It's my 10 year anniversary on Tumblr đ„ł
I feel so old right now đđ, I found tumblr late in life.

@theartofmadeline
art blog(derogatory)

Kaledo Art
2025 on Tumblr: Trends That Defined the Year
One Nice Bug Per Day
he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
Not today Justin
Jules of Nature
đȘŒ

Discoholic đȘ©
sheepfilms
Xuebing Du
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"

pixel skylines

Janaina Medeiros
No title available

JVL

No title available
hello vonnie
Keni
seen from France
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seen from Malaysia
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seen from Malaysia
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seen from Maldives

seen from United States
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seen from United Kingdom
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@nerdyladydream
It's my 10 year anniversary on Tumblr đ„ł
I feel so old right now đđ, I found tumblr late in life.
âSeptember came in with golden days and silver nights,â
- J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
Reblog to have something good happen at 1:42 tomorrow
đ€đ»đ€đ»
Imagine
An orc with battle scars and who is massive, falling for the tiny human who works as a barmaid in a tavern. She is the embodiment of sunshine and had no idea that orcs are supposed to be feared. The orc mistakes her friendliness for fearlessness and thinks she is the bravest human he has met. The barmaid is oblivious to this and is just incredibly kind, (which is brave in its own way). In reality the barmaid has a lot of fears and is a normal fragile human . The Orc finds out about this and surprisingly falls harder for this human. He makes it his job to protect this human and the whole tribe looks out for this tiny human. So this tiny bottle of sunshine has a whole tribe of scary orcs protecting her and she just thinks they are super friendly.
I'm not sure what this is but if anyone wants it I might turn it into a full story.
i have just broken up with my boyfriend of ten years, and i'm going to have to break our lease agreement, hire a moving truck, storage locker, airplane ticket to move back home, and more. i'm really scared about the future but i know i have to do this.
if any of you are looking to commission an artist any time soon, it would mean the world if you could consider me!
you can view my stuff is here. if you could also spread the word that would be amazing.
if you just wanted to be an angel and send me money my papal is
paypal.me/Broegan
Sure iâll reblog that
Oh I will ABSOLUTELY REBLOG THAT
seeing this made me feel like i just got a letter informing me of my own death
Let them come. Let them see this and immediately flee
all i have to say in response is this post:
[This idea has been rattling in my brain and I had to share it.]
I know we all love the âhumans are space orcsâ concept⊠but imagine, onboard the new ship theyâve been assigned to, the human meets an actual space orc. A massive monster⊠fangs and tusks and scars and a battle-hardened stare, looming over all the other life forms on the ship in its thick indestructible armour it refuses to remove. It barely drinks, it doesnât need sleep, its massive shoulders are heavy with the terrible things it has experienced. Compared to the squishy & delicate human body, this thing is a walking tank.
⊠Except instead of hating/ignoring one another, the human and the monster start bonding over both coming from death planets. The human is excited to find a life form who doesnât quiver with fear at the vague description of a jellyfish and the monster is ecstatic to meet someone who understands the feeling of being bitten by a quaâlem (cats are pretty close). They sit together and compare dangerous animals and locations as the other aliens look on in confusion and fear⊠oh, you also have dense jungles of deadly hidden predators, boiling acid lakes, tamed predatory killers, and areas with horrendously high and low temperatures? Sick!!Â
It doesnât take long before the two of them become totally inseparable. The human loves not feeling like some kind of crazy outsider and the monster is overjoyed theyâve finally found an equal in this unkillable marshmallow.
Monster: When I was a youngling, a grol-lik stung straight through my armour. The pain lasted for approximately 16 human hours. Human: Oh yeah man, I get that. As a kid I got a wasp stuck in my shirt. It stung me like four times, it was awful, and all my cousins just laughed at me⊠Monster: [using their arm screen to research human courting methods] I see.
Not quite an âOrcâ per-se, but eh, close enough. See here giant spiky Deathworlder simping for tiny shouty Deathworlder.
This art is amazing and makes it so much better.
Requests were open? How did I not notice??
