#dirge iz

[marionedde]

Flash warning

third time attempting to upload.

They’re so solo cup + wallflower coded

still vers

Masterpost

[ramune-raven-art]

One little slip!!!

@jhonenv

I want to be hated for this.

I thought of the vine where the guy's all like

"Stop saying I look like chicken little. Hes dumb and he's a coward, and I am NOT a coward"

And to top it off last night I watched chicken little.

So Heres Dib, Dirge, and Gretchen.

[zim-commentaryquotes]

Jhonen: Now, look at his legs.

*Roman laughs raucously*

Jhonen: He’s actually got a hole through him! Like, you can see through him to the rock behind- Oh wait, no.

Roman: *still laughing* I thought those were nerves hanging out.

Kevin Manthei: Oh, no...

Jhonen: They are nerves. His legs are all nervy. 

Kevin Manthei: Ugh, that’s the first time I noticed that.

Jhonen: That’s revolting. I am proud of it. 

[waterparksdrama]

Genuinely feel like we are watching a train wreck slowly happen….

and we will be here to play their dirge in the end - iz

[parasite-core]

Man so tonight’s pathfinder session was EVENTFUL. After sending the Hand of the Inheritor back to Heaven, we fought and killed Baphomet, which restored Sarenrae and Lamashtu to power. We returned to the material plane, spoke to Iomedae and the Hand of the Inheritor—

The Hand had lost his holy power due to Baphomet’s influence over him, so Iomedae was in need of a new Herald. So she chose Draven to be her new Herald, The Adamant Shield, in his place. We didn’t have time to celebrate however because Drezen was under siege by Aponavicious—

Each of our personal villains was leading a force—Tachtel, Lady Jerribeth, Lady Salzala, and Dirge. Because they were assaulting the city all at once we had no choice but to split up and face them all at once—

So we had a massive combat in which each part was happening in a different location. Hiskaria faced her parents’ killer Tachtel, who somehow remembered the alternate doomed timeline we’d seen and fled from—

Hiskaria fought Tachtel until he possessed Cassandalee’s Herald. Hiskaria made reference to a slightly 4th wall breaking quote that had been said to her earlier in the campaign by a different villain, and suddenly Tachtel froze and came apart—

When Hiskaria examined what was left of his body, she found a bullet hole in his head, but no bullet or casing. We have no idea what to make of it, except that our GM likes 4th wall and timeline shenanigans so who knows what he could pull.

Luna faced Lady Salzala, who had destroyed her moral body and ascended to a point where she could no longer be harmed. Luna fought hordes of Salzala’s experimental angel-demon hybrids while Arushelae gathered the last pages of Salzala’s journal we’d missed in her previous labs.

Luna put the journal together, but it was still warded by magic. Salzala taunted Luna that she was just a useless meathead child that couldn’t do anything to harm her since she couldn’t do even simple magic to get into the journal. Luna told her to shut up and watch.

With a quiet chant to herself ‘It’s a CAN-trip not a can’t-trip’, Luna tapped into the celestial heritage Salzala had locked away from her in her experiments, and cast break curse, removing the wards from the book.

Holding such a personal piece of Salzala’s life and accomplishments in her hands, Luna bound her to the material plane, making her corporeal again. Salzala panicked and created a shadow copy of a younger Luna using all of Luna’s anger to possess and attack her.

However Luna used Salzala’s book to work out a reverse soul jar and cast her out of her body, and accepted her anger back into herself, a part of herself still. However before she could kill Salzala, Arelu Vorlesh appeared in a portal and gave her an escape route to Iz—

Melody faced her demigod cousin Dirge in the Danse Macabre to determine the fates of Shelyn and Zon’Kuthon. They fought and performed admirably, both giving it their all, both arguing their best for why the world needed hope, why the world was hopeless and destined to suffer—

In the end they came to a stalemate. The Danse ended and they were perfectly evenly matched, neither able to beat the other. Melody tried to talk Dirge down one last time, tried to save him from himself. He found her attempt degrading. Instead, he offered a new solution.

Walk the world as equals. She would ease the suffering of some in her way. He would bring the end of the suffering of others in his. Twin gods who understood humanity in a way no others could. Dirge held out his hand. Melody asked if he would restore the Writ and free her family.

He said he would restore the Writ. Whichever members of her family wished to return to the way things once were could do so. Melody contacted the others, and apologized for if she changed too much. Then she took Dirge’s hand.

Black and white light engulfed them. The Danse had ended. Two new gods had been born.

Draven went to face Jerribeth. What he found was Leto, fused into the Glabrezu. His friend took control of her, and forced her to grant him a wish—he wished for her to fling them into the furthest reaches of the ineluctable Prison forever. A portal opened to drag him in.

Draven refused to let Leto sacrifice himself for him. He used his miracle spell-like ability and tried to use it to bring Leto back. The wish and the miracle clashed, and caused the portal to collapse and suck Draven in along with the Jerribeth hybrid.

Draven found himself in a dark place, surrounded by chains. Leto-beth asked why he always had to be so stubborn. They clashed, their wills trying to force the other out, to be the one to overpower the other, so their spell would be the one to succeed.

Draven caught Leto-beth in Chains of Light, paralyzing him. However he couldn’t get past his incredibly tough armor to do any damage—“so this is how my enemies always feel, huh?” he noted—this was basically a mirror match starting out, high AC low attack

Leto remained paralyzed for a bit but Draven never managed to get through his armor, nor could he get through his stubborn disposition—something else they have in common. Finally Leto managed to dispel the paralysis, and began his own assault—

But again—mirror match. He couldn’t get past Draven’s AC either. But unlike Draven he had something to do about that. He began dumping his AC into his attack. Big mistake—

Because then Draven started finally being able to hit once he let his guard down and getting reckless. And Leto still couldn’t hit Draven most of the time because Draven kept his defenses up. And also Draven crit twice. Which went a long way.

Finally Deaven’s stubbornness won out. Leto yielded—although he told Draven this was a mistake, that he should just let Leto do what he was going to do, that if Jerribeth got control again he wouldn’t be able to protect him.

Draven and Leto left the extradimentional plane, and Draven called to Melody to come help him. He needed a miracle and he’d used his only one.

Melody arrived, and used her final mythic point to try to counter Draven’s old wish that created the chains that bound all three of them—Jerribeth, Leto, and Draven—and free Leto once and for all—

She rolled barely above average on her dispel check even with advantage, and without any more mythic points she couldn’t surge it.

It wasn’t enough.

Leto told Draven. He TOLD Draven it wouldn’t work. He should have listened and let him remove them from the equation. Now what were they going to do?

Jerribeth took back control. She taunted Draven, telling him he should have listened to poor Leto.

She said she was going to Iz before Draven decided to do something reckless, since he tended to get aggressive when she was around. “Don’t die :)” Then the Glabrezu hybrid teleported away, leaving a distraught Draven behind.

We didn’t have time to even process that though, because Luna contacted Draven and Melody telling us that a portal had opened up under the Citadel while we were dealing with that and we needed to get back NOW.

So we headed back. And arrived just in time to hear that the portal was connected to Deskari’s personal realm. And then see three locust-like demons step through, and one spear our wizard friend Aravashnial right through the chest. And that’s where we ended :(

[t-underneaththeradardancing]

a bio - t by - t   o my wat - do we know 

a shapeshift smoking  snake in bunworld 

a deep space nine cadet

super power  iz turning absolutely anything into a bluez dirge  

voted “ most likely to get confused and steal an emu “ by senior care center or wuz that high skool or old skool 

og  maybe 

idk 

ask vita lol

or 

the unpoet 

ambassador to crows in sf

a little help      here   

anybody 

[randomvarious]

Type O Negative - “Paranoid” The Darkest Hour Song released in 1992. Compilation released in 1997. Goth Metal / Doom Metal

Type O Negative were America’s, and quite possibly the world’s, most successful goth metal band (on the world stage, Sisters of Mercy gave them a run for their money). Described aptly by none other than Beavis as “like a cross between Danzig and Megadeth,” this New York band crafted some of the finest and slowest emotional metal tunes this world has ever heard. Their inspirations are wholly evident in their music as they’ve channeled Black Sabbath, the Beatles, 60s psych groups, and a whole host of goth and new wave bands. Type O Negative hold a distinction, which appeared to be mostly meaningless to them despite still being impressive, of being a goth metal band that released albums that achieved platinum and gold status. An incredible feat for such niche subgenres.

One thing Type O Negative were known for was their covers. They took a number of it songs from famous bands and artists and gave them their unique gothic and doom touch, slowing their tempos to a melodic crawl. One such song was Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid,” which originally appeared as the bonus track from their faux live album, The Origin of the Feces (which upon typing that out, makes me realize it’s a crude pun on Charles Darwin’s foundational work of evolutionary biology, On the Origin of Species. Bandleader Peter Steele was heavily into science.).

The funny thing about Black Sabbath and “Paranoid” is that Sabbath is known for their dark and slow dirge riffs, which is what Type O Negative specialized in. But, “Paranoid,” despite being Sabbath’s most famous song behind “Iron Man,” is uncharacteristically speedy, and instead of dirge riffing, it’s almost like a proto-thrash metal song with choppy chord progressions capped with loud and aggressive striking. So, Type O Negative set out to, more or less, Sabbath-ize one of Sabbath’s songs. 

And it’s incredible. I haven’t talked about Peter Steele yet, besides his love for science, but this man had such a distinct and clear baritone. It sounded like a mishmash of Joy Division’s Ian Curtis and Sisters of Mercy’s Andrew Eldritch, but with more brooding and gravitas. Steele had one of the most recognizable voices in all of music.

Responsible for all the sludgy, trudging, scratchy, deep, and distorted metal chords is Kenny Hickey. Most remarkably, and unlike the original, he doesn’t really play a set riff on this and just appears to be playing off Steele’s vocals more than anything. However, at one point, he does reproduce the main riff, and one of the most recognizable riffs of all time, from Sabbath’s biggest hit, “Iron Man”.

The two choruses lyrically divert from the original and are both markedly different musically. The first one sees the band launching into a dreamy synthpop-bridge style, helped by Josh Silver’s keyboard and Steele’s multitracked and delayed vocal effect. Johnny Kelly slowly pounds on his toms, too.

The second chorus starts quietly with just Steele’s vocal and bass, but eventually builds into a jumping off point for the song’s final climactic, soaring push, with Hickey’s shoegazey, droning chords set atop a bed of other simmering, noisy chords, Kelly’s slow drum beat, and Silver’s string synths to underlie it all. The same synthpop vocal effects from the first chorus also make a return, trading lines with Steele’s unaffected (or perhaps less affected) vocals before the song deconstructs towards eventual silence in the remaining minute plus.

An absolute goth / doom metal tour de force from one of goth and doom’s greatest bands. Sadly, Peter Steele passed in 2010 due to heart failure and the band immediately broke up. And with good reason. Steele was the band’s lifeblood. His presentation, candor, and of course, his vocals, are irreplaceable and inimitable. RIP Peter.

[jefferyryanlong]

Fresh Listen - Medeski Martin & Wood, End of the World Party (Just in Case) (Blue Note Records, 2004)

(Some pieces of recorded music operate more like organisms than records. They live, they breathe, they reproduce. Fresh Listen is a periodic review of recently and not so recently released albums that crawl among us like radioactive spiders, gifting us with superpowers from their stingers.)

