tournament ? DIAMOND HIT ? Farewell / Next Season Announcement pg.328 ?

[ceremonials]

39 minutes ago, swiftie13 said:

Round 11 Reviews... So Far!

 

@Jackson @ceremonials @ughgabriel @Citrus

 

Jackson 

 

Every other line felt simple and straightforward and great while the other half didn’t read as nicely and was sometimes worded awkwardly. I’ve read smoother entries from you that hit harder. There were some lines that went well with the concept such as “We stumbled in the backseat, losing boundaries as wet touched,” and “then perhaps some other sunrise I’d wake up next to you.” It’s when you started to play deeper with figurative language that you lost a stylistic cohesion. From “[..] trudged through the Earth until they found our cove,” the charcoal clouds line, and using words like “wane” interrupted this entry. It was tied together with a simple concept which I liked, but it made these weird choices all the more obvious. I will say, the change in the bridge was very well done. I could hear a major key turning minor in my head. 

 

Jackson & Citrus 

 

What even is a dogwood? *Googles* Ah, a pretty tree! Not a pretty word, though. I love the dichotomy between your entries, a really cool way to take advantage of writing two songs in one week. Overall this entry felt very wordy and not in a classic Citrus way where lines punch. The meter was perfect throughout but it really could have been condensed while saying the same thing. The chorus is GOR-GEE-OUS! It read like a real chorus and I could hear a melody while reading it. It also felt short and very, very sweet. The bridge felt a little blunt at times, sloppy even. There is a lot of emotional impact in this entry, so good job on that. I was honestly expecting so much more, though.

 

Ceremonials 

 

This feels unnecessarily descriptive? There were also clumsy lyrical moments like “A dark cousin, he’s not only a reflection.” Not only is dark cousin a really weird phrase but the latter part feels too blunt. The pre chorus was the strongest part of this song which should have been taken the place of the actual chorus. I did feel the reliability and struggle behind the words nonetheless, just don’t push as hard. 

 

Ceremonials & swiftie13

 

It was a pleasure working with you despite schedule conflicts. You stuck it out like a champ, especially having me as a partner. There were times where I felt like we were mis-communicating and after reading the final product, I see there were some unresolved concerns like you replaced the first verse which IMO was a stronger start to the piece. Nonetheless, you really moved us along so thanks for that. I’m proud of this song and I think it goes well with the film which we didn’t technically intend, we just wanted to be influenced by it’s general concept. Anyway, I hope you don’t hate me. I admire your amount of growth and creativity this season! 

 

ughgabriel 

 

This was very wordy, borderline pretentious. Maybe that was the point considering you were talking about conveying a much stronger person than you are so far. Either way, I didn’t particularly enjoy it. I love the pre chorus, it was the only part that nailed what you were trying to say without exhausting the concept with redundancy. It could have worked as a chorus. It didn’t feel as emotional as it could have been, mainly due to the stylistic choices. The outro was perfect and that’s the direction this should have headed. 

 

 

 

I got lazy and stopped cause I was just bitching at this point. This week was a let down so far. OOP. Am too lazy to format.

I know we were kinda fighting a lot but i enjoyed collabing with you too. Our writing styles are very different and I didn't explect them to clash so much, but i think we worked it out for the most part. About the first verse, I do agree that it was a better introduction, but the meter was off and the rhyme scheme was different than the last half and I couldn't think of how to change it   I dont hate you at all, I was frustrated but I know you were with me too. 

 

Hopefully we can collab on an actual song in the future <3

[Hug]

Just now, Jackson said:

i dont even remember saying that either 

It was in dubtrack. You said something along the lines of "I only go to Hug to make myself feel better [about my writing]". Like okay, I get it, you don't find me helpful. How are you supposed to help someone who knows they don't need the help, though.

[Jackson]

1 minute ago, Hug said:

It was in dubtrack. You said something along the lines of "I only go to Hug to make myself feel better [about my writing]". Like okay, I get it, you don't find me helpful. How are you supposed to help someone who knows they don't need the help, though.

i don't remember ever saying that, and if i did it was probably meant as sarcasm like 92% of the things i say, and it sucks for me that you based a season of reviews off of me saying that 

[Jackson]

PSA that me and Hug are in dub together and we don't actually hate each other, we just want a best fued nom in the Platinum Grammys 

[fountain]

“Despite it”...it being what, exactly? I legit can’t figure this out.

