#and it does not help when it is like. very dense political commentary. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

venusmages · 4 years

Text

Cyberpunk 2077 non-spoiler review

Anyways here’s my writeup about my least favorite parts of 2077 for people who are interested in seeing if it’s for them. Both going to talk about content as well as gameplay. This is for PC version, too, because I know last gen consoles are suffering terribly rn and I wouldn’t recommend the game if you’re not going to be playing on PC. At least not until it’s on sale or the issues have been resolved. It really, really shouldn’t have been released on last gen consoles at all in my opinion - or at least should’ve been released on consoles LATER.

If you like Saints Row, GTA, Mass Effect, Shadowrun, or the Cyberpunk genre in general - I definitely think this is something you might want to take a peek at! I wasn’t anticipating the game until about a month or two before release - so maybe that’s why I’m having a blast - but It’s one of my favorite stories from the past decade as far as sci-fi goes. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it, and It’s really impressed me. I can’t even go into detail about all the things I LOVE because I really want folks to experience it themselves. Just know there’s a very intricately detailed world, all the characters are memorable and insanely well realized and complex, and the story is great fun. Also made me cry like 5 times. It’s become one of my FAVORITE games very quickly.

I’d also recommend Neon Arcade if you want someone who’s been covering the game for quite a while, including the technical and game industry aspect. He does well to go into some detail and even though he’s a fan, I’ve found him to be largely unbiased. I’m not going to go into industry politics here because I feel that’s up for everyone to decide on their own terms.

No spoilers, things to keep in mind, content warnings, etc. below!

CONTENT WARNINGS and issues with plot/story

this setting is dark. very dark. if you struggle stomaching things like dystopian landscapes, body horror, physical, mental and sexual abuse, corporate and gang violence, abuse of children, harsh language, and concepts that mess with the perception of reality - this game might not be for you. It’s a very mature setting, and I don’t mean that in the Adult Swim kind of way. I mean it in the ‘oh shit, it went there’ way. In my opinion I haven’t run across anything in it that was handled distastefully when it dipped into the depressing, but dark and gritty isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and I wanted to give a disclaimer.

The game’s universe in advertising and working for the lower class also exploits sex/sex work quite a bit. This is part of the lore itself because in this universe everyone’s become desensitized to sex and violence to the point that marketing embraces it and makes it ridiculous. I feel it’s very obvious that it doesn’t condone this message and is instead a commentary on consumerism - but people still might be uncomfortable seeing a lot of suggestive stuff all over the place regardless.

Women in game are naked more often than men - even though there is nudity for both. This is likely a mix of appealing to the Gamer Boy demographic (even though the story does NOT actually), or the fact that media is way more cool with seeing naked women than seeing full frontal nudity on men. They probably had to tone some of it down to avoid going above an M rating.

The story is amazing, but sometimes it dumps a lot onto you at once. It’s one of those sci-fi stories that you have to really be following the names, faces, and concepts continually to get it all down. There’s a lot of betrayal, background players, etc. I think by the mid-way point I’d mostly had it, but It’s pretty dense. However it’s still amazing. You might just need two playthroughs before every tiny detail clicks - because there’s a LOT of details.

Honestly I think it would help to read up on the lore first so you’re not going ‘what’ constantly. But people have seemed to manage fine without that also! Neon Arcade has a really nice series of videos (like 2 or 3) that get you up to speed with the universe. It also helps you decide if the tone is right for you.

I think the main story should’ve been longer, also. I don’t mind a 20 hr story, especially in a massive RPG, but It feels like they really struggled to cram as much into that time frame as possible. It skirts the edge of being nice and concise, snappy, and tight - and needing just a few more moments to take a breath and wait a second. This is helped if you do a lot of side quests.

The straight male romance option, River, is INCREDIBLY well written but he doesn’t tie into the main plot in any way whatsoever. It’s very strange and feels like they either ran out of time with him, or slapped together a romance with him at the last second. All the other romances at least know what’s going on with V’s story - meanwhile River has no idea, and you can never tell him. He’s an amazing guy though and I highly recommend his questline. He appears in ACT 2.

In general I’d say not to bother with the romances. There are only 4 total, and while the romancible characters on their own are really well written, the romances themselves are just kinda meh. One romance you don’t even meet until act 3. I don’t think they should’ve been included in the game at all, because they definitely don’t feel as fleshed out as everything else.

CDPR also sometimes forget that women players or gay men exist. Panam and Judy have a lot more content than River and Kerry for example. I don’t think this is intentional, they just have a large fanbase of dudebros. It only shows in the romance content and the nudity thing though.

Johnny, Takemura, and Claire should’ve been romances and I will fight to the death on that.

There are gay and trans characters in the game and their stories don’t revolve around their sexualities. It’s very Fallout: New Vegas in it’s approach to characters: IE. you’re going to love them. All of them.

V’s gender isn’t locked to their body type or their genitals- but to to their voice. I don’t think it’s the best solution they could’ve used but given how the game is heavily voice acted I assume that was what they had to work with.

Some of the romances are locked to both cis voices AND body types (not genitals if I recall but body shapes). That’s disappointing but I assume it was because of scripted scene issues and/or ignorance on the dev’s part considering the LGBT NPCS are so AMAZINGLY done. There’s no homophobic or transphobic language in the game - though there are gendered curse words and insults if that bothers you.

Some characters MAY suffer from ‘bilingual people don’t talk like that’ syndrome. But it can be hard to say for sure given that translators exist in this universe and the way they operate aren’t fully described. It’s only momentarily distracting, not enough to take away from how charming the NPCs are.

The endings are really good don’t get me wrong but I want fix it fic :(. All of the endings out of like 6 (?) in the game are bittersweet.

Both gender V’s are very good but female V’s voice acting is out of this world. If you don’t know what voice to go with/are neutral I’d highly recommend female V. Male V is charming and good but he feels much more monotone compared to female V.

V has their own personality. To some this won’t be a detractor - but a lot of people thought they’d be making absolutely everything from the ground up. V is more of a commander shepard or geralt than a skyrim or d&d pc, if that makes sense. You can customize and influence them to a HUGE degree, some aspects of V will always be the same.

Streetkid is the most boring background - at least for it’s introduction/prologue.

GAMEPLAY/TECHNICAL

If you can run your game on ultra, don’t. It actually looks best with a mix of high and medium settings. Unless you have a beast that has ray-tracing - then by all means use ray tracing and see how absolutely insanely good it looks.

There are color blind modes for the UI, but not for some of the AI/Netrunning segments in cutscenes. Idk how much this will effect folks with colorblindness but those segments are thankfully short.

There was an issue with braindances being an epilepsy trigger because for some reason they decided to mirror the flashing pattern after real epilepsy tests - probably because it ‘looks cool’. I don’t have epilepsy but it even hurt my eyes and gave me a headache. Massive oversight and really goddamn weird. Thankfully this was fixed.

There is no driving AI. Like at all. If you leave your car in the street the traffic is just going to pile up behind it. It’s one of the very few immersion breaking things I’ve encountered.

Sometimes when an NPC is driving with you in the car, they’ll drive on the curb and/or run into people. It’s kind of funny but can occasionally result in something weird. Feels very GTA - but nothing excruciating.

The camera angle feels a little too low in first person mode when driving on cars. You get used to it though.

The police in this game feel slapped on and I hope they improve it. Right now if you commit a crime, you can never tell what will actually trigger it. And if you just run away a few blocks the police forget about it.

Bikes are just way more fun to ride than the cars are.

You CANNOT respec your character after you make them. Ever. it sucks. Go in with an idea ahead of time what you wanna do - it’s better than being a jack of all trades.

as of now you also CANNOT change their appearance after you exit the character creator. This, also, sucks. Make sure you REALLY like your V or you’re gonna be replaying the openings over and over like I did.

Photomode on PC is the N key. Had to look it up. The mode itself is great though

Shooting and Mele fighting feel pretty standard. I don’t have a lot of shooter experience besides Bethesda games so anything feels better than that to me. So far I’ve enjoyed stealth and mele the best, but that’s just my own taste! The combat and driving aren’t groundbreaking by any means, but they’re still very fun. I look forward to running at people with swords or mantis blades, and zipping around the city on a motorcycle to see the sights. The story, lore, and interesting quests and characters are the real draw here.

I haven’t encountered any game breaking bugs in 80-ish hours of play time. One or two T-poses, a few overlays not loading or floating objects - but nothing terrible. Again, my experience is with Bethesda games. This is all usually fixed by either opening your inventory and closing it again, or exiting out and reloading your save.

The C button is mapped for crouching AND skipping dialogue by default. That’s terrible. Change it in the settings to be HOLDING C skips dialogue and you’ll be gucci.

There’s apparently a crafting system. I have never been inclined to touch it. But I also play on easy like a pleb so IDK how it all scales otherwise.

The mirror reflections can be a little bit weird, at least on my end. They always end up a teeny bit grainy despite my computer being able to run everything on Ultra Max. You can still get good screens out of it though!

So many people text me to sell me cars and I want them to stop. Please. also the texting menu is abysmal. The rest is ok tho

It’s pretty clear when you’re going to go into a ‘cutscene’. all cutscenes are rendered in-engine BUT you often will be talking to other characters at a specific angle or setting. The game locks you into this usually by having you sit down. It works for me - after all we do a lot of sitting- but it IS very obvious that it’s a way for the game to get you in the frame it wants to display.

That’s all I can think of rn! If you’re interested but wanted to get a slightly better idea of whats going on, I hope this helps. I’m really enjoying it and despite my issues it’s exceeding my expectations. I’m going to be thinking about and replaying this game for quite a while.

#cyberpunk 2077 #cyberpunk 2077 review #2077 review #cp2077 #rosetxt #txt

5 notes · View notes

sanderssides-springfling · 4 years

Text

The Frogman

For @space-mothman

Synopsis- Analogical cryptid-hunting AU in which they search for the mysterious Frogman for a college documentary project.

Warning- Swearing + Minor wound

Note- Hiya!! I’ve had a lot of fun working with the wishes you asked for and I’m super excited to see what you think of it! I hope you’re doing well :D

Virgil held up the two near-identical hoodies in front of the mirror, deciding which to wear when a familiar head poked through the doorway.

“Ooh, are you getting ready for your little date?”

Virgil walked over to kick him out when Janus joined in.

“Leave our darling little brother alone Remus, his boyfriend will be here soon. We have to find the baby pictures before he arrives.”

“He’s not my boyfriend! The teacher paired us up. I had no say in it.” Virgil said as he tried and failed to push the pair out. “And if either of you shows him any embarrassing pictures of me, you’re both dead.”

“Wow, how scary,” mocked Remus as Janus mimed a face of fear. He then added, “If I were you I’d go for the one on the left, it makes you look less…intimidating and murdery.”

Virgil swatted at him with the hoodie before putting it on reluctantly, huffing about how he was planning to choose it anyway because it was ‘warmer’.

Just then the doorbell rang. Virgil’s eyes opened wide as he ran down the stairs to get to the door first but he was no match for Remus. He shoved Virgil out of the way and opened the door wide.

“You must be Logan. We’ve heard so much about you. Why don’t you come in?” He invited with a wild grin on his face.

Virgil stared daggers at Remus as Logan walked in, politely telling Remus he has a lovely home. He was wearing a jean jacket over an unbuttoned plaid shirt and a graphic t-shirt depicting Mothman. His soft-looking hair fell over the rim of his glasses, the eyes behind them taking in his new surroundings.

Before Virgil could tell Logan they should leave, Janus began his, rehearsed, warnings. “You better take good care of my brother, young man. I’m expecting you to bring him home with at least three remaining limbs and having gone through a maximum of one demon possession, preferably none, or else there will be hell to pay. I’m also expecting you to keep criminal activity to a minimum along with the use of venomous vipers, they’re nasty creatures.”

To Virgil’s surprise, Logan had taken out a notepad and started to make notes, taking his speech seriously. Janus clearly wasn’t expecting this either as his expression softened towards Logan. “It’s obvious you’ll take good care of him. I’ll let you two go because I’m sure you have plenty of ‘work’ to do.” He winked at Virgil. “Just be careful.”

“But-”

“The baby photos and home videos can wait for their second date Rem, let’s give Virge a chance to embarrass himself without our help first.”

Virgil glared at his brothers as he dragged Logan outside, only mildly thankful Janus let him off that easy. What had he done to deserve being stuck with those two morons?

“Have fun!” Remus called out as the door slammed closed.

“Come on, I parked down the road. It’s not far.” Logan set off walking away, Virgil joining him a moment later.

“I’m super sorry about them,” Virgil said. “Ignore everything they said, they’re not worth wasting energy on.”

“It’s quite alright Virgil, it’s clear they care for you. I have always admired the dynamic between siblings.”

“You’re an only child? Lucky.” He thought back to how embarrassing his brothers were. They took every opportunity available to tease Virgil, regardless of whether they were alone or with any of his few friends. In moments like that, it was hard to remember why he loved them. He reminded himself, trying to calm down.

On his worst nights, Remus would tell him a gruesome ‘bedtime story’ while Deceit badgered him to add a happy end. They would also take him to concerts of bands he liked and try to fit into the scene even though they hated the music and fashion. Seeing Janus in a My Chemical Romance shirt trying not to curse after jabbing himself in the eye with Virgil’s eyeliner was still one of his fondest memories.

“Although,” Virgil added, “It does have its advantages.”

Logan stopped in front of an old pickup truck. Despite the carefully polished hubcaps and fresh paint job, it had visibly been through a lot.

“Here we are, our ride for the evening.” Logan took hold of the passenger door handle. “The door can be a little tricky sometimes.” He rattled the handle, banging at a spot a few inches below it. The door sprang open. “Like to most things, there’s a trick.”

He pulled the door open fully, holding it for Virgil as he clambered up. “Uh…thanks.”

Logan proceeded to join him from the driver’s side. “It may not look it but it’s a strong and reliable vehicle, I spent all last summer fixing it up.” He said proudly.

“No, no, it’s nice!” Virgil reassured him. “Does it have a name?”

“Why would my truck have a name?” Logan asked, appearing puzzled. He put his key in the ignition. The vehicle whirred to life.

“Nevermind. Are you excited to film our project?”

“Incredibly so! When Mr Picani said we had to make a documentary on any subject I got super excited about the idea of cryptid hunting! Thank you for going along with it!”

“Whatever gets me to pass the class dude. Plus this seems like a better way to spend time than filming ladybugs walking on leaves and doing some boring commentary.” What Virgil didn’t add was that after seeing the excitement of Logan’s face when he proposed the idea, Virgil couldn’t find it in his heart to say no.

He shuffled in his seat. “I’m also really happy I got partnered with you. I know we haven’t talked much but you seem a lot easier to get along with than the other people in our class.” Virgil smiled in Logan’s direction and despite the dim lighting, he could have sworn he saw Logan blush.

“Oh, thank you, Virgil. You too have ‘good vibes’ if I’m using the term correctly.” Virgil grinned, telling Logan he did.

