#then merge these small lots into a big lot and translate or move them using REST and FBDI (file-based data import) to meet the requirements

[cockslutpadalecki]

Ohhhhh can I request some dub/non con (you can write it with whichever in mind) alpha!Sam x Omega!reader x alpha!Dean, where the boys are in the middle of a deadly rut and they take her (maybe she's engaged to another alpha or something) as their mate and are intent on breeding her??? Gimme smut and angst galore! 😘😘

Summary: In the midst of a truce with a rival mob family, the Winchester brothers want one more thing to sweeten their deal. But when Y/N’s Alpha refuses to hand her over, they decided they’re going to have her regardless.

Characters: Alpha!Dean x Omega!Reader x Alpha!Sam.

Words: 2.8K

Warnings: non con/dub con, a/b/o dynamics, forced marking, explicit sexual content, mentions of knotting, kidnapping, drugging, talk of suppressants/heats, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it kids), cream pie, breeding kink, a little praise kink, use of restraints, multiple orgasms, oral sex (female receiving), 18+.

A/N: It’s not as angsty as I was expecting, but I hope it’s enjoyed nonetheless. Betas: @winchest09 and @deanwanddamons but all the general bullshit is entirely mine. While likes are gold, feedback is golden. My work is my own, therefore I do not give consent for this story to be re-posted or translated to any other site. Subscribe to Patreon and get access to fics, just like this one, two weeks before Tumblr for as little as $3.

You smell them before you see them.

Like rain in the air ahead of a big storm. The kind that can decimate your house in seconds, leaving nothing but destruction in its wake.

A perfect metaphor to describe them, you think. Chaos and violence follow the Winchester brothers wherever they go.

You know you should bolt the moment your fiance greets them at the door to his office. Your eyes follow the imposing Alphas as they stalk across the room towards your partner’s desk, their footsteps silent as they’re swallowed up by the carpet.

When the two men sit down, that’s when you really feel it. Something’s off. Like their scents have soured over time, but it doesn’t stop your Omega instincts from stirring inside you.

Months of negotiations have led to this moment— a truce between the two families after decades of rivalry. A chance to make history and end the bloodshed tainting the streets of Lawrence, Kansas.

When the pleasantries and introductions are dealt with, the conversation steers towards the matter of trade offs.

To make this coalition work, they had previously agreed to merge their specialities, using each other’s contacts to keep them at the top of the food chain, so to speak.

Dean and Sam Winchester are to provide guns to your Alpha’s men, and in turn, your beau gives them a cut of all profits pertaining to the drug shipments he controls.

The conversations and arrangements over the last few months always seem to end positively, but there was something that never felt quite final to you. Like they’ve been holding back on a request until today.

“So if we’re all set, we can move ahead and sign this,” your Alpha’s voice brings you back to the present, your gaze on the stack of papers that makes up their contract.

“Wait,” Dean stalls, holding his hand up.

“Are we not done?” your lover responds, a little confused.

“My brother and I have thought a lot about it, but there’s one more thing we want.”

You watch your Alpha relax into his chair, curiosity pulling at his features.

“Her.” Dean’s almost golden eyes flicker towards you.

The air thickens as your beau lets out an incredulous laugh. “No chance. She’s off the table.”

The older Winchester reaches into the waistband of his trousers and pulls out a small handgun, laying it on the table to face your Alpha. “Then so is our deal.”

“She’s my Omega, I can’t give her away. She belongs to me.”

“Doesn’t look like you’ve claimed her,” Sam intercedes, eyes lingering a little too long on your unblemished throat, “so she’s still fair game, is she not?”

You watch your fiance crack his neck, see the way his features darken and you know the Winchesters have pushed him too far.

“The answer’s no,” he grits.

Without another word, they shrug at each other, seeming to accept his response. Dean flashes him a wide smile as Sam slumps back into his chair, and the conversation quickly changes trajectory. You let out a sigh of relief through your nose, but as the meeting progresses late into the evening, the sour taste continues to linger on the flat of your tongue.

-

Everyone is long gone by the time you leave the office. You do your usual check in with the security detail positioned at the main entrance before wishing him goodnight and take the elevator down to the underground parking garage. It’s deserted when you step out, and in any other situation, you’d probably be glancing over your shoulder in five second bursts, but you know you’re safe here, in amongst your Alpha’s grounds. Nobody would dare touch his Omega otherwise they would risk losing their hands… or heads.

You make it to your overpriced, flashy car and curl your fingers around the door handle, but you fail to make it into your seat before everything turns to black.

-

Every fibre in your being aches when you wake in a room you don’t recognise. A cannula sits neatly in the crease of your elbow, and your wrists are shackled to the metal frame of the bed you’re laying on. From what you can tell, your feet don’t seem to be restrained, but your ankles smart as if they once were.

Your skin feels like fire has burrowed beneath it, singeing your veins, and your stomach rolls as your senses pick up on a familiar scent you can’t place yet. As slick starts to gather between your thighs, forcing you to jolt fully awake, afraid of the implications.

It can’t be your heat. You take your suppressants every morning at seven am without fail. You took them this morning with your orange juice and oatmeal.

But how many mornings have passed since then?

The concept of time feels like a myth here, and even though the room has a window, the makeshift blinds are drawn, blocking out any light trying to break through. It could be the next morning or an afternoon a week later— you have no idea how long has passed since you were ambushed in the parking lot.

At least that’s what you think you can remember. It’s all just a blanket of obsidian, daring you to try and pull back the curtain to take a peek at your reality.

You rack your brain, but trying to think hurts even more— the steady thumping in your temple becomes increasingly uncomfortable.

You start to look around the room, any sign that might lead you to the identity of your kidnappers, but it is as nondescript as they come. The bed you’re laying on is basic, and the only other piece of furniture you can see is a chair in the corner, looking long forgotten.

You try to roll on the mattress, but your movements are impeded by the shackles at your wrists. Letting out a frustrated sigh, you resign yourself to the fact that you’re stuck like this until the owner of the handcuffs returns.

If they ever do.

Tears begin stinging at your eyes, wondering when or if you’ll ever see your Alpha again. If he’s even looking for you once he realised you were missing— if he’s realised.

He must have. You’re his most prized possession, you try to reassure yourself just as the cluck of a weighty lock pulls you from your teary reverie.

Your head feels heavy when you turn it towards the door, eyes flickering as it opens and a man you’ve never seen before enters, carrying a tray of what looks like medical supplies.

As he places it down onto the bed beside you, you notice the piercing blue of his eyes and a wave of serenity washes over you, calming you instantly.

 “You’re awake,” he says softly, and you figure he must be a Beta from the way he smells— lavender with notes of sweetest chamomile. It reminds you of the pillow mist on your nightstand. “They will be pleased.”

“They?” you croak, throat sore from lack of use. “Who are they?”

“I’m afraid I cannot divulge that information until my bosses are ready to make their identities known,” he tells you, his fingers expertly preparing a syringe.

You blanch when he nears you, even though your brain reminds you comfortingly that he’s harmless.

“Don’t worry, it’s just saline,” he explains, and points to your arm. “I need to flush this.”

“And what’s that?” you ask, eyeing the bulbous IV bag full of clear liquid.

“Food. They need you to keep your strength up.”

“For what?”

“Do you always ask this many questions?” he smiles.

“Only when I wake up in a strange room with no recollection of getting there, and a needle in my damn arm.”

“I take it this isn’t your first time,” he jokes.

“How’d you guess?” you scoff, voice dripping with sarcasm.

This time the Beta laughs aloud, and it’s like music to your ears. “I’m Cas,” he introduces, even though he seems hesitant. Like he could get into trouble for doing so.

“Y/N,” you reply, before adding, “but I guess you already knew that.”

He smiles, giving you a small nod as he quickly replaces the old IV with the new.

“What is this place?”

“I’m afraid I cannot divulge—” he repeats almost robotically. 

“—  that information,” you interrupt dejectedly as Cas fiddles with the connection on your cannula, making sure it’s tight. “Gotcha.”

Heavy footsteps sound outside the room, and Cas instantly stiffens. You can see the way his fingers shake as he picks up the tray, collecting the medical waste to dispose of. You want to ask him if he’s alright, but instead you bite down on your bottom lip to stifle it. He’s clearly unnerved, and no doubt sick of your questions by now.

Suddenly the door crashes open, and your eyes widen at the sight of the two men filling up the doorway. Finally, the familiar scent you couldn’t place before makes sense, and now it surrounds you like a heavy mist. Your body reacts against your will at the stench, no longer sour or off-putting, but as if your sense of smell has returned after an illness.

You’ve never inhaled something as decadent in your entire life, and it practically blindsides you, as the sound of the recognisable deep baritone voice exacerbates the aching pulse in your cunt.

No, no, no. Not your heat. Not here. Not now.

“Ah, look Sammy, our pretty girl’s finally awake.”

There’s no mistaking it. You finally know who’s responsible for taking you.

The Winchesters.

-

It’s nighttime when the cramps start. Rolling, pinching, contracting agony that rips cry after cry from your parched throat. If you were in any doubt before that your heat was coming, this confirms it. Your body is feverish with sweat, the thin cotton negligee you’re dressed in clinging to your clammy skin. The throbbing in your pussy is almost as painful as the cramps forcing copious amounts of slick to pool between your thighs.

In normal circumstances, you’d almost be embarrassed by how wet you are, but right now, you can’t even fathom shame while you’re desperately trying to cross your legs just to relieve some pressure in your cunt.

Your underwear is long gone, unaware of when or how, and you actually crave the cotton panties, wishing you had some material to create some friction against your sex.

Writhing against the mattress does nothing to quell a single symptom, and you can feel the frustration inside you mounting as your conversation with the Winchesters that morning— night— who knows when before, rattles through your brain.

“We had to keep you sedated to flush those nasty suppressants out of your system,” Dean explained, running a finger down your bare forearm. “Why you’d want to poison this flawless body with those things, I’ll never know.”

His finger moved— up and over the swell of your breast, and gently circled your puckered nipple. You tried to stifle the need to react, but your body had other ideas. You whined, eyes flickering shut as the weight of his touch caused your hips to cant towards his wandering hands, edging closer to your sex.

“She’s close. I can smell it on her,” he sniffed over his shoulder to his brother. “Another couple of hours or so, and she’ll be ready.”

You let go of a deep hum. “R-ready for what?”

The two Alphas smiled down at you before Dean spoke again. “You’ll soon find out, sweet Omega.”

You almost howl at the intensity of the heat, trying to remember the last time you had one this bad, but you can’t recall— your mind is too preoccupied with the waves of arousal laying claim to your body.

You haven’t a clue when the Winchesters appear at your bedside, neither one wearing anything except a pair of sweats. The sight of their glistening chests and rippling pectorals is enough to send another wave of cramps crashing through you, eyes squeezing shut as you can’t concentrate on anything but the rising tide of arousal deep in your core.

“Is she ready?” You hear Sam’s distinct growl, the depth and husk making your skin prickle with heat.

A hand is shoved between your legs, and gives your cunt a tight squeeze. You keen, rolling your hips against the pressure even though it does nothing to stifle the ache.

You’ve no idea whose hand it is, and you no longer care as they stimulate your clit with the pad of their thumb. A desperate whine escapes you, and you start to protest despite your need for release.

“She’s ready, Sammy.” There’s no mistaking Dean’s voice beside you. “She’s gonna take a knot tonight.”

“N-no, my Alpha,” you cry out in a pitiful state, eyes finally flickering open to stare up at the painfully handsome man above you.

“Ssh Omega,” Dean says, pressing a slick coated finger to your teeth-bitten lips before he brings it to his own and licks it clean. “We’re your Alphas now.”

Fear freezes your heart as the bed suddenly dips between your thighs, and Sam’s rough calloused hands run up your shins. You try to close your legs, but he’s too strong in this instinct driven state, his primal need to mate overriding any other coherent thought.

The younger Winchester nestles between your thighs, licking a wide stripe up your cunt and you mewl into the damp air above you. The room already stinks of sex and pheromones, and it’s making your dizzy.

You come across Sam’s tongue the moment his fingers breach your wet heat. In your heady, lust-drunken stupor, you think your quick and sharp climax is enough to sate you, but the cramps only seem to intensify now that they’ve touched you. Like your body craves more from them, even if your mind is screaming otherwise.

“M-more,” you whine, rolling your hips against Sam’s face, hoping he’ll give you what you’re begging for. You need to come again, and fast.

“Omega bitch wants more, Sammy,” Dean laughs when they switch places, his now naked form snug between your thighs. “Can’t deny her when she’s crying out for it.”

He bottoms out in one hard thrust, his fat wide cock filling you to the hilt. You can already feel his knot swelling as he retreats, and you let go of a chest-bursting scream when he ruts back inside you roughly.

You don’t care that it hurts, or that the burn of his knot helps to keep your pussy gaping as he fucks you with reckless abandon— you just need this heat to end.

The coil in your stomach tightens until the tension is too great and it snaps, your body trembling on the older Alpha’s cock as you surrender to your orgasm.

“God, just look at you comin’ on my cock,” Dean says in awe as your body sags back against the mattress. “So pretty laid out for us like this, ‘mega.” 

The praise shouldn’t elicit such swollen pride in your chest, however the docile component that helps to comprise your DNA can’t help but make you giddy. 

“Can’t wait to fill up this tight little cunt, make you all round with our pups,” he adds soothingly, rubbing a hand over your stomach. You blanch at his words, and try to wriggle from him, but the fact you’re still shackled to the bed means you don’t get very far at all.

“Where d’you think you’re goin’?” Dean’s tone changes in an instant as he tugs you back the inch or two you’d retreated in an attempt to get away, impaling you completely on his thick cock. “I’m not done with you yet.” 

-

Your cunt is bruised and aching by the time Sam has his turn, his hot spend leaking out between your puffy folds. Every inch of you hurts from his voracious appetite— fucking you over and over until he’s sure he’s pumped you full of enough Alpha seed to make sure you end up pregnant. You should be horrified with yourself, but you’ve never felt more satisfied. The symptoms of the heat are finally subsiding, and your cramps all but vanished the moment Dean’s knot popped inside you, filling your womb to the brim with his release. 

Sam is still between your thighs, fingering the mess he’s made back into you, the dirty squelch of wetness making shame heat your cheeks. 

Dean stands over you, brushing damp hair from your clammy forehead as he gazes down at you with a wide yet macabre grin. You can feel a plea fizzing on the tip of your tongue, but you swallow it quickly, realising that even in this cock-drunk state there’s no point in pleading with them to let you go and release you back to your Alpha. 

But he’s not your Alpha any more, your thoughts cruelly remind you. The puckered, bloodied marks on either side of your neck have certainly made sure of that.

***

Supernatural: @allys-creative-bubble @angelofthetrenchcoats @akshi8278 @cluz1babe @deanwanddamons @deanwinchesterswitch @fandom-princess-forevermore @flamencodiva @fairlyspnfanfic @hobby27 @jensengirl83 @jensenswinchester @katelyn--renee @mrswhozeewhatsis @notinlovewithdeanwinchester @peachyafshawn @patrick-hockslutter @pink-sparkly-witch @spnbaby-67 @sammykb1994 @sharp-cheekbones-locked @tumbler-tidbits @treat-winchesterswith-kindness @thoughts-and-funnies @thegirlwhorunswithwinchesters @vicmc624 @waywardbaby @winchest09

Forever: @amandamdiehl @buttercandy16 @crashdevlin @dangertoozmanykids101 @daughterofthenight117 @donnaintx @danneelsmain @dandywinchesterbras @deangirl93 @doozywoozy @downanddirtydean @foxyjwls007 @gayasslookinass @hoewkeye @heyyouwiththeassbutt @hoboal87 @ilovefanfic86 @jewelswrites-ish @joseyrw @letsby @letsdisneythings @mogaruke @notyourtypicalrose @nik2write @novawillowbarnes @obsessivelycapricious @pinkshenanigan @princessmisery666 @rattwritesfics @sea040561 @sweeterthanthis @slutformarvelmen @simpformarvelmenandwoman @stoneyggirl @that-one-gay-girl-reads @warriorqueen1991 @wonder-cole @xoxabs88xox @zooaliaa

[apparentlyaswarmofbees]

Let's kickstart the reopening of requests with some Levi loving moments shall we~

I decided to kind of merge both of them together, I hope it ended good~

Have a good day too~♡

I wrote this while having the newest song from E ve, Aono Waltz on repeat the whole time. It's so good

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Wave Vortex - A Leviathan x MC mini fic

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Summary

It happened so fast. Too fast.

If anyone asked Levi if he had ever been in love, he wouldn't miss a beat before replying 'yes'.

.

Warning: uncensored swearing, Leviathan being anxious and insecure af.

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It was supposed to be a fun evening, he had finally put his foot down on his insecurities and asked his best friend, THE best of friends, to go on a date with him.

And they said yes, hells, they said yes.

He was on cloud nine for the entire week, day and night, during boss fights, anime episodes, even to the point of spacing out inside his fantasies while he was trying to rant to Henry exactly about said fantasies.

He was happy, so damn happy. But he was also scared shitless.

He was just so awkward, he couldn't do anything right except for being an otaku, he was ugly and couldn't even express himself unless he was roleplaying, he just knew he would ruin this, he knew.

But he was just so excited.

And now as he sat on a bench outside the human world Aquarium you two were supposed to be having a fun evening at, he couldn't help but think that he should have cancelled the plans and walked away as soon as he started having bad feelings.

Not that it wasn't fun at the start of course.

He may have had arrived one hour earlier than promised and probably made you feel bad about having him wait though for some reason you arrived only a few minutes after.

"I was just too excited to come" they had said, he knew they had to have known he left earlier and came rushing despise it all, he really is a pain in the ass isn't he?

But even so, the moment he bumped his hands with yours and you took a hold of his pinkie, his brain was mush all over again.

He tried his best to make it fun for you, speaking to every single aquatic life swimming around and translating to you whatever they were thinking.

"Oh... Oh!" He exclaimed

"What is it?" You looked back and forth between the demon and the silver fish staring at you two from the glass "what did it say?"

"I-It likes my eyes" he didn't know how to feel about being complimented by a fish, though Henry did cheer him up whenever he needed.

He could hear you chuckle from besides him and turned his head to look at you (he got a bit startled when he met your gaze, were you looking at him all this time?) "I like them too" you smiled, his eyes widened "your eyes kind of remind me of a sunset".

He was spluttering incoherent noises for a good five minutes after.

You guys even found a little place selling soft ice cream cones, he was a bit excited to find what flavor you would order, maybe next time you two hung out together he could pull one of those date moves and get an ice cream for the both of you...

"...What next time?" Leviathan hunched his back over his legs, hiding his face in his arms. Would there be a next time...?

It was all going so well, even though he was a nervous wreck and couldn't even fully grasp onto his best friend's hand because he was a coward just like that. Even then, even then, he believed the two of you were having enough fun, you told him so, and you were smiling, so at least part of it had to actually be true.

But of course, his younger siblings had to come a ruin everything.

And it happened so fast, too fast.

You asked to try his ice cream, now that he looks back at it, he isn't sure why because you two had gotten the same flavor afterall.

But he didn't think of that at the time and let you take a taste.

And he was just so hipnotized by your lips covered in ice cream, he seriously pondered if this was what Beel felt like while looking at food. That little smile, the small lap of your tongue as you cleaned the skin off the cold treat, and missing a spot.

He was going insane.

And that's when it happened.

"Just kiss already dammit!" Came a loud scream from not so far behind him.

It was familiar and high pitched, Asmo, and followed by a second familiar voice, Satan, telling the other to not yell.

But it was too late. The damage was already done.

The moment the lust sibling had finished his line the ice cream cone Leviathan was holding out for you fell off his hands in a jerk motion as he jumped.

Spilling all over your chin, neck and clothes.

Clothes you had specifically told him were your favorite and you had specifically dressed with because you spe cifically told him you also wanted today to be special.

Fuck

Fuck

"Fuck!" He exclaimed right there and then.

You looked down at yourself, mouth agape.

He couldn't stay there. He had to get away, away before you got angry, away before you officially declared all his hopes for naught.

And that's how he found himself trying to not have a full blown panic attack on the pretty damn unconfortable bench he found his sorry ass seated upon outside of the hellhole his brothers and their human housemate found themselves in. Well deserved for someone like him right?

Now that he thinks about it, he should have stayed and helped you clean up right?

"Fuck" he groaned before raising his head to prevent the tears gathering around his eyes to spill out.

He really just had to make a big deal out of everything and ruin it didn't he?

Why was he always like this?

"Levi!" Oh sweet lord of shadows he almost jumped out of his skin again, it was you. And you were running towards him.

He debated to himself if he should run away or stay, deciding that he already ruined things enough by not helping you clean up, he should start apologizing, maybe that will make you less angry-

He stood up, he couldn't make his feet move towards you but he was ready to speak, he could try to do damage control, he could do it.

He opened his mouth to speak but you were faster, you always were.

"Are you okay?"

And he felt so stupid all of sudden.

You weren't angry, you were concerned.

You shirt was clean though he could see it was still wet, why weren't you angry?

Well, he already knew the answer.

Because it was you.

You understood him, you knew he was already on a peak of anxiety the moment he asked you on a date a week ago, you knew him.

You knew him.

And so he couldn't help but start crying.

But this time he didn't hide, he didn't run. This time he reached for your hand first, this time he held onto it fully, this time he really looked at you.

"It's okay! I'm not angry!" He was making you even more worried and you didn't know if you should touch him or not "you're much more important than my favorite clothes! Well, it is still going to be a pain to wash it though-" he kind of wanted to let out a defeated laugh at that.

"I knoooow" he said in between tears. "I'm sorryyy"

He heard you sigh "I know" of course you did "and I forgive you" of course you did "and the day is not over yet, we can still do something fun today!" You paused, looking down, almost skepish "and I want to spend more time with you", he held his breath.

Of course you did.

"I'm sorry I didn't stay to help you clean" he finally let out in a husky voice. He wanted to blame Asmo, be angry at him for startling him in the first place, but either way he shouldn't have left you alone "if it stains I can try to find some kind of spell to get it off"

He looked down to his feet, his hand was still holding onto yours tightly.

You were quiet for a while, he was about to look back up when you did the job for him by lifting it up by his chin with your hand gently.

And you kissed him.

Deeply yet softly, gently yet passionatelly.

He didn't know what he was expecting but it definetelly wasn't this.

You cupped one of his cheeks with your free hand, his face stunned, but at least the tears stopped coming.

"I do love you Leviathan" was all that scaped those lips he was already starting to miss.

If anyone asked Levi if he had ever been in love, he wouldn't miss a beat before replying 'yes'.

Afterall he loved a lot of things: He loved his animes, he loved his games, he loved Henry and he loved his waifus and husbandos. He loved many things but, none of those things could ever reciprocate his feelings, not really.

And he was used to it, he was used to loving without being loved, it was safer, better, free of potential rejection.

But you loved him.

Even after so many times he ranted your ear off about something you probably weren't interested in, even after not being able to fully help when you felt bad other than keeping you company and entertained, even after he has proven himself to be too much of a coward to be fully honest with his feelings but still too stubborn to fully give up on them, even after he ruined your favorite clothes and left you alone to clean it up.

He really needed to step up in his game huh?

He felt his face burn and his heart burst, he wanted to look away from your eyes but couldn't.

Leviathan really did love a lot of things.

"I... I do, I love you too"

And one of those things was definetelly you.

[bunsblr]

Tu... torial? Pt. 5.

Final part of my tutorial! This is a little all over the place, because that’s how I am in this stage of editing. Also I didn’t proofread this...

Open this in dashboard for best view of the screenshots.

Disclaimer: I have no formal training for any kind of graphics stuff, I work in an office as a receptionist - I serve coffee for a living. I am absolutely self taught and while I consider myself pretty comfortable with photoshop, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t about a gazillion of other things that can be done that I have no idea about. There are people far superior than me in the Sims community. This is just how I do it, with techniques I have picked up through the years. Some things I go over in these will be pretty basic, some things a little more unorthodox. Disclaimer 2: My edits take time. This is what I do to relax, one edit takes several hours for me. Sometimes days :))) Disclaimer 3: My photoshop is in Swedish, which is my first language. I tried my best to find the English translations for every step that I do.

Tools used: The Sims 4, Adobe Photoshop 2020, One by Wacom Pen Tablet (very basic and unfancy).

It´s hair time baby! I very much enjoy drawing hair on sims. I make a new empty layer on top of my base Sim layer.

This is where having a drawing tablet makes a huge difference. We need the brush to be sensitive to pressure to get the effect of hair strands. I chose a hard brush, small small size (how small depends on the picture size of course, but I usually land somewhere 6-9 px)

I pick up a color from the hair, I usually starts with a medium light color.

I start by drawing strands around any tips of the hair so they don't look quite so solid. I do this part with both short and long hairs. Hot lazy tip: straight unlayered hairs is the absolute easiest. This is a layered hair so I start with the bottom and work my way up. I pick up different colors from the hair as I go along, to add dept.

Continuing up in the hair and add strands to the pointy bits.

When I feel like the pointy bits have been softened I select one of my hair brushes. I use these ones by Para Vine.

I start painting "around" the hair with one of the lighter colors picked up from the hair, changing the direction of the brush every once in a while for a more natural result.

After this the hair is looking a little fuzzy, so I'm going to go back with my small harder brush to fill these parts out.

I don't add a lot of them, just small bits here and there for filling.

This is a little overkill but... now we have some of that "squary" thing going on in the hair as well that are still showing through our painted layer. Now we could paint over these, but painting can actually be overdone and I wan't to keep the hair recognizeable because the creator put a lot of work into it! So I go into liquify and smooth over any wonky lines still showing, just slightly.

A comparison of before and after hair. Still recognizeable, but softer.

This is our result so far. We've come a long way, but we're not done.

At this point (or actually sometimes sooner) I add an adjustment Curves layer, this will not end up in the finished image, this is just to give me an idea of what the image might look like with more contrast (which we will add later). I keep this at the very top of the layer panel and turn this on and off as I go. Very important to have it turned off if we are going to eyedrop a color and use that to paint, since it would pick up the wrong hue if we have it turned on.

Now I still want the front of my sim to be a little darker to fit my lighting, but I don't want to go over with any more shadow. So I duplicate my Sim layer, and go to Layer -> Adjustments -> Curves. This will only change the active layer, as opposed to creating an adjustment layer down in the Layer panel that will change all layers below it. I drag the curve down a bit to make my new Sim layer darker.

I add a layer mask to my new Sim layer, and bucket fill it with black color so the new layer gets hidden.

I chose an absolutely HUGE soft brush, with medium opacity, and starts painting white on the areas where I want the new darker layer to be showing. And blend by going back with black where the line is to harsh.

Time to add some highlights. I create a new empty layer between my two Sim layers, and add a clipping mask by holding Alt and hovering on the line between the new layer and my bottom sim layer, until the little square with the arrow symbol comes up and then click. This will make whatever I do on my new highlight layer, only show up on the areas where the layer underneath is filled.

 Time to paint. I disable the curve adjustment layer for this. I choose a bright color, in this case a light pink because I didn't want a contrasting color for this picture. I go with a big soft brush around the edges where I want my highlight to hit. In this case, the arm, the hand, the arch of the back and the calf. I didn't add anything to the face in this picture because I didn't like the way it looked, but usually a little highlight to one of the cheeks is just *chef's kiss*

And somewhere around here I got really stuck and really struggled to follow with this tutorial. I felt the picture was lacking something and I tried several different things. I added light rays, tried creating different light sources, there was a moon at some point. But I ended up with just a simple additional gradient shadow down in the right corner (on a new layer down in the Background layer group). Life changing…

And then I didn't like the pink highlight on the skin (sigh, this is how I work, but it’s not recommended to be this indecisive) so I removed that and added a more beige-yellowee highlight instead. And forgot to take a picture after the highlight was added....

And now I go into nitpicking mode. I add a new empty layer on top of my Sim layer, I add it under the highlight layer so it automatically takes on the clipping mask of the Sim layer, I name it Clean-up Crew and go in to refine anything slightly wonky. Picking up colors with the eyedrop tool and going over flaws with a tiny brush.

When I fixed this little light area on the back of her head I left the Clean-up Crew layer and went to my Hair layer instead, because I still have that separate and it's above all the other layers.

I thought my sim was a little too far down in the picture so I moved her up by selecting my whole Sim layer group and the layer on which I have her ground shadow, chosing the move tool and pushing them up. This will move all the layers in the Sim layer group as well as the ground shadow layer equally.

I'm telling y'all, nitpicking mode could go on forever. Added more strands to the bangs.

Noticed a little pointy part on the calf, so I wen't into Liquify on the base Sim layer and smoothed that out. Since the highlight layer has a Clipping Mask corresponding to the Sim layer, the highlight stayed in place.

