#so i decided to make my own contribution from the book!stans side

[cmpstn]

Cristina Martinez

I’ve been a silent stan for some time now, but since being a painter turned curator I had to pay my respects and make this one of the first artists I talk about on my platform. 

Cristina Martinez. Aka sew_trill

I hope I do her story justice because it’s kinda like a “you had to be there” feeling.

I’ve been following this artist since around 2016 and I feel like she always had great connections because I would find myself on her instagram page and she’d have comments from other creatives I admired.  The business side of things just hadn’t popped for her yet because I think at this time she was still struggling with whether she should be fully committed to her craft and making it essentially the only source of income for her family. Which I know a looooooottttt of creatives struggle with.  Not sure about the timeline but she used to work in a radiology department scheduling appointments and she actually went to school for fashion design, dropped out and at one point worked in a bridal shop. All the while having her own studio and making time to stop at the post office after a shift to drop an order off.

 Early on in her childhood she talks about being inspired by Bob Ross, watching him all day on tv, wondering how she would ever be able to reach accomplishments like that, feeling it was very far off but still having an urgency to create.

In an interview with Parents Latina she talks about “giving souls to her fashion illustrations.” She describes a feeling of something nagging and taunting her and this being the reason she decided to quit her jobs that were unfulfilling. The transition to full time artist, she admits, was a bumpy one but has turned out to be very fruitful.

Cristina Martinez, is an Afro- Latina who’s work is all about representing stories and experiences of black and brown women. She uses her art to explore issues of race, identity, and culture while challenging stereotypes and preconceptions. Her paintings are colorful, vibrant, full of life, and they often feature women with bold, moody, unapologetic expressions that stare directly out at the viewer. She mentions how there wasn’t any representation for her growing up, besides when she happened upon a Frida Kahlo portrait in a book at the library. Reminding her of the women in her family Frida has always spoken to her since. This is why representation is so important though, and a big part of why she seeks to create images that reflect the diversity and complexity of the people Cristina herself portrays. She is quoted stating “we have to show that we belong here” , “we have to show that we are part of this society and that we have contributed so much to it.” 

One of her projects that myself and many others really connected with was the “Water Me” series. It’s an example of her dedication and perseverance as an artist. The series started as a self portrait project where Cristina attempted to document her mood over the course of a year. She mentions starting out on sticky notes and as it progressed it evolved into about 700 pieces of work. The series is a testament to her creativity, passion, and commitment to her craft. 

Cristina’s work has been featured in a number of publications, including The New York Times, Hypebeast, and W Magazine. She has collaborated with household names such as Lego, Vaseline, and Nordstroms. More recently she has put together a project with her “pARTner” Al Baseer Holly called “2 Sides to Abstract Painting.” An online workshop that walks you through their 2 different ways of approaching art and paintings. She dropped her first print of 2023 “Still Dreaming Back Then” and Made some merch for Coachella…. The Capricorn is capricorning!

She very humbly credits a lot of her success to her family and other black and brown creatives in her community, giving thanks to where thanks is due.

Overall, Cristina Martinez is an artist who is using her work to challenge stereotypes and celebrate the diversity and complexity of the people around her. Her paintings are powerful, inspiring, and full of energy, and they serve as a reminder that representation matters. If you haven't already, I encourage you to check out her work and see for yourself.

Credits/ Sources:

[hopeless-herondale]

Simon vlogging

Simon : hey guys so we're here on vacation in this beautiful manor and we have the perfect view of the woods *standing on one of the balconies* and I'm going to bet Izzy ,that she can't throw this stone beyond that ledge there.

*Izzy standing on the other side of the balcony just randomly practising moves *

Simon [shouting] : Hey isababe , you wanna make a bet ??

Issabelle [shouting back without missing a beat] : You wanna makeout?

*blurry images and noise of camera falling Simon saying shit shit *

Simon [back in focus] : Oh sorry guys , almost dropped my camera ...*screen goes black*

Next scene

Simon : *cheeks flushed , sitting on the sofa , hair a mess , definitely some shirt buttons undone, Izzy's head resting on his shoulder with a smirk* So um it took us some time... to find a stone...for the bet...so let's go out and finish it .

Izzy [ in the background ]: you never really got a chance to tell me what the bet is you know..

Simon [in the background ,camera is just kept down] : where is the freaking stonee.

[tangledbea]

I just realized something. How was the first time that Rapunzel felt jealous? I'm curious. Headcannon about it?

How about a fic, instead?

Rapunzel understood wanting things. She understood dreams and wishes and desires. She understood not getting everything she wanted, even when other people could, like when Gothel got to leave the tower, or when Pascal changed colors. She understood disappointment, frustration and righteous anger. What she didn't understand was the strange combination of all of these emotions.

She hadn't been home - well, her new home, the castle - for very long, maybe a little over a month, and so far, her parents had let her do basically anything she wanted to do, so overcome with joy that she'd returned to them that they couldn't seem to say no to her. It was great! She'd never had so much freedom in her entire life!

But gradually, oh so gradually, she began to notice restrictions being put in place. They didn't really bother her, because they were also structure! For the first time in her life, Rapunzel got to go to school, and be taught things by experts instead of trying to figure them all out on her own. Learning was so much easier when there was someone to explain the things she didn't understand, to answer her questions, to correct her when she was wrong (though her math tutor was often impressed with what she'd managed to intuit on her own, in a tower). It was time consuming, and she was starting to miss her hobbies, but she couldn't complain much when there was so much in the world to learn about that she'd never even realized there was to learn.

And through it all, Eugene stayed by her side, helping her adjust to living in a society, and keeping her company. He was her rock, and she often looked to him for answers before her tutors or even her parents, asking someone else only when he didn't know the answer. ("But why are there so many forks?" "I don't know, Sunshine. Better ask someone at a higher paygrade than me.")

However, these past few days, he wasn't glued quite so close to her side. He'd started making friends with some of the castle guards, which was good! Rapunzel knew that Eugene deserved to have friends outside of her, and of course she didn't begrudge him this, especially when friendship with the guards would likely lead to him being given less stink-eye as he walked around the halls . But when, on a beautiful, sunny day when the clouds were laying like streaks of paint across the sky and a balmy breeze was carrying the scent of Old Corona's apple orchards on it, he opted to skip her weekly history lesson - which he described as, "so dull that a blacksmith's hammer couldn't liven it up" - to hang out with Stan on his afternoon off, a strange new emotion passed through her.

At first, Rapunzel assumed it was just because she was going to miss Eugene being there. She, for one, found Corona history fascinating. This was the land she came from! The family she came from! Each of the kings and queens and duchesses and dukes that came before her had contributed to the kingdom, for better or worse, and these were the shoes she was going to have to fill someday!

But, as she sat in the palace library, the dusty scent of old books all around her, the only sounds those of quietly turned pages and the scritching of her quill as she took notes from the tome she was reading about Rupert Moody, the fifth son of the twelfth king of Corona, she looked up and looked at the weather, and decided she'd rather be outside having a picnic with Eugene than stuck in here. She calmly placed a ribbon to mark the page she was on, then closed the book and stood.

"Where are you off to, Highness?" her tutor, Master Arkwright asked, peering over the top of his half-moon spectacles at her.

"Oh, I was just going to go outside and--"

"My lesson ends at three o'clock, sharp."

"Yes, I know, but I was thinking today I could just--"

"Sit."

It was a command, as though she were a dog. Rapunzel hadn't heard the like since she'd left the tower, and she felt herself bristling and flushing as she stared wordlessly at Master Arkwright, not moving.

"I said, 'sit!'" he commanded again, more sharply this time, and Rapunzel felt her knees go out from under her as she obeyed, landing hard on the chair. "That's better. Back to your lesson, please."

She just stared at him, heart hammering, a mixture of fear of times long past and anger that she was being spoken to that way swirling around inside her. She glance outside, at the blue sky and those playful clouds. "Can I... at least open the window? Let a little bit of that nice day in?" she requested, and hated how meek she sounded.

"Very well, but don't dawdle."

Feeling like she was being weighed down with lead, she shuffled over to the window and opened it, taking a deep breath of warm sea air and hearing the sound of Eugene's laughter ringing out from somewhere just out of sight. She wondered what he was up to, what he and Stan were talking about, what was making him laugh, if he was thinking about her as much as she was thinking about him. She wished she could join him on this beautiful day and find out. The urge to climb out the window and take off was strong.

Perhaps she was staying too long at the window, because Master Arkwright suddenly said, "Princess, your studies." It wasn't a suggestion.

She slumped back to the table she was working at like a sullen teenager and opened the book again. Once more, the world was the scritch of her quill and the rustle of papers. But now, every now and then, Eugene's laughter would ring out again, and at once her heart would soar at the sound and how much she loved him, and a stab of irrational anger hit her, making her feel more sullen and more left out. What was the point of learning about all these great things people in the past did if she wasn't allowed to go outside and do great things, herself?

Okay, maybe a picnic wasn't a great thing, but who knew where a picnic would lead?

And now, she was keenly aware of the ticking of the clock. She cast a glance its way to check on the time and saw that she still had a torturous an hour and forty-three minutes of lessons left. Master Arkwright cleared his throat and her eyes returned to the page, though she was hardly absorbing what she read anymore, too busy thinking about the nice day and Eugene and how it wasn't fair that he got to go outside and play whenever he wanted to, and she was stuck in lessons.

Those hour and forty-three minutes passed torturously slowly, and for the first time since she came home as the princess, she was glad to be out of lessons, all but slamming the tome she'd been reading from closed and hurrying back to her room, notes clutched in her hand. She was glad to be free, and irritated every time she thought about Eugene and confused about that irritation.

She got out her paints, deciding to work some more on the mural on her wall, but every time her hand got close, the urge to do something mean to one of the little pictures of Eugene flashed through her head, and she had to withdraw her hand, not wanting to do something she'd regret, and not understanding why she was having the urge in the first place.

And so it was that Eugene found her, standing in front of her wall, hand and brush hovering about a foot from it as she stared intently.

"Sunshine?" he asked. "You okay?"

Hearing his voice seemed to snap Rapunzel out of whatever thoughts she was having, and she suddenly felt guilty in the face of the man she loved, who she'd just spend a few hours being mad at through no fault of his own.

"Oh! Um... yes. I was just... I couldn't decide what to paint."

Eugene didn't look convinced, and that made Rapunzel feel even more guilty. Tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, she set her brush down and lowered her gaze. "Actually... I've been feeling really strange for a few hours now, and I don't know what it is."

Immediately, she wished she hadn't phrased it that way, because he looked mildly alarmed. "Are you okay? Are you sick?" he asked, striding toward her to press warm hands against her face.

"Yes, I'm fine. I'm not sick. It's... it's an emotion, not an illness." At least of that much, she was sure.

"An emotion you're not familiar with?" he wondered, then took her hand and led her over to her window seat. She loved her window seat. She could feel the sun in the afternoon and had a spectacular view. "Wanna talk about it, Sunshine?"

His eyes were hopeful and warm and inviting, always giving her the peace of mind to let him know what she was thinking about.

"You got to be outside today, and I didn't. I had to sit in my lessons."

"I thought you liked your lessons.

"I did! Do! I do like my lessons. But today, I wanted to be outside with you, and Master Arkwright wouldn't let me go, and then I got mad at you for being out there instead of inside with me, which is where you've usually been until now."

A smile tugged at the corner of Eugene's mouth, and for another moment, Rapunzel was almost mad at him for smiling at her plight, but that wasn't fair. Especially when that particular smile usually meant he had solved the riddle of what she was going through.

"You were jealous of me?" he wondered.

A frown of confusion pinched her features, and she recalled Gothel telling her that jealousy was an ugly emotion. "I don't... know. She used to say that jealousy was ugly, but I never understood exactly what it was." Was Eugene calling her ugly? That was unlike him.

"It's when you want something that someone else has," he explained. "Actually," he quickly corrected, "that's envy. You're envious. They're not exactly the same thing."

A small smile reached' Rapunzel's face. Trust Eugene to know. "What's the difference?" she asked.

"Well, jealousy needs three people. Like, if you were jealous of Stan because I was hanging out with him today and not you. But what you described was envy. It just takes two people. You wanted what I had. You didn't necessarily want me not to have it, but you wanted to be included instead of stuck with Rupert the Moldy or whatever."

And now, she giggled. "Rupert Moody," she corrected.

Eugene beamed, clearly pleased with himself for getting her to laugh. "Right. Anyway, to make up for you feeling left out today, how about tomorrow we have a nice picnic date for lunch?"

She hummed her approval and snuggled up close. "You read my mind. Thank you, Eugene. Oh! How was your afternoon with Stan?"

And just like that, the feelings were banished.

[sakkac]

re: fumetsu no anata e as of chapter 139.2

this started as a response to @bestbonnist​‘s post on chapter 139.2 but now i’m just dissecting differences and similarities between tonari, mizuha, and kahak like im writing an essay for a uni class. i interchangeably use he/they pronouns for fushi and my writing may be clumsy (bc im not actually writing for uni ❤️).

mizuha is a broken mirror to tonari (and kahak a foil to the two aforementioned) in this modern-day arc, especially in their expressions of love for fushi. tonari’s love for fushi is aged over hundreds of years and mizuha’s, at first glance, is an infatuation just based on how long they’ve known each other. im the biggest kahak stan ever, but even i understand kahak’s love started as an infatuation for parona’s form. though, i’d consider the word infatuation compromised when it comes to defining mizuha’s love, bc u cant be sure if her love for fushi is entirely her own, seeing as it had been passed from generation to generation of guardians.

(chapter 134, read right to left)

tonari and mizuha aren’t that different once you look deeply into the both of them. mizuha’s personality and actions are factors in tonari’s dislike of her, but what ultimately repels tonari from mizuha is that she knows they’re similar, and that manifests most clearly in how she reacts to fushi being with mizuha. i.e. resenting fushi for using her friends’ vessels to help their “love life” in chapter 135.5. she can’t stand mizuha bc mizuha is able to express her love for fushi and fushi does not reject (or accept) it; tonari still hasn’t fully admitted to herself that she likes fushi romantically (perhaps because she can’t separate it from the devotion that led her to harden her body to poisons and to promise her corpse to rest at fushi’s feet), so seeing mizuha appear to progress further than she has irritates her. as for kahak, tonari only has the biases of the other pseudo-immortals and her own of past hayase reincarnations to rely on. (this is not as plot-related, but these two also both like books. kahak read tonari’s fushi book, so i wish they actually met, but in a world where tonari didnt hate hayase beyond death.)

tonari as a child seemed like she thought herself superior to others, perhaps a natural result of her upbringing. she was raised on a prison island, but she herself never committed any crime; banding together w other kids like her, writing about her life in her book (which keeps her separate from or above others in a way). but this thinking ceases at her relationship w fushi. however, i believe this started before they even met. tonari’s childhood dream at seven years old was to write a book her father would be impressed by. she also used to believe in god, while her family was still whole. she even prayed to god when he decided to participate in the tournament in chapter 35. however, she stops referring to god by the time her father had shown tarnish. coincidentally, she meets fushi, who would “upend everything... jeannanda and [her] fate.” she ends up, instead of writing for her father, writing a book to allow a peaceful existence for fushi for whenever they decided to come back. this act shows that the adult tonari has written fushi to a level above her, out of her reach. 

(chapter 35)

here i’ll quote ray’s words about kahak and tonari: “she also has a surprising amount in common with Kahaku, too, with the ‘I want to protect you even if you disagree.’” the way tonari had waited and honed her body for fushi resembles kahak’s attachment; she had finished living for herself, so now she was only allowing herself to live to further create an ideal vessel for fushi (which also brings up one of hayase’s goals). the difference is that kahak lived for fushi because, as raikkousaki said, fushi was the only thing he was “ALLOWED to live for.” however, while tonari is unquestionably devoted to fushi now, what pulled her to him was black hood’s coercion. as a result of black hood’s words to her, she manipulated fushi into helping her solve her problems, to save her from the island. this first “meeting” also revealed that she was attracted to their white hair; she later admits that she admires their fair skin, contributing to the idea that she could view fushi as the equivalent of a god or at the least, a vision of purity (which is :/ imo, bc of her dark skin). we should also keep in mind that, this, technically her first impression of fushi, and his later display of violent immortality in the arena would further his image as a “legend.” 

mizuha was exposed to fushi’s immortality and reveres him like tonari and kahak respectively do and did. instead of the specific word “legend,” it’s “immortal monster.” her first formal exposure to fushi’s fabled power was not unlike tonari’s, since mizuha had went into her grandfather’s library and read on fushi in chapter 124.1. after this, she manipulates fushi to save her, again paralleling the beginning of tonari’s relationship with fushi, but it’s from her overbearing mother and herself. both tonari and mizuha forced their problems onto fushi, but mizuha doesn’t have black hood stepping in front of her saying “you must lead him.” instead, she may have been influenced by the left hand, but i believe mizuha’s thoughts are majorly her own (left hand lies in wait within mizuha’s consciousness like a predator), and what they appear to say is that she’s leading fushi until he decides to follow her willingly. as for kahak, we only have a few pages on his childhood and what we can make of it and of his actions as an adult is that he was willing to follow fushi wherever they went, until left hand betrayed them both.

mizuha’s superiority complex comes from a different place than young tonari’s; she was a prestigious child from young, in addition to her fear of her uniqueness fading as she aged. this caused her to feel separate from other children. when she meets fushi, she sees how different he is from everyone else and uses subtle ways to keep him with her, while never directly admitting she wants him to stay with her, except for ch 125′s “i’m scared. stay with me tonight,” after her mother’s sudden murder. she usually uses excuses instead, like cutely demanding fushi to walk with her after school and go on dates with her.

(chapter 36 vs. chapter 128.2)

as fushi was introduced to the people around tonari and mizuha, they received similar reactions, i.e. “your hair is so pretty!” and “woah, his hair is white!” in the pages following these, the similarities continue into tonari and mizuha gaining ownership over fushi: in ch 36 oopa declares “tonari found him. so he belongs to tonari,” while the islanders try to get on fushi’s good side, and in ch 128 fushi goes out of their way to ask which club mizuha belongs to when asked to join a club (vocalizing her claim on them so she doesn’t have to directly do so).

(chapters 38, 106, and 139)

when the opening comes for mizuha to actually admit her feelings in chapter 139, she tries, but demands instead, “so... love me.” this recalls kahak’s confession to kai in 105.3, that he wants to “protect fushi’s humanity.” kahak and mizuha were both covered in blood when they spoke, but the atmospheres and characters are different; mizuha is clever w her words, but still too immature to let go of her pride, whereas kahak was the exact opposite. he rid of himself of his pride for fushi when he was a child, but said a lot of the wrong things to fushi when it came down to it. additionally, mizuha, when she wants something, she’ll phrase her words so that it seems like there’s only one choice: to follow her. this has been the case for others including fushi (chapters 120.2′s testing of hanna with “if i died, would you cry for me?” and 132.1′s “i’ll teach you about love” and the following guilt-trip). tonari is more direct with her words and meaning than either mizuha or kahak, bc of her personality. she directly confronts fushi when she realizes he had felt betrayed by her in chapter 38, because she still needed him for his plans. but mizuha is more direct with her actions; in chapter 129.1, she latches herself onto fushi, while trying to get information out of him. after the failed marriage proposal, rather than physically attaching himself to fushi like mizuha, kahak used acts of domesticity and protection to subtly appeal to and maintain his space next to them.

(chapter 38 vs chapter 139)

tonari’s “there are people in this world who are better off dead” above isn’t far from the knockers’ reasoning behind “wishing for death is paramount to being dead” and the reason for mizuha’s mother’s death: left hand decided to “eliminate the cause of [mizuha’s breaking point’s] stress.” what this shows is that tonari can also justify murder, though granted, this is from a hundred chapters ago. however, this black and white thinking comes back in the modern era where tonari holds prejudice against mizuha because of her relation to hayase. tonari knows her dislike of mizuha is unfair, she can’t get around it. tonari is still as prideful as she was when she lived on jeannanda; it’s just that she is able to use fushi to justify her opinions now. i also want to bring up mizuha’s reaction to her mother’s death and funa’s knocker’s “purging and guidance.” mizuha seems comfortable with the sight of death, despite having a more normal childhood than tonari, because her actual main concern overwhelms it; she is always thinking on how she can appeal to fushi (almost like kahak), or in other words, how to salvage her pride. so instead of being concerned over being the actual murderer, she is concerned with appearing as a murderer to fushi.

so to actually answer ray’s question, objectively, tonari’s love is as excessive as kahak and mizuha’s. but personally, i think tonari’s love for fushi right now is also unhealthy, though it comes out of good will. kahak’s love also ended in fushi’s benefit, but it was undoubtedly unhealthy. and ofc, mizuha’s love is also unhealthy; she reaches for fushi for perfection, tonari reaches for fushi for humility.

[sugar-petals]

This's been on my mind for awhile and i just wanted to know if im the only one: im both a hard and soft stan for all the bangtan boys but I just can't read any y/n x hobi kind of fics cause it feels weird?? Like I thirst over him (im not saying i dont think he's sexy, handsome or anything, cause he is!!) but it doesnt go so far from that. i cant picture myself dating or *being intimate* with him the way i do with the others..but why?? Maybe its the image he transmits?Wanted to hear your thoughts

as a general note first. it could be any member that a fan might feel more platonic about: simply a matter of character, looks, perceived connection. as you say, it might be that he sends out something else to you. that being said —there are two components to talk about here.

I. ON HOSEOK WRITERS

you’re very right about how sometimes, there’s a strong lateral portrayal going on if an idol fits a particular stereotype. you might be able to picture yourself in a scenario with a member, but it’s not something that’s written in the fandom. maybe because authors didn’t think about it. or maybe it’s unpopular. or not agreed on. several reasons can coincide.

fact is, image can for sure steer the way x reader fics are made. a lot of stage, photoshoot, and MV moments inspire many writers. you do have to say that it’s not all there is though. there’s a portion that gets ideas from backstage anecdotes. and a third fraction comes up with something on their own. a fourth wildly mixes everything. a fifth portion has someone else in mind but writes person XYZ instead. a sixth uses a mainstream porn or twt/tiktok trend as the basis of the character (... uncomfortable). a seventh author uses their life experience. another author replicates a popular book/movie. and so on.

hobi x reader writers have good reasons to get the first of inspo from his performance work where he shines. he’s the most stage-savvy member after all. they might get stuck there and not go any further because there’s already a lot to say about him going all out there. you might feel a way different atraction if someone wrote about a more private hoseok, or not, who knows? if there was some material about that. it’d be interesting to see how it plays out. advocating for some domestic hobi right here 😄

II. ON J-HOPE AND THE FANDOM

another fandom dynamic and bighit strategy that contributes to the effect. i always get the feeling he’s shown to us or shows himself in a more restricted, media-conscious type of way. more professional, less transparent. he’s not yoongi baring his most hidden concerns all day. he’s more sleek, not a target sphere of vulnerability or directness. 

it’s not about privacy, but opinion: we know his family and hobbies and personality, but seemingly not the innermost hoseok. he’s the member that projects the most out but nobody can venture in. extroversion is a better shield than most people think. even if he says something very intimate, or raps about it, he keeps his smile on, and it takes the attention away. namjoon lets us gaze into his mind and strikes that tone, hoseok remains more elusive. his role in the team fortifies that, he doesn’t have to do the concept work that RM/suga do as producers.

a fanfic plot needs some degree of that innermost being in any kind of portrayal to really get to a reader. jimin is so desired as a date by many because he carries a lot of things about him on his sleeve. someone who decides not to do that will leave people guessing and unsure. it’s not always the looks: the idol who’s the least blank slate in a group is often the most beloved. 

they’re easier to picture as your counterpart, an emotional bridge is easier to build. again then — some advocating here: doesn’t his professionalism make hobi even sexier? i find that mature and reasonable of him. you can imagine how seriously he’d take a relationship, and he can separate between his different worlds very well. hobi treats being an idol like an idol. 

the prevailing problem is. hobi’s already shown in body focus, that he’s the dance headquarters of bts doesn’t help, and fans can only pick that up, or spin a 2D narrative of him. it’s been discussed often that hoseok handles stardom and self-reveal with more distance, he chooses to protect himself more than the rest. so what i think is that you have problems going past superficial thirst because 

a) hobi hardly shows himself past his performer self by choice

b) the company promotes him that way

c) the fandom can’t go deeper than that either, on what basis. so, his stage presence and thirst potential becomes overhyped instead. 

which is a testament to his talent but also a tale on how you can fetishize someone: as is often pointed out when people only look at hoseok based on how he can grind his hips in choreography omitting everything else about him. it’s because there’s no going further and deeper from either side. it’s agreed upon and part of the game, but it’s also sad that hoseok uses that blank slate to stay safe, or whatever reason is behind it. it’s business right there.

honestly, it IS a strong kind of strategy to prevail and keep your grind. a lot of idols could benefit from having even a tinge of hoseok’s approach to fame. if he becomes less in reach that way but he rather enjoys him image and fans go along and he’s okay with that, it’s something to deal with in a manner of, hey we see the actual point of it. 

he doesn’t have to feel reachable or as vulnerable as other members opt to be, and the idea of hoseok is that he’s the sun in the first place. it does you good but getting so close isn’t the purpose 😉 some people are more meant to shine from way above. you see how namjoon is the moon man, much nearer to earth, revealing itself up close. you get the analogy, and we get back to the first paragraph like this, it always comes down to character after all.

