#soldier on

[reactionimagecollection]

[sinceileftyoublog]

Andrew Bird & Mary Lattimore Live Show Review: 12/5, Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago

Andrew Bird & Alan Hampton

BY JORDAN MAINZER

A few songs into this year's first Gezelligheid show--Andrew Bird's annual series of winter concerts at the Fourth Presbyterian Church--Bird mentioned that when he put on an Ella Fitzgerald recording when spending time with his family, his niece asked, "Why are you playing Christmas music?" To her, Bird posited, all old music sounded like Christmas music. It's a fairly easy misconception to understand. After all, the feelings you most associate with Christmas, holiday, or wintertime music in general--warmth, joy, familiarity--are often inherent qualities of songs that clearly are from a distant past. A great classic song can make you feel nostalgia for a time you didn't even experience. It's that phenomenon that Bird took advantage of most on Thursday night.

Bird & Hampton

Accompanied by multi-instrumentalist Alan Hampton, Bird played both original and cover favorites from his recorded catalog. Highlights of the former included Armchair Apocrypha's plucky "Plasticities", the minimal "Pulaski at Night", and the swaying "Alabaster" from holiday album Hark! He culled multiple times from his deep well of tunes by Vince Guaraldi and beloved Americana duo The Handsome Family. Midway through the main set, Bird took advantage of returning home and invited Evanston-based longtime collaborator Nora O'Connor on stage. Though O'Connor has long been a backing vocalist for the likes of Bird, The New Pornographers, and The Decemberists, she and Bird actually played a deep cut she recorded with him, a version of Bob Dylan's "Oh Sister" from Bird's 2007 Soldier On EP. The three musicians on stage broke the song down, a capella style, before Bird built it back up with his violin.

Bird

But it was Bird's most recent releases of covers that ended up perfectly encapsulating the allure of the past. In May, he shared Sunday Morning Put-On (Loma Vista) with the trio of Hampton and drummer Ted Poor, a collection of jazz standards (plus one original) interpreted through Bird's unmistakable aesthetic. Bird knows that stringed instruments best emulate human voice, but on Sunday Morning Put-On, he explores the extent to which applying bow pressure on his violin strings can recall the rich sounds that result from blowing air into the mouthpiece of a horn instrument. Early in his set on Thursday, Bird and Hampton performed the Trio's rendition of Johnny Green and Edward Heyman's "I Cover the Waterfront", a song that's been recorded by the likes of Sarah Vaughan and Billie Holiday. Starting with violin, Bird's fluttering followed the original's vocal line; by the time he started singing, his bowing undulated like a tenor saxophone. The performance was eerie, uncanny, and time-bending.

Bird & Hampton

In October, Bird and singer-songwriter Madison Cunningham released Cunningham Bird (Loma Vista), a track-by-track recreation of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks' pre-Fleetwood Mac record Buckingham Nicks. For many in the crowd, even among the pop music aficionados, it was their first time hearing the songs at all: Remarkably, Buckingham Nicks is long out-of-print and not on any streaming services, save for some unofficial uploads to YouTube. Bird and O'Connor duetted a strummed, stripped-down, faster-paced version of "Races are Run". On both Cunningham Bird and on Thursday, for "Crystal", Bird inverted the gender of the lead singer, Cunningham and O'Connor, respectively, singing Buckingham's words, Bird harmonizing Nicks' parts. And there's a fun connection between Sunday Morning Put-On and Cunningham Bird, which is John Lewis' "Django", a song that not only did Bird and his Trio cover on the former but that Buckingham and Nicks covered for their album--meaning Bird also reinterpreted Buckingham and Nicks reinterpreting jazz. The version that led into "Races are Run" Bird played on Thursday was firmly the Cunningham Bird version--after all, Poor's drums are key on Sunday Morning Put-On--but the song's inclusion as a standard that can be adapted in many different ways underscored the very concept of Gezelligheid: conviviality, coziness, fun.

