#yves essays

[thebluesthour]

from A Practical Field Guide to Mystery (by arsspoetica)

[dysfunctionalcreature]

the way this lyric from My R is the most jeandrew lyric ever!!!

like that's literally the basis of why I'm so obsessed with the potential of jeandrew 🥺

[suddencolds]

My heart went out to you with that poll you posted because:

I hope you know this deep down, but you don’t owe anyone anything with the fiction you’re writing for free in your spare time. It’s SO cool when people love what you write so much that they clamor for more, but that can create its own kind of stress. Producing Content here is not your job and it’s not an obligation. If you aren’t vibing with those characters atm, that’s so OK! That’s normal! You created them & they’ll be around when/if you cycle back to feeling passionate about them.

Thank you for thinking of me, anon!! Worry not, my desire to finish the series is a purely personal one 🫡 (Though you're right to say that on some level, I don't want to disappoint—hearing people's thoughts has been one of the things that's brought me the most happiness this year, out of all the different facets of my life 😭 which probably sounds a little pathetic LOL)

That said, I was pretty curious as to where people stood wrt pacing. I've gotten a lot of 'when will they get together?' comments, esp on the forum, so I've been wondering for awhile if it'd be best to be straightforward and end the series earlier than I'd planned to? Like, are people tired that this series has been going on for so long?

It's been interesting for me to see that the poll results mostly err on the side of continuing the slow burn :')

There's a certain major arc I've been planning to write since really early on the series (within the first couple installments) which I haven't gotten to yet... that I briefly considered cutting out entirely, bc it will take time, and idk if it will be well-received (or if I'm capable of writing it. Maybe it'd take like, another 30k words to write it in a satisfactory manner? Maybe the conclusion will feel like a cop out?). I'm still thinking about it 🫡

Ultimately, please feel assured that I am not forcing myself to write!! I'm ready to take another 5 month hiatus (or more, if I need) until I feel up to writing them again. I haven't lost interest in the characters at all; I think I've just been lacking in confidence 😭.

I do really appreciate your consideration, though, and I'll do my best to take my own wishes into account, too. Thank you for loving them :) 💛

[yvesdot]

Every day I meet people who say they "need to get back into reading," that they "haven't read since they were a kid," etc. etc. etc., only to then inevitably say "...except, you know, [YA/comics/kids' books/fanfiction/something else that is objectively writing that you read]."

And obviously if someone wants to get into adult traditionally published fiction I'm happy to show them around, especially if they're trying to find something by minority authors, or something outside of the award-winning bestselling Oprah Witherspoon Book Club picks, or perhaps something faster-paced, or shorter, or whatever makes it easier for them to get into—

but there is also absolutely nothing wrong with having a reading preference. In fact, statistically speaking, in a country where 54% of people allegedly read below a 6th grade level, it's more likely than not that the average person is not destined to love Infinite Jest. (N.B.: literacy is complex if not impossible to define and these are not equally distributed probabilities among everyone in the population.) I feel the need to tell all these people that they are readers, since, by definition, they read—and enjoy it! And if they don't enjoy reading as an adult, well, there are films and songs and television shows and video games out there for them to get their fill of art. There's fashion and sculpture and painting and architecture; nobody has to do my One True Hobby to be smart or cultured or (jeepers) morally correct.

So if you are a reader who prefers books with simpler prose, plots aimed at child readers, fast pacing, art with your words, or anything else associated with kfic/YA/comics/etc., that's perfectly alright. If you find your attempts to read adult fiction or "classics" or whatever other thing you feel you Should read don't actually result in enjoyment, that's alright, too. Any time you spend feeling guilty is a waste—you could spend it reading!

