#viola's vignettes

[lymericslimerick]

𝘐'𝘷𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘴𝘰 𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨, 𝘐 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘺 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘦 | LADS + when you meet their past/future selves

warnings: HEAVY SPOILERS FOR THEIR MYTHS/DEATH+REBIRTH. BE WARNED. angst, mention of mutilation, you assume they're going through a mental episode, still unaware of their past, slightt humour, this has been happening to caleb for years in this headcanon hence your unsurprised/calm reaction (also I typo'ed a fair bit on caleb's, its A-01* not X01, sorry!!)

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── xavier

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── zayne

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── rafayel

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── sylus

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── caleb

[thestarfishface]

He means everything to me, your honor

Normal things to say to your friends

[moesartblog]

Chapter 2

hey so ive been dealing a sudden surge of yet another set of horrid symptoms, which may be related to hyperthyroidism from over medication of thyroxine so ive been going through these Assassin's Creed AU fic chapters

I'm still having a hard time drawing so I'm using some old drawings which don't fully match the text but whatever.

I'm sorta just gonna be doing some vignettes of times before the starting events of the game

I hope you all will enjoy these fics!

Chapter Masterpost

The march back to the Palazzo Pazzi seemed to drag on for an eternity. The sun bore down through a cloudless sky, in a way that didn’t fit with the atmosphere of the events of the day. A 6-year-old Vieri kept a tight grip on his father’s black cloak, with his sister trailing close behind both of them.

The Pazzi family had just left the funeral of Serena, the mother of Vieri and Viola.

Francesco held a dour look on his face, without falter. He walked slowly, with an energy that spoke to how little he wanted to be disturbed. Viola’s face was blank, with her black veil carefully fixed over her eyes. She kept just a pace behind her father and brother. Vieri, stuck to his father’s side, was still fighting back tears, with a small sniffle here and there. As they walked, he would glance up at his father, and each time would see the same expression on his face; stern and closed off.

While walking through the busy streets of Florence, the occasional passerby would offer expressions of sympathy, but dared not approach the family, for fear of how Francesco might react.

Less than a block from their palazzo, Vieri heard two young, jovial voices approaching rapidly. As suddenly as he first heard them, a young Federico rounded the corner at full speed, and raced straight over to an abandoned cart that sat beside a wall. Slapping his hand on it, he let out a loud “I WIN!”, with a gleeful giggle. Just a second later, his younger brother, Ezio came around the corner, with heaving breaths. When he finally caught up to his brother, he stopped just short of the cart and bent over to put his hands on his knees to catch his breath.

Federico, also still catching his breath, leaned back confidently on the cart. “One day, baby brother, you will catch up to me!”

Ezio looked at him with a bit of irritation. “Please… stop saying that… after every race…hah…” Ezio let his head hang back down for just a few more moments. Noticing his little brother seemed to be a little dejected, Federico patted Ezio’s back reassuringly.

“I truly mean it every time I say it, Ezio. But, for now, I remain the superior racer.” Federico chuckled, while Ezio rolled his eyes.

Vieri had been observing the two during his own slow walk. Seeing the two brothers rib on each other, he felt a twinge of jealousy. Why did they get to be so happy while he had lost his mother? At the same time, he longed for a comforting connection like they had. He let go of his father’s cloak and started to walk towards the two brothers, when their mother suddenly appeared around the corner. He stopped just short of them.

“You two need to stop running off on a whim, or I swear you will send me into hysterics.” Maria’s scolding was soft but stern. Both Federico and Ezio apologized in unison, and moved to each side of their mother to hold her hands. As she turned to walk back to where they had come from, Maria caught sight of Vieri, red-faced, and wide eyed. He stood still with his hands nervously clasped together, set small in the wide street. Maria had only a handful of interactions with the Pazzi family, but she recognized the little son of Francesco de Pazzi, and she had recently caught wind of Serena’s passing.  With a sad smile, she slowly approached the little boy.

“Hello, little one. How are you?” Maria asked softly.

Vieri stood still, frozen, and unsure of how to respond. It took a long moment for him to collect his thoughts before he forced out a quiet “Not good…”

 Francesco suddenly appeared behind him and roughly grabbed his arm. “Vieri, what did I tell you about wandering off?” He glanced up to where Maria, Federico, and Ezio were standing. “Auditores,” he said indifferently.

Maria stood straight with a smile. “Francesco. I wanted to offer you my condolences for the loss of your wife. Serena was a wonderful woman, and it is truly a tragedy that she is no longer with us.”

Francesco, keeping a dour look on his face, just responded with a quick “Thank you,” and then gestured for his son to follow him back to where they had been walking. Vieri moved to rejoin his father and sister but then paused briefly to look back at the three. Federico gave the little Pazzi a little sympathetic wave, and Ezio, looking over to his brother, copied his wave. Vieri blinked, then quickly returned to his father’s side.

As they continued the rest of the short walk back to their home, Vieri thought back to the two young Auditore’s hanging onto their mother. He suddenly felt hot streams running down his cheeks. He couldn’t control the wave of despair coming on, and in a final effort to stave off the feeling, he looked up expectantly at his father. But instead of seeing a comforting face to help him through this, he just saw a stern face, looking directly ahead of them. He let his head fall and began shakily crying. His sobs still would not grab the attention of his father, but he felt Viola’s hand slide around his hair, careful not to knock off his hat. She didn’t say a word, but simply held Vieri at her side, as he tried to hold back his sobs.

[aparticularbandit]

what i really like about the short rarepair vignettes is that like. i don't feel the need to write a bunch of set up. i'm just throwing these two into a short little situation. (or i feel the need and just, like. don't do it.)

however.

i've found that if i'm gonna spend a longer time with a character, it's nice to have given myself a little bit of time to get to know them so to speak, and that's usually an independent one-shot. not always.

but junko needed that one-shot. tsumugi needed the exploratory (i may have posted it as a snippet for wip wednesday a while back; it is not her birthday fic). viola did (bly manor). often my first chapter/prologue of things run on vibes and function in that way (we were never friends with darkness; finding family). the haruhi/junko dynamic also has an exploratory...file - the description for the series is there, as is a snippet that will probably be changed before it gets posted. when/if i get there.

the yuisa fic also needed the establishing shot for me to ground myself, but i'm struggling with connecting it to the fic proper maybe because the fic proper doesn't need it. (and i think the miurumi one did, too.)

not sure if either of those will keep them, though, in the finished/posted fic. (the miurumi one probably will. they probably will. idk.)

[autolesionistra]

Non so se avete presente quelle situazioni tipo quando sei in ferie da qualche parte e c'è un evento improbabile nei pressi, roba a cui non saresti mai andato ma non hai una mazza da fare (parlo di tempi in cui non avevo una mazza da fare) e decidi di farci un salto. Ecco, anni fa finii così a vedere in una chiesa montana un concerto di musica barocca per viola e clavicembalo.