“How about some music?” Logan asked before turning on the radio. Pop music crackled out of it, gently playing for the rest of their journey.

~~~~

A cold wind blew through the dense, gloomy woods. In the clearing before it, stood a teenager speaking to a camera, visible in the dying light of the sun.

“There are many legends about the Sanders Wilds, however, most revolve around the same being. A creature said to lurk in the depths of these woods, waiting for unsuspecting victims.

He has been described as a slimy beast with incredible jumping abilities, his hind muscular legs able to propel him forward metres at a time. He most often appears by the many bodies of water found in this forest.

Although no-one has ever disappeared in the woods, most locals swear they’ve met one of the unfortunate souls chased by the being whose very existence is in question.

He goes by many names. The Shadow, the Beast of the Sanders Wilds and recently he’s been referred to as ‘Scary Todd’ by a youngster from a neighbouring Elementary school.”

Virgil raised his eyebrows from behind the camera when he heard ‘youngster’ but Logan brushed it off and continued.

“The most common name of the cryptid we will be investigating today, inspired by its many characteristics, is” Logan stopped for dramatic effect. “The Frogman.“

“That’s quite the speech you prepared there” Virgil called out as he put down the video camera and rubbed his forearm. His arms had begun to stiffen during Logan’s monologue

“Are you ready to go in?” Logan asked.

Virgil froze. There was only one problem, something he hadn’t told Logan- He was scared.

Virgil knew that technically there wasn’t anything to be scared of. The frogman was nothing more than an urban legend, mere shadows and reflections mistaken for something, however, it was the what if’s that plagued Virgil’s mind. What if the frogman was real? What if he appeared? Worst of all… what if he caught them? Virgil wasn’t sure if he was willing to risk his life to pass a college class he didn’t even like that much.

“Virgil?” Logan looked concerned. “Are you alright?”

Great, Virgil scolded himself. This was exactly why he hadn’t wanted to tell Logan in the first place. More than anything he didn’t want Logan to think he was a nervous wreck, scared of a fake monster. Now he’d have to tell his handsome partner he was a chicken and he would totally think less of Virgil. Oh why does Logan have to be so handsome, Virgil thought to himself as he looked towards his cryptid hunting companion.

He was tall, with a sturdy frame that was perfect for giving supportive hugs and his hair was unruly in all the right ways, looking good for running your fingers through. It was very difficult to focus on anything else, Virgil had to admit. Good looking people never failed to make things more difficult.

“I- I’m just… a little scared.” Virgil mumbled reluctantly. “As controversial as it is, I’m not too keen on the whole getting captured by a forest monster thing.”

“Oh.” Logan looked disappointed. “Don’t worry about it, it’s not too late to change the project. I can drive us to the library and we can get started in something different. All that matters is that you feel comfortable.”

Virgil felt touched. Logan was willing to give up something he wanted to do for his well being? It wasn’t often that happened. That’s why he was determined to go in anyway. “No way. We’re going in there and finding that frogman. Just… promise to protect me from any monsters?” Virgil managed a smile as he held out his pinky, holding the camcorder in his other hand.

“Pinky promise,” Logan answered solemnly, hooking his finger around Virgil’s. Then, he smiled wide. “Now, let’s go say hi to The Beast. And…” He paused apprehensively as if he was trying to pick out the right words. “If you’re alright carrying the camcorder with one hand, maybe I could hold your hand? So you feel safe?”

Virgil laughed, slipping his hand into Logan’s. It felt warm compared to the cool evening. “As long as you’re okay with shaky footage.” He joked.

Logan led them into the forest, pulling out a flashlight from his pocket while Virgil switched the camera back on. There was an eerie quiet only broken by the crackling of leaves and snapping of branches under their feet.

“Hey, Logan, you know you can talk, right? We can edit everything out of the footage later.” There was still no response.

Virgil glanced towards Logan, seeing him staring intensely at a spot in the direction they were walking. “Make sure you get this.” He murmured before rushing up, tugging Virgil with him. He crouched down next to an animal print in the muddy ground. Virgil let go of his hand so he could step back and get a better angle.

“This right here is an animal footprint however it belongs to no regular being. While it seems to belong to an amphibian creature as is indicated by the pattern and the indentation from webbing, it is bigger than any regular amphibians could produce.” Logan splayed his hand above the mark to demonstrate. They were around the same size. “This must be the footprint of the Frogman.”

Yay, Virgil thought to himself. Evidence of a creature that might kill them. How wonderful.

He walked to Logan and helped him up, keeping hold of Logan’s hand afterwards because there was no way he was going to risk getting separated from him now. He also enjoyed the feeling of Logan’s hand in his, it made him a feeling of joy that he couldn’t quite place.

They continued when there was a sudden rustling a few metres in front of them. Instinctively Virgil squeezed Logan’s hand harder, holding onto him for safety. They both froze. Logan’s torch turned to the source of the sound, a bush. A moment later a squirrel scampered out of the said bush, disappearing into the darkness as quickly as it appeared. Both Logan and Virgil sighed in relief.

“That sure was one terrifying squirrel,” Virgil said as they continued to walk deeper into the woods.

Virgil attempted to strike up small talk again, not wanting things to become awkward. “I like your Mothman shirt.”

“Oh, thank you, Virgil.” Logan beamed, the way he only did when he was speaking about something he was passionate about. “I had a really big cryptid phase as a child, so big my parents decided to take us to Point Pleasant for the summer break one year. That’s the hometown of Mothman, they have a statue of him and everything. It was incredible. That’s when I got the shirt! It’s been a good luck charm. Not that I believe in luck but it never hurts something else on your side”

“You got it as a kid and it still fits? You must’ve been a tall kid.”

“It was the middle of their tourist season so they were sold out of all the youth sizes. According to my mother, it made a very fashionable dress.”

Virgil held back giggles as the thought of a smaller Logan wearing that shirt going down to his knees with a pair of fashionable red heels crossed his mind. For whatever reason, if Logan were to wear a dress, Virgil believed he’d wear it with stunning red heels. He seemed the type.

“Did you spot The Mothman?” he asked, only half kidding.

“Unfortunately not, although it was probably for the best as I was going to ask him for an autograph. I doubt that would have gone down well with Him.“

The idea of a smaller Logan wearing an oversized Mothman merchandise shirt going down to his knees and a pair of fashionable red heels walking up to the Lord of the Shadows himself, at least double his height, and asking him to sign his autograph book was so funny to Virgil that he stopped in his tracks wheezing, his eyes brimming with tears.

Seeing Logan’s bewildered expression, he tried to calm himself. After a few moments catching his breath trying to keep a straight he was able to regain his composure. “Sorry Lo, I’m fine now.”

“Can I ask-”

“No” Virgil interrupted him. “It’s really for the best you don’t.”

“Alright Virgil, I’ll trust you on this one.” He hummed a song Virgil wasn’t familiar with for a few moments. Then, he said, “I had an idea for while we’re either walking towards the Frogman or further into the depth of woods we might get lost in.” Virgil wasn’t sure if Logan was kidding and frankly he didn’t want to know.

“Yeah L, what is it?” Virgil’s mind started to race when he realized he had called Logan a nickname. While only a shortening of his name, it still seemed very personal and friendly. What if it bothers him? What if he thinks it’s weird?

“Well Vee,” Logan paused to see Virgil’s reaction, looking smug. Virgil stuck his tongue out at him. He wouldn’t admit it but his heart would flutter whenever he got that self-righteous expression on his face, seen often when he corrected the teacher or had got full marks on a test. It was cute. Very annoying, but cute.

“We could directly target your fear of the Frogman. You would have to trust me though.”

“I trust you,” Virgil answered with no hesitation. He squeezed Logan’s hand in his.

“Oh…um…” Logan appeared flustered. “This is going to seem scary but there’s a very low possibility of a negative outcome. Now…repeat after me.”

Logan took a deep breath before yelling “Fuck you Frogman!”

Virgil startled, not expected Logan to be so brazen. Yelling was a common occurrence for Logan however such vulgarities? Directed at a possibly supernatural creature who was reported as dangerous? He shook his head in disbelief.

Logan looked at him pointedly. “Oh no Logan, there is no way-” He stopped realizing there would be no convincing Logan. “Fine.” He grumbled.

“Frick you Frogman.” The words sounded uncertain.

“That was a good first attempt, Virgil. If you want to try again, you should really try to metaphorically shake off any inhibitions and really go for it. I did promise to protect you, the Frogman won’t hurt you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

They had come to a stop next to a running stream of water. Virgil slipped his camcorder into his hoodie pocket and let go of Logan’s hand, freeing both his arms. After running his fingers through his hair trying to build up enough confidence and jumping where he stood for a moment getting into an energetic mood, he felt ready. Or as ready as he could be.

Angling his head to the sky he screamed at the top of his lungs “Fuck you Frogman!”

He laughed in exhilaration, adrenaline running through his veins. Virgil felt invincible. “And fuck your Frogmother too!” He raised his hand for a high five.

“Yes!” Logan exclaimed. As he stepped towards Virgil, he must have been too excited to look where he walked because his foot caught on a tree branch.

Instinctively Virgil went to grab Logan’s hand to keep him up, however, Virgil started hurtling towards the creek as well, knocked off balance. He gasped as he hit the cold water, a moment later crashing into Logan.

The stream had been quite shallow, a foot deep at most. Virgil, quite luckily, didn’t experience the brute of the fall, having fallen on top of Logan. He rolled off and tried to stand. He would definitely have a couple nasty bruises later, he thought to himself.

“Hey Lo, are you okay?” Virgil looked for the torch that fell out of Logan’s hand during his fall. It wasn’t far and within seconds he was shining it directly at Logan’s face. Logan didn’t appreciate it.

“I’m fine, I assure you but please get that out of my face. The light is blinding.” Virgil muttered a few apologies while helping Logan to his feet. Overall, whilst cold and mildly pained, Logan appeared to be okay overall.

The two were both standing up in the middle of the creek. Although their feet were still submerged in the freezing cold water neither seemed to notice nor care. Instead, they were both looking directly at each other.

They inched closer and Logan began softly “Virgil, I’ve been meaning to tell you-” however he didn’t get to finish that sentence.

There was a raucous splashing sound from further upstream. Then there was another, this time louder. Whatever was making the noise was approaching.

Virgil shared a look of terror with Logan. He grabbed the camera and started recording as a shadowy figure started to form. Its form was unclear, however, it moved forward the way a frog might, leaping up and forward. Virgil was sure, it was The Frogman.

“What are you waiting for, Vee? Run.” Logan urged him to come however Virgil was frozen in fear. This was the end for him. He’d never see Janus and Remus again. He’d never tell Logan how he feels.

Logan snatched the torch from Virgil and took his now-free hand into his. Glancing back to the shadowy figure a final time, he muttered a few profanities, irked, then started to run, dragging Virgil with him. This was enough to snap Virgil out of his state, as he started running alongside Logan as fast as he could. The sound of the Frogman thudding behind them, hot on their trail, motivated them to keep going.

Virgil would never consider himself particularly athletic, which paired with the fact his legs were quite short created a challenge as he attempted to keep up with Logan, however, Adrenaline paired with the fact Logan wouldn’t have let him fall behind if he wanted to keep him as far from the Frogman as possible.

The journey out the forest was a blur. Virgil remembered stumbling however he got back up immediately. Logan shined the torch in front of them so they didn’t run into any trees. As a few minutes passed the sound of the Frogman following them faded away but neither would risk stopping. They continued forward and by some miracle, they had returned to the clearing where they had started, Logan’s pickup truck only a few yards away.

Logan slowed down to a stop outside it. “It’s alright, he won’t follow us out here.”

“That’s… really… great… Lo.” Virgil panted. He could feel his heart pounding in his head as he breathed so heavily he thought he might cough his lungs out. “How…are you…back to normal…so fast?”

“Oh, I did track in high school. Now you stay there while I get something.”

Virgil leaned against the truck as Logan rummaged around in his glove compartment. He pulled out an emergency foil blanket. He wrapped it over Virgil’s shoulders. “I only have one so you better keep that on. That water was freezing and I don’t want you getting hypothermic. You’re still soaking wet after all. Are you injured anywhere?”

Unsure, Virgil checked. Sure enough, he had a cut on his shin. Damn, it must’ve happened when I tripped, he thought to himself. Only as the energy from the run wore off, he started to feel it sting.

“Is it okay if I clean that cut for you? I have a first aid kit in the truck’s cargo bed.”

“Thanks, dude, I would really appreciate that. You better get under this blanket right after though, you’re not allowed to get hypothermic either.”

Logan smiled then pulled out a first aid kit from the back of the truck. “You can have a seat on the grass.” Once Virgil did, Logan joined him. “How are you feeling?”

“Still in shock and denial. It’ll probably only sink in later tonight that we got chased by the actual Frogman. How about you?”

“Honestly…I feel incredible. We saw the Frogman! The Frogman is real” Logan grinned. “Also, this might hurt a bit” he warned Virgil as he disinfected the cut. He was right. Virgil’s eyes pricked with tears.

“It’s a good thing my jeans were already so ripped, that way people won’t even question this one.” he joked.

“Did your camera survive that? I hope it’s not water damaged.”

“Nah don’t worry, it’s been through a lot. A little fall and water aren’t going to be the thing to break it.” He inspected the camera. “Unfortunately…I can’t say the same for the footage. The memory card looks completely fried.”

Logan’s smile fell. “That’s a shame, although maybe it’s for the best. The Frogman can continue living his best life in the forest with no scientists looking for him since there’s still no evidence.”

“Really?” Virgil asked incredulously. “You. The smartest person I know. Is against scientists?”

“Well… I’m not against scientists but having watched E.T. as a kid, I wouldn’t trust them with any rare or unusual beings.” He put a plaster on the cleaned injury then looked at his handiwork proudly.

Virgil was bemused by this. “You do know that’s a fictional movie, right?” After Logan did not answer he decided it was best to change tact.

“C’mon, join me under this blanket so you can warm up before we drive away. I’m thinking we go to mine? I can make us some hot chocolate and we can decide what to do with the assignment. I can also lend you some dry clothes if you don’t mind being dressed Emo.”

Logan moved so he was sat next to Virgil, their shoulders touching as the blanket covered them. “Sounds great Vee.”

“It’s a shame we wasted the evening though.” Virgil moped, but then Logan turned to face him. Their faces were mere inches away.

“Actually, I wouldn’t call it a wasted evening. I had a lot of fun spending the evening with you. “

Virgil was more taken aback by that than he was by him cursing at the Frogman. “I enjoyed spending the evening with you too. You’re really kind and surprisingly easy to talk to. I hope we could maybe spend some time together after this assignment is over if that’s something you’d like?”

Virgil felt the tips of his ears burning as his face flushed completely. He knew he was being obvious now but it seemed worth it. Putting himself out there didn’t seem as scary with Logan.

Logan spoke as gently as he had when they were standing in the creek together.

“About that. I wanted to tell you something before we were rudely interrupted earlier.”

“Mhm?” Virgil murmured, not trusting himself to say any proper words.

“I believe I have romantic feelings for you, Virgil. I highly enjoy speaking with you and when you’re around my heart begins to beat faster. If you were to feel the same way I would love to take you on a date perhaps? With fewer cryptids, I assure you. If not-”

“Me too,” Virgil said, in disbelief, cutting him off. He didn’t want to hear the ’If not’ because he liked Logan back. A lot. He took hold of Logan’s hand.

“If it’s okay with you Logan, can I kiss you?” He was surprised by his own confidence, but it felt right. Everything felt right.

Logan answered not with words but by closing the gap between the two of them. It was short and sweet. According to Virgil, it was perfect. Perhaps the evening wasn’t a waste after all.

#analogical #tw injury #tw cursing #cryptid!au #spring fling 2020 #submission

24 notes · View notes

sabraeal · 5 years

Text

Odalisque

Written for @septhi-draw’s birthday; she asked for either some Shirayuki & Kiki or some Mitsuhide & Torou, and my original plan for it fell through (some chapters just got TOO LONG and the timing did not work out), so instead: a part of @onedivinemisfit’s Concubine AU that I felt would fit the bill!

Kiki did not make friends easily.

“I’m sorry.” The boy they have manning the pharmacy today is tall, fair, and sweet-faced; the sort of man that has a hometown girlfriend who snapped him up early and never let go. “Who is it you were looking for again?”

And dense as a brick.

“Sir Obi’s wife,” Kiki repeats, the request growing teeth. She’s said it at least twice, and by the rucked-up confusion on his face, she should prepare for at least once more. “She volunteers here. Small. Freckles.” She hesitates. “Red hair.”

“Ohh!” Finally, those big cow eyes spark with recognition. “You mean Shirayuki.”

“Yes,” Her smile is all canine. “Shirayuki.”

In the grand scheme of the royal court, an earl’s daughter -- or a count’s, as those southerners were apt to call themselves -- did not amount to much. A lady-in-waiting, perhaps. A season’s favored court decoration. Under another king, perhaps even a mistress. But in practice...

Seiran was an old name, older that the walls of Wistal and the Wisteria line by far. Before the flower kings of the south has settled their quarrels and set their sights north, Seiran had been ancient, siring more high kings than any of the other clans. It had been fortune, plain and simple, that had seen a Bergatt on the throne when they were all made to kneel.

And among the ton, it was power that intoxicated men, not titles.

There were no shortages of young counts’ daughters, nor earl’s, when she made her debut at court, but it was to her side that every young buck flocked. She flattered herself at first, believing that she truly was like no other woman they had known. After all, she was witty, she was educated, and she was unbeatable in the yard, at least by her own admission. None of these other court decorations could possibly compete with such interesting company.

That is, until the first proposal. It had confused her, as had his anger at her refusal. He had been a particularly close compatriot, one who had whispered wry commentary in her ear at dinner and trained with her in the yard.

What did you mean by all this, then? he had demanded, as if she had owed him something, as if she had whispered promises instead of jests into his ear. What did you think we were doing?

She had thought, naively, that she was making friends. And still did, until the second, and the third. At the fourth, a particularly persistent fellow, she informed him that she wouldn’t marry a man who couldn’t best her in the yard. The court had taken it as a joke, as a challenge set by a girl foolish enough to believe herself equal to a man.

It was not a misconception that lasted long. Neither did her popularity.

“Is there something you needed?” For once, he seems to gain an inkling of common sense and eyes her with a furrowed brow. “She’s not able to received patients.”

“Oh, no. No,” she assures him with a smile. “Nothing like that. I just thought she might like to go to lunch.”

Even though Kiki soundly rejected every young buck that dared to darken her father’s doorstep with sword in hand, it had not endeared her to the other debutantes of the court. They might have snatched up her spurned suitors, but none of them were grateful to her for the chance. No one enjoyed being reminded that they were second choice.

She had returned to Seiran happy to have her first Season behind her, happy to never return to the gleaming halls of Wistal. Which is why when Father proposed that she go to court again, Kiki had thought the Wisteria madness must have finally kindled on their side of the tree as well.

But when he suggested that she go not as a lady, but as an aide...

Well, Father was always full of clever solutions.

The wife emerges from the stockroom on coltish legs, taking each step as if it were her first. She sends a wide-eyed, helpless look behind her; her face is meant for it, eyes already too-large in her face, the rest of her features small and button-cute. She’s a doe in the clearing, wary of a hunter’s arrow.

Kiki’s mouth thins. She knows the type all too well.

It’s not a surprise when the receptionist comes out behind her, nor is the encouraging smile that lights his face, but --

But Kiki frowns at the hand at her back. She may not know much about love, about relationships, but she knows how hometown girlfriend would feel about that.

And a certain someone else.

Kiki did not make friends easily, but the ones she has...

She protects.

“Lady Kiki.” The girl shuffles, awkward, and for a long moment Kiki wonders if she might drop a curtsy, might show off some of that much-vaunted court training Tanbarun allows their courtesans --

But instead she nods politely, peering through her thick eyelashes with a wary expression. “Higata said you were looking for me.”

“I was.” Kiki tilts her head, offering her a small, toothless smile. “I hope that’s all right.”

“Oh, um!”

The girl is pale as cream, as is fashionable in both the Tanbarun court and Clarines, spotted faintly -- which is not -- and while Kiki looks on, red flares across her cheeks. Not delicate, not controlled, but blotchy, like she’s been slapped on both sides.

Oh. Well. She was under the impression concubines weren’t capable of that. At least, not anymore.

“N-no. I mean, yes. That’s fine. It’s only...” She puffs out her cheeks, clapping her hands to either side. If they weren’t so small, she might cover the whole of her blush. With a firm shake, she continues, “I’m not allowed to treat patients. Not that I couldn’t! But it’s only...pharmacy rules.”

Kiki holds up a hand. “I know. Your friend -- Higata? -- informed me. That’s not what I’m here for.”

Her brows are perfectly shaped, arched so that they may be raised ever so slightly in surprise, so that she barely needs to move in order to convey all the acceptable emotions a woman might have. After all, beauty did not wear wrinkles well.

And yet, she furrows them, forehead crinkling in confusion.

“Then why are you...?” Her lips close around the words. “I mean, what can I help you with?”

“Nothing too terrible, I hope.” Kiki pulls her smile wide, baring just the briefest flash of teeth, trying to radiate warmth, trust. “I just thought you might be hungry for lunch.”

His fingers arrive first, hooked around the balustrade, before his body hauls into view. It’s nothing from there to get a leg beneath him, and then another, perched on the rail like a cat on a sill.

“Glad to see you’ve finally showed up.”

Obi yelps, nearly slipping right off into the bush below. “Miss Kiki! I thought you’d be inside with Master.”

“I was.” She bites back a grin, sidling up to the rail beside him. “They’re talking about birds.”

He lets out a world-weary honk. “Still?”

“Still.”

“I’ve been gone for three months,” he sighs, settling himself on the balustrade, letting one leg dangle over the edge. “I thought you guys would be over all this by now.”

“Oh, you know Zen,” she tells him airily, “he’s very invested in...birds.”

Obi lets out a huff. “If he’s so invested, he should just go see them already.”

Kiki cocks her head, raising her eyebrows in a way that already has him squirming. “Is that your opinion as a married man?”

He makes a noise, something sister to a choke and cousin to a gasp but also neither, and she finally pays attention. “Is something wrong?

“Wrong?” he laughs, looking harried, looking hunted. “No! No. Nothing’s...”

Even before she came into Zen’s employ, Kiki had been the girl amongst the boys, the rose amongst the thorns, and as such, had honed her do not bullshit me expression to a sharp point. She can make even the most incorrigible man regret his choices at a hundred paces.

Obi only lasts as long as it takes for him to look up. “I don’t think she’s happy here.”

Kiki stares, but he won’t look at her, won’t look anywhere but the gardens with an expression she can only call tortured. “I’m sorry?”

“Shirayuki,” he sighs, and oh, she can hear the trouble brewing in that name alone. “She hasn’t said anything but...”

It’s not like Obi to run out of words, but he does, using a twist of his wrist to indicate that she should take them to their obvious conclusion. Which she does, with a twitch of an eyebrow and great zeal. “The honeymoon a bit of a disappointment?”

Obi, to her everlasting shock, blushes. “W-wha? No! That’s not-- I wouldn’t--” He lets out a pained pant. “Who teaches you these things, Miss Kiki?”

“Would it disappoint you if I said Garack?” He looks fit to choke, and, ah yes, his lovely new wife was one of the pharmacy’s newest volunteers, if she remembers correctly. “I could make up a lie if you like. I watched bitches in heat--”

“Please,” he creaks, holding up a hand. “Stop.”

Not if he is going to make chasing this rabbit into its warren so rewarding. “My, my. Is the illustrious Sir Obi, ‘I Light a Fire in Many a Girl,’ all talk?”

“N-no!” he snaps, defensive, straightening his spine as if another two inches might help his reputation. She doesn’t have the heart to tell him that’s not where it matters. “It’s just...”

She hums, lifting an inquisitive brow.

“I maybe haven’t...been the most truthful...” Each word falls from his mouth as easy as a pulled tooth. “About exactly how I ended up married...”

The enthusiasm is a surprise, to say the least.

“I’ll only be a minute.” The girl is practically bouncing on her toes, red curls bobbing brightly down her back, and has been since Kiki deigned to take a seat on their sofa. It’s from Viande, she’s heard at least twice; a wedding gift from Marquis Haruka.

Kiki eyes it warily when the girl bounds back into her boudoir to ‘ready herself.’ The last she’d heard, he and Obi had barely been able to stand being in the same country as each other, let alone room, and now Haruka was sending them wedding gifts.

“It was very nice of him, wasn’t it?” she calls out. “So generous.”

“It is,” Kiki agrees mildly, crossing her legs tighter. She could only trust that Obi had done his due diligence and searched it for poisoned pins in the like. After all, Haruka was no dear friend of his, and Viande was the city of...canals.”I hadn’t realized you were so close to the marquis.”

“Oh, yes!” In all her wildest imaginings, Kiki had never dreamed that she might hear someone gush over Haruka, but here she was, listening to Obi’s own wife recommend him for heaven. This is where her life had led her.

