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sunbeamstress · 9 months ago

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qualia 00002

cool, crisp air, baffled by tall buildings in an orderly grid.

the click-thump click-thump of boots, leather and vinyl, drumbeat ad infinitum into cracked pavement.

a louder thudding, something deeper and more visceral, barely held at bay by a pair of flimsy metal doors, paint peeling, stickers fading.

a blast of warm air and sheer noise. chthonic rhythms. distorted synth and distorted guitar leapfrogging the blade-edged pulses of the 808.

where you can hear it clothing rustles; it squeaks; it's alive, a sea of shiny and lacy and filigreed black from person to person to person. faces glowing white, painted with inverted crosses, lips like glossy PVC, hair bloody and bright or quite dark.

three girls smile at me in the corner and ply me with drinks, or when i've had too much we slip from the building and smoke a joint against its concrete cladding.

my head is swimming and i'm very, very warm. i'm penned in on both sides; nowhere to go. they're telling me i'm pretty, that i'm sweet. i'm hiding my face and my cheeks hurt - i can't stop smiling from ear to ear. they always seem to get closer and closer.

ten minutes or ten hours pass, there's no way of telling. my sneakers scrape asphalt. i'm stumbling past a crosswalk: light and dark and light and dark and light and dark. the boots corral my footsteps, keep them from veering off course, keep me from collapsing. everyone's laughing and having a great time.

black ribbons and lace trail the girl who passes us. she's tall and angular and beautiful. there's a smile on her face: oh hey, they're just like me. she's going to the place we just left. i'm never going to forget that smile.

ten minutes or ten hours pass. the girls have taken me to a hotel room. the qualia here are too many, too intimate and too lurid to describe; maybe if this were a different kind of blog.

ten minutes or ten hours pass. the sun is up. the face in the mirror looks back at me and i see little, mouth-shaped bruises on her neck; there are thin, shallow rope marks around her wrists. the eyeliner she forgot to clean off rims her eyes and smudges her cheeks. she looks really happy.

she pours the hot water with care. it shines where it rises to the neck of the teapot, then recedes at it is absorbed. she does this over and over again until it stays shining.

steam cloaks our glasses. the tea is dark and rich and brown and tastes wonderful: psilocybin, star anise, honey.

her hands are rough yet somehow soft; they feel so good skimming over my scalp, make my brain shiver. we sink into her bed and stare at the ceiling.

the phone is playing some music she made herself. it's complex and beautiful and sounds like a Jewish wedding. the ancient MIDI tones feel like nostalgia and safety and home.

something is happening to my legs and bowels. i can't tell if it's comfortable or not. there's a kind of urgent sensation, a distant, distant neighbor to itching, that makes me saw my legs together like a cricket.

i have to use the bathroom. when i return she's playing music of a different kind: corridors of time from the chrono trigger soundtrack. it's a 10 hour loop. i never get sick of it.

children have made pictures for her on the door of her closet. in the dim lighting, their stark pages stand out against dark brown wood. they've begun to float, hovering quite slowly and without incident in the air.

the room flexes where wall meets ceiling and in this moment i realize the entire house is breathing with me.

look at the ceiling, i hear. it used to be a pale shade of yellow but the colors i see are gold and green and blue. they're vivid and oh so achingly bright.

i'm laughing so hard. that sensation that had been bothering me so long ago has moved to my heart, and it feels like the purest, most formless happiness i've ever experienced.

she's touching me and i'm touching her. we're entwined as tightly as we can get. there's no longer a ceiling; i know the lights are out but sunlight bathes the room. our jutting elbows and the knurl of my wristbone and her clavicle and all of us, the rest of us, have melted together into bark and leaves and thick, soil-clogged roots.

my tears feel warm and crystalline on my face. i don't know how long i've been crying or even why - all i know is that somehow i've died.

i've never been so small or so naked. there's nothing left of me at all but the raw, vulnerable structure of my heart. i'm shaking so badly but i feel so warm.

she holds me tight and she tells me beautiful secrets; she tells me about how we made god, and we keep god alive with everything that we do, every song we sing and every person we love and even the food and water we eliminate are all ways of creating and propagating god.

i'm seeing her face for the first time, touching her hands for the first time, and all of her is so beautiful that i cry and cry again. i can't believe i never saw her like this before. i sob with my cheek buried into her palm and i kiss her wrist worshipfully and my tears course down the soft curvature of her arm.

ten minutes or ten hours pass. my body and soul are dirty sponges that have been soaked and then wrung out.

she makes me drink water; i watch my hands shake as they curl around her bottle, and she lays hers over mine, and i stare into her eyes and i drink my fill.

it feels a little like the bedroom itself: she breathes and i breathe with her.

#t4t #psilocybin #magic mushrooms #goth night #drunk but consenting #love #worship #ego death

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maxellminidisc · 1 year ago

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No More Stories Are Told Today by Mew ^_^ really wanna get my own place specifically to listen to blast this album

Mew is one of those bands that I also keep putting a pin in and honestly really really glad I listened to this, its fucking amazing. Like truly talk about welding genres together seamlessly. Also, god what I would give to be able to blast the richest tunes imaginable in the comfort of MY home, I feel you!! Anyway my 3 faves are:

New Terrain- sucker for the classic move of using backwards tracking to give an eerie experimental flair and this is next level! It works forwards AND backwards, I figured they had to have done something wild to achieve that goopy reverse sound effect on the totally comprehensible vocal melody and sure enough learning they did this so you could "unlock" a bonus song within a song is insane, I love it. I always give props to playing endless with music, especially to achieve the musical equivalent of a Droste effect lol

Silas the Magic Car- this album as a whole is definitely more so upbeat than I sort of imagined it could be, which is a pleasant surprise, but I think this track is gorgeous despite it being one of the calmer ones. Sparkling and mellow. But my favorite thing about it is, again, the vocal layering!! I love when it hits the chorus bits of "I wanted you to be home" and the higher part of the harmony/backing vocal is placed like one beat behind the rest of the vocal mix. It makes the song feel like one of those seemingly "mundane" dreams that reads like a sort of heavy day in your waking life, only theres something hard to place as off that your brain hasn't quite grasped IS very much because it's a dream.

Sometimes Life Isn't Easy- this shit feels so so cinematic, technicolor on so many levels!! What's interesting to note too is that it achieves this whilst being the song that has the least bass boost than the others, the undertone has more of an increased treble cause nothing feels beefy or heafty. Even the drums and that kind vibrating bassline synth feel more muted, with more emphasis on the crashing cymbal sounds to evoke waves crashing into rocks, claps that leap, saxophones that evoke falling stars, etc. That's saying something too cause usually "cinematic" denotes very rich or dense arrangements to give a song emotional weight. But this feels like BRIGHT, even sharp colors exploding into the sky in clear daylight. Fucking gorgeous!

Thanks so much for sending this one in!!! 🥰

#boktai #ask

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elindae-writes · 4 years ago

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Unburied Chapter 21, "The Doctor of Doom" Deleted Scene—Ratchet Infects the Energon Supply with Synth-En

I wrote this scene for Chapter 21 but scrapped it. This scene was meant to help set up the conflict for a totally different storyline that I changed my mind about and got rid of. We got the moon battle arc instead. I also felt that this scene made Ratchet a skoosh too villainy and made it too hard for him to come back and redeem himself later on. This scene is also the reason I needed to have Starscream end up with his own stash of hidden energon that only he refueled from.

I'm putting the scene here because I worked hard on it, was sad that it had to go, and just re-read it and thought, "well this isn't that bad and they might enjoy this scene" so here it is!!

Ratchet’s optics rapidly flickered back and forth between green and blue. He’d always thought of green as a strange color, the color of foreign worlds and foreign dangers.

But he could see truly now. No, the true danger came in the form of the one-winged menace that lurked their halls.

A traitorous little voice that sounded a bit too similar to Prime's whispered in the back of his helm. Haven't you ever noticed the scratches on his wing? The damage left by servos far crueller than his talons—

Ratchet subspaced a cube of synth-en and held it preciously and tightly within his servos. The answer to all of his problems was right here in this cube. All he had to do was unleash its power. He walked down the hall and saw it: the door to the energon supply. It was so ordinary and yet about to contain such extraordinary things.

His spark began to thrum faster in its chestplates. He’d been put on the sidelines for so long now, brushed aside and only paid attention to when useful only to just be sidelined again. He was always the bot who stayed behind while others went on adventures, he was always the bot left out of the rigorous battles and fun conversations, he was always left out of the personal jokes, and he was the bot whose opinion was disregarded.

He winced. That last one stung the most.

But he was also the bot who would change all of that.

The cube of synth-en bubbled and vibrated within his servos and he had to clutch it even more tightly to keep it close to him. As the synth-en within the cube began to shake his own frame began to shake as well.

“This is the right thing to do,” he harshly whispered to himself. But who was he trying to convince? Himself? Optimus? Primus?

Cliffjumper?

“P-perhaps tomorrow would be best,” Ratchet nodded to himself as he walked closer and closer to his destination. “Perhaps I should just turn around and leave this all be.” He’d seen mechs make rash decisions before and tear themselves apart. He was not going to allow himself to become one of those mechs.

His pedes continued to drive him forward. All he had to do was turn around and walk back to his lab, that was it—

The door drew closer and his plating began to shake—

Light pedesteps echoed through the hall.

Ratchet scowled and threw open the door. He shoved himself into the supply room and shut the door so that it was only a crack open. He stared out into the hall and scanned it. No, he was too far into this now and couldn’t allow his plan to be ruined.

Starscream stepped into view. He walked right past the room Ratchet was hidden within and lightly bounced down the hall.

Ratchet scowled at the Seeker as he strode past.

No. That bot right there was the reason he was going to do this. Ratchet shut the door with a final clang that echoed through the room.

He turned around and gazed down upon their energon supply and smiled.

The bright blue cubes were only enough to fuel them for a few days—but when Ratchet was done with them, the cubes would be powerful enough to fuel them all for weeks.

Ratchet walked up to a pile of normal cubes and gently opened up his cube of the synth-en. He gently tilted the synth-en over and watched as a single bright green droplet dripped down and into the bright blue energon below.

Drip.

This was the right decision.

Drip.

This was the righteous decision.

Drip.

He shoved down the self-doubt—

Drip.

And looked upon his handiwork.

The blue cube shook with energy and began to bubble and vibrate as it began to shine green.

Maybe he couldn’t get away with this. There was no way the rest of the Autobots would drink this energon if they knew what he had done to it. The cube shone blue and green and then rapidly flashed black and forth between both colors, just as indecisive as him.

It shined green. No, no, that was too obvious, the Autobots would know something was wrong right away—

The cube then flashed blue. Had the synth-en absorbed properly? Had the power spread properly?

It flashed green again.

Then blue, then green, then blue—

“Decide already!” Ratchet shouted at the cube.

He cringed at the volume of his voice and looked back down at it.

It was blue.

He leaned down and squinted. When he looked very closely he saw a very faint green tint in the bubbles. Ratchet laughed. It was the only kind of thing you’d notice if you were looking and only if you actually knew what you were looking for.

