#none of this has to do with the original post holt shit

[haichengtual]

one of my favourite activities is going to the bookstore and people-watching because everyone is gorgeous

[fireandgloryrpg]

Congratulations Britt and welcome! We’re so happy to accept your application to play Blossom Yeamens with the faceclaim of Olivia Holt in Fire & Glory RPG! We can’t wait to begin roleplaying with you so please remember to look over our checklist!  

!! tw: bullying !!

Out of Character Information:

Name: Brittany

Pronouns: she/her

Age: 18 (but I’ll be 19 on February 5th ;) ayyee)

Timezone: EST

Activity: Gonna be honest and say I have no idea. I’m in my first semester of college (I know, it’s weird) so I’m still lowkey/highkey adjusting to college life so I may be spotty due to homework and the four clubs I’m in (why did I do that to myself my freshman year? I have no idea, good question. Wish I knew). But, I will try my hardest to at least get some replies through daily. On the weekends, however I’ll probably be more active since most of my friends go home on the weekend and I’m left all by myself (*queue Whitney Houston*) because I live further away from school.

Anything Else?: Please be patient with me because I literally haven’t rped since RoL so I barely remember how to use themes and cut posts and shit, but I’m sure after the first few times I’ll be a pro again. Also I’m very sad the rp opened during my hell, aka midterms. Felt like that was a personal attack (jk).

Original Character Application:

Name: Blossom Yeamans

Age and Birthday: 18. June 2nd

Faceclaim: First: Olivia Holt. Second: Auli'i Cravalho.

Heritage: Daughter of Eirene

ABILITIES: None

Affiliation: Fourth Cohort

Headcanons:

Although Blossom comes off as a ray of sunshine, she does have a badass side to her. She takes her training very seriously, training almost everyday. Due to her kindness and peaceful nature, she is often assumed to be weak. She is a very strong warrior, when need be. This developing from her being bullied while in school in New York City. She was seen as a weak freak, and quickly wanted to change that. She started going to the gym more, and even took a few boxing classes to improve her skills. Once she went to Camp Half Blood, she was able to be properly trained and now can handle a sword and dagger pretty well. Of course, she would never use her skills to hurt someone, only to prove that she is not as weak as she may seem. She also developed her skills to be able to protect herself and others if a monster were to attack.

Music was always the most calming for Blossom, besides yoga of course. All she needed was a ukelele and she was good to go. She even was able to write a few songs of her own, although she never dared to share those songs with anyone else. Those songs were her own private, little secrets. Although she never would share her own songs, she was never afraid to share her talents. She always finds her ukelele and sings a song if someone is sad. Sometimes music helps a person more than communicating with them. Plus, who doesn’t like music? Music always brings a smile to everyone’s face, and a little upbeat tune never hurt nobody.

Biography:

!! tw: bullying !!

Blossom Yeamans and her father lived in Eugene, Oregon, also know as the hippiest town in the United States. Her father raised her based on his beliefs of peace and harmony, which allowed them to fit right into the hippy town. She was raised on flowers, tie-dye, and pure happiness. Everyone in the small town was so kind, so insightful, and she soaked in every second and every lesson she learned while she lived there. Her father was also a yoga instructor in Eugene, which fascinated her for as long as she could remember. The whole idea of being able to find your center and be at peace, it was what made her feel most alive. She started learning yoga at age ten, when her father finally let her be exposed to this other side of his life. Ever since, she has practiced yoga every single day of her life. To this day, she wakes up every morning at five a.m and goes outside to do her yoga, watching the sun rise. By doing this, she is able to start her day feeling relaxed, awake, and at ease. Before she was able to have a love for yoga, she had a strong love for animals. While her father was off doing his yoga lessons, she would sneak off and go feed the squirrels, birds, or any other animal she could come across. She would pet them, love them, give them all names. Animals were her friends, and at a young age she decided to stop eating meat. With Eugene having a high growth of organic plants, she was able to eat as many organic vegetables and food as she pleased, making it easy for her to become a vegetarian. As she was a young teenager, she learned what it meant to be vegan, and then decided to cut all animal products from her diet. She hasn’t ate any animal products since the day she learned about veganism, now making her a vegan for four years and a vegetarian for eight.

Although Eugene was a wonderful place to live, full of people who practiced the hippie culture just like Blossom and her father, her father had a bigger dream. He wanted to open up a yoga shop in New York City. When Blossom turned fourteen, they picked up everything and went off to chase her father’s dreams. As any daughter would be, she was supportive of her father’s decisions, but was sad to leave the town she loved so dearly. She knew nothing different, the town of tie-dye and peace was her normal. Once they made it to New York City, reality soon hit her. As she started going to school, people would make fun of her, and for the first time in her life the term “hippie” had negative connotations attached to it. She was called a freak, loser, weirdo, everything and anything. She was bullied beyond belief, and was extremely unhappy with her new life in the city. But, when she got away from school and went home, she could see how thrilled her father was about yoga shop’s success. Between her father and yoga, she was able to find peace, despite the names she would be called at school. She focused on her grades, and soon made it to number one in her class. She still spoke her beliefs and practice yoga as much as she pleased, not letting other’s negative words destroy something she loved.

Once her father found out Blossom was being teased at school, he decided to help her learn how to defend herself, incase someone were to take their harassment to an extreme. He taught her how to dodge things quickly, how to get out of difficult situations, and what to do if someone did harm her. Little did she know, this was also a little introduction to what she would need to learn at Camp Half Blood. She became fast, and could honestly kick some ass when she needed to. Of course, she never did. She was an advocate of peace, she would never lay a hand on someone unless it was for her own protection. Even though she was good at moving fast and defending herself, she never thought she would need these skills.

