If you write songs about the same theme over and over again. I just can’t stand it.

I was at a small concert today at a startup party. It was a young new artist playing. She played three songs with the same theme. Already half of the first song I was bored. Sure, it was an important subject but the feeling I got was more, deal with it it’s an industrial world problem.

I guess we will be bombarded with songs about the environment in the next years. Yes, a really important issue. So important that it should not be handled by the lonely guy with a guitar that seems to appear at every party. I just see how these guys to get more girls will sing slow ballads how the forest is dying. To be honest, instead of singing go out and do something about it.

Even love songs can be very frustrating. I really don’t care if you have been dumped by your boyfriend. The reason is that your last three songs were about three different guys that dumped you. The theme has been done to many times. You need to change theme.

Yes, I know that Talyor Swift wrote more than half of her songs around her dates going bad. Still, also the reason why her songs probably won’t be that classic. This is also why all rappers only do three albums, after that they run out of rhymes around guns and hoes.  The rapper that survives add themes.



If you have the same theme please also write it in a smart way. With that, you can get around it. Like Have you ever seen the rain? No, it’s not about the weather.


So, write songs with the same theme in a smart way. Even better attack the issue in another way or angel. Mainly because most songs are about love, victory, redemption. And yes, we can get another song like that, but you need to write it smart. Like 99% of the songs are not smart in that way.

I guess that is also the thing that gets a great lyricist from a bad one. Sure one-hit-wonder is okay, but surviving in the long run you need to be able to change the subject or the angle.

Another problem is also if you start mixing in things that are not timeless. All the kids today wonder why Offspring mentions Rikki Lake in Pretty Fly For a White Guy. Or why he bought Vanilla Ice? Don’t he like ice cream? To make it timeless it has to fit all time.


The best is also if it can be interpreted in different ways. Like what is Hotel California really about? A guy taking in on a motel? About a guy getting caught in drugs? Or what the writer said in an interview, about the music industry? The more dimensions you can get in probably the better the song will be.

And for f*ck sake don’t repeat too many times. No, it’s not fun to hear about diamonds.