#nothing bad about its just really just want Nicolas ya know

[panmemefangirl]

Me:*finds a nice Nicolas x reader*

Fanfic: Yea no this is actually a Nicolas x reader x Worick ^^||

Me: oh okay...

[grimelords]

The hits just don’t stop coming!

My May playlist is finished and it’s only almost one month late! Everything you want and nothing you don’t from Nicki Minaj, the band that did the OC theme song and Italian Adele. What more could you ask for! 

Listen here!

Curious - Amerie: Amerie, who sang the world's greatest song 1 Thing and unfortunately never had any other good songs, surprise released a 22 minute album called 4AM Mulholland and a companion EP that was 20 minutes long called After 4AM last year. I don't know why she didn't just release one normal length album but anyway, because she's Amerie people weren't exactly eagerly awaiting a surprise release album from her so it came and went pretty quickly. This song though is really very good and sets a really nice midnight smoky tone that the whole rest of the album/EP unfortunately fails to really live up to. I also found out in my research that Amerie is also apparently a semi-influential book vlogger 'BookTuber' and last year edited a book of YA short stories where other BookTubers 'reimagined fairy tales from the oft-misunderstood villains' points of view. She's got heaps going on.

Vipers Follow You - Amon Tobin: Amon Tobin has lost his damn mind yet again. His last album was 8 years ago and it sounded like a hardware test for a new kind of million dollar sound system. Every single type of sound and frequency was crammed into it and it felt like a sound sculture that could physically attack you rather than an album that you listened to for fun. Now his new album sounds like the direct opposite. There's no drums on it at all and it's all stripped back thick and smooth acoustic-modelled textures and it's very nice. This song is a good example of the album feel overall: not exactly ambient or laid-back, but definite night music from a guy who has gone all the way from chillout trip-hop to walls of hydraulic noise over his career and it's always such a thrill to hear people pushing forward in their sound 9 albums in.

Do The Panic - Phantom Planet: Phantom Planet who famously did the theme song for The OC have reformed and released their first new song in ten years. This isn't that song but there was a bunch of people in the comments on the Stereogum article about it saying they were and underrated band and their 2008 album Raise The Dead has bangers and guess what: they were right!

Roman Holiday - Nicki Minaj: Roman Holiday reentered the billboard charts last month because it became relevant again via people putting it in memes where they would play a sped up version of the song over sped up videos of.. anything really. It's not a very good meme but I thank god for it because otherwise I would never have learned that it's a very good song. I also think there's a very interesting lesson to be learned here about Nicki Minaj because she premiered this song at the 2012 Grammys before Roman Reloaded came out with an elaborate Exorcist routine and everyone hated this extremely weird song and extremely weird performance so it was scrapped as the first single and they put out Starships instead. Nicki Minaj seem to me like an artist that has always struggled to ride the line between pop marketability and doing their own unique thing in much the same way as Eminem, and just like Eminem she's eventually settled in to a very safe and marketable version of herself. Roman Holiday is a glimpse of the Nicki That Could Have been that just starts singing Come All Ye Faithful in the middle of a song and does the chorus in an extremely dodgy British accent. There's a good bit on the wiki for this song that quotes Jessica Hooper's Spin review that says "the pop tracks are a paying of the piper and the too-perfect, Dr. Luke-produced songs are her penance for sneaking deranged yodeling ode 'Roman Holiday' in there." More deranged yodelling odes please Nicki!

Cousins - Vampire Weekend: I've never gotten into Vampire Weekend for an unknown reason. I like every song I've heard of theirs I've just never properly sat down and listened to an album and appreciated it until Father Of The Bride this year. I have however always loved Cousins. It’s got a completely deranged riff, the drums sound like their going to catch fire and it ends with chiming bells. It’s completely off the rails and I think the video is one of my favourites ever for just simply matching the tone of the song and the performance.

Lost Your Number - Nu Shooz: On the episode of R U Talkin' R.E.M Re: Me? with Ezra Koenig they were talking about grunge and the early 90s and how music that had 'authenticity' suddently became so popular. Scott's reasoning was that by the late 80s pop music had become so incredibly vaccuous and bad that people were yearning for anything with meaning. He said 'pop was so bad, stuff like Nu Shooz' and I immediately remembered how fucking good Nu Shooz are and paused the podcast to listen to them instead. This is an absolutely great song because the lyrics never rise above linear storytelling. 'I lost your number' is not a metaphor for lost contact or leaving someone or anything like that. This whole song is about trying to call someone but you've lost the piece of paper that you wrote their phone number on. She even describes the paper like maybe you the listener have seen it around somewhere, I absolutey love it.

Paper Trail$ - Joey Bada$$: Joey Bada$$ is a goon but he has good songs sometimes. If he wasn't a famous rapper he would be working full time in reddit arguments where people rank members of the Wu-Tang Clan. He's one of these 'real hip hop' 'lyrical miracle' guys and he even goes so far as to rework C.R.E.A.M in this song to say cash RUINS everything around me :O but this beat is nice as hell and I woke up with the bit where says 'shit is really real out here' repeating in my head.

Julien - Carly Rae Jepsen: I'm really loving this new Carly Rae album. It's not as heavy on hits as Emotion obviously but it's more even overall and has a lot more to dig into I think. I just keep listening to it. This song especially is so nice because it's a great example of how you only need two chords to get something extremely funky going.

Rock Non Stop - Cassius: Cassius finally have another great song! The nearly two minute choral intro is such genius because of how suddenly and forcefully it drops you into the middle of the most boneheaded dance song I've heard in a long time. Two different silly voices going back and forth with each other saying 'rock non stop' and 'gimme the good time', who could ask for anything more?

Just as I was about to publish this I saw the news that Phillipe Zdar died which is so sad! Just as they started releasing fantastic new music! So now this song is tinged with that sort of sadness which is unfair because it’s such a fun and silly piece of music, it doesn’t deserve to hold that kind of weight.

DOLO 5 - Dolo Percussion: This Dolo Percussion album absolutely astounded me. No melody! Just drums! For an hour and a half! It's a complete world of its own and you can get totally lost in the depths of it. Every song has a completely unique palette and it never ever feels boring like percussion focused music sometimes can, it's constantly evolving in every track and never settles into anything for too long. Things just come and go so naturally it feels like actually trying to figure out the structure of these songs would be impossible. There's a few moments where there's a hint of a bassline or melody in a some of the later songs and it completely shakes you up, like seeing sunlight again after years of absolutely thriving in the dark.

Song About An Angel - Sunny Day Real Estate: The way he sings 'running behind' in this is maybe one of my favourite pieces of vocal performance ever. He just shouted himself apart. Also the Genius description of this song is one of the best emo sentences I’ve ever seen: "The song is believed to be a conversation between a guy and an angel (possibly a girl)."

This Life - Vampire Weekend: The R U Talkin' R.E.M. Re: Me? episode with Ezra really put this album into a lot more context for me, because he's talking about being influenced by The Grateful Dead - not musically exactly but in the mindset and the idea of being in a guitar band and making guitar music in 2019 which is an interesting thing to think about. Anyway this has such a Dead feel to it and I'm really interested to see what they do live because as I've heard they're really mixing up their reputation of being a band that sounds exactly like the album and really going for it instead and doing absolutely anything which is a lot more fun.

