#Or because the band is british

[empty-blog-for-lurking]

i dont know how to explain it but to me udad and hnoc are like opposites of each other. (Under read more, cause it is loooooonnnnng)

With udad the situation everyone is in is bonkers shit. The world they live in is absolutely shithole of a place that exploits everyone but the richest of the rich and the people there cant escape even after their death. Every single one of them is bitter and depressed and wronged and just wants to survive and they'll do anything to survive even if it meant killing the other one. All the natural part of that world is long dead and only thing exists is this cold dark metallic hellscape of a city that swallowed its own planet like a cancer. Almost all the songs are just how everyone was exploited, used, wronged, and discarded they were. Ulysses is a drunk fallen 'hero' completely guilt ridden by their role in Illium's fall. They had lost everyone and everything even before the album began. They spent so much of their throughout album getting their shit beat in. They, Heracles, and Orpheus go to Hades (Ashes) in hopes to be freed whether as a request, through theft, or through a deal. And Ashes all but set them all up to die for their own amusement (which btw very sexy of them <3 but that is besides the point). There seemed to be no hope for them.

And yet, despite everything the ending is so hopeful. We know that Ulysses would die, if it wasnt obvious from the title of the album itself it certainly becomes obvious when we learn how their world works. And yet they died a happier ending, they escaped the curse of their city and died reunited with their love. Ulysses died under an oak tree in a grassy fields, among nature which was thought to be dead since The City's takeover. Ulysses died being warmed by sunlight, a right denied to so many others like them. Ulysses died at dawn.

And then there is hnoc. Hnoc starts heroic. Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere take over Camelot from the corrupt Stone clan through their skills and teamwork. They turn it into a place of safety with all three of them incharge. Their lives are hard and filled with violence and hatred and fear and the world they live is harsh and unforgiving. But they still have each other, and they still care for the people around them. There is nature like scorpions and vultures despite it being a space station. The album has songs about love and being in love, about hope of peace, about power of faith. Everyone wants to survive and they are willing to work together to do it. Arthur is embittered by his "daughter's" death but still has his partners to keep him grounded and is ruler/sheriff of a powerful town with lots of knights working for him. What is more, the tragedy that hardened both Arthur and Gawain can be healed because the person they mourn isnt dead, he is Mordred and he is here to make amends. Arthur, Gawain, and Galahad go to Merlin (Brian) to seek aid, and he gives them advice that truly could have saved them, because Merlin really did wanted to save them and the entire station. There seemed to be hope for them.

And yet in the end it meant nothing. It was all for nothing. Alfred and Gawain did not listen to Brian's advice and ended up sealing theirs and everyone else's fate. Galahad did take Brian's advice and it destroyed him in a self sacrifice that ended up being for nothing. Mordred tried so hard for peace but at the end seeing the hatred and cruelty of his world hardened him to the core. Gawain's hatred turned peace talks into war and turned him into sawage barbaric monster he thought Saxons to be. Arthur's hardened core did not let him hope that his child could ever return to him and ended up not giving Mordred even a chance. What could have saved everyone Fort Gallfridian ended up turning into what destroyed Fort Gallfridian whether it be the GRAIL or Mordred. Almost all of them died a pointless avoidable death. And Arthur? Arthur lost everything. He lost his partners, he lost his chance to embrace his son, he lost his home, he lost his people. He may have survived but at the end he lost everything. High noon over Camelot. We didnt understand what it truly meant (all of them dying in the sun) until it was too late.

Ulysses shoots once, and it led to their happy ending. Gawain shoots once, and it led to everyone's tragedy. 3 shots all for Ulysses and it killed them. 3 shots for Arthur, Lancelot, Guinevere, and it hurt Arthur but never killed him. Ulysses was the only one who got to die under the sun, Arthur was the only one who didnt die in the sun.

[morganbritton132]

Before the start of Corroded Coffins’ Friday night show, the band is live on Eddie’s Tiktok account. The phone has been passed around and each member has talked or shown off something, but they’re all really just waiting. Finally, when Jeff is in the middle of talking about their set list, you can the door to their dressing room open and Steve step in to surprise Eddie.

Steve doesn’t even get a word out before Eddie attacks him. You can tell they’ve done this exact thing a lot because no one reacts and Eddie protects Steve’s head as he shoves him into the wall and kisses him. Robin sticks her head in after him and waves, “We’re here too.”

