Here are Frank, Charley, and Mary from Merrily We Roll Along as my little ponies! :D I really loved drawing them and I am pretty happy with their designs.

This may be the most niche fan art I’ve ever posted (and it’s a high bar) but if there are any merrily/mlp fans out there other than me then this is for you. I mean, they are both shows about friendship.

Boyfriends & Beauty Vlogs - Tom Holland/Reader

Summary: Reader is a professional Hollywood makeup artist who also has her own popular YouTube beauty vlogging channel. She has been dating Tom Holland for about 8 months in secret when they decide to make their relationship public by participating in the ‘I do my boyfriend’s makeup’ tag.

Warnings: None? I’m pretty sure this is G-rated, or at least PG. There might be like 1 swear word and an innuendo towards the end that you can take it as you like.

Word Count: 3,397 according to my Google Doc.

Author’s Note: This was partially inspired by an ask I saw on another Tumblr, but I can’t find the original ask so I’ll paraphrase: Basically Peter P. watches the reader put on makeup and tells her that she’s beautiful even without it (I think.) Combine that with my current obsession with makeup tutorials on YouTube (which is hilarious since I don’t wear much makeup AT ALL) and you’ve got this glorious piece of trash fic. This is likely going to wind up being a series as I discover more tags for the Reader to do (or even have Tom & Reader answering the YouTube comments on the video they’re filming in this fic).

(PS: I purposely didn’t use any brand names for any products that the Reader uses, although it’s very common for beauty vloggers to tell their audience what product they’re using.)

Cross-Posted on AO3.

Y/N Y/L/N adjusted one of the lights in her beauty room as she was getting ready to film the latest video for her YouTube channel. “We good?” she asked her friend/assistant Carmen, who was adjusting the camera. “Everything looks great,” Carmen replied.

“Are you ready?” Y/N said off-camera to her boyfriend of 8 months.

“Absolutely,” he replied.

“Ok then, I’ll go through my initial welcome then I’ll call you into frame,” she explained. “Are you sure you’re ready to do this?”

Her boyfriend nodded. “If you’re comfortable with it, so am I.”

“Ok, let’s go.”

Carmen hit the record button and the red light lit up on the front of Y/N’s camera.

Y/N beamed at the camera. “Hi, everyone, welcome back to my channel! Hope everyone is doing well and enjoyed my last video. As I said last time and as you can probably tell from this video’s title, I have a special surprise for you.  I’ve mentioned my boyfriend several times on this channel but he’s never made an appearance nor have I ever even mentioned him by name. Well, there was a reason for that, but he & I have talked about it and since a lot of you have been asking about who my ‘mysterious boyfriend’ is he’ll be joining me today for the 'I do my boyfriend’s makeup’ tag.”

She looked off camera. “You want to join me, honey?”

Her boyfriend walked into frame, just his torso showing since the camera was angled down to where Y/N was sitting.

“Well, have a seat, you goof!” Y/N laughed as her boyfriend sat down. He leaned over towards Y/N and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Hello, love.”

Y/N took a deep breath. “Everyone, this is my boyfriend, Tom Holland.”

Tom looked at the camera and gave an adorably awkward wave. “Hi, everyone.”

Y/N looked over at Tom. “So, thanks for joining me today, babe.”

“It’s no problem, love,” Tom replied.

“Normally this is where I’d ask if you’d ever worn makeup before, but I don’t need to since I’ve been your makeup artist before and therefore already know the answer to that one,” Y/N teased.

“Yes, but you never used a lot of stuff on me, right?” Tom replied. “I only recall some sort of powder.”

Y/N nodded. “Well today we’re going to do a full face - eyes, lips, everything. You ready?”

Tom nodded.

“Ok, so this is primer.” Y/N held up a small bottle. “I’m going to put a little bit on my fingers and I’m going to rub it all over your face and neck. It’ll moisturize you so the rest of the makeup doesn’t dry and crack.” She squirted a pump of the liquid onto her fingers and rubbed them together. “Here we go.”

She smoothed the primer onto Tom’s face, turning his head gently to get both sides of his neck.

“This feels really nice,” Tom remarked.

Y/N laughed. “I know you’ve used moisturizer in your skincare routine.”

Tom shrugged. “Yeah, but I’ve never had my beautiful girlfriend be the one applying it to my face before.” He shot a cheeky wink towards the camera.

Y/N shook her head. “You flirt.”

Tom grinned. “You love it.”

“Anyway,” Y/N said jokingly, “the next step is foundation. I think I managed to match some foundation that I already had on hand to your skin tone, although I didn’t actually swatch it on you so we’ll have to cross our fingers and see if it works. I did grab a few other shades just in case.”

She pumped a dollop onto the back of her hand. “Let’s see…” She dipped her finger into the foundation and swiped a tiny bit onto Tom’s face. “Huh, ok, wait, that might actually work.” She held up an oval-looking sponge, one end flattened and the other rounded into a tip. “You know what this is?”

“Some sort of makeup tool?” Tom guessed.

Y/N laughed. “Technically, you’re right. This is called a beauty blender. I’m going to take the beauty blender and dip this pointy end into the foundation and dot it all over your face, then I’m going to use the other side to buff it into your skin.”

“Ok.” Tom leaned in a bit.

Y/N pumped a bit more foundation onto the back of her hand and began to dot the foundation onto Tom’s face. “Ok, so I know everyone is going to have questions, so leave a comment down below and we’ll try to answer as many as we can in another video. I know the biggest question everyone’s going to want to know is how exactly we met and/or got together. Well, as some of you already know, I was hired as a makeup artist on Avengers: Endgame and Spider-Man: Far from Home, which meant I did Zendaya’s makeup for FFH. I did Tom’s too for both films, but since he wasn’t on set a whole lot for Endgame we didn’t interact much and since he’s so naturally pretty all he needed on FFH was setting powder so he wouldn’t be shiny in front of the cameras.”

“Aww, thanks love,” Tom interrupted. “You’re naturally pretty too.”

Y/N grinned. “Thanks, babe. So anyway, Z and I became friends during the FFH shoot so while we were in London she invited me to go out to dinner with her, Tom, and Jacob. Tom and I sat next to each other at dinner and afterwards he said he wanted to buy his mom some new moisturizer for her birthday so would I mind helping him pick something out while we were in London since I’m a professional makeup artist. So we exchanged numbers and a couple of days later he texted me asking if I could go shopping with him. Little did I know that it was just a ruse.”

“Hey, I had to get your number somehow!” Tom protested. “I didn’t really feel like I had a chance to get to know you enough during Endgame to ask you for it and Z wouldn’t just give it to me – she said I had to work for it!”

Y/N laughed. “And you did. You suffered through 2 hours in a bougie skincare store in order to find your mother some skin cream for her birthday.”

"Totally worth it,” Tom said with conviction.

Y/N couldn’t help the smile that spread across her face. “So then Tom offered to take me out to dinner at some fancy London restaurant as a 'thank-you’.” She stopped to include the air quotes.