The older she got, the more curious she got about her mother. Her mother was never discussed, but she did have one piece of her. A necklace, a necklace that she wore all day everyday. Her father said that her mother had left it for her, as a piece to remember her by. The necklace was simple, but meaningful. It had the universal sign for piece on a simple chain, and inside of it were flowers that always smelt amazing no matter how long she wore it. It was a keepsake, something to remind her of her culture, and of the mother she never had the pleasure of meeting. While living in New York City, she figured she had nothing to lose. She started to ask questions. Who was her mother? Where had she gone? Did she care about her? Eventually, her father cracked and explained that her mother was a Greek goddess, Eirene, the goddess of peace. The necklace her mother had given her was a hint. The peace sign on it indicated her mother was the goddess of peace, and the smell of the flowers protected her from dangerous monsters. It all made sense, why Blossom felt so passionate about the world being a better, peaceful place. But, there was more. There was camp, a camp full of people that were children of gods and goddess, just like her. She decided she had nothing to lose, since her school life wasn’t exactly the best. For the second time, she packed everything up and moved to a new place, Camp Half Blood. After being at Camp Half Blood, she decided to transfer to Camp Jupiter, where she was put in the fourth cohort.

Para Sample:

“You’re weak.”

“You fight like a girl.”

“You’re such a freak.”

“Go be a hippie somewhere else.”

“You don’t belong here.”

Although these were harsh words, these words always motivated Blossom. Those words were said by very unhappy individuals. People who wanted to take their anger and sadness out on her. Hurt people hurt people, but that didn’t mean that Blossom had to continue that chain.

One punch.

One punch into the punching bag for the guy who constantly followed her around for the sole purpose of tormenting her. He constantly told her she was weak. She believed in world peace, an “idiotic notion that was never going to happen”, according to him. How was he so sure? Did he have no faith in humanity? He obviously had not faith in her. If he did, he would leave her alone. Why was he so persistent in trying to bring her down?

Two punches.

Two punches into the punching bag for her trainer who told her she fought like a girl. Yes, fought like a girl. What does that even mean? Anyone can fight, when did gender become part of that? Did fighting like a girl mean she was weak? As a response, she worked out more, more specifically worked out her arms. She developed more muscle. With more muscle, she couldn’t be weak, right?

Three punches.

Three punches for the girl who always would look at her outfits and call her a freak. What was so freaky? Was it the fact that she always had on the brightest colors in the room while everyone else wore the darkest shades of each color? She liked bright colors, it wasn’t her fault that everyone else was so dull and enjoyed darkness. Or was it just freaky that someone could possibly stand out so much? Personally, Blossom never met another person that stood out quite like she did. She liked that part about herself though, it made her unique. Why did no one else like it? What was so hard for them to understand?

Four punches.

Four punches for the girls she tried to become friends with. She tried so hard to gain their friendship, until one of them told her to go be a hippie somewhere else. What did that even mean? Where was she supposed to go? New York was her home now, not by choice but by chance. She was supposed to be her hippie self here. Why was no one else like her? Why did no one understand her culture here?

Five final punches.

Five final punches for the guy who said she didn’t belong. Belong where? On this Earth? In the school? In this state? In this country? On this continent? There were so many possibilities, how was she supposed to know which one he meant? He must of meant at the school, because she knew that she didn’t belong there. She didn’t fit in, but that was okay. Believe it or not she liked not fitting in. It gave her freedom, it taught her not to care what other people think. It taught her what anger felt like, an emotion she never had before moving to New York with her father. She was always the happy kid, and to be thrown into a school with such hateful kids was life changing to stay the least.

She kept punching.

“Blossom? Hey, Blossom?” She faintly heard. It sounded like the voice was miles away. Suddenly, she was sucked out of her trance has she felt a light hand fall on her shoulder. “I think you’ve done enough. We’ll see you again next week, right?” her defence instructor asked with a bit of a worried look on her face.

“Right. Of course! I wouldn’t miss it for anything,” she assured her instructor with a bright smile. “I’ll come back stronger next week,” she stated and simply walked out of the room after that.

She would come back stronger next week because plenty more of rude things would be said to her at school, but she knew that their words wouldn’t hurt her, not in the slightest. Their words would make her stronger. Their words would make her faster. Their words would make her into a warrior, a warrior that fought for peace and love (and could also kick some serious ass if needed).

[thetwoguineabook]

@sunnydisposish thank you so much for the awesome feedback and great questions- hope you don’t mind me responding in a new post.

I’m so in love with Blackbird I don’t even know where to begin: the beautiful writing, the impressive historical accuracy and evocative world-building, the poignant storyline and entirely novel yet still somehow in-character arcs for Victor and Yuuri, the thought-provoking questions about politics, ideology, identity, and personal responsibility so skillfully woven into the love story at its center, and last but not least, your merciless puncturing of the British imperialist/colonialist/racist mindset (especially appreciated by this former subject who grew up in what was then still a British colony).

Thank you! It was definitely interesting to me to explore, even at a slight remove as both POV characters were decidedly non-British, the very weird situation of British politics in the immediate post-war era. WW2 was really the last death knell for Britain as the big imperial power on the world stage, but frankly we as a country still haven’t come to terms with that (cf. half the electorate seriously believing that we won’t be questing paddle-less for where Shit Creek rises in the Mountains of Oh God Why without the rest of the EU). The Attlee government was, in my humble but correct opinion, the best and most socially revolutionary government we ever had, but at the same time as we were creating the NHS and nationalising industries, we were also desperately trying to develop nuclear weapons and pissing and moaning about whether countries we’d been stamping on for centuries were ~really ready~ to see the back of us. It was a truly absurd time period.

