The Song Fight Bulletin Board

I am glad you enjoyed it, inevitableguy! While I can see how my lyrics come across as campy, they were written very sincerely! I wanted to take the listener through the evolution of the thoughts of a delusional songwriter in love with Taylor Swift! This might be my most elaborate, most story-rich and emotional song I've ever written, in my opinion, so please allow me to take you through the meanings!

Part 1: the narrator is musing about Taylor Swift's continued success and is slightly jealous of her lyrical abilities
Part 2: he reveals his intention to woo her
Part 3: he (unrealistically) assumes that Taylor will immediately fall in love with him and they'll live happily ever after. However, he immediately realizes that this would be tragic in and of itself because she might not be able to write music anymore.
Part 4: inner turmoil represented by instrumental
Part 5: the narrator rejects Taylor Swift before she can even respond to him
Part 6: he is sadly at peace with his pre-emptive decision to reject Taylor Swift in order to preserve her musical legacy

inevitableguy wrote:Lunk - you are correct, your song was in five parts, it was under three minutes, it therefore met the challenge. The problem with judging Nur Ein is that as you get into the later rounds, you have a small group of excellent songwriters competing, and you have to slice things really fine to come up with an order. This week was so full of great songs that using the challenge as a yardstick was the only way for me to get through. You met the challenge, I just felt like a couple of the other songs "met it better" for lack of a better phrase.

OK. I was a judge once so I can relate I guess. Thanks for the response.

W.A.I.L. I.A.A.C. 1+5+1+5+5+1 ...
Another top fight. Well done, all concerned – sorry I have to be arbitrary and mean when it comes to ranking but there really aren’t many ways to differentiate otherwise …

BGM - I really wasn’t engaging with this to start with. Well done and pretty but not exciting me until it hits ‘One more fucking asshole tells her to smile’ and then from there onwards this jumps up a notch- the third part is great and gives more sense to the first two. A shame to have to wade through two competent parts to reach the relatively short pay-off of the third.

BSS – lovely. This is my favourite song of the fight and the challenge is met, albeit in a more subtle/less distinct way than perhaps is wise when dealing with a fight where all the songs are very good and the judges don’t have much other way to differentiate. Bottom line is it doesn’t feel like a ‘three-part song’ to me but it is a bloody brilliant song. I’m certainly not marking down on a fair interpretation of the challenge but I would. I really like the synthy end part helluva loads.

Grumpy Mike – good song. The lyric is cute and I like the snide humour although maybe it could have a few more jokes in it. If you’re doing a funny song and all that … but the arrangement is great, the sections are distinct and yet lead in and out of each other to great effect and I am left with an overall cohesiveness that I really admire. That’s another good’un on the books, Mr GM.

IVeg – I like this lyric a lot. Fun tune as well. As with BSS, the interpretation of the challenge is not the way I hoped folks would go but it meets it just fine so no mark downs for that. Actually this song grows and grows on me as I listen. I think it’s a cracker.

Paco – Yeah this is fun. Maybe a little lazy lyrically but that’s no biggie and I do like the phrasing a lot. This is good ol’ pop and the melody is going to be stuck in my head for a few hours at least. As I’ve said for others, the different parts are a bit blurred together, it doesn’t fit my idea of a ‘three-part song’ but hey, the challenge is met. Not got much else to say about this, which is maybe a comment in itself.

Congrats to Mike and bgm! This is going to be a really exciting final round, I can't wait to hear the songs.

I'm disappointed to be out but also relieved to be done. Thanks to the judges, well done to the contestants.

NUR EIN!

Live now!

Round 6 LP
Tuesday 5/31 9:00 pm EST
5 Semi-Finalists going for the right to compete in the final round!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C153Y7rWuP4

Finally got around to listening to these. Paco got ROBBED, y'all.

BGM: Sad creepy story song, and the best three part arrangement. Sections are crisply delineated, the long 'aaaah' that spans the end of the first section and the start of the second is an effective bridge. I'm a big fan of dark and moody acoustic guitar chords mixed with sad and pretty vocal harmonies. In the third section I kept coming back to the line "I don't exist for you" which I thought about often. It's a good line, but it's an idea too adult to come from a 12 year old. My other complaint was I felt like the song's connection to the title was not as strong as I'd like, although liked what you did with it.

Grumpy Mike: Impressive singing and harmonies on this one, I really liked the Ben Folds style guy & piano sound you conjured up. I liked that it was about Talor Swift, and your tragically doomed love. I hope she writes a song about the sting of your rejection. I think you repeated a section, but I didn't really mind, all the parts were sufficiently different, and it didn't sound like an ordinary arrangement. The connection between the song and title is tenuous.

BSS: This was my favorite song of the fight. Pro-style lead vox, sweet backup harmonies, great guitar and synth lines, strong lyrics, interesting story/theme, and excellent production and performances. Congrats this is a great song, and ranks among the very best of this competition. Having said that, I felt like the song was not constrained by the challenge. If this challenge for this round was "Bring your A game" I would have ranked you at the top without a second thought.

iVeg: Didn't hear three distinct parts. The singing is uneven; strong in places, off in others, but you made good use of the title. Production not as strong as the other competitors.

