I'm seeing people point out that the Craving (at least the single version) is about SAI being perceived by a lot of people as a flop album & I think that's probably correct but I also think it probably applies to Lavish, because I truly cannot imagine why else they decided to include it on the album? Like don't get me wrong I love Lavish but narratively it reads as the most 'expendable" song on the tracklist. Yet Tyler allegedly wanted to leave off Navigating (which they gave the lore video to, lmao) and kept Lavish. Which is fair because it's a banger and a nice break from everything else, but it's also just telling to me that they very intentionally did a song about industry bullshit on this album, the most direct they've gotten since Lane Boy.
Like either their label or someone in the industry did something to piss them off that we don't know about, or it's a generalized frustration. I have to imagine it would hurt to be Grammy noms/winners two albums in a row and then be paid dust the minute you do something a little different. Or (purely speculating here) to experience label pressure to have another album cycle like blurryface, when that's virtually impossible to replicate unless you're, like, taylor swift specifically, and when it inevitably doesn't happen they start pulling back on financing/promoting you/helping you get nominations the same way they used to. They're fucking you behind your back and you can't really do much about it because they're the ones with the money and the influence, and you're supposed to trust them to take care of/care about your work. Like tøp has never been a band that values itself on award or critical recognition, it's always been for us, but creatively speaking the whiplash of going right from your most commercially successful album, to your most critically acclaimed album, then to your most criticized - and to a degree you now just assume your time as a critical/commercial darling has passed, which Tyler seems to - would have to hurt. It would have to.
Honestly tho he probably just knew he cooked with the proctologist line and needed everyone else to know too
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As promised! A deleted scene from Chapter 23 of Joining Together in thanks for you all helping my favorite duck not lose as badly in the duck poll <3
An hour left in their wait and boredom is setting in hard. Sarah perks up from her book at the panicked voices behind her, welcoming the distraction to try and identify the language being spoken. French? She looks over her shoulder at a group standing at the departures board, talking animatedly to one another. There are a lot of gestures happening. Five perks up slightly from his slouch to look, too.
As they continue arguing, Five interrupts to call over, “Excuse-moi? As-tu besoin d'aide?”
The group whips around to stare at Five, just as Sarah and Megan are. The same surprised expression is on everyone’s face.
“Parles français?” one of the men asks.
Five unfolds to stand and join them. “Oui. Médiocrement.”
Sarah and Megan watch in open amazement as Five talks with the French group. He nods along to what they say, expression pinching as he asks, “Á Detroit?” The group nods. They talk for a bit more and then Five nods again and leaves with them.
Megan turns to Sarah. “So... Five speaks French?”
“I guess.”
One day, Sarah is going to stop being surprised by all the incredible, random things he can do.
They wait impatiently for Five to return. He does, nearly fifteen minutes later, expression nonplussed like he hadn’t just jumped up and spoken another language out of nowhere. He folds back into his slouch and pulls his phone out to mess with.
Sarah and Megan wait.
He ignores them.
“Five?” Sarah prods.
“Hm?”
“You speak French?”
He shrugs. “Not well.”
“That was cool,” Megan says. “That you helped them.”
Another shrug. “It wasn’t a big deal. They just needed some help to figure out flight shit. Apparently, there’s weather over Chicago, where they were headed after being in New York, and their flight got diverted to Detroit. They didn’t know where they were supposed to go for next steps to actually get to Chicago.”
“All that and you don’t speak French well,” Sarah says dryly.
He slouches further in his seat.
“Do you speak any other languages?” Megan asks, her book forgotten on her knee.
“Um,” Five says. He holds out a hand to count on his fingers. “French, obviously. Spanish. Italian. My German is shit. Polish, for some reason. Greek, technically. A little Mandarin and Korean. A little Russian.”
Sarah stares at him, incredulous. “You speak nine languages?”
“Kind of? And ten. With English.”
“Holy crap,” Megan says.
“And not really!” Five rushes to say, starting to get defensive. “Like, the Greek is ancient Greek, which is functionally useless—”
“You know ancient Greek,” Sarah interrupts.
He rolls his eyes and recites a series of Greek-sounding syllables. “We all had to learn the Odyssey and Iliad in their original Greek. It stuck. It doesn’t count. And, some are just enough so I can say ‘Hi, I’m Number Five with the Umbrella Academy, I’m here to help. Don’t throw up on me.’ And to like. Find a bathroom.”
“How do you say that in other languages?”
“You get one, I’m not a performing monkey. Um, Witam, jestem Numer Pięć w Akademii Parasol. Jestem tu, aby cię uratować. Nie wymiotuj na mnie.”
While Sarah is smiling over how Five translates his name, Megan says, “That’s really cool, Five.”
“It’s nothing.”
“It’s a little something,” Sarah says. She checks her watch. “Still a little early, but do we want to migrate to our gate? Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll be ahead of schedule."
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So I don't know if you already answered a similar question but since lloyd is already kind of a teenager are you still going to include the episode where the ninjas get turned into kids? There's so much potential! Lloyd getting the chance to be the older brother, Jesse getting to swoon over a little Cole😳 and just adorable shenanigans! ... plus a monster on the heels of the Ninjas and out for blood
Yes, still including that episode! It’s got one of my favorite Lloyd moments in it after all ^^
Although Lloyd gets caught up in the aging thing by accident too (everyone affected gets aged down by seven years, making the Core Four 10 and 9 and Lloyd himself 7) and Nya’s the one playing the big sibling role instead (she gets exempted strictly due to Garmadon’s phrasing askfkglsjalf). Lloyd still makes a sacrifice of his childhood—we just still get to know how old he actually is haha
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