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kae-karo · 5 years

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marianas trench: phantoms

the absurd album overanalysis, commentary, and ranking nobody asked for

first, my personal ranking (don’t get me wrong tho i love the entire damn album):

1. wish you were here 1. don’t miss me 1. the death of me 2. your ghost 2. the killing kind 3. only the lonely survive 3. echoes of you 4. glimmer 4. i knew you when 4. eleonora

the album as a whole: oh such an awesome story and so awesomely inspired by the horror genres?? i think some of the non-singles hit the horror mark better but like oh my god it’s such a cool vibe the whole entire thing???? i know the concept was like,,,,,,descent into madness but you can totally feel this struggle with it and with the idea of a doomed/dead relationship, it’s just so so well done??? my one complaint is that i’m not musically inclined enough to recognize where all the references are bc unlike in no place like home and dearly departed, there aren’t really as many lyric references to other albums/songs, it’s more the music. and i know it well enough to go ‘oh that’s familiar, for sure’ but i can’t for the life of me figure out where from (in most cases)

eleonora: i mean the title is based on the short story by edgar allan poe (x) true to theme from the beginning, which (long story short) is about a woman the narrator falls in love with (well, his cousin) but she’s ill and will die, blah blah blah she does and the narrator vows never to marry anyone else but later he does and his first love comes back from beyond the grave to give her blessing for the new marriage - already basically i’m getting vibes of like,,,,,,a genuine desire to move on? which is great imo and like a step forward from previous albums? plus the whole acapella delivery is super reminiscent of so it goes (x) and the layered voices reminiscent of the intro to end of an era (x). plus we have the direct ref to the raven (x) by poe with ‘midnight dreary’. also the idea of ‘don’t hush’ which is later touched on as ‘just hush’ in the killing kind? oof interesting v v interesting

only the lonely survive: a bop a massive bop but! also! just a very intriguing take (at least to me) on a doomed-to-fail relationship, the idea that you can actively acknowledge a relationship is hurting both parties but...choose to stay. i also like the idea (which i might just be extrapolating) that to truly live, to have a really poignant relationship, you have to sort of give yourself over to it? ‘only the lonely survive’ - only those who isolate themselves truly ‘get out alive’ if you will but like, that’s the beauty of putting yourself out there? is like, you truly feel everything, i guess. ‘it hurts like hell to love this well’ sort of touches on that same idea for me. anyway the whole thing goes hard as hell and i love it. ‘he’ll never know you / not the way that i knew you’ we love intra-album references !!!

echoes of you: okay didn’t love this at first bc it felt repetitive (and it was coming on the heels of only the lonely survive which i adored) but it also felt really unique and a little different? when the released it as a single, it’s the first time i thought of this album as truly horror-inspired and totally picked up on the tell-tale heart vibe (x) which was just so interesting, i love how stories like that have turned into these really fresh songs that still call back to these kinds of madness-inspiring stories - that a love can inspire that kind of madness, even when it’s gone. i also wonder if the idea of ‘can’t stop myself from falling now’ has less to do with falling in love (which is, for me, the immediate connotation) and more to do with ‘falling into madness’. the verses and the tempo are so well-paced as well, like this frantic feeling? then the chorus comes in with this suspenseful set of chords? and the theremin in the background!!!! the best way to give a truly Spooky™ vibe. the idea of tell-tale heart, the story, too, is that the narrator is trying to sound completely sane, and explain the murder they’ve committed and why it was justified - that goes along with the theme of this album, too, where there’s this undercurrent of trying to insist that the doomed relationship is somehow justifiable

