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koganphrancis · 4 years

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Shameless really had to scour the history books to come up with the reason I guess they’ve landed on for Ian’s marriage issues.

It would’ve made a lot more sense if they had brought them up in S6, but, no, Mickey was gone by then and Ian was about to experience actual love for the first time in his life-or so the show wanted us to believe. And that’s why I have to call bullshit on Ian seemingly suddenly not thinking he’s deserving of love. Once he got on his meds, he strode bravely into relationships with Faileb and Trash without batting an eye. (And yes, one could argue those were “bad” relationships a person who knows they are worthy of love would’ve avoided-but that was never the show’s point of view. They literally thought each of those partners were huge upgrades from Mickey, and that they would provide Ian with healthy relationships, something other than “war and sex”, which is what they tried to reduce Mickey to.) Think back to when Ian pursued Trash FOR MONTHS-he never once said, “Maybe Trash doesn’t want me because I’m unlovable.”

And that they randomly brought up Ian’s medical condition after all this time as a big part of the “reason” didn’t set well at all. Myles’ AV Club review sums it up beautifully: “I don’t want to dwell too much on this, but I have long argued that the show has fundamentally mishandled Ian’s disorder by refusing to acknowledge how it would impact his day-to-day life. When I asked showrunner Nancy Pimental about this back in 2016, the answer was basically that they didn’t think people wanted to see Ian “popping medications all the time,” but I’d argue that it makes any stories they do want to tell about his bipolar disorder weaker. If they just put in a small amount of legwork discussing his disorder—a mention of a doctor’s appointment, a scene of him picking up a prescription—it would make it less like the show is just circling back to his disorder when it’s convenient for the story. The idea that Ian had to search so deeply to realize that it was his bipolar disorder that was creating his reluctance to marry Mickey (or anyone) implies that even he doesn’t have it at the front of his mind, and while perhaps that’s a defense mechanism the show has set the issue aside too long for that to be articulated. I’m happy the show is finally bringing it back to the surface, and Ian and Mickey’s eventual reconciliation will be better for it, but it doesn’t change the mistakes made along the way.”

Could Ian’s bipolar disorder be part-or even the cause-of his issues about marriage? Absolutely. Has the show done anything before tonight, other than the Season 5 finale, to indicate this? Absolutely not.

Plus, within the episode itself, Ian acts as if Mickey’s the one who has a problem, not him. He tells the assembled family members that Mickey “will work it out of his system” (with Byron) and then be ready to talk things out, so...

Anyway, to go back to the beginning of the episode-if online friends and others hadn’t pointed out that Ian was thinking of Mickey here

it never would’ve occurred to me that he was. I’ve never seen Mickey in that bed-and I haven’t seen Mickey and Ian in bed together in YEARS. Prison bunks don’t count-and even if they did-Mickey bucked him out of there so fast in their first episode this season it couldn’t have counted anyway.

And that brings me to something that also bothers me about the entire way they’re handling this marriage problem of Ian’s-we haven’t seen Mickey and Ian interact in any meaningful way since they got out of prison. The writers have been hellbent on throwing even more obstacles in their path at every turn-which, I get, yes, that’s a big part of storytelling. But these guys have all the traps with none of the downtime to relax and recover together-and to let the audience see what’s going on while catching their breath. They cut the scenes where it was just two of them in the same room, talking about what we’ll never know because they were CUT.

These two have had enough angst-if the show really wanted us to believe the logical destination for them was down the wedding aisle, why not give us a season of them growing together instead of tearing them apart again? They were in prison living right on top of each other-couldn’t the comedy have come from them getting out and sticking just as close, even when they didn’t have to? Couldn’t we have had scenes of them sitting together on the couch, Mickey drowsing while Ian’s watching some dumb reality dating show Mickey has no interest in, but he’s there because Ian’s there and they both like feeling the warmth their bodies generate merely by being close? Couldn’t we have them talking in bed, long into the night-Ian asking Mickey to remind him to get a renewal for his prescription; Mickey having an “oh crap” moment when he’s telling Ian how he spilled his Orange Julius on his (cute) khaki shorts and remembers at 2 in the morning that the other pair is in the laundry and Ian tells him it’s fine, he washed them with his own clothes and even ironed them and they’re hanging in the closet? Have Ian find a You Tube video about making a recipe that tastes “just like” Kentucky Fried Chicken at home to save money, so Mickey’s hanging out in the kitchen while Ian’s attempting to make it with disastrous results and they wind up with Mickey calmly putting the big lid from the spaghetti pot over the grease fire Ian starts in the frying pan and telling Ian he’ll spring for the twenty bucks to get a bucket of extra crispy for their supper? Couldn’t we have just had that interspersed with actually discussions about what they’re feeling or going through? The show, via up till now unknown Sandy, tried to convince us it was giving us domestic Gallavich-why didn’t they just write it?

Anyway, I did like the fact that Ian had to wake up, put some clothes on, put his boot on, get himself down the stairs and Mickey was STILL pretending to kiss Byron behind his big honeydew melon helmet after all that implied time passed for Ian to do all that shit with his injury ;) Mickey is nothing if not fully committed to making sure Ian knows what he’s missing out on.

