Every once in a while I see it: an online reference to “We Built This City,” a 1980s smash hit for Starship, now considered in most polls to be the worst song of all time. And just yesterday I saw a 2016 article that I hadn’t read before: “An Oral History of “We Built This […]
No doubt you’ve heard that the district court legal decision regarding the apparent fact that the writers of “Blurred Lines” (Robin Thicke, Pharrell Williams and Clifford Harris Jr) plagiarized Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up” has been upheld the U.S. Court of Appeals. I have to say, I’m still confused, particularly considering that the […]
It seems that the era of one song-one songwriter is quickly passing us by. There really aren’t many hit songs that are written by one songwriter anymore. Part of the reason for that is that how we assign credit has changed. In the 60s, for example, you might, as part of the band, suggest a different […]
I came across an article in my Twitter feed this morning, though it’s been out there for a couple of weeks, and you may have seen this already. “Songwriting: Why it takes more than two to make a hit nowadays” discusses why today’s hits seem to have such a long songwriter credit list, while a couple […]
In case you were wondering: yes, people do listen to lyrics. I’ve mentioned on this blog many times that if you take a look at “Worst-Songs-Ever” types of lists (all unscientific, of course, but still…), you’ll find that songs are considered bad, corny, or otherwise unsatisfactory based mostly on the quality of the lyric. There has […]
Some of the best learning happens when we’re working on the job, as opposed to studying, and writing music is no different. With every new song you compose, you probably notice your skills improving, and your technique modifying. That’s certainly not to say that you can’t also approach songwriting as a scholarly pursuit – as a student of the […]