The Past Is A Grotesque Animal - of Montreal: I've been getting heavily into Hissing Fauna Are You The Destroyer? this month and it's just so incredible. This song especially as the centrepiece of this whole album is amazing. The mindset is so intriguing to me: absolutely going though it in the worst way possible, getting divorced and everything like that but also somehow managing to keep it twee. The sorts of things that influenced this album would turn any normal person to heavier or stranger music but somehow he manages to believe so hard in the power of twee indie pop that he pushed it to the limit and create a masterpiece.

The Cascades - Janice Scroggins: You know that tweet about riding the bus and looking out the window and pretending the music you're listening to is the soundtrack to the movie about you riding the bus? That's me except with Scott Joplin rags and pretending i'm in a silent film where I embarrass myself in front of a society lady.

The Governor - Nicolas Jaar: I think i’ve probably already had this song on a playlist like three times so I’m going to stop talking about it but here’s my favourite thing this time: It could have just ended and been fine but instead it goes to saxophone hell and that’s what makes this a 10/10 song.

The Less I Know The Better - Tame Impala: My peabrain moment this month was suddenly developing a huge obsession with this song for some reason. Have you guys heard of this band ‘Tame Impala’? I really feel like they might blow up! One of my favourite things about this song is that the top youtube comment for a long time was ‘this is like the cuck anthem’. They’re right!

New Town - Life Without Buildings: Life Without Buildings feels like indie rock from another dimension. This came out in 2000 and for some reason I can't reconcile that fact with how it sounds. It sounds like it should have come out at least 5 years later. I cannot imagine this style of vocal ever working so effectively but somehow it just does. I'm hanging on absolutely every word and feeling it so intensely when in reality she sounds like something went wrong with the recording. I just love it.

Bang Bang Bang - Mark Ronson And The Business Intl: This is a hugely underrated song and this era of Mark Ronson seems to have been totally forgotten which is unfortunate. This song, Bad Romance by Lady Gaga and OMG by Usher all came out around the same time in my memory and I remember feeling very optimistic for the direction pop seemed to be heading in. Bombastic and unique and unafraid to be structurally different but then it turned out it wasn’t really a trend at all, it was just three great songs. So who knows.

Back To The Trees - Adele H: I suddenly remembered this song I completely fell in love with last year and remembered as a moderate hit only to find that it has <1000 listens on spotify and 300 on youtube. Simply not good enough, please listen to this song! Support my friend and yours Adele H: ‘The Italian Adelian’

Out There - Studio: What’s so good about Studio is it’s technically an electronic duo but it has the feeling of a jam jam band. Their wiki article is obviously written by their management but it also describes them as an ‘afrobeat-dub-disco-indie-pop adventure’ which is very true. It’s an adventure! It just keeps moving on and on through fifty flavours of groove!

Shut Up Kiss Me - Angel Olsen: This really is maybe the best love song ever written! Because it's about standing firm and not giving up on love! Stop pretending I'm not there when it's clear I'm not going anywhere / If I'm out of sight then take another look around!

Through This Town - Mia Dyson: If you ever need an optimistic song to lay down on the floor to then here's one.

Cry Flames - Rustie: I'm on my usual shit about how good Glass Swords was and how that it's a tragedy that this never coalesced into a major movement like it should have. This is such a good sound that just kind of disappeared because vaporwave and everything overlapped with the boring parts of it and the anime chillout version became popular instead. Sad!

Real Truth (feat. Tkay Maidza) - J-E-T-S, Machinedrum and Jimmy Edgar: I love this beat so much. The sort of beat that sounds like it's playing out of a droid that got shot with a lazer and is malfunctioning.

Aute Cuture - Rosalia: me putting these lyrics through google translate: oh my god she’s right this IS on fire

Self-Immolate - King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard: King Gizz are a metal band now and they're writing the very best kind of metal songs - sci-fi about burning to death in the skies of Venus that's also a climate change parable.

Magic Arrow - Timber Timbre: Timber Timbre feel underrated to me. I never see anyone talking about them but they're one of the most consistently great bands around, I absolutely love them. There's so much space in this song, this whole style of minimal production is underutilised. It feels like if Wicked Game by Chris Isaak was about an 18th century cult leader instead which I think we can all agree is a much improved song.

Kim's Caravan - Courtney Barnett: I love this style of songwriting where you just sit on an extremely heavy bassline the whole time and have no chorus, which affords you the freedom to just get bigger and bigger and smaller as you wish. The Drones cover of River Of Tears works like this too and I think it's just masterful.

When The Movie's Over - Twin Shadow: My belief is Confess is front to back one of the greatest pop albums ever written. Please, please listen to it and be moved.

listen here

[eriklehnsherrific]

in honor of the apush exam on friday

the apush exam is on friday so here is the ongoing list of quotes my classmates and I have been keeping since october:

“Yee-oh man farmers”-Will, 10/17/18

“Leaving out Will?! That’s like vote-kicking Canada!!” - Josh 10/17/18

“Elecatorical college”- Rishon, 10/17/18

“The Alien and Sedation Act”- Rishon, 10/17/18

“What is really really really significant about the political changes was”- Rishon, 10/18/18

“This class is the class that will destroy you” - Megan, 10/19/18

“‘I don’t want to work hard for him, he’s not smiling’”- Mr. Brown, 10/19/18

“I don’t even know what that means, but lets get it” - Rishon, 10/19/18

“My stomach is like...hungry” - Rishon 10/19/18

“Hey Ethan, do you have reading due tomorrow for Catch the Rider? (Catcher in the Rye)” - Rishon, 10/22/18

“If you can confuse the reader, then you are winning” - Will, 10/22/l18

“Is that a letter of the alphabet or, like… a physical letter?” - Ethan, 10/23/18

“Who can use their tail-hand the best?” Logan Durant, 10/26/18

“Nothing like sucking up a week before end of the quarter” Mr. Brown, 10/26/18

“Mr. Brown, I’m deeply hurt”-Ethan

“That’s okay”-Mr. Brown 10/26/18

“Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. Wait, no no no no… no… no… just... no” Rishon, 10/26/18

“I’m not going to risk wrinkling my suit!” - Ethan 10/29/18

“You can’t suppress poor people” - Josh 11/5/18

(Answers a question on slavery) “what did I just say?” -Will 11/7/18

“Do we need more analyzing? What is the level of analyzation we need?” - Sophia 11/7/18

“Is cotton edible?”- Ethan 11/8/18

“Hope! It gives them hope” - Josh 11/8/18

“What if we use Kansas as symbolism for the US?” - Josh 11/9/18

“Are there any fish that blow themselves up?” - Ethan 11/14/18

“How are crabs terrorists?” - Ethan 11/14/18

“Good ol’ slap stick” (During the Birth of the Nation) - Joel 11/16/18

“That doesn’t mean that honey mustard, barbecue, and mayo are not relevant” - Rishon (during class meeting) 11/20/18

“Snowfile”-Will 11/26/18

“What is manifest destiny?” -Mr. Brown “Ties into a lot of god and stuff” -Will 11/27/18

*Josh dabs at the mention of Nazism* - Josh, 11/28/18

“The plural of wheat is wheats” - Ethan 11/28/18

“Wheats is my favorite word” - Ethan 11/30/18

“I don’t know where I was going with that [rambling for 2 minutes] but . . . It was hard” - Rishon 12/3/18

