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mimicmockingbirds · 1 year

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OK, but hear me out

Say Ride the Cyclone were to be adapted into a film; imagine how much fun it would be to see it animated.

Because for the main plot, like the intro song and the mostly dialogue scenes in limbo, you could easily do a stylistic, but still grounded in realism style that a lot of modern animated projects are doing right now (think Arcane or Into the Spider Verse). But once each of the kids go into their respective songs/fantasies for what their life could have been? What if those were done in completely different styles?? Imagine the additional, visual storytelling that would tell about who they are as characters?

Like say, for Ocean's number, WTWN, everything became more simplified, and the characters (especially Ocean herself) turned into a more rounded, chibi-like style to enhance just how cutesy and likeable she's trying to portray herself throughout that number.

Or for Noel's Lament, everything goes black and white, and the characters become even more 2D stylized, and the film scales down to a smaller millimeter frame, more reminiscent of cartoons from the early 20's, when animation was just starting out, to enhance his idealization of "the olden days" (as Ocean puts it).

Mischa's song, This Song is Awesome could be animated with a more choppy frame rate, and the character designs turn a little more jagged around the edges, kind of like animated music videos (I'm thinking a Gorillaz band vibe). But as he transitions into singing about Talia, the colors start to bleed out over their lineart, and become more paint-like and Talia herself moves like a rotoscoped character (think Loving, Vincent that came out a few years ago) to enhance the sense that she's somewhere between a real person and a fantasy Mischa's built in his mind.

Ricky's song would, of course, be stylized after those sci-fi cartoons from the 90's, like X-Men or Captain Planet.

For the Ballad of Jane Doe, I would love to see something like what Wolfwalkers did back in 2020, where most of the characters (in this case, the other kids) are for the most part, animated like traditional, 2D characters with very clean lines and neat movements, whereas Jane herself stands out for having messier, sketchy line art, and looks more and more unfinished in her animation as the song goes on, because she can feel more and more of her own identity being lost.

Constance's Sugar Cloud I could see done in the classic 2D Disney style (i.e., the Renaissance era of Disney, like the Lion King or Little Mermaid days) because not only is it really smooth and colorful and just all around nice to look at, but it reminds the average moviegoer of their childhood growing up with those movies (among others, obviously), which ties in nicely with Constance's preceding monologue about remembering her own life, and the good that came with the bad.

I'm even tempted to envision the first half of the finale song in a different style, when the stage production would show a quick projection of Jane/Penny's life after she returned to the world of the living. Imagine watching this animated film, and for that segment alone, it becomes that really hyper-realistic, almost uncanny valley CGI animation style, to show that she really has joined the world of the living, i.e. our world, among us, the living breathing movie goers watching this, and watching the other kids still in limbo fade back to that main art style for the final number.

I don't know; it just feels like something that would be so engaging to see from an already compelling storyline and characters. Especially with more experimental animation projects on the rise right now

#random rambling #Ride the Cyclone #Ocean O'Connell Rosenberg #Noel Gruber #Mischa Bachinski #Ricky Potts #Jane Doe #Penny Lamb #Constance Blackwood #idk I just really love animation you guys #so naturally I have to bring my latest hyperfixation into that world #might even sketch these different styles #for a better visual idea #but I haven't done any sketches in a hot minute #so who knows

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vyl3tpwny · 9 months

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Music Genres

When I was kid, you would have probably heard me say something like “I don’t believe in genre labels”. To a degree, there is still something about that sentiment that I agree with; I don’t think you can really put music and styles of music in neat little boxes. But otherwise, I was pretty much wrong about everything else.

Let’s go over that.

pictured: Mala, one of the godfathers of roots Dubstep

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To be blunt, “genre” isn’t just about approximating what a song sounds like. If you say “I love pop music”, that honestly doesn’t mean much. The more specific you get, the more you will approach something someone can imagine like “I like experimental progressive noise pop music”. Ok, I can start to imagine things that likely approach what you're talking about, but even then it will usually not help someone fully understand what something truly is. In categorizing and approximating music styles, genres only go so far. So what makes them important then?

Well, not to say that approximating a style when describing an artist to someone is a bad thing or that doing so isn’t meant to be valued, but it’s hardly the only reason these labels exist. Importantly, “genre” helps establish culture, history, and a musical identity. So when you're trying to tell someone you're listening to a "progressive rock” project, you’re not just imagining odd time-signatures and complex riffs, you’re also meant to understand and consider that whatever is being described as to you has some sort of relevance or importance with regards to the history behind progressive rock; the culture of college bands in the UK, the sound that the punk movement revolted against, the progression of musical storytelling in rock music since the late 60’s and early 70’s, stuff like that. There’s a distinct culture and history you can pinpoint and understand when you describe something as being progressive rock and you can’t just go around calling any complex electric guitar oriented music "progressive rock" unless it has those specific ties as well as understanding and iteration of the roots.

pictured: Genesis, because progressive rock mention

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Genre labels help to clarify what kind of culture and histories a music project is being associated itself with and where a lot of its inspiration comes from. This is much more compelling reason for underlining the importance of genre labels and why they should be used correctly.

So, there is something I need to get off my chest then. There are a lot of misuses of genre labels all over the place, especially online. And I’m not talking about saying something is “Alternative Rock” when it’s clearly some kind of “Folk Rock” record instead. What I’m talking about is something like “Dubstep”.

Even as recent as a few years ago, I started personally reclaiming the term “Dubstep” as a genre label to describe any bass-adjacent music. At the time I did this, I thought it was cool, because the term Dubstep had been dubbed (pun intended) to be cringeworthy lexicon to some people. And while I feel that’s a noble reason to reclaim something like that, because some weirdos think it's cringe, in this case I actually think it’s wrong.

The term “Brostep” has been used to describe any non-roots bass-oriented music that originates from the proper roots Dubstep. It’s a term I didn’t like FOREVER, especially because the phrase was derived as a generalization of the kind of people who tend to listen to it. However, I actually think that Brostep is a title that people should be more comfortable and confident with labeling things as.

