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#hair styles 2011
celebratingwomen · 11 months
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Kat Dennings photographed by Lauren Dukoff for Rolling Stone, 2011
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skitskatdacat63 · 11 months
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“Amore et Timore” - King Fernando I “El Animoso”
#*why is it that when I write tags that are genuinely imporant and wordy it always doesnt save UGH#well. ill try and rewrite them.#hahaha I bring you curly haired king Fernando!!(mostly for cofi)#2011 monza gp core Fernando that gripped us all by the throat right?? right????#also i hope that his hair doesn't appear red to you like it did to me on my pc??? its brown I assure you#anyways! historical context for nerds like me:#'el animoso'(the spirited) comes from Philip V of course#it was apparently bestowed on him bcs of his perseverance and unwavering fervor in battle#and is that not the most Fernando coded thing youve ever heard?????#'Amore et Timore'(through love and fear) however comes from Joseph I#whom seb is partially based on but i thought his Latin motto fit Nando way better so here we are#philip v didn't have a motto as far as i could tell so that's why I stole Joseph's#but i do think the motto for the Spanish kingdom fits Fernando's career pretty well?#'A solis ortu usque ad occasum'(from sunrise to sunset) and i think that suits Fernando's 'longest f1 career ever' p well#anyways I sent a sketch of this to cofi the other day like yeah I probably wont finish this#and now here i am on 5 am on a tuesday grinning manically sleep deprived like HERE YOU GO#i think he looks very cute in this!!! i really did a lot of work on his eyelashes...very important detail to me#he kinda accidentally looks like Louis XIV unfortunately#but thats down to his hair I think. it looks a lot more like the traditional wig style from then compared to what I typically draw#but god imagine being seb in this au!!! you get to wake up next to this majestic beast....#seb would have this painting framed over his bed or something. i mean who wouldn't????#f1#formula 1#fernando alonso#f1 fanart#formula 1 fanart#catie.art.#boy king au
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JUST IN TIME FOR SUMMER 2024 -- THROWBACK TO SUMMER 2011 WITH THESE LOVELY LADIES.
PIC(S) INFO: Mega spotlight on an editorial titled "Sun & Soda," photographed by the famed Harri Peccinotti (b. 1935) for "MUSE" ["The Fashionart Magazine"] #26, c. summer 2011.
The "bold '70s style shoot" features: Anne Vyalitsyna (the cover girl), Shannan Click, Behati Prinsloo, Heather Marks, Valentina Zeliaeva, Marloes Horst, and Hannah Holman.
Source: https://blondeseptember.wordpress.com/2011/05/28/sun-soda-by-harri-peccinotti.
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emo1emoji · 9 months
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Rio de Janeiro
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buck-yyyy · 1 year
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anyways the best thing that’s happened to me since cutting my hair short is that i constantly get compared to male celebrities and characters
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the-lord-of-springs · 23 days
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Why does male Pumyra resemble Tygra🧍‍♀️
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It is done at last! My friend @26aspen-edits made a similar edit of their own vf redesigns, inspiring me to do the same <3
It took so goddamn long to get this done because the vf style is horrible to work with, but now i know how well my ideas work in the style so I guess I'll let it slide
As always, open image for better quality! Original image under the cut <3
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ohmuqueen · 1 year
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Taemin himself could tell me this was not a good look for him and I’d be like “sorry honey but you’re wrong 😔”
x
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ladaeliseeva · 3 months
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strangeasexuallegume · 2 months
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I redesigned the EG Mane Six! I tried to go based of the general design ideas of the originals, though I did deviate where I felt it better suited the characters.
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Twilight: For Twilight I mostly went for something that could look decent enough to make up for the fact that she has definitely been wearing it three days in a row. That bitch is NOT taking proper hygiene and you know it. I also wanted to play around with the idea of her struggling to walk no matter what, making her own mobility aids (that are albeit low quality and seriously uncomfortable since she was working with what she had) the first night that she was there, and then at some point Rarity reveals that she purchased and bedazzled a much better and comfier set of aides for Twilight. Other than that, not much else to say.
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Fluttershy: Tbh, I don’t have much to say about her other than True Stoner Rights and also I wanted to give her a look that would look nice enough to wear to school without risking being picked on, and also isn’t too outside her comfort zone. The look is based on what I thought as a kid was “Parisian fashion.” I imagine that that Fall Formal dress is actually outside her comfort zone, but she didn’t wanna make Rarity come up with a different outfit and honestly the whole thing was outside her comfort zone so it’s whatever.
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Rainbow Dash: I HAD TO FIX IT. RDS IS THE ONLY ONE IM CONSIDERING FIXED BECAUSE THIS IS NOT. MY. GIRL!!!! First off, why did they make her a SOCCER PLAYER??? TRACK IS LITERALLY HER THING SHE WAS BUILT FOR SPEED— I made her a track athlete instead. Second off OH MY GOD THESE OUTFITS ARE SOOOO NOT HER STYLE UGH, I KNOW THAT THESE DESIGNS ARE MOSTLY TO GO WITH THE SAME TREND AS MONSTER HIGH BUT TRJEJSHDJDGSISDRAGH THIS IS NOT RAINBOW DASH!! SAME THING WITH HER FALL FORMAL OUTFIT WHAT IS THIS, THIS ISNT WHAT SHED WEAR TO A PARTY!! UGH!! STUPID!!!!!
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AJ: A lot of her outfit was me working on pure nostalgia from when I was a kid in the early 2010’s. (Oh yeah I forgor to mention, I tried to change these designs to fit what I thought would work for 2013. Aside from Twilight, she looks more current to look more out of place) I remembered stuff like the ankle/shin high boots with all the different buckles that I remember adoring, the jeans or shorts that’d have all sorts of pretty embroidery on them, etc. etc. I also wanted to try and make her fall formal dress look more casual, which I figured would work since I’m assuming Fall Formal is sort of like the homecoming of this universe. Overall, hers was one of the most fun to design.
Side note, RD and AJ are making fun of each other’s trademark poses in all of the default pngs
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Rarity: She was kinda easy, I don’t have a lot to say about her if I’m being honest. I think she was the one that the designers ate with the most. Even her fall formal dress, there’s not much I wanted to change and was actually kinda stumped for a bit on what to do differently.
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Pinkie Pie: she is my Maximalist Kandi Scene Furry Queen. When dying her hair she either did it herself or told the person at whatever salon she went to that she wants to “look like an acid trip.” The non binary flag was made one year after EG first appeared but the genderqueer flag was made in 2011 so Pinkie Pie got True Genderqueer Rights. I couldn’t control myself and gave her straps. She stands out like a bleeding thumb. I love her. By far the most fun design. This was so incredibly self indulgent and I couldn’t be happier.
Edit: forgot to add, I used this pose reference by @albanenechi !
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rescuefield-a · 1 year
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thinking about claire's dramatic ass in 2011 gathering her stuff from the office and getting tfo of the headquarters to go on a quest to clear terrasave's name because they keep getting involved with people who are legit the worst
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celebratingwomen · 11 months
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Natalie Portman photographed by Tim Walker for Dior, 2011
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trashmouth-richie · 4 days
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𝐬𝐮𝐠𝐚𝐫 𝐨𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐞 — eddie x fem reader (7.1k)
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summary: 2011– your roommate drags you to a frat party and ditches the second she sees the guy she’s been fucking. left by yourself, you meet someone by accident, someone who isn’t in the fraternity 
warnings: smut, underage drinking, p in v, unprotected sex, grinding, dancing, eddie is trying to be cocky but he’s just awkward and silly
notes: i had a blast deep diving back into my hs and college days to reminisce with this. i hope if you were growing up during this time you can giggle along with me. love youuu oooh! also i hid some easter eggs in here (they’re not hidden at all)
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The basement was steamy, and not in a ‘oh it’s a little warm in here but more like, every single person is drunk off their ass and the walls are sweating’kind of way.
College was everything you’d hoped it to be and more.
Your roommate, Kenzie was the type of girl who had an ‘open closet’ policy letting you wear her clothes almost more than your own. You weren’t too keen on sharing a dorm room with a girl you’ve never met before, but thankfully—you had gotten lucky. 
You had heard the horror stories from your older sister about her terrible roommate freshman year and you worried for most of the summer that you’d strike the same type of fortune. It wasn’t until you got a friend request on Facebook and a cheery little message : 
[Kenzie Walmen 2:07 PM: heyyyy roomie (;] 
that you knew you had nothing to worry about. 
She was from the west coast in sunny California, that bright western sky seeped deep into her personality. Kenz was sun kissed and bright haired, pretty ocean dipped eyes to give her the All-American type of aesthetic that most girls wished for. And maybe it was her laid back disposition, or her thrill for living it up and every hour of the day— that landed you here tonight at Delta Kappa Sigma. 
It wasn’t your scene.
You weren’t shy or new to getting drunk, you had even been so brave to take the occasional hit from a homemade bong in your neighbors dorm a few times, but the frat parties were known for their out of control Project X style of getting shitfaced. 
