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gaygryffindorgal · 3 years

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Chapter 2: Apprentice Curse-Breakers

Summary: The new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher has some extracurricular activities in mind, and Ben struggles with the events of last year.

Pairings: Eventual OC/Merula Snyde

Word count: 3k

Warnings: Mild swearing, canon typical mean Merula

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Chapter 2: Apprentice Curse-Breakers

Their first class of the year was DADA, and that made Verna extremely nervous. Rowan had made it clear they didn’t think Rakepick could be trusted. In their words, she had been shifty at best and suspicious at worst last year when she had worked with Verna. Rowan was not happy about Rakepick’s appointment as a professor and that made Verna uneasy too. She had always known Rowan had far better judgement than her, and most days Charlie and Ben agreed with that sentiment. So, after breakfast, when the Gryffindors were filing into the DADA classroom, the mood between the four friends was not over the moon. Rakepick was already in the classroom, writing something at her desk. The class went through some major decorative changes each year when a new teacher took it over. It had become routine by now. For Rakepick, the theme seemed to be artifacts of various sizes and ages, that were spread all over the room on pedestals and tables, cabinets and other surfaces.

“Cursed items,” Rowan noted, when they took their seats.

“A niffler,” Verna replied, pointing out Sickleworth, Rakepick’s niffler whom she had had an unlikely partnership with last year, while investigating the Sleepwalking curse.

That was when Professor Rakepick got up from her seat, cleared her throat and snapped her wand, closing the classroom door and making writing appear on the blackboard in front of the class.

“Welcome to Defence Against the Dark Arts,” she announced, in a tone that implied not a small amount of unimpressedness. “I realize I am your fifth instructor in as many years, and that most of your other teachers’ methods were as questionable as their characters.”

Next to Verna, Rowan balled their hands into fists. They obviously had a thing or two to say about that.

“This year, I am not only going to teach you how to defend yourselves, but how to attack the Dark Arts,” Rakepick continued. “You will receive the finest instruction from someone who has actually faced the worst the Dark Arts have to offer.”

Something about the speech did make Verna listen. She couldn’t deny being interested in learning combat spells, the more the better, because she was sure to need them. From the corner of her eye, she also saw Merula listening intently. This year was gonna be another one spent trying to beat Merula to the top of their class. DADA was pretty much the only subject where she had any chance at all. Usually, it was Rowan and Merula vying for the title, but Verna wasn’t hopeless when it came to duelling and martial magic.

“They say this position is cursed,” Rakepick was saying now. “But breaking curses is what I do best. Now let’s get started, take out your books.”

After a whole class spent on how to deal with Ghouls, Verna was feeling much better about DADA. Maybe Rakepick wasn’t going to be so bad. Rowan didn’t feel the same way.

“She might know what she’s talking about, but she has no teaching experience, and I still don’t trust her after the way she dealt with you last year Verna,” they were saying, a little heated. “I think you should be careful if she decides to ask something from you, or… something…”

“Don’t you think you’re maybe overreacting a little bit?” asked Charlie.

“I agree with Rowan,” Ben inserted. “I don’t like her either.”

“We’ll be careful,” Verna assured her friends. “But Dumbledore must’ve had a reason hiring her.”

“Yeah, that’s true… I don’t know, I just don’t like this…” Rowan said and slowly the conversation turned to more casual matters, such as Barnaby Lee’s new pet crup puppy. The general consensus seemed to be that it was extremely cute.

After the day’s classes Verna was officially introduced to one Percy Weasley in the library. She and Charlie headed there to get started on charting out how much cramming they’d have to do for their O.W.L.s, only to find Bill and Percy already there, both noses buried deep in books, a scrappy-looking rat sitting on the table next to their study-material.

“Oh, hi Verna,” Bill said with a smile. “Did you two come to actually study?” The surprise in his voice was neither flattering nor unexpected.

“We came to plan on studying,” Verna told Bill, as she and Charlie sat down.

“Well, that’s better than nothing,” Bill chuckled and then patted Percy on the shoulder. “Percy, this is Verna.”

“I know,” Percy said in a manner that seemed much too adult-like for an 11-year-old. “She gave us a rather short introduction of Gryffindor common room last night, but I haven’t had a chance to properly introduce myself, I’m Percy Weasley, future prefect, Head Boy, and Minister for Magic.”

“It’s really nice to meet you, Percy, sounds like you have your future pretty well planned out,” Verna said and emulated her tone and smile to Beatrice from the previous night, with wildly different results. It appeared Percy was not a fan of hers.

“If you let him, he’ll plan your life for you, too,” Bill said, amused.

“This is my loyal rat, Scabbers,” Percy continued.

“Loyal?” asked Charlie. “It runs off every chance it gets.”

“There’s something off about that rat, yeah…” Bill agreed.

“Ron likes him!” Percy defended his pet.

“Ron’s eight, he likes everything except for spiders,” Charlie complained. Both of the older Weasleys seemed to have such a weird aversion for poor Scabbers that Verna felt bad for it.

“I have a rat too; his name is Hamish. He actually belonged to my brother, but I’ve been taking care of it in his absence.”

This seemed to appeal to Percy, whose tone towards Verna changed a little, when he said: “That’s really kind of you, to take care of your brother’s pet.”

Verna considered this a victory.

Their study session was cut short, when Professor Rakepick approached their table something like thirty minutes into Verna and Charlie trying to figure out what exactly to focus most on.

“Mr. Weasley,” she started, and all three of the Weasleys replied with an immediate ‘yes?’.

Verna stifled a laugh.

“William Weasley,” Rakepick specified. “Come with me. You too Miss Malinda, we have work to do.”

Exchanging a glance with Charlie, and Rowan’s misgivings about Rakepick running on a loop in her head, Verna followed Bill and the professor out of the library.

“What is this about?” she whispered to Bill.

“No idea, I guess we’ll find out soon, though…”

Rakepick took them up to her classroom, where Merula Snyde was already sitting on one of the desks, preoccupied with changing the colour of her painted nails to pay much attention to Verna and the others entering. Verna wasn’t happy to see her. Whatever Rakepick had in mind seemed to involve Merula, and that was never good news.

“Cease your activities Miss Snyde, we have important matters to discuss,” Rakepick commanded, and Merula immediately jumped down from the desk and stood straight. Verna and Bill walked up next to her as Rakepick went on to stand beside the teacher’s desk. She was tall and had a bearing of someone accustomed to commanding respect. Verna found it quite easy to believe she was capable of handling anything that was thrown at her. That’s how I want to be, she thought briefly.

“Congratulations you three. Of all the students at Hogwarts, I’ve chosen you to be my apprentice curse-breakers. Mr Weasley for his bravery and determination, Miss Snyde for her ambition and strength, and Miss Malinda for her natural talent, and obvious connection to the cursed vaults.”

“Why is Merula here?” Verna asked without missing a beat. She was not about to compromise her chances of rescuing her brother for the sake of Merula’s ambitions. She knew by now that Merula would never sacrifice her chances of getting whatever power and knowledge the vaults could give her, not for Jacob’s sake, not for anyone’s.

“Because she is a powerful witch and you’d be a fool not to accept her help, after all, I had to save you from Mr Copper’s attack just months ago.”

Merula remained quiet but gave Verna a smug grin.

“Enough. We need each other’s help to find the next vault and end its curse before anyone gets hurt,” Rakepick said. “I’m going to train you so that you can be more of a help than a hindrance to me, starting with the Incarcerous spell. Wands out!”

The three of them spent the next three hours attempting to learn the Binding spell with Rakepick’s instruction. She was a good teacher. Strict, demanding, but very clear in the way she instructed them, not leaning on any extra flash, just taking the simplest route to the desired outcome. Unsurprisingly, Bill was the first one to nail the spell. He had two years’ worth more experience and had always been talented. When Verna finally managed to cast the spell on Merula, she felt a sense of accomplishment far greater than if they had used training dummies. The spell conjured ropes that wound tightly around Merula, trapping her arms and binding her legs together. She wobbled for a while and then stumbled to the floor with a grunt. Verna couldn’t help but grin.

“Verna, I don’t think she can breathe…” Bill interrupted her victorious train of thought.

“Oh, shit,” Verna cursed. “Finite Incantatem!” she pointed her wand towards Merula and the ropes around her unbound. “Are you alright?” she asked despite herself.

“Of course, Malinda, mind your own business,” Merula spat, looking more hurt by the audacity of Verna asking her if she was okay. She got up and dusted off her ropes, avoiding looking at any of them.

Rakepick cleared her throat and said: “This is a valuable lesson; we are a team now. A family. No matter what happens, we must protect one another. Do you understand?”