Another reason I love it is that it’s so rewarding to re-read, because each time through I notice more little details sprinkled throughout the text, like easter eggs waiting to be discovered. For example, in ch. 4 you slip in a casual mention of a drunken assignation Yuuri once had with some guy from Cambridge named “Guy��� who professed to be a Communist, then in the very next section you have Georgi complaining to Victor about one of the agents he’s handling who goes by the name of “Hicks,” which is none other than the code name for Guy Burgess. :) 

Fun fact: I have a whole document in the notes section in Scrivener entitled ‘Yuuri’s ex-boyfriends’. He was... not very nice to a lot of them, lol. Once it occurred to me that, although Burgess would have come down from Cambridge before Yuuri went to Oxford, they could still very well have met (and drunk inordinate amounts of booze together) at the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race, I just couldn’t resist.

Also in ch. 4, you describe one of the musicians who had performed Shostakovich’s Symphony #7 during the Leningrad siege as “a short woman with long, pale hair and a hunger-pinched face who nevertheless stared into the camera with the piercing gaze of a soldier, a clarinet clutched in her hands like a rifle” – that has got to be an image of Yura’s mother, right?

Yes! That is none other than Yulia Plisetskaya, classical musician and denouncer of Yuri’s shitty dad. I am slightly intimidated by the prospect of writing it because the situation in Leningrad was so incredibly awful, but one of my planned side stories is about the Plisetskys and the Babichevs during the siege, and particularly about that August 1942 performance of the Shostakovich symphony and Yuri beginning to repair his incredibly fucked-up relationship with her.

Oh, and she’s a clarinettist for a reason ;)

In ch. 6, when Yuuri is told he is being reassigned to Korea, there’s a mention of the new British Consul-General to Korea, Sir Vyvyan Holt, and Yuuri’s boss reassures him that “Holt is… well he’s a lot of things, but he’s not an idiot. He’ll evacuate British diplomats if - when there’s a declaration of war.” So of course, when I googled Holt’s name, I learned that not only was he a real person, but when the Korean war broke out, Holt mistakenly thought he would be protected by his diplomatic immunity, and instead of evacuating everyone when he had the chance, he and his staff ended up being detained by the North Koreans, then forced on a death march to the far north of the peninsula where they were kept captive for several years. Oh the irony. If Yuuri had accepted the assignment, he would have suffered even more at the hands of the North Koreans once they realized he was Japanese, even without knowing he was a spy. (Shudder.)

Yeah that was some thick ladling of irony there, lol. Although perhaps Yuuri would at least have got on with Holt, since one of the ‘many things’ he was at least rumoured to be was gay. And the story of what happened to the actual MI6 officer who was undercover in Holt’s office when the war broke out is... well, interesting to say the least. I’ve got an historical notes post about it that just needs to be finished up.

You’ve thought out everything so thoroughly (down to Victor’s nom de guerre, Stefan Rittberger, and the figure skating jump known as the Rittberger loop) that I have to ask whether there’s a special meaning or symbolism behind your choice of “blackbird” as the title of the story. I mean, the first association that occurred to me, especially given your nom de plume of sixpences, was the children’s rhyme “Sing a song of sixpence / a pocketful of rye. / Four and twenty blackbirds / baked in a pie.” But some light googling turned up a plethora of meanings for “blackbird,” including: a symbol of freedom, a connotation of vigilance, shyness and insecurity, secrets and mystery, etc., any and all of which could fit. Then there are the well-known songs Bye-Bye Blackbird (which had a “cameo” in ch. 5) and the Beatles’ Blackbird (the lyrics for which also fit the story), and one of my favorite poems, the haiku-inspired “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens, which is so protean and capacious in its meanings that it could definitely fit. Finally, that redoubtable (and dubious) authority urbandictionary.com gives the following meanings (inter alia) for blackbird: 1. The act of leaving a group of people, especially a social event (i.e. business party), without saying goodbye to anyone and without anyone detecting your escape. 2. Someone who acts happy in public but is an emotional wreck in private. Someone who doesn’t advertise their depression.

Well for starters, the Stefan Rittberger alias followed the same pattern as every other original character in the fic- they are all named after figure skaters from their respective countries of origin (generally speaking with forenames and surnames from different individuals). The only exception was the Jamaican jazz band leader Nigel Harriott- the only male Jamaican figure skater whose name I could turn up was Paralympic skater Nigel Davis, so I gave him the surname of a real Jamaican jazz musician who emigrated to the UK in this period.

As for the origins of ‘Blackbird’... well, for starters, the nursery rhyme connection only occurred to me quite a way into writing the fic, haha. ‘sixpences’ originated as a reference to Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle, one of my favourite novels, and as a way to reference the various notions of luck associated with the old silver sixpence coins, and also because when I picked the name six or seven years ago the Livejournal username ‘sixpence’ in the singular was already taken!

I knew from the very first vague ideas I had about the fic that this was primarily a story about Victor- his character arc, specifically getting him to the point where he would joyfully betray his country for love, was the very first thing I knew I wanted to write about, before I was even sure it was going to be an historical AU! When you get right down to it, this is a fic about that scene where Victor’s standing on the Barcelona seafront, looking out over the Mediterranean, and admiring his engagement ring- it’s a story about what Victor is not only willing, but entirely happy to do for Yuuri.

