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princeofpace · 1 month ago

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It used to be so Civilized

Jon Moxley/Bryan Danielson

Home Invasion Kink; Choking TW

[Ao3]

Moxley adjusted his leather gloves, flexing his fingers as he did. They were well taken care of, oiled and soft. The heat of his hands had shaped the gloves over the years of use he got out of them. He couldn’t help the way it made him excited to wear the pair for this.

He grabbed the crowbar off the ground, quietly as he could. It was just past midnight. The property was quiet as can be, especially for this time of night. It was after midnight; if Mox had to guess it was around 2 AM. Quiet, save for the wind and rustling leaves. He rounded the house to the side door. It would be less likely someone would see him there. Black mock neck, with black cargo pants and boots practically hid him in the darkness of the night.

M ox knocked on the door, waiting a moment before twirling the crowbar in his hand, wrapping both hands around the crowbar, raising his over his head and knocking the doorknob clean off. A gloved hand grabs the shattered knob, gripping it tightly as he yanked it off, fingers entering the hole that had been cut out for the knob as he quietly opened the door, shutting it behind him silently, as if it even mattered.

Boots found themselves on kitchen tile, tracking in some dirt as he walked around, crowbar trailing on the ground behind him. His lazy saunter took him through the house, as he memorized the various rooms. The kitchen was on the side, there was a cozy den in the back that lead out to a patio, a nice bedroom turned exercise room on the first floor. Dining room, with fancy looking wood furniture, and a cotton table runner that was stained with use. There were papers and documents here and there. A sense of being lived in was present in the house. Mox liked that. The photos, the paintings, the decorations. Part of him wanted to start smashing away, at TVs and glass; to tear up couch cushions with the knife he had strapped to his left leg.

That wasn’t what he was here for though.

Mox picked up a picture frame. A photo of Nigel and Bryan from their ROH days. It was a nice picture. Cute, the way Bryan didn’t look at the camera and had an awkwardness to him that was still present to this day. Nigel seemed as confident and cocky as ever, just with some extra chub on him. He looked good too, and Mox would’ve loved having taken a crack at him personally in the ring.

He looked around the room. It was a little sitting area in the front of the room, with plenty of photos and knickknacks to choose from. There was a display of belts in a glass case, that Mox walked ove r to, mostly to muse over. All the fancy gold and belts in the world didn’t matter to him right now. This wasn’t what he was here for either.

The real prize was up those stairs. He knew exactly where his mark was. As quietly as he could in his Magnum work boots, he made his way up the stairs. There was no subtlety in how the crowbar thunked up each stair, lagging right behind him like a dog being dragged.

The second floor landing was all hardwood, compared to the carpeted floors of most of the first floor. Master bedroom, that was his target.

Walking up to each door, he kicked them in with ease. Bathroom. Empty bedroom. Office room. Finally, with two doors left, he found it.

The room was dark, spacious, with the curtains drawn but fluttering as the windows past them were open. It was quiet, save for the soft hum of a white noise machine and the gentle through the curtains. There was a ceiling fan but it wasn’t running. The bed was off to the left, headboard against the center of the wall. There was two nightstands, but one was woefully cleared of any contents on top of it. The other held a few things on top of it: a book, a lamp, and a framed photo.

“Bryan…Bryan…” Moxley called out, watching the lump under the comforter try not to shift. “Let’s not make this difficult.”

He walks over to the bed, boots silenced as they land on carpet under the bed frame. Mox hooks the part of the crowbar that’s curved onto the duvet, slowly dragging it down. There was his target, his prey…Bryan Danielson. Wide eyed, nervous as a jackrabbit. Ready to run like one too. Stripped down to just a plain white t-shirt and some plaid boxers. Mox ran the crowbar down Bryan’s body, cold metal starting under his chin and trailing over his clothes. Against his hardening nipples, pushing the crowbar into them as he watched Bryan bite his lip.

Mox couldn’t believe his own arousal, not hiding it as he groaned watching Bryan’s reactions as the crowbar went lower, hooking into his boxers and pulling the waist band away from Bryan’s hips for just a moment, before letting them snap back into place. Bryan is still able to keep silent, but the outline of his dick through his boxers was clearer than ever. Moxley pushes the crowbar against it, and to his frustration still no response. So he does the next thing that comes logically to him, raising that crowbar above his head. Panic fills Bryan’s eyes, as he quickly rolls out of the way just in time as Moxley brings the crowbar down onto the bed.

Bryan is on the floor for just a moment, scrambling up to his feet. He runs for the closet and Mox barks out a laugh.

“There’s no way you could hold me off right now babe, give it up.” He walks over to the closet Bryan is trying to lock himself into, grabbing Bryan and pulling him off the door. That earns him an elbow to the face that sends him staggering back with a “FUCK!” and the dropping of the crowbar he was holding as he brings a gloved hand up to his face, checking for any blood from his nose.

There’s the slightest glint of relief in Bryan’s eyes as he opens the door to the closet and rushes to close himself in it, but Mox is quicker and stronger, especially right now. Especially after Saturday. Leather hands on both the door’s edge and the corner of the wall into the closet keep the door open. Mox grunts as Bryan keeps trying to shut the door, trying to kick Moxley’s leg out from under him.

“You fucking bastard,” Moxley isn’t having it, kicking Bryan’s knee and making him fall back into the walk-in closet. He lands on his ass and scrambles backwards, further into the mess of shoes on the floor. Mox completely opens the door, stalking further in.

Suddenly, Bryan tries to dash from be tween Moxley’s legs, and for a moment he’s almost made it through before the home invader literally drops on top of Bryan, pinning him to the ground.