Mickey packing up his shit and telling Ian “when you know, you know” was to me equal parts funny and frustrating because it was like he was telling Ian A: Mickey knows how he feels about Ian and B: Ian should know how he feels about Mickey by now-but he clearly doesn’t. I thought having Mickey say Byron might be a Koch was a weird choice-I don’t think either Mickey or Ian (and most of the show’s target audience) would know that would mean his family-it it’s THOSE Kochs-are rich af, and if the show wanted to argue Mickey thought it meant his heir to the Coca-Cola fortune or that they somehow hold a patent on cocaine they can drop fucking dead. And the stretch to try to make the joke about Byron studying something from Britain vs “English” was painful.

And flashing back to S6 yet again, the show had Ian belittle Mickey twice-first by saying his emotional IQ is lower than Carl’s actual IQ (and, again, by the end of the show we’re supposed to think it’s Ian who is emotionally blocked, but how are we supposed to believe it or have sympathy when he was mocking Mickey-who is actually quite open with Ian when it comes to his emotions), and then secondly by claiming that Mickey has freakishly small hands. Well, Ian, you have a freakishly large head, and it doesn’t seem to dwarf Mickey’s mitts:

The scene with Debbie didn’t enrage me for once, and I was shocked. But I was glad she told him to marry Mickey to make him happy-but again in that scene Ian was searching for a reason after the fact to justify his still even a mystery to him reluctance to marry.

The scene with Lip was the best one they’re probably going to have for quite a while, maybe ever at the rate the show is going, but again, violent flashbacks to Ian’s Faileb/Trash days when he said “Debbie told me to” (marry Mickey). Remember those lost seasons where he did anything those bozos told him to and never stood up for himself? And also, if the show wasn’t wasting so much time with scenes of Frank tied to a bed and Debbie grooming an under-aged girl, Lip and Ian could’ve talked further, maybe delved into what Lip suggests Ian figure out for himself someday. If we could actually see Ian trying to get to the root of the problem, maybe it wouldn’t feel like the white board didn’t just say something like: Mickey/Ian break up-bipolar???

Their last scene of the episode had a lot of good stuff in it, even if ultimately it just broke down in the end with the lazy writing. Ian shoving the ring at Mickey and Mickey being let down by finding out not only is Ian not trying a little too late to salvage the engagement, but he’s making some lame “promise” and claims Gallaghers don’t break their promises-how can he say that to Mickey of all people? Name one promise Ian KEPT to Mickey! Noel, as always, plays out so much emotion without saying a word, and the heartbreak is palpable. And when he says Ian is saying he doesn’t love him enough? Noel! He makes it all so real. And we’re not let off the hook yet. But Mickey calling Byron by the wrong name, Ian pointing it out, and Mickey countering with he answers to whatever the fuck I call him was a nice throwback to the days of Mickey’s refusal to use Ian’s first name AND all the nicknames he came up with from Fire Crotch to Sleepy Face and Mumbles and almost makes me believe that the writer of the week maybe bothered watching at least the Gallavich scenes videos on You Tube. Almost. I’m more ready to believe Noel improvised that line in there himself ;)

We then get the reuse/recycle scene of Ian saying how there’s so much wrong with him and how he doesn’t know himself from one day to the next (so, again, would’ve been nice if there had been evidence of him feeling that way/dealing with it before last night), when he says to Mickey “how do you know that’s who you want to spend the rest of your life with?” I thought Mickey’s answer of “Jesus Christ, Ian” was perfect. He wasn’t going to stand there and give Ian a list of the many, many times he’s proven his love for Ian or try to coddle Ian and kiss him to try to make it better. Mickey’s finally figured out it’s up to Ian to either believe in Mickey’s mighty love or not, but Mickey’s done trying to sell it. Mickey’s gotta be so tired of all this-all along he’s done what Ian wants, even back when it was putting his own safety in jeopardy (another thing that I hate about the Terry retcon-remember when he was yelling his head off in the background when Mickey told Ian he’d meet him at the store in twenty, even tho it wasn’t a good time? Ever since that day, Mickey has always done everything in his power to give Ian what Ian thought he needed or wanted from Mickey).

Anyway, maybe I’m just a bear of very little imagination, but I honestly don’t see that they’re going to write anything that wraps up all this “tension” and Ian’s inability to commit well. By the end of the episode, I was picturing that they’ll have Mickey and Ian do a non-singing version of the Elephant Love Medley from Moulin Rouge to get Ian over his qualms about marriage. It fits in perfectly with the writers stealing from other stories, plus the whole thing is 4 minutes, which is considered a long scene for IxM these days.

The last we see of Ian, he takes a little detour to piss in the Vespa’s tank, and so now we’ve had two scenes of Paula getting at Ian’s junk, one of the Vespa with it, one scene of Mickey’s cousin grabbing Mickey’s dick, while that scene with the mayonnaise lube was the one and only time Ian and Mickey have come close to each other’s genitals/having sex all season. For all we know, they haven’t had it since-especially since Mickey had that telling line of getting bitchy when nothing’s been up his ass for a while...

(Gif credits: Ian and pillow-sickness-health-all-that-shit, Club kiss-mickeygifs)

#Shameless Season 10 #Episode 9 #The cramming continues #As does my lamenting how much time they wasted not letting them have scenes in the first half of the season #Mickey moving into Byron's modern day version of Jeannie's bottle and being a bossy bottom was fantastic-Noel not surprisingly knocked it #out of the park #But damn isn't he carrying enough of the show as it is?#Give him more scenes!

