Problems with Words/Vocals

[parablue74]

This is something i hear often. Voice vs Music. Take the vocals of a song, and listen to the music alone, you will hear something that gives many options and directions. Music is tones that is self-representable by the listener, the listener can relate music to anything, like imagine anything. But put in vocals again, and the listener is force to define the song according to what the singer defined it....
Don't understand??? try again...
Take a popular song like Hotel California, take away the vocals, just listen to the music alone, you can imagine the song to relate to anything, maybe your love relationship or something else, but when you put in the vocals back in, the song just define it to relate only with Hotel California....
Music is a language that is universal, vocals is a language that only man can understand... reason why the voice defines the song itself is becos we are able to understand language as it relates to. Listen to a spanish song, and your definition of the song becomes wrong. A dog won't understand what the hell we are singing, unless words like "Sit", "Down" or "Up" are in the song, then they only understand the song as a command.
Sometimes songs sound better without the vocals, becos they define a universal ground, like trance, new age,classical etc, where the idealogy is for the listener to experience a world of their own, instead of the constrain definition of the singer.

 

[MadWerewolfBoy]

hmm... very true indeed...

 

[amnesiac]

Ok I understand, but your point is?

 

[MadWerewolfBoy]

Ok I understand, but your point is?

hmm let me guess.... ah:

"KICK UR VOCALIST OFF UR BAND!!!"

haha

 

[amnesiac]

8O and then get you to sing for us is it? lol

 

[MadWerewolfBoy]

8O and then get you to sing for us is it? lol

lol... jk...

maybe the moral od the story is, if u want to put some vocals in ur music, plsplsplspls... put in sensible stuff that don't destroy ur wonderful music

 

[amnesiac]

lol maybe, we'll wait and see what the author has to say

 

[parablue74]

Ouch.... actually didn't had much of a point there... juz cracking my head over some song production been doing...
Yeah... What i mean is, manipulation of a song has the favour of both adding vocals in or not.. Like when you do add vocals in, the writer intends to give the song a definable meaning that people do understand. But when the writer intends to give the audience a chance to enjoy the scope of experience he/she can relate to, then music becomes the main source/scope of the song. In some music, like Metal, etc..., a blend of music and vocals gives an equivalent measure of personal experience as well as definable experience. The 70's rock music was so definable towards the personal experience that they have long solos of music, so their audience could kick in and simply enjoy the music relating to what they intend to experience.
But Pop being the definable extent has all the time been the scope of fan base, and in order to get fan base, a definable language needs to be understood. Just as the concept of marketing which includes defining your target market, Pop aims to constrain it's market to only "Human Beings!!".
So that >>pops in the extend of commercialism we hear around.
As been seen, if everyone already notice, songs are more and more filled with only vocals and less solos. In history, Classical music was dominant on the personal experience, i had a friend that simply mention that "Lyrics/Vocals are a disaster to songwriting, music shouldn't have lyrics at all!!!". (Yeap, he was a vocalist of my band then!!!)
I think for me as a producer, the amount of vocals i put into songs or music is really just a tool to what the final expression/experience i intend to achieve to the song, but if you want an honest opinion, i think songs without lyrics at all and yet achieve the finest expression that people can relate to are the best compositions/productions ever made. But i need some bread and butter, so i am still going to put in some vocalist...
Any opinions?????

 

[thor666]

well i don't know how much what i say is going to be of value here, but i'll share with you some of my songwriting experience.

lyrics to me, are the HARDEST thing to write. I almost never start with lyrics when writing a song. it just doesn't work for me when the melody is non-existent. I'm a guitarist but i constantly force myself to write melodies without playing the guitar... otherwise the song will sound too much of a "guitar song".

when i write lyrics, i write in 2 ways: a common theme and via subconscious thinking.

A common theme: Usually I try to find a good word or phrase to work with. Say the word "desperation":

Verse 1: Someone running away from the law. (desperation)

Verse 2: Bankrupt fella with no way out. (desperation)

Verse 3: Man lost and starving in wilderness (desperation)

Usually the verse would be as realistic (in this case i don't think -THAT- many people will meet with even 1/3 of the situations).

The point is not the stories, but the theme itself. I try to do this to let the listener imagine the time he was in desperation as well.

Subconscious thinking: I try to get one line of melody, and just sing any kind of lyric that comes into mind. Then I proceed using that single line to guide me through the whole song. I find this works best for me because my thoughts are kind of scattered over the place; this "random" writing allows me to see the theme/topic I'm going into after a few lines are set up. Also, this makes the lyrics a little harder to decipher - I leave the listener to imagine what they mean.

Personally I find it best if the listener has his own views about the song. That aligns with my concept that music is universal; we can think of different things but the same abstract concepts (the theme) is something that links all of us back.

Hope this helps. :wink:

 

[sycododo]

i never understood Bjork's songs.

