February 11, 2012
Music I Like, Plus Bonus Fandom Ramble I Guess.
Sherclop Pones put a teaser image of Friendship is Witchcraft Episode 6 on their youtube page, so I was all like “SHIT, gotta find out when that comes out!” There are links to their tumblogs or whatever the fuck that’s called, so I went and looked at them to see if they had said any sort of timetable. (For the record, take your time, Sherclop Pones! I’m excited, but do that shit right, you know?)
I didn’t find anything, but the guy who does a lot of the editing and stuff had a link to this album. It had appealing art and wanted to give me a seizure, so I figured, you know, I’d try it. It was alright, so I downloaded it, and threw it on my MP3 player. I have then proceeded to listen to it constantly since. Like, constantly. I’ve pretty well fallen in love with it. It’s really silly mashups of songs with video game tunes and all kinds of shit, and… yeah. I like it a lot. I would recommend trying it. Here’s my favorite track, if you need convincing.
But yeah, anyway, I was surprised, so I’m like “Who is this Truxton guy? I bet I’d like more of his stuff.” So I do some searching and stumble onto the website with all this stuff on it. And I’m like “Wait, I remember this ridiculous nurse herm bullshit.”
Anyway, apparently there’s a guy with like a million fursonas that makes concept albums as different people? And Truxton is his most recent creation or whatever? I don’t know. Good for him? Though it makes me kind of feel all the weirder about really liking this album. I don’t know. I remember being like “What the hell is this?” the first time I saw some of those album covers that he’s had done. Plus, since I really enjoyed this album, I’ve been seeing if anything else he has done clicked with me, and I just have stumbled upon stuff that just makes me close my browser in shame.
Let me just make one thing clear. Apparently this is this guy’s job. This is how he makes money. That’s fucking amazing. Awesome! Clearly he loves doing it, and I don’t want to come off seeming like I think he shouldn’t create it and make money off of it. Doing what you love and being paid for it is basically the goal of life, and he made it!
But it just seems in many ways to represent that part of furry culture I just kind of want to be distant from.
I’m a furry, and I certainly don’t think I’m ashamed of it? I certainly make it pretty clear and am not shy about it. Any time I am asked to explain why the hell I am a furry, or what a furry is, I have an explanation, of course, but I know that what it all means to me is pretty different than the fandom at large. I see the furries in my little group, who are a big open accepting family, very inviting, always ready to try something new. The fandom at large is the sort of people who go to conventions, dance, hook up, all this shit. I don’t think if I ever went to a furry con I would feel that sense of family I do with most furries I meet online. Maybe they’re the same people. I know Aesa has gone to these things, and I love him to death. But in a group, it’s just… scary. The overall effect is wrong. That keeps me away. This music reminds me of that in a lot of ways. I can see the bunch of people that want a song entitled “Thorough Pinata Dicking Amateur XXX” and that bunch of people doesn’t seem like people I want to be around.
I suppose this whole “brony” whatever is the same way. I have accepted I’m a super-fan, but I tried watching panels and stuff from BroNYcon, and it just embarrassed me and I had to stop. It was no longer this kind of uninhibited love of something childish and nice which I feel when I talk to people one on one about ponies. It was no longer, say, Molestia’s “let’s make pointless dirty jokes about this because it is silly” fun. It became real. All the fun playing around became super serious and “no, I seriously believe this.” That put me off.
Maybe I’m a hypocrite. I certainly have super-serious but very stupid thoughts about “but no, seriously, if the Mane 6 were lesbians, here’s who I think would fuck based on personality compatibility” and completely ridiculous crap like that. That doesn’t really feel that wrong to me. Similarly, I can have similar dumb conversations about why Fluttershy would actually make a pretty good dom with a small group of friends and it doesn’t feel wrong. It’s just all of us joking and having fun, even if we seriously argue points. But when the scale gets that big, somehow that breaks.
I think I just figured it out. When this stuff scales, I can no longer trust that someone is doing this because it’s fun, and not because they’re insane. One person, one artist, one whatever? I can get that. My brain can handle processing motivations for doing this sort of thing that aren’t creepy or crazy. I can give someone the benefit of the doubt, or see where they’re coming from. Same with a small group. I can process each person individually and make that assessment. But when the group gets too big, suddenly individually working through each person is daunting. I don’t have enough information about each person. I can’t do it. So I can’t be sure their intentions are good. So the idea of being associated with them creeps me out.
I’m not better than anyone. I’m plenty fucking creepy and weird when I want to be. I don’t feel like I’m being unfair here. But fuck, maybe I am. I don’t know. Maybe if I just gave in and didn’t worry about this bullshit, just assumed the best about people like I normally try to, I would be able to go have a good time. Who knows.
Wow, this blog sure went weird places! But seriously, try that album. It’s fun.