June 2014 Favorites!

Hello everyone!

I'm so excited to write this post, because today, I'm going to show you my favorite products for the month of June!!!

I love watching monthly favorite videos on YouTube and reading monthly favorite posts on blogs, so I thought I might start doing my own!  Not only will I be featuring fashion and beauty products, but music, anime, and food products as well, or anything else I just can't get enough of.  I like to cover a wide range. x3

Let's go!

Fashion/Beauty:

Galaxy Print

From NerdyLittleSecrets

From TopCloset

I've been totally enraptured by anything and everything galaxy print this month!  I've always been interested in outer space, and it's starting to leak into my fashion choices!  The above two items are things I've been eyeing on Etsy, and I may purchase them soon.  If you follow me on Instagram, then you'll have seen my galaxy nails in pink and purple that I've done this month.  I even changed my Tumblr theme to a galaxy print for a while.

Maybelline Line Stiletto

So I was looking for a liquid liner in a brown color, and the Covergirl liner I tried really wasn't working for me, so I bought this product on a whim when I went grocery shopping.  I wasn't expecting to be so wowed by this product, but I've been using it a lot since I bought it.  I got it in the color brownish black, and it's nice for a softer look.  The applicator has a felt tip which is great because it gives you a lot more control than a brush tip does, and it applies on very smoothly.  You have to wait a minute for it to dry, but once it's dry, it's dry!  I've had no creasing problems with this product, even after wearing it for a dance concert and leaving it on for the Saturday of a Comicon!  It has incredible staying power and doesn't flake off, but it comes off easily with your make up remover of choice. 

Lip Smackers Starburst Lip Balm

I am SUCH a lip balm junkie.  I always have three or four at a time, one in my purse, one in my backpack, one in my bathroom...I just like lip balm a lot.  I've tried so many different brands of lip balm I can't remember them all, but none of them work as well as Lip Smackers.  I've been using them since childhood, and they've never failed me!  I tried to get into the organic beeswax lip balms like Burt's Bees, but they never felt right and I kept having to reapply constantly.  With Lip Smackers I never have that problem. The newest one I tried this month is the Cherry Kiwi Starburst flavor.  My mom gave it to me since she received it in a goodie bag but didn't want flavored lip balm.  Since I received it, this is the ONLY lip balm I've been using this month.  It's that good.  It goes on so smooth, and it smells amazing.  Super fruity and sweet.  It also leaves a great shine and just the slightest hint of a reddish pink color on your lips.  If you like sweet lip balm, definitely give it a try!

L'Oreal Miss Manga Mascara

Before I left for Germany last month, I threw away the mascara I had been using since December, which was NYX's Pin Up Tease.  It's a great mascara, but I only wanted to take a travel size to Germany, and you're only supposed to keep mascara for like three months so...yeah.  Once I got back to Texas, I had to buy a new one.  There was a lot of hype surrounding this product, and the name was just too cute to resist, so I bought it.  I was seriously floored by this mascara when I first put it on!  I had lost my eyelash curler when I started to unpack, so I had to do without it, but with this mascara you don't even need it for an everyday look.  This stuff makes your lashes look super fluffy and full.  I've been using it every day that I've worn make up, and during performances as well, and it's been working wonderfully.  The only downside to this product is that it isn't waterproof.  I couldn't find a waterproof formula when I bought it, but I've seen different variations on it now, so the next time I run out of mascara, I'll see if they have a waterproof version because this stuff is fantastic.  Apply multiple coats for super dramatic lashes!

Clio Gelpresso Waterproof Pencil Gel Liner

One of my favorite YouTubers, meejmuse, has been raving about these Clio Gelpresso eyeliner pencils for a long time, and since I love highlighting my inner corner and lower lash line, I decided to give this a try.  The main reasons I bought it were because it's a gel formula, and it's a twist up pencil so I don't have to worry about sharpening it. XD  I'm used to using a white cream pencil (usually NYX's Milk or Cottage Cheese) to highlight my eyes, but I wanted to try a more beige or champagne color for everyday wear so it's not quite so striking.  I bought this in the color beige shine, and it's the pencil in the middle of the photo above, with the nude/beige ring around the bottom.  Since this is a product from South Korea, I had to buy it on eBay, but I found it for a good price with free shipping, and it didn't take long to arrive at all!  The seller even included a few sample products for me to try!  I'm very pleased with this product as it's super creamy, long lasting, and easy to apply.  It's the most gorgeous champagne gold color, with lots of shimmer.

Innisfree No-Sebum Mineral Powder

This is another South Korean product that I heard about on YouTube, and it's perfect for Summer!  I love my NYC translucent powder, but since the weather has been getting hotter, it hasn't been controlling the shine on my face as well as it did in the Winter and Spring months.  Since I was already purchasing the Clio pencil on eBay anyway, I thought I would buy this and try it out.  Innisfree advertises this product as a powder to control sebum (oil) on your face throughout the day, and to give your make up a flawless finish.  I was a bit skeptical at first since most oil controlling powders look super cakey on my face, but because of all of the positive reviews I watched or read, I took the leap and bought it.  

