#how to get more Instagram Story poll votes

[sociocosmos]

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[mattysketchup]

sturniolo christmas

matt sturniolo x reader

➽──────────────❥

summary... the triplets had invited you over to film a gingerbread house making video, but the tension between you and matt was insane.

warnings... swearing, tension between matt and reader !!

wc... 690

(masterlist)

➽──────────────❥

the sturniolos house was ready and decorated for christmas, decorations painting the home. you were filming a video with the triplets, a fun holiday activity.

"hey guys, today we are going to be building and decorating gingerbread houses with our best friend, y/n l/n!" nick says as he explains the video to the camera. "hi!" you say as you wave to the camera.

"we're going to be in teams for this, so we have y/n and matt together, which leaves chris and i in a group together" nick explains. "we will have about an hour to finish and you guys will vote on our instagram, @ sturniolo.triplets to see who's is the best."

a couple minutes go by and nick already has the entire group laughing. "what the fuck is that?" nick wheezes as he points out chris' gingerbread man. "it's gingy" he laughs. "look at all his aura nick!" you and matt were now gasping for air at the sight of chris' gingerbread man; it was covered in icing and candy.

"don't fucking put that anywhere near our gingerbread house" nick says. "i'll do whatever the fuck i want to" chris responds, sass laced on his tongue. chris and nick start yelling at eachother, so you and matt take the advantage that they're not working while the time was running out.

you and matt are working in perfect harmony, your house almost done, whereas chris and nicks had fallen about three times. they're still yelling at each other, but you and matt are in your own little world. the roof had begun to slip and matt soon became aware of it, breaking his silence to help you. "make sure you- here" matt wraps his arms around you from behind, helping you hold the roof together while you ice the top.

your breathing subconsciously starts to get heavier, the boy now practically wrapped around you. "okay...there we go" matt says as he stands back up to continue putting gumdrops on the roof. the boys behavior didn't go unnoticed, however nobody said anything.

"chris you're a fucking idiot" nick states as the boys go back at it again. "how am i the idiot? i'm just trying to add gingy to our house" chris chuckles. "oh my-" nick gets cut off by chris throwing the gingerbread man at him, causing a fight between the two.

"oh my fucking- you're gonna die. you're going to fucking die chris!" nick exclaims as he launches the bag of icing in chris' direction. however, chris quickly moved out of the way, leaving the icing to go right for your head. matt is quick to respond, and catches the icing bag right before it smacks you. the two of you are now looking right at eachother, the tension being way too much.

"chat is this rizz?" chris gasps as he stares at the scene unfolding before him. the four of you laugh it off, matt's reflexes being insane once again. you try to keep the odd feeling for your best friend in but nobody in this room knows how much he means to you. everyone goes back to decorating, but not without chris and nick fighting a bit more.

"alright everybody, thank you so much for tuning in and watching this weeks friday video, we will put a poll on our instagram story to see who won so make sure you're following the group account, and we'll see you next friday!" nick says, as matt screams at the camera before shutting it off. you all begin to clean up the mess and nick takes pictures of the gingerbread houses for instagram.

the four of you are now sitting on the couch, matt subconsciously placing his arm around you. you try to choke back words, not wanting anything to change. this night was truly perfect. "i just know we're gonna win" chris states. "i don't give a flying fuck about what you 'know' " matt states as chris starts to huff about how his and nicks gingerbread house was better, a pointless argument that matt showed no mind to. the night ends with watching die hard and sipping hot cocoa, a classic christmas night.

➽──────────────❥

tessas notes... this is for the @mattscoquette and @letstrip13 holiday writing comp ! however i couldn't get the proper tag to work for some reason, im not on this app very much so i do apologize for that :(

blessings and riches, tessa

[nightmaretimefancomic]

Calling All Hatchetfield Artists!

Starkid has gifted us with Nightmare Time, 2 seasons worth of stories that have all made us laugh and cry (hard. way way too hard.), however they are all confined to readings of the scripts. So I, @blueskiesandstarrynights and @midnightnautilus thought we could do something about it.

Introducing the first Nightmare Time fan comic!

Here's how it will work:

First, we'll post a poll here where you can vote for which story should get adapted first. If your favorite doesn't win, don't worry! If this takes off, we hope to adapt other stories as well!

The poll will run for a week, then we'll post a google form for artists to fill out in regards to interest. It will ask about how much you can commit to and how best you can communicate. This will stay open for a few weeks, then we'll get started!

I will be breaking up the script into smaller parts, assigning bits of dialogue and/or action to a page, and assigning a number of pages to artists based on what you told us in the form. More specific details will come as a story is decided

with that being said SHARE SHARE SHARE not just with your mutuals here, but any artists you know on Twitter, Instagram, anywhere! I want to get as many people involved as possible!

With that being said, I can't wait to see what story is picked and hope to see plenty of interest and participation!

[ofmdrecaps]

08/18-19/2024 Daily OFMD Recap

TLDR; David Jenkins; Taika Waititi; GalaxyCon SanJose: Vico, Con, Kristian, Nathan; Leslie Jones; Madeleine Sami; Connor Barrett; Tell Tale TV Poll; Fan Spotlight: BairNecessities Affirmation Cards; Our Flag Means Fanfiction; Love Notes; Daily Darby/Tonight's Taika.

== David Jenkins ==

Davi's sharing more love for our crewmates and their dedication to OFMD. @smolbus, you're right hon, there is always hope! Ty for sharing your ink!

Source: David Jenkins Twitter

== Taika Waititi ==

More birthday shenanigans for Taika and Rita!

Source: Rita Ora's Instagram

Annnnd More Time Bandits Articles! This week Taika's gonna be in quite a bit of the final episodes it looks like!

Image Sources: The Taika Archives Twitter

= GalaxyCon San Jose: Vico, Con, Kristian, Nathan =

These four had such a lovely time in San Jose, and so did so many of our crewmates!! The cast was kind enough to post lots of pictures of the convention! Hope yall had fun! Please feel free to share your pics/stories!

Source: Kristian Nairn's Instagram

Source: Vico's Instagram

Nathan was out with Harvey Guillen and lots of other friends at the Winchester Mystery House while out in San Jose!

Source: Nathan Foad's Instagram Stories

== Leslie Jones ==

Leslie's going to be doing another stand up tour-- coming up Sept 29 you can see her at the Because They're Funny Comedy Festival at The Wharf in Washington D.C.! Learn more on their website!

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by BECAUSE THEY’RE FUNNY- BTF (Property of NICE CROWD) (@becausetheyrefunny)

Source: BecauseTheyreFunny Instagram

== Madeleine Sami ==

Nice to see Madeleine was out with the ladies of Deadloch at the 2024 TV Week Logie Awards!

Source: Prime Video AUNZ's Instagram

== Connor Barrett ==

Our beloved Hornberry out and about watching Angel City FC!

Source: Connor's Instagram

== Tell Tale TV Votes ==

Our dear friends over at @adoptourcrew are keeping us appraised of Tell Tale TV's new polls! You can vote for Ed and Stede for Category 3: Ship of the Year (Comedy or Animated Series)! While you're there if you want to help support some other queer shows, What We Do In The Shadows - Nandor and Guillermo are up in Ship You'd Most Like to See Sail (Round 1)!

