"Are you a soldier, a poet or a king?" Actually see I was born a restless child with my spirit running wild running free
"oh you like *insert media that's super personal to me*? what's your favorite part about it?" well my dear friend i'm gonna have to ask you to settle down, grab some pillows, and prepare for the most annoying 2 hours of your life
omg soldier, poet, king is NOT a Christian worship song
folks on tiktok being like YALL DIDN'T KNOW IT WAS ABOUT JESUS??? and "better take it off my dnd playlist now!!!"
it's not about jesus holy fuck, i mean, it is, but it isn't.
Dear Wormwood is a concept album that uses biblical symbolism to talk about an abusive relationship. The Oh Hellos have a whole ass THING about retelling stories (biblical, mythological etc) to use to deal with your own story which is like...a whole thing in storytelling anyway (the new testament is a monomyth yall, Hero's Journey 1.0, in that regard everything is biblical)
Dear Wormwood is put in the context of someone writing letters (inspired by The Screwtape Letters, CS Lewis) to their abuser. "Soldier, Poet, King" is from the perspective of the protagonist, on the receiving end of the abuse, who (after the song "Exeunt") is escaping from the abuse and attempting to continue their life outside of it. The person who is the soldier, poet, king, is the protagonist. "your city" is the abusive relationship. "Wormwood" is the devil of this person's life.
If you look on Genius, yeah the story is about the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. In context? It's about the Second Coming of the protagonist. The rebirth they get after escaping.
The ending song of the album, "Thus Always to Tyrants", the last line of the album is
Where I go, will you still follow? Will you leave your shaded hollow? Will you greet the daylight looming? Learn to love without consuming?
The protagonist is attempting to mentally escape from the abuse, worried about carrying the trauma into the next relationship.
Soldier Poet King is not about Jesus. It's about fighting. It's about escaping the cycle of abuse. It's about the power that resides in stories, about people who have experienced this before and succeeded. It's about using those stories and learning from them.
Keep the shit on your dnd playlist, it's sort of the whole point.
I’ve listened to these four albums almost nonstop for the past like two weeks…
You never really realize how long a song is until you play it for someone else (does not like this)
at least once a month a portion of the oh hellos lyrics will finally sink into my brain and i start frothing at the mouth
aaaaaaaaaa
I respect Lou's commitment to collecting cool hats
are you an Overuse Capitalizations Neurodivergent, overuse (TM) neurodivergent™️, overuse,,, commas, , neurodivergent, uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuhhhhhh overuse fjhbsdfgj um and uh stuff neurodivergent, overuse parenthesis (because come on, there's always something i have to elaborate on guys) neurodivergent, never capitalize anything neurodivergent, overuse -- hngh what are these called -- dashes - i swear this isnt called a dash - neurodivergent
hey. hey king arthur, his royal pratness, his dollopheaded highness, you know what would be REALLY funny timing on your part?
Does anyone else hyperfixate on certain ships to the point where you only want to consume fanfics for that ship because reading others feels like some form of cross contamination. Then you inevitably get tired of that ship and move on to another until you eventually circle back to the original ship?
Mother Goose: I love all my children equally.
[flashback to 3 seconds ago]
Mother goose: I don’t care for Pinocchio.
the way the Neverafter campaign really drove it home that being “monstrous” is up to you and the way you deal with the cards fate has dealt you. the way they made it such a potent allegory for being Othered and ostracised for something out of your control, like a curse or a disease. and how they showed that despite how others define you, you get to choose what to do with the monstrous side - because we all have one after all.
so you have these characters who are “monsters”, who are offputting and strange and scarred, but they lean into that strangeness that defines them and sets them apart and use it to help others and fight and protect. while others saw what they had become and chose to lean into it because if fate had deemed this their path then why bother deviating? our six heroes really said “life has not been kind to me but that does not mean i must be unkind in return”.
like i’m slightly incoherent but god it’s about fighting back the nihilism in a bleak and cruel world hellbent on twisting you into a “monster” and choosing kindness and love and warmth. it’s about seeing a lost little girl, and taking her hand in yours so that she’s not alone. it’s about accepting that your love is lost to you but still choosing to stand by her side and supporting her no matter what because love between friends still counts and is just as beautiful. it’s about looking the monster in the eye and choosing to empathise with them because who wouldn’t go mad after realising you were always doomed by the narrative to be evil.
After trying to persuade her to join them, Gerard hears the Baba Yaga above—
Gerard, gesturing above: she’s not totally on our side. That was a weird tagalong situation.
Brennan: honestly, the exact analogy is, she was your ride here.
Siobhan: our Uber driver came to the fight with us
Gerard: without Scheherazade we couldn’t get here, we had to get a ride
i wish i could like videos on dropout because that neverafter adventuring party with the trampolines and the axe body spray and zac oyama's car was the hardest ive laughed in a while
There is so much quality content on Dropout but maybe, just maybe, I am going to watch Lvl. 20 Cis-her Gal-a-them for the fifth time
When I'm around my grandparents I'm Cis-her but the rest of the time I'm Gal-a-them