Hi, my name is Amelia. If you're reading this, chances are you already know who I am. Just in case, here's a quick recap.
I'm a mashup artist going by the alias himynameisshan. who, for a while now, has been going through immense grief and loss. It's spawned a lot of new, confusing feelings about myself, feelings I didn't fully know how to process. One way I dealt with these feelings was by making my second full-length mashup album, Everything Is Wonderful. That album was more broad and accessible in how I presented and expressed those feelings. And while that album helped me understand a bit of how I was feeling, there was a lot more that was left stirring in me.
Mashups were starting to become a way of venting and expressing my thoughts and feelings. It was too hard to talk to someone directly about it, but it was too much to keep a lot of it bottled up. I found it easy to use the words of others to convey my innermost thoughts. The releases I made as a result of this are created from a space I call the Nevermore. The Nevermore represents the idea of regression, processing trauma, and dealing with the cycle of grief. It's, mentally, where I go when I need to just retreat, and hide. One day, I'd like to leave for good.
This site acts as, essentially, a commentary of the projects that I created during 2023, that are, in some way, tied to one another. While it's not directly or explicitly stated, there is something of a story and universe loosely presented, you can come to your own conclusion and interpretations as you read. As you navigate this site, you'll be experiencing an in-depth, track-by-track commentary of these projects. Hopefully, this gives a better understanding of the projects, as well as myself.
Clicking on the box below will lead you to the main hub of the website. It should be fairly easy to navigate. Any and all trigger warnings will be displayed on the hub page, below the respective release icon. You are free to close the page and revisit the commentary at any time you'd like. You aren't obligated to read. But if you do, it genuinely means a lot.
Welcome to the Nevermore, I hope you enjoy your stay. I don't
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YOURS TRULY EP | Released February 17, 2023 | Approx. 16 minutes
POSTMORTEM
This was a really fun one to make. Both samples used (minus the intro) were songs I had only really started listening to, so they were very new to me. Normally I try not to use songs I'm not too familiar with, I like finding comfort in samples I use. I chose to make this mashup because of that reason; it was new territory, unfamiliar, confusing, which a lot of the Yours Truly, Nevermore project is rooted in. POSTMORTEM's lead vocal sample is "I Wanna Get Better" by Bleachers. It's a song that's very reflective after the loss of a close loved one. It's something I related to a lot, that feeling of loneliness, wishing for change, and just being confused about the new normal you're in. It's a very cynically optimistic song, and I think pairing it with the instrumental, COIN's "Talk Too Much", really gives that extra psuedo-sincere vibe. In a way, it's become more sincere the longer time has passed from it's released. A lot of people want things to change, they want to seek betterment, but when you're so clouded with these weird and depressing emotions, it gets hard to do anything. You can say so many times that you want things to be different, but I think a lot of people fail to appreciate the amount of strength and courage it takes to BE better. When everything is so new, and you feel lost, it's so extremely hard to cause change. All you can do is want it.
IF I WASN'T UNWELL
This one is a very melancholic track, something I'm apparently known for, I guess. It's also one that's very autobiographical to me. Depression, especially one caused by grief and trauma, can be an absolute bitch to fight. A lot of your actions may come off as erratic or paranoid. You isolate a lot, and for me especially, my RSD (rejection sensitive dysphoria) heightens a lot. I feel undeserving, or that there's something wrong with me, that I'm only going to make things worse for people. I like to interpret this track as me opening up to someone who isn't there, or at least, at the time, wasn't there yet. It's hard to open up to new people and tell them EXACTLY what's wrong with you. Honesty is important, but it's also extremely embarrassing at times. It takes a lot of time for me to not feel scared that the person I'm opening up to won't leave or screw me over right after, especially when it's become routine. But if there was effort in making me feel comfortable, and safe, maybe opening up won't be a bad thing.
(THE FEAR OF) STAYING
Okay, normally I don't take mashup requests. It feels ingenuine to make something that doesn't really reflect me as a person. This is a rare exception. I was approached by a listener of mine, Henny, who had this idea, but the reversal, and sent it to me seeing if I could find a way to polish it up. I listened to the instrumental of that demo ("Fear" by ZachGG) and I ended up relating to it a lot, and figured I could find a way to make it my own. So, I decided to do the reversal, and I think it worked out a lot better. It's a bargaining kind of song. It's about trying to make the best of a really bad situation. It relates to an old relationship I was in, one that was extremely damaging to me in so many ways. Here's something to help you out if you ever find yourself in an abusive relationship: abusers will put you in a state of false security! They will make you think you need them, or they need you, in any way. They make you believe that you HAVE to stay, that there's nothing without them. And it works! More often than you'd think! And after a while, you start to wonder if it was maybe a bad thing to love them, and wondering what would actually happen if either one of you decides to leave, and usually it's a lot of bad thoughts that come to mind! Do me a favor, if you can, leave. Find your support circle, and stay close with them! Because the person you're with who's doing that shit to you? They're only making you worse!
