at least for the time being, i feel like i have things kinda figured out here :)

like don't get me wrong, there's a lot of other things that i really should work on, and as of the past week i've preoccupied myself with enjoying little moments outside instead of in here (good), but that leaves a lot less time for those projects and this (bad). but at least eveything is uncluttered, i guess.

in addition, even if to me they all make sense, the only piece i'm truly 100% happy with from this past month has been my previous comment on modern & contemporary art. the reviews have been good, but i feel like sometimes i weigh them down and lean too heavily on abstraction instead of their raw pictures. sure, the sounds and visuals are right there for the listener/viewer/whatever, so i kinda don't have to draw it out plainly and can skip to the emotional parts. but i definitely need to start incorporating why the contexts of those emotions are brought to life so well.

and i need to get better habits and see more; this month was kinda slow, even compared to last month which didn't feel particularly fast either, but i know that's what i made these postcards for so...

here are mini thoughts ^^;

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books

i finished no longer human, but i'm still conflicted on what entirely to make of it; bad protagonists are usually interesting, and i wanted to give it the benefit of the doubt, but with how little things move and shake, i felt like i really couldn't.

and while i'm almost done now with both the utopia of rules by david graeber and stung with love by sappho, it's been slow as is typical of me—though i hope to get to stoner by john williams next, at least once i finish the poems. forever thankful for my nearest library having a lot of old(er) editions of classics and the like, it makes them more fun to peel through :>

i'm happy that i was able to buy two books guilt-free for the holidays though too, but both will have to be at the bottom of my reading list for a minute unfortunately. i'm more excited about near to the wild heart by clarice lispector than i am dracula by bram stoker, but i know both will at least be engaging, in whatever form they take.

games

yeaa, this section will be pretty barren for a minute if i don't make the time and space; i wish i could, and motivation work seems to be a good thing to try especially now that it's the next year in—but promises are hard, made and kept.

at the very least though, i dipped my toes in genshin impact just to see what it was like, what the style was, and whether i could actually play a game on my phone and not go insane. i'm very early on still, and the voice acting is impossible to get over for me, but the amount of advancements and paths, and general organization—of both those and the missions i've done so far—have at least piqued my interest for what i've seen so far.

it's really just a been a lot of picture cross and suika game if i'm being honest. but those don't really count, at least for what i'd write about here (:

but i'm glad dolphin (kinda) works on my phone too; i've been trying to fix some issues with it crashing, but once i do i think pikmin might actually be the first game i go through completely for here. maybe convenience is the thing? or not isolating more menial work on my computer from everything else i want to do just makes it tough. i'll try and find out soon.

movies

there were a few that i 'watched' but didn't really take in well, but of the films i paid attention to, they all felt at least valuable, even if they weren't all amazing. amsterdam really could've been something great, and i don't necessarily buy runtime complaints very often, but when the ending thirty minutes seemed to derail and over-restate everything that it had already been telling us throughout... i kinda get it.

breakfast on pluto was immacutely off the beaten path, as much as the connections to ireland's history were semi-unknown to me, but it'll definitely be a weird comfort movie to have in my back pocket. memento... i need to rewatch, desperately; i saw it but don't yet feel entirely how i think it should come together, and i think with how well-made it was it deserves that soon.

and then sorry to bother you and carry-on in the same night was interesting to say the least. the former, like amsterdam, came across as genuinely subversive, at least in its messaging under the pretense of an industry it fundamentally disagrees with, but god the ending is wild and a bit too wrapped up. i know it centers on changing while still coming back to your old home, and on one character, but that kind of felt blank after everything we saw come to pass with where he worked, and the implications it made about the lives around him. but the latter was dumb action fun, without a lot i can say past that. i wouldn't not recommend either, but one clearly has more in its tank.

music

here's the list of everything i listened to last month, but i'll just get right to separating the interesting ones out :]