“America, domes and wheats” - Lisa, 12/3/18

“You get wheat. Farmers have a lot of wheat. Wheats, if you will. Starting with big agriculture, farmers have lots of wheats. Wheatses!” - Josh/Joel, 12/3/18

“YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE!” - Josh, 12/11/18

“Stealing is fun”-Ethan, 12/13/18

“Ellis Island is like the TSA but the stakes are higher” - Josh, 12/13/18

“Austria-Hungaria” - Joel, 12/14/18

“MIchael Pheleps” - Rishon 12/18/18

“Can we bring cookies?”-Afra“sure if I don’t know about it”- Mr. Brown 12/18/18

“So its bad...it’s not good” -Rishon 12/20/18

“...you just cut me off to say you don’t know?” - Mr. Brown 12/20/18

“Joel are you balding?” - Ethan 12/20/18

“Simpleton sandwich: two pieces of bread, one slice of cheese” -Will 12/20/18

“So I called my historical critique ‘The Frontier Thesis is a piece of trash and so is Frederick Jackson Turner’ to make myself angry, but I forgot to change it before I submitted it. So the official title was ‘The Frontier Thesis is a piece of trash and so is Frederick Jackson Turner’”-Lisa 12/20/18

I can’t put the picture in here but Rishon deadass thought Ellis Island was called both Essil and Easter Island

“100 dollars… you can buy two fishtanks with that!” -Will 1/3/19

“But I don’t want you to get the idea that they just sent legions of young people down into the mines and said ‘1...2...3…’, and then they sneezed and out came the gold and the silver.” -Mr. Brown 1/4/19

“What type of currency is the United States’ dollar?”-Mr. Brown “Imaginary”-Josh 1/4/19

“We don’t heat our house with the oven, Rishon!”-Ethan, 1/7/19

“How do deaf people program?” -Will 1/9/19

“Say your sorrys”-Rishon 1/9/19

“When your father asks you if you wanna be an arborist…” -Ethan 1/9/19

“ save the kisses for your future wife”-Rishon“ I don't have a future wife”- Will 1/9/19

“Her husband… was like… her chicken” -Lisa, 1/10/19

“William Taft is more like a sourdough loaf”-Aliya 1/11/19

“She Rishoned it”-Mr. Brown, 1/11/19

“John Rolphee”-Rishon 1/15/19

“Give me liberty or give me education” - Josh 1/15/19

“I love how you are holding hands. You can’t do that on the test, but it’s cute”-Mr. Brown “No, that wasn’t… ok”-Rishon, 1/16/19

“If we annex Hawaii, we can stop Pearl Harbor”-Ethan 1/30/19

“The HawaYEET Act” - Logan 1/30/19

“When I read it, I was like, ‘wow’” -Afra 1/31/19

“The big whack”- Ethan 1/31/19

“It will be like the Second World War...except we’ll win this time…” - Megan 1/31/19

“We should colonize Russia so we can rule the world!” - Megan German 1/31/19

“And the politicians are like ‘I can oppress my people now!’ Then WHAM! Right back at ya!” - Ethan 1/31/19

“Note to self, Mr. Brown does not like aliens”- Will 2/1/19

“Treaty of Guadeloup”- Will, 2/1/19

*after falling asleep at 11:30 with book in hand* “these are naysayers” -Ethan (date unknown

)“What was the name of the international organization for workers that had a really funny name?”-Mr. Brown “The Comintern!”-Will 2/12/18

“If you go to QCC you are a KKK member”-Tom 2/12/18

“America was suffering but luckily Pearl Harbor came to the rescue”-Josh 2/12/18

(On rabbit bashing) “Can this be equated to playing a father-son game of catch?”-Ethan, 2/13/18

(On The Dust Bowl) “It’s like Christmas, but not fun” Will 2/27/19

“And the banks gave loans to… which also happened in 2008 or so…?” - Mr. Brown “Terrorists?” - Josh 2/2/7

“Rishon is that a juice box you’re drinking?”- Mr. Brown*Everyone looks back* “Nah, he’s just drinking chocolate milk”- Ethan 3/5/19

“Did the water get intoxicated?” Rishon 3/12/19

“He’s a comfy man”-Ethan, talking about Will’s shoulder 3/21/19

Ethan: “Can I go to the bathroom?” Mr. Brown: “So you can get out of doing work?” Ethan: “Of course not!” Mr. Brown:“Are you going to go vape?” 3/29/19

“We need a Google Doc Renaissance”-Will 3/29/19

“ Mr. Brown can I go to the bathroom?”-Ethan “Why, so you can juul?”-Mr.Brown

“It’s like an in class field trip, but not fun” -will 4/1/19

Afra: *Making the Unit 6 map on the board *Mr. Brown:  “On the board, write methods” Afra: *writes ‘Meth’*4/5/19

“Scums” Rishon 4/3/19

“Look at how big Reagan’s gavel is!” - Ethan

“Big Gavel Energy”-Lisa 4/10/19 “BGE” -Ethan

“Barack Obama. I was trying to remember his first name”-Stefanie 4/29/19

“My life can be summed up into two parts: pre depression and depression” -Stefanie “My life before and after APUSH”-Sufana 4/29/19

“Manifest Destiny. Manifestiny”-Sufana 4/29/19

“I’m going to make it prettier this time. I’m going to make it horizontal.” - Lisa 4/29/19

“This class has a very strange dynamic. Half of us are depressed and the other half would make Narcissus look insecure.” - Sufana 4/27/19

“Battle of Yemen (Yorktown)” -Rishon 4/29/19

“The John Smith Era”-Rishon 4/29/19

“Big Stick Diplomacy”-Mr Brown “Big Stick Energy”-Stefanie 4/30/19 

“We will talk about dictators and leaders of genocide, but not bad actors” Mr. Brown (About Nicolas Cage) 4/30/19

“National Treasure is one of my favorite movies and one of my family’s favorite movies. We’ve watched it more than eight times probably” - Stefanie “Wow. Now I’ve lost all my respect for both you AND your family” - Mr. Brown 4/30/19

“Our APUSH class is just one big support group” - Stefanie (5/1/19)

“1908 supreme court case that gave women a 10 hour work day”- Mr. Brown“Women v United States? Just kidding that’s every day”-Megan 5/7/19

i’m sure we’ll say more dumb shit once the exam is over. for now, happy testing and goodluck!

[robronsecretvalentine]

The Flames of Passion

Robert and Aaron haven’t had much time together, so one comes up with a plan to fix that.

Happy Valentines Day @rustandruin! I hope your day is filled with nothing but sweetness!

The world had not been kind to Robert Sugden and Aaron Dingle. More like the cosmic universe had taken a giant metaphorical dump on Robert Sugden and Aaron Dingle. They had been busy has all hell for a good month, and not the good kind, like, ‘my business is booming my husband and I are going on holiday’ type of busy. No, it was ‘dealing with difficult clients and a difficult teenager and the Dingle clan in general’ type of busy. And both men were about to lose their heads.

They have hardly seen each other in the past weeks, forget about actually talking…or touching…or doing anything else for that matter. Neither of them can even muster up enough energy at the end of the day for some heavy petting. Something has got to give now, both men need to get laid by their husband, and they need it now.

