#it's so fascinating to me how much he's able to communicate through lyrics that apparently he can't in words

[asurrogateblog]

sometimes I forget that 'dear friend' was written when john was very much still alive and listening to that. he already thought every other song was secretly about him how on earth was he supposed to interpret that other than what it obviously is. how are we supposed to interpret that other than what it obviously is

[dweemeister]

The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T (1953)

Theodore Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, remains best-known for his children’s books. The Cat in the Hat; Green Eggs and Ham; and Oh, the Places You’ll Go! are household names in English-language literature. Seuss’ bibliography overshadows his work in films, beginning with the adapted screenplay of his own book, The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins (1943) – directed by George Pal as part of the Puppetoons series. During WWII, Seuss was heavily involved in propaganda films and the Private Snafu (1943-1946) military training films. After the war’s end, Seuss returned to writing children’s books, but also continued to write for movies. The Academy Award-winning animated short film Gerald McBoing-Boing (1950) benefitted from Seuss’ story work, and Seuss’ success there inspired him to write a screenplay for a live-action fantasy film. That screenplay – the unwieldy rough draft coming in at over 1,200 pages – was The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. The eventual movie, produced by Stanley Kramer (1960’s Inherit the Wind, 1961’s Judgment at Nuremberg) and directed by Roy Rowland (1945’s Our Vines Have Tender Grapes, 1956’s Meet Me in Las Vegas) for Columbia Pictures, would be Seuss’ only involvement in a non-documentary feature film.

Like many who speak English as their first language, Dr. Seuss’ books graced my early childhood. So integral to numerous children’s youth is Seuss that his whimsy, wordplay, and authorial stamps are easily recognizable. In that spirit, the cinematic record of live-action Seuss adaptations consists of the scatological Jim Carrey in How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) and the visual nightmare that is Mike Myers as The Cat in the Hat (2003). Compared to the original works, both films are ungainly, casually cruel, and overcomplicated. Not promising company for Dr. T. But even taking into account the three animated feature adaptations of Seuss – Horton Hears a Who! (2008), The Lorax (2012), and The Grinch (2018) – and the fact that Columbia forced wholesale deletions from the rough draft script of Dr. T to achieve a feasible runtime, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T is arguably the most faithful feature adaptation to Dr. Seuss’ authorial intent and signature aesthetic.

In other words, this is one of the strangest films you may ever encounter. No synopsis I could write in one paragraph will ever capture the film’s bizarreries.

Little Bart Collins (Tommy Rettig) is asleep during piano practice and his teacher, Dr. Terwilliker (Hans Conried), is furious. His overworked, widowed mother Heloise (Mary Healey) intuits Terwilliker’s unrealistic expectations (Terwilliker wants to teach the next Paderewski) towards Bart’s piano skills and inability to concentrate. Heloise also appears to be quietly eyeing the plumber August Zabladowski (Peter Lind Hayes) and his wrench. With the lesson done for the day, Bart falls asleep again. This time, he dreams that Terwilliker is now the leader of the Terwilliker Institute, a pianist supremacy mini-state which is built upon five hundred young pianist slave boys (hence, 5,000 fingers) forcibly playing Terwilliker’s latest compositions. His mother is Terwilliker’s unwilling, hypnotized assistant and plumber August Zabladowski (Hayes is essentially playing the same character, but in a different world) is Bart’s only ally around. Together, Bart and Mr. Zabladowski must evade the Institute’s guards as they attempt to undermine Terwilliker’s plans for his next concert.

In its final form, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T is a muddled mess of a story. The analogues between Bart’s reality and his dreams are inconsistent, several would-be subplots never resolve (or at the very least develop beyond a basic idea), and the film’s initial lightness is subject to rapid mood swings that make this picture feel disjointed. Indeed, Seuss’ sprawling social commentary in his first draft – including allegories and themes of post-WWII totalitarianism, anti-communism, and atomic annihilation – is in tatters in this final product. The viewer will witness brief fragments of those ideas, remaining in this movie as the barest of hints of the contents of the original screenplay’s rough draft. Even now, Dr. T inspires psychiatric analyses and accusations that Bart’s relationship with his mother reveals signs of an Oedipal complex (to yours truly, the latter is too much of a reach). The grim nature of Terwilliker Institute renders Dr. T unsuitable for the youngest children. For older children and adults, try going into this movie without expectations of narrative logic and embrace the grotesque aspects that only Seuss could imagine.

If my attempts to describe this movie’s preposterousness through its narrative and screenwriting approach have failed, perhaps I can capture that for you by writing on its technical features.

For its sheer narrative inventiveness – inconsistencies, abrupt tonal shifts, nonsense, and Rowland’s uninspired direction aside – The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T is nevertheless an ambitious film, and Columbia bequeathed a hefty budget to match that ambition. Much of that budget went to the film’s visuals. This is an extravagantly-staged motion picture, as nothing could do Dr. Seuss’ illustrations justice without fully committing to his geometric impossibilities: skyward ladders and improbable connections between rooms, an eschewal of right angles and straight lines, and architecture bound to raise the ire of physics teachers. One could compare this to German Expressionism, but Dr. T’s sets tend not to dictate the film’s mood nor are they subject to high-contrast lighting. Seuss went uncredited as the concept artist on Dr. T, and it was up to Clem Beauchamp (1935’s The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, 1952’s High Noon) and the uncredited matte artists to commit those visuals to the real world. Outside of animated film, Beauchamp and the matte artists succeed in creating twisted sets that seem to leap off the pages of Seuss’ most artistically interesting books. Some of the sets appear too stagebound, but the production design accomplishes its need to resemble a world borne from a fever dream (or, at least, a young pianist’s nightmare).

This movie’s outrageous costume design (other than Jean Louis’ gowns for Mary Healey, the costume designer/s for this film are uncredited) comprises absurd uniforms and two of the most ludicrous hats – the “happy fingers” cap (see photo at the top of this write-up) and whatever the hell Terwilliker dons in the film’s climax – one might ever see in a film. Most of the costumes are laughably impractical and ridiculous to even those without fashion sense. In what might be the tamest example, while working under Terwilliker, Bart’s mother wears a suit that is all business formal on the left-hand side and bare-shouldered, sleeveless, and nightclub-y on the right. The delineation of real life – which barely features in the film’s eighty-nine minutes – and this world of Bart’s dreams could not be any more unambiguous thanks to the combination of the production and costume design work.

The disappointing musical score by Fredrich Hollaender (1930’s The Blue Angel, 1948’s A Foreign Affair) and song lyrics by Seuss rarely connects to the larger narrative unfolding. Seven songs make the final print, with nine (yikes!) Hollaender-Seuss songs ending up on the cutting room floor. Seuss’ wordplay is evident, as are Hollaender’s melodic flourishes. Columbia, a studio not known for its musicals, assembled a 98-piece orchestra – the largest musical ensemble to work on a Columbia film at the time – for The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T alone. That lush sound is apparent throughout for the numerous nonsense songs that color the score in addition to the incidental score. It is unusual to listen to a collection of novelty songs orchestrated so fully. Listen to “Dressing Song: Do-Mi-Do Duds” and its complicated, seeming unsingable lines:

Come on and dress me, dress me, dress me In my peek-a-boo blouse With the lovely inner lining made of Chesapeake mouse! I want my polka-dotted dickie with the crinoline fringe For I'm going doe-me-doe-ing on a doe-me-doe binge!

The rich orchestration seems to hail from a more lavish film. But too many of these songs are scene-specific, and rarely does Hollaender utilize musical quotations from these songs into his score. “Get Together Weather” is delightful, but it seems so isolated from the rest of the film; elsewhere, “The Dungeon Song” exemplifies a macabre side to Seuss seldom appearing in his books. Nevertheless, Hollaender is able to demonstrate his playfulness across the entire film, none moreso during any scene with the bearded, roller-skating twins and the “Dungeon Ballet”, in which the music complements stunning choreography and fascinating props that recall the jingtinglers, floofloovers, tartookas, whohoopers, slooslunkas, and whowonkas from the Christmas television special How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966). Yet, Hollaender’s film score and the soundtrack with Seuss seems to demand something – anything – to tie the entire compositional effort together. Perhaps a song or some cue like that was cut from the film, which is ultimately to its detriment.

Hans Conried (who starred as Captain Hook in Disney’s Peter Pan several months prior to Dr. T’s release) stands out from a decidedly average Peter Lind Hayes and Mary Healey – Hayes and Healey, in a sort of in-joke, were married. Conried’s performance as the sadistic, torture- and imprisonment-happy music teacher can be considered camp, but this is anything but “bad” camp. He throws himself completely into this cartoonish role, sans shame, complete with mid-Atlantic accent, and topped off with exaggerated facial and physical acting that fits this fantasy. As Bart, child actor Tommy Rettig (best known as Jeff Miller on the CBS television series Lassie) seems more assured in his performance than most child performers his age during the 1950s. His fourth wall-breaking asides seem more appropriate in a Bugs Bunny cartoon, but Rettig makes it work, and inhabits Bart’s flaws wonderfully.

Columbia demanded numerous reworkings of Seuss’ script, leading to several reshoots – most notably the opening scene (Seuss opposed the conceit of Bart’s dream framing the film) – and a ballooning budget. Upon its release in the summer of 1953, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T bombed at the box office and was assailed by critics. A crestfallen Seuss, who could not stand the production difficulties that beset the film from the start of shooting, would never work in feature films again. He would dedicate himself almost entirely to writing and illustrating children’s books, with many of his most popular titles (including The Cat in the Hat, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, and Green Eggs and Ham) published within a decade of Dr. T’s critical and commercial failure. His hesitance to participate in filmmaking informed his reluctance to allow Chuck Jones to adapt How the Grinch Stole Christmas! thirteen years later. Animation suited his books, Seuss thought, and he would never again pay any consideration to live-action filmmaking.

The reevaluation of The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T has seen a rehabilitation of the film’s image in recent decades. Home media releases and television showings have introduced the film to viewers not influenced by the hyperbolic negativity of the film critics working in 1953. This is not a sterling example of Old Hollywood fantasy filmmaking, due to a heavily gutted screenplay, scattershot thematic development, and incongruent musical score. Yet, the movie’s surrealistic charms and Seussian chaos know no peers, even in the present day.

My rating: 7/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found in the “Ratings system” page on my blog (as of July 1, 2020, tumblr is not permitting certain posts with links to appear on tag pages, so I cannot provide the URL).

For more of my reviews tagged “My Movie Odyssey”, check out the tag of the same name on my blog.

[romanceboys]

