#it’s that ‘curate your own experience’ thingy

[rileyslibrary]

Is there any reason you might block someone? Any boundaries we need to know? ❤️

Oh boy. Good question, nonny, and a very difficult one at that. I’ll keep it as straightforward and as light as possible. 🍫

I don’t block people whose content/ships make me uncomfortable since I can filter that out of my feed. I also delete requests I can’t fulfil, without publicly judging the person who sent it, so you don’t have to worry about that either. I won’t rant (again) about tropes that aren’t my cup of tea or write a five-page essay on why I consider something wrong. I did that once and regretted it deeply; it felt too self-righteous. Who am I to impose ethics on others? Everybody’s a saint when they talk about other people’s sins.

I block people based on how they treat others and how they might treat me and my content in the future. I do it to protect myself, like a precautious measure, you know? I gauge their behaviours and cut them off before they acknowledge my existence. I basically look out for people who are very comfortable with treating others and their content like shit because there’s a chance they’ll also do it to me. Nit-pickers, who seek for an excuse to rant and humiliate others. And I don’t stop there; I do the same to those who support them and condone their behaviour (I call those “dickheads in the making.”)

TL;DR: I filter content I don’t like, I block people I don’t like. Don’t be a dickhead, don’t support dickheads, and we’re good. 👍

[crescentfool]

i think something that is important to me to remember is that there are small ways i can do things to spark joy for myself and others without waiting for someone else to do it... (conjures up little sparklies from my hands) life is so whimsical!!!

[rius-cave]

jhhhheyyyy it's me the one that sent the lute and adam thingy where lute doesnt recognise adam

uh if you like ever want me to stop interacting with your posts because im young then please please please tell me because i will if you arent comfortable with it :)

Oooh buddy, here's the thing. I'm not your mom, once I post stuff, it's kind of out of my ability to monitor who interacts with my posts and who doesn't. Even blocking isn't gonna stop someone if they really want to see them lol. I was a teen too, I did all kinds of shit.

That being said, I'd rather that no minors engage directly with me about nsfw topics. I think the Lute thing is whatever, but be mindful about your own safety and boundaries. I'm just a silly dude posting my silly shit and my power ends with me saying "This is mature content about a show that is +16 in the first place" so I can't curate your online experience for you.

It also depends on how young you are. If you're like, 12, you probably shouldn't be in Tumblr in the first place lmao, much less even be aware of Hazbin's existence *shrug*

[khaopybara]

tag game ✨

@mbjw saved me from saturday boredom and tagged me in this, so thank you jubs, i enjoyed these a lot.

1. why did you choose your url?

i love khaotung. khaotung was obsessed with the capybara song last year before i even knew who he was. capybaras happen to be a very common animal in the region i live. i was very happy they were getting the recognition they deserved. put them together, we have lovely khao + capybaras = khaopybara (i'm also super sure i've seen people here and on tw use this and i just stole it. i'm not creative especially when it comes to usernames).

2. any sideblogs? if you have them name them and why you have them.

i have two other sideblogs. @tuseryoo for all of the gifs i make so i can have all of them in one blog just because, so i feel like i'm not losing track of the things i create (even though i haven't updated that one in a while), and @captain-xandis that some moots might have noticed in their notifications bc i recently created that one to post gifs about critical role, but i always forget to check which blog appears on top of the thingy, so i'm constantly deleting and reblogging things in the right blog these days.

3. how long have you been on tumblr?

as of july 3rd, i've been here for 11 years now, so since 2013? which tracks with my super strong k-pop phase tbh.

4. do you have a queue tag?

nah, i have a queue going for gifs that are requests or for episodes that already aired, but usually i just post things whenever.

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

ha, i was into super junior. and i was experimenting with fandom for the first time at the time. that's it. i felt like tumblr was a lot more creative and pretty than twitter or facebook, so i stayed.

6. why did you choose your icon/pfp?

i am a mook defender and apologist. i also think aya is super cute and super pretty. i change icons so often though, i blame all the pretty women in qls these days for making me change it all the time.

7. why did you choose your header?

i am breathing and living for the heart killers and kantbison and unfortunately i'm dying from lack of content. the tattoo table kiss is going to change lives i think, so until we don't get the official version, i'll have this masterpiece displayed there somehow.

8. what’s your post with the most notes?

as of now, it's a 23.5 official trailer gifset of sun being jealous of ongsa with amazing 939 notes, but the gifset of lada protecting earn from hitting her head on the table is quickly catching up with 877.

9. how many mutuals do you have?

17 mutuals? i think that's right.

10. how many followers do you have?

843 if you count the main blog + side-blogs.

11. how many people do you follow?

... 27 blogs.

12. have you ever made a shitpost?

i mean, sure? i do get embarrassed by my own shitposts sometimes and i delete them tho.

13. how often do you use tumblr each day?

all the time. it's my favorite social media for sure. i get to see pretty things and my dash is much better curated than other apps. it's great.

