#both mods use scribbles

[dandysworldhcs]

Ooh, mods, hit us with some Craft Sibling headcanons!!! they're everything to me. the greatest. perfection incarnate. pretty please. plink plink. that was the sound of me blinking with my comically sized eyelashes.

-Whatnot

hi. i need a break they got me working overtime with no pay </3 /silly GOOB

-they/he/it/silly/patch -arospec [romance favorable] panromantic xenogender and nonbinary -has weighted plushie materials so he is quite literally a living weighted plushie. this is incredibly convenient because like 99% of the toons are neurodivergent -when stressed he subconsciously wraps sillys arms around sillyself.and gets sillyself tangled which makes things worse. the best course of action is talking to patch and distracting patch while you untangle the arms -the arms make a clicking sound whenever they stretch or retract. iknow it doesnt sound like that in game but thats because hes doing it so fast that the clicks just sound like an elastic stretch -dog therian. literally just look at his convo with astro i Promise you -his paws are really squishy so they just chew on them sometimes -knows the entire catmeme timeline [including the extended timeline] [if you dont know what im talking about look up "catmeme timeline polygon donut" i promise it will change your life] -he absolutely LOCKS IN when it comes to cooking. however since a lot of people doubt his ability and are scared he'll burn down the kitchen he only does it at night. one time cosmo woke up and went to the kitchen for a quick snack and was immediately jumpscared by the smell of the best skirt steak in the world and goob's glowing dog eyes. hes incredibly precise with his arms/hands while he cooks but you Cannot talk to him or distract him. let them cook ok ? -it can choose wether to make its arms as rigid as regular arms or slack like they are ingame. this doesnt hurt him but it takes less energy to keep them slack like they are ingame

SCRAPS

-she/they/scribble/craft/crinkle -trans woman and aroace, flutter and her dated for a while and then both realized they were both aroace [scraps is romance indifferent, flutter is romance repulsed]. theyre very close friends because of it, they still love each other !! just not in the way people expect -making origami/crafts is a coping mechanism/stim, she often blacks out doing it/doesnt realize shes doing it -speaking of origami stuff, shes made origami kitty figurines out of pages from old/unwanted warrior cats books. she has her own little clan collection on her shelf -scratches the tree in the lobby often.its enrichment -shes made little gifts for Everyone in gardenview. yes. Everyone. even pebble. even shrimpo. even if she doesnt like them she made pebble a little paper pillow that he refuses to tear up. and she made a tiny paper shrimpo that he refuses to throw away or damage ever. but he also refuses to let anyone know he kept it. -her twisted is smiling out of distress, a habit carried over from her toon self.

GENERAL CRAFTSIBS

-when goob gets stress-tangled, scraps is usually the one to untangle him -scraps, along with glisten, cosmo, razzle and dazzle, made goob custom dog ears and a tail. patch was ECSTATIC about it. -they have little matching details :-] goob has a scraps patch hidden under his fluff and scraps has a little charm that hangs from her tail thats a red and blue heart [like goob's red and blue accents] -goob knew he wasnt cisgender for most of his life but thought he was just having weird thoughts that people would look at him weird for. until one day scraps was brushing their fur and was like "hey i gotta tell you smth,, im actually your sister. im trans." and goob was like "...WAIT THERES A WORD FOR THAT ??". they helped each other transition <:] -they both made their own warrior cats ocs and made ocs out of everyone else in gardenview. their made up clan is called cleverclan and scraps is the leader while goob is the medicine cat -scraps was Incredibly confused as to why cosmo suddenly acted nervous around her and was a little afraid she'd have to explain she didnt want a relationship. and was then made ecstatic when cosmo confessed he had a crush on goob. yeah im a cakehugs shipper sorry chat i love them -a twisted scraps has missed her tail ability on goob more than once. even if he was in clear sight. the last shred of sense of self before the ichor's takeover

[aggro-my-beloved]

《 ♡ Soulmate September Schedule ♡ 》

hello lovely fandom, @aggro-my-beloved here! i’m over the moon to announce that for the entire month of september i will be posting soulmate au centered fics featuring your favorite redacted pairings! some are canon, some are not…but all the works listed below are ones i’m proud to share. the plots and pairings will be listed below the cut. please interact by replying or reblogging this post, and let me know if you’d like to be tagged in any of the following fics once they are

posted <3 (p.s. pls don’t let this flop)

all the following prompts are based on this post from my main blog, @buck-nialled

⑨.②.②④ ⇒ “Long In The Tooth” (LaskoxDear)

[lasko’s been eighteen for six years now, and frankly, he’s becoming sick of playing a juvenile. what makes his endeavor for a soulmate even more bewildering? they’re one of his students.]

❾.❹.❷❹ ⇒ “Trash Polka” (AsherxBabe)

[babe is tired of wearing hoodies in summer, and leggings in the spring. but their soulmate seems too caught up in his career to mind leaving little notes and drawings on their skin, rather than meeting up for a legitimate conversation. babe takes matters into their own hands, which soon won’t be covered by a mod-podge of their soulmate’s scribbles. at least, one can hope.]

⑨.⑥.②④ ⇒ “The Grey Area” (GuyxHoney)

[what’s more depressing than witnessing an amusement park in black and white? realizing it may be the last time you visit one, is probably what guy would answer, as he dangles upside down on Wonderworld’s “Surge” coaster. the pretty stranger next to him isn’t the worst company, though.]

❾.❽.❷❹ ⇒ “A Great Disservice” (DavidxAngel)

[david serves a dangerous line of work. and angel? they cat sit. still, both come home with cuts and scratches for the same reason.]

⑨.①⓪.②④ ⇒ “Rumination” (DamienxHuxley)

[a re-imagined dialogue to the elemental bois confessing their feelings.]

❾.❶❷.❷❹ ⇒ “Resigned/Sullen” (DavidxAsher)

[neither david nor asher have spoken post-inversion about the turmoil they experienced in the arena. not the scars that wouldn’t heal, not what caused them, and certainly not who kept asher from bleeding out on the ground.]

⑨.①④.②④ ⇒ “Pulsation” (Foolsverse!MiloxSweetheart)

[milo enjoys feeling his soulmate’s heart thump faster when he’s present. but only when he’s present.]

❾.❶❻.❷❹ ⇒ “Like and Unlike” (Davidxfem!Angel)

[angel thinks she’s finally found a cure for her crippling social anxiety at Dahlia’s local gym. but she cannot tell if david, the ill-tempered coach, will be the one to make or break her progress.]

⑨.①⑧.②④ ⇒ “Parting Song” (QuinnxDarlin’)

[when you’re standing next to who you think is your soulmate, as you watch the real one whither away in a shitty steel department chair—how do you respond?]

❾.❷⓪.❷❹ ⇒ “Battered and Bruised” (Samx Darlin’)

[so long as he doesn’t tell them, sam can keep up his act of healing darlin’ without suspicion. it’s magic, after all…]

⑨.②②.②④ ⇒ “Twin, Where Have You Been?” (MiloxSweetheart)

[“well, sweetheart. one of us is gonna have to change.” in which milo and his soulmate will forever be that couple.]