Tom turned slightly toward the camera so he could chime in. “Yeah, I planned to take Y/N to one of the nicest restaurants in London, right, thinking I was going to impress her, but when we get there it turns out the place was closed because 3 people had gotten food poisoning the night before.”

Y/N finished blending in the foundation. “Ok, wait a sec, babe. Next step is concealer.” She held up the tube. “I’m going to swipe this under your eyes, on your chin, and on the bridge of your nose, then I’m going to use the same beauty blender to smooth it out.”

“Wait, so it’s foundation, then concealer?” Tom asked. “Wouldn’t you want to conceal first?”

“You would think, but this is how it goes,” Y/N replied. “You’re correcting what the foundation didn’t cover.”

“Oh, well that does make sense.”

“Ok, just stay still for a sec, but you can continue talking.”

“So anyway, the fancy restaurant is closed, so Y/N suggests this fish-and-chips spot we had passed on the way there. We get in there and place our orders, start talking, pause to get our food, and the next thing we know the place is closing.”

Y/N finished blending in Tom’s concealer. “We had literally sat there and talked for 4 hours,” she added. She set the beauty blender down and picked up a brush and another container. “Ok, next step is setting powder. This is what I used on you on set.”

She tapped out a bit of powder, dipped her brush in it, and tapped off the excess before brushing a light coat all over Tom’s face. “So yeah, we sat there and talked for like 4 hours, then Tom walked me back to my hotel.”

“I was so nervous because I wanted to ask you out for real, but I didn’t know how to tell you that my mum’s birthday had actually just passed.”

Y/N laughed. “You heard that right. Tom’s mom’s birthday had actually been the week before and Tom didn’t really need a gift.” She leaned back to take a look at Tom’s face. “Ok, next step is bronzer followed by contour, then highlighter. You don’t really need bronzer so we’re going to skip that, so we’re just going to take this brush here, tap into our contouring palette, and brush a little here on your cheeks, across the forehead, and then take this fan brush and go down either side of your nose.” She followed through as she explained.  "You know what, we can skip the highlighter too. We’re just going to do a tiny bit of blush instead.“ She grabbed her blush palette. "Yeah, we’ll go with this one.” She dipped a blush brush against the palette, tapped off the excess, and swiped a bit on the apples of Tom’s cheeks. “Perfect.”

She set her brush and palette down. “Okay, we are going to lock this all in with some setting spray, but before we move on to the eyes we’re going to take a little break, so let’s go ahead and get this set.”

Y/N picked up her can of setting spray and said, “I’m just going to spritz this on your face. You might want to close your eyes real quick.”

Tom did as instructed and Y/N gave his face a quick spritz. “All done,” she declared. “So again, next is eyes but before that we’re going to take a quick break and will be back soon!”

“And we’re out,” Carmen said as she cut the camera off. “I’ll be right back.”

“So, how do you feel?” Y/N asked Tom.

“Surprisingly light,” Tom replied. “It doesn’t feel like there’s much on.”

“Good, that’s how a good makeup job is supposed to feel.” Y/N stood and stretched. “You want something to drink? I have bottled water in the fridge over there in the corner.”

“Yeah, that would be lovely. It’s a bit warm under those lights.”

Y/N grabbed Tom a bottle of water and sat back down next to him.

“Thanks again for doing this with me,” Y/N said, giving him a quick peck on the lips. “Maybe eventually we can try out some of the other tags.”

“Like what?” Tom replied.

“Well, they’re mostly variations of this one - like you’d do my makeup, or I’d do Harrison’s makeup, or one of your brothers.”

Tom nodded. “Yeah, alright. I probably could talk one of them into participating since they all adore you. Sam was right pissed that he couldn’t fly out here for this trip. He said he wanted to see me 'looking all pretty’.”

Y/N laughed. “We’ll get him out here eventually.” She checked the time on her phone as Carmen walked back into the room. “Ok, ready to get back to it?”

“Sure. What all is left?”

“Eyes, so eyeliner – well, we’ll attempt that, at least– shadow, mascara, and a lot of people do false lashes but I don’t because they make me look like fuzzy caterpillars are resting on my face, so we’ll skip that. Then lips and some more setting spray and we’ll be done.”

“Angles are still good,” Carmen stepped behind the camera and checked the viewfinder. “You guys ready?”

Y/N sat up a bit straighter and nodded.

“Ok then, 3, 2, 1.” Carmen hit the record button and the light lit up once again.

“Ok, we are back from a quick break, so now we’re going to move on to eyes.” Y/N picked up an eye pencil. “We’re going to try eyeliner, but if your eyes water too bad we’re going to have to skip it.”

She took a deep breath. “Ok, babe, close your eyes and stay still so I don’t accidentally poke you.”

Tom sat stock-still while Y/N lined his upper lids.

“Ok, now I’m going to attempt to do your waterline.”

Tom looked puzzled. “My what?”

“Your waterline,” Y/N repeated. “You know, where your tear ducts are.” She smirked. “You trust me?”

Tom began to look mildly terrified, but nodded.

“If you’re uncomfortable or your eyes start watering we’ll stop, I promise,” Y/N reassured Tom. “Now, get as close to me as possible.”

Tom scooted forwards on his stool.

“Here we go. Now, keep your eyes open and look up for me.”

Y/N managed to get the eyeliner on Tom without too much trouble. She checked his eyes out. “Well, damn. That’s not too bad.”

She sat back. “Ok, the rest of this is easy.”

She picked up another brush and her eyeshadow palette. “We’re just going to get a nice smoky eye going here, so we’re going to dip into this gray color here and get that all over the lower lid.” She pursed her lips as she worked. “Anyway, babe, we were talking about how you walked me back to the hotel after we had fish and chips in London.”

“Oh, right,” Tom replied. “Yeah, so I walked you up to your hotel room and was trying to figure out how to ask you out for real.”

Y/N grinned. “You’re so cute when you’re nervous.” She dipped her brush into a deep purple eyeshadow and continued working on Tom’s upper lid.

“So we’re standing there,” Tom continued, “and Y/N says that she’d see me Monday on set then she goes, 'tell your mom happy birthday for me… you know, when it comes around next September’ before winking at me and going into her room.”

Y/N laughed. “I had been interested in you for a while and Z knew that, so when I mentioned to her that you had asked me to go birthday gift shopping with you for your mom she called you an 'idiot child’ and told me that you were interested in me and had been asking her for my number, then said that Nikki’s birthday was actually the week prior. I just couldn’t figure out a way to tell you that I knew what you were up to without embarrassing you.”

“Well I did feel like an idiot for a second since I was basically busted, but then my phone chimed with a text.” Tom smiled at the memory.

“I just couldn’t leave him hanging,” Y/N explained as she started on Tom’s other eye. “So I texted him immediately telling him that I had a really great time and asking if he’d like to do something the next day.”

Tom chuckled. “I immediately said yes, of course, so we quickly planned to go for coffee and to an aquarium.  Since it was early and a Sunday the aquarium wasn’t very busy, so we had a lot of time to ourselves. When we got to the dolphin tank, Y/N turned towards me and said something about the dolphins, but I was too busy looking at her to catch it. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to make a move, so I took her hand, leaned in, and kissed her, and the rest is history.”

