Les Witches: music for old souls

I’m glad to say I’m back for a little while because of the holiday. Travelling to my homeland wasn’t on my schedule, mainly because I take violin classes on Saturday. My family don’t really celebrate easter since. Despite leaving any christian dogmatism behind (except for me who appreciate the christian morality above all else) they still want to gather the closest relatives in these holidays. 

Coming here always feels good but for some reason this time I’m not feeling at all cheerful. About two weeks ago I was with all my fears and disturbances in full bloom, everything went wrong  and I watched my world falling apart. Things happened all at once. I was in such distress that there was no other way out of the situation other than talking to my mother about things I never told her before, about traumas and feelings - things I've been keeping inside for way too long. This sort of made me feel embarassed and unconfortable with the idea of facing her.  Beyong all that my computer stopped accessing the internet and I spent a bunch of money to get it fixed. I had other domestic expanses and to end the story I got sick. It was only on Saturday that a light shone on me and I felt a little better.

All this to explain that something feels weird like if I had crossed to a parallel universe where things and people are different, including me. I feel something had changed but can’t tell exactly what and how it changed so fast. Okay, it probably sounds schizophrenic, but a less traumatic explanation would say that my life, in spiritual terms, forced me to take a step where I was stuck. If god is a player and I’m a char, let’s assume that I got some skills and ascended to a higher level.  

Music is such a powefull mana potion outlet valve to me that I feel almost in need of sharing my golden lullabies here! I am addicted to early music and concerts, I don’t miss a single one! One of the most valiable artists I ever ran into was Les Witches, a group of musicians from France who play 16th century music with their hearts! Wish I could have the pleasure of seeing them live someday, it would be an unforgettable experience. Their music is extremely hard to find online, even on youtube, so I should be happy with the twenty seven tracks I own, which are most from the album Nobody's jig. Mr.Playford's English Dancing Master. I’m looking forward downloading the Fortune My Foe and Konge af Danmark: L'Europe musicale à la cour de Christian IV. All I could find so far were free samples and my appetite asks for more!

Within Les Witches’s magical realm we get involved with flutes, baroque violins, lutes, harpsichord and so many typical instruments from early music! Listen to the tracks below and let yourself dance.

The Maker – A beautiful stop motion filled with philosophical issues

If you follow my posts here you probably noticed that I have a bent for dark things as well as childish ones (the dolls on the header sums it up) so I’ve recently dedicated a few hours of further reading for childish books and sort of came up with some crazy ideas, but “Oh dear, oh dear! I shall be too late!” What was supposed to be part of a simple summer reading ended up as a possible academic project. Now I’ll research a few other books and movies that look at this issue and start writing something about it! The stop motion The Maker also played a role in this inspiration. Do you want to know why? Well, imagine the combination of three things I love: Spooky dolls, violin and a cute bunny! Now imagine a spooky violinist bunny! The Maker tells the story of an intriguing little creature that runs against time to give life to his creation. Although simple, the tale covers some philosophical issues that have troubled humanity through times and leaves us with a bunch of unanswered questions, such as: who’s the creator? What happens if they run out of time? Is it possible to stop the hour glass? Enjoy this masterwork. Music: "Winter" by Paul Halley.

Gothic room decor – cheap ways of getting your own bat cave

Home decoration is something I have a crush on but though I have a foot into the goth scene I don’t like this extremely black thing. My wardrobe is indeed filled with black garments – but this is something I’ve been changing lately because I don’t have time nor the patience for dressing like a victorian crow all the time. This is pointless. Instead of buying everything black I’ve given a chance for other colors, like red and blown. My house is far from being a goth or medieval realm. Actually one would never guess a goth girl lives here, except for the witch dolls on my shelves: the walls are light yellow, the curtain almost white and there’s absolutely nothing indicating my tastes. I don’t usually hang band posters on the walls, though I had a few pictures of random bands a while ago, but it also said nothing about me enjoying the subculture. I joked a little on the title referring to batman because of my cousin. He mocks me every time he visits us by saying: I’m going up there in your bat cave”. I’d never take it as offense. I think it’s pretty cool since he’s a very religious guy.