And something about guys with too much testosterone and too much Adidas cologne made your skin crawl and not in a good way. 
“Prints always look weird on me,” you grumble into the mirror eyeing your curves in a leopard lace tank top and black skirt, “is it too much?” 
Kenzie adjusts her off-the-shoulder top, adding a bit of shimmer powder to her exposed shoulder, “absolutely not, if anything it’s not enough.” Neon feathers decorate her bouncy curled hair as she eyes you in the mirror, “add that silver chunky necklace, and you’ll look bomb.” 
She was right, the necklace really pulled the entire look together, and if it were Halloween weekend you could even pass as a Spice Girl or maybe Snookie. 
“Sooo, is Steve gonna be there tonight?” You ask elongating the vowels in the aforementioned name, followed by some kissy faces and porn worthy moans. 
Kenzie rolls her eyes, a dusting of pink warming her cheeks, “yeah… about that. He said he has a “surprise” for me when I get there, so if I disappear, I’m just with him, okay?” 
“Wait wait wait—” you protest, holding a death grip clutch on a bottle of UV blue. “We aren’t even at the party yet and you’re already planning on ditching me?” 
— 
And that’s what got you here, a little more than drunk, holding a piss warm Green apple flavored Four Loko to your mouth, leaning against the corner basement wall in hopes to maybe disappear, wishing you were anywhere but in this cesspool of basement. 
The “DJ” (a frat guy wearing neon glasses with bars across them, scrolling through an ipod and a playlist more than likely named ‘Get Crunk’) was playing Kid Cudi, again. Everyone was screaming along to the chorus like he personally wrote it for them and their experience at college. A headache was brewing behind your eyes as the beat thumped loudly into your chest and radiated to your temples. 
Kenzie left almost immediately upon arriving. Swooped up and tossed over the broad shoulder of Steve the minute he answered the door. You laughed and shook your head, imagining how she was probably face down in navy cum stained sheets by now. 
The hours she spent on her hair and makeup went to waste, only being seen by the dead catalog eyes of Playboy’s finest from their pinned positions on the walls of Steve’s shared bedroom. 
Another sip from the overly carbonated beverage has you shuddering, the fiery ripple of fruit flavored [vomit] alcohol scouring through you like lava, causing your face to screw into a disgusted look.
How can people drink this shit? 
Your bladder screams at you to break the seal, demanding to find relief, immediately. The black lights were zero help in disguising if there were any doors that might lead into a bathroom. Pushing from the wall and taking the last hot sip from your drink, you navigate your way to the stairs. 
A table holding lone solo cups in formation from a forgotten beer pong game is now the proud owner of your empty can.
Weaving through the jungle of fist pumping douchelords and tipsy sorority girls making out for risqué facebook pics labeled [*~Freshman Y3ar!~*] you finally emerge from the sweaty pits of fraternity hell and climb the beer stained steps to the main floor. 
The monotonous beat from the music thumped a little less loudly up here, as if the noise was absorbed by the maroon colored carpeting and the oak cabinets in the foyer. 
The house was dated, decorated with a clash of orangey dark wood mixed with emeralds, dark reds and gold. As if this house was based out of Tuscany instead of midwest nowhere— complete with the rubbery fake fruit and vines that stood solely to collect dust. 
You had never been here before and didn’t know where in the hell to start looking to find the bathroom, and like Alice, you figured you might as well try every door knob in this type of Wonderland. 
The first door you peeked into looked like it was a formal dining room, but instead sat a television on the great oval table blasting obnoxiously loud as a pornstar moaned ripples of “pleasure” through her pink pout. Above her was an extremely tanned guy rocking a set of hard abs, thrusting in a slow rhythm that didn’t match her orgasm. 
A snicker slips from your lips and you gently pull the door closed with a small click, loud whoops and whistling from what you could only assume were a couple of frat guys erupt behind the door.
Watching porn together. 
You’ll have to add that to your growing list of things you didn’t know about the brotherhood behind a fraternity. 
The second door looked more hopeful as it was adjacent to the kitchen area. Upon nearly peeing down your leg, you were shocked stupid when you yanked the door open to find a closet housed with cleaning supplies. 
What the fuck? 
How could a frat house not have a bathroom? 
Your bladder squeezed in on itself and you were certain you couldn’t hold it any longer. Just short of giving up on this quest of relief and going back to your dorm, a gaggle of girls run down the steps leading to the top floor, where you could only assume the bedrooms were. 
“…why are frat bathrooms always so fucking dirty?!” 
Bingo.
Hustling up the never ending carpeted stairs, your bladder was on the brink of exploding as you shoved past a wooden door with a paper sign that read, “no jerking off in the shower!! pipes are clogged!” 
Your sandals clapped along the sea foam tiles floors as you slipped into one of the many metal stall doors. With a swift hike of your skirt up to your middle and pull of your panties, you were finally able to pee. 
A choir of angels sang the HallelujahHallelejuah chorus as you went and you sighed in relief that you had made it. 
“..yeah yeah, okay asshole,” a loud voice sounded from just outside the bathroom door frame, “you still owe me from last time,” the voice now echoed as it hit against the tiles and cement block walls, “no, payment is cold hard cash buddy, I don’t care if you have to dip into your trust fund.”  
A pair of black docs stomp into the tiled bathroom, nearing the stall you were in. There's no way he’ll come to this stall. 
“Tell daddy that you need more money for polos or Jordan’s— I really don’t give a fuck, but you need to pay the fuck up.” 
But as fate would have it…and in your hurry to get to the toilet before pissing all over yourself… and forgetting to lock the door in your haste… the stall door swings wide open— revealing a very bottomless you, to a pair of very wide dark, deer-in-the-headlight eyes. 
A beat that feels like an eternity passes, his hand is choked against his belt in a yank to unthread it, his phone wedged between his shoulder and ear. Your hands fly to cover yourself the best you can, panties still at your ankles, skirt still around your midsection. 
It’s all yells and screams with this random guy stumbling over himself dropping his phone on the ground and spewing, “Shit! Sorry! Sorry!” and you yelling for him to shut the fucking door already. 
His apologies don’t stop as he pulls the door closed, and from the other side of it as you pull up your underwear and adjust your skirt. 
“I swear! I didn’t think anyone was in there! I promise!” 
Your face burns in embarrassment as you contemplate melting into the floor and becoming one with the poorly aimed piss stains and the dirty grout. As good as that sounds you still have to leave, you still have to pass the guy who just saw your bare vag and you still have to navigate your way out of here. 
His phone lays face down on the floor, and you pray it isn’t broken for his sake. You pick it up, flipping it over to see that it scathed by with just a fine crack from one corner to another. His screen saver is a picture of a group of guys in a skatepark in the dark, smoke billowing thickly to cover their faces as they stand on the boards, the one with dark longer hair is shirtless, and painted with tattoos. 
“Shit,” you breathe quietly, “your phone is cracked.” 
You can see the shadows of his feet pacing back and forth but when you speak they stop, “oh..,” he mumbles, clearing his throat a bit, “umm, yeah, no biggie it was broke like that already.” 
“You sure?” 
“Yeah— hey, if you wanna slide that under the door I can um, let you ..ahem.. finish up in there.” 
Shit. Duh he needed his phone, and you were just holding it hostage in here as your shame hung thickly in the air. God this might really couldn’t get any fucking worse.
A deep breath in through your nose, you fake a mask of confidence and open the stall door. 
You hadn’t gotten a good look at him when he barged in on you, but now in the fluorescent dust covered light you dared to look a little longer at him. 
Long locks of honeyed brown locks fell onto the tops of his shoulders, covered with a green plaid flannel that hung open showing his neck and a flick of dark lines from a tattoo hidden under a black band tank top. His eyes were just as brown, round and flocked with a grove of thick lashes. Clearly he was the shirtless one in his background picture. 
He smiled sheepishly, pulling his jaw taunt as he averted his gaze to the toe of his boots, noticing your hand stretched out before him to give him back his phone, he glanced at your face, skimming his hand over your palm.
“Thanks— uh…” he started, shifting his weight to lean back against the many rows of sinks, “sorry again, I promise I don’t normally walk in on ladies using the facilities.” 
His eyes met yours and you instantly felt a heat run to your throat, his lips were impossibly plump as he drew them into a tight smirk. 
Fuck are those dimples? Of course they were. God he’s so pretty. 
You smile, “normal people lock the stall, but I was in a hurry… well I was lost!” you exclaim in a huff, fully hands on hips annoyed, “why the fuck would the bathroom be on the top floor?” 
You asked him incredulously like he should know. But on second thought…
“uhh… I dunno,” he shrugs, sliding his phone into the front pocket of his light wash colored jeans, not even looking at the broken screen as he leaned back again, “I’m not exactly an architect.”  
“But you live here?” you question, turning on the sink to wet your hands, “haven’t they ever thought of putting even a half bath on the main floor?” 