[chaosincurate]

My month in music - March 2023

slowthai - UGLY (new)

black midi - Hellfire (revisit)

Black Country, New Road - For The First Time (revisit)

machinegum - Conduit

Alvvays discography (revisit)

Fall Out Boy - So Much (For) Stardust (new)

Yves Tumor - Praise A Lord Who Chews But Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (new)

Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch

boygenius - the record (new)

slowthai - UGLY

This slowthai album is really interesting. My experience with slowthai prior to this was limited to Nothing Great About Britain, and I loved the punky energy of that album which merged unbelievably well with his grime stylings to summarize the (justified) angst-ridden experience of the more combative sect of working class Britain, by mixing together the music of the disaffected, frustrated youth of two different generations, similarly to The Clash's London Calling.

This time out though, while anger and frustration are present, they take a bit of a backseat to mental illness and despair, which called for a genre change, and slowthai picked the perfect genre in my view: post-punk. This new sound is not only a better thematic fit than his previous one would be, but it also suits slowthai very well, because, as the name suggests, it isn't too distant from punk in terms of what is required of the performer, but it sounds very different, switching energy for a bit of complexity which suits introspection very well.

Not only is this a fascinating example of artistic consideration for an album, it's also just a great album, and makes for a great introduction to UK rap for alternative rock fans, and vice versa.

Apple Music link

black midi - Hellfire

I've spoken about this album before on my top albums of last year list (spoilers, it tops the list) and everything I said about the album still applies for me. The album has a dynamism and charisma I've seldom seen before. The energy is transcendent, the lyrics are darkly whimsical and almost dauntingly dense, the instrumentals are virtuosic yet restrained to artistic sense in a way that many virtuosos aren't... What's not to love? I believe this album is deserving of godly worship, and may well be my favourite album of all time. Sure, it has it's flaws, but I simply get too whipped up in the beauty of it all that I become a blind evangelical follower of this album's glory. Praise be to Hellfire!

Apple Music link

Black Country, New Road - For The First Time

Although their later album, Ants From Up There, is my favourite of the two albums Black Country, New Road have put out, For the First Time has it's own place in my heart too. For one, it's one of the only albums that contains an instrumental I managed to get into enough to have in my library (I'm usually appreciative of their role within an album, but for whatever reason, they rarely do anything for me outside of making for good transitions), but it also has a sound that leans more towards Joy Division-style post-punk which I appreciate in a wholly different way to their later album.

They have the same patience about their music, a willingness to draw a sound out and let it roam where it may, which, in my experience at least, is very unique and personally highly appreciated. But it's sonically way darker than Ants From Up There, more imminently haunting, all of which makes it so that, even as someone who doesn't like the album as much, I never think of this album as living in the shadow of the other, an issue that band discographies can face if they are unwilling to offer anything new.

Apple Music link

machinegum - Conduit

machinegum is a superband of sorts, with the lineup containing Fabrizio Moretti of The Strokes as well as Ian Devaney from a band that I can't say I've heard of called Nation of Language. They have a wikipedia page, so I imagine I'm just losing touch at the ripe old age of 22. In any case, I heard way more Strokes in this album than anything else, but for me it just didn't hit the same. There were some standouts that I still really like, though, even after a few weeks worth of listens had made me bored of most of the album. The most notable example of that relative longevity is Atomized. Seeing as that comes early in the album and is pretty representative of the albums sound, I'll link that here. Give it a listen, maybe you'll like it!

Apple Music link

Alvvays discography

I've already done a write-up on this amazing indie pop band that deserves more success (they are already pretty successful, but these guys are the best indie band right now). You can find the fruits of my obsession here!

Fall Out Boy - So Much (For) Stardust

I usually try to take the "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it" approach when it comes to talking about music, but this album disappointed me to the point of frustration, so I'm gonna get negative here. Fall Out Boy stans, you've been warned.

So, first things first, no, this album isn't dreadful. This album has turned the tide following Mania and a long wait, I won't deny that, but to me this album felt like the perfect illustration of why its so important to know when you have nothing left to say. The album is completely unremarkable. It says nothing, does nothing new, and retreads unexceptionally. It feels like they're trying to make music for the kids of the 00s that don't exist anymore. It reeks of immaturity, which would be fine if not for the fact they don't seem to be aware of it. This isn't a punkish, knowing immaturity, it's a mid-life crisis in audio form, and it makes me question whether Fall Out Boy were ever actually good in the first place or whether their earlier material is just carried by nostalgia.