14. did you have a fight/argument with another blog once?

i don't think i ever fought online. i block people with remarkable expedience tbh if i don't like their vibe or their tone or the shit they post, and i also make use of the filtered tags, so you know, no reason to fight.

15. how do you feel about ‘you need to reblog this’ posts

these exist? good for them. you shouldn't tell people what to do.

16. do you like tag games?

sure! i only started being part of them now, so sometimes i forget them, or i just don't see i was tagged, but i do enjoy them.

17. do you like ask games?

i don't think i've ever done an ask game but that's mainly bc i think people won't want to know and won't send any asks, and i'd rather spare my ego from that humiliation.

18. which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

i think many of my mutuals are famous in our ql bubble which makes it a little crazy that some are my mutuals tbh. that's most of them actually.

19. do you have a crush on a mutual?

i do have people that make me kick my feet when they interact with my posts like, twirling my hair, silly smile, giggling because they've noticed me. but actually crushing, imagining our lives in the countryside, with a kitchen facing the meadow in a fine spring morning, with two dogs and three cats, no.

20. tags?

i'm tagging @namtanfilm, @aylinaliens, @sollucets and @sherrymagic, @ayansukkhaphisit and whoever feels like doing it, and to those i've tagged, just ignore this if you want, too, no pressure.

[demongirlgarlicbread]

Hey! New intro post. Been a hot minute since we made the last one. Look under the readmore for all the juicy details.

We are Carstein. Cars if we're friends or you wanna be friends. Not even a "we're using this online handle for the sake of privacy(though we Are)" thing so much as "that's the closest thing we have to a collective name" thing. If you haven't figured it out right now we're a system. Don't really care about labels or community discourse there it simply Is. If you want to yell at us do it for being a weird problematic siscon tranny bloodfreak. That might actually net you some engagement!

We have no specific plan for what this blog is or should be. We may post about kink stuff. We may post about whatever video game or other media thingie we've been thinking about recently. We may vent about disability! We might even keep no notes reblogging things! The mystery must be palpable!

If you want to chat for whatever reason or send asks go ahead. Talking with people is cool and fun, and getting DMs is a delight! If you don't want to talk you don't have to, and if you don't want to see our posts you can always not follow us. I believe in your ability to curate your own experience :).

Loving (faux)sister of @thetacofuckingcat and others unnamed 💜

[jeanjamesb]

Hope she doesn't show up to that golf thingy. It's tiring how you all make all her life about Tom, like she lives to just be "down bad" for him, cheer for him, be his biggest supporter and follow him around. Interesting how you never say that about him. He has his own life outside of these relationship, why can't she?

You know not following or interacting with my blog is free right? You can just curate your fandom experience and leave me out of it if you think I really only make her life about him.

I don't but ya know, that won't change your mind regardless so.

[spidermansbf]

the fun thing about tumblr is that you curate your own experience

just check look for your interests in the search thingy and follow the hashtags, you'll find nearly anything in here

Ngl my very limited understanding of tumblr was that it was a very anglo-dominated space and seeing people here talking about cumbia makes me feel at home.

[edoro]

for the ship ask thingy: belos x ford

sorry that it took me 100 years to answer this but

Belord is choice batshit crossover pairing fuel. it's eerily plausible, because both stories contain a built-in isekai mechanic, we know Ford wandered the multiverse for a while, and we also know Ford has the absolute most dogshit taste in men PLUS he needs barely a nudge to just devolve into full-on mad science villainy, and Philip would be more than happy to provide that nudge

it's 1) extremely funny and 2) provides some opportunity for like, some actual genuine emotion here (largely "what the fuck", but hey, that's what you get with Philip)

Philip of course would love to hear Ford's tales of brotherly woes and would reinforce and support every small-minded, petty, self-centered feeling Ford has about it - yes, your brother did unforgivably betray you because he simply couldn't stand how correct and brilliant you were, yes, you're completely right to be holding a grudge about it forty years later, yes, you did give him a chance to redeem himself by helping you and he still refused and honestly that just proves how fundamentally corrupt and bad he is, doesn't it?

of course you shouldn't even consider that Stanley might have a point of view here, that it might differ from yours, or that just maybe he acted according to that and that things have been hard for him too. no, definitely not.

(of course, Philip isn't going to tell Ford the whole truth about what happened with Caleb, but in a deliciously ironic twist, i can imagine that hearing his carefully curated "wild witches/wild magic Killed My Family Including Caleb" stories might actually make Ford start thinking about what if he never does see Stanley again, how sure he's acted like Stan is dead to him for years but if Stan were actually for real dead...? and maybe give him that bit of a nudge towards contemplating reconciliation, oops)

Philip, of course, is just projecting like hell onto Ford about this. Ford meanwhile is really enjoying someone who can keep up with him intellectually and who shares a lot of his own experiences of being an extremely intelligent, queer man who grew up in a small, insular, conservative community that didn't understand, support, or want him.

