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fyeahhozier · 5 years

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The Irishman is deeper and darker than he's maybe been given credit for... but the geniality and swoon factor remain high.

Variety: Hozier Proves He’s a Career Artist in Gratifying Greek Show

At Hozier’s sold-out show at L.A.’s Greek Friday night, one of the first things you couldn’t help noticing on stage —because it’s still an anomaly — was that his eight-piece lineup was half-male, half-female. Knowing his penchant for socially conscious songs, his decrial of “the anthems of rape culture” in his lyrics, and a general female-friendliness to his appeal, it’s easy to figure this gender parity is a conscious one and think: That is soooo Hozier. Which it is … and so effective, too, like just about every choice he’s made so far in his short, charmed career. On the most practical level, if you can bring in that much female harmony while also getting ace players in the bargain, why wouldn’t you? But it also makes for a good visual emblem of some of the other dual energies Hozier is playing with in his music: darkness and enlightenment; romantic hero and cad; raw blues dude and slick pop hero. He’s got a lot more going on than just being an earnest do-gooder. (Although he does do good, earnestly.)

During Friday’s hour-and-three-quarters set, Hozier focused largely on material from this year’s sophomore album, “Wasteland, Baby!,” which sounded good enough on record but almost uniformly improved in the live experience. Sometimes the upgrade came from making full use of the multi-instrumentalists on hand. The first album’s “Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene” now had Hozier on guitar facing off against violinist Emily Kohavi, trading solos — and if it’s hard to hear an electric guitar/fiddle duel without automatically thinking “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” it was one of many welcome moments making use of the MVP skills of Kohavi, the newest addition to the band. Other times, the improvements on the album versions just had to do with Hozier allowing himself louder and gutsier guitar tones. He’s a bit like Prince, in that way — someone you’d happily listen to playing a very nasty-sounding six-string all night, although he has so many other stylistic fish to fry, which in this case means a still slightly greater emphasis on acoustic finger-picking.

For somebody who made his name on as forlorn but powerful an anthem as his 2014 breakout smash “Take Me to Church,” and who can milk that melodrama for all it’s worth, Hozier has a lot of other modes he can default to. He treads very lightly into the area of soul with songs like “Almost (Sweet Music),” the lyrics of which consist of either name-checking or alluding to some of the great jazz vocal classics of the 20th century, in an idiom that’s not so much jazzy itself as folk-R&B. You could almost cite it as the subtle kind of Memphis-swing thing Justin Timberlake should aspire to, if the tricky polyrhythm and oddly chopped up meters Hozier adds as wrinkles weren’t so un-replicable. Bringing up Stevie Wonder’s “Living for the City” as the night’s sole cover also established that early ‘70s era and sound as an influences he’d like to make perfectly clear. At the other extreme, this son of a blues musician can hard back to those roots so well, in noisy numbers like “Moment’s Silence (Common Tongue)” and the brand new “Jack Boot Jump,” that he could give the Black Keys a run for their money.

“Jack Boot Jump,” which is scheduled to go on an EP of completely fresh material that Hozier said he plans to put out before Christmas, was possibly the highlight of the night, even though — or because — it stripped his excellent band down to just him and longtime drummer Rory Doyle. Having earlier played the current album’s “Nina Cried Power,” which is maybe more of a tribute to other historic protest songs than one of its own, Hozier gave a lengthy introduction to “Jack Boot” indicating that he’s aware of the traps that come with the territory. “I do have some reservations about the words ‘protest song’ and ‘protest music,’” he admitted. “But if you’re familiar with an artist called Woody Guthrie, he wrote the evergreen anthem ‘Tear the Fascists’ down. I was kind of looking into songs in that sort of tradition, that singing out, and I was worried that this is 2019; it’s a very unsubtle way to approach songwriting.” But, he added, “it was a funny few weeks, with 70 people shot in Hong Kong and arrests obviously in Moscow; Chile now at the moment also. And I was thinking, forget about subtle art — what is not subtle is this murder of protesters, and what is not subtle is the jack boot coming down in Orwell’s picture of the future: ‘If you want to imagine the future, imagine a jack boot stomping on a human face forever,’ that chilling quote from ‘1984.’ Anyway, I was just thinking, yeah, f— it, it’s not subtle, but let’s do it.” His electric guitar proceeded to be a machine that kills fascists, and also just slayed as maybe the most rock ‘n’ roll thing he’s written. (Evidence of the new song on the web is scant, or should be, anyway, since he begged the audience “in good faith” not to film it.)

If there’s a knock people have on Hozier, it tends to be the sincerity thing. He’s a nice guy who’s finishing first, which doesn’t necessarily help him become an indie-rock darling or Pitchfork favorite. (Predictably, “Wasteland, Baby!” got a 4.8 rating there — that’s out of 10, not 5.) At the Greek, there was an almost wholesome feeling that would’ve been an immediate turnoff to anyone who insists on having their rock rough, starting with his graciousness in repeatedly naming the band members and repeatedly thanking his opening act (Madison Ryann Ward, a fetchingly husky-voiced Oklahoman filling in on this part of the tour for a laryngitis-stricken Freya Ridings). That extended to a sense of uplift in many of the songs that doesn’t always match the themes of the material. But then, there was the impossible good cheer and attractiveness of the young players, to match Hozier’s own; this is a group where everyone looks as if they could be in Taylor Swift’s band or actually looks like Taylor Swift. The swoon factor in Hozier’s appeal is undeniably high, and it’s safe to say no one left Griffith Park less smitten.

