#and the score is so amazing with big orchestral pieces that swell in the perfect moments

[lorephobic]

keeping up with awards season has truly turned me into such a vitriolic and bitter person i think the academy should explode and there should be no survivors

[skulkingwriter]

So on Saturday, I was in a concert in the Albert Hall, and had to sit on stage through the first three movements of Beethoven’s 9th which... not to be snarky about an obvious classic, but for me, it is not... the most intellectually engaging piece in the world. So I had to find something to think about, and I was staring up at the shadowy figures in the royal boxes, and... this happened. 

If I could, I would have drawn it, but I can’t, so instead you get the written waffle version. This is out of standard continuity, for reasons that will become obvious. 

Vox Machina are at the opera...

They’ve been given a tip off that something lichy is going to go down during the performance, and have decided to infiltrate. 

Percy is in full De Rolo Mode: impeccably dressed and fantastically snobby, keeping vigilant for lich nonsense and genuinely paying attention to and enjoying the music. He is a annoyed that he couldn’t find a way to smuggle Bad News into the opera with him but his pistol is securely stashed inside Vex’s handbag. Vex is sitting beside him having come in on his arm, gorgeous gown, little mask, opera glasses. She’s loving the pagentry a little more than the opera itself, and now it’s well underway she’s starting to lose focus a bit and getting fidgety. She’s mostly using her opera glasses to watch the crowd - supposedly keeping a sharp eye out for liches, but she’s also spotted two men picking their noses, a couple flirting via passed notes in one of the boxes opposite, and a woman reading a book in the back row. 

Trinket is outside the box eating all the little sandwiches from the picnic trolleys and enjoying himself very, very much.

Keyleth is in a lovely but really unnecessarily complex gown that Vex had to help her get into and which will almost certainly end up on fire before the end of the night. She loves the opera so much you guys, she is leaning on the front railing of the box with her chin in her hands, gasping with every swell of music. She’s basically forgotten about the lich. She’s going to cry.

Next to her: Grog, seeming-ed into a beautifully tailored tuxedo. He looks dapper as fuck with his beard and bald head and little bow tie - he doesn’t like the restricted movement but he does enjoy being dapper. as. fuck. He’s doing his best with the opera: Keyleth is having to help him keep up with the plot and he has a lot of questions about why these people solve all their problems with singing instead of violence – but the music is starting to get to him, and by the end he’s going to have his elbows on the railing right alongside Kiki.

Pike is acting as their ‘bodyguard’, standing by the door to the box – mostly so she didn’t have to take off her armour. She’s going to do a good job of bodyguarding and be vigilant for lich business, but she’s enjoying the opera a lot – and she’s enjoying watching Grog enjoy the opera even more.

Vax declined to put down his daggers and get dressed up and sit in a box for several hours, instead he’s up in the rafters, watching the crowd, waiting for something suspicious to happen. He’s trying not to let himself enjoy the opera too much, because he feels like he needs to be Vigilant, but there are a lot of themes of family and loss and it’s giving him a small case of the feels. Luckily he’s in the perfect position to have a good brood about it without anyone knowing about it, bar the large yellow moth that’s landed on the beam beside him and seems almost as if it’s watching along with him. 

Scanlan is in the orchestra pit. Because Scanlan is conducting the opera. He had about 20 minutes to study the score after getting the real conductor blackout drunk, and he’s having the time of his life. He’s alert for strange goings-on among the players and on the stage but he’ll be damned if this isn’t going to be the greatest performance of The Barber of Zadash these people have ever given.

And meanwhile, in the box next door to VM, the Mighty Nein are at the opera... 

The Gentleman has sent them to keep an eye on the lead soprano, who is a Friend and Investment of his.

Caleb is in his Smart Caleb disguise, sitting perfectly still, suffering patiently through a set of mild flashbacks. At the peak of their training and brainwashing, the three young wizards would attend social events in Rexentrum. He’s remembering enjoying the opera with his friends. He’s not particularly enjoying this one. 

