#yeah i'm still not done processing

[namjoonaaah]

his time

[onaperduamedee]

"Moiraine Damodred..." "No, if you have ever loved me, don't do this." "I command you to close the Waygate."

[themanwhomadeamonster]

The 1999 combat theme and its foreshadowing because the autism got to me and I spent too long trying to figure out this soundtrack

Jumping off from @brokenjardaantech's WITW music analysis post here - go check it out, it's very insightful and lays the foundations for what I'm about to talk about! And thanks to @theterribletenno for the burst of inspiration by giving me a massive oh shit realisation in the most chilling way possible LOL

Spoilers under the read-more; TL;DR at the end :'^D

To preface, the soundtrack is structured in an ABC structure with bridges between A and B, as well as another between B and C that borrows from A. The key starts in Cm, briefly modulating to Gm in section B then back to Cm during the second bridge, and settling on Em for section C. In-game for WITW you most likely will only hear up to the first bridge since the Technocyte fight only goes for around a minute long

Sections A, the bridges and partially C feature genre similarities to grunge rock with fuzzy guitar chugging, whammy bar, and palm muting, while the drums are notably sharp snares (except for the first bridge, which are clean bass kicks that gradually distort transitioning into section B's style). Musically, it sounds like a typical fighting soundtrack meant to hype you up - the melody is confident and likes to push and pull its rhythm. But in section C it notably become emptier in its layering while keeping the distorted drums, placing emphasis on the lyrics (which I'll get to below lol). Heavier syncopation and polyrhythms are also introduced.

Section B however is the main outlier. This section is where it most strongly resembles industrial rock: rhythmic synth layers begin to accompany the melody (a pedal point line that plays every semiquaver/sixteenth note), synth drums replace acoustics and the guitars drop the fuzz that is characteristic of grunge and steadily strum every quaver/eighth note. Compared to the push and pull rhythm of section A, this section is steadier, less chaotic than the other sections, it wants you to focus on this section.

Notably, the lead guitar introduces a familiar leitmotif: This is What You Are (which @brokenjardaantech goes more in depth regarding its use in WITW). Here, though, its second chord becomes flattened (Dm -> D♭m) and introduces a diminished, dissonant sound. To me this was the first hint that the song may actually be about Arthur's downfall. This is What You Are is a musical leitmotif that recurs in moments of vulnerability, especially when someone is at risk of losing their sense of self, their identity and what they are. It plays during The Second Dream when we discover the Operator, during the New War when Eidolon!Lotus just lost herself to Ballas and can't recognise the Tenno, and in WITW during the Vessel "fight" when the Tenno is forced out of their Warframe.

I was prompted to actually dig more into the lyrics because I saw @theterribletenno bring up something really interesting

In this specific song, the leitmotif is diminished, it's corrupted. "Surrender to the corruption" - this is what Arthur is afraid of. I brought up earlier that section B had a genre shift. The contrast of the music is important, it's highlighting something, and together with the musicality of the leitmotif, it's making a sense of urgency and danger. The leitmotif is a warning to Arthur.

Section B sings these lyrics:

Break it, break it, Break it open!

Compared to the desperation in the other lines, these two lines are sung mockingly. The Infested are trying to break Arthur, and are succeeding. Their voice is becoming his. But there are actually two vocal lines in this section - you can also hear muted backing vocals in a much less aggressive and lethargic tone warning that "Disillusion". Arthur is trying so hard to keep his own voice and stay clear-minded but it's being drowned out and he's nearing his breaking point, and Albrecht, based on the Codex Fragments you find, is well aware of this.

In section C, while the layering is less intense it's noticeably more heavily syncopated and polyrhythmic, and introduces new (accompanying) echoing and dissonant synth layers reflecting the confusion and disorientation that Arthur begins to feel (these synth layers are actually introduced in the second bridge, but are more easily heard in section C). Section B and C also keep the synth/distorted drums that section A and both bridges lack (at most it's a reverb in those sections); the industrial sound of the song becoming associated with the increasing influence of the Infested over his humanity.