 

[thor666]

some songs are never meant to be understood i guess. and yet sometimes the lyrics distinctly appeals to you. it's a theme that's quite abstract/instrinsic and it's difficult to pintpoint what the song is about.

 

[parablue74]

Yeah, i know what you mean. Lyrics made in layers, where on the surface it means one thing, but the deeper you understand, it start to mean more. A very common technique use by people of the middle ages and before, they always talk in circles. Most of the classics are like that too, like "Stairway to Heaven" etc, and it's not that easy to write, because different considerations of meanings have to be accounted for.
I still write melody first then lyrics. I never like to find an objective/goal of the song too early, i tend to write plenty of melodies, then listen to them to see what "feeling"/"experience" they give me, from there i wait until a good topics strikes off within me, and with the topic in mind, i start writing the lyrics.
Same ol, Same ol, the most abstract lyrics is "allowable" to be use in genres like folk, country, new age and some rock, but when it comes to pop, i never really seen one abstract piece before. Our world is getting straightforward, the way we talk, the way we make a point, it would be hard to talk in circles and still relate with the common crowd. What the common crowd wants is so BASIC, they just want to feel good, understand simple language, and can sing along..... i guess as we songwriters/producers/musicians start to endeavour into the "ocean" of music theories, psychology etc, we start to walk too far away from the common crowd....

 

[atee]

I never like to find an objective/goal of the song too early

Same here. Gets too rigid if you try to stick to what you have in mind imo.

Music is very subjective. You choose how you want to interpret it, that's what makes it so interesting. That's what makes most of pop uninteresting to me. Direct words, directly telling you what the song is about, telling you what to think, that really gets boring.

One advantage people who write/sing this kind of song have is that people think they do understand, that they do feel that way. And they do, very easily, at first listen. Look, a catchy tune. Who cares if these lines have been used a gazillion times? I can relate to it and I'm gonna buy that album! Why waste energy trying to figure out some abstract song no one listens to? I should listen to what everyone's listening to. It's all about marketing.

This is unlike instrumentals, or songs with lyrics you don't understand immediately. At one point in your life you might interpret a particular song in one way, but maybe as you get older you think of it in another. That's the real beauty of it. Ageless music.

 

[paranoia]

I'm kinda late for this diiscussion but I think there are lyrics that are akin to poetry. Language is arbitrary. I can sing something like, "Maybe I wrote in invisible ink, I don't know how I could make it appear."(Amiee Mann's lyrics from Invisible Ink), but that is open to interpretation. That is what I personally in my humble opinion think are good lyrics; lyrics that have depth that are open to interpretation in many ways, and reveal more and more meaning as you listen to it again.

You should really try listening to Baker,baker by Tori Amos. Weird lyrics at first, but the metaphors really resonate in unity with the music--its like an ecosystem that has a dependent relationship. (eg, Hotel California sounds good with its lyrics because its about desolate men and loneliness (or something else for another person), the guitars convey this kind of mood as well.) Ambiguity in lyrics is all good. There's a reason why none of us like Avril Lavigne! =)

 

[thor666]

Agreed. Poetic license does apply partially to songwriting. The usage of metaphors, similies etc are great ways of songwriting.

The problem with modern lyrics is that while it tends to appeal to the first time listener, it can also work the other way - be extremely superfical. It's way too easy for anyone to write "I love you", but it is so hard to express the level of love on the other hand (Tommy Emmanuel's "I've always thought of you" while having no lyrics, is an example of an excellent title.)

We, as songwriters, do want to convey thoughts that are abstract in nature, yet touches the soul of people and allow them to say, "Hey, that's exactly how I felt about (an event hard to express in words)!"




Some other random thoughts:

Take care not to (always) write poems when writing songs! Many amatuers fall into such a pitfall early. Songs do not always follow poetic structure but rather song structure (verse, bridge, chorus, middle 8 ). It would actually be quite bad for a song to rhyme like the previous line for the next 20 or so lines....

Usually. Some people who are experts can pull it off. Just like music theory, you can always break the rules if you know the risks and the reasons for doing so.

 

[fgl]

One of the best ever song writers around today is my personal fav PAUL SIMON. He has written a variety of musical styles from rock & roll, folk, world music, jaz, new wave etc. For the GRACELAND & RHYTHEM OF THE SAINTS album, he actually recorded the drums tracks raw in Africa / Brazil then brought the materual back to NYC to write melodies then finally words over them...a true genius....

+ GRADE A lyrical ability... COMBINING visual poetry with a sort of cinematic theme of the song.

WE SALUTE PAUL SIMON!!!

 

[thor666]

was just looking at my post - i made a big boo-boo! the Tommy Emmanuel song is - "I've always thought of you". ("You're always on my mind" sounds so cliche in comparision. Bah. Been drowned with too much SHE i think.)