Slow down, we've got time left to be lazy.

Song for the weekend: The Gambler- Fun.

I forgot how much I loved this song. It came up on shuffle as I was driving back to my apartment earlier tonight, and it is just such a beautiful story. Listen & Love.

I want to do a long post about how much I love Fun. and how they've grown as a band so much since Aim and Ignite, but my brain is much too tired, so that will be postponed.

One Directions new music video is the perfect combination of sexy and cute

Honestly, everyone-- stop what you're doing and watch this. One Direction came out with a new music video. It's borderline cheesy, but actually perfect in every way. As said in the title, it's the perfect combination of sexy and cute (If you get this movie reference, we can be friends *cough Crazy Stupid Love*) It's simply the boys of One Direction, what they consider "midnight memories" and some serious appreciation for the city of London.

The band is debuting their newest album titled single, "Midnight Memories" and boy is this song 180 degrees different from their last single. Their last single was a Mumford and Suns/Lumineers influenced blend of folk and pop... This one sounds like Def Leoppards "Pour Some Sugar on Me." You can tell that the boy band is trying to experiment away from their usual pop-dance heavy tracks. In fact, they don't even sound like the same band after listening to their first single, "What Makes You Beautiful." Given their new sound, I expected them to have a music video where all of them are clad in black leather debuting a new look and their cool "rockstar" life style. This music video kind of touched upon my image in my mind, but took it in a different direction...

The video, directed by the fabulous Ben Winston who did their last two music videos, "Best Song Ever" and "Story of My Life", begins at a house party. The boys of One Direction are there, except they're not entirely enjoying their time. Each of the boys are caught up in a scene that I feel like is a scenario we've all been through at a party. Realizing that Harry Styles was missing, my first thoughts of where this music video could go revolved around Styles bursting into the party singing the beginning lyrics of their song, which will then lead to the party suddenly picking up at the tune of Midnight Memories (cliche, right?). People will start dancing, and crazy party antics will take part. Ah, but of course, this didn't happen (though in a way I sort of wish it did), probably because they still have a very young fanbase, and management didn't want to promote partying.

Anyways, my image of Styles bursting into the party singing the lyrics of the song was pretty accurate-- except then it takes a different turn. The boy band ends up ditching the party to go out and make their own midnight memories (heh, see what I did there?!) which include wreaking havoc at a restaraunt, riding on electric scooters, and flirting with old ladies jokingly -- Nice dig at your own reputation, Harry Styles.

One of my favorite scenes of course, is the scene where the boys take a boat down the river and admire all of the London landmarks (Big Ben, The London Bridge, The London Eye). As a huge appreciation for London culture, I nearly squealed at all the beautiful sights in the background. It's in this moment where the scene just really fits the song-- a cheesy "living young and wild and free" popped up in my head as I watched them lift their arms wide open with St Paul's Cathedral in the background (check out the first gif in this post.)

 When you think in the context of the song, you assume Midnight Memories is going to be about crazy rockstar tour antics and heavy partying. But this video takes that and morphs it in a way to create a different (appropriate) midnight memories. Clearly their lifestyle is nothing close to normal and obviously, normal boys probably wouldn't be able to get away with stealing a boat and then climbing up on the London Bridge at night. They are living at the top of the world, yet are still humbled by the beauty of something as simple as London's architecture. Plus, you can't help but smile at the outrageous sillyness of these boys.

And of course, watching the video makes you realize that yeah, there are other things to do than drink your life away at a house party and make useless small talk with people you don't know. Why spend your time doing something you don't like? You create your own memories, and you can do anything you want.


With that said, it's a great music video and a nice shift from their Story of My Life music video (which was on the serious side.) It matches well with the song, and Winston does a brilliant job capturing the boys in different lights. Bravo!

BRB, watching it again. :D

*note* gifs borrowed from Tumblr

Macaroons, Dance Concerts, and the Importance of Live Art

Happy Friday!

It's been a great week so far, both academically and physically. I've been having some really great dance classes, I got two midterms back that I did extremely well on, and I did an interview for a summer job that also went well.

