Here's the Top 50 Lyrics which will be moving on to the 2nd Round judging. These were determined by all of YOU and your peers.. the participants of the Lyric Award category, who voted this year. The Top 8 Lyrics from Pages 1-5 plus the Top 3 from page 6 were automatically forwarded. Oddly enough, there were zero ties for these slots. There were an additional 17 lyrics which were vying til the very end for one of the final 7 discretionary slots. We used a series of tie breakers which included the following (not necessarily in this order.. we can't give away ALL the secrets):

For the remaining 7 slots, after their final score, we also used these tie breakers:

1. First Place Votes
2. Total Votes
3. Confirmation of Voting/Not Voting (To clarify, we didn't penalize those who didn't vote as long as they had the courtesy to reply to us with their info as we asked everyone to do. They didn't get the 6 points FOR voting, but they DID get the tie breaker advantage if it came down to that against someone who never responded at all.)
4. Judgment Call: If all of the above didn't break the ties, then our staff did.

Some statistics/factoids:

The Most Points ANY Lyric Got was: 76 (by 2 different lyrics)
The Most Overall Votes (1 through 5) that any Lyric got Was: 22
The Most First Place Votes that any Lyric Got Was: 8
The Least Points Any 2nd Round Lyric Got Was: 25
Only 8 Lyrics Ended Up With ZERO Points
4 Lyrics without Bonus Points Still Made the Top 50

Out of all the votes, no voter got all of the top 5 correct on any page. In fact, only 2 voters even had all 5 of their votes fall in the top 8 lyrics. To me, that's a sign we got a really diverse set of viewpoints/styles represented in the second round. It also should be some comfort to those who didn't make it into the Top 50. There was certainly no "obvious" top 5 Lyrics on a given page to any 1 person.

Below are the 50 Lyrics that finished with the most votes and/or won the tie breakers in the order of their original Lyric Post. We seem to have a wide mix of regular lyric board members and new folks as well as a diverse array of styles, viewpoints and subject matters in the lyrics below. Remember, these are NOT the final 2004 Award Nominees. These are simply the lyrics still in the running for a nomination which will be determined after the Round 2 Voting takes place:

Original Lyric #: Lyric Title
Writer(s)

4: Yeah, God's Like That
Stan Good

5: Crazy Is My Name
W.L. "Bill" Cooper

6: Dog Tags In The Dust
Robert George

8: Tongue-In-Groove
Robert Kvinnesland

11: Henry Teel
Shandy Lawson

19: Cherokee Wind
Carl Towns

27: Seamus, Sean and Me
John Hagius

28: Night Games
Mike Dunbar

43: The Madlibs Song
Sandy C.