❾.❷❹.❷❹ ⇒ “Midnight Oil” (AaronxSmartass)

[the matchmaker test is the one exam nobody can study for. only fate will tell a person who they truly belong with. still, aaron attempts to pull an all nighter with his overly-charming classmate in an attempt to cheat the system.]

⑨.②⑥.②④ ⇒ “All Roads Lead To…” (DavidxDarlin’)

[david’s twelve years young and still leashed in red, wondering when he’ll meet the one on the other side of it, or if he even wants to. darlin’ is eleven years in, a hopeless romantic, and crossing the California state line when they notice their red string now has a little slack.]

❾.❷❽.❷❹ ⇒ “Change Your Tune” (GeordixCutie)

[cutie’s soulmate is the number one target on their shit list. because who on god’s green earth gets the tetris theme stuck in their head on a daily basis? well, they’re about to meet him...]

⑨.③⓪.②④ ⇒ “As If You’ll Live Forever” (ElliotxSunshine)

[the one thing more ironic than sunshine’s soulmate being a dreamwalker is how tired they’ve become of sleeping.]

[i-did-not-mean-to]

Pssssst...S&D sign-ups are still open

@fall-for-tolkien's Scribbles and Drabbles is back for the 2025 edition. (Serious post with dates and infos ➜here)

❥ Do you have prompt ideas and colour crayons?

❥ Do you have a favourite (underrated) pairing?

❥ Is there something (a trope, a pairing, an interpretation, an idea, etc) you just can't get enough of?

❥ Do you like following the muse on unexpected adventures?

☞ JOIN US!

We have 1 sign-up sheet for authors and artists, so pick your poison (or don't! Come as you are, sign up for both, and see where it takes you!)!

We have Hobbit, we have LOTR, we have Silm, and much more. All Tolkien fandoms are welcome, all levels and interpretations of art are celebrated, and there's tons of fun to be had!

Minimum word count is 100 words, but the sky is your limit! Also, every piece of art can be claimed 3 times, so you have a triple chance to get an amazing story for your idea!

Sign-up deadline for artists is 30th of June, so take heart and a leap of faith! We're waiting for you!

Please read the rules, found under FAQs & Art Slide Guide. For all other questions, the Mods are there to help and enable assist.!

See you there!

Also, we have some amazing things in the gallery already, so there shall be something for every taste!

[noel-fielding]

To truly appreciate Noel Fielding’s comedy, you must allow yourself to get drawn into his world. It’s a pretty surreal place, where anything—from gorillas to inanimate objects—can be a character, and characters are expressed through multiple mediums including music and visuals. After nearly two decades on stage, however, the British actor, artist, and comedian knows how to engage his audience. It’s not just about his charisma—though with his signature coiffe, eyeliner, and mod clothing, he is quite charming. It’s also about structure. Even if it seems like Fielding goes off on random tangents onstage, by the time he tours a show, he’s established a carefully constructed journey of augmenting oddness. “It’s getting the balance right so that they’re going, ‘Oh my god, how did we get here?’ Or they’re laughing because they trust you by that point,” he explains.

“I have a bit in my show where I play a half-man, half-chicken,” Fielding says of his current act, An Evening with Noel Fielding.  “I can’t start with that because people would just be like, ‘What’s happening?” he continues. “I do some stuff that’s more accessible, and then I gradually start doing a bit more weird stuff, and then I do this long piece about teabags where I play a bunch of different teabags in a cupboard. By the end, it gets to this bit where my wife’s having an affair with a triangle and where I play a half-man, half-chicken.”

In the U.K., Fielding is a well-known entity. In the U.S., where he’ll be touring An Evening this month, he’s more of a cult figure. There are those who know him from The Mighty Boosh (2003-2007), his show with his frequent writing partner Julian Barrett, and others who think of him as Richmond, the goth from The IT Crowd (2006-2013). But Fielding’s work extends past the stage and screen. A graduate of Croydon Art College, the 42-year-old has published a book of his artwork (Scribblings of a Madcap Shambleton, Canongate UK, 2012) and exhibited at the likes of the Saatchi Gallery and the Royal Albert Hall.

Here, we discuss Fielding’s entry into comedy in the late 1990s and the evolution of The Mighty Boosh. 

EMMA BROWN: What did you want to be when you were five years old?

NOEL FIELDING: [laughs] When I was five? A cowboy. I used to wear this cowboy outfit. I wouldn’t take off. It was ridiculous. My mum was like, “You’ve got to take that off sometime,” and I was like, “No way, this is it.” It was the ’70s—it was turquoise and yellow, really psychedelic colors. I wanted to be a psychedelic cowboy. Or a zookeeper—that’s why we ended up doing the first series [of The Mighty Boosh]. Or a painter. When I was three or four, I was really good at drawing and painting, and everyone used to say, “You’re going to go to art college.” I didn’t really know what that meant. When you’re a kid and someone’s an artist, you think of Leonardo da Vinci. You don’t think that’s a job; you just think of a man with a beard painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

BROWN: Do you come from a creative family?

FIELDING: A funny family. My mum and dad are both really funny. My granddad’s really funny, my uncle’s really funny, everyone’s really funny. You have to be quick, otherwise you get roasted. Everyone takes the piss quite a lot. You have to be really sharp.

BROWN: Did you have imaginary friends as a child?

FIELDING: There was a big age difference between me and my brothers—about 10 years—so I was an only child for a long time. I used to hang out a lot on my own. I played a lot of weird games with a lot of imaginary people. I guess it’s kind of roleplaying, isn’t it? I had a cat called Jethro who had one eye, and I used to hang out with my cat quite a lot. When I was a really young child, I felt like I could see fairies. I was convinced there were fairies in my grandmother’s garden.

BROWN: Were they traditional fairies—little girls with flower hats?

FIELDING: Not just women, men in little green jackets. They were moving really fast, like birds almost, like tiny creatures. I don’t know what that was about. When you’re quite young, your imagination’s quite free.

BROWN: I wanted to talk about the beginning of your career. You won the Edinburgh Comedy Award for Best Newcomer at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1998. 

FIELDING: With Julian [Barratt]? Yeah. I did a standup competition earlier, in 1996 or something, and I got to the final. Frankie Boyle won it and I came in second. It was the first thing I did. Then the year after I did a standup show with Frankie Boyle and a few other people—Chris Addison, who directs Veep and was in The Thick of It. We had the same agents who said, “Why don’t you just do a half hour of standup each, rather than writing a whole hour of standup?” But then we got together and I said, “This would be quite good if we just do a crazy show. I don’t really want to do a half hour of standup.” And he was like, “No, nor do I.” Then we started writing a song about a mammoth and we were thinking it would be quite funny if we could make a smoothie on stage and if we got a girl to cry into it and drank it and fell in love with her. Then we thought it’d be good if we were in a zoo playing zookeepers, and we had an idea for this boss who sucks us through his eyes into this magic forest, and that became Rich Fulcher’s part. Rich wasn’t around when we were writing it, so we just told him we wanted to do a boss at a zoo called Bob Fossil—”You’re going to suck us into this magic forest”—and he sort of improvised it all.