 

 

what? everything referred to in the song DUH

[ceremonials]

39 minutes ago, Jackson said:

PSA that me and Hug are in dub together and we don't actually hate each other, we just want a best fued nom in the Platinum Grammys 

You securing five nominations in that category

 

mess 

[Temporal]

oh lemme come in the dub to brainstorm categories in a sec

[ceremonials]

1 minute ago, Temporal said:

oh lemme come in the dub to brainstorm categories in a sec

What

[fountain]

2 minutes ago, Temporal said:

oh lemme come in the dub to brainstorm categories in a sec

yeah. the finale will be somewhere between 25~27th depending on everything, i imagine. so we should do the reunion and the grammys with the rest remaining few days of the month! i can't remember if you did the grammys and the finale together last time, but i wanna do them separate. 

[Temporal]

10 minutes ago, keshaspearsxo said:

yeah. the finale will be somewhere between 25~27th depending on everything, i imagine. so we should do the reunion and the grammys with the rest remaining few days of the month! i can't remember if you did the grammys and the finale together last time, but i wanna do them separate. 

 

I separated them by a week me thinks. Something like that!

[Temporal]

General Field

Song of the Season

Record of the Season

Best Judge's Song

 

Contestant Voted Categories

Favorite Contestant
Favorite Newbie
- Favorite contestant who's first PH season was DH.

Most Improved

- Biggest improvement coming into DH from PH9

Biggest Breakthrough

- Biggest improvement during the season

Best Sabotage

- Who did another contestant the dirtiest (judge or contestant)?
Best Messy Moment of the Season
- What was the most awkward, messy or funny moment of the season?
Most Iconic Moment of the Season
- What will DH be remembered for?

Best Single Artwork
- Best contestant created artwork for a DH song.
Best One-Liner/Couplet
- Best one or two lines from an entry.
Best Title
Best Concept

Best Feud

- Most entertaining butting of heads between contestants and/or judges.

The Truth Teller Award

- Contestant who needs to come back to Platinum Hit!

Genre/Theme Categories

Best Sex Song
- Best song that's content revolves specifically around sex.
Best Romance Song
- Best song that's content revolves around a romantic, non-platonic relationship but not mainly sex.
Best Troll Entry
- Best or funniest entry written with the intent of flopping.
Best Creepy Song
- Best song that is overly dark, unusual and potentially horrifying in content.
Best Tear-Jerker
- Best song written to induce tears or happiness or sadness.
Best Astral Song
- Best song with heavily spatial or astral imagery.
Best Elemental Song
- Best song with heavily Elemental (water, air, earth, fire etc.) imagery.

Best Family Song

- Best song written centrally about family or a family member (ex. mothers)

Best Religious Song
- Best song using religious/holy/godly imagery or subject matter.

Best Political Song

- Best song about Trump's demonic orange ass and/or Legendary Grandma Hillary
 

1. You do NOT need to fill out every category, but you may do so if you please.
2. You may only submit TWO entries or votes for consideration in each category, choose wisely!
3. For song submissions, please include title and round number.
4. You may submit any work from this season, be it your own or another contestant's.
5. Ballots are due by PM to me 48 hours before the finale (whenever that may be!)

[Temporal]

 

@Jackson - Night Drive
I really loved this. It was super sweet and your style was still really powerful while maintaining that puppy love feeling. My only larger comment on the piece would be that the conclusion in the bridge felt a bit weak - “Maybe we weren’t ready to live life in the sun” was good but the rest felt a bit meh - and a final punch there would’ve made this a knockout. 
- “Thought maybe we could run away on half a tank of dreams” this was a bit too ~~tumblr-y~~ for me (precisely “tank of dreams”)
- “Photophobic” wasn’t used as egregiously in this song as your first, but it was still a reach.   
 

