Song of the Year Songwriting Contest

ARobin Gifford - 2009 Lyric Winner

Robin is a singer/songwriter who will be releasing her debut album in October 2010. She has written over 60 songs though she never considered recording any of them until recently. Robin comments "I really have been focusing on writing and playing around town for fun. I only considered recording my songs after numerous requests started coming in. Its always surprising to hear that a song you wrote honestly touched someone else and that they want a recording of it to experience it again". Robin's writing covers various subject matters, all of which she claims are therapeutic to her. "When I write, it is always from experience! Many times I find my lyrics just pouring from my mind and later have to read them to really get the substance of what I just wrote. There are some deep emotions that can come out if you just let go."

This is confirmed with her winning lyrical work "Losing Me In You". When asked to comment on the inspiration of the lyrics she states "I don't know about inspiration but more like desperation! These lyrics were definitely created in some deep emotional place inside of me that until recently I could not even talk about. It is about something that some woman deal with and that I have experienced personally. Its about sexual assault. It is also about the masking of emotions that derive in the mind during and after the incident. There is an escape that woman go through where every emotion is numb. Every fiber of one's being is displaced to get through the experience".

Robin continues, 'Losing Me In You' also touches on the erroneous emotions and belief systems that the sexual assault was the woman's fault like in the verse when I wrote 'A candid illusion of me is to blame'. I know it sounds absurd to blame yourself for something out of your control but for some reason many of us do. It is like trying to make sense of it all in our own way. It is so hard to believe someone could do such a vile act against someone else that the victim starts considering other variables that may have enforced that behavior. This of course is self-blame. It is wrong to feel this way but it is part of my personal experience and I definitely had to deal with it during my healing process. In the chorus I wrote 'Closing Eyes, Take Me To That Place....' I write this because this is the escapism created by such a dire act. One really has to create a mental distance from the situation to get through it. The lyrics also convey the undying memory of the event. Memories are the only things I currently am dealing with and they are likely to never leave completely. It is the memory that continues to haunt victims of sexual assault more than anything else. It is a long road to overcome but writing has helped me get to where I am today! I do not know how much commercial success this would have but its means a lot more to me than commercial success. This is about an experience I went through and that really is what writing lyrics is all about to me. It truly is therapy in many ways!"

Robin has recently written music to her winning lyrics but noted that she hasn't determined if it will be on her debut album yet.

Losing Me In You

VERSE 1:

Moments that spill into and throughout
Softly pressing with curious eyes
When notions bring silence undying violence
I plead for these memories to die

CHORUS:

VERSE 2:

The scent of disgrace is laconic enough
A candid illusion of me is to blame
Once too fragile I've become something less
Deserving this honor of furious shame

CHORUS:

Closing eyes - take me to that place
Where a heart finds a home that a mind cant erase
Noxious lies - I allow them to subsist
Claim them as my truth - desire them to exist
The innocence fails to pull me through
There's the memory
I'm still losing me in you

BRIDGE:

I just wanted to be beautiful
But just for that one day
A love once displaced is a love now disgraced
Nothing more than beautiful
But just for that one day
I close my eyes now and it all goes away

CHORUS: