This is just me wanting to make a fan soundtrack for my favorite "Xam'd" character. The songs I picked are as follows:
( Contains MAJOR spoilers (also some rather creepy sexism and suicide references) )

 So now that there’s a story on Das Sporking that’s got people talking about Iron Maiden, I figured it’d be helpful if I made something explaining them to those still not in the know. I recently spent a stint in England studying abroad, and while I arrived in the UK a casual fan of Maiden, I returned to the States an absolutely adoring fan.

( See what I have to say... )

And…that’s about it for my own experience of Maiden. Rock on! \m/

 As any metalhead will tell you, “Hallowed Be Thy Name” is about as good as a metal song gets. But what is it about this song, really, that makes it so special? Obviously that’s a matter of opinion. Some people like its complex melodies, some people like its philosophical lyrics, some people like its immersiveness, and so forth. To me, though, it goes beyond that. Plenty of Iron Maiden songs, and just metal songs in general, have gorgeous, complex melodies and philosophical lyrics. Yet, “Hallowed Be Thy Name” still stands as one of heavy metal’s crowned jewels. It’s different from your average metal song, and is a big aspect of what sets Iron Maiden apart from most other metal bands.

( My two cents... )

So…yeah. That’s my long-winded explanation as to why “Hallowed Be Thy Name” is so special.

 The website SongMeanings.com is an open-access site where you can create an account and write analyses and interpretations of your favorite songs, and read what others have written.

Bear in mind that it is open-access, which means a lot of garbage gets onto it, but a lot of gold gets onto it as well.

 It's obvious that whoever wrote those pages is a completely obsessed fan (or most likely fans) who worships the ground they walk on and probably thinks beautiful white chrysanthemums and monkshoods grow from between their toes. Pretty much every other thing that finds its way onto those pages somehow leads back to how totally awesome and special Iron Maiden are, and how they pretty much define CMOA, and how everything they do is amazing and wonderful and perfect--to the point of absurdities like praising a band member for striking a guy with his car because he was running late to a concert as an "Awesome Moment," despite the fact that a moment's logic and reason would tell you that striking someone with a car for any reason is bad, no matter who's doing it!
Before anyone asks, yes I've edited those pages. But I haven't been responsible for the more insane bits like the aforementioned car thing.

 So the other night I walked into the kitchen to make dinner and my flatmates were playing Billy Joel. It's good to know he follows me even to England. :)

 You know one thing that really grinds my gears? People who can't tell the difference between liking something they see in media and condoning it. People who think that liking a nasty or unpopular character automatically means that you would support that character in real life.

And, I recognize that there will always be people for whom the likes of Edward Cullen really are their perfect men. But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the notion some people seem to have that merely liking a character automatically means that you support/want to have sex with that character, regardless of your actual reasons for liking him or her. The hatedom against Snape from the Harry Potter books seems to be a classic example of this--there seem to be a few people who will always believe the worst of Snape's fans, as though the mere fact that they like him and find him sympathetic means that they support him calling Lily a bad name or picking on Harry. There have even been people who've tried to peg fans of Snape as racist (which admittedly partly had to do with the genuinely bad behavior of a few people who happened to like Snape, but STILL).

But that's simply not how it works. I like lots of characters who do lots of really reprehensible things, but I recognize that their behavior is wrong and don't try to emulate them. Liking Legato Bluesummers from "Trigun" does not make me a mass-murdering cannibal out to destroy humanity. Liking Clair Leonelli from "Heat Guy J" does not make me a mad bomber. Liking Mao from "Code Geass" does not make me a deranged psychopathic manchild who'd cut up her love interest with a chainsaw. Nor would I condone the behavior of any of these characters if I met them in real life. So why should liking Snape make anyone a racist? In all likelihood, there's a goodly amount of people (such as myself) who like characters such as the ones above, probably only because they're not real and their actions have no real-world consequences. Isn't part of the point of fiction escapism? And isn't part of escapism the idea that you can get close to things that horrify you while still remaining perfectly safe?

In addition, there is a difference between merely liking something and liking nothing except that thing (the latter of which I'd argue actually is cause for concern). As much as I love Mao, for example, I'd like to think I'd be freaked out if I met someone who went on about how he was the GREATEST ANIME CHARACTER EVER!! and every other anime character was worthless. In a similar vein, the mere fact that I happen to own a Cannibal Corpse album shouldn't mean anything by itself--but, if I refused to listen to anything that was not Cannibal Corpse, then I could see how my family would be worried.

...Yeah.

 So, back when I was in middle school, I heard the Evanescence song "My Immortal" played CONSTANTLY on the radio. It'd play as I was going home from school on the bus (and sometimes in the morning too) and I got so sick of it it wasn't even funny.

Yet, by the time I got to high school it was gone from the radio. And these days, the only connection most of us seem to have to it comes in the form of a certain infamous Harry Potter trollfic!

 So, on the loooooooooooong bus ride back to Upstate New York from the Forward on Climate rally in DC, I decided to do something I haven't done since my last trip to California (several years ago now), and that's listen to Smash Mouth's album Astro Lounge from start to finish.

 

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