don’t miss me?: oh i adore this and the idea of ‘oh hah yeah no i don’t miss you like at all,,,,,,,,,,,,,do you ‘not miss me’ too?’ and like this,,,,,,not obsession but the idea of trying to actively move past missing someone? but just constantly getting caught up on it? unrelated to the meaning but oh my god the little background vocals, adore it. ‘some people try to raise the dead / some people try to live instead’ is like. that’s one of those things that i lowkey would love to get tattooed on my body or something. just really good words, because that’s what it’s like moving on from a rough relationship - and it’s hard to like, see that when you’re in the thick of it? bc like imagine losing a loved one and trying to bring them back to life - we’ve all heard the story, it’s never what’s expected, it’s never quite right and the same goes for relationships. and so, the idea of living instead, of moving on. also the vocal run up to the high note toward the end (x - look idk Music Words) reminds me of something but i can’t quite place it. also ‘i don’t remember why we stayed’ and then in wish you were here, we get ‘i don’t recall now why we’re buried’ which is a fun contradiction

wish you were here: that middle-of-the-night madness that goes alongside one love (x) like,,,,,if you took it one step on the other side of madness and entertained the idea of reviving a relationship that should be dead. except it’s such a bop unlike one love, like it sounds a lot like it could be on astoria, and it’s got that back beat matching this means war (x) in fact, it feels like the exact polar opposite of this means war (like...instead of ‘lmao i’m totally awesome without you’ it’s like ‘i’m,,,,,maybe not doing so great without you, shit i really wish you were here, wish we were together’)? but with the same sort of vibe in terms of the music itself? and the outro (x) reminds me hardcore of something else i can’t quite place

your ghost: this one also reminds me a lot of the general vibe of astoria with hints of like. modern touches? this one reminds me a lot of wildfire actually? (x) but a bit more upbeat? like that guitar style i think is what does it. it feels a lot like there’s this...almost unwilling pull toward the idea of ‘madness’ that they’re focused on, like....a sort of awareness of the descent? also the softer bit toward the end where it’s just josh and the guitar (x) reminds me a lot of something that i once again cannot place for the life of me

glimmer: oh no,,,,,,,,,okay first this (it’s just audio but tumblr won’t let me add audio on its own in a post like this):

youtube

so my first and most important comment is that all i can think about when i hear this song is ‘halo by beyonce halo by beyonce halo by beyonce halo by beyonce’ and it tends to run over everything else lmao. but! i think conceptually it’s more of that descent into madness, into seeing some sort of trace of a relationship, like some sort of residual glimmer that sticks to things, to people. ‘it’s funny what you find when you go without’, like the idea of....probably hallucinating in a sense, but starting to see the relationship/the other person everywhere, on everything, when you’re missing them? even to the point that, when the person comes back, maybe the memories of that relationship stick around too - ‘you’ve changed but it’s not enough / and doubt is insidious / creeps up on you softly / i can’t get it off me, i can’t get it off me now’ like this idea that even though it’s something wanted, to come back together (no matter how bad it might end up), memories and the past can’t really be forgotten - ‘you’ve changed but it’s not enough’ - very reminiscent of wildfire (x - ‘so now you show up when you’re alone again / but we haven’t changed, but now you’re interested) ngl too the overall feeling of the song reminds me of one love? (x)

i knew you when: so this song sorta came out of nowhere to me, like it felt weird and off-kilter like...i knew you when? when what? but like. now it makes a lot more sense, in this sort of...well, twisted way. it feels like things have been twisted around. it comes off the back of glimmer, too, and i think that’s like - oh, these memories are here, lingering, and this is almost a deep-dive into them? it tells a bit of a story and i think it’s less abstract, but it definitely harps hard on the idea that ‘i’ve been loving, loving you too long to just sudden-suddenly move on from this’ that sort of encompasses the entire album really cleanly. it’s interesting, actually, it almost feels like a very sincere moment of clarity and specificity amidst a mess of this drifting toward ‘madness’, but still hinting at that little bit of ‘okay but if you want to....i’ll know you then’, this like concession to that madness, an indulgence in it?

