#and i try to turn the AC on (to 70 because that's what it's at when the AC is on and I wasn't playing games with it)

[thelightsgoout]

you know, i'm starting to think i'm nocturnal because it's the only time i can keep my room at a halfway decent temperature without fighting for it

[lostinlovingrevery]

Logan When You're Pregnant

I got baby fever rn, some here's some headcanons for when you get pergananant (am I pergot?) with Lo's baby

(breeding kink go brrrrr)(nsfw section below the fluff stuff)

First off, I think we can all agree that no matter what variant Logan it is, whether it's planned or an accident, he's gonna freak out initially when you both find out your pregnant

He'll keep the initial freakout under wraps though.

70s!Dofp Logan, Old man Logan, and Trilogy Logan would probably be the most freaked out

The others, like Origins, Future DOFP, who are a bit more settled in would probably be more ready

Worst Logan? You're gonna need to give him a hug

Moving on

They all step up though, don't worry

Even 70s DOFP, he may be a menace but he sure as hell ain't gonna leave you or his baby alone

ANYWAY

Logan is so supportive of you. He'll constantly be checking on you. He'll be nesting almost immediately so get ready

He will definitely become more protective too. Like a lot. He'll try his best to not be overbearing but he's went lot of his life losing those he loves. He absolutely cannot afford to lose you and ya'lls baby

Lets say for this that you two are in an established relationship, planned or not, I'll leave that to ya'lls lovely imaginations

hes there for every doctors trip, exam, sonogram, etc etc. he doesn't miss a thing and holds your hand the entire time

The first trimester is rough. Mood swings, morning sickness, aches and pain. Logan handles your mood swings like a pro. He always knows just what to say, and he never really can take it personal when you get an attitude with him- mainly bc he likely deserved it with his own sarcasm

He's patient with you when you get snippy at him. He'll give you space when you need it, or will be extra attentive. Whatever you want. He's learned to read your emotions

He'll hold your hair back and rub your back whenever the morning sickness hits. Get you some tea, maybe a little toast if you feel like you can hold it down

One day you just couldn't hold anything down, by evening you're in tears, frustrated with everything. You attempted to eat some saltines and couldn't even hold those down. You're crying on the bathroom floor and Logan sits with you, cradling you in his arms as he says soothing things,

"You're so strong bub. You're gonna be okay. I'm right here."

You'll get backrubs and footrubs anytime you want

The food cravings and constantly being hungry becomes a lot too. It's fortunate that Logan had learned to be a decent cook over time.

He'll insist that you eat only healthy good foods for the baby, but when you look at him with pouty lips and pleading eyes because you REALLY want that extra cheese pizza topped with extra pepperonis and peppers, along with those garlic knots, and chocolate chip peanut butter ice cream, AND caramel sea salt chocolates. He has to give in. he's grabbing his keys and wallet to get what you want

Listen, you totally want to eat healthy for the baby too, and you do! You take your vitamins, you incorporate so much fruit and veggies and whatever else in your meals

But dammit sometimes that baby just wants fries dipped in ice cream and you learned how to sneak those unhealthy snacks under Logans radar

(or so you think, hes' got heightened sense of smell. he DEFINITELY smells the weird junk food you're sneaking)

You're tossing and turning one night, feeling restless and just wanting to eat. You wake him up, chatty as hell and eventually you tell him you want something to eat

"Bub you just had a whole meal 2 hours ago"

"I know just something small. Like a poptart. or a rice krispie"

He sighs. "No more poptarts or rice kripies. I'll make you something."

He closes his eyes, expecting to get another few minutes of sleep before he goes to the kitchen, but he can't feel you staring at him. Hard. He took a breath, pushing the blankets off as he got himself out of bed, heading to the kitchen to make you a good healthy snack

don't worry, he's not mad. he actually finds he loves the pregnancy quirks of yours

when you start getting those random hormone rushes, bursts of energy, running around doing anything and everything he gets so amused. but he loves it too when you also start getting sleepy

he really loves it when you get sleepy because then all you want to do is snuggle with him.

you get borderline violent about cuddling with him. you wrap your entire self around his body and you do not let go. even with his strength it's nearly impossible to peel you off him and if he does (he made the mistake once) you get extremely pissy and teary eyed

He will not let you do anything

and by that i mean you're not carrying groceries, you're not cleaning, you are not allowed to stand on ladders or counters, no picking up heavy things

You and him have a time of night and morning where you snuggle, and he'll designate time to talk to you, give you kisses and say sweet things, and then he'll move to talk to your belly

"Gotta make sure the lil one knows my voice"

He loves resting his ear on your belly, hearing both of your heartbeats.

he'll give you a kiss, then the belly, then you again

You better be ready to be touched a lot. He's always gotta put his hand on you somehow. It's not just about feeling your preggo belly but just you too.

NESTING

yeah, hes gonna drive you insane. He gets the urge to redo everything. the babys room. your room. the entire house/apartment if you're living in one.

He makes your bed the comfiest spot every so that's a perk. tons of pillows, only the fluffiest and warmest blankets

while you make decisions on the babys room together, he really wants to put the stuff together, so you sit in your rocking chair in the room and watch him as he gets angry over the crib instructions

it's really cute when he insists on a more foresty/woodland themed room for your baby.

As you get bigger, he gets more and more protective

he actually growled at someone once for attempting to touch your belly without permission. not a bad thing to have at least

it's a little more embarrassing though when it's your friends that you did say could touch your belly and logans hackles raise over it

he tries to recognize when he's doing too much but he can't help it, instinct.

Logan is over the moon when the baby kicks the face time

he just happened to have his hands resting on your belly

when he felt it, you both jumped, staring at your belly and then each other

when you realized it was the baby kicking, you both were like giddy teenagers

logan puts his head against your belly, waiting for it when the baby kicks again- right on his face

he gets slightly offended

but he kisses your belly anyway, promising your baby that he's always going to love them and take care of them

it pulls on your heart strings a bit

you and logan don't care if it's a boy or girl- and decide to leave it a surprise,

arguing over baby names though wasn't fun. you eventually though land on a name if its a girl, and a name if its a boy, names that you both adored

when you start shopping for baby clothes, logans looking at the little girl dresses and you could see the softness on his face, the way he adored the little dresses.

he can't even get embarrassed

it's so cute watching logan sit in the middle of the girly baby aisle, surrounded by pink bows.

he gets equally excited over the boys stuff too.

forever believe logan will just be a great dad in general

when you get big enough where doing things are hard on your own, logan starts definitely not leaving you alone very often

he helps you out of bed

with your shoes

if hes around and you're trying to get up from a couch or chair- even if you aren't struggling he'll still be there to help you up

you ever see those trends where dads hold mommas belly up to provide some relief? logan will insist on doing that.

he just thinks your so damn cute with your round belly

logan will eventually express his nerves about being a father. he'll need reassurance here and there that you think he'll do good.

you think logan would be an absolutely wonderful father of course. look how good he takes care of you

not to mention his non-bio daughters like jubilee, rogue, and kitty

and if lauras around too, it won't be like he never had any experience

logan will definitely stay calm and collected when you go into labor

he supports you every step of the way

if you're going to a local hospital, you bet your ass he'll be speaking for you and protecting you from anything unneccessary

all the while supporting you every way possible. don't worry about squeezing his hand too hard. he literally survived a nuke

despite the amount of things he's seen, it is still hard for him to see you in so much pain. he may even hold back a tear or two. he has to focus on you though

when the baby is here, he's all over you first, making sure you're okay. then his instincts kick in and he's all over the baby

that first cry breaks his heart and he doesn't like how the nurses and doctors seemed pleased by the whole thing. okay sure, it's a good thing. his baby is still crying though and he doesn't appreciate the smiling

you guys ever see that picture of Hugh bottlefeeding his newborn, i think it was during the x-movies filming. that is such a cute picture honestly it makes my utereus clench

he's so proud and supportive of you by the way. He takes wonderful care of you both when you get home

all that worrying for nothing. he was a pro with yours and his baby.

NSFW (mention piv, breastmilk, body worship)

yes i had to include an nsfw part here dont judge me

Logan should have known it would happen eventually. the way he always needs to finish inside you. even if you were using protection, he should have known that it would fail one day

he'll pick up on the hormones quickly, the smell of you triggers something in him and once you both figure out you'll pregnant itll all make sense

at first things are pretty usual with your sex life but the hormones start kicking in

you start gaining a little fat, your breasts get bigger, maybe your ass

you were already irresistable to logan before. now though, pregnant with his baby?

like i said, the mans always touching on you. when youre in private though hes REALLY touching you

don't worry, you feel the same. your hormones start to really kick in and you're aroused 24/7 and he can smell it

"you look so fucking good like this bub." he'll moan when he's thrusting into you, seeing your swollen belly and breasts.

it's not just about you being pregnant but you two just can't keep your hands off each other because you're happy.

your sex life was already very active, now it's even MORE active, like, you cannot keep your hands off him. he's the same way. you look and smell so damn good he can't take it, he HAS to fuck you

logan being a dad to your baby is making him 10 times hotter

logan probably cuts back on being rougher if you both are into that, much to your disdain. your hormones are on fire and you need him to fuck you hard

it takes a little begging and he breaks, giving you what you want

"look at you bub, fucking begging for it. as if i hadn't given you enough already"

logan practically drools anytime he sees you naked

as you get really big, sex becomes less common because you're not really comfortable, and maybe doctors tell yalls to slow it down for a bit.

logan will of course not do anything to risk you or the baby but fuck when you walk around in that tight black dress, tits and belly all swollen. he can barely stand it.

fortunately even if you aren't having penetrative sex, you're still fairly aroused so logan gets to get off to your hand or mouth. he'll return the favor with some light oral

he'll want to help you shower all the time

you're just so beautiful to him.

when you start getting self conscious over your weight gain, logan won't have it. he'll be doing some serious body worship doing your pregnancy, don't worry.

kissing your stretch marks, his hand rubbing soothingly all over your body as he whispers how beautiful you are

when it's closer to your due date, the doctor gives you a list of recommendations to help get things rolling

when logan finds out sex is one of those things, he's over the moon.

you personally, just want to get the mini canadian out of there at this point

it's not the first thing you try, because youre self conscious despite logans affirmations that he thinks you're so sexy

eventually you give in

lets just say you both were on the way to labor and delivery soon after

he adores your body after birth too. like i said. body worship to the maximum. even when you're not banging cause you need to heal first, he's kissing every inch of you to make sure you know he adores you. he sees how you've looked at yourself in the mirror and he isn't gonna have it

oh btw he'll definitely accidentally taste your breast milk straight from the source at some point. he really doesn't do it on purpose, he just got lost in kissing and sucking on you.

lost in the sauce if you may

he wants you to heal and feel good though, so even after the 3 months are up, he'll want to wait a little longer, because he doesn't want to hurt you. he's a big man.

EXTRAS: (random stuff )

the people who are around you are ecstatic over the announcement of your pregnancy

charles is just glad he gets to be a grandpappy (as if he isn't already)

maybe jean and scott are expecting too, or already have their little one, so you guys bond with the couple over parenting as well

wade immediately refers to himself as uncle wade

will also say "our baby" when referring to you and logans baby. logan does not like that.

wade makes a deadpool onesie. you have to stop logan from tearing it apart

okay but a onesie based on logans suit would be so goddamn cute

i said before that logan doesn't like ANYONE touching your belly. even if it's a trusted friend

if someone asks, very politely, you have to make sure logan isn't around before you say yes.

one time hank asked and you said yes, not realizing logan was coming around the corner. it was really embarrassing the way logan ran up so fast, immediately pushing hanks hand off.

hank laughed it off

im sure yall have your own ideas for what yours and logans baby names would be. I think Charlie would be really cute, naming the baby after charles (and it's a gn name!)

rogue, jubilee, and kitty, would be over the moon. they would be so supportive of you and logan

laura would be so excited, a bit curious. you and logan will make sure she doesn't in anyway feel neglected or replaced during the entire pregnancy and when the baby comes

laura is obviously a great big sister.

they would definitely tease logan too btw

you guys don't even need to register. due to the people you love around you- you basically get everything you need before you 3rd trimester even starts

you and logan can be assured that your baby will always be safe and loved no matter what because of the family you both have found. (yes even with origins and old man logan)

[linkons-most-wanted]

Love your high school AU! How would you rank the LIs with respect to their overall academic performance and considering how much they actually care about it? (I feel like Zayne would be first place but Sylus is kinda competitive so...)

Oooh I love this question!

Smarts-wise, Sylus and Zayne are neck-and-neck. They have different kinds of genius. Sylus is intuitive and Zayne is methodical.

I think Sylus is simply too ADHD to care enough about grades to have his GPA reflect his intelligence, though. 😂 Teachers that vibe with him (by having reasonable and non-shitty policies) would be giving him A+ across the board, whereas in other classes if he thinks the homework is stupid he's just not going to do it. So he'd be the classic student where the teachers bemoan that he's "not living up to his potential". But he writes some damn good poetry.

Now Zayne, on the other hand--give him a rule and he's going to follow it. The man simply cannot do anything half way, and he's masochistic enough to do what needs to be done to get the grades (lookin' at you, med school). As a quintessential type five, he simply will not rest until he knows All The Things. The grade is secondary--if he can't ace the test, then he doesn't know All The Things and so he must study more.

Caleb's the one that's going to get really competitive. He's as ADHD as Sylus, but you think he's gonna let pipsqueak see Zayne be better at something than him without a fight? Hell no! Caleb will be casual about it at all times, of course, but as we know from Pathless Realms he was a top student at the Aerospace Academy. He's also going to subtly avoid topics he might not be as good at, packing his schedule with things that come easily to him. (Very type seven of him.)