In retrospect, it only made sense that Obi was to blame.

“If it weren’t for him,” the girl continues blithely, “I never would have...”

There is a hiccup, a hesitation. The moment practiced liars sail through with nary a thought. “The marriage was his idea.”

Hah. That made this particular gift come into focus. It had been Haruka, after all, that was sent to Tanbarun’s court, who had been meant to broker better relations with their neighbor. Obi had ridden along as an attaché, something between personal assistant, body guard, and spy.

He’d threatened to vomit when Zen told him. But now, well -- it only makes sense that they had reached some level of accord. So much had changed in Tanbarun, that might as well too.

“I admired the pattern before.” Her words come slower now, more careful, as if she’s sifting every one. “Obi’s room has something similar, when he...”

The silence hangs heavy between them, and Kiki lets it. The longer it ages, the more awkward it becomes, and she bites back a smile. There is no better way to get the measure of a person than to see how they squirm in the absence of idle talk.

“Anyway,” the girl huffs out with a limping laugh. “I’ve held us up enough.”

The door swings open, and -- and Kiki expected a full walking gown, expertly made and expensively embroidered, just flirting with the amount of humble restraint a knight’s wife is supposed to show. Instead it’s a short dress, hardly embellished at all save for the wrap around her waist, with leggings beneath. It’s a style she’s seen in the market, worn by the city girls who wander it; something practical yet fashionable --

And on Obi’s wife, wholly unexpected. Kiki stares down at her own tunic, cinched tight like a bodice, and her own pants, tailored close to her shape like a man’s buckskins, and realizes -- there are some who would see them and say they matched. Peas in a pod, to quote her father.

It should bother her more than it does.

“We best get going,” Kiki says, wincing at how the words trip out of her mouth, ungainly. She takes a breath, composing herself. “After all, I would hate to take up too much of your time.”

Small fingers grip her vambrace, and those wide eyes shine up at her. “Oh, please.” Every syllable shakes as Shirayuki speaks, tremulous, “no moment would be wasted with you, Lady Kiki.”

“Oh.” That is...entirely too earnest a sentiment for a woman like this. Kiki gently tugs her arm free, gesturing to the door. “Then we should get started. I did promise you lunch, after all.”

“A concubine?”

Obi head whips over his shoulder, shushing her with a hiss. “You don’t need to say it so loud!”

His gaze darts all around, as if the dogwood or the honeysuckle might spread the word. Thought, to be fair, with the amount of spies at court, Kiki wouldn’t doubt a man hiding in the branches.

She settles a glare in him that quite eloquently portrays, it’s a pity I have to say it at all.

Obi withers, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Aw, Miss Kiki, don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” she asks, miles away from her body. “Surely you’re not the first man who led a mission of diplomacy with his--”

“W-wait! Wait.” He waves his hands, distressed, which is exactly what he’s going to be if he doesn’t explain himself in full. “It wasn’t like that at all!”

“Please.” Her fingers tap thoughtfully at her hilt. “Do enlighten me as to what it was like.”

“I know you only said lunch.” The girl keeps pace easily beside here, the thick curl of her hair bouncing with every step. “But I thought maybe...”

Kiki braces herself. Here it is, the first request. Something small, something that would seem innocuous. A stop to an expensive shop. And introduction to a handsome friend, a --

“Maybe we could go to the market too?”

Kiki blinks. That was certainly...small. “The market?”

“I’ve never been.” Her words rush out in a jumble, like a pack of ungainly hounds being called to dinner. “Well, not for a long time, and never here. I used to go all the time when I...”

Her jaw tenses, trapping the rest of the thought behind her teeth.

“Anyway,” she begins again, brighter. “I thought it might be fun. Just the two of us.”

It’s easy to see how she’s taken in the boys with this act; Kiki’s half-fooled herself. With her soft blush and those down-turned eyes, the way her conversation keeps skidding to a halt, well --

She may not be a man, but she is a knight. Her job is to protect the weak, the helpless.

She just doubts this girl is one of them.

“Of course,” she says, smile firmly in place. If this girl wants to give her more time to figure out her game, Kiki will cherish every second. “Let us go to the market, Lady Shirayuki.”

She takes two steps before she realizes the girl hasn’t moved. “Lady--?”

“Please,” the girl blurts out, “there’s no need-- you shouldn’t--”

Kiki may not trust her, but she’s savvy enough to know when distress is feigned, and this -- this is not. “Is something--?”

“Please.” The girl takes a deep breath, summoning a tremulous smile onto her face. “Lady Kiki. You can just call me Shirayuki.”

It’s only when Kiki snaps her jaw shut that she realizes it opened at all. “Then you’ll have to call me Kiki.”

The girl smiles at her, so bright and wide and genuine that it hurts to look at. “All right. Kiki.”

The texture of her disapproval is different this time, at least. “Have you told Zen?”

His grimace tells her everything she needs to know. “Not in...so many words, but,” he hurries to add, “His Majesty knows!”

Kiki let out a sigh. Of course, Izana knows. It wouldn’t surprise her if he had records of the first day of her menses and the proposed date of her next, let alone that his brother’s idiot retainer married a concubine straight out of Prince Raj’s seraglio.

“I had to ask permission,” he tells her, as if this should clear him of his idiocy. “Well...it was after the fact. But I did ask.”

Her pulse presses against her temples, and oh, will she have a headache later. “And what did he say?”

“Well...” He pulls at his shoulder, eyes rolling heavenward. “He was very...skeptical.”

Oh, to put it mildly, she’s sure.

“But he understood we had a limited amount of choices, and an even tighter amount of time to make them in.” He shrugs a shoulder. “His Majesty seems to like her now.”

Kiki’s mouth draws flat. Of course he did. Every man seems to like her. All men want to be needed, and she gives that to them in spades. The girl is practically irresistible.

“Oh yes.” Her teeth buzz with her annoyance. “And His Majesty’s reason could never be compromised.”

Obi nods, without a hint of irony. “Exactly.”

Kiki rolls her eyes. Men were utterly useless.

A single step into the market, and Kiki feels it, that pinprick on the back of her neck.

They’re being watched.

With an air of unstudied ease, she brushes a piece of lint from her shoulder. It’s nothing to flick a casual glance up, and -- yes, there. A man lingers in the shadowed maw of an alleyway.

Ah, so perhaps Izana was not so certain of the concubine’s loyalties after all.

“Oh, there’s an apothecary!”

Kiki startles; she barely has enough time to get her feet underneath her before she’s subject to the full force of Shirayuki’s gaze, as gentle and irrefutable as the tide. “Do you mind?”

It’s not fair that she can look at a person like that, not when her face is practically all eyes. “I would have thought you’d be tired of herbs.”

“Oh, no, never!” Kiki doesn’t recognize this smile on her; it’s wide, earnest, so different from the one she turns to the men when she needs them. “I was going to sell them, back before...”

Ah, there. Another smile is sacrificed to her silence, buried by the thin spread of her lips.

“I never get tired of them,” she says softly. Her fingers reach out, caressing a spray of dried lavender with as much tenderness as a lover. “Did you know? Garack told me I might take the apprentice exam the next time they offer it.”

Kiki blinks. “I...did not. No.”

“Oh!” Her eyes blow wide, hand clapping over her mouth. “I shouldn’t have said that! I haven’t even told Obi yet. I just--” her cheeks flush sheepishly-- “I suppose I got excited.”

Kiki isn’t used to this, this forceful need to support. “If Garack Gazalt personally invited you to take the exam, then there’s everything to be excited about.”

The noonday sun is bright above them, but it pales in comparison to how Shirayuki glows at her words, hands fluttering over her skirt like wild butterflies. “Do you mean it?”

“Of course.” Blind confidence has always come easier than tender feeling. “Garack is an excellent judge of skill.”

And character, she doesn’t add. That doesn’t feel pertinent, save to her.

She nearly jumps out of her skin when the girl grabs her, her small hands wrapping tight around hers. They’re soft, like she expects, but there’s hard calluses too, forming right at the palm and fingertips. Right where one might hold a pestle. Or a dagger.

“Thank you.” Shirayuki gazes up at her with shining eyes, a tremulous smile shaking her lips. “Thank you for saying that.”

It is not a choice to smile back, it is just something Kiki’s mouth does, unbidden. “I’ll say it anytime you like. You only need to ask.”

Shirayuki lets out a noise that is something like a laugh and something like a croak. Something not pretty, something real. “Thank you,” she says, eyelashes fluttering wetly, “but I think I’ll only need the once.”

“I’m worried.”

Kiki nearly snaps back, I’m worried for you, too, but she knows how he’ll take it, how her doubt will do far more than sting. She’s livid, ready to shake him down to his bones for being so stupid, but-- her trust is important to him. And despite all this, he still has it.

“About what?” The girl manipulated herself out of a seraglio and across a border; that she has anything to be unhappy about it patently ridiculous. Perhaps her prospects have disappointed her-- though Kiki can’t see how, not when both Zen and Mitsuhide are wound so tightly around her finger-- but if she was really so miserable, she’d have caught a hay cart to Viande by now.

Obi rubs at a shoulder, mouth pulled thin. “I think she’s...lonely.”

She stares. “Lonely?”

“I mean, I spend time with her!” he yelps, as if Kiki isn’t absolutely certain just what kind of quality time convinced Obi to hang an albatross around his neck. “And she volunteers in the pharmacy too. I just think she’s worried that...”

His mouth closes but his hand opens, at a loss, and -- and she knows. If anyone were to find out the storied past of Sir Obi’s new wife, that she wasn’t some court lady in Tanbarun but instead the first prince’s concubine--

Kiki knew all too well: the court of Clarines was not always kind. Perhaps they might smile; after all, Obi was the second prince’s aide, too close to the crown to cross, but --

Well, that has never kept an invitation from being misplaced. Or stopped the whispers that ran rampant behind fans. We cannot trust a foreign whore.

Kiki might pity the girl, if she didn’t know the type. She might not have a back door on this plan, but she has a half dozen windows. It’s only a matter of time before she takes one of them.

And it will be Kiki who has to clean up the mess she leaves behind.

“Maybe we should have invited the boys,” Shirayuki laughs, engulfed to the elbow with bags. “At least then we would have someone to carry things.”

Kiki tamps down on her impulse to agree. It would be nicer if they could saddle the boys with their purchases and let them sort it out. “We do fine enough on our own.”

Shirayuki gives her a speculative look from the corner of her eyes. “But Mitsuhide is so strong. It seems like a waste not to let him show it off.”

He’d carried her bags for her when they’d first arrived, the girl clinging to him like a limpet. She’d done the same at the festival in Yurikana, all big eyes and breathless voice when he’d bought her the shawl she’d been looking at --

“I like him quite a bit.” If the words seem bold, it’s nothing next to the coy look she casts at her. “Strange that no one’s snapped him up.”

“Hm.” Kiki manages. It’s hard to speak when she’s trying so hard not to pull hair.

“Mitsuhide,” she says again, like she enjoys the way it feels in her mouth, like it’s hers. “He’s your...?”

“Mine.”

“Ah, well.” Shirayuki’s mouth curls. “Then that explains it.”

Kiki does not make friends easily, but the ones she has, she protects.

Whether they want her to or not.

Kiki had planned to take the girl somewhere nice, upscale. A small Tanbarunian cafe had popped up in the market, popular now that their relations were so warm with Clarines, attended almost exclusively by the young, fashionable, and upper crust of the court. An irresistible spot for a spy longing for home, or a social climber searching for a convenient bed to hop to.

Shirayuki, of course, had other ideas.

“Are you sure you’ve never had a meat pie?” she asks, eyes incredulously wide. “I thought they had them everywhere.”

The last meat pie Kiki had eaten was expertly prepared by Seiran’s chef, served in a small, ceramic dish, garnished with fresh sprigs of parsley and sage; the entree to a very restrained five courses. A dish as related to the thing this vendor was hawking as a lion was to a house cat.

“Not one I could hold in my hand,” she says instead, eyeing the stand. “We don’t have many street vendors in Seiran.”

“Oh!” Shirayuki’s mouth spread wide, in a grin that was half pleasure, half mischief. “Then I’ll point out all the best things for you to try.”

There is no reason for her chest to clench like this, or for her eyes to tear, not when she has not given them permission. There is no reason for her to so fondly think of how that grinning mouth reminds her of another, when --

“All right,” Kiki sniffs, blinking away-- pollen. It must be pollen. Summer was terrible for...trees. “But remember, I’m paying.”

Her eyes round with distress. “But we’ll get so much! It’s only fair that I pay for my own, at least. I have some money--”

“Please.” Kiki puts a hand on hers, stilling it in her pocket. “It’s my pleasure. But,” she bites her cheek, uncertain, “you’re sure you don’t want to go somewhere--?”

“No, no!” Her hand twists, catching Kiki’s and twining their fingers. If Shirayuki usually smiles like this, Kiki really can’t blame Obi for stealing her away. “The food is the best part.”

“It would just be nice if she felt like she had a...” Kiki feels rather than sees his eyes dart to her, then away. “...friend.”

“A friend.”

“Yeah.” He rubs at the back of his neck, sheepish, guilty. “She didn’t really have much of a choice in coming here, you know?”

Of course he would think that. The girl practically throws herself at him, angling him into an impossible situation, and yet she is the one who lacked a choice in the matter.

Kiki has to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. Every man thinks a woman is born with both hands broken.

“All right, all right, I’m sure she wasn’t disappointed, so you can stop looking at me like that, Miss Kiki,” he tells her with a wry twist to his mouth. “But the whole marriage was...last second. I’m not really sure that she knew...”

She lifts a brow. “I think she had plenty of ideas about what to expect--”

“Miss Kiki!” he gasps, scandalized hand pressed to his breast. “I didn’t mean that. I meant...” He blows out a breath, color high on his cheeks. “I meant being married to me.“

Oh. It’s so clear on his face now, like the sun through parted clouds and, he-- he--

He’s in love with her. The idiot.

“I have a free afternoon next week,” she says, because she is too good of a friend. “Unless you don’t think you can keep her happy for that long.”

“Miss Kiki,” he breathes, and it’s too much having him look at her like that, like she’s -- she’s something special. Not Lady Seiran, not the second prince’s sword, but Kiki. “Thank you.”

Kiki marks another man as they stand in line, this one lounging on the terrace of a nearby cafe, noticeably not reading his broadsheet. There’s another that hovers by a stall with scarves, fresh-faced and staring so baldly that he must be new to the business. She’ll have to tell Izana the boy needs some work.

“I know it doesn’t seem like much, but there’s something satisfying about eating off a stick,” Shirayuki tells her, weaving through the crowd, “we just have to-- oh!”

Something chimes as it strikes the cobbles, and Shirayuki’s hands fly to her mouth. “My pin!”

With no thought whatsoever, the girl bends straight at the waist, and --

Ah, those are not Izana’s men.

Kiki steps up behind her, giving her a firm tug on the elbow to yank her upright. “You have it now?”

“I do!” Her cheeks are flushed, and Kiki is not the only one who notices. “I can’t believe it fell out.”

“Here,” Kiki takes the stick from her hand, sweeping up Shirayuki’s impossible locks into a knot, and pinning it tight. “Now you won’t lose it again.”

“Thank you!” She raises a hand, touching the simple twist with such reverence that Kiki feels heat flush at her own collar. “I’d be heartbroken if I lost it.”

“Mm.” Kiki squints, the dangling tassel all-too-familiar. “That’s the one Obi won for you, isn’t it?”

In that stupid streetfight, she doesn’t add. They both know exactly what she means. How could the girl not, when Obi had dragged himself through the festival like a man trudging to the gallows, all because they had some sort of falling out, one so quickly forgotten when his wife had realized that he’d fought for--

“Yes, in that stupid fight,” Shirayuki spits with enough vitriol to make Kiki blink. “He got himself a black eye for that too!”

“I know,” she murmurs faintly, “I was there.”

“Yes, you were! Ugh.” Shirayuki rolls her eyes. “It’s very pretty, but I wish he had just--” she lets out a frustrated noise that contained the sort of multitudes that only a woman could understand-- “men.”

“Men,” Kiki concurs, teeth bared as she meets the eyes of such creatures steadily in turn, letting them see just what sort of plans she had for those who could not control a wandering gaze.

They all seem to find the cobbles intensely interesting, all of a sudden.

With a toothy grin, Kiki loops her arm through Shirayuki’s, tucking the girl firmly against her side. “Now come on, our lunch is getting cold.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Kiki warns him, hating how her stomach twists. “We may not be friends.”

Most women didn’t take kindly to having their machinations exposed, after all.

Obi only hummed, his mouth curling at a corner. “You’d be surprised.”

“I don’t think I can eat all this,” Shirayuki admits, taking a bite of another meat pie. Juice dribbles from the edge of her lip, but she doesn’t notice, only shakes her head as she swallows it down. “I had us get too much!”

“It’s fine.” Kiki can’t help but smile, leaning in to catch the drop before it falls onto her skirt. “We’re sharing, after all.”

Shirayuki stares up at her with those too-large eyes, jaw dropped, and there’s-- there’s something that makes Kiki squirm in it. Something too close to awe.

“Right,” the girl murmurs, nodding her head. “Because we’re sharing.”

They settle into a companionable silence, picking at the dishes between them, nearly all of them fried and most of them stuffed with meat, and in a few memorable instances, sweet cream. It’s like nothing Kiki has ever had; the food may not be as high brow as she’s used to, or as expertly spiced, but there’s a sort of satisfaction to eating things from a stick, or biting into dough only to get powder all over her trousers. And the company...

Far better than expected.

“Kiki,” Shirayuki blurts out, red-faced, her head hung over her lap. “Before, when I said I was excited, I-- I lied.”

Kiki may have known this was coming, but she finds herself disappointed anyway. “Oh?”

“I said I was excited because of Garack Gazalt.” Her hands fly out, gripping on to hers. “But I was excited because I was with you.”

She blinks, staring down at the fingers that have clenched themselves white. This was...certainly a new way out of a loveless marriage. “Shirayuki--”

“There aren’t...” Shirayuki’s mouth wraps around her words again, stilling them, and -- and Kiki is so tired of it, so tired of watching her struggle past the things she can’t say.

“Please.” Kiki squeezes her hand. “You don’t need to do that around me. Say what you need to.”

“In the women’s quarters, we didn’t...” Shirayuki won’t look at her, her gaze fixed to where their hands clasp each other, to where Kiki has still not let go. “Concubines don’t make good company for each other.”

She wouldn’t imagine so, not when they’re all vying for the attention of the same man. And with one as flighty and useless as Raj...

“I’ve never had...” Shirayuki hesitates, as if she’s pulling out thorns to say it. “A friend.”

“Oh.” That throws this whole excursion into a new light.

“I don’t mean-- obviously, there’s Obi, but...” She bites her lip. “It’s different. You know what I mean?”

Kiki first got her menses in the castle, right on their first mission beyond its walls. Zen had stared at her as if she had been gored, as if she were about to die right in front of him. Mitsuhide had wrapped his cape about her and bundled her off to the first apothecary he’d seen, paying for herbs and fresh linen with a smile.

It’s natural, he’d told her as she’d stared at the rags with wide eyes, you might feel like you’re going to die, but you’ll be right as rain in a few days. At least, that’s what my sisters say.

Sisters. She’d clung to that; even through the cramping and bleeding, that had seemed to be the more important thing. Mitsuhide had sisters. Yet another crumb he’d given her when she’d been starving to know him, because even then she--

Ah. “Something like it.” She offers her a small smile. “It’s far past time we had another woman around here, at least.”

Shirayuki dares to look up at her, dares to let her smile mirror Kiki’s. “You know, when we first met, I was worried that you...well.” Her cheeks flush, two terrible blotches that Kiki can’t help but be fond of. “You’re very pretty, and knew Obi well, and, ah...” She gives her a significant look. “You know how well Obi can light a fire in women.”

Kiki gapes. She certainly knows how he thinks he can. “You thought...Obi and I...that we...?”

She shakes her head. It’s unthinkable.

“That’s why I asked about Mitsuhide!” Shirayuki giggles, squeezing her hand. “He seems very kind. And very handsome. So I thought if anyone might tempt you...”

“Oh.” She had said he was hers. Just. Said it. Because she thought that Shirayuki was... “Hah.”

Shirayuki’s mouth curves in a shy smile. “As I said, I like him quite a lot. I told Obi he’s just like how I imagine my big brother would be, if I had one.”

“Like a...” Mine. It had come right out of her mouth, so easily. “Brother.”

“Though,” Shirayuki’s smile takes a wicked cant, “I could see how a lady might feel differently.”

She had fooled her. Used her own preconceptions against her and got her to admit out loud something she would have happily taken to her grave, and--

And now she’s teasing her, mouth rucked up at a corner, so like her husband that for a moment it makes Kiki come unmoored, and--

“I only invited you because I thought you might be using Obi.”

Shirayuki’s eyes go wide, searching, before both their gazes drop to the space between them, as if she’s a hound that’s been sick on the carpet, as if her words might have made an actual puddle of sick between them.

“But I don’t think that anymore,” Kiki hurries to add, gripping her hands so tight she must be hurting her, though it’s nothing next to what her words have done-- “Not at all.”

“Oh,” Shirayuki manages, breathless. “Oh.”

“I’m...” This should not be so difficult, not when she has already said the worst of it, not when the damage is already done. “I’m having a very good time. I hope we do this again soon.”

Shirayuki’s breath rasps in the silence, sharp and wounded. She won’t answer, not when Kiki has already ruined everything by telling her--

“Yes!” Her fingers squeeze so tight their knuckles crack. “Yes, please. Anytime.”

Kiki blinks, lifting her gaze to finally look, and-- “You’re not upset?”

“Of course not.” Shirayuki’s smile is blinding, even in her confusion. “You like me! You-- you want to be friends.”

“I do,” she breathes, surprised at how much she means it. “I do. But I didn’t...this wasn’t...”

“Kiki, I understand.” Her head bows, wisps of red springing free from her twist to kiss their clasped hands. “Obi must have told you that I...that we...”

“You aren’t precisely a love match,” Kiki offers delicately. She refrains from adding, on one side.

“Yes,” Shirayuki sighs, relieved. “Any other man would have just left me to fend for myself, but he brought me here, even after...”

She hesitates now, but this time it’s different; it isn’t from shame or fear, but privacy instead. A moment between her and Obi, still too fresh to share.

“I know it can’t be easy to trust me,” she says, “not when he had so little choice.”

Kiki stares. “Obi?”

“I know that’s not precisely true--” Shirayuki flushes, blotching at her collar, her cheeks, her ears-- “but it would never occur to Obi that he could have just gone without me, and I--”

Oh, she knows that look. “You love him.”

“I--” Shirayuki drops her hands, blood draining abruptly from her face. So pale, her freckles sit starkly against her skin. “Is it obvious? Do you think he knows?”

Her jaw works for a moment before she manages, “I can say with all confidence that he absolutely does not.”

“Oh.” Shirayuki’s hands flutter to her face, pressing to the apples of her cheeks, as if she could keep the pink from them if she only tried hard enough. “Are you sure? I thought maybe that was why he wouldn’t lay with me.”

Kiki coughs. Good thing she hadn’t put anything in her mouth before that. “What?”

“He wouldn’t touch me in Tanbarun,” she says, thoughtful, “which seemed prudent of him, at the time. But now we’re married, and I thought...well, there must be some reason he hasn’t tried to, you know--”

“Yes,” she interjects smoothly, before any more of that sort of talk can arise. She could curse Obi, putting her into a situation like this. “I just...I’m quite sure that’s not the case.”

Shirayuki tilts her head, as if she’s mulling over some particularly complex puzzle, and heavens and stars, Obi is an idiot.

“But really,” Kiki starts, unable to help herself, “you haven’t don’t anything?”

“No!” Shirayuki moans, dropping her head into her hands. “And I left all my good lingerie in Tanbarun.”

“Oh.” She shouldn’t get involved, she shouldn’t, but-- “Are you done with your lunch?”

She blinks, staring down at the remains of the plates between them. “Ah! It is getting late. I should let you--“

“Oh, no.” Kiki stands, brushing off her trousers before offering out her hand. “We’re not done here.”

Shirayuki stares up at her, wide-eyed. “We aren’t?”

“Of course not.” Kiki grins. “After all, I know just the place for you to recoup your losses.”

#obiyuki #akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #my fic #concubine au #ans #this fic took THREE DRAFTS #THREE OF THEM #it was supposed to be 3k TOPS #and it ended up being nearly 7K #BUT I'M GLAD I DID IT #getting both Kiki and Shirayuki's voices in this were a bit of a challenge #but man it eventually worked out a lot better than I even hoped #and I got some Kiki/Obi friendship in here #and some background mitsukiki hints #ALL IN ALL A GOOD DAY

28 notes · View notes

happymetalgirl · 4 years

Text

May 2020

Umbra Vitae - Shadow of Life

Converge frontman Jacob Bannon is so impressively artistically prolific, sometimes to his own detriment, that I am hardly surprised by the arrival of and results of Shadow of Life, a more death metal-oriented project that still has Converge’s DNA all over it. Still teeming with wild hardcore energy, Shadow of Life is really not all too different in approach from any of Converge’s most direct work, Bannon pulling from a different elemental this time. The project’s brevity works in its favor, but despite being so short, it feels quickly exhausted of its creativity. Converge is made great largely by the dynamic of the band’s direct metalcore aggression and the variety of curveballs they throw in, but Umbra Vitae reduces that to the raw aggression that sure hits hard, but becomes easy to predict after not too long.

6/10

Havok - V