But ladies (and gentlemen), do be aware that Hozier has some dark-side moments that can almost make Leonard Cohen look like Stephen Bishop. The only time he really overtly accentuated that in concert was in introducing and playing the new album’s “No Plan,” a love song that is also an amiable statement of atheism in which Hozier reminds his beloved that the universe is going to collapse upon itself someday. This may be rather like the gambit in which the ‘50s boy gets the girl to make out with him in a fallout shelter, but in any case, Hozier didn’t stint on the end-of-all-things aspect of it, even putting up on screen behind the band a statement from astrophysicist Dr. Katie Mack pointing out humankind’s and the galaxy’s ultimate fate. (“Honestly I never really imagined I’d end up being name-checked in a song for talking about how the universe is eventually going to fade out and die so this is all very exciting for me,” Mack tweeted in replay earlier in the year.) Suffice it to say that with that soulful a vintage ‘70s groove and that fuzz-tastic a guitar line, many babies will be conceived to the tune of “No Plan,” whether it foresees generational lines ending in a godless black hole or not.

Other Hozier songs reveal darker gets more estimable the more you dig into it. With its bird talk, “Shrike” sounds sweet enough, till you realize that a shrike is a kind of bird that impales its prey on thorns, which does add a rather bloody metaphoric undertone to what sounds like a reasonably pacifist breakup song. “Dinner & Diatribes,” meanwhile, is just deeply horny, not thorny. The most brooding song of the set, “Talk,” has verses where Hozier sings in lofty, literary terms about the romantic myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, only to reveal in the chorus that he’s talking to this woman in such high-minded terms because he just wants to charm her into the sack. As a piece of writing, it’s hilarious, establishing a devilish side of Hozier it’s good to hear. As a piece of performance, it’s just sexy.

But as enriching as it is to realize Hozier has a healthy sense of humor in his writing, bad-boy wit is never going to be what you’re going to come away from a Hozier album or show with. The main part of Friday’s concert ended, as expected, with “Take Me to Church,” his outraged take on abuse and homophobia in the scandalized Catholic church — which just happens to be easily taken as a lusty hymn to sexuality. Following that, the large band returned to a stage that had now been decked out in some kind of ivy, as Hozier talked about his love for the late Irish poet Seamus Heaney (whose last words he has tattooed on his arm) and, “since I’ve come this far,” went ahead and recited his poem “Mint,” sharing his hero’s affection for the plant and its “tenacity for life.”

Tenacity is likely to be a buzzword, too, for Hozier, given his leaps and gains as a writer-performer and seeming level head atop his tree-top shoulders. Taller still of voice, musical dexterity and good will — and still just 29 — he’s somebody the swooners and even some cynics should feel good about settling in with for a very long Irish ride.

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claritalunaluna76 · 5 years

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This time nine years ago, five teenage boys’ dreams were in tatters after being rejected from the X Factor .

But determined not to let a good-looking gang go to waste, show boss Simon Cowell and his genius decided to put solo hopefuls Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Liam Payne, Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson together.

It took the lads just five minutes to agree to his plan and have another crack at the competition - this time in the groups category.

They would go on to be one of the most successful boybands of the century, selling out stadiums and dominating the charts for five years before splitting in an explosion of bitterness and animosity.

But with no experience of harmonies, group singing or even each other, even then Liam wondered what they were really getting into.

“We had seen each other at Bootcamp and got on well, and Niall and I had shared a room. But we were competition then, and at the back of the minds we knew were against each other,” Liam would later recall.

“So it was strange when we were put together and my first thought was, ‘How are we going to make this work when we don’t know each other? It was such a leap of faith.”

A fractious start

Desperate to catch up with the other bands, the newly-formed five-piece spent an intense two intense weeks practising in a bungalow at the bottom of Harry’s step-dad’s garden in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire.

But contrary to their bright white smiles and boyish banter, their very different personalities were already beginning to show, laying the foundations for the resentment, jealously and anger that would one day cause the group to implode.

“We used to be at each other’s throats on the X Factor,” Louis admitted on their This Is Us DVD of his clashes with Liam.

“Whenever I wanted to do anything slightly mischievous, he was always the daddy.”

“Me and Louis did not get on at all,” Wolverhampton-born Liam agreed. “We were two completely different characters. There was one point where I literally wanted to whack him.”

Nevertheless, they sailed through the live shows and came third in the final before scoring a record deal with Cowell, who for them made n exception of only signing the winning act.

A mysterious fall out

By the time they scored their first number one with What Makes You Beautiful in September 2011, Harry and Louis were living as housemates in a rented £3million North London flat in the same block where Ashley Cole and Cheryl once met.

Then suddenly at the start of 2012 they allegedly stopped talking and moved out.

