#muse will of the people

[casually-cool-cassettes]

Cassette of the day: 033: 14 September, 2023

Muse: Will Of The People

Track list: A1: Will of the People, A2: Compliance, A3: Liberation, A4: Won't Stand Down, A5: Ghosts (How Can I Move On) | B1: You Make Me Feel Like It's Halloween, B2: Kill Or Be Killed, B3: Verona, B4: Euphoria, B5: We Are Fucking Fucked

Red, blue, and yellow audio cassettes

[grigori77]

2022 in Music - My Top 5 Favourite Albums

5.  MUSE – Will of the People

The maddest trio to have ever come out of Devon have returned, completing their magnificent comeback as they again prove they’ve been one of the best things happening in prog rock for a while now.  They’re still clinging to the more electronic sound that’s come to pervade their music for the past decade or so, but this still feels like a glorious throwback as Matt Bellamy and co have brought back the old school HEAVY in a big way here …

Standout tracks: Will of the People, Compliance, Won’t Stand Down, Ghosts (How Can I Move On), You Make Me Feel like It’s Halloween, Kill Or Be Killed, Verona, We Are Fucking Fucked

4.  ARCHITECTS – The Classic Symptoms of a Broken Spirit

They’ve done it again. For the second year in a row, the Brighton metalcore heavy-hitters have delivered a blistering, pitch-perfect album full of riotous bangers, this time peeking in what I could happily argue is THE BEST TRACK they’ve ever put together.  As with their previous offering, For Those Who Wish To Exist, this record probably won’t please their old school fans, but I love this stuff JUST FINE.

Standout tracks: Deep Fake, Tear Gas, Burn Down My House, Living Is Killing Us, Doomscrolling, A New Moral Low Ground, All the Love In the World, Be Very Afraid

3.  FLORENCE + THE MACHINE – Dance Fever

Florence Welch and her astounding band have delivered another masterful opus of epic soundscapes and richly orchestrated opulence, effortlessly showcasing the singer-songwriter’s once-in-a-generation voice and big calibre lyrical and compositional flair, proving once and for all she’s the undeniable QUEEN of the indie rock scene …

Standout tracks: King, Free*, Girls Against God, Dream Girl Evil, Cassandra, Heaven Is Here, My Love, The Bomb, Morning Elvis

*Honestly, I CANNOT choose between this one and King for best track on the album …

2.  EDITORS – EBM

The most criminally overlooked and underrated indie band of all time returns with what I think might be their very best album EVER, packed with pretty much perfect electro-rock belters. They’ve always worn their Joy Division/New Order influences on their sleeves, but this one puts the Mancunian pioneers on notice that these boys from Birmingham are now officially coming for their crowns.

Standout tracks: Heart Attack, Picturesque, Karma Climb, Kiss, Silence, Educate, Strange Intimacy

1.  RAMMSTEIN – Zeit

The German masters of industrial metal have been plying their trade since the mid-90s, and every release has been well worth a spin, but they’ve come a long way in that time, and their previous eponymously titled album was a proper banger, dominated by the best track they’ve EVER recorded, the immortal Deutschland.  It seemed like a tall order for them to top that masterpiece … but they’ve pulled off the impossible, crafting a flawless opus that perfectly encapsulates their discordant-yet-ingenious singular brilliance and, OF COURSE, the incomparable voice of Till Lindemann.  Despite appearances they insist they’ve still got plenty more music to make, but this is the PERFECT encapsulation of Rammstein at their very best.

Standout tracks: Armee der Tristen, Zeit, Zick Zack, Angst, Dicke Titten, Lügen, Adieu

The ones that didn’t quite make the cut:

BILLY HOWERDEL – What Normal Was (the other creative half of A Perfect Circle proves he can do dark, edgy and beautiful electronic rock without needing Maynard); THE GREAT DISCORD – Deam Morte (the gothic-edged Swedish metalheads bring us another winner, with magnificent frontwoman Fia Kempe on fire throughout); AURORA – The Gods We Can Touch (the immensely talented young Norwegian singer-songwriter’s third indie-pop album is another winner); GHOST – Impera (Sweden’s most unique metal band continues to dominate as Tobias Forge delivers more retro-styled brilliance); PANIC! AT THE DISCO – Viva Las Vengeance (Brendon Urie pays fitting tribute to his biggest influences – especially Queen - with this lovingly irreverent record)

Honourable mention:

SPIRITBOX – Rotoscope

The best new metalcore band of the block continue to show they really are the ones to watch with this BLINDING three-track EP which shows that the astonishingly talented Courtney LaPlante and co are DETERMINED to keep experimenting with their sound. Opener/title-track Rotoscope is the undeniable highlight here, but Sew Me Up and, in particular, Hysteria both prove to be thoroughly irresistible earworms too …

[buggachat]

something so fucked up about Chat Noir’s whole deal is that he is in a lot of ways Adrien playing a character. Like Adrien picked up his miraculous and was told he’d be a superhero so he was like “ok, time to act like a superhero!” and he lets himself have fun w it and play up the role and let loose and kind of just allow himself to be silly and goofy and have fun and for once in his life not care about performing Perfection™.

