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ganbaramen · 4 years

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Their intention is always to be by your side. The solid foundation of Aqours: Suwa Nanaka, Komiya Arisa, and Suzuki Aina (Translated Interview)

Translation: ramen Translation Check: xIceArcher Quality Check: arbshortcake, Mega-, Yujacha

In their new songs, Aqours is cooler and more mature than ever!

—Aqours, the school idol group from “Love Live! Sunshine!!”, is celebrating their 5th year since their activities began. Your 5th anniversary Dome Tour theme song “Fantastic Departure!” is releasing soon. How did you feel when you listened to it?

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Suzuki: Like we’re setting off on a new adventure. It’s very Aqours-esque—like we’re reaching out to a more distant place.

Suwa: Right, it’s a song unlike anything we’ve had before, one with very strong undertones of a new beginning.

Komiya: We’ve had the privilege of performing at Tokyo Dome and MetLife Dome, but I feel like this song depicts us as we move a step beyond that.

Suzuki: I think people are wondering what will happen to Aqours from now on. This song conveys that Aqours is moving forward, that we aren’t disappearing.

—How did you feel when you were recording it?

Komiya: For this song, they said that it’d be good to sing in a more mature way than usual, right?

Suwa: Yeah. I remember them telling us to sound cool.

Suzuki: On the CD version, only Chika says the “attention please” line at the beginning, but actually, all of us had recorded it. They told us to say it in a mature way, so I got the impression that the song would have a mature vibe to it.

Suwa: I felt like Chika’s voice was really gentle on the CD version of “attention please”! It’s very Chika-like to be cool yet still be gentle.

—Any parts that you particularly like?

Suzuki: There’s a part where we each sing in turn, starting with Ruby, and the way it flows between us got me especially emotional. “Thank you, FRIENDS!!” starts with Chika, so everyone’s lines in the song flow together to connect to Chika. That gave me goosebumps.

Komiya: Until now, the 3rd years usually only got their own part once the song got to the second verse. But here, we sing our solos in the same parts across both the first and second verses. At the bridge (where the background music is quiet), each of us sings our own part, which I think is quite rare.

—How do you feel about the B-side, “Aqours Pirates Desire”?

Komiya: The singing range is really low!

Suzuki: Right? It’s low for Aqours.

Suwa: It thrashes from low to high, so I was wondering whether my own vocals would be in the low parts or the high parts. It turns out mine were in the high parts, so I was like “Ohh, I see!”.

Suzuki: The bridge part is quite low!

Komiya: Oh, and the lyrics in my part have “red” in them, so that’s probably why I got those lines. (laughs)

Suzuki: I really like the “one, two, one two three four” part at the beginning, as well as the parts that are a little “impish”. Maybe I should say we act a bit like pranksters.

Komiya: True, it’s the cool side of Aqours.

Suwa: Yup, very cool.

Suzuki: The instruments used in the song also give it a pirate-like feel, in a good way.

Komiya: I want to dance and wave a flag around to it.

The Dome Tour, made possible by everyone’s support.

—Details have yet to be released, but right now, what do you want to try during the Dome Tour?

Suwa: First of all, I want it to happen…

Suzuki: Exactly! The Dome Tour is something that absolutely wouldn’t be possible without everyone who’s been supporting us.

Komiya: You could say that before we knew it, we became something incredible.

Suwa: We’ve really been raised well. (laughs)

Suzuki: I think this tour is only happening because everyone has been looking forward to it, so when the day comes that we can hold it, I want to give a performance that’ll live up to those expectations.

—Aqours already has experience performing at Tokyo Dome, so what do you pay attention to when you’re on stage at large venues?

Komiya: Our 1st Live (Aqours First LoveLive! ~Step! ZERO to ONE~ in 2017) was at Yokohama Arena. Since then, our choreographers kept stressing that “because there are also fans in the stands, you should be conscious of not only the arena sections in front of you, but also those up in the stands”. Because of that, we haven’t had to wonder about what to do if the venue is really big.

Suwa: During our 4th Live (Aqours 4th LoveLive! ~Sailing to the Sunshine~ in 2018), we were hard to see when we were riding the Aqours Ship, so the staff told us to make big movements.

Suzuki: But when we looked at our rehearsal footage, our movements often looked small even when we were trying to make big movements!

Suwa: The studio is completely different from the actual venues.

Komiya: Yup. And sometimes we have no choice but to use a small studio for our rehearsals.

Suwa: Right, right. The member that’s supposed to be the furthest from you sometimes ends up right next to you because you have to loop around [since there’s so little space]. Also, the actual venue has a two-level stage, but we might have to rehearse at a studio that’s just one flat level.

Komiya: But because we had that experience with such hardships, for times like Fest where we couldn’t spare much time for rehearsals, we were able to say “Just tell us where to position ourselves, and we’ll be good!”.

During the photo session after the concert, a display of initiative despite their shyness!

—At Love Live! Fest in January, you crossed the borders of the series to share a stage with µ’s and the Nijigasaki High School Idol Club. Did anything in particular strike you from Fest?

Suzuki: It’d have to be µ’s performing “Snow halation”—that was unforgettable. After “Snow halation” (on the second day), we were going to go out on the Aqours Ship. So while we were on standby backstage, we could hear µ’s singing. I ended up crying as we gathered in a circle, feeling like “we’re living in a dream”.

Suwa: Everyone was tearing up at that point.

Komiya: Yup. It was a really mysterious feeling.

Suwa: That moment was something we would have never imagined several years ago, so even we couldn’t picture it.

Suzuki: The fact that we would be performing with everyone from the Love Live! series at Fest… it didn't feel real.

Komiya: When I first heard about Fest, I almost couldn’t believe it! (laughs)

—What are your memories of Aqours’ songs at Love Live! Fest?

Komiya: Even though it had been a long time since we did a concert, we didn’t spend much time rehearsing.

Suwa: Not to mention that we did a lot of songs.

Suzuki: Not to mention that we did unit songs too. (laughs)

Komiya: Also, the stage manager had messages for us before and after our performance, like “do your best”.

Suzuki: Right, right. Things like “You’re the best!” or “That fired me up!”.

Suwa: I understand saying that to us afterwards, but it was inconvenient saying that before the performance because we’d tear up. (laughs)

Komiya: Besides that… they made a ditch in the stage so that the Aqours Ship could move. So we couldn’t be in our normal positions. But even so, we were able to adapt to it right away, which was amazing.

Suzuki: Yes. If this was a long time ago, we wouldn’t have been able to.

Komiya: I was kind of scared of myself because of how much better I could adapt. (laughs)

—How were the performances from the members of the Nijigasaki High School Idol Club?

Suzuki: They really had nerves of steel—just incredible.

Suwa: Because they were all doing their solo songs.

Suzuki: If that were me, I’d be so nervous, like “I can’t do this!”.

Suwa: Maybe the Nijigasaki girls were thinking that too!

Komiya: We started out as a 9-member group, so that’s what we’ve gotten used to, after all.

Suzuki: When we were performing solo at our 3rd Live (Aqours 3rd LoveLive! ~WONDERFUL STORIES~ in 2018), I felt fidgety. (laughs)

Komiya: At that time, I was concentrating so hard that I don’t remember whether the penlights the audience was waving were red or white…

Suwa: The colors were mixed!

—Did you mingle with members from the other units?

Komiya: Our dressing rooms were on the same floor as the Nijigasaki girls, so we ended up meeting in the bathroom. Aside from that, we only occasionally crossed paths after our rehearsals finished.

Suzuki: After the concert, there was time to take photos with each other!

Suwa: But Aqours has a lot of shy girls, so we were kind of paralyzed. (laughs)

Suzuki: I was just paralyzed in awe. But then Kusuda Aina from µ’s was kind enough to come up to me, saying that “we’re both Aina!” and “our colors are both purple!”. It was so hard to believe—I was screaming really loudly on the inside. (laughs)

Suwa: Arisa was the exception, though—she wasn’t shy at all.

Komiya: Yup. I went around getting photos as I pleased. With the Nijigasaki girls, it was like an entire photo session, and from µ’s, I got pictures with Pile, Nanjo Yoshino, and Emitsun (Nitta Emi).

Suwa: I took photos with Mimori Suzuko and Uchida Aya.

Komiya: Everyone was shy, but we took the initiative—”I’m not letting this chance slip away!” (laughs)

Five years of closing the gap between their own personalities and that of an idol

—As we look back on Aqours’ activities, would you mind telling us how you feel about these past five years?

Suzuki: I had never danced before, so I was worried about whether I’d be okay, and whether I’d be able to keep up. There was the challenging leapfrog (in “Kimi no Kokoro wa Kagayaiteru kai?”) and most of all: the fact that while Mari is tall, I’m the complete opposite.

I thought a lot about how to make my movements on stage appear bigger and how to bring out the sexy aura that Mari has. I worried a lot about those differences.

—How did you overcome those?

Suzuki: Once the anime started, it was a lot easier to see Mari’s expressions. That enabled me to spontaneously picture what Mari would do. It felt more and more like she stood by my side.

It doesn't really feel to me like the gap's been bridged yet, but I've slowly become more confident in our closeness thanks to the fans who'd say “Mari was on stage!".

—Suwa-san, how about you?

Suwa: I really started from rock bottom: no experience in singing or dancing, much less dancing within a formation. It wasn’t that I was missing something—it’s that I was missing everything. We had girls who could already sing or dance, so I inevitably felt like I had to put my all into it—or else. The only solution was to practice hard.

—Did you become confident in yourself through that practice?

Suwa: Good question. I memorize choreography faster than I did before, and my experiences over this time catalyzed my growth. Kanan and I only share a voice, while our appearances and personalities differ. So for concerts, I make my hair blue and my eyes purple. This makes me feel closer and closer to becoming one with Kanan.

—And how about you, Komiya-san?

Komiya: “Love Live! Sunshine!!” was pretty much my first time taking on the role of a voice actress. I had no understanding of how to approach reading an anime script, nor how to move in front of a mic. So I worked myself up into a frenzy. But since none of the other members had much experience with recording, I was relieved that, in some sense, we were all positioned at the same starting line.

Besides that, since I originally worked as an actress, I was overwhelmed by how I didn’t feel “idolish” enough for the job. You could say that my pride led me to feel too embarrassed about being sparkly like an idol.

—Do you feel like you’re able to project yourself as an idol now?

Komiya: Up until around our 2nd Live (“Aqours 2nd LoveLive! HAPPY PARTY TRAIN TOUR” in 2017), the stronger feeling was that of obligation—”I must do this”.

But I realized that I couldn’t enjoy performing at concerts when I was being animated by this obligation. Once I started focusing on enjoying myself, my feelings shifted as well. Though honestly, I still don’t know whether I really sparkle or not. (laughs)

—Komiya-san seems very close to Dia in terms of appearance.

Komiya: When I first saw them, I actually thought “there’s one that looks just like me”. (laughs) Yet she’s level-headed and talented, so our personalities differ. But, just like Aina, I got to know her human side, thanks to the anime. From there, I’ve gotten to understand her more and more.

All three of the third-years are unexpectedly laid-back?

—What’s your impression of the relations between the third-years?

Komiya: Even though they find it hard to be fully honest with each other, they’re actually the ones that love each other the most!

Suwa: Though we only got to see that after graduation, right?

SuzukI: Yes, yes. They drifted apart, made up, and matured in Season 2 of the anime. Then in the movie, they finally became honest with each other.

Komiya: In the movie, I felt like their relationship went back to how it was when they were children, in a good way.

—You can feel how strong the bonds are between the third-years from how their childhood relationship continued all the way from their youth to now.

Suzuki: Since the third-years are childhood friends, they’re the ones that have known each other the longest, even among all the Aqours members. It’s really a great relationship—you can feel how strong their bonds are from watching the animated performance scenes.