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koredzas · 6 years

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Workshop of Noel Bellemare - The Lamentation of Christ. 1520 - 1546

#art #renaissance #noel bellemare #the lamentation of christ #the dead christ

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fitheghosty · 2 years

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what are the rules of limbo in ride the cyclone? like I'm so confused lmao

cause. the choir is technically dead, but they haven't gone to the other side yet (I'm just gonna assume that's like them becoming ghosts, or heaven for this time being)

so do they feel different? I mean, I would guess jane definitely feels- weird, but not different cause this is all she's known. but does the rest of the choir feel different, like weightless, or just do they feel pain where the accident might have physically hurt them the most?

and like, they can drink (and eat also I suppose) which by the way where did mischa get that? we still don't know djfhffh

they can feel being hurt (noel's lament, when constance punched ocean)

I know these are just a lot of questions that really can't be answered, but it is interesting to think about them cuz my hyperfixation of rtc is only getting stronger :')

#ride the cyclone #ride the cyclone musical #musicals #rtc #musical theater #off broadway #musical theatre #fandoms #theater kid #musical theater fandom

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nbymop · 2 years

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No but what genre of music is Noel's Lament I need to know

#ride the cyclone #rtc #noel gruber

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celiasvalley · 2 years

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So since @fitheghosty gave me a crumb of encouragement (like usual) I have started creating a Ride The Cyclone OC!

Name: Jenna Watson

Pronouns: she/her

Title: The Most Girly Boy in Town

Jenna is a trans woman, but since Uranium was so small and unaccepting, she never got accepted by anyone. She joined the choir, hoping that someone might respect her, like Ocean. But when Ocean refused to call her a woman and father Markus put her in the BASS section, she wanted nothing else other than to leave. It didn’t help that Ocean liked saying her deadname over and over, saying it ‘rolled off the tongue’.

She was dreading her bumper, but after Noel’s Lament and after Karnak fought back against Ocean, she thought there was a chance at her being seen as her true self. She was. Karnak called her Jenna and she was overjoyed.

Her song would be about how desperate she was for femininity, and never being able to get it. At the end, Noel would hand her the dress he wore during his number, and he would insist that she take it.

I don’t have much betont that point, all I really have is that she likes Karnak more than the rest of them bc he was the only one who respected her

#ride the cyclone #rtc #rtc oc #karnak #writing

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gay-otlc · 2 years

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Straight A Supervillain- Chapter Five

Be gay do crime

Name: Ben Rothstien

Alias: Blaze

Powers: Pyrokinesis

Spouse: Alana Rothstein (Thunderclap)

Children: One daughter, under eighteen (name classified as she is a minor) (daughter? Hmm… who could that be? XD)

Education: Eyver Hero Academy

Notes: Blaze, along with his wife, is one of the most revered (or feared) heroes in Eyver City. He first gained fame in 2002, when he stopped a major robbery planned for Christmas Day, when most heroes had been taking the day off. Since then, he has taken credit for his team of assistant’s ability to discover villain plans, and he typically arranges ambushes for them. Fallen Angel had attempted to investigate whether he had an insider working with the villains, but an anonymous family member claims that he’s “not good enough at lying for that.” (it was meeeeee!)

His fighting style typically involves an attempt to inflict minimum damage onto civillians and property, while inflicting maximum damage on his opponents. As fire tends to be somewhat unpredictable, civillians often do get hurt during his battles, but the city as a whole seems to have concluded that stopping the villains outweighs the collateral damage caused by Blaze. This is false. (hell yeah it’s false)

Little information is known about his personal life, but he appears to be somewhat of a workaholic, spending extra time dedicated to taking down villains. He is heavily involved with hero recruitment efforts and vocally holds the viewpoint that every person with superpowers should use them to train and then work as a hero, and he has access to the government superpower database. Currently, he is trying to hire newly manifested supers as his assistants, likely to use them to find villain plans.

Naomi set her somewhat annotated textbook entry about Blaze, definitely not upset that a fucking textbook knew more about her father than she did. He’d never talked all that much about his hero work with her, not in detail. At first, she was too young. Then, too much of a disappointment. Even though it would have been nepotism, and she probably would have said no, he definitely would have been willing to hire his daughter as an undercredited assistant… if he had anyone else for a daughter.

Any daughter other than Naomi, of course.

She almost felt bad for whatever loser ended up working for him in the end. Having superpowers was supposed to be fun, not endlessly rolling a rock up a hill to win Blaze’s approval.

But it wasn’t her job to lament on how much it really sucked to be Blaze’s daughter. It was her job to write a letter of recommendation on how to best counter Blaze. He had recently ambushed Spectrum in her attempt to break her wife, Dusk, out of prison, and the villains were scrambling to find a solution to stop him. Students were given an opportunity to brainstorm for extra credit. Naomi really wanted good grades, just to be sure she wouldn’t get kicked out, so she took the opportunity.

Besides, she had deceived Blaze once before, snuck into a villain school under his nose. This would be easy.

She set the paper down and listened to Lani and Noel talk in the other room, discussing strategy in robbery. Lani was quite good at sneaking past security, she figured, being invisible. Lani was also very good at sneaking into hearts.

Wait. Shut up. She was trying to do homework.

Where was she? Ah yes. Sneaking past security. Blaze was very good at setting up security. He- or rather, his assistants- always managed to keep track of the villain plans. Naomi’s immediate thought was to just not make plans, because Blaze couldn’t ambush plans that didn’t exist, but her history of supervillains class had drilled into her head that trying to improvise crime never ended well. When Auto, meant to be the getaway driver in an arson attempt at Hero Headquarters, broke away from the plan to slash Captain Super’s tires, they got caught because he hadn’t told anyone what he was going to do, and they didn’t plan for his mistake.

