It’s always nice to treat someone you love. Whether you’ve been with them a few months or a few years, you might want to treat your boyfriend to a lovely new gift. The thing is, guys can be hard to buy for! Where do you even start? There could be a million things that are suitable for your boyfriend. Luckily, in this article, you’ll get a few top suggestions that could be real game-changing gift ideas.
Great Gifts For Your Guy
It’s always worth considering what the occasion is and how special you want the gift to be. For example, gifts for anime lovers or comic lovers are an option. It may sound silly, but there are different expectations at different times. Think about it, you might not want to splash out big on a huge gesture as a random present. But, for a 30th birthday, you might want to push the boat out and get something really special.
These gifts below can be adapted to be a budget or a huge gesture gift, depending on how special you want to make each of them. So, whatever the occasion, there is something here for you – and your boyfriend!
1. A Stylish Wallet
Every man needs a wallet. Some like different styles to others, whether it’s a men’s long wallet or a simple cardholder. You can choose the style depending on your man’s style. Wallets come in all shapes, colors, and sizes, however, you probably can’t beat a classic leather wallet.
Leather wallets, like long wallets and bifold sleeves, are perfect gifts. They can add a touch of class to any man’s everyday carry. Consider the long wallet, which has perfect space for six to eight cards, notes, and any receipts. They are slim enough to be carried in any pocket without adding bulk and can be customized with embossed lettering or a personalized message from you. A classy gift that is suitable for any occasion.
2. Key Organizers
Key organizers are a practical and creative gift that will make your boyfriend’s life easier. These are tools designed to help to organize keychains, making it easier to find the right key when needed. Every man has an impressive collection of keys, which can make them difficult to manage. But with compact key organizers, they can get rid of the mess and switch to a more efficient system.
3. Home Brewing Kit
Beer. Most of us love it, some of us hate it. But, most guys in our country love a pint of the amber stuff! During the Covid-19 pandemic, pubs and bars were closed for months on end, making it hard to get hold of a pint. So, in stepped the breweries.
Now, you can purchase a simple home brewing kit. Don’t worry, it’s not messy. Instead, it’s a simple container that looks right at home on a kitchen counter. Pour in the dry ingredients provided by a brewer, mix with water, and turn the kit on. After a couple of days or weeks wait, your boyfriend will be able to pour fresh, home-brewed pints at home. With a huge variety of recipes on offer, there’s a homebrew beer out there to cater to any man’s tastes.
4. Make Memories with Tickets
So far, all these recommendations are physical gifts, which is great. But, there is another option too, to make memories with tickets and events. Now that the world is opening up again, what could be better than giving the gift of a ticket to an upcoming event to attend together?
There are so many choices you could think of, depending on what your boyfriend’s favorite activities are. Surprise him with a trip to a city he’s always wanted to visit, take him to see that favorite sports team, or visit a romantic attraction. Making memories together can be one of the greatest gifts you could ever give.
Within each of these four ideas, you’ve got something different. Whether you want to give a classy, physical gift like a leather wallet or signed football, or you want to give memories and potentially drunken nights, there’s something here for your man. Whatever you choose, he’ll love the thought and effort that you’ve put into it.
You can’t deny that digital marketing is an essential component of any marketing plan. It is inexpensive and effective to use social media platforms, email marketing, and other internet marketing strategies. However, digital marketing methods do not imply that traditional marketing methods are no longer effective. Offline marketing is a type of promotion or advertising that makes use of offline tools like billboards, networking, radio, and television. To take your business to the next level, the finest marketing tactics incorporate both offline and online ideas. Here are five suggestions for offline marketing.
Branding
Branding products have a huge impact on your business when compared to other forms of promotion. Branded products help your company stand out and establish a positive reputation. The marketing strategy is reinforced by seeing a brand on an object every day. Client loyalty and retention are aided by promotional merchandise. They can also increase revenues by boosting leads.
Event marketing
Local events are a great way to find where your customers are and you can benefit a lot if you choose the right event and appear right before them. Most brands do this by sponsoring events, others prefer digital signages. As a start-up, another budget-friendly way to do so is by implementing mobile marketing tours, which will not only help your brand get noticed but also will form unique experiences. Depending on the business niche you are in, you can choose which type of mobile vehicle will be the most effective for you.
Publish a book
A short book or pamphlet can help you get your point across. This offline marketing raises awareness of your company. Sharing your company’s knowledge with the rest of the world is a generous gesture. Amazon’s Kindle is a wonderful venue for publishing both paperbacks and eBooks. You may also offer it as a free download in return for email addresses on your website. Make some actual printouts and give them to your loyal customers if you can. You can use printing services to publish a book that’s on brand and portrays the message perfectly. Moreover, sticker printing can help by further pushing the promo of a book.
