Ave Caeser

[-:Vincent:-]

Bands song about the coliseum, written by vocalist James Derby. It's screamed/yelled so thats why certain parts are repeated.

Granite holds up seats,
One over the other
Circled around a sunken stage

Filled up like water in cracks (x4)

Scattered clouds break light through a veil
Covering from rain

With purple silk and gold tissue...
The emperor takes his place
Thousands all together
To make one voice:

Joy to thee,
master of all,
happiest of all,
first of all,
victory to thee forever and ever

Covering, blood stained sand (x4)

An-tic-apa-tion
To meet the lions gory mane

Red, fall heavy
one by one

My consent to death, to conquer agony
The arena swims around me, I am gone

[TheBigMachine]

It reads, and probably sounds like your average pretentious hardcore song. The Roman Colloseum's have incredible potential for song writing, but the way to do it is not in such a blunt manner. Most people have the general idea of what went on. But you've got to put your reader there, simile, metaphor, and probably most importantly, vivid, shining descriptions.

Dont write your lyrics for how you plan on singing them either.

[-:Vincent:-]

Yeah, well our vocalist wrote the song and then he wanted us to base the music off of his lyrical parts. I didn't like it but it turned out OK. I know the lyrics aren't too great, but we already got a rough draft recording for this song, and were starting on another one at the moment.

I definently agree with you though, you shouldn't write lyrics to match how you plan on singing them. Especially in the hardcore genre, so many things can be matched up with music just be using the syllables of the words and saying them seperatley. Kind of makes me mad that we did that, but oh well.

Thanks for the advice.

[TheBigMachine]

Anytime. Thank God you werent an arse about it. There's been some before that have. :)

[-:Vincent:-]

Haha. I'm just thankful if I get someone to give me an honest reply.

[tytothebenj]

Try this:

Granite holds up seats one above the other
Circled around a sunken stage
Filled up like water in cracks
Scattered clouds break light through a veil covering from rain

With purple silk and gold tissue...
The emperor takes his place
Thousands all together to make one voice:

"Joy to thee, master of all, happiest of all, first of all, victory to thee forever"

Covering blood stained sand
Anticipation to meet the lions gory mane
Red, fall heavy one by one

My consent to death to conquer agony
The arena swims around me, I am gone

[slack]

BigMachine covered it all pretty much. The thing I don't like about this is it hardly has any bite. There's really nothing beyond the surface that I can dig into; no sentiment that hangs with me after I've read it.

With something like this, it seems imagery would have to be its saving grace, but most of the imagery here is pretty basic. I like 'purple silk and gold tissue' but it's not that outstanding. One way I was thinking you could improve this is to give it a theme like color and introduce it early on--introduce images of roses, daisys, colorful banners; you know, more stuff like 'purple silk'.

The reason I suggest that is because this line, "Covering, blood stained sand" made me think of rose petals on the ground for some reason. Rose petals on the ground is infinitely more interesting than mere blood. And I also like the idea that the crowd, by throwing rose petals on the ground, would symbolically be like throwing their own blood on the sand.

Just some things to think about.

[-:Vincent:-]

Oh yeah, I see what your saying, it is a rather bland piece. I'll talk with my vocalist and maybe we'll edit it some.