tournament Golden Hit: Season 2 📀 Congratulations Hug! 🏆

[Remmy]

Still have plenty of work to do  and I wouldn't expect a slayful ending like I did last season!

[Galah]

1 hour ago, fountain said:

One more day to get those last submissions in for the final round of Golden Hit Season 2!

 

 

Challenge post:

https://atrl.net/forums/topic/411781-golden-hit-season-2-?-final-round-“mix-n-match”-pg-50-❌-2-days-to-submit/?do=findComment&comment=22561108

 

Submit here:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1IVm6w1wOKyJkwGRMVLhHai3G7pWC_qK6-OuO6qFjiD0/edit?edit_requested=true

 

 

@Achilles. @Allday @Augmented @beatinglikeadrum @Better Mistakes @camfuckingrockwell @DatChickDoe @Element @EpicSongFan @Gavin. @Jack! @JoeAg @Kylie Jenner @Legend E @Remmy @Temporal @TruGemini @worldwide angel

Woo final day! Let's finish off strong. 

[beatinglikeadrum]

Sorry but I doubt I will be able to send the song. Maybe I will try to write something free style in 15 minutes but I don't think I want to send something so rushed.

[fountain]

4 hours ago, beatinglikeadrum said:

Sorry but I doubt I will be able to send the song. Maybe I will try to write something free style in 15 minutes but I don't think I want to send something so rushed.

[worldwide angel]

song is almost done, how much time do we have left

[fountain]

18 minutes ago, worldwide angel said:

song is almost done, how much time do we have left

9 hours is when the deadline is up, but it’s fine if you need a little longer past that 

[worldwide angel]

18 minutes ago, fountain said:

9 hours is when the deadline is up, but it’s fine if you need a little longer past that 

submitted

[fountain]

31 minutes ago, worldwide angel said:

submitted

Thank you! 

[Hug]

I wonder if I could rank all my entries from the first two seasons of GH from favorite to least favorite

 

[C:\DIGITAL-DYSTOPIA] (feat. Alluring Name) > Welcome to the Club > RAVAGED > Maid of Windemere > Deep in the Expanse > The You I Remember (> Ride into the Night) > To Make a Man... > Edgelord & Savior > Lilith > Hug > Checkmate > mm

 

Although I really like everything except mm, that one is just not good  just for fun I'm gonna try to make a(s) cohesive (as I can) album track list with these songs, based off their themes and how I imagine they sound (and just how they sound for DD, RAVAGED, Maid of Windemere, and Ride into the Night)

 

(the slow-to-midtempo acoustic section)

1. Welcome to the Club

2. The You I Remember

3. Hug

(the radio-ready pop section)

4. Checkmate

5. To Make a Man...

6. Ride into the Night

(the blasphemy banger section -- RAVAGED is the bridge between the two sections)

7. RAVAGED

8. Edgelord & Savior

9. Lilith

10. [C:\DIGITAL-DYSTOPIA] (feat. Alluring Name)

(the try-hard art ho section -- DD is the bridge between the two sections)

11. Maid of Windemere

12. Deep in the Expanse

 

mm is the Target exclusive or something idk I like to forget I ever wrote it.

[fountain]

5 minutes ago, Hug said:

mm is the Target exclusive or something idk I like to forget I ever wrote it.

If it makes you feel better I couldn’t remember what it was. But, I looked it up! Definitely nicely written but I can absolutely see how it would be hard to form a connection with, since I’m assuming it was all hypothetical. 

[Hug]

2 minutes ago, fountain said:

If it makes you feel better I couldn’t remember what it was. But, I looked it up! Definitely nicely written but I can absolutely see how it would be hard to form a connection with, since I’m assuming it was all hypothetical. 

It's just so...different from my usual writing, and not in a good way. It'd be a stretch to even call it lyrics, when I'm typically known for having some of the more...well "lyrical" lyrics. It's a rhyming story that yes I completely made up.

[XO_Life]

EP Title: Grow Old With A Boy I Love

 

01. Evilist 

02. After Thoughts (Evilist Outro)

03. Terrors Of Love

04. Moonlight Healer

05. Regrowth Of A Heart

06. Grow Old With A Boy I Love

 

 

 

[beatinglikeadrum]

Sent somehow. Sad I will end up with such a song since my last entry was good.