Once I knew I wanted it to be a spy story I started doing the 100% most fun spy story thing and making up everyone’s ridiculous codenames. My initial idea for Yuuri was to use something piglet-related, for obvious reasons, but that both felt a bit too mean and also not like something Minako specifically would think to call him. I wanted to give him a name that evoked the kind of figure he cuts at the start of the story- small, unassuming, lonely, but with something very deep going on beneath the surface, the same way one flighty little bird can nevertheless produce the most beautiful song. It also fitted nicely in terms of a metaphor for what he was doing in Berlin- Japan is of course ‘the land of the rising sun’, and he was ‘singing’ information to the Allies from inside their command structure.

There is a minor bird motif throughout the fic- with maybe one or two exceptions, any time a bird is mentioned in scenery description, you’ll find it’s a dark-coloured one. It wouldn’t have made the cut as an epigraph since it’s from 2005, but this from ‘Rapture’, which is one of my favourite Carol Ann Duffy poems, was very much in my mind in planning out the shape of the plot:

How does it happen that our lives can drift far from our selves, while we stay trapped in time, queueing for death? It seems nothing will shift the pattern of our days, alter the rhyme we make with loss to assonance with bliss. Then love comes, like a sudden flight of birds from earth to heaven after rain. Your kiss, recalled, unstrings, like pearls, this chain of words. Huge skies connect us, joining here to there. Desire and passion on the thinking air.

So birds recur as a symbol of independence, of thinking and acting freely even under dire and constricting circumstances, and Yuuri specifically is codenamed after a bird. It only felt natural that the story of how Victor Nikiforov, Soviet patriot and enormously valuable and accomplished spy (indeed, modelled after a man dubbed ‘the most formidable spy in history’), came to throw away his career and his country, to choose love and the freedom to live as he wanted, should share Yuuri’s name.

Sorry to be such a nerd – I’m probably overthinking all of this – and for sending you such an interminable ask (which would have overflowed the tumblr ask box 10 times over), but I would love to know the meaning behind the title.

Look, I just wrote a 100k historical spy novel about characters from a sports anime. I am the biggest nerd. And I really had a great time answering your questions, so thank you again!

[kuroasutoro]

Who The Quiznak Did That? Parts 1&2(Edited)

Based off this post: http://rejected3.tumblr.com/image/150086965075

“Fight! Fight! Fight!” The crowd demanded blood. Her heart was pounding out of her chest. She was about to die. Never to see her mother, safe and lonely, back on Earth. Never to find out where her father and brother went, or even what happened to their pilot. She was going to be killed in a coliseum full of aliens that were craving her blood. All because she went searching for answers. Curiosity killed the cat, she chimed at herself. “Your up!” One of the alien’s robotic soldiers told her, calling her out of her mental ramble. She whimpered as the soldier held out the half sword, half battle axe for her.   “Let’s go!” He pushed her up and out of the corridor the second she took hold of the weapon. The lights of the stadium blinded her as she stumbled into the arena.   When her vision cleared, what she saw standing in the middle of the arena puzzled her beyond belief. Wasn’t she supposed to be facing the Champion? Standing in front of her was none other than the pilot of the Kerberos mission. Takashi Shirogane was standing in the rink with a robotic, prosthetic arm and yellow glowing eyes. Eyes that were looking at her with an intention that was unknown to her. “You ready to fight, little birdie?” His voice called out to her. That was not fully the voice of her brother’s best friend. This voice had a deep, dark undertone. One that matched the glowing eyes perfectly. They were both something that scared her. She was in disbelief that this man was Takashi. This man was more than capable of killing her in the blink of an eye and ready to do so at any moment.   For a split second his eyes went back to those of a normal person, white and full of shock, than instantly faded back into yellow as he sent her a sly grin. “Let the fight begin!” The second the announcer started the match, she knew she was going to die. She knew that she, Katie Holt, was about to be killed for sport by Takashi Shirogane.  

