What Makes a GREAT song?

[Lee Flier]

Originally posted by Griffinator:

Maybe that's the ultimate problem with modern rock music - people don't write songs that push those limits - if anything, people write songs that stay firmly within their own comfort zone as a bassist/guitarist/singer, and therefore the songs remain absolutely droll and simplistic, so as to make things easy for the performer...

Yes, EXACTLY. Lots of people nowadays work up demos in home studios and present the musicians with a "finished product", and the result is an arrangement that sounds faceless and could have been done by anybody. There are very few songs that are really written to serve BANDS anymore, the way the Stones, Who, Zeppelin, U2, the Police, REM, et al did. The song and the sound are completely intertwined in those cases, which is a good deal of what makes them interesting, even though many of their songs can be (and have been) covered by other people and represent good "songcraft" too. But it's obvious the writers had their specific band members in mind when they wrote for them, and I consider that a strength.

[henryrobinett]

Where I don't agree with Lee here is that in all these cases the song survives regardless of whether it was intended for a performer. What about music that CAN'T survive past the intended performer? I think a great song can exist on it's own terms. I think that's one of the things that makes it great. It's beyond a specific performance.

 

Mozart wrote for specific performers but those pieces still are classics because the music wasn't compromised. And Griffinator is right. Most of those great composers had to limit their music to fit the abnilities of orchestras and musicians who were to perform them. I think he makes a great point. What if songwriters were able to push the limits? Unfortunately, and I hate to say it, there's a dearth of musical ability now days.

[Kendrix]

Just realized thta we've all left out one very important attribute of a good song. Dynamics.

 

The dynamic trajectory of a song is really really important.

Should not be 100% "On" all the time. Needs some low points/breakdowns (foreplay) and at least one peak in which the words snd music climax together.

Then you can have cigarette.

[Guest Room Warrior]

Well, then, maybe the discussion is partly about the difference between a great song (which can stand on it's own) and a great "record" or performance (which perhaps can't).

 

I simply love "What Is Hip?" by Tower of Power. Man, what a performance, what a record. And what a showcase of a given band's individuality! But it's not much of a song. (Although, lyrically, I have give it credit for the street poetry of "Tell me, tell me, if you think you know..." Whew!)

 

Kendrix's citing of dynamics comes into the performance category... "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" is a great tune even if a proto-punk band pins the needles and holds them there for 2:45.

[Tedly Nightshade]

Ain't nothing great without someone for it to be great to.

I like Lush Life but it's seriously dated and trite- a shortcoming of Strays lyrically, and you know how I love him.

Nonetheless, it's great for the people it's great for, when it is.

I think people will be singing Proud Mary in a hundred years, maybe because it's not so great that it's not just simply good.

One of the slowhand stonecold signs of greatness is the ability to strive only for being truly good, and not preening in the mirror of eternity.

I hope to learn that one of these times around.

[pauldil]

Originally posted by Ted Nightshade:

...it's great for the people it's great for, when it is.

Good line, Ted. I think that greatness is all so subjective. Even if there's a song I think is great 99.9% of the times I hear it, there may be that one time when I'm just not in the mood for it or just preocupied with something else, or whatever, and I won't think the song is so great. It's relative to so many things in one's life, and so many of those things are moving targets. Your mood changes, your health can vary, you could be tired, stressed, heavily sedated , etc. What are the chances that all your life's reference points line up the same way the next time you hear that song?

 

Paul

[D_dup3]

Originally posted by henryrobinett:

I tend to believe in the knowability of things.

[/QB]

Then allow me to ask what may be an unfair question but one that illustrates the difficulty in answering, with definitiveness, your original query:

 

What makes a sunset effect human emotions ?

[henryrobinett]

Originally posted by d:

Originally posted by henryrobinett:

I tend to believe in the knowability of things.

Then allow me to ask what may be an unfair question but one that illustrates the difficulty in answering, with definitiveness, your original query:

 

What makes a sunset effect human emotions ?[/QB]

Well now I didn't say I knew all things. I just think that it's possible or conceivable that anything can be known. But I'm not sure that a sunset does effect human emotions universally. But it CAN effect mine and clearly does yours and many others too, so let's agree to generalize.