With a sideways glance at Merula, Verna nodded. She hadn’t had this good of a chance to finding any of the previous vaults. Rakepick was an accomplished curse-breaker and now it started to make sense why she had singled out Verna the previous year. Maybe she had already known she’d work here this year and need Verna’s expertise with stopping another curse roaming the halls of Hogwarts. That was something good to tell Rowan, at least, to put their mind on ease.

“And the rest of you?” asked Rakepick with impatience.

“Of course,” Bill said immediately.

Merula eyed both of them with nothing short of disgust and then said: “Fine.”

“Good, then that’s all for tonight, you can go.”

Rakepick ushered them out of her class, and the three of them were left standing in the empty, darkening corridor. Verna had no idea about the time, but she guessed it was quite late and that they most definitely had missed dinner.

“So that was kind of… strange,” Bill said, but he sounded more excited than anything.

“Finally, someone is doing something in this school,” scoffed Merula.

“And I don’t want you or your megalomania getting in the way of saving my brother,” Verna exclaimed.

“Don’t worry Malinda, you finally have capable people helping so there’s a chance you won’t fuck this up.”

“Fuck off Merula.”

The shorter girl laughed, but there was nothing humorous about the sound. “You like to pretend you’re above the rest of us with your little mission to save your brother, but let’s face it; you’re just scared to admit you like feeling special. You want what’s inside those vaults just as much as me.”

“Shut your mouth about my brother,” Verna snarled. “I’m nothing like you.”

“Of course you’re not, cause I’m not pathetic.”

Verna instinctively reached for her wand and Merula did the same, taking a threatening step closer.

“Verna, we should… probably go… now,” Bill interrupted and placed himself between the two girls. He then proceeded to practically drag her towards the Gryffindor common room by the arm.

“I had it under control,” Verna said once they were out of earshot.

“Maybe, but I’d rather not take either one of you to the hospital wing in several different pieces.”

“Fine, yeah, you’re right or whatever… She just gets on my nerves.”

Bill gave her a curious look Verna couldn’t quite place, and then said: “Yeah, I know. You shouldn’t let her get to you that much, it’s what she wants.”

“I know, it’s infuriating.”

“You’re gonna have to be able to work together somehow, though.”

Verna frowned. “I’m not risking my brother’s, or anyone else’s life because of some school rivalry, don’t worry.”

“Good,” Bill said and then stopped. “Is that… Ben?” he asked and pointed to an alcove not far from where they were standing. It was dark so he was partly concealed in shadows, but when he heard his name, he looked towards them.

“Oh, hi Verna, Bill…”

“What are you sitting out here for?” Verna asked and went to her friend. Ben looked rough, like he hadn’t slept.

“I wanted to be alone and there’s always someone in the common room or the dorm…”

“Oh, sorry, I can go- “

“No, actually, can I talk to you for a second, Verna… I…” he trailed off and looked at Bill apologetically.

“I’ll go on ahead, don’t stay out long though,” Bill said reassuringly. Then he walked off to the direction of the Gryffindor tower.

“What did you want to talk about?” asked Verna and sat on the bench in the alcove next to Ben.

For a moment, Ben didn’t look like he was going to answer. Verna had the sudden urge to hug him, but she didn’t move, fearing that Ben would change his mind and leave like last night. Finally, he cleared his throat and stammered: “I’m scared that someone’s gonna take control of me again, and make me do something worse, or that I already have but I just can’t remember.”

He really was in a state. Gently, Verna laid a careful hand on his shoulder.

“We’ll work this out, you don’t have to deal with all this shit on your own, Ben, I’m the reason you’re in this mess in the first place.”

“I still don’t remember what really happened before I attacked you… Do you… do you really believe me? That I was controlled?”

“I promise you that I do, please at least stop worrying about that,” Verna assured him. Ben huffed out a breath and his shoulders relaxed a bit.

“Thank you, Verna, I don’t know if I’d be as understanding if I was in your shoes…”

Verna bit her lip. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to hear, but she couldn’t exactly blame Ben. Everything had gotten so messed up last year with Rowan and Ben arguing and Verna feeling like she was losing touch with them both. They used to all be so close and now every single interaction was laced with something like doubt. An uncertainty Verna wanted so badly to get rid of.

“We should head back to the common room before Filch finds us here, c’mon,” Verna said and got up.

Ben stood to follow and they were about to head after Bill, when suddenly Ben grabbed Verna’s arm and pulled her behind him.

“Look out!” he yelled and took out his wand but before he could so much as utter an incantation, a purple light hit him and knocked him to the side. Verna looked frantically for the source of the spell, and had her wand out in seconds, but she wasn’t fast enough either. Suddenly she felt her entire body stiffen up, as she was hit with what must’ve been the full body-bind curse. As she hit the ground quite painfully, she saw a hooded figure approach them from the shadows of the corridor. Desperately she tried to move, knowing full well it was not going to work. Her breathing came in shallow gasps as she lay there, helpless to do anything. The red-clad figure walked closer and kicked Verna’s wand out of her reach, as if it would’ve been any use for her in this state anyway.

“I told you death was coming to Hogwarts, Verna Malinda,” the figure said in a voice that was impossible to place or describe. It was modified with magic. “We still need you alive, but before this year ends, one of your friends has to die…”

Verna tried to focus on getting her fingers to move, to do something, anything. Her thoughts were a flurry of desperation and anger. The hooded figure leaned over Verna. She couldn’t make out a face or anything that could be used to recognize the attacker. Verna braced herself for something worse, but nothing happened. Instead, the figure stalked off, back into the shadows.

Verna was still trying to force her uncooperative muscles to move, when she saw Ben move in the corner of her eye. The boy sat up and Verna lost sight of him. She heard his footsteps and a muttered spell, and then felt her body able to move again. Without a second glance at Ben, Verna shot up like a lightning bolt, chasing into the direction the hooded person had disappeared to. She had to catch them, she had to. Her ears rang and when she looked down to her wand hand, it was shaking. She wasn’t sure if it was anger, fear, or both.

“Verna, wait!” she heard Ben’s voice, and footsteps echoing after her.

Of course, there was nothing and no one to find. Verna was getting sick of this. She balled her hands into fists so hard her nails dug into her palms. How could she have let the wizard incapacitate her like that? Ben caught up to her and Verna took notice of him now that she could think a little more clearly. He seemed fine, just a little rattled.

“Verna, hey, it’s okay,” Ben tried to reassure her, but it wasn’t okay. Someone had threatened to kill one of her friends. The thought made her chest feel like it was filled with water. The ease with witch this stranger had knocked both of them out of the game made Verna feel sick all over.

“This is bullshit.”

“Verna-“

She took a deep breath. “Are you alright?” she then asked Ben.

“Yeah, you?”

Verna nodded. “Do you think that was someone we know being used against us?”

“I don’t know to be honest… but we should head back now, before someone else attacks us…” Ben said and there was nothing to it, he was right. Verna knew she wasn’t going to find anything but trouble if she stayed here, so she followed Ben back to the Gryffindor common room.

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renee-writer · 4 years

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Guardians of the Stones Chapter 12 A Wedding Night and Lost Daughter

Explicit

They dance. Jamie isn't the best dancer but to be dancing with his wife ~ well for that he will take the men's teasing. They eat and are toasted.

“To the Fraser's. May they fill Lallybroch up with children.” Dougal, his other uncle announces. Jamie flushes. Children and how they are made~well he had yet to tell his bride that he was a virgin. Claire flushes for a different reason. She knows she should have told Jamie that Fergus may be the only child they may have.

Fergus and Hamish had disappeared and then reappeared with secretive smiles and whispered conversations behind their hands.

“Miss Claire, I will be staying with Hamish tonight and…”

“No. Let it be a surprise.” Hamish interrupts. She raises her brows to the young men but they take off with giggles.

“I wonder what that was about.” Claire inquires to Jamie.

“I suppose we will find out.” He leads her back into the dance floor. They dance close and kiss between moves. It is soon not enough. “Mrs. Fraser, shall we retire?”

“Yes please.” She had been married before but to not to a man as giving as Jamie. The thought of laying with him makes her dizzy with desire.

“My wife and I will be retiring now. Thank you for sharing this moment with us and please stay as long as you wish.” A chorus of cheers and whistles greet his announcement. He smiles as her leads Claire away.

They will spend their wedding night in her room off the surgery. When they enter they discover the lads secret. The room is alit in candles and there is a tray of food and several bottles of whisky and wine also on the table.

“Oh those dear boys.” Claire exclaims.

“What a wonderful gift.” Jamie agrees. His bride seems a bit nervous so he adds, “ You needn’t fear Claire. I wasn’t planning on jumping you.”

A smile. “I know you aren’t. It has just been awhile since I did this and,” she pauses as she tries to think of how to tell him. “well, my late husband, he wasn’t into much variety. He actually was a bit controlling over this and every aspect of our relationship. I never felt like I pleased him and I don’t want the same for us.”