“Apart from Harry and Louis, no one knows exactly what caused the falling out — they didn’t even tell the other boys the full details,“ a source told The Sun at the time.

“But it was very serious and their friendship has never recovered. Everyone involved in the band is well aware of the animosity between them.

“It’s been central to everything else that came next with the band because there was suddenly a massive divide.”

From that point on Harry apparently refused to even travel with Louis and the fall-out would become so serious that bosses reportedly had to find a way to make their last three albums without the boys having to spend any time together in the studio.

However, Niall dismissed the claims, telling fans not to believe the reports.

"We stand strong as a band and we’re brothers,” he tweeted.

Those 'gay sex’ rumours

One theory was that the 'Larry Stylinson’ fan fiction depicting the pair as lovers had pushed them apart.

Louis, in particular, was extremely sensitive about the claims and admitted the speculation about their sexuality 'created an atmosphere’.

“People can believe what they want, but it comes across as a little bit disrespectful to the ones that I love, like (girlfriend) Eleanor (Calder),” he said.

“I’m so protective over things like that, about the people I love. So it created this atmosphere between the two of us.”

Zayn told how Harry and Louis had even dialled back their physical friendship in an attempt to stop the rumours.

“It’s not funny, and it still continues to be quite hard for them. They won’t naturally go put their arm around each other because they’re conscious of this thing that’s going on, which is not even true,” he said.

While Harry likes to keep people guessing about his sexuality, refusing to put a label on it, Louis has categorically said he is heterosexual.

And he was raging when a cartoon featured in HBO show Euphoria depicted a sex scene between him and Harry last month.

“I can categorically say that I was not contacted nor did I approve it,” he raged on Twitter , with a source telling The Sun he was 'angered’ that an 'awkward’ situation had been made worse.

Drug scandal

Whatever the cause of the tension, the rift only grew wider when Zayn and Louis were filmed smoking what appeared to be cannabis in the back of an SUV en route to a concert in Peru in 2014.

Narrating from behind the camera as he filmed Zayn lighting what appeared to be a joint, Louis could be heard saying, “So here we are, leaving Peru. Joint lit. Happy days!”

Talking about Zayn taking his warm-up 'seriously’, he continued, “One very very important factor of Zayn’s warm up of course if Mary J herself. In fact I will present it to him now for some fantastic singing.”

Straight-laced Harry - who wasn’t even much of a drinker - was apparently 'furious’ they’d taken the shine off the start of their UK stadium tour with their 'stupid and reckless’ behaviour.

“Harry is annoyed about the whole debacle. This should be one of the biggest weeks of the band’s career… Instead it has been taken over by this controversy,” an insider told The Sun.

“Despite Harry’s reputation, he’s incredibly professional and mature, and not into these sorts of antics,” the source added.

Booze battles

It wasn’t just Louis and Zayn who were in Harry’s bad books.

Liam’s partying was so out of control that Harry reportedly refused to go socialise with the band unless good guy Niall was there to keep the peace.

The pressure of spending two solid years on the road coupled with rumours about their future caused Liam to have a backstage meltdown in October 2015 with the band forced to cancel the gig in Belfast.

“The pressures of fame and being on the road for two years have made Liam ill,” a source told The Sun of the star, who would go on to admit fame 'nearly killed me’.

“He was devastated about letting everyone down, especially the fans, but he wasn’t physically able to get on stage. He had a complete meltdown.”

On another occasion he turned up to a fan event so drunk that it finally gave him a wake-up call.

“I’m not afraid to say that I actually went through a pretty bad [drinking] stage,” he told Attitude magazine.

“There were just a few times that I went over the limit with things and then I had to pull it back.

"I was very fortunate that I had lots of great people around me who said to me, 'Look Liam, you need to chill out a bit now.’”

Admitting he used alcohol to cope with the strain of performing near-constant touring, he said being drunk was like putting on a Disney costume before stepping out on stage.

“Underneath the Disney costume I was pissed quite a lot of the time because there was no other way to get your head around what was going on,” he told Men’s Health.

“I mean, it was fun. We had an absolute blast, but there were certain parts of it where it just got a little bit toxic.”

The pact

The band was fraying at the seams. Zayn was constantly in the headlines, accused of cheating on then-fiancée Perrie Edwar - which he vehemently denied.

There were rumours that he wanted out of 1D - despite the deal they were said to have made to release five albums and a greatest hits record before going on a 'hiatus’.

But Zayn blindsided everyone by suddenly quitting in March 2015 after a concert in Hong Kong.

In a statement he later admitted had nothing to do with him, he claimed he wanted to be a 'normal 22- year old’.

"I wasn’t going to spend another minute doing something which made me ill and which I no longer believed in,” he said of his shock exit.

Harry was seen openly crying on stage during their performance the next night.

But behind the scenes, the lads were reportedly furious.

“The others knew Zayn would have a head start by leaving first, like Robbie Williams did when he quit Take That,“ said a pal.

“It was frustrating to them as Zayn only had to hang on in there a few months and 1D would have gone on their long break united.”

Zayn would later go so far as to claim he’d wanted to leave the band from the very beginning and that he hated their music.

