#tyler joseph preference

[im-literally-so-dun]

tyler i am begging you PLEASE have hair for the clancy world tour

[pardonmydelays]

and what if i start a new tag on my blog

[artist-issues]

Could you rank the album Blurryface and explain your rankings, please? Thanks and have a blessed day!

my brain

yay

Listen readers, if you like my posts about Disney movies & classic books & Old Hollywood or whatever, or if we’ve ever crawled into a story together and deepened our perspective on that story in one of my posts, but you’ve never cared about twenty one pilots, just trust me and read a little bit of this post. I want to show you something so good.

This is my favorite question in a long time. But you have the key to the obsession-corner of my brain, and you let yourself in, so this is a BIG rambling post, and you brought this upon yourself, and I’m very glad

Okay! I’m going to rank it concept-wise. As in, I’m going to rank it based on how in-depth and well-thought-out and excellently-communicated the ideas in the songs’ lyrics are. Because I don’t know anything about music—so any part of the rankings that are affected by something musical are that way because of personal preference, not because I know what I’m talking about. I recommend taking it slow, every one could be its own post because I suck at being succinct. 🙄

14. Lane Boy

I’m not going to defend myself, something had to go last, and everybody knows I’d rather listen to Lane Boy than any non-twenty-one-pilots song, and I think it blows any secular non-twenty-one-pilots song out of the water. So there. But it’s last on the list just because I think the concepts in the song don’t have as much brain-dissecting meat, and eternal value, as the other songs on the album. Other songs are about how we compartmentalize our issues, or they’re about mankind’s messed up state, or they’re about the dichotomy of fear and love.

And then this song is basically just about how twenty one pilots goes where they want to, musically, and doesn’t bow to the music industry or the patterns of what’s popular. But they’re tempted to. And that makes perfect sense, because on an album where he’s fighting his insecurities, being insecure about what “The Audience” thinks of you fits on the list.

I think the best part of the song is the lyric “don’t trust a perfect person and don’t trust a song that’s flawless.” From what I observe about Tyler Joseph, he actually does care whether or not a song, or a performance, is as good as it can possibly be. That’s super clear. But what’s also clear is that he believes in singing about something real, especially real flaws he has, so that other people can relate and use the information. So I don’t think he’s saying “don’t trust a perfect person and don’t trust a song that has no technical issues and couldn’t be any better.” I think he’s saying, “don’t trust a person who claims to be perfect, or their vague meaningless songs that don’t reveal their flaws.” (You know, when we gonna stop with it / lyrics that mean nothing, we were gifted with thought-type stuff.)

Which is still pretty deep, in a song that on the surface is saying “I know the music industry and genre-fans have expectations but I do what I want.”

Side note: I love the aesthetics of the music video and the “tempted by control, controlled by temptation” voiceover they used to do for the concerts with this song. The whole idea that Fame and Success have to be in hazmat suits, with gas masks on, is awesome. I don’t care if the concept is “Fame and Success can’t even deal with us, and all the insecurity we talk about in our songs,” or “Fame and Success are always interacting with songs that are rotting, dead, already on their way out of relevance.” It works either way. It’s cool either way.

But let’s just be real. It stabs me in the heart every time he sings the line, “if it wasn’t for this music I don’t know how I would’ve fought this.”

Like. Really? You don’t? If it wasn’t for music, you don’t know how you would’ve fought the dark thoughts? There’s nothing else you can think of, nothing else that specifically works against dark thoughts, that you might want to clue people in on? In a song that’s about not making decisions motivated by remaining popular, you’re going to point them to your own music as the only weapon you know of which works?

When you set yourself up to tell them that Jesus Christ is the hope that lasts eternally, not just moment-to-moment? When you could’ve said that you know a an everlasting Light in times of darkness? No?

So this one gets skipped more often than the others, and I know for a fact it’s because even subconsciously I don’t want to hear that line. I hope I’m wrong about it. I bet I am. I don’t think he meant all that. I think he was looking for a way to conclude that “I know about pain and darkness and that’s what should be in songs” thought, in a way that rhymed and sounded good. But still.

12. Tear in My Heart

(note: the list got out of order here because tumblr’s post editor is the worst and I couldn’t fix it. but Tear in My heart is ranked one higher than Stressed Out, that’s all you need to know.)

I like it when Tyler Joseph picks a concept that’s simple and then reminds everybody how true it is by talking about it like he does with Tear in My Heart. “Love hurts.” That’s a simple concept. “Yeah okay we know.” But in this song I listen to it and I want to be like “No, do you get it, love, giving all of who you are, even the messed up parts, to somebody and letting them do whatever they want with that, hurts. Not just because you’re afraid they’ll reject you—but because you’re afraid they won’t reject you, you’re afraid they’ll stay, which is harder and demands more of you, and you’re afraid they’ll see you, and change you.” Yes, change. For the better.

That’s the point of the music video. He’s looking around at everybody but he can’t see them clearly, everything warps around when he tries to meet their eyes. But not with his wife (then fiancée, I guess.) They see each other clearly. And then she beats the Blurryface out of him. Because that’s what real love does. It doesn’t ignore your flaws or accept your flaws. It sacrifices to help you grow out of your flaws. And that hurts! That’s uncomfortable! That’s Eustace getting un-dragoned in The Chronicles of Narnia.

But it’s also the best thing for the loved one. And! He introduces the whole idea with “sometimes you gotta bleed to know / that you’re alive and have a soul.” When you’re just in your comfort zone, even if it’s a bad place, you go numb. It’s scary to propose to somebody, or show them who you really are, or tell them how you really feel, but the good that comes with it is exhilarating.

And he uses the words, “she’s the tear in my heart,” which, if you dissect that: the medical term is SCAD, and the result of a tear in the heart are basically anywhere from irregular heartbeat (heart skipping a beat. aww. they’re in love and stuff.) to heart attack, (she has the power to bring him to a jarring halt) to slowed heartbeat. (She can also calm him down.) Even a more zoomed-out idea of the lyric, where you just picture what happens when you cut a tear in a heart, is a great metaphor in this context: blood gets out. It was safe and nobody knew what he was feeling. Now what’s inside his heart is finally visible. Because of her.

One more, one more! “She’s a butcher with a smile.” I love that he said ‘butcher.’ A butcher’s whole job is to follow a plan, and neatly organize, arrange, sort, the meat. From what I understand, a butcher typically follows the muscle routes that are already there. It’s not mad hacking and wanton destruction; it’s thought out. There’s a purpose. There’s even usually a plan, a map they’re following. He could’ve said “she’s a cutthroat,’” or “killer” or even “cutter.” But when there was nothing on the page, he chose to put “butcher, carver.” Purposeful cuts.

And he keeps it on-theme, with the album. Because like I said, the whole album of Blurryface is about insecurity—but it’s about fighting insecurity, and the number-one weapon he uses is putting that insecurity on display. Shining a spotlight on it. Because when you’re insecure about something you try to cover that up. You try to compensate for it, direct attention away from whatever you can;t control. Letting everyone see the thing you’re insecure about is hard and you feel exposed, but that action is actually the reverse of insecurity. Doing so with his wife is the best.

13. Stressed Out

This one is this far down because it’s about wishing for the comfort of simple, nostalgic things when in reality you’re freaked out about the future and the present. And that’s a really relatable concept, for a song, and it’s not super deep. We all do it. But it’s still on-theme, which is what makes the song feel deeper.

I like to get lost in the past because it’s what I know. (And the opposite of shat I know/what I can control is? Insecurity.)

If I have to choose between a difficult adventure in the present, or a painful memory to over-analyze, I’m always going to reach for the painful memory even though it’s a sucky headspace, and nothing new and helpful is likely to come of it. Why? Because I know what happens in that reel in my head. I feel control over it just by knowing what happens. But I don’t feel that control when I spin myself out imaging what could happen, and all the things I can’t control, in the present or the future.

Yeah, I’d rather go back and wax nostalgic for the days I played outside with my siblings, or the houses we used to live in, then think about how rent is due in a couple of weeks or how I might never get to have the career everybody expects me to have. So it’s very relatable.

The thing I don’t like about this one is that it doesn’t have that hopeful note in it that I like in twenty one pilots. It kind of goes, “yeah, wish we could turn back time, but everyone tells us to quit dreaming and make money, and it sucks.” And…that’s it. In the song, itself, there’s no hopeful conclusion. Versus in Tear in My Heart, at least he’s feeling like he has a soul and he’s “higher” than he’s ever been, and the butcher is smiling. At least in Fairly Local, there’s, “I’m not evil to the core / what I shouldn’t do I will fight.” But not in Stressed Out. Stressed Out leaves you dissatisfied, and maybe that’s the point.

11. We Don’t Believe What’s On TV

I love the progression of the ideas in this song (because it does come right after Polarize;) he’s actually taken a hard step. He’s not just standing at a crossroads between decisions, being insecure and never moving. The lyrics are “I need to know that when I fail, you’ll still be here.” He can’t fail if he’s not trying. So I like that the song has such a happy beat, and it’s the first one on the record (unless you count Heavydirtysoul) where he’s not just thinking about being insecure or what to do—he’s committing to doing something.

And then I find the song super relatable. The thing about having a dream is that when you chase it you risk a lot. You risk money, you risk time. You risk your emotions, obviously. So anyone close to you is going to notice you’re chasing after something. It’ll become part of your identity. Like me, proclaiming that I was going to work for Disney for years. If you fail, what do you say to all the people who knew you were shooting for that goal? How will they see you? As a quitter? As a failure? Are they going to feel sorry for you? Maybe it’ll be hard to talk about the things you used to talk about—and then they don’t know what else to make small-talk about. Not only your big direction in life is gone, but now something as comfortable as talking with friends is suddenly affected. And from there it’s easy to go, “wait, who am I without that dream I was going after?”

So the lines “what if my dream does not happen? / would I just change what I’ve told my friends? / don’t wanna know who I would be / when I wake up from a dreamer’s sleep” are spot-on. And they uncover the unattractive side of having a dream: the side where you fail and lose and feel like you don’t know who you are without it, so maybe you cover it up by “changing” the dream, or acting like you never really wanted that anyway, or act like you’ve found something new, to cover the loss.

But I also love the fact that the song is about how superficial things aren’t really what matter—your “dream” isn’t who you are. And the people who really love you and care about you know that, so when the dream goes away, they’ll stick around. Just like how Tyler says he doesn’t care about what’s superficial about them: “I don’t care what’s in your hair, I just want to know what’s on your mind.”

Fun fact: when I bring twenty one pilots up for any reason my father responds with “yeah-yeah-yeah” by default.

10. Ride

Ride is only higher than WDBWOTV because of the rapping verses. And not because it’s the one twenty one pilots song my father allows me to play when I’m in the car with him.

This feels a little repetitive, but I like Ride because it’s what twenty one pilots is about. They’re all about thinking carefully about what’s going on in your head and then making a decision to live for something. (I wish they’d come out and say that “something” is God, but whatever.) Ride is all about that. Living rather than dying is hard, especially when it means living, not coming up with meaningless extreme scenarios where you can imagine dying for someone, or staying happy all the time, or conquering your foes. It just means taking your time, and as life rides along, being careful to live for something day by day. Then again, it is a song that’s still just about thinking about what to do, instead of doing it.

9. The Judge

I think this is one of the clearest allusions to the Gospel Tyler Joseph ever makes, and I love the way he makes it. First off, that by saying he can’t tell if the song is about himself or the devil, he’s acknowledging that he, on a sinful level, is just as worthy of condemnation as the Devil.

That’s why he says, “found my way, right time, wrong place, as I pled my case.” You plead your case, in front of THE Judge, when you’re dead. So it’s the right time—everybody has a date on the calendar when they’re going to die, they just don’t know what it is yet. But it’s the wrong place—he’s in front of God, and he doesn’t deserve to be, any more than the Devil. But that’s why he’s pleading his case by freely admitting his soul matches Hell, not Heaven, so all that’s left is to beg that The Judge be merciful.

I like the mood of the second verse, where it feels like he starts describing what’s going on ‘three lights are lit but the fourth one’s out / I can tell cuz it’s a big darker than the last night’s bout,” etc., but then when he gets to “but I’m not good with directions” he speeds his flow up and sounds like he’s getting panicky. He’s giving excuses for why he’s lost—well why? Because he’s bad at directions. Listening to what he’s told to do, and then following through. And then just admitting that one flaw as an explanation for why he’s lost leads to admitting other flaws, at random, like he can’t stop himself: “I’m a pro at imperfections and I’m best friends with my doubt.”

I personally think, because of the context, that the three lights which are lit, but the fourth one that is out, are representative of Tyler not being clear about his faith. I think it’s an allusion to Peter, denying Christ 3 times (like Tyler already alluded to in Ode to Sleep.) But in Ode to Sleep, Tyler follows up the line about 4-denials with “metaphorically I’m a whore.” My take is, he’s only a whore metaphorically—because in Christ, he’s a new creation. But he keeps talking like he isn’t, worrying over his relationship with God and whether or not he’s really saved. Maybe because he struggles with doubting God keeps His promises, maybe because he struggles with doubting God is real, maybe both.