But. But none of the other characters KNOW THAT. So everyone just sees Chat Noir and is like “look at this guy’s ego. He’s so full of himself. Surely it’d be fair to knock him down a few pegs” without being aware of how few pegs he actually HAS. He’s like the “insecure character who overcompensates in ego” trope except he’s really not doing it unironically, he’s just having a fun LARP pretending to have self worth in his off-hours but nobody else is on the same page about it being a game and he refuses to tell them. He just dramatically pouts about it and lets them laugh and pretends like he’s not internalizing it and it is almost 3 am and my brain forced me to write this instead of sleeping I’m gonna take a melatonin

[tofixtheshadows]

Sorry but Kabru is so fascinating to me as a character, in a pure mechanical sense, because of what Ryoko Kui does with him. Everything about him is a red herring. He's deliberately introduced as some kind of rival for Laios, a party leader who is hopeless against monsters but absolutely brilliant with people both in and out of combat, and who has good reason to oppose him.

By the end of chapter 31, you might even think Kabru's going to end up as some sort of anti-villain, an antagonist with the best of intentions who nevertheless tries to foil our hero's plans. He wants to defeat the Mad Mage himself, he suspects Laios of being too irresponsible to be trusted with control of the dungeon, and his crew even thinks that Laios's party stole from them (and they're kind of right!). All signs point towards an inevitable showdown.

And then ... none of that happens.

Confrontation over the stolen treasure? Kabru is literally too smart to fall for the classic miscommunication trope and correctly decides it's not worth making a big deal of.

Kabru's deadly PVP skills? Aside from trying to take down Falin, he never fights another human again.

Wanting to be the one who defeats the dungeon? Turns out he was only doing that because he didn't think any other adventurer would have people's best interests at heart, and he's more than willing to play a support role in the whole affair.

Thinking Laios is up to no good? He really did just want to get to know the guy more. He has his misgivings, but ultimately ends up trusting Laios with his life.

Is Kabru going to get some sort of comeuppance for hating monsters and not appreciating their ecosystem? Well no, he has good reasons for hating monsters. He ends up wanting to learn about them through Laios's eyes, but he's never forced into any "Wow, guess I was wrong about them!" revelation.

Hell, even his implied ladykiller ways, which might lead you to think he'll end up being the stock "chivalrous lech" type of character, don't really manifest. He has a lot of opportunities to act flirtatiously around women, but doesn't. He's just a guy whose natural charisma makes him into human catnip.

And that's all hysterical to me, to pull it off. It's a fascinating way to tell a story. To introduce a character explicitly as a rival, potentially even a villain, and instead make them a deuteragonist. It's like a magician making a coin disappear, then slowing down their trick to show you the misdirection. "Did you see what I did there?" they ask with a wink. "The coin was in my other hand the entire time."

[toomanyfandomsstuff]

I think the American dream is killing me has the same vibe as will of the people my mom says no so now I need people to validate my opinion thanks

[locallibrarylover]

*by live theatre i mean plays, musicals, operas, ballets, concert versions of musicals, staged readings, & things of that nature. EDIT: YES this includes amateur, local, kids, high school, & community theatre. almost every show i've seen has been local

if you want, list the names of the shows you've seen in the tags!

[contactlessdrivethru]

there is something unique and deeply special about monkey d luffy as a protagonist. he’s overwhelmingly ADORED by the fandom. he’s consistently the most or at least top 3 most popular characters in the whole series. peoples takes about him are gushingly positive. and that’s… really uncommon.

a LOT of fandoms i’ve witnessed or been in have a tendency to favor characters other than the main character. especially in anime. the main characters are often written as a blank slate for readers/watchers to project onto, but that makes them not as interesting and so they don’t get the fan attention.

but luffy is so far from that. and he’s ALWAYS been this way. we love him so much. he’s the heart of the story and the heart of the fandom in every single way. and i think that speaks to how well-written he is as a character. he’s fun and charming and complex and interesting and he makes us laugh and cry and cheer and hope and love. he’s able to inspire so much joy in people, both in his world but also in this one. and i think that’s really special. i feel so grateful to have found this story that means so much to me, and i’m so grateful that luffy exists.