[Julia Fox]

self made masterpiece - EP

 

 

1. vintage 

2. blurry 

3. no woman is no art

4. crying birds 

5. the knife that changed it all 

6. the last time i saw you

Edited October 2, 2022 by Julia Fox

[fountain]

Reminder just a few hours left to submit for the final round.

 

Challenge post:

https://atrl.net/forums/topic/411781-golden-hit-season-2-?-final-round-“mix-n-match”-pg-50-❌-2-days-to-submit/?do=findComment&comment=22561108

 

Submit here:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1IVm6w1wOKyJkwGRMVLhHai3G7pWC_qK6-OuO6qFjiD0/edit?edit_requested=true

 

 

@Achilles. @Allday @Better Mistakes @camfuckingrockwell @DatChickDoe @Element @EpicSongFan @Gavin. @Jack! @JoeAg @Kylie Jenner @Remmy @Temporal @TruGemini

 

[Julia Fox]

Here’s my full song if you are curious to read about it x I’m very proud of it so yeah here it is 

 

Quote

walking by the santiago streets at night 

I passed through at that old bar 

where we used to have a drink then ended up staying till sunrise 

it’s a karaoke night 

Thursday’s bar tradition

they are singing “ain’t no mountain high”

people cheering, calling me to cry

the lights blurring my vision with teary eyes  

reminiscing times that will never be back

as your shadow appears at first sight on my mind

 

chorus:

where did you go that day?

you never tell me the damage

I would have provided some help

or even give you space if you needed it then

or if I do some blame

or if somebody else’s came

communication’s importance 

acting with some prudence 

i thought i treated you gently

maybe i thought it wrongly 

or maybe i just smoked too much cigarettes 

you never tell me anything to make me understand 

what it hurts the most of this hell

is that you’ll never come back to life, babe 

 

second chorus: 

maybe if I would have read your mind 

the day you decided to end all

i was working but i would have answer a call

and maybe you wouldn’t took that knife

the knife that changed it all

took your life and change mine 

and i wouldn’t had waited 3 hours for you to open the door of the apartment

screaming and cursing you cause’ i forgot the keys

and you knew it so you could be in peace 

doing what you did to yourself to shut the demons inside your head

but then i opened the door and saw you laying there with your deep eyes paralyzed

 

our bed is not gonna be in heat

and the books that you had to read 

what the **** i do with them?

i can’t put them in your grave

wish i could fix the past 

you were all that i had 

now none of my wishes will come true 

because they all involved you

 

you are so selfish to left me here alone and 

I’m so selfish to blame you when instead I would had prevent

or maybe the control wasn’t in us 

why am i decoding this like if it could make you revive? 

that would be ideal because I’ll miss you with all my heart

 

third chorus:

I’m still wearing our ring 

I still see you in my dreams 

And in them we are still that messy team

fighting when we feel stressed and 

end up kissing after eating chocolates 

crying thinking about our long dark past times 

listening to oldies and slow dancing to them in the morning with the cats begging us to be feed

while making plans that will never see the light of day

naming imaginary kids that we’ll raise 

thinking about living far away from there

being happy till death tear us apart

and really miss death ******* meant that 

 

don’t you think that we could be finally happy in the afterlife?

hope that you are waiting for me the day I die, ivan 

 

 

[Legend E]

lettuce see if i get a decent score with my entry and then i'll make my album  

[JoeAg]

oh f*ck i’m so sorry i have had a case of the massively empties today and i just got back from rehearsal. lemme do this. sorry again, i know i keep doing this

[Jackson]

4 hours ago, Julia Fox said:

self made masterpiece - EP

 

 

1. vintage 

2. blurry 

3. no woman is no art

4. crying birds 

5. the knife that changed it all 

6. the last time i saw you

kinda stanning these titles seeing them all grouped together in an EP 

[Remmy]

been working on this for like, the past 2 hours nn... still have a bit to do.

also don't forget I'm PST so while the deadline has past, it's not 11:59 for me yet

[Jackson]

 

I'm anticipating an extremely busy week at work this week, so I've been working on reviews slowly over the weekend to try to get ahead of the deadline. Hopefully this is a nice surprise review release for those that submitted earlier in the week! I'm glad to say this has been another solid round! I plan on updating this post if/as more entries come in, so please keep submitting if you're working on something or feeling inspired!