I duplicate my Sim layer group once more, and merge the layers within this group. So now the Hair, Highlight and Clean-up Crew is all merged onto the Sim layer. I hide the previous Sim groups.

With my new Sim layer selected, I go to Image -> Adjustments -> Hue/Saturation. I want to make my Sim a little less bright so it will match the background a bit better.

I drag down the Saturation and Brightness slider a bit until I like what I see. After this I save my whole image as a PNG-file because from now on I want to edit the whole picture but still want to keep this psd-file as it is for anxiety purposes. Important: I disable my curves layer before saving this as a picture, I don’t want that brought with me into the next steps because I will be adding new curves there.

I open my new saved PNG-file. I go to Filter -> Convert for Smart filters. This will allow us to go back and change any filters we add to this layer. I go to Filter -> Camera Raw Filter and for some reason this window opens up humongus. I start by dragging down the temperature. How much depends on the picture, usually more if it's nighttime.

I pull up the Whites a bit for a cleaner look.

Now I add a Curve Adjustment Layer. Now you can add Contrast in the Camera Raw Filter as well, but I prefer the curve layer because I like to control the different levels. This way I can make my darkest parts a little brighter, giving just a little washed out flair to it all.

I select my background layer again and go to Filter -> Noise -> Add Noise and choose a level that I think looks good. This just brings the picture together a bit more. Also vintage vibes :)))

I add my frame (because it´s my aestethic and I think it looks cool on tumblr) by resizing my workspace and adding a filled white layer underneath the background layer.

I resize my picture (Image -> Image Size) because we don't need it to be huge.

And they I just fine tune the Filters and Curves until the end of time :’)))

And that is that my friends! That’s the end of the tutorial! I hope you could follow somewheat and that someone found it useful. Thank you for reading and never be afraid of contacting me if you have any questions :) I’m very friendly.

[rpg-elf-girl]

Shadows House

I have a lot of thoughts surrounding this particular show, both good & bad.

Allow me to give a quick summary for anyone who hasn't seen/read it!

Shadows House is about 'a faceless family of nobles who all live within this giant manor, the Shadows House.

When a Shadow comes of age they receive a 'Living Doll' to both serve as their face and to clean the soot they emit from their bodies.

The most important rule of the living dolls is "don't fret over trivial matters"

A task which is difficult for the ever curious doll Emiliko.

Watch this tale unfold as Emiliko & her mistress Kate navigate this ever mysterious Manor together.'

For a fan of slow burn thrillers, horror, slice of life, supernatural & mystery series' this has been an absolute blast!

It's not quite the combination of genres you'd expect from a show, but it works really well here!

In fact I was so into the anime that this is actually the first show where I broke down and read the manga!

Unfortunately there's no official English release, but at least there are some people translating the series!

As much as I'd like to go on about the manga, this post is meant to be more so about the anime so I'll (try to) leave it at that.

Though i feel obligated to warn anime onlys I'll likely refer the manga a lot in a spoiler section latter in this post I'll try to be vague but I can't guarantee anything. For anyone worried about that I'll lable it do you can read on until then.

Everything from the animation to the music was amazing & completely fit the mood of the story! I remember a couple scenes where I actually teared up because of this!

The Ending theme is an absolute banger! I've listened to that on repeat ever since I first heard it! And the Opening is also great! It's cool for it to be an instrumental, stuff like that is pretty rare! I also heard the song in the op as a motif in the music throughout the show! It really sets the right mood in each scene it's in! It's amazing for getting into each episode!

In terms of adaptation almost everything from the beginning to the end of the Debut arc was done amazingly well!

Even with the stuff they cut it still holds true to the spirit of its source.

The main important part that was cut is something that could easily be introduced latter if they decide to go for a second season, so I'm not too mad about that.

However! Everything after the debut is a bit of a different story.

There was a lot I liked about the last couple episodes but there were some parts that were immersion breaking for me.

I've been being vague up until this point l, but I'm planning on going into spoiler territory for both the anime and manga after this. So I'll make a quick spoiler free summary of my thoughts before moving onto that.

I really really loved this show but in my opinion the last 3 episodes were the weakest of them all. They went anime only for the ending. I don't mind that on it's own, but it was rushed and the writing was sloppy at times.

Now I'm not telling you to not watch the show! Most of It's really really good, and I can still see people enjoying the parts I'm talking about if they want to give the anime a try. Overall I've fallen in love with this series and I could never recommend it enough.

If what I'm saying is giving you bad vibes the manga is available and doesn't have the issues I've mentioned. You can look for a translation online, it didn't take me long to find one so don't worry too much about that.