I'm totally blanking on who made it, but I saw a lil comic about Zayne and Caleb where Zayne had no idea he was top of the class and Caleb was checking the rankings daily and trying to give Zayne a hard time, but Zayne was totally oblivious, and I just thought that was spot on. 😂

Xavier is definitely next up--he's mentioned that he got good grades in subjects he cared about, but not the others. So, he's up there, but def has a B- or a C+ floating around in there 😂 He's also maybe fallen asleep during a midterm or two...

Then we hav our dear fishie. Rafayel is as averse to being told what to do as Sylus, but completely unmotivated by status or money. Any time spent in class is time not spent on art. Any time studying is time not spent on art. Why exactly do I have to do anything that's not art? seems dumb. I'm sure he's got his teachers begging him to turn in the extra credit assignments so they don't have to fail him for the year because wow yeah his art is incredible.

It's not that Rafayel isn't smart. He picks up on more than people realize--as his teachers find when they try to call him out for doodling in the back of class and he immediately gives a complete and correct answer. But if he got really into a painting this week, yeah he's gonna skip the homework. And maybe he'll put in an effort for 70% of the test, but that's probably good enough, and he's gonna circle C for the rest of the questions and go back to doodling (probably MC) in the margins of his notebook.

Art history though? He can teach that class--and he does. Substitute teacher who? Just say something vaguely controversial and you can't stop Rafayel from talking about it. All that math stuff is for someone else to figure out. (Poor Thomas 😂)

Rafayel is also 100% going to pretend to be confused to get MC to tutor him. "I don't get it, can you explain it again?" (He already aced the homework last week.) Being doted on by her sweet, earnest, diligent efforts to explain? A million times better than getting A's.

So it's definitely Zayne > Caleb > Xavier right at the top of the class rankings.

Then, whether Sylus or Rafayel have worse grades depends a lot on whether Sylus sees an opportunity to drop out and start his own business. Why compete with other high school students for a piece of paper when you can be out there making real money, y'know?

If they both manage to graduate, they're pretty even in terms of DGAF energy 😂 But they'd also both be way higher in the class rankings than other people expect. The delinquent and the artist who never does his homework in the top 25%? What? How!

[reixona]

Yuu's Daily Life: A Mishap with the 2 of Spades

Third and last update to the series for the Week!!!!

It's tiring, but also fun!!

Hope you guys are liking it, if you do, feel free to follow the tag #Yuu's Daily Life

Happy Reading!!! or not

============

In the Night Raven College's potion classroom, the air was thick with the scent of herbs and simmering liquid in the cauldrons.

Shelves lined the walls, stocked with jars of dried ingredients, murky liquids, and suspicious-looking powders.

The atmosphere was tense because potion classes were never easy, and with Crewel watching over them, mistakes were not tolerated.

Yuu adjusted their gloves and let out a sigh, glancing at Deuce, who was carefully measuring out powdered moonstone. His brow was furrowed in concentration, lips pressed into a thin line.

"Alright, Deuce, let's try not to make anything explode today, yeah?" Yuu teased.

Deuce shot them an indignant look. "I don’t always make things explode!"

Yuu raised an eyebrow. "What about last week when you accidentally added too much salamander tail and nearly set the cauldron on fire?"

Deuce's face turned red. "That was…a minor miscalculation. I’ve been practicing, okay?"

Before Yuu could respond, Professor Crewel’s sharp voice cut through the murmurs of the class. "Puppies, today we will be brewing a Mist Draught. It is a delicate potion that requires precision, not brute force. I expect nothing less than perfection."

A collective groan rippled through the class. The Mist Draught was notoriously tricky, requiring the exact timing of ingredient additions and precise temperature control. One mistake, and it could turn into a noxious gas or, worse, an explosive mist.

Crewel snapped his fingers. "Get to work!"

Yuu and Deuce exchanged glances before turning to their cauldron. The recipe on the blackboard listed the steps:

Heat the water to exactly 70°C.

Add three pinches of powdered moonstone, stirring counterclockwise.

Crush and add a single porcupine quill.

Simmer for exactly four minutes, then add 3 drops of hellebore syrup.

Stir twice clockwise, then twice counterclockwise. (this ingredients came from that famous Wizard and Witches Books, iykyk)

Simple enough,

if they didn’t mess up.

Deuce grabbed a thermometer and dipped it into the cauldron. "Seventy degrees celcius, got it!"

"Okay, adding the powdered moonstone now." Yuu said as they added three pinches of a silvery powder to the bubbling water, and then a thin purple mist rose from the potion's surface as it hissed.

Deuce mumbled, "Looks right so far," as he reached for the porcupine quill. "I’ll crush it."

Yuu observed him using a mortar and pestle to carefully grind the quill. Deuce's hands were stable because he was adamant about getting better. A bluish-green glow shimmered in the potion as he dropped the powder into it.

"Nice!" smiled Yuu. "Now we just have to simmer for four minutes—"

They were drawn to a startling noise coming from the nearby table. Together with Grim, Ace had somehow produced a viscous, black muck that was bubbling menacingly.

"Oi, Ace! What did you do?" Deuce called.

Ace held up his hands in mock innocence. "Nothing! I just followed the recipe!"

Grim waved his paws, coughing. "It smells awful! Maybe we added too much porcupine quill??"

Crewel was on them in an instant, pinching the bridge of his nose."This is why I tell you to pay attention. If this explodes, you’re scrubbing cauldrons for the rest of the week."

Yuu and Deuce quickly returned their attention to their own potion as the lecturer reprimanded them. The clock was nearly up.

"Alright, stirring time," Yuu said, gripping the ladle.

Deuce nodded. "Two clockwise, then two counterclockwise, right?"

"Yup. Easy."

Or at least, it should have been.

Just as Yuu began to stir, a stray spark of magic from Ace’s bubbling disaster flew across the room and hit their cauldron and a ray of turquoise light flashed from their cauldron.

"Oh no—"

Deuce took Yuu by the arm. "Wait—!"

However, it was too late. With a gentle snap, the potion burst, and then a heavy fog surrounded them both as a thick mist burst from the cauldron.

"Ack! I can’t see anything!!" Yuu coughed.

"Neither can I!" Deuce sputtered. "Is this supposed to happen?!"

Crewel’s voice rang out. "Who was responsible for that mist?!"

Ace immediately pointed at their table. "Them! Definitely them!"

"ACE!" Yuu and Deuce shouted in unison.

Crewel sighed, waving his wand to clear the fog. As the mist dissipated, the classroom came back into view—except something was…off.

Deuce blinked. "Why do you look taller?"

Yuu stared at him. "Why do you look shorter?"

A horrifying realization hit them both at the same time. They scrambled to the nearest reflective surface—Yuu’s polished potion ladle—and gasped.

They had swapped bodies.

Deuce—now in Yuu’s body—stared at his reflection in disbelief. "No way. No. Way."

Yuu—now in Deuce’s body—groaned, rubbing their temples. "I swear, if this is because of Ace’s magic backfire, I am throwing him into a cauldron."

Ace was doubled over laughing. "Oh man, this is gold! Deuce, you look hilarious with Yuu’s scowl!"

Deuce (Yuu?) growled, clenching their fists. "This is not funny, Trappola!"

Crewel massaged his temples, looking utterly done. "You two. Stay behind after class. We need to fix this disaster."

Deuce (Yuu?) sighed. "Great. Just great."

Yuu (Deuce?) groaned. "I knew PE class was the lesser evil…"

[zmediaoutlet]

My ask got too long so I’ll send a 2 parter, hopefully Tumblr doesn’t eat one of them.i’ve always valued your opinions on spn things (feel free to ignore this ask if you don't feel like answering lol). i'm a big dean!girl, but love both brothers and can see good and bad qualities in both (which you should be able to if they're well-written), and i try to follow people-not necessarily with the same views as me, but similar ish.

i like to be challenged on my opinions, but i also don't wanna be triggered everytime i come here. but ALL i see these days are abuser!dean, how basically every action of his is so negative and selfish and awful. And if it’s not hate, then it’s the fetishizing of it, like «Oh yes he’s so abusive and there’s nothing hotter!!!» And I’m always like.. whatever floats your boat but is this all there is???? I guess my question is, what’s your take on these arguments? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

hallo anon -- loving both brothers is the right and true move, so good on you, you're taking in the show as it exists.

I really don't know what's going on with the gals these days. I hear some people calling them 'atticwifers' -- it gags me, lol, but it's a good description. We should pause and put in a thing here which is: people do a lot of stuff for porn reasons, and if they're doing it for porn reasons I don't care at all. Go on with your bad self. Whatever you're jilling to is between you and the magic button, and if that's lolita sammy getting turned on big bad dean's big bad dick then I hope it's satisfactory. Don't forget to hydrate. When we talk about actual analysis, however -- oh boy.

(And also, really, who cares if someone's bad at analysis. Most people are. It's just when it's this pervasive that it starts to chap my tits, and I have nice tits. They shouldn't be chapped!)

My actual take is that these are not "arguments" but rather a long-form version of self-inserts. Y/n is meant to be taking it up the duff from Sam, not pretending you are him. Nevertheless that seems to be what's happening. By which I mean--

You hate your dad. He's such a dick. He's a man, and men are mean and gross and evil and white men especially so, ick. Fuck the patriarchy!! Men like sports and they like beer and they like red meat and they like 70s rock music and they like big muscle cars and they like porn and don't apologize for it and they (and this is the worst part) sometimes they tell you what to do, or have expectations of you, and they're so annoying and brutish and dumb. By contrast, you are someone who fancies themself an intellectual -- maybe you don't feel like you fit in with your family. Maybe you don't like beer or big cars or 70s rock music. You're the blonde chick in the Munsters. So, who's your favorite Winchester brother?

Is he even really a brother? Honestly he's so woman-coded. He's just like you! He doesn't even really like beer ignore that he drinks it constantly; he doesn't even like red meat, he's probably vegan/vegetarian ignore that he chows down on burgers and chicken on screen; he hates Dean's stupid bad music ignore that he sings along and enjoys it; he's practically ace, honestly, he doesn't even grossly pursue women, I bet he's really queer ignore the rapacious fucking of various on-screen women and the literal boner dream he has about eating out Bela.

He never even did anything wrong! He got led into all the bad choices he was forced to make! If Dean and his evil, awful, horrible dad weren't so shitty, he'd be okay and he'd be at college and he'd be living his best vegan lesbian life while listening to your favorite bands ignore that he's the protagonist of a fantasy-horror television show and has repeatedly stated on screen that he knew he was making bad choices, and that the reasons were deeply complicated but he understands that they were his own choices, and that even when given choices later on he continues to hunt, and stay with his brother, because he might genuinely like both of those things.

See, if the bae that you project on is always the victim and blameless, then he (you) get to be holy, too. He (you) didn't do anything wrong. He's a poor acted-upon lamb who didn't have any choice in the matter, and by the way he will always be fucked and not be the one fucking because he has to not show any masculine icky desire, because that would make him unclean and wrong and evil like his nasty big brother/dad Dean, and that just doesn't work with how I project myself onto him. Oh whoops, that came out of parentheses.

--So the thing is that alllll that shit has to exist in the context of Dean (and John, but Dean is the representative on earth) being Awful and Shitty and Abusive and Bad because then it makes Sam more Sainted and Holy and Perfect. Even the flaws become mary-sue-ified. Sure he did that bad thing but only because Dean made him. And then, actually, because Dean's quite handsome after all, if Sam (you) get abusively fucked by him, that's fun to imagine, too -- it's ravishment porn, with two safe layers in between. You get all the fun of the orgasm without any of the icky culpability of actually wanting it, or -- god forbid! -- being a positive actor in the pursuit of it. Hopefully Sam was tied up and crying during the act so he can really, really be blameless.

Atticwifed!Sam does not exist in the show Supernatural that was on the WB/CW. Like at any point. But he exists in many jerkoff fantasies, for better or worse, and I guess after enough gooning it's too hard to see the reality past the fantasy. Which is too bad. I'm sure they disapprove of Busty Asian Beauties for being poor representation, and then they keep putting out... this.

