#fifths of seven

[trumpet-trumpet-toot-toot]

Guide to Spencer Krug’s (Many) Projects

Before I start this post, I should mention this was my final project for my Music Appreciation class and I've basically just reformatted the paper for Tumblr. Also I have never used Tumblr before so please bear with me... Thanks, let's get to it now!

Introduction

Spencer Krug is a Canadian musician mainly known as a singer, songwriter, and keyboardist, though he occasionally plays the piano, guitar (both acoustic and electric), synthesizer, accordion, bass, and kick drum.[1] His first instrument was the piano, which he started playing when he was 12.[2] By the age of 15, he already had a drum set, guitar, bass, amps, and an organ in his bedroom. Around that time, he mainly listened to Fugazi and Sebadoh.[3] Some of his other influences are David Bowie, Jeff Buckley, The Velvet Underground, Leonard Cohen, Erik Satie, Rachel Grimes, and Dan Bejar.[2] [4]

Spencer Krug first attended college in Vancouver where he “screwed around in arts and humanities,” before doing a few years of music school in Vancouver, then at Concordia University in Montreal.[3] There, he studied music composition and creative writing until he dropped out.[5] He has been part of six bands, as well as releasing solo work under the alias Moonface and his own name. Through these projects, he has contributed to nearly 30 releases,[1] which can make it difficult to decide where to begin listening to his extensive discography.

The intent of this post is to break down each of the projects he’s taken part in to (hopefully) make it easier for people to decide which project they’d be most interested in listening to. This post will include general information on each project as well as a description of how their releases generally sound, their similarities to other projects, and their differences from other projects.

Two Tonne Bowlers[6]

Years Active: 1994

Members: Jeffrey Allport, Kent Reimer, Norm Wickett, Scott Marshall, Simon Culver, Spencer Krug, Tom Reimer, Tony Bobbit

Releases: Mantifiluss (1994)

Genre: Reggae

Style: Ska

Two Tonne Bowlers is the first band Spencer Krug was ever in, but consequently the band there is the least information on, as he was part of it while in high school, when he was around 17. Spencer Krug was the keyboardist of the group; the other members played guitar, electric bass, trombone, saxophone, and the drums.[7]

As the band’s name indicates, their music has a two-tone ska style. Two-tone music is Jamaican ska and reggae music mixed with elements of punk rock music,[8] so Two Tonne Bowlers is one of the bands Spencer Krug contributed to that sounds furthest from his later indie rock projects, especially since Two Tonne Bowlers lacked certain punk rock elements, such as distorted guitars.

Mantifiluss is, in my opinion, the most playful and cheerful-sounding music Spencer Krug has put out. It feels like something to dance to without having chord progressions or lyrics that make you ponder complex concepts, unlike many of his other works. Another difference with other bands he’s been in is that he usually sings nearly all or a good part of the vocals, yet he doesn’t sing any of the vocals on Mantifiluss, apart from on the album’s 9th “hidden” track.[9]

Fifths of Seven[10]

Years Active: 1995-2005

Members: Beckie Foon, Rachel Levine, Spencer Krug

Releases: Spry from Bitter Anise Folds (2005)

Genre: Instrumental

Style: Modern Classical, Post-Rock

Fifths of Seven was formed in 1995 in Montreal,[11] but Spencer Krug didn’t join until around 2004-2005 when Rachel Levine and Becky Foon received a grant from the Canadian government and hired him as a third member.[12] Together they wrote their first and only album, Spry from Bitter Anise Folds, which was recorded in 2005 at Breakglass Studios.[11] The group is made up of Beckie Foon as the cellist, Rachel Levine as the mandolinist, and Spencer Krug as the pianist and accordionist.[13]

Although Spencer Krug has composed other instrumental songs, this is the only fully instrumental album he has worked on. Vocals and lyrics usually have an important role in Spencer Krug’s other releases, but the cinematic melodies in Spry from Bitter Anise Folds’ are able to tell the stories lyrics would. The droning cello, sparse to robust piano, and somber mandolin create a melancholic and fragile atmosphere.[14] No single instrument dominates the music, as each instrument takes turns leading and accompanying throughout each piece. The unusual combination of these instruments gives this chamber music an Eastern European folk music sound.[15] Although this group’s sound is vastly different from Spencer Krug’s Indie Rock bands, there are similarities in the way the songs are on the more experimental and avant-garde side of their genre.

Frog Eyes[16]

Years Active: 2001–2018, 2022–present

Members: Carey Mercer, Melanie Campbell, Shyla Seller, Dante Decaro, Grayson Walker, John Paton, Matt Skilling, McCloud Zicmuse, Megan Boddy, Michael Rak, Ryan Beattie, Spencer Krug, Terri Upton

Releases: The Bloody Hand (2002), Split w/ Jerk with a Bomb single (2002), Emboldened Navigator EP (2003), The Golden River (2003), Ego Scriptor (2004), The Folded Palm (2004), The Future Is Inter-Disciplinary or Not at All EP (2006), Tears of the Valedictorian (2007), Frog Eyes / Hello Blue Roses single (2008), Paul's Tomb: A Triumph (2010), Carey's Cold Spring (2013), Pickpocket's Locket (2015), Violet Psalms (2018), The Bees (2022)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Alternative Rock, Avantgarde, Art Rock, Experimental

Frog eyes was formed when Carey Mercer and Spencer Krug happened to meet and play guitar and organ in someone’s basement. They didn’t know each other well but both needed roommates, so they decided to move in together along with Carey’s wife, Melanie Campbell. They didn’t discuss forming a band; Spencer Krug playing Carey Mercer’s songs with him and Melanie Campbell happened naturally because they were living together.[12] Micheal Rak, a band member from Carey Mercer’s previous band, also joined the group and together they recorded The Bloody Hand and the Emboldened Navigator EP in 2001.[17] Carey Mercer played the guitar, Spencer Krug the keyboard/piano, Melanie Campbell the drums, and Michael Rak the bass.[12] Shortly after recording their first album, Spencer Krug left the band when he moved to Toronto for college, then later — in 2003 — Montreal, where he ended up forming Wolf Parade. He reunited with the band in 2006 and recorded The Future is Inter-Disciplinary or Not At All EP and the Tears of the Valedictorian album.[17]

On the album and EP recorded in 2001, the bass playing and the drumming were simple while the guitars were chaotic, and Spencer Krug was “able to lay [his] patterns somewhere in between all of that,” as he explained in a Last Donut of the Night interview. Carey Mercer was the songwriter, and Spencer Krug didn’t modify the structure he wrote but he did add things to it.[12] Carey Mercer’s songwriting heavily influenced Spencer Krug’s own songwriting, which feels most obvious when listening to Sunset Rubdown.[18] Around the time he was first playing with Frog Eyes, Spencer Krug wrote some of his own experimental music and messed around with computer programs like Logic Audio. Much of this music turned into early Sunset Rubdown songs that he put out himself once he was in Montreal.[12] One of the songs from Sunset Rubdown’s first album “Sol’s Song,” even became a song on Frog Eyes’ The Golden River, “A Song Once Mine Now No Longer Mine.”