Pur avendo mietuto qualche vittima fra gli astanti (fra le panche della chiesa si vedevano almeno un paio di teste reclinate in postura più da riposo che da ascolto) personalmente mi acchiappò parecchio, soprattutto quel pezzaccio di  “Folies d’Espagne” di Marin Marais. Avevano pure un CD che si auto-vendevano e lo andai a pigliare; anche se la cosa più vicina alla musica barocca che conoscevo erano le vignette di Sardelli, mi sentii in dovere di fare qualche apprezzamento al violista dicendo che il suo strumento aveva un gran suono, o qualcosa del genere. A quel punto intervenne la mogliera del violista a dire che forse pure suo marito aveva qualche merito nel gran suono e io diventai un poco bordeaux tentando di spiegare che volevo poi dire che mi era piaciuto molto come suonava e di riflesso si imbarazzò pure lui dicendo che, sì, aveva capito l’apprezzamento e ad entrambi credo si rafforzarono alcuni stereotipi di genere sulle mogliere.

Ora, io nella mia vita ho vissuto tanti momenti significativi il cui ricordo si è fortemente appannato quando non scomparso del tutto, ma questi momenti di grande inutilità e piccoli disagi tendo a ricordarmeli come se fossero successi ieri e in momenti casuali, tipo oggi. Pazienza.

Grazie alla magia delle interwebs ho recuperato analogo concerto più recente dello stesso duo (Andrea Maini e Marco Vincenzi) che pur con tutti i limiti di un audio registrato apparentemente con la cornetta di un Siemens S62 regala un certo numero di emozioni, in particolare nella già citata Folies d’Espagne: https://youtu.be/rH3WeBIWf2M?t=961

[boonesfarmsangria]

In March 2022, Ben Howard was sat in his garden when he found himself unable to think clearly, form sentences or speak for almost an hour. A month later, after the same thing happened again, the Ivor Novello Award-winning singer-songwriter learned he’d suffered two TIAs (transient ischemic attacks - known as mini-strokes). “It was out of the blue,” says the 35 year-old. “It was a confusing time.”

That June, after a month of inconclusive hospital tests Howard and his band returned to Le Manoir de Léon recording studio in south-west France, where they’d previously worked on his acclaimed third album ‘Noonday Dream’.

“We went in and put down ten songs in ten days, then spent the rest of the year tinkering with them”. The record was produced by Bullion, known for his work on Westerman’s ‘Your Hero Is Not Dead’ and Orlando Weeks ‘Hop Up’. Howard says, “We worked through the heatwave, the air conditioning broke, after what had happened I was so tired in the afternoons that I slept a lot. We just played solidly and slept, they was no time for retrospection”.

The result is ‘Is It’, a lush, sonically splintered album which captures Howard working through those moments of seismic shift. “I found it impossible not to dwell on the absurdity of it, that with one tiny clot, one can lose all faculties. It really ate into the writing of the record”.

The songs range from the peaceful quotidian Days of Lantana, to cut up samples and driven beats of Walking Backwards, the formers’ pitched and warped Linda Thompson chorus reminiscent of Malcolm Mclaren´s ‘Madame Butterfly’.

Moonraker, a song about climbing in the Guadarrama mountains touches on the meditational, while in the cyclical Richmond Avenue Howard talks of shared childhood moments with his father.

There are colourful, left-field production choices throughout- a staple of Bullion - but with a twist

“We really bonded over records in the studio” he says. “Nathan has an incredible ear and catalogue of sampled beats and rhythms which quickly became the bedrock…There were contributing factors also. Our mainstay drummer Kyle lives in Seattle and as we made the record on the fly we just leaned into drum-machine world, and really left almost all of that side of things up to Nathan.”

“We also did a session at Real World Studios and put most of the record through an echoplex”.

That session featured additional instrumentation from Raven Bush (violin, viola) and Mick Mcgoldrick (flute, Eileen pipes) as well as Howards mainstay band of Mickey Smith (Bass, guitars, percussion) R.D. Thomas (synths, keys, harmonium) and Nat Wason (guitars).

“It’s actually mostly a guitar record, but there are some nice additions. We bought an old harmonium at the beginning of the trip which made its way onto most tracks. I was very much stuck in stuttered delay and synth led guitar patterns. Mick McGoldrick came in to play on Richmond Ave and straight away played Liam O´Flynn lines from the Mark Knopfler record ‘Cal’ which is a long favourite of mine and a big connection to my Dad who had it on tape. That was a beautiful moment, perhaps one of my favourites moments in the studio ever.”

“It was a refreshing way to record, unweighted by the past”

The change is evident on ‘Is It’ - an album which represents a further creative evolution from an artist known for never repeating himself throughout his already-storied career.

¨I was so aware of the overwhelming information coming from everything, almost like my brain couldn’t filter what was happening and had to start again. So we just pushed forward, lyrically it seems obvious to me in parts, It’s about sitting there wondering what the hell is going on.”

Yet with each listen it feels like more than that. A characteristically onion-layered record which rankles like a series of questions, or a series of vignettes throughout Howard´s life, perhaps best distilled in the whirling chorus on ´Spirit´.

‘What’s mine anyway?

My feelings seem to be arranged.

What´s mine anyway?

Spirit? Is it?´

‘Is It’ stands quite starkly on it’s own, buoyed by the circumstances of its creation. “Just to be playing music in the studio felt like a real privilege and a luxury,” says Howard. “It was probably the best studio session we’ve ever had.

[assim-eu-sou]

The World of The Planets, Op. 32

What’s all that music stuff about?

The Planets

First, let’s start with the story’s namesake: The Planets. The setup of the concert Ludmi and Naty attend is inspired by a concert I played in during my first year of college, from the lighting to the visuals. Why did I choose Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age for the Chapter 5 title? Aside from it fitting the theme, Saturn had a very frightening bass oboe solo that I had to play, so I have some bad blood with it. In the clip, you can see and hear vignettes from Saturn, Mars, Mercury, Uranus, and Neptune, respectively.

Setting the Stage

A little bit about the setup of an orchestra:

This is where you can imagine everyone sitting on the stage during rehearsals and concerts.

By contrast, this is the organization of a string quartet. You can see why Ludmila wishes she was still in Vilu’s seat.

Solo Works:

Havanaise - Saint-Saëns: the soundtrack to Ludmila’s destruction and one of my favorite pieces to perform on violin. Listen to a professional performance with orchestra here or some snapshots from my jury performance of it last fall here.

Concerto No. 2 for Violin - Wieniawski: Ludmila’s first jury performance. Listen to a professional performance with orchestra here or my tragically unaccompanied but happily memorized jury performance of it last fall here.

