#the world and my body collaborate to keep me underground and as still as possible.

[khamomile-kitty]

well I got energy to start writing again, got ready to do it, then immediately got hit by a wave of depression that smashed it. I swear to god the universe hates to see my creativity and I’m p sick of it

[therappundit]

Top 10 Rappers of 2020

The finish line of this long, surreal year is finally upon us...which means that it’s time for me to throw down the gauntlet in the ‘Best of 2020’ frivolous list race!  🙌

*Just to be clear*: this is a list of MCs who I believe turned in the best overall performances in 2020. ***This is NOT a list of the my top 10 favorite MCs***, or even who I believe to be the best MCs in the world at the moment...these are simply dope artists that put forth the strongest, most consistently interesting and important (to the genre) high-quality work in the perilous year that was 2020. 

If you think your favorite MC was slighted....well, Michael Jordan is the greatest to ever play the game of basketball but even he didn’t win MVP every year, right? I encourage you to write your own list - it’s a cool way to dap artists that are too often overlooked by industry websites, and share the music you enjoy with others that may not have given the record a spin otherwise.

Even if 2020 didn’t bring you the “instant classic” you had been hoping for, I think it’s hard to deny that this year really had impressive depth when it came to showcasing some of the most diverse music that the genre has to offer.  I can’t speak for music in general - sadly I’m just The Rap Pundit, not The Music Pundit - but I can say that it has been an impossible task to keep a playlist less than 500 songs deep at a time, because for every truly great release in 2020 there seemed to be 30 very good releases. 👌

So how did I come about these 10 MCs (and Honorable Mentions)? Before you get huffy about who I snubbed (and that is pointed directly at my jury of older head peers that consider themselves tastemakers, but also haven’t opened their minds up to any new takes on rap styles since the year 2000)...here are the five chief pieces of criteria that I put into finalizing my list:

- quality (whatever lane you’re in, how often did you ‘own it’?)

- quantity (at least 10 very good-to-great songs released, and 3-4 verses that stand out as a ‘must-hear’ for any rap music fan)

- consistency (not just 4-5 great features and a few forgettable solo tracks, will I want to keep at least 7 or 8 of your own new songs released in 2020 in my rotation for 2021?)

- impact (are you so vital to the type of rap music you make that if you stopped rapping tomorrow, there’s no one else in the game that could fill that void?)

- “it” factor (are you carried by a co-sign or an elite production team, or did you bring a style/talent to the table that could carry a record in and of itself?)

Got it? Then here we go...

1. Conway the Machine

I hope 2020 was the type of year that Conway the Machine had been hoping for since he first began his journey with rap music. After years of scraping and hustling towards music industry recognition (and not just cult figure status), at year’s end we see Griselda’s top Lieutenant holding down a rare balancing act: champion of underground hip-hop, and most requested feature by any mainstream rap star looking to add some tough-talking muscle to their album.

While much of Conway’s content has always been driven by surviving an attempt on his life in 2012, much like 50 Cent, Conway’s way with words and perspective manage to elevate the quality of his material to a higher tier than most. And where - at least in his heyday - 50 Cent benefited from an indestructible super-villain persona, Conway’s success can be greatly attributed to a larger-than-life heart.  With every braggadocious act of gunplay, there are moments of gratefulness to still being alive to share success with his brethren, as well as a painful longing to be with close allies that are no longer with him (at least not in the physical form).

Above all else, in 2020 Conway the Machine did what he has always done throughout his career: delivered well written, passionate bars about coming up in an impossibly challenging environment and coping with loss...only now his craftsmanship and understanding of how to channel all of those feelings into a more polished final product have yielded the most well-rounded solo project of his career in From King to a God. Progress is a slow process, but the long and winding road has finally taken Conway a step closer to that G.O.A.T. status he will hopefully continue to reach for...

Best Evidence: FKTG, and a countless number of scene-stealing verses alongside rap acts ranging from deep underground to household names

2. Freddie Gibbs

I don't use the word "sauce" all too often (this may actually be the first time), but if there was any MC guaranteed to bring sauce to any rap record right now, it's Freddie Gibbs. 

Forever existing somewhere between gritty gangsta and syrupy old soul, the flavor that Freddie brings to every verse is malleable enough to work on virtually any type of record, which was certainly proven in 2020. Anyone foresee a Gibbs & Alchemist Grammy nomination heading into 2020? It’s a testament to how high quality work, through consistent reliability and dues paid, can elevate a project from underground niche following to critical acclaim. While his work with Alchemist may not reach the lofty levels of his heralded collaborations with Madlib, Alfredo represents the best that “quarantine music” can offer...two talented friends saying one day, “hey we should finally drop a full tape together, why not?” - and then BOOM, it happens.

Too many fail to remember that Gibbs already has a long accomplished body of work behind him...so the fact that he may just be entering his prime now, is scary.

Best Evidence: Alfredo, Machinedrum’s “Kane Train”

3. Boldy James

Comeback MC of the year, and no it is not close (but big shout-out to Grafh, another dope MC who had an amazing year).

I'm old enough to remember when folks like Roc Marciano and Ka were seen as sleepy, monotone rappers with little hope of reaching permanent rap icon status (flash-forward to today, and they are widely consider geniuses). For some, the quieter, less hook-dependent approach to making rap songs, was....well, not great rap music. They were wrong then and they’re wrong now, but similar to how the coolest, smartest cat in the room is rarely the loudest, it can take some time and patience before everyone learns what’s what. Time is what is required to appreciate Detroit’s Boldy James, a veteran that has been through it - both in terms of the ups and downs of the music business, as well as the streets through which he draws his stories and inspiration.

Boldy makes it seem all too easy, rapping his verses with the cool, casual tone of telling old stories to a close friend over drinks. Dropping multiple projects (with one still to come) in one year can often lead to over-saturation. Even the most dedicated fans/stans can begin to feel less enthusiastic about new releases when they have already received a healthy portion of more of the same...but most rap fans are not necessarily Boldy James fans. Boldy fans (much like Roc Marciano and Ka fans) are already aware that knowing what type of material to expect from your favorite MC can be a blessing if that MC takes pride in the execution of the final product, rather than the noise leading up to it. 

The beauty of his collaboration with The Alchemist (big year for that guy, huh?), The Price of Tea in China, is that it celebrates the more subtle nuances of boom-bap, proving that great MC and producer chemistry can trump the “shock & awe” of more uptempo rap music. The shock in Boldy James’ lyrics sits within the detailed descriptions of the cold world he grew up in...so monotone or not, how can any music could be more gripping than that?

Best Evidence: TPOTIC, Manger On McNichols, a long list of consistently perfect feature verses

4. 42 Dugg

I would say this is more of a longterm investment rather than the celebration of a rapper already within rap’s inner circle, but 42 Dugg didn’t just steal the show on every feature this year, he also displayed maturity in his ability to craft well-rounded, high quality rap singles. I’m talking joints that work just as well on the street tape level as they would at the radio level. That is especially rare to see from a rapper that is still relatively new to national conversations. 

So much more than just a co-sign of Lil Baby and Yo Gotti, the Detroit eastsider has already proven that he can craft a full solo album with the swagger of a far more seasoned MC. 42 Dugg combines a Boosie-esque, "oh you think you’re better than me??” chip on his shoulder with the unpredictable bombast of Lil Wayne. What he may lack in punchlines he makes up for in musicianship, his voice bringing one of the most nimble touches to trap music that I have heard in a long time. 42 Dugg music is hard and soulful, with the natural hunger of a rapper that knows me might be one smash away from superstardom. By this time next year, I’m betting he will be. 

Best Evidence: Young & Turnt 2 (Deluxe), features on high profile records like Lil Baby’s “Grace” and “We Paid”, and a growing stream of attention grabbing solo loosies

5. Rome Streetz

In 2020 it was almost impossible to be an underground MC with a great project unless you landed a Rome Streetz verse. 

Rome has been bubbling for a while now, but in 2020 he unleashed an onslaught on the game. At times he seemed like the hardest working MC in underground circles, busting his ass to not only make as many appearances as possible, but also to own any song he guested on. He raps like every verse might be “the one” that gets him a huge contract, and that’s a level of hunger and consistency that will likely land him more than one huge contract someday. In spite of that laundry list of strong features, the young Brooklyn MC still managed to release multiple dope solo projects, all flashing a rap style that feels at once a throwback and the fresh voice NYC rap needs. 

Rome is clearly from the same school as many of the New York City greats, because he has the capacity to deliver dark, potent bars with the sharp intellect of a Harvard lecture (think AZ before “Sugar Hill”). While he sounds most at home when he’s rhyming over instrumentals that run more coldblooded than a horror flick, it���s easy to picture him popping up in more places in 2021...if that’s even possible.

Best Evidence: Noise Kandy 4, Kontraband, The Residue, and at least 50 incredible features with a who’s-who of the underground’s finest

6. Stove God Cook$

No one saw this coming....well, maybe Roc Marciano, Lord Jamar, Busta Rhymes and a few more NYC heads in the know - but I guarantee you, no one else saw the Stove God coming!

Bar for bar, no MC owned more rewind-worthy rap quotables in 2020 than Stove God Cook$. Dropping a solo debut with VERY little fanfare and zero features (apart from the steady, reliable guidance of Roc Marciano - low key one of hip-hop’s most reliable producers), a slow bubbling word of mouth campaign on social media eventually got Stove God verses exposed to more and more high profile ears. Such a grass roots campaign is rarely seen...I mean, a rap album slowly becoming a critical darling simply off the strength of more and more random folks discovering the music and Tweeting about it, as opposed to the buzz being calculated before the product??? It feels almost too good to be true these days, as early reviews of Reasonable Drought typically lead with something along the lines of, “hey, have you heard of this album? I have no idea who this is, but it is 🔥🔥🔥”

It has often been said that Roc Marciano has a lot of “sons” in the game, implying that Roc Marci gave birth to a style that a whole generation of underground MCs run with today. So it’s ironic (or perhaps highly appropriate?) that the next level of progression for Roc might be to have a protege, a young Jedi to carry on the tradition on Roc’s own terms, and become the next new star to be embraced by the old heads. But Stove God isn’t a clone of Roc, or anyone else, he’s simply one of the most exciting artists to hit the NYC underground in a generation. Everything from his word choice, to his fresh references and sense of humor, to his delivery and the way he structures his verses, feels like a collection of “firsts”, there’s simply no one sounding like him. And if his work in 2020 is any indication, he will continue to be in a league of his own for years to come.

Best Evidence: Reasonable Drought, spotlight snatching features alongside Roc Marciano and Griselda’s finest

7. Lil Baby

Once viewed by some as just another “Lil”, Lil Baby had been rollin’ coming into 2020, but by the end of 2020 it’s clear that he has arrived at the forefront of rap music’s most reliable hitmakers right now. 

A must-have feature on any rap album reaching for max exposure, Lil Baby’s dexterous flow, charisma, and pen that is significantly sharper than early reports indicated, made him one of the few shining stars in 2020 to consistently deliver good rap music to what in any other year would have been considered smash hits in any club.

What makes Lil Baby’s music standout is that he could easily be a “cookie cutter” MC, phoning in verse after verse just to get another check, but instead he continues to bring it - trying to squeeze in an extra catchy lyric, maybe flow in a way that breaks up a verse to make it stand out from the pack a little more - and even when he is featured over cookie cutter beats that sound like every other trap inspired beats that came before it, Baby seems eager to prove something. I think that’s what I like about him - he’s on a short list of mainstream-bred Young Thug disciples that seem to really want to put the work in to becoming one of the greats. 

Best Evidence: I mean...did any rap star have more songs in circulation this year? Dude was everywhere, but “The Bigger Picture” got his name officially into the lyricist conversation (even though personally I don’t even think it’s one of his more impressive records - at least not stylistically)

8. Westside Gunn

No one denies that the Griselda Records team had a banner year, yet somehow the vocal leader of the group managed to drop a handful of dope projects without receiving credit for being a great MC in his own right. Great artist, great album curator, great business man - sure, but great MC?? That credit is rarely given to the FLYGOD. He might not even understand how natural he is as a solo MC, waxing unpredictable flows and half-bars that stick in your mind in place of catchy hooks or predictable song structure. He might call himself an artist first, but I still call him one of the most prolific rappers today (regardless of whether he retires after the ball drops).

I can’t believe I have to tell rap fans this in the year 2020...but......you all know that message and punchlines are just part of the art of rapping, right...and not the only thing that defines who is a dope MC and who isn’t?? Play any solo cut from Westside Gunn and filter out the “doot-doot-doots” and stream of conscious hooks and what you are left with is one of the most distinctive voices in rap music, attempting off-kilter flows and phrases over some of the most impressive production in rap music today, and to me that sounds like my kind of rap music. What the Buffalo floor general lacks in diversity of subject matter he makes up for with a relentless imagination.

That’s why it’s not all that surprising to me that Westside Gunn enjoyed more mainstream attention in 2020 than he ever has before. All he needed was a window of exposure and he certainly capitalized on it, pitching his sound and his vision in all the right places, without compromising his style or vacating his lane. So strictly as a MC, I would consider him the Young Thug of the east coast underground scene, and if 2020 does turn out to be his final year of recording solo projects, I am thankful that he already has a long list of quality projects with high replay value to revisit again and again. But don’t wait - give this man his flowers now.

Best Evidence: “Euro Step”, “Rebirth”, “327″, “Shawn vs. Flair”, “Michael Irvin”, and YES he even had a more than worthy verse on “$500 Ounces” alongside Freddie Gibbs and Roc Marciano

9. Benny the Butcher

Who else is more reliable to deliver a dope feature verse than Benny?

By now you must be muttering at least a few things about me, so let me just make two points: YES, I am a big fan of Griselda records, but NO I do not consider that an unreasonable bias because even on paper according to a large variety of sources, it’s clear that Conway, Boldy James, Westside Gunn and Benny are true specialists when it comes to the quality of the work they distribute. Its not a fluke or a trend, they’re just that good at what they do...I have been saying this for almost 5 years now, but in 2020 the rest of you sleepy heads finally just stopped hitting snooze.

Benny the Butcher already possesses the writing capacity, attention to detail, and skills of observation/personal reflection to put himself within special company as one of the nicest pens in the business today. But in 2020, he dialed things up even higher...or perhaps word of mouth just finally caught up with the rest of his peers? The tribute to the classic Roc-A-Fella era that was his Burden of Proof project with Hit-Boy helped expose Benny to a much larger audience, and it has been beautiful to see so many more folks quoting and sharing his lyrics on Twitter, because I recall when he had about the same amount of Followers that I do, because it wasn’t all that long ago (I just hope they go back to experience all of his prior work - I’m still partial to his incredible verses on “Shower Shoe Lords” and “Pissy Work”)! 

In my not so humble opinion, I do think some of the more dramatic pomp and circumstance on the BOP album was more suited to a Rick Ross or Meek Mill than Benny, so I’m actually more excited to hear what Benny has in store for 2021. He truly sounds at his best over more minimalistic production that lets his lyrics fill the spotlight...but still, tracks like “Timeless” and “Legend” do remind me of some of my favorite moments from old JAY-Z albums...blasphemous, maybe, but true.

A shot to the leg last month seems to have done nothing to slow his momentum, so if you didn’t board the bandwagon by now, you are inexcusably late.

Best Evidence: Burden of Proof, mercilessly slaughtering every verse on every Griselda projects, and a ton of show-stealing features

10. Drakeo the Ruler

What a journey it's been for the L.A. rising star. 

Flexing a penchant for placing local slang into his music and delivering dark verses with a clear sense of humor, it's easy to see the appeal of Drakeo's style. If Thank You For Using GTL was an inspiring attempt to do anything possible to keep his buzz going (in that case, recording his verses over a prison phone), the quick release of We Know The Truth shortly after he regained his freedom seems to have given him a 50 Cent-esque teflon aura at the moment. 

But this is about more than just Drakeo himself, it’s about what he represented before incarceration, and what he represents now. As one of the more visible forces in a new generation of west coast hip-hop, Drakeo was a few key features away from exploding onto the national scene. Now after surviving his ordeal, likely with a great deal more to write about, his ceiling has only been raised - and along with his growth potential, so rises the potential for the current rap scene out in L.A. right now. Mark my words: by this time next year Drakeo’s flow will be one of the most flagrantly jacked flows in rap music coast to coast.

A sincere welcome home from the rap world, Drakeo the Ruler. Hopefully the worst is now behind you. 🙏

Best Evidence: We Know The Truth, Free Drakeo, Thank You For Using GTL

*Honorable Mentions*:

Che Noir, Ka, Ransom, Billy Woods, Royce Da 5′9″, Jay Electronica, Fly Anakin, Curren$y, Lil Uzi Vert, Roc Marciano, Skyzoo, Black Thought, Tee Grizzley, Your Old Droog, Flee Lord, Lil Wayne

[thanksjro]

Dark Cybertron Chapter 1: Welcome to Comic Event Hell

You know what readers love? When the stories they’ve gotten invested in over the course of a couple years get interrupted for some pseudo-crossover bullshit.

And you know what writers love? When the story they’ve been crafting over the course of a couple years get interrupted for some pseudo-crossover bullshit.

Did I say love?

Because I didn’t mean it.

“Dark Cybertron” was penned by John Barber and James Roberts, with collaboration with comic writer and artist Phil Jimenez, and was published from early November, 2013 to late March, 2014. Atilio Rojo, James Raiz, and Livio Ramondelli did the art, each responsible for scenes in specific locations, with Robert Gill filling in as needed. Alex Milne, Andrew Griffith, and Brendan Cahill would also contribute pencils to the first issue and the back half of the series. It was a celebration of the 30th anniversary of the franchise, and the second birthday of Phase Two... which went on for over four months, but never mind that!