(interview) vogue korea april issue 2020 - perfect taemin

1. superm was another chance for taemin’s ever-evolving performance to be showcased. i thought a lot about how to create synergy with these exceptional performers. to put it simply, i wanted us to come off as energetic. but these days i’ve had a change of heart. our identity is definitely important. rather than just working hard, for superm to show off their colours well we need to show our personalities; we should be seen as one team. to be able to formulate a solid and clear colour is our homework. that’s why it’s regrettable. we couldn’t come up with a novel choreography to carry our new identity. we tried a lot in the practice room. superm seems to have found its musical identity but hasn’t gotten a hold of its performance character yet. the stages are too vague. 2. now that you are finally promoting with your best friend kai in one group, you two must’ve shared your concerns. since this friend is someone who has a lot of passion and ambition, he talks about various things. for instance, this style is pretty good, this choreography is quite trendy. thanks to him i’ve learned a lot. he is also very knowledgeable about the latest ‘hottest’ genres. we talk about these things often and even watch videos together. kai gives off ‘popular’ vibes. compared to him, my interests are quite unusual. nowadays kai is interested in music while i am into science. 3. is it science fiction? these days we’ve been watching videos on the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics together. 4. what aspect of it interested you? originally i was very curious, after seeing a recommended video on youtube i learned about quantum mechanics for the first time. i couldn’t understand the explanation, even those who were explaining it said it was a difficult concept. that was very fascinating to me. kind of like magic.  5. are you reading books on the subject too? the subjects of the books i read are different (laughs). there’s a book that was published long ago called ‘regarding the pain of others.’ it is a pessimistic book that gathers contradictory opinions of people for instance ‘people find joy in the pain of others, it is instinctual.’ as a celebrity, there are times when you are criticized but there are also times when you receive comfort from people. rather than blaming others, while reading this book, i began to think ‘people are like that, at most i shouldn’t behave like them.’ my interests are all over the place. 6. what makes you and kai click? we converse well. our opinions almost never clash and we respect each other. moreover, we fully understand our own roles in superm. 7. what position do you hold in superm? since i can’t ask if it’s the main dancer. in pictures and interviews, i’m the center. baekhyun hyung is the leader (laughs). 8. when the conversation wasn’t flowing well during the talkshow interview, i saw you neatly concluding it.  that does happen. nct and wayv are still in the learning phase. that’s why i first listen to all of their thoughts during interviews then flesh it out with details later. 9. compared to when you set out abroad as shinee then promoting overseas as superm now, the status of k-pop has changed. looking at how superm was able to start off with an arena tour in the us and europe made me feel that k-pop is a ‘hot’ topic. in the past, we’d use venues of this scale for smtown concerts. even if you promote mainly in asia, seeing the audience section will make you realise the perception of k-pop has changed. 10. though k-pop’s scope has expanded and diversified, its definition has become simple. what are your concerns? my first concern is language. after i was able to communicate via language during my japanese activities, there were so many advantages. though each country overseas has its own language, i felt that i needed to learn english first. there are many international fans who want to experience the chemistry between our members, they’d feel much closer to us if we communicated using (a common) language. k-pop isn’t one dimensional. it’s not only about the music, there is music video, style, etc. included. people would make dance covers in the past, now they even emulate the styling. all of this is korean pop culture. 11. superm were on the ellen degeneres show and jimmy kimmel live. before we went on the ellen show we really rehearsed the interview a lot. america’s atmosphere is different so you receive questions that are never asked in korea. they don’t disclose the questions in advance either. we were also worried because the emcee could ad-lib. we came up with the most probable questions and practiced, we also received lessons from american comedians. compared to that, we went on jimmy kimmel live without any prep. 12. what went according to plan and what didn’t? the questions were not as intense as expected, ellen was well aware about k-pop culture so it went smoothly. 13. is there a dance genre you’re into these days? contemporary, lyrical hiphop, in the future as superm i think i’ll be able to show more, not the kind of dancing that you do after learning a given choreography but the kind that is full of emotions. it’s about giving meaning to your gestures. it isn’t out yet but my concert vcr features lyrical hiphop. in it i think i’m dancing alone with a giant full moon as my backdrop but get confused when there are two of us, either it’s another person or a shadow. a choreographer with a body type similar to mine had to dress in all black to come across as my shadow. i wore an oriental outfit with smokey makeup. 14. how do you usually come up with your ideas? i get inspired by the choreographers and creative directors. i imagine it as we converse then the idea develops. 15. was there a time you were inspired by fashion? of course. art begins with the five senses. what you see with your eyes, the things you can feel, clothes, food, perfume, music that you listen to are all sources of inspiration. i create private accounts to follow fashion brands. 16. having debuted at the age of 16, you are still young but your work experience has been long. i was in certain situations because of this. it doesn’t happen as often now but even in my early 20s, i completely belonged to the senior category at broadcasting stations. they are my juniors but many of them are also hyungs, i’m their senior but i’m also the youngest. now there are even staff members who are younger than me. they’re too formal with me (laughs). 17. are there juniors that ask you for advice or help? the superm members! especially ten, he is very curious. when we come out of a company meeting, he’ll get surprised and say “wow, hyung everything you said was right.” i even hear things like ‘veteran’ and ‘seer.’ apparently my predictions come true. but i try not to advise them as much. taking the initiative to say something feels overwhelming. 18. born in 1993 between millennials and gen z, do you share any characteristics with those in your age bracket? we’ve picked out a few of their traits. the first one is ‘they don’t eat fast food.’ me too! i took care of my health well ever since i started out with shinee. i was brainwashed from home to avoid foods that harmed the body. not even ramyeon, snacks were also banned. and just like that in my 20s i started carrying out the regime on my own. it’s become a habit to look after my health ever since i moved out. i always eat things that are good for my body, if the hyungs are taking vitamins, i’d ask for one too. 19. i suddenly recall a variety show where you were the only one who skipped the sauce and ate the meat on its own! one should not eat irritable foods. my mother’s words. 20. how about ‘they watch videos on youtube rather than tv. even the ads don’t particularly bother them.’ that’s right. i watch youtube more often than tv, while watching the ads i'd even marvel at their production quality. i’ve signed up for the premium package now so i don’t see the ads anymore. 21. ‘marrying or wanting to buy their own house.’ i currently live alone and i have no interest in decking out my house. at first, i didn’t think like that but a month later my interest dissipated. i’m lazy. it’s not like my house is for others to see, i’m fine with the incomplete feeling for now. 22. and finally ‘they avoid investing in financial companies.’ i don’t do that. my parents manage that, if there’s a good tip i’ll just let them know.  23. hiphop musicians tend to express their success through music. as an idol musician how have you been using the wealth you accumulated all these years? i invest in food instead of saving up (laughs). honestly, i don’t spend much. i don’t have anything i want. though i do spend on others a lot. 24. what kind of household did you grow up in? what gifts did you inherit from your family as a musician? i inherited my body type. all of my cousins have model-like physiques, they’re taller and slimmer than me. my mother sings well. my father plays instruments as a hobby. oh, and my paternal aunt used to be a ballerina. so perhaps i inherited such genes? 25. you’ve been doing the same thing for more than 10 years. what is the purpose behind creating music and showcasing it? in the past, i would think i should do well, i need to be number one, these days i’ve become ambitious for other aspects. i take pride in the fact that my work supplies others with positive energy. i feel a sense of accomplishment when fans like my music, i want to make them as happy as i am. everyone’s profession is different but i hope this synergy gained from mutual dependence leaves a good impression. 26. are you still composing songs? i used to but now i only participate in lyric writing. it differs with each song, at times the lyrics are emotional or talk about abstract love. it seems like my next solo album will include a song i wrote the lyrics to. sometimes songs composed by overseas composers might prove too difficult for the general public to understand. so i participate a lot in the arrangement or mixing phase. i point out the parts that should be added to the composition and those that are unneeded. teacher lee soo man does give advice but it often feels like i do the producing of my own solo album. 27. taemin’s originality is the clearest when he promotes as a solo artist. which song has best represented your identity? i worked hard on all of them but there was a turning point. at first there was ‘danger’ then ‘press your number’ was a conceptual performance, the transition to ‘move’ turned out well. i wanted to break out from the typical choreography routine and create my own identity, the resulting performances were ‘move’ and ‘want.’ my next solo album is again different. i’ve been making a lot of changes these days. 28. you seem to have high standards when it comes to composing music. was there ever an occasion where you absolutely refused to compromise and gave others a hard time? everyone is used to it (laughs). it’s something i learned from the head manager hyung who’s been with me since debut. the belief that ‘there is nothing that can’t be done. there is no such thing as impossible.’ another team manager hyung would tell me ‘you remind me of our head’ (laughs). honestly, the staff around me work beyond their given roles and with affection. normally work timings are from 9 to 7, they stay back till 10-11 pm for me. they don’t hold it against me, and when things do well, they too feel a sense of fulfillment together with me. 29. the new unreleased song must be quite different from the original then.  there are already 12 versions of the song. when i thought we were somewhat done, we recently started arranging it again (laughs). 30. you hold your body to specific standards for the best performance outcome. i don’t ‘bulk up.’ previously, i used to work out when i ate a lot but my body would feel weighed down, it wasn’t what i wanted. if i gain a lot of muscles or become thick, it hampers my dancing form. that’s why i don’t put on weight. i train my stamina and strength and avoid bulking up my shoulders and arms. 31. by the way, do you do neck exercises as well? i was touched looking at your long neck in the vogue photoshoot. i had been noticing this too, now i know the reason! i think it’s because i dance. a lot of resistance goes into the neck when you dance. our head is the heaviest and it’s the neck that supports it. it goes away when i rest for a few days. we’re shooting amidst the superm tour maybe that’s why it looks thicker now.  32. an editor who has been watching you closely for a long time said that you’ve become extroverted. could it be that experience and relationships have made you comfortable and secure? i’ve lowered my guard. i couldn’t reveal my current self to others before. as a child i used to be so introverted that i’d hide behind my mother when strangers would get into the elevator. i changed with time.  33. is your ever-present smile a product of your personality or just business decorum? i’m always smiling. i even laugh at things other people don’t find funny (laughs). 34. shinee members are currently serving in the army. when they’re on break what kind of advice or nagging do they subject you to? i wish they would do that. we have a group chat on kakaotalk and i always revive it by asking “what’s up” “happy new year.” but as soon as the conversation picks up they only talk about the army. when i inform them about an issue at the company they say “really?” then it’s military talk again. when i feel left out and tell them to stop, they reply with “you’ll understand when you get here.” 35. in your career as a musician, when do you feel the best? when it’s time to reveal all that i’ve been preparing for so long! it feels different from finishing it. the first stage after debuting, shinee’s first concert, performing at tokyo dome, receiving the award... these are the moments that come to mind. 36. watching taemin grow for the past decade has been a huge source of strength. what are your dreams now? there are many. first of all, once shinee comes back again, i want the entire group to give off a feeling of revival. usually after getting discharged, it’s hard to keep up with the next generation, i want to avoid that. i’ve imagined it all when the shinee members return. second, i want to perform a lot on various stages as a solo artist. superm topped the billboard 200 album chart, it’d be nice to enter the top 10 on the hot 100 digital chart as well.  37. you are really talented at setting goals. i’ve gotten greedier. it’s just not for myself but i want to do it for the fans and members, even the staff. they become my driving force. i really am lucky. everybody works hard but i even get the recognition for it. come to think of it, i was given many opportunities and i worked hard to make the most of them, i’m really happy my efforts paid off in the end. i’m surrounded by good people. shinee, superm, many people fill in the gaps for me that i can’t solve on my own. 38. superm’s concert title is ‘we are the future.’ when you hear the word ‘future’ what are you reminded of? first, it’s h.o.t. (laughs). future-oriented things come to mind like artificial intelligence, drones, 3d hologram concerts. then again, in the future, though people might be able to watch concerts through holograms, i think humans will not give up on the tasks they themselves can do. my work will still be the same in the future. 39. the reason you don’t write anything on instagram. i don’t have anything to say yet (laughs). i don’t know if i should make my instagram cool or approachable. when fretting between writing a caption or using an emoticon, i just end up leaving it blank. actually i signed up after my manager hyung suggested that instagram would be good. so i’ve made one but i still don’t know what to upload. i get teased by the people around me for putting up selfies. i even took lots of pictures especially for instagram but... 40. did you not post the pictures? the point of instagram is real-time communication. is that so! i didn’t know (laughs).

translated by romanceboys — take out with full credit (source)

[darkpoisonouslove]

Some Riven x Musa x Layla Headcanons

That Just Won’t Leave Me Alone

I accidentally developed the idea of this OT3 a while ago and the feels hit me today so I decided to write out some headcanons. They are not “explicitly” together by the end of it as I did it more in a way that would have been possible to portray on the show as well. But you can fill in the more overt parts for yourselves. ;)

- Layla and Riven stay up all night watching over Nabu’s grave after his funeral. They aren’t exactly sure why they do that, both of them hoping that it will all turn out to be a nightmare and he’ll come back but both of them knowing that that is a foolish hope to voice so they just stay behind after everyone else has left and spend the night there in silence.

- The two of them have several nights over the summer where they will just get together and drink themselves into a stupor. Neither of them wants to talk about it so the other is the perfect company in which to drown their sorrow. Musa is getting worried about them but once Tritannus happens, they stop their drinking routine because they need to have their heads in the game.

- That seems to have a negative effect, however, since they are both more irate and antsy after losing their grief outlet. Layla has her family to worry about now that Tritannus is threatening them all and Riven is worried about both Musa and Layla (and the other Winx but his focus is more on the two of them) because they are constantly exposed to danger. Layla doesn’t mind (unlike with Roy) because she knows what feelings Riven is putting into his protective actions. She would give anything to be able to protect her family and her planet as well as the rest of the universe from Tritannus and she can use his help as well as that of the rest of her friends.

- Musa makes them both playlists that reflect on their relationships with Nabu to help them get through it and show her support. She is dragged back into her own feelings of loss over her mother’s death and she understands how hard it is on them. It is hard on her, too, and she wants to help but talking just doesn’t feel like an option so she turns to music instead. Riven almost destroys the whole dorm room while listening to the playlist but it helps him get out his feelings. Layla cries herself to sleep for weeks on end while listening to the songs but they do have a therapeutic effect on her and make it a little easier to hold herself together when she is hit with a bout of grief over something little someone says or does that reminds her of Nabu.

- The three of them spar together whenever they have time. Winx are busy with the Sirenix Quest but Layla and Riven both get frantic if they have to spend a day without intense physical activity so they find the time to spar together even if it is in the middle of the night. Musa sticks with them, mostly to help bring them both down and ground them in a more peaceful atmosphere once they are done. They don’t hold back while sparring but neither of them has hurt the other seriously despite that and they all agree that those sessions are both productive and relaxing for them.

- The first time he meets Roy, Riven grabs him while no one is looking and threatens him to leave Layla alone until she has processed everything and grieved Nabu properly at the very least unless he wants to disappear forever. Layla told Riven about Roy being sent by her father to protect her and how it made her feel (she understands her father’s concerns but she hates being treated like she’s fragile and Roy’s apparent fascination with her doesn’t help). Roy backs off after that on the romantic front but still tries to get to know Layla - and Riven - and he actually starts finding his place in the group.

- Riven turns to Layla when he wants to write and compose a song for Musa to show his appreciation for everything she’s been doing for him and his support for her while she’s dealing with her own emotions. Her encouragement is invaluable to him and she keeps things from falling apart between him and Musa while he is busy working on his guitar skills and actually writing the song. Layla helps him a lot with the lyrics and melody of the song to the point where he asks her to play it with him. Layla is on the drums while Riven and Timmy play guitar and Layla sings with Riven (and Musa) during the chorus. It turns out that Roy also plays the drums and he and Layla find another thing they have in common on top of their love for surfing (and sports in general) and their similar fighting styles.

- The budding connection with Roy helps Layla a lot during the summer while she is dealing with the aftermath of Tritannus’ actions. Roy knows a lot about Andros and helps her come up with strategies to restore the realm back to how it was before Tritannus started his attempted reign of terror. Roy is being a lot more respectful towards her feelings on the losses she and the entire realm experienced now and the two of them make a great team. Layla feels comfortable spending time with him even outside of their formal responsibilities.

- Meanwhile, Musa is on Melody to help the planet adjust to the consequences of the cultural shock that the attack on the Singing Whales and the Pillar of Balance was. She also spends a lot of time at home just absorbing the atmosphere and trying to capture it into her music in case something happens to her childhood home. She didn’t feel it right to bring her mother back but she can’t bear the thought of losing all the memories their house is imbued with in case it gets destroyed so she attempts to weave them into her music, even using magic to ensure the success of that endeavor. Music is her safe place after the shocks of losing Nabu and trying to help Layla and Riven through their grief and trauma while also dealing with her own losses and the scars that the near ruination of her whole realm caused.

- Riven is on Zenith helping Tecna with whatever there is left on the planet to fix after the clash with Tritannus. Zenith is pretty organized and efficient so there isn’t that much to do but Riven is relieved to be with Tecna because she doesn’t insist on talking about his feelings and he has a lot of those. He is terrified of what almost happened to both Musa and Layla while he wasn’t there to help them and he resolves to train harder to be able to protect them and all the rest of his friends. He wouldn’t bear to see any one of them suffer any more, not to mention lose them. Tecna helps him strategize to improve his efficiency in battle and she is the perfect embodiment of Zenith after her wish for empathy. Her quiet but friendly presence is soothing for Riven while the whole planet seems to warm up. It is the perfect atmosphere for him to work through his feelings.

- Musa and Riven soon fall into their usual dynamic of misunderstandings and lack of communication when Musa needs his moral support but refuses to actually talk to him while Riven spends all his time training because to him it is more important to ensure that Musa will be safe and he will be able to protect her. Layla is sorting out her own emotions and even though she tries to be there for them and help them resolve things, she has her own issues and it is not her job to babysit them and their relationship. They have to figure it out for themselves while she does her best to support both of them.

- Layla has strong opinions on Nex when they meet since he reminds her a lot of the impression Riven left in her at first, only - a worse version. She decides to give him a chance anyway because getting closer to Riven actually revealed other sides to him but she only ever regards Nex as a potential friend. He isn’t quite as bad as she originally thought him to be but he also definitely isn’t someone that she would want to be in a relationship with. She is spending a lot of time with Roy and she really likes him but, ultimately, she knows that she isn’t crazy about him. Being with him is comfortable but she is deliberately not letting herself get attached to him too much and that very fact tells her that he isn’t the right one for her since if she really loved him, she would have allowed herself to do so fully like she does with all of her friends despite the constant risk of losing them that she faces every time they have to fight a threat of universal magnitude. She tells Roy it would be better not to see each other.

- Musa and Riven break-up because they both feel like they are holding on so tight to each other for the wrong reasons. They are terrified of losing the other but they aren’t doing such a great job of appreciating them exactly because of those fears. So they decide to separate - meaning absolutely no expectations and demands towards the other - and do some soul searching. Riven actually keeps in touch with Roy since they started getting along decently and he knows that Roy is now the most removed one from the group while he is also on Andros so he may have more up-to-date information on how Layla and Musa are doing than the media (he is not spying on them, just telling Riven things he’s heard on Andros). Riven wants to keep his distance from the friend group but still wants to know how they’re all doing and Roy occasionally has news on the rest as well from when they visit Andros.

- Musa and Layla both spend a lot of time on their home worlds whenever that is possible and there isn’t an ongoing crisis and try to process their emotions while navigating political matters. Musa loves spending time on Andros with Layla and helping her out with her duties as heiress to the throne and Layla (and the other Winx) accompanies Musa during all of her concerts when Musa signs a record label as a single artist since they all agree that the band is just for fun and coordinating it along with all their other responsibilities will be nearly impossible. Musa truly opens up her heart and pours it all out into her music and she becomes a rising star on top of coming to terms with who she has become during her journey. The songs (and all the dancing routines that the two of them come up with together) help Layla make her peace with her trauma - both over Nabu and that from her childhood - as well.

- Riven comes back and proves to have done a lot of work on himself and he feels ready to love Musa now - feelings which she reciprocates. The two decide to settle on Andros to be close to Layla and help her out with everything she needs. Riven actually rises to the head of Layla’s personal guard and Musa has tours all over the Magic Dimension so she’d be on the move a lot whether she’d live on Melody or on Andros. Riven worries about her when she is on tour and he can’t go with her while he’s busy protecting Layla but he’s personally trained the bodyguards he hired for Musa and he trusts her to take care of herself so he settles for only calling her several times a day when she’s away and watching her concerts live on his devices together with Layla whenever the two of them can’t be there to see the show in person.

- Layla does not feel ready to get married or even be in a relationship with anyone besides Musa and Riven but she does want kids, especially after she proudly becomes an aunt to several children with Stella and Bloom going ahead and becoming mothers soon after their weddings. She is also supposed to make sure that Andros has heirs to the throne so she decides to adopt. She talks to Daphne, who adopted children as well, and even Vanessa to learn about their experiences and ask for advice. She wants to adopt at least two children because she doesn’t want her kids to be lonely and wants them to have someone they can always count on. Along with her, Musa and Riven, of course.