[bananban-feature]

Stan Talent, Stan Pentagon

So many reasons to stan Pentagon:

1. Self-Produced

They just have a ton of talented songwriters in here! Cube is popular for self-produced idols after all, like BtoB, another super talented group.

Hui is a composer-producer, not really a secret because he’s well-known as a genius as he also composed hit songs for other popular groups (such as Energetic by Wanna One)

Kino and Wooseok wrote a lot of songs in their albums too, including some of my favorites Spring Snow (Kino) and Nostalgia (Wooseok). Kino also wrote their special single Eternal Flame. Wooseok had a big contribution in writing my absolute favorite, Daisy (but mostly written by Hui), and honestly his songwriting talent seems to be underrated.

Jinho has also composed a few and helped write a lot. Yuto also composed songs (aside from his rap lines), one song being Camella that a lot of “unis” love. *Universe/Unis = fandom name

Both Kino and Yuto have their own soundclouds for the songs they write/produce.

Yeo One composed his own solo songs (yes, even as rookies, they were already composing), and they’re actually so good. 

Also, in general, they are so creative in their songs and performances. Example: their Road To Kingdom performances, and also their super fun b-sides like Round 1 and Round 2!

My personal favorites: Obviously the genius Hui, Wooseok (I love him so much!), and Kino (such a talented person)

2. Vocal Kings

Their main vocals (Hui and Jinho) are absolutely top-tier vocalists, two of the strongest ones in the kpop world (imo).

Jinho was LITERALLY a vocal coach of kpop stars. Incredible vocal range.

Their lead vocals Hongseok (actually now a main vocal) and Yeo One are potential main vocals! And their sub-vocals, Kino (honestly surprised he was a sub-vocal cause he’s waaaay too good to be sub!), Yan An and Shinwon, are on par or better than other groups’ lead vocals, imo.

Vocal kings of harmonization. I love it so much, they sound so good! They take after their sunbaes BtoB, the OG harmonization kings. (Song references: You Are, and Shine acapella version).

Wooseok and Yuto’s rap are also so good! Honestly, I go crazy sometimes, especially with Wooseok’s delivery.

Edit, random trivia: I actually found out Wooseok auditioned in Cube as a vocalist and a model. Thank God, he discovered his talent in rapping later on, because dang, this guy is SICK. His rap touches my heart. He is proof that the basis of what a good rapper is doesn’t need to be about how fast you can say your words.

My personal favorites: Hui, Jinho, and Yeo One (what a beautiful voice, and he’s so good and stable live, halp huhu, totally underrated), Wooseok’s rap (I’m a big fan, my eyes are filled with hearts)

3. Musical ability (in general) and Dance

Being composers/producers, they have a good understanding of music theory and techniques, especially for Hui (obviously, the genius), Jinho (as a vocal coach) and Kino (I think).

Musical Instruments: Almost all of them (except for Hongseok) plays musical instruments

Piano: Hui, Jinho, Kino, Shinwon - I have to make a special note here. These guys can really play. They’re not the type to say they play the piano but only press a few chords here and there a bit and sing a song. They play their keys!

Guitar: Yuto (he is really good! he posts electric guitar covers on Twitter), Wooseok, Jinho, Hui, Yeo One, Shinwon

Erhu (Chinese traditional instrument): Yan An - studied it for 10 years. Haha! This is so unique, I’ve never seen him play it, and it’s not exactly a useful instrument to have for kpop music, but I love it!

Edit: I also found out Wooseok can play the violin. Not only that, he’s won a violin competition.. I couldn’t believe it! Violin it’s such a hard instrument. It’s not easy to be good at violin, let alone win a violin competition. Wooseok really surprises me with the musical talent he has sometimes.

Dance: Quite obvious as a kpop idol group, even though admittedly they aren’t exactly the best as a whole group. 

But anyway, Kino is the main dancer. (Also known for being such a good dancer of girl group songs. Hihi cute)

Lead dancers: Hui, Yuto, Yeo One

Apparently, Kino is also the choreographer! I think he was the main choreographer for Daisy. (Don’t @ me, I’m not sure. But in general, yes, he does choreograph for the group.)

My personal favorites: Kino, Hui - this also includes stage presence.

4. Visuals

Their official visual is Yan An. (Pentagon is whipped for Yanan, btw.)

Other unofficial visuals, at least in my book: Yuto, Hongseok, Yeo One, Kino (but tbf, as a well-loved idol group, everyone becomes an unofficial visual)

Shinwon was actually a legit model before being an idol, and he became viral for being “the handsome part-timer” at a cafe Exo went to.

Men’s Health Korea models (YES, ACTUAL MEN’S HEALTH COVER BOYS aka gym freaks): Hongseok, Yeo One. *PS: I have a feeling Yuto will also be on there soon, one of these days

Let me just reiterate though that while Hongseok is known for his muscles, he more than his abs. He’s smart, funny, and talented, as you can see in this whole post. So yeah, basically, please don’t objectify him.

My personal favorites: Yuto (the reason why I checked Pentagon out in the first place! my heart went deugun deugun), Hongseok (what a great face, beautiful eyes), Yeo One (cutie), Kino (very very pretty face)

*check ending for gifs/pics*

5. Other talents

Acting

Literally THREE of them are musical theatre actors, and all were actually the main characters in their respective musicals: Jinho (already a theatre sunbae), Hui and Yeo One. Honestly, this shows both acting skills and strong vocal ability. (Imagine the strong vocal ability of the lead vocal, in PTG, Yeo One, a main character of a musical. It gives you an idea of how good the vocal line up is.)

I think some of them had some acting in dramas, like Hongseok and Yeo One

Update: Yanan and Wooseok are also on dramas/will be on dramas now. That makes almost everybody in Pentagon (still waiting for Yuto and Shinwon) an actor.

Another update: Kino is now hosting his second podcast with Dive Studios! :)

Randoms

Hongseok, Jinho and Kino speaks three languages pretty comfortably: Hongseok/Jinho (Korean, English, Chinese), Kino (Korean, English, Japanese) ---not super fluent but able to have good conversations. And foreigners Yanan (Korean, Chinese), and Yuto (Korean, Japanese) are obviously fluent bilinguals.

Kino drew and painted the album art for WE:TH / daisy. He even gifted a painted version to Hui for his studio!

6. Personality

Let me start by saying Pentagon is a crazy group. They aren’t really kids but they are so chaotic. I love that they have no filter!

Even the leader, Hui, who’s not really young, is very chaotic! Hui is actually such a cutie pie. And also so funny, especially in their TMIs

Hongseok is so funny, so witty, and has absolutely no shame. I love it!

Shinwon is very witty, and is known to be the mood-maker of the group.

Yeo One is a little 4D. He’s like a messy kid and sometimes has his own world. :)) An absolute cutie!!!

Kino is the sweetest person ever! He never fails to tell Universe how much he appreciates us.

Jinho is known to be the kind and caring hyung they can depend on.

My personal favorites: Hongseok (hilarious and crazy, has me dying), Hui, Yeo One (ugghhhh super cute personality!), Kino also!!!

Overall: They have a bunch of all-rounders! (My personal favorite all-rounders: Hui, Kino, and Yeo One) They’re so talented and deserve a lot of recognition and support.

Hui is my bias and my ult, but I can’t decide who’s my next bias.

Update: I think Kino is my next bias, cause he’s just so good, so multi-talented! I can’t with this guy. I’m even considering adding him to my ult list.

But my gosh, Changgu is absolutely adorable. Wooseok talent. Huhu idk if second tier bias or...

***Not to be this obsessive OT10 fan, but I really like Dawn (formerly E’Dawn), so I’m writing his skills as well: Great composer (Shine, one of my faves huhu), such a great Rapper (he gets some amount of hate for his voice, but I actually really like it!), Main Dancer (what a good dancer tbh), and very unique personality. I love him, he’s so talented. (But anyway, even with him gone, Pentagon isn’t lacking! They’re still so great!)

If you wanna see my fave visuals, click below:

The legendary Yuto ponytail

PG-13 Hongseok GIFs only!!!

Also PG-13 Changgu only 

Sweet sweet Kino

[lesbiansforboromir]

Ok I’ve been thinking about “Boromir Lives Succession Crisis” fic all day and I would love your Opinion on how best to achieve the first half of that clause. I feel like there’s basically 3 options 1) Faramir goes on the quest instead 2) Frodo successfully slips off unnoticed and Boromir doesn’t confront him and the party isn’t split when the orcs attack 3) Everything happens as in the book but Boromir isn’t shot (1/2)

(2/2) I’m kind of leaning towards either 1 or 3. 1 because I think it would strengthen Boromir’s claim and pretty much eliminate any bond he developed with Aragorn over the quest, making him more likely to contest the claim, and it has the possibility for good Fari drama. 3 is probably more straightforward but gets real hairy in sorting out the specifics, as well deciding at what point Boromir’s opinion on Aragorn would change etc. Curious how you would handle it!

👀👀👀 I stan you specifically for letting me talk about this- OK SO. 

I have played out each one of these possibilities with @emynarnens so many times that this is the only thing I’m qualified to do now. So to start off!

I don’t think I would recommend #1. Boromir’s effect on Aragorn is a pretty vital piece of Character development for him. Viggo Mortensen actually mentions it but we can see it in the Books too, Aragorn goes from considering the men of Rohan corruptible and weak willed to agreeing with Boromir that he does not believe they gave in too Sauron’s bribery. Essentially Boromir challenges Aragorn to rethink his attitude to humanity, both in others and within himself. Faramir is far too enamoured with the idea of Aragorn’s nobility and royalty and I don’t think he would challenge him in the same way, or at all really. 

#2 and 3 do create issues in terms of the general plot of merry and pippin needing to be with the ents, but if Boromir doesn’t feel he betrayed the fellowship and committed a grievous crime he would perhaps feel a stronger sense of self worth and therefore is certainly shot but doesn’t quite die. Too wounded to stop the Hobbits from being taken, but not dead. Although I would also say that Boromir’s momentary madness and loss of control and the guilt he feels afterwards is also an important piece of character development for him, even if he dies immediately afterwards. He realises he sacrificed too much of his own integrity and lost too much hope in his single minded drive to defend Gondor. His sacrifice for two hobbits, who are just his friends, brings back some of that care and concern the Ring’s influence had worn away. 

But have no fear! I wouldn’t call it necessary to take away any of what happened there. Remember in the books Boromir was not just pierced by three arrows, he was pierced by VERY many, and Pippin tells us Boromir was still up and fighting when he lost consciousness. Indeed, just before Pippin blacked out, he saw Boromir pluck a shaft from his side and continue with the battle, so reasonably the change simply could be ‘he wasn’t shot as much’. Obviously adhrenaline can keep you going and all that but these books are anything if medically sound and Boromir is just Like That. Wounded but not dead is a valid sacrifice and keeps the beats of the narrative intact. 

I would also recommend this because there needs to be some reason Denethor believes his eldest son dead. It is a vital contribution to the darkness that eventually drives him to suicide and means you don’t have to work around Denethor also being alive when you’re talking about the whole issue with the coronation. Denethor can have witnessed a glimpse of Boromir’s fate through the Palantir, and then Faramir perhaps does find Boromir’s horn cloven in the river and Denethor takes this as proof of death in his darker state of mind. 

With this in mind it’s also kind of necessary to have the hunters actually leave a wounded Boromir where he is and believe he will not survive. (I’d recommend this also just for the jab you can have Boromir give along the lines of, “What are you all waiting for? Will you compose a song for my funeral? The hobbits are getting further from you at every moment, go!” Because good god you three it’s enough to question how much you really care about your hobbit friends) 

AND another thing is that this still allows Aragorn his indecision, whether to go with Frodo or rescue the Hobbits, which is also characterful and important. AND it reinforces Boromir’s love of the hobbits, demanding the three hunters leave him there to die in order to save them as he was unable too. There’s still a repentant sacrifice there. 

But anyway the point is if Boromir is alive and perhaps found ‘dying but still with a chance’ by a company of Eored, then I would suggest he is forced to recover somewhere secluded throughout the events of Helms Deep. This is to make sure Pippin and Gandalf still think he is dead by the time they leave for Minas Tirith. It’s a shame because that would be cool for him to be involved, but if Pippin knows Boromir is alive then it’s unlikely that he wouldn’t tell Denethor that and, as I’ve said, Denethor’s grief is important. 

If you really wanted Boromir at the battle at Helm’s Deep, you could go along the route of Denethor not believing Pippin, but that’s a stretch. I suppose you could also consider that the shock of it has already taken it’s toll on Denethor and even if he hears Boromir is alive, it’s done it’s job by the time Denethor believes Faramir will die and the City will be taken. 

(Unless you do wanna contend with Denethor being alive which I also like but that does take away from the narrative simplicity of it just being about Boromir and Aragorn’s conflict and the complex emotions surrounding it. Denethor does not believe Aragorn should be king and it’s unreasonable to think Boromir would go against his father in this case so it detracts from the indecision somewhat. But I would say Denethor being dead is the better option just for this specific idea.)

As far as worrying about whether Boromir would contest Aragorn’s claim goes, I wouldn’t worry about that. Boromir never once accepts the idea of Aragorn as his King. Certainly they are friends, they work well together, he likes him, but his responsibility to his people and the laws of Gondor and his Father’s wisdom and wishes (especially now he’s dead) would supersede any personal connection they have. And really the best case Aragorn has for being worthy of the throne is ‘It was in a Prophecy and also people like me’ so Boromir has plenty of reason to be like… suspicious about Aragorn’s aptitude. 

I think having them as friends adds some interesting emotional elements to it actually, the balance of friendship vs responsibility. You mentioned Boromir’s opinion of Aragorn changing, but the truth is it never does. Boromir essentially ignores the fact that Aragorn is asking for the Throne for the entire book and just accepts him as a man who’s willing to give aide to Gondor. Which is all Boromir really cares about at the time, not really expecting any of them to live long enough for this to be a problem. The conflict between him and Aragorn about the kingship is manufactured by the film entirely. 

In the end the probability is that Aragorn would become king, Aragorn did a good job at becoming heroic and he does seem to have burst out of nowhere and saved everyone. Even the Lords are for it, it appears. I think the eventual crux of it would be the kinds of requests, clauses and checks Boromir would demand Aragorn agree too. How they should change the nature of a King’s rule to fit in with this more egalitarian society Gondor’s grown into. Boromir would also ensure Aragorn went through the proper channels, that a council of Lords was held and his Kingship debated and voted on, make the whole thing something everyone participates in and understands. 

You mentioned Faramir drama too but we’ll get that in SPADES when he’s fighting with his brother over his treatment of Aragorn. Faramir really is thoroughly taken in by Aragorn’s mystique and his reaction to him is to cast off any and all tradition and agree to his coronation on the spot. This could also be because Aragorn saves his and Eowyn’s life, but still he and Boromir will have some serious issues, perhaps for the first time in their relationship so that’d be super fun to explore.

IN CONCLUSION!

I’d suggest absolutely nothing changes except for the severity of Boromir’s wounds. Aragorn still finds him, he still begs Aragorn to save Minas Tirith. The only difference is he verbally tells Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas to leave him and save Merry and Pippin and he is alive when they go though they do not expect him to recover. 

He is found by some Eored and taken to a nearby Rohir settlement (In LOTRO it’s a small town called Walstow and the Thane is a little plagued by the Uruks running around so it could also be a kind of mini adventure for Boromir with helping them repel attacks and eventually being able to evacuate to Dunharrow?) But whatever happens, he doesn’t rejoin his friends until after Pippin and Gandalf leave for Minas Tirith. 

addendum…………………. 

ON THE OTHER HAND… 

I know everything I just said but like… forget it for a moment because I have a second suggestion that absolutely flounces every one of the points I just made but I like it because I’m a sap. 

Gandalf slips up and tells them all on Caradhras that he doesn’t know the password into Moria. 

Aragorn: “What?! Then why are we even discussing it? Boromir’s right, we should risk the Gap of Rohan, at least we will not be so enclosed.”

Gandalf: “I can figure the password out when we get there!”

Aragorn: “Tosh! We could be discovered, pursued or killed long before you rattle through every possible way inside. Nope! The Gap of Rohan it is!”

And then they make their way down south and oh wow! Here’s the Prince of Rohan and he has an entire camp of loyal soldiers who could defend this little party. 

And Theodred exclaims ‘here is Boromir! My (love, partner, boy) friend! I, of course, trust him and his fellows. Let me just finish this skirmish- whoops! That was a close one thanks Boromir, who I love, for being here to save me from that Orc or I would have been dead! Wouldn’t that be terrible? Anyway we are still losing here so let me and Erkenbrand and Grimbold all escort you to safety.’ 

‘Oh? Your two young Hobbit friends left in the night did they? How strange, I hope they come to no harm but I suppose we shall all have to focus on defending Helms Deep for now. I’m very glad I’m here with you Boromir, to be a friendly face who knows when you are acting strangely and remind you of your humanity and softer side, you didn’t seem to be doing very well in the midst of these very strange and not particularly empathetic friends of yours!’

… Your choice of course ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[nomediaplay]

If Tumblr shuts down, where do you go?

Most likely nowhere. In my good-bye note on onehallyu I said I might decide to answer questions somewhere. Then I regged this tumblr, but after a while decided to not do that as I wrote in the first post on this page. But with my usual “luck” in timing, Jessica left SNSD just some days later so I ‘had’ to post a bit.

supermofficial.*com/#events weren’t you bragging SM never forces their artists to do free events             

Sigh. All artists of course have to do promotional events for new releases. And this is even some new group. And not just artists. If an author has a new book coming out, he’ll have to be on TV shows to promote it. If there’s a musical, the cast need to promote it on TV etc. Heck even the very top star Hollywood actors have to go all around the world and be on TV shows and events to promote their new movies.

What I’ve complained about is how many shitty idol companies make their celebrities constantly do lots of promotion for free, and also especially when they use very big established celebrities for events to which fans get “free tickets” by buying CDs.

What would happen to Taeyeon’s music if she were to leave SM? Would she still be able to perform these songs or she’d literally have to start anew?

She (and anyone else) can continue to perform her music however she wants, but she (presumably) can’t make new recordings without SM’s permission. Look here: when it comes to music, there are 2 different types of intellectual property rights:

The first is for, so to say, the ‘creation/invention’ of the song, and belongs to the composers/songwriters.

The second is the copyright of a specific recording. This typically belongs to a record label. That’s literally what record labels do: they organize the recording of music, then market and sell copies of that recording. And the record label will typically sign deals with songwriters, producers and singers to make a recording from which these get a royalty % cut of the total sales of that recording.

Anyone can perform whatever song anywhere without needing anyone’s consent. But if you do it for commercial purposes you need to pay the songwriters. This is handled by collective agreements and organizations such as ASCAP in the US, JASRAC in Japan and KOMCA in Korea which work to collect money for song usage and distribute it to the songwriters.

But to make a new recording of the song (for commercial purposes) you need explicit permission of the songwriters. However, whenever any record label signed a contract for a recording to start with, that agreement would typically stipulate that the record label now has the right to determine who can make new recordings of the song.

So, surely, if you’re a fan of a kpop group, you must have experienced that members of the groups have performed covers of other songs in concerts (because they can perform whatever song they want) - but if there’s a DVD release of the concert some of those covers might be missing (because record labels have refused the right to make recordings of the song).

What does it mean for an idol to have a lot of copyrighted songs, like the ones on those lists?

Per the above answer: it means he/she is listed as one of the ‘creators/inventors’ of a song as composer and/or lyricist. So whenever that song is used for any commercial purpose (such as played on TV, played on radio, performed by at any concert/event, etc) he/she will get paid some money.

However, as I’ve said countless of times before: for any really successful artists the payments from songwriting are really small compared the very big money they can get paid in other ways, particularly from performing at concerts and from doing CF/endorsement deals.

Also, I’d like to point out that it’s difficult to know how much an artist really have contributed to creating a song. Sometimes I get the feeling that YG lists whatever people that happened to sit next to Teddy while he composed a song. And it’s well known that many big western artists throughout history have demanded to be credited as songwriters even though they didn’t actually contribute anything at all.

Does Jessica have the right to use Girls’ Generation’s name to promote herself? Other girls who left SM - left the group as well (at least for now) but they all still use GG’s name when promoting their new projects. OT8 stans believe GG should never be mentioned anywhere near Jessica but I don’t think their situations are that different actually? but maybe I’m wrong?

I doubt that there are any legal constraints, but really, your question is strange because she’d be laughed at if she went around saying she was still an SNSD member. Any ‘group’ in society is defined by how the members of the group recognize each other as part of the group. The other 8 members have made it quite clear that they define SNSD as 8 members without Jessica, so it would be ridiculous for her to call herself as SNSD. Of course, she could if she want have journalists write news-articles calling her ex-SNSD Jessica and she could do interviews talking about her time in SNSD etc. I’m not sure if that would help her or not.

How so many bands and solo acts in japan are able to survive for a long time even though they don’t have good digital or physical sales?

But the Japanse music sales have been completely fucked up for the last 15 years as I’ve ranted about plenty of times before.

Can those bands and solo acts actually sell decent amounts of concert tickets in Japan? If yes, they’re living a good life no matter what their music sales are.

what is more important for a company, the success of their newer groups or their established artists? sorry if it’s a dumb question

Err, it’s not entirely black and white. But for a company to make really big profits (as in money for the owners of the company) it’s most important to get a new group to become really big really fast. This is partly about how new groups are on worse contracts and partly about how fans of these new fresh trendy groups spend huge money on buying albums and streaming like maniacs etc which are things from which the company gets most of the money (unlike for example concerts).

But it’s not all about contracts. Several of these smaller companies have absolutely horrible contracts. That doesn’t mean the companies make any profit. Because their acts simply aren’t successful enough. They spend so much money on everything from music videos to stage outfits and make up to road managers and security guards so there’s no money left.

And so on the flip side, for most of the normal employees who work in these companies to sort everything from music videos to stage outfits and make up to road managers and security guards, it’s really just important to have successful acts period (no matter if new or old) in order to make sure they get paid safely.

It is true that GD alone bring as much money as blackpink?

Per above: yes, GD alone would generate much more revenue than Blackpink. But they are both profitable in the sense that they generate much more money than what’s spent on music videos, outfits and managers etc. And obviously Blackpink has a much worse contracts than GD, so after splitting profits per their contracts YG probably makes bigger profits on Blackpink than GD.

Why do you think YG did a fanmeting in seoul for blackpink instead of another concert?      

Well, considering the amount of negativity YG has ended up in recently:

I thought it had been well established that much of the audience at their previous Korean concert was in fact not paying for tickets, but people who had been given tickets through corporate sponsorship of the concert. In this current situation, there’s probably not a single company willing to sponsor a concert.

Secondly, even with regards to that fans actually would pay to go, I think it’s likely that media would have put out critical articles about YG doing concerts in this situation. By calling it a fan-meeting they’re pretty much making it impossible for journalists to write such negative articles.

Did that super junior member really leave because he got married or there is something more to it?

As I’ve always expressed: save humanity - disband Super Junior.

So no I really have no idea about what they’re doing. But I used to say some 7 years ago that there will probably be a Super Show 10. And we’re soon there. Because members seem to be aware of their own short-comings and their joint success and are OK with doing group activities.