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[badnewswhatsleft]

2023 september - rock sound #300 (fall out boy cover) scans

transcript below cut!

WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE

With the triumphant ‘So Much (For) Stardust’ capturing a whole new generation of fans, Fall Out Boy are riding high, celebrating their past while looking towards a bright future. Pete Wentz and Patrick Stump reflect on recent successes and the lessons learned from two decades of writing and performing together.

WORDS: James Wilson-Taylor PHOTOS: Elliot Ingham

You have just completed a US summer tour that included stadium shows and some of your most ambitious production to date. What were your aims going into this particular show?

PETE: Playing stadiums is a funny thing. I pushed pretty hard to do a couple this time because I think that the record Patrick came up with musically lends itself to that feeling of being part of something larger than yourself. When we were designing the cover to the album, it was meant to be all tangible, which was a reaction to tokens and skins that you can buy and avatars. The title is made out of clay, and the painting is an actual painting. We wanted to approach the show in that way as well. We’ve been playing in front of a gigantic video wall for the past eight years. Now, we wanted a stage show where you could actually walk inside it.

Did adding the new songs from ‘So Much (For) Stardust’ into the setlist change the way you felt about them?

PATRICK: One of the things that was interesting about the record was that we took a lot of time figuring out what it was going to be, what it was going to sound like. We experimented with so many different things. I was instantly really proud. I felt really good about this record but it wasn’t until we got on stage and you’re playing the songs in between our catalogue that I really felt that. It was really noticeable from the first day on this tour - we felt like a different band. There’s a new energy to it. There was something that I could hear live that I couldn’t hear before.

You also revisited a lot of older tracks and b-sides on this tour, including many from the ‘Folie à Deux’-era. What prompted those choices?

PETE: There were some lean years where there weren’t a lot of rock bands being played on pop radio or playing award shows so we tried to play the biggest songs, the biggest versions of them. We tried to make our thing really airtight, bulletproof so that when we played next to whoever the top artist was, people were like, ‘oh yeah, they should be here.’ The culture shift in the world is so interesting because now, maybe rather than going wider, it makes more sense to go deeper with people. We thought about that in the way that we listen to music and the way we watch films. Playing a song that is a b-side or barely made a record but is someone’s favourite song makes a lot of sense in this era. PATRICK: I think there also was a period there where, to Pete’s point, it was a weird time to be a rock band. We had this very strange thing that happened to us, and not a lot of our friends for some reason, where we had a bunch of hits, right? And it didn’t make any sense to me. It still doesn’t make sense to me. But there was a kind of novelty, where we could play a whole set of songs that a lot of people know. It was fun and rewarding for us to do that. But then you run the risk of playing the same set forever. I want to love the songs that we play. I want to care about it and put passion into what we do. And there’s no sustainable way to just do the same thing every night and not get jaded. We weren’t getting there but I really wanted to make sure that we don’t ever get there. PETE: In the origin of Fall Out Boy, what happened at our concerts was we knew how to play five songs really fast and jumped off walls and the fire marshal would shut it down. It was what made the show memorable, but we wanted to be able to last and so we tried to perfect our show and the songs and the stage show and make it flawless. Then you don’t really know how much spontaneity you want to include, because something could go wrong. When we started this tour, and we did a couple of spontaneous things, it opened us up to more. Because things did go wrong and that’s what made the show special. We’re doing what is the most punk rock version of what we could be doing right now.

You seem generally a lot more comfortable celebrating your past success at this point in your career.

