Many thanks to @ravenousraven @markusrill @NateHevens and @lostcharisma for getting me thinking…
Should everyone like your songs?
No. Or at least, you shouldn’t be aiming for songs that everyone in the world will enjoy. if it happens by accident, great, but it shouldn’t be a goal.
If all songwriters aimed for songs that everyone loved, Bohemian Rhapsody and Paranoid Android would never have been written and Bob Dylan would have been stopped from making music decades ago.
And the Beatles would never have composed their more interesting albums, Pet Sounds wouldn’t exist, Hip-hop would never have got started, there would be no protest songs no progressive rock…
Art that aims to please everyone has to bland – the musical equivalent of biege. It might sell (Although not for long, the mainstream music market is dying after all) but it won’t last and it won’t excite.
Good art appeals to a niche and challenges the audience. The albums we’ve had to listen to more than once before we get are alwasy the ones that stay with us longer.
So how might you challenge you audience? What can you do to piss some people off?
1 Take a Stand
Write about something that people will find difficult to deal with – something politcal, something satirical. Lyrics that take a stand on an issue will offend people, no matter what the issue is, but those who agree, or at least admire your guts, will love you for it.
Oh, but do talk about something you really care about – people can smell a fake a mile off.
2. Don’t Spell Everything Out
The song above, Yes, is a great example of lyrics that don’t compromise (Although the Band did over the years mellow considerably). The lyrics also don’t spell everything out. You need to think about what they mean.
Having to think pisses some people off.
3. Suprise
Yes also uses odd time signatures. More challenging rhythms, harmony or timbres (Heavy metal screams anyone?) will piss people off no end. And excite others.
I’m not a fan of hip hop, I really don’t like it. In particular I don’t like it because harmony is almost irrelevent to this kind of music – as long as you’ve got a decent beat underneath it, the only important thing in hip hop is the vocal. Harmonic development? Interesting chords? Any chords at all? A lot of the time you just don’t need them for a good hip hop song.
Great for the hip hop fans, but enough to really annoy me.
Those are just 3 ideas. How else can we piss off listeners?
No related posts.
Write a song about being an atheist, apparently. Most are fine with it, but some are getting angry at me…
I wrote another song with the potential to be extremely controversial, and I wanna know what you think. Here’s the lyrics:
——————
“USA Blues”
(spoken warning: “If you think the USA is the greatest country on God’s green, 6000-year-old-created earth, and you’ll defend that belief with your guns, then you may not want to go any further.”)
Well I live in a strange country
Strange people all around me
Yes I live in a strange country
Strange people all around me
You know I love the USA
But sometimes she makes me weep
We’re a free market society
Money trumps all life
Oh we’re a free market society
Money trumps all life
If the money ain’t in it
We’ll just leave ‘em to die
(1st guitar solo)
Yeah alcohol and tobacco
Kill thousands of people each day
Well alcohol and tobacco
Kill thousands of people each day
Marijuana ain’t killed no one
But you can’t use it anyway
We got a high gunshot rate
And yet we love our guns
Yeah we got a high gunshot rate
And yet we love our guns
“But there ain’t no connection
And you’d be a fool and a communist to make one”
“Thank you Bill Hicks!”
(2nd guitar solo)
We’re the most religious country
In the developed world
Yeah we’re the most religious country
In the developed world
Yes we got so much knowledge
But superstition keeps us down
Well the rest of the world
Has accepted Evolution
Yeah the rest of the world
Has accepted Evolution
Yet the US has got stupid people
Who still believe in Young Earth Creation
Well I live in a strange country
Weird folk all around me
Yes I live in a strange country
Odd folk all around me
You know I love the USA
But sometimes
She makes me weep
(turn-around; end)
——————
This, however, is not the song I want to submit as a “song for comment” when it’s recorded. That’s a different, much less abrasive song…
I don’t find anything contentious in that. However, I’m not from the USA. I get the impression that unquestioning love of country is more important in America.
In the UK people who love our country enough to be public or vocal about it are in the minority and regarded with suspicion.
I suppose you could argue that there are subtlies and nuances to the subjects you’re singing about that can’t be addressed in a short pop lyric – but song lyrics aren’t about writing an essay, so much as expressing an emotion.
Which this does.
Oh yeah, of course. If I tried to get into every nuance and subtlety, this song would be *hours* long. And what with it being a blues song with 2 guitar solos, it’s probably long enough…
I don’t understand how people can call themselves patriots and not find *anything* wrong with the country they supposedly love. They call the US perfect, saying it has the best health care, the best education system… it’s pathetic on so many levels. It seems that, to be a patriot in the US, one has to be a Christian Conservative who ignores facts for personal feelings…
I consider myself a very strong patriot. I the love the USA. And that’s why I criticize it. I recognize that the country I love is flawed in so many ways, and I want to see a change.
Trying to please as many people as possible with your song-writing is the one way street to being bland and boring.
Many people don’t realise just how much they censor themselves.
I wrote a relevant blog post and used my song-writing as an example:
http://www.nomadicneill.com/blog/2011/02/17/stop-censoring-yourself/
I’m fine with songs that don’t spell everything out. I’m fine with thinking about things, and ambiguity. Songs only piss me off if I feel like only the songwriter’s best friend and therapist will know what the lyrics mean. Maybe all of us are guilty of that from time to time, but I don’t think it should be a goal.