- Both Musa and Riven have big reactions to the news. They are supportive of her, of course - heaven knows the high society and the officials of Andros have already busied themselves enough with being critical of her decision - but they also have their own feelings to handle. Musa has to deal with the knowledge that she will adore Layla’s children (as she does with Bloom and Stella’s) and she will worry about them. That is the reason she still hasn’t thought about about having children herself. Or rather, she has been doing her best to avoid it while spending some of the best days of her life with Bloom and Stella’s children. She is scared of leaving the children orphans if anything happens to her and/or Riven (and that is always a possibility in their line of work). She knows that the rest of Winx will take care of her children if something happens to her but she has been through the pain of losing a parent and she doesn’t want her own kids to go through the same even if she managed to move on and pick herself up after her mother’s death. It is still a thing she carries with her every day and she does not feel confident in raising children with the heightened risk for her life.

- Riven totally panics because he doesn’t know anything about children and he will have to interact with them and take care of them. Not just because of his job as the head of Layla’s security, but also because he wants to be there for her and help her raise the children since it wouldn’t be easy for her to do it as a single parent. So he does the only thing he can think of and actually goes to Sky and Brandon asking for advice and a crash course on things he needs to know to be of help to Layla.

- Riven also picks up audio books on parenting and him and Layla both listen to them while jogging together or traveling towards the venue of a royal event. Musa is about as enthusiastic about shopping for the kids as Stella is and she’s also ready to write lullabies specifically for them (in case they are at an age where they will listen to lullabies). They both do everything they can to help Layla prepare herself and learn how to do things right themselves because they want to be there for her and be a part of the process. And they are both enthusiastic about doing it.

- In fact, their enthusiasm rapidly turns into conversations about having kids themselves - which makes Layla (and the other Winx) ecstatic because she is looking forward to helping them out as well - and it isn’t that long before they decide to make that step in their relationship despite not being officially married. They also talk about adopting as well as having their own children because they want to give a home to a kid that needs it. So the three of them end up raising their kids together and the children all think of each other as siblings and stick together no matter what.

[thecoleopterawithana]

The Surrealist

— Not to be Reproduced (La reproduction interdite), by René Magritte (1937).

–

I don’t examine myself that way. I just am. I just go through it. I just wake in the morning and go to bed at night and whatever happens during the day just happens. I don’t really know how I am.

— Paul McCartney, in Music Express: 'Paul McCartney Wings It Alone' (April/May 1982).

–

“In an attempt to explain the significance of surrealist art, René Magritte expressed the view that surrealist images emerge spontaneously, as in dreams, and only after that are the images given meaning. As a result, the genre has the power to convey important ideas even if the artist does not consciously set out to do so.”

–

This series – I just woke up one morning and I had a germ of an idea, which is all I want really. I don’t want too formed an idea, it’s just not who I am. This little series comes from this image I got of someone scratching three fingers down a wall. I woke up with this thing and I thought it would be just a black canvas and these three-fingered scratches, like someone in prison and they’re either trying to get out or they’re trying to mark the dates. I woke up with this thing and I thought it would be just a black canvas and these three-fingered scratches, like someone in prison and they’re either trying to get out or they’re trying to mark the dates. It’s like graffiti. That set me off on a little bunch of paintings. And things happen, like I didn’t want it to just be black, so I was going to make it blue-black. So I threw some blue on the canvas and was going to blend it. But then a shape emerged with this blue, and I still don’t know what it is. It looks vaguely phallic, or somebody’s ass bending away from you. But that’s what started to fascinate me. It’s probably an accident, but also what I like about that is the inner content, that I have no idea what my dreams are about. I’ve no idea, yet they’re every bit as real as sitting here with you. But my interior world, I think it’s not a bad idea to try and tap it.

My view is that these things are there whether you want them or not, in your interior. You don’t call up dreams, they happen, often the exact opposite of what you want. You can be heterosexual and be having a homosexual dream and wake up, and think, “Shit, am I gay?” I like that you don’t have control over it. But there is some control – it is you dreaming, it is your mind it’s all happening in. In a way my equation would be that my computer is fully loaded by now. Maybe in younger people there’s a little bit of loading to go, but mine’s loaded pretty much, so what I try and do is allow it to print out unbeknown to me. And I’m interested to hear what it’s got in there.

I think we must be interested as musicians as often our music arrives that way. I dreamed the song Yesterday. It was just in a dream, I woke up one morning and had a melody in my head. so I have to believe in that.

— Paul McCartney, in “Luigi’s Alcove” by Karen Wright, for Modern Painters (August 2000).

–

John: Now whether he’s – [Paul] was expressing himself because whether we plan it to express our innermost feelings, or sort of surreal it like Dylan, or – Paul, you could say, his lyrics are very sort of… non-specific – if one knows the person, one knows what is coming down. You know, you can read what’s being said—

Yoko: Between the lines.

John: Between the lines. Because people’s expressions and feelings come out in their work whether they want it to or not. So I always express myself directly, or [in the] language of the streets, and other people don’t. And that’s what it was all about. And I don’t go ‘round thinking, “how do you sleep?” the same as I don’t go, “imagine there’s no heaven,” you know. Because it’s 1973 now, and it’s a different world. And as you’ve probably heard, or people have read, Paul and I have communicated [...].

— John Lennon, interview with DJ Elliot Mintz (16 April 1973).

–

I think everything that comes out of the songs – even Paul’s songs now, which are apparently about nothing – the same way as calligraphy shows and your handwriting shows you everything about yourself. Or [Bob] Dylan too. Dylan might try to hide in a subterfuge of clever, Allen Ginsberg-type words, or hippie words, but it was always apparent, if you look below the surface, what is being said. Resentfulness, or love, or hate. And it’s apparent in all work. It’s just harder to see when it’s… written in gobbledy-gook.

— John Lennon, interviewed by David Sheff for Playboy (August 1980).

–

McCartney has written some of the world’s most famous love songs, but has he ever worried about revealing too much of himself? “Yes, but you’ve got to get over that feeling quickly, because that’s the game.” Some songs turned out to be more personal than he realised when he was writing them. The Beatles’ Yesterday will be 50 years old in August. McCartney famously dreamed the melody. But its opening line was originally, “Scrambled eggs/Oh my baby, how I love your legs.” McCartney followed his own advice and “bombed through”, ending up with a universally known song about loss and regret. But its initial spur was more prosaic. “There are a lot of mindsets when you’re writing a song – and one of them is commercial,” he admits. “It’s like any job, where if you do a certain thing you’ll progress in that job. In songwriting it’s an unspoken thing, but I recognise it. I remember hearing somewhere that people like sad songs, so I thought, ‘OK, I’ll write a sad song.’ I knew what I was getting into…” So, in a way, you were acting when you wrote it? “Yes. I wrote from the point of view of someone who was sad. But when you’re taking on a part, it’s usually you you’re writing about. Your psychiatrist would say it’s you.”

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by Mark Blake for Q: Songs in the key of Paul (May 2015).

–

John: There’s no comparison for me. ‘Cause we’re—

Hilburn: You mean comparing artistically, or you mean comparing sales-wise and stuff?

John: Oh, sales-wise, forget it. [Paul] always had more fans than me, in the Cavern… So there’s no comparison on that level. And on the other level, I don’t think it counts. I think it’s like comparing… I don’t know, Magritte and, er – Picasso, if you want to put it on that level. Or whatever. How can you compare it?

Hilburn: Was there ever any sense of competition when you—

John: It’s like trying to compare Gaugin and Van Gogh. They were friends, as well.

— John Lennon talks with Robert Hilburn from The LA Times (10 October 1980).

–

In the beginning, art was what we talked about. [John] told me he thought he was like [surrealist painter René] Magritte. Why? Because, you know, you have the image of Magritte with the bowler hat and the suit, looking very square, but really his work was very surreal and far out. John was living in suburbia, and he was very embarrassed about that, because he felt as if he was not very hip. When he invited me to his house the first time, the first thing he said when I got there was, “I think of myself as Magritte.”

— Yoko Ono, interviewed for The New York Times (7 October 2004).

–

The dream is over Yesterday I was the dream weaver But now I’m reborn I was the Walrus But now I’m John

–

I told you about the walrus and me, man You know we're as close as can be, man Well here's another clue for you all The Walrus was Paul

–

I’ve always loved Mr Magritte’s work and have admired him since the 1960s when I first became aware of his work. I love his paintings so much that I once took a trip to Paris to visit Magritte’s art dealer Alexander Iolas and had a very pleasant meal in his apartment above the gallery. We then went downstairs to see the paintings and I was able to select three pictures.

Robert [Fraser - art dealer and friend] also brought me other interesting Magritte’s pictures over the years and one of them became the inspiration for the original Beatles Apple Records label: the big green apple was inspired by Magritte.

We were amongst the many people who have been hugely influenced by this great artist's work.

— Paul McCartney, in Paintings On The Wall - René Magritte (1898 - 1967) (March 2015).

–

— Le Jeu de Mourre (The Game of Mora), by René Magritte (1966).

–

I had this friend called Robert Fraser, who was a gallery owner in London. We used to hang out a lot. And I told him I really loved Magritte. We were discovering Magritte in the sixties, just through magazines and things. And we just loved his sense of humour. And when we heard that he was a very ordinary bloke who used to paint from nine to one o'clock, and with his bowler hat, it became even more intriguing. Robert used to look around for pictures for me, because he knew I liked him. It was so cheap then, it's terrible to think how cheap they were. But anyway, we just loved him ... One day he brought this painting to my house. We were out in the garden, it was a summer's day. And he didn't want to disturb us, I think we were filming or something. So he left this picture of Magritte. It was an apple - and he just left it on the dining room table and he went. It just had written across it "Au revoir", on this beautiful green apple. And I thought that was like a great thing to do. He knew I'd love it and he knew I'd want it and I'd pay him later. [...] So it was like wow! What a great conceptual thing to do, you know. And this big green apple, which I still have now, became the inspiration for the logo. And then we decided to cut it in half for the B-side!

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by Johan Ral (1993).

–

Linda bought me these for my birthday once [he produces the paint-spattered spectacles of surrealist painter René Magritte which he keeps in a Perspex box on his desk]. Georgette, his wife, was selling the contents of his studio and Linda bought me the easel and his spectacles and some small linen canvases which I didn't dare paint on. I'm such a huge fan that was just mega. I was intimidated for weeks about painting on the canvases but in the end I just went, "Agghhhh!" and I did. Then I tried on the glasses which are a very powerful prescription; they'll give you a headache! What I love about Magritte is he turned the world upside down and inside out in terms of meaning and significance. Science and philosophy and religion are starting to converge on this idea that, whatever hat you put on, you are still you. Dickens writes Little Dorrit but he still comes through in her character. Burroughs and Ginsberg show through in their writing. Magritte's specs are a reminder: the world is a jungle of crazy interpretations.

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by Michael Odell for The Guardian (29 November 2008).

–

— Son of Man, by René Magritte (1964).

–

If I was to shout, “NAME A SURREALIST PAINTER!” at you, the name you many might reach for first, is one of his contemporaries: Salvador Dalí.

Based in Paris for the early part of his career, Dalí was a flamboyantly dressed dandy, with a manically upturned moustache, a colossal ego (who writes a whole book dedicated to their moustache?) and a propensity to drive around in his white Rolls Royce with 500kg of cauliflowers stuffed in the back, as he liked their shape. Fellow Paris-based artist, and founder of surrealism, André Breton kept and bred praying mantises – on account of how the female of the species rapaciously devours the male after mating.

Magritte could not have been any more different. He looked like a banker, dressed in a sober black suit and a bowler hat. [...] But once you come face to face with his paintings, you realise that the bowler hat was merely a front.

Magritte was, in many ways, far more subversive than the flamboyant Dalí. While it’s fair to say that no one painted better scenes of tigers-escaping-out-of-fish-mouths-while-simultaneously-mid-pounce-onto-a-naked women-on-an-iceberg, Dalí’s hallucinatory dreamscapes didn’t anchor in reality. Magritte’s work did: he made ordinary objects shriek.

[...]

He liked to obscure the views of faces – particularly his own - as well as places. Hiding objects over other objects was one of his parlour tricks: like placing a perfectly aligned painted canvas in front of a window and simulating the real view from it.

Magritte was always hiding behind something, whether language or class, or bathing in the anonymity of dozens of faceless salary men. Perhaps all that levitating in his 1953 work ‘Golconda’, was how Magritte saw himself: conducting extraordinary feats of ordinariness.

— Golconda, by René Magritte (1953).

He wasn’t the only artist who, through the cracks of a quiet, clean-cut image, you can glimpse subversion: like all the lonely people, his work stood slightly behind from his public persona.

— by Adam Jacques, on Paintings On The Wall - René Magritte (1898 - 1967), as suggested by Paul McCartney.

-

More on the painters series:

The Painter of Sunflowers and The Man in a Red Beret | Lennon-McCartney VS Gauguin & Van Gogh

[bubonickitten]

So I just spent a few days with my little cousins, and as always I have to share some of their antics:

We were at the zoo. One of the tigers died earlier this year and of course the kids had questions about that. Right now their parents’ explanation of death is “they went to heaven,” so I just go with that -- the tiger was old, he was sick (cancer) and got better once (was in remission) but it came back, and died and he went to heaven, etc. The kids’ great grandfather also literally just died last week, so it’s not surprising that the 7-year-old starts noting the similarities --- “Oh, like granddad?” “Yeah, like granddad.” (He had cancer that came back after being in remission, and he was in his 90s, so old + sick = yes, like the tiger.) 7-year-old is quiet for a moment and then says, “Wait. Do you think granddad is getting chased by the tiger in heaven?” I nearly died.

4-year-old is currently convinced that wolves live in the walls in basements and nothing will convince her otherwise. Her parents have no clue how this started, she just decided one day that the basement is scary because wolves live in the walls. I was showing her pictures of wolves (I took out a big animal encyclopedia at the library for her to look at), talking about how big they are (too big to fit in the walls), how they don’t actually live around here, etc. But, as kids tend to be, she had the most fascinating explanations for how the wolves managed to live in the walls despite their size. Namely: apparently these wolves are magic wolves that know how to shrink and go through walls to hide when they see grown-ups, so only kids can see them. 

This was a little while ago, but -- 7-year-old is currently fascinated by the human body and anatomy (makes sense, her mom’s a pediatric nurse and her dad’s a paramedic). For her birthday all she wanted was one of those plastic model skeletons that you can put together. Her dad cut himself opening it (apparently he thought a pocket knife was a good thing to use instead of, you know, scissors, but whatever). It was deep enough that he had to get two stitches, but 7-year-old was really disappointed that it wasn’t deep enough for her to see the bone so she could match it with the plastic bones on her model skeleton.

4-year-old still sings the “let the storm rage ooooon” lyric in “Let It Go” as “it’s Snowman Jooooohn”. I’ll be pretty disappointed when she stops doing that.

My brother picked up a Pokemon puzzle at a yard sale awhile back and 7-year-old likes puzzles, so we were doing it together. 4-year-old was “helping”. I was teaching them the names of the Pokemon. Apparently, according to them, I’m pronouncing “Pikachu” wrong -- it’s actually “Peeg-achoo”. 

