#Though that could be because of microphones improving in quality over time

[god-breast-america]

was listening to fdr voice recordings and realized all of a sudden how beautifully aged his voice was and i had to pause for several moments to process it WHY DOES IT SOUND SO PRETTY

SO REAL SO REAL SO REALLLLLLLLL I LOVE HIS VOICE SO MUCH ACTUALLY ITS SO SOFT AND GENTLE AND UGHHHHHH IT FITS HIM PERFECTLY

[samithefungus]

Brendon and/or Warren with reader who is a freelancer artist that does a variety of things like family portraits, illustrations for books and magazines, etc and helps them for free.

Thanks Anon for the request, hope you like it <3

Warren x Freelancer Reader

WARNINGS: Nothing this time

-You were working as a Freelancer artist and were hired by a non-profit company to redesign their logo

-The company was called "Ok, Stop!" and even though you weren't sure what they were doing you took the job

-Your current 'boss' wanted you to design at the company's headquarters so they could monitor progress; you found it a hassle, but at the time you couldn't refuse because you needed the money

-During your time working there, you met Warren

-You couldn't really call him a Freelancer because he work for the company, but in his free time he works on podcasts by himself

-Even after you finished working for "Okay, Stop!" you and Warren stayed in touch

-You were called each others almost every day, albeit briefly, since you both had to work

-You decided to help him, since you were sorry to hear that almost all of his free time was spent doing podcasts for work

-You first recommended a better microphone to him, since the one he had sometimes recorded corrupted audios and then because of that he had to record podcasts completely over again

- "Really, I can't even find the brand of microphone you use!!!" You said

- "It's the cheapest one, I don't have enough money for a professional one " He answered embarrassed

- "Well....the most recommended is the Blue Yeti, my streamer friend uses it and it's great; and don't worry about the cost, I'll pay for it" You said

-Warren I look at you really happy , honestly no one had made something so nice for him

-You also recommend him to soundproof the room, so that no background noise could be heard while he was talking on his podcasts

- "Another thing you could do is soundproof the room, there would be no more background sounds on the podcasts" You said

- "I never thought of that" He replied to you

- "Someone gifted me some panels; I don't know what to do with them, if you want I can give them to you" You told him

-After you brought the soundproofing panels to Warren's house you also helped him hang them in the room he use for record his podcast

-Warren was sincerely amazed at your kindness

-Another tip you gave him to improve the quality of his podcast is to write a text where he can refer to the information without having to imrove, as he did before

-Warren wasn't very good at writing so you tried to help him the best you could, even if writing was not your specialty

-When he works too much you stop him by saying: "Take a break, working when you are too tired doesn't lead to anything good"

-The fact that working too much is also your vice and Warren often has to stop you too; sometimes if you don't want to listen to him he will use your phrases against you, since he knows that because of your ego you would not contradict yourself

-Warren will not bother you only if you have an errand with an impending deadline; he knows you have little time to finish it and does not want to you waste it

-Thanks to your advice Warren's podcast has been much more successful than it was before, and he won't stop thanking you

-Sometimes you make some drawings for him to put as covers for his podcasts

-Warren cries with joy every time you do this

-To thank you for all you do Warren try help you, advertising you to his colleagues

-You find it very sweet of him, even though none of them have contacted you yet

-The days when you haven't too much work to do, you both prefer to sleep or stay home and relax rather than go out; this is because of the decrease of energy in your body

-Life as a Freelancer is hard, and you and Warren know it, which is why you and Warren push each other to keep going

Brendon x Freelancer Reader

WARNINGS: Nothing this time

-You met Brendon almost by chance; you met him in a café when he asked if he could sit with you since every other sits was full 

-Neither of you spoke, until you noticed him writing something; you were intrigued and asked him about it

-He seemed astonished by your question; apparently no one ever asked him about his novel

-Brendon happily started talking about his novel, and he was glad that someone was interested in it

-He even let you read a part of it, and honestly you were amazed at how well it was written

-When you heard that no one wanted to publish it you were sad for him and you understood what him feels; you were a Freelancer artist, and in your early days of work it was rare that anyone would hire you and sometimes your hard work was not paid properly and very often was belittled

-You were now a fairly respected artist, thanks in part to the help of some of your friends; that's why you wanted to help Brendon as your friends did to you

-Fortunately at that time you had little work and more like easy errands, so you could help Brendon the best you could

-Brendon invited you to his house so that you could read his novel entirely and give him advice

-When you arrived at Brendon's house, the first person you met was his annoying younger brother; he was a good person, but the way he told Brendon to get a real job took you personally

-You and Brendon had to ignore Briefcase's provocations

-Brendon took his novel and gave it to you so that you could read it

-You flipped through it and saw that it was all handwritten; you were amazed at the dedication he had put into writing it, the problem being that publishers are more likely to publish a computer-written text

-You told him this a little anxiously, as you didn't want him to think you were belittling his work

-Brendon gladly took your advice and from that day began transcribing his novel on the computer

-Briefcase probably hates you, thinking you were leading his brother astray; that's why every time he saw you two together he repeated to Brendon: "It's a bad influence for you!"

-Every time Briefcase does that both you and Brendon roll your eyes

-To help Brendon as much as possible you also contacted some of your writer friends to ask which publishers were most willing to publish a novel

-You also designed a cover for the book

-When you told Brendon all these things he was almost cried of joy

-After meeting with some publishers you finally found someone willing to publish Brendon's novel

-You were delighted, the only problem was that you two would have to work alone on the design of the book

-Brendon was a little worried about this, you reassured him and because you having some experience in designing you offered to help him

-The first thing you did was correct the text, then you divided the book into chapters, so as to give readers some reference points and finally you added a sketch you made for summarizing the chapter at the end of each ones; you did this to make the book more palatable to the audience

-This work took you a long time and some nights without sleep, but in the end you were satisfied with about it

-You sent the file to the publisher and waited for them to send you the first copy before they finally published the book

-As soon as you got the copy of the book, you went to Brendon's house to show it to him.

-When you gave it to him initially he was as excited as you were, but when he started turning the pages he started crying from emotion

-You told him you would think about design, but not that you would use hours of your time to do drawings for his book

-He asked you if he owed you any money for that, and you told him 'no'

- "I just wanted to help you, I don't want any money!" You said

-Brendon hugged you still crying from joy

-Now the next step was to rub his success in Briefcase's face

-Brendon picked up his book and headed to his brother

- "I told you I could do it!!!" You heard him shout joyfully

-You have to admit that this made you smile a little bit

[eurotastic]

Eurovision reviews 2023 - Semi final 1

Eurovision week has officially started, and that means it's about time I write my reviews for Eurovision 2023. I went to the London Eurovision preparty in April, and I had the best time, and for that reason, my opinions are partially based on the live performances that I saw there. As usual, I'm primarily basing my reviews on the song quality (do I want to listen to it outside of the competition?), and the preview videos for the staging - The full package that we're getting in the actual show. I'm also taking general fandom opinions into consideration with some of the songs, in case I think the fandom is overhyping or underrating an entry. I feel like I'm overexplaining the way I judge the songs, mostly it's just based on vibes, but the bottom line is that these are just my personal opinions and you're all free to send me anonymous hate mail if you disagree.

Norway: Queen of Kings - Alessandra

It's one of the catchiest pop songs of the year, so it's the perfect song to open the semi final with. I just wish the staging would have been improved from the NF, because right now it's looking cheap and unimaginative. It's a fast paced europop song with some pirate vibes, it has so much potential for camp but we're getting nothing visually. Cute whistle note though.

7/10

Malta: Dance (Our Own Party) - The Busker

I understand what they're going for, I really do. Introverted nerds need party songs too, but the song isn't good just because the idea for the song is good. The guy says "do you wanna dance", but the song is too slow and low energy to dance too, it just flatlines. At least they're giving us a strong staging gimmick, and Eurovision always needs an epic sax guy, so this entry isn't a complete failure.

4/10

Serbia: Samo mi se spava - Luke Black

The instrumental is fantastic, and the singing is… Is he even singing or is he just doing some sexy moaning and breathing into the microphone? This is definitely a case of style over substance, but it looks so good on stage that I don't care if the songwriting is a little weak.

7/10

Latvia: Aijā - Sudden Lights

I respect this song way more than I actually enjoy it. It's obvious that these guys are really competent musicians, but that doesn't matter when the song is this forgettable.

4/10

Portugal: Ai Coração - Mimicat

This feels like something out of the early 2000s, for better or for worse. I like how Mimicat is doing her own Moulin Rouge type of thing, but that's the problem, it's just a cabaret performance. Once the competition is over, it's not something I'm going to keep listening to.

5/10

Ireland: We Are One - Wild Youth

"We might be different, we might be unique" - No you're not, you're the most generic band on earth.

2/10

Croatia: Mama ŠČ! - Let 3

First there's the authoritatian version of The Village People singing about tractors and morons, then Lenin shows up with some missiles, and then they start singing about a "crocodile psychopath"…It's so beautiful I could cry. It's completely ridiculous and stupid, but it's obvious that it was made by smart people just playing stupid. Also, this does a better job denouncing Putin and the war than any world peace song ever could. It's the first truly great troll entry of the 2020s.

10/10

Switzerland: Watergun - Remo Forrer

This song makes me feel like the type of conservative right wing American who gets really intense about supporting the military, and I don't like it. It's 2023, and in case you haven't noticed, a country participating in Eurovision has been forced into a war for survival. At this moment, the Ukrainian military is the only thing keeping the country from getting wiped out of existance. In case you haven't noticed, it's an ongoing attempt at genocide. With all that said, it looks like someone didn't notice, because here's some Swiss bitch getting on his moral high horse singing some cutesy, whiny little song about how he doesn't want to be a soldier because he doesn't want to "play with real blood"…..Guess what, you're from fucking Switzerland, nobody's ever forcing you to be a soldier, unlike the Ukrainians who don't have a choice! It's a completely tone deaf choice for 2023, especially coming from the country that's using neutrality as an excuse to avoid solidarity with the rest of Europe. I'm getting the same vibe from this as the shitty world peace songs that Russia would send in the 2010s. I hate hate hate hate hate hate this.

0/10

Israel: Unicorn - Noa Kirel

At first I thought this song was the most annoying thing in the world, but after hearing it in approximately 500 recap videos on Youtube I think I got Stockholm syndromed into loving this. It's literally phenomenmenmenemnal.

8/10

Moldova: Soarele și Luna - Pasha Parfeni

Nobody does weird better than Moldova.

Nobody does weird better than Moldova.

7/10

Sweden: Tattoo - Loreen

Loreen is the greatest artist in the history of Eurovision and she deserves to be the first woman to win the whole thing twice.

10/10

Azerbaijan: Tell Me More - TuralTuranX

It's refreshing to get something this completely uncompetitive from Azerbaijan. There's a lot of good songwriting ideas here, I like the laidback vibes, but at the same time it's too bland to stand out.

5/10

Czechia: My Sister's Crown - Vesna

This song felt a lot bigger when it was released a few months ago. I love the aggressive rap parts and the defiant attitude in the beginning of the song, but then there's the "we stand for you" parts��This song is trying to be everything for everyone, and think it would have benefitted from focusing on just being angry without any lines about world peace and holding hands and whatever else. The production is incredible though, I can never get enough of this Eastern European folk hip hop thing.

8/10

Netherlands: Burning Daylight - Mia Nicolai & Dion Cooper

This is the kind of song that I usually can't stand in Eurovision, since it's basically just a bland easy listening radio song. Somehow I don't mind it, it's very well written despite being basic. I'm definitely not voting for it though.

Finland: Cha Cha Cha - Käärijä

It's crazy, it's party, and it's officially my favorite Eurovision song of all time. I love it more than I love Shum, Wild Dances, Rhythm Inside and whichever other song I have called my all time favorite over the years. My favorite things in life outside of Eurovision are professional wrestling and Rammstein, so the music video alone was enough to make me a huge fan of Käärijä. If I see a guy inside a wrestling ring with a huge Rammstein tattoo, obviously that's the guy I'm voting for. It's my most played song of the year on Spotify, and I feel like this whole thing was created in a lab specifically for me. 11/10

[disneyat34]

The Aristocats at 34

A review by Adam D. Jaspering

The second Disney Dark Age was defined by a series of decisions resulting in decreased film quality. Some decisions were timesavers, prioritizing efficiency above craft. Some were financial decisions, scaling back ambition, favoring simplicity. Some of it was a general sense of disillusionment. The glory days of the Disney empire were gone. Animation as a medium was in a rut. The prestige of working in cartoons was akin to working on an assembly line.

The Aristocats was never a children’s book, fairy tale, or published story. It was an original concept by writers Tom Rowe and Tom McGowan for Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. In 1961, they were instructed to develop stories featuring animal protagonists.

One of the stories involved a family of cats forced from their home by an evil butler and maid. The cats would hide around Paris, staying safe, exploring the locales, having adventures. This was the first draft of The Aristocats.

For years, the writers worked and re-worked the story as a two-part, live-action, made-for-TV movie. From every angle, The Aristocats was infeasible. The writers were trapped in an endless cycle of revision, rejection, revision, rejection. By 1966, they gave up. With so much time, money, and effort sunk, they recouped their losses by selling the treatise to Disney Animation Studios.

The animated medium worked to the writers’ advantage. The cats could now talk, react, move, emote, and think like more than simple house pets. It made completing the script much simpler. However, that was the only advantage earned.

The greatest indicator of the troubled writing process is how heavily the movie borrows ideas from previous Disney films. Disney had made films about pets in trouble before, and they were successes. To copy their success, The Aristocats copied a number of plot elements and themes.

Consider what is lifted from 101 Dalmatians. Someone nefarious kidnaps a bunch of beloved pets. The pets evade their captor, and are forced on an arduous trek back home. They find respite only through the hospitality of other animals along the way.

Consider what is lifted from Lady and the Tramp. A spoiled pet, accustomed to love and indoor life, is forced from home. They find a streetwise transient with a heart of gold who agrees to help. Over time, love blooms despite the pair coming from two different worlds.

The Aristocats is a shameless blend of 101 Dalmatians and Lady and the Tramp, simply substituting the dogs with cats. It offers nothing unique. What it lifts, it doesn’t improve on.

The xerographic animation is the worst its ever been. Xerography has always resulted in scratches, inconsistent line widths, and rough details. In The Aristocats, it’s laughably bad. Lines are sketchy, frayed, and wiry. In wide shots, character outlines are too thick. On close-ups, outlines are too thin. Errant reference lines are left in place, never cleaned before going to print. Detail lines are too bold and garish. The animators were either getting sloppy or lazy.

The female lead of the movie is Duchess, a white angora cat. She is voiced by Hollywood actress Eva Gabor. Gabor is best known for the sitcom Green Acres, where she played a socialite unwillingly relocated to a country setting. She admirably plays Duchess, a cat socialite unwillingly relocated to a country setting. 

Gabor lends an air of nobility and sophistication to the character. Unfortunately, she never fully hides her Hungarian accent. She slips between her natural voice and a French affectation, creating a definite European sound, but not of any particular area.

Duchess’s three kittens are Marie (white, voiced by Liz English), Berlioz (black, voiced by Dean Clark), and Toulouse (orange, voiced by Gary Dubin). All three are voiced by American children and speak in an American accent.

In most Disney movies, young characters are voiced  by actual children. The same is true for The Aristocats. Unfortunately, the three actors here are among the worst the studio has ever seen. The children lack a sense of timing and awareness in their recitations. Everything they say is forced and toneless. They’re not acting, just reciting the script. It’s made all the worse they don’t project, delivering their lines quietly and without passion into the microphone. Every line sounds as though they have sore throats and stuffy noses.

The male lead is O’Malley, an orange piebald shorthair voiced by Phil Harris. Phil Harris voiced Baloo in The Jungle Book, and was acclaimed for bringing the bon vivant bear to life. It’s no surprise, in a film that has already recycled so much, it recycles an entire character. Phil Harris gives O’Malley Baloo’s relaxed nature, cocky arrogance, love of music, and budding paternal instincts. The only difference between O'Malley and Baloo are their species.

The plot of the film centers around Madame Bonfamille, an elder Frenchwoman of notable wealth. An aging woman, she meets with a lawyer to draft a will. With no spouse and no living family, she bequeaths her estate and all monetary goods to her beloved cats.

This enrages her longtime, long-suffering butler, Edgar. So much so, he conspires to kill the cats, leaving him the sole beneficiary. The evil maid from the original story spec was written out completely.

There is so much to unpack in such a confounding setup. The first among them, Madame Bonfamille won’t relinquish her estate until she dies. She appears to be in her 70s, but is still fully ambulatory, healthy, and mentally sound. She won’t be passing on anytime soon.

So why would Edgar attempt to kill the cats immediately? If he killed the cats now, Madame Bonfamille would adopt new cats and start the cycle anew. Why wouldn’t he kill the cats when Madame Bonfamille is closer to death? If she’s enfeebled or incapacitated, she’d be unable to amend her will.

Let’s give Edgar the benefit of the doubt and assume he panicked. He was blinded by greed. He was offended his boss would discount his years of loyal service. He’s seen as lesser than a quartet of creatures who use a litter box. He didn’t consider the ramifications of preemptive catslaughter. The insult caught him off-guard.

If Edgar behaved rationally, bided his time, and planned a perfect murder, killing the cats would still be stupid. Without researching French estate law of the early 20th century, we can reasonably assume a person cannot name pets as beneficiaries. In which case, the will’s stipulations would be voided and Edgar would inherit the estate.

Assuming it’s unconventional but acceptable, the cats would need a caretaker. What would cats do with such money? Cats can’t shop, can’t pay bills, can’t pay taxes. Edgar would almost certainly be given power of attorney over the cats. He’d live in the manor, be granted a trust fund, and all in exchange for occasionally feeding a few cats. The cats would legally own the wealth, but Edgar would be in charge of where it’s spent. Edgar would get everything anyways, and his hands would be clean.

Even for a kid’s movie, the plot is overly simple and collapses under scrutiny. After so many rewrites and changing of hands, standards dropped noticeably. Nine different writers worked on this movie. The filmmakers had no expectations of the script beyond “complete” and “printed on paper.” The Aristocats is no masterstroke. But maybe it was never intended to be.

It’s never been officially stated, but in an era of financial instability, it’s easy to see the appeal of The Aristocats. A paper-thin plot is an acceptable concession to showcase a bunch of dancing and singing cats.

Disney had never made a cat movie. Disney had made dog movies, and subsequently sold dog toys and dog merchandise. But some people like cats more than dogs. There was an untapped market for cat toys and cat merchandise. All they needed was a cat movie. The plot was irrelevant.