So it’s not as good as Conformicide, but Havok still deliver the goods on their unfortunately unimaginatively named fifth LP. The band’s Megadeth-esque brand of politicallly charged thrash shredding certainly comes at a particularly apt time and the riffs they deliver indeed sound inspired and the performances ripe with frustrating at the various systems that got us to this seminal moment in history. David Sanchez’ piercing, throat-grating screams are as fierce and fiery as ever and impressive in how quickly he’s able to rattle some of his lines off, and the rest of the band remain tight and cohesive across the album’s eleven experience-crafted thrash tunes. Compositionally I feel like there aren’t as many individual high points within songs that made so many tracks on Conformicide such ferocious bangers, but the band certainly still show themselves to be a good few leagues above average when it comes to writing potent thrash. Where I wish the album went harder was the lyrics. Granted this came out right at the beginning of May, before the killing of George Floyd, and was probably recorded and written before if not early on in the pandemic, but it still feels like it could have gone for more than just the usual targets. I appreciate the band’s tackling of the crisis of credibility of modern media on “Post-Truth Era”, their explicit condemnation of the United States’ unhinged military bullying overseas on “Merchants of Death”, and their acknowledgement of the bias/lies of retelling of history by the powerful and how the lies get bigger over time, but I wish the band were this precise and cutting most of the time on this album because so much of its lyricism is super vague, sometimes in a kind of non-comittal way. The song “Fear Campaign” points out the various ingredients in a fascistic rise to authoritarianism happening right now, but it never moves beyond the usual thrash tropes of distrust of government and corporate media. Meanwhile songs like “Don’t Do It” speak just a bit too generally of social despair to pack much of a lyrical punch, while the lyrics to the track “Phantom Force”, whole not particularly offensive, just repetitive paranoid gibberish. It’s not directly related to the music, but it doesn’t help that the band, who have built their identity so heavily on musical political commentary have been rather quiet in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the sharp heightening of the volatility of the political climate. You could argue it shouldn’t impact their music, but it does suggest that they’re intentionally trying to maintain a level of ambiguity in their railing against the system that will allow anyone to read their own ideology into certain crevices, an approach to artistic sociopolitical critique that isn’t really right for this time. Despite that criticism, I still quite enjoy this album for its continuation of the hypercharged thrash the band has been doing so well.

8/10

Green Carnation - Leaves of Yesteryear

Joining the ranks of recently reawakened bands, Green Carnation returns from their fourteen-year slumber with a five-track slab of their trusty slightly gothic/doomy prog and for the most part it goes pretty well. The band’s performances are solid and it sounds like they never even left. The album likes to sway between melancholic (but not entirely hopeless) forms of gothic sorrow and slower classic heavy metal forms of inspiring melody much like Khemmis, Spirit Adrift, or even Pallbearer. I’d say the opening title track is the example most rife with sweet guitar melody that hits this spot well, and while the rest of the album isn’t a drastic drop in quality, the band definitely hit with their best shot first, and overall make a pretty worthwhile comeback.

6/10

Vader - Solitude in Madness

The Polish death metal icons are on their twelfth album now and at this point for them it’s just a matter of proving to themselves that they’re worthy of their status as aforementioned icons of the genre. At this point their solid and consistent discography speaks for itself and justifies the band’s similarly consistent approach. While never being one for overly lengthy projects, Vader’s twelfth is one of their shortest projects to date, not even breaking the half-hour mark, but making great use of its brief runtime nonetheless with vibrant, pummeling performances and just enough compositional dynamic to bring out the quality in everyone’s performances. Sure it’s kind of predictably direct, but that has been Vader’s MO for decades and it continues to deliver ripe, juicy organic death metal, so I’m fine with them not changing their style up with how well they can consistently conjure a half hour or so of sufficiently exciting and potent death metal. What they decline in stylistic evolution they continue to make up for in raw, experienced, and expressive performances, and Solitude in Madness is just another example of it.

7/10

Chaos over Cosmos - II

Dazzling with proggy guitar technicality again on this quick response to last year’s EP, Chaos over Cosmos take another diversion on the vocal front, with the vocals on this album being both much less present and more predominantly unclean. The third track “One Hundred” is probably the standout cut of the four tracks here, layering on the synths and the whispered passages between space-traversing guitar leads. I still think the band could work on making the production a little more crisp and the compositions maybe a little more frequently injected with flair, but I definitely think they’re on the right foot going forward.

6/10

Witchcraft - Black Metal

Going the route of Thou on Inconsolable, Swedish doom occultists Witchcraft bust out an entirely acoustic album quite fit in its ultra depressing tone for these ultra depressing (or enraging) times. Taking such a minimalist approach does pose a bit of a gamble for any band used to a more bulky instrumental arsenal on the make-up-less appeal of the performances at the core of their ethos. Thou absolutely nailed it, and I’d say that Witchcraft are pretty successful here as well, for just how committed to potent acoustic depression Black Metal is. It’s a bit heavy handed at some moments, but for the most part it’s a well-measured half hour of candid sorrow at a rather fitting time for it.

7/10

Tortuga - Deities

I feel like at this point, I’ll give any band points for playing stoner doom and only half sounding like a Black Sabbath rip-off, and Tortuga definitely earn those points. This album actually released on the first day of the new year, but I didn’t hear about it until now, and I figure it’s worth propping up. Deities is the Polish outfit’s sophomore full-length after their eponymous debut in 2017 (which I also missed of course), and it is definitely a breath of fresh air for the genre it represents. Relying not on monotonous Iommi-imitation to carry otherwise thin compositions, Tortuga follow their own uniquely ambient approach to the genre that focuses more on building a dense atmosphere and mood with the thick, hazy guitars and rumbling bass lines than on numbed, bong-worshipping psychedelia. We get a few of the other staple elements of the genre: wild effects-pedal psychedelia, lyrics about mythical Lovecraftian monsters, and audio samples of old-timey Christian fundamentalist preachers fear-mingering about drugs; but none of it sounds contrived or unoriginal. Deities sounds like if Dopethrone-era Electric Wizard had a little more atmospheric dynamic and less on-the-nose Sabbath worship. Granted the vocals on Deities aren’t as fuzzed the fuck out and the bulk of the album is not dedicated to pissed-off, drugged-out, gargantuan heaviness, but it sure is a solid album in the path it walks for itself.

8/10

...and Oceans - Cosmic World Mother

Despite checking all the productional and stylistic boxes for a modern death metal record, Cosmic World Mother offers not very much in the way of anything compositionally or aesthetically unique or exciting. It feels almost like it’s just embodiment of the Emperor/Behemoth-inspired wing of the genre as a hive mind just on autopilot. The band crank out a few brief highlight motifs here and there, the occasional epic pairing of synthetic strings and tremolo-picked guitars, but most of the album is (while competent, no doubt) pretty one-note and predictable in a way that really only becons repeated listens to make sure you’re really sure you’re not missing anything from the homogeneous blend of songs together you remember from your last attempt to stay attentive through it.

6/10

ACxDC - Satan Is King

After a long road to their debut album back in 2014, grindcore stalwarts ACxDC finally follow up with a worthy sophomore effort this year, during which time Full of Hell have happily risen to the occasion on at least two stellar modern grindcore full-length (as loaded of a term as that is for grindcore) releases. But the L.A. quartet is back and quite fired up in the midst of the sociopolitical turmoil that we’ve all been submerged in. While more traditional in its instrumentation, not as laced with industrial noise elements as Full of Hell’s music tends to be, ACxDC captures a similarly powerviolence-adjacent thrashing intensity and the band do not take their foot off the gas at all throughout the 23-minute affair. The guitars blare with a shout all their own and chug with the kind of mechanically smashing crunch found in modern death metal, the drums and the bass lines are never over-the-top in terms of speed or technicality with the band opting more often for synchronized hardcore punches than grinding through blast beats, which probably puts this album deeper into powerviolence territory than I initially let on. And Sergio Amalfitano’s vocals shift from intense death howls and growls to fast-paced blackened hardcore shrieking with respectable fruidity, probably not as erratically as Dylan from Full of Hell, but certainly quite capably. I’ve been turning to a lot of intensely aggressive and violent metal in these infuriating times, particularly grindcore, and Satan Is King has been a solid addition to that alongside the new WVRM and Caustic Wound albums.

8/10

Old Man Gloom - Seminar VIII: Light of Meaning

The prequel to the band’s previously released full-length this year (Seminar IX: Darkness of Being) finds them in an even more esoteric vein than what they were in back in March. Oscillating between Sumac-esque sludge (which Aaron Turner’s vocals make those parts of the album featuring them all the more uncannily similar to) with subtle experimental flair and more modern-Mastodon/Isis-esque sludgy post-metal to full-on noise music experimentation, the band’s “eighth” “seminar” at the very least makes for a dynamic and interesting listen. Some of the band’s exhibitions in certain styles don’t really do much convincing for their branching off into those directions; some of the noise passages feel kind of like waiting at a traffic meter for a more invigorating portion of the album to kick in, as do some of the less-imaginative sludgy sections. But for what the collective do with their array of experiences, influences, and artistic instincts they come through with more hits than misses, I’d say. The longest track on the album, “Final Defeat” is impressively cohesive in its amalgamation of so many sonic elements. though the subsequent and similarly lengthy “Calling You Home” is an example of the other side of that coin, dragging and uneventful. It’s worth at least a cursory listen for its eccentricity alone, it may vibe with you even more than me, if not, at least it’s an interesting meeting of various creative minds in the post-metal sphere.

7/10

Xibalba - Años en Infierno

Offering an especially weighty slab of sludgy/doomy death metal with some tasteful streaks of hardcore and sludge metal mixed in to the dense swirl, Xibalba bring slow-churning, bulky death metal to the conversation of the various injustices and catastrophes of this year, and the band’s hardcore energy and knack for pummeling rhythms in that vein are exactly the kind of pissed off that such an album as Años en Infierno needs. And that hardcore compositional approach and/or mindset means that Años en Infierno is no homogeneously sluggish record; Xibalba pick up the tempo for rapid-fire hits of deathly hardcore punches and slow down to wind up for devastating finishing blows all with magnificent smoothness. Whether trudging through thick, filthy riff sludge like a massive beast stomping its way through a knee-deep muddy battlefield on slow burners like “La Injusticia” and the doom-laden “El Abismo, Pt. 1” or like that same muscular hulk sprinting on dry land on songs like “Santa Muerte” and “En la Oscuridad”, Xibalba are an organic, brutish force in all the ways I like my death metal and hardcore to be, at the same time.

8/10

Behemoth - A Forest

Named after the cover of The Cure’s “A Forest”, Behemoth’s EP-sized mark on 2020 is ultimately a mild one. Intended clearly to show a more eccentric side of the band with the theatrically tortured guest vocals from Niklas Kvarforth of Shining, the band’s cover of the titular track is really not all that wild for a band who came up from raw shitty black metal roots and traversed their way through blackened death metal to the biblical glory of The Satanist; the band have already shown their vast capacity for branching out from and expanding death metal and black metal, and this cover of The Cure happens to be just a more clumsy, rather than illuminating, display of that ambition. It’s not a terrible cover or a poor representation of Behemoth’s ambition, but I don’t think it’s quite the grand statement the band is making it out to be. The same can be said of the redundant inclusion of the live cut of the cover song. As for the other two tracks on here, “Shadows ov Ea Cast upon Golgotha” (which kind of drags and meanders with no real direction) and the more fast-paced “Evoe” (which is at least a lot more fastinstrumentally vibrant), both are solid enough cuts that sound very well like they could have come from the I Loved You at Your Darkest sessions, though not surprisingly notably below par for that course, much less the high bar of The Satanist, which ultimately makes this kind of a benign addiction to Behemoth’s catalogue.

6/10

Helfró - Helfró

This actually came out in April, but I’m late as it is so what the hell, hailing from the small, but mythic black metal scene of Iceland, Reykyavík’s Helfró make quite the standout statement with their self-titled debut record here. At a modest thirty-seven minutes, Helfró is a stinging and searing, but also impressively aggressively balanced display of black metal and blackened death venom. The guitar riffs are sharp and cutting when they need to be and also quite full-bodied while able to keep up with the high-flying tempo set by the double-bass-blast-beat drumming to capture the delirious hysteria of . The band takes their attack from the icy piercing of mountaintop blizzards of speed and distorted dissonance to fiery rumbles of hellishly low guitars and demonic bellows of damnation, and all with such control and gracefullness; I am all for it! This is a hell of a debut record and I will certainly be looking for more from Helfró to come.

8/10

Asking Alexandria - Like a House on Fire

After being completely put off by the band’s self-titled album a couple years ago, I have not returned to Asking Alexandria at all since then, until now with Like a House on Fire. Honestly, I was kind of expecting some sort of response from the band after such a light and messy album to prove to people like me that they can excel with heavy music still, and I mean the only way to go was up after the catastrophe that was the band’s self-titled album, right? Well I was wrong in the kind of response the band came through with; doubling down instead on their departure from metalcore, Asking Alexandria go all in on pop rock and arena rock in a way that I suppose constitutes a mild improvement, but not a justification for their doubling down. The band bit off way more than they could stylistically chew as they clumsily try to chameleon their way into several styles of pop rock. The class consciousness anthem “They Don’t Want What We Want (And They Don’t Care)” and the alternative metal power ballad “In My Blood” offer a brief glimmer of hope for some vital, conscious arena rock for the album, but the shitty motifs and writing decisions don’t take long to follow. With its gratingly annoying vocal riff, “Down to Hell” sounds like a rejected 2000’s Shinedown song (or a 2010’s Shinedown song). “I Don’t Need You” is a glam rock ballad brough to the 21st century with a knock-off-Halsey feature before “Take Some Time” comes through with more annoying vocal wooing. If not outright awful, Like a House on Fire is most often just aggravatingly wash-rinse-repeat boring and banking on current pop rock trends that Asking Alexandria don’t even have a great handle on. Danny Warsnop’s clean vocals and uncomfortable attempts at coming across sultry are especially hard to listen to, as are the completely out of place and unmeshed EDM elements that pop in and out of various tracks. I wasn’t the biggest fan of Bring Me the Horizon’s last album’s blatant pop campaigning, but holy shit at least they were competent and showed they could handle the variety of styles they implemented. Asking Alexandria are clearly trying a similar angle here but they’re not capable of mimicking Shinedown and Imagine Dragons better than either of those bands, and that’s saying something.

2/10

Revenge - Strike.Smother.Dehumanize

Coming up among all the great new grindcore I’ve been finding these past few months, Revenge bring a distinct blackened edge to the brutish force of grindcore and powerviolence. While a pretty effectively churning grind of manic drumming, chaotic bass lines, and jagged guitar galloping, Strike.Smother.Dehumanize is one of the more homogeneous grindcore records I’ve heard this year, spiced up mostly by the artificially low-rumbling toilet bowl growls (that do lose their novelty before the album’s finish) and the consistent individual flair brought by each members’ performances. But compositionally, the band doesn’t really abide by much more than the usual grindcore mantra of constant intensity, but at that it sure is successful.

7/10

Bleed from Within - Fracture

The fifth album from Glasgow’s Bleed from Within brings such a pedestrian and unambitious of a forty-two-minute offering of melodic metalcore as seemingly possible. It’s just like the definition of a baseline, C-grade performance with passable performances of predictable resortings to of metalcore’s most trodden out tropes; like I saw the opening track’s title, “The End of All We Know”, and I knew exactly how that chorus was gonna go before I even heard it. For its few sick breakdowns like those on “Pathfinder” and “Utopia”, there’s just so much more filler generic metalcore (and some completely unsatisfying breakdowns too) to get through. I’ll give Ali Richardson credit for coming through with some impressive double-bass syncopation that sometimes breaks from the metalcore mold to give the music som brief flashes of being more than ignorable metalcore, and I’ll acknowledge the considerable gusto of Scott Kennedy’s vocal performance across the album as its most consistent positive feature, but it’s not enough to make me eager to return to Fracture as a whole or even throw any tracks into my workout playlist.

5/10

Okkultokrati - La Ilden Lyse

In their prolific first decade or so of action, Okkultokrati have done a decent job injecting grimy hardcore crust punk and a head-turning variety of other styles into the kvlt black metal of their Oslo hometown. After nearly four years of crafting since their most aesthetically ambitious effort to date, Raspberry Dawn, La Ilden Lyse is a bit of a regressive and stylistically reductive letdown after its lush and fascinating predecessor. The production of the black metal elements is much cleaner now, but the trade-off isn’t worth it, especially given that the fuzzier production of the previous albums kind of partially contributed to the unique aesthetic the band cultivated. I don’t know what the point was of going more traditional/typical this time around, but the band certainly aren’t making a stronger case for themselves by blending in MORE with their contemporaries. I hope this is just a one-off and the band get back to making more interesting black metal again soon.

5/10

Alestorm - Curse of the Crystal Coconut

I said in my review of Alestorm’s previous album that I am continuously amazed at how the pirate metal masters are able to keep finding material in their super specific vein, especially with how fresh 2017’s No Grave But the Sea sounded while returning to the more “traditional” sound that characterized the band’s debut album. Somewhat unsurprisingly, Curse of the Crystal Coconut finds the band playing around with their sound a bit in a similar way to what they did on Sunset on the Golden Age, and I would say this year’s effort to grow their sound went a good bit better than it did on that aforementioned preceding album. The band are as irreverent in their wacky sea shanty storytelling as ever (and I wouldn’t have it any other way), though they bring a few “futuristic” (for pirates’ times) elements to the table here, which a folk metal purist could certainly argue are blasphemously out of place on a record about pirate life, but if you’re a purist like that I doubt you’re listening to a sixth Alestorm LP to begin with. I actually think the band did well to make these new elements a part constructive to the overall campy aesthetic of their sound. Opening the canon hatches is “Treasure Chest Party Quest” with a hedonistic schlock rock mission statement that sounds like if Kansas were a bunch of Viner douchebags, but moving into the melodic shanty “Fannybaws” right out of the gate reaffirms the band’s folk metal chops. But it’s the introduction of hip hop elements on “Tortuga” that shows Alestorm is here to sail pirate metal to the farthest corners of the seven seas as they can; the band’s foray into trap territory under the influence of this lighthearted and loveable ambition with Captain Yarrface on this track is honestly impressive. And the band’s experimentation doesn’t end there, with “Zombies Ate My Pirate Ship” also featuring the unexpectedly beautiful vocal feature from Patty Gurdy. All these modern music elements made me ponder the possibility of a modern, internet-pirate-themed Alestorm record; perhaps someday... Beyond just the introduction of electronic elements, the thrashy folk bangers like “Chomp Chomp” and “Pirate’s Scorn” are welcome shots of liquor to jolt the album into pirate eager mode while melodic folk metalcore bangers like he nonsensically gorgeous “Zombies Are My Pirate Ship” are surprisingly invigorating. The quick metaphoric jab at the band’s imitators (or detractors) on “Shit Boat (No Fans)” is a good bit of fighting pirate spirit breaking the fourth wall creatively. There’s also the ridiculously overly epic sequel to the fast-chanting nonsense track, “Wooden Leg”, from Sunset on the Golden Age, whose conclusion is so beautifully stupid *chef’s kiss*. Honestly, I needed this album so badly this year, and I’m glad Alestorm came through with such a fun expansion pack of pirate metal tunes.

8/10

Sorcerer - Lamenting of the Innocent

I don’t know what happened. I loved this album the first time I heard it, but my enjoyment with every subsequent listen since then has been significantly diminished. Perhaps I was just appreciative of the dose of classic heavy metal with tasteful modern production updates to liven up my repertoire of new albums to listen to. As grand, nostalgic, and even 2000’s-Maiden-esque as Sorcerer’s sixth album is, I can’t help but feel at least somewhat distracted by how heavily derivative it is of the NWOBHM, even as it takes some cues from Candlemass and Dream Theater to elevate its grandiosity through proggy, epic doom metal. Now all those influences do combine into a generally effective and exciting aesthetic, and I do think the core sound the band have tapped into is potent and worth chasing, as evidenced by songs like “Institoris” and “Dance with the Devil”, but that sound at its best doesn’t show up in full enough on this album. Lamenting of the Innocent is hampered so heavily by its length and the proportion of that length that is comprised of filler balladry like “Deliverance” or the just slightly too dragged out “Where Spirits Die” and unnecessary repetition that draws out even the better parts of the album like the title track. For all this nit-picking, I feel like I should at least emphasize that I do still quite like this album for its solid performances, especially Anders Engberg’s tactful operatic vocals and the distinctly NWOBHM-style duel-guitar soloing from Kristian Niemann and Peter Hallgren. I do hope that Sorcerer do continue to distill their sound down to its best elements because I could see them being a shining beacon for the continued reverence for the era of heavy metal they so heavily emulate.

7/10

3 notes · View notes

anneapocalypse · 5 years

Text

RWBY 7.05

Almost caught up! I wanted to fit 5 and 6 into one entry, but this episode is just too dense, so I’m giving it its own. That said, I have seen episode 6, which is going to color my reading of this episode—so fair warning for vague spoilers for that episode.

I’m trying to keep all spoilers under a cut as a courtesy. If you reblog with added commentary, please use a readmore so I can reblog it back without spoiling my followers.

Again, disclaimer that my knowledge of RWBY lore is not nearly as extensive as my knowledge of RvB; I’m working on it. Feel free to politely correct me.

I love Ruby’s enthusiasm for Huntress work! It’s a nice reminder that while graduation may have been anticlimactic, being a Huntress has always been Ruby Rose’s dream, and that part hasn’t changed.

Ironwood’s plans for Amity tower means diverting resources and protection away from Mantle. So, I’m sure that’s going to go well. RWBYJNR are helping out around the perimeter, as well

On a rewatch something caught my attention in the working/training montage. Clover’s voice-over gives them their briefing. “I think you’ll find everyone appreciates having a Huntsman around,” he says, over a shot of several citizens fawning over Jaune and one giving him a homemade casserole. “You’re of course free to enjoy your time off as you see fit,” Clover adds, in a knowing tone. “Whatever helps you take the edge off.” A statement which connects to nothing in the montage. His next statement, and the next snippet in the montage, are about training.

So I can’t help but connect that remark about taking the edge off to the one about people in Mantle—poor people desperate for protection.

That reads to me like Clover likes to use his Huntsman status to uh, enjoy the company of Huntsman groupies grateful for protection. And that’s. well. Yeah, I do not like that. I still like the rest of the Ace Ops, but I’ve lost any respect I had for Clover.

Nice to see a cameo for Team FNKI!

Ren’s irritation with Nora continues.

Qrow’s tension with Clover also continues. And Clover delivers Qrow a genuine compliment, which is at least one point in his favor. Qrow also verbally acknowledges he’s given up drinking, which is really great follow-through from last season. I’m proud of him.

Here we meet Robyn Hill, confronting the supply convoy on behalf of Mantle. She seems prepared to take the truck by force, but Penny’s intervention stops her.

Clover doesn’t really seem interested in the fact that from Robyn’s point of view, her concerns about the supplies are one hundred percent justified. His tone says he considers her no more than a common criminal. Robyn is using what we call direct action. That said, she does seem to want to avoid unnecessary violence—especially when she realizes Penny is protecting the truck.

“The Protector of Mantle, huh?” she says pointedly, and judging by the flicker of regret on Penny’s face at that, the jab lands. Mantle has been left in the hands of a team of brand new Huntspeople while its supposed Protector is too busy protecting supplies diverted away for some other project.

Robyn has a point here.

And the fact that someone like Robyn Hill has made it all the way to the Council election speaks volumes about where Mantle’s political climate is right now. I don’t want to get into comparing RWBY characters to real-life political figures because none of them are perfect analogs and they aren’t meant to be. But suffice it to say that a populist figure like Robyn Hill gaining mainstream popularity is a harbinger of social unrest, and a politically-savvy person would recognize that from a mile off.

Ironwood, unfortunately, is not a politically-savvy person. That, I think, he has shown in spades. Remember last episode, when Penny commented that his speech conclusions were getting better? That indicates this is something he’s been working on. Ironwood knows he’s not a strong public speaker. He’s at least that self-aware. But it’s really just the tip of the iceberg where his political failings are concerned.

Ironwood’s heart is in the right place, but he is paternalistic and bullheaded in his methods. He believes that if he can just get the tower built and share his message with the Kingdom, everyone will understand why he’s done what he’s done. He’s deeply underestimating the damage this unrest can do in the meantime, and the potential allies he’s alienating.