Out of all the beauty products on my favorites list, this one impressed me the most.  I mean WOW.  This is the product on this list that I've had for the shortest amount of time, but from the first time I used it, it has worked wonders!  My foundation looked flawless after I applied this, and it helped me achieve a wonderful matte look.  I wore it the first time for about eight hours or longer, and besides some slight eye shadow creasing (I didn't put on primer that day), my make up looked just as amazing as it did when I first applied it.  I have no idea how they do it, but this product is definitely something I will continue to use.  The tub of powder you get is actually quite small, but a little bit goes a long way.  It's a loose powder that comes with a powder puff inside to apply it with, but you can also apply it with a brush if you prefer to do that.  I definitely, definitely recommend this product.  You can purchase it here!

Music:

Seven Lions

I started diving into the EDM genre of music this month, and the album that I've been listening to over and over again is Worlds Apart by Seven Lions, featuring artists like Kerli and Ellie Goulding.  It's an amazing EP that sounds like it was made on another planet, and it takes you out of your head as you listen to it.  It has that electronic sound you would expect from an EDM artist, but the songwriting present is truly something special, especially on the tracks where Kerli is involved.  You can read my full review of this EP here.

Milk Tea

Since my departure from the Kpop fandom, I've been looking for some Independent artists from South Korea to listen to.  Not many people know about the South Korean music industry outside of Kpop, myself included, so I did some digging and found the most adorable band!  This group is called Milk Tea, and they're a duo signed with the Independent record label Juice Media.  They have a sweet, mellow pop sound that I like a lot, and I bought their second album, Love Traveller, off of iTunes.  I'm planning on doing a full post on this group, so stay tuned for that!  For now, enjoy the insanely adorable music video for their most popular song, "Ramen King."

Anime:

Princess Jellyfish

My friends had been telling me about Princess Jellyfish, or Kuragehime, for a few years now, but other anime seemed to push it back every time I thought about watching it.  One day this month, I stayed over at a friend's apartment, and she was shocked that I hadn't seen it, so all of us who were over marathoned the whole series in one night.  Y'all.  This series is SO GOOD.  I was constantly laughing, and I found the cast of characters so colorful and weird, yet relatable at the same time.  Check out the plot summary from Anime News Network:

"Amamizukan is an apartment complex where no boys are allowed. Tsukimi, a girl who adores jellyfish, lives there happily with her friends who all have nerdy obsessions of their own. Their peaceful lives gradually start to change when a beautiful woman helps Tsukimi out of a pinch. She stays overnight at the apartments—but it turns out 'she' is really a 'he.'"

As an introvert and a super nerd myself, I had a great time laughing at the situations these characters got into, and discussing with my friends how they reminded us of ourselves.  Even if you aren't a nerd, I think you'll enjoy this lovable cast of characters and all of the silliness that goes on in their lives.  You can watch this on on Netflix dubbed in English!

Snacks:

Watermelon

I don't know about y'all, but for me, it isn't Summer until I've had some watermelon!  This is the fruit I eat the most of during the Summer, most others being forgotten because the only time I can eat good watermelon is during the hotter months!  I eat it plain, with breakfast, or I'll make it into a refreshing drink!  Any way you prepare it, watermelon is delicious!

Haribo Gummi Peaches

So in Germany, Haribo was EVERYWHERE.  Seriously.  I know that's where the company is based out of, but it was super cool to see it everywhere.  I'm a gummy addict, so I tried a lot of different flavors, one of my favorite being peach.  Peach flavored candy or soda is one of my biggest weaknesses, so eating these definitely makes me a happy camper.  Chewy, sweet, peachy, and covered in sugar.  Yup, heaven.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my June Favorites, and I hope you can try them out for yourself!  Have you already tried some of them?  Do you like them?

What are your favorites this month?  Leave me a comment below!

Thanks for reading, and I'll see you in my next post,

xoxo

Martha

Music: Seven Lions "Worlds Apart" EP

Good Afternoon folks!

Today I'd like to talk about an artist I just got into recently, and his newest EP!

I was scrolling through Facebook one day, and while scrolling one of my favorite artists, Kerli, had made a post.  She talked about collaborating with another musician.  I was excited for new music from her, so I decided to look into it, and that's how I found out about Seven Lions.  The project she was talking about was the title track of his new EP, Worlds Apart.

Now I'm still very new to the Electronic Dance Music scene, as Kerli has been the only artist of the genre that I closely followed, just listening to a track or two here and there from other artists.  I had been wary of looking into the genre because of a lot of the music majors at my University.  Some of them at least, have a stuck up attitude and are convinced that electronic music isn't real music.  After listening to this EP over and over again, I can say without a doubt that they are so wrong!