 

I think there is a wavelength of beauty that most of us perceive and can be moved by. We can see it in great or good art. Something really, really ugly and disturbing can still have a sense of beauty about it. We are moved by beauty, be it a beautiful woman, sunset, painting, book, song. Because we have some sympathetic harmonics, emotionally we can be effected. This is ALL conjecture on my part. One sunset might remind us of another when we were with a girl or friends or family and this effects us to, though we might not remember this association specifically or conciously. I think the mind works in associations, which is why sometimes when we hear a tune we might associate it with a memory we had some other time when we first heard it, or were effected by it in some profound way. Also why some tunes are great in another sense might be that that tune reminds us slightly of something else; another song maybe, though perhaps we, en masse, we can't put our fingers on what it was exactly. Sometimes too much originality can be upsetting.

 

But all of this is personal, so one persons sunset is not another persons sunset.

 

Just some ideas . . .

[Tedster]

Whoops...just kinda stumbled in here, so if I say something stupid and you all go "Yeah, so and so just said that"...forgive me.

 

But, Henry, the fact that many people agree on beautiful sunsets is interesting, no? Just like, what is it in us that makes, oh, say (and tastes vary) but, one "professional singer's" voice sound pleasant, while the sound of Uncle Elbert's howling in the shower that reverberates arount the house "unpleasant". Or one chord pleasing and another dissonant?

[max]

a couple of statements i take to task, henry:

 

'Like in the old Brill Building days. You had to be able to hammer out a song on the piano and have it translate something. These guys, try as they might, weren't performers.'

 

carole king, neil diamond? i doubt you can find better performers (and in my opinion, they do better versions of their songs than any monkey out there)

 

'Can "Smells Like Teen Spirit" cross generations and cross the performance? I mean can a host of other artists cover the song in a variety of ways and still maintain the essence of the song?'

 

there is a very decent version of that song by tori amos, very different, but still effective (affecting)

 

on the topic, imo, in order to be a classic, all the elements have to be there: lyrics, melody, hooks, dynamics (imnsho,what stops most george gershwin songs from being classics is his brother's ira's inane lyrics, acw beautiful porgy and bess (put irving berlin in the same basket))

 

cheers

max

newcastle, oz

[henryrobinett]

Originally posted by max:

a couple of statements i take to task, henry:

 

OK, consider me taken to task.

But I will respond to a couple of things.

 

carole king, neil diamond? i doubt you can find better performers (and in my opinion, they do better versions of their songs than any monkey out there)

Well of course. ANY generalization will be found to have exceptions. Carole King was not a performer until much later in her career. She'd been writing songs for a couple of decades before "Tapestry". Diamond - I don't know. I know nothing about him. But you must admit these are exceptions rather than the rule.

 

on the topic, imo, in order to be a classic, all the elements have to be there: lyrics, melody, hooks, dynamics (imnsho,what stops most george gershwin songs from being classics is his brother's ira's inane lyrics, acw beautiful porgy and bess (put irving berlin in the same basket))

I don't know how you can say or justify Gershwin's music as not being classic. It's been very much alive for 70 years with all of the above elements there, in multiple abundance. I think he defines Classic for me.

[Kendrix]

Originally posted by Guest Room Warrior:

Well, then, maybe the discussion is partly about the difference between a great song (which can stand on it's own) and a great "record" or performance (which perhaps can't).

Whew!)

 

Kendrix's citing of dynamics comes into the performance category... "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" is a great tune even if a proto-punk band pins the needles and holds them there for 2:45.

GRW, Yeah i agree that dynamics have to be enabled by performance. Pulling off the right dynamics clearly depends on a number of purely performance-related factors.

 

However, i also beleive that dynamics are written into songs via transitions and the arrangement.

These become the dynamics that the performers or mixer need to carefully execute.

 

I guess I was referring to the latter - dynamics "written into" the song.

I know I think about it when composing stuff.

