Songs Never Heard
A craft podcast that spotlights some of the best songs you've never heard.
Songs Never Heard
S1E6: Say You Will (Hop On Pop)
A single-take demo that captures the emotional weight of an impossible situation.
Say You Will on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/6IoZEAIlJrv84U5xyu7Osj?si=bfa353db28ed445c
More of Todd’s music:
Robert Howell:
My name is Robert Howell, and in this series I'll be sharing and digging into some of my favorite songs that I've come across during my time in the underground songwriting scene. Songs written by talented people who are creating music that deserves wider recognition. Songs that, unfortunately, most of the world may never hear.
Welcome to Songs Never Heard.
This episode's song finds the personal story hidden inside the political headlines. Let's hear "Say You Will" by Hop on Pop.
Todd Leiter-Weintraub:
In the dark, pre-dawn morning
We wait for the bus
As the sun slowly comes
Feelings overcome us
I'll be oceans away
But I'm always close by
I'll be back in a year
If I survive the fight
I will do what I'm told
Because I'm told that it's right
But when "right" seems so wrong
Then I know it ain’t right
Now I'm going off to fight
For the ones that I'll kill
If I come home with blood
On my hands that I've spilled
Oh, please take them in your hands
Because I'll love you still...
Say you will
Say you will
Robert Howell:
That was "Say You Will" by songwriter Todd Leiter-Weintraub, who releases his songs under the band name Hop On Pop. Todd is an avid NPR listener. He has been for many years. While driving one day back in the early two thousands, he heard a story about the Iraq War and it affected him. The story wasn't about military strategy or political justifications for the war. Instead, reporters had captured the human moments, soldiers saying emotional goodbyes to their loved ones before deployment
The story resonated because Todd knew someone living that exact scenario. His friend, an Army Reservist, was being called up for yet another combat tour. But this wasn't a case of eager patriotism. The friend opposed the conflict entirely, convinced the reasons for fighting were questionable at best. Yet he was going anyway, bound by duty and the reality that soldiers follow orders regardless of personal beliefs.
As Todd listened to those goodbye conversations on the radio, he found himself imagining them from his friend's perspective. What would it feel like to leave your family for a war you didn't believe in?
For years, Todd had wanted to tackle political themes in his music, but was put off by how heavy handed most protest songs sounded. This moment offered a different path. Telling a deeply personal story that would let listeners draw their own conclusions about the larger issues at play.
So the concept behind "Say You Will" was in place. A reluctant soldier's goodbye that would say everything Todd wanted to say about war without saying it directly.
With the concept in place, Todd faced the challenge of turning this emotional scenario into an actual song. But for Todd, the creative process rarely follows a predictable path. He doesn't typically write poems that he later sets to music, or craft melodies that he then fills with lyrics. Instead, ideas tend to arrive more organically.
As Todd puts it, sometimes he has to "...shake things up a little to get them to come out. Kind of like a ketchup bottle." For this song, instead of ketchup, he reached for his capo. Which offered a way to find fresh inspiration from familiar chord shapes. Playing basic open chords, CFDG, in a different position, gave them a different sound and feel.
That shift in key and tone seemed to unlock something. The story came first, but once Todd started exploring those re-tuned chord progressions, the actual lyrics and melody began emerging simultaneously. For Todd, these creative decisions aren't based on formulas or songwriting rules, they're guided by what feels right. And this combination felt right. It was songwriting magic happening in real time.
"Say You Will" wound up almost exactly where it began. As Todd explains, "This was recorded as a demo in a single take. I had every intention of bringing it to a full band and re-recording it with them, but the intimacy of the 'man and guitar' approach made it feel more... right."
The stripped down recording perfectly matched the vulnerable subject matter. A reluctant soldier's goodbye didn't need elaborate arrangements or polished production. It needed to feel real and immediate. So Todd made the decision to keep the demo as the final version.
But he didn't stop there. When it came time to mix the song, Todd asked his engineer to avoid adding any effects to either the guitar or the vocal. No reverb, no polish. Mix them completely dry. Then they edit something unusual, A track of white noise underneath everything to make it feel more like a lo-fi home recording.