@Jackson & @Citrus - Lake Erie
I’m kind of surprised by this entry for a few reasons, the largest of which being that stylistically, this felt very similar to your first entry. These entries were both kinda somber and remorseful and the storytelling aspect (this happened, these places were doing these things) was also very strong. I feel like because I read two of your songs in a row I was able to see the formula of your writing come through, which I did not like. At the same time however, I feel like you and Citrus’s styles didn’t mix as well this go around (disclaimer: I'm not scoring you off of "Vilomah"). There were some lines that were very straightforward and Citrus-y (“Don’t put me in the ground, my love, please don’t give me a grave”) and then there were some which had a really simple, condensable point was drawn out in a Jackson-y way (“We climbed atop the spiral stairs as harbors creaked below”). It didn’t feel consistent from line to line, though where you had more emotional lines such as the end of the chorus that didn’t feel as obvious. It either should’ve been blunt or it should’ve been poetic, not both. I wanted a lot more polish from this.
- “silver dogwoods” were really forced in there to fit the meter. 
- “The lake was calm and knowing like a ritual that night” a “ritual” is an example of something “knowing”?
- “day/bay” was not cute
- “Our bond survives as our minds grow weary” this was a really stiff phrase
- The switch at the end of the bridge was cute, and the alliteration you did with “r” sounds with “… free/ My starry lakeside lover, you’re my sweetest memory” was really nice though probably unintentional! 
 

@ceremonials - Dark Cousin
This title was a bit tragic sis “A dark cousin” was not haunting at all, and didn’t fit in with the rest of your style, PLUS WHY does it matter that the cousin is black  Racism confirmed! As for the song itself, it was kinda boring? I think you could do a lot with the subject matter of a panic attack, but writing about looking into a mirror isn’t something that has the content to sustain more than an interlude. It just felt like you were repeating yourself line after line, and there wasn’t any action or story to give the song any sense of direction. I did like your style, but unfortunately you didn’t give your style enough to work with this go around.
- You essentially wrote the same line twice with “A pair of somber hands existing just beneath the glass” and “There’s someone behind the glass.”
 

@ceremonials & @swiftie13 - Grave of the Fireflies
This was cute, but also not very Ceremonials interestingly enough. Not in a bad or good way, just an observation! Unfortunately, I don’t really know if this subject was the best use of the collab, since knowledge of the movie feels more mandatory with this. Not because the song was too vague without, but because that knowledge made the song pop out more than it would without that knowledge. My other major complaint was that some lyrics didn’t make sense, and feel placed in the song purely for the imagery or flowery language.
- “Over the cliff above the bay / Where the tide would call our name” not only have I read this exact couplet like 45 times, I’ve even written one  
- “I taught you to count fireflies” So basically you taught someone to count? Education chanteuse. No really though, this was awks.
- “If we build a grave for him / Then maybe he can still fly.”” this tugged me in a creepy way
- “The life you should’ve known” Huga is SUING
- ““It’s the ones that burn the brightest / That lose their fire first.”” I don’t know if you intended this to be a double entendre with “the good die young” but this was HAUNTING and I LOVED it. The outro was really nice as well.
 

@ughgabriel - the Architect
I’m sorry, but this was a surprisingly sloppy entry. I feel like you wrote this very quickly because there were so many spots that could’ve been fixed had you just reread this or read it aloud. I almost feel like a language barrier really cropped up here? Because even in your explanation(s) there were really glaring grammatical errors. There were a number of places where I felt that you were just tripping over your words in an attempt to keep up with your demanding style. 
- “Shaped as a martyr but seen as salvation” “but” wasn’t the right word since these two things work together more so than contrast
- “And sculpted to be everybody's great wall” “everyone’s” fit the flow better in my head
- “Wreck down my blocks” this was an awkward phrase
- “Out of the rubbish” You’re not even BRITISH this cultural APPROPRIATION! But really I didn’t like that word  
- “Where I will repair what tempest turned your bricks into” this was a very sloppy line because you wanted it to be in the song even when it didn’t work
- “where I'm used to grieve” hm
 

@ughgabriel & @keshaspearsxo - Don’t Forget to Water Me
If I had to choose one word to describe this song, it would be “extra”. Oddly enough, I don’t think your styles complimented like I initially thought they would; I think you’re both so similar that you created this echo chamber or feedback loop where you both got so contrived and melodramatic that you didn’t serve as a balance to counteract one another. As a result, the language was just so over the top that the fundamental stuff was completely lost at times. On top of that, the song felt repetitive after a while.
- “we owe to you our life” serve victorian English
- “Though we’ve witnessed your tears in every cyclone / And all of your drowned hope in hurricanes too” HOW did you both not realize “cyclones” and “hurricanes” are the same thing hjskgjd
- “I was awoke” this was a really weird verb to use, “awakened” would’ve been a lot less trite
- The 2nd stanza of the chorus is a good example of the over the top stuff: while the rest of the song was quite easy to pick up, the gardens bit lost me, and the first line was construed stylistically in a really weird way
- You guys seem to have contradicted yourself with “And the fault is all on us, yet some still look away” and “This is all down to me”. Whose fault is it? What IS the truth.gif?
- “The wounds we dig into the world cry “don’t forget to water me”” this line was the most melodramatic to me
 

