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Tips & Resources by Brent Baxter, Songwriting Pro on September 23, 2019
Every time you use a cliche in your song, you miss the opportunity to do something great.
Cliches get used so much because they’re so easy. They are the first things that come to mind when we want to communicate certain things.
For example, it’s a lot easier to just say we’re “raising hell” or “painting the town” than it is to dig deeper and say we’re “filling Friday night full of empty cans” or “trying to make the Barhopper’s Hall of Fame.”
The cliche' may be useful because it's like a lyrical shorthand- it can give the listener a lot of information in a few words. But it’s forgettable because the listener has heard it a thousand times. There’s no emotion left in it. (Unless you somehow set up the cliche' in a way that makes it fresh.)
However, when you go beyond the cliche', you have a chance to wow the listener with something they haven’t heard before.
A great example of this is “Summertime,” an older song recorded by Kenny Chesney and written by Craig Wiseman and Steve McEwen. It’s about being young in the... you guessed it... summertime, and there’s a part in the chorus where they reference driving around.
Young + summertime + driving = radio up + window down. Right? Yes. We all know that. And that’s why it’s a worn out cliche'. Sure, it’s true- we’ve all lived that line many times. But there’s nothing memorable or “wow” about it.
Instead, these hit writers reference a Yoo-hoo bottle on the floorboard. "Cheap shades and a tattoo and a Yoo-hoo bottle on the floorboard." So much better!
It’s believable. I can totally picture young guys leaving a Yoo-hoo on the floorboard.
It’s fresh. I’ve never “seen” that image in a song before.
Bonus: It provides a fun internal rhyme (with "tattoo") and melodic moment when Chesney sings, “Yoo-hoo!”
They writers took a cliche' moment and made it a hit moment. It’s our job to do the same.
If you want to upgrade YOUR cliche' moments into hit moments songs, I have a great event coming up for you! In October, I'm hosting a 4-night songwriting workshop called “Your M.A.P. To A Hit Song Lyric.” If you're tired of your songs NOT affecting your listeners, if you're tired of your songs not being noticed, if you want your songs to be more memorable, to connect with your listeners more, and to affect your listeners' emotions, this is the workshop for you.
CLICK HERE TO GET ALL THE DETAILS AND JOIN THIS CAREER-CHANGING EVENT!
God bless,
Brent