The original Dubstep came as a result of Jamaican immigrants bringing Dub music to the UK, which then fused with the remnants of 2-Step Garage which was prominent in the 90’s just years prior. Timbah.On.Toast made a great video called All My Homies Hate Skrillex and it is a really good breakdown of what separates roots Dubstep from the Americanized Brostep, which came after it. I think everyone knows by now that I have a deep, deep love for EDM based Broste and I am the biggest Skrillex fangirl alive. So being both a Brostep and Skrillex superfan, please understand that I think the video is one of the most important things you can watch as an EDM enjoyer.

Conflating the term Dubstep with things that aren’t actually Dubstep is honestly a slap in the face to all of the pioneers of Dub and Dubstep, which famously were both pretty much ENTIRELY invented by black people. I think it’s fair to say that incorrectly labeling music in this way has racist implications. It dishonours and twists the legacy of the music. You can find og Dubstep to listen to on the RYM Ultimate Box Set > Dubstep page. Check some of that out, then listen to some 2010, 2011 Skrillex and see how different things really went.

It confused me at first when I was a teenager, I didn't understand why so many people hated Skrillex back in the day. I came to realize so much of the hate wasn’t even really with regards music itself, but the total lack of understanding or care for the roots of the genre, which all of his work was founded upon and he then subsequently bastardized without caring at all. It was pure disrespect, it was practically cultural erasure and so many people will now only know of Dubstep as “that Skrillex transformer screech music”. Yeah. It actually fucking sucks.

But there is a LONG history of black music being erased from history and being undermined, whether entirely intentional or due to systemic unawareness.

I saw a post the other day talking about how it sucks that so much music is just lumped into being “video game music” when so much of this stuff has deep roots and cultural significance. The first example pointed how a lot of acid jazz music is just described as “Persona music” by the layperson now. Meanwhile, Acid Jazz as a genre is a huge development on things like roots jazz, disco, funk, and hip hop music. You know. All genres that were invented by black people. Fascinating, right?

Jungle music was also mentioned. And this one is very particular for me. Jungle music, when not being generalized as "PS1 Music", is often just called drum & bass or breakcore (also please Google the difference between breakbeat and breakcore, thanks) which are all fundamentally misunderstanding what Jungle music even is. Much of Jungle music, AS MANY THINGS DO, finds VERY prominent roots in Reggae, Dub, and sound system culture in Jamaica as well as countless other prominently black communities in the UK.

But it doesn’t stop there.

If you’re unfamiliar, there is a genre called “IDM”, otherwise known as Intelligent Dance Music. When I was a kid, and I first heard that word, I immediately was like “that is the most pretentious, stupid thing I’ve ever heard”. Eventually as I grew up, I just stopped thinking about that and started referring to more music as IDM. This style of music is generally characterized with “complexity” and being “not much danceable”. While I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the music that is called IDM, I do think there’s everything wrong with the term IDM, intelligent dance music.

When asked how he feels about being labeled as an IDM artist, Aphex Twin responded:

"I just think it's really funny to have terms like that. It's [basically] saying 'this is intelligent and everything else is STUPID.' It's really nasty to everyone else's music."

pictured: Aphex Twin, the funnyman himself

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I think most people would agree with this sentiment. It’s so strange to call one kind of music “intelligent”, out of the hundreds of thousands of genres out there. But let’s bring this back to Jungle music. The reality is that IDM started to become a term around the same time that Jungle music became prominent, in the 90's. Both styles of music are complex, introspective, skittery, and chaotic (but refined and often disciplined) genres. Except, of these two, Jungle music was the one pioneered primarily by black artists. IDM was a sort in competition with Jungle. To therefore call IDM “intelligent” in comparison to Jungle music ... well. I don’t feel like I really have to explain why that’s fucked up.

A lot of people have proposed different names for IDM. A quick look on reddit yields things like “Experimental Electronic” and “Brain Dance” (which was coined by Aphex Twin's label). Me personally, the term “Electro-Prog” comes to mind. Sounds cool.

Similar conversations are presently being had about the term “Riddim”. This brings us back to the dubstep side of this discussion again. Riddim, as an EDM genre, is an offshoot of Brostep music that focuses a lot on repetition over the downbeat, maintaining an insanely distorted sound design, a lot more than the average Brostep song. However, the term “riddim” originates — yet again — from the Jamaican Patois for “rhythm”. And Riddim as a musical style in Jamaica is actually more associated with things like dancehall and reggae, rather than the commercialized "Riddim" that is several hundred times removed from its own roots.

Last year, musician INFEKT proposed that what most EDM listeners call “riddim” should be referred to instead as “Trench” in an article on their website. This proposed name is derived from Getter’s use of the term on his 2014 record “Trenchlords Vol. 1”. I don’t personally know how much I resonate with the term, but whatever the consensus is, I don’t think we should be conflating a westernized, commercialized, and EDM-centric genre like this to Jamaican roots music. Over and over again, it seems that black music is constantly overwritten by developments like this, so I think more care needs to be taken in not allowing that to happen.

As a side note, a lot of people online seem very keen on appropriating Jamaican Patois quite often? There are so many examples of this. When the term “Bomboclaat” started making the rounds on Twitter a few years ago, so many white people were quick to either talk wildly about the term and trend or otherwise start saying it as well. There was a fucking article that sought to answer “The Bomboclaat >> Meme << Meaning Explained”, like they’re not dissecting an element of Jamaican slang lol. Then there was a period of time where people were constantly saying things like “On Jah?” as a stand-in for “On God?” even though this, again, is Jamaican Patois. And even now, you have tons and tons of non-black people going everywhere being like “what is blud waffling about?”, the phrase “blud” ONCE AGAIN also being Jamaican in origin.

I shouldn’t even have to explain what makes these kinds of appropriations weird and messed up. But black people lose jobs and are denied basic things in life over their hair styles, their expressions and slang, and so many other things that a white person can just appropriate and face zero consequences whatsoever for.