I love the sister moment between Winter and Weiss. Even though Winter’s path is not the one Weiss wants to follow, it is very good to see Winter supporting her in distancing herself from their family.

And here, at last, we meet the Winter Maiden, Fria. Who is being kept in complete isolation except for Winter Schnee, who is meant to take her place. Winter has embraced that destiny with pride. Even so… there is an increasingly theme of isolation around the Maidens. Amber was alone when she was attacked. Pyrrha was offered the succession in secret, and it drove her to sacrifice herself alone without her team. Raven… well, she’s a special case, but she’s a solitary figure in a sense too, never letting anyone get too close to her, and those that get close seem to suffer. And here is Fria, dying alone. The Maidens seem to be assigned to the four Kingdoms, so it’s not like they work together. Though they are four, they are not a team. They inherit a gift they never asked for, bear its burdens alone. And die alone.

Man, that’s a downer.

But once again, we see this theme emerging in volume 7: isolation vs. family. Winter is willing to bear this burden alone. Weiss, again, chooses her new family. But she and Winter, at least, have been able to choose their own way, and they find common ground in that.

This is one big reason I’ve gotten so much more enthusiastic about RWBY in recent years. It’s not just that the story is stronger, that the characters are getting stronger arcs, that the art style is more professional and consistent. It’s that the show is growing more and more thematically tight. The writing isn’t just compelling within the arc of a season or the mini-arc of an episode. It has direction. It feels purposeful.

And that’s why I’m so excited about where the story will go next.

Last episode concluded with Watts making contact with Jacques Schnee and this episode wraps up with Jacques making a startling announcement: on the eve of the Council election, he is closing down SDC operations, putting countless people out of work. Jacques himself, of course, is wealthy enough to ride out what will probably be a brief gap in his profits. The same cannot be said for the working class of Mantle. Jacques is walking the line right between blaming Ironwood for his decision, and effectively blackmailing voters with their own jobs, over which he has complete control, to vote for him. It’s an ugly move, and it’s so overtly ugly that it could, in a fair election in this increasingly populist climate, cost Jacques the election.

In a fair election.

But we’ll get into that in the next episode.

#rwby7 #rwby spoilers #read like roses

4 notes · View notes

solidarityinloneliness · 5 years

Text

Love is a privilege… but sometimes that’s okay

This week, we focused on the topic of “Realization of the Self Through Relationship” by watching Call Me By Your Name (Guadagnino - 2017). We also read two analyses of this beautiful film by Miles Rufelds and Joanna Di Mattia. While Di Mattia argues in “Beating Hearts: Compassion and Self-Discovery in Call Me By Your Name,” that the film epitomizes a young man’s sexual awakening by creating an environment full of both “compassion and desire,” Rufelds argues in “But Seeing Through Whose Eyes: Call Me By Your Name and the Mechanisms of Love and Fantasy” that the film is a “tone-deaf parade of bourgeois privilege.” I asked myself, do I find the film to be a representation of empathy-inducing coming of age (like Di Mattia), or a display of privilege so ostentatious that it is inaccessible to the audience (like Rufelds)? After some consideration and doing research on my own, I concluded that I side more with Di Mattia than with Rufelds. However, I feel that Rufelds’ commentary on Guadagnino’s manipulation of the viewer is an essential element that plays towards the film’s favor.

According to Indiewire, Guadagnino set the film in 1983 rather than the book’s original setting of 1987, in an effort to keep the characters “untouched by the corruption of the ’80s—in the U.S., Reagan, and in the UK, Thatcher.” A Guardian interview with writer James Ivory also mentions that scenes of Elio’s parents discussing AIDS and HIV were deleted from the script prior to production. In short, there were deliberate efforts to rid the film of any political statements. The idyllic atmosphere of CMBYN that Rufelds finds so “completely unrelatable” is a deliberate choice made by the production team. Guadagnino was never interested in making a movie grounded in reality. When Rufelds cites Theodor Adorno to state that “capitalist media lure viewers into an encompassing, inescapable fantasy,” he means to criticize films like CMBYN. In the case of CMBYN, however, this very encompassing, inescapable fantasy is exactly what the film wants.

Guadagnino takes full advantage of the Perlmans’ privilege to “enrich” the story. Precocious yet naive Elio is free to explore his sexuality because of his family’s money. After all, Oliver is staying with the Perlmans as the personal intern to Elio’s father, helping his research in return for staying at the Perlmans’ beautiful estate in rural Italy. While Oliver researches with Professor Perlman, Elio is free to enjoy the summer with hobbies like reading dense literature and playing music. All of Elio’s hobbies share in common that they are activities of solitary contemplation, a necessary process for adolescents. Elio’s revelation of his feelings for Oliver is only through a conversation about history, a topic he seems to know so well that Oliver rhetorically asks, “is there anything you don’t know?” as if to be in awe at Elio’s talent and musical upbringing. So in a way, it is Elio’s very preoccupation with privileged hobbies that allow for them to create a connection.

With this privilege as the backdrop for Elio and Oliver’s upbringing, the other key element of CMBYN’s setting allows for Elio to explore his sexuality: compassion. Di Mattia states that “the film’s fabric of compassion… provides a safety net that allows his contradictions to surface – not as character flaws, but as positive elements of his self- and sexual exploration.” By his contradictions, Di Mattia is referring to Elio’s attraction to both Marzia and Oliver. When Elio confesses his feelings to Oliver, he says it shyly, but not because he is ashamed, but because he is not used to being vulnerable. Elio says, “If you only know how little I know about things that matter… You know what things.” Later instead of making Elio’s confession a point of conflict Oliver kisses him. In the film, Oliver is both the object of Elio’s adoration, and the subject of guidance to Elio’s adulthood. Instead of bashing Elio for having feelings, Oliver guides Elio to feel and act in a way that makes their relationship feel important yet secretive.

Just from Oliver and Elio’s relationship alone, we see that the film is grounded in empathy. However, it is Elio’s scene with Professor Perlman that truly hits the nail on the head. When Elio is sad that Oliver has returned to the U.S., Professor Perlman teaches Elio to feel grateful to have made a connection with Oliver, rather than feeling remorseful about his departure. Professor Perlman says, “He was good... You were both lucky to have found each other because you too are good.” Until this moment, not once do the parents explicitly state their awareness of Elio and Oliver’s relationship. In other words, Professor Perlman is compassionate enough to observe them from afar, and intervene only when Elio needs his guidance. Furthermore, saying they are both good implies to Elio that Professor Perlman recognizes that their relationship was special. Allowing his son to recognize his own self worth and think optimistically are the two best ways that Professor Perlman can be to help Elio as a father.

Some viewers might question, “If the film is so compassionate, why does it end with Elio finding out that Oliver is engaged?” Di Mattia makes a poignant argument on this point. She states, “Guadagnino asks us to show Elio compassion too, in the truest meaning of the word - to suffer with him, and feel what he feels.” Di Mattia is referring to the closing credits sequence, in which Elio stands in front of the fire and cries. The placement of the viewer as the fire is fascinating, because the viewer becomes the fire. By becoming the fire, the audience gets to observe Elio at his most vulnerable moment. I believe that this is Guadagnino’s way of saying, “It is now your turn to feel compassionate to Elio.” The most skeptical of skeptics may think that Elio is a privileged teen without any obstacles in his life, but when he see Elio’s face after losing his lover, he must feel empathy towards him. Whether it was the film’s explicit intention or not, it is clear that Guadagnino wants the audience to understand that adolescence for queer individuals like Elio is hard, even when they have all the resources they need.

CMBYN is a rare queer film that doesn’t make a big deal out of the characters’ sexualities. In a way, I think Guadagnino is interested in creating a utopia that he hopes one day will be available to every queer person: nurturing, abundant environments where young queer individuals can explore love with partners of either gender.

I don’t think that every queer film has to depict utopia the way CMBYN does, however. To further this point, I find it useful to take a look at Moonlight (Jenkins - 2016), another popularized queer film in the recent years. Unlike CMBYN’s European upper class setting, Moonlight portrays a poor black neighborhood in Miami called Liberty City. Critics of CMBYN would likely hail Moonlight as being more grounded in today’s political reality of poverty and racial segragation. However, I would argue that CMBYN creates a lustful and compassionate utopia in a way that Moonlight does not, due to the very fact that it is set in a world so removed from reality. CMBYN’s “Somewhere in Northern Italy” setting allows Elio to fall in love, while Moonlight’s Liberty City hardly gives Chiron a chance to feel vulnerable. According to Pamela Demory’s “Moonlight, Adaptation, and Queer Time,” Moonlight is set in queer time, which she defines as “urgency of being [that] also expands the potential of the moment and… squeezes new possibilities out of the time at hand.” In this way though, I don’t think films like CMBYN and Moonlight are particularly different. Both films demonstrate a new approach to Queer Cinema, in which the film reconstructs a potentially traumatic past of a queer character into a series of euphoric and pivotal “moments.” By doing so, the viewer of such movies can begin to see that love is love, regardless of sexual orientation.

1 note · View note

centaurrential · 4 years

Text

1-2-3-Yes!

My, I’ve been very productive over the last few days. I’ve experienced an upwelling of inspiration, and I find it in the oddest of places. In my last post I went on a mini rant about cleanliness, and how the people we rely on to bring us to that state have had the tables turned on them. Make no mistake though, I do like to tidy the bedroom before I sit down to write. We’re always trying to create order in our lives because we’re just reflecting the need for security, and clarity. I give credit to my own happiness for my ability to write again, and in a more focused way than ever before. I’m a natural thinker, a conceptual problem solver, and I do get this ‘high’ from being able to sort out my thoughts, and to put them in a form where they can find themselves in the world.

I consider myself a late bloomer in the sense that during the years I spent in university, when you’re supposed to be reaching your peak, my point of view on my own thinking was cracked. I felt like my thoughts were muddled, there was no clear direction, and that led me to doubt my capabilities. I can’t even count the number of times I’d decided I’d be switching majors. I’m sure my parents were anxious about that. I’d be told I was smart, and my private response would be “what the fuck?”. I felt inauthentic, like a bloody fraud. That I got there by pure luck. There was a thick fog in my mind. But over the last little while I feel the cohesion of my thinking, and the way I see myself, cementing incredibly rapidly. Again, I owe this to My Own Happiness, generously holding a mirror up to me wherever I go, so that I may see myself more accurately.

In a way, language--its mechanics, its malleability, the mind-blowing and surprising connections contained within it--has followed me through life. For many years it wasn’t a thing I thought the core of me--it was more like people telling me I had a talent for it. But where to apply such an idiosyncrasy? Reflecting on my years in university, I think that the trouble I had settling on one major was just an indication that this essential thing in me refused to be bound by the constraints of a certain ‘discipline’. And ‘discipline’ is the right word for it. I tried organic chemistry, for instance, and while I found it fascinating I felt like being in a lab was suffocating too, because it didn’t answer the questions I had in me that were begging to be answered. Screaming, really. I am expansive and I wanted to find what responded in kind, with encouragement. The closest companion I found was the body of Philosophy, but ‘thinking critically’ had its limits too.

I never got my degree. The courses I took never amounted to anything considered ‘viable’, but I was hopelessly obsessed with ‘the big picture’. And in my mind, I could never achieve that understanding by specializing.

No matter how other people viewed me, there was a wall between me as an agent, and me as people perceive me. I felt like this lost soul wandering the earth, not grounded in anything, no roots, no ability to explain what and who I am. Now seeing how vital Language is to my entire being, I finally have found my identity. It moves me; it is meaningful to me.

Anyway...

I suppose the theme of this post is ‘measurement’, but the two major things I want to comment about greatly diverge in terms of the meaning they give to that word. This post consists of a bit of cultural commentary, but there is also a deeply metaphysical component to it. I feel that, only for now, I might exhaust those ideas that are clamouring to be let out and to dance in the air. Like I said though, more will come.

So lately I’ve been addicted to watching “The Crown” on Netflix. I never really cared about the Royal Family--the gravity of their divinity never struck a chord with me. To me, they were always just these stuffy, uber aristocrats with a solid, unmistakeable and long and celebrated genealogy. Their “direct” connection to God, above any other humans, seemed rather arbitrary. Lucky, maybe. There wasn’t anything in me that the publicity surrounding them yanked at. Until “The Crown”.

It’s obvious there is no way the depiction is totally accurate--there are a lot of secrets. But the show as a whole really gets you thinking about the way they view themselves. It’s clear that while they live a privileged life in terms of their financial reserves, their status in the eyes of the public, and a thick protective entity swaddling them, there is also this agony they feel, bearing the prison-like responsibilities that come with being who they are. Of course, the agony is underplayed because they are British and they are the Royal Family. Poise, measured expression, is king. One particular conversation the Queen Mother had with Queen Elizabeth II made me think, damn, these people are like the X-Men!! Along with this divine power they have, they think of themselves as endangered, as super-humans, precious and vulnerable. During the period depicted--from roughly the late forties to the late sixties--they seemed to spend more time making sure this mysticism surrounding them was intact, rather than doing anything else.

It’s pretty astonishing, the internal conflicts depicted, the contradictory nature of their roles. Every single damn move they make, which might penetrate the barrier between them and the British public, requires careful thought and a weighing of all the options. Elizabeth and her sister Margaret are often played up as foils of one another, and in one episode Prince Phillip remarks that this has always been the case throughout the family’s lineage. One is reserved, the other is a free spirit. I know absolutely nothing about the real Princess Margaret but the way she is depicted in the show is never something I would have expected from a royal other than Prince Harry. She drinks like a fish, smokes in every scene, is vulgar and impulsive. So the royal family isn’t a mere pillar of tradition, stuffiness, tight rules and manners. That’s not what sets them apart from everyone else. It’s the feeling of their own institutional, legitimized divineness, the sacredness they carry deep inside of them, that makes them different.

In the first season, John Lithgow’s Winston Churchill gets a lot of screen time. Again, I don’t know much about Churchill but I vaguely recall learning that he had quite the way with words. It’s really impressive, the art he could create, speaking, ad-libbing, on the spot, using such obscure vocabulary. It’s like he’s creating the verbal equivalent of an Impressionistic painting. And he does it with such defiance, such exasperation, that it’s quite a thing to see.

But, we enter an entirely different linguistic world when we watch films like Save the Last Dance. I re-watched it recently, because I love dancing, I love hip-hop, and every now and then I feel like immersing myself in a deep well of nostalgia. I particularly appreciate Kerry Washington’s character--Chenille, a high school-aged black, inner-city single mother--because of her ability to communicate an incredible intelligence and character where everything she says is sharp, austere, emotionally meaningful, and deeply insightful. The use of metaphor abounds here too. Able to sympathize with an antagonist, she knows the political is personal.

A while ago I started reading “The Language Instinct” by Steven Pinker. I never finished the book, because the honest truth is that I rarely ever finish books. It’s a dense volume, but I did glean some important things from the limited amount that I did read. The crucial thing is, if you can derive meaning from something spoken, then the grammar is right. Churchill’s use of language is long, flowery and drawn out, and by contrast Chenille’s is short and economical, but they impact with equivalence. Both characters use language artfully, but the colour, the diction, the wit, the grammatical structures, the cadence, it’s all evolved according to their respective cultures, which are vastly different. Both styles are things of beauty to me.

I so appreciate hip-hop as an art form. Not just beats, melodies, though those are important too... But imagine Winston Churchill trying to stuff everything evocative, in a song, with as much efficiency and skilled wordplay as the great hip-hop artists. I’m not sure people would be rushing to award him a Grammy...

Now on to the more common type of measurement: the mathematical kind.

In a metaphysics class I came across the question, “are numbers real?” Well, yeah! Of course they are, if you think of the sense in which we use them. But outside of their practical utility, are they pure in the sense that they tell you something on their own? If you think of the sequence of Arabic numerals from 1 to 9, you think of the corresponding numbers as ordinal. 1 is first, 2 is second, 3 is third, etc. In terms of quantity, however, it might be more transparent to think of seven apples as a group of apples where the number 7 is transformed from having an ordinal quality into quantitative one. Don’t let multiplication fool you; what we are doing essentially is adding 1, the simplest integer, to every group of apples we have. One apple added to one apple is two; one apple added to two apples is three, one apple added to three apples is four, and so on. In this context the multiplication sign is mere notation; it doesn’t capture the reality of the counting process. And ordinally speaking, numbers are like stairs. Every 1 added to the previous ordinal digit gets us from one ordinal spot to the next, in a linear fashion. And there aren’t really any ‘decimals’ because it is helpful to think in these terms via ‘wholeness’. After all, our psychological tendencies are to organize and make sense of things using the innate concept of wholeness.

I can think of a way in which the numbers 1 to 9 and beyond might be real, but you’d have to think of them as ‘geometrically stable’, or in terms of the relationships between each “one”, rather than as “groups of things that don’t know each other and don’t interact”. For example, three would be thought of as an equilateral triangle, four would be thought of as a perfect square, five a pentagon, six a hexagon, and so forth. If the angles are all equal, I wouldn’t be surprised if this geometry was sacred in its own right. (Astrologers use geometry a lot, to determine whether what is called an “aspect” is beneficial or not. Example: trines (triangles) are much easier to deal with than squares, which signal tension.)

You could continue increasing the number of apexes as long as you like, but as the number of apexes you add to your geometric shape (which MUST contain equal angles) approaches infinity, you approach a perfect circle. It just occurred to me that the numeral for zero also looks like a perfect circle. Not really sure what that means, but it is interesting because zero is thought to be very different from infinity, indeed.

I should mention here that it’s entirely possible someone’s already figured this out, but I want to take it one step further and remind you of the implications this has for what we think of as the stuff of reality.

I think of the above process as a calculus of sorts. But the hard thing to wrap one’s mind around is the notion of infinity. Essentially what I am doing is a thought experiment, extrapolating from the series of geometric shapes that are related to one another because of the ordinal addition of 1 to each sequential quantity of apexes (corners, angles). You could think of ordinal numbers as “slots”, with quantities being the total summation of the things that occupy those slots. In fact that might actually have been the third component to my first-year calculus class, which I was totally unable to comprehend.

What I was describing above was 3 and up. But what about 1 and 2? Well, one is just a point; we’ll get to that in a second. 2 would be a line segment: a line drawn from point A to point B. I should note here that 0 and 1 have special status as binary numbers (like the kind that are used in computer science, but that also have other meanings... which is where we get into the REALLY New Age stuff! not yet though). But two is special on its own because there is a relationship between points, but no angles, and therefore no apexes. The utility we get from its own analysis shows us how to reach infinity in the so-called “opposite” direction (maybe ‘complementary’ is a better word) from the one I talked about above.

If the number 1 represents a point, how small can we get that point? Any point you can form, either on paper or in your mind, will take up some sort of space in terms of the Cartesian plane. If it takes up space, its size can be reduced. Usually people think of halving things, so we’ll go with that. Off you go, dividing your point into smaller and smaller constituents. We’re approaching infinity again, because theoretically there is an infinite number of times you can divide this point. But wait, don’t points make up line segments, which are finite? That must mean your line segment is made up of infinity points. That must mean there is infinity in the finite! What a concept.

Over the years I’ve thought about changes, and what it takes to make a significant change in something. (In mathematical notation, change is represented by a triangle, known as the Greek letter ‘delta’.) An interesting study was once done to examine how newborns count. They don’t do it ordinally like 1, 2, 3, 4... They do it in non-linear ways. Some tribes in the Amazon count that way too: there is no need to have a concept for large quantities of things, probably because there is no utility if you’re not measuring something like the distance from the Earth to the Sun, or even building cathedrals for that matter. Anyway, babies “count” by noting differences in quantities of things, not absolute values.

Here are some examples: there is a huge difference between one apple and two apples. Visually, you can tell. You don’t need to go, “okay! one, two...” You just know. As the number of apples in the original set increases, the quantity of apples added to generate the new set must increase too, in order for there to be a sensible difference between the two sets. The production of difference is dependent on what your origin (set A) is, and how the value of the addition relates to your origin, not just the mere fact that there is an addition.

I’m trying to break down the process of change-making. So the other day I was at the train station getting some tea. I like having my tea with my cigarette. I was pouring sugar into my tea when I thought, would a single grain of sugar make a difference in the taste of my tea? What about 2? 3? 100? At what point will I be able to tell the difference between the plain tea and the sweetened tea? Depending on how fine your units are (in the tea example, it was a grain of sugar), the leap from one ordinal step to the next ordinal step may bring about no change at all. It’s like observing 167 black apples, not arranged in any strict fashion, and then having one more black apple added to that group. Unless you’re a savant, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell.

Let’s think ordinally for a moment. It’s theoretically feasible to add granules of sugar, one by one, to your tea. Let’s forget for a second that concentration is an issue; after every granule added we taste the tea, or find some other way to measure its sweetness. We know there is a threshold between non-sweet and sweet, we can taste it! But what is the point at which we cross that threshold? We’ve already established that one granule of sugar plus another singular granule of sugar (so two granules of sugar in the entire cup of tea) doesn’t make a difference in the taste; the quantities are too minuscule to produce anything. After all, all the sugar anyone has ever added to their tea has ALWAYS been significantly more than just two granules. Somewhere along the way, a shift happens. But how can this be the case if sugar granules come in discrete “quanta”? So even though the difference in sweetness is undetectable between granule number 1 and granule number 2, the change can be detected further along the temporal axis of my pour...? The only explanation is that the power of the single granule of sugar beyond that threshold is dependent on what’s already in the cup. That’s not a linear progression. You know what that sounds like to me? Fractals.

Another example I can think of is the increase in sonic volume. Depending, again, on the unit of volume change decided by the manufacturer of a stereo system, if your volume is at a certain level, one step up may not be significant in terms of the volume of music you sense with your ear.

I mentioned Wittgenstein in my last posting. Along with language games, another thing that stuck with me was the conceptual problem with standard units of measurement. The problem was that we don’t really have an absolute, hierarchical source that gives us the absolute dimensions of a standard unit. The closest thing we have to that is the new definition of a ‘meter’, which is the distance light travels in one second. But how long is a second? Anyway, when we try to grasp what a “pound” is, we may use other units of measurement like grams and ounces, and then we attach a numerical figure to that. An interesting thing to note is that often these conversions aren’t tidy numbers made of integers. They often contain a number of decimal places, things that are not pleasing to the human eye. Why wouldn’t someone just arbitrarily set the value of a pound at 250 grams? That would make things easy for us.

So, not knowing too much about the background of this area of study, I wonder if the real definition of measurement, with numbers not being easy, nor arbitrary at all, is “the quantity of something that is required to induce a significant change in something.” But now we must think of the subjectivity of a thing like sweetness level, because biologies can differ widely from person to person. Some people are sensitive to sugar, others less so.

