#shout out also to the reviewer who forgot that it's a british show and thought it was unreasonable for it to reference call the m1dwife

[falderaletcetera]

gotta say, pretty much everyone who left a poor review on the tsuranga conundrum on imdb (the episode has an alien dude who's heavily pregnant, treated serously by the story) would not survive hanging out with aliens at an outer space bar, and would not survive diplomacy with any alien race. they can stay home while we go out and dance greet the universe, okay? okay.

[night-unfurls-its-splendour]

The Critique of Manners: Part III

~Or~

A Somewhat Indecisive Review of “Emma” (Miramax, 1996)

I have a feeling this review is gonna be a little harder for me to write. Everyone knows that recaps and reviews are most entertaining when the writer has an intense dislike (or intense feeling of any kind) for the drama they’re reviewing. It falls to other writers to pan or praise this film as they will, but I simply don’t have many particularly strong feelings about it at all. I have neither that repulsed dislike for this movie such as I did for Emma 1997, nor that disappointed frustration as for certain aspects of Emma. 2020, but neither do I have a deep, profound love and appreciation for it as I do for Emma 2009.  

Written and Directed by American Screenwriter, director and actor, Douglas McGrath, Emma (1996) is rather what one expects it to be: a 90’s romance film. Perhaps it’s because I had expectations due to the era in which it was made, but I think I have a tendency to excuse some of the problems with this film. There are many unnecessary additions (for comedy’s sake usually and often quite cringe-y) and one definitely can’t claim that the dialogue hasn’t been tampered with. I don’t normally side with the “I do so miss Austen’s biting wit” crowd but, by ‘eck I felt it this time. That’s because Austen’s Biting Wit™ just doesn’t suit a fluffy 90’s chick flick (which this film is in a way that other big screen Austen adaptations of the time just aren’t – and I think approaching this film from the 90’s chick flick perspective is probably the best way to digest it.) This version, more than any other (except perhaps 2009) brings the concept of Emma-as-Matchmaker to the fore with a particular emphasis precisely because it’s a concept that fits well with the rom-com style of filmmaking used here.

The bones of this review, like my review for the ITV version, were written six years ago following my initial viewing only a select number of portions survive from that review (which is still on IMDb).

As with all my reviews I'll be comparing the script, characterizations and plot to the book and commenting on the authenticity and attractiveness of the costumes, and suitability of the houses and sets.

Let’s dive in.

Cast & Characterization

Emma is arguably the easiest of Austen’s works to read because of Emma’s generally good (if condescending and overly self-confident) character, and Mr. Knightley’s sober, mature but exceedingly pleasant manner. I had my doubts about Gwyneth Paltrow playing an Austen heroine, but I at least had faith in Jeremy Northam’s ability to portray the mature Mr. Knightly. My expectations were not entirely disappointed in either case.

My prevailing feeling about this film is that it’s not so much set in Jane Austen’s Regency England, but in an American fantasy of what Regency England was like. Perhaps the biggest factor that reinforces this impression is (of course) the casting choice for our leading lady, Gwyneth Paltrow.

Freckled, ruddy and thin as a twig, Gwyenth didn’t quite, to my mind, fit the physical description of Emma, who is supposed to be “The picture of health” according to Mrs. Weston. Add to this the Regency beauty ideal of a soft and shapely figure with regular features. Fair hair was generally preferred (and I have always imagined Emma as blond, although I’m given to understand that Austen’s idea of pretty generally favored dark hair), so I can’t fault Gwynnie there. What I can fault though is her so-so British accent.

I recently learned that the reason McGrath thought Paltrow would be a good choice was because she’s the only Texan he’d ever met who’d managed to entirely throw off her native accent; I guess he decided that if she could do that she could do any accent work? I guess? Seems questionable to me.

You know Joely Richardson was considered for this part? Gorgeous, refined (British) GODDESS Joely Richardson was passed over because Gwyenth managed to shake an embarrassing accent.

I hate American directors.

I’m not sure if it’s just part of the accent, or her attempt to sound upper class, but on this most recent re-watch it hit me for the first time how very nasal many of her line deliveries are. She also has this problem with looking (and sounding) sort of vapid and… just what is happening here?

Is she having a stroke at the end there?

A bigger problem than Emma’s casting, however, is her characterization.

Part of the above mentioned script tampering is in lockstep with some of the issues with Emma’s characterization here. Her very teenager-esque swings from vowing to never make another match again to immediately trying to think of another guy to set Harriet up with, and her getting carried away in potential scenarios “But if he seems sad I shall know that John has advised him not to marry Harriet! I love John! Or he may seem sad because he fears telling me he will marry my friend. How could John let him do that? I hate John!” (Especially when you never even really get to meet John Knightley in this version? Ugh, pass me with this shit) is so bizarrely childish it’s a little hard to stomach. She spends the movie going back and forth between mature and manipulative to childish and naïve and it just… doesn’t work for me.  Emma can be all of these things but the transition from one extreme to another here seems a bit disjointed to me.

Knightley was a bit of a disappointment to me in this version. That’s not Jeremy Northam’s fault because I can’t think of a better choice they could have made. McGrath showed much better judgment with his choice for Mr. Knightley than he did with Emma.

My biggest problem with this interpretation was how laid back he was when he was supposed to chastising Emma. Their quarrels became more like mere disagreements so the proposal line of lecturing her and her bearing it as no other woman would have isn’t entirely earned. Even in the big scene at Box Hill where Knightley is really supposed to lay into Emma, he starts off pretty solidly, but by the end so doe-eyed and apologetic it fails to deliver the sting of rebuke that is Emma’s biggest learning moment in the story. Perhaps they were trying to go for a more disappointed feel (the kind that makes you feel worse than being shouted at because you really respect the person you let down) but it just didn’t come through for me.

Also of note is the fact that, (I assume) because John Knightley isn’t really allowed time to be a character in this film, McGrath took some of John’s introverted tendencies and transplanted them into his more convivial older brother (“I just want to stay home, where it’s cozy.” – I mean I feel that, but this isn’t something George Knightley would say.) 

Onto the less central characters

I question also the choice of Toni Colette for Harriet Smith. I mean I actually liked her performance more on this watch than previously but I just don’t think she’s pretty enough for Harriet, and she looks a bit clumsy (though that might have more to do with her costumes.)

I also noted that McGrath bumps Harriet’s comprehension skills up just a scooch. Emma never has to explain the “Courtship” riddle to her, Harriet figures it out on her own after a while, while she never manages to in the book.

Now we come to the crux of Jane Fairfax, played by Polly Walker. I don’t care for this choice. My issue is the simple fact that she just isn’t believable to me as a demure, wronged character like Jane Fairfax. Seriously she looks like she would sooner throw Frank across the room than take his cruel teasing, and not in the subtle way that Olivia Williams managed to. They never even utilized her by including some of Jane’s more pointed returns to Frank’s jabs, which they even managed to squeeze into the massively cut down TV movie.    

Speaking of Frank; Ewan McGregor, though generally delightful, was so under-used. Frank and Jane’s plotline always kind of gets shafted in Theatrical release adaptations of this story. It’s not as bad here as it is in say, the 2020 adaptation (they were in that version so little I actually forgot what their actors looked like), but it’s still pretty stunted.

I find it interesting that Ewan McGregor himself thinks his performance in this movie isn’t good; and I’ll agree it’s not his best (certainly it’s no Obi-wan Kenobi) but I thought he did a pretty good job with obviously unfamiliar material

Also if the Davies screenplay of ’97 made Frank’s character too caddish, I think this version didn’t make him caddish enough. I mean he’s hardly around enough to really develop his flirtation with Emma, and they merged Strawberry Picking and Box Hill into one sequence so we never see Frank’s ill humors. I can perhaps excuse this, since it seems like a nuanced story really wasn’t what McGrath was going for here, I think. This is a lite version of the story; schmaltzy fluff for teenage girls’ movie nights. Frank’s ill humors wouldn’t really have fit the tone of this version at all.

Interestingly enough, though it’s taken me a long time to make this decision, I think Alan Cumming might be the definitive Elton? He’s the only one who doesn’t immediately read as a slime ball from the get go. I mean he’s got all the warning signs that Austen wrote into him, but no more than that. He’s not slinking about greasily or obviously pandering (at first), so Emma’s uneasy realization of what’s really happening here isn’t a hundred miles behind the viewer’s (maybe just fifty).

There are as many Mrs. Eltons out there as there are adaptations of this story, and they’re all pretty great (funky accents aside), but other than the 1997 take, this one might be the least great to me. She’s not nearly pushy enough, because Mrs. Elton would never let Emma prompt the conversation when she could do it herself.

  Also, I think McGrath misunderstands Mrs. Elton’s brand of New Money vulgarity. He has her talking with her mouthful, clanking her utensils on her plate as she eats, putting biscuits which she’s bitten into back onto communal plates, which I think even Mrs. Elton would know not to do. Table manners are pretty basic; the couth that Mrs. Elton lacks is of a more nuanced social kind – for instance, what is and isn’t considered gauche to talk about (like how big one’s brother in law’s house is or how many horses he keeps.)

(A sudden thought has just occurred to me: is Mrs. Elton just a more mean-spirited Hyacinth Bucket from Keeping Up Appearances? “It’s meh sister, Mrs. Suckling! That’s right, the one with an estate in Warwickshire and the two barouche landaus!”)

Sophie Thompson’s Miss Bates is chatty and one of better takes on the character, but lack of necessary background hinders her impact on Emma’s story. The comedy in her scenes is some of the best and actually made me laugh, although I think she was just way too giggly.

Miss Bates’s mother, Mrs. Bates, is played by Sophie Thompson’s real-life mother Phyllida Law in a completely coincidental quirk of casting. (I noted in this film how very much Emma Thompson, Sophie’s older sister looks like their mother.)

My only other serious issue with characterization in this adaptation is the representation of Mr. Woodhouse. He is somehow simultaneously more cheery and more disagreeable than he is in the book. His chiding about the cake at the Weston’s wedding seems more like a scolding rather than an anxious admonishment. In one of the first scenes, during Mr. Woodhouse’s “Poor Miss Taylor” speech, he says he cannot understand why she would want to give up her comfortable life with himself and Emma, to have “mewling children who bring the threat of disease every time they enter or leave the house,” and he says this IN FRONT OF ONE OF HIS TWO DAUGHTERS.

Of course in the book, Mr. Woodhouse does lament Miss Taylor marrying, leaving and even having children – but this is all in the context of the danger childbirth presents to Miss Taylor (And the fact that he can’t stand losing a companion). These are his complaints – not the children themselves. In addition, his elder daughter has quite a fine number of children, all of them very young, of whom Mr. Woodhouse is very fond. He’s a character that needs to be carefully handled because, much like his daughter, it’s very easy for him to become unlikeable.

For the rest of the time, though, he just sort of cheerily laughs and is very at ease, when Mr. Woodhouse, as a chronic hypochondriac should be made anxious by just about everything.

Sets & Surroundings

One thing I find interesting about this adaptation is that the houses they chose to use are all of a very neo-classical Palladian style, which I believe (given her disdain for the contemporary trend of knocking down England’s great houses just to rebuild them in a more fashionable style) Austen may have disliked to some degree.

One such house is Came House in Dorset, which was used as the Woodhouse’s estate, Hartfield. Now Hartfield is, I think, described as a well-built modern house so this could be pretty accurate (although Modern could refer to the red bring, boxy style of Georgian architecture, such as the houses used in the 1997, 2009 and 1972 versions.)

Another, Claydon House in Buckinghamshire played the role of Donwell Abbey. I think this might be the worst exterior ever used for Donwell, from a book accuracy perspective. Utterly Georgian, with its’ square façade, Claydon house sort of directly contradicts Austen description of being “Larger than Hartfield, and totally unlike it, covering a good deal of ground, rambling and irregular…” not only is the architecture totally wrong, so is its’ situation, in Georgian fashion, perched on a hill, when Donwell (a very old building) is supposed to be “Low and sheltered”.

Mapperton House is maybe the grandest house yet used for Mr. Weston’s Randalls (I’ve already covered in my review of Emma (2020) why this is a problem – although in this version, as in the 1997 adaptation, there’s no full panic over the snow, so this is less of a problem, but a house like this is still too grand for the reasonably sized Randalls of the book), but it fits the usual 15th-16th century house type that always seems to be used for Randalls.

A myriad of other great houses were used for interiors, however other than Crichel House (Dorset), which was used for Donwell’s interiors, I can’t find information on which ones where used for what. They include Breakspear House (Harefield), Coker Court (Somerset), Stafford House (Staffordshire) and Syon House & Park (Middlesex).

I really appreciate the interiors which were all very colorful and even included doors and molding painted the same color as the walls which is a very Georgian decorating convention, although it looks odd to the modern viewer.

Costumes & Hair

As a rule, the costumes (Created by Ruth Myers) in this movie are pretty damn good, composition wise, but the arrangement leaves a lot to be desired. Myers talked extensively of wanting the costumes to be colorful and bright like the water colors of the time, which she achieved brilliantly. What I find funny is that she talked about using color as if it would be controversial from a historical accuracy point of view, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

The evening wear is generally excellent

My only question around evening wear here is… what’s up with the waistline on Harriet’s ball gown? Why is it going up in the middle? Toni Collette (who actually gained weight for the role, since Harriet was described as “Reubenesque”) verged on looking a little dumpy throughout the film and awkwardly bumping up her waistline in the middle really didn’t help.

I’m pleased to report that is is the one version where Miss Bates’s evening-wear is allowed to look like evening wear. Even Maiden Aunts wore shorter sleeves and lower necklines at dinner or balls. They fussed her up with some lace gloves and frilly fichus but it follows the conventions of the time. I appreciate that immensely, though I have the sneaking suspicion that it’s because of Sophie Thompson’s age.

At 37 Thompson was an unconventionally young choice for Miss Bates, a character who previously had only been cast as older than 50 (Prunella Scales, who would play the role later in 1996, was 64). Indeed, Douglas McGrath almost passed Thompson over for the role on account of her age, but reconsidered after seeing her in spectacles. It seems possible to me that since Thompson was considered young they dressed her “young” as well.

The daywear is where the costumes start to really fall apart. There are a lot of looks here worn in the day that are VERY not day/outerwear appropriate, especially on Emma, most especially the yellow dress she’s wearing while driving that carriage (which, btw is inappropriate on a whole OTHER level). Can we just talk aboutt he cognative dissonance of bothering to put a bonnet on her when her arms and boobs are just hanging out like that? Like, it would almost have been less egregious to just leave the bonnet where it was.

But then there are a lot of Emma’s day-wear looks that are perfectly suitable and appropriate. What I find ironic about that is that most of the short-sleeved, low-necked “Evening-gowns as day-wear” looks are worn OUTSIDE in the sun and most of the long-sleeved, sun protecting, day-wear appropriate looks are worn INSIDE.  She’s also got a profusion of dangling curls in day-time settings that are also more evening-wear appropriate (to match the dresses, perhaps?)

I’m also pleased to report that even in day-wear Miss Bates gets a break from brown in this version. Her clothes are nice, but not fancy like Miranda Hart’s in Emma. 2020, and I like to think that nice thick shawl with lace overlay is the one mentioned in the book that Jane’s friend Mrs. Dixon sent along home with her for her aunt.

