#can we go back to sampling some niche songs from the first half of the 20th century? | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

grimelords · 5 years ago

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October Playlist

My October playlist is finished and it’s complete from Rico Nasty to Rachmaninoff. I absolutely guarantee there’s something you’ll love in this 3 and a half hours of music, and probably something you’ll hate too! Something for everyone!

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Santeria - Pusha T: In anticipation of Jesus Is King I relistened to the entire Wyoming Sessions project a few times, and a year removed from all the hype and controversy here's the thing: it's fucking great. The individual albums ranged pretty widely in quality and felt slightly unfinished for how short they were sometimes, but taking the project as a whole 5-album 120 minute playlist it turns out it's a masterpiece. My personal tracklist goes Ye/Daytona/Nasir/KTSE/Kids See Ghosts, which isn't release order but I think makes it flow the best - both Kanye albums bookending it and the less impactful Nas and Teyana Taylor albums buried a bit further in where you can appreciate them now that you're deep in the mindset of the whole thing rather than alone on their own.

Puppets (Succession Remix) - Pusha T & Nicholas Brittel: This remix is such a perfect match: Pusha T’s corporate villainy finally given a context and prestige it deserves. It’s also short enough that it could feasible be the actual theme song next season, which would be a marked improvement imo.

Use This Gospel - Kanye West, Clipse & Kenny G: I am and remain a Kanye stan, even after everything. It’s nice to see him going back to the extremely uneven mastering of MBDTF era, it’s a sound that is uniquely his and it’s fun to see him revisit it. The thick vocoder harmony is so soupy you get lost in it, and the way it opens up to include the full choir in the No Malice verse is beautiful. Kanye reunited Clipse through Christ and we have Him to thank for that at least. The Kenny G break is great, and the grain and dirt on the whole track when the beat kicks in is so gritty you can feel it.

Man Of The Year - Schoolboy Q: I didn't love the Chromatics album they surprise released but it did thankfully remind me of the time Schoolboy Q sampled Cherry for Man Of The Year. Taken exclusively on lyrics, Man Of The Year is a triumph: he's the man of the year and it's all worked out but the sample and the beat underscores the dead eyed melancholy that runs through the whole of Oxymoron of never winning even when you've won.

Cold - Rico Nasty: This song fucking tears your face off. Imagine STARTING your album at this level of intensity. She just goes straight to 100 and burns the house down. Outside of Lil John so few rappers can get away with just straight up screaming in the adlibs but the way she just lung tearingly screams GOOOO through this is fucking sick.

Fake ID - Riton & Kah-Lo: TikTok songs are becoming their own genre, but it’s a very nebulous sort of a mood encompassing everything from aughts pop punk hooks to skipping rope raps like this. It’s a strange new way for songs to blow up that everyone seems compelled to write articles about but my take on it is it’s exactly the same as ads were in the old days. Remember how many songs did absolute numbers because someone put it in a Motorola ad? Same thing except you’re not being sold a phone this time, so in some ways it’s better. Anyway, this song bangs. The spirit of 212 era Azealia Banks lives on even if she’s doing her best ever since then to kill it.

Doctor Pressure - MYLO & Miami Sound Machine: There was a very good era in the mid-2000s where you could just put mashups out as singles and they’d chart, it was sick. My only two examples are this and Destination Calabria but I’m sure there’s more. Drop The Pressure is a masterpiece but as an alternate version this mashup is equally masterful.

If You’re Tarzan, I’m Jane - Martika: Martika is unfortunately best known for the 1989 one hit wonder Toy Soldiers, a sort of boring overdramatic ballad which is best known for being sampled by Eminem in 2004 in his quite bad super duper serious song Like Toy Soldiers. I say unfortunately because every other song on her first album is great, it’s all hypercolour 80s synthpop and I love this song especially because it is so completely stuffed with activity it becomes dizzying. It gets so lost in itself that they completely abandon the dramatic pause before “I’m Jane” for some reason toward the end and instead just layer three different tracks of vocal adlibs. Every part of this song is great, the weird ‘o we o we o’ chant before the second verse? The neighing horse guitar before the bridge? The musical tour of the world IN the bridge? The part where she says ‘I want to swing on your vine?’. This song has everything.

You Got Me Into This - Martika: Every part of the instrumentation in this is amazing. The bass sound, the main synth, the extremely athletic brass, the wonderful echoing 80s snare that’s as big as a house. I just love it. She also does some really intriguing slurs on the word ‘love’ all the way through, just moving it around absolutely anywhere.

Space Time Motion - Jennifer Vanilla: I love when someone has such a clearly defined aesthetic and mission from the very beginning. Jennifer Vanilla is the alter ego of Becca Kaufmann from Ava Luna who I've had in this playlist before but never competely investigated. Jennifer Vanilla feels like an episode of Sex And The City where Samantha gets really into Laurie Anderson and she is incredible. This video is the best mission statement I’ve ever seen and is currently criminally underviewed so please do your part and support the Jennifer cause by watching these two videos.

So Hot You’re Hurting My Feelings - Caroline Polachek: Caroline Polachek said watch me write a Haim song and did it. Apparently the very early versions of this album started when she was in writing sessions for Katy Perry, but then it started to turn into something else and she took it for herself, and I think you can hear that. With more normal production and a little faster this is a hundred percent a Katy Perry song, but instead it’s completely uniquely Caroline Polachek and it’s all the better for it. And also Katy Perry must be furious because her new songs are simply not good at all.

Electric Blue - Arcade Fire: I just love the obsession of this song in the outro, chanting over and over and over “Cover my eyes electric blue, every single night I dream about you”

Promiscuous - Nelly Furtado and Timbaland: I got a youtube ad for one of those Masterclass videos the other day and it was Timbaland teaching production. This ad went for five minutes for some reason and I watched the whole thing and it made me admire Timbaland even more. He’s demonstrating his compositional technique which is basically to just beatbox, and then loop it, and then add some extra percussion layers with more beatboxing and hand percussion, then loop that and add a little melody by singing or humming. ‘It’s that simple’ he says. Then later he goes back in and puts in actual drums or synths or whatever. I was stunned because suddenly a lot of his music makes sense. Without the barrier of instrument or timbre to get hung up on it allows him to write from this instantly head-nodding place of just making up a little beat you can sing and dance to immediately. Listening to a lot of his music now you can hear the bones underneath everything so clearly, all his beats are supremely beatboxable and all his melodies are very hummable, they’ve never overcomplicated by instrumental skill or habits, they just exist to serve the song.

Serpent - TNGHT: TNGHT are back baby and this song is like nothing I’ve ever heard before. It feels like afrofuturist footwork from another dimension, the mbira sounding lead against the oil drum percussion in this cacophony of yelps and screams that just builds to an irrepressible energy without a bassline in sight.

Ghosts Of My Life - Rufige Kru: I'm reading Mark Fisher's Ghosts Of My Life right now and some good person has put together a spotify playlist of all the songs he mentions. He has a whole essay about why this song is sick so I’m not going to go into it here but it’s interesting to hear about someone growing up with jungle when it’s a genre that has always felt very niche to me. I guess partly as a result of it never really making it mainstream as a genre here, and also me being a little too young for it.

Renegade Snares - Omni Trio: My biggest introduction to drum and bass comes from the game Midnight Club 3: Dub Edition and this really great song from the soundtrack that is finally on spotify after a very long absence. At almost the exact same time as I discovered this song with its spacious piano and repitched snares, I discovered Venetian Snares and breakcore in general. Having no particular frame of reference for breakcore as an offshoot of drum and bass only amplified its appeal to me as a completely alien genre that sounded like nothing else I’d ever heard, and so my personal history with drum and bass is a story of walking backwards into it after the fact which is interesting if not helpful.

Punching In A Dream - The Naked And Famous: The Mark Fisher book also mentions the Tricky song which I’ve never heard from which The Naked And Famous got their name and I thought ‘man remember The Naked And Famous, they were sick?’. The sort of harder edged Passion Pit instrumentation mixed with pop punk, a winning combination.

Vegas - Polica: My favourite part of this song is the unexpected blastbeats after the chorus, using their two drummers to their full advantage and just shaking the song by its foundations every now and then lest you get too comfortable.

Right Words - Cults: I’m beginning to suspect I may be the last surviving Cults stan but if this be my lot I’ll gladly do it

Running From The Sun - Chromatics: The new Chromatics album got me to relisten to their definitive document Kill For Love, and something new I appreciated this time about an album I love a lot is its length. Kill For Love is almost 80 minutes long and it luxuriates in that length. It’s sequenced perfectly so it never feels like it’s long for no reason, but large chunks just completely space out and go out of focus in the soft neon light and the second half of this song is a good example. The whole thing just evaporates into smoke and it feels perfect. If this were a shorter and more concise song that had a proper ending it wouldn’t feel right, this whole album has no straight edges at all and it’s all the better for it.

Chance - Angel Olsen: I cannot belive this song. This feels like she wrote her own version of My Way looking forward instead of back. Instead of the ruefully triumphant "I've lived a life that's full / I've traveled each and every highway" it's “I don't want it all / I've had enough / I don't want it all / I've had a love." before the turn from the future to the present at the end, where she gives up on a forever love in exchange for right now. I love how raw this vocal take feels. It's not her best voice but it feels very very honest as a result. She's just singing her heart out in this huge showstopping closer. In an interview she said "I didn’t love the recording of it very much, and now I just feel in love with it as a closing statement, because it’s a way of saying, ‘Look, I have hope for the next thing in my life.’ I’m not going to anticipate negativity or hate or an end. But instead of us looking towards forever, why don’t we just work on right now?"

Something To Believe - Weyes Blood: This album just keeps paying dividends. I’m systematically going through long obsessive periods with every single song on it and now it’s Something To Believe’s turn.

Don’t Shut Me Up (Politely) - Brigid Mae Power: Without meaning to, Brigid Mae Power seems to have created some incredible fusion of folk music and stoner metal. The way this song absolutely sits unmoving on one deep and resonant chord for so long is amazing. When it does change chords it feels like a full body effort to get up and shift. She has a similar feeling to Emma Ruth Rundle, who more explicitly wears her metal influences, but Brigid Mae Powers' strength is in how much it resembles the traditional folk side of the spectrum. Her voice is also amazing, with the huge effortless runs she goes on about halfway through just coming unmoored from the song completely and floating off into space.

Sweetheart I Ain’t Your Christ - Josh T. Pearson: I had a real problem with Josh T. Pearson for a long time because of how he presents as so authentic on this album, and as I’ve previously discussed in these playlists the concept of authenticity in country music is a source of neverending anguish for me. But his newest album The Straight Hits! has largely cured that for me because it’s not good at all, is extremely contrived (all the song titles have the word ‘hit’ in them) and he’s shaved his beard and replaced it with one of the worst irony moustaches I’ve ever seen. So now I’m free to enjoy The Last Of The Country Gentlemen as a character construction, which allows me a far deeper and truer engagement than the idea of a man actually living and thinking like this which is frankly a little embarrassing.

Codeine Dream - Colter Wall: I love this song, it has that feeling that great folk songs do of feeling like you’ve always known it. The strongest moments on this Colter Wall album to me are in songs like this that chase this particular feeling of morose isolation, and where he leans away from storytelling like his biggest hit Kate McCannon - a kind of cliche country murder ballad. This song is fantastic because of the way it wallows in this black depression not as a low point, but as a reprieve from the lower previous point. Things are as bad as they get now, and they’re always going to be like this, but at least I don’t dream of you anymore.

Motorcycle - Colter Wall: I only just found out about Colter Wall this month and have been listening to this album over and over. When I first heard him I though it was strange I'd never heard of him before because he's obviously some old country veteran based off his voice, but it turns out he's 24 and this is his first album he just sings like he ate a cigar. I love this song especially because it's so straighforward. It's a simple and supremely relatable mood: what if I bought a motorbike and fucking died.

Who By Fire - Leonard Cohen: I watched American Animals a couple of weeks ago and it’s a great movie, highly recommended. This song plays near the end and I waited for the credits to find out what this great song was, and like a rube found out it’s only one of the most celebrated songwriters of all time. I’ve never had much of a Leonard Cohen phase, somehow. In my mind I always get him mixed up with Lou Reed, which I’m learning is actually way off. I love the harmony vocals in this, and the way they move around into the shadows in the ‘who shall I say is calling’ parts.

Words From The Executioner To Alexander Pearce - The Drones: Alexander Pearce was a convict who escaped Sarah Island’s penal settlement in Tasmania with seven other convicts in 1822. He was recaptured two months later alone. In 1823 he re-escaped with a fellow convict, Thomas Cox and again was returned alone.He was executed by hanging later having eaten six men during his escape attempts.

It Ain’t All Flowers - Sturgill Simpson: I found this album going through the Pichfork 200 albums of the decade list and I feel like a fool for not having heard it sooner because now I am completely obsessed. Sturgill Simpson is doing the very best work in country music right now because he's looking backwards with one eye and forwards with the other and this song is a great illustration: a perfect Hank Williams Jr type country song with big voiced hollers that morphs into a surprise psych freakout for the whole second half.

Desolation Row (Take 1, Alternate Take) - Bob Dylan: I’ve always liked Desolation Row a lot as a song but the acoustic guitar on the album version is simply not good, it's just kind of mindlessly playing this long directionless solo the whole time and over the course of a song this long it really adds up to just being annoying. Luckily because it’s a Bob Dylan song there’s a whole universe of alternate takes and mixes and this is a great pared down version I found without it. The best kind of Bob Dylan songs are the ones where he just makes an endless stream of allusions and bizzare imagery, and this and Bob Dylan's 115th Dream are my favourite examples of it.

Living On Credit Blues - El Ten Eleven: This is a groove I get stuck in my head a lot, and this is also a song I think would work well as a theme for a tv show. I've been meaning to do a 30 second edit of it just for my own amusement, maybe I'll do that soon. El Ten Eleven are a duo where one guy plays drums and one guys plays a double necked guitar/bass and looping pedals and somehow against all the odds of that description they manage to make emotional, driving instrumental music of very deep feeling, like this song which is one of my all time favourites.

Dusty Flourescent/Wooden Shelves - Talkdemonic: This is sort of a companion Living On Credit Blues, and Talkdemonic are similarly an instrumental duo with good drums. This entire album from 2005 is highly recommended, it's a sort of halfway between the post rock of the time and a kind of acoustic hiphop instrumentals that ends up sounding very rustic and homemade, like a soudtrack for a winter cabin.

Turnstile Blues - Autolux: This is a perfect song, built around a perfect beat. Every part just fits perfectly.

Fort Greene Park - Battles: The new Battles album is finally out and I absolutely love it. I cannot think of another band that has shed members in the same way as Battles; originally a quartet on their first album, then a trio for their second and third and now down to a duo for their fourth album - and somehow still performing material from their first album live. The paring down has seemingly only servers to focus them and the new album sounds fresh but still distinctively Battles, with no sense of anything lost or missing. This song is my standout so far, and the guitar line in particular is so good and interesting to me because I don’t think I’ve ever heard Ian Williams play something so distinctly guitar-y in his whole career. This is a straight up pentatonic riff with bends and everything. Filtered through his usual chopped and looped oddness it feels like he’s almost gone all the back around the guitar continuum and is this close to just doing power chords next album. And I’ll support him!

Diane Young - Vampire Weekend: I've listened to this song a lot in my life and I only looked up the lyrics the other day to find out that the opening line is 'you torched a SAAB like a pile of leaves' which I somehow never noticed. What a power phrase. There's also this very good quote from Ezra about it: "I had this feeling that the world doesn’t want a song called ‘Dying Young’,“ says Koenig, "it just sounded so heavy and self-serious, whereas ‘Diane Young’ sounded like a nice person’s name.”" and he was right to do it. This song is 100 times better because he’s saying Diane Young than it would be if he was saying ‘Dying Young’. That’s a songwriting tip for you.

Monster Mash - Bootsy Collins & Buckethead: Hey did you hear Bootsy Collins and Buckethead did a cover of the monster mash? Thank god for freaks.

The Dark Sentencer - Coheed And Cambria: There's not that many bands that I absolutely loved as a teenager that I've completely abandoned. I've moved on from a lot but I'll still keep up with them if they have a new album or something. Coheed And Cambria are one that I've almost completely turned my back on. They've had 3 apparently pretty patchy albums since I stopped listening after Year Of The Black Rainbow, which was extremely bad and really taught me what people mean when they say an album is 'overproduced'. On a whim I decided to see what they're up to now and listened to their album from last year and guess what: it rocks. It's got everything you'd expect from them: big riffs, bad and confusing lyrics, his weird high voice, overwrought and overlong songwriting, cheesy muscleman solos. Everything about this band is sort of cheesy and embarrassing and takes itself way too seriously, but I'm discovering slowly that that's what's so good about it. The weird pulp sci-fi story and mindset that underpins this whole band is ridiculous and overwrought and as a result it gives the music a reason to exist the way it does. It’s so big and dumb because the story it serves is so big and dumb. It feels exactly like reading Perry Rhodan or some increidibly long and dense but not especially good series like that, it’s pulp music and that’s what I love about it.

Romance In A (6 Hands) - Sergei Rachmaninoff: Piano works for 4 hands (where two guys sit next to each other on the same piano) have always seemed to tend towards the realm of the gimmick or party trick, and works for 6 hands (where three guys do it) even more so - but this Rachmaninoff piece is just beautiful and I can’t believe I haven’t heard of it before this month. It doesn’t overload everyone with a million things to do, it just builds this very wide harmonic bed for the simple melody to swim in - then the way the melody transfers over to the middle register is just magical before the tension of the final section takes over and builds.

Love's Theme - The Love Unlimited Orchestra: I’m so glad I got to learn about the Love Unlimited Orchestra this month. Aside from having one of the best names in music, they were Barry White’s backing band and had their own solo instrumental records too. Here’s a fun aside: Kenny G was a member when he was 17 and still in high school. This is a genre of music that has seemed to totally disappear into the realm of parody and farce only which is sort of a shame because it is unironically very beautiful and dense in its own way.

Dancing In The Moonlight - Liza Minelli: Can you believe I thought Dancing In The Moonlight by Toploader was an original until the other day when my girlfriend played this Liza Minelli version that predates it by several decades? This also isn’t the original! It was written by a band named King Harvest in 1972, with this version AND a version by Young Generation both coming out in 73 and a whole bunch of others in between (including a Baha Men version in 94) before Toploader finally had a proper hit with it in 2000. Truly the world works in mysterious ways. This version is the finest I think, it just goes and goes, frenetically unwinding at a breakneck pace before opening up into a flute solo of all things and then winding up again even and finishing in a kick line breakdown. Absolutely no limits.