“Look at you champ,” Moxley gets an arm around Bryan’s throat, threatening him with that triangle choke. He pets Bryan’s hair, shushing him before he can even speak. “You can make this easy Bryan, or very, very hard.”

Bryan lets out a low whine from his throat, his arms tucked under him. He tries for the army crawl. Moxley can’t help but be entirely endeared to it, before squeezing his arm tighter around Bryan’s neck, who lets out a groan in response.

“Good boy, that’s what I want to hear.”

Mox adjusts himself on top of Bryan, pressing his hard dick against Bryan’s ass. Even with the layers of clothes between them, he could feel how much Bryan wanted him inside him. Moxley was so used to Bryan being able to put up more of a fight, that his submission only made him feel even more excited. Like a mutt in heat, he began to rut against Bryan. Bryan pushed his hips up against Mox’s dick, and the bliss of it got to Mox as his arm loosened around Bryan’s neck.

“Mox, just fuck me already, please—”

That arm around his throat tightened.

“Now keep quiet,” Mox whispered in Bryan’s ear, before biting it hard and pulling on it with his teeth.

With his left arm free, he snuck it under Bryan, making him lift his hips more into Mox ley ’s as Moxley got his knees up under h im.

Now that there was enough space, his gloved hand was shoved into Bryan’s boxers from the front, earning him a hitched noise from Bryan. Even with the gloves, he could feel the slick precum leaking from Bryan’s dick. Rubbing his thumb against the head of his dick, Bryan moaned, as Moxley began to rub harder just under the head of his dick, into the shaft, before starting to jerk him off.

Mox couldn’t help himself, savoring the small pants and noises Bryan made as Moxley humped him from behind and got him off with his hand alone. It wasn’t very long for Bryan to reach the edge of his orgasm, something Moxley was surprised with. Bryan usually had so much self control. The fact that he was this easy tonight was like he was being served wagyu beef for free. Not something he wanted all the time, but something he could savor right now.

Instead, despite protesting whines from Bryan, Moxley had other plans. He pulled Bryan’s briefs off, one side and then the other, struggling as Bryan tried to stop him with pathetic attempts at flailing. To keep him down, Moxley removed his arm from Bryan’s throat, instead deciding to bite down as hard as he could without breaking skin at the right side of Bryan’s throat. He finally got the boxers off, balling them up in his fist and shoving them into Bryan’s mouth.

“If you want to get what you want, you’ll keep that in your mouth okay?” He was practically growling in Bryan’s ear, a thread of spit having connected Bryan’s throat to Mox’s mouth as he spoke. Bryan could barely nod, his eyes clearly showing he was blissed out already.

The impromptu gag was to give Bryan some sense of relief, from being choked and to let him get more vocal should he want. Mox knew Bryan, in his stubbornness, that he’d keep quieter than either of them enjoyed out of some semblance of pride.

Moxley always loved dismantling that pride.

He grabbed Bryan by the hips, lifting them up. Bryan always looked great with his face against the floor and his ass up in the air. Moxley reached into one of his cargo pants’ pockets, pulling out a small bottle of lube. He flipped the cap open, free hand pulling at Bryan’s asshole to expose it. With two fingers above it and two fingers below it, he stretched it out to drop some lube over it, and over his fingers.

“Relax or this’ll hurt,” Moxley warned, as if Bryan didn’t know. He took his pointer and middle finger, pouring some more lube over the gloves, before pushing them slowly inside Bryan, who seemed more than eager to accept the fingers into himself. Moxley worked them in, pushing slowly before scissoring his fingers to try to open his prey up. His fingers were thick, made thicker with the gloves, and he curled them with muscle memory guiding him. Bryan let out a muffled groan from where his face was pressed into the carpet, and Mox couldn’t help the grin on his own face.

He curled his fingers one last time before pulling them out. Moxley undid the button on his cargo pants, unzipping them, before tugging his own dick out through the hole in his boxers. He grabs the lube again, pouring more on Bryan before his own dick. From there, it was grabbing Bryan by the hips with one hand, his other hand leading his dick into the other man’s ass.

He slid in slowly.

“Breathe, baby,” Mox reminded Bryan as his shaft disappeared into Bryan. “You always feel so damn good.”

Once the base of his own hips were flush with Bryan’s ass, he began to thrust into him harder and faster. Both hands gripped into the other man’s hips as he did, starting to shove Bryan onto his dick than thrusting himself. Bryan’s muffled moans only egged Moxley on as he picked up the pace. Gloved fingers dug into Bryan’s flesh, as he clenched around his assailant.

Suddenly, Moxley reaches his left hand down toward Bryan’s head, grabbing a fistful of hair and pulling him up like that, before wrapping that arm around Bryan’s throat once again, pressing Bryan’s back against his chest as he continued to fuck him, shifting to thrusting his hips into him.

“You’re so close babe, you can do it,” Mox whispered in his ear, before groaning as Bryan writhed against him. He could feel the way Bryan was getting close, knowing he wasn’t too far behind. He could feel his orgasm coming closer and closer, nearly being pushed over the edge as Bryan came over himself, thick white stripes of cum painting the carpet in front of them.

Moxley let himself release into Bryan, filling him up with his own cum. He kept pumping his hips, groaning low and long as he continued to come into Bryan. The warmth around his dick felt amazing like always as Bryan was starting to go limp in his arms.

He finally lets go of Bryan, onto the carpet under them. He pitches forward unceremoniously. All that’s filling the air is the sound of panting, and the smell of sweat and cum.