@8thPrince - World Alone
You definitely reached a bit with this challenge. This wasn’t introspective in the slightest, and even with your explanation, I was completely lost by you creating this super specific, completely different world. There wasn’t any grounding to this piece, and it felt very poem like and really hard to grasp the fundamental story with the introduction of various different subjects. The style was still very 8th, which I assume was how you justify this being a self-portrait, but this was more of a miss for me.

 

@8thPrince & @Hug - Kite Without String
This served anime to me, like, in my head this played out as an anime short like Gabe’s entry from last week. With that said, I quite enjoyed this. I was a bit lost as to how this song was about writer’s block at first, but as the song went on the really clever, really beautiful metaphor started to come to the surface (the bridge was wiiiiiig). My only major criticism just goes back to the metaphor being lost a bit in the beginning, the double meaning wasn’t as clear there, if present at all. 
- “You fly over limbs” I get this tied in with “arm’s reach” but this felt a bit out of place and almost gross?

 

@Aurora - Pendulum
This was quite nice, I find it really hard not to enjoy such a tight meter, great vocab, and solid concept. That being said, you lost me in these places:
- “Within a paradox design” “Paradox” is a noun, not an adjective!
- “A forceful disillusion” a what?
- “Bold imagination, truth abandoned for a phantom / A fanciful solution holds me captive in this dance” what
- “She doesn’t care I want to feel” what
In addition, I felt like you kept the reader at arm’s distance from you still. You tried really hard to make it personal as you said in your description, but you covered a lot of what you talked about with metaphors and crazy language that I couldn’t grasp all of it. Still, this was another solid song and those issues were more minor.

 

@Aurora & @Temporal - Pyramid

[Citrus]

Reviews may be pushed back 30 minutes bc I'm sipping apple cider and getting my life to Carole King and she's a better writer than all of you 

[Jackson]

WOW thanks Hunter

 

I just remembered something else so lemme go back

[fountain]

- You guys seem to have contradicted yourself with “And the fault is all on us, yet some still look away” and “This is all down to me”. Whose fault is it? What IS the truth.gif?

 

wut? the fault is on everybody because we all contribute to things like global warming. when it says "this is all down to me" that is about trying to protect the world instead

[Jackson]

3 hours ago, swiftie13 said:

What even is a dogwood? *Googles* Ah, a pretty tree! Not a pretty word, though. I love the dichotomy between your entries, a really cool way to take advantage of writing two songs in one week. Overall this entry felt very wordy and not in a classic Citrus way where lines punch. The meter was perfect throughout but it really could have been condensed while saying the same thing. The chorus is GOR-GEE-OUS! It read like a real chorus and I could hear a melody while reading it. It also felt short and very, very sweet. The bridge felt a little blunt at times, sloppy even. There is a lot of emotional impact in this entry, so good job on that. I was honestly expecting so much more, though.

this is such a mess, you practically praise the song throughout the review and then "I was honestly expecting so much more"

 

what were you expecting? :D 

[ceremonials]

4 minutes ago, Citrus said:

Reviews may be pushed back 30 minutes bc I'm sipping apple cider and getting my life to Carole King and she's a better writer than all of you 

True

[Temporal]

9 minutes ago, Temporal said:

 

@Jackson - Night Drive
I really loved this. It was super sweet and your style was still really powerful while maintaining that puppy love feeling. My only larger comment on the piece would be that the conclusion in the bridge felt a bit weak - “Maybe we weren’t ready to live life in the sun” was good but the rest felt a bit meh - and a final punch there would’ve made this a knockout. 
- “Thought maybe we could run away on half a tank of dreams” this was a bit too ~~tumblr-y~~ for me (precisely “tank of dreams”)
- “Photophobic” wasn’t used as egregiously in this song as your first, but it was still a reach.   
 