And after all, what was Peter doing when he denied Christ? He was denying specifically that he knew Christ. That he was in a relationship with Him, that he followed Christ. Peter was basically saying over and over, “I’m not a disciple of Christ. I’m not! I don’t know him!” to the people who ask. But it wasn’t true. Peter was Christ’s disciple; Christ chose him, and that’s what made the denial so hurtful.

So I think the lights going out, one by one, and he can tell that a season of that doubt is coming on, are his cue to leave. Get out of there, that place where darkness is creeping up, and go somewhere sunnier. But he can’t get there, because he’s not good at directions, and then he kind of spirals and goes back into the chorus realizing he never had any right to be “Christ’s disciple” in the first place, that’s true, and his only hope is the mercy of The Judge. Which is great, not something to despair over. Because The Judge is merciful.

But the cool part is there’s still an element of “insecurities” in there, distracting him from what would ultimately be a good place. It’s good to realize you’ve got nothing, and to realize that if you could wriggle out of God’s embrace, you would do it every time. Because then you realize all over again that He is merciful and He loves you, and you’re secure because it’s all based on His strength. So that particular cycle is good—when it ends with that realization. But instead, he’s getting hung up, not on “what will God think of me when He realizes (even though He knew it all along) that I’m unworthy?” but on “what will everyone outside my house think of me when they realize I’m unworthy?”

And when that happens, when you’re focused not on what God thinks of you, but on what others think of you, because of your insecurities, you can satisfy yourself, not with God’s love, but with pulling the wool over other people’s eyes. Maybe the people outside your house see the real, unworthy you—but you can cover that up. You can fool them. You can compensate for those insecurities, front, be fake. God always sees you clearly, but the people around you can be fooled into thinking you’re an okay person, and you have your act together. So his insecurities, Blurryface, is hijacking the cycle that would’ve led him to rely on The Judge and making him chase after the opinion of his peers, instead.

Instead of focusing on who God is, which is the hope in everything, Blurryface gets him to focus on who he is—whether that leads him to a revel or despair, doesn’t matter, as long as he’s not focusing on who God is.

I love this song.

8. Hometown

”My shadow tilts its head at me

Spirits in the dark are waiting

I will let the wind go quietly,

I will let the wind go quietly.” <- Those are some of my favorite lyrics ever. Ever ever. Why would a shadow tilt its head at you? Because it’s creepy interesting imagery, yeah, but also, because it’s puzzled. But it’s your shadow. So you’re looking at it like you’re puzzled, too, because shadows don’t move independently; either the light source is moving, or you are.

So the character Blurryface is puzzled because he’s trying to figure Tyler Joseph out—like Tyler is trying to figure him out—and/or because the light is on the move. What light is mentioned in this song? The sun. Which, in all their other songs, is representative of God or the kingdom of God.

Either way, all the insecurities and flaws and doubt that Blurryface embodies doesn’t understand God, or actions made in faith. So he’s puzzled in this song; because this song is about the songwriter begging God to do for him what he can’t do.

I don’t care. That’s what the song’s about. Tyler Joseph does his clever triple-meaning thing, so you can say that the song is about how people back home in Columbus, Ohio don’t really get twenty one pilots’ deep lore and metaphors, and that’s what the song is about—how people back home still don’t know who they are because they’re least famous among people who know them best—but that doesn’t cover the lyrics about “take me home and show me the sun/Son,” or “bring the fire, my bones will make it grow.” And a faith-based interpretation of the lyrics does.

(I mean, obviously, people can sing the song to themselves and assign whatever meaning they want. That’s fine. That’s how using words works. But I’m saying that what the songwriter meant can be understood by the lyrics he chose in the song—and if it can’t, then he didn’t want to be understood or was bad and making himself clear, and that’s just bad communication/useless artwork. But neither of those explanations are descriptive of Tyler Joseph.)

The first verse is what the songwriter wants to have happen—the place he’s from is dark, it’s without the Sun/Son, he wants to go Home, and he can’t do it without dying to himself, and only God can pull that off.

But the second verse is a call to action, for everyone listening, not just a plea for himself out of what he’s feeling. And that action really does have something to do with the temporal “hometown.” You can grow up hearing about God, one way or another, but eventually, you encounter darkness on your own. You realize you’re messed up, whether anyone else sees it or not. And that’s when you can either be insecure and give up, or you can look for salvation. But at that point, you have to look for salvation in something outside “tradition” and just “what the people around you believe.” You have to find out if any of that is rooted in truth, and then choose to believe it yourself. Whether anyone else, including the people who helped make you who you are, from your hometown, agrees or disagrees.

In Christianese we say “make your faith your own.” Even if you grow up in church there comes a time when you have to decide if that’s what you believe, whether your parents drop the faith or not. But it’s not just a church thing. It’s a universal, worldview thing. Even if you grow up in an atheistic community you have to decide, at some point, if you believe that, as an individual. Be introspective and decide what you believe, what you’re going to live for—the message of the band.

And of course, the language he uses is so overtly Biblical! It’s from Joshua 24. And the context of that passage is, God has finally given the Israelites rest from all their enemies, and Joshua, the faithful one who has led them in their homeland, is telling them that it’s decision time. If they choose to serve God, it’ll cost them everything. They can’t serve God and the pagan, materialistic idols their fathers fell to. It’s one or the other. He knows it’s a huge ask, and an impossible ask, actually, because God is Holy. God has to give you the grace to follow Him (same conclusion Tyler sometimes gets to in The Judge.) Here’s the verse, enough of my yammering:

“If it is evil in your sight to serve Yahweh, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh.”

Then later, after the Israelites say that’s what they want to do, they want to serve Yahweh, he repeats,

“So now, put away the foreign gods which are in your midst, and incline your hearts to Yahweh, the God of Israel.”

And this whole passage is really interesting, because Joshua is telling them to do this in the same place, geographically, that Jacob, their ancestor, hundreds of years before, had commanded his own family to bury false idols in the ground and turn to Yahweh. So when he says “put away,” it’s in reference to that moment; their earliest forefathers had a pattern of chasing after the beliefs and false hopes of the world, and then needing to bury those and follow God instead.

Anyway. This song is awesome because it’s about him coming to, in Christianese: “the end of himself.” The lyrics say that nothing about a human being knows the secret to redeeming souls. Only God knows that; only God can do that. So in an album that’s all about interviewing yourself, fighting the worst parts of you, trying to figure out how to beat Blurryface, Hometown says, “aaaand you can’t. You can’t do it. But God can. You don’t have the secret, you don’t have the playbook. But God does.”

7. Goner

This song is higher than Hometown because I like that when he does something slower and more complex, lyrically, without the same speedy metaphors, it’s just a straight-up war cry.

It is kind of a complicated song, though. I think. Because I can’t decide what exactly he was aiming for. Sometimes I listen to it and I think it’s about the songwriter fighting Blurryface, refusing to give up, and parts of the song could be sung by the hero, while others are answered by the villain, during that fight.

But sometimes I listen to it and I think he’s declaring that the fight is already over, (after all, it’s at the end of the album) but he knows it’s a cycle and he might get dragged back into the doubt that starts it all over again. “I’m a goner.”

Or, sometimes, I listen to it and I think it’s just a recap of everything the album teaches: 1) I’m messed up 2) but I’m not a hopeless case 3) but I’m tempted to hide the messed-up part 4) the only way to fix the messed-up part is to admit it, get it out where everyone can see it 5) but even then I can’t fix it, and they’ll all see I’m unworthy 6) Remembering unconditional love and grace fixes it.

Being “known” is the opposite of what the Blurryface character should want. Because again, insecurity is all about avoiding the things that make you afraid, make you feel out-of-control, and putting up a front like you’re fine. You make decisions based on what you want people to see, out of a desire for control. That’s why he’s called “Blurryface.” You don’t get to see his face. You don’t get to know the real him, because the real him’s messed up, and he can’t let anyone see that.

I think the one interpretation I vaguely settle on when I hear the song is that, if all you ever focus on is how to control everything and pretend you’re not messed-up—if all you ever put on is that “blurry face” mask—pretty soon you convince yourself, along with everybody else, that that’s who you are. You start to forget the real you. You can’t see your own flaws anymore—but hiding them is still puppetting everything you do, so ironically, they’re in control. Luckily, the people you’ve opened up to (if you ever have) and God, remind you of who you really are. So that humbles you, and saves you, from just being totally fake.

One thing about the actual lyrics. The fact that he says “the ghost of you is close to me” supports all of those above interpretations. Could be the Holy Spirit (you know, “Holy Ghost”) being closest to the singer when he’s “inside out,” being vulnerable, seeing himself for what he really is and admitting it. Could be the character, Blurryface, who’s been defeated but maybe Tyler forgets that, and feels “haunted” by insecurities that should already be harmless if he’d just remember what killed them.

I see some people saying that what he means is, Blurryface is so intertwined as a part of himself that he doesn’t know what would be left of him if all his insecurities died. I think that’s super bleak. But I can see why it would be that. If it is, it doesn’t bode well for Tyler or anyone who agrees. If you’re already at the point where your weaknesses and insecurities are something you identify with, something you think belongs in you, instead of a foreign contaminant that your soul’s antibodies need to purge, then…you’re really forgetting the Gospel. That’s not who you are anymore. It’s as much a part of you as a set of dirty clothes that you took off when you were 4; even if you’re cramming them back on, that doesn’t make them part of who you are.

I also frequently see people saying, “he’s not just asking for God’s help, he’s asking for anybody’s help! He says ‘somebody’ catch my breath!” Right. But then he says, “I wanna be known by you.” And in Kitchen Sink, it’s clear Tyler Joseph doesn’t believe anybody can know him, fully. Also, Anathema. Also, on this album, Not Today, and Message Man. There are too many lyrics where he explains that he doesn’t think anybody can know him—except God, who, in The Judge, and in other twenty one pilots songs, is depicted as the only one who can see all the way down to the bedrock of who Tyler Joseph is. And who all of us are. Hidden insecurities pulling the strings and all. So when he calls for help, he might be willing to accept anybody, but only God is going to be able to deliver, in the very end. (Friends and his wife can help, but in the end.)

Personally I believe the songwriter knows that. Based on the evidence in everything he writes. I don’t know for sure, though.

Anyway. I love that he ended the album with this song. Specifically, it’s not until the very last note that everything is resolved, and sounds like there’s some kind of peace, some kind of vanquishing of Blurryface. Like the fight is definitely taking everything to win. But Blurryface does lose; there is hope; that’s what I like about twenty one pilots.

It’s that Halloween-style “using darkness to show how weak darkness can be.”

6. Not Today

The concepts I’m talking about liking are getting repetitive, but that’s because he comes at the same topic (battling insecurities) from different angles, dropping into the same cycle at different points. But it’s still the same topic, same cycle.

Anyway! I love Not Today because of how awesome the lyrics are in the chorus, in response to the lyrics in the verses.

He keeps the metaphor of a house in there, but those first lyrics: “I just feel I’m better off, staying in the same room I was born in,” have this lie. The room you’re born in could mean you’ve never grown, never taken any chance, you’ve literally never moved from where you started. Especially because he gives a reason for it; he’s seen the world outside, and he doesn’t see what he can do to impact it for the better. <- That part is why I don’t think those lyrics mean “it would be better if I were never born.” Even though the same basic idea, that he thinks he has nothing to offer, is in both interpretations.

But because of that melodic (is that the right word) pause between “I don’t know why” and “I just feel I,” in the opening line, I think you can miss the meaning of the full thought. He’s admitting he feels this way, but he’s not accepting it, necessarily. Because the whole song is a strike back at “Blurryface.” He admits how he feels, but the fact that he starts with “I don’t know why I feel this way” is a clue that he’s examining the feeling, instead of trusting and accepting it as fact. It’s true that he feels that way. But he’s not making it his home. He didn’t even pick the words, “staying in the same home I was born in.” Or unlike in The Judge, he doesn’t use a possessive objective. He doesn’t say “my room I was born in,” not just because it would sound weird, but also because he’s in a headspace where he’s not accepting these feelings at “face” value.

So I love that opening.

Then, in the first chorus, he’s basically talking about how those dark thoughts, those insecurities, aren’t just in his head anymore. They’re out in the open. Where everyone else can see them—yikes, maybe—but he’s focusing on the fact that they’re out where he can see them. Insecurity wants to hide and fake. Getting it out in the open is step 1 in the right direction. Now the lies, the insecurity, can’t get to him the way it used to when he kept it in his mind as if it were something worth entertaining or identifying with.

Then I like that he takes a break in the second chorus to be like, “pay attention to what I’m doing, the sound of the music is happy but the words are not.”

Because he’s feeling like there’s no use in trying—bad thing. But he’s not giving in to that feeling, he’s examining it for weaknesses—good thing. Happening at the same time. Like the happy sounds, but down words, of the song.

Which just makes you feel like you’re watching a battle. Which one is going to win? The good or the bad? Right now they’re both in the picture—what’s going to be the killing blow that knocks one out of the picture?

Then he goes back into the chorus, but this time I think the words have a different meaning, even though they’re the same: he took that aside to address the audience and explain what’s going on. So the lines in the second chorus, “you aren’t seeing my side,” seem like he’s still talking to us, telling the listeners that they haven’t been understanding what’s going on in his head as he fights his insecurities, but now he’s showing them, which is what they needed to wait for: you can’t know what someone’s going through or how they need help till they choose to let you see.