Frog Eyes is also similar to Sunset Rubdown in their songs’ unconventional structures and lead singers’ powerful vocals. However “powerful vocals” is an understatement when it comes to Carey Mercer’s vocals which are as full of energy as they could be and filled with screams, yelps, and growls. But his striking vocals don’t make the rest of the band any less important to its sound; Melanie Campbell’s pounding drumming, Spencer Krug’s twinkling keyboard, Carey Mercer (and in 2006, McCloud Zicmuse)’s chaotic guitar(s), and Michael Rak's grounding bass are all essential to bringing each song together.[19] As for Frog Eyes’ lack of discernible structure, the songs’ messiness allows the ideas and feelings behind the music and its lyrics to truly shine.

Wolf Parade[20]

Years Active: 2003–2011, 2016–present

Members: Arlen Thompson, Dan Boeckner, Hadji Bakara, Spencer Krug, Timothy Kingsbury, Dante Decaro

Releases: Wolf Parade EP (2003), Wolf Parade EP (2004), Wolf Parade EP (2005), Apologies To The Queen Mary (2005), At Mount Zoomer (2008), Semi-Precious Stone single (2010), Expo 86 (2010), EP 4 (2016), Cry Cry Cry (2017), Thin Mind (2020)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Progressive Rock, Post-Punk Revival

Spencer Krug and Dan Boeckner met in Victoria, British Columbia when they were both working at the same pub to make ends meet.[21] When they were both living in Montreal in 2003, they formed Wolf Parade along with Arlen Thompson and Hadji Bakara. The band was started when Spencer Krug was called to play a show opening for Melon Galia and Arcade Fire but he had no band. So he called Dan Boeckner and they wrote songs with a drum machine playing through computer speakers to have something for the show. About a week before the show, Spencer Krug offered Arlen Thompson to play a show that Saturday. They rehearsed as a full band the day before and the day of the show.[22] For that first show, they were only a trio, but the band was later made up of Spencer Krug as the lyricist, vocalist, and keyboardist; Dan Boeckner as the lyricist, vocalist, and guitarist; Arlen Thompson as the drummer; Hadji Bakara as the keyboardist and thereminist; Timothy Kingsbury as the bassist; and Dante Decaro as the guitarist and bassist.[23] Wolf Parade went on an indefinite hiatus in 2011, but reunited in 2016 and released their fourth album, Cry Cry Cry, in 2017.[24]

When Dan Boeckner was asked to describe the band’s sound in a Montreal Mirror interview not long after the band started, he explained that “ostensibly, we're just making folk music without any of the musical connotations of folk music.” Their sound was influenced by their lack of budget (and therefore limited equipment); they used keyboards because they didn’t have the funds to buy other instruments — initially, Dan Boeckner didn’t even have a guitar.[25] Sub Pop noticed the band and signed a contract with them, giving them a much bigger budget for Apologies To The Queen Mary than the 20 dollars they recorded their EP with.[26]

Their first album, Apologies To The Queen Mary, was an immediate success, and although they had all been in bands before, they had never had this level of popularity until then.[21] The album’s writing and singing are split evenly between the two frontmen, Spencer Krug and Dan Boeckner. The two have distinct styles and consequently were different in the music they wanted to play, so they both had to make compromises to make cohesive albums.[27] Apologies To The Queen Mary is the most cohesive of all their albums, while later albums let each members’ own elements and styles stand out more.[28] Hadji Bakara and Spencer Krug both play keyboards, but in very different ways, according to Spencer Krug in an Exclaim! interview, “Hadji is one of the only elements of the band that's always variating,” while “Dan and [him] work in locked-in patterns.” Dante Decaro, as the second guitarist and fifth member, has more freedom to experiment within the songs musically.[26] And Arlen Thompson’s exuberant drums fill the songs with energy and set the mood when starting off songs, such as in “You Are a Runner and I Am My Father’s Son.” Although Wolf Parade is the least experimental indie rock band Spencer Krug has been in, they still find ways to make familiar rock elements come together in an interesting way in each of their songs.

Just like one of Sunset Rubdown’s songs from their first album had ended up on a Frog Eyes album, another song from their debut album, “I’ll Believe In Anything You’ll Believe In Anything,” ended up on Wolf Parade’s debut album as “I’ll Believe In Anything.”[29] Listening to the two versions side by side really makes the differences between Wolf Parade and Sunset Rubdown clear. Wolf Parade’s “I’ll Believe In Anything” is more harmonious and polished, but to be fair, Sunset Rubdown’s first album is their most experimental and least polished — not that it’s a negative thing.

Sunset Rubdown[30]

Years Active: 2005–2009, 2022–present

Members: Camilla Wynne Ingr, Jordan Robson Cramer, Michael Doerksen, Nicholas Merz, Spencer Krug, Mark Nicol

Releases: Snake's Got A Leg (2005), Sunset Rubdown EP (2006), Shut Up I Am Dreaming (2006), Random Spirit Lover (2007), Introducing Moonface single (2009), Dragonslayer (2009), Always Happy to Explode (2024)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Alternative Rock, Art Rock

Sunset Rubdown’s first demos and album started as a solo project for Spencer Krug to have more freedom making experimental recordings. Spencer Krug explained in a Last Donut of the Night interview that he would “do shit like put pieces of paper between the hammers and the strings so it sounded insane.” Then he’d pull a sample from that and “pile it up into a weird shape on the screen, press play, and listen to what it sounded like. [He]’d build a two-dimensional pyramid out of a three-second sample,” to create songs.[12] Along with its experimental nature, the production (especially on earlier tracks) is very lo-fi, because Spencer Krug didn’t have any funds just like on Wolf Parade’s early EPs. The solo project that was Sunset Rubdown turned into a band in 2006, and what was once an exploration of sound and textures became an exploration of lyrics and structure.[31] The band members’ roles have varied depending on the album, but Spencer Krug has played the piano, keyboard, synth, acoustic guitar, accordion, and kick drum; Camilla Wynne has played the keyboard, omnichord, q-chord, and percussion; Nicholas Merz has played the bass and drums; Jordan Robson Cramer has played the drums, electric guitar, keyboard, and percussion; Michael Doerksen has played the electric guitar, bass, synthesizers, and drums; and Mark Nicol has played the bass and drums. All the members apart from Jordan Robson Cramer and Mark Nicol have sung some of the vocals, but the lead singer is Spencer Krug and Camilla Wynne is usually the one who does the backing vocals.[32] After releasing and touring their 2009 album, Dragonslayer, Sunset Rubdown went on an indefinite hiatus. In 2023, Spencer Krug had a dream that the band were back together and having fun. When he woke up, disappointed that it was a dream, he decided to email the members, and they all replied that they were willing to try getting the band back together. So they started with hanging out and making music, then relearning their old songs, then doing a reunion tour in 2023, and finally — after 15 years — making and releasing a new album.[33]