My only problem with Mrs. Elton’s kit is that it’s all perfectly nice, but none of it is overly-nice. There’s no extra trim, no unnecessary lace, not even any bold colors. I hope Myers and McGrath didn’t take Mrs. Elton’s line in the book about her fear of being over-trimmed seriously.

Let’s talk outerwear. There’s a lot of going into town with JUST a shawl on in this movie (usually over short sleeves), and I’m sorry but I don’t think that’s how outer-wear worked in this time period. A shawl is good enough when you’re taking a turn in the garden but not for going out in public into town, unless maybe you’re wearing long sleeves, or perhaps paired with a SPENCER.

Never mind Mrs. Elton’s line about a shocking lack of satin at the end of the movie, I’m more concerned about the shocking lack of spencers. There are precisely three in this film. I counted (and the sleeves on Emma’s look like maybe they’re too long for her?) Mrs. Elton sports the only redingote in the film.

Jane Fairfax is, as always, in her classic Jane Fairfax Blue™,

although she has some nice white gowns at some points too.

Now, onto 

Definitely a bit more colorful than the 97 adaptation. Mr. Knightley benefits most from the addition of colors other than green. He’s even got some smashing waistcoats and a very nice blue evening coat (I couldn’t get very good shots of them though). The problem is; those trousers? NOT. TIGHT. ENOUGH.

Also… you all see it, right? I circled it in red so you should. Yeah. Knightley is dancing in boots. WTF RUTH? Please! You’re better than this! Who dances in Prussians like that? I ask you! (Frank also wears boots to the Cole’s dinner party so that’s two strikes.)

I’m not sold on Frank’s looks. His day-wear is a bit sedate for such a confirmed dandy (I believe he’s called a “coxcombe” in the book?) and his evening wear… well he apparently only has the one look.

And speaking of Frank’s look in this film, I’d like to know at whose doorstep I should lay the blame for what Ewan McGregor himself has called “The Worst Wig Ever”; and why the hair designer in charge decided to model Frank’s aesthetic on a theme of “Chucky meets the Mad Hatter”.

This hairstyle not only looks dreadful, it’s not at all fashionable or authentic to this time period! Fashionable mens’ hair styles at this point were all relatively short. A Beau Brummel coiffeur, or a short Roman style, or a fashionable head of curls like Mr. Elton’s! Not this farmer chic. Robert Martin’s hair is more fashionable than Frank’s!

The tune they chose for Emma and Knightley’s dance is a baroque melody (so a hundred or so years out of fashion) called “Mr. Beveridge’s Maggot” and as is pointed out in the video linked above, and is the same tune and dance used for Lizzie and Darcy’s big dance in Pride and Prejudice (1995).

I get why it was used in P&P because, slow, stately baroque tunes are often used as on-screen short hand for snobbish character like Mr. Darcy. It’s not super intense either, like the baroque tune used in P&P 05, which was chosen for more romantic effect. So why use this kind of “stuck up” tune for what should be a romantic dance? Maybe because it was used in the 95 P&P which became, almost instantly, one of the most popular Austen adaptations?

Quick note on the dancing and music in this movie. I’m not an expert on English Country dance (I’ll outsource that by giving you the usual link to Tea with Cassiane’s analysis on YouTube) but I’ll add my two cents  - I know Cassiane gave this a pretty favorable three full dance slippers but I think the way all of the actors and dancers move looks very poorly rehearsed and kind of sloppy. I think everyone just spread out way too much.

Douglas McGrath’s Script

I have to say one of the things this film did very well and brought to the forefront is how insular Emma’s life is. The opening credit sequence brings this to our attention right away by showing a spinning globe which, once it slows down is shown to be, literally, Emma’s whole tiny world. Hartfield, Donwell, Randalls and Highbury. That’s it. It’s perhaps not a very subtle device, but it does get the job done and very succinctly too.

I would now like to talk about my issues with the script of this movie; I have some problems with it. Very different problems than it’s 1996 counterpart though.

 First let’s go over the comedic device that jumped out to me most in this movie: the awkward pause.

I think it’s only used twice but they both bothered me.

First there’s the pauses while Emma and Mrs. Weston grill Knightley on whether he considers Jane Fairfax romantically. It’s all written as very “OoOoOooo” with Knightley answering their interrogations and then sitting between them awkwardly as they stare him down as, none of his answers giving either Emma or Mrs. Weston satisfaction. This is one of the most teen rom-com moments of the film to me.

Next there’s all the quiet stretches while Emma and Mrs. Elton have tea at Hartfield. I don’t like the use of awkward pauses in this case because (as I mentioned in Mrs. Elton’s characterization section) it’s so ludicrous to me that there are pauses in this conversation at all. Surely the point of Mrs. Elton is that she loves to hear herself talk and her conceited obsession with the idea that everyone around her must only benefit from hearing her opinions. There should be no conceivable reason why Emma should have to prompt conversation like she does in McGrath’s version of this scene, except to derail Mrs. Elton’s constant self-important yammering.

Watching it this time around I found myself wondering exactly what McGrath wanted to do with this film. I mean I’ve been attempting to decipher exactly whether the changes made were conscious and based on artistic vision, or whether they were changed because the source material just flew over McGrath’s Hollywood Director head.

I mean he gets the important plot points across, but there were other scenes that I had issues with: namely, the Archery scene. This is a pretty intense part of the book because Mr. Knightly goes from astonished, to indignant, to truly vexed with Emma in a short period of time. But this scene in the movie is very casual. The part where Emma’s arrow goes wide and into the general direction of Knightley’s dogs, and he takes an opportunity to make a quip and says “try not to kill my dogs” particularly annoyed me. My issue is that this totally ruins the tension of the scene; and why are Knightley’s dogs sitting BEHIND THE TARGETS ANYWAY? Knightley is a sensible man, and one who knows better than to let his dogs rest in a place where stray arrows could hit them!

The dialouge is very jarring because it flips back and forth beetween being alright, and period appropriate and then it will just spring a very modern turn of phrase and pull you completely out of the setting. I know this is something that’s been brought up with the 2009 version as well but maybe it’s because the actors in that version have (in my opinion) better chemistry that it simply doesn't stick out to me as much.

The comedy in general in this movie just makes me cringe a lot of the time (Sophie Thompson’s “oh sorry, napkin” bit notwithstanding). Like the soup thing when Emma and Harriet meet Mr. Elton after visiting the poor, and the random kid that gets tossed into this scene with Emma… just doesn’t work for me.

Wikipedia describes McGrath’s tweaks on Emma and Knightley’s banter (which really weren’t changed that much, textually) as “Enlivened” to make the basis of their attraction more apparent, which… I’m sorry but nothing about the exisiting banter isn’t lively if delivered in a lively manner. And I wouldn’t exactly call Gywneth’s performance lively, because she has to concentrate to keep that accent up.

I mentioned already that what McGrath essentially did with Emma was take Austen’s story, and remove the nuance (Such as lightening Frank’s infractions in his relationship with Jane and, while not totally contradicting, but also not highlighting the economic commentary of the story that is thematic in Austen’s novel) in order to make a straight up 90’s comedic romance film (Which, if you doubt this, look no further than Rachel Portman’s Oscar Winning but very dated score).

My Question is why? Why bother when the SAME STORY had been adapted into a HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL, modernized rom-com THE PREVIOUS YEAR, which actually, even while being set in the 90’s, did the story greater justice, with far more insight and quality?

Emma (1996) was always going to be over-shadowed by Clueless. At the end of the day this whole movie was kind of a futile effort because despite excellent production quality, the actual contents are watered down and, in my own opinion, pretty roundly mediocre.

Final Thoughts

When I first watched both of these versions I came at it from a very one-or-the-other perspective. I forgave McGrath’s film because it was light and colorful and I’d heard Davies’ version praised so highly at that time as the only faithful, definitive version (only to be let down by it in almost every possible way). But coming right down to it now, it’s hard for me to really excuse McGrath’s effort because a version of Emma that doesn’t take itself seriously enough is almost as bad as a version that takes itself too seriously.

It never fails to jump out at me how diametrically opposed these interpretations are, from the characterization right down to the tone and lighting.

McGrath’s Emma is light in every sense of the word, where Davies’ is dark and ponderous. McGrath’s Knightley is laid back where Davies’ is aggressive and ferocious. Frank, in McGrath’s version, is let off easy by the narrative playing down his moodiness, while in Davies there’s an overshadowing dark-cloud of off-putting caddishness.

Ribbon Rating: Tolerable (58 Ribbons)

The more I watch the 1996 adaptations of Emma (invariably back-to-back) the more firmly I am convinced that Andrew Davies’ made for TV film was (in some ways) a direct response to McGrath’s motion picture.

Tone: 7

Casting: 7

Acting: 5

Scripting: 5

Pacing: 4

Cinematography: 4

Setting: 5

Costumes: 6

Music: 5

Book Accuracy: 6

[tillidontneedfantasy]

Defined by the Things She Loves: A Track-by-Track Breakdown of Taylor Swift’s 7th Studio Album, ‘Lover.’

Contrary to popular belief and misconception, Taylor Swift has always been more of a lover than a fighter. Yes, she can be a fighter, but only when she feels she has no choice. Often times, the combative side of her is brought out as a means to protect her ability to love. “Combat, I’m ready for combat. I say I don’t want that, but what if I do?” is how Swift opens up the vulnerable fifth track from her new album, Lover, titled “The Archer,” in which she explores her automatic defenses when things go well, because how can they possibly stay that way? This is an incessant fear of Swift’s, as seen through her personal diary entries included in the 4 different deluxe versions of the album. In deluxe album 2, there is an entry from 21-year-old Taylor that says: “This ridiculous thing happens to me when I’m this happy...I start feeling like karma will balance it all out by making something tragic happen.”

She then counters her own negative thinking: “But I’m trying to just show gratitude as much as I can. Every day, every minute. I’m grateful for being happy right this moment.” In the foreword for this album, Swift notes how a majority of these diary entries actually do document her taking a moment to cherish the small joys in her life: “I wrote about tiny details in my life in these diaries from a bygone age with such...wonderment. Intrigue. Romance. I noticed things and decided they were romantic, and so they were.” And not much has changed. Even on reputation (2017), an album that evokes a combative stance, or so it seemed to the naked eye, she still always finds the romance in life. Coincidentally, reputation is an album in which the general public took around 2 years to admit was actually good. In a lot of ways, it felt like the reputation era was deliberate in that sense, as if Taylor only trusted her loyal fans to get what she was trying to say and do, almost not wanting the skeptics and overly zealous critics to see what was underneath the armor. All the reviews of reputation slammed it as an album about her infamous feuds, and although they are of course addressed famously on songs such as “Look What You Made Me Do,” “I Did Something Bad,” and “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things,” and sprinkled a little more here and there throughout, that was more of a distraction to the actual inspiration: love. Almost every other track on reputation explores her anxiety and relief around her newfound relationship at the time with British actor Joe Alwyn. It’s really a love story about finding someone who sees you for who you really are, rather than how the world is painting you.

On Lover, Swift takes command of the paintbrush, trying to get the world to see her the way her “lover” and her fans have the whole time. In “Dancing With Our Hands Tied” from reputation, Swift sings, “deep blue, but you painted me golden.” On “Daylight,” Lover’s closer, she describes love as golden like daylight. “Step into the daylight and let it go,” she almost whispers. She’s shedding her snakeskin, and she is ready for people to see her in all her loving and golden glory.

Swift is a storyteller like no other pop singer this generation, and so it would feel wrong to skip any chapter of this beautiful story. And thus, please join me in the track-by-track breakdown of the triumphant and magical Lover.

01. I FORGOT THAT YOU EXISTED

“How many days did I spend thinking ‘bout how you did me wrong?” she opens the album, seemingly reflecting on the reputation era and image. She revels in the magical feeling of forgetting that someone who wronged you even existed; obviously not forever, but just for even a single moment when you’ve realized, “Ah, I’ve made it to indifference! How wonderful!” She laughs and becomes more playful as the song progresses, showing her relief, although not exactly her freedom. In a recent interview with CBS Sunday morning, Swift asserts, "You know, people go on and on about, like, you have to forgive and forget to move past something. No, you don't. You don't have to forgive and you don't have to forget to move on. You can move on without any of those things happening. You just become indifferent, and then you move on." This sentiment is evident throughout the song, and in the nonchalant way she ends it by going, “so...yeah...” As in, yes the drama has affected me, but I’ve come to terms with it, so let’s move on, shall we? And so, we shall! 

02. CRUEL SUMMER

Sometimes, listening to a song can feel like electrocution. “Cruel Summer” is an immediate shock to the system following the bubbly first track. Suddenly, for 2 minutes and 58 seconds, we’re transported back into the anxiety of reputation, but through a different lens. Chronicling what seems to be a fraught start to her current relationship, Swift seems to be suffocating under her own emotions, trying to play it casual and cool, however against her nature. The production is astounding, and it is one of her most intriguing songs to date. Each lyric can be analyzed again and again from a new perspective, leaving you to wonder more and more. (And what so significant happened at a vending machine that she felt the need to include it in this story?) At the climax of the song, she admits that she can no longer keep her feelings secret, and has to risk telling him how she feels, even if that means losing him. “I scream, ‘for whatever it’s worth, I love you, ain’t that the worst thing you ever heard?’” she shouts in the bridge. Earlier in the track she states that “devils roll the dice,” and after her dicey proclamation of love she tells the audience that “he looks up grinning like a devil,” as if he were to say, “Of course I love you back, I rolled the dice for it to be so, didn’t I?” The entire song can be interpreted in a multitude of ways, but one thing is certain: the summer may have been cruel, but it was all love come the fall.

03. LOVER

The best-received and final pre-release, the title track is an ode to her main muse for this album. “Have I known you 20 seconds or 20 years?” she wonders, before asking to be with her lover forever and ever. She’s felt like she’s known him for almost her whole life, and wants to spend the rest of it with him, too. So much so that the bridge sounds like Swift’s (future? past? are they secretly married?) wedding vows, especially with the play on words for something borrowed and blue. The song even sounds like it’s being played by a wedding band with the use of live instruments. Although it has been pushed as a single and is destined to be a wedding song for many couples to come, I unfortunately cannot see it having the same success as Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud” or “Perfect,” despite its superior lyrics and greater emotional depth. And why might that be, you ask? Great segue into the next track... 

04. THE MAN

It’s really a staggering thought experiment to think of how Taylor Swift’s career would be perceived if she was a man. I could write a novel on this, but Taylor did a pretty good job of summing it up in a 3-minute pop song: if she was a man, she’d be THE man. This is without question the truth. The woman has 10 Grammys and countless other accolades, she has written her own music since the beginning of time (her third album, Speak Now [2010], was entirely self-written, no co-writers). Yet she is continually ridiculed and mocked for things for which men are praised. Swift sings the song slickly in her very comfortable alto-range, which feels purposeful. It feels oddly powerful to hear Taylor Swift sing the word “bitch” twice in one song, which not only hearkens back to her defense for the infamous Kimye call, but for a moment really highlights the distinguished usages of the word “bitch,” forcing you to really consider why we let men just get away with it. And yes, the song’s take on misogyny is pretty surface level, but Taylor herself only has to deal with it on such a level, so we have to work with what we’ve got. Either way, I don’t think I’ll ever be over the line, “I’d be just like Leo in Saint-Tropez.” Someone had to say it, and she did!