The transfer was a success. He’d spread the power and truth of the synth-en to the rest of this cube and now that same power and truth could spread to the rest of the team. They would be grateful when they drank it and realized what he’d done to it. They would see, they would soon all see.

Ratchet leaned back and scowled. Starscream would possibly drink this energon too. No, that couldn’t be allowed to happen. There was no way Ratchet could let this kind of raw power fall into the talons of a mech who was infamous for abusing it. He’d have to prevent Starscream from refueling from the main supply... somehow. The Decepticon would need another source of energon to refuel from. Let the Seeker consume the weaker and inferior blue energon. He wouldn’t starve the Seeker, he wasn’t that cruel, Primus, no! But he would have to get creative if he wanted to ensure that Starscream wouldn’t be able to fight back against the justice that would come his way.

He looked back down at the infected cube. He’d still only fixed one of them. Now he just had to spread the power of the synth-en to all the others.

He grabbed the synth-en again and got to work.

Ratchet stumbled out of the energon supply room and squinted at the empty hall. His optics widened when he looked at the chronometer at the edge of his HUD. It was the dawn of a new day and a new beginning for the Autobots.

He looked down at the cube of synth-en still in his servos, the first one he'd infected. It looked like normal blue energon but Ratchet knew of the hidden power hidden deep within it.

Perhaps he should just chug down the cube within his grasp and ride the high of power all throughout the day.

Heavy pedestepes echoed through the hall and Optimus came into view. “There you are,” he said. “We could not find you in your lab.”

“Ah, yes, I was just… cataloguing the energon!”

Optimus frowned. “I thought you considered such 'menial' tasks to now be beneath you.”

“Oh, no! I was worried that Starscream had been stealing or hoarding some. But all is well! Helping us wield the might we should have been wielding from the moment the war began is never beneath me.”

Optimus frowned and nodded slowly. “I see.”

Ratchet hurriedly glanced down at the blue cube in his servos. He could chug down the cube himself, yes…

But there was now another bot here who needed its power and clarity more than he did.

“Drink! You’ll need the energy to finish the war.”

“Do not get your hopes up. The war will not end as soon as you now think it will,” Optimus sighed.

“Yes,” Ratchet said as his optics flashed a brighter hue of green than ever before. “It will.”

Optimus took a long look at Ratchet. He took the infected cube from Ratchet’s servos, Ratchet’s spark flared—

—and Optimus drank it all.

Ratchet watched with wide optics as the infected energon entered Optimus’s systems. This was right, this was perfect, this was everything he'd wanted and more. So then why did his spark seize up within his chestplates?

Optimus frowned. “Are you all right, old friend?” He leaned down towards Ratchet and reached a servo out to him—

His servo spasmed. Optimus moved his servo away from Ratchet and stared at it for several moments.

That was how it always began. First the tremors came, then the doubt, but then the came the clarity.

Ratchet smoothened his plating and forced down the doubt that threatened to rise up his throat and consume him again. No, he had spent this entire war doubting everything. Doubting whether Megatron would see the light, doubting whether they’d win, doubting whether they’d even have enough food to survive.

The time for doubt was over and the time for certainty had come.

And now Ratchet was certain that justice was near.

“Well, of course you’re shaking. You haven’t recharged in who knows how long. Don’t make me chain you to your berth!”

Optimus nodded slowly as he continued to stare at his slightly shaky servo. “I see. Perhaps you are right. You have been acting erratically as of late, but I am glad to see that you have returned to some of your old mannerisms. I trust you, old friend. ”

Ratchet flinched. I trust you, old friend.

I trust you.

If only Ratchet could bring himself to trust in his own plan. He waved to Optimus as the Prime walked off into the shadows of the base. Ratchet stood alone in the hall and clenched his servos into fists before he then spun around and walked through the halls. He had a goal and this time he wouldn’t allow Starscream to get in the way of things. A scowl crossed his faceplate as he walked right past the Seeker’s door.

He ascended a series of steps and pushed open the hatch that led to the roof. Ratchet poked his helm out and climbed out onto the rocky roof of the base as a cold wind blasted out of the sky. He looked up at the thousands of stars above and for some reason the sight of all those stars made his spark clench. The stars shined bright and it felt as if the wind screamed at him. Even when he tried to avoid the wretched Seeker he still infused his thoughts.

Ratchet sat down heavily on the ground beside Cliffjumper’s grave.

“I couldn’t save you. But I can still avenge you.”

The pile of rocks remained motionless and didn’t respond. He was used to having his patients be torn from him. Now the time had finally come to take revenge upon the one who had so cruelly torn so many of them from him in the first place. Soon everybody would understand his rage. Everybody.

Ratchet sat down and squinted up at the stars.

“Which one is Cybertron, Cliffjumper? I seem to have lost sight of our home.”

#unburied #fanfiction #deleted scene #ratchet #optimus prime #synth-en

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jazzviewswithcj · 3 years ago

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A deeper look at Merci Miles: (Warner Records, 2021)

Miles Davis: trumpet; Kenny Garrett: saxophone; Deron Johnson: keyboard; Richard Patterson: bass; Ricky Wellman: drums

By July, 1991 Miles Davis was music royalty. The previous decade saw him reach a level of popularity and stardom seldom seen in jazz. By the early 80’s the trumpeter had changed music multiple times, 4 to be exact, with his foray into hip hop, the first recording to be issued after his death Doo Bop (Warner Bros, 1992) , marking the fifth groundbreaking turn in his career. Prior to his passing from stroke complications in 1991, he maintained a vigorous touring schedule, and the performances of his sextet of the period, the finest late career band he ever led (and arguably one of the best bands of his entire career) were supercharged. The music captured on the newly released Merci Miles: Live at Vienne (Rhino, 2021) marks the first time anywhere save two YouTube videos the concert has been available in full, and is significant and historically important for two reasons: it is one of Miles’ final performances in France available legally, and it features two compositions by Prince, the cheeky entendre laden titles “Penetration” and “Jailbait” that the late icon wrote specifically for Davis.

The picture of the late singer/composer/multi instrumentalist’s involvement with Davis is much clearer through the release of Prince’s own Sign O’ The Times multi disc mega box set and the official release of “Can I Play With U?” a track originally written by The Purple One during the legendary Rubberband (Rhino, 2018) sessions. Prince’s track was going to be included on what eventually turned out to be Davis’ first album with his new label, Warner Bros. Tutu (1986) but was eventually shelved. The track was then slated to be issued in the original, much more substantial The Last Word: The Complete Warner Brothers Recordings box set from the early 2000’s (of which promo copies existed) but was fazed out due to rights issues.

The trumpeter always regarded France warmly, from the time he first set foot on French soil as a 22 year old in 1949. The country was also where in the late 1950’s he recorded the innovative soundtrack to Elevator To The Gallows or Ascenseur pour l’echafaud director Louis Malle’s smoky noir film of which the trumpeter’s soundtrack, completely improvised featuring a top French rhythm section crystallized some of the ideas the trumpeter later would apply on Kind of Blue (Columbia, 1959). France was also the setting for the infamous romance with the late French starlet Juliette Greco. More importantly, France, being the first country to wholeheartedly embrace jazz and recognize creative improvised Black music to be on par with European art music, was ready for whatever Davis brought to the table, instead of the misdirected pining that many fans and critics demonstrated in the U.S. for his past, acoustic centered work.

Merci Miles was captured on July 1, 1991 at the Jazz a Vienne festival, at a picturesque Roman amphitheater filled to capacity. 7 days later on July 8, Miles would revisit the material from Porgy and Bess, Miles Ahead and Sketches of Spain at the Montreux Jazz Festival with a double orchestra conducted by Quincy Jones and featuring the late trumpeter Wallace Roney as a second voice alongside occasional spots for alto saxophonist Kenny Garrett. The appearance featuring this music was followed by an appearance with former band mates in Paris on July 10 (a concert that unfortunately of this writing is being thieved by bootleggers for album release), and the European swing wrapped up in Nice, France on July 16th.

Miles’ band that July 1st evening, featuring Deron Johnson (who grew up with Miles’ nephew and former drummer Vince Wilburn, Jr) on keyboards; Kenny Garrett on alto saxophone and flute) lead bassist and Parliament alumnus Foley, bassist Richard Patterson, and the late Ricky Wellman on drums were inspired and smoking.

“Hannibal” written by Marcus Miller, which appeared on the group’s latest studio album Amandla (1989) is the high energy set opener, with the rhythm section of Johnson, Patterson and Wellman in perfect sync. Miles flies free with some solo lines before the head appears, and Kenny Garrett makes his first appearance with a lengthy solo. Garrett (who has a new Mack Avenue studio album in August) is like a heat seeking missile, the rhythm section responding and creating inner dialogues with him in response to his impassioned, pulpit stirring cries. Deron Johnson, often alongside with Garrett in taking some of the best solos of the evening, briefly dialogues with Miles before spinning off into his own, substantial solo turn. Johnson is a complete history of the keyboardist’s who played with the trumpeter and distills everything in his sparkling, distinctive soloing voice, swinging slightly behind the beat against the mightily funky bass and drums underneath.

“Human Nature”, the classic ballad from Michael Jackson’s Thriller (Epic, 1982) Davis first debuted on You’re Under Arrest (Columbia, 1985). The sensuous existential track became a blank canvas for the Davis band to paint on nightly. The trumpeter renders the melody with longing, then gradually shifts into a resourceful solo with a double time sprint. Within Davis’ solo and the use of Spanish tinged scales, and the colorful keyboard backing, the intense drama of the beautiful arrangements that Gil Evans crafted for Sketches of Spain (Columbia, 1959) which Marcus Miller expanded upon in a sense for the film soundtrack Siesta (Warner Bros, 1989) are clearly felt. Davis quotes “Nature Boy” and a few other asides before passing the baton to Garrett, who used the tune as a nightly feature for intense late period Coltrane trance like meditation. Garrett fits in a quote of the old spiritual “Joshua Fit De Battle of Jericho” before rocketing into space; Wellman in particular follows him wherever he goes. Every now and then Miles jabs some mood setting chords with his Oberheim OBX synth as cues, while Garrett continues to combust. The saxophonist bursting at the seams as a fragment from the bridge to “Milestones” is used as an ostinato, Davis signals a quick blast with his trumpet and the tune ends. Garrett brought the audience and listeners at home on a thrill ride.

“Time After Time” , the Cyndi Lauper classic is ushered in as volcanic applause erupts from the audience, nearly drowning out the music. For 9 and a half minutes, the show belongs to Davis, as he gently finds all the melodic contours he can in the tune. Like “Round Midnight” and “My Funny Valentine” of decades past, “Time After Time” became one of Davis’ signature ballads. He drives his improvisation the same way as Aretha Franklin, Pavarotti, Bocelli or Carreras would, with a marked sense of passion and timeless beauty.

Disc 1 closes with one of the Prince tunes, “Penetration” where everyone gets off on the raunchy funk. Davis and Garrett are one during the track, and it truly shows the admiration and border less musicality that both icons would have shared, Davis struts with swagger between melody statements and Johnson rips into his solo with passion, Garrett’s searing alto ups the ante further. As a contrast, “Jailbait” on disc 2, is a gut bucket blues where both Johnson and Garrett take scintillating solos..