Both "Dark Cybertron” and its preliminary materials were made to go alongside the Transformers: Generations toy-line, each issue being included as a toy pack-in with whatever character was being featured… or, at least, that was the plan. Sometimes it didn’t work out. Regardless, this storyline was created to sell toys directly, as opposed to the MTMTE/RID series being made to sell toys more through the power of suggestion. It’s a small distinction, but important, because it will help explain any lack of soul one may perceive while they read “Dark Cybertron”.

“But Hannz!” you cry out, reaching to grab me by the throat and shake me like a rag doll, because to you I’m merely a faceless voice on the internet. “Surely by calling this specific storyline soulless, you’re completely ignoring the very nature of this franchise that you’re almost uncomfortably invested in!”

To which I’ll say this: look, I’m pretty realistic about where my giant space robots came from; Transformers as a franchise would not exist the way it does without Ronald Reagan introducing the Free Market to literal children and fucking up how we interact with media for the rest of time. There is no ethical consumption under capitalism, and that rings especially true when I’ve got a Spinister on my bookshelf staring me down as I write this, that was likely made out of plastics which either involved blood oil or unethical labor practices, if not both.

However!

The choices of a company to have their comic license holders to cook up an entire plot that derails what they’ve already got planned out for toy tie-in comics is a completely different animal than what IDW had had going on up to this point. Phase Two had been about exploring different ideas that hadn’t been able to be explored during the war, and seeing what happens when you take away a third of the logline for Transformers G1 as a whole. Being a part of a brand of toys was almost inconsequential to how the stories were being told; even the Spotlights, which were also toy tie-in comics, had plenty of charm to them, if only because there weren’t quite as many constraints placed on the writers, and they were stand-alone issues.

Of course, being tie-in comics isn’t the only reason that “Dark Cybertron” is a bit of a slog, considering everything IDW itself was trying to get done within this storyline, but we’ll cover the publishing company’s/Simon Furman’s/Transformers’ tumultuous relationship with the concept of gender identity and expression later on, when it becomes relevant to the story proper. This point also ties into the interesting origin of Windblade, who we’ll meet in a few issues, and what happens when you let your fanbase have a taste of power and forget that people might like to see themselves represented in the media they consume.

“Dark Cybertron” is what ended up making me stop reading MTMTE the first time I tried it in 2015. A big part of it was because it forced the reader to need so much information from RID and even events prior to Phase Two, it wasn’t very fun to try to parse what was going on, on top of the writing beginning to flag because of obvious constraints to what Barber and Roberts could actually do, both within their deadlines and the rules put in place by their higher ups for the event.

 “Dark Cybertron” is the result of the sort of executive meddling that kills reader enjoyment by requiring writers to cram their two worlds together as quickly as possible, without the option to go for nuance because there simply isn’t time. The reason we have four separate artists for the front half of this story is because Milne and Griffith didn’t have time to draw both their current workload and “Dark Cybertron” at the same time... but sales probably went up due to the nature of how the story was published, so I’m sure they didn’t really see a problem with it.

That’s a general “they”, not a Milne and Griffith “they”.

In short, we’ve got license contract obligations, fan-poll obligations, and gender stuff fighting for space within the next 12 issues, which will be published in the span of roughly four months. Things are probably going to be a little bloated and sloppy.

Regardless of any of these points, this is what we’ve got. It’s not like it’s all bad- “Dark Cybertron” has the benefit of being written by two people who had been working closely before it had even been conceptualized. Barber was the senior editor for MTMTE, and IDW as a whole until he left in 2016. It also isn’t a proper crossover- y’know, where two completely separate titles get mashed together for a bit. MTMTE and RID exist in the same universe, just have their own things going on, so a decent amount of things still carry over without you needing to have read every single thing in both. The writing, while not quite up to par with pieces that had more creative freedom and breathing room between scenes, is still recognizable as being Barber and Roberts’. Their voices are still here, they’re just strained under the weight of everything that has to be said inside of 12 issues.

With all THAT out of the way, let’s dive in to Dark Dawn: Dark Cybertron Chapter 1.

We get a quick rundown of the most basic information you’ll need for this entire story to make sense, as we reintroduce the fact that Shockwave is an ecoterrorist with more agendas than a daily planner factory on meth, and also that he grows magic crystals. I don’t care what he says, the Ores are fucking space-magic. If you don’t want to read through all of RID for everything else, please see Robots in Disguise (2012), #1-22- A Recap, For Reference Purposes.  We also get a quick rundown of the Lost Lighters’ deal, as Swerve potentially has a meta-episode.

Be careful what you fucking wish for, bucko.

Our story proper starts with a flashback to the shittiest road trip Cyclonus ever went on, as the Ark 1 finds itself at the edge of a mysterious portal. This is likely why he wasn’t super thrilled when the portal to Luna 1 showed up- portals are probably a touchy subject for him.

Jhiaxus doesn’t know what this portal is- surely this means that science has failed us, and it’s time to call in the religious crowd to try and suss out what’s going on here.

It’s moments like this that make me wonder what exactly happened in the Dead Universe that made Cyclonus’ cheek meat just pack up and leave.

Now, we know that Cyclonus is correct here, because we as readers have more knowledge than the characters at this point, but Jhiaxus tries to write off this theory as hogwash, because he is a man of rationality and science. This is a slight removal from his character in the present, whose most notable traits seem to be a lack of ethics and screaming.

Everyone here seems to be slightly different from their current iterations, actually; Galvatron doesn’t say a word as he steps between Jhiaxus and Cyclonus, only using his body to communicate that the scientist might want to back off. Cyclonus himself is certainly the wordiest we’ve ever seen him to be, droning on through his actual thought process before he comes to a conclusion on what exactly they’ve found. Compare this to the Cyclonus of today, who only deigns to grace everyone with his voice if they outright threaten him, have something he wants, or are Tailgate. If he were to ever pull this verbal meandering on board the Lost Light, people would probably assume he’s having a stroke.

Nova Prime- you remember him, don’t you?- gives not a fuck about the Dead Universe, only what it means for him personally. And what it means for him is more locations to subjugate, because he is cartoonishly evil. His character is the least removed from his present-day iteration out of everyone. He tells the crew they’ll be getting a little closer, only for the portal to do the work for them, by way of dark energy tentacles.

Wow, the pilot for the Ark 1 really is just straight-up named Butt, isn’t he? And what the fuck is that face you’re making, Cyclonus? Are you- oh my god, are you emoting? Oh my god, he’s emoting.

As the Ark 1 is pulled to its doom, Jhiaxus makes a quick phone call to Shockwave to tell him he’s his favorite, and to keep up the good work.

In the present, Shockwave reflects on just how friggin’ long this whole ordeal has taken. Fortunately, Waspinator and the Titan are almost here, and he can hardly wait.

Not, uh, that he’s got emotions or anything. It’s been established that he doesn’t have those anymore. Is impatience an emotion? Does that count?

Shockwave seems like he’d be really frustrating to write for.

Anyway, the Titan shows up, the Ore inside him and the Ore in the underground Crystal City combine, and the Titan starts screaming because everything hurts. Shockwave’s about as thrilled as he can be about the situation, given his lack of emotions.

Above Crystal City, we finally get back to that nonsense about the early sunrise, as someone- maybe Starscream, given the color of the narration box- waxes poetic on the planet of Cybertron, wartorn and wild in its rebirth, ruled by paranoia that has nothing to bounce off of, and so creates its own walls.

Then we get a detailed shot of Rattrap’s mug, and the moment is broken.

Rattrap’s character is a lot of fun in everything he gets tossed into, but you’re a goddamn liar if you think he’s pretty to look at. You are lying to yourself, and I won’t apologize for saying it.

Starscream walks out of his room in his hot new body, feeling fine and ready to take on the world. We’ll check in on him later in the day to see how that positive mentality is working out for him.

So, the sun hasn’t moved, and it’s way too early for the sun to even be up right now. That’s weird. Because I guess he didn’t know how the sun works, Starscream’s only just realized that this is perhaps a problem. He does some computer work and realizes that this is indeed a very bad thing, and asks that Rattrap call the Autobots. Not the ones who fucked off into the wilderness, the other ones. The gay, space ones.

Up in space, Orion Pax and his pals have found themselves in dire straits, the collapsing Gorlam Prime sucking their ship back down as the Death Ore consumes everything.

That’s not how engines work! And I think it really says something about the “Prelude” issues that I completely forgot why Wheelie was down an arm for a solid five seconds.

It turns out that Orion was the narrator the entire time, which I should have known- since when is the once and future Optimus Prime not the primary voice in any media he appears in?

It’s looking rough for the fellas, but luckily we’ve got to get the plot rolling, so the Lost Light VZZZZTs into existence and picks up the Skyroller to place it gently into its belly.

Orion isn’t exactly jazzed about the fact that Rodimus didn’t listen to what he told him, not even bothering to thank the guy for saving his life. I say y’all keep going on your Thunderclash Quest and leave this ungrateful loser behind. No space yachting for you, Orion.

The rest of the Pax Posse enter the Lost Light proper, and Hardhead reveals that he nearly joined the Quest, before he saw who all would be coming with, while Garnak has a tearful reunion with Rodimus. The fact that he’s calling him Sir- which I don’t recall him doing in Transformers (2009), at least not in a way that seems reminiscent of an unfortunate Antebellum Period Romance- feels rather weird, but I’m glad someone’s fucking happy to see Rodimus at least. Ultra Magnus asks Orion if he’ll be assuming command of the vessel, as Rodimus tries not to look horrified by the thought alone, but fortunately Orion’s not going to pull his “I’m Optimus Prime and I Can Do What I Want” Card just yet.

Smash cut to the bridge, as Rodimus tries to make himself sound competent, when Starscream calls. Orion doesn’t like that Starscream has their number, Perceptor almost reveals the fact that this ship technically doesn’t belong to a faction, likely due to being purchased after the war, and Cyclonus gets brought in for his professional opinion.

As it turns out, that early sunrise isn’t a sunrise at all, but a portal to the Dead Universe. This is a problem, because the Dead Universe really sucks, and you don’t want to go there, especially if you enjoy being alive. Orion seems more concerned about the fact that Starscream is ruling the planet, and Bumblebee is nowhere to be found.

Speaking of Bumblebee, he and all his camp buddies are psyching themselves up for a confrontation.

Swoop, please, this is hardly the time for crudeness.

The Dinobots, sick of Bumblebee’s dithering about, decide they’re going to fight the fucking sun and gear up. Prowl, though generally disliking their brand of problem-solving, does share his begrudging respect of their can-do attitude.

Their can-do attitude over fighting the fucking sun.

Then an earthquake happens and the ground rips open to reveal that Titan that Waspinator showed up with.

Shockwave takes over the narration at this point, and we get artsy, as we see events that haven’t transpired yet over musings on the nature of... time? Maybe? It would be in line with Roberts’ go-to topics, but honestly the whole thing’s kind of vague so I couldn’t give you a solid answer. Shockwave gets awfully introspective for a guy who shouldn’t care, I know that much. The point is, he is inevitable and is super good at logic and science.

Also, Nova Prime and Galvatron are back, which is cool, I guess. Not sure where Galvatron had gotten to exactly after the events of “Chaos”, but he’s back now, so it doesn’t matter too terribly much. Shockwave serves them, which we’ll probably get an explanation for at some point.

God, you can practically taste the desperation to pin all these plot points together before the entire thing implodes on itself.

[draco-kasai]

Hero Collaboration Program

Summery: High School Hero Collaboration Program! Helping Sophomore hero students connect with others around the world! Come join us for a two-week-long trip to one of our schools for an amazing once in a lifetime experience with students of Yuuei! Only a lucky 40 students will be selected for this program. They will be split into two groups of 20 and sent to different schools to have completely unique experiences!

A/N: AKA, A very ambitious fanfic I started because even though I have another fanfic in progress my brain decided to give me an idea and I just had to do it. These are all characters I adore and I even did lots of reasurch on them to hopefuly get them down right. I also too many backstories and threw them into a meat grinder to remold them in a way that would make them fit into this universe.

I love Class 1-A, but like they need to be taken down a peg or two, and I want to see them get their asses handed to them.  

Ch. 1 part 2 of 3 Program Sign-Ups -->

Chapter 1 Part 3

           Chapter 1 Part 1

The sound of wheels rolling against concrete and mild chatter flowed around the skate park. A small group of friends all joked about as they took turns going down the vert ramp. A tanned girl with dark brown hair, dark purple horns and pointed ears. Laughed as her brown haired friend almost slipped off his board when he landed beside them. His dark blue eyes glared back over at her, making her snort at his attempt to be intimidating. 

“Stop laughing, Paloma, it’s not funny.” The boy huffed, straightening out his T-shirt.  

With another giggle, she kicked off the top of the ramp with her scooter. Getting some air over at the other side, she gripped the handle bars once she landed and moved to the other side. Performing a tail grab, she smirked, “yes it was.” she spoke quickly, her own tail poking the boys' forehead, before landing back on the ramp and rolling to the other side. Noah blinked a few times in surprise before frowning. The sound of a giggle had him turning to a girl with long red hair that was tied up in a ponytail.

“Bettyyyy!” He whined, making her giggles turn into laughter.

“I - I’m sorry, Noah! It - it’s just… your face!” She covered her lips in an attempt to stifle her laughter. The boy besides her pouts. 

“Ouch, my own girlfriend.” Noah dramatically slapped a hand over his chest, “Well, it was a good two months while it lasted.” 

Betty snorts as she pokes his cheek, “Stop it, I’m just messing with you.” 

“I’m gone for three minutes!'' The two turn to see Paloma smirking at them. The couple glance over at one another before laughing. Rolling her brown eyes, Paloma gestured towards the ramp, “Your turn, Betty. We’ll meet you on the ground.”

With a smile, the girl tightened her ponytail, “Gotcha.” giving her boyfriend a quick peck on the cheek, she adjusted her board and rushed down the ramp. After performing a few tricks, she slowed her descent down and made her way off the ramp to her friends. “Hey Regeena, hey Chaz.” She greeted the other two that joined her group.

“Sup Betty.” they both responded in unison. Opting to get out of the way of the other skaters, the group of friends made their way to sit at a bench. 

“I still can’t believe she’s still in the hero course after that.” Regeena along with everyone else chuckled.

“I keep telling her she should just stick to photography, but she’s so obsessed with proving herself better than Betty.” Chaz sighs, “You’d think she’d stop doing that already.” 

“I mean, she’s gotten better.” Noah pats his friend's shoulder reassuringly, “at least she’s not flaunting her money and wealth around anymore.” 

“Or getting me into trouble.” Betty adds 

“True that.” Regeena nods, “You know, if she wasn’t so obsessed with being better than you, I think she’d make a great rescue hero.’

“Gasp, praise? For Penelope? Regeena I’m shocked.” Paloma jokes, making the girl slap her shoulder. 

“Yeah, oh, hey, Betty, are you signing up for the uh, hero thing program?” Chaz asked, “Penelope came home complaining about the program, I read through the packet though, it seems like fun.”

The redhead smirked, leaning back in her seat she crossed her arms over her chest, “Of course I am. I’d never miss an opportunity to better myself and meet new people.”

“Ahhh I’m going to miss you.” Noah pouts as he lays his head on her shoulder. Green eyes roll skyward as she gently pats her boyfriend's cheek.

“I haven't even gotten accepted yet, Noah. I still have to fill out the packet and get through the interviews.” 

“He’s not wrong, though,” Chaz pouts, “when you do get accepted, cause there’s no way you won’t be, you’ll be gone for two weeks.”

“Wha - two weeks!?” Paloma and Regeena gasped.

“Oooo girl, I’m already missing you so much!” Regeena rose to her feet to walk around the bench and hug her friend. 

“Make sure to text us if you can!” Paloma knocks Betty back into Noah’s chest with a hug. 

“Agh guys! You’re suffocating meeee!” Betty laughs. Noah and Chaz exchange a look before developing them all in a hug, making the girls squeal. “You guuuuys~! Common! Let go! Let’s go skate already!”

“No way! Let me carve this moment into my memory where I will forever look back on it fondly!” Paloma laughed 

“Awe, guuyys” Betty giggles as she does her best to hug who she can.

Betty Barrett. Age 16. Seat 7. Student Rank 6. Hero Name: Atomic Betty. Quirk: Self Gravity 

Can control the gravity of her own body, making it lighter or heavier. She is able to single out any part of her body with her quirk for a stronger attack. With enough concentration, she could manipulate her body’s center of gravity, allowing her to walk on walls.

Hand to hand, Karate, Jujitsu

____

A tall boy walked into the large house in silence. Setting down his backpack on the counter, he began taking out any homework he had been assigned. He paused when his eyes landed on the packet his school had handed out to anyone in the hero courses. If he remembers correctly, his older cousin had taken part in the program years ago, too.

Setting the packet down, he let out a heavy sigh. Walking into the kitchen, he prepared himself something he could snack on while he worked on homework. Wondering back over to the table, he set down the plate and began homework. Once he was finished, he eyed the packet once again. 

Maybe if he got in, his parents would come home and congratulate him. 

He shook the thought off immediately. His parents want him to be a performer, not a hero like he wants to be. They never supported his dream, and yet they're proud of his cousin Zatana. Maybe it’s because she’s a daylight hero, and not an underground hero like he wants to be.

Would Zatana be happy for him if she knew he had applied?

Silently, he wondered if she’d tell her old mentor, his hero; Constantine, and what he would think. 

He bit his lower lip at the thought. His family is never home, they're always busy with putting on shows. Would they even notice him gone for two weeks? No... Probably not. With a heavy sigh, he turned the packet to the page that had to be filled in. Even if nobody is proud of him or supports his dreams, he will be a hero and this program sounds like it would be beneficial for him.

