Coming or Going?
Note on the challenge: Definitely my favorite aspect to this round of songs is how you all used palindromes in your song. Not only did you employ true pure palindromes (ex. A man, a plan, a canal: Panama), you all meditated on the intrinsic essence of a palindrome, and applied it to your songs in myriad ways. This challenge is a bit more quantifiable than the previous two, so my methods for ranking are going to be a bit more involved than a checklist. When evaluating the songs, I looked into both the quantity and quality of the palindromes used. If you had your song full of palindromes on the letter, word, and line level, and also used a palindromic chord progression, melody, and song form, I was more likely to rank that highly. However, if your song revolved around one (1) really clever palindrome and seamlessly wove it into an amazing song in a way that gave the music and the lyrics higher meaning, you also would be ranked really highly! On the flip side, if you stuffed your song chockablock full of palindromes, but they don't make much sense together or were really simple, your rankings fell. It’s not enough to show me that you know what a palindrome is - I also needed to see that you could use them in interesting ways. That said - a few of you used line unit palindromes, and all ran into the same issue: the lines basically said the same thing whether you read them forwards or backwards. Yes, it technically counts, but the magic of a reverse the lines poem is how when you read it in reverse, it takes on a completely different meaning (here are some great examples: https://www.heart.co.uk/news/quirky/reverse-poems-that-confuse-amaze-wonder/ ). In fact, some of them are less a reverse lines poem, and more a series of detached lines, where it doesn't really matter what order they go in. In my evaluations, this kind of ’palindrome’ gets you an acknowledgement, but no points.
Also as an obligatory disclaimer, all of these songs were fun to listen to, and I had a blast listening to and judging them. If you got ranked lowly, it's not necessarily a reflection on you as a musician, just that we are halfway through and competition is getting fierce!
All the Robots: Loving the abundance of internal rhyming throughout the song. I’m diggin the subtle use of accordion in my right ear. Great guitar solo - those rapid notes are incredible! Is that a live recording, or quantized midi? Either way, it’s great. The music is so peppy! So fun! So tongue in cheek! You’d neve know it was a break song. I love that kind of juxtaposition. Minor complaints: you don’t really enunciate the “-LD” in OLD, so for the longest time i thought you were saying, “make me weak and oh!” Of course, that made the palindrome make less sense. Once I read the lyrics, I got it! But for those of us who don't read the lyrics right away, make sure to put a little more intentionality into your consonants. In addition, I love the harmonizing vocals in the chorus, but I never heard them until I put on my fancy headphones. With my love of vocal harmonies, i would like you to please bump up the backing vocals in the mix, even just a little bit. Love the palindrome! I haven't heard that one before, so the novelty gets you extra points ( you know, if you weren't a shadow).
Also in Blue: First, let's get this out of the way: The alarm sound at the end of the song gave me a heart attack the first time I listened to this, because it is the same sound that dragged me out of sleep all through middle and high school, and it still makes me jump on each listen. Now, I LOVED the palindrome guitar lick; it’s invigorating, fun, and makes me want to dance out of bed. The backing vocals are (as I have come to expect) gorgeous, and each time they come in is a really special moment. Of course, the main vocals are also beautiful. I dunno if the buttery smoothness of your voice comes from filters and effects, or if it's just god’s gift to my ears. The way you sing, “It’s MOOOOORRRNing again,” after the solo is spectacular. That stanza, which sounds a bit like a bridge, is probably my favorite part of the song - it’s a really nice change of pace. I love the form of this song - it’s not a palindrome, but it is atypical, and creates a nice backdrop for the palindrome of the reversed lines. Speaking of the reversed lines, unfortunately you fall into the trap I mentioned in my intro- reversing the poem doesn’t really give us any new meaning or insights. Too bad! You do get bolstered by the other palindromes in the song, particularly the musical ones, so fortunately it didn’t hurt you too badly.
