[oats]

Excuse phone-related brevity of votes

Timeless: it was an interesting idea, but I had some qualms with it. First, the tone of the piece wasn't quite...appropriate? Like, it felt serious at times, with a sprinkle of melodrama, then goofy and almost comedic at other times. Just didn't mesh right with me. Also, I get that going to see a musician was this guy's attempt at a date night with his deaf gf, though that required me to suspend my disbelief quite a bit, but what was the end result? I didn't key in on the significance of the event. Overall this just lacked focus. The rhyming was good, though at times it felt like some lines came out of left field to keep the (albeit impressive) rhyme scheme going. All the pieces were present, just not put together well for the final presentation.


Frank: I thought this vintage frank. Your verse was a brushstroke, and you create the atmosphere in vivid detail, starting with the home life of his grandma telling him to knock off that snappy racket. It's interesting because in many ways, the actual story was fairly boring, but you brought it to life effortlessly that you don't even really realize how little actually happened. You pack a lot of depth into these sequences of Polaroids. I didn't like how the end broke the wall and spelled it all out, felt a little tacked on.

Vote: frank just outperformed overall here, much tighter focus on his concept and a greater authority over his writing.