People look forward decorating their houses to make it a cozy place, and I don’t see why it should be different with Goths. So I thought up a few ways you can decorate your sweet home to make it resemble your personality. Remember: Good sense is always a helpful tool, there is no point in turning your home into a satanist temple, alright?

Rugs, tapestries, curtains and such: always a good start

Instead of buying paraphernalia such as pumpkins, fake blood and spider webs (save them for when you throw a Halloween party), consider adding customized bed linen, curtains and rugs to your room. Victorian rugs are by far the easiest thing to find, since it’s a classical pattern and any good store should have it. For tapestries it might be a little harder, for you must order it from specific shops specialized in customization (unless you customize them yourself). The second option is obviously the cheapest but it requires talent. Bed linen is also a simple way of giving your room a quite elegant look. Overall vintage patterns are commonly seen in the goth subculture, specially polka dot and stripes - remember they're trendy right now. Red roses and skull linen would go perfectly well with red walls, but if you think red is way too heavy for a wall you can put only red victorian frames to match the linen. Either way is fine. 

I bought three black provencal framed portraits to hang on the wall but since I live in a rented apartment I’ll probably have to bring them to my family’s house, it’s not a good idea to make holes in the wall when the apartment is someone else’s, hehe. I found them for only $ 6 in a second hand shop I frequent. I personally love these frames because of their elegant and antique look, once you have a black and white picture of you on them it feels like you’re from another time^^. Mine are made of porcelain, but you can also find wooden frames in crafts stores.

This bedspread reminded me of Emilie Autumn, lol. 

These cushions are not at all hard to do it yourself. And again, these patterns are trendy nowadays so you should find them easily. All you will need is a sewing machine, some meters of lace, the fabric, something to fill the cushion and a few pattern pieces for cutting the fabric correctly. Depending on the shape of the cushion you must draw either a circle or a square on the paper, as simple as that! 

Furniture, candles, skulls and paintings

If you have too little money even for the ideas given above there’s still something pretty cheap you can do. Buy wooden frames and paint the borders yourself, then google for artists whose works fall within the scope of goth. I can name a few ones: Mark Ryden, Jessicka Addams, Natalie Shau, Kukula… the list could go on forever (nah). The ideia here is to print your favorite pictures and hang them on the wall using your newest customized frames. Old clocks are also a good alternative and are among the stuff we find in attics.  We goths love candles, antique dolls, skulls and this sort of creepy stuff, don't we? On this post Gothic Furniture I uploaded a few images of what might look great for our bat cave. 

Gothic decorations are typically arranged with antique furniture. Like I said before: vintage is trendy nowadays which means you can get them for lower prices. The industry has been manufacturing furniture inspired in old centuries though the quality of the wood is not the same. At least you can get an old-fashioned bookshelf customized in different colors. I would personally recommend black, red or purple.

In the city where I’m currently living there’s a point where second hand shops of all sorts are located, so I’ll usually hang around over there whenever I’m shopping for clothes. I remember passing in front of a store that was selling a victorian purple sofa.I didn’t dare to ask for the price but it really caught by attention. I just wondered where it had come from, who had owned it and why the hell they were getting rid of such precious thing!

If you want to "goth" the rest of your home this tissue holder might be interesting:

Haha this is great.

Would you ever undergo cosmetic surgery to get elven pointed ears?

Otitis. What a dreadful way of beginning the New Year. 2015 came with good food, drinks, expectations and an inflammation in my middle ear. For 6 days I couldn’t sleep at all – let alone the horrible pain and loss of hearing, which I took long to recover. The doctor prescribed such a huge list of drugs to me that would make anybody believe we’re starting our own pharmacy. For days I wandered in my house with a hot water bottle pressed to my left ear, in a terrible mood. Doctor asked if I’d rather take an injection to stop the pain but I denied vehemently! These injections used to get our bodies rid of bacteria are the most painful ones! If I took it I would most certainly end up with one hot water bottle in my ear and another one in my ass! Nope! Today I woke up with another infection, this time in my throat. Not again…