—What’s something that the third-years will never lose to the other year groups in?

Suzuki: Maturity…?

Komiya: If we consider the anime, maybe it’s their ability to communicate their thoughts to each other, without saying a word. Aside from that, there are many scenes in which the third-years have to pull the first- and second-years back to reality, so perhaps the third-years’ strength is being grounded in reality.

Suwa: In real life, we worked hard for the third-year songs (“Tousou Meisou Moebius Loop”, “Yosoku Fukanou Driving!”) during 5th Live (“Aqours 5th LoveLive! ~Next SPARKLING!!!~” in 2019), and I think our performance was second to none compared to the other year groups.

Komiya: Also, we’re quite calm, and I guess more laid-back than the other year groups. We had plenty of standby time when we were performing for the 69th “NHK Kouhaku Uta Gassen”. We had a narrow space separated by partitions, and the three of us got together, then wondered if we should prepare for the performance by taking a nap. (laughs)

Suzuki: Right, and not only that, but Suwawa (Suwa-san) went straight to sleep before me or Arisa! (laughs)

—So it’s characteristic of the third-years that you’re rock steady and ready at any moment.

Suwa: Yes, I think so. During the standby time, the first-years seemed like they were constantly playing games, so it was pretty lively over there. (laughs)

Komiya: Our ages aren’t even that different…

—What is your mindset as you approach this 5th anniversary year?

Suzuki: We now have the privilege of performing on a dome tour in our 5th anniversary year. Although we’ve evolved and the stages have gotten bigger throughout the years, my feelings haven’t changed from when we started, and I want to move forward while keeping them in mind. As we move ahead, I don’t want to be satisfied with our current abilities. If each of us keeps doing what we can, I’m sure we’ll continue to be loved.

We’ll keep trying our best, so I hope that everyone will keep warmly watching over us. Please continue to support “Love Live! Sunshine!!” and Aqours from now on.

Komiya: After passing our goal of performing at Tokyo Dome, it would be nice if this dome tour serves as a fresh start as we visit several places.

Also, I’d be really happy if this tour enables many people to meet us for the first time. For those of you that are already fans of Aqours: if you have friends or acquaintances that are even a bit interested in us, I hope you can get them to come to a concert of ours and fall into the deep end. (laughs)

Since the venues have gotten bigger, we might end up seeming far away to some people. But our intention is always to be by your side. So please rest assured of that and enjoy our activities.

Suwa: Maybe there are people who learned about Aqours for the first time through this article. Even as we enter our 5th anniversary year, we won’t stop moving forward. If we’ve sparked anyone’s interest, please watch our previous performances, and maybe we can walk forward together from now onwards.

The third-years cast tells all: what’s great about the other two?

Suwa Nanaka on Komiya Arisa

Arisa gets greedy for food! (laughs) Whatever it is, if it's got something to do with food, her going to check it out once we get there is kind of cute. While she seems like an older sister type, the gap between that and her easy-going pace is funny.

Suwa Nanaka on Suzuki Aina

Aina’s very good at singing in a genuine, straightforward way. Personally, I like her baby-like appearance (laughs)—it makes her really cute.

Komiya Arisa on Suwa Nanaka

Suwawa is always calm and collected, and she makes sure to pay attention to what’s around her when she acts. Her calmness in the face of anything, anywhere, is amazing!

Apparently, she also did some cooking during the shelter-in-place period. I usually don’t hear about her cooking, so that surprised me, and I think that part of her is quite cute.

Komiya Arisa on Suzuki Aina

Aina is kind and easy to work with. Because of that, I feel like she’s able to bring us together. She’s always smiling and brightening up the room, no matter where we are, which is also very charming.

Suzuki Aina on Suwa Nanaka

Suwawa is the one I hang out with most in private, and she’s reliable in taking the lead by saying “let’s go here” or “let’s do this”. Though that might just be because I’m indecisive. (laughs)

When we’re out on a date, she walks on the cars’ side of the sidewalk like it’s natural, and when I run into trouble during Aqours’ activities and the like, she comes to my rescue. Her casual kindness is really amazing.

Her best feature is her skin, which is as pale as snow. This is gonna make me sound kind of creepy (laughs), but it feels very pleasant to touch.

Suzuki Aina on Komiya Arisa

Arisa asks me “well, how about we go to a cafe?” whenever I’m troubled, and there, we talk it out directly—she’s the type to show rather than tell. Because she doesn’t like being indirect and she’s not two-faced, you can safely believe that she really means what she says.

But even though she seems reliable, she can be airheaded—she’ll do things like spill some food or space out. That gap moe is cute.

Q&A: Suwa Nanaka, voice of Matsuura Kanan

Question 01: Tell us what you really like about Matsuura Kanan!

She’s somewhat naive, but she’s very thoughtful about her friends. Her figure is great, too. I think she’s charming in many ways. In the anime, the third-years have many serious scenes, but in the movie you can see them brighten up and run free after graduating from high school—I like that as well.

Question 02: Personally, is there anything you want or something you want to do right now?

It’s not really a “thing”. It’s difficult in the current situation, but I have a hobby of traveling, so I just want to go somewhere.

If I could choose, I’d go to Europe, but what I really want right now is to travel, so I feel like anywhere is fine.

Question 03: Are there any media, like books or games, that you’ve taken an interest in recently?

“Mystery to Iunakare” [a manga series]. I already liked mystery and crime dramas, and my interest was piqued when I happened to see an ad for it. Every time, even though I try figuring it out, I can never figure out the culprit, and after it gets solved, I go back and realize there was actually foreshadowing. I take quite a bit of time to read it.

Question 04: When you were young, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A kindergarten teacher. I like babies, so up until around middle school, I also thought I wanted to be a nursery school teacher. Right after that, I started wanting to become a voice actress.

Question 05: What do you do on your days off?

I go on solo trips. Even if the next day suddenly opens up, it’s pretty hard to invite someone out, so I almost always go out alone. Sometimes I go to places I’ve been thinking about visiting for the longest time, but there are also places that I had booked a hotel at when my holiday was confirmed.

Q&A: Komiya Arisa, voice of Kurosawa Dia

Question 01: Tell us what you really like about Kurosawa Dia!

Everything, of course. (laughs) To be specific, in her roles as the student council president and as Ruby’s older sister, she always feels that she has to be reliable. But when she tries too hard to no avail—that human side of her is cute.

In Season 2, Episode 4 of the anime, you can feel that charm of hers gripping your heart. She hides her own feelings so that she can watch over everyone, but her own feelings slowly reveal themselves. It’s wonderful that she was finally able to act freely after that.

Question 02: Personally, is there anything you want or something you want to do right now?

The other day, I put on socks with lamé [fabric with metallic fibers] in them, and I noticed that my favorite black sneakers have a hole in them. I didn’t notice until now, since I’ve only worn black socks! I really want to get new ones as soon as I can.

Also, I’ve been buying more groceries that require freezing, and since I’ve noticed my freezer is small, I want a big freezer.

Question 03: Are there any media, like books or games, that you’ve taken an interest in recently?

I’ve always been buying “Kuroshitsuji” and “Kinou nani Tabeta?”. Recently, other than books and manga, I’ve gotten into the “Boku no Hero Academia” anime—I’ve watched through Season 4 of the anime as well as the movie. I like the Big 3’s Amajiki Tamaki.

Question 04: When you were young, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Sailor Moon. When I was young, since the classical ballet tutu looked like Sailor Moon’s uniform, I apparently thought that I could become Sailor Moon if I learned classical ballet. Though I completely forgot about that thought. (laughs) In middle school, I wanted to become a pharmacist, and in high school, I wanted to become a dietitian.

Question 05: What do you do on your days off?

I roll around and nap on the sofa, staring at the ceiling with no thoughts, head empty. (laughs) If I have errands to run or outings planned, I go out. But I don’t want my skin to get tanned, and when I wonder what reason there is for leaving the house if I don’t have a purpose in mind, I find myself not wanting to go out. If possible, I like to just stay inside my home and not do anything.

Q&A: Suzuki Aina, voice of Ohara Mari

Question 01: Tell us what you really like about Ohara Mari!

She’s a very positive girl—she shines, she’s positive, and she’s fearless. But I particularly like how thoughtful she is towards her friends. Even though she never puts it into words, she loves Aqours so much that she’s always thinking about the other members even more than herself. It’s not often that someone can do as well as Mari in “conveying her love to everyone”.

Question 02: Personally, is there anything you want or something you want to do right now?

I want a Nintendo Switch Lite~! The Coral Pink one. I already have a Switch, but I want another one to carry around.

Besides that, right now, I want to do a concert as soon as possible! Even though concerts are tough, I want to find a way to carry my voice to our fans.

Question 03: Are there any media, like books or games, that you’ve taken an interest in recently?

I’ve been reading [the manga] “Houkago wa Kissaten de”—it’s a comfy romantic comedy, and I can’t help but grin when reading it. It really makes your heart skip a beat! (laughs) I’m also into the game “Identity V”. I mostly play the Violent Struggle game mode.

Question 04: When you were young, what did you want to be when you grew up?

When I was around five or six years old, I would say I wanted to work at “a cake shop!” (laughs), but from late elementary school to middle school, my dream was to be a manga artist. I was pretty serious—one thing I did was taking a correspondence course on becoming a mangaka.

Question 05: What do you do on your days off?

Sleep, play games… to me, that’s the best way to spend my time. (laughs) I often don’t go out, but sometimes I go shopping with my younger sister.

#love live!#love live! sunshine!!#nanaka suwa #arisa komiya #aina suzuki

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fvckyouimaprophet · 5 years

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Glee. Niff + Chandler 😂😂😂😂😂

Okay, I did this to myself by bringing up Niff the other week. 😂 I took some liberties with Chandler because it’s my fic, and I can!

The last week had been a whirlwind. To Jeff, it had felt as if one moment, he and Nick were pushing boxes up two flights of stairs in the sticky summer heat, and the next, they were taking New York by storm. They had already begun their unofficial bucket list, complete with Levain cookies and a 3am pit stop at Veselka. But things had started to slow down. After five hours outside, with the sun reflecting off of the glass and concrete, all Jeff could think about was a little time to sit inside.

“Can we stop here?” Nick asked, motioning to a store down half a flight of stairs. Jeff squinted his eyes, trying to read past the sun gleaming off the storefront.

“Animal Records? As long as they have A/C, I’m down.”

The bell on the door jingled as they walked in. It became immediately obvious that there was no A/C, but several fans whirred at full blast, somewhat cutting through the stagnant air.

The guy behind the counter looked up at them and smiled. “Let me know if you need any help,” he said.

“Just browsing. Thanks!” Jeff leaned in towards Nick. “How is he wearing a beanie in this weather?” he asked under his breath.

“Dedication. He’s kinda cute, though.”

Jeff whacked Nick as subtly as he could. “You just have a thing for blonds.” He slid his way over to the Folk section. However, when he glanced over again, Jeff had to admit, there was something to him.

Jeff began leafing through records, but his attention was turned to Nick, who kept glancing at the blond boy at the checkout. If he noticed, he didn’t convey it. After a little bit, Jeff made his way over to Nick, who was halfway through the Rock section.

“Okay, I’ll bite. How would we even know he’s into us?” Jeff asked.

“I think he is. He—” Before Nick could say more, the guy behind the counter looked up at both of them and smiled again.

“Finding anything you like?” Something about his expression—bordering on a smirk—made Jeff almost certain that he had overheard, though considering the volume they were speaking at, it should have been impossible.

“Debating between Parallel Lines and Blondie by, well, Blondie,” Nick said.

“Ooh, both good choices.” He leaned forward across the counter. “But if you ask me, I’d go with Parallel Lines. X Offended is undoubtedly one of their best songs, but you haven’t lived until you’ve heard Heart of Glass on a record player.”