He rumbles out a laugh that makes your cheeks tingle, your buzz still in full force, “nah, you got it all wrong, I’m not a member of the ‘fraternity brotherhood of Alpha Mega Steroid’”, he jokes with air quotes, smiling wide when your lips tick up at the ends. “But I am a frequent guest, of sorts…”
This guy seemed to be one of those people who can make a nun blush, witty and dripping with a sexual charm that radiated from him like a ray of fucking sunshine. And fuck that grin of his. You’re in trouble. 
“Ahh, okay,” you banter back easily, shaking your hands to dry them since there were no paper towels in sight, “which one is your boyfriend? Let’s see I know.. Kyle? I think is his name, reddish hair, kinda feminine hands, or are you fucking Steve because I gotta say, I think my roommate might be giving you a run for your money right now.” 
Eddie’s eyes light up, a quirk in his brow as he asks, “Blonde girl? Kinda naive, head over heels for that mop of perfectly styled hair? Shit, what’s her name…Kelly? Kitten? She’s your roommate?” 
Of course he would know her, Kenzie knows everyone, and seems to leave a kind of impression on people that you envied. As bright as she shined, you were the shadow behind her. 
“Yeah,” you say, not hiding your annoyance, remembering how you got into this predicament in the first place. 
Eddie looks just as pissed as you’re feeling, “Oh, Stevie boy and I will be having words later on his lack of tact. They’re the reason why I was out wondering the halls like a fuckin’ ghost in a haunted mansion.” 
He takes note that you’re in the same boat he’s in but in your case, it’s a little worse, being a girl alone in a frat house never ends well. 
“I’m Eddie, uhh…designated dealer,” he says in almost a whisper, “for the deep pocketed asshoels full of daddy’s money.”
You connect a few dots, realization hitting hard in your frontal lobe from conversations you’ve kind of listened to from Kenzie about Steve. 
“Ahh, okay… now that you mention it, Kenz has talked about you before. You’re Steve’s old friend, Munson? I thought she meant like a forty year old or something.”
He laughs, loud and belly rolling like, “nah, minus a twenty from that. Steve and I are just close friends ‘s all… and no, not boyfriends.” 
You laugh then, all bubbly and light hearted that has his own skipping beats. Saying your name, he repeats it, a little grin on his face that he tries to hide, “mm that’s cute.” 
“Cute?” you question, an eyebrow raised as you fold your arms in on themselves, poking a hip out. 
“Yeah… cute,” he says standing fully and peering down at you, “your name is very fitting for you.” 
You roll your eyes playfully at his flirty words. Even though your stomach is somersaulting at the way his eyes seem to drip from heaven when he looks at you, your cheeks heating beneath his gaze.
“Is this the part where we exchange our hometowns and majors, because I’d rather get run over than do that right now.” 
Eddie chuckles, “oh yeah, well I’m actually here on an athletic scholarship.” 
“Really?” you question, eyebrows cocked in disbelief. 
“Yes!” Eddie jokes back, trying to bite back a smile, “if you must know it’s for Tennis, but please don't bother me for an autograph. I'm just trying to be a normal guy tonight.” 
“Noted.” You giggle, admiring the way this banter is coming so easily, maybe it was the liquid courage taking over or the fact that he was actually fun to talk to— either way, this night is starting to take a turn for the better.
“So, what does a Tennis star/designated rich boy drug dealer usually do at these kinds of things besides bursting in on girls using the bathroom?” 
He smiles, dipping his chin and looking at you through those impossibly thick lashes. Pushing off the sink he asks, “Sell a little here and there, sometimes dip into my own stash…what do you usually do at these things?” 
“Well,” you tease, twisting on the ball of your foot and heading towards the door out to the hallway, “I’m not usually at these things.”
“Ohh my god,” Eddie preens in his best valley girl/ Kourtney Kardashian impression, “you’ve never been to frat party!?” 
You smile, at his stupid joke, “Noo, I haven’t actually. Kenzie drug me out for a little pick me up after we bombed our History midterm, to…y’know— live it up— YOLO, all that.”
“Okay okay, letting off some steam after the stress of class, I get it...school was never a cake walk for me either.” 
“Yeah! But then your friend snatched her up, and since I don’t know anyone here… I was doing a very impressive wall flower guise, until my bladder interrupted that… and then a guy barged in on me in the bathroom.” 
Eddie stalks towards you, his eyes roving over your body, “Well… now you know me, soo Miss Lady Wallflower,” he cracks, “shall we descend to the basement and keep this party going?” 
His infectious smile stretches wide, practically ear to ear and you find yourself grinning just as wide, trying to twist your lips to at least hide your enthusiasm a little bit but goddamn— something about the way those dimples compliment the fucking christmas twinkle in his eyes.. ugh. 
He was trouble. The kind you had always craved but never dabbled in. But when in Rome…
“Lead the way.”
Eddie had made a pit stop in the large kitchen before returning to the basement. 
“Now sweetheart,” he purred, fishing around the shelves, of a pantry, moving cans of food and bags of chips, “I didn’t plan on drinking more tonight, but I’m not gonna let you drink by your— aha!” 
Eddie stands upright, brandishing a large box of saltine crackers. Your eyebrows furrow in response and he bows low, puts his hand inside the box, “I present to you, Stevie’s not so secret hiding spot,” pulling out his hand, his fingers are wrapped around a bottle of Burnett’s Vodka.  
Your eyes widen with devilish glee as you smirk, “how did you know it’d be there?” 
Eddie unscrews the cap and puts it to his lips for a long six second pull. 
You weren’t watching the way his throat bobbed and gulped when he swallowed each burning swig. Nope, not at all. You definitely weren’t memorizing each valley of cords and muscles as a single drop fell to his sharp chin and jaw. Never, not you!
And you weren’t holding your breath right along with him only breathing when those fucking glorious thick lips popped clean from the mouth of that bottle… his lips shiny from the bitter alcohol like a gloss you desperately need to lick clean. Yeah… no. that was not you…
So it’s only fitting when he speaks hoarsely and clears his throat that you are snapped back to the moment, your core keeping its own pulse. 
“He’s been keeping vodka in the same box in a food pantry since we were in high school, guy is the most unoriginal bastard I know,” he shrugs, wiping his lips with the back of his hand, and you can’t help but almost pout in the wasted opportunity. 
His eyes meet yours and they look just as hungry as you were feeling. He smirks crookedly and you practically flatline from the depth those molasses colored eyes hold. He moved first, inching towards you like a wolf stalking its prey, your pretty chapstick smile daring him to come closer. 
But the fuse between you is snuffed out cold as a crying girl erupts from the basement steps, her gaggle of friends helping calm her down as they leave the house. 
Eddie shakes his head and clears his throat as if he was just as bothered by you as you were of him. Turning towards the fridge he asks, “I’m sure they’ve got some Sunny D you can chase this with if that’s cool?” 
The basement proved to be in the same situation you had left it in: hot, sweaty, sticky. 
“Fuck,” Eddie breathes hotly behind you, loud enough to hear him above the music, “it’s like a furnace down here, no wonder that girl was crying.”
You lead him to the corner you were tucked in before, your drink still sitting on the beer pong table. By the way he is standing you can tell that this really isn’t his scene either, but after a while of passing the vodka and orange juice back and forth between you, he seems to loosen up a bit. His shoulders relax as his back leans against the wall next to you. 
Eddie’s words slurring together as his stories became more and more animated, and you giggle along, never taking your eyes off of him. Completely enamored. 
Your stomach burned with a flurry of butterflies when a few of his clients came up to him to buy, each more nervous than the next. Eyeing you suspiciously, questioning if you were some sort of a narc. 
Eddie stepped ahead of you, his shoulders squared and chest out to casually announce that you were cool and were with him. 
You didn’t know that he was waiting for you to object to it, to shove away from him and call him a pig for even assuming that you’d ever be seen with the likes of him besides in the dark, but you never did. 
Hours pass and the music just gets worse. Wiz Khalifa starts singing about colors and Eddie looks at the crowd of people grinding and rolls his eyes. 
The alcohol has you feeling tingly, a buzzing of flirtation sparks your blood and you are closer to Eddie than ever, the smell of his musky cologne and laundry detergent invade you.
Like any drunk girl, you start getting antsy, a little more touchy, and a lot more feely. Standing around isn’t cutting it anymore and you want to move, toss your hair back to some cheesy song, want to feel those hands you’ve been staring at all night run along your body as your hips move against him. 
Running your forefinger along the inside seam of Eddie’s flannel shirt, you look up at him through your lashes. 
“I’m assuming you’re not one to dance to a club remix?” 
Eddie watches your finger stroke up and down, your knuckles barely grazing his abdomen, but the small touch sending electricity to his spine. 
He leans into you, following your lead and pinching the hem of your skirt between his large fingers “you’d assume correct, the music I listen to is a little more head bangy than this.” 
“So,” you say coyly, pulling him towards you just a fraction more, “what you’re really saying is that you can’t dance.” 
Eddie scoffs, throwing his head back, his throat sticky with sweat and the hair by his ears wet and curling into ringlets, “oh I can dance my ass off honey, taught Channing Tatum everything he knows.” 
His hands find your hips, and you almost lose the little bit of confidence you have gained when the warmth of them seeps through your shirt, his blunt nails skimming your skin in small strokes.