The Boosh did well straight away. There was nothing quite like it. [Flight of the] Conchords do that kind of stuff now, but at that point… When we were just doing comedy, we did a rap song because we were into the Beastie Boys and Beck and hip-hop and stuff like Kool Keith. We wanted to do a rap song. We thought it’d be quite good if this zookeeper that Julian always talks about—his hero is a zookeeper that went missing—appears at the end. He disappeared and then Julian built him up as this amazing guy. And then there’s this character, a jazz-fusion guitarist in the forest, and he has a big afro with a door in it and he opens it and the zookeeper is inside his afro. He’s called Tommy and does a drum and bass rap. [laughs] That was the extent of our first show. But it was different, no one was doing stuff like that at the time. I think being in bands—I’ve been in bands—you’re not coming from a comedian’s point of view. I’ve done painting and Julian was into music. We just found the idea of standup a little bit limiting.

BROWN: When you came in second in the 1996 competition, what was your material?

FIELDING: That was me on my own. It was a long time ago. It would’ve probably been some stuff about having a starfish as a pet from my parents. All my friends got dogs and cats for Christmas, and I got a starfish called Roy. I used to take him down to the park on a lead. It was a weird, long, rambling story. There was some other stuff about chimpanzees—another weird, long, rambling story. And another thing where my dad was a hammerhead shark. I can’t even remember what these jokes were but they were very surreal. If the audience went for it, it went really well. If they didn’t get on board it was difficult.

BROWN: What was the split? Was the audience generally on board?

FIELDING: When you start, it’s not to do with the material so much. It’s more to do with how you can control a crowd and make friends with an audience and sell your brand of humor. When you’re new, you’re not really good at that yet. You haven’t really got the stage skills to sell bad material. They either go for it or they don’t. You’re a bit stranded if they don’t. I think I had a really good semifinal then at the final, I wasn’t too good because I’d been up all night worrying about it.

BROWN: Have you died recently on stage?

FIELDING: [laughs] No. Maybe in America this is different, but you don’t really die once you’ve been doing it two or three years. If you’re going to be a good standup, or a successful standup, or a standup who can work for money, you have to eliminate the possibility of dying quickly. If you still are dying three or four years in, maybe you should be a writer or an actor, maybe it’s not going to be the thing for you. I learned that quite quickly—I could get an audience into my world and if you can do that, they’ll go with you not all the way, but a lot of the way. [laughs]

BROWN: What’s the London comedy scene like? You seem to know everyone.

FIELDING: I think I just know everyone because I’ve been doing it so long. In comedy, you see yourself as a newcomer and then you realize you’ve been doing it for 18, 20 years, which is ridiculous. But I don’t really do gigs in London very often. When The Boosh was big it was impossible because if I did a small club it would sell out to just fans. I’d have to do unannounced gigs because your fans will laugh at everything because they know what you do already. What you really want is a neutral audience that isn’t too harsh—a good comedy crowd—but that don’t know necessarily what you’re doing. It’s very difficult once you’ve been on telly because people know what you do. They give you a little bit of grace but then they’re harsher if you’re not funny, so you have to be funny. Whereas you’re sort of a cheeky surprise when you’re unknown. Me and Julian always felt like if you take yourself off somewhere private and make stuff and then bring it out, it’s the best way because you’re not influenced by the scene and the circuit. There’s these weird little pockets—it’s like school, the comedy circuit. There’s people who are annoying, people who are bitter, people who are really nice, people who are friendly, new people, people who have been doing it forever. It’s a bit like that in Edinburgh [at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival] as well, it’s a bit cliquey and we always tried to separate ourselves from that. Also we decided instead of going around to different clubs all the time we would just do a residency in one place.

BROWN: Where did you do the residency?

FIELDING: In Highbury in this place called The Hen & Chickens, which was a little tiny theater above a pub—it held about 58 seats. We did it every Monday, which was a graveyard slot, but we worked out quite quickly that all our friends who had been out on the weekends liked watching something mellow [on Monday evenings]. We used to do an hour or so. We’d do cabaret stuff in the beginning—have a few of our mates on and musical stuff—and then have a break and then do the show we were going to take to Edinburgh in whatever state it was in, add a new 10 minutes every week or a new 15 minutes. That was how we’d do our shows. We did that for three years and that’s how we learned to try weird stuff. You couldn’t have done it in the confines of a comedy club because there would’ve been standups before you. We did a character where we had a tiny horse on a record player spinning around, a lot of weird shit that was visual, musical, that there’s no way you could’ve done between two standups.

We did do this one place, which is a proper comedy club. We didn’t even have a name at that point, so people would come in and say, “Those two guys are going to be on? The ones who call themselves Lego Wolves?” or whatever we called ourselves. We’d go on after the interval so if we were supposed to be in a forest we’d put loads of fake plants and trees everywhere, and we’d have a big boombox and weird sounds like a forest. We just did 10 minutes of us lost in the forest —a double act thing. And again, that was the basis of our first Edinburgh show.

I guess really what we were doing was looking for a way of doing comedy that wasn’t standup, that was theatrical and musical and visual, and a double act. Also Rich Fulcher was in it, so we had two English, mumbling, quiet people and then a quite brash American. It was quite the contrast. Eventually we added my brother who played the shaman, and then we added Bollo the Gorilla. We had a team: Dave [Brown] was really good at dancing and [my brother] Mike [Fielding] was really deadpan, Rich had a lot of energy, and me and Julian were the double act. We had a lot of skills in that little group so we were good at making shows. We evolved it really slowly and we toured it a little bit, we did radio shows, we did TV shows, we did big tours, we did a festival. The only thing we didn’t do is a film really, which hopefully one day we will.

BROWN: Have you had any surprising Boosh fans?

FIELDING: America was quite weird. It got really big in England really quickly, and it was kind of scary. We went on tour, and the first day we went on tour in York we tried to come outside the venue and there were 500 people outside. They were screaming and dressed up like characters from our show and they chased us to the hotel. My tourmate was Australian and he went, “Shit, what have you done? This is like The Beatles mate. You’re fucked.” We didn’t have a clue, it took us by surprise; we didn’t know anyone was watching. It quickly expanded until we were doing arenas and playing 10,000-seat venues. We’d do book signings and they’d camp out overnight and we’d have 7,000 people trying to get in… It was ridiculous. Then we came here [to the U.S.] and the fans here were much more hardcore, they had tattoos of Old Greg, Howard Moon, and Julian. People had driven from all over the country to come to these shows we did at the Roxy and the Bowery in New York. People drove from everywhere and got flights—they were much more serious, in a way. But then when I did Australia recently, they were nuts. They probably liked it even more than the English people. They loved The Boosh straight away, instantly. We’ve got a cult following here but I don’t know how this tour will go at all, which is quite exciting because you’re not in that position anymore—you used to be in that position when you started out.

BROWN: Where are you going on this tour?