PETE: I think it’s actually not a change from our past. I love those records, but I never want to treat them in a cynical way. I never want there to be a wink and a smile where we’re just doing this because it’s the anniversary. This was us celebrating these random songs and we hope people celebrate them with us. There was a purity to it that felt in line with how we’ve always felt about it. I love ‘Folie à Deux’ - out of any Fall Out Boy record that’s probably the one I would listen to. But I just never want it to be done in a cynical way, where we feel like we have to. But celebrating it in a way where there’s the purity of how we felt when we wrote the song originally, I think that’s fucking awesome. PATRICK: Music is a weird art form. Because when you’re an actor and you play a character, that is a specific thing. James Bond always wears a suit and has a gun and is a secret agent. If you change one thing, that’s fine, but you can’t really change all of it. But bands are just people. You are yourself. People get attached to it like it’s a story but it’s not. That was always something that I found difficult. For the story, it’s always good to say, ‘it’s the 20th anniversary, let’s go do the 20th anniversary tour’, that’s a good story thing. But it’s not always honest. We never stopped playing a lot of the songs from ‘Take This To Your Grave’, right? So why would I need to do a 20-year anniversary and perform all the songs back to back? The only reason would be because it would probably sell a lot of tickets and I don’t really ever want to be motivated by that, frankly. One of the things that’s been amazing is that now as the band has been around for a while, we have different layers of audience. I love ‘Folie à Deux’, I do. I love that record. But I had a really personally negative experience of touring on it. So that’s what I think of when I think of that record initially. It had to be brought back to me for me to appreciate it, for me to go, ‘oh, this record is really great. I should be happy with this. I should want to play this.’ So that’s why we got into a lot of the b-sides because we realised that our perspectives on a lot of these songs were based in our feelings and experiences from when we were making them. But you can find new experiences if you play those songs. You can make new memories with them.

You alluded there to the 20th anniversary of ‘Take This To Your Grave’. Obviously you have changed and developed as a band hugely since then. But is there anything you can point to about making that debut record that has remained a part of your process since then?

PETE: We have a language, the band, and it’s definitely a language of cinema and film. That’s maintained through time. We had very disparate music tastes and influences but I think film was a place we really aligned. You could have a deep discussion because none of us were filmmakers. You could say which part was good and which part sucked and not hurt anybody’s feelings, because you weren’t going out to make a film the next day. Whereas with music, I think if we’d only had that to talk about, we would have turned out a different band. PATRICK: ‘Take This To Your Grave’, even though it’s absolutely our first record, there’s an element of it that’s still a work in progress. It is still a band figuring itself out. Andy wasn’t even officially in the band for half of the recording, right? I wasn’t even officially the guitar player for half of the recording. We were still bumbling through it. There was something that popped up a couple times throughout that record where you got these little inklings of who the band really was. We really explored that on ‘From Under The Cork Tree’. So when we talk about what has remained the same… I didn’t want to be a singer, I didn’t know anything about singing, I wasn’t planning on that. I didn’t even plan to really be in this band for that long because Pete had a real band that really toured so I thought this was gonna be a side project. So there’s always been this element within the band where I don’t put too many expectations on things and then Pete has this really big ambition, creatively. There’s this great interplay between the two of us where I’m kind of oblivious, and I don’t know when I’m putting out a big idea and Pete has this amazing vision to find what goes where. There’s something really magical about that because I never could have done a band like this without it. We needed everybody, we needed all four of us. And I think that’s the thing that hasn’t changed - the four of us just being ourselves and trying to figure things out. Listening back to ‘Folie’ or ‘Infinity On High’ or ‘American Beauty’, I’m always amazed at how much better they are than I remember. I listened to ‘MANIA’ the other day, and I have a lot of misgivings about that record, a lot of things I’m frustrated about. But then I’m listening to it and I’m like ‘this is pretty good.’ There’s a lot of good things in there. I don’t know why, it’s kind of like you can’t see those things. It’s kind of amazing to have Pete be able to see those things. And likewise, sometimes Pete has no idea when he writes something brilliant, as a lyricist, and I have to go, ‘No, I’m gonna keep that one, I’m gonna use that.’

On ‘So Much (For) Stardust’, you teamed up with producer Neal Avron again for the first time since 2008. Given how much time has passed, did it take a minute to reestablish that connection or did you pick up where you left off?

PATRICK: It really didn’t feel like any time had passed between us and Neal. It was pretty seamless in terms of working with him. But then there was also the weird aspect where the last time we worked with him was kind of contentious. Interpersonally, the four of us were kind of fighting with each other… as much as we do anyway. We say that and then that myth gets built bigger than it was. We were always pretty cool with each other. It’s just that the least cool was making ‘Folie’. So then getting into it again for this record, it was like no time has passed as people but the four of us got on better so we had more to bring to Neal. PETE: It’s a little bit like when you return to your parents’ house for a holiday break when you’re in college. It’s the same house but now I can drink with my parents. We’d grown up and the first times we worked with Neal, he had to do so much more boy scout leadership, ‘you guys are all gonna be okay, we’re gonna do this activity to earn this badge so you guys don’t fucking murder each other.’ This time, we probably got a different version of Neal that was even more creative, because he had to do less psychotherapy. He went deep too. Sometimes when you’re in a session with somebody, and they’re like, ‘what are we singing about?’, I’ll just be like, ‘stuff’. He was not cool with ‘stuff’. I would get up and go into the bathroom outside the studio and look in the mirror, and think ‘what is it about? How deep are we gonna go?’ That’s a little but scarier to ask yourself. If last time Neal was like a boy scout leader, this time, it was more like a Sherpa. He was helping us get to the summit.

