#while also not being the writer of the song so he only knows a fraction of the thing. but still...

[eileen-crys]

"Freddie, is it true that the song I want to break free is dedicated to the gay?"

"Noo not at all, not at all! *frowns and shakes his head* That song... Let's start over, the song has been written by John Deacon, and -well- he's a happily married man you know, with about four children. I don't think that's where he got the message, it's got nothing to do with gay people at all. It's basically just about everybody... Somebody who has a very top life and he just wants to break free from whatever problems he's got. It's got nothing to do with the gay thing, besides it's not my song anyway, John wrote it."

Interview with Gloria Maria at Copacabana, January 1985

[calumxkisses]

Us | c.h.

pairing: calum hood x f!reader

genre: fluff

warnings: none

summary: Michael and Crystal take you and Calum along to visit their wedding hall and it's the perfect location for a dance full of love.

a/n: am i obsessed with the idea of dancing with Calum? yes. let me know if you liked it. i'm still not really good at writing fluff imagines but i'm learning and i'll hopefully do better in the future.

you should read this imagine while listening to: us

➳

“So, this is the wedding hall?” Calum asks as he enters looking around the room. The structure is huge, there is still a lot to do but some decorations have already been fixed.

“Yeah, there are a few things we would like to change but it’s pretty much gonna be like this.” Michael responds, walking inside the room and looking around.

“It's lovely, guys. It's like being in a fairy tale.” You whisper while looking around the room. Your fingers are barely intertwined with Calum's as you look at the room, admiring the ceiling and the windows overlooking the sea.

You turn to Crystal and notice a tear running down her face as she admires the room. A smile forms on your face as you see your best friend so happy, her dream is coming true and you couldn't feel more proud of her.

This marriage has overcome the strangest obstacles, the biggest certainly was having to be postponed due to a pandemic, but their love has never stopped in front of these, it has grown more and more and to be able to be among the witnesses of their love is among the things you are most grateful for.

The room is very large, has an oval shape and is surrounded by windows overlooking the sea. Some tables have already been set up and embellished, they are also circular in shape and have floral decorations in the center. The tablecloth is embroidered in lace, it is pearl white but the different colored decorations, which accompany the flowers in the center, make the table look wonderful and original, recalling Crystal's passion for plants.

The chairs that surround them, simple but still elegant, have ribbons that decorate them. They’re gold and white, yet their simple design makes them look gorgeous.

“We are going to talk to the wedding planner to fix some things, in the meantime you can stay here and see if there is something else that we should change.” Crystal's voice grabs your attention, as she approaches Michael and takes his hand in hers. The wedding planner is at the entrance, smilingly waits for the couple and, for a moment, you think that there can’t be a more beautiful job than being able to make the dreams of couples come true.

“Calum, can you check that the stereo is working? They told me they fixed it but I haven't been able to check it yet, you'd be doing me a big favor.” Michael asks as he leaves the room grinning and not leaving time to Calum to reply.

“Gotcha.” Your boyfriend replies, shaking his head in amusement and smiling.

As Calum approaches the speakers, you take another moment to admire the room.

Looking up, your breath locks in your chest as Crystal's gorgeous decorations leave you in awe. The ceiling, which was previously simply white and wooden, is decorated with strips of tulle hanging like waves, giving life to a sense of peace and softness. The stripes extend all over the ceiling, giving the impression of being in the middle of the clouds.

In addition to the tulle, in a delicate way, some threads of small lights descend from the ceiling, romantically illuminating the room and creating an intimate and unobtrusive atmosphere.

A small elegant chandelier hangs in the center of the room, it is gold and its light is not as strong as someone might think, it is ideal to keep the room more illuminated in the most important moments, but its presence is more scenic than functional.

Some leaves and some flowers come down intertwined along the edges of the windows, hiding the window frame and making the atmosphere of the room even more simple and elegant.

The main theme is certainly white and gold, but Crystal and Michael made sure to add a few more hints of color as well, in order to make the room less monotonous and more fairytale.

The light inside the room disappears, leaving only the small lights that descend from the ceiling on. You open your mouth to ask what happened, but the words do not come out as your gaze rests on the sea outside the room, calm as in the best days, while a wonderful sunset is reflecting on the clear water. The sky is painted orange and pink, some clouds are scattered in the sky and you no longer have any doubts on why your friends have chosen this location.

There is a sense of peace in the air and you feel like you are in a different world, in a world of calm and joy, while the land where you have lived in these difficult months seems a distant memory.

“It's beautiful, isn't it?” Calum whispers in your ear as his hands rest on your hips from behind, resting his chin on your shoulder and looking outside.

“If it's a dream, please don't wake me up.” You whisper, closing your eyes and letting the sea air coming in through the window on your left, caress your face.

“I could never do that, you are too beautiful when you sleep.” You can see him smile as he whispers those words and, as every time he smiles, you smile too. There is something contagious about his joyful expressions, they warm your heart and you can't help but share them with him.

“Does the stereo system work?” You ask after a few minutes of silence, turning around to face him and leaving a quick kiss on his lips.

“Do you want to try it with me?” he asks with a smile, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket and pressing a couple of buttons on the screen.

“What do you mean?” A confused expression forms on your face. The long lilac summer dress moves with every blow of the wind but the summer temperature makes sure that you don't feel cold.

Calum puts the phone back in his pocket and, after a few seconds, the first notes of your favorite love song can be heard throughout the room.

While you smile, your boyfriend clears his throat and, reaching out his hand, asks you: “May I have this dance?”

Your cheeks turn red and the muscles of your face stretch into an even bigger smile as you nod and grab his hand. Calum walks you to the center of the room and holds your hips, bringing you closer to him.

And, as the first words of one of the most beautiful love songs echo in the room, you rest your head on his chest and close your eyes as your feet move to the sweet rhythm of the music.

Sometimes I'm beaten

Sometimes I'm broken

'Cause sometimes this is nothing but smoke

Is there a secret?

Is there a code?

Can we make it better?

'Cause I'm losing hope

Calum had never loved dancing, at least not this much. His footsteps were limited to a few twirls and jumps on stage or some weird movement on the dance floor, when the alcohol level in his body was way too high to be ashamed of anything he was doing. He had always seen dancing as something that did not belong to him, an activity that stressed him more than it should, and he had never imagined that he could love it so much.

But after you arrived in his life, one of the moments he loves the most is to dance with you, at two in the morning, in the kitchen, to the notes of any love song you are obsessed with in that moment, in the peace of the silence and of the sleepless night, while Duke looks at you confused and waits for the right moment to come ask for cuddles.

The way you let him hold you, the way you let yourself be vulnerable in front of him, away from judging eyes, and the way he feels like protecting you, in the darkness of the room, makes him feel a sense of calm that he hasn' t felt for a long time before your presence in his life.

And even if he was the universe's worst dancer and the whole world was watching him, he’d still dance with you.

Tell me how to be in this world

Tell me how to breathe in and feel no hurt

Tell me how could I believe in something

I believe in us

Calum squeezes your hand tightly as, observing you with eyes full of love, he spins you in front of him. The sunlight lights up your face and the man in front of you is sure he has never seen anything more beautiful. You look like a Greek goddess, the kind you hear in stories and in history books, the goddesses who saved the bravest soldiers and helped them in the toughest feats.

This is how he feels, ever since he saw in you a friend - and then a girlfriend - more than an enemy, he saw his little world in fractions being put back into place, with delicacy and love, and he is ready to sacrifice his most important assets to always have you on his side.

The sun is slowly setting, making room for the moon and all its stars. Yet, with him holding you tight, it seems to you that the world has stopped.

After the wreckage

After the dust

I still hear the howling, I still feel the rush

Over the riots, above all the noise

Through all the worry, I still hear your voice

Calum would be able to describe every single moment he walked into the dark and you led his way out with your light. Whenever he had writer's block, whenever anxiety kept him from getting through his day, whenever his thoughts got too dark and the demons took over, you were there.

Your delicate hands caressing his face or the sweet melody of your voice whispering comforting words, Calum remembers every one of these moments, every single one.

When the world becomes too heavy and distressing, he knows that you will be by his side and that you will help him carry the heavy weight.

And when the insecurities make their way into him, you will always be ready to remind him that he deserves to be loved.

So, tell me how to be in this world

Tell me how to breathe in and feel no hurt

Tell me how 'cause I believe in something

I believe in us

Tell me when the light goes out

That even in the dark we will find a way out

Tell me now 'cause I believe in something

I believe in us

Between dance steps, Calum lulls you slowly, the song continues to echo in your ears, and even your jaw relaxes. It’s so calming to not feel the weight of the world and the speed of time but to be able to enjoy this moment with a light heart and a head empty of all worries. In a society that runs fast and demands perfection from everything, having the opportunity to be able to stop and be left alone in love and peace is a luxury that cannot always be granted. Especially when your boyfriend is in an internationally famous band and you are trying to make your smaller, yet still of great value, dreams come true.

There is no worry about having to say the right words, having to wear the best clothes or just being yourself and praying to be accepted by millions of people who don't know you but who judge you as being part of your life.

‘She's not good enough for him’ or ‘He deserves someone more beautiful, with a perfect body, with a good mental health’ or even ‘She doesn't really love him, she does it for the money’ And there are also those gorgeous people he meets often, who work in some radio or who know mutual friends, and immediately those words written under your photos get inside you and make every certainty collapse.

You look at yourself into the mirror and you think they're right, that you're not perfect and that he really deserves one of those cover girls or someone who won't make him worry if you don't answer the phone. Insecurities that, however, under the sheets of a now familiar home, Calum makes you forget about.

And the words he whispers to you every day, the way he looks at you as if you were the most beautiful person in the world, the consideration he has of you, the notes he leaves on the table when he goes out or all those details that he pays attention to, they convince you that he doesn't care what size you are, the color of your skin or the negative thoughts that cross your mind, he loves you for your intelligence, for the kindness you carry in your heart and the delicacy with which you treat him, for the funny sound of your laugh and the way you make him feel in heaven, while reminding him to always keep his feet on the ground. And those comments, those ideas, disappear in the blink of an eye.

And now, like every time you’re with him, with your head on his chest and with his arms holding you, with the sea in the background and the lights that illuminate that corner of paradise that Crystal created, everything seems to be in the right place.

Used to be kids living just for kicks

In cinema seats, learning how to kiss

Running through streets that were painted gold

We never believed we'd grow up like this

Calum had never had good words to describe his love life. He had had love stories he was not proud of, toxic or in which he hadn't really felt strong feelings, and of the only good stories he had had, he didn’t like to tell about them because he was ashamed of how he had lived them. He believed that he hadn’t committed enough or that he hadn’t loved in the right ways.

So, he had decided not to try anymore, to put aside that desire to want to create something with someone and the more the people around him fell in love with and the more he thought about the effort he should have made, and all that stress made him forget the meaning to love. He didn’t want to meet anyone anymore, his life was good as it was.

And when you showed up awkwardly, in ruined makeup and wet clothes, Calum had thought of a thousand reasons why he didn't want to deal with you. Who shows up at an event dressed like this? What kind of girls does Crystal meet? And the way you talked about how your umbrella broke halfway and how you were about to be hit by a car didn't interest him. Calum just wanted to eat at that restaurant, pulled there by his best friends after a day spent in the studio.

And when the party moved to a friend’s house, it only bothered him how carefully you made sure you didn't spill your drink as you moved between dancing bodies and wagging dogs. He couldn't stand how you talked about life to Ashton, the love you put into describing the people who were part of it.

And when he saw you a few weeks later, he hated the way you greeted him and the way you worried about how he was doing. All too cheesy, too filmy and unrealistic.

But then, without realizing it, between one hateful look and another, Calum listened with interest to the way you talked about your passions and hobbies, how you described the places you had visited and the cities you dreamed of seeing. He laughed at you dancing and smiled when you paid attention to what people were saying around you, mentally marking down all the information to make sure to always ask the right questions.

And he found himself wanting the same attention from you, to see the smile you gave to others, dedicated to him. And so his answers to you became less and less cold and he had become less good at hiding his sweet eyes from you.

And even though every cell of his body was asking otherwise, to not feel another broken heart, Calum had decided to kiss you in the backstage of the iHeartRadio 2018, while you were wearing his leather jacket and moving his hair from the front of his eyes.

And the rest is history.

So, tell me how to be in this world

Tell me how to breathe in and feel no hurt

Tell me how 'cause I believe in something

I believe in us

Tell me when the light goes out

That even in the dark we will find a way out

Tell me now 'cause I believe in something

I believe in us

And like when Emily Bronte said ‘Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same’, as in the case of your love, there isn't much to do. You cannot go against fate if two hearts are meant to spend the rest of eternity together.

There are no arguments, reasons or strong enough excuses to separate those who are connected by much more than just love. And that’s what makes you this close, that in the darkness of the world, in the hell of fear and anger, that strong feeling resists, and fighting together is always better than doing it alone.

It’s a strong love, ready to defeat everything that tries to divide it, ready to sacrifice the absolute good of one, in order to spend the rest of life in misery together.

Like the rebellious angels, who preferred an earthly love to the eternal glory of God, so you are bound to laugh and cry together, and there is nothing that can make you happier than that.

Calum turns you around one last time, whispering a compliment in your ear and making your laughter echo across the room. The sun has now set and the stars are taking its place, the lights that descend from the ceiling look like little fairies that got lost admiring your love and the room has taken the shape of a magical forest.

Your friends are at the door of the entrance, with eyes full of love they look at the two of you laughing together and their hearts melt to see you so in love and they can’t help but imagine themselves in your place, in a few weeks, ready to dance and share the same love that you and Calum are sharing.

Breaking the peace of that dream, with pride and a grin on his face, is Michael, clapping and laughing at the way your boyfriend is completely in love with you but also feeling happy to see him so positively changed. He takes a few steps toward you and you don't need to hear him speak to imagine the comments he's thinking, making you and Calum shake your heads smiling.

“Just so you know, I expect to see you dance like that at our wedding too.” Your best friend's sweet voice says as she points at you by moving her finger between you and your boyfriend.

You run toward Crystal, her pink hair is tied up in a low ponytail, with a few tufts running down her face. Her smile is big on her face, lighting up her joyful expression. You have a billion questions to ask her, most of them are about the choices they made for the final decorations and your heart is so full at thinking about your best friends getting married.

You’re too caught up in your happiness to notice Calum, just a dozen steps behind you, smiling to his bandmate while whispering: “I want to spend the rest of my life with her.”

“Well, you know what to do.” Michael responds by nodding with his head and looking proudly at his best friend.

“Will you help me organize the proposal?”

--

[monkberries]

So here goes: Personally I find Paul to be hot with a beard. But it annoys me because there’s always some Paul stan who’s like “he was super depressed during that time you know” anytime someone says how hot he looks with a beard. Like first of all, I don’t think we should go around diagnosing people and assuming how he felt 24/7 just based on a couple of quotes when we don’t know him, and second of all I was just saying he looks good. Also idk why Paul stans want to pretend like Paul is STILL a victim when he’s definitely not. He’s a super successful billionaire musician. He’s fine.

I'm going to assume all four of these were from the same anon; I received another along these same lines that seems to be from someone else:

OKAY. There's a lot here.

As I've said before, I think the concept you are both talking about - that Paul is the favourite, that people will attack you if you criticize him, that people are vilifying John more now - is true, but is also a matter of perspective. I think sometimes we perceive the whole fandom as just the people we're surrounded by; that can be true in smaller fandoms, like for obscure shows or whatever, but for the Beatles, the fandom is so much bigger and more spread out across generations, social media platforms, and works of literature than almost any other fandom. There are literally thousands upon thousands of books either about or tangentially about the Beatles; there are pockets on every platform from tumblr to twitter to podcasts to instagram to facebook etc., and it branches off even more niche within those to like, facebook groups specifically for podcasts about the Beatles, or discord servers, or livejournal threads, or music forums, or fics on ao3. There are fansites with thoughtful speculative articles like heydullblog and blogs specifically reviewing Beatle books like beatlebioreview and sites cataloging every bit of minutiae like the Beatles Bible, all with their own flavor of comment sections. And not only that, the Beatles fandom spans generations and cultures in a way that almost nothing else ever has or ever will.

And this is not even going into the shifting narratives that have been in play over the years surrounding Paul specifically, and the huge, huge difference between the perceptions of him by the authors and the Counterculture People, the perceptions of him by regular ass Wings fans who have only idly flipped through Rolling Stone while waiting in line at the local bodega, and the perceptions of him by everyone in between, who may or may not have been unconsciously influenced by the wider narratives about him.

All that is to make the case that the fandom that you are experiencing on tumblr/twitter is an extremely small fraction of The Fandom at large. For every Paul stan on twitter that yells at people for not believing that Paul literally invented music, there is a John stan in a facebook group going on about John's supposedly tireless peace efforts. For every nuanced, well sourced post on amoralto's blog, there is someone in the Beatles Bible comment section saying that John and Paul hated each other. For every fan who's read the major Beatles bios with a critical eye towards bias, there are plenty more fans who just absorbed them as straight fact. This is not to say that your experiences are not real or valid! They absolutely are! What I am saying is that there are infinite permutations of infinite Beatles fandoms out there, and the people you see who insist that Paul is still treated worse than John, I would imagine, are occupying various permutations of the fandom where that is more true, alongside the one they share with you. It's not for me to say whether the Paul or John people have the upper hand on the whole - truly, I don't think anyone has enough perspective on the whole fandom to make any judgment on that, no matter what general Grand Pronouncements anyone may make about The Fandom.

As I've said before, any overly defensive "stan" behavior, whether it's for John or Paul or George or anyone, is exhausting to me, so I definitely understand where you're coming from re: him being supposedly underrated. He is literally one of the most successful musicians of all time; as of the beginning of this year, he is worth 1.2 billion dollars; and, thanks to his own efforts and the efforts of quite a few fans and writers out there over the decades, he now enjoys an incredibly positive "granddude" reputation. There are ways in which it can be exasperating to read yet another indignant refutation of music reviews for RAM that came out fifty years ago, when his last three albums have hit the top 3 in the charts in both the US and the UK and have gotten great reviews. I have seen people wonder, honestly wonder, how much more money Paul could have made, how much more respected he could have been, if the rock press had been inclined to give RAM good reviews. When I see that, it does start to feel like fans of Paul, at least the defensive ones in the fandom permutations I occupy, are arguing with the author photo of Philip Norman in the book jacket for Shout!. It's not that I think those arguments and discussions are not worth having; I do think they're worth having because I believe that the only way we can continue to grow is if we grapple with the mistakes made in the past. But there is a strange kind of disconnect that happens when you read about someone indignantly defending Wild Life as though the members of Wings are currently, actively having eggs and rotten fruit thrown at them, and then you remember that Paul is currently, and has been for many years now, one of the richest men in the entire world.

As for the misogyny thing, I'll copy and paste a quote from Erin Weber which may explain a little better than I can:

"Where it starts entering into serious discussion for me is when you have professional grown men (Schaffner would be the most glaring example of this, but not the only one) repeatedly using the term “pretty” or “pretty-faced” to refer to another grown man. (Norman does the same). Schaffner doesn’t only do that once or twice, he uses one of those exact words at least fifteen times in his references to McCartney. “Pretty-boy” is also a term that at least one journalist has used to describe Paul, and that’s not a stealth insult: that’s an overt one. (My husband, who hates the Yankees, routinely used the term “pretty-boy” to insult Alex Rodriguez. And it wasn’t meant as a compliment).

My reaction to this is based both on studies that I’m aware of (I’d have to hunt them up, but I’ve seen them referenced before) which argue that the use of feminized language can be a method of stealth insult/diminishment when used by men to describe other men, and my own personal experience. It is difficult to see a situation where a grown man using the term “pretty” or any variation of the word “pretty” to describe another grown man means it as a compliment. Even if its purely meant as a descriptive term, it is a descriptive term that is weighted with significant meaning and is feminizing. And given the rock press’s obsession with masculinity and its insistence, as noted in other studies, of using masculine terms to portray a song as good and feminizing terms to describe them as weak or inferior, I don’t think its a coincidence that a rock press that knew well the power of masculine and feminine language commonly used feminized language, particularly in the 1970s and 80s, to describe McCartney."

I personally see this more as pseudo-homophobic than pseudo-misogynistic (like, when I see a man called "pretty" by another man in an insulting way, I immediately think "oh, that author wanted to say a gay slur but he's too Professional"), but the two things can get muddled together, I suppose.