“Who am I to ignore your recommendation?” Nick said. He turned his attention down to leaf through and pull the record out.

“And you?” he asked Jeff. “No pressure, of course. Your boyfriend seems more into records than you.” Boyfriend – so he knew. Jeff wondered whether Nick had perhaps been right.

“Oh, um, I was just browsing, but I’d be interested.”

“Genres?”

“Pop, show tunes, I’m pretty open.”

“It just so happens that I give excellent musical recommendations.” He hopped out from behind the counter. “Though frankly our CDs have a better selection.”

Jeff glanced over at Nick, who raised his eyebrow and motioned for Jeff to follow.

“I insist on keeping the show tunes and soundtracks section well-stocked, even though we rarely sell from there. You’d think with it being New York and all, we’d have better luck, but people don’t exactly go to record stores for that.” He stoped in front of a wall of CDs.

“Oh, do you own the place?”

“Own it? Oh, heavens no! The owner’s a friend of a friend of my uncle. I go to NYADA.”

“Oh shit! No way. We have a friend who does. Kurt Hummel.”

“Kurt, huh?” Something about the tone in his voice told Jeff that there was more to the story, and as if to confirm it, the blond man smirked. “I’m Chandler, by the way. I don’t think I ever properly introduced myself.” He stretched out his hand.

“Jeff. And my boyfriend over there—” When Jeff turned around to motion, Nick was just a few paces behind them.

“Nick.”

“You new to the city?” Chandler asked, shaking both of their hands.

“Yeah. Just moved in last week,” Jeff said.

“I can tell. You don’t have that hardened look in your eyes yet from the MTA messing with you just one too many times.” He chuckled at his own joke and motioned back to the shelf. “So give me your favorite cast albums, Jeff, and I’ll give you the best recommendation list you’ve seen. It’s kind of my superpower.”

Under the guise of shifting his weight from one foot to the other, Nick nudged Jeff. Unless he was reading it wrong, there undeniably was something there.

“Spring Awakening, Next to Normal, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson.” Jeff chewed the inside of his cheek as he thought. “tick, tick… BOOM! as well”

“Excellent taste.” Chandlers stepped forward and leafed through the section. “I’m presuming you know about Heathers.”

“Yes, I love it!”

“And Bare.”

“We petitioned for our school to put it in,” Nick said.

“I love that.” It took Chandler a moment to find the CD he was looking for, and Jeff used the opportunity to look over at Nick. Upon seeing the wide grin on his face, Jeff couldn’t help but grin too, and reached over, squeezing his hand quickly.

“Well, then, how about Razia’s Shadow?” Chandler asked. “It’s more of a concept album, but it I have a feeling you’d like it. Something about you strikes me as a Panic! at the Disco fan.” He handed him the CD, and Jeff did his best to hide his reaction when he saw the price tag. “It is pricier, though, as there are limited copies. I won’t suck you dry. Promise. You should look it up online, though.” He took another moment to look through before handing Jeff another CD. “Bat Boy?”

“I’ve heard of it, but I’ve never listened to it.” He looked it over and nodded. They made their way across the store back to the cash register, and Chandler rung them both up.

“Hey, since we’re new to the city, would you want to show us the ropes?” Nick asked.

“How funny. I was thinking of asking you the same thing.” Chandler scribbled his number on the back of their receipt. “Something tells me that we’re going to be great friends. Maybe I can even take you out to see a show. NYADA gives us great discounts.”

“We’d love that,” Jeff said. He tucked the receipt in his wallet for safe keeping. “See you around, then.”

“See you around.”

They waited until they got outside before turning to each other. ��Told you!” Nick said, elbowing him.

“Okay, okay, you’re absolutely right.”

Suddenly, the New York heat didn’t seem all that unmanageable to Jeff. Not at all.

#niff #chandler kiehl #glee #nick duval #jeff sterling #my fics #my niff #ask #Anonymous

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musicacademic · 4 years

Text

Year 1 - Semester A - Week 7

November 4th - November 10th 2019

Music Industries

Teaching Music

In Music Industries on Monday morning, we were taught about teaching or we taught ourselves about teaching? Either way, it was probably one of my favourite sessions of Music Industries so far. Most of the session was up to us to see how Music should be taught. My professor started by welcoming us into the room with sweets and asked us how our holiday (as an Icebreaker) which was really nice as we’d been on a weeks holiday before that session and that’s where the lesson began. Right at the door.

One of the most crucial parts of teaching is to make sure that the students respect that the classroom belongs to you as a space to educate them but also to them as a space to be educated and to not be afraid to ask questions.

After being welcomed in my professor already had the classroom in a layout that he wanted it to be in to teach the lesson which made the transition between standing outside and beginning the lesson much easier as the classroom was equipped for learning.

A line that he made sure to emphasise was “A teacher’s job before anything else is to make sure a student is learning” and the way to do this is usually through assessments. There are 3 kinds of assessment:

- Self: This consists of letting a student look back on their own work and decide where they were successful and how they think they could learn better.

- Peer: This form of assessment can be shown. An example of this would be swapping work with another student to add their own input on how they feel the other’s work could be improved which allows insight on certain things you may not have noticed yourself when learning.

- Teacher: This is where you as the teacher really learn about how your student learns and you pick up on their strong suits and places in which they may require help. This is how a teacher will make sure that their student is learning.

To make sure we understood the lesson he provided to us an assessment of his own which was to plan our own lesson and present it for the class within 1 minute. When giving us this task he made sure to emphasise that as a teacher you must always remain professional even if giving a more relaxed lesson and that teaching always requires a plan.

See my lesson plan below:

Being a teacher, especially a music teacher within the teaching industry is an extremely hard task due to a number of things my professor listed as:

Noise! - Especially when working with younger years, noise can be a big problem with teaching music as in Primary and the early ages of High School, Music is usually a mandatory subject which means many students that you take may not always be interested in learning how to play music and sadly that means listening to the DJ button on a keyboard going off during your well-planned lessons.

Poor accommodation & funding - With budget cut after budget cut coming from the Government, the Arts are slowly dying as a subject and with less money for Music, schools are less likely to want to put time and effort into making sure that the subject has adequate equipment and workspaces. Which links into the next point:

Lack of administrative support

Competition with other creative arts subjects

Numbers of classes you will have, names, paperwork, parents evenings…

Small dept teams, including peripatetics (peri-pat-etic: a person who travels from place to place, especially a teacher who works in more than one school or college.)

Stress/workload

Even after hearing about the struggles of being a Music teacher, this lesson really influenced me into thinking about it due to the positive reinforcements from my professor that I would make a good teacher even though it was something that I’d always brush aside and say that I wasn’t ready for. I’m very thankful that I had this lesson as even though I knew about most of the parts of being a music teacher I’d never equated it to myself as much as this lesson allowed me to.

Approaching Notation and Analysis

Introduction to Transcription

(Worked on Notating Rhythms - Nothing to Show)

A Performer Prepares

The Cult of Virtuoso: Concertos

A concerto consists of an Orchestra playing with Soloist. It is usually used to:- Add Texture to a piece- Give an important Musician a chance to show off- Showcase a brand new instrument- Create a dramatic dialogue between the Orchestra and Soloist

Throughout the different stages of music (Baroque - Romantic), there were many different definitions for what a Concerto was which meant that Concertos varied a lot during this time but once music progressed to the Romantic era, it finally seemed to become one definition. A Classical Concerto (Cadenza) was the first seen improvised solo given to musicians within music whereas concertos within the Romantic Era were based more on the virtuosity of the main soloist rather than musical depth. Most Concertos in this time were written to show off and gloat about virtuosity.

An Example of a Concerto: (Vivaldi’s 4 Seasons - Winter)

[Vivaldi, Concerto No.4 in F minor, Op.8, RV297, “L’inverno” mut.3 Allegro - 1725]

Recording Music

Recording Studios

In this session, we went into the recording studios and were walked through how the equipment worked which I had learned from my time in College. Not much else was learned other than shaking an egg to be recorded which was quite funny.

A History of Popular Music

Mediation, Semiotic Analysis and Musical Dramaturgy

The definition of Mediation in the Oxford English Dictionary states that Mediation is an “Intermediate Agent” and a “Medium of Transition” which when written in simpler terms basically boils down to Mediation is making music marketable. It is usually seen as opposing to Authenticity as it takes away from the original meaning of the song but can also be complementary to the Authenticity of a piece of music.

When thinking about Mediation the sections usually thought about consist of:

- Live Performance - Selling Merchandise / On stage lighting choices and art

- Package Recording - Recording CDs / Vinyls / Cassette Tape (Image/Artwork)

- Filmed Concert Documentaries

- Radio Broadcasts - Live Lounge

- Feature Film Soundtracks - Netflix / Films / TV Shows

- Adverts for Non-Musical Projects - John Lewis Adverts

- Instrument Choice - Dylan Goes Electric

An Example of Mediation could be the performances of Verdi’s “La Traviata” - ‘Brindisi’ (Lost Weekend (Wilder, 1945)) as it shows how the context within a performance is important to Mediation.

Semiotics is the creating of meaning from an action or symbol. For example, some things have multiple meanings such as the sign the 2 fingers up meaning Peace when it comes to Hippies and Victory when Winston Churchill did it after the war. Most Semiotics depend on the context and the subject’s cultural codes / what they grew up understanding.

Codes are signifiers that promote a certain thought or feeling within a spectator due to the individual’s familiarity with the code. E.g. Shrieking Cellos to a Western audience would be a code that connotes horror whereas someone who hasn’t been exposed to the sound within that context may not feel the same feeling of fear after listening to the same sound.

Within the book Unheard Melodies by Claudia Gorbman, the author proposes that when an audience attributes meaning to film music their reading is based upon their experience and understanding of 3 different semiotic factors (Although sometimes these factors blur and merge):

Pure Musical Codes

Cultural Musical Codes

Cinematic Musical Codes

Musical Dramaturgy: When broken down Dramaturgy refers to techniques and principles employed in the design and presentation of dramatic works which leads to the idea that ‘Musical Dramaturgy’ separates elements that complete dramaturgical functions from ones that do not.

The terminology used when thinking about Musical Dramaturgy includes:

Added Value - Adding music to a scene gives the visuals a value. An example of this would be having one scene with different music over the top and seeing how the scene is perceived with the change.

Non-diegetic Music - This is where the music within a source is absent from the story word aka music that the characters within the story cannot hear. Example: The Opening Scene from UP - The music that plays within these scenes is obviously non-diegetic as it plays throughout the story of their lives and the characters do not react or interact with this. This music is merely there to add depth to the scene for the audience.

Diegetic Music - Being the exact opposite of Non-Diegetic Music, this music exists within the world of the characters and is often something the characters will interact with either through turning on the radio, putting earphones in or walking into a party and having the music play. Example: A scene from The Amazing Spiderman 2 in which the music switches from Diegetic (Being played through earphones in the main character’s ears) to Non-diegetic (The character taking his earphones out and the music getting louder to connote the switch between the two)

Internal Diegetic - This is the 3rd form of music within the context as Internal Diegetic refers to music in which one of the characters is thinking about a piece and therefore the audience can hear this music but the other characters within the scene cannot hear or interact with the music.

Acousmatic - Is the creating of an audiovisual space which brings the audience beyond the borders of the screen into the spaces in which the camera cannot capture. Examples of this would be like behind a closed door or behind the character as they’re being filmed walking down a corridor.

Empathetic - This music is something that is matched with the mood of the scene or of a character/compliments what the audience would think is appropriate for the scene.

Anempathetic - This music is something that is matched against the mood of the scene or of a character. Example: In Kingsman where there is a massacre within a church and yet the music is happy and upbeat.