Zachary Zatara. Age 16. Seat 1. Student Rank 7. Hero Name: Mage. Quirk: Magic.

With magic, he can do various unexplainable things. 

Staff fighting, hand to hand, martial arts.

____

A tanned girl with glasses hummed as she took a sip of her drink, “So, what do you guys think of that program, Mlle. Bustier told us about?” She asked as she brought a hand up to play with the bright strands of her hair.

“Oh, the exchange program, right?” the boy next to her wearing a hat and glasses smiled, “I heard Kim and Alix might sign up.”

“Of course they would. But knowing them, they're going to struggle with those essays.” A blond with cat ears, that turned black at the tips, chuckled softly.

“What about you two? You and Marinette are in the hero courses, right?” The ombre haired girl asked as she leaned forward in curiosity.

The blond smiled sheepishly, “Yeah, I’m applying. It sounds like fun and all, but I, um, I was hoping to get in just to get away for a while.” Everyone at the table exchanged looks before turning to the blond with a reassuring smile.

“That’s fine, Adrien, you definitely deserve some time away from Paris.”

“Yeah, you can’t keep blaming yourself for that, Adrien. You didn’t know, he kept pushing you away and making you work. You couldn’t have known.”

“Yeah dude, after everything that happened this semester, with your dad being arrested as a super villain and all- ow!” He turned to the girl next to him, who was shooting him a glare. Realizing what he said, he was quick to correct himself, “N- not that any of us blame you! I mean, like, how were you supposed to know!? He kept you locked up and- I mean, You deserve a vacation from Paris! Yeah! That! You deserve to have fun and do things you were never allowed to do!” He smiled sheepishly.

Adrien’s smile widened at his best friend’s antics, “Thanks Alya, Nino, Mari. That means a lot. What are you planning on doing, Mari?” He turned to face the blue haired girl that sat next to him.

“Oh, I’ve been planning on applying ever since Luka told me about it.” Marinette smiled as she played with the straw of her drink.

“Luka told you about it?” Nino asked.

“Mhm, He took part in it last year. We would video chat and he’d send pictures. It looks like a perfect opportunity to make connections with possible partners. Maybe It’ll give me new ideas for designs, too.”

“Wha~ I’d definitely apply if I were in the hero course, that’s for sure!” Alya smiled brightly.

“It's never too late, Als.” Marinette rose a brow. “You’re already taking some hero course classes. You could always just…”

Her friend waved her hand about as if to dispel the thought, “No way, I’d rather get footage and interviews of hero fights than be a part of it! You know I’m taking those classes in case I need to protect myself.” She smirked, “Besides, I could say the same for you. An aspiring fashion designer and hero, yet you refuse to make hero costumes.”

“I’d rather make clothes for fashion and not something that would probably need repairs a few days later.” Alya and Marinette giggled.

“Wha- don’t look at me like that, Adrien. I’m in the same boat as Alya, just because I want to be a DJ doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to jump in to protect people. Gotta make use of Shelter after all”

Adrien sighs, “Carapace and Rena Rouge will never happen now.”

Alya snickers as Nino gives his friend an amused smile, “Carapace and Rena Rouge?” Marinette giggles

“Yeah! It came to me in a dream where we battled magic evil butterflies and used magic jewelry to fight crime! I even had their hero costumes all drawn out and everything! We could have been a quartet!”

Alya covers her lips as she laughs, “That's one heck of a dream. I appreciate it, Adrien, but we’re fine. Besides, Ladybug and Chat Noir are going to be the best duo when they debut!” The two friends looked at one another and smiled.

“Oh, You two are signing up as a duo, right?” Nino asks in curiosity, raising an eyebrow. Marinette and Adrien give one another a knowing look.

“No, actually, we’re not.” Adrien smiles

“W - what?! Why?! I thought you two were planning to debut as a duo!” Alya asked, sitting up, she looked between her two friends in confusion.

“We are, but we agreed that we can’t always rely on each other, so we’re going to sign up and, hopefully if we get in, end up in different groups.

Adrien grins, showing off his fangs, as he gives his best friend a half hug, “Being apart for a while is going to be great for us. Divide and conquer! When we meet up again, we’re going to compare notes and talk about our experiences!” 

“Oh… I… I guess that’s not too bad of an Idea.” Alya thought out loud. 

“If you learn any new fighting moves, you can just show each other too, pretty smart.” Nino nods.

“Of course it’s Pur-fect! Our ladybug came up with it!” Adrien laughs at the groans he received. 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Age 15. Seat 12. Student Rank 8. Hero Name: Ladybug. Quirk: Lucky Charm.

Can create items to help her with any situation. The items that are created are random, leading to weird and elaborate plans that somehow always work. When she has finished making use of the item, it disappears in a swarm of ladybugs that fix any damage made after she has summoned the item.

Acrobatics, Hand to Hand, Made up fighting style with Yo-yo

____

“But Ah-Mah pleeeease~!” a girl with long black hair and a pink streak whined

“Juniper, I said no.” an older woman shook her head as she worked her way around her office. 

“But why? Dennis got to apply in his sophomore year!” The young teenager pouted.

“Juniper, you know I need you here to help take care of everything around the house. Dennis has just graduated from the academy and has been busy making a name for himself as a hero, and Ray Ray is still too young to be left alone.”

“But Ray Ray is 12 -” 

“Juniper.” The young teenager fell silent at her grandmother's tone. The older woman let out a soft sigh, “I know it’s not fair.” She walked over to her granddaughter and gently cupped her cheeks, “but it’s always been just us four, ever since you were 8. I’ve worked harder than before to not lose you kids. I can’t retire until Dennis’s work is more secure, and he’s able to help support us better... I need you here, baobei. I’m sorry. Maybe next time…?” 

It’s a once a year thing only for sophomores…” Juniper let out a soft defeated sigh, placing her hands over her grandmothers she gently pried them away, “It’s okay Ah-Mah…” The young teenager walked out of the office, her head hung low. The older woman watched her go with sadness in her eyes. 

“You should let her at least apply…” Her eyes flickered to the open balcony, where a young man with spiked up black hair stood leaning against the door. 

“Dennis!” The older woman smiled tiredly as walked over to the young adult, “Hello, my little bèndàn.” She greeted warmly as they hugged. 

“Ah-Mah you really need to stop calling me that…” Dennis spoke in an annoyed tone, the smile on his lips betraying his true feelings. 

“I thought you wouldn’t be home until tomorrow.” The older woman chuckles softly as she goes back to her desk.

“The mission ended early.” The older boy shrugged, “So, about June -”

“Hey, Ah-Mah, why does June look so sad?” A younger boy asked as he poked his head into the office. He paused upon seeing his older brother. “Dennis!” He cheered, running over to his brother, “You’re back early!”

The young adult lets out a hearty laugh as he picks up his brother in a hug, spinning them about. Delighted giggles escaped his younger sibling's lips. “Hey there kiddo. Yeah, our mission ended early.” He sets the younger boy down and ruffles his hair, “Everything went smoothly.”

“So cool!” Their grandmother smiled fondly as she watched her two grandchildren interact. Her smile soon fell upon remembering the middle child and what had upset her. 

As the young boy spoke with his brother, he was suddenly reminded about his sister. She looked upset as she walked back to her room. “Ah-Mah, do you know why June is so upset?”

“Hm? Oh…” The older woman snapped out of her thoughts, “She wants to attend a sort of exchange student program for hero students. I want to let her apply, I really do, but if she gets in, Dennis and I work and we can’t leave you home alone.” The younger boy's face fell. It sounds like he’s unintentionally holding his sister back.

“I’m a big boy! I can be left home alone for a few hours!” Ray Ray puffed up his chest.

“I know baobei, but grandma has had this business trip scheduled for a while now. It took us months to get this meeting scheduled… I looked over the packet… My trip lines up with the first week that the program starts.” 

“I can always stay home that week till you get back.” Dennis offered.

“Would your work allow that? You had just recently started, I don’t want to place you in such a spot-”

“Ah-Mah, it’s fine. I’m sure my boss would be fine with it if I explain the situation. Not to mention, I’ve saved up my vacation days.” the boy gives a cocky smirk. 

The older woman's lips grew into a large grin, "Juniper will be very happy to hear this, and to see you back home. Come, let us break the good news to her." 

Juniper Lee. Age 16. Seat 3. Student Rank 9. Hero Name: Fāxiàn. Quirk: Detect.

She receives coordinates to a location to find anyone she needs to find. To do so, she must have made eye contact with the person she plans to keep track of at least once. She can keep track a single individual for three hours, has a limit of 5 people at a time for an hour. Her eyes turn purple as she focuses on tracking anyone. 

Parkour, hand to hand, karate. 

_____

“What do you think, sis?”

“I think it’s a really good opportunity. It sounds like it’s a fun little vacation too. You should definitely take advantage of it, Virgil.” An older woman with her dark hair in pigtails nods as she hands her younger brother the packet back.

“Yeah? You think dad would be cool with it?” Virgil asked, black eyes roaming over the packet once again, flipping to the other pages. 

“I know dad can be… strict, but I’m sure he’d understand. You just gotta ask.” His sister placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder before flicking his ear, “Now go get the table set up. Dinner's almost ready.” She grinned, walking back for the kitchen

“Ow, okay, jeez.” He lifted his hand.

“And NO using your QUIRK.” Virgil dropped his hand with a frown. By the time dinner was ready, the sibling's father arrived home. 

“So, Virgil, Sharon, how was school?” the older man asked as he served himself more of his drink.

“College is college, dad. Nothin’ special really happened.” Sharon responded

“Oh? And how are things with Adam going? Well I hope.” 

Sharon blushed slightly at this, a soft smile gracing her lips, “Yeah, things are going really well, actually.” 

Her father smiled fondly at his daughter, “That’s good to hear. Invite him over for dinner soon, it’s been a while since he’s been over.” His daughter’s smile widened as she nodded. Turning to his son, he raised a brow in silent question.

“Oh, uh, heh, school was pretty alright, I doubt the school system has really changed.” Virgil smiled sheepishly, avoiding eye contact. Glancing at his sister, he spotted her pointed look. Clearing his throat, he turned to his father, “Uh hey dad, I have a question…” 

“Oh?”

“Um, well… There's this program, erm, the High School Hero Collaboration Program to be exact, and basically it's a two-week-long exchange program for hero students. I, uh, I want to know if it’s cool with you if I apply.”

The older man let out a soft sigh, lowering his fork. The young teen felt his shoulders tense at the sound. "You really are dead set on becoming a hero, aren't you?" 

Virgil blinked at the sudden question, "Uh, um, yes. Yes I am." 

"I really wish you would just do something safer like your sister…"

"Dad, the reason I want to be a hero is to protect you guys. I want to protect people who are struggling and need help."

"Then become a police officer or a firefighter."

"... Dad…" Virgil slumps back in his seat, "we always have this same argument…"

The older man gave out a tired sigh as he lifted his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose. "I know son, I'm sorry… It's just… it's hard to support such a dangerous profession. Hero's around here… things are just…"

"I know dad… but I honestly thought I had proven myself enough during the field studies.” Virgil spoke up softly. Looking over to his sister, she nods and gives him a reassuring smile, “I want to make the city a safer place. Hero’s around here are already small in numbers and if I can help, even if just a little, I want to do that. Maybe even try to inspire more kids to take the hero course electives.” 

Robert was silent for a moment. Looking at his son, he could see the determination and resolve in his eyes. Letting his posture slacken a bit, his eyes softened, a soft smile on his lips, “You’re just like your mother with that passion to help others.” Virgil blinked in surprise, “Very well. You can sign up for the program.” 

“Yes!!” Virgil jumped up as he threw his fist in the air, “Oh man, Richie is going to be so excited! He’s been coming up with support gear and a new costume design and wouldn't leave me alone about it all day!” 

Robert let out a full belly laugh, “Alright, alright, sit down, son. Let’s enjoy the rest of your sister's delicious cooking first.”

“Yeah, you can call Richie later.” His sister smiled.

“Right, sorry.” Virgil gave a sheepish grin as he sat back down. 

Virgil Ovid Hawkins. Age 17. Seat 20. Student Rank 10. Hero Name: Static. Quirk: Electromagnetism.

Can generate, manipulate and absorb electrokinetic energy.

Hand to hand. 

____

"So, how was school, everyone?" An older woman asked as she and her large family all started eating dinner. All the kids at the table softly answered in unison, making the two adults chuckle in amusement.

"Come on guys, one by one." The older man said firmly. 

A boy with his dark brown hair waving in soft curls spoke up first, "Everyone in the hero course got a packet for an exchange program!" The boy next to him with black hair groaned softly. 

"Really? What's it about?" An older girl asked in curiosity. 

"Dude, that's awesome!" A younger girl bounced in her seat excitedly

"When is it?" One of the boys asked in a soft tone. 

"Will you be working with pro hero's?" A younger boy asked, tilting his head in curiosity. 

"Tell us Billy! Tell us!" The younger girl chirped happily. 

"Dude, Freddy, it was supposed to be a secret." Billy glared at the glasses wearing boy next to him. 

"A secret? Why?" The older man asked curiously. 

Letting out a sigh, Billy explained the program, "- it was supposed to be a secret because I wanted to tell you guys after I got accepted." He glares at a sheepish Freddy, "but I guess it's not anymore." 

"Don't worry! We're still surprised!" Darla says with a nod. Placing her palms on her cheeks, she makes a surprised face. Eugene nods in agreement and drops his jaw, eyebrows shooting up as he also made a surprised face. Everyone at the table laughed at the youngest's antics.

"She's not wrong. We are pleasantly surprised. I'm sure you'll get accepted." The older woman smiled 

"I hope so. It's basically a worldwide thing. From what the teachers said, it's really competitive. Only 40 students get accepted. That's why they have such an extensive application process." he smiled sheepishly, a hand rubbing the nape of his neck. His cheeks flushed red as everyone in his mismatched family shot him words of encouragement. It's been a whole year since he’s landed himself with his family, they’ve already been through so much together. He wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. 

Billy Batson. Age 16. Seat 15, Class Rank 11. Hero Name: Captain Marvel. Quirk: Shazam

When saying the word ‘Shazam’ he is transformed into a version of himself that is at their prime. 

Hand to hand, Stealth, street fighting. 

____

“What is this?” A pale hand grabbed the packet that was handed to her. Black eyes quickly scanned through the front page, an older woman with white hair sat across from her on the table. 

“It’s a program I think you’d enjoy, Jenny.” the older woman smiled softly, “I know that you feel trapped here, being homeschooled and all, so I thought you might want to join the program.” 

Jenny looked up at her mother in surprise, “Y - you mean it? You'll let me apply for this? If I get accepted, you’ll allow me to go!?”

Nora let out a soft chuckle, “Yes, I'm allowing you to go. Actually, I’ve been planning on enrolling you into school next Semester.”

“Really!?”

“That’s right. Once the paperwork is complete you’ll be in school starting January and if you do get into this program, you can think of it as a small break from school, to give yourself a breather, I think it would help you adjust to school better.”

“Oh my gosh, mom! You’re the best!” Jenny grinned widely, her eyes sparkling in excitement as she stood to her feet. 

“Yes, yes, this will be a wonderful opportunity for you to make friends too.”

“Mom, I have friends -”

“Online friends don’t count.” 

“... Social anxiety is hard to deal with.”

“Jenny, you came home late yesterday because you stopped by Miranda’s place and spoke with her for three hours.”

“She’s a sweet old lady. She just needs some company sometimes~” 

“And yet when the neighbor boy said hello to you this morning, you activated your skates and rushed inside.”

“... So it may be a selective type of anxiety…” 

“Jenny.”

The blue haired girl let out a sigh, crossing her arms, “Yeah, okay, fair.” She paused before speaking again, “Are you positive online friends don’t count?” Nora sent her daughter a raised eyebrow, amusement radiating off her in waves.

Jenny sagged her shoulders, “Right. I’ll get started on this now.” 

“Good. Make sure to email any of your teachers for those recommendation letters.” Nora rose out of her chair, “I’ll get started on dinner for us.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Jenny Walkman. Age 17. Seat 6. Class Rank 12. Hero Name: XJ9. Quirk: Cyborg 

Although born like any other, her body is very obviously modified. 50% of her body is organic, containing the most important organs for essential survival. Her skin is smooth to the touch, has the ability to remove appendages to modify or replace. Has the ability to connect herself to electronics and is able to download information directly to her brain. 

Extensive knowledge in mechanics, Hand to hand, martial arts

Chapter 1 Part 3

[neshabeingchildish]

League of Extraordinary Geniuses || Chapter 6

I’d been trying NOT to, in case others wanted to read this story, but at this point, I’ve only seen fans of these fandoms interact, so there will be things mentioned that if you didn’t watch the shows, you’ll be lost about. So sorry if there are others here now, but I am mostly writing for those who have interacted and let me know their thoughts and feelings about this story and they’ve all been familiar with Lab Rats, Henry Danger, and The Thundermans, so… this chapter in particular has some things that it would be much too much to explain it all, from LR canon and a bit from HD too, and I’m sorry if there are readers unfamiliar with that, but y’all haven’t let me know that you’re here.

Y’all probably didn’t expect another update this soon, but what had happened was the last chapter would have been too long, so I found a point to cut it for that one. Also, a story line that I wanted to touch on this story, but didn’t realize how I would incorporate it until @kiddangers made a post about it either her or on her Instagram, can’t remember, and she sparked the topic and now it is a major story arc in this fic, which might be hella hurtful at some point, but... If you’re in for the ride, you’re in for it, Friends. 

@verified-dumbass @just-a-j-reallly I’ve decided not to continue tagging anybody else that hasn’t interacted, out of courtesy and just feeling awkward about tagging people that are nonresponsive to it.