Anyway, actionable items:

Diversify Your Fan Experience. More perspectives can really help gain a fuller understanding of not just the fandom but the Beatles themselves. Don't be afraid to be wrong, and don't be afraid to be right; always be open to learning new things and hearing new insights.

If All Else Fails, Block 'Em.

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 7, Number 9

Les Filles de Illighadad

Another collection of short reviews closes out this week at Dusted, with selections ranging from avant garde classical to free jazz to whacko punk to an unusually gender-inclusive guitar band from Niger.  Writers this time included the usual stalwarts, Bill Meyer, Ray Garraty, Jennifer Kelly, Jonathan Shaw, Bryon Hayes, Tim Clarke, Andrew Forell and Chris Liberato. Enjoy.

All Set — All Set (RogueArt)

In 1957, serialist composer Milton Babbitt’s All Set applied his language-transforming compositional tool kit to the sonic resources of a jazz orchestra. Six decades and change down the road, such ideas haven’t exactly infiltrated the mainstream of either jazz or orchestral music, but they’ve become as handy for some music makers as hammers and nails are for carpenters. So, when saxophonic colleagues Ingrid Laubrock (who sticks to tenor here) and Stéphane Payen (playing the straight alto) needed to come up with a framework to make music together, out came Babbitt’s notion, which they did not play straight, but used as a suggestions for writing their own tunes, and for good measure named their band after the Babbitt’s piece The formative influence manifests in zig-zagging intervallic leaps, but instead of treating these of ends in themselves, the saxophonists carry on constant overlapping dialogues. The rhythm section of Chris Tordini (bass) and Tom Rainey (drums) can’t help but swing, but they do so in a shifting, discontinuous fashion that occasionally leaves it to the saxophonists to play the gaps as well as the horns they use the fill them.

Bill Meyer

 Rodrigo Amado Motion Trio & Alexander Von Schlippenbach — The Field (No Business)

The Field by Rodrigo Amado Motion Trio & Alexander von Schlippenbach

Motion Trio is one of tenor saxophonist Rodrigo Amado’s more enduring combos. But it’s not one that has played often in the years preceding this concert, a consequence of the growth and success of its members; Amado, cellist Miguel Mira and drummer Gabriel Ferrandini all keep busy with other projects. So, this encounter with pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach, which took place in Vilnius, Lithuania in 2019, was not just a reenactment of the trio’s favorite tactic of improvising with a strong fourth musician, but a reunion of the trio itself. This means that the process-oriented can listen for three comrades finding reviving a common language at the same time that they confront with an outsider’s efforts to deal with it. Schlippenbach’s playing brings an unusual harmonic density to Motion Trio’s music, which seems to coax an especially dynamic and at times reflective response from the saxophonist. Ferandini, on the other hand, proposes shapes and timbres that seem to build out from Schlippenbach’s intricate constructions, while Mira keeps up a steady, almost subliminal stream of contrapuntal commentary that is simultaneously assertive and nearly subliminal. But some of the concert’s most exciting moments come when the pianist lays out for a second, and you can hear Motion Trio’s members responding to each other.

Bill Meyer

  BangGang Lonnie Bands — H2K On the Way (TF Entertainment \ Anti Media)

Lots of artists have watched small projects intended only as appetizers grow to surpass their grander efforts. BangGang Lonnie Bands’ recent work, especially his King of Detroit albums, contained a few gems but were bloated in length. There was an ironic twist, as Lonnie’s claimed the throne to the city where he no longer resides. While it remains to be seen what the rapper brings after H2K On the Way, this 15 minutes long EP is his leanest work in years, leaving a long list of LPs behind. Lonnie no longer flirts with scam rap and returns to murder music, fusing gutsiest Michigan-style punchlines with no hostage Californian approach to verse spitting. He’s the naughtiest when he’s trolling the music industry: “Copped a 100 pounds of crank \ should have bought a verse from Drake.” 

Ray Garraty  

  Buffalo Daughter — We Are the Times (Anniversary)

Buffalo Daughter always caught in the cracks between mainstream and experimental, layering vocal sweetness over chopped up blippy beats, not as wildly original as OOIOO, but not exactly girl pop either. This latest album comes after a long break and a slightly less lengthy COVID lockdown, and it’s got some prickly, dreamy jams, part dance, part pop, part funk, part inscrutable. “ET (Densha)” is the mad, moody single, full of low-end synth blasts and thundering drums, but leavened by high whispery vocals. It’s like Shackleton sound-tracking a Hello Kitty movie. “Global Warming Will Kill Us All” is similarly ominous, with vocoder chants and trippy pop choruses and blown out by phosphorescent blots of synth, but I like “Don’t Punk Out” the best, because it struts like an animatronic James Brown, the funk percolating through gleaming futuristic swells of sounds. If disco’s going to come back, can it be this weird and disorienting?

Jennifer Kelly

 Fashion Pimps and the Glamazons — Jazz 4 Johnny (Feel It Records)

Jazz 4 Johnny by Fashion Pimps And The Glamazons

This new EP from Fashion Pimps and the Glamazons manages to fit into the tradition of whacko punk records from Cleveland (and what a tradition that is…) and to comment on the problematic nature of tradition itself. There’s a decided No Wave vibe to Jazz 4 Johnny: listen to it, and you’ll flash on Buy Contortions and on Robert Quine’s attempts to channel Miles Davis and Pharoah Sanders through his guitar. At points you’ll swear there’s a sax somewhere in the buzz and thunder that the Fashion Pimps create — but that’s just Richard Glamazon’s skronky guitar tone, which does Quine one better by not only aping the cadences of a free jazz solo but also the sound of a brassy axe. That’s fun, but we should also recall No Wave’s sharp antipathies for concepts like “tradition” or “perpetuity.” A lot of those bands wanted to neutralize their own existence and thus evade the ultimately conservative action of canonization. Other tunes on Jazz 4 Johnny are more engaged with the later Downtown noise rock scene. The guitar on “Dream Police” gestures toward early Sonic Youth—but even there, the band can’t quite help themselves. Vocalist Steve Chainsaw shouts, “Show me your DNA!” Most of those references are based in Manhattan, so what about Cleveland? The city often recedes into the background when conversations turn to rock-n-roll history, which is too bad. Fashion Pimps and the Glamazons don’t sound all that much like electric eels or Pere Ubu, but the band is tuned into a similarly feral, post-industrial ethos and an avant-garde sensibility that makes anti-art into art you can dance to. Or break things to. Or both. Which may be the best response to the wild and smart tunes on this record.

Jonathan Shaw

 Les Filles de Illighadad — At Pioneer Works (Sahel Sounds)

At Pioneer Works by Les Filles de Illighadad

The entrancing At Pioneer Works documents the American touring debut of Niger-based Tuareg ensemble Les Filles de Illighadad, specifically a pair of shows at the eponymous Brooklyn venue. Travelling as a four-piece ensemble, the band created a swirling three-guitar maelstrom, as captured on this pristine-sounding recording. Founder Fatou Seidi Ghali — the first known woman Tuareg guitarist — and her cousin Alamnou Akrouni were joined by Fatimata Ahmadelher, the only other known woman Tuareg guitarist, with Ghali’s brother accompanying on rhythm guitar. Blending the traditional calabash drum and call-and-response vocals of the tende song form with the electric guitar, Ghali and company steep the communal origins of their sound with a gentle clangor. The music is simultaneously hypnotic and driving, the four performers acting as one multi-limbed, multi-throated being. For the most part, Ghali is content setting the pace and playing along with the melody. One exception is the trio of deftly executed solos during “Chakalan,” where she demonstrates her prowess with six strings. Reports from those Brooklyn shows indicate that the band completely enraptured their audience, and if At Pioneer Works represents only a fraction of how powerful Les Filles de Illighadad are live, this writer doesn’t doubt that at all.

Bryon Hayes  

 Henri Guédon — Karma (Outre National)

Karma by Henri Guédon

You don’t have to be a big fan of R.E.M. to feel overly familiar with “It’s The End of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine).” In dire times, it’s such an easy go-to tune that even adherence to lockdown prescriptions won’t keep it out of your ears. So, deejays, we’ve done your research for you, and found a new tune to soundtrack defiant frugging in the face of disaster. It’s called “Fin Di Mond,” by Martinique-based singer/percussionist/sculptor Henri Guédon. It, and eight more similarly motion-motivating tunes, can be found on Karma, a predominantly celebratory set of retro-futuristic, Franco-Caribbean grooves. Mind you, this music wasn’t retro when Guédon recorded it 46 years ago; the synth lines that swoop through its massed percussion were probably the height of modernity back in the day. Heard now, this music is just the thing to put time itself on pause.

Bill Meyer

HTRK — Rhinestones (Heavy Machinery)

Rhinestones by HTRK

Rhinestones is a sneaky one from Melbourne’s HTRK, a slight but incisive release that seems minor compared to their previous albums but cuts just as deep. Running to a brutally economical 26 minutes, most of the album is built around delayed guitar, drum machine and Jonnine Standish’s ghostly, dejected voice. To a world laid low by the pandemic, Standish sounds startlingly apposite for these times, and track titles like “Sunlight Feels Like Bee Stings,” “Real Headfuck” and “Straight to Hell” signpost the vibe clearly. This is sad, skeletal music, sure to offer a degree of solace if you’re weary, wrung out or wasted — 2021 in a nutshell.

Tim Clarke  

 Matt Jencik — Matt & Lyra (Trouble In Mind)

Matt & Lyra by matt jencik

Matt Jencik is a member of doomy, spacey Chicago band Implodes, plus he’s released two solo guitar albums: 2017’s Weird Times and 2019’s Dream Character. For his latest, Matt & Lyra, part of Trouble In Mind’s Explorers Series, Jencik focuses on the thick, fuzzy tones of the Russian-built Lyra-8 synthesizer (hence the album title). Having said that, he does pull out his guitars to add some acoustic strumming to “Cmellow Ayellow,” and builds 16-minute closer “Clandestine Half Pipe” around electric guitar drones before the Lyra begins to dominate the frame. Jencik apparently made this music to help him sleep, and while this music is suited to nocturnal listening, with an all-enveloping warmth, there’s also the sense of something looming in the darkness. Whether this presence is reassuring or threatening probably depends on the frame of mind with which you approach this immersive 35-minute release.

Tim Clarke

 Joakim — Second Nature (Tiger Sushi)

French producer and Tiger Sushi founder Joakim’s Second Nature is a reflection on the state of the world. It combines samples of whales, elephants, toads and other wildlife with the kind of pop facing ambient techno from aughts chillout compilations.  It is testament to his skill as a producer that the record doesn’t wear out its welcome despite the occasional lapse into the anodyne and the associations this kind of gentle background music evokes. When Joakim disturbs the tranquility on tracks like “Sferics & Whistlers” with its crackles of static and breakdown of discordant notes, Angel Bat Dawid’s klezmatic clarinet on “Waves Ahead” and the komische roll of “Kepler-39” that one is jolts from reverie and pays close attention, but at 16 tracks it feels like Second Nature needs more such moments.

Andrew Forell 

 The Killing Popes — Ego Kills (Shhpuma)

Ego Kills by The Killing Popes

Thank god this unfortunately named combo isn’t someone’s absurd scheme to crossbreed the sounds of Killing Joke and Smoking Popes. Instead, the Berlin-based project exists at the crossroads of jazz and electronics. I know what you’re thinking, and no this isn’t a modern take on acid jazz; this crew makes a jazz-on-acid sort of racket. The core Popes are drummer-percussionist Oli Steidle and multi-instrumentalist Dan Nicholls, who together conjure up a brew with a myriad of ingredients. Their genre-defying fusion of disciplines does have a center, however. Steidle’s dextrous drumming and the elastic band bass proffered by Phil Donkin serve as an anchor point for the other elements — both melodic and bizarre — to revolve around. The addition of vocals inserts the sense of narrative, creating a gravity that tugs at the sounds and prevent them from spiralling out of orbit. As zany as Ego Kills may be, it’s jazz-like enough for afficionados to appreciate. On their own, each of the instrumentalists demonstrates a mastery of their craft; together, they create an uncanny sort of magic.

Bryon Hayes

 Norman W. Long — BLACK BROWN GRAY GREEN (Hausu Mountain)

BLACK BROWN GRAY GREEN by Norman W. Long

Chicago soundscapist Norman W. Long walks his southeast Chicago neighborhood, listens deeply and records the ambient sounds of nature, the echoes of railyards, wasteland and industrial sites both working and abandoned. Adding subtle electronics and treatments to his field recordings, Long conjures atmospheres that speak to space, atrophy and the delicate symbiosis between nature and humanity. On BLACK BROWN GRAY GREEN he immerses listeners in the often unnoticed aural richness at the intersection of the built, neglected and the natural. His choices about when to augment or to present his sources as are forms a narrative of associations, displacements and tensions. Long’s is also a story of reclamation and recognition, a rumination on the situation of the largely minority and migrant populations who live in the neighborhood, many of whom toil as essential workers across the city in the face of ongoing prejudice and hostility. Site specificity is integral to Long’s art but his themes are universal.

Andrew Forell 

 Andy Moor — Music For Safe Piece (Unsounds)

Music For Safe Piece by Andy Moor

Music For Safe Piece is the antidote for every piece of children’s music that’s ever made you want to not hear another played or sung note, ever again. Electric guitarist Andy Moor (the Ex, Dog Faced Hermans) and dancer Valentina Campora have included their sons, Elio and Milo, in onstage performance ever since they were so young, they had to be swaddled and strapped to one of their parents in order to participate. The recorded results of this shared adventure are raw, unpredictable and exhilarating. Moor’s guitar, occasionally augmented by a child’s vocalization, a foot pounding the floor or some choice tune fragments on a cassette tape, blazes a trail of reverberations, scrapes and wobbles. In performance, the boys are known to get in on the act, helping pop to make his sounds while mom handles the movement. This music isn’t particularly pacific, but it’s pretty close to the way kids actually play when no one’s stopping them. The technologically adept will find a QR code inside the CD’s gatefold, which unlocks the short film, “Safe Piece.”

Bill Meyer

RXM Reality — Advent (Orange Milk)

Advent by RXM REALITY

Long-time Hausu Mountain dweller Mike Meegan has relocated to the Orange Milk abode, taming his frenetic brand of electronic mayhem in the process. The blown-out, off-the-grid beats are still plentiful, but with Advent Meegan injects his tunes with melody. He’s also allowed himself to slow down and relax. The vast expanse of “Character Limit” literally breathes deeply as Meegan allows it to swirl around. He drinks up the pleasant melodic aromas of the track before switching gears and unloading burst after burst of explosive beats. “These Days” comes off as an electro-shoegaze hybrid, with gauzy synth pads that float effortlessly among bouncy percussion clusters. Of course, the signature RXM Reality sound — a hybrid of 1990s video game and blockbuster movie — is present and accounted for in tracks like “Allure,” “Screaming,” and “Grip of Evil.” Yet even these balls of energy are tempered with shades of consonance. Having blunted some of the jagged edges of his frantic brand of electronic music, Meegan fits in nicely among the kooky ranks of the Orange Milk imprint.

 Bryon Hayes

 Macie Stewart — Mouth Full of Glass (Orindal)

Mouth Full of Glass by Macie Stewart

You might already know Macie Stewart as one-half of the complicated indie rock duo Ohmme or for her regular appearances as violinist of choice in Chicago jazz and experimental music scenes, but this solo LP shows another side.  These eight songs are lushly, intricately arranged with strings, orchestral instruments and brass, recorded with precision and clarity, but nonetheless personal and introspective.  “Garter Snake” sheathes flaying honesty with baroque instrumental flourishes. Stewart’s voice is bare and unaffected as she confides, “I am addicted…to indecision,” but she makes riveting choices in framing the melody.  Old-fashioned movie strings swell in the spaces between talking-right-to-you verses; agile guitar chords mark time.  “Finally” begins in bare, Bahian guitar play, as Stewart’s voice flutters and floats an unpredictable but fetching tune.  Strings swoop in at the end of the phrase, lavish and lucid.  The title track unlooses massed, harmonized vocals on the spare architecture of picked guitar, a shock of extravagant sung beauty in an otherwise restrained palette.  Like Wendy Eisenberg, but with different instruments, Stewart weaves post-modern complexity into the delicate fabric of pop songs.  The difficulty — combined with the beauty — makes this music memorable.

Jennifer Kelly

 Stingray — Feeding Time (La Vida es un Mus)

Feeding Time by Stingray

In places where heavy music is played and endlessly debated, 1982 might be most strongly associated with English street punk — see the ersatz “genre” of UK82, which enshrines the year and ties it to acid green liberty spikes and scuffed Doc Martens. Fair enough. But street punk was thoroughly informed by the dirty working-class metal being made by bands like Motörhead and Venom, and this new EP by Stingray celebrates those noisy intersections of influence. Of course, Stingray’s version of celebration likely involves several cases of Bass Ale, an eightball of something white and a fistfight or two. Or five. The English band features members of other current hard-driving acts, including Subdued, the Chisel and Chain of Flowers, but Stingray doesn’t prize currency. The songs are short, hard and nasty, landing their punches like a “Bomber” and also like a bunch of “Death Dealers.” The guys in Stingray understand the past they’re drawing on, but does music like this have a future? Fuck knows. Do any of us have a future? Does the earthball? The tunes are less interested in such flights of existential angst, and more intent on their rapacious appetites for speed, sweat and raunch. It’s Feeding Time. Get it while you can.

Jonathan Shaw

Nick Storring — Newfoundout (Mappa)

Newfoundout by Nick Storring

You’ll miss some towns if you blink. The ones that have given their names to the compositions on Newfoundout might confound both eyesight and your GPS, since they are all ghost towns in Ontario, Canada. The music that Nick Storring has made to go with these titles is correspondingly elusive. Performed entirely by the composer, using strings, percussion and whatever bric-a-brac happened to be at hand, it is by turns lush, staccato and propulsive. “The sounds are never particularly difficult, but they rarely telegraph where they’re going, so if you listen passively, sooner or later you’ll look up in dismay, wondering how things got from where they were to where they are now. “Khartum,” for example, starts out sounding a lot like “In A Silent Way,” and finishes up sounding like a respectfully paced conference of grandfather clock chimes. So, put your head back and your ears forward, and let Mr. Storring do the driving. 

Bill Meyer

Ten Ka — Sonic Geometry: Structures, Patterns And Forms (Jersika)

sonic geometry: structures, patterns and forms by TEN KA

Ten Ka is experimental side project of Deniss Pashkevich, a Latvian woodwinds player. The album title’s invocation of mathematics is apt, since this music is produced by dissimilar musical values acting upon each other. Pashkevich’s sound on tenor sax is full and soft around the edges, which is probably what it takes to be a working musician in a part of the world that doesn’t have much of a jazz tradition; on flutes, and especially the Bansuri, he hints at a far Eastern vibe. He also plays Fender Rhodes and prepared acoustic piano, bringing in further elements of user-friendly jazz, but also some sharp, Cage-y edges. But most of the nine tracks on Sonic Geometry: Structures, Patterns And Forms feature modular synths, which provide a foundation of pulsing bass patterns and some intriguing disruptive, acidic sizzles.  It all adds up to something simultaneously familiar and out of the ordinary.

Bill Meyer

 Luis Vicente / Vasco Trilla — Made Of Dust (577 Records)

Made of Mist by Luis Vicente & Vasco Trilla

Not many improvisational settings are more exposed that the drums and trumpet duet. The two instruments are sufficiently different in timbre and frequency range that you can’t help but hear everything each player does, and also how those actions fit together. Trumpeter Luis Vicente and percussionist Vasco Trilla approach this situation with a combination of relaxed consideration and wholly earned confidence. Vicente can power-play when necessary, but for this session, he exercises restraint, using mutes to extract the most lyrical and vocal sounds he can muster. Trilla likewise seeks out the extremities of his kit, drawing continuous ribbons of widely differing characters, such as the alarm clock-like clatter and low-scrubbed drumskin heard on “Swirling Mist.” Their interactions are not just sonically novel, but trusting and deeply intimate.

