/run/media/silveradept: Assorted Misc, Etc.

[silveradept]

A couple of thoughts that maybe can be explored if I get them out on digital paper and let other people look at them:

• I would like someone who is not familiar at all with the universe of Within the Wires (the found recordings podcast created by Jeffrey Cranor and Janina Matthewson) to read the book they put out, You Feel It Just Below The Ribs. I have a suspicion that its main narrative tension will read differently to someone who is new to the world than someone who has been listening from the beginning. (Or, at least, someone who has listened to the first season.) I think I can accurately call the novel Season 0, or, depending on where Black Box fits in the universe, since I'm not a Patreon subscriber, Season -1. It does a lot of work setting up the universe that the podcasts then explore, and so I'm curious to see if a new reader, or one familiar with the genre of literature that the book is about, gets the same messages out of it.


• I'd have to listen to it again, and probably more than a few times with specific ears on, and I still wouldn't be completely sure, but there's something interesting with the music direction of Encanto that makes me wonder how many unique melodic lines there are in the film. Each main character, I think, gets one melodic line to themselves and I think most, if not all, of the music is how well those melodic lines blend with each other when there are multiple singers. Since Lin-Manuel Miranda is involved, I wouldn't be surprised if "single melodies/motifs layered on top of each other" was intentional, given the themes of the movie about family and family working together and what that means.


• Have I recommended the podcast Twenty Thousand Hertz to all of you recently? It's about sound design, so you'll hear a lot about how iconic sounds and jingles/network identifiers came into existence, but you'll also hear about specific technology (like the SM7 microphone), or the science of hearing and how sound works (with some neat demonstrations of how amplification and interference work), or the people who are listening all over the world for numbers stations and what they might entail. They've done Mel Blanc, Bronx cheers, John Cage's most famous work, the TR-808 drum machine, and several spotlights on what the world is like when you can't see anything and have to rely on your hearing to understand the world around you. Plus, there's the Mystery Sound in every episode, something that a person who is familiar with it recognizes instantly, but for others, might be one of those "hrm, I know I've heard that before, but I just can't quite place it." sounds. I'll admit, I haven't figured out as many of them as I might have been able to, but half the fun is trying to puzzle out what a sound might be if you don't immediately know it. (Although it'll never happen to me, because I'm sure there are more than enough listeners to the podcast that the random number generator disfavors me when I know the sound, there's also the possibility that if you guess the current mystery sound, you could win one of their T-shirts.)


• It's been interesting to watch eight seasons of RWBY over the years. Some of the storytelling over the years has gotten better as the technology that Rooster Teeth has had to work with has improved, which allows them to more closely deliver the envisioned ideas for the story. The effects work has increased and the style has stabilized over time (which, is, to some degree, why I think there's a reasonable Machete Order to watch the series in, to give someone a taste of what the series will become, then fill in the background of the why and then go forward, which right now seems to be 4-5, 1-2-3, 6-7-8) into a sort of mostly 3D but occasionally 2.5D kind of series. It's also grown into itself as the kind of story that can support two protagonists and their stories together.
  
  Right at tne end of the eighth season, though, we got to see the possibility of a person's Semblance evolving or unlocking new depths in the right kinds of circumstances, and I realize that has all sorts of interesting implications for the worldbuilding that we probably won't get to see unless it becomes important to the plot.
  
  I also kind of wonder how this series turns out in the alternate universe where Monty doesn't die but continues on to advise and showrun. The broad strokes are probably the same, but I wonder what kinds of details we would be different. And would it be the kind of story where the Wizard goes back behind the curtain, where the Tin Man has no Heart, the Cowardly Lion has no courage, and it's not looking like the Scarecrow has any brains, either.
  
  And, y'know, I feel like RWBY is a good example of what kinds of shows we could be making if we had a robust public domain, because so many of the characters are based in works that are in the public domain, so they can be riffed on without the lawyers coming to say hello. Imagine what we could have in this show if we had a much bigger reference pool to draw from.

Random thoughts for a random day. Take, leave, or expand as you like.

Comments

[silvercat17]

I love 20 Thousand Hertz. I'm still a few years behind on catching up on my podcasts - I just listened to the episode about the Voyager record and, as expected, was blown away.

[silveradept]

It's a really good podcast for people who are casually into audio stuff, like me, and who like a nice narrative about how something came into being.