#etta x nick

[queersrus]

Npd/Narcissus theme

[npd/narcissus theme]

including narcissus from greek myth as well as anything related to the narcissus flower and npd.

tagging @clusterrune, @narcissist-hoarding

(nick)names:

narc, narci, narcis/narciss, narcisse, narcissa/narcisa, narcisso/narciso, narcet/narcett/narcette, narcetta, narcetto, narcel/narcell/narcelle, narcella, narcello, narcin/narcine, narcina, narcino, narcissus, narcissi, narcissist, narcissisa, narca, narcisset/narcissett/narcissette, narcissetta, narcissetto, narcissel/narcissell/narcisselle, narcissella, narcissello, narcissin/narcissine, narcissina, narcissino, narcissisti, narcissista, NP, ND, nargis, narkissos, narciso, narcyz, narkas, nargiza, narges, narcaf, narcas, narce, narcel, narcie, narcia, narciz, narco, narzy mirror, mirra/miraa/mira, mirrora, mirrorer, Major reflect, reflector, reflecta, reflection, Royal daf/daff, daffy/daffi/daffie, daffo, daffodil jon/john, jonqui, jonquil po/poe, poet, poeti, poetic, poeticus, phea, phae, pheasant, pink, pinki/pinkie/pinky, pinks, pinkster, Prince, Princess, Princex, Prinze eye fin/finn, find, finder, findern lil, lili/lilli/lily/lilly/lillie/lilie, Liriope taz, taze, tazet/tazett/tazette, tazeta/tazetta, thespiae King Cephissus queen, queeny/queenie

surnames:

Narcisse, Narcissa, Narcissi/Narcisi, Narcissist, Narcett, Narcissisa, Narciso/Narcizo, Narci, Narca, Narcis, Narcy Myrror/Mirror, Mirrored Reflector/Reflecter Daffodil Jonquil Poet, Poeticus, Pheasant, Pink, Pinkster Eye(s) Find/Finde, Finder, Findern Lily, Liriope Tazetta Cephissus

1st p prns: i/me/my/mine/myself

ni/nar/narci/narcine/narcself ni/narc/narcs/narcself ni/nar/nargi/nargine/nargisself mi/mirr/mirro/mirrine/mirrorself ri/re/reflec/reflectine/reflectionself di/daff/daffi/daffine/daffodilself ji/jo/jon/jonquine/jonquilself pi/poe/poet/poetine/poetself phi/phea/pheas/pheasine/pheasantself pi/pink/pinks/pinkine/pinkself eye/ee/ey/eyine/eyeself fi/fe/find/fine/findself li/lil/lily/liline/lilyself ti/taz/tazets/tazine/tazettaself

2nd p prns: you/your/yours/yourself

no/narc/narcs/narcself no/nar/nargis/nargiself mo/mirror/mirrors/mirrorself ro/reflector/reflectors/reflectorself do/daffor/daffors/daffodilself jo/jonquir/jonquirs/jonquirself po/poeter/poeters/poeterself pho/pheasar/pheasars/pheasantself po/pinkster/pinksters/pinksterself eyo/eyer/eyers/eyerself fo/finder/finders/findernself lo/liler/lilers/lilyself to/tazer/tazers/tazerself

3rd p prns: they/them/theirs/themself

narc/narcs, np/npd, npd/npds, np/d, n/pd, narc/narcissist, narcissist/narcissists, narcissist/narcissistic, narci/ssist, narci/ssistic, narcissus/poeticus, nar/nargis, narg/nargis, nargi/nargis, nargis/nargis', narcissus/tazetta, narcissus/jonquil mir/mirror, mirr/or, mir/ror, mirror/mirrors, mirror/mirrored, mirror/mirroring reflect/reflects, reflect/reflection, reflect/reflector, reflect/reflected, reflect/reflecting, re/flect daff/daffodil, daffodil/daffodils, daffo/dil jon/quil, jon/jonquil, jonquil/jonquils po/et, poet/poets, poeti/cus, poet/poeticus, poeticus/poeticus, phea/sant, pheasant/pheasants, pheasant/eye, pink/ster, pink/pinkster, pink/pinks, pinkster/pinksters, pinkster/lily fi/findern, find/ern, finder/findern, findern/findernself, findern/flower lil/lily, lily/lilys, lil/y, li/ly taz/tazetta, taze/tazetta, tazetta/tazettas, taz/etta

titles:

the narc, the narcissist, the narcissistic, the one with npd, the npd haver, the one who adores themself/their reflection, the mirror gazer, the one who gazes into the mirror/their reflection, the self-admirer, the flower, the daffodil, the jonquil, the poet, the peots daffodil, the poets jonquil, the poets narcissus, the nargis, the pheasant, the pheasants eye, the findern, the findern(s) flower, the pinkster, the pinkster(s) lily, the lily, the tazetta, the narcissus tazetta, the narcissus jonquil, the (x) of Cephissus, the (x) of Liriope

(prn) who is narcissistic, (prn) who has npd, (prn) who has grandiose delusions/delusions of grandeur, (prn) who loves their reflection, (prn) who loves daffodils, (prn) who loves jonquils, (prn) who loves the nargis, (prn) who loves the pheasants eye, (prn) who loves the findern flower, (prn) who loves the pinkster lily, (prn) who was born to Cephissus, (prn) who was born to Liriope

[littlespoonevan]

Based on songs I, personally, have envisioned playing during that moment 💘

[deardarlingreader]

passage, n.

i. A brief section of music, composed of a series of notes and flourishes

ii. A journey by water; a voyage

iii. The transition from one place to another, across space and time

[siempre-bucky]

kitchen dancing

Bradley 'Rooster' Bradshaw x Reader

Summary: Dancing with Bradley on Thanksgiving morning

wc: 730

A/N: another blurb based on a tiktok? yeah.... happy thanksgiving to my american friends.

You went to bed Wednesday night with chaotic thoughts, and scenarios of your and Bradley’s first thanksgiving as hosts created a fiery game of racquetball until sleep finally soothed you. Thursday morning you didn’t wake up to your early alarm, you woke up to a song stuck in your head. Etta James played softly from another room but just loud enough for you to pick out its sweet lyrics. 

Peace and Thanksgiving were never two things you thought had any correlation. You didn’t smell your kitchen burning or your boyfriend yelling at the game on tv—just a pretty song and how your sheets sounded as you rolled over to nuzzle your nose further into the nice smelling blanket. 

The song changed when you finally crawled out of bed, a smile gracing your features. Bradley played the slow song when he felt most relaxed. He played it the night you moved in, the light from the tv the only thing lighting your first apartment. You could still feel the ghost of his hand and the tickle of his mustache when he asked you to dance amongst the cardboard boxes and bubble wrap. 

He played it at your wedding after all the guests tiredly stumbled out of the venue. He didn’t ask for much for the wedding, just to dance to one of his favorite songs in an empty room with his new wife. His chest felt so full, his hands memorizing how you felt in your gown while you were pressed against him. You remembered how he hummed the lyrics, the vibrations against your joyful tear-stained cheek. 

“Morning, honey,” he greeted with a determined rasp in his voice as he saw you from the corner of his eye. Bradley’s hazel eyes were locked on the aluminum foil wrapped turkey he was lifting from the oven to check on. He placed it on the counter with a thick thunk and shucked his hands of the oven mitts. 

“Everything smells so go-” you were cut off by the aviator grabbing your hand and spinning you around, his other hand finding its place on your hips. You let out a surprised laugh and put your head on his shoulder, letting him sway with you side to side. 

“Good? Only the very best for our crew,” he chuckled, “you know how Mav gets about the bird.” 

Your laughs mixed in with the soft music, creating a memory in your mind to look back on while he was away. Bradley felt warm and smelled of his cologne and a hint of herbs that came from the spice rack he built for the occasion. He whispered sweet nothings, his eyes closing to focus on having you in his arms and not on the food covering the island in front of him. 

He liked dancing with you. One dance at a Naval Academy party led to two, and those lead to slow dances on ships in the middle of the ocean and apartments and into an eventual home in Fighter Town. He liked it—even when there was an addition to the family. 

"Mommy?" Nicky asked, his little hands tapping your thigh, the other gripping the fabric of Bradley's sweatpants. 

"Yes, baby?" 

"What are you guys doing?" 

"I'm dancing with your mom," Bradley answered him, his hand falling from your waist to run his fingers through Nick’s bedhead. Nick smiled softly and leaned into the comforting touch, his eyes looking up at him hopefully. 

“Can I dance with mom too?” he asked, rising to his tippy-toes in an effort to appear taller. Bradley chuckled and scooped the boy up, effortlessly placing him on his hip. Nick wrapped his arms around your neck while Bradley stepped forward, his arm protectively on your back. 

“She likes when you hum the song,” Bradley whispered, sharing a secret. Nick nodded against your shoulder and did his best to follow along as his dad hummed the beloved tune, his voice getting softer when he didn’t know, letting Bradley’s comforting voice take over. 

You almost cried, feeling the pressure behind your eyes build. Warmth blossomed in your heart; your little family huddled together and danced in the empty kitchen that would fill with people in a matter of hours. “I love you guys,” you muttered under your breath. 

Bradley’s mustache brushed against your temple leaving a soft kiss on your skin and Nick’s arms tightened around you in a silent response,  “I love you too, honey. Now, waltz me over to the oven so I can finish dinner. ”

[cullxtheherd]

❝ Fuck, I love the way your eyes change when we are like this ❞ ELIZABETH AND LUCIFER WHAT ARE YOU DOING STOP THAT itisindecentCHRIST

uhhh?? tumble has done the thing where i cant format unless i html and like??? no? ANYWAYS?? um? NFKASJEDNFKDSKNFL??? ?

❝ Fuck, I love the way your eyes change when we are like this ❞

Lucifer moves deliberately, mouth at work against alabaster skin. Teeth come down, grazing the negative space of her clavicle, “Hm?” A part of him is certain one of them had been saying something at some point relatively close to n o w, but a larger, much more invested piece contemplates mutual and kinetic dissolution.

Somewhere behind him the ancient, creaking Victrola drops a fresh record into place and he tries, for his own benefit, to focus on anything peripheral not relative to the situation at hand. With the exception of a lit, crackling fireplace Etta James is his only viable distraction [x] and? Since dissolving is impossible, even for him, he entertains disappearing entirely if only for a brief, useless moment.

“𝓔𝓵𝓲𝔃𝓪𝓫𝓮𝓽𝓱,” Able to control himself in similar situations in the past he frowns at the sudden and unexpected utterance of his own doing. Intent on not ruining The Moment™ as he has many times before between them fingertips dig in, grazing roughly against the hem of her dress and urging it higher - up, u p!

Nick’s lungs swell unexpectedly - w a r m - and he exhales, icy against her neck. “Sorry,” Friction, he realizes, is more of a curse than a blessing in this particular situation. “Ah,” His breath catches, Adam's apple bobbing, “What- mm.” At this point he is just making noise to fill up limited space between them.

‘I need a Sunday kind of love . . .’

Palms dredging the curve of her jaw he brings his mouth to hers unabashedly, lips weaving a silent prayer.

‘Every minute, every hour, every day . . .’

It has been countless years since he has dared to make such devotions but he toes the line, unspoken reverence reverberating. Hands travel the seam of her dress, fingertips lingering against precious gems and stones. Had she remembered that he'd liked this dress?

‘To keep me warm when Mondays and Tuesdays grow cold . . .’

Teeth come down against him and he sputters, leaning in. Trim nails dig into soft, silken fabric and he groans, hips arching against the back of his chair. Hands travel the round of her backside, Nick's fingers hungry- pressing against the seam of her undergarments.

Certain he has a hold on her he lifts, shifting and gathering weight. Pushing piles of tomes and ancient texts out of the way he scatters priceless artifacts to the cobbles. Desk mostly free he leans her against it and affords himself a clear, unoccupied moment to get a real, proper look at her.

“Hey,” He feels useless with such an utterance and he rolls his eyes at himself, reaching to tuck a wild wisp of brunette behind her ear.

‘Oh, nothing but Sunday oh, yeah, yeah . . .’

Half of his lips screw up into a smile as he does realize that it is in fact Sunday, “I am,” Catching a wandering palm he brings her wrist to his mouth, “So glad,” In a move he can only attribute to Gomez Addams he presses his lips carefully against the length of her arm, moving incrementally as he speaks, “You are home.”

[bubblestheraccoon]

Music Mixes

Lumberjanes “Arts and Crafts” Program Field

Treble Maker Badge

“Some Risks are worth the Reward”

Music fuels the mind and thus fuels creativity. A creative mind has the ability to make discoveries and create innovations. The greatest minds and thinkers like Hildegard von Bingen, Barbra Strozzi, and Florence Mary Taylor all had something in common in that they were constantly exploring their imagination and creativity. As a Lumberjane it will be vital that we not only enrich our minds, but enrich those around us. Music is just one of the many mediums that can create an empowering environment, it is one of the few mediums that can be enjoyed at any time.

Finch’s Notes:

This post is based on a section from the bonus content from Lumberjanes: To The Max Edition Volume One. I did not create these playlist, their titles, or the blurb at the top of the post. If any of the links are wrong or broken, or if I should add any more disclaimers for song content, please feel free to let me know!

*D-Slur Warning.

**Only version of the cover I could find on youtube, here’s a version of song without the extra audio but it’s on a Russian website that overwrote my adblocker a little bit so visit it at your own risk. Here’s the song it was covering if you want that instead.

***Could not find cover on youtube. Link instead goes to band camp.

****F-Slur Warning.

Fox Fight Jams! By April!

Edge of Seventeen by Stevie Nicks

Bad Reputation by Joan Jett

Run the World (Girls) by Beyonce

Northshore be Tegan & Sara

Woo Hoo by The 5 6 7 8s

Wilderness by Sleater-Kinney

Wolf by Now, Now

Spin Around by Josie and the Pussycats

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Theme

Jet Pack by Dog Party

Pirates by Jenny Owen Youngs

Dance Apocalyptic by Janelle Monae

Bamboo Bones by Against Me!

Push It by Salt-n-Pepa

I Knew You Were Trouble by Taylor Swift

Up All Night by One Direction

Roar by Katy Perry

Eye Of The Tiger by Survivor

Say You'll Be There by the Spice Girls

Ribs by Lorde

Edge of Seventeen by Stevie Nicks (”Best Song Ever”-April)

River Adventure Mix of dooooom by Mal

I Was An Island by Allison Weiss

Shark In The Water by V.V. Brown

Let's Submerge by X-Ray Spex

Eyes Open by The Gossip

Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill*

Giant Kitty by Shonen Knife

I Won't Follow by the Secret Someones

4Ever by The Veronicas

Sk8er Boi by Avril Lavigne

Take Me Away by Fefe Dobson

Borne On The FM Waves by Against Me! & Tegan Quinn

Ain't It Fun by Paramore

3 Small Words by Josie and the Pussycats

Anchor by Letters To Cleo

That's Not My Name by The Ting Tings

Independent Woman Part 1 by Destiny's Child

Crush by the Sleigh Bells

Oh! by Sleater-Kinney

Tropical by Plumtree

Rhiannon by Best Coast or Fleetwood Mac 

The Con by Tegan & Sara

The Competition by Kimya Dawson

Cave Tunes by Molly

I Have Confidence by Julie Andrews

Ain’t No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell

Tightrope by Janelle Monae feat Big Boi

Just A Dream by Taylor Swift

Heartbreak Dream by Betty Who

Corner of the Sky by the Jackson 5

Valerie by Amy Winehouse

I Wanna Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston

Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn

Let It Go by Idina Menzel

Build Me Up Buttercup by The Foundations

Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash

Jolene by Dolly Parton

Rock ‘n Roll High School by Shonen Knife

Don’t Save Me by HAIM

The Cave by Dia Frampton**

She Keeps Me Warm by Mary Lambert

This Is For by Ingrid Michaelson

Cut It Off by Mal Blum

Smash Into You by Beyonce

Jen’s Perfect Camp Mix by Ripley

Gravity Falls Theme Song

Summertime by Audra McDonald

Strong Enough by Kina Grannis

(You’re So Square) Baby, I Don’t Care by Cee Lo Green

Waterfalls - TLC

Just A Girl by No Doubt

Nobody Knows Me At All by The Weepies

I’m Beginning To See The Light by Ella Fitzgerald

Bad Girls by M.I.A.

Spice Up Your Life by the Spice Girls

Magic To Do by Patina Miller & Ensemble

***Flawless by Beyonce

Come On by Josie And The Pussycats

Don’t Stop Believin’ by Journey

Here Comes The Sun by The Beatles

Jo’s really rad! Mix by Jo

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Theme

Androgynous(Live) by Joan Jett and Against Me!

Tous Les Memes by Stromae

Sunshine by Rye Rye feat M.I.A.

L.E.S. Artistes by Santigold

What About Your Friends by TLC

Just One Of The Guys by Jenny Lewis

Melody by Kate Earl

Red Cape by Priscilla Ahn

No Wow by The Kills

I Found You by Tilly and the Wall

Do You Remember the Morning by Kid in the Attic***

Cheerleader by St. Vincent

Concrete Wall by Zee Avi

You Can Count On Me by Panda Bear

Go Your Own Way by Fleetwood Mac (”<3″-Jo)

Don’t You (Forget About Me) by Simple Minds

Ziggy Stardust by David Bowie

Oblivion by Grimes

Q.U.E.E.N. by Janelle Monae and Eryka Badu

Rapid Decompression by Against Me!

Roanokes Rule: The Mix[!][!][!] by April

Rattlesnake by Saint Vincent

Transgender Dysphoria Blues by Against Me!****

Amazon by M.I.A.

Another One Bites The Dust by Queen

Art-I-Ficial by X-Ray Spex

Separate Rooms by Now, Now

What’s Mine Is Yours by Sleater-Kinney

Sci-Fi Wasabi by Cibo Matto

Tennis Court by Lorde

Son Of A Preacher Man by Dusty Springfield

Dreams by Fleetwood Mac

Desire Lines by Deerhunter

Hot and Cold by Ex Hex

White Daisy Passing by Rocky Votolato

Misguided Ghosts by Paramore

For The Best by Gregory and the Hawk

The Hymn Of Acxiom by Vienna Teng

Capture The Flag by Broken Social Scene

From A Shell by Lisa Germano

Rosie’s Turn

Feeling Good by Nina Simone

Annabelle Lee by Sarah Jarosz

Terrible Things by April Smith & The Great Picture Show

You Can’t Be Told by Valerie June

Wild Geese Blues by Gladys Bentley

The Day Is Short by Jearlyn Steele

One Dime Blues by Etta Baker

Hard Way Home by Brandi Carlile

The Devil’s Paintbrush Road by The Wailin’ Jennys

To The Bone by Okou

Panic Cord by Gabrielle Aplin

Cups (You’re Gonna Miss Me) by Lulu and the Lampshades

Crayola Doesn’t Make A Color For Your Eyes by Kristin Andreassen

Complimentary Me by Elizabeth & The Catapult

Blue Spotted Tail by Kina Grannis

Sorry About The Doom by Slow Club

You Know I’m No Good by Amy Winehouse

From Texas: Big “D” by Julie Andrews & Carol Burnett

Finch’s Notes Cont:

Hi! I made this post to avoid work. But mostly I made this post because Lumberjanes is something really important to me, and these playlist are a part of my enjoyment of Lumberjanes I don’t see people talking about a lot! So I decided to make a post in order to share them with y’all. I remember hunching over my phone making a spotify playlist (here, though it’s missing a few songs that aren’t on spotify) while on a trip to California in the summer of 2018 when I first got into Lumberjanes. I probably listened to these songs while I made my first ever Lumberjanes fanart. These mixes helped me to discover artist I really love, like Janelle Monae and Mal Blum. I hope you enjoy them as well!

Other notes: Sk8r Boi is crossed out as that is the way it appears on Mal’s playlist. Also, I tend to shy away from music videos as a personal preference, so that’s why there are so few included on this playlist, though I’m sure many of these songs have beautiful music videos. I might reblog this post in the future with some youtube playlists of these mixes, but if you want to find them yourself there are a lot of playlists of these songs made on youtube already! Or you can make your own playlists using this post. 

And, just for fun, have one final Lumberjanes themed music recommendation:

Lumberjanes by Various

[tigerellasims]

do the music shuffle

Rules: We’re snooping in your playlist! Put your entire music library on shuffle and list the first 10 songs and then choose 10 people.

I love music tags so thanks for the tag @koala-pop

1. The only way is up - Martin Garrix & Tiësto

2. thank u, next - Arianna Grande

3. Edge of Seventeen - Stevie Nicks

4. I AM [Radio Edit] - Sick Individuals & Axwell ft. Taylr Renee

5. Hot Pink - Let’s Eat Grandma

6. Ocean - Martin Garrix ft. Khalid

7. Surrender (MorganJ Remix)  - Jakko, Kenshin, Zex & Etta Matters ft. Anna Yvette

8. Sick Boy - The Chainsmokers

9. Strange Love - Halsey

10. Whippin - Kiiara ft. Felix Snow

I’m gonna tag @wunderlustsims, @gladlypants @louisessims @ranihirosimma @samssims @sophi-x-sims @suepixels @big-titty-goth-wife @mellindi @wannabecatwriter and of course anyone else that would like to do this. just say i tagged you.

[yeoldontknow]

As Still As Sound: 4

Author’s Note: thank you to everyone who has patiently waited for this update. ive been waiting for it too. ily so much. i hope you enjoy <3  Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female) Songs Mentioned: From Her To Eternity - Nick Cave and The Badseeds / Cry To Me - Solomon Burke Genre: soulmate!au; angst; fluff; romance Rating (this chapter): R Warnings: some mature sexual themes; explicit language Word Count: 9K

masterlist

Months ago, the concert was your idea, a thing you suggested with fire behind your teeth and adrenaline in your veins. 

You remember, now, the way your hands rushed to buy the tickets, typing passwords and entering pre-sale codes, telling Kate over and over down the phone that you’d pay for hers if you got in, that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity - that Nick Cave, more than anyone, had constructed your adulthood. In your heart, you carried him, the sound of his voice, and the words from his lips - a soundtrack of misery, anguish, and the fleeting experience of contentment that painted your journey into maturity red and red and red. 

Months ago, Kate agreed, her excitement at the prospect of joining you almost wild and ravenous. Together, you’d looked forward to this, marked days on calendars and held the tickets in your hands in the morning before work, disbelieving and somewhat overwhelmed.

Today, the concert is her idea, a suggestion born purely from kindness; a friendly reminder you need to go out, away from your home and away from your constant, desperate soundtrack - released, finally, from your state of entrapment.

It is not, you imagine, that your anticipation of the show has ceased - far from it - merely that your anticipation and excitement has been redirected to a man whose voice is just as low, just as effective, and meant for your ears alone. The gravel nestled within Chanyeol’s voice is a chocolate honeycomb of affection, putting syrup and sweetness and devotion into your blood - a sugar rush upon which you get high; where Nick’s lyrics remind you of the heartbreak so unilaterally partnered with the act of living, Chanyeol’s words - simple and unpoetic as they often are - ignite the hope you had scorned and turned away, putting the thrill of living back into your lungs.

For weeks you have wondered if this is how people live now, if this is how people had been living long before the solar flare - endlessly searching and seeking, restless and waiting for the vibrancy of an overeager heartbeat; hoping and hoping and hoping to be touched and felt and needed. 

Until Chanyeol, this was not you. These types of deep rooted, tenacious emotions carried with them an unprecedented sense of repulsion - not to the person, but to the intensity, and to, more than anything, the incomprehensible notion that you needed another person to feel whole. 