Concerto No. 3 for Violin - Saint-Saëns: I chose this piece for Ludmila to struggle with because it was in preparation for a jury performance of that specific piece that I finally had to take some more drastic steps when it came to dealing with my performance anxiety. Listen to a professional orchestral performance here!

Chamber Works:

String Quartet No. 8 - Shostakovich: I chose this for the quartet because the second movement is so aggressive. I can see the girls battling it out so clearly. Listen along with the music here.

Wind Quintet No. 3 - Maslanka: This is what the crazy kids were dancing to backstage. My quintet is learning this to play for the gala concert in a few weeks, and it is genuinely so fun to listen to and play. If you skip past the slow chorale at the beginning and take a listen, I’m sure you’ll agree. Here’s a recording.

Violin vs Viola

Finally, I wanted to include a reference for the size difference between a viola and a violin, respectively. I think Naty’s viola would probably even be bigger than mine, because she can handle it.

[lymericslimerick]

𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘐 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘤𝘳𝘺, 𝘪𝘵 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘴 𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘦 | LADS (and you) vs. university group work

warnings: swearing, university au, they are NOT. a polycule these men fucking hate eachother, thank you guys for 1k!! this is the best I can do gift wise for now bc I’m on vacation lmao

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 6, Number 1

A new year means new music. At least eventually, it does, though January is notoriously slow for album releases. Meanwhile, there’s plenty we missed from late (and mid and even early) 2019, so let’s dig into that for one last big Dust. Here we cover subcontinental LGBTQ gangsta rap, industrial clangor, string quartets, Welsh agitpunk, electronics, free jazz, blackened death metal and an odd, charming collaboration between Cate Le Bon and Bradford Cox (see photo). Writers include Bill Meyer, Jennifer Kelly, Ian Mathers, Tobias Carroll, Andrew Forell, Ray Garraty, Jason Gioncontere, Ethan Militsky and Jonathan Shaw.

Jeb Bishop / Alex Ward / Weasel Walter — Flayed (Ugexplode)

Flayed by Jeb Bishop / Alex Ward / Weasel Walter

You know a party is good if it carries on even though the organizer can’t show up. Bassist Damon Smith planned this encounter, which involved his long-term partner in intensity and chaos, drummer Weasel Walter; New England improvisational fellow traveler (at least until Smith moved to St. Louis a few months after this March, 2019 session) Jeb Bishop on trombone and electronics; and Alex Ward, a veteran of work with Derek Bailey and This Is Not This Heat, on guitar and clarinet. Since Walter has played with both of the other guys in and outside of the Flying Luttenbachers, when Smith had to drop out for scheduling reasons, he was confident that the trio could make something of both the opportunity to play and the space made available by the absent bass. He was right. Both the title and prevailing assumptions about Walter might set you up to expect a one-dimensional blowout, but there’s loads of listening and thoughtful, instant reacting taking place on each of the album’s eight, mostly pithy tracks. This music plays out like a combination of jujitsu and shuttle diplomacy, with players shifting between support and challenge, density and space, rapidity and reserve from second to second.

Bill Meyer  

 Cartel Madras — Age of the Goonda (Sub Pop)

Cartel Madras turns gangsta rap’s hyper-male, African-American-oriented bravado on its side, filtering the guns and blunts ethos through a female, queer, multicultural lens without diluting its violence in the least. Sisters Priya and Bhagya Ramesh, known as Contra and Eboshi, have lived in Calgary since childhood, but they immigrated from Chennai, India, once part of Madras, hence the name, hence the tricky scales and intricate, not-quite-Western rhythms of their rhymes. Age of the Goonda works in a spare, menacing way, dense, referential wordplay atop an undulating threat of sub-bass and the occasional spray of bullets.

“Goonda Gold,” celebrates cartoonish dominance, though with a South Asian twist. Little bits of Hindi harmonics decorate the bare architecture of synth bass sounds and cracking, stabbing percussion (augmented here by gunfire); the Cartel’s chant of “Gold on my neck I’m a Goonda/got guns in the air like a junta” puts a subcontinental spin on ghetto law. The clever-est word sprays come in “The Legend of Jalopeno Boiz,” where the duo references everything from Frost/Nixon to incel stereotypes, but the single “Lil Pump Type Beat,” is all hedonism, devious syncopation and sexual predation. Though wildly intersectional, these tracks make no concessions to soft, liberal ideas about how women/minorities/LGBTQ people wield power; they do it just like the men do, with guns. “Take off your top boy/somebody bring me my gun/that bag in the back of the jeep/you just a bitch on the run,” asserts one or the other sister in “Jumpscare.” What was that you were saying about women and nurture?

Jennifer Kelly

 CIA Debutante — The Landlord (Siltbreeze)

CIA Debutante-The Landlord by CIA Debutante

A new Siltbreeze record is a rare blessing nowadays. The label’s first release since 2018 comes from Paris duo CIA Debutante. The Landlord fits in nicely with the label’s storied '90s output, particularly the Shadow Ring. The electronics aren’t quite glitchy—they sound more like the batteries in a cheap toy dying. Still, CIA Debutante are savvy enough to avoid getting too clever with their sputtering, plodding, and whizzing, and they don’t go the easy route when layering incongruous sounds. There’s never the fatiguing sense that they rely on the same few tricks. It helps that their murky, paranoid vignettes are fully engrossing. CIA Debutante tap into something truly nightmarish on The Landlord, which is a rare accomplishment. Sure, plenty of music shoots for tense and creepy, but CIA Debutante have an exceptional gift for the uncanny, the kind of stuff that haunts you long after you’ve woken up and can no longer hope to grasp it. Ethan Milititsky

Decoherence — Ekpyrosis (Sentient Ruin Laboratories)

Ekpyrosis by Decoherence

Decoherence is a pretty good name for a band that locates itself in the liminal space between industrial music’s stomp and clangor and black metal’s astringent tumult. The band’s new LP (and first full length release) Ekpyrosis is at its best when its waves of distorted hiss, dissonant riffing and distant shrieks and growls threaten to rend the record to shreds. One imagines that if you found yourself in an aluminum ladder factory, amid the massive drills and extruding machines and metal presses and then removed your ear protectors, you’d hear something akin to this — especially if the place was possessed by demons of ill intent. It’s a well-crafted, ritualized chaos. The band is so insistent on a specific set of sounds and forms that the record’s long tracks tend to blur into one another. Which may be the point. Decoherence, indeed.

