Choruses

Sometimes I forget that I wanted this blog to include bits about songwriting... In this latest round of band-work, I've had two songs that I've really worked on. The first is called "Raleigh", and it's pretty straightforward garage-rock song with a cool half-tempo pseudo-chorus. I call it a pseudo-chorus because there are no words to it, there are only lyrics in the verses. It's a concept I've been consciously playing around with for a little while now, and I like the idea, especially in a song where the verse lyrics repeat or reference similar themes. I first tried it for Life During Wartime off of B-Sides and Rarities, where the section that would have been the chorus was instead replaced by a noise guitar line. The verse lyrics rely nicely on each other without having to fall back on a chorus for a main theme:

We spoke our poetry with mouths full of sand
'cause we were both a little seasick from the boys in the band
and if all the great poets are geniuses and fools
then I'm a bastard out there, trying to play it real cool
because if poets are talkers and if talk is still cheap
we should be rolling in money or at least just back on our feet
instead we're brake pedals groping for the floor.

(pseudo-chorus)

You said "baby, that's exactly what I need"
and I said "we'll keep bumping heads if we both stay down on our knees"
because, if givers are takers and if taking's still cheap
then we'll run out of excuses just like we run out of ink
because if all the great lovers are innocent and cruel
then we're the greatest of stories acting like the biggest of fools
we should be brake pedals groping for the floor

There, I felt that a chorus would take away from what is a song with two manic verses in conversation with one another, a structure that would be better augmented with manic guitar squeelees. If a chorus is supposed to be the part of the song that serves as the topic sentence (i.e. the "in case you forgot here's what we're talking about") then this struck me as a sound way to go about it -- leaving it out.

Back to Raleigh. Raleigh is a fast-paced garage-rock song about a very sad thing. The choruses were thus left empty to let it breathe.

If these memories of Raleigh won't let me sleep
Come take back his city
come and take it from me line by line
by line by line by
line up your suitors in chevrolets
and lie on me for days
if I'm missing from Raleigh how can you sleep

(pseudo-chorus)

Knee-deep in the city can't get no sleep
erase your face from the street signs
time and time and time again
line up my suitors on subway trains
to try to take away this pain
500 miles from Raleigh feels like 3 feet

(pseudo-chorus)

And if these memories of Raleigh won't let me sleep
then come take back his city
come and take it from me line by line
by line by line by
line up your suitors in chevrolets
and lie to me for days
You said there's no one in Raleigh how can you sleep?

There, the pseudo-choruses work to keep the energy of the song and the topic of the song together. I'm very agitated in the verses, but the non-choruses are more reflective. Alternate meaning: there's nothing but this (the verse) to say.

The problem that I'm having is that this has kept me out of practice for writing good choruses. Both musically and lyrically. Not really a problem, but an unexpected turn in my songwriting, and its starting to play havoc with the second song I'm working on, whose verses are very sparse and need a (as yet unwritten) chorus for context. I think my next task is to learn to wield the chorus usefully again.