So, improvisation was out. There had to be another way to ensure Blaze’s assistants couldn’t figure out the villains’ plans. Could they come up with a decoy plan? But then, they would have to communicate the real plan too, and there was a chance the assistants could get their hands on that. Really, the villains just needed better security. Blaze must have had really good hackers… or really good spies.

Spies.

Naomi knew firsthand how frustrating it was to have to fight for Blaze’s favor, being a teenager with superpowers helping him out and never getting gratitude. It made her want to become a villain. What if the same could apply to someone else? Then, once the assistant was on their side, they could report false plans back to the heroes.

This was brilliant! She was brilliant!

“Hey, Naomi!” called Cameron. “It’s dinner time. You coming?”

She jumped, having been so focused on her villainry that she forgot there were people around her. “Yeah, just gimme a second!” she replied, scribbling recruit unfortunate blaze assistants to villains, have them give decoy plan on a sticky note. Satisfied, and probably overconfident that she would be able to read her handwriting later, she stood up from her desk and ran up to join the rest of her group.

“Lani just kicked our ass at cards,” griped Noel.

“I mean, I was close to beating her…” said Cameron.

Together, Lani and Noel gave him a doubtful look and said “No, you really weren’t.”

“Fine, I wasn’t.” She sighed. “Lani’s really good.”

“Yeah, it’s because I’m great at being ace…” Lani cracked a grin.

Naomi imitated a drum riff for her. “Very funny.”

“Thank you. Technically demi, but whatever. So, Naomi, what were you doing while I was kicking their asses?”

“I was working on that extra credit assignment. You know, the one with Blaze?” She fought to keep her face neutral when she said Blaze’s name. No reason for them to suspect she knew him a bit more than through a textbook and an extra credit assignment.

“Ohh, yeah that.” Noel said. “Any ideas?”

“Why would I tell you? So you can steal them? Not a chance, bitch.” She shoved him playfully.

He laughed and shoved her back. “Fine. I’ll just have to come up with my own, better ideas.”

Cameron rolled their eyes at the pair. “Naomi, you want any help with that? I promise I’m not trying to steal the credit.”

“Suuuure you aren’t,” Naomi joked. “I’m good for now, but I’ll let you know if I need help later, thanks.”

“Cameron, if you’re offering your homework help services, could I ask about the math homework this week? I’m totally stumped,” said Lani.

Shrugging, Cameron said “Yeah, I’m just as lost as you are. Noel?”

“I can try, but I’m really focused on this one formula for chemistry class.” He launched into an explanation about science mumbo jumbo that Naomi really did not follow, but Lani seemed to be nodding along, tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth as she intently concentrated on Noel’s mumbo jumbo. Cameron caught her eye, and Naomi gave a bewildered shrug, glad someone else was confused as hell.

Noel paused, and Lani asked a question about… the periodic table? He nodded in response.

“I’m gonna pretend I understood that,” Cameron muttered.

“Yeah, I don’t know much about chemistry. But I know enough to know that you and I have some real chemistry together.” She grinned and made finger guns at a blushing Lani.

Sometimes Naomi flirted with Lani. A little. Maybe more than a little. But she usually tried to pass it off as a joke. If it got too awkward, she would flirt with Cameron or Noel to prove that, what, it’s totally platonic! Naomi was just a naturally flirty person who did this with all her friends. Honestly, she wasn’t sure if she was hoping for Lani to pick up on the fact that Naomi liked her, or Lani to assume that they were just the pal-iest of gals.

Girls pretty. Naomi dumb. It was very hard being sapphic.

She stuffed her hands in her pockets. It wouldn’t do to set anything on fire in her gay panic.

“Anyone ready for the quiz in history class tomorrow?” Noel asked.

“The what?” Cameron and Naomi said together.

“Did you guys not remember this?”

“The what?”

“Jesus Christ,” Noel muttered.

“Stop trying to push your religion on me,” said Lani. Naomi snorted. “But yes. They told us last week we would have a quiz tomorrow.

“What’s it on?”

“What we’ve been learning about, Cameron. The 1953 peace treaty between heroes and villains.”

“Right. Okay. I think I know that enough to get, like, a B or something. Maybe a C+ or an A-,” Naomi decided.

“Wanna study after dinner?”

“I would, but I really want to keep working on this Blaze thing. Definitely think I’m onto something. Or I could do both. Who needs sleep?”

Lani gave her a look. “You do.”

Naomi sighed. This supervillain school thing was a little stressful- evident by the strand of brown hair that somehow ended up between her fingers- but it was still so much better than normal high school, or- heaven forbid- superhero school. Sure, the workload was a little overwhelming, but it was work she enjoyed. “Fine. I’ll figure out a way to get all three done.”

“Good luck,” Cameron said.

“You’ll need it,” Noel added.

Naomi flipped him off as the group entered the dining hall. “Any guesses for dinner today?”

“Naomi. Dumbass. Beef tips is written on the whiteboard right there.” Noel pointed, smirking.

“Sometimes the whiteboard lies,” Naomi scowled. “Also, gross. Beef tips are gross. I was personally hoping for a nice meal of Jeff Bezos, but beef tips! Vaguely tempted to get back to work and just skip dinner.”

Lani sighed. “Naomi, do you have any sense of self preservation?”

“No!” Naomi grinned and gave a thumbs up.

