Hey guys! I absolutely can’t believe that it’s the second to
last day of the year, 2014 has flown by and if this continues I'm going to be
45 by the time I've finished this post! I sat down last week and noted down all
of my favourites from the year, and realised that if I included beauty and all
the other categories I wanted to talk about in the one post- it would be far,
far too long. Therefore I've decided to split it into two posts over the final
two days of the year. Today’s post is my non-beauty hall of fame for the year,
which will include music, TV, and books! Let’s have a look;
Music
A lot of the acts in this category featured in my Music
Review of the Year which I’ll link for you guys (part one and two), but I thought I’d detail a
couple of lines about my favourite acts anyway. Catfish and the Bottlemen are
one of the best new acts of the year and I first started listening to their EPs,
which featured three singles from their new album, back in May, June and August
of this year- when they were put onto Spotify. Catfish are this amazing hybrid
of brilliant lyrics and some of the best Rock music released in the past 10
years. I love them and I'm sure you will too.
Favourite lyric; ‘I remember when we swapped names, and I
thought maybe you’d stay and try and outdrink me.’
I feel like I've spoken at length about my love for Ben
Howard already in the past month or so, but he really is simply brilliant and
both his first album ‘Every Kingdom’ and his new release ‘I Forget Where We
Were’ are genius. He’s lyrically flawless and seeing him live earlier this
month made me appreciate just how much I love music.
Favourite lyric; ‘saw the police, screaming something
trivial like ‘keep the peace.”
In my opinion, Chvrches are the best thing musically to come
out of Scotland in years, and their weird twist of synthpop that someone manages
to sound intrinsically folky whilst still allowing them to be unashamedly
pop-like and accessible to any mainstream fan, is my favourite thing about
them. I've seen them live twice this year and whilst their music is amazing, a
special mention has to be given to their lighting director as the light show
they put on as they perform is unbelievable too.
Favourite lyrics; “I’ll give you one more chance to say we
can change our old ways, and you take what you need. And you don’t need me.”
I used to think of Taylor Swift as my guilty pleasure when
it came to my music taste, but she is amazing- and as I said in my review of
the year, her changing opinions and reactions to the nonsense she gets from the
media is as much a part of my love for her as her music. I challenge anybody to
find a Taylor Swift song that they can’t listen to and relate too. Now if you
excuse me I’ll be shaking it off whilst dancing round my room.
Favourite lyric; ‘Darling, I’m a nightmare dressed like a
daydream’
X is another album that has featured heavily in my monthly
music favourites of the year, and seeing Ed at the Hydro in Glasgow was
undeniably a highlight of my music year. He continues to defy expectations and
whilst one man with a guitar on a stage in front of 13,000 people should be
underwhelming, if not laughable, he manages to ensure that you are captivated.
It’s impressive and shouldn’t be underestimated just because he manages to do
it every single time he steps out on stage. After the success of + many believed
he wouldn’t be able to follow it up, and that perhaps the novelty of the boy
with the guitar might wear off- but I can’t see that happening any time soon.
Favourite lyric; it’s not from his new album but ‘they say I’m
up and coming like I’m fucking in an elevator’ is one of the most intelligent
lyrics ever.
TV
The Office (US)
If I was to describe my TV of 2014- then the adventures of
the employees at Dunder Mifflin Paper Company in Scranton would pretty much sum
up everything I have loved about TV this year. I had never seen an episode of
the US version of the Office before May this year, but as soon as I started it
on Netflix I became hooked. Quite simply, the Jim and Pam relationship is by
far and away my favourite pairing in any show, ever. Equally, I think Dwight is
an amazing character and the pranks pulled between him and Jim are amazing, and
Michael Scott is a comic character that is pretty much unparalleled in his cringey-ness.
I actually stopped watching the show 2 episodes before the end so that I wouldn’t
have to have finished it, then I managed to convince a friend of mine to watch
it at the same time and Christ, I have never felt so emotionally connected to a
TV show before. It’s a mammoth task to watch it all, but my god, would I
recommend it.
Game of Thrones
Game of Thrones is another show that I became obsessed with
this year, and it does genuinely live up to the hype it receives across the
globe. Despite such a huge cast, they’ve done an amazing job of editing the
books into TV shows that work perfectly and aren’t hard to follow. I am a huge
fan of Daenerys and think that quite
frankly this whole nonsense could be sorted if she just sat her ass down on the
Iron Throne with her dragons. I also adore Kitt Harrington as Jon Snow, but my
favourite character of the lot is Tyrion Lannister, who is played by the
flawless Peter Dinklage. SO GOOD.
Suits
I obviously don’t have a favourite type of TV show environment
as my three favourites for the year have been set in small town America, medieval
style fantasy lands, and the final one, Suits, is set in high powered NYC. Suits
relies almost entirely, in my opinion, on the relationships between the
characters- particularly between Harvey and Mike, the main two characters. I
adore Mike Ross, and basically just want everything to be okay for him in the
end. I love seeing the most vulnerable sides of Harvey as much as I enjoy
seeing him absolutely destroy someone in court. The show is super intelligent
and keeps you hooked even if all they’re doing is solving a pro-bono case.
[disclaimer; I’ve been reliably informed by my lawyer cousin that law is
literally nothing like Suits, which is highly disappointing.
Books
The Shock of the Fall by Nathan Filer
If you ever want to read a book that will fuck you up, then
I’d recommend TSOTF, which centres around Matt, a young man with schizophrenia
who lost his older brother Simon, a downs-syndrome sufferer, on a camping holiday
when they were both children. It’s beautifully written and although the
narrative, from Matt’s POV, could have been clumsy and a little schizophobic if
handled badly- it manages to be insightful, entertaining and heartbreakingly
honest. You don’t find out the true events of Simon’s death until the end of
the novel but this had me sobbing towards the end. An amazing book.
Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith
On a slightly cheerier note, we head to post-Stalin era
Russia. I wish I was kidding but no, my next favourite book of the year was
Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith- which centres around an officer of the Russian
secret service who ends up on the run from the authorities whilst trying to
solve a series of murders of children across the country. I’m doing a rubbish
job of explaining it but I promise the plot is not too hard to follow and it’s
one of the best thriller crime novels I’ve ever read, and I’m pretty well
versed in the genre. Even better- there’s 3 books in the series!
City of Heavenly Fire
I adored the Mortal Instrument series and when the final
book, COHF, was released in March/April (I can’t remember..) I downloaded it
onto my Mum’s Kindle account so that I could read it straight away. I didn’t
realize just how long the book is- it’s larger than the rest of the physical
copies of the books in the series, as it’s a good couple of inches wider and
taller. It’s also 750 pages long. In all honestly these books aren’t going to
win any amazing literary prizes but they are brilliant, and they hold a very
special place in my heart. Cassandra Clare capped off the series beautifully
and I’m so, so pleased as I seriously feared for the safety of some of my
favourite characters when the book was publicised as a bloodbath, but all is
well and I’m so glad.
There you have it, my Book, TV and Musical favourites of
2014. What a mammoth post for you all for a Tuesday night. I’ll be back
tomorrow with my beauty favourites in what will be my final post of 2014, thank
you guys so much for reading and I’ll see you tomorrow!
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