the death of me: oh catch me melting over the transition between songs, utterly seamless. love it. this one is another one that like....feels like a breath of clarity in awareness? like this acknowledgment that there’s something off, this lingering desire for someone from the past, that there’s an emptiness, that this new thing isn’t right, even if it’s something wanted. because other wanted things (or people) make it impossible. i think it’s also the first time in a while where another party (ie not them nor the person they’ve got this tangled relationship with throughout the album so far) is mentioned which is v interesting. i think this track does an excellent job of bringing a ghostly vibe to it, the echoing vocals and background sounds, they almost elicit this feeling of like. the person is drifting away from the person they’re trying to make a new start with, like literally drifting? almost being pulled in by the ‘madness’? and it’s a heartbreaking song, too, bc there’s this emanating desperation to like...move on? and make things work? but this acknowledgement that...maybe that’s not happening? maybe it’s not possible? maybe there’s too much baggage, in a sense? there’s also that very long outro that starts off a little intriguing, adventurous almost, and then descends into this frightening crescendo (x - that also has a hint of something else in it) before these voices come in, crescendoeing again into this sudden stop and then you’ve got josh saying ‘save me from myself’ which i feel like is a reference?????? also cannot believe they made me download that and reverse it so i could figure that out lmao

the killing kind: it wouldn’t be a mt album without a song that’s all over the place and somehow still cohesive and intriguing, huh? oh big mood for the intro, with the very great imagery of wandering a haunted house at night, staring into the shadows, and then ‘the killing kind’ - i think the whole thing is a super interesting concept, again, this acceptance of some of the fault in a failed relationship? ‘but you’ve been haunted too’ and yet not all of it, i think a lot of media represents things as black and white, with all the blame on one person, when that’s rarely the case? anyway, it’s interesting it’s addressed. ‘nevermore’ of course being another edgar allan poe reference (disclaimer there may be other references i’m missing since i’m not massively well-read in the horror genre) i’m also intrigued by ‘can’t get out / from under it / nevermore to leave here’, is that a lover dearest (x) reference? bc that’s what came to mind, honestly. again, excellent with the background vocals giving that eerie vibe. and then the stephen king ‘it’ reference with ‘we all float down here’. ngl that one feels a little forced but again, i’m like. not well-read in the horror genre so there may be more layers to that one than i know. ‘it gazes back / sings to me / i know my love can be the killing kind’ - i think this is interesting that it sings back, that feels very much like a callback that maybe their own previous songs are hinting at the love being ‘the killing kind’. also ‘you should never be here’ makes me think of something (x) the hard guitar/violins in the background during ‘here and now / this is it’ etc remind me of something else. and then ofc we have the astoria run/vocals (x) and then the ref to echoes of you (although it sounds like the slightest pitch lower than in echoes of you?) and then the whole bit with ‘don’t love the bottle’ i swear on my life it sounds like it comes from somewhere? same with the background melody? but i have no idea where, it just sounds like a reference. and then we have the background little melody (x) after he says ‘a hidden melody’ so it’s like reinforced that it’s a reference but idk where from rip lmao. edit: ty to the lovely anon who mentioned it’s from masterpiece theater!!!!! and once again a++++ use of a theremin in the background for max spooky vibes. also ‘evermore’ is totally a reference to ever after (x) along with the little lift after that (i assume) and then the whole acapella bit calls back to eleonora and the ‘now’ bit to something (x) plus the ‘hear me now’ from something wow i’m great at this game lmao as well as the ‘don’t you hear me’ part. ‘we could be together here / forever we’re together bound in madness’ i think again a lover dearest and then ofc we have the vocal runs from something (x) and then the strong background violin from another thing (yeah yeah i know they’re all references i just don’t know what from) and then he says ‘just hush eleonora’ which, as previously mentioned, is a very intriguing development from ‘don’t hush’ like this,,,,,,acceptance of the madness? and then ofc he says ‘eleonoria’ in ref to astoria. edit: also the whole ending is so so similar to the ending of ever after

#marianas trench #phantoms #kt #oh my god i'm so bad at musical references #when it's lyrics i got it easily #but oh my god #someone sned hlep #this feels so incomplete #ah well c'est la vie i suppose

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moriiyun · 3 years

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(sort of) first listen: day6's the book of us: negentropy - chaos swallowed up in love

i say sort of first listen because i've heard the first 3 songs on this album before, i just haven't heard the rest. and honestly, day6's music is so complex so this reaction definitely does not do it justice, so yea!!