That aside, aside. Understanding and labeling genres correctly is such a big part of music history and highlighting and preserving cultures worldwide. When efforts are made to undermine the meaning of a genre label or otherwise use it incorrectly, so much damage is done to the communities and people groups that innovate and pioneer this art to begin with.

For these reasons, I will gladly use the term Brostep. I will happily call things Electro-Prog. And when you talk about genres like Jungle and Dubstep, say it with your whole chest. Be proud of the human race, show respect and love for the people who have forged the greatest parts of music with their bare hands. We will always stand on the shoulders of giants as musicians, so instead of pretending you yourself are the giant, build monuments and maintain the history of these people. You as an artist are nothing without them.

pictured: Augustus Pablo, one of the most important innovators of Dub. Without him, and without many of his contemporaries, I would reckon that half or more of all modern music would simply not exist.

CONTENT WARNING FOR THIS FINAL SECTION, THERE ARE LIKE LOTS OF STRANGE SLURS AND RACIST VIBES.

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One last thing I wanna mention, this is slightly tangential but I think it's relevant to this conversation. It's always weird how lots of websites categorize things like this:

From Big Fish Audio... "G**sy*? "World/Ethnic Loops & Samples"? What the fuck are you talking about. Seems like racism to me.

On Loopmasters they have a "World" section. Any Americanized genre gets its own category, but the entire continents of Africa and Asia as well as the country of India and region of the Middle East (which are part of Asia, hope this helps btw) and lastly South America are stuffed into the nebulous "World Label". Seems like racism to me. Are you telling me you weirdos can't figure out a better way to represent these things?

But then Psy Trance gets its whole entire own category? Aren't there only like five people who listen to Psy Trance? /hj . But like come on.

Shoutout to WA Productions for categorizing a universe of suspiciously mostly black music as """Urban"""". And this company is a dime a dozen, hundreds of corpos do this shit.

East fucking West, what is this dude. There is a racism happening, I just know it. Please give me a count of how many poc are on payroll at your company, I am so curious.

And while we're at it, East West, what is this. Tell me. Fucking tell me.

Thanks for reading.

#vyop

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thelensofyashunews · 2 months

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BBYMUTHA SHARES NEW SINGLE "LINES"

The defiant Chattanooga-born, Atlanta-based artist and underground staple bbymutha has just shared her new single “lines” from her upcoming album sleep paralysis—out 4/19 via True Panther Records. Defined by colorful lyricism and genre-bending production, bbymutha instantly stood out among other SoundCould-era artists on her 2017 hit “Rules” (6M+ Streams) and solidified her name a year later with "Lately" featuring Rico Nasty, as well as the poppy, R&B-infused banger "Sleeping With the Enemy" (9M+ Streams). A viral performance of “Heavy Metal” on COLORS in 2019 followed by the release of bbymutha’s critically-acclaimed debut album Muthaland in 2020 led to subsequent collaborations with Zelooperz, Baby Tate, Na-Kel, Pink Siifu, Kelela, and Fly Anakin on her most recent album, Muthaleficent 3. Most recently, bbymutha announced a 25-date tour in support of the forthcoming sleep paralysis, along with new tracks “gun kontrol” and “go!”, with Pitchfork praising the former for the “allure and force of [bbymutha’s] voice, a thick Tennessee drawl that she wields like a weapon”. Cementing herself as a staple in the Southern underground scene, bbymutha is continuing to usher in a new era of self-discovery and reinvention on her new single “lines”, and forthcoming album sleep paralysis – out on 4/19.

With its jittery beat and electric-shock lyricism, “lines” finds bbymutha continuing to challenge traditional genre boundaries by experimenting with new sonics and textures – a trend that will continue across sleep paralysis. A unique blend of Punk, Electronic, and Rap, “lines” is a heart-pounding thrill ride packed with lyrical barbs (“Religion, worship, purpose / Love is not enough for me”) tied together with an infectious UGK/Fat Pat-referencing hook (“He wanna cut me / Like the lines on the dresser”). The track is the third offering from sleep paralysis, which compiles beats from nine different Electronic and Club producers including Foisey, Bon Music Vision, and Kilder. Marking bbymutha’s first full-length LP with True Panther Records, sleep paralysis layers steely and hilarious musings over windswept synths and echoing industrial 808s, bringing both an urgency to bbymutha’s words and a glint of experimentation to her ever-developing sound. The album’s inspiration was derived from a post-lockdown tour in the UK on which she was introduced to the sounds of 90's Garage and UK dance music, a revelating moment following a gauntlet of bad luck and creative rut during the peak of the pandemic. The album’s title, sleep paralysis is a literal reference to the syndrome which bbymutha has been afflicted with since childhood. Providing a way for her to dive back into memories she didn’t even know she had was essential in crafting the album. Showcasing why NYLON recently hailed bbymutha as “Chattanooga’s best rapper”, it’s an album fascinated with the dreamlike nature of trauma, personal history, and fantasy.

#bbymutha #lines #fly anakin #tour #spotify #youtube #music #artist #musician #soundcloud #rapper #culture #rap #art #chattanooga rapper #chattanooga tennessee #Spotify

