#onecontinuoussigh

The Music

When I first pitched this playlist to Jo, it was with the song Snowden's Jig by the Carolina Chocolate Drops and the intention of including more Jew's harp, bones, hurdy gurdy, that kind of thing. As the concept grew and evolved, different character's associated instruments and styles emerged and the overall vibe shifted a bit to be sort of a blend of Irish and African-inspired folk/Americana and Indo-Middle Eastern aesthetic.

Most of the time when I make a playlist, I find anywhere from a handful to a dozen songs that fit my vibe(s) and then I spend a lot of time just listening to music seeded from that starting point and adding anything that catches my ear to a separate playlist which will become the final cut. Once I have a good amount of music, anywhere from 20 to even 50 or 60 songs, I start the process of culling. I note each song for its primary instruments, style, genre, lyrics, and/or themes and then I start making connections between the songs and the story and between the songs and each other, until I have narrowed down the list. Below are the notes I made on each of the scenes in the fic and the songs that made the final cut, so you can get an idea where they came from and how everything for the playlist came together.

The Playlist

A Series of Meetings

Chapter 1, Scene 1: Intro scene, chill walking around music with a nice beat for walking.

- Steve on the boardwalk, bored, having packed up from drawing caricatures. - Steve disappointed and then disturbed by Doctor Pierce’s Magical Exhibition. - Steve seeing Bucky bound, observing how drugged up he must be, then reacting when Bucky meets his gaze. - The suffragettes and the witch accusation.

Last Kind Words by Kronos Quartet: banjo is Steve’s main instrument, followed by violin/fiddle which both feature. Good walking beat with minor key. Love the name because this is the last time we see Steve relatively unperturbed.

Chapter 1, Scene 2: Whiny/annoying vibes (sorry Sharon).

- Conversation with Sharon. - Steve heals himself with magic and starts planning to free Bucky.

Ganges Delta Blues by Ry Cooder & V.M. Bhatt: Long, meandering song, probably covering two scenes (maybe Ch1:2-3 or all of Ch2). Whining/moaning guitar with banjo vibes—best for Steve scenes (not Ch 3, 5 or 6). Drums would lead nicely into Misourlou, so maybe end of Ch2? Nice winding, travelling song so maybe Ch1:3?

Chapter 1, Scene 3: Steve heavy music—banjo, fiddle/violin, with a strong beat for strengthening Steve, but also for travelling to the fair.

- Steve visits Nat and Wanda. - They remind him of his strength. - Steve and Nat leave to reconnoiter the fair while Wanda researches.

(cont Ganges Delta Blues: see above)

Chapter 1, Scene 4: Primarily Steve, but let’s start to see Bucky influence here, klezmer or mid east vibes.

- Steve and Nat sneak into the fair’s encampment and find Bucky’s tent. - Steve tries to soothe Bucky. - Steve scents Bucky and hesitates to leave him behind, but knows he can’t take him now.

Misirlou by San Fransisco Yiddish Combo: chosen to complement Misourlou from Ch3:1 as this scene is a mirror, so a more Steve-instrument heavy version of the song chosen for that chapter. The speeding up at the end to signify Steve having to make himself hurry up and leave because he can’t save Bucky now but he’s struggling with leaving him behind.

Planning, Steve Dreams

Chapter 2, Scene 1: Steve heavy music with a discussion or argument vibe. Dueling banjos maybe?

- Steve and Nat return to Wanda and begin to plan breaking Bucky out. - Steve wants to go it alone, but Nat and Wanda insist on accompanying him. - Steve lets slip that Bucky is an omega and Nat and Wanda are immediately intrigued. - Wanda suggests that, with an omega for Steve, sex magic can be used to amplify the magic. - Steve concedes.

Budhvaar Raga by Kyle Tuttle: Banjo (Steve) with lots of back and forth/repeats. I like that it’s Steve’s instrument (Banjo) playing Bucky’s style (Indo-mideastern-klezmer).

Chapter 2, Scene 2: Steve heavy, but with Irish influences for his mother.