05. THE ARCHER

The third pre-release from Lover, “The Archer” is a slow-build examination of Swift’s role in her relationships, both with others and herself. We have never seen this side of Taylor, but it feels like we were waiting for it all along, like we needed it. It’s very rare that someone as successful as Swift lays out their deepest flaws and insecurities for the world, other than Lorde on “Liability,” also co-produced and written by Jack Antonoff. “I never grew up, it’s getting so old,” she says, echoing a common criticism of the way she has dealt with feuds or breakups publicly.  “The Archer” is placed at track 5, a track that Swift has historically reserved for the most vulnerable song on the album. The bridge officially earns this spot; it is simple and simultaneously one of her best ever, as she transitions from, “They see right through me” to “Can you see right through me?” and then finally to an agonizing “I see right through me.” Swift’s self-awareness is painfully relatable, as she pleads, “help me hold onto you,” after each pre-chorus as an important reminder that sometimes we need to ask for help in order to grow.

06. I THINK HE KNOWS

It almost feels like whiplash going from the vulnerability of “The Archer” to a song that has the line, “He’s so obsessed with me, and boy, I understand!” But it’s a fun type of whiplash, as if Taylor is saying “wipe your tears and let’s skip down 16th avenue together.” What is admirable about Swift’s craft is that she is able to mature and cover maybe more sexual topics in her music while still keeping it discrete enough for her younger audience. “Where we gonna go? I think he knows,” feels like a wink to the camera (microphone?) moment. And yes, Taylor, we do know. Happy for you, girl.

07. MISS AMERICANA & THE HEARTBREAK PRINCE

Many deemed Lover’s second single, “You Need to Calm Down,” along with its Video of the Year winning music video, which explicitly outlines her support for LGBTQ rights, as an outright opportunistic ploy to win over liberal music consumers rather than a genuine showing of solidarity. The unflashy “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince” proves that Swift means business. The casual listener might not realize the subject matter right away as it masked underneath school tropes and cheerleader chants. Quite effectively, Swift uses high school as a metaphor for the current political state. This song could be better explained through a 7 page MLA formatted essay, but in short, it’d be helpful to take note of Swift’s recent explanation and regret  for her silence during the 2016 election. The lyric “they whisper in the hallway, ‘she’s a bad, bad girl,’” echoes the similarities between Swift and Hillary Clinton that she outlined to Vogue. It is refreshing to hear Taylor write about something perhaps out of her comfort zone with the same eloquence and strength as she would about topics she’s been writing about for years, and her message is clear: she is against the current president and administration, and always has been. “Boys will be boys, then where are the wise men? Darling, I’m scared,” she sings frantically. Me too, Taylor.

08. PAPER RINGS

Quite like “Lover,” this song feels timeless. “Paper Rings” is a series of quips, connecting the moon being high to his friends, her cold wine to her cold shoulder, and feeling blue to the color they painted his brother’s wall. There’s quite a charming sigh after she chants that she will kiss him a third time “’cause you waited your whole life,” and then proceeds to proclaim that she would marry her lover even with paper rings. With the upbeat, musical number like rhythm and the line, “I hate accidents, except when we went from friends to this,” this track is destined to be in romantic comedy films until the end of time, as it should.

09. CORNELIA STREET

Out of all 18 tracks on Lover, “Cornelia Street” is the most reminiscent of Taylor’s staple songwriting, and self-written at that. A beautiful, lengthy retelling of the “sacred new beginnings” of her relationship, the song centers around the street on which she rented an apartment in 2016. She swears if she lost him, she’d never walk the street again. Once again, Taylor masters the ability to make extremely personal details feel completely universal; we all know what it’s like to associate a specific place or time with someone we love or lost, and how that link can never be fully broken. It’s hard to smell the scent of someone you no longer speak to, or hear their favorite song, or walk down the street where you shared something special. On top of the beautiful production, the way Taylor’s voice cracks right before the last chorus when she says, “I’d never walk Cornelia Street again,” is just an immediate tear duct trigger. You need proof that Swift can write on her own? Look no further.

10. DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS

Inspired by the Netflix film Someone Great (which was coincidentally inspired by Swift’s “Clean” from 1989 [2014], says writer and director Jennifer Kaytin Robinson), “Death By A Thousand Cuts” explores the pain of separating from someone, not because some tragic event happened that tore you apart, but because you naturally grew away from each other. “Gave you too much but it wasn’t enough / but I’ll be all right, it’s just a thousand cuts,” she tries to say casually. There is a unique mixture of production styles, and an absolutely mesmerizing bit of piano at the end of the hook. The echoing “my, my, my, my” in the beginning makes sense when it returns for the second half of the song, in which Swift lists all of the things taken up by this person. Though we know this song is not from personal experience, it shows that she can still write one hell of a breakup song.

11. LONDON BOY

A catchy, upbeat song filled with totally cliche tropes of London men, including British vernacular such as “I fancy you!” While some people are taking the song a bit too seriously, it is a fun track that shows just how head-over-heels she truly is with Joe Alwyn, as she giddily describes herself as a child when their eyes meet. “They say home is where the heart is, but that’s not where mine lives,” she croons. Although the meaning of the saying “home is where the heart is” would point to the fact that her home would actually be in London with her lover rather than where she’s from, it’s still a cute twist on the phrase. 

12. SOON YOU’LL GET BETTER featuring The Dixie Chicks

Probably the saddest song Taylor has ever written, “Soon You’ll Get Better” is a mantra to her mother, Andrea, during her cancer relapse. (The Dixie Chicks, Andrea’s favorite artist, lend their beautiful harmonies). However, it is also a mantra to herself to get through the impossible. “Desperate people find faith, so now I pray to Jesus too,” “I know delusion when I see it in the mirror,” and “I just pretend it isn’t real” painfully show how Taylor is dealing with it. But she’s willing to go to any lengths for her mom as she sings, “I’ll paint the kitchen neon, I’ll brighten up the sky / I know I’ll never get it, there’s not a day that I won’t try.” One of the most heartbreaking moments comes in the bridge with the lyric “I hate to make this all about me, but who am I supposed to talk to?” She has said multiple times that she does not think she’ll ever perform the song live and that she cannot even listen to it. Anyone going through a similar situation can understand; it’s a very difficult song to get through without crying. And although the pain Taylor and her family must be going through is unimaginable, there is extreme bravery in sharing such a personal account that is also, unfortunately, a universal experience.

13. FALSE GOD

“False God” is a sultry and confident song about convincing herself and her partner that they can still make their relationship work despite all of the breaking points they’ve reached. “I’m New York City, I still do it for you, babe,” she states, reassuring the both of them that she shines like the brightest city in the world, and there’s no way he’s going to let that go...right? The track is elevated to another level by the saxophone in the chorus, and the way she almost trips over her words, somewhat offbeat with the track in the pre-chorus when she says, “They all warned us about times like this / they say the road gets hard and you get lost when you’re led by blind faith” feels like she’s guiding the listener through the uncertainty and desperation behind blind faith too.

14. YOU NEED TO CALM DOWN

Lover’s second single, “You Need to Calm Down,” is a song about dealing with people who just can’t mind their damn business, divided into three parts: the online bullying Taylor has received, the homophobia displayed outside of her concerts by Westboro Baptist protesters, and the constant comparisons between and competition projected onto different female artists. With its release during Pride month and an array of LGBTQ celebrities in the music video, casual listeners were extremely skeptical of Swift’s intentions, feeling as if she is only showing support for the LGBTQ community now because she thinks it will help advance her career. This judgment is misplaced for two reasons: 1) Swift started off in country music, and so the majority of her fanbase are from red states, so she has much more to lose than to gain, 2) clearly these people have not been paying attention; not only has Swift shown her support to the community in various ways throughout the years, but this is already her second time showing it through music, as she celebrates “you can want who you want, boys and boys and girls and girls” in 1989′s opening track, “Welcome to New York.” Again, she wants to show that she values love- all types of love- above all. Was Swift’s execution perfect? No. Were her intentions in the right place? Yes. Everyone’s been crying for Swift to be more outspoken, and she’s doing her best. And she has been continually showing avid support for The Equality Act, as she started a petition which she asks people to sign at the end of the video. And although I am straight and cisgender and thus everything I just said isn’t actually important, and what really matters is what her fans in the LGBTQ community have to say, I have seen many of them express feeling really seen by their favorite pop star because of this song, and isn’t that the most important part of it all? Taylor can definitely do more and do better, but it’s a genuine start.

15. AFTERGLOW

It’s been years of pleading...years of completely original outcries...”Write a song called ‘Maybe I’m The Problem’!’” Well, maybe she didn’t make that the title, but “Afterglow” is the closest thing we’re going to get. “Hey, it’s all me, in my head / I’m the one who burned us down, but it’s not what I meant / Sorry that I hurt you,” she apologizes, taking complete ownership for a blowout. “Fighting with a true love is boxing with no gloves,” she observes, as when you hurt someone you love so much you are also hurting yourself. Then she turns the fight on its head, making it for one another instead of with one another: “This ultraviolet morning light below tells me this love is worth the fight.” Lover is such an interesting album from Taylor Swift because we get to see the sides of her in love we haven’t before, and in “Afterglow” she shows us all sides: combative, overdramatic, reflective, apologetic, and reparative. So maybe it’s time to retire the joke, kids.

16. ME! featuring Brendon Urie

I don’t care what anyone says: spelling IS fun. And it’s truly tragic (yes, tragic) that Swift decided to remove such a bold assertion from the lead single, “ME!” right before the album’s release. When it comes to Swift, it seems like her critics are constantly waiting for her downfall, which in some way admits that they know she’s good. But what they fail to comprehend is that a songwriter can write serious, profound songs as well as songs that are just for a laugh or to make them feel good. Anytime Swift engages in the latter, it’s responded with aggressive amounts of “Taylor Swift sucks! This song is horrible!” And then when the full album comes out, they sigh, “Damn it, she doesn’t actually suck- just that one song does,” and await the next album cycle for her to prove them wrong again. It seems like Swift is the only one of her contemporaries to receive this treatment. (I wonder why? See: “The Man.”) Was “ME!” a great single choice? Not really. Is it one of the weakest songs on the album overall? Unfortunately, yes. But within the context of the album, following songs like “False God” and “Afterglow,” she’s trying to say, “Yeah, I’ve messed up, but I clean up my messes, and what we have is special because we are both individually special.” That’s a great message! Just because something might appeal to children doesn’t inherently make it childish. And you know what? You literally cannot spell ‘awesome’ without ‘me.’ (And by the way, Brendon Urie is actually the one who wrote the bridge, but alas, no one cares. I repeat, see: “The Man.”) Either way, the overwhelming ridicule over the lyric “spelling is fun” as if the girl was truly serious rather than just trying to be silly was simply ridiculous. I wish Taylor could have just let the haters hate and instead just shake shake shake, but she succumbed to their criticism. RIP spelling is fun, I still have you on the original copy of the single I bought on iTunes and will cherish you forever. 

17. IT’S NICE TO HAVE A FRIEND

The shortest track on the album and the most hauntingly beautiful, “It’s Nice To Have A Friend” features a sample from students of Regent Park School of Music in Toronto. How fitting too, as it tells a tale of childhood love. Swift starts off the first verse by gently singing, “School bell rings, walk me home / sidewalk chalk covered in snow,” and then begins the final verse with, “Church bells ring, carry me home / rice on the ground, looks like snow.” The parallel between these verses highlights that at the end of the day, eternal love is really all about forever friendship, in all its forms.

18. DAYLIGHT

“Real love shines golden like starlight, and doesn’t fade or spontaneously combust. Maybe I’ll write a whole album about that kind of love if I ever find it,” Swift wrote in the prologue of the Red (2012) lyric booklet. Well, she did find it, as is evident throughout the entire album. But it’s stronger than starlight: “I once believed love would be burning red, but it’s golden like daylight,” she sings on the final track of this album. In a perfect closing, Swift describes this love as the light at the end of a “twenty-year dark night.” Now that she has this love, she doesn’t want to look at anything else; she just wants to soak it all in. “Daylight” is hope; it is the message that things always get lighter eventually as long as you let love in. That love can be from anywhere: a parent, a friend, a lover, a song, an album, an inspiration. But you have to let go of the darkness, even when it's all you’ve known for so long, in order to embrace the new. Taylor did that, and we can all follow the daylight she now emits as our guide. 

“I want to be defined by the things that I love,” she declares in a spoken ending. And I believe that this celebration of love through Lover will not only define her professional career, but also her personal legacy.

DISCLAIMER - REVIEWER’S BIAS: Taylor Swift is THE songwriter of our generation. This isn’t bias this is just a fact. Why Are You Booing Me I’m Right dot jpeg.

[honestgrins]

Cutthroat || Klaroline

She’s determined to win, but she’s not above teaming up with a rival to knock out a worse one. (Cutthroat Kitchen AU)

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“Chef Matt,” Alaric intoned solemnly, “you are dismissed. Please relinquish your remaining funds.”

As the burly blond handed over the cash he never even had a chance to spend, Caroline bristled with the thrill of competition. Unfortunately for her, Damon and Klaus seemed just as energized, and she highly resented the elbow poked into her side. “Quarterback down,” Damon sneered next to her. “Is the cheerleader next? Maybe I’ll sabotage you with pom poms next, though I’ll be honest, the skirt would be better.”

She scowled as he leered down the line of her leg, tired of his needling and the gross stares. But she knew what she’d signed up for when first auditioning for Cutthroat Kitchen, and trash talk was the least of her worries. Working with tiny pans and utensils hadn’t been easy, but she’d managed a decent frittata in the first round, and she definitely enjoyed watching Klaus grimace at the substitute ingredients he’d been forced to use. 

Damon, though, he deserved more than a little hardship for this next round. Glancing over to Klaus, she found him watching her curiously. She arched an eyebrow and nodded to the sleazy chef between them. He smirked, which shouldn’t have left her blushing like it did. It’s just a truce, she reminded herself. Come the final round, he’s toast.

At least, she hoped. Klaus Mikaelson was something of a legend around Chicago, where she’d only just gotten her foot in the door of the industry. While she had full faith in her own abilities, the barbs about her lack of experience and youth weren’t exactly unfounded. All she could do was make up for it with enthusiasm and creativity, which the show usually rewarded. But she’d also survived high school and her sorority house, so psychological warfare was second nature to her. 

With the dark gleam of satisfaction on Klaus’s face as he nodded, she wondered if maybe she shouldn’t have conspired with Damon to kick him out first.

Steeling herself, Caroline turned to watch Alaric set up for the next challenge. “Alright, chefs,” he greeted with an evil smile. “For this round, you will be expected to make...spaghetti and meatballs! You have sixty seconds to shop for this basic dish. Go.” 

She rushed forward to beat Damon to the produce, eagerly filling her basket with the best tomatoes, onions, and herbs. Luckily, she was paying attention to Klaus, who’d taken to clearing the pasta shelf into his basket. With a quick pinch of the last box of angel hair, she couldn’t help a grin to match his own when she ducked under his arm to grab the crustiest bread she could find.

