The assignment: So, I’ve been on a bit of a Neil Finn kick lately, and one trick he uses occasionally that is somewhat common for contemporary pop but fairly rare in “classic” songwriting is the use of more than one bridge. Now, this can be a point of contention from song to song: “was that little bit just an extra theme? A variation on another part? A pre-chorus? A post-chorus hook? A middle-8?” But let’s not split hairs. I want you to write a song that has not just one bridge but also a second part that is also a non-repeated, non-instrumental section of music.
Two examples are Neil’s “She Will Have Her Way” and the Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations.” Oh, and the Kink’s “Lola.”
lyrics
v1:
She's the queen of the chaos, I'm the king of the storm
Put the two together, you best be warned
There's no eye of the tempest, no one's keeping score
You should've seen what came before
ch:
You lost me in the last shadow
All my plans went out the window
Shouldn't be so hard to make up your mind
Lost me in the last shadow
I get the feeling I've been lied to
I get the feeling I've been doing time
But I've been doing fine
v2:
You were the only one that mattered, you got lost in your dreams
It ended up in tatters, no matter how it seemed
No excuses, only reasons, that's part of the plan
What you can't feel, you can't understand
br:
You can't understand the scope of the scene
But you can stop & stare somewhere in between
You can't force the one you love to come clean
ch:
You lost me in the last shadow
All my plans went out the window
Shouldn't be so hard to make up your mind
Lost me in the last shadow
I get the feeling I've been lied to
I get the feeling I've been doing time
What am I doing?
-- solo --
ch:
You lost me in the last shadow
All my plans went out the window
Shouldn't be so hard to make up your mind
Lost me in the last shadow
I get the feeling I've been lied to
I get the feeling I've been doing time
But I've been doing fine
Tom Heyman documents life in San Francisco circa 2023, refusing to succumb to easy characterization & instead capturing the city’s nuance. Bandcamp New & Notable Oct 22, 2023
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