#musiccomic

Part 4 (well, technically the real part 3 but shhhh) - we're at the end yet again friends :) Thanks for coming along on this ride with me, it means so much that y'all enjoyed the series 😭🥺. I've done my best to check out all the aro songs that you've been recommending, and as a bonus I've put them up on my story!! So this week's about three of my classic *aro moods* songs. I'm sure most of y'all know Never Been In Love by Will Jay (I would argue it's our community's anthem by now), but I thought I'd show some appreciation for Girlfriend by Bea Miller (alloaro VIBES HELLO) and Aromantic Moodboard by the fantastic @centrialux 💚 I only wish I could have drawn some more songs for this update but alas,,, uni 😖. In the meantime, you can always check out @aromantic_memes, they've been doing an AWESOME rec list of songs What was the first song you really vibed with on an aro level? Mine was definitely never been in love :)

[Image Description:

Slide 1:  Title slide. “Music. III: Relatable” In the background are drawings of headphones, stationary, a portable music player and a sheet titled ‘lyrics’. 

Slide 2: Celia holding her phone, looking down at the screen with curiosity. “I’ve been looking for some new songs recently”

Slide 3: Celia speaks to reader, “There are really few songs that can be interpreted as specifically aro …”

Slide 4: Drawing of Celia’s hand holding her phone. Drawn is what is meant to be a spotify playlist with the title ‘Aro’ with two hearts. 

“But thankfully, I’ve come across some aro playlists, and I’ve found some great music I can really sing along with, and mean it.”

Slide 5: [A series of slides with different backgrounds will be portrayed in the next few slides. They are meant to represent the music video/album art/general aesthetic the original’s songs graphics are associated with]

Celia dances in front of a pink background, wearing a  teal sweater. Her hands trace out a white curving shape. 

In the background drawn are the lyrics “Never been in love (and it’s all good)”. 

On the bottom left in tiny font is a caption: (Never Been in Love by Will Jay)

Slide 6: Celia sitting in a bathtub filled with milky water and flowers. 

The Lyrics “I don’t wanna be your Girlfriend, I just wanna play with your hair.” 

Bottom caption: (Girlfriend by Bea Miller)

Slide 7: Celia sitting at a table, nonchalantly playing with a green photograph. The entire image is a bit distorted, and decorative text at the bottom make the image look like it was shot with an old VCR camera. 

Lyrics: “i could write about love but I heard you should write what you know”. 

Caption: (Aromantic Moodboard by Max Lizanich)

Slide 8: [Back to the usual comic style] Drawing of Celia from the side holding her phone, looking mesmerized. Yellow sparkles shine in the background. Text reads “I never realized it before, but -”

NOTE: This was originally uploaded in 2 parts (too long for instagram) but it was intended to be read as one, so I’ll be pasting the descriptions one after the other as well as putting a complete image description for the whole post after.

Part 2 - in which amatonormativity makes it near impossible to have things to fully relate to and enjoy like everyone else does. Personally, it didn’t really hit me that listening and singing along to songs about romance was something you COULD actually relate to. I thought it was a kind of melodrama that everyone just did because it was a social norm/code, not because people actually felt that way 😭 The song in the second last slide is Before I Cave In by Too Close To Touch :) Do y’all also love very messy breakup songs for the drama and the drama only??

Part 3  PART 2 CONTINUED - this one's a little more personal, haha. The songs are Wolves, Survive, and Architects, respectively, all by Rise Against. Sorry if rock/punk/post-hardcore isn't your cup of tea 😭 Listening to this kind of music was one of the first times I understood what it meant to relate 100% to a song. To sing every word and mean it, from the bottom of my heart. A lot of the music I liked growing up were about break-ups and romantic relationships gone wrong, but even if I enjoyed the melody, I knew deep down that I didn't fully understand what the song was about or was interpreting them in a different way than was intended. With songs like these though, messages about finding the strength to keep going, deciding to actually do something when you know things are wrong and taking charge of your own fate ... it’s way more relatable. I had a rough childhood, and lyrics like these remind me of what it took to keep going even when I wanted to give up on everything (not to be negative lol, I’m doing a lot better now 💚). Was there a song/artist that made you realize what it meant to relate to music fully (or is this just me)?

[Image Description:

Slide 1:  Title slide. “Music. II: Non-Romantic” In the background are drawings of headphones, stationary, a portable music player and a sheet titled ‘lyrics’. 

Slide 2: Text Slide. “Amatonormativity makes romance entrenched in our music.”

Slide 3: Slide shows an alternating series of small drawings and text. 

