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momo-de-avis · 3 years ago

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I am all for the La La Land rant, seriously you'd be doing me a favor

You know, when you to film school, or are around film school students enough, you always meet that guy. It's the guy who thinks he's so different because he seriously believes his tastes are old fashioned and men these days just don't think like him, you know. Just cause dudes these days go around listening to soundcloud rappers like yours truly prefers some good old fashioned Nat King Cole, he's dead set on believing he's got an old mind that is not appreciated enough. This mother fucker will put on It's a Wonderful Life or some shit and say "ah, yes, the good old Hollywood" and then have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the star system truly was

At the same time, this is the dude who will have a streak of modernity to his personal taste that will feel rather displaced. I'm talking about electronica, most likely. This is the guy who likely enjoys Daft Punk or Phoenix or some shit, but nothing beyond that, anything more prog than that it's too "millenial" (this dude ain't Gen Z, don't worry). He enjoys neon lights, he thinks Nicolas Winding Refn is a modern-day genius, but not because of his use of neon lights, but because this mother fucker sees himself as Ryan Gosling in Drive (which---hey! Winding Refn's cinematography is fucking astounding, man, if you put Drive and Only God Forgives on for me, I dead ass can't say which of the two I'm watching, but god damn those are beautiful movies to watch).

So like, this guy is 70% "I've got an old mind, you wouldn't understand" and 30% "I actually think Artificial Intelligence is the future". And that guy is fucking Damien Chazelle

What is so insulting with La La Land, is that the movie started with a single continuous shot of a beautiful dance full of people set in LA, a diverse cast, with so much colour, riddled with these old cars, set in traffic. It's not THE BEST, far from it, but it sets the bar. It's the very first thing you see, this is the shot that opens the movie so it SUPPOSEDLY tells you "this is what the movie is about": a diverse cast, dancing, singing BEAUTIFULLY, in a setting that isn't expensive, isn't too worked out, but is arranged enough that the actors interact with it enough that the choreography comes out a winner.

And then you're delivered a movie about the two most boring white people in LA: a failed actress and a white boy who is convinced he's gonna save jazz, a movie with no colour except the use of neon lights --- and I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH --- in the most textbook way possible when it comes to cinematography (blue in the back when you see Ryan Gosling, red when it's Emma Stone... come the fuck on, man, I know it's supposed to evoke the 50s, but leave the gender binary of colour back in your ass where you dug this shit up).

I particularly hate this movie for the cinematography alone, and for one reason ONLY.

It won a fucking oscar against Moonlight.

And I cannot stress enough how insulting this is because the whole thesis of Moonlight's cinematography is the very tagline of the movie: "Under the moonlight, black boys are blue". Moonlight is a movie that highlights the beauty of black skin, it is so beautifully worked, it has such a detailed and carefully crafted work on light and composition that subjectively speaks to you about the main character's journey, the emotions of the movie, and the very intricate beauty of black skin (and I really want to highlight this because that phrase I mentioned above is repeated in the movie enough times for it to be IMPORTANT), that there are scenes in this movie that you could seriously hit the pause button and just print the frame out and hang it in your living room and bam, there's a beautiful piece of artwork for you to appreciate. Moonlight is that type of movie that you can see was made, every fucking second of it, with such care and dedication, literally every second of it the director thought deeply about the meaning of every speck of light that goes into the frame, and it is so INSULTING that it lost best cinematography to Textbook Neon Lights White Boy's Adventures in Jazz Land over there. I have been holding a grudge against that fucking movie for YEARS because La La Land treats cinematography in the way 2nd year cinema students treat it: it's low-budget, basic and so fucking direct you don't even have to think about it. Like. No fucking second thought. It's like... slap some red in a scene where there's a bit of temptation lurking in the corner. Slap some blue where it's plainly obvious something sad is happening. There's no attempt at that establishing a dichotomy between warm and cold colours, just fucking.... Yellow looks good, let's go! The only thing that stood out to me was Ryan Gosling's shoes and that was LITERALLY the only thing about this motherfucker that spoke "50s", which Chazelle tried so damn hard to say was his inspiration, but the whole tone of the movie was "I really want this to be about the 50s but I'm obviously not going to do that because the 50s sucked" which might be related to the fact that JAZZ WAS NOT INVENTED IN LA AND IT'S PRETTY INSULTING TO SAY A WHITE MAN IS GOING TO SAVE IT, AND NO, JOHN LEGEND WON'T EXONERATE YOU

Damien Chazelle should apologise for that piece of garbage

Also, none of those people can't sing for shit. "Oh BuT ThE MoViE iS AbOuT ReAl PeOPlE" yeah sure that's a choice. I could argue here that choosing to go that way is at a serious risk of breaking suspension of disbelief, which definitely broke mine. But let's not think about suspension of disbelief for now. If it is supposed to be about two normal people, hence the director didn't really care about them singing like professionals THEN WHY THE FUCK DID THE MOVIE OPEN UP WITH A DISNEY-LEVEL QUALITY SCENE OF DANCING AND SINGING

WHY DID IT SET THE BAR SO HIGH AND THEN SENT US ALL TO THE PITS OF HELL FOR TWO HOURS

You know what they call that in film school? BAD WRITING. BAD DIRECTING. It FUCKING SUCKS like I'M SORRY

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vampiremourning · 3 years ago

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@impossible-rat-babies tagged me in a “fictional characters that remind me of/i project onto my oc” meme (thank u owen uwu) so! naturally i went with kat because who else?? would i talk about???/s

she’s an interesting one to disseminate because she’s existed in my head in some capacity or another since i was like. six lmao. obviously this is just going off of her most recent iteration, which is ~vampire~. because she’s so established for me, this is more about vibes/similarities rather than direct creation inspiration.

yennefer of vengerberg (specifically the book/offical canon take on her character) - look i feel like this is just kinda obvious lmao. visually the wiki paraphrases her description as having “pronounced cheekbones, natural, slightly irregular eyebrows trimmed by hand and emphasized with charcoal, long eyelashes, and petite hands. Even in high-heeled shoes she wasn't tall, was beautiful but threatening...” yeah okay kinda cringe perhaps but also this is a power fantasy so. i can do what i want lmao. but yeah overall small, scary-hot, pale, cool eyes, great hair, that’s the visual i have in mind. and personality wise, it’s no surprise that yen was my favourite from the series & that you can see some of the same qualities in kat. i have a weakness for shrewd, self-aware powerful women with internal damage and soft spots for their very select group of loved ones. (mod link.)

mia wallace. height clearly wasn’t a factor here lmao, but i think as far as colour palette and personality go you can see some connections. i wouldn’t call her a femme fatale or anything like that, but there’s something very much surly-yet-feminine about uma’s performance that i dig. also, the risk-taking behaviours and smoking motif.

deanna troi. alright so personality wise they. don’t have a ton in common actually. perhaps it’s just something about being a cool bi women with a thing for scruffy slightly dorky men lmao. deanna could just very well come to mind for the visuals. look at her hair! i need to know what was going on in the next generation’s styling department because i don’t think marina sirtis had a bad look for the entire 7 season run. oh, and i guess it’s also neat that both kat and deanna’s actress are greek.

miranda lawson. i’m noticing a pattern here. are you noticing a pattern here? we love dedicated career women who use their expertise and skillset to put up emotional walls and avoid vulnerability like the plague (until they can’t, that is) and who show they care in some endearingly bizarre ways. miranda and kat both share a protective love & dedication to their families, a tendency to scold rather than admit they were worried, the knowledge that they’re the hottest person in any given room, and oh my god issues with their fathers (or with kat, her sire) in spades. & once again, pretty dark haired woman with cool eyes.

liz sherman. with liz, i think the biggest draw is probably the complicated relationship we see between her and hellboy in the first film. i think that internally she probably pushes people away from a similar place, but her reasons are different than kat. also the way they isolate themselves kinda parallels too--liz seems the type who wants to just quietly recede, whereas if kat feels trapped she goes scorched earth. then again that does seem to be,,, a less literal version of what happens with liz so. maybe there’s more to that than i think.

helga sinclair. holy shit, we have our first outlier for hair colour! full disclosure, i don’t actually remember anything about this movie or her character. like, at all. but that said, the energy she gives off & how she carries herself? very much kat. also, matching under-eye beauty marks!

meg. attitude and vocal tone (in respect to how her voice is low; i don’t have a voice claim for kat right now, but this wouldn’t be how i picture her sounding). also the whole relationship with love and romance and opening yourself up to being with someone else is very apt.

beatrix kiddo. uma thurman has some very iconic roles that really solidified themselves in my brain here, doesn’t she? in this case, while kat’s revenge arc isn’t about a child, it is very much about killing a certain man. that single-minded ruthlessness is extremely her, much like her willingness to get her hands dirty and put in the work. also, the dedication--if you cross enough of her boundaries, kat will quite literally chase someone for the better part of a century until she feels they’ve atoned properly.

#oc tag #katerina irakleidis #vampire the masquerade

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malboroniights · 4 years ago

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Downfalls High

Thoughts? feelings?

I’m gonna put a read more on this for people who don’t want to read all my opinions. I will resume my regular shit posting and fic writing soon enough. I just need to talk about it.

Also this ended up being a lot longer than I thought it would be.

I’ve only watched it through once. But I'm gonna watch through again while I write this out so that I don’t miss anything I wanted to talk about.

So from the intro alone it wasn’t what I was expecting this isn’t a negative, just not a conventional movie. More like a short/indie short with a bigger budget than a standard indie. The end of Colson's monologue also doesn't add up to the ending of the film. But like it's a vibe so we move.

Why is this on Facebook at 1080p at best?, sound quality is so compressed on Facebook. Here's hoping they put it on youtube at least in 4k.

title track - I love this song so much. Still remember my first listen and being blown away by it and this part of the movie does it so much justice to be honest. Big up title track!