of course, like Caleb, Ford was desperate to get out. Philip just ended up being desperate to try to earn their approval and show he could be the best of them all. (interesting to consider the parallels that exist between Ford + Stan and Philip + Caleb, like you can draw some really interesting lines between both of the siblings in these respective sets)

it's really a case of like, Ford looking at Philip and going, "i can fix him" and Philip looking at Ford and going, "i can make him worse."

i think he'd see Ford similarly to how he sees Luz, as another wayward human soul who he can try to convince of the righteousness of his plans + the evil of this realm, and if he can get Ford on his side then Ford's approval will kind of metaphorically represent the approval of humanity in general + specifically the approval of his long-dead Puritan neighbors.

of course outside of the mad science stuff and Brother Complexes they don't have a whole lot in common, and while Ford is very much an asshole he's not as rotten or cruel a person as Philip is, so inevitably this is going to end in the most dimension-shatteringly messy breakup ever, and that's also extremely good.

(also, of course, the endless tragicomedy potential of Hunter and Ford interacting. also, the way that from Ford's pov this turns from a fantasy romance into a slowburn horror as he starts to figure out what's actually going on here.)

(also, the weird old man sex would be insane.)

[doribuki]

4,11,30,43 for the fic ask thingy. Also I love your works bro. Absolutely amazing writing wise and character wise!

4. What detail in [insert fic] are you really proud of?

ill pick one at random from something really old but still precious to me; i wrote a post sirens harlivy fic that had poison ivy's body reacting by growing actual thorns and other plant growth because i loveeeee highlighting her fucked up biochemistry. it's nothing major or particularly altering but it was still something that made me hoot and holler myself.

11. Are you partial to a certain character/pairing or are you more equal-opportunity? If you are partial to any character/pairing, why do you think that is?

when i was very new to fandom i was definitely more multishipper friendly but as ive grown and figured out what tropes i like in fictional pairings and stuff, the more uhhh picky ive grown!

some pairings/characters though i Do avoid content of because of how people in the past have like. come at me over it. but eh. curate your own experiences etc

30. Have you ever written something that was out of your comfort zone? If so, what was it, and how did it affect your approach to writing fic thereafter?

not in fic specifically but definitely when i was younger and pressured into roleplaying things i Should Not Have Been roleplaying. thats really all i feel comfortable sharing! 43. If you take/write prompts: what’s your favorite prompt fic that you’ve written?

i wrote a short prompt that had widowmaker and tracer as rival street artists who were also dating and neither knew the other was the rival and it was very cute

[battysodaarchive]

OK I'm painting my nails right now so I'm doing the voice thingy but I think honestly I really think it's stupid that we think like discord servers are like cringe or like havinf slash being in a lot makes you loser or whatever because I love making little communities I feel like it's like the closest for me personally for like those like older message boards it's like that and it's like you can just make something that's like people that like the same thing as you do and it's like if you make your own server too it's like you get to the curate like that experience and like make it really nice for you and you can be passionate about the thing you like And I just I don't know I just think in a more like online age especially like in this like pandemic world right now I feel like we shouldn't be bullying people for like having online communities because it's like they're not inherently bad just don't be stupid and rude yknow what I mean

[paintedrecs]

For the fandom talk meme thingy: C (not trying to start drama I swear), I, K, R, and X. =D

C - A ship you have never liked and probably never will.

Hmmm, there are a few ways of answering this. One is by listing all my NOTPs, which would be excessively long and ultimately boring because it essentially boils down to “anyone else with either member of my OTP.” I monoship my primary pairings, so I’m pretty strict on what I do and do not like. 

(With the way fandom is now, I should clarify that NOTP means that I personally do not like a ship and I therefore go out of my way to avoid it - by muting terms, carefully filtering tags and search results, curating my own space, etc. It doesn’t mean I think the ship is badwrong or that anyone else should stop shipping it. It just means I do not ever want to see it.)

This feels a little less specific on that front, though, maybe more just: people like this and I’m meh about it?

So Allydia comes to mind. I don’t hate it, and if the Sterek’s good enough I’ll still read a fic with them as a background pairing, but I don’t ever like it as a romantic ship. While I ship Lydia with lots of different characters, including Cora, I’ve always seen Allison as straight, so I suppose that’s part of it? And I love Lydia & Allison as bffs - I see them as entirely platonic, like Scott & Stiles, so introducing romance just doesn’t work for me.

Another one is Sheriff Stilinski/Peter Hale. I...I don’t understand it. Unlike the last answer, this background pairing will prevent me from reading a Sterek-central fic.

I - Has Tumblr caused you to stop liking any fandoms, if so, which and why?

This turned into a complicated and kind of roundabout answer, so I’m putting the rest of the questions under a long-post cut!

I stopped frequenting tumblr for two main reasons:

that whole weird purge thing that made me think everyone was leaving, so I just gave up, which might’ve been premature cause it seems like folks are still going strong on here

the emergence of antis, specifically within the Voltron fandom (although they’re everywhere at this point)

There’s a saying in fandom now: 

“Why is the younger fandom generation like this?!??” “Tumblr raised them.”