Jonathan Shaw

 Bertrand Denzler / CoÔ — Arc (Potlatch)

Arc is a two-part, album-length work by Bertrand Denzler, a Swiss-born, Paris-based saxophonist and composer. It is performed by CoÔ, a string septet led by double bassist Félicie Bazelaire. The ensemble’s composition is a sort of funhouse reflection of a string quartet, distorted towards breadth; it comprises one violin, two violas, one cello and three double basses. But there’s nothing comic about this music, which is quite beautiful in the same way as a slow winter sunset. Denzler’s method here involves the use of continuous sounds, but don’t call it drone. The players use both conventional and extended techniques to create a continually changing sequence of striated sounds. Naked scrapes and cavernous groans arc in formation, changing fairly frequently over the course of each piece. The result is immersive enough to let you get lost, but keep your ears and eyes open; you wouldn’t want to miss one moment of gradual transition. A note about circumstances — Potlatch, the label that released this CD, has slowed its production in recent years, and this is the only record it released in 2018. Apparently, the label isn’t wasting its time with unnecessary effort; Arc clears the necessity bar.

Bill Meyer

 Fujiya & Miyagi — Flashback (Impossible Objects of Desire)

One of the interesting things about Fujiya & Miyagi’s songwriting is that as the UK post-motorik outfit’s music becomes ever more focused and sleekly propulsive, frontman David Best has zeroed in on any number of little aspects of life disturb and upset the kind of cool pulse the band specializes in. Here it’s everything from violations of your “Personal Space,” the “Fear of Missing Out,” and nagging thoughts in the title track to the more political concerns of the closing lengthy workout of “Gammon” (which eventually, in one of the little touches that makes F&M’s music so addictive, settles on the “pure evil vibrating” of a dial-up modem). That doesn’t mean the band can no longer bust a groove just for the pure joy of it, as “Dying Swan Act” proves, but it’s the combination of those chops and the perceptive if increasingly jaundiced eye they turn on life that makes them such a unique and compelling act.

Ian Mathers

 Cate Le Bon & Bradford Cox — Myths 400 (Mexican Summer)

Myths 004 by Cate Le Bon & Bradford Cox

Intricate fancies turn just out of true in this pop-up collaboration between Cate Le Bon and Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox, the fourth in a series of joint EPs recorded under the auspices of Mexican Summer’s annual Marfa Myths festival (hence Myths 400). The two artists work in a skewed, peripheral vision take on artful pop, building interlocking boxes of percussion and whimsey in which fleeting glimpses of loveliness flit by. The song-i-est bit of Myths 400 is undoubtedly “Secretary,” a Weimar-decadent bit of mournful song hedged in clanks and clicks, strings and clarinets, and the odd combination of Le Bon’s pure art-song shiver and Cox’s less pristine, more grounded voice. Yet the rhythm-centered oddities are just as rewarding; resist the slap-bang fanciful-ness of growly-voiced, Cox-led “Fireman,” with Le Bon trilling off center arias in the margins at your own peril. “What Is She Wearing” bangs out disconsonant guitar tones in slightly off center patterns and tunings; it’s a wind-up toy’s existential crisis. Le Bon chants in a Middle European cadence, as the cut falls somewhere between early Michachu and a Kurt Weil song. It’s about the last thing you’d expect to emerge from the desert, eccentric, abstracted, playful and utterly urbane.

Jennifer Kelly

  Urs Leimgruber / Andreas Willers / Alvin Curran / Fabrizio Sperra—Rome-ing (Leo)

Urs Leimgruber has covered a lot of musical ground in a performing and recording career that spans over 45 years. The three musicians who join the Swiss saxophonist on this freely improvised encounter, which was recorded in Rome late in 2018, are well chosen to access aspects of that history and shape it into sound configurations that are quite present-focused. Quick, light-fingered, and restless, drummer Fabrizio Sperra keeps things in constant motion. Swiss guitarist Andreas Willers stirs chunks of almost rock-ish noise and sprinkles stinging, pure-toned notes into the mix that give the music heft without slowing it down. Alvin Curran, an American keyboardist and composer (and member of MEV), draws on classical more than jazz elements in his piano playing; there are moments where he stubbornly erects a structure that the other musicians must either inhabit or work around. But his sampler also enables him to inject the sounds of other places. Shifting between tenor and saxophones, Leimgruber drives quickly spiraling phrases through the open spaces and uses astringent, distressed tone-shards to suggest where there needs to be more space.

Bill Meyer

 The Master Musicians of Dyffryn Moor — Music for the National Health Service (Amgueddfa Llwch)

Music for the National Health Service by The Master Musicians of Dyffryn Moor

When I was a younger punk, I would sometimes take in the phenomenon of bands’ whose lyrical explanations would take longer to deliver than the playing of the actual songs. And while I haven’t seen this crop up much recently, I feel like that aesthetic is alive and well when I visit the Bandcamp page of The Master Musicians of Dyffryn Moor, which includes a terse essay about the dangers facing the NHS under the current British government. This new EP follows two excellent full-lengths, Cerddoriaeth Ddefodol Gogledd Sir Benfro (Ritual Music of North Pembrokeshire) and Contemporary Protest Music, which blend the “instrumental music can be politically charged” feel of Godspeed You! Black Emperor with the intricacy of Steve Reich’s Drumming. These two songs continue in that tradition — furiously played percussion with a heated political subtext — but add a few tweaks to the sound the group has already established. Specifically, there’s a stronger electronic element here: you could probably get a dancefloor moving if you cued up “A spell to protect the NHS from those who seek to destroy it.” Its opposite number, “A hex on those who seek to destroy the NHS,” is built around a steady pulse. You probably can’t dance as well to that, but given the potential psychic damage incurred by dancing to a hex, would you actually want to?

Tobias Carroll 

 Overground Collective — Super Mario (Babel Label)

SUPER MARIO by OverGround Collective

The Overground Collective is a pan-European big band that is based in London and led by Paulo Duarte, a Portuguese guitarist/composer currently based in Scandinavia. If that sounds like a bit to get your head around, you probably need only wait a while to see what Boris’s Britain does to the freedoms of movement and thought necessary for such an endeavor to get off the ground. For the rest of us, it’s a nice illustration of why such fluidity is part of a better way. Duarte spent some time in England studying the ways of various improvisers, and recruited 17 to join him in realizing a set of compositions designed expressly for them. Certain of the participants come from free jazz (Julie Kjaer, Rachel Musson) or cross-genre experimentation (Yazz Ahmed), and you can hear the influence of such approaches in a few moments of freefall and adventurously conceived solos. But these elements fit into a structure that fits squarely in the tradition. Duarte sets tunes you could hum on grooves that’ll make you tap your feet, albeit quickly enough to annoy your neighbor if the floorboards happen to transmit your amateur approximation of his beats, and dresses them up in arrangements that could speak to a person who thinks that jazz’s lineage is a straight line from Duke Ellington to Maria Schneider. Music like this is a reproach to those who think that differences can’t be complimentary parts of a whole.