Source: Adopt Our Crew Twitter

== Fan Spotlight ==

= BairNecessities =

Back again tonight is the kindest soul, Mik, aka bairnecessities! Her OFMD Affirmation cards continue to make me smile every time I look at them! Did any of you get to stop by her table this past weekend at GalaxyCon San Jose? If you didn't get to you can check out her shop/follow her on the various socials here: Instagram / Twitter / Linktr.ee / Etsy

First up is probably my favorite card from her S2 Deck:

The next two are from her secondary character expansion! I adore that we get Alma and Louis in there, and even Doug NoLastName and Jeffrey Fettering get a spotlight with wonderful messages for all of us!

Mik does other series too aside from OFMD (like Good Omens, and Helluva Boss!) You can check them out on her instagram below!

Source: Bearnecessities Instagram

= Our Flag Means Fanfiction =

New Epitizer this week from our good friends over at Our Flag Means Fanfiction. Seriously, the amount of content they put out, keeping us all engaged is amazing. If you haven't given them a listen or a follow please do! You can check out the new "when life gives you lemons" on their linktree!

Source: Our Flag Means Fanfiction Instagram

== Love Notes ==

Hey there lovelies, I hope your Monday started your week off well <3 As I'm sitting here typing this I have my son asleep under one arm, so I apologize if this is a bit scattered. I saw this infographic today and it made me think of you all. I don't know about you, but I spent a lot of my life thinking I had to do everything, excel at everything, have all the money, and the car, and the house, and the kids, etc. But you know what? Life isn't about having everything. It's about finding the things you love and matter most to you and focusing on them. The things that matter most to me will absolutely be different from everyone else (we may share some of the same) but no two people are exactly the same when it comes to interests, and thats beautiful. Dig deep into the things you love crew, and remember you don't have to feel any shame for the things that mean the most to you. Do you like video games? Or Ornithology? How about fanfiction? Or maybe Indy 500 races? Do you find joy when you're alone in the woods? Or sitting out with friends at a bar? Do you enjoy being alone? Or maybe you love to sing your heart out at karaoke? Whatever it is you love-- embrace it, whether it's "Weird" by someone else's standards or not. If it makes you smile, if it makes you enjoy your time on this little blue dot-- dive in lovelies, with no regrets. I so very hope that even if it's only little bits at a time this week you get to spend doing the things you love, whatever that may be. Rest well and drink some water tonight <3 Love you crew

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by The New Happy® (@newhappyco)

== Daily Darby / Today's Taika ==

Happy Murray Monday, and Taika Tuesday everyone! Tonight's gifs are courtesy of @fandomsmeantheworldtome and @meluli, thank you so much for keeping us well fed with fantastic gifs of our favorite folks <3 You are doing Calypso's work my friends.

[stardustto-dust]

Why you should vote Abed Nadir in the 2023 autism swag summit

I've seen people do this for other polls and it is vital that Abed Nadir from the 2009-2015 NBC comedy Community wins this one.

Vote him round one here.

Does he fit the first part of the statement? Yes, Abed is canonically autistic.

When he realised autistic fans related to him, creator Dan Harmon did as much research as he possibly could into autism as to not let those fans down.

While doing said research, Harmon realised himself was likely on the spectrum. Meaning that Abed is a canon autistic character created by an autistic person. How often does that happen?

Due to the above facts, he is a very well researched and developed autistic character, with both traits more commonly shown in the media, such as blunted affect and difficulties reading faces and less commonly shown traits, such as hyperempathy and sensory issues.

From the time Abed first appeared on screen to the present day, there have been many blog posts, magazine articles and even scholarly articles written about how good rep he is. I have seen him on many a neurodiversity advocacy Instagram account. (If you want me to link some I will!)

OK, we have established the autism. What about the swag? Well, first of all, as Donald Glover summarised it "Abed fucks". There is a whole episode dedicated to his friends trying to get him a girlfriend and worrying about his self-esteem and in the end it turns out he gets plenty of girls and, as he says, he has "self-esteem falling out (his) butthole." He also gets guys hitting on him. And how can we mention Abed without his boyfriend soulmate best friend Troy. who canonically wants to have his "gentle and mysterious" "other half"'s children. In short, bisexual king.

Of course, swag is not limited to just sexual and romantic prowess, as the amount of aroace people I know with limitless swag testifies to. Swag can also be measured by commitment to the bit, for example. And, boy, is Abed known for his commitment to the bit.

Abed is Batman, Han Solo and Jesus. He is a mafia boss. He is a cartoon man discovering the meaning of Christmas. He is the narrator and the cameraman. Like, not metaphorically or in archetype. He realises a need for these characters in the story and becomes them.

[GIF- Abed as Batman, applying lip balm, possessing undeniable amounts of swag]

9. "How does he realise the need for the these things in the story?" you may ask. Well, his special interest is film and TV. He is a filmmaker. Thus, he frames his life in terms of genre, often seeming aware of the fact he is in a sitcom. However, this often changes, and, the show branches off into completely different genres, which Abed points out. These shifts in genre explore character dynamics and also are super awesome. Abed is so genre-aware, he changes the entire genre of the show. That is swag.

10. The Community fandom here on Tumblr.com, and throughout the web, is quite small. It will make us very happy. Plus, for the first time in 8 years, there likely will be new Abed content this year, due to the release of the movie. (Due to one of Abed's many catchphrases "Six seasons and a movie!")

11. Please please please please I love him so much and i am very cool you should listen to me please please please.

So yeah, that's it! If you have anything to add, please do!

Click below for some Abed gifs.

[GIF- "Evil Abed" (Abed with a goatee and sunglasses) walking through his college being evil. He hangs up someone's payphone call, pops a girls balloon with his cigarette and then dumps said cigarette into a woman's coffee]

[GIF- Two gifs. One is of Troy, topless, leaning out of an airvent. He looks down and says "I love you". Next is of Abed, looking up at him. He says "I know", before being grabbed by a zombie in a kilt]

[GIF- Abed, wearing sunglasses, saying "movie reference". Jeff is there too and also wearing sunglasses]

[GIF- Abed saying "Cool. Cool cool cool"]

Ok there are so many more GIFs I want to put but I kinda have work soon lol. You get the gist, he is amazing. Vote Abed!

[mangakachan]

I know I just did a poll about the PT designs yesterday (and it’s still running too lmao 😅😂) but Moonie_Fan_Collections is running her own polls (yes, she has more than one poll! Two are for design preference like the one I have, and one for whether you prefer a set of 2 pins for approximately $115 or an individual pin for approximately $70). As she is the maker who would potentially facilitate the translation, manufacturing, and sales of these designs as pins, please vote in her polls if you are SERIOUS about purchasing these as pins!

Please review all 7 of her Instagram Stories before you vote (I took screen shots and put them in this post to make it a little easier to review). Instagram is a bit…weird, and doesn’t let you have more than four options in a single poll, so Moonie had to break up the design preference poll into two polls to accommodate the six sets I came up with. Depending on how the polls go and the voter turn-out, Moonie might consider doing a commitment group for all 12 designs.

While I have to put in a disclaimer that I am not responsible for what may or may not get made from any of my designs (Princess Tutu or otherwise), or any monetary transaction between you and Moonie, if you are serious about wanting these as pins, please let Moonie know by voting in her polls! Instagram Stories are only visible for 24 hours, so please vote before 9pm Pacific Time, Sunday, May 19th, 2024.