“Do these little white lies masked as dorky ass pickup lines work for you?” Your hands are on his chest now, the black light illuminating each letter of his Deftones shirt to sparkle like snow beneath your fingers. 
“I don’t know,” he whispers into your ear, pulling you tight against him so your chest is pressed into his, “you tell me.” 
The music changes and a throwback song  
comes on, one you haven’t heard in years. 
“Guess you’ll have to show me those moves, because in typical drunk girl fashion… this is my song!” 
You grab Eddie’s hand and stomp to the middle of the floor, pulling him along with you until you’re shoulder to shoulder with other drunk and sweaty college kids. 
“Get low?” Eddie asks from behind you, his mouth dangerously close to the shell of your ear as his hands land heavy on your hips, “seriously?” 
Leaning your head back so your lips could reach him you talk loud enough just so he can hear you, “stop talking and fucking dance with me already.” 
“Goddamn…” he groans when you finally push your body fully back into him. 
It’s sloppy and horribly uncoordinated the way your drunken hips move beneath his hands. You’re both swaying along with the music, trying like hell to match the rhythm of everyone else around you. But in the tiny square footage you have in this cluster fuck of a space, Eddie has all the right moves. 
His palms are pressing you tighter into him, making sure you can feel just how hard he is, how hard you are making him. 
Courage and a few prom night dances under your belt have you dropping low and coming up slow, your skirt fanning out the tiniest bit as your knees are bent to the ground.
And Eddie is practically thanking God himself when you run the fattest part of your ass up his body, on the bunched denim by his shins, skimming the barely there fabric of your skirt against the hole in his knee, and finally up where he desperately needs your body the most. 
When you come back up he moves your hair from the side of your neck, his lips puckering around your earlobe as he nibbles lightly, “spin around so I can see you.” 
He groans again when you shake your head and laugh at his dismay, as much as he is turned on and bothered you are too, but the power of keeping him like this, teasing him with your body— turned you on even more. 
You snake your hands upwards seductively, landing daintily at the nape of his neck, twirling the wet tendrils of curls round and round pulling gently. Eddie hisses through his teeth, his hands roaming freely from your hips to your ribcage running them along the length of your sides, bruisingly hard. 
One minute you’re facing away from him, eyes closed in pleasure as he roves over your body, his lips pressed to your neck, and in the next he’s spinning you around so that you’re face to face— eyes locked on eachother, the heat and the alcohol and the endorphins are too much to handle. 
Your once labored breathing snuffs out to nothing when he leans in with licked lips his eyes fixated on your mouth. Standing. Staring. Staring and standing. You’ve had enough of this cat and mouse game. 
“Fucking kiss me alrea—”
His mouth with its plush pillow lips slam into you. He tastes like tart orange juice and a bite of alcohol. Like the way a summer day would taste if it were bottled up. He licks into your mouth and you whine for more of him, clutching onto his neck and pulling him further into you. 
When you break for air it’s loud, smacking lips and lapping tongues, tilting your heads to line up perfectly. When you twist yours again, Eddie holds onto your neck angling it just so with a glint of trouble in those whiskey eyes as he dives into the supple skin at the column of your throat. 
Sucking, swirling— his tongue is hot against you and you’re clutching onto his shoulders, your nails digging into the pilling fabric like he was the only thing keeping you Earthbound. 
You wiggle in his arms, squealing and whining out but he’s holding you tightly against him, moaning words into your neck that you can’t hear above the music. Then he’s on your mouth again, working you into a fit. His big veiny hands move along your back, grabbing your ass softly, then work up to wrap in your hair or lightly scratch at the inch of skin between your skirt and your tank top. 
Doing your own little damage to him, his shirt is shoved up over his chest, your fingernails trailing down his tattooed skin. A rise of goosebumps following in their tracks, and he stops kissing you to suck in a breath, your smile on his lips as you laugh and he whispers a breathy ‘fuuuuck’. 
Your fingers trail down to his waist band, tickling his skin as you suggest an idea with your eyes, one that you’re certain he would understand.
“C’mon,” he mouths, gesturing his chin to the exit as he slowly begins to pull you from the dance floor, up the stairs and into the kitchen area.
Eddie knew what he wanted. Knew it the second you walked out of that stall with that sweet fucking smile on your lips, shy and coy when he called your name cute, like you weren’t at all used to the type of attention he was giving.
And maybe you didn’t want this with him. Maybe you were a: ‘fuck-me-in-the-dark-so-I-won’t-be-embarrassed-by-being-seen-with-you’ type of girl, but you did dance with him, you laughed at his stupid jokes, stuck by him almost all night, but still he needed to be sure. 
He thought maybe in the brighter light you’d change your mind about what you wanted, what you needed from him, but you surprise him when you cling to his side, going up the steps, and backing into a wall pulling him with you by his shirt needily when you reach the top.
“D’ you uh..wanna get outta here?” he slurs, almost sleepily, his bangs fucked up beyond belief, his hair drenched and sticky with sweat and humidity, lips swollen red.
“My dorm isn’t far,” you say, looking up at him through your lashes running your finger along the waist of his jeans, “across campus.” 
Eddie chuckles, “fuck…” he sweeps a thumb over your pouted lips, groaning as he bites his own. “I’d crawl to fuckin’ Alaska for these, honey.” 
Your cheeks burn sweetly from his inebriated compliments. And even though you’re tipsy and so is he, you feel an odd sort of comfort with him—one you haven’t experienced before. 
“Let’s go then,” you whisper into his ear, “I want you inside me.” 
That did it for him. 
Eddie was all but running with you across the campus green, but not before taking off his long sleeved shirt and placing it over your shoulders murmuring how it was freezing and you’d probably get sick. 
Your combined laughter ricocheted off concrete forums and neatly trimmed grass. Passing by the fancy Chemistry Lab building, the Art Museum, the Med School and finally to your painted black brick dorm building: “Wheeler Hall” 
“Here’s home,” you sing out, placing your key into the door and pulling on the steel handle. 
The Wheeler Dorms were the newest addition to the college town. Named after a family that was killed in an accident back in the 80’s or something… you didn’t really remember what happened. 
The side door you had come in through was closest to your room, 011, on the first floor, again, the universe being kind to you. 
“Never been here before,” Eddie said looking around with wide eyes, “any of the dorms actually.” 
You smiled upon unlocking your room and entering, hanging up your keys on the command strip hooks by the door. Whatever confidence he had back at the party is now deflated a bit once he realizes just how different the two of you are. What the hell was he doing here? You’re in college, he’s only here because he deals. 
“Uhh..?” he questions, eyeing the lofted bed, “you know I was joking about being an athlete, right?” 
You giggle and toss your purse onto the futon, “relax, that’s Kenzie’s bed, mine is the shorter one.” 
“Oh thank fuck,” he practically sings letting out an over exaggerated sigh as he plops down on your futon, eyeing the leopard throw blanket, “I may look like a suave Casanova but I’m about as agile as Mr. Bean.” 
Laughter fills the room and you click on a lamp throwing the room into a cozy ambience as you slip off your sandals and sit on your bed, leaning forward, “you’re way hotter than him.” 
Eddie blushes a bubble gum pink sheen, using his still damp and unruly hair to cover his face, “keep being sweet on me see where it gets you.” 
“Is that supposed to be a threat, or a promise?”
“Oh baby, I don’t make threats, not to a girl that’s like you.” 
“Like me?” 
“Yeah you,” he deadpans, standing up and waltzing towards your bed, crowding you in, “funny, sexy, and by some greater power— digs me… at least I hope.” 
“I’m not the type of girl to bring a guy back to my place, Eddie,” you nearly whisper, putting a finger into his dangling necklace and pulling him forward, “you’d be the first.” 
Eddie places his hands next you on the bed, “like your first? Or just here in college first, I’m cool with either I just— are you sure you want this? I can leave if y—”
Cutting him off you kiss him, but not like the heavy kisses earlier when you two were making out like you were each other's oxygen masks, this one is sweet, like melted  sugar on Eddie’s tongue. 
“You talk too much,” you say with a warm smile, wrapping a finger around his curled ends of hair, “no more of that, just kiss me.” 
“Yes ma’am.” 
Eddie wraps his arm around your waist and shifts you up further into the bed, laying your head on a pillow his body pressed into yours. He takes his time with you, kissing your lips then your jaw, working his way down your neck to where the bruises he’s already sucked into your skin were painted. 
Your moans and little breathy sighs have him hard against his zipper, his hips bucking into the tiny fabric of your panties that’s covering up that sweet pussy he got a glimpse of earlier. 
His shirt is somewhere on the floor, you had pried it off of him between locked lips and groans of having to move your lips from his that earned you a throaty laugh from him and the sexiest eyes that drove into you with an intense ferocity. 
He lowers further down your body, kissing every inch, moving your tank top out of the way to eye your orange bra, his mouth between your cleavage, moaning about how orange is now his favorite color. 