FIELDING: We’re doing Boston and New York and Chicago and Portland and Seattle and Vancouver. Toronto, L.A., San Francisco—all the usual places. I don’t think we’re doing anywhere like Kansas. We’re not doing the deep South. We’re doing hipster towns, I guess, and they’re not massive venues. When we first came here as The Boosh, we’d done everything we could do in England so were ready to storm America. “We’re coming, The Boosh is coming!” It was really exciting, and we met Jack Black and Ben Stiller and Mike Myers and Trey Parker—like opening the door, and Mike Myers is like, “Let’s write a film,” and Robin Williams is coming to the gig and talking about the crack fox. We were quite overwhelmed. We were thinking of moving here and trying to do TV show but we had just done 12, 15 years in England and Julian had just had kids, so maybe it wasn’t the right timing. I always had a little bit of a regret about that. I always wanted to travel around and see lots of America, I’d never been to Boston, I’d never been to San Francisco even, so I’m quite excited to just go the places.

BROWN: Have there been any comedians that have come up to you and cited The Boosh as an influence?

FIELDING: [laughs] Yeah, there were loads. It’s manifested in other places, which is weird. Like the guy who makes Regular Show, he’s constantly citing us as a massive influence. I know the guys who did Spongebob were massive fans of The Boosh and they got Rich to do a voice. I see our influence in a lot of weird places, like films and animation and kid’s TV, and not necessarily other comedians. I guess it wasn’t really like comedy; it has more in common with Adventure Time or Regular Show than it has with a sitcom like Two and a Half Men. We’re light years away from that. We don’t own weirdness, we don’t own that style of stuff, but we got there first. It made it difficult for people with a similar sensibility to break through without people saying, “It’s a bit like The Boosh, what you’re doing.”

There was always this comparison between us and [Flight of] the Conchords, which I liked, because I really liked them. We’re friends with them. They started in music—we [went] from comedy to music, and they were music to comedy. I always thought it’d be quite fun to do a film with them, two double acts against each other in some sort of competition. There are a lot of young kids coming through who are a bit weird now. I think Russell Brand was quite a big influence on standup in England, Simon Amstell. I remember being really influenced by Eddie Izzard and Harry Hill and Stewart Lee and Monty Python, The Goon Show, Spike Milligan. You have to have people that you love and you try to be a bit like them, and then you find your own style from that. I was quite a bit like Eddie Izzard when I started, maybe more surreal. It’s always weird when kids go, “I love your standup, I try to do stuff like you.” I think, “Really? I don’t really know what I’m doing. How can you be copying me? I have no idea what’s happening.”

{x}

[aziraphales-library]

Erm-

Helloo‼️‼️

Havent asked before but, so here we go!

would you have any Artist Aziraphale recommendations? Or Artist Crowley?

Either one would be alright! —

You all are all angels,

thank you for making this blog!!! :D

Hi. We have #artist aziraphale and #artist crowley tags. Here are a couple more to add to both tags...

A Portrait For You by Izabella95 (T)

Aziraphale gets dragged out for the evening but not without bringing his sketchbook. He notices someone across the way and has to draw them. Anathema thinks he should give the drawing to the stranger. What could go wrong?

One Golden Glance (Of What Should Be) by Sunjinjo (G)

His first batch of pieces had all been starscapes, and increasingly big and dramatic ones at that. It’d turned out he’d really needed to get a lot of pent-up celestial creativity out of his system. Crowley discovers a new hobby. It might actually be a really old one, though, and the same sort of applies to Aziraphale. Can be read as a standalone work.

A Thousand Words by Kat_Rowe (T)

Aziraphale's been keeping a sketchbook for thousands of years. Crowley never knew that before, but somehow, it's no longer very surprising to him that he appears quite frequently.

The Poet's Eye by HolyCatsAndRabbits (E)

(Note that Aziraphale is called Ambrose in this fic) Ambrose watched Crowley stir into wakefulness just after the sun had fully risen. Ambrose was wearing a robe, sitting at the desk in his bedroom, scribbling out lines and phrases and sketches, trying to somehow capture Crowley on paper. Ambrose had never recited poetry during sex before, let alone written poetry while holding someone in his arms. He had, on occasion, stayed up all night frantically filling a notebook with ideas. Just not while staring at the man who’d fucked him the night before until he’d seen stars and all manner of other visions. Ambrose realized what had happened around three a.m., when he was in the middle of a series of drawings focusing on the line of Crowley’s neck as it curved up from his shoulder and then met the pillow. Ambrose had fallen into using "the poet’s eye" during sex, and he was still using it now, unable to stop seeing Crowley as a living work of art. It was the way he’d first glimpsed Crowley in the park, and here, with the beautiful firefighter lying naked in his bed, Ambrose was filling notebooks about him. The poor man had become his muse.

The Grand Design of Art and Coffee by kahlannightwing (E)

When sharply-dressed Anthony Crowley entered Azira Fell's coffee shop, the last thing the ex-bookseller expected was for him to be attracted to the painter. This was just a stop, per Gabriel's insistence, on Crowley's way to get rid of his art block. It was certainly not permission for Azira to develop feelings! Could it be that Crowley can fall as hard as he has?

Out of Suffering Into Love by Slow_Burn_Sally (E)

Aziraphale is a sexually repressed man who grew up in a religious household. Crowley is an artist with a sordid past. Both of them are afraid to love and be loved.

- Mod D

[curiiositycabinet]

Hi again,,,it’s me😜

Do you think !PIP would be fascinated at “the broken script” mod? the way it uses old textures and almost implements player like structures into your game, seems something that it would like. Also it has a slowed down version of subwoofer lullaby that freaks me out😭

Also is !PIP an oc? It seems like it, if so I really like it :3

GAH i have no idea qhy this never gave me a ping im so sorry 💔 but i will answer anyway

In short for anyone else curious: yes, !Pip is an oc, who was inspired off the mechanics of the popular “playmate” mod

As for whether !Pip would like the broken script or not, I’m inclined to say,,, maybe?

The knocker being tied to the player means he also experiences the same crashes and world deletes, which in turn both harms and irritates him. !Pip, on the other hand, is really none the wiser in every instance

I feel like !pip would definitely enjoy the more retro and classic parts of the game, but at the same time, he’d err a bit more on the side of the entities. Null doesn’t regard him nor the knocker at all which rules him out of being another potential playmate, all the swirly wirly integrity things are violent and therefore unnerve !Pip, and almost all other entities are either aggressive, mindless, or too rare or shy to ever be interacted with properly. As a result, he’d still feel a bit lonely, still defaulting to going to the player for company and games.

He would get excited at the sight of more “player”-esq structures though. It’d be a complete rarity to find a place with signs plonked down and strange words scribbled on, and !Pip would hardly know what any of it means besides the fact that maybe there’s more friends just hiding, waiting to be found!

[selfshipgushing]

I was all bowomp :( a few moments ago but seeing my ask being posted got me a bit better somehow cuz. F/o. Wahoo!!

And yes I am better now, atleast from the sickness!! I almost went "mom i frew up" but it's okay we balling. As for the AU's!! Imma share some!!!