“Thirty seconds!”

Oil, garlic, ground beef, a few too many spices - she frantically ran through the list in her head, sure that she was missing something important. 

“And time. Chefs, please return to your stations.” Caroline bit her lip, painfully aware of the eggs she completely forgot. Refusing to let on about her mild panic, she fought to hold a blank expression as the others tried to size up her basket. It was pretty basic for most recipes, and they didn’t seem to pick up her hopefully not fatal error. “For the first sabotage, I have for you all a handy little device to hinder your opponents.” He held it up, the cuffs and plexiglas shining under the stage lights. “This is the Salad Bar to accompany your Italian classic,” he teased.

Alaric could call it what he wanted, but that was definitely a spreader bar she’d seen featured in an...adult catalog. Before she could school her reaction, however, she let out an indelicate snort. Only Klaus seemed to notice, his smirk somehow deepening with a far dirtier glint. Oh, she sighed internally, a twinge low in her belly warming her with something other than embarrassment. Interesting.

“Two thousand,” Klaus called out, not taking his eyes from her.

“Three-five,” she countered. Maybe her voice didn’t sound as breathy as it felt.

“Ten thousand.” Damon gave her the slimiest look, and it took everything in her not to throw away the rest of her cash to make sure he didn’t get to put her in some BDSM fantasy of his.

Klaus, who had yet to spend any money, glared him down. “Eleven,” he said smoothly. With plenty of money to outbid Damon’s draining budget, he all but dared him to bankrupt himself. 

“Eleven going once, twice,” Alaric watched them all with interest, then smiled. “Sold. Chef Klaus, collect your winnings and crown whomever you’d like.” He collected the money and passed over the bar with a gleeful wink. “Choose wisely.”

Pretending to consider it, Klaus all but tossed the thing at Damon. “You don’t strike me as the type to be comfortable with restraint,” he goaded. 

Gamely strapping himself in, Damon blew him a kiss. “Easy as pie, big bad,  even if it’s too bad Barbie Chef didn’t get a chance to impress us with her...coordination.”

She grit her teeth, waiting to pummel him with the next sabotage. When Alaric brought it forward, though, she nearly jumped for joy.

“Who is going to be the Egghead?” he asked, holding a little headband strapped to an egg cup. “Whoever wears this will have to balance an egg throughout the challenge. If the egg breaks, I’m happy to replace it...for five hundred dollars a plop.”

Provided she got to keep her basket, she could more than afford breaking a couple of eggs - right into her meatball recipe. But first, she had to get one of the boys to ‘gift’ it to her. “Five thousand!”

“Six,” Klaus immediately raised, meeting her eyes with a curious glance. He could really mess with her plan if he wanted to, and she felt a wave of relief when Damon shouted out another ten thousand dollar bid. Klaus luckily backed off, and she could finally breathe. 

Once Damon was announced the winner, she held back a wicked smile until he placed the gadget on her head. Unsettled, he backed away quickly, suspicious to the extreme. Alaric helpfully balanced an egg in the little cup, reminding her of the $500 penalty for each egg broken - but he never said she couldn’t use said broken eggs. Fully justified in her strategy, as soon as the timer started, she made a little bed of ground beef in her mixing bowl and let the first egg fall.  “Whoops!”

Alaric shook his head, clearly amused by her obvious scheming. “Come get your replacement, chef.”

She rushed over to him with her fine and hurried back to start breaking down her bread into crumbs, needing to toss them into the oven to dry out a bit. Chopping onions and tomatoes quickly, she fills the saucepan before Alaric could bring out another sabotage. The more quickly she can get her elements cooking, the more likely she’d get to keep them - she prayed, anyway.

“How’s that egg scramble coming, Blondie?” Damon taunted, though his voice was strained with the effort of mixing meatballs with only one hand bound awkwardly to the other. “It’d be a shame for you to drop another.”

“Actually, it’s been a big help. Hard to bind a meatball without an egg, and would you believe I forgot to grab them from the pantry?” She winked at his dumbfounded expression, primly brushing back her ponytail. “I was a pageant queen, chef. If I can balance a book on my head for an hour in heels, I can handle an egg just fine.”

Klaus laughed at that, though his big hands never stopped their flurry of activity over his station. “A tiara suits you, love, you should have brought it along.”

“The only crown won here is whatever cash you still have at the end of the day,” Alaric pointed out. “That said, who wants to replace their opponents’ stovetop for a camping stove?”

“Eight thousand!” Klaus called, knowing full well he was the only one who could afford such a bid in the second round. 

Caroline immediately moved her half formed meatballs to the sauce; her only hope would be to oven bake them both while using the tiny stove to boil water for her pasta. Though she did lose another egg to her hurried actions, it was more than worth the penalty to see Damon struggle moving his pot of water down from the counter. “Careful!” she called. “You don’t want to spill and have to start over!”

“Shut up, Barbie!”

“And I always thought the trash talk on this show was so witty,” Klaus pouted, whipping some cream into his sauce. “Don’t hold back, Damon, really let yourself loose.”

Muttering from the floor, Damon did let loose a few curse words Caroline hoped the cameras wouldn’t pick up. But she still laughed, happy to see her sauce bubbling softly in the oven. 

Klaus feigned a scandalized horror. “Such language.”

“If you’re looking for the Great British Bake-Off, you’re on the wrong side of the pond, friend,” she teased.

“Oh,” he chuckled. “The baby chef is trying to teach me something, okay.”

“Baby?!”

He shrugged, unconcerned by her offended outburst. “Come chop a few hundred onions a day in my kitchen, sweetheart, then maybe you’ll earn a gold star or two for your mum’s refrigerator.”

Eyes narrowed, she only just held back from pointing her knife in a vaguely threatening direction. “Can’t, it’s too full of awards and news clippings. Like the latest rave review from the Sun-Times. Did you know they named my restaurant as the best dining experience in the city for their editor’s list?”

“I did.” Caroline watched him in shock as he appeared entirely unbothered. “But I believe mine earned the Michelin star this year.” She licked her lips at the smug dimples peeking out from his cheeks; it really was unfair how sexy confidence could be. 

“Two minutes!” 

All the contestants rushed to plate their dishes, and even Caroline felt a little bad for Damon trying to neaten up the mess of his with one hand throwing off his balance. But then she remembered the egg sitting at the top of her forehead, and focused instead on carefully grating some cheese over her mostly passable pasta. Klaus’s, of course, looked like fine cuisine, right down to the twist of his noodles into a birds nest holding three perfectly proportioned meatballs.

To no one’s surprise, the guest judge sent Damon home with more than a few critiques for his ‘lack of polish.’ Alaric called for a fifteen minute break, and Caroline gratefully ran to the craft services table for a bottle of water and some fruit. Klaus followed at a more sedate pace, though he did steal a grape from her plate. “Thanks for teaming up back there,” she said. “I’d hate to be stuck with Damon for more terrible nicknames.”

“I’m sure you would have survived despite our machinations, love. I am impressed with your little egg game, though.”

She blushed. “Well, I’m the one who forgot the stupid eggs in the first place. Let’s be honest, you wouldn’t let me through the doors of your Michelin restaurant with that kind of preparation.”

His smile softened, and she really liked how it looked on his face. “You might be surprised. In fact,” he added nonchalantly, “I’m hoping you might stop in when we’re back in Chicago. I’ve only read about the lobster bisque you made for that glowing review, and I’d be honored to offer you the chance to make it in a real kitchen.”

“And give up my recipe to the competition? No way,” she scoffed, chest warm with pride and more than a little flattered.

Smirking at her resistance, he stole another grape. “Shall we make a wager of it, sweetheart? If I win this dessert round, you make that bisque for me.”

Her eyelashes fluttered. “What do I get when I win?”

Klaus just grinned, wide and knowing. “Whatever you want.“ Oh, that shouldn’t have sent a wonderful shiver down her spine. “May the best chef win,” he challenged.

Caroline shook his proffered hand with her game face on. “Don’t worry, she will.” After all, the stakes had just gotten a lot more interesting.

[covid19worldnews]

Another Now by Yanis Varoufakis

When Margaret Thatcher coined “Tina” – her 1980s dictum that “There is no alternative” – I was incensed because, deep down, I felt she had a point: the left had neither a credible nor a desirable alternative to capitalism.

Leftists excel at pinpointing what is wrong with capitalism. We wax lyrical about the possibility of some “other” world in which one contributes according to one’s capacities and obtains according to one’s needs. But, when pushed to describe a fully fledged alternative to contemporary capitalism, for many decades we have oscillated between the ugly (a Soviet-like barracks socialism) and the tired (a social democracy that financialised globalisation has rendered infeasible).

During the 1980s, I participated in many debates in pubs, universities and town halls whose stated purpose was to organise resistance to Thatcherism. I remember my guilty thought every time I heard Maggie speak: “If only we had a leader like her!” I was, of course, under no illusion: Thatcher’s programme was despotic, antisocial and an economic cul-de-sac. But, unlike our side, she understood that we lived in a revolutionary moment. The postwar class war armistice was over. If we wanted to defend the weak, we could not afford to be defensive. We needed to advocate as she did: out with the old system, in with a brand new one. Not Maggie’s dystopian one, but a brand new one nevertheless.

Alas, our lot had no vision of a new system. Instead, we were in the business of bandaging corpses while Thatcher was digging graves to clear the way for her spanking new spiv capitalism. Even when we were putting up a splendid fight in defence of communities that deserved defending, our causes screamed “anachronism” – fighting to preserve dirty coal-fired power stations or the right of male rightwing trade unionists to reach sordid deals behind closed doors with the likes of Robert Maxwell and Rupert Murdoch.

Just as when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, we on the left – social democrats, Keynesians and Marxists alike – had the sense we would live the rest of our days as history’s losers, so in 2008, with Lehman’s collapse, those living the ideology of neoliberalism saw history erupt with similar soul-destroying force. Some years later, surveillance capitalism forced tech-evangelists, who thought they had seen in the internet an irresistible global democratic force, also to shed their illusions.

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, in September 2008. Photograph: Richard Drew/AP

Two years ago I decided we need a blueprint, a sense of how democratic socialism could work today, with our current technologies and despite our human failings. My reluctance to attempt such an undertaking was immense. Two people helped me overcome it. One is Danae Stratou, my partner. From the week we first met, she has been telling me that my critique of capitalism meant nothing unless I could answer her pressing question: “What’s the alternative? And precisely how would things – like money, companies and housing – work?”

The second, and most unlikely, influence was Paschal Donohoe, Ireland’s finance minister and president of the Eurogroup. A political opponent who thought little of me as a finance minister (a mutual assessment), he was kind enough to write a generous review of an earlier book of mine. While Donohoe liked my account of capitalism he thought the book’s ending, in which I tried to sketch some features of a postcapitalist society, was “most disappointing”.

He was right, I thought. So I decided to write Another Now.

In a bid to incorporate into my socialist blueprint different, often clashing, perspectives I decided to conjure up three complex characters whose dialogues would narrate the story – each representing different parts of my thinking: a Marxist-feminist, a libertarian ex-banker and a maverick technologist. Their disagreements regarding “our” capitalism provide the background against which my socialist blueprint is projected – and assessed.

•••

Capitalism took off in earnest when electromagnetism met share markets at the end of the 19th century. Their coupling gave rise to networked megafirms, such as Edison, that produced everything from power stations to lightbulbs. To finance the huge undertaking, and the massive trade in their shares, the need arose for megabanks. By the early 1920s financialised capitalism roared, before the whole juggernaut crashed in 1929.

Our current decade began with another coupling that seems to be propelling history at dizzying velocity: the one between the enormous bubble with which states have been refloating the financial sector since 2008, and Covid-19. Evidence is not hard to spot. On 12 August, the day the news broke that the British economy had suffered its greatest slump ever, the London Stock Exchange jumped by more than 2%. Nothing comparable has ever occurred. Financial capitalism seems finally to have decoupled from the underlying economy.

Another Now begins in the late 1970s, straddles the crises of 2008 and 2020 but also sketches out an imaginary future, and concludes in 2036. There is a moment in the story, on a Sunday evening in November 2025 to be precise, when my characters try to make sense of their circumstances by looking back to the events of 2020. The first thing they note is how drastically the lockdown changed people’s perception of politics.

Before 2020, politics seemed almost like a game, but with Covid came the realisation that governments everywhere possessed immense powers. The virus brought the 24-hour curfew, the closure of pubs, the ban on walking through parks, the suspension of sport, the emptying of theatres, the silencing of music venues. All notions of a minimal state mindful of its limits and eager to cede power to individuals went out of the window.

Many salivated at this show of raw state power. Even free-marketeers, who had spent their lives shouting down any suggestion of even the most modest boost in public spending, demanded the sort of state control of the economy not seen since Leonid Brezhnev was running the Kremlin. Across the world, the state funded private firms’ wage bills, renationalised utilities and took shares in airlines, car makers, even banks. From the first week of lockdown, the pandemic stripped away the veneer of politics to reveal the boorish reality underneath: that some people have the power to tell the rest what to do.

The massive government interventions misled naive leftists into the daydream that revived state power would prove a force for good. They forgot what Lenin had once said: politics is about who does what to whom. They allowed themselves to hope that something good might transpire if the same elites that had hitherto condemned so many to untold indignities were handed immeasurable power.

It was the poorer and the browner people who suffered most from the virus. Why? Their poverty had been caused by their disempowerment. It aged them faster. And it made them more vulnerable to disease. Meanwhile, big business, always reliant on the state to impose and enforce the monopolies on which it thrives, boosted its privileged position.

The Amazons of this world flourished, naturally. The lethal emissions that had temporarily subsided returned to choke the atmosphere. Instead of international cooperation, borders went up and the shutters came down. Nationalist leaders offered demoralised citizens a simple trade: authoritarian powers in return for protection from a lethal virus – and scheming dissidents.

Demonstrators gather outside Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ $80m New York City penthouse, to protest the retailer’s treatment of workers during the pandemic, in August. Photograph: John Marshall Mantel/SIPA/REX/Shutterstock

If cathedrals were the middle ages’ architectural legacy, the 2020s will be remembered for electrified fences and flocks of buzzing drones. Finance and nationalism, already on the rise before 2020, were the clear winners. The great strength of the new fascists was that, unlike their forerunners a century ago, they don’t need to wear brown shirts or even enter government to gain power. The panicking establishment parties – the neoliberals and social democrats – have been falling over themselves to do their job for them through the power of big tech.

To stop new outbreaks governments tracked our every move with fancy apps and fashionable bracelets. Systems designed to monitor coughs now also monitored laughs. They made earlier organisations specialising in surveillance and “behaviour modification”, like the infamous KGB and Cambridge Analytica, seem positively neolithic.

What was the moment when humanity lost the plot? Was it 1991? 2008? Or did we still have a chance in 2020? Like epiphanies, the fork-in-the-road theory of history is a convenient lie. The truth is we face a fork-in-the-road every day of our lives.