Bill Meyer   

 Simon Waldram — So It Goes (Self-released)

So It Goes by Simon Waldram

Simon Waldram’s refrain-heavy eighth solo album, So It Goes, is a song cycle on love, loss and acceptance influenced by classic indie pop bands like The Field Mice, The Fat Tulips and The Go-Betweens. Indeed, it was the Grant McLennan-channelling “Don’t Worry,” a plaintive reassurance to a past lover, that initially caught my attention. But “I Miss The Sun” betters it, really laying on the Hammond, and squeezing in something noticeably absent from the other songs: a bridge. “When will we see the lull again/Feels like these dark days will never end,” Waldram sings, reestablishing buoyancy as it winds down repeating the title phrase. There’s promise elsewhere, like on the 1960’s-flavored psych strummer “Boats In The Sky,” before it lifts its bow in harmonic repetition a few too many times without checking its fuel gauge first, stranding itself in the firmament. “The Wild Wanderings of Wildebeests” is another one with potential, but its flawless first verse’s worth of strum and fuzz just recurs instead of building towards something of greater impact. The record hits its lowest point on the nearly nine-minute “Windswept,'' a “Primitive Painters'' rip that goes nowhere productive. When Waldram starts repeating ad infinitum “I miss you so much/ I can’t let go of this dream of ours,” you wish you could step in and save him from himself. A pleasant enough acoustic instrumental with birdsong follows in the form of “One May Afternoon,” serving as a much-needed palate cleanser and bridging the gap to the album’s closer. However, “Shimmer” is another moaner that never quite rounds into shape and instead fades out and then, unremarkably, back in.  There’s an EP’s worth of good material on So It Goes, but as an album it only ends up burning itself with the flame its carrying, leaving the listener wondering, “Who hurt you, Simon?”

Chris Liberato

[candyheartharry]

Go Your Own Way - Part 2

Guess what’s back! Part 1 to Go Your Own Way can be found here, ((which as stated previously is based off a tweet I once say for a Mamma Mia!-esque movie using Fleetwood Mac songs and starring Harry)) this one is the playlist for the series, and once again please let me know what you think!!! The word count for this part is just a little over 3k and once again here’s a brief summary of the series 💕The film of the same name stars Harry as our lead, who on screen is the frontman of an up and coming band called The Silk Roses in the mid-70′s, while our female lead (who also wrote and directed the film) plays his not-so-obvious love interest when she joins the band singing background vocals at the suggestion of the band’s guitarist who met her through her brother. During the day she manages the record shop her father had started, while her brother runs a recording studio out of the back where The Silk Roses recorded their early demos. Off camera, Harry and the main character have become close friends, and sometimes acting as someone’s love interest can be hard to drop when the cameras aren’t rolling.

“You really don’t have to go out of your way like this just for me,” she tried to plead with Harry in the kitchen of his New York City apartment, perched on a chair at the island while he tapped away on his phone, sending a few last minute emails to try to work a little Harry Styles magic before the movie premiere later that evening. 

“It’s seriously the least I could do, and it’s not even going out of my way! Look at me! I’m in my own kitchen! I’m wearing slippers!” he replied dramatically gesturing to his feet, where he was indeed wearing a pair of soft pink slippers to accompany his silk robe, grey sweatpants, and white t-shirt ensemble. She may or may not be wearing a similar ensemble, since she may or may not be wearing his clothes after having may or may not have fallen asleep on his couch the night before after they went back to his place after going out to dinner. 

They had gotten a little carried away with one of their never ending conversations they were so good at getting lost in while sitting on the floor of his living room and doing a puzzle on his coffee table, and suddenly it was two a.m. and she found herself fighting to stay awake on the couch while he was sat opposite of her, their legs stretched out to meet in the middle, even though his were nearly too long to do so comfortably. 

At least, she had fallen asleep the night before on the couch, but when she woke to sunlight coming through the window, she realized she was suddenly in a bed in Harry’s guest room, which he must have carried her to at one point while she was asleep. 

Now, with just about ten hours before the movie premiere, Harry was sending emails back and forth with Radio City Music Hall’s head of events staff to see if they would be able to book an extra lounge room space at the venue to set up a small stage and perform a few songs from the movie since he now knew for sure that Mick Fleetwood and both Christine and John McVie would be able to come. 

“I personally think it would be pretty fucking cool if we got to sing with them, plus I know they’d love it. Mick was actually under the impression there’d be some sort of performance going on during the after party in the first place, so I can promise you, this is seriously not any trouble at all, just please let me do this for you and also because I want to for me, too,” Harry replied after he put his phone down, placing his hands on the counter and leaning across to her just a little closer. 

She knows there’s no stopping him once his mind is made up, especially when he thinks it’s over something nice. She really thinks all this is to make up for not hearing back from Stevie, even though other members of the band can come, it looks like she’d be stuck with prior commitments that kept her in Los Angeles for the time being. To avoid getting her heart broken over Stevie not coming, she decided to change the subject, hoping the next topic won’t break her heart either. 

“So have you got a date for the evening?” she asked before she took a sip of her orange juice he had set out with their breakfast, knowing it’s best to be prepared to expect him showing up with someone rather than be caught off guard by it when she sees someone she doesn’t know on his arm later on in the night. He shrugged and took a sip of some juice concoction he blended a little earlier before he replies. “Depends on if she says yes or not, we’ll see.”

Although she was the one who asked in the first place, it still made her a little jealous. She never meant to get a little possessive over her costar, after all they had only met because of the movie, it wasn’t as if they were friends beforehand. Admittedly, she catches feelings much too fast, so she knew it was a dangerous game to play Harry’s love interest in a film and expect to not have some sort of fraction of feelings for him. Was she really just expected to act as if she loved and cared about him, and then just go back to normal life? Maybe a trained actress could do the same, sure, but she was both a writer and hopeless romantic. With Harry she couldn’t really tell if it was a proper crush, or she was just jealous that some of the affection she had seen he was capable of were reserved for someone who wasn’t her. Either way, she tried to collect her thoughts and think of something to say while she spread more strawberry jam on a slice of toast, but luckily he kept the conversation going so that she didn’t have to. 

“So we’ll have to come up with a set list I suppose, probably good to have a few options and then see what John, Mick, and Christine are up for. I was thinking we could do Sara, obviously The Chain, I Don’t Want To Know, and Dreams if those are good with you?” He took the time to add a little more strawberry cream cheese to his own bagel as he asked the question, to which she nodded and hummed a response around a mouthful of toast. 

“Just might have a surprise for you later by the way,” he continued smugly, adding just the slightest shimmy of his hips over the delight that he knew something she didn’t, and also over the delight of knowing how much she hated knowing about surprises. She replied with an exasperated groan just as he knew she would, “Couldn’t you have just surprised me instead of telling me you’re going to surprise me?! Wouldn’t that have made so much more sense?!” 

“Might’ve made sense, but wouldn’t have been any fun for me, now would it?” he teased with a smirk, to which she rolled her eyes and wanted to kick him in the knees. “Anyways, I’d better get going, I should start getting ready soon. Thank you for breakfast and letting me sleep in your guest room. I’ll be there early to do a couple red carpet interviews, since I ya know, wrote it and starred in it and all, so I’ll see you once you get there, I guess,” she replied as she took her dishes to the sink to clean up. 

“Oooh, look at you Miss Triple Threat, are you nervous?” he said with a playful bump of his hip against hers while he rinsed his own dishes in the sink next to her. He had noticed she had been fidgety all morning, and assumed it was nerves starting to get to her. “I should be fine once I get into the swing of things. I’ll feel better once I’ve got other people with me and the rest of the cast is there, so please come find me once you get there so I don’t have to be by myself too long,” she admitted, resting her hip against the counter once she turned to face him. 

“You’re going to do amazing, you’ll hardly even notice when I’m not there. I’ll come find you first chance I get, I promise. Want me to go ahead and call you a car?” he offered as he wrapped one arm around her shoulders to give her a reassuring hug, placing a gentle kiss to the top of her head. She nodded a yes even though she didn’t really want to leave, resting her cheek on his shoulder as he soothingly rubbed her back. 

The two of them remained there like that for a moment by the counter, before he then picked up his phone off the counter behind them to call for her ride, sending a quick text to his driver before sliding his phone in his pocket and wrapping his now free hand around her to hold her a little tighter. “I’ll be fine once I’m there, I don’t know what I’m so nervous for ahead of time,” she confided in him, knowing she would feel more comfortable by his side in front of all the cameras and lights like she does right now in the peacefulness of his kitchen. He was a seasoned professional, and while she knew what to expect, she would have a significantly larger amount of attention on her this evening than she was used to. Sure, she’d been to premieres for projects she had written or directed or even acted in before, but this particular project had felt almost like her baby, and while she was extremely proud of it, she really just wanted everyone else to love it as much as she did. 

“I wish I could just sleep in your guest room all day until it’s time to go, I don’t want to be awake and be nervous, I just want to get this started, the wait is going to drive me insane,” she rambled, still pressed tightly to his chest as he continued to rub her back. He pulled back a little for second and looked down at her with a confused look on his face. “My guest room?” he inquired, resulting in her expression matching his, but suddenly a wave of realization hit her, and she gently shoved his arm over what she thinks she’s come to the conclusion that he had done. 

“Harry, stop it, did you let me kick you out of your own room so I could sleep in your bed? Tell me that I woke up in your guest room,” she continued. He held onto her a little tighter as she tried to squirm away, making her even more flustered at his kindness towards her. 

“Please, you think I’d elect to sleep on my couch when I’ve got a movie premiere the next morning?” he teased. “You didn’t kick me in your sleep and you never snored, but you did try to hold my hand and your fingers were really cold. You just seemed so exhausted so I couldn’t just leave you on the couch. Best blankets are on my bed,” he shrugged like it was no big deal, although to her it was a Very Big Deal and she probably wouldn’t stop thinking about it and kicking herself for having a chance to share a bed with her attractive costar that she couldn’t tell if she had a crush on and not remember anything about it because she was asleep. They had taken naps on set together wherever they had a spot to fall asleep during late night shoots so sleeping near him wasn’t the problem, it was the idea of being in his bed in his room, and not even realizing it. “Harry Styles, you are entirely too much.” 

A notification buzzed on his phone, which he retrieved from his pocket to read, letting her know his car is waiting for her whenever she was ready to leave for her own hotel room she had reserved nearby. She took a moment to collect her things from the night before, slipping back into his bedroom to change into her own clothes again. Earlier when he was trying to convince her to spend time with him before the premiere once they both were in New York she had teased him that there were bound to be more rumors they were dating, and now here she was about to leave his apartment in the same clothes she had worn the night before. Even though she knew it was extremely unlikely that anyone would see her leaving, she still personally hated the idea of what people might think, so once she was half dressed in her own clothes and still wearing his shirt he offered for her to sleep in, she called out to him in the hallway. “Harry, I’m going to steal your shirt for the day, I’ll give it back later, okay?” 

He appeared at the other end of the hall from the kitchen, his hands shoved in the pockets of his robe. “Just a couple weeks ago you didn’t want to go to dinner with me because you were worried people would think we were together, now you want to leave my apartment wearing my clothes?” he teased. 

“Look, it’s either I leave wearing your clothes, or I leave in the clothes I wore the night before, and honestly, I’m not fond of either option! Plus if I take just a white shirt, it could belong to literally anybody so I should be fine.”

“What, you don’t want to wear a tour shirt with my face on it to give people something to talk about at the premiere tonight?” he replied with a smirk, making her once again roll her eyes as she leaned against the doorframe. 

“No, Harry, I really do not,” she replied, trying to sound annoyed even though she couldn’t help but smile. She turned away to walk back into his bedroom before he had the chance to think of another reply, going to fold the pants he loaned to her to sleep in and placing the folded pair on the foot of his bed. Now that she knew it was actually his room and not just his spare guest bedroom, she didn’t know how she could’ve made the mistake in the first place. Personal touches of him were all over if you looked in the right place. A jewelry box with his collection of rings was on top of his dresser, there were a total of three different vanilla cashmere candles in different places around the room, and a small assortment of journals and novels were lined up along the shelf at the bottom of the nightstand by the bed. In the corner of the room a jacket was thrown over a chair, one she recognized from a memory long ago when she first met him in a studio in London when he came in for his very first audition. She hadn’t seen that specific jacket in ages, and it took her a moment for the memory to come back to her, but once she placed where she recognized it from, she was instantly taken back to a rainy afternoon sitting at a table with a casting director when she saw Harry walk in for the first time and introduce himself. 

When his agent had been in touch to express his interest in her film, she had been floored to say the least. She knew she had to be objective, and judge his audition the same as anyone else’s, but she would’ve been lying if she were to say Harry wasn’t her first choice before even seeing him read for the role. If she really had to think about it, and narrow it down to one specific moment that made her thoughts and feelings towards him begin to blur the lines of professional and attracted to him, it was likely the moment he walked into the room and shook everyone’s hands at his audition. Something about taking his hand and meeting his eyes for that very first moment drew her in, she knew being professional might be challenging, which she now knew for sure how challenging that would be. 

Something about seeing that jacket from that very first time she met him had triggered another realization in her as well. Something about it made her realize how long ago that day really was and how far this project had come along, making her also very sad that this was almost all over. This project she had been working for years on was about to belong to not just her anymore, but the whole world. It was a special moment when it first belonged to the cast and crew as well, but finally having it out in the world seemed very surreal and bittersweet. 

“Snooping through my things?” Her thoughts were interrupted by Harry showing up in the doorway, leaning against the frame very similar to how she had been just a few moments before. 

“Do you ever get a little sad when you release music?” she asked once she turned around to face him after she heard his voice.  

“I don’t really know if I would say sad, but it is kind of intimidating I would say,” he replied with a shrug of his shoulders. 

“It kind of just hit me that this project won’t be just mine anymore after this, and really it hasn’t been just mine for a long time, and I don’t know, it just made me kind of sad, I guess,” she shrugged herself, shaking her head in attempts to clear her thoughts. She collected her things after glancing around the room to make sure she wasn’t leaving anything behind and met him in the doorway. 

He walked her down the hall and took the elevator with her down to the garage, opening the car door for her with a quick kiss to her cheek before she slid inside. “I’ll come find you later, you’re going to be just fine. We’ll have a moment to rehearse before we perform with the band later tonight, I’ve got it squared away so I’ll just pull you away from your adoring fans so we can get ready to sing for them. Sound good?” he asked, to which she nodded a yes before he gave her hand a quick squeeze and closed the car door.  

When he started to walk back towards the elevators she rolled down the window and called out to get his attention. “Don’t think I forgot about whatever surprise you just couldn’t wait to tell me about! It better be good!”

He smiled and gave a quick wave as the car starts to pull away. “Don’t worry, you’re gonna love it!” Harry was quite good at pulling strings, and she was about to find out just how good at it he could be.

[valkyrieelysia18]

RWBY Rewrite: Pyrrha Nikos

Hello again! And this time I get to use that for the right post. Today we are taking a look at one of the characters that got severely short changed when it came to character development Pyrrha Nikos.

Pyrrha is perhaps one of the more popular characters of RWBY and her background and fighting abilities gave her immense potential. Her personality was rather sweet too. Unfortunately, the first two volumes didn’t really give her much outside of Jaune and when we finally got something in the third volume, she got killed off. Here’s the thing....I don’t actually mind that she got killed off.

Now before you all crucify me, let me explain. Volume 3 was a mixed bag of storytelling, but I don’t have any problems with the deaths and losses. It was a good way of setting the tone going forward: People are going to die, characters we have grown close to aren’t safe, and even our main team is not untouchable. Pyrrha’s death, the death of the seemingly untouchable perfect hero that seemed fated for success, was honestly a good idea.....executed poorly.

To get what I’m going on about, I’m going to talk about one of the few things I think the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime did better Brotherhood; the buildup and death of Maes Hughes. We get introduced to him a couple of years prior to the story’s present and when we come back to the current time, we see Maes quite a bit whether it helping the other characters or just him being his loveable self. We know him and his family very well. We see him as a father, a husband, a soldier, and a friend. When he dies, its a genuine gut punch. Especially because we know he had a life prior to the plot.

That was never something I got from Pyrrha. For someone who hates her fame, we don’t really see her deal with it all that much outside of her first conversation with Weiss and the Pumpkin Pete’s advertising which one episode in early Volume 1. We only get her talking about one member of her family (her mother) and it’s never brought up again. No, that scene in Argus does not count. Show, don’t tell is a very much a problem with Pyrrha’s story arc.

Then of course there is the biggest problem of all this: her relationship with Jaune. Now, I’m going to get into this more when we get to the Rewrite for the Jaunedice Arc, but I’ll give you a brief overview of feelings on him. I like Jaune and I don’t think that he’s an inherently bad character. He does have some good qualities and potential. Unfortunately, even though I like Jaune, I recognize that he has gotten way too much screen time (to the detriment of many other characters including Ruby and Pyrrha) and he has gotten away with a lot of things with little blowback to himself. I guess I’m more inclined to blame the writers than Jaune because everyone is done in by the writing. So, it’s still going to be there, but majorly changed to make it a lot more balanced and believable. Basically, the relationship is important to her, but it doesn’t define who she is as a character.

I feel this writing is going to get a bit more in depth so prepare yourself accordingly. Also note that I dropped RWBY after Volume 6 so anything introduced or mentioned in Volume 7 and beyond will be disregarded. So let’s get into it!

Before Beacon: Prophecy and Fame

In this Rewrite, Pyrrha was born in a port city in Southern Anima that draws heavily from the Ancient Greco-Roman culture. She was the only child of very prosperous merchants, her family having gained great wealth following the Great War due to their ties to other kingdoms in trade. Much like Weiss’s family, they’re relatively noveau rich. Her parents doted on her and when she got older, they saw she was a natural in the art of combat. They took her to a seer in the city, an older woman by the name of Laurel Visione who as you might guess is a reference to the Oracle of Delphi. Laurel tells Pyrrha and her parents that she was blessed with great strength and talent. That her star is bright and she has the ability to become a great warrior with a great destiny.

Her parents are pleased by these words, but Pyrrha notices the woman seems to be holding something back. As her parents leave, she lingers behind and asks the woman about it. Laurel smiles and tells that those gifted with that much brightness, also tend to burn out young. She goes on and tells Pyrrha that if she chooses the path of a hero, she will save many lives and inspire many more, but it will also take her away from what she truly wants. It doesn’t mean that she will die, free will should always be taken into account, but if she chooses this path she will meet death sooner rather than later. She’s telling Pyrrha this because it’s her destiny, not her parents, and its up to her to choose how she’s going to face that destiny. As a parting piece of advice, she tells her that everything happens for a reason, even if we don’t see that reason until much later.

Pyrrha keeps this all in mind, as well as keeping it a secret from her parents. We’ll get back to Laurel later.

Her parents, unaware of this, go all out in supporting her in her training. With every new tournament and success, their pride grows even more. They do however realize, that the success is affecting her standing among her peers, her fame making it all but impossible for her to have friends. There is an also accident with Pyrrha’s semblance that almost permanently injured someone because Pyrrha lost control. As a result, Pyrrha only uses a fraction of her semblance’s power and that gives more context to when she got upset during Volume 3 when she used it on Jaune in the courtyard.

When she announces to her parents she’s applying for Beacon, they’re shocked. Not everyone who graduates from a combat school ends up at the Academies (such institutes are super competitive) and with Pyrrha’s semblance mainly geared towards fighting people, throwing away her tournament career when she’s at the top of her game seems rash. Tournament fighting isn’t easy and isn’t as prestigious as being a Huntress, but it’s also much safer with sanctioned rules and the paycheck being just as lucrative. Not to mention, she’d be doing her schooling on a completely different continent. As parents, they love their daughter and want what's best for her, but they honestly can’t understand why she’s doing this. Nevertheless, she’s made her decision and there’s nothing they can say to change her mind. All they can do is see her off with a smile and wish her well.

Beacon: Fame, Friendship, and Love

Now a somewhat constant thing that comes up with Pyrrha during her school days is that her fame is very much hanging over her. Students are constantly trying to get her autograph, people like Cardin try to rile her up, and during the tournament some Haven students openly disparage her for transferring to another kingdom. This will eventually allow her and Weiss to get closer, as Weiss has had to deal with fame and even higher expectations since she was younger than Pyrrha.

Her relationship with her teammates become the first genuine experiences she has with friendship; Nora is a great workout buddy who makes everyone laugh and Ren is someone she can talk a lot of things over with such as the differences between Central Anima and Southern Anima. However, she is new to working with a team and it takes her a little while to get used to it. This is part of the reason why she’s so trusting of Jaune’s leadership at the beginning until it is shaken by him revealing the truth about his transcripts.

Of course, being a rewrite she also gets a lot more interaction with Team RWBY. Her relationship with Ruby is very much highlighted with the younger girl being a tad more idealistic and naïve with Pyrrha being a bit more reserved and more knowledgeable about her future goals. These two are very much foils to each other, which I will get to later on.