The stakes of the movie are incredibly low. In 101 Dalmatians, the dogs are forced to walk from the outskirts of town back into London. It’s an arduous journey. The weather is harsh and unforgivable. The puppies are tired and hungry. The villain is actively on their trail, ready to attack at any minute.

In The Aristocats, the cats are forced to walk from the outskirts of town back into Paris. It’s a leisurely walk through the countryside. The weather is pleasant and sunny. Edgar doesn’t pursue the cats, assuming them already dead.

The cats were carted off somehow, and now must return home. Their journey isn’t one of survival, just inconvenience. It’s all the tension of a motorist running out of fuel and walking to the nearest gas station.

The plot is so razor thin, characters and vignettes are introduced that do nothing except pad the runtime. After O'Malley falls in a river, he’s saved by a pair geese. It’s an Avis Ex Machina.

Their contribution to the story fulfilled, the geese do not waddle off. The cats follow them into town. There, we meet the geese’s drunken uncle. The drunken uncle does nothing of significance or importance. He stumbles, confused, dizzy, inebriated in a misguided attempt at humor. It’s funny because he abuses intoxicants. Enjoy, kids!

When Edgar attempts to dispose of the cats, his efforts are interrupted by two hound dogs. These dogs chase his motorcycle, causing Edgar to crash. In order to escape without being mauled, Edgar leaves the sidecar and several personal effects behind. He’s forced to return the next day to retrieve the incriminating evidence.

Why these two dogs are so territorial is inexplicable. They don’t just chase Edgar’s motorcycle, they declare a vendetta against him. They chase him off, they chase him back, they even steal the motorcycle and attempt to run him down. If Edgar wasn’t literally trying to drown kittens, the dogs would easily be the villains of the movie.

The dogs have Georgia accents. There’s no reason why. They live in France, just the same as any other character. Should we assume the dogs immigrated from the American south just to work on a farm in a new country? Were they adopted by French farmers from breeders across the Atlantic?

Simply put, they’re hound dogs. Hound dogs are stereotypically southern. It would be silly to have them speak French. It’s also silly to have two characters with Georgian accents in the French countryside. There were no good solutions here.

There’s also a Chinese cat who supplants his L’s with R’s when he speaks. He has buck teeth and squinty eyes. He carries chopsticks around with him. The Aristocats copied so much from Lady and the Tramp, why wouldn’t it also copy its racist stereotypes?

Madame Bonfamille and Duchess are the only characters in the film to have French accents. The rest of the characters speak with American, British, and Appalachian accents. For a film set in France, an array of English dialects is distracting and confusing.

Maurice Chevalier sings the film’s title song. Disney secured a French icon, but shied away from the French language. French accents were either too distracting or too indecipherable. At the least, the replacement accents should be consistent.

The French setting was entwined with The Aristocats since its Disney’s Wonderful World of Color days. Producer Harry Tytle is credited with setting the film in Paris. The intention was, what 101 Dalmatians did for London, The Aristocats would do for Paris. Yet another idea borrowed from 101 Dalmatians.

While The Aristocats is set in France, there’s nothing specifically French about its setting. Except for the establishing shots, the movie could just as easily be set in Montreal or Stockholm. Most of the movie is set in a faceless countryside or indistinct buildings.

The other puzzling aspect of the setting is when exactly this movie takes place. The movie insists the year is 1910; the vehicles, furniture, clothing, mannerisms, etc support the assertation. But Scat Cat and his crew are cats out of time.

Scat Cat is a jazz musician (voiced by Scatman Crothers, hence the name). Scat Cat and his band are close friends of O'Malley, later becoming friends with Duchess and her kittens. The band play anachronistic, 60s-era swing jazz.

While jazz music did exist in the 1910s, it was closer to its Dixieland and ragtime forbearers. It certainly wasn’t present in France. Jazz didn’t reach French ears until WWI, introduced by American soldiers. All that’s beside the point; Scat Cat and his crew come straight out of the Kennedy era.

Anachronistic music has never been a problem in Disney films, but early 60s music in a 70s movie set in the 1910s is a disastrous choice. 70s music would be acceptable. 1910s music would be acceptable. Even 40s music, splitting the difference, would be an acceptable choice.

Music can’t be used in a movie just because somebody on staff likes the song. It needs to fit the film, of course, but it also needs to be either modern and contemporary, or a nostalgic throwback. It’s the exact reason the Sherman Brothers shirked from using a rock and roll song in The Jungle Book.

60s jazz is dated, irrelevant, and distracting. It doesn’t belong in the movie. It doesn’t fit the setting. It’s not old enough to be classic, and not new enough to be relevant. It makes Disney seem like their finger is off the pulse. But there were big jazzy numbers in The Jungle Book, and The Jungle Book was a success. So The Aristocats also got a big jazzy number, even if it makes zero sense.

The Aristocats is a mess from the bottom up. The paper thin plot is a discarded treatise no one else wanted to make. It’s puffed up with unnecessary scenes and characters that contribute nothing. What little is offered is blatantly recycled from other Disney pictures. The animation is among the worst ever proffered from Disney Animation Studios. The characters are bland and undefined, the setting is underutilized, and the ending is so conveniently contrived, you can tell precisely when the screenwriters threw their hands up in frustration.

It may be unfair to place the failure of The Aristocats on Disney Studios alone. The 1970s was a dark age for animation in general. The decline of the studio system in the 1960s had a ripple effect into the animation industry. Theatrical shorts from MGM, Warner Bros, Universal, Paramount, and Disney themselves ceased in the mid-60s. Animation was becoming outdated and irrelevant.

The end of the era would be tragic, but animation wasn’t a dead medium. Ironically, the rise of Saturday morning cartoons on television meant animation had a larger audience than ever. But without studio financing and prestige, cartoons were churned out cheaper, quicker, and with smaller returns. There was a market demand without standards or incentive. It was a no-win situation.

Still suffering from Walt’s death years ago, Disney Animation Studios was under financial strains and a creative dry spell. Disney animation was coasting on nostalgia, constantly in danger of being shut down. The board of directors only needed one excuse.

The filmmakers cut every corner and made every concession. In doing so, The Aristocats came in underbudget, and turned a profit. In financial terms, the movie was a success. And while the film has its share of fans and defenders, from a cinematic standpoint, in every other sense, it is a disaster. Disney Studios proved cats don’t always land on their feet.

Fantasia Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs Cinderella Alice in Wonderland Sleeping Beauty Pinocchio The Jungle Book The Sword in the Stone Bambi 101 Dalmatians The Three Caballeros Lady and the Tramp Peter Pan Dumbo Melody Time Saludos Amigos The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad The Aristocats Fun and Fancy Free Make Mine Music

[bellatrixobsessed1]

The Dragon Egg (Part 2)

Part 2 for @secrettunnelatla

“No, this isn’t good enough!” Azula grits her teeth. It is decent work--as far as sound goes--but it isn’t battle of the bands worthy. Not even close. If they wanted to make it to Audio of Agni their concept would have to be much stronger, much less generic than a silly gimmick. “What kind of lyrics are these? Who came up with this concept?”

Chan, Zirin, and Ruon all point at one another before ultimately jabbing their fingers at Zirin who points to Azula herself.

Azula pinches the bridge of her nose. “Necrophilia, Zirin? That’s what you came up with?”

“You said that you wanted ‘attention grabbing’.” Zirin shrugs.

Azula rubs her hands over her face. “Our talents need to be attention grabbing.” Hers certainly are and she needs lyrics and a concept that will do them good service. “We need something that will highlight and showcase what we can do.” An absurd gimmick will only draw attention away from the aspects that matter the most.

“You got any better ideas?” Zirin grumbles.

Ruon quirks a brow and smirks, “we can try…”

“Don’t say it.” Azula frowns.

“Surf rock.” Chan finishes for him.

“We need something bigger.” Azula declares. “Something that hasn’t been done before.” She wishes that she would have saved their dragon metal concept for a later date. Then again, dragon metal is what had given them the propulsion they needed to break out from under her father’s shadow. The propulsion they needed to get their start.

But now she is at a loss for how to top that. She can’t imagine that there are many things that can top emerging on stage with a full suit of glimmering metal scales and glowing talons. She isn’t sure what can draw attention better than staring down an audience with reptilian contact lenses.

“I heard that steampunk is in.” Chan shrugs.

“Steampunk is overdone.”

“Zombies?” Zirin suggests.

Azula shakes her head. “The Blind Bandits already did that.”

“We can hold a seance on stage.” She tries again.

“Why are you so keen on utilizing dead things?” Azula pinches the bridge of her nose. Though a seance isn’t a particularly terrible idea if, perhaps, they incorporated other elements, such as handing out tickets in the form of tarot cards. “I suppose we might be able to work with that.”

But an evening of phantoms and psychic energy is a rather far leap from dragon metal and she isn’t sure that their style of music would line up neatly with the aesthetics of a supernatural night…

She spares a glance to the clock. “Keep coming up with ideas, we need to practice.”

“We’ve played these songs hundreds of times, shouldn’t we be coming up with some new songs?” Chan asks. “From Ashes To Phoenix, just announced their second new single.”

Azula’s face reddens if only slightly. “Zuzu can release as many new singles as he wants, that won’t make them sound any better than someone chewing on a microphone with feedback for three minutes.”

Chan stifles a laugh.

She should have known then that the rest of practice was going to be a waste. She has known Chan since they were children and she knows how he can be. She isn’t particularly surprised when he makes practice hell, purposely floundering his way through certain guitar riffs and singing off key when he saw most optimal. His screw ups always through Ruon off and eventually Zirin would practically flop over her drum kit with laughter.

As per usual, Azula is the only one not laughing.

As per usual, Azula is the only one with anything real at stake.

She is reminded quite potently of it when her father calls. Chan has thrown Ruon off for the sixth time that night, they already have to take it from the top so Azula steps out into the hallway and swipes to answer.

He starts in on her before she can even put the phone to her ear. “How is it that your brother has already put out two new singles and you haven’t even come up with one?”

“Because I’m trying to come up with something that has some quality.” She has chosen her words carefully but neglected to watch her tone.

She thinks that it would be more befitting of him to simply yell violently at her. But his voice is so slick and smooth that she can’t even hide behind incoherence. “I’m not funding your band for you to disgrace the legacy. I handed you a blazing torch and you are letting the fire die.”

“I’m trying to…” she pauses. “Pick out the best kindling. Something that will burn for a long time. Zuko is just tossing random sticks into the pit and hoping something will catch.”

This seems to satisfy him, though it doesn’t keep him from ending the call with a curt, “there’s a fine line between perfecting a song and stalling.” He doesn’t even know that she hasn’t started working on a song yet.

He doesn’t need to know.

She rubs her hands over her face. The man was pissed when Zuko’s first album flopped and he’d had low expectations to begin with. She vividly recalls childhood music lessons; they’d come so naturally to her. She could pick up a violin or stroke the keys of a piano and it would come out just right after the first few tries.

Her voice, they said, was golden. A gift. A marvel. She had impressive range. She has impressive range.

And Zuko, even with extra lessons and several teachers struggled to make use of even a recorder. His vocals were ‘generic’, ‘nothing special’  and sometimes he would sing off tune. Ozai wasn’t fond of his improv either when lyrics slipped his mind.

He still forgets lyrics.

His own lyrics.

Azula isn’t sure how he hasn’t yet been booed off of a stage. She supposes there are perks in having magazine writers fawning over abs and ‘chiseled faces’.

But she wants more than that. She wants real talent. She wants a voice so sublime and lyrics so powerful that they draw focus away from any other aspect of her. She loathes and dreads the day when they push out cover that fancies her physique over her genius.

She won’t rely on that.

Unlike Zuko, she doesn’t need to.

She has a voice and she can do things with it that so many others can’t. She glares at Chan and Ruon as they cackle to themselves. She joins them once more, whatever aura she emits, their laughter cuts off. “Are you finished?”

They nod and Zirin nods.

“Good.” She says in a low hiss. “Start over. This time lets focus. We’re going to have a new song by the end of the night.”

It will be a lackluster song, but it will pacify her father, at least until she can come up with something better.

By the end of the session the only thing that she has acquired for her troubles is a headache and a sudden resentment of Zirin. Chan at least knows when to bring a terrible and tired joke to an end. Zirin is a collection of relentless crass comments.

Even if she doesn’t mean any harm by them, she doesn’t know when to shut the fuck up. Sometimes Azula thinks that Zirin is holding the rest of them back. Sometimes she regrets seeing the potential in her. Sometimes she regrets having vouched for her during music lessons until the teachers saw the same thing that she did.

Sometimes she thinks that she only lets Zirin stay because she is Chan’s girlfriend.

Sometimes she lets it go and carries on with practice as though the comments are only mild annoyances. And most of the time they are.

Tonight she has had her fill of aggravation.

Tonight she has had her fill of letting the woman pound on the drums every time she attempted to speak. She locks her microphone in its stand and without another word or a glance back, she leaves the recording studio.

As the door slams she could hear Zirin remark, “daddy’s little diva.”

She doesn’t know how long they wait for her to come back. But she doesn’t. Not that night. Were it not for her father’s expectations she would be well on her way to finding new bandmates. She can’t afford that yet; she is too pressed for time.

Too awkward and isolated to find anyone else anyhow.

She uses her walk home to come up with excuses as to why practice has been cut so short.

.oOo.

Seicho doesn’t expect a call so soon. Spirits, it would be embarrassing if her work had given Azula an allergic reaction. With the woman’s number flashing across her cellphone screen, she pictures rock ‘n roll legend, Fire Lord Ozai showing up at the shop all muscle and fury to tell her off for ruining his daughter’s flawless skin.

Seicho shudders and grins all at once. She isn’t sure if she would particularly mind getting yelled at by her idol, it would be like one of his concerts, but without the music. She picks up the call before it can go to voicemail.

“If it’s a rash, you should probably call the doctor! I’m sorry for…”

“What are you talking about?” She can see Azula’s half-frown through the phone.

Seicho clears her throat. “Nevermind, I thought that you were someone else.” She lies. “Is everything going okay with your tattoo?”

“So far, yes.”

“Are you cleaning it at least twice daily.”

“I clean it once in the morning, once at noon, and once at night. I’m not calling to talk about my tattoo.”

“What are you calling for then?”

Azula is silent for quite a while.

“I suppose I just want someone to talk to.”

Seicho very nearly asks her why she doesn’t just phone a friend, why she has decided to talk to her of all people. Instead she inquires, “what do you want to talk about?”

“I don’t know.” There is a long pause. “Nevermind.” The phone clicks.

.oOo.

She feels foolish hanging up just to call again. But her father is still up and about, she sees his silhouette behind the curtain and she hasn’t come up with an excuse that he’d accept. She could tell him that Chan had to leave early but then he’d ask why she hadn’t continued without him. She could say that the other two refused but then he’d question her lack of control and ask why she didn’t practice alone.

She should just enter and get it over with, it is better if she does. It is the difference between a scolding and a slap.

But today she can’t take any more berating. She hits redial and holds the phone up to her ear.

“Hello?”

“Can we meet somewhere?” She doesn’t bother backtracking to return the greeting.

Seicho draws out her pause for so long that Azula nearly hangs up a second time. “Does the skate park sound good? I’m already there.”

It isn’t her scene. “I’ll be there.” She hangs up before the girl can change her mind.

[howaminotinthestrokesyet]

Behind The Album: In Utero

The third and final studio album from Nirvana was released in September 1993 via DGC records. The band wanted to make a clear departure from how their second album sounded. They felt that their huge hit album, Nevermind, was too polished as a record. The producer of that second LP, Butch Vig, would later note that Kurt Cobain needed to “reclaim his punk ethics or cred.” For his part Cobain would tell Rolling Stone in early 1992 that the record would have elements to it much more raw then found on the second album. However, he did emphasize the fact that the pop sound would not disappear entirely. He had hoped to start working on it l in the middle of 1992, but distance between band members getting together was an issue as they all lived in different cities. Another issue came in the fact that Courtney Love was expecting their first child. DGC was hoping to release a new record by Christmas of the year, but instead they were forced to go with the compilation album of all the early material from Sub Pop, Incesticide. For In Utero, Cobain showed interest in working with former producer of Bleach, Jack Endino and Steve Albini. They brought in Endino to work on a few instrumentals for the record that were eventually re-recorded, and he was never asked to produce in any capacity. The group went back and forth debating whether to hire Albini or not. In January 1993, the group recorded another set of demos while on tour in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. This would later become the track, “Gallons of Rubbing Alcohol Flow Through the Strip,” which originally had the working title of I’ll Take You Down to the Pavement. The latter represented a direct reference to an argument between Cobain and Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl Rose at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards. The band finally decided to go with Albini as a producer despite his reputation of strict discipline within the studio and remaining one of the most opinionated producers out there. He was said to have referred to Nirvana as “REM with a fuzz box, unremarkable Seattle sound.” He would later say that his decision to work with the band came out of sympathy, feeling smaller groups like Nirvana were at the mercy of the record label. This particular statement should be taken with a grain of salt as Nirvana had just released the biggest record since Appetite for Destruction. Cobain had been a fan of the producer based on his work with the Pixies and the Breeders.

Producer Albini wanted to complete recording within a strict two week timeframe. Nirvana paid for the recording sessions themselves on Albini’s suggestion to avoid interference from the record label. The band paid him $24,000 for his services, while he refused any royalties whatsoever, which would have amounted to $500,000. He would continually say that royalties were immoral and a complete insult to the artist. They recorded at Pachyderm Studios in Cannon Falls, Minnesota in February 1993. Krist Novoselic would compare the environment to a gulag. “There was snow outside, we couldn't go anywhere. We just worked." Nirvana during this time emphasized to the record company that they wanted absolutely no interference from them, which meant they did not share anything from these sessions with their A & R representative. For his part, Steve Albini followed suit by only speaking with members of the band. He characterized anyone associated with the group as “pieces of shit.” After a short delay, the band's equipment finally arrived, so the actual recording of the album went very quickly. Each track began with the group playing together as one doing the instrumental aspect of it. For some tracks, Dave Grohl did the drums in the kitchen due to the natural acoustics sounding better. Albini had also surrounded his drums with 30 microphones for each track. They did not remove any take from the album, but instead kept them all. Cobain even added more guitar parts at the end of each day before doing the vocals. Although Albini had a reputation for being opinionated, he let Nirvana decide what to keep. “Generally speaking, [Cobain] knows what he thinks is acceptable and what isn't acceptable [...] He can make concrete steps to improve things that he doesn't think are acceptable." They did all of their musical work in six days, while Cobain said that it was the easiest recording he had ever done. Albini proceeded to mix the album in five days, which actually was slow by his standards because he usually only spent 1 to 2 days on it.