— Hospitalized S/I. I had pneumonia once, would be funny to imagine my brother there when it happened (I was a kid so he'd also be younger). Roy took care of her and watched em draw on the whiteboard, plus got mad when she first got sick because "I JUST got used to have a sibling I can't lose it now"/silly

— The classic killing off your S/I </3 the meds looked a bit too yummy in her tummy. She protects her bro on the afterlife (specially cuz a lot of people hates him) and sometimes also "talks" to him, making scribbles on some blank papers. It's difficult to do so, so it's nothing too developed, but it's still communication!! She likes to draw hearts because it's easy + love!! ^^ /p

— Not really AU but scenario,, a what if gets to meet S/I's biological mother. She's an ass and he knows, and he's very protective too, so it'd be funny >:>

— MIND SWAP!!!!! I already drew this one actually!!! It's silly I recommend you guys to try

— Crossoverssss.... they would gimme such a good dynamic in a tadc crossover maybe,, both of them gets into the digital world but they can't remember each other, or just one of them does,, blows up the mod💥💥💥💥/pos

I wanna yap now can I. Can I explode ur inbox with asks. Pretty please/silly

— 🌺

you may always explode the inbox hibiscus anon

[vanilladreams-bah]

Hi there!! I have a fragment who seems to be dedicated to holding the fact that we yumeship? and thats it? I cant seem to figure out anymore than that. Literally anyone for them to latch onto would be helpful. They seem to be a HFJONE (object show) fictive and She prefers she/they pronouns but any others would be really cool.

✨ Now bringing you a gift from mod Willard:; Yumeshipper ✨

Name(s):; Taylor, Trish, Lola, Mina, Savvy, Destiny

Pronoun(s):; she/they + luv/💖/lol/scrib/ble/scribbles/XD/kiss/bow/kit

Age:; 17

Gender(s):; Demigirl

Orientation:; Pansexual, fictoromantic

Source:; Taylor from HFJONE

Role:; Yumeship holder

Faceclaim:; credit (can take both a human and nonhuman form)

Typing quirk:; types lowercase and informally (like your = ur, like = liek), uses face emojis a lot

Extra:; Big fan of y2k things and is an avid yumeshipper

[red-eldritch-warlock]

✦ Basic Oc info:

Name: Eberwolf Saskia

Class: The Warlock, Support class mercenary

Nicknames: Sorcerer, Mage, Wolf

Age: 25(?) [To be determined, rumoured to be immortal]

Height: 6’4

Birthplace: Graz, Austria

Gender/pronouns: Trans male, He/Him

Personality: socially awkward, solitary, reserved, neurotic, work oriented, cynical, easily flustered

Hobbies: palmistry, reading, collecting records, bookkeeping

Loadout: spellbook, sacrificial dagger, flintlock pistol

The lore(W.I.P)

Other stuff(W.I.P)

✦ Tags:

#Eldritch Invocations - Warlock post

#A gift from my patron- Warlock reblogs

#Whispers from the void - Answering asks

#Warlock antics - Rp starters

#Eldritch blast - Rp tag

#Eberwolf lore - lore tag

#Stag posting - mod posts

#Stag found this - mod reblogs

#Stag answers - mod asks

#Stags silly scribbles - Mod art / writings

Any sensitive topics will be tagged accordingly

!!Ooc and character description below the cut!!

✦ Blog info:

Warlock is an oc for team fortress two :)

I took inspiration from both dungeons and dragons warlocks and magic users, and @the-jack-class (specifically serpie and a bit of jasper) for this oc, and they deserve the credit(serpentine my belerpentine teehee)

I would like to keep this blog to be strictly 16+ with little NSFW. I have pretty bad anxiety, and receiving incredibly suggestive asks will most likely make that spike, and I don’t want to stress over my blog, this is for fun! Feel free to flirt and whatnot with Warlock, but anything i deem too far will get deleted or blocked based on severity.

i would prefer if minors did not interact, this blog may have sensitive topics discussed. or at the very least they do not interact with posts discussing said topics.

Mod is a self shipper, and is open to multishipping!

Mod uses he/him pronouns, and you can refer to me as Stag!!

Mod follows from @transfrogwithcoolsocks

Mod has insane social anxiety so i apologise if i come off as awkward or rude (i’m just a little guy)

Mod has the worst memory known to mankind, so if i send multiple asks it is because i forgot that i already sent one(i am sorrgy)

Any photos i use in posts will be found on Pinterest.

My other RP blogs are: @canineriot-fenrir @meet-the-trapper-tf2 @redhead-string-shredder @crutches-n-stitches @ultimate-exorcist-chyrche @darling-idol-hoshiko @dutch-bunny-rabbit @stupid-fishbait-moray @aussie-menace-dingo @kerosene-n-gasoline @lt-morse @hurricane-tsunemasu

✦ Rp info:

Rp will look like this:

[Actions and such go here]

“Talking will be like this”

✦ Physical description of Warlock:

Warlock is 6’4 with a lithe and lean physique, with toned arms and shoulders, slim waist and thighs and a generally lanky frame.

His hair is jet black and very curly, and is cut to shoulder length, usually tied back when fighting.

Warlock has fairly androgynous features, a sharp jaw, tired eyes, roman nose, sickly and pasty skin and bright violet eyes. He has some slightly unkempt stubble on his chin, and deep set eye bags. He also wears half moon glasses, and on occasion red tinted round shades.

His usual attire is a dark red velvet button up shirt with bell sleeves, a black leather corset, black flared jeans with a book holster on one thigh, heeled ankle boots and white satin gloves. He also wears a pocket watch necklace that has an octopus engraved onto it.

Mod is not the best with remembering to respond so I apologise if I forget about a thread or do not respond to an ask very quickly.

✦ Interact list:

Please do interact:

Tf2 Rp blogs

Rp blogs in general

Anons

Tf2 ocs

Other ocs(from any fandom!)

Nice people

Do not interact:

Basic DNI

Pedophiles

Transphobes/homophobes

Racists

Creeps

Hai friends :3 (sorry for the tags, i love y’all!!!)

