The erratic adventures of shay & jax
No, not the ones in your head, telling you to kill (although goodness knows that we all have those, right?) but your character's voices. I was having a chat the lady behind Morgan (and Sioux, and Kira, and Zero, and Zoey, and... well, you get the picture!) about how to juggle multiple characters. It's not something I've ever been very good at, but it is something I'd like to push myself on more. The last 4-6 months or so I've managed to write both Shay and Jax at a reasonable pace, which is a small achievement for me. The problem is that I'm in danger of writing them as the same character, with Jax heading towards Shay, who's closer to my own personality. I probably made a rod for my own back by not making them wildly different to begin with, but Shay's supposed to be an awkward, over-thinker, who gets around it by acting the fool and flip-flopping between comedy swagger and self-deprecation. Jax, on the other hand, is meant to be a genuinely cocky so-and-so, only really reigned in from out-and-out arrogance by a sense of guilt about how he's treated people in the past. So getting some cocky swagger back into Jax is a priority. I'm also having a proper stab with Al, who might be a bit of a dick (TBC). So, as this is all nerdy navel gazing so far, who wants to talk about rhyme schemes? You do? Good! Hey, wait! Where are you all going? Come back - this is gonna be fun! Fuck around and catch {wreck in the spot}, {sket'll go pop} Regular readers will know I'm a Sean P fan. I've added the curly brackets to pick out the little 4-syllable rhyme scheme he's used in the last two bars of the first track from his debut solo album, Monkey Barz. Stuff like this is why, for me, Mr P was a great rhymer. Using lots of multi-syllable rhymes is something a lot of people do, but here he works the scheme in five times in two lines, while making a coherent little diss of other rappers credibility on the streets, or with the laydeez. Okay, so you either have to be from Brooklyn or listen to a lot of Hip Hop to understand the slang, but that's not the point! Great lyrics don't have to rhyme at all, or course, but my very favourite stuff usually rhymes quite intricately. Especially with Hip Hop tracks, where rhyming is pretty much the whole point. that's why I'm giving myself a chufty badge (well, no-one else is going to, are they? :P) for Shay's last effort. I was particularly pleased with: {I murder verses}, and I [place ‘em in Hearses] Shay Williams, blog freestyle, Yr87 Okay, so I didn't work in the first syllable of the forth line (I guess I could've gone with 'thy words', if I wanted to sound like a Viking) but I'm pleased with that. Four bars which, pretty much, rhyme all the way through - all at least semi-coherent, with no resorting to random words. Yes. Yes I do.
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Following these tenets, I will:
For the purpose of clarity, V is dead, and will remain so forever more. Jackson is no relation of V's at all. This was just a handy way for me to get a 'new' character without mirking Shay. How did y'all spend Halloween?
If the answer is not getting photobombed by a vampire at a burlesque show, then you lose. A few days back, I was seriously considering turning Shay into a parody of the worst kind of bodybuilding.com/misc bell-end. TLFKAC helped me see the light on that one though. Instead, I'd like the character to grow up a little. Him being the class clown is wearing a little thin (for me at least - and when it comes to stuff like this, I'm the only one that counts! :P) As part of that process, I'm thinking about changing Shay's face-claim to someone a little less baby-faced. I'm struggling to think of who though. I have a performance specification in mind, but no-one leaps to mind who fills it:
If any of you could suggest anyone, I would appreciate it. Did you all miss me horribly? What do you mean, you didn't notice that I was gone?! So then, a very pleasant week-and-a-bit off. The stag do was fun, and large quantities of booze were consumed. The only downside that I remember was discovering a pair of soiled underpants under the rug in our apartment while tidying up before breakfast on the first morning. Not what you want prior to cooking everyone a fry-up. Still, over all it was great. If you'd like to raise your glasses in a toast: ladies and gentlemen; the South Hams. I did a little more mooching about on my week off than planned, but I still got a fair amount done. Then, on Friday, it was off up to Bath to prepare for the British Beard and Moustache championships. The day itself was huge fun, with hundreds of hirsute men (nearly 50 entrants in natural beard under 12") and lots of pretty women (most of whom didn't have beards). Not that I was looking, obviously - married man and all that... *shifty eyes* I entered the business class category. I didn't win anything, but looking at the competition I'd say that I was in the top six or seven. My left whisker spend the day stubbornly curling backwards, ruining my symmetry, and maybe costing me a top three slot. Curses! The happy guy I'm standing next to would go on to be crowned British champion in the natural goatee category. Whilst having a few celebratory pints afterwards, he swore me and the boss to secrecy about the fact that there were only four entrants...