When attending networking events or business courses, make sure you have a few extra copies with you.
Create flyers and pamphlets
Your brand message can also be communicated to the target audience through printed marketing materials. Flyers may appear to be a standard strategy, but they are very effective. Go the additional mile and let your imagination run wild. Pamphlets and flyers can be used in a variety of creative ways to capture the attention of the audience. So keep it basic, helpful, and include discount coupons in yours.
Business cards
A business card is an important part of your brand. For a successful business growth and expansion, you must invest in well-designed business cards. Business cards can be printed for a reasonable price. Business cards, despite their small size, contain vital information. However, avoid including too much information. You can include your company name, phone number, physical address, and a few items or services.
You have complete control over the appearance and size of your business cards. Furthermore, these cards are compact and light to carry. Some people keep cards in specific binders or containers for posterity.
Networking
Even with a small business, you can network your way to success. A business network provides you with a plethora of options to connect with a target audience and professional groups. You’ll have the opportunity to make new friends and network with influential people.
Networking, which is usually free, will be used to generate referrals. Referrals come with brand recommendations as well. This could increase your confidence in networking and force you to step beyond your comfort zone. Regular networking will help you learn how to associate with people, which is beneficial to your business.
Madeline Link had already been uploading tracks on Bandcamp for years before playing her first solo show in 2018. Raised in a musical household – her dad fronted the power pop trio The Shinolas, while she and her sister Eva formed a group of their own called Triples – the 24-year-old from Ottawa pursued PACKS as her solo project in between gigs as a set dresser for commercials, but the band has now expanded into a four-piece with Shane Hooper on drums, Noah O’Neil on bass, and Dexter Nash on lead guitar. Their debut full-length, Take the Cake, released on Brooklyn’s Fire Talk Records, combines Link’s penchant for fuzzy lo-fi sonics and incisive writing with occasionally more refined instrumentation, like on the heartfelt highlight ‘Hangman’ or the delicate closer ‘U Can Wish All U Want’. Link started writing these songs while living in Toronto with her sister in 2019, and completed the album after they had to move back to the Ottawa suburbs in the spring of 2020 to quarantine with their parents. Rather than feeling divided or incoherent, however, Take the Cake rolls by with a distinctive energy, no matter the pace. Though just 24 minutes long, Link’s catchy melodies and poetic observations hang around like a dream.
We caught up with PACKS’ Madeline Link for this edition of our Artist Spotlight interview series to talk about her inspirations, lo-fi music, making Take the Cake, and more.
How do you look back on those years when you were first getting into music?
I’ve recently just been digging through all of my earliest stuff that I put onto Bandcamp and I feel so nostalgic for it. I was really a lot more into electronic music. Obviously, when I was like 12 and I was just learning the guitar, I was super into the Beatles and old school rock and roll, and that’s how I got my guitar playing style. But then when I first started recording music, it was just me, so I was using little keyboards and little synths and all that kind of stuff to try and create weird soundscapes. So I really started with a very basic foundation, and by the time I was like 17, I was doing weird soundscape explorations.
What was it that initially inspired you to make music and start uploading it on Bandcamp?
I had seen a lot of other artists that I really liked using Bandcamp. It seemed like it wasn’t really linked to social media at all, so I was just putting it up there as an archive for myself because I knew that not a lot of other people would find it unless I told them about it. So it was really just for me to kind of keep a log of everything that I was doing.
So was it a very solitary process at first, and then it kind of opened up?
It never really opened up, I have to say. It’s still very solitary, especially now with having to do remote jamming, where I’m just writing my songs and sending them to my bandmates. I haven’t had a lot of chances to collaborate – we only really started collaborating when we started playing together, which was pretty much only a year.
What led to the decision to expand the project into a four-piece?
When I was writing music by myself back in high school, I would record all these different parts, and I didn’t have the idea that I wanted to play live. But when I did have the idea that I wanted to play live, I was like, “Oh, I have to tone this all down so that I can play live, just myself and not have backing tracks and stuff like that.” And so cutting off all these different parts of the songs changed the way that I had to express myself. So when they offered to turn PACKS from a one-piece to a four-piece, I was like, “That’s awesome, because I can start writing songs that are meant to have more parts to them, and that when they’re played live, they can still sound like how they were recorded.”
I also read that before PACKS, you were in a band with your sister called Triples, which is partly why I was wondering if your process opened up more later.
Yeah, that band, we based it as a collaborative thing where we both could write songs. But that evolved into my sister writing the main part of the song and then I just wrote the drum parts, because I would bring songs to the table and they didn’t really fit with her style, especially her guitar playing style – we have completely different styles. So being in that project is pretty much the only reason that I wanted to start playing my songs live, because I realized it’s really fun, and when you can stand in front of an audience and get people to feel your feeling, that’s pretty cool.