EDIT: If the poll is not working for you try accessing it on mobile and/or closing and reopening the Instagram app. IG is optimized for mobile so on desktop it can act kinda weird 😓

EDIT 2: Polls have closed! Thank you to everyone who voted! 👏

[mountsmase]

It would be one of those days where neither of you have work or any other obligations, and there’s nothing else you need to be doing, so you take the rare chance to relax and spend the day at home together. UGH YES PLEASE NAPPING ALL DAY

You’ve been wanting to make some Gingerbread for a while and you've got all of the actual ingredients at home but you wanted to buy some icing, and some chocolates and sweets that you can use as decorations for the gingerbread house you’re going to attempt to build. I CAN SEE THIS BEING SO MESSY🤭

You try to be quick in the shops, not wanting to keep Mase and Ace waiting for too long outside but you still grab some extra snacks for the afternoon before paying and going back to find them outside. Mason would take one of the bags from you, not expecting you to carry them both the whole way home and you try and take it back from him because he’s got Ace on the lead and you really don’t mind carrying it but he doesn’t let you have it back. HE IS A GENTLEMAN 😌

You put them on and probably convince him to take some photos with you in them, you move in front of the floor length mirror you have in your bedroom to try and take some but he’d be all over you, constantly trying to make you laugh by tickling you and constantly kissing you when you’re about to take a photo. But they’d turn out as some of your favourites, the ones where you’re both laughing and smiling wide. UGH THATS CUTEEE

You’d go downstairs and put a Christmas movie on, maybe Elf or Home Alone, and then go into the kitchen to get started on the baking (i think his house has a joint living/kitchen area so you’d be able to watch the film from the kitchen) I VOTE FOR THE GRINCH

Baking together would be so so fun, maybe you do quite a lot of baking so he lets you take the reigns and steps in to help where and when he can. And I can imagine him being a little shit and trying to get on your nerves, doing things like flicking flour at you or smearing it over your cheek and by the time the gingerbread has been put in the oven you’d be covered in various ingredients and in desperate need of a shower, but it’s funny more than it’s annoying. He could never ignore you no matter how many times he snuck bits of the batter when you weren’t paying attention. I LOVE THIS OMG, BUT I WOULD GET SO MAD AT HIM 😂

Once it’s all cooked you take them out of the oven and let them cool before cutting up the pieces to the correct sizes to make a gingerbread house with them. Maybe you want to set up a little decorating competition but you don’t have enough to make two so you each take a side and get started on the decorating. It would be a constant race to get the best sweet and chocolate to use as decorations and a lot of them would definitely be eaten before they even make it onto the house. HE WOULD DO EVERYTHING HE CAN TO WIN AND WE ALL KNOW THIS

It’s a bit of a mess by the time you’re finished, both of you having our way too much on it but it’s your own little masterpiece and you love it, maybe you even post some pictures of it to your private Instagram story and make a poll of who’s is the best side. You’d win it and Mason would go all pouty and give you the silent treatment but would crack not even 5 minuets later because he knows for a fact that yours was definitely the better side and he can’t be upset with you even if he was just doing it jokingly. 😂😂😂 HES LIKE A LITTLE BABY

He’d order for you without even needing to ask what you want and he guesses perfectly what you’d want to eat, as he does all the time. CAUSE HE KNOWS YOU LIKE THE BACK OF HIS HAND

You clean up from the baking whilst waiting for the food to arrive and when it does you eat it in front of the TV, watching the Grinch as your third and final Christmas movie of the day. YESSSS THE GRINCHHHH MY FAVOURITE

And when you’re ready to head up to bed Mason would disappear upstairs whilst you’re locking up, wanting to treat you a little by running a bath with all of your favourite Christmassy soaps and bath salts. He knows that a bath is your perfect way to end the day and maybe you mentioned having a bit of a headache earlier so he wants to help you fully relax. TES YES YES I NEED THIS SO BAD

I NEED A DAY LIKE THIS,PLEASE, IM BEGGING

THANK YOU AGAIN BESTIE, LOVED THIS🩷

I was getting so jealous of y/n writing this concept because it really would be the most perfect day

[irlcats-bracket]

Bracket 3 Round 2 Poll 4

Gizmo vs Simon

GIZMO

Very orange and very dumb. Also soft and fluffy and a menace to society (aka: submitter and their partner). Has an adorable (if disturbing) foot fetish (he really likes to lick feet and play with shoes). He came from a bush and has never had The Braincell™️, but you can watch the gears in his head turn as he tries to have A Thought™️.

PROPAGANDA

Oh shoot it's Gizmo's time to shine! Vote for my dumb baby that likes climbing into bags and singing the song of his people

Gizmo needs you to know about his emotional support wand. He carries it around at random times of the day (mostly in the middle of the night) but if you try to play with it he walks away. Once you put it down he pounces and immediately carries it off into another room and sits on it.

You can find more pictures and stories of Gizmo on his Instagram

SIMON

he's two years old but still looks like he's six months old. he also recently cost his father and submitter 4k because he likes to eat random stuff off the ground :) luckily he's adorable, loves to beat them all up in the morning to wake us up, and his little meows sound like, "ba-hoo!"

PROPAGANDA

he is scared of everything that is not his mom, dad, or brother. everything else is to be treated as an very scary, dangerous enemy

he once cost us over 4,000 dollars in vet bills because he loves to try to eat random stuff off the ground. my fiancé and i both work minimum wage so you can imagine how happy we were

he went missing for 15 hours once because he pushed through a window screen and jumped. he is the last cat who would ever willingly go outside so wtf simon ....

he is a gremlin who thinks the world revolves around him (it does)

he loves letting me dress him up in hats, dresses, and shirts!

he loves to lick my fiancés face at 5am and will dig up the covers to get to him

he helps himself to any glass of water left out, even if you're also drinking it

he doesn't understand why people aren't always willing to share their food with him- he wants some!! give him a lil taste!

he also sat like this once ?

anyways i reached the mobile photo limit i hope you like my boy!!

SIMON SWEEP

[sociocosmos]

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[dearweirdme]

I followed the gurumi situation pretty closely last year so I'll try to give a brief rundown of what I can remember lol.