After completion, the band began to send the unmastered tapes to various people including the president of the DGC records. They absolutely hated it saying the songwriting was mediocre, the entire album was unlistenable, and radio would never except Albini’s production. Cobain took the comments personally to mean that the label wanted him to start from scratch and record again with a new producer. He would say, “I should just re-record this record and do the same thing we did last year because we sold out last year—there's no reason to try and redeem ourselves as artists at this point. I can't help myself—I'm just putting out a record I would like to listen to at home." Yet, the group remained dead set on releasing this version of the record as late as April 1993. They had played it for a number of their friends, who had liked it. The singer said, “Of course, they want another Nevermind, but I'd rather die than do that. This is exactly the kind of record I would buy as a fan, that I would enjoy owning." Around this time, some doubts crept up with all members of Nirvana because the mix of In Utero did not sound right. They asked Albini to possibly remix the record, and he flat out refused. “[Cobain] wanted to make a record that he could slam down on the table and say, 'Listen, I know this is good, and I know your concerns about it are meaningless, so go with it.' And I don't think he felt he had that yet ... My problem was that I feared a slippery slope." They took the record to Bob Ludwig for mastering, while at the same time mentioned their issues with the mix to him. Upon completion, Krist Novoselic said he was happy with the result, but Cobain still felt it was not perfect. At this time, Steve Albini gave an interview with the Chicago Tribune, where he doubted whether the record would ever be released. Newsweek would run another article that echoed the comments made by Albini. This caused Nirvana to write a full page letter to the magazine denying the label was putting any undue pressure on them. The same letter would be reproduced as a full page ad in Billboard not long after. The head of Geffen Records, who owned DGC made the unprecedented move of actually calling Newsweek to complain. The band thought about having Andy Wallace remix the release, but once again Albini refused saying they had only agreed to work with him. At the time, the producer also would release any of the tapes that were now in his possession. He only did so after a phone call from Krist Novoselic. The entire album for the most part was not changed at all, except for a remastering. Yet, the producer continually made comments that it was nowhere near the album he recorded in Minnesota. “The record in the stores doesn't sound all that much like the record that was made, though it's still them singing and playing their songs, and the musical quality of it still comes across." He would go on to say that major labels refused to work with him for the next year or so because of In Utero.

As for the music, the producer wanted to go as far away as possible from Nevermind with this record. He felt that the second album made the group look incredibly bad because it had been overproduced at such a level to make it extremely radio friendly. He wanted to create a much more natural sound for the group. The 1993 Nirvana biography, Come As You Are, noted the vision for the band on this record. “The Beatlesque 'Dumb' happily coexists beside the all-out frenzied punk graffiti of 'Milk It,' while 'All Apologies' is worlds away from the apoplectic 'Scentless Apprentice.' It's as if [Cobain] has given up trying to meld his punk and pop instincts into one harmonious whole. Forget it. This is war." If one goes through the track listing, you can count which tracks are over the top punk, and which tracks are more radio friendly pop. The interesting thing is that they correspond equally, 6 to 6. Fans and critics alike would talk about how abrasive In Utero turned out to be, but Cobain and Novoselic really did not see it that way. The bass player had said the band had always had songs as they are found on In Utero. Yet, the group did consciously try to bring fans into the more punk sounding songs by releasing the first two singles that could have realistically been included on Nevermind. Some of the songs found on the record had been written years prior as early as 1990. Cobain used various points of inspiration for the lyrics. The track “Frances Farmer” came from a 1978 biography of the Seattle figure called Shadowland. “Scentless Apprentice” originated from a horror novel that the singer had read by Patrick Suskind. One of the central themes found on the album noted in that same Nirvana biography from 1993 was the fact that every song talked about sickness or disease in some manner. Although Cobain said the lyrics were very impersonal to him, many disagreed with this assessment. Dave Grohl would say this in an interview. “A lot of what he has to say is related to a lot of the shit he's gone through. And it's not so much teen angst anymore. It's a whole different ball game: rock star angst." The singer continued to argue that much of the album had been written years prior to any issues he was going through at the time. For example, “Rape Me” quite possibly could be talking about his frustration with the media in how he has been portrayed over the past couple of years. The track “Serve the Servants” seemed to specifically talk about Cobain’s father and how divorce affected him from a very early age. The Nirvana frontman wanted his father to know that he did not despise him, but he also had no desire to be around him whatsoever. One track, “Gallons of Alcohol Flow Through the Strip,” was actually one of the only improvisational tracks they ever recorded. The song represented a jam session that the group would frequently participate in in during down times at the studio. They had done this quite often, but this would be the first time that it was ever recorded in some form.

Upon its release, the record label took a very low key approach to promoting the album. None of the singles would come out commercially in the United States, as they concentrated all of their press releases at media specializing in alternative music. The band remained convinced that there was absolutely no way that In Utero would sell even a quarter of what Nevermind sold. The record would debut at number one on the charts selling 180,000 copies in its first week. They sold this many copies without big retail chains like Kmart and Walmart selling it because officially the demand was not there. The truth was actually these chains feared backlash due to the graphic nature of the artwork accompanying the album. In March 1994, an edited version of the album would be released with new artwork and alternative song titles. The band made this concession saying they wanted fans who could not go to a traditional record store to be able to purchase the LP. Following the death of Cobain. the third single “Pennyroyal Tea” was canceled, as well as any tour plans. Immediately following his death, the popularity of In Utero on the charts increased by 122% from 72 to 27. The album would eventually be certified five times platinum.

Critics were not unanimous in the praise of In Utero. For the most part, rock writers really liked the new sound from Nirvana. Time’s Christopher John Farley noted that once again perhaps the mainstream may need to go to Nirvana, rather than the other way around. David Browne of Entertainment Weekly emphasized the absolute contrasts on the release. “The music is often mesmerizing, cathartic rock & roll, but it is rock & roll without release, because the band is suspicious of the old-school rock clichés such a release would evoke." David Fricke of Rolling Stone would say that the record was both “brilliant and corrosive,” but undoubtedly a “triumph of the will” for Kurt Cobain. NME’s John Mulvey did not share the same sentiment as he observed the album really was not up to par with previous Nirvana standards. The review from Plugged In did not mince words saying it had absolutely no redeeming value whatsoever. Some reviews became quite bittersweet as you are reminded of Cobain’s suicide. Q said this about the record. "If this is how Cobain is going to develop, the future is lighthouse-bright." Ben Thompson of the Independent merely seemed happy that the record did not represent the punk rock nightmare the group had continually threatened to release. In Utero would go on to top several end of the year lists as one of the best albums including Rolling Stone, Village Voice, and the New York Times. The band would even receive a Grammy nomination in 1994 for Best Alternative Album. As time has passed, critics have lavished even more phrase on it seeing their work with Albini as far superior to Nevermind. Charles R. Cross would write in his Cobain biography, “If it is possible for an album that sold four million copies to be overlooked, or underappreciated, then In Utero is that lost pearl." Pitchfork named it the 13th best album of the 1990s, while it even made Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. NME named it number 35 on its greatest albums of all time list creating quite a sense of irony since the periodical did not think too much of the album at the time of its release.

[zephyrthejester]

Three Years Blog Anniversary!

Well, would you look at that. In the blink of an eye, an entire year has gone by! It has now been a grand total of three years since I started up this liveblog, and ever since, it's been a whirlwind of an adventure that has introduced me to amazing shows, amazing games, and above all, amazing people! As has become tradition, it's time for us to gather 'round by the fire, bundle up in blankets, sip some hot cocoa, and reminisce about the shenanigans we got up to in the year 2019.

You know the drill! Click "Keep Reading" to see the rest! Let's go!

January kicked off with the closing episodes to Steven Universe's fifth season, and what a finale it was! In true SU nature, it managed to be wholesome, funny, terrifying, and sad all at once! Not to mention the finale episode specifically, which was rife with both fan service and a breath-taking final confrontation. It even prompted me to type up three whole Addendum posts just so I could get all my thoughts out there. Intermingling with these episodes were some rather poignant and touching episodes of RWBY's 6th Volume, which saw some great plot advancements for some of my favorite characters. And of course, there was one liveblog session early on dedicated to Fate/Stay Night, a series I began back in 2018. And that would end up being the last I'd liveblog about it. Following the technical difficulties of the Visual Novel crashing at an important moment, I lost much of my motivation to keep going at it, putting Fate/Stay Night on the bench... For now. But more on Fate/Stay Night later.

Then came February! Where I proceeded to do absolutely nothing at all. For 42 days, I fell into a pretty bad funk that I called depression, at the time. Well! I must be in a better mental space right now, because until it came time to make this post, I forgot all about it! Moving past the shame I felt for wordlessly abandoning my blog and discord community for over a month, come March I pressed right into a brand new liveblog: Kill la Kill! A frenetic, frantic, freaky series that serves as the spiritual sequel to what was, once upon a time, my favorite anime ever: Gurren Lagann. I was immediately charmed by it's absurdist humor and over-the-top everything. However, it wasn't long before I succumbed to my greatest flaw. I'm exceptionally picky about what I liveblog, and sadly, Kill la Kill didn't tick the boxes that needed to be ticked for me to stick with it. I eventually dropped the series after only three episodes.

Needless to say, I was getting desperate to reinvigorate my lost momentum. It was then and there, at the tail end of March, that I introduced the most significant change to my brand ever: Liveblogging itself was being benched in favor of a fanciful second attempt at running my video game focused Youtube Channel! While I would certainly continue to liveblog new episodes of shows I had previously caught up with, my efforts would be redoubled and focused upon something I hoped would shake things up for me. I put in the effort of buying a new, fancy, high-tech microphone, and set about to new projects!

First up was a tense and troublesome self-imposed-challenge: A playthrough of Resident Evil 2 Remake on its hardest difficulty, with the added stipulation that I can never access the item storage box! My knowledge and skills of that game were put to the test as I skirted by the dangerous zombies and mutants while carrying only the bare essentials on my person. That series lasted 7 videos, plus a Highlight Reel, over about a week. My new microphone really brought out my screams of terror. Yes.

Immediately following the conclusion of the REmake 2 challenge run in early April, a new series debuted: A blind let's play of Subnautica! A simply incredible sci-fi survival game set on a planet that's nearly entirely an ocean... But much to my surprise, it was secretly a horror game all along. Spanning 18 episodes + a highlight reel between April 5th and May 23rd, we descended ever deeper into the abyss, deciphered alien riddles, fled from toothy leviathan-class predators, established a lovely home base, and had a great ol' time overall. A truly remarkable game with a surprisingly good story, for its genre, and it left me eagerly looking forward to making a Let's Play of its sequel: Below Zero.

Simultaneously, beginning on April 10th, I embarked upon yet another adventure that was of such a large scope, I made my channel's primary time slot dedicated to it. The Phoenix Wright Trilogy! A collection of the first three Visual Novels in a wonderful, wonderful series about the titular attorney at law. It wasn't long before I fell in love with this series, big time. It had everything! Immensely satisfying mysteries for me to solve, memorable and lovable characters, great pacing, and it knew how to keep things fresh and interesting. Although I started out the Let's Play by saying I wouldn't read everything aloud, that proved to be a lie. As of now, the series is a whopping 78 videos long (I do expect it to reach 100 before all is said and done), and I have given voice to roughly 50 unique characters so far. The series really helped awaken my Let's Play chops by improving my speech, vocal clarity, and focus. Swapping between my first video ever (for Legend of Grimrock II) and the most recent Phoenix Wright video is a real night-and-day difference! Overall, it's very safe to say that the series has stolen my heart. Unmatched hype, dizzying plot twists, and delightful shenanigans burst from the seams, truly. The Let's Play is currently ongoing, though the end is within sight...

As the Let's Plays of Subnautica and Phoenix Wright Trilogy progressed, so too did the production quality of my videos. I got a better grip on editing, improving the design of my video thumbnails and taking more care to edit out needless and dull moments of gameplay. I even introduced a brief and stylish video intro, which was my avatar appearing over a dark background before it faded off into gameplay. That would be the image up above! However, as we move into 2020, I’ve begun to feel that it could do with a slight improvement... Wink wink!

Following the end of Subnautica came a new Let's Play involving yet another sci-fi horror game: Prey! Spanning 25 videos + a highlight reel between June 3rd and November 19th, it immediately gripped me with its stunning attention to detail, marvelously crafted environments, and boundlessly creative gameplay. It was a pleasure to explore the varied regions of the Talos One space station, blasting aliens, uncovering secrets, untangling the connections between the employees there, and making some seriously difficult moral choices. A truly impressive video game that's just begging for a second playthrough on my own time at some point.

July 20th saw the beginning of new activity on my blog. In a spur-of-the-moment decision that I didn't think out too well, I brazenly announced out of nowhere that I would be doing a re-watch of Steven Universe! I proceeded to liveblog the first 11 episodes of Steven Universe over a week, lovingly looking back at the series' origins, calling out moments of foreshadowing, and analyzing everything with the lens of all my knowledge about the show. And then... Nothing! Just as soon as it began, the project was dropped. I had hoped it would rekindle my interest in Liveblogging (outside of new episodes of SU and RWBY), but I had no such luck. You know I'm burnt out when even Steven Universe, my favorite thing ever, can't help...

By September 3rd, the Steven Universe Movie had finally released! Over a hype-as-hell two days, I liveblogged the entire film. It truly was Steven Universe at its absolute best! Touching, sincere, unexpected, and rife with some stellar songs that are STILL stuck in my head. It proved that the Crewniverse hadn't lost its spark since the conclusion of the original series.

November 5th was my 25th birthday! My family celebrated by all going out for an amazing sushi dinner. Good times! Sometimes, it's really hard for me to grasp that I'm actually 25... I'm a kid at heart, really! Or maybe it's that I'm a social recluse who enjoys watching anime a little too much. Regardless, I feel no shame!

November 10th saw the debut of RWBY Volume 7, and so far it has been an exceptionally strong season. I've long maintained the opinion that the show gets better and better every season, and Volume 7 has given me no reason to doubt that. One episode in particular became my second favorite in the series, right behind a certain one from Volume 6! I'm really enjoying how the characters, new and old, are playing off each other this go around, and the fights and art direction have been no slouch either. This season's a looker! I'm really looking forward to seeing how it ends.

Hot on the heels of the ending Let's Play of Prey, I immediately started up a new series on November 20th... Chrono Trigger! A legendary and widely loved JRPG from the SNES era of gaming that I had somehow gone all my life without playing. Better late than never to fix a mistake like that! I eagerly dived in and nearly immediately understood why it's heralded as an all-time great. The series is currently 13 episodes long, and each one is an endless stream of me being hyped and giddy. I’m already excited to record more!

December 8th saw the debut of Steven Universe Future, a very special epilogue series that's sure to tie a nice bow on the franchise as a whole. As of this post, I have liveblogged the first 8 episodes, and it's fair to say that while it's not holding back in giving the audience exactly what it wants, it's also doing something very unexpected and very, very interesting with Steven himself. Only time will tell how it all ends and whether every remaining mystery will be answered, but so far I have been more than satisfied with it.

And that brings us to the present! Wow, it felt like a lot less happened this year than you would think, huh? No, it's been jam packed with new adventures! I think I am very content with how the year has gone, and I hope you are as well. We'll be striding into the year 2020 with more Steven Universe, more RWBY, more Phoenix Wright, and more Chrono Trigger! Plus, it may very well be that we'll see the return of Made in Abyss and Madoka Magica, both of which (I believe) are getting continuation movies in 2020. I may or may not be entirely wrong about this. Forgive me if I am...

In the near future, the Phoenix Wright Trilogy will be followed up by a Let's Play of Fate/Stay Night! Indeed, the canceled Liveblog will be reborn in youtube video form! And following Chrono Trigger, well... It's mostly up in the air, though I do have a few good ideas. In particular, I recently got a Virtual Reality system set up... Wink wink!

So that's really all there is to it! Cheers, lads! Cheers to a good year, and cheers to the next year being even better! To our good health, our unbreakable friendships, and all the stupid bullshit we’ll get into together! 2020 has arrived!

[stone-man-warrior]

March 11, 2020: 4:24 pm:

I just returned from running an errand in Dystopia, Grants Pass Oregon.

I went to:

Walgreen’s

As I left my home, the pressure from the local terror cells was in place, and running a “Save The Princess” terror play, but it was somewhat a reversed version of that standardized murder play, it did not work, however.

The grey Toyota Camry from the Myers terror family cell roled down the road as I was at my gate. It’s typical that the terrorists have to drive a car past my front driveway at the time that I leave my home, and 90% of the time that I do take my car somewhere, there will be one of the terror neighbors driving by while I am at my gate. They use the listening devices they placed around my home to know when I have opened my front door, and can hear where I am with other listening devices, and also they have a variety of cameras pointed at my driveway from the Former Monroe terror cell.

So that grey Camry appears to have dropped off Lorena Chapman in front of teh Clyde Baum terror cell, at 333, where there are more cameras positioned on the roadway, disguised as a driveway night-light.

The idea was to use Lorena Chapman, or someone who looks just like her, to do some kind of “Save the Princess“ after I started to go down the road on my way to the Walgreen’s.

The “Good Samaritan” who was also set into motion as part of the attack plan, was someone driving the Rick Manning Red Honda Station Wagon. Who came down the road in the opposite direction just after I passed the Chapman look-a-like that was on foot in front of the Baum terror cell.

Other items associated with the attack plan included that a door was left open in three places along the route to the Freeway. One at Chartrand 376 was the back door to the shell of one of his pick-up trucks. Another was the door of a passing school bus, the driver of the bus was driving with the school bus doors open. And another open door was at the I-5 Freeway exit 66 in the empty lot there where the terror watchdogs sit in their cars while doing surveillance of the people who drive into, or out of, the Hugo Oregon area. That person there was playing the role of the “sleepy, road weary driver who pulled over to take a nap in the backseat with the door open”.

The idea was that they terror bastards needed to get a recording of my voice saying “the door is open” or some other mention of a door. “The Door Is a Jar”, #SAGClubMed terror play, specific for those victims who are on the way to a pharmacy. “The Door is a Jar” comm items, and communication, is all done in such a way that any and all passing terror soldiers in the area, will see the visual clues, read the comm the items are put there for, and in that way, are able to step-in, to provide support services for the attacking terror cell. No words are spoken about the attack, the visual items and other activity is enough, that all of the terror cells already know how to behave, and how to assist with the murder.

The implant in my jaw broadcasts everything that I say, all of the time, and has done so since 2011. The implant is a microphone inside of my jaw. I cannot turn it off, or remove it, it broadcasts all of the time, and the recordings that are created in that trailer at the Former Monroe terror cell are edited, word by word, and fed to public safety people who are killed also, by the terror cells, as a result of their own foolishness.