Finding romance, for you, was a pleasure, and seeking pleasure in another person was a brief, impermanent adventure, something only slightly more transient than a roller coaster. Did people always crave like this? Did your parents want and need and yearn for one another long before they had confirmation they could? Was it not existentially exhausting to want and pine and wish, almost as compulsively as breathing, for the arms of another?

Would you, had you met Chanyeol on the street and not entwined or laced between your music, have felt such pining and longing for his hands, his voice, his breath as you do now? Would you, had you seen him at the shop, buying records and buying albums, unknowingly sharing his music taste with your cash register, have listened to all the same things, hoping to share a part of him as you do now?

In the end, it does not matter. 

These questions do not matter because the cosmos has built itself around you and around him, twining your hearts together until the days have started to blur into one half formed and hardly tangible rise and set of the sun. In your efforts of hearing him once more, the play count and hours logged on your last.fm have reached new highs, an almost constant list of songs based on genres, artists, and decades you imagine he would like growing and growing until, for several hours, it stopped counting altogether, seemingly overwhelmed. Where before you listened to only one album, playing through enough Neil Diamond to feel as though his lyrics are the lexicon of your speech, now you have knowledge of a science and a pattern, but no element of control to manage your testing.

All you know is that you will meet him when you play the same song, and you have, and will and are, pushed yourself into obsession in the effort of meeting him again.

And so it is not that you do not want to go to the show any longer. 

On the contrary, you find, as you tie the laces of your combat boots and check - twice before you leave and once after the tube carriage doors close - for your tickets, you are craving the thunder and violence of live music. Lately, you have needed to be rattled - shaken down to your core by something familiar, not something cosmic. Live music builds the person you are back up from nothing, the person you have lost after days and weeks and months of work, and family, and responsibility structured through a sound wave. 

In losing yourself completely, surrendering to the passion and the energy and the noise until your mind is full of nothing else, do you find your true soul, remember who you are and what you are, someone who survives on the edge of existence and with a smile wide enough to hurt.

And so, it is not that you don't want to go to the show. You are adamant about this, reminding yourself that you need the emotional rest and that you crave this as you stand on the tube platform. An approaching train puts a warm breeze through your hair, the unprecedented loudness drowning out all other sounds and leaving you, momentarily, in a dull roar of silence. Grimacing, you step on the train, frustrated with the noise of the tube and the sense that you lose time every time you take a journey.

Time you could have spent finding Chanyeol.

Annoyed with yourself, you release a chastising laugh. It is not that you don’t want to go to the show, it is simply the hours with live music are hours without him, without an opportunity to find him, have him, hold him - three minutes amongst hours that slip through your fingers. Pressing your back against rough cushion of the tube seat, you raise the volume of the music in your headphones, hoping the sound of Etta James can slow your rapid thoughts into silence, a pout pushing at your lips in disdain.

You only ever have three minutes with Chanyeol, three minutes which seem to pass in seconds, time slipping through and around you as though you are both simultaneously part of the natural order of the earth and separate from it altogether. His voice alone renders time meaningless, a concept the air in his lungs blows to dust, lips kissing at words that become stars in your eyes and held together by the fabric of your ardor. Three minutes and endless seconds, hours missed and hours lost, and it is all completely unequivocally unfair. 

Tonight, the tube carriage is full of people and strangers, some bonded, some free; some headed to the same show as you, evidenced by their band tee shirts and their jittery, shaking legs, and all, most likely, will get to experience the slow descent into love at a pace they have chosen to set. Chewing at the inside of your cheek, you bite back a frustrated sigh, willing your mouth to suck the bitterness from your tongue. The envy of their supposed simplicity sends your heart sinking, resentful and aware that you deserve nothing less than what you have been given.

Gifted to you, somewhat cruelly, is a love that appears only when you least expect it and always when you imagine it has departed from you entirely, a fluke or trick of the imagination brought forward by the human instinct to want a partner. Once more, you are reminded of Kate's words, her small laugh and the acknowledgement that this sort of connection is so like you, your inherent distrust of love resulting in a connection that feels incredible but seems to distrust if you were worthy of it. 

But still, your hand grips your phone tightly, hoping that maybe Chanyeol is listening to Etta James too and that, even if you do not meet in these songs, he wants you, through and beyond time, and down to his very core.

Kate is waiting for you at the front entry of the Eventim Apollo, a delicate flush painted on her cheeks from the uncharacteristically cool night and a bounce in her knees, unable to keep still. A smile is tucked into the corner of her lips as she speaks on the phone, a secret affection given away by the glimmer of joy in her eyes. The surrounding city lights are eaten by the matte fabric of her burgundy coat, as though she absorbs the world and glows on her own. Hurrying through her conversation as you approach, she laughs, the sound adopting a musical cadence she only ever exudes when she is blissfully happy.

'Yes, I'll text when it's over and we're leaving,' she says, rushing through the words as she waves you over. 'Do you want me to call if they play Jesus of the Moon? Okay, love you too. Bye.'

Coming to stand at her side, you dig through your bag, smiling to yourself. 'Baekhyun couldn't make it?'

She slips her phone into her pocket, taking the ticket you hand her with a small pout. 'No, he couldn't find any tickets on StubHub or the forums. The prices were astronomical.'

Nodding, you walk with her to the queue, which has already begun to shrink. Doors opened twenty minutes ago, and while you both have standing stall tickets, neither of you had the energy to queue. It will be just as magical, you know, standing towards the back and letting the light in.

'I can't imagine the fans would be selling,' you muse, opening your bag for checking and offering a polite smile to the security guard who nods mutely in gratitude. 'I'm disappointed, though. I was looking forward to meeting him.'

'You'll meet him soon enough,’ she replies offhandedly, muttering a gentle thank you as security waves her forward. 'I'm impressed by you, though.'

Walking through the entry, you hand your ticket for scanning and cock a quizzical brow in her direction. 'How do you mean?'

Ticket scanned, she pushes it into her bag before gesturing her hands over her ears, giving the impression of ear muffs. 'You brought the small earbuds and not your big clunkers.'

Rolling your eyes, you purse your lips. 'I hate that you call them that.’ 

The slight irritation in your voice is undercut by the hum of people within the venue, some at the bar and others heading towards coat check. Glancing in Kate's direction, you find her eyes remain locked on the entryway to the stage floor, expression unfazed and unmarred by your displeasure. It does not matter if she heard you or not, she's had this conversation enough to know your opinion.

 'They're studio headphones,’ you finish, unbothered by the petulant tone you’ve adopted.

She laughs, nodding at your clarification while she trains a focused stare on the sound booth and the surrounding barrier. 

'There good?' she asks, pointing to the section just in front of the sound desk - a place for you to stand and lean if you grow tired. At your hum of approval, she beelines with you in tow, and continues where your conversation left off. 

'Precisely zero people walk around the tube with those,’ she says, pride overtaking an edge to her voice, pleased by her success of finding a good spot.

'Fuck off,' you murmur, leaning back against the barrier and assessing your view of the stage. 'I just didn't want to bring a big bag. And,' you emphasize, turning to finally look at her once more, 'I'll have you know those headphones have incredible audio quality.'

'For music?' Kate's lip curls in a mischievous smirk, and your mouth runs dry in anticipation. 'Or for a certain someone?'

A small hiss of air escapes your teeth, bemused but unsurprised. For a moment, you let your eyes wander around the room, battling with yourself as you decide just how much you want to give away.

'And if I said both?' you counter eventually, voice bold and unflinchingly honest as you watch her expression immediately softens. 

'Any luck the last few days, then?'

You shake your head, spine straightening as you roll your shoulders back, determined to appear decidedly okay. 'No.'

‘Are you certain he’s your soulmate?’

It is neither an insult nor an accusation, but still the air escapes your lungs, chest winded and pained by the unintended cruelty of her question. But then, you quickly realize the last she's heard is that you were uncertain - that you had no idea about him at all, meeting with her at the pub only to disappear for weeks, responding here and there through text. To her, your relationship with Chanyeol is as good as a science experiment. While you know for a fact you had lied, unwilling to admit, then, that you knew from the moment his first breath reached your ears he was yours, now she simply questions your diligence in an act of concern for her closest friend.

And so you smile, aware that the expression looks sad, unmoved in your effort to make someone else feel comfortable when discussing this topic.

‘I’m confident it’s him.’ 

The firmness in your tone as you say the words does not make up for the pain your muscles had taken on after you lied, but at least, in this moment, the weightlessness of such a melancholy statement gives your heart the sensation of floating beneath your sternum.

It feels good to say it, to admit it. It feels good to be claimed by him.

Warmth floods her irises, one of her hands coming to hold your arm in gentle reassurance. Empathy mixes with sympathy, shades of the Kate you remember pre-Baekhyun glossing over her current visage in a sort of time slip. It hits you, then, that she had felt this way, once. While she had a clear marker for her connection, a clock beneath her skin stopping the moment she came into contact with her soulmate, the confidence that she would ever be released from her own prison had never once been something she believed she could touch. 

All at once, you are reminded of the months she said she wanted to bond even if she didn’t like it, just so that it could be over.

'You'll figure it out soon,' she affirms, the softness in her voice mixing with her stubborn determination. 'On the bright side, this is a vast improvement from believing you don't have anyone at all.'

'Is it though?' You don't mean for it to sound pleading, but the ferocity of your affection has taken hold of pieces within your soul you did not know existed. And, while you are confident you don’t wish to be freed from this new, uncharted intensity, you simply wish there was a logic to make the pain a little more bearable. 'Or am I simply driving myself mad, thinking and overthinking?'

'You do that anyway,' she counters, playfully, 'so I'm not sure the bond is to blame.'

Laughing, you nudge your shoulder into hers and release a groan of agreement, jostled by her honesty. Regardless if you had bonded with Chanyeol or not, your mind would have raced towards an infinite number of conclusions, exhausting your heart into a state of paralysis. Bond or no bond, your mind was never one to allow itself a moment of reprieve.

'Look,' she continues, cocking her head towards the stage in encouragement. 'Just forget about it for tonight. You need a break. No bonds. Just us and our first boyfriend.'

Kate’s advice is sound, and it works for a while. For a time, you are tethered to the moment by the strength in the hold of her hand, the way she holds you to her side and shares, with all of herself, the light and the sound and the feeling. But soon, her grasp on your hand turns your thoughts inward, in that purgatory of time between the opener and the main act, when there is little to do apart from buy another pint of cider, feeling the thrum of excitement down into your bones.

While she checks her phone for texts from Baekhyun, you wonder if Chanyeol is here, sharing this moment with you the same way you have been sharing songs. It would not be preposterous to assume he would be, the majority of London’s rock scene gathered to get high and get wrecked by a sonic release that will likely feel akin to something biblical. Craning your neck, you glance around the venue, hoping to be struck by him as if by lightning. 

For weeks, you’ve wondered if you’ve passed him, shared a tube with him - if he’s even in London at all. Being separated by miles and seas from your soulmate is not uncommon; you would not be the first instance of such a curse, but still those couples found one another, and so you have not given up the waxy sensation of hope as it glides over your fingers. 

But still, you may be the first instance of couple sharing song and sharing sound, only having minutes - perhaps less - to glean as much information from one another as you can. Those who hear one another’s thoughts coordinate meeting places, already knowing what and who they should be looking for; those with sensory loss and clocks have concise ways of knowing when and how to find their person, the earthquake of first contact partnered with a monumental change. Yet, there is no guarantee you would find Chanyeol even if he were here, no promise that you would feel him even if he were rows behind or in front of you. 

And so you cling, in the end, to the prayer that tonight, even if he is not here, he finds his way to any of the twenty-six songs on the setlist. 