Friends no more?

Meanwhile, absence has only made the feud grow stronger, particularly between Louis and Zayn after the latter failed to support him on the X Factor following his mum’s death in December 2016.

"I had a couple of calls with him after I lost my mum and all the boys had agreed to come to that performance and he didn’t show, so that really bugged me,” he said on the Dan Wootton podcast.

“It was just seeing everyone there – Harry, Niall and Liam – that was what I needed that night, that support,” he said. “So on the other end of the spectrum it kind of really showed. So, eh, I hope he’s alright, but…”

Niall admits he doesn’t even have Zayn’s number and that he’s constantly changing it, while Zayn sniped that he didn’t 'really’ speak to Harry when they were in the band so didn’t expect to have a friendship after.

“I ain’t spoke to any of them for a long time, to be honest with you. That’s just the way it is,” he told Vogue.

“There’s things that happen and things that were said after I left…Snide things. Small things that I would never have expected.”

So could they ever reunite?

Mirror - July 23, 2019

#this is the investigative quoted by queerty #that's more like a fanfiction than a journalistic work #but that clearly establishes some changes to the narrative #they have been building since the beginning of the hiatus #with harry and niall on the good side #louis zayn and liam as the guilty part #and larry stylinson as the root of all conflicts #this article also reinforces the harry thinks he's better than the rest narrative #he decides with whom to fly with #and he doesn't want to reunited the band #i want this in my blog because it feels to me #they are escalating in the smear campaign againts louis #again #what is the endgame tho?#further isolate him from his community #and reinforce the idea of internalized homophobia #make him responsable for his own closet?#force him to come out and breach his contract?#can't figure it out #one direction: ninth anniversary #one direction #larry stylinson #louis tomlinson #solo louis sabotage #smear campaign #daily mirror

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cutegirlmayra · 6 years

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I know this is super unoriginal, but how about a boom!sonamy mistletoe story?

(x) Permission was given by artist! If you’re an artist or have artists friends who would be fine with letting me use their art for ‘Preview Images’ for my stories, please let me know! I would be very grateful!!!

I don’t think it’s unoriginal, I have done one before, but that was years ago… So I’ll try and write a new one this time XD

Prompt:

All was adorned with decorations and fun.

Leafs on trees had fallen off slowly, but Amy had excitedly waited for her perfect snow day.

That way…

Sonic couldn’t escape!

She squee’d as she pushed her muzzle up against the glass of her warm home, hearing that a mysterious wind had brought a great cold to the usual tropical island.

Excited about this change, she purchased a traditional tree and even… a silent, but hopeful mistletoe to work some holiday magic!

Eggman… on the other hand, hated this cold front.

Amy smiled and closed her eyes, feeling the cold of the window seep onto her nose and give her a thrilling chill of the freezing degree of the world outside…

Eggman huddled near a fire he man-made and coughed at the smoke, not able to open a window or having made plans to make a chimney. He was bundled up, but still freezing…

“Confound it all!” He threw his blanket down, looking fat with layers of clothes, stacked hats, and mittens all toppled over the other in a frantic attempt at staying warm. “This hunk of metal grows cold just by a sneeze! Now we’ve got this miserable weather abnormality… HA-CHU! -sniff-… Cold moves right through me too… What luck! I can’t even attack Sonic today like I planned without freezing half to death!”

Eggman imagined him in his icy eggpod, floating over the battlefield while rubbing his arms, his teeth chattering, and the team having a snowball fight to destroy his robots.

He shook his head, snapping out of it. “I HATE the cold…” His eyebrows dipped sinisterly down, before striding the best he could with a wedgie and so many layers that it was almost impossible to move right with them all on.

He moved over to his microwave, took it out, and examined it. “Hmm… If I could cause a huge heat wave to this cold front… I could create enough force to melt the snow and bring our warm weather back.” He planned out loud in his head, but Cubot and Orbot looked at each other.

Finally, Orbot boldly moved forward, meekly rubbing his hands together, “But… wouldn’t that cause a wind speed conflict? Something like a-“

“Tornado!!!” Cubot flung his arms up, spinning around frantically as Orbot looked away from him, spiraling off behind him, and shook his head with slanted, disapproving eyes.

“Hmm… still a good plan to take out the island’s inhabitants… And even Sonic!” He giddily yanked the cord out from the wall, not even giving it a second thought, “Boys! Get Steve on the line! We’re getting rid of this- winter. wonder. land.” He glared at each work spoken, moving slowly over the syllables as if to emphasise and stress his hatred for it.

Amy excitedly welcomed her friends in the door, looking up constantly at the mistletoe and moving them discreetly away from it as they came in.

“Hello, how are you-Woop! Watch out, ice puddle. Hello, Sticks- Ah! To your left more,… perfect! Welcome in~ Knuckles, happy to see you- Wah! Watch your step, buddy. SONIC!” after moving them in and dodging them standing under it, Amy happily blocked the entrance of her home from Sonic, who abruptly halted from the fast-paced line being suddenly interrupted in its flow and simply just waved.

