#it would be wayyyy more niche than it was if it came out now

[fauxfroot]

just imagined the fucking buckwild moral purity bs that would exist around izaya if the drrr anime came out now and immediately wanted to commit arson omfg

he is introduced in the anime as talking a girl into jumping off a building. in the light novels he tells two girls they aren't "serious enough" about commiting suicide, drugs them, shoves them in some suitcases, and leaves them for celty to come pick up. like. he would be the character no one would be allowed to like without being called an abuser or someshit. and yet he was THE fan favorite back in the day. fucking wild. i love my trash asshole man so much, lets go back to that just being okay to enjoy in a character yeah??

[wickymicky]

wickymicky’s Top Ten Kpop Songs of 2020

4: Everglow - La Di Da

Retro concepts are hit or miss with me. I don’t have nostalgia for 80s music, for instance, because I was born in 1996 lol. And yet, as soon as the instrumental in this song got going and those synth hits came in right after the first line, I knew I was gonna love this. This song isn’t just a retro concept… its genre isn’t just “80s throwback”... it’s a genre called synthwave or neo retro wave or other names like that. It’s a relatively recent genre that, yes, is obviously based on 80s nostalgia, but is a new thing all its own. It’s based on the sound of action movies and science fiction movies from the 80s, but if you really look at stuff from that era, there wasn’t anything that quite sounds the same as synthwave from the 2010s. It has a lot in common with vaporwave in this way. Vaporwave is clearly retro inspired, but there wasn’t anything like vaporwave back then, lol. It’s a modern reimagining of retro aesthetics.

So like, as soon as it got going, as soon as I saw the visual aesthetic, I knew exactly what was happening and I was 100% on board. As far as I know, there weren’t any other kpop songs in this style, though Twice dabbled with some synthwave aesthetics and sounds for I Can’t Stop Me which came out around a month after this song (and that’s almost certainly a coincidence, I’m sure JYP picks these songs wayyyy in advance and it was probably chosen even before La Di Da came out), but La Di Da commits to this aesthetic and genre way harder than that song does. The thing that struck me the most on the day La Di Da came out, and still makes me lose my mind when I listen to the song now, is how authentic it is. Synthwave has had some mainstream acceptance and some songs in this vein have been released by some big artists recently I think, but for the most part it’s been kind of a niche underground genre. I first discovered it by stumbling on hour-long youtube videos that were “compilations” or “mixes” of various synthwave/retrowave songs or soundscapes found on soundcloud and sites like that. This song is a pretty hard commitment to a style of music that really does come just from the internet, and I think it’s amazing that the songwriters paid tribute to it in such a prominent way.

With that out of the way, let me talk about the song itself lol. Fuck, what a good chorus. I do have my complaints with it, but they’re relatively minor. First of all, though the line distribution in this song is marginally better than their previous title track, the chorus is still sung the exact same way all three times it plays in the song. Sihyeon begins it, Mia sings the second part, and that’s it. They’re great at it, but I would have appreciated a little more variety, at least for the second chorus, to break things up in the middle of the song. Also, I just think the word “haters” is pretty silly, there’s no way to say “I don’t care about haters” without sounding like you do really care about the haters. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be saying it lol. Anytime anyone’s like “Got no time for haters” I’m just like “wow the haters must really get to you, huh?” But anyway, they didn’t write that line, they’re just singing it, it’s not a huge deal lol, it’s fine. The chorus is undeniably really really good, it’s so good that I got over my eye-roll about the “got no time for haters” line pretty fast and I sing along with it every single time now haha. Damn, it’s so catchy. With so many choruses in kpop songs being drops lately, having a chorus sung this powerfully and prominently is like a religious experience lol, it’s fantastic. I love the verses too, I think they flow really well and really complement the synthwave aesthetic well, something about it all coming together just *works* for me. All the little synth additions throughout the song are so authentic too, it just makes me so happy. That synth solo right after the second chorus is perfect.

This song kind of snuck up on me. I like Everglow, I’ve been into them since their debut. I liked Adios, but I wasn’t as happy with the direction it went in. Dun Dun was pretty similar to Adios, and although I like it better than Adios, I still wished that they would do something like Bon Bon Chocolat again, and I could feel myself losing interest in the group as they went more and more down a road that didn’t excite me as much. Their style of girl crush in those two songs is cool, but isn’t something I come back to over and over. It’s a little too… idk… beefy, lol. Too ostentatious. Too built around the drop and saying cool lines as if they’re just catchphrases, and not as much around just being a catchy song that I find new reasons to love every time I listen. By the 10th listen, I pretty much got all of what those two songs had to offer. I do like them, and I listened to them both a lot when they each came out, but they haven’t stayed with me the way you hope a song does. 

So when La Di Da was announced, I didn’t expect much. I expected another song that I would listen to on repeat for a week or so and then move on to something else. And tbh, I was fine with that. There’s nothing wrong with that, it’s like candy or junk food lol. Not everything has to be monumental and become my favorite song instantly, some things can just be something fun to listen to for a little bit. There’s value in that. And I mean, a song that is junk food to me, that I listen to for a bit and then move on, could be someone else’s favorite stuff, and the stuff that is junk food to them might be my favorite stuff, so I’m not saying that Adios and Dun Dun are objectively uninteresting, I’m being very subjective with this lol. Just speaking for myself here. In any case, yeah, I didn’t have a ton of expectations for La Di Da. 