• bites – skinny puppy
• the first two songs (on the original tracklist) are incredible early electro-industrial filth, but it does get just a little tacit on its way to the end; either way, definitely a personal favorite—though i'm nervous there might not be an album that ever makes it work near-perfectly for its whole duration.
• i'm not a fan, but the kids like it! – brokencyde
• this is fucking terrible, but in an appealing way. that closing voicemail is endearing, and i genuinely envy the sheer nerve to take crunk and early 2000's hip-hop styles and graft them onto hardcore so unabashedly. but it is a very ugly combination most of the time, and it's wayy too horny. e-40 is appreciated though.
• punk – young thug
• god i wish this was better. it has it's genuinely fun, off the wall, or otherwise just super catchy pieces, but it's way too long, and there's far too many middling pop rap tracks or confounding splits in tone. at least he can make more music now (:
• pastel blues – nina simone
• harrowing, beautiful, hair-raisingly articulated. please listen to this.
• suicide – suicide
• this one is just terrifying sometimes. the screams...
• the sacrificial code – kali malone
• the first track on this is, from the three most recent of her albums, her best, bar none. it's so soft and overly comfortable, but still teeming with melancholy and just a hint of dread. and i'm glad the rest of the album, even if it's most background reflection than upfront confrontation, continues on beautifully in its wake.
• endlessness – nala sinephro
• i really wish this had the same spark i got from her previous space 1.8, but it just didn't come off nearly as psychedelic or surreal in what it had to say (instrumentally). but it is definitely still worth the time and space.
• the sky's gone out – bauhaus
• i listened to mask by them too, but this is the one that matters; that one felt like a detour to execise instead of concrete expressions—i'm glad that this one simulataneously returns more closely to the gothic rock that they started with, while sprinkling in more serious and searing little switch-ups.
• exhibition mode – dazegxd
• a really high-quality blend of d&b, jungle, and even splashes of jersey club and trance-like garage; it probably doesn't have the same number of highlights to come back to as their other works, particularly girls like jungle with gum.mp3 and dsx.fm with quinn, but definitely their best overall from start to finish.
• drukqs – aphex twin
• this thing is way too long and way too all over the place to ever pick and choose from or come back to in one sitting again any time soon—but... it does have seriously insane highlights that stick out even amongst his best tracks.
• all life long – kali malone
• i didn't think this would click for me so well; choral and chamber music, and just the general atmosphere, struck me as worrying to start. but the way it switches back and forth between genre, between mood, and repeats so assuredly makes it a lovely little hypnosis.
• construçao – chico buarque
• i really need to delve more into regional styles, and this was astounding to take in. the title track really does live up to all the praise i heard levied its way. this thing is gorgeous and intensely meaningful, even if i can't speak brazilian portugeuse. i can still feel it all.
• the weight of the world – syzy
• future riddim (dubstep's whimsical cousin) is a genre that i don't think i'll like even if i dive pretty deeply into its background and history. but this felt a little airy, a little uneven, and super fun because of it.
• laughing stock – talk talk
• this and the two to precede it from them really didn't click much, unfortunately. but without a doubt this one of the three has the strongest articulation, the most beautiful arrangements, and left me with more than enough. i'm sure it'll hit harder and connect more with you.
• 93696 – liturgy
• djenneration is fucking incredible. i still struggle to get past black metal vocal styles, because they're so grating most of the time, but at least the instrumentals and glitchy sidesteps here are absolutely amazing.
• oh me oh my – lonnie holley
• did not expect deep house in a soul album :O you know they're a true artist when they dig up and reincorporate and cook together styles from vastly different beginnings and presents. please listen to this too.
• untrue – burial
• the first three real tracks are some of the best ukg i've ever heard, but it does just kinda sit there for most of the rest of the tracklist. at least it's not too long, and at least the sound palettes throughout are freakily catchy being built from so little. and it sits there very comfortably.

and that's most of the ones i care to talk about here :)

i also relistened on the 30th to epiphanies tore through by elliebell and realized i was a little harsh with my flat 2 rating on first intake. if i hadn't heard frailty by jane remover or wasn't so intimately familiar with it, maybe that clear inspiration wouldn't be such a negative for me, that it feels so personally unaltered in that space despite genuine vocal and lyrical depth. but there's few people borrowing and recrafting closely to that album; this is definitely the closest—but i realized that that's not necessarily as bad a thing as i made it out to be before.

tv shows

i finished when they see us, and i kinda don't have anything to say with it either; it's all upfront, it's all on its face, and as much as i'd like to compliment more than just its heartfelt recreation, it feels like that's all that's there to comment on. watch it, but i don't think it reaches some fantastical height as a miniseries.

i also immediately started watching house again right after saying i had stopped, and i'm already halfway done with the last season. i'm worried it's getting to the point where there's nothing left it can do differently or interestingly, so happy it's the last season—but it's still a nice comfort medical show.

i started daria too, and it was a culture shock with all the sarcasm, all the lo-fi jumps that make it so off-putting through my eyes. it's still a fun time though, like a different world i was never there for.

the first episode of orange is the new black makes me not want to watch it, it's so painfully weird and millenially pandering, and i couldn't not laugh a few times just getting through it... s/o laverne cox though of course.

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and that's all the comments i had for this month's section :)

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BUT WAIT !

it'll have its own space next year, but i thought it would be cool to go back through everything i was able to get through that released this year and rank it out in mini best lists~ so here:

best albums

1. imaginal disk – magdalena bay
2. brat – charli xcx
3. tidal memory exo – iglooghost
4. dark times – vince staples
5. bright future – adrianne lenker
6. carousel from hell – lust$ickpuppy
7. i lay down my life for you – jpegmafia
8. kaleidoscope – turquoisedeath
9. all life long – kali malone
10. the 8th cumming – cumgirl

best singles

1. eusexua – fka twigs
2. magic i want u – jane remover
3. trauma – 2hollis
4. good luck, babe! – chappell roan
5. flash in the pan – jane remover

best movies

1. i saw the tv glow
2. beetlejuice beetlejuice
3. wicked

it's very short, but it's what i have this time around (:

some of them are very particular, but if you haven't listened to/watched any of them i think there's plenty in all of them that you'll get something out of them all. especially imaginal disk, regardless of any style preferences or biases :D

so that's actually all this time, for this month; i'm glad things are a little in order even with more hectic things outside, and i hope that this clicks into place in my mind even more upcoming~

ilysm <3

written 1 jan 2025