Eddie’s everywhere all at once, a hand traveling up and down your thigh, from the crux of your knee to the waistband of your skirt, the other hand is popping your tits out from that new found favorite colored bra of his —smiling wickedly at your peaked nipples. 
You moan lustful bliss as his tongue circles each one, giving equal attention to both, “you like that?” he asks.
“Feels so good,” you whine, “more, please.” 
Eddie smirks with your nipple between his teeth, “don’t have to ask me twice.” 
You weren’t a virgin, but holy shit you felt as if you had never had sex before, well never sex like this. Eddie teased you with his fingers, his thumb rubbing your clit while his fingers pumped inside of you, each curling inward towards a place nobody has reached before. 
He groaned with his bottom lip tucked between his sharp bite rubbing his achy cock through his jeans when you pushed your skirt down laying there in a matching orange lacey thong, bedazzled on the hips. 
“Would it be corny if I say you look like a Goddess?” he asks sheepishly, pinching the stretching fabric around your hips, “because… wow.” 
You bite your finger as if you were really thinking hard on this, hiding a smile, “you’re too much, Munson.”
“Too much?” he scoffs, pulling down your panties and settling himself between your legs, “you haven’t even seen my dick yet.”
You sit up, tits out and naked from the waist down, “well by all means, show me.”
“Greedy girl,” Eddie smirks, “did you bring me here just to get me naked? I’m appalled!” 
You move to your knees, sitting upright a bit so your face is level with his. You kiss him softly, moving to his neck and sucking just right to pull those deep moans from him that make your knees shake. 
Feather light touches skate along the expanse of his chest, working down down down until you’re undoing his belt, thumbing open the button on his jeans and yanking down his zipper.  
When your hand slides between him and his boxer briefs,  Eddie hisses, watching you pump him slow and tight. The feel of your smooth palm against his velvety shaft makes him almost cum right there and then, it’s been awhile since the last time. 
But you’re not hesitating or questioning yourself and he isn’t either. It’s almost fluid like a rocking wave the way Eddie lays you down, a team effort to swiftly shove down his jeans so you can finally feel eachother where the desperation is needed most. 
Legs hiked over his hips, he lines himself up with your gummy slicked entrance. It’s a deep and achy stretch for you, a vice grip for him. The lazy gasping moans you both emit are drawn out, yours practically breathless. 
“Holy fuck,” you breath into his mouth as he peppers you with kisses. He drags his hips out at a measured pace, pushing in just as unhurriedly, enjoying the way your body adjusts, cuffing him like a glove. 
Eddie breaks away from your lips to watch your bodies join together, moaning your name as he presses his forehead on yours collecting your mouth with his. 
“Shit…This okay?” he asks earnestly, nipping at your ear. 
You nod in gasping silence, your eyes rolling into the back of your head as he speeds up. Your hands are skimming down his bareback, pressing him further into you with every thrust, begging him for more. 
He snakes a hand between you, rubbing circles in your puffy clit as he thrusts harder, trying to get you there before he loses all control. “Want you to feel good sweetheart, fuck— keep making those pretty little noises, you’re squeezin’ the hell outta me.” 
And he does. You cum hard around him, your walls fluttering and pulsing so fast you practically black out from the mixed pleasure of his fingers rubbing your clit and his cock stuffed in deep. 
His name falls from your lips in tiny little whines and he bucks into you a hard and final time before he groans, holding onto your headboard for support as he’s bottoming out, stringing rope after rope of hot spend inside of you. 
“Baby,” he whispers, “God—” he stops cold, realizing what he just did and what he didn’t do. “Oh shit, fuck fuck fuck! I didn’t pull out, I'm sorry! I’m so fucking sorry!
You laugh wickedly, your body shaking beneath him at his worried panicked face. 
He’s a babbling, out-of-breath mess, “’s not funny! I just got caught up in the moment and you felt so fucking good and I’m still a little dru—”
“Eddie, it’s fine,” you say, holding his cheeks with both hands squishing them together so his lips pucker like a fish, “I’m on the pill.” 
His face is still squished together when he speaks, “oh, well… okay.” 
“You’re fine,” you coo, coaxing him down from the ledge of regret and self hatred, “I—” you lean up and kiss him square on the mouth, licking into it and sliding your tongue against his, “I liked it.” 
His eyebrows disappear into his bangs and before he can open his mouth to speak you’re pulling him onto you kissing him deep and needy. 
The two of you end the night that way, him holding you, your hands in his hair, kissing so much your lips are chapped— never getting enough. Legs entangled together like a weaved basket. You fall asleep before he does, your little huffed breathing making his skin damp as you curl further into his chest. 
Wonder if Verizon is open tomorrow? He thinks when he remembers that his phone is definitely broke from it landing on the bathroom floor—but he’d never tell you that. 
He also wouldn’t tell you how he was supposed to go back to Steve’s tonight because they were leaving to see another old friend in California for the weekend— or how they needed to be at the airport by 2 AM for a 4 AM flight.  — or that Eddie was Steve’s ride because he lost his license in July. 
Nope.
He wouldn’t tell you any of it. None of that seemed to matter when you were sleeping so cute on his chest like that. 
When late morning comes you’re at it again, this time you’re riding him on the futon, slow like a twangy country song his hands rocking your hips. When you both finish you drag him to the showers, pumping some expensive shampoo into his hair and giggling when you tell him to be quiet so you won’t get caught. 
Steve called Eddie’s phone all night, and all morning, sending duplicate texts of rage, wondering where the fuck he had gone. 
Eddie silences the last call from Steve as you’re getting dressed, wearing a black pair of yoga pants and a zip up hoodie. He smiles when you offer to comb his hair, grabbing your wrist to pull you onto his lap kissing behind your ear. 
His voice is low, soothingly sweet and minty from your toothpaste as he asks, “can I take you to breakfast?” 
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"IT'S GONNA BE A HOT SUMMER WITH THIS COVER!"
PIC(S) INFO: Part 1 of 2 -- Spotlight on Russian-American fashion model Anne Vyalitsyna, a.k.a., "Anne V," (b. 1986, then age 24-25) for "MUSE" Magazine #26 Summer 2011.
Resolution at 819x1024 & 736x957.
"Harri Peccinotti photographed the sexy Anne Vyalitsyna for the second cover of Muse magazine #26 Summer 2011 and styled by Susan Winget. It’s gonna be a Hot Summer with this cover!!"
-- ART8AMBY (blogspot)
Sources: https://art8amby.wordpress.com/2011/05/26/anne-vyalitsyna-for-muse-magazine-26-summer-2011 & Pinterest.
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girlboypersonthingy · 5 months
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i’ve never really asked before but i just read all of your sally face stuff and BFBSVAVAX so i was thinking….
(preferably afab) reader coming home tired and needy, walking in sal and their shared room sighing as they rip off their work shirt and stare at sal who’s practicing a new song. waiting for him to put his guitar aside they fall dramatically into his lap and start COVERING his mask in kisses, stopping suddenly to ask for a real kiss:3
just some fluffy stuff pls it’s been a LONGGGG few weeks:D
A D O R A B L E ! ! ! This week has def been a ‘I want to come home to Sal and collapse in his arms’ type of week for me like oof 😔…I’m sorry this took me a while to get to, I hope you’re alright. Hopefully you’re doing better by now and if not, plz feel free to message me and we can chat 🖤 thanks for requesting and enjoy!
Notes: fem!reader, this is really fucking silly I’m so sorry…
TW: a bit suggestive, lots of swearing, making out, spit/drool, boobs lol 18+ only!!!
Sal x reader- Hard Day 🌙
(Imagine Sal practicing this song while you read this 🖤)
“Fuuuuuuckkkk…” You groan loudly as you drag your feet through the doorway of the house, stomping loudly on each step of the stairs. As you near the door way of your bedroom, you see the light is on, the music is loud and you can hear Sal playing his guitar along to it, occasionally hitting the wrong note. As you step across the threshold of the room, you let loose a big breath of air as you slouch over a bit, catching Sal’s attention for a moment.
“Hey babe!” He shouts over the music while continuing with his playing. He was sat up on the corner of the bed, guitar in his lap, slouched over with his prosthetic still on. You couldn’t help but watch his fingers on the strings for a moment, black painted nails moving oh so smooth but still making little mistakes. “Hi…I’m so tired.” You say but it falls on deaf ears. Sal is just so close to nailing this one part of the song, he’s been trying for two and half hours now and he’s too close to quit.
Disappointed and a bit annoyed, you quickly shed your shirt and continue giving Sal a cranky but needy glare, only covered by a bra up top. “Sal!!!” You finally shout, making Sal look up, making his hands freeze for a moment. He quickly leans over to turn the music off, his blue hair swaying over his shoulders as he moves. “I’m sorry…uh hey…babe. You okay?” Just by the tone of his voice, the way he’s hesitating and stopping to lick his dry lips under his mask, you can tell he’s equally flustered and excited by your lack of clothes.
