#i like girl with mandolin though i think that is a beautiful piece

[fukikoichinomiya]

its such a hard life i lead i just want to watch aim for the ace with jelly but instead i have to study FOR 20TH CENTURY ART!!!!! IDGAF ABOUT 20TH CENTURY!!!!! TAKE ME BACK TO 19TH!!!!!!!!

[annymation]

The au about the transformation of Aster into a black hole sounds like a horror au now I'm going to have nightmares((( Write something else about the Star!Asha and the Human!Aster, please, I really like this au as well as the Kingdom of Wishes

Well thank you! I've always wanted to write darker stuff heheheh

But yeah I do owe you all some wholesome scenes don't I? So let's explore the Role Swaps Au a lil bit!

So how about we go with the scene Star!Asha and Human!Aster are at Aster's old home and they start getting to know each other better? Well, Aster isn't an artist in this AU, he's a musician, so unlike the original rewrite, Star!Asha wouldn't get in a sketch book, she'd get in a music sheet.

Here's how that'd play out:

Aster and Asha were now inside Aster's old home, it was quite tidy up despite being abandoned for years. Aster was humming to himself the song Asha sang earlier, "I'm A Star" while trying to play it on his grandfather's mandolin

"Shouldn't you be going to sleep?" Asked the star girl while exploring each and every thing inside the house, she had a radiant smile that only grew bigger and bigger with every new thing she found "I've seen that humans do that a lot at night, must be important"

"How can I possibly sleep? After I just wished upon a star and somehow that brought down a magical princess from the sky?" They asked, still astounded that this is all really happening and it's not just a dream

"Hihihi I'm not a princess silly, I just chose to look like one cause... Well, you seemed like you could use some inspiration to figure out what to do, and princesses often inspire people in fairytales" She explained while floating above Aster

"I guess so, but what does that make me though? Your knight or something? Heheheh" He said more so jokingly, referring to how he'll have to hide her and keep her safe from the royals

"I don't see why not, you're already handsome like one after all" Asha smiled innocently, stating that as if it was simply something obvious

Aster's eyes widened and his cheeks turned bright red. Did the most beautiful and literally etherial girl he has ever seen really think they were "handsome"???... Nah, that's probably how she treats anyone, Aster is just an average guy.

He stutters trying to think of something to change the subject, still blushing as red as a tomato "Hah-a umm Thanks??? UH- You- you sang just like a-a princess too heh heh" Aster feels himself growing even redder

"Awwn thanks!" Asha didn't seem to notice how flustered he was at all "I'm sure you have a beautiful singing voice too! Can you play for me? Pleeeeeaaaseee" the star adorably asked, her eyes sparkled with what seemed to be little stars twinkling inside her pupils

"... Maybe later, I get rather shy when playing in front of people I've just met" He said, looking at his grandfather's mandolin with downcast eyes

"Oh... That's alright!" Asha was sad for a second but her smile quickly returned as she got an idea "I can play your songs instead!"

And with that, Asha jumped inside Aster's note book, where he composes and writes his music sheets. She turns herself into a black and white drawing, dancing through the pages, stepping on each note, magically making music come from the book. Aster gazes in awe and laughs as she uses the notes to make funny sounds and melodies while the two continue chatting through the night.

........

And that's it, hope you liked this little piece of Star! Asha and Human! Aster!

[rosyfingereddawnn]

only the black rose (chapter 4)

pairing: jimmy page x layla porter (oc)

warnings: bordering on nsfw, a little fluff, and yet another pretentious description of a zep song :)

words: 3.9k

summary: in the blink of an eye, it’s 1975 and layla’s suddenly joining led zeppelin for their north american tour. throughout the chaos, the band take a liking to her, she builds friendships with the boys, and love blossoms. but all good things must come to an end.

author’s note: i blushed countless times writing this chapter. also things are heating up folks!!! not beta’d as always! hope you enjoy!

masterlist

playlist

chapter one

chapter two

chapter three

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The dressing room of the Rotterdam Ahoy was certainly not a palace of luxury, with its plush navy couches and line of chairs pushed against the wall, next to a long folding table packed tight with refreshments. A full-length mirror sits in the corner, casting refractions of faint yellow light onto the off-white brick walls. John Bonham lounges on the loveseat, drumming out an intricate rhythm on his knees, brown eyes far away as he stares off into the distance. John Paul Jones perches on the chair nearest to the door, strumming a tune reminiscent of rockabilly on a beautiful mandolin, nodding his head to keep the beat.

Looking up, Jonesy spots Jimmy across from him, occupying the couch next to Bonzo. Jimmy is tuning up his acoustic guitar, no doubt the precious gift he had received just days before. Every so often, Jimmy would pause in his focused tuning to shift in his seat with a wince, stretching out, before finally resuming.

“You okay, Pagey?”

“...Hm?” Jimmy grunts out, concentration stolen completely by the beautiful guitar in his hands. Heavenly notes swirling around the small room, mixing seamlessly with the sharp harmonies of the mandolin. Jimmy did always preach about unity, after all.

“Are you okay? You keep wincing, and you’ve shifted in your seat about 20 times in the past two minutes.”

“My back is a little sore, I must have slept in an odd position. Nothing serious.” This is punctuated by a crackle as Jimmy stretches once more.

“Well, you did have a nice pillow though, didn’t you?”

“Jonesy—”

“I hope you know that Robert has pictures, Jim.”

“You’re joking.”

“Nope,” Bonzo chuckles, popping the P, and smirking at the man across from him, who has finally stopped plucking the strings of the guitar. Jimmy wrings his hands together, stopping only to thumb at his nose. “No need to be nervous, Page. I’m sure he’ll only show a couple of them at the wedding, which reminds me. We need to know her ring preferences. Stones are important to girls, or something.”

“He took more than one? Wait… Rings? We’re not… I’ve known her for like, 5 days! Marriage? She doesn’t even like me like—”

“Who’s getting married?” Layla questions, voice floating through the open door as she walks in, arm in arm with Robert, who is sporting a cheshire grin. The blond sends a subtle wink at Jimmy, strolling further into the room.

“Layla, quick question.”

“Oh no. Should I be scared?”

“Only a little bit.” Jonesy cuts in, chuckling at the helpless look on Jimmy’s face.

“Bonzo, I-I really don’t think—”

“Pagey, shush,” Bonzo interrupts the guitarist, who splutters, dumbfounded at the exchange taking place. He moves to stop Bonzo from speaking, but Bonzo shoves him back onto the couch behind him, Jimmy landing with a huff. “Now, birdie… What is your favourite gemstone?”

“Garnet. Do I want to know what this is about?”

“Probably not.”

“Great. Well, as fun as this has been, I’ve got to go find Peter, he wanted to talk to me about something,” Layla drawls, a smile just evident in the slight curl of her lips, painted a pretty pink in the artificial light of the room. She catches Jimmy staring her way, and her smile grows wider, taking in the stunned expression on his features.  “I just thought it would be a good idea to rescue Robert from the horde of groupies that had him surrounded first.”

“Very smart. It would be rather hard to play without our frontman. Unless… Bonzo, how quickly can we get Coverdale in here?”

“Jonesy, I’m hurt. You know my voice is better than his.”

“Every single day, I am astounded at how humble you are, Robert. Truly brings a tear to my eye.” Layla laughs, turning towards the door, when a soft voice pipes up from behind her, paired with the sound of footsteps, muffled by the carpet under their feet.

“Mind if I join you, petal?”

A soft smile graces the woman’s lips at the sound of Jimmy’s dulcet voice, and she turns around to face him. Gazing up at him almost shyly, she nods, and they walk out together, Jimmy’s arm comforting around the woman’s shoulders. As they exit the dressing room, Robert pokes his head out, a mischievous smile growing slowly.

“Use protection, you two. Can’t have any little Page-Porters running around the venue.” Before the duo could retort, Robert retreats into the dressing room once more, his golden curls and the sound of his cackle following. Embarrassment colouring his face, Jimmy releases his hold on Layla, but is stopped by a hand at his wrist. Forest green and golden brown meet once more as she nods lightly. Jimmy, confident that Layla is comfortable with his touch, wraps his arm around her shoulders once more, as they walk through the venue in search of Peter Grant.

“For a man of his stature, I hadn’t anticipated how hard it would be to find him.” Jimmy laughs, which causes Layla to look at the man. His laugh may just be one of her favourite sounds, she thinks. Jimmy, sensing Layla’s eyes on him, looks down at the woman, whose head dips shyly, so different from the sassy exterior she lets people see. He lets his gaze linger, taking in the unruly chestnut ringlets that frame her tanned face perfectly. Her brown eyes hold unimaginable depths, and he is frightened by how often he gets lost in them. Her lips, the colour of lovely flowers in the bright morning light, are bitten cherry red out of nerves. Layla looks up at him then, and instead of shying away, this time he holds her gaze.

“Jim, can I ask you a question?”

“Of course petal. Ask away.”

“I’m just… a little curious,” Layla says, smiling as she stares right back, biting her lip for an entirely different reason now. “Why exactly do you call me petal?”

“Because I can make you blush the colour of a rose in bloom.”

“...That was so cheesy. I hope you know that, Jimmy,” Layla says, a giddy laugh bubbling out past her lips. “You know, I need a nickname for you now, so we’re even.”

“Oh, is that right, petal?”

“It is, actually. How about… angel? I mean, just look at that face.”

Jimmy’s breath hitches, audible even through the bustle of pre-show preparations. His free hand moves up to scratch at his neck once more, a nervous tick, of which he has many, that Layla is now accustomed to. Recovering quickly, Jimmy smirks, eyes glinting mischievously.

“Actually, petal, I think I might be a devil in disguise, but that’s something for you to figure out.”

“Right, because a devil would definitely check up on me, and help me when I was drunk out of my mind, and make me morning coffee exactly the way I like it.”

Knowing he’s been beat, Jimmy’s gaze falls to his feet, suddenly very interested in a particularly deep scuff mark. Layla chances a look at the man, and smiles softly at his reaction. Stepping in front of him, she puts a hand to his shoulder, wiping off imaginary dust from his shirt. His eyes follow her fingers, which finally land on his chin, lifting his head to face her. Layla moves in closer, tucking the hair falling into his face behind his ear.

“I appreciate your help trying to find Peter, but you have a show to get ready for, don’t you, angel?”

“I—”

He is interrupted by the whisper of soft lips brushing his cheek, and the fading scent of the woman’s perfume as she slips past him.

“Damn, she’s good…”

----------

Maneuvering through the maze-like hallways of the arena, Layla finally spots Peter, who is in deep conversation with a stage-hand, back turned to her. Moving closer, she can hear snippets of conversation detailing stage lights and lasers, and she wonders just what she had gotten into. Peter, hearing the padding of Layla’s footsteps approaching, finally turns around, grinning the moment he sees her.

“Layla! I’d like to speak with you for a moment, if that’s okay?”

“Of course, Peter! In fact, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” Layla exclaims, falling into step with Peter as they trek through the long hallways once more. “You had said you wanted to talk to me earlier?”

“Right, yes. You had expressed interest in helping out in the wings during the tour,”  Peter says, leading the woman with a paternal hand at the small of her back, ensuring she doesn't get lost once again. “But I was wondering if you had wanted to maybe experience this show in the audience? I only ask, because the experience is much different from the crowd, and I wouldn’t want you to miss out.”

“I would love to, Peter, but if you do need help…”

“Go have fun, dear. A front-row view at a Led Zeppelin show doesn’t come very often, after all.”

“Thank you so much, Peter!”

“It’s my pleasure, Layla. Now, we’ll be on in about 30 minutes, so we better get you to your seats sooner rather than later.”

Peter riffles through the pockets of his blazer and produces a rectangular piece of paper, no doubt the tickets themselves. Layla is led to an usher, and Peter, with a wink and a smile, turns on his heel, walking away, no doubt to check on his boys. The usher leads her onto the floor, right in front of the stage. Layla thanks them, a gleaming smile making her glow.

The venue is already packed to the brim, and with a glance behind her, Layla spots an ocean of faces, eyes glued to the stage in anticipation. At the sight of this, Layla can’t help but reciprocate these feelings.

“Hell,” Layla mutters under her breath, shaking her head lightly. “I’ve seen them play in the studio… How much better could it get than that?”

In the relative darkness of the large room, she can see shadows moving out from the stage wings, the hollers of the crowd growing deafening.

Here we go.

A booming voice erupts out from the speakers scattered around the stage.  Layla can’t help but join in, letting out some cheers of her own, wide smile nearly splitting her cheeks.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Led Zeppelin!”