Then of course there is her relationship with Jaune. In the show, she says that Jaune was the first person to treat her as a regular girl and this rewrite will be showing that. While others will be interested in her accolades and fame, Jaune will show interest in Pyrrha as a person like the things she enjoys and what growing up for her was like. They start on a strong friendship with Pyrrha’s feelings developing into something more and Jaune a tad more oblivious to it. This will definitely change their relationship from Volumes 1 and 2, but not 3. Though I would probably cut out one of the Arkos songs because there are two more than it needs to be. It gives off the impression that Pyrrha defined herself solely by her relationship with Jaune and you never want to make a character come off as just a love interest to another character. And there are so many other people who would probably benefit with a song POV.

Death: Aftermath and Distrust

The main difference about Pyrrha’s death in canon and this rewrite is that her death affects everyone in the main group, especially her teammates and Ruby. Jaune is still very affected as he was her partner and friend and still has very conflicted thoughts over her romantic feelings towards him, but Ren and Nora are also noticeably grieving her in their own ways. Ruby tries to bottle it up most of the time, much like how she treats a lot of her negative emotions and that comes back to bite her much later on when she is at her lowest and reaches her emotional breaking point. For most of the story, she gets very haunting dreams about Pyrrha (occasionally accompanied by Penny) saying that she has accepted her destiny and questions what Ruby is going to do. This will be foreshadowing for what I’ll talk about in the next section.

The biggest effect that Pyrrha’s death has is that JNR is much more distrusting of Ozpin than RWBY. While they will recognize that Pyrrha made her own decision and they blame Cinder and the others for her death, they still see the whole choice presented to Pyrrha as extremely sketchy and questionable. Pyrrha was the type of person who would not have said no if it meant saving people. And more than just what could have been the result of the transfer, its the fact that they chose a first year student for the job when there should have been better candidates with more experience and a better understanding of what they were getting into (especially as we know the cut off date for Maiden powers is 30).

Jaune, Ren, and Nora still see Salem and her group as the biggest threat to humanity, but that doesn’t mean they like or trust Ozpin (this is not the same for Oscar, but that’s another post). And given that this rewrite will make Oz a much more morally gray character who HAS done some pretty reprehensible things in his conflict with Salem, this distrust will turn out to be very much justified.

Another change to the story is that after Mistral Arc, JNR would actually split off from the main group. Getting the Relic to Atlas is definitely a priority, but this also leaves Shade Academy in a bit of the dark with how things are going. So RWBY, Qrow, and Ozcar would head to Atlas with the Relic while JNR accompanied by Team SSSN would head to Vacuo (which doesn’t have closed borders and therefore would be easier to travel to) after a taking a short detour to Pyrrha’s hometown to give the news to her parents in person. This would make writing the Atlas Arc easier by trimming down the size of the group.

The meeting with Pyrrha’s parents....does not go well. The actual confirmation of their daughter’s death is heartbreaking and their grief and anger is focused on the immediate targets: her teammates. They angrily ask why they didn’t try to stop her or get professional help. They especially treat Jaune harshly when he tells them she sent him away before going to confront Cinder. The three very much realize that they’re not welcome and present what’s left of Pyrrha’s personal things (including her circlet). The two calm down a bit as they see these things and accept them with thanks, but politely tell the group to leave and allow them to grieve alone. They disapproved of her choice and this result makes them feel justified in their opinion. They feel cheated of their only child, who could have done so much...had she not chosen to become a Huntress. 

As JNR leaves the house, they’re greeted by Laurel Visione. After a brief conversation about her past with Pyrrha in Laurel’s home, they question why she would tell Pyrrha about her destiny if that destiny would lead to her death. Laurel would tell them that she wanted to Pyrrha to understand the full risks of the path she was walking towards. If she wanted to turn back from that, she could have, she’d have more than enough time to come to the decision, but she choose not to. She accepted her destiny and had viewed it with a measure of peace. Laurel states that she probably died with some regrets, very few people don’t, but she made her own decision to that end and she wouldn’t have blamed anyone for it.

Before the group leave to meet up with Team SSSN to head to Shade, Laurel tells them one last thing: That the choice that Pyrrha had in front of her is the same one that Ruby is also going to deal with.

Destiny: Ruby

Perhaps the best way to summarize the foil relationship between Pyrrha and Ruby is a quote from one of my favorite animes of all time Princess Tutu: “Those who accept their fate find happiness; those who defy it, glory.”

Pyrrha knew from practically the beginning that her destiny as a hero would lead to an early end. And she accepted it. If it meant saving others and doing what was right, she would gladly give her life to do so. During Volume 3 with the Maiden choice hanging over is when she actually considers walking away from everything and staying with her friends, realizing what Laurel meant all those years ago. But in the end, she still chose her path even if she didn’t know everything about what was going on.

As for Ruby, I mentioned Raven giving a warning to Ruby about using her eyes would lead to an early grave like her mother and grandfather (who are posthumous characters who will play a role in the greater story). I’m not going into specifics right now, but the Silver Eyes bear a great cost in this Rewrite and almost all Silver Eyed Warriors die extremely young. The path of a Silver Eye, of a great hero that Ruby had wanted to emulate, will turn out to have a dark price to it. 

The difference between Ruby and Pyrrha is that Ruby does not accept this fate. She will not walk away from the fight, but she is not going to readily sacrifice herself either. She is going to take a look at her fate, her people’s history, Ozpin and Salem’s conflict, and tell them to screw destiny. Screw people making assumptions and choices for her. The only person who gets decide who she is and what she stands for is her. And everyone has the right to make that same decision.

OKAY, that post took longer than I thought it was going to. At least I got it out before I went with my family on our Christmas vacation. The next post will probably get out in 2020. As for the topic, let’s just say it’s not about a person....

[toongrrl-blog]

The Mommy Myth: The War Against Welfare Mothers (Part One)

This gif is from the 1970s film Claudine, a romantic comedy starring James Earl Jones and Diahann Carroll about a garbage man and a welfare mother trying to make the relationship and where he helps provide for her home and kids without the social worker checking in. 

We check in with The New Yorker, who took a break from their cartoons to cover a welfare mother named Carmen Santana (not her real name): she is Puerto Rican American (and judging by the text’s descriptions of her “wide nose”, complexion, curly dark hair, and thick lips, she must be Afro-Latina) who weighs over 200 lbs and boy the writer was having a field day describing her heft and body. She has no interest in “national or international events” (common flaw that goes across class lines), she spends her day watching soap operas, cursing in Spanish and giving her many kids “a good cuffing” and they just throw the trash out the window. Her kitchen is filthy and her philosophy is “what will be, will be” (a common thing) and sits all the time even when she is cooking while her kids’ bedroom is decorated with obscene graffiti; she had her first child at age 15 and went on to have eight more kids by three different men and her mother had three children by different men and now Carmen’s daughter is also on welfare. She spends the money from Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) on makeup and perfume and hair (honestly wasn’t that a thing at some point? Like Midge Maisel and her mother make sure their husbands never see them without perfect hair and makeup) and junk food for the kids and she also plays the numbers where she spends her winnings on “jewelry , beer, and liquour” and “trips to Puerto Rico”. I guess we are not supposed to sympathize with this woman. 

Carmen was an example of a stereotype that was used to represent and demonize welfare mothers. Johnnine Tillmon, the first chairwoman of the group National Welfare Rights Organization saw welfare and the stereotypes as a feminist issue. 

I’m a woman. I’m a black woman. I’m a poor woman. I’m a fat woman. I’m a middle-aged woman. And I’m on welfare. In this country, if you’re any one of those things---poor, black, fat, female, middle-aged, on welfare---you count less as a human being. 

She even said that the biggest reason that people believe the stereotype of the welfare mother is that they are “special versions of the lies that society tells about all women”, sadly she wasn’t listened to in the mainstream media where welfare mothers were deviants in a culture that valued the rugged individual, relentless hard work and sacrifice, slim bodies aided by Bowflex or Thighmaster, and shiny blond hair with perky smiles. Yo because of this stereotype, women of color with several children are considered suspect. It was also another way to pit moms against moms, the resentment of packing the kids’ lunch and work at a dull 9 to 5 job or scrub the kitchen floors while this stereotype gets to have sex with whoever and drink booze with tax dollars. Even Time magazine went in:

Here’s a few facts: the average welfare family in 1994 had three members, the mother and two children. 39% were White and 37% were Black, African Americans numbered 12% of the national population but were about 35-37% of the welfare population and African Americans were three times as likely as White Americans to live below the poverty level. Only 10% of AFDC mothers had four or more children and 80% had one or two kids and figures in 1993 shown 75% of adults left welfare within two years and 1/2 of single mothers worked while on welfare and 1/3 were working to supplement the minuscule allotment and get off from unemployment. But that was lost on the media that focused on families with two or more generations on welfare (a tiny fraction of welfare recipients) even focusing on unwed teen welfare moms because they were...SHOCKING! Only 1% were teen mothers. Welfare mothers were known only by first name and she lived in the urban decay of New York, Camden (New Jersey), Chicago, or Detroit; they were black and unmarried and had a bunch of kids who don’t share a common biological father and she smoked and painted her nails and gave soda to her baby (OMG imagine 2010s soda freaks) and her face was pixelated in the media. Some of them were depicted as cynical about life and motherhood, it wasn’t sexy for them and at least they felt ambivalence (which was soooooo disco era). 

Then came the 1990s where the moderate Democratic Clinton administration introduced “Welfare Reform” where President Bill Clinton ended “welfare as we know it” and he was just following his predecessors: Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and George Bush (the first) regarding their attitude towards welfare recipients. The Welfare to Work program who were being trained by job placement programs that prepared them for low-paying jobs in retail and in service and the resources for job training were limited (also if your hours took you away from your kids?). Also it was hard for welfare to work moms working to move up in their jobs and often mostly got gigs like seasonal retail. 

The depiction of welfare mothers was different from the celebrity mom: she wasn’t ascribed emotions where her eyes welled up with tears or laughed, she wasn’t well lit with a light or a rosy focus, never seen holding her child up or clutching the child and magazines like Redbook or McCall’s never did a cover story with a welfare mom and her kids done up and showing the readers fun things they do with little or no money or touring New York City on $10 for a day or games to play while waiting in long lines (honestly that is a good idea, someone pay Susan and Meredith if the magazines do that). Also if you were a woman of color, especially a young one or a poor one (or both) you weren’t supposed to have the “baby lust” so gushed about in celebrity mom profiles; trust me I grew up a Latina kid in Central California and many older women like my mom would worry about the girls that want to have babies so bad or fall in love hard and fast, a young Karen Wheeler in 1967 can give all to family and babies and staying home but it is more precarious for a young girl of color. 

The media depiction of poor people wasn’t always so negative: political scientist Martin Gilens found that when the “War on Poverty” began, where the Lyndon B. Johnson administration focused on eliminating poverty and started programs like Head Start rather than piss on poor people, coverage focused on poor white people in rural areas like Appalachia or in the Rustbelt where mines or factories closed down, these were the faces of The Grapes of Wrath, the Joad family who fought against hardship on their way to a better life. After Michael Harrington published his book The Other America, public support for ending poverty was strong. But then came the riots in Watts, Newark, and Detroit (just a few) where mostly people of color fought back against law enforcement and the media used images of African-Americans to illustrate their pieces on welfare, which reinforced stereotypes about welfare and as the coverage became more negative, the skin color got darker (even though statistics then and now showed many more white recipients of welfare)

How about how the face of welfare became so feminized? In the 1930s, when the Welfare program and Social Security began under the New Deal by President FDR, a lot of women of color were barred from welfare because of discriminatory practices, this changed with the Civil Rights Movement which opened up some doors for women of color to get assistance for their children and households. Before the Welfare recipient was faceless or usually a man, who got rich off welfare and bought Cadillacs with the money, something that Richard Nixon really clung to and he asked Johnny Cash to perform the song “Welfare Cadillac” at a White House event sparking controversy. Indeed when Cash met with Nixon, he gave him a private concert with songs that were more compassionate and less reactionary than what Nixon wanted. In the early 1960s, magazines like Look or Reader’s Digest wrote to readers about women who sent their many children to beg for money while the mother ate steak with their boyfriend, or worse, spent the money on narcotics and kept giving birth to more than 10 kids. The image of poor, fertile mothers on taxpayer money was more infuriating than that of a able-bodied man getting the money, but making welfare moms work was shocking (as the system was designed for widows to stay home with their children and not worry about money), even a stinging David Brinkley chafed at leaving kids at a daycare center...it would cost the taxpayer more.

Ronald Reagan coined the term “welfare queen” (look it up) and made exaggerated anecdotes and given how people were drawn to him (looking at you Mike and Nancy’s parents), he was believed despite him not citing sources or studies. Reagan voters fell for the image of a welfare mother who spent money for fancy cars, vacations, designer clothes, and played the system (there were a  few like Dorothy Woods, but again if this were common, the landscape of the inner city would look a lot different...) It was a dark time, the Religious Right took control, Proposition 13 in California put a limit on property taxes and started many tax revolts to limit government spending, and let’s not forget Ronald Reagan opposed the following:

Civil Rights Act of 1964

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Fair-Housing Legislation in California

Legislation to declare Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday as a national holiday

How does that Reagan/Bush ‘84 sign look Ted and Karen?

Stay tuned.....

[raeofalbion]

Rules: List 5 quotes from various fics you love and link to the fics! Quotes can be short or long. Tag as many people as you want! (tagged by @leafenclaw - thanks so much! :D)

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tagging: Idk who I follow and who follows me who hasn’t done this yet, so, if you want to do it, go for it and please tag me so I can see!

Okay, so I’ve decided to twist the rules a little and use this as a rec list for my current top five Sherlock fics and my top three Fable fics, in no particular order, so people who follow me for either fandom have something to go through. Under the cut because...long.

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BBC Sherlock

Inevitable Destruction by @jimswestwood (formerly Dionysisch)

(Ao3; Sheriarty) Bored, Jim invites Sherlock into his home, Sherlock decides to stay. — It’s a beautiful 4 part oneshot series that deals heavily with existentialism and wanting, framed in an almost elegant, bordering on philosophical light. Oh and it makes me cry. It makes me cry a lot.

Sometimes it would hit him so hard it became painful even to breathe. The meaninglessness of it all. It all dissolved into the same ephemeral prettiness of clouds, of smoke, of things that could fascinate but hold no substance at all, vanish at the touch. The air in his lungs, the wall he kept staring at. Himself. The words flowing through his brain. Nothing. Just a casual connection, weak strings giving intolerable heaviness to sounds and letters. In the end, the more he repeated something, the more he realized emptiness. Sounds rolling in his mouth numbing his palate, as he took another mask, another voice, another self - an evocation of something he forgot along the way, and in which he forgot part of himself.

Bored, bored, bored. Bored.

His thin lips part slightly, tongue darting gently over scabs of a tormented nature, sign of a certain carelessness betraying a polished image in all its destructiveness. “Bored,” Jim repeats, again. Just a murmur. Gentle, quiet, making sure not to disturb the non-existent life in a bubble of static silence. It makes him think of grey, grey dullness, something like quicksand but gripping at his brain and his heart and paralyzing him until he cannot breathe and exploding into a million pieces sounds like the most tolerable image. Scattering himself like cosmic dust. He wonders if, in that case, he would give life to other stars or just decay. Once more. 

-

Not Until Then by @jamlocked​

(Ao3; Sheriarty, Sherlock/James Moriarty) After Sherrinford, Sherlock goes to see Jim’s brother. What follows is in no way straightforward. — There was a three-way tie for me between this fic, Daemon, and Between Shadows and Sunlight, but this fic. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve read it and I still can’t say for certain what I think is really happening. It’s gorgeous, elusive, and I love how much it makes me think. Jam’s a master at well-crafted, incredibly twisty plots and I’m just...endlessly fascinated by this one.

Sherlock watches his chest stop moving. David’s head tilts a fraction, like he’s listening to a far-off sound. And then…

…and then, his left hand moves to his left knee. It’s an instantly familiar gesture, one burned into Sherlock’s hard drive. Every other thought falls away. Sherlock feels his eyes widen and his mouth drop open, a gasp stuck behind his teeth. The cold, the silence of the country, the light of the windows, all melt to nothing as he watches David ripple his fingers (beats like digits) over his bent leg, pushing a slight emphasis on the roll of his thumb.

For a few seconds, he can’t breathe. His eyes snap up to David’s face - and it is David’s face, it is, but all he can see is Jim. Jim sitting there with his eyes closed and his hair a mess, slumped in exhaustion but still, always, drumming his own beat. Except that wasn't his beat, that was theirs. He knows of no one else who ever saw Jim make that move, and there’s no reason anyone ever should. That was part of their game.

He whirls to the side, back into darkness. His shoe makes a noise as it shifts on the gravel, but it barely registers. He blinks rapidly, playing the movement back, checking he saw what he thought he saw, not just what he wanted. Why would he want that? (Except wasn’t that his secret hope, wasn’t he sad when he realised he was wrong?) He doesn’t want that. It was just…

Logic. Logic. They’re brothers. He doesn’t know what characteristics they shared, and he doesn’t know when they last talked. There are any number of explanations; indeed, they’re lining up in his brain, each one ready to squash down the live-wire burst of shock. Coincidence (rarely so lazy), or wishful thinking, or his brain overlaying a strong moment from his past onto something innocuous.

Sherlock breathes out, and looks back through the window. David is rinsing the plates at the sink, ready for the dishwasher. Just a too-thin, tired man. Sherlock calms himself, and walks back around the house to let himself back in. He has to see this through. He has to know what he’s doing here, and then there’ll be no need to come back.

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To What End? by collaborativesheriartyparty

(Ao3; Sheriarty) Texting, drinks, and...something more. Unique. Possibly dangerous. Definitely addicting. — I don’t know what to say about this series that someone else hasn’t already said but gods, they (the writers) are so good. There’s a depth and a complexity and a lovely, wonderful vulnerability to how both of them write their respective characters and watching Jim and Sherlock’s relationship unfold feels incredibly intimate and, at times, like I should have given them a bit of time alone. It’s fantastic. <3

Sherlock had a funny way of getting revenge, of paralyzing his enemy.  Jim appreciated it.  Why do with effort what could be done with a whisper?  The nights he’d dreamt of the detective had transformed his mornings, either giving him a renewed sense of patience or a real urge to get creative in his ventures.  Jim had wanted to give Sherlock every chance to notice him, and chase him down.  If Sherlock slipped cuffs on his wrists right now with a ‘gotcha’, would it be worth it? Yes. “I think…” Jim murmured, his tongue darting out to wet his suddenly dry lips and, oops, brushing Sherlock’s lobe in the process, “that you should be texting John.” How he managed sing-song just now was a bloody feckin’ wonder.  Maybe because he only took John so seriously.  “Telling him you’ll be home…soon,” Jim continued, tone back to a distracted drawl, and took another deep inhale of Sherlock, his leg almost brushing the other’s now.  To Jim, they were the only people in the bar right now, in the world.  His eyes had closed, and it took every effort to keep his hands off Sherlock. “Instead of starting something you don’t want to finish.”  He’d intended warning, but somehow it had turned out sounding like a challenge.

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Circadian Disruption by @like-the-direction

(Ao3; Sheriarty) They are many things--brilliant, determined, enemies, lovers, human only in looks--and, if Molly has any say in it, soon they’ll also be free. — It was a tie for me between this series and Corpus Callosum--both invoke similar levels of internal joyful screaming, but I seem to recall CC being recced recently, so I thought it might be a good idea to rec this one. And oh, gods, what to say about these fics. They’re so incredibly well written--the prose is beautiful and feels impeccably well-thought out. There’s so many layers to everything that it’s impossible for me to read without finding myself just sitting there, wondering. And crying. This one makes me cry, too.

“Do you dream of waterfalls?”

Sherlock pauses mid-step.

“Waterfalls,” Moriarty says, hushed, “and a precipice.  You, and me.”  There is something in his voice, a quiet heartbreak, and it cracks ever so slightly when he asks, “Do you dream of falling?”

Slowly, Sherlock turns.  Moriarty is deadly serious when he meets his eyes.

