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The secrets to writing the perfect pop song | Think Like A Musician - Video học tiếng Anh
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The secrets to writing the perfect pop song | Think Like A Musician
The secrets to writing the perfect pop song | Think Like A Musician
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Legendas (138)
0:01
There's so many different things that a song is meant to do,
0:04
but I I think that when you're honest about what a song is for people,
0:09
the intent is to connect.
0:12
Hey, you. Yes, you! What's that light inside of you?
0:17
Is it a dream, a beat, a beautiful sound, a heartbreaking song?
0:22
Whatever it is, we're here with working musicians
0:25
to help you grow and share that gift with this wild and wonderful world.
0:34
Pop songs tend to follow a structure that goes:
0:39
verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus.
0:48
You want the first verse melody to pull you in immediately.
0:51
You want someone to know what that song is
0:52
in the first 4 seconds it even starts.
0:56
Because that's your first impression.
0:57
I will sometimes spend literally days and weeks
1:00
working on just the first line of a song.
1:03
I can call out basically every Queen song within the first beat.
1:09
Not bar— beat.
1:12
The verses set the conversation tone,
1:15
and you're involved in the story each moment after the next.
1:20
It's the setting, it's where we are, it's who I am.
1:23
It's how I feel about this person or myself.
1:26
Your verse might be split up into the main part of your verse
1:29
and then what we call pre-chorus.
1:30
It connects the dots between your verse and your chorus.
1:34
The prehook is introducing— a lot of the times— the conflict.
1:38
That has to feel different than the setup.
1:40
And then you have your hook.
1:45
I really like the phrase:
1:47
write the verse for yourself, and write the chorus for the audience.
1:53
So in the chorus, focus on something universal.
1:58
And in the verse, just write something really personal.
2:02
For me, a great chorus will have symmetry,
2:05
and a clear lyric that is easy to sing along with.
2:10
Does it sing well? Is it easy to understand?
2:13
When you're writing a melody, there's a certain rhythm to it,
2:15
in the same way that a conversation has a rhythm.
2:17
Sometimes the phonetics help me write the lyrics.
2:20
So if I'm writing a melody, I'll just sing nonsensical lyrics.
2:25
What vowels feel good?
2:26
The marriage of great phonetics, with a unique but familiar lyric,
2:33
and a catchy, symmetrical melody are kind of like the perfect marriage
2:38
to writing a great hook.
2:39
The goal when you write a song in pop music is to be able
2:43
to sing along with the chorus by the second time you've heard it.
2:45
If you're Max Martin, it's going to be always the rise of the song.
2:49
He says whatever note that you start on the verse of the prehook,
2:52
that hook needs to be higher.
2:54
Now, that's a psychological trick,
2:56
a feeling like now we're going somewhere that we haven't gone.
2:59
But if you ask Billie Eilish, we're going to do the drop hook.
3:02
And the drop hook means we're not going to do the typical and obvious.
3:06
And now we're going into the chorus, and it's the big moment.
3:10
When the chorus hits, it's like a release of all of this tension and anticipation
3:16
that is set up in all the verses.
3:18
If the song has to leave you with one thing or one memory or one thought,
3:21
that's where the chorus does it.
3:23
It's about the way it makes you feel and the thing that you remember,
3:27
and where you were the first time you heard it.
3:30
They hold tremendous significance.
3:33
Usually the standard is you want to get to the chorus at about the 1 minute mark.
3:38
The term "don't bore us, get to the chorus" is very real.
3:43
So, practice writing choruses.
3:46
Remember they can be simple.
3:47
And really more importantly, make it something you believe,
3:51
because if you believe it then probably someone else will.
3:56
So, verse one is what happens to explain why we're going to sing this big chorus.
4:01
Verse two is elaborating on that.
4:04
Now we know what the chorus is, let's elaborate on the thought.
4:07
And usually verse one and verse two are going to be different
4:10
as far as the lyric and also sometimes the melody.
4:14
And if you're feeling a little bit crazy, you have a bridge.
4:17
The bridge, or the middle eight, is the last little bit of information
4:23
before we launch back into our memorable chorus and our outro.
4:28
If the listener has made it to the bridge, they love the song.
4:32
The bridge is 2 minutes in, minimum.
4:35
So if you make it there, amazing.
4:38
The hardest thing is to get them to the chorus.
4:40
It's all about that chorus.
4:42
So I think that bridges are sort of the first thing that people scrap.
4:46
I love them— there's always a place for a section that is not anticipated.
4:50
Bridges are always an exciting challenge as a songwriter
4:53
to lift the song to heights it wouldn't have gone without it.
4:58
But it's equally as compelling to write a song with no bridge
5:01
and have it communicate directly and not need a bridge.
5:06
So I never let structure get in the way of a good song.
5:14
As far as song structure and my relationship to song structure in the modern era,
5:19
I'm not beholdened to it because I think that's what makes music and artists
5:25
in particular stand out when you are going against the grain.
5:30
of what is popular at the time.
5:32
There are a lot of songs where they don't have a super clear structure
5:36
and it might just be a series of hooks that kind of tell the story.
5:41
A lot of Afro beats music operates with that structure,
5:43
where you really just have sections of the song that are undefined
5:47
and it's all hooks.
5:48
I know the structure down and I can do that all day,
5:51
but then once in a while you go, I'm going to forget the structure
5:53
and let the music go where it wants.
5:55
My favorite song is "Fast Car" by Tracy Chapman.
5:57
She doesn't have the normal structure of each verse being the same length.
6:01
It takes like a minute before you even hear the chorus in the song.
6:05
But it works.
6:06
I have songs, they don't even have a chorus,
6:09
it's just one long verse.
6:10
And I feel like a lot of funk songs are like that,
6:13
where they'll just hang on like one phrase and that for like 8 minutes,
6:17
and that's the song— which I love.
6:19
But other songs may have three verses before they get to the chorus.
6:24
I feel like Bob Dylan has a couple of songs like that,
6:27
where it's just so many verses and then finally the payoff.
6:31
A lot of the times when it comes to song structure, I stick with it,
6:35
but I've had songs that have been hit songs
6:38
that completely break those rules as well.
6:41
It really, really depends.
6:42
I try not to get too caught up in what the rules are,
6:46
because I've built a career on also breaking the rules.
6:51
I would say a song is great when it describes something that's really relatable,
6:56
and really universal, but in a really specific way,
7:01
that either you haven't heard before lyrically, or melodically, or production-wise.
7:09
Like some sort of fresh take on a human experience,
7:14
I find to be the most interesting music
7:16
because I think we're constantly looking into music to help keep us company
7:22
and make sense of what we're experiencing.
7:25
A great song is not necessarily the same ingredients
7:30
as what makes a song great.
7:32
So you can have a great song that's a very momentary flash.
7:37
You know what I mean? Oh, that was a great song.
7:39
But, what makes a song great? What also might make a song timeless?
7:44
Relatability, ease of singing, and ease of memory.
7:50
It just sits in your brain easily.
7:52
The songs that stand the test of time have a great melody,
7:57
have a great, unique lyric, memorable lyric,
8:01
and there has been care put into the production.
8:05
And don't be afraid to be vulnerable.
8:07
Songwriting is a really, really intimate experience.
8:12
You're creating something, you're pulling something out of thin air,
8:14
it's magic.
8:15
And so, you have to be willing to be vulnerable and honest
8:21
to make something authentic.