Sorry Fall Out Boy fans, but I needed that. I did like Fake Out quite a bit, though, and that's stood the test of time a few weeks poses, so I'll share that here. I hope everyone else enjoys it as much as the critics appear to have done!

Apple Music link

Yves Tumor - Praise A Lord Who Chews But Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds)

This experimental album from Yves Tumor is the strangest album I've heard that could still be confidently recommended to the majority of music fans. It's very formless, yet still manages to feel familiar. It's a demonstration of Yves Tumor's creativity that he can make something unlike anything else I've heard with such a singular soundscape, but still have the album be easy to get into straight away.

The only slight flaw I can think of that matters, is that it peaks quite early for me, which makes the rest of the album feel worse than the sum of its parts.

Apple Music link

Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch

This is one that has been on my radar for probably about a year, and I finally got around to it last month. Maybe I shouldn't have waited so long, because it didn't live up to expectation at first, but as time went on, I've appreciated this album more and more.

Regina Spektor is pretty weird. Like, all round weird. But it's a great example of why weird is not an insult. The brand-new-sentence style of lyrics in particular makes every line sound so intentional because it had to be. She's clearly digging down to the raw, abstract feelings and experiences that aren't yet translated cleanly into an earthly language, and she translates them herself, from scratch, and it becomes so personal and affecting because it's just all her, no cliches. She could say something as common as a greeting in this style and it would feel like she was the first person to say hello and really mean it. It's fantastic.

As I'm writing this, I realize that I might have enough to say about this album to justify it's own post, but that will do for this one. Give this one a listen if you like folk-leaning alternative stuff like Fiona Apple and Phoebe Bridgers. You might be disappointed, but then you won't be and you'll like it a whole lot.

Apple Music link

boygenius - the record

With the record, three very talented musicians, clever lyricists, and beautiful vocalists come together to make an album that is... Good? I mean, yeah, all those things still apply, and it is genuinely good, its not like Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus, and Julien Baker just lost all their talent completely in a few years, they aren't Green Day, but I guess I just expected more from three women who were such a large part of the popularisation of this kind of sound. It's a good album, and it's still worth a listen if you're a fan of any of the three, or of course if you liked the boygenius EP, but outside of a few fun and/or sincere moments, it felt a little arbitrary to me. Those moments are there though, and they are great, I just think maybe a second EP would be more appropriate than an album that, to me, felt like it had a lot of filler. As always though, you might have a different experience, so if you haven't heard it yet and like sad girl vibes, give it a shot!

Apple Music link

[rukakikuchi]

🔴 Premiering soon!! My LOONAverse retrospective analysis video!

[a-sleepy-ginger]

24/5/24

✿❈✿❈✿

Double ender toast

Talked with brother

Played with dog

Dinner (rice bowl with veg meat and jalapenos)

[hcdahlem]

Vie de l'auteur, idiot

Une vie de scribouillard rassemblée dans un livre. Sauf que ce fort volume est bien davantage qu'une compilation d'écrits. Yves Laplace nous offre ici une plongée dans le monde littéraire et médiatique helvétique, mais aussi français.

En deux mots Une vie d’auteur peut se raconter comme un roman. Ici, elle est également offerte à travers les écrits publiés dans différents médias sur une cinquantaine d’auteurs. De Angot à Zucco, voici une invitation à la lecture qui ne se refuse pas. Ma note ★★★★ (j’ai adoré) Ma chronique Un auteur, des textes, une vie Une vie de scribouillard rassemblée dans un livre. Sauf que ce fort volume…

[clerichs-xi]

thinking abt making barbie memes for yves and klaus

[crushing-on-nico-di-angelo]

and I'm sorry I left, but it was for the best my little dove...

absolute solitude: selected poems, dulce maria loynaz (tr. james o'connor) // the glass essay, anne carson // boyish, japanese breakfast // @uglyfruit // yves olade // hunger, harry styles // a not admitting of the wound, emily dickinson // no surprises, radiohead // fourth of july, sufjan stevens