For me, for years, tumblr was a really wonderful space where I had a lot of great conversations and read very thoughtful threads that helped me to learn some important things about myself, other people, and a world much wider than my own.

But I was an adult when I joined this site, and it really does seem like there’s a whole new crop of kids who have no actual context for ideas like social justice, the need for canonical representation in our media, and a lot of other things that eventually got folded into a big ball of disconnected rhetoric that they now fling as hard as they can at the heads of fandom creators who are committing the ultimate sin of creating content for ships they don’t like.

It’s late, and I don’t feel like getting into a whole Essay Rant about all that.

So on an entirely personal level, I quit running appreciatejack (my Check Please/zimbits/Jack Zimmermann blog) because someone sent me really vile hate for daring to ship Shiro/Keith from Voltron (two unrelated adults in a cartoon). It’s why I turned my ask boxes/anon/chats off on most of my blogs, and then eventually just...got tired of running them.

When I started up appreciatederek, I got a couple asks from people who wanted to know if it was going to be multiship or just Sterek, and when I said it was Sterek, they presumably went off to find other things they were into, because I never heard from them again. Y’know, the reasonable reaction. And then the rest of it was wonderful: finding content for it, and getting responses from people who enjoyed that content.

I thought appreciateshiro would be similar, but it was all so messy from the very start. The Sheith tag was FULL of hate. I was initially checking it every day, trying to find artists and writers and gif-makers to reblog and encourage and support, like I’d done in Sterek fandom, but instead I’d spend literal hours blocking people who came into that tag just to talk about how much they hated the ship.

Every day, I’d look for content for my OTP, and every day I’d come away from it angry and sad and frustrated. I never seemed to run out of people to block. And they never, ever seemed to run out of hate.

It was exhausting. It made me reluctant to go on tumblr at all. And eventually I just...sorta stopped.

So the answer to this question is more, I guess, “fandom made me stop liking tumblr, and in the process I stopped liking most fandoms.”

I’m sure you can kinda tell from the fandoms I’m currently the most invested in.

I love Sterek, and I will always love Sterek. Part of that’s the ship itself, of course, and part is because I had an incredible fandom experience with it. People within this fandom are still really great - always so welcoming and super excited about new content, even so many years on.

Otherwise, my current fandoms are kiiiiinda tiny:

Xanatowen (Gargoyles), which currently consists of exactly 2 people and 12 fics (3 of which are mine).

Trevorcard (Castlevania), which only has ~200 fics on AO3.

Taibani (Tiger & Bunny), which is an oldish fandom with only ~600 fics on AO3.

Remember, I came from a fandom that has SIXTY THOUSAND fics.

So while I feel very lonely and very sad about the low content levels in these fandoms, they’ve also given me the space to let go of some of my fandom hurt & anger and remember what it’s like to just...peacefully love something. I really miss just loving things and talking about loving those things and searching for other people who also love those things without running into....thousands upon thousands of people who HATE that you love that thing.

(Until I wrote all that out just now, I actually hadn’t realized how much this had still been hanging over me, or why I was so hesitant to come back to “reclaim” a space I’d once been super active and happy in. Essay over! Next questions.)

K - What character has your favorite development arc/the best development arc?

Answered here!

R - Which friendship/platonic relationship is your favorite in fandom?

Answered here! 

X - A trope which you are almost certain to love in any fandom.

Found family. This is probably a big part of why Sterek was my first real fandom, because the idea of Pack makes it incredibly natural to build out relationships beyond just the central romantic pairing. 

It doesn’t have to be a werewolf thing, though. I’m honestly not hugely fond of the whole puppy piles concept - I’m less interested in “biological urges make characters literally physically all snuggle up together in bed” than I am in the actual build of the friendships, and the concept of choosing people who will become the family you’ve been missing for whatever reason.

Maybe it’s reconnecting with biological family, or maybe it’s discovering that your friends have been filling that space for you all along, without you even fully realizing it. (The concept of “home” is another big one for me. Home is where your heart is etc etc.)

And hey! Now I can pull back in another question from earlier: about “pairings” that I might not have initially considered. As I suspected, I do have more! Mostly platonic.

For instance: Derek and Sheriff Stilinski becoming bffs. I thiiiink I can probably tie my ABSOLUTE LOVE of this concept back to HalfFizzbin’s can't be hateful, gotta be grateful. And then Cupboard Love really has to be the source of ALL my alive!Hales feels, which also includes folding Stiles into their family.

Fic is largely responsible for building out Derek’s relationship with Boyd, Erica, Isaac, his sisters...making them into an actual pack and friends and family in the way the show never bothered. And frankly while I don’t like canon!Scott at all at this point, I love his friendship with Stiles in fics, and I absolutely believe Stiles and Lydia would be amazing friends once he got past his crush on her. I’d point to another fic here, owlpostagain’s will to follow through, as the ultimate source for major Team Human feels.