So, that attempt failed. The words I used were: “Looks like Chartrand has his foot in the door” as a I passed by, and saw the truck with shell door open. I encountered two more attempts to get me to say “the door is open” just in passing, and while not speaking to anyone.

They may have been trying to use such a statement live, to fool someone that I am giving permission to enter my home, or car, as I passed by the walking Chapman look-a-like on the roadway when I was leaving.

The typical debit card malfunction occurred at the Walgreen’s. The debit card readers at ALL of the places I make purchases, always, 99% of the time, malfunction in some way while I am using the debit machine. The “Malfunctioning debit card reader, is part of the murder scenario at the point of purchase at ALL of the places that items are sold, everywhere. That malfunction makes certain that the intended victim is per-occupied with the distraction that is provided by the malfunctioning debit card reader. The Marked Victim focuses all of their attention onto that small, digital, card reader at that time, and that is a good time for the terror assassins to make the hit on the Victim, while the Victim has the debit card in their hand.

There is some kind of a billing terror play happening with the items I purchased at the Walgreen’s. The price of the items I purchase is almost never the same as it was the previous time I purchased the same exact items. The price should be consistent, but is not. One of the items I purchased today had a price of $0.00. No charge. It was that way the last visit last month also.

What is going on, is there is a duplicate person in the Screen Actor Guild, who si receiving what is known as “MAX” prescription medicine. That person fills a whole bunch of meds, and those are the meds I used to get, before the terror took over. Someone is receiving the medicine that I could benefit from, and I am only receiving sort of a “Token” of what I should be getting at a pharmacy. What’s more, is the persons receiving my prescriptions are also getting more than my history, and beneficial requirements warrant. The terrorist doctor gave those people the “MAX” allotment of meds. All of that happens, I get blamed, and the public safety people who come to investigate, are killed by the people who are perpetuating the “MAX” allotment. As a result, I get far less of the medicine that would benefit me, and has benefited me in the past for many years, and the meds improved my quality of life. Now, all I get is the “token” appeasement meds, some Rock Star gets my medicine.

On the way home, I observed three Impostor Police cars. Two near the Southbound I-5 had pulled someone over, and another Imposter State Police was at the exit 66 that I need to use, with lights flashing. They are trying to make me “Run” out of “fear” because I had to kill Jay Inslee yesterday in defense while at the terror controlled doctor office.

Jay inslee had a kidnapped child with him at the terror doctor, and the people there shot me with a small caliber gun in the waiting area. I returned the favor by turning the shooters gun around, in the lobby, and shooting the shooter with his own gun as he was holding it. I never had to take the gun from the shooter that shot me there.

StoneMan unscathed.

That shooter was there for Jay Inslee, who had the kidnapped child, and they had planned on blaming the kidnapping on me, after they killed me.

A lot happened at the terror doctor yesterday. I already reported hwat was important. Jay Inslee is a piece of shit, and he received exactly what he bargained for, is presumed dead due to severe Corona Virus Bleeding from the head.

Also, I had to defend against a 450 lb nurse at the terror doctor yesterday. That nurse is presumed to be permanently paralyzed  at the arms and shoulders, having suffered a spinal cord injury during the fighting in the back office at the terrorist #SAGClubMed Doctors Office.

That is all of the terror reporting that I want to write about  today. I want to say that I am doing whatever helpful things that I can do, to help the people that are held captive at Boeing Seattle. Whenever opportunity presents itself, I take the chance of retaliation from the people who hijacked Boeing, and I try to get helpful people to go there. and set the engineers  and others free from their captivity at Boeing Seattle.

Yesterday. opportunity to kill Jay Inslee presented itself in the form of a kidnapped child that Inslee had with him. I was able to free the child, as O have done at other times at the terrorists #SAGClubMed doctor that I have been going to fir about five years. I don’t know if teh child was able to leave the building safely, he was about eight years old, I killed Jay Inslee, and escorted him to an exam room there before he actually died. While doing that, the child said: “That man is not my dad. He is NOT my dad”, so, I looked at the boy and said:

“I believe you, run away, go on... go, runaway now, all of the adults around here are terrorists, so, stay away from the adults, don’t let them catch you. Go. Run away now”

The boy ran out from the back office area at the terror doctor. I presume the terror bastards caught him again by now though.

Please send help to Oregon.

End terror reporting: 5:34 pm.

[redowlkitchen]

Dulcimer Update (Year in Review and Beyond edition)

2019 was a relatively successful dulcimer year for me! Here’s a list of some highlights!

After a long search, I found a local dulcimer teacher!

This teacher introduced me to a professional dulcimer player who gave me a lesson as well.

Leather covered hammers are a game changer.

I made nineteen new videos, the most recordings I’ve ever created in a year! Most of them were even new songs. (Wow!)

I recorded a new Ghibli song (Always With Me).

I managed to whip out three new Christmas songs this month and a new recording of Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.

The new recordings I made of previously recorded songs showed some significant increases in skill!

Unfortunately, while I started the year off strong, I took a huge break from dulcimer in the middle of the year and didn’t pick the instrument back up again until November. Life happened. School vacations throw off my schedule, etc. What I can say is that I wish I hadn’t taken such a long break. I saw improvement in my skills this year, but imagine if I had stayed serious about practicing all year! I could have done so much more!

Have I learned my lesson? We’ll see in 2020.

Speaking of 2020…

You’d think I would have learned my lesson by now, but no. One of my New Years resolutions is to stay on a regular practice schedule... again. I need to practice!

I’ve ordered myself new dulcimer lesson books! They’ll be here in a week, and I can’t wait to use them! I think they’re really going to help me improve my skills. Apologies to my neighbors in advance because one of those books is a Christmas book and I have every intention playing around with it for at least January regardless of the holidays being over.

Last year, my original plan was to post a monthly video. In reality though, I was really pushing myself to record a video once a week whenever I could and I think that was a little too much for me. This year, I’d like to stick to one video a month for real. Or, at the very most, one every other week. I want to be able to focus on the music, not making videos.

But with that said, I did buy some new equipment for recording. Up until now, my recording set up has been my phone propped up on a pile of books on a bookshelf. From here on out, I’ll have a tripod and an external microphone to enhance the videos I make! No more awkward angles!

And of course, as you probably know by now, I started a Youtube channel for my videos! I’m not going to lie. It’s been so hard not to repeatedly reblog my Youtube announcement. I’m really excited (and nervous) about starting a channel! Along with sharing new songs, I have plans to record higher quality versions of the songs I’ve already recorded and post them on Youtube. I may even try my hand at a few vlog-style videos from time to time. If you haven’t done so and you’re able, please subscribe to the channel!

[selfcallednowhere]

March 6, 2018, Eugene, OR

Pictures

This was my first time going to a show at this venue, which is to be expected since it was my first time being in Eugene at all. It was all right--smallish, which can be nice.

The initial banter when they first came on stage was also about the venue. Flans said that because they've been touring for 30+ years he always has trepidation when saying they've never played somewhere before, but he was pretty sure they'd never played here before. He said they had played in Eugene before, but the last time they did they were touring in an Econoline van. He said they did a college show and were "doing eightballs of cocaine and heroin."

They once again opened with "Pencil Rain," followed by "I Palindrome I," both of which were cool to see again. Then John picked up the contra-alto clarinet, and Flans said they wanted to remind people that the show was going to be featuring it. John: "'Remind' is a strong word. Notify." Then Flans informed us that it was not the contra-alto clarinet that could be seen on signs put up by the local high school saying one was missing.

JF: We don't even know that custodian! JL: I did take one of the pull-tabs with the phone number to say that I don't know where it went.

Then Flans said the thing again about how they'd be playing two sets, and we should treat them like an opener and hold our applause till the second set. "Talk to your friends about how we're like They Might Be Giants but not as good."

Then he said the thing he also keeps saying that makes me so sad about how they'd be playing new songs and we should just pretend we like them. Then he said Joe Franklin had told them "It's all about sincerity, and if you can fake that, you can do anything." Then they played "All Time What" and then "Damn Good Times" (both fantastic as per usual).

Then they were starting to play "James K. Polk," and John was talking during the intro. He said that on the album he mispronounced the name of this state. "But I'm here to make amends. That's why we're here." He pronounced it correctly as he sang (like he normally does, so it was only notable because of him calling attention to it) and people cheered. Afterwards Flans said, "Well played. They were buying it." John said again that he said it wrong on the album, and then said it the incorrect way, and people booed. "Yes, let's let the dirty laundry air." Flans said that when people ask them how to get to Houston St. (pronouncing it like the name of my hometown and not the name of the street in Manhattan) they just tell them where it is, and John said they give them directions to Texas. Then Flans said that's a New York joke that doesn't really work here.

Flans asked John how his day was, and he said he went to a coffee shop that he couldn't remember the name of. Flans said he went to a bagel shop where the wifi password was "bagelbagelbagel," and John said he would've guessed only two "bagel"s. Then Flans said he'd tried to go to some shoe store called Shoeaholic but he got there just as they were closing, and that he'd wanted to beg them to let him in by telling them "I've hit my rock bottom." John: "I think you've bought enough shoes, John Flansburgh."

Then Flans said they were about to play two songs from their new album, and that before the show they'd been "doing shots of truth serum" and so he could tell us that it's "so much better than it has to be." Then he said this is their 20th album, and when they were making their 18th they'd looked at the list of other bands' 18th albums on Wikipedia and found a surprising number of good ones, but he thinks this one stand alone as the only quality 20th album.

The two new songs they played were "Mrs. Bluebeard" and "I Left My Body," both of which were great (I suppose at this point I don't even need to note the fact that John did mess up the lyrics on the former though).

After "Your Racist Friend," Flans said that he wants to "dedicate my performance to the people standing directly next to my amp. I have a lot of dreams, and one of my dreams is to never have to stand directly next to my amp. I don't want to leave a permanent memory on your left ear. And I noticed you were having a conversation, which seems impossible. I'm making a dedication to long-term hearing loss."

Then Flans was introducing Curt, who was standing at the back of the stage. John said it makes him feel self-conscious when people are standing behind him, cos it feels like they're looking at his hands as he plays his keyboard. "Am I folding my thumb under the right way? Is my total ignorance of technique that obvious? The answer is yes." (Awwwww John, I'm sure you're fine darling!)

Next they played "Turn Around," YES YES YES. There was some quality JL spazziness adding to the usual amazingness of the song.

Next they did "Spy." During the part where they were just playing the song normally (before the improv section I mean) John kept lifting one arm up into the air after he played something--I'm not really sure why, but it was cool. He played the "Here Comes Santa Claus" sample during the improv part when he was conducting again.

Afterwards, Flans was complimenting how well we did the part of the song where he directed us to cheer. "That was nimble. Sometimes it's like directing a dinosaur in hospice. That was delicious."

Flans introduced "When the Lights Come On" by saying it's "relentless," which is a good description. He also reminded us that "Dan Miller's fingers never leave his hands." The song was rockin' and terrific as usual.

Afterwards, people were smoking pot (annoying me as it always does, not because I have any problem with pot in itself but I just hate the smell). Flans: "The pot smell begins. And once the pot smell begins it will never end." He said it smelled like cheap pot, and "this is the HiFi. There are standards." Then he told that one story that's immortalized in the one TMBG Unlimited recording, about how there was a time when they kept smelling cheap pot at their shows but then one member of their crew left and they suddenly stopped smelling it.

Then he said that it reminded him of the next song, and he wanted John to introduce it. He asked John something about making a Laugh-In reference and John said he didn't want to. Then he said that they're older than the rest of the band and they've gotten into fights with them about whether Laugh-In was funny, and that it's like being a parent and defending something you don't really believe. Flans said that it was like saying George W. Bush wasn't really that bad, and that he was, it was just easy to forget, like a scar on your hand is easy to forget. Then John said that he did remember the Laugh-In reference he was supposed to make. Flans: "Jesus christ! Show business professional!" John said he was just confused from all the pot smoke, and he was struggling to find oxygen molecules. Then he said the next song was from a TV show that was on before Laugh-In. The song was "The Mesopotamians" (as expected, since I'd seen him do this joke before).

Before they played "This Microphone," Flans was talking about the percussion thing Marty plays during it that looks like an orange. He said that it was a real orange, and Marty had lanced it with a drumstick and replaced the pulp with magic beads.

Afterwards Flans said that for being a sold-out show in a small venue it was surprisingly comfortable, and that usually at this point in such a show they were puddles on the floor begging for the A/C. John said some people want to see that, and Flans said they were trying to change their reputation of just being puddles.

They once again closed out the first set with "Hey, Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal" into "Birdhouse in Your Soul." TOO MUCH ROCKIN'. I CAN'T HANDLE IT. No seriously it is an amazing way for them to end the set, but I'm not kidding about all the excited boppin' around and really really enthusiastic singing along I can't stop myself from doing on both those songs having an intense physical effect on me. I guess I should just be grateful I then got the whole between-sets break to recover.

So then after the break they came back for the Quiet Storm, opening with the contra-alto version of "Older" as per usual. Afterwards, Flans said that even though this was an acoustic set Marty had "opted in with the limitless noise potential of the electronic drums." Then he made him play whatever that bit of that Phil Collins song he keeps making him play is.

After that they played "I Like Fun," then Flans started to introduce "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too." He said the hostility of the song is "comforting," because it means people being that way now isn't new, and that things suck right now, but they will get better.

Before "Shoehorn with Teeth," Flans said that Marty was "abandoning his electronic drums manifesto of the last five minutes and returning to his vaudeville roots." He also said that the bell Marty was playing came from the same high school that had put up the signs for the missing contra-alto clarinet.

Then something really funny happened. Flans said John should move over cos he wasn't in the light enough (which he wasn't). John said it's hard to light him when he has his accordion on, because it creates shadows on him. Flans: "The accordion is like Dracula." Then some girl (not me, I swear!) yelled "IT'S SEXY" and John said "No it isn't," which was the part that amused the hell out of me because of course he was DEAD WRONG. Then he said "But thank you for saying that" but did not exactly seem sincere--I think he was rather uncomfortable honestly so that made me feel bad for him, but yeh I was still really amused. But I did also have this feeling of wishing it hadn't happened at a show I was at because I figured anyone who knew about it and knew I was there would figure it was me and I would never do that (I had the same feeling a time I was at a different show and some girl threw her bra at him).

So then they played "A Self Called Nowhere" and y'know, the usual--really really intense and emotional for me, the best part of the show, etc etc.

Flans introduced "How Can I Sing Like a Girl?" by saying it was "about being in chorus."

Next they did "Istanbul." During the crazy jam part at the end, John spent some time playing (using the word "playing" loosely here) his keyboard with both his fists and also with both his hands entirely vertical.

Flans introduced "Bills, Bills, Bills" by explaining how the AV Club Undercover thing works. He said that they'd given them a list of songs "that should never be recorded or even talked about again." He said they'd first done "Tubthumping" but they weren't going to play that tonight. "It's too exciting. It's too exciting for our crew. It makes them burst into tears." Then he said after that they'd covered a Destiny's Child song, which forced them to grapple with the fact that Destiny's Child is a much more popular band than they are. He said they'd considered becoming a band whose entire act was just performing this one single Destiny's Child cover. Then he said they were going to keep performing this song both cos they'd taken the trouble to memorize it and cos it always spreads joy.

So they played that one and then "Particle Man." Then:

JL: We spent our formative years in the greater Boston area. JF: I don't know if you've ever played lacrosse. I've had lacrosse played at me. JL: You've been played by lacrosse. JF: Lacrosse is like it's the end of days and civilization has broken down, and there's still an organized way of killing people. That's basically what lacrosse is like. JL: That's basically what the greater Boston area is like.

So then they of course played "Wicked Little Critta" [insert swooning over all the video closeups of John's hands on the Kaoss Pad and his keyboard here], then "New York City." Afterwards, some guy yelled "THEY MUST BE GIANTS!" Flans was amused--he repeated it and thanked him for saying it. Then he said that sometimes when shows are ending they're getting ready to leave and they'll hear the owner of the club come over the PA and ask everyone to give another hand for "Ain't They Giants," and they realize he cares less than anyone else there.

They closed the main set with a run of familiar but still always very fun songs: "Number Three," "Twisting," and "Doctor Worm."

When they came back for the first encore, John said they'd come back sooner than it had taken them this time. Then he said that next they were going to play a quiet song, and it was "inappropriate because everyone is all hopped up." The song they played was "Dead," which I was most certainly not going to complain about seeing, quiet or not!

I was hoping they were going to play "Don't Let's Start" next since that was the second encore song for almost all the shows I'd seen so far, but instead it was "Fingertips," which I know is always a big hit live, I've just seen it many, many more times than I've seen "Don't Let's Start" so yeh not as exciting for me at this point.

They closed the show with "The Guitar," which is definitely one of the all-time best show closers!

So yeh great show overall, and I had some personal excitement afterwards too--Marty gave me a setlist!!! This was my first time managing to snag one in an exceptionally long time. I also managed to get the show poster that had been hanging in the venue's front window, which also rarely happens and featured one of the new promo pictures I'm quite fond of, so that was also thrilling!

The all-important JL wardrobe report: For the first set he was wearing the same black long-sleeved shirt he wore the previous two nights (he always wears the same things over and over, but the same shirt three nights in a row is a bit much even for him), and then for the second set he was wearing that red-and-blue stripey t-shirt he really loves, which made me happy because I really love it too and think it looks fantastic on him.

[verwelktesgedicht]

Special vk moments in Japan (2019)

After 2 1/2 years I returned to Japan. Mostly this time I met friends and went to concerts. Since I would like to make my tumblr a bit more personal again I decided to text a bit about this and write down about the moments and concerts that touched me the most. Well, actually I write a few things about all concerts I went to this time but.. you will notice which one touched me the most xDD If you want to know more about one or anything else.. please just send me a message ^^

First of all, my first concert after returning to Japan: an Arlequin oneman! I actually wanted to see Royz live that day but ticket prices for fan-sold tickets were ridiculous, even for bad numbers. Regular kombini-tickets had soo bad numbers at that time that it was like... standing in the hallway. And travelling to that city where they played would have cost me too much for it being worth standing in the hallway. So I wondered if there is any other concert I might be interested in to go instead and i decided 3 days before the concert that I will stay in Osaka to see Arlequin live instead of Royz in Hamamatsu. Other way I wouldn’t have seen Arlequin while I would see Royz at their 10th anni. So, Arlequin was so much better than expected! It sounds mean but let me tell you: I DID enjoy every of their taiban/twoman I went to so much. Just for some reason the oneman I went to in 2015.. wasn’t the best live ever. Some parts of the live were so boring?! So I realized, maybe Arlequin just isn’t a oneman band but a taiban band for me. Because their taibans were so damn fun! Anyway, I went to see them live in Sep 2019 because i wanted to see them and it was the only chance for that trip! And it was SO good. It felt like they improved a lot - performance-wise and setlist-wise. Aki’s talk improved a lot. He got so emotional?! --> I got so emotional?!? They even made me cry at one point.... I was like wtf. But somehow... it might also because it made me feel like “Damn. I guess I forgot what it feels like. This is it. Live houses are truly my home.”???? “Utopia” was really great because we all messed up the “lalala”-part... 3 times. We could do the melody but not the very ending of it but Aki didn’t want to have any of that shit and let us do it over and over again WITHOUT SHOWING US THE CORRECT MELODY!! It just broke when we didn’t know how to continue. It was so funny actually xD Embarassing and funny. In the end he helped us. I’m still a bit sad I couldn’t see a small live house live of Royz but I am very happy I went to see Arlequin again. I’m fine with how things turned out!