Paco: Not really getting three parts, sees like an ordinary song structure. I like juvenile but, I felt more guilt than pleasure on this one I'm afraid. Not that I thought it was necessarily misogynistic -- maybe it just lives in the same zip code.

Wow. Three judges said BSS's song was their favorite. Yet we were eliminated, it seems based on the challenge. I have to say, that is pretty unsatisfying. Many times judges have said "no one is eliminated based on the challenge" and "it's about a good song first, challenge second" or "I use the challenge as a tie breaker" etc. etc. That all sounds like a bunch of flagrant bullshit now. Not that I'm bitter or anything!

EDIT: Also, thanks for the kind reviews to Chumpy, j$, and inevitableguy.

@ Chumpy - Yeah, I mostly wrote and recorded it between 1 and 5 am Sunday morning, with lots of interruptions. I was happy with the song, tho - liked it better than the semi-rap/ reggae/ jazz mess I submitted Thursday.
@ J$ - Thanks. I like crackers
@ inevitableguy - Thanks for the review! I agree with you about the rough.

It feels so weird to be Wednesday afternoon and not have my lyrics posted up already. I don't even have my chorus written yet for a Nein! version. I don't even feel a compulsion. Ok, maybe a little one.

I really hope my song didn't come off as misogynistic. It wasnt meant that way and I am far from being a misogynist. Was it dumb and a case of bad judgement? Absolutely. I can do better, and will try to do so next year. I've won before, and plan to again. But this song? It deserved the run of ones in the scoring.

Thanks for the comments people, always appreciated. NUR EIN!

Paco Del Stinko wrote:But this song? It deserved the run of ones in the scoring.

See, when I scored for judging back in the day, I think I had an "indescribable charm" category, which mean that a song could score low on lyrics, music, the challenge, etc, but have a high scoring for reason that I can't explain. I would have rated this one high in that regard. It made me laugh, definitely, which is better than well-executed ho hum.

Thanks Chumpy! I can totally see how it could have just as easily been a prompt or topic for my song! It's too bad we aren't given prompts to write about so we can make our own sexy titles! I believe the community is torn on the titling issue all around, and I'm just thankful I was inspired by it!

I'd just like to thank the judges for a delightful Nur Ein! Great titles and challenges all around! We all appreciate the effort you all put into making this happen!

grumpymike wrote:Thanks Chumpy! I can totally see how it could have just as easily been a prompt or topic for my song! It's too bad we aren't given prompts to write about so we can make our own sexy titles! I believe the community is torn on the titling issue all around, and I'm just thankful I was inspired by it!

We aren't given... WHAT?! THOU SHALT NEVER EVER USE THAT WORD!!

Don't take that too seriously some folks round here are a bit allergic to the p-word though (no, not penis). If a prompt is what you're looking for, there's always Spin Tunes.

Paco Del Stinko wrote:I really hope my song didn't come off as misogynistic. It wasnt meant that way and I am far from being a misogynist. Was it dumb and a case of bad judgement? Absolutely. I can do better, and will try to do so next year. I've won before, and plan to again. But this song? It deserved the run of ones in the scoring.

Thanks for the comments people, always appreciated. NUR EIN!

I wanted to post reviews, don't know why I haven't done yet. A bit lazy, I guess. You were on the last spot in my ranking, too, but I can assure you it wasn't because of misogynism. I'm far from being a misogynist myself and I actually laughed my ass off the first time I heard the song. It just didn't feel as well-crafted as Mike's or bgm's to me. I think there has also been some misunderstanding about what "three part song" actually means (and the fault was mostly on our part, not having clarified enough). I'll write about that later.

Yeah, I have to say I have some sour grapes here.
First off, I loved the Paco song! Actually I loved all 5 songs, I'm happy for Mike and BGM, their spots in the finals are well deserved.

That said. The judges seemed out of character with the way they ranked the songs. Going by the words of the 3 who have posted their reviews who said we had their favorite song and we met the challenge, but then didn't rank us on the top because others did the challenge more like what they intended.
They ranked us on top for Boilermaker, we met the challenge, but certainly didn't do it as well as others, yet I think we were on top for the song more than the challenge. Same with Unnecessary, BGM clearly kicked our ass with being more psychedelic, but we came on top because of the song, I thought.

In past Nur Eins I would grill judges for exactly what they meant with the vague language, and I think I got on their bad side doing so. I thought if the judges wanted Through Composed, they would have said through composed. Or if they wanted a song cycle, they would have said so. I'm the fool who wrote a 9 minute song-cycle for the "epic" challenge and was rewarded with the bottom ranking. It seems like the judges would have said a song with 3 "movements", if that's what they wanted.

In any case, thanks for the reviews and the time spent listening.

Wait a sec, the guy who decided to make a song about electro-shock for the Current Events challenge is taking issue with the language of the challenges?

Niveous wrote:Challenge: Three part song in less than three minutes

Lunkhead wrote:I guess I'm confused about the challenge, even though I had thought it was pretty straightforward. To me the BSS song has five different parts (pre-verse, verse, chorus, bridge, outro).