Also! if you're an anime only who's finished the series and want to know where to pick up the Manga I'd recommend at least skiming through the beginning. I know it might not be what you're looking for but there were a bunch of small scenes that either got cut or were merged for adaptation purposes that I think are super cute & give more context to different aspects of the setting. However! Pay close attention during the "night watchers part" something important got cut .

~~~Now for spoilers!!!!~~~

I don't want to make it sound like I'm some manga purist who hates the very thought of the slightest change from the source. I'm anime only for a lot of different shows and I've always despised it when that type of manga reader reared it's ugly head.

While I'll admit some changes did bother me I won't make a fuss about the smaller stuff.

With that said!

I hinted earlier in this post that I didn't have a big problem with Robe-same being cut. That was because without them there it does make for a more complete story if they only get one season to work with.

If there is another season they can easily be introduced latter on. Like maybe Emiliko & Shaun can meet them when the Debutant class reunion is going on before they talk on the roof (or right after that) I actually think that would be the perfect time to introduce them (other than the time they were supposed to appear, but I digress)

Louise teaming up & being friendly with Kate can be explained with some dialogue changes at the first Debutant Class Reunion. Louise can say she was just trying to show off or that she just wanted to get back at Edward and that she isn't interested in helping Kate with her problems. Things can then go on as they did in the manga.

Kates being reckless & telling everything to John can be explained by her being extremely panicked when Emiliko went missing, as long as there are some lines of dialogue adressing this it's fine. Though I do wish she tried to keep some stuff a secret but couldn't because Shaun tries to interfer because he's still brainwashed, or something along those lines. It felt a bit weird after she just told Emiliko to keep that stuff between them. Still that could be explained by how panicked she was.

There are other things, but I don't want to drag the post on too long. Most of the issues can be fixed with little changes here & there.

I never had a problem with the idea of them going in an anime only direction. I just want to have a good time with the show.

Unfortunately I can't 100% vouche for the direction the show went in. There were elements that I can't excuse, even viewing it as it's own entity instead of an adaptation.

My main complaint with it is how they handled the brainwashing of Ricky & Lou. They didn't say a word when the Debutants were talking badly about Edward & even went along with a plan to go against him. It makes absolutely no sense!

Shaun freaked out when John only suggested that he didn't have to be loyal to the house. These guys were flat out rebelling against an adult! It felt like Ricky & Lou didn't have a purpose & were just there to be there.

The whole point of the coffee is to influence shadows against doing stuff like this. It makes the coffee seem pointless and the adults seem dumb for relying on it to control the kids.

I haven't even brought up the fact that both of their brainwashings were broken by something as simple as a few kind words. It straight up contradicts the rules established by both the Anime and Manga.

This becomes very apparent when you consider all the trouble John & Kate went through to free Shaun & Emiliko.

This was my biggest complaint, but I have some other issues as well.

The next big one is how they handled Edward.

1. Why on earth would he even consider kidnapping Emiliko when he had complete control of the childrens wing? Before this point he was depicted as being a lot more crafty than this. He could easily have Kate monitored or something.

2. Why didn't he use his powers to stop them like what he did to Maryrose & Rosemary when they fought back being taken to the adults wing? He's already shown off his power at this point, why not?

3. Why did he reveal his soot powers at all!? Especially while using his face in front of the kids! The whole unification thing is one of the biggest secrets of the house for good reason! There's no way he wouldn't get in huge trouble for exposing it to children!

Here are some other related questions.

Why didn't Kate, Emiliko, & John react to Edward using soot powers? They shouldn't know about unification yet so why didn't they act shocked, or say anything about it?

Is Edward being banished even an option in the Shadows House? Wouldn't the third floor lords just dispose of him rather than risk letting him leave?

How did John even get a veiled dolls outfit? Louise had to use her powers to get Kate one & she left a long time ago.

I can't think of much else at the moment, but I think you get my point.

Please don't take this as me saying that I hate the show because of these episodes. Even if I consider them the weakest of the series I still found a lot of parts to be very enjoyable!

Like I thought it was adorable When Edward was attempting to interrogate Emiliko & she kept being her sunshine self pretending to eat & falling asleep.

Barbara getting to tell off Edward for breaking the rules was great!

I loved seeing Shaun hatch the plan to get Kate into the adults wing to save Emiliko.

Seeing John (attempt to) sneak around the adults wing had me rolling!

The ending scene of Shaun, Ricky, & Lou singing gave me the chills.

(Though I wonder how they'd handle Shaun & Emiliko being brainwashed again since they already used the scenes where they're freed)

Kate & Emilico being propelled by John back to the children's wing was absolutely amazing! I found Shaun & Ricky running over to catch them to be super sweet! (Not to mention the way that scene was animated was absolutely gorgeous!)

Getting hints to what was supposed to come after the debut was nice, at least the groundwork is there in case this gets a season 2!

To (try to) wrap this all up while there were a lot of things I loved and disliked about this show I still had a really fun time watching it!

I kinda hope there's a season two just to see if they can tidy up the mess that the last few episodes created.

Regardless of whether that happens or not I came out of this with a series I absolutely adore.

Heck I could make a whole other post about the manga. (Hopefully one that's less ranty)

Anyway! I won't take any more of your time.

I hope you all have a wonderful day/night! And I hope to see you in my next post!

(Sorry if this one was a bit of a mess!)

[cheri-translates]

[CN] Victor’s Patio Date (Eng Translation)

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a date which has not been released in English servers! 🍒

MC: It’s finally over!

I stretch, basking in the warm afternoon sunlight. 

MC: The air-conditioning in the meeting room was so strong. I almost sneezed...

Victor: That’s why you held your breath till your face turned red?

MC: I did not...

I want to retort, but both our phones vibrate at the same time. 

Curious, I tap and open the message. The sender is Ronan. The beginning of the message reads: “Inviting Mr Victor and Miss MC...”

[Note: If you don't know who Ronan is, check out Victor’s Understanding the Human World date before continuing]

Victor: To attend an appointment on the sky garden of the CR Building, a subsidiary company of LFG, after three days, at 7pm.

Victor softly reads the bottom half of the message aloud - he has received the same message.

MC: I remember that Ronan invited internationally renowned architects to build the film sets for his new movie. It should be this sky garden then? Since he has invited us, could it have something to do with the new movie? 

Victor: We’ll know when we get there.

He looks at the phone in his hand indifferently. Despite his expression, it seems he already has an answer. 

-

Three days later.

Victor and I reach the CR Building punctually. 

Ronan: The two of you are here. Come, the movie preview is on the top floor. 

Without much idle chat, we exchange greetings, and he enthusiastically leads us to the elevator. 

MC: The shoot has already been completed? That’s pretty fast. 

Ronan: Mm, the shoot this time went really smoothly. Whether in the capacity of a friend, or the biggest investor, I want the both of you to be the first few to see my movie. 

MC: Why did I receive an invitation too...

Hearing my soft confusion, Ronan laughs loudly while he responds.

Ronan: When we were shooting Dévotion, it was only because of your cooperation that I could shoot a romantic and poetic Chinese wedding. Also, the movie this time was largely inspired by the two of you, so inviting you is definitely reasonable. For example, Victor revealed that, to him, you are actually...

Victor: Often impudent, and require improvement in time management. But once you slow down, your work capabilities have indeed improved quite a bit.

MC: ...why do I feel like what you told Ronan had nothing to do with my work capabilities. 

I arch my eyebrows, not wanting to show signs of weakness. I toss a grimace towards Victor.

Before phrases in my mind such as “a woman’s instincts are very accurate” leave my mouth, Ronan starts laughing as he watches us from the side.

Ding--

Along with a soft ring, the elevator halts steadily at the highest level of the building. The exquisite sky garden greets my vision as the elevator doors open slowly. 

Green trees display their leaves on mid-air platforms, and flowers of differing colours are scattered around, decorating the area.

The course of a river is guided by steel, flowing into a waterfall, gathering into a river,  and slowly flowing around the trees and flowers.

Victor: The movie preview will start in ten minutes. How much longer do you plan to dillydally? 

As though he isn’t drawn to the view at all, Victor simply holds his hand out in front of me. 

MC: Yes, yes. As expected of the Mr CEO who has seen the big world - displaying an unchanging expression even after seeing such a view.

I hold onto his hand readily, and subtly lean against his side a little more.

The corners of Victor’s lips seem to curl upwards slightly. He accommodates to my footsteps, and we head to the venue together. 

-

The movie preview is extremely successful. 

Summarising the legend of the sky garden, Ronan illustrated a story of the male lead’s struggle at the end of the world, looking for an oasis. 

And the climax of the story occurred at this very sky garden--

Lights and shadows merged with drifting flower petals, the last green leaf, and the last water source at the very end of the world...

Apart from the excellent narrative, the visual effects from the film alone gives one unparalleled enjoyment. 

After the movie ends, I can’t help but give a standing ovation. 

A few members of the audience, who were immersed in the movie like I was, send their cheers to the directors and actors. 

MC: As expected of Ronan’s movie - it’s really brilliant.

Victor: Mm. It’s his usual standard. 

Although Victor says this, he isn’t stingy with his applause. 

MC: There’s a really immersive feeling knowing that we’re in the most beautiful scene of the movie...

Victor: Let’s go then.

Right after the words land, my palm is already encased in warmth. 

Victor: To look at the garden you’ve been thinking about in your heart since just now. 

MC: Okay! It’s a rare opportunity to walk into the beautiful scenery crafted by world-class directors and architects. If we don’t take a proper look, it’d be such a pity.

Victor: In that case, follow me and don’t let go of my hand again. 

MC: Anyway, no matter where I am, you’ll always find me in the end. I won’t get lost. 

We stand up, and I smile while holding onto his hand tightly. 

He lets out a soft laugh. Maybe it’s my misperception, but the night seems to become gentler along with him.

I hear the sound of gurgling water in my ears, and red corn poppies bloom among the shadows of trees.

My fingers brush against the tips of bushes, and I feel the branches carrying the coolness of night. 

MC: Sigh... it’s a shame that this place would be torn down after a while. And it’s such a beautiful set-up designed by a famous architect...

The more we stroll in the garden, the more I feel sorry for its impending disappearance.

Victor: You really can’t bear to see it gone? 

MC: In the bustling city, such a garden is just too precious. 

The corners of Victor’s lips lift in response to my words. He responds calmly. 

Victor: The garden will be retained, and will become a cafe open to the public in the long-term. 

MC: So in the future... it will also be LFG’s property?!

Victor doesn’t comment. 

Victor: Once the movie preview is over, there will be a gradual adjustment of the layout and decor. 

MC: ...it’s really nice to have money.

Victor: That’s your biggest takeaway after watching the preview? 

MC: Of course not. I have very deep thoughts regarding this movie!

Victor arches his brows, as though waiting for my “deep thoughts” and review. 

I clear my throat, temporarily tossing aside my feelings towards capitalism. In my mind, I start recalling the images from the movie. 

MC: In Ronan’s movie, the lead keeps searching for an “oasis” in order to settle down and have sustenance. Every person needs his own “oasis”. It’s only when one has a foothold and a place to rest can he continually move forward. 

Victor: Looks like you really watched it seriously. 

MC: Which is why I’m very surprised by your decision to retain this garden. Perhaps it can become an oasis for busy people in this bustling city. 

Victor: If it’s possible, that would be best. 

MC: You don't think such an idea is overly vague or idealistic? 

Victor: You can only move forward with some resources. This is the same for everyone. Moreover, it’s only when you have a goal in mind and know where you’re heading towards, can you walk far, and walk steadily. 

I run a few steps in front, then turn around to stick out my tongue at him.

MC: Are we here to participate in the movie preview, or to do an inspection with you? 

Victor: Watch where you’re going.

Slightly resigned, Victor pushes aside some branches sticking out along the path. He reaches out and pulls me back to his side. 

Suddenly, a different view from the slender and delicate poppies enters my vision.

MC: Roses!

I blink. In one corner of the garden, in replacement of poppies, crimson roses bloom warmly under the moonlight. 

At the side, there are even a few bean bags and a small coffee table. 

In the luxurious and majestic garden, the roses, while sharing the same colour as poppies, add a different style to the courtyard. 

My thoughts drift to the rose-scented town I had once taken a slow walk with him in.

[Note: This is a reference to Victor’s Magnificent Date] 

I can’t help but smile and ask Victor a question.

MC: Is this one of the methods to attract visitors and raise property value? 

Victor: Yes.

Victor admits it matter-of-factly, but there’s a smile in his eyes. 

Victor: Ronan’s team insisted on adding different understandings of this theme in order to portray a richer definition of an “oasis”. Since they asked for my opinion, I naturally gave them my view.

Standing under the warm yellow street lamp, Victor’s expression looks exceptionally tender. 

Victor: From what I see, the result isn’t bad. 

-

There is a subtle sweet aroma of roses in the air. I sit comfortably on a bean bag, asking Victor with a grin:

MC: What other adjustments will be made?

Dressed in a well-ironed suit, Victor is also half-lying on the bean bag, looking somewhat languid. The aura surrounding him has become much more gentle. 

It’s as though we aren’t at a bustling movie preview, or a sky garden on the top floor of a building.

It’s just a normal weekend evening, in a small courtyard belonging to us, as we shed off the week’s worth of fatigue.

I can’t help but think of the afternoon he slept in front of me, and remember the day he had revealed an almost imperceptible state of relaxation to me. 

[Note: This is a reference to Victor’s Return Home Date]

Victor: You look like you have a lot of thoughts? 

MC: Of course I do! I’ve been to various shooting locations, and have met mature producers with differing styles. Apart from that, I’m also a contemporary member of society with a delicate mind and good aesthetic sense. Which is why I’m clearer than anyone else about what a stressed worker needs most in terms of external care. Just look - even my house is very warm, right?

Victor: If you can change your habit of leaving things lying around, it might be considered a “warm” house. 

MC: This is called “integrating with the masses” - it’s a small beauty in life.

Recalling the earlier topic, I stand up, pulling Victor as we head to the inner area of the park.

MC: For example, I think this place could have a few more elegant seats.

I point at the hanging rattan chair underneath the flower stand. 

MC: That way, visitors would be more comfortable when sitting down. Also, this path we walked on - although it looks very pretty in the movie, it’s easy to get hooked by bushes at the side. If it weren’t for your words just now, I would have definitely bumped into it. Also...

I look towards the trail lined with trees on both sides, leading towards the centre of the park.

MC: Maybe this is just my selfish thought, and has nothing to do with increasing practicality or comfort. However, if I had a choice, I would change these trees to Platanus trees. 

Several strands of shock flash across Victor’s dark eyes. Then, he opens his mouth to ask in slight amusement:

Victor: Why is that so? 

MC: Legend says that the Hanging Gardens was created by the king of Babylon for his wife who was suffering from homesickness. 

[Note: Platanus trees were part of the Hanging Gardens. Platanus trees, also known as Oriental Plane Trees, are a frequent motif featured in Classical Chinese poetry as an embodiment of sorrowful sentiments due to its autumnal shedding of leaves]

I walk along the small trail, staring at the poppies swaying in the wind. 

I wonder if that king, all those thousands of years ago, carried such a heart - wanting to give such a luxurious gift to the person he loved. 

MC: No matter what others may say, I also wish to leave the best things to the person most important to me. To build an oasis within his sight and touch where he can have a peace of mind. You’ve left a corner of the camellia garden for me, so I also wish to give you a small trail lined with Platanus trees. 

[Note: This is a reference to Victor’s Maze date, which is available in EN]

I raise my head with a smile, not caring that my cheeks have already heated up. I observe Victor’s dark coloured eyes carefully, and tell him what’s in my heart calmly and sincerely.

Victor pauses for a moment. Apart from surprise, his eyes also contain an undercurrent of a deeper and heavier emotion. 

Victor: With so many ideas, not letting you write a proposal to collaborate with the design team would be a waste of talent. When exactly did you learn to say such things? 

In the end, all his emotions culminate into his usual ridicule, which is more tender than usual.

Curling his fingers, he taps me on the forehead with some affection. 

MC: If you feel happy, you can just say it directly, really. 

Victor: And when did you hear me say that? 

MC: I felt it!

While laughing, I step onto the stairs, looking at the blooming poppy flowerbed. 

The flowerbed, which is suspended in mid-air, is the highest point of the garden. It is held up firmly by chains above the pool.

MC: Do you feel like I’m especially thoughtful and especially cute right now? 

Victor: I only feel that you’re especially childish.

While Victor says this, he walks up to the stairs and holds onto my hand. 

Victor: And that you’re truly a dummy. 

It is only when he draws nearer that I can clearly see the upward curve of his lips. 

Apart from the faraway lights and the water under us, his eyes also reflect my brilliantly smiling face. 

The flowerbed sways back and forth in small motions. 

Sitting here, I not only have a panoramic view of the garden, but can also overlook the entirety of Loveland City.

In the distance, the city lights are scattered around, artificial light sources forming another galaxy on earth.

MC: Victor, you once said that you would look at Loveland City from a height whenever you’re in a bad mood. I think I can understand something I didn’t think of before!

Victor: What do you understand this time? 

MC: This garden on the top level of the building, where you can overlook Loveland City, is perhaps your oasis. Now that I think about it, everything I said just now was unnecessary, right? 

Recalling my eloquent suggestions to Victor earlier, I start feeling slightly embarrassed.

Victor: Looks like you still don’t know anything.

MC: Tell me - what should I know then?

Supporting myself on the flowerbed with one hand, I grin, turning around to ask him.

The suspended flowerbed sways violently from my sudden movement. Only then do I remember that there are only a few fulcrums holding up the flower bed. 

With an unstable footing, I subconsciously reach out to clutch onto Victor, trying to maintain my balance. However, I still fall against the flower bed, hurting my shoulder blade.

Victor: You’re being impatient again.

[Note: There isn’t a direct translation of the phrase used here, 毛毛躁躁 (”mao mao zao zao”), but it conveys the idea of doing things hurriedly and inattentively]

His voice resounds very close to me. I open my eyes, and directly meet his line of sight.

Because of my sudden movement, Victor has also been pulled towards me. 

One of his hands is wrapped around the back of my head, preventing me from hitting it. Another hand is at my ear, holding me steady. 

Right now, this action seems to be imprisoning me between the fresh flowers and himself. 

MC: S...sorry, I’ll pay more attention next time...

I stammer, my heart rate speeding up. 

Victor: You said this the last time as well. 

The heat from summer has not fully dissipated. Humidity lingers in the air. 

The poppies in the garden bloom quietly, and the night is warm. It’s as though everything I see and feel have become gentle. 

Even Victor’s eyes and outline grow blurry from the light and shadows, encasing him in a layer of tenderness. 

Our sudden proximity causes my heart rate to accelerate, and it feels like my thoughts have been stuck in place. 

I avert my gaze, slightly guilty. I raise my palm to put some distance between us. 

MC: We’re about done with the viewing. The dinner is about to begin, so we should head down... I remember it’s one level below? 

Victor: ...do you know that your ability to change the topic is very poor. 

Victor sighs softly, then gently shifts his hand away from the back of my head. 

When the warmth belonging to him vanishes, a sense of longing floods my heart. 

It’s as though I have awakened from a charming dream surrounded by warm currents, returning to reality once again.

But in the next second, the warmth I’m most familiar with envelops my wrist.

Looking into his dark eyes, I think I must have truly misunderstood. 

Whether it’s the Babylonian king from thousands of years ago, or any other ordinary person, the thing people truly want isn’t the view from their memory. It’s the person they want to share the view with. 

Victor: I’m going to answer your question from just now. Listen carefully. 

Victor: The words you said are not unnecessary. 

Victor: And I am indeed very happy.

Victor shifts upwards, encircling me in front of him again. 

He is so close that the entire world seems to be condensed into his pair of eyes. 

The fountain spurts at regular intervals, shattering the calm of the water. Water vapour floating in the air refracts light, caging us in a colourful curtain of light. 

Victor: Just now, someone eloquently mentioned wanting to build an oasis within my sight and touch. And now you’re so anxious - where do you want to run off to? 

Perhaps the temperature of the evening is overly gentle, and the light from the water is too fine. I’m unable to see what emotions lie in Victor’s eyes. 

As the distance between us closes, I can clearly see every gentle quiver of his eyelashes, and can feel the heat from every lingering breath from our noses. 

His lips move slightly, as though wanting to say something to me. 

Before he can speak, the fountain spurts again. This time, the cool water happens to spray onto us. 

MC: Ah...

I want to hurriedly straighten up and dry Victor, but a gentle yet irresistible pressure pushes me back down. 

The water columns from the fountain change, forming into different heights and shapes. Scattered droplets of water patter on us like light rain.

Victor’s hair, which has always been tidied meticulously, droops slightly because of the water droplets. 

The slender poppies beside us sway slightly. Water vapour condenses on the flower petals, dripping down along the body of the flower. 

Victor: No need to care about that. Having you here is enough. 

His slightly hoarse voice brushes against my ear along with his breath. It circles past the nape of my neck, evoking a certain numbness. 

Victor’s body temperature continuously travels to my wrist, entering my heart. 

Victor: My “oasis”... has already belonged to me since a very long time ago.

🌹 

Phone Call: here 

[kaialone]

Spirit Tracks Translation Comparison: Battle Atop the Demon Train

This will be a comparison of the original Japanese version and the US English localized version.

Specifically, this will cover the cutscenes before and after the battle with Malladus and Cole on top of the Demon Train.

You can also watch these cutscenes for yourself in English and Japanese. If you want, you can check out the EU English version, too.

For the comparison, the usual points apply:

Bolded is the original Japanese text, for the reference.

Bolded and italicized is my translation.

Italicized is the official NOA translation.

A (number) indicates that I have a specific comment to make on that part in the translation notes.

As you read this, please keep in mind that with translations like these, it’s important not to focus on the exact literal wordings, since there is no single “correct answer” when it comes to translations.

Rather than that, consider the actual information that is being conveyed, in which way, and why.

--

Characters in this part who had their names changed between versions:

Kimaroki = Cole, Mallador = Malladus

--

Before the Battle:

Zelda:

ここまでです キマロキ！ もう あなたの好きには させません！

This is as far as you go, Kimaroki! We will no longer let you do as you please!

You've gone far enough, Cole. This is where it ends.

Cole:

…言いましたよね？

私 あなた方に 言ったはずですよね？

魔王様の完全復活を 震えて 待っていなさいって…

それなのに わざわざ自分から 乗り込んでくるだなんて…

...I told you, did I not?

I most certainly did tell you, no?

I kindly asked you to tremble in fear as you wait for His Majesty's complete resurrection...

And in spite of that, you have the gall to force your way up here...  (1)

You again...

The Demon King's return is nigh, you know.

Yet, here you are, making a nuisance of yourselves!

Cole:

最近のガキは言いつけも満足に 守れねーのか？ あぁ！？

You brat can't even properly do as you're told anymore these days, huh?!

You insolent little fools!

Cole:

上等だ ガキ共！ てめえらに きっついオシオキをくれてやらぁ！

Well, bring it on, brats! You pests got a hefty dose of punishment coming your way!

It's time you received the punishment you deserve!

Cole:

さあ  魔王様 融合は もう完全です！！

Now, Your Majesty, the amalgamation has been completed!!

Your Majesty! Your resurrection is complete!

Cole:

……やっちゃってください！！

...Smash them, if you would!!

Please use your power to destroy these two!

Zelda:

…行きますよ！ リンク！！

...Here we go, Link!!

This is it, Link!

-

During the Battle:

Boss Title:

魔王マラドー

Demon King Mallador

Malladus

-

Zelda, when rats appear:

リンク！ 助けて！

Link! Help!

Help, Link!

-

Zelda, when rats are defeated:

ありがとう！ リンク！

Thank you, Link!

Thank you for saving me!

-

Zelda, when taken over:

リンク… 逃げて…

Link... Run...

You have to get away, Link!

-

Zelda, when restraining Malladus:

今です！ 光の弓矢で 貫いて！

Now! Pierce him with the Bow of Light!

Shoot Malladus with the Bow of Light now!

-

After the Battle:

Cole:

ま 魔王さま…

Y-Your Majesty...

Your Majesty...

Zelda:

に 逃がしません！ マラドー！

I... I am not letting you get away, Mallador!

You won't escape this time, Malladus!

Malladus:

ハナセッ! ハナセェッ！！

LET GO! LET GO OF ME!!  (2)

RELEASE ME!

Zelda:

リンク！ き 危険です！

Link! I-it is not safe here!

Link! Be careful!

Zelda:

わたしに構わずマラドーから 離れてください！

Please, do not mind me, just get away from Mallador!

Don't worry about me! Just get away from Malladus!

Translation Notes:

The phrase I adapted as “force your way up here” is 乗り込む/norikomu in Japanese, which can also mean “get on” or “board”, as in boarding a train. However, it can also refer to breaking in, or climbing on someplace by force. In this context, arguably both meanings could work.

In Japanese, Malladus uses no ひらがな/hiragana characters when speaking, only カタカナ/katakana and 漢字/kanji. This is a visual indicator that’s sometimes used for a character who speaks in a strange way, like for example sounding robotic, in-human, or even having a heavy accent. In Malladus’ case, it’s likely meant to invoke a very loud, booming voice.

--

Comparisons & Thoughts:

Since both of these cutscenes are especially short, I included the text from during the battle as well.

Like with his previous appearances, the biggest differences here come from the changes made to Cole’s character, so discussing those will make up the bulk of this section.

-

As we’ve seen in previous scenes, a big alteration to Cole’s character in the English localization is the fact that his habit of abruptly switching between talking formally and informally has been removed.

So of course, we get more examples of that here.

In the Japanese version, when Cole begins to talk in the pre-battle cutscene, he first starts with a slow build-up, speaking in a passive-aggressive, but still quite formal manner.

There is some rising tension here, as Cole goes on almost a bit too long for comfort, about something that obviously should make him angry, while still keeping up that faux-polite speaking style.

Then, he turns around suddenly, now clearly yelling, having switched to his crude and informal style again, adding some impact to this moment.

In the English version, there is much less of a contrast or change in the way Cole talks, as always.

The set-up of the scene itself, its movement and audio, still get some of the intended effect across. But from the perspective of the dialogue, it’s weaker.

They even shortened the build-up to the moment Cole snaps, lessening the tension.

It’s another example where the Japanese version uses Cole’s outbursts for dramatic effect, which in turn doesn’t quite have the same energy in the English version.

-

Continuing from the last point, there also things worth mentioning regarding the actual content of what Cole says here:

…I told you, did I not?

I most certainly did tell you, no?

I kindly asked you to tremble in fear as you wait for His Majesty’s complete resurrection…

And in spite of that, you have the gall to force your way up here…

You again…

The Demon King’s return is nigh, you know.

Yet, here you are, making a nuisance of yourselves!

In the Japanese version, Cole is specifically calling back to what he told our heroes at the end of their previous encounter: “Now please tremble in fear as you wait for that moment!!”

Meaning that Cole’s anger here is not just due to Zelda and Link getting in their way again, but also because his order was defied on purpose.

The English version has no such callback, even though they did adapt Cole’s line from back then fairly accurately as: “I would suggest you tremble in fear!”

I’m not sure if this connection just went unnoticed, or if it was omitted intentionally.

In any case, I think it’s a missed opportunity, since acting petty over this adds to Cole’s character, makes the individual cutscenes feel more connected, and they did have a good set-up for it in their version, too.

-

Next is the line Cole says right after.

It’s short, but I think the differences are kind of important:

You brat can’t even properly do as you’re told anymore these days, huh?!

You insolent little fools!

First of all, in Japanese, this line continues to show how Cole really is genuinely pissed off about the fact that his order was defied, as ridiculous as that is.

But it also goes a bit more personal.

Here, Cole again refers to Zelda as ガキ/gaki or “brat”, which he also called her when he revealed his true nature. And while singular/plural is usually ambiguous in Japanese, the context here makes it a lot more likely he is addressing Zelda specifically with this line.

Adding to that, we also see Cole express frustration at the fact that Zelda has stopped listening to him. And that’s a nice detail, serving as a reminder of the history between these two characters.

For years, Zelda grew up with Cole acting as an overly controlling, malicious authority figure, who was only raising her to use as a sacrifice one day, and thus tried his hardest to stomp every last bit of confidence and agency out of her.

And from what we can gather, she did act obedient to him for the longest time, until the recent events moved her into action.

So now Cole is not just facing some child that is about to throw a wrench in his plan, he is facing a child that he himself raised to never defy him like that, who has broken out of his control in a way he never thought she would be capable of.

By comparison, the English version feels a bit more generic, not really alluding to the personal history between Zelda and Cole as strongly.

It comes off more as your standard annoyance with meddling kids.

-

When Cole calls out to Malladus, in the Japanese version he says that the “amalgamation” is complete, rather than just the “resurrection” like in the English version.

This is referring to something that has come up occasionally, namely that Malladus basically has to completely “coalesce”, i.e. merge with Zelda’s body in order to make full use of it.

I’m assuming the English version changed this line to make it a bit simpler. The fact that Malladus is now fully accustomed to Zelda’s body is already evident from the context, so the exact details aren’t needed.

-

Another small detail about this line from Cole:

…Smash them, if you would!!

Please use your power to destroy these two!

As usual, the English version has Cole be more consistently fancy when he talks, but there is something funny about his line in Japanese here.

In this line, Cole mixes his different speaking styles in a kind of amusing manner.

He starts it off with the informal, almost childish やっちゃって/yachatte, but then ends it with the proper and polite ください/kudasai.

To me, it gives off the vibe that he is very giddy at the prospect of destroying these kids, but still manages to keep enough self-control to not accidentally insult Malladus by using an improper ending for a formal request.

Either way, it’s a fun little moment that plays with his odd speaking habits.

-

When the battle begins, the English version has the boss title simply read “Malladus”, rather than displaying his full title like the Japanese version does.

They did the same thing with Byrne’s battle earlier, so I already talked a bit about this.

Just like in that instance, I don’t know if I would consider Malladus a character who warrants having such a reference to the Ocarina of Time battle with Ganon.

I think Malladus’ battle here is probably a better choice than Byrne’s battle, but I still don’t feel that comparing him with Ocarina of Time’s Ganon like that works.

And even if it did, doing this reference twice in the same game makes it lose its impact.

If they really wanted to do this, they should have picked one of the two battles, rather than doing it for both.

-

Finally, Malladus gets to speak his first real words at the end of this battle.

In the translation notes I explained the unusual way his dialogue is written in Japanese.

As I mentioned there, I think in his case it’s likely supposed to show his voice feeling unnaturally loud and booming, like something you would expect from a powerful demonic being.

The English version seemingly adapts this here by writing his dialogue in all caps, which I think works well enough.

However, they’re not consistent about this, since they drop it the next time Malladus speaks.

As a result, Malladus’ English line here just seems like he’s simply yelling in hindsight, not like there is something inherently different about the way he sounds.

-

All in all, the localization in these cutscenes is another mixed bag for me, but different from the last part.

I think pretty much all of Zelda’s dialogue in this one was localized perfectly. The problem is that she only makes up about 30-40% of it.

Cole takes up the majority of the dialogue here, and while I normally think the English version’s take on him works well at being itself, in this scene it’s just not as good as the original.

In this part, we aren’t just dealing with his basic characterization being changed as usual, he also doesn’t have a comparable amount of energy in the English version.

Since this is the final direct confrontation with him, acting as somewhat of a climax to his dynamic with Zelda, it’s a bit of a disheartening note to end on from a localization perspective.

The English version’s take on Cole has his own style of splendor, and it would have been nice to see it utilized better in these cutscenes here.

But that’s the end of this part. Feel free to check out the next one!

--

< Previous Part | Start | Next Part >

--

[vinciaka]

KALEIDOSCOPE: a project by DAYE

my dear friend serge aka daye just sent a full project for me to listen through before the release of it. It moved me so much that i couldn’t sleep without trying my very best to explain how listening to this made me feel, cause it made me feel very much, all 7 tracks. i want to (try to) explain to you how each song made me feel.

a little quick thing to know before you read this: i tend to reach a lot, and in this little post here, i will try to explain how i saw these songs and the conceptual interpretations i made. they’re probably wrong and might not have been the artist’s true intentions when making the songs,  but songs are more fun if you listen to them in your own way. oh !warning! my “review” or whatever might be very biased lol okay

where were we? oh right, the feels. I feel like it made perfect sense to name this project KALEIDOSCOPE, because just like the real thing, daye reflects both his personal life and producing essence in his music and it creates this beautiful art that transforms into another masterpiece depending on how you decide to look at(/listen to) it. he has used things like audio clips from moments in his life, sounds of a cassette player being opened/closed, voices of friends with his (oh so) suitable voice to enhance theirs, and his own voice as main focus (spoiler: my fav song is where he raps the outro... stay tuned xo). It all results in a beautiful memoir, that i felt was focusing on the things surrounding him, perceived by serge and translated by daye into these songs.

