Write it backwards.

Put an unusual rhyme second & the word found to rhyme with it first.

In my song, Ol' Bum Toe -- not an unusual song -- I have this as a second verse.

I can tell there's a change in the weather
In this Ol' Bum Toe of mine
When I'm torn twixt a one and a t'other
This toe gives me a sign
And when it gets to screamin' like a special edition
Tellin' me which way to go
There's a whole lot of people I'm wishin'
Were as smart as my bum toe.

I wanted to write There's a whole lot of people I'm wishin' were as smart as my bum toe. I thought it was clever and cute. But that left me with a hard rhyme -- "wishin'." I started looking at variations on a rhyme and came up with "edition" -- I remembered the newsboys yelling on the corners "Special Edition!" and I had my rhyme. It also gave me another way to go on the idea that my toe give me the news - it's screamin' like a special edition.

Bob Dylan did it, often.

You must leave now, take what you need, you think will last
But whatever you wish to keep, you better grab it fast

The idea that you must grab it fast if you wish to keep it is stronger than what you need that you think will last. So he uses the weaker line first and the stronger line, the more logical rhyme, second. Whether he did it intentionally or automatically is not the point, if he had done it enough in the past, it would have been second nature.

And later in the same song,

The highway is for gamblers, better use your sense
Take what you have gathered from coincidence

Coincidence is a toughie to rhyme, tougher than "see" or "you," so he takes you to a simple rhyme first -- use your sense. You think, "oh, how clever, to have thought of such a complex rhyme for sense." But it wasn't really, he worked backwards.

It's not just the hard rhymes, sometimes easy rhymes can be written the same way. In Goodbye Jackson, I wrote,

Old enough for rambling, like my daddy done.
He was just a hobo. Iím a hobo's son.
I was only seven when I saw him go
Down to the Jackson train yard and out on the B&O
If that midnight train that's passin',
Is the one that took my daddy, Goodbye, Jackson

I liked the idea of using the name of a railroad, like it seemed to me that someone "riding the rails" would say it: he went out on the B&O.

So I wrote my line Down to the Jackson train yard and out on the B&O and then I wrote the line before it, I was only seven when I saw him go.

Most of this song was written the same way, I took the line I wanted and wrote the first line to rhyme with that,

Never had much schoolin', never had the time.
Never paid the taxman, never made a dime.

And the same with,

Count the country's cross-ties, takin' whatever comes.
Learn me a diffírent language, the slang of the railroad bums.


One way to handle that would be to write the key words you want, such as "never made a dime" and "railroad bums" in a hobo song, and then write the rhymes for them, work them in so the second rhyme comes first.

People will begin calling you clever.


Jon Batson
www.jonbatson.com
Author of The Songwriter's Hook Book at www.cdbaby.com/jonbatson3.

Leaving reality behind.

Making your true-to-life song their true-life song.

Your significant other from Poughkeepsie dumped you for a dog-walker and they both left in a Toyota for Atlantic City. You are of course heartbroken, but glad for a good excuse to write a song. You have a bad week or two, but you donít swear off of relationships forever. Instead you start making a list of prospective replacements. You do, however, swear off that type.

Sound like a real gripper of a plot? Not really, but it is a slice of life, which usually makes for bad songwriting. Sorry, all you citizens of Poughkeepsie, unless the song is a comedy, your version will never be heard.

If you really want the audience to be sympathetic of your plight and admiring of your newly-acquired will to go on, you must wrap it in a nice sounding package. You must, in short, step away from the truth and weave your story into more acceptable fiction.

Think for a moment; how many names did "Lucille" have before she picked a fine time to leave him? How many towns did the guy get to by the time he got to Phoenix? Did Green Day live on a Street of Broken Promises or a Road of Busted Plans before they sang about a Boulevard of Broken Dreams?

"Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves" started life as "Gypsies, White-Trash and Thieves." Why the change? It sounded better.

Trying to rhyme Halifax may not be as easy as rhyming Tallahassee, so unless you are singing about a crab fisherman, change the locale.

Finding a voice for a lost school chum who moved to the other coast might not be punchy enough. Change the gender to meet the lost love type of song and cry your heart out.

When your first love dumped you, didn't you slightly alter the story to make yourself more sympathetic to your friends? Yes you did, even if you said you didn't. Well, do that for your song.