Y/N’s eyes crinkled up at the corners. “Best first kiss of my life,” she said. “Now, mascara. Try not to blink, ok?”

She swiped mascara on both of Tom’s upper eyelashes and carefully applied it to his bottom lashes.

“Last step – well, second-to-last, really – lips. I’ve chosen this really pretty plum color for you, so we’re just going to kind of line your lips here with a deeper color…” She trailed off as she lined Tom’s lips, making sure to slightly over- line his top lip to make it seem fuller. “And we’re going to fill in with the plum.”

She scrutinized her work. “Let’s see…” She dabbed a little bit more lip gloss to the corner of Tom’s lips. “Ok, done. Just another spritz of setting spray and you’re done! Close your eyes.”

Tom held still while Y/N set his makeup. “You ready to see what you look like?” she asked.

Tom laughed. “I’m kind of nervous but then again I trust you, so… yes?”

Y/N picked up a hand-held mirror and gave it to him reflective side out. “Ok on the count of three, flip it around and check yourself out. 1, 2… 3!”

Tom flipped the mirror over and his jaw dropped. He lowered the mirror and showed his shocked expression to the camera. “Damn, love, I look good.” He raised the mirror once again and checked himself out. “It hardly looks like I’m wearing makeup at all except for the lipstick.”

Y/N laughed. “ Well, yeah, we were going for a full beauty look, not drag makeup.”

Tom looked over at her. “Can I kiss you with this stuff on my face?”

Y/N grinned. “Yeah, it’s set so it shouldn’t smudge.”

Tom leaned over and gave her a tender but chaste kiss. “This looks amazing. If I ever have to wear makeup for a role I’m bringing you as my personal stylist.”

Y/N laughed again and turned back to the camera. “Well there you have it. Thanks so much again to Tom for being such a good sport and for letting me use him as my canvas, thanks to you for watching, and again, I know you guys will have questions, so leave us a comment down below and we’ll do our best to answer them in a later video. And always remember: Bring your inner beauty out. Bye, guys.”

“Bye,” Tom echoed.

“Annnd, cut.” Carmen stopped recording and closed the viewfinder on the camera before checking the time. “Ooh. I’ve got to run – gotta pick Simon up from daycare since my husband’s working late.”

Y/N nodded. “Don’t worry, we got this. Thanks so much for helping out this afternoon. I’ll see you later!”

Tom checked himself out in the mirror again as Carmen left. “This really looks fantastic. Can we get a few pictures so I can post them on Insta after the video is released?”

“Absolutely, babe.”  

Tom pulled out his phone and took a few selfies, then took some more shots of him & Y/N together. Tom texted Harrison one of the photos and laughed when he got a response.

“What?” Y/N asked.

“Haz said that the makeup is a vast improvement on me and that we make a very pretty couple,” Tom said.

Y/N smirked. “Tell Haz I’m willing to pretty him up for my audience too. Just say the word.” She bit her lip. “So the world is going to know we’re together in a few days’ time. I know I keep asking but you’re absolutely sure you’re ready to go public with our relationship? I know how much you value your privacy. Don’t feel like you have to do this for my benefit.”

“To be honest, I’ve been wanting to shout it from the rooftops,” Tom replied. “You have no idea how many times I’ve almost talked about you in an interview. You’re beautiful, talented, brilliant, and best of all, mine. Now I’ll be able to talk about my incredible professional Hollywood makeup artist girlfriend all the time.”

“Aww, honey, you’re too sweet.” Y/N gave Tom a long, slow kiss.

Tom stood. “Now, let’s get all this put away so we can go see just how 'long-lasting’ this makeup is.”

*************************3 days later***********************

Tom sat next to Y/N as she finished checking the settings on her latest video. Y/N added one more tag and sat back. “Ok, it’s done loading. Ready?”

Tom put his hand over hers on the mouse. “On the count of three. One, two…. three.”

And together, they clicked the 'publish’ button and revealed their relationship to the world.

Get to know me - tag I was tagged by @anotherplumbob so here you go! I tried to update my simself a bit. Even though my hair is way longer right now :D 1. What is your full name? Celine 2. What is your nickname? Chip 3. Birthday? june 22nd 4. What is your favorite book series? Definitely Harry Potter :D 5. Do you believe in aliens or ghosts? Not in the scary horror movie kind of way. I guess there’s probably some kind of life somewhere out there in the universe. And on the matter of ghosts: Sometimes I want to believe our loved ones aren’t gone completely and still watching over us in some kind but not in a spooky haunting houses kind of way :P 6. Who is your favorite author? J.K. Rowling  7. What is your favorite radio station? I only listen to my local radio station on my way to work in my car   8. What is your favorite flavor of anything? Lime 9. What word would you use often to describe something great or wonderful? awesome I guess 10. What is your current favorite song?  Writing down favorites is always so hard because mine change so much :D But I like the song “Odds of Being Alone” by Trent Dabbs & Amy Stroup a lot at the moment

Putting the rest under the cut for not spamming your dash!

11. What is your favorite word? mhm not really favorite word but my best friend is always saying I use the word amusing a lot even though no one really uses it anymore . Also nostalgic 12. What was the last song you listened to? see favorite song   13. What TV show would you recommend for everybody to watch? Everything on this list  14. What is your favorite movie to watch when you’re feeling down? One of the old Disney movies! I have almost every movie on DVD 15. Do you play video games? yes 16. What is your biggest fear? Losing loved ones 17. What is your best quality, in your opinion? I think I’m quit empathic and people say I’m good at giving advice and cheering them up. 18. What is your worst quality, in your opinion? I talk too much and am being sarcastic to protect myself way too much 19. Do you like cats or dogs better? dogs! 20. What is your favorite season? spring but autumn being very close second 21. Are you in a relationship? no 22. What is something you miss from your childhood? not having to worry about so much  23. Who is your best friend? I have a male best friend I met back in high school 24. What is your eye color? Dark blue with a partial heterochromia in my left eye 25. What is your hair color? dark rown 26. Who is someone you love? My family, friends and pets 27. Who is someone you trust? The persons I trust most are my mother and my best friend 28. Who is someone you think about often? Everyone I know that is struggling with something and people I lost 29. Are you currently excited about/for something? Hopefully celebrating christmas with my whole family again this year! Also having some days off around the end of december! 30. What is your biggest obsession? Constantly changing between my hobbys and interests - currently I’m back at obsessing about everything Harry Potter related 31. What was your favorite TV show as a child? As small child I loved House of mouse and Bear in the big blue house 32. Who of the opposite gender can you tell anything to, if anyone? my best friend 33. Are you superstitious? no 34. Do you have any unusual phobias? I absolutely terrified of diving and being pulled under water - especially after a teacher in school nearly drowned me when I was 11yrs old 35. Do you prefer to be in front of the camera or behind it? I’m working in video post production and as a photographer so definitely BEHIND the camera! 36. What is your favorite hobby? ballroom dancing, sims, reading & photography 37. What was the last book you read? Currently rereading the Harry Potter series so right now I’m at chamber of secrets!

