JPF Home Page Forums Week 54 MP3/Lyric Pick "Country Girl Approved"

Kimberly,

I just went to songramp and sent a site mail to the poster to let them know to come back! I know they are super busy writing, writing, writing, but I am sure they will be appreciative of all the critiquing going on.

Kevin

Howdy All, I've heard & enjoyed many great tunes from the folks involved in this one. But from the first time I read this lyric a while back, I've been unable to get past all the words. There is
just so many of them! I always just read first, then I'll listen.
On my reads of this, I thought "NO WAY" they can cram all these in. But they did, & when I listened i was impressed that it
could even be done. But unfortunately it sounded like, they
crammed them in. Many good lines, but I think most could be said
much more concisely, and the same things are covered again &
again from different takes and angles.
I'm no musician, so I'll avoid that whole end of things.

I'll finish by saying I think there are fresher subjects, out there, & catchier hooks to work with

.............JMHO........................Gus

Country Girl Approved
http://www.songramp.com/mod/mps/srplayer.php?type=hipub&trackid=78056


Verse:
I drive a ‘63 Chevy my Grandpa gave me it gets me where I wanna go
The tail gate's a missin’ it’s a little hard shiftin’ there’s no knobs on the radio
It’s gotta a four-on-the-floor and some rust on the doors and the seats are worn down to the springs
The rods are knockin’ it has trouble stoppin’ but it’s earned every dent and ding
This old trucks got the right attitude it’s been red neck tested country girl approved

Chorus:
I know it ain’t perfect it’s a one of a kind
A little rough around the edges but still in its prime
It’s passed all my test's and never failed
It’s an Eight-Point “O” on the Red Neck Scale
Yeah, it’s American made tried and true
It’s been red neck tested country girl approved

Verse:
There’s a place I go where the beer's ice cold and the music’s always hot
The pool tables leanin’ the glasses need cleanin’ but it’s the best this small town’s got
When you walk through door your feet stick to the floor from all the drinks that spilled this week
But no one cares ‘cause this is a where red white and blue collar meet
This Honky Tonk’s got the right attitude it’s been red neck tested country girl approved

Chorus:
I know it ain’t perfect but it’s a one of a kind
A little rough around the edges but still in its prime
It’s passed all my test's and never failed
It’s a Nine Point “O” on the Red Neck Scale
It’s American made tried and true
It’s been red neck tested country girl approved

Verse:
He’s six foot two from hat to boot and has a back road pedigree
When the radio’s on he knows every song but sings ‘em a little off key
He don’t mind a little dirt he ain’t afraid of hard work he don’t back down from a fight
He’s a shade tree mechanic and a closet romantic that knows how to treat me right
That country boy’s got the right attitude he's been red neck tested country girl approved

Chorus:
I know he ain’t perfect he’s a one of a kind
A little rough around the edges but still in his prime
He’s passed all my tests and he’s never failed
He's a Ten-Point “O” on the red neck scale
He’s American made tried and true
He’s been red neck tested country girl approved
He's been red neck tested country girl approved
Country girl approved

Collins, Starr, Reuter © 2010 BMI

Sometimes I like to choose a song that's very strong in order to point out what works, rather than pointing out what doesn't work, which may be instructive in a way, but only tells you what not to do, not what TO do. This song does most everything right. I have some suggestions, of course, because I'm a songwriter and another songwriter will usually have suggestions. I feel pretty strongly about mine, this time, though. But let me say before I get there that this song, in my opinion, has tremendous craft, excellent prosody of words fitting music, smooth intricate rhyming internal and otherwise, good rhythm of the melody and nice familiar yet not overly cliched chord changes and, of course, fabulous guitar and vocal.

Now for the points where I think it could be stronger, and where I think the posters could be stronger:

Those of you who have read me before know that random apostrophes give me hives. In the lyric, "test's" should be
tests" in first two choruses and last line of first verse should be "truck's" not "trucks." Apostrophes are rampant these days appearing where they shouldn't be when it's a simple plural and not appearing where they're actually contractions.

Those who think there are too many words should listen to current pop music, even current country. Maybe from the influence of rap, there are many words, set to intricate rhythms. There can't be a bunch of words crammed into a regular ballad, but in a song with rhythm like this, it's traditional to have a lot of words, provided the prosody is flawless, which this is except for one place: When she sings "no knobs" in the first verse, the "no" gets lost because it requires more note value. I suggest cutting "There's" in the phrase "There's no knobs" and it would work perfectly.