The show closes with “Wrinkle” a wondrous maze of a melody that is awe inspiring when played a top speed, and “Finale” a drum solo feature for Wellman that showcases his patented bass drum triplets while keeping rock solid time on the snare, a sort of shuffle where the bass and snare switch roles, and some lightning samba as well as his signature Go-Go groove.

Sound:

Merci Miles is taken directly from the original tapes recorded and mixed by Patrick Savey and Mastered by John Webber at Air Studios in London. Similar to Sony/Legacy’s Bootleg Series releases for Davis, the tape is from the official broadcast, in this case captured by the small Zycopolis studios. Curiously for 1991, the sound is mono which could be due to whatever technical limitations of the tape, but it is very good strong mono. The Schiit Bifrost 2 DAC manages to wring out very nice separation for the band in the mono soundstage: In particular, Davis trumpet is vibrant, brassy, golden and present. Richard Patterson’s bass is commanding and takes the center of the sound stage, deep and rich. Ricky Wellman’s drums are full of gusto, there is a reason his nickname was “Sugarfoot” and you hear that in all it’s glory. Kenny Garrett’s passion radiates past the speakers, Deron Johnson’s keyboards float above the proceedings and Foley’s lead bass provides a wonderful textural contrast to everything else.

Concluding Thoughts:

The 80’s and early 90’s Miles cannon has seen relatively scant archival releases versus everything from the 50’s-70’s. Merci Miles is a welcome document of a band that truly was at the top of it’s game and at the peak of its powers. Miles Davis, judging from this concert was showing little sign of slowing down in his playing, there is a vitality and joy here that easily places this alongside his Montreux concerts of the period and the excellent Live Around The World (Warner Brothers, 1996). A wonderful present honoring the great musical icon thirty years on from his passing. The CD (reviewed here) and LP packages contain some particularly touching photos in a triple gatefold in the French Flag colors of Miles memorabilia from that final tour provided by Vince Wilburn, Jr and a superb liner essay from noted scholar Ashley Kahn contextualizing the history of the trumpeter’s French sojourns and the event itself, alongside some great photos. The cover also features some nice embossing of the album title text and Davis’ name. If there is any doubt about physical media, this album is a compelling case for why it’s so good to OWN a physical copy of an album.

Music: 10/10

Sound: 8.5/10

Equipment used for this review

Audiolab 6000 CDT transport

Schiit Bifrost 2 DAC

Marantz NR 1200 stereo receiver (as pre amp)

Marantz MM 7025 stereo power amplifier

Focal Chora 826 speakers

Audioquest Forest and Golden Gate cables

youtube

#miles davis #jazz #trumpet #prince #funk

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avidrawsthings · 4 years ago

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are the crystals around prisma the different energon types she ended up creating? :0 what are the properties of each one?

Yep! Info will be under the cut since it’s a tad lengthy.

Wanted to start this off by quickly explaining a few things:

-The green one isn't Synth-En and the purple one isn't Dark Energon. However, the red one is the same Red Energon from the show. It'll get elaborated further below. I did try differentiating their respective colors to prevent confusion, but eh lol

-To prevent a mix-up, Prisma stores all of her Energon in containers different than that of Team Prime and the Decepticons.

-I originally planned to have the Energon sparkle to make them stand out, but felt it would be a tad much so I left it out in the end.

-There were a few more types but I couldn't find my old notes. Always keep backups, folks. One granted telepathy, another telekinesis, one for size shifting, and another for teleportation.

-In addition to being additional fuel sources, each Energon type would grant a different ability for a certain amount of time. These abilities were meant for more practical and mundane uses rather than the war efforts, especially since Prisma didn't even know a war was coming. In the present, she makes it clear she'd rather have the Energon be used for everyday life rather than any form of conflict.

-When captured and put in stasis, some of her captors injected Prisma with each Energon type to see what would happen as a sick joke, as she was meant to be executed soon anyway. As she remained in stasis for millions of years after that, all of that Energon permanently altered her systems, which also permanently gave her the current abilities she has. She can be sustained on a small amount of regular Energon, as it replenishes the other types in her systems.

The Alternative Energon

Lum-En (White)

Creates hard light.

When as fuel, it allows one to create hard-light constructs Green Lantern style.

Its intended use is to mainly act as an alternative light source as well.

Prisma views it as Energon in its most purified form. When combined with regular Energon, it can cleanse all of the Dark Energon in one's systems.

When spilled, it takes on a pastel rainbow color.

Frost-En (Pale Blue)

Creates ice.

When used as fuel, it can give ice properties to a bot's weapons, allowing their blasters to produce ice, for example.

Its intended use is to help bots to avoid or are in danger of overheating.

Prisma can create snow by producing small clouds.

Splash-En (Cyan)

Creates water.

When used as fuel, it allows bots to synthesize water. Larger doses grants the ability to even create rain clouds when more water is needed.

Its intended use is to aid in putting out fires.

When combined with Flame-En, it creates mist.

When combined with a small dose of Frost-En, it creates fog.

Flor-En (Lime Green)

Creates and maintains plants.

As it was created by complete accident, it doesn't have much in the way of practical use, at least for Cybertronians.

Still perfectly fine for consumption, though.

Safe for organic beings like humans, Flor-En can also help make almost any land fertile.

After learning about Earth's flowers, Prisma enjoys creating them for fun. You'd definitely be seeing giant roses and sunflowers around, for example.

Zap-En (Yellow)

Creates electricity.

When used as fuel, it grants one electricity-based abilities, such as stunning and shocking. Those that already have such abilities would instead get a boost in power.

Its intended use is to help power machines such as non-sentient vehicles and ships.

Rock-En (Pale Orange)

Creates rocks and stones.

When used as fuel, it grants one the ability to create and manipulate the earth (much like an Earthbender).

Much like Flor-En, Rock-En was created by complete accident. It has more practical use on the battlefield depending on where the fights are taking place.

Aero-En (Light Grey)

Creates air and winds.

When used as fuel, it can grant one wind-based abilities for either offensive or defensive purposes, including blasts that can knock opponents away.

Its intended purpose is to help ease the turbulence encountered by ships and other aircrafts.

When combined with Frost-En, it can create icy winds.

Magn-En (Dark Grey)

Causes magnetism and can manipulate magnetic fields.

When used as fuel, it grants one the power over magnetism, and can give similar properties to various weapons.

Its intended use is for every day needs such as repairs, and the operation of certain vehicles.

Grav-En (Dark Purple)

Can manipulate gravitational fields.

When used as fuel, it can boost one's weapons to create a stronger impact. In higher doses, they can manipulate the gravity around them.

Its intended use is primarily for vehicles, and to provide stability to various structures like towers, bridges and even floating cities.

When combined with Aero-En, it can grant flight. This is how Prisma herself is able to fly without an alt-mode.

Gem-En (Pink)

Creates crystals.

When used as fuel, the bot can create crystals from energy, and can shape them however they wish. Can be combined with explosives for rather devastating results.

Its intended use ranges from medical to construction. The crystals can be shaped into temporary prosthetics, various tools and are incredibly useful when it comes to repairs. The crystals are as durable as needed, but can still be shattered with enough damage.

Prisma herself uses Gem En a lot when working in her lab, using it to give herself extra limbs to increase productivity.

Burst-En (Red)

The perfected version of the Red Energon that appears on Transformers Prime.

It grants super speed and enhanced strength.

The original intent was to increase energy and productivity, essentially the Cybertronian equivalent of an energy drink. It turned out to be much stronger than expected.

Prisma herself uses it in very small doses when working.

Flame-En (Orange)

Creates fire.

It grants the bot the equivalent of pyrokinesis, giving them all manner of control over fire. They can even temporarily redirect the oncoming flames from a Predacon, at least long enough to buy time to escape.

The original intent was to help with welding and forging.

When combined with Zap-En, it can create combustion.

#Anonymous #ask avi #transformers #transformers prime #tfp #tf oc #transformers oc #tfp oc #energon #prisma #tf prisma #tfp prisma #prisma oc #alternate energon #maccaddam #avi energon

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finderstrails · 3 years ago

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Odd Companions [Session 0]

Our journey takes place on planet Urth, more precisely in the blue desert of Vaarn. We are following a salvaging caravan heading to Oralens, a mythical city that developed marvelous machinery for recycling and creating water... or at least that what the rumors say.

The expedition is helmed by Samar xon Hevran, a fierce True-Kin women wearing a corn colored coat. She is one of the xon Hevran heirs, a family who earned its fortune though bio-agriculture and fair trade. Samar now pursues a different path but still wants to honor her caste; finding the rumored water-tech would be a valuable addition to the family legacy.

A couple of months ago, Samar met a cartographer who uncovered the location of the fabled city but who was unable to travel there due to lack of ressources needed for such a trip. Samar was eager to fund the expedition with the plan to repair or salvage whatever they find. Her partner Jamik, a fierce coyote new-beast, recruited 30 hireling, ranging from technicians to scouts, miners, healers and mercenary and left from Jasa con Jaxa with a caravan composed of two large bulky cargo-hauler, a handful of beasts and gravibikes.

Meet the three players, member of the Oralens expedition:

Pirrip - a stout and sweaty cacogen, always muttering to himself. He has a club-like leg and elastic limbs. He was hired as the inventory specialist, managing the ration, water and fuel throughout the expedition. He's a bit of a gambler and he's in this for the money.

Fane - a fragile chimera synth with retractable wings. She's hired as an oracle, hoping to prevent riding into bad weather or even more unfortunate events. She is powered by artificial photosynthesis and she fears what will happen beyond the red dwarf's death.

Symeon - a skulky priest synth who got hired as a field medic. He's getting his energy from vampirism and has a particular taste for the True-Kin's blood.

They began their journey toward the city of Sulfri without much issue, with Fane predicting a heat wave happening in a couple of days. Preparing for the warmth, everyone got on the large vehicle and installed sunshades and tarps and travelled at a lower pace, preferring safety over excruciating sunburns. The caravan was attacked once by a small crew of cacklemaw and two NPC crew member got some minor wounds. Symeon took care of them in his unique way... and made sure to extract some precious blood from his patient (sadly non of them were True-Kin). Finally, Pirrip, being in charge of food and ressources, realized he bought perhaps a little less goods than required, leaving some crew member a bit unsatisfied and discontent. Luckily, they arrived in Sulfri the next day without too much stress.

--GM Observations

I wanted to run a session 0 that was more akin to a real game, revealing information about the world in a narrative matter and including the character process as part of the game. The players had a blast creating their character using the tables in the first Vaarn zine. Linking together whatever they rolled was both fun to do as a group and genuinely surprising. Nothing is set in stone and they have until next game to fine tune their backstory, etc. No one expected to play these type of character and everyone agreed that this approach is rather refreshing. I did add and change some rules:

1. We're using Whitehack group system to further help with the character development and experiment with some game mechanic.

2. There are different option when you level up and going from +5 -> +10 in stats costs you 2 points instead of 1.

3. Also following Whitehack rules for the mystic gifts HP cost. I think this is what the book suggests, but the Zine writing is more "simplified".