Progressively through each record, Sunset Rubdown’s music has become more put together and polished. The first album, Snake's Got A Leg, was curated from lo-fi bedroom recordings Spencer Krug had made in the early 2000s.[34] For their second album, Shut Up I Am Dreaming, the band reworked some of the songs from their debut album as well as writing new ones, and each song sounded more complete. But as Spencer Krug put it in an Exclaim! interview, the album was more of a “hodgepodge of songs than a fully realised album.” This changed in their third album, Random Spirit Lover, which was completely cohesive as a whole. Before recording the album, the band had already decided on the track list and they recorded it in that order, refusing to record a track until the previous one was finished.[35] Spencer Krug’s imaginative and storytelling lyrics particularly shine in this band, especially on theatrical-sounding songs like the ones on Random Spirit Lover. Random Spirit Lover was very elaborate musically and had a heavily overdubbed instrumentation,[35] so they decided to go another direction for their fourth album, Dragonslayer. Spencer Krug had an objective to write songs better so that they could stand alone and be played on anything, and that is clear when listening to Dragonslayer. In 2009, Spencer Krug explained in a Drowned in Sound interview that he felt the band was “at the pinnacle of complexity, and to make it creatively interesting, the next logical thing to do would be to take things away.”[31] After their hiatus, Sunset Rubdown released their fifth and latest album, Always Happy to Explode, which does sound less complex and musically busy than the previous records. The tracks on Always Happy to Explode were originally songs Spencer Krug had posted on his Patreon as solo work until Sunset Rubdown had a reunion tour and rewrote the songs together. But using some of Spencer Krug’s solo songs didn’t make the process of writing the album any different; all Sunset Rubdown albums have been songs that Spencer Krug wrote on piano or guitar and then brought to the rest of the members to arrange and add on to them as a band.[33]

Sunset Rubdown’s two most recent albums have more of a progressive rock style — closer to Wolf Parade — than their earlier albums which sound more experimental and artsy. Still, the two bands are quite different; Spencer Krug compared writing with both in an Exclaim! interview, “The band in Sunset Rubdown has the ability to be quieter than Wolf Parade and be more patient… I know that Sunset Rubdown can be more dynamic. We can play more sorts of twisty song structures and let it prog out a bit more without losing patience. And Wolf Parade just blows things out. Even when I write a quiet song on the guitar and take it to them, a month later I'm banging it out on the piano as hard as I can. And that's what Wolf Parade does well, so you might as well just go with it, right?”[35]

Swan Lake[36]

Years Active: 2006–2009

Members: Carey Mercer, Daniel Bejar, Spencer Krug

Releases: Beast Moans (2006), Enemy Mine (2009)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Experimental

Spencer Krug formed Swan Lake with two old friends, Carey Mercer of Frog Eyes and Dan Bejar of Destroyer and the New Pornographers. They had already been collaborating for years when the band formed, with Spencer Krug being an on-and-off member of Frog Eyes, and Dan Bejar picking Frog Eyes as his backing band for Destroyer album Your Blues, touring with them, and recording an EP with them. Additionally, Spencer Krug was roommates with both. First with Dan Bejar in the late 90s, then he moved to Victoria, met Carey Mercer, and became roommates with him in the early 2000s, around the time they started Frog Eyes. It was during the Destroyer/Frog Eyes Europe tour that they all played together and that the idea to make an album together first came up.[37] Throughout their two albums, Carey Mercer played the electric guitar, keyboard, and drums, Dan Bejar played the electric guitar, Spencer Krug played the keyboard, drums, and bass, and they all sang vocals.[38]

Each of the members wrote their own songs — having the chord progression, main vocal melody, lyrics, etc., complete — before recording them together.[39] Though compared to Sunset Rubdown, Spencer Krug tried to keep his ideas very loose so that the other two could fill in the gaps. Because the lyrics came from three different people, they had to unify the albums through the instrumentation.[38] At first, none of them were sure how to approach the project, until they decided to just go into the recording room and sing with an acoustic guitar. Once they had the tracks, Spencer Krug and Carey Mercer did the instrumentation, arrangements, and mixing. Initially, they considered Melanie Campbell as the drummer, but after watching the early sessions, she decided not to join the group. So to create the drum line, they recorded each part of the drums individually and put it all together during the mixing. “It makes for a pretty jerky drum track…it’s quite unsettling,” Carey Mercer commented in a PopMatters interview.[39]

Although Carey Mercer and Spencer Krug are often compared, especially because of their voice, they both feel like their aesthetics are quite different. Carey Mercer explained in an interview from Exclaim! that he has ��this idea of weaving 20 different melodies, and [Spencer] wants everything to turn into one very cohesive whole,” and he especially likes “the parts on the record where you can feel all of [their] wills murking about.” In the same interview, Dan Bejar describes Carey Mercer as having “a kind of total disregard for melody, and a total insistence on it at the same time.”[40] Dan Bejar believes his strengths are in his lyrics and delivery of them but that he lacks any kind of musical sophistication, while Spencer Krug thinks his strengths are in his sophistication with the music and instruments but that he can’t write lyrics as poetically as Dan Bejar, and Carey Mercer feels that he equally works on both.[39]

Swan Lake’s first album, Beast Moans, was weavings of each of the members’ styles, often creating layer upon layer of various melodies and stylistics, sometimes creating a dissonant sound. On the other hand, their second album, Enemy Mine, is more stripped down which makes the melodies clearer, and it has a more deliberate approach to their collaboration.[41] This more stripped-down sound is most noticeable when comparing the song “Paper Lace” on the Enemy Mine album and the version on Sunset Rubdown’s Dragonslayer, where the instruments are a lot more prominent and feel more dense.

Moonface[42]

Years Active: 2010-2018, 2022

Alias: Spencer Krug

Releases: Dreamland EP: Marimba and Shit-Drums (2010), Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I'd Hoped (2011), The Way You Wish You Could Live In The Storm single (2011), Moonface With Siinai – Heartbreaking Bravery (2012), Julia With Blue Jeans On (2013), City Wrecker EP (2014), Moonface & Siinai – My Best Human Face (2016), This One's for the Dancer & This One's for the Dancer's Bouquet (2018), The Minotaur Instrumentals (2022)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Experimental, Avantgarde, Electronic

As Moonface is an alias Spencer Krug recorded solo work (apart from the collaborative albums with Siinai) under, I’ve combined the paragraphs on it and his other solo work below to avoid having two very repetitive sections.

Solo Work[43]

Years Active: 2019-present

Releases: Fading Graffiti (2021), Red Dress / Nightswimming EP (2021), Twenty Twenty Twenty Twenty One (2022), I Just Drew This Knife (2023), 20202021 Solo Piano (2024), Patreon songs (2019-present)

Genre: Rock

Style: Indie Rock, Art Rock, Post-Rock

While he has contributed to many bands, Spencer Krug has also created music by himself throughout the years. The earliest solo work he released was Sunset Rubdown, but the project later turned into a full band.[12] From 2010 to 1018, he released home-recorded instrumental and conceptual experimentations under the alias Moonface. After moving from Montreal to Helsinki, he recorded two albums with Finnish band Siinai, Heartbreaking Bravery and My Best Human Face.[44] But after releasing seven records as Moonface, Spencer Krug decided to release his solo work under his own name for a number of reasons, which can be summed up as that he felt the name created self-made misrepresentation.[45] Since 2019, he has released three solo albums as well as monthly new songs on his Patreon.[43] His solo work has mostly been played on the piano, keyboard, synthesizer, or electric guitar, and he also sometimes adds digital drums, strings, or other effects.[46]