But he’s enjoying it more than his ‘date’, ‘Tracy’. Beau is wearing a slinky gown that she hates, and she’s got her hair down which she hates. She’s completely incapable of sitting still in her chair, and is bored and frustrated out of her mind. This all reminds her of her father’s pretensions to high culture and she hates it. The soprano’s hot, and that’s about all this entire exercise has going for it. She’s going to go to the bathroom four times in the first act. She’s sitting up on her haunches in her chair, spinning a throwing star like a fidget spinner, even though the chair’s really not big enough and her gown really isn’t supposed to stretch that way.

Jester is in the biggest dress with the most skirts any of the Nein have ever seen, absolutely dripping with jewels, gold tips on her horns. She knows and loves this opera – the soprano role is one her mother’s sung many times (and better than this soprano, which she will point out to the others ad nauseum). She’s clutching Fjord’s arm and making comments about how well the orchestra is playing and other versions of this opera she’s seen. He’s looking dapper and slightly stressed in a very nice suit that Jester insisted on actually purchasing for him even though he could absolutely have made himself look like this by magic. It’s got nautical buttons. He’s not really paying attention to the opera – he likes it well enough but this whole thing is making him deeply suspicious. He has a bad feeling about it. The Gentleman wouldn’t tell them what danger there was to his soprano. And also he thought he just saw a feather fall out of the rafters. Are there birds in here? There shouldn’t be birds in here, right?

Nott is seeminged as a young halfling girl. She likes the music, but she figures she can enjoy it while sneaking up and down the corridor stealing bits and pieces from the nobles in the other boxes. She avoids the room with the scary-looking gnome cleric standing at the door. At some point, she’s going to come across a bear eating a tray of cucumber sandwiches and they’re going to stare into each others’ eyes for a moment and then Nott will just… back away... 

Yasha’s sitting at the back of their box wearing a loose gown over the top of her normal clothes, and Beau is so angry that she’s got away with doing that - Yasha has no plans to let on how endearing Beau’s fury is. She’s reminded of the circus in a weird way – the trappings of the opera couldn’t be further from the sawdust and grifting and living hand to mouth and town to town… but in some ways it’s exactly the same. She misses Molly, and she misses Toya. And those feelings could be overwhelming, but she refuses to be overwhelmed, so she leans back in her chair, folds her arms and focuses on watching the soprano and the rest of the Nein. At one point, Nugget – who Jester blagged into the theatre as an emotional support dog – bamfs into her lap, and Yasha spends the rest of the opera petting him.

Caduceus is utterly enchanted – mostly with the intricacy of the orchestration and the costumes. He gave up following the plot and now he’s just watching the players’ fingers move. It’s the time he’s ever seen something like this and he’s amazed. He’s disguised as a human but he’s still so tall he has to sit in the back row of the box and can still see perfectly. He’s also seen Vax up in the rafters, but doesn’t think anything of it. After all, it must be a great vantage point to watch the stage from, he sort of wishes he’d thought of that. 

At some point, Jester realises that this is a great opportunity to make a little mischief for the Traveller, and sends a thaumaturgical fart that looks, sounds and smells as if it’s come from the conductor in the orchestra pit, right at a crucially quiet moment. The front row of the orchestra falter slightly in their playing, and the gnome in the tux turns around briefly, with an expression like he knows exactly what just happened, and his eyes lock on the giggling tiefling and then the soprano reaches a high note and liches explode out of the trap doors on the stage and everyone in the royal boxes rolls for initiative... 

[thesunlounge]

Reviews 102: Faint Waves

I have been wanting to write about the meditative exotica of Faint Waves (aka Justin Weems) for a while, but every time I get ready to do a write-up, I learn another release is imminent and so hold off. But now is the perfect time to look back at Faint Waves’ wonderful year, given that Justin has just issued his most accomplished and far-reaching sets of songs yet: the magically transportive and guitar-led Hideaways II EP (following up 2017′s standout Hideaways EP) and the jaw-dropping Paradise Lost on eclectics, featuring one of my favorite tracks all year in the Dream Chimney dub of the title track. One thing that stands out immediately from the entire Faint Waves catalog is the mastery of melody; almost every track Justin produces contains some sort of irresistible ear-worm hook that I’ll end up humming or whistling for days on end (see “Cherry Blossom” for perhaps the most potent example). And underneath the melodic magic, he synthesizes his varied interests in synth pop, new age, tropicalia, film soundtracks, chill out, and adult contemporary into an adventurous and narcotic balearic haze.

