Happy Birthday Miss Changhode

I had thought a lot about this over the past week or so regarding what to write. Yet I don't know how to go about with this, there is so much to say but I am still staring at an empty page and a blinking cursor.

I had a small list of plans (mostly involving Thor Bro and Scarlet Witch), but your are not the same person who enjoys silly pranks. You are a mature and focused women now and I respect that. Most importantly, I have things to say and this is the only place where I can speak freely.

I hope you find this because like last year I am not going ask you to read it, I know you are busy, or you may have other plans for your birthday. If you are here because you remember, then thank you so much. If you are here because future me complains to you about forgetting and guilt trips you, then I am really sorry.

Since you are here, please don't see this on phone. I tried to make it look good on phone but I don't know much HTML coding for that.

This is the last post on this blog and I hope you will read this, it's quite long.

Dear Miss Changhode,

You have absolutely no idea the kind of influence your existence has on me. When I look back last 7 years the only thing that had any relevance in my life was you. So much so that it is difficult for me to believe that I had a life before 2017 where the words "Miss Changhode" meant nothing. What is even more strange is the fact that I've been with you in person for only a year. 

You have absolutely no idea how happy I felt when you send that mail titled "Atisarga to Pretentious Nobody" on 22-06-2019. No one has ever put so much effort for me. On 09-08-2019 morning we were pranking each other by sending deleted messages, you SMSed me so in return I emailed you that 'Oh really Baby pic' to which you replied "Really... that was awesome, see I am smart ..I have chosen smart best friend and you are a duffer...my best friend can mail also" It was the first time since I was in 8th std that someone called me their best friend. I know that unlike me you are a very popular person and has lot of friends and yet to choose me as a best friend felt like a huge honour. I remember leaving flat that morning to office, I was listening to a song by band called Machine Head on the way, the song was about religious hypocrisies and a call for revolution but I was just so happy, my feet was not touching the ground. You won't understand, that was huge for me, to know that I meant something to someone. Since then I've been there for your ups and downs and I felt I have someone to care for.

Why I am I telling you all of this ?, because I miss everything. You know, there was a time why I used to feel really sad when I open Whatsapp and had to scroll down to see you, now I am kind of used to it. You may think 'Joel is good person...he helps a lot', no I am not a good person, it's just that doing things for you makes me happy and sometimes it hurts when you say 'don't put so much efforts'. You know whenever you come to Delhi for one episode per season like Doug Judy, Jake is more sad than happy because after you leave his life becomes a mess for a while, he knows that. It takes some days for things to get back to normal. Its like in Kerala the whole sky turns grey, filled with clouds but it never rains, it takes a while for sunshine to appear. Often I feel I rather not see you because I know what will follow. In fact I'm fucking jealous your professors, students, colleagues, roommates who gets to see you everyday (first time using f word in my life). Sorry if I went too far, its not your fault, you have made your best to keep in touch with me. Its always you who have called, always the first to ask what's going on. It's just that there is nothing going on in my life, its just emptiness, I don't know what to say and when you speak about your life sometimes I get sad because I am not there in those stories. It's just that I am still at the same place where you left me in Warangal. I haven't moved on since.

Why I am I telling you all of this now ?, because I need a closure of some sort, don't know if it is even possible. This has become unhealthy, it's painful for me, sometimes even literally. I sometimes have arguments with myself saying 'she is just a person like everyone else'. I was living inside my small little bubble before I met you, you showed me a whole new world and now I am alone in it. My ship has been kept anchored ever since, I have to put up the sail at some point and go somewhere. 

Meeting you was the best thing that ever happened in my life. I never knew that someone could be so important to me. I am really proud where you are at this point in your life, you are an amazing person, you have the power to change people's lives. The only advice I want to give you is to never underestimate yourself, just look around, there is no one better than you. Everything will fall in place. You used to tell 'ache logo ke saath ache hi hota hai' and it's true. You will definitely find some one who understands how blessed he is to be be with you, just be patient. I hope we remain friends forever, I hope your kids and my kids will meet at some college and become best friends.        