They both tend to have a lot of questions about how I present myself--mismatched socks, lip + nose piercings, lots of ear piercings + mismatched earrings, sometimes dyed hair, etc. Basically I’m 29 and still Like This bc I was lucky enough to find a job that doesn’t have an issue with me continuing to have unnatural hair colors and keeping my piercings in and what I wear is something that allows me to feel some semblance of control over my life so why stop now if I don’t have to? But anyway -- 7-year-old is currently in a perpetual war with her mother about mismatched socks, apparently. “Mom won’t let me wear two different color socks even though you do.” “Oh. Um.” “I want pink hair like you but mom said no.” “Uh.” “Can you paint my nails like yours?” “Now THAT I can do.” “Okay, I want black nail polish.” “Er... your mom’s not cool with that.” So we did mermaid nails (blue + pink) on one hand and lime green on the other, and we compromised and did black nail polish on her toenails. tl;dr apparently this child is terrorizing her parents with “I want to go through my teenage/young adult fashion rebellion now” and it’s probably my fault lmao.  

Not really a funny kid story, but just something fun: They both like watching those unboxing videos on YouTube -- kids opening those Hatchimals and LOL dolls and other blind box type toys (which, I love blind boxes too -- I’m a sucker for those Tokidoki Unicorno ones in particular). I pretty much love how much they get into it?? Like, I collected a lot of shit when I was a kid -- Pokemon cards, Beanie Babies, rocks, Pokemon figurines, etc. -- and I remember wanting to talk about it for hours on end, even though adults would get bored of it or not show a lot of interest in it bc it seemed like frivolous kid stuff to them, so I was trying to show active interest in what they were saying, because hey, it’s something they’re passionate about, even if it can get a little boring for me to watch YouTube kids opening LOL dolls for 45 minutes straight. But mostly it’s just amazing how much kids can memorize about stuff they love (relatable tbh), and if you actually engage them and ask them questions about it and stuff, it can mean the world to them. So let kids enthuse about stuff if you have the time and ability to sit with them for awhile and just let them talk about and show you things they’re passionate about. It helps them with their communication skills and vocabulary, and it can boost their self-confidence to be able to be the teacher for once and tell you things that you might not know, instead of learning and teaching being a one-way street all the time.

Speaking of a good memory, 7-year-old remembers shit so well?? Even when I don’t??? Like, she’ll call me out on stuff: “Why did you come to [4-year-old’s] birthday party but not mine? It’s not fair.” “Oh. Well, I had to work that day, so I couldn’t come to your party. But I’m here now, so I can play with you while [4-year-old] plays with her friends.” “Hmmmm. Okay.” Or, she’ll remind me of promises I made like months ago (especially if I didn’t follow through on them -- usually unintentionally, I try not to make promises to her if I’m not gonna keep them). Like: “Last time we were here, you said we could see the hedgehog, but she was asleep every day. Can we go upstairs tonight and see if she’s awake? Because you said we could see her.” “You know what? You’re right. Remind me and we’ll go upstairs tonight to see if she’s awake.” Just... kids definitely have a sense of fair vs. unfair, especially considering 7-year-old is the oldest sibling of three and I’m also the oldest sibling in my family (though I only have one younger sibling), and the oldest cousin on one side of the family, and I know that it can seem unfair that the younger sibling(s) and relatives get away with stuff that you can’t, or get more attention than you do, and that you’re expected to be more mature even if you’re still just a kid too -- just like it can seem unfair to the younger sibling when the older sibling(s) get to do stuff that they can’t because they’re too little. 

[woodsens]

The Worst Advice We've Ever Heard About best portable keyboard

Correction Appended

On an album of bittersweet childrens songs that she wrote over ten years in the past, the lady who arrived for being recognised only given that the piano teacher available what, in hindsight, looks like an eerie glimpse of her own upcoming.

Im going away now to a spot so far-off, where nobody understands my name, she wrote within the lyrics of the track referred to as Transferring.

When she wrote that tune, she was young and vivacious, a piano Trainer and freelance songs author who liked Beethoven and jazz, sunsets and river sounds, extensive walks and every little thing about New York.

On a kind of beloved walks, through Central Park in the bright Sunlight of the June day in 1996, a homeless drifter beat her and attempted to rape her, leaving her clinging to lifetime. Once the attack, the words to her song arrived true. She moved absent, out of Ny city, from her previous daily life, and all but her closest good friends did not know her identify. To the remainder of the entire world, she was — just like the far more popular jogger attacked in Central Park seven decades before — an nameless image of an city nightmare. She was the piano teacher.

Now, to the tenth anniversary of the attack, she is celebrating what is apparently her entire recovery from brain trauma. She is 42, married, with a small child. She's Kyle Kevorkian McCann, the piano teacher, and he or she hopes to explain to her story, her way.

Her health care provider informed her it could choose a decade to Recuperate, and Sunday was that talismanic anniversary. I sense my existence has long been redefined by Central Park, she explained numerous days in the past, her voice delicate and hopeful. Right before park; following park. Will there ever be considered a time when I dont think, Oh, Here is the tenth anniversary, the eleventh anniversary?

She spoke in her modest ranch home within a wooded subdivision in a Ny suburb. She sat in the eating area strewn with toys, surrounded by pictures of her cherubic, darkish-haired 2-year-aged daughter. A Steinway grand loaded 50 % the place, and at one place she sat down and performed. Her enjoying was forceful, but she appeared humiliated to Enjoy more than a few bars, and shrugged, in lieu of answering, when questioned the name in the piece. She asked that her daughter and her town not be named.

She phone calls that day, June 4, 1996, the day After i was harm.

Hers was the primary inside of a string of assaults by the same male on four Ladies around 8 days. The last victim, Evelyn Alvarez, 65, was crushed to death as she opened her Park Avenue dry-cleaning shop, and in the end, the assailant, John J. Royster, was convicted of murder and sentenced to everyday living in jail.

Nevertheless the attack around the piano Instructor may be the 1 men and women feel to recall the most. Part of the fascination should do with echoes of the 1989 attack on the Central Park jogger. But Additionally, it frightened persons in a means the assault around the jogger did not for the reason that its situations ended up so mundane.

It did not take place inside of a remote A part of the park late during the night, but near a favorite playground at 3 from the afternoon. It might have happened to any individual. The tension was heightened because of the thriller of your piano lecturers id.

For 3 days, as law enforcement and Medical practitioners tried using to determine who she was, she lay inside of a coma in her medical center mattress, nameless. Her dad and mom have been on getaway and her boyfriend, also a musician, was in Europe, on tour. Finally, one among her students recognized a police sketch and was able to discover her while in the healthcare facility by her fingers, simply because her confront was swollen past recognition. The police didn't launch her title.

The very last thing she remembers about June 4, 1996, is providing a lesson in her studio condominium on West 57th Avenue, then Placing her prolonged hair in a very ponytail and heading out for a wander. She doesn't don't forget the attack, Even though she has read the accounts from the police and prosecutors.

To me its like a point I learned and memorized, she explained. As if I ended up a scholar in class researching record.

She will not take into consideration The person who did it. I may have been indignant to get a instant, but not much longer than that, she explained. How could I be indignant at John Royster? He was declared not insane, but I assume by our specifications he was.

Dr. Jamshid Ghajar, her health care provider at Ny Hospital-Cornell Health-related Center, as it had been recognised in 1996, instructed reporters that she had a 10 p.c potential for survival. Medical doctors had to remove her forehead bone, which was later on replaced, to generate home for her swelling Mind. When her mother built a community appeal to pray for my daughter, hundreds did.

Right after 8 times, she arrived away from a coma, initially in a very vegetative state, then in the childlike point out. As she recovered, she slept minimal and talked consistently, at times in gibberish. I was obtaining mad at people today if they didnt respond to these terms, she claimed.

Like an Alzheimers client, she experienced minor brief-expression memory and would overlook visitors the moment they left the room.

Around various months, she needed to relearn the way to wander, dress, read and write. Her boyfriend, Tony Scherr, frequented daily to play guitar for her. He inspired her to Enjoy the piano, in opposition to the advice of her physical therapists, who assumed she could be disappointed by her incapacity to Enjoy the best way she once experienced. Mr. Scherr played Beatles duets together with her, participating in the remaining-hand section while she performed the proper.

Which was my ideal therapy, she claimed.

In August, she moved back household to New Jersey, along with her father, an engineer, and mom, a schoolteacher. She visited aged haunts and named good friends, trying to revive her shattered memory. I was very obsessed with remembering, she said. Any memory reduction was to me an indication of abnormality or deficit.

Her therapists considered her development was fantastic, but her two sisters protested that she was not the deep thinker she had been.

What bothered her most was that she experienced misplaced the chance to cry, as if a faucet inside her brain had been turned off. A single night time, 9 months immediately after she was hurt, she stayed up late to view the John Grisham movie A Time to Kill. Just soon after her father experienced gone to bed, she viewed a courtroom scene of Samuel Jacksons character on demo for killing two Adult men who had raped his younger daughter.

The faucet opened, as well as tears trickled down her cheeks. I thought of my mother and father, my father, and the things they went as a result of, she mentioned. Minor by little, my sensation returned, my depth of thoughts returned.

Urged by her sisters, she went back again to school and acquired a masters degree in audio training.

Not every little thing went effectively. She and Mr. Scherr break up up five years once the attack, nevertheless they remain close friends. She dated other men, but she usually told them concerning the assault without delay — she could not assist it, she claimed — and they under no circumstances identified as for just a next date.

We've to find you a person, her Mate David Phelps, a guitar participant, claimed four several years back, in advance of introducing her to Liam McCann, a computer technician and beginner drummer. For the moment, she didn't say everything with regards to the assault until she bought to be aware of Mr. McCann, and after that when she did, he admired her energy.

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who experienced typically frequented her at her bedside while she was in the medical center, married them in his Times Sq. Business office. She wore a blue gown and pearls. Although she was Expecting, in a burst of creative imagination, she and her good friends recorded While Ended up Youthful, an album of childrens music that she experienced composed prior to the attack, including the track Shifting. Her ex-boyfriend, Mr. Scherr, created the CD. On it, her husband performs drums and he or she plays electric piano.

Is her everyday living as it had been? Not precisely, nevertheless she is hesitant to attribute the discrepancies to her accidents. Her previous two piano learners left her, without the need of calling to explain why, she reported. She has resumed participating in classical new music, but basic items, for the reason that her daughter would not give her time and energy to practice. As for jazz, I dont even consider, she stated.

She want to generate additional, sensation stranded from the suburbs, but she is well rattled. She tries to be material with remaining household and caring for her daughter.

Dr. Ghajar, a medical professor of neurological surgical treatment at exactly what is now termed New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Healthcare Center, who operated on Ms. Kevorkian McCann following the attack, explained last week that her amount of recovery was uncommon. Shes essentially normal, he said.

Other specialists, who're not personally aware of Ms. Kevorkian McCanns scenario, tend to be more cautious.

Regaining a chance to play the piano may well involve an almost mechanical approach, a semiautomatic remember of exactly what the fingers ought to do, mentioned Dr. Yehuda Ben-Yishay, a professor of clinical rehabilitation drugs at The big apple College University of Medication. The moment brain-hurt, you might be normally brain-injured, for the rest of your lifetime, Dr. Ben-Yishay said. There isn't any cure, There's only intense payment.

The more telling A part of a Restoration, in his see, is psychological, and on that score he counts Ms. Kevorkian McCanns marriage and youngster as a significant victory.

For her part, the piano teacher knows she has improved, but she has built her peace with it. I was type of a hyper —— I dont know if I used to be a kind A, but I had been bold, she claims. Why was I so formidable? I was a piano Instructor. I dont understand what the ambition was about. I actually did come back to the person Im purported to be.

[homestuckcanonconfirmer]

The Top Reasons People Succeed in the best beginner keyboard Industry

Correction Appended

On an album of bittersweet childrens tracks that she wrote over ten years in the past, the girl who arrived to become recognised only since the piano Trainer presented what, in hindsight, seems like an eerie glimpse of her own long run.

Im transferring away currently to a spot so far away, wherever no one is aware my name, she wrote inside the lyrics of the track known as Relocating.

When she wrote that music, she was young and vivacious, a piano Trainer and freelance songs writer who loved Beethoven and jazz, sunsets and river Seems, long walks and every little thing about The big apple.

On a kind of beloved walks, by means of Central Park in the bright Sunlight of a June day in 1996, a homeless drifter conquer her and made an effort to rape her, leaving her clinging to daily life. Once the attack, the words to her track arrived true. She moved absent, out of Ny city, out of her old daily life, and all but her closest buddies did not know her identify. To the rest of the planet, she was -- like the much more famed jogger attacked in Central Park 7 many years before -- an nameless symbol of an city nightmare. She was the piano Instructor.

Now, on the tenth anniversary from the assault, she is celebrating what is apparently her entire recovery from Mind trauma. She's 42, married, with a small baby. She is Kyle Kevorkian McCann, the piano Instructor, and she or he desires to convey to her Tale, her way.

Her doctor informed her it would acquire 10 years to Get well, and Sunday was that talismanic anniversary. I experience my lifetime is redefined by Central Park, she stated several days in the past, her voice comfortable and hopeful. Before park; just after park. Will there ever certainly be a time when I dont Consider, Oh, This is actually the tenth anniversary, the 11th anniversary?

She spoke in her modest ranch home inside of a wooded subdivision in a Big apple suburb. She sat inside a eating place strewn with toys, surrounded by images of her cherubic, darkish-haired 2-12 months-outdated daughter. A Steinway grand filled 50 % the home, and at 1 stage she sat down and played. Her taking part in was forceful, but she seemed embarrassed to Engage in more than a few bars, and shrugged, as an alternative to answering, when requested the title of the piece. She asked that her daughter and her town not be named.

She phone calls that day, June 4, 1996, the day After i was damage.

Hers was the 1st inside of a string of assaults by the exact same person on 4 Girls in excess of 8 times. The last sufferer, Evelyn Alvarez, 65, was crushed to Demise as she opened her Park Avenue dry-cleaning shop, and ultimately, the assailant, John J. Royster, was convicted of murder and sentenced to lifetime in prison.

Still the assault within the piano teacher could be the just one men and women appear to be to keep in mind quite possibly the most. Portion of the fascination needs to do with echoes from the 1989 assault on the Central Park jogger. But Additionally, it frightened persons in a means the attack around the jogger didn't because its situations were being so mundane.

It didn't happen in a remote Portion of the park late during the night time, but in the vicinity of a well known playground at 3 while in the afternoon. It could have occurred to any individual. The tension was heightened by the mystery from the piano academics id.

For three days, as law enforcement and Health professionals tried to determine who she was, she lay in the coma in her clinic bed, nameless. Her mother and father ended up on getaway and her boyfriend, also a musician, was in Europe, on tour. Lastly, one among her pupils recognized a law enforcement sketch and was able to determine her from the healthcare facility by her fingers, because her deal with was swollen outside of recognition. The law enforcement didn't launch her title.

The last thing she remembers about June 4, 1996, is giving a lesson in her studio condominium on West 57th Street, then putting her prolonged hair in a very ponytail and likely out for just a wander. She won't don't forget the assault, Despite the fact that she has heard the accounts with the law enforcement and prosecutors.

To me its like a fact I uncovered and memorized, she reported. As though I were a college student in school studying history.

She would not think about the man who did it. I might need been offended for your instant, but not for much longer than that, she said. How could I be indignant at John Royster? He was declared not crazy, but I assume by our benchmarks he was.

Dr. Jamshid Ghajar, her physician at Big apple Hospital-Cornell Health care Center, as it was acknowledged in 1996, instructed reporters that she experienced a 10 per cent potential for survival. Medical practitioners had to remove her forehead bone, which was afterwards replaced, to make space for her swelling brain. When her mom designed a community attract pray for my daughter, hundreds did.

Immediately after eight days, she arrived away from a coma, first in a vegetative state, then in the childlike point out. As she recovered, she slept tiny and talked frequently, sometimes in gibberish. I was having mad at men and women once they didnt respond to these words, she said.