[cosmossystem]

on the topic of "sysmeds* have gotten louder recently" i just want to ramble and give my optimist perspective on it really because i dont think its the full story. (*and if you have a problem with me using that term, stick around and youll see why i use it.)

for context i formed as a fictive alter in about mid to late 2016. we were going through a lot of rapid splits and shutdowns at this time. many of the people who split would get forcibly dormant just days later, including me, and im lucky that i got out of it because i know a lot of those alters back then didnt. normally i wouldnt call all of us alters, but this was a very trauma-heavy time and we were going through heavily fragmented periods with dissociation and amnesia. we couldnt accept that we were plural.

anyway, point is that we were in plural spaces around then, and i took over as the host in december of that year as i broke up with my shitty in-system persecutor boyfriend (thats a story for a different day.)

so its 2017 and im 12, turning 13 soon, both inner and outer. we are a rapidly growing system of 13, no 20, no 41-- and then soon its back down to about 30, where it will stay for the next 8 years. but in the mean time, me and my new partner, jam, are learning to pilot a flesh-mech on the fly and letting ourselves be cringy tweenagers. we take over the tumblr blogs (most of which are anti-cgl blogs, which is very ironic considering some of our members now do that) and we start journalling. more importantly, in late 2017 i make my own blog and i start chatting. im basically the only person fronting about 70% of the time and im a huge yapper so it starts to take off.

i post art. i wont say what specifically i do or what fandom its for but the gist is that i run a requests blog. (im sure, if you were in a very specific sect of fandom around then, you could probably guess who i am and what blog i ran, but i doubt that will happen here. if it does, keep it to yourself.)

and i get really popular. im talkin hundreds, at one point thousands of followers. i wake up every day to a dozen asks and i fulfill them and i talk about my day with the people in my askbox. i tell them about my disability, about my boyfriends (later, husbands), and i tell them about my plurality. sometimes i get into the weeds of discourse, but i try not to. mind you, im about 13 or 14 and im the staunchest pro-queer, pro-endo, pro-tucute tween you would have ever met. still not quite all there on the pro-kink or pro-ship fronts, but that didnt cause me any issues at that point, and i wouldnt figure it out for another two or so years. anyway, people are usually nice to me and i am nice, if not a bit impassioned, back.

most of the people i speak to on this blog are singlets. but being that this particular fandom is mostly made of younger people like me (at this point anyway) many of them are curious about plurality or plural themselves. funny enough, while i remember discussing a lot of my plurality and explaining what it meant, i dont recall a whole lot of people arguing over it. no one ever sent me anon hate saying that i didnt exist and that didosddsdosod was the only way to be plural. i DO recall getting dogpiled on numerous occasions because this was during the height of ace discourse, mogai drama, and right at the rise of the whole "bi-lesbians-dont-exist" thing, so most of my controversy covered those.

but on several occasions i explained to singlets what a system was, and what it meant that i was "married" to my headmates, and i met so many people who said they were also plural, and i even helped a few realize they were plural. i truly look at that with a sense of pride and joy because how many people get to say they helped someone realize an important aspect of themself/ves? how many people are out there living their life as single when theyre actually more than one? how many didnt know that word existed until a stranger happily explained it to them, before realizing that word applied to them? its one thing to be gay and know youre gay, its another to go your entire life without realizing that being gay is an option until one day it dawns on you and the next youre out and proud. being plural is like that. its world-altering. most dont realize its an option until theyre told.

its not necessarily that system spaces didnt have their problems. from singlets, there was more curiosity. system spaces were still very much divided, but for the most part sysmeds stuck to their corner and mostly only argued when argued with. that word, mind you, did not exist at the time, we just called em "anti endos". i dont remember when or how that term was coined, but theres a good reason we call them that now, and its because they would say the same shit to me that transmeds would. regardless, i dont doubt that there were probably issues of them going out of their way to harass people, but i cant recall any and it never happened to us, so make of that what you will.

in those times, i experienced more transphobia, homophobia, and aphobia than i did anything else. when i did see sysmeds, it was in their own little bubble. i think the broader world didnt care so much about plurality and didnt know that sysmedicalism was a thing that could happen until maybe a couple of years ago now, and back then, it was treated purely with curiosity and intrigue instead of hate.

but "system spaces" have always had an anti-endo side, and i know this because i was one.

i havent said as much up until now, but in those early days of journaling, it was maybe for a year or so that we were anti-endo. couldnt tell you what changed really, but i think it was just a growing exhaustion of hearing about how terrible and awful and cruel and disgusting those evil, evil endos were. a lot of sysmeds like to proclaim their 'one true real genuine method' of being plural is the only one, and since the start we were never going to fit into that mold-- we were and are fictive heavy, in-system relationships, able to change forms in headspace, no dissociative amnesia, very little memory loss and practically no multi-consciousness, the works. but it was there and it wasnt very pretty. i am grateful i didnt internalize too much of it, didnt spread it very much, and we got out when we did because it was toxic enough back then and its worse now.

i should say that i dont think necessarily there is a rise in sysmedicalism similar to, say, the trend of label policing (a la bi lesbians) or ace discourse at its peak. while that does happen with minority labels when theyre suddenly thrust into the spotlight of the week, plurality has not had that moment yet (thank god, knock on wood it never does) and so far the only way this has happened is with a few isolated incidents that i know of, maybe im wrong. but i think its moreso that the plural community has grown to crazy heights with the rise of more people discovering it and understanding themselves, and naturally there would be a proportional rise in sysmedicalism too. the only main difference maybe is now that we have bigger platforms like tiktok and twitter, and we have prominent plural resources like pluralkit and simply plural, and with the rise in political unrest-- all of those things contribute to this rise in sysmedicalism. they have more visibility and a loud voice despite being the minority, and so they get their fifteen seconds of fame.

i guess i get it. theyre angry. theyre upset that the world is injust. they think theyre allowed-- encouraged, even, or that its their right-- to come into a community that has been building itself for the past several decades on inclusion and resource-sharing and cause a commotion. they have a disorder, they have trauma, they DESERVE to be listened to and they dont want to see their very debilitating disorder being mocked like this, or whatever it is they say. unfortunately they are the terfs of this community, and i can say that because ive been dealing with those too for the past decade also.

what im trying to get across is this: plurals have existed forever. this community has existed for decades at this point, maybe centuries. with every progressive movement there will be a counter-movement, and this one is no exception, they just happen to be particularly loud right now. as we grow in numbers, so does our visibility, and so does theirs. the plural community is fine. it continue to be fine. there is nothing happening right now to us that hasnt already happened a billion times before, and there is no sysmedicalist piece of shit on this planet that can destroy us. theyve been trying for as long as weve existed and they never succeed. keep going, keep telling people about us, keep existing and keep doing your best. be louder than them.

red

[real-fire-emblem-takes]

That music take got me thinking about which other characters would like dad rock, and man... if I'm gonna call myself the classic rock nerdlord, I best flex a bit, so -cracks knuckles- here we go. This is gonna be a long one. I'm gonna focus on non-lords for this

Ashe. His dad was into a lot of 70s rock and it rubbed off on him. Same for Lonato, which just makes the whole genre that much more special to him. Putting on a classic rock record brings him back to happier days. There's a lot he enjoys like Eric Clapton and Journey, but a special place in his heart is reserved for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers [and by extension, the Traveling Wilburys]. Favourite song: I Won't Back Down

Inigo/Lazward. Come on, take one look at him and tell me he's not a Beatles fan. I dare you. Guy's practically in love with John Lennon. Subsequently, he also loves John's post-Beatles work. Favourite song: Love Me Do

Frederick. I dunno, something about him screams Jackson Browne fan. He'd also be into the Eagles and Steely Dan. There is no doubt that his music taste influenced Chrom's to a substantial degree. Is that a good thing? You decide. Favourite song: Doctor, My Eyes

Rodrigue. To the surprise of absolutely nobody. What we call dad rock now used to be fresh top 40s hits to Roddy, of course he likes the shit. The first time he heard the Byrds on the radio, he fell instantly in love. He's also a big fan of the Who. Favourite song: My Back Pages [this is a Bob Dylan cover]

Takumi and Leo. This is a two-in-one and yeah I'm breaking the non-lord rule, but hear me out here. These two are bona fide metalheads, but like old school metal. I'm talking Black Sabbath old school with a huge helping of 80s thrash metal. That said, both do enjoy some typical classic rock. Takumi has a soft spot for the Eagles while Leo is a closet Fleetwood Mac fan. Favourite non-metal songs: Lyin' Eyes [Takumi] and Dreams [Leo]

Oboro. Alright, I admit I'm projecting here with this one, but I can't unsee her being a Def Leppard fan, and these days the Leps would be considered dad rock. She's also into David Bowie. Favourite song: Lady Strange [I'm trying not to project too hard here]

Griss/Gregory. Technically a two-in-one, but for all the ways they are different, their taste in music is 100% identical -- or rather, 99.99% identical. Both are huge fans of Alice Cooper, but they have different favourite songs. Favourite songs: Teenage Frankenstein [Griss] and Billion Dollar Babies [Gregory]

Leonie. This surprises a lot of people, but she's not into modern music. I dunno, she just doesn't vibe with it. Older music, however, is a different story, and it turns out she really likes Kiss and AC/DC. No one's quite sure what drew her to those bands above everyone else and she doesn't feel inclined to share. Favourite song: Black Diamond

Lewyn. He didn't have that much of an opinion on the genre before, but traveling on the road resulted in a lot of classic rock getting stuck in his head and he finds he enjoys it. The Allman Brothers Band and Electric Light Orchestra are the ones who take up the most free real estate in his head. Favourite song: Midnight Rider

Tsubaki. There's debate as to whether this is out of left field or completely expected of him. Not that he knows this debate is even happening because nobody wants to get involved in that discussion with him. Like Lazward, he also enjoys the Beatles' post-breakup work, but while Lazward loves John Lennon, Tsubaki leans more towards Paul McCartney, especially the Wings years. Favourite song: Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five

Xane. One might think he wouldn't care for music, but no, he actually likes music. His taste in music is quite varied and isn't limited to classic rock, and of the classic rock he's heard, honestly he wouldn't be able to pick a favourite group out of anyone. He just likes it all. It's really interesting. Favourite classic rock song if he had to pick one: Bad Moon Rising - Creedence Clearwater Revival

I'll be here all day if I keep listing out more so I'm gonna stop there

.

[amburly]

Diamonds and Rust

  A/N: this is my first time writing pls be nice.. this kind of sucks i have the writing level of like a 6th grader. i honestly dont know what ill make this fanfic into bc im indecisive. this is not a reader x challengers, i made a character. i might have a short blurb on Mae and who she is just because i think this chapter didn't get it out much idk. i gave tashi's dad a name bc i think he needed one.

WORD COUNT: 1444

Chapter 1 of Diamonds and Rust

3:21 PM - September 9th, 2006

US Junior Open Finals

Everyone's eyes were on Tashi. She was great. No, not great, astounding. She hit every ball, moved with precision, her backhand was killer (from what I was told, I don’t know anything about tennis.), and through it all, she still looked model-material. If I saw her walking on the street, I’d think she was a famous model, not the winner of the girl’s junior single final. I mean, she’s not the winner, yet, but Anna wasn’t looking good. Apparently she was racist, and couldn’t stand losing. Anna had also been losing her past matches, but she begged her coach to put her in anyways. Her ego was bigger than the universe. The glare from the sun made Tashi look like some sort of angel in her Adidas tennis dress. I could see her wings, I swear.

“Come on!” Tashi yelled. I felt a little bolt of electricity go through me. I never knew Tennis could be so intense. The audience started clapping and cheered for Tashi, as they should. When I watch all those other, boring, tennis matches, they seem.. Bland. They don’t have the liveliness and enthusiasm that this game has. They don’t have Tashi. Anna started clanking her racket on the floor, something that Tashi never did. Tashi was always controlled, along with her anger. I could tell by Anna’s screams, she was ticked off by the applause and the “come on!”, even though I couldn’t even understand German. It was Tashi’s turn to serve.

6:56 PM - September  9th, 2006

Gerald’s (Tashi’s dad) car

 The sound of guitar solos and musicians that died way too young filled the air of the minivan. Gerald was playing some of his 70s music. Lots of Led Zeppelin and AC/DC. 

“Tashi, you were.. Phenomenal.  I mean, I almost shed a tear.” I said, teasing her. 

Tashi chuckled shortly, before taking another sip of those appalling green juices. Sincerely, they tasted more like factory-made chemical-induced poison. Honestly, the poison would taste better. “Thank’s Mae. Y’know, I honestly thought I would faint while playing or something. It’s so hot. I don’t know how these Californians do it.”

I chuckled. It’s true, it really was hot.

 “Oh hey, you excited for the party tonight?” Tashi questioned.

“Uhm, yeah. Of course.” I said, lying, with discomfort in my tone. 

I gave a reassuring smile, because I knew Tashi wouldn’t believe me. She could always tell through my lies. Maybe she was intuitive, or I’m a really bad fucking liar. It’s probably that I’ma  really bad liar. I wasn’t one for parties, Tashi was more  of the party-goer, which made sense, because she was invited to lots. I had more fun eating ice cream and rotting on the couch, watching reruns of Psych. Without Tashi, at parties I’d just sulk around and stick in the corner. I was probably only there for the food, or because I was forced to go. 

“You don’t have to lie. I know you don’t want to go. Be honest, I’m your best friend.” Tashi replied

“Uhm, well, I want to go, for the cause and all. Even if I'm not a big fan of parties, I'm still going. I want to support you and your career.” I said.

“Well, it’s going to be fun. We’re gonna dance, drink, and take pictures!” Tashi exclaimed, trying to cheer me up.

“That doesn’t sound too bad.” “Mae, I am really glad you’re going. Maybe you’ll meet a boy or something?” Tash said, in all seriousness, like the thought of boys were going to cheer me up.

“Trust me, that is like the last thing I’d go there for. I’d rather go to see paint dry than.. Boys.” I said with disgust.

I was lying. I cared about boys.. A little bit. They were tolerable. Though, I had to keep up this fake demeanor, that Tashi couldn’t even see behind, that I hated romance. I wouldn’t try to act like I wouldn’t mind it, if it wasn’t that cheesy. But, if one thing was for sure, it had to be genuine. I have to have a real connection with them - something like love-at-first-sight. They have to be true, and gentle, and kind. I loved very few people in my life, one of them being Tashi. Tashi was the opposite of me. She got all the men, I wouldn’t blame them. She was beautiful, athletic, smart, and confident. She was perfect.

“We’re here girls.” Gerald said, pulling up to the parking lot of the party.

I took a look at my window. It was huge. I mean, I’m talking about a big-ass castle and a whole dance floor, all of it. Our heads turned to him. “Now you girls go on out to the party, I’ll be back, I need to go talk to your coach for a minute. Kay girls?” We nodded, thanking him for driving us, before leaving. I patted down the dress Tashi gave to me for my birthday. She said it’d be perfect for any party, and that I’d looked gorgeous in it. For once, I believed her.  I looked good, better than usual. And Tashi looked impeccably stunning, as always. It was a satin pink dress, with sparkly rhinestones on the top, and flowers and their stems stitched onto it. It was down to my ankles, so I couldn’t trip on it or anything. I paired it with some heels from my mother’s closet. She gave me the “comfortable ones”, although it felt more suffocating than comfortable. Tashi was wearing her designer dress, the one that Adidas paid for. I can’t believe my childhood friend is getting sponsored by Adidas. Adidas! She really is going places. Her dress matched her gold hoops. She looked stunning. If I thought before that the sunshine looked good on her, I should’ve seen her in the moonlight. 