There is an old rule: We don't care about your life -- we care about our lives. We want to be moved. Write songs that move others -- not all about you.

Let's go to a well-known chorus, at least to me.

Wasting away again in Margaritaville
Searching for my lost shaker of salt
Some people claim that it's a woman to blame
But I think that it's nobody's fault*


Now, I don't know, but let's just pretend that Jimmy Buffet was in Rosarita Beach having a grand old time, a little hung-over and couldn't find his left shoe. Let's say that he was not shunting responsibility for his fate off on Nobody (later to be taken on by himself in a brilliant turn of chorus-making art). Let's say that the only woman involved with his vacation was the one he was trying to pick up in the lounge who wasn't going for it. Let's just assume all that is the case for a moment. Would that have made as good a song?

A little hung-over in Rosarita Beach
Looking for my left shoe
The only girl I see wants no part of me
And I guess it just could be my breath

You see? It's just not as punchy. It's dull and boringly true. What to do?

So he made up a name of a place that could be anywhere that tequila drinks are served and says he's wasting away there. He can't find his shaker of salt -- indispensable to such a lifestyle. He hints that people are talking about him, no doubt behind his back and in disparaging tones and intimating that there's a woman to blame. Of course, he just shrugs and says no one is to blame, later saying it just could be his fault and still later, that it's his own damn fault. By golly, he even makes it sound rogue-ish enough to make us want to go down there and be wasting away as well.

So, if the story you wrote does not move others, change it. If it didn't happen exactly that way, so what! I don't know that. I will buy whatever you tell me. Tell me in a colorful enough way and I will help to make it a classic standard the way Margaritaville is. Movies do it all the time. Those who read the book before a movie say things like, "Well that actually happened on three separate occasions and over two years time, not in one night like in the movie. So it really wasn't true to the book." In a book, you have 600 pages, no working budget and no time crunch. In the movie you have to get the story told as completely as possible in a couple of hours.

In a song, you have two verses, a bridge and a chorus occupying about three minutes. You really have no time for the truth. It can be boring and awkward.

You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!

Write fiction -- it is easier to swallow, it's more poetic, and it sells better.

Jon Batson
www.jonbatson.com
Author of The Songwriter's Hook Book at www.cdbaby.com/jonbatson3.
* Margaritaville is © by Jimmy Buffet.

Don't write what you need to say...

Write what you need to hear.

A wise man once told me, Don't write what you want to tell someone else, write what you need to hear. Wise indeed.

As writers we can too often get caught up in preaching to our audience. We know everything, it seems, and are the only source of education for our general audience. Lucky them. How did we get so wise? Do we know more about everything because we are songwriters? Hmm. Maybe not.

Well, you can be wise, and here's how.

Instead of figuring out what everyone needs to be told and writing that into a song, figure out what you need to hear and write that. You will be preaching to yourself and reinforcing what you need to make your life better. The audience can listen in and learn from the instruction or not, their choice. You won't be offending anyone by preaching to them or assuming they don't know something.

When writing this song, practice writing it from different perspectives. If you write a straight-ahead This is what you need to do song, you are preaching. That's not popular with a lot of folks.

Try writing it from another's viewpoint. I like the Wise bartender approach, where someone goes in ans states his problem and the wise bartender gives him the answer. Such songs usually have a And this is what he said to me... chorus. I wrote one that goes:

He said, if you keep her in diamonds and lace
She won't care to wear the pants
Waltz her around in an ev'ning gown
And you can lead the dance
Make her the queen of everything
And you can wear the crown
Put her so high on a pedestal
She can't put her foot down.

I'm not singing to the audience, I'm letting them hear a conversation and take what they want from it.

Tim McGraw has a great song called Live like you were dyin' about a fellow who found out he had cancer. Whoosh! Heavy concept. What do you do? he asks. The man answers to him and we get to listen in, I went sky-diving, I went Rocky Mountain climbing, I went two-point-seven seconds on a bull named Fu-Manchu ... and he said, I hope someday you get the chance to live like you were dyin'.

The song tells us to not put off the important or fun things, to do them today, but a song that just said that wouldn't have been popular. This one catches you and leaves you with the message. Perhaps it's what Tim needed to hear.