- Steve returns home, reflecting on how all of them as witches are at risk of being in the same state as Bucky. - Steve reminisces about his mother, who was previously revealed to be a powerful witch. - The day’s activities finally wear Steve down and he falls asleep on the couch. - Steve dreams of Bucky, both good and bad, being wrapped in his arms and reaching out as he falls away from Steve, but when he wakes, he is alone.

Idumea by Gwenifer Raymond: Welsh take on American banjo. Speeding up a bit at the end as Steve dreams of a Bucky not-his-own falling, also reminiscent of Misirlou speeding up when Steve has to leave Bucky.

Waiting It Out

Chapter 3, Scene 1: Bucky heavy, probably klezmer because Bucky is always Jewish in my head (sorry Jo). Something a bit dreamy hazy, maybe.

- Rehash of Chapter 1, Scene 4, but from Bucky’s perspective. - Bucky hallucinates that Steve is an Angel and he takes what comfort he can in the hallucination. - Bucky learns Steve’s name, though he doesn’t think he’s real.

Misourlou by Klezmerson: In love with this klezmer Misourlou. The whispering hush at the beginning is heavily reminiscent of The Winter Soldier theme mechanized screaming. Maybe a bit too long for this scene. Can I convince Jo to make this scene longer??? More hazy/delirious time loss? idk

Chapter 3, Scene 2: American or British interpretation of Indo/middle eastern music, maybe? Something grungier?

- Bucky realizes he’s going into heat. Although it means he will suffer through it alone, it also promises a break from the stage in the sideshow. - Bucky finds the washcloth Steve used to soothe him and starts to wonder about his hallucination. - Pierce walks in and Bucky is immediately afraid and on alert. - Pierce threatens and abuses him briefly before leaving. - While Bucky writhes in pain from Pierce’s abuse, he thinks of Steve and eventually passes out.

The Old Witch Sleep and the Good Man Grace by The Amazing Devil: ok, admittedly this is nothing like what I initially envisioned for this scene and in this case Pierce is the witch and NOT Bucky, but OMG the lyrics. “I'm learning to be/So much more than my tiredness/So much more than that old witch sleep wishes” and “My head's not yours, it's mine” and “You're not a coward 'cause you cower/You're brave because they broke you/Yet broken still you breathe” and “'Cause I'm not trapped/With you, you see/You're the one who's/Trapped with me/'Cause I've been here so many times before/Don't you think I look pretty/Curled up on this bathroom floor” and “'Cause when I stand, oh all those folks will run/And tell the tales of what I've become/They'll speak of me in whispered tones/And say my name like it shakes their bones” (ok this one is more Winter Soldier than Bucky Barnes, but still) and the vibe is just lovely.

Chapter 3, Scene 3: Jo’s pick for this scene

- Bucky’s heat progresses. - He tries to scent for a nearby Alpha, forgetting for a moment how awful that could be, but scents only the incense being used to hide his heat scent. - Bucky resolves to wait out his heat.

I Wish I Was the Moon by Neko Case: Jo’s pick for this scene. Bucky's really going through it.

Alone with his Mission

Chapter 4, Scene 1: Something repetitive for Steve waiting. Let’s stick to Sarah’s music here, Irish or something similar, but in Steve’s banjo/fiddle.

- Steve waits impatiently for the time to act, then goes to Nat and Wanda’s place at sunset. - Wanda feeds Steve and gives him tinctures and chocolate to bring along. - Nat convinces Steve to let them come along to get him to the tent. - Steve realizes he’s been handled.

The Girl Who Broke My Heart by The Gloaming: Okay, not in love with the piano here, but the fiddle is lovely and the back and forth between them evokes Nat and Steve talking about how the plan.

Chapter 4, Scene 2: A bit more waiting, actually, then meandering for the travel to/through the fair, but we can start to get into the Bucky influence for the bit at the fair, so maybe a bit of mideast compared to the earlier travelling songs?

- They leave after midnight on a dark and cloudy night. - Steve scents Bucky outside the tent and realizes he’s gone into heat. - Wanda casts spells on the tent to keep people away. - Steve tries to soothe Bucky and cuts the rope from his wrists. - Bucky is too panicked and deep in his heat to be completely sensible. - Steve agrees to help him take the edge off before they try to escape. - Steve uses his mouth and fingers to get Bucky off.