38. What was the last movie you watched? I saw phantastic beasts 2 last monday

39. What musical instruments do you play, if any? sadly I can’t play any instruments even though I would love to be able to play the piano 40. What is your favorite animal?  dogs 41. What are your top 5 favorite Tumblr blogs that you follow? That’s way too hard to decide :D 42. What superpower do you wish you had? going back in time   43. When and where do you feel most at peace?  cuddling with my dogs at home 44. What makes you smile? happy animals, seing my friends & family 45. What sports do you play, if any? I’m not a sports person at all - if you don’t count ballroom dancing 46. What is your favorite drink? coffee 47. When was the last time you wrote a hand-written letter or note to somebody? A long while ago back in school   48. Are you afraid of heights? no 49. What is your biggest pet peeve? narcissim and impoliteness 50. Have you ever been to a concert? no 51. Are you vegan/vegetarian? no 52. When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up? I always wanted to work with pets but I couldn’t bear seeing all the awful things at a vet or shelter so I decided to go for something different. I still volunteer at the shelter though! 53. What fictional world would you like to live in? The Harry Potter universe 54. What is something you worry about? I’m constantly worrying about everyone around me 55. Are you scared of the dark? no  56. Do you like to sing? in the car to myself yes but in front of others no way 57. Have you ever skipped school? yes I skipped a few useless classes sometimes 58. What is your favorite place on the planet? My favorite city is London. Favorite place is sitting on my window sill with the window open at summer nights! 59. Where would you like to live? London or somewhere in switzerland even though I love my home town 60. Do you have any pets? two silver labradors 61. Are you more of an early bird or a night owl? night owl 62. Do you like sunrises or sunsets better? sunsets 63. Do you know how to drive? Yes  64. Do you prefer earbuds or headphones? For working or at home headphones but for travelling earbuds 65. Have you ever had braces? yes from age 11-14yrs 66. What is your favorite genre of music? I don’t have a favorite genre it’s a wild mix of everything from calm alternative music to Rock’n’Roll from the 50s 67. Who is your hero? My mother  68. Do you read comic books? no but I read some Disney comics when I was younger 69. What makes you the most angry? people lying to my face, someone hurting my loved ones 70. Do you prefer to read on an electronic device or with a real book? I tried to like E-books but I just can’t get used to them and I love the smell of new books! 71. What is your favorite subject in school? Geography 72. Do you have any siblings? 1 half-sister but we don’t have much contact 73. What was the last thing you bought? a christmas present for my grandma and a Winnie Pooh notebook  74. How tall are you? 165cm / 5,4 feet 75. Can you cook? A few things 76. What are three things that you love? cuddling with pets, sitting on my window sill on a rainy day, sleeping 77. What are three things that you hate? having to wake up early, annoying people & animal abuse 78. Do you have more female friends or more male friends? female but it used to be the other way around for a long time 79. What is your sexual orientation? straight  80. Where do you currently live? Germany 81. Who was the last person you texted? a friend of mine 82. When was the last time you cried? two weeks ago on my way back from work after a real shitty week 83. Who is your favorite YouTuber? I don’t watch YouTube a lot so I don’t have one 84. Do you like to take selfies? not at all - my phone is basically 80% dog photos 85. What is your favorite app? the apps I use the most are Whatsapp, discord, tumblr & spotify 86. What is your relationship with your parent(s) like? My mom and I are very close/ my father and I have a very complicated relationship 87. What is your favorite foreign accent? I love the british accent 88. What is a place that you’ve never been to, but you want to visit? I would love to visit canada and ireland one day 89. What is your favorite number? 4 90. Can you juggle? no 91. Are you religious? no 92. Do you find outer space or the deep ocean to be more interesting? The deep ocean even though I’m totally scared of being under water 93. Do you consider yourself to be a daredevil? No not really more of the opposite 94. Are you allergic to anything? kiwis and most pain killers 95. Can you curl your tongue? no 96. Can you wiggle your ears? no 97. How often do you admit that you were wrong about something? I’m always open to admitting I’ve done something wrong in argument because it’s never jsut one person that did something wrong 98. Do you prefer the forest or the beach? forest 99. What is your favorite piece of advice that anyone has ever given you?  Not really an advice but a lesson I learned. Sometimes you can’t save everyone from themselves. So sometimes you just have to let go. 100. Are you a good liar? depends on who I’m lying to. I hate lying to people that mean a lot to me so those often notice something is wrong.  101. What is your Hogwarts House? Ravenclaw 102. Do you talk to yourself? yes sometimes 103. Are you an introvert or an extrovert? A mix of both. More of an introvert I guess but once I get to know people I can also be an extrovert 104. Do you keep a journal/diary? I used to a few years ago but not anymore 105. Do you believe in second chances? yes but I give way too many to people I like 106. If you found a wallet full of money on the ground, what would you do?return it or hand it to the police 107. Do you believe that people are capable of change? yes but sometimes people are wa better in changing for the worse 108. Are you ticklish? no 109. Have you ever been on a plane? yes 110. Do you have any piercings? no not even ear holes 111. What fictional character do you wish was real? Dobby!  112. Do you have any tattoos? no 113. What is the best decision that you’ve made in your life so far? applaing for my current job 114. Do you believe in karma? Yes 115. Do you wear glasses or contacts? no  116. Do you want children? I’m not sure if it’s going to change but at the moment I would say I don’t think so 117. Who is the smartest person you know? my mother 118. What is your most embarrassing memory? I’m so clumsy I’m getting myself into embarassing situations every day. But on the top of the list would be a mistake on my graduation that caused ALL my photos from my external drive ending up in the slideshow that was shown on stage... 119. Have you ever pulled an all-nighter? yes 120. What color are most of you clothes? all shades of blue, dark red, grey and brown 121. Do you like adventures? I’m a control freak so it’s hard for me to enjoy situations that I don’t know the end of 122. Have you ever been on TV? yes, I worked as a photgrapher on a pet adoption show and was seen in the background  123. How old are you? 21 124. What is your favorite quote? Sometimes the best book has the dustiest jacket and the best tea cup is chipped ;) 125. Do you prefer sweet or savory foods? Savory    I’m tagging @saurussims @simblrbreezycakes & @mlyssimblr (Feel free to ignore this if you don’t want to do it!)

3 Steps to Outsell Everyone Using Instagram

Time for a trick question.

Imagine you’re a fitness expert. You’re trying to sell your personal training services for $100 per hour (not unreasonable in a big city like Miami, New York, Toronto, London, or Los Angeles).

But there are dozens of other trainers at your gym, and thousands in the city.

Now imagine you’re Jillian Michaels, the famous personal trainer from “The Biggest Loser.”

All else being equal, who is going to have an easier time selling the $100-per-hour sessions?

Jillian?

No, it’s you.

Now I know what you’re thinking. Jillian is the TV star. She’s the celebrity.

