Hello,

Been away for a few days. Out on the road. Kevin, I heard you talking about me. The biggest thing you have to ask yourself when it comes to hooks are, "How can you get someone else to want to be involved with this song?" That can mean anyone outside the circles you travel in. That could be a co-writer, a publisher, a song plugger, an artist, or the general public. And with the industry, you are asking someone to put your song AHEAD of their own. So does the hook matter? Of course. It is all just upping the level of your odds.
An interesting title can go a long way to having recognition factor where someone will "hold on to it" (A Nashville term for playing it for someone higher up the chain of command) a little longer. And as always, the inside cut is going to rule.
Kevin, I am not going to have a "golden ruler" or any such thing. i am not here to defend an industry, as i see we have our usual "everything Nashville does sucks" contengient. I have quit responding to that at all. I simply comment one perspective on some of the comments made here. If that offends some, I am sorry. Not my intention.Just most people who are trying to get into an industry then complain about it or act like that industry rules everything, miss most of the points. Everybody out there right now or ever, was a nobody at some time. They swam upstream "one handed" just like everyone else. Until they found someone to take them along with them.
Every mainstream release and many independent releases, have a lot of money invested in them, and a LOt of people have to believe in them to even be released. So people who put their jobs and money on the line, are involved. So dissmissing them so quickly often doesn't seem to make a lot of sense to me. That doesn't mean you have to emulate them, just means you accept them for what they are and do your own thing.

Been reading back over my "Beatles" book by Bob Spitz. I read that and a lot of biographys for historical perspective in the business. Many of the comments on pages like this sound like the industry and George Martin's comments on the Beatles. Superficials, songs that didn't interest him in the least. He was impressed by the personalities and worked with the rest.

On your lists of titles, a lot of time that doesn't say it all. sometimes the melodies, groove, etc. all trump everything which is why a lot of rock can get away with things you can't do in country. And yes, country does use more traditional chords and progressions, which is what the audience demands. So you either work with it or not. It is always your choice. And as always, Nashville is one market, not THE market. There is no THE market.
For Nashville, about 20 years ago, there were a lot of very "cutsey" titles. "If I said you had a beautiful Body would you Hold it Against me?" and "Looking for Love in All the Wrong places." come to mind. Then, as reality entered more and more into the dialogue, those faded as a way of being "too clever by half." In most of the other world, they do titles and songs we wouldn't do here and vice versa. In country in particular,being conversational is the key and most singers won't sing anything that makes them look silly, which is the answer to the question of why there are not more funny songs out there.
Again, 15 years ago, we had musical comedians like Ray Stevens, who were out there quite a bit. That changed as comedy lost it's footing with country radio and playlists, contracted. the same reasons the Beatles did more and more serious stuff and went from "Love me Do" to "Hey Jude." They grew up, and so did the format.

The current trend in country is to write titles about inanimate objects in an attempt to get people to question what that is about, and thereby tweak their interest in the subject. "Big Green Tractor" (Which is nothing like Big Yellow Taxi, but shows you how little things have changed in titles)
"Dixie Fried" and other's are about things in the singers lives usually that happen. Many come from smaller, rural areas, and will sing about that. Some won't. And some will go for the superficial. The music industry is ruled by one hit wonders and always will be.

As soon as anyone has all the answers I guess we won't need discussions like this. We'll all be doing fine. For the time being I would suggest you try and write about what you know, try to get and keep people interested and get things in as many avenues as you can. That is pretty much all you can do.

MAB