Can you talk about what resonated with you initially about lo-fi music?
Lo-fi has always struck me the hardest for some reason. Every artist that I listen to, their earliest stuff, their least pristine recordings, always – I don’t know if when you hear a song that you’ve never heard the likes of before like, sometimes it feels like I’m physically being, like, hit by something. Do you have that feeling ever?
Yeah. Of course.
It’s like lo-fi has the most energy for me – like, literally, I can feel the energy more. Whereas when something has been processed, compressed, pieces have been stripped away, there’s like 80 tracks, way too many tracks just trying to overcomplicate everything it… It’s like, that kind of stuff is fun to dance to and stuff, but if you’re really trying to evoke a feeling from like deep within, it’s that lo-fi that’s gonna actually be the thing that hits you.
It’s raw and intimate in a way that other styles aren’t.
Yeah, exactly. Like, early Beck, Micachu and the Shapes, Elliott Smith, all of that early stuff is just – you can listen to it a million times and you’ll always be able to find a new detail or a new mistake. I really like being able to hear mistakes too.
Why is that?
Why? Because I think…
It makes it more human, in a way?
Not – I guess so, yeah, it’s like… It makes me feel like things are okay. I don’t know why that is, but it makes you feel like this song was produced, it was put out there with mistakes in it. And I think what it is, yeah, it’s more representational of what the human experience is.
Your debut album, Take the Cake, is split into two different periods in your life: living in Toronto in 2019 and quarantining with your parents during the pandemic. When you listen back to the record, is that contrast immediately clear to you, or has putting them together made those times in your life kind of blur together?
Yeah, the second one. When I listen to the album, I don’t really differentiate the songs, even by chronological order. Because I know exactly what each song is about, but I pay more attention to the energy of each song, and the emotion that each song brings up. And so I was still feeling some emotions in the quarantine that I was feeling before. Like, I was feeling that like intense sense of longing – before quarantine, during quarantine.
What are some feelings that kind of separate the songs for you in terms of those time periods?
The main thing that separates those songs is the fact that I wrote the songs during quarantine knowing that I was talking to a label, and knowing I had only a month. So, the previous songs, I wrote them because I was like, “Oh, we’re in a band, we need to keep things fresh and I need to get these emotions out, so I’m going to write the songs at a leisurely pace, whenever I have a spare moment.” Whereas the new songs were written pretty much for the entire month of April 2020. I was like, I didn’t have a job, I was in a music frenzy, I was always writing something, everything was a song – everything. I wrote so many more songs than appear on the album. But I would say the energy was just, I was approaching music a bit more as though it was my profession.
There’s obviously a pressure that comes with that as well. To what extent did that affect your writing process?
It just got me to extract more – the things that are bogging me down, that are logged in my brain mentally, and that linger in my body physically. I was kind of like, mining myself more, you know what I mean? Like we extract natural resources from the earth when we are desperate for more of those resources. I was just doing that to myself, plunging deeper than I would normally go.
What strikes me about this metaphor is that it actually reminds me of the lyrics on the album, which, besides being very introspective, are also poetic in their use of metaphors. It makes me wonder what kind of headspace you’re usually in when you’re writing.
My headspace is usually like, sometimes I can wake up in the morning and say, “I’m gonna write a song today,” and I can just sit down and play around with the words that I’ve been writing in my journal and play around with chords and find something. And then other days, like last night I had this, it’s like… It’s not super rare, but maybe every third song or something I sit down and I have this feeling that I just am going to go insane. And so I write, I just start playing and singing at the same time and the words follow the chords and the chords follow the words, and then it just manifests, and I feel so much better after I do it. I’ve said this in some other interviews, just about having, like, feverish feelings of writing. So yeah, it varies, and I think you could probably tell which songs I went into with an intent to write, and I was thinking a lot. And then there’s other songs where I didn’t have to think at all, and everything just came out without me even having to do anything.
I wanted to ask about the cover artwork, which was done by your sister. Did you have any conversations about the music during that process of creating the cover?
I knew I wanted her to paint something for the cover, and we both were talking about what state of mind provoked all of those songs to be written, what was the common thread of all of those songs. And the common thread is that they were all written in a state – I have to kind of make sure that no one can really hear what I’m doing. So me poking my head out of a mess of comfy sheets, it’s like a visual metaphor for what those songs make me feel. When I write a song, it feels like I’m enveloping myself in a physical manifestation of comfort – even though a song isn’t a physical thing, it feels physical when you’re writing and playing a song for some reason.