“Oh Claire. As we are discussing it, I was in Paris as you ken. The Parisian lasses are a bit more adventurous. I have done a lot. I believe I can please you. But, I've yet to complete the act.”

“You are a virgin?” She is a bit taking aback by his admission. But also intrigued. To be his first..

“Aye. So, my dear wife, if you have your insecurities, you are not alone.” It helps~ that knowledge.

“Will you help me out of my dress Jamie?”

She sees him swallow before nodding. His hands shake a bit as he starts to undo her skirts. When he gets to the laces of her bodice, he is steadier and she is quaking with nervous anticipation. When she is done to her shift, she reaches for the belt holding his kilt on.

“My turn.” Her voice is thickened by desire.They are both breathing hard as she loosens it and it and the kilt fall to the floor. Now they are both just in one layer.

“Claire, may I see you?” he nervously asks. She smiles and unties her shift, letting it pool at her feet. She steps out of it and up to him. He stares at her, wide eyed.

“So none of the French lasses got nude in front of you?”

“Nae.” Said in a strangled tone.

“Let me see you too.” He quickly pulls the shirt off and she also stares. He is like a living version of one of the marble statues she had seen in a museum. And he is hers! She takes his hand and places it on her breasts. He groans and bends down to kiss her. She soon finds herself lifted against his erection as he guides them to the bed. He sits with her on his lap as he kisses down her neck. She lets out her held breath with a gasp when he reaches her breasts and draws a nipple in. He suckles hard and she cries out his name. Frank had been a selfish lover, never seeing to her. Jamie was very different.

Ah Dhai! The taste of her, the sounds she makes, the way she moves against him. They all conspire to drive himself into her. But he is determined to see to her first.

He slips a hand between them and finds the secret heat of her as wet and slippery as an eel. He kens that is a good thing. He moves to her other nipple and slips his hand into her heat.

“Oh!” is said by them both. It is a revelation, the feel of her so hot and soft. For her, who had never been touched wit tenderness there~ Frank just did to make sure she was wet enough to enter, it feels like a miracle.

He starts to move finding the nub that is the center of her pleasure, he focuses on that. He lifts off her breast to watch her. Her face is a ever changing pallet of pleasure. Her eyes wide and dark, her breath quick as is her heartbeat, her tongue comes out and licks her lips as her head falls back. He slips one and then another finger inside her.

“Oh God!” She groans out. She is close, he knows, and he longs to do something he had only seen done. So, he lays her down and slips down her belly, kissing and licking her tender skin. She starts to shiver under him. No one had ever and she is literally breathless with anticipation.

He sighs when he breathes in her scent. She smells so good and he is anxious to taste her. He slips down and lays prone between her legs. He parts her curls with his fingers and tongue. He breathes in her scent for a second before slipping his tongue out to taste her. She taste as good as she smells. He feels her hands land in his hair and tightly grip. He takes that as a sign he is doing well and continues.

She feels herself~ all she was before, Julia and Henry's daughter, Lamb's niece, Frank's wife, a combat nurse, a time traveler,~ dissolve under his talented tongue. She is Claire Fraser now and forever. She cries out her husband’s name loud enough to wake the entire castle as she climaxes for the first time in her life.

“Claire! Oh Claire, I need!” she comes back to herself to find her husband's desire filled eyes on her. She does too and reaches down and guides him into her. “Iffrin! Christ!” calls out the man who rarely says his God's name in vain.

“Yes, God yes!” Her body still vibrates under the effect of her orgasm and his hard length filling her is enough to almost send her right back over the edge. He starts to move gently at first. She copies him and feels it rebuilt, that wonderful power. “Jamie!” she whispers as her legs and arms lock around him. He moves a tad harder, grunting with the effort not to cum himself. She sees and presses up, placing that thrusting length where she needs it. It is enough. Her next ‘ Jamie' is a shout as she cums in a spectacular fashion.

“Claire! I canna!” he cries out himself as he also climaxes. She pulls his seed deep inside as she remains clamped around him.

Some time later, as they lay breathless beside each other, he says, “It was so much more then I thought it would be. Was it~ did you find it satisfactory?” She almost laughs but realizes he wouldn’t understand. So she takes a sobering breath and turns to face him.

“Jamie I had never found pleasure in the act before. Yes, my husband, I found it very satisfactory.”

“Oh! I will strive to always bring you pleasure. I love you Claire Fraser.”

“I love you Jamie Fraser.”

They are awakened by a knock on the door that next morning. Claire groans and buries her head back under the covers. Not a morning person on the best day, after a night discovering each others bodies all that night, this morning is very difficult. Jamie laughs and slips out of bed. He wraps the kilt around him and goes to answer it.

“Mr. Jamie, Mrs. Fitz sent me to bring you and Miss Claire breakfast.” Fergus greets him with a tray of food.

“Mrs. Fitz is a smart lady. Thank you Fergus. Go check on the horses and I will be down shortly.”

“Aye Mr. Jamie.” He leaves and Jamie turns back to his bride.

“I will tell him today that he will be our official son if he wishes.” Jamie comments as they eat.

“He will be so excited. Jamie, there is something I should have told you before we were wed. Fergus may be our only son. I tried before, with Frank. I never caught pregnant. I know handfast lasts a year and a day. If after you wish to.. Well, I will understand.”

“Leave you!” he looks at her shocked. “Claire I married ye for life. Naught will change that. If Fergus is our only one, he will be more then enough. You are enough. You are all I need in this world.”

“Oh my dear husband just when I think I can't love you more.” He kisses her deeply. He ends up taken longer then he had planned to get to Fergus.

“Fergus, you know Miss Claire and I want you to return to Lallybroch with us?”

“Aye?”

“Well, if you are agreeable we would like to make you a Fraser and our true son.”

“Oh Mr. Jamie! I would be honored. Do you truly mean it?”

“We do. You are already our son. We would just be making it official.”

“I can call Miss. Claire ma?”

“Aye as long as you call me da.”

“Da. May I go see ma.”

“You may. She is in her surgery.” He hurries off and Jamie smiles broadly. He is a blessed man.

1945

“So you know where Claire is? We know she was running from her bastard of a husband and went through.” Henry asks. His Ghaildhig is thick but Father Mackenzie is able to understand him.

“Yes. She landed in 1745 and is happy and settled.”

“I am glad but my wife and I still would like to see her.”

“You must fully recover first.” He can't argue that.

Later he is talking with Sister Ruth. “So, you will send them to Claire?”

“Maybe. I have something I need him to do first.”

“Aye.”

#my writing #outlander fanfic #jamie and claire #cannon divergence #outlander fandom #guardians of the stones #a wedding night and lost daughter

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tartantardis · 5 years

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The tenth* TARDIS Tennant

(* technically the eleventh, but we’ll let that go for the sake of alliteration... Anyway, this interview took place in Glasgow, when the Doctor Who team descended for a promotional drive for the 2006 series, eswith David Tennant, Billie Piper, Russell T Davies, Phil Collinson, Steven Moffat and others in attendance. Oh, and Billie’s then-boyfriend too. They premiered Tooth and Claw, a week before New Earth had been shown. This is an edited compilation of the highlights of what they said. As a result of this press conference, I stayed in touch with Russell, and he’s kind enough to give me quotes for Vortex now and again. Also, after I spoke to David Tennant, he was shocked to learn that Hamish Wilson, the other Jamie from The Mind Robber, was the same one who he had just missed out on as a lecturer at the RSAMD - as was - in Glasgow!)

When David Tennant became the Doctor in 2005, it fulfilled the young actor's dream.

The Scotsman, who was 33 at the time, had previously played guest roles in various Doctor Who audio plays from Big Finish Productions, opposite his predecessors Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy - and was over the moon to succeed Christopher Eccleston in the TARDIS.

When it came to casting a new Doctor, executive producer Russel T Davies looked to his leading man from another show which he had just made for the BBC, Casanova.

Russell said: "When I first saw the audition tape for Casanova, I didn't know who he was. I wasn't looking for a big star, and this was before Blackpool had been on, but I knew he was a well-known talent in Scotland.

"We saw him, we loved him and we cast him and enjoyed working with him.

"I also knew he was a big Doctor Who fan!

"Although Casanova was nothing to do with Doctor Who, as it was a separate production made by a separate company, when we learned Chris was leaving it all just fitted together very nicely. We didn't screentest him, having just done three hours of Casanova with David, and by that time I'd seen Blackpool."

And David recalled: "I remember being thrilled to bits when I got asked, and then thinking, 'Is this a good idea?' It didn't last long!"

However, there was controversy soon after David was cast, when it was revealed he wouldn't be using his natural accent.

Russell explained: "I didn't ban the accent - it was just part of the creation of David's Doctor. We talked about the costume, as, for example, we didn't say David would have to wear the suit. It was just a cast of human beings coming together and talking about things."