[whitefang]

Whew! Haven't heard this much expertise bandied about since they banned smoking in doughnut shops!

Ask a simple question, and get plenty of not so simple answers! And then questions about sunsets, no less!!

 

I guess it boils down to the fact that NO ONE knows what makes a song great. At least, BEFORE it becomes great. Then all the analysis begins. But even after careful scrutiny, what's been determined cannot guarantee a successful template.

All the "great" songwriters, ALL of them, never batted a thousand. I doubt ANY of them were 100% sure what the results would be after completion of

any particular song. Tina Turner didn't even LIKE

"What's Love Got To Do With It", and even the composer had his doubts, but she recorded it anyway. Became her biggest hit! Yet, if one has lived long enough, one will have seen efforts to repeat with similar formulae fail miserably! So, what makes a "great" song?

 

Seems not even the "great" songwriters know for sure!

 

Whitefang

[doc taz]

It's because I like it. my version of the Six Degrees theme on the album

[Eric VB]

Hrm ... I was looking for something else and came across this thread. It just so happens that I also recently did a little researching through Wikipedia and discovered the viol.

This thread kind of operates (operated) on the assumption that prior to recorded music, there was nothing but classical music (i.e., Bach, Beethoven, Brahms). But there was.

There was, in fact, popular song, just like today. I think everyone has a mental picture of the traveling minstrel, lute in hand. ("Stroh's beer is proud to present renown artist John Smythe and his magic lute, straight from the court of Henry VIII ...") But have you heard of the viol family of instruments?

Viols were fretted (tied on instead of inlaid) string instruments played by common people. What did they play? I don't know for sure, but Wikipedia hints that they used TAB for notation. Starting to sound like deja vu yet? How many "great songs" did those people write? I'm sure they had their own version of "Teen Spirit" relevant to the time they lived in.

The violin family eventually supplanted the viols sometime around 1680, I think. How funny is it, then, that mandolins were introduced later as a fretted version of the violin family so common folk could play in "mandolin orchestras"? (Mandolins are picked; viols were bowed.) How many times has mankind reinvented the wheel?

Given this perspective, I'd say the truly great popular songs are those written by the great artists "Traditional" and "Unknown". Passed down from generation to generation, probably without any notation for many years, who can say for certain how long they've been around? YMMV

[yidneth]

i think that PASSION

 

passion composing, passion performing, passion releasing your spirit and let it flow...

i wish it was just that LOL

[MusicYouCantGiveAway]

I've always felt that listeners begin by hearing the basic rhythm. If that grabs them, they start listening to the melody. If the melody is interesting they might hear the whole song out if it doesn't get boring, so some changes in texture are required. Then they might listen to the lyrics after all that. Especially in this immediate gratification society, I think you need everything: rhythm, hooks, melody, lyrics, surprises, great performance; for a song to stand the test of time...

Bob

[Cliffk]

Well, then, maybe the discussion is partly about the difference between a great song (which can stand on it's own) and a great "record" or performance (which perhaps can't).

 

Hi guys, I'm new on this particular forum, and have been reading this thread with fascination. Could I offer my 2 cents? I think I veer towards the view that a great song should be able to exist independently of either the original or seminal recorded performance (as often these differ. Think 'Blue Suede Shoes', 'Walking in Memphis' etc.)

I think it was Rod Temperton - writer of Thriller's biggest hits - who said that he doesn't consider himself a great songwriter but rather a guy who writes great records. Similarly, the Grammies (for what they're worth these days) always have separate categories for best song vs best record.

 

I've heard 'Bridge over Troubled Water' sung by many different artists, in many different ways - and melodically, harmonically, lyrically, and emotionally, that song never fails to move me. On the other hand, Britney Spears' "Baby hit me one more time' is a modern pop classic record but it does nothing for me, even though I've had the dubious experience of having heard it performed by quite a few different artists.

[I I mjrn]

Excuse if this kernel has been posited before& I missed but I'd say that the key is apparent rightness.

If a song sounds "right" to the listener, if it seems inevitable, it's great...or seems great to the hearer.