The transition into '8 months earlier' is so smooth, props to who decided on it.

kiss kiss - good intro to the characters. Colson playing the guitar out of the van window had me dead :')

some dialogue! Also Sydney Sweeney we already been knew she is an amazing actress but she was sick in this. Chase Hudson did really well in this actually, I know he gets a lot of shit from coming from TikTok and things he's said in the past. Always hold people accountable but let them try and be better.

drunk face - really like how they did the sound mixing on this one so it wasn't a direct copy from the album. The Travis and Colson visuals for this one were great Idk I just liked it. Cute part of the film + the song just made this part *chef's kiss* VHS parts felt like they fit the vibe more here than on kiss kiss.

bloody valentine - at this point I was hoping for more speaking parts but then bv kicked in. I wish they either had more time or turned it into a series maybe? IDK the idea of the story is right there be perfect for a series. Visuals on Colson and Trav again perfect on this one, happy Slim and Baze were in on this one too. I think Baze and Slim being in this one is making it feel more like a show and missing me live music so much rn.

body bag - Okay so I got a little excited when the track started because I wasn't sure whether they would include songs off Sold Out, to be honest, but they did so v. grateful. This scene definitely went too quickly into another song though. More speaking pls.

forget me too - mohawk kells mohawk kells mohawk kells! - The reverse effect at the start was really smart. This part was slightly confusing at first cause they were fighting so I thought maybe she's told him she was pregnant. What a dick response but no she hadn't told him yet so just didn't make a lot of sense to me. Would have been cool to see the characters actually at/on the rink while they performed kind of like title track where it's like they're almost not really there.

all i know - Mod's cameo! The visuals of Colson and Trippie were good until the parts on the backlot, I feel like this just took you out of the movie. Like I get it but nah this one was my least favorite 'visualizer'. Loved Trippie's isolated vocals over the Sidney buying the guitar scene though.

lonely - AHHH this song, man think I cried the first 5 times I listened to it and when he played it live at the Roxy. The visuals for this one were perfect. VHS parts fit really well again here. "When the high runs out the downfall is inevitable." AHH so good just nothing bad to say about this part tbf.

WWIII - They hadn't location or time marked any other part so felt odd to add it at this point and also never do it again. Landon is basically mini Trav same facial expressions and everything thought it was sweet they put him in. Plus his acting was good. This is my go-to end of the week leaving work song. I know people have a lot of shit to say about this song online. But you have not lived till your going home fast in your car screaming this song.

hangover cure - another amazing song from Sold Out. Just vibin.

concert for aliens - okay actually really liked this scene besides people throwing up(?) in the visualizer part with Colson and Trav. Idk just weird I'm like scared of throwing up, cool Lil Aaron cameo tho.

my ex's best friend - no major thoughts just vibin.

split a pill - AHH this song, gutted only a background song tbf. It deserves all the love and more.

jawbreaker - alls I can think about is the serious clown lung they both must have after filming with all the flour :')

nothing inside - on the second watch I'm more confused at what Fenix is even doing. But loving Iann and Colson's visualizer. Okay, just a small breakdown guess he's okay now. To not have Fenix lip-sync to the "I'm running low on serotonin..." line was missed drama imo.

banyan tree interlude - beautiful. Don't you love that Megan wrote this? I do. But the pillow and blanket - bro - like I'm sad but got to be cozy right? :') also why not cut out the 'same' iykyk.

play this when i'm gone - 10/10 monologue. Honestly wasn't ready for it to end tho.

Wasn't what I expected but honestly, it's so sick. Very grateful for Colson and Mod and anybody else who worked on it, because no matter what I've written above about not liking or understanding certain parts I did love it. It's a crime we haven't got to see these songs performed in person yet.

if you’ve read this far, hi :)

also if you want to talk about it drop me a message

#downfalls high #mgk #modsun #machine gun kelly

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jimlingss · 5 years ago

Text

The Colour of Our Voices [9]

Chapter 8 - Chapter 9 - Chapter 10

➜ Words: 3.3k

➜ Genres: 98% Fluff, 2% Angst, Slice of Life, Broadway!AU

➜ Summary: He wasn’t supposed to hear. He wasn't supposed to know. But the instant Jimin came into your life and pulled the curtains back, you couldn't hide backstage anymore. You were no longer merely a phantom of the opera.

➜ Warning: Intoxication.

cr.