 

 

 

@hurricane326 – Your Name
You’re back! This piece had everything I love about your writing – I love the way you can take something so common and simple and say it in such a beautiful way. This was immediately evident in “The heavens reaching down to Earth to sprinkle morning dew/I knew it would be an indoor day that wouldn’t take the ache away”. There were a few other standout lines here – I really liked “My mind will play its tricks on me/The keeper of their names”. The emotions here are very tangible, and I appreciate the storyline told through changing light and seasons. My one bit of advice – you’ve used seasons as a storytelling mechanism in a few of your songs this season. Try to play with different ways to portray the passing of time. I still think you’ve executed your story well this round, so it’s not a major issue. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know your writing this season. You’re undoubtedly an incredibly gifted writer, so I’m glad to see you end the season with a song like this.

@XO_Life – Evilist
I agree that this is the most ambitious, distinctive song you’ve written yet – a very welcome change after last week’s missteps. I like how you opened your song with a small spoken portion. Having various parts sung, rapped, and talked was a creative way to draw contrast between the sections of the song, and I thought it worked well. Your chorus was my favorite part of the song. Even though you altered lyrics in each chorus, you kept each one interesting, and the repeat “evilist, you narcissist/egotist” hook was super catchy. I initially thought each verse could work as a rap section, but you really showed off your bars in verse three with the internal rhyming and wordplay – I just wish it was longer considering it would’ve been maybe 15 seconds if rapped. I also appreciated how you repeated lines from each chorus at the end of the song. The song was strong enough on its own that I didn’t think the outro song was totally necessary, but I appreciate the ambition and it did add some additional color to the entry. This was probably my favorite song of yours this season – way to end on a high note!

@Hug – Deep in the Expanse
Wow, almost perfection. Leaving your best song for last, how iconic. In a way, writing a song about how you have nothing to write about is an interesting reflection on your journey this season – you’ve written about some well-explored topics, some quite original ones, and now about having nothing to write about. It’s difficult to write something metaphorical and poetic while still retaining the raw emotion behind it, but I think you pulled it off here. You make the place in your mind that you can’t escape feel real rather than figurative, which just adds to the weight of the lyrics. Since I can’t highlight individual lines I loved, just know that pretty much all of them were excellent. I can only say that I loved this so many ways – you’ve written something truly special this week.

@Euterpe – My New Birthday
This is definitely camp! Admittedly, I’m not a huge Halloween person but I can appreciate a fun, holiday themed song. It was a pretty fun read, even if not the most emotionally gripping, but I don’t think that’s necessary for every song. The second chorus especially was incredibly enjoyable – I loved “Ripping apart like prickly pins/The only one who knew/Was the moon, sky, and darkest night too”. There were a few forced rhymes, notably “galore/bore” and “leaving/breathing”. The spoken sections were also a bit jarring for me personally, but perhaps they just added to the campy, unserious nature of the song. This may not be my favorite song from you this season, but it feels like you had a lot of fun writing it, and that really came across – so in that way I’d deem it a success!

@Julia Fox – the knife that changed it all
This is probably one of the most emotionally raw songs I’ve read this entire season – even realizing that it isn’t entirely autobiographical, as you state in your additional information, it feels very personal and real, and that shows the level of skill you possess. The level of emotion crescendos dramatically throughout the song until the very last line. As I’ve said in the past, I love the way you include tiny moments and details in your songs that seem insignificant individually but work beautifully in the storyline to build emotion. My favorite of these is “and i wouldn’t had waited 3 hours for you to open the door of the apartment/screaming and cursing you cause’ i forgot the keys”. I’m glad you toned down some of the more abstract metaphors – I don’t think the song was missing anything without them, and it kept the lyrics more raw. There were a few distracting grammatical errors, most notably “in heat” (look up what that means if you don’t know), but overall I thought this was one of, if not the best song you’ve submitted this season.