Next was kizu-DIAURA-twoman (with gulu gulu as opening act). It was fun! I wanted to see kizu live so much ^__^ And I’m happy I finally did because them and arlequin are the bands I listen to the most during the past 1-2 years. But after them DIAURA played and I realized how high-quality DIAURA’s performances are xDD They are so GOOD! I took my not-vk-fan-friend with me and she enjoyed it too ^___^ And I got MASTER’s ゴミ aka water bottle.

Then I saw alice nine live?!? Spontanously decided. The live was nice. I’m so happy i FINALLY saw them. After 12 years. And they played shunkashuuto with Tora singing (... trying to sing. xDD). NOSTALGIA kicked through!!!

Then I went to see ACME at a taiban. It was my first live of them and it was great! I ended up in Saizen.. and need to write about this in another entry because holy shit.

GUILD was special. I saw them spontaneously back in 2015 and 2014. once as oneman, once as 2man and once at a taiban. Before that I saw them in 2010 in Europe without actually knowing them. It was 1 year after they formed. So.. it’s quite interesting to see them every 4 years xDD I see their improvement. Their change. The live was very nice and funny. I went with 2 friends. One of them I saw GUILD in 2010 together with. I really like GUILD’s songs and enjoyed the live a lot since.. they were on hiatus for quite some time so there aren’t TOO many songs I don’t know. And even the new songs I knew more or less xD It was a lot of nostalgia. And a lot of fun. I missed GUILD and I’m glad they are back.

We spontaneously saw LEZARD and DaizyStripper live next. I was so so happy to see Sora again. I didn’t since I went to my last ALIVE live in 2015. So it was really nice.... I loved to see him having fun!! I loved to see him being in a band he enjoys and belongs to. I’m really glad he seems fine ^^ That was all that counted for me that day! And Daizy were more fun than I expected. Saw them at an open air live in 2014 and it was.. okay. But this 2man was a blast. I was surprised!

Gazette tourfinal at Yokohama Arena was a cool experience but we stood/sat quite in one of the highest rows and were far (not the most in the back but far) from stage, so.. well, yeah. It was a nice experience but I guess I prefer smaller lives?? Best moment was probably when Kai shout without microphone xD his usual “kakattekoi!!” could be heard EVERYWHERE and I was like “so this is what it sounds like live.” and loved it.

One of the lives that made me the happiest was HELLO. taiban. I wanted to see Aki live, my ALIVE boy xD But then I noticed that Nao (ex-ALIVE as well), would be support guitarist for that live and it couldn’t be better??? I ended up in saizen kami2 because the saizen girl wasn’t there for ALIVE and nobody wanted to be in saizen for the support guy and she BEGGED me to be in saizen when she found out I considered being there. So I was 1st row almost in front of Nao. It was soo great ._. I had perfect view on him and Aki and since at least Nao knew I would be there...... Not gonna brag stuff like “omg his smile was so cute T___T” ... but I loved seeing him smile at me. I loved seeing him kinda happy? He looked happy at least ^^ Nao isn’t in a band anymore but I think he does miss that time. At least it looked like that xD I don’t think they have THAAAT many fans. I mean... saizen was free right of me. But yeah, those were the support-spots, so maybe it was because of that xDD Anyway, I loved it. I loved to see them live again. I would love to see them live once again. I’m really so so happy I could go to this live. I mean, I didn’t know the furi well but I had a great Aki-gya next to me who was sooo nice and tried to help me and showed me the furi clearly while doing them during the songs. She even gave me their new CD as gift afterwards! It was only a taiban, so it was very short and I waited through 6 other bands of which I cared for only one but I definitely count this concert as one of the best during that trip. One of the few ones that made me the happiest. Because I could see the boys of the band smile that once were my (closest to-)honmei.

Another highlight of the trip was R-Shitei’s concert in Mito. I was sick and my voice was GONE that day. Really. Gone. I don’t know if this ever happened to me before but ... I couldn’t have ANY conversation. Anyway, the live was really fun!! And... at one point Mamo pointed at us saying that foreigners are here too today and if we’re having fun........ I screamed inside for two reasons: - First.. mamo-nii-chan noticed us ûu ..... xDDDD - Second: “... I NEED to answer but what if my voice isn’t existent again??” And my friend can’t speak Japanese so she had no idea what was going on...... I shout a bit during the live and sometimes it started working again a bit, sometimes it just died right away, so I took my chances and shout as loud as I could “Haaaaai!!” and ended it here because it came out fine and I didn’t want to tempt fate... xDDD I also met a friend from my year in Japan - by chance! She actually said she won’t go but she ended up there anyway xD Nice girl! She helped me with quite a few important things back then.

Then Royz’ 10th anni. When I went to their 5th anni I told myself I will be back for the 10th one. And I made it. 5 years ago I had no idea where I would be in 2019 and how my life would be and if Royz was even still around. But I told myself... if there is any chance for me to go to their 10th anniversary I would do it. I decided for the time of this trip because of this concert. Tbh, I was a bit pissed it was the very first time they made the anniversary live their tour final and also the very first time they held their anniversary in Tokyo. They always held it in their hometown Osaka. But maybe that time is over now. I wanted it to be in Osaka. But anyway...... You have to go with the flow? The live was nice! And the song Anniversary made me cry. I love the lyrics so much!? Also, they talked about Kazuki and his messages that morning. And ACROSS WORLD made me the happiest. It was the last song (of course?) and I was so happy... And seeing the people around me smile like crazy made me even happier xD I know I am not the best Royz fan anymore. I know maybe someone who is more of a fan should lead Royz-yade. I lost them a bit during the past years. But they are still awesome and I still enjoy their music and their concerts. I have so many memories connected to them and I won’t give up on them ^_^ I still love them. I am still happy for every step they make. For every goal they archive. Also, I talked to Kento!? xDDD Pretty boy.

R-Shitei in Wakayama was fun but Mito was more fun xD So no real review here. Except for... they played THREE ENCORE!

Last but not least, ACME. Nice concert! But the fans were strange... Yes, it was a small concert but nobody really called their names like bangya use to. Nobody shout. Many didn’t dance along. It was very strange?!? The band itself was great though! The songs are great, they are funny, their performance is good - and SHOGO is desperately afraid of guitar solo... xDD

I said last but not least, but actually... there was another concert xDD I went to see ALTL. It’s a tiny idol group with bandmen, one of them I like from his previous bands xD So.. actually I wanted to go with a friend but she didn’t make it so I went alone. And it was SO strange. It was in a club/small live house thingy and it was so strange to be there for an idol group??? The fans were different. The atmosphere was different. THE MUSIC WAS DIFFERENT XDDD But it was fun in the end? Way more than I thought. And you could take 2shots with your favorite member and talk a bit. I took.. 3 ûu” for 3000 Yen xD I enjoyed it but I felt lost xD I mean, I’ve been to many vk concerts alone. Also to very very small ones with only like 15 people. But at least that is my scene ^^” At least I knew what to do and what to expect. With that idol concert I was completely lost xDDD But I’m really glad I still went!

[whisker-biscuit]

If You Can’t Beat ‘Em: Chapter 2

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Summary: The water guns are back. And Alastor has come to visit. This won’t end well at all.

It had been about a week and a half since the water gun incident. The event itself had been fun, messy, and borderline homicidal, but cleaning up the lobby (as well as three hallways, a bathroom, and Angel Dust’s entire collection of adult film props) left everyone less than enthusiastic to repeat the experience.

It was around this time that the hotel got a fairly frequent visitor. Whether that visitor was fairly welcome was another matter entirely.

“Charlie-dear! Always a pleasure to see you in high and healthy spirits!”

Alastor breezed through the open front door with more pomp and grandeur than should have been possible. Patting Charlie on the head as one does a young child, he slid calculating eyes over every inch of the room.

“My, that’s a lovely new painting. Did your mother loan that one? She always did have an eye for quality.” The Radio Demon twirled his microphone staff clockwise as he circled in a slow counterclockwise. “You’ve cleaned as well, how darling! It almost looks respectable now.”

His gaze fell on Vaggie, who was standing in the nearest doorway with her arms crossed and her back rigid.

“Hello, my dear. Are you going to threaten me again?”

“No,” she said curtly, “but I still don’t trust you.”

The response was a leering glint to the ever-present smile. Vaggie bristled but didn’t say anything else.

“Ah, I’m sorry to sound rude,” Charlie stepped up in an attempt to peace-make. “It’s uh…good to see you but, we weren’t really expecting this today? To see you here, I mean. Is there a reason you’re here? Maybe?”

Alastor tilted his head. “I’m simply here to check in on my associates! What other reason could I possibly entertain?”

“Sure, because ‘checking in’ is what you’re known for.” Vaggie made parenthesis with her fingers.

The Radio Demon’s eyes became half-lidded, and he gave a mock bow in the girl’s direction. “You’ve caught me at my best today, I suppose. Charlie, should I expect everyone else to be this discourteous?”

The princess opened her mouth to give a reassurance, but it was this moment that Vaggie was pushed out of her spot in guarding the doorway by a spindly, spidery hand.

“Why you blockin’ the way, Toots? Some of us got somewhere to be!” Angel Dust sneered at the girl he’d misplaced. She caught herself before she hit the ground and spat a Spanish curse at him.

“Angel,” Charlie clasped her hands together. “We have a guest, please be polite!”

The spider demon locked eyes with Alastor, who leaned lightly on his cane and gave a derisive little wave.

“The hell are you doing here?”

“Angel,” Charlie wrung her hands together. “Be nice.”

“It’s quite all right, my dear,” the Radio Demon said, looking down his nose. “He’s welcome to express himself in whatever vulgar, childish manner he desires.”

Angel huffed and crossed his top arms over his chest. The lower pair was planted on his hips. “I’ll have you know I’m only childish on Wednesdays, so there.” He stuck his tongue out for good measure and sniffed the air.

“Anywaaaay,” the princess sing-songed, trying to get the conversation back together. “You said you came by for an update, right? How about I…give you a tour of what we’ve changed since you were here last? Does that sound? Okay?”

“Downright darling, dearie,” Alastor purred. He grinned at everyone in the room. “Although I must ask; will it be an entourage today? You know I love an audience, but these listeners rarely tune in to my particular program.”

“Um, well?” Charlie turned towards her partner. “Do you mind sitting this one out? I’m sure everything will be just swell.”

Vaggie glared at the floor a moment before coming to a personal compromise. She sighed and nudged Angel to get his attention.

“You’re going on the tour with them.”

“What? No I’m not, I’ve got better things ta do!” He stared at her, incredulous.

“Sure, and the best thing is knowing what’s new with the hotel so if someone asks you about it, you can tell the truth for once in your life. Besides,” she held up a finger when he tried to protest, “you still owe me for bailing you out of that bad deal with your client last weekend.”

Angel made a frustrated noise and threw his hands up in the air. “Fine! Fine. You just want me to play bouncer for your girl, I’ll do it. But we’re even after this.”

“Fine with me,” Vaggie put a gentle hand on Charlie’s shoulder. “I’ll be making lunch down the hall, don’t…be afraid to let me know if you need me.”

“You know I won’t,” the princess gave a reassuring smile in response.

The demon girl hummed and, with a final distrustful glower at the unwelcome guest, left the room. The three remaining demons stood in silence until they couldn’t hear angry footsteps any longer.

“Well then, let’s get to it!” Charlie announced cheerfully.

So that was how they went from room to room; Charlie pointing out improvements made since Alastor’s last visit, the Radio Demon cocking his head at each display without saying a word, and Angel trailing behind the whole time like a pouting child. Soon they reached the door to the hotel pub.

“Oh, and we’re almost done renovating the bar, too! We just need to change some of the wallpaper and it’ll look good as new, Husk has been so excited about it even though he won’t admit it.”

“How marvelous! You won’t mind if I go take a look, would you, my dear? And Husk will be over the moon to see me, I’m sure.”

The princess started playing with her suspenders. “Well, funny thing about that, you can’t talk to Husk cause he’s –”

“Uhh, sweet cheeks, the guy’s already gone,” Angel drawled, pointing at the large doors leading to the bar. They were swinging closed.

Charlie wavered only a moment before shaking her head and striding after the Radio Demon. She found him standing in the middle of the room, clearly looking for his former associate. The girl stepped behind him and cleared her throat as the spider demon sauntered to her side.

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to talk to Husk for a while.”

“Half-seas over, I take it?”

“Uhh…” She looked over at Angel, who mimed chugging a drink. “Oh. Well he actually went out a few hours ago sooooo I don’t think he’s drunk? Or I hope not. I’m not sure what he’s doing, but I do know that he’s not here.”

“Lovely! Some other time then, perhaps.” Alastor made his way behind the bar. “I see he still keeps everything disheveled back here. I had hoped you would curb him of that habit, but – oh, what might this be?”

He bent at a perfect ninety-degree angle and stood back up holding a water gun. Charlie felt her brow furrow in surprise as she joined the Radio Demon behind the counter. There were five or six of the colorful toys hidden past a line of Jack Daniel’s. There was also a post-it note, scrawled with ‘find where Niffty hid hers.’

“I was wondering where these went,” the princess said, stooping to grab one herself. “Why’d Husk take them?”

Angel Dust snorted and sat down on a barstool. “Cause he fucking hates getting wet. You try having fur that thick and soaking for hours, it sucks ass.”

“But you were playing with us that day. You’ve got a lot of fur too.” Charlie set the gun onto the bar counter and eased her elbows along the polished wood, putting her chin in her hands.

Neither of them paid any attention to Alastor, who turned the toy this way and that with his head angled in their direction.

“Cause it was hot as balls and someone shot me! I ain’t about ta be insulted like that.” The spider demon fluffed out his chest. “Already got wet, didn’t have nothin’ else to lose.”

“You almost lost your…adult paraphernalia.”

“Hey, it wasn’t my fault! Niffty was the one who went after my stuff, the dirty cheater bitch.”

Charlie glanced nervously at Alastor, worried he might have objections to his associate’s name being slandered, but the Radio Demon only grinned. She gave a weak laugh and turned back to Angel.

“Well that’s why I wanted us to play outside, but you wouldn’t listen. And now you know better, so you can’t be complaining anymore.”

“I wasn’t –”

Whatever else Angel meant to say was cut off when a spray of water hit his face so hard it knocked him backwards off the barstool. He crashed onto the carpet and wheezed. Charlie whipped her head around to see Alastor hefting the water gun with an intrigued slant to his smile.

“My, what a remarkable contraption! Water for bullets, what will they think of next?” He spun the toy into the air and caught it with his cane, balancing it on the microphone top.

Charlie pursed her lips and peeked over the counter to see the spider demon wiping liquid out of his eyes.

“Are you okay?”

“Fuck no I’m not okay!” He snarled, craning his head to glare up at both of them. “The fuck was that for?!”

“An investigation, my fine fellow, merely a formality.” The Radio Demon spun the toy again. “Are you going to try to shoot me back?” He looked incredibly smug.

The princess of Hell shook her head frantically as Angel’s face closed off. He glanced her way briefly before turning to Alastor.

“Maybe I will, huh?! Maybe I fucking will!” He hoisted himself up by the barstool to a standing position and snatched the water gun Charlie had left on the countertop. He lifted it –

And got blown back again as the Radio Demon shot him point blank in the chest. Angel skidded against the carpet and blinked dazedly while the princess spun around to Alastor.

“How are you doing that! Stop doing that!”

“Stop doing what, Charlie-dear?” He chuckled, turning the gun her way when she took a step towards him. “I’m only partaking in this intriguing game you’ve been playing of late. I wonder why no one was cordial enough to invite me.”

Charlie jumped as Angel ran to the end of the room and pulled open the doors.

“Don’t just stand there, Charlie! RUN!” And then he was out of the bar into the unknown.

She jumped again when Alastor placed a feathery touch to her shoulder. He was watching the swinging doors with something ancient and predatory.

“Your client is savvier than he first appears, I must say.” The Radio Demon hummed thoughtfully. “I suppose I can give him a sporting chance for that. Charlie-dear, I can’t expect you to play along if you aren’t abiding the rules. Be a bird and arm yourself, will you?”

Whistling a merry tune, Alastor spun the water gun once more around his microphone and stepped towards the doors, leaving Charlie confused and vaguely terrified.

Vaggie was in the kitchen when she heard Angel scream for Charlie to run. Adrenaline burst through the girl’s every muscle and she shot out into the hallway, nearly running into the spider demon as he blindly tore past her. She managed to grab his arm and forced him to stop.

“Where’s Charlie?! Is Alastor hurting her?!”

“If that fucker got her then it’s not my fault!” Angel snarled breathlessly. “I warned her to run!”

Vaggie would have shook him hard to make him reveal where Charlie was, but her brain stalled as something shiny and colorful in the spider demon’s hands caught her attention.

“What – what’s this?”

“Oh, oh yeah, you probably think she’s dead now,” he finally stopped panting and showed her the water gun. “The Pink Pimp found these and wants to play, I guess. But the stuff he shoots fucking hurts! I’d say they were made of wood or some shit if I didn’t know better.”

“So she’s safe? She’s alright?”

“Hell if I know,” Angel looked nervously down the hall. “But I’m not sticking around to find out. I ain’t getting shot again, so either help me or get out of my way.”

The girl opened her mouth, then closed it as she heard the distinct sound of Alastor’s boots treading along carpet, somewhere out of sight but still far too close for comfort. She shared an honest look of unease with Angel.

And that was how Vaggie found herself crammed beside the spider demon in the hotel dumbwaiter.