Celebrity gives you the freedom to charge more for what you offer—and prospects will buy because they automatically know and trust you, even if they haven’t met you.

But here’s the twist.

You can become a bigger celebrity than Jillian Michaels.

These days, the tools are available to all of us.

Instagram (aka IG), the fastest growing social media network, offers proof.

While Jillian Michaels has 1.2 million followers on IG, a young fitness expert from New York named Jen Selter has over 12 million followers. That’s right, a woman who has never had her own TV show now has built up 10X the celebrity of Jillian Michaels, a fitness expert who was on prime time for a decade. More people follow Jen daily than watched the weekly episodes of “The Biggest Loser.”

In today’s world, you don’t have to be on television to become a celebrity and generate massive influence over your audience. You can manufacture celebrity from the comfort of your home while wearing your underwear and using an iPhone.

I’ve done it (although I wore shorts). And when I did, I became famous. (One of my homemade YouTube videos recently reached 3 million views.)

Through the creation of value-driven content, my manufactured celebrity earned me the trust and respect of my viewers, and made it easier for me to sell my exercise programs.

“Sure, Craig,” you’re probably saying. “I’ll just go out there and become a celebrity overnight. How hard can it be?”

Actually, not that hard. Like so many things, there’s a formula for it. And if you stick with it, you’ll see a dramatic change in your bottom line—because you’ll become a well-known, trusted resource in your community.

While there are many ways to build celebrity (such as YouTube), today I want to focus on Instagram. This platform has helped me reach thousands of people I never would have had the privilege of helping 10 years ago—all because I committed to building my “digital celebrity.”

Here’s how I did it, and how you can, too:

1. Show up and add value

As Woody Allen put it, decades before the Internet was a thing: “80% of success is showing up.”

That was true in the past and true today. If you want to build celebrity and make your sales process easier, you need to start by showing up.

My following has grown fast since I began consistently posting stories and photos, and hosting IG “lives” (live videos on IG).

If you create a rhythm, people will come to expect your presence and you will become an industry go-to.

Even people who have never interacted with you will see your comments, friends’ shares of your posts, and ads. When you show up, people can share your content. But if you don’t show up, you’ll get no shares, no celebrity, and no sales. Got it? Good.

You also need to make every post purposeful. There should be value in both the image (or video) and the caption underneath it. You should ask questions to encourage comments, and tell your followers to tag others (getting more viewers to your content).

Over time, consistently publishing valuable content will separate you from 99% of other IG users. Your competitors are likely not posting consistently, and even if they do, they are not posting valuable content. That’s why they will miss out—and why you will become an IG favorite.

2. Don’t skip IG stories

While it’s important to post on all IG outlets (feed, stories, lives, and TV), stories are a unique way to convey personality and status. Let people into your world, showing them the personality behind your business.

Years ago, email marketing gurus like Matt Furey and Mark Ford excelled at this. Today, it’s become even easier to accomplish through Instagram, particularly with video.

Video is the best for this because it allows you to address an audience in a very personal way, while also adding text overlays, polls, emojis, and other stylized elements—all of which increase engagement, show your personality, and reiterate your key message.

An added bonus: You can repurpose these videos on Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn for greater reach. And if the content is solid enough, you can also turn the videos into blog posts for your site. (Always leverage your efforts for maximum exposure!)

Of all of the outlets for IG, this is the best way to share a message, get more personal, and encourage engagement. Plus, with the repurposing opportunity, you’re essentially creating a magnified presence in 5-10 online spaces. That’s the key to building celebrity quickly!

3. Be unique

I already mentioned the value of sharing your personality on IG, but there’s something truly valuable about this element of social media. The more unique and valuable you can be to your viewers, connecting your personal brand with a unique product or service, the more intrigued your following will be.

Think about it: Nobody wants to see what you ate for dinner (unless you’re a nutrition expert). People want something to talk about. They want to be entertained and educated through your posts. Go the extra mile, do the work, and show up consistently with unique, valuable content, and you’ll stand out on IG amongst a sea of wannabes.

Here’s the bottom line:

Instagram is taking over from Facebook. IG is in its Golden Days. Now is the time to jump on board and take advantage of this exceptional marketing platform to grow your personal brand and build your business. When you offer both unique personality AND a unique product, you’ll get the attention of the masses.

Years ago, Jen Selter was just another college grad with an iPhone. Today, she’s the most influential woman in the fitness world. She sells more exercise programs than all of “The Biggest Loser” trainers combined.

If that’s not proof that Instagram is the biggest and best of all media (not just social media), I don’t know what is.

Just imagine what an IG account and iPhone can do for your business. Don’t wait any longer. Follow me on IG and I’ll teach you what you can do to grow your ‘gram—and your business.

With these three steps as your foundation, celebrity and sales will soar.

#

Still confused? I understand. It’s not easy to download everything I know about Instagram into a 3-minute read. That’s why I created a brand new “Everything You Need to Know About Making Money With Instagram” video course. >>>Get it here during our special launch promotion—this week only!

The post 3 Steps to Outsell Everyone Using Instagram appeared first on Early To Rise.

On writing and nerding: my Nookery

Being a Londoner I’ve got about 5 inches of ‘space’ to use as my writing nook. This is more often than not the corner of my living room.

I’ll be honest this is a massive uptick from 10 years of writing in hotel rooms. Officially the second decent thing hotels are useful for, after jumping on the beds.

Finding the right place and space to work has always been difficult for me. I have been a mobile worker most of my adult life, and where transience wasn’t on the cards home was more open-plan sleep and entertainment space than “shed”, like I had once imagined.

Writing in the presence of housemates and close friends has led to a tendency to ‘nest’.

[To be read in David Attenborough voice]

“Here we find the rare Kettle-bird, a nesting writer capable of burying herself in blankets, pillows, hats and hoodies so that all that is visible is a pair of intense eyes, rapidly typing hands and a glowing keyboard. Best to avoid if it looks like it might cry or kill you.”

It also means I’m forever taking things up and down from walls. And you wouldn’t believe the places I’ve found post-it notes! Like most modern writers I have an 'electronic office’ which consists of various cloud based apps like pinterestand g-docs. But I’m building a little 'portable’ office that allows me to physicalise the most important parts and that makes use of my addiction to gadgets, multipurpose tooling and App-linking with digital media for access on the move.

So here follows a few blogs on Nookery essentials for writers needing to build a guerrilla writing space, which can be deconstructed and reconstructed at a moment’s notice.

This is an evolution of Fort-Building of my youth, but for the discerning, space-saving, writer. (Turning it up to 11 for the nerdy ones)

1) Multi-purpose room divider / human-avoider

Blocking out children, demanding friends, television and that ever-so-pesky daylight that makes us shrink back into our coffins is sometimes necessary to allow the imagination to fly. Great for people who like to ‘write in the dark, edit in the light’.

Where possible I think multipurpose is best, and I found a great Etsy supplier that makes custom boards with chalk boards/cork boards included. Chalk boards are great for planning etc. Cork for making sure those pictures and notes and post-its stay in view and don’t get lost down the back of the sofa.