Faint Waves - The Night & The City (Self Released, 2018) “The Night & The City” is spread across three mixes, with the original’s intro marrying textured basslines to Steve Reich-ian idiophones. After a hushed pause, the beat drops alongside faux-brass melodies and epic string sadness, marching away until a beatless midtro sees trumpets wavering over chill-out bass. And after floating a while in this zoned out space, the propulsive rhythms return and transport us back to the late-night urban atmospheres. The “Big Chair Mix” sees the horn melodies of the original transposed to Mark Barrot-style new age vocal pads and accompanied by neon arpeggiations. The beat comes crashing in with a 90s ambient house flair…an echo smothered break-y rhythm ranking among Justin’s very best. And the original’s dramatic beatless section is made all the more powerful here, as heady vocal samples drift over Chromatics incantations. The “Fargo Mix” is more restrained, with harp patterns and vibrant mallet tones giving way to vintage vocal pads and bleary (french?) horns. The drums are now reduced to a heroin jazz sway, with deep natural kick and brushed snare work supporting the sundown ambiance. The remaining cut is “After Hours Dealing,” nailing the sound of rain soaked city streets late at night with its feverish house pads and bass synth comforts. Marimbas and brass weave twilight nostalgia over a snare, kick, and hi-hat pulse while cerebral noises flash in the ether and moments of cinematic ascendency rush in, with everything flowing upwards towards a turbulent sky and noir horns breaking through the clouds like streaks of moonlight.

Faint Waves - Rain Rhythms, Vol. 1 (Self Released, 2018) Gentle yet effected rainfall underlies every moment here, joining first the smooth e-pianos, drums, and soft basslines of “Rain Rhythms No. 1.” This one evokes wistful views of a calm and grey sea from a faraway window, with every sound filtered through delicate yet tripped out echo fx. For “Rain Rhythms No. 2,” sparse dubwise hand drums sit below pads swelling in angelic harmony. It’s like a warm glowing fog, with pitter-patter cymbals keeping time, glassy vibraphones decaying to the horizon, and a midsection of floating beatless reverie. Piano and synthetic woodblock drift on waves of sunshine in “Rain Rhythms No. 3,” with a far-reaching and emotional melody played on pads sounding like heavenly sirens. I’m reminded of Aeoliah’s Angel Love, with transportive ivory heartache flowing above hazy rainforest rhythmics and affecting new age spells. And as time progresses, I find “Rain Rhythms No. 4” more and more compelling. It’s a deep plod into the heart of a dark forest, with sparse tambourine sounds forming the only rhythm aside from occasional kick drums. Wavering and slightly dissonant pads intertwine with deliriously beautiful yet heavily compressed pianos, while marimbas fall like water dripping off leaves. This is one of the few times unsettling and ominous vibes peak their way into the Faint Waves soundworld and their presence is all the more effective and interesting given the sharp contrast with the flowing beauty of the preceding three pieces.

Faint Waves - Amarsi Un Po (Self Released, 2018) “Amarsi Un Po” is a slight detour into the world of old Italian film soundtracks and pop, with string synths swelling in an orchestral prelude for the mediterranean flow to come. An airy drum shuffle, organic and embellished by thunderous timpani drums, is accompanied by sprightly music box melodies and irresistible reed instruments. And at some point the beats drop out, giving way to a string and acoustic guitar interlude evoking springtide romances, with adventurous solo flourishes and the sounds of coastal sunshine. Even better is the “Island Mix”, with seabirds and oceanic samples underlying the building string atmospheres. The rhythms here have a hypnotic flow rather than a shuffling stutter and the mediterranean reeds are replaced by spacious flutes and tropical marimbas. The guitar interlude is still preset, only now the six-string is smothered in celestial reverb and mostly floats alone, aside from foggy string plucks and the ever present sounds of nature. The Sketches from an Island vibes are strong on this one.

