#one off witness characters like they're fine wine

[archivestarlyht]

he accepted the wine glass,   lifting it with a nod.  the stuff he usually drank would probably make any of these blue bloods piss themselves,   but fine wine was fine wine   ----  even if it was from the surface.   might as well try to enjoy the finer things while he wasn't a damned mind flayer.

sol'rys snickered in response to the paladin's remark,   bringing a hand to his face and pretending to fix the hair swept in front of the scar on his cheek.  “hells,”   he said.   “why stop there?   they're probably in his fucking bed,   too.”   despite his flippant amusement,  anxiety lurked beneath his words.  as though it weren't enough that they were dogged by shapechangers,   or the new grand duke's whispered warning that there was an imposter in their camp.  he'd yet to fully rule out his current company was the real one and not a mere doppelganger.   

nothing can ever be fucking easy in this fucking place,   he lamented quietly.  but it would do no good to complain or wallow in their fortune.  “i've never seen anything like them before,”  he said quietly.   well,   not before that mage tower gale had dragged them through.  the memory,   however,   made him wonder.   “maybe there's a way to turn them.  gale commanded the steel-men in the mage tower with its creator's poetry,  didn't he?”   not that he'd been any good there.  the ranger had blinked at the swirl of letters and characters,  scowling at the wizard's enthusiasm showing it off and surprised when it had actually paid off.  gale could be damned annoying sometimes but he possessed a wit that most,  including himself,  could only envy.  “something like that.”

" More than I want to think about. " He’s paid enough attention to this place to see all the implications of a place built to withstand a siege. He knows the look of a person who is both intelligent and paranoid enough to make certain that the defenses are more than adequate, and it’s that truth alone that has made him choke down his words and behave. They’re strong; they’ve faced impossible odds. Causing a fight in here would mean almost certain death. 

One of the Steel Watchers clanks nearby; they reek of cool metal, oil, the magic that fuels them, and the inhuman regard is terribly unnerving. He feels watched, judged, picked apart, and it makes that vile parasite wedged in his skull make his head pound. Whatever it finds — or doesn’t find — it clanks away, continuing on regular rounds. 

He grimaces, and glances over at the words; he’d almost forgotten it, but he slides it over regardless. " All yours, " he grumbles. " Not much of one for wine, anyhow. " The Watcher is far enough away for his hackles to lower a little, and his mouth thins. " Y’know he’ll surround himself with these things. Hells, he probably sleeps with them in his bloody room. " Which is — a thought, and not a happy one. " We’ll need t’get rid of those damn things first. "

[clavi-crossing]

im not really sure for which fandoms youre in, but your scrunkly from your preferred fandom? 😭

HELLO 💖 I know you specifically asked for the skrunkly but I wanna do all because I like talking >:)

Hey remember when 6 months ago I said I'm not really "that much" into Ace Attorney? So that was a lie-

Blorbo (favorite character, character I think about the most) CHECK OUT MY BIGGEST BLORBO COLLECTION FROM 1 FANDOM YET! These will absolutely fall into other categories too but we got: Mike Meekins, Colias Palaeno, Lay D. Furst and Paul Atishon.... gonna count Frank Sahwit. I have thought about any one of them very much at some point and keep roating them so they all gotta be here.

Skrunkly (my “baby”, character that gives me cuteness aggression, character that is So Shaped) Mike.....🥺 He is absolutely shaped and a sweet little guy... he's 6'2 but still a little guy at heart! Nobody is allowed to be mean to him around me!! He's so adorable and always tries his best, but he's somehow really unpopular in the fandom??? An absolute tragedy. Meekins haters DNI.

Scrimblo Bimblo (underrated/underappreciated fave) To think any of my blorbos are not also scrimblo bimblos would be unrealistic hsgdssdh I'm going off of the status of any of my favs within my friend group who all have unusual blorbos... Colias. EVERYONE FORGETS ABOUT HIM I'M SO SAD!! SILLY BUTTERFLY MAN!!! He's just a little ambassador of a country who is just a little naive and obsessed with giving people coupons 🥺 They were really like "There are 2 butterfly themed people in AA :) *referring to Dahlia & Nahyuta*" and I had to lightheartedly bring Colias to the chat like AHEM!!!!! HELLO!! HDFGHDS