Bill Meyer

  Pictish Trail — Thumb World (Fire)

Thumb World by Pictish Trail

Folktronica from the tiny island of Eigg in the Hebrides, this latest album by Pictish Trail (Johnny Lynch) demonstrates the aesthetic value of both isolation and connection. Per isolation: Lynch lives on a windblown island with fewer than 100 other people. But as for connection, he is intimately involved in a northerly folk scene through King Creosote’s Fence Records and surrounded by local musicians. There aren’t that many folks on Eigg, but almost everybody plays an instrument. That kind of environment allows space for eccentricity and practice, which shows up on these expansive, dance-inflected, folk-shadowed cuts. Pictish Trail enlarges his subtle, personal songs with enveloping arrangements of rock sounds and club electronics; Kim Moore contributes some string arrangements and Alex Thomas of Squarepusher sits in on drums. “Double Sided” has the lilt and ramble of Three EPs Beta Band (Lynch has been out touring with Steve Mason lately), while gorgeous, glistening “Slow Memories” has the glitch, glow and aura of early Tunng. Thumb World demonstrates that music can be solitary without being lonely, introspective without self-absorbation. “You’re my solitude/I’m never so alone by myself,” sings Lynch, on the surprisingly rock-guitared “Bad Algebra,” underlining the fact that too many people (or the wrong people) can be isolating, and a few can provide the space for originality and experiment.

Jennifer Kelly

Pinkish Black — Concept Unification (Relapse)

Texas psych sludge prog metal duo Pinkish Black has been quiet for a little while; their last record, 2015’s Bottom of the Morning, was such a compact and potent summation of the miasmic bad vibes that Daron Beck (synthesizers, voice) and Jon Teague (drums) can summon up seemingly at will. No more than a minute into the opening title track of their fourth record you get a strong reminder of just that atmosphere; you might as well be in a haunted castle during the full moon. The closing, lengthy “Next Solution” also offers a reminder of what you might call classic Pinkish Black, but it’s the four songs in between that show Beck and Teague working to make sure there is always room to expand their dark palette. Whether it’s the relatively straightforward, thrashy “Until” or the prettily drifting “Inanimatronic” the results are always interesting. Bottom of the Morning remains the best introduction for now to this duo’s indelible sound, but once you’re a fan Concept Unification makes for a strong and promising follow-up.  

Ian Mathers

  Alexa Rose—Medicine for Living (Big Legal Mess)

“How I wish I were kinder, how I wish I were patient, I could learn all the songs on the gospel station,” trills Alexa Rose in a water pure soprano touched with shivery vibrato as she navigates the twists and corners of the title track from her lovely debut album. The Virginia-born, Memphis-based songwriter has a native’s familiarity with gospel, country and folk blues, but a fresh, sparkling delivery that makes these well-worn forms sound like she just thought of them. A lilting, effortless voice elicits spare melancholy sparked with hope and a crack band of Americana pros in tow – Will Sexton on guitar, George Sluppick playing drums and Mark Edgard Stuart on bass — fill out the songs without a bit of bloat. “Tried and True” enlists a cajun squeeze box and skittering banjo into Rose’s smart, unsentimental songcraft; country teems with strong women disappointed by love, but Alexa Rose is clear-eyed and strong enough to kick its ass without breaking meter. Gorgeous and empowered stuff.

Jennifer Kelly

Sartegos — O Sangue da Noite (I, Voidhanger)

O Sangue da Noite by SARTEGOS

This new release by Sartegos isn’t so much blackened death metal as it is a death metal record that morphs its shape and sound into black metal. The buzzy crunch and acrobatic soloing of opener “Sangue e Noite” gradually give way to leaner, meaner riffs, and by the midpoint of fourth track “Solpor dos Mistérios,” the record has fully taken on the properties of merciless, muscular continental black metal. The record may engage with various metal subgenres, but O Sangue da Noite is held together by Sartegos’s focus on Galician nationalist themes and celebrations of its landscape. The band is named for a miniscule rural hamlet in Galicia, and we are told that all lyrics are delivered in the region’s native dialect. Black metal and ardent nationalism don’t always make for the happiest of combinations. For those of us lacking fluency in the language, it’s tough to know what ideological charge the lyrics carry. And Galician regional politics feature a panoply of leftist and right wing factions, all with their own fiery arguments for the region’s autonomy. What sort of blood? Who sings in the night? Hard to say. But the music’s pretty good.

Jonathan Shaw

 Seablite – Grass Stains and Novocaine (Emotional Response)

Bay Area quartet Seablite’s debut album navigates the fuzzy end of indie pop with aplomb. Vocalists Lauren Matsui (guitar) and Galine Tumasyan (bass) are joined by drummer Andy Pastalaniec and ex-Wax Idol Jen Mundy on lead guitar for 11 tracks of chipper, summery shoegaze that sit easily alongside their most obvious influences Lush, Curve and Stereolab. Seablite’s songs are elevated by the interplay of twin vocals, clean guitar lines and bouncy bass lines supported by cymbal heavy motorik drums. There’s steel beneath the gauze as Mundy brings a little of the Idols’ shade to proceedings and Pastalaniec drives songs like “Pillbox” and “Polygraph” hard and fast down a euphoric freeway of top-down thrumming thrills. Yes, it sounds like a lot of bands you’ve heard and maybe loved but Grass Stains and Novocaine is so well put together and convincingly played it’s hard to resist.

Andrew Forell

 Seiðr — Intethedens Afsky (Nattetale)

Seiðr is a one-man band from Denmark. For just one man, he was awfully busy in the past year, having put out three records. Intethedens Afsky can boast of 10 tracks of dirty, primitive sound with bursts of melody buried immediately under a wall of noise. The inspiration for Seiðr’s music can be found in early 1990s Norwegian black metal, and Claus H. (that’s his name) cannot be blamed for being too much of a good student. Why shouldn’t he have learnt from his elders? The first two tracks here have samples from “nature,” and this gives us a hint to how Seiðr’s music can be interpreted: it’s ruptures in Nature’s hellish landscape. No one will be saved.

Ray Garraty   

 Spider Bags — A Celebration of Hunger (Sophomore Lounge)

SPIDER BAGS "A Celebration of Hunger" by Spider Bags

Spider Bags are still around, making a record every three or four years for Merge. But listening to this debut, it’s hard to imagine how they did it. If subject matter reflects life style, then the motto of these guys back in 2008 was, “We do the hard stuff so there won’t be any left for you. Say, can you loan me a couple of twenties?” But there’s a self-observing intelligence at work in these songs that suggests that self-awareness wasn’t totally obliterated, and a loose, rumbling energy to these roots-tinged garage-rock songs that confirms that the Bags spent at least part of everyday upright. Add to that engineer Brian Paulson’s knack for getting sound under challenging circumstances, which renders the live-sounding performances with sufficient but not distracting clarity, and you have a good soundtrack for the next time you want to drink yourself off the barstool in the privacy of your own home.