[fumifooms]

Dungeon food, ah, dungeon food

Laios Touden and the Winged Lion

Dungeon Meshi, Ryoko Kui

^ 1:  Margaret Atwood, You Are Happy / 2: Grouper, Poison Tree / 3: Anne Carson, Plainwater: Essays and Poetry / 4: Emma Rebholz, No Good Boodsuckers / 5: Natalie Diaz, Postcolonial Love Poem / 6:  Tanaka Mhishi / 7: Jenefer Shute, Life-Size / 8 : Yves Olade, Belovéd / 9: Lara Williams, Supper Club / 10:  Ovid (tr. Henry T. Riley), The Story of Erysichthon from Metamorphoses / 11:  Alex Lemon, Another Last Day / 12:  Kathy Acker, Empire of the Senseless / 13: Grouper, Poison Tree / 14:  Neil Hilborn, A Place Where Someone Loves You / 15: / 16: Bon Iver & St. Vincent, Roslyn v 17: Jess Zimmerman, Hunger Makes Me / 18: Yves Olade, Dark When It Gets Dark, “Topograph” Special credit: Entroponauts gathered most of these

[kyoukamybeloved]

“You hate Dazai-san right.”

“Don’t act like a detective! That bastard is just.. just very, y’know.. It’s not hate.”

Looks like some complicated feelings.

soukoku webweaves: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7

creds:

cold spot - Trista Mateer// art by @taxolotl// wishbone - Richard Siken// ICU - Phoebe Bridgers// bubble gum - Clairo// so we must meet apart - Gabrielle Bates & Jennifer S. Cheng// essays in love - Alain de Botton// youth - daughter// dear Arkansas daughter - lady lamb// fleabag - Phoebe Waller-Bridge// sweetbitter - Stephanie Danler// art by @pleucas// the first bad man - Miranda July// in the aeroplane over the sea - neutral milk hotel// the beach - the neighbourhood// gilded lily - cults// waiting room - Phoebe Bridgers// boyish - Japanese breakfast// art from @/HiChuya on twitter// the hours - Michael Cunningham// yves olade// art from @/rokkyun1 on Twitter// stigmata: escaping texts// Hélène Cixous// wolf OR7 - Natalie Diaz// art by @thornedarrow// poem for a birthday - Sylvia Plath// unknown// art by @pleucas// lev st valentine// art by @bamfxp// vicious - V.E Schwab// I know it’s over - The Smiths// misheard lyrics - car seat headrest// be nice to me - the front bottoms// paper bag - Fiona Apple// trista mateer// art from @/1hys12 on Twitter// back to the old house - the smiths// let the light in - Lana del Rey// one last poem for Richard - Sandra Cisneros// art by @bananana2217

tagging moots and users who liked the other parts :)

@dinosaur-mayonnaise @philzokman @amagami-hime @homuncvlus @vinylbiohazard @bunglegaydogs @zamxii @ghostsinacoat @slug-behaviour @beastchuus @vivid-vices @atsuwushi @gorotic @pendragonstar @ricelover888 @oatmilkbasic @thou-shalt-cha-cha-real-smooth @the-gayest-sky-kid @lotus-reblogs @whiteapplesandblackblood @dazaiyurii @sommmee @shroombunnieses @sempieternal @sigskk @everyversionofmedeadandburied @thesunshinebard @hornyforthevirginmary @chibiko @galaxitic @evermorehypewoman