The title track of the album also finds you in a very reflective mood, even bringing back lyrics from ‘Love From The Other Side’. How would you describe the meaning behind that title and the song itself?

PETE: The record title has a couple of different meanings, I guess. The biggest one to me is that we basically all are former stars. That’s what we’re made of, those pieces of carbon. It still feels like the world’s gonna blow and it’s all moving too fast and the wrong things are moving too slow. That track in particular looks back at where you sometimes wish things had gone differently. But this is more from the perspective of when you’re watching a space movie, and they’re too far away and they can’t quite make it back. It doesn’t matter what they do and at some point, the astronaut accepts that. But they’re close enough that you can see the look on their face. I feel like there’s moments like that in the title track. I wish some things were different. But, as an adult going through this, you are too far away from the tether, and you’re just floating into space. It is sad and lonely but in some ways, it’s kind of freeing, because there’s other aspects of our world and my life that I love and that I want to keep shaping and changing. PATRICK: I’ll open up Pete’s lyrics and I just start hearing things. It almost feels effortless in a lot of ways. I just read his lyrics and something starts happening in my head. The first line, ‘I’m in a winter mood, dreaming of spring now’, instantly the piano started to form to me. That was a song that I came close to not sending to the band. When I make demos, I’ll usually wait until I have five or six to send to everybody. I didn’t know if anyone was gonna like this. It’s too moody or it’s not very us. But it was pretty unanimous. Everyone liked that one. I knew this had to end the record. It took on a different life in the context of the whole album. Then on the bridge section, I knew it was going to be the lyrics from ‘Love From The Other Side’. It’s got to come back here. It’s the bookends, but I also love lyrically what it does, you know, ‘in another life, you were my babe’, going back to that kind of regret, which feels different in ‘Love From The Other Side’ than it does here. When the whole song came together, it was the statement of the record.

Aside from the album, you have released a few more recent tracks that have opened you up to a whole new audience, most notably the collaboration with Taylor Swift on ‘Electric Touch’.

PETE: Taylor is the only artist that I’ve met or interacted with in recent times who creates exactly the art of who she is, but does it on such a mass level. So that’s breathtaking to watch from the sidelines. The way fans traded friendship bracelets, I don’t know what the beginning of it was, but you felt that everywhere. We felt that, I saw that in the crowd on our tour. I don’t know Taylor well, but I think she’s doing exactly what she wants and creating exactly the art that she wants to create. And doing that, on such a level, is really awe-inspiring to watch. It makes you want to make the biggest, weirdest version of our thing and put that out there.

Then there was the cover of Billy Joel’s ‘We Didn’t Start The Fire’, which has had some big chart success for you. That must have taken you slightly by surprise.

PATRICK: It’s pretty unexpected. Pete and I were going back and forth about songs we should cover and that was an idea that I had. This is so silly but there was a song a bunch of years ago I had written called ‘Dark Horse’ and then there was a Katy Perry song called ‘Dark Horse’ and I was like, ‘damn it’, you know, I missed the boat on that one. So I thought if we don’t do this cover, somebody else is gonna do it. Let’s just get in the studio and just do it. We spent way more time on those lyrics than you would think because we really wanted to get a specific feel. It was really fun and kind of loose, we just came together in Neal’s house and recorded it in a day. PETE: There’s irreverence to it. I thought the coolest thing was when Billy Joel got asked about it, and he was like, ‘I’m not updating it, that’s fine, go for it.’ I hope if somebody ever chose to update one of ours, we’d be like that. Let them do their thing, they’ll have that version. I thought that was so fucking cool.

It’s also no secret that the sound you became most known for in the mid-2000s is having something of a commercial revival right now. But what is interesting is seeing how bands are building on that sound and changing it.