Can you do one where the reader is Damian's girlfriend and he sneaks in her room through her window?? You can put anything you like after that I just want the sneaking in partđ
The Intimacy of an Open Window
DAMIAN WAYNE x READER
MASTER LIST in BIO
He's gotta be sneaky. Sneakier than usual, even. He's sure this is your window. It is, isn't it? It must be. Third from the right, sixth from the bottom. He's been sneaking into your room since he was fourteen, nefarious intentions or not.
Still, his eyes feel dry from the lack of decent sleep. There's a slim chance this is your neighbor's window. Again.
So he has be be quiet. He has to go into Robin Mode. In his civvies. To sneak into your window.
Unfortunately, your damned window always sticks when it starts to get cold out.
"That better be who I think it isâand if it is, it better not be."
Damian stops cold halfway in your room. It's 3:23 in the morning. He barely has enough wits about him to remember which window is yours, let alone decipher whatever riddle you just hurled at him. He blinks slowly, left foot still planted on the rusty fire escape and left hand anchoring him to the outside of your window. "What?"
You're laying on your stomach, face turned away from him and pressed into the pillow. He thinks he might have hallucinated it for a moment, until your shoulders shift and roll and suddenly you're up on your elbows, squinting through tousled hair and against the backlight of the full moon.
He cracks a smile, easing his left foot into the room and sliding the window shut with his hand. "Evening, lovely."
"Too early for big words," you gravel, blinking slowly with a creased forehead.
"Those aren't big words," he hums, already shucking his jacket and toeing his sneakers off.
"Shut up, Romeo," you grumble, nestling back down into your bedding like a bear disturbed from hibernation. "Why're you here," you yawn, "anyway?"
He tip-toes around your room to your closet. There, he proceeds to rifle around like a thief on a time constraint and an absolute disregard for subtlety. "The Manor is too loud," he sighs. "Jason is in for the week, apparently. He and Timothy won't stop bickering, and it's putting Father on edge, which shortens his fuse."
You're trying to listen, you really are. But you're so tired and you were having the best dreamâ
"I'll tell you in the morning," he mumbles, still pulling the threadbare tee shirt he always leaves here while he's kneeling on the mattress.
"I'm not scooting over," you warn, a few disrespectful hairs falling into your mouth in the process. You make a face and limply bat them away.
A breathy laugh. "That's fine, Beloved."
He sorts the sheets out, on both sides, and fishes blindly for the second pillow you undoubtedly knocked into the floor. He narrowly misses your nose when he slaps it next to yours, which is pointless in the end, because you end up wiggling just a bit closer to the ever-comforting smell of his favorite colonge.
He doesn't have to hold you for this to be intimate. He doesn't, in the end. You're already comfortable and he's got enough room, so he doesn't bother with moving you or going out of his way to lay on top of you.
It's an intimate situation all on its own. His residency, his physical home, becomes surrounded by black storm clouds and rumbling thunder, and he knows exactly where to go. He knows exactly where it's safe to hunker down until it blows over. He knows exactly where he's safe.
And he knows he's welcome. He knows it's okay to pop in when he needs the peace he only feels in your vicinity. He knows you'll always be the eye in his hurricane.
It's intimate because it's you. No grand gestures or bold words needed. Just you. Because you're his favorite definition of intimate; familiar, close.
His eyes are almost closed, mind almost sailed out to the endless drift of sleep. He lets his head roll against the pillow, sleep blurred vision centering on you one more time. Your breath is already even against his neck, chin just shy of resting on his shoulder. So pretty, so trusting.
You've set your heart in his sturdy hands, and he wonders when you'll notice that he's slipped his soul into your pocket.
The Altar Is My Hips | Batman x Fem!Reader
Summary - Bruce comes home from a Justice League mission and shows you how much he missed you.
Warnings - 18+ content, minors DNI, smut, oral sex (female receiving), fingering.
Word Count - 1.8k
Sick
Relationships: 10th Doctor x reader (Not an established relationship)
Summary: the Doctor and you find yourselves on a spaceship in desparate need of repair and you are determined to help the crew (Kaisa, Lincoln and Bressa), but then the ship also gets highjacked. And on top of that, you fall sick.
Warnings: you're in mortal danger but that's it
You were standing by the big metal desk in the middle of the room, reading the numbers to Kaisa so he could type them in.