YOU DON'T LOVE HER
I'm not gonna say too much about this one. For one, I don't wanna talk about Melanie Martinez more than I have to (a lot has changed since I made this). Secondly, if you want to know more about this, reread about the meaning behind "(The Fear Of) Staying" I guess. What I WILL say about this is that I got the inspiration from a mashup artist mutual at the time, who I knew as stormwalker. stormwalker was known to make Melanie Martinez mashups at the time, and I was also wanting to incorporate my favorite artist, Waterparks, into more mashups. So, I chose to combine those two artists into one mashup, which just so happened to be the same key and tempo. Since the idea hadn't been done yet, I figured I'd be the first. I'm pretty proud of how it sounds, it's one of my more cleaner ideas. I did do something cool for the bridge though. In the vocal's original song ("FUCK ABOUT IT" by Waterparks and blackbear), there's a guitar solo of sorts before the bridge. I thought the section in the mashup where that would've happened sounded empty, and I found a clip from the original page where the song was being promoted. It was the band's website, that was blank, save for a spinning red diamond. If you clicked it, a composition would play, and it would lead to a pre-save link for the single. If you pre-saved the track, a new composition would play, which ended up being the solo with a couple of other elements. So, I just filtered it a bit in Audacity and threw it in there, and it works REALLY well. I'm really proud of that one. Oh, and that stormwalker person? They would become the main inspiration, stylistically and emotionally, for the entire Yours Truly, Nevermore project. Currently, they go by the alias of violet mash, and we are very happy together in a very committed relationship. So I guess it all works out in the end. Sometimes.
AND THE WORLD GOES ON...
This one has a few different meanings for me and for those who listen to it. I'll let you come to your own conclusions on this one, because I think it's just too important to give up what it actually means to me. Let it mean something special to you, if you so desire. It's at the end of the Yours Truly, Nevermore project for a reason, though.
NEVERMORE EP | released May 5, 2023 | Approx. 16 minutes
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This is one of the saddest mashups I've ever made. I made this on New Years, of 2022 going into 2023. I was up a majority of that night. I had witnessed someone close to me using drinking as a coping mechanism, and it had gotten to a really scary point. I don't drink, I'm personally against alcohol, and if you look at the TOO COOL FOR FUN page, you'll get an idea as to why. But this really got me thinking about my father, who had passed over 4 months ago at that point. The loss was getting to all of us. And it had me thinking about the idea of losing someone, or the idea of who someone was. I had started an instrumental base for something, not really knowing what it'd be, but after witnessing what I did that New Years, I knew what the mashup was. And I finished it the following morning. It went largely unchanged by the time the EP came out. Not much needed to be.
SUNBATHE
This one went by different names, I didn't really know what to call it. I had this finished soon after Everything Is Wonderful, as a simple one-off idea. Eventually, I really warmed up to it a lot, and I loved how it sounded. It felt right at home on Nevermore, I think. It's a pretty straightforward mashup about just longing, wanting something new, and feeling lost in your own little world. Combining these two songs was a lot of fun to figure out. Initially, it was just an A+B combination, until I started getting close with someone named Nellie, who you may formerly know as stormwalker, or currently as violet mash. They're favorite artist is Purity Ring, and now one of my favorite artists. I wanted to throw in a nod to Nellie directly in this project somewhere, and I think the Purity Ring song I chose ("bodyache") still fits thematically with the track.
FAKE LAUGHTER
I don't think much needs to be said about this one (it's openly about having suicidal thoughts and trying to downplay them). It's sort of a sister song to "if i wasn't unwell" in a few ways. It's, similarly, about wanting to open up to someone when you feel like you can't do that often, and how RSD affects that ability. This one is, admittedly, a bit more honest than that. This one is more tied to wanting to open up to someone who actually does give you the space to open up, but trying not to get too attached in a sense. It's easy to just make someone you're close to a therapist of sorts, especially unprompted. You really don't want to give this person a reason to leave. The person this was speaking to, my now-partner Nellie, was someone who never failed to give me the space to open up and be myself, but even then, I was scared of getting close. I did that before, and I got hurt, I couldn't do that again. At least, that's what I felt at the time.