[trans-xianxian]

a single log bridge til its dark is indeed not bad

stray italian greyhound, vienna teng / I hear a symphony, cody fry / agua viva, clarice lispector / handle with care, jodi picoult / summer, safia elhillo / pride and prejudice, jane austin / always, spellling / love like ghosts, lord huron / @/filmnoirsbian / the carnivorous lamb, agustín gomez-arcos / I'm not calling you a liar, florence and the machine / samson, regina spektor / jamie anderson / angnes, glass animals / the color of pomegranates, dir. sergei parajanov / turtles all the way down, sammy copley / the night we met, lord huron / mouth full of forevers, clementine von radics / the epic of gilgamesh, trans. herbert mason / caitlyn siehl / questions for ada, ijeoma umebinyuo / grief lessons: four plays by euripides, trans. anne carson / night lement in hergla, leila chatti / salma deera / love song, rainer maria rilke, trans. stephen mitchell / it's only time, the magnetic fields / your love finds its eay back, sierra demulder / art of style, jean cocteau / work song, hozier / the collected poetry 1968-1998, nikki giovanni / coffee and cigarettes, sade andria zabala / ticket taker, the low anthem / little dogs rhapsody in the night, mary oliver / giovanni's room, james baldwin / writing prompts for the broken hearted, eden robinson / essays in love, alain de botton / ono no komachi and izumi shikibu, translated by jane hirshfield and mariko aratani / my love love mine all mine, mitski / beast at every threshold, natalie wee / yves olade / @/ojibwa / last words from montmartre, qiu miaojin / I've been waiting for you, abba / the orange, wendy cope / george macdonald

[lilbirdblu]

Nick Tobias, from Blind Man's Bluff by @ladyred-ms: a web weave

the absolutely true story of a part-time indian, sherman alexie | unknown | the boy who blocked his own shot, brand new | unknown | nothin.last4ever | places i've taken my body: essays, molly mccully brown | abject permanence, larissa pham | unknown | beloved, yves olade | wolf hall, hilary mantel | cop car, mitski | demonevil | bright dead things, ada limon | tongues & teeth, the crane wives | unknown | first love/late spring, mitski | unknown | azra t | nothin.last4ever | unknown | a letter to stanley pennell, martha gellhorn | uknown | everyone i love is a stranger to someone, annelyse gelman | vulnerability, a.j | clockwork princess, c. clare

[yvesdot]

i would like to get you started on how it relates to save the cat

(re: this post)

Oh my gosh you are so sweet and you always ask the best questions... Thank you! I'll copy here something I said in a Patreon post a long time ago, which I find myself frequently repeating:

I find that a lot of people, having never heard of a single writing rule, strongly believe that they are ‘breaking’ them. And, sure, that may well be true—but they are breaking rules as a child breaks a Ming vase, not as an adult cuts out images and words for collage. You have to know what you’re breaking, how to break it, and (most importantly) why. You will only achieve this by learning the rules.

It is my fervent belief that you must be in good company to make good art. This can be the company of a song you love, a landscape that warms you, a book that knows how to make you laugh. These will teach you your rules: that you love violins in pop choruses; that your favorite colors are lavender and sable green; that, in order to get a rise out of you, a joke has to really surprise you.

If you go on to form a band, or paint a painting, or write a book, you will have Rules to live by. They are your rules, learned definitively from your experience, and ready if necessary to be changed. Nobody else need believe in them. You know they are true for you, and you can only write for you—after all, being you, you are the only person you can please with 100% certainty.

I also strongly believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn others' Rules—the Rules of their family, the Rules of their teachers, the Rules of their favorite authors, and so on and so forth. These should be Rules which are known, not necessarily followed—again, one should adopt Rules with care to one's personal tastes and as needs be.

The active destruction of any culture outside of an assumed pan-Western white somethingorother makes all of this difficult. You can sit through a hundred Marvel films and still not know how or why they work, the same way you could be told "the only timekeeping device that exists is a mantel clock" and not be any closer to understanding how a mantel clock works—let alone if that's even the clock you need.

Admittedly I'm coming back to love and joy and harmony again, but, well, how is anybody going to make good art without love? Love for other people, love for the world, love for other books, love for yourself—I'm not picky on what kind of love, but so far, every book I've enjoyed has known love, however subtly.

