The New World of Songwriting – But Not That Different, Really Posted on February 8, 2016 by Gary Ewer Today’s world of pop music can be a very insular one, in the sense that many “discoveries” pop musicians make about what people like aren’t really new after all. I’ve posted an article from the New Yorker recently, called “The Sound Machine,” about how hits are written today. In that article, Jay Brown (president of Roc Nation) said: “You’ve got to have a hook in the intro, a hook in the pre-chorus, a hook in the chorus, and a hook in the bridge.” The reason, he explained, is that “people on average give a song seven seconds on the radio before they change the channel, and you got to hook them.” I’d argue that that hasn’t really changed. Pop music has always been a hook-laden art form. And though we talk a lot about hooks as the main element of a catchy chorus, every section of a song needs something that keeps people list...