In Popmundo news I'm gearing Vera up for a trip to the great big after-party in the sky. It's a shame, but I just don't have any ideas left for the character. If you'd like any of the stuff she's giving away, drop me a line. I had Shay fly to Dubrovnik to apologise to Joni for being a bellend (Shay's note: which she completely blanked - DIACF ginge!) While this is fairly typical of him, I have to say that there was some appeal in turning him into a bit of a shitbag. I know that that's going to go against all the character development to this point, but maybe if he has some kid of life trauma in the future he'll end up being a wanker like, well, like Joni and Feely? For now though he continues to be everyone's non-threatening gay friend (ask Banjolina for details :P)
Two or three big changes might happen in the next week or so, but I have to have a OOC chat with a few people first, so stay tuned, same Bread-time, same Bread-channel. Well done to Geraint Thomas (one of my favourite riders) for winning the men's Commonwealth cycling road race, and to Lizzie Armitstead for basically indelicately bumming the rest of the field on her way to winning the women's race. We can all concentrate on the footy now, which would be easier if I didn't find myself not giving a fuck. For the first time in forever I don't have a season ticket for Argyle, and I'm starting to think of more productive ways to spend Saturday afternoons. I'm sure I'll be 'cured' once the season starts. :P Yeah, my titles still suck. Really thought about offing V last week and concentrating on Shay. Then a friend suggested that I could turn Vera into Ellis, and effectively make V an NPC. This confused my tiny, over-stressed mind somewhat, but I can see what she's getting at. As a playing character V has probably run her race; I don't see her getting back on the road again, and as she's not song writing for anyone or, well, doing anything what's the point? Anyone that wants to 'talk' to her could still do so via PMs, but realistically she'd fade away and eventually die. Ellis as a more prominent character could well be an abject failure, but you don't know until you try, and the only other way to try would be to adopt a kid and wait forever for it to grow up. That said, it would leave a lot of in-game mess that would bug the hell out of the anal retentive in me: song history, showing up in other people's bookmarks, that sort of thing. I'm going to hedge my bets and fish for adoptions. If anyone knows of anyone who wants to get rid of an older kid, let me know. Also, and excuse my ignorance, but is there any way to make characters older, or is that not really a thing? I guess option three is kill V and Shay, get a new character and then resurrect them as Rice has done, which will cost me about £15. Hmm, decisions... Of course, probably the most sensible option is that if I CBA with V why would I with Ellis, so I should just do nowt. Knowing how fucking lazy I am, this is probably what will happen, rendering this whole blog post even more drivelly and pointless than normal. :) I read an interesting interview with ?uestlove of the Roots (and yeah, I'm being an Indier-than-thou dick by spelling his stage name the way it used to appear on the liner notes of Roots albums in the late 90s/early 00s - so what? :P) Firstly the SoundClash sounds like it might be a reason for me to watch MTV for the first time in forever (I watched one episode of Death Valley a few years back, quite liked it, and then promptly forgot about it - might have to catch it on Netflix). Secondly, it's an interesting take on cultural (mis)appropriation. Now I could probably write reams of bullshit on this ("please god, no!" -Everyone) but I'll try and keep it short. For most of the time when I was growing up and listening to rap it was pretty underground. You had the brief spells of chart success, and you had radio-friendly acts, but for the most part people liked a handful of rap songs, or one or two acts rather than Hip Hop in a wider sense. I'll admit that the current explosion of rap's commercial success does give me Hipster-twitches, and I have sneered at all the pale youths in the current scene. Or, to quote fellow whiteboy Vinne Paz: "I'm from a time where every song was righteous/ Before rap was just a swarm of white kids". That said, humanity has always adopted other cultures, whether that's Kublai Khan adopting elements of Chinese culture and forming the Yuan dynasty, or the Rolling Stones covering Muddy Waters. I don't think there's anything wrong with white artists performing musical styles of black origin. I think there's a lot of noise about what is 'white' music or 'black' music, and I'd rather just hear good music, but I'm also self aware enough to realise that it's pretty easy to say that as someone that isn't watching their culture get co-opted. And there's the thing; Iggy Azealea doesn't seem self-aware enough to recognise what a massive bump she gets from being a blonde-haired white girl, why fans of genre that, rightly or wrongly, celebrates 'realness' might get annoyed with an Aussie rapping in an Atlanta drawl, or why reasonable people might be a little ticked at all the racist bullshit she tweeted. Newsflash Izzy: just because you weren't famous when you said it, doesn't mean it doesn't count. Anyway, after reading the article, I figured I may as well listen to the song. Hmm. Suffice to say she's not the next Jean Grae. Fuck it though, pop music has been more about image than content for as long as I can remember, and clearly lots of people do like it. Then again, I'm sure lots of people thought that nice Mr Hitler would be good for Germany. Still, she should probably go listen to some Jean Grae to learn about the Twitter timeline... And just because we haven't had any heavily tattooed women lately, here is Miss Grae, aka my wife when I grow up (around about the time I hit 70, I reckon): Oh, and before anyone asks, Clair won't mind - she'll be married to Chris Hemsworth by then! :D