@eagle-head-charge @wastelandtherapist @conductor-on-grn @sly-daffodils @red-demo-tf2 @rengineer @thenumberonerascal @averagebioweaponslover @meet-the-civilians @meet-the-net @tf2-nurse-is-dreaming

[csmeanerr]

Hellooooo anons! I’m feeling salty as FUCK today, so:

-WellHidden is a dickhead for not paying his admins

-Saunt is a lazy, greedy cunt who sells sketches for thousands— probably stuck that tablet pen up their ass too before selling chibis for 100 eur

-Densy is a moron in both business and design. That’s it

-Dainites are like if I made gryphons wear jackets and sold them as my own

-Terraliens are stupid as shit and they piss themselves if someone even uses the “transparent container with something inside” thing

-Seel isn’t even active lmfao, they just drop some random object themed Cham for $1k+ and dip for another year

-Sirfluff’s designs are just thinly veiled fetishes

-Waterdogs are even more fucking stupid as a concept, though all cs are

-Any CS that has a name of an animal combined with a noun is a cashgrab

-CS mods are like if Discord and Reddit mods had a lovechild and were able to make money off of shitty scribbles that look like a 5 year old drew them

-Succubuns are stupid af, mods need to grow some thicker skin

wellhidden not paying admins proof

saunt selling very sketchy designs for large prices when they can certainly make higher quality designs + a 100euro design that is less quality than even previous ones

the grems tag in general

dainties released a new subspecies called basals and have already started selling them for high prices

terralien tag since there's no specific issue mostly the co-owner bugbox drawing nsfw stuff as a minor and the species being generally understaffed and inconsistent with traits

chimereons has been on hiatus since july 14th 2023 and the last activity of seel in the species was may 24 2022 for an auction that went to 2.6k

sirfluffbutt's multitude of body horror themes in chowlings + did a youtube video of a censored nsfw game uploaded to their audience of minors

that time waterdogs made having disabilities a mythical trait

succubun mods banning users for negative reception about the species outside the server

some people think all ppl do here is complain (which is also true lol) but cs owners have done a multitude of terrible things using their platforms

[hoshinok-detective]

☆ Hello, My name is Kagami Hoshino. This Tumblr page serves as my personal blog. Containing my thoughts, my days, any other ordinary things that happens in my life.. aside from working as an assistant detective of course.

Tags to categorize.

#Myself🔍 — My posts.

#Frogger🐸 — Mod 🐸's posts.

#Scribble🔍 — Mod 🐸's art or doodle of myself.

#My🌟Star — For someone... I think.

#Answer💭 — Answers to all submitted questions.

☆ I accept all questions with a few exceptions to avoid problematic questions or assumptions. I am often busy, so chances are, I will not get to your question in time.

Below is Mod's part. Please read thoroughly.

🐸 BYF !! Please read before interacting !!❗

— This is a Project Sekai OC roleplay blog! please keep all questions to both Kagami and Mod sfw! (Mod is 17!!)

— This roleplay blog WILL be about OC x CANON, mainly the romantic pairing of Kagami & Tsukasa. Kagami is not open for any other romantic pairing❌

(—>OC x CANON is a type of media that's centered around making an OC and pairing them with a canon character from any show, game, or otherwise)

— If you are another pjsk rp account, PLS PLS INTERACT I WILL LIKE YOUUU

— Feel free to interact with Kagami as a Tsukasa rp account. highly encouraged actually

— DO NOT ASK QUESTIONS ABOUT OTHER TSUKASA X CC SHIPS ON THIS BLOG!! Questions asking about what they think of this ship etc will be highly discouraged and deleted. Please understand that this is for my own comfort 🙏 if you don't like it, don't engage.

— Mod bonus; I'll strangle you if you aren't following these ❌❌❌❌❌ (actually. follow them. please)

[🐸🔍 Both mod and Kagami use any pronouns!]

[Kagami's reference sheet !]

Google Doc of everything you need to know about Kagami in detail ! (note that it may not look good. I typed all of it on phone) — Tap here

[bizzybeasties]

BLOOD N' BONES

Left - " Ly " - She/Any & Right - Vry - He/Xe/It

This is a Ask/Rp blog for two of my bizzyboy ocs - Ly and Vry are two bizzyboys with their own quirks, Ly being a Werewolf and Vry being a Vampire. I'll be using purple to indentify Ly's speech and vise versa with Vry but with pink. While they aren't related: They do have a strong familial bond so I'd like to state here. Don't ship them together: You WILL be blocked.

Important Info/tags below!! Please make sure to check them out!!

divider credit

BASIC INFO

This is a sideblog. My main attached to this account is that of @bizzyboyalexei but my main main? account I'm most active on and serves as more of a personal one is @monstored ( I post cool art there sometimes. )

I'm the same mod that runs @grujaja & @bizzydriver as well.

I also tend to use foul language and somewhat suggestive jokes from time to time. Although nothing beyond what's on par with the game.

All spoilers WILL be tagged accordingly!!! Although I wouldn't suggest interacting with my blog if you haven't finished the game personally.

Seeing as these are ocs, don't feel pressured to interact!! this is all in good fun ofc!!!

Feel free to interact and build relationships w/ them. Hell. if you wanna give your character on crush on either of them go for it However there may certian restrictions w/ their romantic preferences in future so if you ARE wanting more with either of them. Please talk to me about it

TAG KEY

Asks

🐺 - Ly@bizzymail [ Ly Specific Ask Tag ]

🦇 - Vyr@bizzymail [ Vyr Spesific Ask Tag ]

🐺🦇 - Beasties@bizzymail [ General Ask Tag ]

RP/Interactions

🐺 - WolfieMishappenings [ Ly Specific RP Tag ]

🦇 - VampiricMistakes [ Vyr Spesific RP Tag ]

🐺🦇 - MonsterMash [ Both Rp Tag ]

Event Tags

Specifically for events that might be happening on the regular. I'll also be including small descriptions.

🐺 - Moon is full circle [ Ly Full Moon Event ] Because y'know - a big thing w/ werewolves is the fact they're transforming every full moon. I'm gonna try to do this whenever the full moon is actually happening. idk it's silly and I think could be interesting so keep an eye out!!

Other

🐺🦇 - Scribbles of the damned [ Art Tag ]

🐑 - Mod is talking [ Mod / OOC Tag ]

other tags coming soon!!!

[oekakidogarchive]

I’m curious: what is oekaki?

Hi! Good question. We can start with a quote from Waccoon, the creator of the Wacintaki Oekaki Boards that me and a lot of others have used in the english speaking sphere.

Oekaki is a Japanese term that roughly translates to “doodle” or “scribble.” On the Internet, oekaki boards are bulletin boards or forums dedicated to drawing pictures that are drawn using a paint program that runs in a web browser. Traditionally, early oekakis were simple pictures drawn with few colors on a canvas measuring 300 × 300 pixels, and they were posted sequentially, rather than in a threaded gallery format. Oekaki boards started showing up on Japanese web sites around 1998, were only available in Japanese, and were often dedicated to anime and video game fan art. Today, the drawing programs are much more sophisticated and allow more complex drawings of different sizes and in multiple layers, but the oekaki bulletin board format usually remains the same. Oekakis are largely dedicated to original work you have drawn yourself. Photographs or work you did not create yourself are discouraged, and in most cases are not allowed. Some oekaki boards allow you to upload pictures from your computer, but most do not. The term “oekaki” may refer to both oekaki drawings and an oekaki board. When someone draws an oekaki, they are drawing a picture. When someone draws on an Oekaki, or looks at oekakis, they are usually referring to participating on an oekaki board.

In English speaking spheres, many oekakis were dedicated to anime, pokemon, or other such popular media in the 2000s. Despite this, many of us liked to draw sparkle animals to represent ourselves in images, thus birthing the oekakidog. As said in the quote, art programs have far surpassed what the old oekaki applets can do, and are much more accessible to a young burgeoning artist than back then, so oekakis fell out of interest, and the removal of java applet support in modern browsers all but was the nail in the coffin for oekaki.