Faint Waves - Paradise Lost (eclectics, 2018) “Paradise Lost” comes to life on a swaying hand percussion groove and blowing synth wind. Rainsticks and deep blue ocean chords sweep in alongside tropical chiming melodies and gleaming mallet instruments, their lilting descent recalling nothing so much as the seaside bliss outs of Bonnie & Klein. This is especially true as swelling cymbals lead to a moment of pure balearic wonder, with exotic acoustic guitar explorations over moving synth chord tidal waves. The Dream Chimney dub takes the magical template provided by Faints Waves and transforms it into some long lost Coyote jammer. The kick and double time cymbals flow hypnotically with massive dubbed out synthbass bouncing through space. New age chimes flow through the mix like some universal ether and the rattles of the rainsticks are every present, stretched and looped into a cosmic breath alongside the sunset pads. Glassy marimbas are locked into an otherworldly dance; a melancholic descent that I would be fine living in forever. And all the while, flashes of acoustic guitar are refracted through prismatic fx, hitting those prime Max Essa vibes. Wisely, the guitar-led beatless stretch is preserved, only now chimes fall like shooting stars and the guitar is heavily obscured by heady reverb and galactic synthesis.

For "Sea of Dreams,” seagulls fly and converse above washing waves. Cymbals swell and introduce a massive kick drum pulse, circled about by gentle bongos and melodious Angelo Badalamenti pads that wrap the body and soul in euphoric warmth. Mystical vibraphones dance in a playful jazz flow and at some point, the kick picks up steam to bring in a spellbinding trumpet solo, both incredibly surprising and masterfully played. Faint Waves has worked with brass before but never like this, with such naturalistic warmth in the impressive jazz runs, sounding as if Miles Davis was scoring a sunset on the adriatic. The Rollmottle mix sees skipping house rhythmics soaring over sparkling blue waves…percolating, hypnotizing, propulsive. And as deep house pads repeat in hallucinatory syncopation, a towering Italo bassline fades into focus, bring us right into that eclectics wonder zone of dark disco and slow motion future balearic. Rollmottle also takes the original marimbas and morphs them into balls of energy bouncing off the sides of the mix, while claps decay eternally over the vibing cymbal work. And after a crucial bass drum drop out leaving just soaring basslines and ocean ambiance, that amazing trumpet solo drops from the sky, now hovering in jazz majesty over the chugging rhythm storm.

Faint Waves - Hideaways II EP (Self Released, 2018) Hideaways II starts with one of the strongest Faint Waves tracks in “Bonita,” as woodblock introduces some truly stunning guitar work. My mouth was agape the first time I heard it, as nothing else in Justin’s catalog hinted at such romantic riffscapes and gorgeous moments of blue sky harmonization. It’s the kind of sonic addition that sweeps his music towards the upper echelons of balearica, referencing strongly Phil Mison, José Padilla, and especially the recent work of Blank & Jones in its mixing of vaguely Spanish six-string fantasies and placid tropical downtempo. And behind the sweeping acoustic layers, new age chimes splash like sea spray, hushed pads add stirring oceanic ambiance, and synth leads sparkle like golden starlight. If there is any justice, this one will appear on a future Milchbar // Seaside Season compilation. “Tanzania” follows with a powerful downbeat rhythm and chiming synths and flutey pads joining forest fauna, while rainsticks and jungle atmospheres background vocal pads shimmering with meditative new age splendor. But the actual melodies skew closer to downer 80s synth pop, resulting in a captivating mix as a new age/world music palette is used to craft something that would fit in an episode of Twin Peaks.

