may I recommend one of my favorite musicians, Rhiannon Giddens? She was featured on the soundtrack playing "Old Corn Liquor" on her banjo alongside former bandmate Justin Robinson on the fiddle.

But the real reason I'm recommending her is because she does what the movie does: celebrates southern American music in all its forms. On her first solo album she did covers of Patsy Cline and Dolly Parton alongside covers of Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Elizabeth Cotten and Geeshie Wiley (also of the Sinners soundtrack).

My favorites from the album (though every song is wonderful) are:

"Waterboy" (by an immigrant Jewish songwriter who wrote for vaudeville and collaborated with Langston Hughes)



"Black Is the Color" (we love an Appalachian folk song with a beatbox!)



"Round About the Mountain (The Lord Loves a Sinner)" which would make for an INCREDIBLE Sinners fanvid....




Her second album is more explicitly political and explores many different moments in Black American history.

On this one she covers songs by Mississippi John Hurt, Richard Fariña, and Roebuck Staples, but she wrote most of the songs herself. Several of the songs are about the dangers of being a black man in contemporary America and she's got an excellent New Orleans-tinged cut or two, but my favorites are:

"At the Purchaser's Option," a title taken from an ad for an enslaved woman that said the baby could be sold with the mom or left behind "at the purchaser's option"



"Come Love Come," which sounds like it belongs on the Sinners soundtrack





And after you've listened to her solo stuff, check out her early work with Carolina Chocolate Drops for some old-time covers of R&B hits and Tom Waits songs and traditional bluegrass songs.


And the incredible project Songs of Our Native Daughters for banger after banger after banger after banger.


Oh and she was also a MacArthur genius and won a Pulitzer Prize for writing an opera about Omar ibn Said. So. You know. Rockstar.

Got long. Behind a cut in case it otherwise would stretch out people's reading pages.
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Thanks for reading. Even if you don't add me I hope you have a good day!

Title: In the Deep
Fandom: none
Author: veronyxk84
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Content: 9 icons (100x100) with stock images from Pixabay (artist credits below the icon table) depicting sea turtles, corals, fish, jellyfish, a scuba diver. Made with GIMP.
Disclaimer: This is a fanart created for fun and no profit has been made. All rights belong to the respective owners.

Challenge: #479 - Underwater



( SHOW: 9 Icons - In the Deep )

Title: That sinking feeling
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,324 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 479 - Underwater
Summary: Jack and Ianto have a slight problem, and Ianto is largely to blame.

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The regular weekly post for us to talk about any and all of our thoughts about the week's new releases.

Baekhyun - Elevator
i-dle - Good Thing
VVS - D.I.M.M
Kim Jaejoong - Rock Star
RIIZE - Fly Up
Koi Kat - Wake Up Call
Yoon Ji Sung - Voyage
Blackswan - I Like It Hot


New MVs are also added to an ongoing youtube playlist.

Last week's MVs: 12 May

Feel free to add new comments in the replies for songs/MVs we missed.

[ Rec Something Wednesday | WIP Wednesday | Monthly General Chat | Comment Fest ]

Fandom: Sherlock Holmes (tagged as both books and Granada)
Pairings/Characters: Holmes/Watson
Rating: E
Length: 13,317 words
Creator Links: rudbeckia
Theme: Angst with a Happy Ending, courting

Summary: Watson, finally pushed away by Holmes’s lack of regard for his feelings, has left 221B Baker Street and moved into his practice. Holmes is confused—he did nothing wrong! But when Holmes realises (because everyone who gives him advice tells him so) that he is to blame, he knows he has to do something meaningful to win Watson back.

Reccer's Notes: Watson gets tried of Holmes' mistreatment and decides to leave Baker St.  Much angst in the beginning, but also a Holmes determined to get his Watson back, cue the wooing!  I enjoyed the inclusion of side characters like Mrs Hudson, Mycroft and Lestrade, and there was also an original character, a woman doctor who works with Watson, that I greatly enjoyed.  It is tagged as both books and Granada, but I pictured the Granada lads when reading it.

Fanwork Links: AO3

Title: wish it would rain down
Fandom: Iron Man (616) comics
Rating: G
Content notes: None apply
Summary: icons of Tony Stark in the shower, in a bath, in the rain, in the ocean... he's been in the water a bunch of times over the years


( wish it would rain down )

random sinners thoughts:

+ love letter to southern american music. we love to see it.

+ finally some recognition that the southern us has always been culturally and racially diverse--the black/white binary dominated and still dominates most thinking about race, but there have always been people who don't fit into either category. having chinese, choctaw and mixed-race people more accurately reflects the time and place than most stories with similar settings.

