Of Mondegreens and Mottoes

[rj_anderson]

 As you may or may not know, I'm a big fan of singer/songwriter/producer Matt Hales, otherwise known as Aqualung. renisanz introduced me to him some years ago, and I've been eagerly buying up his albums ever since. His most recent (and maddeningly hard to find) album 10 Futures features a single called "Be Beautiful", and when I first listened to it just

Comments

[kerravonsen]

Oh RJ! I want to roll on the floor laughing at the irony of this post, because (particularly with Ultraviolet and the related pieces of prose from whence it sprang) I consider you one of the most lyrical writers I know. How could you doubt yourself so? Silly lady!

Though... thinking more on it, it was the context of Ultraviolet which made it lyrical -- the story itself demanded constant creative metaphors to describe synaesthesia, so the lyricism and the story were one whole. And in my own work, the fic which I consider to be one of the most poetic was a Sentinel fic, and that fandom also demands a depth of description because of its context (a man with enhanced senses). So in both cases, one could say that the passion came first.

I'd misheard that stanza. It's not "beauty won't catch your eye / the way that passion will," it's "the way the bad stuff will."

And I have zero idea what that means.I like your version of the lyrics better too

[rj_anderson]

I was going to put in an extra paragraph about Ultraviolet for that very reason, because I worked REALLY HARD to make that one lyrical, knowing that Alison's synaesthesia required nothing less. It was a positive relief to write Quicksilver by contrast, because Niki's view of the world was so straightforward and matter-of-fact by contrast. Writing her narration was so easy style-wise that I almost felt like I was cheating, except of course that I had to do great walloping wads of research about radio telescopes and electronic engineering and other things that were far outside my wheelhouse so it was still a lot of hard work!

Anyway, thank you for the kind words.

Re Dreamwidth, I do have it set up to crosspost to LJ and add a link automatically (and I've just double-checked to make sure I've got it all right), but in this case I crossposted manually because of a technical issue. I'll have to try again with my next post and see if I can get the crosspost working.

[scarvenartist]

Your posts on writing are always just so, so insightful and encouraging. I'd actually been thinking along these same lines lately--usually if I self-diagnose myself with writer's block, it's frequently a paralysis I mentally work myself into, either because I am hearing my own words on the page as clunky and wooden, comparing myself to writers I admire greatly, or setting an expectation for myself that everything I write should be able to be taken out of its in-story context and quoted for all posterity. (HA!)

Anyway, I think your version is better too--and considering it was a misquote that encouraged you in your own unique wordcraft, that's a lovely irony.

(Also, AQUALUNG! I listened to his first album, on the recommendation of one of your LJ-posts ages ago, while on my very first cross-country roadtrip all by myself. SO MUCH NOSTALGIA. I should look this one up, hard-to-find though you say it is....)

[rj_anderson]

Your posts on writing are always just so, so insightful and encouraging


via GIPHY

Hoping that gif shows up, but in any case thank you. I write these things to help me process and remember them myself, but it means a lot to know they help other people too.

As far as "10 Futures" goes, it's a bit of a mixed bag. For one thing it's mostly guest vocalists, although the songs are all written and produced by Aqualung, and all the songs are quite different from one another. My favorites are the aforementioned "Be Beautiful" (the album version, not the remix used for the official video) and especially "To The Wonder", which is one of the most gorgeous and haunting (in a lovely and spiritual way, not a creepy way) pieces of pop music I've ever heard.

(I'm also fond of "Clean" and "Spin Wheel Oscillate", which I'm sure you can also find on YouTube or Genius or both, but that's enough to be going on with.)