Measurement as we currently think of it is supposed to be objective, but it may be the case that for many areas of life, it is not objective at all. Also, things are easier to digest, to handle, when everything is rounded nicely. You see that in itineraries: there aren’t too many times you’ll see a lecture scheduled on paper to start at 3:27. In our grocery store, 6 boxes of granola bars for ten dollars, flat! You get my meaning.

I thought a while ago about what gives words, seemingly random compilations of letters, meaning. One thing I came up with was that meaning emanates from boundedness. Take homonyms, for example. If we are aware of only one meaning for a word, then that’s that. That’s boundedness. But if we are aware of two or more, we need at least a clause, a sentence, effectively surrounding that word, cushioning and giving it its actual meaning. That’s another type of boundedness. Numbers may be elemental, but when we use them in daily life, in politics and whatnot, we’re always using them in context, to deliver something, to get from point A to point B. Take 38591. We can see the structure of the number, but what is it telling us? 38591 dollars? Miles? Kilograms? Years? 38591 isn’t part of the set of numbers that I would say is sacred. It doesn’t tower on its own. It is in need of something. Most things are in need of something to give them the quality of meaning, of truth. That something is “relationships”, interactions with things thought to be on the outside. Once you initiate analysis into this chain of relationships, you start to see that there are very few things that can exist, in a stable state, on their own.

I finish by saying it’s these little peculiarities, the mysteries, the counterintuitive (the world is chock-full) that I love to think about. The world is so much more, so different from what the Enlightenment told us it is. There is still room for wonder and awe. Once you stop experiencing awe, the world is a little less bright.

0 notes

scripttorture · 7 years

Text

Sources

So this isn’t exactly a Masterpost. Good sources on torture are hard to find and it’s not always obvious what they cover. I’ve had a couple of people recommend fictional titles in the comments and while fiction can be helpful for working out how to handle torture in stories it is rarely accurate and no substitute for factual sources.

I thought it might be helpful to give everyone a quick run down of the sources I’ve found most useful and what they cover.

This may well be edited in the future as I find more books. :)

Torture and Democracy by D Rejali

This is basically the book on torture.

It’s the size of a breezeblock.

Rejali covers torturers and victims, provides a systematic breakdown of why torture fails, gives a history of electrical torture, an analysis of factors that encourage torture in society and an overview of how the law fails torture victims. Interrogation is extensively covered.

This book covers torture in the modern era globally and in that area it is very thorough. Historical torture is not extensively covered.

But for a thorough understanding of the topic and modern torture, Rejali is a must.

Why Torture Doesn’t Work: The Neuroscience of Interrogation by S O’Mara

O’Mara’s book is much more focused on science than Rejali’s. It is a point by point analysis of some of the most common ‘clean’ (ie non-scarring) torture techniques used today, explaining exactly how harmful they are and debunking claims that they’re not ‘real’ torture.

O’Mara’s speciality is the brain and he uses his knowledge to show the biological under-pinings of why torture can not work.

An excellent source on torture generally and a brilliant explanation of how pain, memory and distress work. This is useful for writing any traumatic event but doesn’t cover a wide range of torture techniques and is very Western-focused in its approach.

Cruel Britannia: A Secret History of Torture by I Cobain

While I have some problems with Cobain’s book he remains an excellent source.

My problems are pretty simple, Cobain’s a journalist not a scholar and he often allows apologist arguments to creep into his book. He often takes torturers’ word for it and believes them when they suggest that valuable information can come from torture.

Rejali and O’Mara will tell you why that’s wrong.

But the interviews in this book are incredibly valuable. Cobain interviews victims and torturers and sets them in a wider political context, showing how governments have supported or ignored torture.

His interviews on the London Cage and the collected work on Ireland, Aden, Cyprus and the Mau-Mau is well worth a look for anyone interested in those conflicts in particular or the British ‘National Style’ of torture in general.

Sourcebook on Solitary Confinement by S Shalev

Shalev’s Sourcebook is a free resource that’s available online and an excellent break down of the damage solitary confinement causes.

While this is obviously focused on one technique this Sourcebook contains pretty much all the information you could want on solitary.

The majority of the data comes from US prisons and the book is obviously biased towards confinement in a prison context. But the discussion of symptoms, risk factors and long term effects makes this utterly invaluable.

Any author who writes about solitary confinement or isolation should consult at least the second chapter.

Mao’s Great Famine by F Dikötter

One of the best books on famine in print.

The style is somewhat impersonal, but I think that works in its favour. The focus is essentially on how widespread famine can occur rather than how starvation affects the individual.

The discussion on community and the role of enforcers is particularly good.

I’d recommend it for anyone writing a large-scale natural disaster or atrocity.

Amnesty International Reports (Annual 2016/2017)

Amnesty’s annual reports give good concise updates on torture globally, year by year. They are freely available online and generally contain a lot of survivor accounts.

It can be difficult to find specific information using them. You can not, for example, tell from the summaries whether particular techniques are covered. They rarely contain follow-ups on survivors and so are not a good resource for the recovery process.

But the accounts of survivors, in their own words, are invaluable.

World Food Programme

An excellent resource on starvation and malnutrition. If you want to know how a starving or malnourished character would be treated or recover this is probably the best free resource you can find.

Very good for physical effects and for descriptions of disaster relief programs. Not so great on survivor accounts or giving an idea of what starvation feels like on a personal level.

International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims

If you’ve been following my blog for a while you may have heard of these guys. Not only do they work to support torture victims but they also publish a free online journal dedicated to helping survivors recover.

Rather academic and dense, this material often requires a lot of effort and engagement. This is very much the academic side. It can be incredibly helpful, but it’s not always easy to find the information you’re after.

A Darkling Plain by K R Monroe

A collection of interviews with survivors of a wide range of atrocities, Monroe’s book shows a real range of both traumatic events and responses to them.

The main focus of the book is how people move on with their lives after atrocities and how they hold on to their sense of humanity. As such it’s incredibly useful to authors whose writing touches on these themes and authors who want to include a wider range of realistic responses to traumatic events.

Highly recommended.

The Wretched of the Earth by F Fanon

The appendix contains some of Fanon’s notes on people he treated during the Franco-Algerian war.

These notes include two torturers, a family member of a torturer, victims and relatives of victims.

This is still one of the most valuable readily accessible sources on torturers’ behaviour.

The Question by H Alleg

Alleg’s account of torture during the Franco-Algerian war is a classic for a reason. This is a lucid, often harrowing account of torture failing from a victim’s perspective.

I talk about victims refusing to cooperate. Alleg describes what it feels like from the inside.

I strongly advise anyone writing from a victim’s perspective to read this book.

We Wish to Inform you that Tomorrow we will be Killed with our Families by P Gourevitch

The Rwandan genocide. This book provides both an overview of the events, interviews with survivors and transcripts/quotes from the time period.

A difficult but important book, and extremely useful for writing conflict and war crimes.

A History of Torture by G R Scott

This book was written in the 30s and boy does it read like it was.

The casual racism and sexism is extreme and off putting however this remains one of the most thorough books on historical torture globally. Just…read it with a critical eye.

To the Kwai and Back by R Searle

This collection of war drawings is, in my opinion, Searle’s best and most affecting work.

They chronicle Searle’s experience of the Second World War as a prisoner of the Japanese. The drawings document torture, starvation, forced labour and death marches and are interspersed with Searle’s commentary and memories.

The book serves as both a survivor’s account and (as Searle is looking back) a discussion of how he as an individual recovered. It serves as a very good source on large-scale atrocities seen from a personal perspective.

Nonviolence: The History of a Dangerous Idea by M Kurlansky

The focus of this work is in the title but torture crops up in this wide ranging historical narrative time and time again.

It won’t be relevant to everyone’s stories, but I’m including this book for its numerous moving examples of people across cultures and history resisting torture, slavery and genocide without violence. We have very few fictional examples of this kind of action, and the history is rarely remembered.

I want you, my readers, to be aware of as many sources as possible so you can break the mould if you want to.

Tell Me Where I Can Be Safe: Human Rights Watch report on LGBTQ Rights in Nigeria

This is a pretty harrowing read containing a lot of rape and sexual violence as well as torture. Victim accounts are prominent and the report only covers a relatively recent period in one country.

I include this because my reading strongly suggests that it is typical of anti-LGBTQ violence across much of Africa and the Middle East. The methods and tactics used crop up across multiple countries and have been known to occur in Europe (though Gay and Trans Rights legislation has helped combat such violence).

As a result I think this is a very valuable resource for writing torture and abuse of LGBTQ people specifically and an extremely important resource for Western writers who wish to write LGBTQ characters who are not from the West.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by R Skloot

An incredibly valuable overview of unethical experimentation in modern America.

While far from a complete survey this book covers unconsenting or uninformed experimentation on minors, mental health patients, black people and prisoners.

It talks about how experiments were conducted, how subjects were chosen and the effect on both the victims and their families.

Highly recommended for anyone who wishes to write unethical experimentation.

The Horrible Histories Series by T Deary and M Brown

Yes these are children’s books and yes I am sure they deserve a place here.

With their focus on the ‘gruesome bits’ of history these books generally contain quick and accurate overviews of historical tortures. Descriptions of punishments, methods of execution and medical treatments at the time are present in almost all of these short, accessible books.

The focus is on English history as such there’s a lot that isn’t covered, but they’re very good for getting a sense of the tortures that were used during different historical periods quickly and easily.

Men and Hunger: a psychological manual for relief workers by H S Guetzkow, P H Bowman, A Keys, 1946 (The Minnesota Starvation Experiment)

This is not the full text but the 70 page summary sent out to relief workers immediately following the experiment. This covers all the important psychological and physical effects of starvation in enough detail for an author writing a starving character to find it extremely helpful. It contains a lot of specific examples of behaviours and quotes from the men involved with the experiment, giving a rounded, detailed sense of their experience.

However it does contain some racist and sexist language common during the 1940s when it was written.

UN Human Rights report on Rohingya refugees from Myanmar

This is the UN report on the on-going genocide/ethnic cleansing taking place in Myanmar.

The report contains accounts of murder, rape, gang-rape, torture and the murder of children. It also contains brief statistical analysis of the crimes survivors reported witnessing or experiencing (over half of Rohingya women reported being raped or sexually assaulted, over half of the survivors interviewed reported that a family member had been murdered).

This could be useful to people writing about ethnic cleansing and genocide. I think it gives an overview of the situation within countries where these crimes occur, giving a sense of what they’re like before, during and after these atrocities.

War Child: Reclaiming Dreams

This is a quick summary of the effects war has on children by the charity War Child. It focuses on the work they do in various countries; it aims to raise money for the charity and awareness of the causes they’re involved in.

It provides a decent, quick overview of the many factors that affect children in war; both as civilians and as combatants. It talks about how children are used by armies (pointing out that the idea of they are always forced to fight is false) and how families and children caught in the cross fire are affected.

A useful source for authors writing about children in combat zones and a good starting point for anyone planning on writing child soldiers.

The UN Standard Minimum Rules for the treatment of Prisoners, aka the Nelson Mandela Rules

This is a pretty dense legal document outlining how prisoners should be treated and the conditions that are a minimum acceptable standard for keeping them.

It’s tough reading but it could be useful for anyone planning to write about prisons and prisoners in a modern setting.

The collected works of S Kara

Kara’s research on slavery today is based on almost twenty years experience and thousands of interviews with enslaved people across continents.

He covers both individual experiences and the larger global picture of modern slavery. He covers multiple countries and slavery in different kinds of industries.

He also provides a thorough and convincing breakdown of the numbers; how many slaves there are today and where. This is accompanied by a clear analysis of how slavery has been allowed to continue and what needs to be done to stop it.

Brilliant, harrowing, necessary books that are a must for anyone writing about slavery.

Disclaimer

#tw torture #sources #solitary confinement #modern torture #historical torture #clean torture #scarring torture #unethical experimentation #starvation #famine #atrocities #homophobia #survivor accounts #torturers #behaviour of torturers

293 notes · View notes

gigsoupmusic · 5 years

Text

Jason & The Rex Goes In-Depth about New Video "Bullets Are Flying" - Exclusive Interview

Recently debuting with an activist video on gun violence, Jason & The Rex is stepping onto the scene with "Bullets Are Flying". A mixture of hip-hop, future-funk, and dream-pop combine to create a dense soundscape of vibrant horns, a melancholy piano lead, and strange-sounding synths. Jason's pensive, sometimes manic, flow washes over creating a dialogue on the gun violence issue in the US. Jason was kind enough to sit down and give GIGSoup the exclusive inside scoop on the creation and inspiration behind "Bullets Are Flying". https://youtu.be/g5DTa6cvfcs Tell us about writing the song "Bullets Are Flying"…. what emotions were you feeling at the time? Chaotic. Disoriented. There’s a scene in Dario Argento’s Suspiria where one of the characters falls into a pit of barbed wire. The more she tries to escape, the more she bleeds. It’s a mangled inner conflict. That’s kind of how I felt when I was writing “Bullets Are Flying.” I felt more and more entangled in a barbed wire mess of thoughts and emotions and political jabs and daily, present concerns. When the Parkland incident happened, I was already feeling very professionally and creatively stalled. I’m an actor by vocation. At the time, I was going for a lot of Chinatown thug types -- violent, gun-wielding, angry Asian dudes. I was getting rejected over and over again for projects that I didn’t really even believe in. I felt inauthentic as an artist. Music was supposed to be my outlet, but everything I created was stale and uninspired. And the worst part, I felt like I was failing as a citizen. I was -- and still am -- a reasonably privileged adult who has skills and a higher education. The gun crisis stripped teenagers of their adolescence, and those teenagers responded by standing up to the gun lobby and the politicians they controlled. What was I doing? Beating myself up because, after several attempts, I still couldn’t land a part as a stereotype on Iron Fist? Something snapped after Parkland. All the “thoughts and prayers” and familiar rallying cries came to a fever pitch, and I just started writing down…stuff. I was trying to express grief, to articulate my panic and anger, while also trying to provide commentary. I wanted to find an explanation. And someone to blame. A way out. Or a way forward. I wanted to crack the code on gun violence. I was also coming to terms with my guilt. My social posturing. My vanity in all of this. In trying to create this piece, was I turning the attention to myself? It wasn’t joyous or inspiring. It was a regurgitation of all the thoughts and feelings -- all the stuff -- I hadn’t processed.

The refrain of the song actually came to me much earlier, quite randomly. I like to think it’s because it’s more of a passive observation. Bullets are flying. Where? And why? While they fly, people are mourning. These are constants. Whereas, the two verses -- they’re snapshots of that gloomy winter morning when I was pacing back and forth on my bed trying to make sense of Parkland. It’s like I was trying to extricate myself from the gun culture and the epidemic it has created. But every thought would just pull me back into the mess. Barbed wire. Can’t help thinking about it. Gun violence. Mass shootings. I dream of ways to reshape gun culture. But, uh oh, gun culture has shaped giant parts of who I am. And I contribute back into gun culture. Not only do I love a bloody action thriller. I routinely express my love for John Wayne movies. I think the Punisher is a pretty cool anti-hero. In debating and discussing issues related to gun violence, we shout into our echo chambers while attacking opposing views. We display our alliances. We present ourselves on a side. Scoring our solidarity points is just as essential to gun culture as shooting the guns themselves. In writing this song, I was incredibly self-conscious. Was I just filling my notebook with solidarity points and quips from self-reflection? I offered my perspective on gun violence, while simultaneously reflecting and taking apart that perspective. I felt angry and powerful. But I also felt guilty and insignificant. Is saying something mostly an empty gesture? Probably. But not saying something is equally, if not more, disconcerting. Maybe this song is entirely descriptive of this emotional purgatory I create after a mass shooting like Parkland, where processing anything is just squirming in my barbed wire, while bullets are flying. What is your favorite lyric in the song? "I’m an actor, so I know how to weep. "

There are lots of hidden layers and meaning in the video… can you tell us what some of those are and why you chose to include them? I’m pretty fluid with my interpretation of the video. But most days, it goes something like this: Setting - The characters are in a place of purgatory. It’s that place I create when I’m trying to process gun violence. They may or may not know each other. Screens - On the screens, the characters stare at scenes involving their physical selves. Characters - I play the boy, and we designed the look to reflect someone in a prestigious position. On the TV’s, he’s probably a politician of some sort. I don’t think that’s who the boy is in real life, especially if the boy is me. But in this particular place of purgatory (maybe there are multiple rooms in purgatory), I’m presenting the politically active parts of myself. The dancer might be a whole separate character. She’s someone directly impacted by political leaders and their decisions. So in this place, we have a civic leader and someone he impacts. Seen this way, let’s say the boy is fried in the beginning. He’s lost his will. Been in purgatory too long. The dancer enters. Maybe she sees a party she’s currently attending in the real world. She pulls the boy out of his funk. They are actual human beings who can connect. When we hear about gun violence, our screens create abstracts of the event and the victims. But here in purgatory, the two have to make actual, physical contact. Their actions directly impact each other. Movement - There is a loose choreography. But, mainly, Ashley (the dancer) and I created a structure and improvised within it. Basically, there’s a struggle in the beginning. Japanese Butoh definitely informs the early interactions in the video, as the style can create a sense of shared grief. The movement becomes more playful and celebratory, which I think reflects another convoluted part of processing gun violence. After Parkland, I sunk into a pit of melancholy for probably no more than half a day and then I was out with my friends. We’d talk about mass shootings, but then we’d goof off, and the topic eventually recedes, until we’ve tuned it out completely (though temporarily). In the video, the TV screens are upfront and center in the beginning, but then the movement draws our attention to the characters themselves. There’s an ominous outro, where we intercut to the party-goers on the screens lying facedown on a roof. Lives lost to gun violence? In the purgatory place, we only have close-ups of the characters, many of which focus on the hands in spell-like gestures. The issue of gun violence does seem to have this elusive, enigmatic quality. So maybe whatever happens between these two in this purgatory has some ineffable effect in the world.

What do you hope fans gain as a result from watching/listening to your art? Mostly, I hope this keeps the conversation going. Like I said about the video, the topic always recedes, often because the screens start showing other things to us. As artists, I think we can keep things front and center. It’s funny. When I finished the video, I came across grandson’s “Thoughts and Prayers” single. For a whiff, I felt like my project would be redundant. But, of course, until it’s a non-issue, I say the more content we produce, the better. On a more practical note, I’m pledging all the royalties from this project towards organizations like March For Our Lives. So when people listen or watch, they are indirectly or directly (starting to really question my understanding of this concept) benefiting the cause. I think it allows listeners a little extra way to participate in reform measures. You had a hand in creating all of the aspects of the single… writing, producing, creating the video….. tell us about that process as an artist. How does it influence your work? It slows down the process by too much. No, but really, it allows complete ownership over the process, at least of the track itself. I’m entirely responsible for every aspect of it. Holding the work so precious does create a lot of room for self-doubt, but the fears of commitment also pushes for more experimentation. When I create tracks, it’s like I’m recording and re-mixing an exploration. Or maybe it’s like I’m a one-man jam band in my room. It certainly allows me to include weird ideas like recording the words “thoughts and prayers” and using that sample to create different drum sounds. You can’t really tell when you hear it, but I think it’s a fun little Easter Egg. As for the video, I came up with a structure, but this is where I wanted to open up the perspective. I’m kind of enjoying the thought that creating the track itself was like the boy in the video struck in purgatory alone. Then with the video, I’ve invited other perspectives, just as there’s now another person with the boy in purgatory. I’m a nerd, I know. But, yes, I think because I gave myself a clear foundation after working on the track, we were able to do a lot of exploring with the concept of the video, which then allows for its fluid interpretation. Fun fact: the video was originally supposed to involve a dancer and an agent of death battling over a remote that controls one single TV screen displaying a party. You've spoken about how you want your music to be a platform for activism….. what are some other issues you are passionate about? There are a lot. But I’m just going to list one here to emphasize how important it is. THE ENVIRONMENT. Tell us about your upcoming album….. what can fans expect to hear? It’s tentatively called Synthesizer or Variations of: An Endemic Cycle. The EP will have about 6or 7 songs that expand upon the narrative in “Bullets Are Flying.” Just as “Bullets Are Flying” is set in emotional purgatory, the other songs will be placed in their own settings. All the songs will fit into a narrative that has a circular structure. I’m designing musical themes that provide a through-line in the tracks. If you play the album and replay it, the narrative from the last track continues right into the first. You can start the album from any track, and the narrative will continue and circle back. I’m also creating visuals for each track. So if you were to edit them together in a specific and play it on loop, it might feel like one single never-ending movie no matter where you begin. Gun violence is so cyclical. You can enter into it at any point -- initial grief, debate, ennui, etc. --and it’ll eventually loop right back to where you started. How would you describe your musical sound? Musical genres are so bewildering to me. I guess I’ll say this: I’m sort of finding a hip-hop voice in other genres I love. They’re mainly psychedelic dream-pop, future funk, new wave, or even cinematic anime soundtracks. If my process were a scene, I’d like to imagine Childish Gambino getting really high and watching the news with Tame Impala, and maybe Jon Bellion barges in and blasts his new album. I don’t know that these are the sounds that come to mind if you were to listen to my work. But they’re certainly the sounds I’m after, sounds that provide a framework when I produce my music. Read the full article

#Jason&TheRex #newmusic

0 notes

bakechochin · 5 years

Text

The Book Ramblings of February and March 2019