They stayed in that position for a few moments, Mox’s softening dick in Bryan. Slowly, Mox pulls out, tucking his dick away into his boxers and zipping up the cargo pants, buttoning it up. He stands, admiring his work. Bryan, flat on the ground, with cum leaking out of his ass, back rising and falling as he breathed. Reaching down, Moxley pulled the dirty boxers out of Bryan’s mouth. Through teary eyes, Bryan looks up at him and Mox smiles. He liked this view, a lot. He always loved seeing his work, when he could dismantle Bryan. This was a lot less methodical than normal, but it worked out pretty well.

Moxley bent over, grabbing Bryan’s face and giving him a rough kiss on the cheek.

“Love ya. Feel better Bryan.”

#barking.doc #jon moxley #bryan danielson #brymox #kinktober 2024

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mydarkday · 7 months ago

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Mutilated By The Hutu 'Interahamwe' World Press Photo of the Year, prize singles

1994

Commissioned by: Magnum Photos for Time

Photo Credit: James Nachtwey

#magnum #hutu #tutsi #war photography

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sepublic · 2 years ago

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Another old drawing from 2015, because again I’m just lazy now, but also… While the style is a bit different than how I normally do it nowadays, I think both this drawing and the photo I took of it aged fairly well? I mean, if I accepted a photo of Barracudox’s smaller form, I can do this!

Midas the Golden Man is the ring leader of a group of Escapees, easily the biggest one out there, rivaled only by Azayle’s. His story starts in the distant past, as an alchemist and philosopher working on many things, but especially the Philosopher’s Stone. While many appreciated the economic benefits of creating gold, Midas (though he wasn’t known as such then) was more interested in the existential journey it’d take to get there, and hoped to learn good things along the way.

He collaborated with many sources in his travels, deeming his home city too isolated to be sufficient. Midas studied the solar maps of dragons, bartered with various witches, and even briefly collaborated with one named Draik… Through the use of magic and various other ingredients, Midas managed to create a Philosopher’s Stone… Sort of.

Many philosophers idealized the element as the ultimate ideological achievement, but Midas’ was just a literal stone that turned things to gold and not much else. He felt he didn’t learn much if anything, at least no real wisdom, just technical knowledge. Sure, Midas incorporated it into his body, being given a gold touch that he eventually applied to himself, turning his entire body into solid gold!

But it wasn’t enough. And since many alchemists discussed the idea of different kinds of Philosopher’s Stones, different takes on how the magnum opus took form, Midas resolved to simply figure a better one out. Or even, that the Philosopher’s Stone he made was not the end point to his troubles, but rather the starting point to finally solving them!

I should mention at this point that Midas was fairly amoral, and believed in the greater good of philosophy over all else. He’d have been good material for the Phantom Alliance, but perhaps luckily, he was never recruited into that organization, whose recruiters ultimately weren’t omnipotent. While he had an eternal lifespan now (gold doesn’t exactly age), one of the other prizes promised by the Philosopher’s Stone, Midas decided some things were better done sooner than later.

Before he could embark however, Midas needed to apply some quality-of-life accommodations to himself. Being made of solid gold, he was incredibly heavy, and the massive talons certainly didn’t help; So he had magical glyphs carved into his body to lessen its weight. If needed, Midas could turn off these enchantments at any time, allowing him to weaponize the impact that came with this sudden heft. Brings new meaning to ‘putting on weight’…

Likewise, Midas tested the limits of his abilities, discovering he could generate gold directly from his body, and not just turn pre-existing solid objects into gold. This meant growing and even launching golden spikes or weapons out of his body to protect himself (and hurt others), and even a thin layer of regular gold around his fingers.

Only Midas’ hands were enchanted with his gold touch, so if he applied this mundane layer around them, it could act as a safe covering to interact with the world around him. Being able to generate gold from his body also meant repairing it as well; Midas had regenerative abilities, and he could use the gold touch of his hands to repair and fill in damage faster than usual.

Similar to the classic myth he saw appropriate to rename himself after, Midas’ gold touch could be undone by water, but only when applied to the living, particularly those with souls, such as animals and people. Midas theorized the energy of the soul itself, a seemingly intangible thing, had something to do with this; So long as a soul was inside of the gold, its power could be used to undo the transmutation by restoring an original state of the body it was bound to.

Of course, Midas could just as easily distort and destroy the golden statues his victims became; Changing their shape too much could ‘upset’ the soul and cause it to leave, killing the person in question. At which point, their golden corpse would remain gold forever, with water unable to reverse the transmutation, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse.

Fittingly, as someone turned into gold who still had a soul himself… Midas was also vulnerable to water. But instead of curing him, it’d just melt and kill the Golden Man, so he tended to avoid it. Still, his aforementioned method of covering himself in a layer of inert gold proved helpful, as only gold inhabited by a soul reverted. Thus, Midas could generate a thin layer from his body, and catch people who’d expect him to melt off-guard, or hide his weakness’ application to himself.

Unsurprisingly, Midas could only turn solid objects into gold. Liquids and gases didn’t work, and to clarify, only water itself would undo Midas’ power and himself. Other liquids, even if they include water, are often not enough… Though if the ratio of water is high enough, it could work! It’s… magic. Don’t ask.

The liquids in people’s bodies could also turn to gold, and Midas theorized that this was because the power of the soul inadvertently acted as a medium to spread his gold touch to mass that was otherwise unable to be transmuted. Weird, given the soul countered his power, but maybe not? Perhaps its connection to water as a means to undo the gold touch had something to do with being able to spread that gold touch to other liquids…?