BLOOM
This track has partial credit attributed to my friend, Eli, who had some Halsey mashup ideas that he though I could do, and I ended up fitting one of them into this track. This one is directly tied to how I felt about my tendency to isolate, and putting a lot of stock into someone (or some people) who would only hurt me in return. When you're at your lowest, it gets easy to lean on people too much to fix you instead of you taking the effort to do so yourself. I never did that, luckily, but I came close. Especially after putting someone on such a pedestal, when that's only what they wanted you to do, and falling apart when you have to leave them, even if it's the right thing to do. You wish things could be what your brain wanted it to be, but when it can't, it's hard to feel like you can get that feeling again. Loneliness is a lot safer than the risk of emotional damage, sometimes, even if loneliness really fucking sucks.
"I WOULD LIKE US TO BE FRIENDS!"
This was to someone special. Someone who I was extremely infatuated with at the time. I wanted to try and tell them that I wanted to be close with them, that I could comfort them. that they were wanted, needed, and loved. That I loved them. I'm not really sure if they understood that it was about them when they first heard it, but once we got together, Nellie understood pretty quickly. In return, Nellie interpolated this track into their own idea, "little love", off of their forevermore EP. I love you so much, starlight. I'm really happy we're still friends.
IDONTWANNABEMEANYMORE.
This is secretly a transgender mashup. I made this similarly to how I made POSTMORTEM, so making it the final track of Nevermore as a mirror to POSTMORTEM being the first track of Yours Truly was a nice little nod. This one is just about my gender dysphoria, and not feeling like I belonged in my body, but also feeling like if I were to be honest with myself, I wouldn't feel like I'd belong anywhere. I know I didn't want to be me, but I didn't really know who me was. I've been struggling with my gender identity all my life, and it was really meeting Nellie where I started to come to terms with who I am, and I've been feeling a little happier every day with my identity because of that.
WONDERFUL: ADDENDUM - SINGLE | released August 15, 2023 | Approx. 10 minutes
PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS
This mashup feels the most like an Everything Is Wonderful track, which was very much intentional. I wanted to encapsulate the feeling of that album from a later point of view. I found a reaction/review of that album by Winter Does Stuff. They've become a good friend of mine, and in that reaction, they said something to the effect of, "Everything isn't wonderful, but it can be." That really stuck with me, especially because over time - mainly, the last half of 2023 - a lot has changed. I found the love of my life, I discovered my true identity, I've been surrounding myself with amazing people, and while everything in my life wasn't entirely wonderful, parts were, and I knew that I could work towards having that sort of mindset, that everything is wonderful, without the spite and sarcasm and cynicism behind it. And I made this mashup as a way to reflect, and set the mood for where I'm trying to go next, at least mentally. There's a lot of ups and downs, but there's also a nonzero chance that I'll find a more complete sense of happiness if I stick to it. In a way, this mashup is sort of me talking to myself, that things will get better if you allow yourself to be here, in the present, and less stuck in your own head. Once you learn to ground yourself and really break down these parts of yourself, maybe you'll find your happiness. In due time.
SOMEDAY
Around the time I made this, and this single itself, I got with my current partner, Nellie. Nellie is absolutely my soulmate. I've had a crush on them the moment I started talking to them. Actually, no. I've been in love with them since day one. They mean the world to me. And I really wanted to express that in a mashup, somehow. And I was listening to The Muppet Movie soundtrack, and it hit me - I'm Going To Go Back There Someday. It's a song about feeling lost, and alone, even in the company of friends and family, and not really being sure how to put it into the right words. I always thought the "There" in the song was something akin to being home, being in a safe and comfortable place, mentally or physically. And I found that with Nellie. That feeling that, once we confessed feelings for each other, things felt different. I've never felt the things I feel for Nellie before meeting them. It's so much more intense, and far from any good feeling I've ever had, because it's far better than that. I feel like it's possible to feel good things for someone, and not feel so scared to open up. I've been hurt a lot, to the point I've gotten broken and had been desecrated before. But with them? I feel like I can build myself back up again. I feel loved again. I feel found. And someday, we'll be home together. And I'll be the happiest girl in the world. And I can leave this all behind.
MELANCHOLY (REPRISE)
Reprises are weird. Revisiting old topics are weird. I like to think feelings change a lot, that not everything stays the same. Things do change, even the things that seem still. I've said before that grief is messy, it's not constant or stagnant. It's like a spiral, cyclical, it evolves and changes as you do. Part of grief sort of has you questioning life and death. Once someone is gone, they're gone, and they're forever who they were when they passed. I think we all have a fear of death, in some way. We all have moments where we don't really want to die, we just don't want the worst to continue. And I wonder if those who experience severe depression, suicidal thoughts, or just general existentialism ponder the thought that, maybe they don't want to die, they just want the worst to pass. Do they have a happy moment they want to stay in? What if that was their last moment? What if they died happy, young, free, and content with their life? We're all scared of the future, of uncertainty, change, death, and the idea that things will end. Experiencing loss and severe depression has made me contemplate these things. Do I want to die, or am I just tired of living in the lowest of lows? What exactly prevents me from being happy? And when I am happy, like, fully happy, how can I make that last? How can I make that real? Maybe I don't want to, necessarily, live forever, but I'd like to go on as long as possible, and I'd like for someone on the other side, once I die and enter Glob world, I'd like for someone to tell me I had a good time, for the most part.
