junkverse-archive

[junkverse-archive]

psa

In light of the recent policy changes, I’m gonna be disappearing from Tumblr, for the most part. Lost Channel Echoes will still update from time to time, at least until I can find a new home for it. This blog, plus my personal, will remain up as archives, but I won’t be using them much, if at all.

So. Right now you can find me on Twitter, as well as Pillowfort (still under construction atm). I’m most active on Twitter. I’ll add additional apps/sites you can find me on later.

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Yellow Wings // Keepaway

This one has always sparked the fires of wanderlust in me, usually kept banked and cooled out of necessity. Part of it is the dreamy, almost echoing guitar and sampled backing vocals, their sound reverberating as if from a narrow canyon or valley, or out of some thin, gossamer portal. Another part of it is the lyrics themselves, speaking of a longing to be in two places at once, a desire to experience everything, everywhere, as much as possible.

And yet, there’s a sense of paralysis here, as well: the lyrics whisper part of the problem is nothing is true/and nothing has happened at all - the wanderlust thwarted, or held in suspension, anxiety and fear of the unknown ending the adventure before it’s even begun. And there’s a breathless moment where it seems the song might fade out before it’s really started, but it comes back in full force, bright and shining like the noon sun caught in glimmering golden feathers.

[junkverse-archive]

DUSTY FRUIT // THE RUBY SUNS

For a brief time in the early 2010s, there was a trend of summery, vaguely tropical-flavored indie pop and rock. “Dusty Fruit” is probably one of the better examples of this mini-wave within indie music of the time: layered vocals over dreamlike instrumentals, bright and hazy and sounding the way sea air tastes.

I’ve yet to find a solid lead on what the lyrics are, exactly. There’s words, sure, and they’re probably English, but at the end of the day I’m not sure the content of the vocals matters so much here. They’re here for atmosphere, just like the instrumentals, language bubbling to a meaningless June-warm froth. The end result is like trying to recall a long-gone day at the beach: you may not remember what you said, exactly, but you remember who you were with, how you felt, how the salt of the ocean tasted on your lips, how the tide tugged at your body and how the ghost of it remained for hours afterwards.

[junkverse-archive]

BUILDINGS AND MOUNTAINS // THE REPUBLIC TIGERS

So often the natural world and urban spaces are pitted against each other, both in terms of their visual formations, and the effect they have upon the mind and heart. Nature heals, the city wounds.

Here, cityscapes and mountain peaks are treated the same: neither as artificial, built constructs, but as inevitable natural formations. (Or is it the other way around?) Either way, they rise from the bend of the earth the same, unspooling on either side of some or any highway: blue with distance at first, then clearer and with more color as you drive nearer to them, and among them. Made different, one vastly older than the other, but they produce a similar effect, once you’re at their feet:

They make you feel inescapably small.

[junkverse-archive]

SO FAR AROUND THE BEND // THE NATIONAL

The lyrics in this one are, perhaps, more tongue-in-cheek than the gently blue tone of the instrumentation and Matt Berninger’s soothing baritone would suggest. There’s allusions to food budgets so meager they could fit in a teacup, getting high and laughing while praying for Pavement to get back together, tied at the end with the refrain that there’s no leaving New York. It should be sad, but there’s a detachment that makes it all seem somewhat ironic, rather than tragic or merely boring.

Even so, there’s something distant and wistful about this song, almost melancholy: the sense that someone you care about deeply is slipping, quietly and inexorably, through your fingers. A question not of if the relationship will fade, like fog in the face of the sun, but when.

[junkverse-archive]

BRIGHT ORANGE AIR // THE INLETS

An odd little mood piece of a song. I’ve never been precisely sure what the lyrics to this one are -a Google search only turned up a fragment, the entirety apparently lost or only found in the liner notes of the physical album. The most enlightening clue was in an old Stereogum post, which noted that it’s “an ode to the psychotropic effects of municipal lighting.”

Not what my first guess would’ve been, but I can see it. The relatively sparse, precise instrumentation and Sebastian Krueger’s distinct voice, together, bring to mind a cool autumn night, lit sodium yellow and amber orange by streetlights and bars and cafes. The sort of time and place where there’s more light bulbs than stars, glittering and blinking in a rigid net of darkened streets, rather than a formless, velvet sky.