Not just mine (although that too) but everyone else's it seems. People getting out and enjoying the start of spring, hopefully. :)
Really considered packing the whole Popmundo-thing in over the weekend, but I figured that if you act in haste, you repent at leisure. Shay and V will never be a success, but it doesn't take much to keep them ticking over. V is a bit of a lost cause, socially speaking, but I at least have an idea of what to do with her career-wise. Shay will remain mired in metal mediocrity, but I could probably get him out to meet some new people. I should probably blog the two-thirds of a song I wrote for him too, just so his blog isn't so depressingly nekkid. :P On the plus side, the sun is shining and beer festival season has started. I'm swamped at work though, so most weekday evening I shall be drooling on the sofa, watching the idiot-box. At least until the evenings get lighter, anyway. Hopefully your exams/work/whatevs go well. I haven't done one of these in a while. So what to report? I'm finally cobbling together some ideas for Vera's horror album, which is probably a good thing because her current tour is a kind of limbo - she badly needs something to do. Shay is dealing with Irish leaving the band and/or killing herself. I'm currently campaigning for her to 'see the light' and become the sort of evangelical preacher who's all Hellfire and brimstone in public, and hookers and ching in private. I think the consensus is that TGF needs a third member. At the moment all I can say is that something that may possibly be an iron just might be at least fairly close to something which could conceivably at least become a fire. Yeah, it's that vague. :P Anything else? Well, I did a few banner designs for a friend's clubs. I dunno which one, if any, will get used, but it was nice to do a bit of design work for the first time in forever. England won a cricket game, which hasn't happened since before it started raining here in the UK. I vaguely toyed with the idea of changing V's faceclaim (yes, again...) and thought I'd found the perfect candidate, but didn't make a note of her name, and promptly forgot. :P Ayria Lovett was considered, but probably not. Seems she makes smut with Joni's former faceclaim Kato, which makes her a) too young-looking and b) too smutty. One of the less smutty pics of Ms Lovett I should probably just not worry about it. There's nothing really wrong with Teya Salat, it's just that I occasionally think she doesn't quite fit the bill, for reasons I can't quite put my finger on. Then again, maybe I should make a big fuss about it, just to wind up the person (who shall remain nameless *coughtheladybehindtheFoulquierscough*) who asked if I was going to take another four blogs to decide! :D Or, to put it another way, give me some ideas to steal... ;) V is currently back at UCLA, but soon she'll have to start writing for her impending solo career. For those of you that don't subscribe to her blog, here's what I wrote earlier today: I think I've mentioned that I'd like to do an album of horror stories. I'll top and tail it with a reworking of Hungry, and a follow up to that track. This means that I need 10 other tracks, plus some filler songs (although I can probably rustle up some stuff from the Flat Track Bullies back catalogue). She also hinted that people should write suggestions on the back of a swimwear model and send them to her, but that's because she's a disgusting letch. *whistles innocently*
Anyway, if you have any ideas, please post them either here or to V direct. Ta muchly. I've also finally got around to updating Vera's page with the new face-claim. Like you even care. :P This weekend is going to be a good'un. I'm off to a beer festival in Falmouth today, followed by a comic convention in the same town tomorrow, then swinging by an antique fair on the way home. This means:
What's new in Popo? Well, the British English translation is now complete, at least as far as all the 'pending' crap is concerned. We'll start a top-to-bottom check soon(ish). V's bandmate Neil has retired, and V is currently the spare wheel on the Shut Up Kelly tour. Shay is gearing up to tour again, providing the band holds together. Nix is making grumpy noises and, let's face it, Oirish is always a hangnail away from another suicide attempt. If they went, I dunno what I'd do. TGF isn't a success, either in the rankings, or in terms of RP (it was supposed to be a funk-metal band, and has ended up just another optimum sub-genre chasing nothing band). I suppose he'd become V's song-writing pet. Ah well, worry about it if and when it happens! For the moment, TGF has a tour where they actually have some world fame, so hopefully there are at least some rankings gains in their near future. Have a fun weekend, party people! |
WTF?!This site contains out-of-character information for characters and events in the MMO Popmundo, as well as general navel-gazing and apologies for never updating. "If you are offended by words like: Shit! Bitch! Fuck! Dick! Ass! Whore! Cum!" Ice-T
Who the Hell?!
The author is a professional person in his mid-30s, old-school Hip Hop head, Punk Rock fan, Plymouth Argyle supporter, comic book reader, and general lo-fi nerd. He lives in the countryside with two cats and newly-wed wife, all of whom seem to be above him in the pecking order. He is a big fan of tea, fig rolls, H.P. Lovecraft, facial hair and quiffs. While MPB robbed him of his quiff-rocking dreams, he does sport a dope handlebar moustache. Categories
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