Like an Alzheimers affected person, she experienced tiny short-expression memory and would forget site visitors when they still left the room.

Above a number of months, she had to relearn the way to walk, dress, go through and write. Her boyfriend, Tony Scherr, visited each day to Enjoy guitar for her. He inspired her to Perform the piano, in opposition to the recommendation of her Actual physical therapists, who thought she could well be annoyed by her incapacity to Engage in the best way she after experienced. Mr. Scherr performed Beatles duets along with her, enjoying the left-hand part when she performed the correct.

Which was my ideal therapy, she mentioned.

In August, she moved back property to New Jersey, together with her father, an engineer, and mom, a schoolteacher. She frequented old haunts and called buddies, hoping to restore her shattered memory. I had been really obsessive about remembering, she mentioned. Any memory reduction was to me a sign of abnormality or deficit.

Her therapists imagined her progress was wonderful, but her two sisters protested that she was not the deep thinker she had been.

What bothered her most was that she experienced misplaced a chance to cry, as though a faucet within her brain had been turned off. A single evening, nine months just after she was damage, she stayed up late to watch the John Grisham Motion picture A Time for you to Eliminate. Just following her father had absent to bed, she watched a courtroom scene of Samuel Jacksons character on demo for killing two Guys who experienced raped his younger daughter.

The faucet opened, along with the tears trickled down her cheeks. I thought of my mother and father, my father, and the things they went through, she reported. Minimal by little, my sensation returned, my depth of thoughts returned.

Urged by her sisters, she went back to high school and acquired a masters degree in new music education.

Not anything went well. She and Mr. Scherr split up 5 years once the assault, however they remain pals. She dated other Males, but she always explained to them about the assault right away -- she couldn't assistance it, she claimed -- they usually in no way identified as for your 2nd date.

We have to search out you another person, her Pal David Phelps, a guitar player, reported 4 decades back, just before introducing her to Liam McCann, a computer technician and beginner drummer. For as soon as, she did not say nearly anything with regards to the attack right until she got to grasp Mr. McCann, after which you can when she did, he admired her toughness.

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who had typically visited her at her bedside whilst she was while in the medical center, married them in his Moments Square Workplace. She wore a blue dress and pearls. Even though she was Expecting, in a very burst of creativity, she and her friends recorded When Were Younger, an album of childrens tracks that she experienced created before the assault, including the tune Transferring. Her ex-boyfriend, Mr. Scherr, generated the CD. On it, her husband plays drums and he or she performs electrical piano.

Is her lifetime as it had been? Not exactly, however she is reluctant to attribute the discrepancies to her injuries. Her last two piano students left her, without calling to explain why, she stated. She has resumed enjoying classical new music, but basic parts, due to the fact her daughter isn't going to give her time for you to exercise. As for jazz, I dont even test, she mentioned.

She would like to push a lot more, emotion stranded while in the suburbs, but she is definitely rattled. She tries to be articles with keeping dwelling and caring for her daughter.

Dr. Ghajar, a medical professor of neurological operation at what exactly is now termed NewYork-Presbyterian Healthcare facility/Weill Cornell Health care Center, who operated on Ms. Kevorkian McCann following the assault, said previous week that her amount of recovery was uncommon. Shes essentially typical, he mentioned.

Other experts, who will be not personally aware of Ms. Kevorkian McCanns situation, are more cautious.

Regaining the opportunity to Perform the piano could entail an Practically mechanical process, a semiautomatic remember of just what the fingers need to do, claimed Dr. Yehuda Ben-Yishay, a professor of scientific rehabilitation medication at Big apple University School of Medication. At the time Mind-hurt, that you are generally brain-injured, For the remainder of your lifetime, Dr. Ben-Yishay said. There is absolutely no treatment, There exists only intense payment.

The more telling part of a Restoration, in his check out, is psychological, and on that score he counts Ms. Kevorkian McCanns relationship and baby as a substantial victory.

For her section, the piano Trainer is aware of she has altered, but she has designed her peace with it. I used to be type of a hyper ---- I dont know if I used to be a kind A, but I was formidable, she states. Why was I so bold? I used to be a piano Instructor. I dont really know what the ambition was about. I really did come back to the individual Im supposed to be.

Correction: June thirteen, 2006, Tuesday An write-up on Thursday about Kyle Kevorkian McCann, a piano teacher who was beaten and sexually assaulted ten years back in Central Park, misstated the title of her album of childrens tunes. It really is Whilst Ended up Youthful, not When Have been Young.

[reachformyhand]

SHARE UR ART ALWAYS.... ALL OF YOU... P L E A S E....

“Okei doki! But here’s a warning! It’s pretty long! So... if you’re okay with reading long things then here’s my story about my two character Rybocat and Miles!”

note: words in bold are lyrics to the song ‘Touch Tone Telephone’ by Lemon Demon!

I think it's time for you to know the awful truth The day they found Rybocat and announced him to the public. People came running from everywhere over the world. It was 1999! Why wouldn't they! They had just found not only a super computer, but a very cute cat one at the matter of fact! One that perfectly emulates emotions! It's the most advanced thing anybody had ever seen! The finest piece of technology! One with a conscious ultra super processor! They answer within seconds!

The truth about me, and the truth about you Rybocat found the attention fine. Eventually he was put on expedition for people to just visit him. He would help them or just chat. The people who wanted the chat though seemed to always just test his speech processors. Just to see how well he could understand everything. Several times Rybo claimed that he found the tests funny! He claims to be 100% natural. Nobody believed him considering he's all metal. They just thought the robot did this to stop itself from having a meltdown of "I'm just a robot." instead making it think "I am a person. I have a reason to be here." So it didn't self destruct itself

'Cause you're a brand new species The first time he's treated as a person. Someone real was a kid named Miles. He was apparently called a 'prodigy' which means he is much smarter than others his age. He may have been 16 but his mind was so much older! He knew how to perfectly calculate quantum physics. And the thing is that Miles didn't treat him as a robot. He treated him like another kid. They would have nice talks and jokes. They were friends! One day they were having a discussion and Miles said, "Ya know Rybo. You're not a machine at all. You're a brand new species of awesome cat! Super smart! We're a great team, do you think we'd be able to go to space one day with how smart we are?" Rybocat didn't stop thinking about that for the next week.

Big cat, space Nazis, Robert Stack Something that Rybo learnt is that Miles had a large fascination for Space and the Unknown. Things like aliens, bigfoot, supernatural theories. He believed that he can prove that they're real or at lease make them real with enough experimentation. Rybocat always supported him and would bring his own theories to the table.

God damn it, gonna snap, Leonard Nimoy Call me back (Call me back) Even though we talked about those things. Afterwards my scientist person who looks after me and keeps me powered made sure to always tell me that "You're just a robot remember Rybocat. And that even if that Miles child is smart. Some of the things he say are not true. He is just testing you." I knew he was lying. I could tell. The way Miles said things. He was always passionate about what he was saying and it was true but. The scientist man. Those words felt dead in and out. Rybo did not believe his caretaker and would continue chatting about the supernatural with his best friend Miles anyway.

I try to call you every day I'm rehearsing what to say when the truth comes out (Of my very own mouth) Sometimes when Miles was over he would just accidentally not respond to something he said because he was too busy being lost in the boy's voice and the way it elegantly explained his thoughts. Or he couldn't find the words of what to say because of he would wonder if the response would set off anything within Miles. He would try to calculate every outcome of responses. Sometimes the things Miles would say he just couldn't process and he would end up overheating! He couldn't think of how he was supposed too act when Miles would lightly grab his arm to show the newest sketch of a blueprint for his next project.

I've been working on a unified theory If I make it through tonight everybody's gonna hear me out Miles explains that his big project is gonna be a cool alien space ship. Because maybe if they looked like them. They could be picked up by the Aliens and prove that they're real by documentation. He believes its gonna work so much! He would even come in to see Rybocat with oil stains on his clothes.

'Cause I'm the right one On my touch-tone, touch-tone telephone Rybocat would receive updates from the project on his paw. It can be used as a smart phone of sorts. He felt a weird buzzing feeling whenever he looked at Miles now. He thinks its called Happiness. But it's probably more.

I'm the only one On your A.M., A.M. radio Rybocat hears announced on the radio more things like him. Except all of them are different. While he's best suited for mathematics and calculations. Some of the others would excel at other things like Languages and Arts. Coding. History. Most of them had something that Rybo did not however. No emotions. Allowing them to do anything the humans asked them too. It set off something within Rybo. He thinks its... unsettlement and disgust. He wishes he could help them. Help them feel like he does! Have emotions and friends... Rybo suddenly had nobody visiting his centre building. They all went to others. There was other robo's that could do mathematics better then he did. And none of them wouldn't not answer because some questions made them uncomfortable. The only person who would come is Miles. He feels a large attachment to Miles. Miles said that the other robots were boring and not as fun as he was. Not as real as him. Rybo thinks he's experiencing what love feels like.

Oh, I'm crying now, authentic tears Rybocat was told by his scientist that he was going to be scrapped the next day. As they had better people to do his job. The other robo's. Rybocat was terrified. He spent the day crying. Crying real tears. Why couldn't they see that he was real and not just faking it. He was real and he didn't want to be scrapped. He didn't want to die.

They flow out of me when I think about you What about all the things he promised he'd do with Miles. Explore space, discover aliens, summon ghosts. Miles. He doesn't want to leave his friend.

'Cause you're the only person in the world who'd understand 'Cause you're the only person in the world who'd understand the meaning of this Miles would understand how useful Rybo can still be. He'd be the only one that would understand all of the little jokes they'd come up with. Miles is the only person in the world that understands Rybocat.

Oh My God I try and I try and I try to make you listen to me However when I try to talk to him he wouldn't believe me. He would just say that it's impossible to get rid of me. I'm the only robot cat with emotions in the world. And he doesn't understand why they'd get rid of me.

I try to call you every day I'm rehearsing what to say when the truth comes out (Of my very own mouth) I've been working on a unified theory If I make it through tonight everybody's gonna hear me out 'Cause I'm the right one On my touch-tone, touch-tone telephone I'm the only one, hey! On your A.M., A.M. radio Miles realised he was horribly wrong when he was heading home that night. He saw a little festival set up. They were setup and celebrating for the first dissection of a high tech robot. He could see Rybocat's name printed everywhere. He was so wrong. There was even a TV to show the livestreaming of it. He ran home. He riled through his closet. He knew exactly how he felt for his cat friend Rybo. He knew exactly the fluttering feeling he felt in his chest when their bodies touched when they hugged or leaned against each other. He knew exactly that the adults were going to kill him tonight. And Miles wasn't going to let them kill the person he loved.

Don't hang up yet, I'm not done Rybo flinches awake out of sleep mode when he hears glass shattering. He jumps off of the... admittedly pathetic bed/charging station now he thinks about it.

I'm an expert, I'm the one He spots Miles taking off a black beanie he had covering his entire face. "I was wrong! I... They're gonna dissect you and kill you j-just for science or whatever but it's stupid! And I w-wont let them do that to you Rybo!!!"

The one who was right all along "B-but no matter what you do Miles. They're gonna find me. I'm 100 percent sure that they have me microchipped." "Heh... Well. Can they track a microchip travelling thousands of miles per hour in a space ship?" "What!?" "Come with me! I'll show you!" "But-" "No buts! Anything is better. Even if we fail it's gonna take longer for them to reach you and i'd do anything to make sure you're alive for longer." Rybocat lets out a genuine laugh as he grabs his friends hand. He even takes the Beanie from it, covering his own ears with it. Miles says it looks good on him as they're running. This is one of these times where Miles is happy that he lives on a giant farm on the outskirts of town surrounded by cornfields. Because it makes the perfect cover for everything he's been doing.

Better to be laughed at than wrong I'm an expert in my field UFOlogy, yes, it's all real Rybo was absolutely amazed when he reached Miles home to see a huge ship! Along with strange glowing creatures along side it. And... is that some of the other... Robots? "I can explain them later! All I know is that they tested it and it works! It works!"

Ancient aliens, it's all true I'm an expert just like you "You know what this means? We were right! The whole time!" "About-" "About Aliens! When you can communicate with them and explain things. They're even nicer than I thought! And the other robots? They heard about you and wanted to learn emotions too! They idolise you Rybo! They think you're amazing!" "Me?

And like you, I'm a genius before my time "Me? But i'm just... a stupid robot with feelings." "Are you kidding me?! You're the coolest fuckin' person in the entire world! You're the nicest and the smartest and I think I love you!?" "I THINK I LOVE YOU TOO?"

Disbelieving, that's the real crime They hear sirens blare after their admittance of feelings. It's then they decide to talk about that later and instead head into the ship and leave. Leave the place full of people who don't believe.

Pretty soon they'll discover me in the Super-Sargasso Sea Rybocat has one thing he loved the most about leaving Earth. The feeling of Miles hand in his paw. And the shit eating grin he let out as he watched shocked adults see the ship float up into the air and away.

I try to call you every day What can I say when the truth comes out? (Of my very own mouth) I've been working on a unified theory If I make it through tonight everybody's gonna hear me out (Now, now, now) 'Cause I'm the right one On my touch-tone, touch-tone telephone I'm the only one On your A.M., A.M. radio

. . . .

A long time has passed and Rybocat thinks that on earth it would be about 2030. He leans into a microphone while facing a hologram on his ship, sitting behind a desk. Microphones infront of them. Rybocat has even got a shirt and jacket. Along with the Beanie he was given years ago by his now husband. He leans into the microphone after hitting a button on the control panel on the desk. "Hello everyone! This is Rybocat and Miles. The Earth's smartest escapists! You're listening to 51.6 Space AM Radio! Today we will be taking questions about the planet earth and what it was like when we occupied it. Connection-lines are now open for contact!"

Rybocat loves his life. In space, talking about the wonderful things of the universe.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

And that’s my little story! I hope whoever reading this enjoyed!

[douxreviews]

Roswell, New Mexico - ‘So Much For the Afterglow’ Review

“I gotta get through this one, really crappy day.”

The tenth anniversary of Rosa’s death has opened old wounds and dredged up the worst in the residents of Roswell, including Max and Liz.

Liz idolized Rosa but thanks to Rosa’s drug use and her possible mental problems, it’s clear Rosa wasn’t always there for Liz. Rosa’s death embodies that abandonment. Isobel’s psychic nudge may have sent Liz packing 10 years ago but I suspect Rosa’s death was the real culprit.

Either way, her father’s plea sends Liz on a quest for understanding if not outright forgiveness. Her first stop is to visit Kyle in search of Rosa’s autopsy. Maybe if she can blame the drugs, she can forgive her sister. Her next stop is to ask Max if he can show her better memories of Rosa than the ones she continually dwells on. This is the last thing that Max wants to do. His fears are justified when he shares a memory of Rosa on the night of her death.

Following the story from Liz’s POV allows us to empathize with Liz. This is important because we learn some not so flattering things about her and her actions throughout the episode are even less flattering. Liz used losing her job as an excuse to pick up stakes and return to Roswell, abandoning a fiance in the process. While there may be a perfectly good reason for her decision, it still seems like a pretty crappy thing to do.

Just as lying to Max about her feelings for him as she dangles the possibility of a future relationship is a crappy thing to do. Discovering that Max may have knowledge of your sister’s death is definitely grounds for pumping the breaks on the relationship. But her ability to shift from honest communication to manipulation with someone she cares about does not speak well of her character.

The question remains, is Max worthy of her trust? Liz is not wrong about him hiding things from her. And the viewer is privy to information that Liz doesn’t have, namely proof of Max’s feelings for her. However, he is behaving out of character. This is a man who has spent his life protecting one secret yet we saw him barely able to contain his powers on multiple occasions. And while Michael isn’t particularly surprised when Max decks him, Isobel is shocked. More to the point, if Michael had not stopped him, there was the very real probability Max would have killed Wyatt.