I agree with those who think there should be a bridge, but I do not think it should be the third verse. The third verse should come after a short bridge. How about a short two line bridge that stretches the lines out and gives a lot of value to each word...something about maybe there's a reason you're so accepting and easy to please, 'cause there's somethign that keeps you in a good mood. Maybe not that but something that leads us into the verse about the guy...or something on the order of "People say when you're in love, everything looks beautiful so maybe that's the reason...well...He’s six foot two from hat to boot and has a back road pedigree..." These are suggestions and not words. I'm trying to suggest a short bridge with longer note values to each syllable that leads into the guy verse...something that might be a bit more philosophical about how she feels and why.

I'm not sure about 3 minutes and 30 seconds being a rule; if it is, I've never heard it as an iron clad one. Look at all the songs that are longer and shorter. So regarding tempo, I don't think it's not too fast because people are accustomed to quick cuts in music videos, etc., so much so that films are frequently fast cut now, to their detriment in my opinion. But the public is accustomed to hearing an up tempo lyric come fast and in rhythm. If it didn't fit the music so well and have speed bumps like internal rhyming which helps the ear slow down for a second and the mind digest, it might seem wordy. Many songs are wordy at a much slower tempo becuase the way the words fit the music is simply not hand in glove as this one is.

I agree with Randy Gendron, Jean Bullock and others that the last line of each verse should be omitted. You don't want to give away your hook before you get there in a song like that. It's like saying your punch line before the end of a joke. If this were a verse, verse, bridge, verse song, I'd leave the hook there. But you have it in the chorus so I would definitely remove it at the end of each verse. You might also remove the riff after "tried and true" in the chorus, but it's not a deal breaker. I just don't think you need it and when it happened, the chords sort of disappointed me because I'd heard them quite a bit and it stopped everything. I think without the hook in the verse, you will find you don't need it.

"Red white and blue collar"? What's a red collar? I know it's a reference to the Flag and all that, but it has to work both ways and to my knowledge there's no such thing as a red collar unless that's another way of saying "rednecks." If so, I think that's a bit of a reach. While we're on the subject of rednecks, I looked it up to make sure that I understood it and here's what I found: "An uneducated, unsophisticated, or poor white person, typically used to describe residents (of either gender) of the rural US; The nickname given to miners who wore red bandanas for identification during the West Virginia mine war of 1921 (Wiktionary slang def.). Maybe the poster who thought these folks were Ku Klux Klanners (notice spelling--it's not "Klu" but "Ku") has heard Randy Newman's satirical song, "Rednecks" but that's not the definition thought of when a redneck speaks of himself or when rednecks are referred to in a country song. Some folks simply have trouble with the word "redneck" and even with country music. Thanks for your honesty whoever posted that. I don't see that as a problem. It's in the vocabulary. Yes it's been used but so have the I, IV and V chords. It's the kind of familiarity that makes people feel secure--not a worn out cliche. However if you feel you want to use "redneck" fewer times, even after you've cut the last two lines of the verses, you could replace the first one in the chorus with something else like "small town" or "hell yeah!" as Randy suggested, which I like.

Whoever wrote the line about your feet sticking to the floor is a real writer, who observes those little things about life that make songs, poetry, novels, literature of all kind impactful. Those details make us realize we're part of a large group called human nature, and we feel less alone and isolated.

This is a fun, up-tempo country song with a lot of real life in it, for people who live in small towns. To expect this to be Chekov is unrealistic. You can't judge the perfect apple to be wrong just because you're looking for an orange. Sure, in other writers' hands, this song would be different, maybe even better to the tastes of some--and please don't judge it by whether it gets cut. Ask yourselves this: Have you heard songs inferior to this one on the radio? Have you heard songs with a melody less memorable written by the artist? Have you heard songs that didn't have this level of craft winning awards or making a lot of money? You simply can't use that as a standard. You just have to make a song the best that song can be and except for what I've noted, in my opinion, this one has achieved that.

Regarding the familiarity of the melody and chords, many people will think it sounds familiar. I think it was Irving Berlin who said the songwriter has to walk the thin line between familiarity and plagiarism. But to people outside of this genre--like people who never listen to country music--it will definitely sound like something else. That's like an alien who comes to earth and thinks two men look exactly alike because they both have two arms and two legs. There are certain conventions of country writing that over half the songs in that genre have or do and that actually makes the listener feel secure. It's not reason for a lawsuit. Of course, I'm not familiar with every country melody. You could hum it into your Iphone and see what comes up, if you have that ap.

There were a lot of interesting and well-written songs posted, all of which I enjoyed. Thanks for posting them. I chose this one because it's not easy to write a wonderful up-tempo song and many artists are looking for up-tempo songs to complete their CDs. It's much easier to get up-tempo songs cut. I would be surprised if this didn't get recorded but this industry never stops surprising me. I would definitely make the changes and start pitching it to film and TV, other artists, websites where you can post your songs, wherever people go to hear music. I'd also make an instrumental track of it and pitch that. As wonderful as the lyric is, there's a lot of demand for instrumentals and this would be a good one. The guitar playing is really great.