A soft click cuts through the sea of white noise like a knife, and the stage is illuminated by a giant sign reading, ‘Led Zeppelin’ in bold, lit letters, which ignites the flame of excitement once more. A smug look passes between them and the band starts to play, catching the audience off guard. Bonzo’s sharp drumming serves as a count-in for Jimmy and Jonesy, their combined excellence creating a solid wall of pure sound, only penetrated by Robert’s masterful wails. Jimmy, gleaming in a suit accented with shining panels of silver, looks absolutely decadent, enraptured by the music he is playing. The chorus sounds, echoing slightly, across the great sea of faces, who are relentless in their fiery adrenaline. Robert glides across the stage, singing as if the crowd were snakes and he was a charmer, entrancing them with his stage presence and golden voice.

“It's been a long time, been a long time, been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely... time.”

Finally, the last notes fizzle out, Jimmy improvising a run under the blanket of unity courtesy of the rhythm section, and the crowd’s screams grow thunderous, a reward for the incredible first song. This trend remained throughout the entirety of the concert, every song fueling the fire.

Layla is completely in awe, eyes blinking rapidly in hopes of comprehending exactly what she had just witnessed. She had known exactly how talented every one of them was, she had seen it just days ago when they had played in the studio, but what she hadn't anticipated, was just how much the stage lights and the crowd brought them to life. They looked holy, faces painted with pure concentration and confidence. Throughout the show, she couldn't help but hang on to Jimmy’s every move. Up there on stage, bliss apparent in the uptick of his rosy lips and eyes full of ecstasy, he was hypnotising, beautiful strong fingers tickling the fretboard in hopes of squeezing ethereal notes from it. The woman wonders what it would be like; for the guitarist to touch her like that. To make her whimper like the guitar he manipulates every night. She wonders what it would be like to touch unmarked, alabaster skin, to bury her fingers in jet black hair as perfect, pink lips rock her world. The touch of callused fingers making her skin tingle and hum and burn in euphoria.

“Layla, you’re going to start bleeding if you keep biting your lip like that. Are you alright, my dear?”

Looking up abruptly, Layla is met by the whiskered face of Peter Grant, smiling softly as he looks down at her. She shakes her head to banish the illicit thoughts, curls flying wildly about her head.

“I’m… Peter, that was incredible!”

“Why don't we sneak you backstage so you can tell the boys what you think?” Peter says, smirking at the astonished face of the young woman in front of him. “They've been asking about you ever since they got off stage.”

“Lead the way!”

The two make their way to the dressing rooms, idle chat between Layla and Peter the soundtrack. Walking through the dressing room doors, she sees the boys facing away from her, celebrating a job well done. Robert is reclined on the couch, two beautiful blondes on each side getting his full attention. Bonzo and Jonesy are chatting in the corner of the room, sipping on bottles of whatever liquor they could find. Jimmy stands alongside them, laughing softly, dimples rising on his cheeks. In the harsh light of the dressing room, the sweat dripping from Jimmy’s body makes him glow, and Layla can’t help but stare.

“Boys, it seems we have a guest.”

Four pairs of eyes lock on her, and she smiles winningly, the beginnings of a giggle bubbling up her throat.

“Excuse me, ladies,” says Robert, as he extricates himself from the arms of the blondes, smiling apologetically. “But I really must greet the little dove.”

Immediately, arms surrounding the young woman, and as bad as the boys smelled, impressively sweaty after such a wonderful show, she was too excited to care. Pulling back finally, she gives her friends a megawatt smile.

“Guys, that was… That was truly amazing! I don’t know how you did it,” exclaims Layla, hands flying every which way to prove her point. “But you completely exceeded my expectations! I thought your little studio performance was excellent, but… This!”

“Wow, Layla. You’ve got such a way with words.” Jonesy jokes, putting an arm around the woman, leading her into the post-performance chaos. Bonzo pours her a shot glass full of something unidentifiable, vodka perhaps, and Layla tips it back quickly. Liquid courage firmly in place, she catches Jimmy’s eye. Wrestling out of Jonesy’s arms, Layla struts over to the raven-haired man and guides him to the corner of the room, a small hand slipping into his.

“Petal—”

“Shush!  Jim, that performance was… I don’t know what to say! Everyone had a great show, of course, but your guitar,” Layla rambles, speaking so quickly that the guitarist can barely hang on to a word the woman is saying. “... And Stairway. Oh my god, I don’t think I looked away once during the whole song! And—”

“Layla—”

“... Communication Breakdown ended way too soon, but the way you moved your fingers so quickly across the fretboard. I just don’t even—”

“Petal, please calm—”

This time, Jimmy isn’t interrupted by the ranting woman, but rather a set of slightly chapped lips on his, and a soft hand cradling his cheek, the other a warm weight on his shoulder. Layla is… kissing him. As soon as he makes this discovery, the lips against his turn down into a slight frown, and begin to pull away. Frantic at the thought of Layla pulling back, Jimmy brings a hand to her face, the other threading through her unruly curls to land at the back of her head. Deepening the chaste kiss, Jimmy’s eyes close. If he had been less preoccupied, he would have seen Bonzo, phone in hand, calling home in hopes of talking to his lovely wife. He would have seen Jonesy, laughing and pressing ever-closer to a beautiful brunette, a hand pushing back her long wavy locks. He would have seen Robert walking closer with a smirk set on his lips.

Jimmy finally pulls away, staring deep into Layla’s chestnut eyes, glazed over slightly as she blinks back at him, lips a luscious red from the heated kiss. Jimmy opens his mouth to speak, but another voice beats him to the punch.

“Goodness, little dove, if I knew you were handing out kisses like that for a good performance, I would’ve walked off before Jimmy. Hell, I’d’ve shoved him to get to you.”

Layla scoffs at the blond’s words, her hands twined around the guitarist’s neck. “Sorry, blondie, I’m not handing those out to just anyone. Besides, don't you have two beautiful blondes looking to take a bite out of you?”

“Ah, you're right, little dove. Excuse me, but I must get going.” Robert says with a wink, strolling back over to the two women.

Layla looks back at Jimmy, to find him staring at her. They remain there, gazes locked on one other, until Jimmy finally looks away, scanning the room.

“Let’s go somewhere a little more private, hm?” Jimmy whispers, taking Layla’s hand in his and leading her out the door.

Walking through the maze of hallways, hand in hand, Layla is struck by the parallels of the last time her and Jimmy were here. Only this time, she hadn’t just kissed him on the cheek. Her cheeks flush a dark scarlet at the thought as she is pulled into a deserted room, hand still linked with Jimmy’s own.

“Layla, I…”

“That was…”

The couple speak in unison, nerves taking over. Jimmy takes a deep breath, gripping Layla’s hands tightly in his, as he looks down at her, green eyes twinkling like stars in the midnight sky.

“Are you,” He starts, clearing his throat as he gazes down at Layla, who is looking up at him in reverence, reminiscent of the look she had given him on the plane. “Are you okay, petal? You don’t seem like the kind of person to just… kiss someone like that.”

“Honestly? Angel, I’ve been thinking of doing that for a while. Since the moment I first saw you, really.”

“Well… The feeling is mutual, but I mean… I think we should talk about this.”

“Jimmy Page, always the pragmatist.”

The man chuckles, smirking at the woman, places a hand beside her head on the wall, leaning in close. “Hey, you’ve never complained about it before, so why start now?”

“Maybe I did, behind your back. You would have no way of knowing, would you?” Layla says, a sweet smile on her lips as she bats her eyelashes; the image of false innocence.

Jimmy smiles at the woman, until it slips off his face, his downcast eyes troubled. He reaches up a hand to thumb lightly at his nose, and she realizes that he’s nervous. Tilting his head up with a finger at his chin, she meets his eyes.

“Jim, what’s wrong? Did… Did you not like it? The kiss, I mean?” Jimmy startles at this, quick to reassure her with a hand at her cheek, rubbing his thumb in soothing circles along her cheekbone.

“Of course I liked it, petal. How could I not? I just… I want to do this right, Layla.”

“Mhm.” Layla hums, moving closer to the man, smirking softly at the nervousness that plagues the guitarist.

“You’re not just… You’re not just some groupie to me, y’know?”

“Mhm.”

“I don’t want this to be just a one night stand, or… or a fling, or a friends with benefits situation, Layla. I want you.”

“Right.”

“I think we should take this slow, and see where… When did you get so close to me?”

Layla leans forward, placing a peck on his lips, and pulls away, leaving him stunned. He shakes his head, and tries again, brow furrowing in determination. “Layla, I’m serious, I really—”

This is met by yet another peck of the lips. Jimmy opens his mouth to speak, trying once more, but he is thwarted by yet another sweet kiss. Finally giving in, Jimmy deepens the kiss, hands landing in her hair. He spins them around, and crowds Layla against the wall, pulling back briefly, which elicits a soft whine from the brunette.

“Jimmy—”

“Are you okay with this, petal?”

“... Get over here.”

She pulls him in once again, and they resume where they left off. Jimmy laps at the opening of Layla’s bottom lip, asking for entrance, and his request is granted. The couple battles for dominance, their hands roaming anywhere they could reach. Jimmy’s palm slides down to rest at her back, dangerously close to slipping lower. Layla smiles against his lips, and pulls away, breathing heavily. She presses one more breathless kiss to Jimmy’s lips, and smiles widely, taking in the man before her. His hair is a mess, his lips are swollen, and his eyes are locked onto hers, searching her face with a hint of a smile. She wants this to work; for them to work.

“Angel, I want to take this slow too. I don’t want to lose you to someone else, just because we rushed this. I do, however, hope we can still kiss like that on the regular.”

“We’ll see, petal.” Jimmy laughs, winding a familiar arm around her shoulders, as he presses a kiss to her cheek.

“Oh, how the tables have turned… I’m usually the one dishing out cheek kisses.”

“That may just have to change, then.”

“Be careful, I could very well just go and find Robert right now. You know, maybe I'll go steady with him instead…”

Laughter follows behind them like a shadow as they walk back to the dressing room to find the rest of their crew. Jimmy’s arm still rests around the shoulders of the woman, and as they enter, the band take in the disheveled state of the couple.  

“Oh my god—”

“Come on, boys, we have a plane to catch!”

“Actually, Pagey,” Jonesy interjects, smiling at the couple, eyebrows waggling. “We still have a few minutes. What happened while you were gone?”

“Did you guys, like… have a quickie in the custodial closet or something?”

“God, Bonzo, we—”

“Wouldn’t you like to know, Bonham.” Layla interjects, kind smile cutting through the sarcasm of her response. Bonzo smiles back, clapping Layla on the shoulder. Robert pouts playfully, curls bouncing as he lowers his head slightly.

“That should have been me…”

Peter chooses this moment to walk in, alerting them that it’s finally time to leave. One taxi ride later, everybody piles into the Starship, making themselves comfortable. Jimmy and Layla take a spot on the comfortable loveseat, and fall asleep right away, leaning up against one another.

If they wake up, backs sore once again, it’s worth it to them.

----------

taglist: @jimmys-zeppelin @salixfragilis @timetraveller4 (let me know if you want to be added!)

[hazzabeeforlou]

Fine Line Masterpost:

A breakdown, musically and lyrically 

In Fine Line, ‘raw honesty’ doesn’t really mean delving into the details of who Harry Styles is sleeping with, but rather it’s a glimpse into the world of a 25-year-old who is both deeply in love and who fucks up a lot; he’s given to sugary supplications, is plagued by jealousy, pouts at consequences, and struggles with understanding an inner self that keeps prodding him towards exploration of his identity.  

The album is constructed to be consumed by various factions of the fandom. There’s no getting away from the surface dedication of HS2 as an ode to a blonde supermodel with a delicious French accent whose new boyfriend’s father owns a gallery, a girl who has golden hair and blue eyes. I won’t be arguing that away, because it’s intentional, it’s meant to be the surface layer. 

The mantle is not the crust, though. Taken individually, each song can be seen as speaking to the queer experience in varied and complex ways, and I’ve seen some truly beautiful explorations of this angle. Especially with TPWK and FL, the anthemic solidarity with queer experience is astounding and gorgeous. I think it’s no accident that this broad take holds true as we zoom in and look at the complex details; Harry has written songs that speak both to this meaning and also hold incredibly personal and intimate significance between him and a partner (in this post we’ll call them Subject). 

I will be focusing on the album as a cohesive narrative in the context of it’s chronological, linear progression. Fine Line details an incredibly personal struggle; it’s a love letter, an at times embarrassing, self-loathing reflection on a love gone wrong, a love struggling, an emerging self, and a hope redeemed. 

Please feel free to ask questions if any of the technical stuff is confusing, but please also remember that these are my opinions, coupled with my analysis as a professional musician (meaning, hopefully I’m remembering those torturous years of theory dictation correctly!) 

Side A 

All four songs share an off-kilter-ness, a restless, unsettled, frantic feeling, as if Harry is balancing, undecided between throwing himself at the feet of the one he loves or pulling away. This is no illusion; the tonic base is missing from each song save WS (but even here the tonic is sabotaged in our ear, as we’ll discuss). We’re on a journey to side B; we start with a hope that sweet memories and lust can salvage love, and we end with Harry going his own way.

Golden: There are only two chords in this song, DM and CM7, the V and IV7 of the implied tonic, G Major. We never get to tonic though. We never touch that home base. The songs “da da da’s” give it a happier, peppier illusion than the text reveals. 

Harry is already broken, already reflecting and hopeless as the song begins. His intended listener, Subject - the sun, the golden one - waits for him in the sky, and is all he’s ever known. Subject has always browned his skin just right, but now, Harry reflects, perhaps has been too bright for him. (Is some aspect of Harry buried in the brilliance of Subject’s light?) This golden Subject is scared, though, scared Harry is so open. Harry doesn’t want to be alone, but he also needs to peel back edges of himself previously unexplored. Stepping into and away from light is a major theme for Harry, and this opening song sets that precedent. Subject is scared because “hearts get broken,” but Harry’s heart is already broken, so perhaps this refers not to interpersonal heartbreak, but situational. Harry recognizes he’s “out of his head...” BUT, he counters, “Loving you’s the antidote!” He naively gushes out poetry while Subject remains unconvinced. We establish an impasse. 

Watermelon Sugar: The Dm - Cm - Am6 - GM chord progression is an odd one; my best guess is that the song is in D minor, so the progression is: 

i, VII, v, IV

 That’s not typical in a minor key. Usually the leading tone note (in this case a C) is raised (so C#) making the five chord Major (V) not minor (v) and the seven chord diminished (viio) not Major (VII). also the Major IV ignores the B flat in the key signature of D minor and instead uses B natural. So all this to say that the tonic base STILL doesn’t feel like a tonic home, because the normalcy around the key signature is erased. Everything still feels unsettled, unresolved. 

Much has been made of the oral sex interpretation, so, ya. This is a song about remembering the best of times, a prayer to Subject, a plea for summertime and bellies and strawberries, and a feeling Harry is desperate to get back. 

Adore You: The three chords in this song, Cm - BbM - AbM, imply an E flat Major key, so vi, V, IV, respectively. The tonic, Eb (I), is (once again) never used, and instead vi, V, IV circle without ever coming to rest. 

Subject, “Honey,” creates a rainbow paradise. This is another love letter to Subject, let me adore you, I’ll walk through fire for you, you don’t have to say anything just listen to me, you don’t have to say you love me too, just please, please... you’ve been on my mind. Let me adore you like it’s the only thing I’ll ever do. By this wording, Harry admits that adoring Subject is not the only thing he ever does, yet he wishes Subject to remember, or imagine, this false reality. 

Lights Up: We’re in C Major here, with the chords Am - GM - FM, creating the same exact chord progression as Adore You, vi, V, IV. We (yet again!) never reach the tonic of C Major. It’s a constant tease of resolution, but there’s no solid home base. We’re suspended in limbo. 

Subject is “sorry, btw.” What does that mean, Harry asks? Sorry we’re here in this place, that this is happing? This song is Harry’s declaration: he’s not staying, he’s not coming back down. It would be sweet if things stayed the same, but no, I’m stepping into the light. “All the lights couldn’t put out the dark”... even all the golden sun of Subject couldn’t heal the void in Harry’s soul?  Harry asks subject, do you know who you are? implying that he’s determined to answer this for himself. I’m reminded of the crab in Moana, singing “Shiny.” There’s a certain bravado here, a reckless glittery happiness, a flaunting, an exuberance in discovery. 

Side B 

Tonics are all over the place. Harry is certainly certain about heartbreak. No ambiguity here. 

Cherry: GM - Em - CM, or  I, vi, IV. We’re in G Major and we know it. Repetitive “cou-cos’s” pepper the track like hanging fruit (let’s imagine from cherry trees). 

The song is a simple one, simple in its jealousy. Harry has let Subject go, and now Subject is at their best... and Harry hates it. He doesn't want his former pet term of endearment used on another, even though he has no claim on Subject’s actions anymore. Harry keeps finding bits of Subject in how he dresses. They’re not talking lately, and Harry perhaps is most upset that this separation isn’t going how he planned... Subject is at their best without him. 

The gallery line is inserted as a bridge, a unique line of music rather separate from the rest, an intentional narrative. But what’s most fascinating is the end of the song. The previous repetitive chord progression changes. Now we have 

GM - AM7 (an added C#) - Am7 (4/2 inversion) - GM

or I, II7, ii7, I

The “cou-cou” lands during the AM7 (the II7) and it lands EXACTLY on the note of B, extending the 7th chord to a ninth chord, before, on its second syllable, dropping to the A and holding there (a kind of suspension) while the chord progression resolves to the Am7 (ii7), making the A a chord tone. This is deliberate. Unless the whole piece was harmonically built around Camille’s random use of a B to A in a voicemail (also randomly in the perfect key for Harry’s voice) this was purposely recorded for aesthetic effect. I for one really love it, I could listen to breathy french girls mutter about beaches endlessly...

Falling: A straightforward progression. In the key of E Major,

 EM - C#m - BM - AM or I, vi, V, IV

With Falling, the only ballade on the album, we see Harry shift from jealousy to self destructive behavior. I don’t believe the ‘wandering hands’ line is about cheating (he and Subject were already apart) but rather, Harry seeking to wound Subject by turning to others. Communication is back open, because Subject says they care, they miss him too, but now Harry’s gone and fucked it all up. What have I become? What if Subject never needs me again? I can’t unpack the baggage they left. I just want Subject AROUND! Harry isn’t even begging for a romantic connection, he’s simply begging for Subject’s presence. He was so sure he could discover himself in LU, and now he keeps asking, what am I now? Who has he become on his own? He’s falling, and there’s no one to catch him. 

To Be So Lonely: This song waffles between two keys, just as Harry waffles between defending himself to Subject and finally, finally admitting (in just one small line) that he is, in fact, sorry. The song seems to start out in C Major, with CM and Am chords (I, iv) but then at the chorus the Am chord elides from a iv to a i, revealing the key is really A minor. The chorus goes on to be:

Am - GM - Em - FM 

or i, VII (lowered leading tone in minor), v (lowered leading tone in minor), VI

A fluttering mandolin mimics a fluttering heartbeat, and a folk music lilt gives the song a certain feel of heartbreak. 

Harry asks for Subject to not blame the drunk caller, likely himself. Harry was away. He missed Subject. He was just a little boy when he fell, and presumably Subject caught him that time. Subject is trying to be friends, they mean well, perhaps have taken pity on him, but Harry cannot stand to be called baby now, not when that name doesn’t mean what it used to, not when it’s a hollow word. Harry’s ‘home’ is suddenly a lonely place, but Subject has his reasons for how he’s acted, presumably good ones, and finally Harry gives his mea culpa, “this is it, so I’m sorry.” 

Interestingly, only after admitting that he’s made mistakes too, that he’s not perfect, that he shares the blame, does Harry confront and open himself to the realization contained in the next song, the heart of the album and the crux of what Harry’s been dancing around up until this point. 

She: In E minor, both verse and chorus use the same progression:

Em - DM - CM - Am - (Bm, a quick lead-in to) - Em 

 or i, II, VI, iv, v (no raised leading tone), i 

This Bowie-esc sounding song is the first to have characters. In addition to the Subject (perennially addressed as ‘You’) there is The Man and She. I would argue The Man and She are both Harry, a duality. The man drops his kids off at school, the man is thinking of You, like all of us do (everyone thinks of their SO perhaps). The Man goes through mundane daily tasks, but is he faking it? Does he really know what to do? He’s playing pretend, so pretend. 

Now Harry introduces She. (When speaking of She, Harry sings in a high falsetto.) She lives in daydreams, she is the first one he sees, and Harry doesn’t know who She is. A Woman just in his head, who sleeps in his (a jump up to the falsetto for just this one word in the verse) bed while he plays pretend. Much has been said about the gender/fluidity discovery in this song, and by better than me. It’s clear what Harry is saying, it’s clear what he’s going through and wrestling with. He’s thinking of Subject, but also haunted by She, in his head, in his mind’s eye, in his daydreams. She is a part of Harry, and Harry wants to know who She is. 

Side C

Uncomplicated tonics! All Major! A shift into happiness perhaps? 

Sunflower: F Major. BbM - FM - CM, or IV, I, V.  The bridge is fancy:

iii, IV, V, vi, I, V vi, V (vi?) V 

Some trippie hippie song from the 60s! Two lines of thought are apparent from the get go; Harry says he wants to get to know Subject, but then says “before I got to know you.” It’s as if this is a new beginning, like he and Subject are starting over. Much is made of the ‘seed’ thing, a metaphor for new life and rebirth, “plant new seeds in the melody.” Harry is trying hard not to talk to Subject, to not seem eager, not act a fool. He was just tongue tied, then he’s still tongue tied, implying he’s done this whole dance before. He implores Subject to hold their sweet memories: domestic times, kitchens, kids. In Golden, Subject was the sun. Now Subject is a sunflower, hung up high in the gallery, out of the shade, in the light a sunflower needs to thrive, into the light, step into the light. Little gasps from Harry interject throughout; is he surfacing from water (LU music video?), is he breathing between kisses, is he suddenly gifted new life like Gandalf atop Isengard? The end of the piece devolves into calls of unbridled, nonsensical joy, like birds song, like mating calls amongst brilliant plumage. 

Canyon Moon: D Major. DM - GM - AM - DM (I, IV, V, I)

 Bridge DM - (Em transit?) - AM - DM (I, (ii), V, I) 

Chorus DM - AM - DM - GM (I, V6, I6, IV) 

Perhaps the most straightforward tonic bound song of the album. Harry is missing Subject, but it’s a happy nostalgia now, a hopeful one, a “two weeks and I’ll be home.” Home is no longer a lonely place, like in TBSL. The world is happy waiting (there’s no rush? No need to have everything figured out?). “Doors yellow, broken, blue.” You can’t bribe the door on the way to the sky a sky where Harry’s Golden sun awaits him, and now the sky door is broken, busted through, that blue door to a blue sky that never looked so blue. 

We get another glimpse of She here; Subject remains You, Harry remains Harry, but there’s also a She who plays old hippies’ love songs and pretends to know the words; perhaps this is another Camille reference for narrative purposes, but I lean more towards this being another reference to She as Harry, exploring odd new music he’s never heard, trying not to be so pretentious about it but failing. (He’s such an Aquarius.) Most charmingly of all, the single whistler becomes two by the end of the song. 

Treat People With Kindness: F Major. This is the most interesting piece in terms of text painting. 

We start with CM6 - FM, then FM6/4 - BbM, then back to CM6 - FM, then we hold on the Am chord, and then repeat the whole thing. So analyzed in F Major this would be V6, I, I6/4, IV, V6, I, iii. 

But. By using the I6 to IV, Harry plays with the idea of a V of IV, where you take the IV chord of the key and pretend it has its own dominant (V) and use the V of IV not as the I chord normally is used, but as a Leading Tone chord to IV. 

ALL THAT TO SAY. He’s illustrating the lyrics. During “Maybe we can find a place” the chords are playing with dual resolutions. Where is the actual tonic? Is it F Major or B Flat Major? It’s ambiguous! We don’t know! We haven’t found our place yet! 

But then! The bridge. “And if we’re here long enough” and look where we land, on a CM chord, then BbM, then FM, a solid V, IV, I progression. And THEN (bless this boy) on the word belong we get the same A minor chord (the iii) but we get a 7th added to the chord, a G, and Harry holds this G in the melody (plant new seeds in the melody), a note that VERY MUCH DOES NOT BELONG because in no universe does a iii chord in Major have a 7th added! And Harry not only ADDS but draws attention to this note, this note that doesn’t belong!!! Then this iii7 chord resolves to C Major (V), making the G note a chord tone, making it BELONG, making it fit perfectly. 

GOD. Weep with me. 

This is Over the Rainbow. This is Hair, this is Age of Aquarius. Somewhere there’s a place we can belong and feel good and people will celebrate and rejoice in us, someday a new age will dawn. 

Harry is plunging into the deep end, dreaming, caught up in his good feelings and his euphoria in being “given second chances.” He’s tentative about admitting reckless hope to Subject; instead he says, “Maybe we can find a place to feel good?” Harry says he doesn’t need all the answers. He said in LU “do you know who you are” then in Falling “What am I now?” then in She “I don't know who she is” and now he’s at peace. He feels good in his skin, and he will keep on dancing. 

Most personally, I think the sudden somber turn of the line “If our friends all pass away” is in reference to grief. He’s speaking to Subject, but also to himself. It will be okay, okay, okay. Harry can’t control his life, he doesn’t have everything figured out, but he’s come to accept that. 

Side D

Fine Line: D Major. We come full circle, returning to the use of only three chords like at the start of the album. This time, though, Harry resolves to tonic in a repetitive pattern used for both the verses and chorus: 

Bm, GM7, DM6/4, or vi, IV7, I

FL is the summation of the album, the thesis statement, the conclusion of the journey. Harry has endured tests of patience, and accepted that there are things he’ll never know. He’s trying to shake off trepidation (of plunging in the deep end? Of hoping?). He says “My hand’s at risk, I fold.” The poker analogy is an interesting one; Subject (presumably) has gotten past Harry’s poker face, has sussed out his fronts and acts and strategies, and Harry is left bare and exposed, vulnerable before them. He’s been brought to this point, but willingly he folds. He laments that “spreading you open is the only way of knowing you.” We should open up before it’s all too much. Harry is done fighting. He’s also done sleeping in the dirt. For the first time he’s not sugar-coating his words, avoiding their problems via sex and pretense and flowery language. He’s matured enough to admit, “Man, I hate you sometimes.”

Again we have the reappearance of She. Harry says to Subject, “We’ll get the drinks in, so I’ll get to thinking of her.” This She is something between them, within them now, another facet of his and Subject’s relationship. Harry is going to spend time thinking of Her. She, I believe, is a part of him. 

A fine line is a balancing act, a tightrope, a suspension between extremes. But Harry calls out into the echo of the music, “We’ll be alright.” A declaration, a hope, a promise. Brass, strings, and a building crescendo, a cacophony of movie-credit-worthy emotion, sweeps us towards closure. Ethereal voices fade out, moving from dominant to tonic, but then a solitary piano plinks on a V chord, twice, hanging in the air, a question, an invitation, a hope. 

[oh-for-merlins-sake]

Ah thank god, my dumb ass messed up again haha. Could you please give me a 💥 based on the vibes of my blog? I'd also be really happy to get a 🔮 on my fic "Inspiration" (Fred x reader). Thanks a lot, lovely!💕

hellllloooo bobi! ok so i’m gonna do fic review first, then your playlist will be under the cut!

inspiration

ok right away, the imagery is stunning

BOBI, i’m telling you i can visualize everything perfectly wtf!! you have SUCH a way with words and you paint the picture of your story so BEAUTIFULLY

And though you wanted to continue having fun with Hermione, Luna and the rest of the girls waiting for you, you really needed a break. And a drink.

i’ve said this in the past, and i’ll say it again: WE LOVE A RELATABLE READER 💗

ok here’s the thing, you’ve written this in such a way that i need this to be an actual movie LMAO. i don’t know how to describe it but there’s a movie turning in my head as i read this, and i think it’s wicked talented that you’re able to produce something like this

Excusing yourself to leave the particularly interesting conversation you were having with distant Weasley relatives, you slipped off your black flats that, despite looking absolutely stunning, hurt your feet terribly after an entire day of fussing over the color of napkins and flower bouquets. Barefoot on the grass, you walked over to a chair next to a table which seemed to have been occupied, but judging by the mostly empty glasses and plates, the guests weren’t coming back anytime soon.

You tossed your shoes aside with a sigh and rushed to rub your aching toes, hissing from how sore they were.

How has Ginny been dancing like that for hours?

you probably weren’t expecting me to extract this piece from your fic, but i really wanna rave about it for a sec, if i may? you simply thought of everything, bobi. in the first paragraph, i’m given loads of context that helps me understand why y/n is so bloody exhausted and your thoughtful choice of words simply reinforces that exhaustion. i don’t think i need to say it again (i’ll probably say it a million more times) but the imagery packs a haaaard punch! and you also framed the mood of y/n very eloquently without flat-out saying “she’s exhausted” if that makes sense?? i dunno i just think this is a really dope set of words, and i could unpack it for hours!!

But it was his flaming red hair that made your eyes widen - it was carefully smoothed back, shining under the moonlight like liquid iron.

bobi wtf how do u think of these stunning phrases and then craft them so poignantly

OMG this playful banter - i am blushing

also i wanna have champagne w/ fred weasley wtf

also i like that you tag fred as one who rarely breaks eye contact. especially when that cheeky bastard is flirting because i 1000% agree with that idea.

Fred’s presence could only be compared to a shot of whiskey, or the sensation of anticipating a tidal wave to crash into you in less than a second. It was wild and the tiniest bit terrifying, but oh so tempting as it pulled you in.

nailed it

also imagine being one of those “special girls back at hogwarts” WOW

I FEEL THE LOVE AAAAAAHHH

BOBI, WHERE IN MERLIN’S NAME HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE! this was absolutely, without a doubt one of the most incredible pieces of fanfic i have read TO DATE. HOW IS THIS FREE???? like WTF?? i am 100000% in awe of this and of you and of your sheer talent! dude, this is kickass work. thank you for sharing a piece of your beautiful mind!!

okay so now that i’m done fangirling over your fic (lmao), let’s talk about your playlist hehehe. so i get very heady vibes from you and your blog. i can tell you’re quite introspective and you’re rather thoughtful (which clearly shows in your writing as well). and in a way, the powerful imagery in your writing influenced my selections; i usually think these songs paint pretty pictures. so anyways, cheers to you! xo

yellow - coldplay

liability - lorde

big jet plane - angus & julia stone

wildflower - mandolin orange (honestly this is one of my favorite songs ever and this is the song that echoed in my head while i read your fic ok)

@shadowsinger11

[joyfulprincessdragonlover54]

Do you have a favorite book--one that you could read multiple times? If not, what about a movie or tv show?

Hello again my friend.   Was this meant to exclude How to Train Your Dragon (or Disney/Pixar) so you could hear about what other pieces of fiction I am a massive fan of that don’t appear on my Tumblr?  If so, I still have answers for you.  But being brutually honest though.  The How to Train Your Dragon trilogy is my all time favorite story.  Never could tire of it. If you want I can always send you the link to my “What HTTYD means to Me” post through the pm system.  Even if that one is older and in need of polishing.  That’s up to you.   But back to other options you might be curious to hear about.   

My all time favorite novel (rather in this case it is a novella) is Washiongton Square by Henry James.  A rather simple plot to be spun out about how a plain looking young heiress in mid 1800′s New York comes into conflict between her domineering father and a man she is infatuated with is really a gold digger. This is where I discovered that books are treasures beyond comphrension.  When plots such as this that are considered so simple can in fact be filled with absorbing descriptions and crackling dialogue. Only to later to discover what kind of pungent questions they leave you with in their wake.  It has capitvated me for the past decade.  Henry’s prose is so elegant but his characters speak with such a force I find it addicting to re-visit.  Granted I also admit that the way people spoke in older centuries is fascinating as it is. But there’s something mind boggling as it is delightful to read what Mr. James put into a narrative.  This one in particular of his earlier publications holds my attenition because of his minisucle details to recognzing women’s lack of rights and the instintcual desire to garner freedom without ever going full fledged blunt on this controversial topic at the time is an artistic approach to such a signifcant matter.  Unlike another famous (and infamous) story called The Doll House by Henrik Ibsen who was so direct with this it gave the audience whiplash.  Henry James was so gentle and subtle it needed time to simmer but he was being vocal about the concerns of a woman’s position in society.  The questions I myself still ponder about what would have happened to me if I was born back then and would I have been more like this story’s leading lady. Who starts off the epitome of a damsel in distress who is so meak it makes contempories today feel sick to their stomoach. Only for her arc to forge from that pestering Mary Sue type into a person while deemed a “spinster” in that time period to what many today would call a heroine.  Her transition from stereotypical timid shy girl who blushes into a woman who defies society’s expectations without ever being crass about it is a deeply rewarding story to read in my opinion.  

The film I can re-watch and never tire of now that I think about it shares configurations to Washington Square on a philosphical level.   It’s also considered to be one of the 2000′s biggest film flops and most hated by mainstream audiences.  For good measure, it also infuriated historians.  Needless to say that ever since I saw this film in the cinema back in 2005. It has touched me profoudly.  Even if the screenplay took liberties.  Then again, I still love watching Disney’s Pocahontas and not feel guilty about it. Now you may be asking yourself what does that have to do with anything? Well the film I am referring to is called The New World.  A film that dives into the account of her life on a longer and heavier scale.  Released more then a decade after Disney tackeled their own version. Acclaimed filmmaker and writer Terrance Malick (who actually did enjoy the Disney film much to the suprise of many)   decided he would take his dormant script he started to brainstorm in the late 70′s  and bring into life on his own terms.  Now I’m not sure if you are familiar with any of Mr. Malick’s work.  But he has a very specific form of shooting and editing his movies.  In a nutshell, his films  are considered slow and even dull by the mainstream as there is very little dialogue, action and even his  color scheme is mostly made up of brown and/or grey.  He also likes to hone in on what are seemingly random shots of nature. Leaves blowing in the wind, sunlight coming in through the tree branches and water flowing in creeks. But for me. This presnentation of filmmaking for this story was poetic.  I loved how it evolved with a film score that was essentially a collection of classical music and only occasional narration by it’s lead characters.  The editing of Pocahontas’s journey as a free spirited young teen into a woman as she encounters a life filled with fascinating discovery, sensual desire, agonizing despair, new found love and the resurrgence of joy.  Q’orianka Kilcher who portrays her in the film is outstanding! It was her acting debut but you would never know it with how she carries the weight of the film by her shoulders. It was effortless.  The film features a great ensamble cast spead out by people Pocahontas meets and is surround by over the years. They include Colin Farrel, Christopher Plummer, Christian Bale, August Schellenberg, Wes Studi, and David Thewlis. All are commendable. Still, this story belongs to Ms. Kilcher’s character and she does an exquiste job of holding the story thread together. I try to keep my opinion from venturing into the “This should have had an Oscar” chatter. Not in this case however.  I saw all of the leading actresses that held the main accolade attention that year.  All were great in their own right but I would be lying if I said I didn’t believe that there were performances that were over-rated. Q’orianka did something so magnificent (and bare in mind she did it while internalizing dialague)  she created a full flesh and blood human being whose story is now legend and gave it 1000% soul.  I can’t say that every woman nominated provided that. There’s also a quote (from the novel Corelli’s Mandolin) that I love to share with people when I like to describe how the screenplay juggled the love triangle in this story.  The maturity and depth of how it unfurled and evolved I find that most romance stories lack.  “Love is like a volcano. It errupts and then subsides. When it subsides you have to make a decision.  You have to decide if your roots are entwinded together that it is inconceivable should ever part. For that is what love is. It is not breathless. It is not excitement. It is not the promulgation of eternal passion. For that is just ‘being in love’ which any of us can convince ourselves we are.  Love itself is what’s left over after ‘being in love’ has burned away. “  This quote matches ideally to this specifc film’s theme of love and how to value it. I really do think this is one of the greatest represenations of love for not only another person.  But for re-discovering one’s self-identity in a world that craves to put constraints on it.  This film may be at times emotionally difficult to watch but seeing it unfold and going through all of these heartaches to come out the other side makes me feel as if I have had a reprieve. I love how Terrance Malick’s off kilter filming and editing depicts this beautiful age old adage.   :)  

[ducktracy]

26. freddy the freshman (1932)

release date: february 20th, 1932

series: merrie melodies

director: rudolf ising

starring: n/a

i love that title card! obviously the title cards will improve as the years go on instead of being black backgrounds with white text. here we have freddy the freshman, a very popular tune used by carl stalling in the underscore of some cartoons. i know porky’s garden and boobs in the woods use it, just to name a few. the titular freshman freddy becomes a big hit at the party he crashes, and eventually goes on to play in the big football game.