the first song ROLLIN sucked me in with the very calming cheerful melody. the song features rapper mike jones that tells a story about a cute blossoming affection between two people who both seem too shy to come forward about it. the story is accompanied with beautiful inputs of shorter melodies created with something that sounds like a very pianoy electric guitar (comes in around 1:46). this song really shows dayes talent when it comes to creating melodies and layering the same melody with different sounds. we hear everything from violin sounds, to synths, backed by fabulous kicks and claps and hi-hats and tambourines and... you get it. he pays a lot of attention to details and it shows through the very subtle sounds of “plings” and his own “so now we” voice input. the beat is concluded with a beautiful piano outro played by one of his friends and puts a more “ripened love”(lol) denouement to the cutesy lovey dovey mood introduced in the beginning of the song. it ends with an audio clip talking about rolling....the green (or brown) stuff. This song feels: buoyant, calm, blissful, bubbly, cute.

the second track BADBOY (also my second favorite song) is just pure, fantastic, simple yet detailed quality production. this song feels like taking an evening walk in the inner city when everything is about to close during warmer weather & meeting up with fun adventurous friends. the drum loop is just so beautifully chosen and is the highlight of the song to me. the second name of this song should be SYNTHBOY (sry). the thing is, i usually don’t like synthy sounds, but daye chooses his sounds so perfectly and breaks it off with complementary non-expected sounds, and the result is... my second favorite track. the outro is a fun audio clip where his friends are joking around. The song really gives me both summer night and summer day and summer day vibes. This song feels: sunny, refreshing, cresent-moony, breezy

next song SWAGOO is my personal favorite. wow.. just wow. i would divide the song into 3 parts and i mean… 3 parts? ugh daye’s mind! the first part is a sample of a song with vocals that go “your love, your love, your love” and it’s a great introduction to the theme of the song. Next part we’re introduced to a very soothing R&B electric piano feel that was quickly accompanied by a  very minimalistic, clean kick, snare and hi-hat. once again, rapper mike jones is featured and this time tells a story that seems to continue on where he left off in ROLLIN. but this time he’s ready to settle down. the whole minimalistic instrumental through the second part gave off the good feelings of liking someone and being really sure about the whole thing. but i realized that it all was a false feeling of comfort when the second part was cut off into an audio clip. the audio clip is from a video featured by yours truly (lol) & other friends and is from a house party both me and daye were at at some time in april 2019. in the audio clip you can hear us singing to self control by frank ocean, and the part daye chose to add just makes so much sense and is so fitting into the story. it was the part where frank says “i came to visit, cause you see me like a ufo”. after mike jones spoke about being ready to settle down into the relationship, it seems like it all fell off, just like what that part in frank’s song hints at. two people falling off. right after the audio clip, i was hit by what gave me kind of a revelation, kind of an unreligious epiphany… the third and final part of the song. the last part lasts for 30 seconds and that’s what i dislike the most about this project, because to me that last part is the highlight of this tape. daye uses his own voice (!!) in a gloomy way with a sullen beautiful instrumental that i was amazed by. that part of the song is what fits my personal music taste the most. its crazy. the goal of trying to write all of this down instead of reviewing it directly to serge was to give me a chance to fully express how i felt about this project, but still this part gives me a hard time to explain how wonderfully divine it was. his vocals concludes the love story that mike told. the love interest was just “bad news” and the whole thing left daye in a slump. this whole song is just a wonderful story about love that fades when the mutual feelings stop being mutual and daye portrayed it beautifully through merging 3 different parts and leveling it out to create one harmonious song. excellent. i wish i could replay those last 30 seconds over and over again. in the very end, you hear the sound of a cassette player opening, welcoming the next song. This song feels: jolly -> hopeful->surprising->gloomy, amazing, rainy

track 4 and 5 i will review together as one part. first we hear SMILLAS INTERLUDE and then we hear TIMELESS, both have beautiful melodies and lyrics sung by serges friend smilla. the interlude is just different cuts of her voice singing some words, but mostly overwhelmingly beautiful runs. wow what a voice. in between the cuts of her voice daye carries on the theme with cassette player opening/closing sounds. the interlude almost sounds like the process of writing a letter with drafts and parts that both are kept and thrown away but that in the end results in a fully written letter, and that’s what TIMELESS is. if deciding to look at this project as one big storyline where all songs are small pieces of a bigger story, the lyrics in TIMELESS seem like an explanation to why the love was “bad news”. the whole intention of the relation seemed to be confusing and not straight to the point, a “timeless haze” as told by smilla. the best point of this song, the music production by daye, made it feel like everything still was alright. the beat felt like a hug, saying that the confusion is okay. it felt like a rainy summer day. bright outside with gray skies and a rainbow. the song is fully nuanced because all of the elements in it. everything has more than one layer. the drums, the synths, the vocals. during the chorus, a simple bassline is added to the instrumental and it gives the song a whole new layer of depth. the mixing of this song is the best in my opinion. This song feels: reassuring, confidently confusing, self focusing, profound, like a kiss on the forehead.

the second last song of this tape, COMING HOME shares the spot together with BADBOY as my second favorite track. the production is just so spectacular and high quality! i love it. the drum loop hits hard throughout the whole song and once again, daye’s ears made my ears a big favor by choosing it. his talent with finding and picking out the best sounds & layering was really noticable in this song and it all feels like a whole majestic musical arrangement more than just a beat. it feels like the last day of summer. the melody created by the bass, synths and other sound effects makes the song feel like a sad farewell, but affirming of that better days will come. To further push the feeling of that this is a goodbye, we once again have the talented mike jones lifting the song even more with his added lyrics about “coming home”. between mike’s verses, i was blessed with a beautiful guitar solo played by daye’s talented friend edvin. i had a hard time choosing, but the point of this song is the drum loop and the bassline. listening to the project as a whole, it feels like this is the last song of the project even if isn’t. This song feels: elevating, reminiscent, bittersweet, concluding

like i said above, COMING HOME feels like the last song. but now, we have come to the official last song: INTRO2PHASE2. what im about to say, the title already hints on it. this song sticks out the most to me and it is made very obvious the first two seconds of the song with a very intense synth sound that differs from any synth throughout the whole project. the music composition differs a lot too and is no longer soft and summery but rather upbeat, more intense and less... lovey. it was impossible not to move your head along to the beat. What i like the most about this song is that it shows a whole different side of daye and portrays his versatility when it comes to production. whichever genre he decides to approach he does perfectly and leaves his fingerprints scattered all over the finished product, so it still sounds like daye.  this feels more like an intro to the next concept more than outro to this tape, and that is why the song before this was (to me) the last song of this project (or should i say phase?). mike (who is featured here too) also uses his voice in a more powerful way compared to the more relaxed/soft way that is heard in the other songs he is in. if it still isn’t obvious that this is an intro to the switch of concepts, it is made even more clear with mike’s unfinished sentence where he says he doesn’t want drama, he wants-... to be continued i guess! This song feels: intense, like fire, stinky face, hard

 im excited for what’s next to come, and curious about where the focus will shift in the next project. daye left us with a cliffhanger, and hopefully, in the future we will know what it was that mike jones wanted instead of drama.

to summarize, this project felt very conceptual even if intentional or not, the order of the songs made sense if you were to look at it as a whole story. generally, it sounds like the theme is love; from its exciting beginnings to the end of it (and maybe the rebound too?) in a very realistic way. all songs can be seen as one big coherent story, or as individual songs and which one you see depends on how you want to look at it through the KALEIDOSCOPE. This project feels like: love, summer, a story

[harryhooksgazebos267]

School Life Ship

@halliney  hey love!! Here is your ship, I’m so sorry for the long wait!

Ok so you had this one friend group that consisted of nine(yes, nine) idiots. Woojin, Chan, Minho, Changbin, Hyunjin, Jisung(Han), Felix, Seungmin, and Jeogin. You all were soooooo freaking close, like inseparable close. 

You also were close to some of the “members” of this really popular group at your school called NCT. Yeah, they even had a name for themselves, that’s how popular they were lol. There were a shit ton of them that expanded throughout grades. In fact, there were so many of them that they even had little cliques with in them. Now, that doesn’t mean they all weren’t close. Just because they were in a different “cliques” inside there friend group, doesn’t mean they wont kick your ass if you mess with someone in a different clique. They were literally like brothers lol. Anywho, you were pretty close with some of the boys apart of the NCT Dream clique. And maybe, just maybe you wanted to be more than friends with a certain giant whose name definitely wasn’t Park Jisung. 

Ok so maaaayyyyyyybbbbbeeeee you had a crush on the cute little dork but I mean, who knows 🤷‍♀ Moving on, it was a Monday morning and things were going really slow. You were sitting in your first block next Felix working on some math when Jung Wooyoung(lets pretend he would be in class with you lol) strolled up to your seat and sat in front of you with a huge smirk on his face.

“Can I help you?” Felix asked, with an eye brow cocked.

Backstory: You have nothing against Wooyoung but when said boy strolls up to your desk with a smirk on his face, just no nothing good is going to come from it. My man the gossip girl of your school. He knows the tea and the drama and also loves to create it/spread some rumors. The school is a chess board and all of the students are pawns in his little game.

“Nothing you can do for me Mr. Lee. Mrs. y/l/n on the other hand though,” he trailed off with a giggle.

You kind of just looked at him like ?????? What could he possibly want? This caused his smile to drop a little.

“You don’t know why I came over here?” Wooyoung asked confused.

“I, no?” 

“Well, rumor has it a certain boy that goes by the name of Doyum is going to ask you out....again.”

This causes you to groan in dismay. You see, Doyum and you had gone out last year but things didn’t end so well....let’s save that story for later though.

“Are you shitting me? Where did you even hear that from?” You asked aggravated.

“I never snitch on my sources, just know that it’s a very reliable one,” Wooyoung stated as the smirk returned on his face.

“Even if he does ask her out again, she’s going to say no. Trust me, the boys and I wont let that thing even come close to her,” Felix hissed out.

Wooyung laughed sticking his hands up in the air as if he were surrendering. 

“Hey man, I’m simply the man who delivers the news. You should be telling Doyum that....unless you want me to?”

“No,” Felix and you practically scream at the same time.

“Fine, fine I won’t. You guys are no fun. Keep me posted on the tea though.” And with a quick little wink, Wooyoung struts back to his seat.

So for the rest of math, you just sat quietly as Felix went on this long rage about how much he hated Doyum and how he would “fight” him if he even tried to come near you. It warmed your heart but at the same time you were in your own little world, wondering what you should do. Second block went by fast. That was the class you had with Jisung(Park), Chenle, and Jaemin. Lia and Yuna were also two girls in your class that you chilled with. Basically that block was a lot of fun and lots of clownery. They helped you forget about the whole Doyum situation. That was until the last ten minuets of class when you realized that lunch was next and you began to lowkey panic. On the inside of course but the group could feel you mood shift.

“Hey, y/n are you good?” Jaemin questioned. 

You were so in your head that you didn’t hear him though. Chenle, Lia and Yuna also tried to get your attention but that didn’t work. Finally Jisung just kind of shook your shoulders and you snapped out of it.

“What?”

“You ok?” Jisung slowly spoke out.

“Oh yeah, I’m fine,” You laughed out.

“Yep, you clearly aren’t,” Lia stated.

“Guys, I’m fine. Seriously.”

“We weren’t born yesterday, we know you aren’t,” Chenle said as he rolled his eyes.

You looked at all of there faces and realized they weren’t going to let this one go. With a small sigh you decided to tell them what was up. They were NOT having it. Jisung especially.

“Who does he think he is? He can’t just think he can waltz back into your life after he broke your heart like that. God he’s such an asshole,” Jisung fumed, his jaw clenching.

“I mean he might not even ask me out! Wooyoung told me that-”

“If Wooyoung told you, it’s true,” Lia stated.

At that moment, the bell rang. Meaning it was time for lunch....yeehaw :D So the five of them began to flip out but you stayed calm (on the outside) and just casually got up leaving the room as the five of them yelled at you to come back so they could figure out a plan. Once you arrived you sat at your normal table surrounded by your NINE (I’m sorry, I’m hurting over Woojin leaving) friends.

“What’s up mate,” Chan called out as you sat down.

“You didn’t tell them?” You questioned Felix who just shook his head.

“Figured you would want to.”

“Tell us what?” Han asked.

Taking in a deep breath you quickly explained the situation.

“I’m going to kill him,” Changbin stated once you were done. All the boys quickly agreed with him causing you to laugh.

“Y/n, it’s not funny. We’re being dead serious.”

“Guys I can handle-” You started only to be cut off by the one and only Doyum.

“Hey y/n, umm are you busy?”

Before you could even answer a voice, the voice Jeongin, stated talking.

“Doyum why don’t you just crawl back in your little grease hole and leave her alone. You’re the ass that decided to cheat on her so don’t think you can just come and ask her out as if nothing happened.”

Ok, period sis. So Doyum was just standing there with a confused look on his face.

“H-how did you know what’s why I came....”

“Word gets around. And you know what she doesn’t even like you anymore so I don’t even understand why you’re trying to get with her,” Jeongin sassily stated.

“Yeah she liked Jisung,” Felix said as his eyes went huge. He was supposed to say that. You stared at him in horror.

“Yeah she likes, wait what??? Y/n likes me???” Han questioned.

“No not you Jisung. I like Jisung Jisung,” You said with an eye roll.

If the clown emoji was an actually face, that would be Han Jisung. Now at this point most of the lunch room was looking at you so Han wasn’t the only one looking like a clown.

“You like Jisung?” Doyum practically yelled.

“I-I, why does it even matter? Please just leave me alone.” You whispered out.

Doyum opened up his mouth to speak but quickly closed it. After looking around the lunch room and realizing the scene he was causing he decided to walk away.

“So.....how come Felix got to know who your crush was but we couldn’t?” Minho whined.

“Because I thought Felix could keep his mouth shut but I was clearly wrong.”

“Ummm y/n, Jisung is walking over here,” Woojin rushed out.

“What?”

“Oh shoot, he is,” Hyunjin stated with wide eyes as he began to smile widely.

“Go get your mans,” Seungmin squealed out.

“Hey guys,” Jisung said with a little wave.

“What’s up twin,” Han laughed out.

“Nothing much, just was wondering if I could steal y/n away for a second,” he shyly said while looking down.

“Of course you can,” Chan said.

So without another word, you got up and followed him out of the lunch room. The two of you kind of just sat on some..steps? Idk man, it’s 12:30 a.m I’m sorry :( So lets say you guys walked around the school for a bit and found some steps to sit on. I have this vision in my head but I’m having trouble translating it XD 

Annnnyway, you guys are just sitting there on the steps when all of a sudden Jisung starts lightly humming serendipity causing you to laugh a little.

“Oh so you’re trying to win me over with Jimin? That wont work good sir.”

That caused him to laugh as well.

“I’m not very good with words...I, I couldn’t think of what to say and that song came to mind so I just started humming it. Sorry. I just, I really really like you and I was afraid to tell you before because I didn’t want to ruin our friendship. If what Felix and Doyum said was true and you do like me, it would mean the world to me if you would be mine. Y/n, do you maybe want to be my girlfriend?”

“I, of course! Yes Jisung!”

So long story short, Jisung and you started dating. Both of your friend groups merged and became super close. Doyum didn’t bother you anymore because literally had 28 big brothers and a boyfriend who were protective over you. Life was pretty good honestly.

[bookwormscififan]

Crossover Mayhem

So, based off this post I made a couple days ago, I decided to carry on from it.

Warning: If you haven’t read the fic from that post, I would highly recommend reading that, because this plunges straight into continuing.

So, really what happens is I wanted to merge my swap au with my egos. And being in light of Mayhem, it gets that title.

Word count: 1562 words

Why? What do you mean by I shouldn’t have interfered? JJ stared at Chase, confusion clear on his face.

“Because, this is the month.” Chase sighed and led JJ to a calendar on the wall.

Written in big red letters on the calendar were the words Mayhem.

Mayhem? Chase looked at JJ and shook his head.

“Sometimes, one month a year, one of us just… disappear for a while. I have no idea where we go, but we go.” JJ tilted his head, feeling something tickle at the back of his mind.

Are we able to look for Anti? Chase shook his head.

“I don’t know where he is, and once Jackie’s finished with Schneep, he will go looking.” He looked at the mute, and his eyes softened.

“The best we can do is wait.” JJ nodded, still looking worried.

Malvern ran down the hall, stopping in front of Juxta’s room as he heard screams and yells.

“Jux? What’s going on in there? Can I come in?” He put his hand on the doorknob, but stopped as shadowy wisps wrote on the wood. Don’t come in. It’s started. Gulping, Malvern ran back downstairs to check and do a headcount of the family.

Everyone was there. So who was taken this time? Alto stood next to Malvern, wringing his hands.

“The curse was just for the family, wasn’t it?” Malvern nodded, face paling.

“I’m going back up there to see who he’s taken this time.” Alto nodded, and Malvern ran back upstairs.

“Jux? Can you at least tell me who’s in there?” The writing returned, and Malvern furrowed his brow as the words were spelt out. Someone from an alternate universe. Says his name is Anti. He kind of looks like Alto, but he’s fiercer. He has a scar on his neck. Malvern shivered as the cold chill ran down his spine.

“Why do you have Anti instead of one of us?” The writing rearranged itself. Death said you all deserve a break? She disappeared for a bit, then came back with him. Says he was fighting with a ‘Schneep’? Malvern shook his head.

“I don’t know a Schneep. I’ll go tell the others what’s happening.” Alright. Take your time. You know I can’t open the door during this time.

Jackie returned to the house, breathing deeply as he took a seat.

“He’s not anywhere in the world. I have no clue where he could be.” Chase shook his head in disbelief and took Jackie’s shoulders, shaking him slightly.

“What do you mean, you don’t know where he is? He has to be somewhere in the world! We don’t matter to the Community if Anti isn’t here! Please, Jackie, you have to look harder!” Jackie shook his head.

“I don’t know what you want me to do. I looked all over the world, and he wasn’t there. I was gone for three weeks, and you want me to search harder?” He slumped in his chair, a clear sign of defeat. Chase paced the room, stressfully running his hands through his hair.

“Well, I guess we just wait, then.”

Malvern knocked on Juxta’s door, hands shaking as he listened to the screams inside.

“Hey, buddy? The month is almost over, do you think Death will send him back soon? His screams are scaring the others. Schnapple hasn’t recorded in weeks.” He heard silence from the other side, then the writing appeared.

Death visited the other day. She said end of this week. This Anti person had a lot of fears, but he was also really good at being immune to my taunts. I’m just injecting him with insanity now, and that’s working. Just two more days, alright? Malvern nodded, knowing Juxta could feel his answer, and left the hall.

Two days passed, and the screams fell silent. Juxta materialised in the living room, looking to the world as if he was dead. Malvern rushed to his side as he collapsed, and translated his signs.

He was really strong. There apparently is an alternate universe where this house is occupied by almost mirror images of us, but it’s almost like a swapped version. I don’t know why Death wanted me to take him, but making me send him back used a lot of energy. He closed his eyes and Malvern brushed his hair back as he passed out.

“What was he talking about?” Chase looked at Malvern as the hero stared down at his brother with a gaze of concern and love.

“I don’t know, but whatever it was, I hope Death doesn’t do it again. He might not be able to take it.”

“But, if Death makes him take vone of zem, zen ve are not harmed.”

“He never wanted this, but he didn’t want to die either. You have no idea what might happen to him if this comes around again.”

Anti glitched back into the house, wispy shadows trailing behind him, and collapsed on the ground. Jackie raced to his side in concern.

“Anti! What happened, are you ok? I couldn’t find you for ages, the Community are in flames!” Anti coughed, sitting and leaning against the hero weakly. He shook his head against Jackie’s questions, too weak to make a sound. The hero helped him up, and took him to his room.

“Have some rest, Anti. Talk to us when you’ve got the strength.”

The following morning, Anti glitched into the dining room, interrupting the egos’ breakfast.

“Anti! Velcome back, my friend.” Anti took Schneep’s proffered pancake and sat at the table, munching it.

“H̴o̶w lo͘ng wa̷s ̴I g̷òn̴e͜?͡͏” JJ signed the response: A month. Anti’s eyes widened briefly, then he shook his head, deep in thought.

“A̕ ̷m̵on͠t̶h͜,̧ ḩuh...͞” Jackie sat up, looking at Anti over the pile on pancakes.

“Where were you? What happened? Schneep told me you were in a fight.” Anti’s eyes widened for a moment, then he sighed.

“So͟me̴on͜e ẃh̛o̕ ̶c͡al͘led ́hers̀elf͠ ̸Dea͜t͏h ̨to͝ơk͘ m͘e awa͝y͟. ̕Á p̷e͡rs͞o̡n nam̵e̢d J̧ưx̴t͜a͠ ̡wa҉s͟ with͝ ̛m̧e͏.͠ ͡I was in̨ a͏ dark roo̢m.” The egos had all stopped eating, listening to Anti talk with eager looks on their faces.

“Hè ̡starte͟d̕ w̡ith i͏ll̡us̀io͞n͠s that ẃere ͠su̸pp҉òsèd to̢ ͠sc͘are m͘e͏.”

“What do you mean, illusions?” Chase was making mental notes of this scenario so he could work out how to fix it if any more of them went away. Anti looked at him, face pale.

“Images͡ o͟f͘ a̵ĺl ̸of ỳo̸u ̡m͝el̀ti͠n͘g͝ ̨and͏ ̶d̴y̛in͜g̀. ͡W͡ḩe̸n ͜I̵ ͘d͘idn҉'t̡ ̸r̸ea͏c͘t͞, h͟e̸ ̕s̴ta͡rted͘ ̵in͝je̸c͏ting̸ ̸me͘ ͏wit͡h ̨s͟om͏ęth̛i̡ng͞ ̵t͞h̵at m҉ad͞e ҉m͢e̷ see ̷t̸h͞i͢ńg̢s ͞th̛a̴t ̕w͘e̡r̛en̴'t̀ tḩére.” The egos stared; Robbie taking hold of JJ’s arm in fear.

“Ca̷ll҉ed i҉t̵ insa͏n̵ity.̨͠” Schneep tilted his head in confusion.

“Tell us more. You were gone a whole month, that can’t be all.” Marvin was curious to meet this Juxta person.

“I͠ ̸do͏n̶'̀t̴ reme͞mb̶ér͝ mu̴c͠h ̧m̨or͟e ̀than̴ ̨t̶h̢at͢.” Jackie nodded, reaching out to give Anti a pat on the back. Anti responded by picking up the butter knife, a clear sign he didn’t want to be touched. Jackie could see that maybe Juxta had done more than just inject him with stuff, judging by the cautionary looks the glitch was giving everyone occasionally, especially JJ.

Anti looked up after a few minutes had passed, looking as though he had remembered something.

“T̵ḩe̶r̕e i͏s͜ one t͠ḩi̢ng I re̛mem̵ber̴ cle͘àr̀ly̶.”

“What?”

“J̧ùşt t͝h̡a̸t ̢i̧t ̵wa̡s̢ ̴so͝m̧e ̧kiǹd ̕of ̀tw̧i͢s͝t̛ed o͡the͟ŗ r̶eali͞ty̸ ̵whe͘re ̀JJ́ ͢and ͘I͠ ̢wer͠e̵ şwa̧pp̧ed.͠” JJ’s head snapped up in shock, and he raised his hands to sign. You and me? What sort of world is that?

But Anti didn’t reply. He had zoned out, reliving the month.

“I’ve worked something out, Jux. Death can’t possibly take each ego from the other world for you to torment. Maybe you could bargain with her to just take us.” Malvern was sitting in Juxta’s room, petting a lion and talking to his brother about the events of the month.

Juxta had been bedridden for a few days due to overexertion from the torture he had done to Anti. He looked at Malvern, eyes scared.

She said no more deals. Our last deal was for me not to hurt you. Malvern sighed.

“Maybe this was a one-off thing? Maybe she wanted to change the pattern? It’s only been two years since everyone returned home. One month each year, that was her deal.” Juxta nodded, weaving some wisps into a small basket.

Two years, and I’ve managed to hurt three people, not including the rescue mission you all performed that one year. Malvern nodded.

“I guess we’ll have to wait until next year, then.” He stood up, the lion moving away from his side.

“I have to go chat with Chase. I’ll be back in a little while. Let Alto know if you need anything.” Juxta nodded, smiling as his brother left the room.

“Did you not enjoy meeting Anti?” He looked up as Death sat beside him. No. It was nice to meet him, I just don’t want to meet any more. It weakened me to send him back. Death smiled.

“It was part of the plan. I promise you won’t meet any more of them. You know I don’t want to hurt you any more than fate has already done.” Juxta nodded, closing his eyes as fatigue caught up to him.

“You did well, my dear. I’ll see you in twelve months.”

[meiyahg-blog]

How to Make Mold Release Agent: Complete Guide and Tips

To produce large quantities of similar products, manufacturing companies use molds. This process is very efficient and doesn’t take plenty of time, which is another reason why brands use it. Some of the final products which were made using molds include glass, metal, rubber, plastic, and similar. What’s more, molds are also implemented in compression, blow molding, injection, and more, to name just a few. But when producers use mold, they need a chemical component that separates the materials from the mold. And that chemical has a name – mold release agent.

That’s why we compiled a thorough and detailed guide about everything there is to know about the mold release oil or agent. We’ll define the term, see its various types and where it can be applied. After that, we’ll move on to the production process and end with factors to consider when buying mold release agents. Read on and take notes!

 What Is a Release Agent?

For all those who aren’t familiar with the term, a release agent is a chemical that stops the materials from bonding with the surface of the mold. You can even find it under different names such as a de-molding agent. Its main role is to create an effect of slipping so that the substance easily separates from the mold. Metaphorically speaking, it’s like putting a bit of butter in the pan before you plan to bake something with the idea to effortlessly remove the food from the pan’s bottom after you’re done with the cooking.

Thus, the answer to the question ‘What's mold release agent?’ is that it’s considered to be a crucial barrier that prevents the substance from blending with the mold. If that happens and a release agent isn’t used, manufacturers have to perform elaborate processes of cleaning up. All of that may result in losing plenty of time as well as productivity. That’s why companies who implement mold release oils look towards them as an investment rather than a cost once they find the oil that suits their needs and production.

It’s common for mistakes to happen even while using this type of chemical. For instance, an agent that isn’t right for the product or its wrongful usage can have huge negative consequences. That may impact the whole overall quality and performance of the finished product. But we’ll get to that very quickly.

 The Functionality of the Release Agent

 As we previously stated, the main function of the release agent is to act as a barrier. However, more very useful functions can be attributed to it. We’ll cover some of the most important ones now.

Having said that, these chemicals have the ability to minimize the production period. That’s why manufacturing firms can work with exceptionally tight and rigorous schedules. The release agents will help them increase the volume of materials during the process of molding. If that isn’t enough, the whole cycle time of the process is significantly reduced. In return, that translates to saving time as well as money for the brand.

All the damage to the products that can make them not ready for utilization or sale is reduced to a bare minimum with these chemicals. Without them, the mold can be glued to the material. In that case, more material will have to be thrown out and more cash would be spent. So, it’s safe to conclude that they provide another layer of protection.

Moreover, like with most things, molds are also the subjects to multiple replacements, and even unscheduled or premature ones, too. If mold release chemicals are used, the production process will be kept effective between maintenance and cleaning periods. That way, the whole lifespan of the molds is extended and new ones wouldn’t have to be purchased for a very long time.

If we’re theoretically speaking, release oils are meant for just separating. But, in reality, the ingredients of the oils can have an impact on the features and the overall outlook of the end product. Some agents are known to make surfaces appear matte or excessively shiny. And you may not want that. That’s why thoroughly understanding how agents can affect your part is vital if you don’t want any unwanted instances to happen.

We previously touched upon the slipping effect that manufacturers want to successfully detach their materials from the molds. Here, we’ll just mention that another function of the agents is their ability to be merged with other agents. When companies combine them, they can decide the level as well as the intensity of the slipping effect in certain parts of the molds.

Finally, with proper agents, there isn’t much space for cleaning afterwards as very few or no traces are left behind. It goes without saying that that’s very budget-friendly.

 Classification of Release Agent

 There are numerous types of agents. And which one is used depends on multiple factors. They may include the price, the personal needs of the manufacturers, level of danger they may inflict, laws and regulations, drying periods, shipping, and more. For starters, we’ll list the major categories and discuss them afterwards:

·         Water-based release agents

·         Solvent-based release agents

·         Non-permanent release agents

·         Sacrificial release agents

·         Semi-permanent release agents

·         Internal release agents

The trends in release agents point towards water-based solutions. One of the reasons why they’re preferred nowadays is that they’re more environmentally-friendly. It takes a while before they’re fully dry, too. Also, it’s quite affordable to get them as the shipping is usually cheaper for these types of agents.

On the other hand, solvent-based ones are more traditional chemicals. Their components only take care of a safe detaching. They’re known to immediately become dry. But they can be a bit dangerous towards the health of the molders and the welfare, especially if there is no adequate system for ventilation in the room. Flammability is another feature of theirs, too.

The non-permanent release agents are more of a sub-type of the solvent-based ones. They don’t unnecessarily slow down the process or create a lot of extra scrap material. The part where these agents excel is that they’re uniquely modified and created according to specific molds.

The sacrificial agents don’t consist of plenty of solid components. And they’re known to last a shorter period when compared to other kinds of agents. One of their key features is that they should be used at the start of every molding cycle. As a result of that, they require more labor force.

Another category of agents is the semi-permanent. The factor permanence in the language of mold release agents is the period before you need to apply the agent again. And this type of agent doesn’t have to be applied again before each molding cycle commences, unlike the sacrificial agent. If you want to increase the durability of the agent, it’s advisable to use it on surfaces that aren’t wet and are clean and without any other coatings and ingredients lying on them.

Finally, let’s take a closer look at the internal agents. Just like the name implies, they’re added directly to the material in the molding while it’s still blending together. For example, this technique is found in tire molding. Plus, while the material is blending together, the molder can choose the right dosage if they use this type of agent. That shortens the needed time period, too. Molders can also have more control over the whole molding due to these capabilities of the agent.

 Application of Release Agent

 Before you start the applying process, you should be aware that there are various techniques to do this. This is due to the fact that not all agents are the same. Some of them ask for coatings that are thicker while others need a longer time to dry. Therefore, it’s always a good idea to read through the instructions enclosed by the manufacturer to make sure which technique to use.

Which mainly used in:

 l   Polyurethane Releasing: such as PU Soft Foam, Polyurethane Rigid Foam, PU Slow Resilience Release Agent, PU Insole, etc.

 l   Metal Casting: Such as Aluminium Die Casting, Magnesium Die Casting, Zinc Alloy Die Casting, Metal Forming, Metal Extrusion, etc

 l   Composite Material Releasing: Carbon Fiber, FRP Fiberglass, Epoxy Resin , LED Material, PVA Material, etc.

 l   Others: Release agent for concrete Form, Plastic, Rubber, Outside Tyre, Glass, etc.

One of the most common ways to apply the release agent includes aerosol spray cans. They can be utilized by workers, professional machines or even an assembly line. The aerosol can is filled with a release agent that’s pressurized. As for the coating of the molds, the agent can coat either with spray hoses when the projects are bigger and more automated or a simple paintbrush when you’re working on a small project.

Not to forget, a big number of mold release agents are prone to inflaming. So, you should be well-covered and protected while applying them. To minimize the risk, you can use a professional machine. It works without releasing the dangerous fumes from the agent in the air.

Release Agent Production Process

Everybody who works with release agents knows that there is not one mold release agent nor one production process to make it. Each specific industry tweaks its own version. Naturally, a food manufacturer and a company making concrete can’t use the same agent for obvious reasons.

Generally, though, a couple of textbooks mention that a type of a release agent, usually, can consist of water, a functional siloxane, a stiffening agent, as well as a base and a crosslinker. For example, you can use a mold release agent even at home for a sculpture you have ordered. This is especially nice if the mold is of the non-flexible kind.

We’ll show you how to prepare yourself a do-it-yourself release agent. All you need is a couple of drops of different oils and a spray bottle. Put the oil in the spray bottle, preferably by using a funnel. That way you lower the chances of oil getting spilled all over you or your furniture. After that, insert a bit of clove oil. This step will help you prevent mold from appearing on the casting mold. Be aware that some materials among which are plaster as well as alginate and others are more likely to get mold on the surface than some.

 How to Choose a Good Release Agent

 The whole point of applying release agent is to keep the cured part away from the mold. That’s why it’s a waste if your chosen agent isn’t able to do this. To prevent this from happening, you should clearly understand which types of release agents are used for what and apply them accordingly. However, picking the perfect agent can be tricky and tough. Out of all the products on the market, users find themselves doubting which one to get.

Now, we’ll give you a hand with the choice of the right release agent for you. Here are some key indicators to have in mind.

·         Universal vs. Multiple Release Agents – One of the questions you should be asking while deciding is whether you want to use multiple agents or have one that fits all purposes. In some cases, the universal agent can be less efficient. However, some parts can be saved from contamination with it.

·         Affordability – People always search for cheap products. When it comes to release agents, it all depends on the material. So, silicone oils, waxes, and PVA agents have the lowest cost. Yet compromises should be made. These materials are known to not stick long requiring re-application soon. Also, they can transfer to the part with mold.

·         Layer of materials – You should see which agents form thinner and which thicker layers to keep the mold at bay.

·         Enough surface slipping

·         Surface durability and adhesion

·         Chemical inertness

These are only a few things to consider. Of course, you’re free to look at the matter from your own point of view and see which agent serves the purpose you need it for.

Final Words