“Victorian clothing,” he goes on, while the image - the recurring dream Sherlock has had since the day he met James Moriarty face to face - begins to form in his mind’s eye.  “Me, all in black.  You, wearing that fucking--”

“Deerstalker,” Sherlock says in unison with him, unsure what is happening, but feeling in his bones that it is significant, important somehow.  Moriarty nods a bit, and Sherlock slowly continues, “I...refer to you as--”

“‘Professor,’” Moriarty finishes with him, and Sherlock is dimly aware of his pulse rising as he makes his way back toward Moriarty at the ledge.  His adversary’s eyes briefly appear wet, but it’s difficult to tell in the light.  Moriarty says, “We stand at the cliff’s edge, and I ask you something.  I ask, ‘Shall we--’”

“‘Shall we go over together?’” Sherlock whispers with him.  They are standing so close.  Sherlock can see his reflection in Moriarty’s eyes.  “Why do you know that?” he asks faintly, looking between his twin reflections.  “How could you know that?”

“You tell me, Detective.”

It’s a test - Moriarty knows, certainly he knows - but Sherlock thinks he may, as well.  “It...wasn’t a dream.”

-

dinner by @very-trivial​

(Ao3; Jimcroft) Mycroft Holmes is a dangerous man--mysterious, isolated. Sherlock and Jim are convinced he’s secretly a top government official, but they can’t begin to comprehend the scale of his power. To clarify: Mycroft Holmes is a food critic. — This fic never fails to cheer me up. It’s lovely and the descriptions of food, as well as the character interactions, are so amazingly spot-on. Jim and Sherlock’s insistence that Mycroft is a scary government-man is surprisingly funny, particularly alongside Mycroft’s worry that they’ll figure out what his job really is. Also, the end is oddly heartwarming? The whole thing is just really good.

“You’re a crit-”

A hand slapped over Jim’s mouth.

Despite everything Jim now knew about Mycroft Holmes, in this very moment, he looked scarier than ever.

“I’ll tell you everything, but not a single word passes through your mouth - not now, not ever,” the man hisses, sotto voce. The silencing hand did not relent one millimeter as he pressed on. Jim was starting to regret seating them in a corner booth away from prying eyes.

“If my identity so much as appears as a  rumor  on the D-list food  vlogs  , I will make sure you never eat in this town again. You’ll never be able to order  curry  without wondering if the dish has been tampered with. Maybe poison, maybe they just spit in it. I have clout in this world, Jim Moriarty, and you don’t. You put my name out there and  I will use it  . I have friends in high places,  sir , and they owe me favors. I’ve made careers, I’ve launched veritable nobodies into international stardom. Don’t think for one moment you’ll ever be able to set foot into any decent restaurant again if you cross me. You'll live off cheap instant noodles for the rest of your life. Not even the good Korean kind.”

--

Fable

The Sergeant by deadpan riot

(FFN; m!Sparrow & Reaver) Reaver returns home from Samarkand to find Sparrow has usurped his home. Oh, and Sparrow has a new pet. — First things first: I adore deadpan riot’s Sparrow; our Sparrows are somewhat similar, so it makes this fic (well, actually series but the series isn’t up in full) a really easy read for me. This fic balances out the ridiculousness and hilarity of poorly-paired roommates (with a pet balverine) and the solemnity and almost depression that comes from everything that happens in Fable II and all the choices one makes but still manages to keep the story lighthearted and well-paced.

"Did you know, my dear boy, that that beast of yours has, in fact, retained a marginally functional knowledge of the human language? Illiteracy aside, of course…" Reaver toyed with one of the bottles nearest him, watching the hero through his bangs. Smiles had again gone to try his luck at bottle roulette.

"Well, yea, I guessed as much since he does tend to listen to me…But what the hell are you two doing?" Sparrow was now coming down the stairs, prompting Reaver to stretch languidly across them.

"Whiling away my time banished to the foyer, what else?"

Sparrow stopped on the step above Reaver, eyeing the pirate, the bottles, and the general disarray of the room at large. "So 'whiling away the time' includes turning all the pictures upside down as well?"

Reaver cast a glance at the reversed paintings. "As a matter of fact it does, oddly enough."

-

Snow and Stones by Lilith Encodead

(FFN; f!Sparrow/Reaver) Reaver hears rumours that someone new has taken control of Bloodstone only to find Sparrow and a cursed snowglobe waiting for him. — Considering I prefer platonic Sparrow and Reaver fics, you might be surprised to learn this is my favourite Fable fic of all time. And it kills me that it’s not complete. Lilith creates such an amazing atmosphere in here and there’s such a gravity to the fic that everything, even the lighter moments, just seem to carry a lovely weight to them. The way she writes Sparrow and Reaver is gorgeous too, and I just...Lilith, wherever you are, please??? finish??? fic??? D: Please???

"I'm not going to play your stupid little game." she sneered slowly. "If you want answers - look around."

Reaver did not move. He did not speak. Then, ungraciously he eased his grip, before giving his pistol one last shove into her head. Her fontanelle was knocked back into the stone Cullis Gate, as the force reverberated through her skull. With an aching head and blurred vision, Sparrow watched him rise up and survey his surroundings.

Reaver examined the hauntingly empty area briefly, before looking straight back at Sparrow, as if averting his eyes from something disgustingly gory. Around the two of them were the smashed remains of once mighty stone ruins covered in ivy and surrounded by dandelion weeds. Jagged lumps of stone nested the Cullis Gate, depicting faded carvings of the Old Religion bleached by sun and faded with time. A standalone rock archway stood crumbling in front of them; beyond which was a chalky white path leading down to the town.

Every water, every cell, of Reaver's body could sense a foreboding danger through the archway, down the dusty path, and back to his past.

"This is a trick." he insisted. "An elaborate deception fabricated by a vindictive Will-user."

Sparrow remained sat on the Cullis Gate, knowing that Reaver would knock her down again if she gave another dissatisfactory answer.

"Its not." she said simply, as if talking to a child that should know better. "You know it's not."

-

That Which Moves the Stars by ingresviolin

(Ao3; f!HoBW/Reaver, f!HoBW/Ben Finn) Beatrice, empath and princess, embarks on a quest to find her missing father shortly after her mother’s death. — It’s still in early days, but there’s something very charming and curious about this fic. I love that the quest is mainly research-based so far and that all the characters have a wonderfully defined depth and clarity. I’m so curious and excited to see how it all comes together in the end.

"You look very young for being very old," Beatrice whispered at a nearly inaudible level. Her mother and Logan did not catch the comment, but both men at the table did. Reaver glared at her with the same menacing expression as earlier that day, but his eyes were darker than before. Beatrice felt an internal prickle of excitement: her favorite feeling.

She didn't need to touch Reaver to know he was upset, but as his glare darkened her excitement turned to fear. She could see her own image in the darkness of his pupils, as well as the glowing flames of the fireplace behind her. And she could have sworn to Avo that the two were not separate, but that the Beatrice-shaped homunculus at the center of the tiny conflagration in his eyes was being burned alive.

[allyourprettywords]

“60 Songs About Quilting,” Sammie Bordeaux-Seeger

1) Sometimes all the heirlooms you make have to be sold to cover your daughter’s rent.

2) Selling some quilts is like selling children.

3) Some quilts you make scare you, just like stories writers tell scare them, even as they tell them.

4) I remember the first quilt I made when I was 22. I didn’t finish it because all the others in that class who finished their quilts used them for funerals.

5) That class taught me that the making of quilts was the beginning and end of grief.

6) I remember the quilt I was first groped under. I was nine. My mother’s boyfriend/my brother’s father, it was a quilt my mother made that had nine diamonds, not the usual eight you find in a star quilt. She tells stories about that quilt and laughs. I only remember the hand forcing me to hold a penis for the first time under that quilt.

7) Quilts can be both a comfort and a terror.

8) This quilt I am currently pressing has holes in it. All quilts are full of holes, but some can be seen, some not. I mend all the holes as I come to them.

9) It is a heartache to let go of a quilt I have made with my hands.

10) I sometimes wonder if we give away pieces of ourselves in these quilts.

11) I have found pieces of myself in quilts.

12) Every star quilt I have ever made now belongs to someone else.

13) I made quilts for my children for their graduations. One of my children has never graduated. She will get the best quilt.

14) Washing a new quilt before someone sleeps under it is washing away the quilt luck.

15) My quilts reek of smoke because I smoke while making them. I smudge. I smoke. I pop M&Ms like they’re pills to make me quilt faster. They work.

16) My friend told me M&Ms are my version of self-medicating. I told her the quilts are the medication.

17) I have made death quilts for all the people I loved who have died. I have watched my sad quilts lowered into graves with the remains of my beloveds. Those quilts glowed.

18) They say the Lakotas began to make star quilts to replace the buffalo robes meant to honor men for their greatness.

19) I say Lakota winyans began to make star quilts so they’d have something to do with their hands that wasn’t stabbing men for their greatness.

20) I am not a man hater. Do you honor a man for his greatness by wrapping him in a robe that shows your own greatness?

21) Lakota star quilts are made up of diamonds which form stars

22) Rihanna’s song “Diamonds” understands this. This is a Lakota song. “You and me, we’re like diamonds in the sky.”

23) There are 36 diamonds in one quilt block of an eight-pointed star. Each diamond is cut at a 45 degree angle. 288 diamonds make a star. I cut each diamond individually. I sew each diamond individually using ¼” seams. There is some math involved in quilting.

24) That white math teacher at the college believes Indians can’t do math. She doesn’t understand how math-y life and survival actually are.

25) The population of Indigenous people on this continent was estimated at 50 million pre-white contact. Some scientists believe it may have been as high as 100 million. At our lowest point it was only 200,000, post-massacres, diseases, and starvation. Today we are up to 2 million. Still less than 1% of the total population if you don’t count Mexicans, but we do. We count all our Indigenous brothers and sisters. Indians are the fastest growing population in South Dakota, and Indigenous are the fastest growing population on this continent. Someday we will be the majority again. How’s that for math?

26) Imagine how many baby star quilts it would take to welcome every newborn Indigenous baby.

27) That white math lady is paid by money generated by Indians going to college. She’s paid more than the Indian instructors for her trashy opinion that Indians can’t do math.

28) My poetry teacher told me to take the quilt pieces off my wall and put my poems there. That’s how I finished my master’s thesis. I wanted to say, I can write while I quilt. I am poeming and piecing all the time.

29) So many quilters make quilts with words in them. One put the treaties in her quilts. Another wrote “I can’t breathe” in black fabric on her quilt. I like to think my quilts speak without the need of words, but let’s face it, sometimes a quilt, like a poem, needs to be obvious.

30) I don’t hate white people.

31) I learned as much about quilting from whites as I did from Indians.

32) Quilts need all colors to be successful.

33) No one is ever going to write “All quilt lives matter!” so I will here. It doesn’t make sense.

34) I learned to speak white so I could write this poem in your Native language.

35) I didn’t really have a choice about learning to speak white.

36) There are some good white people. I don’t say this to appease or patronize. I mean good white people have enriched my life. If they did it out of guilt, I don’t care.

37) There are some bad Indians. I might be one of them.

38) I am both bad at being Indian and bad at speaking for Indians or speaking to Indians

39) I am not going to be good at being Indian until I stop judging my Indian-ness using shallow white terms.

40) I am a half-breed. The Lakota word for half-breed is “ieska.”

41) Ieska means “speaks white”. Also, “Interpreter” or “translator”.

42) Lakotas inherently distrust translators because of what happened to Conquering Bear.

43) I don’t speak fluent Lakota. I couldn’t begin to translate much beyond the shortest phrases. I “know” Lakota by listening to tone of voice and understanding about five hundred words and phrases.

44) To some Indians and whites, where you come from and how you were raised matter as much as your DIB, Degree of Indian Blood.

45) I am 35/64’s Sicangu Lakota.

46) I am enrolled at the Rosebud Sioux Tribe.

47) I was born and raised at Rosebud, South Dakota.

48) My tribal enrollment number begins 345-U-#####

49) It does matter that I am an enrolled member of a federally-recognized tribe if I want to sell my quilts as “authentic” Indian art. There is a federal law that mandates this.

50) Why is it called “Mandate?” Man + Date = An Order?

51) Who made up these rules and words anyway?

52) Hey, White Math Lady, Indians can do fractions, too! If nothing else, we know our fractions.

53) Can someone tell the white math lady that I learned algebra from a Lakota math professor who earned his Ph.D. in math from Notre Dame University?

54) Maybe you could also mention that he wrote an algorithm that is used to provide water to much of South America. Math = MniWiconi

55) To you White Math Teacher, I offer this proof that Indians can do math:

56) The star quilt is made up of pieces cut at precise 45 and 90 degree angles. The Isosceles triangle is not easy to create in fabric. The balanced 45 degree diamonds are faceted by 48 other 45 degree diamonds that must be perfectly pieced in order to fit together correctly, or the quilt with ripple.

57) Look at the perfectly square squares in each corner, how they create the straight line that bisects the center of the quilt.

58) Tell me about math, about geometry, about the Golden Mean, and I will show you the Lakota Star Quilt.

59) I offer you this proof that you have nothing to tell me about Indians and math and competency tests that you give as proof of your assertion: Indians were making star quilts before they had ever met fabric. They were called buffalo robes.

60) Perhaps if you believe Indians can’t do math, White Math Lady, you should go back to teaching your own, mathematically-competent people?

61) This quilt is made up of holes, of wholes, of halves and quarters and tiny stitches and big stitches and words and pain and memories and laughs and sweat and smoke and chocolate and my grandmother’s hands. This quilt isn’t about math or Indians or treaties or men.

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

About your issue

Hey, I checked your thoughts on Marvel Comics 1000 and while it was nice to see, though I noticed you have some big issue here. Your problem with Zdarsky calling his panel of Iron Man to be the most obnoxious even though it was mostly just Iron Man over the years going backwards from suit to man. That’s it. Just representing who Iron Man was. And honestly, there was nothing obnoxious about it. I mean, filler yes, but, the rest of the things in that issue was filler from Whitely, Simone, DeConnick, and a few others. Calling this thing from Zdarsky shows you have some sort of hatred for this guy. Sure, he might not give you the most favorable stuff like Life Story. But,the guy has proven to be a great writer with his run on PP:SM, his story with Norman, the time travel thing, The Tinkerer, Sandman, and the final issue. The stuff with Peter and his younger self was nice. And his Two-In-One was really brilliant as is his Invaders and Daredevil. Yet, you seem to be more hard on the guy based on some issues with Life Story(which I have debated with you) and other stuff. You also seem to judge him based on one work of Sex Criminals even though it was mostly Fraction and Zdarsky had done the art yet never gave into Two-In-One, Invaders, and Daredevil. And now I see you be harder on the guy based on a few panels of Iron Man even though that was nothing compared to a few others. Infact, you also judge him more based on his work in the previous issues of PPSM from # 2 even though the ones before issue # 6 we’re not that favorable to many. So going back to that just kinda seems redundant on criticizing a guy for his past faults who then improved later on.  Really, it seems you have some sort of issues with the guy even though A) He’s done some great work on Spidey even on the 616 universe making them in character compared to how you see in Life Story B) has made some hard hitting stories C) Has improved since then. And D) Has started making the character strong again before guys like Sean Ryan, Nick Spencer, Donny Cates, and Tom Taylor came along(Tom being the more Problematic). So, Really. What issues do you have here? 

“obnoxious even though it was mostly just Iron Man over the years going backwards from suit to man. ”

That is why it WAS obnoxious. There is no story there. There isn’t an attempt at a story.

“ That’s it. Just representing who Iron Man was. ”

You know DeFalco and Frenz represented who Thor was but actually had a beginning, middle, end, dialogue and something beyond ‘this sure is Iron Man and these sure are his outfits’. It doesn’t say anything about Tony beyond he is Iron Man which like...yeah, thanks I know.

“And honestly, there was nothing obnoxious about it. I mean, filler yes, but, the rest of the things in that issue was filler from Whitely, Simone, DeConnick, and a few others.”

I don’t recall their stories off the top of my head but if you are right then that doesn’t legitimize Zdarsky, it just means there was a lot of bad filler in this book. But at least they had some dialogue and were making some kind of point.

“Calling this thing from Zdarsky shows you have some sort of hatred for this guy.”

Don’t make presumptions.

I don’t hate him personally.

I hate the work of his I’ve read for Marvel and the fact that this is yet another example doesn’t change that. He’s just wrapped up a big Spider-Man story after a big Spider-Man run so obviously he’s a writer I will single out on a Spider-Man blog moreso than Gail simone who’s never written for Spider-Man that I know of. But I singled out Ewing too.

“Sure, he might not give you the most favorable stuff like Life Story. But,the guy has proven to be a great writer with his run on PP:SM, his story with Norman, the time travel thing,”

No he didn’t, that story wasn’t that impressive and it included BS like Peter’s sister. His run on Spec was more bad than good especially regarding all the team up crap, his sister and Jameson.

“The Tinkerer, Sandman, and the final issue.”

How the fuck is basically associating the Tinkerer with aliens again, an idea so dumb that Lee and Ditko never mentioned it again and later writers actively retconned out of the character’s background good?

How is doing the same story Paul Jenkins did over 10 years earlier (and better I might add) proof he is a good writer?

“The stuff with Peter and his younger self was nice.”

A broken clock is right twice a day.

“And his Two-In-One was really brilliant as is his Invaders and Daredevil. ”

I’ve not read that so i can’t comment. Different writers are better fits on different characters.

“Yet, you seem to be more hard on the guy based on some issues with Life Story(which I have debated with you) and other stuff.”

No I’m more hard on the guy due to Life Story and his Spec run, and whilst you have indeed debated the points with me, the points I’ve seen (I’ve not gotten around to all of them yet) haven’t held up to objective scrutiny.

“You also seem to judge him based on one work of Sex Criminals even though it was mostly Fraction and Zdarsky had done the art yet never gave into Two-In-One, Invaders, and Daredevil. ”

When did I ever once judge Zdarsky on Sex Criminals? Provide a link showing that I did that?

And frankly i can only judge him based upon the works I’ve read. The works I’ve read have been his spidey works which have generally been bad.

“And now I see you be harder on the guy based on a few panels of Iron Man even though that was nothing compared to a few others.”

See above.

“Infact, you also judge him more based on his work in the previous issues of PPSM from # 2 even though the ones before issue # 6 we’re not that favorable to many.”

He still wrote them. They are still bad. They are still therefore part and parcel of something i can judge him on. And frankly issue #6 itself was the worst issue he did period.

“So going back to that just kinda seems redundant on criticizing a guy for his past faults who then improved later on. ”

Improving later on would entail not insisting Spider-Man has a super secret sister, not having a clusterfuck for issue #300, not pushing on the PeterxGwen ship, not doing...pretty much anything in Life Story.

“Really, it seems you have some sort of issues with the guy even though A) He’s done some great work on Spidey even on the 616 universe making them in character compared to how you see in Life Story ”

I respect you believe he’s done some great work. This doesn’t change the fact that he has at best done like 2 or 3 decent-good issues. you are giving him the accolade of ‘great’ for stories that don’t fit that descriptor. Sandman’s swan song inherently can’t be a great story because we’ve seen it already!

“ B) has made some hard hitting stories”

Like what? Because from where I’m sitting the only thing Zdarsky has managed to hit is my wallet for Life Story.

“C) Has improved since then”

Going from crap to less crap isn’t much to write home about.

“And D) Has started making the character strong again before guys like Sean Ryan, Nick Spencer, Donny Cates, and Tom Taylor came along(Tom being the more Problematic). So, Really. What issues do you have here? ”

LULZ...no he didn’t.

He absolutely didn’t.

Making the character strong again is what Spencer was doing.

Spencer was reconstructing the character and mythos surrounding him.

Zdarsky simply wrote him LESS badly than Slott.

Please explain to me what Zdarsky did at all that made the character strong again?

Because all I can see to even hint at that is his final issue which is playing in the ballpark of Slott’s final issue anyway.

Zdarsky’s lasting contributiong as of right now is having Peter and Jameson act toxically out of character. THAT is his legacy at the moment!

In contrast Spencer has like 99% of the time written him properly and fixed sooooooooooo much shit Zdarsky either didn’t or broke more, like his stupid Black Cat story, or his stupid FCBD issue with MJ, or Jameson, or his sister, or insisting upon the Gwen ship or doing alien, time travel, wacky sci-fi crap that generally doesn’t belong in Spider-Man at a point in time when we’d been having YEARS of that shit.

Now I am absolute going to reply to your other comments at some point, but know this.

I’m not going to stop criticising Zdarsky when I feel it’s warranted and if you have such a problem with that either don’t read my comments about him or unfollow me. It’s your choice.

