Windows down, music up--am I right, teens?! Billboard-dominating pop songs are the soundtrack to everyone's summer. Whether you love your local station or avoid it like the plague, you have at least some idea of which songs are hotter than the metal part of your seatbelt. Thankfully, the pop music industry is always searching for Hot Young Talent, and radio hits have some pretty common themes. Here are some tips for producing a catchy jam that will be stuck in everyone's heads until seasonal depression hits!
1. Autotune that sh!t.
Are you a terrible singer? No worries, autotune has your back! Do you have the voice of a thousand sweet angels? You might be too good for the radio, but music technology can help you sound like the bubblegum robot America needs.
2. Handclaps.
There's nothing more carefree than a good handclap sample. Throw them in the chorus! Throw them in the verse! Throw them in the bridge with a simple bass-line and repetitive vocals! The possibilities are endless.
3. The "Hey" sample.
Pretty much every tune on the radio right now has this sample in the background. It just sounds like a small group of dudes going "Hey" over and over again, but it's the backbone to so many hits. Who are these men? Do they have families, fulfilling careers? Are even alive? I have so many questions, but there's no question about putting "Hey" in your next big song!
4. Lyrics that make a great Insta caption.
Lyrics don't matter all that much, but a deep verse about the inescapability of capitalism doesn't look cute under a selfie. Rihanna's "Baby, don't get it twisted" line from Needed Me is an excellent example of a caption-able lyric, because selfie-takers everywhere like to make their audience wonder. Who's her baby? Who's getting what twisted? Mysterious!
5. Three-syllable words.
Writing a Fetty-Wap style verse is super easy. All you need to do is string together three-syllable words, with every other line punctuated by a reasonably loud squawk. It doesn't matter what you're saying, or how well you annunciate, so yelling words like "Laundromat", "Dinosaur" and "Falafel" is perfectly acceptable.
In conclusion, you don't have to be musically inclined to make a hit summer song--you just need to know what audiences like to hear. And everyone likes to hear handclaps.