Bird & Hampton

Mary Lattimore

Opening for Bird was harpist Mary Lattimore, a musician who has demonstrated over the past several years that combining classical training with clear experimentation and a sense of humor can, too, result in something fun and beautiful. Lattimore, gifted her harp by Chicago-based factory Lyon & Healy, performed tracks from her dense back catalog, many of which had a story associated with them. She wrote Hundreds of Days' "On the Day You Saw the Dead Whale" after, yes, seeing a dead whale in a coastal California town where she was at a residency. "Wawa By The Ocean", included on her 2017 Collected Pieces compilation, was inspired by her holy routine of buying a hoagie from the Philadelphia-born convenience store/gas station chain and eating it on the Jersey Shore. (Upon finding out about the song, Wawa headquarters sent Lattimore a care package.) "Til a Mermaid Drags You Under" aims to reflect the duality of dark and light in the surf town where it was recorded with Slowdive guitarist Neal Halstead, for 2020's Silver Ladders. On Thursday, hearing the songs' contexts gave crowd members a starting point, either as a lens through which to take in the song or as a challenge to see if they could empty their heads and get lost in the pure sounds emanating from the stage. Lattimore, meanwhile, used synths and looping not to trick and lull you into layers, but to show you how she was manipulating the sounds in real-time, as tangible as her plucks and scratches of the harp. At one point, during Hundreds of Days standout "It Feels Like Floating", ambulances were outside driving down the street, sirens on, but the crowd was subsumed by Lattimore's playing. The harp didn't drown anything out by volume, but like Bird's violin would do later, it enraptured a group of people who had walked through the doors of the church to nestle in the safety of memory and imagination.

Lattimore

Lattimore

[nokingsonlyfooles]

Gods Are Up!

I am being very irresponsible about using Tumblr for updates like I promised! Well, my stylus tips aren't here yet, and the spouse is working on a paper, but I don't have the grey matter to do a real deep dive like I was gonna do on days beginning with T. So, here's an update! I got the list of Invisibles up on the site a few days ago and forgot to tell anyone.

I'm highlighting Lame Anthony [above] because I happen to have a full figure image of him. I gave all of them cute little representative graphics like this:

...which is probably more appropriate for a load of invisible creatures who can only tell mere mortals what they look like and what to call them.

Here are Anthony's stats!

Description: A thin man with a crooked stance and light-coloured hair. Either depicted in Medieval peasant garb or frayed jeans and a T-shirt — with varying accuracy as “jeans” and “T-shirts” took quite some time to appear in their modern incarnation. He does not wear shoes.

Personality: Hyperfocused Space Cadet.

Speciality: Protector of Broken Things. Uncertain how much he’s actually able to do.

Wants: To Admire Anything Broken. The best offerings to Lame Anthony are still in use and have a unique new function due to their brokenness.

Power Level: +/- 0 — he is an Invisible, but there is something wrong with him which may or may not make it impossible for him to do anything. At the very least it is hard for him to do things.

Difficulty Level: 11 — damn near impossible to hold, unable to stay long enough to take any action in a human body, beyond speaking a few words.

AKA: Anton the Broken (Prokovia), Ikswotangi (a museum piece, crayon on cardboard, purported to be the work of an art student who held him long enough to let him sign his own name. It also includes a mysterious sigil, forked lines resembling the track of a bird with a wobbly circle drawn around them, considered a poor attempt at a human figure by most.)

Notes

Even the gods aren’t perfect. Lame Anthony is here to raise questions about just what the hell it means to exist as an Invisible. If they’re not defined by their ability to do things, then what are they? In any case, he seems to be a happy transcendental being and Hyacinth’s house is basically his church.

He is protective of Erik, but he may not be able to do much to help anyone.

He got his own tarot card because he's always hanging around and he's thematically appropriate. I put him in Hyacinth's kitchen - which is a background I finished recently for Hyacinth's tarot card. He's made himself some paper dolls/shadow puppets, two of which are missing pieces of their heads (Erik and Hyacinth) and one of which has a chunk out of its heart (Mordecai). He's holding the broken wooden spoon he likes in between his teeth, as if it's a rose and he's about to do a tango. The scissors and paper scraps are all over the floor around his bare feet. I don't think he can really move physical objects like that, but he would if if could.