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th3-0bjectivist · 9 months

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youtube

Dear listener, three months ago I began posting music by recently deceased artists and long-dead bands that were, all of them, exceptional in some way. I haven’t stopped since, and with this post I hereby pronounce my quarter-year long rediscovery of dead bands to be officially complete… and lucky you, I’ve got a plump Maraschino cherry to place on top of this layered ice cream cake. Folks, crank the volume, smash play, and be placed in salivating awe at one of the most influential dead bands of all-time. Imagine a musical act that is completely mediocre in every way; just some shitty, generic modern band the likes of which you hear ad infinitum on Top-40’s radio. Now, add to that same non-specific act a lead lady vocalist that has a voice on par with Billie Holiday. Back that superb voice up with instrumentalists hungry to deliver something that sounds new and exciting to the world, subtract the pretentiousness and insincerity of modern music, and cube the equation with infinite collective creativity and genuine inspiration. What you are left with is the almighty and immortal Portishead. As English as roast beef and hailing from Bristol, this group hasn’t made an album in about fifteen years and only technically lives on through ultra-rare live performances. In just under two decades from the mid-90’s to 2008, this group managed to produce not mere music, but genuine lightning-in-a-bottle magic. The members were all very motivated by old timey film soundtrack LP’s, leaving a lot of their tracks sounding like a tune from a film noire. Whether they liked it or not, they had a major hand in popularizing trip-hop, a highly experimental genre (in the 90’s anyway) which relies heavily on hip hop tempos mixed with soul, jazz, funk, or whatever form of electronic music you want to throw into the fusion. This was also a band that just kind of burned out; despite their notoriety and mega-successful presence in the industry, the members of this collective were just fallible people at the end of the day, and apparently suffered from extreme exhaustion by way of constantly recording and touring. If you spent your time in studios cranking out some of the highest quality music available at the time, you’d be exhausted too. This is Biscuit from 1994’s Dummy, and it is merely one of many, many outstanding works from their contemplative, well-executed and downright industry-changing catalog. Truly quality music (just like any quality entertainment; movies, television, art, etc.) should reveal something true and perhaps tragic about the human condition. Portishead excelled in this area. It doesn’t matter if they were only around for a moment in time. Their music is TIMELESS.

I don’t generally post many ultra-famous acts on this page unless given a motivation. Here’s my motivation; Portishead changed music on the planet Earth forever. They’re more goth than the whole of modern goth music. They’re trippy-er than the entirety of trip-hop. And, if anything you do in your life has 1/10th the positive impact on the globe as this here musical act, you, my friend, have earned my respect for merely existing. Image source: https://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/the-roots-of-portishead-767977

#portishead #biscuit #dummy #trip hop #music #music on tumblr #audio video #electronica #downtempo #experimental music #experimental rock #beth gibbons #audio #english band

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dankalbumart · 6 months

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Not for Threes by Plaid Warp Records 1997 Leftfield / Electro / IDM / Experimental

#leftfield #left field #electro #idm #intelligent dance music #experimental #experimental music #dance #dance music #electronic #electronic music #music #90s #90s music #90's #90's music

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fantasygerard2000 · 19 days

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WISH and Classical Disney Tropes

With Wish discourse not slowly dying out because people refused to not be angry for stupid reasons, I wanna discuss more about it, especially the actual existing positive things about it.

So, there's this saying from a very few people saying that "Wish is an INSULT to the Disney formula" or "Enchanted could've been a better love letter to Disney". Now, as much as I would say that this take is complete butt, I somewhat understood, but not in a way these people think.

Wish is pretty much a by-the-basics Disney animated movie; female protag, animal sidekick, power hungry villain, musical, all that shindig. It's also an original story, something that Disney detractors claim they wanted after a butt ton of sequels and remakes being made and released recently, not just from Disney but from Hollywood in general. Then again, these cretins would call anything woke bad regardless if it's original or a remake.

However, these people didn't like Wish because it was "not enough". Again, I legit understand this complaint of Wish being half baked, but my gripe about it is that it's pretty much what they claimed they wanted and yet they still complain. Same way how with even if they kept the Starboy and Villain Couple draft, they'll still say Wish sucks and want the Startwink and Bonnie and Clyde to be in a different "better" movie.

I noticed that Wish has problems similar with Princess and the Frog, which are coincidentally similar if you think about it. After their renaissance period, Disney made some non-fairytale films that are experimental during the 2000's. These films, while decent (except Home on the Range) weren't well received, largely because they deviated from the traditional Disney formula, which was being mocked by films like Shrek. Not helped that hand drawn animation was slowly dying out as 3D animated family comedies were the hot topic of the time.

After this period of failing hand drawn films and experimenting 3D films, the returned to formula with Princess and the Frog. Despite this film's popularity and love from fans, it didn't make as much as the previous renaissance films. Largely due to numerous causes like hand drawn films don't make as much money as they used to back in the late 90's and that it was released alongside Avatar (not that one). Princess and the Frog, while a good film, has problems similar to Wish; and that it has a great story but was held back by being a formulaic Disney movie. Let me explain.

Tiana's story about valuing the people who love her (Naveen and Charlotte) to the point that they themselves gave up their own dreams so they can help her achieve hers. This is a pretty heartfelt story Disney has ever made. The main issue, apart from Tiana being a frog for most of the runtime, are the fact it has to commit into being a formulaic Disney movie. Hand drawn animated, villain, magic. Things that on the surface seems good, but are just purely used as a wallpaper to cover an already good story.

There's this thing in fandoms where they don't care how a trope is executed as long as the trope is present. It's this thing as to why people like characters like for example Rasputin from Anastasia, a traditional villain with green magic and a funny sidekick. The thing is that Rasputin is so unnecessary to the point the broadway musical removed him entirely. If you watch the film back, he's mostly irrelevant to the plot about Anya discovering her past.

And that's what Princess and the Frog does with Dr. Facilier. He's cool visually and Keith David is a blast, but he's so unnecessary to the plot that his scheme to marry Laurence to Charlotte so they can Eli's money is pretty plain compared to the previous villains before him.

As for the Enchanted "comparison", I find this rathe funny because Enchanted is a parody to the Disney formula. Like Shrek, it makes fun of the tropes Disney is known for but does so in a affectionate parody. It knows it's ham and cheese and does not hesitate. However, a film spoofing the Disney formula wouldn't be as well received today as it was back in the early 2000's. Heck, Tangled was supposed to be a Shrek copy before they went into a traditional Disney fairytale adaptation.

This ties to when other studios try to copy the Disney formula but they weren't as successful. Heck, Don Bluth himself despite his quitting Dinsey was still committed to the formula. Even films like Happily N'ever After and Charmed try to cash in on the Shrek formula but failed because it's formula has been done once Shrek starts to become more than a jab towards Disney.

So, Enchanted being "better" than Wish is hecka dubious. In fact, if Enchanted were to be made today, it would very be not received because it had "Giselle, a woman, fight the dragon instead of the man." Enchanted wasn't good because of being formulaic, it was good because it subverted a lot of these tropes. It acknowledges the issues people had with classical Disney movies, especially with the unrealistic romances.