All things considered, mold release agents have become a necessity. Without them, your spaces will succumb to mold. They help you make a layer that will separate the cured part from the rest thus saving you the trouble. However, there are many types to choose from, which is why we enclosed some details to help you make your decision. Also, we shared how the applying process goes and told you how to make your own release agent if you don’t want to buy one. In any case, now it’s your turn to decide what works for you when it comes to mold release agents.

So, what are your thoughts after all of this? Have you found the answers you’re looking for? Do you have any experiences with these agents? Share everything with us here!

Lisa Sun, professional chemical release agent sales from SAKURAI mold release agent, has been involved in release agent for over 10 years. For more information visit: https://meiyahg.com/

[blazehedgehog]

A few weeks before SAGE, I was interviewed by Corentin Lamy of french newspaper Le Monde. I answered questions about why I started SAGE, what I think makes Sonic unique, the origin of fan games, and various community history stuff. It was a lot of fun! You can click above to read the full article, which was published in french (translated, its title is something like "When There's No Good Sonic Games, Fans Develop Their Own"). Corentin also interviewed folks like Rlan for the article, too!

But, well, you know me: I’m long winded as heck. I ended up writing nearly TEN PAGES of text in response to my interview questions.  I went on some kind of deep dives. So, with permission, I have been told it’s okay to publish my responses in full here on my blog. Just follow me behind the “read more” tag...

Corentin: Could you tell me more about the fangame scene? Is it as active nowadays than it was 5, 10 or 20 years ago?

Back in the day, SFGHQ was a huge resource hub. It hosted things used to make games, like graphics and sounds, as well as games themselves. When Rlan (Ryan) moved on, SFGHQ slowly fell into disrepair for a long time. Maintaining the database of files was more work than most people wanted to deal with. The forum community was always active, but people were gradually starting to move on. Maybe not even move on, but spread out a little more. Back in the day, it was difficult to host large files by yourself, so submitting your game to SFGHQ was the only way to put your work out there. That was a big draw. As services like Dropbox grew in popularity, hosting your game on SFGHQ began to matter less, and you started seeing more fangame projects show up in other corners of the Sonic fan community.

As SFGHQ's forums began to slow down, some of the people in charge wanted to revive it by merging with other Sonic fan communities. At one point, SFGHQ merged with another forum called Sonic United, and there were also suggestions being floated about trying to make SFGHQ a part of Sonicretro.org (one of the largest, oldest Sonic fan sites). Eventually the Sonic United merger was undone after Sonic United itself was bleeding users and shut down due to a lack of activity, and Sonic Retro opened their own fan gaming subforum in partnership with SFGHQ, which kinda-sorta meant SFGHQ as a stand-alone entity ceased to exist. SAGE went on like normal, and even grew, actually. Big names started making guest appearances, like a Q&A sessions with Naoto Ohshima (original character designer for Sonic and Dr. Eggman) and Mike Pollock (the current English voice of Dr. Eggman).

SFGHQ itself laid dormant, with years worth of promises about relaunching the site. Last year, as part of SAGE 2017, SFGHQ finally, actually relaunched. Instead of having an administrator manually add content to the site, users are now free to publish and maintain their own files. Unfortunately, it's a forum in the year 2018, so it's been kind of quiet. Most of the discussion tends to happen in the SFGHQ Discord, which is almost always active.

Of course, this is just the Sonic side of things. SFGHQ had a knock-on effect and others tried to make their own fan gaming websites for other gaming franchises. I think the only one that's still around is MFGG (Mario Fangame Galaxy), which even today still remains very reminiscent of what SFGHQ used to be like back in its golden age.

Overall, I'd probably say the fangame scene is more active than ever, though. SFGHQ's rise to fame was helped by the availability of easy-creation tools like Clickteam Fusion and Game Maker. Now, there's even more options for first-time developers getting in to game development, what with Unity, Construct, and even stuff like Twine. Everybody makes games nowadays it feels like, and you can draw a lot of parallels between how a lot of professional creators got their start drawing fanart or writing fanfiction. The more tools there are to make games with, the more likely somebody's first game development project will be a fangame. These people may not all be centralized at SFGHQ anymore, but they're still out there.

Corentin: How big is it? Do most developers know each other? Help each other? Sometimes are jealous of each other?

Back in the day, when everyone was centralized in SFGHQ, everybody knew each other, yeah. We were like one big family (in both good ways and bad). Nowadays, with everyone so spread out, it's almost impossible to keep track of it all. There's always a bunch of games at SAGE I've never heard of before, because they come from Gamejolt or some other fringe community I don't frequent. As a result, I imagine the fan gaming community is fairly large.

People don't usually help each other very much. Not for any kind of rude or territorial reasons, but generally because fangames tend to be a very personal, focused thing, and most people have tunnel vision regarding what they want. Everyone's trying to fulfill their dreams and that usually means going it alone, as everyone else is doing the same thing, with their own dreams. There are always exceptions, though. For a long time, Sonic Epoch, a fangame that continued the 1993 Sonic Saturday Morning Cartoon, was a team of three or four people writing the game's script and two or three musicians. Sonic Robo-Blast 2, one of the oldest fangames still in active development, has probably had dozens of people work on it over the years (I personally worked as a texture artist for them briefly). I also helped out on Sonic Time Attacked, one of the most famous classic fangames. Its developer, Jamie Bailey, was nearing completion on the game, but was struggling to produce the small handful of cutscenes he planned to have. I was kind of known for having nice cutscenes in my games, so I helped him out. Also, nowadays, with the advent of Unity making 3D games more viable, teaming up with multiple people is starting to become increasingly necessary. Sonic Utopia is being developed by at least four or five people, I think. Sonic World, a fangame written in Blitz3D, has probably had a dozen contributors by now. You can't really be a solo developer on those kinds of games, they take too much work.

Jealousy is definitely a problem. It's unsurprisingly difficult to draw the line on what's okay when you're making games that are 99% made from content borrowed from official games. If we're borrowing sprites from Sega without asking, why can't we borrow sprites from each other? The answer was always because that person was a member of the community, and they went to great lengths to custom-make something for their game, so obviously they weren't going to let anyone else use it. But, then, nobody had ever asked Sega if it was okay, so why should any of it be okay? That was occasionally a debate, and never with clear answers. Regardless, there were always accusations flying about who was stealing what from where. In particular, I remember a huge war breaking out over the usage of sprites created by a user with the handle "N8Dawg." He had custom-made a set of sprites all by himself, practically professional quality, and after abandoning his own project, decided to turn his artwork over to the community. But he did not do so publicly; he selected a few individuals that he thought would benefit from his sprites, and very quickly, access to these graphics turned in to sort of status symbol in the community. It was a nightmare. There was a lot of arguing over who got to use those sprites, and who had obtained them officially and who had stolen them from another fangame. Eventually, I think N8Dawg agreed to just release them publicly to stop all the arguing. I still have the files.

Corentin: How do you explain than the Sonic fangame scene is so active? What make Sonic so special? Is that because of the characters? Of the mechanics?

Generally speaking, I think fans make content to fulfill a need they aren't getting from the source material in question. This is why you get fanfiction that is so centered around romantic pairings. If nobody is giving it to them, people will always make what they want to see. Fans started making their own Sonic games after the franchise was more or less put on pause for five years in the mid-1990's. Sonic Team stepped away from Sonic games after making Sonic & Knuckles to try and let things rest, but there were a lot of people out there that were clearly hungry for more. So, they simply started making it themselves. You saw the same thing more recently with AM2R (Another Metroid 2 Remake). By the time that project finished, it had been something like 12 or 13 years since the last 2D Metroid game. Fans just made their own, because that's what they wanted to see.

The funny thing about Sonic is that Sega hasn't really kept the franchise under control. There are many, many different versions of the character, each one unique to itself. The Sonic from the Saturday morning cartoon is a different character from the Sonic in the classic games, which is a different character from the Sonic in the Archie comics, which is a different character from the Sonic in the Fleetway comics, so on and so forth. What this ultimately means is that you have tons people who come to Sonic the Hedgehog for wildly different things. Even narrowing it down just to the games, the Sonic franchise has had enough variance that there's a lot of debate over which games are "the good ones." When you consider what I said earlier about people making things that they want to see, there are a lot of Sonic fans out there who feel as though they aren't being served. Fangames end up a very good way to work out those frustrations.

Unfortunately what this means is that everyone has a different answer for what makes Sonic special. For some, it definitely is the characters. A lot of people were upset when Sonic Adventure 2 was first announced, because early media implied Tails wouldn't be making an appearance in that game. There are people upset right now because characters from the canceled Archie Comics haven't made it over to the new IDW Sonic comics. Other people are more about the game mechanics. The biggest splits there are between people who like the Classic 2D Sonic games, people who like the Sonic Adventure games, and people who like the super fast modern games like Sonic Generations.

Sonic faces some very interest design challenges, I think. The controls in those classic 2D games are still very unique, even among today's games. I think that also contributed to the sense that some fans were being under-served, because for the longest time, through games like Sonic 4, Sega was quite clearly trying to replicate those old games, but they weren't getting it right. Because it's not an easy thing to get right, really. Sometimes, it can almost feel like Sonic is successful by accident, like the stars and the planets align in just the right way at just the right time to produce something that could never exist at any other point in time. That'd certainly explain some things.

Corentin: According to you, Sonic fan games are popular because it's been a while since the last decent old school Sonic game. That's probably a big part of the explanation, but that can be the only one : Metroid fan games aren't as popular, F-Zero fan games aren't as popular, etc. How do you explain than Sonic resonate so much with his fans?

Not to dodge the question more, but I think that’s the riddle a lot of people have tried and failed to solve, even Sega themselves. As I said earlier, Sonic almost seems to be successful by accident. There’s a long story to be told here about Sega in the 90’s, some of which was told in Blake Harris’ “Console Wars” book. The gist is that Sega of America and Sega of Japan didn’t get along. Information I’ve read suggests that Sega of Japan saw themselves as genius artists and Sega of America pushed back against their esoteric ideas because they weren’t seen as financially viable. The two sides were constantly disappointed by each other’s demands, and Sonic was born out of this clash of ideals.

The entire reason it’s been so difficult to nail down what makes Sonic special is because Sonic was not the product of a single person, a single art style, or a single anything. It was more like an inexperienced chef haphazardly adding ingredients to a meal and accidentally making something amazing, but never being able to replicate the recipe.

In Sonic’s case, by the time anyone asked what the recipe for Sonic the Hedgehog was, the whole thing had gained too much momentum to be stopped. When something gets popular enough for a long enough period of time, it ends up taking on a life of its own. Once enough fans embrace it, it cannot be killed or destroyed. Think about Transformers, and how sometimes there were many years between movies or TV shows, but were still Transformers fans out there on message boards or at conventions. There will always be Transformers now, in some form or another, until the eventual extinction of the human race. The same is likely true for Sonic the Hedgehog. I mean, the Sonic franchise has already weathered some pretty dark times, but it’s still here. You couldn’t destroy it if you tried.

If you really want me to define what I think makes Sonic special, I think it’s because there’s never been anything like it. Not in 1991, not in 1999, and not even now. It really comes down to two things:

One, Sonic was one of the first true “characters” in gaming. You had guys like Mario, or Mega Man, that were duty-bound to be heroes. They didn't have much personality beyond that, if they had any personality at all. Sonic had that smirk, he was always waving his finger at the player, or getting visibly impatient if you made him wait around. Sonic brought the next level of characterization to games. That continued through games like Sonic Adventure; having that many playable characters, each with their own narrative threads that wove together in to a larger story was unprecedented in 1999.

Two would be how Sonic plays. We've had games like F-Zero, or Burnout, games that are really really fast, but never anything like the way Sonic does it. Sonic gives you the ways to interact with the world that most fast games shy away from. The best Sonic games make you feel like you're driving a rollercoaster, combined with the controlled chaos of a pinball table. You're supposed to be bouncing off stuff, getting thrown into the air, and feeling a little overwhelmed at first. The danger of losing control is part of the fun, but it's a difficult line to walk, and it has to be in balance with the other elements like platforming or enemy combat. It’s a unique blend of high-speed action with a sharp personality that you can’t get anywhere else.

Corentin: What are the biggest difficulties of developing a Sonic fangame?

Specifically regarding Sonic games, the biggest hurdle is probably control. It's such a big problem that a lot of fans have banded together to write programming guides and even create collections of code to make it easier for newbies to wrap their heads around how it all works. The physics and momentum of how Sonic moves are so tricky to properly implement that not even Sega really does it right, for example with Sonic 4, and they're the ones that invented those physics in the first place.

In general, I also think a lot of people underestimate how much work it takes to finish a game, even when most of the coding is already done for you. A lot of fangames get started, but never finished, because people lose interest before they cross the finish line. Staying focused and keeping perspective are probably the two most important things when it comes to developing any sort of game. You have to know and respect your own limits. You aren't going to make a game in a weekend. Depending on how ambitious you are, you won't even finish making game over a single summer vacation. You have to be ready to commit for the long haul. The best fangames take years and years of work.

Understanding criticism would be another difficulty. Over the years as I've reviewed games at SAGE, I occasionally find someone who gets really upset when I criticize their game. If somebody doesn't like your game, you have to learn to not take it personally. Criticism is valuable data that can be used to make better games in the future, so pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and use that information to improve. There can always be a next time, so don't get discouraged.

Corentin: Few fan games come to fruitition. Do all developers of fan games hope they will finish their game, or are they aware that's very unlikely?

Yes, I think nearly all fangames are started with the intention they’ll be finished some day. I can only speak from my experience, but it really seems like everyone, including me and all my friends, initially gravitated towards fangames when we were young. Especially in that youthful innocence, you never really think about how much effort goes in to something. I remember sending letters to Sega in the Saturn era, 1996 or so, regarding the cancelation of Sonic X-Treme. I tried to give them reasons to keep working on the game, and the things I was suggesting were so incorrect it was beyond the point of comedy and was actually a little bit sad. How movies, or video games, or whatever actually get made seems like a kind of magic until you’re faced with the reality of it all. It’s easy to see how somebody might decide to make and finish a video game without fully realizing how long that’s going to take.

It also depends on your definition of what “finished” means, I guess. I’ve created fangames that are not complete, full games, but I consider the project done, because I finished what I set out to accomplish. Even if that was only a couple of levels and a boss fight.

Corentin: Is Sega ok with fangames?

They seem to be, at least for right now. A few years ago, there was an Unreal Engine fangame, "Green Hill Paradise", and the official Sonic the Hedgehog Twitch account left a comment in their stream chat congratulating them on a job well done and encouraging others to keep making fangames. Sega operates that account, so while it was not a legally binding document, it was at least some kind of official statement of approval.

But I say "at least for right now." Fangames are, according to copyright law, illegal. Technically speaking, so is fanart and fanfiction, because any unauthorized use of copyrighted content is illegal. Fair Use mostly covers educational or academic purposes, which don't apply here. So the only reason fangames, fanart, and fanfiction are okay is if the company in question turns a blind eye to the law. Sega is turning a blind eye to the law right now, but that might not always be the case. Obviously we've had decades worth of fangames at this point, but it only just recently lead to something like Sonic Mania. Hypothetically speaking, a few years from now, maybe somebody changes jobs and now there's a different person overseeing how Sega handles protecting their copyright. Then, this hypothetical person decides fangames are no longer okay and shuts the whole thing down. That could happen, and the law would support it.

Something like that actually happened very recently. Sega opened an online shop where they sell t-shirts and other merchandise, which triggered a wave of cease & desist notices directed at fans who were selling their fanart on shirts through sites like Teespring and Redbubble. Fans have been doing this kind of thing for years, even bringing their custom-made shirts to conventions and selling them there. Again, the law says this is illegal, but Sega never seemed to care before. They turned a blind eye to it. But now Sega is selling their own official shirts, they have manufacturing partnerships they want to protect, and the circumstances changed. They stopped turning a blind eye to it and shut the fans down. So, really, who knows what the future holds.

Corentin: In your Sonic Mania review video, you regret that Sonic Team relies too much on nostalgia. But doesn't nostalgia what drive you as a developer of fangames?

Not always. The very first fangame project I started back in high school was called "Sonic Infinity," which imagined a future where Sonic was brought back to life with cybernetic implants in a world that resembled Mega Man X. I just wanted my games to be popular, so I figured by merging Sonic and Mega Man together, I could be popular in two places at the same time. That was around 1998 or so. I ended up getting bored of that pretty quickly, and a new project caught my attention: a fangame called "Sonic: The Fated Hour" which was to be a Metroid-style Sonic game where you'd explore an open world and find gear upgrades. I started that project around the year 2000. Everyone else was still making fangames that continued the story of Sonic 3 & Knuckles, but I wanted something that felt closer in tone to the Sonic Adventure games, which were current at the time. So it had a lot of story and cinematic sequences with artwork I drew myself.

I spent nine and a half years on The Fated Hour trying to figure out the best way for Sonic to work as a Metroid game before I gave up. When you work on something for that long you start to forget why you even started the project in the first place, so I decided it would be best if I just moved on. I still think about that game from time to time, about ways I could do certain things, but I refuse to let myself get trapped in that cycle again.

Along the way there was also a fangame I was working on called "Shadow of Chaos" that would have parodied how self-serious Sonic games are sometimes. That game didn't even really play like a Sonic game at all. You controlled Shadow, who could shoot guns and drove a Vespa scooter. It was intentionally ridiculous. I ended up getting a lot of friends to help me make levels for that one, but I lost a lot of the files to a hard drive crash. Many years later I ended up finding a backup of those files, but by then, the moment had passed.

And those are just my games. In my Sonic Mania review I had footage of other projects from my friends. There was “Thirdscape”, which was part of a trilogy of fangames about an alien invasion. The game took place many years after Sonic Adventure, and featured a grown-up Tails that was taller than Sonic. After Sonic Adventure 2, a lot of fangames were Sonic and Shadow working together, like Aytaç Aksu’s “Chaomega” and Showoffboy’s “Sonic Ki”. Then you had truly weird games, like TLSPRWR’s “Sonic Bible Adventure”, which fittingly takes Sonic through the events of the bible, or RC’s “Crazy Cabbie Sonic” where Sonic must deliver pedestrians to their destination before time runs out, like in Crazy Taxi.

Then you even have games like “Freedom Planet”, which originally started out as a Sonic fangame starring “Lilac the Hedgehog” as she traversed Dragon Valley collecting gold rings. Now, Freedom Planet is an original game starring Lilac the Dragon, available to purchase on Steam, Wii U, Playstation 4, and soon, Nintendo Switch, with a sequel in active development.

The connecting thread is that these were all side-scrolling games, but that was more about the limitations of the tools than any real desire to focus on nostalgia. The fangaming boom happened because of easy-to-use game creation software, but that software was universally limited to making 2D games only. Making 3D games often meant knowing real programming languages. The only 3D fangame for the longest time was “Sonic Robo-Blast 2”, which itself mainly started as a mod for Doom 2. In the big picture, Unity is a fairly recent invention, and we’re only just now starting to see a larger number of fangames using it.

If there was a focus on nostalgia, it was largely because those old Genesis games are the most universally beloved. It’s like I said earlier, fans tend to create the things they want to see. So you had a lot of fangames over the years about returning to Green Hill Zone. I think it was that fact by itself that probably pushed Sega to invest so much more heavily in nostalgia with Sonic 4, which in turn sparked even more nostalgia-focused fangames from fans determined to right Sonic 4’s wrongs. In a sense, that’s sort of why we have Sonic Mania now.

Corentin: What are the 3 or 4 best fan games people should absolutely give a try?

Sonic Robo-Blast 2 is unique to fangames insofar as it’s big enough to support its own community. It’s worth looking in to just to see how far the development team has taken the Doom engine; they converted a first person game in to a fairly decent 3D platformer. There’s also a huge modding community for the game, and an active multiplayer scene. Though it’s not ready yet, the next big update to SRB2, version 2.2, will finally overhaul the entire game to add proper support for sloped surfaces, something Doom didn’t originally support. It’ll probably be the most significant update the game’s ever had in its 20 year development. (trailer for 2.2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cfK3EWnn2E)

I don’t want to be negative, but a lot of people would probably say Sonic: Before the Sequel or Sonic: After the Sequel. Those are two games by LakeFepard, who managed to crank them out in record time. Something like a year each, maybe less. They’re very creative games with incredible soundtracks that rival even official Sonic games. But something about them has always felt a little “off” to me in a way that’s hard to describe, and recently Lake has apparently had a falling out with SFGHQ. I’m not really in the loop on the drama, though, which is probably for the best.

I’d recommend Hez’s “Sonic Classic.” It’s a massive fangame that was inspired by Sonic 4. It can feel a little messy, but its heart is in the right place, and there’s tons of stuff in it. It was almost like having Sonic Mania before Sonic Mania even existed.

That’s already four, but gosh, there’s more. Petit Hedgehog is just a demo, but it’s a cute Sonic-Advance-inspired game with 100% original graphics. I’d also recommend OzcrashSonic’s Sonic World, which I mentioned earlier, because it’s so big and complex; it has something like 30 playable characters and 50 levels, it’s nuts. Sonic vs. Darkness is also just a demo, but it’s a fantastic game in the style of Sonic Rush. There’s probably more, but those are the games I think about a lot.

Corentin: Could you tell me more about SAGE? Why did you start it? You're not responsible of it anymore, right?

No, I’m no longer responsible for organizing SAGE. The people handling SAGE now still check in with me from time to time when they want my opinion on big decisions, but I mostly just cover the event by writing reviews for the games available. It’s been long enough that I my memory is a little fuzzy, but I think I did the first four events, two every year, until I gave it up. I was going through some difficult emotional things in my life at that time, and the additional stress of putting together something like that was having a negative impact on my life. Since then, it’s grown to become much bigger than something I could have accomplished on my own.

The first SAGE was on September 9th, 2000, one year after the launch of the Sega Dreamcast in North America. I was still in high school at the time.

I started it because it was hard to talk about my fangame projects with anyone who wasn’t already in SFGHQ. There was a long-running stigma fangames faced; many people thought they were a form of piracy. They were put in to the same category as pirated bootleg games you’d see on the black market. So it was impossible to have a conversation or get much coverage on gaming-oriented sites.

I think it was around this time I started reading a website called Insert Credit and learning of what Japan called their “doujin gaming” scene. Doujin is a Japanese word often used to describe fan-created content, and in Japan, you can sometimes find doujin manga sold on shelves right next to the official thing. Now there were doujin games -- Japanese fangames -- that were gaining traction on the internet. That kind of acceptance was fascinating to me.

So I started SAGE to try and bring that kind of acceptance over to what my friends and I were doing. I wanted to dispel the stigma that fangames were a type of piracy. Or, at least, not any closer to piracy than fanart or fanfiction.

It didn’t really work. We got a couple smaller sites to post a small blurb about the very first year SAGE launched, but nobody bigger than that would touch it. The stigma remained.

SAGE ended up being successful as a secondary function, as it gave the community milestones to orbit around. Instead of just making games and releasing them whenever, now people were working to get things ready to show at SAGE. Milestones like that are something professional studios use throughout game development to measure progress, and SAGE gave the fangaming community something similar to strive towards. It created a healthier structure for making fangames, and to be honest, it had done so kind of by accident. It wasn’t until many years after I stopped doing SAGE that I realized the entire reason it’s still around is because it became that anchor for development.

And, in the long run, I think SAGE lasting for 18 years did end up helping fight back against that stigma, even if it wasn’t immediately apparent back when I first started. The stigma still exists, you still get comments from people who don’t understand why someone would risk spending all of that time on a fangame that might get shut down, but at least the conversation is more open now than it ever has been.

Capcom sponsored a fangame a few years ago called “Street Fighter x Mega Man”. Microsoft has openly stated they’re fine with fan-content of their original properties, which has lead to things like the “Red vs. Blue” Youtube series and Halo fangames like “Installation 01.” Valve has been increasingly open with its fan community, even co-publishing a fan-remake of the original Half-Life, called “Black Mesa.”

And, of course, we now have Sonic Mania, whose team is made up almost entirely of old SFGHQ users.

Somewhere along the line, SAGE may have helped bridge some of those gaps. That’s pretty cool.

[cheri-translates]

[CN] Kiro’s Variety Show Date (Eng Translation)

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a date which has not been released in English servers! 🍒

The call before this date is important in establishing the context! Please read it first: here

This post is dedicated to @kudoriee​, who is an adorable and pure-hearted soul with a lot of love to give 💕 Hope you’ll enjoy this!!

Kiss Dates Collection: Gavin // Lucien // Victor

Note: This date is mostly a bullet point summary because a lot of details were just fillers. The important scenes that you’re probably here for have been fully translated, no worries! 😂

The date begins with the film crew outside Kiro’s house, with the host staging the whole “surprise visit” thing we typically see in reality shows

They take a plane to the island where the show would be filmed

Once they reach the island, the show officially begins. Kiro isn't the only guest on the show, so they just introduce themselves and start doing tasks

The host asks Kiro who he most wants to visit the seaside with, but Kiro says that it’s a secret

At one point, the host suggests a volleyball game, and that the winner would get an award - a cold soft drink

Because the program team is extremely stingy with their budget, everyone perks up at the idea of getting something for free

Of course, Kiro groups with MC

Even though MC worries that she’d be a burden, Kiro sweetly says “As compared to winning or losing, being happy is most important!”

Her physical strength is no match for their opponents, but Kiro’s strategy enables them to win

The volleyball game takes up 1/3 of the date and there’s nothing worth mentioning...

...apart from this CG making Kiro look like an otter holding a sea urchin:

As the triumphant victors, they attain the coveted prize - the cold soft drink

MC blushes furiously after Kiro drinks directly from the bottle because sure, indirect kisses are so raunchy.

Afterwards, they have some alone time and walk along the beach while the sun sets:

MC: When the host asked who you most wanted to go to the seaside with, why didn’t you respond?

Kiro turns his head and looks at me with a surprised expression. Then, he laughs.

Kiro: You really don’t know the answer?

His shadow falls into my eyes, like a cloud blocking the sky behind it.

MC: I…

Kiro: I’ll bring you to a place first!

MC: Where-

Kiro pulls me into a run, towards the direction of the sunset, as though we’re chasing the vanishing light on the beach. Very soon, the big rocks on the shore enter my vision.

Kiro: Hurry and look, this is the place.

Kiro pulls me along as we walk closer, pointing at a shadowy area. There are two unremarkable, mutually independent rocks.

But the shadows they cast on the golden sand look like a couple snuggled up with each other.

This scene is fleeting. Very soon, the snuggling shadow disappears along with the final ray of light.

Before a sense of regret creeps in, Kiro suddenly leans in close. The colour of the dusk in his eyes grow dark.

I close my eyes without realizing it, and feel a soft and moist touch. It starts off tentative, then becomes demanding.

Our fingers are entwined tightly, heartbeats like loud cicadas, becoming even more urgent with every beat.

Only the waves retain their original rhythm, and continually wash onto the shore.

And then the scene abruptly cuts to MC being in the hotel alone

The program team suddenly sends her a message telling everyone to gather on the beach for an activity

On the beach, the host says they're going to play a game where everyone writes a challenging activity and put it into the box. If you pick it, you have to do what’s written on the piece of paper

Kiro goes first

Host: “Let me see – let one guest on the scene sit on your back and do twenty push-ups!”

Obviously he picks MC, and we get a description of Kiro’s back muscles:

With a palm on his back, I can feel his tense muscles through the thin material of his shirt, and the sweat that is slowly oozing out.

After that, it’s MC’s turn

She has to answer this question: “Who are you most willing to elope with?”

Kiro: I really want to know the answer to this question!

After some thought, MC responds.

MC: I’d pick my good partner, our host for this show.

Host: Are you sure you’d pick me?!

And then the lights suddenly go out (totally not Kiro’s fault). 

As everyone starts panicking, someone grabs her wrist.

Kiro: Let’s leave this place.

Before I have time to think, I’ve already been pulled away by Kiro in the middle of the chaos.  

We leave the sound of voices far behind us. At this moment, only starlight illuminates our path.

Shadows from the surrounding trees are cast on the surface of the water, and everything becomes quiet.

Just when we think we’re safe, a familiar profile, with a phone pressed to his ear, suddenly appears.

Savin: What happened? Why did the power suddenly go out?

Kiro: Oh no.

Seeing that Savin is about to bump into us, Kiro reacts quickly by pulling me into a pond shrouded by fallen branches.

Splashes of water can be heard, but they are quickly overshadowed by the sound of the faraway waves.

Kiro: Don’t move.

Kiro uses his hand to hold me in front of him, his eyes following Savin’s impending figure. This corner should be sufficiently covered by the surrounding plants.

I hold my breath nervously, and dare not move an inch. Kiro’s lips press against my ear, and he says in an incredibly soft and breathy voice.

Kiro: If we didn’t leave just now, would you have “eloped” with someone else?

In the middle of his phone call, Savin seems to sense that something is wrong, and he tosses a glance in our direction.

My body tenses up immediately, but Kiro continues waiting for my response, so I explain in a soft voice.

MC: That was just a game… the answer I gave was the safest one.

However, this answer doesn’t satisfy Kiro. He tightens his arms around me and holds me closer, creating ripples on the water surface.

Kiro: Even if it’s a game, you’re not allowed to do that.

There is a hidden danger in his soft voice. His half-lidded eyes contain an emotion which I’m unfamiliar with.

MC: Kiro?

My instincts make me feel like escaping, but lips dotted with water droplets are already trailing from my earlobe downwards. They stop at the side of my neck and suck gently.  

Seeming to have an intention to punish, he grips that small patch of skin between his teeth, rubbing it lightly then releasing it. He uses the tip of his tongue to lick the area soothingly.

MC: Mm…

I bite down on my lower lip hard to suppress the sound that’s about to rise from my throat. My arm holds onto the only support preventing me from slipping into the cold water. The beating of my heart is almost too much to bear.

Without realizing it, Savin has already left. All that remains are the moving shadows of trees on the water.

Kiro: Didn’t you want to know who I most wanted to go to the seaside with?

The voice in my ear is slightly breathless, but firm.

Kiro: It’s you. Whether it’s Summer or the beach, you are the only one who cannot be absent.

Kiro’s fingers lift the hair covering the side of my neck, his fingertip gently caressing the mark he has left behind.

Kiro: Now, this place has my marking.

His tone is accompanied by a low, satisfied laugh, and a possessive desire.

The fingers on my back follow the trail of water and snake downwards. Blazing heat follows his movements, gradual yet eager, as they flow over every inch of my skin.

His breath lays siege, filling every crevice in my body, wet and lingering.

Even so, Kiro is not yet satisfied. His arms hold me even tighter, and he uses his fingertips and lips to hold me prisoner in this secret corner, and I am unable to withdraw.

Kiro: Miss Chips, you belong to me. So, I won’t let you escape this time.

His searing breath takes over mine. I am unable to tell if it’s water droplets or sweat that slowly trickles down our tightly-pressed skin.

In our misty vision, dots of starlight pass through the trees, and are scattered across the surface of the water. Suppressed gasps diffuse near our ears, and are amplified by our senses.  

The water sways continuously like a tide, gently wrapping two hearts that are about to merge into one.

And the breaths of the sea breeze render the night even more blurry.

[acehotel]

Just/Talk: Justin Strauss with Jerry Schatzberg