To accompany this I also recommend :

Chalkboard pens in many colours because lump chalk is made of evil

Hook Gear Thumb tacks which enable dangling other stuff on top of the pins - genius (also useful for throwing out of the window a loud people disrupting my creativity)

2) Who needs walls anyway?

Being a writer is a symptom of an addition to stationary. FACT. Even with an electronic office I’ve probably consumed an entire rainforest in my lifetime with all the printing, doodling and sticking I’ve done. Combining Whiteboard Paper with Dropbox and Evernote as a tool that transposes notes from Scrawl (OCR = optical character recognition) to electronic notes [I’ll write a separate blog on how to set this up and update a link here] allows me to scribble freely on my walls like a child with ADHD after three boxes of Nerds and a bottle of Sunny D, which means I can follow up when I come down from the sugar high.

3) Electronic Scribblings

In 2015 if it ain’t digital it won’t do. But dammit I spent literally ages when I was a teen making sure I had the most expressive handwriting for my romantic soul - to the point it was borderline illegible - but it’s mine gaddamit and the computer will recognise it eventually.

So imagine my shiny glee when I discovered LiveScribe.

I use aLiveScribe 3 - It’s particularly good for writing workshops as well as sitting in coffee shops. My only issue is that I hate biro and prefer fineliner or ink - but I sacrifice a smooth writing experience for portable productivity. (See it in action with a review here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Asj0qOY1dkI)

Other options include the Sky penwhich uploads straight to Evernote. NeoandEquilalso do smart pens. But LiveScribe is top for me especially given their new project withMoleskin(Which should be rebranded WriterCrack IJS).

When in doubt, also, there’s my trusty Lamy. It doesn’t do electronic, but it does fuel my soul. 

4) Teasmaid / Regular Writer-Fuel Dispenser

Beverages, particularly Tea, are essential for writing; and making a cup of tea ‘in character’ is a great way to get into writing mode. So there are definite advantages to getting up and making a pot, also to make sure gangrene doesn’t set in during a particular epic writing sesh. Therefore I would like to thank the Universe for inventing a teasmade!

1) Sit down to write: Put on timer for Teasmade / Coffeemade(My preference is aSage kettle.)

2) *Bing*: Break + Tea. 

3) Result: Profit!

If only I could get an App to provide freshly made warm biscuits to dunk too. 

Sort of a combined Pomodoro technique with a cuppa ready for you at the end. What’s not to love?

* To Nerd it to 11 you can combine tea/coffeemades with aWeMo plug, IFTTTCode and your Do! Appto hit a button on your phone and get tea. (I’ll post the code here at a later date)

5) Folding desk of Awesome

When I was a kid my dad made me an open sided wooden box to use as a portable desk so that even if I was sitting 3 ft away from the television (common) I was at a good angle for my back and could get my homework done. It was my favorite Christmas present ever.

[ Let’s take a moment to recognise how awesome my parents were again - and how I totally didn’t appreciate it at the time.]

Writing stories and drawing while curled cross-legged on the floor like a super-productive yogi is now my most comfortable operating position. So over the years I have never liked permanent desks.

Here are my recommended portable and fold-able desks available for purchase for those of your without woodworking skills or handy parents.

Wall mounted desks take up little room and if you’re savvy can be disguised by the room divider!  

For those of you not renting a cupboard in London (where nailing anything to the wall is a big no-no unless you want to lose the deposit you sold a kidney to round up in the first place) I’d suggest something that has the air of a Mattel Transformer, but for nerds. I give you my personal favourite folding desk.

If you have a black AMEX maybe you can commission this beauty. (Ultimate Advance Spend Plan: Louis VuittonBespoke Desk Case) 

6) Lighting the scene

I like to adapt my lighting to the scene I’m writing. For example I set a warm light for a scene that is full of love or sunlight, or cold light for something indoors or utilitarian. 

Phillips’ Hue system is pretty damn ingenious and allows for adjusting the multiple lights to illuminate a space with every colour in the spectrum - including flickering candle light if you combine with the hue party app. They also have several products that don’t require wires. Which makes for excellent nooking. The Apps are user-friendly to even the most technophobic user, and for those who need a physical button you can add these switches to the system with minimum effort. 

The portable table lampis my favorite for mood setting and is easily set up in a nook.

Talking about flickering candle light, if you’re writing a scene where this is required I can’t recommend electronic candles enough. All the light, none of the waxy mess.

7) Silence

In a busy space it can be hard to find the right level of white noise to cancel out the world and sink into the one in your imagination. Personally I work best with music on that takes me into my story (the playlists are endless, thank you Spotify), or some form of nature sounds (rains and storms are the best for me, particularly if i want to shut out tube/bus distractions). Chris Jones’ (Esquire Writer) has a great list. 

But for those of you who need true silence then short of throwing everyone out of the house or sticking sheets in your ears I would recommend various Noise-Cancelling device orheadphones. 

* By the way I know I haven’t covered seating. Apart from the fact that I want to create a space that is seating independent, I’m saving my dream chairto celebrate something special ;) 

Okay so that’s it. Quite an involved blog i’ll admit, but hopefully useful-slash-interesting.

Thanks for the help from my circle of writery types to provide inspiration. I hope you’ve found this useful. I created apinterest board with links to the above, and might at some point create a YouTube tour of the Nook to cover the points in this blog. Welcome comments. What do you have in your nook? How to you use technology to enable your writing physically and digitally? Have you used the tools above, and what did you think? 

