The most important objective of any modern musician/composer, due to the globalisation and ease of access to endless amounts of music through streaming, is to catch the listeners interest as quickly as you can. Regardless of genre the general audience demands a reason to listen to what you make; and with an oversaturated market like music production, there is little they won't have heard already.

How do you avoid being uninteresting, but not pretentious?

Using cush chords, simply put is the method of retaining the tonic (first) chord whilst shifting the other chords in your progression to another modal set of chords, in a new key.

For example, let's begin in C major. The 2 5 4 1 pattern would consist of:

Dm / Gmaj / Fmaj / Cmaj

This sounds fantastic by itself, but listeners have heard this progression 1000 times without knowing it. So how do we engage them?

Let's say we use cush chords, and shift everything EXCEPT the tonic C major to the key of Eb major, a minor third above. You use the respective chords from this key aside from the tonic C.

Fm / Bb7sus / Abm / Cmaj

(Instructive video by openstudiojazz for visual explanations)

And here is a transcribed example of these sorts of chordal changes and methods used:

Now your progression sounds vastly more open, more engaging more interesting. This isn't limited to just shifting a minor third above and you can do it as many times as you want in a composition. Implementing something simple like this gives your composing the edge above standard methods used by the majority of others in your position.

Happy composing! let me know if composition effortposts are something wanted or not

!nms

From foxymation

This b-word is literally a redditor. Used to extend respect til I figured it out. Basically british bardfinn

Giving away condoms makes us popular

We may not have high speed rail but at least we have rap

Black people are cool

More censorship please

Trump is so dumb he's gonna do this tarded thing bc I don't like him

Long covid is real actually

What a life

This is all from the past day, she literally can't stop poooooosting

Double digit posts daily for four years. Basically a crack addict. At least she pays aevann's bills

Conclusion:

!nooticers !metashit

from foxymation, a youtuber

this is from foxymation, a youtuber

ignore the 0 effort plating

!friendsofspiderman

Who should I ban next. Should I ban award @sandkwinn more? She said something mean to my girlfriend. I hate her. I hate Sandkwinn.

We spent $20 million on a Sesame Street show in Iraq. It probably looked something like this Lmaooo pic.twitter.com/BGkKEFSjaf

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 6, 2025

this is from a youtuber Foxymations

REPORTER: *asks dumb question*

TRUMP: “I don’t know what you’re talking about and neither do you. Who are you with?”

REPORTER: “HuffPost”

TRUMP: “I thought they died.” 🤣 pic.twitter.com/B14XtHkYhD

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 10, 2025

!chuds

If 79% of Americans oppose "transgender FEMALE athletes" competing in women's sports, imagine how many oppose MALE athletes in women's sports!

Drop the obfuscatory language. The opposition is to ALL MALE ATHLETES, no matter how they "identify."pic.twitter.com/6RKCcIXLNv

— Colin Wright (@SwipeWright) February 6, 2025

!chuds !transphobes

The article:

The comments are full of alcoholic boomers in denial, furiously ing and ing:

A lot of these guys seem like they have quite serious alcohol addictions.

This is the classic Daily Mail alcohol "gotcha" - completely ignoring that if you're an alcoholic then you'll die 20 years earlier and in severe pain after decades of poor health.

I don't care about the size or weight at all. If it came with a modern SoC instead of some 5 year old mediatek garbage, a good amount of RAM, at least 512GB internal storage (with SD card support), a good screen, and a decent amount of promised software support I would absolutely buy one.

I've loved the "tank" aesthetic on smartphones ever since the first one I owned, the OG Motorola Droid.

https://x.com/dailysnoopys/

I forgot a few I think maybe but here we go !fitness tell me WHY ARE YOU STILL FAT

@Aevann pin

https://t.co/ZWIGEllZug

— Aella (@Aella_Girl) January 29, 2025

Some music while you read:

and/or the original:

(ctrl + v):

Zizian Murdercult summary, for those out of the loop

I know a bunch of people who were involved or adjacent, including someone who accidentally got some footage.

The summary below is based on talking to these people, looking at court documents, reading blog posts, etc. (I was also at the protested CFAR reunion and knew Daniel)

More info at the bottom (especially for journ*lists who would like interviews)

Pre-2019

Curtis Lind allows people to live in trailers and containers on his Vallejo, CA property, initially offering affordable housing to artists, woodworkers, and electricians. Over time, some tenants stop paying rent and are later referred to as "The Cult" by neighbors. The cult consists of Ziz (Jack LaSota), Emma Borhanian, Somni (Alexander Leatham), and Gwen Danielson.

Separately, at some point Ziz attends a workshop by CFAR, which is a nonprofit focusing on behavioral psychology and AI.

2019

November 2019: CFAR bans Ziz and Gwen from their alumni reunion, partly due to fears of violence.

November 2019: Ziz, Emma, Somni and Gwen protest at the reunion with accusations of bad decision theory (it's complicated) and transphobia. (All four of them are trans).

The protestors get arrested for blocking entrances (while there are children on the grounds) and wearing Guy Fawkes masks. They're released on bail.

