All I'd like
right now
are some earphones

Just so I could
kick back,
relax
hear the music
slow dance in my ears

Hear
the beat
and every rhythm
swing

Look up
watch the stars
as they sing
sweet Hallelujah's

As I drive past
the night sky,
I lay back in my seat
and pretend to be
in some fantasy

A music video
could almost portray
reality

But my reality
no more
than the music
in my head

The songs not said

The lyrics
I dare breathe
if not written
much less sung aloud

No more
than
the moment
of having earphones
in my ears.

Submissions to the Annual Musical Torture Experiment for 2017 are officially open!

Submit your five songs by emailing them to
[email protected]

"BUT WHAT IS THE MUSICAL TORTURE EXPERIMENT NICK?"

Well me, I'm glad you asked.
The Musical Torture Experiment was started in 2013 by yours truely, Nicholas R Coulombe.
Where I asked everyone I knew, met, or saw on the street, to hand me 5 songs that I would add to one playlist,
listen to that playlist on a loop
AND NO OTHER MUSIC
for an entire month.

I have continued this tradition each year
recruiting Willing victims & voulenteers
to listen along with me.

These victims have many different lives, interests, and genre preferences,
but there is one thing they all have in common.

The blissfull escapism of living in their headphones.

This gaggle of Tune-heads who use their music as a fundamental life resource, a coping mechanism, an escapist fantasy or meditation.
These people offer their body and spirit to music.

Now, for a whole month, they are relinquishing control of their music.

Shotgun no longer shuts their piehole.

For an entire month.
Listeners will not be able to skip or select any music other than
YOUR SUBMISSIONS!

This is the perfect opportunity to force someone to really find whats so amazing about those artists we culturally hate.
Or maybe theirs an oldy that your grandkids Refuse to consider music because there is static or twangy voices instead of bass drops.

Maybe you talk about your love of skrillex and a hipster spits their kombucha in your face.

If you have songs that DESERVE the light of day.
This is your chance to indulge in their exhibition.

want to voulenteer yourself as tribute to listen along with these crazy *******?
keep tabs on what is being added cause you think its kinda interesting?
Or contribute YOUR five songs?

Just
Send an email to [email protected]
by the end of August to participate!

Go check out the playlist itself here:

https://open.spotify.com/user/124409443/playlist/2TAdzDUKx7sfW1uJrqMS7K

I'm walking down a path I know
I got the volume on full blast
I've still got thousands of verses to go
I intend to make each last
But someone walks up to me
Telling me to cease and desist
I begrudgingly comply
But in my mind, I say this:

Don't talk to me now, my headphones are on
I'm dancing in my mind to my song
My feet match the kicker, my heart beats the snare
In this moment, I don't have a care
So while I've got my headphones on
Please take note, I'll carry on

It's the end of the day, I'm finally home
All homework and chores have been done
So I walk up to my room, warm and alone
And soon the phone's concert has begun

So I say
Don't talk to me now, my headphones are on
I'm dancing in my mind to my song
My feet match the kicker, my heart beats the snare
In this moment, I don't have a care
So while I've got my headphones on
Please take note, I'll carry on

I've got two more hours on this ride
Through a long and quiet night
But I've got a little help by my side
To get me to the morning light

So I say
Don't talk to me now, my headphones are on
I'm dancing in my mind to my song
My feet match the kicker, my heart beats the snare
In this moment, I don't have a care
So while I've got my headphones on
Please take note, I'll carry on

Don't talk to me now, my headphones are on
I'm dancing in my mind to my song
My feet match the kicker, my heart beats the snare
In this moment, I don't have a care
So while I've got my headphones on
Please take note, I'll carry on

I present for you
A user’s manual
For your new set of headphones

First: connect to your device
You may need a cord
Or use Bluetooth
But you need to connect to an outside source
The headphones do not come with a playlist

Second: put the headphones on
Make sure you maintain maximum ear coverage
Headphones are not as effective if you can hear the outside world
The thud of footsteps
The jumble of conversations
The pitter patter of rain
And the sound of laughter
Are not as harmonious as your music

Finally: begin the first song
Listen to it blissfully
Because only you can enjoy it
No one else is allowed in on your personal concert
There is no need to take off your headphones
There is no need to turn the volume down
There is no need to disconnect from your mobile device
Because here
No one can hurt you
You can’t hurt anyone
And you can pass by the world like a ship in the night

The headphones have a lifetime warranty
However, we cannot refund you
On the time, friends or opportunities you might have lost
While using our product

Sincerely, your inner coward

Give me a beat to drift with
For the focus I need, I need my mind lifted
Out of this skull you try to pull me back
I don't lack attention because you don't hold my attention
This detention is too basic so I tend to twist it.
Give me a beat to drift with
To you its just noise, this is the soundtrack I live in
These words flowing out of me like a record stuck spinning
Praying I don't get stuck on these scratches
And detach from the needle, that I have my grooves in

I do the impossible with bass, battling my fears
Flashback to the tears of some years ago
Driving home from a job I just got let go,
Figuring out how to let my wife know
Feeling like a bird having its wings clipped
Give me a bass to break walls with
But here I am a force you just can't stop, sir
As I was taking that one test to change my fate
I was blasting  Watsky and T. Walker
With an inspirational message lasting
To the point that I walked out a ninety question wreck
And came out a certified pharmacy tech.

I'm clinging to these lyrics like my world depends on it
I don't even know what god to thank for the ceilings I hit
So I pray to a different one every night and love this life
Even as I lay here writing, I hear what another is writing
Pounding through my head, in a perfect reciting
Give me the words to widen minds with
I don't even know what god to thank for the ceilings I hit
So I pray to a different one every night with the love of my life.

Your voice is like my favorite song.
I'm not quite sure how to explain it.
Soon as you speak my soul is instantly combustive.
A deep echo heard in the farthest region of my soul.
Standing there, roaming free.
Each peak skydiving into the ripple of my heart.
This edgy parapsychology that ceases to end.
Doused in gasoline, ignited, remade anew, soon as the door way to your mouth
is opened.
Never fading.
This majestic feeling that you give.
I wish my headphones had a higher setting.
To take in more of you.
Each throb against my ear drum
Echoes In perfect excitement.
My heart pounds in anticipation.
A pool of gasoline touched by a spark of fire.
A bright blaze taken place inside the well of me until there is nothing left inside.
This is the effect you have on me.
Waiting to hear your voice climb the peak of where I stand
In the farthest region of my soul