Stormzy - Gang Sings And Prayer Album Review

Sitting in an arm chair with my slippers on and a cup of tea keeping me warm at 10pm on a Friday night, I can't help but get the feeling that grime, perhaps, wasn't meant for me. The very nature of the word grime paints a picture of what it has to offer as a genre, and as such it is confrontational, aggressive and unmistakable, which are all things I often enjoy in music. But, rather than confronting things like politics like Rage Against the Machine might do, grime artists often seem to just confront one another, people who've been ''chatting bare shit'', or even random strangers. This is where I begin to lose truck with it, because I'm simply more inclined to listen to something actually interesting than Afghan Dan's three minute romp about a man who's skull resembles confectionery. There's a whole roster of grime artists spinning their own take on the genre, from young blood like Little T and Soph Aspin who are best known for their ''sends'' to each other and other blackpool MCs, to more ''mature'' artists like Bugsy Malone or JME. But then enters Stormzy, arguably the biggest and baddest of the bunch. For those unfamiliar, Stormzy skyrocketed to success after a video of him performing a track in a park poetically named ''Shut Up'' blew up in 2015, and has since earned him (at the time of writing) 47.6 million views on YouTube alone. Figures like that don't come to many unsigned artists, let alone a man barely into his 20s. Now, in 2017, Stormzy has released his debut album, Gang Signs and Prayer through his own independent record label, #Merky Records. The title immediately grabbed me, as it seemed to somehwat deviate from the naming conventions of most grime releases. I wasn't quite sure what I was expecting, but it's reminiscent of what I imagine Kanye and Kim's on-the-table names were for their children. (Disclaimer: I love Kanye West.) The album opens with the aptly titled ''First Things First'', a rather unapologetic track where Stormzy addresses many, many, many things. Topics up for discussion range from his dedication to the music, being a bad man, what it was like before he was famous, calling people dick heads, drive by shootings, drugs, Adele, being better than other people, and a bizarre pairing of Jay Z's alias Jigga and the beginning of Puff Daddy's name, perhaps a nod to the Pokemon character Jigglypuff? Odd lyrics aside, this is a standard affair grime tune. For brief moments Stormzy gets introspective and there's a slight promise of some depth to this track, but he's very quick to return to boasting and maintaining his tough man image. So far, nothing ground breaking. Moving on to track 2, titled ''Cold''. The production on this beat is, pardon me for saying so, fucking sick as. The instrumental is varied and changes at regular intervals, serving synthesized melodies, deep bass lines that punch through the albeit repetitive drum beat, moving at a fast tempo, and keeping my head bouncing throughout. However, I find myself thinking about how fucking dope the beat is a lot more when listening to this track than actually paying any mind to what Stormzy is saying. The track is about just how ''Cold'' Stormzy really is, as he proceeds to talk about how doesn't give a fuck about anything or anyone, how he's not afraid of anyone but plenty of people are afraid of him, and how he is, Stormzy, champion of South London. If it wasn't for the instrumental on this one, it would be entirely forgettable, which is a shame, because the beat is really fucking sick. Track 3 is called ''Bad Boys'', which, is to be expected really. The track opens with a skit of sorts as a heavily aggravated gentleman addresses a group of other presumably Adidas clad gentlemen. He raises his voice, beckons for a man named Carlos, and hollers about how much of a ''bad man'' he was in jail. As much as I hate to break it to both you and Carlos, and any impressionable youths reading this, having gone to jail for unprovoked crime makes you an absolute jeb end and you should feel bad about yourself, unless that's what you mean by ''bad man'', and you're actually talking about what a deplorable individual you are. Stormzy kind of goes on to shut down this school of thought, by effectively calling this kind of person a fake, giving many examples of the behaviour a fake bad man might exhibit, such as thinking they're hard for watching Netflix original Narcos, or driving a nice car but not having the money to actually pay bills. On this track Stormzy falls into his own trap of what I call ''Shut Up'' syndrome, which appears to be a trope in grime. ''Shut Up'' Syndrome is a condition in which grime artists rhyme the same word or phrase with itself for a whole verse, or sometimes even a whole song. This time, it's the phrase ''bad boys''. Whether this is done to remind you what song you're actually listening to, or if it's just for lack of a lexicon I don't know, but I think it's shit and lazy and I hate it. Of course, Stormzy goes on to proclaim that he is the real bad boy, he calls himself a gangster, with a hard R, and talks about how he even has a knife, so it's for real. After this average first verse, we're treated to the most redeemable part of this song, a fairly catchy trap-inspired hook, which again mentions the fabled Carlos. There's then a verse delivered by some bloke named Ghetts, who does the exact same thing as Stormzy, calling everyone else a fucking bitch, and sarcastically stating he's afraid of guns, implying that he's not, which is a real big claim for someone I've never fucking heard of. All in all, a relatively weak track, but I've listened to it three times already so at least the chorus is good. Track 4 is called Blinded By Your Grace, pt. 1. This song is a beautiful sucker punch because it takes what you've heard so far and tells it to fuck off, but in a really nice way. This track is a simplistic, gorgeous gospel song on which Stormzy sings about presumably a woman in his life (or it's about God but I'm going to give Stormzy the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe it's both and he's written a song with two meanings), which is a nice change from always hearing about how many women a respective artist is shagging at any given time in a lot of rap and grime. Stormzy is accompanied by a couple of female voices and a synthesized organ in this track, but its not overdone, and that's what makes this track special as such a contrast from what's been presented this far into the album. Whilst he's no Freddie Mercury, Stormzy sounds very genuine on this track and I think the fact he's not a singer adds to that, because you get a sense of emotion and feeling from him which you might not get on something as crass as ''Cold.'' More of this please Stormzy, I'm about it. Track 5 is a big ol' blast back to the first three tracks, and it's called ''Big For Your Boots''. You've probably heard it already. If ''Cold'' and ''Bad Boys'' had a child and it wasn't disciplined properly this would be it. It is pretty much a lyrical hybridization of those two tracks, where Stormzy continues to talk about how he's better than you, how he will resort to violence should you continue to be over confident, mentions Adele for the second time and you better not dare do this that your the other, or you'll get kicked. This track uses something a lot of modern pop beats do, and that is the utilization of annoying, pitch shifted vocal samples that have been remixed so heavily they're not actually words any more, and I can't think of many conventions more fucking detestable than this. This song is, once again, standard grime. Track is 6 is called Velvet/Jenny Francis-Interlude, and I almost didn't fucking bother with it because of it's even worse pitch shifted vocal samples. Seriously, this sample is awful, it's almost unlistenable, and whoever produced it needs a fucking word with themself. However, when you're not being audibly assaulted by Alvin The Chipmunk's estranged brother, this is a pretty good song. The lyrics focus are about a woman who Stormzy is infatuated with, which is a topic Stormzy seems to shine on. The lyrics here are actually rather good, where Stormzy delves into metaphors and similes, albeit rather cliche at times but still, it's a very nice step up to go from ''I got the big sized toes on my feet'' to ''it feels just like velvet, a touch of the wind then it's gone''. Other than the god awful vocal sample on this instrumental, the beat is very smooth and easy going, something complimented by Stormzy's sung vocals and the accompanying female backing vocals. The hook on this track is melodic and contains the strongest of the lyrics to be found in this song, and I like it quite a lot. Good job Stormzy, gold star for you. Track 7, Mr. Skeng. I feel as though Stormzy actually just wrote several drafts of ''First Things First'', decided they were all alright, and put them on the album as their own tracks. This far into the record, there's been two themes for songs, why Stormzy is great and how other individuals are not, or how much he loves this girl. I like a good concept record, but when your concept can be summarized with the phrase ''I'm good, you're not'', you may need to stretch out a bit more. In this track, you can expect more of the same lyrically, except in this one Stormzy talks about God for a line or two, references two bible verses, and then in the next breath commands that he be called ''Gunshot Mike''. Alternatively, he would