And Robert has a plan…

He had perfected his ‘sick’ work so that he could thoroughly convince Nicola that he was close to death, and then took a trip down to Hotten to stock up on supplies. He doesn’t plan on to leave his home or his husband for anything, nonetheless food and the like. It is a Friday and Robert may have – okay totally did -  bribe Gerry with a pay bonus and a video game of his choosing if he would put in a few extra hours at the scrapyard, and send Aaron packing early.

Robert sets about lighting the whole living room with candles (which normally, he wouldn’t bother with, considering Aaron would either scoff at the gesture or completely ignore their existence) but he was determined to make it a ‘moment.’

Robert puts on the jeans that Aaron likes, the ones that cling to his thighs and Aaron’s favorite shirt on him, and waits on the couch for his husband to get home.

When Aaron does finally arrive home, he tears though the front door in a flurry of expletives after tripping over Liv’s school bag and shoes that she dropped at the door. When he finally looks up, he is met with a darkened living room, only lit by the candles scattered through the space, casting their soft halo of light over his husband who is now standing up from his place on the couch.

“What’s all this about?” Aaron questions, looking around the room with a mixture of confusion and admiration. Robert makes his way over to where Aaron is still glued to his place in the doorway, grabbing his hands and leading him over to the couch.

“We haven’t been able to see much of each other lately and I just wanted to treat you a bit. I miss my husband you know?”

“Um, we live together…” Aaron snorts in retort.

“Well, it hasn’t felt like it, not recently. And… I MISS you…” Robert runs his hands down Aaron’s arms, pulling him down on the couch. Aaron hums as a smirk creeps onto his face and Robert pulls him in for a kiss. They kiss for a while, not making any attempt to go further, just re-discovering each other’s lips. Until Aaron pulls at Robert’s shirt buttons, slowly and deftly undoing them, smiling into Robert’s lips.

When he finally releases Robert’s chest form it’s fabric prison, he tosses the shirt aside, without so much as a second thought, in favor of pushing his husband down on the sofa and straddling his hips…

That is until the smell of smoke starts to fill the room; Aaron having totally forgotten the candles scattered around the room when he tossed Robert’s shirt aside. It is Robert who notices the flaming article of clothing first, panic running though his veins instantaneously. Robert pushes Aaron off of him, who subsequently ends up falling over the back of the sofa, and runs to the sink, filling up a dirty bowl full of water and throwing it on the flaming garment. When his first attempt doesn’t extinguish the flames completely, he grabs the top instinctively and without thinking that it was still smoking, and throws it on the ground to stamp it out, burning his hands and cursing up a storm in the process.

And that extinguishes the flames completely and the only sounds left in the room were Robert’s hisses at his injured hands and Aaron’s groans from where he is finally getting to his feet after sailing over the back of the sofa.

“Are you okay?” Aaron asks, groaning.

“Not really…” Robert says, running over to the sink to stick his burned palms under the cool water.

“Rob!” Aaron shouts, coming up behind his husband to assess the damage. “Those look bad…I think we need to take you to see a doctor, “concern now lacing Aaron’s voice.

“But what about our night?” Robert says through gritted teeth.

“Robert, it’s not like you can do anything anyway with toasted hands. Come on, let’s get you checked out.” Aaron goes to the freezer and takes out a package of frozen peas and Robert cradles them in his hands.

“What about you, are you okay?” Robert asks. “Fine, just a bump on the head,” Aaron answers. As they head for the door, Aaron puts one of his hoodies that was luckily hanging on the hook by the door on his half-naked husband as well as making sure to blow out the rest of the candles that litter the room, that is enough for the night.

________________________________________

After a couple of hours at A&E where they treated Robert’s burns and checked out the now golf-ball sized bump on Aaron’s head, the boys are back in the car, forgoing the prospect of Robert’s semi-fancy food for burgers instead. Aaron pulls over to the nearest lay-by so that they can eat, both too starving to wait until they actually get back to the Mill.

‘I am sorry our weekend got ruined,” Robert says as Aaron stuffs his face into his burger.

“Robert…” Aaron says around his bite, quickly swallowing, “its fine. I mean, I am the one that threw your shirt in an open flame.”

“Yeah, in retrospect, maybe the candles were a bad idea.”

“Candles are always a bad idea, mate,” Aaron snorts.

“We just have been so busy lately, and we have hardly seen each other…I just wanted to make it a bit special, ya’ know?”

Aaron smiles, “I know. But Rob, you don’t have to. I just like being with you. You know, I kind of love you.”

“Really…” Robert questions, “Well, you better not tell my husband.”

“Shut up,” Aaron cheekily demands as he leans across the center console and kisses Robert deeply.

“I love you, “Aaron whispers against his lips as the pair breaks apart.

“You are going to have to find a new favorite shirt of mine, “Robert says in return.

“Hmmm…I am sure I will. Now eat your burger, or am I going to have to feed you now, mitten hands?”

[delightfully-daisy]

CHARACTER SHEET: DAISY AUDREY ELOISE CANARD

And she's been living on the highest shelf... Oh, and they come unstuck Lady, running down to the riptide Taken away to the dark side

[TW: sexual assault mentions; eating disorder mentions]

STATS

Birthday: 14 January 1995

Hogwarts House (Primary): Ravenclaw

Hogwarts House (Secondary): Hufflepuff

Myers-Briggs: ESFJ

Enneagram: Type 3

Height:  5’4

BACKGROUND OVERVIEW

Mother: Lilian Ophelia Marie Harcourt Canard

Father: Jacques Didier Canard

Mother’s Occupation: lawyer—business law

Father’s Occupation: stockbrocker

Family Finances: quite wealthy—combination of old money on both ends, as well as parents’ own ambitions and finances

Birth Order: middle child

Siblings: Nicolas Etienne Jeannot Canard (24); Andre Leon Charles Canard (19)

Other Close Family: Aunt Cecile on her dad’s side (who has a girlfriend and is like super cool and a movie producer); she has another aunt on that side who has two kids her and Nic’s ages but I don’t have my notebook on hand so I cant look up their names oh well; Lilian is an only child

Best Friend: Clarke

Other Friends: Annette Grant, Hermes Petros, Toulouse Bonfamille, Stanley Schell, Abby and Tabitha

Enemies: Tito? Lol she thinks so :C

Pets: a cat named Sabrina! Her family also has two dogs named Gigi and Fifi

Home Life During Childhood: her parents were both very busy, but she and her siblings were very close and her dad made a huge insistence on family time when they were together; to this day they have a designated week in late July and winter where they go on vacations together; she’s very close with Nic and her dad; Andre can be a bit of a brat; she clashed with her mother a bit growing up but she’s starting to understand her more

Town or City Name(s): Paris, France

What Did Her Bedroom Look Like: very nice and spacious, big windows with a nice view, she has a canopy bed, everything is in pastel colors, lots of whites and pinks—nothing too loud, everything soft like a Rococo painting, a big walk-in closet, a nicely lit vanity, the artwork in there is carefully selected, everything has its place

Any Sports or Clubs: did newspaper also probably a creative writing club; used to fence and do ballet, but quite around 13/14 years old

Favorite Toy or Game: loved paper dolls

Schooling: one last semester at Pride U; probably did some pretty expensive private school in Paris

Favorite Subject: Composition, Art History

Popular or Loner: Popular!