But what does my low immune system has to do with the pointed ears? Well, this sort of made me reflect about the plastic issue. Not long ago I ran into an article about a Canadian alternative model called Melynda Moon who had her ears shaped to make them look like elven’s ears. This practice is taking ground not only among public personalities, but also among cosplayers and such. I’m among the thousands of Tolkien’s fans, LARP players (live action role-playing game) and elf lovers from all around the world that long for slipping into neverland (here I mean any world ever created in fantasy literature). Like many of these folks out there I have a pair of elven ears wearied now and then, but would I ever consider getting permanent points where my humanlike round cartilage used to be?

The procedure also known as Spock’s ears consists of cutting the top of the cartilage, removing a small part of it and stitching the parts forming a point.  

The two half-elves: Kimberleigh Roseblade and model Melynda Moon.

When I first heard of it I thought to myself: Wow, it’s cool, these girls are really brave and above all else they have something I truly admire in someone: they don’t give a damn about what others think of them. I personally love people who have personality and don’t do something just because everybody else does. Melynda seems this kind of person. I don’t follow her work but from what I could grasp she has her own style, something “doll like” and alternative – I won’t dare to slot her into a specific style. Looking at the outcome of the surgery in both girls we see beautiful human-elves. For me their ears look great and extremely realistic.

Opinions on these girls’s decision may vary, but indeed the highest rate of acceptance will come from the youngest generations; after all they’re growing up in a society where any type of body modification is common, from colorful hair and piercing to silicon and botox. But of course, opinions are what they are: mere opinions. For those who are interested in the procedure the only opinion that really counts is the doctor’s. I'm biased in this issue; after all I'm familiar with the elvish mythology. My opinion obviously involves taste, but you shouldn't really expect older people (or people who aren't familiar with Tolkien or Norse mythology) to look at your modified ears and find them the most beautiful thing they've ever seen. I accept and admire these ears but that's because of my background knowledge of the elvish literature, games, etc. Most people will say it's pathetic (consider they don't have the slightest idea what an elf is!) and throw accusations of body mutilation at whoever gets it done.

But let’s try not to be cynical in this matter: There’s no point in someone arguing that getting elven ears is a pathetic mutilation if this person has done or plans to get any other unnecessary body modification – it includes breast augmentation and even worse: rib removal! We’re aware of the high rates of these pointless surgeries in the world, and they’re not higher just because most people don’t have the money to afford it. Honestly, I'd rather see dozens of people modifying their ears than see people injecting silicon for sexual purposes. The media is currently bursting with cases of women who made truly pathetic body transformations for the silliest reasons. Check the case of the brazilian model who injected so much silicon into her body that it began to rot inside her and now she’s between life and death. In my opinion everyone is free to decide what they want to change in their bodies - as long as take up the consequences. The brazilian media has recently made a fuss about the model’s critical health condition, blaming the society, blaming the men and everyone who they believe to be responsible for what happened to the lady. Excuse me? The decision of injecting only god knows how many liters of silicon was hers, consequently the fault of what happened is hers alone. She knew the risks. 

Words from these ladies seem to have spread and since people know how much I love elves they keep asking me if I would change my ears someday. It’s funny when I’m confronted with this question. I’m normally a joker so I’ll go: But of course! If someday I have money to perform it I’ll surely do it! When I say that those who don’t know me enough roll their eyes because they know I’m kidding, and those who know me too well roll their eyes the same way because they really believe I’d do it. My answer is no. As a child I suffered from adenoid hypertrophy and had to undergo two surgeries to remove it. Though I can’t recall precisely the age I also underwent a treatment with monthly allergy shots to treat my rhinitis. After all this I would never feel comfortable to undergo such pointless surgery procedures. As simple as the surgery to get elven ears might seem, it has its risks. We must take into account not only the risks of infection during or after the surgery but also the long term problems that it might cause, like ear deformation, since our ears never stop growing and once you sculpt it, the natural growing might interfere in the pointed shape.