Bill Meyer

 Luke Spook — Small Town (Third Eye Stimuli)

Australian multi-instrumentalist Luke Spook steps away from the garage-punk of his Pinheads to conjure up lysergic specters from bygone times on Small Town. There are a fair number of freaked out boil-overs in the offing but the general tone is one of reserved simplicity. Whether sipping tea with the subject of “The Owl” or gathering around the fire with some fellow townsfolk on the title track, Luke channels Syd Barrett to the point of becoming nearly indistinguishable. But what makes Small Town more than just a covers album is Luke’s ability to vary the intimacy of his arrangements when needed. “All the King’s Horses” features a harmonica solo backed up with an (accidental?) chorus of distant, wailing hounds. Those types of moments lurk beneath the surface and inject a pastoral quality that feels authentic. More quirky utopian village than small town, the world Spook creates is a place to live rather than to pass through.

Jason Gioncontere  

 Nick Storring — Qualms (Never Anything)

Qualms by Nick Storring

Nick Storring’s latest recording started life as the score for a dance performance, and it is easy to imagine how it might function in that role. The composition, which spans both sides of a cassette, is episodic. Each moment feels unique unto itself, creating an environment in which things — maybe movements, or maybe something in your own imagination — have the space to happen. If you caught him onstage with the group Picastro, you would probably see Storring play cello, but for Qualms he plays a couple dozen keyboard, stringed, percussive and woodwind instruments. This allows similar themes and actions to appear and reappear in different garb. One stalking theme, for example, manifests once as a psychedelically dense string melody, and again played by gamelan percussion. Elsewhere passages of meter-less sound temporarily halt the progress. Moments of Steve Reich-like repetition surface, but instead of locking in like they might in a Reich piece, they quickly morph into something else. The same pattern of change that probably made this a handy program for a dance performance makes it an engaging pure listening experience.

Bill Meyer

 Sun City Girls — Dawn of the Devi (Abduction)

Dawn of the Devi by Sun City Girls

Dawn of the Devi holds an important place in the Sun City Girls’ discography. Released in 1991, it was the follow up to the much-celebrated Torch of the Mystics, which remains one of the more tuneful and easily-relatable records that Charles Gocher and brothers Alan and Richard Bishop ever did. As such, it had a job to do, and it did it well. That was to throw the followers who sandals instead of sturdy shows off the track. They did this by serving up a song-free album of jagged, totally improvised jams. While it did the job at the time, and in doing so established a pattern of giving the people something other than what they want, in retrospect, you can appreciate it for another reason. Dawn of the Devi makes a pretty strong case for the trio as a rock-derived improvisational ensemble. They sound like they’re listening and responding to each other, and their transitions from acidic splatter to swooning hesitation or heavy ambush make intuitive sense. It wasn’t always that way.

Bill Meyer

 These New Puritans — Inside the Rose (BMG)

Essex experimentalists These New Puritans return with a lush yet disquieting take on English pastoralism. On Inside the Rose multi-instrumentalist twin brothers Jack and George Barnett create an often lovely, occasionally portentous, romantic paean to nature and love. As the Barnetts move further beyond the fractured post-punk of their debut Beat Pyramid, this, their fourth album, elaborates the use of contemporary classical and choral orchestration into arrangements that channel Talk Talk. Jack Barnett’s voice is high in the mix and evokes David Sylvian at his most emotive. Beneath the sheen and swooning strings George’s drumming shifts and slides between Reichian repetition and fierce Taiko inspired rhythms. Inside the Rose is a meticulously produced but never fussy collection, welcoming the listener but refusing either to compromise or patronize. A serious but accessible work full of carefully considered details, some gorgeous melodies and an almost Pre-Raphaelite sensibility expressed in a thoroughly contemporary manner.

Andrew Forell

 Various Artists — No Other Love (Tompkins Square)

No Other Love : Midwest Gospel (1965-1978) by Various Artists

No Other Love is, like the several albums that Mike McGonigal has compiled for different labels, a sequence of gospel records drawn from one collection. In this case it is the collection of Ramona Stout. She culled the 45s that make up this set from her husband Kevin’s trawls of records that had spent years in Chicagoan basements. A graduate student who had spent much of her life outside the USA, she saw with clear eyes the grime of American urban poverty, and found herself deeply compelled by the discovery that hopeful music could grow in such decay. There are no big stars amongst these recordings. Even at the time they were recorded they would have sounded rough and behind the times production-wise — just electric guitars, drum kits, whatever piano or organ was sitting in the church where they were recorded, and congregants’ voices. But the fervor of yearning and the joy of release makes every track a transporting listen.

Bill Meyer

 WOW — Come La Notte (Maple Death Records)

Come La Notte by wow

Underground Roman duo China Now (vocals, drums) and Leo Non (guitars) recent album as WOW, Come La Notte (Like the Night), is seven tracks of 1960s influenced Italian noir cabaret high on atmosphere and drama. Now’s almost operatic vocals are at the forefront over skeletal brushed drums, minimal bass and restrained guitar. The band lulls then surprises with a spectral sax and bursts of crashing cymbals and feedback on “Niente Di Speciale” (“Nothing Special”), a keening gypsy violin on “Vieni Un Po’ Qui” (“Come Over Here”), middle eastern organ on “Occhi Di Serpente” (“Snake Eyes”). Fatalism drips from every note bringing to mind a low ceilinged club in the catacombs where refugees from the sun fill the air with smoke and their guts with grappa and cheap vino rosso as Pasolini scouts for rough trade and fingers grip switchblades concealed in socks. Come La Notte is a slow grower that draws you in even while it picks your pocket. Put it on and live a little vicarious danger in your own private La Dolce Vita.  