Since the beginning of his illustrious career in the 50s, Bronx-born Jerry Schatzberg’s singular vision has shaped, shifted and pushed the cultural needle in fashion, music and film the world over. His seminal works are so powerful that they’re indistinguishable from the subject itself — it’s hard to envision Bob Dylan’s Blonde on Blonde without immediately calling to mind Schatzberg’s portrait of him. He's photographed the greats, directed Al Pacino’s starring debut and was a trailblazer for boundary-pushing art. For this edition of Just/Talk, legendary DJ and Ace friend Justin Strauss talks to Jerry about dressing The Rolling Stones in drag, his foray into photography and why Dylan’s iconic LP photo is blurry. 

Justin Strauss: I'm really thrilled to meet you. I've interviewed a lot of people. When this opportunity came up, it was really something special for me. Your images are burned into my psyche. I've been buying records since I was seven years old. When I grew up, my dad was into records. The cover you shot for Bob Dylan’s Blonde on Blonde LP is one of the most iconic record covers ever.

Jerry Schatzberg: I hope so. We just had an issue over a cover on a Bob Dylan book I'm doing  now, and I think the book cover is beautiful. The German publisher decided they didn't like it. They didn't think they could sell it. I don't know why. I realized after listening to what they were talking about, they just wanted to do their thing. I could just see the board meeting in the morning on how can we get our touch on this and all that. I didn't like anything they submitted.

If somebody shows me something better than what I've got, why not? I'll say it was my idea. But they came through with really terrible stuff. I told the publisher. I said, “No, you'll have to go with the cover we've got.” It's being translated into four different languages. They wanted a little something different in each one so they could tell the difference between the languages, which was just an excuse they gave me.

Finally, I said no to them. Then they said, “Well, let us just submit something.” I said okay. They submitted something, and it again was terrible. “We'll find something else.” They submitted it. It was also terrible. I wasn't being difficult. If somebody does something better than what I've got, I want to do it. It's still going to be my book.

Finally, I got my lawyer involved. They said to him, “We're not going to do the book.”  I said, “Okay. I don't care.” That's a good position to be in because, first of all, books  don't make a lot of money. Fortunately, I have the final say. My lawyer called back and said,  “They're not going to take it.” I said okay. That afternoon, the publisher called back and said, “Okay, we'll take it, but we're not going to take as many books as we were going to.” I said, “I don't care. Fine.” If they sell a bundle of them, they'll order another bundle. Who cares?

And the one of the reasons I like the  cover idea is because I'm a visual person. If you put Blonde on Blonde in a window of record covers, it'll always stand out. I think this in a bookstore on a shelf or in a window will also stand out.  

Justin: You grew up here in New York?

Jerry: In the Bronx, until I was about 13 or 14. Then we moved to Queens. When I got married the first time, we moved out to Long Island.

Justin: And where did you develop a love of photography?

Jerry: That was all just hating what I was doing and I just had to find something different. I was working for the family fur business, but I hated it. There was a big retail camera store not far from where we worked, Willougby's, I don't know if it's still there. I used to go there for lunch hour, and I'd end up walking around for a couple of hours. I didn't even know I was there for a couple of hours, but my father would let me know when I went back to work because he didn't like that his brothers were working back in the factory and I'd take two hours...

Justin: What was your first camera?

Jerry: I had a camera when I was about eight or nine, or six. It was a plastic little camera. I don’t even know what it was.

When I was getting out of the Navy, I had seen something I liked. It was a 35 millimeter camera, an Argus C3. I didn't take many pictures with it, but one day I saw an ad in the Times for a photographic assistant. I had no idea what that was. But I called the number, and the person there was really an employment agent. I told him my story, and he laughed.  He said, “Come on in  and I'll see what I can do.”  

He sent me out, and the first place I went to was Lillian Bassman Studio, and it was like falling down the rabbit hole. I didn't see anything like this in the Bronx or school or anywhere. The interview went very well except they couldn’t offer me much money.  I couldn't take the job.

My uncle worked for a company where, if you rented their diapers each week, they'd give you a free picture of your baby.  I told him I’d like to do that, I’ll take baby pictures. My uncle said, “No, there's no money in that.” I said, “Well, how much money?” And what he told me was more than I was offered at the first interview. So he set it up for me and I borrowed money from my mother to buy a camera. When I went out for my first appointment, the baby was sleeping and they wouldn’t let me in. When I went to the second appointment the baby was sick and they wouldn’t let me in.  So my uncle was right. There's no money in that.

So I decided I would try to sell the photographs and that was a mistake. My Uncle was very good at it. He'd come back with $40, $50 orders from people who can't afford $10. I didn't like that very much. After a year of suffering through that, I call the employment agency back and he remembered me, and he laughed again. He sent me to two places.

Justin: As a photographic assistant?

Jerry: Yes. The first place was too fancy for me, it was really a catalogue house. They made a lot of money, but they didn’t do anything creative. The second place was up on top of a building. There were other guys waiting when I arrived and I was fourth in line. The stylist didn't know when the photographer was going to arrive, and told the first three guys to go out and get some coffee. After five minutes the photographer arrived, and I was the first in line. I had my interview, and he told me he would probably hire me. I didn’t quite believe him, and I went back to selling pictures on Long Island. I called home that night and my wife told me Bill Helburn had called. That was the photographer who said he would hire me. I figured I probably lost the job. I called him first thing in the morning and I got the job. I probably asked for the least amount of money. I worked for him for two and a half years. When I told him I was leaving, he offered me a piece of the business.

I had made a few friends in the industry. One of them was Bob Cato, who was an art director for Charm Magazine. He promised me work at the magazine, and just after I quit working for Bill Helburn, Bob Cato lost his job at the magazine. Now I had a big studio, a small rental, no work, but lots of experience photographing all the young woman who came to New York wanting to be models. We exchanged photographs for experience.         

Justin: When did your work start to appear in Vogue?

Jerry: Through the small advertising agency of my friend, I started to get a few little assignments, around 1954 and, of course, Vogue was the first decent thing that I got.

I said to the secretary as I was leaving, “If I don't hear from him in two or three months, can I call back?” She said, “In two or three weeks, call back.” By the time I got back to the studio, he'd already called to give me an assignment. That was a beginning. It was small assignments, small pictures in the magazine. It was a start.

Justin: Were you into fashion photography?

Jerry: My father was the salesman in the family fur business and, in the showroom, they'd have one magazine, which was Town & Country. I do remember Milton Greene’s name. I guess he was doing most of the photographs for Town & Country at the time. I remember his name, and I didn't pay much attention to the photographs until I was in it.

Justin: And you were always into music?

Jerry: Yeah, even as a kid. I remember I always liked the big bands. I'd be in the car driving with my mother and I'd hear a band, tell her who it was, and she’s be so impressed. I was thirteen years old and I already knew the name of the band.

Justin: And in the 60s, with the Beatles, and the Stones, and Dylan. Were you into all that as well?

Jerry: In the beginning, I was more into rhythm and blues, and that was when I went to college. I went for a year to the University of Miami. It was just starting, and I found two other guys from Jamaica in my neighborhood and we had rented one room on Miami Beach — the three of us lived in that one room. I remember asking one of the bellmen where could we go to listen to music. He said, “Real music?” I said “Yeah.”

He took us out to this place. I guess it was a church, but a small building with spaces between the clapboards. You could see right through them and Count Basie was playing there. The place just shook, but he played for his people, and it was great.

Justin: At some point you merged your love of music and your love of photography and started shooting musicians as well?

Jerry: Oh yeah. Once I was working for magazines, I started to get assignments to do actors and other personalities.

Justin: This was the golden age of fashion photographers, people like Avedon, Penn, William Klein… Did you know them?

Jerry: I didn't know Penn. Actually, Penn bought a camera from me. I knew Avedon. I knew Bill Klein, because we both worked for Vogue. Norman Parkinson, Helmut Newton. When I first started working, I worked mostly in England, and I hadn't gone to Paris. I was friendly with David Bailey, Terrance Donovan and Duffy. They were my buddies. We were working all the time, and playing all the time. We just had a lot of fun.

Bailey told me when Beatles came here and we were all going crazy, he says “Hey, you haven't heard anything. You got to hear The Rolling Stones.” The next time I went over, we went to brunch at a friend's and Mick Jagger came in. At first I didn't know who he was, but he came into the brunch. Dirty sweater, very long dirty fingernails. I was talking to him and then I realized who he was. I hadn't heard the music yet. I said, “Where can I hear you play?” He said, “We're playing this afternoon.”

I said, “Oh, can we all go?” He said, “Yeah.” He called up the theater and put away some seats for us and we went in a caravan of about four or five cars. At the time, Mick’s girlfriend was Chrissie Shrimpton and she was driving his car.  I remember that we all went up there, and when we got to the theater, I saw all these people, these kids outside screaming and running after the cars as we turned into the driveway.

We went to the  backstage entrance and we couldn't get through the people. Mick got out of his car and started running for the backstage and they're pulling on his sweater, hair, all that. We got in. We fought the crowd and went inside. We watched about four or five groups perform. Red outfits, blue outfits, and I figure The Stones were putting on the chartreuse outfits or something. They came out, and they had his ripped sweater and I started to understand who The Stones were and where they were coming from.

Justin: Then, at one point, you shot the picture sleeve for single “Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadows.” What that your concept to dress them in drag for the sleeve?

Jerry: No, Andrew Oldham, their manager called me up, and said, “The Stones have a new single coming out, would you like to photograph them in drag dressed as their mothers?” I said, “Yeah, but I'd just as soon do them as Americans and shoot in New York.” They're wearing American military uniforms. Right around the corner from my studio was a building that looked just like the building I grew up in the Bronx, so I wanted to photograph them in front of that with a star in the window. We did that, and probably some of the most interesting ones are the back behind the scene there, getting dressed for the shoot.

Justin: To dress them in drag was a revolutionary idea at that time.

Jerry: I wasn’t thinking anything like that. But in the new Dylan book I’m doing, Jonathan Lethem (who did the text) also said “You started something,” referring to that sleeve, and mentioned David Bowie.

After that sleeve came out, Frank Zappa called me and wanted to do a combination of the Mothers of Invention in drag and the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper for the cover of their album We’re Only In It For The Money. We used fruit and vegetables instead of flowers.

Justin: Amazing. And you owned nightclubs?

Jerry: Yes, one was called Ondine. The other one was Salvation. We had a different crowd at Ondine. Ondine started as very café society. The person that started it was a Frenchman named Oliver Coquelin.

I had just come back from London the week that we were opening, and he showed me the records they were going to play and I said, “Oh come on.” Charles Aznavour, that's alright once in a while. So I took him to Colony Records and we bought about $100 worth of records and he said, “Oh, my patrons are not going to like that.” I said, “Do you want a successful club, or do you want just have your patrons?” We opened. We were very successful, and then Sybil Burton opened the club Arthur and that took a big chunk out of our business.

My partner, the person I found to manage the club, was friendly with the groupies, the kids that would come in there and give us atmosphere. They were telling us about the bands from California and I figured the way we should go was for the young people.

We brought in the Doors before their album. We brought in Buffalo Springfield before their album. We brought in Jimmy James and the Blue Flames, who a year later became Jimi Hendrix. Linda Keith, who was Keith Richard’s girlfriend at the time, told us about this guitarist she had seen down at Cafe Wha, a club in the Village.

But things were up and down at Odine. The stockholders reneged on the deal they had with me and wouldn’t pay me. I said, “Okay, I'm leaving,” because the same guy that offered us funding was starting another club, which was Salvation. I said to Bradley, my partner, “Let's go down and let's go with the other club.” We did, and Jimmy James (Hendrix) had just come back from London — he opened the club for us just one night, the first night. After that, we just had a disc jockey.

Justin: But no one knew who he was at that point?

Jerry: No, nobody knew who he was, but the club had a good reputation. We had everybody come to that club.

Justin: And was Andy Warhol and his crew hanging out at your club?

Jerry: They'd come, but they'd rather hang out at the Factory, although Albert Grossman, Bob Dylan’s manager called me and asked me if I would photograph Edie Sedgwick. He thought there was something there. I said, “Well, what?” He said, “I don't know, but there's something there.” I said yeah, I would. I was walking the street and there's Andy with Barbara Reuben who was an underground filmmaker.

“Hey, Andy. How you doing?” “Oh, good. How you doing?” “Oh, I'm photographing Edie…” and I sensed  something because he didn't like anybody stepping into his territory. I didn't think I was stepping into his territory...I'm just photographing Edie. I'm not making her my super star or anything. I told him Albert asked me to and he goes, “Oh yeah, fine. Bye.” I get back to the studio and Barbara calls me and says, “Andy wants to know if you'll do five minutes of Edie for his film of her?”

I said, “yeah I’d like to” because I'd been playing around with a film camera. Hang up. She called back five minutes later. “Andy wants to know if he can do five minutes too? He's doing five minutes.” I thought for a minute. “Yeah, sure.” Hang up. She calls, “Can I come down?” I said yeah, everybody can come down. Everybody showed up. The Velvet Underground showed up. All of his gang showed up for the shooting, and I made them stay in the studio. We were in the dressing room. We did it. I have my footage but I’ve never seen Andy’s footage because, while we were shooting, Bobby Neuwirth said to Andy, “Andy there’s no film in the camera,” and Andy said, “oh it doesn’t matter.”

Justin: Did you ever photograph Velvet Underground as a band ?

Jerry: No. I photographed Nico when she was a model. I've got some good photographs of Edie. She's probably one of the most asked for photographs that I have. People just know of Edie, so Andy did a good job.

Justin: Tell me how the Dylan Blonde on Blonde album cover shoot came about.

Jerry: Albert Grossman, Bob’s manager, called me for that. I'd already been photographing Dylan.

Justin: Where was that picture taken?

Jerry: In the meatpacking district. The building doesn't exist anymore. We've tried to find it. People have asked, and then there was actually a search made for it, but they can't find the building. Some guy seems to have found the location because he plugged it into other things that might have been there.

Justin: It was one of the first rock double LPs and the way you used the one photo to cover both of the LP sleeves...

Jerry: Robbie Robertson, in his book, claims that it was his idea to do the double spread. That may be, because it wasn't my idea. I thought it was Dylan's idea, but in his book Robbie talks about it and how he suggested doing it that way.

Justin: When you shot that picture, it's a little blurry, and a little different. Did you know that was the cover, and did you know that it would have the effect it did?

Jerry: No. If they had asked me to send in my choice, I would never have sent that. It was the beginning of February. Dylan had on this little jacket. I didn't want to put on a big coat or anything, so I just had a little jacket. It was cold, and we were shivering. I grabbed about four images where it's blurred like that, moving.

Justin: So it's blurred because you were cold and moving the camera.

Jerry: Yes. Dylan, when he saw the photographs from that day, he picked that picture, which I was delighted about.

Justin: It's a great choice. It was really a breakthrough album, musically and visually. For me as a kid buying records, and for a long time after, record covers were almost — if not as — important as the music. It was what you saw first because we didn't have the ability to hear things before we bought them like we do now. You'd see a record in the record store. “Wow. This looks cool. I'll buy it.”

Did you ever think that in 2018 you'd be talking about this record cover still, that people are still blown away by it?

Jerry: No, no. I'm delighted. I think of these German publishers bullshitting me on the telephone. It's Bob Dylan. Put Bob on the cover and people will buy it. What are you talking about, that you want to change this, you want to change the type, and think people won't understand it.

Justin: So you're doing record covers with the biggest artists of the day, you're doing fashion photography shoots for Vogue. You're living a dream life right in the 60s, early 70s. And you’re a big part of it.

Jerry: Nora Ephron did a piece. It had something to do with “where's it happening.” I was always where it was happening. Her articles were good. She did five photographers. I think she did Hiro, Avedon, Halsman, me and somebody. I think it was at the Post, when it was a liberal.

Justin: Did you know or feel like that time and the work you were doing would have such an impact on modern culture?

Jerry: No, those things you know after. We were just living our lives and doing our thing.

Justin: When or what motivated you to want to go from what you were doing to making movies?

Jerry: When I went to do the collection for Vogue, I wanted to take my favorite model, Anne St Marie, with me to do the collection. Vogue said “No, we've got to find a new girl. She's been around.” I got so angry with that because she was still a great talent, a great beauty. I thought that was so unfair to her. That happened to many models. In those days, they started in their twenties, early twenties.

Justin: You got upset with Vogue for not letting you use the model you wanted to use for your shoot?

Jerry: No, I was pissed off at that story. I wanted to tell that story and I couldn't figure out how. I thought maybe I'd just do a series of photographs and show how beautiful this person is and all that. “No, we don't want to work with her. We've had too much of that.” It's that kind of power trip I didn't like; I always had it in my mind. Then there were a couple of producers from LA that got in touch with me, and they were doing a TV special, The World's Most Beautiful Women. Would I be interested in being an advisor on this?

I said, “yeah, of course.” They came in. They were two interesting guys. Not too interesting, but they were always fighting with one another. I remember that. They had this thing, and I said, “Who's directing it?” They said, “We don't have a director yet.” I said, “You know, I've been shooting film.” And they said “Let us see it.” I showed it to them. They liked it. They showed it to ABC. They liked it. So I was the director now. We went over, and it wasn't just cosmetic beauty. It was women that had more substance, like Antonia Fraser and Queen Sirikit of Thailand and Claudia Cardinale.  

I did Antonia, and then we were waiting for Queen Sirikit to come into London, and she kept canceling. Finally, I told them I had an arrangement. I've got a job. I've got to get back to do that job, and I'll come back again. I left, and maybe two days after I left, she came to London and I couldn't come back. So they decided they would shoot her. They did, and the two guys are still fighting all the time. They each confiscated one segment, the one that I shot, and the other one. They wouldn't give it to each other. The network just canceled them out. But it gave me the experience, and I felt that maybe this is the way to tell my story.

I started to develop that story. It took me four years to get it on, but I started to develop it. I came back here. I talked to some friends of mine who knew a French writer. I got in touch with him. He was coming over to do something in California. I paid him to write a screenplay for me. He did. I liked it, but I didn't like him. He was just a pain in the ass. I didn't want to put up with that, so I just figured I'd take the loss and, by that time, I had already told my story to Faye Dunaway, and she fell in love with the character. So she became part of the project, and it was much easier at that point.

Justin: She had already starred in Bonnie & Clyde, which was a huge film.

Jerry: Yeah, I met her when she was doing her first film. Esquire sent me down to Florida to shoot her and then she did another film for Sam Spiegel, and then she did Bonnie & Clyde. When they came back to New York, Marianne Downy — her press agent — said, “Why don't you call Schatzberg and see if he'll do more photographs with you?” She did. I said, “Yeah, I'd love to,” and she had actually just got an apartment here on Central Park West. Went there, and looked like a hurricane had hit the place. But we became friends, and then once we were having lunch or dinner, she said, “What else are you doing?” I said, “I'm working on this film.”

I told her about the story and she fell in love with it and the character. Then she met the woman that the story is based on, so it just kept building. Through her agency, we got a deal with Warner Brothers. I found a writer, and he did a terrible screenplay. The first screenplay was pretty good, the Frenchman, but I just couldn't deal with him.

Then I was in an elevator in Los Angeles at the Beverly Wilshire, and somebody in the back said, “You Jerry Schatzberg?” It was a producer I had met at a party and he remembered me. He said, “What are you doing here?” I said, “I'm looking for a writer.” “Like what?” I told him a little bit about my story. He said “I just worked with a writer you should meet. I think she's great. But the director doesn't like her screenplay.”

I said, “Can I read it?” He sent me the screenplay and I fell in love with it. I called her up and I asked if she'd come and meet me and Faye Dunaway at the Beverly Wilshire, and she said, “Yeah.”  I thought she'd kiss our rings or something. Shine my shoes. She was very nice, said “Yes, thank you” and she left. 

I was going to do the film with film producer Ismail Merchant. I told him the story, and he was in India. He invited Faye and I to India. We went to India.

Justin: You and Faye Dunaway were romantically involved at this time?

Jerry: At the time, yeah. We went to India. Then we went around the rest of the world and back. I kept calling Ismail and telling him, “We've got to make a deal with this writer. I really want to use this writer.” He says, “Well, I've got to finish this film with James Ivory.” “Yeah, but you're telling me that all the time, and it'll go on and on and on, and I won't have a writer. I really want this writer.” I finally called him, and I said, “Ismail, we're going to have to end it because I'm moving on.” We made a deal with Paramount. No, first I went out to California. I rented a house there and I called Carole Eastman — who was the writer — and I asked her to come. I want to talk to her. She said, “Oh yeah, yeah.”  

But every time I talked to her I said, “Don't worry. I haven't forgotten about you, Carole. I haven't forgotten about you.” She came up to the house. She says, “I can't stay very long because I've got a friend of mine in the car and she's got a bad toothache, and I've got to take her to the dentist.” I figure “Oh, she's making her escape.” I said, “Well, I've got a tape I'd like you to listen to.” “How long is that? Two and half hours? Oh no, I can't.”

I said, “How much can you listen to?” “Well, let's play the first ten minutes. Let me see what it is, and then we'll see.” In the car was Helena Kallianiotes, she played the hitchhiker in Five Easy Pieces. I said, “Well, do you want to invite your friend in?” She said, “No, no. She doesn't want to. She's shy.” I put the tape on. She sits there for two and half hours listening to the tape. She decided she wanted to do that film, so we made a deal. We became good friends. I'd go out to dinner with her and spend six hours with her just talking about it and all that. It was just great.

Justin: So what happens to this film?

Jerry: Then we got the script. I love the script. I brought it to the executive producer Bob Evans at Paramount to read. He didn't like it. He hated it. I said, “Oh, that's too bad.” He thought he was going to get Antonioni’s Blow Up, and my film was not Blow Up. Blow Up might have made more money, but my film was not that. My film's a really good film. I was just delighted with it.  

Freddy Fields was my agent then. He said, “I've got maybe one more shot. I don't know where we go now, but I've got one more shot we'll try. I'm going to give it to Paul Newman and his company, see what they think.” Paul and Joanne Woodward read it and they loved it. Joanne had a roommate that had the same experience and she fell for it. My original thinking before I had met Faye, was thinking of either Joanne or Anne Bancroft as the aging model, and then just get a younger actress to do the other part. But after meeting Faye I thought she could do the part from beginning to end.  

So we started off, and it worked beautifully. I remember the first time I wanted to bring Paul the script, let him read the script and talk about the script. We got there and before we even started working, Joanne came running out of the house. Sharon Tate and Jay Sebring had been murdered. They were very friendly with Jay, and I was very friendly with Sharon. We couldn't work and I just left. We were up in Connecticut and I called Roman Polanski who was in London. I went out to California for the funeral. It was a really sad time.  

Justin: After all this, how does your first film Puzzle of A Downfall Child about an aging fashion model, whose life is now falling apart, finally get made?

Jerry: Well, in 1970 I took the film to Oregon, where Paul was shooting something. I know we showed it to Paul, his crew, and Henry Fonda. He loved the film. People loved the film. Then it was invited to the San Francisco Film Festival, and a Frenchman had seen it there. First of all, I didn't know the Frenchman, but he told me later that when he saw the schedule, he said, “Oh, a film by a bullshit fashion photographer. I'm not even interested.” He turned out to be an important person in the film world. I didn't know him. He called me and said, “I've called Universal because I want to represent the film in Paris and I just want you to know and we're moving ahead.” I said, “Wow. Goodness, that's fantastic.”

I brought the film to Universal’s executive's home to show his friends at his private screening room. They were all eating and drinking and half of them were drunk. I’m there and I hear people saying “I didn’t get that. What was that?” After the screening, the executive says, “I want to talk to you.” He takes me into a toilet and keeps me there for 20–25 minutes trying to convince me that I should have somebody do voiceover at the beginning to tell you what the film is about. I said, “I think if you just sit and watch it, you'll find out what the film is about.” He went on and on and he said “I won't change it unless you agree to it.” I said, “Okay, I don't agree to any changes.” Then he changed it.

I spoke to Pierre and told him what had happened at the executive’s house. He said, “I’ll speak to them.” He called Universal and said “I won't take the film unless it's the original Schatzberg film.” They said, “Oh come on, Pierre. We know what we can sell and what we can't sell.” He said, “I don't care.” Pierre said, “We won’t take it.” They had other prospects, so they said “we'll leave the European version as the original, and we'll do what we want in America.” They did, and I hated it. Every time it would come on, I'd just cringe. But then when years later when they went to restore the film, they restored my version because that was the first version submitted to them. The people in the labs didn't know which one, so they restored my version.

Justin: Your next film The Panic in Needle Park certainly made a big splash.

Jerry: Yeah. Well, that was sent to me right at the end of my finishing Puzzle, and the film lab scratched the last six minutes of my negative. Screw came loose and just scratched the negative all the way to the end. I had a safety, but you can see the difference when the film changed. Now digital has made it so you can do that stuff, but I was very upset. I got the script for Panic at that same time. I didn't like the script. I don't know if I liked it or not, but I didn't like it in my mind. I was really too concerned about Puzzle and the lab's mess.

Justin: Who approached you to direct the film?

Jerry: My agent. They had the script that Joan Didion and John Dunne had written. They were looking for a director, and she saw my film and loved it. I went to my business manager and he said, “There's a good script around.” I said, “What's that?” He said, “It's called Panic in Needle Park.” I said, “Funny, I think I just turned that down.”

He asked why and I didn't tell him about the scratching. I said, “Drugs. I don't know. Too many friends have died.” We're having conversation and he's trying to talk me into it and he says, “You know Al is interested in it.” I had seen Al with him on stage four or five years before that, and I remember saying to him if I ever made a film, that's a guy I'd like to work with.

Justin: Al Pacino, we are talking about. This was his first movie role?

Jerry: This was his first. He had a small role in Me, Natalie or something like that, but this is his first major role. My agent was trying to get him as a client, so we went backstage afterwards and the difference between seeing him on stage and seeing him backstage, you could see how great an actor he was. On stage, he just blew me away, and then he was this pussycat backstage. I went back, read it again that night. Called up the producers again and told them how foolish I was, and they agreed.

Dominick Dunn was the producer, and he was at a party and he was talking to the publisher Helen Gurley Brown about this film. She says, “Well, that sounds terrific. Why don't you talk to Richard?” Richard Brown was her husband, a producer with Richard Zanuck. So my agent talked to him about the film, there at the party, and then he went and gave him the script. Then they said, “Well, what about the directing. I don't know his work.” So they looked at Puzzle, maybe the beginning and the end, and they said okay. Now I was the  director of his film.

Everything was going fine. We started to do some pre-production. They decided they didn't want Pacino. He was too old. He was thirty-one looking twelve. I said to Nick, “Nick, the reason I'm doing this film is because Pacino is involved.” “I know,” he said, but let's go through the charade of casting and at the end tell them it's got to be Pacino.”

I trusted him, we went through the process of casting, and the last actor that came to see me was Robert DeNiro. He was pretty good.

Justin: That's a tough choice.

Jerry: But then the more I thought about it, for me Al is the character. Even though DeNiro is a great actor and he did a great job auditioning with it, Al is the part. So I left it at that. One day I'm looking in a store window on Third Avenue, and I hear a voice behind me saying, “Man, I really want to do that part.” I turn around and it's DeNiro. It's like a deer in the headlights, and you don't know what to say, so I told him the truth. He looked at me, and he turned and walked away. Through the years, we see each other, “Hi.” That's all. Just like that.

There was a tribute to Morgan Freeman at Lincoln Center. I was speaking and he was speaking. We nodded at  each other.  hey wanted us to come back on stage after Morgan spoke, and so I come out. I was standing there. I forget who I was talking to, but DeNiro walks by me. He stops. He comes back. “Hi Jerry.” It took forty years for him to say “Hi, Jerry” to me. That was it. He would have been great in it.

Justin: Well, I think you made the right choice.

Jerry: Yeah, Al was pretty good.

Justin: People still talk about New York in those days, how New York is not the same. What's your take on it?

Jerry: It's not the same. But you have to adjust. I'm not the same.

Justin: The world is not the same. It's not a change for a better or a change for worse. It's just things always change.

Jerry: Well, for some people it's a change for better. Some people it's a change for worse. There are probably some things I don't like about it. There were less restaurants, and I enjoyed going to the few that were special. Now there are more restaurants, and I enjoy going to the ones that have good food.

Justin: How do you feel about the internet, and how it's taken over everyone's life?

Jerry: Oh, that's changed everything. That changed the whole film world. I haven't done a film in ten years. I've been working on one, but I stopped working because I figure my legacy is going to be in my photographs.

Justin: Yes, do you keep up with what's going on with current photographers?

Jerry: So many that I don't know them. Now that you can take a picture and take it again, and again, and again. I see some wonderful things. People have wonderful eyes. They don't experiment as much, and the ones that do experiment do too much experimenting, doing things that have no soul. They add graphics to them, but they don't have any individual souls. It's tough to find people that can take a portrait like Penn, or get the excitement that Avedon gets in a picture.

Justin: Was there anyone that you wanted to shoot that you never got to shoot?

Jerry: I would have liked to have shot Miles Davis. I would have like to have shot James Dean. But I shot so many.

Justin: You've had quite an amazing life. How old are you now?

Jerry: Ninety-one.

Justin: Any regrets?

Jerry: Of course there's always regrets, but regrets are not anybody else's business but mine. But I've had a good life. I'm not complaining. I've lived a good long life.

Justin: I look forward to your next movie, I hope you finish it.

Jerry: I really like the way it's going. Now that I've finished with the book, we're going to concentrate more on that because I think I've gotten some interesting ideas on it.

Justin: I could talk to you from now til tomorrow.

Jerry: No, you can't.

Justin: I can’t. But I would like to.

Jerry: Let’s call this part one then.

[eminperu]

Dreams Money Can Buy: The economics of a pay-as-you-go vagabond lifestyle

Since my last Facebook post about another jaunt across the world, several people have reached out to me asking the same question: how do I “fund my lifestyle” (copyright Emma). It dawned on me that A) lots of folks are looking to travel the world but B) are not sure how to do that realistically and responsibly. As an additional obstacle, people—even the vagabonds—often get weird and cagey when asked about their finances. Luckily, I’m 100% comfortable letting you know that I’m pretty poor and I’m still living what Cardi B and Chance might classify as close to—if not my best—life. I’m happy to share my strategies for the nomad life as someone who has never considered planning a strong suit and whose butt gets all itchy at the sound of the word “budget.”  This is definitely not a how-to, but a how-I-do guide that hopefully can offer one perspective to those who, like me, dream of being homeless and financially insecure—I mean, wanderlusters.  Naturally, each point is organized by subcategory titles borrowed from legendary and timeless songwriter Aubrey Graham. Started from the Bottom (now we’re still near the bottom)

Okay, not exactly the bottom, but not far off. I did have some savings before I started traveling, and I think that cushion was pretty important for my peace of mind/not dying famished in the streets. I set a (admittedly pretty arbitrary) bottom line that I would be comfortable—not thrilled, but not fully catatonic—to have when I returned to a more “traditional lifestyle.” I put that amount in a do-not-touch savings account. Luckily, I haven’t really had to dip into this kitty very many times. Though, again, I’m admittedly no financial wizard, I would estimate over the course of the last year I’ve netted about -$2,000. To me, this year, the amount of time I spent not working, and the amazing experiences I have had were worth significantly more than that figure.

God’s Plan/Controlla

You can plan your travels in advance to varying degrees, but it’s crucial to be honest with yourself about how much uncertainty you can stomach without anxiety sucking all the joy out of the cool stuff you’re doing. I’ve had people tell me, “Oh, it’s so crazy how you can just hop on a plane and not know where you’re going next. You’re flying by the seat of your pants!” Two things: 1) I hate pants. 2) More often than not, I do plan at least my immediate next move in advance. This isn’t so much a due my discomfort with uncertainty, but rather how frustrated I get when I’m forced to spend substantially more money on a ticket/room because I couldn’t commit in time. As a general rule, I plan international travel at least a month in advance and try to get things settled for big within-country trips a week before I leave. I make sure to search airline sites directly, especially for within country travel, and I don’t hesitate to call booking sites instead of reserving online to see if if they can cut me a deal—they’re out here looking for that commission. That being said, the best practice is to seek advice from people who have visited or, better yet, live in your destination. Not only can they steer you towards the right locations/companies/etc., they can also advise you when it might be more economical to book real time in-person as opposed to beforehand online (this happens quite a bit, especially in less-developed countries. Trip Advisor is not always your friend, yo.). Plan as much in advance as you need to in order to feel comfortable and excited, not overwhelmed and anxious, for your trip.