Cavedwellers: Love love LOVE the opening vocal. It is perfectly panned; I feel like I am surrounded by a choir of Truth. The music to this song strikes a really good balance between mainstream music patterns and the polyrhythmic smorgasbord of sound you guys often deliver. That is to say, I love the complicated musicality of this song, and also I would not be surprised if I heard this on the radio. This is exemplified in the gamelan bookends - a great choice. The guitars are phenomenal; I really love the sound you achieve on the solo/chorus melody reprise. More on the mix: I love how in the second chorus, you bring in the various layers of vocals one by one to create a really awesome build. The organ synth acts as a subtle magnifier of when the mix reaches a fever pitch, and you have several of these peaks which ebb and then come back stronger the next time around - an effect I think is really well executed. Thank you for itemizing your palindromes, but if you think I’m taking a dictation of this song to find all the melodic palindromes, you’ve got another think coming. Speaking of palindromes not mentioned in the bio, I did notice that in the bridge, the placement of the palindrome in the lyrics IS a palindrome, and that made me happy. Here’s what I did not like: First and foremost, the backward chimes. I like it in theory, love the concept of using backwards audio as a palindrome (see the next review), but the frequency range is in the exact spot that makes my ear feel like it's being stabbed with an ice pick. It literally hurts to listen to. Now, I realize this is a specific thing I experience in terms of how my cochlea reacts to sound, so I’m going to try not to hold it against you too much, but it did diminish my enjoyment of the song a bit. Forwards, the sound didn't bother me so much. Other complaints are minor - some of the delivery of lyrics is awkward and doesn’t flow (ex. “Especially yours truly”); and the bridge lyrics seem to just be a bunch of words with palindromes thrown together rather than a continuation of the story the song is telling. Otherwise, great song. Love the variety of palindromes (I think you are one of only two songs that uses phonetic palindromes), the singability of the song, the excellent orchestration. Please send me a version without the ackwards triangle that I can add to my music collection.
Cybronica: Me! Most of my thoughts about this are in the song bio - I wanted to sing french, so I did. Thoughts for next time: bring up the volume of the backwards french, and center the panning when switching halves to avoid the click when it switches ears. Also, apologies to anyone who speaks french - I haven't practiced in a while!
David G Harrington: I’ll be blunt, this isn’t my favorite song in the batch to listen to, but my enjoyment of it seriously elevated when I read the lyrics, which are beautifully written. It’s a great sentiment, and the inherent meter and poetry of the text is beautiful. I was really surprised by how much I liked the lyrics (note- I dont usually hear the lyrics right away, so my surprise comes from my overall first impressions of the song, not because I think you write crappy lyrics. That clearly is not the case!). So now I’m trying to analyze why I didn’t like it, because I thought it was the lyrics - the music is peppy, the orchestration is fun, and it's played well; it’s not the music. So here’s my conclusion: I think it’s a combination of the vocal delivery and extremely repetitive nature of the melody. The vocal delivery is different from your previous songs; it sounds pinched particularly in the chorus, like you're putting strain on the vocal folds, and that feeling is compounded by how you sep ar ate ev ry syl la ble instead of letting the words flow in a musical line (You get close to this in the bridge). Also, the backing vocals are cloying; I dont think they line up super well. Try singing them in your regular voice instead of falsetto and mix them quietly in the background. Your bass playing is awesome, sounds fabulous.
The Dutch Widows: Your lyrics are a nonsensical collection of pleasing phonemes surrounding a truly impressive collection of palindromes. I have to agree- they are ‘crowbarred’ in there! I really thought “I tip away a wapiti” was in a different language until I read the lyrics. Something about the nonsensical lyrics combined with your accent which is different from what I am used to hearing fooling my ear. Good news is, my ear enjoyed the strange combination of sounds you were making. I love the perfect [ö] you get on ‘blood’ in the first line. I could have really done without the “FORWARDS/BACKWARDS” call outs, but I dont know what you would have replaced them with, so take that thought with a grain of salt. I don’t mind the silliness of the lyrics, as it seems your whole point in the song is that palindromes are silly (its true! That’s why theyre fun!). The reversed chord progression is pretty awesome, and I’m delighted how long it was yet still worked in reverse.