Once Midas had discovered the limits of his new body, only then could he go on a quest with admittedly vague parameters; To study the world around him, by basically observing and participating in as many different events as possible, particularly those of great social upheaval. With his ability to create gold, Midas had no shortage of funding he could provide himself (though he was wary of inflation), in addition to the threat of force, and went about bankrolling various causes, or masterminding them.

Midas decided that if you needed to make an omelette, you had to break a few eggs. That meant setting up what was basically glorified, twisted social experiments on a large level, in the hopes of extrapolating something from it. Midas saw a lot of bad, but he did see a lot of good, and came to some conclusions that in hindsight, seemed fairly obvious, but there’s a first time for everything I guess. On the side, he searched libraries for scholarly texts because no need to let those go to waste!

Of course, all of this trouble-causing just to see what would happen, was akin to throwing stuff at a wall to see what’d stick. Only Midas was basically lobbing a spear at innocent people. He eventually caught the attention of a pair of wandering siblings, who conflicted with Midas multiple times over his amoral actions. Yeah, it’s nice that your orchestration of a major disaster proved to you that fundamentally, people are good and DO want to help one another in moments of crisis. But you still caused a lot of deaths and surely you understand that destruction and chaos are more detrimental than good, right?

Understandably, some people found Midas obnoxious. Especially his tendency to form a golden human skull in his hands and then wax poetic on a monologue about the nature of people or the world or something like that. It was a common criticism that Midas preferred to gather knowledge without actually applying it, just learn and hoard and write down from time to time but never teach. Midas took this into account, not that he had the chance to really change his behavior because he was eventually captured and imprisoned in the Tower of Tears.

Freezing Midas in magical cryogenic stasis was definitely tricky, due to his aforementioned vulnerability to water. Luckily, the Tears figured it out; They knew Midas would HAVE to create a coating of inert gold around himself to survive, so he did just that as the Tears swirled around the Golden Man and froze, trapping and casting him into a deep sleep plagued with nightmares. When he finally did awake, Midas would ruminate on them for years later…

And he only ruminated because he was freed; The Tower of Tears was destroyed and Midas escaped into the night. He eventually regrouped with a good portion of his fellow Escapees, and sat down to trade stories, listening deeply all night long while also doling out his own tale. When it was done, Midas and his fellow Escapees were faced with a dilemma: What now? Revenge seemed an obvious choice, but what about after that?

Midas came up with some ideas, and he recognized those siblings, still alive and with descendants, were a threat… Perhaps the greatest threat to all of the Escapees, or he just wanted an excuse to enact vengeance. Either way, these and his other plans were what Midas proposed, and the Escapees around him agreed. From there, they settled down into an underground base, and recruited a few more members. Midas became the de facto leader with his lieutenant Lynkos the Living Diamond, and helped to organize the group’s missions.

It’d be easy to view his fellow Escapees as an opportunity for another social experiment of his, and maybe that’s what this really is, in the end; Just another experiment, under false pretenses, like he’s done with so many others. But whether or not that’s the case, Midas does have to admit that he’s come to value his fellow Escapees… Well, most of them. He’s a bit suspicious of Tamericus, but otherwise the two have some fun conversations about alchemy and philosophy, and their own ideas and history with the concept of the Philosopher’s Stone.

Midas is beginning to think it’s more an idea, while Tamericus insists it’s a physical thing that needs to be created, or recreated. And while Midas’ version was a decent start, it’s not the peak of what alchemists could achieve, and to be fair? Midas also agrees, having considered his attempt is more a means than the actual end. Though by Tamericus’ definition, it’s also deficient, and… Okay, Midas also agrees, he literally can’t swim! He might’ve lessened his weight and can apply a layer of inert gold, but! He’ll still sink like a rock! Some physical perfection THAT is! That is one more way in which water vexes the Golden Man.

That’s Midas! He’s an old, classic fave of mine. As someone who’s had to take an actual philosophy class since then, having to write Midas’ weird monologues and vague parameters is definitely the hardest part for me, and at times I do consider rewriting certain aspects of his motives and methods, if only to have more of an internal logic you could grasp. And also because the monologuing could easily come off as pretentious, but then to be fair, I guess it wouldn’t be out of the question to characterize Midas as such for them.

This didn’t really come through in the backstory, but Midas is kind of a HUGE troll. He’s got a lot of sarcasm and dry wit. There’s a playfulness to him, kind of a smug, menacing jokester, and I’m pretty sure this and the monologues are partly because Midas likes to hear his own voice. And, it IS a nice voice; Philosophies aside, Midas has basically the same personality as Hades from Kid Icarus Uprising (who is also his voice claim) with a bit of Beast Wars Megatron sprinkled in, though he’s more chill about being foiled. Like sure he CAN be irritated, but a lot of the time Midas is just enjoying himself and his own commentary.

As I said, he’s kind of just here to learn. He ain’t power-hungry, just morbidly curious (emphasis on morbidly), and while Midas does want to initiate a lot, he’s mostly in it for the ride, so he often takes it in stride, excuse the rhyme. Midas appreciates a good banter and can have a classy air to him (being made of gold either helps, and/or makes you gaudy)… But again, he’s still super obnoxious, and the monologues really don’t help (maybe Midas is just infodumping). Definitely funny to be an outside observer, but fairly infuriating if you have to actually deal with Midas yourself and be on the receiving end of his jabs. At this point, maybe this dude was a court jester in his past life, though with a lot less overt jokes and more emphasis on sarcastic commentary.