Then there’s the bridge about him fighting someone for testing him. Which I think people mostly take to mean “I’LL KILL YOU BLURRYFACE.” But I don’t think that’s what he’s saying.

I mean it’s fine. That could be why. But I think it kind of misses the fact that a dude who insists, “just because I play the piano doesn’t mean I am not willing to take you down,” is insecure. That’s an insecure thing to say. He thinks people are going to see him as weak. And he just throws out “because I play the piano” as like, an example of what he thinks people are judging him about. And he’ll fight them. But then immediately he’s like “I’m sorry.” And it’s funny, I love that whole lyric, my family always joins in on that part because it’s fun to sing.

But the point, I think, is so smart—he’s back to saying something insecure. He has an outburst about how others see him. Then he says “sorry.” But it’s even an insecure, embarrassed-sounding apology. So this verse transitions out of talking to the listener about what he’s insecure about, into, while he’s at it, worrying about what they think of him—and whoops, that was a Blurryface moment, wasn’t it? He was supposed to be fighting that. He was supposed to be examining it. He just slipped into it again, suddenly, and the mood of the song is an involuntary explosion, like he couldn’t help it. So then the next chorus, the changed one, is more of a confession of being messed-up, all over again. “I’m, I’m out of my mind / I’m not seeing things right / I waste all this time trying to run from you, but I’m, I’m out of my mind.” It’s “I’m out of my mind” in the traditional sense—he’s crazy, as in, he doesn’t see reality, even when he’s looking at himself. And you could take that “I waste all this time trying to run from you” as him trying to run and hide his messed-up self from others—which is a waste, because it’s born of insecurity—or you could take it as him running from God. Of course. Both work, for this moment in the song.

But. I think the chorus is the best part. It sounds like two recordings of Tyler Joseph’s voice is singing this part, so I can see why people think it’s a duel between him and the character Blurryface: he’s singing, “not today, let me rip open the windows—now I dare you to make yourself heard.” If he voices his insecurity, the people who love him will come help. But maybe the character Blurryface is singing that right back to him; “not today, let me rip open the windows—now I dare you to make yourself heard.” As if taunting him with the idea that people who hear the real Tyler Joseph may not accept him; if he’s exposed, he shouldn’t draw any attention to himself.

But for all that effort I put into verbalizing how I’ve seen the take that the chorus is Tyler Joseph and Blurryface fighting each other, I don’t 100% agree with it. Because it doesn’t make sense, based on the well-established idea that Blurryface is insecurity—and insecurity would never do this: “tore the curtains down, windows open now make a sound.”

The whole rest of the album takes the tack that turning yourself inside-out, showing people the real, messed-up you, being open, is exactly what the character Blurryface wouldn’t want. He’d never be saying anything so clear as what’s in the chorus.

I mean. Time out. Not to get too geeky in this already-absurdly-long post. But everything about the character was against that. He’s blurry. You can’t see the real him, his face. He doesn’t even like that he has a name, or has been distinguished from Tyler Joseph in any way. In all those cryptic videos from what I can remember of social media before the album came out, you never saw him, even though he was the one supposedly recording. And the videos made no clear sense, I feel like I remember one being just, like, a dark shot of the woods at night and like breathing or something. In the in-character Twitter posts, he can’t spell—he can’t even type anything that he has to say clearly, because clarity itself is a kind of commitment in communication, it tells people something about you one way or another, and Blurryface doesn’t want anyone to be able to hold him to anything he says.

So no, I don’t think he’s got any part in the chorus. I could be wrong. But I don’t think I am. I think it’s someone from the outside, who knows the fight going on inside Tyler Joseph with Blurryface, breaking in. Ripping the curtains off the rod. Kicking the windows open, letting the light in. Telling him to get it out there in the open. Or, daring the Blurryface character to say his lies out in the open. And I think it’s God. Because again, we already established, nobody else can see inside of Tyler Joseph, in his entirety, except God. But if it is, then Tyler isn’t just getting scooped out of the fight by God’s rescuing hand. He’s joined in the fight, and then told to keep fighting—and tell other people about it. “Heard your voice, ‘there’s no choice’ / tore the curtains down, windows open, now make a noise.”

This song would be higher up if it hit me in the emotions as much as Doubt does. That’s how good it is. It’s the big fight scene, but the character Blurryface loses once the house is torn open.

5. Polarize

GGGGR this is taking too long. But I love all of these songs so much, even if Blurryface isn’t my favorite album, I can’t just say succinct things about it.

There’s this interview I watched with Tyler Joseph way back when I was fresh into high school. I don’t remember the exact timeline, or whether or not this album was out already. But he basically talks through Romans 9 without saying so. He tries to explain to the interviewer that he shouldn’t be “messed up.” That that’s not just him being hard on himself, and oh, we’re all imperfect people. He tries to explain that there’s something broken in everyone, that we want to be better than we’re actually capable of being, and that points to the fact that we were designed to be different, and something went wrong. He tries to really organically explain that, but if I remember correctly the interviewer comes back with like another platitude, and I think the subject gets changed. (If I can find it again in the bowels of the Internet from 2013 or whatever it was I’ll post it. It’s what gripped my teenage brain about this band. And about trying to phrase the Gospel that I’d always heard in a way that made sense to people who have never heard.)

But this song is that. It’s him, trying to explain that he’s noticed the polar opposites of his nature. And he’s trying to decide which parts are which, and why, and where the division starts and ends. The problem is, the only One who can help him divide those clearly is God—and surprise surprise, Tyler Joseph’s trust in God is split, too.

This one is ranked so highly because of that. Because instead of just stopping at “I want to do the right thing, but I can’t, so let’s sort that out, and You help me,” he goes even deeper. “Wait, how do I even depend on You to help me when I can’t even decide if you’re there or not?” It’s Semi-Automatic all over again. It takes a different kind of deep thinking to admit that you can’t even ask for help with absolute certainty.

Polarize might get its own separate post.

4. Fairly Local

Fairly Local is this high on the list partly because of the music video and I’m not ashamed.

It’s the introduction to the character of Blurryface, and look at how he can’t make sustained eye contact. I love that.

I also love that the microphone in the music video is a light bulb. Because it’s the words of the song that are illuminating what’s going on in the songwriter’s head.

The duality is just a preview of Polarize, in the lyrics, but I love his vocalizations. Maybe you expected me to say more higher up on the list, but this is too long already, and the more I like it the more I want to make a separate post, if I ever let my obsession out of the locked-door part of my brain on tumblr again. (look now I’m using twenty one pilots imagery, what have you done?)

3. Doubt

This one is this high because he says “even when I doubt you, I’m no good without You.” And he’s talking about God. I might elaborate on that in a different post. I know how this song feels. Getting lost in trying to trace the paths you’ve already gone down in your brain, until even thinking about God isn’t a lifeline as much as it is a maze, because you’re thinking too much about your part in it, and you’re just left reaching out for Him blindly because you can’t see which direction He’s in anymore, in your own brain. And you need something from the outside to reach in and dig you out of yourself, because there’s nothing trustworthy in here anymore. I know how that feels. This song is Addict With a Pen’s sister.

2. Message Man

This one gets its own post for sure. But the lyrics are better than any other song aside from Heavydirtysoul on this album, I think.

1. Heavydirtysoul

This one is top of the list because 1) I don’t think it can take second place to any song musically on this album, and 2) the lyrics sum up the band. I’ll make a post of its own about this one, too.

Is that disappointing? That I went all the way to the top and didn’t give you a thought-out reason for the number one? Well, now you feel some of the insanity I experience when I listen to this band. “What do you mean, you’re stopping there? You took my hand and led me this far and now I have to stumble around in the dark and figure out the rest myself?”

😈

I really may come back and edit it. I’ll tag you if I do. Or just follow the “my favorite band” tag. Hey, thank you so much for this ask! I know I look way too hyper-fixated, but truthfully, they just came out with the new album. And you have to understand, the people around me can’t stand me saying two words about them, because I’ve talked too much about them. So you’ve become my outlet.

If you made it this far I want to hear your opinions, too! I’d do this for every album, but hopefully you learned not to open this can of worms 😂 because then I never stop talking

[hotdogdynamitezzz]

🦇 𝖂𝖊𝖉𝖓𝖊𝖘𝖉𝖆𝖞 𝕬𝖉𝖉𝖆𝖒𝖘 𝕭𝖎𝖗𝖙𝖍 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖗𝖙 🦇

Note: This is my own personal interpretation of what her birth chart looks like and how it represents Wednesday. The only confirmed section is the year and date, excluding the month and time. It's all for fun. Let me know your thoughts 🖤

Confirmed Birth Date: Friday the 13th in Vermont. Year of birth is 2006 as Wednesday is 16 in the series.

Wednesday's DOB used: October 13th, 2006 in Vermont, USA.

Her Chart ~ Rising in Scorpio, Sun in Libra, Moon in Cancer, Mercury in Scorpio, Venus in Libra, Mars in Libra.

Why I chose her as a Scorpio Rising:

Even though Wednesday sees the world through black and white, her strong moral values for right and wrong are defined by her Libra 11th house stellium that prioritizes objectivity, fairness & equity.

Even though Scorpio is an intense rising sign, and Wednesday is seemingly detached. She's actually quite an intense individual in the series when she protects her friends and her bond to her childhood scorpion in the past. You can also see her passionate determination to solve the mystery behind who the hyde and the hydes master are.

She just doesn't act on her emotions or overthink her feelings as I believe her cancer moon in the 8th house would conceal and hide her emotional nature as this house rules over what we conceal and keep secret as well as our fears. So, she's presented as having an "empty" heart, which isn't true, but I will explain more about this when I debrief my thoughts on her potential moon placement.

Because Scorpio is associated with death & and the void, this rising sign lends a cold demeanor to her personality that appears monotonous, but she does show her sudden bursts in her temper. Wednesday's actions show she cares more than she lets on as she's always looking out for eugene.

Wednesday is not fully detached as she gets in her head a lot and is shown to care deeply about Enid and crush on Tyler once she finds the courage to trust them enough. However, Wednesday is always polarized between who actually has her best interests in mind, and her perspective on the world remains suspicious and wounded. So she prefers loneliness and staying in the shadows to protect herself while also investigating those she deems as harmful to get an upper hand.

There is an obvious power dynamic present between herself and others that is common amongst scorpio risings. This power dynamic is people thinking that she's either better than everyone else or too odd to fit in, which is all just a misunderstanding. She has Pluto in the 1st House with this chart, and Pluto does show where we tend to be the black sheep and blamed yet at the same time are perceived as threats or having a hidden power others want to exploit or take. This fits with Wednesday's identity being heavily misunderstood by the school and Ms. Thornhill wants to use her as a sacrifice to resurrect Joseph Crackstone.

As a result of Wednesdays misunderstood intentions and intense personality, she ends up a bit ostracized at her school because she can't trust anyone. However, once she learns eugene and enid have her back, she stays very loyal to them. I believe all Scorpio risings just need to find their people in order to understand and show love to the world as it's often something they are left without.

Her appearance reflects that of a Scorpio rising in which she embraces the dark and macabre side of scorpio and their love for older clothing that reflects the past. Wednesday looks like a put-together ghoul, imo and seeing as how Scorpio rules over death, her appearance just fits that. I also see her smudged eyeliner and bangs, a fitting Scorpio look as many with this rising sign prefer bangs to conceal their forehead and add a layer of mystery.

Her Libra Stellium in the 11th House:

Main focus on Detachment, Selfishness, Objectiveness, Vengeance, Injustice is present in Wednesday's values. She has absolutely no desire for money, fame, status, or anything that would benefit her. Instead, her sole focus Is justice for others, specifically those who are innocently killed by the hyde.

Wednesday has her Sun, Venus & Mars in the 11th house which contributes not only to her life theme of bringing justice to a community and group of people, but also her motivation in life to fight for justice seen with her Sun - Mars conjunction.

This is the hero aspect to me, and Wednesday very well is the community's hero. I think it's important to note how she is written.off as self-absorbed and narcissistic by Xavier during their conflict. People assume Wednesday only thinks about herself, and for a period in time, SHE WAS only thinking about herself and her plan to capture the killer.

Wednesday's disregard and inability to see value in emotions reflects her Sun - Venus conjunction in the 11th house because while it's in Libra, this aspect is solely focused on prioritizing her values and ego. In the 11th house, this can translate to actually disregarding her personal feelings and only seeing importance in community and social matters, especially in Libra.

This is an objective sign that works with fairness meaning she can be very vindictive with no remorse because that is what's morally right in her opinion even if she takes it too far like we saw with Tyler trapped in the chair. 11th house & Aquarian people underdeveloped are known to take things too far just because they are so goal oriented that they tend to disregard the personal feelings of others as it's seen as a barrier to progression. I think this explains why she's only focused on her investigation and views her feelings as weak. Because her feelings could also be a part of her fears, which I will explain next.