The phone rings. It wakes you, deafeningly loud. It shakes you in the middle of your slumber. Usually, you’re the one dialing, but you don’t dwell. With one eye open, you grab your phone off the nightstand. “Hello?” “Hello?” The voice on the other line is unmistakable. “Hi, is this Ms. Y/N?” “Yes, it is.” You clear your throat, trying to rid of the grogginess. “How may I help you?” “I’m the casting director for the original production of When Summer Meets Winter here in New York. We were wondering if you were still interested and willing to set up a convenient date to meet and audition for a main role.” “W-what?” You sit up, hauling the rest of your limbs that are still asleep. Your mouth opens and closes, brows furrowing, wondering if this is a dream. “I mean….I would love to!” “Great, I look forward to meeting you soon.” “I just—” You rub your swollen eyes, utterly confused. The opportunity fell straight into your lap out of nowhere. “I didn’t even put in an application. I didn’t sign up, so I’m just wondering how you got in touch with me….” It’s not possible that the director would actually give you a referral. But why would someone reach out to you like this? It’s never happened before. It’s never happened to anyone before. No one like you without any fame or recognition. “Well, aren’t you the voice of Erik, the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera?” The line goes silent. Your mind is reeling. “Pardon?” // “The Phantom of the Opera production proved to be a lackluster performance and has an even more uninspired director—” Seokjin looks away from his phone, jaw dropped to the ground. He’s offended to no end. “Lackluster?! Lackluster?! She complimented me! What the hell is this?!” Taeyeon takes away the phone from his hand and continues to read for herself. Her eyes skim along the blog post to pick up where he stopped. “The casting was severely shortsighted and purely on appearance alone without consideration for talent. They were unable to cast a sufficient troupe and failed to see that it is talent that makes audiences stay.” “Oh my god. This is ridiculous!” Seokjin slaps his palm against his forehead, turning around in complete disbelief. He is stunned to silence. “Now I am able to understand how one of the most popular musicals known to the mainstream could do so poorly in Broadway theater here in New York. But the production...doesn’t go without surprises.” Taeyeon pauses and everyone around is on the edge of their seats, breaths held in their throat. She inhales and continues to read, articulating carefully. “The only redeeming quality of the production was the wonderful and rather charming singing. But all the credit is not due to the dull actors or stale taste of the director. It is credited to the ghost singer, Y/N…” Heads turn. Eyes pinpoint to you. You hold the spotlight that’s coloured red — painting you into a demon that’s crawled from out of hell, someone worthy of their hatred and disgust. This is the attention you never desired. They regard you with spite, animosity, malice. Director Kang swipes the phone out of Taeyeon’s grasp. He looks at it and continues reading silently. A muscle in his cheek twitches. There’s murmuring amongst the crowd. He swallows hard and decides to repeat it out loud, as if to let the simmering anger purposely over-boil. “The real singer of Phantom is disguised as an innocent intern who sweeps the floor and does coffee runs. It was revealed to me after the show while I was still recovering from the physical torture of being seated in such a corny performance. Y/N approached me out on the street when I was caught unaware. While I was unable to make further contact with the ghost singer afterwards, the claim was indeed confirmed by inside sources I was able to obtain.” All of it is exposed — how Seokjin has a speaker within his clothes, how the pitch is turned down, how you’re the one behind the curtain. The secret is out. It’s been revealed to the world. The curtain’s been pulled while you’re in the middle of a lyric, and now you’re suddenly center stage with the red spotlight and the faceless audience watching. Director Kang scrolls to the end of the critic’s article. His voice is quiet, a murmur, slow to read like he wants everyone to hear. He wants you to hear. “I found myself constantly wondering when it would be over. Ultimately, even the tender singing of the ghost singer could not make up for the empty performance. However, it is spectacular how they could turn such a beloved, well known musical into a boring travesty. I would recommend it to anyone who would like an inauthentic experience and who suffers from insomnia as it would certainly put them to sleep…” The director suddenly slaps the phone to Seokjin’s chest. The actor winces and takes it back. You flinch as well. The pointed glare is narrowed in on you. His jaw is clenched, teeth gritted. It’s a mistake — you can fix this. You didn’t mean what you said. It came out when you were furious and not thinking. Maybe you can go see Min Yoonji, tell her it was all a misunderstanding and she’ll take down the blog post! Yet, you can’t utter these things. You can’t beg your way out of it. It was chaos when you came, people staring, murmuring. It’s been spread everywhere already, not just contained within this production. Everyone knows now — the entire community of Broadway. You’ve single-handedly ruined this production with your recklessness. You’ve illegitimized their production, and with the anger in their stares, you know you’ve destroyed their livelihood. You’ve wrecked it all. But there’s no noise of the destruction. There is deafening silence in the studio. “Clean out your stuff.” “Director—” “Enough. Get out.” He points to the door. “Don’t make me repeat myself.” It’s the worst. There’s no yelling, screaming. He doesn’t even throw a chair like he once did to an actor with a supporting role who failed to show up during dress rehearsal. There’s nothing. You’ve always envisioned yourself leaving this job with a role in hand, having a secure future, knowing you’d make it on Broadway like they did. You’d be able to walk with your head held up high. You’d hear people’s reluctant praises, grumbling about how you actually did it. The director would nod his head in approval. Seokjin and Taeyeon would offer a small smile. It was your dream — what you imagined on hard days. It’s what Jimin had accomplished. But the reality is that you’re cleaning out your belongings while crying. You empty the locker you were once so excited to have. There’s no acknowledgment, no pitiful stares or goodbyes of the people you’ve worked with for the past year. Twelve months. Three hundred sixty five days. Eight thousand sixty hours. Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes. Thirty-one million five hundred forty thousand seconds. It was the job that you hated. The one that you loved. The one you were so happy to get. You’re fired just like that, gripping your cardboard box, absolutely humiliated. Even as you leave the studio, up the stairs and into the lobby, you can hear the whispers. You can feel people’s eyes following your backside. In the snap of a finger, the span of one morning, you are fired. // The rosette wine tastes disgusting. It sits heavy on your tongue, bitter on your lips and dries out your mouth to the back of your throat. It’s a taste you have yet to acquire, but maybe you’ll find at the bottom of the bottle. You grip the neck, taking another swig. It’s a disgusting mouthful as if you’re downing mouthwash after making out with a stranger at a club and you’re still able to feel their bad breath on your own. But instead of making those reckless decisions in an attempt to find instant gratification, you’re sitting on the floor of your bathroom in the dark. It’s comforting. You can’t see anything. Hopefully, if you drink enough, you won’t feel anything either. “Bitch, who do you think you are?” you ask yourself, and respond to yourself. It’s a one woman show. A one way conversation. “You’re talentless, poor, and now jobless. Congratulations to a new low.” You toast yourself with another swig. This wine is probably the last thing you’ll buy in a while. It’s your final purchase, one you shouldn’t have gotten, but that you desperately needed. What you have saved isn’t even enough to pay the rent at the end of this month. You should go home. “Home? Fuck.” The back of your head hits against the wall and you sigh. “They don’t want me there.” But if you don’t go home, what are you supposed to do here? Oh yeah...you have that one audition. They called you this morning. But they don’t want you for you. You didn’t earn it through merit. It’s because you’re popular news, a scandal they can capitalize on and use as a method of publicity. You didn’t get it because of your own talent or skill. You start sniffling. “Oh shit…” Quickly, you take another drink before you can burst into tears. You swallow past the thick lump forming in your throat, letting your eyes sting. You won’t cry — you already did enough of that earlier. You don’t want something like that. To go to an audition where they won’t take you seriously, where their sole purpose is to satisfy their own curiosity. Where you’re Y/N, the ghost singer. Not Y/N, the aspiring actress. Fuck — you take another sip — you have no job, no real auditions, no work. If you stay, you’ll have to give up on Broadway. Maybe you’d find work elsewhere, at some company, an office job at a cubicle. It doesn’t sound so bad halfway through the rosette. A nine to five job would be stable. You’d hate it. But at least you’d have some income. You take another drink with a sigh, and another, and another. Until you come up empty. Until the bitter liquid doesn’t meet your lips anymore. You tip the bottle over your lap with a giggle, and when nothing is spilled, you realize that it’s all finished. Perhaps you could go to the convenience store and find something else to drink….. But your train of thought is suddenly interrupted. It’s perfect timing. You can hear the sound of water running between the walls of your apartment, trickling down the pipes in steady streams. But the noise is joined with someone’s muffled voice. It’s faint, but audible, a sweet tone leaking past the walls. Jimin’s singing in the shower. His bathroom is placed right next to yours, both a coincidence and a rather big invasion of privacy. The wall between your apartment seems to be especially thin here too despite it being a place where pipes should run. But it’s echoing, his singing melody quiet, though still discernible. “In my life, she has burst like the music of angels, the light of the sun. And my life seems to stop as if something is over and something has scarcely begun.” You gather your knees together, listening carefully. It’s nice. But Jimin’s voice has always been pleasant to the ears. “In my life. There is someone who touches my life. Waiting near.” “Waiting here…” you finish singing the phrase, closing your eyes to savour the melody. “A heart full of love. A heart full of song.” You murmur after him, a duet that he’s unaware of. “I'm doing everything all wrong…” You hate that you hate him. You hate that it turned out this way. You hate yourself for hating Jimin. And with that hatred, you find the strength to get on your feet again, stumbling upwards. He once came pounding at your door when he heard your voice. Now it’s you who’s coming after hearing his voice. It’s close to midnight, but you knock on Jimin’s door like a crazed man. “Jimin! Jimin, come out!” You drum against the surface of his door with your closed fist. You miss him. You miss him so much that it hurts. “Right now!” Jimin opens the door and finds you staring at him. “Y/N?” You reach over to hug him, wasting no time to envelop his torso in a tight embrace. Your arms wrap around his body, uncaring that the dark strands of his hair continues to drip — he’s always toweled off his head haphazardly; you often worried he’d get sick from it. He’s shirtless, just in his pajama pants, but you don’t care about that either. It’s actually kind of nice to see him without his shirt, but you don’t want to admit that out loud. Instead, your cheek unabashedly squishes against the skin of his chest. He smells of shampoo and orange soap. And he’s as warm as you remember. Toasty like a sizzled out campfire that just had a roaring flame. You’ve been wanting to hold him again ever since he held you in the backseat of that taxi. He’s caught off guard, stiffening automatically. But his senses pick up the scent of something familiar radiating off of you. Alcohol. “Are you drunk?” Oh yeah. You’re supposed to be pissed at him. “What’s the matter with you, huh?” “What?” You let go, stepping back and pointing your finger right at his face. It’s hard to point when he keeps swaying back and forth, or rather it’s you who’s swaying, balance completely off. But you manage to bring your index finger right between his eyebrows where that knot usually forms when he frowns. You hate that knot. “The hell’s wrong with you, Park?” Your voice is slurring. You’re tipping from side to side. Jimin is utterly confused. You lower your arm with an exasperated sigh. You wish he just got it — that he could read your mind. You hate having to explain. “Why’d you stay with me when I got this removed, huh?” You point to your stomach, finger circling the general area of where your stupid appendix used to be. “You’re not making any sense.” Jimin cringes at how loud you’re being and looks down the hall to see if there’s anyone there. He takes a sigh of relief when there’s no one angry enough to make a noise complaint and his hand reaches out to take you inside his apartment. “Y/N—” But you flinch back and wag your finger at him. “Nuh-uh. Don’t touch!” “Okay, okay, I’m sorry.” “Don’t wanna get confused,” you scold him. He was such a sly dog. “Naught, naught, Minnie. Wanna make my head more of a mess than it already is...” “Can you at least come inside?” he coaxes gently after realizing you’re completely barefoot in your pajamas, your toes sticking out from the end of your pants. It looks cold, and he quickly steps back to give you space. You oblige, but enter only enough to shut the door. You wanna be able to escape if you need to….though you’re not sure where the door knob is. He could probably stop you if he wanted to. “Were you drinking by yourself?” he asks, searching your expression. “Why?” Your head quirks and your lips pout. “Why’d you care about me?” He swallows hard and scratches the back of his neck. “I’ll always care about you, Y/N.” “You oughta hate me.” Jimin holds your stare, completely calm. His brown eyes are gorgeous. They remind you of a puppy’s. And you kind of want to ruffle his damp hair with your fingers. “I don’t hate you.” “But, but,” you blubber. He still doesn’t get it. “You’re supposed to! It’s only natural.” He smiles softly, eyes lit with mirth and amusement. “Why is it natural?” “Cause I’m so mean!” you cry out. It’s official. Park Jimin is dumb and needs you to spell everything out for him. “Told you I hate you. That you were annoying and bothersome and, and irritating, and that I regret teaching you, and how we’re not even friends, and we’re strangers, and that you’re annoying, and bothersome, and irritating—” “Okay, okay. I get it.” He laughs tenderly, like he’s having fun watching you, and that’s annoying. “Does that not bother you?” “It does.” Jimin locks his eyes with yours again. His voice softens. “It does…” “But you don’t hate me?” He shakes his head. He didn’t even need to think about it. But you already knew his answer. Automatically, you burst out into tears. Jimin’s alarmed at once, eyes wide, nearly falling out of their sockets. His palms lift, but he remembers your warning of not wanting to be touched, so he doesn’t lay a finger on you. But he’s still at a loss, not knowing what to do, reduced to awkwardly fumbling the air. “Y/N, a-are you okay? W-What’s wrong? Are you hurt?!” You hiccup, numb to the feeling of patheticness. But then you feel a sudden urgency. “T-There’s something I wanna tell you. It’s really, really, really important!” Jimin nods slowly and puts down his hands as you wipe your eyes with the long sleeve of your pajama shirt. “What is it?” “I!” You point to yourself and then point to him. “Love! Your! Voice!” Jimin blinks. You continue like it’s something you must get off your mind before you forget, “I never got to say — you have such a good tone. It’s sweet. Like sponge cake. And it’s natural. I’m jealous.” Your sniffle and sigh, lolling your head to the side. You think about it for a moment and then hum, once again confirming your own opinion. There’s no way in this world that you can be wrong. You’ll stand with your beliefs until the end of time. “Your tenor is so nice. It’s purple.” “Purple?” The corner of Jimin’s mouth curls, brow lifted. “Purple!” you tell him quickly, as if you’re afraid of dying and fearful that no one gets to hear this secret. “The colour of your voice is purple.” You pop the ‘p’s with your lips and giggle tearfully. It bubbles out like the fizz of the wine and instantly, Jimin smiles. “You have beautiful voice colour.” “What’s your colour?” he asks quietly, all too curious. “Orange, obviously.” You can’t believe he doesn’t know. This wasn’t new news. “Duh.” Jimin plays along with a heartfelt laugh. “Duh!” you repeat after him with an enormous grin. “But I don’t like it as much.” “Why not?” “Cause I love purple!” Your finger peeks out of your sleeve again. This time, it isn’t to point at his face but to jut at his chest, poke right over where his heart is. You smile up at him and Jimin notices how moist your eyes are, glassy almost. He can see each of your lashes when you’re this close, and he can’t help letting his eyes run over the slope of your nose to your cupid’s bow. Your lips look soft. A bit stained from the wine. You have an intoxicating scent that isn’t from the alcohol alone. He has an urge to pull you in close by the waist, the small of your back, to breathe in deeply, and to kiss you. Jimin wants to kiss you. He has since the first time he heard you sing and wanted to hear your voice muffled between his lips. He hasn’t — only yearned to. But it’s difficult to push away the longing at this moment. Though he swallows hard and dispels the thoughts away. He won’t kiss you. Not tonight at least. For now, he’ll hang onto how your voice calls his name, the slurred sound of you telling him you love his voice, the way your lips form when you say that his voice is purple — and the noise you make when you giggle and confess how much you love that colour.

#bts fanfic #bts scenario #jimin fanfic #jimin fluff #jimin scenario #OOOOF Y'ALLLLLLLLLL

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everything-withered · 4 years ago

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Stuck with U by Ariana Grande with Justin Bieber is very IchiRuki. "So go ahead and drive me insane, Baby run your mouth--It still wouldn't change a thing" I can imagine them slow dancing to it ;A;/

I’m not gonna lie, I’m not much of a fan of either of them, but the lyrics are nice enough. The mental reel in my head of Ichiruki slow dancing involves Taylor Swift’s acoustic of “Lover”: And there's a dazzling haze, a mysterious way about you, dear. Have I known you 20 seconds or 20 years? Can I go where you go? Can we always be this close forever and ever?

Lmaoo exposing myself as a swiftie but whateverrr. Anyway, I don’t think this was a prompt but WHY NOT?

Rukia likes music.

Rukia had told him, after she’d caught him headbanging with his headphones on -- the volume loud enough for her to hear -- that she’d liked the sound of it. At first, Ichigo thought she was teasing him, but she’d only lifted the headphones off his head, slipped it on hers and made an impatient motion for him to press play.

For a moment her eyes are wide, and then a small smile begins to bloom. And Ichigo doesn’t realized he’s staring until she’s yelling -- saying that she likes the riff of the guitar, the anger in the drums.

And that’s how she officially meets Karin and Yuzu.

And because even though Rukia is a shit actress, she sticks to lies that are easy. I’m Ichigo’s classmate. We’re just hanging out. I’m sorry for startling you, I didn’t realize I was yelling. She’d even had the good grace to look embarrassed. Which was adorable because she looks like she means it. And he thinks his face is doing something weird because Yuzu immediately invites Rukia to stay for dinner, and Karin is shooting him looks as the girls leave them to “hang out”.

It becomes a regular thing for Rukia to “come over for dinner”.

“At least this way you won’t have to sneak food for me,” she tells him smartly when Karin pops her head in to ask them to set the table -- like Rukia actually lives with them and her staying is just something she does now.

It should bother Ichigo, but this way is more convenient, and he thinks - he thinks his family appreciates Rukia being around.