“Mae you look.. Beautiful. You’re actually gorgeous.” Tashi complimented, looking at the dress, then my face, that I did my best doing makeup on. I chuckled, looking down. I couldn’t help blushing, Tashi wasn’t the type to compliment. At least not like this. “Thank you Tash. Now, I think the folks at Adidas await your arrival.” I say. We hoop arms and get to the party, where we’re met with a bunch of eyes on us, and noises. Especially the noise of Anna Mueller crying over her second-place. She’s wiping her tears, while having a bunch of people around, comforting her. Beside her is the second place trophy she got. “Look at Mueller..” I whisper. “God I hate people like that.. Sore-losers.” Tashi said, scowling at the sight

“She’s a fucking racist too.” I rolled my eyes, along with Tashi, before we began to get our drinks.

People came and congratulated her at the drinks table, it was quite a crowd. Some of them even talked to me, wanting to know what I was doing with Tashi Duncan. After all the people came and went, we’d been talking for at least an hour. The talking already wore me down, and we still had more time at the party. At least I was here with Tashi. “Let’s go dance.” Tashi said, nudging me. I nodded, and followed her to the dance floor. The music was one of Tashi’s favourites. Hot in herre by Nelly. I guess it did fit the theme, it was, technically, hot in here. I could feel the body heat from the other people dancing already. God, why did this game have to be in California? Tashi took the lead in dancing, getting hyped up by her other friends. I chuckled, seeing Tashi so happy, made me happy too. I turned around, wanting to go get another drink, and saw 2 pairs of eyes staring at us. Two boys, one with golden blonde hair, a sleek look and a pink dress shirt, the other a boy with a blue shirt, a cheeky face, and hair as dark as the night. And as soon as I started to really see who they were, the one with the black hair looked right into my soul and gave me a boyish grin. The type of grin that’d make cars stop, lightning struck, and girls faint. I looked away as soon as I could. My heart is pounding. What the fuck? How could I be so scared and attracted at the same time by just a grin? He, quite honestly, had the grin of the Pillsbury Doughboy, and he still made me react that way. Who was that? And then, it struck. He was Patrick Zweig.

[bekolxeram]

On modern technology and air disaster in fiction

I've already written about how dated the Airport 1975 plot would be just for its sexism, but we also have smartphones and internet everywhere now, so a lot of the obstacles in the film don't work anymore in 2024.

Nancy the flight attendant in the film had to rely on radio communication and verbal instruction, but Athena can call 911 or anyone else on the ground. Don't worry about cell service, most airliners have wifi onboard, you can stream a whole Netflix series in HD over the Pacific Ocean. If at least one of the autopilots is indeed able to keep the plane in the air, whatever flight instructor or engineer on the ground can simply send pictures and/or videos to tell Athena which buttons to press.

In Airport 1975, you can see a third flight crew member working behind the two pilots:

That's the flight engineer, his job is to monitor and operate the complex systems on a giant plane. You don't see them anymore in the modern days, because their job has been replaced by computers.

Alan Murdock, after he tethered into the cockpit said he couldn't tell which systems were working as so many of the instruments were damaged. I can see why it was the case in the 70s, with the flight engineer dead no less.

This is the cockpit of an old 747, you see how many analog gages are there? Now, this is an A330, the one Athena is supposed to be flying on:

All the instruments have been replaced by screens and buttons. You see the two screens in the middle? They are the displays for a system called ECAM. It tells you exactly what is wrong with the aircraft and all the steps to resolve the problems. The Boeing version of this system (EICAS) only shows you the issues, you have to pull out relevant checklist on your own, but this Airbus system lists out exactly what you need to do. Athena can absolutely snap a picture of the ECAM screens and send it to someone knowledgeable on the ground. They will tell her what to do.

In fact, that's probably the reason why you don't really see an Airbus aircraft in an air disaster film. If it's a Boeing, at least you can show the pilots grabbing onto the yoke, fighting for their lives.

You don't really fly an Airbus with your hands... You fly it with your wrist. It just looks so anti-climatic.

There was a Qantas A380 in 2010 with an uncontained engine failure that severely damaged one of its wings. That rendered a lot of flight control surfaces inoperable, more than 80 ECAM messages popped up, so what did the pilots do? Hand fly the plane like an ace and heroically bring it down to safety? Nah, the captain did manually try to keep the aircraft stable, but the first officer just pulled out a keyboard and typed away. He had to deal with all the ECAM messages before they could turn back to the nearest airport. He was just there typing for an hour. To a pilot or an avgeek who understands how bad the situation was, it would be very suspenseful, but to a casual viewer looking for some air disaster flicks, that would be super boring.

Finally, and most importantly, modern airliners basically have the ability to land themselves, if the wind condition and the destination airport has the technology for it. Tom Scott has been talked through a successful landing in a 737 simulator before. I assume it would be even less challenging on an Airbus. If the conditions permit, you can land it without touching anything, in 0 visibility.

Of course there're going to be damages to Athena's plane preventing it from flying normally, in order to play up drama. Well, she may not land it that smoothly, but comparing to the 70s, aviation technology has come such a long way that she can probably get it on the ground in one piece.

[weneverlearn]

Kurt Bloch: An Awesome Guy Who Awesome People Like

Rocking with the Fastbacks and recording all your favorite bands since 1979

Fastbacks, 1988; Kurt Bloch far left, Gumby t-shirt

“There truly is something about inspiration and enthusiasm that really is inspiring and enthusiastic!” - Kurt Bloch

--------------------------------------

By: Eric Davidson

I’ve been thinking a lot about joy of late. Like pure, eyes-to-the-sky, skipping down the street joy. There is a paucity of it around right now.

We could follow a zillion trails to and from how we got here, but this is ostensibly a music blog, so I’m going to make a quick stab at the roots of this unenviably joyless position we’re sitting in, rock-wise.

The Fastbacks were joyful. Starting out in 1979 in the dawning days of Seattle’s punk scene, they became a local fave on the basis of action-packed shows stuffed with careening pop hooks, irked energy, and a friendly, guffaw around onstage demeanor that didn’t exactly scream “pre-hardcore era.”

Fastbacks retreated for a few years, circa 1988, and when kicked back into gear a couple years later, found themselves being a preferred opener for a load of grumpy grunge bands who I’m guessing hoped to absorb some of the Fastbacks positive energy to counteract their mope – which the Fastbacks were more than ready to supply.

A mélange of metal volume, fleeting bouts of prog whimsy, Ramones tempos, and BubbleYum stickiness, the Fastbacks created a  singular sound. Like most great bands, they never fit into any particular zeitgeist – too raggedy for the pop punk contingent, too peppy for the grunge trend, they nonetheless retained a respected status among bands who appreciated their consistently grabby tunes and fun live show.

Despite any remaining expectations of what “success” was supposed to be, by the turn of the millennium the Fastbacks became that precious thing – one of those awesome bands that awesome bands like.

It should be noted that, while grunge soon gained a definition as a downer genre (that has taken root since), Bloch and company palled around with that Seattle scene from the get-go, and knew many of them as fun rocker kids just trying their best to get through seven months of rain by rocking. 

The Fastbacks kept careening forward right through the ‘Alternative Rock” era that ignored all the fun underground garage punk and instead painted rock as increasingly dreary and grievance-based. The early 2000s came, and the Fastbacks took their leave.

They’ve recently gotten back together for occasional reunion shows. Always holding them together throughout their stop/start whirlwind of a career was ace guitarist/producer and philosophical center of the band, Kurt Bloch.

Bloch, who began his career as a recording studio whizz with Fastbacks, never stopped twiddling the knobs for lots of your favorite bands and/or underrated acts. We checked in with him on his ongoing mission to bring fun to the fringes despite the mainstream consistently choosing incorrectly.   

-------------------------------

Kurt Bloch, rockin', 1990 (Fuck the NRA. I will assume Kurt's t-shirt here was de rigueur '90s irony.)

-------------------------------------

What was the first album you loved; and what was the first album you loved because of its production?

Good question, hard to answer. I think it was 45s and AM radio that got me going on recording qualities, how loud some of the great hits of the early-’70s sounded. How some records sounded like they were a band playing inside your head. I think I was aware of EQ and compression sounds early on, how the drum fills would sort of obliterate everything behind it on some songs. How the guitar would be so loud in the breaks. How, if the record didn’t have enough treble, it would be unexciting; if there was too much then it’d sound wimpy.

Then getting into albums, and FM radio, you’d listen to Larks’ Tongues In Aspic or Dark Side Of The Moon, and they had this spacious quality that was rad; the Scorpions’ Fly To The Rainbow was right in your face, really up-front and close. Then, going to see bands live, we’d see the coliseum style shows – that was so cool, but then getting to see bands in smaller spaces where you could hear the amps on stage, and feel the sound pressure in the room –now that was a mind-opener. You could feel the Marshalls and the actual sound coming off of the stage.

Then when punk bands started playing, that’s when it started getting interesting. You know, like I just saw this killer band that sounded so great at the show, and their record sounds like a bowlful of shit. Why?! That leads to one-track, two-track, four-track tape recorders, and each time you record something, you have a whole book of revelations of what to do and what not to do. So many great recordings from that early punk era without a bunch of reverb. It was another revelation. A lot of those early digital reverbs that everyone had, I just hated that fake trebly, scritchy sound. Rather just not use any reverb than that icky sound.

How did the Fastbacks form?

Kim and Lulu were high school friends of ours, The Cheaters was our neighborhood band; only lasted a couple years but they were good ones! When that band disintegrated on-stage, there was still band gear in my parents’ basement. Kim (Warnick, bass/vocals) had been in a band, The Radios, and Lulu (Gargiulo) wanted to play guitar and sing. Somehow my parents didn’t put a stop to it all, so we started playing a couple times a week. Not saying we got good, but we got better.

How long before you felt you had locked into the Fastbacks’ sound?

I reckon whatever “sound” we had was pretty well established early on; it was just whatever we wanted to do. Of course we loved the punk bands of the era first and foremost, but also the ’60s and ’70s pop music we grew up with; and the hard rock bands of the ’70s too! And I always was a fan of the wonderful arrangements and sound of the ’70s prog bands, once I started writing most of the songs, these things would creep in.

Live, 1986

I have this romantic vision of Kim Warnick as a long-haired rocker teen crashing parties and such. Is that correct?

Ha ha ha!! We were all pretty good (bad?) at crashing parties, some of the shit we did makes me wince thinking of it all. But it was 1977, ‘78; things were different back then, a different kind of boredom ran rampant through kids’ minds back then. There was a real disdain for society, maybe not to the degree of the UK bands at the time, but still there nonetheless. Often there was nothing to do other than the proverbial let’s go fuck shit up. And the music was such a part of all that.

So you got a story about something back then that would make you wince now?

Back when we were teenagers in The Cheaters, we would go to pretty desperate lengths to create excitement. The Cheaters singer, Scott Dittman, was maybe the funniest person I’ve ever known, and often in our search for something to do, he would drive a car full of us down to the frats at the University Of Washington. We’d go crash frat parties, rarely did we fit in unnoticed. You’d grab some keg cups and try to hang out, usually immediately, “Would you please leave.” And that didn’t often sit well with Scott. If we were going to “please leave” then we would not leave without exacting some sort of a toll. I guess we could run pretty fast, or we would’ve got our asses kicked pretty well back then. Somehow a few weeks later we’d go back to the same frat house that had a bookcase upended or a row of bikes knocked over, and lo and behold, the same thing would happen again. Of course we were never hired to play any frat parties.

Scott also loved to fight. He took boxing lessons and was always trying to teach us how to fight too. You knew when the gloves came out it was time to find something else to do. “Come on, you just gotta keep your guard up.” (smash smash smash) “You said you weren’t gonna hit us in the face.” Yeah right.

The Cheaters and The Accident (another erstwhile punk outfit) set up a show at a non-punk bar, somewhere down by Olympia. This would’ve been 1979 maybe. There were no roadmaps for like-minded or “friendly” places to play, outside of the major cities. But we were trying to do something, anything, and our double bill got the booking. This bar had a dance floor that also was used for bar fighting. There must have been some sort of organization to the fights, but it was sanctioned bar fighting. No-one was on the dance floor or anywhere near it when we started, so Scott tried to solicit a fight or two during our set. This was unfriendly territory, we were all, “Stop this nonsense!” But once you told Scott not to do something, well he was going to double down of course. Fortunately no one took him up on his offers, and we got out unscathed, but the bar owner took me into his office at the end of the night and gave me a rundown on what we needed to do to become successful in the music business, and the first thing was to get rid of that singer.

1978

First Fastbacks show, February, 1980 – any memories of it?

Oh, totally! The first Fastbacks show, it was at a rec center in a quiet neighborhood, it was three bands: The Vains, Psychopop, and The Fastbacks. We were all friends, and it was all three bands’ first shows. Very ramshackle, but we cobbled together a sound system, someone had a few lights, everyone brought what they had, and the show went on. A little rough around the edges, but the power didn’t go out, no cops were called, nothing was ruined – an early triumph for sure.

Was the power pop zeitgeist of that time a thing for Fastbacks? Did you feel a part of it?

No! For sure the New Wave was hitting strong at that point, but we were certainly not embraced by the new wavers at all. I suppose for that first year, we were pretty terrible, but we had some friends and people who wanted to give us a chance. Getting Duff (McKagan – yes, that one from Guns ‘N Roses) to play drums was the first step into making the band more listenable, but we were still a long ways off of what the general public would consider valuable music. We got kicked off of a show after our first set (of two). “That’s okay, you guys don’t have to play another set.” And I was all, “What do you mean we don’t have to?!” Oh, I get it.

Then when the hardcore bands cropped up, we were pals with some of them, but we weren’t furious enough for them really. I recall some sort of fury at a DOA/The Fartz/Fastbacks show. It required some foresight, which many didn’t possess, to support any kind of music that wasn’t 100% punk. Conversely, the proper power pop bands, well, we were a little too power and not enough pop, I reckon. We wanted to be that, but it’d take a bit still to hone those chops.

