One Man's Lament

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analog4

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hi again,

Another lyric for your thoughts.


I had it covered
I knew it all
I was just setting up
For the fall

Chorus:

Win or Lose
It's the path we choose
They say it's just a phase
I'm going through

Things were so simple
When I was young
How could things
Turn out so wrong

Chorus:

I thought all the world
Could be mine
Took it all for granted
All the time

Chorus: X2 and fini.
 
hi again,

Another lyric for your thoughts.


I had it covered
I knew it all
I was just setting up
For the fall

Chorus:

**Well, I haven' done a song critique in awhile so here goes.
Too much is left out here. What fall? Give me a hint.


Win or Lose
It's the path we choose
They say it's just a phase
I'm going through

**The problem I have here first, there doesn't seem to be a strong hook/concept/title. Secondly, there's no real imagery for the listener to latch onto. It's too general---at least for me, there's nothing to involve me.

Things were so simple
When I was young
How could things
Turn out so wrong

**Please give me some specific examples of how things were so
simple when you were young. If you told me that when you lived at home as a teenager, didn't have to pay any rent and a 30 year old Chevy that you paid off with your salary from the Dairy Queen,
that might not be great imagery but at least it would be SOME
imagery. This lyric has none. I kind of feel like I'm watching
somebody who has announced to the world he's going to dig for
gold but only wants to dig a foot down and no more. Do some brainstorming. Get some imagery, some metaphors that will
bring the listener into the song. Too many lines here seem like they are just to "make the rhyme" and not say anything.

I hope I'm not being too critical. I just think you need to start with a stronger title/concept/hook and go deeper, MUCH MUCH
deeper to really say something here.

PaulB
 
As many people have mentioned, just looking at lyrics without the music can be difficult.

I'll say outright that I don't want to judge people without knowing them, or hearing their music. I'm sure everybody here is doing their own thing, tyring to express themsleves in their own way. I'm sure that everybody is putting down their thoughts and feelings in a way that feels good and right to them. I don't feel right in telling someone else what songwriting is, or what they should be doing in a song.
On the other hand, we're putting up our songs here for discussion, and so you can expect anybody and everyone to chime in with their two cents.

Analog X, I like your words. I think that they are fine, and more importantly when I read them, I get some idea of the music behind them. It's probably completely wrong, but since you've previously mentioned Van Morrison and using horn lines, it does give me some idea. And Van by the way, also has songs with little informational context (Inarticulate Speech of The Heart) or a lot (Cleaning Windows) and BOTH types work, as far as I'm concerned.

This particular song sounds like a mid-tempo country contemplative number. I could see it working with a lot of repetition, and amazing music.
 
PaulB,

Thanks for taking the time to provide me a solid critique.

Looking at the lyrics again I can see this is verbal
masturbation.


Oh well, I'll get the MP3 file done and post the entire
song for you to listen to. You never know, I might be
able to salvage something!
 
Hey Analog,

You can probably salvage that song by giving it a thought provoking title. For a cheesy example off the top of my head "First Love." Puts a frame around the sentiment that you have going.

Verbal masturbation, eh? Hah! You just built a very nice metaphor for me. 90% of the pop music cranking over the radio today is roughly equivalent to the porn industry! People getting rich off of musical and verbal masturbation!

OK, so that's a bit extreme, but I thought it was funny. :D

My point being that there are many songs with less definition than this one. You probably don't have to worry about it if you don't want to. They flow together well as it is.

Chris
 
It's snowing now, but I can pretend-----

Ok,

I've got my mp3 files up and running,so I can
post my draft copy of this tune--complete with out of
tune instruments----to Tunesmith.

Now you can hear what verbal masturbation sounds like.

HaHa.
 
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