PATRICK: I love when anybody does anything that feels honest to them. Touring with Bring Me The Horizon, it was really cool seeing what’s natural to them. It makes sense. We changed our sound over time but we were always going to do that. It wasn’t a premeditated thing but for the four of us, it would have been impossible to maintain making the same kind of music forever. Whereas you’ll play with some other bands and they live that one sound. You meet up with them for dinner or something and they’re wearing the shirt of the band that sounds just like their band. You go to their house and they’re playing other bands that sound like them because they live in that thing. Whereas with the four of us and bands like Bring Me The Horizon, we change our sounds over time. And there’s nothing wrong with either. The only thing that’s wrong is if it’s unnatural to you. If you’re AC/DC and all of a sudden power ballads are in and you’re like, ‘Okay, we’ve got to do a power ballad’, that’s when it sucks. But if you’re a thrash metal guy who likes Celine Dion then yeah, do a power ballad. Emo as a word doesn’t mean anything anymore. But if people want to call it that, if the emo thing is back or having another life again, if that’s what’s natural to an artist, I think the world needs more earnest art. If that’s who you are, then do it. PETE: It would be super egotistical to think that the wave that started with us and My Chemical Romance and Panic! At The Disco has just been circling and cycling back. I  remember seeing Nikki Sixx at the airport and he was like, ‘Oh, you’re doing a flaming bass? Mine came from a backpack.’ It keeps coming back but it looks different. Talking to Lil Uzi Vert and Juice WRLD when he was around, it’s so interesting, because it’s so much bigger than just emo or whatever. It’s this whole big pop music thing that’s spinning and churning, and then it moves on, and then it comes back with different aspects and some of the other stuff combined. When you’re a fan of music and art and film, you take different stuff, you add different ingredients, because that’s your taste. Seeing the bands that are up and coming to me, it’s so exciting, because the rules are just different, right? It’s really cool to see artists that lean into the weirdness and lean into a left turn when everyone’s telling you to make a right. That’s so refreshing. PATRICK: It’s really important as an artist gets older to not put too much stock in your own influence. The moment right now that we’re in is bigger than emo and bigger than whatever was happening in 2005. There’s a great line in ‘Downton Abbey’ where someone was asking the Lord about owning this manor and he’s like, ‘well, you don’t really own it, there have been hundreds of owners and you are the custodian of it for a brief time.’ That’s what pop music is like. You just have the ball for a minute and you’re gonna pass it on to somebody else.

We will soon see you in the UK for your arena tour. How do you reflect on your relationship with the fans over here?

PETE: I remember the first time we went to the UK, I wasn’t prepared for how culturally different it was. When we played Reading & Leeds and the summer festivals, it was so different, and so much deeper within the culture. It was a little bit of a shock. The first couple of times we played, I was like, ‘Oh, my God, are we gonna die?’ because the crowd was so crazy, and there was bottles. Then when we came back, we thought maybe this is a beast to be tamed. Finally, you realise it’s a trading of energy. That made the last couple of festivals we played so fucking awesome. When you really realise that the fans over there are real fans of music. It’s really awesome and pretty beautiful. PATRICK: We’ve played the UK now more than a lot of regions of the states. Pretty early on, I just clicked with it. There were differences, cultural things and things that you didn’t expect. But it never felt that different or foreign to me, just a different flavour… PETE: This is why me and Patrick work so well together (laughs).  PATRICK: Well, listen; I’m a rainy weather guy. There is just things that I get there. I don’t really drink anymore all that much. But I totally will have a beer in the UK, there’s something different about every aspect of it, about the ordering of it, about the flavour of it, everything, it’s like a different vibe. The UK audience seemed to click with us too. There have been plenty of times where we felt almost more like a UK band than an American one. There have been years where you go there and almost get a more familial reaction than you would at home. Rock Sound has always been a part of that for us. It was one of the first magazines to care about us and the first magazine to do real interviews. That’s the thing, you would do all these interviews and a lot of them would be like ‘so where did the band’s name come from?’ But Rock Sound took us seriously as artists, maybe before some of us did. That actually made us think about who we are and that was a really cool experience. I think in a lot of ways, we wouldn’t be the band we are without the UK, because I think it taught us a lot about what it is to be yourself.

Fall Out Boy’s ‘So Much (For) Stardust’ is out now via Fueled By Ramen.

[hopeinthebox]

tagged by the gorgeous and fabulous @cordiallyfuturedwight and @aprylynn for february's roundup:

tagging the usual music favs: @jiminsproof @thvinyl @jimin-gaon @visionsofgideontheninth @spicyclematis @kimchokejin @jihopesjoint @monismochi plus @kimtaegis for the amy macdonald of it all 💜 and also you, dear reader. MWAH

[finntheehumaneater]

Who else has been listening to The Last Dinner Party since their first song came out and is now very excited for their first album to come out in February?