Girls - Royal Headache: The sheer amount of power and melody that this song manages to pack into a minute and a half is incredible, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more instantly relatable opening lyric than “Girl! Think they’re to fine for me! Oh girls! And I’m inclined to agree!”

Pov Piti - Matana Roberts: In anticipation of Matana Roberts new volume of her Coin Coin album series that just came out I relistened through the three previous albums and they are even more powerful than I remembered. This song serves as a pretty good mission statement for the whole project, and the heartrending tortured screams that open it set the tone for the rest of it. Matana Roberts sings the injustices of slavery into being, and her sing-song delivery highlights the trauma - her indifferent delivery mirroring the indifference of the world at large. The way she rattles off this story like she’s gone over it a million times and grown numb to the facts only accentuates the pain in the telling, a pain that rises to the surface in the screams of her instrument and herself.

Kingdoms (G) - Sunn 0))): This new Sun 0))) album is one of my favourites they’ve ever done because it’s so straightforward and back to basics. Every song is just ten minutes of straight up no-nonsense, big, rich, drone. They even put the notes in the track names so you can drone along if you like.

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purplesurveys · 5 years ago

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694

What song are you listening to right now? I’m not listening to anything but the last song I played was Violet by Daniel Caesar; I don’t actually know the song but it was part of a playlist on Spotify. Admit it -- you want a Snuggie. What design/color? I don’t even know what that is, but if it came in pink I’d want one. Do you prefer movies at home or movies at the theatre? Home is cozier and costs much less, haha. How many songs does your iTunes have? Ooh, I haven’t used my iTunes in like half a decade buuuut I think it peaked with around 400-500 songs? Idk, I didn’t explore much as a kid and I liked to stick with my favorite singers/bands. Do you take a shower in the morning or the night before? When I’m off school I like to shower at night - much more comfy that way, and I fall asleep faster. But when I have to leave the house whether to go to school, the mall, to crash at someone’s place, etc. I always bathe a few hours before. Always. I hateeeeee not feeling fresh when I go outside.

What's your academic niche? (History, math, science, etc.) History for sure, but there are some science topics I’m also okay in. Who's your youngest teacher? They’re all already pretty seasoned lol I can’t actually tell. I think it’s Ma’am Cai; welp, at least among my current professors, she’s the one that acts the youngest. Have you ever had the samples people offer you at Costco? I’ve never been in a Costco but I typically don’t get samples from our local groceries because idk, they just look nasty :/ The only samples I get are the free ones they hand over at Starbucks and Coffee Bean, haha. If you had to name your kid after a food, what would his/her name be? I’d take olives and turn it to Olivia, which was always my choice for a girl anyway. But if it really had to be food-inspired I’d go with... Brie for a girl, or Sage for a boy. Miley Cyrus: Inspirational role model or a ho? Get with the times, 2009 survey. This question won’t get away with that word today. Anyway, Miley is a badass. I never changed my mind about her, maybe except for that time she did that performance with Robin Thicke. Are you stressed about anything? Right now no. I’m on a six-week break, I wanna enjoy it without thinking about the stuff that would typically stress me out. When's the last time you had a rock, paper, scissors match? It’s been a few months. What's your favorite anime? I don’t watch anime... the only show I got into was Pokemon. Did you cry when Ash let his Butterfree go with the other Butterfrees? I vaguely remember that but I probably got sad over it when I was younger. Don't you hate it when Facebook auto-corrects your smiley faces and hearts? I don’t mind it. Skinny, flared, ripped, or faded jeans? Ugh I hate all of these. I have a lot of skinny jeans in my closet but they’re always a last resort - my go-to these days is mom jeans. What are you excited for? Meh, nothing in particular. I wanna say my birthday? but who knows what the world is gonna come to be by then. Are you part of the Farmville cult? No I never played. I wasn’t allowed to make a Facebook account at the time when games like that and Petville and Plants vs. Zombies were big. What were you for Halloween? Last year I went as Dora. AND IT WAS SO ANNOYING because the party we were invited to prohibited shorts??? And 1) Dora wore shorts and 2) I searched far and wide for a pair of orange shorts? It was the first time I heard of a dress code that strict for a college party lmao I couldn’t believe it. Thankfully Rita had just bought a pair of orange jeans so she let me borrow those. Have you ever had braces? Back in high school. What year of high school are you in? I am not. What's your favorite flower? Peonies. Would you ever bleach your hair? Probably not. My hair has faced enough damage. Have you ever stood on a frozen solid body of water? No. That sounds scary though. I’ve heard and watched people fall through ice :/ Would you ever take up smoking or drinking? I’m already doing both. Thanks, college and peer pressure! Do those girls with 1,000 friends on Facebook REALLY have that many? I dunno, who knows? It’s always possible. I have a bigger problem with the fact that this question just singled out girls lmao. What holiday is your birthday closest to? Uhh Earth Hour, if it counts? If not, we have Araw ng Kagitingan on April 9 which commemorates the Fall of Bataan during WWII. Are you cyberdyslexic? Is this even a thing? I’ve never heard of this until today. Are you regular dyslexic? No. Is there irregular dyslexia? :((( What would your name be if you were a boy? I don’t know. My parents didn’t think about this either I think. Which person from way back when would you love to hang out with? My great grandpa. Either him or his cousin who wrote a book on history. What color are your eyes? Dark brownnnnnnn ugh this will FOREVER be in surveys won’t it. The forever on-going question: Is Twilight stupid or actually brilliant? It’s so stupid. BUT I LOVE IT ok. Did you carve pumpkins for Halloween this year? No. We don’t do that here. Does your family use a real pine tree or a plastic one for Christmas? I think most households here use artificial trees. I was already a little old when I found out other countries would use real trees. Do you know anyone with a play-on name? (Chris P. Bacon, Justin Case, etc.) Not personally but super recently someone named their kid COVID BRYANT and it was all over social media for a few days. Covid Bryant. Let that shit sink in. Only Filipinos, man. Do you have any foreign exchange students at your school? Yeah, mostly Koreans and Japanese people. If you had a week to live, what would you do? I don’t have much of a choice, do I... I’m gonna be stuck at home and do the stuff I’ve already been doing in the last three weeks, and just hope I had fun.

Are you good at brain teasers? Some, but I don’t enjoy doing them in general. Is your handwriting nice? I can handle a pen pretty well, if I do say so myself. I have a neater penmanship than most people I know. What's your second language? English. Is it uncomfortable for you to take showers in glass stalls w/out curtains? Not really but the door has to be locked. Finish the sentence: Remember, remember... The fifth of November? I dunno why I know about that though. Did you understand Shakespeare? No. I always bought the No Fear Shakespeare editions cos I had absolutely no patience to try and understand the original text. What do you want to be when you're older? Rich. What's your favorite dog breed? Golden retriever or pitbull. Are you one of those people who take like, 50 Facebook quizzes at a time? I’ve never taken a Facebook quiz. What was the last shot you got? It was at the roof of my mouth, back when I had a tooth extraction. Ever gotten cavities? A few times. Can you differentiate between the words "your" and "you're?" Yes. Do you use hair ties as bracelets? Lmao always. Don’t most girls do this? What was the last school project you did that you couldn't wait to turn in? My book report for my business journalism class. After I proofread it like 6 times and triple-checked the word count, I couldn’t waitttt to get rid of it. Have you ever graded papers? Sure. I’ve said it in past surveys, but my org hosts journalism workshops to interested schools, whether they’re in elementary, high school, or college. At the end of the day they have to come up with their own articles, and then we check each of them, correct the mistakes, grade them, and give it back to them with our comments. What was your favorite year of school up to this point? Third year of high school. I don’t really have a favorite year of college... I had lows in each of them. What's the latest you've ever woken up? 11 AM. Can you recite the alphabet backwards? For a time I did cos Angela taught me. Then I just never sang it again so I ended up forgetting. If you could master one language in thirty minutes, what would it be? Korean. Are you a sucker for foreign accents? No. Sometimes I find it hard to understand. Where were you born? Is it the same place you live currently? I was born somewhere in Manila, and I live faaar away from there now. How often do you remember your dreams? What did you last dream about? Only if I note them down on my phone. The last dream I remember having was too lengthy for me to want to type it all down, but it involved me and Gabie being exes, and she had her own kid hahaha. When did you learn the ninja turtles were named after Renaissance artists? Pretty early, I guess. I’ve never seen the show though. Do you do yoga? Nope.

#survey #surveys

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trillhouse-lh · 5 years ago

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Writer’s Block (Sin Adults)

> “Daaad… hey, Earth to dad.” > “Mmm,” Bobby grunted, not really paying attention as he typed away at his keyboard. At the doorway stood his daughter, wearing her usual overcoat and an irritated scowl on her face. > “Mmm?! That’s all you have to say?!” Robbie snapped. “Where the hell WERE you?!” She crossed her arms and tapped her foot as she waited for an answer… only to receive none. In fact, the man didn’t even seem to notice that she was talking to him. With a growl of frustration, she stormed across the study to her father’s chair. “HEY! Are you LISTENING?!” > “Not right now, sweetheart,” Bobby mumbled as he typed, not even glancing up from his screen for a moment. “Daddy’s worki-” Before he could finish, Robbie grabbed the back of his chair and spun him around to face her. “Hey!” > “Don’t you ‘hey’ me!” The girl barked. “You were supposed to pick me UP, you jerk!” > “Roberta Elizabeth Loud! Do NOT call your father a… wait, what time is it…?” Bobby glanced at the clock, his brow furrowing as he saw it was only 2:17 PM. “It’s… Roberta, what on Earth are you doing home this early?” > “It’s a HALF DAY, dad… we got out at NOON! I’ve been telling you all week!” Robbie shouted. “Do you have any idea how long I was waiting for you?!” As his daughter’s words sank in, Bobby’s look of confusion shifted to one of remorse. > “Oh… oh, geeze…” Bobby groaned and buried his face in his palm. He’d gotten so wrapped up in his writing that he’d completely forgotten he had to pick Robbie up from school, let alone pick her up early. “I’m sorry, sweetheart… I wasn’t-” > “You weren’t paying attention. Right,” Robbie huffed, looking away from him with a scowl. “What else is new…”

> “Robbie, I…” Bobby began, only to hang his head and sigh. “Why didn’t you call…?” > “I DID,” The girl shot back. “You didn’t answer.” Bobby cocked an eyebrow. > “You… hang on,” He said as he snatched his phone off his desk. “I never got any-” As he checked his phone, the man’s heart sank; there were fifteen missed calls. FIFTEEN, twelve of which were from his awaiting daughter… not to mention a slew of unnoticed text messages. “...Oh, shit…” He muttered. “I had it on silent...” > “OH! You had it on silent! Great!” Robbie said with a sarcastic roll of her eyes. “Never mind that I had to walk my ass all the way over here, it was just a mistake. And here I thought you were just ignoring me! Well, glad we cleared that up!” > “You WALKED? Honey, why didn’t you call Lemy?” > “Because he’s busy with job interviews all day. You know, like you TOLD him to do?!” She spat, making her father wince. ��And before you ask, mom and aunt Lupa were at work.” > “I know, I know… ugh.” Bobby lifted his reading glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. Robbie was right to be mad at him… he’d messed up, bad. With another sigh, he lowered his glasses and looked at his daughter apologetically. “Robbie, I’m really sorry. I was writing, and I-” > “You think that’s an excuse?!” > “No… no, of course not,” Bobby assured her. “This is my fault, simple as that. I swear, I’ll-” > “‘I’ll make it up to you’. I know,” Robbie grunted. She knew her father was being sincere, and she knew he hadn’t MEANT to brush her aside like that… he never did. > But it still stung. > “Whatever… I need some water,” Robbie said with a scoff, turning and skulking out of the room with her hands jammed into her jacket pockets. “Had a long walk, y’know?” Bobby sadly watched her go, then slumped back in his chair with a groan.

> “Nice, Bobby… nice,” The man grumbled under his breath, lightly beating his fist against the side of his head. He took a few moments to wallow in his own guilt before taking a deep breath through his nose and exhaling. He’d have to figure out a way to make things up to Robbie, but that could come later… for now, there was another matter to attend to. > Bobby frowned as he looked down at his phone. While the brunt of the missed calls had been from his daughter, there were also several from an ‘Alan’. Alan Douglas, specifically... Bobby’s literary agent, and the reason WHY he had put his phone on silent in the first place. > Alongside his many other projects, for nearly six years ‘R.J. Loud’ had been plugging away at one novel in particular: Memoirs of a Technician. Title pending. Something of a high-concept tale, told from the perspective of a lowly technician aboard an intergalactic freighter. It was one of his earliest ideas, and one he’d kept close to his heart for years… possibly even his magnum opus. Just a few weeks prior, he’d submitted his proposal to Alan. And now? Now, he was dodging the man’s calls as he continued writing his third draft. > Bobby chewed his lip, his thumb hovering anxiously over his agent’s name. Despite his best attempts to remain optimistic, he’d been through this song-and-dance far too many times before… he’d show them his finest work, work he had poured his very soul into, and time and time again it would be cast aside as though it were nothing more than rubbish. This time, he tried to tell himself, would be different. This time, his hard work would pay off. This time, people would finally be able to read the story he’d always wanted to tell. > So why was he hesitating?

> ‘Alright, Bobby… alright,’ He thought, taking a moment to collect himself. ‘Just get it over with. Whatever happens, it’s fine.’ Bobby took a deep breath and, finally, pressed down on Alan’s name to return his call. His leg bounced anxiously as he waited for the man to pick up. > [Alan Douglas speaking,] A clean and business-like voice spoke through the earpiece. > “...Hey, Alan.” Bobby said, trying his best to mask the lack of enthusiasm in his voice. “It’s me.” > [Oh, Robert! I’ve been trying to get in touch with you.] > “Yeah… I noticed. Sorry about that.” Bobby spun back around to face his computer and tried to get back to work, as though it would distract him from the bad news he no doubt was about to receive. “Well, let’s hear it.” > [You don’t sound particularly optimistic,] Alan said. His client merely gave a short, humorless laugh. > “Should I be?” He asked; Alan made a vague, indecisive noise that spoke volumes, and Bobby let out a sigh. “What’d they say?” > [Nothing, actually…] The agent said. Bobby stopped typing mid-sentence, his brow furrowing in confusion. > “Nothing…?” > [Well, no…] The man paused to clear his throat. [...That is to say, I haven’t actually spoken to a publisher yet. In fact, I only just finished looking it over today. Busy schedule, you know how it is.] > “Oh… I see.” Bobby muttered. This was somewhat unusual… usually if Alan had any feedback or suggestions he’d reach out through email. “Well, what did you think?” For a few moments Alan said nothing, seemingly mulling over his words. > [Right, well. It’s… different, to say the least,] Alan said in an unusual tone, as though forcing himself to sound supportive. [Not quite what one would expect from the genre.] Bobby slumped back in his chair and rubbed his temples, already beginning to feel a pit forming in his stomach.

> “...Is that a BAD thing, Alan?” > [No, not inherently…] The agent replied. [I just think it needs to be… REFINED a bit more before we can-] > “Look. Alan. Let’s not beat around the bush, alright?” Bobby cut in, his voice quiet and sullen. “Just give it to me straight. What did you think.” There was a heavy silence, broken only by Alan’s faint breathing; after what felt like an eternity, the man gave a deep sigh. > [Alright. To be frank, I have no idea how you expect me to sell this,] Alan said plainly. [Don’t get me wrong, it’s well-written, but-] > “But WHAT, Alan.” Bobby snarled. > [...BUT, if I’m being completely honest, it’s just… I honestly have no idea what you’re going for, here.] Alan said. [I mean, who’s this meant to appeal to, exactly?] > “It’s cerebral science fiction, Alan.” Bobby grunted, his fingers rapidly tapping against the armrest as he fought to keep himself calm. “It’s a niche genre.” > [You think I don’t know that?] Alan retorted. [There’s cerebral, and then there’s… whatever the hell THIS is. For God’s sake, you sent me over a hundred pages of a mechanic talking to himself about repairs and space economics.] > “It’s called WORLDBUILDING.” > [Rob, there’s over fifteen pages dedicated to explaining some kind of… cyber capacitor thing.] > “Cyclonic reduction capacitor,” Bobby corrected him. “It’s a crucial component of the ship’s… look, you’re only going off of three sample chapters here. In the full story-” > [Does anything change?] The man interjected. [Do things pick up? Is there any sort of call to action for our protagonist? Does anything HAPPEN in this story, Robert?] Bobby tried to answer, but all that came out was a faint croak. Suddenly, his mouth felt very dry.

> “That’s…” He began, pausing to wet his lips. “...I-it’s a character study…” He heard another deep sigh through the earpiece. > [Right… case in point.] Alan’s said. Bobby couldn’t help but find his tone similar to that of a disappointed parent. [Rob, listen. I like you. I wouldn’t keep doing this if I didn’t. But NO publisher would want to touch something like this. Hell, based on what you sent me, I doubt anyone could even get THROUGH it. There’s no hook, no sense of pacing, no structure… there’s a fine line between ‘methodical’ and ‘boring’, and you’ve crossed it in the first five pages.] Bobby grit his teeth and dug his fingers into the armrest. As much as he’d tried to prepare himself for disappointment, he hadn’t been ready to have his work critiqued so harshly. That his agent’s tone was calm and matter-of-fact, free from hostility or condescension, somehow only served to anger him further. > “...I’ve spent six years on this, Alan. Six years,” Bobby hissed. “And you’re telling me it’s BORING?” > [I’m telling you the TRUTH, Rob. You’re writing for an audience that simply doesn’t exist,] His agent replied. [I’ve told you time and time again, this isn’t what readers want. There needs to be excitement, something to capture the reader’s imagination, especially in THIS genre. You’ve done it before, Rob… you can do it again. Why not continue Sons of Dawn?] > ‘Sons of Dawn’. Bobby clicked his tongue in irritation at the mere mention of it. It had been his second novel after Voice of the Cosmos, as well as his second--and last--to be published. While the first had received a somewhat mixed reception, Sons of Dawn had proven to be a moderate success, and to this day he STILL got fan mail asking him to continue the story.

> But they had been nothing more than generic space adventure shlock to him, the sort of thing one might find in an airport convenience store. He’d slapped both together in the span of a single year for no other reason than to get his foot in the door, and while he’d initially been pleased with the unexpected success, he’d long since grown to resent his early work. Was it marketable? Yes. Was it what he wanted to write? > “...No.” > [Rob-] > “I’m not going to sit here and let YOU tell me what I should write. I’ll fucking publish it MYSELF if I have to.” > [Robert, please, be reas-] > “I think we’re done here, Alan.” Bobby said before the man could get a word in edgewise. “Goodbye.” Without another word, he ended the call. His nostrils flared with sharp, quick breaths, and it took everything he had in him not to hurl his phone across the room in anger. With a growl of frustration he haphazardly tossed the device onto the desk before leaning forward and burying his head in his hands. Rejection was one thing… he was more than used to it by now. But to have the very nature of his work torn apart so thoroughly hit far harder than he had expected and, quite frankly, he couldn’t recall the last time he’d felt so sick to his stomach. > “Sheesh, sounds like THAT didn’t go well.” The silence was broken by none other than Robbie, standing in the doorway with a curious expression on her face. “Turned down again, huh?” > “...How long have you been there, Robbie?” Her father asked, not so much as glancing up from the desk as he spoke. She simply shrugged and sauntered in.