@Jackson & @Citrus - Lake Erie
I’m kind of surprised by this entry for a few reasons, the largest of which being that stylistically, this felt very similar to your first entry. These entries were both kinda somber and remorseful and the storytelling aspect (this happened, these places were doing these things) was also very strong. I feel like because I read two of your songs in a row I was able to see the formula of your writing come through, which I did not like. At the same time however, I feel like you and Citrus’s styles didn’t mix as well this go around (disclaimer: I'm not scoring you off of "Vilomah"). There were some lines that were very straightforward and Citrus-y (“Don’t put me in the ground, my love, please don’t give me a grave”) and then there were some which had a really simple, condensable point was drawn out in a Jackson-y way (“We climbed atop the spiral stairs as harbors creaked below”). It didn’t feel consistent from line to line, though where you had more emotional lines such as the end of the chorus that didn’t feel as obvious. It either should’ve been blunt or it should’ve been poetic, not both. I wanted a lot more polish from this.
- “silver dogwoods” were really forced in there to fit the meter. 
- “The lake was calm and knowing like a ritual that night” a “ritual” is an example of something “knowing”?
- “day/bay” was not cute
- “Our bond survives as our minds grow weary” this was a really stiff phrase
- The switch at the end of the bridge was cute, and the alliteration you did with “r” sounds with “… free/ My starry lakeside lover, you’re my sweetest memory” was really nice though probably unintentional! 
 

@ceremonials - Dark Cousin
This title was a bit tragic sis “A dark cousin” was not haunting at all, and didn’t fit in with the rest of your style, PLUS WHY does it matter that the cousin is black  Racism confirmed! As for the song itself, it was kinda boring? I think you could do a lot with the subject matter of a panic attack, but writing about looking into a mirror isn’t something that has the content to sustain more than an interlude. It just felt like you were repeating yourself line after line, and there wasn’t any action or story to give the song any sense of direction. I did like your style, but unfortunately you didn’t give your style enough to work with this go around.
- You essentially wrote the same line twice with “A pair of somber hands existing just beneath the glass” and “There’s someone behind the glass.”
 

@ceremonials & @swiftie13 - Grave of the Fireflies
This was cute, but also not very Ceremonials interestingly enough. Not in a bad or good way, just an observation! Unfortunately, I don’t really know if this subject was the best use of the collab, since knowledge of the movie feels more mandatory with this. Not because the song was too vague without, but because that knowledge made the song pop out more than it would without that knowledge. My other major complaint was that some lyrics didn’t make sense, and feel placed in the song purely for the imagery or flowery language.
- “Over the cliff above the bay / Where the tide would call our name” not only have I read this exact couplet like 45 times, I’ve even written one  
- “I taught you to count fireflies” So basically you taught someone to count? Education chanteuse. No really though, this was awks.
- “If we build a grave for him / Then maybe he can still fly.”” this tugged me in a creepy way
- “The life you should’ve known” Huga is SUING
- ““It’s the ones that burn the brightest / That lose their fire first.”” I don’t know if you intended this to be a double entendre with “the good die young” but this was HAUNTING and I LOVED it. The outro was really nice as well.
 

@ughgabriel - the Architect
I’m sorry, but this was a surprisingly sloppy entry. I feel like you wrote this very quickly because there were so many spots that could’ve been fixed had you just reread this or read it aloud. I almost feel like a language barrier really cropped up here? Because even in your explanation(s) there were really glaring grammatical errors. There were a number of places where I felt that you were just tripping over your words in an attempt to keep up with your demanding style. 
- “Shaped as a martyr but seen as salvation” “but” wasn’t the right word since these two things work together more so than contrast
- “And sculpted to be everybody's great wall” “everyone’s” fit the flow better in my head
- “Wreck down my blocks” this was an awkward phrase
- “Out of the rubbish” You’re not even BRITISH this cultural APPROPRIATION! But really I didn’t like that word  
- “Where I will repair what tempest turned your bricks into” this was a very sloppy line because you wanted it to be in the song even when it didn’t work
- “where I'm used to grieve” hm
 

