Earlier this year I lost a friend who I had known since the eighth grade. Throughout high school we would hang out with our other friends playing PC games, have LAN parties (we’re ancient, I know), watch movies, play poker, go fishing, and talk quite a bit about scifi and even LEGOs. My friend dealt with an affliction and it was always a possibility that he might succumb to a fatal accident because of it.
Sadly, he passed away in March 2022 and it was one of those freak accidents. But his death got me thinking about legacy and what we leave behind. It’s something I have thought about from time-to-time, but when another friend called me to tell me the news, I started to ponder on the subject of legacy.
Legacy is one of those things that I can’t help but think about. After all, some wish to leave a mark on the world and I am one of them. How big of a mark is up to each individual.
So while I was reminiscing about the fun times we had, and regretting the time we missed out as we got older, I was listening to various beats as a way to distract myself. Until one particular beat, from Anabolic Beatz, grabbed me with its intro and rhythm. The violins and guitar immediately drew me in but when the beat dropped, a few words immediately popped into my head.
“BAM, to the back of the head” was the first line I wrote down as I quickly saved the beat to my playlist with a short note about the tone and theme I wanted the lyrics to focus on. Then I put it on the backburner for nine months until I finally came back to it to see if I could actually come up with some satisfactory lyrics after having posted lyrics for other beats throughout 2022.
I titled the song “No Legacy After Tragedy” which summed up what I felt upon hearing the news of my friend’s death and the direction my mind went in. I thought of all the people who died under immediate circumstances who never got to create a legacy for people to remember them. Luckily for my friend, he has a legacy more than most. Surviving family members being the main thing. But I can’t help but think of those who never had a chance to leave a legacy behind them due to an unexpected death and/or failure to get married and have children. To create some kind of value to the world they had left behind.
It’s a topic I would like to delve into for another post.
So one of my goals for next year is to record this song, though I will need to find someone to sing the chorus which, I feel, still needs to be worked on. But I am satisfied with what I have written when it comes to the rest of the song. Though I’ll probably do some tweaking here and there. I also asked ChatGPT, an AI Chatbot, what it thought of my lyrics will post its response at the bottom of the post.
But I present you the lyrics and have embedded the beat that they will be put to. Let me know what you think.
And to my departed friend…
Rest in Peace Adam
Lyrics
Verse 1
BAM, to the back of your head
Hitting the corner and breaking your neck
BAM, to the back of your head
Laying on the ground you are stone-cold dead
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Hardly anyone to mourn you or even weep
When the gravediggers come to bury you six feet deep
BAM, to the back of your head
A stray bullet hitting you shot from a gang in red
BAM, to the back of your head
Stress-related death for a job in the black or red
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Hardly anyone to mourn you or even weep
When the gravediggers come to bury you six feet deep
BAM, to the back of your head
Seizure out of nowhere and you fall to your death
BAM, to the back of your head
Laying on the ground you are stone-cold dead
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Made more tragic is the life you lead
When it all boils down to a one sentence obituary
Chorus (operatic)
It’s a shame that we all can die
Cut down in our prime or in our twilight
But worse than that, it is a crime
To have no one to leave a legacy behind, for
Verse 2
BAM, to the back of your head
Furniture mover dropped a fridge off a ledge
BAM, to the back of your head
Slipped on a patch of ice, shoes with no treads
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Hardly anyone to mourn you or even weep
When the gravediggers come to bury you six feet deep
BAM, to the back of your head
A drunk driver hits you as he laughs while he fled
BAM, to the back of your head
A junkie swings a bat shrieking that you are undead
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Hardly anyone to mourn you or even weep
When the gravediggers come to bury you six feet deep
BAM, to the back of your head
A small heart attack leads to a fall cause you’re overfed
BAM, to the back of your head
Passing out, blood clot, vaccinated
No legacy in the wake of this tragedy
Life ending quickly it’s really so sad to see
Made more tragic is the life you lead
When it all boils down to a one sentence obituary
Chorus
It’s a shame that we all can die
Cut down in our prime or in our twilight
But worse than that, it is a crime
To have no one to leave a legacy behind, for
Outro
BAM, to a legacy unread
Something that will never exist because you are dead
BAM, to a legacy gone
On a page for a day and gone by the morn
BAM, death is unexpected
But moreso, ipso facto can be self-inflicted
We have the power to change it all
Create our legacy before we lose it all
Chorus
It’s a shame that we all can die
Cut down in our prime or in our twilight
But worse than that, it is a crime
To have no one to leave a legacy behind, for
Conclusion – What Did an AI Think?
After writing the lyrics, I decided to see what an AI Chatbot would say about it. So the first question I asked was “I wrote these lyrics for this beat – https://youtu.be/Nzmt6uULHO0 Can you tell me what you think of my lyrics? Title: ‘No Legacy After Tragedy.'” Then I copied and pasted the lyrics into bar and this was ChatGPT’s response.
It seemed to understand the theme and tone of what I was going for with my lyrics. I don’t agree with its assessment that I should explore different ways of getting the theme across, especially ones that are not as violent of bleak. It would take away from the impact I want the lyrics and beat to have on the listener. I am curious as to if I can get the bot to refine the lyrics and further explore that.
Curious at the prospect, I asked it to re-write the chorus only just to see what it would come up with.
I plan to do a follow-up post to let you see what Chatbot comes up with on its own. But let me know what you think of my original lyrics, what ChatGPT said about the song, and what you think about it in the comments below or on social media!
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