“Oh, well fuck. Um……..I’m gonna run now so, bye!” She took off running. There was no way in the universe she could beat someone like Takashi in combat. Sure she could run but that was basically it. Ba-bump, ba-bump, ba-bump! She didn’t know what was going to kill her first: an evil Takashi or a heart attack. As she looked back to see where he had gone she realized just running wasn’t going to help. He was already gaining on her. He was less then ten feet away. She took a sharp left, slid into a wall then took a right around a pillar. She then jumped behind a wall that was close to her. “Oh come on little birdie, hiding isn’t going to do you any good, and you know it!”  He was playing with her! She opened her mouth to send him a sarcastic remark than thought better of it. It would have given away were she was hiding. She slapped her hand over her mouth and tried to think of a way out of here. Than it hit her. She didn’t have to beat him, she only had to survive until the time limit ran out. She had a plan. She was using her weapon as a mirror to peak around the corner. She saw Takashi looking around every pilar and wall that he came across. She started to doubt her plan. What if he saw through it? What if things didn’t go as planned? What if she wasn’t quick enough? What if- “Found you!” He was siting on his hind legs like a cat, hunched over, on the wall above her. “Gah!” She shot backwards. Well that defiantly wasn’t what she wanted to happen. She hoped that she would have at least another thirty seconds to find another place to hide. Just as she went to dash away he grabbed her long, filthy hair. She knew she need to cut it. It was down by her waist and it was constantly getting in the way. Without a second thought she spun and cut it with the alien weapon. Now it hung just below her shoulders. Takashi was left sitting on the wall with a handful of her hair. His eyes were wide and full of surprise. He hadn’t expected her to cut her hair with ease. She’s a strong girl, Kuro. She is Matt’s little sister and the  Commander’s daughter.  Shut up Shiro! You won’t hurt her, I won’t let you. When have you ever been able to stop me? ……… Right, never! So just sit back and enjoy the view. Takashi had been so absorbed by his thoughts he lost sight of her. He looked back down at his left hand, his real hand, to find that he was still holding on to her hair. He gave a wicked grin and shoved it into his pocket. He always took a memento from each battle or victim he had. He bounded off the wall and broke into a run the second his feet hit the ground. This little birdie is fun! His laughter sent chills down Katie’s spine. The second she cut her hair she took off running. She ran around as many walls and pillars as she could. The battleground was a maze. She had been analyzing the layout when Takashi jumped up on to the wall. She might not be the most physical fighter being held captive but she was sure as hell one of the smartest ones. The arena was a circle and they had only been running (She was running and he was hunting but still) around maybe a third of the arena indicating that it was a lot bigger than she had originally calculated, but that gave her even more room to run and hide. As she rounded the next wall she flattened herself against the wall and tried to steady her breathing. There was no way to calm her heart so she just listened to it. In a strange way it was relaxing. She had been tuning out the crowd since the beginning of the fight. Now that she wasn’t so close to Takashi she aloud herself to breathe. The crowd was shouting and booing. They came here for blood and all they’d seen so far was running and hair cutting. My hair. She ran her fingers through it feeling all the knots and the end. It had always been so hard to run her hands through it before. She actually liked it now. To bad I’ll probably be dead soon, I would have loved to show this to Mom. She had always told her that short hair was really easy to take care of. “Come out, come out where ever you are!” He had taken a lot longer to call out then she though. Almost as if he had taken a break from trying to kill her. She knew that was to good to be true. Katie gripped the handle of her weapon tighter. She didn’t know how much longer she had to stall and she hopped that it would end soon. She really didn’t want to have to fight with Takashi but if this battle lasted much longer he would surely find her again and she knew that she wouldn’t get lucky twice. Stop this! Please, I’m begging you, don’t kill her! Shiro you must really care about this girl. You’re never this talkative in a battle. Hmm…all right I’ll think about NOT killing her, if you promise me something in return. Name it. I want more time in control outside of battles. What?! You are already in control of me when anything violent comes up and I know you have been taking control when I sleep. Well if that’s how it is then I guess this little birdie is going on our list of sins. NO! You…you can have more control out of battles, okay? Just don’t kill her. Hehe, Shiro you have got yourself a deal. “Hey little birdie? I’ve got something to tell you. I’m not going to kill you. Probably just hurt you a bit, but that’s it.” Is that supposed to make me feel better? She knew she couldn’t trust him but something defiantly different. Maybe it was the he sounded. It was almost like the real Takashi Shirogane’s voice. Nothing was menacing about it. she took a chance and took a peak at him. He was just standing there. He even put his weapon down. “How do I know I can trust you? I mean you were trying to kill me, like a minute ago?” She hated being wrong and she couldn’t make a wild guess even if her life was at stake. That was just how she was. Yet that’s what I just did. “Don’t worry, little birdie, I made an arrangement, of sorts, with Shiro. I keep my promises, so to speak. I swear you will make it out of this arena alive.” With the way he was implying this, Katie didn’t know what to think. But that wasn’t really what was on her mind. “Who is Shiro? I mean, I know you are Takashi, right? So did I miss something?” She was completely lost. The way he was talking made it sound like he was saying that he talked to another, actual person. “Don’t worry, sweetie, you'll find out in good time. I have a feeling that we will be seeing a lot more of each other.” Right as he started to talk to her, he was already stalking up to her. All sense of reason seemed to leave her there. She didn’t move. She didn’t make a motion to stop him from getting any closer. She just let him come right up to her. He was three feet away when he took a swing at her. But it was only his hand, for he had dropped his weapon when he started to ‘reason’ with her. She raised her forearm to protect herself, completely forgetting that in her other hand was a weapon. Then all she saw was darkness.

