Lists of Ten

Soupbone Collective

Lists of 10 to celebrate our tenth issue, as well as a small nod to the “Lately” section of our very first zine!

Phoebe: Ten Publishing Projects I Admire and Follow

1. Gender Fail
2. Diskette Press
3. Sojourners for Justice Press
4. Half Letter Press
5. Behind the Highway
6. Thick Press
7. Alfred Valley
8. Low Tech Magazine
9. Your Mind
10. Pseudo Press

Viv: Ten Perfumes I Love

1. Coriander by D.S. & Durga
2. Philosykos by Diptyque
3. Wild Bluebell by Jo Malone
4. Spiky Muse by Ex Nihilo
5. Gris Charnel by BDK
6. Delina by Parfums de Marly
7. Steamed Rainbow by D.S. & Durga
8. Choux Choux by Liis
9. Red Roses by Jo Malone
10. Lust in Paradise by Ex Nihilo

Cindy: Top 10 Tinned Fishes to Pair With Any Menty B (Mental Breakdown)

1. Minnow Cod Liver
2. Jose Gourmet Mackerel Fillets in Curry Sauce
3. Nuri Sardines in Olive Oil
4. La Narval Mussels in Spanish Sauce
5. Matiz Wild Sardines with Lemon
6. Dongwon Canned Tuna
7. Patagonia Provisions Smoked Mussels
8. Trader Joe’s Lightly Smoked Salmon
9. Ortiz Bonita del Norte White Tuna
10. Güeyu Mar Chargrilled Octopus

Holly: 10 of my most well-worn genders, in loose order

1. the Santa Ana winds (my childhood home)
2. burner phones
3. the open field
4. remembering that Brokeback Mountain was directed by Ang Lee
5. rain against my shaved scalp
6. a future where I renew a lease more than once
7. holes in fences
8. my permanent half-packed suitcase
9. one day I’ll be a cowboy
10. one day this country will let us stay

Kevin: A Dance Education

On a whim, I signed up for a dance history class despite knowing just about nothing about dance. Having had a complicated relationship with my body, I was curious about how dancers use their bodies as instruments of art. I envied how they could move like that. I’ve since completed that course, which was really just a long YouTube playlist of dance videos. This summer, I’ve taken advantage of rush tickets to the ballet, scoring surprisingly nice seats to see Giselle and Swan Lake. I never thought I could get into dance, but what keeps me coming back is a deep respect for how dancers of all sorts of dance traditions spend so many years learning how to move like they do. Here are some ballets, films, and choreographies that have added to my appreciation for dance.

1. Giselle

A Romantic ballet, Giselle appears a little rough around the edges compared to later works of Classical ballet that had a more mature and canonical dance vocabulary to work with. But Giselle goes hard in its Gothic pathos. The curtains up staging that opens Giselle Act II, with Hilarion clutching a burial cross in the moonlit, stormy Rhineland forest, belongs on a heavy metal album cover. While feats of technical virtuosity like the 32 fouetté turns would not appear until the late 1800s in Classical ballet, Giselle’s dramatic story instead asks more of its principal dancers in terms of theatrics and subtle miming beyond the dancing alone.

2. Swan Lake

Swan Lake is the Platonic form of ballet to me. The formation work is gorgeous and breathtaking. While the principal dancers put on some incredible solos and pas de deux, what makes Swan Lake work is the corps de ballets and how they fill the stage like a canvas.

3. The King and I (1956)

No clothes come off, but this scene is pure sex. Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr swirling around the ballroom to “Shall We Dance” has more to teach about chemistry than any manosphere influencer or pick-up artist ever could.

4. Shall We Dance? (1996)

A charming comfort watch starring my favorite Japanese actor. After enjoying a run of Perfect Days, Cure, and the 4K restoration of Shall We Dance?, Koji Yakusho continues to be the goat.

This film inspired me to sign up for ballroom dance classes, as it did for many in Japan when it was first released. I hope to someday move as gracefully as the ethereal Mai, her forlorn eyes gazing out the dance studio window.

5. Frances Ha (2012)

Frances’ side arc as an aspiring ballet company dancer is a far more honest portrayal of ballet than Black Swan, which is about ballet only as much as Whiplash was about jazz drumming. You are more likely to end up working in arts admin or teaching children’s classes as an underpaid adjunct than to ever make it to principal dancer. Maybe you will continue to choreograph on the side, as Frances ends up doing.

What’s more, Greta Gerwig grew up doing ballet and starred as Clara in a Sacramento Ballet production of The Nutcracker. On the other hand, I cannot understand Aronofsky’s weird hangup with refusing to give any credit to Natalie Portman’s dance double, the accomplished American Ballet Theater principal dancer Sarah Lane. Neither would Aronofsky acknowledge being influenced by Satoshi Kon’s Perfect Blue, despite having tried to purchase adaptation rights to it at one point.

6. Pose season one finale

like if u cry every time

7. NMIXX “High Horse” NMIXX(엔믹스)

I could make a whole list of iconic kpop dance choreographies. NMIXX’s contemporary lyrical dance for “High Horse” is my favorite of late. A lot of great choreos have come out of JYP groups, between this, Ryujin’s iconic “Wannabe” shoulder dance, and Twice’s early work choreographed by Lia Kim.

8. Stop Making Sense

Stop Making Sense may be one of the greatest concert movies of all time, but it is also a dance movie in its own right. My indie theater hosts Stop Making Sense dance parties from time to time. While I am not the kind of elder millennial washed hipster who shows up to those in an oversized suit, I secretly wish I could be the kind of person who can have fun like that.

9. Baryshnikov Dances Sinatra choreographed by Twyla Tharp

Debuting Tharp’s “Sinatra Suite” at a 1983 performance at the Kennedy Center, Baryshinikov dances alongside American Ballet Theater’s Elaine Kudo, who holds her own in a black Oscar de la Renta dress in a demanding partner choreography. The part of the choreography set to Sinatra’s “That’s Life” is kinetic and slapstick, taking ballet into the territory of a Hanna-Barbera cartoon.

10. La La La Human Steps: Human Sex Duo No. 1

A most memorable contemporary choreography. La La La Human Steps, a now-shuttered Montreal-based contemporary dance company, shared with its Québécois neighbors Cirque du Soleil a lively acrobatic heritage. The physicality and athleticism put on display in Human Sex (1985) is mesmerizing. What a body can do!