Her Cancer Moon in the 8th House

Moon in Cancer was unexpected for many, but it makes a lot of sense the more I thought about it. The moon rules over intuition and subconscious, which is domicile in Cancer, meaning her intuition comes naturally to her. Even without visions, she had strong intuition, being naturally aware and suspicious of those around her. She wasn't your typical friendly cancer moon, but then again, her family isn't typical, so we have to focus on the signs qualities more so than stereotypes when analyzing her chart.

Wednesday was very reserved and internalized her feelings without realizing it. This is very cancerian behavior as they prefer to stay in their comfort zone, which in this case is by herself surrounded by darkness and gore, which her family and specifically her mother fostered.

Another point to acknowledge is how Wednesday has quite a supportive family. They got her out of boatloads of trouble and were there for her more than most other families. In fact, they were quite a clingy family that was close-knit and coddled Wednesday, to which she revolted against.

Considering the Moon rules over our behavior, what's genetically passed down through our mother & our maternal figure, we can see Wednesday is a lot like her mom as the moons' qualities are amplified in Cancer. Wednesday has her psychic visions passed down by Goody & Morticia.

The moon also shows our mom and the 8th house rules over what will withstand throughout time, the legends of individuals, and what will reoccur through generations in our bloodline. I believe this shows clearly with Wednesday's mom Morticia Addams' famous legacy at Nevermore Academy. Wednesday is set to repeat the same history as Goody and kill Joseph Crackstone as well as making a name for herself at Nevermore Academy like Morticia that will withstand time.

Moving onto Wednesday's emotional nature, for a water sign and house moon, you may expect an overly emotional individual, but it can actually create the opposite effect. A lot of the time, those that are water dominant have a clear control over how to express and use their emotions.

This means they can often end up expressing themselves as cold or detached as they don't lose control over their emotions easily. Instead, they control their emotions based on what they can use it for to benefit themselves and others. It's usually those that lack water in their chart that are overly emotional as a fun fact. In Wednesday's case, being both water & air dominant, there's a clear conflict between prioritizing her head or heart.

However, Wednesday chooses to guard her heart as this serves her the best and instead uses her high intelligence to manipulate others for answers. The 8th house rules over our fears and what we keep secret. The moon in Cancer here means she honestly did not want anyone at Nevermore knowing about her family, Wednesday is seen trying to remove her reputation from her mom and hide her family identity.

Another big fear of Wednesdays was trusting others. She had been so used to being stabbed in the back and people hurting her loved ones that it wasn't death that scared her. She actually loved gore. It was instead love and intimacy that she was afraid of expressing and experiencing. As the 8th house deals with deep, intimate bonds, Wednesday feared deep emotional connections throughout the series and purposely put others at a distance and self-sabotaged connections. Wednesday's fear of trust ultimately almoat put her in the grave, but she learmed a big lesson through enid, xavier & eugene on how to truly bond and trust their loyalty.

I'd say Enid helped her the most in this area as her polar opposite because Enid was the light Wednesday needed to nurture her hidden feelings that were comfiest, staying in the dark and alone. Enid brought Wednesday out of hiding and shined light by embracing it. This dynamic definitely resulted in some conflict between the two but ultimately an irreplaceable bond as Enid sought to help Wednesday understand her own emotional needs and to be able to recognize and percieve others intentions which is what cancer moons in any water house are the best at when they've matured.

This placement also indicates massive family secrets and could point towards Gomez Addams' false murder accusations and her mom instead thinking she murdered Garrett Gates when really he was poisoned.

Scorpio Mercury in the 12th House:

Her blunt and sharp edge, she is known for her intelligence and quick wit plus dark humor. She's more focused on strategy, vengeance, and solving challenges that come her way, not chatting up people. Scorpio does rule death, and I hate to say it, but most Scorpio Mercury natives tend to have a dead expression almost? They just sound very sarcastic 24/7 and sometimes monotonous unknowingly as this sign rules over paradoxes.

So naturally, they communicate in a paradoxical way that can be confusing despite their sharp straightforwardness due to mars traditional rulership. Wednesday's trademark humor is definitely seen here, as well as her perception that everyone has secrets, even those we don't suspect. She receives knowledge from higher realms and isolated or foreign places she touches, which can be attributed to the 12th House.

She often finds out secrets by chance, and her goal is to investigate. Wednesday is so secretive I think her Mercury placement here makes perfect sense, especially because she's always overthinking because of her second-guessing which is common for Scorpios as they struggle with knowing who to trust with their information just like how she struggled to trust tyler and xavier.

I'd also say that because this house rules over hidden enemies and Mercury & Jupiter is placed here, we can see how her neighborhood crush and someone who's highly educated and has authority would be her hidden enemy.

Jupiter in Scorpio 12th House:

This shows an abundance of spiritual knowledge & protection from the higher realm being Goody Addams. Jupiter is also very karmic and can show where you have the most success or fortune in which would be spiritual matters, foreign places & anything having to do with magic.

It's actually the best placement she could have for Nevermore as it literally points towards success over hidden enemies. As well as expansion towards what is invisible without a physical body. This means her dreams and visions as well as others' emotions she'd have a level of influence over. This is why Wednesday is seen as such a threat to Bianca imo.

Saturn in Leo 22° 9th House:

I mean, the 22nd degree is known as the kill or be killed degree, but also the fall from grace and rise back up degree. It's also in Leo the shining star in the 9th house that rules over religious and higher educational institutions, which Nevermore would fit into as a school full of magical people learning advanced topics for their powers.

Saturn is about delays, limitations, completing past life lessons, and discipline. Nevermore showed Wednesday that she may actually have gotten herself into some trouble and overestimated herself. Saturn here presents the lesson of Wednesday expressing her heart and this being delayed. Her lesson was to learn how to trust, which almost killed her because she trusted Tyler first. But then someone with leo qualities would be more fit to actually show Wednesday loyalty and love.

I'd say Wednesday's biggest setback was her disregard for her own and others' feelings, but this changed at Nevermore. Another interesting pattern with Saturn here can show where we build ourselves up and keep respect. Wednesday saved Nevermore, so obviously, she was highly respected but also went through many obstacles at her institution with her authority figure the principle Larissa Weems.

Although Larissa wanted the best for Wednesday, she viewed Larissa as a setback and someone who got in her way. Wednesday also struggles with authority figures as a common theme because she values her independence, which can show up as a common 9th house saturn theme and the battle against those who teach you life lessons. To say the least, Wednesday would struggle to listen to others' ideas, beliefs & morals until she matured because she just views hers as better and others as too restrictive and boring. Rules are not for Wednesday lol

Saturn also opposites Neptune in the 3rd House, which means there's a theme of common knowledge being hidden from the authorities and a lot of secret messages made to deceive the school and principle. The neighborhood conflict between Jericho and Nevermore can be seen here because Jericho holds more mystery and secrets than they let on in the neighborhood history, literally being a lie as they praise Joseph Crackstone.

On the other hand, Nevermore feels trapped by Jericho and unfairly treated. Saturn being a cold planet means Nevermore feels isolated from their neighborhood Jericho that is put on a literal pedestal built off of lies.

North Node in Pisces 4th house

Wednesday's life path is to create familial bonds and become closer to her family. This also has to do with searching family history and speaking to ancestors through her psychic abilities. Because her NN is in Pisces in the 4th House, this means she's supposed to nurture and grow her psychic abilities as the 4th House is how we foster and nurture while Pisces theme are unconscious psychic sense and higher emotional comprehension. The 4th House is the root of our being.

Therefore, it is in Wednesday to master her psychic abilities and further develop her emotional understanding. However, she has a hard time understanding herself. She's simply more comfortable with her SN in the 10th house Virgo, where she has an intelligent reputation and work from evidence and facts. She prefers to solve problems rather than work on emotional comprehension.

Pisces 4th House & Houseruler in 3rd (Neptune):

I can see this with Wednesday's struggle to emotionally understand or become attached to others. She may have often felt manipulated by her own family and dissociated a lot at home. The 4th House is our upbringing and emotional roots, how our emotions were nurtured. I can definitely see how Pisces here would make her feel insecure by her family but also protective over them as they're her greatest power and healers.

But at the same time, she felt like living in their shadow with past wounds that were brought up later by her father's accused murder. A theme seen from the I.C. ruler in the 3rd House where dirty rumors about her family were spread to the entire neighborhood.

[abcwordsurge]

hello my good friend mx surge! what kind of music do you like/prefer, genre-wise? got any favorite songs? and then can i get some favorite lyrics? smile! and. tell me what characters/stuff the lyrics make you think of if you'd like to go that far! doesn't have to be any characters I'd know about or even any at all. i am Curious <- all /nf! do as much as you like. i love asking questions and hearing your thoughts 🫡🫡 —marley

hello my wonderful friend marley! eeee I love talking about music. this is gonna be a long one

(disclaimer: I am admittedly Very Bad at genres, so I'm gonna give you artists and maybe you can decide for yourself what genres they are)

AJR is a big one, I could talk for days about AJR. they're one of the only bands I've been to a concert for (very very good concert, very fun, very dramatic, highly recommend, they are clearly showmen, not just musicians, and that makes for entertaining shows). I'm unironically following someone on tumblr who posts ONLY AJR stuff because every time I see the name "AJR" it's like a visceral reaction that makes me grin. ooh, also Twenty One Pilots. I love then. looking forward to their new album

I listen to a lot of broadway. some of my favorites are Be More Chill, Mean Girls, Six, and Titanic the Musical, just to name a few. I love seeing live shows especially- I saw Something Rotten not too long ago, and the Nick was BRILLIANT it. was, admittedly, a high school production, but nonetheless. he danced a lot, even unchoreographed dancing in the background, just like, vibing, and it was so obvious that he was just having a good time and enjoyed being there (the actor, that is, not the character) and I just liked watching him

oh, and Sleeping at Last! I first discovered them by their Atlas: Enneagram album, because I'm a nerd and adore personality tests (I'm an INTP and a 5 in case anyone was wondering), but I've been slowly absorbing the rest of their music, and it's all so beautiful

favorite songs... hm. I can't not say "2085," the closer to AJR's most recent album, and perhaps the most emotionally devastating song they have released as of yet (which is really saying something). best lyrics from that song are undoubtedly the last bit, where they say "you gotta get better, you've all that I got," then it gets softer and the lyrics change to "I gotta get better, I'm all that I've got." HEARTBREAKING /pos. I mean, I like that part enough that I wrote a whole fic inspired by it. one of my very few angst fics. "All That I've Got," a Minnesconsin fic (link here if you're curious). by the way, the first song of that album, "Maybe Man," is also a banger, highly recommend

I love "96000" from "In the Heights" (I think it's only in the movie version, not the musical version? not 100% sure though). ooh this song makes me crazy. this song... ok. I can't talk about this song without being a bit weird about it, but stick with me. this song always makes me think of the people on the Titanic. I read a book once with fictionalized versions of a few of the Titanic's officers and crew members, and once I was listening to this song and when it got to Sonny's verse, all I could think about was how exactly it matched fifth officer Harold Lowe's vibes. it's not really the lyrics, but several of the verses just remind me of various crew members' vibes. and it's. it's just a great song

"Air Catcher" by TOP. that's another wonderful song. always makes me think of Iowa to Wisconsin, for no particular reason. best lyric is "I don't believe in talking just to breathe," which is an idea that always appealed to me

Tyler Joseph is a BRILLIANT lyricist, actually. other great lyrics by him:

"our words are loud but now I'm talking action" (Neon Gravestones)

"for us to think is to be alive / and I will try with every rhyme / to come across like I am dying / to let you know you need to try to think" (Car Radio)

"death inspires me like a dog inspires a rabbit" (Heavydirtysoul)

"haunted by a couple big mistakes / she covers all the dents with the way she decorates" (Redecorate)

"like an "I love you" / that isn't words / like a song he wrote that's never heard" (Shy Away)

I love "despair" by leo. always makes me think of florida talking to loui (in a queerplatonic way, of course). another great floui song is "Tightrope" from The Greatest Showman, but I picture this one as loui to florida

holy moly this is even longer than expected. I'll leave you with this for now. you've probably gotten a good grasp of my taste by now haha. thank you sm for the ask, I had a delightful time answering :D

[beautifulpersonpeach]

I LOVE YOUR POSTS/RESPONSES.

Question (and I think I may know the answer but I’m going to ask anyway because why not?!): can you rank the BTS members visually (face and body) according to your personal preference. Feel free to include past opinions that have now changed.

In my opinion I found Jungkook to be the most good looking…but then I started looking at Jimin and Jesus needs to now come save me. Wahala. I don’t think I will be the same. Okthanksbye.

**

LMAO at "Wahala". Are you West African by any chance? Come say hi if you are! 💜

Hi Anon,

This is the sort of ask I would normally read once, chuckle, read again, then delete. Because what the fuck? Have you seen what they look like?? What kind of question is "rank the BTS members visually"? And then you specified "face and body"? Ma je kin sepe fun ehn o ahn ahn now kilode? Si je te maudis maintenant, je jure sur tout ce qui est saint et sur le prochain album de Beyoncé, que tes arrières petits-enfants ressentiront cette malédiction. Ne me teste pas.

...