#vaults of vaarn #actual play #ttrpg #gamelog #travel log

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sinceileftyoublog · 4 years ago

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Wobbly Interview: Going for Happy

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Thurston Moore Ensemble/Negativland band member Jon Leidecker has been releasing electronic music under the moniker Wobbly for over two decades now. In Chicago experimental label Hausu Mountain, he seems to have found kindred spirits, matching his far out idiosyncrasies. 2019′s Monitress and its follow-up, Popular Monitress, which came out earlier this month, are albums about and by machines, as Leidecker ran his music into pitch trackers and synth apps on his phones and tablets, embracing the errors and randomness that were produced along the way. While the source material on Monitress was mostly improvised, the songs on Popular Monitress are more structured and composed, resulting in songs like “Authenticated Krell”, which follows a comparatively clean synth arpeggio before being enveloped by texture, or “Lent Foot”, where the various instruments trail each other. It’s remarkable just how familiar certain sounds are even if not traditionally instrumental ones, like the typewriter clacks of “Illiac Ergodos 7!” or the zooming notes of the thumping title track. Blurring the lines between what’s instrument and what’s not, and even further, what’s composed music and what’s not, Popular Monitress is a defining statement for both Leidecker and Hausu.

I was able to ask Leidecker about various songs on the album and their inspirations. Read his answers below!

Since I Left You: You chose to write more structured songs this time around before running them through the pitch tracker. Do those nuggets of recognizable structures make the final product all the more disorienting?

Jon Leidecker: Hopefully! On both albums, the main thing is keeping the focus on just how live those pitch trackers are. It’s Monitress as long as you can hear how they’re listening. For years, it was strictly a piece for live performance--I needed to be improvising myself, and able to respond instantly, to really underline just how spontaneous the machine responses are. So the first record tried to keep more of that sense of flow. Large stretches of it are simply baked down from stereo recordings of concerts & radio performances of it. Overdubbing more layers of trackers seemed legal, as long all the voices were following that one original sound.

Of course, when you play a tune, something composed or even quantized, it definitely becomes easier to hear what they’re doing. The exact same code running on each phone will respond in very different ways to the same source audio, and you get a chorus of individual voices. They play a lot of wrong notes, but oddly, if you feed the trackers lots of consonant, major chords, it stops being dissonance, and you can tell they’re going for happy. You hear these weird things, trying to sing in unison, and..the result is just pure delight. Weirdly emotional! What’s a mistake? What’s music?

SILY: How did you come up with the song titles? For instance, is there anything particularly Appalachian about "Appalachian Gendy"?

JL: They’re mostly mashed up references to landmark works in the field of generative & algorithmic composition, from the 50’s up to the early 90’s. The recent push of stories on AI musical tools seems to be about automation and labor-saving, but the field of how to develop tools for more creative ends goes back all the way to Bebe and Louis Barron going to the Macy Conferences on Cybernetics and designing their first self-oscillating feedback circuit.

So while my tracks aren’t really in the musical style of the works they reference--something like “Appalachian Gendy”, which sprung up a fantasy Spiegel/Xenakis tribute, got paired to that stompdown track, and once it did, I added a solo on iGendyn.

SILY: To what extent is your music here inspired by the inner workings of the brain?

JL: Once you get a grip on just how simply neurons and synapses interact, how reassuringly physical thinking is, the electronic music I’ve always found most inspiring often involve feedback systems, self-playing devices, generative music, things that learn rather than settle. Music that helps you model thought. The whole East Coast/West Coast 60’s divide in synth design boiled down to Moog reducing your options until you could easily dial in what you already know you want, and Buchla designing uncertainty machines to be networked together until they approach the complexity of an unknown brain.

SILY: "Synaptic Padberg" and "Every Piano" have moments of recognizable instruments as opposed to alien instruments (strings and piano, respectively). Was that just a product of the errors/randomness of the music-making, or purposeful?

JL: It's supposed to sound orchestral, so I hit my Mellotron and Chamberlin apps pretty hard with this piece. Not like anything remains plausibly real once they're getting hammered by the trackers. That is a real grand piano, however: me playing the tune at SnowGhost Music in Montana. Brett Allen deserves an engineering credit, but I also wanted the first listen to make you wonder.

SILY: There's almost a funky rhythm to "Motown Electronium". Do you envision folks dancing to this record?

JL: Would have been plain wrong to put that title on an unworthy beat. What would a room full of people dancing to this even be like? Maybe in Baltimore.

SILY: Do you think "Training Lullaby" is what a computer trying to write a lullaby would sound like?

JL: Not that relaxing, is it? That’s ten seconds pulled from a five minute live improvisation, just a little burst of fury in the middle. Which I’ve heard enough now that I can sing along to it; so now, for me, it is calming.

I finally had to admit to myself that I’m a fan of the OpenAI Jukebox stuff. It’s right at that stage where their results are still primitive enough to remain a little mysterious. All the context and relationships intrinsic to what humans call music is irrelevant to those GANs. They don’t need culture to make music, they just need waveforms. What does it tell us that simple pattern analysis and brute number crunching on a large enough data set can produce those sounds? They’re training us. I have twelve hours of their Soundcloud dump ripped to my phone, and I play it a lot, though I wouldn’t play it for anyone under four. Can definitely sing along to some of the weirder ones by now.

SILY: How did you approach the order of tracks on the record? I'm struck by, for instance, the chaos of "Grossi Polyphony" following the comparative lull of "Every Piano".

JL: Just trying to show the range, and keep the surprises coming. Perpetual variety becomes monotony so quickly, so there is a very careful balancing act to play between shorter and longer tracks. I like a record where on first listen, any new section that begins, you feel like there are no guarantees how long it’ll last, eight seconds or eight minutes. Even things that sound like they should be songs: no guarantees. I still remember the first time I heard The Faust Tapes as a teenager.

SILY: Did you actually use musical dice to write "Wurfelspiel"?

JL: “Wurfelspiel” is just name-dropping Mozart’s generative piece--again, a real piano, but no musical dice involved.

SILY: The beats towards the end of the album--the pseudo hip-hop of "Cope By Design", techno of "Dusthorn Sawpipe", krautrock of "Help Desk"--seem to me to be far more propulsive than anything else here. Do you see a connection between those tracks?

JL: The album hits you with all these miniatures in the middle to keep things moving, and those three are the last little barrage of them before the shift into the final stretch with the longer, more hypnotic pieces. Can be tough to sequence an album when you’ve got so many short tracks, but it’s also total freedom.

SILY: How did you like getting the Hausu Mountain album art treatment?

JL: Totally family. All the Monitress packaging has always been iPhone panorama mode artifacts, visual glitches not entirely unlike what my phone��s trackers do to what they hear. I gave one of those images to [Hausu Mountain co-founder Max Allison] to work with the cover of the first Monitress, and he sent back this image, saying, “Here’s the initial stage: Your photo reduced to color blocks I’ll carefully render out later.” So when the second hyper-detailed one came back in a more proper Hausu style, they already seemed like a sequence, and this second one was already in place, so it all clicked. Any version of Monitress, the music is different, but it’s always the same piece. I’m really happy they asked me for something. [Label co-founder Doug Kaplan] and Max are just coming from the good place.

SILY: Are you doing any live streams or socially distant shows any time soon?

JL: Multi-location live streams are a blast. The time modulation inherent in all streaming is deeply psychedelic. The kind of listening you have to do when you know that the relationship of sounds together in time is different for each musician involved? I’m learning utterly new tricks, and it’s astonishing just how live the result is. I sat in on a live stream with Thurston Moore Group a few months ago, the four of them in London, and me hooked up to an amp not far from where I normally am when I play with them. And everyone agreed: It felt like I was there, right up until the instant I quit the app.

I’ve been pre-recording some home live sets for Hausu, Curious Music and High Zero Foundation. Negativland is putting together an hour long performance with Sue-C for the Ann Arbor Film Festival in late March. I finished an album mostly recorded outdoors with my old friend Cheryl E. Leonard for Gilgongo, and we’re going to try to a few outdoor concerts, too.

SILY: What else are you currently working on/what's next?

JL: The second album with Sagan, with Blevin Blectum & J Lesser, is coming out in late April. That one took 14 years to finish. There’s a trio record with Thomas Dimuzio and Anla Courtis coming out on Oscarson. Doing a revision of the last episode of my podcast on sampling music, Variations, to incorporate that OpenAI music. Some Negativland releases tying together the last two albums. There are about four of five other albums that might be done, though it takes time to be sure.

SILY: Anything you've been listening to, reading, or watching lately?

JL: This month has been Maryanne Amacher’s collected writings, Keeping Together in Time by William H. McNeill, Ministry For The Future by Kim Stanley Robinson, important even with happy ending. Interview with Karl Friston - Of Woodlice And Men. Listening to a lot of “Blue” Gene Tyranny, Xenakis & Lang Elliott, and last week every Ghédalia Tazartès album in reverse chronological order. I don’t care what anybody says: That guy’s immortal.

SILY: Anything I didn't ask about you want to say?

JL: Thank you for your questions!

Popular Monitress by Wobbly

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soaptunes · 4 years ago

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Soap’s 2020 AOTY Reviews: JPEGMAFIA - EP!

This EP (!) is really just a collection of all the loose singles Peggy dropped on a roughly monthly basis over the course of 2020. Despite that, and maybe even because of it, it’s still a contender for best rap project of the year.

I feel like I’m getting tired of saying that JPEGMAFIA is one of the most creative artists making experimental hip-hop right now. Even more tired of that appellation is Peggy himself, who on one track here proudly shouts out, “Fuck the underground, I’m going pop.” Of course, on the same song (the raucous, clattering “COVERED IN MONEY!”) he claims he beats his dick when he looks in the mirror and compares his gun to Portia La Rossi’s strap-on, so. Take that as you will.

It’s strange that Peggy’s 2019 album All My Heroes Are Cornballs is over a year old now. That isn’t that long ago, but a lifetime has happened since then, and the thing still sounds more immediate than most projects that dropped this year. The same is true of 2018’s Veteran, but both projects have some songs that fall short. I won’t get specific, this isn’t a review of those albums, but a few tracks on both are experiments that don’t pan out - they get lost in the weeds of harshness and strange samples, they lack strong hooks or funny bars, they follow an obscure groove that’s hard to get a handle on. EP! proves that cut down to its essential moments, a JPEGMAFIA record can be a 25-minute blast.

This is only 8 songs, we can take it track-by-track, which I think we’ll be doing for any EP reviews I do on here.

The first song is “BALD!,” a song that dropped in February, just before the pandemic turned this singles series into a quarantine project. If your first thought is that the beat sounds like something out of an obscure Nintendo racing game, that’s because it is - the main sample here is from Ridge Racer 3D for the 3DS. In pretty much every picture of JPEGMAFIA you can find from before this song’s release, he’s wearing a bandana or sweatband or something around his forehead, but this song literally served as the announcement to his fanbase that he’d shaved his head. This is a fucking hilarious concept for a song to begin with, but the beat is genuinely pretty and Peggy’s flow is merciless. Knocking the breakbeats out from under the synths makes them wash out and sound like the audio equivalent of a shitty screensaver, which I mean in the best way possible.

BEST BAR: “Hairline proof God needs balance, BALD.”