> “Long enough. Been a long time since I’ve seen ya so pissed off,” The girl said calmly. She walked over to the desk, flicking a magnetically-floating model of the Enterprise and watching as it spun around in the air. “So what’d they say this time? Too emotional? Too complicated? ‘Too optimistic for the current political climate’ or whatever? That one’s always been my favorite.” Bobby sighed, removing his reading glasses and setting them aside. > “Sweetheart, please, not now.” He grumbled as he rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I’m not in the mood to-” He was cut short as Robbie leaned over his shoulder, her cheek pressing against his as she looked at his computer screen. > “‘Gerald frowned as he withdrew the... tri-conductive relay processor… from the smoking chassis of the… quasi-biotic dexometrical… hex… nani the fuck am I READING, here….?” > “Roberta, LANGUAGE,” Bobby snapped, gently pushing the girl away and minimizing the document. “Don’t you have homework to do, or something?” > “Nah, not on a half day.” Robbie replied with a shrug. “But hey, looks like you’ve got time for a break now, right? C’mon, let’s do somethin’.” > “I told you-” > “C’moooon. I’m bored.” The girl grabbed onto her father’s arm, tugging on it to try and coax him out of his seat. But the man wouldn’t budge, jerking his arm from her grasp with a huff. > “Robbie. PLEASE.” He repeated. “Not now. Go play a game or something, alright? I’m sure Lemy will be back soon-” > “I don’t WANT uncle Lemy right now,” Robbie shot back, shooting her father an annoyed scowl. “We never get to hang out any more. You’re not busy, so-” > “I. AM. Busy.” Bobby growled. His daughter fell silent, seemingly taken aback by his demeanor; He knew he was being cold towards the girl, but right now he was too worked up to deal with her. “Now, please. Go.”

> “Yare yare... you really are in a mood, aren’t you?” Robbie grumbled, her father letting out an audible sigh as she flopped into a nearby chair. “Y’know, aunt Lupa’s right… you ARE too uptight.” > “Right, because she’s SO well-adjusted…” Bobby muttered bitterly. > “Hey, at least she has a real job.” > “Writing IS a real job!” Her father snarled. Robbie scoffed and shot him a cocky smirk. > “Then how come mom’s the one paying the bills?” She joked; unfortunately, her father looked less than amused. His hand curled into a tight, trembling fist, and he had to shut his eyes and take a deep breath to calm himself. > “...BECAUSE, Robbie,” The man hissed through clenched teeth. “This whole damn industry’s run by IDIOTS that wouldn’t know a good story if it kicked them in the teeth. Now are you going to leave me alone, or-” > “Sounds to me like you’re just not a very good wri-” > “That is ENOUGH!” Bobby roared, slamming his fist against the desk as he stood from his chair. The rage in his voice was enough to silence Robbie in an instant, and the amused smirk faded from her face as he wheeled on her with fire in his eyes. “I’m not about to let a CHILD talk about me OR my work like that, ESPECIALLY not my own fucking daughter!” > “G-geeze dad, chill!” Robbie stammered as she too stood from her seat. “I was just jok-” > “I am not a fucking JOKE, Roberta, and neither is my WORK! Now I’m not going to say it again: GET. OUT! Do you UNDERSTAND me, Roberta?!” For several moments neither spoke, nor moved… Bobby stood with his arm outstretched, pointing towards the door as his chest heaved with heavy breaths.

> Robbie chewed her lower lip and averted her eyes, her face scrunching up as though she were fighting off tears, but Bobby didn’t falter; then just as he was about to shout at her again, she let out a growl of frustration and snatched the lamp from her father’s desk. She threw it with all her strength and it struck the wall with the loud CRASH of shattering glass. > “ROBERTA ELIZABETH LOUD!” > “Yeah! I know! I’m fucking grounded, what else is new?!” The girl spat, turning on her heel and storming out of the room. She paused a moment in the doorway to shoot one last glare over her shoulder. “...Asshole…” She muttered under her breath before skulking away to her room, being sure to slam the door so hard that a nearby picture crashed to the floor as well. > For some time Bobby stood there, his gaze fixed towards the door, before looking down at the broken lamp lying on the floor. Finally he groaned and slumped back into his chair. > “Fuck’s sake, Bobby…” He muttered to himself; Bobby ran his hand through his hair, sitting in silence as he let his heart rate return to normal. It wasn’t like him to get so worked up, let alone to the point of screaming at his daughter, no matter how out-of-line her comments may have been. He knew she hadn’t meant it, of course… she’d simply pushed the wrong buttons at the wrong time, and instead of handling it with maturity he’d exploded at her. Perhaps he was simply taking out his anger on her. In any case, he’d fucked up for the second time that day. > He REALLY wished Loan let him keep alcohol in the house.

> Bobby let out a deep sigh as his gaze fell upon his monitor. Six years of effort down the drain… not merely dismissed, but downright savaged. Granted, it was only one man’s opinion, but his criticism had been so thorough that even Bobby couldn’t help but dwell on his words. Now that the anger had faded, he only felt a deep sense of inadequacy. He wondered if this was how Lemy felt about his own failures… a musician that couldn’t play. A writer that couldn’t write. > Pathetic. > Bobby opened up the document again and stared at it, weighing his options. Perhaps he could salvage it… cut back on the exposition, come up with some kind of plot, some POINT to the story he was trying to tell. But perhaps that was the problem… there was no point. There never had been. The stories he wanted to tell simply weren’t what anyone else wanted to read. They were simply wasted efforts, and nothing more than that. > “...Fuck this,” Bobby muttered. He took a deep breath and closed the document, clicking ‘no’ when it asked if he wanted to save. > Back. > Right click. > Delete. > Are you sure you want to delete this folder? > Yes. > Right click. > Empty recycle bin. > ...Yes. > Once he’d done the same for his online backup, Bobby leaned away from the keyboard, withdrawing his trembling hand from the mouse. There… it was done. He wasn’t sure how he should feel… part of him wanted to laugh, part of him wanted to cry, and another part of him wanted to vomit. Instead, he sat in silence with naught the tick of his wall clock and gentle hum of the AC unit keeping him tethered to reality. He wasn’t sure how long he stayed there; perhaps five minutes, perhaps thirty, perhaps an hour. It was the growl of his stomach that finally snapped him from his stupor, and it suddenly dawned on him that he hadn’t had so much as a bite to eat since breakfast.

> “...Alright.” Bobby unsteadily got to his feet. As he made for the door, he felt something crunch beneath his foot: the glass from the lamp. He’d completely forgot about it. “Thank God for slippers…” He said with a sigh of relief. > After a quick detour to the utility closet, he returned to his office and swept the brunt of the glass into a dustpan. He’d vacuum up the smaller flakes later… once he’d dumped the glass and bent remains of the lamp into the trash, he made his way down the hall towards his daughter’s bedroom. Before he could even think about food, he had to apologize for his behavior. > “Robbie…?” He called, gently knocking on the door. “Can I come in?” No response. Bobby frowned and gave another knock. “...I’m not mad,” He assured her. “I just want to talk.” > “Go away,” Came the muffled voice of his daughter from the other side. > “...I’m coming in,” He said. Robbie said nothing further as he turned the handle and stepped inside. The room was dim, but with the light from the doorway he could see his daughter lying in her bed, completely covered by her bedsheets. “Robbie… are you alright?” Again, no response. Bobby frowned and approached the bed, nearly tripping over the girl’s hastily discarded jacket in the process. “Look… I wanted to apologize,” He said softly. “You were right. I was being an asshole, and I’m sorry.” No response. The man sighed and scratched the back of his head. “Robbie, please,” He pleaded, taking hold of the blanket. “Talk to… me…?” > As he pulled the blanket aside, he found nothing more than a small pile of pillows lying beneath. He barely had a moment to process this before an attack cry rang out from behind him; he yelped in shock as his daughter leapt onto his back, wrapping her arms around his neck and wrestled him to the ground with a THUD.

> “Sorry?! You really think that’s gonna cut it?!” > “R-Robbie, get off…!” Bobby struggled in the girl’s grasp, but he was far from a strong man; Robbie easily flipped him onto his stomach and sat down on his back before he could get back to his feet. The man cried out in pain as she took his ankles under her arms and bent back his legs, putting him into a boston crab. > “Or what?! You’ll ground me?! Too late for that!” She snarled with a forced, aggressive drawl appropriate for a delinquent.“You forget to pick me up, you YELL at me, and now you expect me to just FORGIVE you? Ain’t happenin’! I ain’t forgivin’ you till you’re BEGGIN’ for it!” > “OW! Okay, okay! Please, I-” Robbie applied more pressure, earning her an even louder whine of pain from her father. “ROBERTAAAA! PLEASE!” But the girl did not yield; knowing her, Bobby doubted she even INTENDED to until she was satisfied. If he wanted to get out of this, he’d have to play by her rules. “F-fine…!” With a grunt of effort, Bobby managed to push himself upwards. > “Whoa…?!” Robbie gasped in surprise as she found herself being lifted upwards. She may have been strong for her age, but she was still far smaller and lighter than her father; once her feet were off the ground he twisted his body, flipping her off of his back with a yelp. He grunted as her back hit the ground and, to her surprise, she quickly found herself trapped in a cradle pin. > “Now what?” Bobby asked with a cocky smirk. “Let’s see you get out of…?!” His apparent victory didn’t last long; with an amused snicker his daughter managed to slip free from his hold and the next thing he knew, he was once again on his stomach, gagging as Robbie trapped him in a chokehold. That was it: he desperately tapped her arm in submission and she released him.

> “Not bad, dad.” Robbie said with a smirk as her father gasped and panted for air. “That’s the first time you’ve pinned me in, what, two years?” > “Y-you…” Bobby managed to gasp out between breaths. “You’re way too rough, you know that…?” Robbie simply shrugged, apparently unmoved by her father’s plight. He tried to push himself up again, only to find himself pushed face-first down to the ground. > “Apologize again,” Robbie demanded. Bobby sighed. > “...I’m sorry.” > “For?” > “Everything,” Bobby muttered. “Really… I mean that. I’m sorry.” The girl narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips as she considered her father’s words, then gave a small nod. > “...Me too,” She said. Robbie climbed off his back and let him sit up, wincing as he rubbed his sore neck. “For the stuff I said… and the lamp.” > “No, it’s… ugh, hang on…” Bobby flexed his neck a bit, letting out a grunt as he heard a loud POP. “There we go… anyway…” He paused to clear his throat before continuing. “It’s alright. Given the circumstances, anyway… I’ve been a real jerk, today. It’s just…” He frowned and averted his eyes, taking a deep breath before shaking his head. “...I wasn’t mad at you. I was just… mad.” > “What happened?” Robbie asked; her father furrowed his brow, then groaned and flopped onto his back. > “What HAPPENED is that I’m a hack,” He grumbled, raising a hand to massage his temples. “Asimov, Wells, Clarke, Ellison… my whole life I’ve wanted to be like them, you know? One of the greats. Hell, I even deluded myself into thinking I COULD be. But… I was wrong.” > “Hey, don’t… don’t say that,” Robbie said softly, inching a bit closer. “I mean, you got published before, right? It could happen again.” Her father simply shook his head and gave a dry, humorless chuckle.

> “Those were rush jobs, nothing more than that.” Bobby muttered. “There was nothing special about them, hell, I barely even THOUGHT about them while I was writing them. It just... happened.” The man scowled slightly, his tone growing bitter. “...I wanted to tell stories like the ones I grew up with. To make people feel the same way I did when I read them… and the only time I came close was a complete accident. What a joke.” Robbie averted her eyes and pursed her lips in thought. > “Well… I won’t pretend to know much about writing,” She said, scooting to her father’s side before lying on the ground beside him. “But maybe that’s the problem?” > “...Eh?” Bobby pushed himself up on his elbows and looked at his daughter with a raised eyebrow. “What do you mean?” > “I mean… maybe you’re thinking too much,” The girl suggested. “You always told uncle Lemy that he was so worried about what he wanted to be that he ignored the things he was actually good at… maybe it’s the same for you?” Her father furrowed his brow in thought. “Y’know… you always were good at making things up off the top of your head. Remember those bedtime stories you used to tell me?” > “...Prince Nebula.” Bobby chuckled, a nostalgic smile crossing his face. “How could I forget?” He used to lie with his daughter at night, weaving tales of an alien prince and his quest to save the galaxy from the evil Baron Galacticus. They’d been simple, cheesy stories, made up entirely on the spot despite their ongoing narrative. But nonetheless Robbie was always eager to hear what adventures came next for the intrepid prince, and Bobby had cherished those moments above all else.

> “Well, those always meant a lot to me, soooo… I dunno…” Robbie muttered, “Maybe they could mean something to other people too?” Bobby stared at the ceiling in silence, mulling over his daughter’s words. Putting his old bedtime stories into writing was something that he’d never even considered. He still remembered them well enough, and it wasn’t as though he had anything to lose. > “Not a bad idea…” Bobby sat up with a grunt, then got to his feet. “...It’s something to consider, at least. But that can come later… right now, all I want to do is spend some time with my daughter.” > “Really…?” Robbie asked, raising her eyebrows in surprise. “But I’m grounded…” > “Tell you what,” Her father said with a grin, offering the girl his hand. “You don’t tell your mom I forgot to pick you up, and I’ll forget about the lamp… that thing was ugly, anyway. Deal?” Robbie looked at him in silence for a moment, then grinned and took his hand. > “Deal.” Her father helped her to her feet and she dusted herself off. > “Now I don’t know about you, but I could go for a burger… what do you say?” He offered. “And maybe afterwards, we could swing by the comic shop.” > “Seriously?! Damn, I should break shit more often,” Robbie said with a snicker as she followed her father out of the room, being sure to pick up her jacket along the way. > “...Don’t push your luck,” Bobby huffed, shutting the door behind them. “And watch your language, okay?”

#sin kids #sin adults #Bobby Jr.#bobby loud #robbie loud #trillhouse #my work #fanfiction #greentext

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jjr1971 · 6 years ago

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Finally finished Sound! Euphonium, Seasons 1 & 2. Let me start by declaring I could be COMPLETELY wrong in my analysis here. But for me, it was a very beautiful series, and emotionally satisfying. Definitely not "Binge" material but rather something to be sampled a few episodes at a time, over time. Kind of like how I watched all 3 seasons of Aria. oh and ******SPOILERS FOLLOW***** (duh) It was interesting how they built interest/tension in the latter half of the series....Asuka is such a joker, but there's serious intent behind everything she says and does. Like inviting Kumiko over to her home (which she hasn't done for anyone else)...then playfully asking her if she's going to confess her love to her....then later playfully telling Kumiko on the street "I love you, Kumiko"...but always with plausible deniability. If not for her obsession with the music teacher, Reina and Kumiko could definitely be a thing...but that obsession is a thorn in the side of their otherwise beautiful relationship. Not to mention Kumiko starts to neglect Reina because she's so focused on trying to help Asuka stay in the band. I was pleasantly surprised by Kumiko's love confession to Asuka after graduation. Senpai noticed her. Also, Asuka gifts Kumiko her father’s notebook of Euphonium music...the title of which is where we get the title for the whole franchise. It's a subtle and all subtext, of course...it's not overt but Kumiko always gave me vibes that she was gay. Unlike her straight friends, shows zero interest in boys, etc. Reina is probably bisexual; she is obsessed with the teacher, but her relationship with Kumiko is intense and affectionate also. And Asuka is probably a lesbian too...very pretty, no boyfriend, shows no interest in boys...all subtext but plausible. In the first season Reina doesn’t have any friends and is very intense and dedicated to her craft as a musician....only very slowly does she learn to open up to Kumiko and befriend her. They become deeply affectionate towards each other. Kumiko’s relationship with Asuka is a bit more complicated and to an extent always at a distance due to Asuka being slightly older. Not an adult, but definitely her senpai. Kumiko goes the extra mile to help and encourage Asuka for the latter half of Season 2. Asuka is kind to Kumiko but maintains an ironic distance. It is Kumiko who forces Asuka to confront the seriousness of her situation and the intensity of Kumiko’s feelings about her, wanting her to play in the band despite Asuka’s mother’s objections, etc. The show is about striving to be the best you can be, of course; in this case an ensemble of youthful musicians...but their relationships with each other are the most interesting aspects of the show. I also like how Kumiko reconciled with her older sister by the end and how she confessed that she had been Kumiko's inspiration from early on, when big sis was a trombone player herself back in High School. Kumiko was given the Euphonium because the her junior band had plenty of trombones already and nobody else wanted the Euphonium. In High School, there are only 3 Euphonium players...and only Asuka and Kumiko were good enough to go to nationals. It was a really sweet scene when, with Asuka graduating, Kumiko is practicing alone and two friends pop in expecting to see Asuka and compliment Kumiko by saying her playing now sounds just like Asuka senpai. I suppose at some point I will go track down the additional movies that continue this story. I did see Liz and the Blue Bird in theaters, and surprisingly, this one was picked up for an English dub...I was only able to see the sub version since the English dub wasn't being screened in my area that I could see. But Liz and the Blue Bird is a side story and doesn't really advance the main plot...it's a shift in focus to 2 side characters Mizore and Nozomi, the oboist and the flautist, respectively. I don't see the rest of the franchise getting dubbed necessarily. It's kind of a niche show. I'm surprised one of its movies got dubbed. I might try to buy Liz and the Blue Bird on Blu-Ray once it gets a physical release, so I can re-watch it with the English dub. Just curious to see the performances. Plus the show would probably be a nightmare from the sound design/music rights angles. Reproducing the music just right for the dub, securing the music rights for all the songs not in public domain, etc. In any case, Sound! Euphonium is a beautiful series that I’m glad to have watched. After concluding the final episode of Season 2, I then turned to watch a few more episodes of Anonymous Noise, which I will review later, but which is also about teen musicians in school and their screwed up relationships.