Okay so the first photo was leaked a couple days before Taennie coincidentally both went to NYC. Their flights were both leaked in advance, so people were already making a big deal out of it even before the photos leaked. Gurumi posted the first photo on twitter and used some corny caption, something like "are they just friends or more?" and also something about how one of Jennie's friends leaked the photo. So they originally set up this narrative that they didn't know if they were dating or not, but Jennie's friend has betrayed her and leaked the photo and somehow it ended up in gurumi's hands. To garner attention for the first photo, gurumi used bots to increase the likes on the tweet, and many people caught this. They also linked their tweet under popular tweets on army twitter in order to get the photo more attention. So they were clearly mainly after attention from the very start. The photo started to blow up but most people didn't take it seriously. I think another photo leaked right before their respective flights. At this point, people are theorizing about them both going to NYC and making up theories about them meeting up there (super similar to the whole Paris/Cannes situation). However, it was known Tae was going there to work on his Vogue shoot and Jennie and all the BP girls were there for the VMAs (which BTS were also nominated for). The VMAs were fan voted, so many blinks even used the photos to capture people's attention and get them to vote for BP. Taennies started growing in numbers and they said that Taennie were going to make their couple debut at the VMAs red carpet (sound familiar?). Obviously, this didn't happen and a paparazzi that followed BP pretty much everywhere around NYC said they never saw Tae with Jennie. I don't think people even really spotted Tae in the city. So it was anticlimactic, but the stage was set. Even without any actual evidence, Taennies were convinced they coordinated these trips on purpose. Later, both Tae and Jennie posted photos from their trip and Taennies said they were doing lovestagram, even though it's NYC, obviously some of the scenery is going to look similar lol. Nothing in either of their photos could be linked together even though Taennies tried. There was also coincidentally a Foundrae store in NYC (the jewelry brand Taennies love connecting) and Taennies said they went and bought their jewelry together lol. After this, photos continue to leak periodically. People notice that photos are usually leaked whenever Tae would have something coming out (like with Vogue) or when Jennie would have something going on. Interestingly BP's album was released September 16, right in the middle of this. Gurumi gets suspended on twitter and moves to telegram where they build a cult-like following essentially where people ask them questions in a group chat and beg for them to release new photos. Gurumi frequently teased people in the group, doing polls about what photos should be released next. I don't know if it was a power kick or something, but gurumi clearly starts to go off the rails. They come up with thousands of different stories (I don't even remember them all). They tell people Lisa is behind it, they tell people G Dragon is behind it, and they tell people Jennie's friend whose instagram user is twozoobrother is the main one behind it, and he went with them to Jeju apparently. Gurumi starts claiming that a staff member of Tae's is this twozoobrother guy, trying to prove that Tae and him are friends. The only evidence of Tae knowing this person is from 2014, when twozoobrother was apparently a trainee. So the whole twozoobrother thing was the first of their lies. It never really made sense, why would this random guy leak photos to this random user? Jennie is also still friends with this guy so. Gurumi also never clearly states how they obtained the photos, but they imply twozoobrother was the source.

This is so long I have to send another ask sorry

Part 2

At one point, gurumi fakes an email from HYBE, saying that they've been in contact with them and have negotiated about the situation and they've decided to stop posting. Obviously, this was a lie since they continue to post not long after this "email" and there's no way HYBE was in contact with them lmao. They switch up their story of "are they dating or not?" and start telling people in the group that they are absolutely dating and that Tae is straight (weird thing to include). Then they start going out of their way to prove this. They tell people that Jisoo of all people is in the the group chat and she's going to confirm Taennie's relationship by posting a photo of herself on Instagram. Gurumi sends the photo she's going to post. Soon after, Jisoo does end up posting the photo (it's a Dior ad). This proves that they had photos of other idols and proves that Jennie clearly didn't have her icloud hacked, or even her account hacked. If either of these were true, it makes no sense as to why she would have that photo of Jisoo lmao. (Which is why I think staff could be behind this). At one point, a photo of a computer screen with several images in a folder appears (not sure where this came from, I can't remember if gurumi posted it or not). Gurumi tells people not to share the images, because they're edits. However, some of these photos on the computer are part of the Jeju photos gurumi later posts. Also one of the photos in this folder is of some random couple on Pinterest, make of that what you will. Gurumi obsesses over having a statement from HYBE or YG and constantly tries to bait them in order to get one. Gurumi continues to swear to people they're dating, which I've never understood; if they had dozens of leaked images, why did they feel the need to prove their relationship so badly? Why did they care? Gurumi even starts messaging people individually on telegram and tells people a bunch of weird things. I distinctly remember them telling someone that Taennie apparently had sex when they went to Jeju like WHAT...how would they even know that 😭 They basically just started acting like an unhinged weirdo. Gurumi tells people that he has no videos or any concrete proof, but then posts a video that was taken during the first photo they dropped, the one where Tae is getting ready before PFW. The video is super sketchy, it's filmed (or cropped) in a way so you can't see who's recording and Tae doesn't acknowledge the camera at all. It gives me super weird vibes. Gurumi also says Tae calls Jennie "yeobo" (Korean term of endearment) in the video, but the video is coincidentally (!) muted, so you can't hear what he actually says. Multiple people who speak Korean though came out and said it seemed more like he was saying something like "is this nice/good". I don't remember exactly, but it made sense in the context of him getting styled. Regardless, people were pretty sure he didn't say "yeobo"

Part 3

They continue dropping photos periodically (also weird to me - why not just post everything you have and go?) but people were definitely losing interest. The people that gave the photos attention were mainly just Taennies at this point. One of the later photos they posted was of them at a restaurant. The photo is of Tae supposedly, but he's pointedly not looking at the camera and he's wearing a hat so you can't see his face. Once again, they're in a public place but no one saw them? Anyway, gurumi says Jennie captioned this photo with "my other half." Taennies eat this up of course but people start questioning this too. If this was posted on her Instagram story (which it would've had to have been, since she hadn't posted any actual posts on there in a while), then usually the caption is directly on the photo. So either gurumi had to crop the caption out (why do that?) or they lied. This goes on and then HYBE drops their quarterly statement about an individual who has been defaming their artist. Army's immediately think of gurumi, but gurumi denies and says they've heard nothing from HYBE. Immediately following this, they say that they're going inactive. Which makes it seem like HYBE's statement was about them. Then a couple days later YG releases their statement about Jennie's private photos being leaked and gurumi jokes about it in the group, and then they never post again. These statements came out at the end of September/beginning of October, so over a month after this started (towards the end of August). YG's statement was also close to when gurumi posted that bathtub picture of Jennie, and a lot of fans reacted to that and called them out. So I think YG's statement was always over the bathtub image particularly. I mean, why let this thing go on for a month and then speak up?

Part 4

It should also be noted that at the start of this, someone emailed gurumi and asked if they would edit two idols together for them, and they offer to pay them a few hundred dollars. Gurumi responds and tells them this is too low. The person posts the screenshots and a screen recording of this email thread on twitter and gurumi freaks out and threatens to dox this person. Also in the middle of the gurumi thing, an account on instagram who had been "supporting" Taennie and continuously posting the leaks on twitter since they start suddenly switched up on gurumi. They claimed everything was an edit and then they started posting photos of idols that had never been seen publicly before (including ones of Tae and Jennie individually). Their account is suspended, and then a new account is created to continue posting the thread of idols and they say that gurumi went too far. It's hard to know if they were actually working together but it's definitely weird. There was also another account on twitter that's a huge Taennie "supporter," and they briefly turned on gurumi too. They posted a screenshot of their convo with them and said that everything was fake. The convo was basically them asking gurumi is everything was ready and gurumi was telling them to wait (or something like that). This account deleted the tweets not long after and said they were hacked (who would hack this random account? and give them their account back afterward?). This same account was also posting photos of couples from Pinterest on their twitter around a month before the leaks started and they claimed these couples were Taennie. Weird coincidence if you ask me.

Thats everything I can think of at the moment (sorry for the excessive length) but I think this gives an overall gist of everything. Sorry if anything is worded confusingly, everything is just so complicated and hard to explain at this point lol. The situation is extremely weird and I definitely think some staff were involved.