[owlbelly]

so. i understand where the sentiment "listening to an audiobook is the same thing as reading the book" is coming from - i mean, yes, the bottom line is you are taking in the same words in what is possibly a more accessible (or maybe just more enjoyable) format for you! and i'm 100% in agreement that "book snobs" who say "no you didn't really read it" if you listened to the audiobook are full of shit. ofc you should engage with stories in whatever way works for you, there is no moral or intellectual superiority to reading words off a page vs. listening to them

but it also is different? an audiobook is a performance. choices a narrator makes about line readings can drastically influence the meaning of the lines. even just different voices, accents, etc. - there are creative choices being made by the person delivering the words to you, and that affects your experience of the story in a different way than if you were making those choices in your own head. it might even change the way you visualize what's going on!

this isn't a bad thing it's just An Actual Thing & i think it's worth talking about. it rubs me the wrong way when people act like accommodations (and for many people audiobooks are an accommodation) always result in a completely identical experience, or even that they should, & if you suggest that people accessing media in different ways are having different experiences it's somehow ableist

anyway on rare occasions i really enjoy audiobooks but mostly they are much less accessible to me than words on a page (i need to be able to reread, flip back and forth, go at my own pace) & i also just really strongly prefer to encounter a text on my own before hearing someone else's performance of it, if possible! again i don't think it's "better" to read a physical book i just think it is a Distinct form of experiencing a story & acting like the two things are entirely the same is sort of doing a disservice to both

[madamemiz]

sad: falling out of a hyperfixation

tragic: watching your beloved friends and mutuals fall out of the hyperfixation while you're still in it

[brennansmintmilanos]

someone stop brennan, he’s putting Themes in the comedy again…

[butcharium]

My girlfriend and I had our first new year's eve together! She looked so beautiful in her suit and I think we made a handsome couple <3 both of us included a small lesbian detail to our outfits!!!

But as often we had a tendency to be mistaken for Just Some Guys - but that's just because the people around us weren't so used to seeing handsome butch women

[buggachat]

Sometimes I think about how Adrien, throughout the series, constantly grapples with his fear of abandonment. Gabriel conditioned him to believe that any love he receives is purely transactional, and that to earn affection he has to prove his utility. Adrien is constantly trying to prove his worth to his father for scraps of affection, and Chat Noir infamously crumbles on-screen any time he feels as though he is replaceable to Ladybug. It's a constant insecurity of his, like everyone will just dump him like a sack of potatoes the moment they find out how useless he is.

Meanwhile, all Marinette wants to is ensure that Adrien is happy. Because she loves him. She doesn't give two shits about how """useful""" he is. She holds him and tells him that she will never abandon him (both as Ladynoir and as Adrienette), and her fantasies are about saving him, not about him being "useful" to her. Throughout their relationship, Adrien is forced to disappoint Marinette constantly for reasons outside of his control (amok commands), and yet Marinette is still there for him.

At Adrien's lowest point, when he is forcibly torn away from everyone who had ever showed him genuine care, locked away in an all-white room and at his most "useless", right after disappointing Marinette and unable to even join the final battle or contribute in any way, she still saves him. She still loves him. Because he doesn't have to prove anything to her. Because he is loved and cherished for who he is, not for what he does, and that love is not conditional. Adrien's "happy ending" at the end of the first arc wasn't about him finally proving how useful he can be, because he never actually cared about being useful — he just saw it as the only means to feel loved and needed. Instead, in the end, he found out that he was loved and needed no matter what.

[tofixtheshadows]

You guys really need to stop and consider the ways you're talking about Kabru I am dead fucking serious. Like I know that flattening characters is just what fandom does to a certain extent, but Kabru's actual personality is getting lost to the fandom hivemind insisting that he's aggressive/cruel/sociopathic/hateful, and these are particularly concerning takes to see leveled at the only brown character in the main cast day after day. "My poor sweet golden child Laios needs to be protected from this scary brown man" is not a good look! Like, it's very telling that the bulk of the hate and bad faith readings are reserved for Toshiro and Kabru. Everyone else's flaws get to be discussed and validated and forgiven (or erased), meanwhile people are straight making up things to be mad about with Toshiro and Kabru but patting themselves on the back for being smart.

The worst part is how undeserved it all is. I'm trying to lay off anime-onlys because we're still kind of in the red herring stage of getting to know Kabru, but I would still like to gently suggest that even if you think Kabru is up to something, you don't gave to get in the tags of every fan creator's post and bring up how you hate him or You Can Tell he's totally evil. Sometimes I think Kabru's blue eyes give people license to say things about his appearance that they know would sound completely racist otherwise, but referring to his blue eyes acts as a get-out-of-racism free card. The jokes about the dog with brown contacts are getting old, by the way.

For people who have read the manga, it's disappointing. Kabru is one of the most complex and important characters in the story, and if you base your interpretation of him and all your fandom interactions on shallow first impressions you are completely missing out.