This will be the last post on this blog, it feels so emotional writing the last few words, but I have to let this go at some point. I have to start letting go of some more things as well, it's hard for me, but I have to start trying. I know this isn't the birthday wish you expected. I've just been writing about myself. Let me bore you one last time with some lines from the song "Fiction" by Avenged Sevenfold, I feel those lines were written exactly for this moment and I am listening to it a lot lately.   

"Gave you all I had to give

Found a place for me to rest my head

While I may be hard to find

Heard there's peace just on the other side"

I apologize if you found this post cringe or if it made you cry. I apologize if you delayed any birthday plans just so that you can read this at 12:00 am. But then I don't even know if you will even remember to read this. I don't want to burden you, you don't owe me anything, you don't have to do anything for me. You just keep on smiling, that's all I care.

Wishing you all the happiness that life can give.

Happy birthday Miss Changhode !

Live long and prosper.

Yours,

Joel Johny K 

      

           

    

  

Happy Birthday Miss Changhode

Apparently I ran out of ideas, I spent the whole day thinking what to do and ....nothing. I feel like Peter Parker in Spider-Man 2 (2004) who suddenly lost his powers. I am so embarrassed that I am not even going to tell you that I've made the post. Maybe you will find this, maybe not. Maybe this will be just 0s and 1s stored in some server.

Anyways.

Wishing you a very happy birthday. 

Let all your dreams come true

Let there be no more days of blue

Let teary eyes be far and few

Let the new horizons be within your view

I got no more words to rhyme, so I bid adieu..

bye...

Live long and prosper.

Happy Birthday Miss Changhode

 Guess what ? something came from a galaxy far far away.. 

You just had more free time than me that's why you won it 

Well I am happy for you, you obviously have more #skills than me. 

I don't know why it took them so long to send it but it is here finally, you won the #competition

Miss Changhode, I know you are not too happy for getting older but the older we get more are the memories that we can cherish.

I have these, and I thank you for these..

happy birthday..

Live long and Prosper.

Happy Birthday Miss Changhode

 

"I just want a world without pain

I know you will hate me for what I'm going to do

But.. if everyone dies, then who is left to mourn ?" 

Once I promised you that if Elnaz makes new music then it will be about you, Hecate is the first Elnaz song in 4 years. It is an honor to feature your voice in my new song.

The song is as much yours as it is mine and is my humble "gift" for your birthday. Your name is right next to Elnaz in credits in all music streaming platforms and will forever remain that way.

Due to the fact that you are still alive due to privacy concerns I did not use your photo in the artwork :) :) :)

I hope you don't mind me using your voice without your permission and I know the song is not all that great, it is my first foray into industrial/ambient music, far away from my beloved black metal.

There is a dialogue from the movie Gladiator which goes like this

"What we do in life, echoes in eternity"

As long as Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, YouTube Music and YouTube exists, your voice will stay immortal, it will echo eternally and will be heard in all corners of the world.

Maybe one day when you are very old, you can play Hecate to your grandkids and say "Hi mi aahe" and smile.

Live long and prosper ! 

(Thank you Kshitijha for the Marathi translation)

  

Happy Birthday Miss Changhode

Bharati of House Changhode,

First of her name,

Queen of the Andals and the First Men,

Protector of the Seven Kingdoms.

Wishing your grace a very happy birthday.

Long may she reign !

* * * * *

It is an honor to call your grace my best friend

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU !

Live Long and Prosper

Bharati Changhode - Birthday

Miss Changhode, You have lived long enough, 

now do everyone a favor, 

Die !  

Miss Changhode, Thank you for being such an 

awesome friend.

Live long and prosper !

ALL THE IMAGES USED ARE 93.4% HEAVY METAL 

The first one is based on the album Cross Purposes (1994) by Black Sabbath. 

The second is based on the album Waking the Fallen (2003) by Avenged Sevenfold.