So yeah. I’m always going to be drawn to stories about family, in whatever form that takes, particularly if it’s one that’s a little bit off the normal white-picket-fence path.

In Tiger & Bunny, it’s Barnaby joining the Kaburagi family, and learning how to be a dad and a friend to his new husband’s daughter.

In Gargoyles, I’m completely obsessed with the (canonical!) idea of a family that consists of a man, his wife, their son, and the chaotically loyal fae babysitter/tutor/third parent. It is not a stretch to tweak this the tiiiiiiniest bit to turn it into a nontraditional family structure of a man, his wife, his son, and his fae boyfriend. Honestly.

In Castlevania, the fic that made me sob my eyes out at one point does something the show would absolutely never. It gives Alucard the time to rebuild his physical home while befriending the people in the little town that crops up around it. It’s about Trevor and Alucard falling in love, but it’s also about them making a place for themselves in a world where that kind of comfort and stability and friendship is so badly needed.

I think we all kinda need that in our world right now. So I love being able to find it in fic, for the characters who’ve grown to mean something to me.

[teal-deer]

Everquest Next, Matrix Online, and some rambly thoughts about the next big MMO thing

Man. Just. Thinking today about a very long discussion I had with @obscuritory about how video game archival work is already an insanely difficult task, and games like The Matrix Online are quite literally impossible to archive in a playable state. For those that weren’t around when TMO was a thing, it was unique among multiplayer games in that admins actually played the NPCs. If you talked to Morpheus, you were talking to an actual human, not a generic script. In turn, this meant that there were live ARG like events in game where individual players really could shine, in a way that didn’t feel like “ugh so and so got the cool thing and we missed out!” but instead “holy shit, did you see what so and so ran into!?” It’s what Guild Wars 2 really wanted to be in its early stages of development, which you could still kinda see in the initial attempts at Living World stuff like the Karka Invasion, but couldn’t quite get to because they’d already hewed too hard into the Everyone Is The Main Character thing.

The problem in the end with Matrix Online is that kind of curated, individual experience isn’t monetizable, and MMOs require so much massive server upkeep and infrastructure that you kinda *do* need to make money. It doesn’t matter how passionate you are about your unique MMO if you can’t afford the server capacity to handle that much stuff going on (MMORPGs are honestly some of the most complex pieces of programming on the planet right now, it’s silly. so many moving parts). If you have a million players, even if you have a rotating team of people playing only a few major NPC roles (Matrix Online’s very premise made this doable, because tons of NPCs in the open world were, in universe, just programs!)... you still get overwhelmed. There’s only so many unique, curated experiences a team can keep coming up with to feed the appetites of such a large audience.

And that brings me to Everquest Next, or, more importantly, Everquest Landmark’s promises. Basically, Everquest Landmark was a content creation tool that let people do kinda Minecraft Creative Mode-ish building, with the idea that the “best” content would then be put into Everquest’s proper MMO mode. And that in turn just... I’m just rambling this into Tumblr right now, this isn’t a formal essay, but I just keep thinking about this particular Holy Grail of an online multiplayer *thing*, this thing I think companies keep seeking after and never quite get to, which is a fully realized world where players can create their own content and storylines, while admins still have some degree of control and can still sculpt an overall narrative. So, not quite SecondLife, which was a total free-for-all. Something a little closer to MineCraft, but bigger in scope and ambition. Something that evokes the best stories I hear about stuff like Star Wars Galaxies, where people reminisce fondly about just being a bartender and not some adventurer, just... running their cool little bar. I genuinely think that’s what the original designers behind Fallout 76 wanted, but the corporate guys at ZeniMax Media (the company which owns Bethesda Softworks, Id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, and some other stuff I forget about) both went “Hey isn’t that Fort Night thingy popular with the kids” and “We can’t figure out how to squeeze money out of players with this.” And I think that last bit is the problem with that kind of ambition right now. As nostalgic as some of us get about things like Matrix Online, SWG, and even Everquest Landmark... that group is a niche audience to begin with. The game design challenges behind this kind of project alone are enormous, this balance of like... how do you give people simple tools to use but don’t overwhelm them but also maintain a consistent universe that isn’t just a free for all build whatever skyscraper sized dongs you want but isn’t tedious but doesn’t dissolve into fighting but ---- and that’s before you even get into the difficulties in programming it, or the server architecture required to handle it. Every monetization scheme I can think of besides a flat sub fee would just poison the well with the kinds of players you’d want, and a sub fee probably wouldn’t be enough in this day and age. ‘

mumble mumble.

[silveredglass]

RULES

·         Always post the rules

·         Answer the questions given by the person who tagged you

·         Write 11 questions of your own

·         Tag 11 people (or however many you want)

Hello. @dictacontrion tagged me in this, (thank you love!) And can I just say - I love this particular tag thing? It’s different and everyone’s questions and answers are great. It gets long so I will put a cut in, but everyone and anyone come have a chat if you like. <3

1. If you could have one billion dollars or the not (or only incidentally) profitable superpower of your choosing, which would you choose and why?