Personally, I love Save the Cat!. It is a ridiculous book wherein one man decides his Rules are everybody's and the only things worth loving are the things he loves—which he loves A LOT. He is insufferable. His Rules are often not just not my taste but objectively, provably wrong. It's like my family who, yes, would do well to accept that I simply do not want a tech job, but are kind to be there to advise me if, all of a sudden, I do. Everyone should have the opportunity to learn information; without that, how can they discard it?

So when Weird Al is sitting down to study the exact rhyme scheme and writing style of a given song, he's setting and following his own Rules. In a given parody the song must follow as closely as possible X Y Z elements; in this specific song, those elements are identifiably A B C. When we enjoy his work, we're appreciating the effects of those Rules: the limitations that, conversely, free his art.

So what I was thinking, ineloquently in the tags, was about how much I love rules and how I wish we could see the joy in culture and tradition and structure on a larger level the way that we see it in individual artists' work. Rules are not the devil. All rules are not to be hated and feared. I'm typing this out after two nights of Seders—rules up to the ceiling! My beloved Save the Cat! is not a prison to which I am consigning my critique partners. It's just my, and Snyder's, and a good many other peoples', Rules.

It didn't fit anywhere else in this post, but I really wanted to say it, and you're always very nice and enabling, so I'll say it right here, and in a way which is not meant to prioritize any one kind of love and merely to value intimacy as whole. Alright? Here it is. The very best rules are like undergarments: they flatter your form, are not immediately visible, and can be best shown off to those truly ready to appreciate them—as the ultimate act of love.

[crookedkryptonitebeliever]

yves never tells u why he likes u so I wonder how he’d react if u forced him to explain himself because u won’t believe him otherwise. and when I say forced I mean that he can’t distract u from it. u demand a 30 page essay explaining in great detail why he loves u. maybe u even ask “would u love me if I was as worm” on occasion

His answer will change depending on your personality, he will tell you what you want to hear and you will fall for it and walk away satisfied.

However, his true reasons consist of his entire, freakishly obsessive nature of his data vault. All five acres and counting; revealing the truth will undoubtedly spook you to death and serves more of a punishment than a reward. Yves couldn't fit all the reasons in a 30 page essay no matter how he tried as he loves every trait, every thought, every molecule and every atom of what makes you, you.

It's not to say that the reasons he would provide you are false, they're also true. It's just the most vanilla ones he picked for you to hear, the most romantic and sane sounding ones. Yves would gladly churn out a one foot thick journal with proper citations and appropriate evidences, which he thinks is too short given the magnitude of his adoration for you.

But it is already clear from his painfully simplified reasons why he's willingly, eternally devoted to you, that the love he holds is undeniably unconditional and undying. Yves loves the best and the worst parts of you, the most mundane parts and the most complicated ones. Things that you didn't even realize yourself and things you never thought were worthy of attention.

He loves you for existing. For being in this world or the next.

Yves already knows the question about loving a person if they were a worm, even before the advent of the internet as couples and children would ask their loved ones questions of similar nature.

He already did extensive research on how to provide the best care for any species of worms, in the whimsical advent where you would turn into one. He has your terrarium sketched out, with enough enrichment a worm could ever have. A list of foods that worm-you might like.

If you actually did turn into a worm, he has no issue spending days observing you in your element, laptop, clipboard pen and pencils nearby to jot down any findings. Just like how he's already doing with you as a human- except when you're a worm, he doesn't need to be as discrete in his stalking and watching.

Oddly enough, if given the chance, he would also want to turn into a worm like you. So that he could just cuddle you, in his own wormy way. No thoughts, just you and peace.

But to sum it up as shortly and accurately as possible, you are his one and only hyperfixation. That term criminally underestimates the permanent, everlasting and perpetual interest and obsession he has for you. You are quite literally, his everything, his will to live and his ultimate purpose. He will follow you to the boundaries of the universe and beyond, loving every version of you and trying his best to fulfil your every wish just to see you smile.

Yves orbits around your world, and he is very happy with it. Nothing will wean him off you, you're forever stuck in his unyielding arms, Yves engulfing you like this protective yet suffocating cage.

Like a celestially indestructible parasite.