EmKayDeeBee: Love the shanty feel of this song (very topical), love how you were inspired by the phonetic palindrome of palindrome itself. I find it interesting how you worked into the lyrics various almost palindromes. you did the slant rhyme equivalent of a palindrome, which I hadn’t thought of, but am tickled by its presence. If you had don't only those, I would have marked you off, but the form of your song and lyrics is a palindrome, as is the title, and the chorus is an extremely catchy word level palindrome, so your bases are covered. Speaking of extremely catchy, I’ve found myself singing this all week, so extra points for being stuck in my head. Extra points also for being enjoyably stuck in my head. I love the accordion (very stylistic), the violin and harp interludes (which are palindromed in terms of placement!), and the hard panned bass drums. This is a fun song, I love listening to it. Good work!
GGS: Man what a great song. Your voice sounds amazing on this. I love how well supported your voice is throughout the song - even on the quieter parts (the verses), you keep a healthy balance on your breathing apparatus allowing for pure phonation, no breathiness in sight (sound?), even though you're using a mic! This healthy phonation also gives you tasteful vibrato, which I am always a fan of. The layering of backing vocals is excellent. The orchestration is great, love the balance of guitars, and the palindrome is featured, but not too repetitive. When you have the word level palindromes, it works amazing well and is excellent crafted, but the line level palindromes have the same issue as many other songs: they mean the same thing forwards and backwards, so flipping it in reverse doesn’t give us much of a change. :/ That said, the ‘ all my giving ‘ stanza is one of my fav lyrics in all the songs. Great song. Love the ominous drones, the exposed picking, the dramatic shifts in dynamics.
Hot Pink Halo: I like the hard panned intro as the various elements come in. That and the complementary outro are what really makes this song special. As far as the lyrics go, same issue as mentioned in my forward above: they mean the same thing forwards and backwards, so flipping it in reverse doesn’t give us much of a change, either in meaning or in effect. I like the lyrical concept, but I dont think I would have gotten it without the song bio. Your singing on this is really great, and I love the color shift from “Searching for the Minotaur” to “ I hear the roar “. The minotaur line is super well supported, and the rest of the singing is similarly well done. I think you tend to shy away from your consonants, though, particularly liquid and nasal consonants. I would recommend incorporating into your routine some exercises that are exclusively on [n], [m], [ng], and [L]. Note- not na na na/ma ma ma/la la la, I mean just singing scales/patterns/whole songs on just the [m] sound, and then [n], etc. It will help focus your sound on consonants, and also helps keep breathing in line (which you do well, but I’m always in favor of exercising breathing!). Again, lovely orchestration; especially in stereo headphones, its a delight for the ears!
Jealous Brother: I found the lyrics in this to be very awkward, not super metrical, and tending to not flow well, even when read away from the music. This is especially true of the eponymous palindrome: ‘dumb mud’ scans as a spondee (strong strong), but you have set it as a trochee (strong weak), and that makes what I consider an already weak palindrome choice a tainting element in what would otherwise be an ok song. I suspect that if I listened to this song without any of the vocals, I would have liked it a lot better. The instrumentals were fun and stylistic, there's a banjo, and theres a great palindromic solo, but the weak lyrics, telling a weak story, inspired by a weak palindrome, sung in a fake accent (I assume fake cause you dont have it in your other songs), kinda ruined it for me.
