Composition For Dummies Pt. 2 -Lyrics

I must admit, I've been trying to didge this one for a while, for one simple reason – I SUCK at writing lyrics.

But then it occurred to me – if I was naturally a Morrissey, a Paul Weller or Jarvis Cocker, and lyrics just somehow came to me out of the ether.. well, how would I help any of my students who were less fortunate?

So maybe me sucking at writing lyrics is a blessing in disguise, because in order to get anything half decent I really have to work at it.

Now, there are as many ways to write lyrics as there are people to write them, but here's the way I like to try and go about things...

I tend to like to describe a situation, to tell a story with my lyrics and for that to work, I need a few things.

Subject – who is this about? Is it me? Is it about anyone specific close to me? Or is it an imagined character in a situation I've dreamed up, as a sort of “straw man” to try and make some sort of point? (side note – I never do politics in songs, apart from the very frst one I wrote, which was an anti-Vietnam War song... written in 1995.... yeah..) Where is the character, is he/she at home, out, running from or to something?

Context – why is the character in the situation they're in? Are they leaving home for the first time? Leaving or beng forced out of a shared/ family hime?

Second order context – this is less easy to explain, so let me give you an example – you've extablished that the character is leaving home.. so why? Thrown out for having an affair? A relationship just run its course? Do you include both sides perspective in the story?

Another useful method is what I call the “keyword/brainstorm” method: pick a subject – let's say cars, for the sake of argument. Next, try and think of any and every interesting theme associated with the subject – so in our example we would be thinking of terms like power, speed, racing etc. Then set yourself the task of coming up with a first line, no more than that – keep the goals small and manageable – before long you've got somethig like “pedal to the metal in a gasoline dream”.

Yes, it's not exactly Shakespeare, but it would suit Bon Jovi down to the ground.

So with this in mind, go forth and brainstorm! See you next month.