Anyway the album Heartlands by Autoheart is about Alicia and Drippy and Oliver and Shadar. Long post many thoughts read more
Some of these are kind of reaching just bear with me
Alicia adjusting to living somewhere entirely different and being something almost alien and confronting and accepting her death. Also works as a dual perspective with Drippy being turned inanimate and searching desperately for something to save himself, his world, someone to finish what Alicia started
"All the secret histories we bury in the deep" - woops yeah I was meant to tell you about the spellbook in the fireplace. Oh also I'm a legendary magical figure in a different universe
"Is there a place I need to be / A friend I need to call" - Oh god Drippy got cursed am I failing my mission should I even be here the fate of the world is resting on me and this child I just had I'm so alone
"I'm looking for deliverance / I'm looking for a reason to break free" - Drippy trying to get out of the doll
It's kind of. Shadar and the White Witch but also. In a way Alicia and Shadar. And it could a little bit be about Oliver and Phil but only a bit bc that makes me sad
"I know I'm in the wrong / But I am caught up in the eye of the storm" - sad boy shadar and that one big spell he has
"I'm not joking, I'm hoping / I won't always be heartbroken" literally anyone in game could say this. Alicia seeing what Lucien has become and knowing that she can't fix him, but she can find goodness elsewhere
Suicidal ideation runs in the family okokok. Alicia sacrificing everything she knew for a different world. Oliver falling in love with the other world and using it as escapism and then later accepting seemingly inevitable death. Shadar essentially commiting suicide by throwing himself into the pits of despair after being completely disillusioned, then that final cutscene with him and Alicia. Drippy living as a doll for years and just wanting to go home
"And when all is said and done / Irrevocably, I'm gone / And the shadow I inhabit / Fades, fades" - Alicia time traveling and world hopping and leaving behind everything that makes her her. Do you guys ever think about how her life is defined entirely by war.
"Where's my little friend / I need you" - Oliver and Alicia about Drippy, Drippy about Oliver and Alicia, Shadar about Alicia and Oliver
"Living has become my damnation" - Drippy in the doll and also Lucien post-exile
Ok this one is less cut and dry but Shadar and Alicia dialogue. Weird dynamics of Lucien being the reason Alicia is alive and Alicia believing that she has to return the favor, placing that above all other motivations to defeat him. Also could be the dynamic between Shadar and the White Witch, maybe even Lucien and the Bellicosian command
"You say to me you are the saviour, I'm the marionette" - actually this is Shadar and Oliver facing off, Shadar resigning himself to being an avatar of despair ("marionette")
"For all infinity, respectfully no / Cause I am fighting for my liberty / So watch me get up and go" - Lucien to the Bellicosian command and later Alicia to Shadar
Literally just Alicia and Drippy guiding Oliver. Alicia and Oliver having similarly suicidal/self-sacrificial tendencies and Alicia comforting him through that. Drippy pushing him out of the nest and helping him through the other world
"Baby bird / Hear my words / Give it time" - Alicia in every dream sequence
"Don't be afraid of the way you are, it'll keep you holy" - o' pure-hearted one will you please come save ouer world
"You just want to disappear / Silent in the atmosphere" - Oliver's self isolation due to bullying pre-game mentioned in dotdd dialogue. Also do you guys ever think about just how quickly Alicia was ready to throw everything away. Like she had trouble making lasting attachments and never found a purpose in life other than saving everyone else, as if she owed someone
Ok how do I turn a cheating metaphor into a ni no kuni song
"We walk through a mirrored world / I see you and you see pearl" - Oh idk Drippy feeling abandoned bc Alicia goes off without him to pursue her "pearl" (defeating Shadar). Then later Oliver "abandoning" him at Teeheeti. Mirrored world bc other world or something.
Somewhere In The Singing Darkness
Shadar succumbing to despair and stewing in it until he knows nothing else. Lucien wondering what happened to Alicia, angsting about failing to protect her and his people. Then later Shadar wondering what becomes of Alicia after their showdown, then observing Oliver and leaving him a world he's not sure is worth saving
"Happiness can cause distress / Misery can feel the best" - literally Shadar's entire philosophy
"The watering paddling pool / The fumes of gasoline / Intoxicating" - ok miasma marshes I see you
Oliver and Drippy paralell feelings of holding the other one back. Those opening lines are about Oliver having trouble adjusting to the other world and being angsty about Alicia
"Every dream that you're in / Is insidious and subterranean" - Oliver if he was slightly more emo about all the dreams about mom
"Take the loneliness away" THEY ARE BEST FRIENDS YOU GUYS
"If your manifesto / Don't include me I'll go" - I guess he wants to do comedy with his buddies now, let's get back to the boat no I'm not crying wdym
So this is pretty explicitly a breakup song but it could also be Drippy during a few different moments; 1) realizing Alicia has left to battle Shadar, 2) realizing Oliver has left Teeheeti without him, 3) watching over Oliver during his post-soulsnare coma. Guy who can't stop losing people
"And I'm scared to death that it's all too late / And the words I say just won't translate" - Emotional intimacy issues. Me too buddy
"All I want to do is talk to you / But you've closed the door on me" - Oliver being mentally barricaded in his room during the coma OUGH
Ok this one is just. Guy asking his mom to not lose hope after a messy divorce. Not much metaphor I can spin out of this one so we'll call it a surprise guest appearence from Myrtle. Except that also doesn't work because her parents get back together so um. Smoke bomb