Dissonant Harmony - A form of Anempathetic Music which creates a sense of Irony which is reflected through the music and the film scene.

Intracontextual Reference (Leitmotif) - Referencing a song that has been playing throughout a film in reference to a character or a certain event within the film. Example: Top Gun where the song playing on the Juke Box in the cafe is one that is linked with the Protagonist’s relationship with his partner which is heard throughout the film.

Intertextual Reference - Music which creates meaning through its connection with another form of media. An example of this would be if the Jaws theme playing in a different film, the audience link this sound with the idea of something lurking and getting ready to strike and therefore get worried.

Mickey-Mousing - Actions that are syncronised with the music alike what is usually seen in Mickey Mouse cartoons.

Ostinatos and Stingers - An ostinato is a repeated melody or rhythmic pattern that illustrates sudden dramatic tension (A Stinger).

Sound Bridge - Music that starts at the end of a scene and guides the transition through to the next scene.

#studyblr #university #college #school #student #notes #lecture #lecture notes #study notes #musicblr #musician #music #academic #WeeklyAcademic

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fluidsf · 5 years

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Fluid Label Focus on Crónica 019

Francisco López & Miguel A. García: Ekkert Nafn (2019)

Reviewed format: review copy of CD Album as kindly provided by Crónica

Welcome to another new review in the Fluid Label Focus series on the Crónica label in which today I’m reviewing an album that I received as a review copy on CD from Crónica quite by surprise. With many review copies nowadays coming in in digital format through the email or other ways, finding an extra review copy in my physical package of a release I didn’t review yet was a very nice gift. Indeed this album, titled Ekkert Nafn by Francisco López & Miguel A. García was also the exact kind of album I had actually been subconsciously waiting to check out for quite some time, with the last time I’ve checked out López work being through a CD release in a very arty package that I ordered from the quality but unfortunately by now closed Experimedia mail order store so seeing his name on this album already gave me high expectations as through my always ongoing interest in underground and experimental music the glimpses of descriptions of his sound always left me intrigued. Indeed through the ever-growing interconnection by networking with an ever growing number of artists and labels that I review I’ve already come across Miguel A. García’s name as well, but didn’t know yet what kind of sound his material has. Through Ekkert Nafn I found out however that these two Spanish sound artists and experimental musicians have a lot in common in terms of their approach to composing, manipulating and performing with sound but through subtle cues there is a kind of division between the two artists audible on this album, although when listening to this album in full, the transition from López’ piece to the track by Miguel A. García is so seamless that the compositions become one piece, one continuous experience. And while before writing my reviews I always read the release descriptions and refer to them somewhat too, the more compact text on the back cover which doesn’t reveal a lot is in this case also enough to be able to get into these pieces, as like López also said in an interview before, not knowing what these sounds are sourced from is often better than having this knowledge to get into the compositions with a completely fresh mind and no pre-formed expectations in your mind in advance. So that’s also the approach I will take with this review, as much interpretation of the compositions without too much reference to possible recognisable sounds. Before I get into the compositions, I’ll talk a bit about the artwork of this release on CD, as always. The CD of Ekkert Nafn comes in a nice compact cardboard gatefold sleeve with artwork by Raul Dominguez and the signature Crónica design by Miguel Carvalhais. The front cover is quite fitting to my impression of the sound works on this album themselves, abstract paint-like swipes of white and purple-ish colour combined with blue dots puncturing these textures appear over a dark nocturnal background which matches the rather mysterious nocturnal ambience I’m getting from the pieces, strange glimmering sounds appearing in front of you in the dark quiet night. In the middle you can see the artist names, album title, Crónica logo and catalogue numbers in uppercase type in a nice contemporary labelling style. The spine follows the familiar Crónica style again, artist names in normal uppercase type, album title in bold and label name, catalogue numbers + year in regular style again over a black background. The back cover is black as well, listing the track list plus track timings, creation dates and locations, copyright data, links and album credits in serif type. Inside the gatefold you can find more artwork (which is especially focussed around the aforementioned holes in which lights and shapes peeking through). The CD itself is housed in a round die cut in which it can slip in and out. The CD features signature Crónica design, black background, with a pretty bold border around it and shows the Crónica logo in transparent style, catalogue numbers, artist names and album title and the CD logo.

Now onto the pieces themselves, as I mentioned, listening to both pieces by Francisco López and Miguel A. García in sequence on this album does give a listening experience that feels more like one continuous piece rather than two solo works (Untitled #351 by Francisco López being track 1 and Applainesads by Miguel A. García being track 2) and this isn’t entirely surprising as the back cover states that both artists based their pieces on the same batch of source sounds that they also collaborated on within the creation process of that sound set itself. There is definitely a cross of sonic material on this album but while reading this description might make you wonder if that doesn’t render the compositions very similar to eachother, that’s not really the case. Instead the pieces compliment eachother. For a start, let’s look at López’ piece Untitled #351. Lopéz takes on a very dynamic, varied and intriguingly alien approach to his sound world and composition, giving us sounds we think we recognise but bringing these into very mysterious situations. Glimmering mechanical sounds backed with low sub bass pulsations often give the impression of some kind of strange abstract moving structure of particles glowing and twisting in front of you, in the dark night. This “night” suggestion is one I got from both pieces because the sound is very focused in a certain direction in the stereo field, often leaning to centre or a bit more to the right of the stereo field, this mixed with the curious separation in frequencies of the sonic spectrum in which the low end is very low, while other sonic energy floats in the mid-high - high end of the spectrum but has some quite prominent resonant frequencies sticking out quite a lot. Very quiet sections, quite lowercase are also prominent in López’ piece, with a quiet listening environment or headphones being a true requirement for this piece to be able to actually hear everything within it as the piece can vary from louder sections of at times, industrial styled sections of composed sound rhythms and metallic pulsations to very soft, sub-bassi sections of soft tones and tonal elements. This constant variation in manipulation, blend of sonic textures and at times surprisingly musical ways of handling sound through repeating rhythms or tones creates a listening experience that feels like a very nice fresh approach to soundscapes and the Sound Art field in general as while the sonic images are audibly rooted in concrete real-world sounds, the glimmering, glitchy, at times punchy rhythmic pulsations, bass throbs, metallic “percussion” textures and high frequency details together form an ever changing sonic landscape that moves from intense bright activity to sections of very subdued “hidden sounds” at the edge of the threshold of hearing, which creates a great depth, progression and “story line” to the piece which makes it a very memorable, inspiring immersive listen which I highly recommend. Because of the adventurous structure of the piece I also don’t want to spoil how this piece progresses but I can tell it’ll definitely give you whole fresh new perspective on how powerful and also fun sound art and composed soundscapes can be. Applainessads, Miguel A. García’s piece follows up López piece in a great way through a more drone based continuous kind of flowing soundscape which is more high end based in terms of sound spectrum and which features plenty of eerie strange sounds, some of which are recognisable as nature sounds, like crickets and wind. It forms a great extended coda to Untitled #351 with its mixture of nature sounds blended with metallic textures and resonating droning tones. But also this piece does feature its own kind of rhythmic elements in the form of hollow “drop” like sounds that appear quite distant, like water drops reverberating in a damp wet cave. I’d say this piece feels quite a lot like an examination of strange dust particles in the night air turned into a subtly evolving soundscape, like a brooding mostly continuing ambience of metallic resonant ghostly textures that feels both oddly alien and strange but also comforting organic and natural at the same time. Its differing compositional and textural style definitely does make it obvious as being a distinct different piece from López’ composition but the coherent metallic resonance that is also audible in López piece connects both together for a seamless experience and thereby forms an awesomely unique layered sonic journey that feels quiet at times and yet also so close in front of you.

Ekkert Nafn by Francisco López & Miguel A. García is definitely a very strongly recommended album and one of the best Crónica releases from this year as well. A thrilling, immersive and highly detailed sonic journey of concrete sound bordering on recognisable musical elements that unpredictably flows from one event to another and conjures up awesome nocturnal images of subdued or more “open” mystery through the mixtures of nature sounds, metallic mechanical sounds, resonances, sub bass rhythms and lush high frequency details. A highly recommended release for anyone into the composed side of soundscapes, sound art and fans of Drone, Industrial as well as perhaps Noise will also find familiar elements in these pieces to enjoy and with such expertly crafted textural compositions this is an album to re-listen many times. Definitely go check out this album.

Limited Edition CD and Digital Album are available from the Crónica Bandcamp page here: https://cronica.bandcamp.com/album/ekkert-nafn

#limited edition #cd #crónica #2019 #soundscapes #sound collage #field recordings #glitch #lowercase #nocturnal #immersive #francisco lópez #miguel a. garcía #Ekkert Nafn #fluid label focus #album review

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ark-of-eden · 7 years

Text

Thoughts on the Function of Art?

(R:) I didn't want to append this to that big thread about censorship, questionable story content, and authorial intent because I am a Small Person who just consumes things and I was pretty sure that I can't actually add anything useful to the discussion. But I'm still stuck on it a little, so here is a thing that I'm putting behind a readmore in case everyone is fucking tired of the whole censorship debate.

tl;dr: Riss is old and grew up in an environment that was not exactly info-rich when it came to controversial issues. Riss is clumsily attempting to tape this and that together for some reason, possibly just to get it out of the brain. (This ultimately turned into a long fucking story about my early life that doesn't really go anywhere. It's just a long fucking story.)(**ALERT: This includes discussions of stereotypes, slurs, and fetishization.)

People in that thread pointed out the weird over-reliance on interrogating an author about what exactly they meant by writing certain content and that authorial intent should be a yardstick for whether certain content is edifying (and deserving of existence) or not. Other people wisely pointed out that every consumer will inevitably interpret every creation through the lens of their own experience and come up with a different take on what the piece is "saying" about whatever it depicts.

Back when I was very young, there was no way to directly contact any sort of creator. Novels had small text somewhere that mentioned how to send snailmail to the author C/O the publishing company, but naturally there could be no expectation that an author would ever actually write you back. Direct contact with creators was usually in the context of them being guests at a con or signing or gallery showing, which was sort of like seeing a band play live. Every other exposure to them was one-way or indirect, through their work or news articles or possibly from hearing a radio interview or watching a TV program about them, if they were important enough. This was pre-widespread-Internet, so nobody had blogs; some big-name people had fanclubs that mailed out regular newsletters, but the vast majority of creators had nothing but their content in circulation.

I guess that the point of saying all of that is just to illustrate that the present-day situation in which creators have public social media accounts that one can just drop into and toss opinions and questions about intent at them is...kind of a luxury, in my experience? For writers of "classics," there might be printed articles or essays in which they went on about their intent or process, but for creators who weren't popular while they were alive, historians have to go mining for diaries or letters to even get an idea of what sort of person they were, much less what they meant when they wrote that one scene from that one novel that was Kind Of Problematic.

And that was a tangent leading around to a perspective about creative work in general that I heard very early on and took to heart when it came to consuming media. I read somewhere that the point of creating something was to produce a response or emotion in the consumer. Any response. The creation was meant to be a catalyst for newness or change in the viewer, even if the response was something like anger, fear, or disgust. The worst possible response to a creation was dull indifference, because it had failed to do anything at all to the consumer.

I saw supporting evidence for this perspective in a lot of media. Bands built up weird, elaborate Aesthetics purely to draw attention to their songs, not because they were demonstrating some deeply-held belief system. (I've lost track of how many CDs I saw from bands who made dark music about cruelty, despair, and the emptiness of the universe and yet, in tiny liner-note text, poured out flowery squee about how they thanked the loving Lord God and Jesus Christ for blessing them with their musical careers.) Artists who talked to other artists about their craft admitted that they often made the art they did just because they wanted to make it for no special reason, but they fabricated deep-sounding bullshit to attach to it so that collectors would buy the thing just for the story that went with it.