this is our eponymous freshman, freddy. isn’t he cool with his beanie and oversized glasses? i love that they designed him the way they did. i was expecting a jock letterman type, much like the dover boys, not this dinky little dog. i’m not sure if that was intentional, but good on them if it was.

freddy seems to be the talk of the town (and thinks rather highly of himself). he putters through the streets, surrounding by an audience who cheers him on. he sings “rah, rah, rah cha cha! that’s our college yell! baggy pants, crazy dance, it’s freddy, can’t you tell?” as always, the music is syncopated and catchy. we get some gags of freddy slapping his car (with the engine springing out of place at one point).

dance sequence time! this time, we’re at a party, where everyone is joyously dancing to an underscore version of “freddy the freshman”. once again, gifs do little justice, but i love the visuals above. very smooth and amusing! the underscore is lush and catchy as ever.

our hero arrives and crashes the party, literally. his car explodes into bits and pieces just outside the shack. he greets “hi-ho, everybody! hi-ho!” and instantly receives a shower of cheers.

we launch into our musical number of “freddy the freshman”. he saunters through the shack (much like foxy in lady, play your mandolin!) and at one point, his fur coat divides into a bunch of kittens, who sing the chorus of “freddy the freshman, the freshest kid around!” very clever, but also morbid!

no college party is complete without your letterman jock (ah, there’s what i was looking for in the beginning!) bully. freddy meets with his girl, who thinks he’s swell. the horse, not so much. freddy asks the crowd to give a college yell, prompting the horse to snarl “RASPBERRIES!”. enter this great gif above. freddy tackles him, and is greeted by applause! i love the tactility of rubber hose cartoons, how they melt and bend and squish. the animation may be in its baby steps, but it’s much more fun to watch than what we’ll be dealing with in the 60s cartoons (shudder).

finally, it’s time for the game. oh, by the way, there’s a football game! it was probably mentioned, and maybe i missed it (and the dialogue is a bit hard to distinguish), but it certainly seems random like hey, by the way! the football game is here!

nevertheless. an old cat fires the starting pistol, prompting a mouse to pop out and blow a whistle. the jock horse initiates the game by kicking the football directly towards the audience, something i imagine looked really good in theaters!

a pig player has his mouth open, and swallows the football whole (much like the hippo swallowing the cannonball in bosko the doughboy). freddy kicks him in the ass to regurgitate the football back out, resuming the game. as crude and overused as it is, the gag amuses me because of how unsettling it is to think about!

because it’s a cartoon, this isn’t your average football game. a wiener dog shields freddy from any offensive attacks as he runs to score the touchdown. however, because all football fields have them, the dog crashes into a tree in the middle of a field, wrapping itself and thusly unwrapping itself from the bark. another gag includes a giant dogpile—once the dogpile is over, a lone turtle stranded on its back slips out of its shell and puts it on haughtily.

i love how absurd this is. we now cut to a lake in the middle of the football field, where freddy chases a duck who caught the football via raft. absurdity and surrealism, the best way to go for comedy! they both reach land, and freddy tackles the duck’s legs (which are extremely tall). the duck makes it over the end zone line anyhow and quacks in his face.

now we cut to the cheerleading section, which is plagued by stereotypes. three jewish crows hold hebrew pennants and dance, cheering on the team. but that’s not all! an effeminate rooster saunters over and joins the cheering section with a stereotypical feminine voice and mannerisms. obviously, this didn’t age well. it’s obviously offensive and cringeworthy, and even if you could somehow get past that, it’s still not very funny to begin with.

nevertheless, the game ravages on. a lion has possession of the ball while the crowd chants “hold that lion! hold that lion!” freddy LITERALLY holds the lion, pulling on his tail in an attempt to slow him down. instead, he tumbles backwards as he pulls off his “pants”.

cut to an announcer, who’s excitedly narrating the game. in the midst of his fervor he stops and whispers “are ya listening’? hmmm?” our first (or one of them) celebrity reference! this is a reference to radio personality anthony “tony” wons, who would often give that exact catchphrase. i love the celebrity references in all of the 30s-40s looney tunes shorts! some people don’t because of how dated they are, which is true. i had no idea who tony wons was until just now. but i always find them so fascinating, because if i don’t get the joke, it’s still FUNNY and carries on (which isn’t the case today. i feel like if you miss the joke, you miss it completely nowadays). finding out what the references mean and digging around for some background information is always very exciting to me (and explains why i listen to bing crosby and frank sinatra on a regular basis, thanks carl stalling for your beautiful underscores!).

enough blabbering on. freddy manages to catch the ball, and it’s up to him to score the touchdown. to keep his skull getting bashed in (just look at those protective leather helmets!), he fashions a fence into a protective hamster wheel and barrels down the field, his foes bouncing off like flies. there just so happens to be a clothesline present in the middle of the field, and with some bizarrely fun visuals, freddy hops into a pair of underwear (a gag pitched by clampett, maybe? everytime there’s something “crude” i think of him) and uses a stick to row himself down the field. one of the players squeezes him, and he pops out and slides into a pair of pajamas hanging on the field, sagging down and running on the grass. he opens the buttflap and throws the football down, scoring the points. iris out.

this is certainly an... interesting cartoon. it doesn’t have much plot to it (though it is a merrie melody where the focus is on song), so to me it comes off as “here’s a party! and here’s the football game!” the song “freddy the freshman” makes for a VERY catchy underscore (as carl stalling would assert by using it in a number of cartoons), and there were some fun visuals like the horse untangling his legs while dancing, and the entire end scene with freddy scoring the touchdown. the biggest complaint i have is the scene with the jewish crows and the gay rooster—it’s very stereotypical and breaks up the flow of the plot completely. thankfully, the whole cartoon isn’t ruined by it. it’s only a 10 second thing, but it still needs to be addressed.

overall, this cartoon was pretty barebones, there have certainly been better merrie melodies. but the visuals are fun and the gags are absurd (i love that there’s an entire lake in the middle of the field), so i’d give it a leisurely watch.

[tassium]

#TAYLOR SWIFT APPRECIATION LIFE

PART 3 - Speak Now

(part 1, part 2)

Hello and again, welcome to the Taylor Swift Appreciation Life. We hope your brief detention in the relaxation vault-- wait, wrong fandom.

This is probably getting posted in the middle of the night, which doesn’t bode well for anyone actually seeing it, but oh well. It’s time to hop in and see a little more from the amazing @taylorswift by taking the ride through her third album, Speak Now.

1. Mine

I really like this track, but I don’t have a whole lot to say about it. The storytelling in the lyrics is probably my favorite thing about it, and the way the instrumentation propels the song along. And.... I’ve heard varying opinions on the way it turns around and she’s “quoting” the love interest of the story. Personally, I like it. I like thinking of it as if he said that and it’s what inspired her to use the line as such a key part of the song.

And I’ve gotta be honest here, the POP mix bonus track version doesn’t really hit me that hard. I can’t pick out enough of a difference between the two that I really care all that much about that version.

2. Sparks Fly

This is one of my favorite tracks on this album. I like the understated instrumentation behind the verses and the way it just drops into the chorus in a way that feels like going over the first rise on a roller coaster - the way there’s nothing behind her voice for “Drop everything now” feels like that moment where you know it’s coming and you kind of pull in a breath and then you’re irrevocably In The Moment. 

She does a lot of really cool vocal things - in the second verse I love the way she does that warble on “really wish you wo-ould”. Another favorite is the vocalization in the background of the last chorus. Instrumentally speaking, the solo before the bridge is one of my favorites because of how it’s just a little different from the main motif of the song, and I adore the strident guitar and drums behind the bridge itself.

This song also has the first of several mentions throughout her songs of green eyes! Same, Taylor, same.

3. Back to December

I’m just gonna jump ahead and talk about the acoustic version of this song that’s on the target deluxe version, because if given the choice, I’d pick that one to listen to any day. The strings are my favorite part of the original version, and so the fact that the acoustic version lets them shine just that much more is excellent in my opinion. I also like the way that the harmonies stand out a little bit more - usually I prefer the ones where it’s Taylor overdubbing her own harmonies, but in this one I really like how it sounds with that male voice in the background - it actually makes me think that this song has a lot of potential for being made into a duet song with that delicious aching kind of mutual regret feeling.

4. Speak Now

I don’t know about anyone else, but I really like this song. There’s a lot of really smart choices made, both vocally and in the instrumentals (like the way the drums don’t drop in until the second half of the first verse) and overall I think it’s a solid track.

Over the course of relistening to this early work of Taylor’s for these reviews, though, I’ve also had a thought - Speak Now is the culmination of an escalating pattern of Standing Up And Stealing Other Girls’ Guys that’s been going on through both of the other albums. You have Teardrops on my Guitar, where she just pines herself into oblivion over the boy - then you have You Belong With Me, where she actually does something about it, and now we have this, where she literally breaks up an engagement IN THE MIDDLE OF THE WEDDING in order to get her chance at the boy she’s been daydreaming about.

5. Dear John

Easily my favorite track on this album. This is an optimal example of Taylor’s ability to take a song and build it up until it just explodes, even beyond the chorus. The way the song just soars in the bridge, complete with the way her voice just goes a little ragged on "burned them out”.... man. I love it. I love it so much. Another of my favorite moments is when the harmonies slide in with “run as fast as you can” as if that’s the ‘they’ who said that to her.

I think Taylor’s voice really shines in this track in a way that was really foreshadowing of her current vocal talents.

I’ll also never be over the fact that John Mayer claimed this song for being about him. He could have just been like ‘oh yeah I dunno, a dear john letter is a breakup letter right’ but no. He brought it down on himself. “You should’ve known.”

6. Mean

Mean is a jam, and I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise. I’ll bop to this song anytime. I love the bending fiddle between the chorus and the second verse, probably my favorite musical choice in the song overall. The mandolin and the banjo are way up there as well, just in general. There’s something so delightfully vindictive about this track, such a clap back at the haters - and I get Taylor singing her own harmonies, which you already know I love to pieces. (Is it just me, or could Mean be the little sister of Calm Down?)

“Someday, I’ll be, singing this at the grammy’s…. and all you’re gonna be is mean”

7. The Story of Us

THE STORY OF US IS A BANGER, END OF DISCUSSION

…..

ok not really, because I have more feelings to express first.

Taylor’s vocals soar at the end of this track, and I honestly cannot get over the sheer improvement from Fearless to Speak Now when it comes to that. Those belted notes give me life. I love the ‘next chapter’ and ‘the end’ spoken lines, they’re the best for when I’m singing along and dancing around my kitchen. This song is nearer and dearer to my heart than I even realized coming into this review, and I will go to bat for it anytime anyplace any day.

8. Never Grow Up

It sure is a song, alright. It’s a pretty arrangement, and I like the harmonies, but I... don’t have much for strong feelings about this one.

9. Enchanted

Mmmmm, this one’s so pretty. The opening, I love whatever that is in the background, maybe it’s a keyboard? It’s beautiful and ethereal, at any rate, and I love it. The track builds so beautifully to an absolute monster of a chorus - the lead guitar up into that drum hit is a classic and I love it to pieces.

And don’t even get me started on the ending “please don’t be....” etc bit and the use of stereo - listening to this track in headphones is a treat and I love the high in one side and low in the other, accompanied by that soft vocalizing centralized that leads into the belting before we hit another chorus.

It wasn’t until I was listening to this song to write this post up that I noticed that if you really focus you can hear her singing that repetition behind the second half of the last chorus, but I think it’s only on the left. It’s a really nice touch.

10. Better Than Revenge

I’m just gonna go ahead and quote you a conversation my friend @defiantlywhole had about this track to explain my feelings:

Me:  listen. listen. i fully agree with "Better than revenge? we don't know her" but. it's such a banger. i hate it. i love it. why 

Her:  SAME! Dude esp with the whole sb-squared issue. If we could just. Recognize that better than revenge is problematic and love her anyway?? Can you imagine the kind of cool shit the fandom coulda churned out last month? I just want graphics that yell THERE IS NOTHING I DO BETTER THAN REVENGE at them for trying to force Taylor to stay and then punishing her for leaving

So if you wanna know my opinions, there you go. there they are. 

Also i’m never going to be able to unhear “she’s full of springs and she’s not what you think, she’s a mattress” from @stateofswiftpod​ (have you gotten the message to listen to their podcast yet? this is the last of her main albums they’ve talked about so. now’s the time.)