@ughgabriel & @keshaspearsxo - Don’t Forget to Water Me
If I had to choose one word to describe this song, it would be “extra”. Oddly enough, I don’t think your styles complimented like I initially thought they would; I think you’re both so similar that you created this echo chamber or feedback loop where you both got so contrived and melodramatic that you didn’t serve as a balance to counteract one another. As a result, the language was just so over the top that the fundamental stuff was completely lost at times. On top of that, the song felt repetitive after a while.
- “we owe to you our life” serve victorian English
- “Though we’ve witnessed your tears in every cyclone / And all of your drowned hope in hurricanes too” HOW did you both not realize “cyclones” and “hurricanes” are the same thing hjskgjd
- “I was awoke” this was a really weird verb to use, “awakened” would’ve been a lot less trite
- The 2nd stanza of the chorus is a good example of the over the top stuff: while the rest of the song was quite easy to pick up, the gardens bit lost me, and the first line was construed stylistically in a really weird way
- You guys seem to have contradicted yourself with “And the fault is all on us, yet some still look away” and “This is all down to me”. Whose fault is it? What IS the truth.gif?
- “The wounds we dig into the world cry “don’t forget to water me”” this line was the most melodramatic to me
 

@8thPrince - World Alone
You definitely reached a bit with this challenge. This wasn’t introspective in the slightest, and even with your explanation, I was completely lost by you creating this super specific, completely different world. There wasn’t any grounding to this piece, and it felt very poem like and really hard to grasp the fundamental story with the introduction of various different subjects. The style was still very 8th, which I assume was how you justify this being a self-portrait, but this was more of a miss for me.

 

@8thPrince & @Hug - Kite Without String
This served anime to me, like, in my head this played out as an anime short like Gabe’s entry from last week. With that said, I quite enjoyed this. I was a bit lost as to how this song was about writer’s block at first, but as the song went on the really clever, really beautiful metaphor started to come to the surface (the bridge was wiiiiiig). My only major criticism just goes back to the metaphor being lost a bit in the beginning, the double meaning wasn’t as clear there, if present at all. 
- “You fly over limbs” I get this tied in with “arm’s reach” but this felt a bit out of place and almost gross?

 

@Aurora - Pendulum
This was quite nice, I find it really hard not to enjoy such a tight meter, great vocab, and solid concept. That being said, you lost me in these places:
- “Within a paradox design” “Paradox” is a noun, not an adjective!
- “A forceful disillusion” a what?
- “Bold imagination, truth abandoned for a phantom / A fanciful solution holds me captive in this dance” what
- “She doesn’t care I want to feel” what
In addition, I felt like you kept the reader at arm’s distance from you still. You tried really hard to make it personal as you said in your description, but you covered a lot of what you talked about with metaphors and crazy language that I couldn’t grasp all of it. Still, this was another solid song and those issues were more minor.

 

@Aurora & @Temporal - Pyramid

 

bump

[Citrus]

1 minute ago, ceremonials said:

True

Didn't know you were a Carole stan, welcome to the finale

[Hug]

8 minutes ago, Temporal said:

@8thPrince & @Hug - Kite Without String
This served anime to me, like, in my head this played out as an anime short like Gabe’s entry from last week. With that said, I quite enjoyed this. I was a bit lost as to how this song was about writer’s block at first, but as the song went on the really clever, really beautiful metaphor started to come to the surface (the bridge was wiiiiiig). My only major criticism just goes back to the metaphor being lost a bit in the beginning, the double meaning wasn’t as clear there, if present at all. 
- “You fly over limbs” I get this tied in with “arm’s reach” but this felt a bit out of place and almost gross?

We weren't even trying for an anime style...or at least we never outright discussed making something like that. Maybe the thought was in the back of 8th's mind.  Also, yeah we didn't want to drop the bombshell immediately, but ease into the idea as it went on.

 

Also, wow the way I didn't even get the connection with limbs arms reach, but that's how you know that was 8th's doing kii. Although referring to branches as "limbs" isn't too far-fetched, I don't think. *dubtrackfrown*

[Citrus]

Jackson – Night Drive

These line lengths serve a me tea, but nobody died so it’s a flop impersonation. You’ve got some venerable intentions here, but your language is clunkier than I’m used to from you. This chorus is like a daydreamers version of a punk rock song I wrote about suburbia in my sophomore year of high school. It’s a very you chorus, which is good for a round like this. It’s just a tad underwhelming because it doesn’t say anything particularly new for the song, nor does it heighten/highlight the central tenets enough (imo). You have a penchant for description that is cuter in prose than lyrics (charcoal clouds, beaten tires), but that may just be your scholarship winning ACT English score showing. “The days belonged to longing and our secrets to the night” is a slay line, which I’m sure you knew. Overall, this is a cute song but not a fantastic one. The ideas of darkness shielding forbidden love, all that. It feels very trite and overdone, even though you do it very well. Still a good score, so don’t @ me.

