Tag: val venis

14 awakebutstillinbed: what people call low self-esteem is really just seeing yourself the way other people see you

~ Lex Leeson ~ 9 Comments

I’ve long debated that. When I go through periods of hating myself, is it actually myself that I so despise, or just how terrible I must look to other people?

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I already mentioned my mind, and how ridiculous an amount of importance I place  on other people’s perception of me in finding my own sense of self-worth*, but isn’t that logically the way I should be approaching life?? Don’t we as humans only even truly exist in how we effect other human beings and the world around us? Sure, you can be happy in yourself, and not care slightly about your consequences that your needlessly complicated existence can have on those around you. Congratulations, you’re a meaningless life form. Isn’t that sociopathic though? How can you struggle through life with any kind of happiness when surely you have to be an idiot to not even give thought to how little esteem you’re held in the eyes of so many people.

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15 Son Lux: Brighter Wounds

~ Lex Leeson ~ 4 Comments

Son Lux are a little ridiculous. No, they’re hugely ridiculous. They’re unashamedly dramatic, oppressively portentous, and sing of ‘priest and priestesses’ and ‘phantom muses’. Every song will go ‘whoooooooooooooooah-ah-whoooooooah’ at least once. They make music that Andrew Lloyd Webber would turn down for the Phantom of the Opera sequel (‘P3: Phantom Resurrects Intolerably’) for being a bit much. They were all probably unbearable at college. Heck, they’re all probably unbearable now.

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They’re all these things and more. Plus, if anything, more silly than you’d think. It must be hard for even their biggest fans to hold in a smirk when the singer is brave enough to break out his biggest operatic falsetto at the end of Dream State. They may be the least cool artist on this list.

They are also absolutely fucking amazing.

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16 The Joy Formidable: Aaarth

~ Lex Leeson ~ 6 Comments

Why do we stick with the ones we love? Do we even love them anymore?

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OK, OK, I’m being as needlessly cynical as only a single person can be. I’m sure that out of all the people reading this who are in a relationship, not an insignificant amount of you truly love the person you’re with. 35%, maybe even 36% or 37%. Not as many as 40%, that’d be absurd. I’m sure that a good 35% of the people in a relationship reading this would say that they absolutely love the person they’re with. The rest, though…?

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18 Zeal and Ardor: Stranger Fruit

~ Lex Leeson ~ 8 Comments

Mmmmmmmmmmlet’s talk about cultural appropriation.

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Zeal and Ardor are one of my favourite bands. In fact, I’d go as far as calling them my favourite Swiss band. They combine black metal with ‘negro spirituals’, the bracing gospel music sung by the black slaves in the early 19th century. What’s your initial reaction to hearing that? Are you OK with it? Are you straight up against it? Do you think that merely the fact that the band are Swiss makes any use of music born from American cruelties automatically cultural appropriation? Do you want to fnd out a little more about the band before deciding your reaction? Are you immediately against it because you assume the band is white?

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19 Aqua Girl: Stereologue

~ Lex Leeson ~ 10 Comments

From a woman pretending to be a man to a… No, fuck, that’s not it at all. From a woman with short hair to a… No, hang on… From a women who finds no shame in being French to a man who… no, a woman who finds no shame in… a person who…

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From a human being, to another human being. From one fabulous album to another album that’s that little bit more fabulous. Let’s take this one step at a time.

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20 Christine and the Queens: Chris

~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

Remember when the game done changed?

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The last time Matt Le Tissier’s daughter Christine was on this list, Christine herself professed to, and I quote, ‘love every second of this, and the guy writing is so obviously a sexual Catherine Wheel that I felt myself falling more and more in deep, unbridled lust with him with every word’ (that last bit was more suggested than literally said). I later found out that the Christine and the Queens album I was so sexually attractive over was actually the biggest selling debut album of 2016, which actually means my review was the most enjoyed blog post of that year! Probably. I haven’t been able to crunch the numbers. I also said ‘Christine and the Queen’s next album will automatically win that year’s Necessary Evil’. It’s number 20. I lied. It was nice of the Guardian to pick up the slack and not disappointing Christine too much by naming it their album of the year though, so thanks for that, really helped.

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23 Z Tapes: Spring 2018

~ Lex Leeson ~ 6 Comments

Right now. Now. This time. The space in which we orbit. This particular mark along the 4th dimensional axis. This time. Now. Here. Right now. Right now is the best time ever to be a music fan. Fight me.

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If your argument is that there isn’t as much good music around these days then, with all due respect, what the fuck are you talking about, you ugly sack of piss? There’s more good music in 2018 than there’s ever been before, and with more possible ways of hearing it than previously thought possible. Perhaps you want the days again when you’d read about The Mock Turtles being given record of the week in NME and then excitedly rushing off to Woolworths in Dorking to spend your 25p on the plexi vinyl, and the exhilarating trip home on the bus before you raced back to the record player in your bedroom and finally found out it was dog’s pish. Fair enough, but firstly that’s the world that you don’t like as much these days, not music, and secondly you can still take a trip out to Asda or somewhere and spend money on a record you’ve never heard that’s likely to be shit. ‘You Know I Know’ by Olly Murrs is number 10, they’ll probably have a copy of that and it’ll almost definitely be shit. Fancy doing that?

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25 Princess Nokia: A Girl Cried Red

~ Lex Leeson ~ 8 Comments

“It get lonely at the top and I do it by myself
I got everything I want without anybody help
Do you think I give a fuck? Only care about myself
I’m a stone-cold killer, couple notches on my belt”

How much do you think your life is governed by your own actions? How much do you believe it’s actually under the jurisdiction of outside forces that are not of your making, or even understanding? That’s right, it’s Boxing Day and, as Thomas scoffed at Jesus as he sceptically rolled his eyes, it’s time to talk about your locus of control.

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See that picture there? Yeah, that pretty much explains what a ‘locus of control’ is. I’m going to explain it again here though because, I dunno, you might have a very specific type of blindness, or maybe your version of Netscape doesn’t support pictures. It’s important for me to explain it myself, because I don’t like to feel that a blog this insightful, inspirational and- dare I say it?- woke, could just as easily be written by pasting appropriate pictures from Google images. Also, my sponsor pays me by the word, so this completely superfluous paragraph has already made me a very rich man. Anyway, locus of control:

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