But you said "wahala" and I'm feeling sentimental so here's the list for you to tear apart:

7. Kim Taehyung - He's got a nice-looking face. Like the Indian Brad Pitt, but he's Korean, which is somehow even better if you're into k-pop, apparently. I can tell on a cerebral level that he is handsome, but my heart doesn't know it... you know what I mean? His slim build is okay, but even he knows it can be better. I'm very interested in seeing what Taehyung looks like in 2025. I suspect he could go several levels up in my ranking, but we'll see.

6. Jeon Jungkook - The fact I'm ranking Jung Kook sixth should tell people the caliber of visual that is in BTS. All seven of them are mind numbingly hot. No cap. JK is ranked here because despite how hot he is, despite how peculiarly pretty he is, he is still the most baby-faced out of the guys. In my opinion.

5. Kim Seokjin - The shoulders give him several points I'm sorry. I mean, yeah his build is a bit lanky and he could fill out a bit more but still, the shoulders are wide af. I count it towards his overall visual and Jin does have a very Korean handsomeness to him. He's the sort of guy my grandma would want for me... and I know I'm not the only person from my background who has thought so.

4. Kim Namjoon - Joon has the prettiest eyes in BTS. Maybe Jimin ties with him, but Joon's dragon eyes are definitely ranked first in any case. He's worked on his physique too in recent years which has bumped him up my list. I wish he was more coordinated in his motor skills, but he's still pretty decent.

3. Jung Hoseok - Hobi is such a dreamboat. He's lanky but it works for him. The way Tyler Joseph's does for him. But even better than that, J-Hope has stamina. This man is fit. And he is beautiful. Definitively masculine but so delicately pretty. Like y'all don't know what platinum blonde Hobi did to me in 2021. This man is hot and capable and that is a very dangerous combination take it from me.

2. Min Yoongi - Nobody is surprised. I don't even know what to say because I actually bias him. Like I just typed his name out and had to pause to take a breath. I'm keeping it real with y'all rn. I'm that gone. I like that he's a bulldog the whole fandom sees as a cat because that's what he is. I love the music he makes. The way he mixes bass and toplines in all his tracks is incredible. Like, all the lyrics to the chorus of Beyonce's EGO, apply to Yoongi in spades.

...just saying.

Park Jimin - I've said before, he could seem gamine + serpentine + feline + cute all at the same time. It's just fun looking at a face capable of showing so much at once. It's fun looking at Jimin. That's the sort of visual he has. His face is interesting. It is odd in the most benign ways. And by that I mean, most people typically have one definitive facial feature, one that stands out, like a strong browbone, high cheekbones, etc. Really pretty people have maybe two, three tops. For Jimin, his entire face is constructed from distinctive features. I don't want to completely objectify the man by spelling it out for you but Jimin is ridiculously beautiful.

It's just facts.

Jimin has looks. You know what I mean? Jimin has looks where he accentuates certain things. My favourite Jimin looks are some when he looks serpentine, a bit like a snake. Like this:

*

*

*

(The first time I saw this photoshoot I remember I thought, "this is the look of a guy who will go there if there's need to." It's never made sense to underestimate him.)

I'm not sure it needs to be said but I also like his physique the best, whether it's leaner or bigger. Whatever weight he has he carries it well, he moves easily and that certainly adds to his visual. Jungkook too has recently mastered moving through space with ease, I hope what I mean can be communicated, but what I'm trying to say is: a very easy motion with no wasted movements. Anyway, Jimin is best at this, and maybe at a sub-conscious level it adds to his visual for me.

*

Lol, that's the ranking Anon.

[meandcring]

an  independent,  selective  &  mutually  exclusive  multi-muse  blog,  including  muses  from various  media   ....  est.  01.24. / revamped 06.24. penned  by  soph,  22  +.

MEANDER /mɪˈandə/ : follow a  winding  course ; wander at random ; an indirect or  aimless  journey ; an  ornamental  pattern of winding or  interlocking  lines.

stuyding: tba

carrd, board

rules & muses :

( other blogs: oc twenty-third doctor, fifteenth doctor, rose tyler )

rules !

none of the characters / franchises belong to me etc etc

this blog will be mutually exclusive - meaning i will interact with people who follow me and who i follow back !

this blog will most likely contain themes that could potentially be triggering to some people, i.e. loss, death, grief, trauma etc. however, i will tag all of them accordingly ( tw trigger)

i’m quite selective with who i write, which is why i prefer to write with mutuals only

this blog will be low activity - when i find some time to write i’ll gladly dedicate to any of my muses! there’s nothing sadder than forced writing - it’s usually also not very good - so i’ll pop on here when i have muse and motivation.

( however, if you’ve been waiting ages for a reply, don’t hesitate to message me! i probably just forgot. )

i’m open to shipping if the chemistry’s there, as long as you pop into my IM’s or my discord (mutuals only, upon request) we can figure something out! generally, i just love to explore dynamics of all kinds !

i like to use small text and tend to double space, too, but if you need me to change any of my formatting please don't hesitate to shoot me a message and i'll gladly adjust!

while i make my own resources, i'll be using the following icons etc. : tba

muses !

primary muses are in bold, secondary muses in italics, muses with an * are test muses !

dr. who

SALLY SPARROW. carey mulligan teresa palmer. canon. -> intuitive, brave, a real knack for problem-solving LETITIA 'TISH' JONES. gugu mbatha-raw. canon. -> eldest daughter syndrome, fiercely loyal, more than just a pretty face LUCY SAXON. victoria pedretti. canon. * -> 'essentially harmless and not very bright', a bit of a vicious vein, haunted JOANNE 'JOANIE' HALIMA SCOTT. may calamawy. oc -> pro at 'wrong place, wrong time', 80's girl in a year 3000+ world, a question mark wrapped up in one person PROF. WILLIAM 'WILL' HARTIGAN. matthew goode. oc. -> temporal sensivity, unconventional academic, cosmic connection

the htichhikers guide to the galaxy

ARTHUR DENT. joseph quinn. canon. * -> forever categorising things according to 'the earth, and everything else'

the vampire chronicles / interview with the vampire

LESTAT DE LIONCOURT. sam reid. canon. -> brat prince, only the impossible can do the impossible, the damndest creature THE VAMPIRE ARMAND. assad zaman. canon. * -> of machiavellian nature and botticellian beauty, ancient evil trying to adapt to the 21st century DANIEL MOLLOY. eric bogosian/luke brandon field. canon (temporarily: alex fitzalan). -> " what are you, an immortal idiot ? "

stranger things

EDDIE MUNSON. joseph quinn. canon. -> local hometown freak, no hero, heart of false gold

[andronetalks]

Kremlin Spokesman Suggests Moscow Prefers Kamala Harris Over Donald Trump

Zero Hedge BY TYLER DURDENTUESDAY, SEP 03, 2024 – 05:00 AM Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via modernity.news, After Vladimir Putin said he preferred Biden over Trump, the Kremlin now appears to favor Kamala Harris, saying that, “The Democrats are more predictable.” Read more…

[gonehollywoodrp]

CONGRATULATIONS, TALIA! your role of DYLAN O’BRIEN has been accepted and we’re happy to welcome you to GONE HOLLYWOOD! now that your application has been accepted, here are a few things that you should do and we’re looking forward to seeing you on the dash!

send your account in within 24 hours.

follow everyone on the blog roll.

follow all the tracked tags.

make sure you’re following all the guidelines for your new role.

send us a message if you’d like a link to our OOC blog.

OOC:

NAME/ALIAS: talia

AGE: 30

TIME ZONE: pst

PRONOUNS: she/her

____________________________________

IC:

PREFERRED CELEBRITY: dylan o'brien

BACKUP CELEBRITY: n/a

CELEBRITIES GENDER: male

CELEBRITIES PRONOUNS: he/him

AGE & BIRTHDAY: august 26 & 32

CAREER: actor

____________________________________

OTHER:

WANTED CONNECTIONS: britt robertson, tyler hoechlin, adam driver, cindy kimberly, taylor swift, sadie sink, tyler posey and anyone he’s worked with!

GUIDELINES PASSWORD: rfp.

DO YOU WANT YOUR CELEBRITY INCLUDED IN THE GOSSIP BLOG?: rfp.

TRIGGER WARNINGS: rfp.

CAN YOU ENSURE THE GIFS YOU USE WERE EITHER MADE BY YOURSELF OR FROM A CREATOR WHO ALLOWS THEIR GIFS TO BE USED IN HOLLYWOOD ROLEPLAYS?: of course!

____________________________________

ANYTHING ELSE:

MISC: dylan has his own blog, i’m also bringing in a previous plot where he has two children with an npc who are named asmara rhodes (daughter) & rizky andrew (son). i also play lily-rose, anya, zendaya, lily j, saoirse, alex, joseph, nicholas, keanu, will & glen!

[pinkhysteria]

If you had to pick between Klaroline and Klamille, which would you keep and which would you get rid of?

i would probably keep kc. kl@mille is more "significant" on TO which makes it being a snoozefest [for me] more bothersome.

(1) there are elements and scenes of kc i enjoy in a vacuum, lol. (2) i'm typically a spn4spn truther, lol. ✌🏽 vamp/vamp, witch/vamp, vamp/wolf, wolf/witch, witch/witch, etc, idc - that's what i favor. especially with a character like klaus. (3) i prefer joseph's acting in that dynamic, at least initially. (4) obvs not her biggest fan but there's more for me to be fond of and care about with caroline as an individual character than camille. (5) old school kcers were really good at making pretty edits of all sorts, and i'm shallow. 😁 their metas and inability to shut up about tyler have always offset any brainwashing capability of said edits, but they make me briefly supportive!

[jcmarchi]

Google at NeurIPS 2023

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/google-at-neurips-2023/

Google at NeurIPS 2023

This week the 37th annual Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS 2023), the biggest machine learning conference of the year, kicks off in New Orleans, LA. Google is proud to be a Diamond Level sponsor of NeurIPS this year and will have a strong presence with >170 accepted papers, two keynote talks, and additional contributions to the broader research community through organizational support and involvement in >20 workshops and tutorials. Google is also proud to be a Platinum Sponsor for both the Women in Machine Learning and LatinX in AI workshops. We look forward to sharing some of our extensive ML research and expanding our partnership with the broader ML research community.

Attending for NeurIPS 2023 in person? Come visit the Google Research booth to learn more about the exciting work we’re doing to solve some of the field’s most interesting challenges. Visit the @GoogleAI X (Twitter) account to find out about Google booth activities (e.g., demos and Q&A sessions).

You can learn more about our latest cutting edge work being presented at the conference in the list below (Google affiliations highlighted in bold). And see Google DeepMind’s blog to learn more about their participation at NeurIPS 2023.

Anonymous Learning via Look-Alike Clustering: A Precise Analysis of Model Generalization Adel Javanmard, Vahab Mirrokni

Better Private Linear Regression Through Better Private Feature Selection Travis Dick, Jennifer Gillenwater*, Matthew Joseph

Binarized Neural Machine Translation Yichi Zhang, Ankush Garg, Yuan Cao, Łukasz Lew, Behrooz Ghorbani*, Zhiru Zhang, Orhan Firat

BoardgameQA: A Dataset for Natural Language Reasoning with Contradictory Information Mehran Kazemi, Quan Yuan, Deepti Bhatia, Najoung Kim, Xin Xu, Vaiva Imbrasaite, Deepak Ramachandran

Boosting with Tempered Exponential Measures Richard Nock, Ehsan Amid, Manfred Warmuth

Concept Algebra for (Score-Based) Text-Controlled Generative Models Zihao Wang, Lin Gui, Jeffrey Negrea, Victor Veitch

Deep Contract Design via Discontinuous Networks Tonghan Wang, Paul Dütting, Dmitry Ivanov, Inbal Talgam-Cohen, David C. Parkes

Diffusion-SS3D: Diffusion Model for Semi-supervised 3D Object Detection Cheng-Ju Ho, Chen-Hsuan Tai, Yen-Yu Lin, Ming-Hsuan Yang, Yi-Hsuan Tsai

Eliciting User Preferences for Personalized Multi-Objective Decision Making through Comparative Feedback Han Shao, Lee Cohen, Avrim Blum, Yishay Mansour, Aadirupa Saha, Matthew Walter

Gradient Descent with Linearly Correlated Noise: Theory and Applications to Differential Privacy Anastasia Koloskova*, Ryan McKenna, Zachary Charles, J Keith Rush, Hugh Brendan McMahan

Hardness of Low Rank Approximation of Entrywise Transformed Matrix Products Tamas Sarlos, Xingyou Song, David P. Woodruff, Qiuyi (Richard) Zhang

Module-wise Adaptive Distillation for Multimodality Foundation Models

Chen Liang, Jiahui Yu, Ming-Hsuan Yang, Matthew Brown, Yin Cui, Tuo Zhao, Boqing Gong, Tianyi Zhou

Multi-Swap k-Means++ Lorenzo Beretta, Vincent Cohen-Addad, Silvio Lattanzi, Nikos Parotsidis

OpenMask3D: Open-Vocabulary 3D Instance Segmentation Ayça Takmaz, Elisabetta Fedele, Robert Sumner, Marc Pollefeys, Federico Tombari, Francis Engelmann