So I tried deciphering more lyrics for each section; I haven't figured all of it out and most of it could very well be wrong because of how heavily clipped the vocal line intentionally is so I don't want to make anymore assumptions than I need to, but I can understand enough of it to realise that the song is foreshadowing Arthur's corruption to the Infested. In green are the lyrics I'm confident are correct:

A:

Sting it, sting it, sting it! Sting it, sting it, sting it in the flesh!

Bridge:

I don't understand! It brings more disease!

B:

Break it, break it, Break it open! (Disillusion)

Bridge:

Sting it, sting it! Sting it in the flesh!

C:

Who's dreaming? Who's the [???] It's a vision[?]!

TL;DR: the grunge/industrial genre hybrid represents Arthur's humanity/Infested respectively, and the song becomes increasingly industrial as the song progresses, most noticeably through the increasing distortion of the drum sound. Section A sets the stage, section B serves as a warning to Arthur that he's losing his sense of identity as the Infestation drowns out his "voice" while a dissonant version of This is What You Are plays, and section C is him experiencing confusion and disorientation as the Infestation continues to corrupt him.

[juanabaloo]

if you live in the USA and are feeling especially overwhelmed rn, remember we are living through both a modern day civil rights movement (like the 1960s) and a genocide that our govt is funding (like the Holocaust). keep fighting. if you need a break, rest up. take care of yourself. i believe that we will win.

[syxnewt]

my parents want my little brother, who has had a fever no lower than 100 F for the past 2-3 days, to go to school tomorrow

[myname-isnia]

I actually survived 100 days in my Minecraft world and didn't die once lmao

[coollyinterferes]

Today, I offer you...

🌟 he 🌟

[smile-files]

CLOVER II IS REAL. THIS IS NOT A DRILL

[cementcornfield]

huh. not super sure how i feel about this :')

[allylikethecat]

An Ally Update No One Asked For: I do have a Tuesday update for y'all tomorrow but it's probably going to be an afternoon / evening update. I have decided to rewrite the ending and probably won't have it fully finished the way I want it to be until later because I have given up on it tonight and am going to bed 😊

[bravewolfvesperia]

/ realized I forgot to put this in my bio and will add it later but

heads up that my Yuri is a combination of JP Yuri and dub Yuri, but primarily JP. there's a whole lot of nuance to Yuri that got left out of the dub (and seeing as he has waaay more content in JP due to the vast amount of crossovers/Tales crossovers/gachas he's in, it's a lot easier to keep Toriumi's take on him (and in depth understanding no less!) in mind). overall you get the same general person, but the dub left out a lot more his casual/playful side in vocal tone, preferring to go for the "edgy cool adult" concept despite, well, the JP version of him intentionally being quite opposite.

(on another note, context I use for Yuri involves nuances found in the drama CDs that are a condensed retelling of the game (before some original stuff) as well as his childhood novel which has voiced dialogue for his child and teen years. this post covers the game, but a lot of (especially internal) stuff for my muse may be heavily affected by his backstory too which is unfortunately completely absent in the actual game itself)

there's also a lot of back and forth between him and other characters that really lost their depth in the dub (ex. Yuri being much more gentle and soft with early game Karol when Karol was convinced nobody would believe him and that he was a failure, or his banter with Flynn being a lot more relaxed and significantly less annoyed with a better understanding of each other). I'll be retaining anything the dub yeeted out for whatever odd reason regarding his relationships.

(one particular grievance of mine is in the Flynn jailbreak scene, where Yuri is basically saying "you're just dying to abandon me" and Flynn starts off with "that's right" before basically saying the same thing - i.e. they both know it's not true and Flynn is going along with it because That's Them, to which Yuri responds with a solid and fully accepting "yeah" (no hesitation, no concern over it, as he prioritizes Flynn's life over his own).

another extremely strong grievance I have is the port scene - oops also with Flynn - where he's basically holding back tears asking for answers in desperation, which was extremely if not outright completely lost in the dub where he only sounds angry and not just utterly hurt. dub Yuri? I could believe he might kill Flynn if it came to that. JP Yuri? forget it, he would hold back at the last second and couldn't go through with it. that's genuinely the level of difference that was present between both audios.

