Post ver. 0.1
The last time I did a big ol' effort post I got 0 response, but this time somebody asked me to do it
SO HERE GOES!
In this post I attempt to tell you how to write good lyrics. Why you ask? It's probably because yours are super bad. LET'S FIX THAT RIGHT NOW!!!
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Though there is no exact science to expression, just as there is no real way to measure its effect on you, we've come up with handy ways over the years to define the tools which we use to verbally create. I tried to think back to my high school English classes, where we "learned" to read poetry, to see if I could recall all those exact details; I was not successful. So, instead of trying to do that I looked up something I could use to reference, this seems handy:
http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtual ... ments.htmlThe link itself would be nice to check out to see short definitions and examples of these literary devices on top of what I say about them.
So let's basically go down the list and talk about these elements (the link has them in alphabetical order...my order is based on something...I'll tell you what it is later), though I've omitted and altered some things:
Cadence-
The link calls it meter, I'm gonna call it cadence so THERE. This is basically how your rhythm is structured. Ok, there, we're done, that's it, go home.
Yeah of course there's more to it than that, dammit.
We live in the 21st century, everything and everything has associations and you are at least somewhat aware of all of them. Certain styles of music communicate different things, and to create a specific
Affekt-(some kind of feeling/emotion) the lyrics might reflect some kind of (wow) style!
Check this passage out:
a violent flood that stains the night
a cry before the morning light
a vicious tearing of the skin
a monster lurking deep within
no pressure can withstain the fold
leviathon of measured mold
it harkens me to steal my breath
medly of deathObviously, there's more than rhythm going on there, but ignore that for now.
So if we were in English class and I was Mr. Monotone, I'd probably have you mark the stressed/unstressed syllables, but fuck that, this is MUSIC SON. If you read it aloud, you'll notice that this verse HEAVILY emphasis 4/4 time (if you don't know what that is I feel bad for you son, I got a shit load of problems but you've got a ton). The syllables are constant 8th notes (except in the very first line, but we can overlook that in the context of a song) and the stressed syllables fall on every downbeat. We can also look at it like this (if you really want):
a violent flood that stains the night
a cry before the morning light
a vicious tearing of the skin
a monster lurking deep within
where you stress the bolded portion of the words, but again, the rhythm should be intuitive from when you read it.
ULTIMATELY ALL LYRICS YOU WRITE SHOULD HAVE INTUITIVE RHYTHMIC STRUCTURE TO THEM, EVEN WITHOUT A MUSICAL IDEA IN MIND. IT CERTAINLY ISN'T NECESSARY, AND HONESTLY YOU'LL PROBABLY GET A COOLER RESULT IF THERE ISN'T AN OBVIOUS RHYTHM TO IT, BUT...YOU HAVE TO DO SOME SPECIFIC THINGS MUSICALLY TO MAKE IT WORKOk, so the passage has got an incredibly regular rhythmic structure that translates to constant 8th notes in 4/4 time, so what? Well, other than it being pretty cheesy composition, it does contribute to the
Affekt mentioned earlier. The rhythm is driving and relentless; even without the specific words used that characteristic can conjure up emotions. What musical genres do you associate with this kind of constant, aggressive, forward motion?
THINK ABOUT IT NEXT TIME WHEN YOU WRITE, SUCKA
Rhyme (slant rhymes, half rhymes, assonance)-
Oh boy, rhyming, I don't have a terrible joke about it so let's just proceed.
You know what a rhyme is I hope: you say a word and the end of it sounds like another word...ya heard?
Yeah see, rappers have basically elevated rhyming to its own high art over the last 30 years, so the chances of you doing anything amazing with it is 0%, no argument whatsoever, period.
That said, it is important to understand how you too can use the tool of rhyming, albeit not as a display of wit and technical mastery, but as a compositional device:
I don't want to get too in depth, because the way I think about rhyming would take me far too long to explain, and I just got done writing a 20 page paper about Haydn this morning so FUCK ME, SORRY! But, uh, basically, you know how in music there is consonance, dissonance, and resolution? I like to think about words in the same way. As a phrase goes on there is a sort of rub that builds up based on how the lyrics are structured, but when you get a strong end rhyme it just feels like that phrase has completed (or even, resolved via a cadence if you will). All rappers (if you don't do this then you actually can't rap, sorry) will use this effect to punctuate certain words and phrases, like in disses or punchlines. Take for example this line by Killer Mike off of El-P's Tougher Colder Killer:
Pause [comma]
How I know your momma? Bad motherfucker?
Double entendre?I choose this short line because it's fairly simple, also I like it a lot and think it's pretty funny. I haven't talked about wordplay yet, but hopefully you realize what that is (psst, it's when you play with words, either their sound or meaning). The word play here is on motherfucker. Simple enough: a motherfucker is usually just some kind of insult you assign to a person, but here he makes use of a DOUBLE ENTENDRE (a word with double meaning) to basically say he's a bad ass who also had sex with your mother, WOW! Notice how the rhyming connects the phrase and gives it a sense of conclusion on the last word,
entendre. He sets up key words (comma, momma, entendre) as sort of rhyming pivot points to give the punchline that extra...punch.
NEXT TIME YOU THINK ABOUT RHYMING, THINK ABOUT THIS EFFECT!!