“No…I’m not…” You pout for a moment, sighing as you rub your aching temples. He sets his guitar aside and puts one hand out towards you, offering it as a comforting gesture. You gladly accept, grabbing his hand then quickly approaching him and sitting in his lap. “This week…was the fucking worst!” You cry out dramatically, turning to the side so he can hold you bridal style. “I just wanna stay home with you all day, every day.” Sal chuckles softly, one arm tucked up under your knees, the other cradling your back while his hand ruffles the hair on the nape of your neck. “Me too, babe. Me too…” He replies before he gently nuzzles his prosthetic up against your face, making kissy noises under it.
After enough of his cuddly kisses, you decided to return the favor, covering his mask in kisses. You pepper kisses everywhere, all over his prosthetic very quick and soft. Until finally, you pause and place a long kiss on the lips of his prosthetic, humming as a smile grows on your lips. “You know what would really make me feel better…?” You really drag out the words, using your best flirty voice as your finger traces the side of his mask. “What?” He quickly clears his throat, your faces only inches apart. His rapid breathing echos inside his prosthetic as his hand slides up to fully cradle your head.
“Kiss me for real…please?” Your flirty tone turns to a very soft, comforting type of tone, smiling up at him as you watch him blink down at you. There’s a pause, he hesitates for a moment before gulping nervously. Although you’ve seen his face many times before, mouth to mouth kisses were hard to come by with Sal. With a shaky hand, he grabs your own hand and guides it to the back of his head, gesturing for you to unclip his prosthetic for him. He was far too nervous to do it himself, he figured he’d let you set the pace.
To his surprise, you’re pretty quick with the buckles and the mask falls into your lap within seconds. Immediately, your lips meet, Sal uses that hand on the back of your head to push you into him further. As your arms snake around his neck, hugging him close to your nearly bare chest, his other hand is gently kneading your hip as you move your lips against his. The kiss began to rapidly pick up pace, his tongue occasionally licking along your bottom lip.
It was always a delightful shock when your lips or tongue would meet his teeth accidentally where they peek through his cheek and the corner of his mouth, now was no exception. Any time this happens, Sal usually shies away and assumes it grosses you out, especially when he knows he’s probably drooling. Expecting this would happen, you move one hand to the back of his head, matching the grasp he has on you to keep him engaged in the kiss.
A low moan comes from him as he deepens the kiss along with you, tilting his head and running his tongue along your own. Suddenly, clumsily, Sal grabs ahold of your legs and slowly lays back on the bed, pulling you along with him, trying to keep his lips on yours. He fails at this, your lips parting for a moment, him awkwardly shifting under you until he pulls you up closer to his bright red and slightly sweaty face. You can’t help but laugh, not at him, he’s just too cute when he gets like this,
A chuckle rumbles from his chest as he holds you closer, squeezing you tightly against him as he places a final kiss on your nose. “Are you feeling better?” He quickly leans back in for a few more tender lip kisses, smiling brightly as he pulls back. “Yes, sooooo much better. You know what would really make me happy though, Sally?” Your hands run slowly through his long, blue hair as he hums in response. “Hm?”
“Let’s do all of that again…but in a nice hot shower~”
Cue Sal getting a gruesome bloody nose as he glances down at your barely covered chest and thinks about having a shower with you. 🥴🖤
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sophaeros · 8 months
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arctic monkeys for q magazine, june 2011 (x) (x)
ARCTIC MONKEYS: Inside Alex Turner's Head
Words Sylvia Patterson Portrait John Wright
The day Arctic Monkeys moved into their six bedroom, Spanish-style villa in the Hollywood Hills, where the first-floor balcony looked over the patio swimming pool, they knew exactly what to do.
"From the balcony, you could get on t'roof and jump in't pool," chirps the Monkeys' most gregarious member, drummer Matt Helders, in his homely Yorkshire way. "We looked at it and said, That's definitely gonna happen. So by the end, we did a couple of 'em. Somersaults in t'pool, from the roof. At night time."
In January 2011, as Sheffield and the rest of Britain endured its bitterest winter in a century, Arctic Monkeys capered among the palm trees, eschewing hotels for a millionaire's Hollywood homestead as they recorded and mixed their fourth studio album, Suck It and See.
The four Monkeys, alongside producer James Ford and engineer James Brown, lived what they called the "American man thing": watched Super Bowl on giant TVs, played ping-pong, hired two Mustangs, cooked cartoon Tom And Jerry-sized steaks on barbecues on Sundays, had girlfriends over to visit, all cooking and drinking around the colossal outdoor kitchen area featuring a fridge and two dishwashers. Living atop the Hills, they could see the Pacific Ocean beyond by day, the infinite glittering lights of downtown LA by night.
Every day, en route to Sound City Studios, they'd travel in a seven-seater four-by-four through the mountains, via bohemian 60s enclave Laurel Canyon, blaring out the tunes: The Stones Roses, The Cramps, the Misfits' Hollywood Babylon. For the sometime teenage art-punk renegades whose guitarist, Jamie Cook, was once ejected from London's Met Bar for refusing to pay €22 for two beers, the comedy rock'n'roll life still feels, however, absolutely nothing like reality.
NICK O'MALLEY: "It were really as if we were on holiday. When we came back it's the most post-holiday blues I've ever had!"
JAMIE COOK: "It's hard to comment on that. It were just really good fun."
MATT HELDERS: "We always said, As soon as things like that feel normal, we're in trouble. But it's just funny. You might think it would get more and more serious as you get older but it's getting funnier. We've done four albums now and I'm still only 24, I'm still immature to an extent. So who cares?"
Alex? Al? Are you there?
ALEX TURNER: "Yeah, it were good times. But we were in the studio most of the time. So there's no real wild Hollywood stories. Hmn. Yeah."
Wednesday, 16 March 2011, Strongroom Bar, Shoreditch, East London, 11am. Alex Turner, 25, slips entirely alone into an empty art-crowd brasserie looking like an indie girl's indie dream boy: mop-top bouffant hair which coils, in curlicues, directly into his cheekbones, army-green waist-length jacket, baggy-arsed skinny jeans, black cord zip-up cardigan, simple gold chain, supermoon sized chocolate-brown eyes.
Almost six years after I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor became the indie-punk anthem of a generation (from the first of Arctic Monkeys' three Number 1 albums), and nothing prepares you for the curious phenomenon of Alex Turner "in conversation". Unlike so many of the Monkeys frenetic early songs, he operates in slow motion, seemingly underwater, carrying a protective shell on his back, perhaps indie rock's very own diamond-backed terrapin. The most celebrated young wordsmith in rock'n roll today talks fulsomely, in fact, only in shapeless, curling sentences punctuated with "maybe... hmn.. yeah", an anecdotal wilderness sketching pictures as vague as a cloud. He is, though, simultaneously adorable: amenable, gentle, graceful, and as Northern as a 70s grandpa who literally greets you with "ey oop?".
"People think I'm a miserable bastard," he notes, cheerfully, "but it's just the way me face falls." Still profoundly private, if not as hermetically sealed as a vacuum-packed length of Frankfurter, his fante-shy reticence extends not only to his personal life (his four-year relationship with It-girl/TV presenter Alexa Chung, whom he never mentions) but to insider details generally. Take the Monkeys’ Hollywood high jinks documented above: not one word of it was described by Turner. Before Q was informed by his other Monkey bandmates, Turner’s anecdotal aversion unfolded like this:
Describe the lovely villa you were in. AT: "Well... we certainly had a... good view."
Of what? AT: "Well, we were up quite high."
The downtown LA lights going on forever? AT: "I dunno. It was definitely that thing of getting a bit of sort of sunshine. Is it vitamin D? If you can get vitamin D on your record, you've got a bit of a head start. So we'd get up and drive to the studio."
What were you driving? AT: "Nothing... spectacular. But yeah, we'd drive up the studio, spend all day there and sort of, y know, get back. To be honest... we had limited time. So we spent as much time as possible kind of getting into it, like, in the studio.
So your favourite adventures were what? AT: "Well, they were really… minimal. We were working out there!"
Any nightclubs or anything, perhaps? AT: "You really want the goss 'ere, don't you?"
Yes, please. AT: "I could make some up. Nah!"
And this was on the second time of asking. It's perhaps obvious: Alex Turner, one of the most prolific songwriters of his generation (four Monkeys albums and two EPs in five years, The Last Shadow Puppets side-project, a bewitching acoustic soundtrack for his actor/video director friend Richard Ayoade's feature-length debut Submarine), is dedicated only to the cause – of being the best he can possibly be. He simply remembers the songs much more than the somersaults.
Throughout 2009, Arctic Monkeys toured third album Humbug – the record mostly made in the Californian desert with Queens Of The Stone Age man-monolith Josh Homme – across the planet. While hardly some cranium-blistering opus, its heavier sonic meanderings considerably slowed the Arctic Monkeys' live sets and on 23 August 2009, Q watched them headline the Lowlands Festival, Holland and witnessed a hitherto unthinkable sight – swathes of perplexed Monkeys fans trudging away from the stage. With the sludge rock mood matching their cascading dude-rock hair it seemed obvious: they'd smoked way too much outrageously strong weed in the desert.