A piece that kept getting talked about over and over back then was Piss Christ, which was literally a large glass jar full of urine that had a crucifix floating in it. Large sections of society were fucking outraged that this thing even existed, that galleries dared to let it darken their doorways, that the artist was even depraved enough to think up such a thing. I don't recall what the artist herself (I think it was a she) said about why she made it, but what was clear to me was that she had succeeded at the goal of art like an absolute champion. Nobody could look at that piece without having some kind of intense response, and whole groups of educated people were compelled to spill out their opinions and argue about it. Piss Christ was Successful Art, the thing that every piece of art wished that it could be. It didn't matter that most of the responses were negative. Apart from making it, the artist did nothing to encourage all the discussions prompted by the art's existence. People used it as a springboard for debates about What Is Art Really, the empty veneration of religious iconography, public obscenity, and all sorts of other things, entirely on their own.

Granted, there were clear downsides to not having instant access to people's creative narratives and backgrounds, or to the greater community of consumers. There were panels discussing themes in modern writing at cons and sometimes a nearby book club where people could rec things and talk about good and bad aspects to whatever they were reading, but if you weren't in a position to have either of those things? There wasn't a lot to do but chat with any reader buddies you might have or actually trust marketing. This book is a NYT Bestseller and has its own special display in Borders? Well, must be a well-written book with quality content, or else it wouldn't have that kind of backing, right? (I was such a trusting little idiot back then, seriously.) So this was when all those toxic norms of casual misogyny, racism, and queer villainization went unchallenged in a lot of places and was just The Way Things Are.

My family moved around to many parts of the US while I was young and I swear I never heard people anywhere bothering to have a discussion about the trend of weak female characters or how POC cultures kept getting reduced to exotic window dressing. There was a sense that those kinds of intellectual topics were the sort of thing that academics did in far-off Academic Country, where they only read classic literature and went over word-by-word symbolism with ever finer combs. I'm no quality literature historian, but I imagine that those kinds of thematic conversations probably got louder as widescale communication got easier, such that a person could throw out into the aether, "Is it just me, or is the only time when cultural elements from Asian, Middle Eastern, Native American, or African civilizations turn up in mainstream lit is when they need 'exotic savage foreigners'?" and people would be able to chorus back, "OMFG THANK YOU I thought I was the only one bothered by that!!" (I mean, advancements in communication helped every minority find other people like themselves, which is why the Internet is part of real life and a genuinely precious resource to isolated odd folk who are forced to live in places that are hostile to them. You no longer have to live your entire life being the only lonely freak instance of your kind in the entire universe.)

So I recognize the shitty situation of having mainstream marketers telling people which stories were good and which story elements were admirable without also having access to Discourse that would challenge those norms. I remember just accepting that girls would hardly ever be able to be heroes the way boys could be, and that people from far-away cultures were always primitive and backward but in fascinating ways. Nothing in my daily life countered anything that I read. Discussions that I found online much later in life caused me to rethink the trends in everything that I'd read as a kid and see it all with fresh eyes so that I could realign my opinions. It's vital to have discourse and challenge happening alongside creation so that we don't have generations of people absorbing shitty norms that are supported by fiction and not realizing that there are even alternative ways of seeing things.

But there's still that issue, in my mind, of a good creation being one that creates ripples far outside of itself by prompting any kind of response in the consumer. Which is, I guess, why it seems fine to me that Problematic things exist and that people encounter them even if they come away hating those things. The encounter with that thing can make a person think about their own perceptions and experiences, and it can prompt conversations about was learned from that encounter - the why of the result and what it means. Obviously, the same can be done with media that makes a person happy or comforted, and that ends up in Discourse because people end up comparing their experiences and questioning whether the people who are happy/comforted are correct to feel that way about the media.

(Bonus Tangent: it's never possible to be incorrectly upset/offended, only incorrectly happy, strangely. Because telling people that they are not allowed to be upset about something is controlling and aggressive, but telling people that they're wrong to enjoy something is...I'm not finding any positive result. It's shaming, which is a response used to exert social control over others. Talking about whether or not casting shame on total strangers leads to the desired result is something that even I don't want to take the space to talk about. I'm one of those who considers emotion to be out of a person's control. Emotion precedes action. What's important, IMO, is what action a person takes regardless of what emotions they might have, because it's possible to choose actions. Telling a person that they're not allowed to feel a certain way is an attack based on something that a person can't actually control. Whenever I see antis saying things like "no one should ever enjoy this content," I wonder how people are supposed to casually shut off their enjoyment. Can the antis shut off their outrage with a flip of a switch, since it's just an emotion too? Attempting to reprogram a person's emotional or motivational palette leads to things like conversion therapy, which has a high rate of failure/relapse and tends to traumatize people into other mental deformities. That's why it's far more useful to focus on responses to emotion instead of emotion itself. People with uncontrollable emotional responses - such as phobias or fetishes, say - can learn adaptive actions faster than they can unlearn emotional responses.)

This was a hugely roundabout way of saying that I really think that bad media or problematic media are still important. They can prompt discussion and introspection, as mentioned, but, IME, even a shitty representation of a concept can put cracks in a person's worldview and make it possible for them to be open to better ideas in the same vein later on.

For instance, I had that strict mainstream heteronormative upbringing. The only thing I knew about queer people for a huge part of my life was that they needed to be pitied because they were going to hell, and the closest thing to a trans person that I knew about was that Crying Game trap drag queen concept where the sinister man in a dress seduced honest straight men with borrowed feminine wiles. (I literally did not know that transgender people were actually real until after I was 20, which is one reason why I am such a massive late trans bloomer.) I also had that strict gender role upbringing in which there were certain things that a person must and must not do in order to be "proper."

Back when I first got on the Internet and started interacting with fandoms, genderswap fics were popular in my circle. Often, it was basically the same plot as the source material, but you'd switch everybody to the opposite binary gender and then, based on the assumption that men and women think and do things in slightly different ways, the plot would usually derail from canon because the genderswapped characters wouldn't do the same things that they canonically did. It was just one of many common fanfic thought exercises.

Looking back, reading genderswap fics was something that started eroding the strict worldview that I'd inherited. The "men and women just naturally do things differently" was enough in line with traditional gender roles that it passed by my defenses, but the swapped cast of just about everything ended up with lots of strong, heroic women and the occasional male sidekick. Further, writers tended to use the "women are more socially/emotionally intelligent than men" stereotype to correct shitty things that male characters did in canon because, if they were women, they'd be too smart and perceptive to do whatever stupid thing they did and everything would have happened differently. Nowadays, there's formal discussion about the lack of strong female characters in mainstream fiction, but in fandom, female writers just fixed the problem directly with genderswap so all the interesting, powerful people could be women and the guys could be useless arm candy for once. It was a way of reclaiming importance and power when canon media didn't give women much else to work with.

(I became aware while ago that Discourse is informing people that genderswap fics are hugely offensive to trans people. Now, I've described my crappy upbringing, but as a trans person, I don't understand this at all. I get that the "opposite gender" swap upholds the gender binary, but the issue is offense against trans people, not against genderqueer or nonbinary people. I seriously don't get why I should be offended? Is it because the genderswap doesn't include actual RL transgender experiences, as if the entire cast were realistically transitioning as a plot element? Genderswap is not acceptable unless it specifically includes things like "this is the story of how Cloud Strife got her testicles removed and enjoyed growing breast buds thanks to HRT"?? Maybe I'm an idiot, but those are two distinctly different story concepts and both have merit. o_o)

Later on, I became aware of people who were preoccupied with stories and fantasies of fantastical gender transformation, usually male to female. Some stereotypical male character would get injected with an alien serum or zapped by a fairy's wand or something and he would immediately metamorphose into a woman. There was often a disturbingly rapey element to these stories, like the boy wouldn't want to be transformed and was horrified while he was changing, but after he settled into the woman-shape or had sex as a woman after changing, he realized that he loved it and felt so much better that way. The stories were mostly just short repeats of this exact same situation, written by different authors with slightly different details, and this group never seemed to get tired of them.

Eventually, I learned that most of the people in the core of this group identified as trans women, but they lived in circumstances where they weren't permitted any female expression or had lost hope of ever transitioning. They fixated on transformation fic as a way to soothe the pain of living. Looking back, the noncon/dubcon themes that kept appearing in the fics made sense as a way of indirectly satisfying the powerful social forces that were demanding masculinity of them. The male characters were trying hard to stay male, fighting back against the transformation; they were clearly performing all the do not want signals expected of men threatened with feminization. They fought the good fight, but the enemy overpowered them! Womanhood was forced upon them! It was totally unexpected that they enjoyed being a girl after all, but because their maleness had been aggressively destroyed, they were free to stop performing resistance and love themselves.

But you can find fetish material like this in a lot of places, without any context as to the intent of the creator. (And I'd argue that it counts as a fetish if you crave it as necessary somehow, regardless of whether or not you're jacking/jilling to it.) Some people would write the same kind of stories for forced feminization as a type of humiliation. Among furries, transformation fetish material seems to add an extra angle of growing into new power and strength by a change into some larger, more magnificent creature in addition to changes involving sexual characteristics.

Further into the fantasy fetish scene is smut involving dickgirls/cuntboys. Those terms are inherently objectifying and fetishizing; the focus is entirely on the genitals and how a person has the "wrong" ones for their body. Understandably, this is where trans people get turned into dehumanized kink fuel, and real life "tranny chasers" exist who try to weasel into relationships with trans people just to have an embodiment of their fetish.

Artists seem to be slowly getting better with at least giving a nod to real trans people when tagging this sort of art, but (likely to get the most search hits) usually it's just "transwoman/man" alongside "dickgirl/cuntboy." And the art, at least, is clearly designed as fap fuel, so it's not like changing the label makes the content more respectful to the real humans it resembles.

Fetish art with that sort of name shouldn't be uplifting or encouraging because it makes trans people into objects, I know. But I enjoy it when I see it not because it gets me hot in itself, but because I feel heartened when I see sexy art of, essentially, trans people who have not had any genital surgery. I'm fortunate in that I don't have the worst soul-crushing dysphoria surrounding my (still XX factory standard) genitals, but I know a lot of trans people get seriously torn up about theirs and worry that they'll never be truly attractive to others because their genitals are "wrong." While it's possible to find humiliation art online of people with all kinds of body configurations, I tend not to (YMMV again) find much that seems to be specifically shaming or hating on characters who have trans genitals specifically because they are wrong/ugly/queer/etc. They're just participating in enthusiastic hot sex like all the other characters. Sometimes they're literally just standing around looking sexy, like any other badly-posed pinup. But when they're in the mix of whatever smut they're depicted in, they're objects of desire with their own sexual power, unashamed and equal to the others, and the other characters find them attractive and are clearly really excited to be doing whatever they're doing with that hot trans character.

And this response is very problematic, I know, because smut of trans characters that's designed to satisfy fetishes actually does lead to cis stalkers who want trans partners as living sex toys. And art of pre/non-op trans people being sexually liberated and desirable might end up being nearly indistinguishable from most of the fetish art I've seen, apart from lacking the objectifying dickgirl/cuntboy label. I hate seeing those terms in art tags, but the art itself makes me happy. Not even aroused, just happy to see characters who are essentially pre/non-op trans people being desired and enjoying themselves. When you've lived your life believing that you're ugly and unlovable, seeing people similar to yourself in those kinds of situations is a Band-Aid on an old, deep wound. I wish someone would look at me that way. I wish someone wanted to touch me that way. And even if you can't have that for yourself, you can at least look at art where similar people can, and even if those trans people are imaginary six-breasted purple foxtaurs, you can still feel like at least there are trans people somewhere in the galaxy who are free and happy and desirable. It's the same as those trans girls who spent years telling each other the same MTF transformation story over and over and over even though it was pure fantasy. They needed periodic inoculations of that fiction to keep themselves afloat when they believed that they could never have the reality.

