Sticks And Stones

[Ray Brookes]

Last year a 14 year-old girl at my grand-daughter's school committed suicide as a result of on-line bullying. This song is dedicated to her ...

Onella was never gonna be a popular kid
If she had hidden talents she kept them all well hid
Overweight and slow never picked for a team
All the other school kids spiteful and mean

On the Internet playground the bully gets a mark
Faults easily found just a walk in the park
Onella right there at the end of her line
From the poison chalice drinks the bitter-sweet wine

Dot com kids broken by Internet and phones
How life was so much simpler
With just the sticks and stones
We only broke bones

Do the strong survive? The meek inherit the earth?
Is technology a gift or just another curse?
Science walks on the moon while ethics crawl in the dirt
The genie's out the bottle can it get any worse?

[StephenM]

buggers Ray...gosh this is such a great subject... really great sounds everywhere in here..those middle eastern sounding backing vocals up in the edge are so cool....the chords are intriguing... I love music like this but it has a serious message and questions that I think need alot of answers to... great stuff as always Ray...

[Greeny]

You've picked another huge, emotive theme to deal with. Really like the Indian tabla / Moroccan sounding percussion - such a lovely fusion with the acoustic guitar. A really powerful song and delivery - fantastic work. Reminds me of Harry Chapin's W.O.L.D on the vocal.

[tonyc]

great tune ray . we to have a grandson who has difficulties and gets the same problem , love the percussion superb song .  cheers ..tony cee

[TPB]

very serious subject Tech has let people bully who would never say the same things to a persons face. Fine tribute and message in this song
Tim

[Bluesberry]

Solid songwriting....it is so interesting and deep and a bit sad.....the times we live in....what great instrumentation.....vocals are damn fine.....very creative and fantastic

[Pine]

The song aside, this post has great production values...wonderfully full and clean and clear in my cans...

A deadly serious theme here Ray that you have addressed painfully well. Excellent lyric and the instrumental backing enhanced everything to my ear. Loved that percussion.

"Science walks on the moon while ethics crawl in the dirt".....that's some real good writing there Ray.

Great songcrafting... and bravo for addressing an issue much easier to not talk about.

[Ferryman_1957]

Very impressive indeed Ray. The choice of the scale and chords creates the right atmosphere for this sad tale, which you deal with very sensitively but effectively. Some fantastic sounds in here, it's very well arranged and recorded. Great vocals as well. An absolutely compelling listen, this is really, really good. 

[WarpCanada]

Man this one's about a story that's hard to hear about.  My wife and I have talked about what girls face at school these days.

Here in Canada we have the sad story of Reena Virk, and Amanda Todd, Rehtaeh Parsons. And so many more.  Each time we hear it, these stories just gut me.

[Mike_S]

That's a really sad story Ray. Sadly though this is not that uncommon a story in the world we live in. Great lyrics and I have to concur with pretty much all the words. The genie sure is out of the bottle and there is no going back. Humans have this habit of continually trying to discover new things... but where it is going to get us is questionable. Great tune.

Mike