“COVERED IN MONEY!” is a serious contender for song of the year for me. I would absolutely love to watch this guy figure out a beat, because the instrumental on this goes unbelievably hard and simultaneously makes no sense at all. It’s squeaky, stomping, clattering, shambolic, and feels like it’s completely falling apart. Does a beat like this come together in his head first? The drum pattern is borderline nonsensical, did it just come from him messing around in ProTools? I would genuinely love to know, he’s seriously a gifted producer and I wish he’d produce more for other rappers. Somehow Peggy hops into a triplet flow on top of this wonderful mess, the overall impression ending up somewhere in the ballpark of a cartoon character rapping while bouncing on a rusty pogo stick. The man namedrops Ving Rhames, Cannibal Ox, Bernie Mac, and the aforementioned Portia La Rossi all on the same song, and he’s really out for blood on this one, it’s one of his best flows ever. The way he makes the listener wait for the “fuck the underground” line is flawless, he’s slipping between time signatures effortlessly. He does an amazing job of wrangling the herky-jerky rhythms of the beat on the hook, making one of his stickiest choruses yet with the instant-classic line about “borderline dressing in drag.” There’s a beat switch about halfway through the song, which Genius tells me is a second half tilted “The Devil Wears Prada,” but “BALD!” has a lyric about them fucking up his lyrics on Genius, so, you know. It’s not as much fun beat-wise but his bars are just as good, and the song ties up with Peggy repeatedly apologizing and claiming he’s just been “shitted on.” This track is a must-listen, in my opinion, definitely one of the best of the year.

BEST BAR: “I’m covered in money, I’m out for the bag, I flew out the country, borderline dressin’ in drag.”

The sensual R&B of “BODYGUARD!” isn’t a total departure from stuff Peggy has done before - “Jesus Forgive Me, I Am A Thot” had some of those vibes and “Free The Frail” proved that not only can he write a great melodic song, he’s a respectable singer. Bodyguard is Sexy Peggy coming to full fruition though, warm synths draping around soft beats and lyrics that could’ve come out of any 90’s hit. Peggy’s ear for a nice chord progression is evident, and there’s still strange touches like clipped vocals, off-kilter melodies, background chatter, and what sounds like a bicycle chain winding as part of the beat. This one took awhile to grow on me but it definitely did, and it provides a much-needed moment of calm on the EP.

BEST BAR: N/A, but I do like “who’s gonna turn me? Bitches gotta earn me.”

Then comes the remix of “BALD!” with Denzel Curry. The beat kicks in in the same way as it did before, and Peggy’s first verse is identical, but the entire back two-thirds of the song is one furious verse from Denzel. At first, his section gets a more muscular version of the racing game beat, but midway through, Peggy drops the drums out and just lets Denzel do his thing over a skeletal, washed-out instrumental. He spans a wide array of topics, from his stress over violence in his hometown, to loss of touch with his friends, to how cutting his famous dreads let him feel freer and more in control of himself. It’s a very cool verse, and I appreciate him linking it back to the haircut theme in an original way.

BEST BAR: “Dreadlocks had your boy like Sideshow Bob”

“CUTIE PIE!” puts Peggy on a genuine boom-bap beat, with nonstop flexing about his production chops. He gets pretty specific, and the title is apt given how genuinely adorable the sounds on the beat are. This one rolls almost normal for a JPEGMAFIA song, and despite the trove of weird references and the colorful atmosphere, it feels almost like a breakthrough, like he’s being more realistic or candid in his boasting. Like these are genuine points of pride for him and not just braggadocio, you know? Props for the music video here too, it’s definitely one of the best of the bunch. Super distinctive and weird, with Peggy hiding behind cacti and dancing in the middle of the desert with a near-nude woman.

BEST BAR: “Your beats inaccurate, muddy low end and you over-compressin’, ‘cuz you don’t know what you doin’, so y’all be stackin’ it, don’t know the diff so they just hold and attack it.”

The beat on “THE BENDS!” is almost oppressive, orchestra hits and a glacial pace lending the track a dark atmosphere. Autotune slurs Peggy’s bars, and the lyrics are relentlessly cynical and bleak. His actual political beliefs are obfuscated behind humor like “caught a body in a MAGA hat” as usual, but he ends the song with a breathy “fuck Trump,” so that much is clear. The glowing synth lines under the heavy saw bass give the first verse a cinematic quality, the “fantasies, fantasies, fantasies” line only adding to that. This is one of the briefer cuts, and one of the weaker ones too, but even this one has a ton of personality.

BEST BAR: “Strap on my hip ‘cuz I’m bitter and old, Mountain Dew sippers, they hating the scroll”

“ROUGH 7” is EP!’s only true miss, and it’s definitely not Peggy’s fault. The beat is shadowy and evasive, and his verse is ice-cold, but the featured rapper, Tommy Genesis, kind of flattens the song. Her adlibs are cringe-inducing and her rapping is flat and devoid of personality, she tries to do the emo-rap scream double-track but it doesn’t work with her style, especially since what she’s rapping about isn’t tragic or even sad at all. The track picks up instantly once Peggy comes on, as usual he can slither into the cracks of an unusual beat and inject his cartoonish, acrobatic character into it. This is a topically unremarkable verse by JPEGMAFIA standards, but he leans into the beat’s rhythms like on “COVERED IN MONEY!” and it ends up working out in his favor and restabilizing the song by the close. His dejected “wow.” and “huh.” and “nasty.” adlibs help make it too, it’s really kind of ridiculous to compare his adlibs to Genesis’s.

BEST BAR: “Light a square n*** up like Billie Jean.”

Peggy closes the EP with “living single,” probably the second-best song either. He sings a surprisingly heartfelt interpolation of Mariah Carey’s “Always Be My Baby” as the hook, bringing to mind his has-to-be-heard-to-be-believed cover of “Call Me Maybe.” This beat could pass for vaporwave, its slurred groove and downshifted vocal snippets lending an atmosphere to it like Peggy is sitting outside a club smoking after too much alcohol. The stabbing synth riff that breaks through the fuzz keeps him on his toes and lets him work up a relatively speedy flow over the dazed instrumental. I’m not sure why I rate this one so highly, but the vibes are excellent and this is one of the best verses on the project for sure, it’s another one where he really hooks his flow into the off-kilter lurch of the beat. That may be my favorite thing about him as a rapper, the way he can tie himself to a beat and make sure it’s working for him instead of being outshined by it, even if it’s completely insane.

BEST BAR: “Champagne for the pain and sufferin’, fans same color as voice of Tim Duncan”

Hoo, I wrote a ton about that. Maybe I won’t go track by track for the next EP, this is way too long already. In any case, I think due to its brevity and release method this great little record is going to get passed up on a ton of year-end lists, which is a damn shame. It has easily some of JPEGMAFIA’s best work on it - with no time for filler or botched experiments, Peggy delivered a tight, consistent, outrageously entertaining experimental rap joyride.

#jpegmafia #ep!#ep review #album review #alternative music #indie music #rap #hip hop #experimental rap #experimental hip hop

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latin-dr-robotnik · 5 years ago

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What went wrong with Classic Sonic’s music in Sonic Forces? (ft. beevean)

The following is a project I’ve been cooking for some weeks, trying to find out some reasons behind the general lackluster feeling that surrounds Classic Sonic’s music in Sonic Forces. As you may have spotted already, this is not a solo project, since I’ve had the opportunity to talk about this very same topic with @beevean and she raised quite a couple of interesting points that I’m going to bring up as we go through.

Also, Spanish speakers: you can catch the Spanish version of this post here, it’s probably a more polished experience with additional text.

Long post below, so, bring up a ladder and a boombox, I’ll explain along the way. (there’s also a tl;dr at the bottom if you are that type of person)

Sonic Forces stands as a divisive point in the Sonic fandom, that much we all know, and we are not going to discuss the game’s general quality at all on this post. But we are going to take a solid look at Classic Sonic and, most importantly, its music, since I consider that’s the most clear symptom of a bigger problem with Classic Sonic in general, in this post-Generations Modern Sonic world.

A quick look at Classic Sonic

When Classic Sonic debuted in Sonic Generations (2011) as this new-but-also-old Sonic, gaming as a whole was still being bombarded with this “retro-revival movement” that brought back many classic franchises (like classic Mega Man with MM9 and 10 after a decade since MM8), and SEGA itself was in the middle of that train with the recently released Sonic 4: Episode 1 (2010). While Sonic 4 tried to marry Sonic’s current style with classic level tropes and even Genesis-inspired music in a seamless way (showing Sonic’s physical transition from his Sonic 3 days to Sonic Adventure as a smooth one), this new “Classic Sonic” guy in Generations suffered from a mixed message about his origins: is he Sonic from the past, from an alternate universe, or both? Is his music supposed to sound like arrangements of his classic 16-bits tunes or just modern-sounding remixes like the rest of the soundtrack? The fandom still debates about it to this day.

This all led to the introduction of a character that, although considered a “Sonic” like the other “Modern” one, could not establish his own identity beyond Generations’ anniversary-title plot threads. No unique music style, no unique traits, he was just a simpler Sonic.

Major manifestation of the Classic problem.

Fast-forward some years to November 2017, Sonic Forces’ release date. Besides gameplay, story and character criticisms, the music of Forces turned out to be quite controversial for a part of the fandom. Although I personally consider the Avatar songs as top-tier Sonic music, I share similar concerns as the rest about the rest of the game’s music, specially the Classic Sonic level themes.

With Forces, it seems the composers managed to solve some of Gens’ Classic Sonic music problems, as this time there was a better and more consistent attempt at making Classic’s music sound more at home with the “Genesis days” tunes, but even then the composers fell into other traps that ended up being more damaging to the final product.

Years later after the game’s release, I finally brought up this very same topic during a conversation with beevean (I encourage you that, if you find the following snippets interesting, read the entire conversation), and she had the following thoughts to share as to why Classic Sonic’s music was so... underwhelming:

the classic music in forces is the weakest part of the ost, some tracks are okay while others suck, and the main reason for this is that they hired the wrong people for the job

Okay, that wasn’t a fair cut on my part. She talks a lot more about each and every aspect behind the music, and about the people that composed it, she had the following to say:

Okay, about Forces’ music. First of all, the Classic tracks were handled by two people: Tomoya Ohtani, who also composed pretty much 90% of the OST and has been working solo since 2013 (relevant later), and Naofumi Hataya, one of the two geniuses behind Sonic 2 8-bit’s and Sonic CD’s OSTs (plus some miscellaneous work in Heroes, Colors, Generations, etc.). If you loved tracks like Sky High, Palmtree Panic or Stardust Speedway, you have to thank him.

This is already a reason as to why the Classic music in Forces doesn’t resemble the music in the Genesis games. While I can understand that it would have been impossible to hire Masato Nakamura again, Jun Senoue would have been good for the job, having composed music for Sonic 3 and most importantly Sonic 3D Blast. But apparently Senoue was MIA until 2019, so who knows.

I’d like to point out that Naofumi Hataya’s involvement will play a bigger role later in this post, as we keep searching for what went wrong and we look for a potential solution when adressing Classic Sonic.