2021

August 2021: Ziz advocates for "airlocking" (a sci-fi term for killing) various people in blog comments and claims many people seek "suicide by Ziz." Ziz runs a blog which appears to be the primary attractor for this community. They claim that people have two hemispheres, and are either non-good, single-good, or double-good (very rare, which Ziz herself is). Ziz advocates for a ruthlessly enforced altruism towards all living creatures, and to follow the principle that it's never valid to surrender. She promotes the punishment of "non-good" people, particularly those who are not vegans.

2022

February 2022: Jamie Zajko, a close friend of Ziz, claims that Ziz threatens to kill Jamie, if Jamie does not kill Jamie's girlfriend and provide proof of it.

April 2022: Gwen Danielson, one of the protestors, stops appearing for court hearings, and their lawyer suggests they have died.

July 2022: A different friend of this group commits suicide and cites ideas from Ziz's blog in their suicide note. Ziz appears to suggest their ideas caused the suicide.

August 2022: Ziz fakes her own death in a boating accident and stops showing up to court hearings. The Coast Guard conducts a search for her, but finds no body. An obituary is released.

November 2022: Emma Borhanian is killed by Curtis Lind during a violent altercation at his Vallejo property. Somni stabs Lind with a sword, and Lind shoots both Somni and Emma. Lind is stabbed dozens of times and loses an eye. Lind's account is that they had been threatening him for some time, and one day requested he come fix a leak. They hit him from behind, and when he woke up they were attempting to cut off his head (he has scarring consistent with this claim). He then shot Emma and Somni in self defense. His friend claims upon entering the trailer afterwards he found surgical equipment and chemicals he believes were intended to dissolve Lind's body. Somni and Suri Dao are arrested. Ziz and Gwen are seen at the scene, alive. It seems likely Gwen had faked their own death earlier to escape court appearances, much as Ziz had.

November 2022: Somni attempts to escape from jail (twice).

2023

January 2, 2023: Richard and Rita Zajko are found dead from homicide in their Pennsylvania home from gunshot wounds. Their daughter Jamie Zajko was associated with Ziz, and we suspect the homicide was an attempt to gain money (several million dollars) from inheritance. Police also suspect Ziz is involved in the murder. Police also suspect Daniel Blank, an associate of Ziz, is involved in the murder. Blank has not been seen since and we suspect he's dead.

January 13, 2023: Ziz is arrested in Pennsylvania for "obstructing administration of law" and "disorderly conduct." Ziz eventually makes bail (in June) and stops showing up to court. We suspect that the arrest was indirectly related the murders, and that the police didn't have enough evidence to make a full charge.

2025

January 17, 2025: Curtis Lind (who was set to serve as the primary witness in his assault case) is stabbed to death outside his Vallejo property. A man named Maximilian Snyder is later arrested for this murder. The previous year, he applied for a marriage license with a woman named Teresa Younblut, who was in contact with Ziz.

January 20, 2025: Teresa Youngblut and a man named Felix Baukholt are stopped while driving by U.S. Border Patrol in Vermont. They end up in a shootout, and Baukholt and a border patrol agent dies. Police find tactical gear, firearms, and burner laptops in the car. According to the police, an unnamed person who purchased the firearms used in this shooting is also a suspect in the Pennsylvania Zajko murders. We think this is likely to be Jamie Zajko, given that the shooting is in the same town that Jamie Zajko has a registered address (Coventry, Vermont).

That's it so far. We still don't know the whereabouts of the people in this story who aren't either dead or in custody, and we sort of expect them to continue doing murders.

1. If you're a journ*list and want to get in contact with people around the community/rationalist scene who knows the people involved, you can fill out this form and your contact info will be shared around our networks

2. My friend, trying to interview Lind about something else, ended up getting a bunch of footage of him talking about the attack. If you're a journ*list or documentarian interested in this footage, please reach out to him here

3. The above timeline is collected from sources the community has accumulated here.

It also has some high-confidence guesses made by people familiar with those involved. Please doublecheck all claims yourself.

A group of turkeys spotted circling a 'Harris' gravestone in North Dakota.

The footage was captured by a cemetery worker at the Riverside Cemetery in Fargo, North Dakota.

"It was quite bizarre," the man, Paul Eickhof, said.

The reasoning behind the 'turkey circle' may be due… pic.twitter.com/1ceYSdz7Nr

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) February 16, 2025

Did Trump supporters murder this strong kween because of DEI?

/u/That-Nerve8213, hopefully this gets to you and @J's bot hasn't spammed some to keep themselves safe for the billionth time, if you want to save this e-boy you have to be direct. Like literally "I like you" direct. To goes against every feminine instinct you have. Men, especially younger men are way way too r-slurred to pick up on that. Don't listen to the redditors, they're fat ugly unfrickables who want you to be miserable. Pulling for you. Also delete Reddit.

🇬🇧 British farmers protested today!

In addition to tractors, military equipment appeared on the streets of London. Tanks and infantry fighting vehicles.

It is unclear where the farmers got them from.

1/ pic.twitter.com/gvdLo4DEvM

— Lord Bebo (@MyLordBebo) February 10, 2025

Those can be bought by any individual

— Gutsa (@gutsa_ma) February 10, 2025

Can't buy pointed knives but you can legally buy a tank from Temu, what a country