I was feeling down one day and wrote a song called The Only One Saving You Now. It's about being cause over your situation rather than the effect, the person in charge rather than a victim. It could be construed as preachy, if it wasn't funny, but it is very tongue-in-cheek and it is not a sermon to you, it was what I needed to hear. I singing it to myself from time to time just as a reminder. Listen to 2 minutes of it at www.cdbaby.com/jonbatson1.

In the EmmyLou Harris song, A Ways to Go, written by Lannie Marsh, the second verse says:

There's a junkyard dog a barkin'
In the valley down below
He's wanting me to stop and
Gather up a heavy load
Ain't gonna heed his call
Ain't givin him the time of day
You mangy mutt once and for all
I said I threw that stuff away


The verse says that we are often invited to carry junk with us, yesterday's argument, last year's failed relationship and so on, a 'heavy load'. Such suggestions come from a source as low as a junkyard dog, a mutt not liking anyone and not liked by anyone. It is, again, a conversation that we get to listen in on and learn from or not. If we like, we can just hear the words and go on untouched by them.

In Carrie Underwood's hit song, Jesus Take the Wheel, a woman and her child are driving down the road when the woman loses control of her car just as she has lost control of her life:

She saw both their lives flash before her eyes
She didn't even have time to cry
She was sooo scared
She threw her hands up in the air

Jesus take the wheel
Take it from my hands
Cause I can't do this on my own
I'm letting go
So give me one more chance
To save me from this road I'm on
Jesus take the wheel

She is not preaching to us that we have to give over our lives to Jesus, she is telling you what that woman did. It's a very stirring song and makes a point, which you, the listener, can take or leave or enjoy vicariously.

That's a suggestion of how to write it, but the point of this article is what to write. Write what you need to hear. Are you not getting enough done in life? Write about someone who solved that problem and how he did it. Have him tell his son or friend about it and propose the solution in the chorus.

Kelly Fitzgerald wrote,

I wanted this but I got that
Someone to hold I got a cat
I wanted rain; I got a flood
Wished for revenge and I got blood
I wanted peace and I got silence
Wished for excitement; I got violence
Sometime to kill and now I'm bored to tears
Bring on experience you bring on the years
I'll be careful what I wish for next time


It's what she needed to hear. She is making her statement and her resolution and you get to listen in. Do you have to decide to also be careful what you wish for? No, but you can if you want.

Kenny Chesney sings about having a fight with his wife and going into a bar and asks for the good stuff when the wise bartender (yup, him again) says,

You won't find that here
Cause its the first long kiss on a second date
Momma's all worried when you get home late
Droppin' the ring in the spaghetti plate
cause your hands are shakin so much

It's the way that she looks with the rice in her hair
Eatin' burnt suppers the whole first year
and askin' for seconds to keep her from tearin' up
Yeah man, that's the good stuff

So try it. Figure out what you need to hear, what lesson you need to learn in your life. Write down how that would go into a song. You will be wise indeed.


Jon Batson is the author of the Songwriter's Hook Book, available at www.cdbaby.com/jonbatson3.

Do it again.

Have you found an awkward phrase, rhyme or rhythm? Use it again, duplicate the item in another verse to give it cadence (and credibility).

In a co-write, Murder in His Eyes, I needed a rhyme for "lady," so I used "Sadie" and called the lady "Saginaw Sadie," which was popular in the early 20th century where within a group, one might be called their name modified by their place of origin such as "Chicago Phil" or "Texas Jake."

So, Joey in a pickle, was sittin' out his nickel when someone said
Saginaw Sadie, Joey's lady was sharin' her bed

Now, just to make this stick, I used it again later in the song:

When Joe got out he looked about for his pal Jim
But Joey's lady, Saginaw Sadie, had left with him

Thus I gave validity to the rhyme by using it twice in the song. If people thought I was stretching things the first time they heard it, by the time they heard it again, it was familiar, therefore valid.

In a song called Ol' Bum Toe I was writing in dialect or slang. I wrote and sang the words like someone would say them, rather than properly. I also used words like "twitch" and "twinge" and rhymed "mine" with "lying," pronounced "lyin'" (like line).

I can tell there's a change in the weather in this Ol' Bum Toe of mine.
When the twitch and the twinge come together I can tell the paper's lyin'
When it says fair today and it'll be fair tomorrow without a trace of rain.
I go lookin' for a slicker to borrow when my toe begins to pain.