Beevean continued with:

There are mainly two problems here:

1) some of the tracks just don’t fit their stage. I already mentioned that Ghost Town sounds way too happy for a city under attack by giant robots. Death Prison sounds vaguely Egyptian and the difference with the original, bass-heavy composition is staggering. Chemical Flow is the most generic thing and would fit everything and nothing, and again comparing it with the original iconic track is just sad. I think the reason Casino Forest and Iron Fortress are my favorite Classic tracks is that they go very well with their respective stages. This is a problem Adventure 2 had as well, associating a particular style to a particular character, and while I think Forces did it better, for me the priority should be fitting a level.

2) Ohtani was once a very versatile composer (the guy could go in one game from Wave Ocean to Crisis City, for example), but since Lost World, the first game in which he had the responsibility of an entire soundtrack, his style quickly became “anime”. Runners’ tracks? “This sounds like an anime opening!”. How do you recognize his only track in TSR? It’s the one that sounds like an anime opening and uses a synth.

And look, I love Ohtani, he has nothing but my respect, and he made some of my absolute favorite tracks in the series. But I do think they’re making him work too much - he’s the best when he can work with at least another person, and has the chance to span a little. I also think his style is incompatible with the Classic music, which was never anime: even at its mellowest in Sonic 1 it always had a little jazzy/new jack swing touch. Basically the only thing they got right in this game is having a wicked bassline :P

It ain’t *only* the composers’ fault

Following beevean’s words, I’d like to add my own take on the problem. You see, I do agree that the composers maybe weren’t up to the task of nailing the classic Genesis tunes’ vibe (Hataya got real close, though), but at the same time I do think they weren’t properly oriented or didn’t have enough time to keep reiterating on the frameworks they were working with. Like beevean said, some of the tracks improve quite a bit after leaving behind that mixed as hell “almost Genesis but not quite” soundfont.

The composers will work on what they were told to make and I have a strong, albeith unconfirmed, feeling that the Classic Sonic composers where asked to “make it sound retro” by someone higher up on the project management chain, and after checking on their progress, simply said “meh, it’s retro enough, no one will notice”.

The “make it sound retro” argument, in my opinion, opens up a big discussion about Sonic music, because there is no easy way to make it “retro” with Sonic. You just can’t pump out a few nostalgic chiptunes and call it a day. Sonic music may have originated back in the 16-bit days of the Sega Genesis, but his identity is so much more than just that Genesis FM sound. I personally believe, similar to another thing beevean point out, that Forces focused too much on sounding “retro enough” instead of fitting each track better to each level theme or even tap into what really made Sonic appealing on the classic days.

This last point is something that SEGA struggled a lot during the past decade, they introduced Classic Sonic as an entity separated from the current Sonic, yet they simply don’t give Classic Sonic enough development as it’s own character. He’s there because he’s there and we don’t know what to expect from him beyond “he represents the good old days”. But not even SEGA itself knows what that means.

So, what really makes up Classic Sonic’s identity?

For me this is the true heart of the post. Knowing full well what makes Classic Sonic should be the key to every project that features him.

There are lots of points to make about Classic Sonic’s identity and how to establish him should he return once again on a 3D Sonic title (not even using the “modern” anymore, and I personally wouldn’t like to see him again on a 3D title for another decade, if ever), but seeing as the main topic of this post has been music, I’m going to focus on what music style makes Classic Sonic shine.

I already said that throwing some generic chiptunes won’t work, but I DO think that Genesis-inspired tunes can still work, should they stick to what made the classics so great.

And what is that? Well, you have several options here: you can choose from more J-Pop and jazzy tunes to some sick R&B and New Jack Swing beats, all the way through to late 80′s Acid House and wacky 90′s Dance music, even cinematic-like scores and ambient sounds.

Personally, I think the heavy R&B (with its fair share of New Jack Swing) influences are a constant throughout Sonic’s first years, and that kind of sound is one that goes well with his cool attitude™. Spring Yard Zone has always been referred to as “16-bit Every Little Step”, while Sonic CD... well, and Sonic 3... well... JAM. Even Masa’s demos of Sonic 2 feature some sick basses that aren’t all that different from what I was thinking (Chemical Plant and Metropolis come to mind). Sonic CD (JP, also the work of Naofumi Hataya and Masafumi Ogata) in particular springs up to my mind as the purest representation on everything that Sonic was about on his old days, but “pure” doesn’t necessarily mean “refined”, so I think the Sonic CD style coupled with some more smooth Pop for emotional moments (straight from Nakamura’s school of smoothness) and harder 90′s raves for boss fights (think how iconic Stardust Speedway Bad Future has become) could make up the perfect blend for Classic Sonic to follow in terms of style points, but also considering the general themes of each zone (Wacky Workbench being this Dance-heavy zone was a stroke of genius if you ask me, the same with Spring Yard being a jazzy urbanscape.)

Sonic is a product of the late 80′s and 90′s pop culture, he has the moves of MC Hammer, Bobby Brown, and of course, Michael Jackson (also his shoes). As such, no generic “retro nostalgic” tune will fit with him, unlike many other gaming franchises. By embracing Classic Sonic’s wacky nature gems like Sonic Mania happened, and just like I pointed it out to beevean, if you were there the week that game was first announced, you probably saw how much people were gushing about Studiopolis Act 1 sounding so much like Sonic CD with that funky beat. People instantly knew that was the Classic Sonic music they wanted to hear.

And just to make this section even better, I recently asked beevean about her thoughts on what makes Classic Sonic’s music identity. I now urge you to go and read her full analysis because it’s so deep yet very accessible, as I’ll be collecting just a few parts of her response for this post. Trust me, that post is so useful, go and reblog it now, I’ll wait here.

About Classic Sonic’s music styles, beevean says:

So… which is the style that fits Classic Sonic better?

The big love letter to the Classic series that is Mania used CD as an inspiration, and while Mania’s OST is excellent and one of my favorites… I don’t automatically associate New Jazz Swing with Classic Sonic. Before Mania, it was only in one game, the odd one in the bunch too.

3D Blast is my favorite Genesis soundtrack, and as I said it combines the best of two worlds (plus it’s just full of bangers), but it influenced the next era more than the Classic one. The same could be said for the American OST of CD - and besides, tracks like this are nothing like Sonic anyway.

Sonic 1 is the first one and all, but that mellow style fits that particular game more than Classic as a whole, I think the closest OST to this style was Advance 1, actually - another slow-paced, simple game.

So the choice is narrowed down to the ultra-popular Sonic 2 and the refined Sonic 3 & Knuckles. And I’ll be honest, while I think S3&K has higher “highs” compared to S2… my brain immediately jumps to the latter. When I think of Classic Sonic, I think of Genesis brass (the real deal, not that fake synth they used in Forces), twang basses, a swingy rhythm (too many to choose lol), and tons of energy.

Only one Classic track in Forces came close to this description. The others sound more like either a pale imitation of Sonic 1 or modern tracks with a bad soundfont, and that’s when they’re not a complete insult (no i won’t link to it you know what i’m talking about :V).

Author’s note: it’s been, like, two months and she still refuses to talk about Faded Hills, lol

youtube

Author’s note: sorry, beev.

(TL;DR) Closing thoughts.

So, what did go wrong with Classic Sonic’s music in Sonic Forces?

A lack of definition on what Classic Sonic even is about, carried from Generations, made the task of defining his style more difficult.

The composers weren’t up to the task, or they were simply asked to make Classic Sonic “sound retro”, generic sound be damned.

This also means management of the project wasn’t that interested in the Classic portion, or they ran out of time to make it better. This is something that the entire game seemed to have a problem with as well.

The music didn’t fit the stages, and even if it did, Classic’s identity was all over the place. He was there just to be there, and his music suffered from that (compare it to Mania).

Tomoya Ohtani (often credited as the maker of the arguably worst tracks of Classic Sonic in the game) has experienced a shift on his musical style over the last few years that led to his tracks start sounding very similar to each other, this, coupled with the fact he was working on the other 2/3rds of the game’s OST, caused his Classic tracks in particular to suffer.

Classic Sonic’s tracks didn’t take from the 90′s Pop and R&B influences that plagued the old games, and as such, the current Classic Sonic doesn’t have an identity as strong as the original 90′s Sonic. Beevean’s take on this point involves Classic Sonic tracks that feature strong, legit Genesis brass, with twang basses, swingy rhythm and tons of energy.

Once again, I’d like to thank beevean for providing such insightful information and opinions (you can clearly see we both tend to have different takes on what made Sonic back in the 90′s, but in the end agreed to a similar set of requirements to make good Classic music, like basslines and lots of energy), which helped this post a lot more than you can imagine. I wanted to post this back in late January, but the extra time allowed me to keep thinking, searching and listening, while also opened the door to ask beev again about her opinions. This is probably the first “big” article I’ve written this year, and I hope to return soon enough with more.

#sonic the hedgehog #sonic music #welp that was a big post #during the last portion something else started picking my attention #the shift in cultural references for sonic starting with adventure #all the cool skater stuff and the like #i might look into that in the future #in the meantime i think my 'make it sound retro' argument could lead somewhere #because i'm sure ohtani and hataya could've made something way better #but something stood on their way #be it time or management i don't know #well that's it folks #thank you for reading

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mercatorantique · 4 years ago

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aesthetic tag!

tagged by @seungchris

tagging: yall dont have to do it but ! @banghans @kimatas @djxiao @chrrysoda @utunes @itzmidzy n if anybody else wants to feel free to say i tagged u!

rules: bold the aesthetics you relate to and add twenty of your own aesthetic qualities for others to bold

soft

dark academia

edgy

seventies

preppy casual

cinanamon - steph

gold jewelry, slowdancing in the kitchen with a lover, sun on skin, red-tinted lip balm, lazy mornings, getting lost in foreign cities, scent of bakeries, high-waisted jeans, kissing someone’s neck, writing reminders on your wrist, sleeping in braids to have waves in the morning, growing an herb garden, gentle touches, sketches tucked between pages, flushed cheeks, tandem bikes, floating in a pool, vintage gold hand-mirror, deer grazing, softly singing while doing chores

jaesmintea - dia

naptimetea - helena

jeonginks

scxrlettwxtches

listening to a song and remembering the times you used to listen to it on repeat | imagining yourself living in any other life than the one you have now | crop tops and high waisted jeans | forgetting to smile but not actually being upset | nuzzling your face in the crook of their neck | back hugs when you’re stressed | turning in assignments 1 minute before they’re due | wanting a relationship but getting scared the moment you’re in one | pretending that you don’t care when inside you’re burning with doubts and fears | the sound of the evening waves as you lie on the sand | lying in your bed listening to your sad playlist | exhaustion but you can’t sleep | singing loudly when you’re the only one home | feeling safe and comfortable with that person in your life | knee high suede black boots with your black winter coat | comfort over appearance | writing essays at 2 am | creative peak from 1 am to 4 am | the one that always ends up walking in the back of a friend group

hyunsracha - sav!

lveletters

dnceracha - sydni

seungchris - tessa

gutenyang - luca

a game over screen playing its melancholy music in the darkness | being so full of love you start choking on it even though it has nowhere to go | being so drained of love that everything runs together | hazy memories as if they’re no longer your own | wet ink staining the palms of your hands | teeth glinting in the dim light, are those really so sharp? | getting lost in a campfire, the voices of your friends laughter and singing fading out as you stare | home-grown roses and lavender and lilies | the burn in your lungs after a good long scream | the ringing in your ears after seeing your favorite artist in concert, live, feeling the vibrations in your very soul | a smile shared between two...not lovers, but impossibly intertwined regardless | the fascination with catholic imagery and disgust with everything else | a ballroom in the modern era | lips against skin, a kiss and a secret whispered | a leather jacket so loaded with pins and patches that it says more about the owner than any words can describe | a bassline so melodic it catches you off guard, sweeps you off your feet | laughter for laughter’s sake | reading between the lines and only praying someone reads between yours as well | that one knife that says ‘jopping’

#i think i did more than 20 but like im a writer it's what i DO #about tag #bullshit.txt #thank u so muc !!!!