David said: "When Russell came to me, that was how he asked me to play it. I wouldn't say I was disappointed, it's just what I was asked to do. I've always that that part of working as an actor was to take on different accents.

"It doesn't make me any less Scottish because I'm not using my Scottish accent.

"It didn't bother me in particular, but it was a nice chance to do one episode where the Doctor came up with the idea of slipping into a Scottish accent which, remarkably, the Doctor can do!"

David's co-star Billie Piper added: "In the Christmas episode, the idea was that Rose's accent would have rubbed off on the Doctor, but we never actually got around to filming it."

David said: "It was like a chick imprinting on someone when it comes out of an egg."

Comparing the two Doctors, Billie said of David and Chris: "They are different people and bring different things. David's Doctor is a lot more emotional, while Chris's Doctor was more intense.

"Of course they are going to have a different approach, but they are playing the same part. A new person robs off on you very quickly, and you adjust - she moved with the times and the man."

David didn't get the chance to meet his predecessor at the regeneration, as it was shot weeks apart.

He said: "I didn't unfortunately, because of the way it had to be shot - we shot the regeneration on separate days. We haven't bumped into each other, unfortunately. I'm sure we will at some point."

David's third story as the Doctor, Tooth and Claw, saw the TARDIS land in Scotland, which delighted the actor.

He said: "It wasn't a specific ambition, but story-wise, it's nice if you move the characters around and take them to different places. Obviously with filming in Wales, Cardiff has had a shout.

"I was quite keen that Scotland should get a shout and it has certain personal ramifications as well. We filmed in Wales, but there's one shot where on the hillside, they've added a little bit of purple heather. But on the whole, it's remarkably similar with some of the landscape we have up here, so there wasn't a lot that needed doing."

Tooth and Claw was a dark story, featuring grisly deaths, but David denied that the series was too scary.

He said of Tooth and Claw: "I think it does push it quite far, but it's still, ultimately, very responsibly done. It's within a fantastic environment and I think children understand that too.

"I think that's part of growing up, being scared. That's what Doctor Who has done since 1963 and I'm glad to see it continuing to do so.

"A gore-fest would be ridiculous - there's no blood, and it was just fun.

"I think Doctor Who has had horror elements for as long as I can remember. It tours the genres - in the first one we were in a hospital five billion years in the future, then we we're in Scotland and it's gothic horror, the next week is a kind of Grange Hill - it's what Doctor Who does best - every week it's a new style of story."

David's first full series saw the Doctor and Rose growing closer than ever before, building on the friendship which was established with the Ninth Doctor.

"The Doctor and companion has always been very important," said David, "particularly in this series, but the way Russell writes it, it's always an emotional thing, which maybe the show hadn't had before. Rose's family ultimately became the Doctor's family.

"In episode eight, it looks like we're cut off from everything, forever, and we have a quiet moment to consider that idea of never returning home."

David admitted that putting himself in the spotlight as Doctor Who would mean his every action was analysed by the series' devoted fans, for years to come, as well as putting himself in the firing line for TV critics.

He said: "I don't think anybody ever likes being told they are not good at what you do. You invest a lot into what you do. You want everyone to tell you you are great all the time, but I'm wise enough to know what to expect.

"A show like this receives so much scrutiny and analysis, you are never going to please all the people, all the time."

A notoriously private man, David also found that his private life was subject to much speculation, with his romantic relationships regularly putting him in the gossip columns.

He added: "Nobody teaches you how to deal with that sort of stuff. You have to decide where the lines are drawn, and draw them yourself - and hope you leep your own personal integrity without pissing everyone off because you are being snooty about answering questions.

"You have to just try and keep yourself comfortable with what you are really about."

#DoctorWho #DavidTennant #BilliePiper #RussellTDavies #Glasgow #Scotland

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dreamings-free · 3 years

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By Hamish Bowles November 13, 2020

THE MEN’S BATHING POND in London’s Hampstead Heath at daybreak on a gloomy September morning seemed such an unlikely locale for my first meeting with Harry Styles, music’s legendarily charm-heavy style czar, that I wondered perhaps if something had been lost in translation.

But then there is Styles, cheerily gung ho, hidden behind a festive yellow bandana mask and a sweatshirt of his own design, surprisingly printed with three portraits of his intellectual pinup, the author Alain de Botton. “I love his writing,” says Styles. “I just think he’s brilliant. I saw him give a talk about the keys to happiness, and how one of the keys is living among friends, and how real friendship stems from being vulnerable with someone.”

In turn, de Botton’s 2016 novel The Course of Love taught Styles that “when it comes to relationships, you just expect yourself to be good at it…[but] being in a real relationship with someone is a skill,” one that Styles himself has often had to hone in the unforgiving klieg light of public attention, and in the company of such high-profile paramours as Taylor Swift and—well, Styles is too much of a gentleman to name names.

That sweatshirt and the Columbia Records tracksuit bottoms are removed in the quaint wooden open-air changing room, with its Swallows and Amazons vibe. A handful of intrepid fellow patrons in various states of undress are blissfully unaware of the 26-year-old supernova in their midst, although I must admit I’m finding it rather difficult to take my eyes off him, try as I might. Styles has been on a six-day juice cleanse in readiness for Vogue’s photographer Tyler Mitchell. He practices Pilates (“I’ve got very tight hamstrings—trying to get those open”) and meditates twice a day. “It has changed my life,” he avers, “but it’s so subtle. It’s helped me just be more present. I feel like I’m able to enjoy the things that are happening right in front of me, even if it’s food or it’s coffee or it’s being with a friend—or a swim in a really cold pond!” Styles also feels that his meditation practices have helped him through the tumult of 2020: “Meditation just brings a stillness that has been really beneficial, I think, for my mental health.”

Styles has been a pescatarian for three years, inspired by the vegan food that several members of his current band prepared on tour. “My body definitely feels better for it,” he says. His shapely torso is prettily inscribed with the tattoos of a Victorian sailor—a rose, a galleon, a mermaid, an anchor, and a palm tree among them, and, straddling his clavicle, the dates 1967 and 1957 (the respective birth years of his mother and father). Frankly, I rather wish I’d packed a beach muumuu.

We take the piratical gangplank that juts into the water and dive in. Let me tell you, this is not the Aegean. The glacial water is a cloudy phlegm green beneath the surface, and clammy reeds slap one’s ankles. Styles, who admits he will try any fad, has recently had a couple of cryotherapy sessions and is evidently less susceptible to the cold. By the time we have swum a full circuit, however, body temperatures have adjusted, and the ice, you might say, has been broken. Duly invigorated, we are ready to face the day. Styles has thoughtfully brought a canister of coffee and some bottles of water in his backpack, and we sit at either end of a park bench for a socially distanced chat.

It seems that he has had a productive year. At the onset of lockdown, Styles found himself in his second home, in the canyons of Los Angeles. After a few days on his own, however, he moved in with a pod of three friends (and subsequently with two band members, Mitch Rowland and Sarah Jones). They “would put names in a hat and plan the week out,” Styles explains. “If you were Monday, you would choose the movie, dinner, and the activity for that day. I like to make soups, and there was a big array of movies; we went all over the board,” from Goodfellas to Clueless. The experience, says Styles, “has been a really good lesson in what makes me happy now. It’s such a good example of living in the moment. I honestly just like being around my friends,” he adds. “That’s been my biggest takeaway. Just being on my own the whole time, I would have been miserable.”

Styles is big on friendship groups and considers his former and legendarily hysteria-inducing boy band, One Direction, to have been one of them. “I think the typical thing is to come out of a band like that and almost feel like you have to apologize for being in it,” says Styles. “But I loved my time in it. It was all new to me, and I was trying to learn as much as I could. I wanted to soak it in…. I think that’s probably why I like traveling now—soaking stuff up.” In a post-COVID future, he is contemplating a temporary move to Tokyo, explaining that “there’s a respect and a stillness, a quietness that I really loved every time I’ve been there.”

In 1D, Styles was making music whenever he could. “After a show you’d go in a hotel room and put down some vocals,” he recalls. As a result, his first solo album, 2017’s Harry Styles, “was when I really fell in love with being in the studio,” he says. “I loved it as much as touring.” Today he favors isolating with his core group of collaborators, “our little bubble”—Rowland, Kid Harpoon (né Tom Hull), and Tyler Johnson. “A safe space,” as he describes it.

In the music he has been working on in 2020, Styles wants to capture the experimental spirit that informed his second album, last year’s Fine Line. With his debut album, “I was very much finding out what my sound was as a solo artist,” he says. “I can see all the places where it almost felt like I was bowling with the bumpers up. I think with the second album I let go of the fear of getting it wrong and…it was really joyous and really free. I think with music it’s so important to evolve—and that extends to clothes and videos and all that stuff. That’s why you look back at David Bowie with Ziggy Stardust or the Beatles and their different eras—that fearlessness is super inspiring.”