This is my take on Judgement, which has similar figures in similar positions with a totally different context.

That's a divine being (an angel) with an object in its mouth (a trumpet) above smaller human figures (man, child, and woman) with their arms raised. That's the wakeup call for Judgement Day, though. Lame Anthony is much more uncritical and accepting!

Since my eyes aren't working right and I adopted this new, simplified style, people and things are in black, and stuff that you can't see is in pure light - sometimes coloured, but the Invisibles are always plain white. (Unless I come up with a thematic reason to make an exception!)

Note music (which is heard and not seen) in white, and pink and aqua halo indicating Milo is enjoying his steampunk DDR experience. As I was putting this one together, I was about to put a smile on Milo's face (he does manage one occasionally, when he's not overthinking it) then I thought, "Milo should not be obligated to smile for the audience to know he is happy." In text, he doesn't have to, so I came up with a way to do that for him in pictures.

Lame Anthony is based mostly on this guy:

...at least in function and personality. Reverend Jim was definitely the least functional cabbie of the group, but everyone put up with him because you knew he couldn't help it and he was so damn nice. But I don't think Anthony sounds like him. Too excitable and focused. Jim is more liable to say, "Okay," and follow you if you tell him to quit doing something. Anthony will smile at you, wave, and wander right into traffic. Which will blow right through him, as he doesn't have a body and no one's managed to hold him for more than a minute, so it's fine.

If you're not reading Tin Soldier and Soldier On... You have no idea what I'm talking about. But, Invisibles mess with people and reality itself, some of them call themselves saints, angels, or fairies, and people call them gods. You can never get a consistent story out of them about anything. Maybe they made people, maybe people made them, maybe they are people, maybe they were never people... And none of that really matters because if you keep them happy they'll do things for you, and that's all people want from them.

...Except Lame Anthony. He can't really do anything. But maybe that doesn't matter either. He's living his best, uh, whatever-it-is.

I think all the gods I've featured in-story so far have an entry, and there are a few in there you'll meet later. All this stuff is Creative Commons and Share Alike, so if you like any of this god business, you can take it and run with it. Probably there's typos and formatting errors, and I want to do one more illustration for the music, but it's all legible and I made it and I think it's fun.

Yes, my few readers, David (or whatever that is) has an entry too!

In other news: I can't do any more art until I fix my stylus, and I'm going to donate to Whole Women's Health for April, kicking off at least four months of spite donations to women's healthcare providers, but I haven't yet. I've managed to get an appointment with a specialist after a year of begging my family doctor, and I'm anxious and exhausted, not yet knowing if I'm gonna go through another uphill slog to get any actual help. Or if they'll help me at all, I guess. That's taking up a lot of my headspace, so I"m gonna be all over the place this week.

I apologize in advance if I over-or-under-correct my weird behaviour over the next few days.

[jadedfadedalmostgone]

[dashintrash]

He is THE King (and the father)

[whatsnewalycat]

Made this for u 💝

[decamarks]

Thinking of becoming a guy that thinks wolves are the most badass and aspirational animal, but about ants. Like wearing t-shirts about being loyal to my Queen and training to bench 5x my bodyweight. Studying ant warfare. Posting shit like this

[kinocomix]

To the kid who painted this in my class, i see you kiddo. Great painting.

[trickwizard]

i love how the lines in the sand makes it so that Soldier just rotated 180 degrees without moving his feet or using his hands, gmod and sfm animation style

[prlssprfctn]

Freshly adopted Jason, who is so used to taking care of his mother that the first morning in the manor, he wakes up in early hours to cook for Bruce, too.

Logically speaking, he understands that Bruce doesn't need it — he is a healthy adult, and they have Alfred — but it is six in the morning, and his mind is foggy, so he just follows his instincts. Maybe he does not even realise that mom is not here, after all.