#oc #ocs #my ocs #Midas the Golden Man #my art #drawing #sketch #the escapees #GEverse

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nicklloydnow · 1 year ago

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“IN THE ANNALS OF ROCK HISTORY, Chinese Democracy is a punchline and a cautionary tale. Guns N’ Roses spent more than 14 years working on it. At the beginning of the process, they were still arguably the biggest rock band in the world. By the end, they were Axl Rose fronting a collection of musicians who could’ve staffed a rock & roll fantasy camp.

Much of the band’s core when they began making the album — Slash, Duff McKagan, Matt Sorum, Gilby Clarke — either quit or were fired (or both) along the way. New members reportedly had to be approved by Rose’s spiritual adviser, an aura-reading psychic from Sedona named Sharon Maynard, who was often referred to as “Yoda.” At various points, the band’s lineup included ex-members of Nine Inch Nails, Primus, the Replacements, Devo, and the Psychedelic Furs. The list of musicians who auditioned, contributed, or visited the sessions includes Dave Navarro, Brian May, Sebastian Bach, Moby, and Shaquille O’Neal.

You could write an entire book about the tenure of avant-garde guitarist Buckethead, who communicated with bandmates through a hand puppet, and for whom a chicken coop was constructed in the studio, where, according to Zutaut, the guitarist would record his parts and watch porn. Zutaut also once claimed that, after Rose’s wolf puppy took a shit in said chicken coop, Buckethead resisted efforts to clean it up, claiming he loved the smell.

The entire project wasn’t only time consuming, it was wildly expensive, with costs reportedly running to a quarter of a million dollars per month at some stages, and a final tab of at least $13 million. The protracted recording process was a function of, among other things, Rose’s desperate effort to match the sound coming out of the speakers to the sound in his head. A less charitable reading was that he’d simply lost the plot, and without a strong creative counterweight — someone like Slash or Duff who was equally invested in the outcome — there was nobody to help him find it.

(…)

Within the insular confines of the GN’R fan community, though, there were devotees like Dunsford and Madeline, for whom Chinese Democracy wasn’t an embarrassing bomb from a megalomaniac who’d alienated his most important collaborators. It was an overlooked magnum opus by a misunderstood genius. If GN’R’s early albums bottled a certain amount of anti-social rebellion, Chinese Democracy represents a kind of counterrevolution, in which its relative unpopularity has only intensified the passion of its adherents.

Madeline told me that for years on GN’R forums, “85 to 95 percent of fans wanted nothing to do with Guns N’ Roses unless it was discussing the old lineup. Then you have people like me — we call ourselves five-percenters. All we cared about was Chinese Democracy.”

(…)

Amid this void, the less-dedicated fans lost interest, leaving a hardcore group who feasted on any scraps of information they could scrounge. Every paparazzi photo of Rose would be studied for clues to his mind state. Fans would discuss a stray quote from a band member with the dedication of Talmudic scholars.

This sense of scarcity was foundational to the fan community. Anyone with access to new music or information — or anyone perceived to — has cachet. Unreleased music is the most prized of all currencies.

GN’R fans who manage to procure unreleased tracks, or even snippets of them, fall into two basic categories: hoarders and leakers. Hoarders keep whatever they find for themselves or share only with a handful of trusted friends. Leakers distribute it to the rest of the fans. Within the community, hoarders are both despised and venerated. They’re viewed as anti-democratic elitists, but they’re insiders with something everyone wants. On occasion, a hoarder may sell unreleased material or trade it — and some make real money doing this — but they intuitively understand the scarcity principle. If they distribute music widely, it not only puts them at risk legally, it also erases the music’s value and endangers their heightened status.

(…)

By the time of Chinese Democracy’s official release, most of its songs had already leaked, occasionally in dramatic fashion — including one, bizarrely, when then-New York Mets catcher Mike Piazza brought a CD-R of unreleased songs to Eddie Trunk’s radio show. The album’s anti-climactic arrival fed the fans’ thirst for more music. Suggestions from Rose and others that the album was intended as part of a trilogy, and that there was enough music to fill several albums, convinced some fans there was a lost classic just gathering dust in the band’s vault.

In light of this, many fans have come to resent GN’R’s secrecy and stinginess with new music. “The band should’ve figured out a way to manage their community online in a more positive way, instead of keeping them in the dark for so many years,” says Kooluris. “They’ve created all these monsters who just want to pillage, steal, and grab whatever they can get because they don’t feel like they’ve ever been appreciated by the band.… It’s like Stockholm syndrome. They’re chained up in the basement, they haven’t been outside for years, so they act in unhealthy ways.

“It’s more than the music,” he continues. “These people are looking for belonging.… But these guys invest so much that it distracts them from being happy. Because you’re not going to be happy if you’re all in on GN’R.”

(…)

The studio was Village Recorder, the legendary birthplace of Steely Dan’s Aja, Fleetwood Mac’s Tusk, and Dr. Dre’s The Chronic. GN’R moved their base of operations there in 2000. Nineteen of the CD-Rs Bird found in the locker were rough mixes from the 2000-01 Village sessions. They included complete songs, instrumentals, rehearsals, and alternate versions of previously released material. The sessions were legendary among fans. Nothing had ever leaked from them. This, they believed, was where they’d find their lost classic.

(…)

Fans have now been waiting nearly as long for a Chinese Democracy follow-up as they waited for Chinese Democracy. Whispers swirl about the imminent arrival of a new full-length culled from this batch of leaked material. But is this stuff any good?