I'm not sure where all this confusion is coming from. Challenge clearly stated three parts.

glennny wrote:That said. The judges seemed out of character with the way they ranked the songs. Going by the words of the 3 who have posted their reviews who said we had their favorite song and we met the challenge, but then didn't rank us on the top because others did the challenge more like what they intended.

I did not say BSS met the challenge.

Chumpy wrote:... I felt like the song was not constrained by the challenge.

I've consistently complained about entries that I thought either blew off the challenge or did a poor job with the title, I wouldn't say I acted out of character. Also, I don't know how much clearer "three part song" could be. The difference between 'part' and 'movement' is splitting hairs.

Let's say the challenge was "voice and kazoo only" and you guys submitted a killer song with guitars, bass, and a bitchin' drum solo. Everybody else constrained themselves to using only 'voice and kazoo'. Your song might well be my favorite of the fight, because I really hate the fucking kazoo -- but it wouldn't be fair to the others to rank you #1, because everybody else had a much harder time with the song because they had to abide by the challenge. Three part songs are not that common, and listeners will have a harder time latching on to them. People in this fight who did not adhere to the challenge had a distinct advantage over those who accepted the limitations the challenge placed on their song.

Is a song with five parts also a song with three parts? I would say yes. When the challenge was "Bass solo" would folks have failed to meet the challenge if they had included more than one bass solo...? I would say no.

The challenge didn't say "only". I think that is a key distinction that should have been made in the wording of the challenge if that was the intent. For "The Thing Most Easily Forgotten" the challenge was "guitar and vox only (bass is prohibited" it was pretty clear that having guitar and vocals _and_ other stuff was not OK because of the word "only".

I think what some of us would like would be for the judges to a) all agree on the intent and interpretation of the challenge so that only one standard gets applied to all entries and b) word the challenge in a way that matches that intent. That may involve having some back and forth on the boards as contestants point out ambiguities in the wording and/or intent. Here is an example of a judge saying right out something different from what you seem to be saying about the intent of the challenge:

By the way, just to clarify, if you'd rather do a 4, 5 or 7 part song in under three minutes, I won't mind (as long as it's good, which obviously gets harder when trying to cram in more parts; and of course, that's just my opinion, not necessarily all five judges').

Maybe's that part of where the confusion is coming from? From the fact that there is no consensus among the judges about it?

Oh, how I love the EIN.

the challenge read "Three part song in less than three minutes".

It was later clarified that having more than 3 parts was okay.

Our song had 5 parts. Challenge met. There is no way one can logically deny that we met the challenge stated and clarified.

If you wanted songs with sections that didn't repeat that is called "through composed". You know like "Spider to the Fly".
That's not what was written. (Those Nur Ein IV judges were brilliant )

Let's say the challenge was "voice and kazoo only" and you guys submitted a killer song with guitars, bass, and a bitchin' drum solo. Everybody else constrained themselves to using only 'voice and kazoo'.

In that case our song would have clearly failed the challenge. I don't see how submitting a five part song that did meet the challenge written resembles that example.

Wait a sec, the guy who decided to make a song about electro-shock for the Current Events challenge is taking issue with the language of the challenges?

You bet! What we get to go off of is what is written. As contestants we don't get to see the evolving conversation among the judges. If you recall, we were originally going to title round six of Nur Ein IV "Hit Single", as that evolved I renamed our judges thread "Hit the Record Button" once it evolved to "Hit Record". I thought we all enjoyed the 2 meanings.

Look at Nur Ein VII "Villanelle". The 2 top ranking songs were inspired by the Villanelle form, but didn't restrain themselves to strict Villanelle form.
Hey look again at Villanelle, 2 of the acts that were eliminated that round that stuck strictly to the Villanelle form were Man Glut and BGM.

redemption is theirs.

Lunkhead wrote:Is a song with five parts also a song with three parts? I would say yes.

If I sold you a guitar, and told you, "It has three frets that buzz." You'd be rightly pissed off if it turned out it had five frets that buzzed. If I shrugged and said "Isn't a guitar with five buzzy frets also a guitar with three buzzy frets?" you would likely hit me over the head with that guitar.

Lunkhead wrote:When the challenge was "Bass solo" would folks have failed to meet the challenge if they had included more than one bass solo...? I would say no.

Your hypothetical challenge does not specify an actual number like this challenge does, this is not an apples-to-apples comparison.

Lunkhead wrote:The challenge didn't say "only".

I'm sorry but I'm having a hard time taking this complaint seriously. When a number appears without a qualifier it's assumed to be exact. If there was a "or more" qualifier, or an "at least" qualifier then I'd be sympathetic to this line of reasoning.

Lunkhead wrote:I think what some of us would like would be for the judges to a) all agree on the intent and interpretation of the challenge so that only one standard gets applied to all entries

This would be nice, but I'm not show how feasible this is. Some judges were strict about the challenges, and some judges obviously didn't care at all. I agree that it would be less frustrating if there were consistent standards.