11. Innocent

This isn’t a track I seek out to listen to, like, ever... but it’s a pretty piece of music, and her voice is lovely. Honestly, there’s something about it that just makes me sad, which is probably why I don’t seek it out. Listening to it to write this, thought, I am noticing a lot of things about it that I’d forgotten or maybe not even noticed in the first place - like the haunting background vocalizations that I’d missed previously, and the choices in the instrumentals. There something about this song that just feels heavy, if that makes sense. It just sits right on my chest, and I’m not sure if I like it.

12. Haunted

Speaking of liking acoustic versions of songs better, this is definitely one of them. Don’t get me wrong, I love the original version, but...The piano just hits so much harder for some reason than anything about the original manages, and her vocal delivery is so aching and beautiful and just. Shivers, every time.

The backing vocals come across as very dark, almost, fittingly so to go with a song with the topic and title this one has. Her soaring vocalization in the bridge, and the way her voice breaks when she drops into the low note... man, I can’t even. I don’t have words for what this acoustic track does to me. The note after the last chorus is what gets me the most thought, the almost mourning wavering she sneaks into it and just... I love this song, okay.

13. Last Kiss

This track is so beautiful, but speaking of songs that make me sad. Good heavens. I hadn’t listened to this one in a while prior to this listen through the album and it hit me so hard. Legitimate tears.

I can’t even put it into words - this song is a masterpiece of emotion.

14. Long Live

This song also makes me cry, but for entirely different reasons. Somehow it has even more of an impact now, after seeing everything that’s happened for her and after having been privileged enough to see her live with one of my best friends. This song takes that weight still hanging on my chest from the last few tracks and pushes it aside, replaces it with a bursting pride for this woman who I’ve never met and probably never will. She’s done so well.

To be more specific - there’s some incredible guitar work on this song, and I adore the “THIS IS ABSURD” part - and “tell them how I hope they shine” will always make me cry. I love that she wrote this song, and I love that things have only kept going. That belted “fall” at the end of that post-chorus or whatever it is that then also fades and falls away. The ethereal Aaahs in the background of the bridge. The way she leans into the last “all the mountains we moved”. Gosh. It’s all too much.

Proper full bonus track time!

15. Ours

This is definitely my favorite of the bonus tracks. I’m a little sad it got relegated to a bonus track, since there’s definitely songs that I’d cut in favor of letting this one onto the list, but I’m just glad we have it in the first place.

I’m extremely fond of this song - it’s connected to playing music with my dad (who bought me my first guitar - well, him and my mom both) because we’ve teamed up to do this song, and so that gives me all kinds of happy feelings when I listen to this one.

I don’t have much for specific comments on this one, but it’s a Good.

16. If This Was a Movie

I love the guitar opening for this song, it’s on my list of songs to learn to play one of these days. The first few times I heard the song, I definitely didn’t hear “to me-e like” properly, but now that I know what it’s supposed to be, I don’t struggle too much, thankfully. Overall, I like the song - there are things about it that I’m not super fond of, but there are more things that I do like (the drop after the bridge is definitely one of them).

17. Superman

This one’s a bop. She’s a cute little number. Optimal dancing around my room (a la the you belong with me video) material. I won’t say this track is any work of genius or anything, but it’s a solid danceable pop song, and sometimes that’s all you need.

Whew! We’ve done it again. It’s 3am where I am at the time of writing this, so I’m going to go to bed now, but tomorrow we’ll start our transition into New Taylor. I don’t know about you, but I’m excited.

Next up: Red

[musicmixtapes]

August 15th, 2018 Mix

Happy Thursday! I hope you enjoy this mix, I had a lot of fun curating a wide variety of songs that span over several different genres. Spotify Mix 1. Changes by Langhorne Slim - This songs moving acoustic sound and light hearted sound really correlates with the meaning behind it, the flowing feeling of life changing and the confusion of stepping into a new phase of life and being in the dark, but being ready for it at the same time. I think that this song really emotes the way that people grow apart during important shifts in life and how there is both beauty and sadness in this, it can be viewed as both because it represents growth and maturity. 2. Peach Scone by Hobo Johnson - Quite possibly the weirdest mix of musical genres in a song that is very strange but so much fun to listen to and very easy to sing along to also. Johnson combined a conversational spoken poetry and letter style message to someone he is in love with unrequitedly and adds a really cool guitar rhythm and beat to the back to turn it to a funny song. It makes you think about a first love or crush that you've had and for some reason can't let go of. I definitely never thought I would be into a song like this but the easy going vibe to it and the reoccurrence of the "maybe it's the thought of not being so alone" adds such a powerful to the center of the song. 3. The Record Player Song by Daisy the Great - The harmonies in this song immediately attracted me to this niche little artsy indie song that describes the ways that girls with a certain aesthetic try to portray themselves as being elusive and musically inclined, but in all reality are just misunderstood and a little self centered who don't really understand themselves. I think its so important that there is a song that pretty much outlines the "manic pixie dream girl" trope while validating that there is an issue with categorizing girls into one big lump even though they too are confused with their identity. 4. I Can't Tell What The Time Is Telling Me by And The Kids - I was so surprised to discover this perfect blend of rock and pop and that it was a sound that wasn't overplayed at all, mostly because, well, this band is pretty low key on the alternative rock scene. The musicians' proficiency is equivalent to the song's meaning which is always really cool to see with young bands. The essence of the song combines a person searching for deeper meaning with the current generation and the problems that lie within it concerning poverty and the epidemic sweeping the country; but it also talks about caring about someone while being unsure if they reciprocate feelings, smaller topics embedded within a bigger issue. 5. Bad Girls by M.I.A - This was a fun choice for me because I am in love with the show "The Mindy Project" and this song reoccurs in several of the episode when the main character, Mindy, is going to work and doing something that exemplifies strong female power, which we always love to see. I think that MIA the artist always adds a badass female persona to her music and opens up the possibility that not just male hip hop artists can be badass and have that gangsta style in their music. The beat along with the synth sounds is really catchy and great to pump up a night or a morning workout. 6. Art School Wannabe by Sorority Noise - I think the title basically sums up what the song is all about: basically the trope of having a tortured artist life and having to realize that maybe suffering doesn't always have to occur as much as artists think it needs to in order to create "good" art. I like the fact that a post punk garage rock band can laugh at their own perceived artist persona and that maybe life is a combination of highs and lows and the happiness can be portrayed within music too and can make enjoyable content as well. From a review of the song, a critic compared the song to the expression, "You can wear black on the outside and still be happy on the inside" which describes it quite well. 7. Hannah Hunt (cover) by I'm With Her - I am pretty sure I included the original song by Vampire Weekend in a past music mixtape, but my mom played this version in the car one day last week and I completely fell for this one. Something about the female take on this male to female love song made me think of it in a completely new light and the use of the mandolin and violin as well as the acoustic guitar completely transformed the song from a "feels" indie slow song to a folky indie song that breathes new life into it. The mandolin solo in the middle of the song combined with the violin solo made me feel l was kind of in the middle of an empty field listening to it. 8. This Is The Last Time by The National - Completely not acoustic or uplifting, in comparison this song is all about something ending and not wanting it to, but knowing it needs to because it is unhealthy and addictive. The National has come to my attention more and more recently because of their ability to include so many pieces of a band and make such simple sound at the same time, with such precise musical technicality. Berninger is such a proficient songwriter and is able to put a name and metaphor to feelings about relationships that us mere mortals are not always able to do. I think it's interesting that he has said in the past that he is very influenced by the writings of great poet Walt Whitman, as his influence is very clear in The National's song lyrics. 9. Table For One by AWOLNATION - This song comes from AWOLNATION's most recent album that was released a few months ago called "Here Come The Runts" which includes a lot of rock heavy ballads with very different storylines all centering around feeling like the smallest person in a group and being an underdog all the time, which I think is very relatable to a large demographic. I liked this song in particular because of the large swell of the chorus and it's sound shift in comparison to the very chill verses. The song's meaning is not that hard to understand from just listening to it once or twice, being that a summer love occurred and now one half of the equation is done with it, leaving the speaker at a "table for one". 10. Lady Grinning Soul by David Bowie - This romantically styled piano ballad is the last track off of Bowie's iconic album from his persona's Aladdin Sane perspective, which is a lot of people's favorite and has since then turned into kind of a cult classic in terms of music. The title, of all things, perplexed me the most and upon further inspection I discovered that a "lady grinning soul" refers to the feminine characteristics of a man's persona, which is so modern and ground breaking, especially for 1973 when this song was released. Bowie often talks about having a fantastical and idealized romantic obsession with people which didn't always pan out to be releastic, which totally correlates to the eclectic sounds of his music. 11. The Little Things That Give You Away by U2 - Taken from a commenter on Genius Lyrics this song is about: "Bono surviving an accident; a car accident it seems. He’s leaving clues all along the album about “a near death experience” that he has stated having no much long ago." This made me definitely think about the song in a different light and added much more depth to it for me. It has a classic U2 original sound that only the voice of Bono can give to a song, especially the deep writing that is focused in on a specific experience but can translate to much bigger world issues at hand, in this instance, communication and the trouble with people not being able to speak to each other normally. 12. Smoke Signals by Phoebe Bridgers - I could totally see this song being written as a poem first, being primarily that it follows like a storyline entirely and tells about a person reaching out constantly to the speaker in several ways in metaphor of a smoke signal on a beach. Bridgers voice is so soft and beautiful and makes you lean into the meaning of the song and listen carefully to every word there. I'd also like to point out the main use just of the bass guitar, a very quite additional guitar and the swell of string group that swells during the chorus which adds a very cinematic experience to the listener. She later revealed in an interview that this song was written to an ex lover and about their relationship and the complexities of it which is very heartfelt and personal. 13. Wes Anderson by Alex Lahey - Titled as the iconic director of our time who comes out with quirky adventure and life stories, Lahey created her one Andersonian love story within this song and brings us through a journey of her own with someone and the small things that one does with a lover can be the most special just because it's with that person who is held to such a high importance in our live's at the time. This song is just very simply written and laid out, not having to figure out that much to enjoy it because it's clear and concise about being a love song and it doesn't need to do anything more than that to be good and appreciated. 14. Big Sis by SALES - Very much reminded me of the beginning of Sonia Richardson's "Ruin Your Night" except instead of swelling and becoming a rock song, it was content with remaining a bedroom pop/dream pop style of song which I really liked hearing. I think the meaning behind the song can head in a few different directions but I heard it as being with someone who isn't content with themselves because they are trying too hard to be like someone else, most like their "big sis" which is well understood due to the repetition of that line which is pretty crucial to the song. But I think that the minimalistic style of song that is becoming popular in the indie world is really likeable. 15. Gap in the Clouds by Yellow Days - A singer and bedroom producer, artist Yellow Days came out with this song when he was only seventeen years old which is in itself impressive, but the fact that the music is so soulful and vintage sounding made me appreciate his youth behind the song even more. The artist explained about the song that, "It's about being in a depressed state for so long that your sky is full of clouds, but then that special someone makes a gap in those clouds and they can light up your world again" which is so beautifully put because it definitely describes love's ability to influence such a diverse range of music, even from someone with so little years on the earth. 16. Two Slow Dancers by Mitski - This track was released just a few days ago and I was so excited about more new music from Mitski, an amazing artist who is coming more and more popular on the alternative scene, having toured with Lorde on and off throughout the past year and doing shows on her own as well. This song lives and breathes nostalgia and the feeling of being young and slow dancing in a school gymnasium and wanting to recreate that feeling with a new love no matter what age you are. The feeling of being the only people in the whole world while in a dinghy school dance is so special, and as older people trying to stay the same is so difficult and sad. Needless to say, Mitski got it perfect. 17. 4am by girl in red - If a song were to correlate to anxiety and the overwhelming feelings one gets while trying to fall asleep, this would surely be that song because it's exactly what it is. Another great example of a young artist who is breaking onto the bedroom indie pop scene, girl in red describes how the feeling of thinking too much can cloud judgment and create this bedtime hysteria and creating an insomnia nightmare in such a short song. Songs like this are so good to listen to in order to gain the insight that music doesn't need to be seven minutes long to give a deep meaning into someone's emotions and thoughts. 18. Feeling Whitney by Post Malone - I'm not going to lie, when my little brother first put this song on in the car, I did not expect much from it because of his pension for heavy rap music that breaks the bass stereo system, but I was completely taken aback and completely shameful at my snap judgment just because of the artist that had created this song. Malone's completely unabashed story of his drug addiction and the struggle to try to find good influences who could help him get through a hard time in his life tugged at my heart strings so hard. The really interesting chord progressions totally impressed me along with his super folk inspired voice which rivals sounds that come from The Lumineers and Mumford and Sons. I would like to hear more of this from him for sure. 19. Someone Great by LCD Soundsystem - At first, I was convinced this song was about losing someone that the speaker was in love with but didn't appreciate fully and now wasn't able to talk to. In fact, it definitely could be perceived as a multifaceted song in terms of meaning, pertaining to losing someone and how everything that happens in life is colored gray by the loss of that person because it can't be shared with that person anymore. Upon research and reading I found out that this is actually about the death of James Murphy's therapist of all people, and then all of the details of the song really clicked into place for me and reached new levels of love for this track. I think it's so important to write about losing people that aren't just family members or loved ones, maybe just people you grow to care for platonically or professionally. 20. Los Ageless by St. Vincent - I have featured St. Vincent many times on my mixes by now because she deserves that and more at all times in her musical career. I believe that she has released this track as a single recently, as I have heard it a couple times on the radio recently and it has become one of my favorite car bops to dance in my seat to and then realize that the person in the car next to me is looking at me singing and dancing in the car. But although it is very much a dance electronic song, it still goes to the regular depths of meaning that all of St. Vincent's songs have, as it's about the complete juxtaposition from her other favorite city to talk about (New York). The you in the song can refer to losing a lover, a friend, a place, youth, fame, money, etc... I love this because the interpretation is left up to the listener. Thanks for tuning in, see you next week! Julia 

[ethangourlay]

Picasso and Bennet

Compare and contrast: Picasso and Bennett

In this essay I have chosen to consider two, I think completely different, artists that I like and admire for different reasons, Pablo Picasso, founder of Cubism and a more contemporary American artist Stephen Bennett.  Bennett is a commercial portrait painter.  Bennett uses bright colours to capture images of mostly native people from southern hemisphere countries and islands.  