However, a lot of us are nostalgic for the old programs we used to draw in and the allure of a bulletin board styled way of community, so there's been attempts at reviving oekakis. With Paint BBS Neo basically a 1:1 port of the original Paint BBS we all loved in HTML5, I do think Oekakis have a chance at revival and for a new generation of artists to use. Who knows what the future holds?

Mod Cy

[eldritchtouched]

Alleged Final Boss Leak (Part 1: Designs/lighting/etc.)

Good grief, there's so much to unpack with this.

I'll be blunt, I think this in particular is fake. (I don't really know anything about the other supposed leaks, but I knew based on how people were reacting, that something was up with this in particular, so I took a gander.)

I was initially unsure of if it was AI or a sketchy mod, but as I've been looking through everything, I think the supposed cutscene screenshots are AI generated garbage and the gameplay is a janky mod.

That being said, here there be dragons, this might be the spoilers for the endgame, etc.

Supposedly, it's Radahn.

Supposedly, Radahn is Miquella's promised consort. We will unpack the lore implications another time, but there's a lot that doesn't make sense there on all levels.

And Miquella is riding on Radahn's shoulders like some kind of Lorian/Lothric situation, at least for the second half.* (*It's not actually the second half, others have noted it's earlier than that, at around 70% health.)

So, let's talk about designs. I initially saw the supposed stills of the cutscene, and it just makes me go "stuff isn't right in the designs here." Admittedly, I don't really have reference photos of Radahn because I don't really draw him, so I grabbed others' screenshots tonight of him/his armor in the base game, so yeah. Even then, I knew stuff was really off.

First thing's first, We've got Radahn. Now, Radahn here looks weird for several reasons. First is that the red lighting comes from nowhere. The red lighting is more appropriate to bloodflame like in Mohg's fight, or Messmer's flames in the trailer, and is thematically inappropriate in relation to him (he notably uses a lot of gravity magic, which is purple).

Second, Radahn's hair is funky in a lot of ways. In this first image, there's a lot of noise around his hair that doesn't actually make any sense. It instead looks more like what AI tends to do, which is put in random scribbles in place of details.

He also has two random braids. Now, if you look at everything in the base game, he doesn't have braids. Neither the helmet the player wears based off of his armor, nor his design in the cinematic trailer (when he was actually in his "prime"). Nor the paintings in Volcano Manor of him, for that matter. Likewise, his braids are two different styles. One is actually sort of individualted in the plaits (his left, viewer's right) and the other is just a vague suggestion of braids (his right, viewer's left). Even then, they both look flat out wrong- a person wouldn't draw/paint/design braids like this, even if they fuck them up.

The details on the helms are similarly a "close enough" situation. For example, the metal filigree on the helm itself is wrong. Instead of intricacy, it resembles instead wavy fur.

Likewise, how the fangs are set in the supposed leak are wrong. The fangs are too broad relative to the rest of the helm, and don't have the distinctive gaps found in the original helm where those teeth are supposed to be set in the gums.

The lighting is also nonsense. Somehow, there's a red light source from his chest, but this doesn't affect some parts, and there's a golden light source that somehow affects and doesn't affect random things.

His helm is also melding into his hair instead of being distinct.

The Miquella stuff also makes no sense.

Here's the supposed leak of the first image.

The lighting in all of this is total nonsense.

First, Miquella's lighting implies he's being lit from the audience's left, because all the shadows are on the audience's right.

Meanwhile, Radahn's lighting implies the main lighting is from the audience's right, which should affect Miquella differently if he's being affected by ambient lighting. There's also a spot that should be lit (the tip of the tusk on his helm, especially given his face also has ambient lighting) and something on his shoulder that shouldn't be lit by that main light source because Miquella's blocking it.

There's also some wonky anatomy shenanigans. For one thing, Miquella is melding into Radahn's armor. For another, he has another, spectral right arm.

Incidentally, this spectral right arm, despite clearly supposed to be glowing, isn't affecting any of the ambient lighting on either Miquella's flesh or Radahn's anything at all. Likewise, despite Miquella clearly supposed to be glowing, Radahn's armor doesn't have proper ambient lighting.

(Also, what the fuck is that outfit, Miquella?)

On top of that, Miquella's braids are complete nonsense. This isn't how braids work, nor how people who accidentally fuck up braids while drawing/painting (I know I have) fuck up their drawing of braids. The lines are where they are. They start and stop randomly, and are in weird places for braids.

On top of that, his hair randomly melds into Radahn, and starts and stops in weird ways that nobody would paint if they were drawing/painting.

(Sidebar, Miquella's 'crown' looks like compete nonsense, too.)

Now, there's a second image with Miquella.

So, first, the lighting changes. Instead of being to the top right, it's now directly overhead. It also seems not to properly affect the blades of Radahn's swords. (Again, Miquella's glowing, including his glowing arms, don't affect Radahn's lighting for no particular reason.

Miquella's anatomy is also wonky as hell again. His left arm just... ends and he has two spectral arms without apparent hands grasping onto Radahn like Lothric during the Twin Prince fight.

Radahn's anatomy is also wonky as hell.

For context, in the base game, he looks like this. He's a very top-heavy guy, very broad chested.

Not only is he in a random ass, stiff as hell A-Pose, he's also suddenly much more lithe and is way less top-heavy/broad-chested.

The details are also screwy on his armor and swords. First, the swords, because they're simpler. They're thinner and longer than they should be proportionally to how Radahn is both here and the base game. They also have the wrong insignia on them. Instead of the gravity magic sigil, it's... random lines.

For context for his armor, we also have a lot of weirdness. First, here's a few images to refresh your memory on how it actually looks in the base game.

It is very clearly fur-lined at the joints, his arms are clearly fully covered, and the actual metal pattern on the chest piece is clearly supposed to be pseudo-fur, like a lion's mane.

First thing's first, his chestpiece now has a lion's face on it, and random fake abs.

He has random belts everywhere that start and stop without rhyme or reason (light blue). He also seems to have bare arm joints now, but for some reason the undershirt he has on is straight up flesh colored or something with golden embroidery (his right arm) or some random ass string (his left arm)

He also has a lot of weirdness going on with his lower half. He has an empty black void where his crotch should be. He also has the wrong design along the fringe along his waist, and is missing the armor that should be on his hips. Instead, nondescript red fabric (?) is there.

Likewise, he has two sheathed swords on his hips that don't make any sense and just kind of... float there?

[fordcrownvictoria]

Billy May: The Brass-Kissed Rascal of American Sound

If you’ve ever sipped a martini under a ceiling fan while the needle dances over a Sinatra record, you’ve probably heard Billy May—even if you didn’t know his name. Swaggering through the American music scene like a big-band cowboy with a trumpet for a sidearm, Billy May was not just an arranger or composer; he was a sonic prankster, a whip-smart technician, and the secret sauce behind some of the most iconic sounds of the 20th century.