But it was my understanding that this member not only didn’t really contribute with anything to the group, but that he also really pissed off the few fans he had with his actions (such as drawing symbols for his girlfriend when signing autographs for fans).

Is Mnet bigger than SM and YG?

If you just mean Mnet as in the cable-TV channel, the answer is that SM/YG are bigger. But this question is not straight forward to answer. First off it’s difficult to define what one mean with ‘bigger’ company:

By profit? By market cap (value)? By number of employees? By revenue?

My take would be to in most cases (such as this) go by revenue as the most relevant measure of ‘big’ company.

Secondly, in Asia in general and in Korea in particular they have this horrible habit of building conglomerates and interlinked companies. And it just runs in their culture/society. Both SM and YG were new small independent startups initially. But look at them now. They have used all the profits they’ve made over time to start all kinds of businesses very vaguely related to their core businesses and invested in a myriad of other companies and started to become big conglomerates in entertainment.

And Mnet goes way back and to the very top. Mnet is just one cable-TV-channel. The actual company here is CJ ENM. CJ ENM also has a lot of other cable-TV-channels and a huge home-shopping-channel. CJ ENM are also very big in for example producing musicals and concerts in Korea. CJ ENM once upon a time also almost had a monopoly on music distribution in Korea, but nowadays the music distribution business (now called Stone Music Entertainment) is far from the leading distributor. CJ ENM is also the biggest producer of Korean TV dramas and films. That was spun off into a separate company (Studio Dragon) but CJ ENM own like 75% of that company still. CJ ENM has also spun off its music streaming business (but they own like 15% of Genie Music) and its gaming business (but they own like 25% of Netmarble). So CJ ENM is a very big and powerful company in the Korean entertainment industry and much bigger than SM and YG.

And CJ ENM is in turn owned by and part of the CJ Group. The CJ Group also own a whole lot of other companies primarily into food production, restaurant chains and entertainment. Most known to kpop fans is probably that they also own the biggest cinema chain in Korea, but the main businesses are food related.

And CJ Group was in turn part of the absolutely gigantic Samsung chaebol group. CJ was one of the parts of the Samsung chaebol that was split off around 1990 following the death of Samsung founder Lee Byung-chul. It’s a separate group now, but basically, CJ Group is run by 2 siblings who are grandchildren of Lee Byung-chul. Other parts of the former Samsung chaebol are run by other relatives of Lee Byung-chul.

(PS, Lee Byung-chul had TEN children who in turned had a lot of grand children, hence why his gigantic corporate empire is nowadays a bit of a drama mess)

[sebeth]

Fantastic Four # 9 - 12

Warning, Spoilers Ahead…

 A Brief Summary: Doctor Doom suffers another embarrassing defeat

Debuts:

·         The Ovoids

·         Impossible Man from the planet Poppup in the Tenth Galaxy

·         Willie Lumpkin

Favorite Cover: #12 – The Fantastic Four Meet the Hulk!

Invisible Girl Hostage Count: 5 out of 9 issues

Points of Interest:

·         The issue opens with Reed using his “electronic x-ray camera” with “radioactive film” in an attempt to learn more about Sue’s invisibility power.  Sue urges Reed to hurry as it’s “hot and stuffy” while “Torch keeps his flame on”.  Said Torch is acting as Reed’s lab assistant. Johnny is taking notes while engulfed in flames – except for his hands.  Between the causal use of “radioactive film” and Johnny walking around in flames, it’s a wonder the group lives long enough to battle Doom later on.

·         The FF’s signal flare appears in the sky. The trio attempts to exit the lab but the door is locked. Johnny decides to burn through the door but is stopped by Reed: “Trying to stop you from blowing us up, kid! Did you forget how sensitive that nuclear device is to heat?!” Johnny was completely engulfed in flames only four panels earlier and Reed didn’t seem to care but now it’s a no-go.

·         Is it safe to keep a nuclear device in the middle of New York City? Especially with Johnny and Ben living in the building. The duo engages in destructive rough-housing on a near-daily basis!

·         Reed attempts to stretch his arm to reach the Fantasti-Car so the trio can leave via the window but the strain proves too much. No worries, as Johnny has learned something new: “I can concentrate my flame so much that it burns without heat!” What?!

·         The trio escapes the lab. Reed decides “Let’s forget the Fantastic-Car. We can make better time without it!” Again, what? Johnny, maybe, but not the other two. And this is the era where Johnny randomly loses power due to “exhaustion”. Wouldn’t it make more sense for Johnny not to use his powers until the group has reached the scene of crisis? Especially when you have an awesome car-plane just waiting to be used?

·         The three head to the source of the flare. Sue causes a car crash with her “now you see me, now you don’t” routine. I never understood how Spider-Man was a “public menace” and the X-Men were “hated and feared” by the general public in comparison to the Fantastic Four in the early days of the Marvel Universe. Spider-Man mostly stopped criminals and the X-Men were isolated in Westchester County minding their own business…meanwhile the Four, in the heart of NYC, can barely go an issue without causing a mass panic or massive property damage…many times caused by Ben having a tantrum!

·         The source of the “emergency” is Ben wanting to show off the new statues Alicia has made of the team’s enemies. Sue protests the inclusion of Namor. Reed questions Sue over her feelings for Namor: “I thought we had an understanding.” Sue admits she’s not sure of her own feelings.

·         Johnny’s glad he’s “not old enough to have all those kinds of mushy problems”.  Karl Kessel’s “Human Torch” series contains pre-transformation flashbacks of Johnny flirting with girls. And he’s flirting with Valeria, Princess Pearla, and soon to be dating Dorrie Evans in the “Strange Tales” series. Perhaps Johnny’s referring to “serious” relationships?

·         Doctor Doom has returned to earth! And decides to storm Marvel Comics and terrorize Stan Lee & Jack Kirby with the sight of his unmasked face?!

·         Doom proclaims: “I do no blame you for shrinking from the sight of me! I still cannot bear to gaze upon my face myself! But I must remove my mask at times else I feel it will strangle me!”

·         Reed has the nerve to question Ben: “What makes you so bad tempered all the time?” Seriously, Reed?!

·         We have a fun moment of Johnny & Ben uniting to prank Reed by stretching his clothes.

·         Doom ambushes Reed. Victor explains he was rescued by the Ovoids, an alien race whose “science and culture were a million years ahead of ours”.  Doom learned many abilities from the Ovoids including the ability to switch bodies with another person. Victor promptly switches bodies with Reed.

·         The rest of the team arrives and subdues Doom (Reed). Ben and Johnny are very excited to have captured Doom (Reed) and devise ludicrous ways to imprison him. Not to worry, Reed (Doom) had devised a cell to contain him.

·         Kirby draws some extremely creepy “Evil Reed” facial expressions.

·         Back at the Baxter Building, the rest of the team is overrun by a herd of miniaturized animals: horses, bears, kangaroos, moose, elephants, cows, camels, zebras, birds, etc. The trio scramble to contain the animals and return them to Reed’s lab: “You know how angry he gets if anyone interferes with his work!”  

·         Reed (Doom) returns and the trio questions him – 1) Are these the animals stolen from the zoo and 2) Why are you shrinking animals?

·         Victor spins a story that this “reducing ray” will expand the team’s powers and allow Ben to transform at will. I know Reed is the scientist of the story but that explanation makes no sense. The team chooses not to press the matter of the animal theft and forced experimentation.

·         Doom (Reed) escapes from his cell and seeks the aid of Alicia Masters. Unfortunately for Reed, an invisible Sue was visiting Alicia and knocks him out.

·         Alicia is confused: “How can that be Doctor Doom? There’s an aura of goodness about him…of nobility!” Really, Alicia? You can sense that from an unconscious man in a suit of armor? I wish someone would establish Alicia had minor empathic abilities – otherwise, her “sensing” is ridiculous.

·         Johnny & Ben arrive to defeat “Doom”. Ben is furious that Alicia was threatened: “You tried to scare Alicia, did ya? Nothing can save ya from me now, ya miserable ghoul…I ain’t kidding now! He threatened Alicia! Do ya hear me? He dared to threaten Alicia!”

·         There’s a cute scene where the team takes Doom to the parked Fantasti-car only to discover a group of neighborhood kids palying in it.

·         Johnny and Ben suspect something is off with Reed & Doom so Johnny uses his powers to create a mirage to test their suspicions. I love Silver Age powers – always used in ways that make no sense with actual science.

·         Doom is found out, re-switches bodies with Reed, and shrunk to nothingness by his own reducing ray. The next time Doom achieves god-like powers he should erase everyone’s memories of his ridiculous Silver Age-shenanigans.

·         Issue #11 opens with a cute scene of the team encountering a group of children playing “Fantastic Four”. The team shows off their powers for the children. Johnny wisely reminds the kids “Throwing fireballs is easy for me, fella, but don’t you ever play with fire. It’s too dangerous for little kids.”

·         We meet Willie Lumpkin, the team’s mailman. He volunteers for the team: “I haven’t exactly got any super powers, but I can wiggle my ears real good.”

·         The team goes through their fan mail: Johnny receives love letters; Ben gets pranks from the Yancy Street Gang.

·         Reed has yet another cure for Ben who is understandably wary: “I’m sick of being a guinea pig for you! None of these things ever work right!” Ben takes the cure and transforms back into his human form. Ben, Reed, and Sue are ecstatic. A more cautious Johnny muses to himself: “Poor Ben! If he changes back to the Thing again, I don’t wanna be around to see it!”. Johnny decides to head to the garage to “fool around with my new TR-4!”

·         Reed and Ben recap their meeting in college. Ben was “State U’s football hot-shot”. Despite being polar opposites, “I was a millionaire’ son and he was from the wrong side of the tracks”, the duo quickly became best friends. Their friendship persisted throughout World War II. Ben was “a Marine fighter ace over Okinawa and Guadalcanal” and Reed was “behind the lines, working with the underground for the O.S.S.” The timeline of these events would put Reed and Ben in their late thirties at the time of their transformation into the Fantastic Four.

·         Due to the sliding timescale, the World War II bit has been retconned from Reed and Ben’s past. I think Ben’s time in the military is still part of his background – the era has simply changed. I’m not sure about Reed.

·         Sue had begun dating Reed before he left for the war: “It’s always been you, since we were kids together living next door to each other”. This would be retconned later – Sue and Reed wouldn’t meet until Reed was entering college.

·         Sue brushes off Reed’s devotion as the “shadow of the Sub-Mariner” lies between them. The whole Namor storyline could have been resolved much sooner if it was acceptable for comic book women, or women in general, were allowed to have lustful thoughts about men. Sue hasn’t spent enough time with Namor that didn’t involve threats to her, her family, or the human race in general. Poor Sue isn’t allowed to admit she appreciates Namor’s fabulous body in a tight, small speedo so the audience is left with her swooning over his “gentle”, “conflicted” nature. I love Namor but there has been nothing gentle or conflicted in his FF appearances. Execpt for the time he swam with the dolphins but Sue wasn’t there to witness it.

·         We get yet another recap of the infamous rocket flight. I understand the “every issue could be someone’s first” principle but were at issue #11 and it’s been recapped in half of the books.

·         Sue’s upset because a few pieces of mail state she “doesn’t contribute enough to the team”.

·         Reed defends Sue by saying Abraham Lincoln’s mother didn’t fight but she still contributed?! Kick him, Sue! Kick him!

·         Ben becomes overly excited and turns back into the Thing.

·         The boys surprise Sue with a birthday cake.

·         Impossible Man arrives on Earth, causing confusion and chaos in his wake. The Four battle Impossible Man in the Flamingo restaurant. He eventually becomes bored and leaves the planet. If you’ve seen the Impossible Man of the 2000s Fantastic Four cartoon, you’ve basically read this issue.

·         Johnny uses his powers to create “hypnotic rings” during the fight with the Impossible Man. You’ve got to love Silver Age powers!

·         Issue 12 begins a classic rivalry of the Marvel Universe: the Thing vs the Hulk.

·         Alicia and Ben are leaving a performance of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. Ben comments “I get my kicks from low-down New Orleans Jazz”.

·         The army pours into town and mistakes Thing for the Hulk, prompting a mistaken identity fight.

·         Ben is quite irate over being mistaken for the Hulk.

·         General Ross arrives at the Baxter Building. He wants the Four to locate the Hulk.

·         Ross shows a picture of the Hulk. Sue fades from sight: “The sight of that monster unnerved me so that I lost control of my visibility power!” Really? I don’t buy it. First, it’s only a picture and secondly, she lives with Ben and has battled Skrulls and monsters from Monster Island. It’s not like large creatures are a foreign concept to Sue.

·         Even Ben thinks its bull!

·         The boys show off, proudly proclaiming how he – and he personally – will capture the Hulk. Unfortunately for Johnny, flying around the small room a few times exhausts him flame. I appreciate the time it takes Johnny to master his abilities – it’s more realistic as opposed to the “instant mastery” route but two laps around the living room shouldn’t wipe him out as this point. He’s been the “Human Torch” for months as this point.

·         Reed praises Johnny’s skills as a mechanic: “That flame of his is one of our most potent weapons as well as his mechanical skill.  In fact, I’ll give you a little demonstration! Johnny has just finished modifying our Fantastic-Car!”

·         Johnny encourages Reed: “You tell him, Big Daddy!” In an alternate universe, Johnny married Reed Richards – was that his pet name for him?

·         The Four and the General head to the Southwest to search for the Hulk. The Four meet Bruce Banner and Rick Jones.

·         Reed has “long been an admirer” of Banner’s atomic research. Banner returns the praise: “I’m highly flattered that the most brilliant scientific brain of our time should say that to me”.

·         Johnny both shows-off for and pranks Rick. Neither are impressed with the other. Johnny: “Look at him green with envy! Trying hard not to admit he’s overwhelmed by me!” Rick: “He wouldn’t be so swell-headed if he knew I was the Hulk’s partner!”

·         Johnny tends to dial up the obnoxiousness and showboating when he’s with another teen hero: Spider-Man, Rick Jones, and later, Iceman. Possibly a combination of eagerness to impress/work with someone of his age group and a desire to be the best of said age group.

·         The army base’s saboteur “the Wrecker”, but not the Wrecker, kidnaps Rick Jones causing Bruce Banner to unleash the Hulk.

·         The Four and the Hulk meet up in a “deserted Western ghost town” and fight. Ben finds and frees Rick. Hulk flees the scene.

·         The Four prepare to leave the base. Reed hints to Bruce: “I’ve got a feeling there’s a lot we have to talk about – like you, and Rick, and the Hulk, for instance!”

[creativitymouth]

The World Forgetting By The World Forgotten Pt.4

A/N - Okay so I wasn’t expecting my story to blow up as much as it has and I am incredibly thankful. For everyone who doesn’t feel confident in their writing just give a try it will most likely be well received by a very kind community. 

Summary: The end of 11th grade was just the beginning of everything. SlowBurn!RichieTozierxFem!Reader. Aged Up. 

Trigger Warning: Depressive Themes, Swearing, Trashmouth Tozier, Mentions of Neglect and Abuse. 

Chapter 4

11th grade - 1989

You were lost in your thoughts, happy it was the last day of 11th grade but also reeling. The upcoming year would be more stress-filled than any of the previous, everyone was going to go off to college and learn more about themselves then they could in the small town of Derry. You were happy for the growth, but you were also wondering where that left you. The losers had been in your life for 9 years now and you weren’t ready to let it all go. Time was moving so quickly, in fact you had just noticed that morning that it had almost been a year since little Georgie Denbrough had gone missing. It still felt like only months had past when you’d gotten the news. Richie had been the one to tell you and held you as you cried over the disappearance. Of course, you didn’t feel the loss as much as Bill did, but you still hurt a lot. He was only 9 years old, didn’t know much about life and still adored his toy trains. Georgie was a light in the darkness that was Derry and the audacity someone had by taking that from everyone was just cruelty. You had helped his parents around the house after the loss, not wanting them to yell and scream at Bill for undone chores, and they appreciated that greatly. Hell, they treated you better then they treated Bill. Bill had been so stoic for a long time, and you couldn’t blame him. Georgie’s innocence was a beacon and you missed it terribly. You don’t remember the last time Bill’s mother had spoken directly to him, she was only able to see Georgie when she looked at her eldest son. Bill was beginning to do better now, but you could still see the hurt on his face. The determination to find his lost brother and though you didn’t have as much hope as he did you were still going to try. For Ben’s sake, and for Georgie’s memory.

“Hey (Y/N)! Wait up!” Your best friends voice called out to you bringing you out of your thoughts. You stopped walking, adjusting the textbooks you had in your hand before turning and giving her approaching figure a smile. Since 9th grade, the growing darkness you felt inside you only seemed to worsen but that didn’t stop you from putting on a show. The curtains only closing when you got home at night.

“Beverly Weverly,” she put an arm around your shoulders “what an honor.” She smiled back at you, steering you in a new direction.

“We made a new friend.” She stated proudly as your eyebrows stitched together.

“We?”

“Yes, we.” You groaned, Bev had a peculiar taste in friends. The party all night, get blackout drunk kind.

“You won’t even hang out with the losers despite how often I beg.” She rolled her eyes at you dramatically.

“I hang out with Richie.”

“That’s because you’re both addicted to cancer sticks.” You chuckled at yourself as you watched Beverly approaching the new kid.

“You’re just jealous.” Beverly joked, poking you in the rib with her finger. You squirmed uncomfortable with her accusation.

“Jealous.” The word tasted metallic and foreign in your mouth.

“Yeah, because of how in love you are with Richie.” Your head spun. In love? What did she mean? What was she talking about? You loved all the losers, granted you did find yourself alone with Richie a lot. But you were alone with Mike all the time too, and Bev. In love? Before you could question or scold her (or maybe both) the new kid had approached.

“Hey new kid on the block.” Beverly jokes. “This is who I was telling you about.”

“Hi.” He waved nervously, you smiled that signature smile and he eased up a bit.

“I’m (Y/N).” You stuck a hand out to him and he shook it.

“My best friend.” Beverly interrupted, and your smile only grew, it felt nice to be appreciated. “Feel free to call her (N/N)”

“Do not feel free to do that.” You glared at Beverly beside you who chuckled. Somewhere along the line, when Richie and Beverly became friends they’d made up this infuriating nickname for you.

“I’m Ben.” He smiled after glancing at Beverly, his cheeks reddening in the process.

This kid has a thing for her. You thought to yourself. “So, how long have you two known each other?” You wiggled your eyebrows at Ben and he looked away.

“10 exciting minutes,” Beverly smirked “but then I knew I had to introduce you two when I heard him listening to New Kids on the Block.”

“You like them?” Benjamin’s eyes practically sparkled. You shrugged, shoving a hair behind your ear.

“Don’t be coy (N/N),” she nudged you again, “She never shuts up about Joe McIntyre.”

“Bev!” You shouted dramatically. “Embarrassing much?” Bev copied your earlier actions and shrugged before gently taking the yearbook from Ben. You were supposed to be the smiling bright, ray of sunshine, liking New Kids on the Block did not come with the job application.

“Sign this, poor new kid has no signatures and Henry Bowers has been after him.” Ben looked away sheepishly, clearly embarrassed.

“Beverly Marsh.” You scolded before taking the book and signing next to her Stay Cool, Ben from Soc Class. She was being characteristically blunt towards all things obvious.

Have a great summer Benny, I hope you survive Bowers and if things get too rough you can always talk to me. I assure you Beverly will be there too. - (Y/N)

P.S - Didn't she blow your mind this time.

You handed the book back to him, and Beverly smiled.

“Hang tough, new kid on the block.” Bev waved before walking off.

“Please don’t go girl!” He yelled behind her, as you watched with an amused expression on your face. “That’s the name of another,” his voice trailed off “New Kids on the Block song.” You leaned in towards Ben smirking.

“She’s a sucker for poetry.” You said before jogging after Bev. Ben’s expression fell as he considered your words, had he been obvious? He had liked Beverly from the moment he laid eyes on her in Social Studies class, but she had never noticed him prior. So why were you telling him that she liked poetry. As Ben stood there considering your words his crestfallen expression changed again. Sure, you knew he liked Beverly, but you also approved. Maybe the summer wouldn’t be so terrible after all.

“I’m going to go hang with the boys, are you coming over tonight?” She shook her head no, a small frown forming on her face.

“Dad -” She began with a grimace.

“Don’t explain, I got it.” You pulled her in for a hug, purposefully squeezing the life out of her. The parents in this down were deadly, and corrupt. You wondered if they were always like this or if Derry had made them that way. When you arrived at Derry all you had was 8 years’ worth of memories from New York, so you didn’t know if they way you turned out was contributed to Derry or if you would have always been the way you were.

“I need air (N/N), you know, to live.” She wheezed out though she was hugging back. When you guys pulled away, Beverly ruffled your hair before leaving with a wave. You shook your head, once again lost in your head. You too had been alive at some point, but you didn’t know whether to attribute that to Derry.

“(N/N)!” Richie’s voice yelled out. You looked up as he jogged toward you with his giraffe legs. You hated how all the boys were now looming over you, though it had just been 4 years ago when you were all at eye level. Richie now stood at a good 6 feet to your (Height). Eddie, though still shorter than the rest of the boys, was taller than you as well. The tallest of them all being Stan at a whopping 6’2”.

“Trashmouth.” You started until he swept you into a hug, your feet coming off the ground. You squealed, hating the feeling of floating.

“I fucking missed your tiny ass,” he squeezed your body to him, but he was worried you might catch on to his sentiment, so he continued, “though I got to say your actual ass isn’t all that small.”

“You saw me during lunch.” You said, deciding to ignore his crude comment as he lowered you back down.

“And?” He smiled at you and you couldn’t help but smile back. Richie’s heart wanted to melt, he loved making you smile and laugh, especially when you would throw your head back and laugh into the stars. His feelings for you seemed to grow by day which did nothing for his inappropriate behavior. If anything, it made it worse. “I missed having eye candy around.” You scoffed.

“Way to ruin the moment Richard.” You stated, feigning annoyance that you didn’t feel as the rest of the losers found their way to you two. “What’s up boys, what misadventure are we getting into tomorrow?” Bill put his arm around your shoulder, loving the feeling of having his own armrest. You both missed the way Richie glared at the gesture, but Eddie didn’t, and he nudged Richie in the side as he shook his head. Richie gave Eddie a pointed look before taking a deep breath and contributing to the conversation.

“I start my training.”

“What training?” Stan asked.

“Street fighter.” You laughed at Richie rolling your eyes as he smiled at you. The boy basically funded the arcade with the amount of time he spent there.

“Is that how you want to spend your summer, stuck in an arcade.” Eddie interjected, obviously appalled by the thought.

“Better than inside your mother.”

“Rich.” You scolded, though you were trying to hide your laughter. You looked up at Bill who was smiling softly as well, his arm still around your shoulders. Bev had asked you once if you and Bill had a thing for each other and it had been a hassle to explain that he was just appreciative of what you had done for him over the summer Georgie had gone missing.  “What if we go the quarry?” The boys all became silent looking around absently. Even Bill moved his arm away (to Richie's much apparent joy). “Chickens.”

“Guys, we can g-go to the barrens.” Bill suggested instead, and your eyebrows rose. The barrens? That’s around where he told you he thought Georgie might be.

“Right.” You added skeptically. Before noticing all the boys’ attention had diverted to the woman standing outside of the school.

“Betty Ripsom's mom.” Stan said what you all were thinking. “Does she really expect to see her coming out of the school?” You winced at the harshness of the statement. You didn’t know Betty Ripsom, but you had a class or two with her best friend Anne and that girl hadn’t been the same since Betty disappeared. You couldn’t blame her though, if Bev or any of the losers went missing a few screws in your brain would come undone.

“I don't know.” Eddie added, as you all continued to stand there staring at her.

“As if Betty Ripsom's been hiding in Home Ec for the last few weeks.” Richie, of course. You gave him a pointed look and he shrugged.

“Do you think they'll actually find her?” Stan asked.

“Yes.” You spoke finally, giving Bill a reassuring squeeze on the arm.

“In a ditch. All decomposed, covered in worms and maggots, smelling,” You flinched, for Bill's sake. You know Richie didn’t mean to say it to weaken Bills mural, but you felt him shudder.

“like Eddie's mom's underwear.”

“Shut up!” Eddie yelled fed up with Richie's inappropriate comments.