Shadrach by Brown Bird: Mideast/Romani influenced with cello? sounding a bit like a fiddle? This works.

Fruition

Chapter 5, Scene 1: Magic music. Since everyone keeps referring to Sarah as a powerful witch, let’s see some Irish influence here and strings.

- Bucky is amazed to realize that Steve is real. - Bucky is somewhat clear-headed for the moment, but they need to move fast before his heat sets in again. - It’s hard to believe that Bucky is going to be freed, but he trusts Steve. - Steve gives him the tonic to drink. It’s gross. - Bucky starts to lose himself to the heat again, but Steve is fucking him through it so it’s more bearable. - Bucky begins to recognize the spell Steve is casting using their sex magic and starts to help, even through his heat and bondage. - Blinding white light.

Beth Cohen’s Set by Rhiannon Giddens: Irish influenced fiddling here with haunting accordion or something in the background that sounds almost like a maqam??? The music syncs up like Steve and Bucky do as they work magic together and becomes more frantic as they, well, fuck.

Chapter 5, Scene 2: More magic music, but maybe psychedelia-influenced? Something with a soft or triumphant ending.

- The blinding light gives way to darkness, then fireworks of color. - Raw magic everywhere. - Bucky comes to in Steve’s apartment, in Steve’s bed, beneath Steve. - Bucky realizes that the collar is gone and he’s free.

Suspirium - Live by Robin Kester: Jo’s pick. This just sounds like soft, soft magic. Very pretty. Is that a saw??? Great lyrics, too.

The Dust Settles

Chapter 6, Scene 1: Return to home. Irish inspired, maybe, since we’re back in Sarah’s home.

- Steve wakes in bed with Bucky, naked, but no longer bound by his knot. - Bucky asks Steve to kiss him now that his heat’s gone and Steve does. - Lots of kissing and cuddling, but before it can escalate further, Nat and Wanda interrupt. - The girls have been worrying all night. - Nat asks about the arm and Bucky reveals his captors cut it off and kept him gagged so he couldn’t ask questions. It’s awkward. - The girls make tea while Bucky and Steve sit on the couch and Steve finds Bucky very distracting. - The girls explain they’d been waiting all night for a signal and went to check, but the whole encampment stands empty. - Steve ponders thinking about wanting to be home with Bucky after the spell was cast. - Steve and Nat observe Steve seems to be healed in some ways. - Wanda excitedly plans to take notes on the spell work. - Nat tells Steve and Bucky to stay put and lay low while the dust settles and promises to bring them clothes and provisions. - The girls leave and cast a protection spell at the door. - Bucky nervously tells Steve that he can’t stay. - Steve starts spiraling, thinking he was just being a new captor for Bucky. - Bucky admits that he’s been with his captors for a year and he is afraid to stay and get Steve in trouble. - Steve promises he doesn’t want Bucky to go.

In the Pines by Justin Johnson: Nat wants to know where they slept last night. ¯*(ツ)*/¯

Chapter 6, Scene 2: Sexy merging of Steve’s banjo/strings and Bucky’s klezmer.

- The boys take a bath together, explore each others’ bodies, and get to know one another. - Bathtub foreplay.

Snowden’s Jig (Genuine Negro Jig) by Carolina Chocolate Drops: LBR, this song was always going to be for a sexy scene. This might be the sexiest fiddling in the entire world.

Chapter 6, Scene 3: Grounded, but worldly music to denote Steve and Bucky staying together and travelling.

- Wanda and Nat return later with the promised food and clothes, as well as a newspaper that explains that there’s a pending investigation into the disappearance at the fairgrounds. - Bucky prepares food while Steve flirts with him. - The boys plan to skip town, deciding to travel by rail car to the Grand Canyon at the end of the line.

Imidiwaren by Tinariwen: Tuareg music is undeniably travelling music. The voices singing together to rep Steve and Bucky coming together. Good, even beat for movement without being frantic.

The Album Art

So, the album art kind of started out as a joke.