OK, so now that I have established that sort of thing, how do I give it validity? Do it again. By using the colloquial "okey-doke with me" and rhyming "cryín'" (pronounced "crine") with "mine," I kept my rhyme scheme, strange as it is, intact.

It's just like when you look at me and tell me ev'rything's OK
One look in those big sad eyes and I feel the need to say,
It's okey-doke with me if y'never like to show if you been cryín',
But I can tell there's a change in the weather in this Ol' Bum Toe of mine.


So the next time you write something that is so off the wall that you are not sure how you will get away with it, do it again. After a while what started as a risk you almost didn't take could end up to be your signature style.

- Jon Batson

Familiar vs. Unique

As artists, we walk a thin line between the familiar and the unique. Write a song that's too familiar and you're old hat. Write one that is too unique and you're weird. Balance the two and you're a hit.

A great deal has been done with just three chords. How often have we searched for the lyrics and chords to a favorite song online just to find that the song consists of C, F and G7.

Of course, you would want to throw in what Bobby Darin called “The Drop Dead Chord.” The audience hears it and 'drops dead.' Sometime it's a “2-chord” in the middle of the bridge or chorus (in the key of C, a 2-chord is a D).

A standard rock ballad progression, found in “Blue Moon,” is C, Am, F, G7. You find that in many songs today. The older variation was C, Am7, Dm7, G7 - found in “Ain't Misbehavin”, “Makin' Whoopie” and “Back in Your Own Back Yard.” Using this progression could date your piece. Using it too much can put your audience to sleep.

Try something different - again in the key of C - go to an Eb at the end of the line, throw in a relative minor, even the relative minor 7th. Steve Earl does that quite a bit. In the key of C, you have C, F and G7. Then add the second - D - and relative minors - Am, Em and Dm - sometimes using the 7th on the minors. Now you have seven chords for your song and it might take the melody in places you hadn't considered.

On the other hand, if you were to use chords that had never worked for that key, a different chord each time you changed chords with none repeated, you would be innovative and original but no one would understand you. The song could not be followed. I'd like to site a famous example, but there are none. The closest I could come would be to point out that a classical composer named Bela Bartok was famous for his discordant and avant guard work, you rarely hear it played, used in elevators or in the movies. He was too avant guard for the broad public.

Now consider the melody: suppose you used the tune to “Blue Moon” for every song you wrote. Each time you started a song, it would be the same melody. Naturally, your audience would soon be groaning and asking for their hats. There have been songs with one or two notes in the melody, but they weren't overly popular - even the “One Note Samba” had an intricate and exciting chord pattern to play against.

On the other hand, taking the melody for a Country song from Grand Opera would be 'unreal' to the audience. They would wonder where you came from and would ask you to go back. The same thing if you took a Country piece and sang it on the operatic stage. It is just too foreign for that audience.

This would interpret to style as well. I recall an audition in New York City in which a young man stood up with a beat up guitar, a harmonica on a clip-holder and a flat, mis-western twang. He began singing a song that appeared to go on verse after verse after verse, rambling without direction, in a lackluster manner. The producer stopped the man with one phrase: “We've already got a Bob Dylan.” If he had swung from the chandelier while playing the lute he would have been a bit too far out, but as it was he was too familiar.

I have several songs that I feel are brilliant in their language and concept, fulfilling the promise in grand style and well-thought-out poetry that should live for centuries. However, nobody gets those songs, so I don't sing them, I just quietly chuckle to myself from time to time.

And that is what you will have to do: Write your terribly esoteric song that no one will get and sing it to yourself from time to time, marveling at your genius - but don't sing it to the public at large, they won't get it. Or write your three-chord clone of “Your Cheatin' Heart” and imagine that you are giving Hank Williams a run for his money in the song charts. But singing a song thus dated will not get you a popular following.

When you're done with your song, sing it over. Is it too familiar? If so, change the melody or the chords or throw another line into the chorus - make it unique somehow. Is your song perfect, but no one gets it? You might be a bit too far out there - trying reeling it back in a notch or two, make your song more familiar.

When you achieve that perfect balance, familiar enough so people smile and are comfortable with the song, yet unique enough to catch someone's ear and make them start tapping and singing along, then you will have a song that will make them sit up and take notice at the open mics. Who knows, you might even have a hit.

- Jon Batson