The lights dim at nine on the dot, carrying with it the familiar sensation of floating, the yells from the crowd swiftly wiping any further thought from your mind. You smile -  you feel yourself smiling, and you are unsure when your cheeks had pulled back to reveal your teeth, but you do not mind. At once, the hairs on your arms stand on end, brought to life by the strength of adrenaline alone, the gooseflesh along your skin and sending a shiver down your spine. Kate’s hand squeezes yours, a touch and a hold that feels to you like a liveware, and you lift yourself taller, back straightening as though boosted by the roar of the speaker feedback. 

The first notes hit you in the center of your chest, the kind of eruption that could leave a person winded, and the force of it does not seem to stop throughout the night. Eyes closed, mouth screaming the words, the only tether you have to the earth is Kate’s hand, rooting you to gravity. Tension leaves your jaw, the stress of existence seeping from your bones and leaving you weightless, skin tingling from the sudden relaxation. Throughout the night, Kate’s hand in yours becomes a comfort, a familiar sensation you do not need to focus on but recognize just the same, feeling safe simply because her own fingers press into your knuckles in delight. 

And it is then, in the middle of From Her To Eternity, when you realize touch and contact carries with it its own set of rules, a logic and an understanding that goes far beyond conscious conception; a logic that need not be experienced in order to be conceived - you can feel the texture of silk just by thinking of the word; you can feel, rather easily, the cool clasp of a leather jacket, just by picturing the silver.

And it is then, in the middle of From Her To Eternity, that you think on Chanyeol, on the way he pulls at you and your soul, and suddenly, all at once, as if he had never been departed from you at all, feel him over and inside of you.

From out of the black, his hands tug at your waist, aching to press you flush against his body - seemingly disdainful of any separation. During the guitar riff before the chorus, you can almost hear him, cheering and singing along to the notes with an ecstatic sort of howl - one hand fisting in your shirt in an effort to make sure you experience him at the same time. Heart racing and blood rushing beneath your skin, you lean back into where you imagine his chest would be, careful not to fall or pull Kate with you. You take luxury in the peculiarity of this sensation, at a body without a body being at once behind and a part of yours. Almost instantly, you open for and open to him, begging him to stay, to never leave, to make a home of you, and you spread your legs a little wider hoping to feel his leg press against your thighs, encouraging him to bind his bones with yours.

A shiver walks along your nerves as his other hand glides up your extended arm, carding your fingers together as he sings - rich, and full voiced, and transcendent - all the lyrics you echo back to him, to Nick, to the atmosphere. The warmth of his aura floods your muscles, a small moan escaping your lips in the middle your favourite lyric, words garbled by the sudden overwhelm of heat. As badly as you want Chanyeol, so too does he want your skin, wants the prints of your fingertips smeared all over him, bodies thrumming from passion, adrenaline, and delirium.

The fabric of your clothes becomes tight, the denim of your black jeans feeling thin and damp around the curve of your ass; your shirt, wrapped in his grip and rubbing against your waist, is moist at the base of your spine, the heat from the crowd and the heat from Chanyeol pulling the wetness from your pores. His long fingers extend upward against your stomach, grazing the soft fabric of your bra with his nails - a sensation that tickles you, barely there and barely tangible, but felt all the same.

Looking up at your hand, vision blurred and lips pulled into a messy, lopsided smile, you suddenly feel dizzy.

This hand is empty. You know and can see that it is empty. Part of you does not question this because if he were here, if he were truly with you, the roughness of his skin would ignite the chemistry of your molecules, transforming you into something Other and something Unknown. You know your hand is empty, but still the haze of fingers and knuckles and the pink redness of blood at the fingertips takes shape. The blurred edges of this image make you feel motion sick, bewildered by the sudden trick of the light and the trick of your heart, blinking once and twice before it is gone altogether.

There is no hand holding yours, no fingers pressing hungrily at your breast, but you feel them - you still feel him, as though the seismic weight of your wishing has brought him forth, brought the memory of every other contact you’ve felt into the nerves of your palm and married it, desperately, with the malformed shadow of Chanyeol. 

It’s difficult, you find, building a person around a voice or building a heart around sound, but then - isn’t that what a heartbeat is? A constant rhythm keeping space and keeping time, pulling you close and close and close, able to be recognized regardless of the cartilage that separates you from it.

Chanyeol holds you close, curled into you from fear that you will leave him, rocking into your back and pressing a smile into the skin of your neck as he sings and sings and sings. You’re vibrating, holding onto nothing at the same time as you hold onto Kate, feeling wetness pool between your thighs from the sheer magnitude of wanting without having, knowing how it feels to be pressed close to a body, the hardness of a person grazing your back and ass, and allow your mind to fill the missing pieces in on your behalf. The sound of his voice travels through your ears, your mind, and into your open mouth, tongue going dry from the sheer force of him.

Like always, he is a flood, a force of nature you absolutely cannot resist, soul surrendering, almost immediately, to the magic of his existence.

It could be the cider, you think, that elevates your heart rate and puts a rush of blood into your lips that makes them feel swollen, and full, begging to be kissed or bitten. It could be the crowd and their energy making you wish and crave for someone to share this intimacy with, the energy of the room pushed flush the chambers of your heart, and your brain ensuring the hazy outline of Chanyeol be there to deliver you to paradise. In the end, you decide it does not matter, the answers to these questions are not nearly as meaningful as the way he tells you this is his favourite song too, and you cling to the way he speaks and breathes; mostly, you cling to the way his lips seem to press against your ear, demanding you hear him and you do not forget.

And just as swiftly as the song started, just as quickly as the feeling came, it leaves you, the red flush on your chest lingering even after he is gone. The heat from the room sticks to your skin, much the same way Kate’s eyes burn into your profile. With vigor, she pulls her hand from yours, tugging it from your grip. In your peripheral, you watch the way she stretches out her hand and fingers, massaging the bones and regards you with wide, worried eyes that demand an explanation. Unsure what to say and unprepared to speak at all, you keep your eyes trained on the stage, watching the stage as it goes dark and waiting for the sadness of your loss to creep back in as it always does.

But this time, there is change. This time, you are left with a tangible residue to mark his presence, a sign that your overactive imagination was not alone in its efforts.

This time, instead of the loss and the torment of separation, you focus on the sensation of your wet underwear, a pulsing vibration from inside your core reminding you this was real.

This was real. 

The deep flush of your cheeks and the dry skin of your lips is grateful for the chilly night air as you exit the venue after the show. Tonight, the sky of London is clear and black, stars swallowed by the street lights with only the glow of the full moon reminding you there exists a world beyond this, beyond the world you've fallen into with Chanyeol. Breathless, you stand outside and check the time, hands shaking from both adrenaline and memory. This late at night, the tube is still running, but you crave the open expanse of the world, synapses too flooded with desire to handle the closed tunnels of the underground.

Close quarters and tight seats would only make you yearn for the press of his hands and his groin into your lap, the longing to be handled brimming over in the heat of your blood.

‘What the fuck was that?’ Kate asks, the disbelieving nature of her voice breaking your thoughts.

Tearing your eyes away from the sky, you regard her, wide eyed and breathless. Shadows have been carved into her features from the Eventim Apollo marquee sign and the silver glimmers of moonlight, a darkness under her eyes and cheekbones making her look severe and unnerved.

‘What?’ The small, thinness to your voice gives away you know precisely to what she is referring, but you need her to say it.

You need her to say it and to confirm it.

‘You nearly broke my hand during that song.’ Neither angry nor upset, she simply massages her hand in concern, easing the lingering soreness. ‘I know its your favourite, but have some consideration for my joints, yeah?’

Looking down at your feet, your mind empties, mouth giving shape to apologies before your mind can properly form them. ‘Sorry,' you mutter, 'I didn’t realize I was squeezing you so tightly.’

Kate steps closer to you, bending down to study your face with a furrowed brow. ‘You’re all flushed, too. Are you drunk?’

You laugh, but you're not sure why. The sound is a faint whisper of humour carrying with it the turmoil of confusion, sounding, altogether, like you could be drunk. You might be, you think. He makes your skin feel just as edgeless as when you are too many ciders deep and telling London it is your only true, passionate love affair. 

‘Maybe?’ you manage, the words little more than a noise of delirium.

‘You only had three ciders,’ she chuckles, yet her eyes remain guarded.

‘Well,’ you shrug, turning in the direction of the night bus. Your feet move of their own accord, not bothering to see if she follows. ‘Nick will do that to you.’

Pulling out her phone to presumably text Baekhyun, she hums in agreement, but still you feel her eyes bore into your back as you walk away, watching and watching, almost certain you might disappear.

You realize you never said goodbye.

The night bus home is difficult. 

Normally, you relish this journey, take your time savoring the top level of the bus which somehow always feels reserved for concert goers. This late at night, their voices carry, domed around you as they discuss the show, the highlights, or, conversely, simply not talking at all, choosing instead to relive the show through their headphones. Tonight you join them, settling in an open row of seats next to the window and resting your head against the glass, seeking the refreshing texture in the hopes that it will cool your skin. 

Tonight should be no different from all your other post-gig journeys home, excitement palpable in the almost thick heat of the bus and the way there’s a rush of emotion as the bus pulls away from the stop. This is when you’d smile, take your headphones out and play your way through the setlist; other times, you’d eavesdrop on the other conversations, smiling at their reactions and responses, turning inward and tuning out only after you cross the bridge over the Thames and the conversation turns a bit quiet, and a bit personal.

But tonight, the difference is in you - in the way you still cannot shake the feeling of Chanyeol’s strong hands and the thick cream of his voice, the memory of him seeming to overtake the memory of the show altogether. 

Headphones wound in your lap, you regard them with a small pout. The ringing in your ears will do you no favors should you listen to any music, but your hesitation to touch and to use them runs deeper than the usual post-gig tinnitus. Even now, you can still feel him, the paradoxically smooth roughness of his palms as they moved over your skin, and the way his voice made you vibrate, trembling into nothingness in the effort of seeking more. Now, the white wires of your headphones pose an element of distrust and betrayal, the ground rules of your connection seeming to change just as soon as you understand them, and you wonder if you’re ready to feel him again, if you could, or if you’ve even stopped.

Turning to glance out the window, London seems to pass in a crystal haze, the lights from the city dotting the river like miniature spotlights, the city still alive and glittering. The vibrancy of London puts a smile on your face, the memory of the last time you rode a bus mixing with the memories of all the times before you’ve looked out at the skyline and wondered who was living, who was dying, and how many stories could be contained beneath just one streetlight. These idle thoughts always compelled you, your love for London and for the heartbeat of the city always overtaking your thoughts once the bus grew quiet.

Now, your imagination has become consumed with a man and the frequency of a voice that haunts you. Staring down at your hands, you study the lines in your skin and wonder what you felt - if you truly were feeling. Already a naturally warm person, the tender hold of his hand in yours put a rush of blood in your fingers, making them appear swollen and pink. And while you could see through and beyond him, as though he were an ephemeral mirage comprised of a longing that reached down into the chasm of your essence, for one moment you swore you could see the pink of his knuckles as he held you, clutching at your bones in an effort to stitch your bodies together.

Tonight, too, the steps up to your door feel endless, walls of the stairway closing in and becoming tight, compressed. Laughter echoes around you, strange for this hour of the night when your neighbors are usually asleep or out even later than you. It doesn’t sound familiar but it doesn’t sound foreign, the richness of the tone giving way to a younger Mr. Kim and a female voice you place as his wife, Aki. How many times had they walked these stairs, holding hands and kissing wrists, laughing and laughing until they silenced one another with kisses that seared against their smiles? How many times had they pressed one another against these walls, pressing fingers to lips to keep quiet only to fall into one another instead? 

Were they soulmates, too, long before the world allowed for such a love?

The nostalgia of these unlived experiences burns against your throat, a lump forming that seems out of place and altogether irrational. A missing has taken root within you, deep down and all over again, though this time it is not for Chanyeol but for a future and a past running in beside one another in tandem. Do you miss the idea of youth, spending too much time with Mr. Kim and watching the way time eats at a heart and at a person? Do you miss the connection that comes from bodies? Your last boyfriend was years ago, just before the solar flare, and even then you had stopped connecting long before you called the relationship off. Even when you were together, pressed against one another in bed and sharing breaths, you weren’t really there, heart and mind going elsewhere to find pleasure.