TOO COOL FOR FUN EP | released January 1, 2024 | Approx. 22 minutes
REINTRODUCSHAN
Okay, there's a lot to get into for this one, so apologies in advance, but there's a lot of reasons why this exists. Firstly, I've had a lot of.. strange experiences in the mashup scene. I see a lot of people who come in, just for the attention and not really because of a love for the artform. They'll make a mashup for the sole purpose of putting in front of people and expecting praise or good feedback, and half of the time, they aren't good. They don't take time to learn the craft, find their sound, and will just make things for the purpose of making it, not because they actually enjoyed making it. It's just clout-chasing (as if we have clout to chase). There's also people who are just, extremely rude to other mashup artists. If it's nothing extremely profound, busy, or a legitimate banger (aka, if it's not memes or whatever), they hate on it. I've seen a comment about Wonderful that mentioned how that album was unfocused, disrespectful, and just other things that Wonderful is absolutely not. They painted this picture of me being this super influential, new age, emotion-driven mashup artist, focusing on the fact I used to use Audacity for my DAW. I felt like there was this expectation put onto me, of who I was supposed to be, which I didn't like. Along with the imposter syndrome I felt alongside my peers and colleagues, feeling as if my art wasn't as appreciated, and just seeing this weird behavior in the scene, I wanted to make something that sort of re-established myself, and reintroduced myself. I was on Reaper now, I had some shit to say, and I even threw in cheap jokes in here to prove that I'm more than this expectation, while also making half-serious, half-unserious jabs at these kinds of people, because sometimes you just have to. This also sets up the sort of anti-party vibe of the EP. I don't like a lot of what parties represent; loud, chaotic, clustered, weird, etc. Specifically, drinking. I've been uncomfortable with alcohol my entire life, at least as early as 5 years old. I've always seen it as a negative, because that's honestly what it is. It changes peoples, it's addictive, it's gross, and so unappealing. It's so aligned with this party lifestyle, that it's a "fun" drink, and it "loosens you up", and honestly, I think it's a little bullshit. There's some truth to it, but to me, it's a little bullshit. It's become a trigger in recent years, thanks to an extremely damaging relationship, and seeing it in a context where it can be used as a way to abuse people is, for lack of a better term, not the vibe. I've never had it, and I never will, because fuck that! To me, there is nothing good about that stuff, and it's sort of the villain of this EP, with how it represents the party lifestyle, alongside something else I'm about to get into. This is also just a mashup meant to hype me up and make me feel good about myself, because sometimes, you just need that.
REPTILIAN LOVE
If you're a more established hmnis. fan, you may recognize this as a bonus track from Everything Is Wonderful on Bandcamp. I made this with intention of it being on the album, but I could never get the mix right. About half a year later, I thought about remaking the track, because it really is a great concept, and I feel like I could make it sound a lot better, and give it the proper attention it deserves. I mixed and mastered it completely different, with me using Reaper instead of Audacity, and gave the track a new solo, and it was essentially done in no time. This mashup leans into a struggle I've had for the last few years; hypersexuality. It's extremely debilitating, and not at all what shitheads on Twitter or fanfic sites explain it as. It's not a choice, and it doesn't make us freaks. More often than not, it's the result of trauma and the general uneducation of sexual health early on. It warps your perception of sex, because of how people have presented it to you, and especially how traumatic your experiences are with sex. It's something that, while I've gotten better at living with it and managing it, is still a big struggle and something I actively fight with. It presents unsafe, triggering, and intrusive thoughts a good majority of the time. I don't often talk about that part of me, but it's something I'm attempting to come to terms with and find some peace with. This mashup was made with the intent on sort of being that sneak peek into what I deal with, and it comes up a couple times over the next few tracks. Specifically, this touches on how this developed. This also just bangs (pun not intended).