Max’s anger issues open up the possibility he could be responsible for Rosa’s death (although I still doubt it). Especially since Isobel refers to “the last time” this happened. She doesn’t mention when but I’d lay odds it was ten years ago. Is this a side effect from healing Liz? Does it mean he tried to heal Rosa?

I find these new tidbits of information about Liz and Max fascinating. As much as he cares about Liz, he has an overdeveloped sense of fairness and is legitimately offended by Wyatt’s (and the Mayor’s) racism. It’s probably what drove him to become a cop. Whereas, Rosa’s life and death can define so much of who Liz is. From Liz’s choice in music, her overpowering need for an explanation to everything, even her loss of faith. However, for my money, Michael and Alex are the more interesting pairing.

Alex clearly has issues acknowledging his feelings for Michael. We’re given the impression that Alex is not happy with the person he’s become although it’s not clear if it’s because of his injury, what happened during his tour in the military or something more domestic, say his father. And Michael reminds him of better, or at least simpler, times. Michael, being Michael, would rather fain indifference than risk being hurt by Alex’s erratic behavior. So, how ironic is it that Alex and Michael are the ones that are actually honest with each other about their feelings and act on them, while Liz and Max continue to dissemble.

What Do We Know:

Rosa was killed by an alien. Our alien trio knows it and now so does Liz and Kyle. Max’s comment about letting Liz down sounds more like regret about how he handled the situation than a confession of guilt. But I find it hard to believe that a teenage Isobel or Michael was capable of murder. At least not on purpose. Did one of them lose control of their powers? Or was Rosa just in the wrong place at the wrong time?

We also learned that the Evans’ adoption of Isobel and Max caused a rift between Max and Michael that’s never healed. Much of Michael’s anger involves being on the outside and looking in on everyone else’s relationships. For his sake, I hope this thing with Alex works out.

Speaking of long-standing relationships. Max and Jenna? Didn’t see that coming. Just once I’d like a man and a woman to be partners on a TV show and not have sex come into it.

Relationship issues aside, this episode upped the ante on Max, Michael, and Isobel’s potential outing. Liz’s interest in protecting Max’s secret is waning in the face of his apparent betrayal. And Kyle has both the means and motive to inform the government of what he knows. I don’t think that will happen anytime soon, at least not before the season finale. But I wouldn’t mind a few answers.

3 out of 5 big guns

Parting Thoughts:

“So much for the Afterglow” refers to the song by Everclear.

Also in the music matters department, the song “God of Wine,” in which the lyric “a fraudulent zodiac” is featured was playing during Alex and Michael’s scene at the end of the episode.

This is the second reference to Max’s love of Russian literature in as many episodes. I wonder how that comes into play.

Michael and Alex were musicians until something happened to Michael’s hand. Makes you wonder if Max can only heal humans.

Isobel and her husband have an interesting relationship. And I’m not just talking about the sex. He’s very accepting of the fact that she just walks out at the drop of a hat. I realize this has probably been going on for years. But it is odd, right?

Quotes:

Liz: “You gonna arrest me, officer?” Max: "Nah, too much paperwork.”

Kyle: “It’s late. Thanks for the family history lesson, but I’m gonna pass... on all of this.”

Jenna: “You look like garbage, partner. Ruggedly handsome garbage, but garbage.”

Isobel: “How’s your fiance back in Denver?” Liz: “We broke up.” Isobel: “Does he know that?”

Arturo: “There was more to Rosa than the bad things that she did.”

Michael: “You keep showing up like this, I’m gonna start thinking you like me.”

Michael: “Isn’t there some law about building on a historical site?” Alex: “What do you mean, a historical... Oh, because the UFO crashed here? Yeah. We’re not supposed to build on top of Santa’s workshop, either.”

Kyle: “The mid-makeout abandonment was very sophomore year. I got all nostalgic.”

Kyle: “If you’re gonna forgive her, don’t focus on the science. Focus on the memories."

Noah: “The next time we do the thing I like with the thing and the thing, let’s not use my lucky tie.”

Noah: “You want me to take him out for a beer? I can totally do the cowboy thing. Grunt, stare off into the distance. Talk about belt buckles as a secret metaphor for emotions...”

Max: “Are you sassing Jesus?”

Max: “Men who work miracles with their hands tend to die bloody.”

Michael: “For a genius, I was a real dumb ass."

Max: “You been honoring your dead sister any other way? Like, I don’t know, riddling the Crashdown Cafe with bullets?”

Jenna: “You could’ve done that.” Max: “I keep telling you, I’m a feminist.” Jenna: “You wanted him to lose to a girl.” Max: “Also that.”

Isobel: “We’re family.” Michael: “No. We’re not. We all just happened to hitch the same ride on the same doomed intergalactic Titanic.”

Isobel: “Come on, Michael. Is there really nobody in this world that you wouldn’t risk everything to save?”

Maria: “Home doesn’t have to mean a white picket fence house and a family. It can be a person.”

Max: “I don’t want to be an experiment.”

---

Shari loves sci-fi, fantasy, supernatural, and anything with a cape.

[samanthasroberts]

10 things you didn’t know about your old pal Bender from ‘Futurama’

Bender Bending Rodriguez may be a fictional robot from a canceled sci-fi cartoon show, but to fans, he’s so much more than that. This misanthropic, lovable antihero has anger issues and every sort of vice, but under the filth is a heart of gold. Before you start your next binge-watch of Futurama, take a gander at these fascinating facts about Bender.

10 things you never knew about Bender

1) It’s canon that Bender is a Mac

In the season 1 finale, the Planet Express crew takes a tour of the Slurm Factory where we get to see them hang out with good ole’ Slurms McKenzie. Earlier in the episode, Professor Farnsworth scans Bender with a new device called an F-Ray, whereupon we discover that our dear friend Bender is powered by a 6502 microprocessor, the same processor that was used to power the Apple II. In an interview with Vulture, writer David X. Cohen explained why. “This is straight from me,” Cohen said. “When I was in high school, I spent many of my teen years until five in the morning programming video games of my own invention, so I became extremely and intimately familiar with this chip. It ran at 1 MHz—we’re used to hearing GHz nowadays—and so you had to be a nimble programmer to get it to do what you wanted it to do.”

Screenshot via Vulture

2) Apple was all over Bender’s funeral

In season 7’s “Forty Percent Leadbelly,” the world briefly believes Bender has been killed by a train. Apple funded Bender’s funeral, though apparently in the future, the company barters for ad space. During the funeral, folk artist Silicon Red sings Bender a Mac-themed eulogy, including the lyrics:

“Then the steel driving man ran his train through the wall, and crashed him flatter than a MacBook Air, lord. Crashed him flatter than a MacBook Air.”

Screengrab via Pixa

3) Bender has a John Hughes connection 

Bender was named after John Bender from The Breakfast Club. Played by Judd Nelson, John Bender was a tough bully from the wrong side of the tracks who hid a soft and sensitive side underneath his gruff demeanor. We have no idea how that inspired Bender. 

Photo via Giphy

4) Bender’s antenna is a multitool

Bender’s antenna is more than just a transmitter. Over the course of the series it has been a beer tap, a popcorn butter pump, a flusher, a snooze button, a timer, a voice mail notification system, a voicemail deletion button, an audio tape dispenser, a pager, an unintentional cable signal blocker, and a timer for Bender’s internal digital camera.

Screengrab via Ann Marie Jukic/Pintrest

5) Bender came off the assembly line like this

Bender was built in the year 2996 in Tijuana, Mexico, by Momcorp, and he came off the assembly line as an adorable little tyke, though one with attitude. His first words as a baby were, “Bite my shiny metal ass,” spoken as he enjoyed his first beer.

Screengrab via Reddit

READ MORE:

11 intergalactic facts about ‘Starship Troopers’

12 magical facts about ‘Gravity Falls’

10 plucky facts about Disney’s ‘DuckTales’ you never knew

20 schwifty facts about Adult Swim’s ‘Rick and Morty’

6) Bender is mortal

Unlike other robots, Bender does not have a backup unit to house his data in case his body is destroyed. Momcorp saw this as a defect and had Bender ordered to be destroyed, but he was saved by Hermes. This also means if his hard drive is destroyed, he will die once and for all.

Screengrab via YouTube

7) Despite being born in 2996, Bender is one of the oldest beings on Earth

In the movie “Bender’s Big Score,”we learn that Bender is actually millions of years old thanks to his use of the Time Sphere. Time travel through the Time Sphere is one way, so each time Bender is sent back in time he’s forced to wait thousands of years in the limestone cave under Planet Express. There is no exact accounting of how old Bender currently is on the show.

Photo via The Infosphere

8) Bender has a soul

Although he lacks a backup unit, Bender apparently does have a soul. In “Ghosts in the Machines,” he is killed by Lynn, an ex-girlfriend and suicide booth. His ghost haunts the Earth, only able to communicate by possessing other robots until he proves himself worthy of resurrection by saving Fry’s life. Apparently, his soul left his body without his hard drive being destroyed. At least he had fun as a ghost.

Photo via Tenor

9) Don’t assume you know Bender’s family history

Bender’s grandmother was a bulldozer. We learn this fact in “The Beast with a Billion Backs,” when Leela is trying to shame him into trying harder during a game. Leela shouts, “Come on, Bender, your grandmother could push harder than that!” Bender says, “No crap! My grandmother was a bulldozer.” Way to gender shame, Leela.

READ MORE:

What the heck is a plumbus?

The joyful, existential dread of Mr. Meeseeks

Who is Mr. Poopy Butthole?***

‘Rick and Morty’ quotes that’ll blow your mind and crush your soul

10) Bender’s most common words are only partly what you’d expect

Although his character is known for a wide range of profanity, it isn’t until “War is the H-word” that we officially learn Bender’s most frequently uttered words. They are:

1. Ass 2.Daffodil 3. Shiny 4. My 5. Bite 6. Pimpmobile 7. Up 8. Yours 9. Chumpette 10. Chump

Photo via YouTube

Editor’s note: This article is regularly updated for relevance.

Source: http://allofbeer.com/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-your-old-pal-bender-from-futurama/

from All of Beer https://allofbeer.wordpress.com/2018/05/26/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-your-old-pal-bender-from-futurama/

[allofbeercom]

10 things you didn’t know about your old pal Bender from ‘Futurama’

Bender Bending Rodriguez may be a fictional robot from a canceled sci-fi cartoon show, but to fans, he’s so much more than that. This misanthropic, lovable antihero has anger issues and every sort of vice, but under the filth is a heart of gold. Before you start your next binge-watch of Futurama, take a gander at these fascinating facts about Bender.

10 things you never knew about Bender

1) It’s canon that Bender is a Mac

In the season 1 finale, the Planet Express crew takes a tour of the Slurm Factory where we get to see them hang out with good ole’ Slurms McKenzie. Earlier in the episode, Professor Farnsworth scans Bender with a new device called an F-Ray, whereupon we discover that our dear friend Bender is powered by a 6502 microprocessor, the same processor that was used to power the Apple II. In an interview with Vulture, writer David X. Cohen explained why. “This is straight from me,” Cohen said. “When I was in high school, I spent many of my teen years until five in the morning programming video games of my own invention, so I became extremely and intimately familiar with this chip. It ran at 1 MHz—we’re used to hearing GHz nowadays—and so you had to be a nimble programmer to get it to do what you wanted it to do.”

Screenshot via Vulture

2) Apple was all over Bender’s funeral

In season 7’s “Forty Percent Leadbelly,” the world briefly believes Bender has been killed by a train. Apple funded Bender’s funeral, though apparently in the future, the company barters for ad space. During the funeral, folk artist Silicon Red sings Bender a Mac-themed eulogy, including the lyrics:

“Then the steel driving man ran his train through the wall, and crashed him flatter than a MacBook Air, lord. Crashed him flatter than a MacBook Air.”

Screengrab via Pixa

3) Bender has a John Hughes connection 

Bender was named after John Bender from The Breakfast Club. Played by Judd Nelson, John Bender was a tough bully from the wrong side of the tracks who hid a soft and sensitive side underneath his gruff demeanor. We have no idea how that inspired Bender. 

Photo via Giphy

4) Bender’s antenna is a multitool

Bender’s antenna is more than just a transmitter. Over the course of the series it has been a beer tap, a popcorn butter pump, a flusher, a snooze button, a timer, a voice mail notification system, a voicemail deletion button, an audio tape dispenser, a pager, an unintentional cable signal blocker, and a timer for Bender’s internal digital camera.

Screengrab via Ann Marie Jukic/Pintrest

5) Bender came off the assembly line like this

Bender was built in the year 2996 in Tijuana, Mexico, by Momcorp, and he came off the assembly line as an adorable little tyke, though one with attitude. His first words as a baby were, “Bite my shiny metal ass,” spoken as he enjoyed his first beer.

Screengrab via Reddit

READ MORE:

11 intergalactic facts about ‘Starship Troopers’

12 magical facts about ‘Gravity Falls’

10 plucky facts about Disney’s ‘DuckTales’ you never knew

20 schwifty facts about Adult Swim’s ‘Rick and Morty’

6) Bender is mortal

Unlike other robots, Bender does not have a backup unit to house his data in case his body is destroyed. Momcorp saw this as a defect and had Bender ordered to be destroyed, but he was saved by Hermes. This also means if his hard drive is destroyed, he will die once and for all.

Screengrab via YouTube

7) Despite being born in 2996, Bender is one of the oldest beings on Earth

In the movie “Bender’s Big Score,”we learn that Bender is actually millions of years old thanks to his use of the Time Sphere. Time travel through the Time Sphere is one way, so each time Bender is sent back in time he’s forced to wait thousands of years in the limestone cave under Planet Express. There is no exact accounting of how old Bender currently is on the show.

Photo via The Infosphere

8) Bender has a soul

Although he lacks a backup unit, Bender apparently does have a soul. In “Ghosts in the Machines,” he is killed by Lynn, an ex-girlfriend and suicide booth. His ghost haunts the Earth, only able to communicate by possessing other robots until he proves himself worthy of resurrection by saving Fry’s life. Apparently, his soul left his body without his hard drive being destroyed. At least he had fun as a ghost.

Photo via Tenor

9) Don’t assume you know Bender’s family history

Bender’s grandmother was a bulldozer. We learn this fact in “The Beast with a Billion Backs,” when Leela is trying to shame him into trying harder during a game. Leela shouts, “Come on, Bender, your grandmother could push harder than that!” Bender says, “No crap! My grandmother was a bulldozer.” Way to gender shame, Leela.

READ MORE:

What the heck is a plumbus?

The joyful, existential dread of Mr. Meeseeks

Who is Mr. Poopy Butthole?***

‘Rick and Morty’ quotes that’ll blow your mind and crush your soul

10) Bender’s most common words are only partly what you’d expect

Although his character is known for a wide range of profanity, it isn’t until “War is the H-word” that we officially learn Bender’s most frequently uttered words. They are:

1. Ass 2.Daffodil 3. Shiny 4. My 5. Bite 6. Pimpmobile 7. Up 8. Yours 9. Chumpette 10. Chump

Photo via YouTube

Editor’s note: This article is regularly updated for relevance.

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-your-old-pal-bender-from-futurama/

[tgaoe]

Andy’s 2017 Music Report

Favorite Albums, Favorite Songs, and other assorted temporally-specific ramblings.

Preamble

I. Dearth I listened to less music this year than I did last year, partly due to the immense amount of time required to finish my Master’s Degree, and also because I slept better. You may recall from last year’s treatise that I experienced something of a listening renaissance late in the year, turning to music during nights spent sleepless for work-related anxiety. 2017 marked my fourth year in my current job, and the first during which I began to feel confident in my own professional competence. Hence, less anxiety, fewer sleepless nights, less music. So it goes.

