I know the answer to this question obviously depends on the song/writer/subject etc but id be interested to hear a bit of discussion on the topic; how do you like your songs, vague or direct?
Personally I think its the sign of a good songwriter to write something with a meaning that is not immeadiately obvious, or could be interpreted in a few different ways. I think really a good song gives the listener a bit of room to move and fill in the gaps with their own views, experiences etc. Hitting the listener over the head with what you are trying to say doesnt usually make a good song.
I guess an exception would be the 'story-telling' song which describes the actions of a group of people or a couple in great detail, take 'Piano Man' or 'Jack and Diane'. but even in this case the people themselves are not the focus of the song so much as they are veheicle to illustate the broader theme of loneliness or the burdens of time.
I suppose i bring it up because i know my songs are relatively direct and obvious and I wish they werent. Saying something is easy, saying something without saying it is the real talent.
What do you guys think?
Word. I agree.
aka Izabella
I go for the indirect approach, otherwise you end up down there with the schmaltzy stuff like "Teddy Bear" (old CB Radio tearjerker) or "No Charge" (old mother-and-child tearjerker)
Best,
A :-)
"Be good at what you can do" - Fingerbanger"
I have always felt that it is better to do what is beautiful than what is 'right'" - Eliot Fisk
Wedding music and guitar lessons in Essex. Listen at: http://www.rollmopmusic.co.uk
http://www.kingwoodkowboy.com/
I do both kinds. Here's the direct kind from "Hoppy's Happy Cowboy Son"
My pony is my best friend, a cowgirl was, but then
I kissed my horse too many times
That girl was gonna be my wife, but to save my life
I had to ride into the sunset blind
Kingwood Kowboy
Author of over 6,600 song lyrics
http://www.kingwoodkowboy.com/
I dunno, I like the direct approach. "Help!" by the Beatles was a pretty direct song; you couldn't mistake it as anything other than a cry for help. Ditto for "God Only Knows". Then again, these songs are in a way vague enough to be anyone's cry for help or anyone's love song.
Now that I think about it, a lot of my songs are pretty literal, but disguised in some way. Here's some examples:
I Tend
I tend to delude myself sometime
and I need to remember I dwell in real life
but you need to anchor me down so I don't get up and run amok
soon enough this run will bottom up and I'll be out of luck...
Open Up
You were much too obvious
You should have told it to me first
They would not understand like I could
You are facing dangerous waters
because you could not keep it in
dancing on the rocks was never wise from where you stood...
"I Tend" is about as direct a song as I've ever written, but it's not quite literal. I didn't have anyone specific in mind I was singing to with the lyrics, it's just a general, "yeah, I tend to be a bit crazy sometimes" song, and I do not literally need to be anchored down to keep from running amok :). "Open Up" is also pretty direct, based on something stupid I did in front of a bunch of people, but for the song I remove myself from the first person and I use vague imagery like walking across rocks in streams.
Then there'll be some songs I write that use metaphors extensively, but even then the meaning's pretty unambiguous.
You Were Here
You were here today, just an average fish on the go
Wished that you could stay, but you swim wherever the current flows
Thought you were out of my league, thought I'd never catch your eye
But you were never anywhere but here, I apologize
Then again, my music's pretty complicated, and I think some of these lyrics would sound too bare if I were to sing and play it with a simple folk melody and accompaniment.
(I've written most of my songs so far as midis, btw, in a guitar tablature program called Tabit. Unfortunately, I decided to group my songs together off of my Dreams midi-album into two sides rather than 14 separate midi files. The music for "I Tend" and "Open Up" are in the file http://users.wpi.edu/~joausc/Dreams2.mid (make sure Dreams2 is capitalized), with "I Tend" at the very beginning (there's about a minute of guitars before the "vocals" kick in) and "Open Up" at about 12:50, where it starts abruptly. "You Were Here" is in http://users.wpi.edu/~joausc/Dreams1.mid at 13:45. Unfortunately, the tempo the midis play at is sometimes messed up, (it messes up in quicktime and in every mac program I've used) so try playing it in winamp or windows media player.)
Vague all the way. I like the freedom to build my own story around the lyrics, the more obvious the less interesting to me.
Radiohead's 'Subterranean homesick alien' (which is a fantastic rock song by the way)
The breath of the morning
I keep forgetting.
The smell of the warm summer air.
I live in a town
where you can't smell a thing,
you watch your feet
for cracks in the pavement.
Up above
aliens hover
making home movies
for the folks back home,
of all these weird creatures
who lock up their spirits,
drill holes in themselves
and live for their secrets.
They're all uptight, uptight,
uptight, uptight,
uptight, uptight.
I wish that they'd sweep down in a country lane,
late at night when I'm driving.
Take me on board their beautiful ship,
show me the world as I'd love to see it.
I'd tell all my friends but they'd never believe me,
They'd think that I'd finally lost it completely.
I'd show them the stars and the meaning of life.
They'd shut me away.
But I'd be alright, alright,
I'd be alright,
I'm alright.
I'm just uptight, uptight,
uptight, uptight,
uptight, uptight,
uptight, uptight,
uptight.