also reminder these are just my opinions and takeaways pls don’t kill me thanks :D

everyday we fight

i heard this before but why am i noticing so many things now???? like the funky synth bit after the first chorus and the way the 2nd chorus transitions into the 1st part of the bridge wha,,,,,, and there are 2 sections of the bridge which are completely different and i was so baffled that i went backwards to hear it again because i couldn't believe it LMAO. only day6 things i guess. also dowoon is really doing the most on the drums because there is a lot of marching band snare stuff going on especially in the pre-chorus. that's interesting tho cos it's like a battle cry, the snare drum. plus at the end of the song there is a 'ding' which is like that sound when you win a boxing match and it's like 'everyday we fight' so day6 really said fight references this is genius i love this i think it's called wordsplaining?? idk

you make me

i've heard this so many times so now whatever is here is just me nitpicking LOL but seriously, there is so much detail in this there is so much to unpack geez. like first off structure wise there are so many music breaks it actually doesn't make sense but it does. idk. also the bridge literally goes straight from the 2nd chorus non stop and then we transition into a final chorus type thing (or is it a 2nd bridge?) and i have no idea what went on there but it is good. and the pre-chorus is like 2 lines long?? strange but it works so oh well who am i to complain. also on the instrumentation,,, there seems to be like 3 layers of drums, 1 is definitely an edm beat cos it's too fast to play so that's a synth thing, 1 is dowoon playing the legit actual drums during the chorus parts but the last one is strange. it's mostly used during the verses and pre-chorus, and in the background during the chorus. it sounds like a drum pad so not the actual drum kit but the black thing that works like a drum when u hit it, but during the chorus how do u play 2 drums??? like nani?? i suspect he plays drum pad during the verses and the chorus is just an edm synth track that they recorded before hand. either that or they used a loop machine thing for the drum pad sound. i really dunno cos there's no live stages so rip. if anyone asks why i pick up drums soundwise first when i learn guitar, i have no idea okay,, i just do lol. also can we give a shoutout for vocals for 5 seconds,, especially wonpil's falsetto-belt-falsetto in the bridge like damn. talent.

healer

okay i've heard this one before too and this song is. interesting. cos it made me realise that this album so far has basically been even of day's sound with fuller instrumentation. it's more synth than piano based and that's not bad, it's just new for day6 imo. this song is mostly interesting structure?? like the synth bit at the intro was funky and the verse dropping down into the pre-chorus before going up into the chorus just works?? idk. also i'm gonna take a moment to talk about the post-chorus because this is one of the most effective post-choruses i know. i'm not the biggest fan of post-chorus stuff cos it's kinda weird sometimes but this works idk. the synth melody that they play during that part is addicting and also for some reason very destabilising? like idk feels like i'm flying in the sky with peter pan or something. it works for me it sounds really nice. also once again the bridge is a strange one because it's basically a whole section of loud crowd-cheering type sounds and then 1 actual proper line and them BOOM chorus again. a bit like the bridge of shoot me except that bridge has 2 sections 1 cheering one actual singing. this doesn't really have that but somehow it works for the song. day6 are magic i don't make the rules. also can you imagine this in concert with an actual crowd T_T

only

what. WHAT. i haven't heard this one before and i kid you not my mouth was open for the whole song in SHOCK. remember when i said so far the album was very even of day style? well the intro of this song said SIKE and now i can't process SHIT. like what even happened???????? it all sounds good tho. this song is really calming and i will probably start registering it when i start listening to it more. but i'm just gonna talk about verse 2 for a second because ???????????????????????? im so shook someone sang in a low timbre and i was like ??? who this ?? and i was like oh maybe it's jae and i couldn't figure it out until the end of the verse TURNS OUT IT'S FREAKING BRIAN/YOUNG K WHAT EVEN THAT DOESN'T EVEN SOUND LIKE HIM ????????????? im so confused day6 vocal kings i guess. also the bridge...sungjin just kept climbing up and i was like wait his range isn't gonna make it to the end of the bridge but nO IT TRANSITIONS TO BRIAN SO SMOOTHLY AND ONCE AGAIN I AM BAFFLED HOW DO THEY DO THIS. many questions no answers. also outro bit was really nice and it led into a fadeout that i don't usually like but was expected for this song cos this song definitely needs a fadeout so yknow, it works. anywho good song still very baffled but good song. also last note i forgot about this but they were doing a lot of voice echoing like choir-esque bits and that was super cool.