Hold On, We’re Going Home

Building off my last point, for me, having a space to unpack my borderline-hoarder amount of clothes and plug in my electric toothbrush is crucial to my mental health. Who doesn’t love a nest? Though a lot of people move intermittently between destinations, I was pretty settled in Lima. Before flying in, we booked a month in an Airbnb. I easily found a three month room to rent on Facebook/Craigslist, and used the same method to find two of my jobs (oh, sidebar—look for and join ALL online Expat groups as soon as you get to a country. Go to a language exchange and ignore the creepy older dudes who try to get you to “teach them English” and look for other expats who are probably new to the area, too). I also knew I was setting up base camp somewhere with an incredibly low cost of living, and that was intentional (Meygan’s intention, not mine, but still).

Mob Ties

This will be a small section, as it deviates from the financial focus of this piece, but I think it’s important: be proactive ASAP in making friends. It’s so, so easy in any city with a large expat population (again, join the Facebook groups).  Expats are prone to be quite outgoing, likely share your interests, and probably have lower friend standards than you’re used to! Living abroad is like college, and all the other expats are your new floormates. There will definitely be some weridos, but you’ll sift through them and find the gems. Plus, traveling with friends makes things cheaper, so this section is totally relevant. (Nailed it.)

Hotline Bling

This one is straightforward: Make sure your phone is internationally unlocked and get a prepaid SIM card immediately in each country you go to. I’ve never needed to pay more than $20 a month for talk/text/data (you’ll only really need data) and it is PLENTY (how many of you are looking at your Verizon bill and fuming right now?). International plans don’t make sense in the long run and scrambling from Starbucks to random hostels for WiFi is not a good look.

Nice for What

One of the benefits of living abroad is that as soon as I moved, people started hitting me up to visit and/or meet them places. I’ve had the opportunity to visit magnificent destinations with magnificent friends, some of whom I hadn’t seen in years. If, like me, you’re overwhelming popular and well-liked, you have to be realistic and honest about where you can and cannot travel. Whilst on a budget and trying to function in day-to-day life, sometimes merging plans with friends looking to vacation is just not feasible. Compromising is great; it’s also valuable to let the homies know that this isn’t just a trip for you, it’s your lifestyle (did you just throw up a little bit as you read that? Me too. Sorry). I got super lucky and my friends who came and visited me in my more permanent location—Peru—didn’t force me to go to Machu Picchu 96 times! Every country has a bunch of cool stuff to do, and they were more than happy to meet in Colombia, hop on a jungle excursion, or otherwise with plan something that was in my budget/I hadn’t already done.

In addition to being realistic with my budget and with other people, I had to be realistic with myself, which involved some reprioritizing. I haven’t really bought clothes in the last year. I didn’t make my usual music festival rounds. I wasn’t planning to see my family for Christmas. My shoes, which have amassed an innumerable amount of miles, are essentially all falling apart. Time and time again, I chose experiences over things and I couldn’t be happier with that decision.

Nonstop

Having a job, regardless of the wage, always makes me feel better about spending money. You can make money in a variety of ways, but here’s a hot tip: TEACH ENGLISH ONLINE. I AM NOT KIDDING YOU I WOULD NOT HAVE DONE WHAT I DID THIS LAST YEAR WITHOUT IT. There are a myriad of companies (I’m with VIPKID—lemme talk to you about it and get some $$ for helping you apply) that allow you to set your own schedule and teach online from anywhere with a strong WiFi connection. I taught every weekday in Peru from 6:30 am to 9:00am (and an occasional weekend evening) and was done with my workday by 9:15 in the morning. I was also able to teach when I came back to Kansas, when I was home in California, and when I was traveling, Plus, I get money for referring you desperate plebs.

Let me tell you why VIPKID is infinitely better than getting an in-person job (even teaching English) abroad:

The hours and location are 100% flexible. I can open my schedule weeks in advance or the night before, and I can teach fifteen classes in a row or one single class.

There is no lesson planning. Prepping for teaching is an evil succubus that lures you in and steals your time and also several parts of your soul. The VIPKID platform offers ready-to-use lessons that have a universal structure. I don’t even glance at them before I start teaching. It’s the most low-maintenance, easiest form of instruction I’ve ever been involved with.

You don’t need to worry about getting a work visa. For all the work I did in Peru, I was paid cash under the table, as getting a carnet de extranjera (similar to a green card) is time-consuming, expensive, and difficult. I'm not 100% sure, but I feel like this is the case in most countries.

Yes, I make $20-$25 an hour, which can make you feel no ways (real Drake fans will catch that Easter egg), especially if you’ve been making a steady salary in a a place like New York or SF (let’s not get into it here, but all the more reason to advocate for not paying/treating our teachers like trash). However, it’s consistent money, I can do it anywhere, and $20 goes real far in most places outside the U.S.

The Catch Up

That being said, the side-hustle is EVERYTHING. Proofreading, translating, tutoring, working remotely, waitressing, bartending—anything that doesn’t require a lengthy application process and set hours is ideal. While I was back in the States, I very quickly and easily got a temp job working in my mom’s radiologic imaging office; I got to experience an entirely different line of work and gossip and eat donuts with the girls in the front. I absolutely loved it.

Apps like Grabr or housesitting apps are also excellent ways to make money doing stuff you’re already planning to do. Grabr allows travelers to sign up to bring things to people in their destination country that take too long or are too expensive to ship from their country of origin. This utilized two of my strongest skills—ordering items from Amazon and packing a checked bag weighing exactly fifty pounds. On my trip from the U.S. to Peru, I made over $300. Did I bring a kitchen scale and finely ground white electrolyte powders through South American customs? Yes! Did I assume I’d be going to Peruvian jail? Maybe! Honestly, I was more concerned about the giant car part leaking oil that I brought through TSA in Kansas City (thought about leaving a “This is not a bomb note”—decided against it). The point is: it might have taken a little time, some research, and a bit of aplomb to find opportunities like this, but luckily I had all those things in spades. Disclaimer: Use your judgment. Don’t do weird stuff.

Also, in all honesty, got a pretty cute tax refund this year, seeing as I made a significantly larger sum of money in the half of the year when I was full-time employee in California than when I was a part-time degenerate in Peru.

All Me

As resourceful and savvy as I’m feeling after writing this, I have to come clean. This might be a bit of a bummer for those fiercely independent amongst you: I did not even come close to doing this without a ton of help from my ridiculous circle of incredibly generous family and friends (HAHA GOTCHA, IT WAS NOT ALL ME. SEE? SEE WHAT I DID?) My list of people to thank would surely earn me the wrap-it-up music at the Oscars, but I’ll try anyway: My parents helped my broke ass get home so I wouldn’t be alone for Christmas. My friends from all across the world and all phases of life let me crash with them for weeks at a time (and gave me cute clothes that “looked a little weird on them,” made me banana flaxseed pancakes, and did my laundry). My brother and his smokeshow wife bought me flights and let me move into their giant British mansion to be their nanny (they don’t have kids). My saint of a mother literally gave up her bed and shared her tiny apartment with me, advocated for me to get a job that meant her doubling her workload, and let me eat all her food while standing at the refrigerator like a teenage boy. People have given me advice, contacts, hotel points, and miles. Gratitude will forever be the brush with which the memory of this year was painted.

All in all, I’ve had an overwhelmingly positive, life-changing experience with the joys far outweighing the stresses. It’s not hard to do, and I hope this very Emily-specific example can be of some help to you. Remember, you too can shirk all your responsibilities and run away to a foreign country! Even if you’re 25 sitting on 25… cents.

P.S. If you liked this post, please send me shoes.

[alivingroomatthebottomofalake]

My Top 100 albums of 2017

I listened to too much music in 2017. It was hard to keep track. Pop music was weak as fuck, I didn’t really find much joy in it, but I was finding roughly 10-30 albums each month that I could really enjoy in other genres. Many of these were releases on small labels. I must admit, listening to this much music made it hard to enjoy this much music. I don’t think I’ll be doing this in future. I have whittled it down to the 100 albums that came out in 2017 that I spent the most time with, that really lasted in my mind as great new music, i.e. my favourites, and while I try to be objective about my criticism, it’s still about what speaks to me specifically. Everything beyond the top 10-20 is in a pretty vague order, vaguer as it goes, with the final 20 being albums I liked a lot but didn’t spend as much time with, hence the vaguer reviews). I’ve limited each review to roughly 100 words (fewer as we go along, in fact, I tapped out towards the end because I got tired of writing. This took longer to do than I planned and fuck it), and as with last year’s list, I’ve intentionally avoided the use of genre words and pointless artist comparisons (as much as is possible). Check each record out on the merit of the content, not the style, and you will enjoy more.

1. Bjork - Utopia

Utopia sees Bjork return from the darkness with a fresh optimism, and also a fresh process and palette of sounds. The open form/narrative led song writing, and seemingly meandering vocal style that has been gradually replacing the pop style of her early albums has firmly cemented itself, and while not having an obvious verse/catchy chorus form, or club banger beat might be a barrier for the uninitiated, it is one of the album’s strengths, as Bjork explores the themes of the lyrics with some incredible arrangements and some of the most curious production experiments of her career, creating probably the most Bjork album yet. It’s dense and joyous, takes no prisoners in its honesty, and is lush as fuck.

Favourite tracks: Arisen My Senses, Claimstaker

2. Shackleton and Vengeance Tenfold - Sferic Ghost Transmits

Undulating and pulsing bells, acoustic and synthetic percussion, and cinematic swells of scifi synthesizer drones and blips framing a half spoken, half sung narrative about some dark shit. It’s the juxtaposition of the deep, almost monotone delivery of the tormented lyrical content and the brightness of the production, the activity in the sounds that really makes this music come alive. There’s something otherworldly and ancient about the material, curious and yet familiar. The poly-rhythmic patterns and the rich palette of sound textures draw one in for repeated listening, making this a highly addictive record.

Favourite track: Five Demiurgic Options

3. Children of Alice - Children of Alice

There’s so much going on in this music. A strange collage of textures and instruments play out a montage of ideas, flowing together in a seamless exploratory form. If there’s a story here, it’s not being expressed in any literal terms, yet the mood seems to flow in a radiophonic sort of way, and the listening journey is a blast. There are moments that the album falls into recognisable bursts and loops of what could be called “music” but the tracks don’t dwell on developing these ideas in any uniform or traditional fashion, and the pleasure here is how the disjointedness and variety keeps the listener on their toes, especially when several opposing genres and tonal centers begin overlapping. Then the magic really starts to happen.

Favourite track: Rite of the Maypole - An Unruly Procession

4. Saicobab - SAB SE PURANI BAB

What seems on paper as a really simple combination of instruments, becomes an intricate map of rhythm and unexpected sound interplay. The compositions are led by the voice and sitar, and glued together by a percussionist and double bassist. The backings are often as furious as the foreground energy, but the mix gives the instrument hierarchy a tension that totally serves the music. There is an additional level of intrigue in the quality of vocal treatments and fx that elevates the strangeness of the record. At times the energy is chaotic, but the music is highly organised, and while striking the balance of these feelings is no easy task, Yoshimi and co get it right.

Favourite tracks: aMn nMn, Bx Ax Bx

5. Dustin Wong & Takako Minekawa - Are Euphoria

Well, this is such an apt album title. The music on Are Euphoria is itself dancing. This is music reveling in process. Nothing ever really feels settled, but without giving off an unsettling feeling. Rather, it’s an exciting kind of bliss, the thrill of the search. Beats morph tempo, melodies orbit the tonic but hardly resolve, busy textures scratch away beneath nonchalant, liquid vocals, it’s all very quaint, yet mature and highly addictive. Mostly this album is just fun. Fun because one can hear the joy that went into it, and the euphoria is not just expressed, but easily received.

Favourite tracks:  Zaaab, Haha Mori

6. Rabit - Les Fleurs Du Mal

“Chop it up”, says the voice that opens this album, giving perhaps an obvious indication of the process behind the music that follows. Sharp strikes of strings and cut up bits of dialogue in various languages merge with mangled atmospheres and asymmetric synth melodies. There’s a lot going on in this album, but never too much at a time. It’s immersive, but there’s a sense of buoyancy. The album carries a dark quality throughout most of the themes, but it’s an enjoyable darkness, less overt terror, more curiosity. There is a prettiness that pervades the evil. Another aptly titled album.

Favourite tracks: Possessed, Ontological Graffiti, Bleached World

7. Yazz Ahmed – La Saboteuse

Yazz Ahmed’s trumpet tone is impeccable, and on this album she has assembled a cast of amazing players to deliver some incredible moments of ecstatic musicality. There’s a lot of brilliant soloing, infectious melodic themes and well-planned arrangements. The balance of light and shade, big and small, old and new, is constantly moving, like a tightrope walker, balanced and sure footed, but never at rest, never without risk. The album is a constant slight of hand, lulling the listener with warmth and gentle caresses, but beyond mere background moods, it’s full of adventure, and one can’t help but accept the quest it presents.

Favourite tracks: Al Emadi, The Space Between the Fish and the Moon, Bloom.

8. Emel - Ensen

Emel has the most haunting, captivating voice I have heard in forever. I don’t even really know what her songs are about, because she is from Tunisia and sings mostly in Arabic. This album is sombre in tone, and occasionally brutal. The drums sound huge, although they sound like small instruments turned up with great urgency. Even at it’s subtlest moments the album is urgent and immediate. That’s not to say the album is direct or blunt, it’s full of elegance and finesse, but it isn’t really nice, it’s beautiful and human, and it’s the latter quality that perhaps lets the darker side in.

Favourite tracks: Lost, Kaddesh, Ensen Dhaif.

9. Somi - Petite Afrique

This album was a surprise. The tone is set with a little soundscape/collage of music and dialogue snippets, and then segues into a beautiful reworking of Sting’s Englishman in New York (substituting Englishman for African).  The chords are re-harmonised and the lyrics altered, translating a new meaning.  Moving onward, the theme continues, lyrically exploring racial identity, and musically pushing the boundaries of African and African American music traditions. It’s a soulful and militant record. It’s catchy, but fully loaded with potent messages, wicked grooves, and hot arrangements.

Favourite songs: Black Enough, The Gentry.

10. Adult - Detroit House Guests

Adult invited a bunch of artists to stay at their place in Detroit and collaborate on some music whilst there. Artists including Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe, Michael Gira, and Douglas J McCarthy (and more) contributed ideas and vocals to the album. It’s a trippy, synth laden affair. Lots of cool modular sequences and minimal beats, matched with mantra like vocal passages, all whirling around together to create a pretty arty combination of club music and experimentalism. It’s a slow build over about the first 4 tracks, but once it gets going, it’s just a blast to move your body to. However, the weirdness doesn’t let up, and makes for great listening and dancing alike.

Favourite tracks: We Are a Mirror, This Situation.

11. Arca - Arca

It was such a surprise to hear Arca sing. Having produced tracks for so many vocalists, it was probably only a matter of time before they got on the mic. Arca’s voice expresses a sense of fragility, but it’s a deep and personal fragility, definitely not musical. Of that, there is confidence, expertise. The melancholic melodies are expertly accompanied by very sparse instrumentation, and the results are elegantly spun threads of sonic gossamer. But the album does take off and hit hard at times, with some instrumental tracks more reminiscent of earlier Arca works, but they’ve developed the sounds and ideas further, and these moments fit with the new sung material well.

Favourite Tracks: Anoche, Desafio.

12. Noveller - A Pink Sunset For No One

Noveller, aka Sarah Lipstate plays all this beautiful ambient music on an electric guitar. Her sounds are amazing, and the way she weaves it all together with a single instrument is masterful. I think what I appreciate about this record is the virtuosity it displays without ever needing to stand out. The tracks are all quite subtle, and even when the dynamics swell, it’s not about showing off, it’s about tension and release. They are great compositions, and Lipstate’s consummate execution make them a dream to immerse ones self in.

Favourite tracks: Rituals, Another Dark Hour.

13. Dale Cooper Quartet and the dictaphones - Astrild Astrild

Composed of lush, noise riddled drones, moody saxes and dreamy vocal croons, Dale Cooper Quartet & the Dictaphones perfectly invoke their namesake. Like a dreamy cinematic tribute album, but with all the right grit and character to own it. There’s some amazing atmosphereic floating choir “ahs” drifting between the sax lines, and some incredible soundscape tracks that barely feature any “notes”, they swell and dip and build some tension, interspersed with only a few dynamic peaks. The album is all tension and only a few moments of release, but they are beautiful releases. It’s a long album, with long tracks, and it’s a commitment to listen, but worth every second.

Favourite tracks: Pemp ajour imposte, Son mansarde roselin

14. Craig Taborn & Ikue Mori – Highsmith

Tarborn’s incredibly virtuosic avant –garde piano playing blends perfectly with Mori’s masterfully designed electronic textures. The two become one, effortlessly creating new worlds of sound with each gesture. Each piece explores the sound sources in a unique way. There’s a constant juggling of hierarchy that makes for interesting tensions, and while the complexity of the rhythmic textures and atonality make the album dense with information, it also has a really fun quality. The energy keeps it entertaining, but the talent and artistry elevates the listening experience to a state of enlightening euphoria.

Favourite tracks: Music To Die By, Variations On A Game

15. Black Quantum Futurism - Telescoping Effect Pt. 1 Soundscape

This album was composed/designed to accompany the words of Rasheedah Phillips, whom I was lucky enough to see perform with Moor Mother recently. On its own, this music is a powerful work, and an eclectic listening experience. There’s a sense of narrative built in to the collage of sounds and genre, a sci-fi attitude pervades the nature of electronic and synthesized elements, all the while balanced by a celebration of black American culture. It’s intense, and intensely musical without needing to fall back on tropes or tunes. Music that balances on that fine line between radiophonic story telling and acousmatic concrete/collage,  with a fresh and engaging character.

 Favourite track: 1919 (Saros Cycle)

16. Matt Mitchell - A Pouting Grimace

This album is dense, atonal, and rhythmically manic. It sounds like free improvisation, but feels highly organised. To be honest, I don’t want to know which it is (lies, I want to know everything). The virtuosity of the musicians is incredible, but the artistry in both the compositional forms, and how fearlessly the music is expressed are the real strengths of the record. The organised chaos could be annoying or pretentious, but it’s neither, it’s tasteful, exciting, and incredibly contemporary.

Favourite tracks: Mini Alternate, Heft.

17. Sarah Davachi - All My Circles Run

Davachi explores drone, stasis, duration, and the potential of simplicity in four different ways on four different instruments. The pieces for strings, voice and organ respectively, work in similar ways, with overlapping sustained tones gradually replacing one another, but the final piece, composed for piano is obviously a different approach, a kind of La Monte Young era minimalist approach to piano playing. The piano work isn’t out of place or character though. The album is broken up in the middle with “chanter”, another piano piece with a similar feel that ties the whole thing together at the end. It’s some incredible ambient background music, but also beautiful for deep listening.

Favourite track: For Organ.

18. Nicola Ratti – The Collection

Ratti’s Collection begins with a sophisticated arrangement of minimal rhythmic pulses and blips, some overlapping tones emerging from some swells of noise, developing slowly and gracefully into a gorgeous understated composition. The tempos and patterns change from track to track, but Ratti maintains a consistent quality and palette of sounds and across the album, doing as much as possible with the sparse instrumentation. It’s a brilliant album of delightful electronic sounds and intriguing patterns.

Favourite tracks: L2, L8.

19. Merzbow, Keiji Haino, Balazs Pandi – An Untroublesome Defencelessness

This is ultimately a drum record. Balazs Pandi is a monster. The drumming is off the hook. Haino and Merzbow exist as energy, fuelling the onslaught. That’s not to say the album is without variation or dynamic. The record has plenty of variety, up and down moments, subtlety, brilliantly crafted noise, beats, riffs, even some shouted vocals that tie it all together. It’s a sonic journey of discovery. Writing about music like this feels pointless because it taps into something more primal than words. However it feels more political than primitive. This music is reaching into the depths of the human condition.

Favourite track: How Differ the Instructions of the Left from the Instructions of the Right? (Part III)

20. Cleric - Retrocausal

Holy shit. Cleric do everything, like, they play all the notes, all the styles, all the… volumes (?). This album covers a lot of ground, and it doesn’t hold your hand or buy you breakfast first. Fuck, the first track alone is a relentless journey of musicality and brutality. Some of the heaviest riffs of the year, but also some maniacal juxtapositions and ruptures that cause it all to be even more interesting and intense. In the end though, this music is all the more engaging because it stretches so far beyond mere “heaviness” and brings in all these extra colours and feels. Not to mention, it’s great to have a heavy band with some idea of contemporary tonality that stretch beyond diatonic neoclassical lameness or drop D minor modal bullshit. Cleric fucking rule.

Favourite tracks: Ifrit, Resumption.

21. Dead Cross - Dead Cross

To think I almost didn’t bother checking this out. What a loser I’d have been. Dave Lombardo put a hardcore band together, and got Mike Patton involved on vocals, and it totally works. Some great lyrics on here, and Patton is on top form, showing no signs of going soft. The star of the record is the drums, Lombardo is a tight and ballistic barely even covers it when he’s underway. The song writing is also a highlight, the riffs and breakdowns, and overall catchiness of the album really makes this some brutally infectious music.

Favourite tracks: Idiopathic, Grave Slave

22. Alessandro Cortini - Avanti

This album is very special. I feel lucky in that my first hearing of it was a live performance. I saw Alessandro give a talk about synths and his process making the album, and then saw him do the album in full, with old home movies that his grandfather made playing in the background. The record is a beautiful nostalgic reflection. Made entirely with a EMS Synthi AKS (processed through guitar pedals) the beautiful drifting tones and the simplicity of the melodies makes this the kind of music one could be lost in forever, swept up in a daydream and forget time altogether.

Favourite tracks: Aspettare, Iniziare

23. Demen – Nektyr

Demen make soundtracks to dreams. This music is pacifying and disarming. It is spacious, lush, expansive, and yet reserved. Elegant, is perhaps the most apt adjective. The drums are huge and distant, drenched in reverb, as is almost everything, giving the music it’s floating quality. The hamonic shifts are few and far between, making the subtlest of transitions feel enormous. While some tracks begin with long emphasis on emptiness, the dynamic and emotional range of this album is not to be underestimated.

 Favourite tracks: Niorum, Illdrop, Ambur.

24. Mary Halvorson Quartet - Paimon

I’ve been a big fan of Mary Halvorson’s guitar work since her appearance on Trevor Dunn’s Trio Convulsant record. Here her playing and arranging are put on fine display as she interprets Zorn’s Masada material, for Book of Angels volume 32. The Quartet of drums, bass, and two guitars makes for a thicketed texture, and the musicians approach the material this way – texturally – more than they cover traditional jazz quartet roles. There’s still plenty of attention to the melodic frameworks of the original compositional intent, but the group has a tendency to go full battle royale in the solo sections, rather than politely accompanying. The soloing is superb, but the madness is part of what makes the Masada material so special, and Halvorson and co have captured it beautifully, adding a masterful spark and character to this ongoing series of releases.

Favourite Tracks: Yeqon, Chaskiel.

25. Pinkcourtesyphone - Indelicate Slices

Richard Chartier makes beautiful ambient sounds into dreamy musical landscapes. His new record, Indelicate Slices is a beautiful collection of such music. As the title may suggest, this record isn’t sweet background soundscapes to bliss out to, Chartier is delving into some gritty, dark territory on this album, playing with some suspense and pushing the extremes of what the genre may accept. There are some long moments of almost nothing but the tiniest record crackle, which says something of the artist’s minimalist attitude. It’s exciting to hear this approach to sound, from the negative perspective, as opposed to the tendency for bliss and serenity. The dark mood creates a sense of expectation, which Chartier only pays off in small doses, but they are worth the long moments in between.

Favourite tracks: minimumluxeryoverdose, in voluptuous monochrome

26. Nadah El Shazly – Ahwar

Hailing from the Cairo underground scene, Nadah is a beautiful singer, with an eclectic musicality and and abstract sensibility. Collaged forms of music swirl around, tonalities layer up in exciting unresolved ways, and yet it is always soulful. This is a really colourful record, with carefully attended to arrangements, plenty of chaos, but never a mess.

Favourite tracks: Barzakh (Limen), Palmyra.

27. Gravetemple – Impassable Fears

The tone of this albums is abrasive, the bass and guitar tones (if they even are instruments) are sheets of steel against gravel against my brain. It’s ugly in the most perfect way. It’s almost impossible to think of this as music – almost – but the human voice makes the intensity of the crunching somewhat physical, visceral, and the physicality of the drumming binds it all into something one can truly feel. Then somewhere in the middle the album introduces melodic electronic sounds, crunched, low res sounds that bleed into a fresh roaring onslaught. It’s full of surprises, but the gems protected by berserkers. This is not one to go into lightly, but fucking perfectly rewarding for those with courage.

Favourite tracks: Elavúlt földbolygó (World Out of Date), Domino, Áthatolhatatlan félelmek (Impassable Fears)

28. Nazoranai – Beginning to Fall in Line Before Me, So Decorously, the Nature of All That Must Be Transformed

From the long slow build of drums and curious noises, opening up to a cinematic landscape of another world, there’s a lot at play here, lots of colour, lots of restraint. It’s as if this group have only a small idea of the headroom they have to play with, and approach the music with calculated precision, allowing for a gradual, yet slow growth. The first track takes about 20 minutes to peak, and it’s a delicious, almost spiritual high point. Part 2 comes down for a moment, just enough to find a new path, before it begins to tear shreds off the feelings created in the first part, until it gets to the magic and truth at the core. When the vocals begin, all seems revealed, the search is over. The final 10 minutes is an unbridled expression of intensity, joyously reveling in the phenomenon of sound. It’s fucking awesome.

Favourite track: Part 2.

29. The Body & Full of Hell - Ascending a Mountain of Heavy Light

Abrasive and dense, the pairing of these two bands ascends to dizzying levels of heavy. Maximum weight and intensity scrape through your ear-holes with this one. A really clever blend of electronic and  brutal metal elements, the former used sparingly to add highlights to the later, such as the abrasive synth tone in the opening track, or the bouncy kick and vocal fx in track two. It could be a bit pompous, or even a bit generic “noise band”, but it’s way more fun. It really sounds like this was made in a playfull way, and thus the music keeps you playing along throughout the onslaught.

Favourite tracks: Earth is a Cage, Farewell, Man

30. William Basinski - A shadow In Time

Basinski returned in early 2017 with a new album, 2 new works that continue the trajectory of his career, and adding a new sense of depth and density to his palette. The album plays with some familiar Basinski processes, the reverb feedback, gradually unfolding over a long duration, stretching and smearing the tones of loops until they become some kind of trans-sensoral phenomenon. The compositions seem more deliberate on this record, with less reliance on loops for loops sake. There’s a clear sense development in both tracks that make them engaging in a new way. I always like Basinski, but I’m loving this more than usual.

Favourite track: A Shadow In Time.

31. Félicia Atkinson – Hand in Hand

This album is a delicate and bold blend of pulsing electronic melodic sound, atmospheric incidental sound, and spoken word. Atkinson’s words and sounds aren’t expressly trying to teach or convey a sense of importance, but there’s something about the delivery that makes every moment feel important, something that needs to be learnt, or learnt from. Compositionally, Atkinson is a master at balancing textures, and the record explores a lot of sonic variety. On the surface the album is calm and you could almost tune out of it, but it is an album of exquisite detail.

Favourite tracks: Adaptation Assez Facile, A House a Dance a Poem

32. Ifriqiyya Electrique - Laa La Illa Allah

This album has a deep dark atmosphere, and dare I say it, something ritualistic is brewing away beneath these tunes. From the masses of percussion, the cave like reverb, and the mantra like chanting vocals of the first track, this group from North Africa have made a captivating collection that weaves in some upbeat bangers, and some super distorted, rumbling bass, creepers to make a potent spiritually cleansing record. I have very little knowledge of the where or who of the group, but it’s certainly not your typical nice easy world music for a day on the green. It’s gritty and up close and uncomfortable, but also kind of ground shaking and infectious.

Favourite track: Stombali - Baba 'Alaia

33. Anjou - Epithyma

Epithyma opens with a series of crossfading, delicate loop slices, melting and morphing shape, pulsing, but never really landing or forming in any repetitive musical sense. Anjou is sneaky with melody, it’s there, sliding around the periphery, never truly taking over or coming into focus. It’s perfectly ambient, by definition. As ideas are exhausted, they’re so naturally replaced and seamlessly transitioned from that one forgets what came before, or how long it may have been. A beautifully constructed collection of synths and space.

 Favourite track: Soucouyant

34. Walker Harris English - Walker Harris English

These 4 pieces feel like meditations on existentialist cinema rather than just music compositions. There’s something so haunting about it, and instantly immersive, like being lost in “the zone”. The trio have so masterfully developed and transmutated a realm of unfathomable beauty and familiarity into a mystery. Very little needs to be said beyond that. It’s incredible, subtle music. Listen to it.

Favoutie track: A2: Beyond House

35. Sevdaliza – ISON

This is one of the best singer/electronic music releases I’ve heard in a very long time. It has cool, chill grooves and tasty as fuck sound design, creative arrangements, and it manages to be totally current and on trend whilst unashamedly embodying myriad influences that could be easily failed retro pastiches, but instead serve to strengthen the record, and heighten the moods it’s invoking/expressing. Very disappointed that this didn’t seem more mainstream appeal, because its way better than many things of the genre that had half the content/detail.

Favourite tracks: Hero, Marilyn Monroe.

36. Idles: Brutalism

Idles is a brutal reality check. Working class punk rock too late for the world, self-aware, spitting in the face of bullshit and calling it what it is. They are angry, and they have a very good sense of humour about the world and their position in it. They also know sound. The drums and bass are solid bricks and the guitars are like swarms of killer bees. It all serves the lyrics, which I will leave you with a taste: “The best way to scare a Tory is to read and get rich/I know nothing I’m just sitting here looking at pretty colours”.

Favourite tracks: Mother, Well Done, Rachel Khoo, (Fuck it, all of them are brilliant).

37. Xiu Xiu - Forget

Forget is a pretty tidy record. I don’t know if that’s a compliment for Xiu Xiu, but I guess what I mean is that it is cohesive and coherent in a way that translates more directly than many of their earlier releases. I first heard this band live, and so my idea of Xiu Xiu is tied to the stage in a really hypnotic and noisy way, but I found this album has deepened my appreciation of their agenda/aesthetic more than before. Jamie Stewart’s voice sounds better than ever, and the arrangements are lush and exciting.

Favourite tracks: Queen of the Losers, At Last, At Last.

38. Trespass Trio – The Spirit of Pitesti

Sax, bass, and drums is an amazing combination of instruments. It never fails to capture my attention. Trespass Trio keep it simple and soulful, angular and loose, and constantly adventurous. The title track is a dirge like exploration of time and space that conjures an ocean of moods. There’s a few upbeat tracks that swing and hit and dance about the ring in confusing fashion. Very cool stuff.

Favourite track: In Tears.

39. Ulfur - Arboresence

Icelandic composer Ulfur opens his new album with a droney string motif that cinematically crescendos with the sounds of rain, culminating in a blistering explosion of black metal blast beats. This sets the mood for the various extremities one should be prepared for over the course of the record. Ulfur weaves between moody songs and soundscapes, electronic rhythms, dreamy psych-pop and dense spectral sound paintings. A truly unique and eclectic record, masterfully handled.

Favourite track: Tómi› Titrar

40. Ryuichi Sakamoto – Plankton: Music for an Intallation By Christian Sardet and Shiro Takatani

Plankton is an hour long composition by Japanese legend Ryuichi Sakamoto, designed for an installation that explores and documents the nature of the namesake micro organisms. It’s a subtle and immersive piece. Drawing on the philosophy of ambient, washing across the background with all its splendour and detail, free to be ignored or enjoyed on whatever terms you prefer. I could put this on repeat all day long.

41. Hogni - two trains

Two trains begins with a gorgeous Icelandic choral work, perhaps as a statement of identity, of origin, but it quickly moves on to more contemporary sounds, with Hogni’s beautiful falsetto voice leading the way through string laden electronic beats. The choir sounds return here and there over the course of the record, and there’s a great blend of light and dark moods on the record. I’m impressed with the way the variety of styles approached on here works, especially considering the more commercial bent to the song styles. Brave choices and good songs.

Favourite track: Komdu me>

42. Thor & Friends “The Subversive Nature of Kindness”   

Thor Harris delivers a feast of percussion on this record of repetition based minimalism. Each track takes a very simple motive and builds on layers of percussive melody with synth and voice and strings, taking the simplicity to very moving emotional, and cinematic places. It’s all very considered and my only criticism is how safe it all feels, which I guess is the point; kill them with kindness. It’s beautiful music.