Order Matters in the Presence of Dataset Imbalance for Multilingual Learning Dami Choi*, Derrick Xin, Hamid Dadkhahi, Justin Gilmer, Ankush Garg, Orhan Firat, Chih-Kuan Yeh, Andrew M. Dai, Behrooz Ghorbani

PopSign ASL v1.0: An Isolated American Sign Language Dataset Collected via Smartphones Thad Starner, Sean Forbes, Matthew So, David Martin, Rohit Sridhar, Gururaj Deshpande, Sam Sepah, Sahir Shahryar, Khushi Bhardwaj, Tyler Kwok, Daksh Sehgal, Saad Hassan, Bill Neubauer, Sofia Vempala, Alec Tan, Jocelyn Heath, Unnathi Kumar, Priyanka Mosur, Tavenner Hall, Rajandeep Singh, Christopher Cui, Glenn Cameron, Sohier Dane, Garrett Tanzer

Semi-Implicit Denoising Diffusion Models (SIDDMs) Yanwu Xu*, Mingming Gong, Shaoan Xie, Wei Wei, Matthias Grundmann, Kayhan Batmanghelich, Tingbo Hou

State2Explanation: Concept-Based Explanations to Benefit Agent Learning and User Understanding Devleena Das, Sonia Chernova, Been Kim

StoryBench: A Multifaceted Benchmark for Continuous Story Visualization Emanuele Bugliarello*, Hernan Moraldo, Ruben Villegas, Mohammad Babaeizadeh, Mohammad Taghi Saffar, Han Zhang, Dumitru Erhan, Vittorio Ferrari, Pieter-Jan Kindermans, Paul Voigtlaender

Subject-driven Text-to-Image Generation via Apprenticeship Learning Wenhu Chen, Hexiang Hu, Yandong Li, Nataniel Ruiz, Xuhui Jia, Ming-Wei Chang, William W. Cohen

TpuGraphs: A Performance Prediction Dataset on Large Tensor Computational Graphs Phitchaya Mangpo Phothilimthana, Sami Abu-El-Haija, Kaidi Cao*, Bahare Fatemi, Mike Burrows, Charith Mendis*, Bryan Perozzi

Training Chain-of-Thought via Latent-Variable Inference Du Phan, Matthew D. Hoffman, David Dohan*, Sholto Douglas, Tuan Anh Le, Aaron Parisi, Pavel Sountsov, Charles Sutton, Sharad Vikram, Rif A. Saurous

Unified Lower Bounds for Interactive High-dimensional Estimation under Information Constraints Jayadev Acharya, Clement L. Canonne, Ziteng Sun, Himanshu Tyagi

What You See is What You Read? Improving Text-Image Alignment Evaluation Michal Yarom, Yonatan Bitton, Soravit Changpinyo, Roee Aharoni, Jonathan Herzig, Oran Lang, Eran Ofek, Idan Szpektor

When Does Confidence-Based Cascade Deferral Suffice? Wittawat Jitkrittum, Neha Gupta, Aditya Krishna Menon, Harikrishna Narasimhan, Ankit Singh Rawat, Sanjiv Kumar

Accelerating Molecular Graph Neural Networks via Knowledge Distillation Filip Ekström Kelvinius, Dimitar Georgiev, Artur Petrov Toshev, Johannes Gasteiger

AVIS: Autonomous Visual Information Seeking with Large Language Model Agent Ziniu Hu*, Ahmet Iscen, Chen Sun, Kai-Wei Chang, Yizhou Sun, David Ross, Cordelia Schmid, Alireza Fathi

Beyond Invariance: Test-Time Label-Shift Adaptation for Addressing “Spurious” Correlations Qingyao Sun, Kevin Patrick Murphy, Sayna Ebrahimi, Alexander D’Amour

Collaborative Score Distillation for Consistent Visual Editing Subin Kim, Kyungmin Lee, June Suk Choi, Jongheon Jeong, Kihyuk Sohn, Jinwoo Shin

CommonScenes: Generating Commonsense 3D Indoor Scenes with Scene Graphs Guangyao Zhai, Evin Pınar Örnek, Shun-Cheng Wu, Yan Di, Federico Tombari, Nassir Navab, Benjamin Busam

Computational Complexity of Learning Neural Networks: Smoothness and Degeneracy Amit Daniely, Nathan Srebro, Gal Vardi

A Computationally Efficient Sparsified Online Newton Method Fnu Devvrit*, Sai Surya Duvvuri, Rohan Anil, Vineet Gupta, Cho-Jui Hsieh, Inderjit S Dhillon

DDF-HO: Hand-Held Object Reconstruction via Conditional Directed Distance Field Chenyangguang Zhang, Yan Di, Ruida Zhang, Guangyao Zhai, Fabian Manhardt, Federico Tombari, Xiangyang Ji

Double Auctions with Two-sided Bandit Feedback Soumya Basu, Abishek Sankararaman

Grammar Prompting for Domain-Specific Language Generation with Large Language Models Bailin Wang, Zi Wang, Xuezhi Wang, Yuan Cao, Rif A. Saurous, Yoon Kim

Inconsistency, Instability, and Generalization Gap of Deep Neural Network Training Rie Johnson, Tong Zhang*

Large Graph Property Prediction via Graph Segment Training Kaidi Cao*, Phitchaya Mangpo Phothilimthana, Sami Abu-El-Haija, Dustin Zelle, Yanqi Zhou, Charith Mendis*, Jure Leskovec, Bryan Perozzi

On Computing Pairwise Statistics with Local Differential Privacy Badih Ghazi, Pritish Kamath, Ravi Kumar, Pasin Manurangsi, Adam Sealfon

On Student-teacher Deviations in Distillation: Does it Pay to Disobey? Vaishnavh Nagarajan, Aditya Krishna Menon, Srinadh Bhojanapalli, Hossein Mobahi, Sanjiv Kumar

Optimal Cross-learning for Contextual Bandits with Unknown Context Distributions Jon Schneider, Julian Zimmert

Near-Optimal k-Clustering in the Sliding Window Model David Woodruff, Peilin Zhong, Samson Zhou

Post Hoc Explanations of Language Models Can Improve Language Models Satyapriya Krishna, Jiaqi Ma, Dylan Z Slack, Asma Ghandeharioun, Sameer Singh, Himabindu Lakkaraju

Recommender Systems with Generative Retrieval Shashank Rajput*, Nikhil Mehta, Anima Singh, Raghunandan Hulikal Keshavan, Trung Vu, Lukasz Heldt, Lichan Hong, Yi Tay, Vinh Q. Tran, Jonah Samost, Maciej Kula, Ed H. Chi, Maheswaran Sathiamoorthy

Reinforcement Learning for Fine-tuning Text-to-Image Diffusion Models Ying Fan, Olivia Watkins, Yuqing Du, Hao Liu, Moonkyung Ryu, Craig Boutilier, Pieter Abbeel, Mohammad Ghavamzadeh*, Kangwook Lee, Kimin Lee*

Replicable Clustering Hossein Esfandiari, Amin Karbasi, Vahab Mirrokni, Grigoris Velegkas, Felix Zhou

Replicability in Reinforcement Learning Amin Karbasi, Grigoris Velegkas, Lin Yang, Felix Zhou

Riemannian Projection-free Online Learning Zihao Hu, Guanghui Wang, Jacob Abernethy

Sharpness-Aware Minimization Leads to Low-Rank Features Maksym Andriushchenko, Dara Bahri, Hossein Mobahi, Nicolas Flammarion

What is the Inductive Bias of Flatness Regularization? A Study of Deep Matrix Factorization Models Khashayar Gatmiry, Zhiyuan Li, Ching-Yao Chuang, Sashank Reddi, Tengyu Ma, Stefanie Jegelka

Block Low-Rank Preconditioner with Shared Basis for Stochastic Optimization Jui-Nan Yen, Sai Surya Duvvuri, Inderjit S Dhillon, Cho-Jui Hsieh

Blocked Collaborative Bandits: Online Collaborative Filtering with Per-Item Budget Constraints Soumyabrata Pal, Arun Sai Suggala, Karthikeyan Shanmugam, Prateek Jain

Boundary Guided Learning-Free Semantic Control with Diffusion Models Ye Zhu, Yu Wu, Zhiwei Deng, Olga Russakovsky, Yan Yan

Conditional Adapters: Parameter-efficient Transfer Learning with Fast Inference Tao Lei, Junwen Bai, Siddhartha Brahma, Joshua Ainslie, Kenton Lee, Yanqi Zhou, Nan Du*, Vincent Y. Zhao, Yuexin Wu, Bo Li, Yu Zhang, Ming-Wei Chang

Conformal Prediction for Time Series with Modern Hopfield Networks Andreas Auer, Martin Gauch, Daniel Klotz, Sepp Hochreiter

Does Visual Pretraining Help End-to-End Reasoning? Chen Sun, Calvin Luo, Xingyi Zhou, Anurag Arnab, Cordelia Schmid

Effective Robustness Against Natural Distribution Shifts for Models with Different Training Data Zhouxing Shi*, Nicholas Carlini, Ananth Balashankar, Ludwig Schmidt, Cho-Jui Hsieh, Alex Beutel*, Yao Qin

Improving Neural Network Representations Using Human Similarity Judgments Lukas Muttenthaler*, Lorenz Linhardt, Jonas Dippel, Robert A. Vandermeulen, Katherine Hermann, Andrew K. Lampinen, Simon Kornblith

Label Robust and Differentially Private Linear Regression: Computational and Statistical Efficiency Xiyang Liu, Prateek Jain, Weihao Kong, Sewoong Oh, Arun Sai Suggala

Mnemosyne: Learning to Train Transformers with Transformers Deepali Jain, Krzysztof Choromanski, Avinava Dubey, Sumeet Singh, Vikas Sindhwani, Tingnan Zhang, Jie Tan

Nash Regret Guarantees for Linear Bandits Ayush Sawarni, Soumyabrata Pal, Siddharth Barman

A Near-Linear Time Algorithm for the Chamfer Distance Ainesh Bakshi, Piotr Indyk, Rajesh Jayaram, Sandeep Silwal, Erik Waingarten.

On Differentially Private Sampling from Gaussian and Product Distributions Badih Ghazi, Xiao Hu*, Ravi Kumar, Pasin Manurangsi

On Dynamic Programming Decompositions of Static Risk Measures in Markov Decision Processes Jia Lin Hau, Erick Delage, Mohammad Ghavamzadeh*, Marek Petrik

ResMem: Learn What You Can and Memorize the Rest Zitong Yang, Michal Lukasik, Vaishnavh Nagarajan, Zonglin Li, Ankit Singh Rawat, Manzil Zaheer, Aditya Krishna Menon, Sanjiv Kumar

Responsible AI (RAI) Games and Ensembles Yash Gupta, Runtian Zhai, Arun Suggala, Pradeep Ravikumar

RoboCLIP: One Demonstration Is Enough to Learn Robot Policies Sumedh A Sontakke, Jesse Zhang, Sébastien M. R. Arnold, Karl Pertsch, Erdem Biyik, Dorsa Sadigh, Chelsea Finn, Laurent Itti

Robust Concept Erasure via Kernelized Rate-Distortion Maximization Somnath Basu Roy Chowdhury, Nicholas Monath, Kumar Avinava Dubey, Amr Ahmed, Snigdha Chaturvedi

Robust Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning via Adversarial Regularization: Theoretical Foundation and Stable Algorithms Alexander Bukharin, Yan Li, Yue Yu, Qingru Zhang, Zhehui Chen, Simiao Zuo, Chao Zhang, Songan Zhang, Tuo Zhao

Simplicity Bias in 1-Hidden Layer Neural Networks Depen Morwani*, Jatin Batra, Prateek Jain, Praneeth Netrapalli

SLaM: Student-Label Mixing for Distillation with Unlabeled Examples Vasilis Kontonis, Fotis Iliopoulos, Khoa Trinh, Cenk Baykal, Gaurav Menghani, Erik Vee

SNAP: Self-Supervised Neural Maps for Visual Positioning and Semantic Understanding Paul-Edouard Sarlin*, Eduard Trulls, Marc Pollefeys, Jan Hosang, Simon Lynen

SOAR: Improved Indexing for Approximate Nearest Neighbor Search Philip Sun, David Simcha, Dave Dopson, Ruiqi Guo, Sanjiv Kumar

StyleDrop: Text-to-Image Synthesis of Any Style Kihyuk Sohn, Lu Jiang, Jarred Barber, Kimin Lee*, Nataniel Ruiz, Dilip Krishnan, Huiwen Chang*, Yuanzhen Li, Irfan Essa, Michael Rubinstein, Yuan Hao, Glenn Entis, Irina Blok, Daniel Castro Chin

Three Towers: Flexible Contrastive Learning with Pretrained Image Models Jannik Kossen*, Mark Collier, Basil Mustafa, Xiao Wang, Xiaohua Zhai, Lucas Beyer, Andreas Steiner, Jesse Berent, Rodolphe Jenatton, Efi Kokiopoulou

Two-Stage Learning to Defer with Multiple Experts Anqi Mao, Christopher Mohri, Mehryar Mohri, Yutao Zhong