Glup Shitto (obscure fave, character that can appear in the background for 0.2 seconds and I won’t shut up about it for a week) Hmmmmm who's my least existent guy... ... .. . Mr. Furst :( My friend played The great Ace Attorney Chronicles and in one of the first cases of the first game there's.. this absolutely adorable little hatter guy who's just like "Uhm, I make hats, sir :)" and I hold him gently.. 🤲 But he was just a one-off witness which is so SAD BECAUSE... HE'S SO CUTE??? The entire time I was like "omg what if he returns!!!" and then he never did... heartbroken. They bring the OTHER stupid guys back like..... SURE, I WANTED TO SEE FUCKING BEPPO AGAIN??? SAID NOONE EVER- Beppo fans I am so sorry, I should be nicer as a fellow unpopular blorbo haver. Me and my friend did hc the bowler hat juror as his brother and the grumpy tophat juror as their father!

Poor little Meow Meow (“problematic”/unpopular/controversial/otherwise pathetic fave) I think Wesley Stickler might be the most "problematic" one I can think of here. He stole those bloomers for SCIENCE!! Still wasn't right but at least that's a better reason than what most people assume ;( Some might argue that Paul is problematic for the sole reason he's a politician and... yeah that's fair bjdjdshfkj Speaking of..

Horse Plinko (character I would torment for fun, for whatever reason) Mr. Atishon-Wimperson... he's so fun to draw and even more fun to write him getting his ass kicked. I'M HOLDING HIM LIKE AN ICE CREAM CONE!! He's the model politician in that he dodges questions like a mf and promotes his campaign whenever he can. You know I say I hate Rufus from Deponia for his massive ego but this guy might be worse and I love him. How? I don't know, I think Rufus lacks the pathetic vibe I love so much. Paul also won't ever shut up about his great family and how epic his grandfather is. Ngl I feel like he makes them sound all cool and stuff but they GOTTA be fucked up somehow, right?? Not to get off track but when he all confidently said "It's the art of ruling as a king. My father drilled it into my head from a young age." I was like..... .... 😶

Eeby Deeby (character I would send to superhell) Sal Manella. No question, I don't even wanna explain the character he's just gross, he sparks NO joy!! Together with two of the characters from Turnabout Bigtop and SADLY Terry Fawles... smh you could've been such cool characters but nooo!!! The trilogy had to be weird!!!

THIS IS SUCH A LONG POST THX FOR THE ASK ILY!!!

[greaterlandscapes]

My Dean Blunt Rotation aka High Fidelity Left A Bad Taste in My Mouth

For the past 2 to 3 months, my listening habits were teetering to an end; mostly via burnout by spontaneously listening to local artists daily and less likely of a musical discovery drought, whereas my interests of a certain artist or genre hasn't found its, sort of, "eureka", moment per se. I've been feeling less enthusiastic over the things i listen to since my friends have gradually lost their flare when it comes to discovering/exploring untapped parts of the music realm. Thus, in return, my enthusiasm not being reciprocated. It leaves an empty feeling from someone who has been yearning social interaction, may it be media being latched on the topic - it's a feeling that's been guilt-tripping me ever since I was stranded in the other end of the metro. I feel closed off, exposed to the crippling loneliness the lockdown has punished us: a defacto solitary confinement in a national level. Our act of staying online is also an act of staying alive outside.

To be fair though, it's a valid move to not boomerang compliments/gripes over an art you haven't consumed due to someone's autonomy. Your able body being to consume the art you wish to finish with free time is a luxury in of itself. The art is then failed to serve its purpose to reach its goal: You have squiggly lines heading straight to oblivion rather than swirling in the earlobes of a wandering cyber nomad. We, eventually, need to find something that could help us exit, rather than escape, from capital. We, in return, do not shut ourselves from the outside. Instead, we then tend to avoid the stress of protocols and outdoor fascism; Not avoid the indoor liberalism that is eating us alive and online. It's a capital punishment we never knew we signed up for ever since the onslaught of the virus and the state. Art for art's sake is nonexistent now, always has been, it seizes to ever since we went inside. Feeding off of a holographic meatloaf coming from a glowing screen. We have a real-life Karen acting as a nightlight in our rooms.