•••

Suppose we had seized the 2008 moment to stage a peaceful hi-tech revolution that led to a postcapitalist economic democracy. What would it be like? To be desirable, it would feature markets for goods and services since the alternative – a Soviet-type rationing system that vests arbitrary power in the ugliest of bureaucrats – is too dreary for words. But to be crisis-proof, there is one market that market socialism cannot afford to feature: the labour market. Why? Because, once labour time has a rental price, the market mechanism inexorably pushes it down while commodifying every aspect of work (and, in the age of Facebook, our leisure too).

Can an advanced economy function without labour markets? Of course it can. Consider the principle of one-employee-one-share-one-vote underpinning a system that, in Another Now, I call corpo-syndicalism. Amending corporate law so as to turn every employee into an equal (though not equally remunerated) partner is as unimaginably radical today as universal suffrage was in the 19th century.

In my blueprint, central banks provide every adult with a free bank account into which a fixed stipend (called universal basic dividend) is credited monthly. As everyone uses their central bank account to make domestic payments, most of the money minted by the central bank is transferred within its ledger. Additionally, the central bank grants all newborns a trust fund, to be used when they grow up.

People receive two types of income: the dividends credited into their central bank account and earnings from working in a corpo-syndicalist company. Neither are taxed, as there are no income or sales taxes. Instead, two types of taxes fund the government: a 5% tax on the raw revenues of the corpo-syndicalist firms; and proceeds from leasing land (which belongs in its entirety to the community) for private, time-limited, use.

When it comes to international trade and payments, Another Now features an innovative global financial system that continually transfers wealth to the global south, while also preventing imbalances from causing strife and crises. All trade and all money movements between different monetary jurisdictions (eg the UK and the eurozone or the US) are denominated in a new digital accounting unit, called the Kosmos. If the Kosmos value of a country’s imports exceeds its exports, it is charged a levy in proportion to the trade deficit. But, equally, if a country’s exports exceed its imports, it is also charged the levy. Another levy is charged to a country’s Kosmos account whenever too much money moves too quickly out of, or into, the country – a surge levy of sorts that taxes the speculative money movements that do such damage to developing countries. All these levies end up as direct green investments in the global south.

But it is the granting of a single non-tradeable share to each employee-partner that holds the key to this economy. By granting employee-partners the right to vote in the corporation’s general assemblies, an idea proposed by the early anarcho-syndicalists, the distinction between wages and profits is terminated and democracy, at last, enters the workplace.

From a firm’s senior engineers and key strategic thinkers to its secretaries and janitors, everyone receives a basic wage plus a bonus that is decided collectively. Since the one-employee-one-vote rule favours smaller decision-making units, corpo-syndicalism causes conglomerates voluntarily to break up into smaller companies, thus reviving market competition. Even more strikingly, share markets vanish completely since shares, like IDs and library cards, are now non-tradeable. Once share markets have disappeared, the need for gargantuan debt to fund mergers and acquisitions evaporates – along with commercial finance. And given that the Central Bank provides everyone with a free bank account, private banking shrinks into utter insignificance.

Some of the thornier issues I had to address in writing Another Now, to ensure its consistency with a fully democratised society, included: the fear that powerful people will manipulate elections even under market socialism; the stubborn refusal of patriarchy to die; gender and sexual politics; the funding of the green transition; borders and migration; a bill of digital rights and so on.

Writing this as a manual would have been unbearable. It would have forced me to pretend that I have taken sides in arguments that remain unresolved in my head – often in my heart. I, therefore, owe an immense debt of gratitude to my spirited characters Iris, Eva and Costa. Above all else, they allowed me seriously to ponder the hardest of questions: once we have conceived of a feasible socialism that blasts Thatcher’s Tina out of the water, what must we do, and how far are we willing to go, to bring it about?

• Another Now by Yanis Varoufakis is published by Bodley Head. To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.

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https://www.covid19snews.com/2020/11/02/another-now-by-yanis-varoufakis/

[auskultu]

The Who Ready To Hit You With New Ideas

Keith Altham, New Musical Express, 28 October 1967

AFTER six weeks with “the last Schmaltz” it is good to find the Who back in the charts with a new single, ‘I Can See For Miles’, in their old “knockabout” style. It is also good to have Pete Townshend back for interviews, employing his brain like a well-oiled lawn mower that clacks around and around, spitting out ideas and attitudes as it churns up the Scene.

Is there a new approach from the group, perhaps, following their successful American tour and the beginning of what almost unbelievably is their first British tour tomorrow (Saturday) with Traffic?

“Yer, what we’re gonna do is hit ‘em wiv it,” monotoned Pete, in his voice for swinging morons. “Punch ‘em in the stomach, kick ‘em on the floor and sock it to ‘em!”

But our story really begins (for those who like to sit comfortably) in the Who’s London offices, where I met manager Kit Lambert, who shook hands in a detached manner and wandered away to take a phone call from agent Danny Betesh.

Mistake Twenty-five minutes later he returned to ask his secretary whether Keith Altham was meeting him here or at a restaurant. Noticing me asleep in one corner, he immediately realised the mistake and banged a fist against his forehead. I was greatly mollified to learn that he recently failed to recognise his own mother as they passed in the street.

We ate an excellent lunch, at which I was under the impression that Pete might appear. “No, rather my fault,” admitted Kit. “I forgot to tell him. However, we’ll go down to the recording studio in Kingsway and provoke them there.” It was 2.45 when we arrived at the studio, but no one else had arrived as yet.

“When should they be here?” I asked “Forty-five minutes ago,” said Kit, resignedly.

Roger Daltrey was first to arrive, wearing yellow sweater, with a large silver cross round his neck on a chain—and trousers as well, of course, as it was a cold day.

Roger said: “The kids in America are very much more together than in Britain. They have something to rebel against. No one wants to be killed at nineteen fighting in Vietnam.

“We’re more a stage group than a recording group…when we play intricate things on stage we explain them…don’t write what I said about Graham Nash…our fans are broad-minded—they have to be!”

John Entwistle arrived with Keith Moon and John said: “Shall we tell him about those school kids who mobbed us in the Blue Boar cafe on the M1 and began stuffing baked beans and tomatoes from our plates into their pockets as souvenirs? All those meletrons aren’t good for your health.” He also did an impression of David McWilliams by holding his nose and singing ‘Days of Pearly Spencer’!

Hurricane Keith said to me: “Where’s yer sixpence for yer cup of tea?” Then hurricane Townshend arrived, rumbling about how he thought it was 3.30 p.m. they were due to start and picked up a packet of sandwiches. “Pig food,” he yelled and threw them back into a carton. Pete likes throwing sandwiches. “See this?” He indicated a suitcase full of tapes. “That’s the Who’s dustbin!” Eventually the storm subsided and he sat in a swivel chair, swinging from left to right as he talked about the new single.

“We were making records for record reviewers before,” said Pete. “They were too flimsy, to poignant, too prissy. They were factory-made. We’ve gone backwards in order to go forward.

“The further forward you move, the more you confuse the fans. We wanted to do something that would be unexpected. Something that would demand something of the public. ‘I Can See For Miles’ was the answer.”

Then, being Pete Townshend, he neatly injected into his lengthy explanation: “And besides which, we had nothing else suitable to release at the time!” As an established group, the Who have a hard core of supporters and they might find the tour with the groups like the Tremeloes and the Herd confusing. “We’ve tried this semi-intellectual approach,” smiled Pete. “We did it at the first house of the Saville concert last Sunday and died a death, because we were following an overwhelming act like the Vanilla Fudge. We were like a cream tea!

“Kit was so worried he tried to way-lay all the journalists in a pub over the road so they would only see the end of the show, but we put things right in the second house. We did a Brian Poole routine—Roger split his trousers, Keith wore a Jester’s hat and knocked his drums about and I kept falling over. They loved it.

“I’ll tell you who is going to be big next year. Groups not afraid to make concessions and mock the whole process. The Bonzo Dogs, for instance, and Dave Dee, because he is not frightened of being commercial!

“In the old days an ‘Emily Scruggs’ used to come into a recording studio, bleat into a megaphone and there it was for ‘posterior.’ Now we get all hang up on six track systems, multi-recording devices and electronic side effects. Electronic music is infinite in variety and eventually you’ll lose yourself and everyone else experimenting with it.

“On our next LP, The Who Sell Out, we’ve got a number called ‘Rael’ which should have been the next single. It’s all about ‘overspill’ when the world population becomes so great in years ahead that everyone is assigned to their one square foot of earth.

“We played it on stage in Manchester and Scotland and everyone just looked at us with their mouths open—the complication was too much. “I don’t want to lose personal contact with people. We want to do longer personal appearance spots, for example.

Identity “I’d rather do longer to give the audience time to identify with the group and get involved with the music. We’re deliberately overrunning our appearances at present.

“It’s like reading a Kingsley Amis novel and wanting to meet the author after you’ve read the book. You meet him, say ‘Hello dear’ and that’s the end of the involvement.”

And so the mowing machine clacked on with blades awhirling: “Stevie Winwood has a legion of fans; it’s inhuman for him to lock himself away like that in the country and detach himself…I’ve heard all I want to of the Beatles’ last LP; now it’s a memory…people aren’t jiving in the listening boxes in record shops any more like we did to a Cliff Richard ‘newie’…’Paper Sun’ wasn’t a hit record, it was a best seller…’Lily’ and ‘Happy Jack’ had simple tunes people could remember.”

“Something you could hum over a lathe,” chipped in Mr. Moon.

When last seen Mr. Townshend was leaping up and down the corridor of the Kingsway studios shouting, “I’m beautiful, I’m beautiful,” and Mr. Lambert was almost visibly counting up studio fees.

[caranfindel]

Recap/Review 12.20: "Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes"

THEN: Dad’s on a hunting trip, and he hasn’t been home in a few days.

Shit, you guys, they’re taking us back to the pilot. It’s a risky move, showing this particular scene, because it reminds us of how awesome the show was back in the day. This scene has always been one of my favorites, with Sam blowing off Dean’s concern and then Dean repeating what he said but adding the oh-so-telling information (though we didn’t know it at the time) that Dad was on a hunting trip and Sam not breaking eye contact with Dean as he quietly asks/tells Jessica to excuse them for a minute and damn. I love this scene.

Anyway. The rest of the “Then:” hot witch twins, Ketch wants to know the secret behind Sam’s shiny hair, Cas, the Colt.

NOW: A lovely woman who looks way too young to be Max and Alicia’s mother drives up to an inn in a large old house, where she encounters a nasty older woman with a big ring and a big attitude (although I did think “what a delicate constitution you must have” was clever). She offers to cleanse her aura, saying it looks “a little muddy,” and I suspect this is a witch’s version of a southern woman saying “well bless your heart” - they both translate to “why don’t you fuck off and die?” The younger woman is Tasha Banes, here on both business and pleasure (but probably ending up with neither). She does some witchcraft using the order “reveal,” and ends up in an apparently very malodorous cellar, where she’s quickly stabbed through the abdomen. Like I said, neither business nor pleasure is getting accomplished here.

Title card!

Sam and Dean are in the bunker, freaking out about Cas. (Also, they’re both proving my point about Dean being the better dresser, since he’s wearing a nice solid grayish-greenish shirt that probably does things with his eyes when he’s not in a dark bunker, while Sam’s in an unflattering blue and red plaid.) Dean’s venting and chewing on his nails, which almost never happens. Sam’s quietly trying to figure out how to fix it. Dean says he’s always been able to forgive Cas’s missteps in the past, which, well, okay, maybe not but let’s move on. “But last night, I did not recognize the guy staring back at me.” Like that’s a first. Like Godstiel and Leviathan!Cas never happened.

Winchesters in distress. I like it.

Sam decides this conversation isn’t depressing and in fixable enough and unwraps a bundle on the table in front of him. It’s the remains of the Colt. There’s actually more remaining than I thought -it seems like most of the damage was the destruction of the barrel. Dean asks if he can fix it, and Sam answers “I hope so.” That’s actually kind of encouraging. I thought it was gone for good. I’d love to see Smart!Sam figure out how to rebuild it.

We hear the sound of a phone vibrating against a hard surface, but Sam checks his pocket anyway (insert your own hard surface joke here) and declares it not his. It’s not Dean’s either. It’s an abandoned phone, hidden on the table under a book, and apparently it’s one of Mary’s. I’d really like to know where the characters on Supernatural get these phones that hold a charge for weeks at a time (or, in the case of Bobby’s old phone in “Ask Jeeves,” years).

The caller is Alicia Banes, and let’s not ask why she called Mary instead of Sam in the first place because it makes me unhappy and I don’t want to think about it. They do a very cute thing where Max disputes half the things she says because he thinks she’s making a mountain out of a molehill. (Considering that we’ve already seen Tasha Banes get stabbed, I don’t think it’s a spoiler to point out that he’s wrong.) Alicia is worried about their mother because she was hunting a witch and hasn’t checked in as usual.

I did not notice, until now, that it looks like they may be stopped at a crossroads. Coincidence?

To everyone’s surprise, Sam tells her that he and Dean will meet them in Wyoming. Dean thinks they should be concentrating on Cas, but Sam points out that there’s nothing they can do about that right now, Jody’s put out an APB, and rather than sit around banging their heads against a wall, they should get out there, blah blah blah, and then he says this: “Their mom’s on a hunting trip, and hasn’t been home in a week.”

Dean can’t believe Sam is using that line on him. I can’t believe that’s the only reason they reminded us about it.

We get a few extra, quiet seconds of Dean looking… Sad? Undecided? Anxious? Is he thinking of John? Cas? Mary? Apparently it’s Mary, because he takes out his phone and calls her. She doesn’t answer because she’s… strapped to a chair in the BMoL bunker. With huge screws sticking out of her chest?

Well, that was unexpected!

Her phone is buzzing, and Ketch throws water in her face to wake her up. “Please be a dear,” he says, “and shut that bloody thing off.” I spend a second or two wondering if I missed something in the last episode, but then we see Actual Mary in the background, holding the bloody thing. So, the one in the chair is a shifter. Okay then. With her gray clothing, being strapped down by the BMoL, and having water thrown on her, I’m getting a real Sam-in-the-basement vibe. (And don’t forget the screws in her chest. Insert your own getting screwed joke here.) Despite his use of the word “please,” Ketch angrily makes it clear that he wants her to not answer it, so Dean leaves a message. He tells her about the hunt, says he’ll text the info in case she can help, and then does the lip thing and asks her to call back even if she can’t help. Because there’s some stuff going down and it’s got him “spun out” and he just needs to talk to his mama, dammit.

Dammit.

Ketch continues to torture the shifter (and it turns out the things in her chest are spikes, not screws, but my point still stands) and assures her that looking like Mary ain’t gonna make the torture any less torturous. In fact, I think Mary and I are thinking the same thing, and that is that he really seems to get into hurting someone who looks just like Mary. Also, he’s asking for the location of the shifter’s family (pointedly correcting Mary, who calls the shifter he, by referring to it), obviously intending to torture and kill them as well, so. Good luck with getting those answers. He must have learned his interview technique from Toni Bevell. But he promises that the pain will end when the shifter answers his questions.

Shifter Mary laughs at him and says “That eye of yours twitches when you lie.” He responds that his eye twitches all the time, which is probably true, and then punches her. The physical contact allows her to take on his own form, which throws him a little bit. But what really throws him is when it says, in a very non-Brit drawl, “Well then. I guess I know all about you.” Guys. Ketch is not really British.

