#i fucking love drawing lizards they’re so simple yet fun

[lesbokyoko]

whenever i’m in my therapy sessions i just go ham in drawing slug cats and lizards its so fun

[interesting-blog-name]

LOOSE REVIEWS (It Looks Sad., Pablo’s Paintings, Vancouver Sleep Clinic, Steve Lacy)

Just a bunch of very quick, very throwaway reviews that I put together while I’m writing the Björk discography post (I’m currently at Vespertine, so this shit is gonna take a while). Mostly slightly underground bands, all very short projects and one of them don’t even have a project, but you should check them out. Anyway.

It Looks Sad. – Songs For Quarantine

Not much to say about this. It is a 9-minute EP, obviously not meant to be taken as a serious, ambitious release, but it’s from a band I wanted to check out: It Looks Sad.. They’re categorized as emo, but their style reminds the listener a lot more of shoegaze and dream pop, at least from what I’ve heard by them (right now, this and Drool, which fits cozily in my Summer playlist).

If you want some moody music for the quarantine (if it’s still going on by the time I post this) and you don’t care if the songs sound like they were recorded in an underwater cave, then go ahead and listen to this I guess. It’s average as fuck but whatever, that’s the point.

 WORST TO BEST: Eyes, Love, Waves, Bug

 bedroom music/10

“*insert shoegaze mumbling here*”

 It Looks Sad. - Kaiju

2015 EP. Two tracks, one sucks and the other is tolerable. Like I really don’t know what the fuck the singer was trying to do with Creature, he’s hollering all over the place, and the delivery would be more at home in maybe some poorly-recorded punk song, but the instrumental is nothing like that, as it’s pretty much indie-rock 101; not to mention the lyrics, which are the blandest broken-hearted songwriting I’ve heard yet, probably. I now understand how truly emo they were.

For Nagoya, I can at least say the hook is pretty cool, but that’s it really. I guess I’m grateful they changed their style.

 2.45/10

“Best friend this is terrible. You know it’s inevitable. I hope you come back, I hope he comes back.”

 Pablo’s Paintings

Just wanted to give a shoutout to the underground Leeds, Yorkshire band Pablo’s Paintings. I had listened to Lizard a long while ago, and loved it, so I decided to check out the rest of their stuff today (May 25th), and it’s very solid. The track You’ve Got A Long Way To Go draws heavily from a psychedelic influence, while Paint’s Gone Dry and So Long (All Your Friends) sound like something The Beatles would maybe write.

I guess you could call them formulaic, but their mixing and distinct sound are all pretty good for a band that hasn’t gotten a song with over 2000 streams on Spotify. Their songs can be a little to bubblegum-ish, such as So Long (All Your Friends) which doesn’t really stand out as many others, but for the most part, they deliver. Can I Draw You Something? has a slight edge to it, in comparison, but still sporting cute lyrics about just drawing for someone, and Ghost In The Machine has a great progression to it, and a very cool cover art to accompany it. It’s clear the band has a taste for visual arts, from the lyrics to the band’s name.

In short, they do have a long way to go, and I hope they release an album soon, considering all but two of their Spotify singles were from last year; I’d be the first to listen to it.

 WORST TO BEST: So Long (All Your Friends), Paint’s Gone Dry, You’ve Got A Long Way To Go, Can I Draw You Something?, Lizard, Ghost In The Machine

 good band check them out/10

“I draw these lines and take them for a walk. I find that I say things better when I don’t need to talk”

 Vancouver Sleep Clinic – Winter

Contrary to the name, the band Vancouver Sleep Clinic is from Australia. Led by ambient singer (a term I didn’t know existed until today) Tim Bettinson, from my understanding, the band have partly built their audience by reeling people into the music by putting having the songs feature in TV shows and movies and whatnot, since there’s a hefty list of times their songs have appeared in this type of media on their Wikipedia page. I decided to listen to Winter because I discovered Stakes from the fact that the $uicideboy$ sampled it on the song Sold My Soul To Satan Waiting In Line At The Mall, and liked it a lot. The EP as a whole, however, not nearly as much.