The seismic changes of 2020—including the Black Lives Matter uprising around racial justice—has also provided Styles with an opportunity for personal growth. “I think it’s a time for opening up and learning and listening,” he says. “I’ve been trying to read and educate myself so that in 20 years I’m still doing the right things and taking the right steps. I believe in karma, and I think it’s just a time right now where we could use a little more kindness and empathy and patience with people, be a little more prepared to listen and grow.”

Meanwhile, Styles’s euphoric single “Watermelon Sugar” became something of an escapist anthem for this dystopian summer of 2020. The video, featuring Styles (dressed in ’70s-flavored Gucci and Bode) cavorting with a pack of beach-babe girls and boys, was shot in January, before lockdown rules came into play. By the time it was ready to be released in May, a poignant epigraph had been added: “This video is dedicated to touching.”

Styles is looking forward to touring again, when “it’s safe for everyone,” because, as he notes, “being up against people is part of the whole thing. You can’t really re-create it in any way.” But it hasn’t always been so. Early in his career, Styles was so stricken with stage fright that he regularly threw up preperformance. “I just always thought I was going to mess up or something,” he remembers. “But I’ve felt really lucky to have a group of incredibly generous fans. They’re generous emotionally—and when they come to the show, they give so much that it creates this atmosphere that I’ve always found so loving and accepting.”

THIS SUMMER, when it was safe enough to travel, Styles returned to his London home, which is where he suggests we head now, setting off in his modish Primrose Yellow ’73 Jaguar that smells of gasoline and leatherette. “Me and my dad have always bonded over cars,” Styles explains. “I never thought I’d be someone who just went out for a leisurely drive, purely for enjoyment.” On sleepless jet-lagged nights he’ll drive through London’s quiet streets, seeing neighborhoods in a new way. “I find it quite relaxing,” he says.

Over the summer Styles took a road trip with his artist friend Tomo Campbell through France and Italy, setting off at four in the morning and spending the night in Geneva, where they jumped in the lake “to wake ourselves up.” (I see a pattern emerging.) At the end of the trip Styles drove home alone, accompanied by an upbeat playlist that included “Aretha Franklin, Parliament, and a lot of Stevie Wonder. It was really fun for me,” he says. “I don’t travel like that a lot. I’m usually in such a rush, but there was a stillness to it. I love the feeling of nobody knowing where I am, that kind of escape...and freedom.”

GROWING UP in a village in the North of England, Styles thought of London as a world apart: “It truly felt like a different country.” At a wide-eyed 16, he came down to the teeming metropolis after his mother entered him on the U.K. talent-search show The X Factor. “I went to the audition to find out if I could sing,” Styles recalls, “or if my mum was just being nice to me.” Styles was eliminated but subsequently brought back with other contestants—Niall Horan, Liam Payne, Louis Tomlinson, and Zayn Malik—to form a boy band that was named (on Styles’s suggestion) One Direction. The wily X Factor creator and judge, Simon Cowell, soon signed them to his label Syco Records, and the rest is history: 1D’s first four albums, supported by four world tours from 2011 to 2015, debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard charts, and the band has sold 70 million records to date. At 18, Styles bought the London house he now calls home. “I was going to do two weeks’ work to it,” he remembers, “but when I came back there was no second floor,” so he moved in with adult friends who lived nearby till the renovation was complete. “Eighteen months,” he deadpans. “I’ve always seen that period as pretty pivotal for me, as there’s that moment at the party where it’s getting late, and half of the people would go upstairs to do drugs, and the other people go home. I was like, ‘I don’t really know this friend’s wife, so I’m not going to get all messy and then go home.’ I had to behave a bit, at a time where everything else about my life felt I didn’t have to behave really. I’ve been lucky to always feel I have this family unit somewhere.”

When Styles’s London renovation was finally done, “I went in for the first time and I cried,” he recalls. “Because I just felt like I had somewhere. L.A. feels like holiday, but this feels like home.”

“There’s so much joy to be had in playing with clothes. I’ve never thought too much about what it means—it just becomes this extended part of creating something”

Behind its pink door, Styles’s house has all the trappings of rock stardom—there’s a man cave filled with guitars, a Sex Pistols Never Mind the Bollocks poster (a moving-in gift from his decorator), a Stevie Nicks album cover. Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” was one of the first songs he knew the words to—“My parents were big fans”—and he and Nicks have formed something of a mutual-admiration society. At the beginning of lockdown, Nicks tweeted to her fans that she was taking inspiration from Fine Line: “Way to go, H,” she wrote. “It is your Rumours.” “She’s always there for you,” said Styles when he inducted Nicks into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2019. “She knows what you need—advice, a little wisdom, a blouse, a shawl; she’s got you covered.”

Styles makes us some tea in the light-filled kitchen and then wanders into the convivial living room, where he strikes an insouciant pose on the chesterfield sofa, upholstered in a turquoise velvet that perhaps not entirely coincidentally sets off his eyes. Styles admits that his lockdown lewk was “sweatpants, constantly,” and he is relishing the opportunity to dress up again. He doesn’t have to wait long: The following day, under the eaves of a Victorian mansion in Notting Hill, I arrive in the middle of fittings for Vogue’s shoot and discover Styles in his Y-fronts, patiently waiting to try on looks for fashion editor Camilla Nickerson and photographer Tyler Mitchell. Styles’s personal stylist, Harry Lambert, wearing a pearl necklace and his nails colored in various shades of green varnish, à la Sally Bowles, is providing helpful backup (Britain’s Rule of Six hasn’t yet been imposed).

Styles, who has thoughtfully brought me a copy of de Botton’s 2006 book The Architecture of Happiness, is instinctively and almost quaintly polite, in an old-fashioned, holding-open-doors and not-mentioning-lovers-by-name sort of way. He is astounded to discover that the Atlanta-born Mitchell has yet to experience a traditional British Sunday roast dinner. Assuring him that “it’s basically like Thanksgiving every Sunday,” Styles gives Mitchell the details of his favorite London restaurants in which to enjoy one. “It’s a good thing to be nice,” Mitchell tells me after a morning in Styles’s company.

MITCHELL has Lionel Wendt’s languorously homoerotic 1930s portraits of young Sri Lankan men on his mood board. Nickerson is thinking of Irving Penn’s legendary fall 1950 Paris haute couture collections sitting, where he photographed midcentury supermodels, including his wife, Lisa Fonssagrives, in high-style Dior and Balenciaga creations. Styles is up for all of it, and so, it would seem, is the menswear landscape of 2020: Jonathan Anderson has produced a trapeze coat anchored with a chunky gold martingale; John Galliano at Maison Margiela has fashioned a khaki trench with a portrait neckline in layers of colored tulle; and Harris Reed—a Saint Martins fashion student sleuthed by Lambert who ended up making some looks for Styles’s last tour—has spent a week making a broad-shouldered Smoking jacket with high-waisted, wide-leg pants that have become a Styles signature since he posed for Tim Walker for the cover of Fine Line wearing a Gucci pair—a silhouette that was repeated in the tour wardrobe. (“I liked the idea of having that uniform,” says Styles.) Reed’s version is worn with a hoopskirt draped in festoons of hot-pink satin that somehow suggests Deborah Kerr asking Yul Brynner’s King of Siam, “Shall we dance?”

Styles introduces me to the writer and eyewear designer Gemma Styles, “my sister from the same womb,” he says. She is also here for the fitting: The siblings plan to surprise their mother with the double portrait on these pages.

I ask her whether her brother had always been interested in clothes.

“My mum loved to dress us up,” she remembers. “I always hated it, and Harry was always quite into it. She did some really elaborate papier-mâché outfits: She made a giant mug and then painted an atlas on it, and that was Harry being ‘The World Cup.’ Harry also had a little dalmatian-dog outfit,” she adds, “a hand-me-down from our closest family friends. He would just spend an inordinate amount of time wearing that outfit. But then Mum dressed me up as Cruella de Vil. She was always looking for any opportunity!”

“As a kid I definitely liked fancy dress,” Styles says. There were school plays, the first of which cast him as Barney, a church mouse. “I was really young, and I wore tights for that,” he recalls. “I remember it was crazy to me that I was wearing a pair of tights. And that was maybe where it all kicked off!”

Acting has also remained a fundamental form of expression for Styles. His sister recalls that even on the eve of his life-changing X Factor audition, Styles could sing in public only in an assumed voice. “He used to do quite a good sort of Elvis warble,” she remembers. During the rehearsals in the family home, “he would sing in the bathroom because if it was him singing as himself, he just couldn’t have anyone looking at him! I love his voice now,” she adds. “I’m so glad that he makes music that I actually enjoy listening to.”

