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E - Everyone

memories and penstrokes

by niteowl


A/N: I've had several verse ideas in coming up with this song. I'm debating whether I like A or B in the second verse so if you have any thoughts that'd be great. There's also a very rough recording here-[url]https://vocaroo.com/1hfVhLSBLWvo[/url], which I hope to replace with a more polished version. Lack of caps is intentional. 

first it's you and it's me, just two strangers you see,
like how everyone starts in the beginning.
and i forgot your name the very next day
had no clue what was coming my way

then it's me, lost with you
drunk on dark foreign streets
and I make sand look sturdy
'cause the world is so mean.
you're not perfect but you're kind,
so I'll take what i get 
and I'll chase it down again and again

and now you're just a ghost
in memories and penstrokes,
yeah just a ghost in memories.
a song i forgot to forget 
and I'm sorry you're still stuck in my head. 

Version A
next it's me shedding tears on a diary page
'cause I pushed way too hard and you're pulling away
and I know we're too different
to have something that's real
but that doesn't change how I feel

Version B
now it's me crying out for you every night
you say we should hang out
but you don't have the time. 
Was I really so naive to miss all of your signs
Or did I just want to stay blind? 

it was you in front of me, two years since it began,
through the gaps in the words, i know this is the end
'cause what once felt natural feels awkward now
but I still ache for you anyhow

and now you're just a ghost
in memories and penstrokes,
yeah just a ghost in memories.
a song i forgot to forget
and I'm sorry you're still stuck in my head. 


still see you in my dreams,
i don't know what it means,
and i swore it was love,
i was wrong, now i know
and it's been far too long
and i've got to let go
and so i'll write you away,
write you away, hey

now it's you, almost stranger
that i saw on the street,
and i hate to ask,
but do you remember me,
'cause this love doesn't burn
like it did back then,
but i wish you well
with all i have left...
yeah i wish you well with all i have left.


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Thu Oct 01, 2020 4:19 am
alliyah wrote a review...



Ah your voice is really nice and clear in this nite, it didn't seem like you had any word stumbles or odd pauses - everything flowed pretty smoothly I think! I find posting song recordings to be one of the most intimidating things in the world xD but it really helps to understand how the song is supposed to sound. (Also I think in the publishing center there's a button you click that looks like an infinity symbol / two linking-chains that you click for adding a link rather than typing in the "url" code! That should make your vocaroo link work better, I just copy and pasted it though to give it a listen.

So let's take a look at the lyrics!

On the verse A vs verse B I think I liked verse A better,
it felt like this section in verse B

now it's me crying out for you every night
you say we should hang out
but you don't have the time.


that felt a bit melo-dramatic for me, like "crying out" feels really serious, and then "you say we should hang out" feels very ordinary, so the juxtaposition didn't quite feel as impactful to me as Version A. I kind of felt like they both flowed well though!

I definitely liked the aspect that this as a whole felt more like a story-song, where we get the story of a relationship instead of just like a single fleeting emotion / moment, that made the song to me feel really like it moved and progressed more, and by the end I felt a lot of sympathy for the speaker and felt I could get a better sense of the emotion being conveyed too.

I'd interpret what was happening in the song to be the speaker remembering all these good times with the subject, but now kind of remembering them in a questioning / negative light. They had thought they'd shared all these nice lovely moments, but by the end they're wondering if they were really in love at all or if they were closer to strangers! That's actually a pretty interesting development throughout the poem, and also although I haven't experienced the exact same scenario, I certainly can relate to the idea of second guessing memories in hindsight and I'm sure many people can too! As I said earlier, having the whole narrative within the song, really makes it easy to connect to this piece.

The turn in the end where the speaker decides to consciously "write-away" their old memories was an interesting turn too, and left the song on kind of a hopeful end.

I think overall the song could maybe use a little more flowery imagery or metaphors, the rhyming is and sound devices are all there, but it does seem like mostly action rather than much description. I like the metaphor of the ghost or song in memories - I think that's a pretty interesting comparison, and it'd be interesting if you could work that in at all in the last two verses.

Overall I did enjoy listening to this, and really it did sound very smooth - so I think you've done a good job polishing the flow of this all to make it sound nice.

All the best,

alliyah




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Mon Sep 28, 2020 5:30 pm
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fleuralplants wrote a review...



Hi! This is going to be a fairly short review but I really enjoyed reading through this.
I prefer version A over version B. I think it flows more easily with the rest of the lyrics.
I noticed here that you said

you're kid
I think you might've meant "kind" (I'm sure this was an accident, I just wanted to alert you to it!)
My favorite line was the last one, as I really appreciated the sentiment of it.
Thanks for sharing!




niteowl says...


Thank you! Yeah I was having formatting issues so I might have missed that typo because I thought I fixed it. Version A was the first one I wrote but I feel like it's a bit vague and repetitive. I came up with B on its own later which might be why A seems to flow better.




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