He reaches for more spikes, but we cut quickly to the Impala, and then Sam and Dean meeting the Banes twins at a scenic water’s edge somewhere. It must be the next day, because Alicia isn’t wearing her cute outfit, and Sam has changed into an even more unfortunate plaid shirt. Dean’s wearing the Red Shirt of Bad Decisions (and now that I’ve seen this name on Tumblr, I want to claim credit for it), so hopefully something awesomely bad is going to happen. Alicia says that their mother was hunting a “borrower witch,” and Sam explains for the audience that this is a witch who gets their power from a demon deal. And in case we forgot Max is a horn dog, he tells us he got the phone number of the bartender at the only vegan restaurant in town.

(Sidebar: I know of people were excited about Sam/Max, and I’ve read some fics in this vein that I found quite enjoyable. But honestly, I don’t trust him. Sure, he’s sweet and he’s hot and he seemed to be into Sam but he told us he used his witchy powers to seduce men. And if that means “to make myself look hot so men will be attracted to me,” that’s okay. But if he means “to make men want me,” or “to make men think they want me,” that’s a little too close to Toni Bevell for my taste, and I would prefer that he keep it away from my precious Sammy. Also, he seems to be kind of a player, and I’m not slut-shaming, but I don’t think a booty call is what Sam wants or needs.)

(Yes, I do spend a lot of time thinking about what Sam wants and needs. Does that surprise you?)

But I digress. Max compliments the car (because, witchy powers or not, Max sure as hell knows how to work a guy) and Dean takes him for a tour of the trunk. There’s yet another shout-out to the grenade launcher. Those guys really need to use the damn thing this season. It’s funny to me that Dean casually discusses their need for witch-killing bullets in front of a witch. I mean, yeah, they’re hunting a witch, but it would be like Max showing Dean his new hunter-killing spell. It’s just awkward to me.

“Is that a grenade launcher, or are you just happy to see me?”

Sam and Alicia stand around looking beautifully windblown and discussing how their lives are parallel. Max and Tasha are “natural witches,” so they’re extra close, while Alicia has “no magic.” Except artificial witch magic, I guess. Sam tells her that Dean and John had the same bond, with hunting. Alicia asks about Mary, and I expect Sam to say “well, she wasn’t around to bond with when I was growing up, because she was dead,” but I forgot that Alicia knows her as the hunter who is in the here-and-now. Instead he says “she gets into a case and just.. vanishes.” (Just like John, huh?) Alicia comments that Mary’s a great hunter, so I guess they’ve done some hunting together? Is that why she called Mary for help? She doesn’t think she seems like much of a hugger, which Sam doesn’t dispute, even though I’m pretty sure their first hug (since her resurrection) was initiated by Mary.

I would hug you, Sam. Just give me the opportunity.

Team Banechester shows up at the inn and spots Tasha’s car. They also spot a peculiar looking guy next to the cellar doors. Max speaks for everyone when he declares him “not weird, at all” and Sam gives him an adorable awkward little wave, which is not returned.

Maybe it’s that shirt, Sammy.

Dean instructs the twins to “stay behind us” and Alicia says “yeah, sure” but I don’t think she means that because she brandishes an engraved blade and storms inside. She’s greeted by the same kindly clerk who checked Tasha in, and then by Tasha herself. Duh duh duuuuuhhhh!!!! Alicia is thrilled, Max is smug, and Tasha announces they can all hang in her room because she has wine.

Up in her room, Tasha says the witch hunt was a bust. And her phone hasn’t been charging, which is why she didn’t respond to Alicia’s frantic texts and calls. Alicia questions why she ignored her protocol to always call on the fourth day of a hunt, and I was under the impression Tasha was a witch and not a full-time hunter. (And do her hunts always take longer than four days?) Tasha struggles to open the wine while apologizing, and then something weird happens and she makes a face. She asks Sam to pour the wine and then turns away to straighten her broken finger. And remember that, because we’re going to talk about it later. So Alicia puts on some make-out music and Sam pours wine and a million fanfics are started but we’ll have to pause that, because as Dean adorably sniffs at his wine, Tasha announces she ordered vegan takeout and Sam offers to go pick it up. He pats Dean on the leg and instructs him to drink, so Dean empties Sam’s glass into his and it’s very, very cute.

AO3 tag of the day: Dean plus wine plus a trio of hot witches equals a fun time for all.

Cut to the weirdly futuristic BMoL bunker. Having finished his torture session, Ketch is “pumping with adrenaline” and would like to work some of that off with Mary. She shuts him down and says they’d agreed it was a one-time thing, and if she’s referring to the conversation they had when we saw her re-dressing and him cocking his leg out from under the sheets in an unappealing way, I don’t blame him for not getting that. Because I didn’t get it either.

She’s mad because his little torture session didn’t get them any intel; “that shifter was never going to be betray his family.” (Hmmm… I wonder if a Shifter!Mary refusing to betray family is going to mean anything.) Ketch is convinced that pain still works sometimes. “For example,” he says, in his fake Brit accent, “seeing you in pain made me want to have illicit hotel sex with you.” No, he doesn’t, but you know that’s what he’s thinking. He actually says “Anyone who tells you torture is never the answer? They have never been under the knife.” (Mr. Ketch, may I introduce Sam Fucking Winchester?) Mary’s still disgusted that he enjoyed it so much, and says she hasn’t seen that side of him (which is a relief, because I hope she won’t hang around long after seeing it) and he points out that she’s not going to become the Jiminy Cricket of the BMoL, because they don’t need a conscience. (Sidebar: Jiminy Cricket reference reminds me of Dean being Soulless Sam’s Jiminy and aw. Soulless Sam. That was awesome for a bit, wasn’t it?) They believe the ends justify the means. Speaking of the means, he snarks that she should feel free to call Mick and write him up, but she hasn’t heard from Mick - he’s not answering his phone or sending emails. Ketch reminds Mary she should call Dean, lest he think Mummy doesn’t love him. Oooh, burn.

Dean’s staring at his phone thinking exactly that. Tasha joins him on the couch and he tells her what a great job she did raising her kids. She says she just got lucky, and asks him about his own childhood. She then gives us this motto: Parents seem smart and perfect, but when you grow up, you realize they’re just people. I guess that’s why Sam went to pick up the food - so Dean could hear this little speech.

Contemplate that one for a while, Dean, since your contemplation face is so pretty.

In the BMoL bunker, we see Mary listening to Dean’s sad message. But before she can call him back, she hears Ketch on the phone. He says “I can’t just send him Economy Comfort” and then refers to a package with a lot number, and apparently Mary deduces the package and the “him” are the same thing, because she looks pretty distressed about it. Her phone then buzzes, loudly, with a call from Dean. Ketch hears it and looks suspicious, because quite frankly she’s acting suspicious. If she’d answered it, as if she didn’t care who heard and had nothing to hide, he might have thought she’d just now arrived at his door. It turns out he’s actually in Mick’s office, and she wants to use the computer to read her email. Ketch rudely stands behind her and watches her log in.

She has messages from Dean (hunt-related but also one that could go either way and another where he’s openly “just checking” from in yesterday, aw, poor baby) and Sam (apparently hunt-related) and oh, look, a message from Mick that just arrived today.

How convenient.

Oddly enough, the new message from Mick is flagged, just like the messages from Biggerson’s and Online Games. But she’s outwardly satisfied with Mick’s message, saying he’ll be stuck in London for a few more weeks.

Back at the inn, Sam shows up with the food and then gives Dean a significant head tilt, which is not all that subtle but I still love the way they respond to and respect each other’s signals. Like, it didn’t even occur to Dean not to meet Sam out in the hall. He leaves his phone on the end table, which will probably matter later.

Sam shows Dean a flyer he picked up at the restaurant - it’s a missing person flyer, for the unfriendly guy they saw at the cellar door earlier that day. The guys head for the cellar, but we don’t. We head up the stairs to the room where the nasty woman from the lobby is humming along as she creates a person-like structure out of twigs, with a big opening where the heart would go. Hmm.

In the BMoL, Mary calls Dean, but he doesn’t have his phone on him. She says she’s been hunting with Ketch, and apologizes for not being there for them. But she will be, as soon as she finishes this. And she misses and loves them. He’ll probably be happy to have that message someday. Let’s just get out of order and carry on with her story. She sneaks into a storage area and finds a trunk with the lot number Ketch mentioned on the phone. It’s not locked or anything, so she lifts the lid and discovers Mick’s body. Which would be in an unpleasant state of decay at this point. Ew. She leaves that room and sees Ketch coming, so she tries to get into a couple of different rooms, but her handprint doesn’t allow her access. Finally someone leaves a room and she slips in while the door is open. On the wall are several computer monitors, showing various information about several hunters: Garth, Claire, Eileen - and her, and Dean, and Sam.

It’s amusing to me that the photo they use for Dean is security camera footage of Demon!Dean.

She touches the Dean screen and plays a sound file of the conversation they had right after Ketch bugged the bunker, about how much they don’t trust him. She calls Dean again and leaves a message, telling him they have a problem. When she opens the door to leave, Ketch is standing there. He cheerfully tells her that her handprint didn’t work on the door because she’s not meant to be there. She asks why Mick’s body is in a box, and he blames an “unfortunate werewolf mishap.” She calls him a psychopath (and when two of your exes call you that, it might indicate you have a problem, Mr. Ketch) and asks if he killed Mick. He goes all evil villain and says Mick was weak and wasn’t “one of us.” Mary punches him and they fight, while he continues with the evil villain monologue and brags about killing the federal agents and “a psychic girl they thought was human.” Ketch says it’s the end of the American hunters, but he can keep her safe. She declines the offer and punches him in the crotch with the magic brass knuckles. Unfortunately, he has a taser, which trumps brass knuckles every time.

Back at the inn, Sam quickly picks the lock on the cellar door (I like that Sam tends to do the lock picking when they’re together) and the Winchesters are assaulted by a foul odor of death. There’s a cute, realistic brother moment where Dean tries to get Sam to go downstairs first and Sam refuses. So, as Max leaves for his date with the hot bartender, Sam and Dean make their way down into the cellar and find the bodies of the missing guy and the cheery inn clerk. And another body, under a tarp. Oh snap, it’s Tasha. Their hearts have all been ripped out. Unfortunately, they turned on the light, which attracted Max’s attention. He comes downstairs and they try to block him from seeing his mother’s body, but it doesn’t work. Oh, poor Max.

Next Max is in Not!Tasha’s room, throwing Not!Tasha against a wall and asking what she is. The Winchesters busy themselves holding Alicia back while Max does a “reveal!” spell and Not!Tasha tells him to go to the nasty lady’s room. Nasty Lady feels this, snaps her fingers, and the desk clerk’s eyes glow white. Missing Guy shows up in the hallway and Max magically tosses him out the window. As Not!Tasha spasms on the floor and Alicia freaks out, the desk clerk shows up and starts punching and tossing Sam, magically repairing himself when Sam breaks his neck.

Speaking of necks, here’s Sam’s. You’re welcome.

While this is happening, Dean and Max burst into Nasty Lady’s room. She recognizes Max as having magic and says maybe he’ll take the deal that his mother declined. She glues him and Dean into place and shows them Tasha’s death. She explains that, since she sold her soul for power, when she dies her soul will go to Hell unless she can find someone to take over her magic. You know, that doesn’t sound like a deal a demon would make. I don’t know why they’d give you an out like that. Since Tasha refused, Nasty Lady cut out her heart and put it into one of her stick creatures, making it come to life with the power of her ring. “That doll has all of your mother’s memories. It’s her, mostly.” She tells Max that if he kills her, all of the dolls will fall apart. But if he takes her power, Not!Tasha will stay around forever.

The kindly desk clerk chokes Sam, as one does, and Alicia leaves Not!Tasha’s side to save him. But then Not!Tasha’s eyes glow and she gets up and stabs Alicia with her own engraved blade.

Max is clearly considering the offer. Dean tells him “your mother is gone; it’s awful and it sucks -” and he’s interrupted by a finger snap from Nasty Lady that immobilizes him. And really, who is Dean Winchester to give this particular speech anyway? She takes the ring off and offers it to Max, but while she’s not wearing it, Dean is able to shoot and kill her. As she falls to the floor, the dolls attacking Sam and Alicia collapse into dust. Sam runs to Alicia’s side and says “we’re going to get you some help” and if that reminds you of Dean saying basically the same thing to Sam as they knelt in the mud at Cold Oak, it’s probably for a good reason.

Dean tells Max that touching the ring would have bound him to a deal with a demon and he would have lost his soul, and then we hear Sam’s panicked call and mmmm, panicky Sam, I like it. By the time Dean and Max arrive, Alicia is dead, and again, if Max crying over the body of his sibling/hunting partner/best friend gives you Cold Oak feels, you’re not alone.

And I should feel bad about it, but I’m torn, because it gives me this.

Aftermath! Max tells the Winchesters he could have saved his mother and sister if he’d just taken Alicia seriously. Sam tentatively offers to “get supplies” and Dean comes right out and says “"we’ve gotta burn the bodies, Max” because yeah, that worked so well on you, didn’t it, Dean? Max tells them to stop talking and go away, and he’ll do it.

We see the Winchesters in the Impala, with Sam telling Dean he did the right thing. As Dean muses that he didn’t save Max at all, and their loving family is gone, we see Max picking up the ring. Because of course Dean left it right there on the floor. Seriously, you told Max that touching the ring would you bind you to a demon deal, and you left it on the floor? What the fuck, Dean? Or maybe that part wasn’t an accident after all, because as we watch Max put his sister’s body on the bed next to the twig doll the witch made, Dean says “we do terrible things all the time to save each other. I mean, that’s what you to for family? Who am I to stop him?” Sam thinks Max will be okay, but Dean, well, Dean knows this side of the equation better than Sam does, so he’s not so sure. And he’s right, because we see Max cut out his dead sister’s heart and put it in the twig doll. Then he’s helping Not!Alicia get dressed and telling her they have to go, now. As they leave, we see real Alicia’s body on the bed. Max takes the witch’s ring and spell book, and magically sets real Alicia’s body on fire. Aw, Max.

Back to the Impala. (This is a long aftermath, guys.) Dean looks over and sees Sam sleeping.

And godDAMN, sleeping Sam is pretty. So is driving Dean.

He sees he has two messages from Mary on his phone, so he plays them; first the one about how she misses and loves them, and then the one about there being a problem. Ominous music plays, and Dean tries to wake Sam up, but Sam doesn’t wake up and Dean tries harder and the music gets more ominous and I don’t understand what’s happening here. Is something wrong with Sam?

We cut away very quickly to actual Mary, strapped into a chair just like Shifter!Mary, getting a face full of water. Ketch is disappointed that she wasn’t as ruthless as he hoped. Mary’s phone buzzes, and a familiar pantsuit-with-an-accent enters and declines the call. She tells Mary she’s an asset, sits down with her familiar notepad and pen, and says “let’s begin.” Yes, Posh Spice is back!