It's pretty on par with Frozen, which is known to subvert these tropes. Hans, despite what people say about him, is quite memorable for being a subversion to the "Prince Charming" caricature as he was actually using Anna to get to her thrown. And the curse was not broken by a kiss between two lovers, it was broken by familial love.

Heck, an even better example of subverting these classical Disney tropes is Maleficent of all movies. Maleficent was a large deviation from the Disney formula, even by live action remakes standards, by making her the real hero who briefly turned evil after the real villain betrayed her to make himself look like the hero. It's only when she becomes a mother to Aurora that she redeems because she has learned to love again by her. It was her kiss that broke her own spell. It's also a touching story about found family.

Coming back to Wish, the film does the by the numbers formula but doesn't include the major ones, like the romance. Romances in Disney are notoriously known for being unrealistic that it was being made fun by Disney themselves in Enchanted and Frozen. Of course, Disney improve these romances in their later films with Tiana and Naveen, Rapunzel and Eugene and Anna and Kristoff. So, "why Disney didn't include romance in Wish if it wants to be a basic classical Disney movie?" The real question is "what would the romance contribute to the plot".

In several if not a few posts an even one singular video I can find about the Starboy misconception, the romance between Asha and Star would be unnecessary to the story. Especially since the main priority is about returning the wishes so people can achieve them themselves. Yes, I am aware that there are Disney romances that aren't important to the plot but if they're not then why are they kept? If you think about other movies that have unnecessary romances, you'd probably say exactly that, the romance is unnecessary. Even classical Disney movies aren't about a romance has included them because, "male and female characters? Of course they'll get together in the end". Even Princess and the Frog, falls under this. Despite that I like Tiana and Naveen's dynamic in complementing each other, their romance together can often feel forced because they're in an animated Disney movie that's calling back to their well known formula, so they have to. The "getting together" as a reward in a story is old as heck and I'm honestly tired of seeing this story numerous times.

And if you wanted Asha to have a romance, Dahlia is right there. They already have an established friendship so why not have them be established girlfriends? Disney's actual first gay character Ethan Clade has brief scenes with his male crush and even gets together with him in the end. These two are adorable together despite their brief scenes. So, why not have Asha and Dahlia be the same?

And like I said before, even if Starboy was kept, he and Asha would've stayed platonic. Wish was written by Jennifer Lee, and the films she worked in Disney tend to acknowledge and subvert these tropes. And just as they would've stayed platonic, audiences and fans will still ship them because they're just too comfortable with the old Disney, and that what this whole things is.

The non-fairytale experimental movies Disney made weren't well received because people are just so used to Disney making fairytale adaptations so a film that isn't that made by them feels like a pack as been broken. And even their later films post Tangled that are successful, people still favored hand drawn animation, romances, villains.

And when Wish was released, they're still not happy. Now, this is due to Wish not being fully committed to the darn T, but it's still a Disney movie with stylized animation with hand drawn elements, a traditional obviously evil villain and an original black female lead.

But yet, they still look for reasons to not like this movie. Reasons that some are just beyond unreasonable that they should just stop consuming media they didn't like completely instead of complaining how it isn't what they imagined in their head and are better off watching the content that's catered to them and their specific tastes.

Animation fandom is terrible because they contradict themselves. They claim they wanted hand drawn animation back. Despite that there are still hand drawn animated films made today to the point of nominated for an Oscar, that doesn't count because it's from oversees and not mainstream Hollywood. They wanted an original movie, but praised a sequel that ended on the cliffhanger and hope the follow up comes sooner.

Even if your version of Wish was the official version, other people will still be angry at it.

#disney wish #wish 2023 #wish movie #wish #disney

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peachjagiya · 1 month

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“His career goals and music style are highly marketable” sounds like a reformed way of saying only certain genres will do well which is what the comp has been pushing since it branched out into the US and what the fandom repeats to justify their clear bias towards being ot2.

Ok I'm not sure on your tone here. I think you're being salty.

There's a lot of assumption in this ask.

You're assuming I am basing my opinion on what the company pushes.

Not to be this guy but I've mentioned before I have 35 years experience in UK radio. Bear in mind UK radio which has it's own set of rules but that's where I'm based, that's where my opinion comes from. And if the company is saying only certain genres will do well, uhhhh... they are right, sadly. The actual problem would be if they said only certain ARTISTS would do well.

From my experience with playlisting very mainstream commercial radio, Jungkook's music is highly marketable for mainstream play. I got Standing Next To You added to my primarily 70s, 80s and 90s radio stations rotation by playing it to the SM who had never heard of Jungkook and only vaguely knew of BTS and he just loved what it sounded like.

Jimin also has a very commercial sound. As does The Astronaut. Namjoon's Still Life absolutely definitely has marketability but I'd say maybe Change Pt 2 doesn't, for example.

Fri[end]s has viability too but Layover might be a touch too experimental and chilled for mainstream play. For Us could be the exception. Think about how many pop songs you hear with that pitched up vocal. It's a very commercial sound. But then it gets very laid back after that and laid back sounds are a hard sell on radio when sometimes you have to keep the energy up (breakfast radio and drive time radio for example.) These aren't fandom opinions. They're just tried and tested principles of commercial airplay.

Rap like AgustD and Hope would usually probably end up on a genre show or in a "spice" playlist (which is like very limited play over a month to add a bit of interest) which is by definition a niche.

(Side note: and I think any of them would be happy to accept these truths if it means they're making music they love that feels authentic?!)

And almost every single by BTS has marketability. It's not an illegal word or a stick to beat anyone with. It's not a criticism. It's not an indicator of selling out or whatever stupid shit people want to throw at Jungkook. It just happens he loves to make pop music which is called popular music for a REASON.

You're also assuming I'm active in fandom and have a single clue what anyone says - Nah. It's just me on tumblr with a small circle of follows, occasionally seeing the odd tweet and sending my wife stupid BTS memes on Instagram.