AdANNS: A Framework for Adaptive Semantic Search Aniket Rege, Aditya Kusupati, Sharan Ranjit S, Alan Fan, Qingqing Cao, Sham Kakade, Prateek Jain, Ali Farhadi

Cappy: Outperforming and Boosting Large Multi-Task LMs with a Small Scorer Bowen Tan*, Yun Zhu, Lijuan Liu, Eric Xing, Zhiting Hu, Jindong Chen

Causal-structure Driven Augmentations for Text OOD Generalization Amir Feder, Yoav Wald, Claudia Shi, Suchi Saria, David Blei

Dense-Exponential Random Features: Sharp Positive Estimators of the Gaussian Kernel Valerii Likhosherstov, Krzysztof Choromanski, Avinava Dubey, Frederick Liu, Tamas Sarlos, Adrian Weller

Diffusion Hyperfeatures: Searching Through Time and Space for Semantic Correspondence Grace Luo, Lisa Dunlap, Dong Huk Park, Aleksander Holynski, Trevor Darrell

Diffusion Self-Guidance for Controllable Image Generation Dave Epstein, Allan Jabri, Ben Poole, Alexei A Efros, Aleksander Holynski

Fully Dynamic k-Clustering in Õ(k) Update Time Sayan Bhattacharya, Martin Nicolas Costa, Silvio Lattanzi, Nikos Parotsidis

Improving CLIP Training with Language Rewrites Lijie Fan, Dilip Krishnan, Phillip Isola, Dina Katabi, Yonglong Tian

<!–k-Means Clustering with Distance-Based Privacy Alessandro Epasto, Vahab Mirrokni, Shyam Narayanan, Peilin Zhong

–>

LayoutGPT: Compositional Visual Planning and Generation with Large Language Models Weixi Feng, Wanrong Zhu, Tsu-Jui Fu, Varun Jampani, Arjun Reddy Akula, Xuehai He, Sugato Basu, Xin Eric Wang, William Yang Wang

Offline Reinforcement Learning for Mixture-of-Expert Dialogue Management Dhawal Gupta*, Yinlam Chow, Azamat Tulepbergenov, Mohammad Ghavamzadeh*, Craig Boutilier

Optimal Unbiased Randomizers for Regression with Label Differential Privacy Ashwinkumar Badanidiyuru, Badih Ghazi, Pritish Kamath, Ravi Kumar, Ethan Jacob Leeman, Pasin Manurangsi, Avinash V Varadarajan, Chiyuan Zhang

Paraphrasing Evades Detectors of AI-generated Text, but Retrieval Is an Effective Defense Kalpesh Krishna, Yixiao Song, Marzena Karpinska, John Wieting, Mohit Iyyer

ReMaX: Relaxing for Better Training on Efficient Panoptic Segmentation Shuyang Sun*, Weijun Wang, Qihang Yu*, Andrew Howard, Philip Torr, Liang-Chieh Chen*

Robust and Actively Secure Serverless Collaborative Learning Nicholas Franzese, Adam Dziedzic, Christopher A. Choquette-Choo, Mark R. Thomas, Muhammad Ahmad Kaleem, Stephan Rabanser, Congyu Fang, Somesh Jha, Nicolas Papernot, Xiao Wang

SpecTr: Fast Speculative Decoding via Optimal Transport Ziteng Sun, Ananda Theertha Suresh, Jae Hun Ro, Ahmad Beirami, Himanshu Jain, Felix Yu

Structured Prediction with Stronger Consistency Guarantees Anqi Mao, Mehryar Mohri, Yutao Zhong

Affinity-Aware Graph Networks Ameya Velingker, Ali Kemal Sinop, Ira Ktena, Petar Veličković, Sreenivas Gollapudi

ARTIC3D: Learning Robust Articulated 3D Shapes from Noisy Web Image Collections Chun-Han Yao*, Amit Raj, Wei-Chih Hung, Yuanzhen Li, Michael Rubinstein, Ming-Hsuan Yang, Varun Jampani

Black-Box Differential Privacy for Interactive ML Haim Kaplan, Yishay Mansour, Shay Moran, Kobbi Nissim, Uri Stemmer

Bypassing the Simulator: Near-Optimal Adversarial Linear Contextual Bandits Haolin Liu, Chen-Yu Wei, Julian Zimmert

DaTaSeg: Taming a Universal Multi-Dataset Multi-Task Segmentation Model

Xiuye Gu, Yin Cui*, Jonathan Huang, Abdullah Rashwan, Xuan Yang, Xingyi Zhou, Golnaz Ghiasi, Weicheng Kuo, Huizhong Chen, Liang-Chieh Chen*, David Ross

Easy Learning from Label Proportions Robert Busa-Fekete, Heejin Choi*, Travis Dick, Claudio Gentile, Andres Munoz Medina

Efficient Data Subset Selection to Generalize Training Across Models: Transductive and Inductive Networks Eeshaan Jain, Tushar Nandy, Gaurav Aggarwal, Ashish Tendulkar, Rishabh Iyer, Abir De

Faster Differentially Private Convex Optimization via Second-Order Methods Arun Ganesh, Mahdi Haghifam*, Thomas Steinke, Abhradeep Guha Thakurta

Finding Safe Zones of Markov Decision Processes Policies Lee Cohen, Yishay Mansour, Michal Moshkovitz

Focused Transformer: Contrastive Training for Context Scaling Szymon Tworkowski, Konrad Staniszewski, Mikołaj Pacek, Yuhuai Wu*, Henryk Michalewski, Piotr Miłoś

Front-door Adjustment Beyond Markov Equivalence with Limited Graph Knowledge Abhin Shah, Karthikeyan Shanmugam, Murat Kocaoglu

H-Consistency Bounds: Characterization and Extensions Anqi Mao, Mehryar Mohri, Yutao Zhong

Inverse Dynamics Pretraining Learns Good Representations for Multitask Imitation David Brandfonbrener, Ofir Nachum, Joan Bruna

Most Neural Networks Are Almost Learnable Amit Daniely, Nathan Srebro, Gal Vardi

Multiclass Boosting: Simple and Intuitive Weak Learning Criteria Nataly Brukhim, Amit Daniely, Yishay Mansour, Shay Moran

NeRF Revisited: Fixing Quadrature Instability in Volume Rendering Mikaela Angelina Uy, Kiyohiro Nakayama, Guandao Yang, Rahul Krishna Thomas, Leonidas Guibas, Ke Li

Privacy Amplification via Compression: Achieving the Optimal Privacy-Accuracy-Communication Trade-off in Distributed Mean Estimation Wei-Ning Chen, Dan Song, Ayfer Ozgur, Peter Kairouz

Private Federated Frequency Estimation: Adapting to the Hardness of the Instance Jingfeng Wu*, Wennan Zhu, Peter Kairouz, Vladimir Braverman

RETVec: Resilient and Efficient Text Vectorizer Elie Bursztein, Marina Zhang, Owen Skipper Vallis, Xinyu Jia, Alexey Kurakin

Symbolic Discovery of Optimization Algorithms Xiangning Chen*, Chen Liang, Da Huang, Esteban Real, Kaiyuan Wang, Hieu Pham, Xuanyi Dong, Thang Luong, Cho-Jui Hsieh, Yifeng Lu, Quoc V. Le

A Tale of Two Features: Stable Diffusion Complements DINO for Zero-Shot Semantic Correspondence Junyi Zhang, Charles Herrmann, Junhwa Hur, Luisa F. Polania, Varun Jampani, Deqing Sun, Ming-Hsuan Yang

A Trichotomy for Transductive Online Learning Steve Hanneke, Shay Moran, Jonathan Shafer

A Unified Fast Gradient Clipping Framework for DP-SGD William Kong, Andres Munoz Medina

Unleashing the Power of Randomization in Auditing Differentially Private ML Krishna Pillutla, Galen Andrew, Peter Kairouz, H. Brendan McMahan, Alina Oprea, Sewoong Oh

(Amplified) Banded Matrix Factorization: A unified approach to private training Christopher A Choquette-Choo, Arun Ganesh, Ryan McKenna, H Brendan McMahan, Keith Rush, Abhradeep Guha Thakurta, Zheng Xu

Adversarial Resilience in Sequential Prediction via Abstention Surbhi Goel, Steve Hanneke, Shay Moran, Abhishek Shetty

Alternating Gradient Descent and Mixture-of-Experts for Integrated Multimodal Perception Hassan Akbari, Dan Kondratyuk, Yin Cui, Rachel Hornung, Huisheng Wang, Hartwig Adam

Android in the Wild: A Large-Scale Dataset for Android Device Control Christopher Rawles, Alice Li, Daniel Rodriguez, Oriana Riva, Timothy Lillicrap

Benchmarking Robustness to Adversarial Image Obfuscations Florian Stimberg, Ayan Chakrabarti, Chun-Ta Lu, Hussein Hazimeh, Otilia Stretcu, Wei Qiao, Yintao Liu, Merve Kaya, Cyrus Rashtchian, Ariel Fuxman, Mehmet Tek, Sven Gowal

Building Socio-culturally Inclusive Stereotype Resources with Community Engagement Sunipa Dev, Jaya Goyal, Dinesh Tewari, Shachi Dave, Vinodkumar Prabhakaran

Consensus and Subjectivity of Skin Tone Annotation for ML Fairness Candice Schumann, Gbolahan O Olanubi, Auriel Wright, Ellis Monk Jr*, Courtney Heldreth, Susanna Ricco

Counting Distinct Elements Under Person-Level Differential Privacy Alexander Knop, Thomas Steinke

DICES Dataset: Diversity in Conversational AI Evaluation for Safety Lora Aroyo, Alex S. Taylor, Mark Diaz, Christopher M. Homan, Alicia Parrish, Greg Serapio-García, Vinodkumar Prabhakaran, Ding Wang

Does Progress on ImageNet Transfer to Real-world Datasets? Alex Fang, Simon Kornblith, Ludwig Schmidt

Estimating Generic 3D Room Structures from 2D Annotations Denys Rozumnyi*, Stefan Popov, Kevis-kokitsi Maninis, Matthias Nießner, Vittorio Ferrari

Large Language Model as Attributed Training Data Generator: A Tale of Diversity and Bias Yue Yu, Yuchen Zhuang, Jieyu Zhang, Yu Meng, Alexander Ratner, Ranjay Krishna, Jiaming Shen, Chao Zhang

MADLAD-400: A Multilingual And Document-Level Large Audited Dataset Sneha Kudugunta, Isaac Caswell, Biao Zhang, Xavier Garcia, Derrick Xin, Aditya Kusupati, Romi Stella, Ankur Bapna, Orhan Firat

Mechanic: A Learning Rate Tuner Ashok Cutkosky, Aaron Defazio, Harsh Mehta

NAVI: Category-Agnostic Image Collections with High-Quality 3D Shape and Pose Annotations Varun Jampani, Kevis-kokitsi Maninis, Andreas Engelhardt, Arjun Karpur, Karen Truong, Kyle Sargent, Stefan Popov, Andre Araujo, Ricardo Martin Brualla, Kaushal Patel, Daniel Vlasic, Vittorio Ferrari, Ameesh Makadia, Ce Liu*, Yuanzhen Li, Howard Zhou

Neural Ideal Large Eddy Simulation: Modeling Turbulence with Neural Stochastic Differential Equations Anudhyan Boral, Zhong Yi Wan, Leonardo Zepeda-Nunez, James Lottes, Qing Wang, Yi-Fan Chen, John Roberts Anderson, Fei Sha

Restart Sampling for Improving Generative Processes Yilun Xu, Mingyang Deng, Xiang Cheng, Yonglong Tian, Ziming Liu, Tommi Jaakkola

Rethinking Incentives in Recommender Systems: Are Monotone Rewards Always Beneficial? Fan Yao, Chuanhao Li, Karthik Abinav Sankararaman, Yiming Liao, Yan Zhu, Qifan Wang, Hongning Wang, Haifeng Xu

Revisiting Evaluation Metrics for Semantic Segmentation: Optimization and Evaluation of Fine-grained Intersection over Union Zifu Wang, Maxim Berman, Amal Rannen-Triki, Philip Torr, Devis Tuia, Tinne Tuytelaars, Luc Van Gool, Jiaqian Yu, Matthew B. Blaschko

RoboHive: A Unified Framework for Robot Learning Vikash Kumar, Rutav Shah, Gaoyue Zhou, Vincent Moens, Vittorio Caggiano, Abhishek Gupta, Aravind Rajeswaran

SatBird: Bird Species Distribution Modeling with Remote Sensing and Citizen Science Data Mélisande Teng, Amna Elmustafa, Benjamin Akera, Yoshua Bengio, Hager Radi, Hugo Larochelle, David Rolnick

Sparsity-Preserving Differentially Private Training of Large Embedding Models Badih Ghazi, Yangsibo Huang*, Pritish Kamath, Ravi Kumar, Pasin Manurangsi, Amer Sinha, Chiyuan Zhang

StableRep: Synthetic Images from Text-to-Image Models Make Strong Visual Representation Learners Yonglong Tian, Lijie Fan, Phillip Isola, Huiwen Chang, Dilip Krishnan

Towards Federated Foundation Models: Scalable Dataset Pipelines for Group-Structured Learning Zachary Charles, Nicole Mitchell, Krishna Pillutla, Michael Reneer, Zachary Garrett

Universality and Limitations of Prompt Tuning Yihan Wang, Jatin Chauhan, Wei Wang, Cho-Jui Hsieh

Unsupervised Semantic Correspondence Using Stable Diffusion Eric Hedlin, Gopal Sharma, Shweta Mahajan, Hossam Isack, Abhishek Kar, Andrea Tagliasacchi, Kwang Moo Yi

YouTube-ASL: A Large-Scale, Open-Domain American Sign Language-English Parallel Corpus Dave Uthus, Garrett Tanzer, Manfred Georg

The Noise Level in Linear Regression with Dependent Data Ingvar Ziemann, Stephen Tu, George J. Pappas, Nikolai Matni

[halfmoonbayroleplay]

CLAYTON CALHOUN is looking for their BROTHERS. More details can be found under the cut →

NAME SUGGESTIONS: No preference, but ideally a typical country-boy name.