That's why, to return to my earlier point and to the points that the people in that big thread probably said better than I have, I don't want bad media to go away. Even gross White Man Story For White Menfolk fiction can at least prompt discussion and response and might have little bits in it that made someone out there think of something in a way that they haven't before. Even depictions of minorities that are pretty clearly designed to be shallow fetish fuel might be a lifeline to some isolated person to whom that shitty depiction is the most positive representation of their identity that they've ever seen. You'd hope that they'd quickly be able to find better ones, but beggars can't be choosers, and if that shitty depiction hadn't existed then they might never have had the chance or the knowledge that different views were possible. You just can't know what people see and think when they consume a particular piece of media. They bring so much of their own context into the experience.

That's why I wish people would focus on action instead of on vague, catastrophizing speculations about intent or potential or who has a "right" to create or consume certain things. There are at least a couple of stories floating around about female fic writers who regularly wrote m/m smut, but who, IRL, opposed same-sex marriage and disowned their queer relatives. IMO, that's how you can tell who is making objectifying content - by whether they treat actual, living representations of minorities/fetishes like frivolous entertainment. I would bet that those IRL-anti-queer fic writers wrote things that were indistinguishable from the general mass of fanfic, which was why other fandom people were shocked to discover their IRL actions. People create things for all sorts of different reasons, not because ther creations are a clear window into their innermost motivations. You just can't know what's in a person's head, no matter what sort of things they create.

And I've literally spent hours writing this and sort of vaguely editing it paragraph by paragraph, so I'm going to post this now and release myself from childhood memory hell. Ultimately, that reblogged thread still said all of this better, but I just had a compulsion to LET ME SING YOU THE SONG OF MY PEOPLE FOR TEN FUCKING PAGES. :P

And oh hey, I was so caught up in time-warping back to the 80's and early 90's that I forgot that Wikipedia existed, so here's their page on Piss Christ. Turns out the artist was male. Says it was only a photo?? Lies!! I distinctly remember seeing the goddamn gross jar of pee!! Because human memory is a reliable, unalterable record!! (Okay, I've clearly gone on too long here. I apologize to the whole internet in advance.)

#fetishization #queer #early life experiences #slurs #queer fetishization #fandom politics #not even sure what to tag this as so just sort of be generally cautious

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justfollowmyhansel · 7 years

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October 17th -- Lift Up Your Hands

I woke up in the hotel feeling very calm. Relaxed even for what felt like the first time in a long time. Perhaps it was being able to take an extended bath in the ridiculous sized tub. Or perhaps it was the idea that I had absolutely nothing that I had to do that day besides getting to the show. The more I thought about it, it was probably more that than anything else. Besides at this point, most of the pressure to actually do something or the nervousness of just what the show would be had passed. There was still excitement, of course, but I’d be able to enjoy myself in a different way than I had up until that point at tonight’s show having already seen the staging from the same relative angle.

My only bit of shopping that I had set aside for the day was that I had wanted to try out the 100 Yen store. Dollar stores in the US have long been a favourite of mine for the weird things you can find and the way it makes it relatively easy to try new things. Possibly not the best quality things, but enough to give an idea of whether or not it’s worth investing more money into later.

After eating the cereal I had ordered to my room the previous night and armed with the instructions given to me by the lady working the lobby the previous night, I set out.

I got as far as the train station before something went sideways. Of course, like a lot of times getting turned around, I didn’t realize that I had gotten turned around until I was very turned around.

I stopped into a grocery store thinking that it might have been the 100 Yen store I was seeking. It wasn’t, but it did allow for some interesting comparison shopping to be done – food seemed to cost a little less overall in Japan than in the US, but for some reason boxed hair dye was way more expensive. I wondered if it was because less people in Japan dyed their hair than in the US. I only bought a can of coffee there, having passed up most of the other things as either a little too expensive for what I wanted to buy at the time or, more often, too big for what I could carry, eat, or take back with me.

I set off again, passing a few shops, but mostly restaurants and office buildings. On the way up, I had passed every landmark specifically outlined on the map provided by the hotel – the laundromat, the boxed lunch shop, the convenience store – and yet, even though the relative location between places seemed greater in reality than it did on paper, I began to have the sneaking suspicion that I should have hit the 100 Yen store by now…. Unfortunately not knowing what it was called or what the building looked like, I couldn’t look it up on my Google Map.

As the area started to look less and less…. populated (the shops started being further apart and more suburban than urban, not that it wasn’t populated per se), I turned around and stopped into a pet shop I had passed earlier. I had thought it was funny that while John was going to go combine two things I love (dogs and coffee), I was also combining them. Just… in a slightly more conventional sense than I would have thought I’d do in Japan.

In the pet store, much like the grocery store, I photo’d things that were interesting to me, packaging I liked, and comparisons between the products I’d get in the US and the versions that I could get in Japan including, surprisingly, the exact type of dog food I feed my dog only with a slightly more kawaii packaging.

Before I left, I asked the attractive man behind the desk how to get back to the train station listed on the map from the hotel. I wasn’t sure if I was still going to try for the 100 Yen store or not, but either way, I needed to get back to some place I knew before I could get back to the hotel, reconfigure my stuff (AGAIN), and head to the show. And possibly get something to eat….

On my way back to the train station, I saw a sign plastered to the side of one of the buildings, very visibly reading “DVDS”, “BOOKS”, “MUSIC” in the same big red letters on yellow background you might see on an American going-out-of- business sign. I followed the big red arrow to the shop front, feeling more confident that I was closer to being on my way again than I had been moments before. Maybe this would finally be the place I’d be able to get some Yuri!!! on Ice toys for myself (and as gifts for Risa) or maybe this would be the place I could finally buy some Pokemon things for Kelly since she had given me some money in advance specifically for those.

I looked through the shelves and bins of boxed and loose toys; no Yuri!!!, no Pokemon, but I did find a Freddie Mercury action figure. At around $40, he was one of the cheaper action figures I’d ever seen for Freddie; my favourite being one that topped out between $200 and $400 and featured the multi-talented signer in one of his black and white harlequin outfits. The one I had just found featured the outfit he wore at Queen’s last show at Knebworth Stadium and had an additional face or two that could be swapped out for the one he currently had on. That detail alone seemed like something that would have made Freddie proud to have the figure bear his image, but it was really how well it was rendered that sold the toy for me. I carried him around with me as I checked out the rest of the store looking at the smaller selections of DVDs and CDs and the large library on the other side of the division. (A division that beeped loudly in both directions when I carried the spider wrapped Freddie Mercury over it’s magnetized lines.)

After briefly browsing the selection of manga books, I went up to the checkout desk and using Google Translate, asked the shop lady if the store had anything for Yuri!!! on Ice. She searched in her database and found nothing specifically for Yuri!!!, but went to the DVD section anyway to doublecheck. After the brief, fruitless search, she told me that any figures they might have would be with the open stocked/unboxed figures on the back wall. I went and looked again before bringing up my Freddie and checking out. Before I left, I double checked that I was still on the right path since I had made an unscheduled stop. Initially, I had thought the store was something akin to f.y.e. or Borders (before they closed), but after I got back and showed Miya the receipt, I learned that it was something closer to a Vintage Stock. So not totally wrong, but not the closest.

I would have been find getting around Osaka if one of two things had happened: 1. if my copy of Google Maps updated quicker/more accurately so that I actually knew where I was and what direction I was going at a given time or 2. had there been less streets laid on diagonally. Unfortunately, as both things were out of my control, I ended up getting lost again somehow going in the same wrong direction that I had headed in to accidentally find the pet store.

Recognizing the sight of a large computer retailer not unlike Staples, I chose to get some help again. A sales man came up to me fairly quickly and I asked about how to get to the train station. He pointed me in the direction that I had been heading – that I came from – that I was 95% certain was wrong. I thanked him, went back out to the lobby to buy a bottle of coffee and use the restroom, and left.

Still lost and with a not-firm idea of how to get unlost, I found myself heading in a completely different direction yet again after I had thought I was going the right way. Realizing that I had no fucking clue where I was and that my maps were getting me more lost, not less, I went up to a police officer and, again using Google Translate, asked how to get back to the train station. He gave very loud, but relatively easy to understand instructions that made me appreciate that the urge to speak your own language louder and a little slower to people who don’t understand you isn’t just an annoying American thing.

Not long after and having passed another McDonald’s, I found my way actually at the train station for the first time that day. I entered into the first open air market that I had been to all trip. Unlike the ones that food bloggers and tourists who take conventional tourism trips (and not ones that travel thousands of miles to a foreign country to see a show in their own language…), this one had no noticeable odor of fish. To this day, I’m not sure if that’s something that people actually experience or if it’s a persistent rumor.

Instead, this market seemed to focus more on other foods. There were a couple of little shops/stalls that sold sushi, complete with their own refrigerator units and scales to properly preserve and measure the food; there were more little bakeries, though less fancy than the ones at Shibuchka; there were vendors with fashion-adjacent clothes; there was a stall selling mostly cute toys like you’d expect to see Pokemon things there, but there weren’t; and then there were a couple of booths like the one I finally stopped at: one that sold dried goods like seaweed wrapped rice crackers, coffee flavoured candies, and other shelf stable bulk goods. As funny as it sounds, it was like being home and going to my favourite Asian stores around me.

I picked up a pack of flower shaped seaweed covered rice crackers and a pack of the coffee candies. Now that I was back on track, I wanted to have a little bit of a snack just in case I wasn’t able to have time to stop off and have lunch somewhere. As I was checking out, the vendor and her male associate (possibly husband, possibly someone she had hired) made small talk with me, asking where I was from, what it was like, why I had come to Japan, how I was liking it so far…. They both thought I was very brave for having travelled so far on my own. I was happy with the comment, but like so many other times that people said that to me, I wasn’t fully certain what made taking this trip so brave. Japan wasn’t a dangerous country and it wasn’t all that hard to get around, even if I did have to ask for help a lot, usually people were willing and able to help me get to my next station….

As I was leaving, I asked how to get to the 100 Yen store. Since I was already at the station, I figured why not. Neither the main vendor nor her associate knew, but a man who happened to speak English was standing nearby and he gave me some good directions of how to get to where I wanted to be. I thanked everyone involved for helping, for finding someone who knew exactly where I wanted to go, and for having a pleasant conversation with me and headed on my way. I had barely made it three feet away when I heard someone yell, “Hey, you!”

It was so soft, for a second I thought I had imagined the call. I turned and the man who had given me the directions was making his way over to me like he didn’t want to lose track of me. He offered to show me exactly where I was going since he was headed that way and I accepted. It wasn’t too far away from the market, but for the first time since I left the hotel, I was firmly certain of where I was. I thanked him as he went on his way and slowly made my way up the stairs of the open, yet segmented by floors, building.

There were a few things that I had thought were interesting on the landings -- backpacks, luggage, a couple of sweaters...., but nothing that I was quite willing to pay the still relatively high prices for.

Eventually, I found my way upstairs and in front of a store called Dasico. I took a flyer that upon closer inspection turned out to be a job application and went inside.

I've mentioned before on this blog how much I love dollar stores, I find them very easy to look around and usually good places to try out new things, butt the quality of stuff at a Dasico is much higher than that of a Dollar Tree or a Family General.

I started off in the makeup aisle, looking for the things I'd need to complete my Look on Thursday. Namely, I needed eyeliner, but I also found an eye shadow palette, a few nail appliques, some clips for styling my Hedwig wigs, and other things that would have easily cost eight to twelve times more at the beauty supply shop I used to work for like a kabuki brush.