In place of book reviews, I will be writing these ‘book ramblings’. A lot of the texts I’ve been reading (or plan to read) in recent times are well-known classics, meaning I can’t really write book reviews as I’m used to. I’m reading books that either have already been read by everyone else (and so any attempt to give novel or insightful criticisms would be a tad pointless), or are so convoluted and odd that they defy being analysed as I would do a simpler text. These ramblings are pretty unorganised and hardly anything revolutionary, but I felt the need to write something review-related. I’ll upload a rambling compiling all my read books on a monthly basis.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There - Lewis Carroll I am a jammy fucker, and so when faced with all of the editions of Alice in Wonderland that I could have bought, I had to go with the deluxe edition of The Annotated Alice, because it’s big and fancy and I could get my fill of cheeky secondary reading from it. However, upon purchasing it I realised that there is definitely a line that needs to be established when it comes to analysing books like this, and you’ll have to forgive me for repeating some of my thoughts on Peter Pan in this ramble, because my thoughts are much the same for both texts. Unlike Chesterton, who fought against the scholarly intellectualisation of Carroll’s works, as well as giving us the great quote on the subject, ‘Alice is now not only a schoolgirl but a schoolmistress’, I think that there can be benefits for reading Alice with a scholarly eye, especially when focusing on Carroll’s own life and outside influences of his that may have explicitly affected the writing of the stories. (Brief side note, I’ll stick to referring to the author as Carroll as opposed to Dodgson in this ramble, for simplicity’s sake). Whilst I do think that there are a lot of annotations in this book, which I will consider representative of fields of study done on the subject of Alice, only vaguely relevant and interesting in a detached way from the overall narrative, just additional embellishments to the reading rather than explicitly making the stories better to read, I’ve still got time for them because such extra tidbits of information are interesting in their own right. Of course, sometimes the information tidbits aren’t as interesting as what Carroll did with them - why would I care to read the sensible proper versions of verse extracts that Carroll changed into nonsense verse when it’s the nonsense that’s far more entertaining? - but, again, it has its use. What I do have qualms with are the annotations attempting to over-intellectualise the nonsense aspects of the story with real-life physics or mathematics application, retroactively attributing theories and shit to Carroll’s formulation of his nonsense and judging the nonsense by the sum of its (supposed) parts, and of course it’s awful when the annotations spend paragraphs upon paragraphs comparing the twenty billion different drawings of Alice within the framework of Carroll’s hatred of crinoline fashion. That shit can bugger right off. But let’s actually talk about the stories. These stories are, if not the first, than certainly the definitive examples of literary nonsense, and what proved most interesting to me was how said nonsense specifically manifested itself for comedic effect. Alice’s straightforward thinking and no-nonsense attitude (no pun intended) to all the kooky shit around her is always fun, and this book deserves kudos for its bold strides in the direction of really dark comedy in a children’s book. Similarly to a lot of people, I was familiar with the Alice nonsense before reading it, thanks to the 1951 Disney film and the sheer ubiquitousness of the stories’ content in pop culture, but it didn’t make it any less fun to read. I know that this is far from a novel takeaway, but there’s some things in a written text that a film just can’t capture; the writing has a fantastic way of being able to gloss over Alice’s low moments to firmly cement her as a fearless protagonist who accepts all the challenges thrown her way head-on, whereas the film needs to cover every low point in the story with heartstring-pulling poignancy. This is helped greatly by the fact that we know that everything will turn out alright in the end, either because the tone conveys it or because Alice explicitly tells us; there’s strife and peril along the way, but there’s no real risk of the whimsy giving way to any real danger, and so the story can just revel in its nonsense. Reading how Carroll describes all his fun Wonderland nonsense is, of course, incredibly enriching and fun; going into the story, I was expecting a lot from such well-known characters as the Caterpillar or the Cheshire Cat, and was subsequently surprised to see how little they actually figured into the overall story, but this gave way to the inclusion of scenes and nonsense I hadn’t seen before, like the tart debacle in the Queen’s Court. I was advised by a friend to leave it a while between reading Wonderland and the sequel, Through the Looking Glass, because the novelty of the nonsense would lessen were I to read them one after the other, and whilst I agree with his advice I feel that there is so much overlap of content between the two stories (especially considering how the film adaptations pick and choose story elements from both stories) that the new story wasn’t the completely novel experience I was hoping for. Whilst Wonderland didn’t have much of a story structure, with events unfolding and characters appearing as the story went along, there is more of a structure to Through the Looking Glass, however loose it may seem. This structure is that of a chess game, a fact I am left in little doubt about on account of the annotations giving me a constant fucking running commentary of the game’s progress, a progression which only ties into the story in terms of the characters’ idiosyncrasies in a humorous way once or twice in the whole fucking story. I know very little about chess, so any complex nonsense surrounding that fell way the fuck by the wayside when I was reading this, and therefore I was grateful that the usual Wonderland nonsense persists; my favourite encounters are the ones that reflect Carroll’s academic interests and experimentations, including a really interesting discourse on semantics and nominalism held by by none other than Humpty fucking Dumpty. WOULD I RECOMMEND?: YES

The Third Policeman - Flann O’Brien Nonsense writing is a fun concept to me, but my introduction to the genre, and indeed my full understanding before reading this book, was limited to texts by Carroll, which, don’t get me wrong, are of course great nonsense texts, but are familiar to us on account of how ingrained they are in pop culture, and thus you go into them knowing what to expect. I had no fucking idea what to expect from this book, and what I got was great. The story follows a chap with no name getting embroiled with a station of bizarre policemen, a vague setup into which is slotted in subplots about a league of one-legged men, inter-dimensional maps hidden on the ceilings of innocuous bedrooms, colours that make one go mad, and a conspiracy involving men taking on the attributes of bicycles and vice versa. This is supplemented with our narrator linking the banal sights and sounds around him to the speculations on said subjects by the insane savant writer de Selby, leading to pages upon pages of footnotes talking about de Selby’s ideas on bottled darkness or the world being shaped like a sausage, and all the contrasting and fucking ridiculous critical responses and hypotheses about said de Selby nonsense. I don’t need to tell you that this is all fucking amazing stuff. Not only is it always fun, it is described frankly and without laughing at itself, and while there is a lot to keep one occupied, it never gets overwhelming (or at least, the density of nonsense content in the prose never weighs on one’s brain in an information overload). The story is short, but dense with nonsense as mentioned above, and the fact that the few events that do progress the plot occur without warning nor aplomb is perhaps forgivable, because honestly the plot isn’t really the point as much as it is a vague backdrop for the nonsense at hand. All the way through it we have our nameless narrator, who challenges the farce around him but not incessantly or obnoxiously, and has a great patience for the shit he has to endure, greeting every new slab of ridiculousness with a polite nod and a smile; it’s very easy to align with the narrator without feeling like your interests clash with his. What I will say about this book is that, whilst it is purportedly many different things, from a murder mystery to a love story to an allegorical tale of guilt and despair, the sheer quantity of its bullshit means that it cannot be any of said things effectively. As a murder mystery, the plot hook that sets the pieces in motion for the circumstances of the murder is swiftly forgotten as the story barrels onwards. The love story element, whilst being ridiculous because it’s between our narrator and a stolen bicycle, is just one minor element of our narrator’s journey and is only dwelled upon for as long as it takes for the story to travel onwards to the next wacky plot thread. And as an allegorical tale of guilt, any attempt at inspiring guilt or sadness or whatnot is immediately offset by the knowledge that you’re reading a book with sentient bicycles and robes made of woven wind and policemen who refer to a difficult-to-solve problem as ‘an insoluble pancake’. This point does, however, bring us to the ending, which I will not explicitly spoil, but I will say that a) it does come as a surprise, but b) it pretty much juxtaposes the spirit of the entire work, and as such I thought it was a bit of a cop-out (no policeman-related pun intended). A thought-provoking cop-out that came as a bit of a shock, but a cop-out nonetheless. WOULD I RECOMMEND: HELL YES

Complete Stories - Clarice Lispector I like to review books based on whether I have personally got something out of them, and I am subsequently at something at a loss with this collection; as much as there is to recommend in the short stories of Lispector, they’re really not what I, or indeed those who know me, would consider to be ‘my thing’, and so my recommendations for the book may come across as a wee bit disingenuous. But let’s talk about these stories anyway. Lispector’s thing is incredible prose, almost prose poetry in some stories; it is florid and it is evocative and it is captivating, describing the emotions and thought processes of the narrator characters with such zeal and passion and complexity and verbosity. On this basis alone, I can recommend her stories, and presumably also her novels, to which I understand follow the stories in similar ways. However, I myself am loathe to pick up a novel from Lispector, because I find her short stories draining enough; I don’t mean this in a negative way, please simmer down and let me finish. These are incredibly dense short stories, with pages upon pages breaking down and analysing thoughts and feelings, snapshots of life extrapolated on and made to seem like powerful life-changing moments, the grand momentous prose depicting something as banal as a misinterpreted situation or a moment of embarrassment as cataclysmic disasters or mind-boggling enigmas to be contemplated by the finest philosophers. Only once could I sit back and laugh at this (the story ‘The Chicken and the Egg’, if you’re interested); for the rest of the time, I was fully and unequivocally invested in the strife and troubles described in these stories. But that’s not to say that they don’t take a toll. It took me quite some time to read this anthology because, were I to sit down and read these stories one after the other, I feared that the emphasis, the fucking punch that these stories had would become saturated, and it would just be a weary slog through turgid prose. I asked my friend (i.e. the bloke who gave me this anthology) why he considered the novels of Lispector to be some of the best he’s read, and he said that he loved how Lispector could pack seemingly everything into the world, every issue and matter and question and philosophy, into such small events; I won’t argue that Lispector excels at this, but I will protest having to read an entire novel’s worth of it, because I don’t have the patience nor the willpower. Anything else that I can think to say about the stories pales in comparison to Lispector's major strengths, but I’ll say what I’ve got anyway lest anyone were to accuse me of half-arsing these rambles. Some of the stories are unflinching examinations of the darker side of human nature, whilst others sacrifice this rumination for succinct twist endings and a black comedy tone; whilst I am fond of these stories, it can be a tad misleading or even anticlimactic when some stories set themselves up as examinations of curious human nature only to change course at the last second for the sake of the comedy twist (see ‘A Chicken’ for a good example of this). Though I scoffed at the suggestion of such in the introduction, believing it to be too much like base-level GCSE-tier literary analysis, the focus (and to an extent style) of Lispector’s works do noticeably change as she gets older; her earlier works are often first-person stories about love and confusion and vanity, but by her collection Covert Joy her stories are often framed around nostalgic or formative experiences. I prefer Lispector’s earlier stories; they’re more representative of the amazing storytelling I’ve been gushing about for this entire ramble, whereas her later stories are told like wistful recollections, good in their own right but not what I think of when I think of Lispector. I’ll recommend my favourite stories (in the order that they were printed in my collection), with the caveat that not all of these stories are good because of the reasons outlined above: 'Obsession', ‘Daydream and Drunkenness of a Young Lady’, ‘A Chicken’, ‘Happy Birthday’, ‘The Smallest Woman in the World’, ‘The Dinner’, ‘The Solution’, ‘The Fifth Story’, ‘Covert Joy’, ‘Remnants of Carnival’, and ‘Where Were You At Night’. WOULD I RECOMMEND?: YES

The Warden - Anthony Trollope I was a tad ill at ease as I started this book and started discovering some startling truths, most notably that I had been deceived once more into reading something out of my comfort zone. All I knew about Trollope going into this was his misplaced pride in his disgusting beard, but the introduction to the story cheerfully informed me that Henry James had referred to his ‘complete appreciation of the usual’, whereas Carlyle had more scathingly called him ‘irredeemably embedded in commonplace, and grown fat on it’. I was here for larger-than-life characters embroiled in a grand scandal in a sleepy cathedral town, perhaps some boisterous near-deaf old men or some juicy satire about lascivious priests, but I’d only gone and signed up for a quiet and relatively uneventful novel of everyday folk embroiled in quiet affairs! What a fool I am! However, whilst I worry that by saying this I am resigning myself to walk down the long path of boring realism-centric literary classics that I have long reviled, I’ve got to admit that this book is really rather good. Trying to describe the plot may very well deter any prospective readers in much the same way as it initially repelled me, but the general gist of it is a scandal coming to light (or, more accurately, being somewhat fabricated and blown out of proportion) involving the distribution of charitable funds in an almshouse in the quaint cathedral town of Barchester, and the story follows the main people who become embroiled in the affairs, either because they started it or because they’re under threat by it. You’d be forgiven to gloss over this as a load of old banal quotidian twaddle, but where this book shines is in its storytelling. The narrative voice is warm and affectionate, the characterisation is fucking stellar, and the story getting into the minds of its characters with every encounter and fantastically describing how events unfold for different people is all bloody incredible. It is perhaps the warm and inviting quality of the storytelling which results in this not being the most effective of satirical texts, because satire requires you to step back and think about what you’re reading and why it’s funny, whereas beyond recognising a few real-world allusions (my favourite of which is Mr Popular Sentiment, Trollope’s less-than-complimentary imagining of Charles Dickens), you as the reader think and react along with the characters rather than from a lofty distanced position, and the material that you find funny is funny in-world rather than necessarily because is aptly reflects real-life folly or works in some other meta-textual way. The warmness of the story which, at its heart, is a story of an old man trying to do right by his morals and his friends, doesn’t really allow for the most dramatic of plot resolutions, and indeed this book displays some rather odd choices in its pacing of such plot resolutions. Things are established as relatively chaotic in the storyline, with different characters with different motivations striving away and characters with the same motivations approaching their problems in different ways to overcomplicate the affairs at hand, but ultimately there is little payoff for all these hectic antics. The law suit that sets the plot in motion is established to have been poorly founded and generally worthless from the get go, which isn’t a problem in of itself because the titular warden’s guilt about the matters of the law suit are well-founded even if the law suit is not, but the law suit is dropped without fuss and without any serious consequences around halfway through the book, despite all the elements at play and the goings-on behind the scenes that led to the law suit being dropped. The warden’s story ends without fuss or without anything particularly dramatic happening, save a few heated debates and incredulous blustering figures imploring him to reconsider his choices, and overall just seemed a bit empty because of the lack of any real stakes. The actual ending was at times very poignant (and without any real clue as to how things may be resolved), and at times a tad rushed to tie up its loose ends and get in a bit more quaint narration endearing the characters of the story and speaking regrettably of leaving this story to face times to come; I suppose this somewhat reflects the book’s content, if perhaps losing sight of the life-affirming nature of it, and it is if nothing else bittersweet. By fuck it’s going to make me read the next book in the series to see what happens to these lads next, because hell yeah there’s a series of these. WOULD I RECOMMEND?: HELL YES

Dead Babies - Martin Amis I was cognisant of the preponderance of texts that I’ve been reading recently being all warm and powerful and life-affirming, and therefore I decided to read this and Wilt for a mindless black comedy experience. This was perhaps not the most mind-numbing of reads, being a rather fucked up book, but it’s a bloody good read regardless. Amis’ writing is absolutely incredible; his strengths lie in giving life to abstract scenarios and feelings with evocative metaphors, and characterisation that is complex and beautifully written. With this writing Amis paints a picture of a fucked up urban setting, a setting that I would attempt to succinctly summarise but know in my heart that to try would only be to amateurishly ape Amis’ own fantastic scene-setting descriptions, and so I will instead merely say that it is fucking good. It works because it’s a very grim setting, but it is also curiously sensationalised, while still being grounded in its grim content; there are gangs of cold calculating men who perform elaborate synchronised morbid atrocities, there is a pseudoscientific drug-mixing station with different uppers and downers to chemically alter or emphasise any aspect of a person’s character, and one of the main characters is a grotesque dwarf with nails digging into his feet from shoddily-constructed platform boots and a collection of grotty vintage porn magazines. Everything is primal or gross or part of some sort of beautiful chaos, and it’s an incredible hyperbolic depiction of society’s seedy underbelly, reminding me at times of A Clockwork Orange. The powerful narrative voice lends the grotty and grotesque setting a touch of high-mindedness or high society flare. The characters make up a fun array of misfits, from the pathetic to the neurotic to the braggart to the horrifyingly fucking villainous, and with a small cast of characters we get to learn everyone’s opinions of one another and how they bond, which was surprisingly well done considering how diverse and angsty all of them are, and pleasantly surprising that they don’t all just genuinely hate each other because of how different they are from one another. The narrative voice also helps out here; its direct commentary on the main narrative reminded me of Trollope, but this is not narration to warmly speak of the characters or implore the reader to think upon them positively, but rather to remark with grim resignation the actions of the characters or the shitty direction their lives are taking them. And now we come to the tricky subject of comedy, a tricky subject because some people will no doubt argue that this book is too fucking awful to be considered as such. The setup of the story seems like Trainspotting, a grim world periodically ameliorated with little scenes of light-heartedness and comedy, and at the start of the book it’s easy to laugh at the vileness of of the characters’ actions. As the book goes along, however, the narrative moves from the overall setup of a debauched weekend of dissolute youths to being determined by the dramatic actions of the characters, spurned by simmering emotions (and sometimes catalysed by large quantities of experimental drugs) and often ending very very poorly. It is here that some of the more disgusting plot points of the story occur, and yet interjected into it are elements of farce so ludicrous that you have no recourse but to laugh at them in the face of all the horrors surrounding it. Or maybe that’s just me. WOULD I RECOMMEND?: HELL YES, IF YOU’RE IN THE MOOD FOR SOME FUCKED UP SHIT

Wilt - Tom Sharpe This may well be my shortest book ramble to date, and indeed I deliberated whether or not it was worth writing, simply because it is another example of books that I’ve liked in the past and continue to enjoy. There’ll probably be a bit of a crossover between this ramble and my ramble on Roald Dahl’s short stories, as their black comedy content has much in common. This is a relatively short book that takes you on a pretty wild fucking journey of farce; ridiculous situations and misconstrued motivations abound, and even from the confines of a prison confinement our eponymous protagonist is able to escalate the plot like you wouldn’t fucking believe. The general premise, such as it is, revolves around an uneasy marriage of a domineering wife and a put-about unmotivated husband who humours himself with elaborate dark fantasies of murdering her, and the plans of actualising these fantasies (catalysed in part by some villainous Americans) spirals into all sorts of wacky shenanigans that I shan’t spoil. I went into this book at a friend’s recommendation, and at around one hundred pages in I commented that there are parts of the story that veered too far into plain old cringe, and that overall the story seemed to be shaping up to a rather vengeful story written as the author's attempt to vent frustrations. My friend said that Sharpe was ‘playing [me] like a pipe’, and so I persevered, and can subsequently say that all such thoughts are swiftly quashed by the rest of the book, which is an absolute tour de fucking force of fantastic time-wasting and nonsense that leaves all that real-world cringe or vengeful thoughts of worldly injustice behind. And of course we get a satisfying life-affirming ending, because this is that sort of book; everything’ll be resolved in the end with smiles and ironic twists. This isn’t exactly a book with incredibly florid prose or life-changing writing, but what it is is a book written by an incredibly smart person, which is instrumental in shaping this book’s fucking fantastic (and often dark as fuck) comedy, contributing some phenomenal turns of phrase, and as a source, much like Dahl, of a hundred throwaway references to miscellaneous academic tidbits that Wilt employs in his endlessly hilarious time wasting. WOULD I RECOMMEND?: YES

Other shit that I read that I couldn’t be arsed to ramble about: Shakespeare’s Local by Pete Brown (conspicuously NOT about Shakespeare’s local pub but nonetheless about the long history of my all-time favourite pub (The George in Southwark), funny and informative (if noticeably written by a man who is not a specialist in some of the subjects he talks about, for people who are also not specialists in said subjects), would recommend if you can go down to the George and have a pint there while contemplating the history) and Green Men and White Swans by Jacqueline Simpson (a great and informative book with a subject matter seemingly tailor fucking made for me, greatly enjoyed Simpson’s none-too-subtle asides about peoples’ over-intellectualising of pub names, was mildly disappointed that my own home town has got fuck all in the way of cool folklore-inspired pub names, would absolutely recommend alongside a cheeky bev).

#book reviews #book rambles #alice in wonderland #through the looking glass #lewis carroll #wilt #tom sharpe #dead babies martin amis #the third policeman #flann o'brien #clarice lispector #the warden #anthony trollope #i had a load of great ideas in mind for my usual nonsense wittering in the tags but i've totally forgotten all of my great ideas #what an absolute piss take #i really need to be writing my essay right now

0 notes

ibilenews · 4 years

Text

5G network technology: Sifting myth from reality

When Joseph Adegbolu’s mobile phone rang, he hastily picked it up without bothering to confirm the identity of the caller was on display. Upon engaging with the device, the voice at the other end was a familiar one- his mother.

Obviously distressed, she yelled: “Joseph, tell the telecommunication firm that erected that mast that is about 40 metres away from our house to come and remove it. We heard it’s killing people, and has killed many people in China.”

Joseph’s mom is but one of the millions across the globe that are terrified and influenced by some informed and less informed commentaries about the evil they say the Fifth Generation of cellular technology, otherwise known as 5G technology represents.

This high level of apprehension and uncertainty is daily sending jitters down spines in different parts of the globe, with numerous conspiracy theories flying everywhere. From China to the United Kingdom, the United States to Belgium, Canada to South Africa, the story has been the same.

It is this conspiracy theories that have led to the destruction of several 5G masts, especially in China, where the technology has been linked to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which has killed over 190, 000 people across the globe.

The belief in several quarters has been that 5G technology comes with very hazardous electromagnetic radiation, which is extremely dangerous to human health, and which has resulted in the death of many people across the world.

These wild claims about 5G are not new. The technology has outsized political importance because it may provide countries with a competitive edge, with faster wireless speeds enabling more rapid development of driverless cars, and other innovations, especially as countries compete keenly in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) era.

Internet trolls have remained on 5G and its political implications to sow fear, leading to protests in some countries, including the United States. Recently, Russians have been pushing claims that 5G signals were linked to brain cancer, infertility, autism, heart tumors, and Alzheimer’s disease, all of which lack scientific support.

Conversely, 5G is the next great leap in speed for wireless devices. This speed includes both the rate at which mobile users can download data to their devices, and the latency, or lag that they experience between sending and receiving information.

The fifth Generation aims to deliver data rates that are 10 to 100 times faster than the current 4G network, and users should expect to see download speeds on the order of gigabits per second (Gb/s), much greater than the tens of megabits per second (Mb/s) speeds of 4G.

Benefits Associated With 5G Network Technology The 5G network technology has the potential to benefit everything from entertainment and gaming, to education and public safety. Over time, 5G is expected to deliver faster download speeds, real-time responses, and enhanced connectivity, giving businesses and consumers the potential to experience innovative technologies.

Apart from requiring high data rates, emerging technologies that interact with the user’s environment like augmented reality or self-driving cars will also require extremely low latency. For that reason, the goal of 5G is to achieve latencies below the 1-millisecond mark. Mobile devices will be able to send and receive information in less than one-thousandth of a second, appearing instantaneous to the user. To accomplish these speeds, the rollout of 5G requires new technology and infrastructure.

A lot of engineers believe that considering the power and control at the disposal of any country with the expertise to develop this network, the temptation to de-market it by other world powers is high. This may be one of the reasons why a network, which runs on a spectrum that is considered by experts as safe, is being linked to high radiation and COVID-19.

Meanwhile, scientists are working hard to ensure that these conspiracy theories are not allowed to stand as they can disrupt world development.

How Does The 5G Technology Work? According to t-mobile.com, 5G networks can be built in different ways from multiple bands of wavelength spectrum: low-band, mid-band, and high-band.