“Come on, Naomi, join me in veggie burger hell,” Cameron offered. The veggie burgers here were truly terrible- Naomi tried one once because it was the vegetarian option when they served ham. She vowed to never make that mistake again.

“...I’ll pass.”

“Actually, fuck this.” Noel lowered his voice and asked “Do you guys want to sneak out and get dinner somewhere else?”

Naomi shrugged and nodded. “There’s a pizza place pretty close by, I saw it when my parents were taking me away for the High Holy Days. Also, there’s a Chick Fil A on the way, so we can flip them off.”

“Or vandalise it with rainbows!” Cameron suggested. “Man, it’s been ages since I’ve done illegal graffiti. What if I’ve lost all my talent by now?”

“Why stop there? I can light it on fire.”

“I think the school will be able to guess it was you, Naomi. And we’re supposed to not get caught sneaking out. Not opposed to the idea though.” Naomi noted that this was one of the few times Lani had actually encouraged arson.

“Be somehow obnoxiously queer by Chick Fil A and then get pizza? Is that the plan?” Noel asked. The other three nodded, and Lani- as the one most liked by the professors- told the nearest professor that beef tips were gross and they were all going back to their room to study.

Half of that was true, at least.

Noel led the way out of the dining hall, chatting about the history quiz. Naomi played up how much she had to study- which, admittedly, was already a lot- so any suspicious teachers would buy their excuse. Once out of the dining hall and walking through the hallways, Naomi shared a grin with her friends, giddy and nervous and excited knotting together in her gut. Lani, being invisible and all, seemed unlikely to be seen by anyone else wandering the halls, but the other three were not so lucky. Still, they got out without much trouble.

Once outside, Cameron took off running, and Naomi sprinted behind them. He was faster, unfortunately. Also, she was flying- there was a good chance that helped with speed. The two stopped to take a breath at the entrance to VHS’s parking lot, and they waited for the others. Lani and Noel had opted not to sprint, and instead just walked until the group joined together.

“Sorry,” apologized Noel, as they picked up walking along the sidewalk. “Figured I shouldn’t run in a binder.”

“No, you shouldn’t. How long have you been wearing it?”

“I took it off for a few hours after classes. Chlll, Cameron.”

“Forgive me for not wanting you to damage your ribs,” Cameron replied, playfully shoving Noel.

“Fair. I do, however, want to damage Chick Fil A.”

“As you should,” Naomi exclaimed, pumping a fist.

As they approached, Lani looked around. “Did anyone bring… like… spray paint or anything?” Everyone else glanced around too, finding nothing. They’d probably all been so caught up in trying to get out of VHS unnoticed that they hadn’t wanted to risk going up to the room and coming back down.

Naomi shrugged. “That’s okay- we can still use this!” She snapped, a flame shooting up from her index finger. She wondered if it’d be possible to shoot fire from a different finger. Worth a try?

“Naomi, I thought we agreed no arson. They’ll trace it back to you.”

“I mean, I won’t burn down Chick Fil A. I’ll just…” Naomi trailed off, allowing actions to speak louder than words. She focused very hard on letting the flames fly out of a very specific finger, looping it around until, very sloppily seared just outside the entrance, read gay :)

Cameron sniffed. “Poetry.”

“I think I should be rewarded with pizza for my efforts.”

Noel nodded. “You definitely should. The middle finger was a nice touch,” he added with a laugh.

“Thanks- I just figured out how to do it. Think it’ll get me extra credit?”

As they walked the next block, the conversation drifted into pizza. Naomi complained about the struggles of eating pizza at her friends’ birthday parties when she kept kosher and most of her friends ordered pepperoni only. Lani raved against Hawaiian pizza (“It’s literally not even from Hawai’i! I won’t allow my people to be blamed for this monstrosity!”) Cameron liked all types of pizza except mushroom. Noel held the door open for the rest of the group to walk into the pizza place, Cameron still explaining why she hated mushrooms so much.

“So, I was like three, at a friends house, and I tried a marshmallow. It was great! Marshmallows are good. Except I had a shitty memory even then, so I remembered the name as mushrooms. And I told my parents I tried mushrooms and loved them. My parents served mushrooms at dinner. And I tasted them, and basically went- with maybe a little less profanity- ‘WHAT THE FUCK??? THIS ISN’T A MUSHROOM!’ And eventually we figured out that I meant marshmallow. This is why I will never trust mushrooms again.”

Noel gave him a strange look. “Why are you all so opinionated on pizza? It all tastes good. Anyway, once we get to the front, I’m gonna order one third Hawaiian, one third pepperoni, and one third mushroom. And I’ll eat it all.” He paused to grin at them. “Aren’t I a good friend?”

“I’m going to set your fucking pizza on fire.”

After a lengthy debate, one that earned them strange looks from the other customers, they concluded that they’d never agree on anything other than cheese pizza. Between the four of them, it disappeared quickly, and it was time to head back to VHS. Time and time again, they narrowly avoided getting caught, but they managed eventually. Not that it was hard for Lani. Finally, they made it into their dorm room and flopped on their respective beds, laughing.

Naomi distantly thought that this was the most fun she’d had in a long time. Had she really considered missing out on this, going to a hero school, to make her parents happy? It wasn’t worth it to make her parents happy. She was happy here.

