What goes into the making of a hit song? This is a curious question. If there was one true answer, everyone would be doing it, and nothing would actually end up being a hit. Right? Conspiracy theorists like to believe that the major labels have some sort of computer algorithm that can predict if a song is a hit or not. As the British say: Bullocks. They don’t know any better than any one else, the different is, they’re in a position of power to sell something.
While recording Till We Meet Again, George, Jesse, and I get into a quick discussion about things that can help make a song a hit song. In this case, we’re talking about a little trick that Jesse and I did with a particular transition of a song from one part to another. We changed something about the song structure in such a way that it makes people take notice. Watch the video about making a hit song and find out what we did.
Making A Hit Song
Did you catch what we were talking about? Think you can go write a hit song now?
There’s one band in the world that taught us all to rock n roll all night and party every day. That would be the legendary band known as KISS. As it turns out I have in my possession a piece of artwork that was commissioned for their original drummer Peter Chris. As it’s told, their management wanted to give each member a very special gift. That gift was a custom piece of airbrushed art that was their face without the makeup and a miniature of their character in front of it. One of them was unhappy with the result and returned it. That was the drummer Peter Chris. I have no idea if Gene, Paul and Ace still have theirs, but…
How did I come to obtain or own the one of Peter Chris? Simple, my father was the one who was commissioned to do the artwork. When it was rejected it passed back to my father. In turn when I grew up a bit it was then given to me. So now I have it. It’s quite a conversation piece that’s for sure. Mostly because people always want to know how I came to have it. Plus it’s a tie to wanting to rock n roll with a legend.
A couple of weeks ago I was tooling around in my car running an errand when over the iTunes Radio comes this tune called Life of the Party. I immediately thought to myself, dang this guy nailed it. Not from a lyric standpoint but from a musical standpoint. Then comes a little more research to find out that it was co-written. I still haven’t gone far enough to figure out who actually recorded, produced and mixed it. But said producer did a masterful job at making this guy Shawn Mendes whom I think is about 15 years old, sound like a long time pro. That’s not an easy task.
The real trick is the production on the track. It’s laden with tons of sounds that flow one to another and work extremely well. Shawn’s vocal over the top of it sounds like a great set of takes edited together with the right amount of emotion. The verses are little bit on the lax side, but the chorus kicks it so hard that the verses don’t matter.
Hopefully this kid will get more practice in on his writing and really make an awesome career in music.
Life of the Party
I love it when you just don’t care I love it when you dance like there’s nobody there So when it gets hard, don’t be afraid We don’t care what them people say I love it when you don’t take no I love it when you do what you want cause you just said so Let them all go home, we out late We don’t care what them people say
We don’t have to be ordinary Make your best mistakes ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party I’m telling you to take your shot it might be scary Hearts are gonna break ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party
Together we can just let go Pretend like there’s no one else here that we know Slow dance fall in love as the club track plays We don’t care what them people say
We don’t have to be ordinary Make your best mistakes ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party I’m telling you to take your shot it might be scary Hearts are gonna break ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party
Come out tonight, come out tonight There’s no one standing in your way Come out tonight, come out tonight We don’t care what them people say We don’t care what them people say
We don’t have to be ordinary Make your best mistakes ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party I’m telling you to take your shot it might be scary Hearts are gonna break ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party
Yeah, yeah, yeah Life of the party So don’t let them keep you down Oh you know you can’t give up ‘Cause we don’t have the time to be sorry So baby be the life of the party