Gurumi anon here again sorry, I forgot to add abt the jewellery it actually first came from one of those gurumi pictures itself - the elevator one I’m not even sure was any of them - where they’re both seen wearing matching bracelets but the quality is horrible. Taehyung did have a bracelet like it but guess who else had a matching one? rosé, not jennie. So shippers saw and tried to place the same bracelet on jennie using bad quality and outright lying because she genuinely had real matching jewellery from that brand with GDragon, and when it didn’t work they dug to found her wearing a pendant from the same brand, not in any way similar to Tae’s. again like I said before, it could’ve later on become intentional when they saw, but last year it was not.

Hi anon!

Thank you so much for this summation, I hadn't been able to find anything like this and it all makes more sense now. This to me doesn't look like it's completely company arranged no. Way way, too messy for that. When companies leak pics, they don't really need a story to back things up. They just leak a pic to an already larger fan account and things start happening. The point is not to get attention on the leaker, but on the leaked material. Gurumi obviously wanted attention on theri account. It is odd though that the leaks coincided with promo moments, which does point to it being somewhat used for that. It's possible it started with the company and got out of hand, but it might very well be outsiders (friends.. staff/old staff... maybe someone from media with connections... a hired person to do the initial leaking, lots of options really). I'd say it's from BlackPink's side mostly. Since the Jisoo part points to them having knowledge on BP projects.

Is the Gurumi from Twitter definitely the same as the one on Telegram? Since that's when the unhinged behavior really started.

It kinda gives me the same feeling those fan accounts (like the taennieisfake thingy) do. They get high on power and start unhinging. Maybe the son or daugter of an employee had access to their parents computer, saw all this stuff, happens to be a fan and took the opportunity to create a fandom meltdown. The changing stories, the mention of "taennie having sex" and "Tae being straight" to me point to someone young being behind this. There's a lack of proffesional behavior; no organization, no professional wording, dramatization and some things that just seem impossible (Jisoo in the chat for instance). I think it's a person with loose ties to BP. Someone with acces to material, but no real insight in the business. It being a minor, would also explain the slow advance they made with making it a lawsuit. But then again, if it was the son or daugter of an employee they would've found out really soon.

But holy sh*t what a wild story. Thanks so much for sharing. I'm glad to be able to store this in my blog.

[fuck-off-im-ace]

Warrior Nun Update │ January 10th edition

First of all, last i checked we reached at least 5,5 millions #SaveWarriorNun tweets! With the speed we’re going, we might be real close to 6M by the time i post this. To give yall an idea, i’ve heard that the Manifest fandom, who managed to get their show saved after a cancellation, did 10M in a year? Not sure how true that is, but it is what i heard! 

They were also big on signing the petition, which reached 100K signatures. We reached that goal at the end of december, we’re now at 104K last i checked. 

We’re also borrowing the Billboards strategy from the Wynonna Earp fandom. A Go Fund Me is still taking donations, the more we are the bigger the billboards will be! For legal reasons, we need fanart for them, so if you’re interested in getting your art out there or know someone who would do great representation, go to the Discord to get the specs! 

A lot of people all over the world are getting together with fellow fans that live near them to put up posters to publicise the effort. An Instagram account has been made to share WN things (such as art, memes, stories and more), i think there’s a tiktok account too, so go follow if you’re into that

If Twitter is more your thing, the wonderful team behind the Discord made a little game to get some quotes trending! Each day got its own sentence to get trending along with the general hashtag, like “For all nunkind”, “Just your job?” or “And my pleasure”. That last one was used by Simon himself on a tweet about keeping up the effort to get the show to a new home, so don’t give up hope! They know we’re still there, and they are working on this too. We have some fun ones for the next days, like “Lemon drop”, “Warrior Nun New Home” and “Love you Alba”, cause she deserves all the love. 

The admin team is giving a big effort in the general organisation of the fandom this week. They’re looking for artists for the billboards, video editors for publicity, but also for a ton of other skills! They need coders, tiktokers, data analysts, graphic designers, musicians and people that are real good with management. All the info is on the Discord, as usual.

Some good news, to make this less tedious: We won some shits! As i said in a previous post, Warrior Nun won “Show of the year” on the SpoilerTV poll! KTY won the performer of the month for december, and Alba the performer of the month for november. That puts them both in the “Performer of the year” poll! They are up against some really good and popular actors, so be sure to go vote for them both.

For the next weeks, the admin team is putting together more watch parties, fanfiction events, WN themed D&D, trivia nights, all sorts of fun! Not too late to join on the action if you’re not already in the Discord Server!

It is very important to know that tweets and other ways to publicise the show will not get us a renewal. Netflix doesnt care about a bunch of fans tweeting about it. What matters is views. All this is just to get the show noticed, cause Netflix sure as hell didnt spent a dollar on getting the show out there. So be sure to stream it, suggest it to friends, family and colleagues, and always always finish a season! What Netflix pays attention to is if people watch the show, and if they finish both season. 

To close this big ass post, i just want to remind everyone that Warrior Nun got cancelled less than a month ago. How incredible it is, that we managed to get all that done in a month. Couldn’t be prouder of us. 

[lily-blue-blue-lily]

i made a poll about taylor swift. it slightly made my notes a living hell for a week. heres some info i gathered from it cos i figure some people might find it interesting!

(gonna put a keep reading thing cos this might get long!)

- the post got 36k votes and 7.5k notes and really made it round every possible opinion on taylor swift there could be

- it was a lot more negative than i was expecting. i accidentally found my way onto swiftie instagram a few months ago and now my instagram algorithm thinks thats all i wanna watch so i think maybe my perception of how many people are actually are a fan of her is a bit skewed?

- that being said, in general, people were actually very reasonable and had very nuanced opinions in the notes, which was a little surprising

- however, the people who really really dont like her have absolutely zero chill

- tumblr swifties are a lot better than instagram swifties

- i should have made some options on the poll which included being completely neutral/having no opinions on her as a person, thats my bad

- a lot of people think shes hot, regardless of their opinions on her or her music

- the main reasons, roughly in order, for people disliking her are:

1. her fans

2. the private jet thing

3. the matty healy thing

4. her having a white woman victim complex

5. her being a nepo baby (something i wasnt aware of before this poll)

6. her music being overplayed at peoples places of work (which is so valid, i cant listen to cardigan without wanting to die for this very reason!)

(there were other reasons people disliked her but these are main ones)

- a lot of people who said they didnt like her music did have one or two songs that they said were the exception. these are all the ones i saw specified:

- love story

- you belong with me

- innocent

- blank space

- look what you made me do

- bad blood

- the best day

- safe and sound

- no body no crime

- style

- anti-hero

- we are never ever getting back together

- tolerate it

- seven

- you're on your own kid

- long live

- never grow up

- also quite a lot of people said they disliked her music with the exception of one album. the albums i most saw specified for this were 1989, fearless and speak now.

- a lot of people, regardless of their overall opinion on her/her music dislike midnights

- a lot of people said they only liked her music up until red. alternatively, quite a lot people said they have only liked her music released since red.

- i learnt about gaylors (and kaylors) through this poll. i didnt really know that was a thing. it confuses me. (shoutout to the anon i got about it, i dont agree with you and dont really get it, but you were also one of the nicest people towards me on this poll so i very much appreciate that, thank you!)

- on that topic, everyone, regardless of their opinions on taylor, seems to be annoyed by gaylors. (except the gaylors themselves).