The digits kept swimming in your vision. They were blurry, everything was blurry, but they also kept moving. And when did it get so hot? You wiped the sweat from your forehead while trying to breathe deeply. You knew that if you looked up from the pad, the room would be spinning. The worst part was the tiredness. It coiled through your limbs and made them so heavy you could hardly move them. The effort to keep connecting letters and sounds, keep connecting thoughts hurt.
You closed your eyes for a second and the ship tilted so far you lost your balance. You stumbled back, eyes flying open and arms trying to reach out for something to hold onto.
Suddenly there were strong hands on your shoulder and the small of your back, steadying you. You looked up and recognized the dark orange skin and curly brown hair that was greying at the edges. Kaisa had caught you.
"Are you alright?" his gruff voice came to you.
"Yeah, yeah l'm okay." That sounded weak even to your own ears. "The ship just tilted."
"The ship's fine, love," he answered in confusion. You could see furrowed eyebrows, and then his dark golden eyes. You couldn't make out the wrinkles around them, or the lines on his forehead. Everything was blurry.
He put one hand around you to hold you up, then felt your forehead with the other. It was blessedly cold and you leaned into it with a sigh. "I think humans aren't supposed to be this hot," his worried voice came then.
You could hear Lincoln and Bressa turn around and step closer. You would have cracked a joke about drinks first if you weren't about to ask to sit down from exhastion. But you all had a job to do.
"I'm okay," you tried to reassure him. "Let's just get back to-" As you stepped away from Kaisa to shake his hands off, the ground rushed up and you barely caught yourself on the table. His arms were back, supporting you, before you could fall further. Shit.
"You're sick," Kaisa confirmed with a voice full of worry. He gently pulled you from the table and towards the wall. "Here, sit down," he told you softly and manouvered you to a stack of crates. He helped you sit on one and you rested your head on the taller pile.
"Thanks," you breathed gratefully and closed your eyes.This is nice.
On the other side of the room you could just hear Bressa order Lincoln, "Go get the Doctor. Tell him y/n's sick." Her voice was grave.
~
The Doctor had just recalibrated the fiberlinks of the navicomputer and was well on his way of taking apart the integral protonic bond when Lincoln reached him. The Doctor didn't even pull his head out of the ship's innards, much less stood up. "What is it?" He didn't have time for this.
"Your friend," the young man's distressed voice came. "She's sick."
That made worry explode in his chest. Ice spread through his veins as he hurriedly pulled himself out of the wiring. He hit his head on the way but that didn't matter, not when y/n was-
"What did you say?" the Doctor demanded in a low voice, eyes scanning the Tirellian crewmate.
"Y/n is sick." The Doctor marked every blink, every twitch, every line. He did not like the worried frown on Lincoln's face. He had gotten his answer.
The Doctor put the sonic back in his inner pocket and demanded, "Where is she?", voice forcibly calm but unrelenting. He picked up his coat as the young man turned to show the way, and off they went.
~
When your eyes were closed, you could almost pretend you were fine, but the fever, the heat in your skin was killing you. The box on your cheek and forehead had warmed up and provided no more relief.
You could feel even the darkness around you spin if you tried to think.
~
The Doctor ran into the room after Lincoln, trench coat billowing around him.
"Where is she?" he demanded in worry with his gaze searching the room.
"Over here." Kaisa stood up from behind the large metal table and pointed at the stack of crates beside the wall. He stepped back towards the others as the Doctor came to kneel before you with his coat scraping the floor. His hands hovered just inches above your skin.
"Y/n," he breathed quietly while looking you over. His hand settled on your arm. Scarlet cheeks, sweat - fever, eyes closed, leaning on the crate - exhausti-
You tiredly opened your eyes but you didn't lift your head. "Doct'r." The regret was already in your voice. "'M sorry. I should've-" Should have known the signs, should have slept more, should have eaten-
"You have nothing to be sorry for," he murmured softly, shaking his head. He rubbed your arm, his expression gentle and reassuring.