“-ey! Hey are you alright?!” She could make out what someone was saying but shouldn’t quite tell who it was. Her head was ringing. What happened? Where was she? The last thing she remembered was that she fighting Takashi in an arena. “Oh shit, Takashi!” Katie shot straight up. She remembered was that Takashi had struck her. On instinct she brought her hand to her face to hold her cheek. It was still puffy and hurting but was obvious it had been some time since she was struck. Wait if her cheek was this swollen then it most have been hours since it happened. “Y-yeah?” Came a very unsure voice. Katie looked over to where the voice came from. It was Takashi. “GAH!” She screamed as she jumped away from him. What was he doing here? Wait, where is here? She looked around as to where they where. She was sitting on a cot in a prison cell. He was kneeling beside the cot, looking worriedly at her. She looked back at him. He was looking at her with those beautiful dark gray eyes of his. Wait dark gray? Without a second thought she reached out to move his tuff of white hair to get a better look at his eyes. They aren’t yellow any more! “Your eyes.” She breathed out. From the moment she reached up to touch his hair, he just froze. To scared to make the wrong move and scare her. Call him selfish but he wanted her to like him. No one would talk to him, let alone get close enough to touch him. Not after Kuro pulled that last stunt. He ended up killing someone just waiting to get into the arena. Not to mention she was his best friend’s little sister and his commander’s daughter. So he just sat there as she played with his hair and examined his eyes. She had this gleam in her eyes that were telling him that she was trying to figure out something. By now his face was pink to his ears. But yet he just sat there, waiting till she either said something or jumped away from him once again. When she spoke of his eyes it seemed that she finally realized what she was doing. “S-sorry!” She squeaked and held her hands up in a surrender motion. He blinked a coupe of times as his hair fell back on to his face. He looked at her in an owl like way. Eyes wide and full of something that she couldn’t quite figure out. “It’s fine.” He shot her a sweet and sincere smile that made her heart clench in a painful way. Is this really the same man that I was fighting against mere hours ago? No that’s not possible, this is the real Takashi Shirogane. So then who was trying to kill me then? “Are you okay, Katie?” He was really concerned about if she was okay or not, because if she wasn’t, it would be Kuro’s,and unintentionally, his fault as well. “Yeah. I’m as good as a prisoner of an alien race gets.” Her voice was laced with sarcasm. She sighed out and let her shoulders drop. Is she mad at me? Or Kuro? She doesn’t look like she is in any pain. He was looking at her with real concern. Why is he looking at me like that? OH! Shit! “No, no, no! I’m good! Um, sorry, sarcasm is kind of my go to when I don’t know what to say.” She had a sprinkle of pink on her cheeks. She then gave him a goofy, awkward grin. That simple action made Shiro feel as if his heart was about to jump right out of his chest. “So, um, Takashi what happened?” She really hated not knowing what was going on. Then another question dawned on her. I wonder how he has been holding up? I mean he has been held prisoner for over two years. “Well, um, that’s a funny story….” He coughed into his fist and flushed another shade of red. When he looked up at her, she was just starring at him with a puzzled look. “If you want to know I’ll tell you but I have to know what the last thing you remember is?” He seriously hoped she didn’t remember that he nocked her upside the head. “Um well the last thing, I think, is when you hit me.” Well that plan just went out the window. How do I explain that? “But” She continued. He looked back at her hopping that he wasn’t about to be labeled as Monster in her book. “I think I know why you did hit me. You were trying to save my life, right? I mean at one point you did say you weren’t going to kill me.” Kuro actually said that? Yes I did! You should be thanking me Shiro, I had to do a lot of explaining to keep her alive.  The fact that Kuro had just spoken to him had seriously surprised Shiro. Kuro usually didn’t talk to him, like well, a person. It was usually right before something bad happened.

[doomedandstoned]

An Evening With Pallbearer

~Interview: Melissa Marie | Photos: Sally Townsend~

This year, PALLBEARER celebrates their 10th birthday and it's certainly been a hell of a decade-long ride for the Little Rock four. These days, if you ask them, the band is more apt to describe their sound simply as "heavy" than by other labels, but to us they'll always be a beloved doom metal original. The fact that they've risen to occupy the same festival bills as Slayer, Lamb of God, Black Label Society, and Testament is simply evidence to the strength of their compositions and the compelling power of their message.

As winter's days waned, Brett Campbell (guitars, main vocals), Devin Holt (guitars, backing vocals), Joseph Rowland (bass, backing vocals), and Mark Lierly (drums) made a tour stop in Indianapolis, fulfilling a string of US dates in support of 'Heartless' (2017 - Profound Lore Records) -- an album Doomed & Stoned was not content to review just once, but twice over. After the show (which we filmed and now post here for your enjoyment), Joseph, Devin, and Mark kicked up their feet and chatted it up with Melissa for a spell. (Editor)

Film by Melissa Marie

First off, I just want to congratulate you on kicking so much ass since you released your demo back in 2010 or so. This is great seeing you with Ruby The Hatchet. You guys must be feeling great about what you've done in the first few months of this year already.

Joseph: It's been great so far! We have a bunch of new material we've been working on. Obviously, we put out a new record last year. We had written and recorded that album the year before, so we have been ready to work on new stuff. Even though we're going to be out on tour a lot this year, everyone has been pretty hungry to work on new songs. Every time we work on new music, we learn new things and continue to grow together as musicians, so everyone is just excited to work on new material. We already have five new songs.

Your latest release, 'Heartless' (2017), is another rather conscientious album. There is a lot to be said for the musical attributes -- and, really, 'Heartless' sounds like the most comfortable I've heard this band -- but it greatly intrigues me on a lyrical level, too. The very first track, "I Saw The End," seems appropriate to explain the enduring life in 2017. Was 'Heartless' inspired by the political climate?

Joseph: Well, Brett wrote the lyrics.

Devin: But there was a literal political overhanging, right above our practice space. Everytime we would walk outside, there's a giant Donald Trump sign. So the entire time we're writing the record and we take a break, that's looming over us. Of course, I can't speak for Brett's lyrics. Maybe it subconsciously affected it or maybe it literally affected it, but I think there was kind of element in which we were aware that was there and things were changing and it was becoming a pretty negative environment at the time. I feel better now. Not that things are good, but people are persevering and fighting and there's good things going on. At the time, it was kind of hopeless. We were practicing seven or eight hours a day and then we would go outside.

Joseph: A hate sign, pretty much, and it's still there now. That sign didn't go away. And there's an element in the song, like whether or not Trump had won the world is still kind of fucked. It's hanging over everyone and is definitely hanging over us. Even though a lot of our lyrical content is dark, we want to be optimistic. So there's an element of, let's just hope for the best. We're all gonna die someday, let's live the best life we can.

Devin: I see no point in being a defeatist. That's the most easy, cop-out thing. Your not some kind of philosopher because you think things are shit and you're too lazy to do anything. There's nothing noble in that.