[hunterguyveriv]

Swamp Thing Season 1, episode 7 thoughts:

Today’s episode was just simply beautiful and sad between Alec and Abby in a way you could only expect it to end the way it did. It had so many lying implications between the 2, then one can realize besides the whole “Protagonist not wanting to lose the one he loves.”

Don’t get me wrong I’ve wanted a Swamp Thing & Abby Arcane live action done right since I saw “The Return of Swamp Thing” in 1989/1990. But I just love the whole dynamic being stretched nearly to a near-fatal breaking point.

Accepting Alec - My thoughts on this is just a jumbled mess; it hurts: Accepting Alec played a massive part in this episode. Unlike the Abby Arcanes of the past - The Alan Moore Saga, The Return of Swamp Thing, or the New-52, or even the cartoon mini-series - it has taken her longer to accept Alec as Swamp Thing. Even after she learned from Susie, it was Alec the only time they really touched was briefly when she was suffering from the Darkness-Hallucinogens, and when he showed her what happened to Shawna. It wasn’t until after he tried saving her the Alec Holland-Way failed and had to save her the Swamp Thing-Way that she finally seemed to accept him for what he was now, even though she still wants to find a way to revert him back to human. 

I think the whole hallucination-power was a way to see what they truly wanted. He wanted to remain Alec for her and tried to give up the Swamp Thing persona, but came to the conclusion that if he did things the Alec Holland-Way, he was helpless. Abby also showed that she genuinely wanted Alec back to the way he was, but I am starting to think that was working against them. Think about it, in the previous he said he worried that accepting his new situation would take him further away from her, but they remained at least 10 feet apart from each other. 

Except for the few instances of him touching her, they always seem to have had some distance between them. Even weary on letting the other touch each other. But yet after the pollen made him look like Alec to her, it seemed like they were more willing to be close to one another even touch each other. More so after he fought The Rot off in her body. Up until this time, part of their relationship seemed very superficial on Abby’s part, but one can also argue that it was also superficial on Alec’s side, to want to be seen as “The Charming Man she knew.”

Ugh… I gotta get off this bit, or I am going to keep going turning this into an essay and want to bash my head in trying to wrap my mind around these thoughts.

Abby’s Purpose: In all of Swamp Thing, except for the cartoon mini-series and the 90s Live Action series which I can't remember if she was in it or not, Abby Arcane has always been his heart - his humanity if you will. She was the only one in the Alan Moore saga to keep reminding him of his humanity. That it didn’t matter if he was a sentient plant being with Alec Holland’s consciousness, in her eyes, he WAS Alec Holland. In the New-52 even after he became Swamp Thing and she became sensitive to “The Rot” and showed that she had Rot-Powers, she still reminded him of his humanity.

When he has been at the lowest or darkest point in his life, she would always be there to help him.

So far even though it is a mere fraction of what she has done compared to her comic book counterparts, she does seem genuinely vested to be that support he so desperately needs. She like her comic counterparts, even though she had trouble seeing him as Alec up until last weeks episode - she has always reminded him that he is Alec Holland. (which for the most part to us the viewers we don’t know if he IS STILL Alec Holland like the New-52 Alec who was dying from his wounds in which the Green turned him into the Warrior-King Swamp Thing or a Sentient Entity of the Green with his consciousness). But even if we do learn what continuity they decide to use, she NEEDS to be there for him, regardless of him not wanting her in the swamps of Marais. I just hope with the series being unfortunately canceled (and not being picked up elsewhere by the looks of it so far) it is done in a proper manner that doesn’t make it campy or they kill Abby off. I do want to see her in grievous danger, in which Swampy and possibly Daniel come to her aid.

A little off topic I do hope to see that they go the Alan Moore route, one that scene is just so powerful in the comics. This because after Woodrue mind-fucks him at Sunderland’s corporation building and deals with Woodrue, he searches for the body and buries it cutting ties to “the person who was once Alec” and was so resistant against Abby calling him Alec for the longest time - till he said she could. But that being said there is another reason why I hope they go this route and explore whether Swamp Thing is Alec Holland or not. I am a Guyver fan, in which death is no big deal to Guyvers because they regenerate newer bodies after their control medals have been ripped out of their heads. They very haphazardly explored the whole “If a the Guyver regenerates a newer body, is the person that same person or a shell of that person with their memories?”

Living as Alec & Alec’s Helplessness?: I kind of liked the idea that even though he was still Swamp Thing, and appeared to Abby as Alec, I liked how they did it. After a recent second viewing of yesterday’s episode, I think they (producers and writers) meant it to be like a test to not just Abby (in seeing if she could genuinely accept Alec the way he is) but a test for Alec. Earlier I mentioned the Alec Holland-Way, I think even as Swamp Thing he really wanted to live life as Alec would have. He also tries to desperately save Abby as Alec would have against the Rot, until realizing it wasn’t going to work out.

Now some of you may be saying, “whoa there, that doesn’t mean he is helpless!” But in doing things, the Alec-Way also contributed to Abby getting attacked by that tendril. As Swamp Thing, he would have possibly been able to stop that thing from punching her in the first place. Which even though I say that, I kind of like the idea of Alec struggling with the tendril, because in the New-52 continuity. For those wondering it was established that he begins to lose his power in areas profoundly affected by the Rot. Trying to live as Alec would have possibly weakened his power even more, because as Avatar of the Green, even in Rot Infested areas he should have been able to get it off of her and rip it to shreds.

A return to The Return of Swamp Thing?: I have to admit I loved Alec and Abby in the swamp together walking through it like a couple in love (Someone PLEASE do a video of Swamp Thing/Alec and Abby to this song when the series is over- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFmisnHehtg. It would make us Swamp Thing/Abby Old-Timers with no music video making knowledge happy). It was very reminiscent of Dick Durock’s and Heather Locklear’s wandering the swamp to me, even heard their original theme in my head during their scenes. 

Abby’s Darkness?: When Alec was desperately trying to save her, what if he merely prolonged something else in her? What if the Tendril was attempting to turn her into an Avatar of the Rot like she was in the New-52 saga? She mentioned “the darkness” in the euphoria of pain, and her skin tone and body started to appear like her new-52 counterpart. Now that being said, what if Alec using the green merely suppressed it? Because it is a possibility, he got a glimpse of the darkness of her own past when he took hallucinogenic-darkness away from her in episode 4. A crack theory I know, but I feel like that scene was supposed to mean something besides Abby getting attack and Swamp Thing dropping the Alec persona to save her. 

These are all the thoughts that have been running through my head and have plagued me for the last 15 hours @.@ I’m tired, and I don’t want to hurt my brain anymore tonight.

That being said other great highlights of were Maria stealing the Sunderland Company from Avery. Wasn’t overly excited over Lucilia and Matt’s scenes, if anything they have earned what’s coming to them. I still like the dynamic of James Woodrue and Caroline, you can genuinely see that James is so flat out determined to save his wife which kind of mirrors Abby being so committed to saving Alec. 

I do like the scene with Liz and Matt, however, mainly because, that in the Alan Moore Saga (which is like the holy grail of Swamp Thing lore) only 4 people knew of Alec being Swamp Thing before he was captured. Matt Cable, Abby Arcane-Cable, Liz Treymayne, and her husband. Thus far, it seems like the series is genuinely doing all of Swamp Thing (movies, comics, cartoons,   series) true justice while forging itself as a new identity for the Avatar of the Green.

With Abby going back to Atlanta, I can't wait to see scenes of her with Adrienne Barbeux’s Doctor Palomar and Abby together in a scene. Will they make her first name Alice (as in Alice Cable from the 1982 movie) Will Adrienne get a scene with both Swampy and Abby as if to pass the torch on to this new generation of Swamp Thing stars? Will she give Abby some guidance on what to do with particular Swamp creatures (lol)?

But I still have questions!

Where is that Good Boy Garou?

What happened to Susie?

What happened to Margaux?

Anyway, I am finally done with this post. I am off to go listen to some Godzilla movies as I drift off to sleepy land.

[hallowtide]

What are the best ways to help with ADHD/ADD?

Answered on Quora by Iris Crain on July 30th, 2019.

https://qr.ae/TWvd59

I can answer you from the perspective of someone with Adult ADHD that started in childhood, mother of three with ADHD, and now at least three of my grandchildren are diagnosed…

First, you need to *understand* us. Our brains are literally wired differently. They’re calling it “Neural diversity” now, which I like because it really is just thinking differently, not so much like we’re crippled by some ‘disorder.’ But life for us is like having 35 tabs open in your browser, all on different topics across several genres, and knowing exactly how each one corralates to the others (I actually do this a lot, boggles my husband’s mind.) It’s like having five different radio stations going all at once in our heads, rock, talk radio, news, classical and reggae.

And we really want to be understood. The biggest issues in relationships is when we feel the other person doesn’t understand us and we feel alone. My son had an issue over 20 years ago where he was being defiant in the principal’s office in the presence of a police officer. When I walked in, the cop was unclasping his handcuffs to take him to Juvenille hall. I sat in a child-sized chair in front of my son and said “So, what’s going on?” After 10 mins of being heard, he was calm and understood that his response to the situation was inappropriate (although I took issue because he was being bullied) and the officer said he’d never seen anyone so effectively handle an ADHD kid that wound up. I replied “All he wanted was for his feelings to be heard and understood.”

We feel very deeply. We seem to get our feelings hurt pretty easily. Because we attach to the things that get our attention accutely, when they’re taken from us or otherwise destroyed, we feel like we’re being hurt. We’re often told we talk too much, because we want others to understand and feel things as muc has we do. And we don’t understand why people can go through life without feeling things like we do.

We’re not stupid. I was tested and have a 167 IQ. And yet I forget simple things like remembering to set my alarm the night before so I make an appointment, or what I had for dinner last night. I can hear a song and tell you the song title, band name, and usually the album name, what the album cover looked like, the track, the lead singer, and often a bit of other trivia about the song, band or album. My husband calls me his “own personal ‘Behind the Music’.” Yet many ADHD kids grow up to be adults with a lot of self esteem issues from being called lazy, stupid, crazy, spoiled or weird. They often have PTSD (and some like me have actual physical scars) from bullying, poor grades because they just don’t think like the other kids, and a high suicide rate.

We move at a very fast pace. We thrive in situations were we can apply what we know and are good at in a focused manner. My ADHD son would be so into a video game he wouldn’t notice his bathroom urges and wet his pants as a teenager. If I’m working on an important project or event, I typically spend the last two weeks before the event in what my kids call “pre event psychosis” where I get almost zero sleep, only face-planting my keyboard for 15 mins at a time, with little side effects. My husband says he marvels at everything I do out-of-sight until he notices them or I bring them up. My grandparents used to call it “running circles around them” (sometimes literally.)

We want to be helpful, and involved. We forget that people might not want our help, beause we’re so busy butting in trying to join in. We have so many ideas how you can improve what you’re doing that we don’t understand why you’re comfortable doing things the same way every time. Or by yourself. Or it’s not the best/fastest/most fun way possible. We don’t understand why people say “go away, I’ll do it myself” or “I don’t want your help.”

We’re easily distracted. Scatter-brained. Forgetful. Spastic. For example the other day I was sitting at my desk writing a fiction story on my computer, fixing a USB charging cord, making a short grocery list, organizing my top desk drawer and talking to people in the room, all at the same time. I also fed the fish on my desk, and periodically swapped out the page of the document I was scanning into my computer. What most people don’t understand is that ADHD people can actually do that, and we’re usually good at it. We will also have a thousand and one unfinished projects.

We need different coping mechanisms. For some ADHD people, they need quiet to function, to keep the distractions limited. Me, I like to listen to music, preferably non-lyrical like “handpan” music or binural tones. Something with energy. I put headphones on and five hours later I have the outline of a small novel (and sometimes that’s bad, because it started as a simple reply on facebook that went WAY out of control!!) However, if my husband can’t find something in the fridge, without looking up from my computer I can say “second shelf, towards the back, under the sour cream behind the mayo.” And my office area that looks so cluttered and disorganized? I know what and where everything is, so please don’t move anything.

Yet we’re visionary too! Some of the best writers, philosophers and scientists were or are ADHD. We think outside the box so much, we forget to think *inside* the box, and “Neuraltypical” people don’t have a reference in normal thinking to understand what we’re talking about. It’s not anyone’s fault, we literaly have a different perspective on the world. We can imagine all the “what ifs” in the universe (which can challenge even the most patient parent.) But we’re usually very good problem solvers, inventors and creators.

We get easily frustrated. Because we move at such a fast pace, we have trouble learning the rest of the world dosen’t manifest things as fast as we’d like. We want to be instant Mozarts and Wozniaks, we want the paint to dry faster, we want our TV show to come on now, we want to arrive at our destination as soon as we pull out of the driveway (are we there yet?) We can be pushy and demanding beause we want things to go at our speed. And if we grasp a concept, we want to move on to the next step, whether the people around us are on the same page or not.

We also have trouble slowing down, which is why things like belly breathing, grounding and centering, meditation, yoga, martial arts or even simple playtime in the bath can improve our mood and behavior rather impressively. Learning to do these things is hard for us though…

We get easily depressed. The problem with moving fast in a slower paced world is that we get disapointed on a regular basis. We’re different, and a lot of ADHD people describe feeling like a “Stranger in a Strange Land” (good book by the way…) With all the expectations we have of ourselves and our world, and the disapointment from them, people with ADHD have some of the highest rates of mental health disorders and suicidal ideation overall. (It’s also why learning how to adjust one’s perspective and let go of expectations and live in the now is so theraputic for us.)

Our brains specialize. Much like a savant, we’re usually really good at something, but lackluster at most of the other things around us. When we fixate on a topic or field, it’s one of the few times that we are able to shut out the distractions, and so we excel at that thing. The drawback is that it’s also really hard to get interested in anything else. If we’re good at math in school, we don’t hear the bell ring ending the class, we get distracted at our locker looking *one more time* at those equasions, and we miss 90% of everything the next four teachers talk about because in our head we’re seeing numbers and fractions and sums. (As you can tell, mine was English class, adding sociology in college.)

The best way you can help us is to understand us. Be patient. Be kind. Don’t get angry when we try to help. Or when we don’t remember. Learn more about how we think and approach us from our perspective once in a while. Help us set up the structures, reminders and mechanisms that help us function. Or at least try not to throw us off-track if we’re doing good.

For kids, give them lots of stuff to do, but make sure it’s something that catches their interest. Don’t be surprised when that interest changes overnight. Learn the concept of a “teaching moment.” In those moments, you have their attention - use it to teach them why the situation is good or bad. Don’t nag about the failures or differences as much as recognizing and praising the successes. ADHD people have so many little failures throughout the day that praising us for a success goes a log way.

Realize they are mini adrenaline junkies! My daughter’s teacher realized she needed to be evaluated at seven when, instead of going around the table like most her peers at that age would, to get a marker she wanted she not only went across the table for it, but she did so standing, not crawling, and didn’t understand why it was such an issue. I loved to climb trees, big tall pine trees, all the way where I could touch the top, despite it swaying from my weight, or my mother’s terrified screams.

Make them learn to read, without it they will have trouble finding coping mechanisms because neuraltypical people don’t think like they do, but in the myriad of universes and galaxies in stories they can find descriptions of things that their minds will connect with.

And it goes without saying I hope that most of all, we’re human. We deserve the same love and respect you would give anyone else. And if you do, you’ll find no better or more loyal helpers in all of society. Just let us be us.

[wilderwoodsfans]

Interview: Wilder Woods on his debut album, family, forgiveness

By: Dominiq Robinson   AXS Contributor  Aug 1, 2019

Very rarely does an artist find success after emerging on the scene as a member of a prominent collective. However, William Stanley "Bear" Rinehart III, known as Bear Rinehart, has proven that he capable of standing on his own in one of the most fickle and harshest industries known to man. Bear alongside his brother, Bo Rinehart, founded the alt-rock band NEEDTOBREATHE, during Bear's collegiate years eventually adding members Seth Bolt and Josh Lovelace. Since then, NEEDTOBREATHE has released a total of six critically-acclaimed studio albums, been nominated for a Grammy for Best Christian Song/Performance for their song "Multiplied", and won a total of ten Gospel Music Association Dove Awards.

It takes a lot of faith for an individual to walk away from guaranteed prominence in order to rebrand themselves and become a solo artist, left alone to be the only person to judge by music critics and fans alike. Yet, Bear Rinehart has done exactly that taking up the new stage moniker, Wilder Woods, experimenting with different musical elements/genres, and preparing to release his self-titled debut solo album, Wilder Woods, dropping next week on Aug. 9 via Atlantic Records.

Now, with an upcoming album release date, three released singles, and an international tour set to kick off in September (Tickets), the "Supply & Demand" singer is ready to provide the masses with new raw, unfiltered sonic vibrations reminiscent of Motown's glory days.

And we here at AXS was able to carry out an exclusive dialogue with the new-look Rinehart brother to discuss his first-ever solo musical offering, his creative process, family, and most importantly forgiveness.

~

AXS: Alright, this interview is about you and your metamorphosis into Wilder Woods, but let's nip this in the bud... NEEDTOBREATHE tends to get labeled as a Christian rock band. I've read that that isn't particularly the case. Do you want to let the people know that [NEEDTOBREATHE] isn't in that category and speak on the dangers of putting artists in a specific box for the people?

Wilder Woods (WW): It's one of those things we don't love, we would never call ourselves that and never intended to be. But it's also one of those things where we've been doing this so long, you kinda quit caring about what people are calling you. I think we're just thankful now people are coming to the shows and like our music, and honestly, that's kinda where we're at. If I'm loading into a venue or something, and one of the crew guys is like 'I think it's some Christian band,' I definitely still roll my eyes at that.

AXS: It's gotta be kind of annoying having people put that label on you, but at the same time, you guys [NEEDTOBREATHE] are scooping up a lot of GMA Dove Awards. So, you are getting the proper recognition and accolades for your work.

WW: Yeah, man. 'Our band is the biggest band you're friends have ever heard of,' I say that on stage all the time. And it's just like, 'cause people will say that and they'll be like 'so, where are you playing at?' and I'll tell them that we're playing at the arena, you know? And they're still like 'wait, what?' It's one of those things we're proud of, at one point in time there was never any hype around our band yet, we've still made a career out of it so, you know, we're proud of that.

AXS: Wilder Woods is your debut album and first solo project. The creative process has to be totally different than sitting down with a collective, your brother isn't there and your other bandmates aren't contributing. So, what are the differences in your creative process for this particular project?

WW: Honestly, I started it on my own. I had a buddy across the street from me that had this little kind of like garage/apartment thing and I would go there to write and just get away from everybody. I spent several months writing for the record by myself and then I started collaborating after that. And the whole point of the record was for me to collaborate with new people and not just have it be the band obviously but with all kinds of producers and writers and really find some people that scared me. Meaning some people that would push me off my line, teach me things, and honestly, it became that process of experimenting with other producers and ended up landing on a producer that had never made a major label thing, you know?

So, it was just a guy that I felt like we got along great and what he was bringing to the table was so different from what I was bringing to the table. It really felt like in some ways I got other people around me to help me do it. I've always had that so, it was really helpful for me to invite other creatives into the process. Ultimately, a band is a democracy in a lot of ways and it's obviously nice is being your own boss when you're doing a solo record. Decision making takes a fraction of the time so, I think that that part is really fun but it's also incredibly scary, you know? [If you] fail or slip off on something then it's all on you. Whereas if you're in a band you can kind of spread the culpability out. (Laughs.)

AXS: In regards to the producer you were mentioning, are you referring to Gabe Simon? He was the major contributor to the project?

WW: Yeah, he ended up doing most of the project. He became like... what I call him my Quincy Jones. He really became a collaborator in a lot of ways, he wrote some of the songs on the record with me. But also, we just beat everything up. We'd have a song/demo that we'd know would end up on the record and we'd take it and see how weird we can make it and how messed up we can make it. So, I'd say he's someone that I've become really close to and instrumentally involved with the record and I could not have made it without him for sure.

AXS: I noticed your sound is very big when it comes to NEEDTOBREATHE. Your records are super well layered and warm but, it seems like with this new music you strip some of those layers and provide a more simplistic sound. Some of these records are reminiscent of early R&B and have a certain vibe.

WW: Yeah, I really avoided it at first then I thought how far out there can we take it. Then at the end, as the songs started fitting into the record, I felt like it was ok to do a ballad but for it to feel like something I would write. It became somewhat of a story, we were separating the Wilder songs from the Woods songs that way. The Wilder things were some of the lighter/alternative songs while the Woods stuff was a little heavier lyrically. Throughout some of those lyrics, I may even be talking to my kids in those songs.