He took your hand and found your pulse point, which made butterflies flutter in your stomack despite the sickness. Then he lifted his other hand to your cheek. It was cold so you leaned into it, your eyes closing in content. You breathed deeply but it seemed like there was never enough air.
"You've definitely got a fever, about 39 degrees," he continued in that same soft tone. "And your heart is speeding up. How're you feeling?"
"Evr'thin's spinnin'," you told him tiredly, words a bit slurred. You tried to remember, but the things you were trying to describe made it hard to do that. "Couldn't stand up, Kaisa caught me. Couldn'read anymore, evr'thing was blurry'n moving. My head hurts, my eyes hurt, ever'thing hurts. An'l'm tired," you sighed. "I wanna go t'sleep."
"You will, l promise you will, but you need medicine first," he told you gently yet firmly. "It's the virus Tem, from Polon. We were there about four days ago, it's quite common for the planet, but it's dangerous." His brown eyes were full of worry. "If it's left untreated, as yours was, it can be deadly." He left the sentence hang in the silence after it.
You tried to shake your head but the motion caused more pain and you stopped. "So l'll get the meds and ll'l be fine," you told him tiredly. It didn't seem like much of a problem. You faced death on a daily basis, so what was a little virus?
"What do we do?" Kaisa stepped closer and looked down at the two of you, eyebrows furrowed in worry and hands crossed in front of his chest.
The Doctor moved closer and took you by the shoulders. "C'm on." He smiled encouragingly as he gently helped you stand up. You didn't like it, but the solution to this situation probably required moving.
You leaned against him and put your head on his shoulder as he helped you stay upright. The spinning did not help your stomack.
"Polonians have a vaccine, but it's far too late for that. You though, you three come from Kristella, is that right?" the Doctor looked around the room.
"Yeah," Kaisa nodded.
"So you receaved the whole med package there, including the VC five-six-o-nine."
"Yes."
"Good," he nodded, "bless the Kristellan med care. Your immune system knows the virus so you're not in danger. But you," he looked down at you, gritting his teeth, "are."
Well, that was a bit obvious.
He looked back up at Kaisa. "I want you to get her to the med bay. Give her Triskel two point three with a lot of water, she needs to stay hydrated, and then two shots of Amino when that's down, got it?"
"Yes," the large sailor nodded and stepped closer to take you. "And don't 'Got it' me, young man."
The Doctor opened his mouth to explain the whole Time Lord age thing when-
"I don't wanna go," you mumbled into his chest, pressing yourself closer. The room was spinning, you couldn't see well and you could barely stand. The thought of leaving him (he meant safe and good and you needed him) on this ship where anything could happen to you or him (who would look after him if not you?) made you want to sob.
He pulled away enough to look at you but still hold you. His eyes were soft. "I know," he told you gently and then frowned at the thought of letting you go, "l don't like this either." Every instinct in him flared against leaving you while you were sick and in need of him. He was Gallifreyan, and he protected what was his, even if you didn't know. "But you need medicine, and they need help rewiring the ship," he put it plainly. "I have to stay, and you have to go."
You nodded even though it hurt. He pulled you closer and for a moment, you just held each other.
"Stay safe," you said into his shoulder, almost an order. "Not a hair out of place, you hear me?"
You could feel him smile at the familiar tone. "Yes, ma'am."
It was time to go. You slowly let go of the Doctor as Kaisa came closer. He slung a hand around your waist while you put yours around his shoulders. It worked well, you could stay upright and move at the same time.
Then the whole ship shook like it was being torn apart and you were thrown against the table while Lincoln yelled in surprise. The Doctor and Kaisa kept you stable and unharmed between them, but the room looked like it had survived an earthquake.
"Are you alright?" The Doctor was franctically looking you over for injuries.
"What the hell was that?" demanded Bressa.
~
Kaisa didn't know what to do. You and him were locked in one of the main storage rooms, and they hadn't even let you get medicine. The large Risonians, two out of six who had highjacked the ship, simply came into the med bay and dragged you out before he could find anything to help you. You hadn't even gotten water.
All he could do was put his jacket under your head when you couldn't sit up anymore and hold your hand as you slipped into a restless sleep.