Important Experiences or Events: was sexually assaulted at 17, her then-boyfriend lied about it and harassed her for months after

Health Problems: undiagnosed anxiety, lowkey makes herself throw up after eating sometimes also

Culture: French

Religion and beliefs: Raised Catholic, she wants to believe in a benevolent God but does not really like the Catholic church; she wants to believe in the goodness of people

 PERSONALITY

Bad Habits:  worries, limits her food intake a lot haha, has a tendency to keep her emotions inside before lashing out, cries a lot

Good Habits: uh, organized, keeps up with her fitness, ambitious, kind-hearted (in her own way), stylish

Best Characteristic: determined—once she sets her mind on something or someone, she will not quit

Worst Characteristic: scared—her number one limitation in life is that she is too scared to take chances/take risks/do anything without security

Worst Memory: the whole sexual assault thing and also the night she broke up with Tito

Best Memory: oh gosh, probably getting her bike back

Proud of: not much lol, uh maybe her fashion sense, she’s like really insecure though and attributes all her successes to other factors, poor bby

Embarrassed by: e v e r y t h I ng have you seen how much this girl blushes

Driving Style: she’s a fantastic driver—fast, daring, drives stick-shift in heels, cuts tight corners on her motorcycle, she’s fab, best driver of my characters (except maybe for Eva, but that’s cuz Eva has heightened reflexes lol); does have a tendency to speed, but doesn’t do it except on isolated roads

Strong Points: determined, hard working, kind-hearted, stylish

Temperament: gosh im not sure its like a mix of sanguine and melancholic

Attitude: outwardly, confident and determined; inwardly, really fuckin’ anxious and insecure about everything

Weakness: she’s so insecure and not good with criticism and she’s soft little flower it is easy to crush her

Fears: everything—not being good enough is the main one though

Phobias: see above lol

Secrets: not too open about the whole sexual assault thing for obvious reasons, also he like harassed her for months afterwards

Regrets: every romantic relationship she’s ever had because it makes her seem stupid and heartless and foolish

Feels Vulnerable When: uh always? When she’s being emotional, tbh, since she’s been told to restrict that

Pet Peeves: people who assume she’s dumb, people who assume she’s shallow

Conflicts: oh gosh where to begin—the fact that she wants the world to be this good, ideal place where she has the ability to help it, but the reality that class differences/prejudices in other areas are very real and very hard to overcome; her own desire to do more with her life, but knowing that rejecting her family’s values would not be good, and she really loves her family; navigating being a soft woman in a world that otherwise respects hard, sharp ones

Motivation: She wants to be successful and to make a change in the world.

Short Term Goals and Hopes: Graduate, get a good job somewhere in a big city.

Long Term Goals and Hopes: Rise to the top of her career, hopefully get married at one point.

Sexuality: bisexual

Exercise Routine: goes to spin class three times a week, does a barre class twice a week, weight training the other days, very committed exercise schedule

Day or Night Person — Day.

Introvert or Extrovert — Extrovert.

Optimist or Pessimist — Pessimist, though she tries to be optimistic to other people.

LIKES AND STYLES

Music: girly pop, MUSICALS—she’s a huge musical gal, sings in the shower all the time. Loves taylor swift, knows that its problematic to love taylor swift, but does so in that well #feminism way that’s also lowkey problematic ahaha. Her iTunes is mostly musicals and pop and some classical music too, she likes ballet music.

Books: classics and romance novels; also some trashy YA romance; went through a John Green phase in her high school years; her favourite book is The Bell Jar. She also reads those like “Oprah Book of the Month” club books and enjoys them. Gets most of her reading list from bestsellers lists.

Magazines: VOGUE aka the Bible; also Cosmo and Marie Claire and other high-fashion magazines; whatever the French equivalent of Time is, but also Time; started a subscription to the New Yorker whilst she was in NYC and keeps up with it

Foods: has a sweet tooth—loves chocolate. Chocolate-covered strawberries are her favorite. She thinks she can handle spicy, but she can’t really.

Drinks: Margaritas are her cocktail of choice; she loves champagne and lattes

Animals: cats! Also she loves swans and thinks its so romantic that they mate for life, but she won’t admit that lol

Sports: follows Formula One racing tbh and also fencing

Social Issues: Feminism! (she’s like lowkey a bit of a white feminist) Magick Rights! (lowkey also a bit of a problematic activist in everything; she’s trying though) Also involved in environmental issues!! (she works on a turtle fund thing with Stan)

Favorite Saying: “I believe in pink. I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day and I believe in miracles.” – Audrey Hepburn

Color: Pink!! Any and all shades! Also likes a nice rose-gold. Fond of pastel colors in decorating.

Clothing: Has a very classy, preppy style; lots of skirts and blazers; usually always in heels; most everything is designer and high-end; she takes pride in her style; she also dresses more on the conservative end, but does own a few sexier pieces

Jewelry: very classy, never overdoes herself with jewelry; simple pendants and studs

Games: played the Sims a lot, played racing games with her brothers, Mario Kart fan too

Websites: Instagram—also has a finsta bc she’s hip; tumblr; Pinterest

TV Shows: Downton Abbey, Sex and the City

Movies: The Devil Wears Prada!! (Also Titanic)

Greatest Want: To be successful and make a difference in the world

Greatest Need: To overcome her fears

CURRENTLY 

Home: lives in Castle Suites in a very luxurious one-bedroom flat

Household furnishings: everything is impeccably decorated, lots of pastels and golds, there’s a big window in the living room (which has like white furniture and soft lights everywhere, big white rug on the floor, lots of throw pillows), her room has a big bed with lots of pillows and her closet is organized by type of clothes and colour

Favorite Possession: her car

Most Cherished Possession: her motorcycle

Married Before: Nope.

Significant Other Before: Tito (rip); asshole French boyfriend, Michel

Children: n/a

Relationship with Family:  huge Daddy’s girl, but Daddy is also very busy and not super around all the time and she doesn’t really confide in him; very close to older brother, Nic, sometimes they feel like they are the only people in the world they can trust; younger brother has a strained relationship bc he can be kinda douche but they love each other; relationship with mother is---complicated, they are very similar and often butt heads because of their differences though and Lilian thinks she knows what’s best etc etc and Daisy is just starting to see her mom in a new light

Car: BMW, she also has a motorcycle

Career: journalism student, editor-in-chief of campus magazine: Social

Dream Career: editor in chief of a fashion magazine that also has like a huge philanthropy side

Dream Life: said career, has not given much thought to the like actual life part of it, but ideally she’d like to be married to the love of her life and have two kids as well

Love Life: uh imma get back to you on that

Hobbies : reading, dancing (she loves dancing), driving, sketching fashions, cleaning (lol), amateur baker, used to be a fencer, writing (she used to write short stories but has not in a while)

Guilty Pleasure : those trashy Harlequin romance novels….