- i got frequently (and sometimes quite aggressively) accused of being a swiftie on this poll due to the range of options on it. im not actually a swiftie, im just bad at making polls! i have very complicated opinions on her that frequently change, which is the main reason i made the poll, i wont go into detail on my thoughts on her here (nor did i on the actual poll) but im happy to explain my thoughts fully if someone asks!

- finally, here are some tags that made me laugh!

and this tag, which might be the most baffing thing anyone has ever added to one of my posts:

theres probably more absolute gems hidden in the notes, but this poll got a lot of tags and replies and there was no way i could read everything!

thanks for reading and please dont take any of this too seriously, i made the poll due to my own curiosity and this post is just for anyone else interested!

[calico-eden]

people on twitter seem worried that, with Prime's multiple recent cancellations, Good Omens is at risk of getting axed too. i get where the fear is coming from but honestly? i'm not too worried about it. here's why.

if Amazon cancels GO, or decides not to renew it, they'd have shot themselves in the foot and fucked themselves right over. the show is incredibly popular, and there's absolutely no way they don't know that.

last week, the Amazon Prime account ran two polls, one on Twitter and one on Instagram, about what new seasons are on top of people's watchlists. i don't have any data from the Instagram story, since those disappear, but here's the Twitter one.

38,843 votes total, with 87% being Good Omens. that's around 33,790 votes. it's a fucking ridiculous number! that's 13,700-ish more people than the capacity of the 02 bloody Arena. it's an odd comparison but I don't know about many arenas. maybe they're not all unique voters, but my point is: it's a lot of god damn people.

nobody can say "but what if they're not looking at the fandom", because this is directly on the amazon studios account.

the official Good Omens twitter account consistently gets thousands of likes on every post they make, sometimes even getting into the 10 and 20 thousands. there's no way Amazon haven't noticed popularity like that.

many of these people (like me) may only use the service for watching GO. imagine losing that many users? even if those people still use Prime for buying things, there would be so much loss when it comes to Prime Video. and how likely do you think it'd be for fans to stop using prime video altogether in protest?

drifting away from the show and into the GO franchise as a whole, the kickstarter for the graphic novel? it's record breaking.

people love GO. the book, the show, the story, the characters... they love them all deeply, and god damnit they aren't afraid to show it. amazon would be stupid to cancel it, and they probably know that, so I don't think we need to worry.

let's not forget that there's currently a strike going on. until the studios meet their writers' and actors' very much more than fair demands, I think that very little is going to happen. support the strikers, and let's all hope they get everything that they need to live and work comfortably in their professions soon.

...of course, i could be wrong. i'm not worried, but i could be. however, i stand by it that cancelling it would be a right cock-up from amazon's end.

[mercurygray]

OKAY SO WE'RE DONE. Roughly 6.5K notes and 25,000 votes later.

To everyone in my comments saying 'lol you set this poll up wrong sample size is irrelevant no meaningful results' - thank you, I'm well aware I'm not a statistician. This is a poll on tumblr, for pete's sake. I'm not using it for anything important. I was bored earlier this week and one of my servers was having a really wild conversation about reading and finding fic and I wanted to hear what people had to say.

I don't actually care all that much about the percentages in the answers to the poll itself - I was pretty sure AO3 was going to win by a fair bit. I was more interested in the open ends - what everyone said when they reblogged it AND what they said about platforms I don't know about and don't use myself.

Yes, I'm aware that my idiot self left out fanfiction.net. People brought that up in the comments several times. I am aware. People who mentioned ff.net did so with a lot of nostalgia, yes, but also called out the site's limited tagging features for characters and genre selection as a plus, rather than a negative. They liked having a slightly more guided experience for classifying a story. They also brought up the fact that, before the ads started appearing, the site was actually pretty user friendly and had a clean text interface.

Other people in the comments had a lot of hate for Wattpad, but there are some folks who love it, too. More than several people brought up inline commenting - the ability to comment 'in real time' on a fic, which, admittedly, is a really cool feature. (These folks also talked about how much they hate the ads!)

People talked a lot about accessibility settings when they talked about AO3 - the ability to customize the site using plugins so that it would do something like dark mode or change the font. They talked about downloading fics to read on their e-reader of choice. There is a lot of love for tags and the search feature.

(It was also really nice to see all the folks in the comments who saw someone above them in the reblog chain pointing out how you could make a dark mode happen on AO3 if you didn't know already! This made my heart grow several sizes.)

Not too many people brought up the fact that I also skipped mentioning Twitter or Instagram, but one commenter did bring up the fact that they LIKE fics on Twitter because it breaks the text up and makes it easier for them to read, which I'd never thought about before. Textbreaks like that could be an accessibility feature!

Folks who like reading fic on Tumblr talked about low barriers to entry and making it easy to share something they liked. Lots of people also talked about losing something they liked reading and the lack of a cogent search feature - which is a known issue.

Folks who brought up dreamwidth or LJ (or several other 'threaded' comment-based platforms I'm not familiar with) spoke about the ability to continue a story in comments, about the culture of readers and writers in those spaces.

Everyone talked about losing their place in a fic, about losing a fic they liked, about losing track of authors. That, at least, is universal.

Anyway, thanks for sharing with me! I have to say getting this much emotion in my activity and replies was …probably not what I needed this week, but that's okay. I was just curious, and you all satisfied my curiosity tenfold. It was cool listening to everyone talk about something they love a lot.

This question is not about whether or not you enjoy the quality or quantity of the writing that's available there, but rather the experience of reading the fic.

If you reblog this, would love to hear reasons for why you like one platform over another.

[sa7abnews]

Celebrities have 'incredibly powerful' ability to influence election: Harvard study

New Post has been published on https://sa7ab.info/2024/08/16/celebrities-have-incredibly-powerful-ability-to-influence-election-harvard-study/

Celebrities have 'incredibly powerful' ability to influence election: Harvard study

Celebrities have a “powerful” ability to influence elections and increase voter turnout, a Harvard study found.”While some polling shows that people claim they aren’t influenced by celebrity voices when it comes to politics, more rigorous evidence indicates that these voices are incredibly powerful,” reads a study conducted by Harvard’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. “Nonprofits report higher rates of online voter registration or poll worker sign-ups when a celebrity promotes these calls to action. This potential impact is why nonprofits, candidates, and elected officials are increasingly seeking ways to engage celebrities.”Researchers working on the study analyzed the approaches of 15 managers, publicists, nonprofit partners, philanthropic advisers and celebrities, including well-known names such as Hailey Bieber, David Dobrik, Billie Eilish, Trevor Noah, Taylor Swift, Kerry Washington and The Roots co-founder and drummer Questlove.FOX NEWS POLL: NEW MATCHUP, SAME RESULT – TRUMP BESTS HARRIS BY ONE POINT “Celebrities, like all of us, face choices about how to engage in democracy. For example, they can serve as surrogates for political candidates, helping to ‘rally the base’ or reach new audiences,” the study reads, adding that there is also evidence that “celebrities can help with candidate fundraising, attracting large crowds to political events or volunteer shifts, which draws press attention.”Overall, the researchers found that celebrities are motivated to activism not only because of their beliefs, but because it can also be “good for their brands,” something that was supported by a previous study on the issue.”It helps your audience stay connected to you—a connection based on values, which humanizes an artist and a celebrity in a way that the audience then feels like they know you. And then, when your next film or album comes out, this audience that’s connected to you wants to support you, wants to show up,” Questlove’s Manager Dawn White told researchers.POLLING GURU CAUTIONS PUBLIC AGAINST OVER RELYING ON POLLS: IN LAST TWO ELECTIONS, ‘THEY UNDERESTIMATED TRUMP’ The study argues that the impact celebrities have can be massive, pointing to a 2018 Instagram story posted by Swift to her 112 million followers to register to vote at vote.org. That one post led to 65,000 new registrants in 24 hours and 250,000 over 72 hours.Swift has continued to make similar posts over the years since, while her following has more than doubled to 283 million over the same time period.Researchers found that celebrities have a more profound impact on “younger generations,” which are not as easy to reach through traditional “mainstream media and other get-out-the-vote efforts.””Their control of and presence on social media positions them as centralized sources of information to be tapped into and utilized by those looking to increase voter participation,” the study reads.However, the research also found that celebrity impact has been limited by a lack of organization, including a lack of formal programs that would allow them to test and track their efforts.”Consequently, there is an extraordinary opportunity and potential to grow, mature, and formalize celebrity civic engagement efforts, which can significantly impact civic culture,” the study included. “That being said, the available data indicate that some approaches work better than others.”