#sound euphonium #hibike! euphonium #crunchyroll #lgbt #queer #musician #concert band #high school #high school girls #anime #Japan #relationships #lesbians #bisexuals

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themousai · 5 years ago

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Gig Review: Auckland Will Be Laid To Waste - Penrose Underground [27/07/2019]

Saturday July 27th saw an absolutely stacked lineup of ten bands along with several dozen attendees pile themselves into the Penrose Underground, a rehearsal space and DIY venue for Auckland Will Be Laid to Waste. Downfall Productions now have a few shows like this one under their belt, and their ambition to deliver massive lineups in tiny venues leaves me excited for the future.

The show was MC’d by stalwarts of culture Real Slam Poetry, who offered their trademark guttural takes ranging from family relationships to excerpts from “Hot Rod” to a literal list of things to pack for a trip. Plus, can you name another band with branded vegan soap as merch? Didn’t think so.

Opening the afternoon was high school rock and metal band Strattera. I’m not going to lie, I knew very little about Strattera before seeing them play, besides that they took part in Smokefree Rockquest this year. Since then I have learned [a] how to pronounce their name, and [b] that this band RIPS. A blend of 90s rock and classic metal bands, it blows me away that bands at this age are playing original material at this calibre.

Even though their set was only four songs long, Strattera still made a solid impression via a combination of two things I think are sadly missing from New Zealand music; coordinated outfits and sweet, sweet guitar solos. Seriously, why do more bands not shred licks while all wearing the same colour?

It goes without saying, Strattera are not just good “for a high school band”. They’re just an excellent band full stop. If the up and coming generation of NZ musicians is half as tight as these guys, we have some incredible tunes coming. Watch this band take over.

For fans of Metallica, Rammestein and Smashing Pumpkins.

Next up came the delightful as always Melanie. It’s hard for me to imagine a hypothetical lineup on which Melanie wouldn’t be a highlight. If they’re on the bill, they’re one of the best bands on the bill. I’ve been lucky enough to catch the West Auckland grunge/punk outfit once before and this time round was just as joyous as the first. Infectiously catchy, bouncy and undeniably fun.

Even though they were second on the bill, I think Melanie actually drew the biggest crowd of the day, and weren’t afraid to jump in the mosh, guitars and all. Refreshingly, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that this band take themselves or their music too seriously.

Everything about their sound elicits a carefree, fun energy. Like skateboarding in the sun, or sitting with your toes in the sand, or staggering home after a night out with a smile on your face. Any chance you have to catch Melanie live, take it.

For fans of Pup, Bad Luck and Third Eye Blind.

The show then took a turn for the slam. Parasitic Infestation seem to have a formula for truly impressive live show. It seems like an obvious thing, but I said a silent prayer of thanks to the deathcore gods whenever Parasitic transitioned so seemlessly from blastbeats and slam riffs into a properly chunky breakdown, chugs and bends and all.

As such, Parasitic win the accolade of first pit of the day. Fun fact: vocalist Liam Hand is somewhat of a musical marvel. He has an ordinary human mouth, like anyone else. However, where mere mortals have a throat with a pair of lungs, Liam just has some kind of wormhole into the deepest, darkest pits of hell, producing the most guttural, ungodly sounds with almost no effort.

If any of your favourite genres include the word “brutal”, Parasitic Infestation will leave you wanting for nothing.

For fans of Ingested, Devourment and early Whitechapel.

Continuing and arguably stepping up the heaviness next up was Once Foretold. The first time I saw this band live, they introduced themselves by saying “we’re Once Foretold, we play djent”. And that is exactly what they do.

However, they go one step further into my good books by not falling into the traps that pervade the genre. Overly long spacey interlude tracks? None. Out of place sample tracks? Not here. Half tempo breakdowns so slow that they grind the show to a glacial pace? Nowhere to be heard.

Once Foretold seem to have distilled the best parts of the genre’s biggest names without getting mired in its clichés, and the crowd clearly appreciated it. The monstrous riffs, huge breakdowns and immense energy this band have to offer speaks for itself, with no frills.

For fans of Architects, After the Burial and Structures.

Following on from slam and djent came Chasing South. The oddly labelled “DIY punk” band [which I choose to think stands for “destroy it yourself” given their propensity for wrecking stages] have been putting in that work for almost a decade now. Anyone who’s been following the band all this time can attest to just how much of a niche Chasing South have carved themselves as the only band alive who sounds quite like them.

Drawing from post hardcore, metalcore, punk and mathcore in kind, the melting pot bubbles and fizzes with energy that the crowd immediately gravitated to, with a pit opening wide almost immediately. My favourite part of seeing this band perform is the mix of material their back catalog has to offer, from the bouncy singalongs to thrashy breakdowns to somber, melodic palate cleansers.

This band’s ability to move a crowd has never been more apparent, and with another album on the way I have no doubt audiences are in for treats aplenty. Extra points for covering Norma Jean’s “Sword In Mouth / Fire Eyes”.

For fans of Showbread, Every Time I Die and Touche Amore

Next up was capital city metalcore outfit Severed Beliefs. This is a passion project featuring members of Wellington bands Nailgun and Deadringer, playing a distinctly 90′s influenced mode of metalcore without being scared to experiment with everything the genre implies.

By definition, 90s metalcore is a mashup of scratchy and harsh with melodic and clean, artistic emotion with unfettered aggression. Severed Beliefs deliver on this in spades, and after releasing their self titled demo a few months back have made a clear statement of intent regarding the direction they hope to head.

Also, extra points for the evening’s second Norma Jean cover and the show’s namesake, “Memphis Will Be Laid to Waste”. There is no such thing as a bad Memphis Will Be Laid to Waste cover. Prove me wrong.

For fans of Renounced, 7 Angels 7 Plagues and early Misery Signals

Another personal highlight of the evening, Long Distance Runner are one of those hard-to-categorize bands to which no genre label seems to do complete justice. As a result, anything I say about them is likely to sell short the talent this band demonstrates mere moments into any set they perform. The emotion of post hardcore with the ridiculous pace and technicality of mathcore and even sprinklings of powerviolence create a sound specific to Long Distance Runner.

Their performance ebbed and flowed through blastbeats, droning guitars and wounded howling vocals combining in a wall of sound that you just want to smash your metaphorical head against. Having been fortunate enough to catch them a few times, I’ve noticed that there are almost never moshpits when Long Distance Runner play. Saturday was no different, with most of the audience stood rooted to the spot fixated on the frantic and beautifully abrasive performance, before the band suddenly stopped and exclaimed “here for a good time, not a long time”. Clearly I wasn’t the only one caught off guard and hoping for more. For fans of Pg. 99, Converge, and Baptists

Second to last on the bill came post hardcore and Neon Genesis fans REI. I’ll be the first to admit to having a massive soft spot for mid 2000s post hardcore. Lucky for me, the Auckland five piece have used it as a jumping off point to explore a more experimental and progressive sound than the genre suggests. Saturday’s performance reminded me why this band’s exploration of their distinct sound is so pleasing to both long-time fans of the genre and total newcomers alike.

Their songwriting relies on the best aspects of the genre without becoming generic or predictable. Something I found to distinguish this performance from the band’s previous ones was the vocal delivery being noticeably harsher and more aggressively delivered. You could put this down to the vocalist Lily, powerhouse that he is, having run the show all day and performed an earlier set on bass with Once Foretold.

Whatever the reason, this instance struck me as a more unique and personal performance from Rei and one I hope will be emulated in future.

For fans of Underoath, early Dance Gavin Dance and A Lot Like Birds

Closing out the evening to what remained of an exhausted crowd was five piece melodic hardcore sad boys Take Hold. This band has never really played at this end of bill, having mainly existed on opening slots since their first show late last year. One EP and maybe a dozen shows later, they’ve been hard at work honing their live show to balance heaviness and energy, all the while focusing on playing as fast and as tightly as possible. While most of their set consisted of the expected frantic punk beats and twosteps, the forays into heavier end of the spectrum went down well with the crowd, if the amount of crowd slaying is anything to go by. It’s good to see that a typically opening band can make an audience stick around till the very last act and make it worth their while. They closed their set with a new song, their heaviest to date and barely a minute long. Also, being the last band of the night, they were asked for an encore by maybe two people. They declined. They’d run out of songs.

For fans of Counterparts, Dead Swans and Carpathian.

Once again Lily Mou of Downfall Productions managed to organise and execute a massive showcase of New Zealand’s alternative talent. Ten bands on a single bill is almost begging for huge delays, technical difficulties and no-shows, and yet the crew succeeded in delivering an awesome gig for the all ages scene. Downfall have been going strength to strength with their big bill / small space shows, and I have no doubt there are huge things in store.

Review written by Jai Aronsen Photography by Andrew Cooksley + Mandie Hailwood

#auckland will be laid to waste #take hold #severed beliefs #rei #strattera #melanie #parasitic infestation #once foretold #long distance runner #real slam poetry #chasing south #andrew cooksley #jai aronsen

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supastareden · 6 years ago

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Bringing Hip Hop Back to K-pop: A Retrospective on B.A.P's Career

March 3, 2019 Qing

Following leader Bang Yongguk and youngest member Zelo, who announced their departure from TS Entertainment last year, the remaining four members of B.A.P have recently confirmed the non-renewal of their contracts as well, wrapping up B.A.P’s 7-year run as a group. The news comes as no surprise, given TS Entertainment’s poor track record of managing and retaining artists, as well as the exploitative circumstances prompting the lawsuit the members filed back in 2014.

What is perhaps more surprising, and less known, are the lyrical and musical influences they re-introduced to the K-pop scene, the effects of which we continue to see in their hugely popular contemporaries, including BTS and Got7, and in rising groups like Monsta X and Stray Kids. From the moment they debuted, B.A.P carved out a sonic niche, boosted by clever marketing tactics and lyrics that boldly veered away from familiar themes of romantic love.

For sure, B.A.P’s music may not sound all that revolutionary today. But to fully understand what was unique about their sound, it is necessary for us to go back in time for a moment to consider what the K-pop scene was like in 2011, the year leading up to B.A.P’s debut in 2012. Electro-pop and synth-pop were the go-to genres for male groups—think TVXQ‘s “Keep Your Head Down”, Big Bang‘s “Tonight”, and Super Junior‘s “Mr. Simple”. Theatrical dance pop with an emphasis on symphonic flourishes and melodic choruses were also in trend, epitomised by hits like Beast‘s “Fiction” and Infinite‘s “Be Mine”. Rapping was a standard feature, but rarely the centrepiece of title tracks. Predictably, most releases at the time spoke of attraction or heartbreak.

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This was the scene that B.A.P broke onto, quite literally—at the beginning of the “Warrior” MV, a figure dressed as Matoki (the group’s mascot) smashes the viewer’s screens as the group launches into their song, a gesture symbolic of the boundaries their music would transcend. With its blazing synths, shrill whistles, Bang Yongguk’s deep, growling voice, Zelo’s rapid-fire rapping, and Daehyun‘s soaring vocals, B.A.P’s musical take on hip hop was decidedly militant. “Warrior” was a deliberate shock to the senses, and whether it was your cup of tea, it was clear that it hit one of the marks of a good debut: it was anything but forgettable.

Yet there was more to the novelty of B.A.P’s debut: they brought back to the K-pop scene not just the sound of hip hop, but its socially conscious spirit. They were by no means the first group to engage with this aspect of hip hop; hip hop and K-pop go a long way back. The very beginnings of K-pop can be traced to Seo Taiji and Boys, whose idiosyncratic take on hip hop in the 1990s proved wildly popularwith youths, and Deux, a duo also influenced by hip hop. Their success spawned the creation of first-generation idol groups like H.O.T., Sechskies, S.E.S., and Fin.K.L.. Social critiques pervaded the promotional tracks of the hip hop-influenced groups, with songs like Seo Taiji and Boys’ “Classroom Idea” levelling charges at the Korean education system and H.O.T.’s “Warrior’s Descendant” lashing out at bullying.

While hip hop maintained a presence in the early 2000s through artists like Epik High and Leessang, mainstream idol groups tended to favour other genres, especially ballads and dance pop. Socially conscious lyrics resurfaced briefly through TVXQ’s “‘O’-Jung.Ban.Hap” and Super Junior’s “Don’t Don”, and Big Bang’s experimental music fused the sounds of hip hop with pop and R&B. 2PM debuted with a hip hop sound with “10 Out of 10”, but like Big Bang, they were not as interested in the socio-political roots of the genre, and shifted to R&B and dance pop for subsequent releases. So for the most part, the combination of the sound and content of hip hop receded into the background as other trends took over in the latter half of the decade.

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It was in this context that B.A.P geared up for their debut, preparing to re-introduce hip hop and its social consciousness to the K-pop world. Bang Yongguk and Zelo’s pre-debut release, “Never Give Up”, gave a sampling of the lyrical content to come:

Taking thousand-dollar private lessons This system that emphasizes grades over friendships This pressure called exams This burden called college The stress that is building up Would my parents know?

The lyrics, penned by Bang Yongguk, also held a more personal element:

My dream is to hold a mic and rap But again, I grab a pen and write down math formulas today Yeah, things that we learn at school Are losing dreams and always giving up

As a group, B.A.P’s lyrics are phrased more broadly, with less targeted critiques, but a similar galvanising tone — “Warrior” is a promise to “fight for the souls in this street” against “hidden system[s]”, while “Power”gestures towards a world with no justice that “surrenders to money” and urges, “Don’t yield in front of them / Don’t do that, lift your head up / We got the power / Stand up against them and fight”. The move to bring back the spirit of hip hop that their seniors in the industry once embodied is a fact the group were conscious of—the title of “Warrior” and its opening line, “Warrior is back”, are likely nods to H.O.T’s “Warrior’s Descendant”. (B.A.P also covered the song twice, for an MCountdown episode in 2012 and the 2016 KBS Song Festival.)

Lyrics aside, B.A.P also reworked hip hop to create their own signature sound; common features included a stomping beat, whistles, an aggressive rap style, and powerful, operatic vocals. These were often interwoven with elements taken from broader dance ballad trends, such as orchestral flourishes, best seen in their dramatic 2013 masterpiece, “One Shot”. Even in “1004 (Angel)”, which is as close to a conventional K-pop dance ballad as the group ever ventured, unexpected touches like blues guitar chords, and the effective pairing of silences with vocal refrains that gain momentum and soar, lent the track the sense of power that characterises many of B.A.P’s title tracks.

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The road to realising their musical niche was not, however, without its potholes. After putting out a string of sonically coherent, distinctive releases—”Warrior”, “Power”, and “No Mercy”—the group suffered from conceptual whiplash with “Crash” and “Stop It”, seeing them abruptly shed their aggressive, anti-establishment image and transforming into boys swooning in love. Another worrying sign that our writers back then had picked up on was just how over-promoted and overworked the group was.

Still, the news of B.A.P’s lawsuit against TS Entertainment in 2014 came as a shock. In a cruel twist of irony, they found themselves living out the struggle their lyrics depicted, fighting against exploitative circumstances, including but not limited to being severely underpaid and forced to work in poor health conditions. From the time of their last proper comeback with “1004 (Angel)” and First Sensibility till they reached a settlement with the company and returned in November 2015, 1 year and 7 months had elapsed—a hiatus long enough to weaken the standing of even A-list K-pop groups. For B.A.P, who had only just begun to see the fruits of their labour—”1004 (Angel)” brought them their first music show win—such a prolonged absence was, needless to say, a severe setback for their career.

BTS, who had debuted a year after B.A.P and were also pursuing the sounds and socially conscious lyrics of hip hop, had been steadily gaining traction in the meantime. It was during B.A.P’s absence that BTS achieved a breakthrough with The Most Beautiful Moment in Life Part 1, securing a leading spot in the ranks of hip hop idol groups. Given this and the sheer length of their hiatus, it was understandably difficult for B.A.P to return fully to this niche and have the same degree of commercial success. Their first comeback after the lawsuit, “Young, Wild, & Free”, pushed a message with underdog vibes similar to “No Mercy”, but musically, it lacked the same punch, despite containing some distinctively B.A.P elements and a noticeably more controlled, mature delivery.

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Despite the disadvantageous circumstances surrounding their return to the scene, the group persisted in their musical growth. They ventured into more uptempo, pop territory with “Feel So Good” and “That’s My Jam”; though neither were especially experimental, both were solidly produced and infectiously energetic. They soon followed up with Noir, the best album of their career, returning to a theatrical sound with its title track “Skydive”. Longtime followers of the group would doubtless have been heartened by “Wake Me Up”, a subtle return to their socially conscious beginnings, but with a more refined sound incorporating electronic beats, beautiful hooks, and falsetto vocalisations for a stirring, dramatic track.

Although B.A.P’s final title tracks, “Honeymoon” and “Hands Up”, didn’t quite meet the standard of their earlier releases, an overview of their discography from debut to date reveals that they’ve already left their mark on the industry. Their lawsuit and long hiatus may have held them back from achieving a level of commercial success on par with their potential, but their music rarely succumbed to trends. Their earlier tracks, especially, drew attention to the possibilities and value of a hard-hitting, anthemic, rap-forward, yet strongly melodic sound.

While it’s hard to assert that B.A.P had a direct influence on later groups, their debut clearly signalled the revival of K-pop’s interest in hip hop, and the beginning of experimentations with a heavier, more aggressive soundscape. BTS would take the renewed interest in the social consciousness of hip hop in a more culturally specific direction, pursuing a cleaner sound initially before weaving in rock influences; Got7 drew heavily from hip hop street styling and beats in their early releases, but pursued a more playful, pop-laced sound. Monsta X’s discography recalls B.A.P’s blend of aggressive rapping with soaring melodies, working in contemporary trends in EDM to produce their own signature sound.

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Even as B.A.P’s future as a group remains up in the air with their contract non-renewals and Bang Yongguk and Himchan‘s impending enlistment, the end of this chapter of their career is also a sign of new beginnings. Bang Yongguk, in particular, is already a step ahead with the gutting pre-release, “Hikkomori”, and his first full album, BANGYONGGUK, due out on March 15. If the other members can find a similar artistic freedom—one that TS Entertainment never fully granted them—while still holding tight to their previous drive to find their own sound and voices, the possibilities that await them will be, indeed, as powerful as their music.

(YouTube. TheBiasList. Lyrics via Popgasa. Images via TS Entertainment.)

#Bringing Hip Hop Back to K-pop: A Retrospective on B.A.P's Career #seoulbeats #B.A.P #bang yongguk #daehyun #youngjae #himchan #jongup #zelo #kpop #khiphop

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noisylibrary · 6 years ago

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This year we decided to list our favourite albums in a new format. Pictured above is the collection of our top 100 albums placed near similar sounding albums.

Below is our top 10 favourite albums of 2018, in no particular order!