Under the moniker Moonface and his own name, Spencer Krug feels more free to release works that wouldn’t fit the expectations people have for his other projects. He explained this in a San Francisco Examiner interview, “There are certain parameters that are expected out of certain bands. And it’s not just record labels or audiences or critics who place expectations. I’ve been guilty of playing to expectations. I don’t have to worry about that with Moonface.”[47] Even though he usually keeps his solo work more simple, this leads his releases to have much more variety in styles and sound. It also sometimes creates unexpected shifts between albums with, for example, Julia With Blue Jeans On being a solo piano and voice album, then with his next release, My Best Human Face, being an album recorded with another band (Siinai) and that has a more post-rock style, and then a more electronic and experimental album, This One's for the Dancer & This One's for the Dancer's Bouquet (which is actually a mix of two separate projects),[45] as the release after that. Another difference between his solo work and his other projects is that his solo songs usually have more literal and straight-forward lyrics, unlike projects like Sunset Rubdowns where songs are filled with figurative language.[27] On the other hand, his solo work is similar to Sunset Rubdown in the way that he has often reworked songs for both projects. He explained his reasoning behind reworking songs in a Beats per Minutes interview, “I think songs can change their impact, can change so much based on their instrumentation and the way they’re arranged for an instrument. And I find that really interesting. And then sometimes I find the two results will both be so strong that it’s worth sharing them both.”[33]

Conclusion

I hope this guide has been informative! Although I’d highly recommend listening to all of his projects, I hope this post will inspire you to listen to at least one of them. And if you’re already a fan of Spencer Krug, I hope you’ve learned a couple new things about his projects.

If this paper (especially the last two sections) looks rushed it's because I did the entire thing the last 3 days before it was due. Also if you spot any mistakes, please correct me.

Sources

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4. Wheeler, Brad. “Why Spencer Krug Went Slightly Mad Making His Latest Album.” The Globe and Mail, 15 Nov. 2013, www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/music/why-spencer-krug-went-slightly-mad-making-his-latest-album/article15464077/.

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33. McMullen, Chase. “‘The Reason I’m Not Sad Is There’s Sadness in My Songs’: Spencer Krug Talks Sunset Rubdown Reunion and New Album.” Beats Per Minute, 30 Sept. 2024, beatsperminute.com/interview-spencer-krug-talks-sunset-rubdown-reunion-and-new-album/.

34. “Sunset Rubdown - Snake’s Got a Leg.” Pronounced Kroog, 2024, pronouncedkroog.com/collections/all/products/sunset-rubdown-snakes-got-a-leg.

35. Thiessen, Brock. “The Weirdness of Sunset Rubdown.” Exclaim!, 16 Sept. 2007, exclaim.ca/music/article/weirdness_of_sunset_rubdown.

36. “Swan Lake (2) | Discogs.” Discogs, www.discogs.com/artist/605693-Swan-Lake-2.

37. “Swan Lake Preps Debut Full-Length on Jagjaguwar.” Force Field PR, 6 Aug. 2006, www.forcefieldpr.com/2006/08/06/swan-lake-preps-debut-full-length-on-jagjaguwar/.

38. mmmbarclay. “Swan Lake: Spencer Krug.” radio free canuckistan, 17 Nov. 2006, radiofreecanuckistan.blogspot.com/2006/11/swan-lake-spencer-krug.html.

39. Kelly, Jennifer. “All for One and One for All: An Interview With Swan Lake.” PopMatters, 17 Jan. 2007, www.popmatters.com/all-for-one-and-one-for-all-an-interview-with-swan-lake-2495785739.html.

40. Barclay, Michael. “Three Men On Swan Lake.” Exclaim!, 15 Feb. 2007, exclaim.ca/music/article/three_men_on_swan_lake.

41. “Swan Lake.” Jagjaguwar, jagjaguwar.com/artist/swanlake/.

42. “Moonface (2) | Discogs.” Discogs, www.discogs.com/artist/1747096-Moonface-2.

43. “Spencer Krug | Discogs.” Discogs, www.discogs.com/artist/605695-Spencer-Krug

44. “Jagjaguwar::JAG222.” Jagjaguwar, 2013, jagjaguwar.com/release/jag222/.

45. “Jagjaguwar::Moonface.” Jagjaguwar, 2018, jagjaguwar.com/artist/moonface/.

46. Krug, Spencer. “Spencer Krug | About.” Patreon, www.patreon.com/spencerkrug/about.

47. Examiner Staff. “Spencer Krug’s Moonface Steeped in Empathy, Piano.” San Francisco Examiner, 18 Nov. 2013, www.sfexaminer.com/culture/spencer-krug-s-moonface-steeped-in-empathy-piano/article_7b87ad5f-9577-5f77-9d41-a3b00cf07747.html.

[swan2swan]

Whoever conceived and animated this moment, I hope they're doing well and thriving. This is S-rank romance stuff here.

[doorstovenus]

it’s special interest time baby

beware of the extremely loud scream around 1:25 courtesy of miss melanie bush

[zytes]

9.16.24 / 9.17.24 - september supermoon

[tinkerbitch69]

But seriously why did they make these things? Like who thought “aw yeah, I I wish I could drink out of David Tennant’s hollow cranium!”

What am I saying, this is tumblr. At least one of you has that exact fetish smh 🤦‍♀️

Edit: I have been informed that these mugs use lead paint and thus could potentially cause lead poisoning and felt this was important info for anyone who see's this post. The glaze used and the production process does make them safe to use and other similar products are available on the market but damage to the glaze does make this a possibility. just wanted to make sure everyone is informed of this <3

[setevulpo]

yknow what i find interesting? the cat king's cat body language. like the way it changes until he shapeshifts back to human in that first meeting? pure gold actually, kudos for the kitty playing the part

the first shot we get of him has our darling king in a pretty calm posture. he's lying down on his side, his ears are forward, he's looking straight at the group, but his pupils are still pretty big. his tail is extended but relaxed. all of that points to him being, at most, interested in the wonder trio, but still showing he's dominating the situation (that's the looking right at them part mostly)

that changes when they actually get closer. we see him lower his head a bit, and the tip of his tail starts flicking. those are both things cat do when focused, and it's a stance closer to the one they use when hunting, but the fact that only the tip of tail is moving also means a little bit of playfulness is involved.

and then! it actually changes again!! when crystal says that "it's just a bunch of cats" and it pans out to the dude's corpse on the floor, the king starts pretty much wagging his whole tail! he is not happy that someone (who may or may not be the one who trapped his cat) decided to underestimate his subjects. a wagging tail in cats differs from the one in dogs cause it's often used to convey frustration or annoyance instead of excitement.

and it isn't a slow wag either (that would mean some form of relaxation still)! that tail is full-on irritation that someone insulted his people!

i am losing my mind over this so it had to be set out there for everyone else to be exposed but! it's so cool!

[cosmic-chelonian]

Never understood people who say Five is 'too soft' because... have we been watching the same show? Were they asleep during the first season, which he spends being dismissive and cold with Adric, an issue that was never resolved when Adric was brutally killed? Do they, like many of the show's adversaries, mistake his outward appearance of 'harmless, affable English fellow' for weakness, even though he could switch from that to being your worst enemy on a dime? His continued dry humour, now bitter and sarcastic, in the face of danger or evil is one of the character's most compelling aspects. He hardly changes his outward demeanour, and his continued affected politeness makes him seem all the more dangerous as you see the fury and outrage boiling underneath, and you see a plan form behind his steely eyes.