Sometimes when they come home from school, the twins at after school activities, Rukia makes lunch for everyone -- for when his sisters get back, and for when his dad has a break between patients. Ichigo rolls his eyes and complains about it because he can, but he does as he’s directed, and because it’s just the two of them, he gets to play his music on the sound system.

It’s a “ratchet” that no one else in his family appreciates, but Rukia seems to like it, bopping along and swaying, mumbling the wrong lyrics and then shouting them at him when he tries to correct her.

His family comes home to it often enough that on the days when it’s not just Rukia and Ichigo that are home, they’re introducing Rukia to their music.

His dad is old school, and likes more western music. Rukia doesn’t understand English, but she’ll happily duet Bohemian Rhapsody with his dad any time any place so long as his dad does the high notes and she gets the low ones.

They both think they’re so funny for it.

(Yuzu cries laughing, and Ichigo’s willing to concede that they might be.)

Karin’s taste in music is similar to Ichigo’s, though she prefers less yelling and not so hard rock, and she has a particular fondness for rap music because of the lyricism, and Rukia apparently agrees.

The day Rukia successfully raps an entire song at Karin is the day they both scream so loud, Ichigo’s pretty sure he’ll never hear normally again.

(He’ll take it, though. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen either of them so excited.)

Yuzu is the worst, though.

She’s one of those Top 40 people, and she has Rukia hooked on annoying pop songs before it’s even time for dinner. Ichigo can’t tell if Rukia actually likes it or she’s just doing it to spite him.

He thinks she does, actually, when -- while Ichigo is taking a break from homework -- Rukia goes to the kitchen to get started on dinner, and turns on the radio. He’s lying in bed, breathing through his bruised ribs from the Hollow hunt the night before when he hears her sing along.

She doesn’t ever do it properly when other people are watching, but right now, she does. It’s sweet, has a haunting sort of quality to it.

Ichigo finds himself climbing out of bed to follow her voice, drawn like a sailor to a siren, and blinking when he finds her stands under the kitchen light, swaying with her eyes closed and a small smile on her lips.

When she realizes he’s there, she shoots him a smile, her voice goes a little sour -- like she’s embarrassed to be caught, like she’s trying to pass off the quality of her voice entirely -- and abruptly asks, “What’s slow dancing?”

Startled from his daze, he asks, “What?”

“The guy on the radio said you should do it with this song,” she tells him.

“It’s when you dance with somebody.” Rukia gives him a look that says obviously which makes his eyes roll before he says, “it’s like...” When the words won’t come, he shakes his head stubbornly, then, “I’ll show you.”

Ichigo’s never done it before, but he’s seen enough of the girls’ romance movies to have enough of an idea.

He takes her hands, sets one on his shoulder and the other on his waist, and he mirrors it. Their chests are almost touching, and there’s barely a foot of space between them. When, after examining their stance, Rukia looks up at him, he feels his breath catch.

“Like this?”

“Y-yeah,” he clears his throat, then, “And we just kind of...sway, I guess.” Even though their combined movements are stiff, and jerky, eventually they get the hang of it because as Rukia notes, “It’s like fighting.”

“I guess.”

“Except I’m avoiding getting my feet stepped on. I didn’t realize your footwork in dancing needed as much work as it did in fighting.”

Knowing she’s just trying to rile him up with a mischievous smile on her lips and a twinkle in her eye, Ichigo retorts, “Well then, you’re just gonna have to teach me, then.”

She huffs out a laugh and says, “I suppose I will.”

#ichiruki #deathberry

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dustedmagazine · 4 years ago

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Dust Volume 6, Number 8

Angel Olsen

Now half a year in the pandemic, we’re starting to see the emergence of quarantine records, whether in the trove of reissues hastily assembled to stand in for new product or home recorded projects made with extremely close friends and family or albums that are conceived and written around the concept of isolation. Music isn’t real life, exactly, but it lives nearby. And in any case, it’s still music and can be good or bad whether it’s been unearthed from a forgotten box of tapes, recorded at home without collaboration or side people or technologically gerry-rigged so that distanced partners can work together. So, as long as you all are making music, we will continue to listen and find records that move us, as the world burns all around. This edition’s contributors included Patrick Masterson, Andrew Forell, Tim Clarke, Jennifer Kelly, Bill Meyer, Jonathan Shaw, Justin Cober-Lake and Ray Garraty. Enjoy.

+ — #playboy (Deluxe Edition) (self-released)

#playboy (deluxe edition) by +

One of the most genuinely confounding records I’ve heard this year comes courtesy SEO-unfriendly artist + aka Plus Sign fka Emanuel James Vinson, a Chicago rapper, city planner and all-around community activist who spends his time helping with the city’s Let’s Build Garden City initiative when he’s not making music (which is frequent, by the way — take a look at the breadth of that Bandcamp discography). The concept with #playboy, originally released in April but deluxed in late May, is simple: Two kids find a music machine called #playboy in their basement and start tinkering with it. Its childlike whimsy is conveyed in the song titles (“Getting the Hang of It,” “Wake Up Jam (Waking Up)”) every bit as much as it is in the music, with occasionally grating indulgences, the odd earworm and a brief appearance by borderless internet hip-hop hero Lil B that makes perfect sense in context; the kindred spirit of that community-building cult auteur is strong here. You may wind up loving this record or you may wind up hating it, but I can promise you this: You’ll be thinking about it and the artist behind it long after it’s over.

Patrick Masterson

Actress — Mad Voyage Mixtape (self-released)

I once suggested Darren Cunningham mucks about with his music because he can’t help himself. That was about six years ago on the occasion of his purported “final” album Untitled; with the benefit of hindsight, we can see he was (like so many others, to greater or lesser consequence) just pulling our leg with that PR. Hell, he’s released two albums worth of music in July alone: The first was the mid-month surprise LP 88, which follows in the vein of his acclaimed high period as an often brilliant, occasionally frustrating patchwork of submersible beats best played at high volume with a low end. The second came at the end of the month in an m4a file shared the old fashioned way on a forum via Mediafire link, nearly an hour and a half long, and per the man himself, “All SP-303, sketchbook beats, recorded this past week [the first week of July] straight to recorder or cassette.” It feels very much like a homespun Actress mixtape and is probably best thought of as livelier accompaniment to 88 but, even still, there’s no noticeable drop in quality — once Actress, always Actress. If headier lo-fi beat tapes are your beat, this will slot comfortably in line.

Patrick Masterson

bdrmm - Bedroom (Sonic Cathedral)

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Hull five-piece bdrmm play a satisfyingly crepuscular version of shoegaze on their debut album Bedroom. Ryan Smith, his brother Jordan on bass, guitarist Joe Vickers, Danny Hull on synths and drummer Luke Irvin combine the widescreen sound of Ride with a cloak of gothic post-punk. Like the late, lamented Girls Names, bdrmm find a sweet spot where atmosphere and dynamics either build to euphoric crescendos or bask in bleak funereal splendor. Bedroom seems deliberately sequenced from celebration to lament. “A Reason To Celebrate” evokes Ride at their most anthemic, the tripping staccato driven “Happy” summons the spirit of The Cure of Seventeen Seconds before the pace drops for the second half, the songs become quieter and darker as the band finds a more personal voice. “(The Silence)” is an ambient whispered wraith of a thing, “Forget The Credits” impressively mopey slowcore. bdrmm don’t always transcend their influences, but this debut is an atmospheric treat if your taste runs to the darker end of the musical buffet.

Andrew Forell

Circulatory System — Circulatory System (Elephant 6 Recording Co.)

Circulatory System by Circulatory System

Nearly 20 years after its initial release, the excellent eponymous debut album by Will Cullen Hart’s psychedelic chamber-pop band Circulatory System gets a long overdue vinyl reissue. While his previous project, the undeniably great Olivia Tremor Control, tended to lean more towards classic psych-pop’s traditional tropes — hard-panned drums, loads of disorientating tape effects, wonky harmonized vocals — Circulatory System taps into something utterly uncanny. Both Signal Morning (2009) and Mosaics Within Mosaics (2014) have their moments, but this is front-to-back brilliant, conjuring a sublime atmosphere of reflective estrangement. The music is a thick, grainy soup of shimmering instrumentation, from the eerie (“Joy,” “Now,” “Should a Cloud Replace a Compass?”) to the joyful (“Yesterday’s World,” “The Lovely Universe,” “Waves of Bark and Light”), but part of the album’s magic is the way everything flows into a seamless whole. As is vinyl’s tendency, the rhythm section really comes alive here, the fuzz bass and tom-heavy drum parts booming out, with plenty of vivid details in the mix swimming into view. A worthy reissue of an essential album.

Tim Clarke

Cloud Factory — #1 (Howlin’ Banana)

Cloud Factory #1 by Cloud Factory

Cloud Factory, from Toulouse, France, overlays the serrated edges of garage pop with a serene dream-pop drift. It’s an appealing mix of hard and soft, like being pummeled to death by pillows or threatened gunpoint by a teddy bear. “Amnesia,” for instance, erupts in a vicious, sawed off, trouble-making bass line, then soars from there in untroubled female vocals. Later, “No Data,” punches hard with raw percussion, then lays on a liquid, lucid guitar line that encourages middle-distance staring. None of these songs really up the ante with memorable melodies, sharp words or that intangible R’NR energy that distinguishes great punk rock from the so so. Not loud, not soft, not great, not bad. Cloud Factory resides in the indeterminant middle.

Jennifer Kelly

Entry — Detriment (Southern Lord)

Detriment by Entry

Nuthin fancy here, folks. Just eight songs — plus a flexing, fuzzing intro — of American hardcore punk. Entry has been grinding away for a few years now, and Detriment doesn’t advance much past the musical terrain the band marked off on the No Relief 7-inch (2016). That’s OK. The essential formula is time tested: d-beat rhythms, overdriven amps and Sara G.’s ferocious vocals delivering the necessary affect. That would be: pissed off, just this side of hopeless. Detriment sounds like what might happen if Poison Idea (c. 1988) stumbled into a seminar on Riot Grrrl; after everyone got tired of beating the living shit out of one another, they’d make some songs. “Selective Empathy” is pretty representative. Big riffs, a breakdown, and more than enough throaty yelling to let you know that you’re in some trouble. You might recognize the sound of Clayton Stevens’ guitar from his work with Touché Amoré — but maybe it’s better if you don’t. This isn’t music for mopery. Watch out for the spit, snot and blood, and flip the record.