“Oh, uh… Hiya, Amy! What’s up? It was really awesome of ya to open your house for us… less fortunate… haha.” He hunched down a little, putting his hands together as he smiled weakly up at her. His home was not ‘properly built’ for anything ‘cold’. So Amy’s ‘Snow Party’ was very much welcomed when she mentioned it would be hosted in her warm abode.

Amy giggled, thrilled to introduce him to a traditional Christmas gag, but waited for him to step under it.

“Umm…” he rubbed his arm, then shifted his eyes to the right. “M-may I come in?” He was freezing, and asking felt a little weird but Amy wouldn’t budge…

She blinked her eyes, expecting him to move closer. “Sure.” But she didn’t move.

He rose an eyebrow, before looking behind him and seeing the snows swirl with such power, the wind blasting them in its wake, and clearly, a horror-scene was waiting to happen…

A Sonic Snowman was about to be formed…

He gulped and looked back to Amy, “Hey! I’ll freeze to death out here!” He finally stated, trying to move past her but she blocked his way time and again.

“O-oh, I’ll just step backwards then..” She tried to not make it obvious… but stepped precisely behind the mistletoe.

“Phew, finally…” Sonic got one foot to the rim of the door’s bottom frame when Amy cried out in glee.

“You’re under the mistletoe!”

“The what?” Sonic felt his legs start buckling up from the cold, his back shivering, and finally… his ears growing numb along with his cheeks.

The gang inside, happy and warm, were taking off some layers of clothes before gasping and looking back at the door.

“You say you found the missing toe?” Sticks, completely intrigued, peered over from the couch.

“No, not a toe!” Amy looked disgusted by her misinterpretation, before pushing Sonic gently back out the door. “If a boy and a girl are under the mistletoe during a white snow day… that means… well, especially on Christmas anyway… actually, it’s a tradition that all started with-“

As Amy dragged on, explaining, Sticks started snoring, becoming absolutely uninvolved now that the topic was less to her liking. Sonic began to see ice forming on his nose, his teeth clattering as he held himself, his lips becoming blue.

“I really need to come in, can you tell me about it later?” He had no idea what she was talking about, nor why she was so passionate about it. But right now, his mind was in survival mode.

He needed to get in now!

“O-oh, right. So that means you have to-!” She lifted her arm and closed her eyes for a split second, and with that moment, Sonic dashed to the fire and skid on his frozen knees, swiping off his scarf and basking in its glow.

“WARM ME!” he cried out, demanding the fire to obey him as he bent his back all the way back and sighed out a long-winded breath at the immediate warmth he received.

“Ahhh… that’s it. Thank you.” He then turned to see Amy’s eye twitching.

She slammed the door shut. “You can’t get out of a Christmas tradition!” she complained.

“But I was dying! I still can’t really feel my lips!” Sonic pointed to them, before moving to the fire and rubbing them, making a silly sound with them.

“Ugh, I could have helped with that…” Amy groaned to herself, leaning on the door and folding her arms, pouting.

Her plan had failed… not surprisingly… but maybe she could get him before he left…

Suddenly, the snow was flooding the house through the cracks from the door frame and around the home, as a terrible heat wave was creating countless tornados and hurricanes!

After some Christmas fun, the team was ripe and ready to rumble but had to take off their extra layers, sweating from the new heat.

“I can’t believe… he’d ruin the island’s first real snow day.” Tails complained, wiping his forehead and taking off his heavy jacket.

“That fiend..! He’s killed Larry!” Knuckles mourned the loss of his crudely made snow-castle, having given it a smile, a carrot nose, and two bead eyes that stared into your soul.

It began to melt away… as he leaped towards him and carried to giant handfuls into Amy’s home, stuffing them in the freezer. “I won’t abandon you, Larry! Not now! Not ever!”

“My home!” Amy cried out, “Why is it you guys always trash it!?” She placed her hands on the sides of her cheek, before seeing a massive wave carry through her home, knocking her friends and her down.

But worst of all…

“The mistletoe!”

She rose up to see the stream of warm water carrying her precious tradition down to town.

She raced frantically after it, as Sonic was climbing dead trees to stay out of the water.

“Ah! Amy!” He saw her getting caught in the stream and glared at Eggman. “Hey! The snow isn’t all that bad, Egghead! Why’d you have to ruin everything!?”

Eggman sat with a long-bathing suit from older times and sipped some tropical drink with an umbrella in his Eggpod, soaking up the sun.

“Ah~ Nothing like a good tan, some sauna steam, and an annoying hedgehog complaining in your ear~”

“Grr…”

After taking down the machine, the team desperately looked for Amy, who had also taken out some water robots Eggman had sent to the village.

When she counteracted the tornado with her own hammer spinning, the other wind currents turned cold once more, and no more formed after that…

She reached desperately up to a roof for her mistletoe, having followed it with absolute faithfulness, but felt her foot slip on some melting ice and start falling.

“AHH!!!”

“Got’cha!” Sonic raced up and grabbed her, smiling cheekily, “Miss me?”

“My mistletoe!”

“What’s so special about that herb, anyway?”

“Ohhh! If you would have let me finish! It means we have to-!”