What if I’m the Monster

Conspiracy theories were running wild and fortunately, all of the communities that had reason to think that they might be able to be linked to this scandal quickly took action to try to clear their records and discover who the real guilty party was. The bionic, supers, and non-super communities all began their own investigations as to what might have happened while the collaboration of Dystress, Shoutout, Thunderstrike and Chase Davenport were on the ground, assessing the scene themselves. Of course, Chase was the spokesperson and mission leader. That would put everyone at home at better ease. 

“Myself and a team of trusted heroes have been working practically nonstop since the torpedo attack to figure out what took place here. There were some recent developments that I’m not at liberty to speak about, which Davenport Industries had been handling, and one of our facilities was going to be attacked, when fortunately, a superhero stepped in and managed to save it and all surrounding innocents that might have been caught in the crossfire. We have recovered several remains, but they are as of this moment inconclusive. What I can assure the public of is that my current team and the Davenport brand will be working hard to get to the bottom of this tragedy and keep the citizens of Jamaica safe from any further threats…” 

He and Shoutout left the press conference and returned directly back to the crash site that Dystress and Thunderstrike were at. Thunderstrike had telepathically tunneled a lot of the water, froze it in pillars, and Dystress used her scanning systems for wreckage. With this tactic, they had found numerous parts of the jet and some torpedo shrapnel, but it wasn’t until Chase returned, with his hypersenses that they found the first possible remains of an assailant… “I don’t know how to say this,” he said. 

“With your words, perhaps?” Max offered. 

“That’s an android…” He sighed. Max unfroze the pillar, and Chase telepathically collected the android remains to them. The four looked down at it for a while. There was very little human DNA left to him. Some hair and facial components, a few fingers, and everything else was charred and shattered metal. “They’re starting to enlist them against their brethren,” Chase said sadly. “I don’t know why I didn’t think about that happening. Of course they would! Who better to go toe to toe with them than their own kind?” 

Max and Charlotte noticed that he was really upset about this. Charlotte beckoned over some Davenport analysts to quietly collect this, so that the three of them could inspect the body later. She also decided that they had been working too hard and would need a break. At the very least, Mika would, so she dismissed her and told her to try to get some rest.

“And, you probably should too. You’ve been out of your chamber for days,” Charlotte observed. Chase folded his arms and watched as the employees took the android away.

“I want to begin studying him, right away.”

“I do too, but we’re only human. We do need to rest.”

“We’re not ONLY human,” Chase argued.

“No, but we still need rest and we’ve earned it. You, especially.”

“Why, him especially?” Max asked. Charlotte just threw him a look. It was so smart of her to have a mask that covers her mouth instead of one that covered her eyes, because those looks were a weapon of their own. “Fine. But, if he’s resting, we all should rest and let the androids keep watch while the Davenport searchers keep collecting samples.”

“Is that agreeable, Chase?” Charlotte asked. 

Chase sighed and reluctantly nodded his head. He knew that she wanted him to get some rest and she had a point, afterall. The three of them went to the safehouse and tried to calm their nerves and settle in. 

You would’ve thought that they would be so drained that they would immediately all fall to sleep, but all were restless. Max passed by Mika and knocked on the door, “Hey. You gonna get some sleep, or what?” He asked. She furrowed her eyebrows and looked at him, the expression gesturing to the fact that she was clearly on a call. He waved his fingers at Chapa, on the screen and then pointed at Mika, “Sleep in, if you need to in the morning, but try to at least lay down for the night. You can talk to your girlfriend some other time.” 

Mika scoffed and shook her head, “Goodnight, Max.”

Chapa asked, “He thinks we’re girlfriends? Awesome.” 

Mika replied, “He said that just to be annoying. 

Max smirked to himself as he headed for the shower. Charlotte was in the bathroom, brushing her teeth and washing her face and such. She usually did that before getting into the shower, so he said, “I’m goin’ in,” and she nodded. It didn’t bother her, but he liked to at least be clear. He was in the shower, sort of zoned out and thinking while she sprayed her locs with oils and finished up her preshower things. They crossed paths switching up who was in the shower and didn’t even have the energy for some risque joke about it. 

Charlotte knew that it had to be just as heavy on their hearts as it was on hers… They freed the androids and now it seemed that at least one or some of them not only didn’t appreciate it, but might make it hard enough that they could be in serious trouble for even attempting it. 

When she came out of the shower, Max was still in the mirror, doing his thing. This was the one of the quickest times either of them had ever taken in a bathroom before. He was just staring into the mirror, holding his toothbrush, though. “Hey… You okay?” 

He blinked and then looked at her in her robe, holding a jar of body butter. He smiled and nodded. “How can I not be. I’m in the best place in the world - with you.” He came over and kissed her on the forehead. “It’s gonna be okay.”

She sighed, “It better be. You and Chase let go of a lot to be here.”

“I can’t speak for him, but a lot is here for me.” He cupped her face and pressed his forehead to hers. “I’m gonna make sure Mika’s got everything she needs, then I’m crashing in your room, if that’s okay.”

“I was gonna crash in Mika’s room,” she said. “She has nightmares sometimes after a stressful day and the last few days have been hell for me, so I can only imagine what they’ve been for her.”

“You could very well imagine. You’ve been a hero for a while, now.”

“I forgot how this felt. When something serious and dangerous is staring you in the face and you literally don’t know if you’re about to die. I feel… triggered. I hate that she has triggering memories now, and one of the scariest days in her life has taken place because she’s here for me.”

“Mika is where she wants to be. We all are. We chose you, Char. Come on. Let’s check on the kid and get to bed.”

They peeked into Mika’s room and Chase was in there, moving around. “What are you doing?” Charlotte asked in a whisper. 

“She was having a nightmare. I kept hearing her whimpering, so I’m trying to calm her down or something,” he said. He looked tired and irritated, but he was also concerned. Charlotte rubbed his back and took over. She put on some music, sprayed some fragrance, handed Mika her beloved plushie, rubbed some oils on her feet, tucked her in and strummed her scalp. After a moment, she was snoring and the trio left her to it. Charlotte would be back, but she had this grave nagging feeling that she needed to make sure that they got to bed too. She felt like this was her fault, no matter what Max said to try to smooth her over. They had followed her into this and this had become tricky. 

“I’m going to try to get us a bigger space when I have time, so that you two don’t have to squeeze into the same room,” she said, not knowing what else to say.

“It’s fine. I put my chamber in your room, so Max can have the spare to himself.”

“Nice try, but I’m crashing in her room. She’s got all the good sleepy time stuff like candles and… stuff and I’m sleeping in there, as well.”

“It’s fine. You two are always welcome to crash in my room. I’ll set the mood for you.” She similarly fixed the room as she had done for Mika, programmed some things into Chase’s chamber and when both her guys were asleep, she ducked out of the room and into a video call with Jasper and Henry.

“Char! Thank goodness! We’ve been trying to reach you for days. I was starting to think that the footage of Dystress on the news was altered and you’d been taken into some underground prisoner chamber!” Jasper worried.

“Nope. Just been taken to depression town. Was hoping you had some feel good stories about the kids or something to help me cheer up.”

Henry nodded, “Say no more. Jasper’s been making all of these musical fan videos of the kids and putting them on our DingDong account.”

“Oooh, I’m gonna check those out.”

“ALSO… We got the uh… shipment…” Henry said and looked more serious now. “They’re in the Dome. Wasn’t sure if they were capable of being at Budding Flowers.”

“They’re not defected. They’re free, and want to work with children. Your charity is one of the most successful ones in the world, currently. Androids are people too.”

Jasper winced, “Only… They aren’t… and… well…”

“Ray is freaking out about the recent news that androids now have autonomy, because if you remember, a Piper from the future came back to tell us that hell on Earth was a road paved by a robot takeover. They created ones that looked like children. Jasper and I just don’t feel comfortable, at the moment letting androids interact with kids that we’ve vowed to protect…”

“Wow. You two think that I’ve kickstarted the end of the world?” She asked, feeling absolutely worse than she had before she called them.

“No. We think that you would do anything to help others and to fix the world and that there are others out there who will take advantage of that, if they get the chance,” Henry offered.

Jasper added, “Schwoz’s friend from Davenport was telling us all about an android rebellion that once almost took place. His ex girlfriend’s models are the same ones that you designed yours after. Come ON, Charlotte…” 

“She intended for them to be used for evil. There’s a big difference in our work and the results. Wow… I’m going to go check on Mika. Have a good night.”

“Char…” Henry said.

“Good night, Henry!” She hung up, frustrated and ready to cry. Not because she felt like they were being mean or hard on her. Because, they had a point and she couldn’t believe that her messiah complex had allowed her to miss it beforehand. They didn’t even KNOW about the android remains that were found. Oh God, what if she was the figurative first horseman? Conquering the academic world, looking like a savior to all because of her penchant for improving lives and society and her solutions that help and bring about peace… only to also be the reason that war and bloodshed roll in, and then famine and disease and death… How on Earth she got from messiah complex to I am literally the antichrist, she was unsure, but that was where her mind was whenever she began to doze off. 

.

Mika woke up in the middle of the night from a nightmare. She was gonna get some warm milk with lavender honey and maybe a patty, if there were any more in there. She found Charlotte, sitting on the patio, asleep with her head on her laptop. She went to get Max, but neither him nor Chase were in their room, so she checked Charlotte’s and there they both were. Chase in his chamber, Max in Charlotte’s bed, covered by pillows, with a sleeping mask on and the smell of candles and incense heavy in the air. She woke him up, “Charlotte fell to sleep outside.”

“What?” He asked, half asleep, but jumping out of bed, anyway. He collected Charlotte. Mika collected her devices and they put her back in her bed. Mika felt left out, and grabbed her blanket and stuffie and came into Charlotte’s room too. With her in Charlotte’s bed, Max made a little fortress on the floor and quickly went back to sleep. Mika was awake for a while, but Charlotte’s arm draped around her and she fell back to sleep. 

Charlotte got up and looked around the room. She didn’t remember coming to bed and now, she had Chase in his chamber, Max on the floor with half of her pillows, Mika in her bed and her own head was spinning, because, as she just recalled, she’d cried herself to sleep. Still, she was the first person awake and she started her day without waking any of the others. Eventually, Max and Chase came into the lab, where she was evaluating all of the diagnostics on the remains, listening to music, and talking on the phone, “Well, if I can get those remains sent to me, it will help me to determine how likely the root of that issue is and to ease your mind and maybe others,’ in the process.” Chase looked at the screen and Max went straight to the autoblender. “Okay. Thank you for your cooperation, and tell Douglas to learn to keep his fat mouth shut when he’s in the room with MY people.” She hung up and looked up, “Good morning.”

“What’s that about Douglas?” Max wondered, while Chase breezed through all of the research. 

“He was talking to Ray and Schwoz about Giselle Vicker’s plans to use androids for a hostile takeover and now, one of THEEEEEEEE STUPIDEST powerful men has ideas in his head about the free androids and a robot rebellion and… Anyway, Schwoz is gonna send me the remains of a robot from the future so that I can study it.”

Max and Chase both stared at her blankly, then looked at each other. “How long have you been awake, Charlotte?” Chase asked.

“I got enough sleep,” she snapped, shaking her head. “In another, idk 20 years or so, maybe less… there is supposed to be a robot takeover inspired by the Terminator movies. Thanks to Douglas having a conversation with Ray, he now thinks that I’ve somehow set things in motion for that to occur.”

“Well… If you have, it’s done now. Besides, the fact that you have a robot from the future to work on is all the proof you need that it was gonna happen anyway,” Max said, making a smoothie. “I wanna see the robot, though. Let me in on that.”

“You and I need to keep searching for remains,” Chase reminded him. 

“That’s not gonna take us the rest of our lives. By the way,” Max said to Charlotte as he poured the smoothie, “Told Mika to sleep in. Marx arrived today, so you can get him to do anything that she was gonna do.”

“Who arrived?” Chase wondered, because he was supposed to approve anybody that anyone was trying to bring into the loop and he hadn’t spoken with Max about anybody. 

“His personal android assistant,” a male voice said from the doorway and Chase gasped and prepared himself to attack. 

Max rushed to jump in front of Chase and said, “Sorry, sorry, sorry… It was supposed to be hilarious, but then things took a turn and I didn’t get a chance to explain to you. This is my personal android assistant, Marx. I made him in the Marcus model form to fuck with you, but I promise, he’s of no actual ties to your Marcus.”

“That you know of,” Charlotte said. “I tried to talk him and Douglas OUT  of this.”

“Douglas missed his son’s face and had some regrets and I wanted a personal android assistant. I thought it would be quite humorous to have him walk up to you one day, but fate had other plans,” Max said.

Chase was staring at the android. It looked JUST like Marcus. Why would Douglas allow this and not tell him? What if Leo had seen this thing? Marx was staring back at Chase, but he had a polite semi smile on his face. “Keep it away from me,” Chase said.

“Marx uses he/him/his pronouns,” Max said and patted Marx on the shoulder. “They/them/theirs, at the very least.” 

Chase smiled tightly, “Keep him away from me, and I MEAN that, Max Thunderman!” He stormed out of the lab and Charlotte shook her head. “I asked you to give Marx a different face.”

“I didn’t have time!”

Marx said, “If it pleases you, I could work on some programming to change my face, however, I don’t prefer to do so.”

“Naw, keep your face. Just… stay away from the little guy.”

“From Mr. Chase Davenport. Got it.”

.

Chase was livid. How could that POSSIBLY be seen as a joke? If he knew about Marcus, he HAD to know about all of the pain and terror he caused the family! That only made him feel a resurgence of hostility towards Douglas. Sure, they were on pleasant terms, but some part of him would always hold on to, at least a little bit, the things that he had been willing to do to his own. Really, he was the reason that Marcus was so terrible, then he just left him, for Giselle Vickers to find and… Chase was getting extremely furious thinking about this. Marcus had been one of the first major betrayals done to him. He thought they were friends, and not only were they actually enemies, but that was his brother who his father had turned against him and he hated that Max Thunderman would casually try to prank him by showing him such a face.

After a while, Max joined him, silently at first, but they both felt the tension there. They were silently working. A few times, a question came up in one of their minds, but neither of them wanted to break the silence, because it was uncertain whether it would relieve the tension. Finally, Max had to break. “It was messed up of me to make a Marcus model android with the intention to shake you up. I knew a little bit about the situation and not whatever it was that your memory tapped into back there. And, I really didn’t know you at the time, either. I didn’t think about how it would affect you like this and I certainly didn’t think you and me would be on the terms we are on right now. So, I hate that I took a joke so far, but it was all me. Douglas really just liked the feeling of seeing his son’s face again. And Charlotte, of course told me the entire time that it would be harmful. I just go too far sometimes.”

Chase was breathing heavy the entire time. Waiting on Max to actually apologize, not just list what happened. But, then again, why would he? He was obviously the type to get pleasure out of people’s pain and not even care about their personal trauma at the expense of a stupid laugh. He was much too smart to just “not realize it’d be that harmful,” so Chase wasn’t eager to listen to him and definitely not going to trust him. 

“I guess the perks of being raised in a picture perfect family don’t include having some respect for others who weren’t so privileged,” Chase said. And that was all he felt like he needed to. To dive deeper, he’d dig deeper into his own problems, and he still had work to do.

“My family wasn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t have wanted somebody to make fun of our problems either. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I’m sorry…” Max said, and it really sounded genuine. Chase almost let his guard down. But, he knew that he’d let his guard down with Marcus… With Sebastian… He’d been let down basically any time he ever let his guard down and Charlotte was the one exception to that thus far. He was fine with that fact. “Apology accepted,” he lied, and didn’t want to speak of it again. 

Max felt horrible. Chase looked like an angry little sad puppy. Like… Seeing Marcus’ face REALLY did something to him. There wasn’t a lot of information, so he only knew the highlights that had been shared with him from Douglas, and it honestly sounded like, from what he’d been given, that Marcus kinda got the shit end of the stick. Max was starting to see that Chase probably got those types of ends more than his persona of perfection revealed. “If anybody ever tried to do something bad to you, I’m gonna have your back. I’m shitty sometimes. I do mean stuff. I don’t always prove to be the best sort of human, but… You’re a good person, despite how annoying you can be and I’m still probably gonna let you down and give you shit, but… I honestly do have your back,” Max said.  

Chase sighed, “My back is fine. Can we please just finish this up?” Max got back to work, but he heard Chase mumble, “I’m not gonna be fooled again.”

.

All three of them were looking at what they knew to be EVERYTHING that could possibly have been left behind, while the other agencies went through the waters and the islands to double and triple check. Androids were surveilling them, to ensure that nobody planted anything, though Chase at this point trusted the androids about as much as he’d trusted the bionic army.

Max rarely trusted anybody, but he was trying not to waiver in his faith in Charlotte. 

Charlotte was simply defeated and trying to think. “If I have to spend the rest of my life preventing it, I will.” She looked at a chip that was more advanced than her work, but definitely carried her signature and held her emblem. The robots from the future… The ones that would revolt and enslave humanity? They were connected to her work. She threw the chip across the lab in frustration and stormed out. 

Max and Chase waited. They looked at each other and Max wondered, “What do you think?”

“I think that it’s the androids. I think that they have autonomy and that humanity won’t allow harmony and that they will rise up against them after they’ve gotten tired of being oppressed. What I will never believe is that Charlotte is responsible. She wanted to do right for someone. It wouldn’t be her fault that they betray her.” He fumed and groaned, “Androids never should have been created.”