[newmusickarl]

5-9’s Album of the Month Podcast – Episode 9 Out Now!

The September review episode of the 5-9 Album of the Month Podcast is now available and as ever I take a seat alongside 5-9 Editor Andrew Belt and Check This Out’s Kiley Larsen to review five high profile album releases from the past month in music, and ultimately name one as our Album of the Month at the end of the discussion.

For this blockbuster episode, the five albums we discuss are:

Eat The Worm by Jonathan Wilson

The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We by Mitski

Strange Disciple by Nation of Language (poll winner, thanks for voting!)

This New Noise (Live) by Public Service Broadcasting

Everything Is Alive by Slowdive

If you want to listen to this or any previous episodes on Spotify simply click the link below, but also be sure to follow 5-9 Blog on Instagram and Twitter for more news and polls relating to the podcast, along with other great content like film reviews, sports articles and more.

Listen to the September 2023 episode here

Album & EP Recommendations

Paint My Bedroom Black by Holly Humberstone

If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you’ll know I’ve always been a champion of singer-songwriter Holly Humberstone’s music. Hailing from Grantham in Lincolnshire, which is halfway between my original hometown of Lincoln and my current city of Nottingham, she is the local pop star for which I’m always rooting. She has had quite the career so far too, having built a devoted national following off the back of her excellent early EPs and, more notably, winning the Brits’ Rising Star award just last year. Now the biggest test of her career to date has arrived in the form of her debut album and I’m pleased to say, it delivers.

A couple of weeks back, I was fortunate enough to hear some of this album in full before its release at one of Holly’s acoustic shows here in her spiritual home of Nottingham. It was great insight into the songwriting process, hearing the songs on this debut record stripped-back to their bare bones and learning more about the stories and context behind each song. As it turns out, there’s a lot in here with which I can relate – insecurities, heartbreak, loved ones moving halfway across the world, anxiety-fuelled nights spent in hotel rooms and crazy nightclub sessions around Nottingham. With that being the case, this album can’t help but resonate for me and I find myself keep getting drawn back in to the stories and songs Holly has collected on this solid debut outing.

If there is one criticism it is that on occasion the sheeny pop production can sometimes distract from Holly’s songwriting, but for the most part she manages to get the balance just right. The brilliant title track is the perfect way to kick off the record, with Holly channelling the infectious grooves of The 1975 as she describes a brutal break-up on what is one of the album’s biggest standouts. After that, the acoustic blues of Kissing In Swimming Pools, the uneasy isolation of Ghost Me (which describes a drunken karaoke night in Nottingham’s own Rescue Rooms) and the dynamic, almost grungy d4vd collaboration Superbloodmoon, all also striking a chord in the first half.

That said it’s the second half where this record really hits home, with single Antichrist leading the charge thanks to its moody production and anthemic chorus of “I gave you bad love only.” It then goes into Lauren, which may just be my favourite of the whole record and is certainly one of the strongest lyrically, with Holly wishing she “could rewind to every Rock City night” as she recalls a strained relationship with her friend. Flatlining then rides its hospital-heart-monitor-inspired beat before Elvis Impersonators sees Holly share how much she misses her sister now she has moved to Japan. The album is then brought to a beautifully understated close with popular recent single, Room Service.

When an artist has a couple of strong EPs and none of the tracks feature on the debut, you can sometimes worry that they may have burned through their best songs too soon. Thankfully that’s not the case and on Paint My Bedroom Black, Holly proves herself to be an inspired songwriter that is still only just getting things started.

Listen here

Javelin by Sufjan Stevens

However, arguably the biggest release of early October has been the tenth studio album from highly acclaimed singer-songwriter, Sufjan Stevens. In the days following its release, Sufjan dedicated Javelin to his “beloved partner and best friend Evans Richardson” who sadly died in April of this year. With that added context, it made an album that already felt emotionally shattering hit that much harder.

From the moment the cymbals crash and the synths reverberate around Sufjan’s cries of “You know I love you” on opener Goodbye Evergreen, you know you are in for something quite special yet also heartbreaking. Over the next run of tracks Sufjan continues to astound with his unceremonious yet majestic songcraft, as the uplifting instrumentation twinkles around Sufjan’s devastating penmanship on tracks like A Running Start, Genuflecting Ghost and Will Anybody Ever Love Me?

However as great as the first half is, it is the back stretch that left my jaw firmly on the floor. My Red Little Fox is a heartfelt, flute-laden hymnal whilst lead single So You Are Tired is a brutally beautiful, piano-led, string-drenched lament. The way Sufjan cathartically tackles his grief on these tracks is reminiscent to Nick Cave on albums like Skeleton Tree and Ghosteen, allowing his pain and sadness to unload through the words whilst using the music to ensure it never becomes too overwhelming for the listener.

I can’t leave this blog however without mentioning one track in particular – Shit Talk. Without a doubt one of the songs of the year, it is a near 9-minute masterpiece centred around a strikingly simple assembly of raw acoustic instrumentation, resonant human emotions, gorgeous choral harmonies and refrains of “I will always love you…I don’t wanna fight at all.” Utterly breathtaking in every single way.

For me this is a record that ranks right up there with Sufjan’s finest records like Illinoise and Carrie & Lowell, with the Michigan-born songwriter sadly always seeming to produce his best work in the wake of such tragic circumstances. A beautiful yet devastating record that I fully expect to clean-up on some of the year-end lists come December – and it would be fully deserved.

Listen here

Crazymad, For Me by CMAT

From Sufjan’s tenth album to Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson’s sophomore outing now and it’s another record full of high points. Having only just released her debut last year, the artist known as CMAT has wasted little time in delivering an assured follow-up that successfully builds on the foundations laid with her breakout first album.

It starts very strong with California and Phone Me both joyous, string-tinged pop anthems, before midway through Robbie-Williams-endorsed John Grant collaboration - Where Are Your Kids Tonight? - still shines bright. However once again it’s the latter section where my favourite tracks seem to appear, with the piano-driven I…Hate Who I Am When I’m Horny seeing CMAT bemoan herself and her love life. Most recent single Stay For Something is then my pick of the whole bunch, thanks to some wonderfully bluesy guitars and CMAT’s own impassioned vocal cries of “Have you found what you’re looking for?”