You're also assuming I recognise OT2 as a thing. I don't even know what that means, if I'm honest. I'm Tae-biased OT7. I certainly don't recognise any two members as being better musicians or more valuable than others and my personal musical preference actually favours Hope, Yoongi and Tae so...

A side effect of doing this for many years is that I have to be realistic in how I listen to music and recognise where it will fit. It's not about who I like more.

If you were being nice and I just misunderstood, send me another ask and tell me off. :D

Boo anon/Thanks anon, depending on your intent. But have a heart regardless 💜

#my asks #when you're not sure but post it anyway

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spiderdreamer-blog · 8 months

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Tarzan (1999)

It's hard to define sometimes where the end of the Disney Renaissance period from the late 80s through the 90s is. After the release of The Lion King, the 2D animated features steadily made less money and critical acclaim became more mixed. There was a sea change occurring thanks to more competition from companies like DreamWorks and Warner Bros., as well as the advent of the computer. For me, the dividing line is 1999's Tarzan, mostly because it's after this point that we get to what I and others call the 2000-2004 "experimental" age with films like The Emperor's New Groove, Atlantis: The Lost Empire, Lilo & Stitch, and Treasure Planet. But Tarzan has much in common with those films, representing a step away from the Broadway musical traditions and into a new, intriguing arena of animation storytelling. It's genuinely one of my favorite Disney films to revisit, and I hope this review helps explain why.

The story takes Edgar Rice Burroughs' initial novel Tarzan of the Apes as a guideline more than an actual adaptation, namely ditching concerns about nobility wealth inheritance and unflattering black African caricatures (the spinoff TV series would deal with the latter in trying to be, uh, less problematic about such). We pick up with Ye Olde Dramatically Convenient Boat Wreckage in a truly commanding opening sequence set to Phil Collins' anthemic Two Worlds. Tarzan's unnamed parents land in Africa and are put in parallel to gorillas Kala (Glenn Close, at the time coming off a very different performance for Disney as live action Cruella De Vil) and Kerchak (Lance Henriksen). Tragedy strikes for both families, and where one loses his parents, another gains a son. But Tarzan (Alex D. Linz as a child, Tony Goldwyn as an adult) grows up knowing he is "different", desperate to prove himself as an ape and belong. He seems to find an equilibrium, becoming best friends with Terk (Rosie O'Donnell) and Tantor (Wayne Knight at his most nebbishy), and even managing to vanquish Sabor, but then strangers arrive. Strangers who look like him, in the form of British scientist Archimedes Porter (Nigel Hawthorne), his daughter Jane (Minnie Driver), and their guide Clayton (BRIAN BLESSED). Now things steadily grow more complicated as Tarzan wishes to learn all he can about these outsiders and himself, but what might it cost?

One of the first, most notable things about the film to me is its complexity in the writing and characterization. Looking back, the Renaissance can have a problem in terms of male leads being love interests who don't get as much focus or slightly bland focus-tested "likable". This isn't true for ALL of them; the Beast has many layers to his personality, while Simba and Quasimodo are great, imo, because they have more baggage tying them down and thus more to rise above for true heroism. Nor does it make most of them bad characters. But it was notable enough, as was the tendency for them to be overshadowed by the villains or sidekicks, for co-directors Kevin Lima/Chris Buck and writers Tab Murphy/Bob Tzudiker/Noni White to slightly...course-correct.

Ergo, Tarzan himself is very much the main focus here. There's only one major sequence that he's not really involved with, and even when he's not onscreen, the other characters are as intrigued by his contradictions as the audience. (Insert your own Poochie jokes here, though obviously it doesn't come CLOSE to that) We truly feel his anxiety about fitting in, and the lengths he goes to are intensely relatable even at their most self-damning.

The other characters, too, feel richer and more lived-in than many of the standard types. Kala is a mother figure, one who tries to make Tarzan feel like he belongs, but is deeply scared of losing him. Kerchak is possibly my favorite character in the film because of how much you have to read into his actions because he holds so much back emotionally until the very end. Even then, he comes off as a more realistic harsh father figure than a caricature, and we can always understand where he's coming from. Jane is one of the best Disney love interests, meanwhile, feeling like a modern romantic comedy heroine with a lot of drive and initiative, as well as being just genuinely nerdy, which you don't often see even today. Clayton manages a nice two-step of seeming like an obvious bad guy but playing things down the middle until he gets what he wants. Even the comic relief gets good moments, such as Professor Porter gently supporting the romance or Tantor standing up for himself at a critical juncture.

Of course, what helps here is that said characters have some of the most beautiful environments and animation backing them up in Disney history. The African jungle is depicting as a kind of painterly, hyper-real fantasy, with impossible tree shapes and vines that bloom in the sunlight. And the then-revolutionary Deep Canvas CGI process allows Tarzan to soar through them, the camera spinning and rotating with each movement. The design sensibility is "classical" Disney to a large degree, but with slightly longer faces or larger eyes to add expressiveness. The California, Parisian, and Florida animation teams all clearly busted their asses to make this come to life. And Glen Keane's work with the Paris studio on Tarzan might be the best of his legendary career in terms of the variety of movements and subtleties in expressions. So too goes the rest of the supervising animators: Ken Duncan makes Jane truly lovable and wholly distinct from the likes of his Meg or Amelia; Randy Haycock gives Clayton a macho swagger that feels entirely his own rather than feeling like a Gaston ripoff; Bruce Smith combines remarkable anatomy work and microexpressions with Kerchak; Russ Edmonds' Kala is warm and motherly while never letting you entirely forget she's a gorilla; Dave Burgess makes Porter funny with his slightly squat, short shapes; and Mike Surrey and Sergio Pablos make for an excellent duo on Terk and Tantor in terms of contrasting their size, as well as the latter giving nervous-nelly body language to such a huge character. That's harder than it looks.