Jon Porobil: This is a sweet story, though it requires a lot of filling in the details from the listener. I do like how you have it end where you started, a story level omage to palindromes, though I would not really say it was an actual palindrome story. Good use of palindromes peppered through, but I find, “She didn't leave to chance to leave, didn't she?” to be a weak word level palindrome, as it doesn’t make grammatical sense in the back half. The rest of the chorus leaves me wanting BBQ, though it does also count as word level palindrome. I take issue with the jarring switch to first person in the 6th stanza, when the rest of the song is in third person. Who's saying it? Viv? Hannah? Both? Even if its both, saying ‘she’ would have maintained the anonymity. Musically it is a solid easy jazz inspired tune. I like the midi jazz ensemble, particularly the trumpet and sax in my ears. The bass is played exceptionally well, my favorite part of the mix. I also think making the ‘come back baby back come’ hook BVs in the back half of the chorus was a good call. Even if it’s evocative of juicy ribs, its a hell of a hook. However, I notice that you were very careful to double pronounce the [k] of baCK Come, and I think that wasn't super necessary. In this style song, eliding the two [k]’s would have been fine, and in fact I thought that's what you were doing, but in the exposed penultimate chorus, I heard it and it stood out to me. It sounds like it threw you off ever so slightly rhythmically, just cause that’s a lot for your tongue to do in a short time (thatswhatshesaid). Save yourself the effort.
Menage a Tune: What a heartbreaking lyric you’ve written! This song is beautiful. I could fully expect to hear this in an american art song recital in my college days. If you can, write it on sheet music! I’d love to hear it in concert. You were right to lower the pitch, and I think you could have addressed that highest note a couple ways. The simplest would have been to rewrite it lower. Buuuuut that takes out the majesty of the melody, so let's not do that. So now lets look at what's happening vocally: it's hard to hit that highest note, and it sounds to me that part of the issue is you are reaching up for it, instead of landing on it like a ballerina landing on point (pardon the woowoo vocal language; there’s no hard and fast technical terminology in voice lessons, so let me know if you have any follow up questions). Basically, you sing most of the time in your chest voice. That’s usually not an issue, as that is where most of your singing and talking is done, so your voice is used to it and strongest there. However, it doesn’t go very high, so learning how to use your head voice on your higher notes, and how to mix your head and chest voice on the notes in between, would be a boon to you on songs like this. Other than that, your rhythmic timing is a little off - not off off, but it sounds like you're hesitating or anticipating your entrances a bit. This probably could be fixed with practicing a bit more, though a week doesn’t always give us time to do that!
Ominous Ride: Your word level palindrome is exceptionally well written. In general, I have noticed the word unit palindromes usually worked better than the line level ones, and I think you have some of the best word level palindromes of the whole fight. You did a fab job of making sure the words made sense both ways, and were grammatically correct both ways. The chorus is a great example of this, especially lines two and five. They both have the word ‘that’ in them, but the meaning and usage of the word is different in each context. I love it! Well sung, the doubled vocals are perfectly lined up, and I love the ‘ah’ backing vocals in the chorus. Good playing in the band, keeping the ear engaged but not tiring us out. Love the half time on the chorus, and the dotted rhythm ascending lick in the right ear. Is that a clav synth or a low mixed guitar? Or is it the bass?? It's the bass, isn't it? It’s a great sound!
Rackwagon: i really like the music to this song, but the palindromes are weak. The rhyme palindrome is just ABBA, which is not groundbreaking. I would have liked it to be a complement to an already robustly palindromed song, but instead it’s 50% of it, where “dust to dance to dust” is the other 50%. This word level palindrome is also pretty weak, not meaning a whole lot syntactically. With the echo and the way you deliver the words, it sounds like you're just saying, “dust to dust to dust to dust to dust;” it is not super inspired either way. Speaking of vocal delivery, however, I do actually quite like how you sing this. You’ve got a strong voice, and the way you dance through the melody (pun intended) is great. Tasteful vibrato, slides, ornamentations, appoggiaturas, it’s very well done. I also like the old timey piano sound. Works well for the fred and ginger reference, and also I just like slightly out of tune pianos. So yeah, good song, but the weak take on the challenge really brought you down.