Perhaps, in the end, you simply miss the happiness of coming home to someone, coming home to Chanyeol, or, most likely, coming home at all. Pushing through your door, the silence seems to swallow you, the quietness of your flat unfit for the energy pooling at your fingertips. Home hasn't felt like home for months, not since you first played Neil Diamond on repeat for days. Something about your flat has felt off, right in the ways that are familiar and wrong as thought something terribly important had been lost, or never found at all. Tonight, the quiet of it all eats at you, skin still stinging with the strength of Chanyeol's touch, and you find you need sound to drown out this loneliness.

Stripping off your clothes, the freedom of your removed bra makes you smile, suddenly hyper aware of the curves of your body. Embodied as you are, you find you need music to hold you together, to press against you the way hands should be - the way Chanyeol's hands would.

Solomon Burke's record is torn at the sides, the edges fraying and taped too many times for you to count. It should never have been left in a charity shop, but then, if it hadn't you never would have come to own it. Faded and worn as its sleeve may be, the record still rings clean and true, the pressed black vinyl glossy and glimmering in the low light of your flat. Uncorking a bottle of wine, your lips go numb as your heart begins to race, head tilting to the side in the expectation of a mouth gliding along your neck. The hair on your arms stands on end, the atmosphere suddenly full of static, electric as it kisses against your skin.

The world fades, the familiarity of this comforting and so unlike the illusion of his touch at the concert. In this, you ground, the world around you silenced except for the music and for him.

‘God, I’ve missed you,' you mumble, knowing he can hear you just fine.

Redness spreads across your chest, a flush of embarrassment at your admission painting you pink and pink. Silly, you think, for there was nothing to miss. You're certain he had never left you.

Chanyeol's laugh is low, a thunder roll easily missed if one is not hanging on every sound he makes. ‘I can still feel you,' he says, though the words come together behind a soft, impatient whine. ‘You’re driving me wild.’

‘Speak for yourself,' you snort, watching the wine as you pour it through half lidded eyes. ‘You’re the one that found me, and now I’m wearing you. I didn’t think we’d be able to...do that.’

He hums in agreement, pride evident in the smile you can almost hear him wear. ‘This, too.’

You knit your brows together, corking the bottle as you glance around your flat, confused. ‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s the first time I’m hearing you without headphones.'

Eyes widening, your gaze lands on the record as it turns and turns, the glimmers of light swirling over the record as it plays. Your headphones, earbuds and studio over-ear alike, are in your bedroom, packed away for their use tomorrow when you'll need them for your commute. Out of habit and the inherent human need for rationality, you look around your flat, feeling him close and hearing his breath as falls in a rushed, excited rhythm. Outside your window, the streetlights take on an otherworldly glow, the fabric of your couches, chairs, and curtains suddenly richer, deeper, your world coloured entirely by his presence.

Overwhelmed, you find all you can manage is the painfully simple, whispered exclamation, 'Oh, my god.'

He moves, that much is evident by the sound of his rustling clothes, and you turn around, looking for his shadow.

‘It’s the clearest you’ve ever been,' he says, sounding pleased. The joy of it, the joy and the shock and the clarity of him is heady, and you reach a hand out, gripping your counter. 'You’re surrounding me.’

Once again, he is not wrong, the sound of his voice seeming to fill the empty corners of your house and mind. Your grip on the counter tightens, joints aching from the effort of keeping still. If he were here, you'd reach for him, pull him to you and kiss him until your lungs hurt from lack of breath. If he were just as needy, maybe he'd place you on the counter top, spilling your wine as his hands massaged bruises into your thighs, leaving marks on your neck for the world to see.

It's shocking, you realize, what the sound of his voice can do. Just one laugh and already he stains the walls.

Swallowing thickly, you take in a long inhale, hoping to clear your mind and focus. ‘So you were at the show.’

It is not a question, just a statement of fact.

Chanyeol's laugh is one of disbelief and one of comfort, an odd mix of emotions you read so easily and find yourself getting drunk on just the same. Glancing down, you see the wine, untouched. ‘It’s so bizarre you just know it,' he says, breathless in his delight. ‘It’s like continuing a conversation we never started.’

‘So you were there tonight?’ you repeat, needing to hear his confirmation and refusing to let yourself run wild with the sheer magnitude of him.

‘Yeah, I was,' he admits. ‘I started feeling like you were there and...I don’t know.’ Chanyeol falls silent, but just as clearly as you can hear him, so too does your mind see him. He blushes, looking down at his hands and standing in the same place as you, sleeveless grey shirt revealing the muscles in his arms as he holds onto the counter. ‘I couldn’t help myself.’

The sound of your heartbeat fills your ears, and while you want to rush forward and talk and talk, for a moment you are speechless.

Chanyeol is in London.

There are no seas separating you.

Tonight, he was at the concert and just as easily as sharing a song, so too can you share the city. This kind of confirmation is worthy of a celebration, a late night phone call or text message to give an address, a number, a cab ride to a doorstep so hands and mouths can finally meet. But you don't mention it or expand on it, biting the side of your tongue in hesitation instead. Blood rushing in your ears interrupts all your fantasies, mouth unsure you're ready for your own admission to make it real.

When it's real, it breaks, and you're still unsure you're ready to be moved beyond the confines of the earth.

Blinking slowly, you ground yourself back in the deep breaths he takes to keep himself calm, and smile. 'I'm glad you didn't.' Once more, your eyes find your wine glass, hand reaching for the stem to swirl it around and around. 'It's been a long time since I've felt someone hold me so close at a concert. You were keeping me warm.'

Almost immediately, he replies. ‘Don’t talk about someone else's hands on you.' It is neither a demand not a command, but a plea. ‘I don’t like picturing it.’

Smirking, you cock your head to the side, the honey sweet drip of arousal running down your spine. ‘Possessive already?’

‘Yes,' comes his quick, unashamed reply. ‘Everyone before doesn’t matter,' he clarifies, eyes falling closed to keep himself calm, 'but I still can’t help it. My hands have been aching all night. I'll never have my fill of you.'

Uncertain how to reply, you simply smile. You smile straight ahead and at nothing at all, knowing that he can feel it. Nothing matters anymore, so long as he can feel it.

‘I wouldn’t have expected you to be there,' he says, words falling quickly in an effort of making the most of your time together. 'There weren’t many women, especially towards the front.’

Rolling your eyes, you sigh, tired of these types of gendered comments men so easily make when it comes to rock music. ‘Then you weren’t looking hard enough.’

Chanyeol, however, acquiesces easily. ‘True,' he affirms. ‘Though, to be fair, I was really only looking for you.’ You both fall into the memory, of the way you found one another in the breadth of a moment, in a setlist, and in the all encompassing ecstasy that comes from live music. ‘That’s my favourite song of his,' Chanyeol shares, sounding almost shy. 'From Her To Eternity is so powerful.'

Something about this makes you feel young, impossibly young and carefree, like your longtime crush has just admitted he likes the same things as you, and therefore it must be destiny. You laugh, feeling yourself go light headed from the force of it, and remind yourself that it is. It is actually destiny. 

‘Mine too,' you agree, giggling. ‘It’s funny, people don’t mention that deep cut.’

‘Deep cut?’ he questions, and you have to stop yourself from sighing in deep affection at the image of his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. ‘Do you know something I don’t?’

‘No...just…’ Your words die, backtracking from your blanket statement. ‘It doesn’t get chosen very often as a favourite, is all.’

Seeming to realize that your time together is coming short, the end of side A looming closer, Chanyeol changes the subject. ‘I didn’t think I’d find you in this record.’

Humming, you look back at the record, and the torn somewhat bent edges of the sleeve. 'That's true,' you nod at no one in particular. 'It's a hard record to find, which is a shame because Cry To Me is the best part of Dirty Dancing.’

A small noise of uncertainty blooms from Chanyeol's chest, curiosity and interest blending together in one small, magical sound. ‘I don’t know what that is.'

Baffled and overtaken by skepticism, you laugh. Normally, such statements make you roll your eyes in disgust but there is something so wonderfully endearing about his joke you cannot help but smile. ‘That’s literally impossible. You’re such a guy.’

A low, slow rumble quakes in his chest, your eyes falling shut in preparation of the thickness of pleasure you know he is about to adopt. ‘If dirty dancing is what you want…’

‘Don’t start,' you whisper, mind replaying the sound over and over, addicted. ‘You’ve got me drunk on you.’

‘Speak for yourself,' he teases, mirroring your earlier statement.

For a brief moment, you can almost see him. Bottom lip caught between his teeth, his wide eyes look longing through you, hoping to find and touch and hold whatever part of you he can access. Like this, you both fall quiet, looking everywhere and nowhere for one another, and eventually, the shift of the earth on its axis makes your body sway, overcome by your unintentional stillness. Just like you could at the concert, you feel his hand reach for your waist, catching you, and it is this contact that makes you understand the difference between imagination and connection.

Where imagination is distant and feather light, a super imposition of assumption onto expectation, this is is a cosmic wave in which your drown, skin and soul and heart rattled by the impossibility and intensity of him. Neither fictional nor imagined, he is hyper-present and he is cosmic, a sunbeam trick that runs along the endings of your nerves.

‘So, do you like soul music, then?’ he asks, breaking your silence with an anxious tension at the back of his throat. His words are thick, heavy things that weigh against you, and you know he too is struggling to hold himself together.

A slow smile tugs at your lips, a lopsided grin of adoration. ‘I love it,’ you begin, pressing your tongue against your teeth unsure if you should continue. There’s so much on this you want to say, so much you normally give to other people with little passion returned. But he’s your soulmate, and if he’s really yours he will give back in spades. ‘Most days, I think it’s my favourite genre. It’s speaks of human connection in a way that I think other genres just can’t comprehend.’ 

‘Absolutely,’ he agrees, enthusiasm palpable in every syllable. ‘Their voices are full of the full spectrum of human emotion...it’s like they’ve felt so much more than I ever could. Every lyric is a love letter.’

Silently, you chuckle to yourself, eyes roaming up towards your ceiling in thanks to a God you never really had faith in. ‘Every time I listen to it, especially to an Otis song -’

‘God, I love Otis,’ he interrupts, over eager. ‘Sorry,’ comes his rushed apology, bemused by his excitement. ‘It’s just good to talk about it with someone.’

‘It’s okay.’ 

You want to reassure him everything he will ever say, every interruption is fine and good and gold, because you want, more than anything, to listen to him speak until the sun goes black. But Chanyeol remains quiet, impatiently waiting for you to continue, and you are so willing to give him absolutely everything he desires. 

‘It’s so hard to explain…’ Your words fade, mind struggling to form a sentence that could convey the depth of your emotion. ‘He moves me,’ you finally announce, uncertain anything further needs to be said. 

You have said this before. This thought and opinion is not unfamiliar or new. You have said as much to countless other people, people who simply laugh and tell you this thought is incomplete. Movement is born from a moment of pleasure, a spark and release of joy, and rarely is such a feeling understood outside of the moment in which it exists. To everyone else, this thought is illogical - not impossible, just unusual.

But Chanyeol sighs, a long exclamation of understanding, his heart and soul wilting directly into yours, finally witnessed. ‘Yeah?’ he swoons, urging you to continue with the force of his ardor. 

Turning, you lean back against the counter, tilting your head upwards as though anticipating a kiss. ‘He was so young,’ you continue, voice small and distant, longing tracing every word on your tongue, ;but the way he spoke and the way he sang…’ You drift, trembling at the sudden sensation of a light touch ghosting along your cheek. You think it might be his nose as he runs it along your skin, breathing you in. ‘His music always feels like he’s lived three lifetimes, and loved, intensely, his way through each of them. I think I’d like to live like that.’ 