[scarletspectral]

See one thing I love about dp is that all this shit is going down in the early 2000s, these mfs have nokia 3310s and are bragging about their high scores in snake. They are illegally downloading ringtones off of myspace and beebo on the family computer to let the school know they really loved the album samstown, or maybe silent alarm. Danny and jazz both get really invested in lonelygirl15 and inevitably the beebo exclusive spinoff, katemodern. Dani has an emo phase exclusively to the song wires by athlete, sam gets REALLY into manchester ochestra's album like a virgin losing a child WAY before anyone else does. Tucker mockingly makes the dial up noises and says "you've got, ma-il" along with the robotic female voice in the same inflections whenever he boots up AOL on danny's home pc. He also had genuine anxiety attacks at age 8 or 9 over the impending doom of y2k.

I want these losers to be living the true 2000s childhood that myself and older siblings did, it's so fun to me.

[alabamyright]

decided to make a poll on this because a lot of people i’ve met in the fandom thought that sparks originated in england thinking that ron and russell were london boys instead of los angeles boys. in fact, it is common enough to the point that even sparks has addressed it multiple times and in the sparks brothers even the english celebrities being interviewed thought they were from their own country.

i myself thought that they were british especially since the only pics i saw of them were from 1974. 1974 probably causes people to mistake them for british since they did have a british backing band in the island years. but yeah i wanna know how many people thought they were british or american. took me months to process they were american even hearing their american accents and everything lmao.

[the-alan-price-combo]

a sequence of pure animal-silliness 🙏🐾

[victorluvsalice]

Happy Birthday Marie!

@offwithhxrhead You requested a story where Madeline meets someone who could potentially be a new romantic interest, and I hope I have delivered:

--

“WOOOOO!”

Madeline eagerly joined in the clapping and stomping of feet as The Pondcrossers finished up their set and departed from the stage. “Awesome show, huh?” a guy next to her said, eyes bright.

“You know it!” Madeline agreed with a beaming grin. “Best night out I’ve had in a while!” And I didn’t even need to get drunk or high off my ass to enjoy myself. Isn’t that a surprise.

“Oh, don’t start with that again,” the Queen of Hearts grumbled from a far corner of her mind. “I’m rather tired of that refrain.”

Yeah, yeah, sorry, Madeline thought back, shaking her head to dispel the negativity before it could take root. I know I’m doing a lot better these days. Been kind of a rough road to get here, sure, but – I’m out, I’m about, Mum and Dad trust me not to do anything stupid. That’s progress. She grinned back at the stage as the crowd began breaking up into smaller groups, friends chatting with friends. And that was a fucking great band! Why the hell they’re playing this place instead of living it up in Hollywood or – or Liverpool is beyond me.

“Liverpool?” the Queen asked, one eyebrow raised.

It was the first thing that came to mind! I don’t know the party towns of England! And asking Mum or Dad isn’t going to help, given the latter grew up in the ass end of nowhere and the former spent most of her life in a psychiatric hospital. Which you didn’t help with.

“Oh, shush and get us something to eat,” the Queen replied, rolling her eyes. “One gets peckish.”

Madeline’s stomach growled in answer. One does – might as well pick up a snack before we hit the road, she agreed, working her way toward the bar. If they serve food here, anyway...places like this always have peanuts or something, right? Eh, if they don’t, I’ll just swing past the nearest burger joint and –

Is that the bass guitarist?

Madeline stopped in her tracks. Perched on a stool at the very end of the bar was indeed The Pondcrossers’ second guitarist – Jean, if Madeline remembered correctly. Which she was pretty sure she did, as she’d spent a lot of the set watching Jean. The woman was exactly the type Madeline liked most – sporting wide hips, generous cleavage, long dark brown hair done up in a braid, and sparkling blue eyes. She’d handled her guitar like she’d been born with it in her hand, rocking in perfect beat with her bandmates and shooting the audience wide, come-hither grins every so often when the music allowed. Just the memory of that smile gave Madeline the shivers –

And now, she was almost within touching distance of the woman. Madeline stared at her, frozen. Holy shit, I didn’t realize...I mean, I guess it makes sense, singing like that is probably thirsty work, but...is it okay if I just – go up to her? I dunno if she’s cool with fans meeting her outside of sets or not...especially fans who might get a little...n-not that I’m gonna do anything but say I liked her music, but she is really fucking gorgeous and I’m on a dry spell and –

“And anyone who said your father’s influence in you is lacking should see you now.”