It’s interesting, this sense of the process being comforting but also feverish, like you said. And the way those covers are depicted made it seem like it could be suffocating as well.
Yeah, totally. It never feels unnatural or like too much, but when I get into that feverish songwriting state, it can kind of feel like I’m indulging in insanity or something. [laughs]
The final track on the album, ‘U Can Wish All U Want’, is one of those acoustic moments, and it feels nostalgic and hopeful at the same time. I read that it was written about moving in with your sister and living in the city. What does that song mean to you now?
It really is about this feeling of knowing you can be your full true self, living with this person. Like, when I was living with my sister, it’s just like … You don’t have to worry about anything. And you can just laugh – because laughing is my kind of favorite thing to do, and she’s like the funniest person that I know. So I was just, you know… all good things have to come to an end. That’s kind of the general idea of the song, is that all good things must come to an end.
Despite the recent cancellation of Jupiter’s Legacy, add to that the numerous questionable cancellations, Netflix has managed to maintain a large share of its subscriber base. Luckily for TV and film fanatics, Netflix is bringing out many new shows, including Sex/Life, a series created by Stacy Rukeyser.
A provocative new look at female identity and desire, Sex/Life is the story of a love triangle between a woman, her husband, and her past. Billie Connelly (Sarah Shahi) wasn’t always a stay-at-home mother and wife. Before she married loving and reliable Cooper (Mike Vogel) and moved to Connecticut, Billie was a free-spirited wild child living in New York City with her best friend Sasha (Margaret Odette), working hard and playing even harder. Then, exhausted from taking care of her two young kids and feeling nostalgic for her past, Billie starts journaling and fantasizing about her passionate exploits with sexy ex-boyfriend Brad (Adam Demos), the big heartbreak she never got over. But the more Billie remembers, the more she wonders how she got here — and then her husband finds her journal. Will the truth about Billie’s past start a sexual revolution in her marriage, or lead her down a path back to the life she thought she left behind with the man who broke her heart?
It’s been a… slow week for news, so I’m back again to bring you some of the best action films, a nostalgic trip back to the early 2000s, and a collection of love, death, and robots to entertain your week.
QT8: The First Eight – Amazon Prime Video
Tarantino (second from right) with some of the cast of Reservoir Dogs.
Stepping onto the film scene in 1992 with his unapologetic, blood-soaked, and influential Reservoir Dogs, Quentin Tarantino has risen to become one of the most popular and exciting directors in the last thirty years. From his Palm D’or winner Pulp Fiction, to his reimagining of history with Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood, Tarantino needs no introduction. When Tarantino mentions a new film being made, it is a BIG deal. QT8: The First Eight follows Tarantino from his beginnings working in a video store to the release of his ninth film, exploring the eight films he has made in between. With interviews from stars like Christoph Waltz, Jamie Foxx, frequent collaborator Samuel L. Jackson, producers, and close friends, the film takes a behind-the-scenes look at the unorthodox process and unique style that have made Tarantino an icon. Tara Wood does a great job interviewing those nearest to him instead of QT himself, getting a more honest overview of the director. It culminates in an entertaining and enjoyable viewing. It will make you grab the nearest Tarantino DVD you have. 3.5/5
Django Unchained – Blu-ray
Jamie Foxx in Django Unchained.
And grab a Tarantino DVD I did! Django Unchained was my pick of the Tarantino filmography. Starring Jamie Foxx in the title role, Django teams up with the endearing bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) to find and kill the three Brittle Brothers for their bounty. What follows is an attempt to track down and save Django’s wife, Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) from the Candyland plantation, owned by the alluring yet cruel Calvin J. Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). Filled with the usual boldness of a Tarantino picture, Django Unchainedpresents a hero’s story through the eyes of one man who will do whatever it takes to save his wife. It’s a clever satire that never dulls during its 165-minute runtime, and Tarantino has yet again made a historical film in his own style (like Inglourious Basterds) that should not be taken too seriously – have fun with it, be entertained by the excellent performances and the over-the-top shoot outs, and don’t get caught up in the inaccuracies. 4/5
Boyhood – Amazon Prime Video
Ellar Coltrane stars in Boyhood.