"Heheheh, yeah," responds Turner, unperturbed. "That's your theory. You probably weren't alone."
Back in the Strongroom Bar, Turner's arm is now nonchalantly draped along the back of a beaten-up brown leather sofa. He ponders his band's somewhat contrary reputation…
"I think starting the headline set at Reading with a cover of a Nick Cave tune perhaps was a bit contrary. D'youknowhat Imean?! But to be honest, that summer, at those festivals, we had a great time. And I know some fans enjoyed those sets 10 times more. And you can't just do, y’know, another Mardy Bum or whatever. Because how could you, really?"
With Humbug, notes Turner, "I went into corners I hadn't before, because I needed to see what were there," but by spring 2010 he wanted their fourth album to be "more song-based" and less lyrically "removed". He was "organised this time", studied "the good songwriters" (from Nick Cave, The Byrds and Leonard Cohen to country colossi Johnny Cash and Patsy Cline), discovered "the other three strings" on his guitar, and wrote 12 songs through the spring and summer of 2010, mostly in the fourth-floor New York flat he shared with Chung before the couple moved back to London late last summer (the New York MTV show It's On With Alexa Chung was cancelled after two seasons). The result: major-key melodies, harmonised singing and classic song structures.
At the same time he revisited the opposite extreme: bands such as Black Sabbath and The Stooges ("we wanted a few wig-outs as well"); he was also still heavily influenced by the oil-thick grinder rock of Josh Homme, who is clearly now a permanent Monkeys hero. After four months' rehearsals in London, on 8 January the Monkeys relocated to LA for five swift weeks of production and Homme came to visit, singing backing vocals on All My Own Stunts. Tequila was involved.
"Tequila is probably me favourite," manages Turner, by way of an anecdote. "But it takes a certain climate... It's not the same... in the rain. Yeah. [Looks to be contemplating a lyric] Tequila in the rain."
Vocally, he developed the caramel richness first unveiled on The Last Shadow Puppets' Scott Walker-esque The Age Of The Understatement, finding a crooner's vibrato. "Everything before was so tight,” he notes, clutching his neck. "Probably just through nerves. That's just not there any more." Suck It and See contains at least four of the most glittering, sing-along, world-class pop songs (and obvious singles) of Arctic Monkeys' career: the towering, clanging She's Thunderstorms, the summertime stunner The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala, the heavenly harmonised title track and the Echo & The Bunnymen-esque jangly pop of closer That's Where You're Wrong.
Elsewhere, in typically contrary "fashion", there's preposterous head-banger bedlam (Brick By Brick, the rollicking faux-heavy rock download they released in March "just for fun", featuring vocals by Helders; Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair, and Library Pictures). News arrives that the first single proper will be Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair. Q is perplexed. Brilliantly titled, certainly, but arriving after Brick By Brick, the new album will appear to the planet as some comedy pastiche metal album for 12-year-old boys.
You've got all these colossal, summery, indie-pop classics and you've gone for... The Chair? AT: [Laughing uproariously] "The Chair! I'm now calling it The Chair, that's cool. Well for once it weren't even our suggestion. It was Laurence's (Bell, Domino label boss). And I were, Fucking too right! He's awesome. It'd be good to get a bit of fucking rock'n'roll out there, won't it? It's riffs. It's loud. It's funny."
If you don't release The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala as a single I'm going round Domino to kick Laurence's "awesome" butt. AT: "I think it'll be the next one!"
The record's title, meanwhile, could've been more enigmatically original than the un-loved phrase Suck It and See. The band, struggling with ideas due to the opposing sonic moods, invented an inspiration-conjuring ruse: to think of new names for effects pedals in the style of Tom Wolfe, Turner being long enamoured with the American author's legendarily psychedelic books The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby, "cos that just sounds awesome".
"There's the Big Muff pedal," he elaborates, "That’s the classic. I've got the Valve Slapper. And there's the Tube Screamer. So we came up with the Thunder Suckle Fuzz Canyon. And… wait till I assemble it in me mind… em… it'll come to me… The Blonde-O-Sonic Shimmer Trap. So we were going for summat like that."
A wasted opportunity?
"Nah. Because some of those things ended up in the lyrics anyway. Suck It and See was just easier."
Alex Turner, rock'n'roll's premier descriptive art-poet, still writes his lyrics long-hand in spiral-bound notebooks. "Writing lyrics is a craft that I've practised a bit now," he avers. "In me notebook it looks like sums. Theories. There's words and arrows going everywhere. There's always a few possibilities and I write the word 'OR' in a square."
For our most celebrated colloquial sketch-writer of the everyday observation (all betting pencils, boy slags and ice-cream van aggravations) the more successful he becomes, the less he orbits the ordinary. "I'm not struggling with that, to be honest," he decides. "In fact I'm enjoying writing lyrics much more than I did. Stories. Describing a picture. Um. There's quite a bit of weather and time in this one. Which is probably not reassuring. 'Oh God, he's writing about the weather.' Maybe leave that out!"
There are also some direct, funny, romantic observations: "That's not a skirt, girl, that's a sawn-off shotgun/And I only hope you've got it aimed at me..." (from the title track).
Some of your romantic quips, now, must be about Alexa. AT: "Right. Yeah. Definitely. Well... there's always been that side to our songs, when we weren't writing about... the fucking taxi rank. It's kind of inevitably... people you're with." [At the mention of Chung's name, Turner is visibly aggrieved, head sliding into his neck, terrapin-esque indeed.]
It must have been very grounding being in a proper relationship through all this madness. Because if you weren't, girls would be jumping all over your head. AT: "Em. Hmn. Well, of course that helps you to... I don't really know.. what the other way would be."
Does Alexa wonder if the lyrics are about her? AT: "Oh there's none of that. Yeah, no, there's no looking over the shoulder."
She must be curious, at least. "Maybe."
Did you ever watch Popworld? AT: [Nervous laughter] "Em! Now and again."
Did you ever see the episode where she helps Paul McCartney write a song about shoes? AT: "Ah, yeah I think so, maybe I did see that."
Well, if I was you, I'd have been thinking, "She's the one for me." AT: "Well. Yeah... maybe that would've... sealed the deal! Hmn. But maybe that wasn't when i got the ray of light. When was? Nah [buries head in hands]. I might have to go for a cigarette..."
Q can't torture him any more and joins him for a snout. Turner smokes Camels from a crumpled, sad, soft-pack and resembles a teenager again. As early song You Probably Couldn't See For The Lights But You Were Staring Straight At Me says, "Never tenser/Could all go a bit Frank Spencer…”
In January 2006, when Arctic Monkeys' Number 1 album Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not became the fastest-selling debut in UK history, inadvertently redefining the concept of autonomy and further imploding the decimated music industry (& wasn't their idea to be "the MySpace band", it was their fans': the Monkeys merely kick-started viral marketing by giving away demos at gigs), the 19- and 20-year-old Monkeys were terrible at fame. They weren't so much insurrectionary teenage upstarts as teenage innocents culturally traumatised by the peak-era fame democracy.
To their generation (born in the mid-'80s) fame was now synonymous with some-twat-off-the-telly a world of foaming tabloid hysteria where renown and celebrity meant, in fact, you were talentless. Hence their interview diffidence and receiving awards via videos dressed up as the Wizard OfOz and the Village People. Which only, ironically, made them even more celebrated and famous. (“That were a product of us just trying to hold onto the reins," thinks Turner today. "Being uncooperative.")
Q meets The Other Three one morning at 11am, in the well-appointed, empty bar of the Bethnal Green, Bast London hotel they're staying in (all three live in Sheffield, with their girlfriends, in their own homes). First to arrive is the industrious, sensible and cheerful Helders, crunching into a hangover-curing green apple. He has recovered from last year's boxing accident at the gym, which left his broken arm requiring a fitted plate. Now impressively purple-scarred, the break felt "interesting" and the doctor couldn't resist the one-armed drummer jest: "D'you like Def Leppard?"
Currently enjoying an enduring bromance with Diddy, he still doesn't feel famous, "it just doesn't feel that real, there's no paparazzi waiting for me to trip up." He and Turner, during the four-month rehearsals last year, became an accomplished roast dinner cooking duo for the band. "I reckon we could have us our own cookbook," he beams. "Pictures of us stirring, with a whisk."
O'Malley, an agreeable, twinkly-eyed 25-year-old with a strikingly deep voice and a winningly huge smile, is still coyly embarrassed by the interview process. A replacement for the departed original bass player Andy Nicholson in May 2006, he went from Asda shelf-filler to Glastonbury headliner in 13 months and still finds the Monkeys "a massive adventure". His life in Sheffield is profoundly normal – he's delighted that his new home since last October has an open-hearth fireplace: "Me parents had electric bars." He has also discovered cooking. “I’m just a pretty shit-hot housewife, most of the time," he smiles. "I cook stews, fish combinations, curries, chillies. I made a beef pho noodle soup the other day, Vietnamese, I surprised meself, had some mates round for that."