#straight a supervillain #i love these people so much #the flame with the middle finger <3 #s writes things

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artist-picasso · 3 years

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Weeping Woman I, Pablo Picasso, 1937, Art Institute of Chicago: Prints and Drawings

A ferocious image of grief, Weeping Woman I is one of the most powerful works that Pablo Picasso undertook in the wake of his seminal Guernica (1937; Museo del Prado, Madrid). After completing Guernica, an expression of the horrors of war and a critique of fascist tyranny, Picasso continued to be drawn to the subject of agonized grief. Between June and December 1937, he undertook a series of drawings, paintings, and prints known as The Weeping Women, in which he focused and elaborated on two figures first presented in Guernica. The figure in this print may also represent the artist’s lover, the Surrealist photographer Dora Maar. In Weeping Woman I, Picasso drew inspiration from contemporary events and sixteenth- and seventeenth-century religious imagery. He modernized the traditional theme of the Virgin Mary lamenting the death of her son. The importance Picasso accorded this etching is suggested not only by its size—it was the largest plate he had yet attempted—but also by the energy he invested in it. He developed the finished print through seven independent states. It seems that he felt the need to work and rework this image, perhaps in an effort to exorcise the demons of war and his difficult relationship with Maar. Through prior acquisition of the Martin A. Ryerson Collection with the assistance of the Noel and Florence Rothman Family and the Margaret Fisher Endowment Size: 695 × 497 mm (plate); 774 × 568 mm (sheet) Medium: Drypoint, aquatint, and etching, with scraping on copper in black on ivory laid paper

https://www.artic.edu/artworks/135430/

#pablopicasso #artinstituteofchicago #museumarchive

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thornofthevale · 3 years

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random thoughts as i listened through ride the cyclone:

will emily rhoms voice ever not give me chills immediately? (no. the answer is no.)

i'd hoped there'd be more dialogue but I'm not ever gonna complain about this

it shouldn't amuse me that the line digging at misha in ‘what the world needs’ has changed so many times, "will smith movie", "adam sandler movie" and now it's "transformer movie"

ditto for the line about ricky and his attention span

noel my dead gay son i love you so much you dramatic ass bitch

no real comment on space age bachelor man, it's good! but eh. never been my favorite.

“misha bachinski: the angriest boy in town." my BOY, my CHILD, the LIGHT OF MY LIFE

i won't lie i was really really hoping to hear constance's monologue but fuck if jawbreaker didn't still get me somewhere deep and make me cry like a baby

sugar cloud is the biggest fucking bop and no I'm not taking arguments

‘it's not a gamble/it's just a ride’? fucking chills. the whole way through. unbelievable.

the balled of jane doe hit me just as hard as i fucking expected

‘be safe, be good’ hit me so hard? like holy fucking shit? is this allowed?

a world inside? what the fuck. I didn't sign up for this I have. emotions. i thought the emotional rollercoaster (ha) was over

i'm sorry the censored version of noel's lament feels so fundamentally Incorrect

....i’m still thinking about ‘be good, be safe’. holy shit.

#ride the cyclone #rtc #constance blackwood #misha bachinski #ricky potts #ocean o'connell rosenberg #noel gruber

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crucgone · 2 years

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listen,,,,,,,,,,,i may be a trans man but when I/Me/Myself and Noel’s Lament come on i question my gender

#im pretty confident in my identity #but when those songs come on i wanna be your girlfriend boyfriend and that fucked up girl #and thtats the that on that sldfkjlsnkjmhlkfghksjd

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tiesandtea · 3 years

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An in-depth & really interesting review of Head Music’s various - often forgotten but actually brilliant - b-sides. Originally posted on The Vapour Trail London blog on 20 November 2019.

The folklore of early Suede and the B-sides compilation ‘Sci Fi Lullabies’ would lead the casual observer to believe that the band had peaked creatively to the point that post-1997 B-sides would not be worth investigating, however I believe differently and now, thanks to the reissues of ‘Head Music’, these can now be easily accessed for wider reappraisal.

Full article under the cut.

Coincidentally coinciding with the recent release of Brett Anderson’s second memoir ‘Afternoons with the Blinds Drawn’, Suede have issued the 20 year deluxe edition of their fourth album, ‘Head Music’. Their final number one album to date was issued in May of 1999 to much fanfare, following in the footsteps of their classic ‘Coming up’ in 1996, a record that spawned no less than five top ten singles and saw them achieve astronomical fame across Europe and Asia (indeed, Anderson remains a genuine celebrity in parts of Scandinavia as a direct result). Whilst ‘Head Music’ was a hit, its making has gone down in the annals of history as being even more fraught and littered with personal scandal than even that of their second album, ‘Dog Man Star’, the record that infamously served as original guitarist Bernard Butler’s swan song. The chief reason was Anderson’s spiralling addictions to heroin and crack, which in the eyes of the singer served to influence what he and many others deem the patchiness of the record. Indeed, when Suede first reissued their heyday albums back in 2011, Brett would include within the sleeve notes his own rewritten track listings in each, citing Suede’s fervent devotion to ensuring that their B-sides were up to the same quality as their singles and album tracks, thus costing the associated albums some potential improvements. Songs from the album that often raise debate amongst its makers and listeners include ‘Asbestos’, ‘Elephant Man’, and the almost universally-derided title track, a scrappy, crappy exercise in suggestiveness that even producer Steve Osborne initially refused to have anything to do with.