 

Jackson and Citrus – Lake Erie

You ****ing ******, silver dogwoods is ugly, and whistling wind is a CLICHÉ.

 

Ceremonials – Dark Cousin

This is a very broody, moody, kind of song, which is a little different from you. Not that you don’t write bleak **** because you do, but this time your descriptive language matched the tone you were aiming for. I’m not generally a fan of using the same word for a rhyme twice in the same song, especially in close proximity (glass in chorus and verse 2). The thought behind this song and the imagery of a “dark cousin” is really quite stunning, I love the ideas you’re working with here. In practice, however, it becomes less relatable. It’s very…airy. Not in a sense that it’s stupid, but that it lacks a sense of corporeality (I think that’s a word?). Basically, it’s a little too head-y and lacks something the reader can latch onto. I know it seems blasé coming from me because all I can do are storytelling songs but, honestly, it’s very hard to draw someone in without having any human voice within the song. That’s what this one is lacking, and that’s why it sounds more like a poem as it is now.

 

Ceremonials and Swiftie – Grave of the Fireflies

What is with PHers and the need for adjectives that add nothing? Not this song that much (other than ‘distant plains’), just a trend in the last few I’ve read. The dialogue in the chorus is well-conceptualized but a little awkward. It’s difficult to have he said she said in song, especially as the thesis. It comes across as you not knowing what else to put down, especially since there wasn’t even a change in point of view – it’s second person the entire time. I talked to you about the “Your glance…Eyes were closed” line and I get it more, but I still think it’s best to avoid things that only make sense on a figurative level since people don’t listen figuratively on the first go round. Plus, it’s more fun when something has both a literal and a figurative meaning and they’re distinct. Overall, I appreciate this. I like when people try to write within self-imposed limits (trying to match with the film), but it didn’t work at the absolute best level here. It’s not as hard-hitting as it needs to be to match the bleakness of the film, so it sort of suffers as a result. IF you’re going to make a companion piece, it has to hold up alongside it. Even ignoring the film, it’s a little pedestrian. Good things were the meter and pacing of the song, and I enjoyed most of the verses.

 

[Citrus]

UghGabriel – The Architect

“I’ll petrify my pain inside my creations” is my vote for ARTPOP line of the semifinals, I’m living and cringing at the same time. Werk. Portions of this have some chunky lines and rhymes, the prechorus being the most blatant example. The leaving my shreds line was the hardest to fit in the flow, in particular. This awkwardness carries into the chorus. Your tendency to use some higher level vocabulary and formal wording makes it a little harder for things to flow smoothly in your songs. However, I LOVE the ”Still I always knew / That no palace was ever held by broken pillars / I will sustain you”, what a stellar set. It needed some help to flow but I don’t care because that’s gold. Your outro summed up the central points of the song better than the chorus imo, and I wish that brevity had been more observed throughout. You just need to trim some fat/forced wording. Using rhymes like “blueprints that I drew” with “absorb all my hues” is never not going to sound choppy. Overall, I liked the idea and you had some brilliant lil lines in there. Cons were the way that it flowed. It was less like a river and more like a rapid.

 

UghGabriel and keshaspearsxo – Don’t Forget to Water Me

No shade but how drunk were y’all when you decided on doing a hippie version of the Captain Planet theme song? I jest. The issues with this is that, like with Ceremonials’ Dark Cousin, it’s super hard to relate when a song is an idea without a human anchor. This reads like someone’s thoughts on the planet in an unfiltered, stream of consciousness way, but it doesn’t come together as neatly as I’d like. It’s not poorly written, it’s not clunky, it’s just…not a song. It’s a poem at best, and a diary entry at worse. There’s definitely some enigmatic style here, but you try to do too much with limited natural imagery and it comes across as very scattered.