Within the GN’R community, views diverge. “There’s plenty of material that could really be a legendary album,” says Dunsford. Kooluris is less sanguine: “These fans think Axl’s got another ‘Paradise City’ or ‘November Rain’ in the vault, and he fucking doesn’t.” There’s widespread enthusiasm for the raw, guitar-driven “Hard Skool,” which was released as a single in 2021 and hearkens back to pre-Chinese Democracy GN’R. It’s a particular curiosity because many fans interpret the lyrics (“You had to play it cool, had to do it your way/Had to be a fool, had to throw it all away”) as a shot at Slash, who rejoined the band with Duff in 2016, and ultimately contributed guitar parts to the finished song.

Many of the leaked songs aren’t hard to find online. Listening to them, it’s easy to convince yourself that with a little polish, “Atlas Shrugged,” the tense, dramatic “Perhaps,” and “State of Grace,” an industrial-tinged midtempo creeper, could’ve anchored another classic GN’R album. Other tracks feel half-baked. But judging these songs based on rough mixes feels unfair. Exploring ideas that never get fully fleshed out and trying things that don’t succeed is how the creative process is supposed to work. This, of course, underscores the moral argument against leaking unreleased music. “Ultimately, there’s only one truth,” says Kooluris. “It’s stolen music. These guys try to rationalize it, but it’s not theirs.”

(…)

One of his long-running motivations around leaking music has been to stick it to “the hoarding putzes,” though he recognizes the biggest hoarder of all is Rose himself. “He doesn’t owe anybody anything, but sometimes he teases like he’s going to do something, then nothing happens, and people get frustrated,” Craig says. “It’s almost like drug addicts.… You’re so desperate for a fix you’ll do things not within the norm to get your fix. All these kids are acting like they’re members of a spy ring.… You don’t see that with Metallica or Faith No More.”

(…)

Being a music fan has changed a lot in the past 20 years. Collecting an artist’s every release was once the sign of a true die-hard. Now, we all have that for nearly every artist in existence for the price of a monthly subscription fee.

So, in this time of instant access and overwhelming abundance, what defines real fandom? How do you prove it? Well, if you’re Rick Dunsford, you do whatever it takes to get your hands on the music nobody else has. When being a fan is easy, you do what’s hard. These GN’R fans — not just Dunsford, but the whole collection of crazies — understand that.”

“This, in the Year Punk Broke A.D., was months before Nevermind, and a year before Kurt Cobain, on the exact same journey as GN’R, rocked a “Corporate Magazines Still Suck” T-shit on Rolling Stone’s cover. But even as grunge and punk revivalism supposedly unseated mainstream rock in the Nineties (or so the myth goes), Guns N’ Roses, who’d been covering punk groups the U.K. Subs and the Misfits for years, were playing in stadiums alongside Metallica (another band that covered the Misfits, as well as punks Fang years before Nirvana). Mainstream rock, with all its primordial influences, was still bigger than ever and would remain so for at least a couple more years. This box set, memorializing the 30th anniversary of Guns N’ Roses’ overwhelming and intimidating Use Your Illusion albums — arriving, in true GN’R fashion, a year late — presents some interesting alternate facts for the alternative explosion.

(…)

The albums, in hindsight, present the paradox of a band of outsiders who have become the biggest band on the planet but still want to be rebels (see also: Neil Young’s fable of Johnny Rotten, and Kurt Cobain’s fable of Kurt Cobain). It’s a portrait of an identity crisis and it eventually tore them apart. But at the time, they rose to the challenge and reaped the rewards, even if by all accounts the Use Your Illusion albums are still Too Much Music.

(…)

By this point, the band had been called up from the streets and had risen to the occasion. They were still working together, and, gosh, maybe even liked each other. Three decades since their release, we know understand how the Use Your Illusion albums represented the most of what they could do, and they secured their legend. If they had called it quits completely after the tour, like the Police did after Synchronicity, and avoided all the nasty press digs, it could have been a clean break and we probably still would have gotten Chinese Democracy. But Use Your Illusion was a testament to their determination, which is still their driving force. Not grunge, not Spin, not good taste (or even bad taste) could hold them back then or now. This is a portrait of the kings of the jungle.”

#axl #axl rose #guns n roses #chinese democracy #use your illusion

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jaijaitbinks · 2 years ago

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"I'm just a guy who takes photos for fun"

Saitama is an anonymous photographer whose pictures are in a professional level. He simply sells them (at normal prize, for less than what they really cost) to a bussiness man who runs a photography gallery. This place holds photos from lots of different artists, but the public's favourite exhibition is always Saitama's. Genos is an amateur photographer and when he discovers Saitama's work, he decides that he needs to find that guy to improve himself. He first asks the man who buys the photos, but he won't reveal anything (because then, Saitama would become famous and he wouldn't get those high quality photos at such cheap prize). Genos surfes the internet, but nobody knows Saitama's identity, so he tried to investigate on his own. One day he wants to take a photo from a bridge, somehow stumbles and his camera almost falls into the water, but Saitama casually cathes it in the nick of time. They start talking and eventually become friends. Saitama gives Genos advices and tricks and sees that Genos is more skilled than he thinks.

Genos doesn't know who Saitama is until he goes to his apparment and sees all the pictures hanging and is like "OMG is you, I've been searching for you, you're my idol." Saitama begs Genos to not tell anyone and he finally agrees...but only if he takes Genos as disciple. Saitama accepts, resigned. Genos starts making a name for himself, but still thinks there's something missing: his main inspiration, his opus magnum. However, after spending one afternoon together, Genos wants to take a picture of the beautiful sunset. While he tries to find the perfect angle, the lens stops on Saitama (and Genos realizes the beauty of his sensei XD) "I'm sure someday you will find your muse, Genos." Genos looks through the camera, takes a picture without Saitama noticing and then stares, realizing he has already done it. I just made this because I liked the idea of Genos looking at his sensei as if he were a masterpiece.