I’ve always been a fan of Richard Linklater as his ‘Before Trilogy’ is a work of art. Dazed and Confusedand Everybody Wants Some! are fantastic, while A Scanner Darkly and Bernie offer something fresh to his filmography. And, of course, School of Rock is a classic. Meanwhile, Boyhood is something unique and yet, not. Boyhood is a coming-of-age drama following the childhood of Mason (Ellar Coltrane) from ages 6 to 18 as he grows up with his divorced parents (Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke) and sister (Lorelei Linklater), all while trying to navigate the awkward stages of adolescence. Boyhood is a simple investigation into humanity, charting the moments that shape Mason’s life through the 2000s and early 2010s. As someone who grew up at that time, I felt myself growing nostalgic for my own childhood. Furthermore, when first released, the film was mainly known for its production that began in 2001 and lasted twelve years to coincide with the actual growing up of Coltrane, giving us a real feel of ageing alongside Mason. However, what Boyhood achieves over the 165-minute runtime is not something extraordinary enough to make me love the film. The film has fantastic performances from Arquette and Hawke, a down-to-earth script and perfect music to complement the visuals, but Boyhood lacks tension. It simply doesn’t possess a strong plot or character arc, making it difficult to fully engage with what is happening on screen. Weirdly enough, I still find myself liking this film. I was not angry at its flaws, but I did not celebrate its strengths. I feel that maybe in a year, five years or even twenty, I will re-watch this film again with new eyes and conclude a whole different opinion. But, for now, it was simply okay. 3/5
Love, Death & Robots – Season 2 – Netflix
Pop Squad quite literally fulfils part of the show’s title.
Season One of this show was a monumental hit, a collection of short films celebrating the variety of what animation can provide through multiple studios and stories. I covered the first series on Our Culture, praising it for its brilliant animation and the narratives explored. Season Two does not live up to what its predecessor gave with a lack of animation diversity and less comedic stories. Maybe that comes down to the episode number being cut down from eighteen to eight, or perhaps it’s because fewer studios were on board. In any case, I felt it was underwhelming. Not every episode has to have hyper or photo-realistic animation – the medium is there to create possibilities that live action has limitations with – but it just all seemed to fall a bit…flat. Also, spoiler alert, no yogurt.
My favourite episode was Pop Squad, which takes influence from Blade Runner (a personal favourite of mine so I am biased), and stars the great Nolan North. Significantly, it literally includes Love, Death and Robots. 3/5
Ranking list follows:
2ndAutomated Customer Service
3rdAll through the House
4thThe Drowned Giant
5thSnow in the Desert
6thThe Tall grass
7thIce
8thLife Hutch
Bad Boys – Amazon Prime Video
Martin Lawrence and Will Smith star in Michael Bay’s high-octane Bad Boys.
There really is no director like Michael Bay. Whether that is a good or bad thing is entirely up to you. Sure, his films are overtly patriotic, riddled with poor humour, and have endless product placements that will make your eyes roll… but his movies make billions worldwide. For better or worse, Bay has established himself as one of the most commercially successful directors ever; I don’t want to get into an essay on Michael Bay, but he does know how to make crowd-pleasing films. Regardless, his high-octane, stylised visuals and large-scale special effects have put him firmly on the map.
Bad Boys is universally known to be one of his best films, with the charismatic leads of Marcus (Martin Lawrence) and Michael (Will Smith) as two detectives investigating $100 million worth of heroin stolen from their police precinct’s evidence room. Meanwhile, they’re also protecting a witness to a murder in connection to their investigation. Filled with the expected fast cars, explosions, and shoot outs, Bad Boys is nothing new when it comes to plot and story, but it damn well has all the ‘Bayhem’ you can handle. 2.5/5
Who had old New Zealand/Australia pop rock band Crowded House returning with a new album on their 2021 bingo card? Us neither. It’s been over a decade since we last heard from the beloved outfit, but that time hasn’t dulled their infectious spirit or keen ear for melodies. Nor has the public’s appetite for their pleasing sound disappeared: the band are currently on track to earn a top five finish in the UK album chart for their seventh studio album, Dreamers Are Waiting.
For a band who have been going in some form since 1985, listeners shouldn’t be expecting to be challenged by Crowded House, and most of the record is merely pleasant and amiable. Perhaps it comes down to them being a full-on family affair now: Neil Finn’s son Elroy is on drums, his other son Liam is on guitar and backing vocals; although not technically a Finn, Nick Seymour is also back on bass, the other remaining founding member. Their old producer Mitchell Froom rounds out the collective on keyboard. It’s why the songs bounce with enhanced harmonies and interplay, everyone feeling comfortable with who they’re surrounded by.
Now aged 63, Neil doesn’t sound ready for retirement just yet. He’s always possessed one of the most disarmingly sweet and soulful pop voices and it’s undiminished here. Whether finding a softness for lovelorn lines or delivering with gusto the more upbeat numbers, his voice is still resoundingly dependable. There are no outright failures in Dreamers Are Waiting. ‘Bad Times Good’ is a simple and understated opener, and ‘Deeper Down’ could have perhaps been a more memorable closing song. ‘Too Good For This World’ is also a bit timid instrumentally.