Oh, I also had my first macaroon ever so that was an experience. In fact as I type this up right now, I'm chowing down on a hazlenut flavoured one and drinking a cup of tea. I'm feeling fancy fancy freeeee (although I probably shouldn't be eating a dessert since my stomach isn't feeling too great. we'll call this sacrifice)

Anyways, I think the main thing I want to blog about is the importance of live performances. In my last post, I talked about how I was home to watch my younger brother perform with his highschool, School of the arts. School of the Arts in San Francisco is a very Ballet and Modern based school, so their dance concert was mainly works of contemporary ballet, modern, and the occasional jazz pieces.  These kids are all in their teens-- from 15 years old to 18, and all of them have got such talent. My brother kicked some serious butt (of course I'm being biased, but let's be real here... he's an awesome dancer) and it was just so cool to see him dancing in something completely different from Billy...

Except I do have to make note of one of the pieces that kind of reminded me of a continuation of Billy's "Shadow Dance" right before "Grandma's Song".  This piece used interesting lighting to create shadows onstage, and of course my brother whos obviously a seasoned expert on shadow dancing, had an awesome little duet with another dancer where he used his hands to create shadows that fit with her shadow. It was pretty cool and probably would have been the result of Billy's shadow dance if he didn't see Grandma sifting through his private stuff.

There were loads of other talent on the stage as well, and I have to make note of these two dancers... both tall and both are red heads... These guys were featured quite a lot and boy can they move! holy man, I was shaking my head in awe. The two of them had a duet, and it was so epic and ginger. Not sure why there's the idea that gingers are "soulless" and "unfortunate" because honestly, after Ed Sheeran, Rupert Grint, Karen Gillan, Prince Harry (The list go on), and now those two kids..... I Beg to differ. Gingers ROCK.

So despite it being a great show, I think watching this show and watching my younger brother perform was kind of the inspiration behind my working hard in classes this week. Not to say I haven't been working hard in class, because I definitely do, but this week I had a different motivation behind me. After watching a live performance of dance, I was motivated to really work hard in classes so I can perform again. And I think it's really important, especially for artists, to constantly be exposed to live art. I'm really fortunate that the university I go to offers live performances weekly, whether it's a dance concert thesis, a live improv comedy club, or a jazz music night. Not only do you get a sense of inspiration and motivation while watching talented performers, you gain an even bigger appreciation and respect for the art. Don't you agree?

With that said, this weekend is going to be full of live performances: I'm seeing my friends dance in a student choreographed dance thesis, I'll be working on a dance-chemistry collaboration video, and then on monday I'll be attending a musical theatre night show in LA (with andy mientus and michael arden! I've only recently found out who they are, but my golly can they sing!) I'm so excited for these events and I love surrounding myself with such talented people who may have a different focus in the arts, but all have the same passion and drive. :D It makes me just want to embrace all of them in a lovely hug.

That's all for now! Lovely weekend to all and to all. xo

There's no place like home

Happy Saturday at 1:30am!

I am currently writing to you from my very own bed at my home in Half Moon Bay after a spontaneous trip from Irvine to surprise my brother for his first dance concert with SF School of the Arts.

It's been an incredibly stressful week-- I had another midterm that I didn't do as well as I hoped on (Yay BioSci!), a large rough draft of a bibliographical essay on Jerome Robbins, and another Dance History Quiz (which for some reason I had this strange false confidence while taking it... I guess writing "Martha Graham" and "Isadora Duncan" for every answer seemed about right in my mind at the time).   The first part of the week went by at an excruciating pace and I'm praising the fact that I won't have to worry about any exams till June. This was definitely a week I was wishing I was back on tour, especially after seeing my tour family the past weekend. I'm still struggling on adjusting back to student life, and I think it's taking me slightly longer than I thought.

Which again, is why I'm so so happy to be home. After the stress of midterms and papers, there's honestly nowhere I would rather be than here. I love being home.

Home to me is both tangible and intangible. It's tangible in the sense of it being a physical place you're referring to, aka your home that you grew up in. But over the course of years of living away from my physical, I realized that home can be more than just a physical house, but it can be a feeling.  Home is being surrounded by people who really love and care about you. And being back at the Viernes house, I'm getting both the tangible and intangible aspects of "home"-- it's overwhelming in the best way. I'm not saying that I'm not surrounded by people I love and care about at school (vice versa) because I am, and I couldn't be more thankful to have such lovely people in my life... It's just hard when everything you were once familiar with feels foreign again. I would go into greater detail, but given that it's almost 2 am, I might have to stop right about now