Recently, at his dad's 50th birthday bash, the party band, made up of family and friends, insisted he join them onstage "for ...The Dancefloor. So I were up there [mimes playing bass, all sheepish] and it were the wrong pitch, they didn't know the words or 'owt, going, Makin eyes... er..." He has no extra-curricular musical ambitions. "I'm happy just playing bass," he smiles. "I've never had the skill of doing songs meself. It'd be shit!"
Cook, 25, is still spectacularly embarrassed by the interview process. He perches upright, with a fixed nervous smile, newly shorn of the beard and ponytail he sported in LA: "Rockin' a pone, yeah, because I could get away with it." With his classic preppy haircut and dapper green military coat (from London's swish department store, Liberty), he looks like a handsome '40s film star. (Turner deems Cook "the band heartbreaker" and had a word with him post-LA: "I said to him, Come on, mate, you've got to get that beard shaved off. Get the girls back into us. Shift some posters.")
His life in Sheffield is also profoundly normal. He still plays Sunday League football with his local pub team, The Pack Horse FC (position, left back), remains in his long-term relationship with page-three-model-turned-make-up-artist Katie Downes and "potters about" at home, refusing to describe said home, "cos I'll get burgled".
A tiler by trade, he always vowed, should the Monkeys sign a deal, that he'd throw his trowel in a Sheffield river on his last day of work. "I never did fling me trowel," he confirms. "Probably still in me shed." He's never considered what his band represents to his generation. "I'd go insane thinking about it, I'm pretty good at not thinking about it… Oh God. I'm terrible at this!"
Back in the Strongroom Bar, Alex Turner is cloudily describing his everyday life. "I just keep meself to meself," he confounds. He mostly stays indoors and his perfect night in with Alexa is "watching loads of Sopranos. And doing roast dinners".
No longer spindle-limbed, he attends a gym and has handsomely well-defined arms – "You have to look after yourself."
Suddenly, Crying Lightning from Humbug rumbles over the bar stereo. "Wow. How about that? I was quite happy the other morning cos Brick By Brick were on the round-up goals on Soccer AM. It's still exciting when that happens. It was like Brick By Brick is real."
He spends his days writing music, "listening to records", and recommends Blues Run The Game by doomed '60s minstrel Jackson C Frank ("who's that lass?... Laura Marling, she did a cover recently), a simple, acoustic, deep and regretful stunner about missing someone on the road.
Lyrically, he cites as an example of greatness the Nick Cave B-side Little Empty Boat [from ‘97 single Into My Arms ], a comically sinister paean to a sexual power struggle: "Your knowledge is impressive and your argument is good/But I am the resurrection babe and you're standing on my foot."
"I need a hobby," he suddenly decides. "I'd like to learn another language." Since his mum is a German teacher (his dad teaches music), surely he can speak some German? "I know how to ask somebody if they've had fun at Christmas." Go on, then. "Nah!"
Where Turner's creative gifts stem from remains a contemporary rock'n'roll mystery; he became a fledgling songwriter at 16, after the gift of a guitar at Christmas from his parents. An only child, did his folks, perhaps, foresee artistic greatness? "I doubt it!" he balks. "Cos I didn't. I wasn't... a show kid." Like the others, he doesn't analyse the past, or the future.
"You can't constantly be thinking about what's happened," he reasons, "it's just about getting on with it." The elaborate pinky ring he now constantly wears, however, a silver, gold and ruby metal-goth corker featuring the words DEATH RAMPS is a permanent reminder of he and his best friends’ past. The Death Ramps is not only a Monkeys pseudonym and B-side to Teddy Picker, but a place they used to ride their bikes in Sheffield as kids.
"Up in the woods near where we lived," he nods. "Just little hills. But when you're eight years old they're death ramps." The ring was custom made by a friend of his, who runs top-end rock'n'roll jewellery emporium The Great Frog near London's Carnaby Street. Ask Turner why he thinks the chase between his writing and speaking eloquence is quite so mesmerisingly vast and he attempts a theory.
"Well, writing isn't the same as speaking," he muses. "Not for me. I seem to struggle more and more with... conversation. Talking onstage... I can't do it any more. Hmn. I'll have to work on that."
The ever-helpful Helders has a better theory.
"Since he's been writing songs," he ponders, “It seems like he’s always thinking about that. So even when he’s talking to you now, he’s thinking about the next thing that rhymes with a word. Even when he’s driving. We joke he’s a bad driver, his focus is never 100 per cent on what he’s doing. Which is good for us cos it means he’s got another 12 songs up his sleeve. I think music must be the easiest way for him to be concise and get everything out. Otherwise his head would explode.”
The Shoreditch.com photo studios, 18 March. Alex Turner, today, is more ethereally distracted than ever, transfixed by the studio iPod, playing Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, a version of I’d Rather Go Blind. Occasionally, he’ll completely lose his conversational thread, “Um. I’ve dropped a stitch.”
The first to arrive for Q’s photoshoot, he greets his incoming bandmates with enormous hugs (and also hugs them goodbye). Today, Q feels it’s pointless poking its pickaxe of serious enquiry further into Turner’s vacuum-packed soul and wonders if he’ll play, instead, a daft game. It’s called Popworld Questions, as first posed by someone he knows rather well.
“Oh, OK. Let’s do it,” he blinks, now perched in an empty dressing room. He then vigorously shakes his head, “Um…I’ve gotta snap back into it.”
Here, then, are some genuine “Alexa Chung on Popworld” questions (2006-2007), as originally posed to Matt Willis, Amy Winehouse, Robbie Williams, Pussycat Dolls, Kaiser Chiefs and Diddy.
Why do indie bands wear such tight jeans? AT: “Um. I supposed they do. They haven’t always. When we first were playing I was definitely in flares. You need to be quite tall to get the full effect, though. So, that's why this indie band wears such tight jeans, cos we've not got the legs for flares."
What makes you tick in the sexy department? AT: "Wow. Pass. What do I find most attractive in a woman? Something in the head? That's definitely a requirement. Well... Hmn. I'm struggling."
Tell us about all the lovely groupies. AT: "No!"
If dogs had human hands instead of paws, would you consider trying to teach them to play the piano? AT: "Absolutely. I'd teach Hey Jude."
How many plums d'you think you can comfortably fit in one hand? AT: "They're not very big. [Holds small, pale, girly hand up for inspection] It's a shame. Probably three. Diddy only managed two? Maybe not then. I can carry a lot of glasses at once, though. If they're small ones I can do four."
Are you cool? AT: "Not as much as I'd like to be. There's this clip where Clint Eastwood is on a talkshow and he gets asked, Everybody thinks of you as defining cool, what d'you think about that? And he gets his cigs out, takes one out, flicks it into his mouth, lights it and says, I have no idea what you're talking about."
Here, Turner locates his Camels soft-pack and attempts to do a Clint Eastwood. He flicks one upwards towards his mouth. And misses. Flicks another. And misses. "Third time lucky?" He misses. "I'll get it the next time." And succeeds. "Hey. Fourth time. Don't put that in! So there you go. I'm four steps away from where I wanna be."
Thank you very much for joining me here on Popworld, here's my clammy hand again. There it is, let it slip, hmmn. You can let go now. AT: "OK! Were you a Popworld fan, then? It was funny. Cool. What were we talking about, before?"
Blimey, Alex. What must you be like when you're completely stoned out of your head? AT: "Stoned? What d'you mean, cos I seem like that anyway? Yeah. A lot of people... tell me I'm a bit... dreamy. But I like the idea of that. Of being somewhere else."
Two days earlier, Turner had contemplated what he wanted from all this, in the end. Many seconds later he gave his deceptively ambitious answer.
"I just wanna write better songs," he decided. "And better lyrics. I just definitely wanna be good at it. Hmn. Yeah.”
RUFUS BLACK: AKA Matt Helders, on his ongoing bromance with Diddy
Matt Helders has known preposterous rap titan Diddy since they met in Miami in 2008. “He goes, Arctic Monkeys! Then he said summat about a B-side and I was like, He's not lying! I just thought, This is funny, I'm gonna go with this for a while." Last October Diddy texted Helders, suggesting he play drums with his Diddy Dirty Money band on Friday Night With Jonathan Ross, to give his own drummer a day off. “I were bowling with me girifriend at the time. In Sheffield, on a Sunday." On the day of recording, says Helder, "We had a musical director. That were one of the maddest times of my life. Next day Diddy said, Why don't you just stay? Come along with me. So I went everywhere with him." Diddy had "a convoy of cars" and made sure Helders was always in his. "He'd stop his car and go, Where's Matt? You're coming with me! So I'd get in his car. Just me, him, his security, driver." Diddy, by now, had given him a pseudonym - Rufus Black. "He kept saying, I don't wanna fuck up your image. And I'm, I don't think it's gonna do me any harm!" He stayed in Diddy's spectacularly expensive hotel. Some weeks later, Helders almost returned to the Dirty Money drumstool for a gig in Glasgow. "But we were rehearsing in London. I were like, I might come, how are you getting there? And he were like, Jet. Jump on t’jet with me. But I had to stay in Bethnal Green instead.”
Love’s young dream: Diddy (left) with Helders
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