When Neil lets it all go though, relishing in the fun of playing with his family and friends again, the other songs take off. ‘Playing with Fire’ is relentlessly hooky, a stomping standout. The swaying ‘To the Island’ plays like a sly ode to New Zealand, famously the land of Neil’s birth: “The world is beyond us/ It’s too enormous/ But oh, the island is just right/ It’s the perfect size,” he insists; given how well PM Jacinda Ardern handled the coronavirus pandemic over there compared to certain other countries, he might actually have a point.
Elsewhere, the lyrics display the viewpoint of an elder statesman, a world-weary man. “The next generation’s talking/ We’re behind the wheel/ We’re driving straight into the wall,” Neil sighs in ‘Playing with Fire’; “This is not right, this man is a fake/ But they will follow him down to the edge of the cliff/ And if he tells them to jump/ They will jump right in,” he lambasts in ‘Whatever You Want’. It’s not gripping commentary, but it’s endearing in its attempted pointedness. Liam is given songwriting credits for two of the middle songs, ‘Show Me the Way’ and ‘Goodnight Everyone’, and the former is particularly solid, containing sweet words about backing up family in a time of crisis.
At this stage in Neil’s life, nothing Crowded House do is likely to reach the quality of their classic run of records from the late ’80s and early ’90s; pop has always been a young man’s game. But the innate understanding of pop aesthetics remains, the effortless melodies still pour out seemingly at will. Dreamers Are Waiting isn’t going to bring the band a wealth of new fans, but their return will be a welcome sound to those who have been following them all these years. “There’s a battle ahead/ Many battles are lost/ But you’ll never see the end of the road/ While you’re traveling with me,” they sang in their seminal 1986 anthem ‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’; listening today, it certainly seems that way.
There are so many fascinating planets in the Star Wars universe. Some of them are more crucial than others, however, when it comes to the saga of Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Darth Vader, and the rest of the gang. So, let’s take a look at some of the planets where the main action took place.
Tatooine
The first planet that worth discussing is the one where it all began – Tatooine. Our hero Luke Skywalker first appears here, and a lot of the action in the first episode, A New Hope, takes place there as well. In terms of living conditions, things can be tough, but there are distractions in the form of pod racing. Just be careful when entering a cantina in towns like Mos Eisley, a hive of “scum and villainy.” Tatooine is not the best place to live, according to Betway, but you can do a lot worse. Of course, the story of Anakin Skywalker starts off here as well, which makes it a crucial planet for another reason entirely.
Alderaan
The home of the heroine of Star Wars, Princess Leia, Alderaan also became the unofficial headquarters of the Rebel Alliance. Unfortunately, this is one of the main reasons why a target was painted on it, and the Empire decided that it had to be destroyed, which is one of the most devastating events in the film series – but a vital one nevertheless.
Dagobah
On the surface, this remote and swampy planet does not really seem like the kind of place where great things could happen. However, it was vital in the Star Wars story in that it was where Luke Skywalker met Yoda, who trained him in the ways of the Force. Without this happening, our hero could not have been successful in his mission, so it certainly has to go down as one of the most crucial planets out there.
Hoth
After Alderaan was destroyed, the Rebel Alliance needed a new place where they could plan how to overthrow the Empire, and this became Hoth. While it is an icy and inhospitable place, this meant that it was not going to be such an obvious planet for destruction.
Endor
Of course, we have to put Endor on the list of the most important Star Wars planets as it was where the last battle in Return of the Jedi took place. However, it was another one that the Death Star put in their sights for destruction. The other main thing that the planet is known for is its furry and potentially murderous creatures, the Ewoks.
There we have just a few of the most crucial Star Wars planets and the reasons why they played such a central role in the franchise and the events that took place within them. Of course, there are plenty more locations in such a rich universe!
The opening track of Japanese Breakfast’s new album, Jubilee, is named after Satoshi Kon’s surreal anime film Paprika, but it also calls to mind another one of the Japanese director’s masterpieces, Perfect Blue. A haunting meditation on the violent consequences of fame and celebrity culture, the 1997 thriller follows a 21-year-old pop idol who finds herself stalked by an obsessed fan and starts to lose her grip on reality. While not nearly as gory or complex as that film, Japanese Breakfast’s ‘Paprika’ also kicks off by blurring the line between fantasy and reality as Michelle Zauner sings about trying to connect with people through her music: “How’s it feel to stand at the height of your powers/ To captivate every heart?/ Projecting your visions to strangers who feel it, who listen, who linger on every word,” she sings before quickly answering her own question: “Oh, it’s a rush!”
