Nobody Listens To the Words

It’s an old argument:
Do lyrics matter?

Of course, producers, beat-makers, composers, and illiterate A&R weasels (there are more than a few) are lined up on one side, arguing that music is all about the groove, the feel, or the melody, and that nobody really pays any attention to the lyrics. On the other side, there are the lyricists, quietly muttering “Yea well, tell that to Bob Dylan” under their breath.

Sometimes it’s hard to know the truth. Certainly, there are plenty of tracks that succeed more on the basis of the drum pattern than the rhyme scheme, and instances where the melody is a lot deeper emotionally than anything in the verses of the lyric. But when you’re in a publishing or an A&R position, you usually find yourself paying more attention to the lyric than anything else, when it comes to deciding whether or not a song is special enough to stand out.

Here’s my theory:

Lyrics matter if you make them matter. I think a listener decides within the first few lines of the song, and then reconsiders about three lines into the chorus, whether this is a lyric to which it’s worth paying attention. If you grab the listener with the first few lines of the verse, or if you hit him or her with a brilliant concept in the hook line of the chorus, then the listener will stick with you and try to follow the story in the song. Conversely, if you open with a trite predictable line, and the chorus does nothing to grab attention lyrically, then the listener will conclude that this lyric is not important, and will focus attention on something else– the melody, the rhythm, the production gimmicks, or the prospect of a quick ending to the song.

Without question, the importance of lyrics rests somewhat on the genre– rock and singer/songwriter audiences (and critics) attach a great deal of importance to lyrics, but also tolerate a lot of ambiguity; dance audiences don’t care much, and demand something that is at least somewhat congruous with the activity of dancing and sweating and generally going off your head. Country music is extremely lyric-centered, as is hip-hop, while teen pop tends to be focused on the melody. Sometimes, the worst thing you can do is misread your audience, and try to inject lyrical messages or sophistication where it doesn’t belong, or offer up simplicity and directness, when the crowd is waiting for something clever and profound.

The key point is that lyrics don’t have to insightful, brilliant, poetic or even wildly clever in order to be effective. But THEY DO MATTER, more than most listeners even know. The crucial functions of lyrics are to (a)grab attention (b) provide a catchy or memorable “concept” for the song (c) define the “persona” or “point of view” of the artist singing the lyric (d) establish a comfort zone for the listener, by giving them something that they can relate to, in a language they understand. If a lyric does that, a lyric can make a song a hit– even if it’s not going to win any awards for poetry or perceptive insights. Look at “My Life Would Suck Without You”, “I Kissed A Girl”, “Lips of an Angel”, “I Love College” or “Birthday Sex”. There is nothing musically that sets those songs far apart from the competition. Those songs succeed largely because the lyrics perfectly perform all four functions.

Interestingly, lyrics are also becoming a big business. For the first time, the music industry is actually cracking down on illegal lyric sites on the internet, in an effort to drive fans to the legitimate sites, which do pay royalties for the right to reprint. More importantly, lyrics are being reprinted in books, greeting cards, board games and even clothing. A recent Billboard article featured a new apparel company, Lyric Culture, that sells everything from floor-length dresses emblazoned with lyrics from John Lennon’s “Give Peace A Chance” to tank tops with Madonna’s “Material Girl” in hot pink lettering. The company has licensing deals with all of the major publishers. Writers and publishers are paid a royalty based on the wholesale price for each item. This kind of deal, or a one-time upfront fee for smaller ventures, is relatively typical of most products that use lyrical reprints.

If publishers could all get together and offer one piece of advice to songwriters, I’m quite sure that the most likely instruction would be this:
Don’t “settle” when it comes to lyrics.

Don’t decide to go with a typical or predictable title, a ho-hum concept, an idea that doesn’t add anything to the persona of the artist, or language that doesn’t ring true to the audience for whom you’re writing, just because “it sings well” or “it feels right” or “nobody pays attention to the words, anyway”. Lyrics matter if you make them matter. And if you make them matter enough, people will not only pay attention– they’ll pay money, to have them printed on the internet, or in a coffee-table book, or in a greeting card, or on the back of their jeans.



Eric Beall is the author of "Making Music Make Money (An Insider's Guide To Becoming Your Own Music Publisher)", the upcoming "Hits Only, Please" and a respected music industry veteran. Currently, he handles A & R for Shapiro Bernstein, one of the industry's most venerable and respected independent music publishers. Prior to joining the executive ranks, Eric wrote and produced the pop hits "Nothin' My Love Can't Fix" for Joey Lawrence (Top Ten Billboard Hot 100) and "Carry On" for Martha Wash (#1 Billboard Dance Chart), as well as songs for Diana Ross, The Jacksons, Safire, Samantha Fox, Brenda K. Starr, and many others.