I suppose one billion dollars because I could do a lot with that.. Fund a lot of shelters, healthcare. Give a lot away to indigenous peoples to make their own choices. I could get myself elected. Possibly buy a two bedroom terrace in the city I live in (although real estate is crazy here so that would eat up a chunk 😉 But yeah, I mean you’d go for the money and the ability to change lives.

2. What article of clothing makes you feel most awesome? 

My under-boob-body-suit-spanx-thingy? Also, I have this amazing navy matt sequin skirt and it’s, uh, well it’s amazing. It comes to about my knees and it twirls (!) and did I mention it’s made of matt navy sequins.

3. How did you get into your most recent fandom?

I don’t really have a ‘recent’ fandom as such. Relating this to my blog and fic stuff, I guess for me I have always had just one blog that everything went on; I was never good at separating interests or interested/good at ‘curating’ something. I did for many reasons discourse and theories and lies people tell and a whole damn hot mess delete my old blog and start again, but I literally had about 5 people I spoke to on that and 4 of them have left tumblr. That said, it’s always been Harry Potter and 1d and music in general and pretty pictures and sometimes a boob or two.

4. What’s your least favorite/most hated book, and why?

Ahh. Jesus. There are books I hate that I have never read – like The Da Vinci Code. But for something that I have read, probably anything by Brett Easton Ellis. I’ll focus on American Psycho. 

I spent a lot of time in my late teens and early twenties either at school or uni reading books written by men about male experiences (presented as seminal works for ALL humans which eye-roll they are not) and often feeling very uncomfortable about them, but because they were deemed ‘cool’ or ‘good’ by people I respected I never spoke up about my issues with them. AP is honestly just the pinnacle of this. It’s not that I think the book is poorly written, or that it doesn’t have a place as such, or even that I have a problem with the shocking the elements of it – but it gets away with so much horrid misogyny in the name of art and really the violence actually takes away from the theme of the novel and so just ends up being sensationalist bullshit.

I am not sure if this makes sense, but basically I hate it because it is misogynistic and bad and also because of what it represents about me not speaking up when I wanted too.

5. Describe a fanwork you’d love to read/see/watch, but don’t want to create yourself, please?

Hahaha, @charlotte-bird’s Glasto fic. (Although I want to write a festival one shot myself, I love her sketched out plot idea and this art work a lot.)

6. What would be the lineup of your ideal music festival?

OK. I ended up with a spreadsheet which involved a fantasy festival lasting three and a half days, over three stages and two tents, and I was negotiating set times with myself because I wouldn’t be able to see all the bands I had programmed for myself at my fantasy festival? It was a mess.  SO, I have gone for a nice one day-er featuring artists who I have not yet seen live, and for most, will of course never get that opportunity.

The Go-Betweens. Manic Street Preachers. Pulp. Amy Winehouse. Fleetwood Mac. David Bowie. The Beatles (cos you would if you could.) and then The Supremes to dance the night away…

7. You’re given the power to unilaterally create one law or policy in one country - what is it? 

Fark. I don’t live there but straight away I thought of health care in the US. It’s unfathomable that people go broke because they break a leg? But closer to home and for personal (selfish?) motivations I would create federal policy around domestic violence, sentencing and parole conditions for offenders and proper long-term funding for short and long term effects of domestic violence. And leading from that a reformative framework for addressing crime that is primarly committed against women and children as a whole.

8. If you had to commit to living in one place for the rest of your life, what would it be?

I think near a river on the NSW South Coast. Or maybe Edinburgh. But I’d probably want to stay in Australia. We have a fair amount of problems and douchebag conservatives, but it’s a very lucky place to live.

9. Thinking about your life a year from now, what’s one thing that you hope will be different?

I’d like to have some proper travel plans for a long trip overseas & the other missed connection stuff relating to that.

10. What’s one thing that you hope will be the same?

My family are all healthy.

11. What’s the last thing that made you laugh? 

Emily’s Cartoon this week , I just saw it reblogged again on my dash and lmso – the sky badger kills me.

OK. I’m tagging @charlotte-bird, @serpensthesia, @devinesis, @dddraconis, @slowestdive, @kiwisinnewyork, @thebluepeninsula, @jadepresley um @dictacontrion want to do this again !? (totally do not have to at all) @blamebrampton? 

I know you’re all busy, so no pressure. And I know everyone always says 'anyone else who sees this and wants to please do’ - but I mean it, honestly I love this one, it’s like having a great chat.

My questions are:

1. Have you ever had something happen to yourself (not as a baby) that you didn’t remember until someone else told you about it?

