Notes on Songs

THE WAR SONG

-        Comedy – satirical of modern army and warfare

-        Outcast

-         16-18 year old grunger kid

-          Black nails, pale and weak

-          Teenage angst

-          Bored and dumb, a drifter

-          Marching army in background

ASLEEP ON MY ARM

-          Both boy and girl in bed

-          He acts out the entire lyrics through facial expressions and slight body movements

-          Singer will have to work on singing whilst laying down

-          ALTERNATIVELY, singer could stand and have someone else in the bed, acting his lyrics, whilst he sings to the audience

-          ALTERNATIVELY, singer could interact with other actors whilst a body double lays in bed being his character

-          Scene before:

o    illustrates a nice relationship

o   Threatening father of the girl – stereotypical judgement of father of a girlfriend

NERD LOVE

-          Classic American high school student archetypes

-          Nerd girl in green sweater, glasses, high socks, long skirt

-          Guy as a jock, sporty high school student

-          Meet in a quiet library, where girl is reading Twilight

-          Love at first sight kind of idea

-          People act out the things quoted in the lyrics, eg. The Star Trek characters enter and do Spock signs and stuff (the famous hand signal) to the narrative of the lyrics

GOOD FOR YOU

-          Soloist singing, taking centre stage

-          Movement from the rest of the cast behind her, to make the performance more encapsulating

-          An emotional protagonist, lighted in a way that makes her seem lonely

-          A song about dreaming of an ideal situation

-          IDEA: she discovers her ex-boyfriend with another girl  and gets jealous

-          IDEA: Ex-boyfriend is actually Spiderman!! She can’t be with him because he’s a superhero, and it just wouldn’t work

HONEY

-          Someone escaping the friendzone!

-          His best friend has been going through a rough patch with her boyfriend

-          Singer has fancied her for ages but never wanted to say

-          Finally confessed it and feels much better for it, confidence is shown in the song

-          Ends badly, rejected at the end of the song, audience feel sympathy for him

MAMA CUT ME DEEPER!

-          Blood motif

-          Struggling kid

-          Stresses of life

-          Mum is harsher on him, rather than support

-          “at least the hurt is proof of life” – his mum is doing this so he understands the pains of the world

-          Although it’s his song, relates to all characters on stage? All in sections, acting out the same movements

SON OF A GUN

-          Sporty kid who’s actually a nerd, geeking out

DODGE BALL

-          Not being picked for the team, not being picked for other things too

-          He’s an outcast

-          ALTERNATIVELY he’s popular but feels awful about it all

HELEN

-          Movement piece referencing pornography as the lyrics state without doing it physically (for obvious reasons!)