Alfred finds him in the weakly dimmed kitchen when he finishes his walk around the Manor before starting with his chores. He is amused at first, stopping quietly behind the child. He is doing great (that's a surprise since Dick intentionally just stirred more trouble), and Alfred can't help but smile a little.

'Good morning, master Jason. If you are hungry, you should wake me up the next time. I promise to take care of you.'

Jason blinks owlishly, still awfully sleepy. His eyes are barely opened, his hands working on the automat.

'Breakfast,' he mumbles, frowning a little. 'For mom- I mean, for dad.'

Alfred's smile falters. His original impression shifts in a late realisation.

Oh.

'Master Jason, you shouldn't really-'

'Finished,' he yawns, putting a one — just one, nothing for himself at all — plate in front of Alfred.

It is a very simple dish, scrambled eggs with some black paper and toasted bread — but not even made in a toaster, just on the pan; this kid probably doesn't know how to use toasters. It smells nice, Alfred compliments mentally.

'Can you-' He yawns. 'Pass to-'

And then little Jason falls asleep helplessly, falling right in Alfred's arms. He catches him, of course. This boy weighs nothing at all.

'Hey, Al,' Bruce sticks his head in the kitchen, no less sleepy. 'What is going on?'

Alfred explains to Bruce what happened, and he is no less distraught. He helps him to put Jason in the bed and eats all the breakfast he prepared, with a mixture of delight and despair.

And when Jason wakes up, embarrassed by the faint memories of the early morning, Alfred puts a big plate in front of him, filled with so much food that his big blue eyes light up instantly.

'Bon appetite, master Jason,' he smiles. 'Your cooking had passed my personal standards for a cook. You are a good soldier.'

Jason giggles, his mouth already stuffed with bacon.

'That I am.'

And that he always will be.

[iwritelmao]

Penelope: hey since you’re “not my kind and gentle husband” could you move that wedding bed bc I’m actually supposed to share that with my husband so…

Odysseus: *has just killed 108 people* *has not seen his wife in twenty years* *goes batshit at this bc THATS THE OLIVE TREE WHERE THEY FIRST MET!!*

Telemachus: oh hell nah, idgaf who you are no one yells at my-

Penelope: NO?! YOU WONT?! YEAH, I KNOW BECAUSE YOURE MY MAN! SO DONT PULL THAT EMO SHIT AGAIN OR YOULL SLEEP IN THE WEAPONS ROOM

…

Telemachus: my parents are perfect for each other

[quixoticprince]

Guys I don't think this kindly stranger is all that nice But yeah, if Medic confessed about stealing their souls in the next pages I don't think anyone would really care

Based on this post thread

[nokingsonlyfooles]

This Lesbian is Visible! (Because I Draw Her!)

This is Hyacinth! I redrew her tarot cards this week. (With the blue light filter on, I can see I didn't quite match the blacks for Abandonment, so I still hafta take another shot at that. Nevertheless, it should be good enough for Tumblr at internet resolutions.)

I'll unpack the tarot symbolism some other time, on a card-by-card basis. For the moment, I'll just let you random Tumblrites have a look at her in her latest form. My eyes aren't working right and detailed drawings hurt, so I'm doing everything up shadow-puppet-style.

Hyacinth repairs people and objects with metal, which is a thing you can do in Tin Soldier (and Soldier On!). She deserted the army to get away from the only woman she ever loved - she has issues and she needs you to fix her! She didn't go home and find Barnaby had sold the house to a cute little family in winter, but the original 5 of Cups has snow, so I went with it. It's metaphorical snow. Her current found family are certainly not faceless, stereotyped, or nuclear. She prefers them, but she likes to tell herself she doesn't really need them, or need anyone.

Anyways, she'll repair you within an inch of your life and she's happy to make friends - unless you look like you're going to require some kind of commitment out of her. Oh, but maybe someday we'll get her a girlfriend who's able to roll with the punches... You'll have to read to find out!

[vogelys]

TF2 will always have a special place in my heart

[loch-n-ceol]

Thanks Valve, I’m crying