 I was gifted a copy of Medeski Martin & Wood’s End of the World Party (Just in Case) right after Christmas. I spent and hour or so on New Year’s Day 2019 absorbing the album onto my brain material, synching the regulated rhythms of my circulations to its beats, while taking a run up the Valley of the Temples in Kaneohe. In those green hills, where gravestones in the short grass reflected dull sunlight and sepulchers and tombs stood forlorn behind gates and at the end of paved walkways, I felt that the record, through its instrumental soul-funk numbers, sought to reiterate the impending collective mortality that all of us, including the animal life and vegetation that propagate just on the periphery of our attention, must embrace--the covering over of eyes and mouths with rust and dust, the withering of appendages into basic molecular structures to float forever. Running past cars and families and graves and flowers on plastic stands stuck into the ground, I was surrounded by the living and the dead. 

On that New Year's Day I was moved, as I had been in New Year’s past, by the pitiless sweep of existence, that wave that pushes spirits out from bodies and transforms bodies into useless, dumb matter. I like to think that I caught just the edge of that wave, some brush of it against my calf as I ran, but I know such awareness is only granted to those who have linked hands with the Death Angel and allowed themselves to be led away. I stopped for a moment at the edge of Ocean View Terrace, an elevated monument to the dead a the foothills of the majestically ridged Ko’olaus, from which, through the trees far beyond, sightless, buried eyes might look upon the distant water. I put my hands on my knees and breathed as if I’d never tasted the air before.

“Anonymous Skulls” is all we can expect to be when our ruins are discovered by subsequent civilizations, those peoples or beings who will undoubtedly be bewildered by out bizarre ways--our preoccupation with money and status, our obsession with youth, our language that is communicated with such a degree of subjectivity as to be meaningless from occasion to occasion. Medeski Martin & Wood’s first track from End of the World Party throws vocoder-ized synths, layered as grieving voices of women, over a backbeat of marked time pushing forward into that narrowing portal of the future. End of the World Party is a more cleanly produced record, overall, than the group’s 2006 release with John Scofield, Out Louder, most of the smeared textures of Scofield’s electric work absent. “Toxic,” the Britney Spears hit that released a year prior to End of the World Party, informs the opening to the album’s title track, maybe a reference to the commercial music of the period, which would seemingly soundtrack the inevitable armageddon. With its drenched keyboards evoking guitar tones, I thought “Reflector” more accurately fit the mold of a party track--a mirror image of our wasted time in oblivion rendered in sound, all of it without the benefit of a memento mori to foretell our doom.

In order to fully understand the context of “Bloody Oil”, the rumbling stand-up bass dirge led by Chris Wood, you have to transport your consciousness back to 2004. The Bush/Cheney era, the disruption of the Middle East, Halliburton, Black Water, oil fields on fire in the deserts of Iraq. In 2004, much like the present moment, it seemed we were near the end of a polluted world, its core honey-combed by ceaseless drilling, its air and water saturated with the by-products of oil consumption. All of us then were acutely aware of the visible symptoms of a sick environment, over-peopled by bad actors.

Contrasted to “Bloody Oil” is “New Planet,” an optimistic, upbeat number that counters the dour gravitas of the preceding track. For a few minutes sonic space textures and synth beeps engage the listener in the excitement of an undiscovered frontier, a place to populate with our imaginations. Toward the end, though, the grows somber, desolate, as if the planet we found to inhabit grows small in our vision as we pull away from it, its crust collapsing upon itself, its resources all sucked out, a lifeless husk.