+ the dobro is one of my favorite instruments ever and i hope this movie inspires a million people to start playing it

+ finally a movie that's filmed in Real Locations and knows to use cgi for necessary effects and not for the whole world. the production designer should win every oscar. as should the costume designer.

+ The Scene was one of the best scenes i've seen in cinema. like. wow. yes. that's what movies are for.

+ wtf was up with using "wild mountain thyme" though that song is from the '50s????

+ honestly the irish picks were pretty low-hanging fruit and something more obscure would have been more interesting but “rocky road to dublin” is a banger of a song so i’ll let it pass

+ having the white trio play the world’s whitest version of a geeshie whiley song was a genius move (and that one! with those lyrics!)

+ so proud of michael b. jordan in my heart he'll always be vince all grown up

+ michael b. jordan and hailee steinfeld got top billing, but this was sammie's story. miles caton, i'm excited to see what you'll do!

+ lovely to see wunmi mosaku, who i have liked since in the flesh, getting such a great role. she's otherworldly beautiful.

+ i am always happy to see hailee steinfeld

+ delroy lindo!!!

+ i thought it was pretty cool how jack o'connell kept going in and out of that irish accent--added texture to the character

+ can chris eyre or somebody make a movie about the choctaw characters? it's tragic we lost jeff barnaby a few years back--he would have been awesome at that.

+ a bunch of people left when the credits started, and i feel sorry for them

+ rhiannon giddens on the soundtrack! honestly i would have side-eyed them if she hadn't been

+ i always think that i don't like horror movies but i think i need to admit to myself that i do like them, i just prefer them to be period pieces

+ the amount of time we had for set-up before the revelations of what kind of world we're actually operating in was excellent and not something i expect to see in 2025

+ the dialogue was layered enough that i feel like i'm going to keep picking up new little details on subsequent rewatches

+ in short: that was a Movie and i love a Movie

Title: Stains
Fandom: Dayshift At Freddy's
Rating: G

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Fandom: Star Trek AOS
Pairings/Characters: Kirk/Spock
Rating: Teen +
Length: 11,213
Creator Links: BC_Brynn at AO3
Theme: Angst with a happy ending.

Summary: My name is S’chn T’gai Spock, and I am six years old. At the age of twenty-nine, I have been involved in an accident that has reduced my physical age and erased my memories accordingly.

Reccer's Notes: Usually, in stories about aging, one partner/beloved grows old, but in this one, Spock finds himself a child again. Despite losing many memories, he knows and remembers Jim, and he is absolutely determined to get back to him. But he has to grow up first. There are a lot of challenges along the way.

What I admire about this story is that both the author and the narrator (Spock) have such singular focus and total commitment to the project. One of the issues the story takes on--and what sets it apart, IMO--is the way that a slightly different upbringing and life path create a different person. It also addresses the sacrifices one must make to achieve a goal. It's absolutely heartbreaking. But, as this theme specifies, there is a happy ending. Also, of course, it's got big meant-to-be energy!

Fanwork Links: A Guiding Star

Title: An Unfortunate Footnote
Fandom: Dimension 20: Fantasy High (Spoilers for Junior Year)
Rating: PG at most. Angst, and references to Kristen's religious trauma
Notes: I still have so many feelings and thoughts about Kristen in FHJY, and this prompt brought them back up for whatever reason!

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Title: A Plea for the Planet
Fandom: Original
Rating: G
Length: 209 words
Summary: A call not to ignore the waters of the planet

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters/Pairings: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Rating: Teen
Length: 617
Content Notes: no AO3-type warnings apply
Creator Links: Auburn on AO3, Auburn's old eternalvox website on Wayback
Themes: Angst with a happy ending, Established relationship

Summary: John might walk into the water and disappear like a changeling from some bastard fairy tale; everything rich and strange he’d given Rodney fading like magic without him, lost.

Reccer's Notes: Angst with a happy ending can be compact as well. We start the story with hints of John having been through something traumatic, but we never know what (and given Pegasus, take your pick). Or maybe they've lost Atlantis. It's from Rodney's point of view, his angst, and I love the unknowns here, the lyricism and pain, finally resolved in a storm's wild beauty.

Fanwork Links: Not Near the Sea

highlights from peanuts 2024 page-a-day calendar. (i scanned these in february and forgot about posting this until now... lol)

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Title: in another life
Fandom: The Double (cdrama)
Content notes: references to canon violence, gaslighting, nightmares
Length: 100 words

Summary: There are worse fates.


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