The aural end is just as good. Much hay and memery has been made of Phil Collins going ridiculously hard on the storytelling songs, which I fully support. But it really is true that they add so much here and take the burden off the characters in terms of singing save for the improvisational scat number "Trashin' The Camp". I'm partial to "Strangers Like Me" in terms of the earnest yearning and connections that Tarzan makes over the course of it. And of course the various versions of "Two Worlds" are essentially the mission statement of the film, complete with absolutely bitchin' percussion. Mark Mancina's accompanying score is also excellent, sounding like a fusion between The Lion King (which he produced/arranged for both the film and Broadway show) and his action movie work on projects like Speed or Bad Boys. Particularly great is the cue that plays when Tarzan defeats Sabor and builds up to his classic yell, which milks the heroic triumph for all its worth.

The voice cast is also excellent top to bottom. Goldwyn has a deeper timbre than many Disney male leads, less of an ingenue, and this adds to the stormier emotions; we truly feel his pain on lines like "Why didn't you tell me there were creatures that look like me?" But he's not TOO grim, thankfully, and gets some good subtly funny moments such as sounding out monkey noises in a conversation that Jane only hears one half of. Close is properly maternal, of course, getting her best showings in emotional one-on-ones with both Linz and Goldwyn as they hash out their relationship. Henriksen, like the animation, wisely underplays Kerchak and lets the emotion come out through his gruff, gravel-pit voice rather than obviously signaling things. Driver is hilarious and winning as Jane, getting some of the best laughs and most sweetly tender bits of the proceedings. It's all the more impressive when you consider she played Lady Eboshi in the Princess Mononoke dub the same year, which is the utter opposite of this performance. BRIAN BLESSED doesn't do a lot of his patented BRIAN BLESSED yelling outside of some choice bits at the end, but he makes a meal of Clayton regardless as a charismatic asshole, and I like how he plays a climactic bit of manipulation in particular. Hawthorne gets a much better showing here than his previous Disney voice role as Fflewddur Flam in The Black Cauldron, daffily sweet and humorous in equal measure, while O'Donnell and Knight are familiar vocally but use that to inform their characterizations rather than distract.

I think what I like most about this movie is that it feels incredibly well-rounded. Some Disney movies from this period might have a great villain or sidekicks but a weaker protagonist in Hercules or strong protagonists/villains but a weaker supporting cast as in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. (Then you have Pocahontas, which sucks on ALL ends!) In Tarzan, everything feels of a piece, and nobody jars against the tone or mood. Combine that with the dizzying highs of the animation and truly excellent emotional beats, and you've got a real winner that stands the test of time in my eyes.

#disney animated canon #tarzan #disney's tarzan #reviews #analysis

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doom-nerdo-666 · 1 year

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Horror does have a place in Doom

(Mainly felt like making this post after a video by thebeansprout13, even if this comes out later because it was in my drafts for a while)

This is a very talked about, overplayed topic on Doom and it tends to repeat, sometimes because certain opinions/observations are more popular than others.

I think horror is an element in Doom and there's a lot of ways to talk about this, both in favor and against or even somewhere in the middle.

The 90's games

We all know about Doom Bible's canned ideas of the characters and story but even then, Doom is clearly inspired by Aliens, Evil Dead, DnD and so on.

But maybe this mix of inspirations (And the weird presentation of the games) means there's different things to pick apart.

If Doom was a movie, it could have been a B-movie with a goofy, campy nature and still have some eerie atmosphere or gross practical effects.

At first we have:

Some dark, suspense based music tracks.

Darker areas meant to show off lightning and "slow" moments.

Probably the default movement speed and the history behind "ALWAYS_RUN".

Doomguy being hurt in the box art and ingame status bar.

The Arch-vile's intended design of an eerie HR Giger inspired alien.

Textures like the flesh walls with metal pipes, twisted faces and some hanged corpses people thought were based on a real pic of Mussolini (But it's actually GI Joe figures).

But then there's:

The fast gameplay and combat that can happen.

Cartoony designs and assets.

The metal music (And other tracks like those that sound kinda like jazz).

The campy writing style in the manuals and intermission screens.

The presentation of Daisy's death.

Some of Doomguy's faces.

The name "BFG" and how some assets were made like using toys to make the guns.

Maybe whenever a level was clearly gimmicky and "gamey" or experimental.

The ridiculously low-tech aesthetic with blue carpet floors and maybe how Phobos' sky doesn't look like Phobos.

So it seems Doom always had a mix of elements and that's why people even argue over this, though i also see benefits of Doom being a "blank canvas" when it comes to its staying power.

Doom 64 was the more horror focused classic game with its take on Hell and some demon designs (But still not showing Doomguy's bloodied mugshot or some assets of classic Hell).

Even its theme song was barely metal (And i think John Romero really liked the PS1 port).

And D64 is also seen as "the real Doom 3" though this is a bit of a topic i mentioned in a different post.

Doom 3

A "reboot" of the series and a new entry in a time after the series was dormant (And mostly carried by fan mods).

D3 pushes things to a specific direction that John Carmack thought it was natural.

Some fans think the same, others thing it's opposite to what they expect out of Doom, some even accept it as a new thing.

D3 is much more story focused, with a bunch of cutscenes, background/lore, characters and most if it isn't goofy.

Demons are redesigned and some barely resemble their original versions (Might be because they looked "goofy" even if we have fanart that knows how to make them eerie; Meanwhile, D3's Arch-vile didn't capture the original design that much).

New demons represent a new art style that makes them "more serious and scary" or at least surreal.

The UAC stuff is still low-tech but in a more detailed, "professional" way.

Gameplay is slower, with a focus on reloading and the lantern.

Darkness focus and horror etc.

More serious tone, with little music.

D3 marine never smiles and looks worried most of the time.

Besides UAC and Hell, there's the Martians as a way to "extend" the universe but they're still mostly mysterious and not shown a lot.

The premise of a UAC marine having to fight demons after the UAC unleashing Hell is technically there, but it's also differently done from the original games (At least/specially if you look into the "lore" in the old manuals).

This game divided some fans, though a prespective i like to hear more is one that likes the idea but not so much the execution and i also always bring up how unfair it is that later versions (BFG edition and others) tend to have new problems or cut content for no reason, while not fixing certain flaws.