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kn1ghthawk · 4 years ago

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Fallout OC questionaire

@falloutfandomeventhub Fallout OC Questionnaire Whether your OC is a Lone Wanderer or Sole Survivor, these questions can be asked by others to know more about them! Or simply be used as a guide to further develop your character. Ask away, luv! 00. Which Fallout game are they from? Fallout 4 01. Which faction(s) did they join and which did they destroy? Why? The only Faction to be destroyed was the institute by the minute men. Officially, the botherhood won the commonwealth. Their equipment and training are stronger than either the railroad or the minutemen can handle on a one-by-one. With the institute destroyed, the railroad had lost its greater purpose. Some of the remaining members worked to establish a pipeline to Far harbor and Acadia for those who didn't wish for a mind-wipe. Others chose to join the minutement to make the world a safer place. The brotherhood is the army, the minutemen are the police. 02.What is their S.P.E.C.I.A.L.? S4 P6 E1 C1 I10 A4 L3 Strong enough to bend metal to his will, but no 'heavy hitter' or load hauler. Good eyes and quite perceptive, able to play with explosives without fear and an able rifleman The frost seems to have sapped all of his endurance he developed in the army, finding himself constantly winded. Between his sarcastic nature as a veteran, the dysphoria of a new world, and his half blasted face, his charisma is something to be desired Intelligence is where he shines, capable with computers, engineering and certified to operate with fusion cores. His agility is fair. Able to be sneaky, but by no means a ninja. He is lucky in cards but unlucky in love. Hard pressed to romance any companion, he is still able to get a lucky shot off. 03. Give us a summary of their backstory. Son of a locksmith, he used his gift with tumblers to break into places for the cheap thrills and fell in with a bad crowd. The first time he met Nora was popping a lock for her in the rain and he decided she was someone he was willing to make a better man of himself. He enlisted, became a combat engineer, got half his face blown off. Came home after the tour, got popped in the freezer. 04. What’s their full name and does it have a meaning? Do they have any nicknames and how did they get em? Nathaniel Victor Winters, A.K.A. Vic, Blue and THE SILVER SHROUD! Vic is a shortening, blue comes from the suit he emerged from the vault, and the silver shroud came from his time enacting revenge in goodneighbor and his codename with the railroad. 05. What’s their sexual, romantic, and gender orientation? Do they feel comfortable telling other people? He's bisexual male favoring feminine appearance lovers, he lost his virginity with another man in the gang he ran with as a kid. In this war-torn world, what you have in your pants and where you stick it really is on the bottom of the totem pole. 06. Do they have any mental illnesses? How do they cope? The horrors of the war and what he has done still tear at him today. He often stays up late nights tinkering and drafting until he is finally too exhausted to think and blacks out. He 07. Do they have any medical conditions? Is medicine/ treatment available for them? His lungs are frost-burnt from the improper freezing technique. He can get enough air to walk and talk, but any sudden exertion like running has him on his knees in ten seconds. he has second and third degree burns on the right side of his face and body. 08. How much do they care about their outer appearance? What’s their “beauty routine”? How often do they shower/ bathe? His physical appearance is a sensitive subject, some days he feels like he looks like half a ghoul with his second and third degree burns down the right side of his face and body. Optimally, he likes to wear his silver shroud get-up with the scarf wrapped around his face and operator goggles. (use surgical mask or striped bandana to represent the scarf pulled up) Not only does he like to bathe, but he has started building water heaters for a hot bath. 09. What do they fear the most? Fire makes him... uncomfortable, his armor always has asbestos when it is an option. He fears loosing curie, the only other person not bothered by his features beyond Hancock, both of whom are his only lovers. Part of him is afraid he will wake up in the tube again, that this was all a dream. 10. They’re biggest flaw? Do they recognize it as a flaw? He overthinks everything, he has an obsession with returning some of the old world tech back to this new place. He sees a hundred things being used or not used that would make things so much easier. 11. What are they most insecure about? He is almost entirely sure he is a synth, placed by deacon into the vault. 12. What Wasteland threat do they fear the most? (ex. Deathclaws, super mutants, raiders) Raiders are just people. So is the institute. But if he had to pick one single crature he will call for an airstrike on everytime is the mirelurk queen. Three story tall crab spitting armor-melting acid? Hard pass. 13. What’s their zodiac sign or which one do you think they relate to the most? What are their placements (if you know them)? (ex. Aries sun, Taurus moon, Aquarius Venus) May 5th 2045 (Taurus/Ox) 14. What’s their Myers–Briggs Type? (ex. ENTP, ISFJ) INTJ- The scientist 15. What Harry Potter house would they be in? (ex. Gryffindor, Ravenclaw) Ravenclaw 16. Which Pokemon Go team would they choose? (ex. Instinct, Valor, Mystic) Team mystic 17. Out of the nine forms of intelligence (rhythmic, spatial, linguistic, mathematical, kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic, and existential) which one(s) are they really good at and which one(s) is(are) their weakest? 1) Mathematical 2) Kinethetic 3) Linguistic 4) Spatial 5) Interpersonal 6) Intrapersonal 7) Naturalistic 8) Existential 9) Rhythmic 18. What natural alignment are they? (ex. Lawful Good, Chaotic Evil) Chaotic good, Doing the right thing, regardless of the law. 19. Do they have any hobbies? What are they? Tinkering, repairing, drafting. 20. Do they have a favorite holiday? How do they celebrate it? Halloween, costumes and parties. 21. What’s their favorite season? Winter, not just because of the namesake, the way the snow absorbs all sound and colors to make a calm quite monotone of the world. 22. Do they have a temper or are they level headed? Level-headed but vengeful. 23. Do they express their emotions freely or hide their true feelings? He holds his feelings until he has time to walk them out and express himself calmly. But if he gets overwhelmed with loss, he is known to find a corner and break down. 24. Are they a leader or a follower? A reluctant leader as he is the only man with a plan half the time. 25. How do they come off to others? What first impression do they usually make? Know-it-all, gallows humor, awful ugly. 26. Do they prefer to travel alone or with company? Who have they traveled with if any? Current companion if any? He has traveled with most of the companions, leaning on their experience and expertise. His constant companion is Curie and dogmeat. He has the sentinel to provide assistance and carry what he needs to keep himself agile. 27. Would you describe them as selfless or selfish? Does it depend on the situation? Most often he is selfless, throwing caps and resources as problems. He always makes sure the farms under his protection have eight turrets and the farmers are well armed and armored with the standard of leather armor and bolt action rifles. 28. What do they find most attractive in others? Name at least one psychological and physical trait. (doesn’t have to be romantic attraction) In curie it is her sweet faux-french voice and elemental green eyes that almost glow in the right light. From his minor hearing loss in the war, he often reads lips which leads to liking the shapes of certain mouths. 29. Do they flirt often? How easily do they fall in love? He is heavily flirtatious, but he cannot fall in love without sleeping with someone first. As a concupiscent, he has trouble forming longer relationships past fleeting friends without engaging in sexual activities with them. 30. What’s their love life like? Are they interested in anyone or in a relationship? He is in a relationship with Curie and Hancock in a 70/30 split. Hancock knows the need to get down and dirty to do what had to be done. So often after a 'dark' mission, hancock will get loaded and Vic will get drunk to wind down and whatever happens next happens. 31. Do they prefer to solve things diplomatically or using violence? “Si vis Pacem, Para bellum. If you want peace, prepare for war.” He always hopes for peaceful resolutions, popping a grape mentat before an important meeting but keeping track against addiction. But that peaceful meeting almost always comes with a loaded ten on his thigh and one person as backup. 32. What is their combat style? What range do they prefer? Do they sneak? He is a fine rifleman, preferring to take his targets one by one from a hidden distance for as long as possible with the sentinel and dogmeat running melee interference. If curie is with him, she cannot escape her programming with her buzz-saw limb so Vic gives her a melee weapon like a ripper or the throatslicer for her to exercise her medical expertise. Handcock is given a shotgun and a chance to go to town. 33. What weapon(s) do they always carry with them? Vic's favored sidearm is the ultimatum but his go-to is the Kiloton radium rifle. Before then It was Crickets spray-n-pray with the railroad deliverer. 34. Their most prized possession? A lucky rabbits foot he keeps as a charm on his pistols lanyard loop, it was a keepsake from the first time he ever went hunting. 35. Their thoughts on power armor? He finds them very convenient, as long as they are not overutalized or relied on to accomplish the task. As part of the combat engineers, he spent most of his time in a base skeletal frame with cobbled bits ten feet behind the real armored infantry solider marching through the front lines. 36. Favorite armor/ outfit? The silver shroud costume, armored up thanks to Kent. Otherwise, a pair of ballistic military fatigues with full heavy combat armor. 37. How’s their aim? Do their hands shake while pointing a gun? When using a rifle, his left hand holds the barrel steady, when using a pistol his right hand shakes from the nerve damage of the burn so he has to settle for center mass. 38. What are their thoughts on having to kill on a daily bases in order to survive? Does it take a toll on them? Or do they shake it off rather easily? The sad truth is that killing is easy, push a button, pull a trigger. The hard ones are the melee kills, feeling the hot blood splash and run as the last moments of fight or flight kick in before the death rattle. 39. Thoughts on death if any? (ex. Fear it, accept it) He is fairly accepting of death, the world is already a better place for his coming and going. 40. Do they move around a lot or prefer to have a place to call home? Adventure has kept him on the move, he is content for now, his place is in the workshop bringing back Boston to the way it could be. He trusts his friends to keep the day-to-day running while he plays with his pet projects. 41. What’s their favorite location? He likes Red Rocket when he needs to get away from sanctuary hills, Deacon jokes it is the silver shroud's secret lair. He likes to stop in on all the settlements to make sure he didn't need to call in the brotherhood for a massive problem. 42. Their opinions on ghouls, feral and not feral? Feral ghouls still remind him of zombies. His preferred practice is to kneecap them so they fall and let the others finish them off. He has heard the feral transition on the holotape to ozwald and can only compare it to rabied dog and will put them down like dogs. He feels that it is similar to dementia at an old folks home, there is no coming back yet, even from the serum. 43. Do they scavenge for their supplies or simply buy them? He is a scavenger as often as possible, Often holding off or doing without until later, Sometimes he will buy a weapon just for a specific part, then pass the rest of the weapon to one of the farmers. 44. Are they the type to get distracted and go off to an unknown nearby location or do they stay on track? It often depends on the severity of the mission at hand. If it is tracking a signal or fetching something then he is free to wander. But if it is a time sensitive mission like an assault or someone is in danger, then he is a one track mind. 45. How do they sleep? Are they picky about where and how or can they sleep basically anywhere? He prefers to be able to pull something over his shoulder, be it blanket or jacket. He can only really be at rest to sleep in a room with closed or no windows and a door he can lock or brace. Often blocking bathrooms with fallen stall doors so he can sleep on the floor. 46. What’s their favorite radio station and song? (post-apocalypse) Johnny guitar by Peggy Lee, it was the nickname of the boy he lost his innocence with. 47. What’s their favorite post-apocalyptic food? Are they a picky eater? Do they know how to cook? He prefers the canned dog food, it is a hearty protein and reminds him of army beef stew MRE's 48. What’s their favorite beverage? Do they drink alcohol? His favorite drink is Nuka Cherry and his favorite hard drink is numa Dark or rum and cola 49. Anything they like to collect? (ex. Unique weapons, Bobbleheads) He often collects weapons and armor mods to add to his modular suits to try and think of an answer to every situation. 50. Are they good at disarming traps or do they constantly miss them? He has seen what happens when a trap gets missed, the lives and limbs lost. He studied EOD wherever he could from anyone willing to teach him, the rest has come from experience.