With his hands on you, you don’t even apologize for the slight stutter to your speech, affected.

‘Intensely in love?’ he whispers, and you lean into the sound, wanting.

‘Yeah.’ 

The sensation shifts to your other cheek, and you tilt your head in the mime of granting permission. Barely there grazes move along the edge of your cheekbone, tickling a phantom of wave of affection in its wake. But he remains silent, expecting and yearning for more.

‘For a long time,’ you manage, voice strained against your tight throat, ‘it was something I thought I’d ever want or need, that feeling of being loved through your humanity and into your spirit. I never thought I’d want it, because it couldn’t exist or, if it did, it was rare enough most of humanity shouldn’t bother trying to find it.’

‘A losing game,’ he clarifies, wistful and longing in his agreement.

Briefly reminded of Amy Winehouse, the distant melody plays in your mind. You wonder if he likes her as much as you. ‘But now -’ you raise your hands, curling your fingers and almost feeling the hard muscles of his hips as you pull him into you, ‘it’s like unlocking a door, you know? Stepping through to the other side and realizing, finally, what everyone had been singing about. I want that...to be loved so intensely, so in love, that it becomes the one thing I never question.’

Drowning in one another, you let yourself be held, body warming to a temperature that makes you crave the refreshment of air conditioning. Your skin is flushed, cheeks and neck and knuckles a reddish pink from both heat and desire, the rhythm of your heart putting a sheen of sweat at your brow. You don’t know when you got so warm, when he became a fire for your hands alone, but you don’t mind. If having him means burning, you don’t ever want to be cooled.

‘I want that, too.’ His forehead rests against yours, the last force of a touch you know is about to fade. ‘I want to give that to you.’

And with that, he is gone. The record stops, apartment quiet enough to make your teeth and ears ache, Side A complete. Normally, you’d whine and let yourself grieve, screaming to yourself that you want it, god how you want that, too, but tonight, for some reason, there is no place for such woe. 

Chanyeol is in London. 

Chanyeol is in London and now you have both heard and felt and learned him.

Chanyeol is in London. 

It won’t be long now.

[alwaysdowntohidewithyou]

“Most parents will be familiar with the experience of being ignored by their teenage offspring. Tormented by my daughter's incessant loud singing around the house, I've lost count of the number of times I pleaded: 'For God's sake, Florence, please put a sock in it.'

Of course, she didn't take a blind bit of notice. Just as well, really. My daughter is Florence Welch, of Florence And The Machine.

She is 22, lauded as the next big thing and her debut album Lungs has been sitting at No2 in the charts, behind the late Michael Jackson.

She has won the Critics' Choice Award at the Brits and was this week nominated for a Mercury Music Prize. She's even been on Radio 4's Woman's Hour, for goodness sake, not to mention Jonathan Woss.

This has all happened in the space of a couple of years, and it takes some getting used to.

Florence was born into an Anglo-American middle-class family. Her mother, Evelyn, is an American art historian and I worked in advertising. We lived in South London, we took holidays in Cornwall.

There was music in the house and there were books. There were performers and musicians on both sides of the family. I took Florence and her younger sister Grace to violin lessons (ouch) but it wasn't their passion.

Because of her mother's work, Florence did have an early exposure to Renaissance painting, which may have had an influence on the somewhat visceral world view expressed in her lyrics. As a child, she was particularly fascinated by Mantegna's Circumcision Of Christ, and by various paintings of the martyrdom of St Agatha, who had her breasts cut off.

Florence, always a difficult sleeper, was often as an infant encouraged to nod off by being wheeled around the sitting room in a pushchair to the accompaniment of loud music.

Her earliest subliminal influences include The Smiths (whom she found highly soporific) and Syd Barrett (less so). We also tried works by The Soft Machine, REM, The Go-Gos.

One evening a few years ago when I was passing Florence's bedroom I heard her shouting out: 'That's amazing, I'm having a bloody epiphany.'

I poked my head around the door and saw her sitting on the bed with a huge pair of headphones on. She had, it appeared, just listened for the first time to Jefferson Airplane's White Rabbit.

People have asked whether there was a moment when I realised that Florence had a gift. There was. It happened during a performance of Bugsy Malone at her school, Alleyn's, in Dulwich. Florence was ten or 11 and she was playing the lead female part of Blousey Brown.

At school productions, parents are usually interested only in the efforts of their own offspring, but when Florence sang, the whole audience was suddenly fully engaged. I remember thinking: 'Cripes, she's got a voice - this is serious.'

It wasn't just her perfect pitch - she had the essence of phrasing and timing which makes a good singer great.

On the basis of her phenomenal performance she was co-opted to sing a rather obscure and difficult Gilbert And Sullivan song at my father's memorial service at St Bride's in Fleet Street in 1997.

My father, Colin, was a journalist and satirist who had been deputy editor of the Daily Telegraph and a parliamentary sketchwriter for the Daily Mail, so the great and good of Fleet Street were there. Florence sang brilliantly in front of scores of weeping crumblies.

After this she became something of a fixture at funerals. When I recently gave her a hard time about the dark quality of her lyrics - the first song she wrote was called My Boy Builds Coffins - she said: 'You made me sing at funerals. What do you expect?'

Florence spent her later teenage years in a mysterious group called the Toxic Cockroaches. Her mother and I, by now divorced, probably did not pay enough attention.

Having won a place at Camberwell School Of Art, she sang with a band called Ashok.

On one occasion she called me from Greenwich, angling for a lift home. Her band, she said, weren't there but there were some others around who she might play with. I turned up and watched her sing two songs, which were phenomenal.

No, she said afterwards, she hadn't rehearsed. No, she had had no idea what she was going to sing when she got on stage. This stunned me then and still stuns me now.

Florence and her bandmates were 'spotted' by an old-school music manager and there was talk of a contract. 'Don't sign anything until we've had a chance to have a look at it,' we implored. 'Yeah, yeah,' said Florence - and went ahead and signed it.

That's where it all could have gone off the rails. She was 19 and miserable, in the wrong band, life signed away, career over before it had begun. Despite my misgivings, I became a bit of a rock dad, and phoned a friend who was a music lawyer.

It turned out the contract was only binding on Florence as part of the band, so all she had to do was resign. After that we paid a bit more attention.

Florence engaged her present manager, Mairead Nash, one half of the achingly fashionable Queens Of Noize club night promoters, by trapping her in a club washroom and singing an Etta James song at full volume. Their partnership has worked pretty well so far.

Once established in her own right, and aided and abetted by Mairead and the 'thunderous' Machine, Florence's progress has been swift and spectacular.

Last year I was the one driving Florence and a two-man Machine around Europe in her stepmum's camper van, following in the wake of the MGMT (another popular band) tour bus - all for the princely sum of €75 a gig.

This year it is a professional driver, Florence, a five-piece Machine and a road crew in their own tour bus.

I still go to some gigs, but my small part in this drama is, to a great extent, over. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and my early days as de facto tour manager are a great source of envy to my fifty-something chums who would give their eye teeth for the chance to go 'on the road' with a band, man.

There are, of course, alarming aspects to the whole thing. I have witnessed Florence clambering up the gantry at Glastonbury in 6in heels and I have seen her being passed around the audience at a gig with Pete Doherty.

Indeed, I shared a light ale or two with the rock and roll Rimbaud and found him to be quite charming, if a trifle vague. I must admit, though, a report that he had proposed to Florence earlier in the evening did cause a momentary attack of the vapours.

It is all exciting. But a word of warning to any potential pop stars and their parents: it is also expensive. Florence has received reasonable advances, but had to use them to pay for a lot of the band's running costs.

Florence will, we hope, make some money, but only if she sells a lot of CDs and gets film tie-ins - and after she has repaid her advances.

I may have to wait for quite a while for that bungalow in Weybridge that all rock stars seem to buy for their parents.

The fact that Florence has become public property can invade one's life and conversation. We do have evenings within her extended family where all mention of the 'daffy diva', as I call her sometimes, is forbidden.

Her sister Grace is at Sussex University, and so is able to get away from the all-embracing tsunami that Florence's life has become.

Florence's 15-year-old brother, JJ, thinks it's all pretty cool, and finds the connection with a pop star a good way to develop conversations with girls.

I do occasionally feel a twinge of unease about this whole extraordinary thing, and I remember the first time I felt it. It was more than a year ago and Florence was playing a gig in an inexplicably fashionable joint in Hoxton, Hackney.

Practically every A&R man in London was there. As I watched Florence putting her heart and soul into the performance, I glanced round at the audience.

There were the fans, wild-eyed and transported by the experience. And there were the A&R men, with quiet, thoughtful faces. They weren't here to enjoy themselves, they were taking care of business, and the business was my daughter. That's just the way it is - no worse than any other business, but it was a sobering thought.

It was also at this gig that one of the A&R men who knew that I was Florence's father turned to me with a quizzical expression as she launched into another of her perverse, Gothic tales of death, dismemberment, and bloody revenge.

'I know what you're thinking,' I shouted, 'but I can assure you she had a perfectly normal upbringing.'”

-Nick Welch, 2009 (x)

[foxgirlontherun]

Klaus x Dave playlist by me: on spotify

1. beautiful disaster - kelly clarkson 2. unchained melody - ane brun 3. colorblind - counting crows 4. breathe me - sia 5. surprise ice - kings of convenience 6. you - keaton henson 7. unsteady - x ambassadors 8. halo - ane brun 9. someone to stay - vancouver sleep clinic 10. wherever you will go - charlene soraia 11. i hold you - clann 12. follow you down to the red oak tree - james vincent mcmorrow 13. stay alive - roo panes 14. somebody to die for - hurts 15. these arms of mine - otis redding 16. wonderful life - smith & burrows 17. the funeral - band of horses 18. all i want - joni mitchell 19. who will love me - jerome holloway 20. dancing - elisa 21. iris - natalie taylor 22. when the stars go blue - ryan adams 23. in this heart - sinéad o’connor 24. hear you me - jimmy eat world 25. caught by the light - the boxer rebellion 26. i will love you - fisher 27. for everything a reason - carina round 28. to be alone with you - sufja stevens 29. tonight - lykke li 30. i want to know what love is - ane brun 31. make you feel my love - ane brun 32. for you - tracy chapman 33. can't help falling in love - ingrid michaelson 34. stand by me - ben e. king 35. when it's cold i'd like to die - moby 36. at last - etta james 37. everywhere - fleetwood mac 38. crystal - stevie nicks 39. landslide - fleetwood mac 40. heaven is a place on earth - belinda carlisle 41. a case of you - joni mitchell 42. for your precious love - otis redding 43. how to disappear completely - ane brun 44. haunted - kelly clarkson 45. thinking of you - katy perry

[paintme-intrust]

sirius’ corny date music (x)

i. it’s oh so quiet // björk ii. la vie en rose // louis armstrong iii. this will be // natalie cole iv. haven’t met you yet // nick jonas v. fly me to the moon // frank sinatra vi. l-o-v-e // natalie cole vii. i wanna be loved by you // marilyn monroe viii. unforgettable // natalie cole ix. can’t help falling in love // elvis presley x. summertime // louis armstrong, ella fitzgerald   xi.  mona lisa // nat king cole xii. body and soul // amy winehouse xiii. dream a little dream of me  // louis armstrong, ella fitzgerald  xiv. i put a spell on you // nina simone xv. when i fall in love // nat king cole xvi. a sunday king of love // etta james xvii. a kiss to build a dream on // louis armstrong xviii. moon river // andy williams

[lauramarlingnatural]

it won’t be long ‘til happiness comes, a playlist

listen 

               tracklist:

i. Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head - B.J. Thomas // ii. I'm a Believer - The Monkees // iii. Mean Old World - Sam Cooke // iv. Last Dance -  Donna Summer // v. Wouldn't It Be Nice -The Beach Boys // vi. The Air You Breathe - Belinda Carlisle // vii. You Make My Dreams - Hall & Oates // viii. Bella Donna - Stevie Nicks // ix. Wildflowers - Dolly Parton // x. Lovely Day - Bill Withers // xi. Tutti Frutti - Little Richard // xii. How Will I Know - Whitney Houston // xiii. Like A Prayer - Madonna // xiv. Freedom - Wham! // xv. September - Earth, Wind & Fire // xvi. I Say a Little Prayer - Aretha Franklin // xvii. You Can't Hurry Love - The Supremes // xviii. Every Single Little Piece - Emeli Sandé // xix. I Will Survive - Gloria Gaynor // xx.1999 - Prince // xxi. Hold On - Wilson Phillips // xxii. Stop! In The Name Of Love - The Supremes // xxiii. Something's Got A Hold On Me - Etta James // xxiv. Thinking of You - Sister Sledge // xxv. Love On Top - Beyoncé

[greeneyezblackheart]

@undercover-squirrel @x-a-black-winged-dove-x 😘😘😘

@axls-cigarette @rocknrollsoul76 @your-local-rockstar-simp @tarkus-princess2112 @rocketqueen48 @b0hemianbarbie @songbirds-sweet @electric--love @lord-of-the-weird @izaacblue @katiegameplays and whoever sees this.

thank you so much@highlyycaffeinated! i hope you have a day as great as you! c:

--

rules: put your "on repeat" playlist on shuffle and list the first 10 songs that play. tag a few people while you're at it

somebody to love - queen

i want your sex pts. 1 and 2 - george michael

long shadow - joe strummer

wrap her up - elton john, george michael

mammamia - maneskin

don't let the sun go down on me - elton john, george michael

heal the pain - george michael

death or glory - the clash

fat bottomed girls - queen

battlestations (<3) - wham!