You Won’t Get What You Want - Daughters

Uncompromisingly noisy and abrasive, Daughters have proved that, as amazing as their last album was (2010s self-titled release), they were only scratching the surface when it came to the aggression, horror, and abrasiveness. You Won’t Get What You Want has the energy of a thrash or black metal album, but the rhythm and repetition of a Swans record. It’s noise rock pushed to it’s furthest extremities. What separates Daughters here though from other loud rock bands is easily their versatility. When this album gets loud, it gets ear shattering: songs like “The Flammable Man”, standing at just two minutes, is one of the busiest and most overwhelming rock songs of the year. “The Reason They Hate Me” is similar in that regard, but offers a more direct and straight forward song structure.

Even in their quiet moments, Daughters still manages to be as terrifying. “City Song” is atmospheric and chalk-full of tension, with frontman Alexis Marshall speaking his esoteric lyrics at a near whisper quiet volume, back by harsh shots of noise and a thick wall of sound. “Less Sex” and “Daughter” are similar in their hazy approach, but still manage to remain on par in terms of substance, whether it be in the mental health references in the former, or the intense, scoring harmonies at the tail end of the latter.

While the previously mentioned tracks are all fantastic and make for a powerful and diverse listen on their own, Daughters without a doubt saves the heaviest and most mind-melting moments for the last two songs on the record. The first of which, titled “Ocean Song”, takes lyrical cues from an album like Spiderland, telling the story of a man who, upon returning to his home, is struck with an overwhelming sense of terror (“He explodes through the backyard like a shot from a gun, clearing the fence in one leap”). It’s one of the most intense moments on the record, and it is only escalated by the unrelenting piles of guitars and crashing drums. However, it’s on “Guest House”, the albums final moments, that the true horror of this album comes to its ultimate climax. Over and over, walls of sour guitars and drums crash down on top of one another. Marshall’s vocals are more tortured and broken down than they have ever been, as his cries of “Let me in” go completely unanswered. The song is only four and a half minutes, but not a second is wasted, as it is packed with dread and fear that will shake the strongest of souls to their core.

For sure, there are albums in 2018 that might reflect on the current times better than that of “You Won’t Get What You Want”. Will this album still be as relevant as an album like “Wide Awake” or be as well remembered as “Kids See Ghosts” ten or twenty years down the road? It’s hard to say. Regardless of what you think of the album, though, it wreaks of universal dread; its lyrics may be tough to pin down and won’t be as relatable as most albums from the past year, but its sound is unmatched in terms of its experimentation and its emotional trauma. It’s not for the faint-hearted, but if you can see through the many, MANY, noisy guitars and instruments, then you may just find yourself enjoying the existential sadness of this record.

Die Lit - Playboi Carti

Playboi Carti is no lyrical miracle. One listen to his viral hit (and banger) Magnolia from 2017 and his general subject matter and sound are apparent. Unfortunately, his debut mixtape didn’t exactly live up to the expectations of that song. Thankfully though, Die Lit was released earlier this year and allowed Carti to prove himself as a more than worthy name in hip-hop. Die Lit is loaded with dusty trap bangers, minimal and simple but hypnotic instrumentation. The beats are woozy and drugged out, but are filled with psychedelic sounds and samples. Playboi doesn’t venture too far out of his comfort zone, but does demonstrate that his style is more versatile than it was on his debut mixtape and on Magnolia. “R.I.P” is probably trap’s banger of the year, with its aggressive lyrics and Carti's cutting energy. “Shoota” with Lil Uzi Vert is actually sort of epic in the way its pianos and strings escalate with Carti and Vert singing over top of it. This album even has a few topical tracks, like “Mileage”, which is as close to a love song as you’re going to get on this record. If you haven’t been pleased with Carti up until this point, I implore you to give Die Lit a shot. Again, Carti is not this generations Tupac, and his lyrics are easy to criticize for being simple and just plain dumb, but his rapping combined with the whacked out, zany beats on this album create an album that is utterly intoxicating.

Snares like a Haircut - No Age

With the amount of influences on this record, this record should sound like a sad attempt at reinventing the sounds of 80s and 90s indie and post-punk. But it’s just the opposite - No Age combines these influences to make a rock album that tributes its roots while also crafting something strange and idiosyncratic. The vocals are passionate, the riffs are tight, especially on the opening track, and the production is solid from front to back. The band combines Sonic Youth-like indie and psychedelic passages to create something an album that is both accessible but also experimental. The title track, for example, is a spacey, electronic instrumental centre-piece that really shouldn’t work as well as it does. No Age effectively encompasses so many different styles and ultimately succeeded in making one of the best rock albums of the year, hands down.

2012-2017 - Against All Logic

House Music doesn’t really have a lot of sway in terms of influence and popularity in 2018. Sure, the mainstream is crowded with bass-heavy EDM music, and it has been for much of the 2010s, but much like hip-hop, it’s all been saturated to a point in which the current trends and sounds bleed between songs seamlessly to the point where nothing new is being brought to the genre. There comes a time in every genre’s existence that the sounds that were popular decades prior start to creep their way back into the music. In the underground Dance Music scene, this reinvention has undoubtedly been led by producer Nicolas Jaar. His 2011 album Space is Only Noise was hazy and ambient, but featured driving base drums that kept the music groovy. Similarly, in 2013, his collaboration with Dave Harrington under the name Darkside improved on these sounds in a major way, adding some rock elements to the otherwise dark and patient dance beats.

Now, in 2018, under a new alias “Against All Logic”, Jaar out of nowhere drops what is easily one of the grooviest and most infectious dance albums of the past decade. It wreaks of the late 90s and early 2000s house music from the likes of Daft Punk, but the samples and textures that Jaar plays with all add up to an eerily atmospheric and dense listen. But even on the surface, these songs are catchy and funky and will get you moving from the first song to the last. “This Old House is All I Have” is the perfect opener, especially in its title reference the roots of the album's music. From there on, it’s a wild concoction of sample-heavy house; Jaar’s attention to detail in the sounds of this album is evident in each and every one of these songs. It may not be first on our list, but it’s about as close to perfect as a dance music album can sound in the current landscape of music.

Some Rap Songs - Earl Sweatshirt

At 25 minutes and only 15 tracks, Earl Sweatshirt makes a statement before you even hit play on the first track, that this is not going to be a typical release from the former Odd Future member. Then once you do hit play, it becomes even more apparent that Some Rap Songs is not even close to your average rap album in 2018, especially from a name as recognizable as Earl’s. His generally monotone voice and nonchalant style are still here, but it’s the instrumentals and lyrical subject matter that separates this album from not only Earl’s own discography but from every other rap album in 2018. The experimental beats are hard to grasp, cluttered and grimy as if the spirit of Madlib lives within every single one of them. Listen to the piano samples on “Loosie” and “The Mint”, both of which are choppy and grainy, the former being one of the most lumbering on the entire project.

As amazing and unique as the beats are, though, it’s still Earl who steals the show. His sense of humour is still present, but for the most part, these songs deal with Earl’s struggling mental health and personal issues. One of the most compelling and personal moments on this record doesn’t even feature Earl’s rapping, but instead features his mother and late father, intertwined in speech and poetry on the song “Playing Possum”. For such a short album, Earl packs so much emotion into these songs, and admirably so, as this album manages to be so heart-wrenchingly sad but also bittersweet at the same time. It’s not exactly going to brighten your day, but it’s an album whose introspectiveness allows a window into Earl’s current psyche, making for an incredibly compelling character portrait, all in less than half an hour.

- Braeden

Veteran - JPEGMAFIA

The fifth full-length project from Baltimore’s JPEGMAFIA - a single rapper/producer, yes, not a mafia - is strikingly gritty, witty and definitely not shitty. Veteran sounds like a collection of angered thoughts and an ultimate release of energy in an America that JPEGMAFIA isn’t all that impressed with. Targeting white supremacists, the alt-right and Morrissey of The Smiths, “Peggy” uses an array of grinding electric beats, niche O.D.B. samples and a self-produced collection of noises that beautifully compliment the abrasive narrative that is conveyed violently and melodically on this 48-minute rollercoaster. JPEGMAFIA has always been unapologetically targeting specific individuals with his music, songs like Libtard Anthem, Whole Foods and Curb-Stomp may shock younger viewers, caution! The humour in “Peggy’s” delivery and content is felt in songs like Macauley Culkin, My Thoughts on Neogaf Dying and Panic Emoji, reminding us that he is never taking himself seriously enough to appeal to the pseudo-woke rap population, while thoroughly embracing the old and the new’s of hip-hop in a fantastic compilation of songs.

Wide Awake - Parquet Courts

Parquet Courts are a New York-based, art-punk band with a consistently energetic take on everyday subjects and notions of feeling unsure about oneself. On their sixth studio album, Wide Awake!, the sound is an evolved yet familiar one from the group, while the narrative content has both grown and narrowed its scope on a collection of pressing topics for the modern American. Describing the new social divide that the western world is building for itself and comparing it to Total Football, Normalization and Tenderness, Andrew Savage takes the lead on the album’s vocals, in lieu of the past records’ alternating co-lead vocals with Andrew Brown. Where this facet of Parquet Courts’ exchange in dialogue has become a memorable trait in the rest of their discography, Wide Awake acts as one extended plea for change and a sense of revelation in songs like Before the Water Gets Too High, Death Will Bring Change and Extinction. Despite the pessimism in the lyrical content and song titles themselves, Wide Awake maintains an aura of hope, prosperity, and fuel for a fire that invites acts of revolution from the people.

Kids See Ghosts - KIDS SEE GHOSTS

The long-awaited collaboration between Kid Cudi and Kanye West was well worth the wait, making use of the best of the duo’s musical styles in a modern and unprecedented way. With Kanye’s regular production team behind the scenes, this piece of Kanye’s six-album puzzle of 2018 was intricately built to flow from a range of different emotions that were either felt exclusively or shared by the two established hip-hop powerhouses. Following a string of experimental and sonically challenging albums in the preceding half-decade, both Kanye and Cudi managed to compile an uninterrupted stream of triumphant motifs and dance-inducing ballads that resonate with the ever-changing landscape of hip-hop music and its newly divided culture. The exchange between some of West’s strongest and most vulnerable lyrics are chilling in synchronous harmony with Cudi’s swaying hums on songs like Reborn and the eponymous Kids See Ghosts. Memorable to say the least, KIDS SEE GHOSTS shows no pause in the strides of some of the past decade’s most thorough musicians.

Year of The Snitch - Death Grips

If you didn’t like Death Grips in the past, your opinion may not change at all. If you like Death Grips, you’ll love their sixth studio album, Year Of The Snitch. Packed with a full-size punch of industrial hip-hop breaks and hard-rock-influenced live instrument progressions, this album is nothing short of a masterpiece in its personality, raw-ness and dedication to a new and refreshing sound. Following a spree of idiosyncratically absurd promotions through their Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts, the opening track “Death Grips is Online” breaks the fourth wall between their mysterious roll-outs and the cult-ish fanbase that marvels at every breath they take on the internet. The Sacramento trio announced that they would be working with Andrew Adamson (Director of Shrek), Justin Chancellor (Bassist for TOOL) and Lucas Abela (an artist that cuts his lips with glass) on the album with little bits of promo scattered on their social media accounts including a spoof of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia's” opening credits to announce the album name. Chancellor’s bass lines complement and enhance the driving rhythms created by producer Andy Morin and Drummer Zach Hill while Adamson’s spoken vocal recording creates an added mystery to his creative input on the album. Whenever the album builds itself on a riff or motif, it grows to a climax and abruptly tosses listeners back and forth with confusing and abrasive transitions, further developing this overall sense of disgust and crude emotions. This theme is sprinkled most predominantly on songs like The Fear, Shitshow and Black Paint, where a feeling of discomfort is a lasting impression for the unprepared listener. Even where an opportunity existed to have two songs flow seamlessly together, Dilemma is followed by Little Richard instead of The Fear, which sums up the album to a t. In sequence, this album tells a story that is both captivating and mysterious in a challenging and jarring manner.

Your Dog - Rose Droll

Rose Droll’s debut full length made its way into my musical scope out of nowhere, and I could not be happier to have stumbled upon it. Multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter Ellen Bert ventures deep within what feels like one drained state of mind following a period of trauma in mentally abusive relationship in an earnest, gripping and thoughtful way. Comparing herself to the dog of her former partner, a Fat Duck and -not- a Happy Kitten, the San Francisco native paints a powerful image of the emotional discomfort that can be felt from an imbalance in energy from one partner to the other with mournfully catchy riffs and melodies, bouncing between a driving DIY indie sound to a singer-songwriter ballad matching the sentiment of each song and resulting in a harmonious and meticulously structured thought. The spoken lyrics in songs like Hush and Boy Bruise beg listeners to follow along and decipher, and within them is a rewarding, exciting and captivating message every stanza of the album.

-Calum

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thechrisgonzo-blog · 8 years ago

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Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’ Album Review

Once thought as the prodigal son of hip-hop, the career of Scott Mescudi—better known to the masses as Kid Cudi—has definitely been a roller coaster. Emerging onto the music scene in 2008 with his breakout single, “Day ‘n’ Nite”, and later signing to Kanye West’s GOOD Music label, Cudi has definitely been one of the most influential artists in the past decade. Some would even say that he’s criminally underrated and many people don’t give him the recognition that he deserves. Even though he might not get as much praise as the contemporaries that entered the game around the same time he did (i.e. Drake most notably), Cudi has amassed a cult-following that will continue to support his career no matter what. But since the release of his last studio album, the indie-rock attempt and critically panned Speedin’ Bullet 2 Heaven, even his die-hard fans were questioning Cudi’s ability to produce a project that’s been as universally loved as the first two entries of the Man on the Moon series were. I can say confidently that his latest effort, Passion, Pain & Demon Slayin’, has steered the ship back in the right direction.

Now before I get into what I liked and disliked about this album, I want to give a little more backstory of the album and the promotion of it leading to its release. Cudi began working on material shortly after Speedin’ Bullet 2 Heaven dropped and previewed a couple of tracks titled “The Frequency” and “All In” on his SoundCloud in the first quarter of 2016, giving fans a first glimpse of what the new album would sound like. He would then continue to provide snippets of tracks through his various social media accounts. Based on those previews alone, the overall sound was more reminiscent of his previous hip-hop work compared to the punk-rock aesthetic he recently tried to emulate. That definitely peeked my interest and many of Cudder’s die-hard fans’ interests as well, and I was definitely curious to see where Cudi was going with this. Slowly more details emerged as the year went by such as the title of the record; the variety of producers he was working with like Mike Will Made-It, Pharrell Williams, Mike Dean, Plain Pat, and of course his long-time friend and WZRD bandmate, Dot Da Genius; and some features like Travi$ Scott and Willow Smith. Cudi would also reveal via Twitter that the album would be a double-disc album, and it would be released at the end of September.

That tentative release eventually got pushed back due to sample clearances, and Cudi would be apart of some controversy as he had a short public beef with Drake and Kanye West after he called both of the superstars out on Twitter. Not too long after the beef, Cudi would go on to post a letter to his fans on Facebook stating that he had checked himself into rehab for depression and suicidal urges—leaving the release of the album in question. Kanye later reconciled publicly with his former GOOD Music signee at one of the stops on his Saint Pablo tour shortly after Cudi went into rehab. After a little over a month in rehab, Cudi came back into society and once again began to promote the rollout for the album with a definite release date of December 16th and a final track list that included additional features from André 3000 and divided it into four acts, much like in the Man on the Moon series. Fans were in for a pleasant surprise from Mr. Solo Dolo.

I cannot deny that I loved this album. It took me multiple listens and a couple of months after the release to fully appreciate it as whole. The production and instrumentation is hands down the best it has been since Man on the Moon II, and that’s primarily due to Cudi enlisting others for help unlike his previous three studio albums where he handled most of the production himself. The intro track, “Frequency”, sets the mood perfectly for the sonic journey the listener takes through the album. The overall sound is the typical atmospheric aesthetic that’s been present on most of Cudi’s albums, and it compliments his vocals well. He also implemented some beautiful string arrangements on certain songs that I absolutely loved. Lyrically, Cudi doesn’t overcomplicate what he’s trying to say; he’s being as honest as he has ever been when he raps/sings about his inner demons, how fame is affecting his life, and how he continues to push through and produce his art. That honesty is what I have always appreciated about him as an artist. Also, some of the standout songs are structurally some of the best songs he has crafted in years—from the melodies, grooves, and songwriting. The guest features also compliment Cudi’s style and don’t overshadow his prowess for the most part. Even though I thoroughly enjoyed the majority of the album, there were still some elements that I didn’t like and I felt they were a little unnecessary.

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One of the main issues that has been the consensus amongst critics and fans alike is the length of the album. With 19 total tracks, the album is an hour and a half long. If every song on the album was a perfect gem then length wouldn’t be an issue, but unfortunately that’s not the case. I feel that Cudi stretched the ideas on certain songs—whether it’s having the instrumental go on for a certain amount of minutes or where Cudi just vocalizes some of the lyrics repetitively—to have the songs last 4 to 5 minutes where they could’ve easily been 2 to 3 minutes long. If he would’ve trimmed some of the fat and cut it to about 12-14 songs, I think that this project would have been up there along with his first two albums in terms of quality.

Overall, this album was an enjoyable listen despite its length. Kid Cudi delivered something that his fans will enjoy as it is truly an amalgamation of all his previous works, and it’s the most focused he’s been musically in years. He brings honesty through his lyrics and songwriting, the instrumentation is varied and very infectious to the ear, and the album is consistent throughout. It might not be for everyone as Cudi does appeal to a certain niche of people, but I can confidently say that there are songs here for everyone. The perfection summation of Cudi’s career can be heard on the album closer “Surfin’” as he proclaims on the chorus, “Now, I ain’t riding no waves. Too busy making my own waves, baby. I ain’t riding no waves!” Simple but effective and whether fans gravitate to Cudi’s experimentation in genre-blending or not, he isn’t riding what’s trending in the current music scene; he’s simply doing him. To conclude, I’m very excited to see where Cudi goes on his next project and maybe we finally get the concluding chapter in the Man on the Moon series? Who knows but Kid Cudi definitely displayed all of his passion, voiced his pain, and slayed his demons on his latest effort.

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Overall Rating: 8/10

Favorite Tracks: By Design, All In, Rose Golden, Baptized in Fire, Kitchen, Surfin’

Least Favorite Tracks: Releaser, Wounds

Thank you for reading and stay tuned for more pop culture reviews and discussions! One Love - Chris Gonzo

#complexityblog #kidcudi #passionpainanddemonslayin #republicrecords #wickedawesome #musicreview #albumreview

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kpopgerapitico · 8 years ago

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Song of the Week

IT’S A NEW YEAR!!!!!!!

And for some reason, instead of taking a break like any sane company would, a bunch of groups had comebacks that will inevitably be forgotten by the end of next year. This turned out longer than usual (I was being wordy), so I added a cut for your convenience.

