Everything You Need To Know About Songwriting, by Romy Croquet
I'm Romy Croquet, I go to Grace Church High School in New York City, and I've been interested in music and songwriting for as long as I can remember. When I was 9 and 10, I had a babysitter named Ilana who was a big fan of broadway and would play me showtunes all the time. She would explain the meaning behind the lyrics with every song we listened to. We listened to Hamilton a lot, and one of the lyrics was, "Excuse me miss, I know it's not funny, but your perfume smells like your daddy's got money." Ilana explained that the man singing was walking around manhattan in the 1970's and could tell that someone was wealthy just from their perfume. He was seeking out someone with money because he needed it. I became obsessed with how music could tell a story and paint a picture in your head. When I was writing music, I loved it because I could express things without actually expressing things.
For my project, I interviewed songwriters and wrote up a collection of their opinions and strategies. This was geared to help songwriters learn about other songwriters, and how they write lyrics. Everyone has different things they do and like when it comes to lyrics, so being able to hear from lots of professionals was really interesting and helpful.
During these interviews, I learned a lot about what makes a song good. Of course there's other factors besides lyrics, but lyrics are surprisingly one of the most important things. Yes, in some cases people want to listen to an upbeat hit as background music, but many people find comfort and relatability in music, and that's where lyrics serve most of their purpose. Lyrics have more power than you would think, as people listening to idea's about the world over and over in songs can be quite influential. Lyrics that people love have a couple common factors.
Here are a few:
Storytelling
Telling a story in your lyrics can push listeners to really pay attention and follow the song closely, as if they are awaiting the next plot twist. Telling stories in lyrics creates a flow to the song, in the same way that a movie or a book uses a beginning, middle, and end to create a flow.
Rhyming
Lyrics that sound good and fit together are easier to memorize and love. Rhyming is an incredibly efficient strategy that songwriters use to add to the "almost satisfying sound" of music, as said by lead singer of Phoenix, Thomas Mars. "A good rhyme can feel like a puzzle piece when you find the right word to tie everything together", says singer/songwriter Claud.
Relatability
Writing lyrics that are relatable is one of the most important and reoccurring factors in songwriting. This is what most pop hits have in common- they share an emotion that everyone has been through. We hear stories about love, hate, confidence, insecurity, loss, revenge and more. Most of the songwriters I've spoken to say the same thing about writing relatable lyrics. You shouldn't write them trying to relate to people, but rather write about your own experiences (unless the experience is super unique) and people will hear their stories through yours. It's strategically better to write relatable music through your own experiences, because faking an entire story is harder than you would think, as the emotion won't peak through in the way you want it to.
Imagery
Images in someone's head serve a purpose to illustrate the story you have written, and are now singing. If listeners can see your story, they will enjoy listening to it more. My favorite example of imagery in music is "Novacane" by Frank Ocean, and "Super Rich Kids" also by Ocean. The lyrics paint a picture of the story he's telling, and his lyrics are so specific and interesting that listeners are hooked from the beginning, as he sets the scene with details of his surroundings. "Brain like Berkley, met her at Coachella" Describing the girl and the place they met. "Too many white lies and white lines", "Super rich kids with nothing but loose ends, super rich kids with nothing but fake friends". In these lyrics, Ocean describes the sad lifestyle of "Super Rich Kids", where he paints a picture, tells a story, and uses rhymes to convey this story. "White lies" convey that these kids are so rich they have no morals and lie all the time, "White lines" which rhymes, and imply's their use of cocaine, which ties back into the idea that these kids have no sense of safety or wellbeing. They're so rich and bored with their money they'll do anything to feel something. This theme of wanting to feel something comes back, "too many joyrides in daddy's jaguar", you can almost see the kids in the expensive car. He later goes on to paint the picture of the kids eating ultra-healthy food, and never seeing their parents.
Themes
Themes are important in lyrics because the story your telling has one specific emotion. Hopping around from diffrent emotions can be confusing, unless your theme is someone being confused! I think having a reoccurring theme or emotion that keeps coming back can create better flow and can be easier to write.