Whilst admittedly I hadn’t completely bought into the CMAT hype the first time around, there are plenty of moments on Crazymad, For Me that have already had me coming back for repeat spins. A brilliant follow-up from an artist who shows no signs of slowing down her ever-gathering momentum.

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I Don’t Want You Anymore by Cherry Glazerr

Whilst technically arriving right at the end of September, the fourth album from American rockers Cherry Glazerr is another record that has been in rotation during the start of this month. As ever from the Clementine Creevy-led trio, I Don’t Want You Anymore is packed with big guitar riffs and a splash of psychedelia, but with frontwoman Creevy showing more vulnerability in her lyrics this time around. It means the band’s music hits even harder than before, with songs like Addicted To Your Love, Ready For You, Sugar and the title track all standing out.

That said, it is the early Smashing Pumpkins-style roar of Touched You With My Chaos that rises highest, thanks to some seismic guitar work and Creevy’s anguished cries of “I said that I loved you.” Overall though it’s another tour de force from Cherry Glazerr, ideal if you want something with more of a punk edge in your headphones this month.

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Versions by The Anchoress

It would take an extraordinary artist to tackle such established, iconic tracks by the likes of Depeche Mode, New Order, Radiohead, Nirvana, The Cure and more, and then turn them into something that is entirely their own. Thankfully Catherine Anne Davies – better known as The Anchoress - is no ordinary artist.

This really is the ballsiest of projects as with the aptly-titled Versions, The Anchoress doesn’t shy away from taking on some of the best-known hits from some of the world’s biggest bands, putting herself at risk of being scoffed at by loyalists to the originals. However even the most-ardent fans surely can’t help but admire the perfect balance The Anchoress strikes on this project, managing to remain true to the original classics whilst enshrouding them in her own mesmerising sonic aura.

So, if you want to hear an Autumnal take on some familiar favourites, dive into this one.

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Re: This Is Why by Paramore

Then if you want more reimaginings, American rock behemoths Paramore also recently released a new version of their highly-acclaimed sixth album, This Is Why. A combination of remixes, covers and collaborations, as well as a demo for unreleased track Sanity, this new version is admittedly a mixed bag with some of these reimagined efforts destined to have you reaching for the original album instead. That said, there are some moments worth checking out, particularly in the back-end where the collaborations with Romy of The XX, bedroom-popstar Claud and Boygenius’ Julien Baker are as good - and in at lease one case a slight improvement on - the original versions of Liar, Crave and Thick Skull respectively. Elsewhere there’s not much else, except Wet Leg also seem better suited to a track like C’est Comme Ça too!

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The Rest EP by Boygenius

And whilst we’re on the subject of Boygenius, I will also give a quick mention to their new 4-track EP, The Rest. Whilst Boygenius’ debut album The Record still hasn’t resonated with me in the same way it has for some, the Autumnal weather has brought about a new appreciation that has helped it to grow on me since I first dove into it earlier on this year. Now to round off their colossal year, the beloved trio have gifted fans an additional batch of tracks that weren’t finished in time to make that much-hyped debut. It’s an EP where each member takes a turn at stealing the spotlight for a song, with the beautiful Lucy Dacus-led Afraid of Heights my personal pick of the bunch.

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Also worth checking out: The Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light by The Streets, Formentera II by Metric, Buy This Now! By Uni Boys

Tracks of the Week

Dancer by IDLES & LCD Soundsystem

On the singles front, it has been a fortnight of comebacks and collaborations, starting with this beast from post-punk favourites IDLES which dropped this week. Teaming up with none other than LCD Soundsystem, Dancer is the first single to be taken from their forthcoming fifth studio album, TANGK. With the new album described as a collection of love songs, Dancer is IDLES at their raucous best thanks to an instant chorus, a big bassline and those signature raw punk riffs.

Watch the entertaining video for the track here

Run Run Run by The Libertines

Also announcing their return, likely lads The Libertines have announced their first new album in 9 years will drop in March, titled All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade. Run Run Run is the opener to that upcoming record and it’s certainly a promising start, reminiscent of the quality you would expect during the band’s early 00s heyday.

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My Youngest Son Came Home Today by Billy Bragg & Michael Stipe

Celebrating 40 years in music, Billy Bragg is set to release his new album boxset The Roaring Forty at the end of the month, which features more than 300 tracks including highlights from each of Billy’s twelve studio albums, non-album singles and B-Sides, session tracks, rare live recordings, collaborations and previously unreleased material from across his career. To help promote it, he has widely released this collaboration with REM’s Michael Stipe for the first time, which is a haunting and timely cover of the Eric Bogle classic of the same name.

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Blanket / What Should I Do? by Kevin Abstract

Venturing out into his post-Brockhampton musical life, Kevin Abstract has announced his next solo record will be titled Blanket and arrives early next month. Most intriguingly the American rapper/singer-songwriter has stated the project was inspired by Sunny Day Real Estate, Nirvana and Modest Mouse, influences you can certainly hear on these first two teaser tracks. What Should I Do is a melodic, guitar-driven cut whilst Blanket even carries some shades of Blur’s Song 2 with its raw rock riffs and shouts of “WOO!”

Is a genre-bending affair imminent or is this a complete direction change altogether for Abstract? I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

Listen to Blanket here

Listen to What Should I Do here

Tantor by Danny Brown

Also dropping a new project in November (which is technically his second album of 2023 following the acclaimed JPEGMAFIA collab album, Scaring The Hoes) is Detroit rapper Danny Brown. Quaranta will be Danny’s first solo outing in four years, but this first taster track shows he hasn’t lost his step in the time he’s been away. Tantor intriguingly begins with the old internet dial-up tone, before a bizarre beat comes in, almost reminiscent of a TV theme you’d find on an old detective show. Wonderfully weird experimental rap as always from Danny Brown.

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The Hills by Rachel Chinouriri

Also releasing the first taste of her highly anticipated debut record which is rumoured to drop early next year, The Hills is one of British singer-songwriter Rachel Chinouriri’s most instantly anthemic tracks to date. Riding a wave of soaring guitars, it’s a song about feeling like you don’t belong, written whilst Rachel was recording in LA. Bring on the debut!

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Trust Exercises by Easy Life

And finally on the songs front this week, the Leicester-based band (now formally known as) Easy Life have been the talk of the music world the last few weeks. This follows the news that air travel company EasyJet were unjustly forcing them to change their band name, causing an awful set back for a band just trying to establish themselves and make their way in the music world. It’s another horrible story of a big corporate entity stifling creativity and I hope Easy Life manage to bounce back under their new guise. In the meantime, they were at least able to have a triumphant headline show as Easy Life for one final time, whilst also releasing this single. So help them out and go give it a spin!

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Also worth checking out: Mud by bdrmm, To Do List (After The Breakup) by Blossoms, DArkSide by Bring Me The Horizon, HEAVEN’S GALAXY by Kid Cudi, Long Way by Lonely The Brave, Shame by Lauren Mayberry, I Can’t See Past Monday by Lossline

REMINDER: If you use Apple Music, you can also keep up-to-date with all my favourite 2023 tracks through my Best of 2023 playlist. Constantly updated throughout the year with songs I enjoy, it is then finalised into a Top 100 Songs of the Year in December.

Add the playlist to your library here