Départe - Failure, Subside

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things and no good think ever dies"

- The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

The above quote is a famous dialogue from arguably the greatest movie ever made. I personally don't adhere to the sentiment "hope is a good thing", to me hope is a mirage, a lie fed into gullible masses. The second law of thermodynamics states "entropy always increases with time" or in simple words "things only gets worse", that's what I believe in. Call me suborn, inconsolable or pessimistic, I don't mind but I've seen my life evolve around me. Tasmanian metal band Départe believes in hope but their music is a haze of unforgiving post metal dissonance.

"Awake, oh sleeper Shroud yourself in light

 Awake, awake, oh sleeper Shroud yourself in light"

Failure, Subside has lyrics with heavy christian undertones, it is not preachy holier-than-thou kind of exhorting but they are bluntly optimistic and uplifting. In a sea of nihilistic blasphemous extreme metal bands, this is a welcome change but Départe with their music can scare a vast majority of those bands away. Their sound borrows heavily from the Ulcerate palette but they paint colors of grey on a post-metal canvas and this means they are far removed from the Alcest/Deafheaven camp of shimmering oceans and tranquil winds. This is atmospheric black metal of visceral dread until you start reading the lyrics, the entire 50 minutes is all about this unresolved paradox.

"Forgive me, Father
 I am but a thread, unraveling
 Lost unto the air
I am undone
I am undone"

Seas of Glass starts things off with an ominous built up in a funeral doom tempo until it fades into Ashes in Bloom, where things gets faster and chaotic. Eerie melodies takes birth and grow on your right ear and the clean vocals comes in with a strong Deftones vibe, sounding like a less adventurous Chino Moreno. At the song's later half it all calms down with ringing clean guitar chords with the man behind the kit waiting to explode and it does on Wither.

Four minutes into Wither the soothing voice singing "Forgive me father..." calms the air around from which it builds up into a mournful riff. Grief Echoes (Golden Scars) stars of like an Ulcerate song with some Jamie Saint Merat inspired drumming and a huge helping of the sense of unease that the Kwis are famous for. However at the song's midsection they go for Zhrine-esque shimmery chord voicings, bringing down the tempo, giving the vocals all the space for it to express. After the almost empty interlude of creepy noises and cymbal washings, Vessel lurches through with some double bass rolls that almost always stops abruptly. The song reaches its climax with an uplifting chord change followed by the album's most empowering lyric.

"Come oh wind, oh breath of life

still these waves that seek to drown me  

My voice will rise above these looming mountains
these towering pillars of  loss and defeat"

         

Ruins opens with a female spoken word sample with tension building, the opening has a lingering dread around, as if someone played a suspended chord and is too suborn to change it. Insistent blast beats and desperate vocals gives way to cleanly plucked notes and lightly strummed chords and from there a distorted melodic motif comes to life along with the scream "Saturate me..". It dies into clean reverbed strains, blending and fading away into thin air as the record comes to a halt.

     

The production aids to the whole experience, the kit sounds powerful with a real thump in the kick drum. When the double bass rolls comes in, it feels like a torrent of rocks falling over you and the base has a real presence, even taking limelight in the songs Vessel and Ruins. The vocals are given ample space in the mix and it does make use of that space to express Départe's earnest lyrics. 

If I am pressed to say a complaint it would be the way the album is split. I feel naming the 7 songs as "parts" or movements like the Batushka debut would have made the record more intimate and seamless as it wont allow the song titles to bring some preconceived notions. The songs do blend into each other and the start and end of songs seems to get blurred if you are not keeping track which again gives credence to the idea of "parts" as opposed to song titles.

It is strange to start off 2019 with an album released in 2016, in fact I was about to review the Gorgon album released a week before. However as I am writing this I know for sure that I won't be able to do justice for an epic symphonic blackend death metal album in my crestfallen days. It seems natural and sincere to write about a record that echos the same feelings that I am going through right now. 

So did this record change my mind ? I am still skeptical about the idea of hope, all I can say for now is that Départe did their best. Allow me to wither in solitude, let the sun dry my petals of love.

"Come and shine bright, light of the divine

Saturate me"   

LINKS FOR YOUR ENLIGHTENMENT

Départe   Ulcerate   Zhrine

        Deftones