See-man-ski: I really like the sound you get on this song. The piano holds the song together, and it’s a really nice effect for the song. Your vocals are great, and I like the sound of the ooohs in the interlude. Is that an accordion I hear? And clarinets?? Your arrangement on here is a delight for the ears. Your palindroming is sparse - just the one with a chord progression as relish - but you do a great job of building a whole song around it. It really feels seamlessly incorporated into the lyric, and the lyrics make sense and explore a hard topic in a tasteful way. Side note: when I first started listening, it sounded like you were saying, “and it feels alive,” which I think matches the tone of the song - thinking something’s alive when they’re not. ;_;
Sober: Your song also fell in the trap of just because the lines are backwards doesn’t mean they should be. Nothing new is said by flipping the line order in the verses. So this song mostly relies on musical palindromes. I like what you did with them a lot - this sort of challenge can really get the creative juices flowing, and make us write things we might not have done otherwise. I like that that happened here, but as a judge and a purist, I have a couple notes: note wise, I am seeing palindromes, but the unbalanced rhythm of them turned me off. Ex - bars 7 and 8 of your music example (btw THANK YOU FOR PROVIDING). I would have wanted that first note of 8 to be an 8th note so that the rhythm mirrored, not repeated, what was in bar 7. There could have been an interesting branching out with themes and variations where you had them mirrored, then repeat the rhythm, but I think that would be a different song, and don't mind me you're giving me some interesting composition ideas… I like the lyrics a lot. Really captures the frustrations of the creative process. Is that why the two verses mean the same thing? Because even though we are constantly trying to be creative, we sometimes come back to the same spot over and over again? Even if that’s the case, feels like a cop out for my main complaint with a lot of the line level palindromes in this fight.
Vom Vorton: Your line unit palindrome gets the closest to a proper reverse line poem out of all the entries. Sure, the basic idea is similar, but there are some phrases that mean different things in the front half vs. the back half. Ex. in the first half, he wonders why he's such a state, whereas in the second half he wonders why he always waits. It’s a subtle difference, but it's a bigger difference than almost every other line unit reversal in this fight, so you get the brownie points! This song for some reason evokes turn of the century melodramas to me, like gift of the magi. Really the whole song is like a painted portrait, a still life of melancholy. This is no doubt helped by the fact that orchestration you chose helps put us in a state of stillness. What I really like about this song is that it’s a change of pace from the goofy upbeat songs I have come to expect from you. Don’t get me wrong - I love your signature sound, but having a contrast every once in a while is super effective, and you do the moody, self-reflective thing just as well as the upbeat novelty songs. I really like how you have the title in the low spoken, heavily echoed effect in the middle solo; it reminds me a bit of David Bowie in Ashes to Ashes (and other). I’m not sure how I feel about it being a shouted ‘chorus’ (though chorus isn't quite right), but I don't know how you would do it differently, so for now it works. My favorite line is the drinking line - very well put together, makes syntactical sense, flows well. Least favorite is the thinking line - a little awkward to say, doesn’t make a whole lot of syntactical sense. This song is a Mood with a capital ‘M’ and you hit it on the money. Love the morose way you sing it, love the arrangement, how the instrumentals ebb and flow, and the melodicas are a really lovely touch. Love the song!
Thank you for your great review and vocal advice. I did vocal exercises for about a half hour before recording this, while waiting to see if my partner was going to send a re-recorded lower version. Just in case I had the Audacity manipulated one ready to go, and recorded it between 1100-1140pm. He didn't realize it was due, lol. I am not gonna complain, having my teacher and his concert harp is a joy. We are working on an even lower version, which will also fit on my harp (only 28 strings so not as large as his). I will send you the sheet music when he is done arranging it for me. I used to take voice lessons, but boy the old pipes get rusty with time, been 8 years since I was last in class. Gonna have fuuuuuuun with the next song!
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