I know part of this is because Dungeon Meshi is a comedy, but the story also wants to be taken seriously. For example, it's admittedly really funny when Chilchuck calls Laios "sick in the head", but that doesn't change the fact that the way Chilchuck casually belittles Laios caused him to hide the fact that he was "hallucinating" from his friends for weeks. Those feelings matter.

Like, this

is funny.

But this?

Is not. This is just a very clear example of a brown boy with PTSD. As someone else with PTSD, just looking at this fucking sucks, man.

The only reason why Kabru thinks about killing Laios is because he is in the middle of a flashback. He's struggling through a panic attack. If he truly wanted to kill Laios because he's violent or because he finds Laios inherently annoying, he wouldn't otherwise talk with Laios normally. Notice how he doesn't act this way at any other point in the story- it's just because he's triggered by monsters. Even when he's thinking about his plans to "deal with" Laios later, he's reluctant to actually kill him and only considers it to prevent another tragedy. Despite his deadly skills, Kabru relies far more on "soft" power- insight, persuasion, diplomacy. He's a rare example of a character who absolutely is, or at least can be, manipulative, but seems to use his abilities for good. He's not a pathological liar, he isn't looking down on everyone behind a smile. He's someone who is extremely emotionally intelligent, and he's willing to put aside all his own basic wants and needs to stop the cycle of dungeons devouring humans.

I'm going to cut a potential thesis on his character short and just give some examples of things that fandom should consider about his personality more:

Racism in fandom isn't just about whitewashing in fan art, or using racial slurs. The insidiousness of bad faith readings, reductions to racist tropes, lack of fan content for characters of color, and dismissal of a character's complexity are far more common. You can believe yourself to be completely neutral or even positive about a character and still churn out low-grade bile about them into fandom's collective unconscious. Fandom reflects real life.

And I have been around fandom long enough to see how these behaviors (mostly from my fellow white fans) affect fans of color, how it makes a fandom feel hostile and unwelcome to them. It's fun to make jokes and memes, I'm absolutely not saying that everything needs to be a deeply nuanced take, but we need to be careful that it doesn't veer into toxicity. Please think about how our contributions to fandom come across, and what sort of vibes they cultivate in this communal space.

[gent-illmatic]

/.\ MUSE

[little-sw33tie]

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE SKINNY TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE FAT TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE MUSCULAR TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE DISABLED TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO DON’T OR WANT TO TAKE HORMONES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO CAN’T TAKE HORMONES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO TAKE HORMONES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO HAVE AFFIRMING SURGERIES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO DON’T WANT OR NEED AFFIRMING SURGERIES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE WHO CAN’T HAVE AFFIRMING SURGERIES

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE THAT ARE APART OF SYSTEMS

I LOVE NON-HUMAN TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE TRANS POC (THIS INCLUDES MIXED POC OF COURSE!)

I LOVE TRANS WOMEN

I LOVE TRANS MEN

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE OUTSIDE THAT BINARY

I LOVE PEOPLE WHO CALL THEMSELVES TRANSEXUAL

I LOVE STRAIGHT TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE GAY TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE AROMANTIC SPECTRUM TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE ASEXUAL SPECTRUM TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE NEURODIVERGENT TRANS PEOPLE

I LOVE BEING TRANSEXUAL

I LOVE HOW DIFFERENT WE ALL ARE

I LOVE TRANS PEOPLE

[physical-manifestation-of-spite]

We all love Arthur playing the piano. But I think a lot of people forget why Arthur stopped playing in the first place and why it's so important that he won't easily return to it with the same fondness.

Music was Arthur's passion. It was what he invested in to get past his parents' death, and it was a healthy coping mechanism that blossomed into a well-earned career. He loved it. And his daughter died because of it. He was so absorbed in his passion (and himself) that he forgot about his own daughter and she drowned to death. It's a horrifying, distressing way for a toddler to go. And it was absolutely Arthur's fault.

So his love of music and piano specifically has been tainted by the grief and guilt of his daughter's death. When John asks if Arthur misses playing the piano, he says, "No," without hesitation.

How odd that something you've divulged your career into is not something you miss. But then when you learn how Faroe died and how Arthur ignored her--or "dismissed" her, according to him--it all makes sense. So when I read these snippets/fanfic stories where Arthur plays the piano eagerly, it gives me pause because I know something is missing.

The piano is tied to his daughter's death. That will never go away. In the same way that the music he has written will never leave him, even when he loses all memory, including his own name. The piano is tied to his grief of Faroe. It is tied to his grief of his parents. And his grief is so interwoven with Arthur that he can never escape it. He can only continue on with it as a constant tune in the back of his head, something we hear nearly every episode of Malevolent. Arthur isn't fond of the piano anymore. But the tune he wrote for his daughter, who died because of it, plays in his head every day.