Hmm. Come to think of it, though not everyone loves my stuff, I don’t think it’s pissed anyone off yet. Gotta work on that …
No, I’m being a little tongue-in-cheek when I suggest pissing people off as a specific goal. But certainly, you shouldn’t worry if someone does dislike your music.
Pleasing everyone all the time means you’ll never move anyone very much. Things that are univerally popular are only every ok, and never great.
Oh, I’m being tongue-in-cheek too. Though I’m a little sad that the people some of my lyrics would annoy haven’t heard my songs. I want to annoy those people.
@NateHevens: Okay well I’ll start by saying I’m not an athiest. But I’m totally with you on the USA and how messed up things are here, so I was able to connect with your lyrics. That’s the beauty of songwriting. Once you write it, it’s not yours anymore. If you do a really good job you’ll bring a Christian and an Athiest under the same roof and make them both feel a similar emotion somewhere inside their disparate beliefs (as was accomplished here…) Props to you.
The second song I ever wrote is called American Myth, and it’s about the myth of the so-called “American Dream.” I think you’d like it.
@Tom I completely agree with you on this point: “Things that are universally popular are only ever ok, and never great.” I just read the post on the Rebecca Black song, Friday – which I had only first heard a few days ago. When that song was released, people thought it was a parody on today’s mainstream popular music. It actually seemed that way to me when I watched the video. But then everyone quickly learned that this girl was serious. Yet those same people listen to Spears, Gaga, Katy Perry, Bieber and everyone else and think it’s great! I don’t get it. In my opinion, most of their songs are as bad as Rebecca Black’s. Seems that the secret to making a living as a “musician” these days is to write a really bad song, or cover a really bad song that was already written, get an interesting haircut, do a video, post it on youtube and wait for the horrific mess to go viral. And then make sure you show up at an awards show in a meat suit or an egg. But then you’re not a musician at all. You’re just a celebrity who made it big on bad terms. Again – I don’t get it…
You say the pop music industry is failing – can I get more info on that? Are the sales really that low? Because I still turn on the radio, and unfortunately have to hear a lot of crap before I get to hear one golden tune. I just put a band together and they are hoping to hit it big, get signed, win a Grammy and all that other jazz. Part of me is all for that. I still respect many Grammy-award winners out there (Adele, for example.) But the other part of me is scared to death of that kind of fame, because I know that in many cases it comes at the high price of your soul. I want to write great songs, and if I make it big, great (I know very few people get there.) But I don’t want to lose myself in the process. I’d rather be me. If you like it, great. If you don’t, then oh well. If you’re a good writer, there will always be people out there who don’t like your stuff. Thoughts?
Oh and please direct me to more evidence of the mainstream music industry’s failings – I’d like to see numbers if they are out there. That will be interesting info to share with my band mates…
Thanks for this site – it’s awesome. I’ll be visiting often.
Why thank you for reading!
Info on the state of the music industry.
Have a look at this article from my site: http://www.songwright.co.uk/2010/09/12/songwriting-rules-and-how-to-break-them-write-for-the-market-part-1/
And also have a read of Bob Lefsetz:
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
Or Andrew Dubber:
http://www.newmusicstrategies.com
I’m no expert on the industry at all, but the general consensus seems to be that the major labels are losing sales and pop ain’t the cash cow it used to be.
Music is healthy but no label will touch you until your making money – and if you’re making money what do you need a label for?
Famous and rich? Not gonna happen (but it never happened for the majority anyway). Making a living? You can definitely do that.
I write about songwriting because I think I know a bit about it. I’m not an industry expert. I’d recommend following the people above, and also googling indie musicians like Steve Lawson and Matt Stevens as two examples of (definitely not mainstream) indie artists who make a living.
Hi tom!
I think there is a piss off song… friday!
cheers
Hello friends,
very good post about Music. Thanks for your efforts
Hi, I stumbled across this site by accident and I am not a musician but I love music. I say all that so I don’t come across as patronising and misunderstood. Like you Tom, I am from the UK and our radio output absolutely stinks. Our most popular music stations, Capital, is now networked across the country and churning out the equivalent of lumpy porridge hour after hour. The same twelve songs over and over…….and over again! It is an absolute travesty to what we know as “music”.
Music is one of the arts so by it’s very nature will be subjective and should inspire different feelings in different people. It will even inspire different feelings in different age groups, backgrounds, moods etc. An example; when my wife left me I played a lot of Eminem (by the way, I’m 56) which is great angry, revenge music. Now I’m ok again I am back to my usual, Coldplay loving, self.
We have a so-called artist here named Tracy Emin, her ‘artistic’ installations are an absolute pile of dog poo…….to me! I don’t understand it, I just don’t get it. She is much revered in the art world so what am I missing? Who knows, I don’t lose sleep over it. Banksy, on the other hand, I DO get but does that make him bland?
I’m starting to waffle so I would just like to agree with you Tom on the subject of just writing from the heart not a commercial head, there are too many music factories producing that crap already.
I love the songwriting process demonstrated by Jack Black in the film School Of Rock, he makes it look almost too easy.
As a non song writer but a music lover I would like to offer a little (hopefully constructive) criticism to Nate. The sentiment and the passion in your lyric comes through but personally I don’t like the repeat of the first line of each verse. I think it’s a wasted oppportunity, you could add even more of your frustration here instead. Like I said, I’m not an expert and this is just my personal feeling.
By the way, in the UK you only have to sell about 15,000 singles to get a top 40 entry so it gives you a clue how bad the ‘industry’ is suffering.
Good luck everyone