Ne-Yo Mad - Now that’s how you write a song
I’ll be honest. Usually, I’m my favorite songwriter. But today, my hat goes off to Neyo I just heard a cut off his new project (Year of the Gentleman) called Mad.
Don’t know what to say. it’s just a great song. The chorus has like 3 different hooks and they’re all catchy as hell. He makes a cool reference to J Holiday’s hit song “Put You To Bed” that is subtle but incredibly effective. Little things like that which make people want to sing your song. Neyo is a master at not just the art.. but the science of making hit records.
If the above player doesn’t show up in your rss reader, come to EricMakesMusic.com to hear the song in full.
This entry was posted on Sunday, September 28th, 2008 at 12:27 pm and is filed under Songs I Love. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
September 29th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Interesting. I’m at work, so can’t access the song due to the firewall. But isn’t melody really the main component in songwriting? Finding something melodic to lure your listener in? some years back, I read a Musician Magazine interview with George Martin, the Beatles old producer. When asked what advice he would give to up and coming bands, he said, “learn how to write a bloody good song!”
Now, he’s worked with the Beatles, so it’s an easier thing to just say, “learn to write good songs” when you might not have the talent of finding hooks and melodies like Lennon-McCartney did.
But I aways wondered if the science of making hit records (or just good songs), that old Tin Pan Alley thing, is/was manipulative. Or rather cold and clinical given that someone was making lots of money off of these hits and i wasn’t necessarily the performers. I guess it’s because I’m someone who works from inspiration and emotion versus a straight forward musical comp/theory of, “well, if we take this to a minor chord, it give the song a greater feeling of foreboding and if we make the next chord a suspended one, we’re waiting for the resolution, so it builds tension, blah blah blah.”
I dunno. I guess if you work long enough, you can learn and use these musical tools and techniques to enhance whatever feelings you want to pass along to your listener in song. but I just never liked the workmanlike-assembly line feeling from those hitmakers. It’s like Barry Gordy bringing in someone to re-work your song and to that hired gun, it’s all disposable, he doesn’t care what the song means to you, or that you spent many drunken nights working on the verses over the break up of you and your girlfriend. And maybe YOU were disposable as well to Gordy! If I were Ne Yo, I don’t think I’d wanna waste my time writing songs for some stupid actress’ CD about things I don’t care about so they can get their hit record and their picture all over the magazines covers.
Perhaps I’m envious of guys like Ne-Yo or teams like Gerry Goffen and Carole King who are able to come up with great melodic hooks all the time.
For the record, I really don’t listen to radio these days and haven’t in the last 15 years or so. I’m not the best judge of what’s out there—for any genre!
September 29th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
I read a good songwriting book that distinguished between writing songs for yourself as an artist and writing songs that you hope will get picked up by another artist to sing - specifically pop songs. Those songs then to have a set of rules that they must follow - e.g., be 2:30 to 3:30 minutes long, should have a catchy hook and fit one of the standard song structures, etc.
I think with all artforms the artist struggles to find the balance between technique and inspiration. Some lean totally towards inspiration and forget about technique. Others do the opposite. But I think there are examples of people who have found success all three ways.
Personally, I try to find a balance. I think it may be easier for me because I’m a Gemini. So my artistic side is very inspired but has learned to work well with my logical side which is very rule-based.