Had Duff McKagen played in any band before that?

Duff was the bass player in The Vains, who played that Laurelhurst Rec Center show. That was his first show. He must’ve been 15, barely 16?

Did he exhibit behaviors that would later align with Guns ‘N Roses’ infamous lifestyle?

We were still pretty reeled-in at that point, no one really even got plastered, no one started doing drugs yet. Might’ve been some Budweisers around, but nothing stronger yet.

Guns 'N Roses 2nd show, 1985

Got any Vains stories, recollections of a show, or the general scene from whence they came/played? Was there a good raw, original punk scene in Seattle in late '70s? I'm aware of Soldier and some other bands, but I wanna get it from the horse’s mouth.

The Vains only played three, maybe four shows total. In the late ’70s into early ’80s it was pretty hard to keep something going if you were any sort of impatient. Most bands never got the chance to play enough to iron out any difficulties, or taste any sort of real success. Lots of arguing over what direction to take, stick to your punk rock guns, and play to a rental hall of your friends; or try to get “jobs” in the bars, which would mean being stricken with the “cover band” tag, which was NOT punk.

1978

The Enemy worked the hardest, yet still couldn’t crack the code in 1979. The Telepaths, The Blackouts, The Lewd – everyone broke up, or moved away and then broke up. The Fartz made a pretty good go of it, but even they sorta morphed into Ten Minute Warning, and then morphed into an art band… The Silly Killers stayed pretty punk. The Living ripped it up for their short lifespan. But they were all in that 1982 dilemma, you can almost see a line in the sand, drawn in the summer of 1982. Not a lot of bands made it across that line that summer.

The Enemy live, 1980

If I remember it was some sort of divine intervention that The Fastbacks reconvened in 1983 to fire it up again, it was nearly the end of the line. But it was also clearly a new beginning, a new lease on life, a new crop of kids started bands in those Metropolis years; the Metropolis was a new all-ages venue that I would consider the petri dish of the next bundle of bands.

As the ‘80s took hold and punk rock hall shows were sort of the only stage for many of our bands, after a couple years of not getting to any sort of next level, it was clear that there needed to be a re-grouping of some sort. We’d see our friends’ bands get actual paying gigs in bars – if they were non-punk sounding. Of course many of the punk bands went to the dark side of ’80s metal. Everyone was looking to do something that could “go somewhere.”

Somewhere right in that 1982 corridor, drugs started flourishing, stupidity set in. Duff came with us Fastbacks as a “roadie” in 1984 down to L.A., and when we came back I reckon he moved to L.A. to escape that whole rigamarole. No one was getting anywhere here anyway. A bold move at that time, at the advanced age of 20!

1987

Word is Fastbacks have had between 12 and 20 drummers. Short of naming every single drummer, are there a few you’d like to point to as having had a particularly interesting stint; or who went on to other bands?

Gosh, all the Fastbacks drummers had something great about them. There were a few who only did one show. I publicly apologize to those who didn’t last. Those were strange times. I don’t think there are any unsolved mysteries in the Fastbacks drummer world, Dan Peters, who recorded a couple songs with us but no shows, Tad Hutchison, and Tom Hendrikson, who each did one show…. Some convoluted moments for sure, and all killer drummers!

Do you think if you would have remained drummer for Fastbacks that you would have still gotten into production?

Yeah, I think the fascination with recording was parallel to the live playing side of things, it was always there in my constitution. Wanting to learn, wanting to figure out how to make records that captured how killer bands sounded. It was such a tall order back then. Seemed like the old guard [engineers] didn’t “get it,” or were prohibitively expensive; and so many of the others didn’t sound kickass like we wanted. Of course this comes from the actual band, first and foremost; that is learned the hard way! But if the band blazes at their show, it seemed that their records should sound blazing too, but that wasn’t often the case.

1988

1989

From what I remember, the Fastbacks rep was that of the favorite local band of all the Seattle bands, and hence got on as openers for bands who would soon get huge during that whole grunge thing…

Pretty hard to say from the inside view. We had the unfortunate hurdle of being broken up from late-1988 till mid-1990. A lot of opportunity probably squandered during those times. But, unlike anyone else I can think of, we did get a second chance via Sub Pop, and another decade of rock. I know we were quite lucky in that department. We never did gigs large or small with Nirvana, Soundgarden, sort of the class of ’89. We did share a slightly miserable practice space with Green River and later Mother Love Bone. Always pals with those cats, so we did do opening stints with Pearl Jam in 1996, all around the world.

What was miserableness about it?

Oh man, that place… It was in a basement in Pioneer Square, the old, original downtown Seattle. The Great Seattle Fire devastated downtown in like 1889, and they rebuilt the city on top of the old city, one floor higher. So our basement was on the level with the old, original city; some rooting around could be done. There was no bathroom or running water down there, so you had to go to the bar a block away to use the facilities, but often you just couldn’t be bothered. In the space next to ours, it was a smashed up, decrepit old room that we moved all the garbage from our side into. No lighting of any sort, so it was all flashlights if you had them, and filling up bottles of pee and putting them where ever we could find room.

But of course we raged supreme down there, some epic parties, bands playing, and whatnot; of course no water or facilities, but grand times in the ’80s. Somehow, I ended up being in charge of paying rent, not the best job for me to take on. It meant tracking down Andrew Wood once a month and trying to get him to pay his share of their rent. First it was Malfunkshun, and Green River was there too. We might’ve blown up before Mother Love Bone started? I think I remember Green River blowing up too, after their California trek; it would’ve been not too long after that that The Fastbacks unceremoniously imploded. But for a while it was definitely a rager.

-------------------------------------

Nifty, random link I stumbled on with some cool early Fastbacks fliers, stories, and live stuff.

-------------------------------------

1992

While you didn't play with the "biggies" of the scene as much as I thought, got any early Nirvana or Soundgarden tale of any sort you'd like to share?

Our fabled practice basement was just a couple blocks from The Central, a venue that was sort of home base for a lot of stuff. The Vogue as well, it was on the north end of downtown, we were on the south end. Many people had keys to the place, so it was not surprising to duck in between sets at The Central, to have cheap beers or whatnot. I first saw Soundgarden at The Central, and they were certainly mind-blowing. Would’ve been ’87? Quickly became a favorite Seattle band, and when their first 7” came out, my roommates hated me. I had a tendency to play those 45’s over and over and over again. But they played The Central a lot, and just got better and better, heavier and heavier. I remember the first time they played “Beyond The Wheel”, it was at the Vogue. I was standing next to Mark Arm and we looked at each other and just said FUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHH…

The first Nirvana show I saw was also at the Vogue, it was maybe not the greatest Nirvana show, but man I thought that singer was amazing. Shortly after, Jon Poneman (Sub Pop co-founder) was at the bar there and said, “If you buy me a coffee now, I’ll give you a 45 tomorrow that will change your life.” An easy proposition. Sub Pop HQ was half a block away, he gave me a “Love Buzz” 45, and once again, the roommates had a reason to hate. I must’ve played that record 100 times in a row. Might’ve taken them a bit to find their pummeling style, but man they sure did. Then after Bleach had been out a while, all the rumors of major label this and major label that… So exciting and weird.

Who is a favorite Seattle “grunge era” band you really dug and maybe didn’t get the recognition you think it deserved? Mine are the Derelicts and Zipgun.

Of course! Pure Joy, Flop, H-Hour, the Meices – wait they were actually from SF… Huge Spacebird, Once For Kicks…. Have you got an hour or so?!

I know you are no doubt tired of this question, but do you have a late ‘80s/early ‘90s story or show that happened where you thought, “Damn, this Seattle scene thing is getting some real attention? This is fucking weird.”

After the Fastbacks blew up in 1988, I started playing with the Young Fresh Fellows, and we were off and running pretty hard right away. Certainly a parallel path from the Seattle Grunge Explosion, but a decent path it was! I was pals with Jon and Bruce (Pavitt) at Sub Pop when they started, so I’d go hang out at their early HQ/distributor place downtown. It was amazing to see some of these bands blow up when they did.

Young Fresh Fellows, 1989; Kurt Bloch far right

I suppose the thing that sealed it for me was listening to the advance cassette of Nevermind on a Young Fresh Fellows trip. Scott McCaughey had been assigned to review it for local music rag, The Rocket, and I nabbed it from him on a trip out East. It totally blew my doors wide open. Already having been a superfan since that “Love Buzz” 45, and seeing a couple of the shows they did here before going out to record that album, then hearing it for the first time on headphones; then as our tour progressed, seeing the record just going ballistic at every record store, it was just crazy. It never stopped getting bigger and bigger. This is so fucking weird!

Strange feeling of seeing a local band you saw shlubbing around town or peeing next to them at a dive, to hearing them play in a grocery store in Nevada, or whatever....

Soundgarden was the first one I remember blowing up. They went from Sub Pop to SST to A&M – they sorta seemed to have their shit together pretty well. Alice In Chains were kinda off our radar, they were only on the Rock radio stations; it wasn’t until their second album that I noticed that they actually were killer. But Nirvana, they were crazy cool from the get-go, not in the FM Rock station sort of way, but the punk underground sort of way. Plus I didn’t really know them at the beginning, so there was way more mystery about them. A couple legendary Seattle club shows before they went off to start Nevermind; the OK Hotel first playing of “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” we were just transfixed – What the fuck is this?! Then the Off Ramp show, they went on really late, and got cut off right before 2am. Somehow the club picked up the empties and let the band play on into the night, and what a show it was. Then… nothing.

Didn’t really hear anything from Nirvana ‘til the advance cassette of Nevermind went out, and of course thinking, if I like this so much, it’s probably never gonna go anywhere. Wrong. It was like a slow ball of fire, radio then record stores, like every record store playing it, every magazine… It would’ve made you hate a lesser band, but it really was great so there was a sense of pride attached to it all. Finally something we loved is big. But then how big? There seemed to be no end to it. It was everywhere. And so weird to think that kids dug something that was blazing and amazing.

Were you defacto producer of Fastbacks from the get-go of recording?

Oh for sure. Not by strong-arming anyone, but just because there was no money, and no one else could be bothered! Our first 45 was with Neil Hubbard and Jack Weaver, as we were doing a song for a Seattle comp LP, and as per the usual, just recorded some extra songs in our allotted time. The first EP was Peter Barnes, drummer for The Enemy, killer Seattle band and very much an inspiration to all the bands in the late-’70s in Seattle. Then after that, it was trial by fire.

Can you tell me more about The Enemy, and their local import?

The Enemy pretty much initiated the punk “scene” in Seattle. There were a few bands, but they started a club, it was all ages, March, 1978. Otherwise it would’ve been hall shows, but The Bird brought everyone together. Originally only open for a few months, but there were shows there every Friday and Saturday, it really did give us something to do.

My first band, The Cheaters, might not have actually played anywhere if not for them. We could have languished in my parents’ basement forever if not for being stopped by The Enemy members at a Ramones show: “Hey! Are you guys in a band? Would you want to play at our club we’re opening up in a few months?” Of course we said yes, we didn’t tell them that we were just barely a band, we’d never actually played a show, nor would we maybe ever had if not for their offer. We were just teenagers, my brother Al was still in High School. But they took us in and let us play shows. The drummer, Peter Barnes, filled in for a night our real drummer couldn’t play.

Everyone knew each other, when it was time to record what was to be The Fastbacks’ first EP, Peter volunteered to be our producer. He figured out how to get cool, kickass sounds and make things happen. No one had any money or experience so it had to be on a budget, but he made it happen. The record turned out great. “In America” was on the commercial new wave station, we thought we had it made!

I thought I knew what to do, to various degrees of success. Conrad Uno at Egg Studio did much of our first album. He was wise beyond words and also a great teacher. After that LP was finished he was all, “You can do all this, I think, I’ll be back at the end of the night to close up!” Then it seemed like the right avenue. So many producers seemed like they just wanted to add stuff in order to have their presence be felt. I always felt, like – what is the least amount of stuff we can have on here to make it happen? Less stuff, but louder. Certainly not against adding things, but also happy to leave things out as much as possible. Always loved the one-guitar bands that didn’t double everything all the time. Makes you think a little harder about what you’re doing.

1994

Okay, I will name a band, and you give me the first thing that comes to mind when you think of your production gigs with them:

Presidents of the U.S.A.

We’d do several takes of any given song, as the band was learning them, Chris (Ballew, singer) would play his two-string bass flawlessly every take, and sing a scratch vocal that could’ve been used as the keeper. Never a mistake, never less than killer every time.

Robyn Hitchcock

Also just an amazing music machine. Put him in an iso booth with a mic for vocal and one for acoustic guitar. He’d show the band a new song and go into the booth, sometimes it would just be one take and they’d nail it, with the lead vocal included. Never a lyric sheet in sight. A brain that truly works overtime. Peter Buck playing his 12-string on a song that he had just heard, and plays flawlessly the first time. Great Peter quote: “I like to get things right.” Indeed!

Fastbacks

Ha!! Some of the recording we’ve done astounds me to this day. It’s like any idea we had, we’d just do it. I swear, no one ever said, “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Listening back to the early ’90s recordings, there truly is something about inspiration and enthusiasm that really is inspiring and enthusiastic! Some of that music is pretty weird, even some songs that I wrote, I can’t imagine where they came from. I know we did them and all, but what was the impetus, where did they come from?!

Nashville Pussy

Another tale of just trying not to ruin a band that sounded killer. Amazing to think that they all fit in the tiny live room at Egg for that first album. The sheer volume of air pressure in there was unbelievable. A perfect example of what we’d set out to do, just try to not let the recording process get in the way of the recording. And nominated for a Grammy! I went with them to the Awards show – limo, booze, and afterparties. We were scheming all the horrible things that we’d say when we won the award, who we were gonna thank, who we were gonna blame. Of course there’s no way we’d win, they barely could say the name of the band when reading off the nominees! But what an experience. So many laughs.