@Legend E – Creating Oceans (The Book)
Writing a song about writing a story was a unique choice – I think it worked well given the structure of your song. While it still felt lyrical, there was a strong storytelling element here. I also should note that everything here made sense to me. In past rounds, there have often been moments were I didn’t quite catch onto your metaphors without reading your additional information, but your language here was quite accessible. The strongest part of this entry were the lyrics discussing the writing of the story, or metaphorical links between the story and the friendship. The titular line is probably my favorite. The birthday/cake lines didn’t feel entirely necessary – I think there could have been more compelling settings to portray the ending of the friendship, although I did appreciate the gift bit. It was perhaps a bit of a wasted opportunity to write in such a storybook-type way, as I think this missed some of the magic of your more metaphorical, songlike writing, but it did satisfy fountain’s challenge well. You continued to showcase your songwriting talents here, and I’ve seen a lot of growth from you this season. Great job overall.

@worldwide angel – nevermore
This is quite a different tone from most of your material this season, and I appreciate that willingness to take a risk, especially in the final round. The unabashed vitriol is tangible from the first “I hope you choke”. Structurally, I like how you approached the challenge. Using meter to portray a sense of repetition while using completely different lyrics was a smart way to ensure your song still felt lyrical while adding a more free-flowing, poetic element. After reading your other information section and then reading through the lyrics a second time, I don’t pick up on anything that specifically links the theme to generational trauma or familial rage. I think this could work just as well as a song about an abusive relationship or a strained friendship. I think adding some specific details or references to family members would have strengthened the emotional resonance even more. There’s definitely a time for writing universal songs that readers can insert themselves into, but I think this is a piece that would have benefitted from additional depth and detail. Regardless, you came into this game with a fully formed, skilled style of writing, and I’ve come to look forward to your entries – a potential future winner, perhaps?

@Augmented – The Surrender
Not you essentially surrendering in your other information section – how meta. Obviously, this is fairly short, and you mentioned that you didn’t really have the opportunity to write something you considered a full song. I think this does work as a sort of interlude – not necessarily the conclusion to a trilogy you were originally aiming for, but a bridge to a more confessional song. Despite the length of this, it actually does a great job of building tension, and I can feel the anxiety and anticipation building. From a challenge standpoint, it seems as if there’s three different voices portrayed here. I think the first two are fairly similar, and seem to be representing the same person, but the mom dialogue, even if brief, showcased exactly what I was looking for, as it allowed the song to leave your head and become a more tangible conversation. I think this is the start of something great – it’s obviously not finished, but I hope you do finish it. I’d love to see it if you do, assuming you’re at least marginally satisfied with it.

@beatinglikeadrum – alcohol dependence syndrome/abandoned child syndrome
Not your rushed entry being over 700 words you know you don’t HAVE to write that much. Despite the length, it didn’t feel overly cumbersome due to the conversational, storytelling nature of the song. The line lengths, long sections, and lack of structure made this feel like less of a song, but it perfectly fits fountain’s challenge, so I can’t fault you for it! I think having two perspectives added a lot of depth to the story. Showing two siblings that responded very differently to the same trauma was a great way to show some of the intricacies associated with growing up in an abusive environment. My favorite line was “Like Jesus, you changed the water from your tears into deceptive wine” – this was a fascinating way to reinforce the alcoholism theme. I do think there was a lot that could have been cut or edited here, particularly in the second verse, but it was a fairly solid entry for something you described as rushed. I think you may be the contestant that’s shown the most growth this season, so I hope you’ve enjoyed participating as much as I’ve enjoyed seeing your progression.

@TruGemini – Applause
If anyone was going to attempt every challenge, we thought it would be you – and I’m happy to see you go for it! I think anyone could have found a way to cobble together an entry with traces of each challenge, but your approach was truly ambitious. I think each challenge provided a bit of strength to your entry. While the formal rap section was pretty brief, I could see the majority of this song being rapped due to the longer line lengths and meter of the song. While I could see this being an internal dialogue from the beginning, I still think having two voices allowed the song to have some emotional variety and kept things interesting despite the length of the song. While the varied choruses and free structure fit 8th and fountain’s challenges, this still had a very lyrical element to it, which I appreciated. I liked how the shortest, most melodic section of the song came at the end. It’s an unusual place to put a hook, but I think it was a great place to tie together the song and leave a lasting impression. There were some places that felt less necessary to the story, and the self-empowerment theme bordered on cheesy at times, but I think the scope, ambition, and delivery of this displayed a near mastery of your craft. I’m happy to see you go out on a season best.