OH. MY. FUCKING SHIT.

HOLY FUCK I LOVE THIS SO MUCH WHAT?????

I MIGHT BE DUMB BUT I WANNA KNOW IF YOU WANTED ME TO LIKE. WRITE A SCENE FOR THIS FOR THE SERIES I HAVE ON AO3 OR IF YOU WERE JUST SHARING, BUT EITHER WAY THIS IS LOVELY AND I'M GOING TO BE BRAINROTTING TF OUT OF THIS.

Okay, maybe Genos does polaroid photography on the side as well? Like he takes professional photos to earn money and make a name for himself, and then the polaroid photos are a side thing he does just cuz he loves the aesthetic. Then, at some point, he tells Saitama this in passing or Saitama finds his polaroid camera and he tells him that.

Saitama suggests "Hey, maybe we could take a selfie with it then? I think that'd look nice in polaroid." And Genos is internally over the moon. He agrees to it, of course (but if anyone asked later on why he had a photo of him and some bald guy in his wallet, he'd say it's only because he was fulfilling his sensei's request and he didn't know where to put the picture afterwards cuz he didn't want to throw it out), and they take the photo together.

He puts it in his pocket to develop, and for a while, they go on with photography lessons, walking around abandoned streets and snapping pictures. ("There's photo potential everywhere, Genos," Saitama had said, "Even in the grimy ruins where there's no signs of life. The fact there's nothing and no one to touch this area anymore is beautiful." Genos looked on at him with admiration and awe.)

It's only when they end their little trip and he goes home that he remembers the polaroid, and promptly takes it out. And he does not know how to describe it to anyone else that wasn't himself that the small, soft, gorgeous, and enchanting smile he had the fortune of capturing in that white-framed photo was single-handedly the light in his dark room, the first bloom of spring, the Northern Lights from a mountain view. It's one of two things he would never give away.

Not even to that other thing—person. Not even to him, he wouldn't give the photo.

#AAAAAAAAAAAA YOU GOT ME GOIN'#I LOVE THAT AU DUDE #FUCK #opm #one punch man #saitama #genosai #saigenos #genos #eggtoaster

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artbookdap · 2 years ago

Photo

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. being greeted on his return to the US after receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, Baltimore, MD. October 31, 1964. ⁠ ⁠ Photo is from 'Leonard Freed: Black in White America, 1963–1965,' Reel Art Press's remarkable expanded reissue of the Magnum photographer's seminal 1968 civil rights photo-essay.⁠ ⁠ Read more via linkinbio.⁠ ⁠ @leonardfreed #martinlutherking #drmartinlutherking #drmartinlutherkingjr #martinlutherkingday #civilrights #leonardfreed #blackinwhiteamerica⁠ ⁠ https://www.instagram.com/p/CnctAarJ5nB/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#martinlutherking #drmartinlutherking #drmartinlutherkingjr #martinlutherkingday #civilrights #leonardfreed #blackinwhiteamerica

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4eternal-life · 9 months ago

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Rafał Milach (Poland, b. 1978). Visual artist, photographer, author of photo books. Professor at the Krzysztof Kieślowski Film School in Katowice, Poland. "Currently my focus is on visual investigation of the systems of control and manipulation at the interface between the authorities and society. It follows from my long-term interest in the political transformation of the post-Soviet territories. For me, the former Eastern Bloc has become a laboratory in which various models of modern propaganda are tested...

A key focal point of my current artistic practice is the clash between non-heroic gestures and ostensibly neutral spaces, which are in fact set against a political background of current events."

His award-winning photo books include The Winners, 7 Rooms, and The First March of Gentlemen. Rafał Milach has received scholarships from the Polish Minister of Culture and National Heritage, Magnum Foundation, and European Cultural Foundation. Finalist of the prestigious Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2018 and winner of the World Press Photo competition. Co-founder of the Sputnik Photos collective of photographers and member of Magnum Photos.

Rafal Milach

#Rafał Milach #polish photographers #Georgia #photography #contemporary photography #architecture

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emreerolblog · 6 months ago

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The Negro Speaks of Rivers, Langston Hughes

I’ve known rivers:

I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.

I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.

I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.

I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.

I’ve known rivers:

Ancient, dusky rivers.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

photograph: Leonard Freed, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. being greeted on his return to the US after receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, 1964. Courtesy of Magnum Photos.

for the poet's favourite recordings:

#poetry #music #photograph #Spotify

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abigailvonah05 · 6 months ago

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Artist Research #7: Alec Soth

Introduction/Background:

Alec Soth is an American photographer born in 1969 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Throughout his career as a photographer, he has published over 25 books and done over 50 solo exhibitions. Growing up he was known to be very shy during school, but nevertheless he successfully studied and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College In New York. His photographic style is documentation and with this style he is concerned with “mythologies and oddities that proliferate America’s disconnected communities' ' (Magnum, profile). His projects tend to feature the midwest in America in a large scale format. Soth’s view of photography is very unique with his work being compared to works of literature, but Soth believes photography to be more fragmented; “It’s more like poetry than writing a novel” (Magnum, profile).

