WILT Week 1

Hey friends! Here’s what’s going on with Oscar. I’m trying to listen to roughly 2 albums and 1 book a week this summer (I’m an audiobook guy). I have not done a great job of doing so so far, so now I’m making it your problem (perceived social pressure is a great motivator for me). I also wanted to post more on social media and Substack, so this is also that. I’m throwing in two dogs and a turtle for you all, so if that’s what you’re here for, it’s at the end.

WILT stands for What I Listened To.

Albums:

The Downward Spiral — Nine Inch Nails

This week, I listened to The Downward Spiral by Nine Inch Nails as recommended by my cousin Sophie. I enjoyed it enough. I already knew Johnny Cash’s cover of Hurt, but the rest of the songs were new to me. Like, it’s very overtly edgy, but I think it’s self-aware about it. If I released it, it would be as a bit, and the people who know my humour would catch on to it being a bit pretty immediately, I think. I don’t know anything about Nine Inch Nails or the context of the album, and I’m not gonna look into it.

It’s a very hard-noddable album. I could nod my head along to most of the songs. I listened through the whole thing on a forest walk, and was nodding basically any time there wasn’t a stranger in view.

I did think it was a bit at first. Maybe it is, but then it just kept going. Like, to say the obvious, it’s expressing deeply negative emotions. Maybe that speaks to its vulnerability, and I’m meant to take it seriously, but it did not read as particularly vulnerable, because it makes such a point of expressing apathy, which is like the least vulnerable thing to express. Well, that might not be true. I’m not gonna listen to it again for now, but maybe it was saying “No one cares” rather than “I don’t care,” which is kinda high key a criticism of apathy.

What are we meant to do when our feelings are so negative as to make it cringe to share them? Share them anyway and have them be dismissed because people are generally unequipped to take a certain threshold of emotion— more so genre— of emotion, seriously? That will just reinforce the idea that everything sucks. If I’m a guy who thinks everything sucks, and I say “Man! Everything sucks! I hate everything!” and then people dismiss it, I’m gonna take that as further proof that everything does indeed suck.

Okay, this started as my feelings about the album, and has quickly shifted to my feelings about my feelings about the album if I’m meant to take it seriously. Is it my fault, or the album’s that I can’t?

Wait, crap, you guys, when I want to share negative emotions, will people just think it’s a bit? Guys, I’m fr devastated about this. This is the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. This is an interesting sphere of vulnerability to be working in. I’m vibing right now. It’s called vulbing when you vibe with vulnerability.

Overall, it was fun, made me think about vulnerability and negativity, and gave me some head-nodding opportunities.

I didn’t do any other full albums this week. If you want to recommend me an album though, now’s the time. No promises that I’ll get to it.

Books:

(Spoilers for everything)

Six of Crows:

I finally read Six of Crows (shoutout Betty). It was a very fun read. Really good sense of character for the main characters. Kaz Brekker. What a name, huh? I liked the worldbuilding a lot. A magic drug that makes your powers super amplified but also probably kills you is such a fun plot device, and I liked that the whole worldbuilding and plot revolved around the implications of the drug existing.

I didn’t love the sense of progress it gave me; sometimes, it felt like we were just doing heist tropes to do heist tropes. Especially getting the gang all together at the start. But I really enjoyed the end. The whole confrontation with that guy who hired them (forgot the name). It was very fun. It sets up the next book very nicely. I’m excited to read it.

Golden Compass:

Wowza! This one was fantastic. Ralph has been trying to get me to read this one, and I finally did. What a good plot hook. It’s such a ride from the start to the end, and I was so interested in the mechanics of the world and invested in the character of Lyra that the exposition was super enjoyable. I loved learning about the bears and the witches and the daemons. And dust. Wow. I really liked learning about dust.

Seeing the daemons interact with each other was so cool. What a brilliant way to show interiority. Every time I learned something about how daemons work, or what was taboo or whatever, I would always go “Yup. That makes sense.” I really can’t wait to read the rest.

I have a lot more thoughts, but I kinda just want to get this post out, so I’ll share more once I’ve digested more (I only finished it today).

2 Dogs and a Turtle:

1. Bear

2. Witch

3. Daemon

(I think this one is easy)

In case you are unfamiliar, 2DaaT is a game where 1 person provides 3 names. 2 are dog names, 1 is a turtle name. You have to figure out which are which.

Goodbye:

That’s all for now. If I keep doing this each week, I want to share some of my creative work with each post, so stay posted.