Because you'll still find some older fans thinking Doom was supposed to have some form of tension or horror, compared to those that prefer the fast action side of things.

Oddly enough, Hell in the series always had potential to be weird but D3, the game with the most experimental demon designs, didn't really took advantage of those elements.

At least D3 has some mods that fix some people's issues with the game, whether or not it leads to them respect the game more.

If you ask me: Doom 3's horror isn't just the dark corridors or slow "doomed" marine, but it's the crazy designs like the Bruiser having a screen on its mouth or the Revenant having transparent skin.

And i think D3 has its fair share of goofyness like the Turkey minigame (And the others in RoE that later versions deleted for no reasons) or that one fat zombie going "mmmm boy" that farts.

Doom 2016 and Eternal

D2016 is like an extreme opposite to D3: You are the horror and gameplay is more focused on movement and projectile avoiding that there's barely hitscan enemies besides the Possessed Security and maybe the Hellrazer.

Besides the arena focused combat, there's the Glory Kills, alt fires, upgrades, Mick Gordon's music, the character of the Doomslayer and so on.

But bits of D3's style are still present, speciall Mars and Hell a bit since Doom technically wasn't always "Mars" (Otherwise, more people would bring up the classic Phobos aesthetic and specific textures but even Hell still doesn't carry certain elements back).

(In fact, when D2016 was revealed, people complained about the lack of color and even said the demons looked "MOBA-ish")

The Hellknight is clearly inspired by its D3 design but one major difference is being eyeless instead of the weird eyes (Or are they sockets?) it had in D3.

Most demons have a rather "focused" aesthetic of chitin armored creatures and even lore explaining how they work or even how the UAC was involved in some being created/modified (Which may or may not affect the appeal of Hell being a weird dimension of evil that Doomguy has to put up with).

It's also somewhat known that D2016 was influenced by outside factors for Doom: The Doom comic ("Rip and tear") is obvious but there's probably other theories like anything to do with Death Battle or internet copypastas/webcomics joking about Doomguy (And i guess Brutal Doom but there's still arguements about it).

Doomslayer being a killing machine that scares demons is like an inverse to the "doomed" D3 marine: Putting classic Doomguy in the middle since he's both a strong action hero but still gets hurt (Even his portrayal in the 90's comic is like this).

The existence of D2016 is also a result of Doom 4 being cancelled: A game that was so deviated from Doom, it didn't even feel like a D3 sequel (And maybe it wasn't).

In a way, D2016's appeal relies on some bits of fanservice and at least getting basic ideas that people associate with Doom, which contrasts D3 not relying on "outside factors" but also chosing specific parts of the series while also executing them in a way that i'm not sure if it was ideal for D3 itself.

Then there's Doom Eternal, which builds up from 2016 in a lot of ways (And in was that people either like or hate it but it's still a very beloved and popular title).

The aesthetic is more colorfull and brings back some classic designs (Not entirely as they're put inside the new aesthetic), there's the concept of the "Doom universe", lots of new mechanics and a lot more to like (But also things that divided some fans).

Eternal's "videogamey" pickups were technically based on how some people thought pickups in D2016 overlapped with the environment, even if people liked how items in D2016 "existed in the setting" (Because even in classic Doom, you didn't have those kinds of pickups).

There's a lot of debates about Eternal's lore and aesthetic that leads to comparisons to 2016 but i'm thinking on making a post dedicated to that (Specially with some prespectives, opinions and stuff that most people don't consider).

Regardless, Eternal has clearly different media influences compared to the originals and feels like a different genre.

Basically, if classic Doom is a "campy B-movie", Eternal is a "saturday morning cartoon with gore" (And D3 is a serious sci-fi horror movie, i guess).

(And let's not forget: Different people are behind these games, in a series where people already interpret them in their own ways)

Sometimes, i think Doom is like the Planet of the Apes movie series:

D3 is closer to the original premise but 2016/Eternal are seem to be the more liked iteration of the series.

(Meanwhile, we have Mighty Doom as the most cartoony Doom game but in a cute way while the RPG Doom's had a different cartoonyness and sense of humor and a rather serious intro comic)

"Horror" in Doom to fans (And what else)

If you look at some pieces of fanart (Or even fan redesigns) and some mods, there's definitely an appeal of Doom being more horror focused and tense, even without affecting certain designs or the personality.

It's why one could not only defend D3 but even think that D3's issue isn't being different but rather doing a flawed job at its own direction.

Because 2016/Eternal also have their own differences from the original games but they seem to mostly nail their own direction.

I even see "horror" complement the "power fantasy" concept of modern Doom: Making Hell weirder and stranger, which makes Doomguy/Slayer feel even stronger.

Because "horror" as a concept can mean a lot: Not just dark corridors or walking slow, but it can lead to really interesting designs that make Hell feel threatning and weirdly creative.

After all, if it's possible to make a game out of "fans want a Doomguy that is more powerfull and the gameplay is fast", i don't see why we couldn't have one that is "fans want a tense, bone chilling experience and the demons look scary but still cool", even if you see those cool fan redesigns as better than what we got in D3.

(I like to believe that different types of Doom can coexist)

Even D3 haters may find or cherrypick some parts of the game they like (Which also makes me think it's another good reason why MetaDoom is a really cool mod).

I believe it should be possible to make a game that has elements of both "paths" represented, even if it means like a level with disturbing environments and then you find a goofy collectable toy in a secret.

I also said this before but i kinda get D3 hate coming from older fans but not people who got into the series at 2016 and after, because you technically "skipped" the "dark age" that some fans went through.

How hated D3 really is depends on which opinions or mindset overcome the others, because fanbases and hobbies almost tend to have an "anglicized canon" that is rather pushed by some specific people.

Anyway, i tried to add as much i could in this post but i'd like if someone like a Youtuber or older fan were to analyze this and even add more to this or correct potential flaws.

It's a topic that could be more explored, because even people that argue "Doom was always X" overlook elements that support their claims.