accept being called Mr. Skeng as well, but I'm not sure why you'd want that, because my vision of Mr. Skeng is an overweight secondary school P.E teacher who also covers Geography when there's no supply teachers available. The instrumental on this track is also forgettable, synthesized strings, generic drum beat. Not a particularly special one. Track 8 goes by Cigarettes and Cush, but I'm spelling it Cigarettes and Kush, because I'm not a fucking caveman. This song is about loving a girl, but really liking her because she's always got fags and a 20 bag on her. Stormzy sings again with a female backing vocal provided by Lily Allen on the hook, and it's fairly enjoyable. Stormzy talks about how he's perhaps made some mistakes in the relationship so far, but he vows to fix it. If I had a gram for every time I'd been told that in previous relationships and it not actually happen I'd always have kush too. The second verse in this song is performed by a lady called Kehlani, and she does a pretty stand up job, making ''passing the bong'' seem like a genuine romantic gesture. On the next Stormzy delivered verse, he talks about how he hopes God saves this girl of his, because she saved him, and its all very sweet, but it's somewhat implied that their relationship only seemed salvageable when they had some weed in, and she might not really care that much any more. I hope it works out mate. Track 9 is another interlude track and this one is called 21 Gun Salute. Another one with an organ instrumental, but this one is actually about something different. On this song Stormzy pens a tribute to his friends, or ''bredren'' as they might be called on the road. Stormzy once again addresses God, in the hopes that divine intervention may bless his friends and he, by helping his friend with a gambling addiction or letting Stormz ''bun his zoot in peace''. There's some really subtle elements to the production on this track that flesh out it's simplistic body and make it a very pretty piece of music, such as the vocal harmonies in the chorus, or gentle bass guitar licks that hang in the background of the track. One of my personal favourites of this record. Track 10 is Blinded By Your Grace, Pt. 2 and it's pulled a proper Spiderman 2 on it by being even better than the first one. This track is actually really, really good. Like, really good. Stormzy declares his love for God on this track in true gospel fashion and he does it very well, backed by a full band and gospel choir, with some excellent instrumentation accompanying what is a very heartfelt set of lyrics. This is the kind of thing I was hoping would be on a record called Gang Signs and Prayer, and Stormzy delivered, albeit 10 tracks into a 16 track album. If there's one thing that gives me hope for Stormzy's future as an artist, it's this song and to a lesser degree the others like it, because it proves that he's more than just a grime artist, but someone with a genuine sense of self, and I hope that he moves into this introspective direction further down the line. Excellent track on every front. Track 11, Return of the Rucksack. This one is grime again. A repeat of some similar lyrical themes in this one, again about being better than the rest, and calling people out. However, Stormzy does acknowledge on this track that he thinks highly of his abilities, in fact, he states that he thinks he's best, and attributes that to bias. At least there's some self awareness on this one. Stormzy's delivery and rhyme scheme on this one is a bit of an upgrade from previous tracks of the same cadence, and out of all the more deeply grime tracks on this record, this one is probably my favourite. That being said, it's nothing I've not heard before, and it's nothing I've not heard before on this album. Track 12 is called 100 Bags, and it's about Stormzy's mum. Please keep making music like this Mike mate, it's really good. Stormzy as an artist undoubtedly does his best on tracks where he's opening up and singing about things of substance. Before this song begins, there's a voice mail recording of Stormzy's mother telling him to put his faith into his Lord, and it makes you feel all good inside because it's apparent that his mother is very proud of what he's accomplished at such a young age. This track brings Stormzy into a more human light almost, and I feel reminded of the fact that he's not much older than myself, and he comes from very humble beginnings. Stormzy expresses that in this song whether he means to or not, showing his gratitude for what his mother did for him raising him as a single parent, not an easy task by any measure. He talks of how he's going to make up any mistakes he's made to her now that he's successful and can give her what she deserves. There's some lovely instrumentation on this one, with a very interesting multiple vocal layer effect in the tail end of the track. Again, it's moments on this album like this that make Stormzy great. Tell your mum you love her. Number 13 is called Don't Cry For Me. On this track Stormzy once again opens up and talks about what it's like to grow up in South London, and decries a lot of the hardships that come with it. In the first verse Stormzy tells of friends he's lost, whether that be through losing touch or people who've sadly passed away, and he talks of the pride him and his friends share together. He also addresses an issue often not touched upon, that issue being the expectation of masculinity from men of all ages. Stormzy states that he cried when his friend passed away, as if it would be unexpected for him to do so. When surrounded by the stigma that men should hold their emotions in and never express themselves through emotional formats, deep seated issues arise, and big ups to Stormz for bringing that up. In the second verse Stormzy talks about how cutthroat the way of life can be in the place he hails from, and talks about how some of his friends are serving life sentences, stating that it's a ''burn or die'' kind of atmosphere. I feel the need to highlight the fantastic work of Rosie Danvers here, who provides the orchestral strings on this track as well as others on this album. Rosie Danvers has worked with the likes of Kanye West and Jay Z in the past, and she always does a fantastic job. The instrumentation here provides a beautifully smooth R&B track, pushing Stormzy's work out into other urban genres. Track 14 isn't really a song. It's a phone conversation between Stormzy and and chap called Crazy Titch. Crazy Titch pretty much monologues throughout the call about Stormzy, and how he's going to take grime to being a ''first rate genre'', comparing him to Neo from The Matrix. He sings Stormzy's praises quite a lot really. To be completely honest, Crazy Titch is probably right. Grime is an interesting beast, it's one of those things that's been on the rise for the last couple of years in a big way, and more and more people from all over the UK are diving into it headfirst. At the end of the day I'm just a bit of an emo really so I'm hardly the authority on whether grime is good or not, but you've made it this far into this review so you must care a bit about what I have to say. Although its not something I'd regularly spin on my turntable, there's no denying that grime is the next big thing, anyone with half a foot of foresight could see that. I think it will really revolutionize rap music in the years to come, and I wouldn't be one bit surprised if Stormzy was at the forefront of that. Track 15 is Shut Up. You've heard Shut Up. I don't need to talk about it whatsoever. The final track on this album is called Lay Me Bare, and it's easily the most honest song on the record. One final message to God, Stormzy puts his blood on the page. This song reads like a man's final words, Stormzy documents his difficulties with depression and for want of a better term, lays himself bare. Stormzy thanks the people in his life who've helped him through hard times by name, and gives another very genuine performance. In the second verse of this song especially Stormzy produces a lot of emotion, and this time, genuine anger at his father who had been vacant from his life for years. Again, you get an insight into the real Stormzy on this one, perhaps more so than any other. The production on this track serves the song very well, and although it uses that vocal sampling technique I addressed earlier, I've definitely heard it put to worse effect. A very real piece of work indeed. So, that was Gang Signs and Prayer. For a debut record from such a young man, I'd say this record is a solid achievement. For me, this record is a bit hit and miss, but when it hits, it knocks it out the fucking park big time. The weaker tracks on this for me are easily the songs where Stormzy sticks to the rules of grime lyric writing, and I don't find that particularly enjoyable, especially when there's quite a few tracks like that on this record. Stormzy's strongest suit is when he opens himself up, and he really does that towards the end of this album, credit where credit is due, he comes out with some absolutely outstanding moments on this. If it wasn't obvious, I think the best track on this album is Blinded By Your Grace pt 2, by a long way. Coming away from this, I enjoyed this a lot more than I disliked it, and for that, this album gets a strong 7/10. Definitely worth a listen, but there's room to grow and I'm sure Stormzy will do just that. If you're into grime any way, this will likely be your Bible. Well done Stormzy.