Styles’s role-playing continued soon after 1D went on permanent hiatus in 2016, and he was cast in Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, beating out dozens of professional actors for the role. “The good part was my character was a young soldier who didn’t really know what he was doing,” says Styles modestly. “The scale of the movie was so big that I was a tiny piece of the puzzle. It was definitely humbling. I just loved being outside of my comfort zone.”

His performance caught the eye of Olivia Wilde, who remembers that it “blew me away—the openness and commitment.” In turn, Styles loved Wilde’s directorial debut, Booksmart, and is “very honored” that she cast him in a leading role for her second feature, a thriller titled Don’t Worry Darling, which went into production this fall. Styles will play the husband to Florence Pugh in what Styles describes as “a 1950s utopia in the California desert.”

Wilde’s movie is costumed by Academy Award nominee Arianne Phillips. “She and I did a little victory dance when we heard that we officially had Harry in the film,” notes Wilde, “because we knew that he has a real appreciation for fashion and style. And this movie is incredibly stylistic. It’s very heightened and opulent, and I’m really grateful that he is so enthusiastic about that element of the process—some actors just don’t care.”

“I like playing dress-up in general,” Styles concurs, in a masterpiece of understatement: This is the man, after all, who cohosted the Met’s 2019 “Notes on Camp” gala attired in a nipple-freeing black organza blouse with a lace jabot, and pants so high-waisted that they cupped his pectorals. The ensemble, accessorized with the pearl-drop earring of a dandified Elizabethan courtier, was created for Styles by Gucci’s Alessandro Michele, whom he befriended in 2014. Styles, who has subsequently personified the brand as the face of the Gucci fragrance, finds Michele “fearless with his work and his imagination. It’s really inspiring to be around someone who works like that.”

The two first met in London over a cappuccino. “It was just a kind of PR appointment,” says Michele, “but something magical happened, and Harry is now a friend. He has the aura of an English rock-and-roll star—like a young Greek god with the attitude of James Dean and a little bit of Mick Jagger—but no one is sweeter. He is the image of a new era, of the way that a man can look.”

Styles credits his style transformation—from Jack Wills tracksuit-clad boy-band heartthrob to nonpareil fashionisto—to his meeting the droll young stylist Harry Lambert seven years ago. They hit it off at once and have conspired ever since, enjoying a playfully campy rapport and calling each other Sue and Susan as they parse the niceties of the scarlet lace Gucci man-bra that Michele has made for Vogue’s shoot, for instance, or a pair of Bode pants hand-painted with biographical images (Styles sent Emily Adams Bode images of his family, and a photograph he had found of David Hockney and Joni Mitchell. “The idea of those two being friends, to me, was really beautiful,” Styles explains).

“He just has fun with clothing, and that’s kind of where I’ve got it from,” says Styles of Lambert. “He doesn’t take it too seriously, which means I don’t take it too seriously.” The process has been evolutionary. At his first meeting with Lambert, the stylist proposed “a pair of flares, and I was like, ‘Flares? That’s fucking crazy,’ ” Styles remembers. Now he declares that “you can never be overdressed. There’s no such thing. The people that I looked up to in music—Prince and David Bowie and Elvis and Freddie Mercury and Elton John—they’re such showmen. As a kid it was completely mind-blowing. Now I’ll put on something that feels really flamboyant, and I don’t feel crazy wearing it. I think if you get something that you feel amazing in, it’s like a superhero outfit. Clothes are there to have fun with and experiment with and play with. What’s really exciting is that all of these lines are just kind of crumbling away. When you take away ‘There’s clothes for men and there’s clothes for women,’ once you remove any barriers, obviously you open up the arena in which you can play. I’ll go in shops sometimes, and I just find myself looking at the women’s clothes thinking they’re amazing. It’s like anything—anytime you’re putting barriers up in your own life, you’re just limiting yourself. There’s so much joy to be had in playing with clothes. I’ve never really thought too much about what it means—it just becomes this extended part of creating something.”

“He’s up for it,” confirms Lambert, who earlier this year, for instance, found a JW Anderson cardigan with the look of a Rubik’s Cube (“on sale at matchesfashion.com!”). Styles wore it, accessorized with his own pearl necklace, for a Today rehearsal in February and it went viral: His fans were soon knitting their own versions and posting the results on TikTok. Jonathan Anderson declared himself “so impressed and incredibly humbled by this trend” that he nimbly made the pattern available (complete with a YouTube tutorial) so that Styles’s fans could copy it for free. Meanwhile, London’s storied Victoria & Albert Museum has requested Styles’s original: an emblematic document of how people got creative during the COVID era. “It’s going to be in their permanent collection,” says Lambert exultantly. “Is that not sick? Is that not the most epic thing?”

“It’s pretty powerful and kind of extraordinary to see someone in his position redefining what it can mean to be a man with confidence,” says Olivia Wilde

“To me, he’s very modern,” says Wilde of Styles, “and I hope that this brand of confidence as a male that Harry has—truly devoid of any traces of toxic masculinity—is indicative of his generation and therefore the future of the world. I think he is in many ways championing that, spearheading that. It’s pretty powerful and kind of extraordinary to see someone in his position redefining what it can mean to be a man with confidence.”

“He’s really in touch with his feminine side because it’s something natural,” notes Michele. “And he’s a big inspiration to a younger generation—about how you can be in a totally free playground when you feel comfortable. I think that he’s a revolutionary.”

STYLES’S confidence is on full display the day after the fitting, which finds us all on the beautiful Sussex dales. Over the summit of the hill, with its trees blown horizontal by the fierce winds, lies the English Channel. Even though it’s a two-hour drive from London, the fresh-faced Styles, who went to bed at 9 p.m., has arrived on set early: He is famously early for everything. The team is installed in a traditional flint-stone barn. The giant doors have been replaced by glass and frame a bucolic view of distant grazing sheep. “Look at that field!” says Styles. “How lucky are we? This is our office! Smell the roses!” Lambert starts to sing “Kumbaya, my Lord.”

Hairdresser Malcolm Edwards is setting Styles’s hair in a Victory roll with silver clips, and until it is combed out he resembles Kathryn Grayson with stubble. His fingers are freighted with rings, and “he has a new army of mini purses,” says Lambert, gesturing to an accessory table heaving with examples including a mini sky-blue Gucci Jackie bag discreetly monogrammed HS. Michele has also made Styles a dress for the shoot that Tissot might have liked to paint—acres of ice-blue ruffles, black Valenciennes lace, and suivez-moi, jeune homme ribbons. Erelong, Styles is gamely racing up a hill in it, dodging sheep scat, thistles, and shards of chalk, and striking a pose for Mitchell that manages to make ruffles a compelling new masculine proposition, just as Mr. Fish’s frothy white cotton dress—equal parts Romantic poet and Greek presidential guard—did for Mick Jagger when he wore it for The Rolling Stones’ free performance in Hyde Park in 1969, or as the suburban-mom floral housedress did for Kurt Cobain as he defined the iconoclastic grunge aesthetic. Styles is mischievously singing ABBA’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)” to himself when Mitchell calls him outside to jump up and down on a trampoline in a Comme des Garçons buttoned wool kilt. “How did it look?” asks his sister when he comes in from the cold. “Divine,” says her brother in playful Lambert-speak.

As the wide sky is washed in pink, orange, and gray, like a Turner sunset, and Mitchell calls it a successful day, Styles is playing “Cherry” from Fine Line on his Fender acoustic on the hilltop. “He does his own stunts,” says his sister, laughing. The impromptu set is greeted with applause. “Thank you, Antwerp!” says Styles playfully, bowing to the crowd. “Thank you, fashion!”

#finally read through this #it's long #harry #vogue us #dec 2020 #article #published:#13.11.20 #m

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themousai · 4 years

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Single Review: Happy Valley - Achilles

Happy Valley is a very good band named after a very garbage suburb. The suburb itself is known locally for getting very little winter sunlight and containing one of the city’s largest landfills, steep hills of gorse and yellow flowers with the smell of hot garbage. That being said, it’s a shame that the suburb can’t measure up to the band, because the bar has been set really chuffing high with Achilles, their latest piping hot slice of fresh and tasty post-lockdown post-hardcore. If there’s a single active band in the country right now that would be at home on Deathwish Records, it’s these lads.

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Achilles breaks out quick with a four-count snap dropping into a frantic and swelling wall of sound that will be familiar to listeners of melodic hardcore’s darker limits of the spectrum. The steeply banking 6/8 climb right out the gate is in the comfort zone of anyone who jams Modern Life is War or Touche Amore. The riffs are serious and somewhat panicked, the tension and urgency of the track made immediately apparent. While bands belonging to this melding of genres often feel the temptation to crank up the gain for maximum fuzz, to let scratchy tone and howling feedback provide the song’s edge, I’m glad to hear Achilles doesn’t give in.