She reached out for it, before pulling back and frowning at him, but the plant toppled off from the winds and smacked Sonic right on the lips.

“ACK!” He hacked and spat it down to hit Amy’s lips, where she took it off and held it out.

“Tastes terrible!” he coughed, but Amy blushed, realizing…

She shifted her eyes to Sonic and blushed more as she held the mistletoe up. “Does this make one more?”

“One more what?”

Before she could, Sonic turned his head to the others calling, and Amy aborted the mission when she noticed he didn’t see her attempt at a kiss.

She hid the mistletoe after that… played in the newly falling snow, and enjoyed the rest of the day.

She even let him go without complaint.

But apparently,… Eggman heard Sonic complaining about the plant and mentioned what it meant, and then snickered at thinking they may have kissed.

Sonic, embarrassed by the truth of Amy’s schemes, tried to avoid any plant that hung over his head for a full month! Still not really understanding what it truly meant…

(I’m not sure if the real show would mention ‘Christmas’ but if not- ‘snow day’ works too xD)

#sonamy #boom sonamy #sonamy boom #sonic boom #sonic christmas #sonic the hedgehog #sonic #amy rose #cutegirlmayra #sonic boom prompt #sonamy prompt

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noahfence1d · 5 years

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This time nine years ago, five teenage boys' dreams were in tatters after being rejected from the X Factor .

It took the lads just five minutes to agree to his plan and have another crack at the competition - this time in the groups category.

They would go on to be one of the most successful boybands of the century, selling out stadiums and dominating the charts for five years before splitting in an explosion of bitterness and animosity.

But with no experience of harmonies, group singing or even each other, even then Liam wondered what they were really getting into.

"We had seen each other at Bootcamp and got on well, and Niall and I had shared a room. But we were competition then, and at the back of the minds we knew were against each other," Liam would later recall.

"So it was strange when we were put together and my first thought was, 'How are we going to make this work when we don't know each other? It was such a leap of faith."

Desperate to catch up with the other bands, the newly-formed five-piece spent an intense two intense weeks practising in a bungalow at the bottom of Harry's step-dad's garden in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire.

"We used to be at each other’s throats on the X Factor," Louis admitted on their This Is Us DVD of his clashes with Liam.

"Whenever I wanted to do anything slightly mischievous, he was always the daddy."

"Me and Louis did not get on at all," Wolverhampton-born Liam agreed. "We were two completely different characters. There was one point where I literally wanted to whack him."

Nevertheless, they sailed through the live shows and came third in the final before scoring a record deal with Cowell, who for them made n exception of only signing the winning act.

A mysterious fall out

Then suddenly at the start of 2012 they allegedly stopped talking and moved out.

“Apart from Harry and Louis, no one knows exactly what caused the falling out — they didn’t even tell the other boys the full details," a source told The Sun at the time.

“But it was very serious and their friendship has never recovered. Everyone involved in the band is well aware of the animosity between them.

“It’s been central to everything else that came next with the band because there was suddenly a massive divide.”

However, Niall dismissed the claims, telling fans not to believe the reports.

"We stand strong as a band and we’re brothers," he tweeted.

Those 'gay sex' rumours

One theory was that the 'Larry Stylinson' fan fiction depicting the pair as lovers had pushed them apart.

Louis, in particular, was extremely sensitive about the claims and admitted the speculation about their sexuality 'created an atmosphere'.

"People can believe what they want, but it comes across as a little bit disrespectful to the ones that I love, like (girlfriend) Eleanor (Calder)," he said.

"I'm so protective over things like that, about the people I love. So it created this atmosphere between the two of us."

Zayn told how Harry and Louis had even dialled back their physical friendship in an attempt to stop the rumours.

"It's not funny, and it still continues to be quite hard for them. They won't naturally go put their arm around each other because they're conscious of this thing that's going on, which is not even true," he said.

While Harry likes to keep people guessing about his sexuality, refusing to put a label on it, Louis has categorically said he is heterosexual.

And he was raging when a cartoon featured in HBO show Euphoria depicted a sex scene between him and Harry last month.

"I can categorically say that I was not contacted nor did I approve it," he raged on Twitter , with a source telling The Sun he was 'angered' that an 'awkward' situation had been made worse.

Drug scandal

Whatever the cause of the tension, the rift only grew wider when Zayn and Louis were filmed smoking what appeared to be cannabis in the back of an SUV en route to a concert in Peru in 2014.

Narrating from behind the camera as he filmed Zayn lighting what appeared to be a joint, Louis could be heard saying, "So here we are, leaving Peru. Joint lit. Happy days!"

Talking about Zayn taking his warm-up 'seriously', he continued, "One very very important factor of Zayn’s warm up of course if Mary J herself. In fact I will present it to him now for some fantastic singing."

Straight-laced Harry - who wasn't even much of a drinker - was apparently 'furious' they'd taken the shine off the start of their UK stadium tour with their 'stupid and reckless' behaviour.

"Harry is annoyed about the whole debacle. This should be one of the biggest weeks of the band's career... Instead it has been taken over by this controversy," an insider told The Sun.

"Despite Harry's reputation, he's incredibly professional and mature, and not into these sorts of antics," the source added.

