[B minor, slow patient tempo, no click] [Intro | dry near-spoken delivery to come, guitar alone with its delay trail] [Verse 1 | dry, near-spoken lead vocal, flat and unhurried | guitar alone with its delay trail, nothing else yet] A choirmaster struck the interval dead, named it a devil dressed in dread. Candlelight taught every throat the shape of sound that doctrine wrote. [Chorus | same near-spoken delivery, only slightly more melodic | Hammond enters underneath] I'm the line that never bends, I'm the fence that just pretends. Every builder swore they'd found a devil circling the sound. [Verse 2 | same dry near-spoken lead | bass enters, still spacious] They swore no wire could hold a soul, they swore no circuit paid the toll, a picket line outside the door, called it thin, and nothing more. [Chorus | same near-spoken delivery, word for word | Hammond and bass together now] I'm the line that never bends, I'm the fence that just pretends. Every builder swore they'd found a devil circling the sound. [Verse 3 | still dry, still restrained, no cracks in the delivery yet] Now a banner flags the upload clean, a comment thread decides what's seen. They call it artificial, thin, never once bothered to look within. [Instrumental | guitar and Hammond swell together for the first time | drums finally open up, tempo unchanged, only the arrangement widens | this is where the wall starts coming down] [Final Chorus | vocal opens for the first time into a fuller, multi-tracked, soaring delivery | full band, drums fully open, no longer restrained] I'm the line that never bent, I'm the artificial in the argument. No devil ever touched the sound, just a pedigree that built its own crown. [Outro | guitar fades to a single sustained note, arrangement thins back down] [spoken, dry, almost amused] "I was never load-bearing."