Max scoffed, “We could say the same thing about bionics! And how do we know that it isn’t something that a human tried to do? They always try to harm anybody different, especially if they read as more powerful. It could be one of the thousands of geniuses we’ve sought out over the past few weeks, or one of the… of her trusted employees…” Max tugged his hair a little and said, “Whoever it is… We’ve got to stop them. This can’t be the legacy forged for Charlotte’s good deeds.”

“I agree with that,” Chase said, and he meant it. He summoned the chip to himself and said, “I’m going to use every skill that I have to try to find a link to someone or something that answers these questions. But first, we’ve gotta make sure our woman is okay.”  He set it down and Max nodded his head. They found Charlotte near the Man Copter, hugging Mika and sending her away, for her own safety. Mika was crying and begging her not to do this, but Charlotte was definitely in a mode right now. There was no way she could let whatever was happening tarnish this bright young girl that she loved and cared so much for. 

“I won’t leave you out. I’m sharing everything with you. I just want you out of range until we figure out who tried to attack the place, okay?”

“Okay,” Mika said, ugly crying and nodding. She added, “But as soon as it’s safe, I come back, right?”

“At the very instant!” Charlotte told her. 

“Okay.” She waved at Max and Chase, who she saw watching, then strapped herself in.

“She’s going to one of my safehouses with the twins and their nanny, and will be working remotely. She felt like I was punishing her for this.” Charlotte shook her head. “Listen… I need some physical gratification now. I’m sorry if that seems toxic or foolish, especially considering how things are going at the moment, but I have to have release. I have to feel something primal and satisfactory. So… I’m going to head to Dystopia  for a little bit, but I’ll keep contact with you.”

“Dystopia? What’s in Dystopia that will give you what you need that you can’t have here?” Chase wondered.

“Her boyfriends,” Max said, sadly. 

Charlotte wiped her face, “I just… Need to connect and I need it ASAP. I’m sorry…” 

“Don’t be. We understand,” Max said. She could tell that he was furious, despite his words, but everyone knew that Henry and Jasper were where her home is and she did love Max and Chase, but they didn’t know how to handle everything she was currently experiencing. Plus, she owed the Defenders an apology, for questioning her, when it turned out that despite the fact that the idea came from a sensitive place, the worries were valid.

“We’ll come too,” Chase said. “We’ll stay out of the way, but I don’t think that the three of us should have that much distance between us right now. We need to stick together.”

“I agree,” Max said. 

“Yeah. Of course, if you two still are in it with me.”

“Charlotte, you may not realize this yet, but… Max and I are yours, too.” Chase said. He had blurted it out, and didn’t want to follow it up, but he meant it, and fortunately, Max didn’t argue with him. “So, to Dystopia, I guess.”

“I’ll show you around while they’re having their reunion. You only ever got to visit during crises, right?” Max said, relaxing a little as he turned to Chase, feeling closer to him right now than Charlotte, after this no matter how unintentional, but all too familiar form of rejection from her.

“Yeah.”

“I have some roots in Dystopia. We’ll have a Max’s World Day Out, yeah?” Chase didn’t want to do that at all, but he shrugged his shoulders in surrender, anyway. “To Dystopia,” Max said and wrapped an arm around Chase’s shoulder, walking him away from Charlotte. She gave them a smile, and for a moment, felt like maybe she didn’t need to visit Dystopia and see the guys… But then again, that little moment of complete comfort elsewhere? Well… She’d at least owe it to Henry and Jasper to let them know that maybe her heart had moved on...

[machene-ffxiv]

Machene - LFRP (Balmung)

The Basics –––

Age: 23

Birthday: 13th Sun, 3rd Astral Moon

Race: Elezen (Duskwright)

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Heterosexual

Marital Status: Single

Server: Balmung

Physical Appearance –––

Hair: Red/Pink Tint with Blonde Highlights

Eyes: Left - Blue /Right - Silver

Height: 6’1/185cm

Build: Slender, muscled/athletic

Distinguishing Marks: Beauty mark by right eye.

Common Accessories: Earrings, Big Axe, Good luck Moogle Charm

Personal –––

Public Profession: Airship Captain/Art Collector

Profession: Smuggler

Hobbies: Reading, Travel, Fixing anything with machinery, Magitek

Languages: Common Eorzean/Doman

Residences: Airship - Phoenix; Usually found in Inns as she travels a lot.

Birthplace: Ishguard

Religion: None

Fears: Losing herself to loving one person, Familial obligations, Losing her freedom

Relationships –––

Spouse: None.

Children: None.

Parents: Father: Michelangelo Mikiene (Soldier/Tactician)/Mother - Helianatrix Fountaineau (disowned from lesser Wildwood family/Ishguardian noble house)

Siblings: One older brother

Other Relatives: None yet of any relevance

Pets: None.

Traits –––

Extroverted / In Between / Introverted

Disorganized / In Between / Organized

Close Minded / In Between / Open Minded

Calm / In Between / Anxious

Disagreeable / In Between / Agreeable

Cautious / In Between / Reckless

Patient / In Between /  Impatient

Outspoken / In Between / Reserved

Leader / In Between / Follower

Empathetic / In Between / Apathetic

Optimistic / In Between / Pessimistic

Traditional / In Between / Modern

Hard-working / In Between / Lazy

Cultured / In Between / Uncultured

Loyal / In Between / Disloyal

Faithful / In Between / Unfaithful

Additional information –––

Smoking Habit: No

Drugs: No

Alcohol: Fond of wine occasionally.

RP Hooks –––

Airship Captain/Lover of all things machine - She has a gift for flight as well as a passion for all things to do with airships, particularly her vessel, the Phoenix.  She has a penchant for getting into machinery, magitek or otherwise, and is a practicing engineer.  

Criminal activity -  She has ties in the criminal world, underground, etc.  Dealings in smuggling art and other goods keep her busy from time to time as well as other things that may interest her as profit is a welcome boon to her world.

Hired for a job -  Her services are available for the right price and circumstance.  Skills of the martial sort sometimes come in handy at times, besides her skills in being a cipher and other less savory expertise.  

—More Information—

What I Am Looking For –––

Long Term Story Opportunities - I do enjoy the one off and shorter role play scenarios, but i am also looking for longer term story/plot possibilities with other characters.  If you have any ideas, interest, and think that my character may fit with your’s or vice versa, feel free to contact me.   

Pre-existing Relationships - This can be interesting, and if you have an angle that works, let me know.

In game/Discord/Tumblr RP - I like in game RP as my first choice, but I am open to RP via DIscord too as I started in an entirely text medium back in some day.  Tumblr is also one that I am willing to look into, though that is still not something that I have done much of.  

Types of Roleplay -  I am fairly open-minded about types, though relationship/love role play is not the first option that I seek.  Lust and other stuff can happen, though ERP (which I am not against if it fits into the story/RP/whatever) is also not my first or even last thing that is sought.  I like intrigue, enemies/rivals, strong friends/allies, humor… and well, the sky can be a limit.

Communication/Good vibes OOC - Even if our characters are bitter enemies or whatever IC, I like to think that the ‘out of character’ stuff can always stay civil, amiable and so forth so all involved have a good time in whatever direction RP goes.  I am always willing to listen to communication if a story direction/idea is not working for others involved in the RP and open to changes if agreed upon by all involved.  It is about the journey for me, not the destination.

About RP style –––

Paragraph role player - I tend to articulate myself in longer sentences though I am not one abusing the thesaurus either.   I am fine with shorter sentence and just dialogue as I have adjusted to RP styles in MMOs.  I just love a good story/plot/scene and so forth.  

Lore - I tend stick with the stuff that fits the setting, and I am still refreshing my knowledge on that at times.  If something I do does not fit or make sense, let me know.

Why so serious? - While I adore intense, serious role play at times, I believe humor does the body, mind and soul good, so I enjoy having fun at the expense of my own character at times and perhaps others, but never in a non-fun way (at least OOC non-fun).  

Availability/Contact Information –––

Discord: Ask me for this.  I tend to just want to put out there on tumblr, etc, but am willing to add people for conversation/plotting, etc about the RP, and of course, possibly doing some RP on Discord.

Balmung Server - This character is on Balmung.  However, when the open world Crystal crossing over opens up, I am more than willing to do RP/collaborate with others from other worlds. 

Timezone - HST (Yes, Hawaiian Standard Time) - Does not always work for everyone, but I tend to be on often during the week in the evenings of my time zone with.  Better availabiilty on weekends as I am off work then (I get on earlier) .

Tumblr DM -  @starlogica/machene-ffxiv

Tumblr -  https://machene-ffxiv.tumblr.com/

@mooglemeet @balmungrp @ffxiv-balmung-rp @ffxiv-crystal-rp

[bootycallreverie]

Twelve Days in America - Part 1

(Photo credit: jacob_cherry via djlisafrank; original post here)

I can’t easily summarize everything I saw, did and experienced over the past bit in the United States. Any attempt won’t do my memories the justice they deserve, but I want to commit a few thoughts to posterity while they’re fresh in my mind.

On August 15, I flew to Philadelphia with my pal Aeryn to meet our friend Ethan and drive all together to the Honcho Summer Campout - an underground queer techno gathering located on a private campground in Artemas, Pennsylvania. I had been to Honcho’s regular event in Pittsburgh last August and was impressed by what they had created: a dance floor space where, for the first time in as long as I can remember, I could finally be my true self again. Based on that experience, and though I had never slept in a tent before, I knew I needed to make it out to the Campout this summer.

I have suffered from crippling self-doubt for a very long time. This has manifested itself in different ways, with a particular impact on my body image, though also on my career prospects, social relations, approaches towards sex and general mental state. The feeling of liberation at Honcho in Pittsburgh was something I hoped I’d find again, primarily as a balm to soothe the aches of what has so far been a challenging and frustrating year.

I was not expecting to be gently pulled apart, rearranged and healed over four days of immersion in (virtually) unadulterated queerness, faggotry, community and love. From the second we arrived on the grounds, I felt like we were in actual heaven; our first taste of it was driving down a muddy path to our campsite against a stream of hundreds of beautiful queers in revealing swimsuits (or less) walking toward a riverside swimming hole to cool off from stagnant summer air. Despite a weekend of rain and mud, things would only improve to levels of nearly unimaginable satisfaction.

(Photo credit: Ethan Fontneau via _troxum_ original post here)

Lots happened over the four days at the campground, much too much to write here. Every single moment had worth. Every single moment built upon the last one. The people I met inspired me to do more with myself, but more importantly, the folks at Honcho helped me realize a concept of self-love that I had never before known possible.

There are a few salient memories I will share here:

On the first day, I ran into someone I have known for a while from whom I’ve often sought validation but never received it. This time, beyond exchanging pleasantries, I found absolutely no need to pursue his attention further.

[K], a handsome man I did not think would be attracted to me but proved otherwise, invited me to jump into a muddy patch in the swimming hole with him. Even though I ruined my new speedo, I’m glad I did.

Over dinner on the second day, I met [Jo], who remarked that “…in America, people find an excuse to say no. In Spain, people find an excuse to say yes.”

I met [A] through a happy case of mistaken identity. We could not keep our hands off of each other. This absolutely beautiful man confessed to me that he had been afraid at first to approach me because he was convinced that “a guy like you would never be interested in a guy like me.” Later on, he told me to look around at the magic in the forest under the stars and drink it up, because none of it was fantasy - all of it was very real. As we fucked with passion in a tent, he looked into my eyes and said to me that “even though we just met, I am not afraid to tell you I love you, because my love is here to set you free, not bind you.”

I’m not entirely sure how I first crossed paths with [C], but we had an instant connection. We loved each other deeply for a few special hours. I can’t forget looking into the eyes of this beautiful gentle giant and thinking that I am not merely capable of love, but also that I’m worthy of love too, and how rare and special it is to meet someone that makes silence perfectly comfortable and familiar.

I asked [Ja], this charming Southern muscle daddy type if I could bum a cigarette from him outside one of the dancefloor venues. He didn’t have any, but with a mischievous grin, he said “let’s go find you one.” Before I knew it, we were fucking like animals in a clearing. I couldn’t help but think to myself that this was what I had been born to do: pursue what I wanted instead of merely accepting what came to me passively.

[E] was a fleeting encounter on the dance floor. This beautiful man with a smile from ear to ear came up to me to say “I hope I can get my hands on you later; I’ve had my eyes on you all weekend.”

[B] joined me as I sat on a bench overlooking the river in the morning rays. He remarked that he liked my hex tattoos and pulled his phone out to take a picture of them. As he looked at the image he had just captured, he nodded quietly in approval of his own work: “…ha,” he said, “…that’s hot.” It was one of the most empowering things I’d ever heard.

(Photo credit: bryantherye; original post here)

[D] is a DJ I met from DC. On the last night, I mentioned I was also a DJ, though not at any comparable level to him or anyone playing at the Campout. Despite this, he wanted to stay up late talking about our favourite disco artists, with each new offering from one eliciting squeals of approval from the other. I realized eventually that [D]’s approval of my choices were genuine. He legitimately liked my taste and said we should stay in touch to collaborate in the future.

At sunrise on the Monday, I was seated in a gentle, chill-out cuddle puddle that had slowly become more carnal. As time went on, I found myself mounting [K] and gently fucking him as a small group watched, including his beautiful boyfriend. As I reached climax, it dawned on me that I was entirely sober. My behaviour had not been influenced by intoxicating substances; my desire and my drive were innate to me. I had identified what I wanted, and with respect for the needs and wants of others, I took it.

As Monday’s sunrise developed into full-on morning, I walked home to my own tent to make a pitiful attempt at sleep before we had to pack up. On the path back, me with my overalls carelessly undone and slung perilously on my hips, I crossed paths with another man who had obviously just engaged in an act of sexual pleasure. With knowing smiles, we looked at each other in the eyes and happily exchanged a friendly “good morning.” 

On the drive back to Philadelphia, I reflected on the quality of the crewmembers that had assembled quasi-spontaneously around this trip: Ethan, Aeryn and our new friend Christopher, whom we met at camp. We all had plenty to offer each other - laughs, snacks, spare hands, tales, costume accoutrements, shoulders to cry on when needed - but most importantly, we were all there for each other no matter what. No shame, no jealousy, no expectations on anyone else’s time…simply a bond of friendship and unity founded in a genuine desire for us to all thrive. In a lot of ways, it was a taste of queer brotherhood that I have sought after for years.

I still have a lot to process, including how I apply this newfound empowerment and self-love into my everyday life here in Toronto. I’m not entirely sure how that will happen, but based on the way I’ve felt over the past days, I know I am largely equipped to make my dreams come true.

Forgiveness is hard, especially when you’re trying to forgive yourself. The first photo in this post does not do justice to what I felt when I saw it on a crowded dancefloor under the gentle haze of happy intoxication. I was forgiven for all the times I’d descended into self-hatred, all the times I believed what my mother had told me, all the times I’d been set up to fail by my ex-boss, all the times an ex-lover had made me out to be a horrible person.  To know that I was finally home, with my people - that I had a people - has made me rethink my place in the world. These precious days have given me hope in a bright future for myself…a much brighter future than I ever thought I deserved.

[ballerinascribbles]

“The Tate Modern? Ah, you can skip it.”

This is what a native British gentleman and engineer says to me, a starving artist visiting from the States. Having never met ballet’s ideal standards for beauty, age, weight, or race, I am defensively inclined to give the Tate Modern a chance. Plus, it sounds like a dare, so I go twice in two days.

The Tate is an institution boasting the United Kingdom’s collection of British art, international contemporary, and modern art. Its mission is to amplify the public’s accessibility to, enjoyment and understanding of art through its four magnificent galleries: The original Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool, Tate St Ives, and Tate Modern. Together, these sites house nearly 70,000 artworks of unimaginable variety.

The Tate Modern is my favorite. To get to the Tate Modern, I recommend taking the Tube and hopping off the Central Line at St Paul’s. You could, of course, get closer, faster, but hopping off here gives you a gorgeous fifteen minute walk past St Paul’s Cathedral, over the River Thames stretching under the Millennium Bridge, just brushing shoulders with Shakespeare’s Old Globe theater before embracing the monolith we know as the Tate Modern. This is the world’s favorite modern art museum, the fifth most visited museum, the youngest and most popular branch of the Tate group. Upon its opening in 2000, the Tate Modern attracted 5.25 million visitors - more than twice the amount of visitors from the other three Tate sites combined! When it became abundantly clear that this museum would remain among the world’s heavy-hitters in way of record high attendance, plans for expanding the Tate Modern were promptly announced. As it stands, the building is a dazzling, dizzying, thought-provoking piece in itself.

Now, let’s pretend you took my advice. You do stroll from beholding the classical beauty of St Paul’s Cathedral to confront the perhaps imposing but nonetheless iconic combination of steel, brick, and glass pictured above. If this is mildly shocking and slightly, secretly disappointing, don’t worry. This doesn’t make you a bad person.

Let’s take that stroll together from Old World beauty to contemporary reflection. Let’s slow over Millennium Bridge to look back, St Paul’s Cathedral framed in blue glass and sky.

Let’s pause outside the intimidating brick facade and wonder together if we’re shallow or simple-minded for not instantly appreciating the significance of the Tate Modern. Let’s allow for the possibility that our first impressions may be disproven, and let’s stride right inside.

We’ve stepped over the threshold to the First Floor River Entrance. We glance over the life-sized map on the wall to our right or we take to wandering, which I prefer. The Tate Modern may be thought of in terms of three separate pillars under one roof: The main Turbine Hall in the center, the Boiler House to the north, and the Blavatnik Building to the south. Let’s push past light, quiet crowds to peer over the first floor balcony or bridge stretching over the striped ground floor. We’ll see an immense pendulum swinging side to side along the seam of the Turbine Hall. We’ll watch children and adults alike chase the moving metal sphere, sprinting and craning up to see a glimpse of themselves in the orb above. We wonder together whether this was meant to illustrate the push and pull between childlike playfulness and existential profundity, or if our wild imaginations are working overtime. We keep walking.

