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deepbluerevue ([personal profile] deepbluerevue) wrote in [community profile] ph_logs2023-07-30 06:11 pm

Early August Catch-All and Intros

Who: Grace Holloway ([personal profile] deepbluerevue) & sundry (You)

What: Grace’s musical performances (ranging from her debut to all the gigs afterward). These will be her introductions to most of the town’s residents!

When: Three days after Grace’s arrival <-> Mid-August

Where: Various venues for live music gigs around town (restaurants, lounges, taverns)

Warning(s): Rapture in the late 1950s into the 1960s was a tough place to live, though Grace is unlikely to bring such things up of her own accord.




PRE-SHOW [Music venue, such as a restaurant, lounge, or the Oak & Iron]

It’s mid-afternoon, and the venue is sparsely populated by customers. Besides the employees, though, there’s a woman in a simple ensemble of a long brown skirt, linen shirt, light brown vest, and tidy women’s boots, the outfit completed by an ill-matching, utilitarian walking cane in her left hand. Her tightly-coiled hair is swept back into an elegant but unadorned chignon, and as she moves from spot to spot in the venue, staring at the performance area at each stop, there’s a growing crease between her curved, pencilled brows, red lips pursed together.

As someone approaches, however, the crease disappears, replaced by a warm smile. “Hello there. You looking for something?”


SHOW + POST-SHOW [Music venue, such as a restaurant, lounge, or the Oak & Iron]

By no means was the live performance flashy. It hardly could be, not when the performer merely walked to the area cleared for her, introduced herself as Grace Holloway, and, after a half-minute or so of casual conversation to match the mood of the audience, sat herself upon a tall wooden stool and, with no accompaniment, began to sing.

At venues such as these, with a newcomer artist such as her, the musician is meant to be background entertainment, and Miss Holloway arranges her set accordingly: her voice is a smooth, well-supported croon, transitioning seamlessly from teasing paeans of good times to wry, melancholy blues of the bad, and back again. The set lasts for a full hour, until most people are done with their meals, and Miss Holloway concludes with a jaunty march, bowing to scattered applause before disappearing into the back halls.

Miss Holloway reappears some fifteen minutes later, a glass of water in her right hand, and seats herself at an empty table. She looks slightly tired, but mostly vibrant — if not happy, then at least content.

Note:For Grace’s range, think Sheryl Lee Ralph’s voice performing Bessie Smith’s oeuvre. You can find an example on Grace’s journal!



FOR MAYOR POE [Town Hall]

The fourth time Grace Holloway found her way to the Town Hall with business in mind, she discreetly kicked a little bit of wood into the front door jamb to keep it propped open. Fool her twice, shame on her. Though whatever power locked her in likely wouldn’t be much incommoded by a little thing like that, it made her feel slightly better to take some precaution.

The mayor’s office door was slightly cracked, and Grace knocked lightly on the frame. “Excuse me, Mayor Poe? Would you happen to have a minute?”
deaths_head: (human} content / satisfied)

Oak & Iron - Post Show

[personal profile] deaths_head 2023-08-07 06:22 pm (UTC)(link)
Not long after her set, a big, pale hand with long fingers sets a glass at her elbow--perfectly chilled and filled with a golden brown, foamy drink.

"Sarsparilla. Lucked out, they keep some on hand here." The Shade explains in his warm drawl, moving around to the other chair at her table. "My way of sayin' you put on a hell of a show, ma'am."

Little bit of an understatement, that--rock 'n roll and the blues are a bit after his time, but hell if the spirit of those tunes don't call to him in a strange and lovely way that made his chest ache when she sang...

"My name's Joe, mind if I join you?"
deaths_head: (biker} smirky / smug)

[personal profile] deaths_head 2023-08-10 05:30 pm (UTC)(link)
The Shade nods his head in thanks, folding his massive body into the chair across from her--and smiles just a little at the way she savors her first sip of soda.

"Good, ain't it?" he chuckles, nostalgic warmth in his features. "First sip I had when I got here--boy, I tell you what, 'bout fell over I was so happy."

The word feels stilted on his tongue--but it fits that bright feeling in his chest when he thinks of it.

"Best drink I had. Ever." he sighs with a flat out grin. "Never did appreciate the little things my first time 'round--but lookit me, you'd think I was on the clock the way I'm talkin'. Mind if I ask where you're from? Guessin' you ain't local singin' songs like that."
deaths_head: (human} content / satisfied)

[personal profile] deaths_head 2023-08-31 06:02 pm (UTC)(link)
The Shade smiles with a nod. "Sure 'nough does, ma'am. Southwest boy m'self, born 'n raised. Grew up in New Mexico, though Daddy was from Texas 'n Momma was from Cork, Ireland. Caught me a show once in Houston while I was apprenticing my trade as a boy--vaudeville. Somethin' else, that...yeah, means plenty."

The environment around him is one the Shade finds comfort in--it's all but native territory to him, but there's something about sharing it that hits something in his gut he can't put a name to. Something warm and bright and vaguely electric--he thinks he might like it.

"Can't say I heard of Rapture, though--whereabouts is that? Big city, no doubt?"