AXS: About your new moniker... Wilder Woods is both of your sons' names combined.

WW: Yeah. Honestly, I don't have any delusions that when their eighteen they're gonna listen to the record and think it's cool. They're gonna think it's wack and they're not gonna like what I'm wearing on it. I remember my dad made a record in the '70s, he's a trumpet player, and I remember finding it when I was a kid and being like 'what is he wearing?!' and not thinking the music was that great or whatever. But, I want there to be lessons in [the album] for them, name it after them, and I want them to know it's ok to take a risk to do something new in the middle of your life like this. Also, I want them to be aware of the things that matter, the things that are important. There's some stuff on there about guilt and shame and I don't want them to have that. Obviously, they are going to feel it someday but I want them to know that I love them no matter what they do.

AXS: You speak on forgiveness on "Someday Soon" and mainstream music tends to veer towards more secular topics but you've found a good balance sonically while still remaining inspirational.

WW: Yeah, I think that's important, man. I don't care what people are doing but I want them to feel inspired when they listen to it. I want [the music] to take them to a place, you know? The last thing I would want is to influence them to make bad decisions or hate themselves more after listening to my music.

AXS: So far as using your family as motivation for your projects, is that something you're gonna continue to do as a solo artist?

WW: It will be interesting to see where I'm at next time around. Because this [album] is the first one, some artists tend to leave their families out of their work but for me, it was an opportunity to bring them in. My wife, she was in the first video we shot ("Sure Ain't"). [The label] called and said 'we need a model, like a really hot model or whatever...' and I was like 'I want to bring my wife and put her in this video.' To me, that's just more important, more valuable, it's a little more real, you know? I'm certainly not trying to become some kind of pop star who forgets who he is. I feel like bringing family with me. And honestly, my boys are super young, my oldest is four, but I would say since they've been born I've learned from them more than I have anybody else in the world. They teach me something new every day and that's what I wanted to sing about.  

AXS: You describe that your trial and tribulations within your personal relationships have helped define who you are and made you a better person. What are your thoughts on the youth movement's views on relationships? Younger people tend to throw in the towel a lot easier these days due to the over-exposure of outside influences.

WW: I think that anytime that you can show a relationship with your wife that is good and healthy, like the relationship between John Legend and Chrissy Tiegen, that's positive to see. Growing up when I was in high school, we didn't have social media. So, I didn't have this perfect view of what everybody is going through, I had more [of an experience] of what actually was happening. And now, there's a lot of comparisons going on which makes people think 'well their lives are going that way' when in reality it's not true.

Secondly, I'm at that age where I'm starting to realize I've been married for a while but, mistakes are where you get to learn about yourself. They're just as good as the good things that happen to you, you know? When something bad starts to happen I think 'Ok, this is probably gonna lead to something better. It might not be right now and I might not know how.' I think it's more about perspective than anything else.

AXS: Totally understandable. It seems like not just artists but many people are struggling within their personal relationships these days.

WW: Yeah, there's a lot of stuff out there. There's a lot of traps. I've been fortunate enough to be shown grace. There's a song on the record called "Mary, You're Wrong" and it's mostly about that. I think it's not about how good I've been but how gracious the people around me have been and I'm thankful for that.

For me, I got married when I was really, really young. I think when I first got married, I probably didn't trust the grace and forgiveness that was always there from my wife. That's a lesson I've learned, she's got more than I think she does, you know? She loves me no matter what. Early on [in our relationship] I could have honestly been more open about things and would have learned a lot faster. I had to learn the hard way. If there's anything I've learned and it's not just with family or business or whatever but like, being open and honest and real, people have a lot more love for you than you think.

AXS: Do you have any expectations for your first solo album? Do you have any specific goals?

WW: I definitely have goals. They're more long-term though. I think this project will still be really new three years from now when I'm making a different record and will have the ability for the live show will be able to build on itself. I think that that will be a really exciting time. But at this time it's so new, I just want to take it slow. I want people to sorta attach themselves to a song and go, but it's gonna be a long build-up, you know? There are artists that I like now that took a couple of years to kinda break. So, if this thing is gonna work it's gonna be because we found new fans and not just NEEDTOBREATHE fans. I think we've made it different enough and weird enough and I'm excited about the live show that I believe in it in that way. This project is setting me up for where I want to be and where I see myself a few years from now.

~

Be sure to check out Wilder Woods self-titled debut album, Wilder Woods, upon its release on Aug. 9 (preorder here) And check out the video premiere of his acoustic version of his new single "Electric Woman" in the video provided above. Don't miss the opportunity to catch the "Light Shine In " singer/songwriter in a city near you during his fall tour (Tickets).

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 5, No. 1

Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids

Our first Dust of the year ties up loose ends from 2018 with several of our writers using the holiday break to rip through big piles of neglected discs, find the good and the great and share their observations. It’s an impressive haul with a little something for everyone from fusion-y Afro-jazz to twin guitar reveries (played by actual twins) to improvised percussion to a fascinating bandleader who reminds us of everyone and no one. This edition’s contributors included Bill Meyer (who wins this round), Isaac Olson, Derek Taylor, Patrick Masterson, Jennifer Kelly and Jonathan Shaw. Happy new year.

Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids — An Angel Fell (Strut)

An Angel Fell by Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids

What makes An Angel Fell, the latest from Idris Ackamoor and his resurrected Pyramids, such a blast is how effortlessly they mix Afrobeat, Afro-Cuban, dub, free jazz, blues, soul, gospel, bossa nova, and Arkestral vocals without sounding like a pastiche. What makes it important is that this inclusive, post-everything musical approach is married to an equally inclusive and utopian political sensibility: inclusive in the sense that sci-fi parables are given a seat at the table next to real world concerns, and utopian in the sense that the mystical Afrofuturism of songs like “An Angel Fell” and goofy exotica of “Papyrus” never trivialize the album highlight, “Soliloquy for Michael Brown,” which, despite its name, includes the whole damn band. Most importantly, it’s inclusive in the sense that Ackamoor and company want you marching and dancing with them, and utopian in that they whipped up a joyous hour and seven minutes of scorching solos, arresting hooks, and straight fire to get you there.

Isaac Olson

  Anna & Elizabeth — The Invisible Comes To US (Smithsonian Folkways Recordings)

Ann Roberts-Gevalt and Elizabeth LaPrelle have used backlit, hand-cranked scrolls to illustrate the stories they rendered with Appalachian harmonies and strings. On their third album, The Invisible Comes to Us, they reframe their tradition-steeped sound with retro-futurist instrumentation supplied by producer and multi-instrumentalist Benjamin Lazar Davis of Cuddle Magic and accompanists such as drummer Jim White (Xylouris White, Dirty Three) and steel guitarist Susan Alcorn. Vocoders, feedback, brass and Mellotron keep the sound varied and far from by-the-numbers folk, but the duo don’t tamper much with their impassive presentation of Civil War-vintage infidelity. It’s hard to shake the suspicion that the duo could have made just as strong an album with just their voices and strings, but that doesn’t keep this from being an intriguing advancement of the evolving folk music paradigm.

Bill Meyer

  Martin Blume / Wilbert de Joode / John Butcher — Low Yellow (Jazzwerkstatt)

The title of this trio recording is a bit of a stumper. When the CD is playing words like “bright,” “acute” and “mercurial” come more quickly to mind than “low” or any single color. German drummer Martin Blume, Dutch bassist Wilbert de Joode and English saxophonist John Butcher have been playing together since 2004, and this live set from 2016 is a splendid example of the aesthetic and methodological rapport that can evolve over such a span. These men might not know exactly what they’re going to do when they get on stage, but it’s pretty clear what they are doing. They improvise with an exacting attention to process that allows a music to come into existence that would not be possible if you swapped any player for another, yet never involves one musician dominating the others. Each has a highly distinct musical vocabulary and sufficient differences in background for the music to surprise in deeply satisfying ways.  

Bill Meyer  

 Bixiga 70 — Quebra Cabeça (Glitterbeat)

Quebra Cabeça by Bixiga 70

Quebra Cabeça means jigsaw puzzle in Portuguese, and this latest double LP from the Afro-Brazilian ten-piece certainly fits a lot of pieces together here — rattling barrio percussion, twitchy Lagos-funked guitars, 1970s American blaxploitation soundtracks, space-age synths and swaggering sax and brass frontlines. If it sounds like too many parts, that’s where you’re wrong. Cuts like “Pedra de Raio” integrate the mystic chill of trippy fusion with a molten throb of samba rhythm. An effortless propulsion of hand drums, bumping bass and warm West African guitars moves the cut forward; serpentine sax melodies and blurts of brass jut off from the foundation. “Levante” syncopates, but slowly, with undulating, Eastern-toned sax lines weaving snake dances over it all. “Torre” picks up the pace from there, leaning into its Afro-funk influences with an agitated tangle of trebly guitars, cow-bells and blasts of horns. None of these pieces are jammed in willy-nilly, and everything fits. If you like the Budos Band, but wish they’d do a Fela tribute, this is your jam.

Jennifer Kelly

 East of the Valley Blues — Ressemblera (Astral Spirits)

Ressemblera by East of the Valley Blues

Cryptophasia, a.k.a twinspeak, is the phenomenon of twins developing a language of their own, largely or entirely unintelligible to outsiders. East of the Valley Blues, comprised of Andrew and Patrick Cahill, is a twin guitar group, which is to say, they each play guitar and are literally twins, and while their knotty, wholly improvised fourth release, Ressemblera, isn’t entirely cryptophasic, you’ll need to listen closely to start piecing it together. Grab a pair of headphones and you get a brother in each ear, which helps. So suddenly do the brothers Cahill pick up, break off and drop shards of rhythm and melody that Ressemblera never resembles other guitar music but their own for more than seconds at a time. You’ll hear snatches of Fahey, Connors, Bailey et al. but the fun of Ressemblera comes from hearing familiar sounds doubly refracted through the Cahill’s unique styles and responses to each other. Ressemblera plays out in one, dense half hour track and a short epilogue, making it the least accessible East of the Valley Blues release to date, but for those willing to dive in, it might be the most rewarding.  

Isaac Olson

 Flanger Magazine — Breslin (Sophomore Lounge)

FLANGER MAGAZINE "Breslin" by Flanger Magazine

Remember Caboladies? For a few years back at the height of the synth resurgence, they kept up a respectable stream of squelchy sound, only to disappear like memories of Myspace. It would appear that Christopher David Bush of Caboladies has taken a path somewhat akin to that navigated by laptop rockers who swapped their Macs for modular synths; go back, man, peel back the generations of gear. The digital sheen’s gone from his solo music as Flanger Magazine, replaced by an unenhanced analog vibe generated by acoustic guitar, monophonic synthesizer, and field recordings of birds that bath near the Ohio River. Instead of the audio expanse of yore, he crafts shy and pensive themes that would be just about right for that PBS afternoon drama you dreamed up after a few too many mid-day snacks about the adventures of some long-haired Scottish mid-teens in already-outgrown flare-legged pants their friends the runaway redundant robots. Damn, that was a good dream.

Bill Meyer

 Fred Frith Trio – Closer to the Ground (Intakt)

Closer to the Ground by Fred Frith Trio

Rigorously resisting complacency and conformity across stacked decades can carry the consequences of burnout for even the most ardent and resilient of creative musicians. Closer to the Ground is evidence of guitarist Fred Frith coming to terms with this fact and realizing with renewed vigor the pleasures of playing in a band. Ensemble endeavors have been a regular outlet since his youth and while the measure of their enduring value is no epiphany, the company of bassist Jason Hoopes (fielding both acoustic and electric strings) and drummer Jordan Glenn has an obvious and immediate effect of dialing in the guitarist’s mercurial and explosive side. Both sidemen are mere fractions of the Frith’s age, but each is quick to illustrate that when levied against ardor and experience any differential is just a number. Grooves are plentiful, mixing prog rock atmospherics, dub and latticed drones with a flexing, propulsive sense of consensual purpose. Frith syncs his strings to all manner of filters and pigments, refusing to hew to any enduring signature and his partners respond with a similarly colorful palette of support. Titles for the nine pieces are all evocative, but in the end its the assembled aqueous sounds that adhere to the space between the ears above all else.

Derek Taylor  

  Fritz Hauser – Laboratorio (hat[now]ART)

The lede to the liners accompanying Fritz Hauser’s Laboratorio is “Drums and Space,” as an accurate and pithy a synopsis of the Swiss percussionist’s art as a curious neophyte listener could ask for. Hauser’s been active as a Contemporary Classical composer for much of his career, constructing complex music that draws on all manner of drum family devices. He’s also devoted time to associations with world-class improvisers including Joe McPhee and Jöelle Léandre. Here, the focus is on solo pieces devised around the nexus of music and architecture with inspiration provided by students of the latter. As with past Hauser projects the organized sounds are exacting. Identified only by a sequential Italian number, each piece explores facets of his assembled kit (snare, toms, cymbals, woodblocks, etc.) and how those components interact and refract within the crystalline acoustics of the recording space. Ranging from ghostly metallic whispers to strident tumbling rhythms the revolving parts create a recital rich with diaphanous dynamics and precision pivots in direction. Hauser’s an unassuming master of his craft and this hours’ worth of drum-driven dramaturgy delivers on nearly every count.

Derek Taylor

  Sarah Hennies / Greg Stuart — Rundle (Notice Recordings)

Rundle by Sarah Hennies & Greg Stuart

A few years back Sarah Hennies released an album called Work. While that was a solo CD of composed music, and this is an improvised collaboration between Hennies and fellow percussionist Greg Stuart (who, along with Tim Feeney, comprise the trio Meridian), the title comes to mind when listening to this cassette. For while both musicians are well acquainted with realizing profound, provocative and beautiful works by Michael Pisaro, Clara de Asis and Hennies herself, the vibe here is “let’s get to work.”  The two musicians approach the assembled resources of the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity like a couple of tradespeople sizing up a tool shop. “What do you have here?” “What can I do with this?” “What shall we build?” Moving decisively between hard objects, scraped surfaces and hovering mallet and piano figures, they construct an edifice of sound rich in tonal and temporal contrasts. Nice work.

Bill Meyer

 MP Hopkins — G.R/S.S (Aussenraum)

MP Hopkins is a both sides of the coin kind of guy. Heads, you get abbreviation.

G.R stands for “The Gallery Rounds” and S.S for “Scratchy Sentence.” Tales, you get elongation. Each of those pieces lasts a side, and each side is an unhurried investigation of the sounds that happen when not much happens. The first is a collection of degraded field recordings of forced air ventilation, not-quite-heard conversations and other stuff you aren’t supposed to notice when you check out some art. “Scratchy Sentence” is the outcome of Hopkins’ struggle to get something out of some synthesizers he didn’t really know how to use, which he compares to the task of coaxing conversation from a grumpy old man. The old man might say, “well if you learned how I talk, I’d sing!” It’s true, but who is holding classes on the lingo of old EMS and Arp machines? You learn as you go, and the discoveries that you make during that early struggle just might yield some cool sounds. That is the case here.

Bill Meyer

  Sarah Longfield — Disparity (Season of Mist)

Sarah Longfield can shred — but is that enough? Maybe it is, in a field of music that’s as hyperbolically dude-centric as virtuoso-level rock guitar. Steve Vai, Yngwie Malmsteen, the fellows in Animals as Leaders: there’s little restraint in their compositions or performative styles, which feature as much groin-focused acrobatics as tapping harmonics. So, it’s sort of refreshing to watch Longfield do her thing. She plays. Occasionally she nods her head. Much of her music is as overstuffed as the spiraling, wanking, proggy nonsense that acts like Animals as Leaders churn out. But Longfield’s understated presence and her emotionally poignant vocals keep the songs grounded, if a bit mannerly.

Jonathan Shaw  

 Richard Papiercuts — Twisting the Night (Ever/Never)

Twisting The Night by Richard Papiercuts

Richard Papiercuts sings in a gothy baritone, tossing off mordant asides like a 1930s movie star. That is, he’s somewhere in the Venn Diagram where the dank glamor of Bauhaus intersects with the Monochrome Set’s fey wit (it’s a very small slice). To add to the complications, his band is large, multi-instrumented and exuberant, prone to happy squalls of guitar and irresistible blurts of brass and saxophone, but also clearly aligned with punk rock’s brevity and punch. (Think Olivia Tremor Control playing Minutemen covers.) And so, it is very hard to get a handle on Richard Papiercuts, much less to box him in with reference and antecedents, but it is much easier to say fuck it all and just dive in. You can start at the beginning with “A Place to Stay,” a walloping beat galloping between big slashes of guitars, and Papiercuts singing archly about (I think) having a baby. Or move right to the ebullient roar of distorted guitars in “Starless Summer Night,” where a rackety, endlessly repeated groove recalls rave-y shoegaze bands like Chapterhouse. “The Riddle” sounds exactly like the Pixies until it doesn’t, that is until its grinding bass and incandescent guitar gives way to a joyful overload of jangling strings, banged piano keys and loopy riffs of trombone and sax.  “World and Not World (Twisting the Night)” begins in a pinging new wave synth, which is subsumed not much later by a rushing krautish momentum. And over it all Papiercuts presides, morose, poetic, disdainful and stylish. If rock stars still roamed the earth, he’d be one.

Jennifer Kelly

 Dane Rousay — Neuter cassette (Dane Rousay)

Neuter by Dane Rousay

The cassette’s case is pink. The playing is decisive and attentive to contrast, but also reserved. The title cancels gender, and by implication conventionally binary readings of just what a solo drum performance is about. Dane Rousay’s latest recording highlights the communicative power of orchestrated gestures. Each strike, scrape or roll not only fills up space, but asks you to think about the point of that sound manifesting in that space for as long as it is around and as long as you think about it. That’s not just a solo percussion tape you’re hearing; that’s existential expression.

Bill Meyer

 Kenny Segal — Happy Little Trees (Ruby Yacht)

happy little trees by Kenny Segal

For a guy who’s fallen asleep to full-length Bob Ross episodes for years now (ask me about the days when I had to navigate endless hazardous popups on this one Chinese streaming site before the Rawse estate finally brought the whole series to YouTube), I really let myself down not investigating Kenny Segal’s Happy Little Trees closer to its mid-October release. The L.A. beatsmith, who made his name at Concrete Jungle playing drum n’ bass, has done work for Busdriver, Open Mike Eagle and collaborated with Milo, but he’s on his own here painting rhythms into the wilderness of your mind’s imagination sure to satisfy both the ASMR devotee in your life and that person who has fallen down the rabbit hole of Spotify chill mixes and cannot be retrieved. Featuring instrumental assistance including guitars, bass, sax, flute and piano from a tight cohort of co-conspirators, you’ll likely know where you stand based on the title of the seventh track alone: “Adultswimtypebeat.” Come, let’s make some big decisions together.

Patrick Masterson   

 Howard Stelzer — Across The Blazer (Marginal Frequency)

MFCD C | Across the Blazer by Howard Stelzer

The two tracks on Across the Blazer are founded upon a device beloved by sound designers. The Shepard Tone comprises three looped sine tones that are selectively faded to create the impression of an endlessly rising pitch. Imagine pitching a tent inside one of George Martin’s tape creations from “A Day in the Life” and spending the night while it never ends, and you’ve got an idea of what listening to this CD will do to you. It simultaneously instigates the apprehension that something is going to happen and the experience of nothing happening. Stelzer creates this experience with carefully filtered cassette tape noise, but the tools don’t really matter. It’s the vividness of the experience, which is enhanced by the halo-like masslessness of this enveloping sound, that counts.

Bill Meyer

 Szun Waves — New Hymn to Freedom (Leaf)

New Hymn To Freedom by Szun Waves

Much of New Hymn to Freedom, the latest by Szun Waves, a free improv drums, sax and electronics trio tangentially related to that booming jazz scene in London you’ve been hearing so much about, is the burbling and exhilarating aural equivalent of the (in)famous “Star Gate” sequence in 2001: A Space Odyssey, except there’s a younger, more hopeful version of yourself at the end of the tunnel. But the best tracks on New Hymn To Freedom, the gorgeous, nocturnal “Fall Into the Water” and the melancholy, swinging “Temple”, are grounded and restrained. It’s as easy to imagine them playing as you lay on the hood of your car as it is piloting yourself through the cosmos.   