“Gross.” Stan added.

“She's not dead.” Bill said suddenly, looking up from whatever had interested him on the ground. “She m-m-m-missing.”

“Sorry Bill, she's missing.” Richie was obviously apologetic. He sometimes forgot to filter his feelings on the missing kids, but in all honesty, he thought they were dead. Richie caught you squeezing Bills arm and couldn’t help but wonder if maybe your feelings were directed to Bill and not him. A pit was forming in the bottom of his stomach until you let go of Bills arm and walked over to stand next to him.

“Good job Tozier.” You whispered so only he could hear you. He smirked, the pit evaporating at your closeness. “You know the barrens aren't that bad.” You tried to encourage the other 3 boys to accompany you and Bill.

“Who doesn't love splashing around in shitty water.” Eddie grumbled. You all laughed at him, knowing that he was going to come regardless. You found yourself leaning into Richie subconsciously, though Richie had noticed prior. You decided not to move as the conversation carried on and you all made plans for tomorrow. Richie had gotten himself a car from the local used car shop, it wasn’t much, and it had constant breakdowns, but it worked. Stan had a car as well, though it was more his father's than his. Eddie didn’t have one because his mom told him driving could kill, and Bill just wasn’t ready for the pressure of the driving test. You were supposed to have had a car already, but your parents kept forgetting, not that you expected much. You were probably going to end up like Rich and just buy one from the junkyard, though in all honesty that 1988 BMW your parents had promised sounded amazing. Bill and Eddie had decided that they would bike to Stan’s and have him drive them because of the outstanding safety concerns of Richie's car. You didn’t mind as much as they did, and your heart cracked at the thought of Rich being alone, so you told him to pick you up. The innocent and cheery moment between your friends was soon destroyed by a pressure on your shoulder. You turned around to see Bowers smirking down at you as you tensed up. Richie was the first to react and grabbed you shoving you behind him. Though you had a burst of courage in 9th grade, it only antagonized Henry more. He had never repeated his sexual actions, but it didn’t stop him from getting all your in face.

“D-D-Don’t fucking touch her B-Bowers.” Bill spoke up as the boys blocked you from him and Hockstetter. You shivered as your skin began to grow clammy and warm.  

“Bill shut up.” You warned, finding your voice. You didn’t want them to get hurt for you, not again. Especially since Bill had come out of this year bruise free.

“Did you s-s-s-say something, B-b-b-b-Billy.” Henry began lowering himself, so he was facing Bill. “You got a free ride this year cuz of your little brother.” Bill flinched slightly. “Ride's over, Denbrough. This summer it's going to be a hurt-train, for you and your faggot friends.” Henry straightened himself winking at you before walking away. Richie made a move to go after him, but you grabbed his arm.

“Not worth it.” You shook your head, causing his riled-up expression to soften.

“I wish he’d disappear.” He settled on saying watching as Henry and his friends made their way over to their dingy car.

“He's probably the one doing it.” Stan said shaking his head.

-------------------

“Parents suck.” You comment suddenly after the near silent drive you and Richie had to your house. You could see the darkness of your place from your position on the curb. They had just returned home two days ago, and now they were gone again. You practically lived with strangers. You tried your hardest to act like the absence didn’t bother you, but sometimes quiet is violent.

“Yeah,” He comments thinking back to the black eyes and drunken mothers he had to endure at home. “Yeah they fucking do.” You shook your head, reaching for the car door handle when his arm came out and stopped you. “Are you okay?” He asked suddenly, and your heart plummeted. Richie felt this question was a long time coming, you had a surprisingly good poker face but sometimes it slipped off and though you were unaware, Richie had noticed. You didn’t know the answer to his question. It was age-old, and you had hoped never to hear it. Were you okay? You didn’t know. You cried yourself to sleep at night, couldn’t find pleasure it basic things, and smiled almost every chance you got to try and make your brain happy by force. Sometimes you didn’t eat for days, and at times you wouldn’t leave your house for a week before Eddie came to drag you out for fresh hair. You looked in the mirror and never liked what you saw, and always found yourself hating you. You were your own worst enemy, sometimes you felt so much and sometimes you felt nothing at all. So, were you okay?

“I'm fine!” You stated too loudly, and seconds too late as you plastered a smile onto your face. Richie cocked an eyebrow, he had seen the wheels in your head turning for an answer. You climbed out the car, you back to him as you took a few breathes in to calm your racing mind. “Want to come in? My parents won’t be home for,” you paused not knowing an answer “a period of time that I’m sure extends past this night.”

“Didn’t they just fucking come back?” Richie’s voice was laced with agitation. He didn’t like the thought of you being left alone.

“Yep.”

“And those dickheads left again?”

“Yep.” You stated again not wanting the obvious pointed out, and not wanting pity. All your lives were hard, Eddie's mom was obsessive, Stan's dad was too strict, Richie's parents were either fighting each other or him, Mike's parents died, Beverly's dad liked her in ways a parent shouldn’t like a child, and Bill’s parents had too much to deal with after Georgie’s death. You were a rag tag team of kids with fucked up lives. So, he shouldn’t have been questioning you. “You coming in or not?” You smiled again, turning to face him. Richie didn’t like it, he didn’t like the plastic smile you were giving him, and he didn’t like how much you were hiding inside yourself. He recalled the conversation he had with Beverly in 8th grade.

“Yeah.” He said sighing. You bounced on your toes in response and began walking to your house with Richie in tow. “(Y/N).” He said once you were both inside taking of your jackets and shoes.

“Yeah, Richie Rich.” You looked up at him with a smile, more genuine than the last one. His heart sped up, this was it. You were both alone, no friends around to interrupt you. You were looking up at him with a smile, and Richie saw his entire world in your eyes. He’d been carrying these feelings since he was 11, and had been in love since he was 13. Maybe, if he confessed your smile would brighten up a little more. Richie knew you weren’t a toy that could simply be fixed but he wanted to support you every step of the way. And maybe the first step would have to be him telling you that he was in love with you. “Rich?” You questioned, his face turning into a tomato.

“I love you.” He said suddenly. Your eyebrows knitted in confusion, your heart speeding up. Did he mean he loved you, like romantically? Did you even know if you felt that way? You felt a lot of things around Richie, things the other boys couldn’t make you feel. Your palms would sometimes grow clammy when he flirted with you, when he protected you always felt the safest, and your heart always sped up at the smallest of touches, but you always attributed these things to you guys being close. So, was Richie saying he was in love with you? Or was he just saying it as a good friend? You decided on the latter. Giggling slightly.

“Duh Rich, I love you too. You’re like my favorite loser.” Richie’s heart sunk, this didn’t go as he expected at all. You didn’t even understand what he meant. “I would go as far to say best friend, but Beverly would kill me.” Richie smiled at you sadly. He loved you as more than that, he loved you as more than anything. Yet here you were, smiling at him as if he had just said the most innocent thing in the world. He considered correcting you, at the same time he considered just pushing you against your door and kissing you until you felt what he meant. But he did neither, instead he took your hand and lead you to the living room.

“Let’s watch a movie short stuff, nothing with clowns. Those freak me the fuck out.”

---------------

That night, you found yourself asking Richie to stay with you in your bed. You didn’t know what had come over you, just that you didn’t want him to leave. He’d stuttered for a few seconds before agreeing.

“I always knew I’d be the first one to get laid.” He’d said as you shoved him in the arm. You felt like tonight you had made a big error in judgement when Richie told you he loved you, but you rather never know than lose him. Lying next to you, in your Dad's night clothes, Richie again felt like he was going to explode. Your breathing had evened out after a few minutes, and Richie smiled to himself. It wasn’t until you in your sleeping state, laid your head on his chest did he realize just how fucked he was.

Richie Tozier used to think his biggest fear was clowns, now it was that he was going to lose you.

Taglist!!!!!!!

@glue-lamp @mikoalabear @fightmebub @apartofthelosersclub @toziers-girl @firstfannypack @mysticalreadingnerd @imaginethis-st @snarkpunsandsarcasm @neonshock @mari-melancholy @teenwolf2424 @michaels-hands @veryweirdintrovert @interstellar-brownies 

[filmstruck]

Jungle Madness by Pablo Kjolseth

I had the honor of hosting Werner Herzog for a dinner back in 1999. Prior to his visit, I had hunted down an out-of-print first edition autobiography by Klaus Kinski entitled Kinski Uncut The book goes into eye-raising details that are by turn boastful, salacious and extremely lewd. Kinski traipses from one sexual conquest to another while undercutting many of the famous directors he's worked with along the way - including Herzog. At the sight of my hardcover edition, Herzog's eyes lit up as he exclaimed: "Oh, what marvelous lies!" Herzog then also recalled how Kinski had called him up prior to its publication and said something along the lines of how he had made up a bunch of horrible things about Herzog because he thought that would help sales.

Kinski Uncut is many things, but it's never boring. Here's a taste of how Kinski describes Herzog: "In any case, he's still sporting those unwashed, sweat-stained, fart-soaked rags - and he's just as unwashed as ever. And his teeth are as rotten as ever. And he's just as recalcitrant and he still stuffs his face like the garbage can he is - without ever picking up the check."

Herzog got his revenge on Kinski with the release of his documentary MY BEST FIEND ('99), which was released eight years after Kinski's death and gives Herzog the last word on their mutual love-hate relationship. Actually, Herzog doubles-down on getting the last word because ten years after MY BEST FIEND he went on to publish Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the making of Fitzcarraldo. In this book he revisits the journals he kept while shooting FITZCARRALDO (’82). He describes this book as "inner landscapes born of the delirium of the jungle." A clear taste of that delirium can be had from an excerpt from his journal marked down as "Iquitos - Camisea, 23 May 1984":

Kinski looked at the site and announced that my plan was completely impossible, prompted by madness. He is becoming the epicenter of discouragement. On closer inspection it became clear to me that no one is on my side anymore, not a single person, none, no one, not a single one. In the midst of hundreds of Indian extras, dozens of forest workers, boatmen, kitchen personnel, the technical team, and the actors, solitude flailed at me like a huge enraged animal. But I saw something the others did not see.

That "something" was a monumental movie about the title character’s quest to build an opera house in the middle of the jungle, a film that would go on to win the Palme d'Or award at the Cannes Film Festival along with many other accolades.

FilmStruck is streaming seven titles as part of its “Herzog & Kinski” theme, including Les Blank's BURDEN OF DREAMS ('82) about the making of FITZCARRALDO. Les Blank and Werner Herzog shared unique bonds. I met Les Blank when I screened what would end up being his last documentary: ALL IN THIS TEA ('07). This happened on the same night I met Charlie Kaufman for the first time (that being a longer story for another time). Blank was a much gentler soul than Klaus Kinski (or Kaufman, for that matter), but he was also a hell of a storyteller and he deserves to have his own words heard on his time with Herzog before and after FITZCARRALDO.

With this in mind, I now reach for my bookshelf Burden of Dreams: Screenplay, Journals, Reviews, Photographs edited by Les Blank and James Bogan. The following two paragraphs are written by Les Blank as part of his intro ("The Genesis of Burden of Dreams"):

In 1979, Werner convinced the program committee of the Hamburg Film Festival to invite me over to present a retrospective of my films. Here, I firmed up details with Walter Saxer, the producer of all but one of Herzog's films. I was to come down in October of that year and film preparations for the Fitzcarraldo production. The general plan would be for me to make the film as I saw it, but if it proved detrimental to the success of Fitzcarraldo's release, I would agree to postpone my release until a year later. Jose Koechlin von Stein, a Peruvian who had loaned Herzog the money to complete the filming of Aguirre, The Wrath of God, was to arrange financing with the help of West German television.

When I arrived in Munich, I spent a night at the apartment of Werner's half-sister, who took me on a fascinating tour of Munich's famous beerhalls. And I thought I was a beer drinker! These people are something else... the more dedicated swilling it down from liter-sized mugs in between puking on their feet and pissing in their pants. The following morning, I met Werner at the train station where an entire section of the Hamburg-bound train was reserved for the Munich-based film community. During the trip Werner introduced me to his countrymen and women, always insisting that I show the tattoo on my arm of two death-head masks, one laughing, one crying. They are attached by ribbons in the New Orleans Mardi Gras colors of green, purple and gold. I received it from San Francisco's Ed Hardy while making a film with Bruce 'Pacho' Lane on the great American carnival tattoo artist, Stoney St. Clair. When Werner had first seen mine, he immediately went to Ed Hardy to get tattooed with a skeleton dressed in a tuxedo and singing into an old-fashioned microphone. He proudly exhibited his tattoo, after he showed his friends mine and said, “See, this one is better.” His is a good tattoo, and may be better by some standards of tattoo judgement, but having marked myself for life, and having it called inferior, I found myself quietly cursing the Aryan arrogance of my boisterous benefactor. In Hamburg the train was met by a brass band and fire swallowers. The mayor threw a gigantic party and I decided I liked the Germans. Strange as they are, I seemed to get along with them and they seemed highly appreciative of the eight or nine films that I showed. At Werner's press conference I began to get a taste of the anti-Herzog element. He was viciously attacked for exploiting the indigenous people of Peru; and while he had explanations of rumors such as forcing Indians to work at gunpoint, I began to wonder uneasily how innocent he really was.

Blank and Herzog had met many times while attending the Telluride Film Festival. Herzog himself tends to premiere many (but not all) of his films at that prestigious film festival which also, coincidentally, overlaps with Herzog's birthday (T.F.F. always occurs over Labor Day Weekend, Herzog's birthday is September 5th).

In 2007 Blank would receive the Edward MacDowell Medal for "outstanding contributions to the arts." Previous winners had included only two other film directors: Stan Brakhage and Chuck Jones. Chairmen of the jury included Taylor Hackford, Ken Burns, Steven Soderbergh, Mira Nair, Spike Jonze, and T.F.F. founder, Thomas Luddy.

Luddy, quoted in a New York Times obituary for Blank, said: "...Les Blank's films will be revered as time-capsule classics. I said 'Amen,' as did all the other members of the committee. We never even discussed another name, and our meeting was over in less than an hour."

Herzog's FITZCARRALDO is a monumental achievement. So is Blank's BURDEN OF DREAMS. It really doesn't matter what order you see them in, as long as you see them both.

[lyntendoswitch]

At the tail end of 2020 I discovered the video content of Tim Rogers who has inspired me to also voice my game opinions in an unnecessarily verbose and personal way. I don’t recommend clicking on the read more, but if you’d like to read a little bit about the best games I played this year, go on ahead.

10. What Remains of Edith Finch 9. A Short Hike 8. Disco Elysium 7. Personal 5 The Royal 6. Persona 3 Dancing In Moonlight 5. Vestaria Saga War of the Scions 4. Ring FIt Adventure 3. Final Fantasy 7 Remake 2. Hades 1. Animal Crossing New Horizons

2020 found me with an unprecedented amount of free time. I spent most of this year working for the government (a job with a very small brain effort that left me with evenings and weekends free to do whatever the hell). Additionally, I spent most of the year in quarantine with video games as my true, real friend and life companion. Compiling this list gave me more titles than ever to choose from, so I feel better about my list than ever. So here are the best games that I played this year.

Before I get into the top 10 I want to give 4 honourable mentions.

13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim This is the most recent game I played since making this list. I loved so many things about this game - the soft art style, the harsh music, the convoluted crazy plot. I love the aesthetic of this game and loved the characters - I believe it is rare to have an anime game where none of the characters irritate you. I even loved the combat, although I did not think I would. Something about shooting so very many missiles is so satisfying even when you don’t exactly know what is going on in the screen. The final battle in this game was definitely my favourite moment in this game - it was stressful, it was engaging, it was so extremely fun. The tragedy of this game comes down to personal taste. All time travel stories with complex timelines are bound to fall apart eventually, because no writer can keep all the threads together in a logical sense. 13 sentinels had so many story beats, plot twists, betrayals, and sci-fi tropes crammed into their storyline that I knew halfway through the story that there was no way they would be able to resolve all of it in a fulfilling way. I was, unfortunately, right - the ending explanation for all the chaos is, in my (correct) opinion, extremely lame. However, I certainly had fun on the journey.

Fire Emblem 3 Houses: Ashen Demons DLC I did not place this on my ranking since it is not really fleshed out enough to be considered its own game (unlike in previous years, where I have confidently but the Splatoon 2 Octoling Expansion as a separate title from Splatoon 2). However, this blog is, above all else, a Fire Emblem stan account, and I will not NOT talk about Fire Emblem. I do not care for the Abyss house. I think the characters are too close to being plucked out of the Fire Emblem Fates universe for comfort, and I mean this to be as profound an insult as possible. These characters are gimmicks above all else. I also do not care for the expanded lore that the sewer city brings to Garreg Mach. The idea of a centralized church school army is already so unstable, and to have a population of rat people living under it makes the whole foundation of the world crumble a little. However, the story and gameplay of the Ashen Demons DLC added something that the base game did not, which is challenge. (As an aside, I play on normal mode and am aware that there is challenge available to me if I wish for it.) FE3H offers you so many characters, so many paralogues, so many opportunities for training and stat increases, that eventually plot missions become completely boring. Ashen demons limiting everyone to new and interesting classes, limiting your available units, and preventing any sort of training made the chapters fun again. I found the chapter where you were supposed to outrun a golem before some gates closed fun as hell - it was my favourite part of the entire side story. 

Kentucky: Route Zero I played this game in February, and I remember not liking it at any point. It is confusing, disorienting, and lacked a clear goal. However, it has now been 10 months and I still think about it constantly - both the vignettes presented in it, and the way it made me feel. The Besties podcast made an excellent point about this game when they said that no one who plays this game ever compares it to other games - only books, movies, or paintings. The whole game is so fascinating and sticks with you - the wretched circle of a highway, the horse funeral. My favourite part is the live performance you attend at a run down diner with your party of four as the only audience. It is so quiet and contemplative and melancholy, and the scene is absolutely perfect. Kentucky Route Zero might be my favourite high concept artsy abstract artwork ever.

Blaseball As with everyone, it is difficult to call Blaseball a game. As the website says, it is a cultural event that I am so happy to participate in. I am so happy to have found a piece of media to fill the aching void that left by Homestuck when it ended, then re-opened the wound with their awful post-epilogue novel. I deleted my Twitter account this summer because I was tired of being angry and doomscrolling. And then, after Chris Plante on the Besties told me about Blaseball, I happily remade a Twitter account that only followed the official Blaseball account, the devs, and the numerous RP accounts. The quality of life improvement that having simulated, pleasant, hilarious social media to check every day is indescribable. It helped me cope with a rough life transition. Thank you, Blaseball. My favourite moment of 2020 is the 11pm boss battle of Shoe Thieves vs The Shelled One’s Pods.

And now....... The List.

10. What Remains of Edith Finch The start of 2020 was incredible because games journalism websites were churning out endless top 10 lists for both the end of 2019 as well as the end of the decade. I religiously picked through all of these lists and wrote down a list of 30 best indie games of this past decade that I missed out on for whatever reason. It was my first and last experience with a backlog - previously, I would simply impulse purchase games I really wanted to play, and I would not rest until the game is beaten. Having a backlog of things to try stressed me out endless and it dampened the impact of almost all of these quirky 1-6 hour indie experiences. However, not even the stress of meeting a self-imposed quota could dampen the impact of What Remains of Edith Finch. Exploring this house and playing through its various scenarios was so fascinating and beautiful. For me, the most impactful moment of the game was playing as the little girl who became an owl who became a sea serpent. That was when I realized I was not playing something that I would be thinking about for a very long time.

9. A Short Hike A Short Hike was the very first game I played off my backlog list of Best Indie Games. And boy, is it ever. This game takes 2 hours to finish but is absolutely saturated with heart and the exploration makes those 2 hours feel like you have been on a much longer and more fulfilling journey than you believed possible with so few hours. It is Animal Crossing and Legend of Zelda combined, condensed, and polished into a beautiful pearl. I was so instantly in love with the characters and loved doing the little side quests. I also loved getting totally lost because I wanted to see how far I could swim and ended up on a different part of the island. The most impactful moment of this game is its finale, which I won’t spoil, but it is absolutely incredible.

8. Disco Elysium Many people more eloquent than me have said great things about Disco Elysium, and they are all correct. As someone who loves character building and creating a character to roleplay instead of playing as myself in a game, I have never been more enabled to do just that than Disco Elysium. The mystery was so cool, the mechanics are exactly what I like, the exploration is great. The one drawback of this game is that I literally cannot remember a single song from it. Maybe it had an amazing OST? Every game that is released nowadays has to have an amazing OST. There is so much reading in this game that the music really has to be unintrusive, and so it faded right into the background and out of my memory. I love that you could create your own persona in the game, but that you find your identification later and discover who you were before. Also, I would die for Kim Kitsuragi. The finale of this game also kicks ass - I will not spoil it but there is a moment that is so quiet and intimate that it took my breath away. What an amazing experience.

7. Persona 5: The Royal In 2017, I did something that is not the deciding factor, but definitely contributed to, my being sent to hell after I die. I was in an unhappy relationship and really wanted out, but my boyfriend at the time had a PS4 and I did not, and I really wanted to play Persona 5. As such, when he got the game and I borrowed it, I tried to finish it as quickly as possible so that I could give it back and break up with him. To my dismay, Persona 5 is upwards of 80 hours long, and I was burned out long before it was over. I finished the game with such resentment in my heart that I could not fathom why anyone would like it. As someone who is older, wiser, PS4-er, and in a better mental state, I decided to give P5R a try. Playing the remake at a much slower pace and really contemplating the story and characters made for a totally different and much more pleasant experience. I finally was able to shed my dislike for these characters who held me hostage 3 years ago and really appreciate them. Additionally, the new content they added to the original was SO good. The new music in Mementos makes that whole section bearable!! Akechi’s entirely reworked social link!! Maruki is one of Atlus’s most interesting characters, and the final dungeon was so so so interesting!! I am profoundly sad that I can’t recommend this game to anyone because 120 hours is just prohibitively long. Most impactful moment: when Akechi joins the party and he is like, totally feral, lol

6. Persona 3: Dancing In Moonlight Every once in a while my palms start to itch because it has been entirely too long since I’ve played a rhythm game. This palm itch feeling sunk me deep into Theatrhythm Final Fantasy back in 2017, and this feeling forced me to impulse buy Persona 3 Dance. I am furious that I liked this game so much, because I know it was created simply to extract money from fools like me. The story was so blatant about it! “It’s a dream, ok? We’re all dancing because it’s a dream and none of this matters. Go play a song, idiot.” I’m not even angry at this - I almost respect the hustle. Additionally, it was so wonderful to hang out with the Persona 3 crew again. I did also play Persona 5 Dancing in Starlight, but since I had already spent a hundred and twenty hours with the phantom thieves, there was no feeling of being reunited like with P3D. Also, in my mind palace, I consider P3D to have “actually happened”, and P5D to be the money grab hustle. S.E.E.S. is a cohesive unit. If Mitsuru Kirijo says it is time to dance, then dance we shall. I cannot be made to believe that Ryuji, Futaba, or Makoto will be compelled to dance even in a dream. Finally, having Elizabeth as your velvet room attendant did wonders. If there is a line between being a loveable eccentric and being annoying, Elizabeth tiptoes just around the former, whereas the twins are squarely located in the latter. The remixes in P3D also all kick ass (Burn My Dread Novoiski Mix? Deep Mentality Lotus Juice Mix?? Neither had any right to go as hard as they did), and I loved how they personalized the dance styles to the characters’ personalities. Even if this game was a money grabber, it was still made with love and respect for the series, and I loved playing it.  Most impactful moment: That first king crazy ranking on all night difficulty... god damn

5. Vestaria Saga: War of the Scions I had mentioned earlier that I appreciated the FE3H DLC for adding challenge back into 3 houses, but then I played Vestaria Saga and I realized I simply did not remember what challenge actually was. Vestaria Saga, the game by Fire Emblem’s creator, is the hardest Fire Emblem game I’ve ever played. This game honestly rules - it closes its door to the waifus of modern fire emblem games and is a return to form with political intrigue and smart tactical decisions and well-rounded characters. Every single chapter has these wonderful and deeply stressful plot twists and you always have to scramble to get all of the objectives complete without dying. There is a moment in this game where the main Lord, Zade, scolds princess Athol for being so reckless, how he had to force the army to fight a losing battle to rescue her, and look at how exhausted everyone is. He gestures to his army, and for the first time in a tactical RPG, I felt it. In all the fire emblems I play, my units end up being able to dodge and tank any hits they receive, but in Vestaria Saga finishing a map was a stressful, long, and sweaty process. I loved every second of playing this game - it is so rewarding in its gameplay and so rewarding in its story. Most impactful moment: the kiss!!! And how all of them face consequences immediately afterwards!!! I adore this game.