2. Best food combination that shouldn’t work but does that you have ‘invented’?

3. Do you like live theatre? Art exhibits? If so tell me about something you’ve seen that made an impact.

4. Do you have an accessory or jewellery or makeup that you wear almost always?

5. What is your strongest olfactory memory?

6. What album that has been released in the past two years should I go buy?

7. When you were a kid did you have a favourite make believe game you’d play? Or dress up you’d wear?

8. Tell me something that made you feel proper chuffed with yourself. In a nice quietly contented way.

10. Have you ever had a scary or very odd animal encounter? 

11. Share a link to a fic or fan art that you love?

[beatsfortheillperth]

Words with Somanyfeels

Mixes and blends offer their listeners the opportunity to take in various tracks that develop a mood that their curators can express and alter depending on their current feel and drive. They allow with each play, a platform for many artists to be appreciated and understood through. Something we here at beatsfortheill admire about the rise in technological communication of today’s day and age, and there is one DJ that comes to mind whom is already using this musical tool to his advantage. An artist we had the privilege of sharing words with recently here at beatsfortheill and that creative is Las Vegas-based blend master Somanyfeels aka Julian Guerra.

With his ability to tailor mixes that induce ambient feels and take one’s soul on a journey through the ever altering musical landscapes. Somanyfeels lives up to his name developing mixtures that entice and allure the senses, leaving listeners feeling content and entertained where ever the day or night may take them.

Smooth transitions and mind-stilling tracks are what can be expected with this game-changing curator, a man on a mission and a soul on the pursuit for feels that move. 

We here at beatsfortheill can only look forward to Somanyfeels future endeavours. So with that in mind enjoy the uplifting words of the curator himself.

Inspire, Love, Relate and dabble in Somanyfeels expressions via the new mix he curated for us here at beatsfortheill, you won’t be disappointed.

Favourite Food: If pizza and tacos could somehow morph into one, it’d be that!

Favourite Beverage: Coffee and tea are my life

Last track you listened to: Waterfall By Laxe Luther

A childhood memory in regards to music: I remember eating Swedish Fish as a young kid in the public pool in Reading, PA. The speakers were bumping Smash Mouth and I was groovin’. Been a long road since then haha.

A track to chill to: bbygurl By Oneonthebeat

A track to bounce to: To the moon By Lil Purpp

Look back to your 14-year-old self, what music were you listening to back then: Uhmmm, honestly I was into the heavy metal scene. At the time, my favourite band was Disturbed and I also loved Metallica. I was trying to learn guitar so these bands inspired me to enrol in classes and practice guitar tabs. these were songs you could find on my myspace account, along with those falling skull thingies.

Views on Mainstream Media: GET OUT OF THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA BUBBLE. It is these sorts of people that love to have things explained to them. Go out and find those definitions for yourself. There’s always more happening then what major media outlets make it out to be. I am a firm believer in this because that’s all my parents do. Watch CNN and FOX and melt in front of it. They don’t really know how things work outside of what people tell them on the TV.

What does Somanyfeels mean: I really like making people feel good about life and so that’s how the name came to be. Honestly, it was supposed to be the name for my personal music blog. But once I talked about it, people would say it matched my openness and positivity.

Favourite Location: Brew Tea Bar in Las Vegas (they have the best boba tea hands down!)

Favourite Album: YUNG by Linafornia

Thanks man, so let’s start off with how you got into creating mixes in the first place. When did you start blending tracks into your own musical journeys and what sparked your interest?

No thank you, Sophie I am honoured! I got really into it after making a lot of private playlists for myself and parties I would go to. But after a while, I wanted to have a more hands-on approach on how to present these playlists for friends and so I started this series called Sensory Compilations- A bunch of laid-back beats in one mix. Actually, I modelled it around artists from this LA label called Soulection. Joe Kay is a HUGE inspiration to me. The general idea stuck and since then I’ve taken them down as I’ve started my newest ambient series. Always looking to change things up. My goal one day is to be a central source for ambient music through the tracks I find. Artists exclusives with visual artist involvement with each project. That kinda stuff.

What inspires you as a curator of sounds when it comes to day to day living and music mixing? Do you feel your day to day goals help inspire more creativity when it comes to putting together a mix?

I think that the ability to piece together treasures from artists who you love into one whole is inspirational. And I also think that being in a city where a lot of this music is overlooked and commercialism is highly accepted, it takes every inch of effort from local creatives to impact the way people live and hopefully encourage individuals to live more artful lives. If I can get one person to say wow that really changed my vibe up, that’s a blessing. Not all will like it which I understand, but just that one is ok with me.

I live my days essentially on the wind. Whatever happens, happens. Sounds a little on the edge right? Meh, in a sense it is but there are good things that come from it too. It’s good to have goals and dreams, but being conscious of how things are moving can be really stressful for me sometimes. With music, I live each song for a moment and like that could change to something completely different and you grow with that. I think constant change is what keeps my creativity and adaptability alive!

Have to mention your mix series Hunt//Gather a beautiful collection of ambient goodies that offer the ears a peaceful playground of beats, much love. Can you share what Hunt//Gather represents to you and what led to its creation? Also, what can one expect when the push play on a Hunt//Gather mix?