We then find ourselves afloat on the “Mystic River” as cymbal swells bring with them a melody that is hard to describe, causing me to choke up, tears to well, but also a sense of warmth…vivid nostalgia, fond memories of old, wistful romances. The track features Amparo and sits somewhere in that Tommy Awards and Farbror Resande Mac zone, with glacial downtempo married to cold glowing space atmospherics. The cymbals occasional skip in cerebral patterns and there are these soft narcotic guitar riffs, evoking Cocteau Twins, Talk Talk, and other classic examples of moving post-rock. Following this trip, we find ourselves in some clearing in the jungle, as the starlight of “Wind Whisper” shines down in overwhelming brilliance. The track sees Maricopa leaning synth work swirling together with understated yet affecting mallet instruments, all over a classy downtempo rhythm with hints of blissed out jazz in the swelling basslines and marching cymbals and shakers. The journey ends with a reprise of “Bonita” and synthetic waves and solitary woodblock underlying the deeply cinematic guitar playing. Its beauty is brought into sharp focus here, untethered as it is to any rhythms or synth atmospheres, with the delicate yet confident runs and harmonies floating out to that magical realm where the sea meets the sky.

(all images from the artist’s and label’s Bandcamps)

[drink-n-watch]

  Genre:  Supernatural, action, drama, mystery, romance

Episodes: 24

Studio: Bones

  Have you even seen The Happening? The evil tree movie by M. Night Shyamalan. I haven’t but I love watching reviews and parodies that rip it apart. So Imagine if that movie had been written by William Shakespeare, except in modern times and Shakespeare is 14. Also he just got dumped! That’s how you get Blast of Tempset!

Ok, ok… I’ll give you a real synopsis although if you do watch this series, you’ll see that my synopsis was brilliant! Take two:

Rougly a year ago, someone murdered beautiful young Aika Fuwa, leaving behind a loving older brother who’s turned his pain into a thirst for revenge at all cost, and a grieving boyfriend who’s numbed himself to the world. How is it even possible to move on from such an enchanting young creature? Mahiro and Yoshino are going to have to find an answer quick because something is turning people into metal statues. And a magical girl stuck on a deserted island, needs their help.

yup I only picked this show because of AniList, no other reason

I picked up Blast of Tempest because AniList told me to… Ok what actually happened was that I watched In/Spectre last season and it reignited my interest in these type of supernatural action stories. It wasn’t a perfect series but it still left me wanting to see more. As I was going through the page for that show, AniList had a row of suggested “similar” titles and Blast of Tempest was first in line.

I took one look at those beautiful classic Bones character designs and in my Crunchyroll queue it went.

Like I mentioned, the series is from Bones, a studio with production values I happen to admire and respect. It doesn’t have a signature look but it’s willing to play with styles and techniques and usually puts out titles with great attention to visuals and animation. I often love how Bones’ shows look. Granted, Blast of Tempest dates back to 2012 and the studio was much less adventurous with production at that time. But it still looks great.

Yoshino and Mahiro have a complicated relatonship

The high point of the production (in my opinion) is definitely the detailed and varied character designs. These stay fairly consistent and with a wide array of conventionally pretty anime boys and girls, it’s fairly easy to find someone you enjoy looking at. The animation is good, and there certainly is a lot of it in the series, but occasional shortcuts are visible. Stills or jerky movement due to lowered frame number, that sort of thing. This said, the animation is good. Don’t get it twisted. The show is almost constantly in movement and there are very few hiccups. A lot of new releases don’t live up to this.

On the flip side, the soundtrack was probably the low side, at least for me. There are some elements of this story that I find annoying but for the most part it was an interesting action mystery blend with some great supernatural elements. But the presentation really emphasized those annoying bits and by that I mean the music. The voice acting was a touch overly stern but that didn’t bother me as much. Oh and the main cast is entirely female! That blew my mind! Mahori doesn’t sound like a young boy, he infidelity sounds like a gravelly young man. Yuuko Sanpei is unbelievable!

The score though was, objectively speaking, rather pretty. The entire series had this grand orchestral soundtrack with sweeping pieces. And I mean the entire series. You know when you’re watching a show and you get to the climax of the season. Maybe there’s a huge reveal, maybe it’s the emotional catharsis, and the music swells with grandiose importance filling the scene and punctuating the significance of the moment. You get that 3 to 5 times an episode in Blast of Tempest. It is so overbearing and makes everything come across needlessly dramatic but not so much so that it’s parody.