4. Ring Fit Adventure Ring Fit Adventure is the most fun I’ve ever had with a gimmicky fitness game. This game finally understands that they key to continuing with the game and building good habits is the ability to unlock and equip beautiful athleisure clothing. I actually got gains from Ring Fit Adventure, and I know this because I stopped playing it for a month, came back, and was unable to finish the reps at the difficulty I set for myself. This game make gym stuff so genuinely fun in a way that no one else has been able to do. I also really like the feel of the ring con! I have a few moderate complaints about it (a fitness game will never be perfect, unfortunately): you always start reps on the same side, and if you kill enemies then you don’t get a chance to try the other side at all, the motion sensor on yoga poses is wack, and FUCK the robot baseball minigame game to hell. Despite this, I absolutely adore this game and what it stands for. I may never beat the campaign, but it will always have a place in my heart. Most impactful moment: the first fight with Drageaux

3. Final Fantasy 7 Remake I was so so so curious about the hype surrounding this game that in the month before its release I manically played through the original Final Fantasy 7 so that I would have enough background information to be able to play and enjoy the remake. I was very glad I did. FF7R kicks ass. It is my favourite Final Fantasy game ever, and maybe it will always be so. I take a lot of issue with most FF games because they get too cosmically big and ridiculous and nonsensical by the end and that ruins the immersion of the story for me. Since FF7R only covers the Midgar portion of the original, it is forced to create grounded characters and a grounded, smaller scale story. And it is AMAZING. I loved every single minute of this game. The OST is incredible, and the art in it is absolutely unbelievable. I love how they incorporated random encounter enemies in this more realistic version. Also the dialogue!!! The way these characters banter with each other is so life-like and true to character that it boggles my mind. Even the NPC side conversations - never has a city or town felt so alive and filled with people than in FF7R. The ending of this game filled me with PRIMAL fear for the future, but it is so clear that the team making this game loves the world and its characters so much that I cautiously say I trust them to take the story further in the later remakes. Most impactful moment: Cloud saying “bring it on bitch” to an enemy made me black out laughing

2. Hades I generally stay away from rogue-likes and from real-time combat because for a game-liker I SURE am bad at video games. However, everything Supergiant Games ever makes seems tailor made for me, so when Hades came out of early access I bought it, and then I didn’t stop playing it until 80 hours later when I had unlocked everything ever. This game is SO good. The voice acting and storytelling is phenomenal. They did a spectacular job blending the story with the core gameplay elements. They made dying in a rogue-like fun and rewarding. The music is (as always) transcendent. I cannot say enough good things about Hades. Most impactful moment: a tie between the first time you watch the sunrise after your first successful escape, and the romance social link between Zagreus and Thanatos

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons Of course... Death Stranding may have prophesized the pandemic, but Nintendo created it to sell copies Animal Crossing New Horizons. This game saved all of us. The experience of having so many people I knew playing the same game all the time for the entirety of March and April was so incredible. I have plenty of quips about ACNH with relation to old games in the series (I loathe crafting, I loathe printing out Nook Miles Tickets one by one, and I worry that the sandbox landscaping feel of this game makes me less inclined than ever to actually talk to my villagers), but while they are all valid criticisms, they certainly did not stop me from pouring 350 hours and counting into this game. I have loved slowly, carefully crafting my island into a replica of Garreg Mach. I have loved collecting furniture and making turnip money and completing the museum. There is simply no other game that can be 2020′s game of the year. Most impactful moment: checking your mail and having one of your friends mail you an item that reminded them of you

[survivesalem]

Episode 2 - “AHAHAHAHAHA 😂 -screams -” -Jessie

My plan worked, mostly. Czern left and I felt bad but it’s survivor. Raffy (I believe it was Raffy at least) voted with Czern which I don’t like tbh. Raffy has a lil target on my back and I’m sitting pretty with me being the least likely to go home at this point on my tribe. 4D chess, I don’t play chess but it’s hot. I hope my tribe and Liam’s tribe don’t lose any more challenges so we can dominate. I miss Liam 🥺🥰.

Originally I'm from tengaged so the way a social game is played and how you communicate with people is really different. Unfortunately I'm bored with a lot of people on my tribe. Austin is someone I like... I want him to view me as someone new and someone who'll make a good sheep. I can kinda sense he's gonna be trouble in a way, he doesn't seem super trustworthy. Jessie is a big question mark for me. IDK where I stand with her but I think we can get along but I also think she feels comfortable. At first I didn't like Dylan all that much but now they're really rubbing off on me. Dylan stans Avatar, I stan Avatar so in my eyes Dylan is a good person. Paolo is super friendly, he's also new to the ORG community so I feel him & I could make a good duo. Zach is probably my favourite person on the tribe idk why I just feel a good energy from him and I like it so I feel like if Paolo, Zach & I could link up and form a tight 3 and just knock off someone like Jessie that would make me feel good. I really wanna prove myself with the scavenger hunt challenge I feel like I've done a lot with the challenge but I feel like I can do more so I'm ready and willing to fight to keep my tribe safe.

Omg okay so I never made one of these but I will right now! So basically I like my tribe. I know a few people on here and the other ones seem nice. I would LOVE to avoid tribal, as I think I am not in the *best* standing, but I think if I attend tribal I mayyyy be able to survive. I LOVE THAT THERE IS NO TWIST THANK FUCKING GOD. Here are my thoughts on my tribe: Brien - I have hosted Brien and he is super talkative 24/7. He is a great guy and I really want him to trust me, but I have heard he created an alliance without me. I think if I just have some more activity we might be in the clear w him. Eve- I LOVE EVE. I played with Eve in BBPokemon and they were an incredible force. I know they tend to be villainous and make a splash every season, but hopefully I can them on my side and I won't be at the receiving end of their chaos. Cameron - Don't know them and will hopefully make them the first boot. Gizmo- Awesome! They are super nice to talk to and I can tell they are a good ass player. I want to align with them on this tribe, but I am not that passionate about it. Keegan- I. LOVE. KEEGAN. Keegan is super a sweetheart and such a good guy. He is SO good at orgs and I want to go far with him. Def my #1 fav on this tribe!

UM HELLO TRIBE WHERE ARE YOU ? Legit only me and Liam are submitting for the scavanger hunt and the clock is tick tick ticking . Like guys we aren’t winning if only two people submit . Do they not realize two tribes go to tribal ? It’s literally as quiet as the movie the quiet place . On the bright side maybe me doing stuff for the tribe means they’ll keep me because wow I’m active !

Here's the problem: my tribe is half inactive. Ben and Alex truly do not give a fuck whether we win or lose. This means they will be very easy vote offs during this phase of the game, but I don't want to risk having to repeatedly go to tribal over and over again. I am starting to get frustrated. They are literally not responding to any of my messages at all. I've tried reaching out to Ben twice now, and he hasn't replied back to either of those messages. I am so sick of it. For Alex, I don't know what his problem is either. This tribe truly is cursed in part due to them all being men. I need a swap to happen soon so that I can actually be put on a competent tribe. I am terrified that we are going to lose the challenge because it doesn't even seem like Ben or Alex know that it's even going on. Ugh. I'm so over this.

This scavenger hunt has been fun. I was thankful to already own most of the items between my apartment and my parents house. What I didn't have I had to drive around to find. What gave me the most trouble was the Magic 8 Ball. I ended up finding a mini 8 ball that was fully functioning. Given that 2 tribes are going to tribal counsel, and the current state of our sheet, I'm pretty sure Good is going to tribal council. I hope I'm wrong! But hope for the best, prepare for the worst. I think I'm safe this vote. I seem to be in the majority so long as I can trust them. I just hope we are all loyal until at least tribe swap or merge, whatever happens first. If we go to tribal, I'm pretty sure Eve will be getting the vote, but who's to say.

I do not believe we are winning this challenge. But I don't think I'd be the one voted out in any case. Alex and Ben both seems like they're not even going to submit for the challenge, so I will just ride this tribe out until we get rid of the both of them. I predict that there is a swap after this round because then it will be 15 which is the perfect time to swap into 3 tribes of 5. If not, I believe that we'll go till 14 to swap into two tribes of 7. Then, we'll merge at 11. I predict that Mac, Jay, and I will be able to survive till swap, but I'm not sure how I could begin to survive a merge. Maybe if I'm put on a tribe with either Dylan, Paolo, or Austin. I can make a pull on pre-existing relationships, but I will definitely have to give up control to them.

My tribe is filled with people who never learned how to read rules properly. Alex really said "I didn't know I had to put them in a doc." Like,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, I am exhausted. Why can't people rise to my level? Is that too hard to ask? And! Alex said something in the tribe chat which means he's actively ignoring my messages and for why? This doesn't make any sense to me at all. Are they purposefully throwing their social games down the toilet? This is what I get for being on a tribe with all men.

There’s an hour left in the challenge. I feel like we have a chance but also think we will lose. I’m worried but I know if we go back to tribal I’m the least likely to go home. That’s king shit. ✌️😙

I am sad because I know Czern wouldn't have disappointed me like this. Jay told me that Mac or Alex allegedly said that Ben was good at challenges. Where is that? Such bullshit.

Also Alex really didn't even attempt the videos nor the high point items, huh? Ugh

Yay we flopped again x IM GETTING TRIGGERED FROM MY LAST SURVIVOR ORG!! Anyways. I am the swing vote without people realising which is hot. I’ve decided Ben needs to leave since he costed us the challenge by not submitting. I have to break it gently to Alex since he’s good mates with Ben. This also means people won’t see me as playing both sides. Woohoo. I’m not going home.

Ben is leaving because he didnt do the challenge and he doesn't talk to anyone and if Raffy wasn't on this tribe I honestly have no idea what I'd do. Pls swap soon thanks

WE WON AGAIN. wow I’m so proud of this tribe. I truly did not expect us to not go to tribal just because it’s a double tribal. Wow I’m just so proud of us. I feel like we are a very cohesive tribe too. We really vibe.

WE WON IMMUNITY *Happy dances* I feel really good about my tribe now! I really like Jessie now which I didn't think would happen but we've clicked finally. We made an agreement not to vote each other out for now. Zach is such a sweetheart and I love him. Paolo is a lil inactive because he's busy but I love his determination to contribute. Dylan is a literal fucking genius They are super intelligent and I'm so impressed. Austin is like a big ? for me if we lose I'll probably vote for him... I'm praying for a swap right now, I would like to meet new people and make more bonds before merge and then I can make some moves!

AHAHAHAHAHA 😂 -screams - so after me complaining a lil last confessional about my tribe being missing in action they came out of no where and we snagged the win. I’m currently vibing with Liam who seems to be as big of a book nerd as me . I love just finding people I get good vibes from . Still searching everyday for advantage items I’ll never stop looking for those because I never know when people will decide I’m no longer an asset. I will keep trying my hardest in each challenge 💕 we got this Tituba tribe . I’m lowkey proud of us all for snatching the win . Also my hair smells like milk I need to shower .

So we have to go to tribal I’m a little nervous bc there is always a chance you can go when you’re at tribal but it gives you the rush you crave. I have my 4 person alliance with Gizmo,Cameron and Keegan leaving Eve and Lukas in minority and I would love to stay loyal to it if they are loyal to it as well. I trust Gizmo he seems like a stand up guy Keegan seems sketchy but I trust him more then Cameron tbh. I know Gizmo has a good relationship with Lukas so I’m hoping he can keep Lukas from saying my name. I was wanting to Target Eve this tribal however I’m sure things are bound to get messy and with me and eves history she might just be petty and try to get the votes on me but I told her that if the vote is based on the challenge it should be Keegan and hopefully Keegan is the Decoy vote and gets 1 or 2 votes but ideally right now the 4 person alliance sticks together and votes Eve and Lukas can vote with us too so we can look unified and everyone can feel unified going into a potential swap. I’m gonna keep my options open come swap time bc the only person I trust 100 percent on this tribe is Gizmo idk if that’s his social game being so good but I don’t think he is playing me. So right now it’s looking like Eve will go but I’m sure if eve even has an inkling that she is getting votes then she will stir up trouble and I’m ready for trouble

Well everything has been super slow since we keep winning lol. I mean k love winning but it sometimes doesnt show where you stand really on your tribe. Jessie I trust 100% and I wanna work with liam and dylan too. I know zach paolo and dylan all know each other tho so I wanna break that up if I can before swap guess we will just have to see what happens after tribal

My alliance is voting out Ben. It is the easiest and least complex vote. I do not believe anyone would want to do anything else. It's really just that simple. I doubt this boy is even going to vote lmao

Tonight is first tribal. I hope everyone *sticks to the plan.* Eve is supposed to go home as far as I know. I had to lie to their face today....I don't like it. But! Its how the game is played. Its not personal, its drag.

[creative-ive]

Top Albums of 2017

2017, the weird year of political distress, independence as an option, an entirely evolving digital music world where artists were born for the new age. 

Creative-ive chose to give our creatives an opportunity for their voice to be heard. They were brave enough to put down their thoughts on the album most impactful on their lives/culture this year. (They are in no particular order)

Enjoy the reviews. Please share it with those you love.

______________________________________________

We begin with the Saturation Trilogy

Saturation 1 - BROCKHAMPTON

The fascinating thing about a creative collective is the ability to see every individual’s contribution to the whole. Being a part of a creative group and still maintaining the voice that makes you, you isn’t just a feat but something to be admired. So for the 12 member Brockhampton boy band to seemingly come out of nowhere and drop this 17 track album uniquely constructed with fuck you heavy bangers and beautifully vulnerable songs as a debut album is nothing short impressive. Like reallyyyyyy impressive.

“I’ll break your neck so you can watch your back” is one of the furious rhymes Brockhampton lay down on the opening track that shows the pure aggression of the young collective. Lyrically, this album delivers haymaker type bars on all of its tracks.The album is reminiscent of the exciting power that the Wu-Tang brought on 36 Chambers (yea, I just said that. Brockhampton has the talent and balls to be THAT influential). However, as aggressive as several of these tracks are, this album brings to the table a flavor that doesn’t get discussed nearly enough. This album brings gives you sincere emotional honesty. On the standout track, Milk you get a moving personal account to what it means growing up and finding yourself. Not in the cliche travel to Rome, fall in love and find yourself way, but in the personal testimonies, the group tells all. The themes on this song are nothing short of amazing for anyone let alone a debut album; understanding letting go, coping with heartbreak, realizing you’re not okay, fearing losing the people you love, and ultimately moving forward with all those feelings in your heart and continuing on your path.

If you want an album you can relate to in a brutally sincere and genuinely furious capacity, do yourself a favor and spin this.

Written by Oscar Aquino

Saturation 2 - BROCKHAMPTON

Brockhampton, the boyband that flipped the game upside down and continuously impresses with consistency. The first one made people pay attention and while they did, quickly released a second album to cement their talents. This album propelled them into the masses and the ears of Tyler who booked them for his Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival. In the Brockhampton documentary, Kevin mentions capitalizing on the hype and to continue riding the Saturation wave with messages that compel their audience. To saturate with real messages in a world of processed music. This is what has caused this young generation to stan this group much like we did for Odd Future years ago.

Gummy, a five-letter word, begins the album where the rest are too, aside from the final track. Kevin Abstract starts off with the anger of not being appreciated enough despite his influence. He takes the perspective of a hater mentioning the fact he can’t rap and stays playing a role of high school loser yet he’s already in 20’s. Kevin’s self-awareness, as well as the rest of group, is incredibly impressive. Ameer Vann, the man on the album’s cover, starts off by saying he’s the king that deserves a crown made of thorns like Jesus. Dom McLennon says, “I could get shot in my back and they’d tell the world that I fought ‘em,” to which he’s referencing Michael Brown and the state of police in our country. He shows no fear in bringing such a touchy subject into his verse and make positive use of his platform.

The Rap God said, “let there be light”, and on that day, he united a boyband to save Hip-Hop.

Queer, Matt Champion expresses his insecurities about having no muscles which would often represent femininity in males. He talks about having to walk to work and mindlessly work for 8 hours. Now that he’s reaping some success as an artist he can’t stop, there’s no chance he’s going to vacation. Matt shares that he has depression and it is not erased by fame. Yet he will continue to grind at it. Merlyn Wood starts off by saying “fuck Dolce & Gabbana, racist mothersuckers tyna be my pana (partner),” this is such a rebellious take where most rappers would flaunt a brand, they’re taking shots at their non-sensitive advertising. “The Waco is far away, I don’t even mind, as long as you stay right here, right next to my side,” Kevin sings on the hook. They all seem to take perspectives of their rising fame and going away from their hometown of Waco in Texas. I feel the word queer is used in the context of weird, for their position in the rap game and being “radical” enough to think they can make it in music. If they remain a resilient support group for each other, they will continue to elevate themselves.

To me, the craziest part is the fact most of them met through KanyeToThe forum where they all decided to move to LA and start a boy band. On Jello, Kevin raps “met all my friends through Kanye West and I ain’t met him yet.” Ameer always raps about the duality of being a gangster/drug dealer to now garnering success through making records. He says, “turned rap into the new pop,” which is the best lyric of this song solely because of their desire to break the conventional stigmas on words such as boyband and what pop music is.

Teeth is an interlude which only features Ameer showcasing his personal dealings with racism and hardheadedness towards his mother. She only wanted him to excel by putting him in white schools where all he “learned” there was that he was different (by his skin color). He professes that Brockhampton will soon have stars on Sunset Boulevard. Reminiscent of Kanye West’s Homecoming line, Ameer leaves off with a shining piece of wisdom, “if you shooting for the stars, you only headed one way.”

Swamp entails their ability to “[fuck] commas up from the outside,” the outside is their place in rap where they’re still not being taken seriously. Merlyn, “never would’ve met my friends if not for satellites … luckily professor failed me at the proper time.” He has often expressed the leap of faith that he took moving to California with the rest of the group. The internet made them what they are, there’s magic in the connectedness of the web.

Tokyo themes around insecurity, regret, and past mistakes. Joba expresses his inner conflict of what-ifs in his life. They discuss the notion of what has you “shook” on a Saturday or any day.

Jesus is where Kevin’s talking about a toxic relationship. “Remember when I was trippin’ off some wack shit, when I thought the automatic had an answer?” Kevin says to himself. Often when we’re stuck in maniac depressive state we think that a gun or suicide will have the solution to our inner problems. But in hindsight, Kevin’s chuckling at how wack that problem was and his happiness of not taking his life.

Chick, Matt is honest with his purpose to make “loot” for himself while inspiring “some of you, to do what you do despite all the fuck you’s.” Those that are around you that don’t support you are often projecting their own insecurities. The message is to continue through all the hate because they won’t ever realize the vision until you’re “shitting on the toilet with Grammy’s in your lap.” Ameer raps about “[people] talk a lot of shit, in a safe place, aiming with they keyboard, they shootin’ up a case (uppercase).” He tweeted his anger about internet trolls and how it affects him due to insecurities.

Junky, Kevin wastes no moments in delving into the landscape of being a gay rapper. Kevin uses his platform to speak for those that can’t. “And for me to be onstage in front of that many kids and for them to be like, damn, I identify with this person – now they have a new hero that looks like them,” Kevin said in his interview for the Guardian. Matt uses his verse to discuss the notions of patriarchy and males power over women in feeling they owe us something (sexual favors). This is a beautiful idea that is often not present in a machismo culture that rap is. He calls for men to respect these women as individuals with choices in their actions. Women are humans too, not objects to stick our junk into.

Fight, Ameer states, “my male role models drug dealers and thugs,” wherein the black (minority) community rings true too loudly. He explains how he deserves to be hanged from trees like the rest of history by his teachers. Black people are “born with a target” which is stuck on their skin unable to be removed. Ameer understands that he will have to live with this for the rest of his life.

Sweet, my favorite track on the album starts off with Matt talking to his subconscious representative of his care-free/alter ego self. He expresses his successes or issues to which it replies to him. He asks himself questions that as a rising star should have it figured out based on the perception of fame. A big ego, girls flocking like seagulls, paying off your mom’s house so she can live comfortably for the rest of her life. The standout verse of the whole album hands down is Joba’s. His journey of leaving for LA with $300 dollars to his name, living off of Ramen, to now eating $500 dollar dinners not even having to pay. He reflects on his teacher’s hard instilled thoughts of having to go to college to be successful in life. His flashback to his Walkman days of listening to NSYNC that a desire to be Justin Timberlake inspired his dream. Ironically, what was the biggest boyband of possibly all time now has a new flame reaching for their spot: Brockhampton.

Gamba, off the hook, seems to be in the perspective a baby callin’ for their parents, trying to reach them only to trip and fall. The parent then asks them “what you gonna do when you older? What you gonna do when you grow?” This seems to be the running theme throughout the entire Saturation Trilogy, that they’re reaching for their dreams.

Sunny, the standout lyric is how now Ameer’s making clean money and working 7 days a week non-stop, “My daddy called me, said he seen my last video, looking at a young me, coulda had a heatstroke.” His father seemed to always nag him about being a respectable man and now he’s finally doing it. His father is proud of his success, reflecting on his younger self, he would have fainted.

Summer, the most beautiful song on the album with the vocals of bearface. With the production so elegant and its guitar sweet-sounding to that of Kanye West’s Gorgeous off My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Tells a story of summer love in the heat of it all, that person you meet that is so different from the rest.

Saturation 2, my personal favorite of the entire trilogy stands out to me as their official stamp in the rap industry to prove they were no creative fluke. Kevin Abstract has formed his “own dynasty” much like Def Jam, a total force in creativity. Not only as a boyband but as a record label, a media company/ad agency. There’s so much to be learned from this group and that there are no excuses for your potential success. It’s all a matter of how much you want it. “There’s also Apple, it started in a small room and it becomes this huge corporation. Basically, how I wanna be.” Kevin says in an interview with Fader. They’re not following a specific blueprint, they’re winging it and believing whole-heartedly in their visions. That ideal of friends lifting other friends up towards stardom. It inspires me, it makes me want to dream more, go after what I want. There are no excuses in the internet age of not taking hold of your dreams. You are who you surround yourself with. The people around you become the boiling pot of how you’re brewed for the world’s consumption. Surround yourself with dreamers, shoot your shot, in all directions because you don’t want to limit yourself to only one way.

Written by Erik De La Cruz

Saturation 3 - BROCKHAMPTON

If you don’t know who BROCKHAMPTON is by now, don’t worry, they’ll keep flooding the internet with content until you do. With their final installment in the Saturation Trilogy, the unorthodox collective has somehow managed to do the unthinkable; progressively improve each studio project within a year span.

Saturation III is by far the most enticing and diverse narrative from the LA based group. From the heavenly R&B falsetto on BLEACH, to the chaotic opening dance number in BOOGIE, this album offers a little bit of something for both casual listeners and All-American Trash stans alike.

With their latest work BROCKHAMPTON offers a more mature and vulnerable take on their music. Partnered with incredible production from members Romil, Q3 (Jabari & Kiko), and Bearface, the album serves to tackle taboo themes such as isolation, sexuality, and mental health. The track Sister/Nation stands out with first half production reminiscent of an early Odd Future. Here member JOBA, channels his inner Marshall Mathers with vocal stacks acting as multiple personalities. At the 3:51 mark the title production abruptly transitions into a synth and layer heavy canvass where members Ameer and Dom recite verses addressing societal normalities in adolescence and racial division.  

In my personal opinion, BROCKHAMPTON member JOBA, completely stands out with his contributions to Saturation III. His versatile abilities include but are not limited to singing, songwriting, rapping, production, and engineering. Whether it be background vocals on STUPID, unorthodox cadences on ZIPPER, or production on TEAM, JOBA’s signature is somehow stamped on every Saturation III track.  

I will admit when I heard that BROCKHAMPTON planned on releasing three studio projects in 2017, I was extremely skeptical. However, it is the end of December and I am currently sitting here writing a review for the biggest musical surprise of 2017. It’s become apparent that with creative direction led by Kevin Abstract, non-replicable chemistry, and unconventional practices, BROCKHAMPTON has all eyes on them for 2018.