And if he is sentimental sometimes, why do they see it as being 'too soft', instead of what it truly is: a need to atone, after the universe punished him for his harshness towards Adric in the worst possible way? Adric's death haunts Five for the rest of his life, and you can actually see it in Davison's portrayal, even if no mention of Adric occurs in the script. You can see Adric's ghost in the wild desperation in Five's eyes during his final serial, while he rushes to give his life to save his companion. Because he cannot let this happen again because of him. And the last word out of his mouth as he dies is 'Adric', as we come to the heart-wrenching realisation that his mind is not filled with his own imminent doom but with thoughts of that poor boy, of how he killed him, of how he never got to show how much he cared for him. Of how much it hurt that he could almost be forgiven by trading his life for Peri's, but still he could never go back and save Adric.

And that's why my blood boils when people say he's 'too soft'. He's one of the few classic doctors with a character arc, for god's sake, and it's all about him being too harsh.

[minimallycreative]

a list of media i like for when people ask what i'm into

Books

The Hunger Games

Red, White, and Royal Blue

The Song of Achilles

Pride and Prejudice

What If It's Us and Here's To Us

The Truly Devious Series

The Secret History

If We Were Villains

The Handmaids Tale

The Magnolia Palace and The Lions On Fifth Street

A Good Girls Guide To Murder

If This Gets Out

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo*

Circe

One Last Stop

King Lear

TV Shows

Brooklyn 99

ATLA

TLOK

Young Royals (I haven't finished the third season because I know i'll cry and I haven't had the strength)

Good Omens*

The Dragon Prince

She-Ra, the reboot

Call The Midwife

Dead Boy Detectives

Sweet Magnolias

School Spirits

Music

Paris Paloma

Hozier

Florence + The Machine

Ramblewood

Stevie Howie

Twenty One Pilots

Fall Out Boys

Ashnikko

Halsey

Miranda Lambert

Erin Kinsey

Sleep Token

Conan Gray

Greenday

Note on the asterisks: i like the media not the creator of said media. I do not support zionists, i do not support sexual abusers.

[thedisdainfullysilentvisitor]

What made you start watching Doctor Who?

[cursedthing]

Painted a Nine for 17776 release anniversary :D

[elucubrare]

i'm modifying a sock pattern using a pattern i've used before because it does what the first one should, so i'm naming the google document like a racehorse - the way War Emblem's sire is Our Emblem and his dam is Sweetest Lady, who's descended from Lord At War. anyway the patterns are Diogenes Club and Angular Velocity so i think i'm going with Angle of Entry (to the club)

[starleska]

having a hunt for 2025 calendars and - oh!!!! who is that i spy...?

TOYMAKER???????? 🙈💖💖💖💖💖

[evviejo]

requested by @eriadu-in-the-wildwood >> hologram doctors + the power of the doctor

[starryarklows]

Finished artwork of Lemy Abelard! 💛

[genderqueerpond]

WE LOVE OUR FIVE BATTERED AND BROKEN AND BLEEDING

[yellow-faerie]

Could you talk about one of those Doctor Who aus?

Hello! Thank you anon for the ask :) I have a few AUs that I'm currently rotating in my head but my favourite at the moment is the one I just call The Modern AU - it's official name is The Doctor Project but that's not what I call it. This took me a hot minute to write up because it is a lot.

(Also if you wanted to hear about any of my other AUs, I put some brief descriptions in the tags :D)

The basic premise is that the Doctors are all human and a team that worked together for their variety of expertise during the early 2000s to repel an alien invasion and the effect it has on each of them and their general lives. Also the Tardis is there as the only sensible one of the lot.

Some doctors do have more story fleshed out than others, mostly due to the fact that I'm still quite new to a lot of the eu stuff like Big Finish and the books and certain Doctors I would feel better about having engaged with some more of it before getting some proper stories fledged out (mostly because I hope it will give me some more inspiration lol)

I'll put some more general outline below the cut for anyone interested :)

[Warnings: mentions of abuse, discussions of war and the aftermath, complicated relationships to disability, implied torture ]

First Doctor

So the First Doctor is the oldest of the bunch, a retired surgeon and medical doctor (he used to work at Royal Hope Hospital) who was brought into the Doctor project for his research into medicine.

He spent most of the War in London due to his old age making it difficult to run around cities infested with alien invaders but he does get sent out periodically (mostly when one of the others gets too injured to be moved from their current location which happens a few times).

He had a daughter, Gillian, when he was quite young but he and his wife split up, and his daughter spent most of her time with her mother instead. However, he was the one to gain custody of his daughter's daughter (Susan) when Gillian died as his ex-wife had also died.

When the Doctor was conscripted, Susan was about 15 and stayed with their neighbour Steven over the course of the war, and Vicki and Dodo, two girls he fostered as well while their parents were off fighting.

Due to the secure nature of the work that the Doctor Project was doing, she and her grandfather only exchanged a few letters over the course of each year, and they were always heavily edited, and she found herself finding a lot of the emotional support she was lacking from her two teachers at Cole Hill, Barbara and Ian.

When she left Cole Hill Sixth Form, a year before the war ended, she moved back into her grandfather's house but kept in contact with Barbara and Ian who helped her with finding a job and advice on living alone, etc. This would break GDPR and a host of other protection laws these days but it's the middle of an alien invasion, let's pretend that doesn't exist. They didn't know the Doctor at all until after the war when he returns and it's a bit weird for everyone.

Especially since Ian is completely furious at him for leaving his granddaughter alone, mostly because people meet Susan and get the immediate urge to protect her; they do mostly get over that particular hurdle though as more comes out about how the war ended, although the Doctor doesn't help matters much by being his usual grouchy self.

His usual grouchy self made worse by the fact that everything has changed a lot since he had left home. Susan is in training to be a nurse and has these faux-parental figures she trusts so implicitly, and is decidedly more wary around him; he has also been fundamentally changed by living four years in various bunkers while working against an invisible clock to defeat a foe more technologically advanced that they are.

Eventually things do settle down: Ian and the Doctor apologise to each other, Susan and the Doctor have enough heart-to-hearts that it clears the air between them, that sort of thing.

There's not a whole lot of plot to any of the First Doctor's stuff but the vibes and the setting are pretty much in place.

Second Doctor

The second doctor is probably about forty when he's conscripted and he was a physics lecturer at St. Andrews university, specialising in sound and acoustics and waves, that sort of thing. He invented several new versions of sound systems which is what got him noticed for the Project.

St. Andrews is where he meets Jamie, actually, who was working as a guard; they bonded over a mutual love of music, Jamie in particular on the bagpipes, and then over other mutual interests.

I'm imagining they got married before the war (as this is an alternate history anyway, I'm making gay marriage legal earlier because no-one can stop me) when Jamie went on to fight in the army and the Doctor got conscripted into the project. Both of them being in different deployments so regularly meant letter writing was even more difficult.

After the war, the Doctor gives up the whole lecturing thing, as the project had left him with a bad taste in his mouth over the work he had been doing. Instead, he takes his knowledge of music and goes into conducting an orchestra, as well as giving music lessons on the side.

