I just finished song number one for the RPM Challenge. Nine songs and twenty-six days to go! I have to say that I’m really surprised at how well this song turned out seeing as how it came out of the ether within the past few days. The song is called Only God Can Hear You Sing and it deals with young people with mental issues trying to survive without the safety net that used to exist in our city before our current mayor.
This song also hits a deep chord with me, as I have bi-polar disorder and have actually been through the broken system more times that I care to mention.
The subject of the song is a fictional street girl named Sarah, who like many young people have to resort to petty crimes just to survive with their mental condition. Ideally, our social services could help these people to heal and thrive. More often than not, these people end up in Cook County Jail- which is where our song takes place.
I’m not sure I would have written about this if it weren’t for the RPM Challenge. It’s just not something I would sit down and say “ok… I’m going to write about this.” I’m very glad I did, and again, I think the song came out beautifully.
Back to the “Quality vs. Quantity” issue that is at the base of this challenge: there are some things about the song I may have done differently had I more time. In particular, the vocal melody in the chorus is a little pedestrian. But I do think it works well for this song. Also, the rhyme scheme is a little off, but whatever. Nothing rhymes with California.
I have the lyrics ready for song #2 but haven’t written any music for it yet. That I will do tomorrow. In working with Only God Can Hear You Sing over the past 9 hours I’ve become pretty attached to it. I’m definitely going to release this next month, hopefully as an EP with other songs from the RPM Challenge. Thanks for reading, and I’ll catch up with you soon.