Standout Tracks: SISTER/NATION, BLEACH, JOHNNY

Standout Lyric:

“It seems I’m destined to fall apart when I’m depressed, it’s all a test, scream at God from my bedside, I glue my hands together, life’s got me hog-tied.”

 Written by Tommie Brown 

Laila’s Wisdom - Rapsody

“A better one.”

The opening lines of Laila’s Wisdom, Rapsody’s Grammy-nominated second studio album, echo the popular phrase of Miami’s larger-than-life DJ Khaled. However, when it comes to making classic albums, her goal isn’t just “another one.” On this album, named after her maternal grandmother, Rapsody sets her sights on making it “a better one” than her last, and she succeeds with gusto.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way: Rapsody has been killing it for years. Anyone who’s heard her rhyme knows that she can hang with the best. Just take a listen to her standout verse on Kendrick Lamar’s “Complexion (A Zulu Love).” One listen to that verse and anyone can see that she’s a star. She deserves all the recognition for her lyrical ability, complexity, wordplay, and depth. One play-through of a Rapsody verse is not enough; her lyrics are those that you must go back and listen to repeatedly to fully grasp the triple-entendres and flips that she laces in her stories.

Now that we’ve established her past, let’s talk about the present, especially as it relates to the gift of an album we were blessed with this year. Before even listening to the album, a look at the production credits for this project should let you know that this is something special. 9th Wonder’s contributions to this project cannot be overstated. It’s common knowledge that this man is an absolute legend and beast when it comes to his samples and chops, but this work is something special. 9th and Rapsody have a musical bond that dates back to her signing with his indie label It’s A Wonderful World Music Group back in 2008 and it’s clear as day on this album. He’s credited as a producer on 9 of the album’s 14 tracks (7 of those being solo); this goes a long way in making a project that’s both lyrically AND sonically cohesive.

It’s hard to pick out some of my favorite songs on this project, seeing as how they’re all fantastic, so I’ll just go straight through. The title track of the album is a powerful opening over a sample of Aretha Franklin’s “Young, Gifted, and Black.” Rapsody sets the tone early on, that we’re about to be blessed with the lessons of her grandmother she carefully laced throughout the album. “Power” is easily a standout track, outside of Kendrick and Lance Skiiiwalker’s assists to Rapsody’s musings of power, both external and internal. “Chrome (Like Ooh)” has one of the BEST beat switches I’ve heard all year, outside of DUCKWORTH (produced by 9th, unsurprisingly.) Producers Khrysis and Ka$h Don’t Make Beats both knocked that one out of the park, and continue the flow beautifully into “Pay Up.”  On this song, Rapsody creates a tale of two gold-diggers, both female and male, the latter a flip on the common view of women as opportunists in the music industry.

Ridin’ is a come-down from the upbeat pace of the previous track. It’s smooth and silky, something that you can spark one up to and ride around your hood with your friends, contemplating your places in life. This song comes with another gorgeous beat switch, featuring a Busta Rhymes sample (more on him in a bit) that switches the scene to a house party that gets rolled up on by the cops. Rapsody promises to turn down the volume, only to turn it right back up as soon as the doors close in direct and unapologetic defiance. This is a party for Rapsody and her friends to unwind from daily strife, and she’ll be damned if a cop kills the vibe.

Now I’ll admit, though I didn’t feel the vibe on “Sassy” that much, it’s still an amazing track, and I wholly understand that it’s not for me. By that, I mean that this is a track of empowerment, especially for women; this is evident in the references to Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise.” Rapsody uses her words to continue the message of the original: that she is going to thrive at being exactly who she wants to be, regardless of whether or not others find it offensive (and if you do, the 1950’s is where you can take ALL of your seats). The album continues into “Nobody,” with features in the forms of Moonchild and Anderson .Paak’s gorgeous vocals and Black Thoughts always stellar words of wisdom.

In the interest of brevity, I’m going to skip ahead a couple tracks, but not without mentioning Busta Rhymes’ feature on “You Should Now.” It’s gorgeous and makes you just want to love your significant other with all of your heart. The contrast of his trademark gruff with the sensitivity and passion that he feels for this woman is perfection and is capped off by the final lines and chuckle that he delivers.

“A Rollercoaster Jam Called Love” is a special song; Rapsody starts off talking to a lover about her need for space, but not too much of it. She wants to strike the perfect balance of love with this person, where they can both be themselves while still enjoying their time and bond together. She knows that it’s not an easy task, but also knows that the work it takes is necessary to maintain the healthy relationship. 9th’s transitions on this track mirror the ups and downs of a relationship; not every day is the best, and it’s necessary to be okay with letting things slow down at times to really build a life-long partnership. The track closes out with the couple splitting, and the breakup is solidified on “U Used 2 Love Me.”

“Knock on My Door” finds Rapsody telling the story of her pining for a neighbor of hers, wishing that he would come and knock on the door of her life and let her take care of the rest. It’s the feeling that we’ve all felt before; your mind’s imagination runs through all the possibilities of how you and your crush will finally get together. The final verse plays out as an imaginary conversation with this new boo, revealing Rapsody’s imagination of what the vibe would be like between the two.

.Paak returns for “OooWee,” injecting his signature vocals to bring an extra helping of soul into this track where Rapsody talks that talk in full glory. She knows she’s got the juice and isn’t willing to let the people know that she’s a boss.

And now, the final track, “Jesus Coming.” This song is something special. 9th’s simple loop with minimal percussion gives the song space to let the emotion of Amber Navran’s vocals seep through before Rapsody begins her tale of loss. The first verse seems to be from the perspective of someone dying of an overdose after being peer-pressured to partake in drugs/alcohol/etc. The background “Time to Go Home” sample replays throughout, which Rapsody incorporates into her lyrics. The second verse is from the perspectives of a mother and a daughter who are shot and killed in a park by stray gunfire stemming from a nearby argument. The mother notices the men escalated tensions and tries to leave but it’s too late, and Rapsody provides their final words as they lay dying. In the final verse, Rapsody closes out the song from the perspective of two dead soldiers on opposite sides of the same war, drawing the parallels in the two and how they were more alike than they could have imagined. She injects raw emotion into each of the verses, changing up the delivery perfectly to make each of the stories hit home, regardless of your background.

This album was criminally under-appreciated by the masses this year, and I believe this is largely because of the sheer quantity of music that was released in 2017. Though it’s easy for great bodies of work to get lost in the sauce, this album does not deserve that fate. This is an album that deserves to be recognized as the best album of the year.

Laila’s Wisdom will be a classic that will be talked about for years to come, and I’m excited to see Rapsody continue to grow and build a career that will see her go down as one of the all-time greats of hip-hop.

Written by Lewis Holloway

Digital Druglord - Blackbear

My favorite album of the year comes from the artist by the name of blackbear. One where the central themes of women and drugs are prevalent but he’s still able to convince the listener into feeling for him. Making you feel what he feels, whether it be lust, betrayal, or feeling numb. Digital Druglord does just that. Whether you put yourself in his shoes or you tie in his lyrics to your own life, emotions will be felt. So, in essence, the act of feeling and feeling nothing, are the main drive in the creation of this album. The inner struggle with drugs, being taken advantage of, and not being able to love is broad but connects to plenty of hearts. Feelings of bitterness and a sense of hopelessness are stained in each track and will leave you alone to wonder if you could be able to cope with such a lifestyle and self-reflect.  Sonically, it comes together elegantly with Blackbear’s vocals layered on top of each other with melodic and catchy beats. It’s an album that’s worth to be listened to with an open mind, there is at least something you can take away personally from this project.

if i could i would feel nothing, stands out as the outlying track that sums up the album and puts a whole new meaning to being numb. It’s a song you play when nothing seems to be going your way or when life feels like in a cycle you cannot change. Blackbear is his most vulnerable on this track, from lyrics from, “Mixed prescriptions, bad decisions, world is cold and life’s not fair,” to “I’ve been prayin’ they won’t find me, laying somewhere in a ditch,” blackbear is having trouble accustoming to his newfound stardom.

Written by Kevin De La Cruz

Flower Boy - Tyler, The Creator

Out of all the albums that came out this year, I would have to say that amongst the group Flower Boy by Tyler the Creator stuck out to me the most. As someone who has listened to Tyler from his early on cockroach eating days in his video for Yonkers, Tyler has come a long way with Flower Boy. This album as a whole is as bright as it’s album art and in my opinion a true artistically defining moment for Tyler. Tyler expressed that after his performance at his festival Camp Flog Gnaw he was glad to no longer had to perform Yonkers which was the song that got him on the map. He believed he had enough great songs on his album to retire that song from his performances, he was glad that he could finally be himself and not the crazy Tyler everyone expects him to be. In Flower Boy, there are 14 tracks each their own work of art. What stuck out to me about this album is that each song is catchy in their own way, each song has a hook that almost everyone can sing along to examples being “Run it, run it, run it, run it I rock, I roll, I bloom, I glow (I glow)” from Where This Flower Blooms or “who dat boy, who him is” from Who Dat Boy and “ boredom, boredom, boredom, boredom” from his song Boredom with Rex Orange County and Anna Of The North, to name a few. However, the song that sticks out to me the most was Where This Flower Blooms which featured Frank Ocean. The song is essentially a story talking about his early beginnings about living at his grandmother’s house and having to sleep on the floor due to having no bed. There were nights where he had nothing to eat but had supportive friends that would let him stay at their place and cook for him, which he saw as his second family. He talks about how the Rent-a-Center, a furniture store known for allowing payment plans would call and show up to his home for repossession of the items due to lack of payments. However, now he can afford luxuries such as expensive cars which is something he brings up numerous times in the album.

“Now I skrrt, skrrt, skrrt, skrrt, in toys I only dreamed that I could afford, now I roll through Okaga”

In that he means that he can now drive his expensive cars he dreamt about through Okaga which has been speculated to be a place where Tyler can be free to do whatever he wants due to the success he has worked so hard for throughout the years. In the hook, he says “I rock, I roll, I bloom, I grow (I glow)” which to me means his progression as an artist, Tyler has truly bloomed from this album which may be the reason he named the album Flower Boy. He is not only seen as a rapper but a true creative. Tyler has come far from his early days of sleeping on the floor to being a rapper, record producer, music video director, and now designer of his own brand. Flower Boy truly captured his growth and I believe is a true representation of who Tyler Okonma truly is.

Written by Stephanie Salas

Cozy Tapes Vol.2: Too Cozy - A$AP MOB

Grab your surfboards, A$AP MOB making waves again!

The second installation of A$AP’s Cozy Tapes was released as part of “The AWEGEST” campaign which saw the release of Asap Ferg’s Still Striving, Twlevyy’s album 12 and the unveiling of a website, awgeshit.com, a home base created by The Mobs influences in music fashion and culture. Back to the album haha

Cozy’s intro is a roast session among teens, in a bus on the way to Yamborghini High, letting you know A$AP is about to take you to school. The engineering is top of the line. Contributions from A-listers Hit-Boy, RZA, and Hector Delgado (an A$AP staple) deliver intoxicating posse cuts: Perry Aye and What Happens mixed in with tracks that make you want to spazz out like the Bahamas, Please Shut Up, and of course Feel So Good. Along with producers comes a bevy of featured artists (Jaden Smith, Gucci Mane, Frank Ocean etc…) who know the standard, and drop verses that exude confidence and challenge each other to prove who has the sauce, no one is just collecting a check here. The definite standouts on the album are Playboi Carti age 20 at the time of release age and Smooky MarGielaa age 15. 15!! Each deserve a rookie of the year award for hanging with veterans and not skipping a beat. Those honorable mentions shed light on the fact that the A$AP brand shows all the signs of growth for the future, consistency, and no slowing down. From its inception in Harlem to its blog on Tumblr led by A$AP Yams {R.I.P} to its rise in power from rap crew to Monolith, A$AP Mob has cemented itself as a pillar in Hip-Hop. Evident as the leaders in music fashion and whatever else they put their hands on, A$AP is going to continue to push boundaries influence and inspire the future generations as they are doing now. Wrapping up the album, the message for “shit is real out here love each other lift each other up … do whatever you want but you can’t change this fucked up world if you’re dead.” Always Strive And Prosper. Insert wave emojis xxx

Written by David Magadan

Verse 2 - JJ Project 

JJ Project did a comeback after 5 years on July 2017 with the most beautiful and meaningful album I’ve ever heard this year.

“Tomorrow, Today” the song title talks about how people between 20-25 go

through a phase where they are lost and don’t know what to do with their life. I believe many people can relate to this song because nowadays a lot of young adults are facing this in their lives where they’re lost and want to give up, where they expect people to take them and guide them when the reality is that you have to look for yourself and have to find your own path. All the songs have meaningful lyrics talking about life, relationships, and friendship.

You can definitely feel the meaning of the songs and not only the lyrics, the music is amazing with vibes of R&B and Soul that can make you feel at peace and happy.

The mission of JJ Project was to make a beautiful and meaningful album to help us find our way and they achieved it because thanks to this album I feel like I’m not the only one facing a lot of things. Even if it’s in Korean you should take a time to listen (and look up for the translations of the songs of course) I assure you this album will help you find your way.

Written by Carolina Maddox

Tell Me You Love Me - Demi Lovato

Demi Lovato, the prized Disney starlet, comes back in 2017 with a vengeance to be respected by the world, she’s gracefully singing to the world to tell her they love her, and she’s not sorry for it. Through her YouTube Red documentary, you see her story of this albums process and it’s both wonderful and alarming.

Tell Me You Love Me, the title track tells a story of insecurities, needing to have a significant other in her life, and the need to fill that void within her. She’s vulnerable in her flaws and the strong urge to keep this relationship intact. From the infatuation driven honeymoon relationship of Sexy Dirty Love, she seems to be exploring her sexuality casually with others till finally finding one that drives her crazy in the best ways. 

You Don’t Do It For Me Anymore, tells a story of her breaking up with her past-self filled with addictions and an eating disorder. Often, we feel bad for ourselves and expect pity from external sources, she finally picks herself up and decides enough is enough. To leave a lover is one thing, but to rip apart a past version of yourself is the most difficult breakup anyone can ever have. To want to grow and unlearn all these past agreements instilled in ones mind it brutal and excruciating mentally. 

Daddy Issues, she explores the duality of effects a father leaving a daughter emotionally drained at an early age could do in her future relationships. She expresses the fact she’s in love with broken men with commitment issues - a tough reality to admit. “You’re the man of my dreams, cause you know how to leave,” just like her father, she longs to find that in her soulmate. No matter how shitty he treats her, “lucky for [him]” she’s got daddy issues and will stay doing whatever he wants to keep him from leaving forever – like her father.

She insists jumping the boundary of having a platonic relationship to “Ruin the Friendship.” She talks about the sexy, fun, and a bit scandalous idea of wanting to hook up with a close friend or best friend. In what is a continuation of the last song, she expresses her strong desire to fill voids in Only Forever, giving that person a lifetime of chances. She’s firm in her request only to say that she’ll wait no matter how long it takes for them to be together.

Lonely and Crybaby showcase her effects of being left heartbroken to a lover she gave her all to. Demi seems to contradict herself throughout the album which is the foundation of humans. Lonely is Demi longing for her past lover yet continuously chasing love in hollow one-night stands. Crybaby shows her stubbornness to claim she isn’t one but admits that this lover really hit her heart where she had no choice but to weep. Those that hold themselves to be invincible emotionally when they do fall, they crash hard.

Games, in a digital age with Tinder and Bumble, relationships have become sort of a game to score. Technology has enhanced our ability to have options while simultaneously flooding our tear ducts with more hurt. Left on read, no double texting, late night “wyd” texts - all a result of lack of communication.

Occasionally through this harsh world, you meet a fantastic lover that can leave you scavenging for water and the inability to "Concentrate” after sex. She is so awestruck by the performance she’s willing to do anything and be a sex slave. I appreciate Demi’s ability to be so confident in her sexual urges without feeling shamed.

Demi from heartbreak to taking romantic risks in going on adventures with someone she trusts. Hitchhiker, tells a story of just going along for the ride and not overthinking all the labels people tend to put on relationships. She’s young, sexy, and confident. She has every right to be vulnerable while taking the risk at this new love that’s driving her wild.

I wanted to shed light on this beautiful album. She truly wowed me with her vulnerabilities, contradictions that make her human despite her celebrity, and flaws in self that make her, her. Although it was Grammy snubbed, it deserves to be recognized as a coming of age masterpiece. She uses her platform to tell girls it’s okay to be recklessly confident in yourself, it’s okay to rely on a lover and needing them, it’s okay to show weakness in this maddening hookup culture. She’s fearless in her desire to want to be heard for who she is. There’s duality in love, the good and bad will always be there and no human can be perfect. Neither is Demi, so give it a listen, and go tell her you love her.

Written by Erik De La Cruz

Harry Styles - Harry Styles (Self-titled)

If there is one thing to be true about the year 2017, it is that it has been one hell of a year for music. Harry Styles is definitely in my top 10 albums of the year and I was hesitant to listen to him at first since I was never a huge fan of One Direction. Let me tell you, I was completely wrong. Get ready to transport back to the 60′s with this funky rock and roll inspired album. There is a song for every mood and every song is a fresh new take on some of your favorite classic bands. On the contrary, Harry isn’t afraid to be vulnerable with this album, and you hear this in acoustic songs like Two Ghosts, Sweet Creature. His voice on melodic ballads of piano and guitar makes my heart melt and I am definitely all up in my feels when it comes to these songs. I love that the acoustics are balanced with fun and quirky rock songs like Kiwi and Carolina. You can catch me blasting these playful numbers in my car with my best friend belting out all the words. The energy is amazing and none of these songs ever get old.

The songs that spoke out to me the most would probably have to be Sign of the Times or From the Dining Table. Sign of the times is such a successful single that I believe goes into how hard and dark life can be. We have all felt lost and hopeless but we still have to keep moving forward. Our life here on Earth is very short lived and we go through many experiences but we all end up in the same place. This is a heavy song yet beautifully written and recorded. It showed us all a side of Harry that he kept hidden. He has grown so much since he first started his career. Harry’s From the Dining Table hits such a chord with me I don’t know if it’s because of his soft voice on a beautiful guitar piece or the simple yet powerful lyrics of being stuck in the middle of a love triangle. It is just the perfect way to end the album. He uses a symphony to break the bridge, which just emphasizes how perfectly layered his songs are. All of the different sounds and instruments give you the perfect listening experience. I would say this album is best heard in your headphones while walking out on the town, but that isn’t to say that you can’t listen to it all the way through on a nice long drive.

There is a song for every mood that you’re in, and it really shows how eclectic Harry is in his own music. Harry definitely proved to be such a great and charismatic solo artist and I am dying to hear what else he comes up with next. The nostalgia this album brings is just the icing on the cake. Whether you are a 13-year-old fanatic or an adult who was growing up during the greatest rock age of all time, this album is a go to. It’s nice to see how many different styles Harry has up his sleeves. If there is any music I am looking forward to in 2018, it is Harry’s next album. Don’t wait another minute, go stream Harry Style’s debut album right after you read this article, I promise you won’t regret one thing!

Written by Whitney Paramore

SweetSexySavage - Kehlani 

Feelings.

We all have them and we all deal with them every single day. Some in healthy ways, and in other ways not so much. We constantly search for ways to cope with our feelings and it’s not always easy trying to find something that will help get you through. SweetSexySavage was that album for me and that’s why I think it was one of the top albums of 2017.

Released on January 27, Kehlani’s debut studio album SweetSexySavage is a project that dropped so early in the year that it sometimes doesn’t get the credit it deserves. But if you take the time to listen and digest each track on this album, you’ll hear and feel the care and dedication paid to each song and understand the effort that went into making each song its own unique musical journey.

Kehlani’s strength lies in her most endearing quality; her relatability. Gay, straight, tatted-up, male or female it does not matter. She WILL have a song for you.

When the project first dropped and the title of the album was revealed it reminded of something but I couldn’t figure it out right away. After considering it a little bit, Kehlani drew inspiration for the album’s title from TLC’s classic cut CrazySexyCool.

And as a fan of 90’s R&B, she did an excellent job of drawing on older inspiration while curating a project that stayed true to her new sound that she nails so effortlessly. “Too Much” from the jump gives off those classic R&B vibes that make you wanna sing and dance like you’re in a 90’s music video. Producer Jahaan Sweet absolutely bodied this beat and it allowed for Kehlani’s lyricism and confidence to shine through for one of the highlight tracks off this album.

Speaking of confidence, Miss Parrish does little to dissuade from the idea that’s she’s lacking any. Songs like “Escape”, “Distraction” and “CRZY” all highlight Kehlani’s brash nature but they’re unique because they are all done in different ways.

“Escape” could be related to the Sweet portion of this album. It almost sounds like a ballad but after listening to the lyrics you realize it’s a woman who wants to be with someone, but not at the expense of either persons’ goals or personal happiness. She doesn’t want anything long-term; she simply asks “baby, can we, Escape?”

“Distraction” keeps the emphasis on the short term in a very sexy way. The Grammy-nominated track does not shy away from keeping things “100” in this type of situation. Making it very clear that she’s not looking for anything serious. “Are you down to be, a distraction?” is an ode to all of us who have felt at one time or another that a relationship isn’t something I probably want to have with this person, but I wouldn’t mind having a little fun with this person either. I would also strongly recommend you watch the music video for this song if you haven’t already. It furthers highlights the sexuality Kehlani wanted to evoke in the song while giving off an early Destiny’s Child vibe with all the creative set pieces throughout the video. Definitely one of my favorite videos and songs for the year.

“CRZY” was the lead single that dropped for the album and it let you know right away that she wasn’t going to just rest on her laurels after coming off a Grammy-nominated mixtape You Should Be Here. The song is as savage as it gets. The song is filled with lyrics that let you know that she is a force and will be around for the long haul so you better get used to it. She lets you know from the beginning of the record that “I got it, and you goin respect it” and if you have any questions about who she is, she’ll be straight up and tell you “If I gotta be a bitch, Ima be a bad one”.

Like all of us, however, we all don’t feel confident 24/7. We have our moments of insecurity and feelings of vulnerability and she has songs like “Advice” and “In My Feelings” that connect to that.

“Advice” can hit home with almost anyone who listens to it; a relationship has gone wrong, leaving one with lingering questions as to why it didn’t work out the way we thought it would. “How is the man of my dreams, not a man of his words?” is a line that people who have felt wronged in relationships can immediately gravitate to. However, Kehlani does offer a silver lining. Even with all the hurt that this relationship has brought, she makes it known that “it’s time to take my own advice” and sometimes that’s all most of us really need. We’ve all had times where we’ve given other people relationship advice but when it comes to ourselves, the answers don’t appear so easily. Kehlani let’s you know that you’ve been hurt, but now it’s time to get up, move on and start taking your own advice.

“In My Feelings” piggybacks off of the idea of confused thoughts and temporary feelings. Kehlani keeps the relatable lyrics going with “and I don’t know why I’m even still here…why do I feel this? I’m in my feelings”. At some point, there has been that person in your life that you felt you had some sort of connection with and even with the signs saying you shouldn’t keep messing with this person, something about that person keeps you interested in them. Kehlani’s right there with you; saying you’re not the only one probably holding on to something that really isn’t there.

We could go into the production and the lyrics for hours and hours when it comes to this album. Don’t get me wrong, they’re all top notch and the quality is outstanding. But it all circles back to one main reason why we listen to music. To help us feel a certain type of way. Very few artists today can pull off that feat with such style, confidence, and passion the way Kehlani can. I know that when I’m feeling depressed, ecstatic, hurt or happy I can throw on a Kehlani song and immediately know that there is someone out there who is feeling what I’m feeling and can relate to what I’m going through. As you listen to Kehlani’s incredible voice and captivating lyrics bump through your speakers, be ready to feel all types of emotions from one the best singers we have in our generation today. It won’t take long for you tell why SweetSexySavage was one of the best albums of 2017.