II. Duplicity, Disaffection Another reason. Prior to November 21st, I spent an inordinate amount of time listening to a single band, the band that made my #1 record from 2016. They were also my most-listened to band of 2017. I went deep into their back catalogue, full immersion, and I found such joy and pleasure in doing so. The band helped me through a fraught, life-altering personal ordeal. I traveled to see them play and it was cathartic. However, on 11/21 it was revealed that the leader of that band may have betrayed much of what he/they claimed to have stood for as steadfast advocates for kindness, equity, and empathy. The woman or women he hurt are the primary victims, but secondarily his hypocrisy destroyed a community of people who connected strongly with his music. I believe in rehabilitation. But I also doubt I’ll ever be able to listen to this band the same way again, if at all. I share this troubling information because it undoubtedly colors this list. For weeks after the revelation I only listened to songs sung by women, maybe to offset the damage somehow, maybe to avoid connecting with another secretly awful man.

III. Disappointment Last year I wrote extensively about how the absence of releases from legacy acts resulted in my exposure to an unusually large number of new/emerging artists. That trend of exposure continued this year, for unfortunate reasons. Most new releases by old favorites proved little more than pleasant. Though something like 20 albums from 2017 fall into that category, only five or six made my list of favorites, and even some of those did so despite caveats. I suspect this may have to do with the current circumstances of my life more than with the music itself, at least in some cases. For instance, Sleep Well Beast will not appear below, but I am the only National devotee I know who doesn’t love it as much as their previous records. Time will tell, I suppose.

IV. Derelict I devoted significantly less time to this project this year than I did to its previous iterations, probably 20 hours vs. the usual 40-60. I usually track favorites all year and begin writing in October. This year I was much less diligent, not commencing writing until mid-December. It shows, I’m afraid. I did not keep an actual Favorite Songs list, nor did I keep a running record of micro-moments.

Blame the Master’s. Over five months of work my research project ballooned to 18,415 words spanning 118 pages—characteristically about twice as long as it needed to be. It’s a mystery how I mustered the energy to eke out another 6000 words for this thing after all that.

V. Dingus As always, forgive my assumption that readers of this monstrosity possess a certain level of familiarity with prevailing music culture. The writing reads better that way. Also as always, please forgive the preposterous pretense that anyone would want to read this, the bloviations of yet another obsessive 30-something white man desperate for your attention.

My 19 Favorite Albums of 2017

19 favorites because 19 was how many favorites I had.

19 The World’s Best American Band White Reaper Big, stupid, shameless riff rock; a record as fun as its title is ridiculous. The band almost has the chops to live up to it too, blazing through ten hook-dense, hedonistic rockers with fatalistic abandon. No introspection here, folks. The only lesson White Reaper has to impart is, “If you make the girls dance, the boys will dance with ‘em.” Noted, dudes.

18 Cigarettes After Sex Cigarettes After Sex How to Make the Sexiest Music Ever, Apparently

1) Start with early Interpol. 2) Slow it down. 3) Tighten it up. 4) Strip away the fuzz. 5) Replace Paul Banks with Greg Gonzalez, a man whose smoky, sultry voice I mistook for a woman's until just now. 6) Drop the nonsense lyrics in favor of straightforward stories, proclamations, and invitations, all specific and intimate like the first xx record.

The result: a collection of variations on "Fade Into You" sans twang. Almost unfathomably sexy. The sexiest.

17 The Nashville Sound Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit I don’t love this album, but I do love all its songs. The Nashville Sound should have been a solo record with an accompanying full-band live release a few months later. The 400 Unit is so talented, so utterly professional that they can’t help but sound canned, over-produced, in a modern studio. Any old band off the street can be made to sound that way. What makes the Unit special is that this is how they sound live. They sound perfect. Perfection on record isn’t much fun.

Jason Isbell is the best songwriter of his generation. Case in point: Leonard Cohen’s “Chelsea Hotel No. 2,” his best song and a contender for best song by anyone, famously concludes with the couplet, 

I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel That's all, I don't think of you that often

Isbell manages to casually convey the same sentiment through implication on Sound’s “Molotov”: 

Another life but I still remember A county fair in steamy September In the Year of the Tiger, nineteen-something

He remembers, but not that well, not the year. He doesn’t think of her that often.

16 Need Your Love Sheer Mag The opening salvo of “Meet Me in the Street” and the sort-of title track tells you everything you need to know about Need Your Love, the surprising segue of anthemic nails-hard rebel rock into heartfelt, slinky soul-funk. Sheer Mag is everything 70s rock, all facets, plain and simple, in timbre, tone, and demeanor, fitted to modern pop structure and sensibility. Massive riffs, throaty hollers, cavernous sonics, never not danceable. The last 40 years never happened.

15 Something to Tell You Haim Four years ago I passionately engaged in a pointless internet debate on the false premise of the superiority of Haim vs. Lorde. Of course this was less about the actual artists than it was the debaters’ desperation for validation of our own tastes and preferences at the expense of others’, which is a stupid thing insecure young white men do for some reason. However, looking back now and comparing the two entities’ work and public personas does reveal fascinating differences in their approaches and cultural placements, especially considering the rollouts and receptions of both artists’ follow-up records. I’ll write more about Lorde later (spoiler), but she crafts songs that achieve timelessness and universality seemingly unintentionally, through trope subversion and highly specific and personal writing. Haim achieves the same through something like the opposite approach.

Every Haim song feels like a glossy new product behind a high-end shop window, displayed uniformly, calculated and designed for maximum value and mass appeal. I’ve said this before, but Haim recordings sound like money, sound expensive. Because they are. Haim recordings are light, airy, sleek, tight, and huge. The lyrics strive for universality by exploring standard romantic emotional states in the most vague, impersonal, situationally unspecific possible manner. We do not know the identity of the “you” in these songs. Hell, we don’t really who the “I” is. We can project whoever we want. These songs are perfect manufactured products. That may read as negative criticism, but it is not. The total orderliness of Haim songs forces order on anarchy. Haim songs make the world simple, make it make sense. Every question has an answer, every problem a solution.

There is an exception that proves the rule here, a more experimental Haim song that towers above the others by subverting those established expectations of order, transcends them to depict in actuality the true messiness of love. That song is “Right Now,” and it is a monster jam, likely the best song Haim has ever written. The structure is confounding, the melodies don’t time out naturally, nothing musically makes sense, is rational, in the same way feelings don’t and aren’t. There is a call-and-response with which it is almost impossible to sing along because the response comes in like half a beat later than every other pop song has trained us to expect. Feedback blares, clicks click, hums hum. “Right Now” is imperfect, and in that it is the most perfect Haim song. It came not from an assembly line, it came from a soul. Or souls. “Right Now” even allows a single reference to an actual specific event, a quiet conversation overheard through a window, which, even though still somewhat vague, gives the song a level of personal meaning to the narrator missing from, you know, every other Haim song. More like this please.

By the way, this short PTA-directed performance film is incredible, and suggests that everything I wrote in that second paragraph may be negated when the band plays live.

14 Graveyard of Good Times Brandon Can’t Dance Brandon Ayers's collection of mom's basement DIY songs plays as much like a friend's great mix cd as it does a solo artist's album, intuitively-sequenced and formally experimental in the sense that the dude seemingly tries any musical idea that occurs to him, and there are so many here: stoned weirdo neo disco, 80s soft rock, wall-of-sound shoegaze, earnest folk, synthy dance rock, 90s industrial and more, all effortless, catchy and united aesthetically by competent use of limited production resources. Ayers's lyrics are always either smart or hilariously, knowingly dumb as he explores a kind of mundanity inherent to a life of low-budget hedonism, as well as how much he loves his dogs, mom, sister, and grandma. Can't go wrong with that.

13 Villains Queens of the Stone Age Josh Homme and Britt Daniel have much in common culturally, both mid-40s men who have spent nearly two decades each as highly unlikely sex symbols, sustaining multi-decade rock careers, stalking stages with maniacal, borderline-predatory confidence. But musically they’ve shared few qualities until now. Villians has airless, precise grooves similar to some Spoon records, but, you know, with that Queens menace and evil. The QoTSA has always been a band about perfect playing, but this time Homme brought in preeminent funk racketeer Mark Ronson to help shape Villains. The result is the shortest, most accessible record the band has ever made. Actually, it is not the shortest—it just feels that way. Villians cooks, showcasing the same old Queens, aggressively showy and prone to extended digressions, but with arrangements more focused, lightweight, and compressed than ever before.

Make sure you stick around for the entire song. Trust me.

12 I Love You Like a Brother Alex Lahey What is happening in Australian that the country keeps producing these witty, confident female punk singer/songwriters? Alex Lahey’s style certainly mines a similar humorous vain to Courtney Barnett, but her approach is more energetic and less erudite. I always feel held at a distance by Barnett’s music; listening to it is almost a purely intellectual exercise. Lahey’s, however, has a casual immediacy that makes me want to smile and laugh and dance.

The title track is both punk as hell and sticky-sweet, a genuine love song from a sister to a brother, insanely catchy and refreshingly sincere. I am no one’s sister, and my brother and I, though we love each other, have never had a connection quite like the one Lahey documents here. Still, I so feel this jam. It follows the album’s opener, “Every Day’s the Weekend,” an actual love song, albeit one about having fallen for a broke, emotionally elusive charmer. “Fuck work, you’re here, every day’s the weekend,” is lyric of such powerful brevity, so effectively conveying the feeling during those times when someone exciting has unexpectedly exploded into your life. The hilarious “Perth Traumatic Stress Disorder,” another gatestormer, follows, and then the album starts to mutate into something more complex and interesting.

I Love You Like a Brother begins as an aggressive punk record, but slowly warps into atmospheric, radio-ready stadium rock. On a couple occasions this may be to its detriment, but as a whole the album serves as a solid testament to Lahey’s versatility as a writer. The lyrics of “Awkward Exchange” are comparatively anonymous to the earlier tracks, but the open sound, dynamic structure, and wordless chants beg for massive festival singalongs. It might happen. It should happen. The two approaches combine on “Lotto in Reverse,” perhaps Lahey’s greatest triumph here, an inward-focused dirge grafted onto a massive, hooky rock song that more than earns its prominent placement on Spotify’s Badass Women playlist.

11 Go Farther in Lightness Gang of Youths Christian music is terrible, almost all of it. Not just because it all still sounds like U2, but because none of it deigns to explore actual life as a flawed human who happens to be Christian. This is so intentionally. The Christian music industry is insidiously Randian; cynical and deplorable. Gang of Youths is fighting back, hard.

Singer/songwriter David Le'aupepe is a vulgar spiritualist, kind of a like an Australian David Bazan or Sufjan Stevens in the way he publicly struggles to reconcile his faith with his human proclivities. His studious lyrics often recall very early Bruce Springsteen, with their expansive vocabulary and wide-ranging cultural literacy. The band met in church (like U2!), yet the man swears with relish and documents his perceived failings as well as his issues with the spirtual institution to which he belongs. Get a load of this, from “Perservere,” which is actually my least favorite song on the album:

But God is full of grace and his faithfulness is vast There is safety in the moments when the shit has hit the fan Not some vindictive motherfucker, nor is he shitty at his job What words to hear, and I’m a mess by now 'Cause nothing tuned me in to my failure as fast As grieving for a friend with more belief than I possessed

Imagine that at Sunday service! If all Christian music was this nuanced and genuinely introspective then, well, Christian music wouldn’t be a ghetto. It would just be more music.

This album is long, almost feature-length, most of its 16 songs stretching beyond five minutes. Fortunately, the wealth of ideas and arrangements sustain the length, if only just barely. Gang of Youths are adventurously egalitarian in their consummate unoriginality, adamantly subscribing to the notion of Ecclesiastes 1:9, content to let Le’aupepe’s compelling narratives give the band identity as their arrangements freely pillage ideas from the most successful indie rock bands of the last decade, mostly those who can now fill arenas; the Killers, the National, Arcade Fire, Bon Iver, LCD Soundsystemm Bloc Party. My favorite songs here pound forward relentlessly like Titus Andronicus. On some songs Le’aupepe’s words tumble out uncontrollably like Gareth Campesinos, on others his voice could be mistaken for Matt Berninger’s low growl.

Also, I’d be remiss to not mention how appealing I find it that there are no white people in this band. It’s rare and refreshing to hear this kind of massive music from a cultural perspective so different then my own.

10 Hot Thoughts Spoon Spoon is a band of consummate constants and variables. The band knows exactly what defines it, what listeners like, and they always deliver while also changing just enough to surprise. Every record, every song, reliably has three particular elements: an airtight hard rhythm groove, simple, catchy, repetitive; a masterful command of pop structure; and Britt Daniel’s enigmatic brand of ultracool, vaguely sexual vocal swagger. The other sounds around those elements, the atmospheres and tones, change with each record. Hot Thoughts delves deeper into the psychedelic G-funk timbres the band played with some on They Want My Soul, as Daniel continues to explore nonthreatening, acceptable ways to express desire. In short, it’s another Spoon record, and it rules.

9 Strangers in the Alps Phoebe Bridgers I keep coming back to lyrics. Lyrics draw me in like nothing else, the more smart, personal, and specific the better. Lyrics don’t come more specific and personal and smart than Phoebe Bridgers’s. She tells vivd stories, recounts memories of events and emotions by conjuring indelible, detailed settings and images with devastating depths of feeling, mostly over quiet, close-miced acoustic guitars underlaid with noninvasive strings and other atmospherics. Prepare to be haunted.

Though she sometimes doesn’t bother and the songs don’t suffer for it, as on the incredible “Smoke Signals,” Bridgers can also write the hell out of a chorus. Try not to get “Motion Sickness” stuck in your mind.

Strangers in the Alps does take a production risk I would understand some finding off-putting. Sometimes sound effects supplement and/or match lyrical events; a plane flying overhead, a boot crunching leaves, the kind of thing. It’s strange at first, but ultimately sets the album apart from others by similarly earnest stool-seated strummers.

8 Near to the Wild Heart of Life - year’s best title Japandroids I’ve seen this band play three times. The third was this year. Those previous had been with friends, and before the shows we drank and goofed around, celebrating our affection for each other and getting just the right level of lit up. This year I took a vacation day from my professional job, drove to St. Louis alone, and waited in line alone while reading a screenplay by one of the guys I used to go to shows with, eventually watching the show alone while nursing a single beer. It wasn’t the same. But it was still good.

Japandroids write what they know. Seven years ago what they knew resulted in a masterpiece, an album more relatable to me at the time than any other. Indeed, Celebration Rock remains my all-time favorite record, its ragged, propulsive riffage and emotional narratives of kinetic nights with close friends still have the power to take me back to that time, when I had more energy and a will to wildness. However, over the long interim between albums, the Japandroids’ lives and mine ceased to resemble each other. My closest friends moved. I have bills and a career and a generally pleasant, stable life—one distinctly not wild. Meanwhile, those dudes are evidently still globetrotting, every night out there swilling top-shelf tequila to nurse the heartache of intercontinental romance, living hard and loving harder. I no longer relate. As a listener I’m an observer now when I was once a participant. However, while I don’t connect with latter day Japandroids experientially, in a way the fact that Wild Heart still plays great for me despite that suggests that Japandroids is a legitimately great band on a musical level, rather than one just great for its ability to bash out messy, meaningful feelings..

These dudes are not shy about their laziness as songwriters, at least in terms of prolificacy. They release music as soon as they’ve reached the requisite minimum quantity of great songs, and it takes them forever to do so. Like the two previous Japandroids records, Wild Heart has only eight tracks, and they cheat even to amass that many. While Celebration Rock included a (totally awesome, raucous, thematically-appropriate) cover song, this time one Wild Heart track is an interlude, barely a song (“I’m Sorry [for Not Finding You Sooner]”), and another is just bad, sounding like a high school garage band trying hard to write a Japandroids song (“Midnight to Morning”). They really shouldn’t have let that one through. But man, the other six songs still kill with the same ferocity as before, some with an increased sense of melody and hook, and they all sound great live and feel great to shout along with, which, let’s be honest, is mainly what this band is for, and has always been for. The shouting just means a little less to me now.