Booze battles

It wasn't just Louis and Zayn who were in Harry's bad books.

Liam's partying was so out of control that Harry reportedly refused to go socialise with the band unless good guy Niall was there to keep the peace.

"The pressures of fame and being on the road for two years have made Liam ill," a source told The Sun of the star, who would go on to admit fame 'nearly killed me'.

“He was devastated about letting everyone down, especially the fans, but he wasn’t physically able to get on stage. He had a complete meltdown.”

On another occasion he turned up to a fan event so drunk that it finally gave him a wake-up call.

"I'm not afraid to say that I actually went through a pretty bad [drinking] stage," he told Attitude magazine.

"There were just a few times that I went over the limit with things and then I had to pull it back.

"I was very fortunate that I had lots of great people around me who said to me, 'Look Liam, you need to chill out a bit now.'"

Admitting he used alcohol to cope with the strain of performing near-constant touring, he said being drunk was like putting on a Disney costume before stepping out on stage.

"Underneath the Disney costume I was pissed quite a lot of the time because there was no other way to get your head around what was going on,” he told Men's Health.

“I mean, it was fun. We had an absolute blast, but there were certain parts of it where it just got a little bit toxic.”

The pact

The band was fraying at the seams. Zayn was constantly in the headlines, accused of cheating on then-fiancée Perrie Edwar - which he vehemently denied.

There were rumours that he wanted out of 1D - despite the deal they were said to have made to release five albums and a greatest hits record before going on a 'hiatus'.

But Zayn blindsided everyone by suddenly quitting in March 2015 after a concert in Hong Kong.

In a statement he later admitted had nothing to do with him, he claimed he wanted to be a 'normal 22- year old'.

"I wasn't going to spend another minute doing something which made me ill and which I no longer believed in," he said of his shock exit.

Harry was seen openly crying on stage during their performance the next night.

But behind the scenes, the lads were reportedly furious.

“The others knew Zayn would have a head start by leaving first, like Robbie Williams did when he quit Take That," said a pal.

“It was frustrating to them as Zayn only had to hang on in there a few months and 1D would have gone on their long break united.”

Zayn would later go so far as to claim he'd wanted to leave the band from the very beginning and that he hated their music.

Friends no more?

Meanwhile, absence has only made the feud grow stronger, particularly between Louis and Zayn after the latter failed to support him on the X Factor following his mum's death in December 2016.

"I had a couple of calls with him after I lost my mum and all the boys had agreed to come to that performance and he didn't show, so that really bugged me," he said on the Dan Wootton podcast.

"It was just seeing everyone there – Harry, Niall and Liam – that was what I needed that night, that support," he said. "So on the other end of the spectrum it kind of really showed. So, eh, I hope he's alright, but..."

Niall admits he doesn't even have Zayn's number and that he's constantly changing it, while Zayn sniped that he didn't 'really' speak to Harry when they were in the band so didn't expect to have a friendship after.

"I ain't spoke to any of them for a long time, to be honest with you. That's just the way it is," he told Vogue.

"There's things that happen and things that were said after I left...Snide things. Small things that I would never have expected."

So could they ever reunite?

While Louis says it's 'inevitable', Harry reportedly isn't on the same wavelength.

“Since stepping away from 1D Harry has really enjoyed life outside that pop bubble," a source said.

“And right now he has absolutely no desire to get 1D back together.”

#one direction

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sparda3g · 6 years

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Kingdom Chapter 569 Review

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Hara must be a fan of cliffhanger endings. Before his break, he ended on a cliffhanger. Before the holiday break, he ended on, you guessed it, a cliffhanger; literally no less. At last, we return to the normal routine (until he takes a break that is). After intense moments, we are left hanging (haha…) with Bajio’s leap of faith. Hara doesn’t disappoint when it comes to the follow-up and this chapter is no exception. It was a thrilling chapter that had me shaking with fear and excitement, and it ended on, once again, a cliffhanger. And I’m not complaining.

Bajio was last seen jumping off the cliff while holding Yotanwa. If you guessed that he will jump off and land on the ground below, then you are wrong. The answer is he lands on the other side of the mountain. That really happened. The man is a monster. I have to admit, I laughed at the Quanrong Army’s reactions toward his suicidal jump, because it’s similar to mine. I didn’t even think of that possibility, but hell, he did it. I also laughed how some are asking to try to do it as well, but like hell they would. I probably choke if someone seriously try and fail though.

It’s kind of funny to follow their point of view. They are scanning the view to see if they have survived. They finally determined that they did and everyone is shocked. Seriously, they should have try to jump; it would be hysterical. Unfortunately, my fun ends since they have a bridge on the east side to cross that would lead them to their location. It’s bad enough that they won’t bother to sound the horn for reinforcements that could have alerted others as well. In other words, Bajio and Yotanwa are all alone.

I appreciate a page of the landscape view to give us the terrified sensation of where they are at. It’s dark, filled with trees to limit the space, and it’s only those two that must fight to survive. They have a sit down or lay down chat as they rest. This is the defining moment between the two. On one hand, it’s a nice discussion that shows the emotional side of Bajio. On the other hand, it gives me a really bad feeling for what’s to come.