The teeth of the track are sharp and clear, and as a result the whole piece seems more genuine on its own merits instead of displaying all the hallmarks of the editing suite. Consistency is key. Hamish Morgan’s vocals sit between a high toned wailing and a mid-level impassioned yell which pairs well with the dark tone of the instrumentation. The drums blend well, patterns of blastbeats and frenzied cymbal washes helping the track to climb and climb with a consistent energetic and almost maniacal charm.

There are finely cherrypicked threads of Jane Doe era Converge and Roads to Judah era Deafheaven, with all of the emotional heft such influence implies. Achilles then drops out into a breakdown almost uncharacteristic of this particular generic corner of hardcore, a genuine pit-worthy beat fit to both turn and bang heads. This kind of shift is genuinely unexpected but a brilliant payoff, and a well executed crescendo for such an emotionally tense piece of music.

“But Jai,” I can hear you definitely asking, “how difficult is it for a band to produce music that’s actually good during a global pandemic?” To you I say: calm down, I already asked.

How did the band function during isolation? Zoom calls and group chats can only go so far, so how much was the songwriting process changed by not being able to get in the same room? It was pretty funny actually, we had a couple of laggy as video calls, which mostly ended up being yarns, with a bit of talking about production etc and progress on the video. Thankfully, we had done all the recording before lockdown – so we were able to keep going getting everything ready. Did manage to get some riff writing done through lockdown, so there are some barebone skeletons of even more songs kicking around for future work which is great. But ultimately, you couldn’t say songwriting worked well during lockdown.

Are there any new influences the band is trying to emulate? Is the sound Happy Valley aims for the same now as it was in 2019? Achilles is the first song written totally from scratch after Aaron joined the band on drums. We didn’t have anything we wanted to emulate in mind, we just kinda mashed all of our different influences together in the room, and explored everything that was coming out until it felt right. It definitely represents a kick up in the intensity of our music, as Aaron brings a lot of that from his influence, experience playing in different bands, and talent.

That isn’t to say that any of the old sounds are gone by any means, but we have a different mix in the band now, and this will continue showing through in the future as we all assert who we are on the music.

Achilles is a particularly energetic and mathy track. Why did the band choose to release this first with an accompanying video? Is the song representative of your new material, or is it significant otherwise? Achilles was written totally stand-alone, and as I said before, is the first song that was totally built from the ground-up with Aaron in the band. We felt that because of this, it naturally lent itself to a single and a video, along with the nature of the song itself as short, punchy and memorable. You can definitely hear a lot of the new influences in the band in Achilles, and this is something that will also be present on our EP we will release later in the year. The songs on that release existed before we solidified our new line-up, but they have been completely retooled, rewritten and improved, and we can’t wait to get them out there.

Name the single biggest hassle or fuck-up from the entire writing/recording/filming process. Right at the start of the writing process, there was a core riff to the song that we absolutely could not get in sync with throughout the band. It was actually hilarious, as where we were practicing at the time, there was only a really budget drum kit and this contributed a lot to the frustration. The rage was palpable, lack of us being able to explain the timing properly in words, equipment problems, a new line-up getting used to each other, it was a perfect storm. Worked out well though, I think you can hear some of that intensity in the track for sure!

Naming your band after a street synonymous with the smell of hot garbage is a risky move. However, if the music you then deliver turns out to be excellent, you’ve won.

Achilles is an exciting new offering, and marks Happy Valley as a band poised to make some serious post-quaratine moves. Happy Valley write songs more emotionally aware and reflective than lighthearted or mindlessly aggressive. The anger is there, but it’s more intermingled and subtle. More like a wave crashing over your head, less like a shovel.

Keep up to date with Happy Valley Instagram | Facebook | Bandcamp | Spotify

Written by Jai Aronsen Promo photo taken by Amanda Hailwood

#JAI ARONSEN #happy valley #happy valley wgtn #new zealand #single reviews #reviews #achilles #wellington #aotearoa

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ofcourseshesbetter-archive-blog · 7 years

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So, yes, this happened! I still don’t have the proper ability to comprehend that I got to this milestone. I made Mary on a whim, assuming I’d probably not keep it going with her, despite my obvious love of her, thinking most people wouldn’t want to interact with her since she’s not exactly the definition of well loved in the fandom. But so many of you have made this such a wonderful experience for me on here, and made playing Mary so much fun. Thus, lets get on to the shoutouts!

THE GINGER NUT SQUAD (aka the CAH group of fuckery):

@hisjiminycricket

Serah, you are genuinely one of the sweetest, kindest and most loving people I can say I’ve had the fortune of getting to know. I swear, you don’t have a bad bone in your body and oh I admire you so much for that. I know I can always go to you with anything, big or small, or just someone to fangirl over Warstan about... You’re one of a kind. Thank you for putting up with me and my craziness. I know i’ve told you this a million times over but I absolutely bloody love you.

@mvcrofts

HAYDEN MY LIL FELLOW CATS DORK WHO I LOVE TO THE MOON AND BACK! I don’t think anyone else on here would go with a random idea about a ship I had out of no where and build it up the way you somehow do with me with Mycroft and Mary. You make me laugh to the point of tears, you make me smile like nothing else. I can’t put into words just how much I genuinely adore you. You’re a wonderful person inside and out, and I feel so lucky I get to be your friend.

@bakerstreetsconsultingsociopath

Aly! While you constantly drive me crazy saying Aussie slang THAT NO ONE HERE USES, I still love you so much. Your Sherlock is so quick witted, so much like in the show, which makes me so happy with the threads we do because I love getting to write Mary being a sassy little pain to Sherlock. Somedays I swear to god we have the exact same relationship as Mary and Sherlock but that makes things all the better. You portray him in such a brilliant way and no one else can take that from you <3.

@nctanthca

MIRANDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! The many extra A’s all in caps lock should be a proper indication of how much I’m actually obsessed with you, like lowkey though I think you’re so incredibly funny and charming and sassy ( just like Anthea) and I just... No words. Not only are you a talented writer, OOC, you’re so chill and easy to talk to. Plus, I love the little friendship Mary and Anthea have, just the two of them being total girls, drinking all of Mycroft’s whiskey and reminiscing on their younger years. I couldn’t imagine it all any other way.

@psychopatx

Jack, or should I say Jim because you sometimes actually terrify me with just how much you are like him. I don’t think you realise how well you portray him, how well you do him justice. Your love and passion for him, and his story, his personality, just everything about him is so lovely to watch as you grow and develop him in a way the writers could never do - which, Jim deserves. Also, your cosplay of him is fucking incredible, just so you know.

@thenewsexy

Ali!! My Marene partner in crime! While our interactions on here are limited, I’ve gotten to know you pretty well OOC, and you are just so sweet, so adorable, so freaking cute I can’t use any other words to properly describe you. Not only are you actually stunning af, you’re so talented at writing Irene, you put your own spin on her in this perfect little way that just works so well. Never ever leave, okay? Because no one else would love on Mary & Irene in the way the two of us do ahaha!

@deadcentred

Sara! Or should I say, the actual living embodiment of Molly Hooper. I’m pretty sure the two of you were twins in another life. While the majority of our interactions have either been OOC, or briefly in memes we’ve sent one another, I love reading your threads, I love the voice you give to Molly, the one she certainly deserves to have because Molly Hooper deserves all the love in the world. We really need to write more IC, because much like Amanda - I need the Molly and Mary spinoff where the two of them lounge around, drinking wine, and just being total girls while the boys are off being boys.

THE BAKER STREET GANG (AKA THE LOVELY PEOPLE WHO SOME REASON TALK TO ME AND WRITE WITH ME CONSTANTLY DESPITE ME BEING TRASH):

@losingsiide

MAC! Aka, the biggest dork in the world who I just want to snuggle and protect away from the world and hug till I can’t hug no more but unfortunately I’m on the other side of the world so it makes it very very hard. There is very few people on here like Mac. He’s the fucking bees knees (yes bee reference was very important). Every conversation I have with him is never boring. He always manages to bring my mood up, make me laugh till I’m physically crying with tears, for some reason deals with my obsessive love of Mary (and encourages it), and joins in on my never ending thirst for Martin Freeman. To have a friend like him in this shitty world, I just feel really fucking lucky. If you haven’t got to know him the way I do, do it. Because not only is Mac a brilliant Sherlock, but he’s also a terrific friend.

@suumuxor

Allison! I’m pretty sure you could probably already guess what I’d say about you, but it don’t matter cause I’m gonna say it all, ka-peesh? If you haven’t checked out mother fucking Abigail Holmes (yes she’s Holmes not Stewart that was Mary typing okay don’t correct me correct her) is one of the best OC’s out there. Period. She’s so well thought out, well developed and fits in seamlessly into the framework of the show. Not many OC’s can do that which is a testament to just what an incredible writer she is. Also, hers and Mary’s friendship is the definition of #GOALSAF. I mean, who wouldn’t want their friendship, let’s be real here? I never ever want to stop writing with you, because I can’t imagine Mary without her BFF.