 I will consider here the two artists and the contrasting approaches they took.  I will outline what I think they are trying to say in their work, consider any similarities and highlight where there are key differences.  

Picasso was talented in different mediums.  He was a sculptor as well as a painter.  And he was also a print-maker.  He was born on October 25th, 1881 in Malaga, Spain.  His father taught him to draw and paint as a child.  By the time he was 13 his skills surprised his father. At school Picasso doodled in his books (as did the next artist Stephen Bennett that I will compare him to).  In 1895 Picasso was in Barcelona and applied to join the school of fine arts.  Although he was too young (14) he got a place because of the skill he showed at the entrance exam.  He started to skip classes though to sketch the streets of Barcelona.  

Picasso produced thousands of pieces of art during his life and influenced many other artists.  He produced art in many styles before and after his Cubist period.   His style moved from realistic in the early period of his life to more abstract. He went through different styles during his career from his Blue Period, Rose Period and his African period due to the look and influences of his art before he moved into the Cubist period.   Interestingly in the African period Picasso was influenced by African indigenous tribal masks.  Later I will outline the influence of native art and indigenous culture on Bennett.

Cubism was an avant-garde art movement developed around 1907-08.  It started with Picasso’s Demoiselles D’Avignon.  A couple of the faces in the painting reflect this African mask look. Picasso was incredibly innovative and was responsible for co-founding the Cubist movement alongside Georges Braque. Some say the term was coined in 1908, when the French art critic Louis Vauxcelles saw Georges Braque’s landscapes.

The subject and objects in Cubism are broken up into pieces and re-arranged on the canvas however the artist wants to place them.  This gives the painting an abstract form.  An example of this is ‘Girl with a Mandolin’ (1910).  One of the main characteristics of cubism are that it has images of an object represented from different angles on the canvas at the same time. It is like you can see the back and front of an object at the same time. Cubism then brings the different views of objects or figures together.  This approach means that paintings can appear fragmented and abstracted.  Picasso aimed to show different viewpoints within the same space.  This would suggest their three-dimensional form. In doing this the Cubists emphasized the two-dimensional flatness of the canvas instead of doing what other artists had been trying to do which was to give the objects in a painting the illusion of depth.  So, in some images a woman’s face might look like both eyes are on one side of a face! A head’, said Picasso, ‘is a matter of eyes, nose, mouth, which can be distributed in any way you like’.

Cubism was partly influenced by the late work of artist Paul Cézanne in which he could be seen to be introducing the concept in painting things from slightly different points of view.  And this art style stimulated other art styles.  Picasso and Cubism inspired other styles like Futurism, Dada, and Constructivism in other countries and he continues to inspire artists.  (Like me.)

Stephen Bennett is an American portrait painter.  He was born in New York in 1961.  He studied first at community college and then he went on to Fine Art at the State University of New York at New Paltz. From an early age, Bennett, like Picasso, constantly sketched the faces of his family, friends and people he encountered. During his college days in New York, Bennett focused on painting classes and studied the theory of colour.  He has however always been focused on portraiture unlike Picasso who moved from one style to another frequently.  

Before seeing his work I had painted a portrait of Chance the Rapper and when I saw Bennett’s work I could see some similarities in the way he used colour and the way I liked bright colour in my paintings.  Bennett is a colourist .  His portraits are in some ways an extension of the kinds of colour-filled portraits painted by artists like Van Gogh and Gauguin, who had also influenced Picasso, or slightly later the works of the French Fauves.

Bennett paints in great detail with fine brush strokes. This is completely different from Picasso who daubs paint and uses large brush strokes on many of his painting, in contrast to Bennett.  

Bennett seeks out local people in developing countries to capture their faces.  He shows some of their ritual jewellery and traditional clothes.  Bennett’s portraits are mainly of people who live on various communities, continents, and small islands in the southern hemisphere.  He paints large colourful paintings, some as big as 2.2 x 1.5 m. He says he wants to celebrate the world’s diversity through realism using bright colour.  He observes people and he can bring out the beauty of a face by his play with colour. His aim is to work through until he captures 1000 portraits to reflect the diversity of these people.  

Bennett, like Picasso before him, wants to promote peace. Picasso made political points though his paintings in Paris during the German occupation and in his portrayal of the horrors of Guernica.  Bennett advocates tolerance through an art education and cultural exchange across the World.   He founded Faces of the World, a non-profit corporation with a mission of “increasing cultural pride and affirming the importance of indigenous cultures who have been the true guardians of planet earth.” Money from the sale of his paintings of these indigenous people supports this foundation.

The styles of each artist are in sharp contrast. Where Picasso’s portraits like “The Accordionist” in Cubist style is abstract and fragmented the portraits of Bennett are bright with faces mostly front facing on flat planes but with realist detail.  Picasso wanted to emphasize the difference between a painting and reality whereas Bennett seems to want to enhance reality by his detailed painting and use of colour.

Picasso moved through different styles, or periods, in his life, including Cubism, but Bennett is much more singular in his art style of portraits.  People are invited to hire him for private portrait commissions of children, adults and family groups. A client can work with him choosing the style, size and colouring of a portrait.  While Picasso was influenced by and collaborated with other artists, this is something that an expressive, experimental artist like Picasso did not do. Bennett adopts a modern approach where people sell their work and offer more customised packages through websites, instagram and other social media outlets.  

To conclude, based on everything I have looked at, Picasso’s Cubist work and Bennett’s colourful paintings,  we can begin to discuss the quality of the art work. I chose Bennett as he has more than impressed me with the hyper realist paintings that almost make me believe that these painting could be passed off as a photographic image. The detail in the wrinkles and so forth is amazing and catches my eyes constantly. Obviously the two artist have completely different styles but I’m stunned at the authenticity of his work. Picasso clearly took another approach to most of his work, his cubist pieces especially.  One point to the cubism work, is the lack of detail, the abstract quality that entices the viewer. The cubism approach creates a form or even an indication of something special. It’s almost like a jigsaw or a puzzle where you are trying to piece all the parts together. I feel this also is a certain aspect to the work that Bennett loses when painting detail. In conclusion to detail ii would say I enjoy looking at bennets work a little more as I feel you can relate to the portraits a lot more, the characters of a painting now become human as the amount of detail involved.

Colour, colour is the number one priority in work, in my opinion. The colour for a piece will obviously depend on the composition of the work, clearly I’m a sucker for brightly coloured paintings, but the colours used in Bennets portraits are mesmerising, the vibratility of the colours exploding off of the work. It creates a sense of happiness or even pride. The problem is, that colour is completely dependent on the composition. As bright colourful paints clearly work for Bennets portraits, whereas the dull creams and black and whites also work for Picassos more geometric cubist work.

So, after everything I have researched my opinion is strong. I believe Picasso is one if not the most successful artist of all time, but Bennets work is much more ascetically pleasing to the eye than Picassos cubist work. Huge respect to both of them.

 Picasso

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/c/cubism

https://mymodernmet.com/what-is-cubism-art/

http://www.pablopicasso.net/cubist-period/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubism

https://www.theartstory.org/movement/cubism/

https://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/themes/cubism/

https://www.pablopicasso.org/cubism.jsp

 Bennett

https://theportraitpainter.com/web/stephen_bennett/biography.htm

https://stephenbennett.us/

https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/1-stephen-bennett?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIx_D7lP_m7wIVBfuyCh2m4wqqEAMYASAAEgJXFfD_BwE

https://www.artistsnetwork.com/art-mediums/acrylic/acrylic-stephen-bennett-risk-reward/

[gigsoupmusic]