UNTITLED (ft. violet mash)
I made this one with my partner, Nellie, who you have definitely heard of before if you're on this website. We both struggle with trauma from our past relationships, and this is our sort of overlap in our trauma. It dives into that feeling of trying to process trauma, and hoping that your person will still stick around through the struggles. It's also a reminder to each other that, we're not at fault, for what we went through or how we perceive things because of our trauma. Nellie had more of a voice here, picking out the vocal sample and the key this mashup would be in, and that's absolutely on purpose. If you wanna learn more, check out Nellie's album "Storms", and my EPs "Yours Truly" and "Nevermore".
CAUGHT IN THE CITADEL
This is one of the most hmnis. mashups ever. It was an idea I've had kicking around since Nevermore, but didn't really know what to do with it. Over time, I kept revisiting it, and improving the mix a bunch. Eventually, I started to conceptualize this EP, and this mashup fit right at home here. It's a very vibey mix, and somewhat melancholic. I imagine this as sort of a conversation with my struggles and trauma personified (for this HYPOTHETICAL purpose, I will be referring to this person with she/her pronouns). It's a conversation about trying to leave her, and move on from her. Every time I think I'm getting better or I'm doing fine, she comes around to remind me of what I've been through, HYPOTHETICALLY THOUGH, and my progress is halted yet again. You have to do a lot of building yourself back up when dealing with trauma and processing it, and trying to move on from in, so to speak. And I think this goes without saying but, HYPOTHETICALLY, had I know what I'd be getting into, I would've avoided her. You never really know if something, or someone, will hurt you, and break you. She seemed so appealing and enticing when she didn't present herself as a problem. But now, that you've been put through the ringer, HYPOTHETICALLY SPEAKING OF COURSE, you have to work on building yourself back up again, and as we've established, is not that easy. The added party sounds in the back create this sort of claustrophobic feeling, and also acts as this reminder that this can happen anywhere. Dealing with her, HYPOTHETICALLY, is a quiet struggle most of the time. And even in an environment that's meant to be fun and c***f***, it can be rather debilitating and restrictive.
THE LESS FUN, THE BETTER (ft. Ben Animated)
90% of this mashup is from Ben's mind. I thought it was a really great idea when he presented it to me, and I wanted to give it a facelift. It's such a fun idea and I didn't want to see it go to waste. So I remade it in Reaper, on a call with Ben of course, and pulled some samples from "Skip To My Loops" by Norman Cook (aka Fatboy Slim) to give the beat some bounce. "Skip To My Loops" is a sample CD, filled with beat loops and various samples for DJing and just sampling in general, and I try to use it a lot whenever I can. There's a ton of cool things in that CD, and I'm lucky I found a HQ rip of it online. This mashup really gave me the idea to make an EP like this, and even gave me the name of the EP, too! I consider this sort of a response to "Caught In The Citadel", where when you have to build yourself back up, you're met with all these weird emotions and feelings about yourself and what you went through, and it's not fun, at all, to navigate them. Contrasting with such a fun, upbeat sound, really gives it that added depth of like, no matter how you present yourself, you'll always have that negativity inside you, somewhere, always lurking around. I don't have much else to say about this because, again, the main idea came from Ben, so I don't wanna speak to much on it, aside from how I interpreted it and how it relates to this EP. Please give him more of the praise for this one, this is one of my favorite collabs I've ever done and it would not have been possible without him.
TOO COOL FOR FUN
This mashup sort of summarizes this EP in a way. It touches on that general disenchantment and fatigue of dealing with mental health struggles, while also not really providing any resolution to it. It's still ongoing, and there doesn't seem to be an end in sight. A running theme with the releases on this website is the cycle of grief, which is what the Nevermore represents; a neverending cycle of dealing with trauma and grieving, whatever you may be grieving. To me, it's a mix of a few things; it's grieving people close to me, and a former version of myself that is born from the Nevermore. Whenever I'm in that stage of processing and regressing progress, due to how turbulent progression is, I retreat and hide behind what the Nevermore represents. Sitting in that sadness, being unable to really enjoy being with friends or loved ones, or even the things you love to do, because that paranoia and RSD (rejection sensitive dysphoria) kicks in, and everything can set you off. Sometimes, it's easier to hide than it is to deal with it, and that ease makes it so much harder to leave. The title of this song, and the EP, is a bit of a jab at myself when it comes to mashups, and that expectation that I'm something of an emotional and sad mashup artist, but also with not being a fan (or actively against sometimes) the party lifestyle, and as we've stated before, alcohol. I've been told before that I don't know what I'm missing out on with substances, implying that I'm choosing not to enjoy something or have fun, so I've decided I'd own that. I am too cool for fun, at least those people's interpretation of what "fun" is. With who I am, and who I want to be, I'm above that. I don't need that. And anyone who acts weird about it or doesn't respect that can suck my girldick for all I care!