--

tagging (no pressure); @thislookinyoureyes @whatmarisays @brian-ur-bruh @delicatelyfantasticninja @trinikins @ayyyokai @urlolaluna @queenies-of-the-universe @musiccat1971 @hazypoppy @wastingawayinquarantine @whitequeen-ofwillowgreen and anyone else who'd like to join in! (tag me if you'd like c: )

[odviin]

Some of my faves...

ANIME/MANGA:

Hikaru no Go (Sai, Akira, Hikaru) Pet Shop of Horrors (Count D, T-chan) Eyeshield 21 (Hiruma, Rui) Nurarihyon no Mago (Youkai Rikuo, Aotabo, Kurotabo, Kubinashi, Yuki Onna) Gokusen (Yankumi, Shin, Kyou) Yuri on Ice (Yurio, Otabek, Victor, Yuuri) Tiger & Bunny (Tiger, Blue Rose, Fire Emblem) Shounen Onmyouji (Guren, Mokkun, Masahiro) Detroit Metal City Beelzebub Hunter x Hunter (Hisoka, Illumi, Kuroro) Angel Sanctuary (Rosiel, Mad Hatter) Yami no Matsuei (Muraki, Tsuzuki, Watari) Shingeki no Kyojin Naruto & Naruto Shippuuden (Kyuubi, Naruto, Gaara, Itachi, Neji, Hinata, Kimimaro, Temari, Orochimaru, Jiraiya, Tsunade, Haku, Zabuza, Samehada, Deidara, Pein, Yondaime, Sandaime, Kurenai) Get Backers (Akabane, Ginji, Kazuki) Death Note (Light, Ryuk, Rem, Mikami, Misa) Kuroshitsuji (Sebastian) Saiyuki (Sanzo, Gojyo, Hazel, Gato, Kanzeon Bosatsu) Katekyo Hitman Reborn (Hibari, Mukuro, Dino, Tsuna, Gokudera) Silver Diamond (Kou, Narushige, Touji) Hoshi no Yakata (Sumiya, Sakurai, Hirofumi) Loveless (Soubi, Ritsuka) Gravitation (K, Hiro, Ryuichi) Fullmetal Alchemist (Ed, Al) Yakitate Japan Natsume Yuujinchou One-Punch man D.Gray-man (Kanda, Allen) Fruits Basket (Ayame, Kyou, Hatsuharu, Ritsu) Weiss Kreuz (Schwarz, Schuldig, Farfarello, Crawford, Ran/Aya) Harukanaru Toki no Naka de Ojisama to Neko Bleach Nana

Studio Ghibli (Calcifer, soot sprites (susuwatari), Howl, Haku).

TV SHOWS:

DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (Sara, Amaya, Snart, Mick, Gary, Ray) The Flash (Cisco Ramon, Caitlin/Killer Frost, Harry/HR, Joe West, Barry, Julian, Gypsy) Lucifer (Ella, Lucifer, Cain, Mazikeen, Trixie, Chloe, Dan, Amenadiel) Supergirl (Kara, Alex, Maggie, Lyra, Wynn) Supernatural (Castiel, Crowley, Charlie, Garth, Rowena, Gabriel, Dean, Jack, Death, Billie, Ghostbusters) Doctor Who (9, 10, Donna, Wilfred, Jack Harkness, Amy, Rory, Rose) Stargate: Atlantis (Rodney, Ronon, Todd, Carson, Jennifer, Zelenka) Xena (Xena, Ares, Gabrielle, Callisto) White Collar (Neal, Mozzie, June, Peter, Elizabeth, Diana, Clinton) Person of Interest (John, Harold, Carter, Shaw, Root) Brooklyn Nine-Nine (everybody, but especially Rosa.) Hannibal Lost Girl (Vex, Kenzi, Trick, Tamsin, Bo) Arrow (Sara, Nyssa, Thea, Malcolm, Felicity) Gotham (Cobblepot (Penguin), Nygma (Riddler), Fish Mooney) Constantine Farscape (Aeryn, Crichton, Scorpius, Braca) Galavant (King Richard and his dragon) Versailles (Philippe, Chevalier, King Louis XIV) Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Spike, Tara, Cordelia) The Musketeers (Porthos, Constance, Feron, Sylvie) Shadowhunters (Magnus, Izzy, Raphael) Agent Carter (Peggy, Jarvis) Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (May, Fitz, Simmons) Game of Thrones (Oberyn, Daenerys, John Snow, Arya, Margaery, Brianne, Ned Stark, Khal Drogo) Once Upon a Time (Hook, Regina, Merida, Mulan, Belle) Santa Clarita Diet Jessica Jones Stranger Things Veronica Mars Sense8 Dexter

I will probably love Good Omens once it comes out.

JDRAMA:

Gokusen (Yankumi, Shin) My Boss, My Hero Ikebukuro West Gate Park Mr. Brain Zettai Kareshi Ando Lloyd Bloody Monday Kurosagi Nobuta wo Produce

COMICS:

The Sandman (Morpheus/Dream, Death, Delirium, Emperor Norton) Belzebubs Looking for Group (Richard) Scandinavia and the World (Iceland, Finland) Kiroileva siili The Crow The Darkness Nemi Valerian Elfquest My Life as a Background Slytherin (+ some DC & Marvel stuff)

MOVIES:

DCEU: Wonder Woman, Justice League, BvS, Suicide Squad. (Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Flash, Etta Candy, Chief (Napi), Harley Quinn, El Diablo, Lois Lane) (I am really waiting for the Justice League Dark & Gotham City Sirens movies!) The Dark Knight trilogy (Joker) MCU: Black Panther, Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy, Doctor Strange, Thor, Iron Man. (Loki, Bucky (Winter Soldier), Yondu, Doctor Strange, The Cloak of Levitation, Nick Fury, Black Widow, Pepper, Mantis, Heimdall, Hela and pretty much everyone from Black Panther) FOX: Deadpool, Venom, X-Men: First Class + DOFP + Apocalypse, Logan. (Deadpool, Magneto, Venom, Yukio, Negasonic Teenage Warhead, Blink, Bishop, Warpath) Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, Rogue One, Revenge of the Sith, New Hope. (Rey, Poe, Finn, Chirrut, Baze, Leia, Kylo Ren, General Hux, Phasma, Anakin, Qui-Gon Jinn) (vulptices/crystal foxes) The Crow Velvet Goldmine Terminator 2 (+ others too) Mad Max: Fury Road LOTR/Hobbit (Thranduil, Legolas, Gimli, Thorin) Harry Potter (Luna, Snape, Lucius) Kingsman Maleficent Rocky Horror Picture Show The Shape of Water The Long Kiss Goodnight The Great Wall (Lin Mae, Tovar) Pirates of the Caribbean Interview with the Vampire + Queen of the Damned Labyrinth (Jareth) Airheads Wayne’s World Blades of Glory Priscilla: Queen of the Desert The Birdcage The Crying Game Battle Royale Vaiana/Moana Frozen

PODCASTS:

Welcome to Night Vale

BOOKS:

Good Omens (Crowley, Aziraphale) Discworld (Death, Death of Rats) Dragonlance (Raistlin, Tanis) Hobb: Farseer & Tawny Man trilogies (Fool, Fitz) Johannes Cabal the Necromancer All for the Game trilogy (Neil, Andrew) Ender’s Game + Speaker for the Dead Harry Potter (Luna, Sirius, Remus) Heinlein: Double Star LeGuin: Earthsea

I SHIP:

Stucky: Steve+Bucky (MCU/Marvel) Kylux: Kylo Ren+General Hux (SW:TFA/TLJ) Stormpilot: Poe+Finn (SW:TFA/TLJ) Destiel: Dean+Castiel (Supernatural) Chirrut+Baze (SW: Rogue One) Venom/Eddie (Venom) Harrisco: Harry+Cisco (The Flash) Shinkumi: Yankumi+Shin (Gokusen) Malec: Magnus+Alec (Shadowhunters) Cecilos: Cecil+Carlos (WTNV) Hartwin: Harry+Eggsy (Kingsman) Harley Quinn+Poison Ivy (DC) Legolas+Gimli (LOTR)

[nick-trimble-blog]

Nick Trimble - About the most enjoyable interpreters of song are Jazz singers. The abilities of the human voice is phenomenal in the truth that one could imitate another person or instrument, or sing several octaves on the piano. The human voice can also interpret emotion in a way only a person can. Jazz instruments can show emotion, but the natural gift from inside the human voice is conveyed in a variety of ways. To Illustrate, each singer has his or her own style they have. Some of them may not be the best singers that Simon Cowell would compliment. Still, the're many Jazz legends and people like them who have their own individual unique style. The je ne sias quoi x factor of a voice that is distinct, yet pleasing to the ears. The Jazz singers who have this quality have been heard in many clubs, and recordings a long time ago. These Jazz Legends have helped make Jazz music popular especially with the use of the voice. There are four various types of Jazz singers that made it internationally of Jazz music. One style is the well-known crooner noise from singers like Ivie Anderson, Harry Connick Jr., Mel Torme` Michael Buble`, Tony Bennett, Billy Eckstine, Mildred Bailey, Michael Kaczurak, Sathima Bea Benjamin, Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Johnny Hartman, Bing Crosby, and Nat King Cole. The signature element of the crooner reasonable is a voice with a smooth and sophisticated resonance manufactured for the microphone as clear as a radio announcers speaking voice. Another style of Vocal Jazz Singers is the soulful bluesy seem with Singers such as Diane Schuur, Nina Simone, Bessie Smith, Etta James, Della Reese, and more. The soulful sound of voice is the skill of ornamentation of the voice running up and down the scale with ease. Bluesy and soulful is also a depth in the range of the voice that appear as if it comes direction from the soul. The're Jazz music Virtuoso's who have the skills to do anything from vocalese to scat to ballad to fast and complex in perfection. The Jazz singers of this category are Ella Fitzgerald, Phoebe Snow, Eva Cassidy, Ernestine Anderson, Betty Carter, Taxicab Calloway, Sammy Davis Jr., Eddie Jefferson, Bobby McFerrin Jr., Jon Hendricks, Slim Gaillard, Rachelle Ferrell, Annie Ross, Etta Jones, Dame Cleo Laine, Sarah Vaughn, Carmen Mercedes McRae, Mabel Mercer, Nikoletta Szoke, and Nancy Wilson. The Virtuoso can croon a ballad and articulate it in a unique way. The virtuoso Jazz singer can also be strong and sassy and scat in great complexity without any problem. There is undoubtedly that the virtuoso Jazz singer is the entire embodiment of what Jazz is about. The last type of vocalist has an ethereal appeal that seems to come out of another place with uniqueness in noise, and acceptable to the world of Jazz. The unique style of Jazz singers is a sound that one doesn't typically hear. For example, the uniqueness can originate from the seem quality of the voice or by doing something that sets the Jazz singer on an unusual plane than its competitors. Singers of this category are Amos Leon Thomas, Billy Holiday, Lee Wiley, Blossom Dearie, Shirley Horne, Rita Reys, Eartha Kitt, Anita O'Day, Ray Reach, Ethel Waters, Monica Zetterlund, Jimmy Rushing, Louis Armstrong, Cassandra Wilson, Al Jarreau, and Dennis Rowland. Each one has a particular good of raspy, lush, high pitched, yodeling, vibrato, or gift of humor. There are also the typical Jazz singers who deserve to be in the spotlight also for having what it takes to make it successfully in Jazz.