Andrew Forell  

[lindavater]

🍃💜🍃 Do you remember the bark vases I made over the holidays (go to my link in bio for the how-to) and I told you that they would be equally as beautiful in the spring? Well I think I like them even better now, styled with violas and pansies, moss, Iris reticulata, and baby bulbs. A nice little vignette by my front door. Do you agree? . . . #garden_styles #purpleflowers #gardenideas #containergardening #cottageliving #springiscoming #instagarden #topiary #cosycottage #cottagedecor #countrycottage #lvgardendesignschool #gardenlife #gardendesign #gardenlife #lindavater #cottages #countryhousestyle #cottagechic #cottagegarden #gardens #gardenofinstagram #gardenphotography #cottagestyle #englishcountryhouse #jardin (at Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) https://www.instagram.com/p/B9hlWFXF_uN/?igshid=12pmff2upzfrp

[marcos123socram]

Ritorno delle vignette Abruzzesi!!!! Qui la notizia,riportata in tutto od in parte, di un cervo(pardon: palco. 👍) affamato. Gnam yum "Avrà gradito?!" "Saranno Frisc i frutti?""avremo risposte?" Notizia in breve 👇👇👇👇👇 Luigi è un vecchio venditore ambulante. La pelle cotta dal freddo, cappello di lana in testa e una posa disinvolta, osserva un enorme cervo maschio, che sta mangiando dalle cassette delle frutta. Siamo a Villetta Barrea, borgo nel cuore del parco nazionale d’Abruzzo, in provincia dell’Aquila, dove - sempre più spesso - capita di vedere qualche cervo a passeggio per le strade del paese. I 650 abitanti sono abituati a vederli sbucare da un giardino o da un parcheggio, e il rispetto è assoluto, nessuno si sogna di cacciarli via o di disturbarli. Si convive, è la normalità.      “Qui fanno dieci mesi di frid e due di frisc”, sorride Pierluigi Viola, ristoratore e autore della foto. Ovvero: dieci mesi di freddo e due di fresco. Insomma, caldo da queste parti non fa quasi mai. E di certo l’inverno non è tenero. Le temperature scendono quasi sempre sotto lo zero e gli animali sono affamati. E a volte capita che vadano a cercare cibo negli orti.  Questa volta, però, questo grande cervo dalle corna maestose (si chiamano “palchi”, in realtà, sottolineano gli esperti del posto), si è spinto oltre: e “ruba” mele e pere sotto gli occhi del padrone del banco.  #abruzzocartoon #vignettedimarcofiorenza #vignetteabruzzesi #abruzzese #abruzzo #palchi #abruzzen #abruzzolovers #abruzzodellemeraviglie #notizie #notiziecalde #marcofiorenzaart #vignette #fumetti #fumettiabruzzesi #fiorenzaemaipiusenza #lartedimarcofiorenza #news #cervoabruzzese (presso Villetta Barrea) https://www.instagram.com/p/CYYkgqNItcV/?utm_medium=tumblr

[michaelpatrickhicks]

Review: Doorbells at Dusk: Halloween Stories, edited by Evans Light

My rating: 4 of 5 stars Nothing says Halloween quite so much as a new horror anthology devoted to carved pumpkins, witches, ghouls, and murder as we turn toward the darker half of the year. Doorbells at Dusk is a solid entry into the annals of such anthologies, gathering fourteen short stories from a range of the horror genre's talents like Josh Malerman, Amber Fallon, Chad Lutzke, and more. Doorbells at Dusk showcases a broad range of Halloween horror themes, as well. There are some truly fun and occasionally depraved and psychotic stories (my favorite kind, personally), as well as gentler, spookier slice of life riffs. I always find anthologies to be a mixed bag, and this latest from Corpus Press proves to be no exception. While there a few stories I didn't care for, I still found plenty of others that impressed and delivered exactly what I was looking for in terms of haunting effectiveness and unbridled mayhem. Most of these latter were from authors whose works I've enjoyed in the past, and I found them delivering the best of the bunch here. Adam Light's "Trick 'Em All" was easily my favorite of this antho. As I said, I like my Halloween stories depraved and bloody, and Light delivers with his story of a psychotic teen receiving messages from his newly carved pumpkin to kill his family. This is a brutal, crazy gorefest and I'll be damned if it wasn't straight up my alley. Jason Parent serves up a fun little treat as a group of thieves break into the wrong house in "Keeping Up Appearances." Gregor Xane's "Mr. Impossible" is a fun bit of science gone wonky as a neighorhood is drugged and costumers believe they actually are whatever they are dressed as. "Rusty Husky," from Dusk's editor Evans Light, delivers on its premise of revenge on a serial killer in a nastily inventive way that's all about its tricks and treats. Amber Fallon's "The Day of the Dead" puts a cool little The Twilight Zone spin on Día de los Muertos, one that will definitely make you want to dress up for Halloween this year. Chad Lutzke's "Vigil" goes in an entirely different direction and stands proudly as a bit of the odd man out here. Eschewing the paranormal entirely, Lutzke focuses on a different sort of monstrosity altogether as a stunned and shaken neighborhood gathers to watch the police discover and exhume a score of bodies from an abandoned house. There's no shocks or scares, but Lutzke writes so well, and so honestly, that this small town vignette captivates the whole through. Sean Eads and Joshua Viola present a historical slow-burn work of Halloween horror that good and truly sticks the landing once the full scope of "Many Carvings" atrocities are fully revealed. Doorbells at Dusk is a welcome addition to the pantheon of Halloween horrors. Not that this is much of a shock, mind you. Evans Light knows how to deliver a great Halloween antho; you don't need to look past any of the three Bad Apples books he co-created to find proof of that, and Doorbells at Dusk serves as further evidence to this claim. Doorbells at Dusk, in fact, is a natural outgrowth from those earlier anthologies, and this one is larger and more diverse in both its stories, their premises, and contributors. Unlike Bad Apples, though, it also seems rather deliberately aimed at a wider, more general audience of horror readers, forgoing the occasionally vulgar, gruesome, splatterpunk sensibilities of its harder-edged, dare to offend cousins. This isn't a bad thing, certainly, but I still found myself wanting Doorbells at Dusk to get a bit meaner and dirtier than its raison d'être permitted. It's safe to say, though, that Light has deftly generated a small library of Halloween attractions to satisfy any number of tastes. Doorbells at Dusk presents a fine sampling of tricks and treats for readers jonesing for some good and proper seasonal reads as the leaves turn color, a chill sets in, the world turns a little bit darker, and it arrives just in time as the membrane separating this world from another grows thinner and thinner day by day. [Note: I received an advanced reading copy of this title from the publisher, Corpus Press.] View all my reviews

[mimosaeyes]

Summary: Twice in her life, Lyra Silvertongue leaves part of herself in another world. Post-canon speculation. For their annual rendezvous on Midsummer’s Day, which falls on 24 June this year.

Word count: 3944

A note: Yeah, months of radio silence on the fic front, and now this. Sorry if you were holding your breath for something else. It’s part of my annual tradition (only since 2016, though) of revisiting book series I read growing up, and writing oneshots about them. These pieces are deeply personal, not just because of the nostalgia factor but because I think they serve as snapshots of my writing style and worldviews.

More behind-the-scenes considerations under the cut!

I didn’t want Will to die that way, but I thought the universe wouldn’t be so kind as to let both of them go in their sleep like Lyra did.

I included Mrs. Cooper’s death (where I didn’t include Ma Costa’s, even though she must have passed away before Lyra) solely for this hidden contrast: Lyra feels a movement in the Dust when Mrs. Cooper passes because Will grieves her passing. She doesn’t sense that Will has died because Will doesn’t regret it. It was important to me that I give them both ‘good’ deaths, which reflected the way they lived.