Okay, first, let’s talk about Not!Tasha. Did she or didn’t she know she wasn’t real? Because when she broke her finger, she didn’t freak out. She turned away, so no one else could see her, and fixed it. So did she know she needed to stay undercover? And what does that mean about Not!Alicia? She doesn’t seem to have a clue what happened to her. And yet, if she has all of Alicia’s memories, she’s going to remember being stabbed, just as Tasha should have remembered that.

And now let’s talk about Mary and her complete lack of subterfuge. For someone who went out of the country to hunt, leaving a toddler at home, she’s certainly bad at hiding her thoughts now. When you’re locked in a small room with a psychopath, you don’t say “Hey, I know what you’re up to, and you’re a pyschopath.” You pretend to go along. You say “Yes, dear, I understand what you’re saying about my sons. Maybe we should discuss that later, after some illicit hotel sex. If you’ll excuse me, I need to go get the fuck out - I mean, I need to go powder my nose.” You don’t ask about the body with a bullet in its head. You don’t let on that you know things that will cause the psychopath to want to kill you. You just don’t.

And what about all the parallels? Max lost his parent/role model and his sibling/partner/best friend and made an awful, soul-condemning deal to not be alone. Mary watched Ketch torture her mirror image in an attempt to get information about its family, and now he’s doing the same thing to her. Toni is about to work Mary over just as she worked Sam over. The Colt is unusable but might be made usable again. And Cas is doing the whole Godstiel thing again.

But the thing I can’t get past, to no one’s surprise I assume, is Sam. That was such a weird little bit at the end. Like, if nothing’s wrong with him, and he was just slow to wake up, they hit it way too hard. And if something is wrong with him, they didn’t hit it hard enough. It’s driving me crazy.

Anyway. This episode had a lot more packed into it than I expected. It didn’t have enough Sam (what episode does?) but, according to the Twitter of the actress who played Tasha, Jared’s latest baby was born during or right before filming, so I assume he had some time off. And I’m cool with that. But I need you back next week, Jared. (Do we only have two episodes left? Is this a 22-ep season? Or are there three?)

Please please please help me stay unspoiled for anything past 12.20. Thank you!

[poppedmusic]

SXSW 2019

8 – 17 March 2019

Words and Photos: Elena Katrina

I didn’t think that I would ever go to SXSW. It seemed far away and I’m not just talking about geography. I have the bug though – in both ways – the way in which I don’t want to ever miss it ever again and also the actual SXSW Flu. I’m so sick I’m not allowed to fly and I’m on some crazy American drugs from the doctors. So, I’m reflective and impassioned and delirious. It all seems a good combination to get going on the review for 2019… at least a start…

I’m not really sure where to start with this one, to be honest. I had some idea of the crazy time that was going to hit me when I arrived in Austin but not the exact pull I was going to feel toward some bands over others.

There was one clear winner who was going to dominate my efforts and I’m going to be open about this from the get-go. When you do something like this…. the blog thing…. you do it because you are passionate, passionate and have taken leave of your senses. When you take unpaid leave and spend every penny of your very small savings to go to a festival an 11-hour flight away, you can be damn sure you are entitled to spend some of your time doing what the hell you want. As long as it’s legal anyway! And for me that would be going to see the same act play more than once.

Step forward Sam Fender. Knowing that he was back, I was back and that it had to be done. I couldn’t choose between one showcase and another. I did set off with a list of 3 and decided on one. I did go to another showcase so that I wouldn’t see him twice in one day but as I sat on the floor between bands editing photos I had this overwhelming urge to leave. I’d made sure the showcase I was at was a good distance away but it didn’t matter… turns out I might not even run for a bus but run for an artist… yup, you guessed it. I didn’t go to see him alone… oh no, everywhere I went I encouraged other people to pick that show over another. I don’t think I’ve ever done this before either. Vevo House. My main base for the first 3 days was host to Sam’s first live show and one I allowed Island to see me in “fan mode”  – I couldn’t hold back the squeal of delight at the opening chords of Hypersonic Missiles. The British Music Embassy the next on the list several hours later – where Sam himself declared he was beyond exhausted “we’ve been up since 6am. Thanks for coming to watch us die” he said, arms stretched as if expecting a hug to be forthcoming. He may have looked tired but that man keeps surplus energy in his little fingers because he sounded on fire. I just feel utterly exhilarated whenever I see him. I almost had to get someone to carry me out of there…. turns out running really isn’t for me. Anyway, to not spend the whole review on him, I saw Sam four times, including at Fender House “I’ve come to get my share of the family business”… the guy just cracks me up. But anyway, OK. Judge if you will but my time, my money, my blog….my faves.

Now that that is out the way time to give love to everyone else. And there really is loads of that left to go around. I had a list of 26 bands I wanted to see – more than double from last year. I managed to see 13 of them plus another 8 acts I hadn’t planned on, which is always a good thing! From the non-listed, I have to admit that I don’t know how Orchards have not been higher on my radar. They’re exactly the kind of thing I love – and my god their energy live is something else. I forgot that it was the middle of the day, the venue was hot and sticky with sweat and excitement and the band were nothing short of hypnotic.

It wasn’t just unexpected Brits that I saw, oh no. What would an international festival be without seeing some … well… at least one international act. Signed to Heavenly Records, Netherlands’ band Pip Blom were a band I didn’t think I liked. That was until I rocked up at Abbie McCarthey’s Good Karma Club showcase to see them and happily delved right in. Their set was tight but not overly polished. It felt organic and the connection between band members was shown in open smiles and those looks across the stage where only those two people understand. Shimmering shoegaze grunge that caught the affections of the crowd. I even overheard Annabel Allum exclaim they were the best thing she’d seen all SXSW. Now that’s something. It was also on this same line up where I got to catch up with Popped faves Bad Sounds. If you’ve not seen these guys yet, you really want to get a wriggle on. They’re great no matter where you see them but the closer you get the more involved in the craziness you can be. And that really is something you want to be up in the face of as the pair bounce around the stage- loving and living life to the fullest. Me? Oh I danced like I’d been drinking all day (I’m a sober person).

It became evident when I picked up my pass that the best way forward with getting to see bands was going to be to pick some showcases and stay there ….. that and to let other people take me off and away. It’s almost impossible to make a schedule. Especially when there are unofficial showcases as well as the packed official schedule. I love to see the unofficial shows – ones where the general public come out to play and spend hours in line to catch bands.

Glasgow’s Fatherson, were one of the bands I managed to see play a few times. Firstly their official showcase for our pals at Killing Moon and then secondly a free show at a rooftop bar in glorious sunshine to a roar of applause. It was something else to see them play outside in the middle of the afternoon. Their chilled out alternative sounds brought both the calm and chaos. An absolute treat. Boy Azooga and Thyla also played open shows. Both of whom I saw play out at Lazarus Brewing for our new US friends Music For Listeners. Bringing his own personal ray of sunshine Boy Azooga was an act I’ve listened to at home but never seen live. I wasn’t prepared for the joy that was going to hit me. He delighted everyone around him with the upbeat tunes and quirky lyrics. In contrast, Thyla were cool calm and collected with a subtle rock goddess as their front person, it was hard not to feel somewhat intimidated as I watched on in awe. Now I’ve seen Thyla play before and I am always blown away by them. They manage to do this in a way that always leaves me feeling a little confused. They’re not in my face yet they capture my attention and every single time leave me wanting more.

Another band who leave me feeling exactly the same are Lucia. I saw them last year for the first time and thought Lucia herself was going to jump off the stage and rip my head off. That right there is one intense performer. I was so scared of her that when I was told she was just across the crowd from me I said “ok!” And tentatively waved across the room. The next thing I knew this Glaswegian Glamazon was stood next to me wanting to say hi. “Uh…ok”. Turns out, it’s all an act. PHEW! She means what she says though, don’t be getting me wrong, but I enjoyed every moment in Lucia’s company over the festival, it just so happens I turn into jelly when they’re on stage. Not to be messed with this lot. So enthralled by their performance I made a point to see them twice.

There was a great box of Brits out en mass for this year’s SXSW. Some bands such as Island, Fatherson and The Amazons who have all got albums under their belts and a solid touring schedule, and then there are the super newbies; the likes of Cassia, Larkins, Lucia and The Ninth Wave. All still relatively new to the UK crowds and without a debut album under their belt, but bringing their A-Game to SXSW. I’ll tell you something for nothing too, it didn’t matter newer to the game or not, not a single band gave a bad performance. Not a single band played like they’d never played here before. The Amazons delivered their first ever SXSW show as if it was just something they’d thought they’d do that day when they woke up, as did The Ninth Wave – who, incidentally terrified me so much with their performance that I ran straight to their booking agent (figuratively anyway). Their single Sometimes The Silence Is Sweeter definitely isn’t a sentiment I’ll agree with when it comes to seeing them, but live it’s a punchy

The Distiller and Scruff Of The Neck teams were out to play every day too, with shows all over the place as well as their own showcase – smartly advertised by way of the bags (I’m still repping mine today, eager to continue to spread the good word despite the party being very much over). Lit up like the batman sign in the night sky, on a rooftop somewhere in downtown Austin, I watched Larkins. A band I’d never seen before and a band I’m entirely convinced I’ll see again. Nothing to do with how they threw down the challenge to Cassia in our bean bag tournament – nope, just on the standard of show. Energetic and assured, these guys enjoyed the show as much as the crowd that gathered to witness. I count myself amounts the new fans they made. I’m hoping they’ll think that’s a good thing.

Anteros were rightfully excited to be at this year’s SXSW – with just shy of two weeks to go until their debut album dropped, it was the perfect opportunity to show the world just what they were made of and why the likes of us have been shouting about them for years. Their live set is polished to perfection, it shines just as much as any glittery outfit Laura can find. And she can find them. Their set at The British Music Embassy was packed with music fans and industry (sometimes we are even the same thing) and you could see there were nerves but by the time Laura was grabbing at the hands of the female audience members to get them up on stage, you just knew there was more to this than just doing a good show.

An unexpected highlight of my week was an incredibly emotional set from Grace Carter. Not only does she command the stage like she was born to be on it but she has a tone of vocal that really hits me. She has some range on her too, I tell you that for nothing. While she might be more on the urban side of new music for us I will wholeheartedly tell you to check her out. Her single Why Her Not Me came with an explanation that you could see was hard and I caught her eye during a moment and all of a sudden tears just streamed down her face but she carried on, pausing for a big breath to control and control she did – delivering what was one of the single most emotional performances I’ve seen, ever.. not just at SXSW, but in over twenty years of going to shows.

Now I want to talk to you about a serious hidden gem that really is worth uncovering and in my opinion one of the UK’s most underrated talents; Eliza Shaddad. Watching her live is always a pleasurable experience. It had been a long time since I saw her play solo but bringing a band along to international showcases is an expensive business so for some shows she played solo and others she borrowed label brother’s Island. This tiny and unassuming person steps onto the stage and somehow just grows. Like a small bud, she nurtures the song and before your eyes and ears, everything just blooms. I can’t for the life of me understand why more people aren’t shouting about Eliza.

Island are a band I’ve been somewhat passionate about for a good few years; their music makes me sooo incredibly happy so you can imagine the grin on my face when they boarded my flight to Austin. It was a pretty stupid grin again as I watched their gear go round and round at the airport. I did let them travel in peace though – I waited until they were drunk on free margaritas before deciding I should interview them. With a host of shows to chose from it was a midnight show for Killing Moon that I plumped for, knowing the venue was reasonably intimate and moody. I get the distinct feeling that seeing this band in smaller venues is very soon to be a thing of the past. They certainly have the talent and the set to bring in much larger crowds. For a band who make pretty melodic laid-back vibes, to watch them is something else. The energy is that of a much heavier band – they bounce around the stage feeling every beat. Newer songs like She sit happily alongside older tracks and although before they went on I felt like I needed toothpicks to keep my eyes open (jet lag), I felt entirely (if only momentarily) rejuvenated.

The craziest night I had was all thanks to End Of The Trail who amongst their lineup had managed to bag both Avalanche Party and The Blinders. Nestled in the back of a dark and dank dive bar was where I found myself surrounded by people hidden in the shadows, it really was a throng of people but it was so dark you could struggle to see the whites of peoples eyes unless they were stood right by you. I was kindly taken side of the stage so I could try and shoot but as any gig photog knows; red light and nothing but red light is never going to turn out well. It can be forgiven though because really the show was so electric it was hard to want to take photos. For those of you who like Your music to have a garage-punk rock out then, you need to get onto Avalanche Party. They do not stop, it’s fast, furious and sweaty as hell. Their lead singer has a presence that belies any kind of self-confidence issues and he roams the stage, he’s up, he’s down, he’s on the stage, off the stage. My camera could hardly get a focus on him. It was a sweaty ride and seemed to be over in a flash. The crowd wanted to get closer and I was glad I was safe at the side not being battered like everyone else.

  After just enough time for me to catch my breath, The Blinders took to the stage. There was a whole other feel to this show than the last time I saw them (Kendal Calling’s NYE party – Victoria Warehouse) – there’s always going to be a slightly different presentation of music in a smaller venue and for me The Blinders are lucky in that they work both ways. Here there was a real tension in the air, it was thick and heavy and as their set went on the crowd and band felt as though they were one. I can’t say I know what happened toward the end of the set but as Tom climbed a speaker stack all of a sudden things started to go a little bit wrong – the lights went, the mic went… all hell let loose. The thing is, for some bands this would be a problem (don’t get me wrong there was some slight panic going on) but here it felt like it made the show – the darkness, the chaos all fed into the rawness of their set. The music never stopped by the way – the drums kept a pounding, the bass kept a thudding. It wasn’t until I stepped out into the street that I realised that The Blinders‘ weren’t even the headline act. They were mine that’s for sure – they delivered as though they were.

All in all it was an incredible year for the Brits at this year’s SXSW and one I’ll never forget – as I’m sure neither will everyone else who went. I went feeling sure I wasn’t going to go again next year and so make the most of it…. and now I’m already thinking… hmmm SXSW 2020 has a certain ring to it… so watch this space!

Catch up with our SXSW insta stories here.

Check out our photo diary here:

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This review is dedicated to HER’S. RIP.

      Festival Review: SXSW 2019 SXSW 2019 8 - 17 March 2019 Words and Photos: Elena Katrina I didn’t think that I would ever go to…

[beyondforks]

Tour: A Review & Excerpt of Fat Girl Begone! by D.E. Haggerty

Fat Girl Begone! by D.E. Haggerty Genre: Adult (Contemporary Romance) Date Published: May 1, 2017 Publisher: Self

I’m a total mess. My boyfriend dumped me – get this – because I diet too much. Not because I’m fat, mind you. Of course, this spurs me into the diet-fitness-revenge-plan of the century, which leads me to the gym and a scorching hot personal trainer. I even manage to make some cool new friends, including a millionaire if you can believe it. Things are looking up! Naturally, that’s the moment my ex decides he wants me back, the personal trainer asks me out, and my millionaire male buddy decides to throw his hat in the ring. But that’s not enough drama. No, not for me. Because I’ve also lost my job and decided to start my own business. Just call me Ms. Drama. 

Warning: Bad language, bumpy roads, and embarrassing moments ahead. But there’s also more than a bit of romance and even, if we’re lucky, love. Fingers crossed.

Not endorsed by or affiliated with any brand of tequila. 