 

@Remmy – Being Myself
Strangely, I don’t think I’ve seen a showtune submitted in one of these tournaments before. It was certainly an original take on the challenge! I think your chorus was quite strong, and I especially enjoyed the title line. I’ll admit that I’m not a huge musical person myself, but this absolutely fits into that type of format, from the over the top emotions to the kitschy self-empowerment themes. Because of that, it’s not incredibly believable as a self-empowerment song, but quite believable as something that fits into a play. It may not be my favorite song you’ve submitted this season, but it’s incredibly original and was quite fun to read!

@JoeAg – Eleventh Hour
If I had a quarter for every song this season that used the word “mote”, I would have three quarters. But it’s interesting that they would all come from you. Anyway – I loved the premise of this song. Not to make this review about me, but growing up in an extremely religious household, God was always a source of fear for me. As I’ve grown older, I’ve realized that “God” isn’t necessarily one being, but each individual’s higher power that they call upon for strength or comfort or when something doesn’t make sense. Using something that typically invokes pain for most queer people as a sign of hope was refreshing. I feel like your second stanza was perhaps a bit of a reaction to all of our reviews saying we have no idea wtf you’re ever talking about, but I understood the “he” to be God before I got to that line, actually, so great job building a world and inviting us into it. Everything here actually made a lot of sense to me, and I felt like each line built up a piece of the story. Beyond the calls to a deity, the idea of wanting to run away despite not knowing how a parent will react to their child’s sexuality was also well written, and quite relatable. Honestly, I found a lot of this song to be extremely relatable – I could see myself in a good portion of the lyrics, even when they didn’t directly apply. I think that’s a sign of your strength in both writing emotive lyrics and storytelling. You and Julia Fox both have a similarly strong ability to add color through hyper-specific references, and I think you both took that ability to new levels this week. Lines like “we lay there, aroused, freezing our asses off” and “we’ll **** off to the southwest” are things only you could pull off, and I absolutely adore them in the context of the song. I’ve quite enjoyed most of your songs this season, but this is my absolute favorite. It has your trademark intellectualism and quirkiness, but it also has a unique sense of refinement and elegance. Very well done.
 

 

[fountain]

21 minutes ago, Jackson said:

 

I'm anticipating an extremely busy week at work this week, so I've been working on reviews slowly over the weekend to try to get ahead of the deadline. Hopefully this is a nice surprise review release for those that submitted earlier in the week! I'm glad to say this has been another solid round! I plan on updating this post if/as more entries come in, so please keep submitting if you're working on something or feeling inspired!

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

@hurricane326 – Your Name
You’re back! This piece had everything I love about your writing – I love the way you can take something so common and simple and say it in such a beautiful way. This was immediately evident in “The heavens reaching down to Earth to sprinkle morning dew/I knew it would be an indoor day that wouldn’t take the ache away”. There were a few other standout lines here – I really liked “My mind will play its tricks on me/The keeper of their names”. The emotions here are very tangible, and I appreciate the storyline told through changing light and seasons. My one bit of advice – you’ve used seasons as a storytelling mechanism in a few of your songs this season. Try to play with different ways to portray the passing of time. I still think you’ve executed your story well this round, so it’s not a major issue. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know your writing this season. You’re undoubtedly an incredibly gifted writer, so I’m glad to see you end the season with a song like this.

@XO_Life – Evilist
I agree that this is the most ambitious, distinctive song you’ve written yet – a very welcome change after last week’s missteps. I like how you opened your song with a small spoken portion. Having various parts sung, rapped, and talked was a creative way to draw contrast between the sections of the song, and I thought it worked well. Your chorus was my favorite part of the song. Even though you altered lyrics in each chorus, you kept each one interesting, and the repeat “evilist, you narcissist/egotist” hook was super catchy. I initially thought each verse could work as a rap section, but you really showed off your bars in verse three with the internal rhyming and wordplay – I just wish it was longer considering it would’ve been maybe 15 seconds if rapped. I also appreciated how you repeated lines from each chorus at the end of the song. The song was strong enough on its own that I didn’t think the outro song was totally necessary, but I appreciate the ambition and it did add some additional color to the entry. This was probably my favorite song of yours this season – way to end on a high note!