AGE RANGE: Younger brother would be 30-33 & older brother 34-36

FACECLAIM SUGGESTIONS: Any white male that fits the age range would suit, but some suggestions include Jack Lowden, Michael Vlamis, Robert Pattinson, Garrett Hedlund, Joseph Quinn, Mike Faist & Tyler Young.

ADDITIONAL DETAILS. The three brothers have always been inseparable, bonded through the harsh treatment from their father following their mother’s abandonment of the family. Instead, Clay is the father figure between the three of them, although he’s absolutely not one to take advice from. Think of shameless vibes when you’re picturing these siblings: they’re a trio of wild idiots with no inhibitions, getting into trouble and engaging in petty crime for no other reason than they simply want to. Your character would not be wealthy, is unlikely to have a very good/respectable job, and would have a pronounced Southern/Tennessee accent.

CONTACT INFO. Please contact MANES on CLAYTONCALHOUN ON TUMBLR OR nonbinary johnny knoxville#9455 to discuss this connection.

[pardonmydelays]

poppyyyyyy

what’s your favourite piece of clothing that tyler has

ok, this question made me so happy because there's literally nothing in this world i'd love to talk about more than tyler joseph's clothes. like a normal person. ok. let's go.

FLORAL KIMONO. it's so fucking cool and i hope he will never stop wearing it actually. forever iconic.

SLUTTY TANK TOP. iconic, iconic, iconic. makes my brain go UDYEU37328384^#&%. i mean, can you even blame me... i think he also has a white version of it but i prefer black.

CLANCY'S JACKET. black. oversized. looks cool with a cat mask. makes him look like a smol bean. what's not to love.

THIS FUCKING BLOUSE. idk man. i want one too actually. it's so pretty i want to cry. he is so pretty i want to cry.

THOSE FUCKING PANTS. like seriously the logo makes them look so cool. and they look incredible with this t-shirt and boots, ugh. this whole outfit, i swear.

THE JACKET. he's a fucking rockstar. seriously, look at him. oh my god holy shit. just look at him. please. (this jacket deserves to be seen. i had to post more pics. i'm sorry. you're welcome).

THE MOTHERFUCKING BEANIE. i mean come on. this beanie is so short it doesn't even cover his ears. it doesn't make any sense to me. it's so fucking stupid. any normal person would look like a fucking idiot in it. and yet... tyler somehow looks so fucking hot. i can't explain. but i want one too.

i could also write another post about all of those oversized t-shirts he owns. i love and want all of them. but let's just leave it like that for now.

[artist-issues]

What kind of music/which artists do you like?

This is going to be a long answer! Twenty One Pilots is the only band I can definitively say is my favorite. They're in a different league than all the other bands or artists rattling around in my brain, close to the same way C.S. Lewis is in a league of his own in my brain when it comes to storytellers. Theres another ask I answered on my blog where I talked about why and how—I've loved them for twelve years. I'll put a whole ramble about them under the cut if you want to hear more about that.

I love Kings Kaleidoscope. Same types of topics as Twenty One Pilots, but with more overt Christianity and worship. So much as I prefer and love TøP, I'll always recommend Kings first.

I also love the Gray Havens for all the allegories and Lewisian imagery. And Sarah Sparks' Into the Lantern Wastes, for the same reason! Some of my favorite songs right now are by Gable Price and Friends. My easy listening is Needtobreathe and The Oh Hellos!

I love that Twenty One Pilots' music is super genuine. And I don't mean it like everyone else seems to when they talk about, like, NF singing about his grief and anger or Taylor Swift singing about her femininity in the genre, or whatever. I mean, if you look at Tyler Joseph's background and then look at the specific way he chooses to word things, you realize he's not just being genuine about the way he feels. He's being genuine about the way he thinks, and how those two things connect—and how wrong he often is. And how silly our culture's patterns of thought are, too.

That's harder to do. Because essentially what NF and Swift and artists like them are doing is they're just sharing with you. They're telling you about themselves. And sure, there is a type of vulnerability to that. But it's one thing to make a statement about yourself—it's another thing to use a statement about yourself to make a larger, more important point. That's a type of self-sacrifice and honesty that actually helps others, instead of just shines a spotlight on you and how relatable or raw or great you are.

I mean, obviously, you can't have "a larger, more important point" without also having "a genuine statement about yourself"—because if the people you're talking to don't trust you or relate to you or feel like you understand them, on some level, then they don't want to hear your "larger, more important point." But the fact is, with Twenty One Pilots, it's not all about them. They're uncomfortably honest about themselves because they want you to be I comfortably honest with yourself, about yourself, to lead you OUTSIDE of yourself.

And to God. I believe to God.

Anyway. Examples of what I'm talking about from their work below, in case you care, and haven't heard them, and just thought they were the latest indie-emo My Chemical Romance or that I just like them for the teen-angst-nostalgia of it all—

"Hello, I've been traveling in the desert of my mind," (which is from Addict With a Pen, a song about doubt and a crisis of faith and apathy, and my unmatched favorite) is such a smart way to talk about what it's like in the human brain. And how morbid and dry and lifeless it actually is in there, when you keep turning to yourself and looking inward for answers.

It's a desert in here. The water/Truth you need to survive comes from outside of your brain—and you have to constantly be reminded of the Truth/water from the outside, because the more you keep it in your head and analyze it, the more prone you are to only analyzing it as a form of control over it, when all its power to help you in the first place actually came from the fact that the Truth is outside you, bigger than you, beyond your control. Once you measure Truth by what you can understand/control, you've stripped it of its authority over you, and its authority over you was what was helping you. It was where faith came in. So then it "drains." And you have to shake yourself out of your brain and go back to looking outside of yourself, humbly, for answers. Asking God to wash you, give you a feeling and a faith that you can't produce by willing yourself to have it or thinking as hard as you can about it.

Or, "Mindless zombies walking around with a limp and an hunch, saying stuff like 'you only live once.'" (Thats from Heavydirtysoul.) That's such a smart way to say that. Mindless zombies—zombies literally feed on living brains, they're happy to consume other people's thoughts, but they don't have any of their own—they're "walking around with a limp and a hunch," so first off, they're moving, but it's slowly, and haltingly, because they're dead. Not really going anywhere, just going through the motions of living. And then "with a hunch" not only adds to that visual of them going through decaying, useless motion, but "hunch" can also just mean a gut impulse, an idea that's not fully thought out. The zombies need to quit talking like they're "seizing the day" while they are actually just going through the motions of life, never thinking seriously about why they do what they do, or what they believe.

He says some of the same idea in Car Radio, which is all about the good and the bad of thinking, and he claims he "will try to come across like I am dying to let you know you need to try to think." But then at the same time, there are repeated themes through songs like Trapdoor and Migraine that "nothing kills a man faster than his own head," or "sometimes to stay alive you gotta kill your mind." And back to Addict With a Pen.

Basically what I'm saying is Twenty One Pilots is so genuine that they get to a place where they say, "it's important to pay attention to why you think what you think and feel how you feel —but never to let your thoughts or feelings control you. You control them. Let your thoughts and feelings lead you to what's true—which is that you're broken, and so are those thoughts and feelings—so what are you going to believe in, instead of them?"

At least, that's the core of what I love about them. And they used to seem much clearer, in their own way, about what they thought everyone should believe in: God. Who else knows your own head and feelings better than you do—but is still 100% more trustworthy as a compass than you are?

Nowadays it feels a little like they've fallen in love with analyzing the thoughts and feelings. Like that figure focusing so hard on the little drop of truth in his hand in Addict With a Pen, when what he really needs to do is realize he can't hold onto it and needs the Water to hold onto him. But that's okay. I mean, as long as they don't stay there.

[roswell-rp]

STRIKER CANNON (johnny knoxville) is looking for his BROTHERS !! (1/2 SLOTS)

name of the connection: utp cannon — i would appreciate if you could be inkeeping with the other siblings, by having a ‘traditional’ first name but going by a nickname.

preferred faceclaim: i’ll be looking for one older brother between the ages of 35-39. any white male would fit for this but some suggestions are boyd holbrook, ryan gosling, jack lowden, michael vlamis, casey deidrick, theo james, robert pattinson & garrett hedlund. i would also be looking for one younger brother (30-34) and some ideas for faceclaims include jacob elordi, joseph quinn, mike faist, jeremy allen white, tyler young & nick robinson

description: ( TW: mentions of abuse ) the three brothers have always been inseparable, bonded through the harsh treatment from their father following their mother’s abandonment of the family (more info in Striker’s bio). instead striker is the father figure between the three of them, although he’s absolutely not one to take advice from. think of shameless vibes when you’re picturing these siblings: they’re a trio of wild idiots with no inhibitions, getting into trouble and engaging in petty crime for no other reason than they just want to. your character would not be wealthy, and is unlikely to have a very good/respectable job, and will have a pronounced southern/tennessee drawl.

player contacted before application?: yes please @strikercannon

[helpersofindie]

hi! do you have some suggestions for bandmates of joseph quinn and sophie thatcher? any race and gender identity, but preferably in the 21-30 year range. thank you!

this is quite a broad request so this got quite long. under the cut you will find 96 faceclaims. i hope these help you out!

david iacono (20)

lola tung (20)

talia ryder (20)

maitreyi ramakrishnan (20)

quannah chasinghorse (20)

xolo mariduena (21)

auli’i cravalho (21)

d’pharaoh woon-a-tai (21)

josie totah (21) – josie is a trans woman!

milo manheim (21)

sean kaufman (22)

renee rapp (22)

owen patrick joyner (22)

halle bailey (22)

conan gray (23)

megan suri (23)

lizeth selene (23) – lizeth is genderfluid and uses they/she pronouns!

jonathan daviss (23)

gavin casalegno (23)

sivan alyra rose (23) – sivan is nonbinary and uses she/they pronouns!

alycia pascual pena (23)

hunter schafer (23) – hunter is a trans woman!

sabrina carpenter (23)

chella man (23) – chella is a trans and genderqueer, uses he/him pronouns, and is deaf!

tanner buchanan (23)

coco jones (24)

ariela barer (24) – ariela is nonbinary and uses she/they pronouns!

froy gutierrez (24)

christopher briney (24)

maya hawke (24)

chloe bailey (24)

madeleine madden (24)

belmont cameli (24)

brianne tju (24)

luka sabbat (24)

felix mallard (24)

charlie gillespie (24)

toheeb jimoh (25)

diana silvers (25)

kaylee bryant (25) – kaylee uses she/they pronouns!

kiana lede (25)

rhenzy feliz (25)

evan mock (25)

quintessa swindell (25) – quintessa is nonbinary and uses they/he pronouns!

wolfgang novogratz (25)

jeremy shada (25)

alyah channelle scott (25)

elliot fletcher (26) – elliot is a trans man!

mason gooding (26)

jacob batalon (26)

chase sui wonders (26)

aj clementine (26) – aj is a trans woman!

zendaya (26)

chance perdomo (26)

tom holland (26)

alex fitzalan (26)

roman zaragoza (26)

alex aiono (26)

ryan potter (27)

haskiri velazquez (27)

zion moreno (27) – zion is a trans woman!

troye sivan (27)

rachel sennott (27)

ryan destiny (27)

haley lu richardson (27)

kehlani (27)

jessie mei li (27) – jessie is gender nonconforming and uses she/they pronouns!

nick robinson (27)

megan thee stallion (27)

cody christian (27)

amrit kaur (28)

reece king (28)

jordan fisher (28) – jordan uses he/they pronouns!

phoebe bridgers (28)

dylan gelula (28)

khadijha red thunder (28)

natasha liu bordizzo (28)

gavin leatherwood (28)

shamir bailey (28) – shamir is nonbinary and doesn’t have any preferred pronouns but does not prefer they/them pronouns!

yalitza aparicio (28)

pete davidson (29)

katie stevens (29)

liz gillies (29)

devery jacobs (29)

aisha dee (29)

avan jogia (30) – avan uses he/they pronouns!

keith powers (30)

kaitlyn alexander (30) – kaitlyn is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns!

keiynan lonsdale (30)

chase stokes (30)

joe keery (30)

mena massoud (31)

tyler posey (31)

meghann fahy (32)

olly alexander (32) – olly is nonbinary and uses he/him pronouns!

dev patel (32)