Mudhoney

Five Dollar Bob’s Mock Cooter Stew (Reprise, 1993) doesn’t get enough props. I think it’s a great record. I really tried to make each song sound different and killer in its own way. Dan Peters (drummer) is always dishing out the quality.

Young Fresh Fellows

It’s easy to work quickly with a band you’re in. You kind of already know what’s going to happen, you know how to set up since you’ve already seen what works and what doesn’t over the last decade or two. We had intended to record maybe four or five songs for Tiempo De Lujo. Somehow we’d crammed all four of us in the basement here; after the two days we’d recorded twelve band tracks – so an album it was! Toxic Youth as well. We’d gone over to Jim Sangster’s living room to learn a few songs before starting recording the next day, and once we got going, they just kept coming and coming. When inspiration strikes, keep the tape rolling!

Can you describe Conrad Uno's Egg Studios; the kind of size or situation you were dealing with? Was there like a famous recording board there you worked with?

Egg Studio, where I and others honed their chops, was a welcome alternative to the “normal” studios of the time. It was truly a basement studio, the performance room was smaller than an ordinary living room. Many bands’ rehearsal spaces were larger than this. But it really did have a relaxed feel to it, and loud bands could all set up in the room and play live and get a good sound. Mudhoney, Nashville Pussy, Supersnazz, Devil Dogs, Supersuckers, Zeke – it was home base for so many great albums.

Conrad Uno moved into the house in maybe 1987, I reckon we finished Fastbacks …And His Orchestra there; and by early 1988, we began Very Very Powerful Motor, then the Sub Pop 7” and Zücker sessions. It began as an 8-track studio. Conrad brought in the Spectrasonics console that was formerly at Stax/Volt studio – rumored to once be owned by Paul McCartney, under whose purview a varispeed knob was installed. The knob remains, it’s Paul’s Knob. The console is now at Crackle And Pop studio here in Seattle, and is working better than ever.

Before Mudhoney began their third album, Piece of Cake, their second at Egg, they bought a 16-track machine for the studio, and that was the classic setup for so many records there in the ‘90s.

1996

I personally would love to hear about making the classic Devil Dogs album, Saturday Night Fever (Crypt/Sympathy for the Record Industry, 1994). Whose idea was it to make it kind of like a party, with friends and fans whopping it up in the studio between songs?

It was their idea from the beginning to make it a party album, “You have been invited… to a party!” Another band that didn’t need any fancy fussing about, they already sounded like a house on fire. Just tried to record them and not get in the way, make sure that the playback sounded like it did in the room with them.

Definitely the last night of the session, they invited all their Seattle friends over for a party, and we played the songs from the album through twice, if I remember, and just had a mic in the room while they were going. All the bottles clinking and all the blabbering was totally what happened. There was so little time to get everything done while we were there. They had booked two gigs on recording days – one out of town in Bellingham! Basically it was like wrangling the Three Stooges to record and mix a full album and an EP in like five days. Let’s just say that the morning hours were not particularly productive. But fortunately, when they were on, they were unstoppable. And so fuckin’ funny! What a fucking great record!

Oh yeah, definitely the most hilarious band to tour with too! We did a month with them once in Europe, traveling in the same packed little van. And even the bad hungover mornings in the van drives would lead to so much cracking up. Singer Andy G. sometimes stood up and imitated Tom Jones live. Anyway, can you recall who all was in the “crowd” on that record?

Honestly, I don’t! The studio was in a neighborhood, so all sessions had to be finished by 10pm. I loved the idea of recording a loud listening party and then mixing that in with the album, but it was so precarious to cram a bunch of drunks in the tiny studio and try to not let any gear get ruined, while still egging on loud misbehavior. Then getting all the cats out of there by 10 and not annoying Conrad or his neighbors in the process.

You must have some fun Andy G. stories too.

All three of those guys had their moments! Andy, Steve, Mighty Joe. Someone should’ve given them their own TV series. It might not have lasted very long, but what a show it would’ve been. I’ve never seen a group rile each other up the way they did. Should’ve had a room mic going constantly while they tried to make a group decision. There was way more work than we had time for. Somehow we got it all done, but just barely.

-------------------------------------

Crypt Records, 1993

-----------------------------------

And here’s where I decided to check in with Devil Dogs drummer, Mighty Joe Vincent, to get some more details on their Bloch party: "So, in the friends crowd [on the Saturday Night Fever album] was Eddie and Dan Bolton from the Supersuckers, James Burdyshaw and the rest of the Sinister Six, and a bunch of really cool women whose names have escaped my memory banks.

We def recorded on the Stax board. I remember because we had hopes that there was some soul residue left in the cables that might coat our tracks.

We totally loved Kurt. What’s not to love? I do remember that it was a Crypt budget recording so we had to make every minute count, so we were mixing until we were all so tired we were delirious. I’m pretty sure we went ‘til 2a.m. or something like that, but that was mixing. We did that in the middle of a tour, so we did about two weeks of gigs from NYC across this great nation of ours as well as that other great nation to our north, then out to Seattle. While we were doing it , we had a gig up in Bellingham, so we took a day off to drive up there.

I remember Scott Mccaughy was working there at Egg. I was talking to him one day and he told me his days of playing out on the road were over as his wife just had a kid and he had to be a good dad and provide a steady paycheck. I really felt bad for him. And then of course, a short time after that, Pete Buck asked him to come on the road with R.E.M. and said he would pay him a million dollars. Like an actual million dollars. That always made me happy to hear."

-------------------------------------------

And now, back to Kurt Bloch!

Who were bands you liked to tour with? And/or, a classic Fastbacks tour story?

We had some great west coast tours with DOA in the early-to-mid ’80s, they were definitely an early inspiration to go head-on and charge through best you can. They certainly blazed a trail for the rest of us to follow, doing everything themselves, like Black Flag did from Southern California. The ’80s were a rocky road for the Fastbacks. We played a lot of shows in Vancouver, BC, as well as Seattle, but it was a lot of problems and fighting, ha, and it wasn’t until the ’90s that we actually went out for any length of time – certainly getting into occasional serious trouble with The Meices, Motocaster, Gaunt, and even the New Bomb Turks!

Pearl Jam asked you to do some stadium shows in 1995, arguably the peak grunge year. How did you relate to the whole fame/stadium situation surrounding those shows?

It was January ’95, Pearl Jam asked us to play a radio show from their rehearsal space. I kinda didn’t know what they were talking about, and maybe sort of blew it off. I was trying to finish a Sicko record that night, couldn’t be bothered. I did like their Vitalogy record, “Not For You,” “Spin The Black Circle.” The rest of the Fastbacks were all, “C’mon, we’re doing this!” And I grudgingly told Sicko I was going to have to leave early. I didn’t even bring a guitar, I knew that Stone had a cool ‘50s Gold Top, maybe I could use that.

Then of course we get there and it’s really fun, just a big party scene, tons of buddies and band cats. We played three songs on the Pearl Jam gear setup, maybe Kim talked on the radio, drank some beers, great time! That was cool enough, but then they asked us to open a few shows at the end of the year, Salt Lake City and San Jose I think, and we’re all like, “Hell yeah!” And everything went well, then, “Would you want to go do a U.S. tour, oh and maybe a Europe tour following that…?” And we were all, “Hellz yeah!” And that all went great, clearly we would be the next big thing, the world is gonna love us, nothing holding us back now! We had a great record out, New Mansions In Sound (Sub Pop, 1996). Man, that was it – lots and lots of fun, great shows. We invented an auxiliary opening band for some of the shows, The What. We played Who tunes with Eddie Vedder incognito with a wrestling mask. We drag Mike McCready out for jams, Stone Gossard to sing one of his PJ songs, Eddie did “Leaving Here” with us a couple times, just great rock times in the giant venues. Somehow it didn’t lead to us being the Next Big Thing, but it was fun to pretend for a few months.

1994

Any good backstage shenanigans stories?

There weren’t a whole lot of super shenanigans. They had an espresso machine onstage every night, so we’d all slug down coffees, blast through our tunes, and then get drunk and watch Pearl Jam. Sometimes we would annoy their wonderful crew by being loud and boisterous aside of the stage, spilling bottles of wine or whatnot, but not much more than that. Everyone got along really well, and it was well-protected against after show bullies or negativity. We’d just keep on our course, often ‘til the huge sports arena closed down and they’d kick us out after everything had been loaded out – and we’d still be back there cranking tunes and running around.

It was totally like an arena-sized version of a living room party most every night. Their crew moved all the gear, we barely had to do anything except play every night.

I know you knew some of their members from earlier in the scene, but did you know Eddie Vedder before he got asked to join Pearl Jam?

I might not have met Eddie until the live radio show we did? He came up from San Diego. Didn’t know him before then at all, but we were fast friends. We would spend hours talking about the Who and riding around on the catering carts and smashing into the walls of the arenas. Come to think of it, we were probably very annoying. But no one, like, smashed up their hotel rooms or anything. It was probably comparatively tame.

Might sound weird, but while playing in the Seattle scene -- which is generally described as kind of serious, or dark, or junkies, or you know, “grungy” – did you and the Fastbacks feel kind of out-of-place; or are those kind of definitions of grunge and that town/time not correct?

The Seattle “thing” certainly was a dark, serious sound. That isn’t to say that every musician was dark and serious, but that darkness prevailed. To say The Fastbacks felt a little out of place at that point would be correct; but I always thought we were here first. It’s not like we didn’t dig lots of the bands, but it also wasn’t like we would try to take them on at their own game. It just wouldn’t’ve happened. We did do a version of “Swallow My Pride” – Green River’s, not The Ramones – on Sub Pop 200 [compilation], after a Soundgarden version too; but it ended up being menacing only in a Blue Öyster Cult sort of way, rather than ala either previous version. Slow and heavy just wasn’t in our DNA.

Columbus, OH, 1993 (Courtesy of Bela Koe-Krompecher)

I remember when Fastbacks stayed with New Bomb Turks while on tour in 1993, you guys, well I think specifically Lulu, made an amazing Thai meal for us. Did you always cook for bands you crashed with, or just for us ‘cuz we’re so awesome and nice?

Ha. I think the wonderful cooking was a bit of a rarity. We weren’t much of a crash on people’s floor kind of band by the ’90s, but sometimes it was great to have a day off and some good ideas! Remember that Metallica VHS box set had just come out, and we watched it ‘til the end because Lulu and I both worked on the film crew for the shows they filmed in Seattle, and we wanted to see if we, several years after the actual shows, got any credits at the end… and sure enough we did. Reason to celebrate!

Columbus seemed to love you. What were some other fave towns you played?

Always a great time in Columbus. Not necessarily Cleveland though. We weren’t the hard-touring road warriors that a lot of the other (more successful) bands were. It was whatever city we had friends in that were the best. Vancouver BC, San Francisco, L.A., NYC, maybe Albany, Columbus, Istanbul…

Contract and ticket for 1993 Columbus, OH show. (Courtesy of Bela Koe-Krompecher)

Highly technical and professional stage diagram implorations, Columbus, OH, 1993 show (Courtesy of Bela Koe-Krompecher)

I could be wrong, but you didn’t go over to Europe a lot, did you? Were you able to procure any production work from Euro bands you met whilst on tour there?

Oddly, not a lot of Euro tours… Seems like we should’ve done more, but there was always something. Young Fresh Fellows did some great trips, especially in Spain. Fastbacks Spanish tour was a bit of a dog’s breakfast. Not because of the people in Spain, no sir. We certainly lit it up in Japan once, though!

I did a couple albums for Les Thugs, the French band. One of them in Seattle and one in Angers. May have been bookended with some music travel. It’s amazing to look back at the old calendars and see that between tours with the Fastbacks and Young Fresh Fellows, recording with those two bands and recording other bands. Man, there were times when there was nary a day off, those ‘90s months were packed! Gotta consider myself pretty lucky. And so many killer records I got to be part of.

As a producer, do you feel you are mainly bringing an “ear” to finding the sounds the band wants, or do you try to gently impose a certain style and sensibility over the whole production?

Always try to keep the kickass factor high. I would never try to impose anything other than to try to keep everyone happy so they could do their best work, and not do the same bit over and over and over. Work hard and play hard, but not to overanalyze every little thing. Not under-analyze either, but if it’s killer, it doesn’t matter if everything “lines up” perfectly, or if the choruses speed up a little bit. Try to capture what is great about a band live in concert, and not dilute that if you can help it. Don’t add a bunch of crap just to put your mark on a project.

It's interesting how you professed a love for prog, but you had an innate sense of not always overdubbing too much – note your comment about loving bands that only had one guitar, etc.

The true exciting prog bands started coming out around 1968 and ’69, Yes, Genesis, King Crimson, Van Der Graaf Generator; Pink Floyd and Moody Blues had already been around but maybe weren’t quite included. Recording technique at the time was still fairly straightforward for the most part, there was of course room for overdubbing on an eight-track machine, but most of the first-wave prog bands’ recordings were not overloaded with overdubs. The magic was what they did with their four or five musicians, the arrangements you hear on the record were the same instrumentation as they played live. Some of the songs would have been concocted in a studio, but it wasn’t until later that walls of overdubs became commonplace.

That’s where the greatness of the original bands lies – cool vocal arranging and melding several songs’ worth of ideas into one track. Not a lot of room for squirminess either, it wasn’t so easy punching in on a giant eight-track tape machine in 1968. You made one mistake on that verse? You do the whole thing again!

Okay, gotta ask, with as much exposition as you’d like – what was your favorite recording session(s); and worst recording session(s)?

Pretty much always subverted the disasters. A time or two I told a band, after seeing a live show, that they weren’t quite ready to record yet; play a few more shows and practice a lot, record your practices and actually listen to them constructively. Studio time is expensive, practice time is (or at least was) cheap. You don’t have to have every bit of every song nailed down exactly, but do have most everything pretty well figured out, and be ready for criticism during the recording. If the rhythm isn’t working, be prepared to fine-tune your part so it is; if your harmony vocal is a half-step off, go ahead and adjust!