@Hug – Deep in the Expanse
Wow, almost perfection. Leaving your best song for last, how iconic. In a way, writing a song about how you have nothing to write about is an interesting reflection on your journey this season – you’ve written about some well-explored topics, some quite original ones, and now about having nothing to write about. It’s difficult to write something metaphorical and poetic while still retaining the raw emotion behind it, but I think you pulled it off here. You make the place in your mind that you can’t escape feel real rather than figurative, which just adds to the weight of the lyrics. Since I can’t highlight individual lines I loved, just know that pretty much all of them were excellent. I can only say that I loved this so many ways – you’ve written something truly special this week.

@Euterpe – My New Birthday
This is definitely camp! Admittedly, I’m not a huge Halloween person but I can appreciate a fun, holiday themed song. It was a pretty fun read, even if not the most emotionally gripping, but I don’t think that’s necessary for every song. The second chorus especially was incredibly enjoyable – I loved “Ripping apart like prickly pins/The only one who knew/Was the moon, sky, and darkest night too”. There were a few forced rhymes, notably “galore/bore” and “leaving/breathing”. The spoken sections were also a bit jarring for me personally, but perhaps they just added to the campy, unserious nature of the song. This may not be my favorite song from you this season, but it feels like you had a lot of fun writing it, and that really came across – so in that way I’d deem it a success!

@Julia Fox – the knife that changed it all
This is probably one of the most emotionally raw songs I’ve read this entire season – even realizing that it isn’t entirely autobiographical, as you state in your additional information, it feels very personal and real, and that shows the level of skill you possess. The level of emotion crescendos dramatically throughout the song until the very last line. As I’ve said in the past, I love the way you include tiny moments and details in your songs that seem insignificant individually but work beautifully in the storyline to build emotion. My favorite of these is “and i wouldn’t had waited 3 hours for you to open the door of the apartment/screaming and cursing you cause’ i forgot the keys”. I’m glad you toned down some of the more abstract metaphors – I don’t think the song was missing anything without them, and it kept the lyrics more raw. There were a few distracting grammatical errors, most notably “in heat” (look up what that means if you don’t know), but overall I thought this was one of, if not the best song you’ve submitted this season.

@Legend E – Creating Oceans (The Book)
Writing a song about writing a story was a unique choice – I think it worked well given the structure of your song. While it still felt lyrical, there was a strong storytelling element here. I also should note that everything here made sense to me. In past rounds, there have often been moments were I didn’t quite catch onto your metaphors without reading your additional information, but your language here was quite accessible. The strongest part of this entry were the lyrics discussing the writing of the story, or metaphorical links between the story and the friendship. The titular line is probably my favorite. The birthday/cake lines didn’t feel entirely necessary – I think there could have been more compelling settings to portray the ending of the friendship, although I did appreciate the gift bit. It was perhaps a bit of a wasted opportunity to write in such a storybook-type way, as I think this missed some of the magic of your more metaphorical, songlike writing, but it did satisfy fountain’s challenge well. You continued to showcase your songwriting talents here, and I’ve seen a lot of growth from you this season. Great job overall.

@worldwide angel – nevermore
This is quite a different tone from most of your material this season, and I appreciate that willingness to take a risk, especially in the final round. The unabashed vitriol is tangible from the first “I hope you choke”. Structurally, I like how you approached the challenge. Using meter to portray a sense of repetition while using completely different lyrics was a smart way to ensure your song still felt lyrical while adding a more free-flowing, poetic element. After reading your other information section and then reading through the lyrics a second time, I don’t pick up on anything that specifically links the theme to generational trauma or familial rage. I think this could work just as well as a song about an abusive relationship or a strained friendship. I think adding some specific details or references to family members would have strengthened the emotional resonance even more. There’s definitely a time for writing universal songs that readers can insert themselves into, but I think this is a piece that would have benefitted from additional depth and detail. Regardless, you came into this game with a fully formed, skilled style of writing, and I’ve come to look forward to your entries – a potential future winner, perhaps?

