[LET ME RELEASE] [INTRO — ONE SAX BREATH / ELECTRICAL HUM] [Whispered, inches from the microphone] Rip off my head… Let the noise fall out. I don’t want to die. I just don’t want to carry this version of me anymore. [STUTTERING ARP — ONE NOTE FAILING TO ESCAPE] Re—re—re— [VERSE 1 — LOW, CONTROLLED MALE VOCAL] Every voice I swallowed built another room, every word I couldn’t say learned how to bloom. Now the walls have teeth, and the ceiling knows my name. I keep calling this survival while it eats me all the same. I wore what they handed me. I smiled when it cut. Said, “Nothing is wrong,” with a mouth full of blood. Now something underneath me is pulling at the seams— Not asking to be rescued. Begging to be seen. [PRE-CHORUS — HEARTBEAT ENTERS] I don’t want to speak if the words aren’t mine. I don’t want to breathe on somebody else’s time. I don’t want your silence stitched beneath my teeth— Open the wound. Let me release. [CHORUS — VIOLENT BUT MELODIC] LET ME RELEASE— Every borrowed voice inside of me! LET ME RELEASE— Every shape you said I had to be! I am not the wound. I am not the leash. I am not the mouth you taught to never speak. If I have to break to find what still belongs to me— Let me— LET ME RELEASE! [POST-CHORUS — DISTORTED VOCAL CHOPS] Re—re—release. Piece—piece—by piece. Not from life. From what life forced into me. [VERSE 2 — BROKEN BEAT / BASS GROWL] There’s a stranger in the mirror wearing everything I’ve done, holding all my old reactions like a loaded gun. He knows every accusation. He can imitate my fear. He can make the past sound present when there’s nothing standing here. I tried to drown him in forgiveness. Tried to starve him into peace. But buried things don’t disappear— They sharpen underneath. So bring him to the surface. Let him finish what he means. I will look him in the face without becoming what he sees. [PRE-CHORUS — VOCAL RISES] I don’t want to heal if healing means pretend. I don’t want forgiveness that invites it in again. I don’t need another hand to pull me to my knees— Give me back my breath. Let me release. [CHORUS — FULL IMPACT] LET ME RELEASE— Every borrowed voice inside of me! LET ME RELEASE— Every shape you said I had to be! I am not your verdict. I am not your disease. I am not the quiet that made everybody pleased. If the mask must scream when I tear it from my teeth— Let it scream. LET ME RELEASE! [ALL INSTRUMENTS CUT] [Close-mic inhale] …please. [HORROR SAX EXORCISM] [One low sax note bends beneath pitch.] [Left channel: broken three-note phrase.] [Right channel, delayed: same phrase reversed.] [Sub-bass shadows the melody one octave below.] [The sax begins arguing with itself—warm tone against overblown multiphonics.] [STUTTERING ARP ACCELERATES] Re—re—re—re—re— [SAX SCREAMS UPWARD] [FALSE END — COMPLETE SILENCE] [One quiet breath] I can hear myself. [BRIDGE — DRY PIANO / CLEAN VOCAL] Under all the noise, I was never gone. I was holding one small note for when the pressure stopped. It wasn’t rage. It wasn’t peace. It was the sound a soul can make when it finally belongs to the body underneath. [FINAL CHORUS — FIRST HALF RESTRAINED] Let me release what was never mine to keep. Let me release every promise made through fear. Let me release the need to disappear just to make somebody comfortable with having me near. [DRUMS AND SAX ERUPT] LET ME RELEASE— But leave my heart inside of me! LET ME RELEASE— Not my love—only the leash! I will keep the scar. I will keep the seed. I will keep the parts that learned what I will never be. I don’t have to vanish to become somebody free. Open my hands. Give back my name. Let me— RELEASE! [OUTRO — SAX BECOMES WARM AND HUMAN] [Whispered] The mask hit the floor. The face underneath was still breathing. [Four-note broken-crown motif] Re— leased.
