Ren - For Joe (Initial Thoughts)

It was beautiful, touching... An homage to one of his best friend's, who committed suicide 13 years ago. There were nearly 8000 people in the premiere on YouTube to witness it. Double the amount than the last few times.

The song starts off with the ending of Suicide, the part he just recorded a while ago. The part about Joe's suicide and how Ren wasn't there to stop him in time. I'm not sure, but I think this was recorded live. He breathes in just the same spots as the audio. Sounds eerily similar as the one on Suicide, too... But maybe he's just that good. Then he sings non-word notes for a bit, and then references Dominoes, my favourite song by him. Dominoes is about suicide as well, and self confidence issues, and depression. It's very fitting here.

"Some will die before they live, that's just how the story goes"... That hit hard. Makes me want to live. Even though today was the last day I had a (very brief) thought to end it. I've been feeling fine today, just physically exhausted. And I think my thought was more like an intrusive thought than a self-harming one. The ones you get so you DON'T accidentally do something harmful to yourself. (And that latter part of the bar is from Dominoes.)

He also reminded us to tell people we love that we love them. I try to do that every time I interact with someone I like. Make them know I care, that I am there. And that includes Ren, Knox, Ian, all these artists I've been pretty much obsessed with lately. 

Then he references Freckled Angels, the OG song for Joe. It's about Joe, he's the freckled angel. Occasionally he lifts his hands off the keyboard and lets it play out while he raps over the note. In the end he did that and it didn't play (intentionally), and I thought that was very effective and I loved it. In the end his voice breaks, like he's about to cry. I was wondering through the song how is he doing this without breaking into tears... (Oh, which actually differentiates this and Suicide from each other. In the end of Suicide, he breaks down in tears. So, they are recorded separately and this is a live. The timelines and origin stories align.)

I like how he took all the songs he's written about Joe and playes them backwards - Suicide is the newest, Dominoes is the middle one, and Freckled Angels is the oldest of these three. Like he's taking a trip down memory lane, of his grieving process and his thoughts about Joe's death and the why it happened. 

I've never lost a friend like this. I do have a friend who was about to jump off a bridge but our friends stopped him (I wasn't there, I didn't know it was happening, only heard about it afterwards). And later, he stopped me. I called him because I felt a small glimpse of hope that at least he cares enough to say I shouldn't do it and then I didn't do it... Ok, now I'm tearing up. Maybe this is a good place to stop and go watch other people react to this as well. Now that I have my own thoughts put into words.