Heartless by Pallbearer

Did your fans respond to 'Heartless' in the way you thought they would? I'm sure gauging the online response is difficult because trolls do exist, but do you feel you got the response you expected?

Joseph: Trolls speak the loudest, so it's kind of hard to tell sometimes. So it's easy to look to much into that you. But we toured for a solid nine months last year, and so many people came up to us and talked about how much Heartless meant to them. So many people would say, "This is the best album you've done yet!" Or even if it wasn't their favorite, they still loved it. Just hearing fans say they love Sorrow and Extinction or Foundations, we rarely heard, "Well I love your old records, but I fucking hate Heartless."

Mark: Sometimes there's a little bit of that.

Joseph: (laughs) Our shows are bigger than ever. We're playing in bigger places and more people have been coming to the shows. It's clear it was a positive thing for enough people.

Devin: And an eclectic mixture too. People of all backgrounds. People of all ages and races and sexes and orientations. It's awesome.

Joseph: There's this perception even today, that online there's a group of people that don't like Heartless.   I just feel it doesn't translate in real life. The real life situation has ended up being quite a bit different. All of us feel quite a bit strongly about the record. There wasn't that "Oh man, we messed up" moment. I think it's the best thing we've done. It helped us to grow as musicians, leaps and bounds. The new stuff we've been working on is a good sign of that. We're always looking to evolve, learn from what we've done before, maybe continue to add elements that we've utilized before or combine with new stuff we've learned recently. Lately, especially Devin and I, we've been on a mega jazz kick. It's affecting a lot of the new songwriting. It's always going to be this constant evolution.

Devin: We've learned to keep ourselves excited about music, because it can be so draining touring so much. Last year was nine months out of the year, we have loved ones and family that we miss. So you have to keep the carrot in front of yourself. So we do that by challenging ourselves and being creative. Yeah, let's try some jazz stuff. That keeps us smiling and motivated. Every night we're excited to play.

Joseph: We're constant music fans. Even if we weren't musicians and out there touring, music is something that would still consume all of our waking life. It's just a by-product of listening to and discovering awesome music.

Devin: We are an absolute testament to organic growth, I believe. When we formed this band, none of us were half the players we are now. And not that we're great, there's no ego involved, we just weren't as good when we started. We've played for years now and are constantly working hard to get better. It's been the most organic thing.

Joseph: Even as individual players, some of us were better than others but we didn't know what the fuck we were doing as a touring band. When we were starting out, all the other local Little Rock bands we looked up to didn't really tour - and if they did, it wasn't much. Those were our heros. We only saw them in a home context. So we didn't know anything about touring or what it meant to be a professional band. We learned a lot of hard lessons!

Devin: It's the absolute definition of what it means to be a DIY band. From nowhere without an idea of what to do to becoming us. And again, there's no ego or narcissism. It's just been so organic. We're all just so happy to be on the ride.

Joseph: We're still trying to figure out how to make all this work.

Mark: Hopefully, we'll continue to grow more comfortable and interesting to listen to.

Joseph: Being in a band is a weird thing because people overlook so many aspects that it's almost like being on a sports team. They don't think of everything that's on the business side. Every day we gotta figure out where we're gonna sleep. We gotta figure out where the most comfortable place where we'll be rested enough.

Devin: While being able to afford it.

Joseph: We gotta make sure we're on time to get a good sound check. Like for instance, today we had the meet and greet at Kuma's Corner Indianapolis, so we had to be here even earlier than we would normally need to. So there's all these logistics that go into it and I think 95% of the people out there just think that bands show up and play. We have a tour manager that goes with us on the road, but right now this is just a week long tour so we decided not to bring out the tour manager but she's usually with us on those longer tours and we pay her. There's so much that goes into getting up on stage and playing and doing what we love. We have to keep in mind a hundred and five other things.

Devin: Someone could be having a bad day. So you have to learn to keep your space but also have them involved but also be empathetic to what they might be experiencing. So you're a therapist, counselor, couch philosopher, whatever. You have the tread on these waves so everyone is still able to communicate at a level that everyone is comfortable and okay. Sometimes you just wake up and it's a hard day. You also remain thankful that people and came and paid to see you play, and you want to perform the best you can. It's just difficult sometimes. Everyone has bad days. You feel unattractive or any sort of issue. You feel like you look like shit -- or you do look like shit because you haven't showered in three days -- and people are taking pictures of you. We just want to perform authentically and be genuine. But some days you're sick, or you've got allergies or whatever. It's very difficult and I think a lot of people overlook that stuff. I see it. Every now and then I'll see a band that's struggling but it's so genuine and authentic, that's it's special. They'll remember that performance and you'll remember that performance and for totally different reasons.

How do you feel being referred to as a "doom" band? Of course doom is an umbrella term, but it's clear Pallbearer is more than that. I pick up on a lot of undertones that are closer to progressive rock than doom.

Joseph: That's absolutely where we started. When we started this band, our goal was to make music in that style.Very quickly, we wanted to do other stuff. We wanted to add our own sort of personal touch. Going back to what I was saying earlier, we love so many different kinds of music that it consumes our lives. There was something that felt a little disingenuous with sticking to one specific thing. We wanted to bring in other elements on top of that foundation that we had.

Mark: Foundation of Burden! (laughs)

Devin: So many bands just echo the old bands and that doesn't interest me at all.

Mark: That's my biggest beef with doom.

It's a very oversaturated scene, for sure.