The second half of End of the World Part (Just in Case) veers away from the themes implied by its title, though the band carries forward the continuity of the overall sound. “Mami Gato” is a technically proficient exercise on piano, a workout lacking in the aural sweatiness of Out Louder. Like many other songs on the record, the song’s coda over the last few minutes is a departure--in this case, the song transitions to a kind of nouveau old-world cocktail jazz, that sound that arises behind your head when you think upon cigarettes in holders and women in hats and carefully parted and combed hair and spats and absinthe fountains. “Shine It” is boilerplate blues-funk, while “Curtis” is refreshingly the dirtiest sounding the band gets, all distorted wah-wah's and uptight bass. “Sasa” could be a Beastie Boys instrumental from The In Sound from Way Out!, except Medeski Martin & Wood are less nasty in the pocket, and really know how to hang int there. With its dreamy, noir-ish beginnings, “Midnight Poppies/Crooked Birds” emerges from an electric slumber to an askew melody with backwards bass loops and sqauwkbox keyboards.

Cool virtuosity defines End of the World Party (Just in Case). It is the sound of polished musicians playing polished music. As instrumentalists, Medeski Martin & Wood don’t struggle against one another; rather, they impeccably complement one another, from note to note, rhythm to rhythm. As affirming as the music is, I had to wonder--what would the end of the world really sound like? The implosion of hundreds of bunkers and bases and factories? The sustained pained creak of splitting wood as a tree slowly collapses? The cry of a shambling animal? When the end of the world truly does come, will we have time to put to use what we’ve practiced, will we have the fortitude to help each other, or will we kill our neighbors lest we die ourselves, and rend our clothes and weep? What will that sound like?  

[sarasa-cat]

Holy shit 4687 words just blatted out of nowhere into a text file. (thank you awesome person who left that prompt ... need to look up which prompt was left by whom b/c I didn’t copy that info into scrivener idky).

....

So many writing about writing thoughts behind the cut. I’m... full of thoughts.

1.  Realizing that as much as I desperately NEED a timeline to keep track of all the events in Monsters -- and the tight timing of world events like how in hell does all of FFVII:OG fit into less than 2 months of time????  O_O -- trying to work out ALL OF MONSTERS FIRST IN AEON TIMELINE IS A GIANT NOPE. Monsters wants to be figured out more organically (crying... there are so many words I just cannot even .... oh god why?) and I just need to keep writing and organizing and updating my AeonTimeline file as I need to add more stuff or fix dates or scratch my head over the headscratchers.  FWIW, Squeenix really messed up certain things in their official timeline. How does it the stuff related to Dirge even make sense?

2.  Trying to write Monsters linearly isn’t really working because there are things that need to be discovered in the middle and end (most hopefully already discovered? please? PLEASE???? PLEEEEEEZZZZZEEEEEEE???) that need to be rippled back and foreshadowed yadayada. And fuck me, rit1ng iz so hahrduuuh.

3.  Wow. I. just. still. don’t. know. if. how. what. when. how. if I believe my Vincent+Yuffie interactions during their flashbacks to FFVII:OG. I guess... I... you know. Here’s the thing. It’s hard to “objectively” write fanfic when a shit ton has already been written. Many fan writers have written Yuffie (in any story, not just VinYu) as either a loud mouthed ditz or as a REALLY REALLY REALLY RESALLLLLLLLY INSECURE and nervous nervous nervous omfg such a nervous mess. And, you know, I like some these stories so I’m not picking on the approach, per se. And then there are the other (smaller) pile of Yuffie stories that tend to be loved and recommended by fandom where Yuffie has a really strong personality that is wacky and unique in its own unique way (per author/story), and those are <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 afaic (and I suck because I never leave kudos or comments bc I usually read on my phone and I'm a l0zer *shameface*) but ...

So, idk, I’m freaking loving all of my Lu-Vincent-Hojo scenes and my Vincent-prior-life-in-60s/70s too, but whenever I write Vincent+Yuffie (which I have a shit ton of, like way more than anything else at this moment, not that you would know, but like an entire freaking year of experimental draft that is daft), I just feel like ... idk. Does this even work? 

Does. This. Even. Work?