To start off with the main problem I have with Winter, the tracks are all the same. Seriously, I cannot distinguish one from the other; all the songs are soaked in reverb and mainly center around simple acoustic guitar chords and generic pianos, mixed with Tim’s head voice and sometimes the dumb decision to include a synthesized drumming track, like in Vapour, where the fast-paced hi-hats sound so out of place and clip so badly in your ears, it sounds like your earphones are having a mini seizure, but not in a cool way. Meanwhile in Flaws, there’s this unnecessary, wack finger-snapping that makes it sound like I’m listening to some techno song with around 3000 views on YouTube (I do like his backing vocals in the track though).

At its best, tracks like the opener, Collapse, offer an actually powerful passage, in that song’s case, the hook breakdown, where the 808 drum patterns are actually very welcome, and the synths under it are very beautiful and harmonize really well. The final track, Rebirth, also attempts a grand breakdown of sorts, but falls flat because the song is so unnecessarily stretched out and weirdly segmented, and it’s so unexpected: the song is a slow piano/guitar ballad as usual, and then, around 3 minutes in, after the song fades out almost entirely and tricks you into thinking it ended, the drum kicks start rising and all of a sudden there’s... something? I don’t even know what instruments are playing apart from the  superimposed drums and what I think is an electric guitar, because it sounds like god knows what, an overheating computer mixed with some shrieking sound, which I assume is the guitar, way off in the background. And then Tim sings a last verse and the song suddenly ceases to exist. Same thing happens with the shortest track here, (Aftermath), consisting of 4 lines, your average piano and strings, and of course, the reverb. It builds up an epic instrumental, and after the brief singing section, just ends. No further instrumental work, just woosh. It’s gone.

I will give credit to Tim’s verses. Even though they’re always delivered with the same intonation, his lyrics are alright, and at least in Stakes, he employs some backing vocals that really make the track, and the hook is magnificent. They tend to blend into one another, with constant themes being metaphors for words he should have or regrets saying, the cold (obviously, given the EP title), sometimes drowning/large bodies of water, and of course, all tracks are about melancholy and heartbreak. But in some parts of the EP, his verses really do feel like some alright poetry, such as the awkward last verse in Rebirth (“I’m starting again, tearing my flesh, stripped to the bone, the all that I’ve grown. Leaving behind, breathe like a child. It’s taken the winter to find who I am”) or the already mentioned beautiful hook in Stakes. In most of the songs, however, I find his themes to be too repetitive and, I wouldn’t say uninspired, but run-of-the-mill.

So overall, the EP doesn’t amount to much. All the tracks attempt to go this emotional route, but they’re very repetitive, and that numbs them and robs them of their emotion a lot. Listen to it if you want to relax, or maybe even sleep to it if you want to take their name literally.

 WORST TO BEST: Vapour, Flaws, (Aftermath), Rebirth, Collapse, Stakes

 4/10

“I sunk in oceans blue, now they’re all frozen over. I should have took your hand, we should have crossed the border.”

 Steve Lacy – Steve Lacy’s Demo

Member of The Internet, singer-songwriter, guitarist, bassist, drummer and producer Steve Lacy is an artist I’ve wanted to check out for a while. I have at some point in my life heard his song Looks, off this demo, but thankfully I forgot how it went so I can check it out again. It’s gonna be a quick listen and review, but I’m curious (and while looking him up I found out he won a Grammy with Kendrick’s DAMN., for producing, backing vocals and songwriting, so that’s cool, congrats Steve).

Right away, I’ll just mention this project is very lo-fi. As in, the drums and his voice are poorly mixed. I’ll give it a little bit of a pass because this man played all the instruments in here and I appreciate the fuck out of that, but anyway. You can tell right at the first track that singing isn’t Steve’s forte, at least in this album, at this time. The hook in that song is just bad, the good part are the instruments, the guitar riffs and the very dynamic bassline, plus the fun little bongos. However, just like all songs here except Dark Red, this is waaaaaaaay too short. It has two short hooks, the verse, and that’s it. The songwriting, I feel, is one of Steve’s more substantial talents; this song I just mentioned is mainly about how a relationship can’t progress because the two involved don’t like much about each other apart from their looks, and Ryd is all about taking a girl to your backseat, but even though these themes are very simplistic, Steve fleshes them out into something more interesting and melodically rich. In Ryd, his smooth vocals surf over the sunny riffs, but what takes away from it are the weirdly mixed drums, as they sound like they’re playing way louder than they should be. The track is groovy though.