Fat Girl Begone by D.E. Haggerty was a cute and funny story about a woman who has so many things going for her, but doesn't have the self esteem to back it up. Everly has allowed her long time boyfriend to let her feel worthless for far too long, but she doesn't even realize it yet. So, when he dumps her, she feels like the world has ended. Fortunately, she has kept her sense of humor through it all. I thought Everly was from England at first, because there were a few British slang words thrown, but the story seemed to take place in America, so I'm not sure where it actually took place. No biggie though. I think the words are fun, so I didn't mind. I enjoyed Everly's adventures and misadventures as she found herself with the help of friends and working out. My biggest gripe was, the dialog didn't always feel natural. The characters all had these words that they'd continuously use, and it got distracting. For example, one of Everly's friends addressed people as "Bitches" all the time. I mean ALL the time. Another, addressed people as "Chica" every time she spoke as well. There were more. It was like each character had their own word they used to address others, and they used it pretty much every time they spoke. This felt awkward, because people don't naturally talk like that in every single conversation. But, back to the story. It was definitely entertaining, and I enjoyed watching Everly's confidence in herself grow. She's quirky and fun, and I love that. It was also empowering, as she is a character that most woman can relate to in many ways.

Fat Girl Begone! by D.E. Haggerty was kindly provided to me by Reading Addiction Book Tours for review. The opinions are my own.

“You should totally jump that, chica.” It’s Monday, and I’ve just survived another Zumba class. I only hit Tara once. Okay, twice, but who’s counting? I’m still trying to catch my breath and stop my heart from jumping out of my ribcage. None of which stops me from panting after my personal trainer. Before I get a chance to respond to her comment or tear my eyes away from Gabe’s epic ass, the rest of the gang joins Tara and me. “What are you bitches yapping about?” Oh great, Charise didn’t just say that at maximum volume or anything. “Everly taking her personal trainer for a ride.” Oh my god. Please tell me no one else heard Tara announce that I’m lusting after Gabe. I hear giggles and murmurs of agreement from the other exercisers exiting the group exercise room. Of course, everyone heard. Charise, Tara, Naomi, and Jessie have one volume – embarrassingly loud. I ignore them and head to the locker rooms with my head down. Of course, I can’t help but sneak another glance at Gabe. He’s doing squats for God’s sake! I defy any woman – or man for that matter – to not look. I keep my eyes glued to those glutes as I walk in the opposite direction. My foot hits something and before I know it I’m going down. I end up sprawled on the floor of the gym. I look down at my outfit and sigh in relief. Good. No rolls of fat are showing. Thankfully, I had put a long sweatshirt on over the loose tank I was wearing during class. A hand appears in front of my face. “Let me help you up, babe.” I look up to see yet another example of male perfection. Does this gym have a portal to Mount Olympus for the Greek Gods to come and go as they please? Because damn. This is one fine specimen of manhood in front of me. “Babe?” His voice startles me out of my perusal of his perfection. I reach out and he grabs my hand to pull me up. Only he doesn’t stop there. He pulls me flush to his body and then leans down to whisper in my ear. “It’s okay, babe. Happens all the time when girls look at me.” And crash. There goes my adulation of the man. I knew there was a reason no one believes in the Greek Gods anymore. Vanity is not attractive. I pull on my hand until he releases me. “Thanks.” “You okay, sweetheart?” As if I couldn’t be embarrassed enough, now Gabe’s here. “I’m fine. Just wasn’t paying attention to where I was walking.” Out of the corner of my eye, I see the former Greek God puff out his chest as if I had paid him a compliment. I can’t help it. My eyes narrow at him, and I attempt to engage my eye lasers. Just like the two gazillion other times I’ve tried to use those lasers, they malfunction. Gabe ignores the entire episode. “You here to do your exercise class?” “Nope.” I shake my head. “I just put on some workout clothes and then ducked my head under the faucet to get my face and hair wet.” My personal trainer laughs and grabs my shoulder to give it a squeeze. Why is he squeezing my shoulder? “You’re funny, sweetheart.” I wasn’t going for funny but whatever. Someone shouts ‘Gabe’ from the other side of the gym. I look over to see the blond bimbo he was training staring daggers at me. Gabe squeezes my shoulder again. “Sorry, sweetheart, I need to get back to work. I’ll see you Wednesday, right?” I nod, and he winks before walking off. “Looks like I’m not needed here.” I forgot Mr. Vanity was still standing here. I don’t bother responding to his obvious pout. I shake my head and walk to the locker rooms.

I grew-up reading everything I could get my grubby hands on, from my mom's Harlequin romances, to Nancy Drew, to Little Women. When I wasn't flipping pages in a library book, I was penning horrendous poems, writing songs no one should ever sing, or drafting stories which have thankfully been destroyed. College and a stint in the U.S. Army came along, robbing me of free time to write and read, although on the odd occasion I did manage to sneak a book into my rucksack between rolled up socks, MRIs, t-shirts, and cold weather gear. After surviving the army experience, I went back to school and got my law degree. I jumped ship and joined the hubby in the Netherlands before the graduation ceremony could even begin. A few years into my legal career, I was exhausted, fed up, and just plain done. I quit my job and sat down to write a manuscript, which I promptly hid in the attic after returning to the law. But being a lawyer really wasn’t my thing, so I quit (again!) and went off to Germany to start a B&B. Turns out being a B&B owner wasn’t my thing either. I polished off that manuscript languishing in the attic before deciding to follow the husband to Istanbul where I decided to give the whole writer-thing a go. But ten years was too many to stay away from my adopted home. I packed up again and moved to The Hague where I’m currently working on my next book. I hope I’ll always be working on my next book. Fat girl Begone! is my eleventh book. To learn more about D.E. Haggerty and her books, visit her website.You can also find her on Goodreads, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, Pinterest, and Twitter.

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[wingsoverbros]

“First Blood - Another one bites the dust...” or “My thoughts on SPN 12.09″

Welp, due to a series of frustrating events in my personal life, this was written very late (and in great frustration and a hell of a lot of sleep deprivation.) Please forgive me if some things in this review don't make total sense.

I’m also in a guest library and are running out of time, so I can’t check the links. Hopefully they work, and I’ll check it when I get the chance. Thanks  :)

For previous episodes: 12.01 - 12.02 - 12.03 - 12.04 - 12.05 - 12.06 - 12.07 - 12.08

Since were back from a month and a half hiatus, it might be best to include a "Then": In the first half of season 12, God has swanned off with his sister, leaving Team Free Will to clean up the mess. Mary has taken time off to adjust to being 33 years out of time, leaving a really upset Dean behind. The team, led by Cas's determination to make up for accidentally letting Lucifer out of the cage and a timely assist from the British Men of Letters chapter, manages to find and re-cage Luci. Unfortunately, he was wearing the president at the time, and the government took a dim view of exorcising Potus. The guys got grabbed by a really irritated Secret Service swat team, and a distracted Cas got given the slip by Lucifer's  inadvertent girlfriend Kelly, who happens to now have Rosemary's baby in the oven.

Now, on to Supernatural 12.09 - "First Blood"

The first episode back from the 2016/2017 winter hiatus was certainly a step-up from the winter finale episode, but it was not exactly a home run. It did well with continuity and used the secondarily characters well, but the action felt a little uneven in spots. Given the story-line, though, I'm not sure it could have been written any better.

I enjoyed how they used the secret service agents to deliver the reminders of previous seasons interactions with law enforcement agencies. It's refreshing to see them actually acknowledge past history on this show, when frequently, it seems that they'd rather forget what they've done in previous seasons. Even better, for once, the authority figures actually seemed competent. I rather enjoyed the sense of humor that the top of the group displayed. Reminded me a bit of Victor Henriksen in season 2 and 3. It's actually a shame they all died. Government figures have a really hard time surviving in this series.

I must admit that it gave me a good case of the giggles to see the British Men of Letters have such a hard time dealing with the American hunters. Their ever-more-frustrated expressions were priceless. They clearly didn't understand the way hunters in the US function, and I'm wondering if they understand Americans in general. They come from a society that thrives on a hierarchy, and they're trying to sell a subordinate position to a rebellious group of warriors who are some of the most independent and least trusting of authority from a country founded by independent rebellious warriors who distrusted authority figures. It's like they're trying to convince a fish that it needs to leave the water behind and take time in the air. They just aren't going to go for it.

I wonder if they thought that the Winchesters were just a particularly uncivilized example of the breed, rather then a better-then-average example of the Hunter community. They were clearly growing frustrated with their lack of success at recruiting. They also seem to be recognizing that they may have underestimated the Winchesters. They seemed at least a little impressed with the fact that the guys captured Lucifer and stuffed him back in the box. I'm still not trusting their motives in expanding to the US, though. Something still seems very power-hungry and rather off about the bunch. Nothing good can come from a group that customarily settles things by butchering all the bystanders.

I'm particularly unsettled by Mr Ketch. In his interactions with Cas, he keeps giving him increasingly odd looks. Almost covetous, if I had to put a name on it. I'd not be surprised if at some point before the end of the season, he tries to leash Cas and claim him as property of the British MoL, or even his own private tool. This was actually the first thing that came to mind when they gave the guys the Pulse Egg last episode, and the feeling only grew this episode. There's no such thing as a free lunch, especially with these types.

I liked the Brit MoL's typewriter. It was very retro, but I liked how it turned out essentially to be a supernatural teletype machine. They haven't heard about laptops? I wonder what their labs look like.

The afternoon before the episode aired, I saw that Andrew Dabb had typed "...sorry" on his twitter. Needless to say, this made me quite nervous. The show being this old and with another season already in the planning stages, I knew that the guys and Cas were fine, but there are several characters with no such guarantee. One of which, Mary, was already known to be in the episode. The result was that I spent quite a lot of time on Thursday worried about Mary's chances in the episode.

Billie being in the episode was a surprise, and gave me rather mixed feelings. I'm always delighted to see another recurring strong female character, but given her job description and tendency to threaten the Winchester family, I spent most of her on-screen time threatening the tv screen. Her sudden death displeased me. Sure, it led to a very lovely speech by Cas, but I'm sure we could have figured out a good way to get out of that situation without ganking another female character. It seems a bit repetitive, frankly. Of course, if it's a "pick one: Billie, Rowena, or Mary" situation, then I'd have picked Billie as well.

Farewell, Billie. You were fun. Have a good oblivion with Tessa.

A thought: The Winchester and allies have been responsible for the death of 4 separate Reapers - Ajay, Tessa, Billie and Death himself. How long till Reapers just plain refuse to reap them? Will the guys just be ghosts, or live forever? And with Billie dead, does that mean they won't be threatened with being tossed into the void anymore?

I ran hot and cold about the interactions between Cas and Mary in the episode. I understood why Mary yelled at him in the beginning, but really didn't like it. His expressions when that happened made everyone I watched with agree that Cas needed a hug. I was amused by his resulting cold shoulder (I'd have a similar reaction if the mother of my significant other yelled at me for following orders.) Clearly, Mary forgot the reactions from the point that she arrived in. I really appreciated that she apologized, though, and the essentially familial reactions they had from that point on. Overall, their interactions felt very realistic.

Mary continues to act just like her son, from her instinctive yelling at Cas when things go wrong (one of Dean's thankfully infrequent failings - see the second half of season 5, second  half of 7, 8.22, 9.22) to her hunting style (her hunting of that vampire reminded me of Dean's solo hunts in season 10) to her driving. I was amused and pleased by her reminder to Cas to buckle his seatbelt. When was the last time we heard that in this series? Have we ever?

Cas certainly went through the wringer this episode. Poor guy spent most of the episode feeling useless and out of his depth. I loved that he spent the time alone trying to hunt and save people. You can almost imagine him repeating "what would Dean Do?" to himself during the episode. It's a shame he couldn't pull off a successful hunt, when other episodes show him actually doing much better at it. He must have been distracted.

In season 4, Anna Milton described Angels as "emotionless". It's a characterization that I've never agreed with, even then, but the inaccuracy of that description is especially evident now. Castiel spent the episode displaying a wide amount of expressions, with stress, depression, worry, and joy most evident. The look on his face when he heard Dean's voice and during the entire episode after they find the guys in the woods was extraordinary, pointing to Cas having one hell of an emotional roller-coaster in the last third of the episode. The "this mud-ball needs every Winchester it can find" monologue in particular blew me away, as it felt like the closest thing we'll get to a declaration of allegiance and love that we'll likely get in this series. Cas has officially declared his loyalties to the only family he has left, and Chuck help anyone who tries to hurt or take one of them. Cas is now officially the Winchester Family Guardian Angel.

The guys came off a bit more menacing this episode then they have in recent years. I was surprised whenthey used the traps on the soldiers, although Sam giving that box (a first aid kit? My tv glitched at that point so I couldn't tell) to the injured soldier mollified me a bit. The guys have come a long way from the bright and innocent kids they were in season 1. I can't help but wonder how horrified they would have been to see themselves now (and how they'd react to Cas and Mary).

At first during the episode, I was surprised by their caving after only 2 months of isolation, and Dean's statement that it was "worse then Hell". Frankly, I've gone through periods of (both complete and partial) isolation nearly as long at various points throughout the years, and although it was rough, it wasn't "have to get out. Will make a deal if I have to" bad. After some thought, though, I can see why they in particular would see it as more torturous. They're used to free movements and near constant social interactions, so it really would be unbearable for them. The Winchesters are, at heart, very social creatures.

I hope they think about their reactions to the isolation in the future when they deal with Cas. Cas has,essentially, been in their shoes in that regard for years. He's a millennia old being who was part of a eternally-interconnected social group, always within shouting distance of other angels, right up till he met the Winchesters. Now, without them, he's alone. No wonder he's desperate to save any and all Winchesters.

I loved that Dean automatically just got into Mary's car in the back seat with Cas, and his pleased hug and greeting when they spotted him in the woods. It's been far too long since we saw both men/beings being happy when they hugged. I prefer all of Team Free Will when they're in good moods and pleased to see each other.

I was surprised by Sam and Dean agreeing to another deal, again. You think, after the last 6 years, that they'd learn that things never work out right when they do that. Well, at least they can't yell at Cas for calling Crowley or the MoL this time without looking like real jerks in front of Mary.

Crowley continues to be the only figure in the series that's learned from his conflict with the Winchesters. That being will never be a true villain again. I'm also betting on his being one of the few to outlast the series, whether we want him to or not. (Also, he's the king of Hell. How is the location of secret prisons above the pay-grade of his people? Especially if the MoL know of them? He's got at least one vice-president in his roster, if not a few presidents.)

In terms of the action and pacing this episode, it did seem slightly uneven. Much of the episode seemed to have very little action, with all the excitement seemed crammed into just the second half of the episode. Given the plot-line of the episode, though, I can't really see how that could be fixed. There's not much you can do to increase the action when half the episode is literally about being crammed in a cell waiting, or sitting in a room unable to find someone. It kinda requires inaction. So they get a pass from me in that regard.

All in all, it wasn't perfect, but it was still interesting to watch. They used continuity and characterization with good effect, and the issues with action and pacing were something that really couldn't be avoided, so they didn't bother me too much. They still get a mark off from me for killing another interesting female character, though. Hopefully, they can do better in upcoming episodes. I look forward to the rest of the season.