My hands already full, I moved on to the other aisles, picking up another beauty thing, briefly observing a new girl being trained, finding a Hello Kitty sleep mask.... By the time I made it halfway through the store my hands were so full, I was in danger of dropping my new possessions. A pair of school girls offered me their shopping basket and gratefully, I accepted.

By the end of the trip, I had racked up more than $40 worth of assorted things from beauty to stationary to the odd piece of clothing and had successfully asked a couple of questions (and understood the responses) without the aid of my translator app. A very patient shop girl answered my pointing at things and going “nan des ka?” I happily paid for my items, in cash not card, and started to head back downstairs, but before I got too far, I remembered that I had forgotten one of the things on my list -- hair gel.

I walked back into the store and went up to one of the people, asking if they sold anything that would make my hair stick up complete with gesturing what I had wanted. Together, we found a firm hair wax that should have had enough hold to get the look I wanted; possibly with a couple of applications, but it was what I had to work with (honey.)

I went back downstairs and took a closer look at some of the stores I had passed up on my way to Dasico. One of the levels was akin to a Kohl’s in that they sold a lot of shoes, semi-discounted luggage, sleeping bags, kitchen appliances, and other things you’d expect to find in your average suburban soccer mom’s home. The next level is a bit of a blur to me, something that I either didn’t retain or am misremembering as I had thought Dasico was on the 4th floor, but I can only come up with a brief layout for three....

The ground floor was more like the first two levels of the mall at the Hikarie -- mildly-to-a-lot more pricey than the other levels, but with a more serious attitude to it. Like this was a place you could go to get a suit you’d have tailored somewhere nice, but not quite upperend enough that they’d customize a suit from scratch for you. I bought...less on that level.

I exited that building and, on the recommendation of one of the women on the middle level, went into a shop across the street that specialized in socks. My search for the sexy stockings I had seen on Saturday was proving futile, but I wasn’t quite ready to give up looking. I browsed through the ample selection rejecting potential socks more on price or length than because of their very attractive patterns and textures. Once again, I paid and was on my way to the next stop -- the hotel.

Following the printed map that Hotel Grand Fine had given me the previous night, I realized that I hadn’t come up the right way at all when I went looking for the train station. I wasn’t sure exactly what the issue was yet, only that there was one and that if I could remember these sights for the next few hours, I’d be better off than if I didn’t.

Putting in the hotel as my destination again, I used a combination of Google Maps and printed map to wander back to the hotel. I took more time than I had necessarily wanted to, but I arrived and with the show being at seven that evening, still had four hours to get there (and two, if I wanted to be early.) On my way back, I texted Miya asking for specific translations of a couple of phrases. I had decided that even though I wouldn’t likely get to meet either actor in person and that the drawings weren't finished, I still wanted to try. After all, given that most of my friends at this point had met John, the likely worst response I’d get would be no response. Which is exactly the same thing I’d have if I didn’t try at all.

I retrieved my key from the front desk, went upstairs, quickly changed from my Hedwig Japan t-shirt to my RENT one, and headed out again.

The path to the train station this time was different than it had been this morning -- a sooner turn onto a wide boulevard, a longer straight forward walk before a turn.... I thought I must have missed the train station entrance again since Google Maps can be very imprecise as to where the entrances are... I stopped into a convenience store and asked one of the ladies running it where the stop I was looking for was. She directed me to the woman who ran the shop and knew a little more English than she did and I was pointed in the same direction I had been going, only a few more blocks up.

I thanked them and found the entrance, quickly getting on the first train I needed to go to the show.

As it turned out, that would be one of the last stops I actually fully understood how to get from point A (the station) to point B (the next station.) The one I arrived at had far less clear signage. I ended up asking a janitor how to get to the platform my paperwork indicated I needed. She brought me up to the station master, who printed me another set of maps, which provided me with yet another set of directions on how to get where I was going. So far, four people, four sets of directions, and a very, very confused Hansel.

After what felt like a lifetime, probably mine, I was on the right path again. At least for a little while. At the next station, I was faced with the same problem I had had in Tokyo - two platforms that left from the same level, but across from each other, were called the same thing. I hopped on one, put the Osaka-jo Hall into my maps app, and waited to see what happened next. The next station listed was wrong, which I found out pretty immediately, but Google Maps had been wrong before on that front; usually not showing a “smaller” stop along the way of the one I actually needed to go to. I zoomed out to see what direction my blue indicator dot was going in relation to the map and sure enough, it was the exact wrong way. I set an alarm for the time the show was supposed to start labeled ‘You’ve Missed the Show’ because at this point, it felt like I wouldn’t get there until 8. At the next station, I hopped off and then hopped onto the correct train, going past my origin spot and then arriving at the next station.

The next station might have been the entirety of Utah, it was so big. I followed the signs as far as I could before stopping to ask someone where I should be going. He pointed me underground and said to follow the green signs for the JR Line since that’s the one I’d be taking to Osaka-jo and that it might be a lot of walking, but to keep following the signs. So I did and after passing two McDonald’s, a couple of convenience stores, and more people than I’d see in an average week, I finally found the stop I needed. I wondered, not for the first time, if there was another train that might have taken me closer to my next stop.

The train arrived and I felt like I had finally reached where I was supposed to be. The signage said something along the lines of Osaka-jo Square and after heading towards the signs that pointed in the direction of Osaka-jo Hall, I started hearing a person over a loud speaker directing members of the crowd there to see Hedwig to go a specific direction. I knew enough Japanese to be certain that this was about Hedwig and that it wasn’t a misunderstanding on my part so I followed the signs and the speakers to what appeared to be a large, possibly outdoors, stadium. Seeing the size of it, I was all the more glad that Miya had managed to upgrade my ticket from second balcony, Row M to the first floor.

I confidentially walked up the two or more flights of sturdy bleach-white stone and handed my ticket over to the man taking tickets. He looked at it and said “Standard ticket?” “Hai.” “You need to be...over there.” and pointed vaguely in the direction I had come from.

I thought perhaps I had gone too far around the building in my search for a small line and so passing back around the trailers and buses that had brought the equipment from Tokyo to Osaka, I went more towards the front of the arena and showed my ticket off again to a different man directing foot traffic. He told me that yes, I was at Osaka-jo and yes, there would be a version of Hedwig viewable here, but where I needed to be was NHK Osaka Hall, the public broadcaster, as that’s where the actual performance would be. In that moment, I remembered vaguely Miya forewarning me that there were two different places called Osaka Hall and that I needed to be careful which one I went to.

I asked how far I was from where I needed to be and by foot, I was still twenty minutes away. I looked at my phone for the time. I still had a little over an hour and a half to get there, but given my luck? And how quickly I’d been getting places? I hailed a taxi.

The taxi driver was almost as confused as everyone else had been along the way about which Osaka Hall I needed to be at, but after a few moments, we understood each other and were on our way. It was maybe a five minute drive from Osaka-jo Hall to NHK and cost close to $10, but the expense was worth the sudden certainty that I was actually back on track. Seeing a slew of other Hedheads there certainly confirmed this.

I got into the ever expanding line, my heart beating out of my chest like it hadn’t since the last time I saw Hedwig, but worse. What if I showed the drawings to the usher and she wanted me to come back stage? What would I even say? Would I actually be able to manage words or would it be like the time I briefly met Anthony Rapp and was only able to smile and nod along to what my mother said I had liked about his career? And why hadn’t they opened the doors? It was time, wasn’t it?

In my attempt to not fidget too hard while waiting in line, I took off my sweater and redrew the silver and gold Hedwig temporary tattoo that I had done for the last show in Tokyo. Last show in Tokyo, last show in Japan for 2017, what really was the difference?

Not for the first time since arriving in Japan, I started to sort of regret not dressing up more. Not cosplaying the show like I had thought I was going to for two years before I actually had the chance to see it live. Of course, so many of the cosplayers here had much better costumes than the ones I had thus far been able to put together, but should I have tried harder? In the back of my mind, I remembered that part of the reason for not cosplaying was that I wanted to meet John as a version of myself and not a version of Hedwig. He’d met thousands of Hedwigs, and Yitzhaks, but tended to remember meeting people outside of their makeup more. And the other reason was that I wasn’t sure I’d want the attention it would attract being one of the taller people in the crowd to begin with and then wearing Hedwig’s tall red boots from Tear Me Down or her black ones from The Origin of Love and Angry Inch.

I took out my ticket for the fourth or fifth time that day, reconfirming that I did in fact still have it, that it did look like a real ticket and that someone hadn’t tried to pull the wool over Miya, or my, eyes.

And eventually, late compared to the Tokyo shows, the doors opened to allow the crowd to enter.

I picked up more flyers for HtTtGaP, placing them carefully with the other flyers handed out by the theater in my bag before heading to the bathroom to compose myself again.

I found my seat by myself, which considering my absolute failure at finding things earlier in the day seemed like an important enough victory. And then moments later, I found it again when it occurred to me that I had chosen a seat too far back and that I actually should be about five rows ahead of where I was presently seated.

I played around on my phone for a few minutes trying to decide whether or not I actually wanted to give over the drawings that I had worked on the last time two years ago and hadn’t ever finished. The ones that I had been planning on finishing, putting on a t-shirt or two, and wearing to the National Tour had John or one of the other Hedwigs I had loved from Broadway been performing. The ones that before printing on a spur of the moment, “oh look, I have these to go along with the other Hedwig drawing I’ve done,” had forgotten about almost completely in the excitement of actually Going and seeing John as Hedwig.

I pulled out the small spiral notebook that I had brought with me to the theatre and a purple pen. It took me two tries to get his name to be actually legible, but a note was written (in English, with his name in Japanese written along side his name in English.) Afterwards, I quickly translated and copied a note to Ataru basically saying that I thought her performance was incredible and that it was such a pleasure being able to see her these past few times in Japan. Later, when I showed the pictures I had taken of the notes to Miya, she said the version of ‘perform’ that I had used was more like the one an instructor might have used with Ataru than a regular fan, but that it should show between her note and John’s that I wasn’t a native speaker and simply meant to give a compliment to her.

I stood up and very nervously headed towards one of the ushers at the back of the venue. It looked to me more like my high school’s (very nice) performance auditorium than one that I would expect to see what’s basically a rock concert in. It honestly looked more like the sort of concert hall you’d see on PBS while watching a performance of a modern composer than one that you’d expect to see Blondie or The Ramones at.

I tried to explain what my intentions were with handing her the papers and the usher immediately goes ‘Ah! Giftu?’ which I assumed (and later confirmed) did mean gift. I showed her the notes and said that all of the drawings went to John and that Ataru’s note went to Ataru. I figured if John wanted to give her the Yitzhak one, that would be amazing, but I wanted him to see all three of them before they were given to the people actually playing the characters. She asked for my name and I pointed to where I had signed on John’s note ‘H. Smyth.’ It hadn’t occurred to me when I picked the name how semi-awkward it might be to actually introduce myself to John as ‘Hansel’. So for now.... I was ‘H. Smyth’, the name I thought I might go back one of these days and publish under.

I went back to my seat and was somehow more nervous than before I had given over the notes and the drawings. What if John wanted to have me thrown out for some reason? Or what if I had broken some unspoken rule by mentioning in my note that I had thought it was kind of funny that I had drawn these given that Hedwig’s opening costume had a gold Hello Kitty silhouette on her ass.

The show was later starting than any of the other ones thus far had been, going past the unedited, album version of Light My Fire and completely through one or two songs after it. I worried that maybe I had had something to do with delaying the show. Ridiculous, of course, but sometimes one likes to overestimate one’s importance to the world. A practice that is ironically very Hedwig in it’s execution....

