21. Full on Rage

Claudia McMahon, Shania Jackson, Kaira Gula - 2025 LIU

This is another song that didn’t exist until after the workshop. Like I mentioned earlier, a song called “Full on Rage” always felt like it needed to arrive after a massive emotional buildup. So I started with the title and worked backward. I wanted it to launch like a slingshot.

Taking a cue from Bojack Horseman, we drop the one and only f-bomb in the entire show here. Because restraint makes impact possible. When it finally lands, it hits hard and immediately tells you: this is different.

The synth loop at the top was originally conceived for cello running through a delay pedal. Tiffany played it in the LIU production, and even with her precision, it just wasn’t occupying the sonic space I wanted. So I re-orchestrated it as a bed of electric pianos and digital synth plucks with delay, letting the cello step out of the loop and start accenting specific notes as the texture thickens.

The final lyric is pulled from Kurt Cobain’s suicide note…which itself is quoting Neil Young. Even for the uninitiated the lyric hangs in the air like an unanswered question: Is this where it ends for her?

Since Vincent’s art is visual, it felt right that the climax be wordless…felt rather than explained.  So a dance piece was the way.  A slightly cheeky, inside-baseball music joke: the time signatures move from 4/4 to 5/4 to 6/4 before finally landing at 7/8. Almost a reverse countdown to a climax.

Circling back to the idea of “The Jellicle Ball written by Genesis,” this becomes a full-on band showcase: a pulsing instrumental surge featuring an intricate synth solo, followed by a soaring guitar solo that eventually fractures into a guitar duet. It’s chaos with intention. A body moving faster than language can keep up.