Cheshire appeared by her feet, winding around her ankles. “You seem stuck fast to the ground,” he observed with his trademark grin. “Purrhaps I should try to claw your feet up?”

“Loathe as I am to agree with that disrespectful creature, you should get moving,” the Queen of Hearts added, draping a tentacle over Madeline’s shoulders. “You are no mere pawn on the board – you are an ace in the pack. And you should act like it.”

Both of you be quiet before I start talking to you aloud! Madeline hissed, then bit her lip as she looked back at Jean. They did have a point – she was getting nowhere just standing there. In fact, she was probably starting to look a little bit creepy. And she did want to at least say “hi.” And tell her how awesome her band was. And if anything else happened...well, it happened. Madeline sucked in a steadying breath, then pried her feet off the floor and made her way over to the stool, trying to exude confidence. “Hi.”

Jean looked over. “Hi!” she said, all friendliness – that was one worry dispelled, at least. “Assuming you saw the show.”

“Yeah – you guys were amazing,” Madeline told her, smiling. “Best band I’ve heard in ages, trust me.” She offered a hand. “Madeline Van Dort.”

Jean took it, shooting her another dazzling smile. “Jean Carpenter. Pleasure to meet you.”

Madeline swallowed as their hands touched. Oh boy. Yup. Major crush. After one night. Gonna be hearing about this in Wonderland for months...worth it. “Pleasure is all mine.”

[trans-leek-cookie]

Thinking about how I randomly got into The Smiths, then noticed a few different people talking about them negatively, went "Huh. Weird. I bet their fans are kinda pretentious, but what's the deal?" Then only learned later from someone reblogging an aesthetic photo of a shirt with a quote from one of their songs on it that one or multiple of the band members was like a Massive Racist, and looking more into that to find the guy said some racist shit about Chinese People Specifically

[garlique]

i hate buying concert tickets like i loveeeee going to concerts and the band im waiting on rn is a band ive listened to for over Eight Years and they haven't toured ONCE in that time so like its gonna be great but hooooo0ooo my god im stressed im stressed. at least its not through ticketmaster!!! just through the actual venue itself and at least IM not paying for it. they go on sale at 9 am in 36 minutes and im sooooo fucking determined. someone check back in at 9 05 and see if i got them

[spring-lxcked]

popping in for a lore drop which is just that william having been a Young English Man in america when english bands and such were getting so popular influenced him a ton. like, he's a guy who would have learned a fake american accent but didn't because ppl tend to like his accent. this is a guy who will do something extremely stereotypically english and you have to guess whether it was intentional ( either to be charming or funny ) or Real. 50/50 chance.

[brltpop]

Goth bless people who post music documentaries on ytb 🙏

[spacemountainvanity]

i love british bands 1979-2010 so much im like Boy you make no sense and i don’t understand you. I love you

[marlinspirkhall]

omg marlin I didn't know you listened to bastille!! I mean I knew you were British but I didn't want to assume, they aren't exactly the first band that comes to mind when you think "British music". finally someone who knows about them and not in a oh-they-are-that-ohohohohpompeii-song-gyus way!!

I love the implication that you can stereotype British people. I also have bad teeth if ur interested /lh

Yeah I was obsessed with Bastille for a full year when I was 13-14, to the point that I developed a minor psychic connection with them (this is also a lesser known British stereotype), and thought "I bet Bastille are on the radio right now" and went to turn it on, and there was a man talking. My brain immediately went 'It's Dan Smith' even though I'd never heard him talking before and after the interview concluded and they confirmed that it was indeed Bastille I was like >:o

My favourite song was The Weight Of Living Pt I, especially because I first heard it as a hidden track on the Bad Blood DVD and would have to fast forward through "Get Home" every time I wanted to listen to it, which severely impacted my ability to play it on repeat. The melodies in that song are still so fun. I only recently learned that "Albatross around your neck" was an idiom and not just an incomprehensible lyric that Bastille came up with.

[girl4music]

Who the fuck was gonna tell me my favourite Pop/Rock band of all-time released a Greatest Hits album?