Hey, did it occur to you that you could use this principle to the OPPOSITE EFFECT AS WELL? That is, NOT RHYMING in order to build TENSION? I saw it illustrated pretty well in this one video that talked about how Eminem is #1 best rapper or something, honestly I think MF DOOM beats him in like every way but uhh that's not the point. He used a song by a different group as an example for this principle, Every Breath You Take by The Police:
Every breath you take
And every move you make
Every bond you break, every step you take
I'll be watching you
Woah, so there's like, end rhymes in every line except for the very last one???? How does that make you feel: lost, anxious, TERRIFIED? I'm not gonna talk about the possible implications this has for the song's meaning, but isn't it COOL how NOT RHYMING can give you that feeling? Obviously, this is coupled with the rhythmic structure which kind of sets you up for that feeling of going towards something you never get to.
YOU CAN DO ALL SORTS OF FUN THINGS WITH RHYMES, TRY IT OUT. OBVIOUSLY YOU DON'T HAVE TO LIMIT YOURSELF TO END RHYMES EITHER, PERHAPS YOU HAVE A VERSE WHERE KEY WORDS RHYME
WITHIN THE LINES, WHAT IMPLICATION MIGHT THAT HAVE, HMM?
Alliteration-
Dude, doesn't doing dorky demonstrations like, destroy you?
They kinda do! But yeah, that's what alliteration is, having the same starting sounds (I believe there was different terminology for whether that starting syllable was on a vowel or a consonant, but whatever dudeski) in successive (or at least close together) words. This is really just another way to emphasize certain words, and also to help give a passages a certain character, based on the quality of the sound being repeated. I touched on this in another massive analysis post of mine, when I broke down Mr. Mothafuckin' Exquire's verse on El-P's (what can I say, I really like Cancer 4 Cure) Oh Hail No: (notice I used a different system for excerpts)
Stu Beef wrote:9 Visceral, villainous, vindicated by venomous vibes
10 Viscious, concealing my mental illness by willing a smile
Some nice alliteration here, and by nice I mean pretty damn aggressive. It’s not just the stressed starts of repeated consonant sounds that gives these lines more edge, but I feel like staying on that [ih] vowel sound (sorry, I don’t quite know my IPA) almost gives it an extra tense/angry feel (just try sayin it, you’ll see what I mean). It contrasts nicely with the more open [ah] sound at the end of each line.
Hopefully you can see how the different elements we've thus far discussed: rhythm, rhyme, and alliteration add to the sound of the short excerpt. The driving rhythm coupled with the tension caused by the repeated "V" sounds seem to resolve as the final word "smile" ties back in with "vibes".
THAT'S A REALLY NEATO EFFECT THAT CAN GO QUITE WRONG, UNLESS YOUR AIM IS TO BE REALLY CHEESY. WHATEVER, DUDE, JUST WRITE INTERESTING LYRICS!!!
Diction-
Oh boy, word choice and syntax! Now, this one is a little more complicated, and it really depends on the writer. Let me just say that you can masterfully write in the style of an overly emotional teenager, just as well as when you awkwardly flop attempting to imitate Robert Frost or something. To simplify, it's about consistency.
Say you were going to start off with something like:
Tonight our love burns like the lights on the dance floor
DJ forget our names and make us melt away
what if you were to suddenly go
Forsooth, thou art my eternal flame
my heart shall know no life beyond its presence to your figure, so beauteous, that angels would weep in envy of itObviously, that's absolutely fuckin ridiculous (and hey, if you were going for a comedic effect why not, but that comedic effect also has no subtly whatsoever so I'd have to call you a hack artist).
so most people don't really go that route. However, often people end up trying to sound "deep" but in actuality their lyrics are completely trite, boring, and laughable.
Honestly, I'll take:
Wake up in the morning feeling like P Diddy
(Hey, what up girl?)
Grab my glasses, I'm out the door, I'm gonna hit this city
(Let's go)
Before I leave, brush my teeth with a bottle of Jack
'Cause when I leave for the night, I ain't coming back
over well...most everything I hear amateurs write. Ok, while whatever you write might be totally honest and expressive of how you feel and everything, umm, art is more than that? If you're going to write with the intention of your work being consumed and CRITIQUED by other people, bring something to the table dude! I mean, yeah, if you know your audience consists of hormonal children, by all means WRITE FOR THEM!! I'm not saying that we can't talk about feelings in songs, I'm just saying WHO THE HELL DOESN'T!?
WHEN WRITING, CONSISTENCY IS KEY. OBVIOUSLY, YOU CAN FLIP EXPECTATIONS TO COOL EFFECT BUT YOU HAVE TO KNOW HOW TO BUILD UP THOSE EXPECTATIONS FIRST. WRITING SOMETHING THAT IS "DEEP" DOESN'T JUST CONSIST OF HAVING SLIGHTLY ADVANCED VOCABULARY; AS I LIKE TO SAY, "
Good art is like an onion: it has layers."
OK I'VE BEEN WRITING FOR 2 HOURS AND I'M TIRED NOW, COME BACK LATERTone-
Mood-
Similie-
Metaphor-
Irony-
Imagery-
Symbolism-
Allegory-
More later? -----------------------FAQs----------------------
Q.
Wow, do you actually think about all this shit? What a nerd!!!A. Yes, in fact I do. However, it takes a lot less time to write a verse (for me) than it does to explain it. You should learn to juggle all these ideas and implications at once after some practice, it helps to just THINK THIS WAY as well.
Q.
Ok, so I read your post and writing lyrics is still hard, should I go to the hospital?A. Well, I don't want to say that nothing is wrong with you, because if you're reading this, chances are that something clearly is. I will however say, yeah, shit is hard when you first start out. Actually, some shit is ALWAYS hard, it really depends on you AND your standards. If you constantly improve but never meet your standards, that's probably a GOOD THING (unless you actually just really suck)! Always strive to improve!!!