Lyra bustles about, wanting to say goodbye to her old friends, but quickly realises she has outlived most of them. But the story I tell is indeed her farewell tour, and therefore must (and does) take place non-chronologically. Conversely, the coda after “And so they begin” was added (late in my revision stage) to suggest that the stories of Will and Lyra are truly in the worlds they leave behind, the people whose lives they touched.

‘Lyra’ comes from lyre, an ancient musical instrument like a harp, so I named Will’s daughter after another string instrument: a viola. I don’t think he would’ve picked something too phonetically similar, like Laura. Too haunting, and a bit weird. Also, The Incredibles 2 is out this month (I enjoyed it immensely), and Viola Parry sounds like Violet Parr, to whom I really related because of her shyness and her snark. Both His Dark Materials and The Incredibles were an important part of my childhood, and this whole collection of mine is about revisiting series that influenced me, growing up.

The Shape of Water has a sequence about the heroine’s daily routine where she masturbates in the bathtub. Watching that on the big screen, I was surprised. But I think Guillermo del Toro is right in saying that’s one aspect of female sexuality we don’t see represented, and it was relevant for Lyra because of the time period in which she lived. My association of Lyra’s masturbation, as a healthy, acceptable habit, with water and the gyptians’ boat is at least a subconscious allusion to The Shape of Water. Also: I put that in the same vignette as Lyra’s fever-dream about Will, to leave ambiguous what she needs Will for. Immediately after that comes the part where Will feels like he needs Lyra for her ability to find the right words, to comfort a child like Viola. What does Lyra need Will for? Water, however you may choose to read that.

Elaine Parry’s needing to count things is a plausible sign of dementia, but her mental health issues are not canonically certain. I confess I took liberties. My grandfather had dementia, but by the time he could no longer recognise me and my sister, we were mostly grown up. We weren’t close, though.

Finally: I didn’t give both Lyra and Will a conventional nuclear family, because I think there’s more than one kinship system/structure that can give someone fulfillment. And so I haven’t given Lyra another love interest, like Will has — and I hope that’s not because of some internalised misogyny thing, where the woman has to be faithful to the man in order to be sympathetically received. My reasoning is that Lyra’s parents weren’t ever around, and her concept of family mostly involves the gyptians, her academic community, and now the witches and the armoured bears. She doesn’t get a biological family, but she’s never needed one, to feel loved.

[forestcollective]

Enter a moonlit world where fragments of Arnold Schönberg’s #PierrotLunaire universe crash with digital creations, in a brazen encounter between dance, sound, poetry, video and design. Reimagined as a cascading digital experience, Pierrot takes vignettes from the seminal song cycle and transforms them into a unique multidisciplinary digital world, culminating in a new sonic reimagining by DJ @pixlpixiii For 🎟 link in our bio 📲 💀💀💀 Arnold Schönberg composer Albert Giraud original text Pixlpixi composer, DJ Daniel Szesiong Todd translation, writing @_toddoftoddhall_ Evan J Lawson director @evanjlawson Ashley Dougan choreographer, dancer @goforash Jane Noonan costume, room design @janetnoonan Underground Media, Chris Bennett video documentation, editing Jasmin Bardel design, visual art @jazzy_mc_jazz_pants Aleise Bright voice Kim Tan flutes @pliedpiper Helen Bower violin, viola @piecesofhelen Danaë Killian piano Rosanne Hunt cello Ryan Lynch clarinets @epiccsaxguy Tim Hannah assistant conductor @fromankiwi Old Skool Audio, Dave Wilkinson audio recording engineer Kate Baker photography @katejbaker Presented with @abbotsfordconvent #ForestCollective is supported by @creative_vic & @yarracityarts 💀💀💀 (at Abbotsford Convent) https://www.instagram.com/p/CVbcT9Bh6na/?utm_medium=tumblr

[oosteven-universe]

Archie’s Girls Betty & Veronica #234

Archie’s Girls Betty & Veronica #234 Archie Comics 1975 By Various    Betty & Veronica star in their first comic book series! Take a trip back to the earliest days of Archie Comics as Betty Cooper and Veronica Lodge show the town of Riverdale who's really in charge! Prepare to experience the original Betty and Veronica with stories like "Bats Over Cats", "The Cut Up" and more!    I don’t know about you all but I’m a huge fan of Archie Comics and I have been for most of my life.  I wish I still had those Archie Dolls I gave out as a Channukah gift but alas, so if anyone feels like finding those dolls from 1987 well I’m here.  Now this I wanted to read and review because it is from 46 years ago and I always find it interesting to see what life was like then and how it was portrayed in the comics of the time and nothing was ever as relevant as the Archies were from decade to decade.  Also it doesn’t hurt that regardless of the kind of day you are having there’s nothing that an Archie book won’t do to make it that much better, a good day or a bad one, sunny or rainy it doesn’t matter Archie makes the world a better place.    Now I absolutely love the way that this is being told.  The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well.  That we see each of these vignettes being a complete tale in such a short amount of space is absolutely phenomenal.  The character development that we see through the dialogue, the character interaction and how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter does wonders bringing us their personalities.  The pacing is excellent and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story the more we find ourselves lost in this world.      How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story open up avenues to complete the tale is a masterclass in storytelling.  You just don’t see this level & quality of storytelling on such a regular scale outside of Archie they basically mastered the anthology series format.  Also it’s great to see a Hostess ad and a Li’l Jinx story within these pages as well.  How everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward are impeccably achieved.    Another fact throughout the entire run, from its inception until now, is that the interiors remain pretty much uniformly the same.  The style is easily aped and it takes some true master visual storytellers to be able to make it feel like there’s no transition between artists.  The way we see the linework and how the varying weights are being utilised to create the detailed work is sublime to see.  The colour work we see is fabulous.  To see the various hues and tones within the colours being packed in like a tattoo is rendered exceptionally well.  The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show some remarkably talented eyes for storytelling.  The way we see backgrounds judiciously utilised is fantastic and we see them a lot more than often times today. ​    This just brightened up my night.  The final panel of the issue with an exchange between Betty and Archie sums up Veronica’s life to a “T” and it couldn’t be any more apropos if you ask me.  I love that even though this was written in the 70’s it is still so relevant today is just a testament to how the Archie books have been written over the years.  Just update the fashions, though even those would be considered retro and wearable today, and viola you’ve got yourself a modern comic.  

[lymericslimerick]

𝘐𝘵’𝘴 𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘻𝘺 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘐𝘵’𝘴 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘦, 𝘐 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘺 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘺𝘰𝘶 | LADS + when they’re needy

warnings: suggestive, swearing, sub undertones for the LIs, boner mention!!! (caleb)

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── xavier

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── zayne

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── rafayel

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── sylus

.˚₊‧˗ˏˋ ─── caleb