Then he noticed the computer log in the corner behind the crates. He could rewire it, send an altering pulse through the system... He looked at you as your head turned from one side to the other as you gasped for breath, mumbling nonsense in your sleep. Your fever was rising.
"Right then, love. I'm going to get help."
~
When the Doctor noticed Kaisa's message beeping under the log, he'd been momentarily confused. He'd made it very clear to the Risonians that you needed medicine and that he would do anything to make sure you got it, so why would they-
A second later, a pair of the hijacking crew came marching into the room with guns drawn. The Commander was as shocked as him when two of her people turned against her.
This was bad.
~
The Doctor walked into the storage room with his hands behind his head, with Bressa and Lincoln behind him. What remained of the Risonian crew had been locked into a separate room, to keep you all separated. His eyes immediately scanned the space for you.
When he turned the corner behind a high stack of crates, his hearts lurched. You were unconscious, lying on the floor with Kaisa holding your hand.
The Doctor was by your side in a second. Your skin was pale, but your cheeks were scarlet and your forehead glistened with sweat. You were mumbling in your sleep, your breaths laboured. Your head was turning restlessly in the throes of a fever dream. He took your warm hand and held it tightly.
"She was asking for you," Kaisa told him softly, eyes still trained on your face.
"What?" The Doctor's gaze flew to the larger man in confusion.
Kaisa looked up at him, "She was asking for you." He searched his eyes, for what, the Doctor didn't know. "Even after she couldn't answer me anymore, she kept asking for you in her sleep."
The Doctor felt like a hand had squeezed his hearts. It happened again, he did it again, you were in danger and it was his fault. He looked down at your closed eyes and scarlet cheeks. You were helpless, you needed him, and he couldn't do anything.
He brought your hand to his cheek and held it there with his palm as he closed his eyes. He needed you to live, he needed you to be alright. You had to be.
"Doct'r," your voice was barely a whisper.
His eyes flew open and he stared down at your still sleeping form. You turned your head to the side and, "Doct'r," again his name.
It lit a blazing fire in his chest. That was it. That was it, he was getting you out. He was getting all of you out because that was what he was going to do and the universe would bloody listen. He was the Doctor, and you were his. He was not losing you, not ever.
They'd taken the sonic but he was, for all intents and purposes, in a supply closet. Time to find out exactly which supplies he had.
Someone said "Are you really so stupid to think that Africa has the same technological advances as us? If they did they would probably have clean water and not live in houses made of sticks and mud. Get over yourself and stop being so ignorant."..... Below is a tiny collection of images of the Africa they refuse to show you..
ches
Iâm sorry youâve been made to believe that the whole of Africa is poor, I really am..
Reblogging for those of you who think Africa is only what the media and movies portrays it to be
This fucks me up because itâs scary to think that we can be showed something all our lives and not even know itâs a lie
And that my friend is the power of propaganda, indoctrination, and media
Are these pictures of South Africa or of Africa as a whole?Â
@the-collecting-turnip From top to bottom:
1. Port Elizabeth (South Africa)
2. Unknown
3. Nairobi (Kenya)
4. Pretoria (South Africa)
5. Aburi Botanical Gardens (Ghana)
6. Cape Town (South Africa)
7. Pretoria (South Africa)
8. Harare (Zimbabwe)
9. Windhoek (Namibia)
10. Windhoek (Namibia)
To @kushandwizdom this is a rather unfair portrayal of Africa as a whole since half of these are literally just South Africa. So Instead to add to this post and better dispel the myth of Africa as the vast wasteland of poverty most people think, I found a much more mixed collection of pics from various countries.
Luanda, Angola
Agadir, Morocco
Lagos, Nigeria
Cairo, Egypt
Port Louis, Mauritius
Abidjan, Cote dâIvoire
Algiers, Algeria
Tripoli, Libya
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Tunis, Tunisia
So, there, a much better case demonstrating the various major cities around Africa showing it isnât some technologically backwards continent, but actually pretty up-and-coming in the world of commerce.
I once was talking to my Ethiopian manager about ignorant people asking her dumb shit about her life before she moved to the statesâŠ
the worst story she told me about was when she told a fellow student (at a fairly prestigious university) about a concert she went to back home. The other student responded with âomg you have music there!?â đ€ŠđŸââïž
Rebloging, because we need to see these pictures.Â
As for stupid questions:Â âdo you have grocery stores in Ecuador?â
These are great!
