Plucked this one from NightyIcons (I have to rediscover how to do the dA member link thingy again).

1. Pick anywhere between five and ten fictional characters that you like. They don't have to be Transformers -- cartoon characters, book characters, movie characters, whatever.
2. For each character, find a song that either fits the character's personality, or just reminds you of that character for some reason.
3. Find the songs on YouTube (if you can).
4. Post your list of characters, along with their corresponding songs. If you can't find the song on YouTube, say so.

Going a bit over the five to ten mark here. *shrugs* Got the charas, got the songs, ya know? Why put a cap on it? Anyway, lots of the songs that get stuck on individuals are done so for reasons of metaphor rather than actual concrete lyrical content. For example, I love songs that describe the look, texture and use of clothing, because for mechanical beings that do not require clothing, garments often represent to me moods, masks, or psychological states. Same goes for makeup. I also love tagging love songs and general romance ideas to individuals as much as to pairings, because things like longing and betrayal, lust and sacred union can be directed toward concepts other than another individual. Also, disregard gender references. Just to give you a heads up on these and other wacky chara/song combos you may see here.

Now, here's your list!

***Let's start with Optimus Prime. The song that I've draped over his broad shoulders is A Thousand Years by Sting. And I love this song for him because it gives him back everything that the mythos denied him to have. That being his person. We know the heroic leader, the courage, the selflessness, the sacrifice, and everything that makes him (sometimes sickeningly) great. This song makes him smaller, makes him fallible, makes him accessible, makes him one of us. Because, as we may sometimes forget, he once was. He once was Orion Pax. And I don't believe that that part of him left when Alpha Trion took the mangled body of a dock worker and turned it into the future Autobot leader. This song is the longing for reconciliation between Optimus Prime and Orion Pax, and a reminder to us that Optimus is subject to all of the doubts, indecisions, regrets and more, as we all are.

***Next, Prowl. Now... this, I still personally regard as the strangest chara/song match I've ever thought of, in that it really makes the most sense of any I've ever had. I am of the crowd that believes Prowl is not without emotion, but that he is very effective in keeping it under lock and key to suit his needs. Nighty puts it best when comparing Prowl to a Vulcan and, as such, he is just an emotional wreck waiting to happen. It's just a matter of the wrong circumstance at the wrong time. So, following this - -if you'll excuse the pun - logic, I have pegged Prowl with the U2 song Daddy's Gonna Pay For Your Crashed Car Just remember as you're listening to the song, replace the word 'daddy' with the word 'logic', and the word 'momma' with 'emotion', and everything else will make sense.

***On to Hound. I have two songs for him (honestly, there's more, but...), both of which sort of embrace my own interpretation separate from canon. This idea is that Hound is a bit of an incomplete spirit, a wandering soul, someone who is always in search of his true self. It's his greatest quest, the ultimate tracking mission. Hence, the first song is The Wanderer by Johnny Cash and U2. I especially love this lyric: I went out there in search of experience/ To taste and to touch and to feel as much/ As a man can before he repents... I think this really encompasses that search for self that Hound goes through; there's no promise that in this searching he'll always be the good 'bot, but it's what he hopes to be in the end. The second song is The Fuse by Jackson Browne. This is the inexplicable drive to carry on the search.

***Time to tackle Mirage. I turn again to U2 for him, with the song Acrobat because it plays out the struggle to find balance, compromise and meaning. These are things that I believe Mirage has trouble getting his hands around, in his life with the Autobots, and it's something that he needs in order to have peace in his personal life.

***How about Gears? Little explanation needed here. I think the song says it all. This is I'm Only Happy When It Rains by Garbage.

***Let's do Smokescreen. (snrk) I really haven't found a song yet that pegs him down. But, I do have one that I associate with his sort of unofficial position as Autobot therapist. That song is fsq_hKtg5s"The Couch by Alanis Morissette.

***Not to leave the Decepticons out, I even have something for Starscream. It's a little twisted in his delusional thinking, how he fits into the Decepticon ranks. A little poppy for the idea, but here you go. QaMgMuzgY8"Slow Burn by David Bowie.

***Next, Sideswipe. I think I got glued to Starhorse's idea of this mech, in that he's always in motion. Whether it be mental or physical, in battle or in downtime, this 'bot must always move. And I think that Cake's song, The Distance, captures this well.

***Of course, you can't have one without the other, so here's Sunstreaker. And again, I have to hit up U2 for the perfect song for my idea of Sunny. What better than Even Better Than The Real Thing! And because Sunny is just that effin' cool, he even gets a remix version. The song itself is often misinterpreted as one big gratuitous boast of one's self. Really, this song is sung from the vantage of a man who struggles to conquer self worth issues, asking of himself to give himself the chance to prove he is worth something. That's how I see Sunny. (In regards to the vid: beware the heaping amounts of shimmying body parts and the escaping nipple...)

***And together as they should be, Sides and Sunny. It was a while ago that I happened to be listening to this song, and one lyric caught my attention, utterly screaming 'LAMBOS!' to me. Steel made of soul and sin. Upon listening to the song a few times over, I knew this was their song. Ride the Wind by Poison.

***Here's an Omega Supreme snapshot, a song for his bitter rivalry with the Constructicons. This is As Heaven Is Wide by Garbage.

***Remember Devcon? Yep, got one for him, too. Now, I'm stealing back my explanation which I posted long ago at Koontah's Genesis Outpost, because I don't think I'm clever enough to say it all over again. The song is Hawkmoon 269 by U2. And for Devcon, this is why: I think of Devcon in this song, but out of context of the song. The whole thing is metaphorical, and instead of longing for a lover, Devcon is longing for his homeworld, Cybertron. He travels vast distances, for indeterminate periods of time, and the only chance he ever has to come home is when he's captured a Decepticon. But, rather than hang around, his dedication to his people presses him on to the next fugitive hunt, and so he says good-bye before he's really even had the chance to say hello. In the song, it speaks of endless nights and still more day ahead, and I think of how tiring it must be to be on this constant chase, and when he does take a moment to rest on some foreign planet - like in the song, when it says 'as the room spins around' - his mind must be whirling out of control. Does he even know where he is that moment, as he's travelled so long? And he must ache because of that. Still, the only thing that brings him peace enough to rest and move on, is the knowing that one day it will all be over, and he will be home again, for good.

And, that's about all for tonight! More to come!