Perhaps due to all of this, the resultant B-sides of the album’s singles have been lost in time somewhat. Whereas the B-sides associated with the first three albums reached legendary status in such a short space of time that the band issued a compilation double album of nearly all of them in 1997, ‘Sci Fi Lullabies’, their 1999 counterparts are rarely spoken of within the same reverent breath. I would argue that this is vastly remiss to the point of sacrilege as, taken in one listenable chunk, they serve to create what on its own would be an incredible record.

But before we investigate further, it’s worth exploring the genesis of Suede’s musical direction at this point. As Brett and the band have noted many times over the years, Suede sought to follow each album with a record almost diametrically opposed to its predecessor stylistically. The kitchen sink gutter glam of their groundbreaking debut was consciously followed by an ambitious, widescreen and darker ‘Dog Man Star’, the pretension and bluster of which was then followed by a strict album of ‘ten singles’ in ‘Coming Up’. Each time, at least one B-side would serve as a blueprint for what would follow; 1993’s ‘High Rising’ and ‘The Big Time’ served very much of signposts for what would follow in 1994, and then again in 1995, Richard Oakes’ sexy glam pop of ‘Together’ would point the band towards ‘Coming Up’ in 1996. Here, they would seek to expand upon the sonic direction of Mat Osman-penned ‘Europe is Our Playground’, a song they so loved they reworked its arrangement live and subsequently re-recorded for the aforementioned B-Sides compilation of 1997. Caked in icy synths and led by a dub-inspired bass line, it signified something cold and electronic, the desolate melancholy of ‘Dog Man Star’ reimagined by Kraftwerk or Berlin-era Bowie. The band promised this new direction in interviews and the public’s appetite was whetted.

Early in 1998, as part of a Pet Shop Boys-curated tribute to Noel Coward’, the band released one of their prime hidden gems, a suitably synthetic and clinical version of the great writer’s ‘Poor Little Rich Girl’. Unfortunately this was shown to the masses on television via a mimed performance that saw an utterly wasted Anderson grinning inanely with zoned out eyes whilst trying not to fall off a chair. This performance distracted from the impressive song (also featuring the highly talented Raissa, who had supported Suede on their Coming Up tour, on vocals) and seemingly left no impression on anybody.

And so to fast forward to the album. The making of the record has been documented extensively not only in Anderson’s second autobiography but also in David Barnett’s authorised biography ‘Love and Poison’ and Mike Christie’s recent documentary set ‘The Insatiable Ones’. If you’re not familiar with the story, it is a jaw dropping tale of decadence, debauchery and depression, the likes of which have seemingly and thankfully been removed from the culture of music making today. Indeed, there’s not a lot of money around now for bands to blow on endless recording sessions fuelled by endless drug abuse. But what emerged was a flawed but often brilliant record that has stood the test of time well and honestly sounds as fresh as the day it was released. The album’s track list can and will continue to be debated but ultimately, had they shaved off two of the more superfluous numbers (I would argue that the title track serves no purpose as does the turgid closing track ‘Crack in the Union Jack’), it would likely be held in the same high regard as the vast portion of their other records. But we won’t dwell on that here.

First single ‘Electricity’ was accompanied by no fewer than five b-sides, all of which carry some merit. ‘Popstar’, a concise lyrical study of the relationship between fan and band, contains the kind of crystalline synths and dubby bass that the band had sought to highlight with their two musical blueprints prior to the album. Richard Oakes’ guitar parts are sparser than ever before but serve the song well, and the chorus is cold and epic in a way that takes the song from good to great. ‘Killer’, complete with a lyric that seems to expand upon the ficitonlised femme fatale of ‘Coming Up’s ‘She’, is more impressive still; a dark, brooding slice of electro-noir that slinks and stalks in the manner suggested by the song’s lyric. It builds and builds to a desperate crescendo and brings to mind the best of Depeche Mode at their ‘Violator’ zenith. ‘See That Girl’, complete with yearning Anderson vocals lamenting ‘this dog shit world’, is less impressive but still good. A real undersung high point of the time is the Neil Codling-written and sang ‘Waterloo’, an electronic folk classic that sees some beautifully melodic guitar lines almost acting as choruses, and a tenderness rarely reached by the band. The fifth and final b-side (it was on the minidisc – yes, minidisc – version of the single), is ‘Implement Yeah!’, an old co-write with Justine Frischmann where Brett parodies Mark E Smith to amusing effect over a gutter-punk thrash that the band premiered with Justine at the 1997 Reading Festival.

‘She’s in Fashion’ followed in 1999 and quickly became one of the band’s better known songs via endless radio play that perhaps contributed to it being their first single since ‘New Generation’ in 1995 not to reach the top ten. Looking back, I imagine the fact that you could walk into any shop at any time during that Summer and be exposed to it as one reason why fewer people bought it than they might otherwise. The B-sides rank among the band’s very best. ‘Bored’ continues where ‘Implement Yeah’ left off with a Stooges-like guitar thrash adorned by sweet synths and a classically anthem Suede chorus. During an interview at the end of 1999, Mat Osman threatened a harder, rockier direction for the next album which never did come to fruition and it’s possible that this would have been one of its blueprints. ‘Pieces Of My Mind’ is better still, and a rehearsal recording of it sounding very different can be found on the new reissue. Taking its cue from ‘Europe is Our Playground’, it is a dreamlike wander through almost psychedelic electronica and its lilting chorus imprints itself on your mind immediately. ‘Jubilee’, a Codling creation, is one of the best of the era and would probably have made for a better first single than ‘Electricity’, a romantic epic that chugs along like ‘Trash’ and bears a dramatic and addictive chorus that would surely have been incredible live. Perhaps the lyric was somewhat off-putting to the band, a blank retread of other songs including the ‘run with me’ hook of the ubiquitous ‘Europe’. If so, this is a shame as if we are to be honest (and Brett has said so numerous times himself), the entire era was marred by some seriously autopilot lyricism that was charming in places in its framing of the Suede lyrical lexicon of language, and just plain boring in others. The single is rounded off by the gorgeous ‘God’s Gift’, a simplistic piano piece aided and abetted by swirling synths and understated bass that had been written by Brett about Justine many years before. As with a few of Suede’s records (most notably the first album), the spectre and influence of Ms Frischmann lurks around the songs of this era but in perhaps a much more positive way; the two had rekindled their friendship prior to the making of the album and it was Justine’s love of new wave that inspired some of the music.

