Recent submissions have had us scratching our head here at beyewatch. We've received a tonne of songs which have never made it to the site because of a) the poor choice of song b) the tenuous link to Habib's name or mostly c) the song has been re-done so badly that you wouldn't recognise it if someone sang it to you and d) we can't work out the phrasing making it impossible to sing.
So here's our top tips for Beye'ing a song...
- Choose a great song - Either something current, hugely memorable or something so popular that you can't go wrong. Examples would include The Ting Tings 'That's not my name' submitted by Neil Legget or Bongo's 'Yesterday' masterpiece by The Beatles.
- Try listening to the track when you write rather than rely on your memory - That chorus you remember so well always has a different line to what you thought. My friend thought for years that K.D. Lang was singing 'can't stand gravy'!
- Choose the chorus - Choruses of songs work best. It's the bit people usually remember and generally is the best part of a song.
- Keep the same meter: Try and keep to the same phrasing / number of syllables as the original. This way people will be able to sing the lyrics you've written more easily. e.g. Michael Jackson sings "Beat it, just beat it" which is 5 syllables. "Habib Beye it, just Habib Beye it" has 9 syllables. You can squeeze 'em in but it's tough. Better would be "Beye it, just Beye it!". (That's surely ripe for plucking?! This is how songs come to us; stream of consciousness stuff...)
- Think of the terraces - The best songs on beyewatch are the ones you can imagine people singing. The site is littered with clever versions of songs with verses and choruses. Truth is they'll probably never be sung to Habib. We live in hope that a good percentage could be though. Listen to the songs we have at the moment for other players. They're simple, memorable and most importantly they're repeatable so you can sing them over and over again.
1 comment:
touchy...
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