Before December of 2020, Jordan Holmes (comedian, author, podcaster) had never, intentionally, listened to a Taylor Swift song. Then began The Swiftening, where Jordan decided to review every Swift album in order. So far, he has covered Swift’s 2006 debut, 2008’s Fearless, 2010’s Speak Now, and 2012‘s Red, 2014’s 1989, and 2017’s reputation which we encourage you to check out if you haven’t already.
Continue reading “The Swiftening, Part 7: Lover (2019)… Almonds Are Forever”
Before December of 2020, Jordan Holmes (comedian, author, podcaster) had never, intentionally, listened to a Taylor Swift song. Then began The Swiftening, where Jordan decided to review every Swift album in order. So far, he has covered Swift’s 2006 debut, 2008’s Fearless, 2010’s Speak Now, and 2012‘s Red, and 2014’s 1989 which we encourage you to check out if you haven’t already.
Continue reading “The Swiftening, Part 6: reputation (2017)… Shite Heaven In Hell”
Before December of 2020, Jordan Holmes (comedian, author, podcaster) had never, intentionally, listened to a Taylor Swift song. Then began The Swiftening, where Jordan decided to review every Swift album in order. So far, he has covered Swift’s 2006 debut, 2008’s Fearless, 2010’s Speak Now, and 2012‘s Red, which we encourage you to check out if you haven’t already.
Continue reading “The Swiftening, Part 5: 1989 (2014)… “Fast Five” sounds like a handjob”
2020 was, to put it mildly, a weird year.
COVID affected every aspect of our lives, including the art we consumed and, perhaps more importantly, how we consume it. We couldn’t go to the movie theater. Many artists we releasing their “quarantine albums”. Most shows and movies had to stop production for some period of time. Sports went away and then came back under weird conditions.
But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a great year for the arts. It was just… different.
Because of this, we scrapped our plans to write the “Best Of” articles that usually appear in magazines and websites. We’re bringing back the Friday Five. We asked our writers and guest contributors to list their five favorite pieces of consumed media from the last year.
Here is what The Fancy Boys loved about 2020.
Continue reading “Friday Five: Special 2020 Wrap-Up Edition!”![The Swiftening, part 4: Rednarok [Red (2012)]](https://fancyboysclubcom.files.wordpress.com/2021/01/img_4238.jpg?w=720)
Until very recently, Jordan Holmes had never, intentionally, listened to a Taylor Swift song in his life. Then he began The Swiftening, in which he promised to listen to every Taylor Swift album in its entirety. Parts 1-3 of The Swiftening gave us Jordan’s thoughts on her 2006 self-titled album, 2008’s Fearless, and 2010’s Speak Now.
Red is Taylor Swift’s 4th studio album and I knew from the beginning this is where things would get tricky.
Red was the album most referenced to me as music to look forward to. The album means a lot, or some at least, to a lot of, or some at least, people. “Tread lightly – at your peril” was the tone.
Abandon hope all ‘Ye who enter here.
Continue reading “The Swiftening, part 4: Rednarok [Red (2012)]”
Like an aimless teenager wandering the halls, I am often late, not to important things– like class– but to pop culture. For instance, I just started watching Brooklyn 99 and started a TikTok this past spring.
So, as you might expect, The Great British Baking Bake Off was one such pop culture phenomenon that alluded me, until now. I’ll be honest: I have no other way to tell you what Series I have seen without referencing Big Streaming Service’s “Collections”. I have completed the most updated episodes of the recent “Collection” and “Collections” 1 and 2, which I can only assume is not Season, I mean Series, 1 and 2 because the contestants seem to already understand the show’s format and its hosts and judges.
As a teacher, I found myself watching this show and being simultaneously entertained and recognizing that the show has value in what we can learn from it about teaching and learning.
So, if you are a teacher, a parent, or a school board member or know someone who is or was a teacher, parent, or school board member, on your marks, get set, READ!
Until recently, Jordan Holmes had never, intentionally, listened to a Taylor Swift song in his life. Then began The Swiftening, in which he decided to listen to every album of hers in chronological order and give his thoughts. You can read his thoughts on her 2006 self-titled debut, and her 2008 breakout Fearless by clicking on the links.
I swear to you, I hit play on “Mine” the first track from Taylor Swift’s 3rd studio album, two seconds later I hit pause and audibly sighed, said – out loud, to no one – “This is going to be tough.”
Continue reading “The Swiftening, Part 3: Speak Now (2010)”![The Swiftening 2: No Fear T-Shirt [Fearless (2008)]](https://fancyboysclubcom.files.wordpress.com/2020/12/fearless2.jpg?w=720)
Last week, special guest contributor Jordan Holmes began what he called “The Swiftening”, in which he would listen to every Taylor Swift album in chronological order despite never having, intentionally, listened to any of her songs before. It began with Swift’s 2006 self-titled debut, which you can read here.
Against all the odds, an unemployed podcast host struggling to start writing another – god knows whatever you’d call what he did last time – has managed to craft from his vast resource of quarantine time another bitter screed against someone vastly more talented and successful.
(I wrote that before I finished, so if you didn’t read it… I didn’t.)
Continue reading “The Swiftening 2: No Fear T-Shirt [Fearless (2008)]”
Week 14 of the NFL season has come and gone. As always, Matt Drufke- who watches none of the games- has so many questions. Fortunately, Fancy Boys Football experts Brendan Andreasen and Jack Baker do and are usually happy to answer some of them. Let’s mailbag.
Continue reading “FANCY BAGS FOOTBALL MAILBAG: WEEK 14”
(EDITOR’S NOTE: Earlier this week, I reviewed the new album from Taylor Swift. My friend, the perfect and hilarious Jordan Holmes, responded as such:
From that tweet came great discussion. From that discussion came the idea for Jordan to review Swift’s entire discography. Here is part one, a look at the 2006 self-titled debut.)
Continue reading “The Swiftening, Part 1: Taylor Swift (2006)”
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