Some of the great sessions are those where I feel that I learned things, a new piece of gear, a new way of looking at things. Overwhelming Colorfast, Supersuckers, Les Thugs in France, The Meices in Florida… Or the records that just slammed out of nowhere. Devil Dogs, Flop, Supersnazz, Nashville Pussy. So many first albums by bands where they have been playing the songs at shows for a year or two, the tempos are up, the blood is pumping, get rid of the headphones and make it like you’re playing a gig. Play the song three times without stopping. Play three different songs in a row without stopping.

1999 (Courtesy of your's truly)

You’re still actively producing. What have you worked on recently you’d like to highlight? And what’s coming up?

There’s always some great Seattle band records going on – Bürien, 38 Coffin, Once For Kicks, Insect Man, The Drolls, Zack Static. These days, some records take a while to finish, I suppose it’s the nature of the business now. Trying now to clean the slate and get these out the door before starting new ones!

And there’s maybe a new Fastbacks coming, no?

There was no plan of any sort. We were having lunch as we sometimes do, and started talking about a couple songs it would be fun to learn and maybe record. Our pal Joe “Meice” Reineke had recently finished an ambitious and fantastic recording building in his back yard; wouldn’t it be fun to check that out….? Well let’s call him and see what his schedule is. Oh! he’s got a day open, whaddayasay, let’s take it. Well there’s a few other songs we could learn, let’s make it two days… I guess we’d better practice… What if we did enough songs for an album? Maybe we did! Got some band tracks, everyone played their butts off! Now we gotta make more magic. No target completion date nor avenue to release, but everyone is excited to finish it!

------------------------------------

Post Script: This article sprung from an editor at a national mag asking if I wanted to do a story on Kurt Bloch, which of course I said yes to cuz Kurt's a great guy and I've been a Fastbacks fan for a goodly spell. But some months passed and plans changed, and so here it is! Also, I would've put more videos in this piece because the Fastbacks have a ton of great songs, but I guess I just learned there is a 10-video limit for a tumblr post. Who knew?

All images courtesy of Kurt Bloch, except where noted.

[kivaember]

Honestly Index Dunham gets essentially no appreciation, do you happen to have any thoughts on him?

me digging through old asks in my inbox fhhghgh

I DO. HAVE SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT HIM.

I hc that the RLF are split up into multiple factions and all of them have their own idea of what a liberated Rubicon looks like. You have those that follow Father Dolmayan that have a religious reverence/fear of the Coral, and want to stop its industrial use once they kick the corporations off Rubicon.

Meanwhile you have other factions that want to reclaim control over their planet and regain their position as the powerhouse in the galaxy - which means exploiting Coral, industrially and defensively. Where Index Dunham falls, I haven't quite decided yet, but from his arena profile which says he was a worker...

Well, either he is a very, VERY spry 70+ year old unaugmented human or there was still illicit Coral mining going on under the PCA's noses - which we know because of BAWS hiding a small Coral well in their arsenal. No doubt Dunham was probably working in one of those illegal mines, trying to harvest as much as possible to feed the mealworms which in turn feeds the dwindling Rubiconian population...

Then the corporations crashed the party, and they sniffed out every single small well that the Rubiconians were using, punting Dunham out of work but still in possession of a BASHO AC.

I don't think Dunham has, like, big ideological dreams like Flatwell and Dolmayan do, or even ambitions like Ziyi does as a Coral Warrior. I feel like Dunham is someone who just desperately wants to eke out a life where they're not scrounging for scraps they can't even survive off of. The only way he can do that now, though, is fighting corporate forces in a repurposed construction AC, and putting up a pretty decent fight considering. Guy tried to solo three ACs at once, and if you sit back and just let Iguazu and Volta handle it - yeah, they win eventually, but it's very, very slow going.

Dunham, in another life would've been an amazing AC pilot. In this one, someone who just wants these scavenging hyenas off his planet so his people can stop being starved to death.

[sketches4mysw33theart]

What Careers Did The Poets Have When They Grew Up?

✌️ Charlie

Not in any universe can you convince me that Charlie became a banker. He would definitely have rebelled against his parents and found a way to do his own thing. I can see him following in Keating's footsteps and becoming a teacher, maybe a university lecturer rather than high school as students have more freedom there. Alternatively, he could have gone down a more Bohemian path, and become a writer or an artist - I think he could write sci-fi books, even screenplays for comedic shows/films, or get heavily involved in the Pop Art movement of the '60's, like Andy Warhol. I can imagine him starting his career like this and then going on to become a teacher.

🙈 Todd

I would love to see Todd become a therapist or a councillor as an adult. Considering his own struggles growing up, and also Neil's, I think he'd want to rectify those mistakes of his past by supporting the kids of the future - maybe he'd pioneer having councillors in private schools, because Lord knows he could have done with one. On the other hand, Todd's confirmed talent combined with his anxiousness could lead him to becoming a reclusive poet either. Unlike Knox (more on him later), Todd wouldn't have a 'normal' job that he abandons to focus on his poetry - poetry would be his life, and he would spend every hour writing it, even if he never sold a single piece, a la Vincent van Gogh (Keating would 100% buy anything he put out though).

🧍‍♂️Pitts

Please, God, let this man become a radio show host. Sure, he's shy, but he's clever and he's dedicated. He co-designed and made a radio with Meeks; once it was working they connected 'Radio Free America', and the boy was thrilled. So, I can see him getting on some 'pirate radio' or 'free radio' station in the Summer of Love in the 60's, broadcasting illegally and secretly. If being a radio personality doesnt work out, I think he would become a scientist of some kind, creating new inventions and trying to make lives better.

🤓 Meeks

I'm visualising Meeks as an archaeologist. I love the idea of this guy on a dig, dusting off discoveries, and using his ace language skills to translate whatever's found on them. I think that kind of career would excite him and put all his education and passions to good use. Failing that, he could easily turn his back completely on the education and values that were instilled in him, and 'seize the day' following Keating's influence - I envision him in a band in the 60's/70's. There were plenty of instruments at Welton, so I'm sure Meeks picked up a thing or two about guitar or drums, and he has plenty of time to hone his skills in time for the rock boom - personally, I see him as a drummer since drummers have to keep time, essentially staying in charge of the music.

❤️ Knox

Knoxious has a romantic mind and a unique drive, and I can see him putting that to good use as a poet. He's the only one of the group we see who consistently writes poetry throughout the film, and I think he'd maintain and cultivate that passion in secret throughout his school days and beyond. Of course, poetry doesn't exactly rake in the dollars so, I can see him becoming a lawyer fresh out of school, as expected of him from his parents. However, he would do this only for 10 - 20 years so he can save up plenty of money and start putting his poetry out into the world, and then eventually turn his back on law to focus on his art full time.

📚 Cameron

This boy would be the only one to make Welton proud. He'd become something that all the kids parents wanted them to be - a doctor, or a lawyer, or a banker. Something smart and safe and practical, just like him.

And Neil became a famous actor and lived happily ever after, the end, bye

[blackjackkent]

OK, time for another boss battle report, Cazador Szarr edition. This one got pretty elaborate. XD

Opening state of play:

Enemy list is Cazador plus two ghasts (labeled "Fallen Gur Hunter," upsettingly), four werewolves, a skeleton named "Chatterteeth," and six bats. The bats have one hit point each but I'm making no assumptions at this point.

Cazador starts out with seven stacks of a buff called "Ritual Sources" - corresponding to the seven spawn currently being held in magical fields around the arena - which gives him 70 temp HP, 7m extra movement speed, and extra necrotic damage. He also gets an individual unique buff for three of the spawn (For "Yousen", he gets an extra 2-16 hitpoint regain every turn, for "Violet" he gets a +5 to AC, and for Astarion himself, he gets an extra bonus action.)

All of this also means we are shorthanded by one person because Astarion is currently being used as a power socket. (On the bright side, despite the cutscene, he still has all his armor and stuff on, so maybe we can get him back into the fight and let him get the killing blow.)

Cazador can apparently use Call Lightning for ten turns without using a spell slot, with which he immediately beats the shit out of Jaheira on his first turn.

He can turn into vampire mist and run around the arena which makes him immune to non-magical damage. "This status is removed by sunlight," says the description of the form. Well, this at least is good news, because guess what Jaheira has:

The spawns themselves all have a "sacrificial lamb" condition which states: "If Cazador draws power from all the spawns bound this way three times, he will ascend." So we're on something of a time limit.

By the way Cazador has 270 hit points, including the 70 temp HP he's getting from the spawns. O.O;

We do get a bit of a hint to kick things off.

"Those runes," Karlach says. "Cazzy's using them to suck the power right out of those poor fuckers."

"If we can reach the glowing sigils, maybe we can redirect that power from him to us," says Hector.

First of all, I love that Karlach calls him "Cazzy". Second, I can't imagine Hector is much more thrilled about taking that power for himself, even temporarily, than he is about Cazador getting it, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

I think our top priority here is as follows:

a) Get everyone onto one of those sigils (ideally Astarion's? maybe we can get him back into the fight?) to start disrupting Cazador's power sources. b) Get Daylight cast on as much of the arena as possible. c) ????? we'll figure it out from there.

Let's go.

-----

Combat report:

Getting Karlach onto one of the sigils on her first turn passed one of the "Ritual Sources" buffs from Cazador onto her, so that seems like a good start. The problem here, though, is that stepping back OFF the sigil immediately gives the buff back to Cazador. So the utility here seems a bit limited since most of our squad is kinda up close and personal.

Not entirely clear on whether I am supposed to be trying to kill the non-Astarion spawn, although that does seem like it would certainly remove the buff more permanently. They're basically resistant to everything so it doesn't seem like a GREAT use of our time, but options feel really limited.

The ghasts are surprisingly annoying as they all run straight at Hector and cast Stench to make him nauseous, meaning he can't take actions. He's so powerful tho that he kills one of the werewolves with bonus actions alone.

Karlach meanwhile gets surrounded by all five bats and bit a whole bunch and Jaheira gets downed by the second round of Call Lightning. This is off to a great start.

The one spore zombie that was still following Jaheira around from the fight earlier misses every single one of its attacks in this fight, bless its heart.

Hector manages to take out all the ghasts by turn three but is now the only good guy conscious on the field as Karlach has gotten bitten into unconsciousness. More bats have spawned at the start of the round. Cazador has managed to avoid starting his turn in the Daylight spell repeatedly so he has not yet taken any damage from it yet. All the bats have now come over to surround Hector instead. This is going terribly.

DISCOVERY: When Jaheira's spore zombie kills something (in this case, a bat) it turns into a new friendly spore zombie! That's nice! Everything else, however, is terrible.

At this point, Cazador ascends. All of the spawns, including Astarion, explode into a giant pile of wet meat. Astarion's personal quest is marked complete. I sigh, very heavily, and reload. Yeesh.

Attempt 2!

I feel like there's a trick here that I'm missing, but the second pass does start off much more optimistically; Hector and Karlach are able to take out all three ghouls immediately and Jaheira gets Daylight up again.

Once again Jaheira gets wrecked at the top of the second round when Cazador gets his next turn. She really is squishy as fuck and I am not sure why I suck so badly at playing her. :( I love you, Jaheira, I'm sorry I keep getting you killed.

Eventually I got frustrated and sent Hector over to just whale on Cazador, and he's such a battering ram that he did manage to get him all the way down to 100HP. However, it was on turn 3 and so Cazador promptly got up afterwards and turned everyone into marinara sauce.

Realistically, Hector and Karlach are powerful enough between them that I'm pretty sure we can cheese this fight but just going straight to Cazador on turn 1 and beating the shit out of him; however, I would kind of like to figure out how to do this fight the "correct" way. Reload.

Attempt 3!

New strategy - what if we ignore all the enemies and just run all three of us onto three of the sigils immediately? (Specifically, the three sigils for the spawn that are giving him extra buffs. Unfortunately, they're of course the ones furthest away from us but we have dash actions for a reason.)

With this in mind, backing up an extra save and doing some pre-work. Jaheira gets the Misty Step amulet back, ritually casts Longstrider on everyone which will give them extra movement speed until long rest, and precasts Conjure Elemental, Conjure Woodland Being to get more bodies on the field, and Heroes Feast too, why not (immunity to the Stench poison for one thing), then casts Protection from Energy on herself to help offset the fucking Call Lightning that's wrecking us right out of the gate.

While I'm doing this, @ryssabrin comes in clutch with some advice in the replies in my previous post, pointing out that we can use the Help action on Astarion to pull him out of the ritual and back into the fight. "cazador will focus fire on him but he won't do the ritual." This is HUGE because that three-turn limit was what was really fucking things up.

So that's our new priority. Jaheira and Karlach go to stand on two of the sigils, and Hector books it towards Astarion to free him. Ryssabrin also pointed out the utility of Sanctuary in this case - presumably to put on Astarion if Cazzy is gonna focus fire him - so I have Hector load that up too, and cast Protection from Evil and Good on himself.

Heroes Feast is fun. It also gives us a big hamper of camp supplies in addition to all the buffs. Please fill in your own joke:

Mad prep, let's go:

OK let's give this another try. I'm not scared, what are you talking about.

In addition to all the buffs, we also luck out here somewhat in that on this run, all three of the team get top initiative (second only to Cazador himself). Jaheira's concentration on Protection from Energy gets broken INSTANTLY but she does take less damage than she did previously.

Jaheira misty steps onto Yousen's sigil, stealing Cazador's per-turn heal and one of his ritual stacks (and casts Daylight). Karlach goes to Violet's sigil and steals Cazador's extra AC and another ritual stack (and rages for extra DR). Hector as planned beelines straight for Astarion, Help-actions him into the fight, casts Sanctuary on him, and barrels towards one of the other sigils. Cazador is now down to four buff stacks and no special buffs, and cannot ascend. QUICKSAVE.