The COVID lockdown made us listen to music — both for better, for worse. For one, it made us pass most days. You could say the same for any sort of media: film, mixed media art, or whatever pre-Covid activity that sprung up during our time in isolation. For music, however, there was an uptick of new listeners that made others Wheel-of-Fortune the fuck out of their music discoveries in sites like RateYourMusic, Bandcamp, or even Sophie's Floorboard. We've continued to expand and became more open change of opinions and be less of a jackass towards someone else's opinions. On second thought, our opinions have been catalogued, leaving more notes than actual footprints of our previous listens. Our new discoveries made new bands and re-emerging bands, bands who faded to obscurity, crawl back in the surface with newfound interest from younger listeners (ie Panchiko, Jai Paul, and Dean Blunt) and this glowing, previously unseen and unexpected overwhelming support from fans of departed artists (ie SOPHIE, MF DOOM)

For the other, we've hogged gratuitous amounts of media, resulting into losing our primary direction as to how we want to consume our media based on the preconceived notions of what we want in our art. There is goodness in becoming directionless when you think about it, but there comes a cost to our identity as music listeners. Instead, we end up widening our tangents, falling in endless rabbit holes, having zero chances to emerge from the surface. In fact, i refuse to call it a "rabbit hole" instead i'd rather call it a "pipeline" of sorts — transitioning casual music fans into a full on, different, unique versions of themselves that would define them when laws and protocols have eased in the outside world. Our act of staying online has either made most of us break our character or enliven our past selves. The music pipeline is now more apparent, stretching the norms of what was once alienated by a silent majority, but now accepted as an acceptable form of expression. The more music we are exposed to has made casual listeners stranged out or react in ways that our personality have betrayed us or deemed not as acceptable to them. Still, not changing anything that was prominent pre-pandemic. Liberal cop behavior is stronger, now more dangerous than it ever was once perceived by the outside world.

HIGH FIDELITY? NO, THANK YOU.

Imagine a situation inside of a record, pre-pandemic of course, where you do not feel like lifting a record out from the shelf, instead, you window shop just for the sake of windowshopping. Capital and media made us think that going to record shops is a semi-productive activity. The age of discovery has died ever since High Fidelity romanticized and normalized the incelage of horny record diggers. Does this movie age well, yeah sure it does, for old 90s nerds at least. But did it translate well over in the past 20 or more years of events and tragedies that unfolded in pre-9/11 America? No it didn't. It was an age of free expression, only liberals would dream of whenever they take a sip of Guinness beer in their favorite dive bar.

Mind you, over a couple of months ago, it was my only chance in seeing why this movie was the talk of the town back when it was released. There's music, yeah, and attractive leading leadies, yeah, it has everything a 90s kid would love to salivate and drop their gonads over while they watch this movie. I obviously did not live to see the movie on opening day but i could imagine the scent that came out of that movie theater with attendees donning windbreakers and The Who shirts with popcorn dressing stains on their plastic cups. If there was a Filipino counterpart to this movie, i'd bet corporate champions Eraserheads and Rivermaya would soundtrack their music over and have either Tado or have Boy 2 Quizon, but i sense it to age like milk more than it could age like fine wine due to the senseless jokes one can execute in a Cubao or Cartimar record store.

John Cusack is obviously the incel in question here: a damaged, vengeful ex who constantly fails to live his partner's expectations and weaponizes his personality over the situations that has nothing to do with his interests. I spent the entire time being absolutely disgusted over the spineless responses of John Cusack's leading character. The movie then treads on flashbacks with John Cusack's failed relationships and what he could do to move on from each and one of them. If i could stand a SONA for 3 hours then I can't stand John Cusack being the dull entry point to incel, making more reasons why you should hate record store clerks who don't give an iota of shits to someone's inviting rapport. High Fidelity is opium for massive music circle jerks who can't take a single breathe of fresh air or a single quota of touching grass. There's more targeting weak and inferior guys and hot women who dump dumb overconfident dudebros more than the actual "music recs" in the entire movie. The more I think about this movie, the more I realize how our personality is in line towards Dick, the record store being unmercifully dunked on by the movie's two leading characters. He's an angel in the world of cynical bastards, witnessing both demons pitchforking record store customers in the ass while they're purchasing the latest Sonic Youth album.

I believe that Jack Black, the dark horse of High Fidelity, has a pleasing personality more than an irritating demeanor due to this behavior in the record store. In fact, outside of the record store, Jack Black doesn't seem to take the business is your pleasure act pretty seriously. Unlike John Cusack's character he brought his obsession over involving a record in an important memory/point of his life. There is so much stuff that has happened outside of the record store, so much for Rolling Stone and NME being the bible of music at the time, endlessly christening and shilling artists that believe to become the second coming of the Beatles. The music references here however are treated as fluff than it is a mechanism that would drive the senseless plot forward. If anything, there are events pointed out in the event that doesn't have anything to do with the life of the characters.