Exclusive GIGsoup Interview: Mikey Mike

On Friday 20th September L.A based singer/ songwriter Mikey Mike met with Gigsoup backstage at his sold out show in London. On the third date of his European tour, fans flooded eagerly into the ‘The Waiting Room’ as the interview commenced. The ‘Doin` Me’ singer had a calm composure as he sipped whiskey from the bottle and nodded his head to the music that bellowed from the other room. His debut album ‘Life On Earth’ was released merely weeks before the tour and received a huge amount of praise from fans worldwide. Mikey Mike is known for his diverse genre splicing which was reflected in the mixed crowd that attended. He was charismatic and genuine during the preparation for the interview and conducted himself almost as though he’d sold out shows in London on numerous occasions.  He gave a full hearted answer to each question and one thing that he circled back to a lot was his gratuity toward his fans and the support that they showed. It’s safe to say that Mikey Mike reciprocates the passion his listeners offer him, which is shown in the interview below. Life on earth volume 1 was diverse in genre, is that a testament to the time it took to create, or is the diversity something that’ll be frequent in your music? Yeah, I definitely think it will be frequent; it’s one of those things where I’ve grown up loving so many different types of music. I had pockets where Id only listen to Nirvana and Led Zeppelin, and then I got sick of that and only listened to rap. So I genuinely fell in love with every genre and when I started making music it didn’t feel right to do any of them, I think I took little pieces of all of it. Also, part of it was the amount of time cause it was probably five years ago that I started, and just to get a platform where I could put it out and get people to hear it, we had to wait this long. So naturally in five years the music changed so much, you know, it changes week to week but in five years even more so. A little of it, from what I hear is... it’s almost un-cohesive but not in a bad way. I think my voice, even if it’s a different genre and such, my voice or my spirit kind of pulls that together. So yeah, it never started purposely, just naturally, but it’s definitely something important. There’s even times where I really like something but it all sounds the same colour, the same mix and everything, you can listen to those songs five times and it isn’t any different from the other so I do like bouncing around with it. You say that the album’ Life On Earth’ is a genuine perception of your life on earth and you break that down track by track. Yeah, you have all kinds of different trips in life, sometimes you’re in a more spiritual place and sometimes you go in a more physical or nasty place and the album hopefully goes through that trip. What city has been your favourite so far on this tour? We’ve only done Germany and Sweden, so I’m going to go with Germany because we had a great show. Sweden was tough because I don’t think we have a big market there in terms of people that know the music. In Germany we had people singing all the tunes and – I knew some people there that have been fans. Like, the girl I stayed with, she had covered ‘Doin Me’ on a mandolin two years ago, so when we said we were coming she said ‘oh, you can stay at my place’. So it was cool, it was special in that way that you get to meet these people that have been touched by the music, and then you become friends with them, you know? Like this girl, I lost her cat, I left the window open, the cat escaped and then we were up until 5:00Am looking for the cat, you know, it was crazy. As an artist there must have been times that you felt like quitting, what stopped you? Stopped me from quitting? I think the main reason was that I loved it, the only reason I think I’d have had to quit would have been to make money some other way instead, but somehow I always had these little feelings – anytime I was about to run out of money it was like a gift from God where some cheque from music came in and kept it going. Other than that there’s been no thought about stopping, because I don’t know what else I would do you know? Cause if someone was like ‘you can have lunch at twelve’ I’d be like, ‘I’m not even f*****g hungry man!’ it’d be crazy to have to go back to that. I’m blessed that I get to do this. Ever since I was little I had a belief, there’s always been a little pit, kind of in my stomach that was like ‘I f*****g know I can do this’ and so, I just ran with that. So does that kind of work as advice to someone who’s trying to do what you’re doing too? Yeah I don’t think there’s a grey area, if you want to do it, you’re going to do it and if you don’t give a s**t or you’re half way or quarter the way, you’re not going to do it. You’re either going to do it or not. What was it like to work with Rick Rubin? It was really interesting before I went to his house, I remember reading interviews about Eminem, he was saying that the first time he met Rick; he was sick to his stomach and so nervous. I was like ‘it’s f*****g Eminem and he’s played for a hundred thousand people and this guy was nervous to meet him? I’m gonna take a s**t on his floor in there!’ And then I got up there and I was a little nervous just because he’s one of my heroes in music, and I knew he was the one guy that if I could get my music to, he’d understand the diversity and all that part of it, so, I always wanted to meet him for that reason. I remember knocking on the door and he answered, he was just there f*****g barefoot, he was like ‘oh hey man, what’s going on?’ and I was like ‘Hey, how you doing?’ Immediately all the nerves disappeared because he was so cool, he’s just like the guy you see in all the interviews, there’s no judgement or anything he’s just a person that’s really there, so it was amazing, it was a dream come true. The beauty for me was, at the time I was on the ninety-eight percent line of believing in myself as an artist, not as a producer. But when I played him my music and he goes – ‘you got this, you’re going to do something special, you can do this’ then I was like ‘I have no question, I don’t need any other kind of validation from anybody, I could have the whole world hate it but I like it and Rick likes it, so I’m gonna go f*****g play.’ That was the most powerful part for me, I had ninety-eight percent confidence and when I left I had no questions, Rick Rubin is with me, like, who else do you need in music to believe in you? You toured with Yelawolf in the past; will there be a feature with him sometime? Possibly, possibly, I haven’t talked to him in a while but he took me out on that tour, which I appreciate so much, and he was the man and he was awesome, he was great to us. But he’s kind of got his path, hopefully, sometime down the line. We talked at one point about it but, we’ll see if we can do something cool. How will volume two vary from volume one? I think probably the way I use my voice, I’m probably signing more, and speaking and rapping in pockets. I just find myself with a guitar and I always end up coming out with more melodies, so I’d say maybe more singing but I do want to keep the speaking and the rapping because it keeps it kind of interesting. But I don’t know, some of it is very raw, it’s very much things from my life. Were you shocked by the reception you received in Europe? Yeah, the London thing when they said it had sold out, in about five days or something, we couldn’t believe it, especially when the add came out because it was in Germany, I think it came here a little bit but it didn’t run nearly as long. So I thought if anything, if anywhere would sell out, it was going to be Germany, but it literally came back, like, there’s no mistake it has sold out. So that was like, holy s**t, there’s people here that know it and, it was weird. It was also weird because I didn’t ever get a tonne of messages from people in London saying they loved the music and so on that I remember, but I’d get a lot from Germany so when the tickets went up I just assumed if anything did really well it’d be that. It did good, but here sold out, so I was very surprised. It must be crazy to be making music in L.A, and there’s people overseas loving your music? I mean, I don’t know if I could sell these many tickets in L.A, maybe I could, maybe I couldn’t but it’s crazy to think across the pond, it happened. If you make music that resonates with people, they’ll find you. Yeah I believe that, and it was even amazing that the girl playing right now, her manager, he came down when we were doing sound check, I didn’t know if he was somebody from the distribution company we work with. They told me that he manages the girl that is playing and he happened to be a huge fan of the music and he couldn’t believe it, he was like ‘wow, that’s who we’re opening for?’ which was amazing because it’s just one of the moments that you realise that there’s so many people here that know what you’re doing and you have no idea. Just one random guy happens to manage the artist and it’s weird, it’s trippy you know? Especially people that have come from hours away, it’s so humbling. They’re like ‘thanks for coming’ and I say ‘no, thank you for coming! It’s been so cool. What kind of influence do you think this tour will have on your writing? If it isn’t too early to tell? No, I think I already know, it’s that, I think for me knowing that people from across the world are listening and you had no idea they even exist, it puts that much more power and responsibility in your hands. So even on those days where I’m really f*****g hung-over and just want to sleep, you have to pick up that f*****g guitar and go out there, cause there’s a lot of people listening and you may not even see them, but they’re there. You know, I’d say that that’s the biggest take-away for me. I literally flew eleven hours across the damn world and there’s people there that know it and love it, so yeah, I’ll take that. To a lot of people, your music makes a difference. It’s humbling to me, when people hear it and tell me that it helped them get through a bad time or did whatever, it changes everything. ‘Doing me’ helps a lot of people. Yeah, it’s a hard one to top in a way, it speaks to so many people in a good way and I’m proud of that. It’s funny that it’s that simple too, if you say it in the right way and you say it with conviction people go ‘F***k!’ It’s such a simple phrase just ‘f***k what they say, I’m doing me’ if somebody just said that walking down the street you wouldn’t think nothing of it. It seems obvious but when it comes together in a certain way, it seems to do something, it’s crazy. That’s the last of the questions. Thank you so much, I had a great time.

The Interview. The show: Only a short while after the interview Mikey Mike leisurely strolled through the middle of the crowd on his way toward the stage, stopping for pictures and greeting fans. The moment he stepped on stage the venue was overwhelmed with cheers and applause. People had travelled from far and wide over the UK to attend the show and they were not let down. Mikey Mike put on an electrifying performance which consisted of a lot of crowd interaction, he performed the entirety of his debut album and showcased an unreleased song titled ‘Amazon Prime’ a comedic song with a hip/hop infused with indie feel to it. The crowd screamed Mike’s lyrics back at him on all songs but particularly on tracks such as ‘Cooler’, ‘Yasmin you will never hear this’ and of course ‘Doin` Me.’ After the show he stayed behind to sign posters, shirts and to pose for pictures. After that stayed in the bar upstairs to party with the fans who remained. At the end of the night, for fans that couldn’t get tickets due to the show selling out, he performed one more time outside in the streets of London in the early hours of the morning. Mikey Mike appreciates the support that he’s shown and strives to give it back tenfold. In the years that led up to the debut album there were many complications that slowed the release down. Now, with his first record out, a European tour behind him and the release of the second volume in his sights, he’ll have the ability to take his music to new heights. Given the interactions he has with his fans and the genius that goes into his creations, he’ll have no trouble selling out every show next tour, so be sure to keep a close watch on Mikey Mike, he’s a rising star, and Rick Rubin likes it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMo-TKhW5VY Read the full article

[ts1989fanatic]

Listen to Taylor Swift’s Red, One of the Best Pop Albums of Our Time

Though Taylor Swift’s decision to put her discography back on Spotify a week ago was—despite her protestations—an obvious attempt at further inflaming Katy Perry, it’s also a good enough reason as any to reexamine her discography. So it is now that I urge you to listen to her fourth album Red.

It’s hard now to think of Swift as something smaller and more humble than the highest, most gleaming lightning rod in a dark thunderous sky, but when Red was released in October 2012 she was mostly just a good ol’ pop star. She was not without controversy, of course (Kanye West’s interruption of her VMA acceptance speech happened in 2009), but still most of it was centered around which of her songs were about which of her famous ex-boyfriends, a scavenger hunt she openly encouraged via clues written into her albums’ liner notes. She was not yet a one-woman factory for conversations about feminism or race or gentrification, whose every move is treated with presidential-level scrutiny.

Red, in many respects, feels like the last pure Taylor Swift album we’ll ever get. It’s not just the last one before her career became consumed by the narratives that grow from it, but also the last one before she completely engineered her music for world domination. Nobody with a stake in the Taylor Swift business—which is a lot of people—would deem her most recent album 1989 to be anything other than a gigantic success, not when counting (the money derived from) three No. 1 singles, 1.2 million copies moved in its first week, and a sold-out worldwide tour. 1989 is still encoded with Swift’s DNA—top-shelf songwriting and her typically biting, often self-referential lyrics—but it presents a homogenized version of a pop star who once stood alone in an industry colored by the creation and pursuit of trends. 1989 pulls broadly from the history of pop music—”Shake It Off” nods at Motown girl groups, while a song like “All You Had to Do Was Stay” is pure Radio Disney—but it’s mostly infatuated, like so much pop of the time, with the ’80s. The country music of her early days was left a molted skin. Her much cooler friends Haim loomed large.

Speak Now—her third album, released in 2010—was similarly imperfect, though in the opposite way. Like 1989, Speak Now is a largely great album that contains several astounding songs. But it situates Swift in a place that feels inert, not expanding on the pop-country of her impeccable sophomore album Fearless as much as just playing it louder. Red, meanwhile, is the perfect midpoint between both records, staying true to her roots as a country traditionalist and singer-songwriter confessionalist, but also charting several exciting, new paths for her music.

The most obvious of those paths was the blatant, even danceable, pop that would bloom into its own album on 1989. Red’s lead single “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”—her first to be produced by Max Martin and his partner Shellback—loudly and clearly announced a new Swift, with a lilting chorus that’s shot into the stratosphere by pulsing keyboards and thunderous drums. (An alternate version sent to country radio, and since scrubbed from the internet, offered a salve to her core fanbase by threading instruments like banjos and mandolins into the mix.) Still, despite being her first No. 1, it’s one of Red’s more forgettable songs. Much better were “I Knew You Were Trouble.” and “22,” two later singles that were classified at the time as being inspired by the Skrillex-era understanding of the phrase “dubstep.” Listening back now, both just sound like songs where the bass enters prominently in the chorus, and the so-called “drops” are deployed with a purpose instead of simply as gimmicks. On “I Knew You Were Trouble.” the crashing bass echoes the feeling of being plunged to rock bottom, whereas on “22” it does the opposite, signifying the fleeting upward sweep of feeling young and invincible in the face of the oncoming doom of growing up. By contrast, something like “Shake It Off” feels purely kitschy. (“Red,” the title track, is perhaps the album’s best pop song since Swift flirts with Fleetwood Mac, but that’s an altogether different distinction.)

But the pop maneuvering on Red still feels almost like a bonus—experimentation that wasn’t screwed up. The meat of the record is songs that were smaller but more natural outgrowths of her previous albums. “State of Grace” and “Holy Ground” are the kind of stadium rock she explored on Speak Now through the filter of a band like Snow Patrol (whose singer Gary Lightbody contributed a song to the album), but more taut and purposeful. Both of those songs convey a reverence for the emotions brought on by a sudden crush—how you can look back and remember the energy of pumping adrenaline—and they’re thematically perfect musical compositions, unhurried as if to marinate on the moment but also fleetingly epic. Then there’s the actually epic “All Too Well,” which expands the skyscraping scope of her delicious John Mayer diss “Dear John” with a stunningly strong vocal performance, and one of the best lyrics of her career: “And you call me up again just to break me like a promise, so casually cruel in the name of being honest.” The slower, acoustic ballads—”Treacherous” and “Sad Beautiful Tragic”—are expertly constructed in a similar way, delicate, wistful songs about fragile emotions that feel like they might break if you tried to pick them up. (Join me in ignoring the collaborations with Ed Sheeran and Lightbody.)

Perhaps my favorite song, though, feels like one of the most minor. “Begin Again” ends the record in an almost whisper, with Swift singing gently over plucked guitar strings and sighing string accompaniments. Concluding an album about the thrill of being thrust into a relationship and then picking up the pieces after that relationship leaves you broken, Swift narrates the story of a first date—from looking at herself in the mirror at home, to walking into the cafe and having her date pull her chair out for her. It’s a song that contains everything wonderfully divisive about Swift—her normative views on relationships, her insecurities about coolness (“You said you never met one girl who had as many James Taylor records as you / But I do”), her belief that break-ups are almost always the other person’s fault—but is nonetheless funneled into a song that renders relationships in a way that is tangibly human, narrowing in on the small moments that define our interactions.

Despite her love for writing about relationships in the lineage of stories that stretch across centuries—Romeo and Juliet, Prince Charming and his white horse—this her legacy skill as a songwriter, and so there was no better way for her to end her best record. “We walked down the block to my car, and I almost brought him up,” she sings. “But you start to talk about the movies that your family watches every single Christmas / And I want to talk about that / And for the first time, the past is past.” So corny! And yet…

ts1989fanatic Another reason RED DESERVED A GRAMMY