Jo had been playing around with the art from The Weeknd's House of Balloons album and the 2014 film Captain America: The Winter Soldier for fun, but they hadn't really intended to use it for the fic. When they later shared some of the inspiration they were drawing from in the fic as the art from the Once and Future Witches, I immediately thought the brush work from that could work really well with the House of Balloons concept and sent Jo the basis of what would later become the playlist album cover art a few days later.

Front cover art based on the layout of The Weeknd's 2011 mixtape, House of Balloons. Faux runic/magical symbols are from Marvel's Hellhunters (2024). Image of Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes is from the 2018 film Captain America: Civil War. Image of Chris Evans is from Tony Duran's 2004 photoshoot for Flaunt Magazine. All images are used under fair use. Other art and fonts are courtesy of Canva.

The Header Art

I played around with a few concepts before landing where I did with the fic header art. I had just completed work on another project that had been really fun and a bit silly, but I wanted to make sure this project, with its distinctly more somber tone, had a completely different vibe. Here are some early concepts and layouts that were not used.

I finally decided that I wanted to keep things very simple for this fic. I decided to go with no more than 2 images per header, along with the title. I felt that simple, aesthetic images added to the atmosphere of what was already a very moody piece.

I also went through a few different font options. And this isn't even all of them. The fonts ultimately chosen for the fic were Huova Outline (title), EFCO Brookshire (series/subtitle), and 29LT Makina (by lines and chapter header titles).

Huova Outline was chosen, I'm not even going to lie, because it dots its i's with little stars. I was looking for an outline font with a 20s type vibe and then I saw the i's and I went 100% Midwestern, "ohfercute." It features most prominently on the fic cover where it is written across a fittingly starry sky.

EFCO Brookshire was chosen for its magical-looking, scrolling embellishments and its similarity to the font used on my copy of Something Wicked This Way Comes. Both works feature a strange carnival or fair come to town, magic, and unwilling souls held by the fair.

With two very different, rather fancy-looking fonts, I wanted to keep the third font very simple, but still anachronistic, so I chose a font reminiscent of the text of a typewriter. This is the font that carries through the chapter headers.

Fic Cover

This image from Niko Rau is used under the Unsplash license.

Although I'm sharing it first here, the fic cover header was actually the last one I made. My first instinct was, of course, stars and clouds, but I thought it was too obvious and spent an embarrassing amount of time looking for just the perfect dark academia, tent revival, wet specimen exhibit vibe in the free license images. After too long digging through images with nothing to show for it, I eventually decided to stop fighting my instincts.

I tried a couple image options, but landed on this piece by Niko Rau because I liked how off-center it felt and I decided to further off-center the title to add to the feeling of wrongness throughout the story, about the treatment of witches, about Steve's treatment as an alpha, about the fair that's come to town, about its mysterious captive, and more.

Chapter 1

Top image from Erwan Hesry and bottom image from R Martinez are both used under the Unsplash license.

From the beginning, I wanted two things for the header for chapter one, and that was to establish the fair and to establish Bucky's bondage. Initially I was planning to make a faux pamphlet, sort of like a tent revival tract, but it ended up looking so busy while simultaneously looking unfinished. I realized how much it would take away from the reader to fill in so many blanks about Doctor Pierce and his menagerie.

At this point, I started to look at different types of specimens and artifacts that he might have on display, but ultimately nothing I could come up with would be as disturbing as whatever the reader could come up with using their own imagination. I abandoned the idea of showing anything but the red tent.

As far as Bucky, I was initially looking for a body double of a man on his knees, but, and I feel like a total nerd for saying this, none of the images I found looked as good as Bucky on his knees in the comics--and I wasn't ready to include comic-book Bucky Barnes, so I went back to the much simpler order of chains to represent his captivity. I had already amassed some different chain shots from previous layouts, but none of them really felt right until this one. I also modified it slightly to give the light reflections a red hue like the tent where Bucky was kept.

Chapter 2

Top image of Chris Evans as Steve Rogers from the 2014 film Captain America: Winter Soldier is used under fair use. Bottom image of arsenic wallpaper from the 1874 book Shadows from the Walls of Death is in the public domain.

When Jo and I were discussing their research materials, sources, and inspiration, one of the things they shared with me was a review of a book from 1874 called Shadows from the Walls of Death about arsenic used in wallpapers and of course I immediately understood that Steve was living in a goddamn death trap. No wonder Sarah could never fully heal the boy. I had to have Sarah Roger's wallpaper of death on one of the chapters where she's discussed and this seemed like a perfect place for it.