Sports or Clubs: Social, PrideU’s premier campus lifestyle magazine; probably involved in like journalism clubs

Talents or Skills : she’s a great dancer and a fantastic driver; also a good writer

Intelligence Level : she is great auditory learner, very sharp and quick to pick up what she listens too; writes the best out of my characters; reads a lot too; not great at sciences or math, but she tries her best and the hard work pays off; a fan of history, but only as it relates to cultural stuff (wars bore her); the most emotionally aware of others of my characters, can read people well

Finances: wealthy—parents are wealthy each from their individual families and from their own careers, pay for their children

[starless-chasm]

Year-end Book (and Book Blogging) Survey


It's the last day of December! Before I go all dramatic and revisit my IELTS-ful year, I mean not-so-eventful offline memory lane, I’ll just do some “book business” and answer this year-end literary survey. I’ve seen this posted in my tumblr dash so I guess I’ll answer it. Apologies in advance…I may be publishing a lot of entries today. I'm trying to be productive, but hey, thanks for understanding! :)) 
1. The Best Book You Read In 2017? 
This question is probably one of the pet peeves I will never ever be able to avoid. It never fails to render me speechless every time—not in a good way, obviously—it feels like you're being asked who your favorite son/daughter amongst your kids...no, you can't just do that - so many to choose from! Haha. That said, I have a lot of favorites in different genre. 
•The Hate You Give by Angie Thomas
•A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas
•Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo 
2. The Most Disappointing Book or a Book You Wish You Loved More Than You Did? 
The Gentleman's Guide To Vice And Virtue by Mackenzi Lee. I really wish I could like it more just like what people in the internet are saying. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate it, I just don't like it. Runner-up’s Renee Ahdieh’s The Rose and the Dagger. This is the sequel to The Wrath And The Dawn which I truly loved as it's a re-telling of my favorite fairytale of all time: One Thousand And One Nights. I was smitten with Ahdieh's oh-so-surreal work on the first book, but this one’s an exception. There’s just something…off about it. 
3. Most surprising (in a good way!) book of 2017? 
Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli. I first picked up this book last year and only got to read its first chapter. I really don't know why I did it. Haha. Then early this year, I wouldn’t have picked this book back if it solely brandished a regular soulmate formula, but the nerd factor involved in its blurb (and its title, duh!) convinced me to try it one last time. It was amazing, and not just in a geeky kind of way. Also in a flabbergasted oh-my-god-it-shattered-my-heart-but-still-made-me-smile-at-the-end kind of way.
Runners-up are: the YA book Turtles All The Way Down by John Green, and The Sun Is Also A Star by Nicola Yoon. 
4. Book you recommended to people most in 2017? 
I will never stop recommending The Hate You Give. In fact, I can almost see myself still recommending it in 2018. Also, on top of my list is the poetry book The Princess Saves Herself On This One by Amanda Lovelace and The Wrinkle In Time by Madeliene L'Engle. Oh, and also Sally Thorne's The Hating Game! Because they’re awesome, okay? Just spreading the love, ‘ya know. Same with all of John Green’s. Yeah, I roll like that. 
5. Best series you discovered in 2017?
Right, I’m going to cheat again because there’s a lot of good series in different genres I discovered this year: 
• A Court Of Thorns and Roses trilogy by Sarah J Maas (young adult fantasy, science fiction).
•Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo (young adult fantasy, science fiction).
•To All The Boys I Loved Before trilogy by Jenny Han (young adult fiction) 
6. Favorite new authors you discovered in 2017? 
Markus Zusak, Sarah J Maas, Leigh Bardugo, Becky Albertalli, Nicola Yoon, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Khaleed Hosseini, Rupi Kaur and Madeleine L'Engle. 
7. Best book that was out of your comfort zone or was a new genre for you? Actually, I have a problem with going out of my comfort zone in terms of reading ever since I can remember. But let's see, I'd like to try reading a lot of biographies next year, then I'll get back to this question. 
8. Most thrilling, unputdownable book in 2017? 
Hmm, in terms of unputdownability (gads, I love the word), I guess the award’s going to Leigh Bardugo's Six of Crows series and Lauren Oliver’s Before I Fall (yep, I liked Oliver’s debut novel more than her famed dystopian book). They’re just so gripping! 
9. Book you most anticipated in 2018?
Puddin' by Julie Murphy. Come on—Murphy's writing another YA story after her debut novel Side Effects May Vary? Who can’t NOT get excited by that? I hope I can get through next year.
10. Favorite cover of a book you read in 2017? 
Unfortunately, this is not the version I own. I have the American edition, the one with the dominoes on the cover. The Book Thief has a total of 35 editions and I specially adore the UK Adult Edition. I mean, how can you not love this edition? There’s just something about it that really appeals to me. Dancing with Death, even in illustrations, look so morbidly beautiful and poetic. I'm still hoping I can find the UK Edition though.
11. Most memorable character in 2017?
Unfair! Just one? If this survey is going to continue having questions like this one, I have no choice but to cheat. Just lemme do it, mkay? 
• Kaz Brekker from Six of Crows Duology by Leigh Bardugo.
• Feyre Acheron and Rhysand from A Court Of Thorns And Roses Trilogy by Sarah J Maas. Well, I specially love Feyre—just the fact that she may be my fictional alter ego if I were to be chucked in the pages of a young-adult fantasy book. She’s feisty, and she believes she can forge her own destiny. She reminds me of myself in so many ways.
• Simon Spier from Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda.
12. Most beautifully written book read in 2017? 
The Wrath and the Dawn (need I say more?),The Book Thief until I got my hands on this I’ve never enjoyed reading a Death anthropomorph narrating a story that ever exceeded the one in Gaiman’s The Sandman graphic novels). 
13. Book that had the greatest impact on you in 2017? 
You wouldn’t be mad if I say it’s one of the books above, right? Haha. 
14. Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2017 to finally read? 
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. I should have read this a long time ago! 
15. Favorite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2017? 
from Lauren Oliver’s Before I Fall: “Most of the time—99 percent of the time—you just don’t know how and why the threads are looped together, and that’s okay. Do a good thing and something bad happens. Do a bad thing and something good happens. Do nothing and everything explodes. And very, very rarely—by some miracle of chance and coincidence, butterflies beating their wings just so and all the threads hanging together for a minute—you get the chance to do the right thing.” 
from Markus Zusak, The Book Thief: "I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant."
I could add more, but I’ll just leave it at two. 
16. Book That You Read In 2011 That Would Be Most Likely To Reread In 2012? 
Not counting the ones I repeated more than twice above, I guess I’ll reread Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda before I watch the movie adaptation. 
17. Book That Had A Scene In It That Had You Reeling And Dying To Talk To Somebody About It? (a WTF moment, an epic revelation, a steamy kiss, etc. etc.) 
Haha! To be honest? Six of Crows duology. There’s a reason why it's my favorite this year. :p I’m always gushing about this duology—sending messages to my friends, fangirling about it online (even joining a contest where I declared my love for one them). 
18. One Book You Didn’t Get To Read In 2017 But Will Be Your Number 1 Priority in 2018? 
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, The God of Small Things by Arundathi Roy, 1Q84 + a bunch of other books by Murakami. There. 
19. Book You Are Most Anticipating For 2018? 
Please refer to question no.9. 
20. One Thing You Hope To Accomplish Or Do In Your Reading/Blogging In 2018? 
Just read more, learn more, inspire more, and blog more.


[grimelords]

I finally finished writing up my February playlist for your enjoyment but mostly mine. It’s 48 songs ranging from italian screamo to Celine Dion and you have my personal guarantee you will enjoy at least one of them.

Halftime - Young Thug: There's two parts in this song that are maybe my top two Young Thug moments ever. 1) when he says "I got water I look like I'm fresh from Hawaii" and then makes a noise like a dog shaking himself off 2) the world's longest tyres screeching sound, at about :47, it goes for fully 12 seconds and is absolutely perfect.

Hydrogen - M|O|O|N: Hotline Miami is a good ass game and this song is great but I've got to admit that I only really know it because someone edited a video to make a dog bark the melody line and I think that's very good. 