Written by Leonard Pinckney

Soft Sounds From Another Planet - Japanese Breakfast

The human experience is one akin to that of a celestial being. It feels like it is out of the scope of our minds, and not meant to be understood. After all, humans are just animals burdened with this consciousness. The word burdened is used intentionally here because that is what it is. Sure, humanity is what it is because of it, but this anxiety about existence, is draining. It is obscenely frightening. It is suffocating, entrancing, engrossing, claustrophobic. To many, the mere thought of it drives them to temporary insanity. Being a human is not easy. Navigating the social constructs erected by humans of the past is exhausting. It is fucking confusing. Things like love, death, and sex make up the most polarizing facets of being a human, and they deserve to be celebrated and analyzed. It feels almost mundane to not worry about what else is beyond us. It feels like we are doing the world a disservice by not understanding our existence or purpose. The beauty of it is being able to revel in the human experience of others, and music is a perfect medium to share experiences like these through. Music is such an easy way to connect because there are no words that can explain abstract concepts such as those in any succinct way. Human vocabulary just cannot convey such specific and complicated information.

Michelle Zauner, also known as Japanese Breakfast, aims to ease your anxiety about life in her new LP, Soft Sounds from Another Planet, where she covers everything from femininity and self-love, to the duality of humans and their actions. Michelle communicates her experience and masterfully crafts an epiphany-inducing sonic journey that will take your breath away upon first listen, and demand many, many more subsequent ones. This album came at a perfect time for me. 2017 was the year of loss, change, disappointment, and heartbreak. 2017 was the year where I felt that everything I was sure about was utterly wrong. It was the year I got lost. Lost in my thoughts. Lost in the past. Lost in the future. Lost in the world. This album, however, has left seeds of hope and happiness in the voids where there were only encroaching voids of endless despair.

The first single on the LP, Machinist, details falling in love with a robot. This track is filled with sweeping synths and Michelle’s voice is obfuscated with an impressive layer of auto-tune, which is a joy to listen to. It is a sci-fi narrative that comes together to materialize an upbeat, jazzy nu-disco track that will make you want to dance until you listen to the lyrics and realize how the love portrayed in this track mirrors what love feels like between humans. To me, this song is about loving a “robot”. Not necessarily a real robot, but someone who is cold, and does not have your best interests at the forefront of their minds. To me, it is about loving someone selfish, and no matter what, they have “total control”, as the monotonous voice in the song professes. It seems almost inevitable when in love, however, one person is always going to care more, and the one that cares less ultimately has all the power in the relationship. To me, that is why this track is so powerful. We tend to forget that sometimes, and we need to realize love is about more than you. Love is not about control, love is about nurturing your partner and yourself. This track is a cautionary tale to those in love to not lose focus, and become a “robot,” because sometimes we become robots inadvertently in our daily lives.

The next single, Boyish, details a scene of jealousy, and self-consciousness. Where Zauner shows the unhealthy side of jealousy and the irrationality of it all. More importantly, however, she shows the humanity in it. She really emphasizes the fear of being unwanted by the one you love. It evokes such a commanding tone of self-deprecation and self-hatred. Michelle belts out lyrics like, “So here we are, we’re just two losers/I want you and you want something more beautiful”, where you can feel the disappointment in her voice. You can feel the hurt. If you know the feeling, your heart will sink and you’ll be brought back to the time when your own insecurities absolutely tore you apart and made you feel unloved by your significant other, over something seemingly insignificant. This track is so clever because, at the end, we realize she is feeling this way because he had looked at a waitress in the restaurant they were at and she felt like she was inferior to her. I think it just shows how sensitive, and irrational we become when it comes to love, and when it comes to being sure of ourselves. It shows the fragility of the perception of ourselves, and how easy anger and jealousy can completely take over at times. Humans tend to lose control when they feel like what is theirs is threatened, in this case, it is feeling like the other person is theirs. It seems like these kinds of attachments are unnecessary and only cause suffering, might it be a necessary evil? Maybe.

The third and final single off the album, Road Head, is an upbeat, guitar-filled romp about trying to save a dying relationship. In this track, Zauner recalls a moment where she did what seemed like a last-ditch effort to save a relationship through something wildly sexual, such as, road head. Listening to her speak about this experience is heartbreaking because she obviously was so deeply in love with this person, she would’ve done anything to save the dying relationship. Ultimately though, it was for the best, as she mentions that this person was abusive and told her that she would never make it in the music business. Again, this just holds to what was shown in the first single about being the one who cares more in a relationship, the other person has all the power and you’d do almost anything to save it. The feeling of unwanted-ness seems almost inevitable for one side. This song is important because it ends with her running away and chasing her dreams, which to me really resonates with the period of growth most people try to chase after heartbreak, which is the most important part. The growth.

To me, one of the most powerful tracks is called, 12 Steps, which is about Zauner’s own experience in ending in a relationship, where she had met the love of her life in a bar while she was dating someone else at the time. Michelle says this song is somewhat an apology to that person, but I think it really explains what goes on when love has run its course. Sometimes love ends, and sometimes we need to move on and find our own way. Changes like these are devastating but sometimes necessary. That is the message this track speaks to, and to me, it is relieving, from either side.

The rest of the album visits themes like surviving trauma and dealing with death. The track, The body is a blade, talks about moving on with your life even as your mental state deteriorates. To me, it really shows the disconnect between the physical world and your mental world. No matter what happens to you, the world is going to keep moving, and your body is going to keep moving. What needs to happen is your mind needs to catch on and you need to allow yourself to move along with the world.

This album is a guiding light. It is cathartic. It is enlightening. It is raw emotion from another human, that has been distilled into pure musical bliss. It conveys the lowest feelings that we can ever feel but leaves you with the hope to recover. To me, that is beautiful.

Written by Eduardo Escoto

Luv Is Rage 2 - Lil Uzi Vert

Lil Uzi Vert. The Stephen Curry of rap. In my opinion, Lil Uzi is talented but substance and culturally he has adapted to the typical mumble rap that is today where everyone raps about is bitches, money, jewelry, cars, drugs. Uzi in LUV IS RAGE 2 does follow this path but he shows glimpses of actual talent in his songs.

Dark Queen: Lil Uzi in this song talks about how he is an artist and rappers in all generations get swallowed by the industry and change. Mostly for the bad with substance and crime. He talks about how his mom was worried that he will spend time in jail and he promises he will wash up and show his mom that he wants to stay true to himself and his family despite having this high class and famed lifestyle. When I heard this song while just playing this album in the background of me playing basketball this sounded very different from all the other songs he had in this album. I could tell he really poured extra time and effort on this song and other songs which I’ll get to.

The Way Life Goes: This is personally my favorite song on the album and maybe even from all of Uzi’s music. This song sampled landslide by oh wonder. I think Uzi took the part that reflects more with what he was going through and which was heartbreak. He talks about his ex-girlfriend Brittney. And how their relationship seemed so promising and that there was a side of Uzi that he really wanted to change to “that perfect companion” to her because she deserved that and she was the only person he wanted to change for but to let go of the lifestyle he had aspired to chase his entire life was too hard to give up especially after just obtaining it and grasping the industry at such a young age. He hints at getaway vacations he had with Brittney like in Hawaii where they were already in serious talks of full commitment. But because of him still wanting to keep the Rockstar lifestyle she left him for a man who was fully committed to her. Which is something he couldn’t give but meant the most to her, not the money. Then Uzi really realized he’s missing something that he can’t buy with money. Which is true love that he can offer and fully commit to one. He continues to hint that he’s still heartbroken through most of the songs on the album which is called LUV IS RAGE 2 for a reason.

Pretty Mami: Pretty Mami isn’t the most relevant song to my main point of the side of Uzi that he really pours into love. But in pretty Mami, Uzi found a girl in the coast. Not clear where but he says, “Spanish girl named Rosa and she from the coast”. He states that this girl is a temporary hold for the hole that that is empty in his heart that used to belong to Britney. This girl was pretty, nice, good but he misses even how Brittney would tell him when he’s wrong so he learns from that. He prefers that than “a yes-women” who agrees and just goes along with what Uzi wants instead of telling him when he’s wrong to make him a better person. Now, the most popular song on the album and of Uzi’s career.

XO TOUR Llif3: This song not only is good but Uzi pulls in different parts of what’s going on in his life into this one song. In this song, Uzi really goes into the lonely life that he has now. He has everything he needs but he truly doesn’t have any “friends” he refers to his friends as the faces on dollar bills as his only friends that never change because of his fame. He hints at his ex-girlfriend Brittney in here in the chorus saying how she was suicidal because the way Uzi treated her during the end of their relationship while she tried to make it last but Uzi clearly had other things that were more important at the time than her. The way his relationship ended with her truly made him turn to drugs to help numb the pain that he’s feeling. And because of that, the drugs led him to other drugs that turned him suicidal and really contemplated about “blowing his brains out”. In the music video of this song, you see the satanic side of him showing that he sold his soul to the devil or he just truly vows to Lucifer which he mentions multiple times in this album. His girlfriend admitted that she wasn’t afraid to kill herself no matter what happened throughout the outcome of their relationship which stuck in the back of Uzi’s mind that he felt bad for making her go through that. And almost led him to do the same and was only “pushing him to the edge of suicidal”. Overall this album was my favorite throughout the year. The beats in this album were crazy and I saw a side of Uzi that I never knew existed and I really like that from him and I hope to see more of this side from him because I really enjoy this side of him and some of my favorite songs from him are his heartbreak songs.

Written by Anthony Pantoja

War & Leisure - Miguel

Miguel has long been one of the premiere R&B singers. If there’s any detriment to Miguel’s ability as an artist, it’s that he arrived on the scene around the same time as Frank Ocean and The Weeknd. However with neither of the latter releasing an individual album during 2017 (although you could argue Frank Ocean’s singles were arguably better than many albums this year) Miguel is given space to show off one of the best voices in music. In Miguel’s 4th solo album, War & Leisure, he finds the perfect balance between of upbeat Pop/R&B and dark brooding guitars that contrast the album.

The first four songs of Miguel’s War & Leisure are some of his best work as an artist. This quarter of the album plays out like waking up the morning after a nostalgic, buzzed night. 

On Miguel’s opening track “Criminal,” brooding, dusty guitar riffs blend seamlessly with Miguel’s voice before it gives way to one of Rick Ross’ better verses in recent memory. 

“Pineapple Skies” (my favorite track on the record) sounds like a fusion of tropical house and funk. This track also showcases the incredibly wide range of Miguel’s singing ability and, in my mind, further cements him as one of the best active singers in modern music.

“Sky Walker” is probably Miguel’s most popular track from War & Leisure and for good reason. The chemistry between Miguel and Travi$ Scott is unmistakable. Perfectly complimenting each other in a way that almost sounds like Miguel doing a Travi$ Scott impersonation in his own unique way and vice versa. The album takes a darker turn as soon as we come to track 5 “Wolf,” with a song that sounds all too familiar for Miguel. Heavy uses of distorted guitars and Miguel’s cadence on this track give off a punk 50’s crooner feel to the song. “Harem” is another highlight of the album and in my opinion, one of the smoothest songs Miguel has made to date. From the slow drum beat, spacey guitar riffs, and Miguel’s ability to switch his pitch at moment’s notice this is a near perfect track in my mind.

The only song that feels out of place from a cohesion standpoint is the song “Told You So.” After which the album maintains a darker tone to it. Caramelo Duro was also an incredibly unique track in which Miguel finally sings a verse in Spanish on his album. The first time he’s ever done so (to my knowledge) and he executes perfectly.

All in all, this is a fantastic album that has made me realize how much I’ve missed Miguel in the R&B space. He brings an unmistakable and authentic feel to his music while maintaining the sound that has made him one of music’s best.

Written by Alex Perry  

Sonder Son - Brent Faiyaz

2017 was Brent Faiyaz’s year. From singing the hook of the century in Goldlink’s Crew to dropping his debut album ‘Sonder Son’, Brent Faiyaz has garnered the attention from the world that he deserves. This year was an exceptional year for R&B and it is easy to get lost in all of the commotions that albums like Freudian’ and ‘Ctrl’ have created, but ‘Sonder Son’ is not one of those albums to get lost in the mix. Faiyaz’s debut album gives us something authentic, genuine, and pure. While his voice is already all of those qualities in and of itself, ‘Sonder Son’ puts our ears under a stethoscope to explore the different pulses of his life thus far. The 22-year-old beautifully introduces himself to the world through the songs in his debut album. The word sonder means; “the realization that every passerby is living a life as vivid and as complex as our own – causing each of our experiences to flow into each other.” Faiyaz grants us entrance into his own vivid and complex life through this album in hopes that it will somehow connect to our own experiences. The rich picture that he paints about his life through his words highlights our humanity and the struggles we face as people. The raw emotions felt from his incredibly silky smooth voice is R&B at its core. Music as personal and vulnerable as this can be credited to the incredible push he and his manager made to be an independent artist. ‘Sonder Son’ is a perfect example of what it is like to make music from your heart without the restrictions and agendas that the labels want to push onto talented artists. Overall, ‘Sonder Son’ is a refreshingly vulnerable album that gives us insight into the struggles of a now successful artist that listeners will undoubtedly appreciate.

Written by Kyle Solano

Mansionz - Mansionz (Self-titled)

As the year winds down and I reflect on the music that was released, Mansionz always comes to my mind as one of the most memorable albums this year. Mike Posner and Blackbear collaborating was a stroke of genius and a breath of fresh air. With the oversaturation of monotonous trap and mumble rap, Bear and Mike keep it refreshing and honest when it comes to the lyricism and instrumentals.

One of the things I really enjoyed about the experience of this album was the separate personas that Mike and Bear play into. Mike plays the artistic and more introverted side of humanity while Blackbear plays the party animal, the asshole, the selfish side of humanity. Together, the two creatives represent a duality that comes with fame. While one side of being famous wants to push the envelope and expand on art, the other side wants to party hard, drink and do drugs. This contrast, whether intentional or not, add so much to this masterpiece of an album and plays perfectly into every song.

Tracks like “My Beloved”, “A Million Miles”, “White Linen”, and “Gorgeous” all explore the idea of this duality and finds the artist having different perspectives on subjects such as women, relationships, and fame. Where Mike will be happy that he got to play his guitar, Bear talks about having a threesome at some party. Mike wants to have a stable relationship while Bear wants to spend all his money and go on vacation trips. This is where the album really shines for me in showing that, deep down, everybody has conflicting emotions that question our morality. Mansionz isn’t afraid of being honest and straightforward about how they think and behave.

While the duo has different views on certain subjects, they also seem to agree on much of the time. Both “STFU” and “Dennis Rodman” portray Mike and Bear being assholes and wanting to live life how they want to, not bound to social norms or opinions. “Nobody Knows” finds Mike and Bear admitting that, no matter what they say or do, they really don’t know anything. No amount of alcohol, women, or religion can assure anything because, to the duo, they have no certainty. Both artists repeat that they hate everything they love, and in turn, they love all the things that they hate, which gives off a tone of uncertainty, being lost, and loneliness. While depressing, the duo agrees that life isn’t simple and no matter how much you believe, you’ll probably end up believing in too much.

Of course, there is much more to Mansionz than a dual mindset; the group has much more to say. “Rich White Girls” is a very satirical song about white girls and their daddy issues, describing the difficulty in trying to please them.

“I’m thinking about horses” seems to be the odd one out of the bunch, in that, it is a spoken word poem performed only by Mike Posner, nobody else. The poem consists of random thoughts that Mike has that relates to his existence and purpose, like comparing horses, who are mighty and powerful but “trade their freedom for a dependable meal,” to humanity, revealing that maybe we are all slaves but yet have the power to break free. Or comparing his father’s growing age to standing against a growing tidal wave, unprepared without swimwear, showing how uncontrollable his situation is. Not only is the track extremely poetic and beautiful in its comparisons and metaphors, but the performance is extreme and heart-wrenching. Mike’s deepest thoughts and fears scream out with passion and pain. “I’m thinking about horses” fits perfectly as an interlude that shifts the focus of the album from being “assholish” to being more compassionate and poetic. Much more can be discussed about this track as it is the deepest cut on the album, but this review would go on for way too long if I did, so I’ll leave it at that.

The album finishes off with “The Life of a Troubadour” which plays out like a story. Both artists represent who they are, Mike being the artistic Troubadour who just wanted to spend the night with the princess, to Bear who plays the power-hungry Mad Hatter who wants to steal the throne. The track ends with The Mad Hatter killing the Troubadour, which represents the death of art in modern day music. The ending is fitting and sums the entire album up nicely in a sort of bedtime story.

Aside from all the metaphorical and poetic ties that this album has, sonically, it is a fun experience. “Wicked” sounds like a fusion between a 90’s pop song and a Blackbear song, and it’s amazing. Other tracks like “Dennis Rodman”, “My Beloved”, “Nobody Knows”, and basically every other track on this album all have great energy and synergy between Mike and Bear. Although this album is not My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy levels of production, the production is solid and very enjoyable.

After all is said and done, why should I listen to this album, you may ask. Aside from being poetic and artsy, the music sounds incredible and each track weaves perfectly together to create a unique experience that I’ve never heard before. Other than that, there’s not much more I can say other than just to go and listen to it right now. I could stand and preach all day about this album and how it deserves more recognition but in reality, it’s up to you, the reader, to decipher for yourself as to why Mansionz is such a gem of an album. Maybe it’s the best album or maybe it’s the worst, nobody knows.

 Written by Alexander Apodaca

Melodrama – Lorde

My favorite album of the year was Melodrama by Lorde! I became a really big fan of Lorde’s in 2015. Her album Pure Heroine brought me back to my teenage self and Lorde touched my soul. Fast forward to June 19th when I heard Melodrama for the first time … I sat on my bed with my journal in hand and earphones on full blast. A sigh of relief! Lorde makes me feel very emotional. She will put you on a rollercoaster of emotions throughout the album. From happy dance parties, to feeling sad, lonely, to feeling good and loving yourself! Lorde makes me feel free! I can dance and cry to her music in one sitting.

Hard Feelings/Loveless is my MOST favorite song on the album. I wrote in my journal to remember this feeling. It was a perfect moment, feeling relief & Lorde was speaking to me. I even shed a tear or two. It is two songs in one, but they mesh so well together. Lorde calls the second half, Loveless, a bizarre little outro. She said the song altogether is a heartfelt breakup song. She is finding solitude in being alone and caring for herself.

Standout lyrics:

“I light all the candles, cut flowers for all my rooms, I care for myself the way I used to care about you, these days, we kiss and we keep busy, the waves come after midnight, I call from underwater, why even try to get right, when you’ve outgrown a lover, the whole world knows but you.”

Loveless transitions into its own song with Lorde saying “baby” very faintly and then Paul Simon saying “what is this tape? This is my favorite tape,” that she sampled. I feel like it’s her rebellion speaking of wanting to be heartless, “bet you want to rip my heart out, bet you want to skip my calls now. Well, guess what? I like that.” I feel like after a major heartbreak we become a bit of rebel ourselves. We rebel to love. Are we actually a L-O-V-E-L-E-S-S generation?

When I heard Supercut for the first time I was very emotional and sad, but happy too. It’s a rollercoaster of emotions. Lorde said it is a sister song to Ribs from Pure Heroine. Ribs is my MOST favorite Lorde song. In my journal, I wrote, “hearing this for the first time feels so great.” Although I was talking about one song – it’s how I feel about the whole album. In an interview with The Spinoff Lorde says, “I felt the way I used to feel when I made music as a kid and it felt like I could cry because it’s such a relief to get out how you’re feeling for the first time.” I felt this when I heard Supercut also because it was nostalgic to listening to Pure Heroine. So many feelings at the same time and it’s a relief to feel. Reliving memories of people you love and remembering the feelings you felt. It’s like remembering a dream.

“In my head, I play a supercut of us, all the magic we gave off, all the love we had and lost, and in my head, the visions never stop, these ribbons wrap me up, but when I reach for you, there’s just a supercut.”

Liability was a surprise single from Melodrama in early March 2017. To be a “liability” is to be burdensome. Lorde said in a Beats interview: “I had this realization that because of my lifestyle and what I do for work there’s going to be a point with every single person around me where I’m going to be a tax on them in some way.” She found self-love and understood that she needs to be happy with herself. Although it may be a liability with her lifestyle she will always have herself to love and care for. Self-love is something I personally have tried very hard to work on. It will always be a work in progress, but remember to love yourself. Nurture the relationship you have with yourself and you’ll no longer feel like a liability to others.

“So I guess I’ll go home into the arms of the girl that I love, the only love I haven’t screwed up, she’s so hard to please but she’s a forest fire, I do my best to meet her demands, play at romance, we slow dance in the living room, but all that a stranger would see, is one girl swaying alone, stroking her cheek.”

Lorde went from teenage angst in Pure Heroine to coping with a breakup, finding self-love, and finding comfort in solitude in Melodrama. “I’m actually rewiring to become an adult. All that is insane.” The theme throughout the album is about the highs and lows of a relationship. You will definitely get into your feelings while listening to the album. Melodrama deserves so much recognition! Lorde co-produced every song on the album! She worked alongside Jack Antonoff, Frank Dukes, Malay, and many others. Her songwriting is absolutely incredible. It was playing on my speakers throughout this year. Luckily for me, I was able to see her live for the first time in 2017. Lorde did not disappoint live or with her sophomore album Melodrama.

Written by Valerie Rosales

CTRL by SZA

After a string of EPs, various features on fellow-TDE tracks, writing credits for both Rihanna and Beyoncé, endless album delays, internal label drama, and a sudden threat to quit music, it seemed like SZA’s album would never see the light of day. However, on June 9th, 2017, the First Lady of Top Dawg Entertainment finally released her debut full-length album entitled, CTRL. Vulnerability. Insecurities. Womanhood. Losing control. Gaining control. Everything real and relatable is actualized in SZA’s breakthrough album. Both lyrically and vocally, the songstress’ most cohesive work to date pushes the boundaries of the R&B realm. Even in 2017 – a year in which R&B seemed to thrive like never before, SZA established not only her own unique sound but her worthy place in the genre. Fourteen tracks of ethereal vocals, overlaying mesmerizing synth-induced beats, sprinkled nostalgic references to ‘90s pop culture, seamlessly mixed in JT, River Tiber, and Drake samples, and features from Pharrell, Travis Scott, Isaiah Rashad, James Fauntleroy, and Kendrick Lamar, the long-awaited release of CTRL has proven to be well worth the wait. 

The album explores the perils of modern dating, sexual freedom, and the internal battles of self-love in the most brutally honest way. SZA exhibits a vast amount of self-awareness by asking herself, “Why I can’t stay alone just by myself? / Wish I was comfortable just with myself / But I need you” in “Supermodel” and in “Drew Barrymore,” bluntly admits, “I get so lonely, I forget what I’m worth / We get so lonely, we pretend that this works.” She plays with one-sided love, illustrated in “Love Galore” asking her temporary lover, “Why you bother me when you know you don’t want me? Why you bother me when you know you got a woman?” but is accepting of the chaos of it all in “The Weekend” singing, “The feelin’ is reckless / Of knowin’ it’s selfish / And knowin’ I’m desperate / Getting’ all in your love / Fallin’ all over love, like / Do it ‘til it hurts less.” After all that promiscuous havoc though, SZA, ultimately, is in search of a worthy and grounding kind of love asking her potential lover, “Can you remind me of my gravity? Ground me when I’m tumblin’, spiralin’, plummetin’ down to Earth / You keep me down to Earth” in the song “Garden (Say It Like Dat)”. An album so multifaceted with songs about temporary lovers, past lovers, and weekend lovers, it is impossible to not find something applicable to our own complex forays in love.

In a society where women are still scrutinized for owning their sexuality, CTRL delves into the subject full force. Throughout the entire album, SZA displays complete comfort in her sexuality. In the Kendrick Lamar featured track, “Doves In The Wind”, she gives power to the pussy with K. Dot rapping, “Niggas’ll lose they mind for it / Wine for it, dine for it–pussy / Spend time for it, see no colored line for it–pussy” which is representative of the idea that men will do anything for it. In the song, “Normal Girl” where she samples Drake’s “Controlla” she croons, “You like it, when I be, aggressive / You like when I say to you / Get it if you got it, I’m ready and waitin’ for it / I’m callin’ to put it on, yeah” revealing how she isn’t like a “Normal Girl” and in such a patriarchal subject, she knows what she wants. In a sense, SZA is gaining CTRL by finding empowerment in her sexuality versus the societal norm of shame when it comes to women on this subject matter.