My 16 (and younger) year old Yuffie is VERY CONFIDENT and really very much acts way older than she is. My 19-21 year old Yuffie has had her confidence shaken and she actually acts a bit more cautiously and nervously. Perhaps one can say that she becomes more self-aware of her limitations and the damage/trouble/discomfort she is able to cause?

Meanwhile, my Vincent is a complete freaking mess. The difference is that pre-bullet Vincent didn’t have the self awareness to realize what a mess he is whereas post-bullet Vincent is able to at least ask the question “what the fuck is wrong with me?” and, eventually, sort of introspect his way toward a state of mind that isn’t self-defeating.

So... I guess I better stick some of it out there for comments to see what is and isn’t working?

Looks at that 4687 words that blatted out of nowhere thanks to a prompt. 

My face:  :D    :)     :/      >_<        >_>      ._.

idk.

writers problemzzzzz.

[marionedde]

btw here are other characters im adding into my au

The "social rejects" aka dibs investigation group

Matthew P. Mathers the Third- 21. They/them. One of gaz's band members, plays bass. Agender.

Melvin- 20. he/she. Has achondroplasia. Obsessed with space, so joined the investigation crew.

Dirge- 21. he/she/they. Genderfluid, secret passion for death and the occult.

Keef- 21. he/him. ADHD. Has a youtube channel.

Gretchen- 21. she/her, transfem. GAD. Often does things spontaneously.

Zita- 20. they/them. Was popular, but rathered hanging out with Gretchen and her friends. Very smart and studious, super logical.

ROOMS:

Zita and Gretchen live in apartment 207.

Keef and Dirge live in apartment 209.

Melvin and Matthew live in apartment 304.

MASTERPOST

[zim-commentaryquotes]

Roman: I’m already starting to scratch!

*laughter*

Jhonen: Yeah, I’m starting to itch, there.

Kevin Manthei: I mentioned, actually, I had to watch this episode for a week while I was scoring it, and it just... kinda... It’s hard to watch all that itching going on for a whole week while you’re working on the show.

Jhonen: The sound! The sizzling! It’s like their heads are just sizzling with lice!

[zim-commentaryquotes]

Roman: I don’t understand why just the red dome protects her head, though. 

Roman: It’s open all the way around it.

Jhonen: I don’t remember exactly, but I think Rob originally had it so that most of the episode was giant lice... kind of plaguing the school. And, I wanted to stay away from another-

All: Monster.

Jhonen: I mean, I wanted to save the monster for the end. 

Roman: Monsters aren’t good.

Jhonen: *offended* Monsters are awesome. 

[zim-commentaryquotes]

Kevin Manthei: Keep it serious, even though [Gretchen] is being goofy.

Jhonen: We rarely ever did silly music.

Kevin Manthei: Right.

Jhonen: Unless- My thing was-

Kevin Manthei: If it's silly, it's going to be insanely silly.

Jhonen: Well, insanely silly that just rudely gets thrown into horror. 'Cause I don't think anything's funnier than someone being really happy, happy, having a great time and then getting plunged into a nightmare.

Kevin Manthei: Right.

Jhonen: It's funny for me to see them go from smiling to screaming. And, the music should do that. The music should go from happy, cheesy, bouncy to something out of a nightmare.

Roman: It's like a lot of my relationships.

*chuckles*

Jhonen: Like all relationships.

[zim-commentaryquotes]

Jhonen: Now, Roman, what is your process for not having anything to do with this?

Jason: Would you have done so much exposition?

*laughter*

Roman: There's so much to say!

Jhonen: This episode! That's-That's what I remember hating about this! There's so much exposition!

Jason: But he mentions it, though, right? Isn't it this episode where he says how he's-?

Jhonen: No! No, no, no, that was like my only little note. See?

Dib: Wow, I'm boring!

Jhonen: That was the only thing I added, really, was that, "Wow, I'm boring." Because I thought it - that - I thought it made it funny!

Jhonen: It didn't, but...

*laughter*

Jhonen: Turns out I'm not funny, but-!