Jonathan Shaw

Equiknoxx — VF Live: Equiknoxx (The Vinyl Factory)

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There’s nothing like a little roots music to get you through the sweltering summer heat, and this early July mix by Gavin “Gavsborg” Blair (half of forward-thinking Kingston dancehall unit Equiknoxx) was a personal favorite of the past month for hitting that spot. The group tends to throw curveballs at the genres it tinkers with, and Blair’s mix highlights why they’re so good at it: The crates run deep. Spanning everything from legendary producer and DJ Prince Jazzbo to in-house music fresh out the box (e.g., “Did Not Make This For Jah_9” was released in late May), Blair sets the mood and educates you along the way. Like everything else these cats do (and that includes the NTS show — support your independent radio station!), it’s hard not to give the highest recommendation.

Patrick Masterson

Ezra Feinberg — Recumbent Speech (Related States)

Recumbent Speech by Ezra Feinberg

Knowing that Ezra Feinberg is a practicing psychoanalyst, it’s tempting to read meaning into the name of his second solo album. But be careful to think twice about the meaning you perceive and ask yourself, is it the product of Feinberg on the couch or your own projection? His choice to name one of the record’s six instrumentals (there are voices, but no words) “Letter To My Mind” certainly suggests that there’s an internal dialogue at work, but the music feels most like a layered deployment of good ideas than an exchange of intrapsychic forces. The synthesizers shimmer and cycle like something from a mid-1970s Cluster record, resting upon a pillow of vibraphone and electric piano tones, which in turn billow under the influence of undulating layers of drums. Feinberg’s guitar leads are bright and pithy, like something Pat Metheny might come up with if he knew he was going to have to pay a steep price for every note he played. Ah, but there I go, projecting an implication of adversary process where there may be none. Might it be that Feinberg, having spent a full work week immersed in the psychic conflicts of others, wants to lay back on the couch and exhale? If so, this album is an apt companion.

Bill Meyer

Honey Radar — Sing the Snow Away: The Chunklet Years (Chunklet)

Sing the Snow Away: The Chunklet Years by Honey Radar

Jason Henn of Honey Radar has a solid claim at being his generation’s Bob Pollard, a prolific, absurdist songwriter, who tosses off hooky melodies as if channeling them from the spirit world. His least polished material glints with melody hidden beneath banks of fuzz, whispery and fragile on records, but surprisingly muscular in his rocking live shows. This 28-song compilation assembles the singles, splits, EPs and bonus tracks Henn recorded for Chunklet between 2015 and the present; it would be a daunting amount of material except that it goes down like cotton candy, sweet, airy, colorful and gone before you know it. Like the Kinks, Henn has a way of making strident rock and roll hooks sound wistful and dreamy. In “Lilac Pharmacy,” guitar lines rip and buck and roar, but from a distance, hardly disrupting Henn’s placid murmur. “Medium Mary Todd” ratchets up the tension a bit, with a tangled snarl of lick and swagger, but the vocals edge towards quiet whimsy a la Sic Alps; a second version runs a bit hotter, rougher and more electric, while a third, recorded at WFMU, gives an inkling of the Honey Radar concert experience. A couple of fine covers — of the Fall’s early rant “Middle Class Revolt” and of the Monkees rarity “Wind-Up Man”— suggest the fine, loamy soil that Henn’s art grows out of, while alternate versions of half a dozen tracks hint at the various forms his ideas can take. It’s a wonderful overview of Honey Radar so far, though let’s hope it’s not a career retrospective. Henn has a bunch of records left to make yet if he wants to edge out Pollard.

Jennifer Kelly

Iron Wigs — Your Birthday’s Cancelled (Mello Music Group)

Your Birthday's Cancelled by IRON WIGS

As an adjective, “goofy” had gotten a bad rep in hip hop. Anything that is unusual, inventive and not in line with “keeping it real” is immediately stigmatized as goofy, weird, nerdy and bad. Iron Wigs is goofy but hold the pejorative connotations. Chicago representatives Vic Spencer and Verbal Kent team up here with Sonnyjim from the UK to do some wild rhyming. They collaborated before, but Your Birthday’s Cancelled is a complete, fully fleshed project, masterfully executed from start to finish. Instead of the usual gun busting you get a fist in the ribs. Instead of drug slinging, a blunt to activate your rhymes. Each member of the group has a distinctive delivery which makes you to listen carefully for every verse, no skipping. It’s a relief to listen to rap artists who don’t pretend they’re out in the streets while they’re at home enjoying a favorite TV series. The standout track here is “Bally Animals & Rugbys” with Roc Marciano dropping by for a verse.

Ray Garraty

Levinson / Mahlmeister — Shores (Trouble In Mind)

Shores by levinson / mahlmeister

Jamie Levinson and Donny Mahlmeister’s Bandcamp page indicates that they’re based in Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago. This goes further towards explaining their association with Trouble in Mind Records, which is located in the same county, than their music, which brings to mind something much further north. The duo’s music is mostly electronic, with modular synthesizers setting the pulse and sweeping the pitch spectrum while lap steel guitar adds flourishes and a shruti box thickens the textures. The album is split into two, with each track — one is named “Ascend,” the other “Release” — taking up one side of a 50-minute cassette. The first side trundles steadily onwards, and the second seems to bask in a glow to that never totally fades. Since there’s no “Descend,” it’s easy to imagine this music sound tracking a drive into the Canadian north, the journey unspooling under a sky that never darkens, its progress towards Hudson Bay unhindered by other traffic or turns in the road. Perhaps that’s just one listener’s fantasy of easy social distancing and escape from the present’s grim digital glare into a retro-futurist, analog dream. But in dreams we’re free to fly without being seated next to some knucklehead with his mask over his eyes instead of his mouth, so dream on, dreamers. This tape is volume one of the Explorers Series, Trouble in Mind’s projected program of limited edition cassette releases.

Bill Meyer

Klara Lewis — Ingrid (Editions Mego)

Klara Lewis’s latest recording shows a narrowing of focus. Previously she seemed to be trying ideas and methods on for size, investigating ambient electronics or hinting at pop melody without completely committing. Given the approach to music modeled by her father, Graham Lewis of Wire and Dome, she probably does not feel the need to do just one thing, and that’s a healthy angle if one wants to stay interested and flexible. But there’s also something to be said for really digging into an idea, and that’s what she has done here. Ingrid is a one-track, one-sided 12.” Burrowing further into one-ness, it is made from one looped cello phrase, which gets filtered and distorted on each pass. The effect suggests decay, but not so much the gradual transformation of a William Basinski piece as the pitiless abrasion of a woodworker going over a plank with sander. The combination of repetition and coarsening hits a spot closer to one that Tony Conrad might reach, and that’s an itch worth scratching.

Bill Meyer

Luis Lopes Humanization 4tet — Believe, Believe (Clean Feed)

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The cruel economics of contemporary creative music-making favor an ensemble like Humanization 4tet. At a minimum, the filial Texan rhythm section of Stefan and Aaron Gonzalez (drums and bass respectively) and Lisbon-based duo of Rodrigo Amado (tenor saxophone) and Luís Lopes can each count on having the other half of a band on the other side of the Atlantic. But any project that’s on its fourth record in a dozen years has more going for it than the chance to save on plane tickets. For the Portuguese musicians, it’s an opportunity to feel an unabashedly high-energy force at their backs, as well as a chance to drink from a deep well of harmolodic blues. And for the Gonzalez brothers, it’s the reward of being the absolute right guys for the job; it has to be a gas to know that the heft they put into their swing is so deeply appreciated. While Lopes’ name remains up front, everyone contributes compositions, and everyone gives their all on every tune.

Bill Meyer

Joanna Mattrey — Veiled (Relative Pitch)

Veiled by Joanna Mattrey

This solo CD, which closely follows a collaborative cassette on Astral Spirits, is only the second recording with Joanna Mattrey’s name on the spine. But Mattrey is no newcomer. The New England Conservatory-trained violist has been playing straight and pop gigs for a while. If you caught Chance the Rapper on Saturday Night Live, Cuddle Magic with strings or a host of classical gigs around New York City, you’ve seen her. But if black dress and heels gigs pay her bills, improvised music nourishes her heart. And if sounds raw enough to scrape the roof of the world nourish yours, this album is new food. The premise of Veiled is finding veins of concealed beauty concealed, and that search impels Mattrey to tune her viola to sound like a horse-haired Tuvan fiddle, clamp objects to the strings and blast her signal through some satisfyingly filthy amplification. And whether it’s a slender tune or a complex texture, the reward is always there.

Bill Meyer

Angel Olsen — “Whole New Mess” single (Jagjaguwar)

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Everyone processes a breakup differently (though, to be fair, that’s probably less true now than ever). For Angel Olsen in 2018, it meant retreating to The Unknown, a century-old church in Anacortes, Washington, that Mount Eerie’s Phil Elverum and producer Nicholas Wilbur made into a recording studio. What ultimately came from those sessions was All Mirrors, but Whole New Mess is a chance to revisit that album (fully nine of these 11 songs are ones you’ve heard before; only the title-track and “Waving, Smiling” are new) in a more intimate framework — just Angel, a guitar, a mic and her reverberant heartache. The most cynical view to be taken here is that it’s a stopgap capitalizing on people’s vulnerability amid a pandemic quarantine, but it could also be a corrective for the bloat of All Mirrors, a record I listened to once and haven’t thought about since. Late Björkian excess doesn’t suit her nearly as well as the light touch delivered herein, and your interest will similarly hinge on how much Whole New Mess sounds like the old one.

Patrick Masterson

Ono — Red Summer (American Dreams)

Red Summer by ONO

Ono, the long-running noise-punk-poetry-protest project headed by P Michael Grego and travis, tackles the Red Summer of 1919, evoking the brutal race riots that erupted as soldiers returned from World War I. During that summer, conflicts raged from Chicago to the deep south, as white supremacists rioted against newly empowered returning Black veterans and an increased number of Black factory workers employed in America’s northern factories. Ono captures the violence—and its links to contemporary race-based conflicts—in an abstract and visionary style, with travis declaiming against an agitated froth of avant garde sound. “A Dream of Sodomy” lurches and rolls in funk-punk bravado, as travis declaims all the nightmarish scenarios that haunt his nocturnal hours, while “Coon” natters rhythmically across a fever-lit foundation of hand-drums, mosquito buzz and flute. “26 June 1919” wanders through a blasted, rioting landscape, sounds buzzing and pinging and roaring around travis’ fractured poetry. “White men, red men, Manchester town, send ‘em home, Oklahoma, send ‘em home, in a Black man house, send ‘em home, send ‘em home,” he chants, ominously, vertiginously. The center isn’t holding, for sure. The disc closes with the uneasy truce of “Sycamore Trees,” where steam blasts of synthesizer sound rush up and around travis’ vibrating, basso verses about meeting under the sycamore trees, a metaphor like the blues and gospel and nearly all Black music is full of metaphor about reuniting in a better place. Powerful.

Jennifer Kelly

Julian Taylor — The Ridge (Howling Turtle, Inc.)

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Singer-songwriter Julian Taylor does the little things well. That's not to say that he doesn't do the obvious things well, too, on his latest release The Ridge. His easy voice fits his songs, letting autobiography come with comfortable phrasing. As a writer, he tends toward the straightforward, avoiding extended metaphors or oblique references. The title track considers a particular form of life, and Taylor sticks to the tangible, singing about the stable, “Shovel manure, clean their beds, and prepare the feed for the day.” Taylor's songs make sense of the immediate world and relationships around him, but they avoid woolgathering. The album feels a bit removed from the current climate, but that's no complaint when Taylor's developed a welcoming place to visit. It isn't always easy here, but it's always companionable.

But back to those little things. Each song has carefully detailed orchestration and production. The record goes down easy whether tending toward James Taylor, Cat Stevens or something closer to country, and much of that easiness comes from the precise placement of every note. Burke Carroll's pedal steel, for instance, never exists for its own sake, but to serve the lyric that Taylor sings. The album contains enough space to feel like a rural Canadian ridge, with details drawn into to support Taylor's direct stories. The Ridge could easily go unnoticed (unobtrusiveness not being a highly rewarded trait), but its subtlety and care make it worth taking your boots off and sitting down for a minute.

Justin Cober-Lake

Various Artists — For a Better Tomorrow (Garden Portal)

For A Better Tomorrow by Various Artists

Compilation albums loom large in the American Primitive Guitar realm. Takoma, Tompkins Square and Locust all had larger ambitions than merely offering a sampling of wares, and to them, Garden Portal says, “hold my beer. I’ve got some collecting and playing to do.” For A Better Tomorrow started out as a Bernie Sanders fundraising endeavor. But when Bernie bailed and COVID-19 came on the scene, Garden Portal pivoted to support Athens Mutual Aid Network, an umbrella organization that coordinates aid to the underserved in this trying time. But in addition to good works, there’s some good work going on here. Not all of it is guitar-centric, but even the tracks that aren’t are close enough to the strings and heart template of the aforementioned parties to merit consideration under the same rubric. Joseph Allred’s been ultra-productive recently, so it’s actually helpful to be reminded of the spirit that infuses his playing by listening to it one track at a time. Rob Noyes’ “Diminished” takes the listener on a deep dive into the construction of sentiment and sound. And Will Csorba’s Pelt-like blast of fiddle drone, “Requiem for Ociel Guadalupe Martinez,” will put your hair up high enough to make that self-inflicted quarantine do a bit easier to execute.

Bill Meyer

Various Artists — The Storehouse Presents (The Storehouse)

The Storehouse Presents by The Storehouse

The coronavirus pandemic put the brakes on many things. You doubtless have your own list of loss, but for the proprietors of The Storehouse, the catalog of things kissed goodbye directly corresponds to their endeavor’s inventory of reasons to be. Over the past few years, the Storehouse has invited audiences out to a West Michigan farmhouse to enjoy a potluck meal and a concert played by some musicians of note. If there had been no lockdown, listeners could have enjoyed the Sun Ra Arkestra last April. Instead, no one’s playing, and no one’s getting paid, so the Storehouse has compiled this set of live and exclusive studio tracks to sell on Bandcamp in order to benefit the musicians and the Music Maker Relief Foundation. The cause, is good, but so are the tunes. Want to hear Steve Gunn and William Tyler in sympathetic orbit? Or Joan Shelley pledging her love? Or the first hints of Mind Over Mirrors’ new direction? Step right this way, preferably on one of 2020’s first Fridays.

Bill Meyer

Z-Ro — Rohammad Ali (1 Deep Entertainment / Empire)

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On one of his previous tracks, Z-Ro admitted that he’s basically just writing the same song over and over again (that’s how meta he is now, writing songs on writing songs). While he exaggerated a bit, he was not that far from the truth. In the last half dozen years he’s been writing the same three or four songs in various combinations, reconfigurations and forms. Rohammad Ali follows the same template: haters hate him, but he’s OK and is counting his money. Multiply this by 17, and here is the album. Despite this self-cannibalizing (lots of poets did that), Z-Ro with every new album sounds fresh and far from tired. The self-repeats just fuel him. Rohammad Ali has only one rap guest, and it’s Shaquille O’Neal whose rap career didn’t jump off in the 1990s. A lack of guests only proves that Z-Ro can self-sustain without support from the outside. The only thing from the outside he needs is hate.

Ray Garraty

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lovemesomesurveys · 5 years ago

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Have you ever read the Hunger Games series? Yep and watched all the movies. I was really into it at the time. When was the last time you ran into something? Hmm. I don’t recall. Do you enjoy dressing up? Nah. Do you live in the city or a rural area? I live in the city. Would you say you have a sense of style? My sense of style consists of mostly graphic tees and leggings, but also some Adidas clothes. And shoes.

What’s your biggest fear? This question comes up all the damn time. Have you ever been bitten by a wild animal? Nooo. Are you close to any of your cousins? Aww, I used to be close to a few of my cousins. Not anymore, though. :( That’s all my fault. I became really distant and withdrawn from friends and even family outside of my immediate family. Have you ever been lost in the woods? No, thankfully. Where did you last travel? Disneyland back in February. Do you enjoy driving? I don’t drive. What song did you last listen to? I mentioned this in a previous survey already, but I’ve had Savage by Megan the Stallion stuck in my head because of TikTok. If you have a job, how often do you work? I don’t have a job. What time do you normally go to sleep at night? For the past month I’ve been going to bed after 6AM. :X Do you watch a lot of movies? Hmm. Not a lot, no. I watch more TV shows. Do you like Tom Petty? ”Now I’m freeeeeee Free fallin’.” Would you rather have snow or rain? I love rainy days. It doesn’t snow here, but I wish it did. Do you own a lot of sweaters? I own a lot of sweatshirts. Have you ever tried rock-climbing? Well, no. For obvious reasons. Ever ridden in a police car? Nope. Favorite decade of music? That’s tough cause I like music that spans across decades, but I think the 90s and early 2000′s will hold a special spot. Have any of your best friends been your best friend longer than a year? My longest was my best friend of 15 years. Ever witnessed a murder? Noooo. Does your room have a ceiling fan? Yep. Have you ever tried blogging? Before Tumblr I had Xanga for a long time. Favorite television channel? E!, MTV, The Hallmark Channel, TeenNick, TVLand, and the ID Channel. Have you ever lied under oath? I’ve never had to be under oath. What are your religious views? I’m a Christian. When did you last change your bed sheets? A week ago. Would you consider yourself a flirt? No. At what age do you plan to be married? I don’t plan on getting married. Do you eat a lot of junk food? Honestly, all I eat is sandwiches, ramen, eggs, and Wingstop. Sometimes pizza and pasta. When did you last go on vacation? I’ve answered this 3 times now tonight, but I went to Disneyland back in February. Are you resilient? I was when I was younger. Definitely not anymore. Have you ever failed a subject before? I failed one math course in community college and had to retake it again. I ended up doing a lot better the 2nd time. I honestly believe it’s because I had a better teacher. If so, what was the class? ^^^ Do you wear more bright or dull colors? Dull. Majority of my clothes are black. Do you know anyone who has attempted suicide? Yes. What’s your favorite quote? Blah. How many clocks are in your house? Like 20 including all the electronics. Do you play any sports? Nope. What is your biggest life regret? I have a lot of those. Have you ever been injured in a car accident? No, thankfully. If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you be? Well obviously right now I only want to be at home, but I look forward to the day I can go to the beach. Have you ever had highlights in your hair? Yeah, I had them for years. Favorite fast food restaurant? I’m not into fast food anymore like I used to be. I was a fast food junkie before. The only takeout I’m into is Wingstop. And pizza from a local place, but I haven’t had that in awhile. In what country were you born? US of A. Are your eyes more than one color? Nope, just brown. Have you ever caught something on fire? Something in the microwave once, something in the oven once, the tips of my hair.... What would you consider your biggest flaw? Oh boy where to start. What do you think your best quality is? I don’t know. Do you enjoy listening to others’ problems? I used to be the person people came to if they needed advice or just someone to talk to and I was good at it. I liked being there and helping any way I could. People told me they felt comfortable talking to me and I was easy to talk to. It could also be overwhelming and draining at times. Especially leading up to when I fell into a really low, dark place a few years ago. I couldn’t be that person anymore. I wasn’t in a good headspace. I pushed everyone away and became very distant and withdrawn. That was 4 years ago and I’m still out of that place. :/

Do you keep any plants in your house? Nope. What is your mother’s occupation? She’s a manager at Walgreens. Do any of your friends like your musical style? My family and I share some musical interests. What are you most looking forward to? I wanna say this quarantine ending, but I know resuming life in the real world would also be making me anxious when the time comes. I guess I’m most excited for seeing Gabie again, because I haven’t seen March 7th. <<< SAME to the first part. What was your favorite television show as a child? Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, PBS, Saturday morning cartoons on ABC, WB Kids... all the kid shows in the 90s, basically. Are you afraid of insects? YES. ALL of them. Are you cold-natured? I’m very warm blooded, I feel like I’m always hot. I like when I’m actually cold and can wear a hoodie/sweatshirt or curl up under a blanket. How old were you when you got your first pet? We had a dog when I was a baby. Did you / do you enjoy high school? I liked parts of it. What would you say was your favorite age? Childhood. What annoys you most about social networking? Trolls, fake news, cancel culture.

Are you the center of attention most of the time? Nooo. I never want to be the center of attention. What are you currently reading? I’m starting the 2nd book in the Jack Ryder Mystery Series by Willow Rose. When did you last go to the library? Sometime back in 2014 when I was still in school. Are you ill at the moment? Not with a virus or anything like that, thankfully. I just always feel crappy for other reasons. Do people tease you about anything? How I’m too sensitive. How late did you stay up last night and why? Last night I went to bed at 4 in the morning, which is really early for me these days. Have you ever written poetry? I dabbled with it when I was 16. I still have the diary I wrote them in and yikes they’re so cringe-y haha. Curtains or shades? Curtains. How many people have you spoken to in the last hour? Zero, everyone in my house is asleep. Do you tend to text a lot? Nope. Ever lost a great best friend? Yes. What is your favorite kind of flower? Eh, I just say roses but I don’t really have one. Do you own any guns? No. What would you say is your favorite book of all-time? I could never choose. What’s your least favorite part of the day? Late evening always seems to go by really slow.