Joseph: When we started out, there weren't all these local doom bands around. There weren't these Sleep/Electric Wizard imitater bands all over.

Devin: Black Wolf Goat Mountain. That's like every other fucking band.

Joseph: Well, that hadn't quite happened yet. And you know what, that's great. There's always going to be bands that are after that. If you're playing locally with your buddies, you wanna smoke weed and play sick riffs, that's great. That's not quite the same motivation we have. We are always looking to challenge ourselves. Maybe that's what those guys are doing too, it's just in a different state or realm. I don't want to downplay what those bands are trying to do. We just very quickly grew out of wanting to emulate these tone bands.

Devin: Like amp worship shit. I like amps too, but there's a thing where you're gonna sound like Black Sabbath or Sleep or Pentagram. You eliminate those things and there's only twelve bands left.

Joseph: If we're talking amp worship, I'll take Robin Trower's amp tone versus Electric Wizard's amp tone.

Devin: You're not gonna be better than those bands. Why rip off Sleep? Because it's not going to be as good. Ever. Fucking ever! You're never going to be as good, ever. And there's so many bands that do it. It's cool if you're jamming and shit, but if you're really trying to perform or be genuine about it, I don't understand the drive of sounding exactly like someone else.

Joseph: There's no band that we've ever been like, "Dudes, let's just make a song that sounds like this." There might be an idea that's one part of the song, that gives way to entirely new ideas. But never like, "Let's recreate Dopesmoker."

I really think Pallbearer is one of the key bands that helped the doom scene in really becoming so popularized in the world of metal.

Joseph: Without sounding like an ego maniac, I feel like it's a pretty easy conclusion to make. It's blown the fuck up. I don't really know of anyone else that's really quite on the same level. Windhand was out there.

Devin: Yeah, Cough, too.

Joseph: Windhand and Cough, both of those bands are at the forefront.

Devin: There are definitely bands doing it. None of us want to take any sort of sole credit. If there was a first wave the American style of doom that is real popular right now, then we were probably on that first wave.

'Sorrow and Extinction' (2012) -- definition of a masterpiece.

Devin: Thank you.

I see you will be out on a massive tour with death metal greats Obituary along with some thrashy bands like Skeletonwitch and Dust Bolt later in the year. Are you trying to reach out into new areas to find new fans? Do you think your EP with the Type O Negative and Black Sabbath covers helped push you into new territory?

Devin: We'll play a darker toned set. It'll be more condensed since we're doing direct support. It'll be a darker set, for sure.

Joseph: It's not a tour that I don't think any of us would seek out, but one of our goals is to find people out there that enjoy deep and heavy music, but haven't necessarily heard of us yet.

Devin: The worst metal fan in the world is the fucking ignorant bigot that just likes one type of metal. That's so stupid to me. It is the dumbest, funniest thing and I'll laugh at you all fucking day.

Preach!

Devin: A lot of people like Candlemass and Obituary and Metallica and Pentagram or whatever. It's all metal, people call it different things. So I'd love to play on a death metal tour. We'd rather do that than play with five other doom metal bands that all play mid-tempo shit. I love mixing the genres up.

Joseph: One of my absolute favorite bands that we've ever played with is Cianide.

Devin: They're so sick.

Joseph: A band that is completely and theoretically outside of our style of music, but they're so great. We talked to them after the show, they're fans of us and we're fans of them. It was fucking great.

Mixed bag shows rule. Like the last time you guys were here, that was a great show with Kayo Dot. I'm a big Maudlin of The Well fan. I personally really enjoyed that and it was my first time seeing you guys, as well.

Devin: Ninety-percent of my metal friends would say the same thing. Why not bring a band like Kayo Dot to a show? People that listen to metal oftentimes listen to other shit.

Joseph: There's nothing more boring than a show and every single band is exactly the same. Not just as a musician, but also as a music fan. I don't want to go to a show if it's the same goddamn thing for four hours. That is not stimulating, in any way. The Obituary show is something that our agent put together. He also works for Obituary, so he asked if we would be interested in doing it. "It's different, but yeah we're interested." When it's like this, our own tour with Ruby The Hatchet, we wanted to doing something that is memorable, stimulating. We want people to walk away excited about it. There's something for everyone out there, even if they don't like us. Maybe they'll enjoy the other bands.

Any future potential covers? Your Type O Negative cover fucking ruled.

Joseph: We're doing "Run Like Hell" (Pink Floyd) very soon, actually. We're recording that in April. We're always talking about new cover ideas.

When I had heard that you guys covered Type O Negative, I was not sure but then I listened to it and damn! Pete Steele's voice is so deep and I was not expecting that.

Joseph: Brett's voice is actually really deep.

Devin: He's got a lot of range. That wasn't manipulated in any way. That's just him.

Joseph: A number of people have said that they thought that was a sample of Peter Steele at the end of the song. And, no, there's no sample -- all Brett.

Devin: No autotune shit. We are very morally against that shit.

What's the most important personal lesson you've learned from being in Pallbearer?

Joseph: Don't play through four full stacks and expect it to sound good.

Devin: Stop believing that music theory can find you. It's not a prison, it's just a path.

I understand this is one of the last dates on the tour. What's next for Pallbearer?

Joseph: As I said earlier, we have some new material that we're working on. A lot of that will not all be on one record. We're doing a song for the Adult Swim Series that should be coming out in April. Then the Pink Floyd cover. We have a few other things happening. We'll be touring pretty consistently until September or so, then it's going to be writing time for the next record.

Thanks for chatting with Doomed & Stoned, guys, and best of luck with the road ahead!

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