So we’ve had several “instrumental” categories in previous walrii, so let’s do sort of the opposite, because I love and appreciate good lyrics. Also, Amanda Gorman has inspired me.
Category host name: Skydiver8 Category: A song with lyrics so poetic, you wouldn’t be laughed off stage at your local poetry slam if you just read them with no music. Musical tastes: No mumble rap. No screamy metal. Honestly, I spend most of the time listening to those songs wondering about the long-term damage the poor “singer” is doing to their voice. Anything that might chart on a current country top 100 is not my jam, either. Finally, as we learned last time, weepy college coffee shop open mic “folk” music is definitely not for me, either. Basically anything else is fine. Any other judging notes: If the lyrics are unintelligible, I’ll probably downvote it (hence the no mumble rap or screamy metal caveats above). Though I do like him, Bob Dylan would probably not score as highly, just because it would make me think you copped out. If it’s literally a poem that someone set to music, that’s fine. Folk is in quotes above because I don’t consider traditional folk like Peter, Paul, and Mary or Arlo Guthrie to be in the same league as this new coffee shop stuff.
Poetry, like any art form, is highly subjective, of course, but let’s be honest, some songs have song lyrics, and some are poetry set to music, and I suspect y’all know the difference. So let’s do it.
Category: Broaden my horizon. Introduce me to artists I don’t know, new genres or subgenres, basically anything that is new/unfamiliar in some fashion. So stay away from what we typically get in the charts or hear on the radio. If I can immediately think of dozens of songs just like it this will probably negatively affect your ranking. No need to go overboard: The song will be judged by how much I like it, not by how obscure or exotic it is.
Musical tastes: I mainly listen to rock and metal (from vanilla to extreme) and their siblings, cousins and bastards. I also listen to pop, hip-hop, some classic, a tiny bit of opera and I can generally find something I like in most genres.
Basically no-hoper genres: hardcore techno/gabber, Operetta
Dubious genres: Electronic (although some electronic music did well in the previous categories I judged), Jazz, country/western, disco, RNB, Soul
I listen to a lot of stuff, so just about everything else is in with a shot.
Any other judging notes:
There are two rules that if broken will lead to a low score.
The song should not annoy me.
The song should not bore me.
I previously judged a Walrus and you can find the reveal thread here:
Warning: This time I will judge very well-known songs much more harshly. (Copy-pasted from previous Walrus, obviously even more true for this category)
I think there’s bands operating in related spaces like jazz or just weird drones that have escaped metal by now, but, yeah, it’s people working in and around doom metal.
(Didn’t want to list bands and then maybe ‘disqualify’ them, but maybe I should.)
So yeah, I grew up with former hippies as parents. Even went to an “alternative” elementary school. Music class meant sitting around singing If I had a Hammer. I actually really like what you might consider “traditional” popular folk music. Arlo Guthrie, Peter, Paul and Mary, Pete Seeger, Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, etc.
But somewhere around the '90s, “folk” music took a turn and now all that you hear is the stuff that I panned in my last walrus. I’m sure there’s good newer stuff out there in the Arlo Guthrie vein, but I’ve yet to hear it.
There’s legitimately tons of options in this category. The trick is finding the good ones. I’ll be lenient on the more famous qualifier as long as there’s at least an argument they are as well known for something other than music.