So like, when it came out and I listened to it for the first time, I was absolutely floored. Nobody told me it was gonna be that good lol, I was not prepared at all. Cignature, Fromis 9, and CLC also released comebacks in September, and I had high hopes for all those. I thought for sure that the Cignature or Fromis 9 comeback would be my favorite song of the month, but I ended up listening to La Di Da like twice as many times as any of those other ones haha. I wasn’t even intending to! I wasn’t streaming it and forcing myself to listen to it over and over! I just couldn’t stop. I didn’t think it would be in my top 10 either, because Everglow, while being a group that I like, aren’t one of my ult groups or anything like that. But I can’t deny it. This song is so damn good lol. Here it is, at 4th place. Incredible. Completely reinvigorated my hype for Everglow too. Can’t wait to see what they do next, and I hope Yiren and Sihyeon get well soon

links to the rest of the list: 10 - Fiesta (Izone) 9 - Crossroads (GFriend) 8 - Assa (Cignature) 7 - Boca (Dreamcatcher) 6 - Kick It (NCT 127) 5 - Cool (Weki Meki) 4 - La Di Da (Everglow) 3 - Mago (GFriend) 2 - Tag Me (Weeekly) 1 - Scream (Dreamcatcher)

[xoruffitup]

Adam Driver SNL Standby Line: Hour 18

Okay WOW this update is coming wayyyy later than expected, but today has been such an exciting and continuous whirlwind!! I have SUCH treasured memories from doing the line for Adam’s show in September 2018, and this day so far has been the most beautiful full-circle beginning to this entire weekend experience. I know I’ve definitely said this before, but going to Adam’s SNL show last time was how I met the fandom best friends who I’ve talked to almost every day since then, and we knew the second this show was announced - without even having to talk about it - that we would be here together again, sleeping out on the sidewalk in sleeping bags and 9287382 layers for our man! (We do have a hole here with us though shaped just like @umkylo who couldn’t do two trips from Australia so close together after London TROS premiere <//3)

Sarah, @reylonly and I rolled up to the line at 5 AM this morning. We are, by our count, 17 - 19th in line! We were a little farther back in the line last time but even still ended up getting Dress Rehearsal ticket numbers within the first 10 (since most people who’d been ahead of us for Adam’s last show got tickets for the Live show rather than Dress Rehearsal). Since we absolutely loved our Dress experience so much last time, we’re sticking to the same plan this time. All fingers and toes crossed that we’ll score some promising ticket numbers again! 🤞

I didn’t sit to write any updates in the whole 18 hours so far because literally we’ve been catching up, (roasting/ranting about TROS), laughing our asses off at twitter memes, and talking to other people we know throughout the line. The first solid three hours alone were taken up with “And what the fuck was that part when...” / “Can you believe that...” / “And anOtHeR tHiNg....!” all about attempting to come to some terms with our manifold TROS feelings since this is our first time being together in person since the film. It felt amazingly cathartic.

The sun rose on a beautifully clear and sunny winter day. Couldn’t have had a better day to spend out here in NYC.

At 11:30 I went into a cafe for a while to take a work call scheduled for noon. While I was mid-call @reylonly blew up my phone about the pics of Adam and Kenan out filming a digital short where Adam’s dressed like a pimp rapper!! (This show is gonna be amazinggg?!?) I rushed back to the line immediately after my call so we could freak the fuck out in person about our excitement and inability to deal with this ridiculousness even at all!!

I also returned to the line to a delivery of incredibleee donuts from my fandom wife @asongforjonsa!!! ❤️ What a truly beautiful and delicious moment that was! We did a coffee run after the donuts, continued general flailing, and before I knew it it was 5 PM, the sun was setting, and holy shit we’d already been here for 12 hours and it felt like the blink of an eye? This day was actually almost going too fast???

(Me and my true love: donuts. Featuring a hint of @reylonly in her sleeping bag caccoon)

Around 6, @lovesbitca8 and @monsterleadmehome stopped by the line to come visit me!!

At 7, security came and moved the line one block over to right in front of NBC studios, where we got very official barricades to set up camp in. :) It’s much more picturesque on this street and we’re loving it!

NBC people came out afterwards to give us soup, which was much appreciated! It’s certainly not as cold as January in NYC tends to be, but it is pretty damn chilly out here as the night gets later.

Around 9 I rendezvoused with Jess/sadboykylo who I met in the line for Adam’s last show! Remember the Reylo Thanksgiving from last time where Reylos delivered a bunch of food to us in line? Round 2 has been happening tonight, which made me SO happy! I went and hung out with her group for about 45 minutes, and within that time about 8 pizzas were delivered, as well as cinnamon buns and a “care package” including iced tea, gummibears, and chocolate. Once we’d eaten our fill, we went down the line sharing the pizza with people. The best two pizza interactions were definitely A) The four 20-something dudebros who exclaimed “yeah we’re here for Adam!” and B) The lady who, upon mentioning Reylo, we somehow quickly escalated to talking about explicit fan fic with?? Asksjskja really love everything about this fandom. I mean, Reylos sending pizzas to other Reylos resulted in Reylos in line bonding over our shared love of weird niche fics? Truly stellar :’’)

Alright! That was a lot to dump in one update but ahhhh so much time has already flashed by! I can’t type much more now because my fingers are going stiff from cold (nbd), so more to come later! Only about 8 hours left!

Final pics to share of amazing signs throughout the line:

(Sorry for any weird formatting - blame the Tumblr app! : P)