45: Welcome To My Life
Amelia Rose

48: I Won't Be Here Long
Harriest Ames

52: At The End Of The Day
Timothy A. Perry

58: That's What God Looks Like
Greg C. Brown

66: Dancing Shoes
Jim Moore, Dave Mackechnie

73: Memories of a Lifetime
Connie Fletcher

74: I Will Cry With You
Michael Thomas Ellis

78: The Man of Her Dreams is Jim Beam
Ashleigh Wehmeyer

79: Give Me Wings
Alan D. David

97: The Wind and the Stones
Bruce Madole, Julie Shephard

101: Cowboy in Chicago
Corky Bernard

103: I Was Dancin' With the Devil
Corey Parkman

113: Daddys Little Secret
CowboySlim

115: Blood and Adrenaline
Ozone Pete

123: The Virginia Waltz
John Campbell

125: Love Doesn't Divide, It Multiplies
Sonny B. Bell

131: When Cordelia Played
Zak Morgan

135: Complicated Woman
Anne Meredith-Will

138: When Dogwood Blossoms Fall
Elizabeth Marquez, Michael Ellis

144: You Made Me Laugh (And Mean It)
Matthew Fox

149: Duct Tape
Joe Wrabek

151: Better
Steve Brown

162: The One-eyed Babysitter
Robert E. Oxford

164: If Heaven Allows
Billy Ray Jarrell, Willie McCulloch

170: Two Letters And A Heart
Dan Fenstermacher

174: Blue Crayons Write The Best
Mario Spinosi

175: Amanda's Dreams
Timothy D. Brown

181: Sadly, Softly Beautiful
Erica Molz

182: No Easy Road (To Easy Street)
Bobbie Gallup

204: Some Day, Some Way
Kaley Willow, Wyman Griffith

206: Pink Ballet Shoes
Judy Hollier

213: Joshua's Moon
Graham Andrews

230: Big Man Of Steel
Butch Price

234: Mot Yumat
Marsha Caddle

237: The Hollow
Chuck Whiteside

238: Sweet Manhattan Melody
Colin Buckley

242: Holding Hands in Wal-Mart
Richard Berman

249: They Say
Paul Martinez

258: Decorated
Evyn Charles

262: Weapons of Love
Michael R. J. Roth

265: Let Your Soul Breathe
Janelle Donovan

We will email all the Top 50 Writers with more info and instructions on what to do next.

Congrats to those who are moving to the next round, and thanks to all of you who entered and helped with the voting. We'd love to have you continue to participate in the next round of voting as well. Info will be posted on the message boards on how to vote in the 2nd round. That will take place later in March.

Thanks again,

Brian

Brian Austin Whitney
Founder
Just Plain Folks
www.jpfolks.com

I don't see a Bad One in the Bunch..know of a few More I wish'd Been There.

CONGRATS to Evabody on this List..& to ALL you Patient Folks who helped Pick These. & Especially to BRIAN & Co.--for Doing So WELL what He Does SO WELL!

I can see that my taste is definitely in the minority on this board. Only one lyric of the 5 I voted for made the cut , but at least it was the one I considered best on page .

I've learned a lot from being behind the scenes for the last 5 years doing the awards. I used to think to myself how awards must always be rigged because I didn't think the best songs/albums won and of course my tastes must be right! HA! It was wake up call time for me!

Though I can often instinctually guess which songs will do well with the overall judges, I also realize it's rarely similar to any 1 persons taste, including mine. That's the downside to having a lot of people judge/vote versus 1 persons particular taste, which sometimes can produce more interesting and eclectic results. (It's the problem you have with 1 radio programmer doing mass radio playlists for everyone like they do at Clear Channel). You can also get a mix of tastes which result in sometimes odd results. Last year, only 1 judge in the final round of ALL genres of the music awards got the top 5 songs in any genre in the correct order. And do you know who that judge was? A 6 year old girls who was voting in the Childrens Category and who nailed all 5 in order. We had label VP's who didn't get more than a couple right.

I also learned a few other interesting things. Last year we had a successful producer who voted in a particular category. They also found a song they wanted to (and eventually did) license for a TV project. (No, I am not going to tell you, so hold off on the emails). The interesting thing was the song he chose to license wasn't even in his top 5 choices for that genre. BUT.. (and here's an important factor to always remember) it DID fit his business need better than the 5 songs he picked ahead of it. The Best Art doesn't always make the best fit for commerce. A lesson everyone pursuing both should never forget.

Brian

Looking forward to seeing the Best Lyric Winner at the Awards show this year!

Just wanted to say it was a cool and enjoyable experience taking in everyone's thoughts and feelings.

Very powerful!

Thank you Brian,Linda and all the JPF behind the scenes workers for helping and honoring all of us. Thank you Brian also for your words of wisdom!

Congrats to all......

Never stop creating and sharing!

Cheers,
jaen
www.agirlnamedjaen.com

It's been a great experience so far with such a the diverse group of writing skills.
Congratulations again to the 50 and to all the rest who have done a super job. Write-on!

And thank you Brian, great job.

Your kindness is indeed appreciated. I know you are probably expecting a check in exchange for your votes, but current fiscal restrictions preclude this.

However, rest assured that first thing Monday morning, once they have ripped off and turned in the front page for credit, I intend to visit the dumpsters behind all the local 7-Elevens and collect the unsold Sunday papers. Then I will ask the wife to go through them and clip out the valuable coupons so that I may send them to you. Please do not feel slighted if they are addressed to "Occupant" and arrive in a "ValPak" envelope. Third class postage is truly a superior value.