Honorable Mentions:

I am so confused by NCT 127′s comeback. The video starts in fake old footage, and then moves to the present. But the fashion doesn’t change. And the title is in 3 languages, but the song only touches on 2. Why is it even labelled in Chinese? We may never know. Musically I really like the chorus and the bridge alone, but I’m not a huge fan of them together. I keep waiting for NCT to define themselves in SM’s lineup, but it really hasn’t happened yet. They seem to fit somewhere near EXO, just a little bit harder. Maybe. I am intrigued but thoroughly confused by Limitless.

All of these older groups are coming back, with music that I just don’t understand. It all references there old stuff to get original fans back, but also tries to be current. And sadly, the 90′s aesthetic in music is not really in right now (with the notable exception of SHINee). Or maybe I just don’t find it interesting. Anyways, S.E.S fell into that trap with Paradise, which stole the drum sample from SHINee’s 1 of 1 and with Remember, which feels stuck in every way except its really nice sound production.

What is with all these idol bands coming out of the wood works? Not that I’m complaining. MAS 0094 is joining the group with their debut(?) Make Some Noise. It is a song I didn’t know I needed. If you took FT Island at their hard rock style, and then added the melody and style of B1A4, you would get this song. I adore it. My one complaint is sadly in the production of the recording I have.The guitar is horrible cut off in the processing, as is almost all of the band sound, making a wall of almost white noise in the chorus. The vocals are great, but everything else feels like it was recorded with no understanding of clipping.

Seventeen has finally gone for BTS’s proven non-vocal chorus in Highlight. I fell more than a little bad that I can’t tell visually that this is Seventeen, but way to go performance team. And I have a feeling this track is an insanely good workout song, maybe a good pump up song, and definitely a killer dance track that will be remixed a bunch. No guarantees that I remember it at all in a month though.

I love me a good R&B vocalist. And Heize has done a great job making a name for herself, so when I see her featuring on something, I’m pretty sure I will at least like it. That is true of DAVII’s Navigation. I like how simple the vibe of the whole track is, without being boring. It feels like something that should play in a record shop while you search through vinyl with a coffee in your other hand.

I never thought I would see the day that a group tried to be a new Infinite, since the originals fit into such a distinct niche. But TopSecret is doing there best with their debut, She. The dancing in the video reminds me of the knife style stuff Infinite has had mastered for years. The music even has some of the same retro styles you hear in a lot of Infinite’s stuff. It’s disconcertingly like looking at the alternate universe Infinite. Where Infinite had to be super cutesy. And have a band concept.

I love AOA when they are mixing addicting dance tracks with sexy vocals and their equally sexy concepts. Good Luck is a great example. So is this years Bing Bing. While not as powerful as last year, it is still a solid track from them. I didn’t like Excuse Me as much, and was bored with it way faster.

You know how I said S.E.S had messed up? Shinhwa gave the perfect example of what you should do. Touch is all sorts of cool. It feels like the stuff way younger groups are putting out in every way except one. There is a confidence and maturity in Shinhwa, one that comes out in their willingness to still take risk 19 years into their career. They all look amazing too, which is just unfair when their youngest is 35, and the hyung line is all 37. Even their music video is effortlessly cool.

Daydream was one of my favorite albums last year. So when I looked at this years schedule for Day6, I was half scared, half excited. Excited for what may be a constant onslaught of killer Day6 tracks. Scared that they may falter halfway through the year, or lose any health they had from overwork. Putting that aside, the first song of the year is out. And it is a banger. I Wait has a really really interesting verse section, a guitar break at the end for the first time with the group (not a particularly interesting one but still) and a chorus that fits into their existing discography well. I can only really describe it as an interesting combination between Western alt. rock, K-pop, and K-Rock. And I may be in love with the combination.

Choosing the winner this week was super hard. I did my listening to almost all of the tracks a day early, and was deliberating between Shinhwa, Day6 and the winner. In the end, the winner went to the song I cannot get out of my head.

I have talked about Korean ballads here a lot, and how important understanding the language is for me with ballads. But once in a blue moon, they get me hard just like they are designed to. Vromance’s I’m Fine did that. Their vocals are absolutely stellar, enough to put some fear in the current ballad kings, BtoB. They aren’t even pushing the top of their ranges (no one is in falsetto unless they are up an extra octave). I would almost comment the sin of putting them on the same level as 2AM (GASP!). And the video had me crying a la the beginning of Up by the end. There are also some really interesting things happening musically into the final chorus that I adore. The live is insane.

#sotw #vromance #i'm fine

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deadcactuswalking · 6 years ago

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REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 31st March 2019

Yeah, this is quite a bit frickin’ late but I’ve been busy tonight and you got the Beauty of “Doin’ Your Mom” this week anyway so I hope it’s fine that this is pretty late. Anyway, I don’t care, let’s get to the top 10, and this episode might barely get to the minimum word limit; we’ll see.

Top 10

Lewis Capaldi is at the top spot for what I believe is his fifth week with “Someone You Loved” at number-one.

At number-two we still have “Giant” by Calvin Harris and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man as the runner-up.

Tom Walker is up a spot to number-three with “Just You and I”, at a new peak.

I’m surprised that Jonas Brothers have been able to survive increased longevity, as their single “Sucker” moves up a single spot from last week to number-four.

Somehow, Ariana Grande’s “break up with your girlfriend, i’m bored” is still moving up spaces, one this week to number-five.

Dave’s “Location” featuring Burna Boy is up two spots to number-six.

We also have a new arrival in the top 10, with “Fashion Week” by Steel Banglez, AJ Tracey and MoStack. It’s producer Steel Banglez’s second top 40 hit and first ever Top 10 hit as a lead artist, AJ Tracey’s fourth top 40 hit and first ever Top 10 hit, as well as MoStack’s fourth top 40 hit and first ever Top 10 hit. Congratulations, guys, but we’ll talk about the song itself later.

LAUV’s “i’m so tired...” with Troye Sivan is up a space to number-eight.

At number nine, we have “Walk Me Home” by P!nk up three spaces to number-nine thanks to the video.

Finally, NSG’s “Options” featuring Tion Wayne is up a single spot to #10.

Climbers

We have three notable climbers this week, all of which are top 20 entries, with “Boasty” by Wiley featuring Idris Elba, Sean Paul and Stefflon Don moving up 11 spaces to #11 and “Here with Me” by Marshmello and CHVRCHES making its way up nine positions to #14. We also have Ava Max with “So Am I”, up 12 spaces from last week’s debut to #18.

Fallers

We have seven fallers and they can be set into three pretty distinct categories. First, we have the songs from Dave’s PSYCHODRAMA gradually making their way out, with “Disaster” featuring J Hus down five positions to #15 and “Streatham” falling eight positions to #22. Then, we have the songs affected by UK chart rules and the streaming cuts that songs with legs typically experience, with “Don’t Call Me Up” by Mabel collapsing down 13 spaces to #16 just as it makes its breakthrough in the US and “7 rings” by Ariana Grande thankfully being completely demolished as it moves down a whopping 22 spaces to #29. Finally, we have the expected yet somewhat premature songs clearing the way for a soon exit, like “Please Me” by Cardi B and Bruno Mars down eight to #25, “Nights Like This” by Kehlani featuring Ty Dolla $ign down five to #33 and “How it Is” by Roddy Ricch, Chip and Yxng Bane featuring the Plug down six to #40 (The faster the better).

Dropouts

We just have four of these this week, with “Juice” by Lizzo sadly making its exit from #38 off the debut, “Nothing Breaks Like a Heart” by Mark Ronson and Miley Cyrus finally leaving from #36, and two songs that never really took off, “Bally” by Swarmz and Tion Wayne from #40 and “wish you were gay” by Billie Eilish from #39, although the latter will probably rebound thanks to the album impacting next week. There are no returning entries so let’s get straight to the new arrivals—

FEATURED SINGLE

“Free Uzi” – Lil Uzi Vert

Produced by DJ L Beats

It’s weird to put Lil Uzi Vert in this section in particular, but I don’t think this song will ever chart considering Lil Uzi Vert’s main audience is probably using Spotify, and this track is only available through a YouTube video, SoundCloud and I think TIDAL because of course, why not? Anyways, Lil Uzi Vert signed a contract when he was young and offered money by DJ Drama, Don Cannon and their label Generation Now, a subsidiary of Atlantic. To cut it short, and to disregard all the drama (No pun intended) like the leaks, Uzi saying he’s going to retire music and “Wake up back in 2013”, him being cut off of NAV’s album due to label shenanigans, Lil Uzi Vert cannot release music when he wants to and has been revealing this info via depressing Instagram Live streams and to see him so defeated is kind of painful, so when I saw that Uzi released a song called “Free Uzi” I figured it wouldn’t be introspective and would be more of an anthem for young aspiring artists who are being shelved by their label... I now understand that 1.) That’s an incredibly niche market, and 2.) No, the song’s about having sex and shooting people. Using a beat ripped from a G Herbo track from 2012 to express his anger towards the label in the oddest way, using a pitched-up version of his voice (To the point where he kind of sounds like Playboi Carti). This song screams raw Uzi, and is a middle finger to his label by being relatively inaccessible in comparison with what the label would want Uzi to make for a comeback single. It’s got an entirely uncleared sample, an almost complete lack of ad-libs which are otherwise incredibly prominent in Uzi’s discography, a monotonous flow that instead of droning as it’s used for the entire song, becomes a mantra, the lo-fi video by some unknown director which is just Uzi smoking and performing really wacky, cute dances with his friends (And NAV) in a corner store, the very abrupt ending and some of Lil Uzi Vert’s more explicit sexual and violent lyrics, including an outrageous line about Colin Kaepernick – search it up, it’s pretty hilarious. It’s such a vengeance song against his label, and I never expect Uzi to be this furiously stubborn and willing to jankily put together a half-unfinished song just for the sake of making DJ Drama even more panicked. It’s an absolute joy to watch and listen to, and I hope it makes it onto Eternal Atake if that ever comes out. Oh, and:

I still watch Big Bang Theory, that’s the nerd in me

Yeah, no, that line’s inexcusable.

NEW ARRIVALS

#38 – “Pretty Shining People” – George Ezra

Produced by Cam Blackwood – Peaked at #12 in Scotland

So this is the fifth single from George Ezra’s second album Staying at Tamara’s because he can’t stop milking his most mediocre effort yet, and also Ezra’s sixth Top 40 hit overall. The record has been winning awards left and right so I don’t blame him for pushing this single – although it was already pushed a year back with a music video as a promotional single – and at least this song is generally pretty inoffensive, although Ezra’s voice sounds odder here than ever, and has a country twang to it that matches the production but does not fit in the slightest, although immediately it is not nearly as noticeable after just the first verse. Overall, this is actually just kind of a pathetic, plastic folk-pop song with some nice guitar licks in there, sure, and an electric guitar riff that is way too distant in the mix, with the hook being an overwhelming pile of absolute cheese that I haven’t heard since R.E.M.’s “Shiny Happy People”. I do appreciate how it is mostly live instrumentation, and I do love the steady drum beat here, but otherwise I wasn’t impressed the first time and it’s worse now that I know his hit song formula and that this “New” track follows it to an absolute T. It’s not awful, but I’d skip it. Next.

#32 – “Piece of Your Heart” – MEDUZA and Goodboys

Produced by MEDUZA

So, I feel this one needs some backstory. MEDUZA is an up-and-coming DJ collective or EDM producer band from what I can gather, and by up-and-coming I mean they literally have two songs available on their Spotify page, and one of them is a remix, so yes, this is technically the debut single from the Italian dance music band, and Goodboys? Well, it’s their debut single too, I’m pretty sure, as they have nothing except a picture up on their Spotify page. Looking at Genius, I now know that they are a London-based pop trio consisting of three producers and I’m assuming vocalists. Hm, two artists, both with no single released yet, collaborate for their debut single, so the only idea I have to base my expectations off is “EDM”, and yes, I suppose it is, and I actually quite like it, to be completely honest, more of a guilty pleasure – if you think those exist, of course. In reality, this is generic deep house that isn’t really much of a novelty or anything special, at least on the surface. The vocalists from Goodboys have very distinct British accents that make their repetitious hook sound hilarious, and I like the glitchy synths harmonising with the synths before the “Drop”, which, by the way, is one of the dudes from Goodboys vocalising the drop as if he was on that Radio 1 show where DJs have to guess their own drop, and it’s pretty cute if anything. Not only does it replicate the drop, which is nice in itself, but it really gives it a homegrown feel because it sounds like someone trying to sing along to it at home. Oh, and the melodies in the post-chorus are pretty gorgeous, and I love how the drop kicks in the second time with the stray snare before everything. Is it generic? Yes. Is it janky? Yes. Do I still like it? Hell yes. If you like this Loud Luxury brand of house-pop, this might just be for you.

#19 – “Keisha & Becky” – Russ and Tion Wayne

Produced by Gotcha Bxtch

So, when I say Russ, I mean Russ splash, a UK rapper known for his top 10 hit “Gun Lean”, which he lazily interpolates in his second Top 40 hit (and Tion Wayne’s third). I don’t mean the American rapper who everyone hates, and I made this distinction last time. Whilst it’s annoying, it’s separated on both Spotify and Genius as Russ splash so it’s not like it’s going to be confusing to a casual listener. Anyway, this is a song by two UK grime rappers known for faux-dancehall and trap bangers in which they talk about killing people, so how can they pull off trying to make some sort of love song? Well, they don’t. I don’t think I’ve heard a less sexy “Very sexy” in my life. In fact, there’s not really a synth melody to carry this song, just an ambient stock sound in the background with just heavy bass and trap percussion to give it much of a beat and honestly the stark minimalism really works. If you ignore the hook’s existence, Tion Wayne sounds as enthusiastic as ever and I’m starting to really love this dude’s charisma. He has an insane ad-lib that is just a really long screech on here as well, which I think is an explanation in itself to why I like this dude. The first half of the hook is exciting until, well, “Very sexy” (It isn’t), and when Wayne and Russ start trading bars it gets pretty fun, in fact Russ sounds pretty great on the song. His rapid flow and nasal delivery is a perfect fit, but honestly I can’t get over how it’s decidedly unsexy for a song about how Keisha and Becky are “Very sexy”, and makes no effort to be because it’s just a trap song about gang violence and attractive women like they all are, but there’s not really much storytelling to explain who Keisha and Becky are or anything, it’s just that one line that irritates the hell out of me, “Keisha, Becky, very sexy”. Like the rest of the song, it’s so bare minimum that it nearly works, but it still misses the mark for me. Sorry, Wayne, I’m excited to hear your next song, but Russ? He can go away, he’s kind of worthless, but I see some improvement.

#7 – “Fashion Week” – Steel Banglez, AJ Tracey, MoStack

Produced by Steel Banglez and TheElements

What Steel Banglez does is make these who’s-who collaborations between British rappers almost like he’s DJ Khaled, although in this case you can tell Steel Banglez actually co-produced the beat because he does have a signature style, which is trap with a sprinkling of dancehall... so, yeah, he’s a producer who just makes generic beats that everyone else makes, right? Why is he so big? Well, he’s kind of a pioneer, because he was one of the first to combine UK rap, dancehall and pop hooks as well as keeping that ruthlessness and bloodthirsty attitude of British trap, to great success. So, is he any good? Usually, no, he kind of sucks and his style does nothing for me. This one definitely has a Caribbean rhythm that I like but there’s not enough bass to make the beat really hit, and MoStack is an absolutely pathetic rapper who gives one of the worst performances I think I’ve ever heard in UK rap as he mumbles in his offbeat falsetto without a care, with the mix barely even caring enough to keep his vocals audible. Compare it to AJ Tracey, with a strong delivery, odd and urine-related yet actually witty wordplay, multisyllabic rhymes, and he’s on the same song and does the hook. If MoStack wasn’t on this and the beat had some more bass than it does, maybe this could have been serviceable, but especially with the awkward instrumental section, despite me personally liking the strings and AJ Tracey’s verse, I can’t like this as much as I want to.

Conclusion

Wow, not a great week, huh? Well, MEDUZA and Goodboys take away Best of the Week for “Piece of Your Heart”, even though I wouldn’t say it’s exactly great or even all that good. Worst of the Week obviously goes to Steel Banglez, AJ Tracey and MoStack for “Fashion Week”, but nothing else is even notable enough for Honourable or Dishonourable Mention. See ya next week, and free Uzi.

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moleofmetal · 8 years ago

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GIG REVIEW: Kill II This, Divine Chaos +more at Lyrics Dundee.

Bands: Kill II This, Divine Chaos, Burning The Dream, Dirty Judas, Tusk

Setup to be quite a monster ever since the 2 shows running the same night decided to combine and collaborate instead clash of and make a full course meal of a metal! With 3 of 6 the bands (That's half) only recently rocked out a major a festival; Bloodstock this year, this was set up to be a great way to finish of the metal year with this the last meal and gig of the year!

So on we go and get stuck in! Tusk are on first and are get on stage quickly and efficiently and fire up in a fashion of band proud to open for one of their favorite bands. This time looking much more confident and relaxed. Kicking out some solid covers of L7 and Motorhead as well as their own tracks.

It's great to see them being a lot more confident in their own material giving them more of an emphasis in their set this time, feeling as if they are slowly pulling away from the covers. It's also so good to see look as if they are enjoying themselves more, a much more relaxed Tusk was on stage this time. This is something they have taken from the studio and truly applied to their live show, learning to have more fun and it's working noisy wonders.

Despite having slightly truncated set due to the number of bands on, and the later start to get try more folk in first. The did an honorable job of leading everyone into this night of metal revelry.

[7/10]

Getting up on stage next is Bloodshot and provided the most banter between the song and some of longer tunes for the night. Ripping some quite majestic southern rock/metal jams their set was a good mix of old songs and one or two new ones, all proudly written by themselves as proclaimed by singer Lee Annandale. Like an old bull-dog you’d probably call “ol’ Reliable” that a bit looks rough and creaks and groans a lot, but when provoked the right way can still fetch like the best of them. They played a solid set of songs, very entertaining if a little shorter than normal.

[7/10]

Dirty Judas work their magic again on stage. Bringing a can and a half of groove, served in meaty chunks, up in the perfect bowl fit for the bulldog above like the finest pedigree chum. Definitely feeling a looking more fluent and confident being higher up in the bill that last time.

I was surprised that front man Danny Sexbang Col MacGregor didn't come forward out to the crowd to help get the limited audience engaged more into the action. Not the most energic I've seen them but what they lacked in movement they made up for in precision in strikes

[7/10]

Pretty much explosive from the very outset Burning the Dream swamp everyone in their signature style. A shitstorm of styles melding Groove metal given a modern metal facelift with melodic death metal and even adding elements of slam death metal into the heavier bits,

A hurricane of a front man (Paul Kelly) who is not afraid to get up close and personal into the dauntingly empty pit area. Trying to get people moving as there was a plenty a headbang happening but the there was no pitting sadly.