[thick-thighs-and-sharp-eyes]

NPR’s “150 Greatest Albums Made By Women”

“This list, of the greatest albums made by women between 1964 and the present, is an intervention, a remedy, a correction of the historical record and hopefully the start of a new conversation. Compiled by nearly 50 women from across NPR and the public radio system and produced in partnership with Lincoln Center, it rethinks popular music to put women at the center.” 

Joni Mitchell - Blue (Reprise, 1971)

Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (Ruffhouse/Columbia, 1998)

Nina Simone - I Put A Spell on You (Philips, 1965)

Aretha Franklin - I Never Loved a Man The Way I Love You (Atlantic, 1967)

Missy Elliott - Supa Dupa Fly (The Goldmind/Elektra, 1997)

Beyoncé - Lemonade (Parkwood/Columbia, 2016)

Patti Smith - Horses (Arista, 1975)

Janis Joplin - Pearl (Columbia, 1971)

Amy Winehouse - Back To Black (Island, 2006) 

Carole King - Tapestry (Ode, 1971)

Dolly Parton - Coat Of Many Colors (RCA Records, 1971)

Erykah Badu - Baduizm (Universal, 1997) 

Madonna - Like a Prayer (Sire, 1989)

Whitney Houston - Whitney Houston (Arista, 1985)

Diana Ross and the Supremes - Where Did Our Love Go (Motown, 1964)

Fleetwood Mac - Rumours (Warner Bros., 1977)

Janet Jackson - Control (A&M, 1986)

Lucinda Williams - Car Wheels On A Gravel Road (Mercury, 1998)

Selena - Amor Prohibido (EMI Latin, 1994)

The Ronettes - Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes Featuring Veronica (Philles Records, 1964)

PJ Harvey - Rid Of Me (Island Records, 1993)

Sade - Diamond Life (Sony, 1984)

Aretha Franklin - Amazing Grace (Atlantic, 1972)

Loretta Lynn - Coal Miner's Daughter (Decca, 1970)

Ani Difranco - Little Plastic Castle (Righteous Babe Records, 1998)

TLC - CrazySexyCool (LaFace, 1994)

Tori Amos - Little Earthquakes (Atlantic, 1992)

Nina Simone - Nina Simone Sings the Blues (RCA Victor, 1967)

Alanis Morissette - Jagged Little Pill (Maverick, 1995)

Adele - 21 (Columbia/XL, 2011)

Liz Phair - Exile In Guyville (Capitol/EMI/Matador, 1993)

Björk - Post (Elektra, 1995)

Queen Latifah - All Hail The Queen (Tommy Boy, 1989)

Tina Turner - Private Dancer (Capitol, 1984)

Blondie - Parallel Lines (Chrysalis, 1978)

Grace Jones - Nightclubbing (Island Records, 1981)

Kate Bush - Hounds Of Love (EMI, 1985)

Odetta - It's a Mighty World (RCA Victor, 1964)

Gillian Welch - Time (The Revelator) (Acony Records, 2001)

The Staple Singers - Be Altitude: Respect Yourself (Stax, 1972)

Tracy Chapman - Tracy Chapman (Elektra, 1988)

Ella Fitzgerald - Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Johnny Mercer Song Book (Verve, 1964)

M.I.A. - Kala (XL/Interscope, 2007)

Heart - Dreamboat Annie (Mushroom, 1976)

Dusty Springfield - Dusty in Memphis (Atlantic, 1969)

Emmylou Harris - Wrecking Ball (Elektra, 1995)

Celia Cruz - Son con Guaguanco (Emusica/Fania, 1966)

Etta James - Rocks The House (Argo, 1964)

Rickie Lee Jones - Pirates (Warner Bros., 1981)

Hole - Live Through This (DGC, 1994)

Sarah Vaughan - Sassy Swings Again (Mercury, 1967)

Bonnie Raitt - Nick Of Time (Capitol/EMI, 1989)

Linda Ronstadt - Heart Like A Wheel (Capitol, 1974)

Nico - Chelsea Girl (Verve, 1967)

The Go-Gos - Beauty And The Beat (I.R.S., 1981)

X-Ray Spex - Germfree Adolescents (EMI, 1978)

Mary J. Blige - What's the 411? (Uptown/MCA, 1992)

Labelle - Nightbirds (Epic, 1974)

Indigo Girls - Indigo Girls (Epic, 1989)

The Pretenders - Pretenders (Sire, 1980)

Destiny's Child - The Writing's on the Wall (Columbia, 1999)

Dixie Chicks - Wide Open Spaces (BMG/Sony, 1998)

Madonna - Like a Virgin (Sire, 1984)

Spice Girls - Spice (Virgin, 1996)

Cassandra Wilson - Blue Light 'Til Dawn (Blue Note, 1993)

Miriam Makeba - Pata Pata (Reprise, 1967)

Sinead O'Connor - I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got (Chrysalis Records, 1990)

Rosanne Cash - King's Record Shop (Columbia, 1987)

Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual (Portrait/Sony 1983)

Stevie Nicks - Bella Donna (Modern, 1981)

Salt-N-Pepa - Blacks' Magic (London, 1990)

The Runaways - The Runaways (Mercury, 1976)

Astrud Gilberto - The Astrud Gilberto Album (Verve Records, 1965)

The Raincoats - The Raincoats (Rough Trade, 1979)

Donna Summer - Bad Girls (Casablanca, 1979)

Tammy Wynette - Stand By Your Man (Epic, 1969)

Aaliyah - Aaliyah (Blackground/Virgin America 2001)

The Bulgarian State Radio & Television Choir - Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares (Nonesuch, 1987)

Portishead - Dummy (Go! Beat, 1994)

Laurie Anderson - Big Science (Warner Bros., 1982)

Sleater-Kinney - Dig Me Out (Kill Rock Stars, 1997)

Laura Nyro - New York Tendaberry (Columbia, 1969)

Bobbie Gentry - Ode To Billie Joe (Capitol Records, 1967)

Roberta Flack - First Take (Atlantic, 1969)

Joan Baez - Diamonds & Rust (A&M, 1975)

Alice Coltrane - Journey in Satchidananda (GRP/Impulse!, 1971)

X - Los Angeles (Slash/Rhino, 1980)

k. d. lang - Ingénue (Sire, 1992)

Shania Twain - Come On Over (Mercury Records, 1997)

Barbra Streisand - Funny Girl, Broadway Cast Album (Capitol Records, 1964)

Alison Krauss And Union Station - New Favorite (Rounder, 2001)

Meshell Ndegeocello - Peace Beyond Passion (Maverick, 1996)

Britney Spears - ...Baby One More Time (Jive Records, 1999)

Sheryl Crow - Tuesday Night Music Club (A&M, 1993)

Shakira - ¿Dónde Están los Ladrones? (Sony, 1998)

Lil' Kim - Hard Core (Big Beat/Undeas Recordings, 1996)

Mariah Carey - Daydream (Columbia Records, 1995)

Bikini Kill - Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah (Kill Rock Stars, 1993)

Taylor Swift - Fearless (Big Machine Records, 2008)

Buffy Sainte-Marie - It's My Way! (Vanguard Records, 1964)

Eurythmics - Touch (RCA, 1983)

Alabama Shakes - Sound & Color (ATO, 2015)

Umm Kulthum - Enta Omri (You Are My Life)(Sono, 1964)

ESG - Come Away With ESG (99 Records, 1983)

Sheila E. - The Glamorous Life (Warner Bros., 1984)

No Doubt - Tragic Kingdom (Interscope, 1995)

The Shangri-Las - Leader of the Pack (Red Bird Records, 1965)

Gladys Knight and the Pips - Imagination (Buddah Records, 1973)

Against Me! - Transgender Dysphoria Blues (Total Treble, 2014)

Miranda Lambert - Platinum (RCA Nashville, 2014)

Diamanda Galás - The Litanies of Satan (Y, 1982)

Mercedes Sosa - Mercedes Sosa en Argentina (Universal Distribution/Philips, 1982)

Aretha Franklin - Young, Gifted and Black (Atlantic Records, 1972)

Reba McEntire - Rumor Has It (MCA, 1990)

La Lupe & Tito Puente - La Pareja (Fania/Tico Records, 1978)

Macy Gray - On How Life Is (Epic, 1999)

Joan Jett - I Love Rock 'n' Roll (Boardwalk, 1981)

Chaka Khan - I Feel for You (Warner Bros., 1984)

The Slits - Cut (Island Records, 1979)

Anita Baker - Rapture (Elektra, 1986)

Joni Mitchell - Hejira (Asylum, 1976)

Siouxsie and the Banshees - The Scream (Polydor, 1978)

Cris Williamson - The Changer and the Changed: A Record of the Times (Olivia Records, 1975)

Carly Simon - No Secrets (Elektra, 1972)

Fiona Apple - Tidal (Work Group/Clean Slate/Columbia, 1996)

The Carpenters - A Song for You (A&M Records, 1972)

Sonic Youth - Sister (SST, 1987)

Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster, Panaiotis - Deep Listening (New Albion, 1989)

Marianne Faithfull - Broken English (Island, 1979)

Teena Marie - Wild and Peaceful (Motown Records, 1979)

Shirley Horn - I Thought About You — Live At Vine St. (Verve Records, 1987)

Shelby Lynne - I Am Shelby Lynne (Island/Mercury, 2000)

Fanny - Fanny Hill (Reprise, 1972)

Solange - A Seat at the Table (Saint/Columbia 2016)

The B-52's - The B-52's (Warner Bros., 1979)

Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band - Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band (Apple Records, 1970)

Ofra Haza - 50 Gates Of Wisdom (Yemenite Songs) (Shanachie, 1987)

Cocteau Twins - Heaven or Las Vegas (4AD, 1990)

The Bangles - All Over the Place (Columbia, 1984)

Norah Jones - Come Away with Me (Blue Note, 2002)

Joanna Newsom - Ys (Drag City, 2006)

Iris DeMent - My Life (Warner Bros., 1993)

Robyn - Body Talk (Konichiwa Records, 2010)

The Breeders - Last Splash (4AD/Elektra, 1993)

Oumou Sangare - Moussolou (Women) (Kartell/World Circuit, 1989)

Patty Griffin - Flaming Red (A&M, 1998)

Meredith Monk - Dolmen Music (ECM, 1981)

Terri Lyne Carrington - The Mosaic Project (Concord Jazz, 2011)

Alicia Keys - Songs In A Minor (J Records, 2001)

The Roches - The Roches (Warner Bros., 1979) 

Starting here: http://www.npr.org/2017/07/20/538307314/turning-the-tables-150-greatest-albums-made-by-women-page-15