@watsonofagun

Angie! I started following you on my old account as Rosie, and to be honest - I was so intimidated by you and your freaking quality af writing that I could barely talk to you. Then, I made Mary, I got talking to you and all my fears went floating away because you are the definition of being sweet as a cupcake. I love talking to you about random little headcanons I think of at the most peculiar times of night, I love each new thread we write together, and most of all I freaking love you and your John. As Mary said to John, “You make me so happy” - every time I get one of your replies I smile excitedly for what seems like forever and then respond to it into my queue as soon as I can, because I know whenever I get a reply from you - it’s going to be a good one! Plus, you’re never allowed to stop writing with me okay because it’s not allowed, get it? Good!

@julietthotelwhiskey

Michelle, oh wait no I’m sorry, I forgot I was talking to Dr John Hamish Watson. While we’ve only got a couple of threads going on, they’re all so stupidly happy which, with the angst ridden agony story that is John and Mary, the two of them need a little happiness. I could never get bored reading your writing, not only just the ones to me, but with everyone else. Every little thing you do while writing John is so on point, it’s like Martin Freeman is sitting behind the screen writing it all himself. I really hope we continue to write together ( all the happy things, obviously, although I’m sure there’ll be a time where we somehow write something angsty together), because to get to write with you makes feel very, very lucky, okay? You’re so bloody brilliant and you should never forget it.

@geniusofdeduction

Tasha! I don’t know how you do it, but man oh man, your Sherlock is so bloody brilliant, always on point with absolutely everything and anything he says. how you manage to have dealt with him for as long as you have, I give you props (considering I used to RP Sherlock ages a go and gave up after a month). There’s a reason you have as many followers as you do and it’s truly because you write him in just a way that is perfectly yours, but also in the way that incapsulates everything we all love about the quirky pain in the butt that is Sherlock Holmes. I definitely feel lucky to get to be one of those people you choose to write with among all the brilliant people you could.

EVERYONE ELSE WHO FOR SOME REASON HAS WROTE WITH ME IN THE PAST OR I CONTINUE TO STALK FROM THE SIDELINES INTIMIDATED AF BECAUSE AS MENTIONED BEFORE, IM ACTUAL TRASH:

#( i just do as i'm told; out of character )#( give these guys all the love ok? )#( so many wonderful writers i just heart eyes to everyone )#( it was about time i got to doing one of these )#( im sorry if i forgot anyone but i went through as many people as i could remember and all the people i follow that i watch and read things #( but here you guys go! bias/follow forever list)

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musicallyrich · 7 years

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Summerfest Day 9...

7/7/17 Milwaukee, WI Summerfest

I went earlier in the day on the 9th day of Summerfest, and was able to catch a lot of good shows from up and coming talent that music fans should keep an eye open for when coming through your towns.

First, as we (I was with a group of 3) entered the park, we were able to catch the last three songs of Milwaukee's own Alex Wilson Band. We came up to the stage right as he was starting a cover of a Billy Boy Arnold song, and then proceeded into a B.B. King cover. I recognized both songs, but couldn't place them, because he was able to turn them into his own sound (admittedly, I'm pretty sure that I knew the Billy Boy Arnold tune through another band covering it, or possibly several others). He and his band excellently handled the material, and Alex had some blistering soloing during each of the songs. I also want to make a comment, that he is someone who finishes off an extended guitar solo. He doesn't just play the solo up the neck, until he gets to the highest notes (the climax of the solo, typically) then stops it. He plays through, and continues to work his way down the fretboard, which gives a sense of tension and release to the solo within itself. His final song was an original that was very good, and added a bit of a soul flavor to the blues that he had been playing up to that point. I would have loved to see his full set, and catch some more of his originals, and hope that I will get a chance to one of these days. Very impressive, in the 20 minutes I saw from him.

Next as we walked around, we ended up at the Johnson Controls World Sound Stage for the 3 p.m. show Sawyer Fredericks. In the description on the Summerfest app (paraphrasing from what I remembered), it called him an original, Americana artist with quality melodies and soulful vocals. That for a 3 o'clock show had me curious. What I found out when I arrived, was that he had also been a contestant on the TV show, The Voice, so there was a decent crowd of people of all ages there. I'm assuming that many were there to hear the covers that he had performed on the show because- A. I heard a few different sets of people around me talking about it in between songs, mentioning that he must be performing some original material, because they weren't familiar with the songs. B. Many people stood up and left after the first song, and several more after the 2nd, and to me didn't look like they were overly happy with the performance to that point (that is an assumption on my part, all the poeple that I heard talking about it stayed for most, if not all, the show). I also assume that the pre-teens that were there with parents were also expecting the songs they knew rather than the originals, many which were a bit deliberate and dark. I will applaud all those that did stay to hear songs that they didn't know, including most of the younger fans, most that I saw walking out were in there 30s and 40s. Those that did stay were rewarded with a fine show featuring an artist and band that, certainly have growing to do, but have a strong base from which to build. The music ranged from hushed almost acoustic to soul blues rockers. Sawyer played acoustic guitar and sang. He had a very good electric lead guirtarist, who also played some slide, and was clearly the standout musician of the four. A good drummer held time and filled as necessary. His brother on the bass was solid, but probably didn't enhance the overall music as much as just serve as a foundation. He, however, looked the most nervous to me, so that could have played into it. Also, some of the songs really felt as if they were written on an acoustic guitar and really hadn't been fully fleshed out with band arrangements. So, as they play some of the material longer and arrangements of some of the songs gets better, that will attribute to the bass player being able to be a little more insertive in his playing which at times sounded tentative. They did end the set with a cover of the traditional song "Man Of Constant Sorrow" which really engaged the still large crowd (which by this time had gained more people from just walking by and hearing it, than they had lost after the first 2 songs showed it was going to be a set of originals). At this age, you just hope they continue to work at their craft and improve, because if they do you will hear about this band for a long time.

We then headed for some drinks, and to the Harley Stage for the first artist to appear on the stage as it turned into the Rhymesayers Stage for the rest of the night. The lead-off artist was newly signed Sa-Roc. The female MC from Washington DC (also home to the great rapper Oddisee, I have no idea if they have crossed paths) put on a very energetic show to get the crowd into it. She was going back and forth between playing her own hype person in between songs to spitting out rhymes that covered subjects from having a good time to female empowerment, especially in the world of rap. She was on for just a little over half hour, and put on a great show. About 10 minutes following her, DJ RJD2 and Rhymesayer rapper Blueprint came on and worked together for the first time in about 10 years (if I remember/heard what they said correctly) as rap duo Soul Position. They poured out a number of songs from their collaborations, as well as some from Blueprint's solo career (I think), and put on an awesome show for just under an hour. I've seen Blueprint one time before, in that setting with a backing band and dj, and he has delivered in both occasions.

We then jaunted back over to the Johnson Controls World Sound Stage (could we shorten that name, btw) and caught the last 2 songs from Austrailian Blues Guitarist, Hamish Anderson. Their trio (guitar, bass, drums) had a thick sound, and did a wonderful job of melding into their power trio setting. They know how to take up space without getting in each other's way, and all handled their instruments very well. In the few minutes I got to see them, they gave me enough to be interested in catching them in full some time.

I headed back to Grieves as the other 2 with me grabbed something to eat. I was able to catch the last 30 minutes of Grieves' set at the Rhymesayers Stage. I've seen part of him live once before, and as much as I feel like I should like him. His lyrics are positive with solid music productions, and a fun lightheartedness to his proceedings, I find myself never quite feeling like I'm really feeling his music inside me. He does have great rapport with his fans and handles the crowd well while onstage. The music is solid and he does a nice job of performing. It might just be a case of it not hitting me quite right, I'd also like to check out some of his recorded work, and see how that hits me. I can’t say at this point that I’ve heard anything where I could give a definitive stance on how I feel about his music, I just need to listen to some more when I get a chance. However, if you like Grieves already, and are wondering whether he can deliver live I'd say you should enjoy him.

Following Grieves, before we got to Aesop Rock & Rob Sonic the skies opened up again and poured rain on the festival. Since we had decided we were going to call it an early day, when we got a break in the downpour we headed for the car and headed home. Another great day of fest with several artists making their way onto my radar for the first time.

Written Under the Influence of...Car Seat Headrest- Teens Of Denial, Alice In Chains- Unplugged

#summerfest #musicallyrich #rhymesayers #alex wilson band #hamish anderson #sa-roc #blueprint #soul position #rjd2 #grieves #sawyer fredericks

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