above the clouds

first things first: the return of shaker, acoustic guitar and piano my beloved <3 like the sounds were so pretty and acoustic in the first verse i knew there was gonna be a drop somewhere but the drop came in a place i didn't expect and in a way i didn't anticipate - turns out it's the one melody i remember from the teasers and now it's gonna be stuck in my head forever because it's that good of a melody. i also didn't expect the drums to go that hard but they did and it works out so yknow what i can't complain. once again day6 are wordsmiths and musical geniuses because they started the song very softly with the sound of wind, as if you're flying in the sky cos 'above the clouds' but not only that they end with a similar windy sound and they also end similar to landed (by even of day) which is so poetic and ironic because landed = on the ground and this song is 'above the clouds' like seriously this is the biggest brain shit ever. the bridge has an ascending bit which is super cliche but idk this is one of those songs where you want them to follow the cliche melody??? idk but it worked for me and this might be one of my faves in the album so far.

one

this song ................... wack. it starts with an almost hip hop beat and i was like ??? but then it slowly layers more vocals and instrumentals and suddenly it sound like well, a day6 song. and i cannot explain how in love i am with the chorus, it feels like the rallying cry of the broken people, and it just reaches you in a very different way from the rest of the song and is completely different. also there is someone singing a lower harmony at certain parts of the verse and it is so LOW and i cannot figure out who sings it but it almost sounds like dowoon so like DOWOON MAYBE VOCALS???? idk but yea it is one interesting harmony because usually day6 layer upwards and not downwards, but this really adds depth, like so much of it and it works for that portion. also the bridge is super cool cos it starts right after the chorus but the drums cut out but then they come back in so you focus on that and then as it's building up it abruptly just stops. and the music cuts out for a good 3 counts and you're so confused and then suddenly mini drum solo !!!!!! and it makes you anticipate and look forward to the chorus that much more because it just stops and you're left wanting so much more, especially because it echoes off at the end and DOESN'T RESOLVE NICELY. it makes you feel like the song isn't done or is too short. overall it's an incredible song and it really is just that good aaaaaa

so let's love

woah. literally this song is so......idk anymore. it starts off super acoustic and just very mellow but it just suddenly cuts to what you think is the chorus but nO it's actually the pre-chorus so it feels like you false started and it's so mind boggling and suddenly instrument breaks everywhere and no proper second verse, we immediately get a pre-chorus and second chorus and then drum and electric guitar break ????? and then bridge which is CRAZY because we go from falsetto airy stuff to BELTING and suddenly it goes quiet and then INTENSIFIES WITH 2 LAYERS OF SINGING before quieting down and ending. and it really is such a fitting ending to the album because it encompasses the absolute chaos because there isn't a regular proper structure and yet it's beautiful and melodic and sings about soft things and it feels like a warm hug. basically 'chaos swallowed up in love' put into music. and it's so fitting and just works because this is just a day6 sound that is so. them. and it's what this album is all about, the strangeness of it all with something familiar, which is probably what makes it such a welcome listen.

edit

figured out why this song hits different: it’s desperate and sad as fk. hits you straight in the feels because it’s as if they’re yearning for something but it’s so out of reach that they just. stop. idk it really is just heart wrenching in every single way. someone compared it to ‘i need somebody’ but idk i feel like it’s same but different.

overall, day6 never disappoints and it's once again an epic album from them. this is my first ot5 comeback as a myday so this album is super special to me and to have such a beautiful tracklist is amazing. it's incredible what day6 do every single time, they are insanely good at what they do and i'm so glad that i have their music.

#the only disappointing thing is no dowoon vocals but it's okay we'll live #also yes i am reacting to music again!!#─ music #day6 #a: the book of us: negentropy - chaos swallowed up in love

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