In like...any instrument; he's not even very good at playing a lot of them but he has the technical know-how to make someone else very good at playing them, if they can get past his eccentricities.

Zoe is the first violin in the orchestra who he gives personal tutoring too in a vague attempt to get her to put some feeling into her music. She's technically very brilliant and knows her way around most string instruments with almost military precision, but she was taught in a very wooden way and the Doctor is attempting to bring that out of her.

Victoria, on the other hand, takes piano lessons from him except she's around like four times a week and barely ever actually plays the piano and they always give her supper because her home life is...not the greatest. Her father's very absent and her mother's dead. It's all a bit iffy.

Eventually, Jamie probably calls Social Services who are overstretched in the aftermath of the war as it is, but she manages to find herself to a very nice foster family (the Harris') who make sure she keeps having her piano lessons. Although they continue not to really be piano lessons.

[I feel that I should put a note on Ben and Polly here; they are sort of known to both One and Two as Polly is Barbara's niece (and quite close to her aunt) and Ben is Two's half brother (but not that close all things considered) - they are the sort of people who come around for birthdays and Christmas and the one off weekend, and give you very thoughtful advice and presents, but that's sort of the limit of your relationship with them.]

Third Doctor

The Third Doctor studied chemistry at university, trying out multiple different branches, and had managed to get noticed for a variety of things such as creating a few new medications, discovering the compounds of some rarer chemicals, that sort of thing (I will admit, I don't know what makes a chemist famous).

Sarah Jane is his younger sister by about twenty years: when she was younger, she had a bit of a hero worship of him going on but nowadays she's much more sensible.

He worked at Cambridge with Liz before the war, and a lot of the breakthroughs they made together; they (and by they I mean the Doctor has while Liz is facepalming in the background) have a bitter rivalry with the Oxford researcher Emil Masters (the Delgado Master).

They are married but they keep that out of their professional rivalries.

After the war, however, the Doctor stays with UNIT. He's the only one of the doctors to do this and it's mostly because he doesn't trust that unit won't make terrible decisions with the research the Doctor Project produced, so he stays as a Scientific Advisor and pokes his nose into everyone's business to keep his conscience clean.

Jo is his assistant as per canon, only now she is being invited around for supper four times a week at his house and is probably inheriting everything that both the Master and the Doctor own when they eventually die.

They turn up to her wedding to Cliff when her parents don't.

Once again, this is incredibly vibes based rather than very much plot; there's probably going to be something to do with Jo falling out with her family, but that's about as far as I got with it. It's mostly fluff at this point lol.

[Also a note about the incarnations of the Master: while the doctors aren't actually related, the incarnations of the Master are because I find that entertaining, and also there are less of them]

Fourth Doctor

The Fourth Doctor is an environmental activist before the war! He got a PhD in ecology and then proceeded to throw away a promising career in academia (his parents' words) to gallivant around the planet doomsday prophesying.

What he's actually doing is blackmailing people into implementing climate saving machines, etc. so that he isn't Doomsday prophesying; he actually meets Sarah doing this because they both get thrown in prison for getting nosy around a nuclear power plant and thus is the start of a beautiful friendship/relationship, it's really unclear to everyone else.

He has two sisters; Winifred (although everyone calls her Fred) who is Romana I, and Romana who is Romana II. Romana turns 18 just before the war and Fred turns 25 around the same time, while the Doctor is 30ish.

Romana immediately joins MI6 (she had always wanted to be in the secret service) and the Doctor gets roped into the Doctor project, which means that when Fred dies during the war, neither of them get informed for months due to the lack of proper communication channels.

This is something they both feel very guilty about, especially considering the fact that they have two nephews who got immediately lost in the overworked system without any other relative around who could look after them.

Anyway, also during the war, the Doctor gets captured by the aliens, and held for a good few months; he barely ever acknowledges that this ever happened to anyone, even when he is literally hospitalised after rescue. He just...pretends that everything is fine and dandy actually.

His doctor is actually Harry who then gets roped into the whole Very Secret Doctor Project thing for like a month until the Doctor was determined to no longer need constant observation etc and then he's just sent back to his ship.

However, Harry has better communication with home than the Doctor, and also shore leave, so he's sent to basically tell Sarah Jane that the Doctor is alive and alright - they immediately hit it off and so after the war, Harry and she hang out a lot until he's also living in the house with her, the Doctor and their gaggle of foster children (their are a lot of orphans after the war and so the three of them foster).

The actual content of their relationship is debateable - they could be a throuple, it could be that two of them are a couple and the other is third wheeling like a boss, it could be that none of them are romantically involved at all - but they do care for each other a lot.

Also the children are Luke and Sky from SJA and Leela, who's probably about 16. They have a dog, too, called K9 because the Doctor has called every dog he has ever owned since he wasa child K9, and just added a MK on the end; currently they're on Mk IV.

After the war, they just sort of settle back into what they were doing before; Sarah Jane writes for her newspapers and magazines, Harry takes up a civilian doctor's position again at New Hope and the Doctor returns to blackmailing people into Doing Better, only none of them are all that alright after the war and hiding it affects how well they are with other people.

There are some arguments had, mostly with the Doctor and Sarah Jane as Harry is much more mild mannered - with each other, with various siblings, with annoying work colleagues - until they at least admit that something is wrong, and then they go from there.

Fifth Doctor

The Fifth Doctor is the computer guy. He studied computer science at university and as well as developing quite a lot of high level software, he also developed cheaper hardware storage stuff.

With a lack of people I wanted to make him related to, I made him a Cranleigh - I think this was so he could go to boarding school and hate literally everything about it apart from cricket. His notes say that he cuts most communication with his family after going to university so they're not that important to the story.

During the war, he gets caught under a collapsing building at one point which causes nerve damage to his spine which affects the communication between his legs and his brain, periodically causing the connection to short out and his legs to collapse; the collapsed building also means that he can get quite a lot of pain in his legs, and should really be using crutches (only he forgets to bring them with him a lot).

Before the war, he works for some sort of big tech company who fund a lot of his research but after the war he doesn't particularly want to do research any more - nor work for a big tech company - and goes on to lead the IT department at Royal Hope. Which consists of Turlough (who is there because he needs a job after school and he heard that IT jobs were really easy actually) and possibly a few other characters (I've heard of some that exist in audio format, so when I get there, I may edit this).

He also fosters two kids in the aftermath of the war: Adric, who's mother was Fred and who's older brother died in the time that they were lost in the foster system, and Nyssa, who's father Tremas Masters (the Ainley Master) got imprisoned for murdering both of his wives and very sweetly asked his old university roommate if he might very kindly look after her for him.

Tegan is Nyssa's girlfriend and is subsequently always around at their house, to the point that the Doctor just gave her a key and makes supper expecting that she'll be there.

As for Peri, she and the Doctor meet at the local garden centre, and now she comes around to help look after his garden because her apartment is too small for a proper one (she and Six keep saying that they're saving up for an actual house but that might be a commitment too far).

There are the inklings of an actual plot idea I had here? In my head, somehow the Master escapes prison and intends on escaping the country with his daughter, only the Doctor is like no??? You can't do that to Nyssa??? And someone gets hospitalised.