Blatantly political in their attitude and especially in their merch they have an uncompromising style, with a clear aim, “Get fucking Moving!”

The band that really need to get a release out and fast, although they promise it's in works. Watch this space.

[8/10]

Divine Chaos

Tied for the “band of the night” between them and Burning The Dream, Divine Choas quickly took to the stage and came on like a tsunami, sweeping away all in their wake. While the previous band focus was the heaviness of their package, Divines chaos attack was more gear towards the progressive. Showing off massive Melodic death metal hooks combined with some breakneck thrash/death fast sections, and elements of crust in the vocal delivery.

The rapidity of the set with littlest of a gap between track after track each having the equal part melodic sweeping technicality to neck wrecking thrashing that really made it hard one on the neck muscles.

An intense set that was fired out quickly and precisely for a very complete attack!

[8/10]

Up finally was Kill II This taking their time to get up and ready on stage but what time they spent on delaying and building anticipation was more than made up for in Volume! They were the loudest band of the night and submerged us all in a lake of hard rocking alternative metal infused with industrial elements. And it's this sample-heavy fusion that is really blunt force the main focus on the chaos.

In the riff department, they keep things mainly simple, splashing from the old nu metal vial with the vocals providing mostly clean and their darkly uplifting gothic overtones.

Overall I found the sound enjoyable but kind of dated, in a fascinating way like a "Niche within a niche". Rooted in the 90′s to early 2000 wave of metal where they hit some relative success, but they were too underground for most mainstreamer metalheads (like myself) to be that interesting at the time, and are now too mainstream and dated at the same time for now matured and older metalhead to really get invested in apart from the nostalgia element if you knew them at the time.

It's great that these guys are having another shot to get the recognition that never got first time round but like the aging rock stars of the glam hair metal era, that might be even a little insincere of them to try and jump on the trend of the time.Thankfully they have not compromised anything, and look like they love doing what they do and probably more so now than they even did back then.

[7/10]

Photos by the awesome JGW Lee Photography

https://www.facebook.com/pg/Jgwleephotog

This although a great show and had some amazing bands playing, as well as a rocking after show party at the only metal nightclub in the town KAGE, it was a good night!

The only real and my biggest complaint of the night was the crowd. Well, lack of, turning out to be another night of bands pretty much playing for other bands with minimal others in the room.

This might be a case of the relative obscurity of the headliner and or an aging metalhead scene in the town, or even a competing out of town show. It certainly could do with more people to help elevated this gig from a good standard one to a great one!

The venue was nice and comfortable, with a good sound. As another venue that is only "thinking about" putting on more metal shows it would do well if it did no doubt. Although the decor might be a bit too swanky for the metal crowd.

#Kill II This #Dirty Judas #bloodshot #tusk #Burning the Dream #divine choas #nu metal #Alternative metal #industrial metal #death metal #gig review #Local Bands #local metal #local gigs #Bloodstock #l7 #motorhead #Kage #Danny sexbang

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deadcactuswalking · 6 years ago

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BABY, DON’T HURT ME: The Top 5 Best and Worst Hit Songs of 1994

1994 was the definition of a 6/10. I can’t sit through all 100 in one sitting, but it’s not like it was terrible, in fact, my worst list was hard as nails because a lot of the bad stuff was just not interesting enough to talk about. When I did my 2017 list, stuff like “Thunder” by Imagine Dragons was just so mind-bogglingly terrible in every way, hence I had a lot of material, but here, you can clearly tell how better I am at talking about music I like, because God damn, there are some all-time classics hidden in all this boring schlock and even the stuff that’s not fantastic has a lot of redeeming qualities and charm. Hence, the worst list is mostly composed of stuff I found to be utterly charmless – well, except the #1, but you’ll read on for that. First, however, before we even get into talking about where on earth the popular music scene was in 1994, here are the Honourable Mentions – songs that just couldn’t make the cut for a much shorter list than what I would usually make. I’m going to try and keep it brief, because there were a lot of songs I actually really enjoyed that didn’t really cut it when under the pressure of just a top five list.

Honourable Mentions

These are basically in order of where they were on the Year-End list, so don’t think the guys at the top weren’t ever going to make the list because some of them were pretty tough snips.

“The Sign”, “All That She Wants” and “Don’t Turn Around” – Ace of Base

If you ever wonder why people hate Magic! and UB40 so much, it’s because white-washed cod-reggae can be done so much better.

“Whatta Man” – Salt-n-Pepa and En Vogue

Not the best horn sample in this Year-End, but Goddamn, they get close.

“Wild Night” - John Mellencamp featuring Meshell Ndegeocello

I don’t know who either of these dudes are but they can make a nice song. On the other hand, how in the hell do you pronounce Meshell’s surname?

“The Most Beautiful Girl in the World” – The Artist Formerly Known as Prince

This dude still had it way after his heyday when he started calling himself “the Artist Formerly Known as Prince”. Rest in peace.

“Fantastic Voyage” – Coolio

This dude had a second hit – before “Gangsta’s Paradise”? That’s cool... not going to make the obvious pun.

“Any Time, Any Place” – Janet Jackson

This song is a full seven minutes of pure beauty, but the reason why it doesn’t make the list is because it’s seven minutes. We’ll get on to that later on in the list.

“Because the Night” – 10,000 Maniacs

Specifically the MTV Unplugged version. The other version is just not as effective.

“This DJ” – Warren G

Warren G is kind of overlooked now, but he was a hit-maker back then who could crank out some fantastic stuff back in this G-funk era.

“Cry for You” – Jodeci

Drake shouts this song out in “Controlla”, but he doesn’t exactly reference it in a clever way. He just says “I think I’d die for you” and then rhymes it with, no joke, “Jodeci, “Cry for You””, like, okay, Aubrey.

“Keep Ya Head Up” – 2Pac

This sample was done better by BlocBoy JB. Something about me just loves how they take the Five Stairsteps’ vocals and make them Kanye chipmunk-style, as BlocBoy mourns the losses of his friends from life in the streets, but since he’s still young, he is a “child” as the sample suggests, so it kind of seems condescending when they say “things are going to get easier”, and Bloc is trying to say that young people go through real hardships too. I don’t know, but this isn’t a BlocBoy JB review, and if I wanted to I could talk about that song in length, but I’ll just say this 2Pac song is damn good too.

“Who am I? (What’s My Name?)” – Snoop (Doggy) Dogg

I mean, I’d be able to tell you if you didn’t change it all the time.

“Rock and Roll Dreams Come Through” – Meat Loaf

The video for this is directed by Michael Bay of all people. That’s all I have to say.

“Mary Jane’s Last Dance” – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Okay, but Red Hot Chili Peppers kind of did this riff more justice.

“U.N.I.T.Y.” – Queen Latifah and “Here Comes the Hotstepper” – Ini Kamoze

These were the songs that made me want to extend these lists to ten songs, but on the other hand, my Dishonourable Mentions made me want to shorten these lists to no songs.

“I’ll Take You There” – General Public

Who?

“What is Love” – Haddaway

Now, THIS one hurts to cut. This is a bonafide classic.

“Bop Gun (One Nation)” – Ice Cube featuring George Clinton

The 11-minute version of this song is more tolerable than it sounds.

Now that’s it for the Honourable Mentions but what exactly was 1994 pop music like? Well, I can tell you one thing – G-funk and smooth R&B and hip-hop were in full effect by this time, and many people say the 90s took a while to start, well, this is the breakout year for the 1990s as a decade. All the tropes you expect from early and mid-1990s pop music are here, and they’re here to stay (excluding a lot of the grunge and rock, mostly because of nonsensical Hot 100 chart regulations from at the time). Enough rambling, let’s get onto the actual list. These are...

BABY, DON’T HURT ME: The Top 5 Best and Worst Hit Songs of 1994

#5 Worst

So, if you think Scum Gang scumbags becoming popstars is a new thing, you obviously haven’t been following the absolute trainwreck that is R. Kelly. He was all over this year, whether it be him riding solo or providing vocals, songwriting and production for other R&B acts like Aaliyah and new (at the time) duo Changing Faces, who had both of their first two singles written and produced by R. Kells himself. I was on the fence about this particular track until I saw the Wikipedia article.

“It features uncredited vocals from R. Kelly.”

Alrighty then!

#5 – “Stroke You Up” – Changing Faces featuring R. Kelly

The immediate second this song starts I shrivel up and want to die. That piercingly high first note in the loop aggravates me because it’s just an instant onslaught of a screech. Oh, and that cowbell-like noise that appears in a lot of ‘90s R&B? I hate it.

Don’t get me wrong, I love 1990s R&B but man, it has to be done well to be anything more than a bit of a slog to get through, mostly because pretty much every song in that niche has these set of tropes, and I’m not going to lie, I probably could not sit through a whole album by anyone in that scene who isn’t Usher. Like, you’ve got to have some charisma to make your songs interesting – and that’s true with any decade and any genre – so when you’ve got only serviceable singers and a creepy-as-all-hell backing vocalist, you don’t exactly do wonders to the blocky production.

Don’t even get me started on that hook.

Do you mind if I stroke you up (I don’t mind)

Oh, of course, you don’t freaking mind, you’d get a stroke from anyone as long as they’re female. I don’t think you guys exactly needed confirmation... although actually maybe consent is the best foot forward in R. Kelly’s case... wait, why does R. Kelly need to consent to anything except jail time? He’s a piece of sexist human trash and this woman needs to ASK to just stroke him, oblivious to the fact that he can just hop straight into the girls in his sex cult?

All through the night

You know, you’re supposed to get like eight hours, so are you just going to stroke him for nearly half a day? Because knowing R. Kelly, I’d think he’d want a bit more.

Until your body’s tired

How is he going to be tired? You’re the one actually making some sort of motion, albeit it just be stroking... for eight bloody hours.

Oh, and R. Kelly can stop moaning in the intro and outro. We never need that, okay, we just never need R. Kelly moaning anywhere, anytime, please reissue this song without it. In fact, Spotify, I think I’m going to report abuse for the moaning alone. Nobody needs to sit through this tire fire of a track.

#5 Best

Talking about arrogant, forceful jerks, here’s a song about them.

I know what I want and I want it now / I want you, ‘cause I’m Mr. Vain

Uh... maybe I shouldn’t have met the R. Kelly comparisons. Yikes.

#5 – “Mr. Vain” – Culture Beat

That synth hook is iconic... well, at least for me. I’m into a hefty load of Eurodance and 90s house, in fact a lot of 90s electronica tickles my fancy in more ways than one, so I listened to this a lot before I even considered doing reviews as my hobby – in fact, all of my best list is like this, pretty much, and apologies for the nostalgia goggles but we need them because we’re going deep into Music Heaven’s seas and we ain’t got submarines.

That synth hook is only beaten by “Better Off Alone” in terms of 90s classic dance hooks, but that’s not the only thing about the song that’s amazing, no, before we dive into the vocals and lyrics, how about we just appreciate the rapid-fire guitar strumming replicating the hook and the freaking strings solo before the final chorus? Seriously, there’s a lot of attention to detail in what seems to be a simple Eurodance track and I appreciate that.

Also, this song is a narrative. Let’s explore that, shall we?

Call him Mr. Raider

What?

I guess it kind of makes sense in the context of “This dude only wants to get one-night stands with girls he considers to be of his stupidly high standard” (if you squint) but “Raider”? You couldn’t think of another word there to describe him? It didn’t even need to rhyme, it’s not part of the scheme.

Call him insane

Yeah, okay, so this song is about a guy who’s so irresistibly charming that all the ladies flock yet he only wants one night with them and will immediately stop caring once they’ve had sex... Is this song about Lil Yachty?

I know you want this for life / Taking pictures with all my ice / But I can’t have no... wife / I just want you for the night – Lil Yachty, “1Night”

Okay, obviously, I’m kidding – Lil Yachty didn’t even exist when this song was written – but I’m not joking when I say Tania Evans and rapper Jay Supreme do a pretty good job at representing different sides of this story. Sure, Supreme’s flow may be a bit stilted, and Evans’ (fantastic) vocals might be wasted on way too repetitive lyrics, but it’s Eurodance, cut it some slack.

Call me Raider

No, I won’t call you “Raider”. We already went through this, Jay.

In all seriousness, though, I just love how much Jay perfectly overplays the fact that he’s just an uptight douchebag.

Call me what you like / As long as you call me, time and again / Feel the presence of the aura / Of the man, none to compare

“Feel the presence of the aura”? Who the hell are you, Lucario?

Overall, despite some flaws in its writing, this track is still a dance classic, mostly for how well and intricately it’s produced. Really a fantastic demonstration of how genres like Eurodance can be top-tier stuff as well.

#4 Worst

You know, when I think “forever”, because of music I’ve listened to in the past, I don’t imagine the ungodly length of time that is. What does forever even entail? Is it an individual’s lifetime or just the span of life on Earth in general? Either way, I like my “forever” songs immediate, driving, punchy and to the point. Like Donna Lewis’ earworm hook on “I Love You Always Forever”, the hunger that Drake, Kanye West, Lil Wayne and Eminem show on the bloodthirsty posse cut “Forever”, the good stuff is what takes the concept of “forever” and makes it NOW. Now, what happens if you take the concept of “forever” and play it incredibly straight... that phrase being a synonym of “making it as boring and plain as a sponge cake with no icing”.

#4 – “Now and Forever” – Richard Marx

Now, music isn’t my only interest, far from it, one of those interests being video games, and more often than not game-wise, you could catch me playing a Nintendo game, so when I saw Marx, before Groucho even crossed my mind, my first thought was the character from Kirby, and maybe that’s not exactly the best first impression of a singer I’ve ever had.

You know what? That would have been much more interesting, because this is pretty non-descript, to the point of it being infuriatingly “nothing”. This guy’s voice, however much force he wants to put onto it, is just serviceable at best and pretty okay throughout, while a white-bread acoustic guitar is being strummed mindlessly in front of a solid orchestral instrumental, which would be pretty nice if it wasn’t so pushed back in the mix to focus on Marx’s promises of being someone’s man “now and forever” – yeah, okay, well, at least try and sound like you care. Put some effort into saying you’ll love someone always, like Bon Jovi’s “Always” the same year, which pulled off the simple power ballad much more effectively by simply seeming like people put effort into it. I can imagine that the band wrote their song about a real-life woman, but Marx here might as well be singing to a cactus. Next.

#4 Best

Now, you may be wondering why a song recorded and released in 1975 about an event from 1963, that eventually hit #1 on the Hot 100 in 1976, is on a list about music from 1994, and it’s all because of a remix – not the first one, mind you – that landed it back onto the charts in 1993 and 1994, “peaking” at #13. Thanks, Ben Liebrand, but your remix is irrelevant because the version I’m counting is the original.

#4 – “December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night!)” – Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons

So this was Valli and his band’s biggest hit in their extensive discography and very lengthy career, mostly due to being pretty much the opposite of what they always did. Sometimes shaking up the formula is actually ideal in pop music, as Valli saw when he relegated himself to backing vocals, letting the leads be handled by the drummer, Gerry Polci, and the bassist, Don Ciccone. Usually, this might have been a risky misstep, since the singer is chosen as the frontman due to the fact that they would naturally have more vocal talent, yet despite Valli being quite literally the name of the band, there’s no real frontman, as everyone sang and everyone appeared in the videos... and that’s impressive, considering how much of an ordeal that is, with how many members there are and were, and how members constantly go in and out while Valli’s still standing. The fact that the band never felt like Valli was in power is honestly one of the reasons why this song works so well.

This song sounds so joyful and happy, and you couldn’t replicate that with one man playing all the parts, because of a tried and true phrase.

One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do – Harry Nilsson, “One”

If this was all one guy and it was just all the parts mixed together, I doubt it would feel anywhere near as gleeful and carefree as it does as a group record. It starts with a tight disco groove, and then you’ve got that classic piano melody, before Polci starts singing and he’s not a Phil Collins by any means, but he does the job damn well for a drummer, and that just adds to how fun it feels. Everyone did their best and contributed to a happy, sunshiny song that holds up to this day – and by everyone, I mean everyone, it definitely sounds like all seven or so of these guys, including even the keyboardists and the guys on the horns, had a blast recording this. I can imagine them just loving it in the studio. Oh, what a night, indeed.

#3 Worst

Oh, yeah, fun fact: Did you know that last song was originally going to be celebrating the repeal of prohibition, and Frankie Valli wanted it to be changed to a song about an affair? Yeah, and it’s not necessarily a subtle song about an affair either.

Spinning my head around and taking my body under – Don Ciccone, “December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night!)”

You know, I guess it’s somewhat poetic and at least it depicts the subject in a way that doesn’t feel cliché and cheesy. On the other hand...

#3 – “Said I Loved You...But I Lied” – Michael Bolton

What a terrible thing to say right to your significant other’s face, Michael Bolton. Why would you manipulate someone like that, man? Is this some sort of nasty plot to get sex without any consequence?

Said I loved you but I lied / ‘Cause this is more than love I feel inside / Said I loved you but I was wrong / ‘Cause love could never ever feel so strong

Oh... well, then. That is the dumbest bait-and-switch I’ve ever fell for. Well, this sickeningly sweet song is something else to add to my list of reasons to punch Michael Bolton in his corny face. Wait a second, he’s in his 60s now? Huh, maybe I should scrap that list entirely.

You know, Michael Bolton used to make metal and hard rock back in the 70s, and I won’t exactly say his work under that style was all that good, at least it wasn’t as vomit-inducing as his middle of the road, soft rock ballads, including this one, which hides its snoozeworthy self under a guise of a clickbaiting title... which I imagine isn’t even the reason this song became popular, no, it’s because of radio play, specifically adult contemporary stations – why would you put the effort into clickbaiting adult contemporary listeners when in the end, a song about tricking a woman for sex and/or a mediocre romance could have been written better than this generic schlock, and would have probably garnered even more attention, especially from the good-guy Michael Bolton?

I suppose none of this matters when the music’s good, right? Well, it’s not. It’s borderline tropical semi-tribal pop music, actually, it’s kind of interesting. The intro feels like it would fit right into Legends of the Hidden Temple and I don’t think that’s entirely a compliment. Michael sounds out of breath all the time, and nothing else in this song is worthy of even a footnote. I’m so glad we get immediately to the good stuff after trash like this.

#3 Best

Alright, now we’re getting into the hip-hop stuff that I loved this year, and, yeah, there was a lot of it but only a few of these songs really left enough of an impact on me to put them on the list. Remember when I said Warren G was overlooked? Well, I don’t think anyone forgets this G-funk classic.