7 Don’t Be a Stranger Nervous Dater Rachel Lightner has the gift, my favorite gift. She expels what she considers her worst qualities, and she does it through great songs; extremely catchy, smart, driving, dynamic punk songs. She does it publicly, with casual confidence. She makes it look easy and, most importantly, normal. Feeling how she feels is not unique. Sharing those feelings legitimizes them, creates a community around them. I mean, look at these lines:

Cause when things get quiet I feel uneasy I need my friends or at least just the sound of the TV To keep these things in my head from screaming “You’re inadequate! You’re a piece of shit! You could run forever but you’d never get away with it! And if people really knew who you were, They’d probably cover up the ground that you walk on with spit!”

If you can’t relate, then I envy you. If you can, and if you like punk, you need this band.

The players behind Lightner are also great, building arrangements that match incidental turns in the lyrics. The lines above are from the title track. Listen for how the song bends and nearly breaks as the narrative does the same, then recovers before almost breaking again. The band follows a formula, each instrument doing a specific job. Drums, bass, and one guitar lock into rhythm, while a lead guitar incessantly plays highly-involved tasto solo hooks. The band rarely veers from its set aesthetic, and when it does, it does so with purpose.

Occasionally a male member of the band will cameo, supplementing Lightner’s self-excoriations with early-2000s emo-screaming in the background. It’s a signifier that, intentionally or not, effectively ties Lightner’s music back to that era, an era that very intentionally excluded and delegitimized women’s voices. As has been proven time and time again in recent years, that was stupid. Women do it better. The contemporary women making emotional, personal punk music are doing it so well that nobody’s come up with a term like “emo” to dismiss it. I love being alive right now.

6 Big Fish Theory Vince Staples For when people ask what kind of music I like, that impossible question almost only asked by those who do not share the obsession, I have developed a stock answer of surprising accuracy. The smartest versions of punk, rap, and country. Country is a fudge, designed to open up a conversation about what “smart” country is. Dorks call it “alt-country.” Anyway. That’s a separate essay. You may have noticed that Big Fish Theory is the first rap record on this list. I am not tapped in to most contemporary rap. The slow, repetitive codeine scene doesn’t do it for me, and rap is more about single songs and premium playlist placement than it is about albums now. The album-focused rappers are dinosaurs. Four fossil-rap acts made solid records this year, and three made my list. Ranking them was difficult, and I am not at all confident in my final assessments. Vince Staples could have ranked highest another day.

Some days I like Big Fish Theory more than DAMN. Vince Staples’ world is less complicated, more concentrated and angry. Some days unnuanced anger is what I want. For fuel. Case in point, compare the two’s thoughts on the President and the country. First, Kendrick, hinting and contemplative:

Homicidal thoughts; Donald Trump's in office We lost Barack and promised to never doubt him again But is America honest, or do we bask in sin?

And Vince:

Tell the President to suck a dick, because we on now Tell the one percent to suck a dick, because we on now Tell the government to suck a dick, because we on now

And, of course, both men appear on “Yeah Right,” every bit as glorious a linguistic whirlwind as could be expected.

Also, I don’t know another rapper more musically experimental, forward-thinking, and adventurous than Vince Staples, including Kendrick. Vince is admirably without ego here (humble!); often letting the music overtake his voice, having faith in listeners to look up his words if they so desire. Much of Big Fish Theory is essentially modernized Chicago house with rapping, while also proudly West Coast. And it bangs, hard.

5 Melodrama Lorde This one took time. It took reading younger people’s perspectives to appreciate, grow to love. The first listen felt cold, staid. Pure Herione had been an instant rush, a loud announcement of a new, exciting pop personality, fully steeped in enthusiastically appropriated pop tropes of the time and letting Ella Yelich-O'Connor’s novel personality shine atop it all. Melodrama is different. She doesn’t shine, she seethes and writhes. She’s growing up in front of us, with surprising, precocious wisdom and emotional maturity.

There is nothing particularly contemporary about the sound of Melodrama. It’s less jokey, more earnest than Pure Heroine. And ultimately, despite that it does not provide the same sugary pleasure rush of its predecessor, Melodrama is far superior. It doesn’t sound like a time period, it sounds like first love and first heartbreak, because it is the manifestation of those. It sounds timeless, orchestral without an orchestra, because it is those things.

One track is a notable exception to the timelessness, and that makes it almost impossibly special. I will elucidate later in the Favorite Songs section.

4 DAMN. Kendrick Lamar Has there ever been an artist so deft at balancing/blending pure creative expression with commercialism? Until DAMN., Kendrick had achieved that balance through compartmentalization, by creating knotty, esoteric records, masterpieces, while also featuring on the most crass chart-bait singles imaginable. Another case in point: Kendrick made “For Free?” and appeared on the “Shake it Off” remix the same year. DAMN. inextricably fuses the two compartments without compromise. Almost every second of the album is both at once. Every song has earworm hooks and brain-breaking lyrical density. The record is jammed with potential singles, yet still works as a whole… even when listening to the tracks in reverse order. All hail. DAMN. is unquestionably the best album of the year, but even so, and even though I flew 1500 miles to see him play it live his hometown… it is not my favorite this year. DAMN. somehow isn’t even my favorite rap record, a late-breaking change-of-heart that took me by surprise.

3 RTJ3 Run the Jewels It’s too long. Let’s get that out of the way. But it’s all essential. For months I said that cutting “Hey Kids” and “Thieves!” would have made a better record. I was wrong. “Hey Kids” is the weakest track, for sure, but Killer Mike’s verse is straight up canonical, despite the relative frivolity of El-P’s bars and the idiocy of Danny Brown’s feature. “Thieves!,” on the other hand, after some close-listening and Genius deep-diving, is one of RTJ3’s best tracks, a massively ambitious dystopian sci-fi narrative that subtly riffs on Hamlet. Part of that ambition is manifested in a structure quite different from the straightforward presentations we’re used to from these guys; listening without the proper context doesn’t provide the furious pleasure typically associated with Run the Jewels.

Killer Mike & El-P were in an unenviable position prior to releasing this album. RTJ1 surprised everyone, even its makers; a no-stakes lark that happened to be much better and more special than that due simply to the sheer volume of talent involved. Expectations for RTJ2 had been high as a result, and they were exceeded as the band chose to treat the project with seriousness and gravity, leveraging their newfound fame and cultural relevance/reverence for conscientious advocacy. The result, RTJ2, is an unimpeachable classic, one I will listen to for the rest of my life. How could they top it, or even match it, without repeating themselves? By ratcheting up the ambition even further, and with it the risk.

Run the Jewels had been many things on their first two records; angry, funny, aggressive, stoned. Introspective was rarely one of those things. On RTJ3, the duo turn their focus inward, exploring feelings, emotions, and motivations as they apply to the external world in a manner they had never done previously. They also continue to make hilarious dick jokes.

The first and last four tracks are the best work they’ve ever done, the bookends especially. I didn’t appreciate just how great “Down” is until seeing the group close a couple live sets with it. The friends with whom I saw those shows and I were confused by that choice, but it caused us, or me at least, to listen to the song differently, to consider it as the type of song to close a set. Turns out, the choice was a great one. This band has become a band about hope manifested as anger and action, and no track conveys that notion better than “Down,” no RTJ album does it better than their third.

2 Turn Out the Lights Julien Baker Julien Baker creates stadium soundscapes using only a clean electric guitar and/or piano filtered through looping pedals. Many artists try this and fail. Especially in a live setting, it’s a cynical trick often deployed to impress perceived plebes, as I’ve seen Ed Sheerhan and, sadly, Elvis Costello, do in person. But for Julien Baker it is not a trick. It is seamless, unnoticeable; technical mastery not for its own sake, for impressing an audience, but for empowering expressions of deep feeling.

Turn Out the Lights is so much more than its production and arrangements, however. Baker is one of the most talented living writers, singers, and performers. Her percussion-less, entirely solo arrangements exist only to serve the themes of her songs. She’s one woman, onstage or on record, alone with the power of a full orchestra as she looses her interior on the world, her battles with addiction and depression, her fight to square an existence as a Christian and queer person, and her longing search for love and meaning through it all, the constant quest to hurt less.

1 After the Party The Menzingers If this were a list of “best” rather than “favorite” albums of the year, After the Party would be much lower, possibly not even included. There’s nothing innovative or original happening here, nothing generation-defining, no new ideas or calls to revolution. But there is an endless well of energy, feeling, and hyper-competent rock musicianship. The Menzingers have one of the most able rhythm sections working, serving the songs of two extraordinary writers, who seem incapable of picking up guitars without creating stadium punk hooks as indelibly catchy as they are heavy. This is smart, pure, meat-and-potatoes rock music, the meatiest and starchiest.

Beyond the wholly satisfying drive and force of the band on a primal musical level, these dudes have a real working-class, post-religious Midwestern mentality, despite hailing a little too far east to fully qualify. Many of these songs deal with how to gracefully age and settle while maintaining an uncommon resistance to traditional values. It should come as no surprise how strongly I relate. Earlier I mentioned Japandroids, how their initial records depicted the romance of early-20s debauchery and intense friendship. The true triumph of After the Party is how the The Menzingers manage to write about moving forward, building lives with partners, embracing careers and domesticity while also looking back fondly at bygone wild days without romanticizing them, fully owning that a calmer life is a better one, but allowing that the past was pretty damn fun.

After the Party may not become a timeless classic like other records on this list might, but this year it was the album to which I connected most. It was, and is, mine.

A Few of My Favorite Songs of 2017

8/7 “Truth Hurts”/“Water Me” Lizzo Lizzo should be a huge star. She’s like André 3000 good. She’s my Beyoncé.

Including these songs here is like an honorary Favorite Album spot. I listened to the two singles back-to-back more times than I did most albums this year. Lizzo has talent in excess of her excess of confidence and swagger.

Music journalists could not shut up about the two times Rihanna rapped on record this year, a little on the Kendrick album and on the only good 45 seconds of the N.E.R.D. album. Both instances earned effusive and universal praise. It bothers me that Lizzo doesn’t get that type of attention. She raps, sings, and writes far better than Rihanna, better than most pop stars working, really, and she often does it all in the same song, the same line.

“Truth Hurts” is a total kiss-off rap banger, insidiously catchy as it deconstructs and rebuilds the chorus of “Black Beatles” into something much better and exponentially more driving than its lugubrious origin. “Water Me” is an aggressive funk jam that Lizzo goes nuts over, showing off the full range of her voice, trying about a hundred different modulations and weird ideas. They all work, and together form some truly transcendent pop.

Check out her older stuff too, including a couple unlikely collaborations with Sadie Dupois from Speedy Ortiz (!) for my punk friends.

7 “What Can I Do If the Fire Goes Out?” Gang of Youths This isn’t another “Younger Us,” a song that so fully represents a period of my life that the opening chords still sometimes have the power to make me tear up. But it does take me be back to another time, and moves me in a similar way to the Japandroids classic. I haven’t told many people about this, but though I didn’t openly quit the church until a few months after graduating high school, I had struggled to maintain faith for a few years, even while playing in a devoutly evangelical Christian rock band.

“What Can I Do If the Fire Goes Out?” takes me back to a specific morning, a bone-cold, see-your-breath morning, driving to school my sophomore or junior year, listening to the first song from the second Spoken album and weeping at the lyrics’ longing prayer for help and guidance. In hindsight, Spoken made objectively bad music; comically derivative and poorly-structured. Throughout the Gang of Youths album, and especially on “Fire,” similar sentiments are explored and depicted more articulately, with far superior musical acumen. I’ll never believe again, but it’s nice to be made to have those feelings again, to experience unforced sympathy for another’s spiritual struggle.

6 “Right Now” Haim See the last paragraph of the Haim album entry above.

5 “Even” Julien Baker Julien at her most simple, most distilled, uncharacteristically just 4/4 quarter-note strumming an acoustic guitar, showing us that her layered productions would be nothing without the powerful songs beneath them. And what a song, karmic allusions and memories of conflicts.

It's not that I think I'm good I know that I'm evil I guess I was trying to even it out

Yeesh.

4 “Supercut” Lorde That word, and its power. Until recently no expression or single word existed to describe that wistful wash of isolated, curated romantic memories, warm-tinted flashes of the loveliest tiny moments of a lost relationship, ignoring fights and infidelities, only seeing sunshine. The good parts. And knowing its nature, indulging it with caution, recalling fondly and reliving without desire to return or recreate. “Supercut” could not have existed at any other time, on any other album, by any other artist. Lorde took the most modern of language and forged a work of art of crushing emotional truth; timeless, indelible, perfect.

3 “HUMBLE.” Kendrick Lamar I saw Kendrick play his first ever solo headlining arena show in his hometown. When it came time for “HUMBLE.”, the music dropped out after the initial “Hyeuh, hyeuh!,” and Kendrick let the crowd rap the entire song acapella while he just gazed around, observing in awe. The moment was magic.

2 “If We Were Vampires” Jason Isbell I’ll be honest. I don’t know how to write about this one without getting inappropriately personal. It’s been a hard year for me in certain relevant ways, and this incredible song has not helped matters.

1 “God in Chicago” Craig Finn The adjective “cinematic” doesn’t do justice to “God in Chicago,” which, despite lasting a mere four minutes and forty-five seconds, and not being cinema, is one of the best films of the year, a devastating, seedy road trip romance with a tight plot, loveable flawed characters, and an ambiguous ending. Craig Finn fronts my favorite band of over a decade, and yet this is the best thing he’s ever done. Every detail matters, every word and phrase considered and intentional. It’s Craig’s “Chelsea Hotel No 2,” a quiet meditation towering over an oeuvre of louder, more sensational and populist work. I love this man.

Appendices

I. Albums I enjoyed and/or listened to often but did not become favorites for whatever reasons Allison Crutchfield, Tourist in this Town Arcade Fire, Everything Now Big Thief, Capacity Broken Social Scene, Hug of Thunder Bully, Losing Charly Bliss, Guppy Cloud Nothings, Life Without Sound The Dirty Nil, Minimum R&B Drake, More Life Fat Joe/Remy Ma, Plata O Plomo Father John Misty, Pure Comedy Feist, Pleasure Craig Finn, We All Want the Same Things Japanese Breakfast, Soft Sounds from Another Planet Jay-Z, 4:44 Jens Lenkman, Life Will See You Now LCD Soundsystem, American Dream Migos, Culture The National, Sleep Well Beast Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, The French Press Ryan Adams, Prisoner Sampha, Process Sylvan Esso, What Now Tigers Jaw, spin The War on Drugs, A Deeper Understanding Waxahatchee, Out of the Storm Wolf Parade, Cry Cry Cry Worriers, Survival Pop Yaeji, EP2 Yr Poetry, One Night Alive

II. Albums with which I was simply unable to spend enough time So many. Basically any album on any list covered on this site—the ultimate resource for end-of-year music dorkery--that I didn’t mention in my document I would have at least given a cursory try. That’s my normal process. There just wasn’t time.

III. A vain attempt to string together some final thoughts I’m exhausted, too exhausted to force a cute unified narrative onto my experiences with music this year beyond what I already have. As for the future… I’m excited, in a different way than normal. I don’t know what’s coming out next year. I haven’t done the requisite research. I’m into the idea of just letting it happen, letting New Music Fridays reveal themselves week-to-week.

Haha, just kidding. As soon as I post this I’m jumping in headfirst, making a 2018 Most Anticipated List. Sayonara suckers.