 

8thPrince – World Alone

Not you stealing and classing up Katy’s plastic bag line “Like a bag without purpose…It can fly wherever the wind may go” I SEE you. A lot of you went the more metaphysical route with this challenge than the snapshot way, to middling degrees of success. This is well worded (even if it doesn’t flow as perfectly as I’ve come to expect from you), but it comes across a tad like a SparkNotes version of Leaves of Grass (which is my fave book of poetry, so all is not lost). My favorite aspect of it was how you really latched onto those seemingly unimportant but actually monumental moments in everyday life. I just wish you had capitalized on those, and really explored the feelings associated with them, as opposed to glossing over each one.

 

8thPrince and Hug – Kite Without String

You pretentious mother****ers. Cardinals are probably my favorite bird, I always used to see them on the hill in my backyard in the winters growing up. Gorgeous lil things. “Rooftops where smokestacks” is a very flabby phrase, but I can forgive it. I think the ‘kite without string’ is mentioned a tad too much, but it’s a cute line. Bye @ “we’re slaves to chance”, I bet y’all are those people who can’t write without inspiration. I really enjoyed this, overall. It’s not some huge, heavy, sauntering topic, but it works because you approached it artfully. It’s a little same-y throughout (in terms of the lack of a sense of development from start to finish), but that’s an 8thPrince kinda thing and it works in most cases so I’m not mad about it.

[Citrus]

Aurora – Pendulum

I think I actually hate you. The way you use language so easily is disgusting, especially when it’s this high level stuff. You’re like some annoying ass white math professor who raps about algorithms but actually has flow. You didn’t need the disclaimer on the song being too down or whatnot, because, honestly, I didn’t get a lot of the stuff you mentioned. I got the concept of wanting to feel things and being detached, but the more specific stuff you described never came up (nor was it necessary for my understanding of the song, I think). Your usage of all the great language and rhyme schemes hurt you a little here because it moves so rapidly that it’s a little hard to latch onto some key phrases and really get the emotion out of them. I’ve always enjoyed your work, and this isn’t an exception, but it’s too frenetic and shallow in the areas it wants to be deep and reflective.

 

Aurora and Temporal – Pyramid

I think this is the most “annoying kid in the honors class” thing I’ve read this season. When I saw that “Arabian” I got ready to CLOCK any inaccuracies about the Middle East, but you guys didn’t really use the region for anything other than some basic exoticization of pharaohs and belief systems (aka the way the rest of the world does it too lol!). This is a little preachy, and it being a political song doesn’t excuse that (see: Blowin’ in the Wind by Bob Dylan). You had a consistency to your imagery, but it was all so surface level (in terms of actually discussing Egyptian history/culture) that I was waiting for a mummy to pop up. You lost the humanizing aspect to this by focusing so much on your message (a Hillary Clinton tea, RIP), and, despite what other judges may claim/encourage, the humanistic appeal is the most important determinant of a song’s success. Technically flawless but emotionally hollow, this is a great song that focuses too much on artifice and showmanship.

[Citrus]

Sorry my reviews are ugly and shorter, but I wanted to make sure I got them in so we could have results tonight

[Hug]

25 minutes ago, Citrus said:

8thPrince and Hug – Kite Without String

 

You pretentious mother****ers. Cardinals are probably my favorite bird, I always used to see them on the hill in my backyard in the winters growing up. Gorgeous lil things. “Rooftops where smokestacks” is a very flabby phrase, but I can forgive it. I think the ‘kite without string’ is mentioned a tad too much, but it’s a cute line. Bye @ “we’re slaves to chance”, I bet y’all are those people who can’t write without inspiration. I really enjoyed this, overall. It’s not some huge, heavy, sauntering topic, but it works because you approached it artfully. It’s a little same-y throughout (in terms of the lack of a sense of development from start to finish), but that’s an 8thPrince kinda thing and it works in most cases so I’m not mad about it.

Pretentious?  And um, what does the write without inspiration line mean? We were lost for half of our writing session as to what to do, but I'm glad it came out as well as it did. "Sauntering" apparently means slow or relaxed. What does that mean in the context of this review. 

 

Also, the lack of development may be partly due to the fact that we only had 3 verses, and originally two were for verse one, and the bridge was for verse 2. We eventually split it up because we figured a shorter song with not-so-clunky lines would be better than trying for force out another 4-12 lines that just wouldn't be very good. The lines weren't always written for the purposes they were turned into.