Were we to scuttle downstairs to Level 0, we would stumble across three enormous underground oil tanks known un-mysteriously as The Tanks: One serves simply as a utility space while the other two showcase performance art and installations, earning the description as “the world’s first museum galleries permanently dedicated to live art.” Level 1 contains the Terrace Bookshop and gift shop. Levels 2, 3, and 4 provide the breathtaking public space packed with free displays because like all UK national galleries (and unlike many museums in the United States), the Tate Modern grants general admission free of charge. Only special exhibits require an additional fee, but we ought to feel very free exploring the ever-changing collections of Levels 2, 3, and 4. Each floor is separated into east and west wings, breaking tradition for organising the artworks not chronologically, but thematically: Artist and Society, In the Studio, Between Object and Architecture, Performer and Participant, Materials and Objects, Media Networks, and Living Cities. Let’s start at the Start Display, an introduction to basic ideas of modern art.

Level 5 buzzes with open-ended questions for being home to the Tate Exchange, a place devoted to engaging, communal conversation, collaboration, and discovery of new ideas and perspectives on life through art; the Tate Exchange is free and open to all. The Blavatnik Building runs a tall ten stories, each floor after Level 5 featuring places of varying exclusivity indelibly designed for contemplation. If we’re not buying Tate membership today, I recommend the top floor open viewing terrace, which is free and accessible to all (just be sure to use the dedicated elevator from Level 0). We can eat and drink at any one of the cafes and restaurants located on Levels 1, 3, 6, 9 or 10, but let’s be sure to end up on Level 10 to steal a spectacular 360-degree view of the London skyline.

That’s the long and short of the Tate Modern’s floor plan. Now let’s talk about its contents.

Maybe you’re enlightened enough to immediately understand every piece in the Tate Modern, all contemporary and modern art. But maybe you’re like me, and this doesn’t come naturally. The Tate Modern’s collection will be challenging. Bear in mind and rest assured: Reckoning with modern art is meant to be difficult.

I am a classical ballet dancer, through and through. Classical ballet is, like the architecture of St Paul’s Cathedral, classical for being built in a restrained Baroque style. This style of architecture and art was born of the Renaissance, the rejuvenation of classical antiquity and Greek thought within the then modern world, a style characterised by grandeur, exuberance, richness, and drama. My British gentleman from the beginning of this tale thought I might as well skip the Tate Modern because I more instinctively belong to the Baroque, to environments like the National Gallery with its sumptuous color schemes and ornate ceilings. I, of all people, am trained, programmed, and paid to adore and support classicism, idyllic lines and art and architecture. I am spoiled for clarity and a tad demanding for easy understanding. I encourage you to walk with me, past St Paul’s renowned and widely accepted beauty, over the hallmark of the Millennium Bridge to the edge of our comfort zone, onto the brink of the Southbank and into something new - the Tate Modern mindset.

Architects Herzog and de Meuron made light work of converting the old Bankside power station, rendering a truly contemporary public space which is deftly integrated with the existing historical structure. The lines are blurred between what is new and what is old within the Tate Modern, the minimalist, urban character of the building only enhanced by the non-obnoxious, thoughtful way. The effect is focused, undistracted, but still welcoming. Its halls feel unperformative, expansive and symbolic, but matter of fact. This is refreshing, when you open your mind and allow it to be.

There is a certain gilded fanfare to which I am accustomed. You’ll know what I mean if you’ve ever seen a theatre with red velvet curtains, plush seats, gold leafing, and satin pointe shoes. A theatre is akin to the National Gallery in the sense that both are stages for classical art delivered in a traditional way. The ballet audience receives and applauds only the beautiful finished product onstage. The audience is, however, never privy to the work poured into our pristine and polished presentation of ballet because we would never allow them to see the sweat put into our practice. That would break the illusion of grace and ease! It is the ballerina’s responsibility is to master her breath, mind, and body. There’s no room for quivering, faltering, or falling onstage. That is what rehearsal is for.

The Tate Modern is important to me because it wakes me up and makes me think. To me it feels like a ballet studio, a productive, experimental, progressive, rehearsal space with plain walls devoid of pretension, costumes, and dramatic lighting. It’s about the work. Our experience at the Tate Modern differs from our experience at places like the National Gallery because there’s more work to be done. The art here doesn’t play easy on you! You have to ponder, weigh out and decide what pieces mean to you, and in turn wonder what those conclusions mean about you. We become scientists and philosophers immersed in the museum rather than mere spectators separated from art, tasked with revealing meaning unique to our individual experiences as we wander along walls with Dali, Warhol, Picasso, Rothko, and more. The wooden floors of the Tate Modern are left unsealed so as to show the natural wear of life, the grit and lack of glamor left under our crisscrossing footsteps. You begin to feel at home. You begin to find the work rewarding. You begin to appreciate that you are never entitled to understand the world and the people wandering these halls with you, and you begin to work harder to earn the privilege of elevated understanding and tolerance.

And you begin to remember what you’ve always known: Our humanity is not just what we package up prettily, perfectly, and put onstage for the world to see. Our humanity requires work, activity, trying, failing, honesty, respect, and courage to listen to and uplift one another.

Let’s not skip the Tate Modern. Let’s go twice.

[youmightfindyourself]

Finally we saw what we’d come all this way to see. Not only was the jetty above water; it looked like a glyph marooned in a desert. It was smaller than I expected it to be. Also wilier. The jetty changed shape and seemed to actively grow or shrink as we drove parallel to it, forcing us to constantly recalibrate our perception of it.

In short: We were not in hell. This was no inferno. The sky was low and soft and gray-mauve or dark mauve, as were the isolated triangular crags of mountains in the distance. ‘‘From that gyrating space emerged the possibility of the ‘Spiral Jetty,’ ’’ Smithson wrote. ‘‘My dialectics of site and nonsite whirled into an indeterminate state, where solid and liquid lost themselves in each other.’’ The lake, with its pinkish cast, was difficult to differentiate from the sky, creating the illusion that there was no horizon line. It kind of did feel like the end of the world, though not in the way I originally meant it. The world hadn’t been destroyed; it simply dissolved into a combination water-gas-solid substance that surrounded us. Salt lakes, I later learned, are also known as ‘‘terminal lakes’’ or ‘‘endorheic basins.’’ ‘‘Endo’’ (from the Ancient Greek) means ‘‘within’’ and ‘‘rheic’’ ‘‘to flow.’’ They are self-contained bodies that do not empty into any ocean. They are the self-contained end to an infinite means.

One of Smithson’s favorite words was ‘‘dialectic,’’ meaning he desired that things exist in productive tension with other things, thereby producing a ‘‘dialectical situation.’’ Our situation, vis-à-vis the jetty, clearly qualified as a dialectical one. But what was the ‘‘site’’ here, and what was the ‘‘nonsite’’? I’d been reading oodles of Smithson and still felt confused by these two words that crucially underwrote all of Smithson’s earth art.

‘‘What you are really confronted with in a nonsite is the absence of the site,’’ he said in a 1969 interview. ‘‘In a sense the nonsite is the center of the system, and the site itself is the fringe or the edge,’’ he said in a 1970 discussion with the earth artists Michael Heizer and Dennis Oppenheim. (If I occasionally tired of Smithson’s gnomic tendencies, I was not alone. Oppenheim, in the same 1970 discussion, grouched: ‘‘Why do you bother with nonsite at all? Why don’t you just designate a site?’’) But the most compelling definition, to me, is Smithson’s claim that the nonsite is ‘‘based on my experience of the site.’’ The nonsite is a drawing or a sculpture or a box containing slate from a quarry. It is the collaborative transmission, or so I like to think, that results when a geographical landscape moves through or commingles with a figurative, human one.

Sites and nonsites, in other words, involve the equal interplay of consciousness and matter. Which again made me think about the crows and what had thus far shaped their interior landscapes, the ones that might come to play (or interplay) on this trip, as well as on the vaster metaphorical trip that eventually their lives would comprise. How might they contain their interior landscape — their evolving selves, basically — and how will they productively, without becoming overwhelmed (or without imposing preconceptions that close down possibilities), deal with the deluge of feeling and information that exists both within a person and without?

...

In his essay ‘‘The Spiral Jetty,’’ Smithson included a list of materials a person encountered as she walked from the center of the jetty. He demarcated 20 directional points (North, North by East, etc.) The materials view from each point was the same:

Mud, salt crystals, rock, water.

Mud, salt crystals, rock, water.

The same materials, listed 20 times, the stack of repeated words gesturing toward sedimentary time layers while also, in replicating the many hash marks on a compass, implying the unseen presence of a circle.

Smithson completed ‘‘Spiral Jetty’’ in 1970. He died in Texas in 1973, while aerially surveying the artificial lake area where he hoped to build his ‘‘Amarillo Ramp.’’ He hired a plane, a pilot and a photographer. The plane crashed. All three were killed. The artificial lake is dry now. The ramp, completed after his death by his wife and friends, is eroding. The crash site — or maybe it is a nonsite — is a few hundred yards away.

We parked in the dirt lot. We scrambled down the rocky bank onto the flats. The push-pull of negative/positive space made the jetty seem even more kinetically alive and like the storm its shape resembled, one that messed with the intuitive logic of water behavior. The land we’d driven over was filling up with water, while the lake appeared to be emptying of it.

We walked the spiral many times; we developed individual jetty styles and jetty rules. The crows cut across the puddled sand between the concentric rings, but I did not, I never did that, I would never do that. I walked the line, or rather, the curve. Later we flung off onto the flats. My husband made minijetties with black rocks he found in the sand. The jetty, he said, was spawning.

We returned to the jetty and walked it again. Was it an ancient ruin? Was it the beginning of a new civilization? Was it an example of, as Rainer Maria Rilke wrote, ‘‘the revision of categories, where something past comes again, as though out of the future?’’ In always being both, it encouraged temporal slippage. We were not looking at the past or the future; we were in the middle of time. We were at the point of dislocation around which salt crystals spiraled upward like a staircase as they grew. The crows wrote their names on the sand, and because there was no rising tide — no ocean’s clock — their names would possibly never be erased.

Smithson, in his 1966 essay ‘‘Entropy and the New Monuments,’’ mentions a recent electrical blackout in the Northeast. ‘‘Far from creating a mood of dread,’’ he wrote, ‘‘the power failure created a mood of euphoria. An almost cosmic joy swept over the darkened cities.’’ (When Smithson wrote this, a far more economically destitute New York had yet to experience the subsequent 1977 blackout, the violent and anarchic results of which would probably not be qualified as expressions of ‘‘cosmic joy.’’) When we are in Maine, we often lose our power, and yes, the promise of darkness inspires glee. I gleefully fill the tub with water and the lamps with oil and make sleeping situations nearer to the woodstove. I create in our domestic interior a much more active and dynamic conversation with the exterior, that thing we are so often unaffected by, or simply trying, with our house, to keep out. And while this skill set has mostly been of use in places where the power lines are aboveground, sagging, even in good weather, from tilted pole to tilted pole, the underground electricals of New York are now equally menaced by rising (and descending, into the works) water. My gleeful preparations are increasingly applicable to many more situations, and by that possibility I feel energized. Not because I crave drama or instability, but because I am rendered, in a kind of trippy and exhilarating way, both indispensable and irrelevant.

At the jetty I became entirely irrelevant, and the result was even more exhilarating. Smithson, when searching for a framework with which to explore both limits and limitlessness, found useful the concept of entropy, i.e., the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy proved intriguing to him because, as he understood it, energy was ‘‘more easily lost than obtained’’ and thus, ‘‘in the ultimate future the whole universe will burn out and be transformed into an all-encompassing sameness.’’ I experienced that ultimate future. I experienced what the planet would be like when we were, every one of us, gone. I had, before our visit, worried not only about my crows but also about the loneliness of a planet that might someday have no one to see it, walk through it, feel intense things because of it. That is what made my brain and my heart fold in on themselves. Cities, yes, gone; ice caps, gone; but the beauty of the planet routed through a human consciousness, that’s what I couldn’t comprehend vanishing. This was what, more than my own particular death, I’d despaired at. But on the jetty, I understood what Smithson intuited so long ago in Rome: Beauty did not need us.

‘‘You don’t have to have existence to exist,’’ Smithson said.

If there were a sun, it would have been setting. As the sky grew subtly pinker and purpler, other cars appeared: two families, a lone woman and a couple. Some walked the jetty, but others struck out directly for the invisible horizon and soon became tiny black marks floating in the middle of the same-color distance. The young couple stood on the flats and hugged and kissed. The lone woman neatened the jetty; she found errant rocks and threw them back within the boundaries, redarkening its outline.

Back in the parking lot, as the rain finally started (it had been threatening), we talked to some of these people. All of them were longtime residents in the area. The jetty-neatener said: ‘‘I’ve never been here before. Today just felt like the day.’’

The Art at the End of the World

[girlieinterns]

Maxine Musto back again with a brand new Professional Confessional!  This week, I spoke with Aleix Martinez about his work as a visual artist and publicist as well as key advice he has for those aspiring to be in his position.  Check out the interview below:

Maxine Musto: If you had your own Wikipedia page, what would the synopsis be?

Aleix Martinez: My synopsis would be that I am an artist across multiple platforms, because I do make my own art, and a long-time music publicist. I am a champion of art for other people and my own, particularly art made by marginalized people, which has been the focus of my own art and the majority of my career.

MM: You are currently an artist, can you tell me a bit about your art?

AM: At the moment, I paint, collage, and make video art that explore hypercapitalism and what it feels like to be surrounded by indicators of extreme wealth as we are in New York, particularly when you come from the working class.

MM: Which came first for you, visual art or music?

AM: Music is my gateway to all art because I did not go to art school.  I am largely self-taught and self-educated in general, but absolutely about art.  I was that kid who slept with the radio on and was obsessed with pop music in the 80s.  And then in the early 90s, I found my way to more underground music like Riot Grrrl, punk, and music happening overseas.  My first exposure to really thinking about visual art was noticing who designed the album covers or if they had licensed an existing work of art for it.  I started finding out about artists and writers through the people that the bands and artists I liked mentioned in interviews.  This was before the internet was in everyone’s homes, so my way of finding out about things was hearing someone else talk about them.  I found a lot of art from Madonna, but there’s also this British band from the 90s called Suede who helped me find my way to a lot of visual art and experimental filmmakers.  I’ve always been drawn to artists who do all of it, someone who makes music but also designs album covers or writes.

MM: Can you tell me about your work as a publicist today?

AM: I’ve been a publicist for almost twenty years and it has radically changed in that time.  In the beginning, it was all on the phone, with long conversations about art, lineage, and ideas.  Now, since the rate of consumption of art is so fast, I spend a lot of my day targeting and thinking about what makes my clients interesting, what about them deserves attention, and who I think it will excite and resonate with.  Then, I express that in the most concise way possible.  I send a lot of pitch emails, and a lot of it is alone, creative brainstorming and looking through a thesaurus.  Really trying to encapsulate things and being very strategic because you don’t want to bother the same people all the time, especially if you think it’s not likely they’re going to be receptive to something.  I also speak to my clients a lot.  I still represent Santigold, alongside Girlie Action Media, as well as Jake Shears, Sofi Tukker, and Cut Copy.  With more established artists, I really try to guide them into that path of longevity.  Maybe something is small but I know that it’s going to resonate, so I try to convince them they should do it even though it’s the smallest thing because it’s going to keep them present to a younger audience.  I love this part of my job because I get the chance to give a lot of artists pep talks.  Putting your art out there is a very vulnerable thing.  Being rejected or being ignored can be very difficult, but that moment in the culture changes and it becomes more supportive of you and what you’re doing.  I love to encourage people to make art with very little concern for the marketplace and to make what you have to make.  And then worry about who is going to buy it afterward.

MM: Along those lines, I know you worked with Girlie Action for a long time with a really great client roster.  Can you tell me who some of your favorite clients were to work with?

AM: For me, working at Girlie Action greatly transformed my life.  Pretty early on at Girlie Action, I found myself gravitating towards a lot of LGBTQ+ artists such as The Gossip, Scissor Sisters, and Anohni, who forged the path for queer artists in the last decade.  I don’t know if it’s the first transgender artist on TV, but when we booked Antony and the Johnsons on Letterman, it was one of the first moments where underrepresented queer artists were seen.  At the same time, I had the opportunity to work with a lot of legacy artists like Tori Amos, Morrissey, and Grace Jones, people who had already sold many millions of records by the time I met them.  My favorite person to work with is Santigold.  I’ve worked with her for sixteen years and she is someone who is hands on.  She produces, writes, sings, performs, makes costumes, choreographs her stage shows, designs clothing, acts on television, and collaborates with painters and fine artists who are not working in music.  She is someone who really is more of a cultural force.  To see someone do that so well and so successfully without compromising themselves is really motivating for me to keep pushing myself.  I have a lot of fun experiences with the things she is involved in like shows at the MOMA or shows in LA.  More than anything, she is my favorite person to work with because she is an artist who is an all-around artist.  She could be choreographing a dance one day, making a beat the next, and designing a sneaker the following.  And that’s incredible to me.

MM: Name an artist or a band you think everyone should know

AM: I love an artist named Allison Wolfe, one of the creators of Riot Grrrl.  She’s someone who now, for over twenty-five years, has put out this body of work that keeps evolving.  It’s so funny and so incisive in dealing with the culture.  She deals with serious issues but puts a lot of humor in it.  She’s also someone who has largely operated on the underground this whole time and you always see her speaking out or supporting other musicians.  She has really lived her life at the intersection of art and activism without ever compromising and I think that as much as people talk about Riot Grrrl, they talk about it in general as a movement and don’t get into the specific artists. She has had five or six bands at this point.  Her catalog is so fascinating and she is always doing something more interesting than the last time you saw her, which is a difficult feat for someone with a career that long.