A redneck neighbor once asked my mom (in the 80s) if they had cars in Peru. Sigh.
This is the product of poor world history in school & little current affairs coverage outside Western Europe, except for catastrophes, so all we see are the war torn, poverty stricken, disaster-affected parts on the news. And racism, of course.
I bet most Americans who think that African countries are just completely poverty stricken have no idea what the US looks like in its poorest areas, not everywhere in the US is nice suburbs or unrealistically large apartments on tv
Los Angeles, California
Hartford, Connecticut
New Orleans, Louisiana
Camden, New Jersey
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
McDowell County, West Virginia
Flint, Michigan
Washington, D.C.
Do you see the world as it is, or as someone told you it is?
This photoset proves you can make anywhere look great or terrible. Itâs all framing and more people should know about that
Worth a reblog. I donât think the US version was on there when I first reblogged.
Hi, so i was wondering if you could do a x reader fic where the reader is from the modern world and Fili finds out that she is his one. He tries to court her, but she is oblivious to it and thinks he's just being nice. Also it would be cool if the reader makes the first move and Fili is just left speechless.
Dwarven Customs
Summary: Confused about dwarven customs, you decide to show FĂli just how much you care for him.
Pairing: FĂli x F!Reader
Word Count: 659
A/N: Sorry this took so long! Iâve been in a bit of a writing slump lately, but hopefully it goes away so I can finish up the requests I have. Enjoy!
All FĂli could do was watch, heâd never before seen anything more perfect than the view he was blessed with now. Smiling, his eyes followed her fluid movements. Hands raising in the air as she twirled with the other dwarrow around the fire, her hair dancing in the evening breeze. He was absolutely mesmerized, as if under her spell.
Bofur sang as some of the company danced, a merry night amongst the journeyâs troubles. A laugh was a rare sound during the quest, the weight of the future of Erebor sitting on the companyâs shoulders. It was a much needed break.
đđđâ€ïžâ€ïž
Hey I saw that your asks are open for Fili and Kili. I was wondering if you could do a fic or hc about Kili were he falls for the reader and tries to flirt with her but makes her laugh instead. He gets flustered and embarrassed.
Stupid Things, Kili Durin
first fic Iâve published so far and I was nervous???? While Iâm literally writing a book????? So technically itâs nothing new????? But still?????
Fic, female s/o
Tw: misread sings? Kili being insecure? Flirting?
Absolutely amazing â€ïžâ€ïž
OK to make a font out of your own writing
go here
http://www.myscriptfont.com/
instead of printing it off just use this blank thing that way you dont have to scan it or anything
so fill that out by pasting it in any art program and whatnot
then save it and upload it to that site
and itll give you an option to download it
so do that and then install it BAM
I JUST GOT THIS ON MY TABLET ITâS SO COOL OH MY GOD
for some reason it refused to recognize the third page of my letters but they were all pretty unnecessary mathematic things anyway so Iâm not too worried. still something to keep in mind though, I hope it doesnât happen for you!
paintfont.com would be a good place to go to quickly make a custom font for your comic!
ehh
It looks just as horrible in real life..even worse with the letter attachedâŠ
Iâll try this later.
you can also use alternative alphabets
Welp. Guess I know what font Iâm gonna be using for comics from now on. B)
Welp. Looks like I have to do this now. So I can use this for Tengriâs asks.
For some reason there is no apostrophe in my set, but it still looks cool.
NEAT THING ALERT
The site is now called https://www.calligraphr.com/en/ but itâs basically the same!
Iâve been wanting to make one of these out of my dadâs handwriting, he does last year and he used to write everything down about his life
calligraphr is a godsend for webcomic artists
every person can feel freddieâs presence in their souls when they sing MAMAAAAAA UUHHHH, I DONT WANNA DIE, I SOMETIMES I WISH IâVE NEVER BEEN BORN AT ALL with all the air in their lungs iâm not joking
itâs fucking crazy to think about the amount of people who have sung bohemian rhapsody? like itâs such a unifying song, by nature of the fact that so many people know it. it holds so many good memories for me and other people. itâs a song you scream in the car with your friends while you drive around your boring hometown, itâs a song you drunkenly sing with your arm around your best friend, or a song you sing along to with strangers when itâs on in public. itâs bittersweet to think about freddieâs legacy carrying on like that through his masterpiece. freddie carries on because heâs a part of so many peopleâs good memories and bohemian rhapsody is a huge part of that.