I knew I also wanted Steve represented on this one because it's the second chapter of his damn story and he hadn't been in the art, yet. I initially thought about including one of his sketches pinned to the wall, but I couldn't decide on what to put on the sketch. I briefly considered having a photo of Steve and/or his mother pinned to the wall, but since MCU didn't deign to cast the most important person in Steve's pre-serum life, I would have had to fancast someone, fake a picture, and I wasn't even sure how it would look "pinned" to the wallpaper, so I decided to just go with a tearaway photo frame for Steve's beautiful mug.

I tried to match the color of the font to the arsenic flowers, but it was completely illegible, so I saturated it a bit and lifted it.

Chapter 3

This image from Sophie Walker is used under the Unsplash license.

Chapter 3 presented a few dilemmas. As a Bucky-centric chapter, it made sense to feature him in the artwork, but this version of Bucky has a metal arm, so any images of Sebastian Stan as Bucky would have to be from an MCU source OR used such that his left arm would be obscured. In addition to this, there's simply not a lot of open license bondage images, much less ones that look like Bucky AND have the left arm obscured. I did find some usable images, but I decided to go for a simpler and more aesthetic image.

I wanted to go with a red font both to evoke Hydra and blood.

Chapter 4

This image from Cottonbro is used under the Pexels license.

For whatever reason, I really latched onto the tinctures that Wanda gave Steve to share with Bucky. I had an idea in my head of the bottles in a bag or being handed over from Wanda to Steve, but finding images of bottles of a thick, brown liquid proved surprisingly difficult, so I widened my horizons and just looked for any brown bottle or bottle of brown liquid.

Eventually, I found a nice, sharp image of a classic hinge top brown bottle with a bright red background and I thought... Red for Wanda's magic--this will work perfectly! It was only a single bottle instead of two, but that worked for the title, Alone with his Mission, so I paired it with a nice yellow script and sent it to Jo.

Jo was less enthused about it. It turned out, they had always imagined the bottles to be smaller, so I set back out to find more images of goddamned bottles. I sent along a few different versions, including a brighter toned, longer angle version of the above, but it wasn't quite right. I played around the with it, recentered, cropped it, adjusted the saturation and hue until I came to the above and I knew it was going to be perfect. I sent it along to Jo and they were on board!

Chapter 5

This image is courtesy of Canva.

Like everything else here, the header for chapter 5 began its life with a very different concept.

Originally, I had planned to layer and tile images of Steve and Bucky with wild, colorful filters to create a bright, chaotic pattern reminiscent of broken glass. I probably worked on it longer than any of the other headers and before I even finished it, I already knew I hated it. It didn't come together, it looked messy instead of chaotic, the colors clashed, and I wasn't happy with how it represented what was presented in the fic nor the title of the chapter. I read the chapter again and I could really only imagine one thing that would work.

It was perhaps a bit of a gamble if Jo would go for it. I sent it along, seemingly just a white panel with the lettering in the middle, and waited to hear from Jo. They were cautious about it so I took some time to embellish the field, adding more depth and layers of off-white, a shining starburst effect in the middle and speckles of white on off-white at the edges. I explained that what had looked like just a white field before was actually white on off-white and subtly got the effect of the blinding light of their magic casting across, but we could go with something more obvious, though I wasn't sure I liked it. Jo agreed and we went back to the simpler header you see here.

Click through for the higher resolution, then move the image and you'll be able to see the contrast in the white versus off-white that our brains ignore at this smaller scale to just say--is bright.

Chapter 6

This image from Liana S is used under the Unsplash license.

Okay, I lied in that last section: this one chapter stayed the same from concept to finish. I knew from the beginning that I wanted that tub on the header. Took a while to find a good one, but I loved that this one shows the movement of the water as it fills by magic!

And that's... it? Jo's fic was such a moody, dark little romp and I wanted to give them something that would complement it, not draw attention away from it. I stepped outside my musical comfort zone and had so much fun that I actually have another instrumental playlist coming together right now!