Favourite track: Swimming with Stina.

43. Mario Batkovic – Mario Batkovic

I never could have thought I’d be writing about a solo accordion album in my yearly list. Maybe I’ve been listening to too much Pauline Oliveros over the last couple of years. That’s a good thing. Mario Batkovic is an amazing accordion player. The album highlights his virtuosity as an instrumentalist, as well as a consummate composer, but it also shows him investigating sound, delving into the tone of the instrument, and exploring what it can do. This is what makes me love it, because Batkovic presents the instrument as more than notes, and delivers a rich and complex series of sound paintings.

Favourite tracks: Gravis, Desiderii Patriae

44. Wadada Leo Smith – Najwa/solo reflections on Monk

Trumpet player Wadada Leo Smith released two great records this year. I am including them together only because I feel that his “Solo reflections on Monk” gives insight to the work on Najwa. Najwa is an ensemble record, with 4 guitars, and most notably to my ears is the bass tone of Bill Laswell. Each piece seems to be a moving tribute to a master of the jazz idiom, from Ornette to Coltrane, and the album explores this devotion in character. The dedications are blistering, joyous harmolodic/spiritual jazz experiences, while the title track feels like a tribute to Miles, a bare amorphous atmosphere, perhaps presenting the trumpeter’s influence as honestly as it can be. What is great about these two albums side by side, is hearing a modern master of the idiom pull new things out of the influences, and show that regardless of the instrument one’s hero played, the content is what inspires, not just the tool.

Favourite tracks: Najwa, Ohnedaruth John Coltrane: The Master of Kosmic Music and His Spirituality in a Love Supreme

Also: Adagio: Monkishness - A Cinematic Vision of Monk Playing Solo Piano

45. Ben Frost - The Centre Cannot Hold  

Frost had a fucking busy year, with a bunch of EPs, TV and film scores, and this full-length album (Edit: I just finished Dark, and if I could find the OST album I would be rating that in my top 20, it’s phenomenal). The Centre Cannot Hold is more of what Frost is known for with his solo works.  Dense harsh sound pounded, tenderised, and compressed into musical forms, often forcibly. But Frost’s sensibility as a composer of sound and music doesn’t lack subtlety or musicality, and the production is such high quality that after a few minutes the static and distortion become such natural entities, allowing the listener into the beautiful tones and warm beats tumbling throughout the record.

Favourite Tracks: A Sharp Blow in Passing, All That you Love Will Be Eviscerated.

46. Laraaji - Sun Gong/bring on the sun

These two albums seem to play best as companions. Bring on the Sun is a multifaceted exploration of minimal/ambient ideas using zither and mbra, voices and other sounds, beautifully recorded and performed. Sun gong uses metallic percussion as a drone instrument, and explores similar ground with different tools. Both albums are dense with content and yet easy to absorb, offering a constantly engaging and surprising experience on repeat listens. I actually feel bad that I haven’t spent enough time getting to know every nuance of these two records, as they have so much to offer.

Favourite tracks: Sun Gong No.1, Laraajazzi.

47. Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe - Levitation Praxis

In a similar vein to Laraaji, Levitation Praxis sees Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe perform a beautiful series of sounds in a barn full of Harry Bertoia’s sound sculptures. The resonance of metallic forms in such a reverberant space is intoxicating, and Lowe uses his dreamy falsetto voice to commingle in the reverb bringing a warmth and humanity to the cold steel sounds. The presence of the space is felt in the recording, the shuffling of a body through the room, the intuitive nature of the performance, all factors that make listening to this special.

48. Kyle Motl – Transmogrification  

A collection of solo double bass improvisations recorded over two days. Motl explores his instrument intimately, pulling sounds from the wood and steel and hair and shaping them into gorgeous careful music. There’s not a lot more to say. The album presents an imaginative and adventurous spirit making abundance with very full tools.

Favourite track: Urrong.

49. Kid Koala (with Emiliana Torini) - Music to draw to: Satellite

Sweet tunes, with a delicate balance of scifi and mellow pop. Emiliana Torrini’s voice is beautiful, and it breaks up the atmospheric instrumentals really nicely. This is some pretty easygoing music, great evening chill out soundtrack stuff.

Favourite tracks: Collapser, Photons.

50. Flaming Lips - Oczy Mlody

The Lips made a trippy as fuck, synth pop record. It’s totally acid, and only those who have the experience will know exactly how perfect it is. The lyrics are totally oldschool tripper lyrics. It’s kinda perfect at this stage in there career to just own that shit. It has some great sounds, and the comfortable nature of the music is constantly shifting, and gets a bit mucky from time to time. Definitely feels like acid to me.

Favourite tracks: There should be unicorns, Listening to the frogs with demon eyes

51. Shackleton and Anika - Behind the Glass

This goes here on the list because it’s so incredibly similar to Shackleton’s other record with Vengence Tenfold, and although it’s just as good, I felt two albums like this in one year wasn’t fair to put them so close together. Proves how pointless this rating system is. Anika’s voice and words are cool as fuck, and the sounds, production, and arrangments are hypnotic. Enjoy.

Favourite track: The Future Is Hurt / Dirt and Fields

52. Will Guthrie - People Pleaser

This is another great album that I heard for the first time as a live performance. Will has amassed an odd bunch of sounds/samples and collaged them into something quite abstract to accompany his percussion and drums. It’s quite a mission. It has a punk quality to it, sounds a bit DIY and noisy, and I love it for that. Unfortunately I’ve only got it on vinyl and have paid no attention to the track transitions. Just check it out.

53. Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe - Kulthan/Marlek

Two very cool modular synth albums, that are both 2 long tracks that explore very simple repetition/minimal ideas, probably each a single synth patch. Lowe has been doing a fair bit of this lately and I’m really enjoying it. It’s not super ground breaking, it’s just cool music. Lowe uses his voice as a subtle element in there with the machine which really elevates the sounds to a higher level, and gives the music a mystical feel.

Favourite track: Magnamite

54. Boris - Dear

Boris return with massive drums and some dense as fuck doom. I think my favourite thing about this band is the way the simple pounding weigh of the band is juxtaposed against the vocals, which are, for lack of a better word, beautiful and clean against the heavy tones.

Favourite songs: Deadsong, Kagero

55. kara-lis coverdale - grafts

Grafts is a single 22 minute track. It would seem that it is made up of a whole bunch of simple little loops, grafted together. I’m not really sure if that’s the idea or not, but it makes sense. The sounds are gorgeous, and the piece flows seamlessly. It’s a great work and can be enjoyed repeatedly with much depth to be discovered over multiple listens.

56. Moor Mother X Mental Jewelry - Crime Waves

It’s moody, dark, angry, bold, and it’s gonna fuck with you. The lyrics are heavy. It’s not quite hip hop. It sits more in line with the recent afro-futurist/punk movement. I love it. I saw Moor Mother Goddess live in January and her shit is the real deal.

Favourite tracks: Death Booming, The City.

57. Nicole Mitchell - Mandorla Awakening II: emerging worlds

This is a psychedelic free jazz odyssey, on the Sun Ra level. It inhabits so many sound worlds, it’s cosmic. The flute is the focus, but it’s full of some amazing percussion and string passages that blur the lines between late 1960s scifi film and gypsy music. It’s kinda hard to pin it down, which is why I love it so much. Great music in the car. So much happening.

Favourite tracks: Egoes War, Forestwall Timewalk, Staircase Struggle.

58. Colin Stetson: all this I do for glory

I love Colin Stetson. Every year he tries something new. This album opens with a cool little beat based track, which caught me off guard, and the beats/percussion continues throughout as a feature of the record.. His sax tone is still dirty as fuck, but no longer the only focus. I love the way he has tried some vocal things on here, which sometimes sounds like he’s singing while playing the sax (I wouldn’t be surprised) and the percussion stuff is very cool. Tracks still fall into the classic Stetson, repetitive minimalism/arpeggio word, but it’s still refreshing and surprising.

Favourite tracks: Like Wolves on the Fold, In the Clinches

59. Thurston Moore - rock and roll consciousness

I guess what I love about this, its that it takes a bunch of really aggressive and noisy elements, things one usually expects from Thurston Moore, but it uses them as this really positive tool, and explores a really trippy type of happiness. It’s almost summertime, getting high on the beach music. It really caught me by the heart.

Favourite tracks: Turn On, Exalted.

60. Kaitlyin Aurelia Smith - The Kid

What an incredible universe of sound Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith has created. The more I listen to this, the more baffled and in love with it I become. I’m always finding new nuances, and there is a lot of ideas drifting through this record. This album is more focused on the “song” than her earlier works, and there’s a lot more beats and vocal led tracks. The beats are grainy and glitchy, and the vocals are very processed with harmonies from vocoders and such. I like the songs, but I love the synth instrumental bits. Overall, this album is super playful, and colourful, and lots of fun.

Favourite tracks: Who I Am & Why I Am Where I Am, I Am a Thought.

61. Mere Woman – Big Skies

What a fucking great sound. Sydney’s Mere Women have produced an enormous sound, and they have some great beats and lyrics. Ultimately, the guitar sound is what has captured my attention the most, but I’m really excited by the overall package, the consistency of the songwriting and the way each some has a clever, stripped back and focused character. There’s never a generic beat or form.

Favourite songs: Big Skies, Drive.

62. Binker and Moses - Journey to the mountain of forever

A fantastic 2 disc set with one album entirely drums and sax duets, and the second disc augmented by some additional saxes and drums, trumpet, harp, and tabla. It’s the perect background music for art making, and that’s how I usually listen to it. Disc two is the shit!

Favourite tracks: The Shaman's Chant, Valley of the Ultra Blacks.

63. Nadia Sirota – Tessellatum

Nadia writes such epic string arrangements, I can’t even tell what instruments I’m hearing after a while. It’s an exploration of drone and rhythm, but it feels super fresh, and it avoids a lot of minimalist clichés while still seeming canon.

It’s a deep listening, immersive, durational work, and as such, it needs to be listened to in full, perhaps a few times, to really be appreciated. Totally worth the time.

64. Ecca Vandal – Ecca Vandal

Feels like the most mainstream thing on my list is a DIY local who brings the party and the fight on her debut record. It’s probably the best pop record of the year, and one of the best local releases in years. Ecca is a phenomenal performer and a great songwriter. Her team, the band and collaborators, have really made something fresh, mashing a lot of different genres together, and making if work. The best thing is how courageously heavy and out there the riffs are.

Favourite tracks: Price of Living, Future Heroine, End of Time.

65. Actress - AZD

Beginning with some totally cool blippy synth bits, AZD takes its sweet arse time building up into the masterful dance album it is. Once it does, each cut is just as perfect as the next. This is the perfect music for late night house party dancing.

Favourite tracks: Fantasynth, X22RME, Falling Rizlas.

66. The Necks - Unfold

Four nice long tracks, each with a different mood to explore. The Necks are masters of the long unchanging, durational improvised sound world. On this album, the focus is less on groove and more of texture, and the organ plays a central role in the first two pieces, giving this a kind of spiritual, 1960s, Terry Riley/Alice Coltrane kind of vibe. The percussion takes more of the lead on the last track which is more rhythmic, but still not really a groove. Great stuff for sure.

Favourite tracks: Overhear, Timepiece.

67. Jeff Mills - Trip to the Moon

Jeff Mills scored the old 1902 silent film, A Trip to the Moon, using beautiful synthesisers and playing with all the oldschool scifi tropes, reworking it into a delicate collage of music and soundscapes. What’s great as a listening experience is that the transitions that would no doubt seem obvious with the film, create surprising forms in a purely musical realm. Very cool stuff.

Favourite tracks: Rocket Spaceship Destination, Outer Space, Bewilded, But Not Confused

68. Lau Nau – Poseidon

Finnish artist Lau Nau has a dreamy and delicate sound, but it avoids being overly twee and meh with some lush arrangements and her cool, lazy vocal style. I’m a fan of the string sound on this record, and the subtle fx processing/electronic textures, which totally fly under the radar, but serve to really enhance the mood. Occasionally things get a bit more outrageous, and bizarre, and it adds t the overall adventure of the record.

Favourite tracks: Unessa, Suojaa uni meitä, Kun lyhdyt illalla sytytetään, ne eivät sammu koskaan

69. Cornelius - Mellow Waves

I love Cornelius, and it has been so long since he released anything, so this had me super excited. Point was a life changing record, and the follow up, Sensuous, was good, and mellow Waves is still pretty good, although I feel like Cornelius has a thing he does and it’s pretty clear now that that isn’t about to change much. Mellow Waves is more cool Cornelius tracks, lots of sudden blips and shifts in reverb, lots of polyrhythms and noisy guitar solos. Quaint and sophisticated yet also kind of raucous. I can’t help but feel he does this sort of thing in his sleep, but it’s still good music.

Favourite track: Sometime/Someplace.

70. Avey Tare - Eucalyptus

I like this so much better than Slasher Flicks, and the recent Animal Collective Painting with… Avey has developed a really interesting bunch of ideas, ranging from loose psychedelic meanderings, to straight up pop folk tunes, all built around voice and acoustic guitar, and punctuated by strange arrangements of sounds, worked on in collaboration with the genius Eyvind Kang. It’s relaxed and ambitious at the same time. A curiosity of sorts, with lots of depth.

Favourite tracks: Ms. Secret, Selection of a Place, Coral Lords.

71. Black Cube Marriage - Astral Cube

Chicago instrumentalist Rob Mazurek leads this ensemble of improvisers and sound adventurers. The results take on many forms, with shifting and cascading textures and rhythms bursting with noise and all manner of avant shit on display. It’s a little bit chaotic, but it represents masters of their art doing what they do best.

Favourite track: Syncretic Illumine

72. Graham Lambkin & Taku Unami - The Whistler

Well, I mean, what even is this? On the surface the record comes across as nothing more than a bunch of random recordings. Maybe that’s what it is. Stuff is happening, it has been recorded, and it’s really fascinating to listen to. The first disc sounds like someone in a workshop, occasionally whistling while they work. Disc 2, titled Small Mistakes In Nature has instruments being played at times, and the sounds of the outside world, and really flows on into bizarre headspace of where the hell am I and why? To be honest, this is an acquired taste and sometimes a frustrating listen, but it’s something I like, so…

73. Brooklyn Raga Massive – Terry Riley in C

I’ll begin by saying, I love Terry Riley and I love In C, so this was an easy win. Traditional Indian classical instruments playing an amazing piece of western music, that itself was inspired by Indian classical traditions. It works, and it’s a fucking awesome version of the piece. Just do it.

74. Jlin - black origami

Curiously, it took me a while to get into this. Something about the sound is too clean, and I couldn’t quite get into it. But after a few tries, it got me hooked. I think what I dig is the types of patterns and the choices made in terms of percussion sounds and vocal textures. It has such a cool feel and great movement, but it’s abstract enough to ponder and delve into with the ears as well as the body. I saw Jlin a couple of times live recently, and it translated so well that the album got back on my radar.

Favourite tracks: Enigma, Nyakinyua Rise.

75. SUBHEIM & MONOLOG - Conviction

A very cool dark, downtempo mix of drones and throbbing beats. With lots of space, some lush guitar, and plenty of swelling dynamics. Not much to say about it, it’s simple and tidy, and calculated.

Favourite track: Wone

76. Erin K Taylor - Source

Source is 1 track, almost an hour in length. Centered around a field recording, with bird calls and a trickling stream, and the very distance sounds of traffic. After a while it sounds like other sounds are being subtly added into the mix, but I’m unsure how much this is edited/constructed, and how much is just captured. Eventually, there’s some vocals, and the planning and artistry is revealed. This is a deep listening album and really requires patience and attention. It has some surprised buried in there, that will reward you for your time.

77. Pan Daijing - Lack

Maybe this could have made it higher on the list. Listening back again now, it is so much more interesting than I remember. The voice seems to be the central connecting element of the work, and Pan Daijing constructs a variety of abstract forms, punctuated by noise and synth, and a mix of acoustic instruments (what sounds like dulcimer on the opening track). All very cool stuff.

Favourite track: A Loving Tongue

78. Smakos - A Vampire goes west

Synth based instrumental music, all very atmospheric and cool, with what seems like a strange narrative throughout. The sound is a bit distant, with a sweet little reverb to it, and it plays on the nostalgia a bit with the blippy arpeggios floating through the tracks. Very cool use of sampled voices in the background too.

Favourite tracks: One Day We Will Trip Out From Star To Star, Picnic In A Multiverse Cassette.

79. Schnellertollermeier - Rights

Minimal math rock type stuff. The first track caught my attention by barely doing anything for the first minute and a half. But then things develop, and grow and the patterns are fun. It takes a while, but gets pretty heavy. Each track follows a similar formula, building up from a simple polyrhythmic idea, but they are cool ideas.

Favourite track: Round

80.  Ex Eye - Ex Eye

Colin Stetson teams up with Shahzad Ismaily, Greg Fox, and Toby Summerfield to make a kind of Baritone sax centered (for lack of a better word) metal album. It’s heavy and chaotic and mixes up the genre elements in a fresh way. Nice to hear more sax in heavy music. This album takes some risks and it pays off.

Favourite track: Opposition/Perihelion; The Coil

81. Deradoorian – Eternal Recurrence

Stripped back and mellow, moody, lush, emotionally rich and dynamic. All this and more, Angel Deradoorian has made some beautiful and thoughtful tracks. I often get lots in this record, and just let it play on repeat because it’s a bit short, and it’s really hypnotic. Aptly titled I guess.

Favourite tracks: Return-Transcend, Ausar Temple

82. Keiji Haino, Jim O’Rourke, Oren Ambarchi – This Dazzling Genuine “Difference” Now Where Shall It Go

More pounding noise, guitar and drum improv, from three fucking legends of the game. It’s wild and full of energy and never really lets up. Keiji Haino has been mad busy with these kinds of collab albums of late, and somehow, they’re all winners. Check it out if you’re into this sort of thing.

83. Platform - Flux Reflux

An album of avant garde improvisation, with some incredible sounds and textures.  Platform seem like a pretty hip group, and they craft a bunch of really cool, diverse pieces.

Favourite Track: Reflux

84. Tyshawn Sorey - Verisimilitude

Moody, dark and slow, atonal and pointalistic modern jazz type stuff. Led by Percussionist Tyshawn Sorey, and with some amazing piano playing by Cory Smythe, Verisimilitude offers a lot of very creative and interlectual approaches to new music, crossing over the contemporary classical avant garde and free jazz worlds seamlessly.

Favourite track: Obsidian

85. Matt Nelson, Tim Dahl, Nick Podgurski - GRID

Four tracks of screeching bass guitar, sax, and drum interplay. It’s noisy as fuck, and really interestingly constructed. There’s a form of instrumental torture at play, but everything is completely in sync. The group operate as a single unit. Destroying everything with blissful abandon.

Favourite track: (-/+)

86. Trio Heinz Herbert - The Willisau Concert

A live improvised album of electronics, drums, and guitar, some of the most beautiful sounds I’ve ever heard. It moves between abstract and odd to pulse driven and musical in waves of expressive brilliance.

Favourite track: Fragment Z / Brugguda

87. Bérangère Maximin - Frozen Refrains

Aptly titled, Frozen refrains could well be just that, a small collection of time stretched moments. But it’s a lot more, and it takes a little patience to delve into. It really teases you, and makes you wait, but the detail in the sound design and in the micro forms of the long seemingly unchanging sound scapes are rich and exciting once you really listen.

Favourite tracks: Burn and Return, Clash.

88. Ohmslice - Conduit

This album is a mishmash of bizarre processed percussion, synthesiser, and abstract/surreal poetry, with some crazy guitar and horns in there for some bizarre accompaniment. It’s actually really compelling, and the words make it seem all the more interesting.

Favourite tracks: Crying On a Train, Broken Phase Candy, Paint By Numbered Day

89. Here Lies Man – Here Lies Man

This review is a cop out, (this is where I tapped out of writing in general) but… This is a dirty psychedelic rock/afrobeat cross over record, and it is pretty cool. I enjoyed it a bunch of times, not much more to say.

Favourite tracks: I stand alone, Belt of the sun

90. Perera Elsewhere - All Of this

Dark moody beats and singing. I liked it a lot. Something kinda post triphop, downtempo type music with cool modern production ideas. Definitely worth a few listens.

Favourite track: Girl from Monotronica

91. Locust Toybox - Drownscapes

David Firth of Salad Fingers fame has always made music under this moniker, but this is the first in a while, and usually his music is kind of broken beat type stuff. This is a lush dreamy ambient album, and it’s totally gorgeous.

Favourite tracks: Return To The Meadow, Birthday Lungs

92. Chicago/London Underground - A Night Walking Through Mirrors

An excellent live free jazz album that I spent quite a lot of time with in the first half of 2017. Beautiful sounds and textures, great players. Put it on at night.

Favourite tracks: Something Must Happen

93. Wolf Eyes - Undertow

Abstract and noisy, with cool spoken word bits. I was a bit surprised by this one. It’s trippy and dark, which I like.

Favourite tracks: Undertow, Thirteen

94. Lee Gamble - Mnestic Pressure

This is just some cool electronic music that I enjoyed. It’s not solely focused on beats, and that makes me happy.

Favourite tracks: Istian, East Sedducke

95. Tomutonttu – Kevätjuhla 

Cool and exotic sounding electronica. Beautiful sounds full of curious charm and otherworldliness.

Favourite tracks: Kuteen valoon I - Lukin jalka, Operaatio satamassa

96. Juilia Bloop - Roland Throop

Cool loops and beats, amounting to some excellent atmospheric oldschool sampler music. Very chill and yet very clever.

Favourite tracks: Too Many Ghosts, Let’s have some music

97. Cologne Tape – Welt

A really eclectic and exciting mishmash of ideas and instruments on this one. Moves from blippy electronic experiments to bombastic drum focused stuff but always with subtlety and an atmospheric quality.

Favourite tracks: Welt 2, Welt 4, Welt 8.

98. Rafael Toral - Moon Field

This is a brilliant electronic/scifi style soundscape album. It’s a weird and beautiful combination of sound design/fx and abstracted music ideas.

Favourite track: The Stars

99. Bellows - Sander

Beautiful and sweet tape loops and synth patterns. It’s really simple and sophisticated.

Favourite tracks: Untitled #2

100. Do Make Say Think - Stubborn Persistent Illusions

A really good collection of ideas in a genre that doesn’t often have any. I enjoyed this a lot.

Favourite tracks: Bound, And Boundless, As far As The Eye Can See.

Honourable mentions.

There were a whole bunch of albums I enjoyed that didn’t technically fit the list, compilations, and a few EPs, all great but not right for a full length album list. I also left off a bunch of things that I thought were great, but I just didn’t have time to delve into it all. I wish I had’ve had more time with a bunch of albums.

That all said, these two albums deserve a mention, but not in the top 100 because both these albums were recorded in 1975, and only released in 2017. They both show innovative legends doing their respective things as well as can be expected, and are both gorgeous listening experiences. Neither needs more detail than that.

Terry Riley & Don Cherry Duo - Live 1975

Organ minimalism and trumpet improvisations, a meeting of two legends, a conversation through the medium of music.

Suzanne Ciani - Buchla Concerts 1975

Ciani demonstrates the potential of the Buchla synth, in all its glory. What more do you need.

[itshistoryyall]

Part Three: Rule of Three

Photo Credits: here

In this next part I want to talk a little about some important texts for the context of this project. One of them is the Canon Episcopi, a 10th century medieval canon law. For anyone who doesn’t know what “canon law” is, it is basically a written guideline authored by some church authorities and used to govern the church, its clergy, and its patrons. It’s important to highlight this text because it gives us a clear idea of what surviving pagan cultures looked like in Medieval Francia (modern France), but not in the way you might expect. As mentioned above, a lot of what we know about the past is just really good detective work, and this is one of the instances where a document helps us understand far more than what was originally intended. It’s a cohesive set of ideas that suggest how the church should treat several circumstances regarding their local pagans, and as usual, it wasn’t preaching tolerance. In summation, it called anyone who believed in anything other than Christianity an infidel.[1] Pagans still existed, and still do to this day, in fact, but the Church used a heavy hand when dealing with them most of the time. Often, they used their own beliefs against them and merged popular Christian anecdotes to help assuage people who were not happy with the idea of conversion to a new religion. I think that the author of the overview for this document said it best when they said that,

“new Christians [did not] simply cast aside old beliefs…conversion was a dynamic process…[and] elements of indigenous religious practice were frequently mixed, often deliberately, with Christian belief and ritual…Certain practices can be said to have ‘survived’ the process of conversion…After all, nearly every Christian ritual had some sort of pre-Christian antecedent or model.”[2]

They just simply couldn’t kill them all or threaten everyone with violence in order to bring them to their knees before the Lord, and so, they got creative.

           Canon Episcopi calls anyone who believes in the mystical arts a liar and, what I’m most interested in is it’s mention of, “wicked women, who have given themselves back to Satan…[who] in the hours of the night…fly over vast spaces of earth.”[3] You just can’t get more witchy than that folks, and don’t worry, I know that this was written in like 900CE, but I should also mention that it was referenced in another important document—Corpus Juris Cononici, a canonical law that remained intact beginning in the 12th century all the way until 1917. I’m not going to attempt the math there, but it’s too damn long and we can all agree on that. So, now we know our Collective Catholic Opinion (CCO for the rest of this project),[4] is that we don’t like pagans, and with the introduction of this new text, witchcraft is now a pagan practice. This was originally, a really good detail to hammer out in canonical law because it typically kept the Inquisition from meddling in matters of alternative religions, UNTIL (you knew that was coming, I already warned you in Part 1) Canon Episcopi was thrown out by Pope Innocent VIII in 1484 (not the same Innocent One as before, but damn did we not learn a lesson?). Anyway, the most innocent pope of all time decided that witchcraft was to be forever tantamount to devil worship which was what gave inquisitors permission to go after pagans and those accused of practicing witchcraft—great.[5]

           So, that brings me to my next document of importance, the Malleus Maleficarum, the Latin here, in case you aren’t a weird Disney fan, is where we get the word ‘maleficent’ and thus the name for one “Mistress of Evil”…moving on.[6] This book was written between 1486 and 1487 and can also be referred to as “The Hammer of Witches,” a direct translation of the original Latin. It was written by some German Dominican monks—'Dominican’ here, refers to the Dominican order of Preachers founded in France by the Spanish priest St. Dominic, so, not the islanders as I was originally very confused about. Recall from earlier that the first instances we see of witch trials occur in a German-speaking part of Switzerland, so you can see how this thing is gaining speed. There were other texts along the way that were written in regards to witchcraft, but there was a really important invention that made this one unique—the printing press. It spread like wildfire, and there were more copies of this document than any other, and it so precisely aligned with the mounting witch-craze, the Inquisition, and the Corpus Juris Cononici, that it almost seems planned. Am I a conspiracy theorist, you ask? Maybe. After researching this project, I’m beginning to wonder, myself. Let’s indulge.

           In 1481 Pope Innocent VIII (I’m so surprised), heard about those German monks who were in the middle of writing about these witches, and they complained to him that the authorities weren’t properly looking into the accusations. This actually prompted the Pope to issue one of those papal bulls we all know and love, titled, Summus Desiderantes Affectibus, translated—Desiring with Supreme Ardor. It wastes no time getting right to the point, those who were practicing witchcraft were to be henceforth considered heretics, and doling out the full support of the Church and the Faith to inquisitors to prosecute these cases as they saw fit. Three years later, the monks published their instruction manual for other sympathizers. This document was separated into three parts. The first was addressing skeptics and assuring them of the reality of the situation and suggesting that not believing in the existence of witchcraft was another form of heresy. The second part included proof that real harm was caused by magic, and the third part was made up of guidelines for investigating, arresting, and punishing witches. It was used by Catholics and Protestants alike, and while it was never made official by the Catholic Church, it was most assuredly referenced. It was not continuously in print; however, but was re-printed and widely distributed in areas “as needed,” meaning that when prosecutions started ramping up in some areas, the press would begin to print and distribute more.

           I’m gonna delve pretty deep into this document because it’s really important that we know where some of this information comes from in reference to future prosecutions, tortures, and accusations of presumed witches. The manual directly mentions that witchcraft is found amongst women most predominantly and uses the idea that both good and evil manifests in women more powerfully than in men. It specifically singles out midwives because of their aptitude for contraception and pregnancy termination��see, you guys thought this anti-abortion culture was new…it’s not. It made wild claims that midwives ate babies, or offered them to devils, and elucidated pacts made with the Devil, sex with incubi, possession, and, I’m not quite sure how to word this, the act of vanishing penises (That’s the best I can do here. I tried some other stuff and believe me it was much worse). The part I love most is that most of the references used to substantiate these claims come from some of the great Greek philosophers and writers like Homer and Socrates, who were big, giant, probably gay,[7] pagans. I can’t love that more, guys…it really doesn’t get better than two homophobic, misogynistic, intolerant religious zealots getting their entire bibliography from some gay pagans. Finally, what the document describes as “quarrelsome women” could not be considered witnesses to witchcraft, and it excuses this by alleging that this is to prevent friends, families, and neighbors from bitter fights.

           To determine whether or not someone was a witch, they could be examined physically. Any corporeal evidence might include marks on the body, physical objects that were concealed on the body, or not weeping while being tortured or when presented in front of a judge. When checking for these “marks,” women were stripped of their clothing (by other women), their hair was shaved—this could be a small amount or all of it depending on where that pesky devil’s mark was going to be found. Often, this mark could be a mole, a flea or insect bite, a birth mark, or a speck of dirt. Anything passed, really, and once these marks were found they needed to make sure that there were no other instruments of witchcraft on a person in order to execute them. The manuscript mentions that if these items are not removed, there would be an inability to burn or drown the witch, and the same goes for if she was still under the protection of other witches. The practice of drowning or burning an accused witch to prove her innocence began, and although the accused was never around to celebrate her liberation afterwards the practice persisted, nonetheless. While determining the guilt of these witches, a confession was paramount in determining the outcome of a person’s wellbeing after the trial.

           Accused witches could only be executed by the inquisitors or authorities of the church if they confessed themselves, but, remember that the church had already authorized torture as an acceptable method of questioning at this point and could be persuaded into confessing by any means necessary. Often, they would confess quickly under the pain of torture, and were said to have been abandoned by the Devil. Conversely, those who held out, were under the Devil’s protection and more closely bound to him, and torture was viewed as a form of exorcism. Confession under torture was not enough; however, and they had to confess again while not being tortured for it to be a valid confession. If the accused continuously denied the accusations the church was not permitted to execute her, but they could eventually turn her in to local authorities who were not beholden to the same restrictions.

After a confession, the accused could be offered the option of repenting against all prior acts of heresy and perhaps be granted the avoidance of a death sentence, but later when I pull out the statistics, you’ll see precisely how rare that option was. They were also likely to allow a witch to avoid a death sentence if they snitched on other witches, but typically the investigations into those that were implicated by the original witch were presumed to be innocent until a thorough investigation could take place. Prosecutors also did not have to reveal that the removal of a death sentence did not mean that they could not imprison them indefinitely. Judges that presided over these trials were given specific instructions on how to ward themselves from wayward spells of the spurned witches on trial, and to ensure that they had the full cooperation of those amongst the court and spectators, there were specific instructions that allowed those who were uncooperative to be excommunicated from the church or even labeled heretics themselves if their obstruction was persistent.

Pope Innocent VIII’s bull acted as a metaphorical magnifying glass over the ant that this situation was in Switzerland and Germany, but to conflagrate things further, in 1501, Pope Alexander VI[8] issued a new papal bull, the Cum Acceperimus,[9]that extended the reach of prosecutions for witches to Lombardy and officially broadening the reach into Italy. I think it’s important to point out that this particular pope was a Borgia, and for those of you who haven’t seen The Borgias on Showtime, the Borgia family is basically the Kardashian/Jenners of the Medieval world—so many scandals and orgies, one can nary keep up. Beginning in 1500 and all the way through 1560, historians consider these few decades to be the peak of trials in Europe, and in order to focus more in-depth on this aspect we’ll be ending this part here, but it may be worth mentioning that this oddly severe belief in superstition beginning with the Malleus Maleficarum, may have been one of the many sparks that stoke the flames of the Protestant Reformation in Europe.[10]

[1] See Canon Episcopi for a full quote, but this is in direct reference to a bible verse from John 1:3 that makes mention of God being the maker of all things and suggests that those who believe that other entities may have done so are “infidels.”

[2] (Traces of Non-Christian Religious Practices in Medieval Pentitentials, n.d.)

[3] Direct quote from the Canon Episcopi and shortened for clarity and pointed reference.

[4] Please don’t talk to normal people about the CCO, it’s not a real organization, and outside of this context it’s probably very offensive to modern Catholic practitioners and I am not looking to get cancelled on Twitter

[5] (encyclopedia.com, 2019)

[6] Maleficent is defined by Webster’s as, “doing evil or harm; harmfully malicious,” and the original Latin form is maleficentia.

[7] the ancient Greeks were partiers and lovers, man

[8] Not a safer name than ‘Innocent,’ it turns out.

[9] DON’T YOU DARE GIGGLE AT THAT NAME

[10] It’s important to note here that history doesn’t have a large grasp on one specific event that might have been what caused this leap, but it was more likely a combination of quite a few different things, but it is my own humble opinion that torturing people certainly wasn’t a good way to rally support for the Catholic Cause™