Here's a fresh new release titled ‘Perfect Blue’ by the Oakland, California-based trio Still Ruins. I really enjoyed their driving sound - it's a cool mix between classic new wave and mellow dream pop. What I like most about it are the smooth and jangly guitars and the vintage synths that add a slightly melancholic tone to the music. 'Perfect Blue' has a nice '80s feel to it, and I associate so many beautiful things with it: driving through a neon city at night, watching VHS movies, and discovering new music through mixtapes. Give it a listen and make sure to keep up with Still Ruins's new releases on Spotify: Stream: https://open.spotify.com/track/5SxAzuXTdKnaDqw5Xo7gYp ✔️ Available on our Indie Playlist on Spotify.

[chloesimaginationthings]

There's doomed yuri... in my FNAF ruin?