My entirely unhelpful analysis is that the soundtrack was entirely too “intense” and loud…

which occasionally applies to the characters as well, but I still like them

And the story really didn’t need to be any more dramatic than it already was. It constantly references Shakespeare… I use to really dislike Shakespeare when I was a kid. I thought his works were just ridiculously overrated and often trite. Yes, I was a very insufferable kid… With time I’ve grown to appreciate the bard. He’s still not my favourite but I do think the prestige was earned and I respect the contribution to modern fiction.  And I have to say the Tempest was and is my favourite of his plays. Having it quoted throughout the series is kind of sweet. But anything that spends that much time quoting tragedies (there’s more Hamlet than Tempest..) is bound to have moments of melodrama. And there certainly are more than a few.

I was able to soldier through mostly because I really wanted to now what was happening and because there was something under the stereotypical flat characters. Mahiro and Yoshino who carry the first half of the series seem like shallow stock characters with fanservicey tropes. The fiery rebel with a heart of gold! The mysterious calm one…with a heart of gold… Fine but nothing special. However there was always something just a bit off. And against all expectations, in the end, both were just petty side characters which in itself is pretty amazing.

fanservice for all!

Then there is Aika. The character is dead before the beginning of the series but we see her in some way in almost each episode. And she is the most important character was far as the plot goes. She is the catalyst for everything. And boy did I not like her. She’s very very pretty but beyond that it’s just the slightly mean and rather dull. Around the end of the series we get to meet her, except… it’s someone different.This girl is fun and charming and a lot nicer. I like this girl, I understand why the boys would too. But why did she change now?

And that’s when it hit me. We never actually got to see Aika, we got to see the memories and dreams of Aika of two boys that love her. And you know, the heart is deceitful above all things. There is no less reliable a narrator than one who is in love! And of course Mahiro and Yoshino felt hollow. They were husks of their former selves. And they also grow a lot in time.

It’s surprisingly subtle and well sustained character development out of a show that’s often clumsy with dialogue and way to on the nose with both symbolism and reveals. And there are a lot of reveals. I saw a few coming, some had me baffled and a few left me with my jaw hanging opening and staying up late to see what happens next.

I love this image of Aika

I feel like I’ve talked a lot and didn’t say much. OK bottom line, Blast of Tempest is like a supernatural soap opera with moments of very smart writing sprinkled in a see of immature narration. And I enjoyed it. The characters were pretty to look at, if you disregard the music you get the impression that the series doesn’t take itself to seriously and the supporting cast is very charming!

It’s only superficially similar to In/Spectre. This said if you like magic and evil trees (oh yeah, there’s a lot of evil trees….somehow I forgot to mention that….) and the screencaps look good to you. I say give Blast of Tempest a watch. I had a good time with it.

Favourite character: Hanemura!

What this anime taught me: I want a sweater with a big letter I on it!

his name is Yoshino you see…

If life gives you lemons, Add VODKA

Suggested drink: Shirley Tempest

Every time anyone mentions “Yoshino’s girlfriend” – take a sip

Every time Mahiro and Hazane bicker – take a sip

Every time we see a flip phone – take a sip

Every time Aika goes on a date – gasp

Every time Yoshino lies – shake your head and take a sip

Every time we see Aika’s selfie – take a sip (selfie on a flip phone is just weird…)

Every time Yoshino wears his glasses – squint

Every time a talisman breaks – take a sip

Every time anyone quotes Shakespeare – get some water, you don’t want to die

Every time anyone talks of the “world’s logic” – take a sip

Every time we see scary scary butterflies –  close your eyes

Every time Fraulein Yamamoto introduces herself – raise your glass

Every time we see the stars – take a sip

Every time Hazane is naked – clutch your pearls!

It’s a pretty sow, my Pinterest board ended up rather full. Here’s a taste

      Blast of Tempest – The Happening 2 Genre:  Supernatural, action, drama, mystery, romance Episodes: 24 Studio: Bones Have you even seen The Happening? The evil tree movie by…