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Is It Okay to Complain

from Harmonium by Patrick Ames

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Track 5: Is It Okay to Complain

This is the one track on the LP closest to Stevens and the whole poetry thing but it’s not a poem that I set to music, though, it’s a song that uses songwriting devices to tell a universal story about a parent and their offspring as they age together. I had no one in mind when writing it. It’s a story of two people and the story line uses repetition of key words and ideas that change stanza by stanza, such as “the Fates” and the reprise of “Look at you now.”  I pair those repeating elements with the music and the melody and it’s the only track to have an actual guitar solo, done early on but left intact to reflect the strong emotions running through this parent and child relationship as they grow older. Jon keeps the track focused, not over-produced, slightly bare bones with all the emotion and family angst intact.

lyrics

Is It Okay to Complain -
© 2022 by Patrick Ames.

Look at you now, you’re all grown up
Practical hair frames a face I’ve thought of
Your shoulders are square defiantly straight
You smile when you speak as if thankig the fates

But those eyes have never
and that stare remains the same: Is this what time does to us?
Is this how things change?
Is this how I age with you?
Is it okay to complain.

Look at you now, you’re all grown up
Kids at your feet, their faces need scrubbed
Your body is used as it carefully waits
For your family to grow up and escape their fates

But those eyes have never changed and that stare remains the same: Is this what life does to us?
Is this how families change?
Is this how I age with you? Is it okay to complain?

Look at you now, you’re all grown up
Your spouse and you have broken up
You call every week and we talk until late
You squirm in your seat as if delaying the fates

eyes have never changed
because that stare remains the same:
Is this what God does to us?
Is this how things change?
Is this how I age with you?
Is it okay if I complain?

credits

from Harmonium, released June 1, 2022
Patrick Ames: Guitars and vocals
Jon Ireson: Bass, Guitars, Keyboards, Programming, Producer
Chana Matthews: Backup vocals

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Songwriter Patrick Ames continues to evolve his potent lyric signatures with new singles for 2023.

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