What's Changed?

[michael11]

Hmm. Wikipedia has a page on the song. It was written by two songwriters. Apparently it wasn't screened or proofread, because they wrote it one day, demoed the next, and RF put it on hold the next day. The songwriters just wrote the song and didn't do the video. So I guess effectively the video is separate from the song. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_Comes_Goodbye
There is a disconnect there, so that's probably why the video doesn't match the song,lol.

Well I guess we're back to square one. Yes, why did she break up? Why did she drive slow with no radio? Why did she ring the doorbell this time and not just come on in? Maybe he wouldn't fix the radio and fill the truck with gas, or the truck was running poorly and losing power and she had just had enough of him not fixing anything, and if he didn't fix nothing before they got married, he sure wasn't gonna after they were married.

Michael, you were right on the money, it's apparently just a poorly worded song. What's odd is that two people wrote it and neither one caught it.

Well Len!

Do you think we've got The Emperors New Clothes Pt 2



The thing is,though I love the song I wouldn't have given it another thought other than the fact it's one of ML's all time favourites so I thought it must be cool and checked out the lyric which is something I never usually do.

and that's when I thought I would come here and ask to see what I had missed.


Thanks for the research on the song BTW.


Michael.

[Len911]

You know Michael, I'm gonna shut up because I do remember a video where there was some talk of the gravel on the driveway crunching or something.

[michael11]

You know Michael, I'm gonna shut up because I do remember a video where there was some talk of the gravel on the driveway crunching or something.

Thing is though Len,we are told we shouldn't have to explain a lyric so it follows a video shouldn't either,maybe it should expand on the story.


I just borrowed this from the wiki page,

"its underdeveloped lyrics"

It is still a fantastic song!


Regardless of any lyrical anomalies.

[Len911]

There you go, under developed lyrics. I guess I just feel a little disappointed, that the girlfriend didn't die, I thought it would have really been clever, and now it seems like a let down.

[Casey H]

A great melody & vocal and killer hook forgive a lot of sins...

Casey

[mojobone]

This is one of my favorites too, but I think some folks are missing the point; in country music, we're supposed to be using small details to reveal larger truths. (hearing the gravel crunching in the driveway puts the listener right in the scene, for instance, and also provides a visual of a country lane in the mind's eye; it ain't paved, but the listener figures that out, becoming involved with the song-THAT's the key)

Here's a quote from the Wiki article with the relevant stuff in bold:

"The song has received mixed reviews from music critics. Jim Malec of The 9513 gave it a "thumbs down" rating. His review criticized it for having an overly dramatic production in contrast to its underdeveloped lyrics, which he thought made the song sound awkward. He referred to lead singer Gary LeVox' vocals as "atypically restrained" and "richer and considerably less whiney [sic] than usual" in the first verse, but said that, as the song progressed, his delivery became "hilarious in its urgency."[2] Blake Boldt of Country Universe gave it a C rating. Boldt also thought that LeVox "gracefully handle[d]" the first verse but "tumbl[ed] into operatic tendencies toward the end." He also considered it a "copycat" of the band's 2006 single "What Hurts the Most".[5]
Matt Bjorke of Roughstock gave a more favorable review. Although he referred to the song's structure as a "well-worn power ballad path", he considered LeVox' performance "nuanced" and overall thought that the song was "better than anything on the trio's previous album, Still Feels Good."[6]

In 2010, the song was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Country Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocals."

At the Nashville mini-rally, we learned that the guys that wrote this researched Rascal Flatts' lead singer's range, wrote their melody to fit, and hired a demo singer who could effectively hit the same notes. Clearly, they had heard Jeff Steele's "What Hurts The Most" and used it as a stylistic target. The point is that this didn't happen by accident, the song was written specifically for Rascal Flatts. (For whatever it's worth, I think the reviewers were right; it was overproduced and over-sung. The demo was just piano and vocal, with a killer delivery, and way more effective)



The stuff you leave out is what makes a lyric universal; it's where the listener jes' sorta fills in with their own ideas of what the song could be about, they'll relate to it in their own way, unique to each individual that hears. So no, you don't need to explain everything in your song, you just need to avoid a lyric that takes the listener out of it by making them go, "Huh?" and scratch their heads. And yeah, it's really just a(nother) breakup song, so they inserted a twist in the video that doesn't really even make any sense, but there's a good reason for that, too; visual storytelling (particularly in a music video) can end up being too literal, just a bunch of stuff that happens in a particular order, so it was likely a conscious attempt to make the whole thing seem a little more dreamlike. I think you'll agree that's far more "artistic".

Check out the video for "Hello World" by Lady Antebellum for an example of a video that amplifies on a song's lyrics rather than obfuscates, but be warned; it'll wreck ya. It did me.

[AndrewCavanagh]

"We are told we must explain things in intricate detail when we write lyrics,especially Country lyrics."

This is not necessarily true.

It is true that most lyrics can be improved enormously by making all the words and language as specific as possible, using more emotive language and using words, phrases, scenes etc that evoke images in your listeners minds.

But you're not writing a newspaper article when you write a song.

Songs work because they make the listener feel real emotions and bring back memories and associations consciously or subconsciously.

A story in a song doesn't necessarily have to be totally clear and unambiguous to work.

In fact in most cases it's impossible to achieve that in a song anyway...there just aren't enough words to work with (if you want a laugh read the different theories about what the lyrics in Hotel California mean then read what the songwriter says he was writing about).

If you listen to a wide range of songs you'll find many that can be interpreted in multiple ways and a pile of fans who are sure they understand exactly what the songwriter meant with each line.

You're going to drive yourself crazy trying to work out exactly what every song means.

[Len911]

Andrew, I agree, with this song, the video didn't match the song. I don't think it was that the lyrics had any contradictions.

[Kolstad]

Well, isn't that the brilliance of this? It IS detailed, read verse one, yet the chorus still opens for multiple scenarios without sacrificing a huge payoff. There's a difference in being detailed and being explanatory. I think the first is the requirement, not the latter.