And sure, it’s meta, and a little bit messy, but it also is a rush. Rather than hinging on the lingering threat of creative stagnation hinted by the previous lines, Zauner leans fully into the pure euphoria of the moment, capturing the cathartic joy of collective attention: she reaches a higher register as if to project those triumphant words into the sky, her vocals soaring over an ebullient horn and string section reminiscent of early Beirut. This sprawling canvas stretches out over the rest of the record, which retains that buoyant energy while zeroing in to explore the nuances of these big, sweeping sentiments. There’s a touch of that ambivalence on the following track and lead single, the infectious ‘Be Sweet’, but that’s not enough to overshadow the fact that it’s a straight-up disco tune (if ‘Paprika’ was inspired by Susumu Hirasawa’s Paprika song ‘Parade’, then this is more in line with ‘Angel of Love’ from the Perfect Blue soundtrack).
Zauner co-wrote the song with Wild Nothing’s Jack Tatum with the intention of having someone else sing it, but unlike a certain pop hit written by another high-profile indie artist, it’s now impossible to imagine someone else performing it. Though far from a flawless vocalist, Zauner’s inflection here is perfect, and the song takes on a powerful resonance in the context of her discography. There’s one thing she does in particular – and it’s not ground-breaking, or revelatory, or even slightly strange by pop standards – but the way she goes from “I wanna believe in you” to “I wanna believe in something” is utterly captivating; sidestepping the I, landing on believe, then taking a leap on something, as if her plea for affection and understanding invokes in her an almost cosmic yearning.
In 2014, Zauner lost her mother to pancreatic cancer, and her first two albums, 2016’s Psychopomp and 2017’s Soft Sounds from Another Planet, grappled with the effects of her grief and PTSD, something she further explored in her debut memoir Crying in H Mart. Jubilee, then, marks a new chapter in her artistic trajectory: Zauner has said it’s about “the joy of creation,” but the more fitting part of that quote is that it’s “a record about fighting to feel.” It’s that fight I hear ballooning in significance on ‘Be Sweet’. On ‘Slide Tackle’, the best the 1975 song not by the 1975 since last year’s ‘I Know Alone’ by HAIM, Zauner directs those demands expressed on ‘Be Sweet’ inwards, battling her demons so she can embrace that desire to feel – and essentially, be – good. By comparison, it feels like an enormous task.
The laidback instrumental cleverly belies the heaviness of the song, but as those synth textures unspool on the lush ‘Posing in Bondage’, that loneliness becomes inescapable. At this point, the colourful spark of the opener is starting to look more like an ominous cloud. Then, ‘In Hell’ uses the contrast between sound and subject matter to devastating effect: Originally a bonus track on the Japanese deluxe edition of Soft Sounds, the song was written about having to put down her family dog, but also reflects the darker feelings of helplessness that come with watching a loved one die a slow and painful death. “Hell is finding someone to love and I can’t have you,” she belts, and the synth melody that follows feels not jubilant but jarring. For a song with such a steady build-up, its dissolution feels like a moment of early defeat.
In between those strikingly earnest and personal moments, Zauner grounds her writing by delving into fictional narratives that give the album an air of playfulness. ‘Kokomo, IN’ is a tender and nostalgic song about adolescent love, reveling in a sweetness the rest of Jubilee has a tendency to complicate. On the other end, ‘Savage Good Boy’ sees her assuming the role of some kind of capitalist villain; it would feel a little bit out of place if Zauner wasn’t such an expert at conveying complex relationship dynamics through fantastical scenarios, the kind that – in this case – obliquely mirror the psychotic violence of those Satoshi Kon films.
In fact, if Zauner wanted to craft a convoluted, self-referential narrative about the dark underbelly of stardom or really anything else, the rest of her discography (andself-directedvideos) proves she easily could. Even the guitar solo that takes up half of the closing track, ‘Posing in Cars’, is a story unto itself. Hell, if you really wanted to pick the record apart, you could draw a line between ‘Be Sweet’ and the first song on Psychopomp, ‘In Heaven’ (to say nothing of the title), in which she cries out: “Oh, do you believe in heaven like you believed in me?” But Jubilee’s greatest achievement is that it evokes a layered struggle without undermining the celebratory power of simply carving out your own path. It has everything Zauner knows a third album should – confidence, ambition, perspective – without drowning in its own glory, and the result is her richest, most rewarding work yet.
The word unsee appears twice on Jubilee, first on ‘Posing in Bondage’ and then on ‘In Hell’; both times, it’s negatively charged, about how we’re forced to bear the weight of our experiences all our lives. On ‘Posing in Bondage’, it comes right before what might be the album’s most quotable line: “When the world divides into two people/ Those who have felt pain/ And those who have yet to,” but it’s the “I can’t unsee it” that stings the most. No matter which camp you fall into, you might find yourself in a similar situation after listening to this record – whatever it actually is. Jubilee may start out with a song about the pressures of being “at the center of magic,” but Zauner makes you feel a part of it, seen regardless of how much you’ve endured or where you’re coming from. Now, that’s a rush.