The album poetically sums up the quarter-life crisis with authentic candor. SZA acknowledges the things we have trouble admitting to ourselves in a manner that simultaneously stings but reassures us that we are not alone in these inner conflicts. In the song “Prom”, she expresses the constant internal musings of a young adult trying to find a sense of purpose, “Fearin’ not growin’ up / Keepin’ me up at night / Am I doin’ enough? / Feel like I’m wastin’ time” and, again, on “20 Something” singing, “All alone still / Not a thing in my name / Ain’t got nothin’, runnin’ from love / Only know fear.” Her lyricism displays the fluctuating self-esteem of the average 20-something. To tie it all in, scattered in between songs are words of wisdom from SZA’s own mother and grandmother. Throughout the entirety of CTRL, SZA displays the true strength in vulnerability. It is a reminder in the form of an album that lets us all know we don’t all have it together and that that’s okay.

CTRL thoroughly tackles what it’s like to be a 20-something searching for love, entertaining temporary highs, struggling with insecurities, and the harsh realities we face while trying to find our purpose in the world. As of October 2017, the album has been certified gold and with her single “Love Galore” hitting platinum, and “The Weekend” (which wasn’t even released as a single) also hitting platinum, her success knows no limits. With such a strong breakout year, there’s no telling how far her talents will take her. There’s no question as to why she is the most nominated female artist for the upcoming Grammys. This is just the beginning of SZA taking CTRL.

Written by Rachel Reyes

Freudian - Daniel Caesar

Daniel Caesar, the Canadian R&B and soul singer-songwriter, risked it all for his music career. He became frustrated by his stagnation and moved to the city homeless pursuing stardom. The night of his graduation he left with a garbage bag full of clothes. Where he had to make his own family. He struggled early with his parents because of his desire to sing love songs in which they would tell him, “if you’re not going to sing songs glorifying God, anything that isn’t doing that specifically is glorifying Satan.” To which they finally came down to a mutual understanding that “God is love.”

“This whole album is the arc from the inception to the death of just the most intense relationship of my life.” – Beats 1 Interview

Get You became his breakout single which has amassed millions of streams pushing him into mainstream stardom. The song entails him being awe-struck with his capability of getting such an out of this world and way above his perceived “type” of a lover. The world is constantly experiencing droughts, famine, and natural disasters. Daniel explains how whenever he’s with her it’s like being in their own world. The song is in a self-reflective state where Daniel feels he doesn’t deserve everything he’s been given but simultaneously appreciative of it. In this relationship, they were both going through so many things together so being able to have that enhanced their bonding. He states that during this period he would have nonstop sex because there was nothing better to do. This is the first moment that Caesar introduces a principle of Freud, with the id. The id is the unconscious, impulsive part of the psyche which operates on the “pleasure principle” which seeks immediate pleasure and gratification. Kali Uchis states, “the memories, it’s all just memories” may allude to the suppression principle included in Freud’s studies. Kali displays gratitude towards her lover knowing that nothing is forever and to appreciate what you have now.

Best Part is the smooth honey-like duet we didn’t know we wanted. Alongside H.E.R. they express their adoration for their significant other. The beauty of being someone’s favorite anything is something long romanticized and fantasized about. He compares her to water when you’re stuck in a desert as someone he can’t live without. She is “the sunshine of [his] life” which is ironic that she is both the water that quenches him and the sunshine on his life which would dehydrate him in the first place. Despite the duality of love, she is the best part of his life. In a digital generation, the importance of movies and videos is extreme. A favorite movie is usually held close to someone’s heart and calling a lover the “best part” about it, is worth swooning over. “If you love me won’t you say something,” is both a plea and a question. Unaware if this person feels requited love for him. Often when you begin to hang out with someone feelings rise to the point of uncertainty – do they feel the same? Especially if they become the best part of your life’s movie. In a subtle beg, he whispers “love me, won’t you…?”

Hold Me Down, an interesting tale of insecurities and love that is tearing apart at the seams. It starts off with a soft conversation between Daniel and his girl asking “could you, could you say? ‘I love you Danny’” to which she replies, “you want me to?” and then she does. It then transitions into the chorus, “if you love me baby let me hear you say it,” he is certain that he is her favorite despite being left in the basement, thrown on the pavement. This imagery reminds me of Toy Story where Andy first gets Woody and expresses such love and admiration for it. Daniel/Woody’s ego blinds him to see no other reality but the fact he is the favorite despite being played with like a toy. Daniel becomes infatuated to the point he’s willing to start a family with her. The pussy is so good to Daniel that he self-emulates like a Buddhist. He even astral projects into another dimension of how great it feels. He shows his imperfections by saying his spectacle of a life is a sad story and hopefully one day he will find glory – hopefully with her alongside him for the flight. All he wanted was to take her to “higher heights” yet she resisted leaving her comfort zone. He even acknowledges she had “dreams of a better life” possibly marriage but this time there seemed to be no hope of “making it through.” In the bridge, the female is introduced in the form of conversation with Daniel’s previous statements. On how Daniel is traveling far away with music that she’s left behind with pain where she begins to carry resentment. With his success bubbling the superego of Daniel could be strengthening to the point she is asking him who he thinks he is, “some kind of celebrity?” and threatening him to ‘wait and see’ if she sticks around much longer because of that. All Daniel asks her is to stay true to him and having to remind her of all the things he does. He played the game (music industry/being a toy) where all he wants is for the moment; some reassurance that she will hold him down.

Neu Roses (Transgressor’s Song), tells a story of his girlfriend who cheats on him. Neu Roses is wordplay for new roses/neurosis which portrays two forms of a dying relationship brought by infidelity hence she transgressed the trust. “Neurosis is a relatively mild mental illness that is not caused by organic disease, involving symptoms of stress (depression, anxiety, obsessive behavior, hypochondria) but not a radical loss of touch with reality.” This girl still recalls the fateful day she threw the love away of Daniel. It appears the resentment she held in the previous song caused her to act out of spite only later to beg for him not to leave. She realized that she made a big mistake, and to not “turn [her] sunshine to shade” as once she was that to him. She then states, “I know this is a game we play,” which would make it seem that they both had their “friends too” while she always came back because he took her breath away. He admits he “fucked with some empty cups” meaning hollow sex with multiple girls. He knows she has various partners, but he doesn’t want to run out on his luck, so he considers stopping from running amok. This could be reaction formation, a Freudian concept which one would switch unacceptable impulses into their opposites or a form of passive aggressiveness. Projection is another term that could be used here in his need to call her out for his own mistakes.

Loose is Daniel talking to himself about his toxic relationship and rationalizing the need to cut the rope. He begins to realize that she has built a depression (cloud over her head raining with thunder). The positives are outweighed by the negative. He is quick to lose patience with her and cause fights. He calls himself out on being a coward because he isn’t helping anyone not even himself by grasping onto a dead relationship. Daniel contemplates his power in this relationship and how if he can’t do it for himself, he should do it for her. Often, we see only the good in others we are with to the point that we stick out through horrid cycles of pain. We can’t seem to let go of what brings sunshine to your life and scared of the darkness that comes after.

We Find Love, a song about the beauties in the ugly of a relationship. He comes off in somber tone aware of the fact that it’s over, but still nostalgic about the good times. “You don’t love me anymore, let’s see how you like this song,” is a spiteful statement coming from a place of resentment and ego. He immortalizes her through this album, that’s where his power lies – in the success he obtains. He realizes since the day they met she was the “girl of his dreams” which is what Get You entails but deep down he knew they could never be no matter how hard they try. The hearts fragile tendencies fall down into which they break into pieces. This seems to showcase the cycle of what love is - finding it, uplifting your spirits, falling down, and then ultimately giving up on the love you would have died for.

Blessed showcases Daniel’s vulnerable state of awareness to his flaws. He has become dependent on this girl to the point he can’t go a moment without her. Her presence must be around or else he feels empty. Despite his horrible traits, he feels blessed to have a girl that is willing to stick with him through all his trials and tribulations. He considers her a home despite how broken he is, he will come back to her.

Take Me Away, he wants to sit back and enjoy the creation that God has manifested to him in the form of a beautiful woman who’s willing to cater to him. “Every time she tops me off, it’s celebration,” this is a double entendre for when you top off champagne it’s filled up to the brim. The double meaning is that she is performing oral sex on him as he sits back – what a reason to celebrate. “She loves to top me off … all she wants to do is please me.” Her willingness to perform oral sex on him is possibly due to an oral fixation she has which is an ideal of Freud through the oral stage. He asks himself what life has become due to his “strange new love” he has with her where they don’t speak much. The communication comes in the form of lust. She begs him to take her away to an orgasmic state. This next line I believe is the central and most crucial line in the whole album due to is the central theme of Freud, “Every time I go inside of your protected, place with reverence, I’m reminded of a time I was neglected.” It could mean at a time where he felt neglected in a relationship, but more so I believe it’s from neglect of love from his parents specifically his mother. His adoration and admiration of constant sex and wanting to escape reality comes from the psychosexual stages of the id’s pleasure-seeking energies – genital stage. This is the personality development concepts that Sigmund Freud discovered in his career.

Transform, the premise of the entire song is the ego and his battle with it for love. “If a leopard never changes its spots, how can I change what I’ve got?” he questions the way nature is and how it’s unfair that he’s expected to change if no one never questions the natural course that animals live their lives. Ego is in the way of his ability to change for his lover. He could feel mad now but once it fades away he will not have her there – a lonely life in the kingdom. He’s aware of his non-attractiveness so if this girl loves him, maybe he should come around. He’s addicted to her love and the energy with it, he baptized himself because it “saved his soul like Jesus.”

Freudian like DNA intertwines two strands of both his mother and his lover. The first verse has Daniel expressing to his girl that she is the reason she sings and hopes to preserve her in the form of art (or save their relationship). He takes a moment to thank her for saving his life and giving him advice that ultimately changed his life despite how they ended. The second verse is about his mother and the need to bring her honor. Through psychoanalysis, people are driven by two things: life instinct (the need for sexual and emotional bonding) and death instinct (aggressive drive). Sigmund Freud is famous for his Oedipus Complex which is characterized by a boy experiencing a form of sexual desire toward his mother or vice versa (for a female). The fact that he went back and forth with both his mother and girlfriend brings about the concept in an interesting way. We long for the reflection (or opposite) of our parent in our lovers. “Send me kisses when it’s grey skies, it’s been so long, look how time flies, if you love me won’t you let me know,” shows a longing for his past lover of wanting to know if she still has feelings for him. He now has the same grey skies he would give her and his sunshine is long gone.

Freudian (Outro), plays on an organ as Daniel sinks into an abyss of his own mind. “Isn’t it nice, human sacrifice,” and the universe’s form of “natural selection” of people and of ourselves. In many ways, that girlfriend is dead to him. As aforementioned, the “death instinct” is apparent here in his ability to sacrifice himself as an artist.

In his Beats 1 interview, he says, “I’m trying to live out Hero’s Journey, it’s sacrifice to a point… I’m putting my business out there.” The supernatural or even superego, where he meets helpers along the way in the form of lovers, to his death and rebirth, transformation and return to his highest being.

My personal favorite lines are: “They say I’m a martyr, charge that to my ego, I just want all the lights.”

He hears others call him a martyr for being vulnerable which only boosts his ego in thinking he is sacrificing himself for the greater good. When his selfishness drives him to only pursue his name in lights rather than for humanity. He continuously takes the “easy way out” each time where he brings dishonor to his own self.

“Vulnerability is the greatest thing. The reward is very high but the price is… [the danger is there, fear is there] but I guess that’s why it’s so awesome, ya know?”

The thrill of being open with your flaws is admirable for not many are able to accomplish such a feat in a compelling way. The risk to be shamed, “killed” through critique, and the online trolls that are out there in this world.

“It’s Freud, I’m trying to analyze, I’m like looking at myself, trying to figure myself out. It’s like looking in the mirror.”

To look at others we can easily project our fears and perceptions onto them without realizing it. However, the bravest thing one can do is look at themselves, look within themselves to decipher one’s own code. Why we are the way we are, psychoanalyze not just our positive but embracing our negative to become the complete hero.

Written by Erik De La Cruz

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Honorable Mentions: 

DAMN. by Kendrick Lamar

Process by Sampha

Black Ken - Lil B

Peak - Choker

The Thrill Of It All - Sam Smith

Drive Slow - Mac Ayers

American Teen - Khalid

Everybody - Logic (for its concept)

Dua Lipa - Dua Lipa

Fin - Syd

About Time - Sabrina Claudio

Frank Ocean Singles (could’ve been its own album)

ADDED AFTER:

Coco Music Soundtrack - Pixar (Various Artists)

Cybersex - Blackbear

Funk Wav Bounce Vol. 1 - Calvin Harris

SYRE - Jaden Smith

Trip - Jhene Aiko

Yours Truly Forever - Phora

Loverboy - Russel (aka Pryde)

_______________________________________________________

I just wanted to say thanks to all those that helped and participated in the album reviews with me. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without you all.

I appreciate them all and the hard work you put into helping this to come to life!

Let me know if you have thoughts, opinions, or your own albums you feel like we missed!

By Erik De La Cruz

CEO of Creative-ive (pronounced ivy).

contact: erik@creative-ive.com

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[survivor-namibia]

ANNOUNCEMENT

The Rites of Passage!

Bryce: Alivia you were literally the most robbed person in this game. You should be at the end! You’re the winner in my book. You were my number 1 for your short stay in the game and we would have ran this game together as co-token blacks!!! Chips: If I remember correctly you quit the game because you did not have enough free time to play. I'm sorry that it did not work out overall and wish you the best in your life and being able to maintain that balance. Jacob: didn’t you like die or something? I think I talked to you a little and it was cool Zeezo: We never had the chance to meet which is sad because I've heard you're an icon. I don't know why you had to quit the game but I hope everything is going well for you

Bryce: Legend wish you didn’t leave so soon but glad you put yourself first. Chips: I assume you quit the game because Jaiden was added to it as a replacement. I'm sorry that you feel you could not have played the game with him on the tribe and I enjoy your sense of humor when I have spoken to you. Jacob: idk who you are Zeezo: omg you quit because of Jaiden??? Queen

Bryce: Cute name!! Chips: I never got to meet you, but since this is your first tumblr game I'm sorry that it was cut short. It might have been because of your choice of Russell Hantz as a player. He's pretty icky. Jacob: didn’t talk to you in this game but I absolutely love you on zwooper, you are one of my best friends over there and you are pretty chill! Zeezo: Even though we were on the same tribe we never talked so I don't have much to say here LFNDKSN

Bryce: I love the accent over your o. Chips: I never got to meet you, but I do enjoy that you like Rubik's cubes. I own a Rubik's cube that is a stress toy and it's always fun to give it to people because they expect it to be a real one and get confused when they squish it. Also, I'm sorry that your priority of winning the game was cut short so early. Jacob: uhhhh Zeezo: I was shook when I heard your voice because I thought you were a 14 year old girl??? Wow

JAIDEN

Bryce: You made someone quit so iconic. Chips: You came in on my tribe as the replacement player for Alivia and definitely helped us in being a successful tribe before there was a swap. Thank you for your contributions. I like to think that this time around could have been the game we played together but we got swapped away from one another. Jacob: uhhhh Zeezo: I've never really met you but from what I've heard you're a bit of an asshole and someone even quit because of you. I don't know you personally though so u don't really know!

Bryce: Loved your skype avi. Chips: From what I understand about you in this game and our relationship you prioritized a different season over this one and didn't really contribute very much. We didn't really talk at all, gamewise, and you got voted out early into the swap. I understand wanting to go all out in a main season so don't feel bad about that. Jacob: you were the first guy that I voted out and it felt pretty cool because it was the first time me Luke and Carson aligned Zeezo: eeeek I don't know anything about you. Sorry :(

Bryce: Sad that we had to vote you out but you were super chill and nice and think we would have worked together if not for us losing that immunity. Chips: I'm not entirely certain why you have the same affinity for Lillian Morris that I have. It seems that in nearly every game that we end up cast together one of the two of us ends up with Lillian and it's almost always you. Other than that it was nice to be in another game with you. You're always a delight. Jacob: uhhhh Zeezo: You're actually a pretty cool guy! It sucks that we lost that immunity and had to vote you out because we might have worked well together. I've gotten to know more about you after you got voted out and I think you're great!

Bryce: Aqua was my favorite cheetah girl and I feel she was underrated just like you! Robbed of making merge. Chips: I don't think that we ever interacted in this game. You did well into the swap and almost made merge. Sorry that your journey got cut just short of making it to that end. Also, the fact that you chose Nick as your icon is perfect. He was a fun and a strange player Jacob: we didn’t talk but you were also a casualty to me Luke and Carson so I respect you for that Zeezo: I was pretty surprised when you got voted out because I viewed you as someone who could have made it far if you'd gotten to merge. I guess you were also unlucky in terms of the swap. Hope you're doing well!

Bryce: Bryan robbed king!! I wanted to work with you and that tragique idol play prevented it. But still pretty cool how you had to be idoled out and I think your exit changed the game in a way that benefited me getting to the end so wooh! Chips:  I suppose you getting idoled out of the game was the catalyst for the gameplay of the season starting. Great job in igniting that! Before you were voted out we didn't really talk at all until we realized that we both had sucked at doing so. Then we talked to each other a bit and then you got idoled out so our conversation sort of fizzled. On the plus side you were officially "avenged" in your elimination by getting the four out (minus jacob) Jacob: Bryan? Didn’t you get out the round Luke played an idol on me Zeezo: Bryannnn I was so sad when you got voted out. ;_; If you hadn't been idoled out that round I think you could have made it really far since you're so likeable. You're so fun and cute and I adore you. You called me pretty during the live tribal so... <3 We still have to watch something on Netflix together and hopefully after this game is over we will keep in touch!

Bryce: We never talked and for that I’m sorry, my bad!! You stan icons in ausvivor tho so wig! Chips: First of all, your introduction video was both fantastic and strange. Second of all, I wanted to work with you in this game but it didn't seem like you wanted to really talk to me very much. I'm sure that I'm just reading into something that's not real life, but that's how I felt and so it didn't work out. Jacob: we didn’t talk durring this game but I met you on a zwoop game and you’re pretty cool, it’s unfortunate that you left Zeezo: I decided I wanted you gone after you kept ignoring me repeatedly ;_; You were a pretty funny guy in the tribal chat and you watch Black Mirror so... Yay!

Bryce: Ashley it was such a thrill to get to play with you again. We had some fun talks and I always enjoyed messaging you. We worked together well after the initial trip to the spa on that reward! Sucks that you had to go but I think it was the best move to make at the time even if it hurt a lot to do it. Chips: Wow! If someone was robbed out of this game it was you. I felt so incredibly bad when that blindside was pulled on you because of an idol scare. Nothing was told to me at all. I just wanted you to at least make sixth in the game and so I was incredibly sad when your name came out. It was great getting to talk to you in this season and I greatly appreciate your tip of butter slime! Hoping to make it again soon with some kiddos! Jacob: we legit didn’t talk at all which disappoints me Zeezo: Your vote was the 2nd hardest vote I've had to cast this game and I expect you still resent me. I felt so bad but I thought that that was what I needed to do and I'm so sorry if it hurt you. You were pretty cool on a personal level and I enjoyed talking to you. When you were voted out you flipped us off and left so.... Icon?

Bryce: You are a king! I was super threatened of you tho in the game because like people kept wanting to keep you around even tho you were good at competitions and had good game sense so I really wanted you gone. King of being at the airport! Chips: Hey dude! This is probably our third time-ish playing in a game together and I think I made a pretty good effort in trying to play with you in the first round of merge. You had made the argument that you did not know what was going on. Then it was pretty evident you were one of the four let in on the surprise vote so I knew I had to let you go. So sorry. We need to meme together some more here soon! Jacob: CARSON YOU WERE PART OF MY OG CREW I was with you since day 1 and I enjoyed playing with you Zeezo: I really did want to work with you at a point but after thinking it over I decided my best move was to vote you out that round. We didn't really talk a whole lot but you seem like a really nice person plus you were iconic at challenges!

Bryce: Mo you’re the best! When I saw you were cast too I was so happy because when we played in the past we had such fun and I was ready to do it again! It was amozing to get to play with you again and I feel like this time we were even more iconic tbh. Sadly things happened in F6 and we both didn’t get to move forward but still had a blast playing with you. Chips: It was nice getting to meet you in this game considering that I heard about how iconic you were (are) in the Athena series. We didn't talk much until close to the end of the game since we were using the coasting strategy pretty effectively until things started to shake up. I'm sorry that I was forced to vote you out. Were it not a 50/50 rock situation I would have done it completely differently Jacob: the round you left sucked, I had a whole elaborate plan that Raffy completely shut down after I saved his ass! It was fun working with you though! Zeezo: The round you got voted out was probably the most intense round of the game. Wew I'm glad I had immunity otherwise I would have been a ball of sweat. My immunity and Rafs idol put you in a terrible position since your allies basically had to flip on you which was unlucky. You weren't the most talkative person in my eyes but you seem really nice and I wish we had talked more during the game

Bryce: Luke I so wanted to work with you but after the idol play it was just easier to like target you so that’s what happened :( . But I think you were so fun to talk to and even tho we weren’t on the same side it was still cool. When you came back I had finally listened to reputation and you like convinced me that dress was a bop so thanks! King of winning all those comps in a row wig! Chips: You said in a message to me that we both play a game where loyalty means a lot to us and that is very true. We both like to find people that we are comfortable in playing together with and to try and stick with those people as much as we can. This made me want to play with you a bunch because of the like-minded ideals. The only issue I had was when you made the first play of the season at merge where you let three other people know the happenings of the tribal council. I knew from there that I wasn't going to be one of your numbers and just something tacked on. Sorry if it's boring that I didn't want to keep you even after you came back from redemption, if you hadn't have voted for me we may have seen differently Jacob: LUKE ANOTHER MEMBER OF THE OG CREW I love you and I’m sorry I didnt notice that you played an idol on me Zeezo: Omg your idol play? Iconic... It had me shook! On the other hand I think you could have done things differently without putting an unnecessary target on your back. That move led to a whole new alliance being made and I think if you hadn't done it this game could have gone very differently. At the same time you're someone who loves making the game exciting so I understand why you did it and you're probably the most iconic player of the season... You were a fun guy to talk to and a beast at challenges (redemption island had me shaking in my boots). I knew that I couldn't let you reach the end so I voted you out twice... oops. But I know you're someone who's not going to be bitter at all so... icon! :p

Bryce: My cracked king!! It was amazing to play this game with you and like ever since NuAndara we were tight and it was amazing. I think we were a cute duo! Voting you out was the hardest vote of the game and I’m still super sad because you’re so great KJSDFKDSJSD. But you weren’t super mad so wooh!! I think you were def a power player and happy that we were aligned together. Fave to call with (eyes). Chips: I have a lot to say to you because I feel like we were pretty close early into merge and even when we weren't merged I think that we had a good chance to get to know each other. You're the first (and only I believe) person that I went on call with and I know that we didn't even really talk about this game, but the fact that we talked at all makes me feel closer to you and closer in our friendship. At the end of the day you are a great person and a great strategist in the game of Survivor. I think you are well-equipped for the game in that you know when to make cuts and when to take your time. The fact that you flipped a vote on someone I was close to and then ignored me afterward is testament to your ability to cut throats. The fact that when we finally did talk afterward you made it clear that your intent was to remove me from the game speaks volumes to the level of confidence that you had in the game and the direction that it was going. I am proud of you for doing so well in this game and I want you to know that just before we were able to flip the vote from Jacob for your blindside I had predicted you the winner of the game. I know that you were in a position where there was no benefit to you flipping your vote because you had the W locked down and that level of control is fantastic. Great job in this game and I hope that in playing we were able to grow closer and form a relationship that will exist outside of this game. I loved getting to know you. Jacob: you gave me several thousand heart attacks man, you are so strategic it’s fucking scary, but you are a really nice guy and it stung having to vote you out Zeezo: Eeek. Your vote was probably the hardest vote I had to cast in this game. We'd become good friends during the game and I appreciate the way you reacted when I voted you out so much xx. I had to separate my emotions from the game and I decided to vote you out in the last 40 minutes which I'm sure must have had you sweating bullets. You're such an amazing guy and I  know we're going to keep in touch after all this is over. We'll have that call again... [eyes]. You're an icon and ilysm <3

The final individual immunity challenge will be posted shortly! Stay tuned, survivors!