It is intended to put the listener out of their element and into something wild and untamed. At some point, if not during the whole mix, I would hope for you to feel as though you were away from society and in some unsettled landscape. Can you find your way back? Do you even want to leave? I want people to feel like they don’t have to rely on anything else but their own ability to do and feel what they want.

I started this series after hiking in Zion National Park. Something about that place man…

When you play one of these, just expect it to be a journey!

HUNT / / GATHER 01 TO 05 / / Somanyfeels Ambient Mix Series 

How do you feel your upbringing has affected the path you took within music? Were you always into music and learning the way songs can blend together? Also, can you share a few classic tracks you loved growing up?

Honestly, my upbringing didn’t really involve too much musical inspiration. I feel like I was a late bloomer. My past was all about meeting new people, seeing cool places and eating new foods. Bless the culinary arts! I was only really exposed to it once I started in the music industry. I was working for an event promoter here in Vegas and seeing DJ’s and producers move a crowd with such ease made me want to buy a cheap controller and start.

Oh! Almost forgot, here are a few songs from growing up!

Stand Up ft. Shawnna by Ludacris

Welcome Home by Cohered & Cambria

Sunshine by Atmosphere

You are also a part of a collective known as The Rabbit Hole out of Las Vegas USA, a group of creatives making music that really showcases diverse hip-hop and electronic beats, much respect. Can you share what The Rabbit Hole represents to you and what goals do you collectively share? Also, what do you enjoy most about building a community within music?

The Rabbit Hole saved my inspiration. I was stuck in a sense. I don’t really know what I would be doing if I didn’t meet this family of cool cats. Each friend within the group, in their own way, has taught me more than I knew about myself. My ear and style have evolved massively. I have a way to offer up an idea and have people work with me on that idea. I also have people to relate to if I have questions about how to do something involving mixes, graphics, marketing and so on.

I love seeing people walk into the monthly events that we have and just instantly start connecting with other showgoers. Networking yea sure that’s one thing, but I think people meet new friends in this setting. It makes me so happy!!! The way I see it, typical Vegas life is all about work, maybe going to catch a happy hour somewhere, and if you’re really trying to have a night out, hit the strip. IT’S SO BORING!! Can you do more? I think myself and my collective realize that there is so much more that the desert has to offer. We have a voice and we want to use it to build an authentic culture out here. Step by step, slowly but surely!

Las Vegas Collective - The Rabbit Hole

What do you feel makes a mix impactful to listeners and how do you try to set the mood when it comes to putting a mix together. Do you have to be in a certain mood before you hit record?

Wow, this is an awesome question! A mix should tell a story. There are countless ways to mix sounds. I don’t play a mix and say, wow they should have done it this way. No!, I try to focus on how I think the person felt while in their zone.

Transitions come with time, so I highly encourage anyone who enjoys digging for music to just start. Learn as you go. Get a simple program and get to work experimenting. It feels amazing to tell a story! Let alone tell it in your own way.

Here at beatsfortheill, we have a deep love for genuine spiritual expression and art. Can you share some of your favourite spiritual beings, ideas, and concepts? Also, artists that you feel our readers would benefit from checking out?

I love Matsuo Basho, a Japanese poet who’s Haiku’s really bring you into a peaceful state of being.

Oh and please read a book called Intimacy by Osho. It teaches you how to trust and love yourself. I read it a little while back and it has changed my perception of my life immensely!

As far as art goes, I really enjoy work by this artist called Beeple.

He is a huge reason why I am on Tumblr all the time.

Can you share the highlights of your journey through music so far and also what should we keep an eye out for in the future from Somanyfeels?

The strange thing about music is that it does not always stay on one specific path. There is so much happening around you as you find your style, your stamina, and your inspiration that there can be one idea one day, and the next day it could change entirely.

For me, I try to keep an open mind, help myself to become better, and help others along the way with the experiences that I have gained.

The future for me looks to be something along the lines of music and photography. I LOVE radio and mixing but lately, my heart has been leaning more towards capturing moments in different ways.

I would love to put out a mix of all exclusives from my favourite artists along with a visual package. That’s my goal for the end of the year.

I would also love to interview some really cool beat makers on my radio show (aired on 91.5 KUNV HD2 and traklife.com).

Keep on the lookout for another Hunt//Gather series in late August!

Photo by Julian Guerra aka Somanyfeels Photography

Musical Recommendations?

I Think I’ll suggest some cool indie labels for you guys to dig through on Bandcamp & Soundcloud :)

The Rabbit Hole

Saikei Collective

Dustera\

GUILD

BLVNT Records

Oneiric Tapes

Dome Of Doom

Treehouse Collective

Fuzzoscope

Any Last Words?

Keep the art alive! Also thank you so much, Sophie, for having me. Peace and Love!

Support Somanyfeels Here

Soundcloud- https://soundcloud.com/somanyfeelsmusic

Facebook- https://www.facebook.com/somanyfeelsmusic/

Instagram-  _somanyfeels_