#3 – “Regulate” – Warren G featuring Nate Dogg

God, no movie soundtrack tie-in deserves to be this smooth and this catchy. This song is immediately recognisable from that Dr. Dre-like synth hook and tight rhythm sampled from “I Keep Forgettin’ (Every Time You’re Near)”, a soul song from singer-songwriter Michael McDonald, which was a success of its own back in 1982, peaking in the top five. Sadly, it’s nowhere near as good as the song it eventually birthed 12 years later.

This song is basically one extremely lengthy verse of Warren G and the late Nate Dogg trading bars and telling a story of both rappers being involved in some ghetto violence, with funky instrumental breaks separating topics and flows.

It was a clear black night, a clear white moon

Warren’s looking to pick up some “skirts”, as they say, but for the most part, he’s just cruising. Meanwhile, Nate just arrived in Long Beach and is on a mission to find Warren – for whatever reason – before women start distracting him, because, of course, they do, it’s hip-hop. Warren notices a gang shooting dice, so he decides to politely join the activity and engage in some of the fun, and then they pull out their guns and try and kill him. However, Nate Dogg doesn’t have time for women.

Since these girls peepin’ me, I’mma glide and swerve / These hookers lookin’ so hard, they straight hit the curb / Onto bigger, better things than some horny tricks / I see my homie and some suckers all in his mix

He was on a mission to find “Mr. Warren G”, and he has discovered the holy grail, however there is one obstacle – the gang that is attacking Warren. He screams out for help from Nate, he’s completely hopeless, in fact, it’s surprisingly vulnerable for a gangsta rap track.

I’m gettin’ jacked, I’m breakin’ myself / I can’t believe they’re taking Warren’s wealth / They took my rings, they took my Rolex / I looked at the brother, said, “Damn, what’s next?”

He’s expecting even worse assault from these guys, but he doesn’t know what’s next because nothing can be this awful, right? He doesn’t believe this was even possible for him to be in this situation. But then, Nate Dogg, shades on, goes all action hero on them right after Warren G starts to accept his fate.

They got guns to my head, I think I’m goin’ down

But then, Nate shoots all his problems away.

Nate Dogg is about to make some bodies turn cold

I said Nate had no time for women, but that’s incredibly untrue, because right after he shoots multiple men to death, he’s picking up women on the streets, and, to be honest, yeah, I’d get in his car. Like Ty Dolla $ign, who I feel Nate was a massive influence on, he knew how to be seductive and smooth in his delivery, even if what he was singing wasn’t particularly sexy.

She said, “My car’s broke down and you seem real nice, would you let me ride?” / I got a car full of girls and it’s going real swell / The next stop is the Eastside Motel

For the final section, Nate and Warren just lay down some of the ideology of the G-funk philosophy... okay, then!

It’s the G-funk era, funked out with a gangsta twist

You know, it’s actually pretty impressive how throughout this violent yet sensual story of murder, assault and illegal criminal activity, as well as mentioning smoking and complementing women for their physical appearance, there’s actually minimal profanity. Warren G’s really for the kids, huh?

This whole story would be pointless, however, if it wasn’t for how well it was all sung, and I say sung instead of rapped because, yeah, it’s pretty much an R&B song with the melodic flows both take on, and I’m not saying Warren is anywhere near to the level of Nate’s singing ability, but you can tell effort was put in on both sides for them to complement each other well, and with Warren’s vulnerable and uncertain portrayal, a more unsure and confused personality and scattered flow really assist in painting the story, especially in stark contrast to Nate’s deep, smooth tone that makes all this sound effortless. Overall, yeah, this song is irresistibly catchy without anything even resembling a chorus, mostly due to the infectious beat and fun flows from everyone involved. Undoubtedly one of the classics in hip-hop. Rest in peace, Nate Dogg.

#2 Worst

“Whoomp! (There it Is)” by the Tag Team is an energetic and fun banger, with a catchy, sing-a-long chorus and a repetitive but effective rhythm. It’s an okay song, so making a song nearly identical right down to the “whoo” sounds isn’t going to result in anything awful... right? Right?

#2 – “Tootsee Roll” – 69 Boyz

Really, guys? 69 Boyz? You’ve got to know the innuendos involved there, and even if you did know and that was the origin, or even if they had another moronic excuse like they were all born in 1969, or there were 69 of them (which is a blatant lie), you’ve got to admit how cringeworthy and childish of a name that is... I’m not entirely sure if that’s to be expected of Miami bass, but considering its alternate names are “booty music” and “booty bass”, I should probably keep that in mind when digging deeper into the genre, but in the meanwhile, I cannot imagine any woman shaking their booty to this stiff, almost metallic beat, with some stock whistle sound effects and a constant onslaught of cheering gang vocals looped for the whole damn song to the extent of it being absolutely unbearable.

The Butterfly? Uh-huh, that’s old

What’s the Butterfly? Genius states, “The Butterfly was a dance move that caused the performer to look like a butterfly.” Thanks for that detailed explanation, now, what on earth is a “Tootsee Roll”?

From what I can gather, it’s just the opposite of the “Butterfly”, which is played out, while the “Tootsee Roll” is a dance you could still see in clubs at the time and is timeless? I mean, I doubt it, because rolling in a club is extremely dangerous and probably will lead to various deaths.

Keep rollin’ that derriere

...Is it like, twerking?

If so, that’s actually a decent comparison. Tootsie Rolls are softer taffy sweets that do not melt and are one of the first candies to be individually wrapped in America. Butts are not as soft as a Tootsie Roll (from my experience of seeing a few pictures of the candies) but they don’t have as much bone, you can slap them like jelly but they don’t melt (unless you have a severe medical problem), and typically, butts are wrapped in clothing, which could be different for each individual with a butt. That’s a pretty clever metaphor... too bad that 1.) your song’s an unlistenable, mind-numbingly repetitive loop with little to no changes to the instrumentation throughout, 2.) Tootsie Rolls also come in long sticks known as logs... is this a gay-pride anthem, then, or am I looking way too deep into this nonsensical piece of trash? Probably the latter.

#2 Best

Now, I wish I could talk about this next guy much more than I end up doing, but he’s way past his heyday, in fact, he’s a one-hit wonder despite having an extensive career that lasts more than four decades. This was his only song to ever hit the top 40, but does that matter at all when he’s had such a long-lasting career simply because of this one song? This track put him on the pop music map and stopped this weirdo from being a completely unknown figure in the music sphere, which he probably would have ended up being if not for this breakout single. You could say this song is riding the wave of both alt-rock and hip-hop being insanely popular at the time, but knowing my boy, I can safely say this was not a sell-out moment. This is one of the strangest, most diversely-talented musicians doing what he does best: wacky self-deprecation.

My teacher said I’m a loser, I told her, ”Why don’t you kill me?” – Kanye West, “Get ‘em High”

#2 – “Loser” – Beck

In the time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey

Sorry, repeat that?

In the time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey / Butane in my veins so I’m out to cut the junkie

This song is the second on the best list to use the technique of sampling, modifying a portion of another work in order to use it in a new creation. This particular track samples a relatively manic drum beat from “I Walk on Gilded Splinters”, a Dr. John cover by blues guitarist Johnny Jenkins, and this sample does more than just adding a tight drum pattern to the song, as it adds to the interpretation that it was a parody of what was perceived as late-80s “slacker culture”, since sampling was a bit infamous in the early 90s. Just as recent as 1991, sampling had caused a headlining court case in which Gilbert O’Sullivan forced Biz Markie to not only pull all of the offending records off of stores, but also accept his career being ruined from the money he lost and the fact that the old white man was victorious over a predominantly black hip-hop culture, showing not only another case of the transformative use of work being unfairly refused, but also the racism that is still prevalent in court judges, the music industry and society today, as proved by Meek Mill’s recent case of being wrongly imprisoned. Yeah, it was an important lesson to learn in terms of the consequences of sampling, but it leaves a bad taste in peoples’ mouths, especially for Beck, who appreciates the art of sampling, despite it being seemed as lazy by many others in the biz, including Damon Albarn of Blur and Gorillaz, who has recently presented his anti-sampling thoughts (despite many, many cases of sampling other works himself). In fact, I believe Beck actually brings this up in the second verse.

The forces of evil in a bozo nightmare / Ban all the music with a phony gas chamber

Hence, throughout this sarcastic verbal beatdown Beck gives himself in the verses, he sounds bored, tired and exhausted, relying on the charm in his voice and the simple, sampled beat to carry him along. In fact, the lyrics seem to be Beck just spitballing, as well, as it’s mostly complete word salad, but it definitely has a consistent vibe of uselessness and being pathetic.

With the plastic eyeballs, spray-paint the vegetables / Dog food stalls with the beefcake pantyhose

Overall, though, it just seems like it’s an incredibly ironic, borderline nonsensical and witty suicide note at points – there’s always discussion of death and guns and pretty grim imagery.

I’m a loser, baby, so why don’t you kill me? (double-barrel buckshot)

He hung himself with a guitar string

Someone keeps sayin’ I’m insane to complain / About a shotgun wedding and a stain on my shirt

The whole song is a slog in the best way because of its repetitive chorus, unconventional sampling and... interesting ad-libs.

(Get crazy with the Cheese Wiz)

It’s nothing like a parody of slacker culture, at all, actually, it reads more like a man on the edge of absolute insanity, and we get to explore his mind, which is all-over-the-place with some brief observations and commentary on the industry and early 90s society, while he occasionally contemplates ending it all.

And my time is a piece of wax falling on a termite / That’s chokin’ on the splinters

This is a strange, confusing song, but Beck’s a strange and confusing artist, and I love him for it, especially when he subtly adds some meaning in the lyrics, such as songs like this... and it’s not even in his top 10 best songs.

#1 Worst

Okay, so, flash back to even before the Honourable Mentions where I said this.

“Hence, the worst list is mostly composed of stuff I found to be utterly charmless – well, except the #1, but you’ll read on for that.”

Yeah, and when I said that, I wasn’t lying – this next song has a lot of charm, hell, it has a lot in common with my choice of fifth best hit song, “Mr. Vain”. Both are quirky little Eurodance songs, but this one does not understand how to embrace how awful it is, while “Mr. Vain” did that perfectly. This song is charming yet also insufferably incompetent.

#1 – “Another Night” – Real McCoy featuring Karin Kasar

Yep, that’s their name – Real McCoy. I don’t understand how a Eurodance act would be this desperate to prove themselves as “real”. Now, I’m pretty sure this terribly-named act is a band, actually, two or three members, one of which being the “rapper” on this track, O-Jay, but we’ll get to him. First, let’s focus on the instrumental, which is pretty well-made actually, albeit pretty typical of the time – it even has a pretty forced reggae influence in the steel pans obviously profiting off of Ace of Base. We have some nice piano chords, a jackhammer beat, an annoying synth that goes from the right to left channel constantly – which would be cool, if it didn’t go on for the whole song and you know, sounded any good.

That’s not what makes this song so horrible, honestly, it’s the vocals. First we have a vocal sample that comes in occasionally but trust me, when it comes in, it does not stop hammering at your brain. It is a really lazy yell, like a man who’s in a deep ditch, hence it echoes, but he can’t talk properly, or like at all, so he just makes a sound that resembles chopped-and-screwed Mario jumping sounds compiled together with some reverb and pitch-shifting... but that’s technically still the instrumental, the vocals on top can’t possibly be as bad, right? Well, I guess the singer, Karin Kasar isn’t bad, even if the lyrics combined with her light-as-a-feather performance are as putrid and sickeningly sweet as you can get, at least Tania Evans had some “oomph” in her voice.

Contrasting Karin Kasar is O-Jay, the “rapper”, who provides some deep, stilted, multi-tracked verses – see the dynamic here? Exactly the same as “Mr. Vain”, except that song prevailed by being joyful despite its obviously less optimistic subject matter that made it feel self-aware, while this plays it straight... but somehow makes it feel less sweet and more terrifying. This O-Jay guy took it too damn fair, he sounds creepy and the lyrics he’s provided with don’t exactly help either.

You feel joy, you feel pain, ‘cause nothing will be the same

Uh, can you stop, please, like, right now? It’s disturbing when this man’s deep voice, not shrouded in the mix, is perfectly clear and you hear every word he’s saying in this intimate yet skin-crawling tone. It’s not pleasant and really doesn’t help build the mood, in fact, I’m pretty sure it takes the mood of the song and bites it in half.

Hey, sister, let me cover your body with my love

Hold up – sister? Look, I know that’s something people call important or friendly females in their lives and in any other case, this line would be fine, but, Jesus, O-Jay, could you maybe say it with some kind of corny flair because your delivery itself implies so much more than what’s being said. Oh, and it doesn’t help when in his final verse, we have an eerily distorted sub-bass with a manic synth playing during it.

I am your lover, your brother

You’re not helping! All this track is is a sloppy remake of “Mr. Vain” which falls flat on its face with everything that Culture Beat’s track succeeded in.

Another night, another dream, but a-always you / It’s like a vision of love that seems to be true

Isn’t that a Mariah Carey song released in 1990?

I had a vision of love / And it was all that you’ve given to me – Mariah Carey, “Vision of Love”

So, not only do you ride the coattails of the Eurodance movement that became prominent in the US because of Haddway and his top 20 song, completely rip off Culture Beat’s top 20 hit (and #1 in the UK!) “Mr. Vain”, shoddily enforce some reggae pop because Ace of Base had three massive songs, all of which ended up being in the Year-End top 10 of this year, but you reference the name of one of Mariah Carey’s biggest #1 hits, just in case you weren’t enough of a clumsy amalgamation of everything early 90s in America and Europe. Nice one, you lazy, pathetic, untalented hacks.

#1 Best

Let’s take a little trip back to the Honourable Mentions, where I said that Janet Jackson’s “Any Time, Any Place” would not make the list due to its length, and that’s mainly because this is a list of hit songs, and honestly, if your song’s not short and sweet, does it really “hit” you as much?

A pop song doesn’t need to be conventional and can stray far from the formula, and I appreciate that when it happens to be that a 1994 hit does not follow the rules of its niche, see “Loser”. However, when you make a song, no matter how good it is, very long and not particularly that far away from what is expected, it loses the punch I want to see in good pop music. That’s why I hate “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran so much – it lacks what I want from any good pop song, a real hook that reels you in, not because it’s catchy and not because it’s unique, hell, I’m not talking about the musical hook here, just a moment in a song that forces you to pay attention and even if you don’t like it, you will understand why it’s so popular because it demands you to be attracted to it. I don’t like “Blah Blah Blah” by Kesha featuring 3OH!3. Listen, I like both of these artists fine, but I’m not a fan of the song for many reasons, however there is a true hook that grabs me in, and it’s not the chorus, it’s Kesha’s voice, which is childish and bratty, but it just commands your attention because of how obnoxious it is. “Any Time, Any Place” doesn’t exactly have that hook, hence no matter how much I liked the song, I just couldn’t write about it in mass. It’s not as interesting as it could have been.

Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, we have something special down here at Birdland this evening – a recording for Blue Note Records.

This song has so many of them.

#1 – “Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)” – Us3

Oh, my God, this song has so many of those hooks. First of all, how all of it is so blatantly sampled. I think the additional trumpet solo is the only original addition and composition other than the vocals and knowing classic hip-hop, that solo is probably sourced or interpolated from somewhere – hell, the pure amount of samples of Blue Note’s catalogue on this song and Us3’s album lead to them grabbing a record deal with them. Now that’s how corporate bigwigs should be treating artists who sample. The first sample is immediately obvious to you – it’s a vocal sample at the beginning of the track spoken by Pee Wee Marquette from Art Blakey’s A Night at Birdland Vol. 1 album. After this brief spoken word section, we get into the beat which kicks in almost instantly afterwards for a real punch, and I’ve listened to the original track, Herbie Hancock’s “Cantaloupe Island”, and can confirm it’s just pretty much a sped-up version of the first 16 bars with a lot of subtle changes, but that’s not a bad thing, as the drum beat is fun enough to dance to, as what was probably in mind, the recurring additional vocal samples crowding up the track (acting as kind of a chorus) from both Marquette and Lou Donaldson (specifically “Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky (From Now On)”), as well as the occasional lively ad-lib from the rapper here, Rahsaan Kelly, shortened to Rahsaan, who scats a nice little “itty-bitty-bop” throughout. The final instrumental break before the track ends is heavenly, with Gerard Presencer’s fantastic and frankly pretty insane trumpet solo just going on and on. It’s crazy how good it is as well, the playing is intricate and fits the beat perfectly, mostly because of how wacky it is, until it just fades out like it’s nothing.

Speaking of wackiness, I think that’s the main appeal here, because it sounds like a jazz rap song straight out of a cartoon, fittingly for its title containing the name of the Disney movie Fantasia, but it’s all so smooth in its execution despite being littered and cluttered with samples all over the place. It’s beautiful in all its layered madness, and taking any of the layers off would be a disservice, and yes, that’s including Rahsaan.

Brace yourself as the beat hits you / Dip, trip, flip Fantasia

He may not be the best MC, but he has a slick, impressively stable and at times surprisingly quick flow for the time, and with his alliterative lyricism that often include a lot of fun, colourful words, he fits right into this Roger Rabbit of a jazz song.

Groovy, groovy, jazzy, funky / Pounce, bounce, dance as we dip in the melodic sea

He even has some pretty cool lines about actually taking a trip to the neon land presented in Fantasia...

Caught in the groove in Fantasia, I’m found

...and damn, if I don’t feel like I’m there. This song is just so fun to listen to, honestly, because of the pure joy you can feel from every sample, every trumpet riff, every line Rahsaan spits. I thought “Loser” by Beck was going to be my #1 going into this Year-End blind but as soon as I noticed this song was on it, the chance dropped from 100% to less than 3%, because even though I love both songs to death, “Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)” is such an overlooked classic that I can’t help but love and want to talk about. Everyone’s heard “Loser” but this is not something people really look back on today for all I know. I first heard this song on Vintage TV, actually, a British television network that shows old music videos, and it was a 90s and 80s funk block they had on when this song was broadcast, and when it came on, I had an instant grin on my face and I’m so glad it came up on this Year-End otherwise I would have likely to never have talked about it, and I couldn’t have done that. This song is way too good for me to pass on.

Feel the vibe from here to Asia / Dip, trip, flip Fantasia (out!)

As I said, it’s not conventional for a mostly instrumental song by a British acid jazz band to hit the American top 40, but to stay in the Hot 100 top 10 for three weeks is crazy, and just shows that although the general public and I may disagree at times, the power of national appreciation can do pretty great things for humanity. Thank you for reading, guys, and thank you to Us3, Rahsaan and Gerard Presencer, for making the best hit song of 1994, and one of my favourite songs of all time. See ya!

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