Vale - Bicep: The way the fuzzed out bass rhythm contrasts against how crystal clear and plastic futuristic everything else in this song is is just great. This song reminds me that I should probably listen to Kelala because I've only heard her in features so far and they've all been great.

Sittin' On The Edge Of The Bed Cryin' - The Drones: This is a sort of atypical Drones song because it's not about about a particular thing, it's just about a bad feeling and not being able to see your future because of everything lurking ahead of you. I think that's why I like it so much, because it's just sort of a song about saying 'I feel bad!!' and not having to give a reason.

Golden Dawn - Gospel: I really do think that The Moon Is A Dead world is an all time great album and that it rarely gets talked about anywhere is one of the greatest crimes of underappreciation in music. It's understandable, because it takes a lot for an uncool genre like screamo to get mainstream critical attention the way something like As The Roots Undo did, and mixing that kind of aggression with extremely uncool lengthy 70s prog keyboard solos... look, I get it. But somehow there's nothing uncool about any of this music; it's just deeply felt, radically composed and authentically performed. It's absolutely one of my favourite albums of all time and this is the centrepiece. I was taken with a fantasy this month of doing something very cool and transcribing the drum part of this song just to see it laid out in front of me because it is really a masterpiece. Also there is something very special about imbuing a lyric like 'hey you, you got a cigarette man? you know I know you got one on ya.' with so much gravity that you can't help but yell along.

I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times) (feat. Popcaan & Young Thug) - Jamie xx: Young Thug says he's gonna ride in that pussy like a stroller in this song and that’s when I knew I was in love.

Crow Jane - Skip James: Yet another good song in the pantheon of songs about shooting your wife for being too proud and then immediately regretting it because now you have no wife.

Le Merle Noir - Olivier Messiaen: I think it's really funny that in the classical music canon there is about one hundred freaks who got singularly obsessed with putting their best approximation of bird song in their music. Birds don't even sound that good but in the old days its the closest you had to a markov chain I suppose. Anyway this is a really nice piece that my girlfriend did as one of her flute performances in her music degree and I like it a lot.

Obsession - Animotion: I started watching Comrade Detective this month and the soundtrack is all sorts of very good 80s synthpop. This song especially stood out because in the show it was being performed with accordions in an illegal Romanian casino, but this version is good too.

Back To The Trees - Adele H: Nothing worse than being a musician named Adele and having to go by Adele H because Adele is well and truly taken. I found this album on a random blogspot and it truly felt like 2011 again. This song is like a primitivist hymn sung with a loop pedal, and if you're in the right state of mind it's very moving.

Aries - Lynx: I was doing some googling and ended up finding the band that Dave Konopka from Battles used to be in. This band is good because they're called Lynx and they have a song called Mrs Lynx, and I think it's both prudent and wise to write a wife for your band. This song however, is called Aries. I was hooked from the start-stop drums right at the start, but this is some of my favourite type of math rock. Clean, clear, concise and purposeful and never losing sight of the structure of the song as a whole.

Westham United (live) - Tera Melos: This is the best version of Westham United I've ever heard, and you can hear the lyrics a lot better here than the album version. Tera Melos live are so unbelievably tight it's insane, This is ferocious, god bless Audiotree.

You Let My Tyres Down - Tropical Fuck Storm: Tropical Fuck Storm is Gareth and Fiona from The Drones' new side-project and it sort of just sounds like the Drones with more female harmonies in the background which is good as hell. I love the weird little guitar frills in this where it's mostly pretty chordy and then he does these little hammery runs now and then that really liven the place up.

Fool - Mia Dyson: I have a big thing about Mia Dyson because she made three incredibly good albums and then left Australia to try to make it in America and unfortunately failed, and ever since then all her music has felt like she's aiming toward some kind of crossover appeal instead of just doing what she really wants. But luckily it's finally paying off because this new song sounds like Haim's first album and it's really good so everyone wins.

Are You Ready For The Country? - Neil Young: This is the song I envision playing over the air raid speakers through the city when it all goes down.

Living Through Another Cuba - XTC: Continuing that theme, Stereogum had a very good playlist of the other day called 80s Nuclear Anxiety and I discovered this incredible song in it. This song is good in headphones because someone's doing some very restrained zither playing every 4 bars and once you notice it it's impossible to stop hearing it. 

Release - Christoph De Babalon: I found out about this extremely bleak album from the really good reissue review pitchfork had the other day, and this is probably my favourite song on it because I'm basic and it's the most straightforward dnb on here. This album reminds me of Zomby a lot, not only in the music but in the approach where the structures seem to simultaneous reflect someone putting a lot of care into their music and not giving a fuck about it. The individual sounds are so meticulous but the structures of all the songs here are very meandering and feel like they could end at any time or go another ten minutes and you wouldn't notice.

Preachin' Blues - Son House: The idea of joining the preisthood as a way to get out of having to get a real job is a timeless idea that appeals to the teens of today more than ever.

1 di 6 - Raein: What I love about the internet is the way you can just type words in and it will manifest whatever you wish, like a sort of cursed wishing well. In this instance the words I typed were 'italian screamo' and the gift it bestowed was this incredible one-long-song album from Italian screamo band Raein that completely kicked my ass.

A Little Change Could Go A Long Ways - City Of Caterpillar: I've been investigating early 2000s screamo, and in particular Circle Takes The Square's contemporaries and it seems crazy that I've never heard this City Of Caterpillar album until now because at long last it's something that sounds comperable to As The Roots Undo. The extremely brooding, crescendocore post-rock intro that dominates more than half of this 10 minute song gives way to a complete storm. I am absolutely desperate for a screamo revival but it seems like nobody else is.

Jupiter - Cave In: This song is good but it also sounds like it's from a musical, I think it has to do with the clarity of his lyric delivery. It sounds like the difference between American Idiot and American Idiot: The Original Broadway Cast Recording, but it's also a very good song.

I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho) - Pitbull: I woke up with this song in my head one day which is always a very good song. Also this song has a good sample chain: the beat's sampled from 75 Brasil Street by Nicola Fasano, which samples the horns from The Bomb! (These Sounds Fall Into My Mind) by The Bucketheads which in turn sampled the horns from Street Player by Chicago. How good is music!

Introduce Me To Your Family - Otoboke Beaver: My friend sent me this song because it came up mysteriously in his Discover Weekly and I'm so glad he did. It's good to know that japanese punk has been continuing on and getting more and more insane without me noticing.

Part 5/ The Sun's Gone Dim And The Sky's Gone Grey - Johann Johannsson: RIP to a good man. I was so sad and shocked to hear that Johann Johannsson had died last month. This album is a favourite of mine, and while this song doesn't have the weight it should outside of the context of the rest of the album it is still an incredibly heavy mood and a beautiful piece of music.

Heart - Bertie Blackman: This song feels like the alternate, evil version of Single Ladies by Beyonce to me and I get it stuck in my head all the time.

Acetate - Metz: I'm obsessed with the rhythm of this song, how it just tumbles over itself over and over in this lopsided way and the way that plays against the big straight forward power line of this song: I. WANT. YOU. TO. TAKE. IT. AWAY.

Bodysnatchers - Radiohead: It's funny to think of Johnny Greenwood as a film composer, and especially as the composer of the Phantom Thread when he does songs like this. This song is just straight up Riffs. The most air-guitarable Radiohead song outside of Creep.