The show, of course, still happened and was performed beautifully. Like I’d remark to Miya and Risa the next day, not once in five performances did John get the words to Wig in a Box correct and on most shows flubbed one or two of the other songs as well, but I didn’t care. The audience didn’t care. All that mattered was the energy in the room (which was amazing) and that the performers seemed to be enjoying themselves as much as the audience. My seat allowed me to see Ataru’s final outfit even closer than I had been able to on Saturday night because of where the venue doors were in relation. And that night provided more opportunities for improvs than on any of the other shows; one that basically involved John forgetting his line and Ataru improving spitting water in his face. (His reaction was hilarious and got them back exactly where they needed to be in terms of the script.)

Once again, Hedwig said ‘then love the front of me’ to Tommy with a delivery that would have made you think it was always there. And at the end of the show, they did the End of Love again, but this time slower since John’s voice was a little sore from performing so much lately. Slightly slowed down, it was still a wonderful song. And as John had recently announced it as a podcast, possibly one of the few times it would be performed live. After the song, John gave his final remarks, as usual, thanked the band and Ataru, his other half for these performances, asked if she had anything specifically that she wanted to say and then went into fully thanking everyone involved with the production including the director, the translator for the show, the translators for him in and around Japan, the artists involved with painting Hedwig’s capes, the animators for the new Origin of Love sequence, the costumers, and finally the people who helped him with his tuck. I was one of the few people who had laughed when John said that in English and one of the many who laughed when Ataru translated it moments later. It was a funny thing to have thanked someone for and made funnier by the just adorable way he said it. Cait and I agreed later when I told her about that moment that it was one of the things that made him so charming and reminded us both of David Bowie.

That alone was the moment I was still laughing about, standing outside the theatre part of the venue, and texting when I met a musician from Japan. He asked a little about my trip, how I had enjoyed it so far, why I had come over. I told him I was from Kansas City and he mentioned having been there with his band about a year ago. He asked if I had stopped off in his hometown and I said no, that because the bus ride was so long to get from Tokyo, I hadn’t had a chance to, but possibly the next time I came to Japan I would. And I truly meant it because despite having gotten significantly lost, I had enjoyed Japan immensely and even then wanted to visit again sometime when I had the time to be a little more prepared in my planning, possibly having learned more Japanese and definitely having pre-walked the majority of the streets I’d be travelling on. He and I chatted for a bit before walking out of the venue with his disinterested girlfriend hurrying him along.

The lobby that had been home to a few food court type options, had completely closed down. The only indicator that something had happened there that night being the few dozen people still milling about and the lights still being on in the main areas.

I walked out onto the street, headed in the direction of the train station to Hotel Grand Fine, and as I walked by NHK, blew a quick kiss up to the upper levels before seeking out food places in Google Maps.

I settled quickly on a soba noodles place. Miya had mentioned having them with her family a few days or weeks before I had come over and I couldn’t remember based on the name whether or not I’d ever had them. It was taking forever to find the restaurant that was allegedly so close to where I needed to be that I stopped into a 7/11, not having given up, but wanting to have at least something since I was quickly remembering that I hadn’t eaten anything all day. I picked out a few snacks and another cold coffee drink before buying two pork skewers at the front of the shop. The consistency in American convenience stores was something I found equally consistent here with the skewers tasting exactly like the one I had had the previous day before getting on the bus to Osaka, but without the other chicken thing that I had accidentally ordered first.

Newly fed, I headed out towards where the noodle place should have been again. And again, finding something else to eat instead.

The restaurant had a visual menu for their food as a window cling near the entrance to the shop. I took a photo of what I wanted and headed inside. The man behind the bar indicated that I could sit anywhere and I chose a spot towards the back, texting and going over the next day’s plans both as I waited for my food and as I ate.

I had finished maybe half of the food when they started to close up. I asked for a box and after another eternity spent trying to translate, gesture, pantomime, and otherwise indicate that I wanted to take the remainder of the food with me, was given one. I paid, left, and headed back to the hotel where I ordered another set of fries and cereal as I started to repack my bag to get ready to go. Afterwards, I took a quick shower and bath, having to cut down my enjoyment of the tub by at least half so that I would be semi-well rested for the return trip to Tokyo.

I set my alarm and went to sleep, both very happy with my trip so far and a little melancholy that this would be the last time this year that I’d see Hedwig performed live.bs

#travel diary #travel diary japan #japan day 7

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fluidsf · 5 years

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Fluid Label Focus on Crónica 017

Haarvöl + Xoán-Xil López: Unwritten Rules of a Ceaseless Journey (2019)

Reviewed format: review copy of Digital Album as kindly provided by Crónica

Welcome to the 17th review in the Fluid Label Focus series on the Crónica label. Today I have for you another recent release on the label that I finally got to this month. This is the new collaborative album by Portuguese experimental group Haarvöl and field recordist and sound artist Xóan-Xil López, titled Unwritten Rules of a Ceaseless Journey. This album features three long pieces for dance that were created for the play Revoluções (Revolutions) by choreographer Né Barros. As always, Miguel Carvalhais from Crónica kindly sent me an advance review copy, in this case of the digital version of the album. The Bandcamp download I got here features the 3 album tracks in high resolution 24-bit/48kHz audio, as well as a high resolution version of the album cover (in a wider 3259x2965p resolution as also used on the packaging of the physical CD version) and a PDF file. The PDF file (in my review copy it’s the promo version) features the album cover as well as additional artwork by Rui Manuel Vieira of Haarvöl, design of this release is by José Carneiro. Besides the artwork, as with many Crónica release you will find a lot of details on the release including the tracklist, credits and a description of the album and the various pieces. I read the full PDF file before listening and the texts per track are admittedly quite complex and oftentimes abstract, so they do require some background knowledge and reading to fully comprehend but even if (like me) your strength isn’t in the academic part of arts and music and concepts within them there’s quite a few recognisable reference points in the texts and names and literature mentioned to reference. As is also mentioned in the description of the album, the three pieces all depict three layers of time, past, present and future which also an interesting aspect of the concept behind the music, though for me personally these time layers were clearer as a difference in textural build up and sonic patterns between the three pieces and the “human sounds” within the music gave hints to passing time. It is definitely interesting to re-listen the pieces and reference details within them to the text in the PDF file but a great quality of the music is also that on its own the inherent effect it has on the imagination and subconcious are very strong, so let’s have a look at the music itself in the next section.

As mentioned before, Unwritten Rules of a Ceaseless Journey consists of three long pieces, each of which is around 15 minutes long and while each of the three pieces can work as an independent work if listened on their own, there’s also a great consistency in the music even though the three pieces definitely differ from each other in quite major ways (referencing the various phases of time). In terms of overall sonic signature, I’d say that Something’s Missing (Utopian) is a shifting at times quite noisy haze of textures, glitches and often metallic manipulated field recordings, The Pulsating Waves (Reality) goes for a more Industrial Drone sound, though it’s not as noisy as the first piece and Don’t Look Back, Run (Trauma) is the most minimalist in terms of composition, being mostly centred around a repeating Drone motif and filtered resonances. The album begins with Something’s Missing (Utopian). This piece moves through various phases, mixing field recordings, drones and glitches together to create a deep immersive and ever evolving soundscape that freely moves from fluctuating resonances to more tonal focussed moments in time. High frequency shimmering pulsations throughout the piece add a great metallic shine to the music and the glitches add some vibrant rhythmic elements to the mixture which are also very well blended into the sonic image. The piece has a very dense kind of layering within it in which field recordings, the drones and glitches are blended in such a way that there’s these audible edges between the sounds and the sonic layers seem to both intertwine and all be clearly audible as separate parts of the mix of the piece. The evolution of the music in the piece throughout is also very focussed on both textural contrasts and balance and the sounds used are also often not easily discernible in which sources they come from with the metallics in the field recordings and some of the resonances in the drones adding a layer of “artificial” sonic energy in the piece but this also makes it feel quite magical and wholly original and new. I love how the music’s combination of concrete sounds and textures also at times creates new wonderful organic sounds from material that is often coming from very human sources and the combination of both tonal pulsations and scattering glitch elements is quite unique and offers a great new take on Drone music that I haven’t heard before. The buzzing climax near the middle of the piece and the distorted organ like drones in the second half are highlights in the piece too. Indeed there’s a lot of things going on in these pieces but even with this many layers and changes throughout the music always stays consistent and not hard to grasp and most importantly never gets to a point of staying idle and “looping it out” which is a risk of Drone music if an artist would get too minimal with his / her approach. The very good mix and master on the piece also makes me feel this music could work great in multi-channel surround installation form as there’s a great depth and spatiality to this pieces, very good. In the next piece The Pulsating Waves (Reality), the music moves into a more “Industrial” like direction, so to speak, with quite a lot more focus on field recordings of machinery and metal clangs, as well as buzzing electricity like whirring sounds though the drones remain too, albeit in more subdued filtered form. With fuzzy human sounds of distant voices and crowds as well as some great vocal samples pitched in various hissy resonant tones the music moves into a contemplative introspective ambience. The buzzing electrical sound reminds me of the Mosaique album Shattering Silence (also on Crónica) that I reviewed last year but in this case there are mysterious resonances and distant sounds from the field recordings which again lead to a bit of a climax near the middle of the piece but also get quite intense in the finale of the piece in which an array of machinery sounds and heavily resonant flanged metallic sounds are combined with even more noisy mechanical sounds to create an ending that’s both intense but also quite hypnotic with its ever shifting overtones and resonances. The Pulsating Waves (Reality) definitely has more of a general Industrial ambience to it than the first piece but the gradual but also very varied composition of sonic elements also does give it a bit of a minimal Glitch kind of feeling in the middle of the piece with the droning tones accompanying the whirring sounds in subtly stuttering way. Again, definitely an awesome piece of music this one and while it’s quite Industrial, the piece has a very intriguing sense of introspection and tranquil peace to it too though the calm drones and fluctuating resonances throughout, feels quite like an atmospheric aural version of a panoramic time-lapse of a factory, intense mechanical sounds but also a sense of rest in your mind. Final track Don’t Look Back, Run (Trauma) is the most minimalist composition on the album, with a strings like droning tone forming a repeating pattern throughout almost the entire piece. The field recordings are much less recognisable as well, with many of the elements in the piece being very resonant, metallic or high frequency. Glimmering delayed elements, additional filtered drones as well as filtered distant noise change and evolve within the piece overtime, always moving in a new direction while the main droning tone keeps moving in an irregular rhythm. Indeed it’s an especially great quality of all three pieces on this album and of course of Haarvöl and Xoán-Xil Lopéz themselves that even in the most minimalist piece on the album, there’s such a rich variety of both organic, metallic and other sculpted sonic elements as well as constant evolution of the composition that the music always stays intriguing throughout and never stops moving forward in the extended length of the pieces. A great closer to an awesome album of music.

Unwritten Rules of a Ceaseless Journey by Haarvöl and Xoán-Xil López is definitely an awesome strongly recommended album, that is one of the best releases on Crónica and also of experimental music in general so far this year. The richness of textures and completely original sound that these artists create together on this album breaks the borders of soundscape and Drone music in a great new way that makes the music so well suited to many re-listens as well as these pieces will always sound new and different, even with every new repeated listen. There’s just so many layers and details of evolution in sound in the pieces to be discovered that it’s amazing how well balanced the pieces are all are considering how densely packed with layers most of the pieces are. I would especially recommend this album to fans of soundscapes, field recordings and Drone (Ambient) music but also if you’re into Industrial and even Glitch you’ll find plenty to enjoy in this music, it’s very rich music. So go check out this album for sure, you won’t regret it.

Digital Album and Limited Edition CD are available from the Crónica Bandcamp page here: https://cronica.bandcamp.com/album/unwritten-rules-of-a-ceaseless-journey

#digital download #album #crónica #2019 #field recordings #soundscapes #drone #industrial #glitch #vivid #haarvöl #Xoán-Xil López #Unwritten Rules of a Ceaseless Journey #fluid label focus #underground music #experimental music #album review

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