It’s probably the first time we have seen them interact like friends rather than fighters. Granted, they do talk about their time in combat from the past like fighters, but they speak in your daily friendly manner. How much hell it was to take down the Three-Eye Tribe, how Bajio got lost in the midst of combat, and how Yotanwa was surrounded by hundreds of enemy. I had a bad flashback to when Shin lost his friend before sleeping. Aside from that, it was comforting to hear their history.

Despite all the moments where they were on a brick of losing, the strongest fighter to her is none other than Bajio. She hit the soft spot really good. He doesn’t want to acknowledge it for he thought that time where they fought wasn’t him. He was not human as Yotanwa more or less teases him. It’s rare to see Bajio being sincere, so this moved me.

What also moved me is Yotanwa’s somewhat apologetic words. If she didn’t go for the meeting in the Rita Mountains, she wouldn’t have become King of the Mountains. Most importantly, if he hadn’t met her, he wouldn’t have shed so much blood of his own. That’s seriously sweet. I also like how she uses her cloth to suppress his wounds. She is just fantastic. Her words, bravery, and skills are among the best classman you can ask for.

It leaves one question remain: what oath did Bajio create with Yotanwa? She doesn’t recall anything, so it was his self-made oath. He will tell her everything; that is if they survive the next onslaught. I got chills when the Quanrong Army arrived; Bajio left nothing but death flags. Make no mistake. It’s a hell of a setup for a grueling survivor scenario, but I seriously don’t want him to die. The series didn’t leave a pattern to know that a character will live, so this has me emotionally invested. From there on, it becomes an enticing, thrilling, and unnerving action-packed ride.

It’s as brutal as you can expect. Crap load of dismemberments, bloody hell mess, and downright impressive performance from those two. It’s unreal how those two are handicapped from all the injuries, yet still pull off a fighting will to escape. It added more with Rozo King indirectly hyped them to be more than human if they fight with those injuries. Like that one man said, “After that jump, I’m not even surprised anymore.” Sadly, it motivated the Quanrong Army to no longer hold back, and go all out to kill Bajio and capture Yotanwa.

They send out more men to block their path as well as sending message for reinforcements without sounding the horn. Damn, why the bad guys are smart in this series? My worries rapidly grows the more Bajio takes the beating. My head keeps on ringing, “His time is up. His time is up. His time is up.” Yotanwa gets punched right in the face hard. I cringed seeing that. It’s still unreal to see her getting pummeled. She tried to continue fighting, but the number game overwhelmed her. She gets knocked out, the army carries her away, and Bajio stares in agony.

There’s a flashback when Bajio’s life changed with his bout against Yotanwa back in childhood. It’s the extended version of what was shown already, but for all the right reason. Not only we got to relive the moment that changed him forever, but we got the valid reason why. She didn’t come across as a tyrant to enslave him, rather gave him an opportunity to live as a human. She was never the monster that would take anyone as her slave. She treated them like family. Bajio’s tears got me. I love these characters.

Bajio goes berserk, which got me hyped. It also got me worried. This looks to be his swan song; his final moment. We actually got to see his eye for the first time. That’s like an omen that he has reached his end when you see something that you don’t see every day. He’s on his last stand. I pray to God for a fictional character to live. The next chapter will be a breath-taking one; I just know it. This chapter, however, doesn’t end there.

The Chieftains and their men are gathering up for the sunrise; just as Yotanwa planned. The one piece that was left out was the rendezvous point. Where exactly do they need to go to? One believed their task is to meetup with her by the sunrise; however, that’s not the plan. In fact, she never intended to have her as the prominent factor of winning the battle. The rendezvous point is the Quanrong City. I marked out.

When I saw Enpo, I was going bananas from excitement. I know it’s among the fans’ prediction and it’s the most likely scenario, but after brutal hardships, this is very welcoming. What makes it even greater is that Yotanwa knew she’s the perfect bait, which explains all of her action. She’s fine to take on hundreds or thousands of men alone; as long as her men wins the battle, she will be pleased. Thankfully, Enpo sees a chance to win her for he will have his Enshu Tribe to climb the wall and capture the city. I can’t help but hear Game of Thrones theme playing during the scene. Anyway, this make sense to use his tribe for this task. Great stuff!

The presentation is pretty stellar and rightfully so. I grasped the emotions from Yotanwa and Bajio’s words. Not to mention, I was awed by Bajio’s sentimental side, especially his childhood. I can’t see his face, but you can sense his emotions. The raw action was gruesome, the sequence got me thrilled, and the last stand got me praying. The setting added more to the grueling atmosphere. Still praying as we speak.

This was a hell of a chapter of survival. The calming portion was relaxing and very nice. The action was intense and brutal; some parts I thought I would never see actually happened. The presentation is stellar as said before with the intensity and climatic struggle to survive. The ending got me hyped for Yotanwa’s victory is near. Hell, it actually ended on a cliffhanger when you think about it. Clever. Bajio was undoubtedly MVP. So please, let him continue to live.

#kingdom #chapter 569 #review

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