"YOU ARE GOING TO SUFFER FOR EVERYTHING YOU DID TO ME!" Astarion bellows, and then I have him stand absolutely still and not do anything, because he can't be targeted by attacks in Sanctuary but only while he doesn't attack anything. I like to think he is debuffing Cazador with the pure power of his ANGRY GLARE, though.

Jaheira once again gets fucking trounced immediately but at least her unconscious body is on top of the sigil so it's still debuffing Cazador.

Round 2 - Cazador's out of mist form and I could keep Hector on the sigil removing the extra stack from him - but realistically the dangerous ones were the two that Jaheira and Karlach are on. Hector is best served barreling straight at Cazador and battering ram smacking the shit out of him. So that is what he does. For a total of [does quick math] 183 DAMAGE! :D Cazador lost Call Lightning concentration too. Big moves from Team Juggernaut and this is all looking much more manageable. (For insult to injury he still had enough movement left to go and stand on the nearby sigil again too. XD )

Karlach hurled two separate health potions at Jaheira, using up both of her actions, and neither of them did anything useful for some reason. Very annoying. So now I just sit here while the 513451345 enemies on the field take their turns and hope for the best.

Time for some roleplay choices. Cazador is down to 65 HP and still prone, which means Astarion can get a sneak atack on him. So I make the executive decision to SCREW SANCTUARY because Astarion needs this killing blow.

Jaheira dies. Again. And, again, from a story perspective, we are pretending this didn't happen. XD

Round 3 - Cazador once again mists up, so I spend Hector and Karlach's turns taking out some of the adds. Astarion tries to take a stab at the mist form just to see if it works. It doesn't.

Round 4 - Hector flattens Cazador down to 13HP and positions himself to give Astarion sneak attack. Karlach stares menacingly at everyone...

And Astarion gets the killing blow.

And then we killed the 113451324 bats that had spawned during this whole process. Victory!

[littleladymab]

MAB ❤️❤️❤️ What about your number 88 for the ship of your choice?

Oh man oh man so it's Iron & Wine's cover of "Time After Time" and it did just remind me that my friend and I haven't actually started the playlist this is supposed to be on, but I looped it while writing something LMAO

Another Knight Lite song! It's for Atlas and Alonso (Arthur and Merlin, respectively). They're our old man ace yaoi couple and they make me SO tender.

Atlas is 60, divorced, judge turned city councilman who has known that he's Arthur for decades now (since like I think the 70's?) and for a long time was just fumbling around trying to do best by this fact until he meets Imogen (Nimue) and Siobhan (Morgause) and from there they somehow make a facebook group that connects them to Alonso, who is still in Europe at this time.

Alonso, 53, history and medieval lit & languages scholar, who has always known he's Merlin, had attempted to gather other knights when he was in Europe. Because of the curse of this reincarnation cycle, though, there is a limit of knights able to exist at one time, and a timeline to obtain that limit, and he ends up losing Tristan and Bedevere in a way that plagues him deeply (so when he meets Liam later, he's not quite sure how he wants to handle this boy Galahad).

Eventually Alonso comes out to LA to join Atlas, to take his position as Merlin to his Arthur, and when you're stuck in reincarnation loops but you are both yourself (original flavor) and this new person (yourself, in this timeline) you have all these memories of who you had been and who you and this other person you are so connected with had always been, and sometimes that makes it so easy to fall in love with this someone, because it always has been them, hasn't it? Even when it wasn't, it always is!

[[Send me a number 1-100 and a character/ship and I'll talk about a hypothetical fic OR just send a number and I'll talk about a character!]]

[everythingelvispresley]

Stories From Elvis’s Band

When he first hit in 1955, Elvis was like an H-bomb on shaky legs. In 18 months, he went from hillbilly singer to the biggest star in America, with a parade of No. 1 hits such as “Heartbreak Hotel,” “All Shook Up” and “Jailhouse Rock.” Along the way he upended our entire pop culture—from music to fashion to attitudes about race and sexuality.

His traveling companions on the road to the Hilton were a group of ace musicians, including Glen D. Hardin (piano), James Burton (guitar), Ronnie Tutt (drums) and Jerry Scheff (bass)

Preparing for Elvis’ new live show was an impressive undertaking. Luckily, Elvis and his new band clicked immediately. We rehearsed probably 200 songs, says Jerry Scheff. When we played them with him, it wasn’t like a rehearsal. It was more like we were just having fun, like jamming almost.

In rehearsals, and on stage, Elvis keyed off the guitar, says James Burton. We had great eye contact. He loved guitar. If I’d play a lick or something, he would just turn around and say, Yeah, baby! It was a great communication that all of us had. With so many songs at his disposal, Elvis rarely followed a set list. You never knew which way he was going to go on stage, Burton says. He could change at any moment. He’d say, James, give me an E. Then he’d go into whatever song he had in his mind.

He’d play stump the band, Hardin says. He’d try to find little ways to pull something on us. I don’t think he ever did because we were watching him so closely. We were playing the Forum in L.A. one time, and he was about as far away from me on stage as he could possibly be. He bent down to kiss a girl and I guess she whispered in his ear, Do Blue Christmas. As he raised back up, he went right into it. Now there’s only three eighth notes as pick-up notes. I’ll have a … and the whole band came in. It was things like that, non-stop. He was always very appreciative that we were right on top of him.

Says Tutt, As time went on, he would use more and more karate moves, to cut off songs and during songs, where there’d be musical interludes or solos. Because they’re almost quicker than the eye, those moves, I felt like there was only way for me to really understand them. And that was to study the same form of karate as he did. We’d have lessons and workouts up in his suite. It helped me a great deal to understand how he moved.

Elvis the comedian

The intensity was balanced out with practical joking. For all his iconic status as the king of rock ’n’ roll, Elvis often acted more like a jester on stage and off.

He was always coming up with something silly, says Hardin. Once he introduced me and said, You know, somebody told me the other day that the D in your middle name stands for Dolores. Is that true? I said, Why, hell no!He said, I think it is. I was told by somebody who ought to know. He just went on and left it at that.

He’d do imitations too. He did Engelbert Humperdinck and Tom Jones real good. He could do Billy Eckstine, Dean Martin a bit, even Moms Mabley. He would sing happy birthday to me a lot, Burton says, even if it wasn’t my birthday.”

Scheff says, One night, he brought one of those little battery operated laugh boxes on stage and said, Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like you to meet Colonel Parker. As far as the humor is concerned, says Tutt, Elvis, as much as anybody I’ve ever known in my life, loved to laugh. He was a very emotional man when it came to that. He didn’t hesitate to laugh or cry. His whole life was built around trying to find humor in things.

What Might Have Been

All the musicians agree that the big fight that might’ve saved Elvis was a world tour. During the ’70s, he toured America, but never beyond the 50 states (his 1973 TV special Aloha from Hawaii was a vicarious substitute, beamed worldwide via satellite). The reason that Elvis never performed outside of the U.S. was that Colonel Parker, née Andreas Cornelius van Kuijk, was an illegal alien. To fly out of the country would risk not only being exposed but barred re-entry.

Elvis wanted so bad to go to Europe and to Japan, says Burton. He was looking forward to it, even in the year or so before he died. He felt that these people always came to him from around the world to see his shows, and he felt like it would be great for him to go over there and present his show to them in their country.

If Colonel Parker had let him follow his idea to become a more serious artist, things might’ve been different, adds Scheff. Elvis had a lot of pressure put on him by the Colonel and by fans to do the old stuff. I’ve worked with a lot of people, like Bob Dylan and Bob has always been able to change, like a chameleon. He didn’t care what the fans thought. He didn’t care what his manager thought. Elvis wasn’t able to say, Listen, screw you. I’m doing it my way. That more than anything else was one of the reasons he got so depressed.

In the end, when these players talk about their time with Elvis, it’s overwhelming how much they loved and respected him. I’m sure I expressed how much I enjoyed working with him, but he wasn’t one to sit around and let you pat him on the back, Hardin says. If you said, You’re the greatest, he would’ve probably said, Well, I’m doing pretty good for an old country boy.

I don’t think I ever told Elvis how much I admired him as a singer, says Scheff. Back then, everybody was being cool. I regret that now. I don’t even have an autograph, because I was being too cool. I think if I’d asked him for his autograph, it might’ve pleased him.

Burton concludes, Elvis didn’t know how great he was. He never came off like, I’m the king of rock ’n’ roll. As a matter of fact, there were many times on stage when people yelled out, Elvis, you’re the king! And Elvis would say, No, I’m not the king. God’s the king.

[magicalyaku]

Happy new year! After the slump of the previous months and my last artist alley of the year, I finally had a lot to read in December! I bought so many books in November, I had to get at least through a few in order to include them in my yearly awards. xD Work was still shit but reading was fun again. :D

Dark Heir (Dark Rise 2) (C.S. Pacat): This was my last book of 2023 and easily my most anticipated. And did it deliver! Left me emotionally devastated for days! xD Seriously, I don't want to know what my neighbors thought what was going on, in case they heard me going "Aaah! No! No no no nooooo! Kya! NOOOO!!" during two certain scenes. /D The nice thing about this series is that I have absolute faith in Pacat's ability to write it well und give me an outcome I am satisfied with. I mean, go look at Captive Prince. The way the relationship between Damen and Laurent develops (even after MAJOR shit going on between them!), the political threads and all that, it's just done very well. And now, here's the Dark Rise series and I sit and watch the spiral of doom the characters are caught up in it and apart from maybe Sinclair not a single one of them is fully good or bad. And it's sooo interesting (and emotionally devastating)!! Hng!! I would actually like to write much more about what I loved and suffered through, like the whole thing with the Visander situation and how Sarcean made all of his worst enemies because he just couldn't keep it in his pants. And James. James. And Cyprian! And everything. But I can't because whenever I try I still feel the excited giggles in my brain and can't have a coherent thought. It's great, but also ... Hnggg!!

The First and Last Adventure of Kit Sawyer (S.E. Harmon): This was fun! At some point early on I looked up what other books the author has written and it's more than ten and I thought "Yes! It feels like being written by someone with a lot of writing experience!" There's just something about the liveliness of the characters and the dialogues. Also so much adventure with a slightly different flavor than usual being set in the jungle and all, I loved it.

By any other Name (Erin Cotter): I wonder why all of my historical fiction books are set in England. This is another highly adventurous story. I was a bit surprised as one thing that's mentioned in the summary already only appears like after half the book. But other than that it was pretty good. It has spies and theatre and pretty nice characters. And I did not anticipate everything that happened which is good!

Wren Martin Ruins it all (Amanda deWitt): The author's previous book Aces Wild: A Heist was one of my top books in 2022, this one does not quite reach those heights but it was still very good and very enjoyable. Wren is such a messy and fun character. As reader I absolutely knew what was going on and who was writing with whom but it was nice to follow the characters' path to awareness. In a way Wren's aceness is not as heavy as in other books (see the next one for instance) but at the same time it deals with a few of the social issues a_spec people are faced with which was nice.

Just Lizzie (Karen Wilfrid): This is a middle grade book about a girl coming to terms with being ace. The heroine has a really nice character arc. And the other characters are sometimes what you expect them to be and sometimes they are not. And maybe … that's ok, right? And I loved it and I cried through half of the book. I guess, it hit home a little more heavily than I expected. :'D (Like that one time where Lizzie is wondering how she will spent Christmas when her parents aren't around anymore? Haaa. It had just been Christmas when I read this and I'm in my 30ies and my Dad is above 70 now so that is a concern I actually have, you know. It's not nice to be reminded. :'D) It's a really good book, I think, thoughtful and well put together and empowering, too.

A Hundred Vicious Turns (The Broken Tower 1) (Lee Page O'brien): Now this was difficult. The cover is gorgeous. Easily my favorite one this year. I only lament that there's no real gold printed. The wasted opportunity. yAy The content is … difficult. I like the story on a whole. The premise and the magic system are really interesting. The characters … were interesting as well? They're fine, their motivations are not easily seen which, in a plot full of mysteries, is actually quite okay. I just didn't build the emotional connection. There's also a lot of anxiety, especially on Rat's part. There was one bit in the writing style that irked me a little. The overuse of pronouns. Because Rat was the only one with 'they' and in most scenes it was only one other person with them, so there often really long stretches where only the pronouns would be used instead of the names. It wa snot confusing because you could easily tell the characters apart, but it felt weird. I'm very used to reading the names a lot. Oh well. It's not a fun read, but it is intruiging and I will read the next volume to see where it goes.

A Magic Steeped in Poison (The Book of Tea 1) (Judy I. Lin): I managed to squeeze in a YA heroine inbetween all the gay boys! And I liked it better than most other female-led YA fantasies I read recently. Doesn't mean I loved it, but Ning was pretty okay as a heroine. The thing is, the circumstances under which I started this book weren't the best and that probabbly reflected on the whole experience. I picked up the German audiobook for a very long bus trip, but listened to it only later while doing some hours of very boring tedious work. The audiobook itself was okay, except that the reader could not decide how to pronounce some names. For instance, Kang was Kong first, then Kuang before she settled on Kang. And that kind of thing drives me mad. How am I to connect with a character when I am left this uncertain how their name is?! The German translation also decided to leave some of the names in English (especially the teas) which in my opinion doesn't make sense because why would the teas in Fantasy-China have English names when everything else is either translated into German or left Chinese? D: I couldn't stand it and finally switched to my printed edition (in English). /D It got better from there, but it's hard to forget the echo. As for the story, I don't really like court intrigues. Cruelty and injustice are just things I really struggle with to read about. (They make me angry and I don't want to be angry at my books.) But it never tipped over the edge into annoying area. I have the sequel at home as well, so I'll it. The covers are beautiful after all.

That was 2023! Next up is my big Best and Worst award ceremony! uAu~