The most focused song here, Dark Red, tells the story of a man who’s worried his girl might leave him soon. The instrumentals are nothing special, very basic, and same with the vocals, even though they’re more rooted and solid in this song. The next song, Thangs, emphasizes its bass way more than other songs, but once again, Steve’s voice is not pleasing to listen to, specifically his high-pitched backing vocals, they’re awful. The lyrics are the most basic here, and this song just goes by without leaving any impact after ending pretty abruptly.

Haterlovin is weird. The vocals are way too low, but I like how they differentiate themselves by not going the melodic route, instead Steve chooses to rap them, and his flow in the verse is impressive, but at the same time the hook is way too repetitive for the song to work, and even though it’s nice he switched up and focused the track on the drums, it still leaves it pretty bare.

To close it up, Some brings some promise, with a pretty funky bassline and hook, but then ends out of nowhere and starts a hidden track, Snaily, which I admit has nice falsetto vocals from Steve, but I don’t know why I couldn’t be a separate track. Overall, the album isn’t great, but I appreciate how organic and talented Steve is. Throughout the songs, his creativity is pretty noticeable, so I can’t hate his efforts, but unfortunately his ideas don’t find the right light to shine here.

 WORST TO BEST: Thangs, Haterlovin, Looks, Some, Dark Red, Ryd

 4.5/10

“Next thing I know she was feeling on me, and I was in the M double-O D when she said park my car down the backstreet”

[jeonggukkiepabo]

DIE FOR ME [KTH] 🪐 TEASER

SUMMARY: Jeongguk and you have always been known as Ying & Yang, him, the nature witch, holding the power of everything that’s tied to the ground and you, the cosmic witch, having the sky, stars and planets on your side.

Ever since being little, the both of you have been interested in black magic, practicing it secretly to get better at it, summoning ghosts and casting curses over people that made your lives difficult. But this is going to be bigger, better and more dangerous. Jeongguk’s boyfriend of almost two years cheated on him with that stupid witch Jimin whose power it is to talk to animals… he’s nothing special, yet Namjoon fucked him. And Jeongguk wants revenge. He’s going to summon Asmodeus, using the demon prince’s powers to get his revenge on both Namjoon and Jimin.  What kind of twin sister would you be without offering your help?  During the progress of summoning, you accidentally cut yourself and some of your blood goes into the offering bowl, mixing with the herbs - but neither of you realize it. Asmodeus is summoned successfully, but your blood in the offering bowl brought a little twist into the situation.

GENRE: Halloween  🪐 Smut  🪐 some sort of e2l  🪐 angsty 

WARNINGS: revenge, dark magic, mentions of blood, a lot of sexual content, mentions of hell, major character death

AUTHOR’S NOTE: this fic is going to be part of @ksmutclub​s annual monster smash collab! i’m so excited to be part of it again. i hope y’all are as thrilled as i am for many spooky fics, hehe.

WILL BE RELEASED ON OCTOBER 31ST

“This is everything we need, right? Wait, did you pack the lizard tail? You know which, the yellow one, not the green-” “God, Jeongguk. Yes, I brought everything you told me. I was in a rush, you know how mom is, she knew that something is going on so I told her Yoongi sent me to grab some herbs and animal ingredients for his potions.”

You groan as you drop your heavy bag in front of your twin brother who’s currently busy with drawing different runes and lines onto the floor. With goat blood.

“This is always the most disgusting part of rituals. Goat blood smells and it’s like the goat is still talking to me,” Jeongguk scrunches his sensitive nose as he dips his finger back into the bucket of blood. As a nature witch, Jeongguk has a deep bond with animals and plants, being able to communicate with them and feel whatever they’re feeling. He’s basically able to control everything that belongs to the earth, it’s almost like he’s tied to it.

And then there’s you, the cosmic witch. The Yang to Jeongguk’s Ying. The universe is your source of power; planets, skies and stars are allowing you to cast spells and strengthen them. Whilst Jeongguk harbors the Sun; it is the Moon that is your main source for reloading and storing your energy until you're ready to use it.

