Wednesday, December 3, 2008

How Do You Write The Perfect Song?

I've been looking at blogs on country music, songwriting, and looking at various artists songwriting techniques. So how do you write the perfect song? Obviously, a song is personal to the writer, the reader, and when composed, the listener.
But in a the current musical radio play such as Top 40 or even in country music 'POP COUNTRY', how do you write a song that extends to the masses? I'm studying the right way to compose a song, but everyone has their own way of telling their story or a story that affects them.
I once heard Justin Timberlake talk about writing "Losing My Way" after he saw the show Intervention on A & E. As well his song, "What Goes Around (Comes Around)" was a song he wrote about his friend who was dating Elisha Cuthbert. Apparently, Cuthbert had cheated on his friend with one of his friends, but he took that experience and made it connect with his own experinences as well as hsi fan base.
In my own experiences with life, I look at every aspect in terms of what genre I am writing for. When I am writing for POP/R&B Club jams or MJ'esque songs, I try to take the experiences of the city life and apply it to the song. When it comes to country-folk-style songs, I try to take experiences from myself and others by reading blogs, magazines, newspapers, or talking to people directly about their life.
For instance, when I was driving home from Provo, Utah this last August I stopped off in Yermo, Calif. to get gas and I was basically at the bottom of the barrell in terms of money and just my situation in life. When I was pumping my gas I noticed a guy searching through trash cans for cans to get money. I had a load of change and decided to give him the change as well as some food I had. I talked to him for a sec or two about his life and we were off our separate ways. But I took from that experience and searched my soul of how we could be in a similar situation in terms of money, but different where we were in life. I took from that experience and tried to write according to that.

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