Tuesday, September 29, 2015

7 Things: The Hamiltunes Edition

I pre-ordered the "Hamilton" soundtrack.  I had maybe checked the release date a few times.  I had joked about taking the day off so I could just listen intently and sing along, and think in lyrics for a day.  And then, I swear, totally accidentally, took the day off so I could take my cat to the vet for her annual checkup.  And then...(and then!) NPR released it in early listening form last Monday. So...extra chair dancing steps from my fitness tracker. So here we are. 
1. I had remembered how much of the show is about love.  Love of country, love of ladies, love of men, love of truth, love of power, love for children, love for parents, love of doing what's best not just for you but for others (well, sometimes).
2. I had somehow forgotten how much of it is about writing.  Obviously.  Duh.  But between "Non-Stop" and "The Reynolds Papers" and the references to the Federalist papers to the more overt points made about writing in "Hurricane".
3. And there is a ton of talk about legacy, and who gets to tell the story, in fact there is a song titled "Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story".
4. There are a few things I noted are not in the soundtrack.  Now this is the radio play version, so there's some language that is truncated, but also some things that occur in quick dialogue between songs, or that are not crucial to the song that are not there.  (One Miranda was explicitly asked about on twitter and he said they were saving some things to punch you with the live performance. The text has since been posted for the curious.)
5. On the second pass through I started to notice things that reminded me more explicitly of "Bring It On".  I may do a larger piece about this, but some of it is things that show up everywhere, who do you love, what do you stand for, and so on.  The siren bit though, I remembered that from "Bring it On", it has a very different effect here. 
6. These performances, they are stunning.  Stunning live, stunning on tape.  And the orchestrations.  It's just.  Wow.  I got to "Satisfied" and was just, um, blown away, and then I hit "Wait For It".
7. Also, again, this is a story about a man. And his friends and foes.  But there are ladies all over the place.  And Eliza gets the last song.