Isaac Olson

 Terre Thaemlitz — Comp x Comp (Comatonse Recordings)

Comp x Comp by Terre Thaemlitz

Anyone too lazy (or naïve) to investigate the mammoth back catalog of producer, poet, queer theorist and all around champion of the disenfranchised Terre Thaemlitz beyond the canonized DJ Sprinkles release Midtown 120 Blues has been gifted something special as 2019 dawns: Thaemlitz’s Comatonse Recordings made its way to Bandcamp in early January with a hodgepodge of albums that, as she puts it, “I have sold out of, but there is not enough interest for a physical repress.” Among these releases – which include 1995’s organic Soil and 1999’s bait-and-switch-campaigned Love for Sale: Taking Stock in Our Pride – is something especially noteworthy, Comp x Comp. The 76-track album is, as its title would suggest, a compilation of minimalist glitch, noise, ambient and nigh orchestral pieces that largely eschew dancefloor adrenaline. A series of 10 disorienting audio shorts each around a half-minute, "Mille Glaces.000-009," will intrigue Mille Plateaux completists deprived of a chance to hear it when the label went bankrupt in ’03, but there are also proper tracks like the 11-minute “Get in and Drive” and “A Quiet of Intimacy Mirrors Distance.” Thaemlitz’s idea of filling out the remainder of a CD length with 47 mostly silent one-second tracks occupies much of the tracklisting, but don’t be fooled: You’re getting your 80 minutes’ worth… and not a second more or less.

Patrick Masterson

Mike Westbrook — Starcross Bridge (Hatology)

As befits a man known best as a big band leader, Mike Westbrook has not made many solo records. This is only his third in 43 years, and it freely references things and people who have passed. Aged 81 when he recorded it in December 2017, Westbrook has seen a lot. He’s old enough to remember World War II and the drabness of postwar England; old enough to have been persuaded first hand of swing and modern jazz’s life-giving inspirations; to have seen his band-mates experiment there way into free improvisation while the world went nuts for the Beatles; and to have seen his generation inevitably pass the world on to the ill-gripping paws that have dubious hold of it now. You can hear bits of all of that across this album’s 14 tracks, as well as more personal memories. Cherished favorites by Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk bump up against pop tunes that he played with his wife Kate, and a couple originals are dedicated to musicians who played in his band but are no longer with us. Each performance feels as well framed as a remembered story, the one that you tell over and over to keep that memory alive.

Bill Meyer

 Woven Skull — S/T (Oaken Palace)

Woven Skull by Woven Skull

Ireland’s Woven Skull has a few neat tricks up their sleeve: they use drums, viola, mandola and whatever else is laying around, to whip up furious, black metal-esque squalls and eerie folk hauntings. They harness roiling free improv to mantric repetition and pentatonic, vaguely north African motifs. They mimic (and insert) the sounds of the bogs that surround their home base in Leitrim into their headier jams and, like their spiritual forbears Sun City Girls, they’ve got a penchant for homemade, bike bell gamelan. However, Woven Skull’s greatest trick is convincing you, for as long as they’re playing, that they’re the greatest band in the world. More serious than Sun City Girls and more playful than Bardo Pond, Woven Skull is a great introduction to your new favorite cult band.

Isaac Olson

[waheedarehman-infinitelylovable]

“GURUJI AND  I”. By Waheeda Rehman.

   I could not have accepted a more difficult and delicate role than writing an article on Mr. Guru Dutt. Difficult because he was a much misunderstood man; and delicate because----------well, because Waheeda Rehman is writing about Guru Dutt.

   An extremely sensitive, quiet and complex person like him could not but be misunderstood. He was so quiet that his modesty or rather shyness, could be misinterpreted as arrogance. He hardly spoke a sentence or two when I met him for the first time in 1955. That meeting appeared to be just a coincidence; but destiny must have known that my days were changed.

   “Days are changed” translated in Telugu, the language of my first movie, would be “Rojula Maraie”, my first film. It had completed it’s 100th day run in Hyderabad. Mr. Guru Dutt happened to be in Hyderabad at that time and had seen a big crowd outside the theatre. He was probably told that one of the artistes of the movie, who had only given a dance in the film, spoke to the audience in the theatre in Urdu. Later at a party given by the exhibitor he was also present there and I was introduced to him. I had not seen his movies or even heard his name till then; I did not know who he was. In fact I did not give any importance to that meeting and forgot all about it. But he did not.

   About two or three months later, one afternoon a fat man who called himself Manubhai Patel wanted to meet me at my residence. He said that Mr. Guru Dutt would like to see me and I should go to Bombay for two or three days.

SECOND MEETING

   I met him in Bombay at his office in Famous Cine Building in June 1955. He was quietly sitting and watching me while most of the talking was done by director Raj Khosla, production-controller Guruswamy and writer Abrar Alvi. That was my second meeting with him.

   The result of that meeting was a contract for three years. For the first year I was to be paid Rs. 1,200/- per month. While the contract was being typed he asked me, “Are you not happy”?

   “I will be happy when I am satisfied with my costumes” I said.

   “Don’t worry, all the costumes will be to your satisfaction and you won’t be forced to put on the dress which you don’t like. Is it all right”? he asked.

   “It will be alright, if it is mentioned in the contract” I said.

   “Don’t you believe me”? he asked.

   “Well it is not that. But don’t you think it would be better if you put this in the agreement?” I suggested.

   A clause stating that the costumes will be to the liking of the artiste was included in the agreement; and I told my mother “Yes they are nice people”.

   Later Raj Khosla, Abrar Alvi and Guruswamy congratulated me for being signed by such a “big director-producer and a very nice man” but warned me not to be disturbed when he sometimes loses his temper.

   “Do you mean he loses his temper also?” I asked them.

   “Yes” they said.

   “Without any reason”?

   “Well sometimes; but he does not mean anything. He is a very good man”.

   “If he does that with me, I won’t work and would go back to Hyderabad” I also warned them.

   Some persons are of an aggressive type; they are always talking about whatever they intend to do or seem to think. It is very easy to understand them, to describe them. But Guruji was extremely introvert. There would be a turmoil going on inside him but he won’t express it. In fact the more he worked or thought the less he spoke. As a result, so little was known about him and what went on inside his mind that he could be understood only by studying his reactions to particular situations----if at all those reactions could be observed.

   That is why in this article when I want to describe him, his reactions to particular situations, I happen to be writing more about me and the problems I created for him.

   Yes I did create quite a few problems for him and perhaps any other producer would have never tolerated it. But he was a different man; another like him I haven’t met again.

   Once I refused to put on a particular dress in “C.I.D.”, my first film with Guru Dutt Films. The shot was ready, the artistes were waiting and one by one, Guruswamy, Raj Khosla and others were trying to convince me that there was nothing bad in the dress; but I said only one thing, “I don’t like this dress”.

   One of them said, “Listen, this is your first movie, if you start objecting to these minor things no other producer will sign you”.

   “Then let them not sign me; but I will not put on this dress. Get me another” I said.

   Two or three days later, when Guruji returned to Bombay, he was informed that he had signed a very difficult girl.

  “I am told that you created some trouble about that dress”, he asked me.

   “Yes. It was not decent”, I said. That was all we talked about it. He did not like to argue unnecessarily about anything. However I did see him losing his temper sometimes.

   Both “C.I.D.” and “Pyaasa” were being shot simultaneously at Kardar Studios; and he had advised me to come and sit on the sets and watch the shooting when I had nothing else to do. One day I saw him losing his temper on a senior artiste and I was really shocked. That day I told him, “You don’t shout at me like this, otherwise I will quit, I can’t face it.

   “I have told you I won’t lose my temper with you. Now don’t worry” he said.

   “Yes you better don’t “I insisted and explained, “I don’t know acting. You teach me, tell me what to do and I will try to do my best; but don’t get angry with me”.

   He did not get angry with me, even in the most trying circumstances.

   The shot of “Pyaasa”, when I come running down the staircase and speak a dialogue was taken twenty times, and every time I failed. By the time I came running down the staircase I was too exhausted to speak the dialogue. He noticed it, came and told me that I should take rest for some time; but I was not prepared to admit that I was tired and the shot could not be okayed till lunch break. But he did not seem to be angry at all. 

   After the lunch I had to give 14 more takes, till the 34th take was okayed. Perhaps a record for me; and also a record of the patience of Guruji.

   He was a very complicated and contradictory person. He would lose his temper, particularly on the set, if anything went wrong; and at the same time he did not lose his temper on me, even if things went wrong. He was extremely impatient and yet he had shown extra-ordinary patience in many matters. He was a man who enjoyed every moment of the work of creation and yet at the same time he admired death, loved it, idolised it and wanted to destroy himself. That was Guruji.

   Like all great directors he had a keen sence of observation; he knew his artistes very well and also knew how to take the best work from them.

   My acting in “C.I.D.” was not good and my work done on the first set of “Pyaasa” was also disappointing. Everybody said that I was a wrong choice and had no future. Moreover I was a difficult person, also extremely stubborn, who would not put on this or that dress. But the only one person who seemed to have faith in my abilities was Guruji. But for him I would not have been what I am today. After hearing the remarks of everybody he said only one thing, “Let us try her once again”.

   The next schedule of “Pyaasa” was fixed outdoors at Calcutta where he shot for about 20 days. That song of “Jane Kya Toone Kahi, Jane Kya Maine Suni” was picturised there.

   He was very happy when he saw the rushes of that shooting.

   Everyone had liked my work and said so. They had changed their opinions.

   Like Guruji most of the persons around him were very frank. No one ever had to praise him for taking a good shot or picturising a sequence, as appears to be a fashion in quite a few units. When they did not like something they said so without any fear or hesitation and he always listened to them, whether he followed their suggestions or not. Most of the time he did whatever he wanted, whatever he liked. If he did not like a scene or a song picturisation he would scrap and re-shoot it. 

   Sometimes he did not like himself and just wanted to be dead, to scrap himself off. He used to say “What is there in life except success or failure; one of the two must happen and I have seen both : there is no charm in living any more”. A song of “Pyaasa” (”Yeh duniya agar milbhi jaye o kya hai?”) was so typical of his thinking.

   Usually people who are fed up with life are fed up with work also; but not Guru Dutt. He was an extremely devoted film-maker till his last days. Either he was trying to create something or talking of those who wanted to create something or else he was brooding and thinking of death. He seemed to enjoy the very thought of it. 

   Very little could really be known about him, about what went on in his mind, only a fraction of it could be seen outside.

PRAY FOR “KANOON”.

   He had faith in God, he believed Him; but I don’t remember that he ever visited a temple or any other place to worship or pray for something. Only once in his life he had asked me to pray for the success of a movie. It was neither “Pyaasa” nor “Kaagaz Ke Phool” nor any other of his own movies. It was B.R.Films’ “Kanoon”.

   “But why do you want me to pray for the success of “Kanoon”? You have nothing to do with it”. I asked him.

   “At least someone is trying to make a movie without songs, which I could not. If he is successful, someone else could be inspired to go a step ahead. You must pray for the success of this film without songs”, said Guruji, who was considered one of the best directors for picturising songs.

   He was not a man who would be jealous of anybody’s success or prosperity. On the contrary he enjoyed their success, he loved his fellow beings, wanted to do his best for them.

   He was a great lover, he loved his work, he loved his fellow-beings, he loved his creations and loved death too.

   Why did he love death, why did he eulogise it, considered it to be the most pleasant thing of the world? God had given him everything except contentment. He was never satisfied and I think he knew that he would never be satisfied and that life will remain for him nothing more than a chain of successes and failures. Perhaps that is why he tried to find in death whatever he could not find in life, an end, a perfection, a contentment where he will not feel the pain of discontentment.

   I do not know whether his death was an accident or something else. But I had a feeling that nothing could have saved him, he did not want to be saved.

   Many times I explained to him that no one could ever get everything in life------for that even death is not a solution; but he was a perfectionist, who could not be easily satisfied. Perhaps he refused to accept that life can never be perfect. He wanted to get everything.

   Sometimes you want to do something for someone; but with all your best intentions and sincerity you just cannot do it. There are things that are destined, there are some patterns of life that cannot be broken, you simply cannot change them. We must accept them or else destroy ourselves.

   He refused to accept those patterns drawn by Destiny and destroyed himself. His death may have been just an accident; but I know that he had always wished for it, longed for it............and he got it.

   In his death the film industry has lost a great director, humanity has lost a man of compassion and I have lost a great friend who had made the first and the greatest contribution to my success as a film artiste. I will always be grateful to him for this. I could not save him; but I sincerely wished that I could............or at least that someone else could.

   But who can say that even if he was saved, his life would not have been more painful than death for him? Whatever God does is for our good only. He knows what is best for us. As Rabindranath Tagore has said:

   “We cannot choose the best,

   The best chooses us”.

   His death has been a great loss to us; but whatever happened was perhaps best for him! That is the only consolation left.

   (The above article was published in a special issue of “JOURNAL OF FILM         INDUSTRY” dated November 17th, 1967.)

Source: “Guru Dutt, A Monograph” by Firoze Rangoonwalla, National Film Archive of India, 1973

[dontshootmespence]

Can’t Get Enough

A/N: An anon request for a Spencer x Reader where the team goes to see Hamilton and the two of them can’t help but duet together in their apartment afterward. :D

After three straight months of back-to-back cases, Rossi felt like the team deserved a day out, so instead of doing his normal thing, which was to invite his friends and teammates over for dinner and drinks, he decided to pull every string he could and get the team tickets to a Broadway play that was nearly sold out - Hamilton.

Spencer was a history nerd. Y/N was a Broadway nerd. Penelope was a sunshine-y nerd, and everyone else was a nerd in their own way - him included. It took every connection he had and quite a few thousand dollars but he had it to spare, and his team deserved it.

As he looked over and saw Y/N’s eyes glazed over in amazement, he knew it was worth it. Everyone seemed to be having a great time. Tara was practically sobbing and Garcia was without a doubt sobbing in the seat right next to her. Most of the group had been wanting to see the play since its inception, but it was nearly impossible to get tickets unless you had a lot of money, which was a shame because Broadway should be for everyone.

On the way out of the theater about three hours after they’d arrived, everyone was buzzing about the performance.

“So the guy that played Hamilton - he was one of the writers?”

“He was the writer for music and lyrics,” Y/N replied, her smile a smile wide. “Lin Manuel-Miranda is a fucking lyrical God.” Although everyone had a great time, Y/N was the one who had been most interested in seeing it before Rossi had even mentioned the tickets.

Tara spun around and walked backward - a gutsy move in the middle of New York City. “I mean, I knew he was skilled, but damn. That was amazing. The minute I get home I’m downloading the soundtrack. I’ve been listening to it on YouTube, but that is meant to be bought and listened to daily.”

“Way ahead of you,” Y/N and Garcia said simultaneously. “We’ve been listening to it nearly every day since it came out.”

Rossi smiled knowing he’d brought the team a little bit of joy in the midst of their hectic and sometimes overwhelmingly depressing lives. Turning toward Spencer, Rossi coaxed a little conversation out of the shyest member of the group. “You enjoy, kid?”

“Oh yea,” Spencer said instantly, craning his head toward Rossi as if being snapped out of a daze. “Me being quiet isn’t because of a lack of excitement. Quite the opposite in fact. I’m just stunned by how amazing it was. The music was great and it was very educational. It would be a great thing to show in schools.”

Emily and JJ were up at the front of the group, along with Matt and Luke, all of whom were now talking about what some of their favorite songs were. Y/N stopped mid-sentence, having overheard Spencer and Rossi’s conversation. “You know, as a matter of fact, since this play started, Lin Manuel Miranda has had history teachers begging him to give the same treatment to other historical points in history purposely because so many kids are so fluent on the founding fathers now. It’s really amazing.”

With a giant smile, she ran around the rest of the group and came to jump on Spencer’s back. “Carry me!” She laughed. “I need to zone out about the amazingness that was Hamilton on our way back to the train station.”

They’d arrived in NYC the day before and stayed in a hotel for the night, but now it was time to take the train back home to DC. “Also, Spence, I’m warning you right now, I’m going to be singing the soundtrack all weekend.”

Spencer gently squeezed her thighs, which were firmly clasped around his waist, smiling as he gave her a quick kiss. “Oh, I know. I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

The next day, Spencer and Y/N woke up in their apartment and immediately turned on the soundtrack as they went about their morning routine. 

Y/N knew she was going to be singing, but hearing Spencer kill “My Shot” while he was in the shower was something she hadn’t expected. “Spence?” She asked half-laughing as she cracked open the door to the bathroom. “Are you rapping...?”

“It’s catchy! Shut up!”

She snorted and told him it was nothing to be embarrassed about; she was just amazed. “In fact, I think I just fell a little more in love. Also, now you have to sing with me when you get out of the shower.”

“Okay,” he replied, “But only if you never mention this to anyone, including my mother.”

“Deal.” She said deal, but it was definitely not a deal.

While Spencer jammed out to “My Shot,” Y/N belted out a rendition of “Satisfied” that would’ve made Renee Elise Goldsberry proud. Spencer walked in on the tail end, clapping for her, hair still sopping wet and dangling in front of his eyes. “That was amazing.”

“Thank you, love. I started making pancakes.” She turned around and pointed to a stack on the table that they could split while she finished the remaining pancakes and they started their duet. 

“’That Would Be Enough’ is going to be first and you are the Hamilton to my Eliza. Go.” 

As they started, Spencer was hesitant, but eventually he got into it, grabbing Y/N’s hand and dancing around the kitchen.

Will you relish being a poor man’s wife Unable to provide for your life?

I relish being your wife Look around, look around… Look at where you are Look at where you started The fact that you’re alive is a miracle Just stay alive, that would be enough And if this child Shares a fraction of your smile Or a fragment of your mind, look out world! That would be enough

“You have such a beautiful voice,” he said. “Maybe one day you can sing to our kids.”

They’d been together for a couple of years with the intention of marrying, but this was the first time in a while they’d discussed the topic again. “We having kids?”

“Lots,” he said softly, smiling against her lips. “Four.”

“Four?”

She’d always wanted a big family. “I think I could get behind that. We’ll have to sing for them though. Both of us.”

“I can do that. What song’s next, my Eliza?”

“Wait For It!”

Spencer smiled and turned the iPod to her choice of jam. “I like this one a lot. I think it might be my favorite.”

“Really?” She asked. “Why? It’s amazing, but why’s this one your favorite?”

For a moment, Spencer thought about it. “I guess it’s something about the message. Having control of your own life. Being unabashedly you. I think it’s a message I could’ve used as a kid. It resonates with me, I guess.”

Smiling, Y/N ran into his arms and kissed him. “I get that.”

The soundtrack went on and on, neither of them bothering to switch from one song to another and instead letting it play on. Y/N belted everything out. Spencer was of course a little more reserved but no less enthusiastic. “Can we let our kids listen to this?” Spencer asked as the two of them bounced up and down on the couch like children themselves. “It’s entertaining and educational. I think every kid should listen to this.”

“Me too. And absolutely.”

The entire afternoon passed by in a haze of “Guns and Ships,” “Burn,” and “Non-Stop” until dinner time, when they started the whole soundtrack over again and began cooking together. “Are we gonna keep this on the entire night?” Spencer chuckled.

“Yessssss. But first I need to listen to Non-Stop again.”

Spencer came up behind her, hugging her tight as she sang out loud, occasionally joining in himself. Toward the end of the song, one of their neighbors, a young college student by the name of Ronnie Mamun banged on the door. They’d both complained to each other on numerous occasions for loud parties or music. “I am not throwing away my shot!”

“Yea, baby!” Y/N laughed. “Fellow Hamilton fan!”

Ronnie snickered as he walked up the stairs. “If you keep that on, I won’t yell at you!”

Quickly, Spencer and Y/N eyed each other and agreed. Y/N ran to the door. “Hey Ronnie, you want to come in and stay for dinner?”

“What’cha havin?”

Y/N remembered her college days. They didn’t discriminate when it came to free food. “Baked ziti and garlic bread.”

“Oh hell,” he laughed, “free Italian food and Hamilton? I’m in. You mind turning on Non-Stop again? That’s my jam.”

“Mine too!” Y/N laughed, high-fiving their neighbor upstairs. 

Spencer’s voice was nearly drowned out by his girlfriend and neighbor. It had to have been the 20th time they’d listen to that song today, but as long as Y/N looked this happy, he’d listen to it a thousand more times.

@iammostdefinitelyonfire26 @jamiemelyn @coveofmemories @reddie-for-mileven @unstoppableangel8 @rmmalta @lukeassmanalvez @veroinnumera @lookwhatyoumademequeue @hogwarts-konoha