Just finished my first term as a postgrad and am now very ready to devote the whole break exclusively to loving the Captain.
I’ve mainly been using my printmaking acct on instagram to post art over the past couple years, but am crossposting here because I know there’s a better chance of Ghosts fandom folks seeing it and hopefully enjoying it
You know when the Captain put their hand on the glass lovingly and Yancy was just like High Five! We know Mark was telling us that we gotta stop simping for Yancy…
Nearly 10 years after his introduction, and the last time he appeared in a comic, Nextwave’s The Captain has returned in Nova #9 to do what he does best. Drink, punch things and talk shit about Civil War.
Some of my favourite bands, like, EVER came from Scotland, it’s a a font of truly AWESOME music, and my absolute top band to EVER come out of that blessedly bleak and dramatic land to the North are the Biff themselves. MASTERS of crazy alr rock, constantly pushing the envelope of their amazing sound and experimental to the extreme, ridiculously talented and super charismatic (not to mention almost PAINFULLY pretty) frontman Simon Neil and the Johnston brothers, James and Ben, are true incomparable rock GODS to me, and these are my very favourites of their music …
10. SKYLIGHT (Opposites)
Oooooooooooooh … yeah, let’s start with a nice moody one, shall we? XD Yeah, this is definitely one of their darkest and mostly mournful songs, haunting and bleak to listen to, and yet, typical to the Biff, there’s a lot more going on here than you might thing. Lyrically this is a wonderfully complex song, with a surprisingly inspiring message to it once you look past its presentation …
9. A HUNGER IN YOUR HAUNT (THe Myth of Happily Ever After)
The boys’ latest album was written in the heart of Lockdown, a response to the truly crazy new social landscape they’d found themselves in as they were preparing to release their new album A Celebration of Endings just as all the craziness hit. This one is the very DEFINITION of all they were feeling, and by extension all of us, all the fear, frustration and uncertainty we were all living with as we pondered what the hell to do with ourselves when so much that we always took for granted was suddenly snatched away from us in daily life. The result is not only one of their very greatest ROCK OUT tracks, but a word of pure, undeniable musical genius, the absolute highlight of a cracking album. (Note: Yeah, technically the above video is for the double bill with Unknown Male 01, but the video is SO awesome and the two compliment each other SO well that it still totally counts …)
8. SPANISH RADIO (Opposites)
Some of the biggest fun you can have with the Biff is when it comes to their adorable eccentricities - seriously, these guys can be so delightfully off-the-wall inventive sometimes, and this has always been one of my favourites, a blessedly odd little high-energy rocker which is just SO MUCH FUN. And only the Biff could pull off including a delightfully catchy through-line of Mariachi trumpets …
7. THE CAPTAIN (Only Revolutions)
Yes! They even (technically) once did a SEA SHANTY!!! XD KInd of … once again a brilliant example of the boys just letting rip with they’re more adorably whimsical side, this has always been a real fan favourite and rightly so. That wonderful sense of mad fun extends brilliantly to what really is one of their very best music videos, a wild cavalcade of POTC-esque inventiveness and wild abandon (and plenty of sexy Simon without his shirt, too) …
6. MACHINES (Puzzle)
Their breakthrough album is PACKED with heavyweight top-notch bangers, but this is UNDENIABLY the best of the bunch, a beautifully soulful and haunting little ballad about picking yourself up out of a funk when you’re really at your lowest ebb, that life goes on no matter how bad it can get and things will get better. This really is the Biff at their most moving, and this really is one of the things they’re the very best at …
5. WOLVES OF WINTER (Ellipsis)
Sometimes they’re at their best when they just let go and get all heavy, because these guys are also MASTERS of pure-blooded incendiary POUNDERS too. This truly is one of their very best on that score, providing a spectacular opening to this particular album as well as another winning statement of intent. Simon Neil himself refers to this as an “attack sone”, basically saying “don’t fuck with what we do”, and BY THE GODS did they ever achieve that with THIS ONE …
4. TINY INDOOR FIREWORKS (A Celebration of Endings)
The absolute, undeniable highlight of their SPECTACULAR previous album is one of their most thoroughly endearing, downright full-on LOVABLE tracks EVER, just pure fun energy, one of the catchiest songs EVERY WRITTEN as far as I’m concerned. Even the song’s meaning is enthusiastic, Neil writing about how, as a particularly creative mind, he can never switch his brain off, and sometimes can’t sleep because he’s ALWAYS coming up with new ideas, a sentiment that, like many others on here I’m sure, I can totally commiserate with. This song also has what I consider to be the Biff’s very best video EVER …
3. FOLDING STARS (Puzzle)
Perhaps the most laid-back, easy-going and just downright simplistically CHILLED OUT song they’ve ever done is this light, breeze and fantastically catchy little love song which, for once, really IS an acutal love song, although not a romantic one - instead, Simon Neil in fact singing about the death of his mother, Eleanor. So yeah, it IS a love song, but it’s a familial one about grief, too …
2. MOUNTAINS (Only Revolutions)
I first got into Biffy Clyro back in 2008, and this was the single that did it, an undeniable barnstopper which is also, conversely, one of their stranger and more offbeat numbers (quite probably THIS is the very reason I was so instantly intrigued and taken by it). Originally intended as a standalone single and later folded into their brilliant follow-up to Puzzle, this is STILL an udeniably definitive Biffy track, catchy, adventurous and enjoyable leftfield in the very best way, with one of the very best choruses Simon Neil’s ever written.
1. STINGIN’ BELLE (Opposites)
Quite simply the Biff at their VERY BEST EVER, this blistering centerpiece from their very best album is, like the record is dominates, a stone cold alt rock MASTERPIECE. Unsurprisingly it’s become a MASSIVE live fixture for the boys, who usually use it to play out their gigs, and it’s a perfect choice for that since it is a proper heavyweight rocker with a particularly ingeniuous experimental bent, the second-half instrumental section building to a truly SPECTACULAR climax that even sees the Scottish rockers getting particularly patriotic with a great enthusiastic well of bagpipes …
