3 Ways to Make Your Songs Active

Robert Grashaw
Aug 8, 2017 · 6 min read

This article discusses three ways to make songs active. It begins with a comparison of passive songs and active songs. Then it examines how juxtaposition, repetition, and subtext activate songs. Finally, it asks the reader to consider what a song will do before s/he considers what a song will say.

Passive vs. Active Songs

In pop music, often a singer sings a love song because s/he is in love, or a breakup song because s/he is heartbroken. Rarely do you hear, much less feel, a “meta-reason” that drives the song. Consequently, often pop music is passive. Songs don’t do much work.

Active songs, on the other hand, perform an action. The song is used as a vehicle by which to achieve a specific goal. Active songs engage listeners on three levels: that of song craft, that of subtextual meaning, and that of an action a character performs in a song. These levels of engagement command an active listening from your audience and extend the lifespan of your song.

You can make your pop songs active when you answer this question:

What does the singer want to do through the song?

Take the love song. The singer is in love and the world is new. Why sing about that? Is the singer so overcome by the discovery of love that s/he is compelled to sing? What other reasons might drive the song?

What if the singer sings about love because s/he wants to convince him- or herself that things will work out this time? Or to confront the fear of being vulnerable? Or to make an ex lover jealous?

Now take the breakup song. Life is over. Love is the worst. Why would anyone sing about that? Misery loves company? Those subtle tweets aren’t eliciting the desired sympathy? What other reasons can we find to drive the song?

What if the singer sings about a breakup in order to process the loss? Or to persuade the ex to get back together? Or to get a third party on his or her side of the argument?

Each meta-reason influences the way the song is written. If the singer wants to confront vulnerability, you use different words and music than if s/he wants to incite jealousy. If s/he wants to persuade an ex, you use different words and music than if s/he wants convince third parties. As the songwriter, your approach changes in accord with the motivation that drives the song. You make different lyrical and musical choices to create a desired textual and subtextual meaning.

The key is to ask yourself how the singer uses the song to achieve a specific goal — to manipulate or to seduce.

Let’s look at three ways to do that:

Juxtaposition

When you juxtapose words and music, you create layers of meaning. And layers create subtext.

When a happy lyric is set to sad music, we know that something’s amiss. Either the singer is in denial, or is trying to convince him- or herself of something that isn’t true, or is unaware intellectually of an emotional undercurrent.

Likewise, layers are created when a sad lyric is set to happy music. Perhaps the singer tries to drag him- or herself into an emotional state with the music. Perhaps the singer pretends to be sad while secretly s/he is thrilled by some bad news. Perhaps the singer pretends to be happy on the outside while s/he struggles internally.

You don’t have to juxtapose in big blocks — happy lyrics, minor music; sad lyrics, major music. You can achieve the effect with finer strokes. Maybe a happy idea or image is set over a diminished chord in a major song. Maybe a sad lyrical phrase is met with an uplifting musical turn. You can dial the technique down to scale.

The meaning of your words is undercut when you juxtapose them with their musical opposite. The same is true vice versa. Not only will this make your song more active; it will make your song more engaging to the listener.

Repetition

Repetition is a great tool by which to strive toward a goal, to create subtext, and to make your song memorable. Most song structures are designed to repeat sections and certain lines in each section. Why not put that feature of the design to work for the benefit of the song?

The idea of active repetition is that, if the singer needs to repeat a line or an idea, the sincerity and veracity of what s/he says is called into question. You’re out with a friend who tells you repeatedly that s/he is over an ex, or that s/he isn’t into someone. The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

Say you write a chorus in which the singer defiantly claims that s/he is never (ever) getting back together with an ex. Say that line repeats three times in the chorus. By the end of three choruses, it will repeat nine times not including the tag at the end of the song. In your own life, if someone told you, “We’re never getting back together,” nine times in three minutes, what would you think?

You might think that s/he is trying way too hard to convince him- or herself that s/he doesn’t want to get back with you. You might think that there’s a part of that person that wants to get back with you. And why not? You write killer songs. But that partial want is subtext. It’s repetition in action.

Repetition makes a song active when it’s used to achieve a certain goal. Whether the singer wants to convince someone of his or her feelings, whether the singer wants to persuade someone toward an idea, repetition is one of the most effective rhetorical devices by which to make an idea stick.

Subtext

Manipulation and seduction are all about what’s left unspoken. It’s the attempt to persuade someone through subtext that’s manipulative. It’s the suggestion of an idea, the thrill of reading between the lines, that’s seductive.

On a musical level, the unspoken is almost a pedestrian notion. Music itself is a language that emotes without words. We sense emotion, meaning, and movement in the evocative colors of melody and harmony. And these unspoken feelings shift from one chord to the next, which impacts the meaning of the overall composition.

On a lyrical level, unspoken words are the difference between statement and subtext. A statement articulates a feeling plainly: I love you. Subtext evokes a feeling with varying shades of subtlety: I can’t take my eyes off of you. How do you say, “I love you,” without saying, “I love you”? That’s the key: How do you say what you want to say without actually saying it?

When you talk around an idea rather than coming right out to say it, you force your audience to lean in and engage with the song. There’s an unspoken conversation being had beneath the conversation that’s being had aloud. Subtext compels your audience to wrestle with your lyrics and how they interplay with your music. It commands multiple listens in order to detect and absorb the hidden meaning of your song.

Again, the aim affects the approach. The action of your song will impact and shape how you say what you say both in the text and in the subtext of your song. To be effective, the sung text needs space to dialogue with the unsung subtext.

Conclusion

Active songs engage listeners on multiple levels, which increases your song’s lifespan. To make songs active, ask yourself how the song will be used to achieve a specific goal. Most active songs either manipulate or seduce. Juxtaposition, repetition, and subtext are useful tools to achieve either goal. Before you decide what you want your song to say, decide what you want your song to do.

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