“Whether it’s a breakup,” (to the left, a drawing of two people having a fight) 

“A crush,” (a headshot of a brunette with a broken heart drawn on their shirt)

“Unrequited feelings,” (a drawing of a girl staring at another girl who doesn’t notice her)

Slide 4: Previous slide’s format continues onto this slide. 

“Falling in love,” (a drawing of hands holding a note. Inside is a stereotypical heart with arrow, inscribed with initials ‘H+J’. Bottom says ‘-luv u’)

“Jealousy,” (the person who was holding the note looking up, annoyed. In the foreground of the sketch the object of affections is leaning woefully into the arms of a girl, melodramaticallly saying ‘woe is me’)

“-it’s always about romance.” At the bottom left Celia stands talking to viewer, looking a bit dejected. 

Slide 5: Panel of Celia talking to the viewer but looking down. “As an aro, to be honest, it’s really alienating.”

Slide 6: Celia singing with her eyes scrunched shut, her fist raised in front of her as she pretends to be upset like the lyrics of the song. The background is a sharp goldenrod yellow to indicate the musical nature. 

In the background the lyrics are drawn in rough white brushstrokes: “Two hearts that beat in sync but they could never be”

Slide 7: Panel switches back to usual colour, and Celia seems to have snapped out of the moment. She says “- well that was … not relatable. At all.”

Bottom right corner: “But it’s also nice to sing along with things that you really believe in, relate to.”

Slide 8: Celia sitting on the ledge of an outdoor table. In the background are mountains and a forest. She is listening to music on a set of large red headphones. Caption at top reads “I guess that’s why I like rock music.” 

Slide 9: Text slide: “It’s not that I think pop, or other music genres aren’t socially aware. But I find that there are some great rock, punk, and post hardcore bands that sing about social issues, past traumas, healing, growth, and thriving.” 

Slide 10: Text slide: “I love singing along with them, acknowledging all of the unjust things which exist in this world, but still finding the beauty in life and the strength to not only survive but try and make things better.”

Slide 11: A musical slide with illustrated lyrics and a bright yellow background. Celia sings with a microphone in one hand, and her other hand raised in a stereotypical rock hand sign. 

Lyrics: “The smoke you ignored is a flame you can’t contain.”

Slide 12: A musical slide with illustrated lyrics and a bright yellow background. Split panel of Celia singing back to back. For the left side, she is signing more aggressively and seems to snarl. On the right, she stands up straighter and seems more hopeful. 

Lyrics: “Life for you has been less than kind/ -but how we survive is what makes us who we are.”

Slide 13: A musical slide with illustrated lyrics and a bright yellow background. Celia continues singing, smiling with her fist raised again. 

Lyrics: “Let’s decide to be the architects the masters of our fate”

New series!!! All about music this time :) The song in this part is Fxxk boyz get money by FEMM. It’s funny how looking back, there were so many small hints and clues to our identities that are only clear to us now. This song was definitely one of those early signs lol. Did y’all also have a song/ or something else that was very aro that you related to when you were younger?

[Image Description:

Slide 1: Title slide. “Music. I: Signs” In the background are drawings of headphones, stationary, a portable music player and a sheet titled ‘lyrics’. 

Slide 2: Celia walking down the street in the winter, humming a song. Caption reads: “It’s funny. You don’t realize you’re aro sometimes.”

Slide 3: “I discovered the song ‘FXXK Boyz Get Money’ when I was 15. 

Drawing of a younger Celia sitting at a table, listening to music coming from her laptop. She seems intrigued by the music. The lyrics: “Boo hoo hoo you’re just a silly boy! Go back to mommy and your Fischer-Price toys”

Slide 4: Celia (current age) talking to the viewer “Honestly, I think that the song itself is pretty cool. It’s a fun, tongue in cheek rebellion against sexist norms about women.”

Slide 5: Celia looking up playfully and thoughtfully, hand held near her chin as she tries to remember the past. “But at the time, when I sang along, I really resonated with some specific lyrics”

Slide 5: Younger Celia belting agressively at the camera. Her eyes are scrunched shut with the effort of her singing. An arrow points at her, note reading: “Agressively belting lyrics despite not being able to sing (well).” The panel is drawn in a sharp goldenrod yellow to indicate the musical nature, and the lyrics are drawn around the figure. 

Lyrics: “Cause I’m too smart for all that, you can take the ‘love’ shit back”

Slide 6: Younger Celia dances along with the music. She holds her hand out as though gesturing for someone to stop. The panel is again drawn in yellow with the lyrics written around the figure. 

Lyrics: “No drama in my life, never gonna be your wife, tossin’ all the boys off to to the side”

Slide 7: Close up on Celia now. She smiles wistfully, “Just, looking back on everything now …”

[𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕊𝕥𝕒𝕣]

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