Listen to tracks like “‘Cello Song” and “Hazy Jane I” to hear how he handles it.) The guitar picking is intricate and steady while the melody floats over the top, creating a dreamy feel that still manages to convey a sense of energy. You don’t have to go overboard in a song like this just sprinkle images and the physical expression of an emotion here and there in your song. (You can read more about expressing emotion in your lyrics in “FTV” Shortcuts #52 & #53.) Then, in the third verse, he expresses the emotion physically (“I cried aloud, I shook my hands.”) Both of these techniques work well to get listeners to feel what the singer is feeling. In the second verse, Murdoch uses imagery (“Watch the sky breaking on the promise we made / All of this rain…”) to give the listener a mental picture of the emotions he’s feeling. You always want your lyric and music to work together, reinforcing a single effect for the listener.
A very flowery or literary lyric might sound out of place, at odds with the music. This plain, everyday speech style fits well with the melody, the folk guitar picking, and straight-ahead vocal. It almost sounds like the singer thinking out loud. The lyrics are conversational and emotionally honest.
#ALEXI MURDOCH ALL MY DAYS TV#
Fade outs are okay for radio but a button ending is much more effective at the end of a TV scene (“FTV” Shortcut #77). Let the instruments ring out naturally on a final note, chord, or percussion hit. You can hear tags at the end of “Poison & Wine” by The Civil Wars, “Keep Breathing” by Ingrid Michaelson, and “Never Say Never” by The Fray, all songs that have been very successful in film & TV.īONUS FILM & TV SONG TIP: For film and TV, be sure to wrap up your song with a well-defined ending (a “button ending”).
Music editors like to use a tag at the end of a scene because it’s often the most emotional part of the song. The tag is often the refrain line, but not always. Many a road, you know I’ve been walking onĪnother repeated line at the end of each verse (“As the days keep turning into night”) also anchors the listener in the song and could be considered a secondary hook.Ī “tag” simply refers to a line at the very end of the song that’s repeated several times, sometimes with variations (as you can hear in this song). Well, I have been searching all of my days, Instead, it relies on a memorable, repeated refrain line – “All of my days” – after the first and third lines of each verse to provide the hook. The song doesn’t have a fully-developed chorus. This is a traditional folk song structure. The structure is: VERSE / VERSE / VERSE / VERSE / TAG out. Drake is another artist whose work was introduced to a broad audience through TV commercials and films. The simplicity of the recording and intimate vocal style both owe much to the work of Nick Drake, an artist Murdoch has cited as an influence. The genre is Indie Singer-Songwriter, a style the film and TV market absolutely loves! There are many similarities to English folk revival and folk/rock artists such as Nick Drake, Sandy Denny, and John Martyn. Shortcut # refers to my book “Shortcuts to Songwriting for Film & TV.”
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