[junkverse-archive]

“Yuri!!! on Ice” Setting Material Collection - Victor Nikiforov 

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“Yuri!!! on Ice” Setting Material Collection - Katsuki Yuuri

[junkverse-archive]

Can they not be beautiful for like 2 seconds?

[junkverse-archive]

Hey folks guess what! This account finally hit 2,000 followers! And to celebrate, I’m going to randomly select one person to recieve a box of goblin loot!

Wait, what?

Goblin loot. Loot from, or perhaps gathered by, a goblin.

What does that mean, though?

g o b l i n  l o o t

Bramble, please.

Fine, fine.

What I will send the winner is a box of small, interesting objects. I haven’t decided on the exact contents of the box yet (and likely won’t until I know who it’s for), but it may contain some or all of the following: cool rocks, jewelry, small toys or games, beads, stationary, individually wrapped candy or snacks, a feeling of childlike wonder.

The contents will not be: of any particular monetary value, physically hazardous to the best of my ability to determine, alive, mind-altering, illegal, or cursed. Some items will probably be second-hand or found objects. Actual contact with genuine goblins not guaranteed.

Cool! How do I enter!

For a valid entry, please reblog this post and then go fill out this survey. You need to do both parts; it’s a little more work for you but it’ll keep your host from crying tears of frustration when it’s time to choose a winner. Duplicate entries do not improve your chances of winning.

You must be following me to enter - this is a follower milestone giveaway, after all! If you want to follow me for the giveaway, that’s fine. If you’re also following my art blog, I’ll add a little something extra to the prize.

To win, you must have a mailing address in the United States of America. I will ask the winner for their address after I have selected them. I’m very sorry to my international followers - I love you all! It’s just not possible for me to ship internationally at this time. I hope you understand.

I will choose a winner on the evening of March 31. Please have your asks open so I can contact you! The winner will have 3 days to respond.

This giveaway is not affiliated with tumblr.com or its parent companies.

[junkverse-archive]

but this is just my opinion 👀

[junkverse-archive]

FOR REVEREND GREEN // ANIMAL COLLECTIVE

My relationship with Animal Collective’s work actually predates my stint with music blogs by a year or so; I first encountered them on MySpace, of all places. (Their page is still there, and seems to be updated regularly.) But I include them here because they were all over the music blogosphere, with every new album and EP, and their signature sort of strangeness primed me for some of the weirder finds I’d stumble across later.

And I suppose it’s not a wonder that this song in particular seemed to resonate so much with me when I was a teenager. Underneath the shivering instrumentals and Panda Bear’s high, straining vocals is a song about anxiety, simmering social unrest, and the disillusionment of adulthood. In Animal Collective’s hands, these seem… not necessarily less bad so much as more distant, made alien by music that, at the time, was like nothing I was familiar with -and still stands out from a landscape with no shortage of experimental pop.

[junkverse-archive]

hi yeah i found out recently that the popular caramelldansen (you know. the one you know.) is actually a fucking nightcore remix and this is the original

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i have consumed a lot of media and honestly the most powerful string of words i’ve ever heard is still frederick from fire emblem awakening saying “pick a god and pray”

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Miu Suzaki & Ryuichi Kihara perform their short program to Yuri on Ice during the Team Event for the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang. They earned a score of 57.42, a personal best for the pair team.

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I GOT THE // LABI SIFFRE

This was one of the first tracks I heard on Said the Gramophone, back in early 2010. It ended up being a fantastic introduction to both music blogs and funk (a genre I previously had not had much exposure to): that slow, slinking bass line at the start, the impeccable guitar and Siffre’s honey-smooth vocals, bolstered by a perfectly used horns section. It’s a perfect blend of sex appeal and class, and all in the service of one of the sweetest and most genuine love songs I’ve heard.

Here, Siffre sings of finding a lover who lifts him up from interminable, constant blues - in the lyrics he describes himself as a downer and a lonely soul, who finds light and meaning with his sweetheart. And, really, isn’t that the dream? To find someone who helps you become a better version of yourself? It’s just not often we hear that dream set to a sunny brass chorus, or brought to life by Labi Siffre’s fantastic voice.

[junkverse-archive]

The ideal antiques store

-pitch dark -you get a revolver and a glow stick to traverse the store and defend yourself from shambling horrors