“It’s always the dark spells that contain some disgusting smelling things. Remember the time we used the cow’s tongue for that one spell we casted on Hyunjin? The one he got acne from,” You giggle at the fun memory, how one of your past crushes declined your cinema invitation and ended up with a year of acne because you were too proud to accept a simple ‘no’. Instead, Jeongguk and you, both 15 years old and happy to finally have a reason to use black magic, cursed the poor boy and ruined any other of his dating experiences for the next few months. 

Jeongguk groans at the thought, shaking his head with yet another nose scrunch. “I remember that I hated every second of it, thanks to you and your stupid Hyunjin. I don’t even know what the tongue’s use was. Now, can you hand me the lizard tail and the crushed orchid leaves and the fresh birdsfoot trefoil blossoms? At least they smell good.” He quickly wipes his hands from all the blood and walks over to the simmering cauldron. “I wonder why they need orchids instead of roses, aren’t those supposed to be the flowers that are used in every love potion?” You ask as you slowly add the ingredients into the cauldron, curiously watching your twin’s hand motions. 

“Mhm, but roses mean commitment and… well, current love. I did love Namjoon, but him and Jimin deserve everything but love. Hence the orchid, they’re known to withdraw strength and magical powers. Poor Jimin won’t be able to talk to his stupid animals anymore. 

The birdsfoot trefoil stands for revenge. Namjoon doesn’t ever deserve to love or use his cock again. I wonder if he topped Jimin… Poor Alpha wolf Namjoon, didn’t even want to use his knot on me but getting on his fours for me like an Omega in heat.” Jeongguk chuckles as he mumbles one last spell to finish the potion, ready to use now.

“Ew, Gguk, no sex talk in front of me, okay? Let me cast my spell on the offering bowl, then we can transfer the potion.” You grab the golden bowl and place it on Saturn’s rune, smiling as it lightens up under your touch. Whispering kind words and your affection towards the planet, you ask it for help in this special situation, knowing that the planets will always be on your side, whether it’s black or white magic.

What you don’t realize is the small drop of blood from where you’ve accidentally cut yourself before running down your middle finger and into the offering bowl. 

Out of the corner of your eye you can see Jeongguk lighting some more candles with his fingertips, smiling at the progress both you and your twin made during the years. Twins are always known to be more powerful than other siblings, sharing special powers. They’re known to be gifted with opposite magical elements; water and fire, planet and galaxy, earth and air. It’s no secret that you’re strong, but ‘regular’ magic has never been enough for you. Craving more and more power, Jeongguk brought up his interest in black magic when you were 7, having heard of it from school literature and the hushed words of your coven - all you’ve known back then is how dangerous black magic is and that it’s strictly forbidden.

There wasn’t anyone to teach you the casts and spells from the ‘forbidden’ books, so the only logical thing to do for two curious kids was secretly hunting the coven library for information.

You were 9 when the first spell of black magic passed your lips, successfully turning the old neighbor’s cat into a turtle - for no particular reason, Jeongguk just hasn’t seen a real turtle before and was curious.

Years and years of practise and sleepless nights were really worth it, even though nobody could ever know about it (nobody but Yoongi, who’s usually the one to cover you and the weird ingredients you need for your spells). 

“Okay, I’m done. Come here, Gguk.” You grab your twin’s hand and close your eyes once you’re settled in front of the circle. Jeongguk squeezes your hand slightly to show you that you’re in this together (because dealing with demons will always be scary to the both of you) and starts counting down from three so you can start to cast the spell together.

You’ve never really summoned a demon that dangerous before, especially not one of the seven demon princes. 

Asmodeus is the one you’re calling for, demon of revenge and lust, the perfect saviour to fulfill Jeongguk’s plan. Revenge on Namjoon who has cheated on your poor twin with Jimin. 

Usually Jeongguk isn’t one for revenge or hate, but Namjoon has really hurt him… and Jeongguk isn’t one to just sit there broken hearted and cry, no. He wants Namjoon to feel the same pain he felt (for a few days, before he decided on summoning Asmodeus). 

You strengthen your hold on Jeongguk’s hand as soon as you feel the familiar rush of heat, as you sense the disgusting smell of boiling goat blood.

The energy in the room shifts, but it’s not like the movies where demon’s appear out of smoke, no. 

You’re not even sure if it’s really Asmodeus who’s suddenly sitting in the circle, cross-legged and a curious look on his face, eyes wide open.