Notable works:

Alec Soth’s Sleeping by the Mississippi is one of his most defining photo book publications. Published in 2004, this was Soth’s first book and established him as one of the leading figures of photographic practice. This photo book depicts a series of road trips along the Mississippi river. To show these road trips, he photographs a mix of individuals, landscapes, and interiors that all convey the mood of loneliness and longing. Sloth merges a “documentary style with poetic sensibility” (Mackbooks). He first began to get the idea for this project when he began to get influenced through seeing the tradition of road trip photography. He decided to make this his own tradition and started following the Mississippi river in the car. He used the river as a way to connect with the people he photographed along the way. His strategy was to stop his car as soon as someone or something caught his eye, although this didn’t go exactly as planned since the photos he ended up taking weren’t what he envisioned. He eventually was able to capture what he wanted when he met the people along the Mississippi and they let him into their homes.

Awards/Nominations:

Alec Soth has won many awards in his life so far. A few of these awards include the following:

1999: McKnight Foundation Photography Fellowship, Minneapolis, MN.

2001: Travel and Study Grant, Jerome Foundation, for Sleeping by the Mississippi.

2003: Santa Fe Prize for Photography.

2004: McKnight Foundation Photography Fellowship, Minneapolis, MN.

2006: Finalist, Deutsche Börse Photography Prize. A £3000 prize.

2008: Bush Fellowship, Bush Foundation, Saint Paul, MN. A $50000 grant.

2013: McKnight Foundation Photography Fellowship, Minneapolis, MN.

2021: Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society, Bristol

Personal thoughts:

From researching Alec Soth and his work, I feel like his process of taking pictures is similar to mine, especially with how he took the photos for his project Sleeping by the Mississippi. Oftentimes I don’t have a set plan for how my pictures are going to look or even what pictures I will be taking at all. I did this for the scavenger hunt assignment, which I walked around Fresno State as well as my house looking for anything that stood out to me. I take a lot of comfort in the way he does this and even the fact that he almost didn’t stick with photography comforted me in a way as well. This gives me hope that even if I’m discouraged about how my photos look now, I know that if I keep on going I can accomplish everything I want to achieve.

Works cited:

https://www.magnumphotos.com/arts-culture/alec-soth-sleeping-by-the-mississippi/

https://www.magnumphotos.com/photographer/alec-soth/

https://www.mackbooks.us/products/sleeping-by-the-mississippi-br-alec-soth

https://alecsoth.com/photography/about

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alec_Soth

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ldrm · 7 months ago

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Alec Scoth

Alec Soth is an American photographer, born in 1969; his artwork is based more around the tradition of documentary photography. He is based in Minneapolis–Saint Paul, USA, is a full fledged Magnum Photos, and has a fellowship with the Guggenheim, McKnight, Bush, and Jerome Foundations. Soth was additionally awarded with the 2003 Santa Fe Prize for Photography. In his page on Magnum Photos, it states his thoughts about photography is more fragmented, as if it is more poetry than like writing a novel. A lot of his works are of people in general. None of the photos seem glamorized, outside of some photos for events that people were dressed nice for, a lot of the subjects felt more relatable and the works featured on the page were in a more retro setting.

This photo is of a woman and I assume her date as they were at the movie festival. From the film style and clothes the people were wearing, I would have expected this was taken way back in the day but turns out it was taken in 2012 and not in the 1990s. I feel simultaneously impressed but also feel a little bad as I feel old despite being in my 20s.

Horror Hotel Conversation and Movie Festival. Clarion Inn Hudson USA, 2012 Alec Soth

Magnum Photos

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vianey2618 · 1 year ago

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2. “Nicaragua” by Susan Meiselas

“Nicaragua”, by Susan Meiselas edited with Claire Rosenberg. It was originally published in 1981 but was given a second edition that was published in 2016 by Aperture, a non-profit organization. The pictures within the book were taken from 1978-1979, a very overwhelming time for the country of Nicaragua as it was in the midst of a revolution. The Somoza family had ruled over Nicaragua for 43 years leaving the people poor, thirsty, and sick as their leaders refused to help their citizens' basic needs. The people were desperate for a change to occur and in 1959 people began to unite on how they would make that happen and what they wanted to do. This led to the formation of a group of rebels in 1960, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), originally only consisting of 20 members; they would only continue to grow. Eventually becoming big enough that they could launch a military effort against the regime in 1970. They began a series of kidnappings and would successfully overthrow the Somoza regime in 1979. Beginning their new struggles of reformation and reconstruction. The book focuses on the revolution, the struggles, and the hopes of the people not glamorizing anything but just showing it as it is. The book is divided into multiple sections which enables the viewer to see the story being told. The book begins with photos of the Somoza Regime followed by photos of FSLN and their final offensive when they win the war, and ends with showing the start of the reconstruction. Susan Meiselas does not shy away from showing blood and death in her photobook, she focuses on showing the people and how they feel. She shows the revolutionaries laughing together and bonding in a moment of calm before they must go and risk their lives again. She shows families hiding and running away visualizing the true impact of this war and why it is being fought. She shows the lives of those who were killed mercilessly in the war. She shows the voices of the people whether through graffiti or through quotes. The book not only contains photos but also interviews of people she met and took photos of. Susan Meiselas herself was born in Baltimore, Maryland. She is known for her work on human rights issues in Latin America and focuses on documentation works. She received her MA from Harvard University, and her first book, Carnival Strippers, was done while she was teaching. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Hasselblad Foundation Photography Prize (1994) and the International Center of Photography's Infinity Award (2005). Her work has been exhibited at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago. Since 2007, she has been the President of the Magnum Foundation. Overall I enjoyed the book. It was informative and showed people the reality of war. Although the photos of dead people did really shock me at first I understand why it was there as it presents the uncomfortable truth. People enjoy being oblivious to what is happening around them and I think it’s important to learn about what’s happening even if it makes us uncomfortable. It is a good bittersweet book.

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