If anything, this movie did a great job at capturing the feeling of music bros being dumped on the wayside by a mature set of characters and how their current conditions aren't perfumed by the studios' liking of having to Cinderella story the shit out of a bunch of normal record store owners. The reality is in the reaction of one's social capital being invaded and we're here to witness how those reactions panned out in 2021. This is a villainous depiction of music nerds being the salt of the earth, the bane of all media discussion, still reflective of the insufferable salt of cyberspace found in music forums like 4chan and RYM. High Fidelity is a pipeline of 90s musicology, a dreaded fever dream of an owner waiting for the decade to end, trends ossifying and re-emerged by the hands of nostalgia-savvy individuals. It was, at its time, every music-movie nerd's excuse equivalent of Scott Pilgrim VS. The World. There are memories worth remembering and cherishing, and this movie isn't one of them.

DEAN BLUNT, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK

In the past two weeks I've been fancying myself into sitting down and listening to different projects from the ever elusive, UK-based sound artist Dean Blunt. The first time i chanced upon his music wasn't too long ago - albeit a recent one in the time of COVID - was when I randomly stumbled upon his records at a Spotify recommendations section under John Maus (yeah lol i know the implications whenever his name is mentioned) - but then i was enamored by his online presence so quickly I put everything down and dedicated an hour or two researching about this man's music.

Other than the fact that his album "The Redeemer" wasn't the best record to start off in journeying through his discography: ending up disgusted and borderline bored even and I was more likely to lambast this record's aimless, pretentious art-pop inflections. By the end of the day, it was a preference long solidified by his undying fanbase. According to his hardcore fans, the music isn't really music, evaluating it as a free form of sound art, rather than sticking to a structured and conventional cues; the genre is nullified by most analysts of the arts. The growing interest of the general public towards Dean Blunt's pranks and antics have long appealed to my tastes as a chaotic neutral individual. Pranks that are well executed to piss off UK gallery connoisseurs and entertain ironic attendees who'd shit on the art piece rather than participate in it.

More of the resources I've found about Dean Blunt online: numerous aliases and collaborations that lasted around almost 2 decades. The most notable of all them, at least for my money, are either Hype Williams, a duo consisting of Dean and frequent collaborator Inga Copeland, and Babyfather, an art performance parodizing the pirate radio culture in the UK. I have not delved enough in Blunt's body of work to evaluate everything and what i could synthesize from it. For now, I enjoyed it as a form of entertainment. Well, color me impressed because Dean Blunt isn't clowning around, he, in fact, makes blissful and transcendental music from left to right.

Dean Blunt was the only few artists that made me want to binge on their discography. His movements in his music has attracted this pesky listener who thinks that being mysterious is a plus. I mean, look at me who thinks The Paul Institute, Panchiko, and Burial are the greatest artists that have walked the face of the earth.

The most I've enjoyed from Dean Blunt's discography are his mixtapes and collaborations: preferably his Soul Fire and ZUSHI, both of which were packaged as B-sides or supplemental releases rather than major releases such as the Babyfather project or the Black Metal releases. His knack for blurring the lines between genres still fascinate me as of this writing, and it continues to amaze me how he doesn't seize to compromise his art, he's here to prove a point and it sells quite well despite the lack of direction in his music. Blunt's music has more aggressive and hazy texture than the hollow, wide, soulless structure of art-pop/hypnagogic pop released today. He creates terrains from the rubble of his country's current shortcomings. The music overlaps the actual intentions with abstract concepts, becoming deconstructed down the line. In Babyfather, noise music coincides with Blunt's amateurish rapping. In Black Metal, Blunt isolates himself along with the assisted skeletal guitar playing. Both projects throwing all tropes in a vaccum alongside Blunt, who he himself would sought to become a personification of a musical void.

--

(Excerpt from the Babyfather album review in TinyMixtapes)

--

Dean Blunt is an entity that wishes to become one person, but no, this isn't a figure in a specific art form; this isn't Banksy, this isn't Bob Ong, this is made by one person, clearly it is if you listen closely, and it's been entrancing me ever since his presence was felt on the horizons of the internet. Dean Blunt, what the actual fuck.