Born in 1916 in Pittsburgh, Billy May grew up inhaling the golden fumes of the jazz age. He cut his teeth as a trumpeter in the Charlie Barnet Orchestra, where he first made waves with his arrangement of Cherokee, a sizzling, horn-heavy number that put both Barnet and May on the jazz map. But the trumpet was just his front-facing talent. Behind the scenes, Billy was scribbling down wild, electrified arrangements that would later catch the eye—and ear—of big names who needed their sound sharper, brassier, and more alive.

The Collaborator: Swing with a Twist

Billy May didn’t just work with the stars—he supercharged them. His collaborations read like a Grammy Hall of Fame guest list: Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Bobby Darin, Peggy Lee. But these weren’t just gigs. May’s arrangements helped define the very persona of these artists. With Sinatra, he co-invented the “swingin’ bachelor” sound—think Come Fly with Me and Come Dance with Me—brassy, buoyant, and rhythmically irreverent.

He took Nat King Cole’s velvet tone and wrapped it in plush orchestrations like Just One of Those Things, blending elegance with zany instrumental accents (a May trademark). He gave Dean Martin that lazy, lounge-lizard lope, and with Bobby Darin’s Oh! Look at Me Now, he proved that he could take a rock-turned-crooner and make him sound like he’d always worn cufflinks.

He didn’t limit himself to vocalists, either. May’s film and television scores ranged from the slapstick (he scored The Green Hornet and contributed to The Mod Squad) to the grand (The Great American Pastime) and the bizarre (Naked City). He even wrote music for The Muppet Show, which might be the most May-like of all: technically brilliant, slightly unhinged, and irresistibly charming.

Brass Bones and Sonic Architecture: A Composer’s Playground

At first blush, a Billy May arrangement may sound like a swing party wearing a lampshade on its head. But underneath that bravado lies a deeply intelligent, architecturally precise musical structure. May was no random joker—he was a musical engineer who designed every shout, every swoop, every flutter with surgical precision.

Form and Phrasing: May gravitated toward 32-bar AABA forms, a staple of Tin Pan Alley songwriting, but he rarely let them lie flat. Instead, he used orchestral hits and punctuation to reframe sections, often making the "B" bridge explode in contrast. His introductions (the “pickup architecture”) were nearly always cinematic: brass fanfares or “fall-offs” that teased tonality and groove before the main melody kicked in.

He employed tight modular phrasing, dividing arrangements into 4- and 8-bar blocks with internal tension and release arcs. Each phrase often started with a syncopated motif—frequently in brass—and was then mirrored or answered in reeds or rhythm section, creating a conversational fabric within the ensemble.

Harmonic Language: Though rooted in swing-era jazz harmony, May flirted with advanced chromaticism. He loved secondary dominants, deceptive cadences, and parallel modulations. For example, in Come Fly With Me, he subtly shifts tonic centers to give a sense of upward motion—harmonically “flying,” if you will.

His voicing choices were especially progressive. He would stack chords in extended tertian harmony—9ths, 11ths, and 13ths—but often voice them with close intervals in the low brass for a snarling, compact sound. He was not afraid of tone clusters and bitonality in transitional sections, particularly in comedic or cartoony interludes.

Instrumentation and Orchestration: Billy May’s orchestration is where he truly played god. He often orchestrated in “choirs”—brass, reeds, strings, rhythm—with each section behaving like a character actor. His brass writing was iconic: plunger-muted trumpets, bass trombone in the basement growling like a tuba, and trumpet shakes that made the air vibrate. He exploited register spread masterfully, with piccolos and lead trumpets floating above baritone saxes and bowed basses.

May’s "slurping saxes" were one of his trademarks. He often scored saxophone solis with rapid chromatic slides and scoops, passing melodic lines across alto to tenor to baritone in ascending or descending chromatic fragments. It sounded like the saxes were laughing.

Woodwinds weren’t just for padding either. He employed flutes and clarinets for comic relief, often using them in jabbing, staccato figures or octave displacements that interrupted the flow with a wink.

Rhythm and Time Feel: Rhythmically, May was never square. He favored laid-back swing feels with drums and bass slightly behind the beat, giving his uptempo numbers a kind of looseness that still felt tight. He frequently layered triplets over straight eights, making rhythms bubble and swirl. Syncopation was key—horn stabs fell off the beat, then resolved precisely in time with the vocalist.

He was particularly fond of "false cadences"—moments where a line seems to resolve harmonically and rhythmically, only to be subverted by a slapstick brass hit or sudden key change. These were more than gags—they were rhythmic punctuation, keeping the ear alert and amused.

Counterpoint and Interplay: His internal counterpoint was dazzling. Behind a simple melody, there might be a dancing clarinet obbligato in thirds, a walking trombone line that echoed the bass, and offbeat piano punches. He often used mirror counterpoint—having two instruments approach each other melodically from opposite ends of the register, intersecting on a punch chord or unison figure.

This wasn't just busy orchestration—it was spatial design. May arranged as if building a sonic city, where every street had its rhythm and every building its resonance.

Legacy: The Big Swingin’ Goodbye

Billy May passed away in 2004, but you’ll still hear his fingerprints in everything from retro lounge revivals to TV bumper music that tries (and often fails) to swing as hard as he could. While others took themselves too seriously or not seriously enough, May danced that perfect line. He believed music should entertain, but never be cheap. It could be playful, but never careless.

He made the music jump, jive, and occasionally hiccup with glee—and never once apologized for his exuberance. His scores had personality: they chuckled, they strutted, they whispered sweet nothings in your ear and then slapped you with a trombone.

In an era when arrangements were supposed to play second fiddle to the singer, May made sure the music sang too. He was the ghost conductor of the American songbook—always in the wings, grinning, with a trumpet mute in one hand and a glint of mischief in his eye.

So raise your glass, cue up Big Band Bash, and let the brass blow wild. Billy May isn’t just a name in the liner notes—he’s the reason those notes dance.

[raspberriesim]

hello hello ♡ my name is elisabeth & this is my lil sims blog :') bookworm, shy, brooding, friendly, & supernatural fan!

cc finds. (under co!)

resources. ♡

reshade: moonbloom (settings adjusted a bit for less eye strain </3), sometimes senshi (with mxao 4.0.2 fx)

cas lighting: usually none, but i have been trying out this lighting mod (side light) by breezytrait. remember to only have one in your mods folder at a time btw!!

in-game lighting: no blu (gameplay ver) & no glo (v2) by luumiasims.

cas background(s): i cycle through a few depending on what color matches a sim's skintone / hair / clothing. most come from bobatrait & berryconfetti, along with this background that looks just like the sims 2 cas room <3 again: remember to only have one in your mods folder!!

presets: northern siberia winds, evoxyr, miiko, sammi (most used lip presets actually), kijiko, obscurus-3D (both curly & straight).

contacts: sims3melancholic (#123), simsenshi, simmerstesia, nintensims, waterblue. i rarely use default contacts, so most are non-default :')

skins / skin details: tba!

defaults: fluffy clouds replacement, kawaii moon (normal).

overrides: aesthetic main menu (sweet passage currently), flip phone (v2 / gray), friendly scribbles font.

* please remember i am still learning how to edit / have pretty screenshots & images so please be patient with me !!