Jazz: Character

Slow blues can get the blood slowing, make a man sit and think. And drink another whiskey while he remembers the woman he left behind and ignores the broad sitting next to him. Fast jazz can get a man up and dancing, thinking thoughts of what a success his future will be, thinking about how he can get his competitors before they get him. Marlowe knew how to play both kinds of jazz, which most jazz players did, and he understood how they worked, which most jazz players did not. Beside that, he knew how to play other kinds of jazz that most musicians didn’t even know existed, but most players had experienced at one time or another. He could play a jazz that would make a man hunger after things lost or never had, a hunger--


Inspiration: "Silver" - Bonobo
Story Potential: Low
Notes: There's nothing particularly wrong with this, it's just not very original. Been done a million different times, a million different ways. Could be a nice side character in a story, though--but not the main feature.

Fantasy: Mortification

"Give me a sign!" he called to the sky, arms spreadeagled as he screamed into the blue, blood trickling down his flesh where he'd mortified himself with thorns. He was determined to stay in the desert shrine until he received a sign, and if God had so abandoned him that there was no sign, he would die of thirst, and that seemed well enough. He'd brought enough water for three days, and he would refuse to drink the last flask until he was traveling home. Then he would need it. If he drank regularly and became dehydrated eventually and *then* he received a sign, he wouldn't even make it home. He sat on the stone and waited. In the heat of the day, sweat trickled across his--

Inspiration: B.B.K. - Korn
Story Potential: Medium
Notes: And the sign is that the water in the last flask never runs out, but he almost doesn't find it out, and only when in despair.