This EP as a whole has an ethereal feel to it, and it transports you to another world inside of your head.  To me, when I listen to it I feel like I'm floating.

Before I go into more detail track by track, here's a little background information on Seven Lions:

The man behind Seven Lions is Jeff Montalvo, a producer, remixer, composer, and DJ from Santa Barbara.  He found the name Seven Lions from a character in the fantasy novel Latro in the Mist by Gene Wolf.  Seven Lions released his debut EP, Polarize, in 2012 and caught the attention of Skrillex.  He signed with Skrillex's record label, OWLSA (owned by Warner) in 2013.  He then released his next EP, Days to Come, on that label.  He released one other single with OWLSA before signing with Casablanca Records (also owned by Warner).  Worlds Apart is his first EP with Casablanca Records.

Now, let's get to the music, shall we?

This is the EP in its entirety from Seven Lions's official YouTube channel, so you can listen as you read.

The first track is called "Don't Leave" featuring pop singer Ellie Goulding.  I do have a few tracks by her already, so it was nice to have a familiar voice to start of the EP with.  The track starts off with something sounding like white noise which escalates into a steady pitch.  Next, you hear a melodic beat that sounds like something I'd imagine you'd hear at a space station.  The music then drops to provide ambiance for Ellie's vocals, then builds into its own melodic line under her.  I think this track has a very interesting give and take with the vocalist, since the EDM tracks I've heard usually go one of two ways:  they either give way to the vocalist, or the vocalist provides the ambiance and fades in and out.  In my experience, it usually goes with the latter of the two, but this track has a good balance of vocals and back track with intertwining melodic lines.

The second track on the EP is the title track, "Worlds Apart" featuring Kerli.  Before I even heard the song I knew I would like it just because it had Kerli on it.  That may be my bias showing, but I love her vocals and her songwriting is superb.  This track has a similar slow build up that "Don't Leave" had, but when Kerli joined in the music there wasn't a huge stop as if to say "here's the vocalist!"  Throughout the entire track, it sounds and feels as if the vocals and back track are one entity moving along with itself.  There is a great sense of movement with this track, almost as if you could see muscles moving with smooth choreography, or like water flowing in a river.  I think this smooth sense of oneness and movement is what makes this track stand out from the rest on the EP.  Truly an amazing track.

The third track, "Nepenthe" is the only track on this EP where Seven Lions is by himself.  This track is the hardcore dance floor track where you can lose yourself in the music and go nuts!  I do like listening to this by myself, but I'd love to hear it in a live setting where it's at its full potential to get people moving.  I can just see all the glow sticks and brightly colored outfits in my head!  Although this is a dance floor track, there is a certain restraint in it.  It still fits in with the rest of the EP in that it has that otherworldly, floating feel, and while you can dance to it, it's not the kind of track that would blow out your speakers, and I can definitely appreciate that.

The fourth track is "Strangers" featuring Myon and Shade 54 & Tove Lo.  Now I've never heard of the featuring artists before, so I'll have to look them up in the future.  This track is the shortest on the EP at three minutes and twenty four seconds, so I have a hunch that this is meant to be a pop single in a way.  Unlike the other tracks, the vocals hit you immediately and continue throughout the track without any long breaks.  I believe this track is meant to highlight the vocals, and the vocalist does have a very strong voice that's pleasant to listen to.  I can definitely imagine myself dancing like crazy to this one, and this is arguably the most upbeat track on the EP.  If you don't know too much about EDM but are a pop music junkie like myself, I think you'll like this track.

The fifth and final track is "Keep it Close" also featuring Kerli.  The way this track starts, it sounds like an electronic music box of some sort with a repeated melody, then it melts into an ethereal vocal with a pulsing line behind it.  Montalvo said that this was his favorite track on the EP since it was less about getting people to dance and more about the songwriting itself.  This song is written in 3/4 time and you can definitely feel that, since it's much different than the other tracks and feels almost like a waltz.  There is use of piano in this track, and it's refreshing to hear a midst all of the electronic sounds.  Kerli's vocals here are more differentiated from the back track than they are on "Worlds Apart," though there is some sort of effect added to them that blurs them a bit, and it sounds like she's melting into something, or sinking down slowly.  Her vocals are in a floaty soprano although because of that melting effect, it feels grounding to listen to.  The song closes with the slow piano and the music box sound again, like it's winding down.  I think it was a brilliant idea to end the EP with this track, as it shows off Seven Lion's experimentation with a new sound, and because it's different than what he's done in the past, it gives the listener a taste of possibly what's to come.

This EP has quickly become one of my favorite albums for the Summer, and the more I listen to it, the more different things I hear each time.  If you're skeptical about getting into the EDM genre, I think this would be a good starting point, and for you seasoned EDM fans, this is a taste of something new within the genre that I think you'll enjoy.  

Do you like Seven Lions?  What do you think of his newest work?

Let me know in the comments below!

Thanks for reading, and see you in my next post!

xoxo

Martha