that said, I love Troy Baker's performance itself - I just think he was unfortunately deeply incorrectly directed for several of his major scenes, and also unfortunately, some of those cases were involving some of his most important relationships)

if any of y'all play Vespy any time soon, I fully recommend giving it a shot with its original context at least once (if you're playing the DE version there's an option for JP audio)! even if you don't understand JP, at the very least the tone won't be lost on you! from what I've heard apparently there wasn't much communication between the directors on both sides, so a lot of Yuri got lost in the localization (and Karol's screaming is glorious in JP lbh).

tl;dr Yuri really is just a silly little guy and he's really not that cool or serious. he's a dork. he's a dummy. and he's easily embarrassed about it. get deep enough into his feelings for Flynn when they're not in a life or death situation and he'll completely cave in embarrassment.

[realboutfatalfury]

it might just be bc it's late and i get sad sometimes when it's late but i'm sad i like feeel soooo bad about several things and i feel like i want to cry but i can't ughh idk...

[fractallogic]

FIREFOX WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM LATELY

my dude you can't be making my computer crash when I only have like 20 tabs open. that's rookie shit!

anyway my computer crashed right before the interview ended and too much memory was going ... somewhere ... for me to get R running right and they didn't tell me it was going to be a case study project thing that I'd be doing today instead of just a normal interview and AAAAAA.

maybe tomorrow I can just be fucking normal because oh my god. this is too stressful.

also my desk chair is starting to just. randomly. drop down very slowly. which means that at some point sooner than I want to I'll have to get another one. which SUCKS. but FINE. GOD.

[showmethestarlight]

So I think my thoughts on The Tortured Poets Department are that I'm a little conflicted. I think it is a good album, the sound is a bit Midnights and folklore and evermore, which is a bit messy but it kind of works. I think it's more of a matter of which kind of albums you prefer for where it falls in your rankings but the albums that are mostly slow songs that stay at the same level/tempo aren't my favourites so this isn't my highest (I love Speak Now for example for songs like Haunted) but I still had a good time listening and I still had a few I liked a lot on the album. I liked the sound and storytelling of But Daddy I love Him, I think Florence and Taylor's voices are really good together on Florida!!! I liked My Boy Only Breaks His Favourite Toys, and I loved the dark and deep atmospheric feeling of Who's Afraid of Little Old Me? And I thought Clara Bow got its message across really well. There are some songs I'm confused by and I think I'll need some time with to understand like Fortnight and Fresh out the Slammer and some odd little lyrics here and there that I think maybe could have been cut because they just felt out of place or unnecessary. And I just don't think I'll ever be much of a fan of Guilty as Sin? I think I like Cassandra but at the moment it feels too much like mad woman. I think those are all my thoughts so far, I probably need a few more listens to process everything.

[fazcinatingblog]

Imagine if out of all the mistakes I've made, the things Sophia thinks I'm doing wrong, the one thing that gets me fired is that I don't agree to the boss smoking in the office.

[cocklessboy]

The biggest male privilege I have so far encountered is going to the doctor.

I lived as a woman for 35 years. I have a lifetime of chronic health issues including chronic pain, chronic fatigue, respiratory issues, and neurodivergence (autistic + ADHD). There's so much wrong with my body and brain that I have never dared to make a single list of it to show a doctor because I was so sure I would be sent directly to a psychologist specializing in hypochondria (sorry, "anxiety") without getting a single test done.

And I was right. Anytime I ever tried to bring up even one of my health issues, every doctor's initial reaction was, at best, to look at me with doubt. A raised eyebrow. A seemingly casual, offhand question about whether I'd ever been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Even female doctors!

We're not talking about super rare symptoms here either. Joint pain. Chronic joint pain since I was about 19 years old. Back pain. Trouble breathing. Allergy-like reactions to things that aren't typically allergens. Headaches. Brain fog. Severe insomnia. Sensitivity to cold and heat.

There's a lot more going on than that, but those were the things I thought I might be able to at least get some acknowledgement of. Some tests, at least. But 90% of the time I was told to go home, rest, take a few days off work, take some benzos (which they'd throw at me without hesitation), just chill out a bit, you'll be fine. Anxiety can cause all kinds of odd symptoms.

Anyone female-presenting reading this is surely nodding along. Yup, that's just how doctors are.