If you listen closely, you can hear that subtle hiss running beneath the track. It's an intentional choice that Todd made that serves the song's emotional core . Making the listener feel like they're overhearing an intimate unguarded moment rather than listening to a polished studio performance.
One of the more interesting elements of "Say You Will" happens in what Todd doesn't say until the very end. If you listen to the first two verses, you'll notice something unusual about their structure. Each verse ends with a line that hangs without resolution: "I'm always close by," and "I know it ain't right," creating an emotional tension that feels unfinished.
This wasn't accidental. Todd was withholding the song's central plea, the desperate words that give the song its title. "Say you will" exists as an unspoken thought in the soldier's mind during those first two verses. The words he can't quite bring himself to voice as he approaches his departure.
Only in the final verse, after he's admitted his fears about coming home with blood on his hands, does that internal plea finally break through. It's the last thing he says as he boards the bus. A heartbreaking admission that he needs some kind of assurance that love will survive whatever he might have to do.
"It was a hundred percent intentional," Todd confirms, "while choruses relieve the musical tension of a song, this spotlights the emotional tension, the core of the song." Instead of a traditional chorus that provides resolution, this one creates the kind of raw vulnerability that makes listeners feel like they're witnessing something deeply private.
Todd's background as a professional writer shows up throughout "Say You Will," but nowhere more clearly than in the second verse. Listen to how he weaves repetition and wordplay into the soldier's internal conflict. "I'll do what I'm told, because I'm told that it's right. But when 'right' seems so wrong, then I know it ain't right."
The repetition of 'right' and 'told' folds into the rhythmic pulsing quality of the song that also mirrors the thought loop of someone turning a dilemma over and over in their head. The soldier is caught between duty and conscience. And Todd's word choices reflect that relentless mental cycling.
This linguistic technique isn't just clever for its own sake. It serves the emotional truth of the moment. When you're grappling with a moral contradiction this profound, one's mind can get stuck in these loops. Cycling through the same rationalizations without resolution.
Todd admits he loves playing with words , saying, "As you know, I'm a writer by trade, so any chance for wordplay and I'm in!" But in "Say You Will," these linguistic games serve a deeper purpose. They reveal character and internal struggle in a way that straightforward narrative couldn't achieve. The soldier's confusion isn't just described, it's embodied in the rhythm of his thoughts.
Creating "Say You Will" presented Todd with an unexpected challenge that had nothing to do with songwriting craft. Once the song was written, he felt he needed to tell his friend, the Army Reservist, who had inspired it, what he'd done.
This wasn't a conversation Todd was looking forward to. He had transformed one of the most personal and difficult moments of his friend's life into a piece of art. As Todd puts it, " The hardest thing about creating this song was explaining it to my friend. That I was trying to tell his story, in a way, and praying he was okay with it."
The vulnerability was intense. Todd was exposing both his creative process and his friend's private experience. Hoping his friend would understand what he was trying to accomplish rather than feeling betrayed or exploited.
Fortunately, his friend got it. He recognized that the song honored rather than exploited his experience, giving Todd the blessing he was anxiously hoping for.
Todd regularly performs "Say You Will" live, and the reactions tell him he succeeded in his attempt to make a political theme personal and accessible. He's witnessed audiences moved to tears by the song's intimate portrayal of an incredibly difficult and complex situation.
But the most meaningful response came after one particular performance. Two soldiers approached Todd after his set with a question that made him nervous. "That soldier song. Did you write it?"
When Todd confirmed that he had, their response validated everything he'd hoped to achieve. "Well, thank you for that. It means a lot," they told him. As Todd recalls. "I think they felt seen. That was one of the greatest compliments I've ever received."
The moment proved that Todd had found exactly what he was searching for. A way to honor the human experience that is often hidden within impersonal and polarizing political headlines. By focusing on one reluctant soldier's goodbye, rather than grand statements about war and policy, he not only wrote an excellent song, he created something that actual soldiers recognized as their true experience.
"Songs Never Heard" is created and produced by me, Robert Howell. It's a tribute to all the seldom heard music that, in my opinion, rivals what you'd hear on the popular charts. If you're interested in having one of your songs featured, drop me a note at rrobhowell@gmail.com.
Until next time, keep writing.