Canadian Musician‘s Mike Raine is in Toronto as CMW takes over the city and will be checking in daily with reports on the conference programming, the bands showcasing around the city, and more. See below for thoughts from Mike’s final day at the festival.

On the fourth and final day of the conference portion of Canadian Music Week the focus shifted back to the artists and, in particular, songwriters.

I started the day by catching some of the “Hello Halo: Getting Your Music in Games” panel, which had a bit of a misleading title since much of the discussion was about how videogame companies use songs and the related royalty deals and less about how unknown bands can get their songs in games; however, the panelists, including Activision Publishing/Blizzard’s VP of Music Affairs Tim Riley, agreed that you don’t have to be Jay-Z or Coldplay to get your song in a game. They’re solely interested in songs that match the mood of the game, regardless of

whose song it is. Because each company can operate differently, panelists warned, do your homework first. Go online or make some calls and find out who’s in charge of sourcing songs for the company’s products and contact that person directly. When you do, said Alex Hackford of Sony Computer Entertainment, know that most of them prefer hearing potential songs through streaming services because audio file attachments fill up an inbox and CDs become clutter. The less you annoy them, the more receptive they are to what you’re offering.

Next up was the “Elements of a Hit Song” presentation by Ralph Murphy and Jay Frank, who are both industry veterans and authors of books on how to write hit songs. I know many songwriters scoff at the idea of deliberately writing hit songs because music is supposed to come from the heart and soul, and in a way, I agree. Nonetheless, this was the most fascinating session of the day and, let’s be honest, it’d be cool to have a hit song. So if you’re in the market for a hit song, or just want some insight into the psychology of the modern listener, here are five tips:

1. You have seven seconds to impress your audience. In the age of the internet, where a different song is a click away, research shows that listeners, on average, will give a new song seven seconds to hook them before they move on. In fact, 25 per cent of all songs sold in the U.S. last year had an intro of exactly zero seconds.

2. Get to the vocals. Interestingly, whether it’s speech or song, vocals are something people inherently don’t want to interrupt, so they’re less likely to changes stations or click away in the middle of a lyric, as Frank explained. As such, if the vocals kick in within the first seven seconds of a song, a listener’s more likely to listen to the whole tune, or at least more of it. That’s why first verses are often longer than the others. Who says manners are dead?

3. Beware the “two minute fatigue wall.” If a song follows the same pattern and sound for two minutes, subconsciously listeners feel nothing’s going to change and they’ve essentially heard the whole thing, so throw in a something different around the two minute mark to regain the listener’s attention.

4. Be a winner. Whether the song is about a breakup or a street fight, very few hit songs portray the singer as the loser. As Murphy said, many songwriters have a tendency to whine, preach, or vent, but the listener doesn’t care.

5. The chorus should kick in around the 45 second mark. Interestingly, this isn’t a psychological tip but a practical one. The reason is that the 45 second mark is the default sample start time for any song sold on iTunes. Do you want people to only hear the chorus or part of a verse?

Moving on, I also attended the “Ask the Artist” panel, which was supposed to be a chance for unknown artists in the audience to ask questions of other young musicians that have graduated beyond the local bar scene. I expected this to be the most informative session of the day but no one asked questions and it transformed into a regular discussion panel. If you have the privilege of attending such a panel in the future, I’d suggest asking questions, because it felt like this was a bit of a wasted opportunity for many artists in attendance. The one point the panelists did drive home was to take advantage of the various government grants available to unsigned Canadian artists. Few countries offer artists so many opportunities to get some money to further their career.

On a more positive note, freshly-minted Canadian citizen Paul Rodgers, former singer of the classic ‘60s and ‘70s groups Free and Bad Company, gave a very entertaining interview and performance. In between amusing stories about how his advice made Robert Plant a lot of money and how he almost became the singer for The Doors, Rodgers did advise singers that one of the keys to preserving your voice as you age is knowing how to properly warm up. He must be onto something because his voice is as strong as ever. The same certainly can’t be said for a lot of aging rock singers I’ve seen live.

As well, Jeff Price, CEO and Founder of TuneCore, a company that works with artists to ensure they’re getting all the royalties they’re owed, gave a very animated and well received presentation on the terribly complicated, unfair, and inefficient world of songwriter royalties in the age of the internet. The good news? There’s loads of money out there for anyone with an original song that’s available to the public. The bad news is that getting all the money you’re owed is nearly impossible.It’s also impossible for me to get into it all here –Price barely scratched the surface of it in an hour-long presentation, but songwriters might want to check out more from TuneCore here.

Lastly, here’s an interesting anecdote from the songwriter’s circle that has completely changed the way I hear a classic ‘90s tune. According to the song’s writer, Dan Wilson, the Semisonic tune “Closing Time,” the cap to just about any night out at the bar, isn’t actually about closing time at a bar; or at least not entirely. As Wilson explained, he went through a period where he was obsessed with making every song about two different subjects simultaneously. As such, “Closing Time” is partly about closing time at a bar, but it’s more about the impending birth of his child. But no one got the second part. Now go and listen to the song’s lyrics again, keeping in mind the part about the baby, and it seems so obvious that it’s hard to understand how anyone missed it in the first place. Funny how these things work.

Anyway, that’s all for this year folks. It’s been truly fun and interesting few days with far more useful information than I can pass along here. I would definitely recommend to anyone in the music industry that they attend in the future. Until next year, take care.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 26th, 2012 at 11:45 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.