@Augmented – The Surrender
Not you essentially surrendering in your other information section – how meta. Obviously, this is fairly short, and you mentioned that you didn’t really have the opportunity to write something you considered a full song. I think this does work as a sort of interlude – not necessarily the conclusion to a trilogy you were originally aiming for, but a bridge to a more confessional song. Despite the length of this, it actually does a great job of building tension, and I can feel the anxiety and anticipation building. From a challenge standpoint, it seems as if there’s three different voices portrayed here. I think the first two are fairly similar, and seem to be representing the same person, but the mom dialogue, even if brief, showcased exactly what I was looking for, as it allowed the song to leave your head and become a more tangible conversation. I think this is the start of something great – it’s obviously not finished, but I hope you do finish it. I’d love to see it if you do, assuming you’re at least marginally satisfied with it.

@beatinglikeadrum – alcohol dependence syndrome/abandoned child syndrome
Not your rushed entry being over 700 words you know you don’t HAVE to write that much. Despite the length, it didn’t feel overly cumbersome due to the conversational, storytelling nature of the song. The line lengths, long sections, and lack of structure made this feel like less of a song, but it perfectly fits fountain’s challenge, so I can’t fault you for it! I think having two perspectives added a lot of depth to the story. Showing two siblings that responded very differently to the same trauma was a great way to show some of the intricacies associated with growing up in an abusive environment. My favorite line was “Like Jesus, you changed the water from your tears into deceptive wine” – this was a fascinating way to reinforce the alcoholism theme. I do think there was a lot that could have been cut or edited here, particularly in the second verse, but it was a fairly solid entry for something you described as rushed. I think you may be the contestant that’s shown the most growth this season, so I hope you’ve enjoyed participating as much as I’ve enjoyed seeing your progression.

@TruGemini – Applause
If anyone was going to attempt every challenge, we thought it would be you – and I’m happy to see you go for it! I think anyone could have found a way to cobble together an entry with traces of each challenge, but your approach was truly ambitious. I think each challenge provided a bit of strength to your entry. While the formal rap section was pretty brief, I could see the majority of this song being rapped due to the longer line lengths and meter of the song. While I could see this being an internal dialogue from the beginning, I still think having two voices allowed the song to have some emotional variety and kept things interesting despite the length of the song. While the varied choruses and free structure fit 8th and fountain’s challenges, this still had a very lyrical element to it, which I appreciated. I liked how the shortest, most melodic section of the song came at the end. It’s an unusual place to put a hook, but I think it was a great place to tie together the song and leave a lasting impression. There were some places that felt less necessary to the story, and the self-empowerment theme bordered on cheesy at times, but I think the scope, ambition, and delivery of this displayed a near mastery of your craft. I’m happy to see you go out on a season best.


 
 

 

I hope it goes smoothly

[Remmy]

1 hour ago, Remmy said:

been working on this for like, the past 2 hours nn... still have a bit to do.

also don't forget I'm PST so while the deadline has past, it's not 11:59 for me yet

i know you're all on the edge of your seats waiting for an update

 

almost done!  i think

[Hug]

Oh...!

 

I don't know if fountain told you this part Jackson but I was originally serious about not wanting reviews because I was anticipating being told "This was a disappointing way to end the season..." as I personally felt like what I wrote was terrible (before taking a step back to stop focusing on my worst thoughts and realizing it wasn't anywhere as bad as I was imagining), and after having two really good weeks I just feeling like **** about it kfjdf

 

I had writer's block pretty bad this week, and that frustration led to Deep in the Expanse, which was really just me venting to myself in lyric form, so to get a glowing review for it...I am in shock!

 

Thank you for the positive feedback the me that sent a few days ago appreciates it  

 

Oh, and idk if any of the other judges are lurking but I don't wanna annoy y'all with pings. If you happen to be lurking, I do consent to having parts of my lyrics posted publicly. I was just in my feelings when I sent in the form.  

[Legend E]

Oh thank you  I included the birthday part cause it is actually real and I will always complain how, in general, my birthdays have been some of the worst days ever