The Insistent Guitar
By jegasus on January 11, 2026 10:33 pm
### Lore
No matter who picked it up and plucked at its strings, the guitar would always play the same thing. Every single player who tried to tame it failed. They would toss the ax aside, cursing its angelic sounds and say the instrument was cursed, broken or both. It languished in the pawn shop for years.
Then she came along. She had heard about the broken guitar and was curious to give it a shot. She picked it up, plugged it in and started playing. The same notes insisted themselves onto her fingers. But instead of trying to fight back and play something else, she allowed herself to be taken by the music. Eyes closed, her fingers plucked the strings exactly as the guitar insisted. Finally, someone was listening, truly listening! The guitar's lamenting tone felt even more melancholic as it bore its soul to the only person who would listen. She understood. The guitar was telling her something. Something vital. Something everyone needed to hear. And she was scared.
### Production details
Howdy howdy, peeps! I hope y'all had a wonderful week!
The true heart of this song, the plucked instrument paired with the chiptune arp, came together a few weeks ago when I was lying in bed at my brother's house. I got super excited because it was the first thing I had made in a long time that truly felt like I was starting to break out of my creative rut. After getting that main piece, I put the song down and started to work on other things, but I 100% knew I would very soon get back to it eventually.
I had originally intended to submit another song to WB, but after working on that other idea for a few hours, I wasn't able to get what I really wanted out of it, so I put it aside and remembered this beautiful little project. Then, over the course of two short sessions, I sketched the general arrangement and made this into a full song with a few different sections and additional instruments & stuff.
As usual, this was done entirely on the Dirtywave M8 Tracker. Also worth noting that this project did not include any samples. So everything you're hearing are its internal synths.
Ok, I just checked my M8 and it says I worked on this whole project for a total of about 2.5h. That is wild to me - I feel like I poured in at least four or so hours in this! Hahahahaha...
Anyways, I'm really proud of how this one came together. I feel like I might even want to come back to this at a later point and create a couple more sections just because there is something so pretty and lush about the vibe that the plucked instrument establishes. There's definitely a lot more to explore here.
But alas, we beat weekly, and the due time is upon us. Who knows, maybe I might even revisit this at a later week down the year! That might also be fun 
Also, I gotta say: GOD DAMN I missed making music with you people. This little corner of the internet is such a sacred place. Thank you for sharing your art and voice in this space and allowing me to witness the beauty you all make.
Cheers, folks!
Audio works licensed by author under:
CC Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike (BY-NC-SA)
lovely plucked melody especially the higher theme ooh yais! Excellent lore and outro! \m/