MM: If you could have dinner with one person living or dead, who would it be and why?

AM: Oscar Wilde and Dorothy Parker.  I’ve been around musicians most of my adult life, so other types of artists are always fascinating to me because I have so many questions.   I don’t understand other worlds, but anyone who is funny and defiant and can give you an insight into what this world is really like, making that biting comment that exposes the truth while also making you laugh, is always my hero.  It’s such a hard thing to fight for justice or speak truth to power without being bitter and instead, offering something that is beautiful and entertaining.  I would just love to trade barbs with them and get the gossip that’s not in the books because I’m sure they both have amazing stories.

MM: What advice would you give people interested in working in your position, both in publicity as a day job and an artist pursuing a passion of love?

AM: As a publicist, I would tell you to look who is representing or signing the art that you’re interested in and then try to intern at a couple of those places and get the experience.  Publicity is something that is very demanding, and it requires a specific skill set.  There are a lot of people who love music who just don’t have the eye for publicity.  Find your way to the things that interest you.  If you see that there’s a PR firm that has the bands that you love or a label that is signing them, keep bothering them until you get an internship.  Don’t take no for an answer.  The music industry is still a place about paying your dues.  So if you don’t already have connections in it, that’s a way to make them.  I think that people want to feel that you value being around them and what they have to say.  Everyone also values a self-starter.  If you have a great idea or if you write about music or writing in general, share that with the places you intern.  Don’t be shy.  Everyone is always looking to approach something in a different way or for a new fresh voice.  Get yourself as close to the things you love as you can, and don’t be shy about sharing the best parts of you.

In terms of making art, my advice is completely different.  If you’re making music, there are so many tools that you can use.  Push it as far as you can, make sure you have an online presence, and work on your socials so that they are telling your story.  Even in terms of reaching out to press for musicians, do it as much as you can and once you feel like there is some traction or if you are working on a large project, speak to people like publicists and see if there is someone who can offer you something to get it to that next level.  You really want to have as many of the cards in your hand as you can when you have your first meetings with people.  The more you can say for yourself, what you’ve done, and what you’ve built, the better position that you are in.  Unlike music, visual art has a lot of institutions in place and it is hard to go in through the window if you haven’t walked in through the door with everyone.  So I would encourage people to get the best art education that is in their means because most of the art that is hanging in museums comes from the same galleries and most of the art in those galleries come from the same schools.  For music, it’s do it all yourself, but for visual art, it’s find your way inside the system.

[easterndaze]

Budapest’s New Underground

Although the international reputation of the country, whose PM hailed illiberal democracy as his preferred NWO, is not the best (to say the least), there's a parallel culture that largely operates independently of state-run infrastructure, creating several microcosms with their own audiences and worldviews, implicitly turning against misogyny, discrimination, narrow-mindedness, and reflecting the techno-dystopian times we are living in at the moment.         "...The goal of our underground is to create a second culture, a culture completely independent from all official communication media and the conventional hierarchy of value judgements put out by the establishment", wrote Ivan Jirous, a member of The Plastic People of the Universe, in 1975. For the purposes of this article, we will focus only on Budapest. Hungary, in general, is very centrist, even more so than its neighbouring countries. Most of the cultural happenings take place in the capital. "It is worth mentioning that to me the 'underground' seems to be an arty, intellectual, middle-class, mostly Budapest-centred, or at least city-centred thing", explains popular music scholar Emília Barna. "For instance, there is so much rap music made in the outskirts or the provinces, extremely poor areas of Hungary, scenes that thrive in these localities as well as on the internet – music that I would certainly call political because these artists directly address issues of poverty, social deprivation, criminality (gangster and prison life) etc. – yet as far as I know this music is never referred to as part of 'the underground'".

UH Fest

"A strong stage performance and powerful art are always political acts", says Krisztián Puskár, one of the organisers behind UH Fest. The experimental music staple was established at the dawn of the new millennium, taking inspiration from the now-defunct Austrian phonoTAKTIK festival. Since 2000, UH Fest (also known as Ultrahang) has staged approximately 500 performances. From noise techno, through avant-garde improv, to an hour of drone, UH Fest aims to challenge its audience's expectations and break the boundaries between various genres and generations. Thus, over the course of the week of the festival, the likes of Romanian spectralist Iancu Dumitrescu rub shoulders with Low Jack, KTL, Sote and Richard Dawson. Unlike many other similar urban festivals in Europe, UH Fest is not institutionalised, and is largely run on a volunteer basis. "To this day, we are just ordinary citizens without an institution behind us. We have a foundation, which is a legal entity, but not in terms of an office or infrastructure. It was a grassroots initiative, a family venture in the beginning, because my sister and brother-in-law were also involved", says András Nun, the organiser of the festival and one of the most pivotal figures of the Budapest underground music scene. Aside from its main event, which usually happens in late September/early October, the festival has also organised so-called "Demo" events for up-and-coming local talent, which acted as a springboard for several successful musicians such as The Death of Rave artist and Mark Fell collaborator Gábor Lázár, Opal Tapes and Lobster Theremin producer S Olbricht (whose own Farbwechsel imprint we'll discuss later), and the improv duo 12z.

OMOH

OMOH is a new addition to Budapest's queer scene, shunning the music played at mainstream gay events and embracing a more abrasive type of techno and underground house. The name itself comes from Russian police special forces and can be interpreted "as a sort of middle finger to all homophobic legislators of the world", explain the organisers, whose identity remains a mystery. "No organisers, no line-ups" is their egalitarian motto. The monthly (or so) OMOH party takes place at the top of a decaying shopping centre built in 1926, the home of the infamous Corvin Club & Bar. This sprawling venue is wedged between the 7th district, renowned for its tourist-filled ruin bars, and the up-and-coming, working-class 8th district. "Lively, chaotic, and most definitely an architectural, urban and social war zone – not postcard material. Which fits our mindset perfectly." The right-wing parties who came to prominence across Central Europe – most prominently in Poland and Hungary – championed heteronormative, Christian, conservative, nationalist values, the resonance of which can be felt in places like OMOH: "Even if club owners and managers have no problem with the LGBTQI crowd, the organisers still have to deal with the suspicion of the staff and the regulars – to put it mildly. And our audience, quite frankly, is a division of brave little foot-soldiers claiming their share of an environment which is by no means a so-called safe space."

Auróra

About 10 minutes' walk from Blaha Lujza Square, deeper into the dimly lit streets of the 8th district, the increasingly gentrified inner-city "ghetto" which is also one of the most ethnically diverse and lively areas of Budapest, lies Auróra. Located in the street of the same name, Auróra is based in an inauspicious building – you will have to ring the bell in order to get in. This family house with a cosy garden has become an oasis of alternative culture and thinking in its purest sense. Aside from its music programming – which largely centres around the weekend – the space also provides offices to several NGOs such as Budapest Pride, Roma Press Center and DrugReporter, maintained by a platform called the Auróra HUB, which is funded from Auróra's profit. The genealogy of the space can be traced back to Sirály, a former squat located on one of the busiest commercial veins of the city, at Király St 50, which was shut down in 2013. Several activist groups and a few political parties emerged from the vaults of Sirály – one of which was the collective behind Auróra (another established Gólya, a venue also located in the 8th district). Auróra's music programming is diverse, and encompasses over 40 gigs per month, ranging from free jazz, techno and punk to experimental electronics – all of this without any official state support. "The political situation doesn't let us cooperate with culture-politics at all", say Auróra's Fanni Tóth, Áron Lukács and Zsuzsi Mekler. "You can see self-censorship, fear and unpredictability across cultural institutes all over Hungary. We think the only possible way to keep this platform of NGOs and the lively discussion about issues in our country alive is to run a social centre like this, totally independently."

RNR666

RNR666, or Rock'n'Roll 666, is a music community established in 2005 by three friends from rural eastern Hungary: Csühes Pali, Lavor and Szabo, whose backgrounds include music, art and fanzine publishing. Initially begun as online radio, the RNR666 RADIO SHOW, the group widened its activities to include concert organisation, online publishing and record releasing. Their collective spirit is marked by a fiercely DIY attitude and punk-inspired ethos. They began in the era of Myspace, which connected them to the global underground and the low-budget, so-called "food-flat-and-beer bands". 10 years later, not much has changed in terms of the frugality and DIY aspect of this scene. "Lots of the venues here don't care about the fact that you want to do small, but subculturally very important events, they are just interested in profit", says Lavor as we sit in Kék Ló, an improv venue/bar in the 8th district. These days, they might do one gig per month, largely due to the lack of resources, inviting mostly foreign bands – they have to finance everything from their own pockets. This is how they released their first 7-inch, a psychedelic garage rock split between Piresian Beach, the moniker of Budapest-based singer-songwriter Zsófia Németh – who is also a member of the collective – and JC Satán. Although event promotion has shifted to Facebook, they still make posters and spread the word IRL: "I still party six days a week, so I get to talk to people that way."

Farbwechsel

Farbwechsel is a truly glocal label based on friendship and personal connections, sourcing its roster almost exclusively from local talent and organically spreading the "Budapest sound" abroad. This happened largely thanks to acclaimed producers like Route 8, S Olbricht – who established the label with Bálint Zalkai aka Alpár in 2012 – Norwell and Imre Kiss, all of whom released their debut albums on Farbwechsel. You'll often find musicians associated with the imprint jamming in each other's bedrooms, sometimes perusing vintage hardware instruments borrowed from Zoltán Balla, an avid collector and member of Farbwechsel-signed project Wedding Acid Group. Even though several artists from the label's roster have gradually begun to release music on foreign labels such as Opal Tapes and Lobster Theremin, they remain faithful and committed to the imprint that brought them recognition, and they also organise regular events in Budapest. Their sonic aesthetic has been described mostly as lo-fi house, but that doesn't do them justice. There's a sense of ghostly melancholia and longing, perhaps an aural appropriation of their home city, a place constantly hovering somewhere between the past and the present. This is most prominent in Mikolai's work, which centres around the dancefloor and transgresses it at the same time. The label roster has become stable over the last five years, with names such as Saint Leidal The 2nd, Aiwa, S Olbricht, Norwell, SILF and Alpár. 

Küss Mich

Küss Mich… and follow me to a gritty basement, where we'll dance to abandon and the music will elevate us beyond our physical selves, bodies sublimating in communal spirit. Küss Mich is a romantic event – romantic in its truest, least-saccharine sense. Founded in 2008 as an irregular DJ club event at the iconic drinking den/underground basement Vittula off Blaha Lujza Square, Küss Mich is a legendary night in the context of Budapest nightlife – a place that hailed eclecticism before it was in fashion and steered clear of the corrosive irony inherent in postmodern hipsterdom. Their sonic cocktail contains a blend of DIY-synthwave, punk, Italo disco, acid and industrial – in a concert or DJ format. "The motivation was to entertain ourselves. One of us had an industrial-dark-synth-punk background, the other came from techno and acid-oriented electronic dance music. We were both tired of the narrow-mindedness of these scenes", says Krisztián Puskár who also DJs under the moniker Splatter, one of the founders of Küss Mich alongside Gábor György alias Gördön. Adopting their outsider status and subverting expectations of the then-segregated music milieu, rediscovering past gems and presenting them alongside current sounds and bands, enabled them to navigate the muddy waters of contemporary music, aided by a devoted audience. "To choose a German name was pretty strange, fun and uncool back then. Now it's totally the opposite of that. German party and brand names will vanish or become out-of-vogue, but great people will still be there to do things on their own. And us too. If there is no money in it, there must be another motivation, right?"

JazzaJ

JazzaJ is a compound word combining "jazz" and "zaj" (which means "noise" in Hungarian). The event, which aims to bridge the free jazz and noise/experimental scenes, based on improvisation, was founded in 2011. "We wanted the noise musician to meet the free jazz musician. The underground rocker to meet the folk musician. The baroque player and the avant-garde music-philosopher to meet the electronic music geek", says Ernő Zoltán Rubik, one of the organisers of the event. Over the last five years it has grown into a communal gathering of discerning listeners, who welcome anything that JazzaJ offers them. "Listening is a creative act", adds Rubik. The main task that musicians who play at JazzaJ are given is to leave their comfort zones. "We believe in no style". Recently, JazzaJ began to invite musicians to be curators – each month a musician puts together the line-up, which sometimes creates rather interesting and surprising juxtapositions. This way, they've staged "hardcore-like nights" courtesy of Balázs Pándi, video operas with Miro Tóth, baroque and noise improvisation with Albert Márkos, and 12 saxophonists running around the room via Gergő Kovács. The JazzaJ community is sourced from the sprawling local scene, but remains tightly connected not only to neighbouring countries, but also the European and international scenes. "Our way of promoting improvisation as an act of freedom and tolerance, listening and presence, is already political without naming it so. There were times when we felt that for some people, this was a weekly refuge, a hideout from everyday cruelty and ignorant aggression taking place on social and political fields, or the streets." (photo: Attila Nagy)

T+U

T+U stands for Technologie und das Unheimliche, or the uncanny, the strangely familiar – that which repulses and attracts you at the same time. Established in 2014 as a publishing project and cross-disciplinary movement by Mark Fridvalszki, Zsolt Miklósvölgyi and Márió Z. Nemes, T+U is located somewhere between Berlin, Budapest and Leipzig. Their leitmotif is an exploration of the confrontation between the age-old dichotomy: the human condition – its various manifestations and cultures – and technology, through theme-based issues and events. Music plays an important role in their modus operandi. They have a regular radio show on legendary Tilos Rádio and create guest mixes, employing a specific sonic aesthetic that chimes with their ideology: dark, technoid, dystopian. Some of T+U's members have left Hungary for personal and political reasons. "Within the recent years, mostly due to the socially and morally harmful cultural politics of the current political establishment, there is less and less air for progressive art and subversive thoughts", says Zsolt Miklósvölgyi via email. "This catastrophic hedge-hop mainly caused by the anti-intellectualist, reactionary attitude of the ruling right-wing populist party and its substandard cultural myrmidons, obviously forces many of us into 'exile'. But within our techno-capitalist era, the image of 'living in exile' no longer means that you exchange one geo-cultural location for another, but you are in constant transition. You are not only characterised by the place you are from, but rather by the way you are rewriting these already-existing cognitive landscapes and cartographies."

Drrpnc

If you are a musician or into underground rock and extreme metal in Budapest, you will probably have passed through Keleti Blokk and the adjoining Dürer Club at some point. The sprawling complex neighbours the green oasis of the city park, whose integrity is threatened by a huge makeover that, for the foreseeable future, may replace much of the greenery with shiny concrete. Drrpnc is a secret cellar somewhere in the underbelly of the aforementioned space. A cross between a rehearsal room and a gig space, Drrpnc has become one of the city's most prominent havens for the punk/hardcore and extreme underground metal. Needless to say, the modus operandi of their activities is strictly DIY. "We have always had some challenges, such as leakage, electrical damage, etc., but the Hungarian scene is a community, so we can solve all of our problems through our common strength", says Adam Mjöl. The future remains uncertain. "This building, where we are now, will be probably demolished, so we have to start looking for a new place."

Davoria & Külvárosi Techno

The seeds of Davoria were sown around the year 2000. The collective began organising sound-system parties in the summer, as part of the then-thriving freetekno scene and its annual summer teknival gatherings. Ever since their beginnings they have always been part of both worlds – throwing events at regular clubs as well as the outdoor, illegal parties. These days, Davoria's monthly events take place at Müszi (situated in the 8th district at the aforementioned Corvin shopping mall), a space for alternative culture that also includes the offices of the civil watchdog Atlatszo.hu, as well as Auróra. The sonic identity of the event remains faithful to their beginnings: hardcore techno, noise and experimental electronics. "We call our parties tekno, because we feel that this term is open enough to represent different kinds of genres, from tekno to experimental music", explains Davoria organiser Péter Márton, who also produces uncompromising techno (or tekno) and noise under the respective monikers Telesport and Prell. Davoria also host a stage at the now-legendary underground techno event Külvárosi Techno (Suburban Techno), which takes place several times a year in the industrial premises of the large studio space and now-defunct venue R33. Ideologically, their stance hasn't changed over the last fifteen years. "We try to show that even in a commercial world, you are capable of doing productive, good things while keeping your freedom."

Originally published in Glissando magazine #30 

Lucia Udvardyova

[colinresponse0blog-blog]

Hip Hop Song Writers

Hip Hop music writers are finding the track writing course of turning into easier than ever before with the rising number of song writing tools and software program out there on-line and available in the market. Traditionally song writing has at all times had the identical steps, lyrics, music, production; the trail followed varying from artist to artist.

Generally in hip hop, the beat comes first. The artist working on arranging the beats first after which getting on the lyrics. That is principally completed because it's simpler to try to write lyrics to slot in with a pre-existing beat, but it's comparatively tough to try and kind a beat round lyrics that have already been author and selected. The idea of the beat is the drum and other percussion devices.

Drums are the premise of the tune manufacturing and will be sampled or created on authentic kits. In sampling, the hip hop tune writers use a part of an already existing song, or observe by one other artist. The essence of sampling is that a part, be it drum or vocals, from a track or recording belonging to every other artist is taken and used by the music writer as part of their track.

Parts of the monitor will be combined into the primary track over and over to type a sample, which is known as a loop. Loops not only add a distinct dimension to the tune, but in addition add layers, introducing the work of one other artist into the mix, which might be thought of as some type of collaboration on the hip hop music writers half. There are other ways to collaborate equivalent to engaged on lyrics with another artist or having them do visitor vocals on your song track.

Apart from the drums, bass lines are also an integral part of any hip hop song. Where the drums add a backing to the music, bass strains add a depth, a resonance. Usually synthesizers can be utilized to create bass strains. The association of the drums, bass strains, sampling parts and many others. is all depending on the hip hop song writers, how they want to type the music.

Curious about new hip hop track releases? From underground rap superstars like Ambiance or Aesop Rock to Soiled South rap artists like Lil Wayne, here's the very best places to new hip hop music releases.

Radio Stations

True, radio stations have lost some of their influence thanks to the recognition of the Web, although new songs generally get a number of airplay here. Below you will discover classic hip hop stations and a few on-line ones which have blown up not too long ago...

Power106. The authority in the case of new rap songs. Energy 106 plays tracks from the hottest established double dutchess rappers like Eminem, Lil Wayne and Kanye West, as effectively the up and comers like T.I and Flo Rida.

Hot97. Their tagline is "Hot97 Is Hip Hop and R&B" and with their track record of providing the hottest new beats and interviews, no one is about to say otherwise.

Energy one zero five. Initially a delicate rock radio station, Power105 now focuses on offering new and basic rap tracks. In addition they supply the newest freestyles from prime artists to youthful MCs seeking to get seen.

IMEEM. With IMEEM, listeners could make their very own music playlists on the fly and incorporate a wide variety of musical types corresponding to underground rap old-school hip-hop and mainstream artists. Fans can save their playlists for later use and share it with different customers on the positioning. When you're looking for a new hip-hop track or freestyle this is the place to go.

Pandora. Indisputably Pandora is one in all my favorite sites what I'm searching for new music. All you have to do is kind within the title of your favourite rapper Pandora creates a streaming playlist that includes related artists, based upon musical types and lyrical content.

It never ceases to amaze me how many rap artists I've come throughout using this website; it is like preventing and also you hit rap tune every 5 minutes.or one other great feature with Pandora is your means to drift for every track as its play. Should you vote a tune up, Pandora's extra likely to embody that track again and your ongoing playlist; voted down and it's possible you'll not see that same track for months to come, if at all.

Hip hop music has been around for 30 years now, and during this time there have been many artists to produce superb songs. But, some of those songs have caught in our minds and nonetheless make us rise up and dance and sing alongside once we hear them. We salute those who have given us musical talent so outstanding to make us soften after we hear their music.

The top eight hip hop songs ever are (in no explicit order):

1. 'It was a great Day' -Ice Cube

From the beat to the lyrics this is that really feel good track that instantly relieves the entire stress of the day. We are able to all relate to the track, and irrespective of what number of instances it's played it's nonetheless that sound you bob your head to.

2. 'Youngsters's Story' -Slick Rick

You'll be able to't talk about hip hop without talking about Slick Rick, one of the biggest performers on this genre. This tune has that flowing beat and lyrics that get stuck in your thoughts each time. Anyone who is aware of hip hop is aware of this jam.

3. 'Juicy' -Biggie Smalls

This music began a new era in rap music as it's the tune that made Massive Poppa what he still is to the world today, even 10+ years after he was shot to demise. Juicy stated it was all a dream and this music offered inspiration and really feel good vibes to each single one that listened to it.

four. 'Straight Outta Compton' -NWA

Straight Outta Compton is likely one of the most popular rap songs of all instances. It is usually responsible for the West Coast gangster rap movement that changed the lives of numerous individuals. Straight Outta Compton details the life out on the streets of one of many state's most dangerous cities with hardcore rapper Eazy-E on the vocals.

5. 'Rapper's Delight' - The Sugar Hill Gang

Hip hop, hippty hop... He's rapping to the beat simply making an attempt to maneuver your toes. Most individuals know each single phrase to this basic music. This was one of many world's first introductions to the musical style, and a powerful one which it was.

6. 'Push It' -Salt N- Pepa

Released in 1986, Push It was a success for the trio of rappers. This can be a sassy joint that made it to dance charts and nonetheless at present rocks the body and the party.

7. 'Hypnotize' -Biggie Smalls

The legendary rapper tops the top 10 record once again with this track, reaching number one only one week after the rappers demise. This fast-witted, humorous track with the quirky beat feels good to take heed to. It also started an eruption of love, tears and celebration of life at Biggie's funeral on his solution to be laid to rest on the streets of Brooklyn.

8. 'Hard Knock Life' -Jay Z

Jay-Z is a musical god, as he proved back in 1998 with Laborious Knock Life, a music sampling Annie in the refrain. Jay raps about residing that tough knock life, an actual song that most of us can really feel at some level.

Rap music is a part of us, a part of our soul. There are literally thousands of amazing songs out there in this style, with musical expertise from world wide. There may be nothing quite like hip hop music when the sounds hit you.

I can't stress sufficient the advantage of having your property recorded Hip Hop songs Mastered by an out of doors Mastering Engineer that specializes in the Hip Hop style. The top consequence will little doubt be higher when accomplished by a educated ear with an acoustically tuned setting & Mastering particular gear. With that said, it's potential so that you can obtain usable outcomes in your home Hip Hop recording studio & the aim of this article is that will help you obtain these outcomes using the recording gear/software program that you just already personal.

If you're recording on Digidesign Protools software then you need to use the plug ins that came with the program. Most related packages ought to have comparable processing plug ins so consult your person guide for these.

You'll begin your mastering session with a two observe stereo mix of your tune preferably with the master stage peaking at about -3db by no means hitting the purple on the meter. This mix ought to already be sounding the way in which you need whereas needing a lift in volume & perhaps a couple EQ tweaks to make it translate well to varied sound programs/sources.

Beginning with the EQ make adjustments to the lows, mids, & highs, based mostly on any notes that you just taken after listening to your combine on several various kinds of sound sources akin to earbuds, a automobile system, a bookshelf stereo, a mono clock radio, laptop speakers and many others.

Your objective is for your master to end up sounding good on all the completely different methods where of course on larger methods with sub woofers you should have extra bass & on laptop speakers & earbuds there will likely be little or no sub bass. The bottom line is to have a grasp that also retains clarity on every of these sources. Once you take heed to your mix on these sources pay attention for frequency issues that have a tendency to point out up on multiple sound sources as these are the primary things it's best to work on with the EQ.

You should try trial & error to search out the frequencies and keep in mind it is at all times better to repair by reducing the offensive sounds then by boosting other frequencies to cowl them.

Remember that any EQ tweaks that you just perform on the stereo combine goes to have an effect on the entire song so be certain that the adjustments are actually fixing the issue without causing an even bigger one in one other space.

The subsequent step in your home Hip Hop Mastering session after you're proud of the EQ results will likely be adding a Compressor to the observe. This will probably be used to offer the song a easy level sound making the observe stage consistent from begin to end. The Compressor will also support in boosting the perceived quantity of the tune. Beneath is a set of Compressor settings that I've come to use on Hip Hop tracks as a place to begin when placing collectively a music Grasp.

You'll want to do A/B listening comparisons between your working grasp & a commercially released Hip Hop observe that's similar in type to your track. You will want your master to be as loud as the commercially launched song and translate effectively on all the different sound methods/sources.

Simply as you will want to do with a mixture, after completing your tune master put it aside & go away it alone for a day or two then come back to it with fresh ears and you will have a different perspective on it & finds issues to fix that may have been missed earlier. as soon as you are feeling your song master is comparable to the commercially released music you are completed mastering your new music.

There are numerous totally different specialty packages & software plug ins that are designed for Mastering however this text is geared toward those which might be trying to master their songs using the choices which can be already present on their recording software program or workstation. Also needless to say Pro Mastering houses will furnish you with a master CD that will likely be verified to be error free as well as contain special encoding that would be the grasp you would need to give to a CD replication/duplication plant to get mass produced CD's. This is a vital feature although it seems in the music business extra & extra artists are bypassing the price of getting CD's made & instead having download only releases.

The data in this article ought to give you a path to follow when making an attempt to grasp your Hip Hop songs in your individual residence studio. There aren't any guidelines set in stone although trial & error have helped to formulate the mastering process given above.

Brian G a.okay.a. BG has 15 years expertise starting out as a Deejay turned Producer/remixer turned recording engineer with an honor student diploma from AIA. Brian G has recorded over 50 Hip-Hop and R&B artists in his house studios as well as recorded his own hip-hop songs.

[restrepoofficialblog-blog]

Downloading Top Hip Hop Songs

Hip Hop music writers are discovering the music writing process becoming simpler than ever before with the increasing variety of tune writing instruments and software accessible on-line and available in the market. Traditionally track writing has all the time had the identical steps, lyrics, music, production; the path adopted varying from artist to artist.

Usually in hip hop, the beat comes first. The artist working on arranging the beats first and then getting on the lyrics. That is largely achieved as a result of it's easier to try to write lyrics to slot in with a pre-current beat, however it's comparatively troublesome to try to type a beat round lyrics which have already been writer and selected. The basis of the beat is the drum and other percussion instruments.

Drums are the idea of the music production and may be sampled or created on authentic kits. In sampling, the hip hop track writers use a part of an already present song, or track by one other artist. The essence of sampling is that a component, be it drum or vocals, from a track or recording belonging to every other artist is taken and used by the song writer as a part of their monitor.

Components of the track will be blended into the main track over and over to form a sample, which is called a loop. Loops not only add a distinct dimension to the tune, but in addition add layers, introducing the work of another artist into the mix, which could be considered as some form of collaboration on the hip hop music writers half. There are different ways to collaborate reminiscent of working on lyrics with one other artist or having them do guest vocals in your track observe.

In addition to the drums, bass lines are also an integral part of any hip hop track. Where the drums add a backing to the song, bass traces add a depth, a resonance. Typically synthesizers can be utilized to create bass traces. The arrangement of the drums, bass lines, sampling components and so on. is all depending on the hip hop track writers, how they want to style the song.

Serious about new hip hop tune releases? From underground rap superstars like Atmosphere or Aesop Rock to Soiled South rap artists like Lil Wayne, here's the most effective locations to new hip hop tune releases.

Radio Stations

True, radio stations have misplaced some of their influence due to the popularity of the Web, although new songs typically get quite a lot of airplay here. Beneath you'll discover classic hip hop stations and some online ones which have blown up not too long ago...

Power106. The authority with regards to new rap songs. Power 106 performs tracks from the most popular established rappers like Eminem, Lil Wayne and Kanye West, as nicely the up and comers like T.I and Flo Rida.

Hot97. Their tagline is "Hot97 Is Hip Hop and R&B" and with their observe file of providing the hottest new beats and interviews, no one is about to say in any other case.

Energy one hundred and five. Initially a gentle rock radio station, Power105 now focuses on offering new and classic rap tracks. In addition they supply the newest freestyles from prime artists to youthful MCs seeking to get observed.

IMEEM. With IMEEM, listeners could make their very own music playlists on the fly and incorporate a wide variety of musical types corresponding to underground rap outdated-faculty hip-hop and mainstream artists. Fans can save their playlists for later use and share it with other users on the positioning. For those who're searching for a brand new hip-hop track or freestyle that is the place to go.

Pandora. No doubt Pandora is considered one of my favourite sites what I am on the lookout for new music. All you have to do is sort within the title of your favourite rapper Pandora creates a streaming playlist that includes associated artists, primarily based upon musical styles and lyrical content.

It by no means ceases to amaze me how many rap artists I've come across using this site; it's like combating and also you hit rap track every five minutes.or another great feature with Pandora is your capability to float for every music as its play. Should you vote a track up, Pandora's more prone to embody that music once more and your ongoing playlist; voted down and it's possible you'll not see that same track for months to return, if at all.

Hip hop music has been around for 30 years now, and during this time there have been many artists to supply wonderful songs. However, a few of these songs have stuck in our minds and still make us rise up and dance and sing along once we hear them. We salute those that have given us musical expertise so exceptional to make us soften once we hear their song.

The highest eight hip hop songs ever are (in no explicit order):

1. 'It was a superb Day' -Ice Dice

From the beat to the lyrics this is that really feel good music that instantly relieves the entire stress of the day. We are able to all relate to the music, and irrespective of how many times it's performed it's nonetheless that sound you bob your head to.

2. 'Children's Story' -Slick Rick

You possibly can't talk about hip hop without speaking about Slick Rick, one of many greatest performers on this genre. This song has that flowing beat and lyrics that get caught in your mind every time. Anybody who knows hip hop knows this jam.

three. 'Juicy' -Biggie Smalls

This music started a new era in rap music as it's the music that made Massive Poppa what he nonetheless is to the world at the moment, even 10+ years after he was shot to loss of life. Juicy mentioned it was all a dream and this song provided inspiration and really feel good vibes to every single one that listened to it.

four. 'Straight Outta Compton' -NWA

Straight Outta Compton is one of the hottest rap songs of all occasions. It's also answerable for the West Coast gangster rap motion that modified the lives of numerous people. Straight Outta Compton details the life out on the streets of one of the state's most harmful cities with hardcore rapper Eazy-E on the vocals.

5. 'Rapper's Delight' - The Sugar Hill Gang

Hip hop, hippty hop... He is rapping to the beat simply making an attempt to move your ft. Most individuals know every single word to this traditional track. This was one of the world's first introductions to the musical style, and a powerful one which it was.

6. 'Push It' -Salt N- Pepa

Launched in 1986, Push It was a hit for the trio of rappers. This is a sassy joint that made it to bounce charts and still in the present day rocks the body and the occasion.

7. 'Hypnotize' -Biggie Smalls

The legendary rapper tops the highest 10 listing as soon as once more with this tune, reaching number one just one week after the rappers dying. This fast-witted, humorous track with the quirky beat feels good to take heed to. It also began an eruption of affection, tears and celebration of life at Biggie's funeral on his approach to be laid to relaxation on the streets of Brooklyn.

eight. 'Laborious Knock Life' -Jay Z

Jay-Z is a musical god, as he proved back in 1998 with Arduous Knock Life, a track sampling Annie within the refrain. Jay raps about dwelling that tough knock life, a real tune that almost all of us can really feel at some stage.

Rap music is part of us, a part of our soul. There are literally thousands of wonderful songs on the market in this genre, with musical talent from around the world. There may be nothing quite like hip hop music when the sounds hit you.

I can't stress sufficient the good thing about having your house recorded Hip Hop songs Mastered by an outside Mastering Engineer that makes a speciality of the Hip Hop genre. The end result will no doubt be better when performed by a educated ear with an acoustically tuned setting & Mastering specific gear. With that said, it's doable so that you can achieve usable outcomes in your house Hip Hop recording studio & the aim of this article is to help you obtain these results utilizing the recording gear/software program that you just already own.

If you are recording on Digidesign Protools software then you should utilize the plug ins that got here with this system. Most similar packages should have comparable processing plug ins so seek the advice of your person guide for those.

You'll start your mastering session with a two monitor stereo mix of your song ideally with the master stage peaking at about -3db never hitting the pink on the meter. This combine ought to already be sounding the way in which you need while needing a lift in quantity & possibly a couple EQ tweaks to make it translate well to various sound techniques/sources.

Beginning with the EQ make changes to the lows, mids, & highs, based mostly on any notes that you just taken after listening to your mix on several different types of sound sources equivalent to earbuds, a car system, a bookshelf stereo, a mono clock radio, laptop audio system and so on.

Your purpose is in your master to finish up sounding good on all of the different systems the place in fact on bigger programs with sub woofers you'll have extra bass & on laptop computer audio system & earbuds there shall be little or no sub bass. The secret's to have a grasp that still retains readability on every of these sources. Once you listen to your mix on these sources hear for frequency issues that tend to indicate up on multiple sound sources as these are the first things you should work on with the EQ.

You must strive trial & error to seek out the frequencies and keep in mind it's always higher to fix by cutting the offensive sounds then by boosting different frequencies to cover them.

Keep in mind that any EQ tweaks that you carry out on the stereo combine goes to affect the whole tune so ensure the changes are literally fixing the problem with out inflicting a bigger one in another space.

The next step in your house Hip Hop Mastering session after you might be proud of the EQ outcomes might be adding a Compressor to the monitor. This can be used to present the song a smooth level sound making the track level constant from begin Music video by RESTREPO to end. The Compressor may also aid in boosting the perceived quantity of the track. Beneath is a set of Compressor settings that I have come to make use of on Hip Hop tracks as a starting point when placing collectively a song Grasp.

You will want to do A/B listening comparisons between your working master & a commercially launched Hip Hop track that is comparable in type to your music. You want your master to be as loud because the commercially released tune and translate properly on all the different sound techniques/sources.

Simply as you will want to do with a mixture, after finishing your music master save it & depart it alone for a day or two then come back to it with contemporary ears and you could have a distinct perspective on it & finds issues to fix that may have been missed earlier. once you feel your music grasp is similar to the commercially launched track you're completed mastering your new song.

There are a lot of different specialty programs & software program plug ins which might be designed for Mastering nonetheless this article is geared toward those which might be trying to grasp their songs utilizing the options that are already present on their recording software program or workstation. Additionally needless to say Pro Mastering homes will furnish you with a grasp CD that can be verified to be error free as well as include particular encoding that will be the grasp you'll need to give to a CD replication/duplication plant to get mass produced CD's. This is a vital feature though it appears within the music business more & extra artists are bypassing the price of getting CD's made & as an alternative having obtain only releases.

The information in this article ought to give you a path to comply with when trying to master your Hip Hop songs in your individual residence studio. There aren't any guidelines set in stone though trial & error have helped to formulate the mastering process given above.

Brian G a.ok.a. BG has 15 years experience beginning out as a Deejay turned Producer/remixer turned recording engineer with an honor scholar diploma from AIA. Brian G has recorded over 50 Hip-Hop and R&B artists in his dwelling studios as well as recorded his own hip-hop songs.