Have you ever won an award for a speech? No. Do you tend to curse a lot? Nah. Have you ever played on the Ouija board? Nooo. I don’t mess with that kind of stuff. Do you sleepwalk? Nope. Have you ever slept on the floor before? Yeah. Are you a fan of public displays of affection? I don’t care for like heavy make out sessions or groping all over each other, but I don’t care about a kiss, cuddling, or hand holding. When did you last attend a yard sale? When I was a kid. We had a family friend who had them often. What goals do you wish to accomplish tomorrow? I don’t have anything I want to accomplish tomorrow. When is your birthday? July 28th. What was the best part of today? It’s only 430 in the morning. Do you attempt to stay away from drama? Involving me yes, but I like celebrity gossip and drama. What liquid did you last drink? Starbucks Doubleshot energy drink. Do you ever prefer to be alone? Yeah, I need to have some alone time. Have you ever had a deadly animal as a pet? No. Favorite Disney movie? Alice in Wonderland, Winnie the Pooh, A Goofy Movie, and Toy Story. Have you ever been to the beach? Countless times. I love the beach. If you have, how many times have you been? ^^^^ What was your dream occupation at age ten? I wanted to be a teacher back then. Are you terrified at the idea of weight-gain? No. I’m underweight and need to gain some weight. Do you drink a lot of water? I only get like 2-3 glasses a day. :X Does your room have carpet or hard-wood floors? Carpet. Do you take naps daily? No.

Who were you named after? No one in particular. Do you plan on traveling this spring or summer? No, we’re still going to be dealing with all this. :/ Do you know anyone who is colorblind? Nope. Have you ever been a teacher’s pet? I guess so. I was always the good kid, the “pleasure to have in class.” Teachers loved me. What is your absolute favorite hobby? Reading, surveys, coloring. Ever been to a tanning bed before? No. I have no interest in that. Are you satisfied with your financial stability? I have enough to pay my bills and a little extra for other stuff, so I’m grateful for that. Who is your favorite actor / actress? Alexander Skarsgard. Are your nails painted? Nope. Do you ever accidentally talk to inanimate objects? Not accidentally, but I talk to inanimate objects when they don’t cooperate. More like talk shit, but haha. What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream? Strawberry. Have you ever kissed someone of the same gender? No. Do you receive any hate mail? No. Have you ever sent a letter in the mail? Yeah. If you could, would you have a pen pal? I did in 3rd grade. It was fun. We even got to meet them toward the end of the year during a field trip. I wouldn’t want one now, though. What color are the pants you’re wearing? I’m wearing black leggings. What is your life philosophy? Hmm. Who last sent you a goodnight text message? No one does. Do you own any clothes that are your favorite color? Yeah. One of my favorite colors is black and most of my clothes are black. I have a few items that are my other favorite colors as well. Have you ever been in a hot tub before? Once for a short time. I didn’t like it. What’s your favorite comedy movie? I have several, but the one that came to mind first was Bridesmaids. In which year were you born? 1989.

#personal #text #survey #surveys

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fastsalad · 5 years ago

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I just rewatched the Melodramatics production of anb and it’s so iconically 2006 I just had to make a post with every single thing that was iconic. This got really long so most of it is under the cut lol

-Gordon looks like my cousin Cassidy

-The sweater vest pattern

-All the stagehands are dressed as nurses which is really clever and blends really well.

-All of Rhoda’s outfits are so iconic and 2006

-Bungee’s little dance during calamari is the reason I live.

-Nancy D’s hairstyle gives me Tracy Turnblad vibes

-RHODA’S HAIR CLIPS

-Roger legit looks like one of those annoying dumbass boys I went to middle school with who would act out for attention I’m sorry I love him but it’s true

-Lisa is so short compared to everyone which makes everything ten times funnier

-The choreography for Heart and Music is also the reason that I live

-Gordon lowkey also kinda looks like John Mulaney

-The doctors facial expressions are the best thing

-Mimi’s voice is actually my favorite thing

-Mimi is so iconic her PURPLE EYESHADOW AFJLHSDL

-Mimi and Gordon’s interactions during Mother’s Gonna Make Things Fine give me LIFE

-BUNGEE’S FROG WALK I’M DEAD

-The little vocal swing thingies roger does during Sailing? Legit my favorite thing.

-Roger: “Yes iiII’d wanna go sail.” Me, sobbing: yes you go you funky little sailor man

-Richard’s face when Nancy D said she was the thin nurse was the actual funniest thing

-Roger and Bungee were in Gordo’s Law of Genetics and I lowkey loved it like it added another layer to the song especially since they were the only two doing the bass parts and they had different choreography than the rest

-get it minister

-Once again, a+ choreography

-At the beginning of And They’re Off Gordon wheeled himself onto the stage in a wheelchair and then dramatically turned his head to look at the audience on beat with the song and it made me chuckle.

-RHODA’S LOW-RISE PANTS AND LAYERED SWEATERS ITS SO 2006 I CAN’T

-Everyone was pretending to be old at some point? Idk

-Gordon’s voice makes me so happy

-The cast just overall has a very nice sound

-Roger’s dad wallet

-“Looking sharp looking fit” guys he’s not wearing a suit what do we say here

-~LisTeN tO RoGeERr~

-Just Go was just overall very cute and funny

-“He’ll be brave as Zorro” does a weird sword fight dance

-Cause it’s gonna ~scaAaAaAre~ them! (Cue Gordon having a heart attack)

-Bungee is iconic as always

-Sitting Becalmed in the Lee of Cuttyhunk was like a weird fever dream but I lowkey loved it

-Nancy D and the doctor getting so excited over brain surgery is my favorite thing

-Gordon looks so confused and weirded out and honestly? Mood.

-RHODA’S SCARF

-“Maybe we’ll lauuuughtooloud” listen I felt that ‘oh shit I waited too long and now I’m behind the music’ moment.

-Gordon and Roger’s voices go together so nicely

-Mimi is literally my favorite

-“What’re ya, stupid? Go and fly with the man!” Made me feel unexplained emotions.

-Roger looks so sad at the end of the song and it breaks my heart

-“Let’s just go over this. You have a home right? Cause I don’t.” This Lisa is iconic.

-Lisa’s facial expressions = also iconic.

-Mr. Bungee’s glasses

-“The preferred word in any kind of situation is- DON’T TOUCH ME!”

-The waitress nurse’s hat and Nancy D’s glasses

-The waitress nurse holding a copy of the actual script for the show during The Yes Song

-The little hand motion Bungee did for “get into my car”

-The zoom in for affinity

-THE FLIP PHONES

-The lighting for in the middle of the room

-The audience loosing it when Richard started singing

-Mimi struggling to get onstage with the crate

-The pictures on Gordon’s bookshelf

-The way Mimi says “asshole” so casually

-The horse head statue and seashell being used as bookends

-The lighting is back for middle of the room reprise

-Rhoda picking up the books Mimi dropped during the scene change

-Roger’s striped polo shirt that just screams sailor

-The return of Roger’s dad wallet

-Just the way Lisa did the “you love him. Too bad.” bit

-And her belting “when life turns out to be” it was different than most actresses do it and gave me chills

-Roger’s facial expressions

-The end of A Really Lousy Day in the Universe like holy shiT MY EMOTIONS

-Brain Dead was really fast and. Vibes.

-Also the minister and waitress switched costumes for brain dead? Strange.

-The waltz choreo

-The single water glass on the table

-“OH LOVERS START ROMANCING” and just the whole green teeth moment. Yes.

-ROGERS PIROUETTES. HE DID LIKE THREE IN A ROW THAT’S FRICKEN HARD

-RHODA’S RAINBOW SUSPENDERS

-Gordon’s little scoff-gasp thing after “tawdry”

-“Yes it is!”

-Just Gordon and Rhoda’s whole dynamic during Whenever I Dream

-The dramatic reveal that Gordon wasn’t puppeteering her at the end

-Rhoda’s clog dancing

-Richard’s superhero costume

-The fact that the video quality dropped dramatically when the lights came down

-The priest/waiter literally sparkling during Eating Myself Up Alive due to the UV lighting

-Richard’s attempted opera singing

-“YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYA”

-The end of eating myself up alive reminded me of the ending of The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals.

-The pictures on Gordon’s bookshelf that used to be of him and his loved ones being changed to just photos of Gordon’s face from different angles during the music still plays on

-Gordon playing the piano during the music still plays on

-MIMI TURNING OVER THE PICTURES OF GORDON AND THEN PICKING UP THE LAST ONE (which I’m pretty sure used to be of her and him) AND HOLDING IT BEFORE TURNING IT OVER TOO

-The bookshelf being empty except for the horse and seashell bookends is really chilling

-The whole apartment just looks so much more dreary and empty and lifeless than the first time you see it like props to the set and lighting designers

-Just the entirety of the music still plays on

-MIMI PUTTING ON SUNGLASSES AT THE END

-BUNGEES ENTRANCE

-HIS LITTLE SIDEWAYS HOP

-The way the frog eyes just jiggle around

-“okey dokey” (double ok sign)

-“s p a g h e t t i ! “

-(the biggest, funniest smile) “I L I K E S P A G H E T T I ! “

-THE HIGH FIVE

-Just all of bungees little hand gestures and dances

-Gordon’s little smile when he said “I’m ready”

-The fact that them singing “Richards gonna catch some hell for this” is very muted

-The audience slowly and subtly starting to lose it throughout You Boys Are Gonna Get Me in Such Trouble

-Richard’s weird little dance at the end

-THE LITTLE SMOOCH AT THE END OF SAILING REPRISE

-Lisa’s book advertisement

-“MY price? T w o b u c k s.”

-The gay history book

-Lisa having a feather boa for some reason

-THE FROG HAT

-Roger’s striped polo shirt that just screams sailor part 2

-Whatever the hell that shirt Gordon was wearing was

-LISA’S LITTLE SMILE WHEN SHE HOLDS UP TWO FINGERS

-The fact that she’s so short makes this song even funnier

-The little dance she did for “silly picnic”

-“YOU KNOW I REALLY HATE CRAZY PEOPLE”

-Gordon: (snatches a book) “HA. HA.” Lisa: (snatches the book back and throws Gordon’s cane into the corner)

-This Roger has a softer voice than most who have played the role and it just gave some of the lines a different vibe? And I loved it.

-Bungee coming on at the end without his frog head

-The fact that bungee looks about a third of his age with the frog head on? Like he legit looks ten with it on but like 30 with it off.

-Gordon: (dramatically throws the frog hat offstage)

-get it minister part 2

-Just. Every harmony in this show.

-“Finally there’s sun!” GORDON’S VOICE I’M CRYING HES SO GOOD

-The little clump they form at the end like agdlabkglsfkgak family

-Did I already mention the waitress’s sideswept bangs? So 2006.

