Salem

Yeah my previous statement only applies to the actual song vocals, I feel like I should clarify. Things like the Light Shower transition from FS and the new TV intro are likely newer than the initial leaks, since I imagine the transitions were added after the final track list was selected.

None of the previously leaked songs have new vocals, just new production at most. Sirens recycles the "Uweigh" vocals from the 03 breakdowns and layers them into the final breakdown before the bridge. I personally don't care for that because it feels overdone but I'm glad to have an official Sirens release either way.

I think it honestly would be an amazing song if it weren't pitched down, but hearing the pitched down version reminds me of a little girl playing with her dolls and trying to make a deep voice for Ken. I just can't take it seriously and with the theme it is really held back by that fact.

I feel like it's easy to be frustrated with the Portals era released tracks when the tracks we heard from the leaks were *so* good. I think just about anyone here would've rather we got something like Garden over Moon Cycle, or Needle & Thread over Pluto. We saw some of her career best within the leaked sessions, and while I'm glad three of these tracks made it to final release (with differing degrees of quality in their reworks, Sirens being by far the best handled of the bunch) I wish we'd seen more of them, or songs similar to them, instead of tracks like Spider Web and Evil. Edit: Another thing I forgot to mention, but it's easy to feel like some of the weaker elements of the sessions made it into these new tracks while abandoning the stronger ones. Ex: Powder has that vocal effect, which was present but better used on many of the scrapped sessions due to their unique melodies and vocal delivery, which is something that is lacking on the final album because a lot of the tracks feel like they were over-thought lyrically and became too wordy or just over worked.

After listening through: I'm SO glad Sirens final blends the clearer bridge instrumental from 03 and the breakdowns from 04. That said, I do think Sirens is the only deluxe track I particularly care for. Her vocal delivery in the other two isn't really something I like from her.

Three ^

She really wants us to sit through Moon Cycle

Honestly hoping we get 3-4 tracks tonight instead of just Sirens. Something tells me it's going to have the same super quiet mastering Portals has for some reason. If that's the only issue though I'll run it through FL Studio and fix it up.

I hope it's the entire deluxe, but she's doing a release at a set time which is more common with singles (and which I find annoying but I'll live). I will say, I find it HILARIOUS how she tried to replace Sirens with Nymphology, it wasn't as liked as Sirens, so now she has to release the OG.

Hoping it's the full deluxe tonight honestly. I've only been listening to Leeches and I'd like to be streaming Sirens + a few new songs.

I wasn't able to because it's considered long distance by my carrier, so pls post what it says.

I mean, it has some little guitar transitions but I wouldn't say it's the pop-rock sound Void or Evil are, more like experimental pop with some live recorded elements than anything, though to me I never considered Void/Evil/BOTL to really be rock either because to me rock is something like Get Scared or Apocalyptica. They always just felt like some weird fusion genre.

It’s just a theory, but I think Portals, while doing pretty well among her younger fans, isn’t bringing back the type of money Atlantic is expecting and she’s trying to release a song she knows fans love to fix it. This era so far has been very high budget in terms of things like having a makeup artist to put that prosthetic on and those snippet animations, and the tour is planned to be very short. Since touring and merch are typically how artists make the money to pay off their advances, I imagine Atlantic is already starting to worry about another loss like what they saw after K-12 with her only planning to perform for a month and a half compared to her usual year plus long tour cycles.

Hoping for sirens on Wednesday or Friday... if it's only mastered, then I have hope for more bops.

Now... even as your brother... what the hell is this phrasing...

I think too many people replied to the "what's your favorite track from Portals" with Sirens or other leaks and now she's realized what we want...

@Jacks Toilet Crisps when she randomly hears my Kettle On A Stove impression on VC.

That is FOUL.

777, yeah? Dm me it please! Yeah I was considering buying a Walmart pressing but I think the fact I’ve seen so many videos was like a sign. Yeah, I think her team may have gone with a new company for the US pressing this time, but the quality isn’t as good as the one that they used previously. Still odd to me how the CDs had that issue but only with the listening event ones.

Anyone else seeing a lot of videos about the QC for Portals merch? I don’t think I’ve seen anyone get a vinyl that looks similar to mock-ups. So far, it seems the lavender ones are all white, the bloodshot ones are all translucent pink, and the black and white splatter ones are all almost fully grey. I know there were also issues with the listening event CDs having grainy cover art (and one video claiming the audio was really bad). Hopefully future pressings are better, but I guess we’ll find out in a few months.

I mentioned this before, but a track being taken down from YouTube doesn’t mean it’s being released or even that someone on Melanie’s team made the report. It’s more likely that a fan pretended to be Melanie to get it taken down.

Unfortunately, it’s not well known just how simple it is to put out a false claim so people often will take the claims they see as fact. YouTube copyright strikes are frequently abused because of how easy it is to put in a claim. It’s as simple as going through the report menu and claiming the work belongs to you, as it will remain claimed for a certain period of time even if you fail to provide proof the content belongs to you. That’s why a lot of time leaks will get taken down, even if claimed under incorrect titles or random users. I’ve actually heard of somewhat large channels getting deleted from YouTube because of people sending false claims, so it’s actually a relatively big problem.

I checked and it is not registered to her BMI Rep. Someone put up a copyright strike on YouTube under the title “Milk Of The Siren,” and it spread a rumor about the song being registered. I also noticed when checking her BMI Rep that none of the portals tracks have been registered yet.

Makes me think she's going to do the prosthetic every night she plays. A shorter tour would make sense in that case, since the latex and such used in prosthetics like that can be very harsh on your skin. That said, even two months would be very long if that's the case... I think the only way a tour in the creature would work is if she pulled a Hollywood Undead and had a custom sculpted mask with a cutout for her nose and mouth to make it easier to sing and breathe.

I'm not really surprised that she did this, but... come on Melanie, you have a mic that cost you over 3k, please use it ToT