[A note about Royal Hope, and also Cole Hill, and other reoccurring places: occasionally, the characters coincidentally working at these places is an actual coincidence, but the rest of the time it's because the Tardis has a lot of sway with people and she is always pushing the doctors and their friends to work in similar places so that they actually talk to each other again.

Or something like that. Honestly it's just plot contrivance because I like putting them in the same working environment, it makes it easier for me]

Sixth Doctor

The Sixth Doctor studies law and philosophy, being a lawyer both before and after the war. He's a really good one too, just really obnoxious.

I don't have a lot for the Sixth Doctor yet because I know he has a few audios that I want to listen to for some ideas, but I am very fond of the two seasons we got of him so here's what I have:

Peri meets the Doctor because he represents her in court when she's fighting her stepfather over something; after the court case (which they win) they go out for a few dates, and even though he's obnoxious and incredibly big-headed, he's also weirdly sweet and gentlemanly and so they get together officially.

Then the war starts and the idle talk they had of getting married/getting a house gets pushed aside while the Doctor joins the project and Peri helps with farm work by using her botany to develop crop something or other.

The war really did affect the Doctor. When he was younger, he suffered from Bipolar Depression but got it under control with medication and therapy, but the war and it's aftermath dragged that out of the depths which definitely put an extra strain on his and Peri's relationship.

When it's really bad, he did try to strangle her (like in the show) which did cause her to leave; but she does come back eventually, after the Doctor calls to apologise, and he does get it back under control.

At some points, it's really not the healthiest relationship, but it doesn't stay like that forever; it's something I really want to get into with my writing and I have the outlines of a fic over the period that he and Peri spend sort of separated.

On a lighter note, some of the other characters of the era! The Master keeps appearing on his doorstep after escaping prison looking for help and the Doctor keeps refusing to give it because he did try to kill Five; he once is a prosecutor against the Rani for unethical experimentation and she straight up sends a hit out against him; the Valeyard is his coworker who hates the Doctor a lot more than the Doctor hates him; and Mel is straight up just his personal trainer at the gym who got WAY too invested in his life.

Seventh Doctor

The seventh doctor is a high level tactician for the MOD before the war, and is actually one of the ones to help collect the other doctors together. He actually continues to do his MOD job while doing the Doctor Project which means he's the only doctor to really have a good understanding of what's happening around the world in real time.

However, he doesn't really have anyone to write home about. He grew up in foster care and it took a lot of effort to get to where he was at the outbreak of war, and so he didn't exactly have that many friends about.

The exception to that is Mel who he grew up with in part and so he does send her the odd letter.

After the war, he gets made redundant by the MOD and goes on to become a PE teacher at Cole Hill; he always dresses like he might be lecturing on politics or history, and stands on the sidelines while watching the students. Or he actually lectures on history or politics; honestly the amount of PE that's done is reliant on the mood.

He also ends up living with Ace; officially, she's his foster daughter, but she's so fiercely independent that she insists that they're roommates and he was willing to accept that.

I wish I did have more for him but I'm hoping that as I get through the Audios and books and such like, I'll get a better understanding of his era and the characters around it to make something a bit more developed.

Eighth Doctor

I'm only eight or so audios into this doctor's travels with Charley, and I have yet to read the Eighth Doctor Adventures (although I am looking to) so this isn't at all a complete section.

The Doctor is an expert in psychiatry and neuroscience, specifically in memory, mostly due to his own issues with memory throughout his childhood.

I'm still debating what the actual cause of the memory issues are, but I'm thinking that it might be because he had epilepsy as a child that was believed to have gone as he grew into adolescence but returned due to one (or multiple) head injuries during the war. I know there are certain types of epilepsy that can really affect the memory.

Either way, the Doctor also seems to be a bit of a romantic and very easily swept up in someone else's life; I see him, before the war, having a disastrous marriage to Grace Holloway which breaks down over four years of not seeing each other and ends in divorce as Grace returns to the states.

After the war, I think that he rents out the rooms in his house which is how he meets Charley, but that's about as far as I can really go with other relationships in his life because I haven't seen anything else of his stuff.

Ninth Doctor

The Ninth Doctor is an expert in mechanical engineering and is the one who does the main body of creating the Moment (the thing that takes out the alien invader's mothership).

He is the son of the War Doctor who's the General who Seven went to with his idea of creating a project to end the war, and the one who officially leads them. He mostly raised the Doctor single-handedly but was not exactly the most caring man in the universe.

The Doctor has a lot of very complicated feelings about his father which don't really get resolved because he (the War Doctor) sacrifices himself to set off the Moment.

Anyway, the Doctor never really wanted to get into Academics and become some sort of fantastic mechanical engineer but his father really pushed it (especially when it became clear the Doctor would never join the army); so after the war, he becomes a sort of freelance mechanic and works with Mickey.

Which is where he meets Rose. Rose often comes to visit Mickey at the end of his shifts because they're friends and live close together, and so she and the Doctor meet regularly there until they are both like...want to go travelling?

Rose was 19 when the war started, and runs the Bad Wolf magazine which she basically created at the beginning as a sort fo morale booster and also because she didn't like how the newspapers were reporting and wanted to make something that wasn't filtered through a hundred government filters; Sarah Jane actually writes for it during the war and on occasion afterwards, and is quite a good friend of Rose's for all that they don't see each other face-to-face all that often.

Still, after the war, sales of Bad Wolf kinda drops off a bit but Rose really loves the magazine and so wants to try something different: she wants to travel so she can see the world, and show people how people are rebuilding and getting their lives back in the aftermath (and help out where she can). She tells the Doctor this and then he offers her his van, and they start travelling together.

They live out the back of his van for years and they're quite happy to do it; they get married in Paris, periodically come back to visit Jackie (who is naturally rather displeased about this life choice they've made - although it's fine because they paid for her to come to Paris for the wedding), and just generally having a good time. They're like van lifers except not obnoxious about it, and when they eventually have Mia, they move back to the UK somewhat permanently (they still travel on holidays) so that she is living somewhere steady and permanent in her upbringing.

We also can't forget about Jack - he was a pilot during the war who also wrote for Bad Wolf, usually entertaining and slightly flirty pieces, and after the war, Rose and the Doctor invited him to travel with them after a few years. When they settle down in London, he moves to Cardiff for a bit on a 'journey of self discovery' where he meets the various Torchwood team (I have to admit I haven't got around to watching Torchwood yet).

He is Mia's godfather (so is Mickey, and Shareen is her godmother) and he dotes on her like no-one's business.

Tenth Doctor

The Tenth Doctor is an expert in anthropology and archaeology. He's Donna's little brother although there isn't much of an age difference between the two of them.

Of all the doctors, he's probably the one I've had the hardest time with.

I know he has a wife who died during the war (I'm thinking that this might be Astrid, for lack of someone better), and that Donna's boyfriend Lee died during the war as well - a lot of people did, during bombings and attacks and that sort of thing - and that with his wife he had a daughter (Jenny) (although I'm also playing around with the idea that he also had a younger daughter, that being Sally - as in Sally from Blink).

In the aftermath of the war, then, he and Donna move in together to help each other out, and eventually their mother and grandfather join them as old age arrives.

Donna meets Shawn in the aftermath and they get on well, and have a very healthy relationship and marriage. On the other hand, we have the Doctor who has the worst situationship ever with Martha.

In the aftermath of his wife's death, he meets Martha who got her medical licence during the war and has been working at Royal Hope since then, and I know that they probably hook up a few times in what is absolutely not recommended.

This is where I get a bit stuck on how things develop from here. I've been getting fonder and fonder of Tenmartha as I think on it more (although Martha does not deserve him) but I do quite like the idea of the two of them coming out of trying to force a relationship and being like...oh we're much better and healthier as friends.

Also, although that epilogue for them came out of nowhere, I do think that Mickey and Martha have a lot of potential as a couple.

There's a lot more I would like to develop here but I shall see what happens as I start writing some more of this.

Eleventh Doctor

The Eleventh Doctor was chosen for his mathematical skill. He's also the youngest of all of them, having just finished his PhD at age 20 as the war broke out.

He's the adopted son of Brian, so Rory's younger brother by a few years, and used to follow him and Amy around like a duckling that had imprinted on the closest moving thing. He did end up going to university quite young (honestly like most of the rest of the doctors) and it's there that he met Strax, Vastra and Jenny who took him under their wing as they were older students.

The war happens before he can really start a job and after the war, he struggles for a bit to find his place, but eventually ends up working with his old university friends in the Paternoster Detective Agency.

Amy and Rory get married after the war - Rory is a nurse at Royal Hope, which he was training for before the war, and Amy is a painter. She always intended on being a model or something like a fashion reporter, but during the war she found painting brought her (and others) the joy that could sometimes be very lacking in such a desperate time.

Her favourite artist is Vincent van Gogh.

They have Melody, although her birth is rife with complications, and so they decide to settle very happily with just the one daughter. She is doted on so completely by everyone, especially her uncle; there's a period when she's like four or five when she is convinced that the Doctor is a secret agent of some sort and gets really into all the spy sort of things.

She makes him play dress up with her and she calls herself River Song because it sounds cool and secret-agenty and the Doctor is her quirky sidekick.

[I debated with putting River Song in as a separate character but I wasn't quite sure what I would do with her? There's potential there for an AU of sorts where she is there, but I unfortunately never quite vibed fully enough with River for her to be a major player in the Main AU]

He lives with the Ponds for a bit after the war, and then moves in with Craig, but when Craig moves out with Sophie, he mopes about it and moves back in with the Ponds.

It's around this time that he meets Clara; she's an English teacher at Cole Hill and her mother went missing nearly five years ago. After trying to get the police to do anything at all, and then saving up the money, she hires the Paternoster gang to find out what happened.

What actually happened is still a bit of a mystery, but she definitely isn't still alive, which the Doctor is the one to tell her the news.

I don't think I'm going to do anything romantic with them but I do think they're quite cute together, so I might dabble. But also I quite like the Doctor being aro and I can see him just living with the Ponds and never leaving.

Twelfth Doctor

The Twelfth Doctor is an astrophysicist. He's spent a lot of his life developing telescopes and astral bodies, but after the war, he mostly just lectures. He's such a longstanding part of St Luke's university that they probably couldn't fire him for anything short of murder.

He's married to Missy quite young, actually, although they never had children; she has spent like half of their marriage in prison though, and now spends most of her time hanging around the Doctor's office being annoying to all his students.

During the war, he did get blinded. It's something he has a complicated relationship with, and does not like it when people mention it around him. He uses a cane when he moves around and wears sunglasses because it hides that his eyes aren't necessarily looking at the person he's talking to.

Again, he has a complicated relationship with it.

Nardole is his teaching assistant, only he's massively overbearing about every aspect of the Doctor's life (only he just manages to be endearing enough that the Doctor doesn't just fire him on the spot).

Bill is, like in canon, someone the Doctor tutors, only now instead of getting to see the galaxy, she has he, Missy and Nardole giving her wildly different yet equally terrible dating advice, which somehow works to get her with Heather.

As for Clara, I genuinely don't know what to do with her; she's such a big part of the Twelfth Doctor's story that I do really want to have her be an important character, but I don't know how. If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them!

Thirteenth Doctor

The Thirteenth Doctor is an expert in microbiology. She's a government researcher into disease for the few years before the war, but after the war, she becomes an A&E nurse. She found that she preferred chaos and wanted something that was less science based but still within her interests.

She's fostered by Graham as a child, which is how she knows him, and subsequently how she comes to know Ryan and Grace, when Graham meets them. Her mother was Tecteun who she was taken away from when she was twelve due to the fact that Tecteun was a piece of shit (as in canon).

She wrote a lot to all of them during the war; out of all the Doctors, she probably spent the most writing letters (apart from maybe Six who wrote to Peri...so much, he spent so much time agonising over writing letters to her).

She knew Yaz from school and they both moved to London after the war - they met up again when they both returned from the war, and they decided that a change of scenery from the place they grew up might do them good.

London was one of the main targets during the war so there was a lot of practical work and training to do in both the police force and in nursing (which is what the Doctor wants to go into); they stay in shared accomodation and volunteer to help with the rebuilding effort in some of their free time.

When the rebuilding is mostly finished and everything has started to even out again, they stay in London; the Doctor has a job at Royal Hope and Yaz has found her footing in the local police force. They visit Sheffield a lot though, and invite Ryan to stay with them a lot, so he can get away from all the Old People.

Fourteenth Doctor

The Fourteenth Doctor technically doesn't exist. The Doylist reasoning for this is because there was far too little that separated the Fourteenth Doctor out to make him his own character in a modern AU; the Watsonian is because there was meant to be a Fourteenth member of the Doctor Project but he died in transit to the first meeting. Out of respect, the rest skip over the number that was meant to be his.

I've played around with the idea that the Fourteenth and the Tenth Doctor were siblings/related/possibly twins but I think this might be more of an AU sort of thing.

Fifteenth Doctor

Obviously we haven't had the Fifteenth Doctor's actual first season yet or much of anything for him (very excited for it though) so this is very much a work in progress - I'll make more decisions about his story after the season has come out and I've watched it; from vibes alone though, I think he'd be possibly an expert in sociology, and after the war he would own a club or something similar, where Ruby would get herself a job.

Notes and Stuff

Congratulations for getting this far lol! This AU is very precious to me and gets bigger every time I watch a new episode/listen to a new drama/rewatch/relisten/etc.

There are a few general things I'd probably note: all the Doctors have like...actual names (mostly John or a variation there of) but I refer to them all as the Doctor because that's what rolls off the tongue more easily.

Another thing is Idris/the Tardis - on one hand, the original idea was that she would die and her funeral would be the thing to get the Doctors back together so to say, but the more I think about it, the more I would like her to live.

I'm planning on writing some fic for this AU and posting it to AO3 - there's a Sixperi fic I really want to write, and I'm a sucker for some family fluff with various Doctors - and I might draw some stuff, so stick around if you're interested :)

I've only been really into Doctor who for four or five months, and with such an expansive EU (and frankly, such a lot of main content), there's a lot I don't know (although I very much intend to know it one day). If you got this far, I would honestly love to hear your general thoughts and ideas on the AU, a lot of the Eleventh Doctor stuff I worked out was developed from conversation I had with a friend!

Anyway, thank you for getting this far! And thank you for the ask to let me ramble, it took me a while to get all the rambling together but now I've finished, I'm really pleased I got here.