Nameless, Faceless - Courtney Barnett: I'm so glad Courtney Barnett is back and her new song is an absolute killer! I can't get enough of it and I cannot wait for the album.

Can't Fight The Moonlight - LeAnn Rimes: This is a song written from the perspective of a vampire, and a banger. The instumentation in this is a perfect distillation of everything good about 90s pop. Especially the bizzare chunky guitar and orchestra stab that starts it off. The big bass sound and orchestra stabs in the chorus? I'm kissing my fingers like a chef right now.

Lava Lamp (Chopnotslop Remix) - Thundercat: It sounds strange but the chopped and screwed version of Drunk is fast becoming my favourite version. Firstly because it's very appropriately named Drank and secondly because the biggest obstacle to me getting heavily into this album was that it was just way too busy sometimes, a flaw that has been perfectly surmounted by chopping but NOT slopping the entire thing.

Someplace - Yamantake // Sonic Titan: I am desperate for more from this band. I absolutely love this mix of airy guitar and vocals suddenly moving into very classic metal. It's very theatrical and I absolutely love it.

Jejune Stars - Bright Eyes: Remember how Bright Eyes last album had extremely heavy Rastafarian But Not Reggae influences for some reason? I loved that. The guy talking about Pomegranates at the end of this song, and especially the way he pronounces pomegranate has become a staple of my inner monologue.

New Coke - Health: God Health are just so powerful. I want them to score a film some day soon, because they did a great job with Max Payne 3 and their sort of singular aesthetic is just so intoxicating. I go through stages of not listening to Health for months and then it's all I want to listen to for hours and hours very loudly.

3AM - Matchbox Twenty: Check this out: Rob Thomas has the exact same voice as Gerard Way from My Chemical Romance

Is That All There Is? - Peggy Lee: I was thinking about Trump's weird brain, which I believe to be a sort of smooth pebble covered in mashed banana, and so I googled his favourite song, and it is this. He says "It’s a great song because I’ve had these tremendous successes and then I’m off to the next one. Because, it’s like, “Oh, is that all there is?” That’s a great song actually, that’s a very interesting song, especially sung by her, because she had such a troubled life.". Listen to this extremely nihilistic song and imagine him swanning around with his weird body and singing along to it please.

New Town - Life Without Buildings: Life Without Buildings reinvented songwriting and nobody even cared. It's unbelievable. This song is an incredible end to their incredible album that feels like it was written just for me. I love Life Without Buildings!

Music For The Long Emergency - Policia & s t a r g a z e: Polica's new album with the stargaze orchestra is unfortunately kind of mixed but luckily the title track is very, very good. It feels like a real textural expansion of everything Polica's been doing before, to have so many more layers to play with really benefits them but the songs are thankfully still rooted in the drums, bass and vocals combo like usual and haven't gotten lost in the possibilities of playing with an orchestra. The synth sound that begins about halfway through this is so thick and so nice and really takes the whole thing in a different direction for the second half.

Carnival Of Sorts (Boxcars) - R.E.M.: I'm really loving R U Talkin R.E.M. Re: Me? and so far and the main difference I've found between it and UTU2TM is that every single R.E.M. song sounds exactly the same. They're very good, but it's one song. So when they go through the album track by track and talk about what the love about each one it almost sounds farcical. They could be playing the same song 12 times in a row and I wouldn't notice. That said, this one differentiates itself by starting with a weird circus organ before beginning The R.E.M. Song so I appreciate it for that.

Give Me A Smile - Sibylle Baier: As I understand it, Sibylle Baier was warned about the existence of music blogspots some time in the early 70s and started living her whole life from then on in the hopes of being the source of a good post. This album was released in 2006 and is made up mostly of reel-to-reel recordings she made at her home in Germany in 1970-73, except for this track which was included on a 1970 compilation called Folk Is A Four Letter Word 2 which I think was the only commercial recording she ever made before quitting music and acting entirely, moving to America and starting a family. 30 years later her son made a cd of the songs to give to family and friends and somehow one made its way to J Mascis of all people and he had it released on his label Orange Twin.

III. Toccare - John Adams: This piece came up in my Release Radar playlist because of the day a couple of years ago when I listened to Nixon In China twice in a row. I don't know anything about it but I love it a lot and am particularly in love with the bass guitar that comes in about a third of the way through and then disappears entirely. What a choice.

Saturdays (feat. Haim) - Twin Shadow: On Twin Shadow's last album he made a swing at Big Chorus all-out commercial pop and it didn't go perfectly so I'm very glad he's back to his old ways because this song is just amazing. Every part of this song is catchy. The chorus is so satisfying because it has about it has about three different sections and it builds beautifully. Haim are here doing great. It's just perfect and I can't wait for the album.

Because I'm Me - The Avalanches: Wildflower didn't get the respect it deserved in my opinion. It quite literally sounds like it could have come out the year after Since I Left You, which is a very good thing! I'm also a huge fan of fading a whole song down right in the middle just to play a sample of someone quietly saying 'hello?' like they're answering a phone.

Bats In The Attic - King Creosote & Jon Hopkins: I've never heard another album that sounds like this one. Every part of the recording just sounds so beautiful it's like it was handmade from silk or something. Listening to this after literally anything else feels like a chilled glass of water on a hot day. King Creosote's voice also has the very beautiful paradoxical qualities of a scottish accent mixed with incredibly clear enunciation and I really love it. I'd love them to do another album together.

Another Man - Barbara Mason: Check out this song. First of all it sounds extremely good. Secondly it's about when your man turns out to be gay. It starts out good but by the last verse it is straight up hateful, calling him defective, not entirely a man and a 'facsimile of a man' which is unbelievably cruel. The way she says it is very good though because she says "Because in my case what I thought I had was not a entire whole man, but a facsimile thereof. Wasn't a clone or nothin', you know, I'm not.." and then she trails off. Glad she clarified this wasn’t a clone situation. Weird, mean, good song.

Monument (T.I.E. Version) - Robyn & Royksopp: The original version of this song is long as hell and a lot more on the ominous side of the ominous/menacing scale, whereas this version pushes the slider all the way up on 'menacing' with the huge distorted bassline leading the whole thing. A perfect song for obelisk worship in the grim electronic future, or even for carving your own obelisk in preparation.

Everybody Knows - Leonard Cohen: Hey remember when Leonard Cohen died and bleedingcool.com had the best headline of all time "Genius Songwriter Of Music From “Watchmen” Sex Scene Dead At 82". I think about that all the time. Anyway this song is great but that's obvious.

E-Mail My Heart - Britney Spears: Britney Spears first album is good cause Hit Me Baby One More Time is about pagers and this song is about emails. Teens love to communicate, and they've only grown to love it more since this song came out. In Britney's own words in 1999: "E-mail My Heart is a song that everyone can relate to, everyone’s been doing e-mails and it’s “e-mail my heart” so everyone can relate to that song.“ True.

It's All Coming Back To Me Now - Celine Dion: This song is deluxe. This song sounds like it was recorded in an expansive marble bathroom and I feel like I should have to be wearing a suit just to listen to it. This song has 15 cup holders and comes with power windows as standard. This song sounds like someone paid November Rain $100 to attend a fancy party with them and pretend to be their boyfriend but then they accidentally fell in love for real. 

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