Thank you again,

dawg
# 101 in your program, but
Number One in your hearts.

Once again, thanks and good luck to all the semifinalists!
TD/Tim

Happy Songwriting Wishes to all...
Kaley.........

I have posted all the Top 50 Lyric Finalists. Please do a quick check for me to make sure I didn't miss any or copy/paste the wrong lyric (which I did once and had to fix..). There's an interesting collection of lyrics there for sure.

And to those bright enough not to vote for my entry!!

my condolences to the Empress and Tricia who were my co favorites; i wonder if the vegas big wigs~~~ will understand, it was just a slip of the tongue~~~

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http://www.ampcast.com/music/26305/artist.php

Brian's right about the thing about knowing who'll get through even when you woulnd't vote for them yourself. From that point of view, i was spot-on, even though my votes were very different. Yay. Good for me.

I've been going through the 50 final lyrics, and wow, there's some serious competition in there! Most of it is top-class stuff, and it makes me wonder why i even bothered to post my own lyric against these! One thing surprises me, though. In the discussion after last year's lyric contest, if i remember right, there was talk about how people shouldn't post long lyrics because such a lyric wouldn't make a good song, for one, and the reader who is voting might run out of patience, for another. That doesn't seem to have held in this year's contest. Maybe it's a direct result of having everyone vote on just 50 lyrics. Or maybe it's an indication of how much popular opinion goes against industry standards (which is a good thing, in my rebel opinion! ) Ultimiately, my vote wouldn't be based on length or rhythm or hook or idea or story or singability, but on the poetry of the thing. Yup. And i demand that everyone follows the standards that i set.

Pramod

My observation was that very short lyrics didn't do very well. It's interesting that in the regular music categories, often longer songs do better than their shorter counter parts as well... the average length of winning songs are usually significantly longer than the 3.5 minute radio preferred standard.

You deserve to be proud of this accomplishment! Enjoy!!

My entry from last year ended up at #5 when all the dust cleared. Crossing my fingers going into the next gauntlet!

It looks like it will be at least late May or June until we can get to the nominations stage of our Music Awards this year. Should we hold off on the 2nd round voting until we get closer, or make everyone wait in anticipation that much longer for the results?

By the way, haven't been around for a while. Wanted to say thanks to all those who voted for my lyric. Knowing who all was on the same page with me, it was truly an honor and a huge surprise.

Thanks again, Brian and all.

Steve

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Marty listen here

Why would we separate it from the rest of the awards? Are you suggesting we don't give the award out with the other awards either? I am kinda shocked by your comment?

Everyone else:

I know folks were impatient waiting for the first round results. If we do the voting now and people have to wait until mid to late June to know the results I am guessing people will get pretty ancy about that as well.

I think you might be misunderstanding the timing. We won't even announce the nominees of the Awards until late May or even late June. (It's a LOT of stuff to go through folks!). So if we vote on the top 50 right now and get the results in a week or two, we won't announce those final nominees until the other nominees are announced. Then it will be an additional 2-3 months til the awards from that point. Right now I am thinking of the awards being the first weekend of September, so we can also celebrate our 6th anniversary at the same time. Plus the winners/finalists will have a cool promotional boost for their music for the upcoming holiday season.

If that's your timing, why not start round 2 voting April 1 and give the entire month for voting. Will then be easy for folks to fit voting into their schedule and give you a month to make sure there's nothing bizarre in the results before announcing the nominees.

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Marty listen here

We don't share any results with anyone until the nominations are posted on the site and later when the winners are announced to everyone at the awards. I've never liked awards programs that tell the winners they won beforehand. Many use it as a bribe/encouragement to get the winners to attend. I've always thought that if you have to do that to get someone to attend, it's probably better for them not to come in the first place.

I decided to push the next round back a bit so that we resolve it all closer to the time that we get the nominations announced for all the other categories. We'll post the info on voting in the newsletter and it will be open to all current members of the group.

Have some fun, hear?