The door was closed, but there was a small opening slot where Angel had taken up watch with his water gun held under his chin and ready to fire. It was rare to see him so serious, but Vaggie wasn’t going to say anything, stuck here like this. Instead she pretended not to stare as a black eye blossomed around his face and felt the way they both trembled.

It didn’t take long for the Radio Demon to enter the kitchen. He was spinning a water gun by its trigger around his cane, looking for all the world like a dapper gentleman on a Sunday stroll. He paused once as if considering something, then made a motion with his hands and conjured up a shimmering green symbol. It disappeared almost immediately, but there was no time to consider what it was meant for.

Vaggie watched as Angel took the shot carefully, lining up his nozzle right between Alastor’s eyes. She held her breath, afraid that the spider demon might die for such an action but even more afraid that Alastor would catch them first and they’d lose this chance.

The spider demon’s eyes narrowed and he pulled the trigger. They watched as the stream of water went sailing for the Radio Demon, who saw it far too late to move out of the way.

He dodged it a different way. His head snapped backwards until it hit his spine, and the water flew harmlessly above him and into the far wall.

Angel and Vaggie watched in abject horror as Alastor reached behind him and physically pulled his head and neck up to something more autonomically possible. He cracked his head towards one shoulder, then the other, and stared at the two of them through their little slot.

“Commendable effort, truly, but you’ll have to try harder than that.”

The Radio Demon advanced towards the dumbwaiter and Vaggie grabbed ahold of the pulley rope, frantically tugging at it until she and Angel were propelling to a higher floor. They heard delighted laughter echo up after them.

“Very well, a strategic retreat! No doubt we’ll see each other soon, and continue the game again! Best of luck to you both!”

“Move faster!” Angel hissed in the girl’s ear. “He’s gonna try and cut us off!”

“I’m going as fast as I can!” She hissed back, frantic and frustrated. The spider demon growled.

“Here, just let me do it!” He grabbed the rope with all four hands, then with a sickening squelch another pair grew out of his body, just above his hips. Those hands also took hold of the pulley and soon the dumbwaiter was flying up through floors.

“What should we do?” Vaggie gripped the corners of two walls as best as she could, trying to maintain her balanced crouch.

“I dunno, I’m the shoot-first-get-high-later kind of guy, not sharp in the smarts kinda way.”

“Oh I’m well aware of that fact.” She ignored the following insult hurled her way. “First priority is finding Charlie and making sure she’s safe. If we find Niffty, we’ll warn her too.”

“Okay, alright, I can work with that!” Angel stopped pulling the rope and they squeaked to a halt in a dilapidated-but-once-fancy room. The two hopped out and surveyed their location.

“Alright then,” Vaggie rubbed her shoulders, then held out one hand. “If I’m going to protect anyone, then I’ll need a weapon too. You help me get to wherever the water guns are stored and find Charlie, and I’ll watch your back. Truce?”

The spider demon stared at the offered hand in clear surprise. Then he gave a grim, dark smile and took the handshake. “Truce.”

Meanwhile, Charlie was running herself ragged trying to find a sign of where Alastor – or anyone really – had disappeared to. She couldn’t let someone get hurt. She couldn’t let Alastor hurt anyone was the priority, honestly, because whatever he’d done to the water guns was enough to be dangerous from the way she’d seen Angel panic.

She ended her search on the fifth floor with no luck and ran into the stairwell, only to catch Alastor inside with one foot paused in the air. His head was twisted around in her direction; no doubt he’d heard the way she was tearing through the building. With a little whistle he turned to face her directly.

“Still not armed I see. Oh well, if you insist on refusing to play by the rules then there’s no choice but to leave you to your disadvantage!”

“Alastor, please, I’m not here to fight! I just wanted to talk!” Charlie pleaded as the Radio Demon advanced towards her. Her hands were held up in defenseless desperation.

“Talks of peace? Why you’re cute as a bug’s ear, dearie! But that’s not quite enough, I’m afraid.”

He took another step, eyes flickering pitilessly, and then suddenly went very still. His head tilted exactly forty-five degrees to the right, and Charlie heard what had caught his attention – Niffty was giggling somewhere up the stairs. There was no doubt she was watching them.

“Well! If it isn’t one of my associates! I should swing by and say hello!”

Alastor grinned wide as the giggles cut off abruptly, and he turned to head up to a higher floor, leaving Charlie once again. Except this time she was much more terrified. And much more determined to protect her hotel residents.

She sprinted up the stairs after him.

“My oh my, where could everybody be? I’d assumed this was a hunting game, not a hiding game. Oh, but I suppose that’s the same thing when you really think about it!”

Alastor took a right and found himself in an unfamiliar hallway. Here he caught Niffty, hanging off the doorknob of an open door a ways down. She shrieked and slammed it closed, and he approached only to find she had locked him out.

“Phonus Balonus! Barricading yourself away isn’t sporting!” He tapped the door twice with the water gun, then proceeded to smash it through the wood completely, providing an open hole for him to stick his head through. “I thought I taught you better!”

Niffty was huddled in the left corner of the room with her own gun in hand. The moment Alastor’s grinning face appeared she screamed-giggled at the top of her lungs and pulled the trigger, a demented smile smudged across her visage. The Radio Demon pulled his head out just in time to avoid being hit, then knocked the door down completely.

From down the hallway, Charlie skidded to a halt just in time to see Alastor step into Niffty’s room. The screaming inside raised in pitch and then tapered off like an omen. The princess, fearing the worst, ran to the doorway and ended up colliding with the Radio Demon as he emerged again.

Charlie fell back on her butt, hands splayed behind to keep her upright. She stared up at Alastor, who hadn’t even flinched from the hit and was leaning lightly over his microphone with a reserved smile on his face.

“I suppose I have a confession to make,” He purred, eyes half-lidded. “You asked me why I came to visit today, and I gave a sort of half-truth. I was not simply interested in the wellbeing of my associates. I also arrived in the hopes to find some entertainment.”

“E-Entertainment?” The princess squeaked.

“Precisely! You have such a knack for it, and these last few days have been so dreary, I couldn’t resist the temptation. And lo and behold! Here you were, partaking in an enchanting little game of mayhem. How could I say no?”

“But, we weren’t actually playing that game anymore though, it – we finished!”

“Oh dearie, how you slay me!” Alastor raised his cane and tapped Charlie lightly on the nose. In the same motion he pulled a water gun from behind his back. “But it’s never over until the canary is dead.”

The gun was cocked. His face split in two.

“And frankly, songbird, you’re still moving.”

Two hours later, Alastor was in quite high spirits. He nimbly tapped around splintered wood and a limp spider demon, making his way to the hotel’s entrance.

He whistled a jaunty tune as he removed the curse from the front door, watching its shimmering green hue dissipate into nothing. With a sadistic lilt to his grin he opened it and then paused, one foot half-forward in the air.

Husk stared back at him from the porch, keys dangling in one paw and a baseball bat in the other, raised as if to smash at the door.

“Oh it’s you,” the drunkard remarked idly, gaze flitting from Alastor to the entrance and back again. “I couldn’t get in. Thought maybe someone was tryin’ ta prank me.”

He hefted the bat over his shoulder and stepped to the side as the Radio Demon resumed his march forward, smile wide and self-satisfied.

“How insulting. Me, spending so much effort on mere mischief? You know me better than that!”

“Alright, alright, don’t get your horns in a twist,” Husk grumbled. He watched the other practically glide down the porch steps. “What the hell were you doin’ then?”

Alastor stopped and looked back. He tilted his head and his eyes flickered like a broken digital watch.

“Merely mischief.”

And just like that, the Radio Demon went on his merry way. Husk dug the handle of the baseball bat into his forehead to make the headache disappear. Then he walked into the hotel lobby, intending to head right to the bar to get a much-needed drink.

This plan was thwarted immediately when Husk stepped onto soaking wet carpet. He froze, painfully aware of the damp beneath his feet as he took in destroyed furniture, smashed paintings (except for that newest one from Charlie’s mother, strangely enough), and all the hotel residents laying unresponsive throughout the room.

It would have been enough to make him worry, if Vaggie hadn’t stirred and groaned in that exact moment, drawing Husk’s eyes to her and allowing him to spot the melted water gun in her listless arms.

Oh. Oh.

“Idiots,” Husk declared to the carnage. “Idiots and children, all of you.”

 A/N: So someone suggested a while back that I do another chapter with more characters, and the thought couldn't leave my head. I sat on this chapter for a long time until there were more snippets from the show and I could get a feel for Alastor's personality. Gotta say, he's a blast to write. What a swell and absolutely terrifying guy.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy it!

P.S. if you have any ideas for more Hazbin characters in this weird little series, let me know! I'd love to add Sir Pen or others but I'm kinda stalling on how that'd happen haha.

[tygerbug]

Do you have any advice for aspiring filmmakers without an actual cast and crew and (as of right now) no ability to get a formal education? Tips on what to practice or challenges so when I actually start involving people, I'll have a decent grasp on what I'm doing?

This is a big topic to discuss. I’m gonna write a long one here and reminisce a bit about movies I made a long time ago. Hope you’re into that sort of thing.

Shoot some footage on your own, record some sound and learn how to edit! I was on a Mac so I used the now very outdated Final Cut Pro 7 for many years. Adobe Premiere Pro is more standard. I used that when I started out, and I use it more now, along with After Effects. I originally trained on an ancient version of Avid as well.

Try to get a single friend to help you! That will help. But you can also do animation, or film yourself, or film scenery, or voiceover. There’s plenty you can do on your own.

I started in the 90s, when camera technology was terrible. The cameras now are amazing! The economy is not. I started to have trouble making movies because I need to pay bills! It’s a cliche but people’s phones are better than anything we had then.

Currently I have a Panasonic Lumix G7 DSLR which shoots 4K, and cost maybe $450. I used to know every feature of my camcorders and be in complete control, but I honestly don’t understand this one as well as I should. It’s nice though.

Before that, in 2007, I had a Panasonic MiniDV camcorder which must have cost $4500 or so. I was still using it for some things until recently, when it started eating my tapes.

I have a Sennheiser cardioid XLR mic (from 2007), and a Tascam audio recorder hooked up to it (from 2019). Maybe $150 altogether. I’ve somehow had the same microphone stand since 1993, maybe longer.

I also have a Parrot teleprompter mirror, for when I need to record web videos and read text off a screen.

We bought a heavy expensive tripod in 2007 and I found it difficult to use. I probably broke the damn thing. It wasn’t working well. I was used to much lighter, cheaper tripods, and kept using my old one. Then I ended up buying two tripods cheaply. I think both were Goodwill finds!

I still have an enormous greenscreen setup we bought in 2007, very wrinkly now and rarely used.

With the old MiniDV cameras (or before that Hi8, 8mm and VHS) you needed a lot of light to get any kind of decent picture. I’d buy a $20 shop light from Home Depot and point it at the wall. It was very hard light, but bouncing it off something would diffuse it and light up the room. It was also very yellow and we’d put a blue theatrical gel over it to change that. It was also very hot and would make the room tough to film in! We also had little clamp lights with regular light bulbs in them as needed. You can get that stuff at Home Depot or similar for cheap.

Cameras today are a lot better, and even if the footage is grainy you can noise reduce in post with plugins like Neatvideo. You’ll want to be more subtle with your lighting than I had to be back then. But a lot of times you’ll still want a powerful light that will light up the room in a clean-looking way. Even then I’d often work with cinematographers for a more subtle feel. They would put diffusion material over the lights, or black foil to concentrate a more powerful light into a single beam. It’s worth experimenting.

I guess I’ll get very personal with this and talk about my whole history, because I’m like that.

I started out making movies as a kid in the 90s. I started out doing little animations on my own, which grew into a 90-minute sketch comedy feature (I was 15-17). I attempted to involve my friends from high school, but it was hard to get them to commit and show up, so a lot of that film was just me doing animation and puppets to fill the gaps. Once I premiered it, everyone got very excited at what I had accomplished without much help and wanted to be involved. I worked with them to figure out what they were interested in filming, and they contributed to the scripts and concepts and production.

We shot four more comedy features in the first half of that year, before I left for college (USC Film School in Los Angeles, 1999), often with a big cast and in all kinds of locations. I was also writing a satirical musical play at the time, and was starting to try to be a screenwriter (I eventually wrote about twelve unproduced screenplays). The main feature we shot that summer was a 2-hr parody of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace which would have been my first “real” screenplay, and which was based partly on the ideas of others in my friend group. There was some improv to the comedy. We also shot a 5-hour improv piece which was a comedy-drama (and then cut down to feature length) and which aged better.

I came back the next summer and shot two more similar features (which were in the same style as the Phantom Menace spoof and the improv piece respectively). I also ended up collaborating with other filmmakers on some stuff, which I ended up regretting due to the people involved. And I made student films, and a big, overlong drama feature while I was in college called Gods of Los Angeles (which took about three years). Later in 2007-9 (ages 25-28 or so) I directed Shamelessly She-Hulk, a superhero feature which is on Youtube. I also did more animation, and some quick, low effort webseries and web video stuff on my own, and I continue to do so. I’m currently working on some Unannounced Projects.

I often think that moving to Los Angeles and attending USC Film School was a mistake. It’s an easy town to get lost in and just sort of fade away and disappear, even before the economy crashed and things got a lot more expensive over the past 20 years. At any rate, my film education at USC was similar to my film education outside of it- The teachers would just tell us to pick up a camera and go, and do our best with it. It wasn’t very formal. What film school did provide was an audience- Your fellow students would all give notes tearing your student films apart, and I had to get a lot better very fast to keep up and deliver quality filmmaking.

So my advice is that you don’t really need a formal education in film to make movies, at least if you’re starting out and doing your own stuff. What you really need is to be young and have a certain amount of financial support on your side. Once I got older and had to work and pay my own rent during an economic recession, it was a lot harder to make films. If you’re still living with your parents, great! Or if you’re in an okay financial situation, great! Use whatever resources you’ve got.

Mainly you need free time, and people to help you. There’s a lot you can do on your own. As I said, my early experiments as a kid filmmaker were pretty much done on my own, and I sometimes had to create scenes on my own for every movie that followed. I might do a quick pickup shot, or re-record some voiceover. Making movies on your own isn’t an ideal way to work, of course, but a lot of people on Youtube are doing it!

I learned a lot about filmmaking by simply doing it. I’d made something like twelve features by the time I was out of college. Nothing I would still want to watch today, but I learned a ton by doing them. I expected I’d become a Hollywood filmmaker, but making that happen takes money and resources and connections I didn’t have (and still don’t). People don’t want to admit it, but it takes money to get noticed at all in Los Angeles. And when you’re older and need to pay bills, time is also money, so it’s very hard to find the time to work on projects unless you have some money in your bank account. If you have money and time in Los Angeles, you can go to more events, meet more people, pay to enter your scripts into contests and things, and there’s not much of a chance you’ll get noticed by doing that either. But money and time allow you to make more art and try again.

At any rate, if you’re just starting out and learning, there’s plenty you can do on your own, but ideally you want to have a partner who is just as interested as you are, at least during the shooting. I have often spent years editing feature film footage on my own. WhoSprites, Shamelessly She-Hulk, The Thief and the Cobbler Recobbled Cut and Gods of Los Angeles all took years to edit. But the actual shooting of She-Hulk and Gods of Los Angeles and all my earlier features was usually done very quickly.

If you’re young and working with friends and collaborators to create a feature, like I did many times in my teens and twenties, there’s a certain momentum which is key, and very easy to lose. You can get a group of young people together to film a feature for a week or a month, and they’ll work very hard. All the features I ever shot were like that, where I had one or two main collaborators who were there every day for a week or a month or a few months, and we just worked and worked and worked, while other people came in and out.

The movie I did in college, Gods of Los Angeles, I flew my friend Dave in to star in it. That was summer 2002 and we had maybe a month to shoot with him, as well as do a road trip to South Dakota for an amateur film festival where we shot some other stuff as well. We worked on the movie every day. Other actors would come and go but I only had Dave as an actor for that period. Sometimes we were sleeping on the floor at a friend’s place before filming there - we were all over town. Dave lost weight in the desert on the road trip. But we had that momentum to get as much of the film done as we could. It was this ridiculous long script, like four hours worth of story. We ran out of time and I ended up cutting a whole act out and shooting a rewritten ending the morning Dave had to get on the plane back to Connecticut.

We had that momentum to work and get the feature done. We were young and in college, and it was summer. We had no bills to pay. We had free time. We shot most of the feature during that month. We worked around every other actor’s schedule but Dave and I were there every day.

After that, and when the school year began again, production was a lot slower. Trying to get any actor to show up for a shoot was tough. We went months inbetween shoots and it took a long time to finish the last few scenes.

I did notice I’d gotten a lot better as a filmmaker during that shoot. We had filmed Dave’s stuff during this crazed rush, and all the later stuff I was able to shoot in a much more controlled way. No-budget filmmaking, in my experience, is always a disaster. Everything goes wrong and you prove your worth as a filmmaker by rolling with it and still getting the scene done even if you don’t have that actor or that location or whatnot.

You learn a lot by just doing it, as a filmmaker, and it helps to be young and without bills to pay. If you have one good collaborator who is willing to really join you on this journey for awhile, for a week or a month or parts of a few months, you have a movie. All of my movies were like that.

Los Angeles never agreed with me, physically or in any way. I moved to Los Angeles 20 years ago, and left ten years later. I spent that whole first ten years wanting to leave. I knew immediately when I stepped off the plane that I’d made a big mistake. I did leave, for five and a half years, and then ended up back here. I had big dreams, but everyone in this business has big dreams. I expected Hollywood, but it felt more like tripping and falling into a white-walled room which locks behind you and sinks down into the ocean, and nothing else happened for twenty years.

So I’d often leave Los Angeles for awhile to make a movie with friends elsewhere. I went back to Connecticut one summer, and I went to the Midwest twice (a mistake), and roadtripped to South Dakota. I had just unsuccessfully tried to move back to Connecticut one Christmas in 2006, and ended up in some shitty apartment with two people who were trying to kill each other. Pretty typical for my Los Angeles experiences. It’s just a dangerous town when you don’t have money. You always feel like a criminal, and I can no longer count the situations I lived through where my life was threatened. That was almost a constant.

I needed to get out of there, and someone I’d met while doing stand-up comedy called me. He had a rich mother, and he was bored and wanted to learn how to make a horror film. For the hell of it I’d written this script about Marvel’s She-Hulk character. I’d written it in a week. My scripts usually took a year but this was an easy write. He read it, and he decided we should film that script.

I did warn him that it was a fanfilm, so we could never really make money from it, or release it on video, or show it at festivals, especially back then. I don’t think he fully understood that until we were four months into production and had shot most of the film, at which point he shut things down.

But for four months we worked together every day. Our She-Hulk actress came in pretty much every day for a few weeks to film on greenscreen. A lot of times we were shooting one actor at a time because of scheduling, and we pretty much shot the whole thing in that apartment in Santa Monica. I’d put sticky paper up to turn the walls green or black. We just kept at it, getting through a huge amount of material every day. It’s not great to shoot a big superhero feature one actor at a time. That was tricky to edit together later. But working with one actor, or two actors, at a time, is very controllable. You’re not wasting anyone’s time. You don’t have scenes where one of the actors doesn’t have much to do. They’re always working. Sometimes we had a bunch of people onset at once, and sometimes that was more chaotic. It did mean we had more people to work the lights and sound and effects. It can be tricky to get Los Angeles actors to commit to this sort of thing. You’re never sure who you can really rely on and who is going to flake out on you. We ended up shooting with fewer actors and less crew, and doing our best with it.

And when you’re not paying people, sometimes actors will quit on you. We lost one of our two lead actresses on She-Hulk, and by the time I’d recast her months later we didn’t even have money anymore, or most of the original actors. I was shooting on my own for no money. We had auditioned 400 people for the film. It was a huge, long process where I called in anyone in Los Angeles who would work for no money. But some of my first choices didn’t want to actually do the film in the end. I got my first choice for She-Hulk, and got the best people for the parts. But I recall that original actress saying she’d rather be waitressing and making money.

It was always easier to find great actresses who weren’t working. Finding guys who were any good was always tougher. On my college movie Gods of Los Angeles in 2002, I kept losing the male actors I originally cast in every single part, after a day of filming. They weren’t willing to spend that much time on such a ramshackle, no-budget feature where I was learning as I went. The women were all cast from the start, and stayed put.

I shouldn't admit this, but on both Gods of Los Angeles and Shamelessly She-Hulk I eventually had to cut scenes and edit around some male actors, who hadn't quite completed their entire parts, but had come close.The people who stayed, stayed because they believed in the project. We didn't have much money, but I was always a good dialogue writer, and was writing very meaty parts that actors enjoyed playing, even under the circumstances. And the circumstances were messy. (Screenplay structure was more of a weak point, though I got better at that too in my unproduced work.)

She-Hulk was a big role - she had tons of dialogue to get through - and we often shot her alone. We just kept working, and we had that momentum, and we wrapped her part in a couple weeks. Finishing the rest of the film later was a slower process.

But it’s about working within people’s schedules. That gets harder the older you get, because people have bills to pay and things to do.

On She-Hulk, one older actor usually had a beard for other roles. I wanted him to shave it for the part. One day he told me he’d shaved his beard and would want me to shoot his whole part in the next three days or so. We were already booked up for those days with lots of shooting with other actors. But we brought him in at night, and shot most of his part alone. Or in the morning, when he was already starting to grow the beard back.

I once shot a comedy feature in a week, where we all became horribly sick and injured in a dozen different ways. The director was depressed and not in the mood, and in retrospect was bullying me the whole time I knew him. It was horrible, but we still shot the feature in a week.

The Phantom Menace parody was filmed over a month or two, as was the one we did the next year. In both cases I was working every day with Dave, and other people would come in and out depending on their availability. So we had that momentum.

We also found time to shoot a comedy/drama improv feature. I had two collaborators on that first one, and we rehearsed for a couple of weeks while shooting the other movie, then shot the whole damn thing in one night. We tried to do it again the next year but everyone was too tired. We hadn’t really had a break, and Dave had barely slept all month.

Looking at the footage from those (summer 2000) movies later was a turning point for me. I was a dumb kid of about nineteen making dumb movies on low quality video cameras, but I was also a perfectionist. And I lost my temper a lot on that shoot, while trying to get my friends to take the shoot seriously and get the footage I needed.

As a director, if you lose your temper you’ve lost control of your film. You’ve lost the respect of those around you. It’s not going to get them to take you seriously. A director needs to be the nicest guy onset. You’ve got to make people comfortable, and feel like their contributions are valued. They should feel safe, and comfortable enough to give their best work to you. You need to earn their respect. If you have the right collaborators, they will do brilliant work for you, if you let them be themselves.

I was tough, as a director. I would shoot a lot of takes, until I knew I’d gotten the footage I needed in the edit. With enough preparation, four takes should be enough, but it’s not unusual for me to see 16 takes in the edit for more complex scenes. We wouldn’t do a ton of rehearsing. We’d shoot and fix problems on the fly.

I wouldn’t lose my temper. I’d just ask them to do it again, until we had a version where nothing went wrong technically, or with the performance. If an actor isn’t playing the scene right, it’s usually a bad idea to tell them how to read the line. It’s unprofessional but it’s also not how actors work. Fixing the exterior performance is phony. They need to feel and understand the scene inwardly. If they’re not playing the scene right, you haven’t explained it right, and you need to talk to them for a bit about what their character is feeling.

Or maybe it’s just a dumb scene and the actor isn’t feeling it. While looking back at the She-Hulk movie, there are a few lines which make me cringe, which I wish I’d rewritten. Easy jokes, which border on offensive or vulgar and don’t suit the character or the film.

I was looking at the raw footage from one of those scenes recently. I knew the line was bad at the time, and clearly I feel awkward directing the actress to say it. I ask if she can say it with a little more feeling, since she was playing it off very flatly, as if embarrassed of the line. She said “No, because it’s a stupid line!” The footage cuts off there. She wasn’t wrong. We should have rewritten the line, and she gave the best performance she could under the circumstances, because she needed to communicate that her character was embarrassed of the line too.

When I was making movies in college, I was still embarrassed that I’d lost my temper during the shoot in summer 2000. I was trying to be nicer as a director while still pushing hard enough to get the shot. I overcorrected. I have wavy hair which gets unmanageable unless it’s cut very short. I would let my hair grow longer than that, and I’d really look like a mess. A scruffy kid with glasses and mad scientist hair, wearing a red windbreaker jacket and scuffed-up jeans. I looked like a slob! I thought it helped the actors relax and not have to take things as seriously. I grew up in Connecticut as this gifted overachiever, always pushing very hard and being very intense about things. In California I was learning to slow down, and calm down, and go with the flow. I think it helped me, but I went with the flow so much that nothing ever happened in my career for twenty years!

But some of that was just that I wasn’t presenting a serious image to the world. I was presenting the image of a guy who really hated himself. I thought of myself as a clown. I felt bad that I was making my actors work so hard and do so many takes, and I thought I had to be the guy onset who was making things seem much more relaxed and casual, but also pushing them very hard to do brilliant performances and shoot a lot of takes. I should have loved myself more, enough to clean myself up and look professional onset. My appearance was at odds with the high-level filmmaking I wanted to do, because my self-esteem and self-image wasn’t there.

As a creative in Los Angeles, at least to an extent, you are who you pretend to be. The industry is full of pretenders. The industry is biased toward people with money and connections, but people with money and connections are also just more presentable. I had very high standards for the filmmaking I was doing, but I looked and acted like a weird kid! It’s amazing that anyone took me seriously enough to work with me. To an extent I had trouble making friends and felt very isolated, especially among people who really wanted to work in the industry. My friends tended to be people who didn’t fit in either, and who wanted to leave Los Angeles at the first opportunity. I took myself very seriously as an artist, but a lot of people at USC took me at face value instead, and seemed to hate me instantly! Young people can be very cruel. Well, all people can be very cruel.

I used to do stand-up and improv as an idiot character called Radio Man. When I’d perform him live on campus, people would treat me like I actually was this ridiculous character. I was thrown offstage by security several times! Maybe I should have pretended to be cool!

I feel like that was partly my problem with networking and trying to make friends in the industry and get work that way. This is an oversimplification, but I felt like the mindset in Los Angeles was very different. Not better or worse than New York and Connecticut, but upside-down. New Yorkers can be gruff until they get to know you, and they’re more open with how they’re really feeling. People in Los Angeles tend to wear a mask at first. They want to smile and seem pleasant and impress people in a non threatening way, and it’s a front. You find out what they’re really like later, if they like you. You see their dark side. I’m generalizing of course, but I was never a very social person, and this was all backward from what I was used to. People were being very guarded and false when I was trying to be open and truthful, and vice versa even! I was zigging, they were zagging. I felt like people hated me immediately wherever I went! Or at least couldn’t figure me out and weren’t impressed. I wasn’t great at putting up a front and impressing people. And in Los Angeles it’s hard to impress people anyway. You’re talking to creators, who are all boasting about what they’re doing as a multi hyphenate. At that point I’d made a bunch of features as a writer/director/editor, but I was still a dumb kid with few resources and no connections.

Youtube has changed everything, but it’s also not a filmmaker’s medium. Most of the people who are getting successful on Youtube are doing video essays as themselves, straight to the camera. People aren’t really getting known for making short films and features like we used to do. I still remaster material from the 2007 She-Hulk production for Youtube, and it feels very out of place with everything else that Youtube is.

That can be a positive, I suppose. It’s not a big deal for a filmmaker to record themselves doing video essays and reactions, and Contrapoints for example has stepped up that game with her colored lighting and aesthetics, bring a feature-film quality to Youtube.

I’d like to think there’s room for lots of different kinds of content on Youtube, and as a small creator it’s unfortunately very hard to get seen, so you might as well create what you like, and what really matters to you. The algorithm seems to push certain kinds of content (including some gross political content which is definitely helping cause the end of the world). The algorithm is also impossible to predict.

I had barely touched my main Youtube channel in eight years until recently. That was a mistake. I was sort of grandfathered in as an older channel, and once I put up new content in 2018, sometimes the algorithm would smile on me and give me millions of views. But it’s impossible to predict. One or two popular videos and the rest go thud.

I considered that a channel for the She-Hulk movie and my Doctor Who animations, and other filmmakery stuff. But I’d stopped editing that film, and was doing some very dumb web videos on my own instead for awhile, which I uploaded on another channel. I started other channels for my film restoration work. I hadn’t considered Youtube as a career. It was simply an outlet for the various things I was doing.

If I was starting a new channel now, I wouldn’t be getting the views I get on the old channel. It’s probably best to do everything in one place, do it well and make it easy to find.

As for the other stuff, the filmmaker stuff - actually learning how to make a film - just do it. You’ll learn as you go.

In my high school movies, these early comedies, I barely knew where to put the camera at all. At first I was shooting long wide shots, then some closeups. All very basic stuff. I was leaning heavily on the dialogue. Without dialogue I didn’t have a movie. There were only a few sequences I storyboarded or even shot a lot of angles for. Usually it was when we were parodying an existing movie, and recreating their shots. That was always fun- recreating a famous big-budget Hollywood movie on a budget of zero, and making it work somehow.

I learned a little more each time for sure, but in film school we had to do these little short films with no dialogue. I was leaning on the same style I’d had in my high school comedies. My first couple of shorts had the same goofy feel. One of them used pop culture references instead of having characters and story. And without dialogue that didn’t work. It was about some friends of mine as an action-hero fighting team (and not a very impressive one). It was pretty dumb.

This was for a class (in 2001) which originally shot on 8mm film, so it had to be silent. We were shooting on MiniDV instead, so we could have shot dialogue, but that’s not what the class was about.

I couldn’t use any of the tricks I’d had in my comedies. I had to tell a story without dialogue- something that people could take seriously. I didn’t even know how to get a performance out of someone without dialogue, which became immediately apparent. I couldn’t use any of my strengths, and that was great because I had to learn quickly.

My third short was vastly better. It really told a story without words. I shot a few more like that later, including four on 16mm film.

These were all supposed to be 5 minutes. I think short three was 16 minutes.

My fourth and fifth student-film shorts actually had heavy dialogue, but I was still learning very fast and challenging myself to do something different.

I scripted the fourth short without dialogue. It was about a dying cartoonist, and was intended as a very personal, serious drama. Writing it without dialogue forced me to come up with visual ideas to keep it interesting. I then rewrote it with dialogue but kept most of those ideas. I’d already been writing serious screenplays for awhile but this was my first serious film- a big step for a goofy kid like me! It was 18 minutes long.

As I recall, I got in trouble for using dialogue so heavily, and my grade was taken down a few notches. That happened a lot at USC, always on the films I was most proud of!

My fifth was an animated adaptation of the Terry Pratchett novel, MORT. It was crazy over-ambitious for a five-minute short at the end of the semester. I’d written a 45-minute script, and I had to shoot it in a weekend and edit it in about as long. I got my friends together and we recorded the voices in one long night. I played Death and I certainly sounded like Death by that point. For the animation I made some clay figures with drawn cutout faces, in real-world locations. It was nothing fancy, but I really did shoot it in a weekend, and made it work in the edit as best I could. I was new to Avid and digital editing generally. I released a 25-minute animated film, having cut out anything I didn’t absolutely need to tell the story.

I was proud. I’m sure I got in trouble for it! I wasn’t alone either- Someone else in the class had shot a dialogue-heavy adaptation of The Catcher In the Rye.

In another class, when shooting on 16mm film, the films really did have to be 5 minutes long, and not a second longer. We only got one or two takes because film stock was limited, and you really had to tell the story visually.

Due to shenanigans I was forced to take the class twice, and did better work the second time. With a partner I shot a fantasy film The Journey of Truesong (with thrift-store costumes), and a time-travel musical with CGI and splitscreen effects, all done in-camera. We also got in trouble for both, because both involved dialogue and were against the rules. We’d made the most exciting films in the class, and got punished for it. That sort of thing happened a lot.

I remember on The Journey of Truesong, our actress was vegan, and I didn’t know. I’d brought ham sandwiches for lunch. She was too polite to say anything and starved the whole shoot. When we opened up the fruit (and I think trail mix) her eyes went wide and she chowed down. Ask your actors about food restrictions and make sure you have a way to feed them! We were in Griffith Park, miles from anywhere!

A few years later I filmed a scene for She-Hulk, again in Griffith Park, with four actors. They were supposed to barbecue hamburgers in the scene itself, so I bought a grill and figured that would be our meal for the day as well. I wanted to wrap an actor playing a bad guy so he could go home, so we shot his scenes first. The sun was going down by the time we grilled the hamburgers. The scene was grainy since we were losing the light, and getting the grill running was taking time. The actors had to get a little silly and improv around it, and I reshot some of it later in a different location (obviously so). By that point the hamburgers and other food had been sitting out in the sun for hours and were absolutely inedible. Everyone was starving!

Today you could maybe use a food delivery app. Maybe not, because we were still in the park in a very remote location. It was a disaster of planning on my part, and I think an actor quit after that. When you have no budget, going out on location means going out on a limb and hoping it works. In this case I wasn’t able to feed my cast. The actresses rolled with it and forgave me. An actor didn’t.

Food is very important, and easy to overlook! If you’re shooting in your own home, or a very controllable location, you can keep food in the fridge. On location in the park, in the heat, the food had a very limited shelf life, and so did the actors.

If we weren’t out in the middle of nowhere, we might all drive to a fast food restaurant to eat. That can take up hours in the middle of a shoot if you’re not careful. Having enough food onset certainly helps.

I had very high standards for the sort of actors I’d cast. In high school I was just casting friends, but I grew out of that. Even so, I think that someone who will really stick with you and is willing to put in the work with you is just as important as raw talent. If someone can’t act, maybe they can run the camera, or hold the microphone, or just generally help out onset and with the production. They can drive around, get the food, set things up that need to be set up. They can be an extra, or a costumed character. There’s so much that needs to be done, and no-budget shoots immediately become a trashfire of problems because it’s hard to get it all done in time. Things will always go wrong, and you prove yourself by how you deal with all of that.

I know that got very personal, and very long.

But I hope that helps!

[lepidea-blog]

In the next decade or 2007, iPhone 8 among the iPhone releases has probably caused less tension. A very good reason for this: iPhone X Apple’s naming sends a very clear message. iPhone 8 or iPhone 8 Plus, but iPhone X (pronounced iPhone 8) is not the best iPhone you can get. “Ten”). And you do not have to wait two years for it because nowhere.

Notwithstanding the fascinating attraction of the effectiveness of the OLED display from the edge-to-edge and the feeling of a future-feeling- for iPhone X, not everyone will be motivated to participate in the iPhone X $ 1,000 or more. Now, you are looking for the upgraded cycle iPhone 6S or just more affordable iPhone, Apple iPhone 8 for you. Our review shows, it can be refurbished instead of the revolution, but it is a great Apple iPhone 8 Smartphone.

Battery:1821 mAh | RAM:2 GB RAM | Storage:64/256 GB, | OS: iOS 11, upgradable to iOS 12.1 |CPU: Hexa-core (2x Monsoon + 4x Mistral)| Rear camera: 12MP | Front camera: 07 MP | Screen size: 4.7 inches, 60.9 cm2 (~65.4% screen-to-body ratio) | Resolution: 750 x 1334 pixels, 16:9 ratio (~326 ppi density) | Dimensions: 138.4 x 67.3 x 7.3 mm (5.45 x 2.65 x 0.29 in) | Weight: 148 g (5.22 oz) |

iPhone 8–Design

Apple iPhone 6 unveiled the iPhone in 2014, and it has since stuck with the same original design. Internal elements with each repetition have been enhanced, pressure sensitive with screen 3D touch, has become morphed into the home button recessed touch, and we lost the headphone jack along the way. But iPhone 6 has almost identical levels of each iPhone and has a very similar look.

Apple iPhone 8 is a fraction larger than its predecessor, but enough to fit 7 things on iPhone is enough. The big change is given in the way of glass behind the aluminum, it is becoming heavier in the hand – 10 gm heavy to be precise We have been told that this is the most durable glass, but the Apple iPhone 8 cases are suggested to avoid costly repairs.

You have a choice of three colors: Silver, Gold and Space Gray. At first glance, space seems to be black in gray, but look around and you’ll see that the glass is a dark gray color. Silver is as much as you expect, and Gold has a patchy tint.

The ugly antenna bands have been reduced to small strips on each side and bottom. You’ll get the power button and SIM card tray on the right spine, and switch left and right to the left. The bottom power plant is flattened with speaker and microphone and there is nothing at the top. There is no winner for 3.5mm audio port, but Apple iPhone 8 has a thunderstorm of 3.5mm headphone jack adapter.

A Mirror Apple logo is sitting in the front and middle of the phone, and there are a camera and flash jute from the top left. This “camera or map” is another reason to invest in a field, otherwise, the camera will always rest when the iPhone keeps it behind.

Apple iPhone 8 is very hard and expensive, slightly more than the iPhone 7. It is a comfortable size for the slip in a pocket and it is one of the best phones in the market for easy hand operation.