High-band millimetre wave frequencies have greater bandwidth available to carry more data in dense urban areas, but require cell sites to be close, and have limited penetration in buildings. Mid-band balances speed and range, providing broader coverage than high-band. And it is less impacted by buildings. However, much of its bandwidth is already in use, so there’s not a lot available for 5G growth. Low-band like the powerful 600MHz spectrum travels farther than other bands – over hundreds of square miles – and can pass through more obstacles, providing a better, more reliable signal both indoors and outdoors.

With 5G, higher amounts of data can be transmitted more efficiently than 4G LTE. That means stronger network reliability, faster downloads, and support for more connected devices than ever before. It is an advancement of 4G technology.

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the body in charge of global communication had planned that 2020 will be the year for the commercial launch of the technology after which its global standardisation would have been perfected.

Deployment Threatened By Conspiracy Theories While 5G has been projected to have the power to enable the new normal in terms of superhighway transmissions, some theories have enveloped the globe about the alleged hazardous nature of this technology, which some claim can be devastating to human health. Besides, there are claims that 5G is the cause of COVID-19, and that the lockdown in several parts of the world translates to a government cover-up.

It was also claimed that the coronavirus can communicate through the radio airwaves and that 5G can kill birds and destroy plants among others.

Specifically, these claims have been bouncing around the industry for years, even ahead of the 5G technology being validated in lab trials. This even dates back to the 1990s, when mobile phone usage was incredibly limited, with critics claiming the 2G airwaves could cause cancer.

Although these rumours have been thrashed in most parts of the world, the emergence of 5G seems to have reopened these health claims. Finding a source is very difficult, but a lot of posts on social media seem to fan the flames of these fanatics.

Telecoms.com noted that a picture of an engineer climbing a telecoms mast in a hazmat suit in the United Kingdom was used as justification for these claims, though it was clear that the individual was using hazardous chemicals to clean the equipment. These illusions of proof help to paint the picture, as the blind following the blind, tend to ignore the thousands of images of healthy engineers installing or repairing telecoms equipment without such protective equipment on.

The idea that the airwaves used in mobile communications can be detrimental to health is reinforced by the idea of ionising and non-ionising radiation. Telecoms equipment does emit radiation, but so do most electrical equipment. The point, which seems to get lost, is that Electromagnetic Radiation (EMR) is not powerful enough to cause damage to humans.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), there are two general kinds of electromagnetic radiation: ionising radiation and non-ionising radiation. Ionising radiation is powerful enough to knock electrons out of their orbit around an atom. This process is called ionisation and can be damaging to a body’s cells. Non-ionising radiation has enough energy to move atoms in a molecule around and cause them to vibrate, which makes the atom heat up, but not enough to remove the electrons from the atoms.

EPA stressed that the damage, which can be done to the human body generally depends on how far up the spectrum the airwaves being used are, or whether it is high or low-energy. A high-tension power line can create a much higher energy electromagnetic field that is still low in frequency. Therefore, there are safeguards around these sites, while medical equipment using x-rays makes use of much higher frequencies so it should also be regarded as dangerous.

However, numerous public health authorities such as the World Health Organisation (WHO), and the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), the Germany-based scientific body in charge of setting limits on exposure to radiation, have both stated on different occasions that the airwaves used by mobile communications is not harmful to health.

Perhaps, one of the conspiracy theories, which has gained the most significant traction in recent days, is that which alleges that 5G acts as an accelerator for the dreaded coronavirus.

As with many conspiracy theories, it is very difficult to trace the pseudoscience back to its origin, and this claim is a perfect example. Pre-dating the coronavirus outbreak, the idea that 5G suppresses the immune system is a popular one for critics and has been given a new life in conjunction with the spread of COVID-19.

The theory states that radiation from mobile communications is influencing the human body on a molecular level (suggesting it is ionising radiation), but also inhibiting the immune system.

As emphasised by the Cornell Alliance for Science, there is no evidence linking 5G technology to the COVID-19. The outfit maintains that if a hotspot emerges in one area, which happens to have 5G antennae, it is coincidental.

The most absurd of these theories is the claim that the lockdown (at the behest of the government) to prevent the spread of the pandemic is a cover-up, which will allow the installation of 5G masts en masse without the general public being aware. This remains an interesting one, which even the most hardened conspiracy theorists are unable to come to terms with.

The antagonists claim that by doing it in secret, the general public will not be able to comment, object, or protest until it is too late.

A popular evangelical pastor in Lagos, also recently reinforced the claim that the Federal Government enforced the lockdown to install 5G fibre pipes, most especially in Lagos and Abuja. He went as far as convincing his followers that the technology has the imprimatur of the Anti-Christ, which will ensure that human is installed with microchips.

No Cause For Alarm Over 5G In Nigeria With a cocktail of controversies circulating daily and raising more questions about the technology in the country, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ibrahim Pantami, recently called on Nigerians to discard any unverified information about 5G and COVID-19.

He also tasked them to remain calm in face of the coronavirus pandemic, as the government is working hard to control its spread, adding that the government does not take decisions based on speculations, but only on facts and figures, which must be based on inputs from experts within the field.

Pantami cautioned Nigerians against fretting as no license for 5G has been issued to anyone, no spectrum for 5G deployment has been given, while no approval has been given to any telecoms operator to deploy 5G in the country.

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), also advised Nigerians to disregard talks linking 5G with COVID-19.

Head, Public Affairs at NCC, Dr. Henry Nkemadu, said: “First, there is no correlation between 5G technology and COVID-19. The 5G technology amounts to advancement in today’s 4G technology designed to transform the world positively.

“Second, there is no deployment of 5G in Nigeria at the moment. The NCC back in November 2019, approved a trial test for the technology for a period of three months, and that trial has been concluded and installation decommissioned. The trial among others was to study and observe any health or security challenges the network might present. Relevant stakeholders including members of the security agencies were invited to participate in the trial.”

Fifth Generation Technology And Health Concerns According to Professor Andrew Wood of the Australian Centre for Electromagnetic Bioeffects Research (ACEBR), a key contributor to the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP): “We believe the main biological effect of the electromagnetic radiation from mobile phones is a rise in temperature. There are also concerns that there could be more subtle effects, such as links between long-term exposure and certain types of cancer, but while there is some evidence from epidemiological and animal studies, these remain controversial.”

Wood, who noted that 5G mobile technology promises a 10-fold increase in data transmission rates compared to current 4G networks,underscored the commonly accepted electromagnetic radiation limit in the current international standards that apply to mobile technologies.

“As the frequency goes up, the depth of penetration into biological tissues goes down, so the skin and eyes, rather than the brain, become the main organs of health concerns. The major hurdle is that the power levels involved in mobile and wireless telecommunications are incredibly low, which, at most, facilitates temperature rise in tissues of a few tenths of a degree. Picking up unambiguous biological changes is therefore very difficult.

“However, it will be important to balance risk and reward. Wireless technologies bring enormous benefits, and being over-cautious would potentially deny these benefits to needy communities.”

From his perspective, a radiologist at the Alex Ekwueme Federal University Teaching Hospital, Abakaliki, Ebonyi State, Dave Okorafor, in a report said: “There are about seven different kinds of (natural but also artificially producible) radiations called electromagnetic radiations out of which three – gamma-ray, x-ray, and high-frequency ultraviolet ray – are capable of damaging human cells or the DNA in them. Gamma-ray, x-ray, and high-high frequency UV radiation are called ionizing radiations because they can change the structure of the smallest unit of matter found in living cells.

“By this mechanism, they can cause skin and other kinds of external and internal injuries to the human body. These bodily injuries usually manifest within days to months. The effects of these radiations can also lead to cancer when normal body cells run mad as a result of damage to or change in the DNA sequence (or gene) carrying information with which the body is supposed to produce proteins that should regulate the multiplication of the body cells.

“On the other hand, we also have four other electromagnetic radiations whose energies are not high and strong enough to cause the degree and kind of biological harm attributable to the three other radiations above.

“These weaker radiations are the visible light (with which we see in the day), infrared, microwave and radio wave. Microwave and radio waves are both called radiofrequency (RF) radiation. The radio wave is the weakest of the electromagnetic radiations because it has a lower frequency range and, as a result, a lower amount of energy. One unit of it is longer than all of the other radiations and, as such, it cannot easily pass through a lot of materials like metals. Microwave is a radiofrequency with a higher frequency and higher energy. Similar to the radio wave, it is also non-ionizing. This means that both radio waves and microwaves cannot cause cancer. Radio wave has been the electromagnetic radiation used for the conveyance of data in radio and TV broadcasting, wired and wireless telecommunications, WiFi, and Bluetooth communication, among others,” he added.

Years Of Research Established No Health Risks – GSMA The Global System for Mobile Telecommunications Association (GSMA), which regulates mobile usage and standards has also reassured the world of the safety of 5G technology.

Its chief regulatory officer, John Giusti, said: “Twenty years of research should reassure people that there are no established health risks from their mobile devices or 5G antennae.”

A White Paper from Deloitte disclosed actually how 5G is capable of enhancing the effectiveness of pandemic prevention, treatment and drive the digital transformation of healthcare systems in response to major public emergencies, such as the current COVID-19 pandemic.

The White Paper titled, “Combating COVID-19 with 5G: Opportunities to Improve Public Health Systems,” was produced in collaboration with Huawei.

Amongst its findings, the document noted that the effectiveness of communication and data exchange has been essential in screening for infected individuals and controlling the outbreak. This is by enabling thermal imaging, continuous remote monitoring, and diagnoses during patient transfer.

The research also highlighted the need to build and upgrade public health emergency response mechanisms, through which governments can make right decisions promptly, and allocate resources more effectively.

In this regard, 5G can also promote collaboration by enabling connectivity, maintaining effective communication among hospitals, and enable medical data and reference sharing between hospitals and scientific research institutions, especially “in the rapid increases in data volume and mounting demand for remote and HD video-based treatment” scenario.

Stakeholders Views In a public post, the Vice President, Corporate Communications and CSR, Airtel Nigeria, Emeka Oparah, also debunked claims linking coronavirus to 5G technology.

Oparah disclosed that there has been a strategic campaign against the 5G technology driven by business and diplomacy, propagated by an orchestrated campaign to discredit the innovation, “how it got twisted to establish a link to Coronavirus is perhaps the most important argument to debunk the fables.”

According to him, to understand 5G, it is important to first understand G. “G stands for generation. So, 5G means Fifth Generation Mobile Technology. Most mobile telecommunications operations are currently running on 4G (4th Generation LTE and high-speed mobile Internet). Before now, we have had 3G (voice and mobile data) and 2G (digital voice) and 1G (analog voice), of course. It must be admitted that the mobile telecommunications industry is probably one of the most innovative and fastest developing of all.”

A social entrepreneur and communications management specialist, Dr. Niyi Ibietan, said Monaco is the first principality, micro-state, and country to deploy fully functional 5G telecom services in the world, “which is situated between French Riviera in Western Europe, and the Mediterranean, Monaco is reputed as a wealthy country of about 40,000 residents but noted for $2.1m per capita income.

“At the moment, Monaco has recorded 66 cases of COVID-19, one death, and three recoveries. If 5G deployment correlates with COVID-19, Monaco ought to have disappeared from the face of the Earth.”

Indeed, on the BBC, scientists brand the so-called connection between 5G and Coronavirus as “complete rubbish.” According to them, the radio waves involved in 5G and other mobile phone technology sit on the low-frequency end of the electromagnetic spectrum, which is less powerful than visible light. Consequently, they are not strong enough to damage cells – unlike radiation at the higher frequency end of the spectrum which includes sun’s ray and medical x-rays.

A Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Bristol, Adam Finn, added: “It would also be impossible for 5G to transmit the virus. The present epidemic is caused by a virus that is passed from one infected person to another. We know this is true. We even have the virus growing in our lab, obtained from a person with the illness. Viruses and electromagnetic waves that make mobile phones and Internet connections work are different things. As different as chalk and cheese!”

0 notes

jillmckenzie1 · 6 years

Text

Colorado Poet Series: Interview with Alyse Knorr

The local literary scene is, one must remember, a community. (One you can be a part of, by the way, whether you’re a writer or reader!) In fact, after I interviewed the poet Elizabeth Robinson who connected me with fiction writer David Hicks, and it was David Hicks who recommended that I reach out to poet Alyse Knorr.

It was my pleasure to read two of Alyse Knorr’s poetry collections, Copper Mother and Mega-City Redux for the purpose of this interview. These collections of poetry and prose respectively are both delightfully dense and unusual explorations which perpetuate insightful cultural commentary within each of their respective narratives.

First, a little bit about Alyse:

Alyse Knorr is an assistant professor of English at Regis University and editor of Switchback Books. She is the author of the poetry collections Mega-City Redux (Green Mountains Review 2017), Copper Mother (Switchback Books 2016), and Annotated Glass (Furniture Press Books 2013), as well as the non-fiction book Super Mario Bros. 3 (Boss Fight Books 2016) and the poetry chapbooks Epithalamia (Horse Less Press 2015) and Alternates (dancing girl press 2014). Her work has appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, Denver Quarterly, Columbia Poetry Review, The Greensboro Review, and ZYZZYVA, among others. She received her MFA from George Mason University, where she co-founded Gazing Grain Press.

Now, about Copper Mother (Switchback Books 2016):

“Through a startling mixture of forms and language, Copper Mother generates an unusual love story—of loving one’s world so tremendously that that world must be shared, at enormous risk and with unprecedented ingenuity and effort. The ‘Friends’ of Knorr’s universe bring their gentle curiosity to human heroics and frailties, and the humans—we humans—are redeemed by our eagerness to share our naked selves and by Jane, who bravely matches the terrors of mortality with a selfless faith in our capacity to love. Sincere even in its playful and fantastic moments, Knorr’s poetics emerges from a deep groove of mourning all that we have to lose and will certainly lose, every day and on the last day, perhaps most of all ‘our mothers, tired/and lovely and floral and gone.’ In that mourning, though, runs an illimitable current of open-hearted reverence that is the best of humanity and beyond its possession—that craving for contact ‘[t]his world wishes across/space’ to whomever might accept our greeting and the belief that we are already together with loved ones, those we’ve lost and those we haven’t yet met, in the slippery fullness of time.” – Elizabeth Savage, author of Idylliad

And finally, about Mega-City Redux (Green Mountains Review 2017):

In 1405, Christine de Pizan, the world’s first professional writer, published an allegorical work called The Book of the City of Ladies, in which she imagined constructing (with the help of her fairy godmothers Reason, Rectitude, and Justice) a walled city where women could live safe from sexism, misogyny, and gendered violence. Six hundred years later, we still need such a city. Mega-City Redux charts a road-trip search for this mythical city today, with the help of 21st-century feminist heroes Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Xena Warrior Princess, and Dana Scully from The X-Files. Mega-City Redux is essential architecture built from ‘sword, suit, stake, and pen’ – feminine, marvelous, and mega-tough.”

– Mel Nichols, author of Catalytic Exteriorization Phenomenon

From here, we dialogue:

1. Your most recent projects, Mega-City Redux and Copper Mother inhabit unique worlds while following somewhat strange, utterly unpredictable narratives. How did the seedling ideas for these works germinate into their final works? Can you describe the creative decision-making process which led to their unique content and form?

The idea for Copper Mother came from a Radiolab interview with Ann Druyan in which Ann describes creating the Voyager Golden Record with her late husband, Carl Sagan, in 1977. NASA sent the Record into deep space with the hopes that an extraterrestrial civilization might find it, and it contains images, sounds, and languages from Earth meant to introduce our species to aliens. I started reading more and more about the Record, and started wondering what might happen if aliens did find the Record and come to Earth to talk to us about it. Ann ended up a character in the book as “Jane,” and I imagined that the aliens might have a technology that would allow present-day Jane to converse with her 1977 past-self. I’ve always been a big fan of science fiction, so I had a blast getting to play with some classic sci-fi tropes (like time travel and a moment of “first contact”) in the book.

I wrote Mega-City Redux after reading Christine de Pizan’sThe Book of the City of Ladies, a 1405 allegory in which Christine imagines building a walled city—with the help of her three fairy godmothers Reason, Rectitude, and Justice—where women can live safe from sexism and misogyny. I also wrote the book in the wake of the 2014 Isla Vista shootings, when a man shot and killed several women out of purely misogynistic hate. This violent tragedy made abundantly clear to me that we still need Christine’s City of Ladies today just as much as we did 600 years ago, so I imagined going on a road trip to find the City with my three personal fairy godmothers—Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Xena Warrior Princess, and Dana Scully.

With both of these projects, once I had the premise and the characters in mind, I just wrote as many poems as I could to try and see what would happen. I love to work in the novel-in-verse form because I get to build a world and create characters and then put them into interesting situations just to see what they’ll do. I love when my characters surprise me and when the plot takes a turn I didn’t see coming!

2. How did you arrive at the decision to source the unnamed female narrator’s fearless female companions Dana Scully, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Xena Warrior Princess, as companions? How are their popular personas purposed in your work, and what effect does their pre-established backstories have on your work? Why did you choose these characters specifically?

I’m a big TV buff, and TV has always been my outlet for self-exploration and my pathway to self-understanding. When I was a young girl, I couldn’t picture myself as the damsel in distress or the love interest in the media I consumed, but I could imagine myself into the role of hero in the form of a Ninja Turtle or Batman. I only felt ready to come out as a lesbian in graduate school after watching all six seasons of The L Word. And so, I really do consider Buffy, Xena, and Dana to be my feminist heroes or role models—they made a big impact on me when I first watched their shows, and they continue to mean a lot to me today.

At the time I wrote Mega-City Redux, I had also recently read Susan Douglas’s book Enlightened Sexism, which is all about the pop culture feminist TV renaissance of the 1990s-2000s, when shows like Buffy and Xena debuted with their fiercely feminist and also really campy and fun content. Even though Mega-City Redux is about very serious social issues, I wanted to have fun with it, and I loved the idea of spending time on a road trip with these three extremely different women. I loved thinking about how they might interact—how they might annoy each other in the car and how they might care for the other. I really appreciate that they’re all such different types of heroes, which I think is important for feminist dialogue. Dana is my Reason figure—logical and intellectual. Buffy is my Rectitude figure—she tries to set things right, which is an inherently vulnerable act to take. Xena is my Justice figure—she wrestles with the thin line between justice and revenge.

What’s great about these three characters is that they’re already so complex and have so much backstory—Dana Scully is the voice of reason to her partner Fox Mulder, and she’s a very logical, left-brained doctor—but she’s also a person of firm religious faith. This kind of complexity made it easy to work with my characters’ backstories and stay true to them without caricaturing them. But my main goal wasn’t to write about the shows or the characters but rather to take them and plop them into my narrative and go on this quest with them.

3. Mega-City Redux cleverly, humorously combines feminist content with pop culture imparting an accessible, modernized spin. What reader responses have surprised or impressed you? What role do feminist works such as your own play in the current political climate?

I’m always surprised to see just how much these pop culture figures mean to folks. I’ve had readers talk to me about how they first realized they were gay because of Dana or Xena, and I had a reader recently show me a photo of she and her wife dressed up as Xena and Gabrielle (Xena’s beloved) for Halloween. I teach a class on superheroes at Regis, and I love talking with my students about why pop culture matters. TV is often lightyears ahead of the mainstream public discourse, so it can advance social justice movements in powerful ways—shows like Glee and Grey’s Anatomy won a lot of hearts and minds over to the cause of LGBTQIA rights. But TV also acts—just like the Golden Record—as a kind of time capsule snapshot of our world and our culture at this specific moment in time. I love this inherent tension, and I love the space that pop culture creates for “serious play.”

When I read works like Frank O’Hara’s poem “Lana Turner Has Collapsed” or Gary Coleman’s book of superhero poems Missing You, Metropolis, I’m always reminded of the power of writing about our celebrity or our fictional pop culture heroes. These are our modern-day “saints” and icons—our role models and outlets and thought experiments. They can act as a kind of common language through which to discuss the issues of our time, and because they exist in another, imaginative realm, they’re also inherently full of possibility and potential. These, to me, are the ingredients of powerful dialogue.

4. While the majority of science fiction works treat alien arrival as synonymous with the apocalypse, Copper Mother approaches alien arrival with a tone of friendly, casual curiosity. What reason lies behind this significant, divergent decision?

I wrote Copper Mother while I was living in Alaska, and while we were there, my wife and I received many visitors—family and friends who had always wanted to go to Alaska and finally bought their plane tickets after we moved there. So we spent a lot of our time being tour guides—showing our visitors things and places that felt totally ordinary to us but that totally blew their minds (glaciers! moose! bald eagles!). I think for this reason, I imagined a real tenderness between the humans and Our Friends. They often have awkward but always well-meaning, sweet exchanges. The humans sincerely want to be good hosts and Our Friends genuinely want to be polite visitors. I’ve always been interested in what happens when two very different cultures or groups meet and interact, and on what gets included or neglected from the tour or the introductory conversations.

I’m also very invested in the sincerity of the Golden Record project itself—it’s our only truly “species-wide” project—the only artifact we have that attempts to represent us as a unified planet rather than a fractioned collection of different groups. There’s an inherent optimism in the idea of the Record itself—a beautiful hopefulness that I wanted to capture in my book. To launch the Record into space is to believe that someone will find it who wishes us well and wants to connect with us—and that’s the possibility I wanted to envision in my book, not the terrifying (and cliche!) apocalyptic one. I’m a pretty uncynical person by nature, so this was easy for me to imagine.

5. Throughout the work, the aliens, later joined by Then-Jane, communicate through sound effects. How did you go about developing these dialogues?

The Golden Record includes a tremendous amount of sound, including an address by Jimmy Carter, spoken greetings in 55 different languages, a wealth of music (including Beethoven, Chuck Berry, Navajo night chants, and mariachi), and a series of “sounds from Earth” (wind, rain, crickets, wolves howling, cars).

During my research, I learned that many astrobiologists believe that if extraterrestrials ever actually hear the Record, they probably won’t be able to distinguish between the different sounds included—their auditory organs and understanding of language may be so different from ours that they may not know the difference between the music, language, and natural sounds on the Record. For that reason, I wanted Our Friends (and Then-Jane, since she’s a product of the Record) to speak with a mixture of all the types of sounds included on the Record. All of the dialogue they speak comes from actual Record contents, whether it’s a thunderstorm or a hyena laughing or a trumpet wail. I like the way this allows me to play with the definition of “language”—which is something the Record does, too, by including whale song not in the natural sounds portion of the content, but in the languages section!

6. And finally, info on how to purchase both works!

The best way to purchase is to go out to my website, www.alyseknorr.com, and click the licks on the books to go to the publisher’s page.

from Blog https://ondenver.com/colorado-poet-series-interview-with-alyse-knorr/

0 notes