‘Everything Will Flow’, the great lost ballad of the era in the same way as ‘The Wild Ones’ had been five years prior, saw an interesting bag of B-sides attached that differed in style in a far more pronounced way than the two earlier singles. ‘Leaving’, which Brett sees as the ultimate casualty of this period, is prime Suede in its romantic portrait of a girl departing relationship for a new life, although the underlying sentiment is entirely opposite of that of ‘Another No One’ in 1996. Although still featuring synthesised textures, its abundance of gentle guitar and piano is much more organic and not only serves as an appropriate backing to the not dissimilar ‘Flow’ but also as a subtle nod to where the band would go next. ‘Weight of the World’ is entirely a Neil Codling construction as with the earlier ‘Digging a Hole’ on the ‘Lazy’ single of 1997, however here he is eschews piano in favour of nylon strung guitar. Ruminating on the idea of his own demise, the song finds Neil in introspective form and perhaps shows a window into how he must have been feeling at the time, his health suffering significantly during the making of the record resulting in a chronic bout of ME of which he would never fully recover. It is sad and beautiful and at the time I wondered whether he would one day make a solo record. To date, he never has. ‘Seascape’ is up next, an ambient instrumental piece at odds with the majority of Suede’s output (indeed I believe this is Suede’s sole instrumental within their canon). Pleasing and dreamy in a subtly Eno-esque way, it lures you into a false sense of security for what would follow. The final song of the ensemble is the shocking and brilliant ‘Crackhead’. Noted by Q at the time for its outlandish appeal, it remains one of the most captivating songs in Suede’s history. Built around a staccato electronic motif, it lurches and grinds in a manner the band never achieved before or since, as a hoarse Anderson vocal tears apart his own addiction to the ice with suitable ice. At the time, Brett was in recovery, however this sounds like an isolated howl from the depths of dependence. It roars and builds to a final shrieking chorus of ‘you can’t give it up’ which says all that really needed to be said.

The final single of the era, ‘Can’t Get Enough’, another candidate for what should have previewed the album in place of ‘Electricity’, limped to number 24 in the charts but boasted perhaps the greatest array of B-sides of all the singles. In archetypal Suede fashion, ‘Let Go’ cut an honest precursor to the musical way forward, which would culminate in the predominantly folky ‘A New Morning’. Three-layered harmonies and melodic acoustic strum back one of Richard Oakes’ finest guitar performances, chiming and chugging riffery that would be revisited on later single ‘Obsessions’. Brett’s lyrics convey an all-pervaying positivity minus the bland triteness of the single of the same name, capping off an irrestible euphoria that would be deemed suitable for release as an A-side in their commercial home from home that was Sweden. It’s a shame that they were unable to replicate the feeling of the song across the subsequent ‘A New Morning’ album, however upon reflection the fault may lie in the fact that said album would be over-produced to the point of clean-cut nothingness by the otherwise accomplished Stephen Street. Next song ‘Since You Went Away’ is folkier still and retains much of the same charm, with Brett lamenting the feeling of loss felt in the aftermath of a realtionship break-up. Again, this is truly lovely stuff and acts as a further blueprint for album number five that would never quite be capitalised on. Heading over to CD2, ‘Situations’ is powered by a synthesised Eastern motif and ponders the ‘lonely minds’ and ‘vacant stares’ typical of Anderson’s lyrics of the time. While slightly over long, it would have worked on ‘Head Music’ had it been the more darker record the band initially promised, and even to these ears sounds somewhat influential on final Suede single (at the time), 2003’s ‘Attitude’. The very final B-side of this era is the brilliant and biting ‘Read My Mind’. As with ‘Crackhead’, it reveals a starker, harsher sound complimented by the blank words defining a phase of depression, most likely revealing the way the writer was feeling at the time. The chorus harmonies add to the relentlessness of the piece and once it’s over, you’re honestly left wanting more.

So these B-sides make up the lost record of 1999 whilst also pointing towards Suede’s final record of their first run. The rockier record that Osman hinted at was surely influenced by the likes of ‘Bored’, ‘Crackhead’ and ‘Read My Mind’, whilst the likes of ‘Let Go’, ‘Leaving’ and ‘Since You Went Away’ were very definitely influences on what eventually did surface. The folklore of early Suede and the B-sides compilation ‘Sci Fi Lullabies’ would lead the casual observer to believe that the band had peaked creatively to the point that post-1997 B-sides would not be worth investigating, however I believe differently and now, thanks to the reissues of ‘Head Music’, these can now be easily accessed for wider reappraisal.

#suede #head music #happy HM anniversary!#head music review

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