Apple has refined this design in the last three years, so it is very polished. But the familiarity is humiliating to the nations, and when you keep an eye on the front of the Apple iPhone 8, it is difficult to feel frustrated about how familiar it is.

iPhone 8–Screen and sound

It is difficult to explain that Apple makes a bigger battery in iPhone 8 to buy a less-than-expected trend with iPhone X. In the past few years, for the innovation of design and display, you must see Apple’s main competitor Samsung, because it has popularized edge-to-edge screens and OLED technologies. And it was LG’s long-running ratio of the hands-on proportionately wide proportion of screens.

When Apple enters the bones with these trends, it clearly acknowledges that the iPhone 8 design is outdated. The main modification in front of the iPhone 6 to iPhone 6 is the evolution of the home button, but it remains unchanged from the iPhone 7. Although Touch ID is working very well, we liked to see more screen focus.

Just look at the numbers. The Apple iPhone 8 measures 5.45 × 2.65 inches, but it only has a 4.7-inch screen resolution of 1,334 × 750 pixels. In contrast, the Galaxy S9 measures a very low comparison of 5.81 × 2.7 inches, allowing it to pack at a resolution of 2960 × 1,440 pixels in a 5.8-inch display. If you are surprised, then the iPhone has a 5.65 × 2.79-inch and 5.8-inch display, but in 2436 × 1,125 pixels resolution.

Apple’s IPS LCD is the only real help TrueTone technology that is designed to tie the look based on the light of your environment to suit the colors. But it’s hard to see any real difference with having an iPhone 7 beside it.

All that said, the display of the Apple iPhone 8’s bright, the different conditions of light is obvious, and probably the best IPS LCD near. It’s comfortable to read movies, and games for a long time and look awesome on iOS 11. But, finally, it is not just sharp in almost all other displays in this bracket and some of the biggest factors in it.

A welcome improvement stereo speaker, which phones 25 percent louder than iPhone 7 There is a flash of slight lightning and it seems cool for a phone, but most people still want to use headphones. We are pleased to see Apple Bluetooth 5 support added, so if you go to the wireless root you can get it better, faster and support more than Bluetooth 4.2 in the iPhone 7.

iPhone 8–Powerful performance that’s ahead of the pack

Design and display are unchanged in most cases, under the Apple iPhone 8 Hood some serious cutting-edge hardware packs are made. Apple’s new A11 Bionic Chip incredibly fast It combines two high-performance core with four high-efficiency cores and has Apple-designed GPUs.

We’ve seen Apple iPhone 8 become faster and faster in navigation, apps, and games. It was not an incoming call during a game of Aft 8. We did not snatch anything in it: Airborne, which is run nicely, or jumps to read emails from Netflix, Apple iPhone 8 moves everything at its speed. Do not make any mistake, it’s a powerful device.

When we were playing the Giachen 4, the iPhone 4’s 4,270 single core scores and multi-core scores of 10,259 were operated, compared to the Galaxy S8’s 1,762 single core and 5,723 multi-core and HTC U11 which is 1,926 single core and 6,493 multi-core. Even the new Galaxy S9 only scored 23377 single core and 7,982 multi-core scores.

Run Antutu Benchmarking Tool, iPhone 8 score 214,492 Galaxy S8’s 155,253 Galaxy S8 and 175, 748 compared to the HTC U11, in Galaxy S926,1,876.

Whatever you slice it on, the Apple iPhone 8 is one of the most powerful phones. There is a similar chip like the Apple iPhone 8 Plus and the iPhone X, so there is no compromise on performance. It is difficult to say whether you will experience any real benefits because we have no problem with the functionality of iPhone 7 or Android phones like HTC U11.

The Apple iPhone 8 is probably even more beautiful, but now we think that you will strive to find ways to take advantage of all the raw materials.

Apple keeps an extra 1GB of RAM in its larger iPhone, but the iPhone 8 finishes exactly as much as 2 GB RAM. It is not directly compatible with Android phones, which have a lot of RAM, because operating systems behave very differently with memory management.

The only time we felt any strain was that during the session of extended-reality gaming. There were no stutter or lag, but the games like Zuma Blitz and Rev. ARA are quick to cheat the battery and make the glass very hot in touch.

iPhone 8–Software

As the Apple iPhone 8 revises a familiar design, Apple’s latest platform updates, iOS 11. Its biggest addition comes through MARKET, a development framework for advanced-real applications and games. They use your iPhone camera to do game components, furniture and more on your living room floor.

There are lots of fun here. Kids love the virtual pet game, DR Dragon and we enjoyed using the Magic Plan App to create the perfect floor plan of our home. Although ARTs are available on older devices, as long as they run iOS 11, additional power of the iPhone 8 can tell over time and we hope to hit new heights at AR at the near future.

In general, a pleasure to use iOS 11. Swipe down from the bottom to access control center for all your fast toggles and sliders. Swipe from top to bottom for notifications. The only drawback from Android is the general lack of big dumps and customization options on app icons on your home screen.

There is no doubt that iOS 11 is a flashy operating system that can easily capture. With TouchIn Purchase Animation, you have high-quality pistols in everything from zooming into apps. It looks cozy and looks stylish. The only little problem we encounter is an automatic refresh in the App Store which makes it impossible to find it. After turning off the Apple iPhone 8 again, the problem has gone and it has not yet returned.

iPhone 8–Camera &Multimedia

We were excited to take the Apple iPhone 8 camera for a spin. There is a lack of dual-camera setup available on Apple iPhone 8 at Apple iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X, but it is still one of the best cameras used.

The Apple iPhone 8 is a 12-megapixel main camera with an F / 1.8 aperture, optical image stability, and HDR. It is designed to be easy to use. Just do not shoot and shoot more often, you will get a delightful picture. We tried it different types of different lighting, indoor and outdoor, and could take great shots with confidence.

Apple has now definitely changed the color of HDR to increase its involvement with iPhone 7 and even though it is still more realistic and something like the Galaxy S8. Low-performance performance improves, but it’s one of the few areas that can take Apple iPhone 8 out. You’ll find some low light photos and exposure problems in photos.

Smartphones have improved so much in the past few years, but Apple may offer the best competition. iPhone 8 mostly matches its colleagues, surpasses some and rarely falls in others, but the time comes and cameras are improving, there are better performers available.

By contacting the independent photography expert Dxomark we have seen that the previous joint headphones – pixels and 90-digit scores have closed the top spot by U11-iPhone 8, which has 92. Many phones have exceeded it, then Google Pixel 98 on 98, Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus and 109 with Huawei P20 Pro. Apple’s iPhone X97 and Apple iPhone 8 Plus have scored 94, both of which offer a dual-lens camera which gives zoom power and a strong Bokeh effect.

Based on our own experiments, we recognize that the camera is better than these phones compared to the Apple iPhone 8, but we are not talking about a huge bay in the class. Portrait mode is not available on Apple iPhone 8, or the Apple iPhone 8 Plus graduate portrait lighting feature is not ashamed, but we do not think most people will really miss them.

The iPhone can record 4K videos up to 60 frames per second in 1080p frames per second for 840 seconds, which makes it even more capable than most of the flagships. There is a 7-megapixel front-facing camera that rounds out the F / 2.2 aperture and it will work fine for facetime calls and stitches.

iPhone 8–Reason for buy

This is a growing update on the iPhone 7 and it’s as good as it is, we’re not sure that it initially jumped $ 50. If Apple puts 5-inch OLED in 1080p resolution in this body, it would be easy to recommend the Apple iPhone 8, but if iPhone X is available it is a solid sell.

Yes, If you are set up on an iPhone, you must check out the iPhone X. It’s an exciting new design, a much larger and sharp HDD screen, a superior dual camera and all new face tracking features that we have never seen before in a package that is not much higher than the Apple iPhone 8, even though it costs you $ 300.

If you are not indifferent to the sticking with iOS, you have to look at Samsung’s Galaxy S9. If you are a bit older, then S9 Plus or LG V30 can offer a lot of things. However, Google’s pixels are worth $ 50 cheap in both the best Android alternatives and the closest match to the Apple iPhone 8.

If you choose the Apple iPhone 8, we think it will end you for a long time. Apple will continue to update it for several years and the cutting edge processing power definitely offers some future-authentication. You can easily use the Apple iPhone 8 for four years, or you can use it for two or three years and then it can sell for a decent price. It is IP67 rated, so weird dank will not be a problem, but we would suggest a case for protection against scratch and cracks.

If you still love your iPhone 6 or 6S and you want to upgrade without spending too much, or you want a small phone without compromising power, then the Apple iPhone 8 will check all your boxes. But if you like the best iPhone, buy iPhone X.

[horriblegaming44]

Top 5 Best Lightweight Gaming Headset in 2023 – Horriblegaming

The majority of people think that headsets that are easier to wear are more comfortable. Despite having less padding, they don't exert as much pressure on your head and ears. They are also less stressful on your neck as a result. Particularly for gamers that play for extended periods of time, these have a big impact.

Unfortunately, many consumers mistakenly think that lightweight gaming headphones are of lower quality. Usually, it's accurate. People who feel they aren't really to blame for this.

Because of this, it can be challenging to locate a gaming headset that is only 200 or 300 grammes.

You're in luck if you're seeking for a portable gaming headset.

Below is a list of the top 5 Lightweight Gaming Headset expected to be on the market in 2023.

Best Lightweight Gaming Headset

1. Razer Blackshark V2

Razer, you rock. We still don't understand how they were able to fit so much into something so small and light.

The Razer Blackshark V2 is among the lightest gaming headsets, although not being the lightest. Its 262 gramme weight is significantly less than that of many of its rivals' products. It still contains just as many features, if not more, as the previous one did.

The microphone and sound quality on this over-the-ear, closed-back headset are superb. 50mm TriForce Titanium drivers with separate high, mid, and low tuning choices are its main selling point. Also featured is a detachable Hyperclear Cardioid microphone. It is a function that makes it possible for the microphone to just pick up voices while blocking out extraneous noises.

As a final flourish, the Blackshark V2 has cooling cushions that are oval in shape and filled with gel. By doing this, the effects of pressure buildup are lessened, and the engine doesn't get too hot.

The $100 price tag on the Blackshark V2 only increases its worth.

Technical Specifications

Over-ear, closed-back acoustic design

 TriForce Titanium 50mm drivers

 Wired connectivity (5.9 feet)

 Hyperclear Cardioid Microphone

 Dimensions: 262 grams/9.2 oz.

2. Astro A50 Wireless (Gen 4) 

Bravo to Razer. We're still perplexed as to how they managed to cram so much into something so little and light.

Though not the lightest gaming headset, the Razer Blackshark V2 comes close. It weighs 262 grammes, which is far less than many of its rivals. Despite this, it contains just as many features as the other, if not more.

This over-the-ear headset with a closed back has a great microphone and sound quality. It boasts 50mm TriForce Titanium drivers with distinct controls for the highs, mids, and lows. It also has a removable Hyperclear Cardioid microphone. The microphone can be made to focus just on voice calls thanks to this capability.

As a final flourish, the Blackshark V2 has cooling cushions that are oval in shape and filled with gel. By doing this, the effects of pressure buildup are lessened, and the engine doesn't get too hot.

The $100 price tag on the Blackshark V2 only increases its worth.

Technical Specifications

Closed-back, over-ear acoustics

Neodymium magnet 40mm drivers

Wi-Fi connectivity (15-hour battery life)

6.0mm unidirectional voice-isolating microphone

11.2 ounces or 380 grammes.

3. Razer Kraken X

A Razer product is on our list for the second time. This time, it's the Razer Kraken X, which is quite inexpensive.

For $50, you should actually be prepared to get a basic gaming headset. But, at least in terms of features, Kraken X is anything but lightweight. Typically, being lightweight means having less features. Taking into account that the Kraken X weighs only 250 grammes (8.8 ounces).

Despite being exceedingly light, the Kraken X has a potent punch. Because it includes virtual 7.1 surround sound, the depth, clarity, and sharpness of the sound are improved.

However, it is done using the app. You're forced to accept the deal at this price.

The Kraken X also has a beautifully understated design and is pretty comfortable to wear, if that's even a term. Certain improvements could be made. Although the design is excellent, the microphone cannot be taken out, and it has a plain appearance.

Technical Specifications

Closed-back, over-ear design

 Drivers: 40mm Neodymium Magnet

 Connectivity: Wired (4.27 feet)

bendable microphone Microphone Cardioid

250 grammes or 8.8 oz in weight

4. HyperX Cloud Mix

The HyperX Cloud Mix is not just one of the best gaming headphones on the market right now. It's conceivably HyperX's best gaming headset to date.

This is very complimentary. Few gaming headphones have yet been made by HyperX, a small company. However, there are still further justifications for praising the Cloud Mix.

Its appearance and feel are similar to that of an expensive headset, which is one feature. The aluminium frame has a sturdy, hard feeling. It is also portable and lightweight. In addition, a plush, soft material with a memory foam-like feel is used to cover the headband. This makes it comfortable to wear. The entire design is finished with a matte black lacquer that has very no branding on it.

It is not only the best, but it also works well. It can be used as a wireless headset in addition to having a wired connection. It can also be used by almost any Bluetooth-capable device, such as smartphones, tablets, and gaming consoles.

The Cloud Mix has braided cables, a portable case, a retractable boom mic, and clear, balanced sound. A 20-hour battery life is typical. It only increased the bar for future HyperX audio products.

Technical Specifications

Closed-back, over-ear acoustics

Drivers: Personalized 40mm Dual Chamber

Wi-Fi connectivity (20-hour battery life)

Electret Condenser Boom Microphone

Weight: 260 grammes or 9.17 oz.

5. Audio-Technica ATH-ADG1X

The audiophile market is where Audio-Technica struggles to survive. They keep putting out useful headsets. The ATH-ADG1X from Audio-Technica does a fantastic job of illustrating this.

The ATH-best ADG1X's competitive price and distinctive Audio-Technica features are its main selling points.

Focusing on the other advantages is preferred because excellent sound is already a given. It's fortunate that the ATH-ADG1X has a lot to offer. This pertains to its weight (285 grammes), the comfort of the 3D Wing support system, and the length of the cords (6.6 feet). The mic is really clear and bright, and the ear pads are cosy.

The ATH-ADG1X furthermore features a metal honeycomb enclosure in addition to all of this. This enhances audio quality while keeping the headset lightweight and cool.

Technical Features

Open-air, closed-back acoustic design

53mm drivers

Wired connectivity (6.6-feet)

Hypercardioid Electret Condenser Microphone

Weight: 285 grams/10.1 oz.

[auspicious-voice]

A post of my recording setup for UTAU voicebank production

Hi! This post is a little different than others, but I wanted to write a post pertaining my recording setup when it comes to making UTAU voicebanks. I've made upgrades to it over the past 7-8 years or so, so let's get to it!

Just note that this post is coming from someone who uses UTAU as a hobby, and that much of my audio equipment is for casual use. I also don't really partake in anything related to professional audio, so please keep that in mind!

Recording Setup from 2014-2016

Short section considering I started out with not too much knowledge on microphones and other audio equipment.

Recording Environment

Since I was starting out, I recorded most of my voicebanks in an open, untreated environment. I didn't take into account how much of a problem this was, but give how low quality my voicebanks were around this time, I didn't notice it too much.

Microphone

This one's weird, because I had a laptop microphone that was muffled in sound quality, and when I installed a trial of FL Studio onto that laptop, the microphone quality became clearer for some odd reason. In 2014, one voicebank was recorded with a laptop microphone (before I installed FL), and then another voicebank was recorded with the same microphone (after I installed FL). I'm so confused as to why my laptop microphone's quality changed, so it's a mystery to me.

Then my old laptop broke mid-2015, and I purchased a new laptop in 2016. I used the built-in microphone to record VCV voicebanks for my UTAUs, though the quality was muffled and... not very good in general. This was around the time I wanted to upgrade my microphone so I could give my voicebanks new updates with better quality.

Recording Setup from 2017-2021

This setup is what I stuck with the longest now that I got a new microphone. Everything else remained the same for the most part.

Recording Environment

Around this time, I recorded most of my voicebanks in my room. It's small, but the fact that it was untreated spelled a plethora of problems for the voicebanks I recorded. With the purchase of a new microphone, those issues would be even more pronounced.

Microphone

The microphone I (currently) use is the Blue Snowball iCE! I'll admit, I only got this microphone because I saw one of my favourite UTAU users use it at the time, plus it was cheap to get. It's a nice starting point to get better audio quality for a microphone that's around $70 CAD.

However, for some reason this microphone is shunned by a fair portion of the UTAU community nowadays, and when I asked people around if this microphone was good, they all told me to get something like the CAD u37 instead as if there's that one microphone that everyone should use. I don't really get why people are so worked up whenever someone uses this or that, plus it's just a hobby.

The Snowball iCE does a fantastic job at recording good audio in general, but over time, I kept noticing that it picked up a shitton of echo and reverb as evident in my recordings. To be fair, this is a condenser microphone and they're known for being extremely sensitive. I initially thought that the resamplers I was using were fucking up, but it was my recording environment that was making things worse.

Ever since noticing this, I did take measures to improve the quality of my voicebanks, which will be explained in the next section.

Recording Setup from 2022-present

While the microphone didn't change, the rest of my recording setup did.

Recording Environment

I still recorded in the same room, BUT I did purchase an isolation filter to help reduce the amount of reverb and echo in my recordings. When I recorded my newest voicebanks, I could barely hear any reverb in the samples and the voicebanks sounded better in UTAU when rendered.

The overall quality of the voicebanks recorded in a somewhat treated environment are pretty good even when recorded on a cheap microphone. This got me thinking about those who recorded with the Snowball iCE microphone, and if the environment that they recorded in was so shit that it ended up affecting the quality of their audio.

Now that I think about it, while a microphone (one that is not from a laptop) is good for making clear audio, it's the environment that makes or breaks the overall quality of the audio. It's a matter of if you treated the recording environment with anything that absorbs echo or not.

Microphone

Same microphone is still being used. >:D

Accessories

This time, I did purchase a desktop mic stand (so that I don't lean down too much when recording) and a pop filter to remove excess plosives in my recordings. At least I don't have to accidentally spit into my microphone anymore.

I actually got my pop filter from a thrift store, and I got my desktop stand from Amazon. Put these together with the microphone and the isolation filter, and you pretty much get a nice recording booth.

Final Thoughts

While my recording setup is cheap and amateur-ish, I do think that it does a great job in capturing good audio quality for my voicebanks. Sure it doesn't measure to more professional setups others use, but this is a hobby after all. Even a casual recording setup can get you around anywhere as long as you have fun.

I'm happy with my current recording setup as it is, and I don't plan on upgrading it any time soon unless something big happens.