Except...

I started transitioning about 2.5 years ago. At this point I have a beard, male pattern baldness, a deep voice, and a flat chest. All of my doctors know that I'm trans because I still haven't managed to get all the paperwork legally changed, but when they look at me, even if they knew me as female at first, they see a man.

I knew men didn't face the same hurdles when it came to health care, but I had no idea it was this different.

The last time I saw my GP (a man, fairly young, 30s or so), I mentioned chronic pain, and he was concerned to see that it wasn't represented in my file. Previous doctors hadn't even bothered to write it down. He pushed his next appointment back to spend nearly an hour with me going through my entire body while I described every type of chronic pain I had, how long I'd had it, what causes I was aware of. He asked me if I had any theories as to why I had so much pain and looked at me with concerned expectation, hoping I might have a starting point for him. He immediately drew up referrals for pain specialists (a profession I didn't even know existed till that moment) and physical therapy. He said depending on how it goes, he may need to help me get on some degree of disability assistance from the government, since I obviously shouldn't be trying to work full-time under these circumstances.

Never a glimmer of doubt in his eye. Never did he so much as mention the word "anxiety".

There's also my psychiatrist. He diagnosed me with ADHD last year (meeting me as a man from the start, though he knew I was trans). He never doubted my symptoms or medical history. He also took my pain and sleep issues seriously from the start and has been trying to help me find medications to help both those things while I go through the long process of seeing other specialists. I've had bad reactions to almost everything I've tried, because that's what always happens. Sometimes it seems like I'm allergic to the whole world.

And then, just a few days ago, the most shocking thing happened. I'd been wondering for a while if I might have a mast cell condition like MCAS, having read a lot of informative posts by @thebibliosphere which sounded a little too relatable. Another friend suggested it might explain some of my problems, so I decided to mention it to the psychiatrist, fully prepared to laugh it off. Yeah, a friend thinks I might have it, I'm not convinced though.

His response? That's an interesting theory. It would be difficult to test for especially in this country, but that's no reason not to try treatments and see if they are helpful. He adjusted his medication recommendations immediately based on this suggestion. He's researching an elimination diet to diagnose my food sensitivities.

I casually mentioned MCAS, something routinely dismissed by doctors with female patients, and he instantly took the possibility seriously.

That's it. I've reached peak male privilege. There is nothing else that could happen that could be more insane than that.

I literally keep having to hold myself back from apologizing or hedging or trying to frame my theories as someone else's idea lest I be dismissed as a hypochondriac. I told the doctor I'd like to make a big list of every health issue I have, diagnosed and undiagnosed, every theory I've been given or come up with myself, and every medication I've tried and my reactions to it - something I've never done because I knew for a fact no doctor would take me seriously if they saw such a list all at once. He said it was a good idea and could be very helpful.

Female-presenting people are of course not going to be surprised by any of this, but in my experience, male-presenting people often are. When you've never had a doctor scoff at you, laugh at you, literally say "I won't consider that possibility until you've been cleared by a psychologist" for the most mundane of health problems, it might be hard to imagine just how demoralizing it is. How scary it becomes going to the doctor. How you can internalize the idea that you're just imagining things, making a big deal out of nothing.

Now that I'm visibly a man, all of my doctors are suddenly very concerned about the fact that I've been simply living like this for nearly four decades with no help. And I know how many women will have to go their whole lives never getting that help simply because of sexism in the medical field.

If you know a doctor, show them this story. Even if they are female. Even if they consider themselves leftists and feminists and allies. Ask them to really, truly, deep down, consider whether they really treat their male and female patients the same. Suggest that the next time they hear a valid complaint from a male patient, imagine they were a woman and consider whether you'd take it seriously. The next time they hear a frivolous-sounding complaint from a female patient, imagine they were a man and consider whether it would sound more credible.

It's hard to unlearn these biases. But it simply has to be done. I've lived both sides of this issue. And every doctor insists they treat their male and female patients the same. But some of the doctors astonished that I didn't get better care in the past are the same doctors who dismissed me before.

I'm glad I'm getting the care I need, even if it is several decades late. And I'm angry that it took so long. And I'm furious that most female-presenting people will never have this chance.