Reblog if you have sung bohemian rhapsody with your friends
every time i see this post iâm reminded of the video of 65,000 people singing bohemian rhapsody in near-perfect harmony
like, what other song can make that claim?
Some of the highlights of that video include:
The crowd cheering after the first stanza when they realize what theyâre all doing
So many people audibly âdoing the guitar partsâ⊠like ya do
The sheer number of voices joining the rediculous falsetto (thanks, Roger)
How they all start jumping at the ramp-up âso you think you can stomp meâ
Hands up, hundreds, thousands deep for the final âoooooâs and the last line to close the song
Only days before my state went into lockdown, âBohemian Rhapsodyâ came on in the restaurant kitchen Iâd just been hired at and, no shit, every single worker in that little diner started singing along. Me (the only queer afaik), the manager, all the other kitchen workers, the dishwasher up front, the two people on the counter, all but two of the men over 30. Just belting out Freddie Mercury at the top of their lungs. And you can bet when âsometimes I wish Iâd never been born at allâ came around, we every single one of us ramped up the intensity and basically made sure Freddie could hear us in the afterlife.
One of the things that struck me, listening to the video, is that you cannot distinguish the original vocals from the crowd, and sometimes you can barely hear the music. And the POV is on the stage the speakers are playing the song from!
Thereâs good reason why, nearly fifty years after the height of their career, Queen is still considered one of the best bands of all time ever.
(And how albums left lying about in cars will eventually metamorphose into Best of Queen albums.)
Something else thatâs rather incredible about this is, Bohemian Rhapsody is a very difficult song from a technical standpoint. Likeâhumor me, okay, go flip it on and try to sing the whole thing at the top of your voice without falling off-key, out of breath, or cracking at least once. Then come back.
Okay. Youâre back? Welcome back. Unless youâre a trained singer, you probably canât do it. There are too many long notes, too many key changes, and too many places whereâif youâre singing all the partsâyouâre just up and down the scale too damned fast. Iâm saying this as a trained singer and I canât do it. I always crack on âmagnificoâ and âleave me to die,â and I have a pretty decent range, but I know I sound ugly as hell on that final coda.
Okay. Now that weâve established that, I want to talk a little about singing as a chorus. One of the things a lot of people learned during the pandemic is how hard it is to take twenty people, all in different places, and stitch them together to make a single coherent song with perfect pitch and timing. Youâre all practicing on slightly your own tempo, slightly your own key, even if youâre all working from the same base track. (You can see this in a lot of the Wellerman compilations from Tiktok, where someone always says âSoonâ a moment before everyone else on âsoon may the Wellerman come.â) When you have a chorus comprised of many smaller choruses that are all traveling to be together, this is what dress rehearsal is forâto get all of you onto the same tempo so youâre starting and finishing at exactly the same time. This is a thing that normally only happens after at least several days of practice, and it is an important skill that must be taught. Youâre not just born knowing how to do this.
I do not know how many people at that Green Day concert were trained singers. But I do know there is no way in hell all few thousand of them were a single groupâthey showed up a few at a time, maybe even flying solo for the night. Now go and listen to the video again. Listen to the ends of verses and the pickups. Theyâre fucking crisp as hell. Everyone is starting and ending at the same place. Not even a single note off. (And yes, you can hear when itâs a single note off, even in a crowd that big. A handful of people would be enough to throw it off.) And while a few in the crowd may be off-key, so many more are on-key that the cumulative effect is of the song being on-key. This isnât even the band theyâre there to see.
They donât just know this song, this technically-difficult song, this long and complex song by a completely different band. They know it perfectly. They know it down to the fucking note. They know it so well that they did it in perfect synchrony, without a single chance to practice.
Do you know how insane that is?