Throughout the week, we update our Best New Songs playlist with the new releases that caught our attention the most, be it a single leading up to the release of an album or a newly unveiled deep cut. And each Monday, we round up the best new songs released over the past week (the eligibility period begins on Monday and ends Sunday night) in this segment.
This past Friday saw the release of two of 2021’s biggest albums so far: Wolf Alice’s Blue Weekend, whose final single ‘How Can I Make It OK>’ is an anthemic highlight, and Japanese Breakfast’s Jubilee, whose glossy opening track is filled with wonder and infectious energy. Also last week, Samia returned with news of an upcoming EP, led by the soaring and emotive single ‘Show Up’; Billie Eilish served up another single from her sophomore album, the minimal yet infectiously breezy and confident ‘Lost Cause’; IDER’s ‘BORED’ is a driving, bold single from the duo’s second album, delivered in a stream-of-consciousness style; Martha Skye Murphy released the chilling yet entrancing ‘Found Out’; SPELLLLING builds on the elaborate, fantastical world of her latest singles with the title track to her forthcoming LP, The Turning Wheel; DARKSIDE have a new track out from their long-awaited sophomore album, the proggy and intriguingly fractured ‘Lawmaker’; and finally, Jessie Ware unveiled another track from the deluxe edition of What’s Your Pleasure, ‘Hot N Heavy’, an unsurprisingly great and kinetic dance-pop tune.
We’ve all played a scratch card or 12 at some point in our lives. They’re easy and affordable options for those looking for a fun and instant way to gamble with minimal effort. What’s more, they provide some exciting opportunities to win real money.
Bingo scratch cards have been around for many years and are incredibly fast and easy games to enjoy, both in real life and at online casinos. This game format is also incredibly prevalent and accessible and ranked as the fifth most popular way to gamble in the UK. But let’s take a closer look at what are online bingo scratch cards and how they compare to their real-life counterparts.
Online versus regular bingo scratch cards
There are many similarities between online and regular bingo scratch cards, and a few differences. When we talk about what are online bingo scratch cards, we look at what makes these types of games so convenient, fun and attractive to new and seasoned players alike. We will also be comparing them to regular versions of the game to see why online bingo scratch cards may be the best option for players looking for fast rewards at the click of a mouse.
Using your mouse to scratch
With online versions of this game, your mouse is used to scratch the required places on the card (or your finger when using a device with touch capabilities) to show the result. Depending on the type of scratch card you’re playing online, you may need to scratch off the entire card or a specific area online, so make sure to check the instructions beforehand.
Opportunity to play for real money
Just like regular scratch cards, playing online provides the opportunity to win real money. Players need to join an online casino and make a deposit to play for real money. There are also options to play for free, which require no deposit but eliminate the opportunity to win. As scratch cards are typically games of chance, playing for free simply provides players with all the fun of scratch cards without any risk.
Online bingo scratch cards are more convenient
When playing a regular scratch card at home, you will need to return to the shop to claim any winnings. With online scratch cards, there is no need to leave the comfort of your home, as is the case with all virtual games. If you win by playing an online scratch card, you are instantly rewarded into your preferred account without any effort on your behalf.
Fun and easy games of chance
By law, a player’s chance of winning must be clearly stated on a real-life scratch card. When playing online, this is shown as the game’s return to player (RTP) percentages. While bingo scratch games are based on luck, the general rule of thumb is that the higher the RTP, the better your odds of winning are.
Potential to win big
It just takes one card at a price of just £1 to win smaller, more frequent amounts. Other times, players can walk away with six-figure rewards. This makes bingo scratch cards the perfect game for both low and high rollers. Some bingo scratch cards even feature progressive jackpots. And because all games are based on chance, there is no skill required, and anybody can win if luck is on your side.
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Like most online casino games like bingo slots, card and table games, and classic games, you can play online bingo scratch cards whenever the mood strikes, anytime and anywhere, from your desktop or mobile device. Games are optimised for smooth and seamless gaming on the move, adding to the convenience of your playing experience. Playing online means all your favourites games are accessible at the click of a mouse or the touch of a button.
Fun and dynamic themes
Scratch cards are famous for their fun and engaging themes, ranging from your favourite TV shows to sports, and more. Some online scratch cards even feature unique and niche themes to take your experience to the next level.
There are many reasons to give online bingo scratch cards a try the next time you’re online. These games are not only fun and affordable but offer some exciting winning opportunities that are instantly credited to your account. Players looking for new chances to win will be pleasantly surprised at what these types of games have to offer.