-Bungee reminds me so much of my friend Phineas it’s scary

-AND GORDON LOOKS SO MUCH LIKE MY COUSIN CASSIDY ITS SCARY

-the frog noises in the credits

#i might do this for some other iconic productions ive watched #like french woods and east street players #is it just me or are all the song titles in this show super duper long #a new brain #gordon schwinn #mimi schwinn #roger delli bovi #rhoda anb #mr bungee #lisa anb #im not tagging the rest of the characters ajuhdskjab

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geez-lopez · 6 years ago

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Wow y'all I love Choni I really do but, sorry not sorry, there is no valid comparison to Brittana.

We're talking about a generational wlw pairing that was born in a queer bait joke and saw its roots grow into a wooden sailing boat because an entire fandom and the actresses fought for that recognition and representation. They fought back in 2010/2011 on a network known to be conservative and on a show written by misogynistic white gays™ who only used their female characters to prop their dudes or their "perfect" gay showboat couple (I don't hate Glee tho). The premises, the storytelling and the characterizations are utterly different, the fandom "folklore" and following surrounding it as well. IMO the Brittana fandom and the pairing by extension got a bond that no other fandom can have nor come near to (not even clexa) and I'm gonna tell you why : That effing bond was made through shitty low quality and freezing streaming links, through restless nights of voting on shitty pairings polls and meaningful Twitter trends. That bond went through all genres of iconic fanfictions, through the mocking of "rival" ships, through the bullying of its own showrunners and the alienating and invalidation of one of its actresses and her then on screen fling's interpret. You cannot even start to compare all the shit they had to face as a pairing and as a fandom because Choni arrived in a television and social media landscape that were favourable to them, and with the "privilege" of telling their own stories without any other pairing or character being thrown here and there as an attestation of their love because God forbid two fictional women to love each other without a lead character validating their relationship.

And while I can draw some parallels between the pairings due to the personality of the characters (mostly Cheryl/Santana), the struggles with their sexual orientation (Cheryl/Santana again), the fact that they're both biracial couples or the similarities due to high school life (cheerleading, theater class etc), my honesty doesn't allow me that comparison. The only thing I can genuinely say is that without Brittana and their fandom battling for the portrayal of a healthy teenage wlw relationship (ok maybe not always healthy) there wouldn't be half of the wlw pairings you've been enjoying since 2011. If the Brittana fandom hadn't said stop to eating crumbs and instead asked for a whole warm bread, if they hadn't paved that way and made showrunners realized that wlw could make a huge part of your audience and deserved to be represented through heartfelt stories and shown in a more positive light, well maybe some fights would still be on and Cheryl would have ended up in Archie's bed, just like in the comics.

#brittana #choni #my messages are open to discuss this but i don't answer to hate

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theexistentiallyqueer · 5 years ago

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Okay so I’ve been thinking about that really bad Hot Take that’s been circulating about fanfiction. And it’s been kind of simmering in me. The root of the problem with it isn’t so much that it diminishes the quality of fanfiction so much as the way it characterizes two completely different genres of media.

Preface: at no point is this ever, ever, ever a diatribe or condemnation against fanart or the work fanartists put into their work. This is about the value that is ascribed to visual art vs the value ascribed to literary art. I am trying to talk specifically about the denigration of literary art in fandom spaces and the way it’s been recently, in a very popular tumblr post, martyred at the expense of queer and disabled writers and writers of color.

Fanart (as a collective genre, according to that post) - Good, artistically-driven, pure, wholesome. Fanartists draw for the sake of becoming better artists, and every work a fanartist draws or creates is made with the goal of becoming a better artist. Fanartists never draw anything that is base, silly, shippy, or smutty; if there is pornographic art, it isn’t pornographic but Erotica. There is no such thing as low- or middling-quality art, because all artists are striving to sharpen their skills and become better artists, and there are no fanartists who draw just for fun or shits and giggles. Fanartists achieve fame purely on the merit of their own artistic ability. There’s no room to criticize fanartists who attempt to cis-wash trans (or trans pesenting) characters, or fanartists who blatantly, frequently, and with frankly no impunity (as their art is reblogged, and reblogged, and reblogged) whitewash characters of color.

Fanfiction (as a collective genre, according to that post) - Smutty, ship-fodder, audience-pleasing trash. Fanfic writers write for the sake of expressing their inner boners or enacting their internal fantasies. No fanfic writers seek a sense of growth in their writing or work to improve their writing in any way. The only reason any works of fanfiction are popular is because they cater to the readership’s base instincts, and the True Authors, the Really Daring authors who write Real Literary Content, are cast the wayside.

It’s such a two-dimensional view of the situation--and it doesn’t even take into account edited content, such as gifsets, which makes up a huge portion of fandom content and has been a type of content, along with fanart, that fanfic writers have long voiced their (our) upset about getting more active & polarized attention than written works. It presents this dichotic view of fanart good/fanfiction bad. Which is also incredibly ugly and disturbing when you consider the fact that fanfiction is the earliest form of curated fan content, and fanfiction itself is inherently transformative in a way that fanart and edits are not, because fanwork in general, and and fanfiction in particular, is inherently in and of itself the public (fans) themselves overriding the corporate-owned landscape with their subversive interpretations.

Like, I have seen not-good fanart. I have seen bland, unimpressive, generic fanart. There is fanart from artists who don’t have their own unique sense of style. Fanart from artists who are just starting out and haven’t developed their skills yet. Fanart from artists who draw as a hobby, and damn they may be good, but they don’t give a fuck about contributing to The Body of Artistry because they have bills to pay and career interests outside of art, and damn, they’d really rather draw these two characters making out, or blushing at each other, or straight-up fucking, than they would create something of Great Artistic Importance. That art gets so many notes. It is liked and reblogged and shared.

And that’s all valid, because art ISN’T A COMPETITIVE SPORT. I embrace fanartists who draw just because they want to, because they don’t care about quality or artistic ideals or whatever, and just want to draw someone being happy, or sad, or angry, or getting dicked down, or whatever!!! It doesn’t matter. Draw because you want to draw. Because your art is an expression of yourself that speaks of your experiences and transgresses the definitions of the world you’ve been told to adhere to. You make art for yourself, to say fuck the system!!!! We’re just the lucky souls who get to appreciate it afterwards.

The complaints that come from fanfic writers--and yes!!! I am one, so proceed with the accusations of butthurt--are that fanart and edits get more social media attention (in the forms of likes, reblogs, retweets, shares, etc.) than fanfic does.

And it’s a valid complaint! It isn’t rooted in some alien reality that fanfiction is inherently more base and less artistic than fanart. I’ve seen some pretty aesthetically displeasing fanart get a high reblog count. And I’ve seen some incredible works of literary attention get no recs, no likes, no comments. I’ve seen works of middling writers who have a lot of fucking talent and show it in their work, and yeah maybe they write porn, but their prose SINGS, and no one comments, no one shares it, no one makes their love of it public the same way they do the fanart, the same way they do the edits and the gifsets.

It’s rooted in two things:

1. Literature (which fanfiction is a subgenre of) takes time to appreciate. You can look at a piece of art and reblog it without thinking about it. It could be a work on par with the Mona Lisa, and you could still look at it without any aesthetic or artistic sense and say, “Hey, that looks pretty.” But you can’t read without thinking; reading is an active mental pursuit you have to engage with. (If you try to pull out Twilight on this point to fight me, I’ll fight you back. I’ve actively read Twilight. Even reading awful literature takes effort; arguably it takes more effort than reading something good).

2. Literature is hard to market with words, because when you’re trying to encourage other people to read it, you have to use even more words. You have to use words to convince someone to read even more words! Some fanartists draw comics or fanart inspired by fanfiction--I love those artists and they do more for us than they could possibly know--but for the most part, you can’t use visuals to show someone why they should invest their time in reading a thing. And unlike fanart--when it’s a tribute, when it’s a showcase of the character’s or characters’ canonical attributes--fanfiction can’t be green-stamped by creators, because fanfiction is inherently built in narrative, and canon-compliant or not, that opens the legal owners of the property up to legal disputes.

So much easier, then, to focus on fanart, which distribution and publishing companies love because they see free advertising in sharing it, to complain that fanfiction is a dispirited genre of unartistic creators who just want to read the queer version of a bodice-ripper.

And then we get to the question of: why is the bodice ripper so bad? Are you willing to critique Jack Kerouac and Charles Bukowski with the same derision you have for queer writers? Are you going to hold the wish-fulfillment fantasies and introspective examinations of sexuality in relation to gender, race, class, and physical ability written by writers expressing their own experiences as inherently debauched and debased because pornographic fanfiction is popular, but not hold George R R Martin to the same standard? Are you going to criticize the prejudices and disparities and biases in publishing that prevent marginalized writers from being able to break into the industry?

Are you ready to combat the enduring popularity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which is overwhelmingly a series of heroism tales about shitty and mediocre white men?

Are you going to take aim at HBO for taking a fantasy series that, while still written by a sexist author who has a disturbing fixation on female sexuality has uplifted its female characters as heroes in their own right, and then drove it into the dirt to end on a note with the male “hero” murdering his female lover, an abuse survivor, after engaging her in an intimate kiss?

Did you take issue with the streaming blockbuster Stranger Things only confirming a character as canonically gay--after planning to have her be a straight romantic option for a major character--because the actress is the one who repeatedly badgered the showrunners about how she didn’t feel her character fit that role?

Are you invested in the fact that video games continue to be majority white, majority male, majority able-bodied, and majority inaccessible to disabled gamers?

You want to complain about fanfiction having too much porn and somehow that deligitimizes fanfiction as a genre as a whole?

Fuck off. There are hundreds, thousands even more likely, of other authors of equal skill to you or greater, who are struggling to have their works recognized in fandoms that don’t want to put the effort in to reading them, the effort into sharing and appreciating them. It’s harder to make someone care about a fanfic. You can reblog a fanart, and your followers will see the art itself right away. If you reblog fanfic, they have to make the conscious choice to engage with it. And none of that is your fault, because you can’t control how other people engage with fan content, but you can advocate, vocally, for the fair and equal respect for fanfiction and fan-written content. You can remind people, again and again, how fanfic writers do so much for so little.

But you want to come into my house and compare fanart to fanficton and claim one is inherently better? You’re the Banksy to my Catherynne L Valente, to my N.K. Jemisin, to my Seanan McGuire.

Start understanding the system is built against us all and start understanding why your battle is uphill. What’s oppressing your creative success is a white, straight, cis monopoly on what the good story, what the correct story is, limiting your options, tying you to a narrative you don’t belong to. Queerness and marginalization exist beyond what’s depicted in mainstream media, and fans expressing that through their own written content?

That’s us taking back the corporate-owned narrative for ourselves. It’s self-liberation through the written word. And yeah, some of it is porn.

It’s porn when it’s a drawing too.

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