#fallout 4

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thesinglesjukebox · 5 years ago

Video

youtube

SELENA GOMEZ - LOOK AT HER NOW

[5.82]

The single at least one of you requested...

Ian Mathers: I say, I am beginning to get an inkling that this song intends us to think that it is subtextually referring to one Justin Bieber! [3]

Michael Hong: Proof that a breakup track doesn't have to be forced and predictable to demonstrate confidence. Chopped background vocals, a chorus that creates euphoria through its blurred loop, and Selena Gomez twirling the production around her voice like a loose strand of hair -- it's an amalgamation of Gomez's excellent 2017 singles, and an absolute earworm. [7]

Joshua Lu: Selena Gomez's comeback singles are like a display of Julia Michaels's range as a songwriter, a dichotomy that brings to mind Revival's "Perfect" and "Hands to Myself" -- or Nervous System's "Worst In Me" and "Pink." Julia's entire mainstream career beginning in the interim does affect the song's present-day freshness. But "Look At Her Now" paves new ground as much as it retreads old styles. Flattening synths push those "Issues"-esque string plucks into the backdrop, and Selena's stutters are more rapid and more nonsensical, and thus more captivating. It's quirky, catchy, and when those background vocals come in during the second chorus, surprisingly transcendent. Sure, Julia and Selena work an awful lot together, but can you fault them when their output is still this good? [7]

Thomas Inskeep: Sleek minimalist synth-pop fits Gomez better than more traditional top 40 pop/EDM; this sounds like the next logical step after her Talking Heads-sampling critical triumph/commercial flop from a couple years ago. Then you realize that Ian Kirkpatrick produced both this and "Bad Liar," along with Dua Lipa's superb new single, and it makes more sense. Now, how do we keep Gomez in this lane and away from losers like Kygo? [7]

William John: There's an explosive song hiding in here, and you can glimpse it occasionally -- in the flash of spidery synth during the first chorus, or at the very end where it all suddenly coalesces, as if a river has turned a bend and unexpectedly encountered the ocean. But it's shielded by muffles and hums, the curse of the anti-chorus, and the kind of frustrating restraint that, for me at least, plagued "Bad Liar". [5]

Katherine St Asaph: Selena Gomez's musical style, primarily Julia Michaels-written wallflowercore, hasn't much resembled a brash, confident kiss-off since "Come and Get It," let alone a song about a relationship between two people "a little too wild for each other." So how does she pull off one of those songs when her recent tabloid narrative breakup calls for it? By removing herself as much as possible. Most obviously, "Look At Her Now" is in third person, creating the same distancing effect as "This Is What You Came For": a song less about getting over someone than gazing, awed, at a girl who has. (So make of that what you will.) Michaels' lyric skims over the drama and past the infidelities -- the second verse, in its "an incident happened, neither good nor bad"-ness, sounds kind of like carefully phrased PR from a politician caught in an affair. Gomez's vocal does the same, emoting only intermittently and swallowing lines you might expect not to be swallowed, like "oh God, when she found out!" (To be fair, the cause may be the vocal comping being... noticeable.) The confidence is delivered by other voices, literally: samples of a child's bratty taunts, some chopped, wordless (and uncredited, obviously) toasting. Gomez is trying to have it both ways: writing a confessional, singer-songwriterly track that's still EDM- and R&B-adjacent, even if it means smothering a conversational vocal in so much processing and embellishment it no longer sounds conversational, or turning over the whole chorus to anonymous somebodies-else. Still, if dreary piano ballads have a low ceiling, wistful pop songs have a high floor. [6]

Oliver Maier: The third-person narration and Gomez's hushed, reverential delivery on the verses imply some kind of profundity that the mindless, irritating anti-chorus seems hell-bent on rebuffing. Maybe that's the point, by some galaxy-brain rationale. [3]

Natasha Genet Avery: I've always staunchly defended Selena Gomez, insisting that what she lacks in talent, she makes up for with excellent taste. After hearing these "mm-mms," I guess I'll see myself out. [3]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: God bless Selena Gomez for taking words thrown together in a blender and singing them with such bluster and joy that you don't have time to think about how ridiculous they are: "Once again, I'm yours in fractions," "You and me bleed the same light," "I'm slipping down a chain reaction,""Just like the Battle of Troy, there's nothing subtle here," "I've been running through the jungle, I've been running with the wolves," "Syncopate my skin to your heart beating," "Metaphorical gin and juice," "Bowery/Whiskey neat," "You are the thunder and I am the lightning," "Your lies are bullets, your mouth's a gun," "Let the chemicals do its stuff til the energy is too much," "Taki taki," pretty much every word of "Fetish." When Selena released a new dance track, I had my fingers crossed that I might get a shiny new toy, and boy, oh boy, did she not disappoint. "MM-MM-MM-MM-MM-MM-MM-MM...WOW" is everything I could have wanted it to be and more. She's gone post-verbal, folks! [9]

Alex Clifton: I thought the "mm-mm-mm" chorus was a cop-out the first time I heard it, but it fulfills the same function as the "ba-de-yas" of "September" -- words aren't necessary when you've got a song like this. It's deservedly smug and dismissive, perfect for deflecting any shards of bad memories from the past from her current happiness. If "Lose You to Love Me" was Selena at her most vulnerable, then "Look At Her Now" builds her back up into being the dance-queen badass that I always knew she was, but with the confidence to match. [7]

Jackie Powell: Ian Kirkpatrick's Jackson Pollock-style overdubbing of Gomez's and Michaels' vocalizations during the chorus places the listener dancing in the club rather than crying, and the heavy bass synth loop on the bridge adds color that complements the vocal brightness of "she knows she'll find love." The subject matter is a blatant follow-up to the introspective "Lose You to Love Me," but the wise writing from Julia Michaels and Tranter adds substance. This is the next stage of grief. Is it acceptance? I'm not sure. But the emotional snapshot is realistic and relatable. The couplet I'm drawn to the most is in verse two, when Gomez chants "What a thing to be human/Made her more of a woman" with the utmost conviction. The way she talk-sings the word "woman" is alluring but also so sanguine. In the Sophie Muller-directed visual, it's almost as if Gomez is channeling her inner Diana Prince in the1984 Wonder Woman poster; a blast of color coupled with a metallic outfit screams Amazonian energy. Apparently this is a track for her "ride-or-dies," which I assume would include Michaels. I mean, who wouldn't want to see them as Amazon goddesses? You must be related to Ares if you don't. [7]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

#Selena Gomez #pop #music #music review #writing

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daggerzine · 3 years ago

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The Boo Radleys- Keep On With Falling (Boostr)

Last summer a single, then an EP, and even a short fall tour sparked the return of The Boo Radleys. Now a full-length album is being released. Simon ‘Sice’ Rowbottom, Tim Brown and Rob Cieka began writing the songs via file sharing, giving them each the ability to add any details they each wanted. Being a huge Boos fan, I was happy to hear they were back. I first heard them when my brother played me their EP, Boo! Forever. At first, I thought my speakers were blown, but then I realized it was sonic bliss. I soon began collecting all of their output. The new album continues where they left off, Kingsize’s Britpop, and this time around guitarist Martin Carr does not join in.

The album opener, “I've Had Enough I'm Out (Album Version),” sucks you in with soft, acoustic guitar and then kicks in with the pop we’ve known to love about the Boos. Add some strings and gorgeous harmonies, which I totally forgot about with them, and the album is off to a great start. Apparently, it’s Sice’s current stance on religion. Check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_FClgtUZfo

The next song, the title track “Keep On With Falling.” brings to mind the “Wake Up Boo!: Music for Astronauts” acapella portion from a b-side off of the Wake Up Boo! single in 1995. The beautiful Beach Boy-ish harmonies lead into a bouncy pop song with an amazing keyboard ending.

“All Along” is another one to sing along to with its echoing guitar effects along with a driving rhythm section. I’m just going to throw this out, it’s a song Tahiti 80 could have written. Amazing keyboard solo as well.

The rhythm section really kicks in on “I Say A Lot Of Things.” They bust out the horns as well, another Boo trait I forgot about that always adds a nice touch.

An acoustic guitar intro on “Tonight” is a great transition to what appears to be the slowest track on here. But then layered harmonies add to this as it builds and builds to a faster beat. Here come the beautiful strings again as well. Back and forth with its tempo has me loving this one. It builds to a blistering guitar solo and softly ends with that gentle acoustic guitar.

“A Full Syringe And Memories Of You (Album Version)” brings the band back to full throttle with a bang. A chirping synth carries the tune. Blasting guitars, especially the lead solo adds to this track. Here’s the EP version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F4zrfF9II0

“Call Your Name” begins with a dreamy, eerie keyboard that transforms into a song Julee Cruise could easily add to her setlist. It ends with another keyboard and guitar jam.

With “Here She Comes Again,” the dub intro starts off as one of my least favorites on the album. But that all changes when Sice’s “C’mon Kids” distorted vocals begin. It then takes off and turns into a mishmash of sounds with those luscious harmonies again!

The next track, “You And Me,” has a New Order keyboard/bass feel to it. Nothing wrong with that. Maybe it’s a nod to their 90s roots. And that’s just one of the reasons I love this song. The vocals really stand out on this one.

“I Can’t Be What You Want Me To Be” is another rocker for the album that begins soft and then explodes. Their original 90s sound really stands out on this one, plus some keyboards.

The album ends with “Alone Together.” Imagine a “Baba O’Riley” intro going out of control. It continues with an explosion of sound through distortion and a very tight rhythm section. At the end, re-enter the “BO’R” synth with a nice fade out of keyboards and the album’s over.

Eleven amazing pop songs worth the wait, as well as numerous colored vinyl versions to pick from. If you’re like me, I’ll be buying the collector’s double CD version with its numerous bonus tracks. I’m also hoping the band has plans to tour the US. ERIC EGGLESON www.thebooradleys.com

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